Chapter 6: A Legendary Solution
As the heroes journeyed slowly out of the castle of their newfound nemesis and back to their own home base back at Peach's castle, they were lost in thoughtful silence. Mario wondered of Bowser's condition and if it should ever be mended. Sonic fumed over The Dark Stranger's arrogance, which he saw displayed within his host's applause. Link mused over the villainous banquet, thinking over all sorts of reasons for its taking place at all. And Spyro worried over the worlds, for the safety of not only his own world but that of the others.
What happened after the defeat of the monstrous cake fiend was The Dark Stranger's recognition of the heroes as true warriors and worthy adversaries. A big celebration was given over the heroes' victory, and many other Tygons appeared amidst the crowd to join in the party. The villains who were there were introduced to the heroes in a surprisingly curt manner by The Dark Stranger himself. The red-haired man was known as Ganondorf, and the egg-shaped fellow humbly bowed and revealed himself as Dr. Eggman.
After all of these trivial introductions between the heroes and villains, The Dark Stranger put on a brief show involving a rather talented magician, whom Mario recognized almost immediately as Dimentio, a former associate of one Count Bleck. Something seemed off about the entire act, but as soon as the show was finished, Dimentio flipped out such that nothing could be asked of him regarding his participation. Afterwards, The Dark Stranger kindly asked that the guests vacate the premises, but not without taking with them some of the wonderful king's jewels, taking one each. Naturally, the heroes didn't bother taking anything; Ganondorf didn't bother with it, but Eggman couldn't help but snatch up a few for himself.
And it is at this point that the heroes are now walking back down the forest path, the castle now in sight. Within the courtyard, they arrived to very little greeting save from the princess and her elderly assistant, Toadsworth. It was to them that they spoke of their journey to the castle and of the banquet and the mysterious Dark Stranger.
"What an odd thing to do," Toadsworth mused. "Throwing a party, but with both heroes and villains in it? How peculiar."
"Doesn't really matter," Sonic shrugged. "We've got bigger fish to fry anyway."
"True," Link agreed. "We still need a way of fixing the worlds and returning things back to the way they were before."
"Well good, cause I've been working on the solution!" cried out a familiar fellow.
"Professor Gadd!" Mario responded.
"Yes, yes," Gadd said, "it's me, but now's not the time to chat! Quickly, now, follow me to the lab!"
"The...lab?" Spyro asked, alongside Link shrugging his shoulders. Neither knew of such a place back in their worlds, but Link felt sure he'd at least seen something like it back in his.
The lab itself was filled with unbelievably marvelous machinations and crystal-clear vials and test tubes. Much of the lab consisted of tables littered with such scientific equipment. Liquids of all different kinds of colors, textures, aromas, and the like swirled about the room as the professor led the heroes to the backroom, guarded by a heavy metal door.
After unlocking the electronic lock, Gadd led the heroes into a large area with only a single desk with a single reading lamp set upon it. The walls consisted entirely of shelves and books covering a wide variety of topics; from black holes to volcanic eruptions to the supernatural and the extraterrestrial, there was naught a bit of knowledge left in the world that wasn't already fitted betwixt the shelves.
Gadd walked round to the desk and indicated a certain passage within the book he was studying. "I did a little more research into the legends of old," he said, "when I discovered a rather convenient method of working out our problems."
The heroes peered down onto the page and read out:
"...Of all the unlikeliest of possibilities to arise, the collision of multiple dimensions or universes is among the impossible,
yet we never doubt the possibility from arising. If the end of the world can happen at anytime, why not the distortion
of the very mutliverse? For this reason, an artifact was constructed known as the Grand Device.
"This device was built for the purpose of restoring transdimensional interweavings that may occur, and as such is divided
amongst the universes. Within the worlds, there exists but one gear, hereby referred to as a Grand Gear, that will correspond
with the Device. Gathering the Grand Gears from all the worlds and applying them to the Grand Device will trigger the appropriate
reaction, namely the unraveling of the worlds from each other and the restoration of the individual universes as such. Should the
Gears be used with the Device in such a manner to resolve such a crisis, a new set of Grand Gears will be redistributed throughout
the worlds once more, such that should the event happen again, then it will continue to have its own solution."
