I do not own anything by Nintendo.
Pit/ Dark Pit/ Palutena
"Omigosh look! It's Toon Link!" yelled an excited voice. A boy all dressed in white ran up to him and began vigorously shaking his hand. Toon Link noticed amidst the onslaught two bright white wings protruding from his back.
"Do you have to assault everyone you come across, Birdbrain?" said an annoyed voice. "And why are you surprised? You knew we were meeting with him." Toon Link turned and found the source of the voice: a boy standing off to the side. He looked exactly like the boy in white, aside from the black color scheme. He seemed much crabbier.
"I just can't help it! He's famous! Everyone here is!" the white angel said, but did release his grip. Toon Link didn't know how this kid knew him since he was only famous in Hyrule. Maybe he had spies? "I'm Pit, captain of Palutena's Army!" he said grandly. Now the Hylian was convinced he had spies.
"Hard to believe you can be captain of anything, Pit stain," said the other boy.
"And Mr. Grumpypants over there is Pittoo."
"Will you stop calling me that?" said the black angel hotly. "It's Dark Pit! I'm tired of telling you."
"But Pittoo makes you sound less edgy," said Pit cheerily. He sidled up to his doppelganger and attempted to put his arm around him; instead Dark Pit punched him hard in the face. The angel fell to the ground in a flurry of feathers. Toon Link felt like maybe he was intruding on some sort of sibling fight here. Dark Pit stood with crossed arms as a bruise formed on his cheek, the exact spot where he had hit Pit. He caught the Hylian staring at it.
"That unstable hand thought it would be funny to amp up the fact that I'm his clone. Anything bad that happens to him happen to me," he explained. For emphasis, he kicked the fallen angel in the ribs. Pit yelped and Dark Pit revealed a new bruise developing on his own torso. Toon Link was glad that didn't happen to any of his multiple selves.
"Now boys, what did I tell you about hitting each other?" a feminine voice questioned. Toon Link turned to the voice and saw a tall, beautiful woman with long green hair floating toward them. She waved her staff and healed the two angels, putting Pit back on his feet as well.
"Thanks Lady Palutena!" Pit said gratefully. He scratched his head. "Aren't you supposed to be at your own meeting?
"He'll be fine. He was getting annoying with all his bragging anyways," she said nonchalantly and waved behind her.
Off in the distance, Sonic was left suspended over a small pond, screaming for his life. Palutena giggled to herself.
"I'm much more interested in this cutie here," she said to Toon Link. The Hylian felt his cheeks turn red. Pit puffed out his chest and saluted.
"This is Lady Palutena, Goddess of Light and ruler of Angel Land. She protects all that is good!" he said proudly.
At the word 'goddess', Toon Link quickly dropped to one knee. This delighted Palutena.
"Now he understands how to show the respect I deserve, unlike you two," said Palutena. She basked in the Hylian's reverence for a while.
"I do that all the time!" said a jealous Pit. Dark Pit rolled his eyes.
"Yeah but you're not as cute," she said, beckoning Toon Link to stand up. He did, still a bit unsure of how to act in her presence. "Bet you've never seen a goddess before, huh?" She smiled at him.
Toon Link thought about that. He'd met his fair share of deities in all his adventures. It was true that Link had met lots of goddesses, like Faron and Ordona. But in his adventures, he'd mainly run into gods like Valoo and Oshus. And all the frog gods. There was Ciela, who had turned out to be the Spirit of Courage and Time. He wasn't sure if she was a full goddess or demigoddess. Then there was Zelda herself, who was descended from a mortal Hylia. She clearly had lots of magical abilities and sacred power. Did that count? And what about Great Fairies? Were they demigods or just really powerful spirits? In an effort to prevent a theological discussion with himself, he just nodded his head yes.
Palutena seemed disappointed. Dark Pit found that hilarious and laughed accordingly.
