We're All Friends Here
A Kirby One-Shot

Notes: This fic is set midway through the events of Kirby: Star Allies. There are some light headcanons in play. No major spoilers are featured in this fic.

Planet Earthfall

Dark Meta Knight was grumpy.

This, by itself, was nothing new.

Ever since his inexplicable revival (thanks to the power of the Dream Rod), he had tried to keep himself fairly aloof and distant from everyone else – the 'Star Allies', as they were calling themselves. A variety of thoughts often stewed through his mind. He didn't know why he was here. He didn't why he, of all people, was chosen to be brought back. And most of all, he didn't know why Kirby insisted on trying to be his friend.

He didn't need friends.

He didn't need them at all.

And he certainly wasn't thinking about the subject. No way. He wasn't sitting on this hill, awake at nighttime, contemplating his path in this universe. That would be ridiculous.

Hmph, he mentally snorted, staring out into the autumn fields that made up Planet Earthfall. Why am I even still travelling with these simpletons? It's clear that—aside from that pink puffball—they want nothing to do with me. I can see it in their eyes. And honestly, it wasn't like it was unwarranted. Meta Knight, he was sure, still held a bit of a grudge from being trapped in the Dimensional Mirror.

Whatever. It's not like they matter in the long run, he tried to tell himself. Their opinions don't matter to me. There's nothing I want with the acceptance of simpletons like them.

(He ignored the pangs in his heart that clearly betrayed his claims. They didn't exist.

They didn't.)

This subject shouldn't be on my mind to begin with. I should be resting and saving my strength for the trials ahead.

Unfortunately for Dark Meta Knight, sleep was something that was currently failing to come to him – hence him sitting upon this hill blankly gazing out at the brown-leaved trees abound. That wasn't even mentioning he was a brooder by nature; he couldn't not think about these subjects when there was nothing else going on.

…why do I keep coming back to this?

What about it keeps striking at my mind?

As the mirror knight continued to brood in silence, he soon found his solo act would be gaining another participant. "Hey, hey, hey!" he heard that irritating voice call out to him. Great. Him. "Whatcha doing all alone here, Darky?" His scarred eye immediately began twitching as he turned around to face his unwanted associate.

The jester on a beach ball. The villain who attempted to use NOVA for his own gain. The prankster who would stop at nothing to satiate his own mischievous nature. And—more importantly—the most annoying individual he ever had the displeasure of knowing. "Marx," he growled. There went his calm evening. "I could say the same to you, peasant."

"Oh come off it, Darky!" the jester grinned. "I felt like going out for a little walk! Is that really a crime, now? Are you gonna attack me just for wanting to taking a look around?"

A groan nearly escaped Dark Meta Knight's mouth. "Your wordplay is just as irritating as ever, to say nothing of your persistence with continuing it." It wasn't an exaggeration to say he would rather be around Dedede – who, mind you, was the one who personally smashed him into pieces – than spend any extended amount of time alone with Marx. "If you are 'on a walk,' as you so eloquently claim, then get back to it. There is nothing you would ever graciously offer me, and you gain nothing from approaching me like this." That much, he thought, was obvious. Their personalities were completely incompatible. They had nothing in common together. That was just how it worked.

Marx, however, seemed determined to prove him wrong. "Oh really? Not even as a fellow villain offering sympathies with your desire for true friendship?"

Dark Meta Knight began choking. "W-What?" he coughed out, the self-dubbed villain having not expected the response he was giving. "Sympathies? Desire for true friendship? What sort of blabber are you on about, simpleton?" What about him stated that he even wanted any of that? This was nothing but madness (delved with a bit of the truth, as the case may be). "I require none of that!"

"Really?" Marx giggled. "Are you sure about that? Your being defensive is proving otherwise, you know."

A flinch. He was right. Grrrr…! He hides a perceptive eye beneath that aggravating façade. "…so what?" Dark Meta Knight finally ground out. "What does that matter to you? You don't share any of the 'desires' you allege me as having. You already integrate well," (and dear NOVA, saying that hurt for some reason), "within this insipid community, minus my own counterpart. I repeat, there is nothing we could give each other in terms of anything."

He had to keep insisting that. He had to make it the truth. So what if Marx was much more in everyone else's good graces? So what if he could interact with the Star Allies better than the dark knight ever could? That didn't matter.

