Pikmin: The Flora and Fauna
"Wildfires" of PNF-404
Throughout the forest, a great clamor could be heard. A battle as old as time itself ran throughout the forest, creating noise as it went. Red after yellow after blue, Pikmin of all colors made haste in escaping the beasts behind them.
Bulborbs of all shapes, colors, and sizes filed after them. Eyes ravenously scanning the ground, they bit and tore at the brush and the Pikmin, threatening to swallow them whole. Once a single Pikmin tripped, they were to be consumed, never to be seen again.
Eventually, the Pikmin came across an encampment. Sitting by the spaceship, Olimar and Louie (a tired Louie at the very least) waved the Pikmin in frantically. Never before in these Pikmins' lives have they been this terrified of the enemies behind them, nor more glad to see their captains.
Scrambling up the legs of the Onions, they made haste in finding shelter as quickly as they could possibly move their tiny legs and arms. While the Pikmin with primary colors had separate homes to escape to, the violet and paler of the bunch had to hurry for the ship's comfortable steel brig.
For the White Pikmin, it was simple. A quick sprint, a hop, and they were down through the smoke filters of the ship, down into somewhere safe and metallic. The slower of the bunch, the Purple Pikmin, had it harder. While they tried in vain to move faster and faster, terrified of the impending doom on two legs making an effort to catch them.
Olimar and Louie felt the roar of the engine as it prepared for take-off. The first captain glanced over at the purples. There was little chance they would be able to make it on their own. So, the most sensible thing to do in a situation where death is staring back at you and the easiest way to escape would be to not walk towards them is to burden yourselves with a load of heavy Pikmin as you get closer to them.
But, considering Olimar had rebuilt his entire ship from scratch as it was nearly ruined by a meteorite a while back, sensible was a bit of a stretch. But if he wanted to preserve lives, he would have to do it. Dashing away, from a borderline asleep Louie struggling to remain conscious, he dashed through the grass towards the struggling Pikmin.
Finally reaching the handful of carrot-like soldiers, he began flinging them towards the ship, slamming across the floor, finally stirring Louie from his slumber as a side-effect. While Louie woke up, the Pikmin filed in an orderly, yet frantic fashion as they piled into the ship, barely escaping the Bulborbs across the field. Finally satisfied, Olimar whistled, glaring at Louie, who simply nodded.
A beam of colorful light enveloped both Olimar and Louie as they were sucked into the ship's cockpits. Just as the engines blared to life, however…
Thud!
One Bulborb had ignored the risks and had slammed into the spaceship. A creaking noise followed by the sound of circuits sparking followed. While Olimar was immediately concerned, all three of the sentient beings began rocketing off into the stratosphere, setting the unlucky Bulborb's face aflame, also sending the Bulborb scrambling away for cover. With the Onions lifting up from the earth, the captains and their army lifted up into the sky, Louie sighing in relief as he laid back in his seat.
Past a cluster of trees, they soared, passing through the leaves as they rose. The red light blinking above his head, mounted on an antenna bobbed above playfully, but Olimar was in no mood to do any of the sort. He had also planned on writing a journal entry today, but considering the awful turn of events so far, it would probably be better just to turn in for the night. Leaving the cockpit slowly, Olimar lowered himself into the iron hull of the ship, walking past a distressed Louie, whose normally relaxed face was wide awake and terrified. Nodding to his co-employee, the two walked for a minute or two before finally coming across their bunks.
Without hesitation, Louie leaped from the metal floor onto the bed that he called his, wrapping himself in a blanket, eyes still bulging wide after the terrifying incident. Olimar made his way towards his own bunk, removing his helmet, leaving the red light to dance by itself. Placing himself on the bed, he stared up at the metal ceiling. Try as he might, he could not shake the last attempt the Bulborbs had pulled on receiving a meal. And unfortunately for Olimar, he would be carrying the thought of Bulborbs crashing into the ship to sleep tonight.
