Dawnrider

World of Light

Level: 6 (6 -> 7/60)
Location: Eryth Sea - Smash City Alcamoth -> Dead Zone - Argent Tower
Word Count: 651 (+1 EXP)

Power: Pending…

When Red Team arrived back at Argent Tower, those who were there before would find that it wasn’t as they left it, and as such, they would not be afforded a slow, easy start that some of them had hoped for. That was to say the pace would be hard set for them to one of immediate urgency right out of the gate. Before Banjo’s bare feet could hit flat against the cold metal floor the squad were instantly beset upon by a parasitic horde of mutant monstrosities that had more than enough time to build up in their absence with the doors forced wide open for (and likely by) them. As soon as they registered this, Banjo hastily drew Kazooie, ‘charged’ her and began returning fire.

Weighed against a couple of choice members in their party, the duo were sporting decidedly meager firepower, but still proved more useful than not to just the right extent. While a torrential rain of crossbow bolts, a sweeping volley of blue eco rounds and a roaring cloud of dragon fire tore through the front line, Banjo and Kazooie were able to individually take out any strays that managed to clear the onslaught, at one point shooting down a leaping Flood with its tentacle arm reared back ready to swat to first one of them it came into contact with. The duo found themselves suddenly more thankful than ever for the experience afforded to them through the tacked on ‘Shooter’ element in their sequel, as well as starting with full Blue ammo to make use of it. Though, the practical necessity for it meant that their supply was already noticeably dwindling while they and the rest of the squad were getting nowhere fast. They soon adjusted their strategy to saving shots for the smaller, skittering parasites that would splatter with one round apiece while switching to melee for average mid-sized enemies. This was made much easier by Linkle’s ice wall as the enemies’ advance slowed significantly, but it served as little more than a holding pattern for the Team.

Said pattern was forced to a destructive end when the crystalline barrier was battered to shards from the impact of a heavily armored vehicle against it, followed by a stream of lightning from its top-mounted arm that struck out the teleporter, ensuring them no way back. Banjo dove aside and rolled out of the turret’s line of fire, stabbing Kazooie’s beak through a former human Flood, through which the reanimated creature persisted. In a light panic Banjo fired Kazooie in an attempt to knock it loose, only to end up shooting behind it, which happened to be useful in its own for the moment it lasted before Banjo withdrew his Kazooie’s head from its torso and swatted its head away with a hefty swipe. When he disgustedly shook the iccor from his foot after stomping a crawler flat, he got a good look outside at the remaining root that the duo remembered they were bound for. It was then that Bowser made the timely call to move, to which they promptly complied.

Banjo put Kazooie away and switched to the Accept-Lance as he made a run for the retreating vehicle. He took two heavy, wide-sweeping swings around him with the lance while advancing, and topped it with a third arcing strike to set himself into a sidelong semi-vault by its grounded tip. Kazooie popped out mid-flight to stick a running landing to give herself a brief start on bounding after the dozer. Banjo pocketed the lance and twisted mid-jump to transition from talon to foot and catch them in a reckless, rolling landing atop the vehicle. The duo managed to overshoot their jump slightly, forcing him to grab a hold of the shocking turret arm for lack of anything better to hang on by, fully aware now of its function, but desperate for an expeditious escape.

World of Light

Level: 6 (51 -> 53/60)
Location: Eryth Sea - Smash City Alcamoth -> Edge of the Blue - Inkwell Isle Three
Word Count: 1040 (+2 EXP)

Through the panoramic portals, down the hole in the Guild Hall in Lumbridge, through the Casino’s front doors, and out of the cave that housed it--supposedly representing Hell itself--Blue Team took their first steps into the Edge of the Blue. For some of them, including Hat Kid, this technically wasn’t their first trip, but it was their first time entering the region proper since the initial incident that brought them effectively to the other side of the continent. Maybe they should be thanking Gneidxick for making it so convenient for them. Not only did they get to skip over the Dark forest to get there (even if it meant having to backtrack through it later), but once they were done they would have their pick of where to enter it from when they got back around to it. The fogged town beyond the treeline under creepy moon-gaze just screamed, “You’ll definitely be going here later.”

She eye-traced the picturesque coastline starting from the Forest in question to the other end of the horizon as far as she could see. Over the cartoon landscape she could spot the sea-borne city in the distance, but could make nothing of it from where she stood beyond the simple fact that it exists. She had to admit, when she signed up to travel to the world’s shore, she was a little surprised to have not seen (yet, at least) some element of a familiar locale she had expected to find. Though the idea fell in line with what she knew about the world, for the same reason, there was no telling what to expect from it.

Speaking of the unexpected, another black coat, hitherto unnoticed, made her address to Peach, laying out instructions for the next leg of their journey a tad too conveniently. As if it wasn’t hard enough trusting any of the faceless exposition machines that were these “Organization” agents (or just anyone who wouldn’t show their face to a supposed ally), she flat out handed them a set daunting and unscrupulous directives with some… interesting word choices: Gather a near dozen victims “guests”, lure them aboard “The Maw” for a proverbial ‘Bermuda’ cruise, survive the voyage to the “black” Bottomless Sea, and escape there. Yeah… that sounded like a plan; nothing sketch about it at all.

Of course, she claimed mutual interest in their quest with a desire to help, and in contrast to the last guy (Gneidxick), who had made a game of jerking them around “qualifying” them for the hunt, she was offering them a fairly direct route to their objective. That being said, if she really wanted to help that badly, couldn’t she have already had the necessary ten “guests” lined up for them to take aboard? Especially if she had been there for apparently “months”, as she said. Moreover, she clearly knew an awful lot about how this process worked and what it entailed to be so dry on helpful key details, yet heavy on poeticism. It sounded like something she could have possibly done herself, or volunteered to help with, for one allegedly so interested in seeing it through. Here, her similarity to Gneidxick showed in a patent lack of candor regarding her motives. What was really her ploy here?

Between her last adventure and the current one, as many times as she had been duped and cheated by people she worked for, it was little wonder that Hat Kid harbored acquired trust issues, and the hooded woman leading them on was setting off her scumbag radar. Was this woman going to somehow betray them at (or close to) the end of all this, regardless of what road they took there? Most likely, the child thought. Was that going to stop her from considering the way given and acting on it? As always, of course not, because she didn’t exactly have a better idea at the moment, and it wasn’t as if she would find one where they stood if she thought really hard about it for long enough.

Naturally, the given plan incited a moral quandary among some of the others, who proceeded to debate over the possibility of a better solution, or lack thereof. It didn’t seem to occur to some, as it did to the child, that they were perhaps jumping to conclusions in their assumption that the prospect sacrifices were necessarily worth saving, or as Ace suggested, that they had to be sacrificed at all, rather than additions to the hunting party, perfectly capable of handling it, that could more than help. The only way they would find out for sure is if they started looking, so instead of competing philosophy, Kid decided to get a head start on their search, consulting her top Hat for a heading toward her next objective as she looked back out over the island. For good measure, she would also be checking her Compass for anything of value she could pick up along the way before taking off.

Just as she was about to take her first steps away, the black coat spoke up once more, elaborating slightly more one what would await them aboard the monstrous vessel, and incorporating a degree of flexibility in the plan. As far as taking control of the ship, THAT was something the child could do. As it so happened, she actually had some experience with exactly that before. Well… wrecking it, anyways, but from what they could infer about it so far, this one probably deserved to be wrecked. If it came down to it, and none opposed for any good reason, the gang could count on her for that much. Though she still wasn’t feeling that great about the plan, it was certainly starting to sound better already.

At the black coat’s direction, Hat Kid sauntered aboard the afforded pirate ship, heading straight for the bow to scope out their destination whilst checking her Hat and Badge once more. Once the captain showed himself again, Hat Kid turned her attention to him with a salute in an enthusiastic show of eagerness to set sail… or just as part of her playful nature. She figured it would PROBABLY be better to let him man the wheel on this one.

World of Light

Level: 6 (48 -> 51/60) | 6 (3 -> 6/60) | 4 (26 -> 29/40)
Location: Eryth Sea - Smash City Alcamoth -> Peach’s Castle; Hat Kid’s Ship
Word Count: 3100 (+3 EXP)

Power: Pending…
Item: 100 Blue Eggs, 50 Red Feathers, -2 Jiggies

For what was essentially a mass conference on the end of the world, the overall reception to it was certainly more positive than expected. Not that there was much to expect, but among such things wasn’t boisterous, cheerful applause of enthusiastic consent. Peach’s eloquence in conveying the matter may have been in part to thank for that, along with the seemingly natural, foolhardy inclination to fight back against tyrannical divinity to reclaim dominion over their own lives, or perhaps to prove they had it all along. Whatever reason they went with, no one already fighting for it could blame them. They never needed a better reason to save the world; why should anyone else?

Aside from the ‘Alcamoth Mercenaries’ being spoken for by their apparent leader, other volunteers promptly set to signing up for any one of the four available missions. Well… locations, rather. With the shortage of information, there wasn’t much in the way of mission parameters or a plan; just destinations. Regardless of what they needed to do they simply knew that it needed to be done, and that any were so eager to act in the face of the unknown was, in its own way, admirable. Such came with the territory of heroism after all.

Soon after the meeting’s end, Banjo and Diddy managed to find each other within the crowd for a joyous, long overdue reunion. He knew Diddy for almost as long as he’d known Kazooie, whom he reminded in a whisper to be mindful of her manners. The two (Banjo and Diddy) went as far back as either of them could remember, all the way back to the start of a proverbial “Golden Age” where they both got their starts. Some may not remember it, but Banjo in fact got started by joining Diddy to aid a friend in need on a vehicular adventure. Ironic, considering his and Kazooie’s last known exploit marked something of a soft stop to their career. In a way, his known life began and ended (or paused) in the driver’s seat--a fact that came up in conversation some shorts ways into it.

Conversation largely consisted of catching up, with subjects including how they had been before the end of the world, what they had been up to then and now, and even the making of an atypically reserved, almost shy introduction of Kazooie to Diddy, and vise versa. Hers was a reservation borne of Banjo’s request to be more polite this time--a request she genuinely wanted to honor, even if it meant overcorrecting a bit. It didn’t take her long after to perk back up and level out her demeanor, as the discussion soon segued into the good news: they were officially part of the Smash circuit now. Diddy, of course, was ecstatic when Banjo presented him the letter as confirmation, and quickly followed it with a request to the overjoyed Kong that he temper his excitement before he could erupt into raucous cheer and draw undue attention their way. Now, Banjo thought, wasn’t the time for ceremony, or the unfulfilling lack thereof. Not that it kept him and Kazooie from imagining it in their future, daydreaming of it in the moment.

