We Like Ike
The battlefield was ripe with the unconscious bodies of the fallen smashers. Pichu had been the first to go, having accidentally electrocuted itself. Peach followed shortly after when she got conked on the head with a baseball bat. There were only two remaining. One was a male, human mercenary with surprisingly voluminous purple hair. His name was Ike, and he carried a shimmering sword that was nearly the length of his body. The other remaining fighter was a giant gorilla. The giant gorilla's name was Donkey Kong.
The two rivals stood on the back of a giant spaceship, which was rapidly propelling itself through Earth's atmosphere with increasing speed. The clouds passed them by as nothing more than splashes of white on a blue canvas, and the roar of the engines rattled their eardrums.
Nobody was quite sure how they were managing to stand on the back of a spaceship propelling itself through the Earth's atmosphere with increasing speed, but they didn't care that much. Ike brandished his sword, his eyes narrowed.
"Come at me, you vile primate!" Ike shouted.
Donkey Kong made a confused expression and cupped his hand to his ear to show he had no idea what Ike was saying. The drone of the ship's engines made it impossible for anyone to communicate.
"I said, 'come at me, you vile primate'!" Ike reiterated. Donkey Kong just shrugged, still having no idea what the young man was saying, and came at Ike.
Ike readied his sword and swung just as the gorilla neared him. To Ike's surprise, DK jumped over Ike in a powerful bound. Ike spun around just in time to avoid a haymaker from the gorilla. Even with his giant weapon, Ike was more maneuverable than Donkey Kong was, so he decided to stay out of the beast's reach until he found an opening. Ike took a swift step back.
And slipped on a banana peel.
"Aaaah!" Ike screamed, his arms spinning around like a windmill, but he couldn't retain his balance and he fell on his back with a painful thud. Before he had the chance to get up, Donkey Kong was already on top of him. He only had time to flinch as the gorilla's fist collided with his face.
It was over. The entire world around them dissipated and the recreation room of Super Smash Mansion appeared in its place. Ike materialized and fell from the ceiling and onto a pinball machine, dazed. The smashers gathered around him. Roy offered Ike a hand and helped the other fighter up.
"You know what this means," Roy said to Ike. Ike's jaw dropped.
"No! It can't be true! My Smash Rank!" Ike shouted. He dashed over to the other side of the room where a television display hung on the wall. The display showed the ranks of all the smashers. Ike had been ranked first – and therefore the fighter with the greatest amount of wins – for the past three weeks. To his horror, he watched as his name sunk down the list and Donkey Kong's rose to the top. Ike gasped. "I'm number two!"
"At least you're next to me now!" Marth said, patting Ike on the back. Marth was number three.
"My honor! My dignity!" Ike shouted. He fell to his knees.
"That's a bit much," Samus, a tall, lean girl with long blond hair said. "I think you're exaggerating."
The room was silent except for the sound of Donkey Kong's laughter. Ike spun around on his knees and faced the obnoxious gorilla, an evil glint in his eyes. He pointed to Donkey Kong.
"That last battle was a fluke. I'm still the best fighter around, DK, and you know it."
Donkey Kong shook his massive head and beat his chest, saying in his own language that Ike was full of crap and that his mother was a fatty.
Everyone gasped.
"My mother isn't fat," Ike said, his voice dangerously even. "You've taken this too far. We need to settle this. Now. Decide who is the best smasher out of the two of us once and for all."
"That's a good idea," Marth said. "Who would like to be in charge of this event?"
A tall, muscular man in a tight body suit stepped forward. He was smoking a cigarette and had cropped brown hair. Everyone called him Snake, even though he was built more like a mountain lion.
"I'll do it," Snake said. He lifted his arms in the air and raised his voice. "We will hold a series of totally badass challenges. Whoever wins the most challenges will be proclaimed the top smasher in the manor. Sound good?" Snake spat on the purple carpet, making Roy cringe. Ike stepped forward.
"That sounds great to me. I will definitely win the most challenges and become the top fighter. That is, if DK can handle it," Ike said.
DK shook his giant head and pounded his chest with his fists, which meant in his language that he was going to smash Ike's knee so badly that the swordsman wouldn't be able to have children. Nobody bothered to correct DK's misunderstanding of human anatomy.
"Okay!" Snake said, crossing his arms. "Let the competition begin!"
