A/N: This chapter has been in the making for a while now. First I needed to get there on Super Mario Galaxy, and play through it again, so that I knew what to base this chapter on. That didn't take long, but then some real life stuff got in the way. Now that I have free time again, I can finish this chapter!

Oh, and if you haven't checked it out yet, a new story of mine based on Super Smash Bros was released recently! It's called "A Smashin' Time!" Anyways, to the chapter!

Chapter 21: Gusty Garden Galaxy

"Wow! What a view!" Popo said.

"Um... That's a space dump. It's where aliens dump their trash." Captain Toad said, holding the steering wheel.

"What? No it isn't!" Popo looked closer. "If it is, then why are there huge piles of shiny stuff?"

Captain Toad chuckled. "That's alien poop."

Popo didn't respond.

The four hunters, Ness, Toon Link, Diddy, and Popo, had convinced Captain Toad to fly them to Gusty Garden Galaxy. Captain Toad could never deny some young adventurers dream of treasure!

"Look! I think that's it!" Ness pointed to a collection of green planets, filled with huge flowers.

"Yep!" Toad said. "We'll be there in a couple of minutes."

As they got closer and closer to the galaxy, the sky turned from the black, star-filled sky of space to a cloudy, blue sky. The galaxy was much larger than what Super Mario Galaxy showed it to be.

"Well... Where do we start?" Ness asked.

"Eee aaaa oooo!" Diddy Kong started waving his arms. In his hand was a map.

The three kids circled around him. The map was crudely drawn on a dirty brown paper, with yellowish stains on it. The map had an outline of the galaxy. Diddy pointed at a single area on the map.

"The forth wall should be somewhere in that area, if it's here in the first place. It's had a lot of existanal activity, especially recently." Toon Link said.

"Does that mean that someone else is looking for it too?" Popo asked.

"Not likely. If anyone else is looking for it, they would've had to seen my research." Toon Link said. "Anyways, let's split up to search faster. I'll take this cluster of planets." He pointed far off to a bunch of planets, filled with flowers and giant petals, with a cubic planet in the distance.

"Alright, I'll take that cluster of planets." Ness pointed to a bunch of giant planets that looked like apples and a planet with a giant tree.

"So... What should I search?" Popo asked.

"Search those ones over there." Toon Link said. He pointed to some planets that looked very out of place. It was a bunch of man made blocks with question marks on it. Cannons were everywhere.

"Great..." Popo sighed.

"Aaahh ooooo eeeee!" Diddy Kong pointed to a planet with a giant tree on it.

"Alright, you'll have that one." Toon Link clapped his hands together. "I think that's everywhere! Here," he gave each of them a walkie-talkie. "If you find anything suspicious, tell the others."

With that, Captain Toad dropped them off at their separate locations, and they began their search.

On a different planet in the galaxy, someone was watching them. "You're playing a very dangerous game... Kiddos." The figure snapped his/her fingers, and his/her teleported away in a flash of bright white light. I'm saying his/her because I don't know who this person is yet, but you didn't hear that from me...

Toon Link

Toon Link had arrived at his destination first. On the planet he arrived at, a couple of bunnies were bouncing around. Seeing him, they waved, and continued playing in the flowers.

Toon Link noticed a blue-green crystal behind them, with a couple of shiny things encased in it. Being the adventurer (and hoarder) that he was, he took out a bomb and blew it up. The shiny gem-like things inside of it flew out and landed near his feet.

"What is this?" Toon Link took it in his hands. It smelled nice. "I keep it. You never know when we'll need these... Things." He pocketed them, and noticed more falling from the sky. "Weird."

Getting back to the task at hand, Toon Link looked around. He found nothing. There was another planet nearby, but it was far enough away for Toon Link to not be able to jump there, or hookshot there.

The bunnies saw him eyeing the other planet in confusion, and hopped over to him. "Hey! I'm a bunny!"

Toon Link looked at it. "Yes... Good to know." His eyes were still focused on the planet.

"You wanna get there?" The bunny pointed it's ear to the other planet. Which looked very similar to the planet they were currently on.

Toon Link nodded.

"Then follow me!" The bunny walked up to one of three giant pink flowers, and spun in a circle, the three flowers were uprooted, and started being pushed by the strong winds to the other planet. The rabbit grabbed one of them, and went to the other planet.

"Whoa!" Toon Link grabbed onto one of them, said a quick prayer, and jumped off the planet, into the open sky.

Have you ever woken up from a dream where you're falling, and your whole body kinda spasms for a split second when you open your eyes?

Well, that's exactly what Toon Link experienced when he was lifted into the air, times a thousand, for a full three seconds. It was pretty bad.

