Road Trip, Chapter 9

ROAD TRIP

Chapter 9, 1 of 3 Endings: Total Party Kill



Link was pretty sure they’d crossed the fuzzy border into Hyrule when the air started smelling of home.  There was the distinctive scent of the fall leaves of Faron Woods, of grass-combed wind, of pumpkins growing in fields and everything that bespoke Hyrule - his Hyrule. The road had turned to dirt many miles back.  It was difficult to navigate Otto on the medieval dirt cart-trails.  There was talk of abandoning the bus in favor of footwork or finding horses, but everyone decided that it was too risky.  

Dark Pit, meanwhile, hung out in one of the back seats with Abby, staring intently into a hand-mirror.  Zelda had given it to him when he’d wanted to check his hair.  Now, he was looking into it and appeared to be whispering to it.  He was smiling.  It was a rare thing to see a smile grace ‘Pittoo’s” face, at least when it wasn’t a smug smirk after kicking someone’s tail in a Smash match.  Cautiously, Lucas crept up on him and peered over his shoulder when he was distracted.  The dark angel was quite good-looking, everyone agreed, but nobody could be that vain.  Scratch that.  Meta Knight was so vain he had his face emblazoned on his airship, but Meta Knight was not here.  

Lucas stifled a gasp, biting his lip just in time to keep Dark Pit from noticing him.  He sat back next to Ness and Lucario.  “I think Link might be right,” he said.  

“Huh?” Ness asked.  

“Maybe its Lady Zelda’s mirror that’s special.  I didn’t see Dark Pit’s reflection in it.”

“So, he’s a vampire-angel, what else is new?” Ness joked.  

“No!” Lucas insisted, keeping everything quiet.  “I’m pretty sure I saw Pit in it!”

“No, really?” Ness wondered.  “I wanna see!”

“No!” Lucas said, grabbing him by the sleeve and looking back over to Dark Pit, who was softly laughing at the mirror.  “We shouldn’t disturb him!  This is private for him.”  

“Do you think you might see your mom or your brother in the mirror if he puts it down?”

“I don’t know,” Lucas said, pouting.  “I don’t think so.  I think the mirror-thing might just be for him.  Maybe Zelda put a spell on it.”  

“Maybe.”  

“His aura is a little brighter,” Lucario rumbled, purring telepathically.  “We are all in a little better spirits.” He sniffed.  “I do think there is some magic in the very air of this land.”  

“Hey!” Toon Link exclaimed, hopping over the seats to peer at the other boys and the jackal.  “Maybe if we stop or there’s time, we can play some pumpkin-ball! My big brother says we’re near Ordon Province, were people grow pumpkins!”  

“Pumpkin-ball?” Ness asked skeptically.

“It’s like your baseball,” Toony said, “Except that you take a sword… or a bat… I guess, and stick it in a pumpkin, and you can hurl it like a ball!”

“That doesn’t sound like baseball at all,” Ness assessed, shaking his head.  “But it still sounds like fun!”  

That’s when the dropping sensation happened, and the screech of metal on stones, and the great cloud of dust.  The entire tail end of Otto suddenly fell away; sending everyone, save for Samus braced in the drivers’ seat, backwards.  The double-doors fell open and standing there, in the middle of the road was a zombie-version of Donkey Kong with the rear axel of the bus in his massive hands.  

Everyone had their own expletives for this – words little American boys should not say, but do anyway, followed by something indecipherable in Ancient Greek by their raven-winged angel.  The Hylian curses were perhaps the most interesting, said by the princess of all people, as well as her pair of heroes.  The Chozo-speak coming out of Samus was completely without translation.  W retained her calm.  Doctor Mario let forth a “fascinating,” followed by science-ese.  Yoshi simply proclaimed “Whoa!”  The dog and the Absol barked their little heads off.  

And, everyone was out of the ruined bus, weapons drawn, powers at the ready as more figures shuffled out of the woods.  The creature that was formerly Donkey Kong glared at them with reddened eyes as he beat the ground, which was not a problem for those good at jumping or with a Power of Flight.  

