Dave the Intern

Dave the Intern, real name David, is a minor antagonist in the Sonic Boom franchise. He is an anthropomorphic teenage nutria and a small-time crook working part-time at Meh Burger as the fry-cook and manager (formerly as the junior chef manager ). He is also a founding member of the Lightning Bolt Society. Living with his mother, he aspires to become a supervillain despite his extreme shortcomings and constant ridicule from people who treat him as the local flunkey.

Concept and creation
Dave was originally intended as a one-shot character for the plot of "Double Doomsday". However, due to Dave and Eggman requiring a meeting place for the plot, the staff made Dave an employee at Meh Burger. From there, his character was further developed until he became a recurring character. Dave was originally going to be called "Dave the Employee" after "Double Doomsday" but that name got overruled.

Appearance
Dave is a tall and skinny anthropomorphic nutria about half of Dr. Eggman's height. He has aqua fur with bangs mimicking a hairline, cowlicks on his head and neck, green eyes, and an almost completely white muzzle. He also possesses a wide black nose, three freckles/zits on each cheek, and two overly large buck teeth. For attire, he wears the standard Meh Burger uniform, which is a lavender shirt with yellow leaf-markings and a name tag on it. He also wears white gloves, and a pair of red and cyan sneakers. He also has two braces on his buck teeth.

When attending the Lightning Bolt Society, Dave wears a purple robe with a long hood and a red fez emblazoned with the Lightning Bolt Society's symbol. For a short time though, his Lightning Bolts uniform consisted of a purple bowling shirt with a wide white stripe down the middle, and matching shoes. Dave also has a costume created in the likeness of his super villain persona, which include a cardboard box cutout for a helmet, a table cloth for a cape, brown gloves, and blue covers strapped to his shoes. As a waiter in Meh Burger's VIP room, Dave's wardrobe includes a red jacket worn over a white shirt. For spaceflights, Dave has an advanced white spacesuit with aqua boots, belt and arms, and a white helmet with an antenna and transparent visor.

Past
Living at home with his mother, Dave was driven to villainy, possibly as a result of not having the best home life. Because Dave could never live up to his villain-admiring mother's expectations though, he would constantly get pestered by her. When his mother eventually found a new boyfriend, Dave would dislike how the guy ordered him around.

During Dr. Eggman's infamous carrier, Dave became a fan of the doctor and aspired to become like him. When attending his junior prom, Dave spent the entire event standing alone in the corner while his classmates had fun. Eventually, Dave helped found the Lightning Bolt Society, a group of low-time crooks, of which he became a member of. With his lodge, Dave would search Eggman's trash for noteworthy weapons.

Season one
After a year and a half in the fast food industry, Dave met Eggman at his work at Meh Burger where he managed to impress Eggman and become his intern. While working at Dr. Eggman's lair, Dave heard Cubot's dislike of him and dismantled the robot in secret. Dave was soon promoted to Eggman's protégée, but when Eggman told him to wait for the bigger projects, Dave snapped and locked himself in Eggman's lab where he activated the countdown on Eggman's Doomsday Device to prove himself a villain. As he and Eggman then competed over who could destroy the planet best, Tails came to help Dave improve his device. In truth, however, it was a trap which rendered Dave's Doomsday Device moot. Dave was then fired by Eggman and he returned to his old job, swearing revenge.

Back at work, Dave once made an order for Eggman, only for the doctor to take it without paying. Dave and the rest of the Lightning Bolt Society later got the news that Tails destroyed an orchard. Thinking it meant Tails was evil, the group recruited him after Dave helped Tails reseed the orchard with the Mutant Seed Gun and made him their new leader at their clubhouse. As Tails revealed he was not evil though, Sonic, Amy and Eggman broke into the club, and Dave was commandeered by Eggman to attack Sonic. However, his attempts utterly failed and the heroes got away.

In the Village, Dave and the villagers were sold Eggman's Tomato Sauce by Eggman himself. After Sonic involuntary proved it was safe, Dave bought some sauce cans. A few weeks later however, he was attacked by his workplace's cash register, which had been turned into a weapon by Eggman's sauce cans. Fortunately, he was saved by Team Sonic who put a stop to Eggman's scheme. While later at work, Dave served his last chili dogs to Fastidious and Sonic. As Dave revealed his chili dog status to Eggman when the doctor tried getting one, he mentioned they had more at the warehouse, setting Sonic off to appease Eggman. Nonetheless, Dave continued serving Sonic, Knuckles and Tails when they came to Meh Burger.

