Upcoming is a long chapter. It's far from the conclusion, but it is the WHAM! chapter. Enjoy.
Notes: I apologize if I am mangling the characters from any game/series I haven’t played or played much of as yet. At the suggestion of one of my reviewers, I took a little look on YouTube of a playthrough of the first chapters of “Kid Icarus: Uprising” – which is a game I have yet to play (but really, really want to when I can get around to it/buy games again) to try to get some handle on Pit’s character. I also went to my old standby of TV Tropes for characterization hints. I want to remind readers that I am mainly going by the Super Smash Bros. characterizations- such as they are, the exceptions being for characters from games that I do know well (and even there, I am taking artistic license. Pikachu as a hidden genius, for example, Young Link of Ocarina of Time/Majora’s Mask growing up to be the “Toki” portrayed here) and so forth.
And, yes, I’ve been watching a lot of old episodes of “The Simpsons” lately, so a certain joke/word/phrase in here was intentional, though I actually cannot remember the specific episode it’s featured in. All I knew is that I thought of it as soon as I saw one of Pit’s sayings.
NATIONAL ANTHEM
Chapter 5
I watch as a coffin is wheeled through the hallway, on its way to a transport train to take one of the fighters home. A massive sword rests upon its lid. Marth follows the casket and I bow my head. There’s a certain honor among swordsmen in our little world. I cannot say that I knew Ike well… or at all, but it is still a sorrow to see him go.
Donkey Kong had done him in, strangely enough. They and Diddy had met and gotten into a battle. Diddy had leapt for Ike’s face. Acting on instinct, Ike cut him in half. His casket had come through earlier. Enraged at the loss of his small partner, Kong had given the ground a furious pounding, throwing the swordsman off-balance. The gorilla had then grabbed him and made short work of breaking his spine, like a strong man breaking a plank over his knee.
The fighters were dwindling. Some of our own ranks were, too. Kirby had gone back to his own world – I can’t say I miss him. I think that Marth was considering shipping out, as well. Some of us stayed on after we’d lost our people. I always stayed until the final failings and the victory were complete, myself. To tell the truth, I feared that if I didn’t, some bad things might happen in New Hyrule, since Ganondorf seemed to keep a very special eye on me. The Champions were required to attend final ceremonies, anyway, so I never saw any reason to go home and then come back.
Some of us went out into Smash City for drinking. Pikachu was holed up in his hotel room, having gotten sick off some of the food at the buffet, which was being investigated. That’s what you get for eating fruit not native to your land, I guess.
I went back to the viewing room and sat down in front of the big screen. Midna and Mario were in the room with me. The camera briefly followed Fox as its main character. He’d been staying low and being sneaky. It seemed out of character for him, being a strong fighter, but he really was being as sly as a fox. He made short work of stealing the food stashes from Bowser and from Donkey Kong, whom I didn’t believe was going to last very long. The big ape was suffering wounds inflicted by Bowser and a serious stab-wound inflicted by Ike in a failed attempt at self-defense.
I smile when the camera turns to Link and Pit. They are in a thick area of the forest, on high ground. When the camera comes to them, Pit is standing upon the top of a dead tree that he could have only gotten onto by flying. He has his wings spread out against the sun like some kind of magnificent swan. The warrior-angel gazes out over the surrounding area while Link draws an image of the holy Triforce in the dirt with a stick. I guess, perhaps, that he’s trying to invoke the protection of the Golden Goddesses upon them.
When Pit comes down and asks what the image is, my boy explains.
“I don’t know if Palutena can hear me from this world,” Pit says.
“Palu..?” Link asks.
The sound is pretty good. Maybe the Stage-crew has decided that their conversation makes for viewer-interest. I lean forward.
“My Goddess of Light,” Pit explains. “I am eager to get back to my universe, because I serve her. I command her forces and the humans there need protecting.”
“I don’t command anything,” Link explains, “I’m just a kid from an island… I want to protect my Grandma and my sister. They’re humans, though we’re all actually Hylians. We’re supposed to be descended from a goddess of light, a patron-goddess who became mortal to save us.”
Pit is smiling as he sits down next to Link. “I feel like I’m a little more mortal here than normal,” he says.
