Barks and Bytes - A Sonic Boom Story

Chapter 2 - Some Fame to Blame

By the time it was Saturday, my team's game, as in the one my old team made, was released, and initial reactions were...well, pretty good- No, wait a minute, very good- No, outstanding! In fact, villagers were screaming for my game and waving money while waiting in a rather long line at the only game store in Village Center.

"Ladies and gentlemen," said the game store manager. "may I present to you-"

"Shut up and take my cash!" yelled Belinda, a slim brown goat.

He sighed, "...Blades of the Rebellion. Talk about hype. Sheesh..."

"When I showed up, I began to wonder how my company's game managed to build up so much anticipation in the first place, considering how we originally intended it to be a small, zero-budget, non-profit game, more than a year ago. Eh, expect the unexpected...

Perci, a purple bandicoot, pointed at me outside the line. "Hey, look who we have here: It's the director of that game we've anticipated, for quite some time!"

Everyone cheered at me.

"Hope you had fun riding the hype train!" I replied with considerable pride. "You're going to love all the effort we put into our first public game we're releasing!"

A fan brought a notebook and a pen. "Say, how about an autograph?"

"Maybe once you purchase the copies for which you let me sign them."

"Fair enough!"

While the store was bombarded with customers, the game manager took me inside and gave me a stand where I would autograph the copies. "I also brought a seat soft and fluffy, just like- er, for you, Tails."

I lightly scratched my head. "Thank you." So I sat down and wrote my signature on each of my fans' game covers, faster than Sonic rolling around at the speed of sound (not literally). A little later, my blue friend zoomed into the store and found me there. I wasn't paying attention to him at first, but then tapped me while I was busy signing.

"'Sup, Yellow Sky?" he asked, doing his signature pose with his index finger sticking. "Looks like you've got a bunch of guys and gals waiting in this second line for your autograph, after buying your neat game! Long live the rebellion."

"Yeah, about that, signing like a hundred copies is no picnic," I wheezed while writing and sweating.

A while later, a muscular, mustached scientist showed up, ramming through the line of customers to get in front. "Out of my way! Evil scientist coming through!"

Sigh. It was Doctor Eggman.

The salamander cashier in the store informed with partial grief, "I am sorry, but we have sold out of all 150 copies of Blades of the Rebellion. And to tone down demand and prevent any more traffic, for YOU to take advantage of, we have no plans of restocking the game until further notice."

The remaining villagers groaned and left, except for Eggman, who was just desperate to get a copy.

"What!? This can't be!" Afterwards, he brought a large, glowing green lump of pork, preserved with brine and such. "Maybe this tasty ham will convince you to sell me a copy sooner. Sure, it's evil ham, but it's still ham!"

How cute, Eggster. I remember when you wanted to build a robot that would feed you that, according the the pilot where Sonic wanted a new sidekick.

Anyway, the cashier looked closely to that ghastly meat. "Looks...tasty, but bribing the employee won't cut it. As a policy, we don't do personal favors."