#SONIC UNDERGROUND \m/(>-<)\m /

[grawlix-ness]

Seasons’ Beatings

Dingo drifted the finger frame toward the table, toward Sleet. Scratching at a canine tooth with his pinky, the wolf was slow to notice. When he did, he flinched and ducked away, then frowned, realizing his overreaction. He played it off with a disdainful snort becoming of an aristocrat, turning up his muzzle and placing his hands in his lap primly.  Once again the words adorable and hilarious came to mind. And pretty. And periwinkle. But mostly pretty. Even in his cruder moments, there was always an elegance to Sleet.

Word Count: 6,789

Characters: Sleet and Dingo, brief nonspeaking appearances from Manic and Sonic

Pairing: Sleet x Dingo

A/N: rated G, no crude humor this time around. Well, this took far longer than I wanted. This was supposed to be a side quest, but I hit a few roadblocks along the way. Pretend it’s still December. Finally I’m freeeee

I don’t know if I’m super happy with this, but I figure I can always go in and edit. I caught strep writing the latter half and was feeling altogether bleh. Happy Slingo Holiday Special and to all a good night

As much as Dingo enjoyed getting straight to walloping, the thrill of the chase had its merit too.

He preferred charging headlong through crowded bazaars and port cities, sending market stalls and their contents flying, making his presence well-known. Stalking on a cool, starless night from the trees in the form of an arboreal apex predator and striking when the target least expected it offered a different buzz. No matter the approach, it was all good fun seeing the terror flood their eyes when they realized they were cornered and the two bounty hunters were only pretending to listen to their babbled appeals and excuses. 

Sometimes, they’d get a fighter, someone who really knew how to make the chase worthwhile, the type who’d whirl on Dingo mid-step and dare a glancing blow. Never much of a challenge, but refreshing nonetheless. Dingo liked to let them think they had him on the backfoot before quashing their hope and a great deal of their bones, if the client allowed. 

The thing with chases though was that they were more enjoyable when you weren’t on hooves. And you weren’t in snow that went up to your weird, jutting reindeer ankles.

 And you weren’t providing transport for Mobius’ worst backseat driver. 

“For the love of—Dingo, I’ve seen you move faster for the ice cream truck! Get up! He’s getting away!” Sleet’s heel connected with Dingo’s downy underbelly twice. “Yah, yah!” His spurring didn’t hurt, but it sure was annoying. 

With a huff, Dingo clambered wobblily out of the steep snowbank he’d sunken into, flung the rapidly piling snow that’d fallen onto his velveted tines off, and broke into an uneasy gallop onto hopefully less engulfing ground. His legs felt a hair’s breadth away from turning into icicles. Maybe he should have suggested a penguin form instead. Sliding down the Northern Tundra’s slopes on your belly sounded much less taxing than charging down them on hooves. 

“Come on!” Sleet persisted, albeit with a touch of chattering teeth. “Eyes on the prize!”

What do you think I’m doin’?  Dingo would have said, but his tongue was decently warm inside his mouth, and he didn’t want to risk a draft. Even in this heavily insulated form, the cold was managing to seep through. The froth that leaked from his fuzzy, cowish muzzle crystalized within seconds of exposure, and his tusks were starting to rime. 

Sleet was holding up well, all things considered. No doubt due to Dingo’s woolen craftsmanship. Winter was sweater weather, and Dingo fancied himself a pro at knitting sweaters. Sleet was wearing one beneath his armor, over his undersuit, both of which already conserved heat passably. His grousing when presented with the sweaters, among other handmade winter apparel, had decreased over the years. He still made an attempt—oh, did he try—but his efforts to avoid wearing them weren’t nearly as long-lasting, and his tough guy excuses were all used up. 

The prize of which the moody jockey referred looked like nothing more than a little green dot in the freezing fog and stretching white expanse. 

Sleet shooting Manic’s hovercraft out of the sky hadn’t slowed the hedgehog. As soon as the bounty hunters disembarked the Red Whiptail, expecting to retrieve the unconscious, if not dazed, royal pain, they found out he was very much still alert. The improvise and use your downed hovercraft as a snowboard type of very much still alert. 

“Move it, Dingo! Yah!” Another jab in the side. Dingo tossed his antlered head and grunted in warning. 

If only there were a low branch around to humble him.

A humorous idea, but an ill-advised one. While Dingo wasn’t against ill-advised ideas, capturing Manic was a win they both needed. Sacrificing their chances for a fleeting laugh, that’d be one of his biggest blunders ever. 

As the little green dot grew nearer, Sleet’s weight leaned forth. Blaster bolts whizzed over Dingo’s antlers. The volley lit the fog up enough for them to see Manic’s quilled shape serpentine with barely any difficulty, dodging every scintillating beam and vanishing into wintery obscurity once more. 

“Agh!” Sleet let out a growl of frustration and hammered a fist onto Dingo’s withers.  “Confounded pincushion!” His shouts were drowned out by a passing gale of icy wind. 

Freedom Fighter activity in Mobius’ polar regions had increased ever since the Empire began installing refueling outposts and garrison bases there. With construction underway on a secret major oil rig operation, and a group of nosy Arctic Freedom Fighters at large, His Pinkness had all his subordinates scattered high and low. 

On any other day, in any other biome, Dingo would have been pleased by the diversion Manic’s appearance brought. It didn’t snow where Dingo was from. The driest of Mobius’ continents, Trailus was warm year around. Before becoming a bounty hunter, he’d only experienced snow inauthentically, by way of depictions in media and decoration for festive storefronts. Those holiday specials he grew up watching never emphasized just how blisteringly cold the stuff could get.

Extended exposure to freezing temperatures also made his body feel a bit . . . starchy. Weaker even, although he didn’t like to think about that. Sleet once hypothesized his unique molecular structure would solidify at an extreme level of frigidity, such as the conditions found at the Ice Cap. Although the Northern Tundra wasn’t extreme, it wasn’t particularly cushy either. 

Why’d those Resistance wimps have to go and make a big fuss now? Couldn’t they have waited until after the holidays? Better yet, why couldn’t Robotnik have waited to build the rig until after the holidays? 

It’s the one thing this whole bleedin’ season is good for! thought Dingo. 

The abundance of seasonal sweets, the banquet halls to raid, the unattended banks, the carolers to throw water at, the parade floats to pop, the decorations to sabotage, the gift heists, the family-friendly icons to crudely imitate and subsequent children to frighten! There was no shortage of mischief and mayhem to be had. Or there would have been, if Robotnik hadn’t essentially criminalized any sort of revelry that wasn’t venerating him. The elite and subordinates like the bounty hunters had certain allowances, of course, but any gift-giving that wasn’t to him was strictly prohibited and, after the Urchino incident, Sleet was hesitant about going behind Robotnik’s back. Meaning no time-honored Sleet and Dingo gift exchanges! 

Anger at both his employer and adversaries compounding, newfound strength and speed surged through Dingo, cold-numbed legs accelerating, his hooves great pistons punching in and out of the compacted snow. A rumble built deep in Dingo’s throat, then exploded out as a forbidding bugle loud enough to rival the howl of the wind. There was such force behind it his head careened back. The cry rushed from his lungs, breath streaming out and billowing like white fire. Sleet, snickering, gave Dingo’s fluffy neck a companionable slap, evidently very pleased by the potent shift in energy.

Mid-bound and mid-reverie about pulling Robotnik limb from limb however, right when the slope began to bottom out, Dingo’s four-chambered reindeer stomach suddenly tightened. At once, he jammed all his hooves deep into the packed snow. His back and hindquarters canted low and hard while he slammed the brakes. Snow kicked up behind him in an impressive shower as he slid, like dust beneath screeching wheels. When his momentum stopped, he thudded heavily onto his haunches with a grunt. 

Dingo was a firm believer in going with his gut, his instincts. Sleet pooh-poohed this, but Sleet was an incorrigible pooh-pooher. If he wasn’t loudly naysaying something, he must have been out of sorts. 

“I have a six cents,” Dingo had once tried to explain. 

“A sixth sense,” Sleet had replied in his grousing I’m too tired for this voice.

“Whassat?”

Presently, his six cents were giving him a bad feeling about what laid up ahead. He took a few investigative sniffs of the air, the last of which being the deepest. The large snowflakes he accidentally inhaled on this turn made him hitch and sputter. Once he recovered, he stared into the wintery haze beyond. Far too murky to identify any obstacles or enemies. Dingo crept forward, keeping his antlers low and at the ready. He noted Sleet’s quiet. Perhaps he felt it too. 

Soon, he discovered just what it was: a gaping crevasse in the ice. Edging closer to its cliff, Dingo peered down and made an awed, distinctly Trailian noise as he admired the vivid blue of the chasm’s jagged walls. When he had his fill, he lifted his chin and said in a tone not the least bit hiding the smugness that swelled within him after all the kicking and yah-ing and unwanted, unconstructive critique, “Heh, good thing my mutant super senses felt that, eh, Sleet? What was it you were sayin’ about my steering again? About my tragee . . . trajuct . . . whatever smarty-smart word you said?” There was no nasal and grudgingly accepting reply to validate him. “Sleet?” Not even a defeated huff or grumble. “Sleet?” 

He realized his back suddenly felt a lot more cold, more bare. Dingo turned his head as far as his bulky reindeer neck allowed and took stock of his fussy rider’s absence. Inwardly, Sleet’s outlined afterimage winked at him like a neon sign. “Where’d ya go?” Dingo looked around, making a small circle in place. At the same time he completed his pivot, he heard a muffled groan from up ahead. Dingo squinted and focused in. 

The fog abated enough for him to see Sleet’s lower half sticking out of a snowdrift. Dingo jolted with panic . . . and then it hit him, the recollection of that one fancy science concept Sleet told him about whenever he feared he’d misplaced his tail: object permanence. Panic quickly gave way to barely smothered, full body spasming laughter. 

He hadn’t bisected his partner in some horrible, strangely bloodless accident. Sleet had merely gotten an icy cold faceful of comeuppance, flung off when Dingo stopped at the crevasse. 

“Hold—” An explosive ‘snrk!’ breached Dingo’s muzzle, and he had to take a moment to gather himself. “Hold on, Sleet! I’ve got ya!” He wheeled, bounded a few paces, turned back around, and primed his muscles for a running leap. Pawing the ground, he took a snorting breath, twin clouds of misty condensation blasting from his nostrils upon his exhale before he barreled forward and launched himself. “Hup!” 

He soared with a practiced ease. This  form might not have had any flying magic like in the tales—he had tried once before, there was a lot less whimsy and a lot more crashing—but Dingo had history jumping cliffs and canyons in the Badlands as a horse, which was basically just a less poky reindeer. 

His dismount was even cleaner than he could have hoped. The feat stoked his conceit higher. Tail raised, he took on an exaggerated trotting bearing, hooves lifting loftily. “Did you see that?” He paused, realizing the comedy of the question. “Oh, right. You couldn’t, ‘cause your head’s—” 

Giggles slipped out from him as he reared and pressed his forehooves into the snowdrift, returning to his fours as it gave way. How it crumpled apart reminded Dingo a little of the breakable chocolate desserts the aristocrats enjoyed. He found the mallets given to break the treats far too puny and ineffectual, though he supposed those qualities complemented the nobility well. 

Mumbling concussed nothings, Sleet sloughed out on his front. 

Alongside one unmoving Manic the Hedgehog. 

“Sleet!” Dingo tore backward in surprise. “Sleet! You got ‘im!” Excitement laced his voice. 

“Wha?“ Sleet��s gaze was unfocused, eyelids asymmetrically shuttered. He spoke with a thick dizziness. 

Dingo thrust a hoof towards the vermin, pointing as best he could. “The hedgehog! You got ‘im! We did it!”

A brief silence passed between them as Sleet registered this. His once woozy eyes lit up, and the wolf sprung to his feet, lifting Manic by his wrist and giving a breathless, ecstatic laugh. “I-I must have collided with him when you threw me!” The when you threw me part held none of the usual Sleet sneer. Nothing like a captured quarry to smooth things over. 

They whooped and cheered and Dingo trotted a little victory jig in place, the soul-crushing atmosphere and all work-related misgivings peeling away in the face of their electric jubilation. They’d done it! The Freedom Fighters’ morale would no doubt weaken when they saw one of the prophesied children roboticized. Robotnik could call this whole thing off! They could go back to the fortress in Robotropolis and make some pitiful small business fork over all the sweet treats they can carry and heckle a community theater play! 

And maybe, just maybe, they’d wander under a mistletoe. 

“Before we roboticize him,” Sleet was explaining, jogging Dingo from his moony pining, “we use him as a carrot to draw his accursed siblings out.” 

