Two Nights at Crazy Carl's - Part Three

Sonic slept in the next day, not getting up until past Noon, but he still felt exhausted.

"Ugh, I'm never drinking three Monsters ever again," he said sleepily as he swung his feet off the bed and pulled on his shoes. His mouth was dry and he had a bit of a headache. Maybe it was just because he had slept in a strange bed too? He stretched and looked around Carl's spare bedroom, swinging his feet a bit. There were just a few family photos hung on the wall and a plain wooden dresser with an old folding chair leaning next to it.

After doing some quick calisthenics, he threw open the heavy curtain and winced at the midday sunlight, yanking it closed while doing a vampire impression and hissing away from the light.

Ozzie announced himself with a soft bark, nosing open the spare bedroom door.

"How did you sleep, Ozz? Better than me, I hope," he ruffled Ozzie's fur and scratched behind his ears. Ozzie's tag wagged furiously. "You want breakfast?"

Ozzie immediately ran off to the kitchen, but Sonic had already beaten him there, setting down the full dog bowl just as he arrived, wiping his hands from washing the can in the sink. Ozzie began eating eagerly without missing a beat. Sonic leaned on the kitchen counter and looked around.

"Carl?" Sonic called out, but not too loudly, in case he was sleeping.

Sonic poked his head down the hallway and noticed Carl's bedroom door was ajar. He carefully walked up, feeling a sudden sense of dread. "Maybe we shouldn't have watched that scary movie? Nah, I'm just being paranoid," he muttered. Talking aloud to himself was a habit he still hadn't been able to break, especially when he was nervous.

"Caaaarlllll?" Sonic crooned, nudging open the door. He peeked inside.

Carl's bed was unmade, but there didn't appear to be anyone sleeping in it, most of the sheets in a crumpled pile on the floor.

"Carl?"

Sonic zoomed around the room, checking multiple locations at once, the closet, under the bed, behind a chair, opening a window, but he stopped in the middle of the room.

"Are you trying to scare me? It's not gonna work!" he shouted, his voice echoing a bit in the empty hallway.

Sonic checked the rest of the house, and the backyard, before coming to rest in the front yard, scratching his head. That's when he noticed…

Carl's RV was gone.

"Carl!?" Sonic cupped his hands around his mouth, calling loudly. "Some babysitter you turned out to be!"

A gentle breeze blew in response, spinning some of the colorful decorations on his lawn.

"Seriously, who's babysitting who, here?" Sonic muttered, kneeling down in the dirt driveway, spotting a pair of tire tracks. He blasted off, following them deeper into the forest.

Sonic soon arrived in a clearing, spotting Carl's RV.

Zipping up to the driver's seat, he peered in the window, and couldn't help but smirk. There Carl was, asleep at the wheel, his head lying on top of his trusty pair of binoculars, a bit of drool rolling down the edge of them.

Sonic's smirk turned evil. "Like I'm gonna pass this up!"

He ducked out of sight, chuckling.

A large branch snapping in half made Carl wake up instantly. He stood up in his seat, dumping his binoculars onto his lap and bumping his head on the RV roof.

"Gal-DURN-it! What in tarnation!?"

He rubbed his eyes and peered around the clearing, scrambling for his binoculars.

Rattling bushes caught his attention. "There you are, you son of a-" They stopped suddenly.

Carefully, he set the binoculars down on his dashboard, when more bushes began to rattle on the other side of the clearing. At first, he seemed confused, but then he glanced at the clock on his dash and grinned. Looks like someone was up early today. But this time, Old Crazy Carl was gonna get the worm - or hedgehog, so to speak.

Carl stalked towards the bushes, trying not to crack up and give himself away.

The bushes kept rattling, and as Carl crept closer, his grin got wider. "I've got you this time," he whispered.

"AH-HA!" Carl dove forward and pulled apart the bushes, discovering a terrified squirrel who immediately screeched and ran up the nearest tree.

"BOO!" Sonic shouted as he landed on Carl's shoulders, covering his eyes with his hands.

"JEHOSHAPHAT!" Carl swung around, stumbling over his own feet and falling down, right into a large pillow Sonic had placed there, exploding into a shower of goose feathers raining down.

Sonic zipped in front of him, stifling a giggle.

"Go on, then. Let it out."

Sonic cackled, doubling over, "I got you! I got you good!"

"I knew it was you! I knew it!"

"Yeah, but I knew that you knew, and you're too slow!"

Carl brushed the feathers off of himself and stood up. "Anyhow, what are you doing out here?"

