[center][img]https://fontmeme.com/permalink/240315/de039f859a0f7ed86c79f6d4265d3386.png[/img]

[b]Word Count:[/b] 1,530
[b]Level 5 Captain Falcon:[/b] 0/10
[b]Exp Gained:[/b] +3
[b]NEW EXP Balance---[/b] 3/10

[H3]Carnival Town[/h3][u]Sandswept Sky[/u][/center]

Carnival Town offered two separate racing events on the whole, and each was very different from the other. The biggest in terms of scale was Big Blue. As its name suggested, Big Blue was a large F-Zero track suspended over the ocean waters of Carnival Town’s harbor. Its size and overall distance was much greater than the comparatively smaller scaled Kart Races held on Carnival Town’s namesake track. This was necessary because of how much faster F-Zero machines were. Big Blue’s size and scale also meant that those races couldn’t be held on a daily basis like the Kart Races could be. In fact the F-Zero race on Big Blue only took place twice a week, whereas the Kart Races could be held regularly every day.

In fact a Kart Race was being held right at the moment. The track itself was versatile and capable of having its course, terrain, and obstacles swapped around once a day so that no two races here were ever exactly alike. Both events attracted its share of colorful racers, but Kart Racers on the whole usually trended toward younger drivers, while the more dangerous and technical aspects of F-Zero machines meant they were for adult drivers only. Of course that didn’t mean there weren’t adult Kart Drivers, in fact a certain F-Zero Pilot was currently fighting to maintain his lead over the pack in that day’s Kart Races. He drove a Kart modeled after the body of his personal F-Zero machine - the Blue Falcon. And although it handled quite differently, its driver wasn’t about to let that stop him from maintaining his reputation as a skilled racer.

That racer’s name was also plastered all over the leaderboards for fastests lap times and win/loss records as well. In the few days he’d been here at Carnival Town, Captain Falcon had already begun making a name for himself. He was already famous in the F-Zero Grand Prix but now that fame and infamy was beginning to follow him into the Kart Races as well.

[color=1f66b2]"Yes!"[/color] The Captain shouted out as he managed to successfully corner around a sharp turn. He was being chased down by a few opponent Karts, some of whom were even prepared to fire the items they had grabbed from the item boxes scattered around the tracks as a means to take out the competition. But Falcon himself was more accustomed to the F-Zero Grand Prix in that regard. As such, he often went out of his way to refrain from utilizing such item boxes to his advantage simply because they didn’t exist in the races he was accustomed to and therefore he was used to claiming his victories on sheer driving skill alone. And it wasn’t lost on him that this fact often tended to peeve the other kart racers currently trying to overtake him.

Also “Karts” was probably a loose term to describe the vehicles being used in these races. Some of them were indeed classic style karts, but not all of them. Some racers had their karts styled after motorcycles or four-wheel ATV’s, depending on their preference. Out of the many different racers Falcon had found himself going head to head with, there were some standouts who often gave him the most difficulty. [url=https://i.ytimg.com/vi/d0-nja3LlCo/maxresdefault.jpg]A certain bandicoot girl with a blonde ponytail[/url], [url=https://static.miraheze.org/greatcharacterswiki/thumb/7/7f/Conkerracing.png/320px-Conkerracing.png]a red-furred squirrel with a bit of a potty mouth[/url], [url=https://cdn.mobygames.com/promos/1677142-chocobo-racing-render.jpg]a white-furred critter with tiny wings and a red pom-pom on its head[/url], [url=https://oyster.ignimgs.com/mediawiki/apis.ign.com/sonic-and-allstars-racing-transformed/d/d9/Beat_All-Stars_Racing_Transformed_Screen_2.jpg]a kid in lime-green clothes with his ears perpetually covered by headphones blasting music[/url], and [url=https://i.ytimg.com/vi/ps2hebagSrU/maxresdefault.jpg]a large cat with purple fur[/url]. But the worst of the bunch had to be [url=https://hard-drive.net/wp-content/uploads/2023/07/larry.png]the pair[/url] [url=https://www.j1studios.com/wordpress/wp-content/uploads/Screen-Shot-2014-02-22-at-11.54.27-AM.png]of turtles[/url], whom Falcon could only assume were related somehow given they shared a last name. These two “Koopas” had gained quite the penchant for racing aggressively and sometimes even outright playing dirty.