“We kind of all are,” Link says. I do not know whether his words are morose or just a bad attempt at humor.
“It’s like a birthday party and everyone’s trying to kill me!” Pit quips.
“At least you didn’t get stuck with uncomfortably warm and silly clothes on your birthday,” Link mock-complains. “It was my birthday when I was chosen, which is why I’m dressed like the Ancient Hero.”
“Come again?” Pit asks.
“On my island, the clothes I’m wearing are the custom for when boys become men…something like that. It’s kind of weird… Toki – that guy you met in the training hall, the Champion, is supposed to be an Ancient Hero in my world and boys my age are supposed to dress like him.”
“The guy who smelled like ten barrels of booze and a broken toilet?” Pit inquires. “He doesn’t seem like much of a hero to me, but I suppose he had to be strong to survive and be a Champion.”
“Don’t make fun of him!” Link defends. How cute, he’s defending me. Poor kid. “Toki told me about his Brawl and he went through a lot!”
“I wanted to come down here when I saw the Melee’ Tournament,” Pit confesses. “It looked like a lot of fun and a good way to hone my skills. Pew! Pew! Pow! Then everything went all weird. Everyone in my world’s been trying to figure out how it all got hijacked by Mr. Ganondorf… both gods and mortals. I wanted to join this at first, but now I am here against my will. There’s not even any hot springs here. That’s a bummer.”
“Don’t ask me. Ganondorf originated in the history of the universe shared by Toki and me and we can’t figure it out. The only thing we know of that might cause universal power over many worlds would be our Triforce – the will of gods and existence in crystallized form… It’s kind of the ultimate manifestation of free will. However, whenever he’s tried to get it, it splinters off into fragments because one has to have a balanced heart to touch it and Ganondorf has never had a balanced heart. He’s always only ever been after Power.”
“He sounds like a God of Evil. No regard for humans, I take it.”
“Not even for his own people, when it comes down to it,” Link sighs, “even though he likes to pretend they were his initial motivation.”
I watch the two stretch out on the grass and watch the clouds go by. I cannot help but feel a pang in my heart. Their friendship is budding along nicely and it’s sweet that my little guy has found a new friend, but this is the Brawl. I know the inevitable outcome of this friendship. All friends are destined to part one way or another, but to know that it will happen violently and soon is almost too much for me to take.
“You know, with those wings of yours, you can fly wherever you want, right?” Little Link asks the angel. “Are you planning on giving the other fighters death from above?”
“No way!” Pit asserts, crossing his arms and holding his head up high. “I don’t want to fight in this place unless I have to. Taking out monsters and evil beings is no problem for me, but this thing…setup…whatever… this is completely unfair! Besides, I wouldn’t be able to get very far. I fly under a blessing, and that blessing does not last for very long. I’m not like a bird, able to go wherever I please as long as I catch a fair wind. I wish I was like a bird. I was hoping for that…someday.”
“I’m sorry,” Link says sincerely. “Still, you’re lucky. I can’t even fly at all! I was raised on an island and I can’t even swim very well!”
“What is this? A pathetic-contest? Let’s beat each other out on who can be more pathetic?”
“I am an excellent swordsman,” Link said, sitting up straight and tall with a silly, faux-serious look on his face. “And I’m an expert sailor.”
Pit laughs. “That’s the spirit. We’ve gotta stay positive. It’ll get us through anything!”
“I wish we had some food, though,” Link said, clutching his stomach. “Maybe the Stage-management will drop some. There’s not much in the ways of berries and stuff. Even if they drop it on the ground, I don’t care.”
Pit mutters something about “floor ice cream.”
Suddenly, Link and Pit look at each other and mumble; “Mmmm… Floor-pie.”
They burst out into giggles and roll around, kicking up their legs. That’s when they remember to quiet themselves, in case anyone might be listening.
“I checked the perimeter,” Pit says, almost sobbing with laughter. “I think we’re okay, but…food...food… we’re so hungry we’re laughing at anything…lightheaded…”
“It’s perfectly cromulent,” Link chokes. “Maybe hardship and hunger will make us stronger and embiggen our souls… but I still want floor-pie… ala mode…”
And, I’ll be a monkey’s uncle, but the kids get their “floor-pie.” When they get up to scout around, a ways down the trail they’re on, there is a bush behind which they discover plates with various kinds of pie… ala mode, of course. I guess the Smash City viewers called that in or demanded it from the privileged viewing-arenas.