“Yeah! . . . Uh, what’s the carrot for?”

Sleet raised the limp hedgehog higher. “He’s the carrot.”

Dingo scrutinized the boy, brows and nose wrinkling. He hummed an indecisive noise. “I think I’d make the better carrot. Manic’s more of an artichoke, I reckon. Maybe asparagus?” Dingo quickly amended after giving Manic another glance over. “No, wait! Definitely an artichoke.” 

Just as Sleet opened his mouth, there was a booming sound, almost like a miniature thunderclap, as if the air itself had shattered. 

Then, WHOOSH!

A meteoric gust of wind and a glowing javelin of blue sped between them, the force of the blur’s passage slamming into them and bowling them over. Before the geyser of snow the interloper kicked up could settle, Dingo angrily leapt to his hooves and struck out with his antlers. Nothing connected. He’d only been attacking empty space, space where the impossibly fast Sonic had just been. 

Sleet’s hand, too, was empty. The only evidence of Manic’s short-lived nabbing were the scattering of green quills on the ground. 

Dingo bristled, nostrils flaring, blood burning. He made to pursue, but a steadying arm caught him in his chest. Dingo fixed the now standing wolf a pleading stare and uttered a desperate moo. His body went nervy and twitchy, like a housecat’s after seeing a bird they can’t reach. If he just pushed a little harder, if he funneled every ounce of his rage and hatred and anguish in the run, maybe he could catch him. 

Sleet said nothing though. His face was one of weary acceptance, a familiar sight. He turned his attention from Dingo’s shuffling and reindeer whines to the horizon. Dingo followed.

 There was no blue dot. There was no green dot. 

Sonic had cleared the Northern Tundra’s vastness in milliseconds. He and Manic were gone. 

“But I . . . we . . . ” said Dingo quietly. 

Sleet sounded half bored. “Come on, Dingo. It’s not worth it.” 

The fight drained from the mutant’s cervid muscles. His ears slunk. His tail drooped. He stilled. Sleet placed a hand on Dingo’s shoulder. The way it lingered before he vaulted and climbed aboard, Dingo wondered briefly if it wasn’t just to mount up, but a rare show of comfort. 

With Sleet astride, Dingo turned away from where the hedgehogs vanished. He took a few plodding steps forward, setting course for where they’d left the Whiptail. Dingo hesitated almost as soon as he’d started however, eyes falling upon the loosened spines. The clouds overhead, once blanketing and unconscionably opaque, had curtained somewhat. Bright sunlight pooled over the quills, and the snow beneath them glittered. As Dingo considered them afresh, his rounded deer ears bobbed curiously. They looked almost like pine needles. 

The image made him hearten. His mouth twitched into a small smile, the first stirrings of inspiration purling in his mind. He could still salvage this. 

Dingo walked over and, gingerly, picked one of the quills up in his mouth.

Living in the Northern Tundra base Robotnik had arranged for them felt a bit like living in a big sardine can. 

For something so recently built, there was a palpable aura of dinginess and dilapidation to it. Robotnik spared expenses whenever he could, and ensuring the bounty hunters’ quality of life was clearly something he didn’t worry himself with. That much was obvious by the low ceiling and door frame Dingo had to duck and sidestep to enter; no matter how many slapstick injuries he accrued, it took a mighty conscious effort on his part to remember to be size-aware. 

Bleak, minimalistic, and perfumed by the industrial fustiness ever-present in the emperor’s handiwork, the station was a true exercise in function over fashion. It was toasty at least. The hum and rattle and whir of the heating system went on day and night. 

The circumstances in which they found themselves reminded Dingo of a monster movie he once saw, about a group of scientists fending off a shapeshifting creature. As a shapeshifting creature himself, the irony was not lost on him. Only, he was far more handsome and charismatic than the space invader featured, and the scientists’ accommodation had more than three rooms. When the duo first arrived, Dingo jestingly promised Sleet that he’d never ever “assimmilatize” him, on his Quokka Scouts’ honor. 

The wolf, alas, didn’t get the reference.

Returning from their not-so-fortuitous hedgehog hunt in the Red Whiptail, Dingo, biped body plan restored, had been pleased to see an imperial freighter touch down with them. The robots that disembarked carted a large hovering dolly heaped with crates. Crates that held very special, very precious cargo of the jolly persuasion: Dingo’s extensive collection of holiday decorations. He saw to replacing the base’s gray upon gray upon gray with colors of a more lively mood posthaste. 

“Don’t you think you’re going overboard with . . .” Sleet began, sitting cross-legged at the thinly-cushioned circular booth in the middle of their measly kitchenette slash living room. He, now wearing his sweater true, waved the bitten end of a jerky strip he’d been gnawing on in Dingo’s direction. “All this holiday hullabaloo?” 

Their food options were limited to sledging biscuits, canned meats, and the unglamorous like. 

Definitely nothing he would swipe from a banquet hall, Dingo thought. What he wouldn’t do for some glazed ham right about now. 

The portions allotted sustained Sleet fine but they never filled Dingo up, hunger quick to wake him in the middle of the night from his bunk. How did Robotnik expect him to aid in world domination on a near empty stomach? If he was half the genius he boasted to be, surely he’d have created a food replicator by now, like the ones in the space serials on TV.

“This place is cramped as is,” Sleet continued. “When you said you were expecting a shipment, I was hoping you meant something useful.”  He added under his breath conspiratorially.  “Like libations.” 

Indeed, Dingo had considered using his imperial entitlements further, such as requesting an hourly delivery of frozen pizza. But he could only pull rank so much. Turning Robotnik’s logistics personnel into pizza delivery men was apparently a step too far. If they’d been given more time to prepare, Dingo would have stocked up his rucksack. As it was, he’d eaten all the snacks he packed already. 

Dingo gave a small shrug before extracting a red tablecloth from a crate and unfurling it in one big shake.  “It gives the room some life.” Dust and glitter flew off, causing Sleet to grimace and squinch his snout in a manner Dingo found both adorable and hilarious. Dingo turned his head slightly to hide his enjoyment of the pulled face, since Sleet wasn’t fond of being thought of as adorable or hilarious. “Some feng shui.” He wasn’t sure he was using the word right, but it felt nice rolling off his tongue. 

Sleet made a growly noise in his throat as he bit into the jerky and yanked off a piece after much effort. He gave it a few vigorous chews before saying low. “You’ve been watching those house renovation programs again, haven’t you?” 

“Heh,” Dingo’s cheeks heated. Not with shame for enjoying yet another traditionally un-bounty hunter-y activity, but from the knowing tone of Sleet’s voice, from being read so ablely, so easily caught. Man, he’s good. “I-I just think it’s fun to imagine wreckin’ the really fancy ones, y’know?” 

Sleet sighed. Dingo got the feeling it wasn’t true annoyance. “Do me a favor and get it out of your system before we return to Robotropolis,” Sleet said through chomps of his leather-tough snack, having popped its entirety into his mouth. “Robotnik doesn’t care for others questioning his judgement. I imagine that includes fortress design decisions.” 

Bit of a drab thing to imagine, Dingo thought, when one could imagine something more incredible like bagpipe-playing giraffes. “Okey-doke!” Dingo assented with a cheerfulness. He draped the cloth over the booth’s table. Not made for small surfaces, most of it spilled over and bunched at the floor. Dreamily, Dingo clasped his hands to one side, head following suit in a tilt. “Beeeautiful,” he said, then looked to Sleet with great anticipation, lower lip bitten and tail awag, whipping excited arcs. 

“It sure is . . . something.” 

Pleased with Sleet’s speechlessness, his dreamy pose deepened into a silent squee, a full-toothed, face-splitting beam scrunching his eyes. 

“Ugh,” Dingo opened his eyes to see Sleet shielding his own. “Don’t do that in front of me. I just ate. Your wrinkles have wrinkles.”

Oh, Sleet. Dingo would have rolled his eyes if he were better coordinated. The last instance he tried Sleet claimed he looked like a drunk chameleon, and the sensation felt odd. 

Taking a step back, Dingo appraised all his much-needed renovations thus far through a finger frame. His tongue poked out as he focused, scanning over the silvery tinsel and lights, the plastic garland and the big, red ribbons. It was no traditional Dingo family getup—he hadn’t his siblings here to help, and like Sleet said there was only so much he could unpack before things became hazardous—but considering what the room looked like before it’d more than make do. 

Dingo drifted the finger frame toward the table, toward Sleet. Scratching at a canine tooth with his pinky, the wolf was slow to notice. When he did, he flinched and ducked away, then frowned, realizing his overreaction. He played it off with a disdainful snort becoming of an aristocrat, turning up his muzzle and placing his hands in his lap primly. 

Once again the words adorable and hilarious came to mind. And pretty. And periwinkle. But mostly pretty. Even in his cruder moments, there was always an elegance to Sleet.

Dingo admired him and his proud, terribly kissable-looking snout a moment longer before skirting off to their sleeping quarters. There was more crashing than he’d intended. 

He returned shortly after with his tome of a scrapbook and an assortment of stationery supplies nestled close to his chest. He grinned at Sleet, who had risen in reaction to the clangor and squeaks of boot soles against aged metal. 

“Ah, yes,” said Sleet flatly as he resettled into his seat. “More essentials.”

“Uh-huh!” Dingo dumped all the items onto the table. Out of everything in the accumulation, Sleet stared most incredulously at the scrapbook, mouth agape as he beheld it. Heavy enough to qualify as a bludgeoning weapon, thick enough to jam a titanium blast door, the whopping composition was several years worth of recorded memories, a highlight reel of roguish escapades, bashed skulls, juiced up sidearms, double-dealing and ill-gotten Mobium. 

Dingo plopped down close next to Sleet. The wolf bounced slightly from the new weight on the shared seat. “And you’re gonna help me finish this!” said Dingo, opening the album to an empty two-page spread. Sleet looked at it, then back to Dingo, then back to the book, as if not comprehending. Dingo gave him a giddy and encouraging nod. Sleet, not for lack of Dingo’s trying, hadn’t seen the scrapbook up close before. It only made sense he’d be taken aback by its awesomeness.

When he spotted a certain green spine amongst the table’s clutter however, his expression curdled. “What's that doing here?” he said in a voice like he’d smelled something foul. “Don’t tell me you’re . . . ” Sleet cut himself off with an irritated huff, looking to the ceiling and muttering. Then he whipped his head towards Dingo. “What’s the use in memorializing such a humiliating failure?” he snapped, gesturing indignantly at the memoiric cause of complaint. “I thought your scrapbook was for triumphs, for trophies.”

Dingo blinked and shrank in on himself somewhat. He expected Sleet to be reluctant, sure, but not upset. Upsetting Sleet was the last thing Dingo ever wanted to do. He just thought this’d be a fun activity, something to do other than wait on pins and needles for another command from Robotnik. Perhaps Sleet had been more annoyed by their conditions than he’d let on. 

Ears edging back, Dingo averted from Sleet’s glare and tightened jaw. He grimaced and put a hand to his burly arm, rubbing there and holding himself uneasily. Maybe this wasn’t such a good idea after all. 

No, Dingo thought, quickly recouping his nerve. 

He had to try. 

Dingo drew a breath, then admitted. “It was sad.” His eyes turned downcast.  “Yeah.” Despite himself, there was an ache in his voice. His hand clenched unconsciously into a fist as he thought back to their defeat. A mental image of Sonic and Manic’s sneering faces apparitioned. Dingo’s heavy brow lowered, but only for a moment. He stopped himself from imagining thrashing them. There was a more important matter to attend to. His gaze lifted. “But,” he put extra emphasis on the word, brightening, “as my hero Tommy—” 

 Sleet interrupted with a groan. Dingo, recognizing the comparison concerned a multimedia action-adventure franchise Sleet couldn’t be further from being a fan of, winced. Nevertheless, it was the first example that came to mind and, considering the wealth of box sets and comics in Dingo’s quarters back at the fortress, this was assuredly one  reference the pop culture ignorant Sleet was familiar with. 

 “—Thunder said in Tommy Thunder and the Citadel of the Ancients, y’gotta take the good with the bad. It was bad Manic got away. But we made it out without gettin’ spindashed, yeah? And that rush when we had him? I know you felt that.”

Sleet appeared to, albeit grudgingly, consider Dingo’s words. His snarl lines softened, as did his disparaging glower. 

With this, Dingo’s resolve strengthened even more. “Things could’ve gone worse. There coulda been a snownado. I hear those exist. We coulda woke up a yeti, or fallen down that crack and gotten captured by creepy ice hermits who’d force us to perform for their entertainment.” Sleet arched a brow at him.  “Well, y’know. Just a thought,” said Dingo innocently, venturing a smile. “A hypothetical. That’s what it’s called, right? Hypo-thet-ical.” His nose scrunched. “Feels weird. Why so many letters? The time it takes to say it, y’could go ‘round the world and back again.” 