Alas, it was not to last. Awakening from his post-attack slumber, Olimar woke up to a red light. But unlike the one plastered on his helmet, this one sounded worse. His brain slowly processing the fact that his helmet did not make sound on its own, he realized too late that there was something wrong. Both Olimar and Louie were launched out of their bed without warning, tumbling about the metallic cabin, and while Olimar rolled around dizzily, Louie slept soundly throughout the lack of gravity that was spurred by the sudden movement.
Outside of the ship's cabins, the ship itself was twirling from side to side, the nosecone desperately attempting to stay in the air. The Onions appeared to notice the ship's rapid descent, and slowly began to lower, following the ship through the waking light of an early dawn.
That was the original plan. What was neglected in the original plan was to watch for tree branches. The Onions began fluttering down as smoke rose from the flowers, Pikmin running about somehow in the enclosed space. Well, it was a guess, mostly due to the amount of plants screaming. Everyone screeched in plain, unadulterated fear as the plummeted, up until the point where the crash finally occurred.
Olimar opened his eyes. A white light beckoned to him. Blinking, Olimar looked around. An empty, expanse of white flowers filled the land. Next to him, Louie stood, walking through the field with a white robe on. And a… Halo?
Soon, a few of the flowers stood up, halos popping up above them. Pikmin began standing up, following Louie. They all had robes on, and they all seemed to be light on their feet. So light in fact, that they began drifting off into the sky. Olimar was astounded by the fact, so astounded by it that he did not notice that he himself was floating.
Oh wait, yes he did. He noticed and he was flailing rapidly. A burning sensation invaded his nostrils, and somehow that spurred him to make way for the ground. Louie and the Pikmin glanced behind them, and found Olimar attempting to return to earth. They did so as well, almost swimming as they attempted to grab the earth as the same burning sensation invaded their senses.
Except for the Red Pikmin. A few of them glanced at each other, shrugged, and followed in a calm, yet somewhat cautious manner.
For the second time, Olimar got up, and his throat felt clogged. He coughed once, and realized the reason his throat felt as it did. His helmet was off. Blinking, he looked to the side of his bed, noticing that the helmet was dangling from the side. Reaching out for it, an invisible stranglehold on his throat, he grabbed the helmet and placed it on his head in a jiffy, the sweet taste of air filling his lungs yet again, Olimar sighing in relief. Glancing over at Louie, he noticed in the panic of last night, he had neglected to remove his helmet.
"A blunder managed to save his life." He commented as he stared at his peacefully slumbering co-worker.
However, if the noise outside was any indication, there was trouble brewing. Getting up and off his bed, he cringed as he landed on the steel floors, concerned they might give way. Carefully striding outside of his cabin, he walked throughout the vessel, eventually coming across the cockpit opening. Climbing up, he was greeted with sunlight as he approached the cockpit. That being said, when he pushed the cockpit off, he was greeted with…
"Aiyee!"
Onions laid in a heap in the corner, leaf bandages wrapped around them as smoke rose. Looking down, the captain realized that the ship had planted itself into the ground, the talkative nosecone stuck in the dirt, grumbling something about meddlesome bugs. That was hardly the worst part. Under the morning sun, Olimar could see rows of Pikmin working tirelessly. Normally, that would be a good thing, but the injuries and chaos inflicted on the Pikmin took an evident toll on the troops.
Flames wrapped around the Onions and the ship's crash landing site. Without hesitation, a few Pikmin went as far as to throw themselves onto the fire. Olimar might have been shocked, had they not been Red Pikmin. Said reds flopped up and down on the fire as if they were fish, in hopes of subduing the flames.
Spoiler alert.
It did not work. While the flames flickered under the Pikmin, the fire kept on burning. A few yellows would attempt reaching the Onions by tossing each other over the walls of flames, but that would hardly work, as they would just come back with flaming flower buds. Their burns were treated with Red Pikmin flopping up and down on their flowers, which, surprisingly, worked out well for them. Eventually, the ring of fire intensified to a point where every flammable Pikmin out there started to collect themselves into a single group, sweating as the burning began advancing on them.