Way to go, kid. Way to go.
It is late evening and I am in bed in my room when Samus falls. I have my room’s television on and am drifting half in and half out of sleep, expecting to fall asleep to non-events when I sit bolt upright in bed to the noises of a midnight ambush.
It is Link ‘d Ordon and Sheik who come upon the bounty hunter’s camp. I expect them both to become smears upon the trees because Samus was sleeping in her armor and snaps to attention immediately when the intruders breach the perimeter of her general territory. I never knew Link of Old Hyrule was good at dodging. He’s not as good as my boy… he has some trouble, as he’s not a good jumper. Seriously, when I was watching him in training, I’d wondered if he’d put weights on his legs. I’m a retiree-fighter and I can still get more air than he can.
Sheik, however, is moving swiftly through the trees, jumping branch-to-branch, not touching the ground. She uses a chain she found somewhere on the Stage to lash Samus ‘round the neck, which throws off her canon-shot, which in turn, destroys several tree-tops instead of Link’s head as intended.
When Sheik releases the chain, Link is behind Samus before she can recharge. He puts his sword to her neck and seems to be trying to pry off her helmet. Both of them are slowly sinking in thick mud.
“Looks like I caught a little bird…” Link taunts. “A hatchling in a tin can…”
“We’re both sinking, you fool!” Samus hisses. “Let me go or we’re both dead!”
“Oh, if I let you go, you’ll just charge up that blaster again. I can’t die that way! I’m the Hero of Twilight!”
“Hero, my ***!” Samus spits, “There are no heroes here!”
Suddenly, I see Sheik’s foot blocking the camera-view. This is apparently one of the tree-mounted cameras. She leans in, looking right into the lens with those blood-red eyes of hers. Her face it reminds me of…. No, she’s not the same… I watched my lady die long ago. Sheik takes the short sword off her back and I see it swiping for the lens, then static and darkness.
She broke the camera? Why did she do that? The Stage-keepers are not going to be happy with her at all. Maybe she and Link are planning on doing things especially terrible to Samus? Perhaps they figure on her turning the tables and Sheik decided that she didn’t want an audience to witness the ignominious deaths of a proud Hylian and an even prouder Sheikah? I hear Samus scream over the still-functioning audio. Whatever Sheik’s reasons, the camera is gone for five whole minutes.
Another camera pops to life, from a different angle, this time a little outside of the area where the three combatants were fighting. Sheik and Link emerge from the trees. Link ‘d Ordon is holding his sword aloft triumphantly in one hand and a cracked helmet in the other. Link is coated up to the chest in mud. The two are laughing about the sinking mud making for “easy body disposal” and how loud and pathetic their victim’s final cries were.
I burst out of my hotel room into the hallway, clad in my pajamas. “Did anyone else see what happened?” I yelp out to others who’d come from their rooms. Mario is helping a drunken Falco to his room… I assume they didn’t see, having just come back from one of the bars. Midna is awake, having come from her room. She wraps her robe around herself and gives me a scolding look for ogling her in her nightie.
“Did Pikachu see?” I ask, headed to his room.
Midna pushes me back and sets a small amount of orange-colored Twilight-magic around the doorknob. “Don’t you dare bother him!” she demands. “He’s sick, remember?”
“But…Samus,” I say.
“I saw, and I’m sure he did, too,” Midna says.
I sigh. “I can’t believe she went down so easy.” I glare at our resident Princess of Darkness. “Your fighters are stronger than I took them for.”
“They’re ruthless and they do me proud,” Midna says with an obnoxious air of boredom as she inspects her knuckles. “Now can we go back to bed?”
