It Came from Lucina's Head

Chapter 13: The Fourth Encounter

By the time Lucina closed her eyes, Robin had already fallen asleep. She had been lying in her bed for almost two hours, her mind a constant rush of thoughts as she wondered what ungodly horror would decide to pay her a visit tonight.

For now, in the darkness of her hospital room, it was safe to assume the worst.

When Shulk told her about his sick and twisted vision, she didn't want to believe it. She knew she had to, however, due to his uncanny ability to accurately foresee the future. Captain Falcon nearly blew a fuse when he heard what the Homs had to say and was fully willing to interrogate every resident of the mansion (including the Waddle Dees) in order to find out who this potential "murderer" could be. It was highly recommended by Shulk that they revise their current plan of having Robin stay in Lucina's room in favor of something more secure, such as moving her to a room that had no windows, or having multiple Smashers guard her while she slept.

Robin of course dismissed such proposals and decided to come up with his own way of remedying the situation. The mage had given Lucina a bell to string around her wrist during the night. Should something unexpected come up, or should she find herself being attacked by one of those monsters just like before, all she had to do was ring the bell, to which Robin would immediately wake up and promptly break her free from her nightmare. There was no doubt in his mind that as long as Lucina was awake, the creatures in her dreams could not attack her. Therefore, the final solution became more of a backup "alarm clock" of sorts, as well as providing the natural safety net of someone else being in the room with her.

Lucina glanced over at the Smasher in the other bed before staring at the small bell on her left wrist. The bell itself was quite the peculiar little thing, resembling the type of jingle bells one would see and hear around Christmas time. Even more interesting was the fact that the bell would not make a sound if she moved her arm around naturally, but the moment she tried shaking her hand about, the chiming was so loud, it could probably be heard from the next room over. This was so demonstrated by Robin when he gave her the bell before bed time. "If you're in trouble, just ring the bell and I'll wake you up," he had said. Indeed, his words were very comforting, but that still didn't change the fact that whether she liked it or not, someone or something was going to show itself tonight.

Lucina began tossing and turning just like she had done in the previous night, occasionally looking over at Robin who seemed to be in a deep sleep. She noticed that he had left his enchanted Levin Sword lying idly on the nightstand between their beds. He had said something to her earlier about borrowing it if she absolutely needed to defend herself from an intruder. He strongly stated, however, that she was only to use it as a last resort, or basically if the bell plan were to fail for some reason. Lucina wasn't very well-versed in magic, but at the end of the day, a sword was just a sword. Being without a weapon of her own really did make her feel crippled, so she was thankful to have a dependable friend like Robin to rely on.

Oddly enough, Captain Falcon was the only one who was so strongly against Robin sleeping in Lucina's room. Truth be told, Lucina wasn't quite sure of the reason, but she figured that it had to do with Falcon's given chemistry with Robin. She knew they weren't particularly close (or even good friends for that matter) but something about the way they talked to each other made her feel a little uneasy. She'd always known Falcon to be the outgoing type who got along with any Smasher who didn't categorize him as one of the "annoying ones." On the other hand, he could also be a jerk sometimes, but his interactions with Ike said otherwise. Those two were a bit of an odd case as well because despite their apparent differences, Ike and Falcon actually got along fairly well with each other. She knew for a fact that they were nowhere near to being close friends either. As the thoughts occurred to her, Lucina wondered if there was anyone who would call him or herself a best friend of Captain Falcon. Perhaps this was the reason why the racer had gone out of his way to ask her to watch a movie with him? For all she knew, the confident and iconic Captain Douglas J. Falcon could very well have been the loneliest resident of Smash Mansion…

Ultimately, all these strings of thoughts were the only thing preventing her from falling asleep. She found herself occasionally glancing at the security camera in the high corner of the room, wondering if R.O.B. was watching them again. The fact that there was someone behind the camera was more or less the saving grace as to why Robin was so confident in his plan. If a mysterious murderer were to show himself, the camera would undoubtedly catch the attacker in the act, to which R.O.B. would activate the mansion's alarm systems, alerting every resident of the intruder's presence. The robot had made sure to test the security system yet again after it seemingly malfunctioned during Lucina's previous struggle with the Wallmaster.

