Wikipedia: Hedgehogs
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Literature Text
Allright, this fanfic takes place in the Sonic X universe. Before you all scream and run away, I have to add that none of the humans will make an appearance, but I need this adventure to be set on earth. You don´t need to know Sonic X to enjoy it..
(If you find the introduction boring, just skip to the part where the actual jokes start, a few paragraphs down where the bold begins. )
Disclaimer: I own neither Sonic the hedgehog nor any related characters nor the article I used as a basis for this fiction.
Sonic comfortably stretched out on the grass, drinking in the sunlight of this beautiful day.
Three of the Chaos Emeralds still needed to be found, Robotnik was as usually at large and probably building a Giant Flying Fortress of Immediate Doom (or just playing Scrabble with his robots) right at this moment, but for now, all the blue hero cared for was relaxing in the wonderful warmth of this day.
“Right, Cream! Open your presents, you´ve waited long enough!”
He smiled as he heard Tails´ eager voice. Today was little Cream´s birthday and they had come out here to have a pic-nic to celebrate it. Amy had gone back to the Thorndyke´s house to fetch some ice-cream but most of the other Mobians who had landed on earth were there, since not even the stubborn echidna could resist the adorable rabbit when she had presented him with his invitation, complete with tiny ribbon and all. (“Please, Mr. Knuckles? Pleeeease?”) Even Shadow was present, as he currently had no other place to stay. The only ones missing were the Chaotix but maybe they´d show up later.
Sonic sat up to grin at Rouge who was now nearly being hugged to death. Maybe not such a bright idea to give Cream her first diamond necklet…
Knuckles, rushing to the rescue, quickly saved the bat by distracting the hyper-active rabbit with his own present. He received a pink flower-necklace for his troubles, much to the amusement of Sonic.
“Aww, Knuckles, it clashes with your fur, how can you?!”
“I´ll wipe that smug grin right of your mug, you…”
“Mr. Knuckles, don´t you like it?” Cream had stopped unwrapping the present and was now staring teary-eyed at the red guardian.
“No, no, no Cream, it´s great!” And if that annoying blue freak didn´t stop giggling right now…
The echidna´s present turned out to be a pair of oven mits, which was nice, since Cream loved cooking.
“Now it´s time for mine!” Tail´s announced, handing her a flat, yet heavy, package. When the rabbit had opened it, however, she was puzzled.
“What is this?”
“It´s a laptop! I made it myself, you can use it to surf in the internet so you don´t get bored when you have to stay at the house all day.” He proclaimed proudly, turning the gadget on and starting the webbrowser.
“The internet?” Cream looked even more confused.
“Yeah, it has games and pictures and everything! For example, there´s Wikipedia, a huge human encyclopedia from which you can learn a lot about this world.”
That got everyone´s attention. 'Urf', as the humans called it, was still a strange place for them and the prospect of learning more about it seemed attracting.
They gathered around the screen as the wireless connection stabilized and Tails typed something in the URL field of the browser.
“Here, see?” he said, as the main page had loaded. “Everything you could possibly want to know. Anyone interested in something in particular?”
“Oh, I know!” Cream piped up, “Let´s see whether they wrote something about Mr. Sonic! His adventures are always so amazing!”
Sonic, having heard his name, trotted over to them and sat down as well.
“This is strange…” Tails said, “There´s no article about ‘Sonic the Hedgehog’. But they do seem to have something about hedgehogs. Let´s see what they say…”
Sonic grinned. “Oh yeah, hedgehogs. Very cool dudes in general.”
Knuckles snorted.
Cream smiled. “That means we will be reading up on you, too, Mr. Shadow! Oh, isn´t that exciting?”
Shadow looked at her, then stated: “But I am not a hedgehog.”
General staring.
“I am the Ultimate Lifeform.”
More staring. General sweat-dropping.
