Hi. I don't know how to start this story. I'm not one to post online about stuff like this. i guess i should introduce myself. My name is James, and I'm a huge Sonic the Hedgehog fan. I collect merch, games, anything and everything Sonic. Yes, this includes the Sonic the Hedgehog curry. Now, I don't usually play Sonic ROM hacks, and when i do it certainly isn't... whatever the fuck i just played. If this is a joke, or some sort of hacked version, it's really sick and twisted.
Now, I suppose I should explain the game. Earlier today I got a package in the mail from my friend. There was a note attached along with a cd. It says "James, I cant fucking do it anymore man. Ive been trying to just wait it out it isnt working he wont leave me alone. Hes after me and i dont know how long i have. burn this cd please. just do it i need this fucking thing out of my life please. for the love of god do NOT play it hell get you too. please. From Kyle" Now, I'm not usually one to disobey a friends wishes, but you can't just expect me *not* to play a CD I've been told to burn. Especially not after going off the radar for 2 weeks. I mean, its just a disk, what harm could it realistically do? A lot, is the answer. The disk was pretty normal, besides having "Sonic" and "RATS!" written in permanent marker. Not sure what that means or has to do with anything even now. I was a little nervous to play, especially with the note i was given. As much as id like to say it blew up my pc or showed my ip address, it didn't. The disk booted up pretty normally.
The title screen was... weird. The banner over the ring looked like it was torn at the edges, and simply said "SONIC!" in big red text. There wasn't sega copyright. it said "RAT 0001" Sonic looked strange. he had these little horn thingies in place of his ears, and his pupils were replaced with grey rings. He was holding up the "horns" gesture with his left hand. I chocked it up to it being a weird romhack, which was a little disappointing. I was hoping it would be a genuine pc port of sonic the hedgehog. I pressed start and was brought to the save select in front of a dark, cloudy background. the saves included Tails, Knuckles, and... for some reason, Eggman? Once again, I assumed it was more romhack stuff. Very avant-garde, the choice to play as Eggman. I was only able to select tails for now, as much as I'd like to see what certain other characters were like. When i selected Tails, something that sounded like poorly compressed laughter played. I was then taken to a cutscene of tails flying above Green Hills. Text appeared that said "Sonic has been missing for 2 weeks. Nobody knows where he has gone. Tails is leading the investigation, flying above green hill when he spots something interesting..."
Tails is then shown to land in green hill, starting off Act 1. Act 1 was pretty much bog-standard for a sonic level, just less enemies and no powerup monitors. something cool though is that that title screen character (hereby referred to as sonic, for lack of a better term) seemed to be following tails from inside the background. The second level was stranger. It started off normally, save for some of the trees and flowers being cut up. Then the animals started running away. It wasn't just when i broke a badnik, no, it was sporadic waves of these animals just running away. It confused and unnerved me. Just *what* could they be running away from??? Background sonic was still there, of course. Now, this is when things started going from weird to fucked up. Act three, simply named "Hill?" began as "normally" as the last level, until Tails came across an animal corpse. He stopped and let out this horrible scream. I just sort of sat there a moment, stunned by the shrill noise that just played from my speakers. Tails sat there while i waited, holding back tears and horrified. He stooped down next to the animal, doing what i assume to be grieving. Poor Tails :(. He stopped and slowly rose when i guided him right again. There were several more animal corpses, and the animals were running away in steadily increasing droves. towards the end, it was a steady stream of them, and the bodies piled up. there were even some bodies strung up in the trees. It all came to a climax at the end of the level, where instead of a signpost, there was sonic. The game at this point became a cutscene. Tails waves to sonic, who doesn't seem to interact. tails is offput by this, and takes a few steps closer. He tries again, still getting no reaction. He takes the final few steps towards sonic and pauses. now that he's up close, he seems to be slowly coming upon the realization that this isn't the real Sonic. sonic turns around abruptly, which causes tails to shriek and jump back. tails is visibly scared at this point. sonic begins to talk, and a crushed voice rings through my speakers. it was like someone doing a poor sonic impression. "Heya, buddy!... You look scared, don't'cha recognize your old pal? You know what always calms *my* nerves? A game!... Now tell me," the voice takes on a low, disgustingly intimate tone. "do you want to play with me?" Tails takes a step back and tries to run away, but sonic speeds towards him and the game cuts to black. I was then taken to a level named "Hide and Seek". Tails looked at the camera, frantic, and began pointing to the right. I assume he wanted me to find him a hiding place, so I pressed right. Tails peeled out and sped to the right, and the timer started counting down. Tails kept running until the timer hit 0, at whichpoint the words "ready or not, here I come!!!" blared from my speaker. Tails did something ive never seen him do in a sonic game; he touched his feet down to the ground and started running *while* spinning his tails. This didn't help much, as Sonic was gaining on him, looking depraved. Then, right as he was about to grab tails, he suddenly stopped while tails kept going. Tails didn't seem to notice he wasn't being chased anymore, as he continued to run. That was until he hit a tree in the middle of the path. tails hit the stump and flew back. he hit the ground with a sickening loud crack. He sort of slowly got to a sitting position and grabbed his now profusely bleeding arm, and just... sat there. None of my inputs seemed to do anything. Suddenly, the drowning theme started up and tails began looking around, terrified. As the drowning theme reached its climax, it stopped and Sonic stepped out. "Too slow, little buddy!" he said. a pause. Tails started crawling away. "want to try again?" he continued, blood now starting to drip from his eyes. Then, his eyeballs seemed to fall out, which i thought was particularly grotesque. He grew larger, more imposing. Well, about as imposing as you can get when you're a 16-bit sprite in a video game. Then, he dashed at Tails, who let out a blood-curdling scream. The screen went to black for about 10 seconds before an image of Tails' body faded in. His color was a dull brown now, and he was skewered through the head with a post. It was pretty horrific. It looked hand-drawn and compressed. Then, I was taken back to the title as if nothing happened.
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