Chapter 3: The Yellow Pikmin

As soon as that wall crashed down as soon as noon began, I had the sudden revelation that this was the fastest I had ever gotten the wall down as well as getting the first treasure. Even in my fastest time, I had only gotten the wall down just before three fourths of the day was over. I guess having two people helped. At this rate, Olimar would be in no danger. But what about me? Over the course of the day I had thoughts of living with Olimar and his family, but this was a video game! I had no idea if the people who created the game even knew what Hocotate's cities looked like. As far as I knew, as soon as the rocket lifted off the surface it would disappear and I'd fall into a glitch in the game or something.

I decided, at the moment, to ignore it and focus on beating the game. Olimar looked confused as soon as he saw the yellow onion. He looked at me and asked, "There are more types of pikmin?"

"I'm not going to spoil it for you." I winked slyly at him. "Give me the pikmin and avoid the bulborbs. Touch the yellow onion and start plucking pikmin. I'll handle the bulborbs."

"Alright" He said, not one hundred percent sure about it. He walked past the bulborbs while I threw pikmin onto the dwarf...

...or, should I say, threw them onto my feet. That was, strangely, the only pain I've felt so far, besides pinching myself; having my feet crushed by light pikmin. I still couldn't throw far at all. I hoped this wouldn't affect our strategy. I hoped that this would wear off. Heck, I also hoped that I'd wake up from this dream soon. I wanted to help Olimar, don't get me wrong, I love the guy, but this experience was too weird.

...I realized that I needed to stop thinking so much and actually focus on helping Olimar. If I thought too much, I'd get killed.

I decided to stop uselessly throwing pikmin and swarmed the little guy. He died within a few seconds, and by then I saw the yellow onion up and running. Olimar had already gotten five pikmin and was looking at me while pointing at the sleeping bulborb. At that moment, I felt so useless. I had no idea what to do. I figured that if too many pikmin died, I'd just reset the day (Oh boy) so I swarmed the large bulborb as well.

Big mistake...

The bulborb woke up, but with all of the pikmin I managed to cut its HP down to one fourth before it got to full height and that glitch, you know, the one that causes the bulborb to become completely invincible if it's about to bite, happened. The pikmin attacked its feet, but it was invincible as it snatched down three red pikmin. They cut its HP in half of what it used to be before it snatched FIVE pikmin at once! I didn't know what to do. Olimar didn't either. We were frozen in fear and confusion as the bulborb snatched up seven more pikmin before it was killed. I groaned and slapped my head three times, each time saying, "Stupid!" to myself.

"Well that was smart," Olimar said. He was the one smiling slyly that time. The pikmin's losses must not have affected him much. He must not realize that the only way he could possibly survive was to keep at least 100 pikmin alive. Right now we were at 50 pikmin after losing 29. We weren't doing so well.

"Shut up," I said, not playfully if you catch my drift. "I'll gather up one of these bulborbs with the reds. I'll follow them. You keep getting the yellow pikmin's numbers up, okay? There's plenty for them to gather."

He sighed and nodded. I swarmed the bulborb outside the arena, but walked back inside to say, "Be careful with the bomb rocks" while pointing at the three bomb rocks near the stone wall. I winked at him as he looked confused and followed the red pikmin. I followed them to the red onion and plucked the twelve pikmin that came out. I looked at the ledge that held the 5-pellet and remembered something.

"Dude, I'm telling you that it won't work." I had said. You were the one telling me to throw the pikmin onto that ledge to get the Shock Absorber (one of the few names I remember) and defeating the bulborb. You said it would get the day done faster. You said that you had gotten it done in 12 days and this was the first step. You didn't tell me everything, but this part I remembered.

I never tried it myself in any of my runs, but you continued saying, "Just trust me. It will work. How else could I get 12 days?"

I remember that day. That was the day I kicked you out of my house. That day was a few weeks ago. Thankfully you realized I wasn't serious. Otherwise I wouldn't be telling you about this at all.

I'm getting off track. Anyway, I decided to trust you and threw all 57 of my pikmin onto the ledge. Yes, onto the ledge. I guess I improved at least a little bit, because they all landed on the ledge. It took a few minutes longer than I wanted it because they kept falling off because I couldn't get them up the ledge far enough. They all landed on the edge and there were so many of them that they pushed each other off.

Anyway, you should know what I'm talking about. The point is: I got all of them on the ledge. I climbed up the root to the next ledge, kept to the wall and avoided the annoying bulborb, whistled all of the pikmin, kept to the wall again to get behind the bulborb, walked to the popping seeds and managed to get two nectars out. I let the pikmin become flowers to defeat the bulborb faster. Then, I swarmed it.