But, after Toon Link finished pooping his pants (metaphorically, of course), he opened his eyes. He was only moving a at a whopping five miles an hour. "Oh."

Landing on the next planet, Toon Link noticed a few metal plates on the ground. They opened up, and some mole-like creatures popped out. "Foe?" The mole said, looking at him. "Or enemy?"

"Uh..." Toon Link was about to say something when the mole started pelting him with... wrenches? "Hey! Cut that out!" When he ran to the mole, the mole hid underneath the metal plate.

Toon Link just kept on trekking through the small planet as he was pelted over and over again by different tools. After an eternity, and a couple of bruises, he reached a flowery plane. The bunny was there, leaning against a vine that swirled up towards the air.

"Over here!" The bunny grabbed onto the vine and climbed across it. The vine led to another planet, which had one of those famous launch stars that Mario had told him about. Excitement filled Toon Link when he saw it, and he climbed across the vine quickly.

Landing on the small island, Toon Link looked at the launch star. He slowly approached it, and it automatically sucked him in, and soon he was levitating in the center of it. "Whoa!" Toon Link looked at the star swirling around him. All he needed to do was spin, and he would be launched to who knows where!

He prepared his best spin attack, took a deep breath, and let loose. The launch star launched him away at a breathtaking speed towards the cubic planet. He had never felt more alive! Well, the time Link brought him on a Loftwing ride was came pretty close. But to actually feel as if you were flying...! He finally understood why Pit wanted to fly by himself so much.

When he touched down, he took half a heart of fall damage. Hehe.

Anyways, when he landed, he found a bunny in front of him. He was pretty sure it was the same bunny as before. "Oh. Hello again!" Toon Link waved.

"Again?" The bunny sniffed the air. "You smell like my brother, Bun Bun."

"Bun Bun?" Toon Link nodded. "Not bad."

"Yeah..." The bunny grimaced. "Anyways, why are you here? If you want the shiny thing, it's already been taken!" The bunny gave him an adorably mean face.

"I'm just looking for this... thing..." Toon Link didn't want to tell him the actual reason he was here. It would just slow him down!

"Oh! You mean that thing!" The bunny said. "Well, you can't have it! Unless... You can catch me!" The bunny ran away, into the maze of the cubic planet.

"Well, it's the only lead I got so far... What could go wrong?" Toon Link said, completely unaware of the irony and foreshadowing of that sentence as he rushed forward to look for the bunny.

Ness

"Wow! That's a lot of apples!" Ness said as he tried to bite the ground. Said act was harder than he thought it would be. When he finally managed to scrape a bit off and put it in his mouth, he did a double take. "Why couldn't Olimar's garden grow these instead?" He started eating more and more.

Sure he was eating the ground, but if he was willing to eat a hamburger out of a trashcan, this was nothing!

While he had eaten bear the center of the apple, he reached a layer of something that was definitely not apple. It was squishy, and green, and slimy...

"What the heck is this?" Ness poked it. There was a deep rumbling sound from within it. The green bulge started to shuffle and... move! Ness climbed out of the whole he had eaten in panic, and watched as part of a giant caterpillar slithered out of the apple hole.

"Whooooooooo arrrrreeee yoooouuuuuuuu?" The caterpillar said. His voice was deep and slow, as if he had just woken up and was still half-asleep. It was also very nasally.

"Um... Who are you?" Ness asked back. He wiped his face from the apple juice.

"Well... Uh..." The caterpillar thought for a little bit. Eventually he eyebrows shot up. "Oh yeah! I'm a caterpillar." He smiled, looking quite content with himself.

"Oh.. Cool." Ness said. "Well, thanks Mr. Caterpillar, but I think I gotta go..." He started to head off, but realized that he had no way to get to the other planets.

"I'll help you leave... If you can do one thing for me..." The caterpillar looked at Ness with one eye, as if challenging Ness to take his challenge.

"Alright." Ness shrugged.

"Good! You have to... Pass my test!" In a tornado of changing, the caterpillar changed into a tuxedo. A gold, shiny tuxedo. Ness felt the ground rumble beneath him, and saw reality start shifting as they were transported to a stereotypical game shown theatre.

"Hello and welcome to 'How Well Do You Know Your Video Games!'" The caterpillar waved, with his nonexistent arms. A crowd of toads, goombas, koopas, and all sorts of Mario enemies cheered. "A game about your knowledge, of video games!"

Ness was confused. "What are video games?"

The caterpillar laughed. "All in good time, adventurer. Now then... This game show consists of a barrage of questions about video games! Get them all right and you can move on! But if you don't... Then I guess your adventure ends here!" The audience laughed.

Ness was really confused. How does he know about my adventure?