"Me? What are YOU doing out here?"

"Musta nodded off."

"Uh-huh..." Sonic gathered up the feathers, stuffing them back inside the pillow. He tied a knot in the end and shoved it through the open passenger side window. "No, I mean why are you out here?"

"Something triggered one of my traps. Something big."

"How big?"

"Big enough to leave that," Carl pointed down at the ground, "You're standing in one."

Sonic looked down to discover he was indeed standing inside a large indent in the ground. Looking around him he began to notice a trail of them.

"Whoa…"

"Some kind of footprint, but I ain't never seen anything like it. Have you?"

Sonic stepped out of it and carefully knelt down. Long Claw had tried to teach him basic tracking long ago, but he had always been too carefree to really remember (or even pay attention) to her lectures. He frowned a little. They would really come in handy about now.

The shape was definitely bird-like, but not like any bird Sonic had ever seen. The biggest bird he had seen around Green Hills was a golden eagle, and they definitely didn't stumble around the forest floor like this trail was showing.

"Anyway, I lost the trail down at the creek," he pointed beyond the trees.

"So you decided to camp out here and see if it would come back?"

"Yep."

"Uh, weren't you supposed to be babysitting me last night? The sheriff will be awful mad..."

"No! Don't tell Tom!"

"Oh, I won't… as long as you give me some ice cream," Sonic grinned.

"I ain't got any ice cream."

"Then you'd better get some. My silence doesn't come cheap."

Sonic's grin grew wider. Carl finally threw up his hands in defeat.

"Oh fine! Get in."

"YES!" Sonic whooped, leaping through the passenger window and buckling up.

After a trip to the grocery store for a pint of ice cream (they finally chose cookies and cream, the only flavor they could agree on) and a bunch of toppings, they settled back in at Carl's house, gorging themselves on homemade ice-cream sundaes.

Sonic used his spoon to scrape every last tasty morsel from his bowl. "You know, Carl, I'm kinda surprised you even wanted me to come over."

"Why do you say that?"

"Well, you know... after all the things I've done… over the years. I haven't exactly been nice to you..."

"Sure you stole a couple - well, a hell of a lot of batteries from me - and you did give me the runaround most summer nights, but... Looking back on it, it was pretty fun. Truth be told, I was getting bored until you came to town. Sides, Tom explained everything, I know you didn't mean anything by it. You were just trying to survive. Just make sure you don't steal no more, got it?"

"Yeah, I know."

"So whatcha wanna do tonight?"

"Can we watch another movie?"

Carl smirked. He had a feeling that's what Sonic would ask for, so he had a whole stack of VHS tapes ready for him to pick from. He laid them out across his coffee table, letting Sonic pick them up and examine them.

There was Pet Sematary (1985), Friday the 13th Part 1, War of the Worlds (1953), but Sonic's hand stopped over one that looked much newer than the others: The Ring.

"The Ring…" Sonic said quietly, imagining his own golden rings, safe at home, hidden in the secret stash under his bed. He picked it up and turned it over, looking at the pictures and skimming the text.

"What's this one about?"

"A cursed VHS tape!"

"Then how come it's called The Ring and not The Tape?"

"I s'pose you'll have to watch it to find out."

"Aw c'mon, can't you tell me a little bit more! Please?"

"Well, the curse is that whoever watches the VHS tape dies after 7 days!"

"What?! Oh my god, we have to watch this one right now!"

A second later the VHS tape was playing and Sonic was sitting on the couch with a bowl of popcorn, his mouth already crunching loudly on some as he offered the bowl to Carl.

Carl grinned and sat down beside him, grabbing a handful.

After they finished watching The Ring, Sonic couldn't stop talking about it for an hour, asking a ton of questions and Carl doing his best to answer what he could, given that he didn't know very much about Seattle, and he also didn't know much about the original film, Ringu, which was much harder to find for someone who lived in a small town. The barrage of questions finally ended though as Sonic got hyped up for another movie. This kid devoured films like Cookie Monster snarfed down cookies.

"What are we gonna watch next? Ohh! What about Pet Sematary?" He put The Ring back in its sleeve and retrieved Pet Sematary from the coffee table, grinning as he teasingly pulled it out of the sleeve.

Carl glanced at the clock. It was past nine, and he had kept him up a little late last night ghost-hunting. "I don't know that we have time for another movie before bedtime."

"Aw, just one more, please? Then I'll go to bed! I promise!"

Sonic made the most adorably sad face Carl had ever seen, his lower lip quivering, "Pwetty pwease, Cah-wul?"