An extended second of silence passed with the duo staring musingly, reminiscently at the letter in Banjo’s hand. Their attention was brought back to the present when Diddy caught them spacing out, reminded them where they were, and asked if they wanted to make use of their new status with an exhibition match or two, volunteering himself as a 2v2 partner for them. As tempting as it was, they both had to respectfully decline for the time being, but tabling the standing offer for later. Their celebratory initiation and any accompanying parties would have to wait for a better time, when the world didn’t need saving… or at least when they had nothing better or more important to do. For one who previously held a premature endgame party/cookout for their first adventure, and even tried to lazily, irresponsibly duck out of the final showdown on the second, this sense of priority was a new showing from Banjo.

On the subject of saving the world, Banjo thought to ask Diddy about the part he planned on playing in that, and returned an offer in kind to join them on their crusade--be it to return a favor from the past, or just for its own sake. He similarly declined, however, clarifying an ordered need to keep a ‘reserve’ force filled out, and that he’d already been selected for it. They took this to simply meant that he would go wherever he was needed, whenever he was needed there, so it didn’t entirely rule out the possibility that they would/could run into each other in the field at some point. This marked a decisive stopping point in conversation as both parties made their friendly, parting salutations. At which point Banjo and Kazooie left to make their preparations, which mostly just involved taking the newly established path of graffiti portals to Lumbridge and back to resupply themselves by sneaking into the Cucco pens to pilfer a full stock of Eggs and Feathers, not knowing in their prior absence that they could have probably just asked for it at no charge to them, as per the quest reward.

After finishing their supply run of unnecessary criminal misconduct (hopefully unnoticed/-acknowledged by anyone) they returned to the main atrium to select a mission for themselves. The Dead Zone was among the three options, and they meant to return there eventually, given what they knew about it, they both had to admit that either one of the other two sounded more appealing--especially if they stood a respective chance of containing a beach or exotic oasis. The thought of it had them considering what they would be missing out on versus what they would be getting for their troubles...

“Hmmm. Sooo… I’m sure they don’t need our help in the Dead Zone, right?” And like that, Banjo was back to old habits, trying to find an out for a task he quietly promised to undertake for lack of wanting to return to the region.

“The people who’re already there fighting for their lives?” Kazooie emphatically exaggerated. “Probably not… but what can you live with?” Kazooie dryly tacked on a false line of guilt to poke at her partner and influence his decision making, signifying an obvious motive on her part.

“Nice try, Kazooie, but I don’t think they’re gonna bite it because we’re not there.”

“You’re probably right, but what about that ‘Skull Heart’ the hairballing pun machine mentioned?” She reminded Banjo of Nadia’s declared intent from when they initially left the Dead Zone, which they just happened to pick up on. “Weren’t we going to help find that? That’s kind of our thing, after all, and it sounds like something we’d probably rather not leave alone.”

“*sigh* I was afraid you might say that,” Banjo conceded as he begrudgingly approached the reception area to sign the respective roster.

“Don’t worry, Banjo,” she started as she leaned forward out of Banjo’s backpack and over his shoulder to sign them on. “I’m sure there’s something good in it for us,” she continued, more or less admitting a degree of underlyingly self-serving intent.

“I should’ve guessed as much.”

---

While everyone else was figuring out their headings and preparations, Hat Kid snuck off back to the castle through Jr’s portal to take care of some things of her own at ‘home’, but not before signing her name to a mission roster--ALL of them. She gave no thought or respect to procedure or protocol. She would go wherever she felt like whenever she made an honest decision to. It was in writing now, so no one could dispute it, she (incorrectly) figured, even if they could read or at least decipher said writing (in which case they definitely couldn’t dispute it ;p). Any way Administration took it, she wouldn’t be getting left out, so she needn’t concern herself with it further until the time came… maybe. In the meantime, she had a separate, long-term affair to attend to.

The child rematerialized at the bridge just outside of the castle’s front door, conveniently within reach of her water-bound ship, and made a direct path for it. She was slightly surprised at first to find a number of Toad servants within upon entering, one of whom apologized for the intrusion and explained that they simply came out to help tidy up the home of a recognized ally to the royal house as a courtesy. He clarified further that she needn’t worry about compensating them, since they were “used to it,” which the child took as good news, even if it did lend some unintentional insight on how the Princess regards her subjects. Even aside from any of that it was of little concern to her. If you leave your house parked outside of someone else’s unattended with the front door wide open for an extended period, you didn’t exactly get to complain if and when someone found their way in, but truth be told she didn’t care who made themselves at home if they were helping out in some way, as they were. She’s certainly had worse intruders aboard before, and even he sold her a map to help her on her adventure. Come to think of it, she should probably look into installing security some time.

Back to her business, she approached the command console and began running some quick diagnostics. As it turned out, the ship was definitely busted, and probably wouldn’t move any time soon without extensive repairs. After being blasted down by a dragon, crashing into a castle and nosediving into a watery moat, who would have guessed that? She had a lot of work to do, and virtually no time to get any of it done before heading out. In the absence of competent, knowledgeable helping hands, going around repairing every little mechanical and cosmetic flaw in the ship by hand between outings was going to take an eternity and a half. The idea hit her that she still had a Time Piece on her person, and three more in the vault that she could use to systematically rewind the damages a little at a time. Sure, it would dramatically reduce repair time and monetary costs, likely affording her completion in under an hour, would she potentially burn out a Time Piece to accomplish it, or inadvertently affect more than that doing it? While the former was a significantly more likely consequence, that was the problem with harnessing raw, unrefined Time power. If you weren’t careful with how you directed it, things went wrong everywhere--and everywhen--in a hurry.

She sat for a moment in intensive thought, trying to figure out a way to make this, or something, work. Then, it occurred to her: the ship. She already had a means of refining the temporal energy that she used regularly. She had never used it in this way, of course, but if she just cyclically rerouted the energy already available to her and ran it in reverse, it might keep the outputted energy from escaping past the ship and make a full correction to the damages in one move with next to no consumption. It was a bit of a stretch, but who ever accomplished anything by taking zero risks. She thought no further of it and decided to put her hypothesis to the test, punching in the according command sequences and engaging the ship’s main drive.

The vessel rumbled and whirred to life as if readying for takeoff, and with a forward push on the throttle, it ‘boomed’ into motion, but not. The ship itself could be best described as running in place, but everything that happened to it ran backwards… visibly. To any possible onlookers within or around the castle, only a swelling flare of blinding white could be seen emanating from the source, followed by an implosive flash of bright blue to signal the ship’s disappearance. From Hat Kid’s perspective, events quickly replayed themselves before her in rewind; from Toads entering, to watching herself get thrashed around by turbulence and hit with Rumbi, all the way back to when she initially came under fire by MegaDragonBowser, a moment she couldn’t previously recall. Brightness slowly encompassed her vision, obscuring (or perhaps representing) everything up to that.

After a moment, her view cleared up, and the next thing she knew, her ship sat inert, fully repaired as hoped. She perked up at the realization, but before she could get too excited about being right, she glanced back at the vault to be sure everything was still in place. The display read ‘x3’ just as before, and further inspection within the vault confirmed the same. She sighed with relief at the reassurance before exiting the vault and shutting it behind her. With her work here done, she began to make her leave, but not before stopping at one of the restored, empty relic displays, examining it thoughtfully, and pulling out the two golden jigsaw pieces she found back at Spiral Mountain to place within the display’s magnetic field to float aimlessly. It would have made more sense to put them on display in the art room, but that was something to address later.

It was when she turned back to leave that she got her first good look outside, noticing an immediate, if not terribly dramatic change in scenery. She swung the door open and peered down over the side to see that she wasn’t over water anymore. In fact, she was actually behind the castle now. That much became clear to her as she hopped out of her ship (shutting the door behind her this time). She turned back around to gaze proudly up at her good work with smug satisfaction. She not only undid all of the damage dealt to it previously, but also managed to park in a better spot without even having to try. What’s more was that it took pretty much nothing on her end. And to think she almost acquiesced to a more conventional approach to repairs and relocation. Completing simple, necessary tasks the right way was for chumps!

…

…

So what did that say about her? What did it speak of her that she would so soon suspend her own standard--to never abuse such power to meet her own ends as she saw fit--the second it became the slightest bit convenient for her? Her bright smile gradually descended into a discouraged frown as the realization began to set in for her. Did this one time infraction on her own morals doom her to a future of lapses, or could such an action be re-promised against and forgiven; reconciled as a necessity for the future in service to the greater good? Or was that just proof of fallacy; a handwave of conduct as the genesis to justified ends? Would they do the same? Was she really no better than those she distrusted, and for the same reason? Did it stand to reason that she could truly be just another… “bad guy”?

She shut her eyes and clapped both sides of her head to snap herself out of her stupor of internalized dread. All this low-hanging ethical existentialism was making her head hurt. She was too young to be having these sort of thoughts anyway. Figure out what you can now, and take care of what you can today! Learn from the past; look to the future; ACT in the present! And on that, she remembered she had something more present to figure out: her mission destination. Before she could let her young, curious mind dangerously wander again, she refocused on the matter at hand and started going over the destination list in her head as she made the portal trek back to Alcamoth so that by the time she got back, she could decide where she wanted to go… for real this time.

---

“You sure I can’t count on you for this one?” Fox asked of his wingman. Him and Falco spent the better part of the period following the conference conversing pier-side, overlooking the bustling city proper as they went over what was discussed earlier. The initial apocalypse, what they remembered between then and ‘awakening’, the implication of ‘Spirits’, what it all meant, with an assurance from Fox that it wouldn’t be getting any easier, and an unexpected declaration from Falco that he wouldn’t be joining him or any of the main force on their mission.

“Sorry, Fox, but I’ve got places of my own to be,” Falco replied as he faced about to head off. “I’ve got people counting on me here, and between you and me, those guys look like they could use a ‘fearless leader’,” he said somewhat mockingly, gesturing headways to what he could see of the main force. “You should go be that for them. I’m sure you can handle it.” Though low-key backhanded the complementary endorsement was, it was evident in his tone that he meant it. Even his occasionally rivalrous attitude toward Fox didn’t detract from or diminish the genuine respect he held for him.