"I've met lots of goddesses!" Pit boasted. Without anyone asking him to, he launched into the stories of his adventures. He told how he'd saved Palutena from Medusa's clutches in the Underworld by gathering the Three Sacred Treasures. Then, twenty-five years later, he had to fight Medusa again. (Toon Link thought he looked a lot younger than that. Maybe angels aged differently?) He had to fight lots of enemies to get to her, created Dark Pit by accident in the Mirror of Truth, and once again collected the Three Sacred Treasures. He defeated her, but it turned out she was just a puppet for the real threat, Hades. Then there was a Reset Bomb threat, a random alien invasion, the Chaos Kin debacle, and the final fight against Hades. He talked about the Power of Flight, being trapped in a ring for three years, and about the many weapons and powers Palutena granted him. And he had, in fact, met lots of goddesses. Anything he could think to mention, he did. He rambled on for a long time. Toon Link was surprised at how much the angel talked; he didn't know anyone in Hyrule that talked that much. He wondered why Palutena didn't fight Hades herself, instead making Pit do all the work. Of course, the goddesses of Hyrule always let Ganondorf ruin everything and make young boys fix it, so he just chalked it up to being a deity thing.
"Impressive right?" Pit said when he finally finished. He flexed his arms before Dark Pit punched him in the shoulder.
"You left out the part where I saved after your wings burned off!" Dark Pit growled.
"There was a lot of stuff that happened. I can't be expected to remember everything," Pit said, waving him off. Palutena stepped in before Dark Pit had the chance to throttle his doppelganger. She hastily asked Toon Link what he had gone though to earn his spot among the Smashers.
Pit's ego deflated as the number of adventures the Hylian had gone through began to tower over his own. Toon Link was sure the angel would get really upset when he learned of Link's Loftwing. Dark Pit was enjoying himself watching his double become humiliated by a mortal. Everything was going well so far. But Toon Link noticed the more adventures he rattled on, the more distracted Skyworldians appeared to get. The two angels kept flinching and Palutena looked frazzled until she finally slapped a hand to her ear. The goddess had had enough.
"Viridi! Will you stop squealing so much?" she snapped. "That is not behavior fitting for a goddess."
"Yeah that's getting really annoying," Dark Pit grumbled. Pit nodded in agreement.
Toon Link was very confused. He hadn't heard anything but Dark Pit laughing at Pit's dismay; he was sure he had good hearing. And the goddess from Pit's story was here? He looked all around but didn't see her.
Pit looked at the young swordsman's vexed face. He snapped his fingers in realization.
"Oh right! Mortals can't hear the gods like we can," he said. He listened for a moment. "Viridi says she thinks your 'adooorabllle' and wants to know if she can recruit you to the Forces of Nature."
Toon Link was sensing a theme here. He blushed and politely declined before continuing with his story. He managed to get through the rest without many more interruptions. Viridi must have still been squealing since Palutena kept sighing. When he was finished, the trio asked him a few questions before Pit complained that he was hungry. The Hylian fished around his Bag and pulled out a Hyoi Pear. It worked earlier with Charizard and he wanted to see if the angel would like it too. He was thoroughly unnerved when Pit threw it on the ground after taking it from him. But he crammed the whole thing in his mouth before asking for another, so his experiment was a success? He ate several more pears before Dark Pit intervened.
"Stop giving him those or we'll be here all day," he said. He snatched the pear out of Pit's hands and gave it back to Toon Link. Pit pouted after his stolen fruit and glanced at one of his wings sullenly. He perked up immediately.
"Oh I almost forgot! Can you sign my wings?" he asked excitedly. He flapped his puny wings emphatically. Pit produced a marker from his toga and handed it to the Hylian, offering him a wing. Sure enough, Toon Link saw several signatures scrawled all over his feathers. He wondered if they would ever wash off, the marker looked very permanent. He signed his name in his best Hylian (just Link). Dark Pit commented how his and Link's signatures looked different. It was true; Toon Link had used the script of the Great Sea while Link had used the Hylian from his own time. He was about to hand the marker back when he caught a glimpse of Pit's other wing. Ganondorf had signed his name, and judging from how thick the ink was, rather forcefully. He was appalled. Why would he have that horrible pig man's signature? Toon Link angrily scratched out the King of Evil's name. For extra emphasis, he plucked out the feathers (ignoring Pit's yelp of pain) and stomped on them.
"Aw that one took me forever to get," Pit whined, massaging his wing. "It hurt too."
"This kid's not too bad," Dark Pit smirked. Palutena giggled in agreement.
The three watched as Toon Link pulled out a Fire Arrow, burned the crumpled feathers into a little pile of ash, and blew them away with the Deku Leaf.
Endnotes
Pit and Palutena are real chatterboxes. No wonder Dark Pit's so angry all the time.
A new Kid Icarus game would be great. I just hope the controls are a little easier to use.