A corner of Sleet’s mouth quirked, and a soft ‘hm’ escaped him. Amusement. Faint, but there all the same. Seeing Dingo’s smile broaden in turn, Sleet caught himself and endeavored to reharden his face.  Dingo understood Sleet’s mannerisms too well for that to fool him. The mutant felt relieved his joke landed. He was starting to get the hang of these hyper-bollies and speech figures.

Dingo let his triumph sink in for a moment before speaking again. “A failure’s only a failure if you don’t learn from it.” 

Sleet, who’d taken to rolling a pen up and down the table with the flick of an idle finger during the lull, seemed to start at this. He stopped his distraction, and his ear twitched. 

“That’s why I record every job, bad or good,” Dingo patted one of the pages, “in this book.” When he turned to Sleet, proud of his craft, Sleet somehow looked at him even more bewildered than he had the book. Dingo frowned. What’d he done now? 

Sleet’s eyes creased, disbelieving, almost accusatory. “Where’d you get that from?” 

“Get what from?”

“That proverb? The thing you just said?”

“Uhh . . . ” Nervous, Dingo’s eyes flitted left and right, searching for help where there was none. “. . . ‘What’s a proverb?”

“No, the—” Another ‘hm’, and a slow half shake of his head. He inched forward, laying his arms on the table, the tenseness in his shoulders ebbing away as he regarded Dingo with a sort of mellow wonder. Their eyes held, longer than Dingo had been expecting. 

Was Sleet still waiting for an answer? “Can I, uh,” Dingo lowered his head in appeal and tapped his forefingers together, “get a hint?” 

Another beat, then Sleet mused softly at last. “Always the optimist.” As he said this, a small smile crept over his face. He let it remain. 

Small, but more nourishing any banquet hall raid, Dingo thought, heart dancing. His tail thrummed the cushion as he drank in the hard-won expression, a pleasant warmth blossoming in his chest and radiating outward. The aw-shuckness of it all overwhelmed him so much all he could do was smile back, rub the back of his head, and stammer little waving off noises. It didn’t matter that he didn’t know what an optimist was. From the way Sleet said it, how he looked at him, it must have been a great compliment.

 “Awh, well, y’know,” Dingo began once his tongue untied, feet moving in slow kicks beneath the table. “I like lookin’ on the bright side, too. Oh, and hey,” he put in, giggling, “we might’ve lost Manic, but now we know you make a great projectile.” 

“Don’t push it.” 

“Right.” 

Sleet’s eyes found the book once more. He reached over, grabbed a corner of the album’s front cover, and closed it. 

Dingo’s dancing heart sank. Was the projectile joke too far? 

He knew Sleet had a dislike of revisiting his past. ‘Never look back’ was a maxim he’d hardwired into his very being. 

But the past in the scrapbook is different. I’m in it. I’m there for him, thought Dingo, feeling his ears sag. He swallowed his disappointment and steeled himself for Sleet to rise and walk away. 

And then Sleet began slowly tracing a hand over the album’s cover. Dingo’s ears lifted as he watched Sleet. The way the wolf contemplated it, if not for the puffy stickers, water damage, and yellowed photographs of their mugshots, one could have been convinced it was some hallowed, priceless artifact.

“You put everything in this?” he asked after a stretch of silence, gaze still rapt. Sleet’s voice was thoughtful, barely above a whisper. He passed the tips of his lithe fingers over the title, which Dingo had lovingly, heavy-handedly markered. 

BOWTEE HUNTOR BFFS

“Everything.” Most everything. He’d sooner wear shirts for the rest of his life than immortalize the arrow incident. “I’ve been wanting to show you, but you . . . well, you were always busy. With things like ironing and filing reports and ironing reports and filing ironing reports.” 

Sleet stiffened, and his face paled a little at the mention of his unusually frequent postponements. If Dingo didn’t know any better—and he was often told he didn’t—he’d say Sleet looked as if he’d just realized he’d forgotten to turn in one of those pesky ironing reports. Hopefully Robotnik wouldn’t notice. 

“Sometimes all on the same day! I don’t know how you do it!” Dingo amiably bumped his shoulder into Sleet’s. “It’s like, are you a worker bee or a wolf?” He chuckled at his own joke. 

Sleet cleared his throat before agreeing fast. “Yeah. Busy.” The sudden discomfort on his face began to abate. “I was busy. Very busy,” he said, and it almost sounded like he was saying it as much for himself as for Dingo. 

“Ah, it’s no problem. Really. Nothing to be sorry for. Better you than me! Haw!” Dingo laughed again, clapping a hand to Sleet’s back. “Robotnik’s never asked me to do any of that beep-boop ‘puter stuff.”

Sleet pawed at his shoulder blade, then leaned back to survey a bulge between the album’s text block. He opened the scrapbook there, a section in the middle. 

 “Oh!” Dingo piped up. “This is the poisoned knife of that Raiju Clan assassin that tried to kill me! Remember that? My gains were too thick for her noodly arms to yank it out, haha! Best sleep I ever had. 

Oh, and that’s my medal for eatin’ all that Spagonian ice! Remember? When we were tracking that runaway Mazuri prince for the reward money? Oh, oh,” he bounced in his seat when Sleet turned to the next page, “and this is a scrap from the robe of that Meropian city official I mugged! The one who looked at me funny! The pattern’s real nice. Oh, oh, oh, and these are the teeth of those Jackal Squad jokes what tried to poach our poached quarry! I kept the blood an’ gums on ‘em, it adds a little splash of color to the page, y’know?”

They continued like this, Sleet turning pages, Dingo commentating. Unprompted, he would point out the little flourishes he’d added to border his scrawled captions and detailed what material he used to produce his hand-drawn recreations of events. Occasionally Sleet would go beyond a monosyllabic reply, reminiscing along with him in his own way by critiquing the veracity of the accounts. 

 “That’s us making up our debt to Torque after you pushed me into that lever,” said Dingo, tapping a vignette with caricatured versions of themselves holding wrenches and looking sooty. “When we put her and her crew months behind on work. I didn’t know a monkey that small could be so angry, gahah-ha! I was gonna make it a sorta flipbook, so the ships could crash into each other like they did in real life, but I, er, couldn’t figure it out. Check this out!” He held the scrapbook up and jostled it lightly. The rendering of Torque had googly eyes, and they shook below her big, angry eyebrows. 

The interactive feature evoked a genuine snicker from Sleet. It was a sound Dingo wished he could bottle up and listen to on repeat. 

Luck shone upon them. At least half an hour had passed with nary a pinging communicator to answer. 

Dingo had been so occupied retelling exploit after exploit that he’d almost forgotten about the blank spread. It was Sleet who’d reminded him. 

“What would I do without you?” Dingo had said. 

“Flounder.” Sleet had replied. “Well, more than usual.” 

At first, Sleet seemed intimidated by the wide-ranging assortment of crafting supplies. He was very precious when using them, holding them like scientific specimens rather than tools to free one’s imagination. Dingo thought it was sweet he cared so much about not using up his things, but Sleet was being much too cautious. It took a while for him to unrestrain himself and indulge, although his manner of design was more controlled than Dingo’s. He was especially taken with the bottles of glitter glue, praising the adhesive’s efficiency and cleanliness. 

Soon enough, they eased into a comfortable rhythm, cutting and pasting and drawing away. Dingo continued to hark back to past vistas and wrought havoc aloud all the while, but slower, less gushingly. 

 “Are we still banned from Emerald Coast? The staff was real huffy about my shark fin prank, the buncha snobs.”

“No, Dingo, they were ‘real huffy’ about you uprooting the resort’s ornate marble fountain and throwing it at the mob of heavily-armed bounty hunters that were tailing us.” 

“Hah, yeah. Good times.” 

It was when Dingo began coloring in the page’s piece de resistance, the grand pine tree that Manic’s quill would adorn, that he felt his eyelids growing heavy. He fought it, blinking his eyes determinedly and completing another swathe of green, but the pull came to him once more, stronger. Somewhere between recounting the Chaos Cola security gig and their time in the Mercian dungeons, Dingo had helped himself to a mug of hot cocoa. The warmth of the beverage, the soreness of his reindeer-worn muscles, it was all beginning to sap his energy.

Maybe if he just rested his eyes, just for a moment . . . 

“Dingo.”

“Mwuh?”

“You’re smushing me.”

Dingo cracked his eyes open. Sure enough, he was slumping heavily against Sleet’s side, one weighty arm draped across the slighter canine’s shoulders. He jolted with a snort and removed himself. “Sorry!” Dingo blurted and dusted orange fur off from around Sleet’s collarbone. 

How could he have dozed off during something so important as BHBFF bonding? He wiped his mouth with a forearm and sniffled. Shame faintly panged at him. “I wasn’t asleep,” Dingo denied preemptively, removing his glasses for a moment to scrub his eyes. “I was . . . ” A yawn threatened to interrupt him. He stifled it the best he could, face screwing up. “I was inspectin’ your . . . work.” 

“Mm, of course. Snoring while inspecting. What a novel idea.” 

Dingo stretched his arms upward. In doing so, he almost cuffed Sleet with an elbow. 

“Watch it!”

“Sorry! Again!” More heedful of his dimensions, Dingo brought his arms back down and, blinking off-kilter, smiled lopsidedly.  “I’ll inspect less closely.” His BHBFF remained skeptical. “Agh, okay, okay! So maybe I’m a little tired. Not much of a cardio guy.” Dingo raised his unbraced knee and massaged a small circle into it. “Still kinda achy from that run.”

Something that looked a little like sympathy set on Sleet’s face. Dingo couldn’t quite tell. His eyes felt like they had a film over them, and even if they weren’t currently beset by rheum he doubted he’d be able to recognize a sympathetic Sleet, since he wasn’t demonstrative when it came to certain emotions. 

“You should get some rest,” Sleet said. 

“What? And let you have all the fun? Not,” Dingo spoke around a yawn bigger than the one before, “a chaaance.” He frowned, realizing the grogginess in his voice was undeniable. Pesky biological need, ruining the moment. “Just a fluke. I’m up. Bright-eyed and bushy-tailed!” 

To illustrate, he grabbed hold of his tail and tried shifting it into that of a squirrel Mobian’s. With a dull heat, the appendage distended and rippled promisingly for a few heartbeats before sagging like a deflated balloon. The air trapped within sputtered out, squeaky and indecorous.

“Th-that’s supposed to happen. The molecules are, er, moleculing. Warming up.” Sleet’s unimpressed expression redoubled as Dingo protested. “It’s a real thing!” 

“Dingo.” 

Eager to prove he still had it in him to scrapbook, Dingo reached for a sequin on the table. 

Sleet’s hand intercepted his. “Dingo.” There was a firmness to his voice. 

Dingo stiffened in surprise, ears shooting up. A fluttery feeling stirred in his stomach as Sleet’s hand coaxed Dingo’s away from the sequin. It intensified when Sleet used both hands to clasp Dingo’s transgressing one. Dingo was more than strong enough to pull free from his grasp, but why would he ever want to? The sequin was a distant memory. 

Their gazes lifted at the same time. 

“I insist,” said Sleet, in that hushed, velvety tone only he could muster. 

To Dingo, the trappings behind Sleet seemed to dissolve into an ethereal scene, a peach-pink sky with clouds as round as cotton balls. A welcoming, warm and radiant glow ebbed around Sleet’s form. 

 Dingo barely realized he was purring. “Hhokay,” he said, sounding like he’d taken a lungful of nitrous oxide, feeling lighter than air. 

“Good.” Sleet nodded once, then withdrew and shooed at him. “Off with you. If we’re going to catch those insurgents, you need as much energy as you can get, and I can’t work if you’re going to be snuffling and puffing and mumbling about penguins right in my ear. Your jowls flap like old shingles in the wind.”

Dingo blinked, and the Aphroditic backdrop vanished. “Y-yeah.” He was late to pull his hand away, returning it to his side as haltingly and awkward as a SWATbot. If Sleet noticed, he didn’t say, having delved right back into stenciling snowflakes, just as committed to their detail as he would when creating a blueprint. “Shouldn’t you get some sleep too?” 

“Later. I have some reading to catch up on.”

“Oh, did a new fashion mag come in?”

“I’m talking about the scrapbook, Dingo.”

“Right, right,” Dingo said as he stood up, “I knew that.” He thought he heard another ‘hm’ of amusement from Sleet as he shambled off to their quarters. 

As soon as he saw his bed, the buzz of the day’s unexpectedly long leisure and Sleet’s open affection waned. 

