STRANDED [ON HOLD]

Rude Awakening

Tails smiles with a jokingly-sinister smile as he inches out of his room and tiptoes to the kitchen at the asscrack of dawn. He grabs two frying pans and feels the need to slam them together in order to wake everyone up. He was going to continue with the Vine as well, if it wasn't for a pillow hurtling towards him going 90mph. He falls to the ground in a dazed state and the culprit walks back into his room and dusts his hands off, throwing himself back onto his nice comfy bed. Someone finds Tails on the ground and pokes him, before shrugging and continuing to go to the kitchen to eat Honey Nut Cheerios, which is a terrible idea, considering they aren't the bee who enjoys this cereal and asked specifically for it for himself. Rude awakening for everyone today, huh? This is the same person who told the other one to throw a pillow at Tails to knock him out, Espio. Not the one for violence typically... well, you would be mistaken. He eats the poor bee's cereal and doesn't waste a single drop of the skim milk he poured into the bowl BEFORE the cereal. Talk about a psychopath.

About an hour goes by before the next pair comes out of their room, Shadow and Blaze. Espio does a quick two finger wave to them before he gets to his next game of Mario Kart, playing as Roy Koopa. Shadow and Blaze hop over the couch and sit next to him, asking for controllers, and he points to the controllers near the dock, charging next to the TV. They each grab a set of remotes and pick their characters. Shadow plays as Dry Bones because he is the edge lord himself, while Blaze picks Bowser Jr., she's always had a soft spot for the little spiky dude. The first race was Wild Woods, and Blaze dominated, giving her an easy fifteen points to the leaderboard. The next race was Baby Park, and surprisingly enough, Shadow won this one after bombing Espio, who was in first, last minute. Blaze ended up more in the middle of the line up, which brought her down one place from her first ranking position. The third race they did was none other than Mushroom Gorge. Shadow fell at least once every lap, which was quite hilarious to the other two, but also a good distraction. Shadow had also changed his character to Toad, per request that he felt like the character was his issue, not operator error. The other two did not believe him. Blaze ended up pulling ahead again and was victorious in the first race out of now four once again. Espio picked Waluigi Pinball as the next race, and he came out on top, but Blaze was second so she still ranked first. Shadow still found himself at the back of the line, and almost chucks his controller to the ground, but realizes Tails would kill him, even though he could probably build a new Joy-Con in minutes. He walks away to cool himself down, leaving Espio and Blaze to continue to be neck and neck, almost killing each other after each race and annoying each other before the next race starts.

Thirty minutes later Rouge and Sonic walk out of their rooms. They both have the same squinty-eye exhausted look on their faces as they turn to look at each other. They each blink slowly at the other and trudge out to the kitchen. Sonic is wrapped in a blue blanket, while Rouge is wrapped in a robe and a purple blanket and has her hair in curlers. They both look down, blink slowly again, and step over the passed out Tails in the middle of the floor. Rouge makes a coffee and Sonic grabs a can of pre-workout. Silver floats out of his room, about as exhausted as the last two, and lands in the middle of Espio and Blaze, who barely notice. He lays his head on Blaze's shoulder, who is too focused to realize because she is working on saving her Super Horn for the Blue Shell that is speeding towards her while she is in first place on 3DS Rainbow Road.

Cream and Amy walk out into the hallway and smile, then hug each other before continuing to the kitchen. Both of their bangs are in curlers, but the rest of their hair looks like they haven't brushed it in days. Amy trudges along to Sonic in her red slippers and smiles up at him. He opens his blanket like a pair of wings and she scoots in and he wraps his arms around her. She smiles in bliss as she breathes in his calming scent while he rests his head on hers. Rouge notices this and takes a mental note, smirking. Cream looks at Tails and places the blanket she carried out on him and lifts his head so he is laying on the pillow. She notices a small smile on the fox's face, but she decides to ignore it.

Everyone has yet to say anything to each other, but they all don't mind.

Tranquility before the storm, as some would say.

Knuckles sprints out of his bedroom at this ungodly time of hour, but doesn't say anything after he reads the room. He nods his head to everyone and pours a glass of apple juice. He would die on his hill saying that apple juice is better than orange. No one argues with him, as his opinions stand true or he would be angered, which isn't fun for them.

Charmy flies as fast as his little wings can carry him this early in the morning towards the kitchen. He grabs a box of his favorite cereal, takes the bag out of the box, and notices the bag is a little lighter than it was a couple days ago after he finished his cereal. He ponders and his breath hitches. He flies around the room and takes a sniff at everyone to see if he can smell the honey off their body. He reaches the chameleon and goes to yell at him but gets elbowed in the gut by Blaze, who is very into her tilt controls. He falls to the ground, dizzy.

Vanilla yawns and looks at her surroundings as she walks out of her room. She squints, surprised at her surroundings. Serenity washes over her as she notices how calm and peaceful everybody is, a change from the usual morning shenanigans she waltzes into each morning. She was almost expecting to see a knocked out echidna and hedgehog. She opens the fridge and makes a mango smoothie and sighs in relief at the sight.

Sticks sprints into the room after Vanilla with her hair in a bun. She runs over to make a breakfast burrito, hold the burrito. Makes no sense, huh? Well, that's how she orders it, and somehow Amy knows how to comply with her strange request. The beans are the issue, but she always says 'hold the burrito'. Everyone else walks out to the table and sits down, waiting for their normal meals. Vanilla smiles and hands out their usual, which they smile back at her and dig in.

Just as things couldn't get any more peaceful, Cream turns on the diffuser and drops in lavender and vanilla.

No one speaks.

Everyone has yet to say anything to each other, but they all don't mind.

Tranquility before the storm, as some would say.

Just thought this chapter would be cute and a good idea to transition into the more serious chapters! They will be more tense than that of these ones, I promise. I'm writing an apocalypse book, not a fluff. I hope you enjoyed the filler chapter!! This is the end of the first Arc. The next Arc will start in a few weeks or so, as I still have to write it. I hope you're enjoying the book so far!

— LUCKY