Chapter XXVI: Yellowed Grass
Reaching the southern shore of Dreamland only took the group around half an hour or so. Once Dedede had gotten them out of the forests around the base of Mount Dedede and pointed Twilight in the direction of the Rainbow Islands, they were off in a single teleport all the way to the shore.
The alicorn was panting a bit when they blipped back into existence. Anxious as she was to get Spike back–somehow, she hadn’t quite worked out that part of the plan yet–she’d forgotten that teleporting so many people could be so draining. Though even accounting for that, it took a bit more out of her than she had been expecting.
“Are you alright?” Bandee asked.
Twilight took a deep breath. “Yes, I’m fine. I just need a second.” She stared out over the water while she recovered. There was an island visible out there, almost a kilometer away. “Is this where the Rainbow Bridge is supposed to be?”
“Yeah, but…” Bandee trailed off. “How’re we gonna get over there?”
The island was surrounded by mostly sheer cliffs, so even putting aside the distance, swimming to it didn’t seem to be an option. Twilight could potentially teleport them all again, but she didn’t want to cause too much undue strain on her magic, especially not this early. She might very well need it for purging whatever had possessed Spike.
Fidgeting a bit, she adjusted the tiara on her head, making sure that the sticking charm was still in place. She wasn’t sure whether a single Element would be effective without the others, but it at least seemed like it had helped back at the castle.
“I could levitate everyone,” Twilight mentioned.
Dedede shrugged. “I mean, I’m pretty sure Bandana and Gooey here are just about the only ones who can’t at least hover.”
Gooey just maintained its dopey grin and levitated about a meter in the air, a slowly-rotating ring of orange spheres having sprouted from its back.
Everyone stared at him for a moment. “Bandana’s the only one here who can’t hover,” Dedede corrected.
Twilight looked at him incredulously.
“I can hover!” Dedede defended, a scandalized tone to his voice. “I just don’t have a reason to often!”
Kirby nodded.
Twilight still seemed disbelieving. “I’m sorry, how?”
Dedede grinned. “Like this!”
The penguin inhaled far more air than Twilight thought would be possible, inflating to almost twice his usual size. He flapped his arms and slowly, but visibly, the ballooned king rose into the air. “See?” Dedede said, immediately falling to the ground as speaking let out the trapped air in his body.
Twilight made a strangled sort of noise as her brain struggled to come up with a rational explanation for what was happening. “What? But-? That’s-? That’s not how lift works!” she complained.
Kirby looked confused and puffed up as well, demonstrating his own ability.
Dedede gestured vaguely in his direction.
“Listen, whatever Kirby’s doing has got to have some sort of magic behind it,” Twilight explained. “I haven’t figured it out yet, but it has to be there. You, on the other hoof, I haven’t seen use any sort of magic whatsoever.”
“Hammerspace!” Dedede countered.
Twilight blinked. “What?”
Dedede grabbed his hammer from nowhere and put it away again. “Hammerspace.”
Bandee facepalmed. “It’s not actually called hammerspace,” he assured. “His Majesty just calls it that because that’s where he keeps his hammer.”
She still fidgeted a bit at waiting longer, but Twilight’s curiosity got the best of her. “How does it work?”
Dedede laughed. “Hell if I know!”
She turned to Bandana.
He shrugged. “Every creature I’ve ever met that’s native to Popstar has been able to store things and retrieve them magically–it’s how I store my spear whenever I’m not holding it. I think it’s just part of how the planet works.”
Twilight sighed. “Alright, I can work this out later, I guess.” She shook her head. It was close enough to storage spells that she knew, anyway. Hay, even Spike could store things with his messenger flame, so who was to say that the denizens of Popstar couldn’t do that naturally. “We’ve got a mission, right now. Bandana Dee, do you mind being levitated across?”
A green-and-black flame flicked across a green gemstone for a moment before both vanished. The Darkness could feel the emotions of this world become even more muted, and thus it gained a slight bit more power. It gazed back out across the water, narrowing the dragon’s eyes as it saw four figures approaching the previous island. They staggered a bit as the wave of apathy hit them, but the situation was all too clear to the Darkness. It was being followed.
