Chapter Ten: The Revealing of the One

The Mysterious Dude's Office

The mysterious dude had thrown Master Hand into a nearby dungeon, telling the other smashers that he was still figuring out what to do with the smash master.

"Do you have any ideas?" he asked his assistants. They had left the dungeon and entered their secret office where they would often hold meetings.

"Um..." Gato said, "keep him in the dungeon?"

"That's boring."

"Throw him out into the wilderness?" the assistant suggested.

"Nah, he'd find his way back to the mansion too easily."

"..."

The ideas weren't exactly flowing too well. On the one hand, they knew that Master Hand would eventually overcome his fear of this place and be able to force his way out which may lead to expensive destruction and they certainly couldn't afford that. One the other hand, if they let him free, he would possibly be able to find his way back to this place and warn all the others.

Decisions, decisions.

"I think it would be a wiser idea to talk about what we're going to do with the five smashers we've imprisoned," the assistant said. They had been able to grab Young Link just a little while earlier and already threw him into the cell. During all the commotion that happened earlier, they lost sight of Mr. Game and Watch but didn't worry about him. The 2-D smasher couldn't possibly do much damage to them, right?

"Maybe you're right," the mysterious dude said, "but I don't trust all those smashers there with their leader in the same room."

Gato nodded. "Can't blame you. But honestly, what could they possibly be doing now?"

"Why don't we find out?" the mysterious one grinned, heading towards the dungeon. It wasn't their most productive meeting, but hopefully they'd find something more entertaining and worthwhile where their captives were being held.

In the Dungeon

When Young Link arrived, the others caught him up on what was going on.

"We still don't know exactly what they're planning on doing with us," Pikachu said, "but hopefully it won't be too bad."

"We sent out pairs of smashers to look for you guys," Young Link said, "I don't know if any of the others have any leads on where we are."

"They probably won't," Master Hand spoke up, "this place feels like it's underground somewhere."

"What are you doing here anyway?" Young Link asked.

"..." Master Hand turned around, refusing to reply.

"I'd like to know the same thing," Mr. Game and Watch said, wandering around outside the two cells, "but I'm too gleeful just wandering around in freedom."

"Have you found any way out yet?" Kirby asked.

"Nope," Mr. Game and Watch replied, "at least not for you guys. I'm sure I could squeeze out between the doors or something."

"You should," Pichu said, "and then go and bug the evil people."

"And then hide along the walls afterward? Sounds like fun!"

The door to the dungeon opened.

"Well, well, well," the mysterious dude walked in, "what do we have here?"

"Um...six smashers and a giant hand?" his assistant replied.

"What do you want with us?" Young Link asked.

"I..." the mysterious dude paused, "well, we're not sure entirely, but we'll figure that out eventually. I was just trying to figure out what to do with that thing." He pointed towards Master Hand's cell.

"You won't get away with this!" Master Hand growled.

"That's what they all say," the mysterious dude said, "and usually they're right. But I am different and will succeed."

"Sure you will," Watch said.

The mysterious dude narrowed his eyes. "We shall capture you someday and throw you into a cell from which you cannot ever escape!"

"Uh huh," Watch said, "I'd love to see that happen."

"Who exactly are you anyway?" Jigglypuff asked.

"..." the mysterious dude stared at the small smasher.

"Well," he began, "I guess it wouldn't hurt to tell you. I am the Omnipresent netherworld engineer. 'One' for short. Some people call me the mysterious one."

"Okay..." Kirby said, "and what would you need us for?"

"I work for a netherworld toy company," the One said, "they call it 'The Toy Company.' I don't know why such an uncreative name, but we come up with toys to entertain all the little demons there."

"Wait, are you gonna sell us as toys to the demons?" Pikachu asked.

"...that might be good," the One said.

"Or are you going to use us as models for future toys?" Young Link said.

"...that also might be good."

"How about forcing us to work in the toy factories?" Kirby said.

"...that is also a good suggestion."

"Are you really omnipresent?" Pichu randomly asked.

"..."

"No!" Master Hand said, "You can't take them to the netherworld of yours. We need them for tournaments in the mansion!"

The One turned to face the smash leader. "Can't you just request their worlds to send other heroes or something?"

"...well..."

"Sir," One's assistant spoke up, "may I leave? I would like to see whether we've gotten any new messages from the company's owner or not."

"Yeah, sure, you may go," the One replied, "I better not catch you doing something else though."

"...yes, sir," and with that the assistant left.

"I think we've got some wonderful ideas here," the One said, "does anyone else have any suggestions?"

"Oh, I know, I know!" Pichu said, "Why don't you take us to the factory, let us pick out our favorite toys, and then send us back to the mansion where we can play with them all day and all night?"