“Fox-Fire!” sounded from back in the woods.  A familiar figure shot into the air, flanked by another familiar shadow.  Donkey Kong fell to blaster-fire as a beloved old friend landed hard on his prosthetics in front of Link.

“Fox?”

“The one and only!” the anthropomorphic creature replied.  “Where have you been, Wolf Boy?  You know we’ve been lookin’ everywhere for you!”  

Falco joined Dark Pit on the slanted roof of the ruined bus, taking a back-to-back stance.  “Nice to see ya, kiddo,” the blue bird said.  “Your flock’s lookin’ a little light.”

“I don’t want to talk about it,” Dark Pit replied.  

“Less talk, more firepower. Gotcha.”  

Somewhere in the background, someone “Falcon Paaaaunched!” an undead Diddy Kong.  There seemed to be more former Smashers in this group of zombies that what the group of Otto had encountered before.  There were several more Miis.  

“What the?” Samus asked, charging up her canon, “Is that R.O.B.?  Is he on our side? Why are his optics red?”  

“Machines are startin’ to get infected to, sweetheart,” Captain Falcon said, gliding up to her.  “Don’t ask me how.  We lost little Mega Man a while back, didn’t know how to put him down, so he’s out there.  His mechanical doggie, too.”  

“How in the world does a physical disease cross the boundary into electronics?” W asked as she “saluted the sun” into a vanguard of gray Mii Swordfighters.  

“Foxed if I know,” Falco replied.  “Maybe this kind of thing infects ‘soul’ or AI as much as blood.”  

PK attacks were going on all around.  Lucario stuck to Aura Spheres, staying off his injured foot.  Abby the Absol sent wave after wave of night-slash attacks into infected Pokemon that were coming out of the woodwork.  

“Hey!” Fox protested his name being used as an expletive.  He turned to Link as Link readied a powder-bomb.  “Glad to see you’re okay…. Didn’t know if anybody had gotten out of Smash City before people from Snake’s world nuked it.”

“Snake…nuked it?”

“That’s our best theory.  What we saw signs of what looked like his people checking the remains of the area.  You do remember he got out before this party started, right?”

“Yeah.”  

“Who else is alive?”  

“The Fire Emblem family and good ol’ Meta Knight. The smoking remains of the Halberd are out over yonder.  Kinda crashed the thing when something started messing with the electronics… Hyrule magic, we guess.”

“Or, it got infected somehow,” Link said, making a face.  

“That, too.”  

Link lobbed his artillery and then brought out his bow.  He’d do better doing clean-shots on the various former arena-spectators crowding him in.  “All of the Swords got out?”

“Yeah,” Fox explained.  “They were really worried about you, too, and the young one, and the sword-wielding angels.  Your whole sword-fellowship was broken up.  Good that you’re all in one piece.”

“Not all of us,” Link said, loosing an arrow.  “We lost Pit a while back.  He’s with his in spirit.”  

The Hylian could glimpse Pit’s spirit making a face at what was a bad pun out of the corner of his eye. He had nothing in this, being the expert wielder of horrible puns.  “Look out!” the dead angel shouted.  

Link nearly dropped his bow when he saw a washed-out version of Pac-Man coming through.  He was zombie-fied himself, but was munching through fellow zombies – cracking spines and tearing through their limbs in a black-blood cannibal feast.  

“The Triforce!” Toon Link shouted.  He held up his left hand, upon which the symbol for the Triforce of Courage had appeared, glowing.  Link looked at his own hand, which bore the same mark.  A mark on Zelda’s hand flashed to life.   Instantly, they all knew what they must do.  

“The Temple of Time!  It’s in these woods!” Link shouted.  “I know a shortcut!  Zelda, Toony and I can feel where it is!  Come on! Follow us!”    

Toony ran forward given an opening, right through a clear spot in the woods.  That was just about when he got sucked up in a vacuum of breath by a white, dead-eyed Kirby.  