The next day brings terrible events – and not just Donkey Kong succumbing to that sword-wound, which finally does happen. Link ‘d Ordon and Sheik decide to split up temporarily. Sheik opts to follow a few signs left by Fox that he’d failed to notice and cover. The Hero-turned-villain decides to follow a different trail…
He’s hunting my boy and his guardian angel. I sit, bunching up my hat on my knees. It’s bad enough that he’s found some signs and seems to know roughly where they are at. What’s worse is that he decides to take his wolf-form. He thrusts his long nose in the air, sniffing, catching their scent.
And he does catch up to them. Since I am in the big room and cannot call out a warning without raising suspicions, I reach into my pocket and furiously tap the communication stone with my fingernails, hoping something will register. It doesn’t work. Pit has taken the high ground on a boulder when he clearly sees that something is up, because he takes out his bow and draws back one of those energy-arrows of his. Little Link tenses, taking out his sword and raising his shield.
The rustling in the bushes seems to come from all sides. Then, suddenly, a furry shape bursts from the foliage and aims itself right for Pit. Before I know it, a fanged mouth latches onto his left wing and tears. Both the boy and the wolf go down with snarling and yelling, but, in nearly an instant, the wolf is up again.
A rock hits it between the eyes.
“Over here, Ugly!” Little Link shouts. “Yeah, that was me! Have at me, lapdog!”
The Wolf of Twilight snarls at Link and slowly approaches. He leaps for the kid and the kid counters with his shield, steering the slathering jaws away. They circle around each other, each striking – sword against fang – neither getting a solid hit in.
For just a moment, I see Pit try to get up. Ah, geeze, he’s covered in blood… He’s staggering and can’t seem to wrap his hands around his bow.
In a split-second, the wolf is on top of my boy. Link kicks him in the stomach, and with a quick yank of his hand and a quick flick of his sword, relieves the mutt of his tail. I cheer as a flabbergasted ‘d Ordon runs off with a yelp and a whimper, leaving a red trail behind him.
Link pants, holding the still-twitching tail in one hand. He drops it and runs over to Pit. I sense a stirring in my pocket.
“I…I feel sick!” I choke out, excusing myself to the bathroom. For added realism, I really do get sick. I force my stomach to lurch, sending ropes of vomit out of my mouth and down my chin as I run to the nearest men’s room and find a stall. I quickly compose myself and sit down on a stall and pull out the stone, listening to poor Tiny panic.
“To--… uh.. Goddess Farore! Goddess Farore! Help me! What do I do?”
Disguising his communiqué as a prayer to one of our goddesses… clever.
I whisper into my stone, putting on a faux-female voice. “Your goddess hears you, oh valiant warrior,” I say, “but your goddess is in her private chamber right now, and so cannot see you. Describe what’s going on to me, kiddo.”
“Pit! He’s really hurt! I mean, like bad! His wing! It’s…it’s…”
“Is he breathing?”
“Yeah, and shivering and… well, you can hear.”
Indeed, I hear screams and other sounds of agony.
Tiny’s voice comes to me small and sad. I know he needs to whisper below his breath so that the people behind the cameras think he’s just praying on his token, but his voice genuinely shudders. “Pit’s wing…it’s hanging onto him by a thread of meat…”
“Is the bone out of the socket?” I ask.
“Y-y-yeah.”
“That simplifies matters. Listen to me, Tiny. Take some leather or a thick, smooth stick and thrust it into Pit’s mouth. Then… neither of you are going to like this, but you need to take your sword and cut off that thread.”
“B-but!”
“Just do it! At this point, its’ not going to get any better! If you leave it like that, I guarantee that it will get worse! You know Ganondorf had all the fairies wiped out and there’s no such thing as red potions in Brawl! Even the milk will only get you woozy anymore and your Grandma’s not there to make you soup!”
Dindammit. I didn’t mean to make him cry like that.
“Stop crying! Unless you want your new friend out of the game now, just do what I told you. After that, put pressure on the wound and get yourselves to a safe place! If you see any Hylian Willow trees along the way… you know what they look like, right? Shave some bark off and make him chew on the pith. It’ll help with the pain.”
I hear noises of the kid obeying my instructions. They are not nice noises. After several minutes, things settle and all I hear is heavy breathing.
“Kid?”
“I’m here. Toki? What do I do with the wing? Pit kind of picked it up and is holding it and staring at it and stuff…”
I feel like crying. In fact, I think I am a little. Good thing there’s a roll of toilet paper beside me to dab my eyes with.