This would not do.
It gathered a ball of darkness in its claw and launched it at the island it had come from. Destroying the second bridge had granted it just enough power to do so, and when it landed on the other side it would seep into the local wildlife, sapping away any emotion other than rage. It wasn’t anywhere near as good as direct control, but with any luck, reducing the island’s inhabitants to their base instincts would slow down its pursuers terribly.
Its work done, the Darkness slipped into the trees. It held no illusions that its paltry tricks would stop its pursuers, of course. It would need to completely take out these rainbow-hued bridges before it got powerful enough for that. But it would buy it time, time enough to plan ahead and strategize on its way to the next bridge.
The owl that it could see in the canopy above it could do quite well if its pursuers got to this island.
As soon as the group landed on the island, they could tell that something felt subtly…wrong. It wasn’t anything about the landscape itself, that all seemed fine. The island was covered in a grassy plain, with a large lake on the opposite side. A river flowed out of it and away from them, disappearing from view in a small copse of trees. Twilight figured that it probably terminated in a waterfall, plunging over the island’s cliffs and into the ocean below.
The grass was a bit yellow, but Twilight couldn’t quite tell if that was its natural state or if it was just the dry season; vegetation on this planet was a bit weird. It wasn’t terribly hot, but she was starting to feel the lack of shade. As they touched down and Twilight levitated Bandee to the ground, she could feel a few beads of sweat from both the exertion and the summer heat.
She looked around, searching for whatever that off-putting feeling was. “What’s this island called?”
“Grass Land, I think,” Bandee provided. “Bit of a boring name, I know.”
Finally, Twilight’s mind landed on what she thought was so unsettling. “Is it usually this…quiet?”
She wasn’t exactly prone to going out into nature, but being friends with Fluttershy had led to the inevitability every now and again. Wherever wildlife could flourish, there was almost always sound. Be it the chirping of birds, small animals skittering around in the grass, or any other of the large collection of sounds that animals could make. But here, there was…nothing. No birdsong, no chittering, just the slight rustling of grass in the breeze.
“I don’t think it’s supposed to be,” Bandee said.
Dedede frowned. “Something’s wrong,” he stated the obvious.
Twilight took a step forward. Slowly, the rest of the group followed, and they began making their way across the island. “Where exactly are we going?” Twilight eventually asked.
“To the next Rainbow Bridge,” Bandee replied. “Or at least, where it should be if it’s destroyed another. We all felt that second wave of just…apathy, right?”
Twilight and Dedede nodded, though Kirby looked faintly confused and Gooey seemed distracted by some of the grass rustling in an unusual manner.
Twilight blinked. The grass was moving opposite the wind. Slowly, they began to move towards it, hopeful that there was something else on this island.
The grass was tall, reaching most of the way up her legs. Some of it had gone to seed, too, and her nose scrunched up. Apparently there was quite a bit of pollen in the air as well. Looking off to the side, she let out a sneeze.
Almost immediately, another sound finally rang out. Were it not for what said sound was, Twilight would’ve been relieved to finally have heard proof that there was some sort of animal life on the island.
Unfortunately, the sound was a rattle.
Everyone froze. The rattling stopped for a moment, but then picked up again, closer this time. There was a tense moment of silence before the grass close to Twilight moved, and she acted on instinct.
Her horn flared and she caught something in the grass in her telekinesis. Gulping, she slowly–and carefully–lifted it out of the grass. A rattlesnake hovered in her telekinetic grip, outstretched to strike and its fangs not more than two centimeters from Twilight’s leg, its venom already dripping from its grooved teeth.
Then quite a lot of things happened at once.
Her ophidiophobia kicking in, Twilight screamed and threw the snake, not particularly caring where it landed, before she launched into the air so fast that the grass around her blew in all directions. A swarm of flying insects launched out of the grass after her, and part of her registered that they were wasps. Her wings reacted before her brain really caught up to that fact, though, and she was already fleeing.
