#bdt au

And here's Citri's icon, for your convienience!

EDIT: I forgot to include the icons, so sorry, here they are!

Backstory:

Little is known about Sonic's early upbringing, other than the fact he was orphaned at a young age. As a child, he also met and befriended a young chipmunk named Sally Nettle. The two would spend a lot of time together, always having eachother's back.

When the Robotniks first spawned in Mobius, back when he was seven, Sally was quick to deem them hostile and a threat to the current status quo. Determined to "fix" that situation, she formed the Freedom Fighters. Sonic, swayed by her arguments, joined as its second ever member. The first two weeks of the organization's existence weren't anything too out of the ordinary, with its members simply going out and destroying any "dangerous" technology made by the doctor. However, things were about to change...

One fateful night, Sonic and a few others were sent out on a special night mission. The order was simple - infiltrate one of Robotnik's bases, destroy any tech inside, don't leave out anything. The deployed split up, and the hedgehog was left alone. As he spindashed through the various agressive-looking robots, he started to get into a rhythm, enjoying the sound of metal clanking down to the ground and the feeling of doing right by the world. That feeling soon dissipated, though, as he felt the splash of something cold hitting his quills. A squelch, and a scream.

Terrified, the hedgehog immediately halted his movements, slowly backtracking to see just what happened. It was not a pretty sight. A body, nearly ripped to pieces by the impact of a full-speed spindash. Despite all that damage, though, he recognized it. He recognized that purple dress and those cog-shaped hair clips. He... just killed a child. And not just any child - the daughter of the man he, and everyone, else, were fighting against. Still... she was an innocent. She didn't do all those things Sally was talking about- and, come to think of it, Robotnik didn't, either...

Time seemed to freeze, as Sonic found himself unable to do anything, to even move his eyes away from the corpse. Eventually, though, some other Freedom Fighter made it to the same room (tripping up pretty much every anti-intruder alarm the place had on their way). What followed was something he could never fully recall. Sonic only remembered some bits of it - the anguish and fury of the doctor, staring down at what remained of his daughter. A frantic escape, the feeling of being dragged away by someone else. The praise from the Freedom Fighters and the declaration of war. It all happened so quickly... quicker than even he could handle.

Ever since that day, he grew disillusioned with the Freedom Fighters, and Sally Nettle herself. Sure, NOW her concerns were valid, but they wouldn't be had she just given the dimension travellers a chance to explain themselves. They wouldn't be, had he not blindly believed in her ideals. In her.

He still stuck around, seeing as he was promoted to head of the second unit, as well as the fact that Robotnik was now actually a threat. After the "Vanilla incident", any chance of him and Sally mending their broken friendship was rendered null, as she only grew more cold, distant and paranoid. Forever dissatisfied with life, Sonic slowly accepted that this is just the way things are now, probably.

Having reached the beginning of his twenties, Sonic's life didn't change in any notable way from how it was. Sure, he did make some new alliances, such as the guardian of the Master Emerald, Knuckles, but ultimately, life was just as miserable as always. That was until he met Tails, a young fox who wanted to join the Freedom Fighters to get revenge for his recently-killed parents. Initially only a recruit assigned to Sonic's unit, the two quickly developed a brotherly bond.

Finally, life started to have meaning again. Thanks to their genuine friendship, Sonic started to feel alive again. No longer just going through the motions of life because too many people are depending on him for him to give up, he once again found an idea worth fighting for. Tails deserved a better world, a better life than the one this poor 12-year old had to endure now. And, by Chaos, he was going to give him that life.

Then the Descent happened. Suddenly, everything he was used to toppled as he found himself trapped within his own mind. Unaware of the situation outside, he could only make educated guesses from the brief flashes of reality. Very unpleasant guesses, to put it bluntly.

Yet, somehow, reality found a way to do even worse. When Tails managed to figure out how to spawn within Sonic's subconscious, he was relieved to see his friend after so long. Relief turned to horror, however, as Tails began to describe the situation outside. Sure, he was being suspiciously vague, but consise enough for Sonic to understand what he meant. Almost too vague... as if he was hiding something from him. Determined to know the truth once and for all, the hedgehog began to rapidly start questions, trying to get any sort of specifics out of his younger friend, something, anything. The latter kept pleading, telling his older friend to stop prying too deep into things (which had the exact opposite effect). And then, suddenly...