“Leave it. Take it out of his hands if you have to. The last think the poor kid needs is a reminder of what he just lost. Keep the tail, though.”
“The tail?”
“Link ‘d Ordon’s tail. Pick it up and take it with you.”
“Why would I do that?”
“It’s the perfect intimidation-tool. He’ll probably come back for you later, and when he does, you can wave it around to remind him of how strong you are.”
I am back in my room, watching from the small television when I contact my charge again. The cameras are following other fighters, namely, Sheik and ‘d Ordon. They are providing a bit of unintentional comedy, at least for me. I have to stifle my laughter to use the stone. I know I should feel horrible for what I’m laughing at, but I don’t… he deserves every minute of what he’s going through.
“Hey, Kiddo,” I say softly. “You aren’t being watched.”
“Toki! We can talk now?”
“I think so. Other people are being televised right now. I thought I should let you know… you really struck a blow on the other Link today. Right now, he’s at his camp with his pants down and Sheik is pouring hot pitch on his bare butt!”
“Huh?”
“She’s trying to cauterize his wound. You really messed him up today, do you know that?”
“I didn’t think I did much at all. I just lopped off his tail. He doesn’t even need it in human form.”
“Do you know what a wolf’s tail is, kid? It’s an extension of the spine. It affected him even in human form. You clipped his tailbone. I don’t think he’s going to ever be able to sit right ever again! He’s probably going to be walking really funny, too. If he takes on wolf-form again, he’s going to be off-balance.”
“So I actually did something?”
“Yeah, you did. How’s Pit?”
“He’s hanging in there.”
I put away the token when the screen shifts to my boy and the clipped angel. Link is without his hat and I find it easy to guess what happened to it. Pit’s left side is clad in bandages and where they aren’t soaked dark red and drying rust there are patches of green fabric to be seen. He sits with his knees drawn up to his chest. His right wing twitches a little and, for a split second, I could swear I see a glowing, spectral wing where the left one should be. It flaps gently and vanishes. Link sits next to him. They both stare into their campfire.
“I waited so long to be able to fly…I can’t even do so temporarily now…” Pit says forlornly.
“The goddess you serve is powerful and good, isn’t she?” Link asks. The angel’s eyes brighten.
“Oh, yes, very much!” he answers.
“From what you’ve told me of her, she actually takes an interest in you, personally. In my world… the three goddess who are supposed to rule over everything… in our mythology…kind of… created the world and left. They left stuff for their heroes and are associated with certain things, but we’re pretty much on our own most of the time. I don’t think my goddesses will do anything for me…”
“But I heard you praying earlier. To a ‘Farore,’ right?”
“That was…urk! Um!... I’ll explain later, okay? Anyway, what do you think will happen when you go back to your world?”
“Well, Palutena has brought me back to life before. I don’t think she can do that if I fall in this world, but, maybe… I see what you’re saying. Maybe if things go well for me and I see her again - she’ll definitely heal me!”
“Exactly!”
“Wait a minute. You said ‘when’ I go back to my world. Link… for that to happen…”
“Oh, I know. I’ll probably get stomped by Bowser or something. He’s still out there. Or shot by Fox’s blaster, or…”
“Just stop it, okay? Don’t talk like that.”
“If it comes down to just the two of us… I don’t murder my friends.” Link says.
“We can make a stand,” Pit suggests. “I’m not owned by President Ganondorf and neither are you!”
Link smiles a cheeky smile. I shake and hang my head, glad that he cannot see it. Defiant talk. Those two are going to get themselves both killed for sure.
Link decides to change the subject by offering Pit some stories of his world. I don’t know how appropriate it is, but my kiddo starts talking about the Rito people. He details their culture. They’re a race of birdlike humanoids that live in New Hyrule. They do a very good business in mail-delivery. They are born without the ability to fly and fledge when they come of age, gaining the ability upon the completion of a test of courage. As I listened in, I worried that such a story would upset Pit right now, but, instead, it seems to do quite the opposite. He leans forward, as comfortably as he can and hangs upon every word.