Carl rolled his eyes, "Alright," he waved a hand, and before he could blink, the next tape was playing, and Sonic was perched on the edge of the couch, feet swinging excitedly as the opening credits played over ethereal music. Sonic's eyes were wide with anticipation.

Carl didn't realize Sonic had even fallen asleep until he was watching the character Jud walk up the steps, eyes wide, and Sonic's loud snore made him jump off the couch and nearly yelp in surprise. He paused the movie and looked over to see Sonic slumped over a throw pillow. He shifted around and snored a little more. He was surprised the kid hadn't woken himself up with a snore that loud. Kid could probably sleep through a tornado, Carl thought.

"Damn kid gave me a fright," Carl muttered, shaking his head and looking down at him. He checked his watch. It was past his own bedtime too. For a moment, he wondered if he should move Sonic, but he didn't want to wake him up. Instead he brought out some blankets and carefully moved his head back onto a bigger pillow, being careful of his quills.

"Sometimes, dead is better," Sonic quoted perfectly in his sleep, and Carl had to hold in another laugh as he covered him up with the blankets.

"Goodnight, you little scamp."

A soft rumble shook Sonic awake on the couch. He blinked and yawned as another rumble rattled him. This one was a little more powerful.

"Huh?" He started to sit up, but another rumble made him roll off the couch, knocking his knee into the coffee table.

"What the?!" He scrambled to his feet, completely alert now, his heart pounding as his eyes began to shimmer a soft blue, "Carl?"

He didn't waste any time, running to Carl's room. The door was ajar and he rushed to his side, gently shaking his sleeping form.

"Carl!"

Carl snorted and coughed, flinging himself upright, eyes wide. He settled when he saw Sonic standing there, looking frightened, his glare softening immediately.

He started to ask what Sonic was doing when the entire house shook.

"There's something out there! Something BIG!" Sonic grabbed his arm, practically yanking him out of bed.

Carl didn't need to be told twice, though he stopped to slip on his robe over his pajamas and his house shoes, letting Sonic hold his hand as they crept towards the living room. They both peered between the blinds, gazing around the yard.

"See anything?"

"SHH!"

"Right! I'll be quiet! I'm good at being quiet!"

Sonic's ears flickered and then he held his hands over them, crying out.

"What's wrong?"

"You don't HEAR that?"

"Hear what!?"

Sonic doubled over, curling into a tight ball. "That high-pitched squeal!"

Carl stuck his pinkie finger in his ear and cleared out some wax, but nope, he didn't hear a single thing.

Before he could ask further, Sonic sat up again, sighing with relief.

BAM! The whole house shook again. They looked around. Thankfully, Carl didn't have a lot of breakable things.

BAM! More things toppled to the floor. Whatever it was, it was getting closer. Sonic swallowed. This was bad. Whatever this was would definitely wreck Carl's house. He'd be lucky if he had a house left. So there was only one thing to do. Lure it away.

Carl saw him leaving and tried to grab his arm, but all he got was a fistful of air.

"Sonic! Come back!" Carl shouted as the door swung back towards him. He pushed it aside and shouted after him, "It's too dangerous!"

"Gal-durn-it! Tom is gonna kill me!" Carl muttered, scrambling to grab his 12-gauge shotgun leaning against his porch swing. He took a moment to load it, and grabbed an additional fistful of green buckshot shells from a tin bucket, stuffing them in his robe pocket. Ozzie was hot on his heels, whining loudly.

"No. You stay here, Ozz! Sit!"

Ozzie sat, but his ears folded down. He whined even louder, his tail whipping back and forth.

"Oh fine, guess I could use your nose. Find Sonic, okay boy? Find Sonic!"

Ozzie barked and sniffed the ground, then took off, Carl right behind him as the loud stomping grew closer.

It was darker that night than it had been yesterday. Still a few hours before the sun would rise. Carl stumbled in his slippers and eventually kicked them off, finding it easier to run barefoot to keep up with Ozzie, his robe fluttering in the night air.

Sonic slid under a falling pine tree as it crashed into the ground, skidding to a halt in the dirt just before he slammed into what he quickly realized wasn't another tree but a giant mechanical leg. The robot straightened up to its full height, which was at least taller than Carl's house. Sonic stood in shock for a moment before darting away as it lifted its leg up and came down towards him, snapping the fallen tree trunk in half where he'd been standing a moment earlier.

"Too slow!" Sonic called as he halted a few feet behind it.