“So what will you do?” Fox asked in regards to Falco’s preoccupying affairs, expecting he wouldn’t remain idle.

“Probably cover the skies wherever I’m needed,” he answered with a shrug and a head shake. “But if you ever need a bail-out, I’ll be there.” Fox lightly smirked at the remark, delighted at how some things just never changed.

“Good luck out there… wherever you go.”

“Keep some of that for yourself,” Falco replied casually as he started taking his first steps away. “You might need it.”

“Take care, Falco,” said Fox in parting, responded to by Falco with a simple blind wave back. With that, Fox made his way over to reception and started looking over the available options, weighing them to the best of his ability. Knowing (or in the case of one, remembering) as little as he did about any of them made it difficult to make a valid assessment as far as where his talents were best suited. The most he could do was hazard his most educated guess based purely on name, location, the current lineup for each mission, and his assumptions about all of them. After a brief minute of consideration, he came to a decision, approached the respective mission roster, and signed on for it...

World of Light

feat.

GM

@Lugubrious

Level: 6 (25 -> 45 -> 48/60) | 5 (30 -> 50/50) LEVEL UP! ---> 6 (0 -> 3/60) | 4 (3 -> 23 -> 26/40)
Location: Land of Adventure - The End -> Eryth Sea
Word Count: 3383 (+3 EXP)

Power: Pending…

Dragon bone cracked with sickening report under Koopa might, a ripple of shadow fanned out over The End in its death throes, sunlight broke the abyssal atmosphere, dissolving it away like photo-soluble cloud cover, and with the return of spacial ‘normalcy’, the island gave way to gravity underfoot. For Banjo and Kazooie evacuation was as simple as launching back into Flight, but could do nothing from there to help anyone else leave the doomed earthberg. Uncertain of their ability to support passengers in Flight, and unable to catch up to the plummeting landmass even in a terminal dive, it was too late for them to consider it now. They were left in the aftermath of their impulse to watch the island fall with their teammates still on it, and they could only hope now that everyone else found their own ways to safety.

Hat Kid and Fox sprinted for the nearest edge to them, neither having an exit strategy in mind, but knowing they couldn’t afford to stick around long enough to think about it. A solution for the child flew over her head as Jr took off in his hastily repaired Clown Car, to which she lept after and threw out her Hookshot at it, latching on and sailing clear of the End Stone just a yard shy of the edge. Fox, seeing no immediate alternatives and no reason to look back for one, bounded from the island into open air, opting to figure it out as he went. Even at their relatively generous height to the isles below, however, he wouldn’t have much time to do that at his current rate.

He scanned the array of still floating islands for the nearest one to him according to altitude and distance, calling in his lifetime of experience airborne to make quick, intuitive mental calculations for how best to approach it. Reaching any one of them safely (or at all) would require a well-timed boost and shield stop in the right order to allow for drift and cancellation, but that was only if a better, less risky way didn’t present itself to him in a timely manner. That looked to be the case until he noticed his flight path intersecting with that of… a flying chicken? Nevermind where it came from, or why it was there. He thought that it surely couldn’t be the better solution he was hoping for, but then saw it working for Cuphead and Linkle (whom he tried not to look too hard at when hit with a discouraging chill of negative energy). As absurd as it seemed, if it really worked that well, then there was little reason not to try it now.

Fox boosted after the fowl in a trail of white jetstream smoke, catching a hold of it with one hand for an initially unsteady descent. The sudden addition of his own weight made for a somewhat startling drop for the Cucco and Fox alike, which he rectified in a rush by getting both hands on the flying flightless bird. He tried to be as gentle with the unfamiliar creature as he could, considering the predicament, and after a second the two of them stabilized. To his surprise, it actually made for easy going from there, coasting the rest of the way down to make landfall on a nearby island.

A little at a time, the party regrouped on solid ground, amidst a hybridized biome of terrestrial and aquatic. Fox gently released the Cucco to return to its master, which turned out to be Linkle, meaning its arrival to his aid wasn’t just random coincidence. Again, he refrained from lingering his gaze on her, glossing over her and Geralt as he conducted a head count. His assessment wasn’t the best informed, however, as he hadn’t made himself aware of who and how many their group were up to that point.

“Is that everyone?” he asked aloud to anyone who could or would acknowledge him. Though he would prefer an actual answer--be it verbal or gesture--he could take contented silence for its own confirmation. Better that than for questions to be raised of one’s whereabouts following an incident.

Hat Kid took to the Courier with a curious eye, inspecting his new draconic form with a sense of wonderment. From the front she could see his new claws, and perhaps for the first time since meeting him, his eyes beneath the shade of his hat, aglow with amethyst. She still couldn’t make out a full face though. From there she circled around to his back and tugged lightly on the tails of his scaled dragon-leather duster, then mounted his actual tail (that he now had). She then crawled up onto his wings, giving them a once-over before moving to stand on his shoulders to get hands and eyes on his horns. She made a quick climb up the scaled cowboy’s form, excitedly, but impertinently, stealing a feel of his newly added dragon parts to see if they felt as they looked.

“COOL!” she gushed admiringly, doing little to hold back her exuberance in the face of such a development. Sure, she had seen Spirit fusion before, but found the prospect and results largely unappealing (with a few exceptions) up until now. While she had a certain respect for the idea to begin with regarding its potential, she saw it similarly as something that could easily be overdone or done wrong altogether. Perhaps seeing a nigh exemplary high-level fusion was what it took to excite her about the possibilities, but not so much that she would willingly rush it. This was the kind of thing you wanted to be picky about, that you wanted to be patient with. In the meantime, she thought it would be worth reexamining everyone else’s Spirit transformations to get a better grasp of its effects on others, now that she was paying closer attention to it. She dismounted 6’s head (at a rate dependent on his tolerance) and joined the Koopa Troop (and whoever else) in taking a seat by the campfire, joining in the round of marshmallow roasting and quietly relishing the opportunity for a moment of downtime.

Fox tuned in to the brief commentary between Peach and Poppi about the distinctively man-made features of the island, speculating with educated guesses as to their purpose. “I’ll go check it out,” he added, volunteering himself for lookout and setting off accordingly. He proceeded at a leisurely pace, seeing as the matter didn’t demand his immediate attention… but would soon nonetheless have it. A few minutes passed in uneventful quietude in his search for one of the platforms in question, and as he neared one on the island, he spotted movement in the distance of another around the same time; the figures’ shapes unclear, but their action confirming. They stepped onto their resident platform and blinked away to another island, while Fox moved to make sure he kept them in visual registry. They reappeared on a closer island, their visages made clearer to him as familiar to him; one especially so.

“Falco?” he questioned aloud with eyes narrowed on the distant subjects. Upon closer inspection, he could see his old ally traveling with two other fellow Smash veterans: Ness and a Jigglypuff. In anticipation of their arrival, he moved to the platform to meet them on the path leading from it, approaching at a matched pace to theirs. “Good to see you too,” he smirked in reply to Falco, taking a light verbal jab at him for skipping the friendly salutations.

“What? D’ya miss me that badly?” The two anthro pilots lifted a hand in preparation as they neared each other and met them with a firm, brotherly clasp. “I figured you could handle yourself without me for a change.”

“Better than you,” Fox teased.

“Ey, don’t get cute! Last I checked we’re even,” he retorted assertively.

They referred, of course, to all the times they had bailed each other out of trouble. Fox could vividly recount a handful of saves he’d received from his fellow wingman. The inverse of the same he’d long since lost count of. In other words, they were never even, but it didn’t truly matter to either of them. What mattered was that they were always there to help when they most needed it. That’s what it meant to have a loyal friend at your back: that you could be entire star systems apart, and you’d still never be too far away.

“I’m glad to see you’re okay… all of you,” he directed to the entire party of three. It was then that he noticed, in the bigger eyes of the child and Pokemon, that there was something missing. No corrupting red adorned them, and grateful as he was for that to be the case, it made him wonder how. In his musings he was caught staring after a moment.

“Uh… are you okay, Fox?”

“Huh…?” he responded with a head shake as he broke from his contemplative stupor. “Y-yeah… I’m fine.”

“You sure? Because you looked like you were tuning out for a second.”

“It’s nothing… nothing I can explain...” he clarified, prompting a subtle, but curious look from Falco. Admittedly, this was all still new to him, so he could hardly begin to explain something he didn’t yet fully understand himself. Though there were a few waiting back at camp who could fill in the gaps for them, and he was due to have that conversation himself. “Come on,” he instructed, gesturing headways up the path. “There are more of us up ahead. They can catch you up better than I can.”

In the middle of their reunion the two pilots received extra company in the form of Peach. Like Fox, the princess recognized the familiar faces of all three newcomers, though more as acquaintances than friends. In the period of rest prior, she also spotted an all-too-memorable emblem adorning the floating palace from which the three ventured forth. Circular with an off-center cross, it was a symbol of remarkable simplicity that stood for something of uncommon importance. Seeing it loosened some of the memories lodged in her backbrain, and battles fought of campaigns concluded, sequestered away in her mind from her daily life of sports, parties, and getting rescued. She wanted to get down to business immediately, but she didn’t mind her comrades getting a moment to reunite. This world made for a lot of people robbed of their friends and family, after all. Something like this was not to be taken lightly. Peach approached, but only waved for now. Not for one moment did she consider that her appearance had changed drastically.

Unfortunately Falco only got her appearance, and though he couldn’t shake a sense that he’d seen this woman before, he didn’t recognize her. “Hey,” he greeted. “So you’re one of Fox’s new pals, huh?”

“You’ve... met, actually,” Fox corrected, considering not the tact with which to approach such a revelation until after hinting at it.

“Oh, yeah?” Falco looked at Peach in a new light, but couldn’t quite see it. “...Where?”

Peach blinked. “I’m surprised you don’t remember. We worked together to defeat Tabuu. Princess Peach?” She grimaced, realizing. “Oh, right. I forgot that my looks changed.”

As a befuddled Falco looked on, she held her arms wide to give the newcomers a good look and help them realize. A mix of pink and black, her sporty longcoat, undershirt, and jeans suggested more ‘biker’ than ‘princess.’ Her crown of thin, blonde-streaked black dreadlocks roughly resembled her old hairdo, but her rougher features and dark skin were a far cry from her origin appearance. “I absorbed the spirit of a man named Mr. Grimm. I got both some of his looks, and his power to manipulate souls.”

