Setting the World on Fire
She kept walking to the fire.
It called to her like a siren song. Not one of those pretend sirens that hung around the rocks of her world, singing whatever pop tune came their way, but a siren of myth. Sirens that belonged to the world that was before. Before the tides rose, and the Turf Wars began. The fire crackled, the fire sung, and she was ever drawn towards it. Her ink gun hung limply at her side. The fire. It was everything.
She could see them as she drew closer. Silent sentinels, aligned in a row, of all shapes and sizes. None of them were of her own kind. Most of them, as she drew close, as she peered through the gloom, had at least vaguely inkling proportions – two eyes, two arms, two legs, two feet, two hands. Everything in two. The world boiled down to two – inklings and octarians. Victory and defeat. Red and blue. Fire and water. No water here, to put out the fire, but that was not what she desired. For the fire sung loud, the fire shone bright, and she was ever pulled in towards the coda.
Go back.
A voice within the song, but one she did not hear. The sentinels stood in silence, like an army at the gates of Hell itself. Hell was fire, the absence of water, where none could find shore or sanctuary, and yet, she feared them not. The first was her size, a cap over his head, his body clad in strange clothing. The second stood tall, with sword, shield, and bow – antiquated weapons, yet in his hands, she suspected, far more deadly than the ink gun she held at her side. The third, as tall, clad completely in armour, its eyes behind a visor, shining in the gloom. The fourth, even smaller than her, soft and round, and yet, still in silence. Still a shadow in the light of the fire.
Go back!
Still the voice ignored by her ears, while her eyes took in the light, and those within its shadow. In the row of sentinels, the forms grew ever stranger. A great ape, a creature of jungles long since killed by the rising tide, as salt marred the land. A fox, a creature of cunning, long since reduced to scattered islands across a sea of sorrows. A green dinosaur, of a time before even the great bipeds walked the land, before they caused the seas to rise. Warriors many, of that people, many with naught but sword, or sometimes a book. A hedgehog blue. A mouse yellow. All in silence. All in the fire. No longer in the fire's shadow was she, now she was in theirs. On and on went the lines of sentinels, standing in vigil, stretching from her unto eternity. No end to the army. No end to these warriors. Ever the fire burning.
"Away! Away!"
She stopped. For as enraptured as her eyes were, at last, her ears heard a different music. The fire, it still sung in pleasant melody, but the song it sung was homophonic. The fire kept the rhythm. But the singer controlled the tone. Tone turned to minor, as a sentinel emerged from the darkness. Her mouth hung open, agape. The sentinel…if it could be called that…it was nothing but an outline. The vague outline of an inkling, yet taller. Its face without features, its footsteps without sound, its eyes without soul. If she didn't know better, she'd say it was made of nothing but polygons. The building blocks of reality, if reality was nothing but a computer simulation. And given what she'd seen in Inkopolis, sometimes she wondered.
"Away," said the sentinel. "The fire is not for you."
"But…but the fire called to me," she whispered. "I can hear it."
"And see it, no? Do you see its shape? The brand it will mark upon you?" It gestured to the other sentinels. "All who bear the mark of the Hand?"
She didn't say anything – the sigil of the fire didn't look like a hand. It looked like a circle. A circle with no beginning or end. On and on it span, the fire burning…the circle spinning…turning again…and again…and again…turning as many times to reach infinity, before the fire expired, and heat death took Creation.
"Where were you?" the sentinel asked. "Did the fire take you?"
"I…" She trailed off. She'd been doing…something. So long ago, yet so near. Her reality, yet like a dream. "I was…I think I was…"
"Fighting?" asked the sentinel.
She nodded.
"All of them fought," it said. "The Hand wanted warriors."
"The Hand?"
"The Hand," it said. "It who would be master. Not crazy yet still mad. The fire must burn. It always burns. At times it cools, but before long, the inferno comes back." It gestured to the lines of sentinels, still standing in formation. Like an army ready to be let loose. "Some are kept, some cast aside. Some come as guests, others are kept in servitude. The Hand controls the strings, and the strings are but buttons. Buttons pressed, and battle is waged. On and on, while the fire burns. Burns bright, but long. An affront to nature."
The fire. It was still burning. Still singing. Burning ever brighter…singing ever sweeter…she took a step, and would have taken another had the sentinel not taken her arm. She shot it a glance, baring her teeth, letting out a hiss. Who was he to stop her, she wondered? He, who was without form? He, who rejected the fire, and the music?
"The fire still calls," it said.
It…he…she couldn't be sure anymore. But it mattered not. Its words mattered not. All that mattered was the fire.
"You may answer it," it said. "But see what I have seen, before listening to its call."
"What do you-"
She saw it. Saw the fire.
A kingdom of mushrooms and toadstools was burning.
A land created by goddesses was burning.
The realm of stars and dreams was burning.
An island of clouds and rainbows was burning.
A colosseum of monsters and gladiators was burning.
An armada of ships in a starry ocean was burning.
A jungle at the edge of the world was burning.
A racetrack that extended into infinity was burning.
A town called Onett was burning.
The depths of an alien world were burning.
On and on, the worlds filled her mind. All with the fire. All with the music. All of them linked – many roads, one destination. A final destination. Where the fire ended, where the song reached its coda, and infinity met entropy. There, the strings began, and hope went to die. Here was the Hand. The Hand that conducted the orchestra that spread the fire. The Hand that was laughing.
The Hand that saw her. The Hand that reached out to her…from the end of infinity…through the fire…the music stopping…stopping…stopping…
"Help," she whispered, grasping the sentinel. "Help me."
It looked down at her. "Do you seek the fire?"
She shook her head. Even as the Hand reached ever outward. Even as the sentinels began to awake. Began to move. They, who had given themselves to the fire. Brothers and sisters all.
"Do you seek the music?"
She shook her head, quivering. She was burning. The worlds were burning. Her world was burning…fire taking the seas…inklings and octarians all…burning…everything burning…
"Do you cut your strings?"
"Yes!" she cried, sweat and tears disappearing in the inferno that consumed them. The fire that sought to consume all. "Yes yes yes!"
The Hand reached her. The fire became a conflagration. Hell itself brushed her soul and-
She awoke, her head groggy. Inkopolis. The Turf War. Her hands, covered in ink. The sun, burning her skin. The music…what music?
"Hey!"
She sprung up to her feet and looked at its source.
"Whoa!"
An inkling, just like her. Her firing partner. Her comrade. Her friend.
"You alright?" he asked. "I think you took an ink pellet to the head."
She nodded. "Fine."
"You sure?"
She nodded again, turning her eyes to the sun. So distant, yet so warm. Bathing the world in its rays. The driver of the wind. The giver of life. Fated, in due time, to burn the world, even as it drowned. Fated to consume this world, and end the music of the spheres, rendering all her people had built to dust.
In time. Long from now. This world was still here.
"So, anyway?" her friend said. "What happened?"
She shook her head. Remembering fire and fury. Of worlds beyond her own burning. Of those who had given themselves to conflict eternal. Of a place beyond her reach, but not beyond her mind.
"Nothing," she whispered. "Nothing happened."
A place beyond words.
A place where the fire continued to burn.
A/N
So, yes, this was based on the Smash Brothers Switch reveal trailer. Because I can't look at something that causes the Internet to implode and not try to ruin people's fun. :p