I lay back on my bed, sure that in some other world, somewhere, a goddess is weeping.
Days pass by. Sheik catches up to Fox and he falls. Little Link and Pit do not move from their camp due to Pit’s condition. He grows ill, a victim of infection to his wound. The “Goddess Farore” instructs Link to collect venom from Deku Babas and to boil it until it becomes red. It is not a traditional red potion, but something of a “poor man’s version” I learned about long ago. Link manages to find half a discarded pokeball to boil the stuff in. I have no idea how that got into an Old Hyrulean forest… perhaps it was a leftover from the days before the division, from the old non-lethal fights. Those of us who’d fought for fun used to temporarily use pokemon all the time.
The slapdash medicine does not help Pit much, but it seems to ease his fever a little. My heart is broken for the brave: Every morning, shivering and sweating, the kid climbs up on the rock they’re camped by and watches with his bow ready while Link prepares the venom-concoction and hunts for food.
When Sheik falls, I feel no sorrow. I cannot laugh like I did at Link ‘d Ordon when she was treating his tail, even though, in all honesty, a part of me is tempted to. The Sheikah warrior dies in… just about the most embarrassing way for anyone to die in Hyrule, especially from the perspective of outsiders.
In Hyrule there is a species of domestic bird. In most places, that kind of bird is known as a chicken, while in Hyrule, it is known as a cuccoo. There are some notable differences between the chickens of most worlds and cuccoos, however. Cuccoos are normally as gentle and cowardly as any kind of off-world chickens, but when they feel threatened, they flock together and turn into an ax-crazy homicidal army. The ones that had been let loose in the Stage seemed to have had their aggression ramped up. Sheik did not even need to try to hurt them. She merely stumbled upon a flock of them in a clearing and was pecked and clawed to death without mercy.
I wonder if the creatures are a new addition to the Stage – something to spice up the last dwindling days or perhaps punishment set up specifically for that particular fighter as judgment for what she’d done to that one camera several nights prior.
That leaves… let’s see…. At this point, the only fighters left are my Little Link, Pit, Bowser and Link ‘d Ordon.
In the bright and early morning, Bowser finds his way to my boy’s camp. He’s still scuffed up from previous battles he’s survived and is angry. He stumbles in, setting fire to the bushes with his breath. He gives a roar in Pit’s general direction. For his part, the wounded angel stands up and holds out the blade portions of his divided bow – a sword for each hand.
It looks like they are going to take each other on when Link returns from the nearby forest and brings out his own sword.
Bowser lumbers and swipes. Link gets a claw right across his shield. He jumps and backflips, catching a claw to the leg. Link yelps, but stands. To my surprise, he pulls ‘d Ordon’s tail out of his pocket and waves it around like a little victory-flag.
“You killed the wolf-man?” Bowser asks, incredulous.
“I took him on!” Link shouts.
Meanwhile, Pit sits down on the rock overlooking them, too weak, it seems, to stand tall anymore, struggling to form an energy-bolt upon his re-assembled bow. His movements immediately capture the turtle-dragon’s attention.
“An easy kill,” he says to Link. “I’ll deal with you, Squirt, after I put this one out of his misery.”
Just as Bowser inhales sharply to build up a blast of fire, Little Link does something amazing – amazing and vicious. He jumps up, kicks himself off Bowser’s belly, does a flip and plunges his version of the Master Sword deep into Bowser’s forehead!
Bowser stands in what seems like surprise for a moment. It’s like his brain doesn’t register that something just split its hemispheres and sank into its stem. Pit is staring wide-eyed. Link stands upon the ground, panting, hands on his knees. It’s like he’s expended all his energy in that one very hard flying-leap. Link nearly falls down as he makes haste to get out of the way of Bowser’s corpse, which lands with a thud.
Link wears no emotion on his face as he yanks the sword out of his fallen foe and cleans it off on the grass.
“You defended me,” Pit says.
“Of course,” Link answers, his speech a little dull and rife with exhaustion. “I defend my friends. And when you and I manage to get out of here, I’m gonna do the same thing to Ganondorf!”
Pit wearily stands. “Something’s coming.”
“Yeah, I hear something strange. Howling?”
“Get up here right now, Link.”