Falco scratched his head with his feathers. “Well, I’m sure it’ll make sense sooner or later.” He watched as Jigglypuff walked out of the conversation, going for the group of people at the center of the reef. When Peach turned to head that direction, he and Ness followed suit. “So, what’re y’all doin’? Last thing I expected after seein’ that big sphere pop was a whole bunch of people flyin’ around.”

“We just kicked the ass of this huge black dragon,” Peach told him, her smug smile not at all hidden. “Two down, eleven to go. Not just dragons, either. We’re fighting the boss of every region.”

Falco whistled, which was a real accomplishment with a beak. “Whoa. You guys are nuts.” Though given his usual company over the years, that hardly surprised him. “What’re you doin’ all that for? Fun? I know it ain’t for your health.”

Peach gave a dry chuckle, thinking of those hurt badly during this mission, and of those who’d already given their lives. Was this fun? The new part of her soul didn’t seem to relish bloodshed, and the old part certainly didn’t. “Nope. To save the world. Well, all worlds.”

The pilot looked taken aback. “What, that’s it? No more details or nothin’?”

Peach shook her head. “So that I don’t have to explain a million times, I’m going to wait to give the full story to whoever’s in charge, since you three strike me as a scouting deployment.”

“Oh. Makes sense, I guess.” The Princess proposed a curious, but plausible theory that Falco and the other two were a splinter of a larger party, much like their own, prompting silent speculation from Fox. After taking a deep breath, Falco got a little more serious. “Something tells me you ain’t jokin’. Well, if the world’s on the line, the time for smashin’s over. Count me in.”

Ness nodded his agreement, the young boy’s face solemn. Fox echoed this, happy to have his wingman back. Jigglypuff couldn’t answer on account of being amid the other heroes already, preparing to introduce herself with a song.

---

Meanwhile, Banjo and Kazooie broke away early into the respite period to look around, more out of habit than necessity. After a minute or so, they crested one of the hilled ‘starfins’ of the island and gazed out at the tower; the emblem emblazoned on it familiar, and fresh in their memory. Banjo pulled out the invitation letter they received from L.O.G. (of all people) and inspected the seal on it, comparing it to the one adorning the tower. It went without saying that they were the same, but the question remained as to what lay within the monolithic structure.

“Hm. You think any of them might know this place?” ask Banjo.

“I don’t know, but let’s go ask them anyways,” replied Kazooie before they backtracked back to camp, where they would happen upon a brief exchange of slightly heated dialogue.

“I’m sorry, YOUR ‘army’?” Falco responded defensively to Bowser, none too keen on his conscription attempt. “Well, I hate to turn you down ’Your Highness,” he emphasized mockingly, “but I’ve seen your armies; what they’re worth. Not interested.”

“At ease, Falco,” Fox calmly interjected. “He’s on our side this time.”

“What if he is?!” he replied rhetorically. “If he really wants to help, that’s fine,” he turned his attention back to Bowser, “but I don't work for you! I ain’t one of your flimsy goons, and I ain’t gonna be! So you can forget talkin’ at me like it. That goes for the rest of us. ‘Got it?’” He ended his declarative rant by repeating the Koopa King back to himself, letting the last word hang for a second before backing off to allow the tension to deflate. The following accosting of Bowser by a cleanup/makeover crew was sure to see to that. In response to the awkwardly timed silliness, Falco just hung his head with a resigned sigh and withdrew from the scene. Just as well, his piece was said, his point made (maybe), and caring little either way if the Koopa communicated an understanding or not (fully expecting ‘not’), or for whatever he otherwise might have had to say about it in response. To him, the “biggest, baddest villain” was little more than a big, delusional pushover with a bloated ego and sense of entitlement to match, and Falco was just one among a shocking many who wasn’t afraid to challenge him.

“What was that about us being ‘free’ anyway?” he turned to ask Peach and Fox; whoever could best answer that for him. Fox opened his mouth to try, but was cut off just ahead of his attempt.

“Forget whatever you’re all arguing about,” chimed Kazooie, loudly. “Banjo and I just found something, of course.” The snarking Breegull had the attention of the space animals, as well as an open ear from Hat Kid, with surely more.

"Let’s hear it,” said Fox.

“Erm, well… you know that place we saw on the way down?” Banjo started. “Would any of you *ahem*... fellow ‘Smash’ guys happen to recognize it?” Besides the new arrivals, that qualified only four of their troop to potentially answer their question: Fox, Peach, Bowser and Jr.

“I saw the symbol,” Peach mentioned. “Don’t recognize the building.”

“Weeell, allow me to enlighten ya,” Falco said. “That tower’s the place where the Super Smash Brothers fighting games have been happenin’. We’ve been runnin’ tournaments, brawls, Smash Run, you name it. And thanks to the sim rooms, we’ve been doin’ it on stages from all sorts of worlds. The joint’s got livin’ quarters, gym, cafeteria, hospital, you name it.”

Peach put a hand on her hip, her face questioning. “You said ‘we’. Who else is there?”

“Fighters, admins, and some randos. All us fighters are from past tournaments, and the admins keep things runnin’. Then there’s just some people who hang around, not doing much.” Falco broke down the inhabitants of the tower, which only gave a real idea of some of their identities to those who also participated in these ‘past tournaments’.

"And… you’re out here?” Fox asked, implying a ‘why’.

Falco crossed his wings. “Just to see what’s goin’ on. When the bubble popped, the lookout spotted a bunch of people flyin’ around. There’s enemies around here sometimes, and refugees other times, so we pay attention.”

Hearing all of this struck with Fox for more reasons than one. Described seemed to be a city built around a colosseum, with the local culture centered around it, and one apparently providing asylum for those in need of it. By the sounds of it, Falco and co. had been here for some time, with cited memory of their exploits dating back presumably farther than a day--several, perhaps. Fox had only ‘woken up’ a little less than an hour ago himself, so he could assume they’ve been up for longer than him at least. Yet, somehow, his wingman was distinctly less aware of the situation at large for the outside world than he was, which was saying something. For that reason, he couldn’t help thinking something might be amiss. As much as he’d like not to shirk the duties of his new mission, whilst finding the prospect opportunity to ‘play’ again dangerously tempting, it was clear to him that there was a better reason to go. They needed only agree to. He looked to Peach, his perceived peer among the adventuring party, believing her to share his (or similar) thoughts on the matter, and silently expecting joint approval on venturing there.

Peach already had a plan in mind. “We’ll go with you back to this facility of yours shortly,” she told Falco. “We’ve got a lot to discuss with the people there.”

Fox nodded his concurrence in kind, then looked back at those gathered around the fire resting, disrelishing the idea of asking them to break camp so soon after setting up. It wasn’t as if they could settle in regardless (and would be impractical to try, considering where they were going), but he did try to empathize a little for those who didn’t share his stamina or propensity for seeing a mission straight through with little to no pause.

“We’ll gather everyone on your call,” he said to Peach, entrusting the order to her. Having been with this party for longer and better acquinting herself with them, it stood that she would better know when they would be ready to set off.

World of Light

Level: 6 (19 -> 25/60) | 5 (24 -> 30/50) | 3 (27 -> 33/30) LEVEL UP! ---> 4 (3/40)
Location: Land of Adventure - The End
Word Count: 1016 (+6 EXP | Overdrive!)

Power: Burst
Items: -2 Red Feathers

Chaos was the word here. One could hardly be blamed for getting lost amid the action, as much of it as there was to keep up with. Since the moment the last of the Ender Dragon’s healing stones were shattered she was harried relentlessly by the party, allowed not a second untouched. From all sides, brutal pummellings, focused fire, heavy bombardment and all other manner of devastation was brought down on the black drake one successive move at a time, yet she persisted still in spite of the apparent damage sustained over a short period. It seemed that any time the heroes got on top of the Ender, she would manage to shake them off, and her sheer enormity (to rival Bowser) made it near impossible to keep her pinned down.

The final hit in Poppi’s assault threw the Dragon’s head back, catapulting Hat Kid off with it. Between the mere fact that she was fighting a dragon (and, from the looks of it, winning), to standing atop it amidst the explosion from Linkle’s cast mega bomb, inexplicably unharmed, to now following Ace’s earlier example by grappling onto the beast’s tail, she had to admit to finding a thrill in the conflict. This was just the kind of thing adventures were made of, she thought. Nothing like seeing a teammate get maimed and being subsequently flung away with a batting tail spin to remind her of the reality of the situation. Of the several others affected, be it by direct bludgeon or the accompanying wind buffet, Peach and Banjo and Kazooie stood the best chance of immediate recovery; the pair already being airborne, and the Princess uniquely air capable.

The duo went no farther than the spires before Kazooie beat her wings back to halt their trajectory, righting themselves and regaining control, with Banjo politely waving off the Toadies. As a veteran Smasher and daring career fighter pilot, Fox had a considerable degree of aerial awareness not afforded to most. Certainly enough to get his feet behind and under him in preparation for an impending landing, one that halfway surprised him by coming sooner than expected when he hit feet first squarely into the palm of a giant royal bee. Though unacquainted, he recognized her from his initial cursory inspection to be an allied member of the adventuring party. He cocked an appreciative, affirming smirk at the relative stranger just as she caught the small, purple clad child in her other hand like a baseball mitt, and seeing as her hands were now full, reached out one of his own to clasp arms with the incoming Cadet. Catching the hunter in flight jerked him over by the arm a bit, but he was otherwise able to maintain his balance and footing in the Queen’s daintily gloved, disembodied hand.

“Think you can get us close to it… without stopping?” he requested, with due respect to Her Highness (and as an unfamiliar comrade), that they be brought to the Dragon at speed rather than simply dropped off. To the Cadet, still hanging on by Fox’s and his own grip, he instructed, “Hang on, and be ready!” For what, he didn’t specify, but trusted the hunter to understand by the time they completed their approach. Hat Kid tipped her cap out of her eyes to get a good look at the regal insect carrying her before takeoff, her expression shifting in stages from curiosity, to her joyous default, to excitement when they picked up speed. Meanwhile, Banjo and Kazooie were closing in as well from the other side, conserving their limited Feather supply until coming within their attack range.