Eyelids already shuttering, he crashed onto his too small mattress and drifted into sleep, dreaming of new adventures, new floggings. 

New memories to record with his best mate Sleet.

[sparky-kasane]

GUYS. GUYS!

PROBABLY A QUINKY DINK BUT IDGUYFVVVUYFSYISBZDUTHESUTESHSTE /pos

[skimmingmilk]

Hiya Skimming!

I just finished re-reading Relative Dissonance again (I love all your Sonic works so so much💛💛💛) and it got me wondering about a couple things!

Do you have any headcanons on how UG!Sonic and UG!Miles grow closer after the ending of the story??

Do they do similar stuff to UG!Sonic with Tails, like riding on top of the van together etc.? Or do they have their own dynamic?? Also I’m curious about the dynamic between Miles and Sonia/Manic👀

And the other thing, we know Robotnik got yeeted into another dimension and isn’t dead..will he make another cameo in any of your future fics?? And what would you say he’s up to at present?👀

No pressure to answer this btw!!❤️ and I hope you’re having the loveliest day❤️

Hi there!

I'm delighted you like "Relative Dissonance" so much! I'm so proud of it and really look forward to playing around with it again one day ❤️ But definitely happy to answer questions in the meantime!

Yes, UG!Sonic and UG!Miles will eventually be as close as any other Sonic and Tails across the multiverse, but of course their dynamic will feel natural and specific to them. It helps that they both impacted each other in a way prior to Tails even coming to that dimension, but music is definitely something that bonds them together.

Back at their storage unit, they end up cutting into unit next to them and turning that into a smaller scale version of Miles's workshop, as well as a place for him to sleep. When they're not on the road, he's usually working in there while the triplets practice, jamming along like he used to with his recordings, but he'll come out sometimes to watch them. Sonic will also hang out in the workshop and test out ideas for new songs on Miles, to get an opinion from his "number one fan" ;P He strings up a hammock in the corner as a place for him to sleep inside, instead of always being on the roof or isolating himself in the van. Sonic and Miles go on scavenging adventures together and they eventually take on a project to build a working plane so they can see and help more of the world as it starts to repair itself. It's not the Tornado or the Cyclone, but something all their own.

Miles is pretty independent, which Tails was too, but unlike Tails, Miles doesn't trust as easily. He's pretty closed off at first, wary of disrupting his place within the sibling set and feeling like an outsider. He hasn't needed anyone for so long. He doesn't want to depend on them because it will hurt when they let him down or leave him. He's pretty similar to Nine in some ways and can come off as a little abrasive at times, but so can UG!Sonic. But Miles still has a softness to him and does care deeply about what the triplets think of him, even if he tries to hide it.

Miles is a good listener and he pays attention to every detail when they talk to him. He makes little upgrades to the triplets' tech wherever he can. Nothing too obtrusive the way Tails did, just small, almost invisible quality of life upgrades. Sonic will tell him he doesn't have to earn his keep, that he can stay as long as he wants to, but Miles will deny that that's what he's doing.

Miles and Manic of course get to bond over their shared love of mechanics. Manic gets to move his workbench into Miles's workshop and they'll work together on projects occasionally (just not the plane, the plane is for Sonic and Miles only and Sonic is very middle child about it xD). Sonia and Miles are slower to connect, but when they do, their dynamic will very much be like one of them could murder someone and the other would help them hide the body. I mean, all the triplets would, but Miles and Sonia would be the ones to want to protect Manic and Sonic from whatever mess they got involved in (and honestly, are probably trying to keep them from making things worse, lol).

Where Tails made the triplets aware of what exactly was missing in their lives, Miles fits into that empty space perfectly. It was always meant for him. He's not a replacement for Tails at all, though it takes a bit of getting used to for all four of them. There are some growing pains as they adjust to one another. But whenever it seems like Miles is feeling overwhelmed and overcrowded - Sonic will take him for a run. And they can go as fast and as far as they want, knowing there's still a home waiting for them when they're ready to come back.

As far as what happened to Robotnik, I haven't decided yet what else might be in store for him! I left it open-ended intentionally. He might not have ended up in a dimension that supports organic life. Or maybe he's in the original Underground universe now and is bent on getting revenge on those hedgehogs and their little fox, too! His story may or may not be over. All I know at the moment is that he's definitely low on my list of priorities for what I'm able to devote brainstorming energy to xD So if he is up to anything, we might not know for a while.

Thank you again for the ask! ❤️

[cxlliefxngames]

time to look for sonic games to play illegally 😼

[lunar-solarsystem]

BSHSJWKJEIWHSUSBWOSOWNSJBWIS

:000 omg i cant wait for the render-

I’m making a thing for CU-

This is gonna be the illustration card for the adventure of the first time the triplets meet Solar in CU! You can probably tell what it’s about-

I am going to render this one-

Anyways good night guys-

[leanuponmybar]

so kayna's recent stories of her playing the wii during rolling stock got me thinking

Starlight Gaming Headcanons (these are compatible with any version of these characters)

Rusty has the Trainyard Wii. For the first few years he had it, it was in his shed which led to many a train coming to his room to play. There's been many a time where Rusty would get back from a long day of work and just see the Nationals or literally any other group. in his shed. playing his Wii.

After a bit of time passed, he was like "fuck it" so he moved it to the whatever the equivalent of a living room/common area is in the yard

Rusty loves Pokemon. Control's dad got him into the first generation and has been hooked ever since. Pearl likes it too but mainly likes it since she likes the designs of the pokemon. Her favorite pokemon is Eevee.

Him and pearl go on pokemon dates together where they go out on the rails, find different spots on the railroad line, and try and find all the pokemon they can on pokemon go. It's precious

Besides pokemon for the cute desgins, she's a Mario Kart/Wii Sports F I E N D. She either mains Luigi or Bowser so she can be tall and scary. If you go against her, be prepared. She's oddly competitive

99.9% of the time, Dinah likes games such as cooking mama, sims, and disney dreamlight valley but when she's pissed, she mainly plays Mortal Kombat and pictures the opponents as whoever she's mad at

Dustin likes FNAF and knows a little too much about the lore. He watches Game Theory religiously

Flat Top, being the living shitpost that he is, likes shitposty games like Zelda Cdi. He mainly plays Call of Duty to laugh at the name and to roast whoever's in the lobby with him. He likes making incels and children cry.

Joule loved Minecraft. Full Stop. She's really the only Gamer within the components

To calm down after a long day of being The Sane One in the Yard, Wrench likes to play Animal Crossing

Buffy likes Sonic underground only because the theme song slap

ashley likes the Oregon trail just to give her pc families shitty names and to give them dysentary

gb and the nationals love just dance and the sims but they say they like gta, madden, and COD to keep up with the reputation. They know all the kpop and Rasputin choreos by heart

Buffy likes Sonic Underground only because the theme song is fire and Sonic Boom because the show's insane and on crack

The coaches each have their own Animal Crossing Islands and they go to each other's islands all the time

Dinah likes to listen to Video game soundtracks as she's cooking. The Wii Sports, Wii Sports Resort, and Animal Crossing soundtracks have a special place in her heart

You would think Papa/Mama likes chill games like Pong and Tetris, but when they're alone, they yippy those kayees in Red Dead Redemption

every so often, like once a month or so, the entire yard gets together to have a Mario Kart and Smash tournament. they call it "Race Night but No One Gets Hurt". The hosts are Wrench and Dustin since s o m e o n e has to host this chaos thats s a n e

one of the rules is that Caboose has lost controller privileges. for obvious reasons

here's some kayna!pearl reaction images that are gems

feel free to put any other ideas in the tags/comments!

[a-simply-simping-simp]

SEGA WHEN I CATCH YOU SEGA SEGA WHEN I CATCH YOU

So mad so mad so mad so mad so mad at SEGA why why WHY must they do this to me. Imagine falling in love and then KILLING that same love. Hahahahahaha imagine being a kid when it happened. HAHAHAHAHA IMAGINE HAVING ALL OF YOUR FRIENDS JUST WATCH YOU SOB AS YOU HOLD THE TRIGGER TO SHOOT YOUR LOVE. HAHAHAAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAAHAH IMAGINE ALL THATS LEFT OF HER AFTER YOU EXPLODE HER WITH AN ENERGY CANNON IS A SINGULAR SEED. IMAGINE NOBODY EXCEPT ONE PERSON REALLY COMES TO SHOULDER YOUR PAIN AND TEARS. IMAGINE NOBODY THOUGHT THAT MAYBE A CHILD SHOULDN'T HAVE TO SHOOT HIS NONOFFICIAL GIRLFRIEND. IMAGINE-

Anyway, all greiving aside, I miss her.

I joined the Sonic fandom in a kinda odd way ngl. At the time, I was stupid and a fresh middle schooler and it was extremely popular to make fun of the sonic franchise cuz it was a whole meme and stuff. I also made fun of it cuz I thought I was supposed to. But I realized it was stupid to make fun of something I haven't even seen before. So I wanted to educate myself on it. Coincidently, I saw a video. It was by CourtneySNT about her first ever sonic fancomic around that time. I really enjoyed it actually. Sometimes I go back and rewatch it. Anyway, in her comic, she had introduced Tails to the screen and I fell in love with the fandom. Grant it, her depiction of tails at that moment was the polar opposite of what he's actually like, but still. It compelled me to watch Sonic X, The Adventures of Sonic the Hedgehog, Sonic Boom, Sonic Prime, A bit of Sonic Underground, and just...Sonic the Hedgehog. I also watched a few gameplays and a lot of cutscene movies of the videogames as well as parodies and fan content. So...yeah.

Now it's just a Sonic Prime Nine analysis/rant below lol

Also, since I mentioned SONIC PRIME, I might as well rant about it. NINE. WAS. SO. PERFECT. He was well written, well scripted, and well developed. Everything about nim was chef's kiss. His story was literally just a what if. What if Sonic never met Tails? Well, number one, he wouldn't be named Tails. He'd make his own name. Nine. Also, he became cold and distant because he expected others to treat him the same due to his two tails. Perfect character already but then they fleshed him out some more and introduced this...guy named Sonic.

He didn't know Sonic at the time nor did he really know...anybody. So when this blue loser comes waltzing into his house unannounced, he obviously gets hostile. Why? Well, one, because a rando broke into his casa. But also because everyone he met was hostile to him first. Crazy. Then this guy seems to be friendly. A first. So, Nine lets down his ice cold walls and trusts him. Let me emphasize that. NINE TRUSTED SONIC. Remember that. It is SO important.

So, Nine goes along and helps this guy for no real reason other than the fact that he considers him a friend. Now, you'd think he also helped to stop the egg council, but he really never had bad blood with them in the first place. He isn't in the resistance nor shows any resentment. He's Nine all on his own, with or without the council. In fact, he probably doesn't care if they rule because he wanted to be alone anyway. But he helped. Why? Because he wanted to help his FRIEND.

This goal warps when Nine discovers an empty realm called the grim. He can have a fresh start there with him and sonic. Just the people he cared about. He asked Sonic to go with him because he wanted to share his dream with him. He wanted Sonic to be a part of it with him. But Sonic undermined his dreams. It'd be one thing if he simply disagreed with it or gave a good, justifying, and well explained reason for refusing, but instead he didn't explain himself well. Sonic entitled himself to the prisms, assuming him getting home was everyone's priority. I don't mean to villainize him because this was simply reckless and unknowing behaviour, but still. Nine got upset that his FRIEND was trampling on his dreams as if they didn't matter nearly as much as Sonic's.

So, he "betrayed" Sonic. I want to bring this to everyone's attention. Nine had critisized Sonic because he recklessly didn't think about what woukd happen to everyone else if he DID bring back his home. Like, nobody knows jack squat about the prisms. Sonic, Nine, Shadow, even the egg council was lost when it came to those big shiny rock things. It shines and made our universes. That's all they knew. So, with that in mind, it makes sense to be concerned. Like what if it kills us? What if it destroys our world in order to bring back yours? They only exist because of the prism being destroyed, so if you fix it, would that kill them? Idk, I feel like this was mentioned once and never brought up again and it makes me mad. Such potential.

Anyway, after the situation, Nine goes back to the grim to make his dreams come true by himself. Because the one person he TRUSTED broke his trust. So, after a bunch of irrelavent stuff happens, Sonic goes to the grim after making a deal to Nine. Nine lets him into the grim and Sonic starts to preach to Nine about their friendship. Nine listens and almost starts to trust him again, maybe thinking about his actions and how they might not have been the best. How their friendship could maybe be salvaged. Why? Because Sonic said he woukd sacrifice himself to save Nine too. But then an entire army shows up to beat Nine into a teeny tiny pulp. Grant it, Sonic did not call them to the grim. But then he imediently sides with them in taking Nine down in an all out war. After saying he'd sacrifice for Nine too, he pulls an uno reverse on him. Trust broken. Again.