Down on the ground, the others were dealing with the sudden influx of ground-bound animal life that was assaulting them. Bandee was taking some of the worst of it, being short enough for the grass to almost entirely come up around him. A number of rodents and other assorted small mammals swarmed him. Quickly, he summoned his spear and batted away those that had gotten close to him, taking care not to hit any with the actual spearhead. He hadn’t been to the Rainbow Islands in a long time, and judging whether a species here was sapient or not was always iffy. He wasn’t willing to take the chance.
The copperhead that lunged out of the grass at him was a bit more of a problem, though. He was already in the process of batting away a particularly large rat, and had no time to bring his spear up to defend himself.
Thankfully, it never actually reached him. As it was lunging, Gooey interposed itself between them. It didn’t seem to be out of any attempt at heroism, though–Kirby’s new friend looked to be more curious than anything. Bandee tried to rush forward and prevent the snake from actually biting, but was too late. The copperhead bit down on Gooey, sinking its fangs into the blob’s body.
Gooey just shook it off.
The snake fell to the ground, stunned, as the blue blob stared at it. It didn’t even seem all that hurt–Bandee couldn’t even see any bite marks on Gooey’s body! More than anything, Gooey just looked mildly inconvenienced. It extended its long tongue, wrapped it around the snake, and threw it quite a ways.
Granted a slight reprieve, Bandee blinked. “Uh…thanks?”
Gooey just maintained its grin and bounced towards Kirby while Bandee turned his attention to his king.
Dedede was having a bit of a rough time. He was being assaulted by the larger animals around, which, given the general fauna of the area, might not have seemed like much. Badgers, after all, weren’t particularly large. But several of them attacking at once could be vicious. The King of Dreamland was doing his best, but even with his hammer he couldn’t sustain a fight against so many opponents darting in and out of his defenses.
Bandana Dee rushed forward, spear in hand, to defend his sovereign. Dedede slammed his hammer down as he approached, launching two of the badgers attacking him Bandee’s way. The loyal Waddle Dee hit the both of them with his spear, knocking both unconscious and out of the way.
“Any idea what’s going on?” he asked, jumping up and grabbing ahold of the back of Dedede’s robe with one hand and holding his spear in the other.
Dedede just grunted and slammed his hammer down again, launching a pair of prairie dogs into the middle distance. A large ferret tried to attack from behind, but Bandee’s position prevented that possibility well enough. “I’ve got no clue!” Dedede bemoaned.
Bandee felt his king suddenly shift as he hit something else. Instead of another of the island’s wide assortment of wild animals, though, this was something else: a fireball of sorts. It hit the dry grass after Dedede batted it away, igniting the plants with a whoosh of flame. Bandana Dee scrambled up to Dedede’s shoulder to get a better look at what had launched it, though what he saw only contributed to further confusion.
The perpetrator looked like it was a giant hamster, given that the animal spat out another glob of something on fire as they turned to look. It was a solid meter tall, towering over Kirby, who was darting in and out of combat with it in some fireballs of his own. Bandee figured that he must’ve inhaled one of the hamster’s attacks at some point.
As they watched, the hamster dodged one of Kirby’s charges by digging itself underground. Kirby uncertainly looked around for a bit, before suddenly dodging to the side as the hamster burst out from the ground directly underneath him. There was a tense moment as the two combatants looked at each other, before Kirby cloaked himself in fire and rocketed into the hamster. The larger animal flew back a ways, rolling into a ball and covering itself in a rocky outer shell as it did. It skidded on the ground a few times before slowing to a stop and uncurling itself, seemingly eager to continue the fight.
Then Gooey landed on top of it, and it pitched forward before faceplanting.
There was the pitter-patter of quite a few small things hitting the ground as the wasps chasing Twilight all fell out of the sky. She landed herself a few moments later, the soft breeze carrying away the cold air left around her horn from the cooling charm she’d used. “Is everyone alright?” she asked.
Bandee and Dedede looked around, noting the lack of wildlife attacking them. “I think so…?” Bandana wagered.