No, it didn't matter at all.

(And why was he even here? Didn't he distrust the knight? Or did he get over it?)

"…you're trying really hard to lie to yourself, huh?" Marx remarked. "I guess I can't really blame you for that. I wouldn't have seen it if I didn't know about it." The jester hopped off his ball and sat down right next to Dark Meta. The knight didn't bother trying to resist. "It's hard to adapt to such a friendly environment after you've been the bad guy for so long."

…well admittedly, that was something they did have in common. "…right. You once attempted a coup of Pop Star, correct? Deceiving that pink puffball into summoning Galactic NOVA and using it for your own gain…"

"It was a pretty brilliant plan, if I do say so myself." As much as it pained Dark Meta Knight to admit it – it pretty much was. If it wasn't for Kirby managing to stop him in the eleventh hour, Pop Star would probably be a very different place. "It should have made Kirby dislike me. Despise me, even. And yet, when he brought me back to life… he just accepted me, just like that."

"Oh?" Now this was something he hadn't heard yet. Dark Meta Knight had arrived after Marx, so this was rather… intriguing. "Do tell."

"Let me tell you this. When I came back, literally the first thing out of his mouth was," and it was here where he started speaking in a high-pitched tone, "'Oh hey, Marx! We're going on an adventure! Wanna help us out?'"

Dark Meta Knight snorted. "You aren't jesting, are you?"

"Ha! You'd like that, wouldn't you?" Marx laughed. "No, no, I'm not. That's really what he said. Honestly. I was pretty baffled. I tried to take over Pop Star and he just kinda treats it like an afterthought. Like, what even? It was like he was pulling a prank on me and I wasn't in on it! But nope. He was serious." His jovial expression dimmed a bit upon this recollection – something that didn't escape the dark warrior's notice. "…I didn't get it, then."

A beat of silence passed between them. "Everyone else was pretty wary of me," he continued, "and rightfully so, too. And yet, Kirby treated me the same as he would anybody else. I—I didn't really know how to handle it. Still don't, in fact. But… I liked the attention. It was something—it is something—that I've never had before. It's… It's a good feeling."

"…why are you revealing all of this to me?" the mirror knight asked. "You are merely only weakening your reputation in my mind – more so than it already is. What sort of purpose is this serving?"

"I'm telling you this because I can tell it's the same type of thing you want, too," Marx replied, utter seriousness on his face. Dark Meta Knight's eyes subtly widened at this sight. "You want attention. You want friendship. You want those things even if you won't admit it to yourself."

Another flinch. How… How did he…!? How could he…!? "You… You dare?" he growled. "You dare volley such—such unfounded accusations?" S-Such a thing is not true at all!

"Again, it's not unfounded. You wouldn't be so defensive otherwise. I can tell; you've never had anything like this before. You don't know what to do, or how to feel about it, so you just try to push everyone away. And you hurt because of it."

Dark Meta Knight clenched his fists (yes he had them, shut up). Marx was hitting every single beat, and he knew it. In fact, now that he was talking about it… it was easier to see how much sense he was making, amidst all the denial he had been telling himself.

"…fine. I'll admit it. I desire the attention. I desire his friendship. I desire it all and I have no idea why." He was spilling it all out now, and it just wouldn't stop. "W-What does friendship even matter!? I've gotten just fine being alone. I've never needed friends before now. So what has changed? Why do I even feel this way at all?"

"It's because Kirby's a friend," another voice dreamily interrupted. Marx and Dark Meta Knight looked back, and there they saw Gooey, the little friendly remnant of Dark Matter. "He sees a lot of things."

"Well, well, well! If it ain't Gooey!" Marx remarked, his face slipping back into the smug frontage he loved to put on, almost on instinct. "You need a late night snack or anything? I hear there's a NESP sitting out there waiting for you, then," he snickered.

Gooey took in stride, as was his custom. "You like talking, don't you?" he stated. "That's okay. I like talking, too. I like people talking. People become better friends when they talk."

"What are you doing here, cretin?" Dark Meta Knight took to asking. The timing of Gooey's appearance was far too suspicious. "Surely you cannot be here for the pitiful reasons this jester suggests.

A smile. "You're wondering why Kirby sees you as a friend, right?" The other two's eyes widened. "It's a question. I can see questions, too. It's easy to answer."