The heroes looked up at the professor and at each other. "So all we need to do is find these Grand Gears?" Sonic asked.
"Don't make it sound so simple!" Gadd protested. "Yes, all you have to do is find the Gears, but think about it! There's only one within each world!"
"Which means what? I don't see a problem," replied the hedgehog.
"It means that there's very little chance of finding the gear in this world alone, much less the ones trapped in our own worlds," Link declared.
"Precisely!" the professor concurred. "We have no indication of where the gears themselves are, nor of how to find or use them when the time comes to do so! We're in a bigger mess than we'd even imagined - with all due respect to what's already happened!"
The party fell silent at this. A solution had been found, yet it was one of impossibly high difficulty. How could they look for something they didn't have the faintest clue as to where it was? There was very little that could be done in a situation such as this. Then Peach asked, "Why don't we ask the Star Spirits? Surely they would know something about this gear."
"It's possible," Gadd replied. "After all, the Star Spirits have been around for far longer than any of us have."
"We could even try and get to the Overthere to talk with Grambi," Luigi added.
"This is true," Gadd said and then began incoherently muttering to himself.
For the three heroes who remained new to the world, Mario had to explain who all these characters were that the others were talking about. Afterwards, everyone joined in, discussing who they could ask about the gear or where they could find the gear. They spoke of spirits and wise old frogs and great beings of great power. They spoke of mountains, of oceans, and of castles long forgot. They talked of everything within the world, and pretty soon those who would otherwise have been unfamiliar with the world they dwelled in became much more aware of it all, and they began talking of similar parts of their own worlds. Pretty soon, the discussion of the gear was pushed aside in favor of listening to the stories of these other worlds.
Things dragged on like this for an hour before a Toad walked in slowly, carrying some sort of book with him. As he approached, the princess took notice of him and nicely asked, "What do you want?"
The Toad stared back, a glazed look over his eyes. He held the book open in front of him and handed it to the princess; as she took the book from his hands, the Toad fainted upon the floor.
"Oh goodness!" Toadsworth remarked dismayed, and the heroes helped in trying to revive the poor Toad. When he finally came about, the Toad appeared groggy and held his head.
"Wha...what happened?" he asked.
"I think we oughta ask the same of you, buddy," Sonic replied.
"I...I don't know," the Toad answered. "I was just wandering Toad Town doing some shopping, and the next thing I know, I'm...here."
"Why that's just maddeningly unhelpful, isn't it?" Toadsworth said. "Oh well, you best come with me. We'll get you some place to rest easy."
As Toadsworth escorted the young Toad out of the room, the heroes drew their attention back to the princess, now simply staring down into the book. The book itself was closed, and in this form Mario recognized it as the Dark Prognosticus.
"How did that Toad get a hold of this?" he wondered aloud, reaching out for the book. The princess however smacked her hand down on the book so that she clamped tightly onto it between both her hands. Mario looked at her curiously as she stared back, horrified, shaking her head.
Mario was taken aback by this uncharacteristic backlash from Peach. She would never do anything like this. Meaning something about this book had truly gotten to her. Mario approached slowly and reached for the book again. Peach held it tighter to herself, but Mario continued to reach for it before finally managing to struggle and pry and free it from her clutches. He looked back at her, then towards the book which had held to a certain page near the end. He opened the book to reveal what was there.
Upon the page was a drawing duplicating the one the heroes saw during E. Gadd's explanation of the ancient legend. Beneath it was a brief description, mimicking what was written beneath the drawing from E. Gadd's lecture. But the second half of the page continued the image, revealing a world that appeared to be blowing apart and a brief description:
Should the enemy unite the darkness
Then they will bring about an age of darkness
One with no hope, no light,
Simply the world shrouded in Darkness.
The worlds in danger of being covered
Must fix them with the Grand Gears
And place them within the Grand Device
Before the end draws near...