Kirby and Gooey were more distracted by the giant hamster, who itself was waking up. The former gave it a pleasant wave as the latter happily bounced a bit. The hamster seemed a bit dazed as it picked itself up, but that faded quickly.
“Oi, mates, thanks for that one,” it said, and Twilight physically recoiled in confusion. “I don’t know what came over me there, but you got my mind out of a right bind!” It chuckled. “The name’s Rick, by the by.”
Twilight’s brain took a moment to reboot. “That’s a giant talking hamster,” she eventually dumbly said.
Rick coughed, a few embers spilling from his mouth. “Well, I’ve been talkin’ long as I can remember!”
“A giant, talking, fire-breathing hamster,” Twilight amended.
Dedede laughed. “Yeah, and you said that penguins don’t talk from where you’re from, either.” He twirled his hammer. “But here I am!”
“You do look significantly different from penguins in Equestria,” Twilight countered. “He looks just like-” she cut herself off, shaking her head. “Sorry, it’s a bit rude of me to talk about you like you’re not here.” She trotted forward, offering a hoof to shake. “I’m Princess Twilight Sparkle of Equestria.”
Rick enthusiastically grabbed her hoof in a paw and shook. “Pleased to meetcha, Your Highness,” he said. “Dontcha worry ‘bout seemin’ rude; I know a lotta the shit we got here on Grass Land is confusing to Popstarians.”
“I’m not from Popstar,” Twilight objected, but Rick had already rolled away from her and towards Dedede.
“I think I’ve seen you two around, but I never did pop over to get your names,” he said.
Dedede twirled his hammer again and postured. “I’m King Dedede!” he proudly declared. He reached up to his shoulder and plucked Bandee off of it. “And this here is my top General: Bandana Waddle Dee!”
“Call me Bandee; it’s shorter,” Bandee cut in.
“Righto, little buddy,” Rick responded. He curled back up into a rocky-coated ball and rolled back over to Kirby and Gooey. “And what ‘bout the good blokes here that got my mind back on track?”
“Kirby!” Kirby happily replied, gesturing to himself. “And Gooey!” he pointed to Gooey.
Rick smiled broadly. “Well thanks again for helpin’ me out, there!” He looked back at Twilight, who had a prominent frown on her face. “You alright there, Princess?”
That seemed to jolt Twilight out of whatever thought she’d gotten lost in. “Oh, yes, I’m fine,” she answered. “I was just thinking about the differences between the wildlife on the rest of Popstar and what we’ve seen here. Hay, if you couldn’t talk or breathe fire, I could be convinced that you were just a really big hamster from Equestria.”
Dedede frowned. “Where’re you going wit’ that?”
“What if the wildlife on Grass Land isn’t from Popstar, strictly speaking?” Twilight asked in a hopeful voice. “It’s extremely similar to wildlife we have back in Equestria, so maybe there’s some sort of connection?”
“You think it might be a way for you to get back home?” Bandee asked.
Twilight shrugged. “Maybe. But it’s worth looking into–I’ll tell Sunset about it after we save Spike.” She whirled around and started moving in the same direction they had been before the scuffle–towards the copse of trees. “Let’s get to the next Rainbow Bridge.”
The rest of the group caught up to her as she was beginning to trudge through the grass that hadn’t been flattened or burned by the fight. Rick joining them caught all of their attentions, though, as he rolled up and uncoiled. “You lot are headin’ over to Big Forest, then?”
Twilight involuntarily snorted at the absurdity of the name, but no one really noticed, given that it happened at the same time as Bandee’s answer. “Probably. Someone’s possessed Twilight’s little brother and is destroying the Rainbow Bridges.” A determined look came over his face as he shifted his spear a bit. “We’re going to stop them.”
“Well, I hope you don’t mind me comin’ along, then,” Rick declared. “Whispy’s taken up hangin’ about on Grass Land, an’ if whatever got me so angry got him too, we could be in for a world o’ hurt.”
Twilight stopped short. “Isn’t Whispy Woods a…tree?”