Running around it had given him ample time to look it over. There was no doubt in this mind that this was a Robotnik robot. It had the same black sheen as the three-tiered vehicle that had literally ripped apart Tom's old pickup, and a giant red eye was in the center of its round body. Besides the two legs that definitely matched the large footprints near Carl's trailer last night, it also had two smaller but bulky arms, fitted with C-shaped pinchers that clanked open and closed as it grabbed at where Sonic had been, each time missing him.

It finally turned and now the red eye was focusing, gazing down at him. A pair of bright lights temporarily blinded him as they snapped open, making it look like additional eyes.

"Back for another round, Robotnik?" Sonic dared, his whole body glowing brightly as waves of energy sparked across his fur, "Well, I aim to please."

Sonic wasn't sure what to think about Robotnik himself at the moment, (especially since Sonic had personally banished him to the Mushroom Planet himself) only that he needed to take this thing down before it hurt someone. He'd worry about whoever (or whatever) was actually piloting it later.

The arm darted towards him again, but Sonic easily dodged as it gripped the trunk of a huge pine tree instead.

"Missed me again!" Sonic teased, but stepped back when the robot easily wretched the tree free from the ground, the trunk spilling bits of root and dirt. The robot gripped the tree like a baseball bat, preparing to swing.

"Uh-oh."

Sonic's speed allowed him to easily dodge the 360-degree swing, but there were suddenly trees raining down all around them in slow motion. He tripped over one while trying to dodge another and skidded, rolling just out of the way as another huge trunk missed him by inches. He slammed into another smaller falling tree as it fell, pinning him down.

Sonic groaned as he kicked and heaved, trying to lift the trunk off himself. The robot began to stomp closer. It discarded the broken tree trunk like a used chopstick and snagged another bigger trunk, holding it up high over its head, ready to bring it down onto Sonic. It couldn't end like this! It just couldn't!

Time suddenly resumed as a sharp whistle suddenly made the bot turn away from Sonic..

"Over here, you overgrown harvester!" Carl hollered as he raised his shotgun and fired two rounds of buckshot, shattering the glass lens of the robot's eye and putting tiny dents all over its metallic body. Carl fumbled in his robe pocket for two new shells, popping open the shotgun and loading them.

"Carl!" Sonic shouted, "You can't take that thing down!"

"I'll sure as hell try," he said, cocking the gun and then shooting again, this time aiming for the robot's hand. It moved the trunk to block the shot but the sudden movement threw the bot off balance and the blasted trunk clattered to the ground. The robot whirled, recalibrating, slowly standing back up.

Carl set the shotgun down as he bear-hugged the pine trunk and lifted it off Sonic, who was able to zoom out next to him, which was good because he couldn't hold it for long and it crashed back down.

"I've got an idea!" Sonic shouted and zipped off, returning with a long length of rope.

"Hold on tight!" Sonic said, shoving one end of the rope at Carl as he blasted off with the rest.

Carl was bewildered but tightened his grip, widening his stance. He had no idea what Sonic was up to, but at this point, he was open to suggestions.

"When I say go, pull!"

Sonic whipped around the robot's legs several times, and then skidded to a stop.

"GO!"

Sonic ran backwards as fast as he could as Carl pulled as well, trying not to get pulled off his own feet. Thankfully, the robot was the only one who did as the ropes closed and pulled its legs together. It began to topple to one side, arms swinging to grab anything it could. Unfortunately, there weren't any trees left for it to grab. It stumbled over one of the fallen ones.

"TIMBER!" Sonic yelled, dodging it and dropping the rope.

Carl yelled as well and grabbed his shotgun, cocking it and firing it again at the bot. This time, the shots did piece the metal, leaving sparking holes. He loaded again as Sonic divebombed by curling his body into a sparking ball of energy. He left an even bigger hole in the center, cutting straight through.

The robot flailed but Sonic and Carl continued to scream and shoot and ram into it until it finally stopped, the red lights finally dimming from its shattered glass eye, smoke rising up from it.

Sonic skidded to a halt next to Carl who fell to his knees, both of them panting and feeling high from the adrenaline rush. They looked at each other for a long moment and then smiled, laughing and hugging each other tightly.

"That was so cool! I didn't know you were secretly Arnold Schwarzenegger!"

"And you're one hell of a blue devil, through and through," Carl said, "But I'm real glad you're on our side."

"Like I would let anything bad happen to my favorite neighbor," Sonic grinned and Carl playfully ruffled his quills. "Looks like your bigfoot turned out to have two left feet."