Meeting with up with the Lightning Bolt Society, Dave learned from the Chameleon that Eggman had left his lair. Dave and the Lightning Bolts thus took over the lair, but could not figure out its systems, and, in the process, launched many random attacks on Seaside Island. Dave in particular shut down Orbot and Cubot. As Team Sonic and Eggman tried to stop them, Dave and his associates prepared an ambush after seeing them on surveillance, but had to flee when the unlikely allies outsmarted them. One time when Dave provided Amy with poor service, he ended up competing with Chez Amy over Meh burger's customers. Using various gimmicks, Dave gained the upper hand, but was later left unemployed when Amy's partner, Dr. Eggman, who was upset about Dave's service too, blew up Meh Burger. Dave was soon hired by Amy, but his poor service of Eggman drove the villain to attack him and Chez Amy. Though Dave survived, Chez Amy was ruined, but Team Sonic helped Dave rebuilt Meh Burger, giving Dave his job back. It was later with some glee that Dave helped Mayor Fink banish Sonic when he lost a race to Swifty the Shrew. He soon after voted against the Village Council's decision to bring Sonic back and have him stop Eggman, but it was for naught. As the annual Chili Dog Cook-Off arrived, Dave was confident he would win even though Sonic could easy discern his "secret chili recipe" when he bragged to Team Sonic.

Dave eventually went to Knuckles while he served as deputy major to have him outlaw cheap sandwiches so that Meh Burger could stay in business and he could keep his job, but his proposal was ejected. As Dave continued his job at Meh Burger, he was hired by Eggman to serve as the caterer and an actor on his movie set, where Dave portrayed Sonic. However, he was demoted once the real Sonic took over his role. When Dave and the village were in a uproar over Sonic's supposed insensitivity, Dave provided Sonic with poor service at Meh Burger as retribution. Attending the Lightning Bolt Society later, Dave and his lodge learned from the Tree Spy that Sonic had retired and Team Sonic was out of town, so they used this chance to harass the Village. However, after they set a sheep stampede loose, Sonic returned to stop their activities. As Dave moped over being showed up, he and his lodge were forced to attend Amy's sensitivity seminar after Willy Walrus made an offensive comment. While at work later on, Dave met an alternate Knuckles who mistook him for someone else, much Dave's disinterest.

Under his mother's nagging, Dave sought to live out his supervillain dreams by destroying Team Sonic, but all his attempts failed to even get their attention. As Eggman then condescendingly showed Dave his new Electrocage, Dave accidentally knocked out Eggman. Dave took this chance to imprison Eggman in his cage and announce himself as Eggman's successor to the public. When Sonic mocked him though, Dave brought out Octopus Bot. However, he could not control the robot and had to be saved by Team Sonic, who also freed Eggman. In the process, Dave smashed his mother's house, which finally made her acknowledge him as a villain. When New Year's Eve then arrived, Dave worked a late-night shift at Meh Burger to serve the guests visiting the Village Center.

Continuing his job, Dave brought Tails his raw steak at Meh Burger when he tried to impress Zooey, only to embarrass Tails in front of her when giving him his "Hello Doggy" toy. Dave and his "bro" Lady Walrus later came to the auditions for Bro-Down Showdown and got chosen for participation. Thanks to their good relationship and some well-timed disqualifications, Dave and Lady Walus won a new couch which they quickly ruined. Another time, while Knuckles was a celebrity, Dave was able to sponsor Knuckles on behalf of Meh Burger after giving him a store discount. When Sonic was believed to have become a thief, Dave joined an angry mob at the town hall. After Knuckles volunteered to find Sonic, Dave and some villagers followed him to help. After losing Knuckles and Sonic, Dave's group kept looking for the latter while the former proven his innocence in the meantime.

Dave would later participate in the Robot Battle Royale using a deep-frier robot of his own making. However, he lost to Tails' Hypnobot in the first round. When the Fuzzy Puppies craze came, Dave quickly became a fan and had many meetings with his Fuzzy Puppy fan group, who helped their fellow fan Eggman learn the game. At Puppy Con though, Dave got arrested when the Lightning Bolt Society seemingly attacked with a rockslide, although it turned out Eggman had framed him. Dave could thus resume his job at Meh Burger. When Team Sonic then put up A Rose Without Thorns, Dave was given the lead role of "Annie Rose." Alongside the team, Dave put on quite a show, though as a storm began after the finale, he took Sonic's offer to seek shelter in Amy's House. Dave would later stay impartial as the new supervillain Charlie began bullying Knuckles. He later came to see a fight between them, a fight which Knuckles won.

Dave soon after joined the Lightning Bolt Society and other local villains at a meeting held by Eggman at his lair, who wanted them to form a team to beat Team Sonic. After some leadership disputes leading to team exercises, Dave helped encourage Eggman to lead the group so they could prove themselves after Shadow the Hedgehog had left the group criticizing them. At the attack on Team Sonic, Dave joined his faction of Team Eggman for an ambush on Amy and Sticks, but was beaten.