“Yep!” Kirby answered from ahead of them.
“And wasn’t he on the mainland?”
“Yeah, he does that sometimes,” Bandee said. “I don’t know how either.”
Discord’s popcorn squished loudly as he chewed and Cadance and Shining stared at the screen. Cadance seemed a bit surprised–though only slightly–at the events immediately escalating. She had, after all, attended her own wedding, so she knew that Twilight could fight if she needed to. She had never seen Twilight willing to fight with such ferocity, though, even if all she’d actually done during that scuffle was throw a snake and freeze some wasps.
Her husband was a bit more critical, though.
“The cooling charm was a good idea, but Twily panicking from the rattlesnake seems like it actively hindered her,” he noted. “I know she would’ve thought of that earlier if she hadn't panicked. But hey, at least it was wasps and not ladybugs.”
Discord leaned over curiously, an eyebrow raised. “Dear little Twiggles has a fear of…ladybugs?”
“I never really got that one,” Cadance admitted. “Twilight never wanted to talk about why she’s afraid of ladybugs, though, so I never pried.”
Shining waved his hoof a bit. “She had an infestation in her room when she was six or so. It…didn’t end well.”
Discord stroked his beard while humming contemplatively.
Shining, who had caught on, growled at him. “And you better not have any ideas.”
Discord gasped dramatically and placed a paw on his chest. “Moi? Prey upon a pony’s deepest fears and insecurities for my own personal amusement? Why, I would never.”
Both Cadance and Shining gave him an incredulous look, and the former eventually spoke up. “You know, I think I can make time to have a discussion with Fluttershy after this…”
“Message recieved, shutting up now.”
There was a great cacophony as the filing cabinet tipped over and Twilight’s friends all tumbled out of it and onto Discord’s living room floor. “Rares, I think yer horn’s pokin’ me in the ribs!”
“I’m terribly sorry, Applejack, but I can’t exactly move with Rainbow on top of me!”
“Yeah, well, Pinkie’s standing on my wing!”
“Laying,” Pinkie corrected with a wheeze. “And I think one of my hooves landed on AJ’s hat. Discord’s pretty funny, but he’s got a weird sense of humor sometimes.”
“I’m right here, you know!” Discord complained from across the room.
Everypony ignored him.
The filing cabinet shuddered a bit as Fluttershy forced her way out of it and noticed the pile of ponies. “Oh no, I’m so sorry, I should’ve thought that something like this would happen if everypony went through at once, I should’ve warned you-”
“Fluttershy, darling, you are fine,” Rarity assured as the pile disengaged itself. She gave a pointed glare to Discord afterward, who whistled innocently.
“So,” Rainbow yawned, “what’d we miss?”
“Well, the talking hamster, for one,” Discord said, and Fluttershy rushed over with a gasp, planting herself right next to Discord on the couch and staring at Rick on the screen.
“Yes, and I heard that poor Spikey-Wikey got…” Rarity made a scrunched-up sort of face, “possessed?”
Discord solemnly nodded. “A horrible condition, I know, but dealing with mind-altering aliens is never fun.”
Rainbow suddenly perked up. “Aliens?”
“Discord, do you still have that second screen you were using?” Cadance asked.
Wordlessly, Discord gestured and swapped the views between his smaller tablet and the big screen, handing off the smaller one to Fluttershy. Spike–or Spike’s body, at least–was crossing another of the Rainbow Bridges. This one, just like the others, drained of its color and disintegrated away in the wind, the last bits of it coalescing into a blue gem.
As Spike’s green-and-black flame blew over it, Applejack squinted at the screen. “Ah ain’t sure if it’s just me, but did Spike there just get a bit…taller?”
Rarity’s ears fell back as she took a seat of her own. “Oh…oh dear.”
For a moment, Twilight felt hopeless out of nowhere. The weight of the world was pressing down on her, and she actively stumbled as, for a brief moment, she wondered what the point of it all was.
She shook herself out of it in mere moments, though. Clearly whatever had taken Spike had just destroyed another Bridge.