Tails began to read out aloud:
Hedgehog
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
The name 'hedgehog' came into use around the year 1450, derived from the middle English word 'heyghoge'. Other folk names include 'urchin', 'hedgepig' and 'furze-pig'.
“What?! Sonic stuttered, “Pig?!”
“Well, as far as your appetite goes, they certainly got that one right.” Knuckles said, grinning. “Keep reading, that might be interesting.”
Hedgehogs are easily distinguished by their spines, which are hollow hairs made stiff with keratin. Their spines are not poisonous or barbed and, unlike the quills of a porcupine, cannot easily be removed from the animal.
“You sure about that?” the echidna asked, yanking Sonic hard on one of his back spines, causing the hedgehog to land on his behind with rather more force than necessary.
“Hey!” Sonic, who was by now reading on the grinning faces of the others that this might very well become rather humiliating rather quickly, tried to signal to Tails to stop. The fox, oblivious to everyone else around him, ignored the frantic waving.
When under extreme stress or during sickness, a hedgehog will lose spines.
Knuckles raised an eyebrow. “Under extreme stress? Well, Sonic, when you´re fighting against Eggman again, you might want to watch out for that, it could be embarrassing…” Even Cream had to giggle at that.
A defense that all species of hedgehogs possess is the ability to roll into a tight ball, causing all of the spines to point outwards to sometimes even attack the intruder, by trying to ram into the intruder with its spines, leaving rolling as a last resort.
“Well, at least they got that correct”, Sonic admitted grudgingly, “I was starting to think that the one writing this was a serious nutcase…”
While forest hedgehogs have relatively few predators, primarily birds (especially owls) and ferrets, smaller species like the Long-eared Hedgehog are usually preyed on by foxes.
Every face turned to Tails. Silence descended. Sonic slowly shifted away from him.
The fox looked up: “…what?”
All hedgehogs are primarily nocturnal, although different species can be more or less likely to come out in the daytime.
“Nocturnal?” Knuckles snorted, “Give me a break, the closest this guy gets to ‘nocturnal’ is raiding the fridge for some left-over Chili dogs at midnight…”
“Well, you forget that he has to hide during the day or Tails would eat him.” Shadow stated, sounding serious. Everyone else looked at each other, then howled in laughter.
The hedgehog sleeps for a large portion of the daytime,
“You have to admit they obviously know what they´re writing about…” Rouge grinned.
either under cover of bush or grass or rock or in a hole in the ground.
“Well…that´s new…” Knuckles moved over, then knocked exaggeratingly at a boulder, yelling: “Hey, Sonic! You awake yet?”
The blue hedgehog groaned. This article was sure to haunt him for quite a while…
In general hedgehogs dig out dens for shelter. On their back paws they have 4 toes with long, constantly growing nails. They have these characteristics because hedgehogs burrow.
“This is ridiculous! We do NOT burrow! They´re confusing us with echidnas or something!” Sonic shouted increasingly frustrated over the general amusement, but to no avail.
“Hey Sonic, let´s see your back paws!” Knuckles called back, nearly getting his wish fulfilled by Sonic´s sneaker (and foot) narrowly avoiding his face.
Hedgehogs are fairly vocal,
“Ooooh, Mr. Sonic, you can sing?” Cream sounded awed, while Sonic thought that the roboticizer might actually be preferable to this.
and communicate not only in a series of grunts and snuffles, but sometimes in loud squeals (depending on species).
“He´s…he´s communicating in…” Knuckles tried to say something but was overwhelmed by shrieks of his own laughter.
Hedgehogs occasionally perform a ritual called 'anointing'. When the animal comes across a new scent, it will lick and bite the source and then form a scented froth in its mouth and paste it on its spines with its tongue. It is not known what the specific purpose of this ritual is.
“Let´s hope Amy never takes him into a perfume shop…” Rouge called, stiffling her giggles for a bit.
“You can really lick your back? That´s hard…” a slow, rumbling voice wondered.
Sonic looked up and saw Big the cat. Wonderful.