Link scrambles up on the rock. Bursting out of the treeline is a certain dark-colored, slightly unbalanced tail-less wolf. He is not alone. He is followed…no…pursued by a horde of what appear to be other wolves – no… Wolfos!
Wolfos are a species of Hyrulean monster. They are like wolves, but can stand on their hind legs like men and have strong, manlike chests. There are the common gray variety and there are white ones, which usually only inhabit snowy regions.
The wolf-form of Link ‘d Ordon looks scared. The zoom-in I see of his eyes shows genuine fear. He makes no move to harm either Tiny or Pit. Instead, he runs around their rock, looking like he is hoping to lose the pack. He’s injured. I can see a line of blood glistening on his fur.
The pack surrounds the rock. The kids are standing and have their weapons drawn, ready to defend their tiny territory. Link ‘d Ordon fights and snaps, keeping some of the gray wolfos back. He whimpers and whines when a golden creature emerges from the forest. It is a wolf, like him – not a wolfos, but a pure wolf. Its fur is white and golden and it glows like something divine. It has one sharp blood-red eye that glows like something belonging to an undead creature.
I’ve never seen this animal before in my life, yet something about it is achingly familiar.
The Ordonian, though he is in his wolf-form, speaks in a human voice. “Stop it, old man! Don’t come any closer!”
The golden wolf takes two steps closer. The other wolfos part the way for him. Pit and Little Link stare on in unbelief.
“I’m sorry, Old Man! You don’t understand! I had to! They made me do it!”
Why is Link ‘d Ordon calling the strange wolf “Old Man?”
And then it hits me, like the falling corpse of a turtle-dragon. Midna told me a bit about her world – and about the supposed story-mode. In the story-mode (though I do not know if they ever got the chance to experience it firsthand or just “felt it in their code”), her Hero was visited by the spirit of an ancestor in the form of a wolf. I take a long look at the golden fur… the blond fur… The creature on the screen is no spirit. It is a physical being conjured of magic or perhaps of forbidden science.
My heart sinks. My brother’s body was buried in New Hyrule, but not before officials in Smash City did a full autopsy and other things, never mind the obvious cause of his death. I realize, with a sickness rising up in my gut that Ganondorf used a bit of my brother’s blood or tissue that he’d probably kept on file for just such an occasion: I am looking at a bit of my brother’s body in the form of a monster-wolf. To remind one fallen Hero of the heroism he lost, a vision was created of a past Hero he’d once admired. The golden wolf convicts him silently.
They’ve turned my Big Brother into a beast! I think I can feel my mind slipping further down the drain…It’s spinning…circling…
It’s freaking out Link ‘d Ordon even more than it’s freaking me out. He cringes up against the rock. He acts like the golden wolf’s one-eyed glare is burning him. He is a prisoner of guilt, it would seem. It doesn’t look like he wants to fight the golden wolf at all. When the golden wolf seems assured of this, he dives in, seizing Link ‘d Ordon by the shoulder. The wolfos follow suit, snarling and tearing.
I see bloody clumps of fur flying. Little Link is hiding his eyes. Pit readies a light-arrow. He aims and he fires.
As soon as the arrow lands, the golden wolf and the wolfos disperse, running back into the forest from whence they came. I wonder why they aren’t sticking around. It would seem that they were sent after a single target and suddenly lost interest as soon as that target was finished.
Link ‘d Ordon is splayed out on the grass. He is not a wolf anymore. His tunic is torn down to the chainmail. There is a neat, bloody hole in his chest where Pit’s arrow struck home and went right through him. He is still and his eyes are open. The shot I see of his face sends a strange feeling through me. He was, perhaps, the greatest danger to my charge and he was a psychotic, efficient and remorseless player throughout this whole ordeal, but I cannot help but feel sorry for him. It isn’t because he was supposedly my successor in another time and another life. It is because his eyes – his dead-eyed skyward gaze – looks incredibly sad. The look on his pale face is one of absolute remorse.
Things are not quiet in the viewing room. Midna is shrieking and crying. She uses her magical hair to overturn a chair. She storms out into the hall and I can hear her punching the walls and cursing arcane curses surely known only to the Twili.