“So, I don’t think I’ve actually met Whispy, yet,” Twilight mentioned as they started moving again, mostly to start some conversation and counteract the apathetic feeling they’d all felt. They’d entered the trees proper, now, and thankfully the grass was far shorter here, choked out by the general underbrush. The grass outside had mostly gone to seed, so by the time they’d gotten to the trees Twilight’s eyes had been watering. “What’s he like, usually?”
“Normally he’s pretty nice,” Bandee replied. “But he does get kinda snippy around allergy season, so if whatever happened to Rick happened to him…” he trailed off.
“Yeah, an’ I was a right blighter like that,” Rick pitched in. “Just felt kinda mad at everythin’.”
Twilight blinked in realization. “Whispy’s a tree.”
“Yeah, and?” Dedede asked.
“How does he have allergies?”
“Well he’s gotta have an immune system, don’t he?”
There was a titanic sound, and everything around them shook. Leaves scattered from the trees’ canopies, and one in particular a ways down shook dramatically. Birds took to the air in droves as the arboreal mass shook back and forth, a few giant apples and a Gordo clanging to the ground.
The sound, of course, was one, very distinctive word, for a certain definition of the term.
“ACHOO!”
The ground shifted and roiled as the sapient tree’s roots moved beneath it, one great wooden appendage emerging and rubbing a mask that was secured around its trunk. Above the mask was a giant pair of glasses, so Twilight figured that the mask must’ve been covering whatever passed for a nose and mouth on a tree.
It, strangely, wasn’t quite as surreal as she expected it to feel. Probably because she’d been around to see Applejack read a story to Bloomberg.
Still, she was a bit wary of the giant apple tree in front of them. Whispy seemed to be in a bit of an irritable state as it was, and she wasn’t quite sure how the general apathy that was going around would affect him.
Kirby, of course, didn’t care, and waltzed right up to him with a happy wave and a drawn-out “Hi!”
Whispy visibly slumped and began grumbling something under his breath. Twilight couldn’t quite hear the beginning of his rant, obscured as it was by the mask, but it was gradually increasing in volume.
“...can’t even be bothered to leave me the hell alone.” He snorted in exasperation, a strange sound to come from a tree. “No, I’m done with this. Begone.”
Suddenly, the ground around Twilight erupted. Roots–extremely sharp roots, in fact–burst from the ground on either side of her, and she barely had time to register what was happening as they stabbed out at her. Hastily, she threw up a shield. The roots slammed into it full-force, ricocheting off of the magical construct but making Twilight wince nonetheless.
Whispy didn’t slow down, though, quickly switching targets to Dedede and Bandee. Two more roots speared towards them, and the King quickly grabbed his hammer out of nowhere and slammed it into the root that was after him. That wasn’t enough to deter it, though, and it had only slowed it down by a second or so. But that was enough for Dedede’s hammer to at least partially transform as a jet of blue flame shot out one of its faces. Dedede did a full twirl to build up momentum, and the hammer slammed into Whispy’s root with enough force to shatter its tip.
Whispy roared in pain, but Bandee didn’t have time to consider that as he danced around the root aiming for him. He didn’t have nearly the force behind his attacks that Dedede had, so he had to get a bit more creative. Slamming the tip of his spear into the ground, he vaulted above the root’s next strike, landing on top of it with his spear still in hand.
“Whispy Woods!” he shouted, running down the length of the root towards Whispy himself. “As your commanding officer, I order you to stand down!”
Whispy didn’t verbally reply, instead just jolting his root up a bit and sending Bandee flying into his canopy.
The others hadn’t been idle while this was going on, though. Rick had curled into a stony ball and launched forwards, aiming to hit Whispy right in the glasses. The tree countered that, though, by simply whacking him out of the air with a root. That kept him from fully focusing on Kirby and Gooey, however, who each got a good hit in–Kirby with a fireball and Gooey with a dark laser of sorts.
Twilight didn’t know how the physics of a laser that actively darkened the area around it worked, but she had other things to worry about at the moment.
