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"I am but a small voice, I have but a small dream..."

~Lea Salonga, I Am But A Small Voice

Legend, Track 4: I Am But A Small Voice

If I had been freaked out before, I was terrified now. There was a voice speaking to me inside my head. You would be scared too.

Are you just going to sit there all day? the voice— Samus— said calmly. Someone will come looking for you.

There's a freaking voice inside my head! I thought.

Yeah? So? Samus answered calmly. Listen, kid. You're Sam, right? I nodded. She began to speak (think? Gah!) in a calming tone, sort of like the tone that grown-ups use on crying babies. Okay. Since I'm obviously sealed inside you, then that means Luke was telling the truth after all, and you should probably go to see him on Monday.

My brain seized on one word out of her talk. Luke? Is that Bluey?

Yeah, you called him Bluey. But for future reference, his real name is Lucario. Master Hand told us that he'd find our containers when the time was right. I guess now's the time... Now hurry up and get out of this bathroom before someone bangs the door down. I'll explain more later.

I nodded, stood up, and opened the door. I walked back outside, reclaimed my burger, and wolfed the rest of it down. After we all finished lunch, the guys and I trooped downstairs to the entertainment room while Uncle Roy and Aunt Riza showed my parents around the city. When we got to the entertainment room, the guys shoved Adam onto the couch and threw their presents at him. It seemed to be a time-honored tradition, so I said nothing and dodged when one of James's throws narrowly missed my head. Adam caught most of the presents (most of them... one hit him in the gut) and started to rip off the paper. The presents were mostly models of Halo things (Adam loved Halo, for some reason I never got), a couple of PlayStation 3 games, and a Wii game.

"It looks like Kage wins for 'Most Original' this year," Maurice commented.

"That's because I got his present while you guys were playing that prank on Lyle, remember?" Kage asked.

Adam continued to peel the paper off his present. "Whoa... Super Smash Bros. Brawl? This is a collector's item, Kage! Where'd you find it?"

"Gamestop. It was used," the Japanese boy replied. "And cheap." The other boys punched Kage lightly, muttering "Cheapskate".

"Well, what are we waiting for? Let's play!" James spoke up. The boys started to move around the room, digging out an old Nintendo Wii from the closet and passing out four Wii-motes.

"Oh yeah. The tournaments were popular, so they made video games about them. And that's all the Super Smash Bros. info you'll ever need to know," Adam said to me. He handed me a Wii-mote. "All right, so here's the first match up. It'll be Sam and me against..." He frowned. "Let's go with Kage and Anthony."

A quick run-through of the manual later, the first match was ready to go. I selected Samus (of course), Adam went with some guy named Snake, Kage picked Link ("There was a manga of him too," he said), and Anthony selected the random character button. The next screen was a stage-selection screen. Since it was Adam's birthday, we let him choose. He picked a simple stage called "Shadow Moses Island".

Hmm, perfect timing, the real Samus spoke up. This way, I can teach you the moves without having to attack anyone.

I watched the timer tick down. 3...2...1... Wait. What do you mean, teach me the moves?

Link's above you. Tilt the directional stick up and press B. I followed her instructions, and the Samus on the screen curled into a ball and rotated around and around, injuring Link. That's the Screw Attack. I refrained from making any crude jokes. All right, so Anthony's Captain Falcon... God, I hated that guy... He's next to you. Tap to your right and press B. As I did so, a missile shot out of Samus's... arm?

That would be my Arm Cannon. I'm not that much of a freak.

I continued to follow her directions, learning that pressing just B made a charge shot, Down + B made Samus into a little ball that she called a Morph Ball, A just made Samus do physical attacks, C was jump, and Z was dodge. Good, you're getting the hang of this, Samus complimented me. A shiny ball popped out of nowhere and began to float around the screen.

That's the Smash Ball. Get it and you unleash your— my— strongest attack. Noting that the boys were still attacking each other, I jumped to the top platform and screw-attacked the Smash Ball. The ball broke suddenly, and the screen went dark. The Samus on the screen glowed eerily, and her visor turned yellow.

"Holy— what did you do, Sam?" Adam asked.

Now face your opponents and press B, Samus ordered. I maneuvered the onscreen Samus into position and hit B. A powerful laser erupted from her arm... sorry, Arm Cannon. Captain Falcon and Link flew off the stage, and Adam high-fived me. "Great job, Lady! We'll win for sure! Wait, what's happening to your person?"

This was the bit I disliked about Brawl, Samus muttered. The pieces of armor fell off of the onscreen Samus, revealing a blond woman in a tight bodysuit. Behind the couch, someone whistled. "Daang."

All right. I'll just give you all your instructions for Zero Suit me now. She told me all of the button combos that I could use to attack. After finishing her instructions, she went silent and didn't speak for a while. While I beat Kage and Anthony up, (that Plasma Whip is pretty awesome) Adam, who was messing with all the buttons, hit 1 and 2 at the same time.