So now, he wants to trust nobody. Why? Because Sonic broke once too many. So he starts fighting. And fighting. And fighting. Like he's been doing his entire life. Who is he fighting? Someone who he thought was his friend. Someone who claims to be his friend. Someone who he thought he wouldn't need to fight. And he's clearly breaking his own body in desperation while doing so. Nobody really said anything about it either btw. Like, he's literally hurting himself and Sonic, his "friend" didn't even try to stop him because he was hurting himself, but because he was huring others and taking the prisms. I understand of course because he's hurting your friends, but his own pain wasn't even a slither of his drive.

Anyway, the ending sucked personally. It was anticlimactic. Nine gives in just because and then Sonci goes home, mystery never discovered, and yay we're done.

[godofautism]

zoned out,, Favorite series Favorite movie Favorite book otp When/why did you join tumblr do you have a playlist i could steal opinions on this monstrosity: 👁️W👁️

band/artist reccomendations? Favorite fandom?

Sorry all the boops crashed my Tumblr

1. Idk, hard to say. Probably Sonic Underground

2. Again, hard to choose, though I suppose my favorite would probably be Jaws (3D specifically) or Coraline (mainly 3D but also normal)

3. The Last Book in The Universe

4. Idk what otp means

5. Why? Can't remember. When? Can't remember.

6. Yes!

7. 👍

8. MITM (Milk In The Microwave), femtanyl, spellcasting (made most of the regretevator songs), Chonny Jash and Odetari!

9. M O U T H W A S H I N G

[chucklenutss]

LIST OF BANDS/MUSIC ARTISTS THAT I LIKE IN ALPHABETICAL ORDER (because I have nothing else to do) (i probably missed some out)

A

- A Perfect Circle

- Adrianna Lenker

- Alex G/Alex G Offline

- Alice in Chains

- alt-J

- Amy Winehouse

- Aphex Twin

- Arctic Monkeys

- Avril Lavigne

B

- Babes in Toyland

- Basement

- bauhaus

- Beabadoobee

- Beach House

- Beastie Boys

- Beck

- Bedroom

- Bikini Kill

- Birth day

- Black country, New road

- Black Kids

- Black Lips

- Blur

- Blondie

- Blvck Hippie

- Butthole Surfers

- bôa

- Bratmobile

C

- Cage The Elephant

- CAKE

- Calpurina

- Car Seat Headrest

- Cardiacs

- Carson Clay

- Chapell Roan

- Charli xcx

- Cherry Glazerr

- Childish Gambino

- Chris Isaak

- Cigarettes after sex

- Clairo

- Cocteau Twins

- Current Joys

D

- Dandelion Hands

- Daniel Johnston

- Daron Malakian and Scars on Broadway

- Dayglow

- Dazey and the Scouts

- Dead Calm

- Deftones

- Destroy Boys

- Djo

- Dominic Fike

- Dream, Ivory

- Dreamer Isioma

- Duster

E

- Edward Sharpe & the Magnetic Zeros

- Elastica

- Elliot Fullam

- Elliot Smith

- Emezie

- Evanescence

- Everclear

- Eyedress

F

- Faye Webster

- Fiona Apple

- Flatsound

- Floor 14

- flyingfish

- Fontaines D.C.

- Foo Fighters

- Foster The People

- Frank Sinatra

- Franz Ferdinand

- Fugazi

G

- girl in red

- Girls Rituals

- Glass Animals

- Gorillaz

- Greenday

- Greta Van Fleet

- GRLwood

- GROUPLOVE

- Guided By Voices

H

- Hatsune Miku

- Have a Nice Life

- Heavenly

- Her’s

- Hole

- Hot Flash Heat Wave

- Hozier

I

- I am the Unicorn Head

- I DONT KNOW HOW BUT THEY FOUND ME

- IC3PEAK

- Ice Cube

- Insane Clown Posse

- Instupendo

- Isaacwhy

J

- Jack Stauber

- Jack off Jill

- Jamiroquai

- JAWNY

- Jeff Buckley

- Joan Jett & the Blackhearts

- Joey Valence & Brae

- Joji

- Joost

- Jordana

- Joy Division

K

- Kali Uchis

- Kasabian

- Kate Bush

- Kero Kero Bonito

- Kikuo

- Kimya Dawson

- King Krule

- Kittie

- Korn

L

- L7

- Lady Gaga

- Lamp

- Lash

- late night drive home

- Laufey

- LCD Soundsystem

- LE SSERAFIM

- Le Tigre

- Limp Bizkit

- Linkin Park

- Lorde

M

- Mabel Ye

- Mac DeMarco

- Mac Miller

- Mafumafu

- Mag.Lo

- Make His Ribs Show

- MARINA

- Mars Argo

- Masayoshi

- Takanaka

- Matt Maltese

- McCafferty

- Memo Boy

- Men I Trust

- Metallica

- MF DOOM

- MGMT

- Michael Cera

- mid

- Mike Krol

- Mitski

- Modern Baseball

- Molchat Dolma

- Mommy Long Legs

- Mother Mother

- Muse

- my bloody valentine

N

- Neutral Milk Hotel

- NewJeans

- Niko B

- Nine Inch Nails

- Nirvana

- No Doubt

O

- Oasis

- of Montreal

- OK Go

- Orville Peck

- Outkast

P

- Panchiko

- Pantera

- Paramore

- Pavement

- Pearl Jam

- Penelope Scott

- Perfect Confusion

- Phoebe Bridgers

- Phosphenes

- Pinegrove

- Pink Floyd

- PinkPantheress

- Pity Party (Girls Club)

- Pixies

- pizzagirl

Q

- Queens of the Stone Age

R

- R.I.P/Vewn

- Radiohead

- Rage Against the Machine

- Ramones

- Rare Americans

- Red Hot Chili Peppers

- Red Velvet

- Remi Wolf

- Rex Orange County

- Rio Romeo

- Roar

S

- SALES

- salvia path

- SE SO NEON

- Serj Tankian

- Sex Bob-Omb

- Sex Pistols

- Sign Crushes Motorist

- Siouxsie and the Banshees

- Sir Chloe

- Slayer

- Sleater-Kinney

- Slipknot

- Slowdive

- Slutever

- Smash Mouth

- Snot

- Sonic Youth

- Soundgarden

- SONDER (my band!!)

- sputn1k

- Stereophonics

- Steve Lacy

- Stevie Dinner

- Strawberry Guy

- Sublime

- Suki Waterhouse

- Syd Matters

- System of a Down

T

- Tacocat

- Take Care

- Tame Impala

- TEMPOREX

- The Backseat Lovers

- The Big Moon

- The Black Keys

- The Breeders

- The Cardigans

- The Cranberries

- The Cure

- The Fratellis

- The Frights

- The Front Bottoms

- The Garden

- The Hives

- The Julie Ruin

- The La’s

- The Libertines

- The Moldy Peaches

- The Offspring

- The Oozes

- The Smashing Pumpkins

- The Smiths

- The Strokes

- The Velvet Underground

- The White Stripes

- The Rolling Stones

- Thundercat

- Title Fight

- Toby Fox

- Tom Cardy

- TOOL

- TV Girl

- TWICE

- Twin Peaks

- Two Door Cinema Club

- Tyler, The Creator

- Type O Negative

V

- Vacations

- Vampire Weekend

- Violent Femmes

- Vundabar

W

- Wallows

- Weezer

- Wolf Alice

- Worry Club

- Worthikids

X

- X-Ray Spex

Y

- YELLOW MAGIC ORCHESTRA

- Yot Club

- Your Favourite Martian

not much down here…

[grawlix-ness]

Dancing Fool

Dingo had made a host of enemies in his travels as a bounty hunter. They all paled in comparison to the heinousness, the ruthlessness, the utter unspeakableness that was Robotnik’s formal dress code.

Word Count: 4,598

Characters: Sleet and Dingo

Pairing: Sleet x Dingo

A/N: rated PG - only slight pandering to the furry gaze this time around via the olde colliding-into-a-compromising-position trope.

Ayyy, it's shorter! I had to cut some things. I like to imagine the melody Sleet hums is that part of "Grande valse villageoise", you know the one.

Dingo had made a host of enemies in his travels as a bounty hunter. It was impossible to pursue such an adrenaline-pumping line of work without coming to blows with fellow mercenaries or opportunistic outsiders. With varying results, Sleet and Dingo contended with high-profile gangs, rogue wizards, tech cultists, ninja clans, pirates of both sea and sky, and the losers at the Jackalope Lodge with their unjust hat obtaining rules.

Well, that last part was more of Dingo’s pet project. He just really, really wanted one of those antlered hats.

All of the aforementioned adversaries paled in comparison to the heinousness, the ruthlessness, the utter unspeakableness that was Robotnik’s formal dress code. He hated Robotnik’s formal dress code.

For a time, Robotnik’s galas weren’t all that bad. The finger foods for example were perfect for flicking at distracted guests. He once managed to land two deviled eggs into Lady Remington’s big pink powdered wig. Dingo thought it was a marked improvement.

But now it seemed like every week there was a gala. He’d blink and suddenly he’d be surrounded by indecipherable conversations and dresses that were entirely too long and ice sculptures he wasn’t allowed to punch even though they looked so satisfying to. It had gotten old fast.

He tried to say as much to Robotnik once. Sleet smacked a hand over his mouth and became visibly embarrassed whenever he managed to get a word in edgewise. His ideas about livening up these mandated soirées would sadly remain ideas, and the formal dress code would continue to be his sworn enemy.

Dingo never did like shirts, let alone tuxedos. The mutant couldn’t quite explain why. It was a visceral, instinctual thing. He could tolerate a tank or a crop top. Shirts though, they were downright unnatural. Even so, if there was anyone he would wear a stiff, starchy monkey suit for, it was Sleet. What was the word again, compromise? Friends compromise. And Sleet, for all his fussing and snippiness, was the best friend he’d ever had.

Presently, Dingo felt a little compromised himself. His dress pants were riding up. “Do I hafta wear this?” he asked, taking advantage of the privacy screen to pull out a wedgie. Had he done so out in the open he surely would’ve received quite the earful.  “I just worry, maybe it’s a bit much?”

As Sleet had with the last Royal Hedgehog Palace party, he turned Queen Aleena’s bridal chamber into a make-do dressing room. The resourceful wolf sat some feet away at a crafting table overspread by fabrics, spools of thread, and other sewing material Dingo couldn’t identify. Despite the excess, his workspace still managed to look fairly orderly; Sleet had an enviable way about upkeep and organization. He was in the middle of finishing up some quick fixes on his own suit.

Dingo was surprised Sleet actually heard him. Typically whenever his long-snouted friend sewed he’d get all trancelike. Dingo could relate. He got absorbed in scrapbooking just the same.

It took some effort for Sleet to place his tools down and pry himself from his work, yellow eyes peering over rectangular reading eyeglasses and affixing Dingo with a scrutinous, steady gaze. Dingo gulped and licked his lips. He might get that earful after all.

 Sleet’s tone was calm and measured. For now. “Elaborate.”

“Well, uh, I just think, if we were attacked, we might not fight so good. You know, with all this decoration.” It was not the most well-founded of concerns, Dingo understood as much. Being Robotnik’s foot soldiers, and in all but name errand boys, meant they were protected. Robotnik had no love for party crashers. Any rival bounty hunter foolish enough to try and settle some bygone score would have to get through a wall of SWATbots first. Simply put, if your name wasn’t Sonic, Manic, or Sonia, you’d have an extremely rough go of it. “Isn’t this supposed to be for the nobles anyway? Why do we have to dress up too?” He hurriedly added.  “N-not that I don’t appreciate your work!”

“Dingo, what are our rules?”

There was a beat of silence as he considered this, eager to impress Sleet by getting the answer right. “That . . .” Dingo began carefully. “That you’re the brains of the outfit?” The phrase never made much sense to him. How could an outfit have a brain? Let alone multiple?

“Precisely.” The mutant internally pumped a fist in celebration—after tearing through so many suits in the past, he’d learned not to lift his arm with too much gusto. “You don’t think,” Sleet tapped at his temple, “I think. I’m the thinker. So, please, no more thinking. You’ll give yourself a hernia.”

Dingo brightened. That was thoughtful of Sleet. Dingo didn’t want any hernias. Well, actually, he didn’t know what those were, but they sounded like they hurt. “Alright. You know best.”

Sleet tittered at this and, delighting in the compliment, lifted his head and held it proudly. “Yes, too true, old friend.” He frowned suddenly. “Stop wagging your tail. It’s improper. Gentlemen don’t wag their tails.”