Like Whispy’s attention turning back to her. But she was ready for it, this time. When he launched more roots at her–three, this go around–she flared her horn and caught them in her telekinesis. With a grunt of effort and a bead of sweat running down her forehead, she focused her magic and performed a basic transmutation spell to soften the material. It wasn’t anything spectacular, and the only thing that made it strenuous was the scale, but it was enough to allow her to tie Whispy’s roots together, rendering those ones unusable.
He just responded by shaking himself a bit, though, and a dazed Bandana Waddle Dee fell out of his canopy and onto Twilight’s back. “Look out!” Bandee shouted.
Twilight didn’t ask why, she just jumped out of the way. Right on her previous position, a rather large Gordo hit the ground with a thud.
There was a second series of loud thuds closer to Whispy’s trunk, as multiple other Gordos landed right in front of Kirby as he was preparing to charge again. The pink puffball slowed down enough to avoid stabbing himself on their spikes, but that gave Whispy enough time to slam another root into him, launching him a ways away and forcing his fire ability out of him.
It was the first time that Twilight had actually seen Kirby lose a copy ability up close. Bandee and Sunset had fully briefed her on how Kirby’s copy ability worked, or at least as much as they knew about it, anyway, but she hadn’t had the chance to properly see it in action. Well, except from a kilometer away and enraged enough to blow up a mountaintop, so she hadn’t really had the chance to see it in action in a situation that she could actually analyze it.
He didn’t stay without a copy ability for long, though. Whispy had attempted to drop another Gordo on him as he landed, but Kirby deftly dodged out of the way and sucked up some of the leaves that had fallen with it. From it, he gained a bright green hat made of leaves, with an emerald-hued gem at its center. He waved his arm and summoned a leaf, staring at it curiously for a moment.
Whispy tried to catch him off guard as he was learning about the new ability, but Kirby waved his other arm and summoned a whole storm of leaves, sharp enough to slice straight through the new root that Whispy was stabbing at him with. The tree physically recoiled, and everyone realized that this was their chance.
Bandee, still on Twilight’s back, brandished his spear. “CHARGE!”
Twilight took to the air, Bandee wobbling dangerously on her back, and she fired a magical laser at Whispy at the same time that Gooey fired a laser of its own. They hit at around the same time as well, hers cracking Whispy’s glasses and Gooey’s slicing one of the strings on his mask. Rick, Dedede, and Kirby struck at the same time too, Rick shooting some fire on his way out for that little bit of extra sting, Dedede just whaling on him, and Kirby riding forward on a cyclone of leaves that had Whispy crying out in pain.
As a final strike, Bandee jumped off of Twilight’s back and speared downward, slicing off the last of the fabric holding Whispy’s mask in place as Gooey bodily slammed into him, which also shattered his glasses.
Immediately, Whispy began coughing extremely loudly, but he himself seemed relatively subdued. Most everyone backed off, but Kirby walked up and consolingly patted his trunk as the tree hacked up a nonexistent lung.
“Oh stars above, why?” Whispy wailed between coughs. “Why must hay fever exist?”
“Hey, Twilight, you able to do anything about that with that fancy magic of yours, maybe?” Dedede whispered.
Twilight, her horn still lit from the battle, telekinetically grabbed the remains of Whispy’s mask and joined them back together. “Just to be clear,” she loudly asked, getting the tree’s attention, “you’re not going to continue attacking us?”
“Oh, goodness-” he coughed, “-no, I don’t know what came over me there! I just felt so angry and lashed out!”
“Same thing happened to me, mate!” Rick called. “Don’t beat yourself up ‘bout it, it seems to be goin’ around.”
Whispy sighed in relief as he secured his mask back onto his face. “I just have to thank you all for saving me from whatever affliction affected me there! Why, I feel downright horrible!” He gasped upon fully noticing who was among them. “General Dee! Your Majesty! Please accept my humblest apologies!”
Dedede dismissively waved a flipper. “Eh, like the hamster said, dontcha worry about it. Whatever’s going on has hit more than just you.”