“Toony!” Zelda gasped, seeing it happen.  Link readied his bow to pop the undead marshmallow just as Toon Link was spit out.  The zombie-Kirby gained a hat upon his head and bounced off to engage Captain Falcon.  Toon Link got up off the ground.  He’d turned pale and his eyes glowed red, not unlike his “dark” costume.  

Link kept his bowstring tensed, shaking.  Toon Link stalked toward him and Lady Zelda, moaning, the infection taking instantly into him through some mysterious process of Kirby’s corrupted innards.  Link winced, letting his arrow fly.  With a “pink!” it bounced off a curved blade.  

Dark Pit stood between Link and Toony.  “No!” he said, glaring at Link, his wings tense.  “I can’t let you put him down!  I’LL take the guilt this time! We’ll call ourselves even!”  

Swiftly, his angelic blades separated the zombie of Toon Link’s head from his body.   Link had no time to thank Dark or to mourn.  Zelda grabbed him by the wrist and pulled him along.  

They found themselves running through the forest.  Other survivors were on their heels.  Duckie and Abby barked and sent clays and slashes into the pursuers, acting as the rear-guard.  Fox and Falco came up in the middle.  Link saw a flash of swords from people up on one of the hills between the trees.  His heart swelled with relief and pride.  The Swords.  Someone was clearly casting powerful spells from a book, as well.  

A pair of zombies dove and grabbed for Lucas and Ness.  Lucario stood between them and kicked them away, only to get swarmed.  “Go on!” he cried.  

The two boys were in despair, but they sent PSI attacks with all of their strength. That is, until a pair of Mii-Swordfighter-zombies sidelined them and zombie-Kirby swept in to take Ness.  

Yoshi made eggs out of a few of the assailants, which, when they cracked, allowed members of the Swords to stab them into re-death.  Marth and Ike were brutally efficient, as was Roy, whom everyone had thought had went home before the Mansion fell.  As it turned out, he had come to be a spectator to the Smash Tournament and unfortunately had been caught up in all this.  

“Yoshi and Marth should be in the rear-guard!” Doctor Mario announced.  “They’re infection survivors, so they’re immune!”

“We can still get eaten, Doc!” Marth responded.  

“Like you’re gonna let that happen!” Ike said with a smile as he relieved a zombie Game N’ Watch and a Mii-Gunner of their arms first, and then their heads.  

“Hey, you ever find the new guy?” Link called to them, “The guy with that huge weird red sword?”

“We have not,” Meta Knight intoned, flapping up beside him.  “We think he failed to get out of the city.”  

Link’s face fell when he found among the infected people that he knew – people that he loved.  Zelda had to tug him by the shoulders to keep him moving as she sent a wave of Din’s Fire into bloody-faced beings that had once been Rusl and Uli – the Ordonian couple who had raised him.  

A large horde of zombie Gerudo-warriors came for the group.  Link, however, knew where he was going.  He could feel the Triforce calling to his soul.  Its energy burned in his bones.  

Yes, these sunken clearings were familiar.  He did not know how he was able to get here without the use of the golden cuccoo like he had used before, and likewise, he was without Midna, but they had, indeed, stumbled upon another route.  Zelda lighted down with him, using Farore’s Wind to keep herself in a gentle glide.  He hopped and jumped.  There were infected everywhere, and his friends fighting them.  

Link looked around and found the pedestal for the Master Sword in the courtyard of the ruins of the Temple of Time.  “I just hope it’s there!” he gasped.

“It will be,” Zelda assured him.  “The true-Triforce always gravitates to tune of Time.”  

The edge of the forest around them was lit on fire.  The pale face of an infected Bowser showed itself.  Yoshi and Doctor Mario took him on.  The turtle-dragon grabbed Yoshi and broke his neck before stomping the doctor into the dirt.  

“There’s no time…” Zelda said.  “We have to go in, now!”  