“Oops. Right.” Dingo hadn’t noticed. “Sorry, the thing’s got a mind of its own! Gahah-ha!” He laughed hard, and Sleet’s sour expression reminded him that gentlemen also don’t laugh like that. “Sorry. Er, I mean, my apologies. Howsat sound?”

“You’ll get there,” said Sleet.

Dingo hoped not. The farther from gentleman the better. Gentlemen never got to do anything fun. All the same, he readily accepted the praise, the fleshy, dark brown commissures of his jowls quirking into a smile.

 Sleet removed his eyewear, rose from his seat and approached the center of the room. “Let’s see it. Come.” He beckoned with a finger and, after some futzing with a particularly itchy lapel, Dingo emerged from behind the screen. The wolf’s critique was immediate. “I can’t believe this. Your sleeves are wrinkled. How’d you wrinkle them so fast?” Sleet grabbed Dingo’s arm and inspected it further. “I just pressed them!”

The inspectee shrugged one huge shoulder and offered. “Maybe you didn’t press hard enough?”

“Dingo.” There was a hint of annoyance in his voice.

“Right. No more thinking.” No more thinking. The request usually came easy.

 Anxiety wasn’t something he was accustomed to. He couldn’t quite put a finger on why he was anxious. He just was, and everytime he perceived its presence, no matter how dully, Dingo felt as if his chest was moments away from caving in on itself. The fur on his forehead steadily matting with sweat, he had never before been so thankful for the existence of handkerchiefs. Whoever invented suits was onto something there.

While Sleet smartened up a cufflink, Dingo used his free hand to produce his handkerchief. He dabbed the perspiration from his brow. “Phew. It’s stuffy in here.”

“I told you so.” That was one of Sleet’s favorite things to say. “I told you, you should have trimmed.”

Dingo snorted. He wasn’t that scruffy. “I think it gives me a proud and dig-niffyied look. Like a lion!” To demonstrate, he bared his sizable chompers and clawed at the air. “Grraugh! See?” Once more, with feeling. “Grrrahh! Smart, right? Rich people love lions. They put ‘em on all their fancy royal flags.”

“Which reminds me,” Sleet said dully, “no party tricks. Your Tyrannosaurus rex impression at our last event scared Lord Beauregard half to death.”

He growled. A real growl, one markedly more intense than the offerings in his brief presentation. “Beauregard. That rotten, old codger. What kind of name is Beauregard anyway? I shoulda roared louder. Might’ve helped ‘im along, if y’know what I mean.” The wink that followed was massive. He could never get winking right.

Although Sleet shook his head, unmistakable humor played about his lips, and he had to stop fixing the sleeve to fight back a snort.

Dangit, Dingo thought. Almost had him.

“You can’t say things like that out there either. Jokes referencing death are a definite faux pas.” So many rules. How did Sleet keep up?

 “I’ll be good. I’ll be the best dance partner ever.” After the latter sentence left his mouth, his stomach suddenly clenched. Dance. The word echoed in his head.

Was the suit causing all this? Was it made out of some type of bewitched fabric? Was the air filled with witchy fabric particles that were making him think? No, he’d felt this way before donning the claustrophobic raiment and before setting foot in the dressing room.

“Dingo?”

He snapped to attention. “Huh, what?”

“I said, go on.” From the way he enunciated, and the look on his face, he must have had to repeat himself. “Walk around.”

“Mhm,” Dingo drew in his bottom lip and lightly sucked on it, “I dunno, Sleet. It’s a bit tight.”

 “Pain before beauty.”

The mutant stopped himself from groaning. Sleet always said that. No matter how often he did, the statement never became any less nonsensical.  “It makes my bum look big,” Dingo tried again, more forcibly.

“Complements your fat head. Are you stalling?”

“No. Maybe? No? Not on purpose. Are we talking about the same stalling?”

“What other type of stalling is there?!”

Dingo raised his palms in a mollifying gesture and relented. “Okay, okay, I’m going, I’m going! It was just a question, s’no need t’shout.” He shook his arms out and bounced on his heels to limber up, blew a slow breath, then proceeded to take the pair of trousers for a test drive. Instructions unclear, he resisted the gnawing pang that told him to look over his shoulder at his audience of one, so as not to appear completely incapable. The initial steps were herky-jerky as expected, and he narrowly tripped after misplacing a foot, but after the walk back he felt his confidence grow.

Confident enough to do another lap freestyling, mimicking models on the covers of the fashion e-magazines Sleet liked. Confident enough to wave and blow kisses to imaginary paparazzi. The one, real member of his audience looked neither annoyed nor amused. He bore merely indifferent acknowledgement, an expression that read: here we go again.

Tough crowd, thought Dingo. Sensing his performance would soon overstay its welcome, he turned away from Sleet, stopping to catch a make-believe rose, and bowed deeply. Too deeply. The taut fabric could no longer endure his hijinks. There was a loud “rrhhip!” that seemed to echo around the room like a bolt from a blaster. When it faded, Dingo noticed a light breeze on his hindquarters. He glimpsed over his shoulder. Sleet’s facepalm confirmed it: he ripped his pants.

He looked down and surveyed the damage, tail held aloft. “Blow me down. Would y’look at that? Guess I should ease up on the squats, yeah?”  Few things embarrassed Dingo. Sleet however squirmed at almost everything. It entertained the mutant to no end. Sometimes, he’d goof around just to see the look on his face.  To Dingo’s dismay, Sleet hadn’t budged much at the clothing malfunction. “Awh, come now, Sleet, surely my jacksie deserves more fanfare. It’s a good one, I think,” teased Dingo, now facing him. He traced the outline of his hips and gave a small sashay.

The pelvic wiggle did the trick. “What?!” His affronted squawk was music to Dingo’s ears. “I’ve given your jacksie—” Sleet put on an affected Trailian accent for the word—“enough of my attention. Lest we forget the arrow incident.”

A tiny “ope!” escaped Dingo’s muzzle. The arrow incident did count as embarrassing. He rubbed his arm and looked away, hip-swinging bravado quickly replaced with sudden shyness. “Heh, yeah, I guess you got me there,” he admitted with a soft laugh.

“A sore spot for you? Hm?”

If it were anyone else making light of his harrowing experience, he would have punched their head so hard it span around, smashed them into a fine paste right then and there. But when Sleet did it . . .

Dingo kicked impotently at the floor and tried to say it wasn’t sore anymore and that was years ago and that he wouldn’t have been shot by their quarry’s hidden ally if Sleet hadn't been so frustrating and—

 His tormentor smirked, one fang peeking out from his lips. “Still sounds sore to me.”

That fang. That twinkling, delightfully fiendish fang. Dingo’s heart fluttered at the sight, and he had to will his tail not to wag. Cheeky thing, gives as good as he gets. Sleet’s boldness, his bite, it was enchanting from the very first day. No one had ever spoken to him so . . .  forwardly before. Not without their legs turning to pudding or their bladder vacating halfway through the confrontation, that is.

They returned to their respective corners, Sleet muttering something about liking another color better anyway, Dingo’s eyes trailing after Sleet’s wake. Looking back while moving forward, the mutant dog wound up bumping into the folding screen. He promptly excused himself, then remembered it was an inanimate object and manners weren’t necessary. Once behind the screen, he ended his rubbernecking with a yearning sigh.

Robotnik’s shindigs were more up Sleet’s alley. If they were good for anything, it was seeing him smile. Sleet was a gossip hound. Gossip hawk, he liked to correct, arguing his more coordinated and strategic methods afforded a stronger, sharper title.

“Get this, Lord Ambrosius is about to croak. The old fool’s giving his entire estate to some nobody friend, and the in-laws are incensed!” He had once excitedly told him, hands rubbing together, his smile gleeful and toothy. “This is going to be a bloodbath, I just know it!”  Sleet’s eyes had burned with an ineffable intensity. He had such pretty eyes, and they got even prettier when he was on the trail of a potential scheme. And his laugh, it made the whole world light up.

Dingo didn’t know who Lord Ambrosius was, let alone who his in-laws were. He didn’t understand much of anything Sleet said when he was hobnobbing and muckraking. Nevertheless, Dingo played along to the best of his abilities, keen to support Sleet’s interests.

A part of him wished Sleet would take the time to do the same for his interests.

Dingo quickly quashed the notion, as he always did whenever it wriggled into his skull. With Robotnik breathing down their necks, there wasn’t much free time allotted for either of them.  He shook his head to further dislodge those negative thoughts. In doing so he caught a glimpse of the room’s wall clock. His mouth, usually so profuse with saliva, went dry. Maybe it’s faster than it should be.

He didn’t have much experience with dancing. Until now, no one’s ever asked him to, and he had no reason to consider the idea. A brisk victory jig, maybe. Dancing though? Like, formal dancing? Not a chance. He was familiar with proms and homecomings byway of watching teen flicks, and those sometimes ended with messy drama and pranks from bitter rivals.

What if tonight’s dance ended up like that? Being laughed at by a bunch of self-important nobles wasn’t ideal, but he’d get over it. For Sleet though, the shame would be too great.

 It’d destroy him.

At the revelation, Dingo’s anxiety struck anew. Barring his family back home, he’d never cared so deeply about someone before, never had anyone to lose before.

So when it was time for another inspection and test drive he said. “I don’t wanna dance, Sleet. I’m no good at it.”

“Oh, Dingo, you’re no good at many things. Why should this be any different?”

“I’m bein’ serious, Sleet.”

Sleet searched his face, head cocked birdishly. Apparently finding what he was looking for, his dubious expression softened. “Oh. I see.” His ears and voice lowered, and Dingo’s accelerated sense of smell detected, however faintly, a pheromonal note of regret. “I’m sorry.”

Dingo blinked. He was no mathematician, but it seemed to him he could count on one hand the times Sleet had verbally apologized to him. The phrase sounded odd. Not displeasingly so, just . . . different. I’m sorries weren’t bestowed to anyone, the wolf favoring prim and proper forgive mes and my apologies.

“There is something on your mind. Please, go ahead.” He extended an imploring hand. “You have my full attention.” Sleet was sorely lacking in the area of heart-to-heart conversation. He seemed so unsure, sounded stiff, like he was pulling from a script he’d only just begun to rehearse. Maybe he was. It didn’t upset Dingo any. Script, no script, Sleet was reaching out.

And Dingo obliged. More effusively than intended.

The following deluge was just barely discernible. Dingo knew as much. There wasn’t anything he could do about it, words coming out a mile a minute. His voice spiked and cracked and wavered. Many times he had to choke back a sob or circle back after a tangent.

“—and I don’t want you to end up like Cindy from Passing Notes 2!” The closer reverberated off the walls. At last he allowed himself to breathe, taking in big gasps of air. Sleet was blurred behind unshed tears. Dingo scrubbed his eyes with his arm to see him properly.

The wolf looked more than a little taken aback and stood in silence for a good while. Intermittently, he made attempts to respond. His mouth would part, close, open again, then close again. He would raise his finger, drop it, raise it again, then hook it and place it to his lips—a thinking gesture, one he assumed when parsing through information.

Dingo frowned reflectively. He had dumped a lot of information on him. Some essential, some ancillary. Mostly loud, he realized late.

Just as he was about to apologize for his ungentlemanly volume, Sleet came to, albeit slowly. “So you’re saying I’d be better off dancing with someone else . . . because of a motion picture?”

“Movies,” Dingo corrected. “And shows. And a mini-movie TV special. You know what, that’s not so important. I don’t want to make a mess of things.” He slumped. “I know I’m a bit of a mess myself.”

“Dingo, if I wanted someone else, I would have chosen already. You’re a mess, yes, but,” Sleet cupped Dingo’s face and coaxed him out of his hunched posture, then said so silkily Dingo felt the tips of his ears tingle, “I can appreciate a challenge.”

Dingo leaned into Sleet’s palm and shut his eyes, a happy rumble reverberating in his throat. It was a treat when Sleet initiated contact. This type of tender, touchy-feely contact, anyway. He had no qualms about yanking Dingo’s ears, whacking him upside the head, or kicking him square in the backside when he blundered.

“You really are nervous about this,” Sleet said when he pulled away, frowning. “You sweat through my glove.”

“Oh no! I’m sorry, Sleet!” Dingo buried his face in his hands and despaired. “I ruined your glove, it’s already happening! I know you said not to think, but I have. And there’s so many thoughts! It’s ‘orrible!”

“Tell me one.” Sleet sounded farther away.

“Well, I-I could . . .  I could accidentally knock you into a fondue fountain.”

“I like fondue.”

“My pants could rip again!”

Light footfalls. His voice was close again. “I’d fix them. Another.”