All of the smashers stood in the great field behind Smash Manor. The grass had gotten a bit long because Link had shirked his grass-cutting duties in favor of smashing all the pots throughout the house. Everyone formed a large circle around DK and Ike, chattering excitedly as Snake entered the ring.
"We will have three challenges. Whoever wins best two out of three will be the ultimate victor and will be given the Crown of Ultimate-ness to wear on their sexy heads. Mario, show everyone the Crown of Ultimate-ness," Snake said.
Mario, with a hefty leap in the air, snatched the tiara off of Marth's head and showed it to the crowd. Everyone oohed and ahed.
"That's mine!" Marth said. "Can't you buy your own crown?"
"Suck it," Snake said. Mario handed Marth a lollipop and the prince began to suck it with a frustrated expression. "Now. For the first challenge."
Kirby waddled into the ring and handed Ike and DK each a small jar with some amber substance inside and a spoon.
"What is this? Poison?" Ike questioned.
"No. It's much worse. Cinnamon," Snake said. "You are to each eat a teaspoon of this. Whoever gets it down first will be the winner."
"But this is just a spice!" Ike shouted incredulously.
"If you truly think that, then you have not known Hell," Snake said. "Start in three … two .. one!"
DK took a look at the jar, shrugged, and swallowed the entire thing without even taking the lid off. Ike, taking the rules more seriously, twisted the cap off and scooped out a spoonful of cinnamon and put it in his mouth.
Ike's eyes burned, his throat closed up, his face swelled, and tears streamed down his face in a matter of seconds. His entire head filled with fire. He fell backwards, gasping and clutching his throat, sputtering and coughing. DK, his cinnamon still enclosed in a shiny glass jar, had none of the symptoms and looked at Ike with bemusement.
Ike spat out the remainder of the burning dust onto the ground.
"The winner is Donkey Kong!" Snake declared. "Ike, zero; DK, one! Onto the next challenge!"
"He didn't even do it right!" Ike said.
"Don't be so technical," Snake responded. He snapped his fingers and the plains around them morphed into a beach. Master Hand had given Snake the power over choosing the battle sites that day, just because the gloved menace was sadist.
Everyone dropped from about ten feet in the air and landed on the fine sand, sending it everywhere.
"Rats," Roy said. "I got sand in my pants!"
Roy, being practical but not self-aware, took off his pants and shook them out. The general male population was very grateful that Roy had chosen to wear boxers that day. The general female population just stared.
"All right!" Snake said in his best commentator voice, "our next challenge will be a test of skill. Ike, DK; put on your deep-sea diving suits!"
Ike and Donkey Kong put on their deep-sea diving suits. Donkey Kong received his suit from Meta Knight. Ike already had his on because he had worn a deep-sea diving suit under his clothes for the past seven months for reasons nobody knew.
"We are going to be doing underwater basket weaving!" Snake declared. "Here are the rules: we are going to put you ten feet underwater, and then you are going to have to weave a basket from willow branches. Whoever completes the basket according to these parameters first is our victor."
Kirby held up the parameters for the basket which were written on a poster. Ike and DK memorized them in a matter of moments. Once they were properly dressed, they stepped into the ocean. The weight of their suits kept them on the sea floor, exactly ten feet from the surface. The water that surrounded them was tumultuous and murky, making it difficult to keep a firm grip on the flimsy willow branches.
Aha, Ike thought to himself, it's a good thing I specialized in Underwater Basket Weaving in the army. They all mocked me then, but who's laughing now?
"Gurgle gurgle," laughed Ike.
His slender fingers manipulated the willow branches with prodigious dexterity, allowing him to complete his basket in a matter of minutes. He swam to the top and presented his basket with confidence. The crowd cheered.
"The winner is Ike! DK one, Ike one!" Snake shouted. "Time for the tie breaker! To the next challenge!"
Before anyone had the chance to react, the world around them shifted and they were suddenly standing on a bleak plateau. They must have been hundreds of feet high, as they could see for miles from where they were standing. There was no grass, no flowers – no vegetation to be seen. Ike materialized half a dozen feet in the air and landed on the packed earth face-first with a thud.
"Somebody needs to fix my teleporter," Ike groaned.
"Everybody, quick! Come over to this unstable precipice!" Snake shouted while waving from his position on the unstable precipice. Everyone ran to the edge of the cliff, which dropped sharply and had a clear view of the ground hundreds of feet below.