"Huh? What's happening? It looks like I'm calling someone," Adam said. A communication screen popped up, and Snake began to talk to some random girl. "Mei Ling, Samus took her clothes off!"

The real Samus groaned. Reason 597 why I hate fighting in the Zero Suit. I love my Plasma Whip, but all these jokes just make me sick.

As Snake and Mei Ling continued to talk about my character, Anthony amused himself by Falcon-punching a wall. "Look, the wall fell!" he exclaimed, as the wall crumbled.

"Um, yeah, you wish. Even without the Power Suit, all that training she did with the Chozo has made her a super athlete. I don't think a normal human could ever keep up. Just look at her," Mei Ling told Snake.

"...Her loss," Snake replied.

And thus the "Snakus" pairing was birthed, Samus sighed. I've never forgiven Mei Ling for that.

The fight ended soon after that. Adam and I won, and I decided to take a break from playing. I watched Adam and Lyle beat up James and Maurice, while Kage pulled out a book and started to read again.

After a while, I got bored. (The game was exciting and all, but there's only so much "FALCON PAWNCH!"-ing that I can take.) So I decided to talk to the voice in my head. Yeah, I know that sounds weird. Hey, Samus? Do any of these guys have Smashers sealed inside of them? I asked.

Huh? Oh. No, all the Smashers' containers— that's you and all the other people who are hosting us— live in Dairanto City. I think they did it so that it would be easier to find us in the future.

The rest of the weekend passed by quickly. Adam and his friends played video games for the whole night (and part of the morning too), then fell asleep around four and woke up at eight. After waking up, they were surprisingly good-natured. For having only four hours of sleep, anyway. If I have less than 8 hours of sleep I turn bipolar. They played video games some more until eleven, when Adam drove the guys home. We ate lunch with the Malkovich family and then started the drive home.

The drive was long and boring, as most road trips with my family are. Luckily, Adam had given me a couple of batteries from his stash, so my mp3 player was up and running again. I nodded my head and quietly rapped along to nobodyknows+'s "Hero's Come Back!" while my mom and dad sang along to "Don't Stop Believin'". I love them and everything, but parents singing along to music in the car is just kind of weird to me. (And embarrassing, if you have the windows wide open.)

As soon as we got home, I went up to my room, shut the door, put some music on, and called Pit about what had happened. He picked up the phone almost immediately.

"Pit?" I asked.

"Speaking, who's this?" he replied.

"It's Sam. My SS woke up, and it, no, she's talking inside of my head!"

"Yours too?" he asked. "Mine woke up this morning. I got this splitting headache and then this guy's voice started speaking in my head. My SS was an angel, right?"

"Yeah, why?"

"I didn't know angels knew so many swear words," he said wryly.

"I'm not going to ask how you figured that out, Angelo," I replied. "Heard from Link and Z lately?"

"No, I don't think theirs have woken up yet. You know Z. If hers woke up, even if it was at 1 in the morning, she'd text us all right away."

"Point. But I wonder if they've asked their parents about their spirits? We probably should, you know..." I trailed off, trying to figure out exactly how to ask my parents about this whole spirit thing. You can't exactly just blurt out at dinner "Hey Mom, Dad, did you guys know I have a spirit sealed inside of me? Did you give permission for it? Why did they pick me?"

"That could be a bit troublesome," Pit muttered. I figured he was thinking of his own parents. They were doctors, after all, and he'd inherited his scientific outlook on life from them. If it was going to be hard for me to talk to my parents about this, it was going to be twice as hard for Pit.

"Sam, come downstairs! It's time for dinner!" my mother called.

"Ask them. Today," Pit said to me. "If all else fails, ask your SS for help."

"I will if you will," I replied.

"Fine. I'll see you tomorrow. Let's go."

We hung up at the same time, and I walked downstairs to the dinner table. The scent of KFC greeted me. I figured Mom had been too tired from our trip to cook some actual food.

"Isn't it great to be back home?" my dad asked, smiling. "It's nice to see Roy and Riza and Adam, but there's just no place like home." My mom smiled and nodded.

Pit's voice seemed to replay in my head, as if I were listening to a sound clip. Ask them. Today. It repeated over and over in my head, until I finally snapped and gave in to the pressure.

"Mom? Dad?" I asked.

"Yes, dear?" my mom asked, scooping some mashed potatoes onto my plate.

How am I going to say this? I went into an internal panic. Crap, I should think before I open my mouth!

Then... I don't know how to explain it. It was like Samus's spirit took over and my spirit got shifted to the side. She took control of my mouth and asked my parents something.

"What do you know about Samus Aran?"

Definition of the day:

SARCASM — Listening to "Ganon Slayer" while your baby brother listens to VeggieTales.

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