“I could crush you!”

“Must be a day ending in ‘y’.”

Dingo uncovered his face. “Uhh, I could accidentally knock you into a fondue fountain?”

“You already said that.”

“But I didn’t specify the type of fondue.”

 With importance, Sleet raised his hand and held it out as if taking an oath. The glove was no longer sweat-stained. It looked brand new. “I’m the thinker, Dingo,” he reiterated. “I plan ahead.”

 “Wow, Sleet,” Dingo awed, “how’d you do that? Magic? I didn’t know you could do magic. Hey, how come you don’t use your magic when fighting the hedgehogs?” He added in a mutter out the side of his mouth. “Coulda come in handy . . .”

“It’s not magic. It’s forethought. I simply replaced the glove,” he said, jabbing his thumb over his shoulder at his workspace. “I’ve accounted for every possible social gaffe.”

“Ohhhh. Yeah, that makes more sense. Wait, I thought accounting was about money?”

Sleet ignored this, continuing. “And, should anyone dare laugh at us, we can just frame them for conspiracy and have them roboticized.”

“Hah! Good idea, Sleet!”

“My ideas always are.” Sleet took Dingo’s hands into his own. “I bet all you need is more practice. That’ll stop your jitters.” Not for the first time, Dingo silently marveled at just how small and thin Sleet’s hands were without his gauntlets. Dingo’s hands were big and calloused, thickened from uppercuts and haymakers, from punching through concrete walls and tearing weapons transports straight down the middle.

He was so fascinated by Sleet’s svelte digits that the wolf’s “Follow my lead.” was just barely perceptible. His brain might have missed it, but his body heeded, venturing the first steps of a waltz. It was not as straightforward as the aristocrats made it appear—right out the gate he stepped on Sleet’s foot—but with every subsequent figure, and every affirmation from Sleet whose footwork was considerably more deft, his clenched stomach eased. They weren’t gliding across the floor per se, but they certainly weren’t bumbling either.

Draping his arms around his dance partner’s bullish neck, Sleet began to hum a melody.  He had a habit of humming while he worked. Dingo didn’t get to hear it often, not since he pointed it out. Every now and then however Sleet would slip up. In this instance, his hums sounded more purposeful, but no less pleasing, Dingo hanging onto every mesmerizing note. Although the tune was familiar, he could not recall its name; a classical music enthusiast he was decidedly not. The best he could describe it as was swoopy, because of its gentle, dreamy rocking.

Just like with the pants, each leisurely spin stoked his faith in himself and encouraged him to try something new. Calling back what he had seen in previous balls when he wasn’t busy catapulting deviled eggs into wigs, he swept Sleet into a twirl. Not missing a beat, the wolf theatrically outstretched his arm as if reaching for an imaginary audience of his own—he held the pose for a not insignificant instant, perhaps for an equally imaginary spotlight—and upon the twirl back he closed their distance, rewrapping his arms around Dingo’s neck and pressing himself lightly into him. They danced cheek-to-cheek, allowing Dingo to drink in his faintly perfumed fur. Sleet’s humming drifted off into a contented, purring sigh that vibrated through Dingo’s entire being.

Then, Sleet noticed Dingo sorting through his memory for another move. “What is it? You’ve got that ‘I have a cabbage-brained idea look’ in your eyes.”

“I do. Er, I dunno if it’s cabbage-brained, but I do have an idea. I think it’s called an angel lift? I saw it on TV once.”

Sleet squinted.

“It’ll be cool, I promise!”  

He acquiesced, and in one grand, effortless swoop, Dingo grabbed Sleet by his pelvis and held him above his head. Initially, the wolf was startled, eyes wide and hackles prickling at his newfound altitude. But soon Sleet’s distress gave way to a hard-won, whooping laugh, Dingo feeling his dance partner’s muscles untense and, without any guidance, flow into the intended, soaring position.

The one thing Sleet apparently hadn’t accounted for was the spool of thread that had rolled onto the floor.

It made itself known by catching Dingo’s heel when he’d taken a step back, aiming to spin. “Whoa!” He immediately slipped and pitched backwards. Before they hit the floor, he managed to pull Sleet into a protective embrace, hoping his muscular frame would act as a cushion.

THUD!

His head connected hard with the tiling. Luckily, Dingo’s skull was thick, and he had a lifetime of experience handling falls. He hissed a small “oww” before checking in on Sleet, releasing his grip from his skinny form. “You okay?”

Eyes squeezed shut—Dingo presumed he had been steeling himself for a harsher impact—the wolf lay prone against him. This was entirely unusual. Typically whenever they fell Dingo was the one who ended up on top of him, and in such heaps their muzzles rarely ever faced each other. “Yes, I’m—” The novelty of the moment shook him a bit when he opened his eyes. “Oh!” Perhaps a bit was an understatement.

In their descent, Sleet’s hands had landed squarely on Dingo’s fulsome chest, one on each ab. That wasn’t so unusual. Dingo didn’t know why he reacted so strongly. Sleet touched his chest all the time, pulling the skin there as if it was an inbuilt leash. When he had an aside to share, he’d pull him in. When they were late to a meeting, he’d pull him along.

“Good sirs, Lord Ro—” They both looked over to the opening door. “Oh dear, have I interrupted something?” A robot, small, stately, distinctly not hailing from the SWATbot lineage. Hovering shiny and chrome, it didn’t have pockmarks or the spindash dents of a fighter, speaking in plummy chirps instead of impassive drones. This model probably had a specific name or designation. Dingo wasn’t sure and didn’t care. Right now, it was just an expensive-looking pest.

Sleet evidently agreed, launching upright and stomping towards him, fists balled tight. “Ever heard of knocking? I should have you melted into slag for such carelessness!”

The pest cowed. “I—er—I—” Dingo hadn’t thought it possible for a robot to be ashamed and embarrassed, at least not one of Robotnik’s, but the bot was proving him wrong in record time. Tapping its forefront digits together, it said.  “His Lordship. H-he sent me to inform you that the guests have begun to arrive. ”

Sleet’s hackles relaxed. “Tell His Lordship we’ll be right down.” He took an authoritative step forward. “I’m feeling magnanimous today, so I shall forgive your gross imprudence. See that it doesn’t happen again.”

“Yeah!” Dingo chimed in. “You pop your funny little frisbee head in here again without knockin’ I’ll . . . er . . . well, it won’t be pretty! Piss off before we ain’t so magnanimoose no more!”

It hurriedly dipped its funny little frisbee head and babbled penitential nothings before peeling for the exit.

“Nosy bots. Hmph.” Sleet slackened his power pose and dusted himself off. “Guess we better get going.” He extended a hand towards Dingo, offering to help him up. “Think you can go another round?”

Dingo’s gaze dropped to the floor. Considering, he sucked on his bottom lip again.

“Hey, Dingo.” The mutant looked up.  “Doesn’t Cindy win in the end, and Tabitha gets her just desserts?”

He accepted Sleet’s assistance and, stunned, was slow to respond.  “Yeah. Yeah, I guess she wins.” Did he hear him right? Musta conked my head real bad. “Y-you’ve seen Passing Notes 2? But I thought—you said you don’t—”

“It was for educational purposes,” Sleet explained. “Your behavior can be quite puzzling. I figured if I studied one of your favorite pieces of media I could better understand you.”

This time, Dingo let the tears run. Rather, he burst into tears, big, blubbering buckets of them.

“Why are you crying? Did you twist something?”

“I’m happy!” The word came out more like HEH-HHHAPEEE because of his sloppy, hitching breaths.  “They’re tears of joy!”

“Oh,” Sleet said, sounding somewhat discountenanced. “Well, that’s good. I’m glad you’re happy.” He grimaced when Dingo loudly blew his nose into his handkerchief. “Do see that you replace that. Will you dance?”

“Bloody oath I will!” Not gentlemanly. “I mean, uh, yes. Yes, I’d love to.”

Sleet put a hand on his shoulder. “You’ll get there. Clean yourself up.” Then, a pause, and a sigh. “And stop wagging your tail.”

[theangrycomet-art]

If you want to draw things from my AU's/Redesigns/OCs that's fine BUT you have to tag me (I wanna see it!)

Requests: closed

COMMISSIONS AVAILABLE:

KOFI

I am also Tumblr/AO3 Exclusive so if you see my work ANYWHERE else that was posted WITHOUT my permission and should be reported!

I have an Instagram account but I don’t post anything there- at least as of Sept. 2023.

AU Master Post

TFA Blackarachnia is NOT Elita-1 AU/Elita-1's Squadron in TFA AU: Basically TFA renditions of the Female Autobots with my take on TFA Elita-1 and the (slight) changes resulting from it. Blackarachnia was not named Elita-1 but Athena. Otherwise her backstory is the exact same.

How to Do A Hard Reset on a Doomed Timeline for Dum-Dums/Chrono Hard Reset AU (Donbot and Mira get sent back in time by Future!Renet, Ol’ Lady Renet, to prevent the M-Bomb from detonating and wiping out humanity and repair that glitch in time. However, they quickly realize that they can save more lives then they initially thought. TLDR: S4.5/ Season 4/5 Time Travel Fixit/Rewrite of TMNT 2012 ft. their Mutant Apaocalypse counterparts)

Sonic Underground Reprise (TLDR: Sonic Underground reboot, with a grimmer turn of events, I take things from the games and comics ‘cause I can :3)-(@juicenjamtime)

Glamrock Kids (FNAF AU where each Glamrock gets a Kid ft Glamrock Bonnie and Glamrock Foxy and his crew!)-(@flyingfazfoxes)

Loonatics Unleashed Redesigns (has slowly become a rewrite)

Sooga Back Then (Pucca Prequel)

Crossing Wires (Pokemon Royal/Fantasy AU, Diodeshipping focused, AO3)

ZoREIark AU (Hisuian Zoroark!Rei AU,connected to most of my Pokemon works)

Murphyborg/ 2D Milo (Milo Murphy's Law in 2nd Dimension)

Ok KO Let's be Gems (Ok KO cast but as Gems from Steven Universe)

MisMasked AU (RC9GN, but if Howard stole the mask before Randy even knew he had it)

Functional Engines AU (Ben 10 Reboot Sequel/Crossover w/ Reboot!GenRex)

Madly Broken AU (explore Mad Ben's dimension, Crossover, AO3)

CN Gen 2 (Basically my massive cartoon network fankids Universe) (@cngen2-archive )

D Crew AU (Disney XD characters working to explore the supernatural that has several extensive sideplots- look basically this is an All Grown Up AU for my disney faves)

OC Lore: Tag that covers information on any and all my OCs

AU Lore: Tag that covers information on any and all my AUs

There's probably more that I am forgetting tbh...

[ultraericthered]

Tier Ranking meme for Sonic the Hedgehog franchise villains.

Given how large and vast this franchise is, it took me quite a while to put together! (Scourge the Hedgehog fans, Please Do Not Interact) S Tier - Dr. Ivo Robotnik/Eggman Classic, Dr. Ivo Robotnik/Eggman Modern, Julian Kintobor/Robo-Robotnik/Ivo Robotnik (Archie Comics), Metal Sonic (All Versions), Dr. Zachary, and Dr. Finetivus.

A Tier - Dr. Ivo Robotnik/Eggman (OVA Anime), Dr. Eggman (Boom), Dr. Ivo Robotnik/Eggman (Paramount Pictures), Gerald Robotnik (Paramount Pictures), Shadow the Hedgehog (Paramount Pictures), Shadow the Hedgehog (SA2), Rouge the Bat (SA2), Heavy King, Erazor Djinn, the Metallix Empire, Ixis Naugus (Archie Comics), A.D.A.M, Dark Enerjak, Walter & Wendy Naugus, and Clutch the Opossum.

B Tier - Dr. Ivo Robotnik (AoStH), Dr. Ivo Robotnik/Eggman (IDW Comics), Mr. Dr. Eggman (Sonic Prime), Fang the Hunter/Nac the Weasel, Sage, Captain Whisker & Johnny, Dark Queen Merlina, Commander Brutus, Chaos (Fleetway Comics), Captain Claw, Snively Kintobor (SatAM & Archie Comics), Lien-Da, Kragok, Breezie (Archie Comics), Hypnobot, Shadow the Hedgehog (Boom), Mimic the Octopus, Surge the Tenrec and Kitsunami the Fennec, Rusty Rose, Knuckles the Dread, Miles "Nine" Prower, and Agent Stone.