Link struck his sword and withdrew it, opening the Gates of Time.  He sprinted to the doors and heaved them open, revealing the interior of the ancient temple as it had been in the past.  He was constantly looking back. Marth and Ike came up beside him.  “We’ll guard!” the insisted.  Duckie and Abby came running.  W was busy kicking a former Geurdo in the jaw.  Dark Pit was yelling and carrying on.  Link was sure he saw what looked like the remains of Mayor Bo tackle him to the ground in some corrupted form of a wrestling-move.    

Link and Zelda ran through the doors, followed by the dog, the Absol and, unexpectedly, Dark Pit, who dashed in and fell to his knees at the last minute as the doors began sealing.  

“Marth! Ike!” Link screamed.  He could hear their screams on the other side.  The dog whined, the Absol barked and Zelda went to her knees.  She put her hand on Dark Pit’s back, gently.  He hissed and winced in pain.  

“He’s in bad shape,” she said softly to Link as he turned around.  

“Dark?” he asked.

“You can…” Dark Pit began, “You can call me Pittoo… you’ve earned it.”  

The angel was, indeed, in terrible shape.  His right wing was missing and his left wing was partially stripped to bones.  Blood pooled beneath his arms as he held himself up on the floor of the ancient interior of the Temple of Time.  

Link’s brain took that moment to notice that he hadn’t heard the squawking and warnings of the spirit of Pit in a while.  In fact, he didn’t see the ghost-angel anywhere.  

“We…we should press on…to the interior of the place…r-right?” Dark Pit asked.  His voice sounded mixed, like there was another voice layered on top of his – his twin’s voice.  

Zelda gasped.  She stared at the light reflecting off the small puddle of blood that had formed beneath the disheveled Pittoo.  Link noticed it, as well.  Pit looked back at them from the reflection.  His eyes pleaded with Zelda.  

“I’ll do what I can,” Zelda said to the puddle, trying to send her healing magic into Dark Pit’s body.

Dark Pit shook his head.  “It’s not gonna work.  Maybe I can keep going for a while, but with my wings messed up like this… I… I’m a goner.  P-Pit would want me to help you, so I’ll do that… I guess.”   He grit his teeth and got up, hissing in pain.  “If those doors don’t hold… I’ve still got my weapons.”  

Pittoo promptly withdrew his Dark Pit staff and sat down before the main doors, setting up the magical rifle to shoot anything that tried to come through.  

“We can’t leave you!” Zelda said tearfully.  

Dark Pit withdrew the mirror she’d given him and held it up so she could see his “reflection.”  He spoke again, in the double-voice.  

“We’re together,” the Pits said.  “We are already dead.  If you get to the Triforce, we will live again.  Otherwise, we are ready to meet each other again in the City of Souls.”  

Dark Pit attempted to give Zelda her mirror back. “No,” she insisted.  “You two should be together.”  

Duckie licked Dark Pit on the arm before trying to lead Link through one of the open doors of the temple interior.  Abby sat down beside Dark, refusing to move.  

Link and Zelda wended their way through the various rooms of the time-displaced Temple of Time.  

“At least it doesn’t have guardians and monsters like it did last time,” Link said nervously. “Oh, don’t go near those statues.  They might come to life.”  

The dog sniffed about.  Link followed the increasing pulsing feeling in his hand.  In fact, a small light began to show from beneath his glove shooting out to form a little pinpoint, like the triangle on a compass.  Zelda’s hand had a similar glow, responding to the true Triforce of Wisdom like Link’s mark was responding to the Triforce of Courage.  No doubt, Ganondorf was on his way, with his army of the undead going before.  Whose wishes would prevail?  

The two Hylians and their canine companion wended their way up the floors of the temple.  “I can’t believe we’re the only ones left,” Link sighed.  “Us and the dog.”  

“Dark Pit is downstairs with Abby,” Zelda reminded him.  

“Dark Pit is dying.  Pit once told me how vital the wings are to the angels of their world, how only restoration from a supernatural spring had saved him from death.  We don’t have anything like that for his brother right now.”  

“He’s brave for being our guardian.” Zelda said with a nod.

“He’s doing the only thing he can do at this point,” Link said dryly.  

