Weapons drawn, tensions high, and muscles wound up; no matter how heartening Linkle's response or intriguing her follow-up comments about the light, any pondering about what happened needed to be put on hold until people felt sure they wouldn't be plugged full of holes. Tora just about hit the deck when the gunslinger started blasting in Bowser's direction, but after the initial shock wore off and the Courier congratulated himself on a job well done, everyone came to about the same conclusion.
Tora snapped his wingtips. “Ah! Friend is not bad guy after all. Is just insane person!” He observed as the Courier invite the grim-looking warrior for a drink, seemingly disarming that situation as well. Unfortunately, Death found new probable cause to attack Bowser when the King Koopa let out a frustrated roar a moment later, shaking the earth with the pounding of his feet. When he finished, instead of piping down, Bowser made tracks in Kirby's -and therefore Tora's- direction. The Nopon froze in place, breaking out in sweat and with mouth agape, as the giant stomped over and took one hell of a seat. Popped up by the resulting shockwave, Tora toppled over, and with faint protest wiggled his arms and legs to try and right himself.
Kirby, meanwhile, seemed to stir from his unconsciousness at Bowser's prodding. He looked incredibly weary, and more than a little sick, but the shadow of a smile could be seen in his face. “Oh, oh?” he uttered weakly, the sounds a far cry from speech. He tried a little longer, but did not seem capable of speech. He held up a hand to shake, as if with of a friend he hadn't imagined he'd see again.
Recovering from his tumble, Tora straightened himself and laughed brightly. “Mehmeh! Friend Bowser overestimate pinkypon's talky-talky skills, methinks.”
He fell quiet, however, as Kirby rolled over a moment later, and with one of his tiny nub arms pointed toward the bottom of the hill. At the foot of the hill lay a great expanse, grassy and flat at the beginning but more and more difficult to traverse farther on. Blocks floated in the air, pipes stuck up from the earth amid great swathes of tall grass, and a few strange plants could even be seen. A long way off, across the whole of the expanse, a
castle loomed. As one looked into the distance, one could make out very different terrain in different directions—a towering forest, a land shrouded by darkness, several cities, a mountain range, an ocean, a desert, and more.
Most of all, however, one could see something that floated in the sky, so far away as to appear minuscule, but nevertheless recognizable to a few. It was at that singular point that a second sun gleamed, a brilliant orb surrounded in majesty by seraphic wings of red and blue, and encircled even further by a barrier of multicolored light, at least ten different shades undulating in a slow, joyous dance.
“Whoa...” The sight left Tora in awe, and he rubbed his head with a wing. “How did not see before? World is super biggie, and...definitely not mine.” For a moment he seemed depressed. He squinted as he tried to make out the light in the distance, then grunted in disgust. “Ugh. Even from here, very nasty-brighty. Worse than staring at sun.” He glanced at Kirby, who appeared to have fallen unconscious, and thought no more about the far-off entity. “Oh. Lights out for little friend,” he remarked as he settled his wings. A pensive look then overtook him. “Wonder what happened.” As Blazermate's treatment finished, Tora looked over the fresh bruises and scars that covered the pink puff's body. Precision burn marks, long cuts, fist-shaped indentations, a number of closed-up holes, and of course the gash on his back all made for an incredible assortment of injuries. On one cheek there even lay a the vaguely cone-shaped remnant of a puncture wound that struck Tora as strangely familiar.
Putting the bothersome feeling aside, he backed away from the sleeping puff and tried instead to think about what Rex and Pyra would do.
Never give up. A determined optimist like Rex would likely say something to that effect, maybe even bringing up a line of his infamous Salvager's Code. But Tora didn't know what to not give up on. He knew almost nothing about this situation, and especially the strange people around him. All these tempers made for a terribly stressful atmosphere. If Rex were in his shoes, he would...ah, of course!
Tora cleared his throat. “Meh meh meh! Hello, friends biggie and small!” he called out, drawing as much attention as he could. “Things right now very confusing, know bugger-all, meh. But instead of running around like Skwaror with head cut off, can reduce unknowns by saying 'hello' and giving name! Me first!” The Nopon bounced off the ground, rising up with a flap of his wings to achieve a 720-degree spin. He landed, gave an adorable smile, and slapped his chest with his wings before declaring, “Am
Tora! Full of super science know-how, and Driver of Poppi! ...Who not here, but Tora will surely find!”
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