Season two
Acting as public spokesman, Dave announced action star Tommy Thunder's public appearance at Meh Burger when he came for promotion. Dave later treated Tommy and his associates to an elegant dinner in Meh Burger's exclusive VIP room, but denied the room's existence when the associates returned alone. Hearing later that an asteroid would impact the earth, Dave showed up to buy a spot in Eggman's bunker to ride out the impending apocalypse in. Although Dave did not get a spot, Team Sonic would stop the asteroid. Following that, Dave would continue his job at Meh Burger.

Due to an increased crime rate, Dave was forced by law to get a permit for committing evil. To do so, Dave had to take an exam, which he passed, although the law was soon rendered null and void. He also got inspired to buy some Fuzzy Puppy figurines from Orbot and resell one of them to a mystery buyer, unaware that Orbot was manipulating him. Dave was later at work when Mrs. Vandersnout suddenly made him her new houseboy and had him drag her around. Back at his job, Dave sold Sonic some low-quality chili dogs just before Eggman called Sonic into battle. Soon after, when opening Meh Burger, Dave noticed to his shock that the place had been ransacked by an unknown culprit, prompting Team Sonic to investigate. When Knuckles then got a job at Meh Burger, Dave asserted himself as Knuckles' boss during his intro. After a few days of bossing Knuckles around though, Dave caught Knuckles messing up Meh Burger while trying to attend to his other duties, and fired him. Learning afterwards that their village was named after Sticks' evil ancestor, Jebediah Badger, Dave began scorning Sticks. As a vote between Amy and Eggman's propositions for a new town name then came underway, Dave got enticed by Eggman's campaign and would vote in the following referendum.

After Dave serviced Eggman badly, the doctor got robot workers instated as Meh Burger's staff. Not wanting to get fired, Dave tried proving his worth to his boss, Mr. Slate, by facing one of the robots in a contest, but lost and got fired. He then tried ruining the party at Meh Burger's reopening with the Lightning Bolt Society as revenge, but got dumped in favor of the party. Still, Sticks got Dave to help Meh Burger and its customers when Eggman sent them towards space. With Dave flying Tails' Plane, the two reached Meh Burger in the sky and got it and everyone down. As thanks, Dave was made Meh Burger's manager by Mr. Slate, with a robot worker provided by Tails for him to manage. Regardless, Dave continued to work at Meh Burger as usual. He would soon after praise Tails as a hero when he seemingly proved that Muckfoot was real with a photo. Back at work, Dave stopped Team Sonic when he found them breaking the restaurant's plates, just before the group had to leave. Dave later had a lengthy discussion with Sonic at work when he got Sonic's name wrong for an order.

Taking Meh Burger's company car to Team Sonic's charity car wash, Dave witnessed his car being hotwired by Bolts and used to attack Team Sonic. A few hours afterward, Dave hid at his workplace when malware-infected robots went on an unparalleled blitzkrieg in the Village. During the chaos, Dave reunited with the Lightning Bolt Society, before getting inspired by Knuckles to help Team Sonic and the villagers fight the robots. Ultimately, the Village prevailed when the robots withdrew. Resuming his job, Dave would identify Meh Burger's one clean spot for Team Sonic when they noticed it, before hearing Eggman gloat about his latest plan. Eventually, Dave and the Lightning Bolts decided, after failing for the eightieth time in a row to commit villainy, thanks to Team Sonic, to try bowling as new vocation. Proving to be skilled bowlers, Dave and his group became stars after beating the PinDashers. Dave attended afterward public appearances and his job during the lead-up to the rematch with the PinDashers, but soon had a group argument with his team that broke up them up. However, a sad Dave was convinced by Team Sonic to meet his old team with them. There, Dave and co. saw Team Sonic fight the Mega when Eggman attacked, and got inspired to reunite as evildoers when the fight reminded them of their happier days as villains and friends. After inadvertently helping Team Sonic beat the Mega when trying to fight the team, Dave and co. got scared off by Sonic when they refused him his rematch.

Archie Comics
Dave was amongst the villagers who went to Dr. Eggman's Eggtoberfest. There, he got to try the high-velocity rollercoaster.

Personality
Overall, Dave is a complex character. Outwardly, he is a nerdy, dorky and awkward teenager and loner who still likes playing with action figures. He is also a devout fan-boy and suck-up, being overly enthusiastic about any menial task given to him by the subject of his admiration.

Apparently unhappy with his job at Meh Burger, Dave usually acts rather mindless and indifferent while at work, paying little interest to the customers' needs and displaying sloppy dedication to his work. His lack of overall enthusiasm about his profession has left him with a near-constant moody expression. Regardless, Dave still cares about his job at some level, having shown many times that he does not want to actually lose it, and has either sunk into a depression or planned revenge in the cases where he was left unemployed. He is also not one to sit around while his workplace is being threatened. As a waiter in Meh Burger's VIP room however, Dave acts much more professional and exhibit both polite and gentleman-like behavior.

