4 Smashers stand against the light…

Also, I should've said I'd be avoiding spoiler-related stuff until after December 7th, because this story could go on for a while without spoiling anything too major.


The Stadium of Champions…


As nighttime settled upon the World of Light, Snake, Mario, and Kirby were attempting to help Isaac get back up to speed regarding the current situation.

"So… everyone else is just gone?"

Snake, Kirby, and Mario all nodded sadly. Isaac, in turn, looked away from the trio and up towards the sky, admiring the beautiful constellations that littered the dark of the night to take his mind off that fact. Before he could get too absorbed into the nighttime view, however, startled noises from Kirby snapped him out of his stupor.

Purple, shadowy insects swarmed the ground around them, and began to form a large shape, as Snake grumbled, "I thought that they said those things were gone…"

As the Shadow Bugs finally assumed their completed form, the last of the bugs melted away to reveal Duon.

Mario, Kirby, and Isaac, who had never seen this robotic monstrosity before, not even in Subspace, all squawked in alarm, while Snake, who had fought Duon on the Halberd, simply pulled out his grenade launcher, saying, "It's showtime!"

Duon switched to the blue half and slashed at Isaac, who narrowly dodged, only to get caught by a energy burst from Duon's pink side. Snake then launched a grenade at the robot, which got lodged in one of its servo motors. When the grenade detonated, Kirby inhaled one of the pink Duon's energy blasts to become Beam Kirby, and started waving his wand in arcs, sending out orbs of energy at Duon. Duon then felt a massive burst of fire on its other side, and attempted to rotate, but failed due to one of its servo motors being completely fried. Mario slid under Duon's body and promptly began hammering away at its wheels, dodging any slashes that the blue side tried to tag him with. Isaac then cast Wild Growth on the robot, the numerous vines snaking into the robot's mechanisms and beginning to slowly destroy crucial parts of the robot. As Duon twitched and recoiled from the sheer agony of the vines slowly killing it from the inside, Isaac gave a tight squeeze, destroying the robot's main CPU, and shutting Duon down for good. As the robot shorted, the Shadow Bugs faded away to reveal Mr. Game & Watch inside, apparently unconscious.

The group waited for Mr. Game & Watch to wake up, and when the two dimensional amalgamation woke up, he regarded the four of them with a friendly wave, letting out a series of beeps in Morse code that Snake translated as, "What happened?"

Mario explained, "Unfortunately, it-a turns out that the Shadow Bugs inside you were not-a completely gone. We-a fought that-a robot that you apparently transformed into on-a Meta Knight's ship."

Game & Watch appeared to be horrified by this, as during the transition from the third to the fourth tournament, he had underwent a series of therapy sessions with Master Hand regarding morality because of his lack of understanding of right and wrong that allowed for Tabuu to use his body for the creation of Shadow Bugs. He then beeped out, "How did they come back? I thought that the process had worked..."

Snake grunted, "Maybe the hand's treatment wasn't perfect..."

Game & Watch hung his head in shame, until Mario extended a hand out to him, saying, "Come on. What's done is-a done. All that-a we can do now is to try-a and get everyone back."

Mr. Game & Watch reluctantly took the plumber's hand, and the five of them went to the stadium's left exit.


Outside the Stadium of Champions...


As the group stepped out of the stadium, they heard a deafening crack. The group looked back to see a Master Hand sealing off the exits they didn't take by snapping its fingers. The group of Smashers pushed forwards, only to be met by a Spirit Orb floating in the distance. Going closer to investigate, Isaac let out a startled yelp as he was pulled inside.


Super Mario Maker...


As Isaac landed on the grass, he pulled out his Gaia Blade, ready for a potential threat, only for Wario to shoulder charge him from behind. Groaning as he massaged his back, Isaac looked up to see a formation of Warios in varying outfits, all preparing to tackle him. Sighing, Isaac raised his sword, and the Wario formation began a full on sprint towards the Adept.

Isaac jumped onto the platform above him, sighing in relief as the team of Warios charged underneath. Before he could celebrate, the four Warios in the back turned around, jumped onto Isaac's platform, and promptly shoved him off. Gritting his teeth, the Venus Adept switched his Djinn around until he had achieved the Jupiter Druid class, and unleashed crackling bolts of lightning from his free hand, electrocuting the formation of Warios standing on the platform. Isaac then followed up by unleashing a Sky Diver onto those four Warios, sending them flying. Isaac then shifted his Djinn and equipped his Tomegathericon, turning his class into the Necromage.

