Tails' Workshop

[Tails]

Tails was startled from his reading session by the knock on the door, but he knew Sonic would answer it. He hoped it was Knuckles, because he was ready to go on another adventure, although he would like - at the same time - to finish reading a couple chapters. To immerse himself into the adventure in the book and just be thrown into the book's spell of both learning without knowing it and just having a merry time knowing that you could make words into a story.

Don't get Tails wrong, it was a very good book, but he had to know who knocked on the door. "Who is it Sonic?"

[Huu B.]

Huu was already prepared for this.

"Ah... glad I found you, Sonic. I have a package here for you. Fan mail, I believe."

He set the nerve-gas package on the ground beside him, then displayed a clipboard and pencil.

"Would you sign your name right here, please?"

There was really no point to this part, but he had to keep up his disguise.

[Sonic]

[Enter the slowest RPer alive!]

"Fan mail? No thanks."

And with that the Blue Blur closed the door on the would-be postal worker, having no desire to accept something he wasn't going to bother reading anyway. Besides, this was exactly why he didn't give out his real address to anyone. Fans and meeting people in person was cool, but mail wasn't necessary for a guy who could run to whomever he wanted to talk to faster than the speed of sound anyway.

"Oh," the hedgehog said as the door opened up once more a second later, looking at the delivery man again. "And you guys shouldn't be bothering Tails with stuff addressed to me."

[Still not able enough for anything good but I can at least put words on a page now. Enough to let the thread continue.]

[Huu B.]

((@#&*$@#&*$&#%$! Why does nothing I do ever go as planned?))

Huu mentally cursed as his plan suddenly fell flat. He kept his gaze at the hedgehog, however.

"Wait a minute, Sonic. The postage has already been paid and everything. I didn't come all the way out here for nothing. This..." He looked at his feet. "This isn't just some old letter from a random fan. This thing's sender probably went to a lot of trouble getting this wrapped up and sent to you. How would he feel if he found out you had dismissed it without even looking inside to see what it was?"

He looked up again, wiping an invisible tear from his eye. "I put my heart and soul into making sure the mail goes to whoever it's addressed to. I don't disappoint anyone who counts on me. Do you? Am I greater than the famous Sonic the Hedgehog in that regard?"

Huu secretly praised his ability to make up a sob story to sway people.

[Tails]

Tails, although Sonic had not told him who it was at the door, just by hearing what Sonic said gave him the idea that Sonic was talking to a delivery man.

It made Tails wonder how exactly a delivery man would be able to find his workshop and it also made him wonder if the delivery man knew that his workshop was a place to relax and do the things he loved. Sonic was a welcome sight and so was Knuckles, although he hadn't seen knucklehead for awhile. If Amy Rose showed up, he'd also welcome her with open arms, since she was like his big sister. But it made Tails suspicious that a delivery man would show up and offer fan mail, because the mail he usually received over at his workshop was a check from his mom and dad.

Granted, there were stacks of fan mail around his office, but he would usually either get rid of it, because Sonic wouldn't read it anyway, or just give an effort to tell Sonic that people still cared about him, but he would still get rid of the fan mail without looking at it. He might look at the fan mail every now and then, but he knew it was usually just for Sonic, so he usually didn't bother even looking at the fan mail.

There were times that there was fan mail for him, but it would seem to be more about Sonic than him since Tails was too young to considered date material. Or at least what he read of their fan mail, seemed to say that. The fan mail usually contained mushy stuff that was for him. Like, "You're so cute." and things like that. It got to the point where the fan mail kept repeating itself, so nine times out of ten Tails would just toss it.

Tails, just to be safe, went to his computer and stopped the download. He put on his watch that could hack into things and had the CT23 battery, which gave his watch the ability to hold large files. He only truly trusted Sonic around things as high tech as his watch he had around his right wrist right now. Other than that pocket watch that contained a very faulty, very old battery that only had about a year left before it went kaput - other than the fact that the pocket watch's chaos emerald detecting capabilities was also faulty because of the battery -, Tails trusted the watch that had his CT23 battery. He didn't trust the CMPT5 battery as much as he trusted the CT23 battery.

Tails stayed back, away from Sonic, because he trusted that Sonic would be able to take care of it. He went back into his bed room, since he figured that he didn't want to get in Sonic's way. This time, however, he wasn't reading a book. He was getting pencil and paper ready to configure the CMPT5 battery and try and make a new battery that functioned in the same way and would also be named CMPT5. But, he was doing it slowly, very slwoly, because he was suspicious about this delivery man and hoped to heaven that he would leave. He thought that Sonic's rejection would be enough for the delivery man to leave, because Tails didn't want anymore fan mail.