Beneath Dave's non-threatening exterior, he is an angry, terrible, and mentally unstable kid who seeks absolute anarchy and world destruction. He is driven by an overly ambitious goal of becoming a supervillain, a dream which he lives out with a vivid and great imagination. Though he is small-minded and not very clever as his evil schemes rarely amount to anything threatening, he is still ruthless and dangerous in his own (shortsighted) way; when hearing Cubot's dislike of him, he coldly dismantled him, and when Eggman told Dave to wait for the bigger projects, he snapped and would go as far as to destroy the world to prove himself evil.

Because no one shows him any respect, Dave is at constant odds with other people as he just wants to be bad and be recognized as a big-time villain. This desire for recognition has made him lash out in anger at those who degrade him. Dave has along those lines also shown an interest in asserting dominance over others, like when he made it clear to Knuckles when he got a job at Meh Burger that he was the echidna's boss. He can also be vengeful, promising retribution at whoever gets in his way.

Powers and abilities
In addition to poor health and below average physical skills, Dave has no special powers. However, he has a vivid and great imagination and some stander planning skills, but lacks the resources and IQ to go through with them. He does have a few skills at robotics though, having constructed a primitive robot with an A.I. He is also skilled at marketing, being able to keep Meh Burger as the top establishment in the Village using various gimmicks despite Meh Burger's mediocre standards. He has also proven himself a capable airplane pilot.

Equipment
Dave wields a few quirky firearms which he uses with sufficient accuracy. He once acquired the Mutant Seed Gun, which was thrown out by Dr. Eggman after he deemed it a failure. He also wields a Meh Burger cannon which he uses to both deliver food to customers and as a projectile weapon. While his cannon is rather ineffective in terms of offense, as it lacks the power to destroy even the most fragile of Badniks, it is useful for disorientating foes.

Dr. Eggman
Dave is a big fan of Dr. Eggman and knows all his work. In fact, when Eggman let him be his unpaid intern, Dave considered it an honor and loved doing all his menial tasks. However, when Eggman told him to wait a few weeks before he could work on the bigger subjects, Dave's admiration of Eggman turned into hatred and they ended up competing for who could build the better Doomsday Device to show the other up. After Eggman fired him, Dave swore revenge against the doctor and is willing to overthrow him and take his place as the dominant supervillain of Seaside Island. Nonetheless, he is shown to still be willing to occasionally align himself with the doctor.

Mrs. Dave's Mom
Dave had a very strained relationship with his mother. In addition to being irritated over her degradation of his interests and childish treatment of him, Dave lived long under the pressure of her expectations for him to become a villain. Because he is not very competent though, Dave would get no appreciation from her, prompting Dave to lash out at her in the belief that she thought he was a loser. Nonetheless, Dave always obeys his mother's orders, like when she told him to stay away from the Lightning Bolt Society.

Deep down, all Dave wants is to make his mother proud of him. This has led him to take extensive actions to prove his maliciousness. He eventually accomplished this and earned her respect when he destroyed their house.

Lightning Bolt Society
The members of the Lightning Bolt Society are Dave's partners in villainy. One of the founding members, Dave is treated as an equal among them. The group is also among some of the few who does not mock his attempts to be a villain, as they themselves have the same ambitions as him despite their extreme shortcomings.

Although Dave does have his disagreements with some of them members and can get frustrated over their incompetence, he nonetheless considers them valued comrades. In fact, despite suffering one defeat after another with them in their villainous efforts, Dave feels happy just hanging out with them and treasures what they have together. Most noticeably, Dave chose to give up fame, respect and endorsement deals and return to the life of a two-bit crook so he could preserve the friendship he had with the Lightning Bolts.

Lady Walrus
Dave is very close friends with Lady Walrus, so much that they won Bro-Down Showdown which test partners of their knowledge of each other, showing they are very familiar with each other They both view each other as "bros" and have their own fistbump. Despite the ridicule Dave receives about their "bro-lationship," he does not like to label it.

Friends/allies

 * Dr. Eggman (formerly)
 * Lady Walrus
 * Lightning Bolt Society
 * Willy Walrus
 * Weasel Bandit
 * Chameleon

Enemies

 * Dr. Eggman
 * Orbot
 * Cubot
 * Team Sonic
 * Sonic the Hedgehog
 * Miles "Tails" Prower
 * Knuckles the Echidna
 * Amy Rose
 * Sticks the Badger

Trivia

 * Dave has played a member of Team Sonic on two occasions, the first being Sonic and the second being Amy.
 * Dave has asthma.
 * Dave works at Meh Burger for less than a minimum wage.
 * Dave is the only member of the Lightning Bolt Society with a revealed relative.
 * Dave has mentioned his junior prom, implying that he is a high school senior, or at the very least, almost done with his junior year.
 * Dave asks his mother every day about what his father was like.