"...you're kidding right?"

"If we show all the wonderful toys to the other smashers they may want to buy them too," Pichu pointed out, "and then you can sell more and more and more with the more exposure they get."

The One and Gato exchanged glances. They hadn't thought about something like that before. They had always thought there would be lots of torture and hatred involved with this little scheme, but getting higher profits was actually kind of appealing...

"Advertise for us," the One said, "that sounds like a perfect plan! Too bad three of you are Pokemon...darn, I should ordered a bigger variety of smashers."

"Maybe we could just exchange them?" Gato suggested, "You know, go over to the mansion, ask if any of them is willing to trade places with one of these five smashers."

"Six," Watch said.

"That sounds like a wonderful idea," the One said, turning to face Master Hand, "and you should be the one to suggest it at the mansion."

"Me?"

"Yes, you. You have the ability to address them all simultaneously, right? Through your intercom system or whatever. Just explain the situation we're in and then report back here with the results."

"And what would happen if I failed?"

"Then we'll go with one of the more diabolical suggestions presented to us."

"Oh."

"It would be nice to have more than five smashers but I guess we can start with five then move up eventually. See if it works at all."

"Alright, I'll do that...if you let me out, that is."

The One nodded and released Master Hand from his cell, teleporting the smash master back to the mansion.

In Some Random Area

Marth finally found out where the piranha plant had gone to. Apparently it had tried traveling underground but hit the wall of the tower nearby, knocking it out.

"Great!" Popo said, "Now how can we get Nana back?"

"Why don't we dig up the entire plant?" Mario suggested.

"Sure, why not?" Roy said, "It's not like we have anything else to do."

After a short while, they unearthed the entire plant but couldn't find the other ice climber anywhere near it.

"Weird," Falco said, "do you think Nana's been digested or whatever?"

"No!" Popo yelled, falling to his knees, "That can't be!"

"Maybe it was a teleportation plant and Nana's now somewhere really random?" Captain Falcon suggested.

"A teleporting piranha plant?" Luigi asked, "I've never heard of that before."

"Anything's possible," Captain Falcon shrugged.

"Let's just keep digging around here and see what we can find," Link said.

Everyone nodded and continued their search for the lost smasher.

Ness

Ness had managed to find the right direction to the mansion. He breathed a sigh of relief when he spotted it.

"Finally," he said, "I can tell the others what happened to Young Link!"

Just as he started heading towards the mansion, someone bumped into him.

"Hey, watch it!" Ness said, his eyes widening when he realized who it was, "Bowser? What are you doing here?"

"Just wandering," Bowser replied, "Nana got eaten by a piranha plant and so Popo and some others were trying to find her. I think she was killed though."

"Oh," Ness said, "that's no good."

"Eh, it's just whatever," Bowser shrugged, "I'm heading back to the mansion now. You coming?"

"You're heading back? But everyone there is looking for you...they'll be mad."

"So what? I can handle them."

"Wait a second...what happened to Pichu and the others? What did you all do with them?"

"Oh, some guy wanted them so we sent them to him."

"..."

"I don't know all the details but we kind of ditched him so...yeah."

"..."

"Believe me, I don't know anything else and I don't really care to either."

"...wow..." was all Ness could say. He decided to head back to the mansion with Bowser, hoping it would be a bit safer there after what happened to Young Link.

Peach and Zelda

After resting, they were successfully able to retrace their steps back to the mansion.

"I wonder if anyone else has found anything useful yet?" Peach said.

"I hope so," Zelda said.

As they walked back to the mansion they noticed Ness and Bowser entering the front door.

"Bowser's back?" Peach said, "That's no good."

Zelda's eyes widened. "Do you think he's taken Ness prisoner? And is now going to take everyone else prisoner?"

"I hope not...let's hurry up and get inside!"

In the Mansion

The smashers looked around in Master Hand's lair but couldn't find him or Game and Watch.

"That's bizarre," Dr. Mario said, "do you think he was behind all of this?"

"I wouldn't be surprised," Mewtwo said, "we never know what he's up to."

"So now what are we going to do?" Yoshi asked.

"I could see what the others are up to," Fox said, "none of them so far have reported back. I'll just fly above the woods and see if I can find them."

"Good idea," Dr. Mario said.

"Should the rest of us just stay here then in case they do come back?" Samus asked.

"I don't know..." Dr. Mario replied, "I feel like we should be doing something more useful."

"Why don't we just search this place for any clues?" Yoshi said, "we could even look at all the security cameras and such to see if Master Hand was talking with anyone."

"You guys could do that and I'll search the internet to see if I can find any more information about this toy company," Samus said.

"Sounds like a good plan to me," Dr. Mario said.