Maybe all of the beasts left because the Stage-keepers sensed what was about to happen and sent whatever they’d implanted into the wolfos to action to get them away from the area…
Pit falls down, his strength gone. Between the fever and exertion, it’s heroic that he’s lasted this long. Link catches him and apologizes about touching the area where he’s hurt.
“Pit?” he practically squeaks.
“Thank you, Link,” Pit says. “You defended me and I got to defend you... and to give your ‘other half’ mercy. I was glad to be able to do that. It looks like I’m finished.”
“No you aren’t!” Link pleads. “Stay with me! Don’t you remember? We were going to make a stand together! You were going to go home! Palutena was going to heal you!”
“I don’t look it, but I’ve lived a pretty long life,” Pit says. I can see him smile. “You have yours ahead of you. And floor-pie. And your sister. And the sea.”
“You were going to fly….you need to fly again.”
Pit looks to the sky. “I am, Link. I can feel it… and I can see her… I can see her! I… I’m flying…”
He slumps in Link’s arms, his remaining wing dragging on the stone. The angel closes his eyes slowly and smiles gently. Link cradles him for several minutes. No announcement is called. I wonder if Little Link is feeling Pit’s heart slow down. He’s certainly not waking up again.
Then it is called.
“GAME!”
I sigh. My boy won. New Hyrule has a new Champion. I’m not happy about it, though. I am happy that my boy lived, but… the ending of these Brawls of Honor is never happy for any of us who’ve been through them or has an ounce of conscience. Very soon, Little Link will be brought back here to be cleaned up and cared for. That nasty claw-wound on his leg will need looking after. Perhaps I’ll give him a taste of Chateau Romani or hard Goron-whiskey. It doesn’t matter if he’s not of-age. We will drink to fallen friends and fallen foes and see if we can forget, for a while, the sight and scent of blood.
I wander out into the hall and before I know it, Midna grabs me by the collar. She pushes me into an empty hotel suite and she slams me against a wall. I don’t have any of my weapons on me, but I try to fight back. She pins me with Twilight magic.
“The plan is ruined!” she roars.
“What plan?” I ask. “Let me go!”
She growls out Twili curses and a few old Hylian ones that I actually know. “You’re a part of our plan now! You and the stupid kid!”
“What in Nayru’s name are you talking about?” I demand.
“The plan! The plan!” Midna laments. She lets me up, but I decide not to flee or to call security, because I want to know what the bloody mustard she’s talking about.
“We didn’t want to involve you, Toki,” she sighs.
“Just what the Hell is going on?”
Midna sits down heavily in a leather chair in the well-appointed room, which I now realize is hers. “My Link was supposed to win.”
“That psychopath?” I scoff. “I’m glad he didn’t!”
“Shut your ignorant mouth!” she hisses. “He was more honorable than you know. More honorable than you!”
“Maybe I ought to go…”
“Sit. Down.”
I obey, in spite of myself.
“There are some secrets that you do not know, Toki. Some of us… we were planning something. We didn’t want to involve you because we thought you were useless. Looks like we have no choice now.”
“Are there cameras in this room?” I ask. “This is a big open suite, not like mine. I don’t think I’ve been watched for a while. Technicians got tired of watching me drink and barf and scratch things every year. And I do parade around naked sometimes… Should we go to my room?”
“You’d like that, wouldn’t you?” Midna says slyly. “Yes, there are a few cameras here in the living-area. The powers that be have enough class to keep them out of the bed and bath, at least. I am using a bit of Darkness magic to obscure what we are saying – both in regards to audio and lip-reading. I couldn’t do that in the arena, so Sheik had to take a risk and physically damage one of the cameras…She made it look like wanton vandalism without any inherent meaning. Or at least, she tried to. That incident might catch up with us.”
“The night she and Link ‘d Ordon killed Samus Aran…”
“That is one of the things that is a secret, Toki.”
“They butchered her, didn’t they?”
“Samus Aran is alive, Toki.”
“Say what?”
Midna looks me straight in the face.
“Samus lives. Termina lives. The other worlds that Ganondorf supposedly sent into oblivion live… and Ganondorf has the Triforce.”
:loveeyeballs:
