//------------------------------// // Ch.2- The Awakening // Story: The Equestrian Flower Garden // by RoyalStar709 //------------------------------// It was a busy day at the convention center, the hustle and bustle of the crowd filling the halls. Alex walked rather slowly compared to his fellow con goers, not really sure what to do with himself. This was the first time he had ever been to a con so he felt rather lost. He adjusted the large transparent bowl covering his head, moving the red antenna away from his vision. He sighed, deciding to head to the showroom floor. After a few minutes of just wandering around, he found himself drawn to a stall run by a man dressed as the merchant from the Resident Evil series. “Welcome stranger! I've got rare things on sale!” he said, looking at Alex with a smile, his accent surprisingly spot on. “I see....” Alex nodded, looking over the man’s wares. His eyes stopped, his gaze landing on a replica of the S.S Dolphin. He had always wanted one, ever since he had seen the complete version of the ship after finding all the 30 pieces in Pikmin 1. He picked it up, looking it over, noting the high quality of the trophy. “So, how much for it?” he asked, shifting his gaze from the ship to the merchant. “Hmm...." The merchant stroked his chin, "Lets say... a hundred dollars.” “Deal.” Alex said with a nod, taking out his wallet from the space suit's pockets. He pulled out several twenty dollar bills before passing it over to the merchant. "Thank you." He said, grabbing the model and looking it over happily. “Enjoy yourself,” the man said with a nod, putting the money away. Alex smiled, waving goodbye , "Thanks again!" Suddenly a bright light engulfed him, blinding him. "Hey! What's going on?!" He yelled, before the floor around him disappeared, as he felt himself falling. I groaned, feeling my body constantly shifting around as if someone was carrying it. "Hey...." I call a bit lazily, "Knock it off..." I said, waving my arm around. I felt my hand make contact to something, the thing had also made a whining noise. My eyes snapped wide open, instantly my upper body shot forwards, strangely enough everything around me was still moving, but the strangest part is, I'm surrounded by trees, grass, and dirt. "Wha...?" I slowly turned my head back to see what was carrying me. Carrying me were a group of small red carrot shaped creatures, all of them had a leaf on their head. "No way...." I whispered, my eyes widening even farther as I recognized the creatures, they were Pikmin, red Pikmin to be more specifically. "Umm....." The Pikmin turned their heads towards me. "Hi?" The Pikmin let out a high pitched whine, dropping me onto the floor and scattering around the area. "Hey! Wait!" I called after them, hoping they would come back. After several minutes of nothing but silence, I sighed. “Great…” I muttered sarcastically. I looked around me, still seeing nothing but trees and dirt. “..Well, it’s not the strangest dream I’ve had.” I walked towards to where the Pikmin had run off to, immediately noticing the large body of water, I licked my lips, just realizing how thirsty I was. “I suppose I could get a drink.” I sprinted towards the small pond, grinning, as I slowly started to remove the helmet. A sudden hiss caught my attention, as I noticed air start leaking in the suit. I was about to ignore it…. until it became harder to breath, and I mean like I couldn’t breath at all, I was suffocating. I gasp for air, not realizing the problem until I looked towards the helmet, I frantically reached towards it and forced it back towards its proper place, the inside of the suit suddenly became much more easier to breath. I gasped for air, breathing heavily. “The hell was that?!” I asked, suddenly not believing this was a dream anymore. I fixed the helmet, making sure it was tightly secured. I shivered as realization slowly started to creep in. “Oh no…..Please no..” I scurried towards the body of water, and gazed upon the reflection. “No…” Staring right back at me was not the handsome face I was accustomed too, it was Olimar's face. “No!” I yelled, backpedaling. I shook violently, as I realized the situation I was in. I wasn’t back home, this isn’t the con, this isn’t California. Which only meant one thing. I was turned into Captain Olimar, and transported into the Pikmin world, but the worst part is, I’m not 17 anymore, I’m around 30 years old with a wife, two kids, a terrible boss, and a terrible job! “NO!” I screamed, “I can’t be 30! I can’t have kids! I’m too young! I can’t even take care of myself!” I sobbed quietly, lamenting over the fact that now I’m a middle aged man with financial problems and gets paid even less than minimum wage. “It’s over….my life is over.” I rocked myself back and forth, not hearing the thunderous stomping. “*Growl*” My eyes snapped wide open as I heard the loud growl. Slowly, I turned towards the sound of the growl and saw a large yellow being with a red back with white polka dots, the creature had a pair of snail like eyes. The creature in front of me, was a Bulborb. “Umm...you wouldn’t happen to be Bulbie..would you?” I laughed nervously. I was answered with a loud roar from the Bulborb. “Yeah… I thought so.” Immediately I grabbed a handful of dirt and tossed it towards the Bulborb’s eyes. “POCKET SAND!” Seeing the creature flinch, I ran towards the woods and away from the clearing. “I don’t wanna die! I don’t wanna die!” I cried, running as fast as I could, the Bulborb slowly was catching up to me. I screamed as I ran towards a tree, climbing it with speed I wasn’t aware I had. I panted, chuckling as I saw the Bulborb growl. “HA! How do you like that?!” I yelled at him, throwing a stick at his eye. “Looks like someone won’t be getting dinner tonight! HAHA!” I laughed, taunting him from above. The Bulborb huffed, laying down in front of the tree, glaring at me. “Please don’t tell me you’re going to say here watching me..” The monster’s eyes narrowed, glaring at me. I sighed, knowing I was most likely going to be stuck here for a while. “Hmm…..Swooping Snitchbug…..Honeywisp.” I called out, naming all of the creatures that flew by me this past hour. “Spectralids!” I yelled, pointing at a large red butterfly. The insect flew down, landing ontop of the Bulborb’s back. I sighed, getting tired of the small game I made. “Well... I guess I really am in the Pikmin world.” I looked back at my only source of company this past hour, noticing that he was asleep. I grinned, climbing down the tree and slowly walked away. “Finally.” I muttered to myself. “I thought he’d never go back to sleep.” I snickered, carefully making sure to not make any loud noises. Twilight stared at the endless body of water in front of her, watching as everything seem to move back and forth slowly. She sighed, wondering if she really was prepared for this as the princess believed. “What if I fail…?” She whispered to herself. Suddenly Twilight felt herself get pulled into a hug. “Worry not Twilight!” The lavender pony looked up and saw Luna was the one who pulled her into a hug. “With mine help thee art sure to succeed!” Twilight felt herself smile. “Thanks Luna….but you’re slipping back to your old way of speaking again.” She pointed out. “Ah yes.” Luna frowned, “My most humble apology, tis a hard habit to breaketh.” She said before frowning. “Even now I have difficulty breaking this habit.” Twilight rested her head between her hooves, staring at the ocean again. “Twilight, what’s wrong?” Luna asked, seeing her go back to moping. She sighed, “It’s just…. what if I fail, what if I can’t save them?! What if whatever got to them, gets us?!” She asked. “I’m just worried that I won't be able to protect them.” Luna trotted to Twilight’s side and put a hoof on her shoulder, “Twilight, I understand your fear… but you don’t have to worry.” She said, trying to comfort her. “Your friends are strong enough to protect herself, not only that but now you have us as well.” She said, gesturing towards the group of guards exercising on the deck, Rarity and Pinkie were watching the sweat covered stallions work out with a small blush, “We will be by your side, protecting you and your friends from any danger that may come in our way.” Twilight smiled, “Thanks Princess.” “Please, we are equals now, just call us Luna.” She nodded, “Thank you… Luna.” “Ow!” “Stop moving so much!” “Well maybe I wouldn’t be moving so much if ya moved your wings out of my face!” The barrel shook violently as a trio of voices were heard echoing out of it. Luckily for the voices no one was around to hear them. “Well how about you get your face out of my wings!” “And just how do you expect me to do that?!” “Guys! Not so loud! Somepony will hear us!” The barrel stop shaking, suddenly a pair of orange hooves shot out of the barrel, soon the rest of the body slowly crawled out of it. “Do you see anything Scoots?” The orange pegasus scanned the area around them before smiling, “Nope! Nopony here!” Soon two more fillies jumped out of the barrel, a yellow earth pony and a white unicorn. “Looks like operation: Get Cutie Marks is a go!” The yellow pony said, making the other two grin. “I wonder what our Cutie Marks will look like!” Sweetie Belle wondered. ‘ “It’ll probably be something cool! Like a explorer’s hat with a whip!” Scootaloo guessed. “Or maybe a map?!” “Whatever it’ll be I’m sure that it will be so cool, that it will make Diamond Tiara jealous!” Applebloom said proudly. The three huddled up together, grinning widely. “CUTIE MARK CRUSADERS ISLAND EXPLORERS!!! YAY!!!” The trio cheered loudly. “Huh?! Hey did you hear that?” A sudden voice said. “Hear that? I felt it!” The three fillies looked up and paled as they realized that someone had heard them. “Quick hide!” Applebloom yelled, panicking. The three quickly ran towards the opened barrel and jumped in, making sure to close the lid tightly. Alex carefully wondered around the forest, already seeing over half of all the animals already start crawling back into their homes. Alex eyed the creatures suspiciously, wondering why they were in such a hurry to leave. Alex flinched, the sunlight’s glare reflected from the clear helmet, causing his eyes to burn a little. “Ow! What is it with this world loving to screw around with me!” Alex looked up towards the sky, watching as the sun started to set. “Huh… the sun is setting….” He looked at it with a bored look, before realization started to set in. “The sun is setting.” If this world really was the Pikmin world, then when the sun sets you know it’s time to go. “Aww man.” He sprinted farther into the woods, avoiding some of the other creatures. Running for his life, looking around, he spotted a hollowed tree, the tree seemed big enough to house him for the night. He quickly sprinted towards the hollow tree, grabbing one of large leaves that were on the floor, and set the leaf up to cover up the entrance. “Made it.” He whispered to himself, his heart beating rapidly. Turning towards the tree’s entrance, he frowned when he saw the last rays of sunshine leave. “Might as well get some shut eye, don’t want to be awake when those monsters wake up.” He grabbed one of the large leaves and covered himself with it, as if it was a blanket. Hesitantly, he looked outside, only being able to see the stars outside. He shivered hearing a loud roar, already tired from today's events he quickly fell asleep.