Air rushed harshly past the heroes in flight like road noise as they made a beeline for the Dragon--incidentally by the power of a bee no less. Fox knelt down in her palm for stability, still dragging the Cadet on one side, and Kid sat up herself in similar preparation for whatever the daring vulpine had in mind. Whatever it was, she was eager to get in on it. In any case, she swapped hats and kept a vial swirling until then. On the last rapidly approaching stretch of their advance, Fox let out a forceful groan with the strain of exertion as he brought his shoulder back to underhandedly throw Ace toward the Dragon with as much might as he could muster for the maneuver, and whether assisted by Sectonia or by his own strength, he would go soaring in behind him.

Fox followed through on the toss with such force that it entered him into a long distance gainer, having used the entirety of his bodily strength for the stunt. While he was at it, he thought to whip out his sidearm to pepper the Dragon’s face to cover Ace’s approach. By then Banjo and Kazooie were close enough to blindside her in the temple with another Beak Bomb before having to disengage while they increased their altitude and realigned themselves for the next round. This was shortly followed by Fox zipping through the air at the beast’s head, stopping just shy of arm’s reach. This differed from his usual dash technique in that his trail was of starkly darker coloration, and wicks of flame emitted from him softly ahead of a brief glint to signal a sudden heavy explosion generated from it. He leaned into his fall as he went into Jet flight around the Dragon for a quick burst of evasive mobility, mounting her wing if possible.

Finally, Hat Kid, who launched at a much steeper angle, came down chasing the two vials she could get off before descending, switching to the Power Cap and charging her umbrella in freefall. Like before, she landed forcefully on top of the drake’s skull, this time jabbing the tip of her parasol into the hole left in it as she let loose a fully charged, Power-imbued Geyser Beam directly into it. In the best case that this yielded a satisfyingly conclusive result, the Cadet would hopefully be out of the blast zone, lest the result be decidedly less satisfying.

World of Light

Level: 6 (15 -> 19/60) | 5 (20 -> 24/50) | 3 (23 -> 27/30)
Location: Land of Adventure - The End
Word Count: 620 (+4 EXP | Overdrive!)

Items: -1 Red Feather

Having been rejuvenated by osmosis, Kazooie woke with two quick headshakes to dispel her daze, then gave Banjo an affirmative nod before they took off to join the others in swarming the Dragon. The great drake bore down on the fortified, gigantified Koopa King, who held mostly even ground with the leviathan thanks to the enhancements provided by their allies. The clench between them was broken after a moment, with some significant damage on both sides to follow, and just no sooner than they left cover, the duo would have to seek it once more to clear themselves of the caustic bombardment. The ever nimble Hat Kid was able to dodge the corrosive clusters with relatively little issue, and Fox had his Reflector handy as always to deal with it in the usual manner most convenient to him, allowing him to continue his advance unimpeded.

The rebounded bomb missed the Dragon, however, as she entered into a sweeping loop to generate another forceful windwall aimed at scattering the fighters yet again. The Ender’s repeat strategy would yield little of anything for her this time against the centered fighters who were ready for it. Kid simply hooked onto one of Bowser’s tail spikes to anchor herself to the nearest, heaviest thing she could find on a second’s notice. Fox Jet boosted off to the side at a low, rising angle--parallel to the gale--to exploit the wind’s force so that it might expedite his ascent to one of the taller spires on his flight path. His landing was slightly unsteady on account of his method, but nonetheless manageable, successfully perching him atop the obsidian column.

The Dragon then centered herself over the island’s shallow peak and began spilling forth physically impossible quantities of acid from her maw like an open valve, threatening to flood the land’s surface and presenting a new hazard for everyone on the ground. Hat Kid immediately sought higher ground on the giant shelled back of Bowser, who likely wouldn’t feel or otherwise notice her due to their insurmountable size disparity. On the other end, Banjo and Kazooie were making their way to the top of the highest pillar they could reach, irrespective of the acid flow, using a series of extended jumps and Shock Springs to reach a suitable vantage point from which to take off in Flight. Just as soon as they went airborne the duo lined themselves up with the Dragon and burned a Red Feather to charge forward with another Beak Bomb aimed at the side of its head. Should the impact prove heavy enough, the Dragon would (hopefully) be concussed out of sustaining the acidic downpour, ‘shutting off the faucet’, so to speak. In any case, the bear and bird would use the divebomb’s recoil to disengage so they could be ready to move, evade or attack once more.

After traversing enough spires to close in while staying off the ground, Fox moved to capitalize in short order, dashing onto its head, planting the muzzle of his blaster flush against its skull, and opening fire. Weak as the individual shots were, they came out in rapid succession to pile on damage in a hurry, so he would see if he couldn’t bore a small hole into the drake’s head this way before inevitably being forced to dismount, using one of its horns as a handhold to maintain his ground for as long as he could before then. To follow, an explosive vial came soaring over Bowser’s head at the Ender, with Hat Kid coming up behind it in stride. She swapped out her hats mid-run, leapt from Bowser’s head, and crashed down onto that of the Dragon with a tiny, flaming, Power wreathed fist...

World of Light

Level: 6 (11 -> 15/60) | 5 (16 -> 20/50) | 3 (19 -> 23/30)
Location: Land of Adventure - The End
Word Count: 523 (+4 EXP | Overdrive!)

Items: Red Feather* (addendum; -1*), Chicken Thigh, Honeycomb

Banjo and Kazooie’s rebounding midair tumble wasn’t the usual result of Beak Bomb impact. With zero delay between contact and detonation the crystal exploded quicker than they could bounce off of it. Given a moment’s pause of confusion as to why they were going end over end in freefall, Banjo reflexively reached out for the obsidian spire. He had missed the ledge by this point, but managed to jam a claw’s worth of digits into the pillar’s side for a loosening handhold. Before he lost his grip, he looked over his shoulder to see Kazooie hanging limply out of his pack, unconscious. When his hold gave out, he made sure to direct his fall to hit face down so as to spare his partner the throe of gravity. The impact was reduced from the stalled height Banjo bought them, but still enough to bounce him once against the ground. Getting back to his feet, he took the Chicken Thigh from his inventory and stripped it of meat in one pulling bite, expecting the health gain to transfer to Kazooie as it normally did (while also trying not to think about the technically cannibalistic implication of directly feeding chicken to his avian friend, had he done that instead). He waited a moment to see if she returned to consciousness before doing anything else.

The duo’s proximity and position relative to the tower saved them dealing with the turbulent gale force that wrapped around the Dragon on its return. Fox and Hat Kid didn’t share their luck. Fox, having landed in the middle of the field inside the spires, made a run for cover the second he picked his head up to see the Dragon rushing headlong downlane. He missed its form this time, but the winds carried him from his feet for a couple hundred yards, past the island’s edge. He managed to slow his arc to a near stop with the inexplicable ‘stalling’ effect generated by pulsing his Reflector before he could be sent too far to recover, and followed by shooting himself back toward land in a blanket of powerful, propulsive flame.

Hat Kid, still in tow with Jr, was left at the mercy of disorienting inertia, equal parts unable and unwilling to detach from the tumbling kart for fear of which way (and how fast) it might send her. She paid for it by face planting against the same black stone as Jr when she was swung directly over him by the length of her line. She was brought to the ground almost as quickly when the kart fell and dragged her down with it. She sat up, rubbing her head with a grumble of pain and annoyance alike, and proceeded to pop a Honeycomb in her mouth like a butterscotch candy for a quick pick me up. Slightly reinvigorated, she stood up, detaching her Hookshot to let it reel back in, and scanned the field to look out for any remaining crystals before heading into the thick of the action. Though a good distance behind her, Fox would be quick to catch up, as would the duo (depending on Kazooie).

World of Light

Level: 6 (5 -> 11/60) | 5 (10 -> 16/50) | 3 (13 -> 19/30)
Location: Land of Adventure - Spiral Mountain -> The End
Word Count: 1896 (+6 EXP | Overdrive!)

Power: Brewing Hat, Beak Bomb, Jet
Item: Red Feathers (-2-3), Trowlon-lon Milk (-0.4)

With the duo’s unceremonious, but official, induction into the ranks of Smash, the brief intermission was over. Proper ceremony and celebration could wait until later. The matter at hand demanded their collective attention, which the Princess called upon for the pre-mission briefing. Her speech served more to inspire than direct, and certainly, it was somewhat inspiring… in the sense that it inspired some confidence in Fox that someone of reasonable competence was taking charge in his (or anyone else’s) absence. Though either of them were preferable to nothing as far as direction, between her and Bowser, he had a clear preference. At Peach’s last line, a corner of his mouth cocked up slightly in a light, satisfied smirk. She may yet have a latent talent for squad leadership if left to foster it, but likelihood of sharing the burden over shouldering it ensured she’d be able to do so comfortably--relatively speaking.

With that, the party proceeded across (or in some cases over) the bridge in managed order, which, in the way of steady traversal, posed no issue for Hat Kid, Fox, or Banjo and Kazooie. For the latter two it almost stood as a reminder of old times… if not for the excess of company, the change in landscape, the difference in objective, and pretty much everything else. This sentiment of alien circumstance carried over well into Grunty’s Lair, the interior not so much as remotely resembling its former self. A finely laid brick corridor took the place of the open, methodically carved out cavern that they remembered from before, ending some ways in at a darkened well frame embedded in the wall--no doubt an entrance into the looming dark that hung over the lair. Upon confirming its safety and simplicity of use the party entered through one at a time.

On the other side they were met with… something not entirely unexpected, but certainly foreign to anyone there. A veritable archipelago of largely barren, pale yellow stone lay suspended within backdrop of infinite darkness in every direction. Fox observed quietly to himself that this was, in fact, NOT the Subspace, though it was conceptually not too far off. Of course, it wasn’t Space proper either, as him and Hat Kid knew too well to be the case (unbeknownst to one another). Despite the evidently ominous nature of this place, the child was less put off by it than most present. As far as she was concerned it was just another pocket dimension to be cleared; pretty standard fare; nothing to be too worried about.

The thought came to her too soon, as a few of their comrades were beset upon by a small number of hitherto unseen wraith-like aberrations, likely native to this dimension. With the sudden increase in their presence, the creatures’ immediate proximity to their accosted allies, and their sporadic teleportation, Fox found some difficulty focusing on any of them long enough to get a clear shot off. Banjo and Kazooie struggled similarly to find an opening amidst the madness to jump in for an assist. Just as well, for one of their allies managed to intuit and call out the secret to the creatures’ behavior so as to prevent further drawing their ire. Hat Kid was spared the danger of looking directly at any of them by her Hat’s waypoint focusing on the center of the central island.