But this, too, was something Falcon was no stranger to. He’d had his share of rival racers in the Grand Prix who also were overly aggressive in their attempts to retire their rivals as a means of eliminating the competition. Though admittedly these two Koopa brothers were quite a bit brazen and sometimes even cartoonish in their antics. But the pack was crossing the finish line and beginning the final lap of the race. And the track for today was designed with sharp corners and at least one loop-de-loop in mind. These corners invariably made for prime spots to try and force drivers off the track or even set traps if one was smart enough to calculate where most of the racers would make the tight turns. In fact one of the first corners contained a slyly placed banana peel that someone dropped during the previous lap that Falcon narrowly managed to avoid. The foul-mouthed squirrel behind him was not so lucky and careened out of bounds. He was unhurt but this set him back irreparably and he was certainly not happy about that fact.

Unfortunately for most of the racers, Morton Koopa’s large size meant it was relatively easy for him to drive through more than one item box at a time and effectively rob racers behind him of a chance to overtake his lead over them. After breaking through some item boxes, Morton started roaring with laughter as he barrelled his way forward a few positions while supercharged by a Power Star - knocking aside Mog and Coco in the process. Meanwhile his smaller brother Larry had just fired off a red shell that homed in on poor Beat and blasted him aside for the Koopa to zoom past. So this now had them setting their sights on the Captain, who was still maintaining his lead at this point.

First the Koopalings tried getting on either side of Falcon and slammed their Karts inward against him, only for the F-Zero Pilot to slam his brakes and cause them to miss and slam into each other instead. Falcon then hit the gas and steered around the stunned Koopalings, but it wasn’t too long before they were tailing him yet again. This time Larry shot another koopa shell, but it was green and therefore wouldn’t home in on its intended target. This allowed Falcon to safely dodge the green shell, resulting in it wildly bouncing around the track barriers and eventually blasting Morton, resulting in the two beginning to bicker with one another. Moments later, Morton busted out an item of his own. This one temporarily transformed him and his Kart into a banzai bill that blasted through Larry and would have slammed into Falcon as well if he hadn’t managed to veer out of its path. But at the very least this now put Morton in the lead where he now threatened to take first place and put an end to Captain Falcon’s current win streak. That was until the Captain spotted something blue blur past him.

Yep, it was the dreaded Blue Shell. Someone farther behind must have managed to obtain one and fired it off. And since Morton was the one in the lead now… “Oh come on!” The Koopa bellowed out when the spiky blue shell circled his Kart and then slammed down on him with explosive force. This completely grinded his momentum to a halt and resulted in Captain Falcon zooming past him and eventually past the finish line as well. He may have gotten a little lucky at the end, but Falcon’s win streak still remained intact for the time being. Incidentally, Morton and Larry’s aggressive antics backfiring on them resulted in rest of the pack managing to overtake them and leave them both in dead last, and arguing with each other over whose fault this was.

The Captain, meanwhile, brought his Kart to screeching halt and watched with satisfaction as the leaderboards updated to include his latest lap time records as well as the additional points to his win/loss record. Overall a pretty good race, he thought. And he still hadn’t needed to resort to using those item boxes yet, either. Though he had to admit that particular ending did involve some good luck on his part, but as far as he was concerned that was all just as much part of the game as one’s driving skill was. Sometimes you really did need something a little extra beyond pure skill, and this definitely seemed to have been one of those races.

Ah, but the Kart Races were not the main thing that drew Falcon to Carnival Town. No, that would be Big Blue. But the next Grand Prix race scheduled for that track wasn’t until later that evening. As such, Captain Falcon still had plenty of time to kill before it was time to head over to what he considered to be the “main event”. Given the time, he decided he’d break for lunch before continuing any of his escapades on the racetrack. In fact he may just look around at what some of the other games Carnival Town had to offer as well. He had to spice things up, somehow, after all.