“Oh, hi Big!” Knuckles greeted the newcomer joyously, “You´re just in time to hear Sonic tell us about the specific purpose of a mysterious hedgehog ritual.”
“Get. Blunted.” Sonic replied, using a not-so-mysterious hedgehog insult instead.
Hedgehogs perform well with other pets,
“Other PETS?! Have these humans lost their friggin mind?!”
including cats and dogs. They are occasionally threatened by these animals, though, but for those rare instances, the hedgehogs just roll into a ball until the threat is gone.
“Wow, Sonic, you sure are threatened what with Tails and Big here at the same time…” Rouge said in a voice that was positively dripping with fake concern.
Sonic wistfully wished that rolling into a ball would help here, too.
Diet
Although belonging to insectivore family, hedgehogs are almost omnivorous. Hedgehogs feed on insects,
“Oh my Gosh, Sonic, you ate Charmy!”
“Knuckles, if you don´t shut up this very second…”
snails, frogs,
“Froggy!”
and toads, snakes, bird eggs,
“Well, I guess I understand why Jet the hawk didn´t like you that much, you probably having messily devoured his siblings and all…” The echidna guardian was having the time of his life.
carrion, mushrooms, grass roots, berries, melons, and watermelons.
“Apart from the watermelons none of this is right!” Sonic shouted despairingly, receiving only “Go sleep under your rock, you´re nocturnal!” by Rouge as an answer.
The hedgehog is occasionally spotted after a rainstorm foraging for earthworms.
“Stop it! I can´t take it anymore!” Knuckles was holding his sides, his stomach muscles already aching from so much laughter. “I hope it rains tomorrow, we can all go spot Sonic foraging.”
Rouge put on a contemplative face: “That will be hard to do, considering his hydrophobia and all…do they have that in there, too?”
In areas that have hedgehogs in the wild, they are often welcomed as a natural form of garden pest control.
“Finally we know why Chris fished you from that pool, you´re a garden pest control…”
Sonic merely scowled at that last remark, mentally already making a list of ‘pests’ to be controlled.
Although hedgehogs are lactose-intolerant, they will eagerly consume cheese,
“Chao?!”
“Relax, Cheese, they´re talking about actual cheese here.” Rouge said, petting the little creature affectionately.
“Yeah, and Sonic is too busy trying to alternatively eat Jet´s children and Froggy anyway…”
“Knuckles! Remember that Cream´s listening, too!”
milk, and dairy products, causing illness. The common pet hedgehog (Four-toed Hedgehog) can however have a small portion of cottage cheese as a dietary supplement.
Everybody looked at Sonic´s plate. It didn´t help the hedgehog much that today of all days he had chosen that cottage cheese sandwich after all the chili dogs had been eaten.
“A common pet hedgehog! That´s what you are!”
“A garden pest control!”
“Want to know what the pet hedgehog has to say to you?!”
Amy, meanwhile, had returned and was trying to find out what the commotion was all about.
Reproduction and lifespan
Depending on the species, the gestation period is 40-58 days. The average litter is 3-4 newborns for larger species and 5-6 for smaller ones.
Loud whooping and cheering from Knuckles´and Rouge´s places. “You hear that? Way to go, Amy!”
Amy blushed and looked shyly at Sonic who was now staring at the ground, trying to hide from the others that he too had gone a little red in the face.
As with many animals, it is not unusual for an adult male hedgehog to kill newborn males.
You could have heard a needle dropping.
Then:
“Stop staring at me! The author of that is obviously insane!”
More stunned silence. Sonic sighed and pulled Amy down to him.
“See what I´ve been going through for the last quarter of an hour? Well, at least I am not the only hedgehog here anymore.” Glaring at Shadow, he added: “Since someone here blatantly refuses to accept his heritage!”
Shadow gave him a cool look. “I am not lactose intolerant. Therefore, I am not a hedgepig, but the ultimate lifeform.”