As the clock struck 2 in the morning, Lucina was beginning to wonder when these freaky nightmares were going to occur. She had her eyes closed and kept falling in and out of sleep, but the intrusive thoughts kept on persisting. A part of her just wanted to get it over with since she definitely knew it was coming. But hey, if tonight ended up being the first night in three days where she got a perfect night of sleep, then that would be totally fine with her.

"Try not to think about it," she thought. "Just go to sleep."

And eventually, she really did fall asleep, if only for a split second. For as soon as she was about doze off, an eerie humming sound coming from the door caused her to bolt upright in her bed. She glanced towards the source, noticing that the door was wide open, and that there was a strange pulsating green light coming from somewhere down the hall and making its way towards the room.

"That's strange. I thought Robin shut the door before he went to sleep?"

She glanced at the Smasher in the other bed only to realize in horror that Robin was no longer there. The bed was perfectly made, as if not a single soul had slept in it for quite some time. And naturally, this only meant one thing...

"It's the dream world again," she thought. She quickly got a hold of herself and took a deep breath. "But it's okay. All I have to do is ring the bell."

But of course, when she went to shake her arm, there was no chiming sound coming from the bell. As a matter of fact, the bell wasn't even attached to her wrist anymore. All that remained was the loose string Robin had used to tie it to her. Lucina began frantically searching the area in and around her bed for the item, all the while dreading the thought of whatever nightmarish creature could possibly be making its way to her room.

Immediately, her thoughts about Shulk's vision, Falcon's attitude, and Robin's plan had more or less gone out the window. At this point, all Lucina wanted was to get out of this nightmare and back into safe reality. And still the ominous creature kept approaching, the eerie lights becoming brighter with each passing second.

"Robin!" shouted Lucina. She began looking about the room for any sign of him. "Robin, where are you!?" The girl jumped out of bed, her bare feet landing on the cold hard floor.

Upon standing up, Lucina noticed that a thick layer of fog had somehow lingered into the room from the hall. This fog, however, remained close to the ground and silently crept across the floor. The white and cloudy matter was high enough for Lucina's feet to be completely hidden by it, but that didn't stop the fact that the continuous humming was getting louder and the continuous light was getting brighter. She braced herself, wondering what on earth she would have to fight now, but not before noticing that Robin's Levin Sword was still on the nightstand. Instinctively, she reached for the jagged weapon, swinging it about a few times to get a feel for its weight. The sword was slightly lighter than the Falchion, but it was also significantly shorter, meaning that she was really going to have to gauge her distance with this new foe.

After readying her blade, she turned towards the door only to come face to face with her new enemy. Truthfully, this monster was the most bizarre thing she had ever come across in her dreams.

The creature's body composed of nothing but a large floating eye, with various strands of some red and stringy substance dangling from various parts of its surface area. As it levitated eerily, the strange humming noise became quite loud, and the source of the green light seemed to be emanating from its center. Also, it was almost impossible to notice that the fog drifting into the room appeared to be coming from the floating eye, descending off the top of its head and seeping onto the floor as if a continuous bucket of water had been dumped on it.

"Begone monster!" shouted Lucina as she swung the Levin Sword aggressively.

The floating eyeball continued to stare at the swordswoman, seemingly unfazed by her apparent threats. The humming noise refused to cease, and Lucina could feel her head start to ache at the nonstop buzzing. She glanced at the camera in the room, wondering if it was possible for R.O.B. to see anything that was going on right now.

That was when the monster struck.

The red and stringy strands began levitating before vibrating violently. Sudden sparks of electricity began surging through the eyeball's body before an electric bolt shot from its center. Lucina quickly reacted and deflected the shot with the sword, but the sheer force of the attack caused her to stumble back a bit.

"What kind of creature is this?" she thought to herself as the monster began charging another attack.