Inevitably, the issue of safe traversal to their target destination came up, regarding those among them who couldn’t fly or jump far enough to at least reach the scattered islets and avoid a perilous fall into the everdark. To that end, Hat Kid, Banjo and Kazooie, and even Fox could probably all make it with mild difficulty using the latter method, but it was for the better that they take a less circuitous route along with the others so as to not lag behind and risk possible delay by more Endermen. Jr, otherwise unwilling to take passengers, would end up hauling a technical stowaway by the propeller of his kart with Hat Kid using it as an attachment point for her Hookshot, hooking onto it as the Koopaling took off flying overhead. In similar fashion, Fox nimbly hopped onto Euden’s back in dragon form, landing lightly in a kneel and keeping a handhold on for the duration of their crossing. Light as the pilot was, he expected (and hoped) the prince wouldn’t mind. Finally, Banjo and Kazooie shot themselves skyward in a streak of red stars that marked Flight for them, and promptly estimated in their heads an inability to cover the full distance to the island without spending precious resources. Between Red Feathers and the Trowlon-lon Milk, they could more easily spare the latter, so Banjo threw down another serving of hard watery swill to triple their launch height and coast the rest of the way over.

At varying rates, by varying methods, everyone made it to the island a little at a time and carefully made their way toward its center. A period of unsettling silence and inactivity that hung in the air like the atmospheric haze around them marked the prelude to the impending conflict, followed by a chorus of Endermen to sound off the arrival of their foe. A pair of purple lights aglow in a starless sky revealed against the dark a great ebonic drake that claimed this dimension as its domain. The beast swooped down to set itself atop the frontmost obsidian spire, making its imposing presence known to the intruders in guttural announcement before entering a ramming dive toward the clustered heroes.

To some end the Ender Dragon’s opening attack succeeded better than expected, knocking aside roughly half of the party that failed to scatter in time. Banjo was bowled straight over underfoot and sent tumbling along the porous stone, Hat Kid contacted with the Dragon’s head while trying to jump over it, and Fox dashed wide of it, but not enough to avoid being struck by a wing end and thrown back-first into one of the spires. By the time they got back to their feet the Dragon was already out of their ranges, so the best they could do at the moment was to spread out, keep mobile, and let the more range capable of their group go to work on it until it circled back.

While staying on the move, Hat Kid tried to analyse the situation to figure out what she could contribute and how, and she noticed something peculiar. Neither Jr’s MOAB balloons nor the Dragon’s corrosive bombardment (both of which they made a point of steering clear of) did any discernible damage to the spires. She began drawing parallels to the previous boss battle in her head. Black Pillars; Black Spires; Both seemingly indestructible; Both bosses so far have been dragons; these are probably just coincidences, and I’m definitely overthinking the wrong aspects of this… Her internal rambling did point to one relevant truth, however: that this boss had a gimmick… and some were already onto it. It was then that she noticed a beam trailing from one of the spired crystals to the Dragon, and another subsequently detonating under the knife of a Striker. She didn’t exactly know why, but this struck her (as well as others, it seemed) as a necessary step to bringing the leviathan down.

“Hey!” she called to the animal duo, pointing to any one of the crystals being besieged by their allies, trusting they would understand from there before Sprinting off to find Jr’s kart and grappling onto it again. She carried her momentum of her upswing through by entering into a vertical wall run up the height of the nearest spire, detaching her hook as she reached the top and pushing off the crystal’s housing cage in a soaring backflip. Her time perception dilated at that exact second just long enough for her to switch hats, donning what appeared to be a conical witch’s cap. She then manifested a full vial of unknown contents--seemingly from nothing--shook it for a second until it activated, looked down to smile and wave at Jr, and hurled the improvised chemical explosive at the crystal, all while passing over the Koopaling. She righted herself on her backfall and hooked onto it once more.

With a proper directive given to them, Banjo and Kazooie immediately saw a way to make themselves useful, even if it had limited uses. Banjo neared one of the spires, chugged another swig of the reddened lightener, and ascended for the crystal that sat atop the structure. His ascent was more graceful, controlled, deliberate than the first time around; closer in manner to an assisted jump. As per the pattern and dynamic, Kazooie took over from there, seizing aerial control when the potion’s effect wore off. Once they were lined up with the crystal, she reared back in anticipation, expending one Red Feather, and tucked her wings as she shot forward in a breakneck kamikaze dive, aiming to shatter the gem on impact. Unlikely as it was to be the case, should one more hit be necessary, she would repeat the attack accordingly. After which, she would need to spend another Feather to stay aloft at their height.

The assault on the spires didn’t go unnoticed by Fox whilst seeking cover between them. His problem was being able to hit them from his poor angle on the ground, as well as having an acid spewing dragon to evade and occupy. The battle was still young, however, and he still had a narrow window to make a move before the drake came back around to make another run. As he made haste for any unassailed tower with a still intact jewel atop it (should there happen to be one), Fox drew sights on any one of the nearby Endermen, intentionally antagonizing the gangly spectre to draw it closer, leaping over whatever reckless attack it threw out, and footstooling off of the unsuspecting creature to propel himself higher. With an additional wall jump, followed by a variant propulsion technique, he quickly boosted to the top of the spire in a jetstream of white smoke. From there he got a good look at the Ender Dragon on its return flight to the island, as well as the coordinated crystal destruction being conducted around him. By this point the Enderman he offended would have teleported up there to meet him. Fox then dove from the tower, air dashed away toward the open, and turned to litter the gem with a rapid volley of lethal red light on his way down. The explosion resulting from its destruction would surely take care of the pursuing Enderman.

He landed closer to the center of the battlefield between the spires in the midst of the Dragon’s impending return, and measured the next action he took against that of the beast. If it bombarded them again, he would stand his ground just long enough to throw out his Reflector to respond, having seen the caustic projectiles once already and evaluated them, based on identical past experience, to be manageable. Otherwise, if it attempted another straightforward physical assault, he would instead disengage and clear himself of its path. From there (in the latter case), he would harry it with prodding blaster fire from below, aiming for its beaming violet eyes that made for the easiest target.

World of Light

feat.

GM

@Lugubrious

Level: 5 (42 -> 52/50) LEVEL UP! ---> 6 (2 -> 5/60) | 4 (37 -> 47/40) LEVEL UP! ---> 5 (7 -> 10/50) | 3 (0 -> 10 -> 13/30)
Location: Land of Adventure - Spiral Mountain
Word Count: 1672 (+3 EXP)

(Level ups pending…)

With the battle safely concluded in full, the Seekers of Light (that’s what they were called, apparently) assembled within the tower for rest and preparation for whatever awaited them within the eldritch veil beyond the hag’s dwelling. Peach, the de facto matriarch of their pack, oversaw Spirit distribution, calling for the attention of anyone interested. This discounted Hat Kid, who had no interest in the spoils herself. Not that it stopped Bowser censoring for her and his son whatever basic age-restricted truth about the world (that they were probably already aware of to some extent) he was afraid of them finding within one of the Spirits. Always such a curious thing… how adults’ minds worked when it came to children, with a level of irony that seemingly eluded them in spite of their good intentions. Sure, bring them along with you, barely supervised, on an unendingly perilous journey wherein they not only witness otherwise innocent conscripts of the Grand Seraph meet bloody, violent, horrifying ends at yours and your allies’ hands, but sometimes aid in them, carry them out themselves, and face the not unlikely possibility of facing such ends themselves. But a few naughty words, skimpy get-ups or suggestive innuendo were somehow too much for them psychologically?

Whatever, she thought in dismissal of the idea in favor of finding something else to occupy her attention with. When consulting her hat and compass for anything of interest or importance, naturally, her hat pinpointed the lair’s entrance at the monument’s mouth across the bridge. Their objective lay that way after all, so of course. But what, if anything, did her Compass Badge have to tell her? If she heard them right, this place was home to the animal pair; Kindred Spirits to her. There was a chance that they had in common exploratory proclivities, thus inviting a theoretically equal possibility that their worlds had in common a need to be explored; things within them to be found. Might she find something worthwhile here, in this part of their world that they were currently in?

Elsewhere in the room, Fox was being tended to by the group’s resident medical mech, a “Blazermate model” she called herself. Her work was spectacularly efficient, erasing every perceivable ounce of injury, pain or exhaustion left over from whatever battle he had just fought within (less than) the time it took to fully anesthetize the average patient for surgery, and she accomplished this with scant effort simply by dosing him with a sustained stream of healing energy. It was almost dumbed down in a sense, but if it got these kinds of results, who was he to argue? As with most things, he didn’t know or need to know precisely how it functioned to understand how useful it was. Sadly, he wasn’t exactly in his right mind to lend it the level of admiration one might say it deserved, for he was still, at present, hopelessly preoccupied with trying to mentally catch himself up on the situation at hand.

“Restored?” he mouthed silently to himself, miming the part of the Princess’s reassuring statement that stood out to him. He went over the few uneducated guesses he could devise in his head as he watched the soft white aura on him die down, largely ignoring the unknown implication of it beyond that of an assumed side effect. “Thank you,” he greeted quietly to the medabot with an appreciative nod before she moved on to her other patients. His attention then turned to the collection and assimilation of Spirits, witness of which raised further questions in his head that he wasn’t yet quite ready to ask. Link, atypically (though occasionally) vocal as he was, beat him to the initial line of questioning, starting with the statuses of the remaining ‘Smashers’.

“I just woke up five minutes ago,” he answered, slightly shaking his head. “Your guess is as good as mine.” Bowser, the first restored among them, was happy to provide a heavily condensed summation of their survival and objective. That confirmed it for him. They really did lose, and he wasn’t lost in some kind of post-mortem dream limbo born of their last thoughts. Though, if this was the new reality, it would be hard to call it ‘preferable’.

While Bowser’s explanation left a lot to be desired in terms of specifics, it covered the subject matter thoroughly enough that he left Peach with very little to add. Still, to be shown up in terms of responsibility by the Koopa of all people was an unappealing prospect, so she clarified what she could. “Galeem is protected by some kind of rainbow barrier. This world has thirteen regions, and all have a powerful opponent we must defeat. In order to get strong enough to do that, we can use the spirits of the fallen. They can be itemized, or bonded with, or absorbed. Absorbing them has the greatest effect, but doing so changes you.” With a wry expression she used her longcoat’s tails to perform a mock curtsy. “See?”