It appears that he, too, has a perceptive mind behind his oblivious nature, the knight mused. Puzzling. "What is this answer, then?" he asked aloud.

"Are you sure you want him to answer that?" Marx questioned, his eyebrows ruffling. "I mean… it's Gooey. All he ever does is eat and sit around with his tongue out."

"It's okay, Marx. I'll be fine. Thank you for asking." ("Uhh… He does realize that wasn't worry, right?" Marx muttered.) Getting back on topic (a miraculous feat for him), he began saying, "Kirby likes seeing good things. He sees good things in people. Meta Knight is nice. Dedede is nice. Ado is nice. Niceness is in everybody, he says."

"…I don't get what this has to do with our initial topic," Dark Meta Knight said, confused.

"It's like…" Gooey turned toward Marx. "Kirby says, 'You don't want to be what you were before.'" Marx recoiled, his defenses immediately dropping as a result. "You don't want to be dark. You want to be lighter. Kirby sees that. That's why he wants to be your friend. He thinks you can be a good person."

Marx was shaking, far more than Dark Meta Knight would have expected. Gooey's words… What sort of effect are they having on him? What relation does this have to his own case of resurrection? "…how?" the jester whispered. "How do you know…?"

Another smile, this one almost enigmatic. Then he turned to the mirror knight himself, and said knight didn't know what to expect out of this. Avoiding this, however, would be an embarrassment. "You don't see a lot of people, do you?" It was a very simple question, and yet it proved to be a powerful one. "You want to have a friend, but you never got one. Kirby wants to be that one. And you want that, right?"

Dark Meta Knight looked at the floor. "…yes," he relented.

"That's okay. It's not wrong to want to be nice. It's not wrong to want to have a friend. Friendship is a good thing." The little blob moved forward, extending his tongue and patting his friend on the shoulder. He didn't fight it, as much as he wanted to. "We're all friends here. That's important." And now the tongue was hugging both him and Marx. "I like you guys. And so does Kirby. Kirby likes seeing good in people. So let's have good things, okay?"

…what do I say, here? the mirror warrior thought. I've handled myself perfectly fine without all this 'friendship' business. I've built up my own strength without the need for it.

But… I suppose, if I were to be asked… I wouldn't mind it. Trying 'friendship'.

That pink puffball… He is knowledgeable about bringing simpletons together like this. And he certainly is more than just the joyous being he presents himself as.

…I admit.

I want to be his friend, too.

"…I'll try," he finally conceded. "It will be a most difficult task… but I will try."

"Ha ha! He finally admits it all!" Marx whooped. "Perfect confession, right there! Whoop whoop!" Dark Meta Knight growled in annoyance. …dear NOVA, save me from his nonsense. "O-Okay, Gooey. You can get your tongue off of me now." A beat. "Err… Gooey?"

"I want to hug a little more," Gooey idly said. "Can we hug, Marx? That's what friends do, I think."

"T-That's fine and all, but—oh god, is that drool? Ugh! Please stop that! Agh!"

Dark Meta Knight snorted. "How amusing," he muttered quietly – but it was with a smile, this time. Unseen it may have been, it was still a smile.

Perhaps there was something to these 'simpletons' after all.

It's been a while since I wrote a simple Make a Friend one-shot, so… here we go. Marx and Dark Meta Knight are outliers when it comes to the Dream Friends – they're (former) villains, after all. So I thought it would be interesting to see how they interact because they share that trait. (They also share the whole 'I died and came back' thing, so… there's that.)

Dark Meta Knight, I imagine, would have plenty of problems adapting to being in the Star Allies. Design-wise, he's the Shadow to Meta Knight's Sonic – so I based his personality based on that foil. He's edgy, he's grumpy, he has no social skills whatsoever. I imagine he'd be pretty alone too, which wouldn't do wonders for his personality either. Add in his villainous deeds, and you have a recipe for awkwardness.

Marx, on the other hand, I envision as someone who adapts far more easily. We know he can put on a façade based on his act in Kirby Super Star, so we can imagine can acclimate better than Dark Meta Knight. But we can't also forget that he became a Soul Boss in the game's True Arena, and that would definitely wear on him as well, even if it's far less visible. Overall, I think these two guys have a lot of potential, and I really am happy to see them alive and well again with Star Allies.

Gives me a lot of fluff material for the future, to say the least.

Well, that's all for now – see you around!