The monster reeled back and fired another shot, this time forcing Lucina to summersault into a dodge, the lightning bolt zipping past her and striking her bed as a result. The bed immediately disintegrated into nothingness, leaving no traces of it behind but a pile of ashes. Lucina picked herself up off the ground, holding the sword out in front of her in defense.

"It attacks with concentrated electricity. One wrong move and I'm done for."

She charged forward, preparing to execute her signature Shield Breaker attack on the target. The eyeball maneuvered out of the way, using its midair momentum to strike her in the side with one of its whip-like strands. The lash stung like a knife, and was multiplied tenfold due to the fact that Lucina was only dressed in her hospital gown. She suddenly regretted not coming into this night more personally prepared. She put a hand to her side, only to see her palm covered in blood. And still the creeping fog continued to icily roll over her feet.

The floating eye quickly set itself up for a new attack as it began rapidly spinning the red tendons on its body, and amplifying the sound of the humming noise into a whirling buzz saw. The noise was excruciating to the ears as Lucina quickly found herself trying to block her eardrums from the assault. The rapidly spinning wires soon began simulating spinning blades as the creature began approaching her with every intention of cutting her up into little tiny pieces.

"Not today!"

The creature sprung forward with a blade, but Lucina was quick enough to block it. The blade was whirling so fast that sparks began to fly as the metal connected, pushing Lucina back against the wall forcefully. She looked up to see the eyeball charging at her again.

Fortunately, she was able to pull off a perfect Counter, deflecting the monster's attack back at it, and sending it into a chaotic frenzy in the air. Lucina squinted as the green light pierced her eyes, but she fought through it and retaliated with a slash of her sword, knocking the creature off balance yet again and sending it spiraling before it landed on the ground. The humming sound began to die down as the creature's eye started spinning around in a dizzy state. Sparks of electricity began shooting off in different directions as it tried to lock onto the swordswoman, forcing Lucina to duck in case of being struck by a stray bolt.

"I've got to end this now before it gets another chance to attack!"

Lucina stood tall and held the Levin Sword in front of her, using the magic infused within the blade to absorb the spasmodic lightning bolts. She began to approach the dazed creature, the electric strikes dying down as the monster started regaining control of itself. The eyeball monster only had a few seconds to think before it realized how close Lucina was to it. She quickly reeled back and stabbed the jagged blade into the center of the eye, plunging it so deep that the tip of the sword punctured through the other end of it. The monster began reeling and shrieking in pain as the crimson wires surrounding it began to spasm violently, the humming and buzzing noises now becoming uncomfortably loud. Lucina didn't stop there however, as she grabbed the hilt tightly with both hands and began twisting as hard as she could, pushing the blade deeper and deeper into the eye of the creature, forcing it to cry out even louder.

"Return to the hell from whence you came!" shouted Lucina as blood spurted from the monster's eye onto her face. "And never set foot in my dreams again!"

The monster shrieked and howled, but Lucina did not let up. She continued to push and push with all her might, refusing to show any sign of mercy to the creatures that had been torturing her these past few nights. She closed her eyes and cried, praying that this final attack would save her from the nightmares once and for all.

That is, until she felt someone grab her wrist.

"Lucina!"

Lucina's eye shot open and she froze. She was standing in the dark hospital room like before, only the eyeball creature was nowhere to be found. There was no icy fog, eerie green light, or irritating humming sound. There was, however, flashing red lights going off in every room of the mansion, the sound of an alarm signifying that there was indeed an emergency at hand.

She looked down to see that the hilt of the Levin Sword was still in both of her hands, only it was no longer piercing into the core of some hellish nightmare of a monster. No, instead, the blade was plunged deep into the body of someone who was lying in the bed opposite to hers. Robin's bloody hand was clenched tightly around her wrist like some sort of claw. She immediately broke free from his stone grasp, a flood of tears flowing down her cheeks as she constantly screamed, "NO!" The jagged sword stood perfectly straight as it protruded from Robin's abdomen, his face bearing an expression of empty, lifeless emotion.

The bell that he had given Lucina for protection was now lying broken and shattered on the floor.

Author's Note: I'm sorry.