“I think I get the gist,” Fox answered with a nod. Strange as it was to be considered a now universal norm, it wasn’t the first he had seen or heard of this. In his time, he had met other fighters with known assimilative empowerment capabilities. That, however, didn’t inspire in him an immediate enthusiasm to experiment with it himself. ”You can fill me in on the rest later.” He stood up and paced to the tower’s entrance, positioning himself where he could get a view of the Subspace. “If we’ve got another shot at doing this right, we’ll be sure to make it count this time.” He spoke with quiet, assertive confidence. “But however we do it…” He drew the sword he hadn’t been using (unsure of how it came into his possession in the first place) and passed it to Link hilt-first, seeing him as someone who could obviously make better use of it. ”...we need to be ready.”

Meanwhile, after being met with silence on the matter, Banjo shrugged and lowered the Friend Heart, allowing it to deflate and dissipate with his focus drawn elsewhere. A familiar name fell on his and Kazooie’s ears by the monk’s utterance of it.

“L.O.G.?” Banjo pondered aloud, scratching his chin, then his head, in visible ponderance. “Where have I heard that name before?”

“You mean that tube-headed hack from the spin-off, out-of-touch with his own industry and target audience?” Kazooie elaborated in rhetorical inquiry to the monk, just to make sure they were thinking of the same person. Banjo suddenly recalled who they were talking about and shook his head at the Queen’s confirmation of the same, having apparently encountered him herself as well. “Trust us, you won’t want one from him,” Kazooie added at her mention of ‘sequels’ from her. “And for what it’s worth I don’t think he’s canon anyway,” she further assured, implying the possibility that anything he said could potentially be disregarded as inconsequential.

“Eh… it wasn’t all bad,” Banjo interjected apologetically. “I think he at least meant well, for the most part.”

“They always do.”

“Well, you have to give people a chance to learn from their mistakes, Kazooie.”

“Are you sure you can call it that?” she asked with her own implication/accusation to make. “Looks like they kept that hideously designed refrigerator character…”

“Looks like they also snuck you in as a cameo,” he observed, wondering if he was given the same referential treatment.

“True,” she conceded with sudden curiosity. “Question is whether or not I’d want it after playing.”

“We’ll figure that out when we get to it later. Let’s keep an open mind about it until then.”

“Fair enough.”

After a moment spent going off-tangent, they snapped back to the present to address the matter itself.

“W-Wait! You said you met him here?” Banjo asked either of the two who encountered him, wondering how the royal bee did so in the midst of combat. “Where, exactly?”

“Probably squatting in our house, making more bad games.” A wild, lucky guess from Kazooie.

“I don’t remember asking him to house-sit…” he wondered. “In that case, you want to go talk to him; see if he knows anything?” he asked Kazooie.

“Not really, but if it gives us an excuse to check in on things at home…”

“I was thinking the same thing,” he said before making for the exit. “I need to make sure I didn’t leave the stove on again.”

With that, they were off, making the short trek back to their house. Their exit shortly followed that of Hat Kid’s hitherto unnoticed outing to look around the valley for whatever treasures her badge picked up on. The duo weren’t expecting to achieve anything of value to the mission by checking in at home, as the intent was more for a sentimental visit than a productive one. Despite the relative urgency of their objective, (hopefully) none of the leaders, including Fox, expressed any objection to their leave. If there was a time for them to visit home, it would be now. For all they knew, they would not get another chance.

---

A short while later, Hat Kid returned from her brief caper with two gold jigsaw pieces, two armfuls of brimming honeycombs, and the gratitude of a rescued pterodactyl-esque creature. ‘Rescue’ entailed little more than making direct contact, at which point the grateful creature flew off, so why it needed help to begin with was a mystery to her. It seemed like something they could have done at any time. As for the spoils, she couldn’t think of what to do with the puzzle pieces, but found them neat and novel enough to warrant keeping anyway. As for the honey, she got chased by too many bees for it to not get used, and she certainly planned to make good use of it. She would have to take care to keep it free of the giant bee’s notice if it was to last her.

Banjo and Kazooie returned a moment or two after the child to a room of ready adventurers, with their instruments reclaimed (but stowed away), an opened letter in hand, and their spirits lifted. They had been waiting for longer than they could remember for this, and they were hardly alone. It wouldn’t surprise them to be met with a round of applause by their teammates in recognition of it, but with or without it, the fact alone was its own celebration. All that mattered was that they were happy now. They were at peace. They could face anything now.

“Congratulations,” Fox, the Seventh of the Original Eight, offered them with a soft smile and a friendly hand on Banjo’s shoulder. ”You’re one of us now.”

World of Light

feat.

Linkle

@Gentlemanvaultboy

Level: 5 (42 -> 45 (-3) -> 42/50) | 4 (34 -> 37/40) | 2 (17 -> 20/20) LEVEL UP! ---> 3 (0/30) | 7 (40 -> 43/70)
Location: Land of Adventure - Spiral Mountain
Word Count: 3372 (+3 EXP)

(Level up pending…)

Banjo and Kazooie were slow to follow on Geralt’s order after he had detrophyfied them, still reeling from the experience and in need of a second to wake themselves back up. Hat Kid was even slower still, slowly returning to consciousness just as exhausted as when she went out. The animal pair were better able to handle injury--even individually--than the child, therefore able to quickly recollect themselves. They jogged over to the tower entrance with the Kid a few steps behind them, mentally prepared to re-engage, only to find their foe pacified by the green-clad ranger woman of their group. Banjo halted his advance at the first notice of this, exercising equal parts restraint and caution as he observed from a manageable distance (door to bridge).

“I’m guessing we won?” he asked, having come to the obvious conclusion, but wanting to be doubly sure.

“We did?” Linkle called back. There had certainly been sounds of quick and dirty violence, so she popped her head up over the ice wall to be sure, but all she saw when she looked for the people that had taken out Tora were Jak, Gaige-Tron, the giant bug, and the Courier’s pet bug hanging around a pair of spirits that she presumed to be the Other Micheal and the lady with the big crossbow. If they needed any more confirmation of the area's safety, one only had to look up at Bowser bossing everyone around from the tower without a care in the world save for what they might have to face next. Linkle did some quick and simple math, then turned and gave the bear a thumbs up.

Banjo returned Linkle’s gesture with a nod, which told Kazooie she could cease swivelling her head about to watch for danger. Hat Kid sighed with relief at the news, propped herself lazily against the wall, and popped the cork on her half-empty bottle of Lon Lon Milk like the cap of a flask she would have no business carrying to finish the second, and last, serving of it. Had she considered it, and not needed the healing and nutrition as much as she did, the Heroine of Hyrule might have appreciated the familiar flavor. Banjo exited the tower to approach the Hylians and two hunters, but hadn’t cleared the green to the bridge when a swift silhouette passed over them. Fox bounded high above, the contrast of the sun darkening his shape at the crest of his leap before he aggressively descended on Link’s position with a forceful heel aimed for the weakened hero.

Linkle looked up over her shoulder when the shadow fell over them, only having a second to register downward strike. She turned to face the descending foe, standing in front of Link and crossing her arms in front of her to block the blow. In that moment she was able to register who the attacker was, and her confusion over why the flying fox was attacking now was swept away by the sunset red of his eyes. Right, Ryu had had this problem.

The heel threw her back against bridge railing, eliciting a pained groan from Link as she slightly crushed him. “Heart the Fox or he’ll never stop!” She shouted to everyone around her.

Fox pushed off of Linkle’s guard, drawing his sidearm on Link the instant his feet rickety lumber. Balance proved little issue for him, as it seldom did, but his aim shifted about still as he tried to get sights on Link around his stubborn protector. Alas, he could find no opening in the second spent looking, so he instead zipped past the woman in a phantasmic blur, turning with a reverse roundhouse at the end of his dash and ready to follow it with his firearm.

Linkle, luckily, knew what the fox must have been after. Even if he suddenly zipped past her faster than her eye could track she still had a pretty good idea of where he was going to end up. So, not even wasting the time to look, she extended one leg out and spun with a kick that would fly right over Links head and right into anybody standing over him. Both kicks collided at their ends, cancelling them out, but continuing Fox’s rotation. In that moment, the gears of Galeem’s influence turned in his head, occupied by multiple subseries of synaptic responses that amounted to a simple overriding shift in priorities. His mind--absent of his true self--interpreted the retaliatory defense as aggression, and just like that, Linkle was now an enemy in his eyes. He chased his deflected strike with his blaster hand, spinning to face the ranger woman, aimed at her chest, and squeezed off a short, rapid burst of point-blank laser fire.

Linkle yelped as a burst of fire hot agony exploded in her chest. There was no push to it, it just hurt, so she lashed out with her foot to try and kick that dangerous thing out of his hands. The toe of her boot forcibly bumped the pommel of the gun’s grip in a disarming strike that sent Fox’s gun flying in a steep arc that he followed with his eyes. In a single fluid turn, he faced his back to his opponent as he threw out a webster kick to her chin that simultaneously served as a jump to get him over the side of the bridge. He extended both arms out to each side--one to catch his gun, the other to find purchase on the ropes--then slung himself back around, tucked to fit through the gaps, and threw himself feet-first at Linkle. His rebounding strike met Linkle’s torso, knocking her back across some length of the bridge, and with the impact, he followed through into a retreating back tuck and resumed fire--before and after he landed.

Linkle slid back across the bridge, already feeling the hot stings of the fox's cool gun as she did. One in the thigh, another buried in her shoulder, one flying right across her cheek. She rolled backwards, pulling her shield off her back and holding it in front of her to absorb the shots, the lasers leaving smoking holes burned into the woodwork wherever they hit. She didn’t think the shield would last very long at all with the rate he was putting those shots out, but at the very least he wasn’t putting them into Link. She had his undivided attention by this point. Actually, that was probably perfect.

“Somebody?” She called out over the rapid fire PEW PEW PEW of the blaster barrage. “Come on, while I’ve got him on the ropes. Make a friend!” At that moment she felt resistance as a single hard impact met with her shield that threatened to force her back, but little else. Fox rushed the girl down and applied further pressure with a straightforward assault of seven additional kicks to her shield, the last of which had him flipping overhead with the rising adjustment in her guard, drawing the sword he took for the first time with two rotary, vertical follow-up slashes. Before he touched down again, he wreathed himself in flame, slowing his fall to a near stop with what was clearly a preparatory build-up for some kind of attack. Unique to his condition, hints and sparks of multicolor flickered beneath the burning red, further betraying the cause of his rationality deficit. Just as he was about to fire himself forward (at the potential risk of burning down the bridge), he was taken by surprise when he felt himself knocked aside by something that he could tell was heavier than him.