"What's the challenge now?" Ike questioned.
"You and DK are going to jump off this ledge. Whoever hits the ground first is the winner!" Snake shouted.
There was a silence. Ike stared at Snake for a very long time.
Ike shrugged.
"Eh, why not?" the fighter said. He edged closer to the ledge and Donkey Kong did the same. "Are you ready, big guy?"
Donkey Kong shook his massive head and pounded his chest with his fists, saying in his own language that since he, DK, was bigger than the puny swordsguy, he, DK, will fall faster and thus he, DK, will hit the ground first and be the winner.
Nobody bothered to correct the massive ape's knowledge of physics.
"They're not really going to do this, are they?" Roy asked, concerned. "Ike can't be…"
"One …" The two smashers stepped even closer to the edge. "Two…" They took a deep breath. "Three!"
DK and Ike jumped off the edge of the cliff and began their frantic freefall to the ground below. The wind whipped through Ike's hair, making it flow rather handsomely. DK was screaming his head off and waving his arms at rapid speed, turning himself into a makeshift primate helicopter, and slowing himself down. Ike was edging ahead.
"Ha ha!" Ike said. "See you at the bottom –"
Something soft and squishy slammed into Ike's face, sending him flying into the cliff side with a crash. He was so deeply embedded in the rock that his fall was ceased. Ike peeled the thing off his face and looked into the beady eyes of a spherical, chubby, pasty monster. It was one of King Dedede's minions. King Dedede was another obese smasher that was one of DK's best friends. Ike looked up just in time to see Dedede floating in front of him. Dedede was fat, but his body was capable of inflating like a balloon, which made him fall slowly.
"Hyuck hyuck hyuck," hyucked Dedede. This meant in his own language that he wasn't going to let Ike win the battle.
"Sorry, your highness, but I can't lose here!" Ike shouted. He jumped back into the air, pushing off from the wall to give himself a boost. Another one of Dedede's puffy minions whizzed past Ike's head, followed by another. "Darn it! I can't let them hit me again!"
Suddenly, Ike got an idea. He drew out his sword and held it in both hands. He concentrated his energy onto the blade, and soon it began to emanate tendrils of fiery power. He held the sword above his head.
"Great…" Ike started. He swung the sword down with all of his strength. "Aether!"
The sword charged downward at dizzying speeds, dragging Ike with it. He soared past DK in a matter of seconds.
Ike hit the ground first in an explosion. The force of the impact created a massive crater and debris flew high into the sky. DK landed soon after, creating his own respectable crater. Both of them lost consciousness after hitting the ground for obvious reasons.
"Ike! Ike!"
Ike awoke in a hospital bed. He gazed up into the angry faces of Marth, Roy, and Zelda. Snake was smiling down at Ike because Snake was mentally unstable.
"Did I win?" Ike said in a small voice.
"You jumped off a cliff!" Roy exclaimed. "You jumped off a cliff!"
"But you did win," Zelda said with a roll of her eyes.
"That's good," Ike said, smiling serenely.
"You jumped off a cliff!" Roy shouted again.
Ike took a deep breath. He had defeated DK with only minor repercussions. His position as top smasher was secured for now, along with his honor. He took Marth's hand and held it tight.
"Thank you for your support, Marth," Ike said.
"You're insane," Marth said, eyes narrowed.
"You jumped off a cliff!"
"Does DK have anything to say about his defeat?" Ike said.
"We don't know. He doesn't have the strength to shake his head and pound his chest with his fists," Snake said.
"You jumped off a cliff!"
"It means a lot to have your support and friendship," Ike said, "what would I do without such loyal friends—"
"Do you guys want to get something to eat?" Zelda asked those who had use of their legs. Marth and Snake nodded their heads in the affirmative. Roy just shook his head in disbelief, exclaiming his mantra again. "Bye, Ike!" said Zelda.
The group left Ike in the mansion's hospital and went to eat some crepes. The whole day had been rather pointless except that everyone had learned a few valuable lessons.
First, was that they would never let Snake be in charge of anything ever again.
Second, was that Ike was an idiot.
Third, was that crepes were delicious.
And most importantly, they learned to never let petty competitions get in the way of their friendships.
On second thought, the day had been rather pointless.
END