Just then, the sound of doors being hawed loose thundered downstairs as well as the sound of percussive weapon-fire.  “Goodbye!” Dark Pit’s voice sounded in a yell that was as cocky as it ever was on the stages.  

Duckie howled.  He howled again, perhaps for Abby as well as Dark.  

“Onwards and upwards,” Link said, his head bowed as he took a stairwell.  He sighed.  “Post haste.”  

Zelda paused at an archway, holding up her hand to get a good look at the guiding light. Suddenly, her eyes went wide as a sword-tip pierced through her chest, wielded by an armored Stalfos that had sprung up behind her.  Duckie jumped into action and grabbed the creature by a femur.  With a “Hiiiya!” Link cleaved the thing’s skull.  After he sent it clattering to the ground, he placed a bomb upon the scattered bones and took Zelda up in his arms and carried her away from the blast-radius.  

“Zelda?” Link hoped.  She was limp and her eyes spoke to him of death.  “Zelda…”

He put her down, leaning her up against the brickwork of a wall.  He closed her eyelids and brushed hair hair-tails out of her face.  He knelt down and gave her a kiss on the lips.  “Farewell, Princess,” he said.  “I’ll see you again.  I’m almost there.  I’ll see you again.”  

Duckie was howling long and low until his howl was suddenly cut-off in a yelp.  Link looked just in time to see him pulled back and munched within the maw of the zombie-fied Pac-Man.  ReDeads flanked the hungry being, screaming and creeping forward.  Link ran until he came to sealed doors behind which a light shone.  

Yes… he felt it in his very soul!  The Triforce had, indeed, incarnated physically and it was here!  It was so unlike his first trip through this place; when the Triforce had stayed in the Golden Realm save for the marks upon the gods’ chosen avatars.  Link tried to ignore the smell of dog’s blood as he braced his shoulder and leapt into the doors to burst them loose.  Forget hunting everywhere for a damn key!  Dodging guillotine-pendulums… yes, this was familiar.  He jumped, dodged and rolled.  

Then, he beheld it.  Link saw the very Power of the Gods sitting right before him.  He did not remember this room in the Temple of Time before – one with a white pedestal and curtains.  He pumped his legs forward only to be tossed to the ground as something grabbed his calf.  

No! So close!  Oh, Triforce, hear my wish!  

The Trifrorce remained silent and indifferent. He could not reach it to touch it. Cold, dead hands held him down.  Link looked up to see the pale, undead faces of Ike, Roy and Dark Pit, the latter twitching one bony wing with black blood marring the remains of black feathers. Out of the corner of his eyes, Link saw the mirror Zelda had given him shattered on the floor. The hunting dog was baying – a howl more low and eerie than ever before.  Samus, out of her armor, laughed at him with black blood dripping out of her nose.  She uttered a guttural growl.  

“Did you think you could escape, Fairy Boy?” she asked in a deep hiss.  Link was sure he felt his chain-mail lifted up and a sword open up his middle.  He gnashed his teeth in pain.  Dark Pit gripped his hair and held him back as the others held him down.

Link looked at the high, vaulted ceiling of the temple and the gentle golden glow of the Triforce.    He whispered a prayer, the one he had spoken over so many of the Fellowship up until now.  The once-Hero never thought he’d have to, or, indeed, get the chance to say the Hylian Prayer for the Dying and the Dead over himself.  This was no quick death in battle, the kind he’d always expected for himself.  

“From Farore’s Life to Nayru’s Wisdom… Aaaaagh!  May Din’s Power grant my spirit rest… aaaack!”  He could taste blood in his mouth as he started to strangle.  He felt parts of his body being torn and slipping from him. “May…maa-aya-ay…the L-light….of Hylia… Aaaaaaah!  Light my way home!”  

Link felt his breath slip as the sounds of Ganondorf’s laughter and fresh meat being eaten filled his ears.  





Congratulations!  You’ve got the Zombie Bonewing Dark Pit Trophy!  Continue?

ENDING POSSIBILITY ONE OF THREE.  

You just hit the Bad Ending on the game!  For other possible endings, stay tuned!