The Warios turned around and began to charge at Isaac, and Isaac cast a Dire Inferno, which caused the Warios to break formation to go around the massive wall of hellfire that was summoned. Isaac then rushed in, grabbed a straggler, kicked him up into the air, and then sent him downwards into the abyss with an overhead slash. Isaac then switched Djinn to the War Adept class, and snapped his fingers, casting a very erratic Thunder Mine which barreled into three other Warios, bringing the number of the horde down to eight.

As the remaining Warios charged, the ground began to glow underneath their feet, and then the Grand Gaia that Isaac had been charging the entire fight erupted, sending the Warios flying along with partially melted earth from the mantle. When the chaos had ended Isaac found himself staring at the lone surviving Wario, who was decked out in his classic purple and yellow outfit. This Wario, looking around to find his entire pack gone, rolled up his sleeves and charged at Isaac, who readied his sword due to him depleting most of his Psynergy. However, instead of tackling him, the Wario grabbed Isaac and began to violently shake him down for cash, only to get hit by the hilt of Isaac's sword. As Wario stumbled backwards, clutching his nose, Isaac, disoriented by the violent shaking, swung his sword in a clumsy arc, allowing for Wario to slap and knock him to the ground, before winding up for a massive backhanded punch. Isaac rolled away, changed his Djinn to achieve the Chaos Lord class, and used the last of his Psynergy to cast Supernova on Wario.

When the smoke from the explosion had faded, Isaac looked over to see Wario, on fire, preparing to charge like an enraged bull, which the possessed treasure hunter did. Isaac dodged, and the last Wario hurtled off into the abyss, releasing a Spirit Orb, which was soon joined by 15 other Spirit Orbs to form a large one. Feeling a slight tug on his scarf, Isaac yelped as he was yanked out of there by Snake.


Back in the World of Light...


As Isaac tumbled onto the ground, Mr. Game & Watch ran over, holding one of Snake's medkits. As Isaac refused medical treatment (as Mario insisted that his cousin could patch him up once they found him), Kirby took the Spirit Orb of the Chargin' Chuck Corps that Isaac dropped, and promptly put it in the Spirit Pouch.

Meanwhile, Snake had gone to talk to Mario regarding what had happened in the three years he had been gone.

"...Metal Gears? Those-a giant robots on Shadow Moses? I-a thought that-a Master Hand destroyed them after the-a Subspace incident!"

Snake grimly nodded, saying, "There's a chance that they may be somewhere in this realm."

After a pause, Snake asked, "You said that guy that looked like you in a doctor's outfit was your cousin?"

Mario nodded, and told him all about Dr. Stefano Mario...


Mario looked around anxiously for anymore newcomers, as while seeing Peach was a pleasant surprise, Bowser, the Pokémon called Mewtwo, and especially that Ganondorf guy unnerved him, and he had no idea how to converse with the rest, as the two kids that called themselves the Ice Climbers had gone to talk to Ness, Marth was in his own conversation with Roy, and he had no idea as to how to converse with Mr. Game & Watch or Pichu.

Before Mario could get up and go get some food, however, he felt someone tap his shoulder. Expecting it to be Luigi, he yelped in surprise when it turned out to be someone who looked like him in a doctor's coat.

"Hey, cugino, calm down!"

Mario, having not heard that term in five years, turned around to see that it was indeed his cousin.

"Stefano, it's-a so good to see you! How's that doctorate of yours coming along?"

"Oh, I finished it."

"That's-a great! Does that-a mean you're the in-house doctor in-a case something goes wrong?"

"Actually..."

Stefano pulled out an envelope just like the one Mario had received for the tournament, and said, "I'm working double duty."

Mario gave his cousin a fist bump, and excitedly ran off to tell Luigi the news, while Stefano watched his little cousin run towards Luigi with a smile on his face...


So yeah, not every treatment is perfect, which is why G&W still has Shadow Bugs inside him, but this time, they were coerced out of his unconscious body, as Galeem felt that he was too low-priority to be a Puppet Fighter. And yes, that means G&W was sort of acting like a battery for Duon once again.

I decided to go the full nine yards with the Chargin' Chuck Spirit, and turned it into the Chargin' Chuck Corps from Mario & Luigi: Paper Jam.

Lastly, I went with sheer coincidence regarding Dr. Mario's identity.