...suddenly he wasn't talking to Tails anymore. The entity LOOKED like him, but it was grey, had its own entrails wrapped around itself, had insane-looking black eyes with the most dilated red pupils he had ever seen- and it was trying to KILL HIM, for Chaos's sake! During his self-defense, Sonic made it clear about what he thought about demons killing and replacing his friend- he'd never forgive them for it. Never. And whoever was behind it, he'd make them pay. As soon as he figured out how to leave his prison, he'd avenge his fallen friends. He'd kill every single demon he got his hands on.

Personality:

On the outside, Sonic seems like a cocky and sassy individual, taking great pride in his speed and skills alike. He enjoys a good fight and a well-delivered quip at his opponent. To the average person, he seems like the ideal hero - optimistic despite everything. Powerful, but only using that power for good. (If only that was entirely true.)

Sonic was always into the idea of freedom and justice above all else. He prioritizes those two things equally, and considers them intertwined. To him, there's no freedom without justice, and no justice without freedom. It's why continues to stick around the Freedom Fighters, despite finding Sally's ideals to be "a load of shit" - it's because of him that the conflict escalated. Freedom says he could just leave them, but justice says he has to fix his wrongdoings. That, and he's undoubtedly one of the FF's best soldiers. If he left, the very idea of freedom could get shattered by Robotnik's quest for revenge.

My personal lore and design thoughts:

His energetic and sassy attitude is a cover for how he really feels about the world - apathethic and nihillistic. Ever since that night (when he was seven), he's lost pretty much all faith in the world (reaffirmed during the Vanilla incident). His friendship with Tails was the one thing keeping him going, not just following the motions of life without a thought. He doesn't get that luxury anymore, though.

The second I estabilished how the subconscious will work in BDT, I was like "I need to redesign this guy". With that in mind, I started thinking "how would he look like in there?". The phrase "blue blur" came to mind and I just KNEW I had to interpret that literally. The second part was simple, just a bit of motion blur. The blue, however, was a struggle. I wanted it to be extremely vibrant, but it just wasn't looking vibrant enough. To counter that, I simply desaturated the rest of his colors. Modern problems require modern solutions 😎

I kept the black and white eyes, because in my opinion, that's a good way to convey that he's currently possessed, but not actually demonized.

He was still looking a bit too simple, however, so I started to look for things to add. I settled for yoinking the bandages that Boom!Sonic wears. I think it was a good call, makes his design that bit more distinct from his NU counterpart.

As for his lore, I honestly admit I forgot about it for a long while 😭

I thought it'd be fun to make him more involved in the whole beginning of the war. Gives Eggman a reason to hate him a particular, gives Sonic lifelong trauma - it's a lose-lose scenario for both sides and I love it!

Other than that, though, he just sorta... sticks around. Sorry to be so uncreative, but even NU itself isn't creative in that regard, either... Although, his existence during round 1 takes a lot from Sonic.EXE; Retribution (in the sense that he gets brief flashes of the real world, but is ultimately unaware of what's happening), so something interesting is still there, I guess. That, and when I first saw him talking to Tails in the subconscious, I KNEW I had to include it. The context differs a lot (no Chaos Hunter in BDT, which is a shame because I wanted to include him, but couldn't find a feasible way to do so), but the scene idea itself remains. It's why Sonic snaps into control much more during the events of Round 2 - Tails made him aware of the situation outside of his subconscious. It also had the unfortunate side effect of making Green Hill zone resemble its redder NU counterpart that much more. Quite sad.

If I had to describe him in one word, it would be "fierce".

also my friend asked me to add this when I post him

1. Only characters with proper introduction posts qualify. I know I've posted more on other websites, as well as the blog itself, but I feel like it wouldn't make sense to include them. (Introduced characters include: Jina, Amy, Sonic, Citri (LDF!Limely), Charlotte (LDL!Cream), Sally Nettle (LDL!Sally), LDL!Knuckles, Tails + Inner Tails, Merely and Claire (LDE!Christy).)