Ignoring the obvious physical threat posed by the cloak of fire, Banjo decided to heed the Hylian girl’s call and threw himself bodily at Fox in a wrapping tackle, taking him out of the air, and both of them (including Kazooie) over the edge of the bridge. There was little he could do in time to direct their fall besides keeping a tight clinch on the suddenly adversarial vulpine to make sure he came with them, and they fell like a weight into the moat, audibly slapping face-first into the water’s surface. This made for the duo’s third, and most painful dip today. They resurfaced a couple of seconds later, Banjo dragging Fox from out to lay him limply onto dry land and giving him a firm slap on the back to help him cough the water from his lungs. He was still alive, if barely, and by all accounts tapped out. He would sooner fall unconscious than get up after anyone else in his current state. Even as he tried sluggishly to lift his gun, Kazooie needed only to wing slap it away from him to render it virtually harmless.

“You okay, Miss?” Banjo called up to the girl in inquiry, gesturing a more interrogative thumbs up this time.

“Uhhhhhhh…” Linkle said, standing up and walking to the edge to look at them. Curiously she took a finger and put it to where the fox had shot her in the chest. It passed through the hole it had burned in her shirt and into the small divot that had been burned into her skin. She flinched and yanked the finger away. “Nothing that Blazermate can’t take care of!” She called back, forming some ice in her right hand and pressing the clump to where one of the shots had grazed along her cheek. “Do you guys know how to make him cool?”

“We got it from here, Fangirl.” Kazooie retorted in confirmation, cracking at Linkle’s established fascination with her world’s heroic legends.

“Yeah…” Banjo quietly said to himself, nodding. “Yeah…” He sat moatside for a prolonged moment longer in contemplation of the ‘make traitors cool’ process, long enough for the lingering silence to wear out its welcome.

“...”

“Well…?”

“Yeah… erm… I… don’t actually know what to do,” he admitted, rubbing the back of his head in slight embarrassment. Though a demonstration took place just moments ago, he had reappeared just in time to miss it.

“Hm…” Kazooie thought aloud, probing her own memory bank in search of a communicable example to work from. “Okay. So, remember when we fought that tree, back in the Dead Zone, and whatshisface threw a heart at Nero?”

“A heart? You mean, like…” He started, wondering if there was some other morbid occurrence in that place that he had somehow missed.

“No,” she preemptively corrected before her partner could enter a fallacious line of inquiry, “It’s much friendlier than that.” If beating a potential ally candidate into submission to be conscripted or liberated passed for ‘friendly’, then she wouldn’t be entirely wrong.

“Ooh. Okay,” he answered with a nod. “So… do we have to find them, or…”

“Just summon them, I think.”

“How do I do that?”

“Try touching yourself… O-on the heart, I mean,” she quickly corrected in a subdued fluster, the occasional innuendo they were once used to getting away with slipping into her dialogue. To test this, Banjo hovered a hand over his heart, where a pink, diffusing glow penetrated his palm on both sides. He pulled his hand away by a few inches to see a soft stream of rose-colored energy follow, and both of them admired it for a moment before he gently beat his chest to manifest a Friend Heart for the first time.

“Like that?” Banjo held the Heart aloft floating above his hand, presenting it before them and smiling as he beheld it.

“Yep. That’s it.”

“Al-right! Guess I’ll just…” By the time he returned his attention to their downed rogue teammate to administer ‘friendlification’, they found that the behatted child had already beat them to it. Fox’s color started returning to him, and with it, his memory…

---

On the cusp of dusk, they--an unprecedented gathering of heroes, villains, and everything in-between--stood at what may as well have been the world’s precipice, between it, and it’s self-appointed new ruler. At the front of all of them… was Fox, with an assemblage of legends at his back, Heaven and its army before them, and him quite literally pointing a gun at the new closest thing he’s ever met to ‘God’. Though he would never admit to knowing it, he was in over his head, but that never stopped him before. This wasn’t exactly a first for him, or a number of those with him. To those for whom it applied, they had been here before, at the very same cliff overlooking the sea, peering out into the horizon at the shining blank spot left in the world by the destruction of the Isle of Ancients that preceded Tabuu’s defeat. Back then it acted as a symbolic beacon of a brighter future to follow. Little did any of them know that the light of new dawn would eventually herald their darkest day. And now, they stood again once more… at Ground Zero...

---

Fox’s eyes, now clear of hostile red, opened on the New World for what seemed like the first time; as if waking from a coma. His most prominent memory rushed back through his head, overlapping with that of most recent events. He weakly pushed himself up and began examining his surroundings, trying as he could to make sense of them while he took the moment to readjust. The next thing he knew, a purple-clad child in a top hat was handing him a steel broadsword that she was obviously too small to wield, the logical conclusion being that it wasn’t hers.

“You dropped this,” she clarified, ironically further confusing him ever so slightly. He eyed the weapon for a moment with an expression of puzzlement before simply accepting it.

“Thanks,” he replied, reclaiming the sword and propping himself against it. The child then strolled over to the next curious item she spotted laying at the moat’s edge: Fox’s blaster. The realization hit him as she started playing with it like it wasn’t a dangerous tool that could cause her serious harm if mishandled, knowing fully well that it could (as she understood with swords). This prompted Fox to check his holster to find it atypically empty. “Hey,” he addressed her once more to get her attention. “That’s mine too,” he calmly beckoned, politely demanding she relinquish to him his own firearm, as she did without a fuss. She already picked one up back at the canyon earlier, so there was no need to rob anyone of theirs. She tossed Fox his pistol back and nonchalantly made her way back up the mountain.

Banjo and Kazooie, meanwhile, were pondering a few choice implications about the situation amongst themselves.

“Huh…” uttered Banjo, slightly dumbfounded by the unexpected interruption.

“Well, that was a little disappointing. I guess we built that up for nothing,” Kazooie complained, having unreasonably felt cheated out of a moment of exaggerated importance.

“At least she saved us some XP…” he added, suddenly sure of how the Heart system worked, and then less so. “So… what should I do with this now?” He thought for a moment about what one influenced party member could mean for the rest of them. “You think there’s anyone else we might have missed?”

“I don’t know, but I’m wondering how we failed to notice until now. We’ve been travelling with it the whole time.”

“Right. I’m just saying... I’d hate to waste this.”

“I don’t think it matters.” Around that time they noticed Fox had returned to consciousness. “Oh, look. He’s awake,” Kazooie noted with little enthusiasm.

“Heyyy, erm…” Banjo started awkwardly, “Sorry about that. Are you okay?”

“About what?” replied Fox, genuinely unsure as to the nature of the apology offered, exhaustion still present in his voice. As he looked around, a slightly better question came to mind for him. “Where are we?”

“We must’ve hit him too hard,” Kazooie mockingly inferred at his expense.

“Home,” Banjo answered. “Well… we’re home. At our home. Everyone else is just passing through.”

“Everyone else?” The very mention piqued Fox’s interest, for he couldn’t help being curious as to who all else was left.

“They’re up there.” he said, pointing to the top of Spiral Mountain. “We should probably be getting back to them now.”

“Yeah…” Fox concurred, and began hauling himself somewhat shakily to his feet.

“Need a hand?” Banjo offered to the clearly injured vulpine.

“Thanks,” he started as he stubbornly stood back up, “but I’ll be fine.” While he wasn’t wrong in that he could make the short trek up on his own, Banjo would have outpaced him just by walking at his present rate.

“Here,” Banjo insisted, throwing a supportive arm around their revived ally’s shoulders. “It’s the least we could do to make up for earlier.” That part still didn’t make much sense to Fox at the moment, but he couldn’t be bothered then to spare the mental energy questioning it. He conceded to the offer to help, resting his own arm around the generous ursine as a voluntary crutch, and they began hiking up the mountain trail at a relaxed pace.

“I’m Banjo, by the way, and my pal here’s Kazooie.” Save for the formal introduction, Fox was already somewhat familiar with the pair. Although he had never met them until now, he still knew them by name and reputation. What’s more is that he remembered the call to action against Galeem not reaching them in time. Not that it would have made much of a difference, he thought.

“My name’s Fox.” He replied.

“Fox, eh? Your parents must’ve had QUITE the imagination,” Kazooie remarked sarcastically about his obvious namesake.

“I wouldn’t know,” he retorted tersely, letting the somber implication of his reply speak for itself. After about a minute they rounded the mountain’s peak, where the others were no doubt waiting.

“Medic!” Kazooie called out, expressing not the sense of urgency that usually went with the command. Banjo immediately sought out Blazermate, for lack of knowing any other healers in their group, and dropped off Fox next to the tower while he went to ask for her help. They found her already at work healing Link, the queen bee, and others. Poor girl was liable to be swamped with requests. “It hurts right here, Doc,” Kazooie began on approach, specifying no part of her despite the emphasis. “Think you could patch me up, please?” Banjo gave her a nudge of reminder for trying to cut in on the waitlist. “Oh, right. And him, too,” she added with a gesture to Fox.

“I know you’re busy, but would you mind taking care of him when you get a chance? He needs it worse than we do,” Banjo clarified, making sure to thank her in advance after putting in his request. Kazooie had a point in that they needed care as well, but they could sooner wait than the three besides them who were hit the hardest. Though, the fact that Kazooie asked nicely did stand out to him, even if her politeness was accidental (and undercut). Before he forgot, he held the Friend Heart he was still carrying aloft in presentation and asked, “Does anybody need one of these? I’d hate for anyone else to go rogue on us,” he declared aloud to anyone who was listening.

While he waited for (or received) medical aid, Fox took stock of those around him. Among them, he only knew four: Bowser, Jr, Peach and Link, and to say that he ‘recognized’ them would be generous, to say the least. Link’s was the only face out of them that remained familiar. The other three had undergone some… changes. Was he having some kind of feverish dream, or was he seeing prospect symptoms of a nightmarish new reality. One thing was for certain, he would have to get acquainted with it, and likely soon. The umbral boundary that lay just beyond drew his eye and reminded him of a past evil that they had once faced. If Bowser’s educated guess at what waited for them ahead proved to be correct, the lair of Banjo and Kazooie’s nemesis wouldn’t at all resemble its former self from when they first set foot in it. Whatever it promised would almost certainly be far worse.