Luckily for them, a saving grace seemed to have appeared. Through one opening in the ring of flames that led into a miniature gully, a collection of blues rushed with small pails of water. As they rushed heroically onto the scene, Louie popped over by Olimar, gave him a good morning wave, and almost popped his own eyes out when he stared at the fire approaching slowly but surely. It seemed as though the blues might be on the trail to extinguishing the fire.
The blues made a beeline straight for the outer rim of the ring, then turned. The two captains only grew terrified when they noticed one thing. They were headed for the ship. Glancing down, the two noticed a spark of electricity buzzing from a scratch in the ship's side. Electric wires sparked onto a knot of grass, creating a makeshift bonfire. Lacking knowledge of how exactly electricity conducts water, they approached the wires, bucket raised to pour.
A shrill whistle broke out amidst all of the chaos. Frantically, Olimar whistled at the blues, putting all of his lung power into ensuring that they would stay as far away from the electricity as possible. The would be firefighters lowered the bucket. Olimar laid a hand on the side of the ship, raising himself out of the cockpit, standing on top of the ship a moment later. He stared at the ragtag group of panicking PikPik carrot lookalikes, glaring at them. He raised one hand, and pointed towards the blues. A rallying horn caught their attention, and soon, they found themselves making their way over the Onions slowly, following the leader's finger.
They caught on quickly enough, and began extinguishing the fire around their small root-like homes. Next on his roll call, Olimar turned to the yellows, whistling, pointing directly down towards the ripped cables sticking out of the ship. They nodded wholeheartedly, and advanced on the wires, dodging the fire. As they reached the lines of electricity, they pushed it back inside the ship, and one after another, formed a new wire using their own bodies, the yellows flashing. The engines sputtered.
Leaping off of the side of the ship, Olimar glanced at the reds, specifically those pretending to be a fish out of water. They ceased their pointless floundering, glancing at Olimar curiously. Pointing at the flames, the captain with a red antenna signaled for the fire. The Pikmin obeyed, and suddenly, a flood of crimson engulfed the flames as Red Pikmin quite literally fought the fire, smouldering it with smacks and hits, their fire-retardant bodies deflecting heat left and right.
Watching from a safe distance, Louie gazed in awe from the lopsided ship. That would be fixed soon enough, as dirt fell from the nose cone. The hungry captain found himself falling back in the cockpit as the ship hovered upwards, righting itself, then landing back on the dirt, the nose cone spinning about, scattering dirt, looking surprisingly shiny for something that slammed into the ground from high above this distant planet's ground.
The reds battled the flames with fists and stems, the yellows held the ship together, and the blues poured for what seemed like an eternity. Or about thirty minutes at the longest.
A few stressful minutes later, the remnants of the crash were gone nix for a handful of scorch marks littering the ground. But despite that, both of the captains, the ship, and the brave little Pikmin sitting about. They sighed, sitting in the shade of the Onions, a few resting in the grass, no matter how burnt it actually was. Sitting by the side of the ship with a few parts of his suit covered in soot, Olimar wrote in a pad with a stylus.
"It's amazing, really. The combined efforts of the Pikmin were astounding, it brings me back, to be certain." He finished, depositing his stylus in his suit's pockets, sighing, staring at the sun as it hovered just above the planet.
He briefly reflected on the accident that all led to this. Funnily enough, while the Pikmin and he made mistakes, they would fix them in an instant. He had made a mistake, whether it was his direct fault or not, by crash landing here. Was it really a mistake though? ...Maybe he was trying to hard to be philosophical. But even then, as Olimar rested up by the ship, perhaps that was closer to the truth than he might think. For the rest of the day, the whole lot of them would bask in the light of day, resting their batteries.
Speaking of which, they would have quite a bit of trouble with said batteries when Louie would decide to try and turn on appliances in the ship.
AN: Apologies for the delay. You ever look at the sunset cutscene and wonder how the ship manages to escape scot free despite being under siege by a bunch of creatures? I thought I might take a more probable approach.
Thanks Piston24 for reviewing! Glad I could provide something that might explain having a whole load of PikPik carrots to throw at wild animals.
All jokes aside, thanks for reading, this is ThePizzaLovingTurtle, off to feast on food because I'm hungry, see you.