2. This is an in-character Q&A, not a roleplay. Please stick to just asking questions unless an action is absolutely nessesary for your question.

3. Character responses will signed off and colored in green (+ purple, if the question involves another character). Uncolored responses are from me, and red text is... well, red text.

4. Answers are semi-canon. (So, for example, if you asked Jina about her opinion on Labubus, it doesn't mean Labubus are canon to BDT, but if they were, this would be how she'd feel about them.)

5. I reserve the right to not answer an ask if it blatantly breaks the above rules, makes me uncomfortable or is inappropriate.

6. The Q&A DOES NOT mean you can no longer ask me questions! In fact, your questions are still greatly appreciated! They don't even have to be BDT-related, I'll gladly answer non-BDT related questions too!

Backstory:

Knuckles was born to an isolated tribe on Angel Island. Raised without much knowledge on the world outside the island, he was very close-knit with his community. Through his impressive strength and agility, he was selected at a young age to be one of the guardians of the Master Emerald. For a majority of his life, the tribe functioned unbothered by outside forces.

That was until one very unfortunate day.

The robotic forces of the vengeful dr. Robotnik invaded the island in search of the Master Emerald, annihilating anything that stood in their way. Knuckles, who had just barely turned eighteen at the time, valiantly fought back as hard as he could, but the situation seemed hopeless. The numbers of defenders kept dwindling, with innocent members of the tribe landing in the crossfire as well. Just as things seemed too dire, though... backup mysteriously started coming onto the island. These people who the echidna did not know, helping him fight off the invading forces... with their and his efforts combined, things were finally looking up. They managed to liberate the island once more - but at that point, there wasn't much to liberate. Almost all of the tribe was wiped out, and Knuckles was the only survivor.

Personality:

It wasn't all horrible, though - the people who mysteriously came to aid with the invasion introduced themselves as the "Freedom Fighters", a group of Mobians fighting back against the unjust opression and tyranny of the invader from another dimension - dr. Ivo Robotnik. Their leader, Sally Nettle, explained her ideas to Knuckles. How they fought to save the innocents and protect the world, offering the aid of the FF should Angel Island and the Master Emerald ever get attacked again. Although typically wary and sceptical of outsiders, Sally's words came at a very opportune time, right after he lost almost everything, and something about her ideals resonated with his. So, he accepted the offer.

The next nine years of his life were almost as uneventful as the first eighteen. With only the occasional back-and-forth of a robot attack and the swift counter of "his" defense unit, it was almost the exact same thing. With the important exception of the fact he was usually all alone.

Things changed during the day of Descent. Somehow, someone managed to sneak to the island unnoticed and set fire to it. Knuckles was quick to react, grabbing the Master Emerald and immediately evacuating from the island. Even though he ran as fast as he could, the flames seemed to spread at an unnaturally fast rate. Even though he pushed onward with determination, the distance seemed to stretch as his legs suffered more and more from the fire. And just as the edge of the island seemed in sight - he felt something sharp tear through his back. With his last breath, he covered the Master Emerald with his body, hoping to protect it from the fire - only to wake up with a demonized Tails staring down at him, and the precious artifact nowhere to be found.

Knuckles is quite stoic and solemn, tending to keep to himself. Usually, he doesn't interact much with others, being more of a reclusive type, with a few exceptions. Because of this, he can come off as blunt and uncaring due to his lack of social skills. Though Knuckles usually remains calm and collected, he's prone to provocation and can get quickly angered should someone set him off. Through the Eye's influence, it can sometimes lead to a fury spiral which is very hard for him to snap out of. He can also be quite vengeful. If someone seriously breaks his trust or does something truly unforgiveable, Knuckles will stop at nothing to get his revenge. Most of the time, though, he either stops himself from going too far or someone else helps him. It can also go the other way around - he's the 2nd best at dealing with the Eye amongst the main cast, so he often ends up being the one to help others (usually Sally (pre-Descent) or Inner (post-Descent)) snap out of their frenzied anger. Knuckles is also quite naive, as his tribe's secluded nature meant he grew up lacking quite a lot of social ingenuity. He's a fierce believer in honesty and straightforwardness, tending to assume the same about the others. This leads him to be easily convinced of certain ideas spread by people, even if their goals don't align with their actions. He's not entirely gullible, he can tell obvious lies, the struggle comes from either manipulation or lack of information (such as the fact LDL!EXE (Exetior) was the one who burnt down Angel Island).