“First of all, it´s hedgehog, and secondly…”
“And I don´t eat my young.”
“Neither do I and…”
“But you may be forgiven. You lead a harsh life with Tails being a constant threat to your existence.”
Sonic dropped his head in his hands, giving up. Amy smiled and put her arm around him.
The hedgehog's dilemma is based upon the apparent danger of a male hedgehog being poked by the female while matin-
“Finish that sentence and you´re dead, Tails.”
“-eh, maybe we should cut that section out altogether!” the fox added hurriedly while he felt his friend´s burning death glare in his back.
Although he wasn´t able to read out the next sentence aloud, he himself found it rather interesting: “The hedgehog´s dilemma states that the closer two people are to each other, the more they may hurt one another.” While most of the other things in the article had been – while very entertaining – still utter rubbish, this statement oddly enough rang very true. Sonic had told him once that he didn´t dare get close to Amy since Robotnik could use her as a weapon against him and he wouldn´t be able to bear the thought of her being in danger. “The closer two people are to each other, the more they may hurt each other…” Seems like being a hero is not always as great as everyone thinks…
He grinned again. Still, no reason not to continue the torture a little bit.
Larger species of hedgehogs live 4-7 years in the wild (some have been recorded up to 16 years)
Knuckles suddenly stood up and made a very solemn face. In a tragic voice, he started to proclaim: “We have gathered here today to say our last good-byes to our dear friend Sonic, who has now peacefully died of old age-“
“Goddammit Knucklehead, I´m sixteen and you´re a year older than me!”
“Well, it didn´t say anything about the life-span of echidnas in there, did it? You, on the other hand, should be looking for a retirement home in my opinion…”
Sonic didn´t want to start a fight on Cream´s birthday but muttered something about a certain echidna looking for his teeth soon enough.
Domesticated hedgehogs
The purchase of domesticated hedgehogs has seen a considerable increase in the last few years due to their apparently innocent and playful looks.
“Oh Sonic, that sounds so cute!”, Amy squealed.
He gave her a disbelieving look. “Modern trafficking sounds cute to you?!”
Knuckles raised a finger. “Please note the ‘apparently’ in the former statement.”
Hedgehogs are difficult to maintain as pets due to their low resistance to climate and temperature changes,
“…and due to their tendency to blow up stasis pods with Chaos Blast…” Sonic muttered, shooting another baleful glance at an impassive Shadow.
and their inability to adapt to enclosed environments.
“Now I´m convinced that whoever wrote this, studied you first.”
“You´re positively screaming for a spindash, you know that?”
“Oh, go and perform your hedgehog ritual or something.”
Hedgehog diseases
There are many diseases common to hedgehogs, mostly fatal.
“Lemme guess, among those listed, Thrill-seekingus Irresponsibili ranks first!”
“Listen, Knucklehead, just because you will probably die before me of sheer boredom from guarding your giant glowy rock, that doesn´t mean that I…”
“Shush, Sonic, we want to hear the rest of it. You can forage earthworms if you´re bored.”
Wobbly hedgehog syndrome is very common.
Another shout of laughter, followed by: “You hear that, Amy! Don´t let him get near any bars!” Rouge was already red in the face from so much laughter.
Human influence
As with most small mammals living around humans, cars pose a great threat to hedgehogs. Many are run over as they attempt to cross roadways.
Rouge frowned. “Cars running over hedgehogs?”
Knuckles shrugged. “With Sonic, it´s more likely the other way round…”
…domesticated hedgehogs will often display a behavior of getting their head stuck in tubes (commonly, toilet paper tubes) and walking around with the tube on their head.
The shrieking laughter could be heard from miles away, Sonic was sure.
“Who the hell writes this stuff?!”
Culinary use
Hedgehogs are a food source in many cultures. Several recipes from the Middle Ages call for the use of hedgehog meat.
They looked at each other.
“Soon as possible we leave this planet.”
Everyone agreed.