Carl nodded, "Is this one of that robot doctor fellow's thingies? I thought you sent him packing?"

"I did," Sonic said, examining the fallen robot. "There's no way he could make it back here without one of my rings."

"Then who's driving that?"

Sonic glared into the remains of the shattered lens.

"Whoever they are, they need to leave me and my friends alone!" he shouted and stomped one last time, making sure to destroy whatever camera was in there.

Sonic's voice echoed as the viewscreen cut to black.

Stone screamed into a pillow, throwing it back down onto his makeshift cot beside the Doctor's chair. (He still couldn't think of it as his chair.) All those days of learning the complex controls and performing target practice drills had been worthless after all. The hedgehog had snuffed him in minutes out without barely breaking a sweat. He supposed it would take him years to develop the Doctor's natural skills to pilot his badniks with any sort of finesse.

And what could he do now? Now that he had trashed the Doctor's last remaining trump card, the one intact robot that was left in the truck. There was no Doctor here to build him any more. He had used it up. All he had left were four working spybots and those were clearly no match for Sonic.

No, if he was going to have any chance of getting one of the hedgehog's rings, he was going to need a less-direct plan. Something that would make the Doctor grin in delight. For now, he didn't have the mind power left to think about it, so he downed the rest of his now cold coffee and went to bed, powering down the truck for the night to save what energy it had left.

The next afternoon, Sonic stood up on Carl's fence, waving frantically as Tom pulled up in his pick-up truck. Ozzie barked excitedly, both front paws up on the fence, his tail wagging.

Maddie rolled down the passenger side window, "See?" she elbowed Tom, "I told you they'd be fine."

"Anything happen while we were gone?" Tom asked. He wasn't sure he trusted either of the giant grins on their faces. They looked far too innocent.

"Nope." Carl said.

"Just two wild and crazy guys having fun watching movies!" Sonic added, putting an arm around Carl.

Tom had a hard time believing that, but couldn't find any physical evidence to the contrary. Crazy Carl's house looked just as odd as ever, but nothing seemed out of place or on fire or well, anything suspicious. Which is exactly why it made him more suspicious. Ozzie barked, jumping up to the open window to lick Maddie's face.

"Who's Mama's good boy? It's you, Ozzie!"

"Sonic!" Jojo squealed from the backseat, bouncing and waving frantically. "Gotta go fast! Gotta go fast!"

"Time for me to go, Carl. My fan club awaits!"

Tom rolled his eyes, but smiled at Carl, "Thanks again, Carl. You're a lifesaver."

"Shucks, the little blue devil can come and visit anytime he wants. In fact, ya'll should come over for a barbeque sometime," Carl said, carefully lifting Sonic over the fence and handing him the duffel bag of Ozzie's things.

Sonic tossed them into the truck bed and ran over to the open rear door, sitting eagerly next to Jojo who immediately hugged him. Ozzie jumped in behind Sonic and crawled over him, licking Jojo as well, making her giggle. Sonic shut the door as they drove back to 55 Plymouth Road.

Sonic stood up on the seat and took one last look out the back window and saw that Carl was watching him go, waving. He waved back, surprised by the sudden sadness washing over him. Crazy Carl wasn't so bad after all. He was actually really good. The best Carl, as a matter of fact.

"Hey Tom? Can I stay over at Carl's next weekend?"

Tom sighed, but smiled at Sonic in the rearview mirror, relieved that he hadn't come back to find a forest fire or an exploded house. Sonic genuinely looked like he meant it too. Maybe things would finally become somewhat normal in Green Hills again - as normal as they could get with a supersonic alien teenager running around anyway.

Author's Note: Thanks again for your patience, Dear Readers. I was on a roll writing this when the Sonic movie first came out, but the current state of "Quarantine Life" has made things much harder to deal with lately, especially my anxiety and depression. I've had a few really bad days between then and now and it's been hard to unleash my creativity without constantly second-doubting myself.

Honestly, I was very afraid this chapter wouldn't live up to everyone's lofty expectations, so it's been important to remind myself that I'll never please everyone (especially since this is the Sonic fanbase we're talking about) and to just have fun with it, as that's what initially got me writing this in the first place - all the joy from the new movie. I've taken liberty with a few details here and there, but I hope you can still enjoy it despite any inherent flaws. Like Carl, I'm only human. I decided to finish this episode and move on.

If you're struggling to create things too, I hope these words encourage you to pick up whatever project you've been meaning to work on and be creative, whatever it may be.

For the moment, I still have more Blue Devil Tales to tell, so I will be back!