Knuckles is loyal to a fault. If he devotes himself to something, he'll do almost anything for it. There are a couple moral lines he refuses to cross, such as directly killing a child, but it's moreso a sign of his kind-hearted nature deep down rather than hesitation in his loyalty. Self-sacrificial, he's more than ready to throw away his life for the Master Emerald (which, technically, he did) or his friends. If he sees a cause as right and just, he'll do whatever he can to aid in it, even at his own expense. Knuckles is ultimately someone who cares more about what they swore their life to protect than himself, even (VERY reluctantly) agreeing to work alongside the person WHO GENOCIDED HIS WHOLE TRIBE for the sake of the greater good. (He's still planning to permanently kill Eggman for it as soon as Exetior's plans are fulfilled, though. Concern for his friends and the innocents of Mobius are the only things currently stopping him from doing so.)

My personal lore and design thoughts:

It took me more than I'd like to admit to figure out his role in the AU. I knew that, yes, he'd still be guardian of the Master Emerald and the last echidna alive (in this dimension at least), but not much else. I was struggling for ideas until I randomly stumbled onto an old "shower thought" I had - it's a shame that Knuckles, the character who lives on Angel Island, isn't even aware of its burning in most Sonic.EXE AUs. Then it hit me - what if he was the one who got "hide and seek'd", so to speak? So that's what I did.

It was kind of a shame to realize I couldn't make him a fully burned, mangled corpse due to pre-estabilished demonization rules (very sad). At the very least, though, I managed to sneak flame-shaped scars on his legs (from a past event so it doesn't count), as well as slightly char the edges of his cape for a little bit of that "died in a fire" flair!

As for his outfit, the creation process can be best described as "looking up scouts uniforms and different Knuckles designs then yoinking an element from each". For example, his shoes are heavily based off Knuckles.ALT, the belt pouch is based off Renegade Knucks from Sonic Prime, the markings on his quills are borrowed from a piece of Knuckles fanart (for additional irony, one of the marking types resembles a fire), and his beret is based off one I formerly wore while in the scouts. The cape is the only thing that I didn't specifically take from an inspiration source, it's there mostly because capes are cool + it meant I could char something in his design, which I felt was nessesary to fully convey my vision.

Personality-wise, he's much calmer and less prone to physical fights than his Sonic counterpart. This wasn't my original intent, though. He was initially supposed to be unusually bloodlusty and violent (as that's the way he came off as to me as while I first watched playthroughs of EOT). I quickly scrapped that idea because it felt too out-of-character, even for an AU. After that failed, he had the exact personality of normal Knuckles as a placeholder for a long while as I figured out what I want to change in it. A moment of personal epiphany was when I was looking at his NU wiki page. This line in particular stood out to me (this is starting to be a reoccuring pattern):

"He will assist Tails if he ever has any bouts of anger, telling him to calm down; even if he gets insulted in the process."

That's when it suddenly clicked. I liked the idea of swapping Tails's and Knuckles's dynamic depending on whether they're alive or demonized. Alive? Tails is stopping Knuckles from going too far and acting unnessesarily violent. Demonized? Knuckles is the one to do so.

As for his backstory, I didn't have much of an idea. His whole tribe getting wiped out by Eggman was something I initially only kept as a placeholder, but I grew a bit attached to the idea. It made for a pretty good reason as to how he'd know the Freedom Fighters despite being isolated from Mobian civilisation for most of his life, as well as why he'd agree to join them to begin with. (You can probably imagine how awkward being suddenly told to work together with the man who annihilated your whole tribe was for Knuckles...)

If I had to describe him in one word, it would be "Conscientious" (very hard word brain ouchie).