C Tier - Dr. Julian Robotnik (SatAM), Dr. Ivo Robotnik (Fleetway Comics), Dr. Ivo Robotnik/Eggman (Dash & Spin!), Dr. Ivo Robotnik/Eggman (Sonic X), Chaos, Gerald Robotnik (SA2), Black Doom, Void, Emerl/Gemerl, King Arthur, Infinite, Grimer, Emperor Ko-Dorr, Locke the Echidna, Helmut von Stryker, the Xorda, Rouge the Bat (Archie Comics), the Egg Bosses, the Shellbreaker Crew, T.W. Barker, Morpho, Dixon, and Dr. Starline.

D Tier - Dr. Ivo Robotnik (Sonic Adventures), Dr. Eggman (manga), Momma Robotnik, Dr. Warpnik, Ixis Naugus (SatAM), Great Battle Kukku XV, Wendy Witchcart, Imperator Ix, the Babylon Rogues, Mephiles the Dark, Dark Gaia, Black Dragon, Megatox, Captain Plunder, Vermin the Cybernik, Boss Krouch, Mammoth Mogul, Geoffery St. John, Dimitri/Enerjak, Kage von Stryker, Nic the Weasel, Uma Arachnis, the Lightning Bolt Society, Nominatus, and Charlie & Belinda.

E Tier - Lord Robotnik (Underground), the Biolizard, King Boom Boo, Nega Mother Whisp, Iblis, Ifrit, Eggman Nega, the Deadly Six, The End, Wes Weasley, Dr. Brandon Quark, Katella the Space Huntresss, the Evil One, Max Gamble, Fleabyte the Bounty Hunter, Super Sonic, Crocbot, Warlord Kodos, Hunter, Eclipse the Darkling, Dark Oak, the Froglodytes, Jack Sinclair, and the Buyer.

F Tier - Dr. Eggman-In-Name-Only (Sonic 06), Lyric the Last Ancient, Mesmer the Goat, Omen the Rat, Trogg/Shirob, Death-Trap, Princess Kupacious, Colonel Percy Granite, Agent X, the Leaf, Doctor Genius, King Sonic, Drago Wolf, Sleuth Doggy Dog, Dr. Ian Droid, Mecha "M" Robotnik, Evil Sonic/Scourge the Hedgehog, Fiona Fox, Rosie the Rascal, Thrash the Devil, the Iron Dominion, King Shadow, and the Sand Blasted Freedom Fighters.

[7grandmel]

Todays rip: 14/04/2024

Thwâmpröck Desert

Season 8 No Album Release (Read More) Thwomp Desert (OST Version) - Mario Kart Wii

Ripped by Madinstance

So you know how yesterday's post was about a ripper with a very clearly defined niche of work, with Jamangar and Locked In The Underground? And earlier in the week I was covering the sheer prowess of ripper Madinstance, the raw power he exudes with I will Never be a Redneck? And just a few more days before that, where I talked about how much Mario Kart Wii's music means to me with Sweatpants Select? Well amidst my lineup of possible future posts, I slowly realized how perfectly Thwâmpröck Desert fit all three categories - a great way to end the week, and another Season 8 rip to boot.

Madinstance is an exceptionally skilled ripper, that much I hope I've made clear over my past posts on him. But with a few exceptions from time to time aside, he's also a ripper with a rather particular focus - a lot of his greatest rips, such as Every Mob Wants to Rule My World, Fell From a High Place (Reprise) and M​-​O​-​O​-​G City, are all focused on paying respects to Minecraft and its legendary original composer C418, wheras recently Initial Deluxe (I've Just Raced on this Course Before) appears to reveal a newfound love for the Mario Kart series. You may think at first thumbnail glance that Thwâmpröck Desert is an extension of that, a rip of a Mario Kart game, but there's one more field of his expertise that I'm yet to cover on here. C418 is beloved by many, yes, but within those privy to video game music history, particularly in the chiptune community, few composers are as revered and celebrated as the Follin brothers, Tim Follin and Geoff Follin.

To VGM aficionados, they need no introduction - but then, its those same aficionados who would know such things as that Robocop on Game Boy of all games has amazing music, as I discussed in Viva La Robocop. Most others, those who are primarily video game fans, will simply choose their favorite composer based on their own favorite games. That's completely valid too, of course, many long-running franchises like Kingdom Hearts, Sonic the Hedgehog, Dark Souls and so forth have key people composing for them that are incredibly distinct, to where you KNOW what a Kingdom Hearts game will sound like, what a Dark Souls game will sound like, and so on. Yet what makes the Follin brothers so fascinating in contrast, is that their soundtracks were attached to all kinds of games from all sorts of places: Ecco the Dolphin on Dreamcast, Silver Surfer on NES, Pictionary on NES, Plok! on Super Nintendo - practically the entire spectrum of games of the 80s and 90s, from shovelware to all-time classics, the Follins contributed to. Yet to them, the individual game quality hardly mattered! Be it Pictionary or Plok, Tim and Geoff Follin composed every soundtrack like it was their life's greatest achievement, creating full-on chiptune prog-rock in games that had NO business going that hard (I know that's a bit of an overdone and reductive turn of phrase, but really - PICTIONARY???) The brothers knew how to make any platform they were working on positively sing, and their obscure weirdo games have become titans amidst VGM enthusiasts as a result. An underdiscussed side of video game history, still cherished by a specific subset of nerds yet today.

Which, then, brings us back to Thwâmpröck Desert - an arrangement of one of Tim Follin's most insane pieces, the title screen music for NES game Solstice. It deserves a listen all of its own - the way it fakes you out with the most barebones little ditty of all time before switching into a rock masterpiece is an absolute work of art, and the piece just keeps growing from there, at once impossibly layered yet incredibly cohesive. Madinstance LOVES ripping the Follins' work, he's made a name for himself in part for ripping the SNES game Plok! in particular during Season 6 and Season 7, yet even still I was unsure how well Thwâmpröck Desert could really work. Its not a rip of a Follin composed game like the aforementioned Plok! rips - its arranging this impossibly dense piece of music into a song that already sounds like the violin version of pure, yet elegant, panic. Yet I suppose that also makes it the perfect fit for the Solstice title theme's sheer density - and when actually listening to Thwâmpröck Desert, its hard to imagine that Thwomp Desert ever sounded any different.

It's just - GAAHH!!! Its fucking mind-boggling how good it sounds, how this odd song I'd barely thought about from Mario Kart Wii wound up being the perfect template to arrange Follin's music into. The melody's string instruments are perfect for the Solstice title theme's pure distilled chaos whilst still capturing that sense of elegance and flow, and the most quirky instruments still present in Thwomp Desert add a delightful texture to the arrangement. I have to pause it every 10 or so seconds I listen to just process all that I've heard - the percussion, lead, backing, the progression of the song, its all handled absolutely masterfully, I cannot BELIEVE this was just dropped on us on a normal tuesday! I will Never be a Redneck was at least a season premiere!!

Whew...well, alright, I hope you get the picture - The Follin brothers' music fucking rocks, and I am SO glad that a ripper as amazing as Madinstance has taken it upon himself to pay regular tribute to their work. Games like Mario Kart Wii are leagues more mainstream than the games that the Follins typically worked on, and the idea of SiIvaGunner getting less VGM-savvy viewers to find out about these legendary composers - it just makes me really happy! Madinstance's rips are bangers to be sure, but much like Beautiful! ~ Curveball of Sean Kingston, like Beyond the Floating Isles, like Gate Happy: they're bangers that can also open up a whole new world of musical interests to viewers like you and I. And isn't that just the coolest way for SiIvaGunner's art of subversion to live on in?

(oh, also, its called Thwâmpröck Desert because the Solstice NES game takes place in "Kâstleröck" and I just found that very funny)

[cxlliefxngames]

sonia and manic are the 2 sides of my gender presentation actually

[lunar-solarsystem]

GEKSKAKAOSNK

Spaniard makes his appearance once again!! :D

YIPPEE ANGSSTT EHSJSNKS

Tw: Robot Gore

Yea I never told y’all WHO repaired Sun in CU-

It was Spaniard, he’s someone willing to assist Sun to the best of his abilities, of whom he knows is wanted by the Creator and yet won’t rat out Sun’s location. Sun probably knew Spaniard because Spaniard’s brothers(the other 2 ai) were royal butlers while the twins and Spaniard were growing up(he’s about 1-2 years younger than the twins).

Spaniard took up mechanics as a hobby only recently, so while he was fixing Sun to the best of his abilities with his limited resources… it was a terrible job- (At least Sun could walk and function well enough-)

Here Spaniard had stopped the leaking, patched up the torso, and removed all the unsalvageable parts of Sun’s legs that could still be directly attached to the torso. So now he’s working on making it so Sun could have his formerly ripped off left arm. They are both still covered in oil as Spaniard has been doing his best to fix Sun as much as possible, there will be break periods but for right now he’s just trying to help Sun be in less pain. Sun is in immense pain currently as he hasn’t built his pain tolerance yet.

Anyways good night guys!

[thecreaturecodex]

Saltor

Image by Thomas M Baxa, © TSR, Inc.

[The last of the illithdae from Dragon 150, and the one that I think was best served by Lords of Madness. D&D 3.5 gave it its own unique ability, a sonic scream that acts as a lo-fi version of an illithid's mind blast. The Dragon Magazine version comes in multiple HD forms, but I took the Lords of Madness approach, and just used the highest HD version.]

Saltor CR 5 LE Aberration This creature resembles a hairless monkey the size of a goat, with a long canine muzzle surrounded by thin, flexible tentacles. It carries a spear in its hands, tipped with a stone point.

Saltors are illithidae that are fairly close relatives to mind flayers themselves, being the equivalent to an illithid as a monkey is to a human. Unlike true mind flayers, saltors do not have extreme sexual dimorphism—males and females look functionally identical to each other. They do undergo a form of ceremorphosis, however, raising tadpoles in pools and placing them in the partially emptied skulls of humanoids. Saltors use small humanoids as their hosts and do not compete with illithids for corpses.

Saltors typically live and travel in groups. A troop will have a central hub containing its breeding pool, and then bands will split off in order to forage. They are omnivorous with a taste for fungi and meat, and especially prey on small humanoids such as derro or svirfneblin in order to use their corpses to reproduce as well. Saltors prefer to attack from ambush and keep at range, hurling magic missiles and javelins to weaken prey before closing to melee. Their terrible scream acts as both weapon and alarm call, and a lone saltor that screams will likely have a half dozen of its fellows close behind to back it up.

Of the various kinds of illithidae, saltors are among the most likely to be found in a mind flayer colony. Mind flayers see them as just the right combination of useful and disposable, and saltors for their part view illithids as something like demigods. In addition to acting as foot soldiers and laborers, saltors may be found serving mind flayers as experimental subjects, sacrificial victims or emergency rations, all of which the saltors accept as their rightful place.  

A saltor stands about three feet tall. Their own technology is at a Stone Age level, and they covet metal weapons and tools. Saltors advance by class level, and often take levels in barbarian or psychic.

Saltor    CR 5 XP 1,600 LE Small aberration Init +4; Senses darkvision 60 ft., Perception +10 Defense AC 17, touch 16, flat-footed 12 (+1 size, +4 Dex, +1 dodge, +1 natural) hp 51 (6d8+24) Fort +6, Ref +6, Will +6 Resist sonic 10; SR 16 Weakness light blindness, sunlight sickness Offense Speed 30 ft., climb 30 ft. Melee 2 slams +7 (1d4+2 plus grab), bite +7 (1d6+2) or masterwork spear +8 (1d6+3/x3), bite +5 (1d6+1) Ranged javelin +9 (1d4+2) Special Attacks pith (bite), screech Spell-like Abilities CL 5th, concentration +7 3/day—blur, magic missile 1/day—haste (self only) Statistics Str 14, Dex 18, Con 19, Int 11, Wis 12, Cha 14 Base Atk +4; CMB +5; CMD 21 Feats Deadly Aim,Dodge, Multiattack Skills Acrobatics +17, Climb +19, Perception +10, Stealth +17; Racial Modifiers +4 Acrobatics, +4 Perception Languages Undercommon Ecology Environment underground Organization solitary, pair, band (3-10) or troop (10-40) Treasure standard (Small masterwork spear, 5 Small masterwork javelins, other treasure) Special Abilities Pith (Ex)A saltor can make a coup de grace attempt with its bite attack as a full round action without provoking attacks of opportunity against a helpless or pinned opponent. This coup de grace does not function against creatures that have no head or no brain, and creatures with multiple heads are not killed if they fail the save (although that head is no longer functional). Screech (Su) Once per day as a standard action, a saltor can give a terrible screech. All creatures in a 30 foot cone take 3d6 points of sonic damage and are stunned for 1 round. A successful DC 15 Fortitude save negates the stunning effect. The save DC is Charisma based. Sunlight Sickness (Ex) In an area of natural sunlight, a saltor is sickened.