Heroes of Dreamland, Book 3: The World of Nintendo (OLD)

The Final Battle

Onboard the Warship Nintendo:

It was very late afternoon, but you wouldn't be able to tell. Fog covered the sun and the ocean, a thick, dark fog. It wasn't as dark or black as the Darkness, but it still made for slow-glowing.

Rose was nervously pacing back and forth near the helm, hoping and yet dreading to soon see land through one of the occasional openings in the fog. Having no other way to get rid of her anxious energy, she pulled her sword out and began slicing through the air with it, battling imaginary foes.

"Just be careful you don't break something," Geek Toad joked weakly, earning him a glare from Rose. This was no time to be in a jovial mood.

Geek Toad's dragon was gone, for now. It had disappeared back into the book at his request hours before, just like a Pokémon into a Pokéball. Speaking of which, Rinda's Pokémon were all in their Pokéballs. Rose had found a last bottle of Potion inside her knapsack, which Rinda was unsure of which Pokémon to use it on. Rose had suggested she wait, until they had more of an idea of what they needed.

Rinda, Geek Toad, and Thdwee had all slept fairly well. Actually, Thdwee's little-bitty, steady, even breaths had been the only thing that had kept her from having a panic attack.

Because Rose had slept terribly, waking up over and over again from the exact same nightmare: the non-heroes had lost, and they were trapped on the Forbidden point. All that was there was them, and the statues of the heroes, serving to remind them of their ultimate failure, as the world grew Darker and Darker around them.

"I'm so scared," Rinda shivered from where she sat down below, interrupting Rose's thoughts. She was curled up into a ball shape with her head on her knees. "We're going to fail, I just know it."

"Don't think like that. If you say you're going to fail, then you've already failed," Rose told the Elf sagely.

"That sounds like something MK would say," Geek Toad laughed at her. "Are you going to go on to become a cold-but-good-leader-y Star Warrior?"

"Sounds cool to me, as long as I don't have to lose everything I love first," Rose shrugged. "I'd rather be more like Kirby. Happy, innocent, lovable, brave, but I'd still also want to be a good leader like Meta Knight. You know?"

"I'd like to be more like Link and Ash, myself," Rinda admitted. "They're both so brave. And Link's so smart, always knowing what to do, and never saying anything until it's needed. But Ash has so much enthusiasm, and cares for his Pokémon so much, even if he does make them fight."

Nodding, Geek Toad agreed, "I'd like to be more like Link, too. But I also look up to Mario and Luigi. Bowser's way bigger than them, but they never back down from a fight. And they have so much fun going off to save Princess Peach, yelling 'Let's-a go!' and 'Woohoo!' the whole time. They just both know how to make the best of any situation."

Smiling a bit, (conversation did help,) Rose turned to Thdwee, who was sitting in the corner and watching her. "Who do you look up to most, Thdwee?"

The Waddle Dee blinked his eyes at her for a moment, then pointed to her, Rinda, and Geek Toad in turn, 'smiling' as he did so.

"What? Us? Why?" Rinda asked in surprise.

Thdwee just shrugged, unable to answer. But if he could have talked, he would have told them, "Rose, because she's so nice and happy. And she's also cool with her sword. I wanna be like Rinda, because she sees the beauty in everything, and loves everybody. And I wanna be like Geek Toad, because he's super-smart, and is willing to talk to anybody about practically anything. You guys are just as cool as the heroes, in my opinion. I just wish I had some sort of special quality of my own."