Granted, Tails liked fans, but not their fan mail; because Sonic and him could just race to their house and the fans could tell them from there. But Tails had to consider the fact that if mail didn't exist, then he'd probably have a stampede of his and Sonic's fans at their doorstep practically every day. Then how would Tails be able to keep his mind occupied. How would Tails use his workshop as a place to relax and allow his mind to concentrate on his latest projects. He wondered why the fans haven't done just that yet, but, if they did stampede into his workshop every night or every day, Tails knew there was a chance he'd lose it after awhile without being able to keep his mind occupied.

Even now, Tails knew that he and Sonic would get rid of the fan mail as soon as it made it through the door.

Tails then listened in on the delivery man's enquiry and could tell that he wasn't going to leave. He seemed very determined, yet he also seemed sad. It was something that Tails wasn't sure he liked, because that's how most of the time the fan mail would get through the door. The good old pity trip.

Tails wasn't sure he liked the delivery man at all, but he saw no reason to actually act upon it.

In a sense, Tails thought, the delivery man had a point. He probably was greater than Sonic in the regards of caring for others who went out of their way to send some letters. I think I might like the delivery man, but I'm still a little annoyed about why anyone - especially this delivery man - would be so persistent in hounding him and Sonic over some mail.

Tails would be sweet enough to tell Sonic where the address was so he could visit the fans in person, but Sonic knew that Tails didn't go with him, since there were plenty of times where Tails would get jealous and he just didn't like going through that. However, what Tails didn't know was that this delivery man was up to no good.

[Sonic]

Sonic literally rolled his eyes at the little speech. If he signed for it even just this one time then they'd never stop sending stuff to Tails even though it was addressed to him. He didn't like to think his little buddy might be getting saddled with letters while he was off on his frequent travels. Then again, seemed like they did so anyway. This guy, though... what did he care if the package was signed for or not? He'd have to be quite the enthusiastic deliveryman, but the story didn't exactly ring through as genuine in his act.

Ultimately though, this was taking too much time. Sonic was still more exhausted than he'd ever let on after his man-to-man with the Ultimate Life-Form didn't have the patience to talk about the mail issue anymore. Once the hedgehog's green eyes had gotten back to looking at Huu there was a flash of blue and then the sound of the door closing. The package was gone and the pencil the deliveryman had been holding fell to the ground, a quick scrawl of some sort left where the recipient's signature was supposed to go on his clipboard. If you squinted it did sort of look like Sonic, one might suppose.

"Your gadget finished, Tails?" Sonic asked back inside, holding the package in both arms to his torso. He saw the fox was walking back from over where he had left his latest doohickey earlier and that it wasn't doing the same thing anymore. Not that Sonic exactly knew what it had been doing in the first place, mind you.

[Huu B.]

Huu went extremely silent as Sonic took the nerve gas package. Only one thing was on his mind.

Oh crap. This was NOT the way I planned it.

Up until now the plan had been deliver the package, have Sonic open it and get paralyzed, copy him, go inside, talk to Tails, convince him to hand over the stopwatch, leave, and collect. But since Sonic had taken the package inside the building to open, probably in Tails's presence... well, this wasn't good. Everything was completely blown.

With few other options, Huu hid beside the building, right around the corner from the entrance, and listened in on what would develop next.

[Tails]

Tails heard Sonic rush back inside and couldn't have been more happier. "Is the delivery man gone?

Tails grabbed the pocket watch from within his bed room and carried it, along with the blue print for the "CMPT5" which only at the moment has just "C" on the sheet.

Tails let himself be seen and explained. "No, actually the gadget isn't done yet Sonic. It's still in the computer waiting for me to reconnect. But, beyond that, I can't say anything further."

Tails started walking again. "I'm going to go down in my private space and work on these blue prints there - namely in the T-room."

Tails opened a trap door and walked down into the T-room (or namely the Tornado room) with the pocket watch. He was getting ready to take out the battery from the chaos emerald detector, or namely the pocket watch to see what the battery looked like.

As Tails walked down, he asked. "What do you wanna do with the fan mail?"

[Sonic]

What indeed? He signed for it but he sure didn't feel like going through mail right now. The 'hog needed to sleep.

"Well, let's see if they sent anything cool and then get back to relaxing," he finally said as he set the package down on Tails work table and beckoned the fox to come over and take a look with it. It would be cool if they sent snacks, but then you can't trust food sent in the mail. A shame, really.

Whether Tails accepted or declined the offer to come look the hero's fast hands would begin untying and opening the box.

[Huu B.]

Huu was growing increasingly nervous as he waited in his hiding place. He listened carefully for the audio cues that would tell him the nerve-gas package had been opened, and play it by ear from there. In the meantime, he began to blur his body to shift back to his neutral form.