“Something’s possessed my little brother and is destroying the Rainbow Bridges,” Twilight explained. “We’ve been trying to catch up to it.”
Whispy, in a motion that Twilight personally found to be incredibly strange for a tree to perform, twisted himself around to look out over the water. “My word!” he exclaimed. “The Bridge is gone!”
Rick rolled up to the cliff face, staring down at the water as a wave crashed against the rock. “Crikey! Even the bloody ocean seems pissed off!”
True enough, the ocean’s surface was churning, and another wave loudly slammed into the cliff–overpowering the sound of the nearby waterfall, even–as a particularly strong salty breeze blew past them. Twilight’s nose scrunched up. That wasn’t just salt–it smelled like there was ozone in there as well. Squinting, she cast a farsight spell and looked at the sky quite a ways away. Just barely poking up over the horizon was a mountaintop, almost entirely obscured by steadily-darkening clouds.
“There’s a storm rolling in,” Twilight said. “We should get moving as soon as possible.”
“Allow me,” Whispy’s voice spoke up, and the ground rumbled for a moment before the cliff face below them split open and his roots shot out of it. He seemed to be actively straining himself, if his expression was anything to go by, but soon enough the makeshift bridge had reached all the way to the next island, which was as similarly cliffed as Grass Land, but completely covered in a forest.
“I can’t keep this up for long, but you should be able to get to Big Forest on my roots,” Whispy said. “Consider it an apology.”
Twilight was considering telling him that she could just levitate them across, but decided against it. This was faster, anyway. “Thank you!”
The group stepped out onto the bridge and began the long walk to Big Forest.
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*Ay por Dios, it got Hammerspace!*
Still love that Spiderverse quote!
Seriously though, quite the mess the Dark Jackass's leaving behind for our heroes ro deal with & they still haven't caught on to Spike yet! Here's hoping cool purple dragon can turn things around from inside though, especially since he started growing again cause of greed growth!
Hello, Whispy. We're going to be seeing a lot of you. And HURTING you.
Ah yes, the cleanest method to break mind control: a good ol' beating.
Well that’s terrifying; a swarm of Dark Matter influenced wasps. Are you using Gooey’s moveset from Star Allies? Overall I am quite looking forward to what you do with the Dark Matter Trilogy.
Whispy having hay fever always makes me laugh. One has to wonder, however, why glasses?
So are we just gonna skip the Rainbow Drops?
11644234
Dark Matter is a master of its craft, but as it itself acknowledged, Spike has Heart. It so simply dismissing him as relatively weak may very well be its own undoing. :)
11644294
Poor, poor Whispy Woods. Doomed to be the first boss of the majority of Kirby games.
11644330
This is the Kirby series, after all!
11644535
Hornet swarms are already terrifying enough on their own--adding in some good ol' mind control on what primitive brains they have to make them more aggressive just makes it all the worse.
And yes, I've been using both Gooey's and Rick's movesets form Star Allies! I have similar plans for Kine and Coo, but coming up with what to do with Nago, Chuchu, and Pitch is going to be interesting, given that they got kinda shafted after DL3.
11644619
According to the Kirby Wiki at least, it's a Japanese culture thing. The glasses and mask are both used to prevent hay fever (at least if I'm reading the wiki right), and I would presume the glasses because pollen is just as much an eye irritant as it is respiratory.
11644685
Oh, they're still there, just not on the islands. Dark Matter is destroying the Bridges personally this time, instead of just having Dedede's minions do it, so it is dealing with them in a different way; the Rainbow Drops are what it's using Spike's messenger flame to store.
11644688
Oh. I honestly didn't know that pollen could also irritate the eyes, which I guess is obvious now that I think about it.
Heh don't let it bug you Twilight even when not possessed Wispy Woods is one mobile tree.
11644912
Whispy's mere existence raises so many anatomical questions, to which Twilight will be getting disappointingly few answers.
So, on a scale from one to ten, how much is Twilight gonna freak out when she learns that Gooey's part of the thing that's possessed Spike?