The bulborb woke up, but luck was on my side because it tripped over itself trying to snatch at pikmin. It somehow missed and my pikmin were able to kill it. I jumped for joy and looked at the ship part. Olimar would be so proud.

I looked at the yellow onion and saw several seeds were popping out of it. I was confused, but soon saw the radar being carried by pikmin. Olimar came into view (even though he was very small from this distance) and whistled the pikmin under the onion to go through the tunnel where all of the sheargrubs are. I couldn't believe it. He actually figured out how bomb rocks worked all by himself.

I stared at Olimar working for a few minutes before a few of my pikmin touched me on my thigh. I looked down and they pointed at the bulborb. I was speechless. This small gesture made me realize that pikmin had feelings. I know, what I said sounded cruel, but they could be thrown to their deaths and never stopped Olimar or Louie or the President from doing it. I know, I've done it several times before. More cruel thinking, I know.

I nodded at the pikmin and swarmed the bulborb and the treasure, leaving me with no pikmin left. I walked off the ledge, allowing them to carry it on their own, passed the radar and walked to Olimar.

"All right," I said. "What's going on?"

"What do you mean?" He asked innocently, though he smiled knowingly. I raised my eyebrow and he sighed. "Okay, while you were gone, I gathered up everything in the little bowl-thing and got 35 pikmin exactly. I looked at the bomb rocks, did you say they were, that you pointed at and threw a pikmin at them. It picked it up and walked over to me. I threw two more pikmin and got them back. I wondered why they were at the wall and threw the yellow pikmin, which, if you didn't know, flies much higher than the red pikmin, at the wall. It set the bomb rock down and the rock began fizzing. It suddenly blew up and the wall dropped down. I realized how powerful these must be and threw the other two pikmin at the wall. They set their bomb rocks down and the wall collapsed as they blew up.

"I walked into the next level and saw my Whimsical Radar on the ledge. I was so close to another ship part! I threw twenty of the pikmin onto the ledge and they carried the radar to the ground. They suddenly walked towards the two small creatures that were sniffing the ground; I think I'll call them dwarf bulborbs because they look like my pet, Bulby, and I whistled them back. One of them bit at a pikmin, but missed, and began chasing him. I swarmed that dwarf bulborb and they managed to kill it, but the other one grew interested. I threw a lot of pikmin onto the other bulborb and managed to crush it, but some new creatures burrowed up from the ground.

"They were pink and purple bugs that didn't have any legs or arms, but they scuttled on the ground towards my pikmin. A purple bug snatched one of my pikmin in its jaws and I swarmed it. So many pikmin attacked it, but it wouldn't die. I thought that they were invincible! Finally it ate my yellow pikmin and the pikmin killed it. I thought it was very odd. I decided to take no chances and let my pikmin take the dead bodies. However, I was left with seven pikmin so I decided to look around. Immediately after I passed where the dead bodies were, several of those creatures popped out of the ground. I whistled my pikmin back in fear and ran out of the area.

"I plucked out the pikmin that were created from the bodies and saw you on the ledge staring at me. I decided to go back into the area and fight them. I saw them rise from the ground and swarmed them, one by one, and somehow, they weren't invincible, so they died fairly easy. I made sure to get all of them out and walked out to find you here."

He paused and walked over to the onion. A sheargrub body was sucked into the onion, but no pikmin came out. "I think it's broken." He said.

I suddenly remembered that only one hundred pikmin could be on the field at one time. I told him this and he looked confused. "Why?" He asked. I shrugged. "Possibly because having more than 100 would make the game too easy."

"Game?" He asked.

I realized my slip of tongue. I shook my head and said, "Never mind." I then told him my story (leaving out the reference to you, of course) about how I got the third ship part. I felt proud that we were now beating my own record. This might end faster than I had thought.

"It's getting dark," He said after I finished. "Thank you for getting another ship part for me. Once they get them to the ship, all we'll need is one more ship part to go to the next level."

I remembered one thing. "We have time. Get three yellow pikmin to those bomb rocks and follow me to the base ASAP."

"What does ASAP mean?" He asks.

"You're kidding." I said. "Just hurry up."

We actually ran to the base, making sure to get every single pikmin along the way, and I told him what to do. He threw all three pikmin carrying the bomb rocks at the second wall, they let them go, and the wall was destroyed. After we destroyed the wall and Olimar got a good look of the level (without any pikmin) we left the planet.

Two days down, I thought as we left the planet and I saw the yellow and red onions following us, and we have four ship parts. We're doing well, so far, and I think Olimar's beginning to trust me. This game's getting interesting. I like playing it.

End of Day 2:

Red - 57
Yellow - 56
Ship Parts: 4/30