6:30 AM
June 26, 20XX

"...Doctor? Are you in here...?" A voice quietly whispers. The clinic door opens slowly and shakily. As of right now, said doctor is at his desk, reorganizing a bunch of papers and files that had gotten scattered. Feathers as well… the clinic isn't typically this disorganized. Dr. Mario spun his chair around to get at least a small glance at who had just entered, and their reasons for doing so.

What he was expecting was something harshly different from what he saw before him.

"M-MAMA MIA! WHAT HAPPENED TO YOU?!"

"..."

Carefully shutting the infirmary door behind him, Olimar points to a shiny blue metal rod that apparently went straight through his chest, it's other end more than clearly visible, sticking right out of his back. Drops of yellow tea and red blood were slowly flowing off from both ends of the rod, and right onto the white floor beneath the two. Both fluids left big stains on him as well. Surprisingly, he looked almost completely unfazed by it. Key word: almost.

And the best thing the captain would say to simplify things without exerting too much effort was-

"It's just... a small cut."

The doc spun around in his office chair once again, with a very evident confused and distraught expression. He was at a loss for words. While the sight itself isn't the worst thing he'd seen, it certainly was not something that would just happen every day, and whenever it did, usually the object wasn't fully impaling someone.

What is anyone supposed to do about someone who's probably dying, somehow strolling into the clinic themselves showing neither reaction nor urgency?

"Wha... T-There's a rod in your chest and it's gone all the way through! That's 'just a small cut' to you?! And… you walked in here yourself?" He finally managed to say. "...Sigh…how did this even happen?"

"Well, you see… I don't… know…? One moment, I'm minding my own business, and the next...I find myself skewered like this."

At around 6 AM is usually when Olimar sets out on the day's adventure, back on the distant planet, otherwise known as PNF-404. Though, ever since the captain was given an invitation to join the Smash Brothers ranks several years ago, that morning schedule hadn't changed in the slightest.

He happened to be on his way to the dining hall, as he was always one of the first few smashers to arrive. The four extra cups of yellow tea, the finest in the mansion, mind you, was just an added bonus of waking up and being there early.

Stopping to look at the windows, he saw that the sun was still rising, the clouds had this magnificent, paper thin effect to them, and the sky itself was a gradient pinkish orange color. In the distance, one could still see the moon, as well as the few stars that had not completely vanished yet.

Olimar decided that this was worth staring at for a while. He could even enjoy his four extra cups of tea while sitting in a chair in front of this window just watching the sunrise, if he really felt like it.

...So that was exactly what he did.

Fifteen minutes into admiring the skyscape, a sudden light blue glowing thing speeding by caught his attention. It looked to be some sort of projectile, though it was moving too fast to tell exactly what it was.

When he looked to its supposed source, there was nothing there. Huh. Olimar turned back to the window, assuming that "thing" just then wasn't of much importance. Another one was then fired from the same direction, that one passing by quickly as well.

Then, another blue thing flew right above… and into him. Red and yellow splashed on himself, on his chair, the floor, a bit even got on the window.

It appeared to be a perfectly clean cut... save for the other end of it, of course. He tried and tried valiantly to pull it out for a while, to no avail... it would only cause more blood to spill out, and well, too much fluid loss would be... only slightly more problematic.

"I mean… the only one there at the time was Pit, sitting nearby... and he just… kind of… ran away? My guess is either he went to call for help... or perhaps... he was just afraid of getting impaled too...by who or whatever did it to me. I can't tell, honestly..."

"Oh, so that's why he was yelling at me earlier."

"DR. MARIO! DR. MARIO! IT'S AN EMERGENCY! SOMEONE GOT STABBED WITH A- I DON'T THINK HEALING ITEMS WOULD WORK ON THIS KIND OF THING!" Pit squealed as he burst through the door to Dr. Mario's office, startling the latter. The angel frantically dashed up to the doctor and began shaking him vigorously and running about the room in a crazed panic. His wings were flapping intensely as well the entire time, scattering various papers, white feathers, and folders all over the floor and desk.

During this, Dr. Mario was awake but unresponsive; he had not expected such an urgent and loud intrusion into his office this early, because most smashers were still asleep at this time. As soon as he even began to register these events, Pit immediately left and was out of sight in mere milliseconds, shouting and crying, "LADY PALUTENA! LADY PALUTENA! EVERYONE! COME QUICK!" at the top of his little lungs.

Most of the smashers opted to go back to sleep upon hearing the angel's voice, internally (and some, secretly) hoping some other smasher that was already awake would come and help out with whatever was going on right about then. It was a nice Wednesday morning, why get up?

"I-I'm not sure... if he ever came back to his spot… Shortly after he ran away... I got up and walked here to the best of my ability. Yes, I'm aware… the floor...is a mess now…"

"Don't worry about it. What's more important is the fact that you are definitely not okay and you just made things worse by walking. We can get all those other details sorted out later."

"…And we're sitting here talking casually, a-as if there isn't a metal rod piercing through me right now… I… I can hardly breathe...and my vision… i-it's starting to blur..." he coughed.

"Yes, and you're getting blood and tea on the floor. Come, I'll try to pull that out for you. Oh, and… that thing's been stuck in there for thirty minutes now?"

"...Precisely…"

It is still unknown as to who or what was responsible for this incident, but after nine grueling and extremely painful hours of pulling, one thing was made clear: That it wasn't just 'a blue rod'. A few broken bits of metal and were found here and there...

Carefully piecing them together built the tip of an arrow.

Author's Note:

If you don't talk to me, you naturally won't know what C.R/23 is.