"Alright, to the first question!" The caterpillar cleared his throat as the lights turned off, except for a spotlight on Ness. "What year was the arcade game 'Donkey Kong' released?"

Ness looked at the board. There were four choices:

A)1899

B)74917332991747919482

C)293 B.C

D)1981

Ness thought to himself. Donkey Kong? They have a 'video game' named after a giant ape?

The caterpillar chuckled when he saw Ness being confused. "I'd hurry if I were you. You have ten seconds."

Ness started to panic yet again. 'Donkey Kong' starts with the letter D... So let's pick that.

"The answer is D! 1981!" Ness said.

"Correct!" The caterpillar nodded. "At the last second too! I have to warn you, though, it'll only get harder from here!"

Ness gulped, and prepared for the challenge ahead.

Popo

Well, at least it can't get any worse... Popo thought as he hid behind a coin. For the past five minutes, he had been hitting his head trying to flip gravity and had been assaulted by a swarm of goombas, and now he was being bombarded by a bunch of cannonballs too.

He yelped as another cannonball had blown up next to him, lighting a nearby goomba on fire. Looking over the coin, he saw another volley of cannonballs heading towards him. "Oh no..."

He clenched his buttocks as the cannonballs slammed against the coin-shield. The coin was strangely resilient. Boom! Boom! Boom! The third cannonball shattered the coin, leaving the poor mountain climber defenseless. Two more cannonballs closed in.

Popo sprang to his feet. He had to act fast or he'd end up like Ike and Link after the Christmas party. Or Falco and Captain Falcon after their race, or Marth after Ike and Link got their revenge, or... I could go on and on.

Closing his eyes, he swung his hammer, and hoped for the best.

While the cannonball should've exploded on impact since it has before, this is a story. Therefore, it rebounded off his hammer right into the other cannonball, making them explode mid-air.

"Whew." Popo panted. He looked over, and saw the cannons in the distance. He decided to make a run for it, and jumped over the cannons right before they shot again, onto safe ground.

Looking ahead of him, was nothing. There were no more platforms; there was just a giant expanse of sky. Sighing, he turned around to head in a different direction. But, something shiny caught his eye. In the corner of the platform was a shiny blue orb, about the size of his head. Looking into it, he saw some weird footage. It was Mario, going through the ordeal that Popo had just gone through, with a little more grace than the mountain climber.

But, something about it was weird. The view was from behind Mario, and there was a little blue star thing that flew around everywhere. When it went over the star bits, the star bits flew into Mario. But it moved in... 2-D? Upon closer inspection, Popo deduced that it was not really there at all, but it was some otherworldly force that helped Mario. Yeah... Popo's quite smart himself.

Popo felt himself gravitating toward the blue orb. He held out his hand, and slowly reached for it. The next thing he saw was a blinding white light...

Diddy Kong

Diddy Kong was having a whale of a time. Not really. When he landed on the tree island, he was soon attacked by a giant mole wearing a blue helmet that with spikes across the rim of it. It was burrowing underground and popped out at him every once in a while in an attempt to slash him.

His attacks were slow and easily avoidable, but Diddy Kong was getting tired, fast. He needed to find a way to beat this guy soon.

Ookeee ookeee ooo (what do I do?)? Diddy Kong ran around, dodging another one of his claw attacks. He climbed up the giant tree on the flat side of the planet, hoping that the mole would not be able to get him from here.

Fortunately, the giant mole couldn't reach him from here. But, soon enough the mole was bashing the tree in a rage. "Come down from there! Cmon!" He had a deep, squeaky voice. Yep. Indeed.

"Never!" Diddy screamed. "I mean... Ook Ook!" He clung on for dear life.

"Please!" He bashed and bashed at the tree. Soon, a tree was lurching back and forth, and Diddy was thrown into the air. Luckily, he managed to grab onto a stray branch. Diddy tried to hold on, but he could feel his grip loosening.

"Come down NOWW!" He wound up his paws one last time, and slammed them at full force into the tree. Diddy was thrown into the air. He didn't find any branches this time. He opened his eyes, to see the ground approaching him, fast. He closed his eyes, and waited for the impact...

Ness

Ness didn't mean to brag, but he was literally the best ever. He had been guessing the entire game, and had gotten every single one of them right! The questions made no sense, so he chose the answers that made the least sense to him.

"Alright! This is the last question! Get this correct, and you get to continue your quest for the fourth wall!" The caterpillar question for a drum roll, which was done, crudely, by a goomba with a koopa shell. "Ahem... What is the name of your creator?" The choices flashed on the screen.

A)Ness's Mom

B)Ness's Dad

C)Sanic

D)Nintendo

Ness was confused. "Creator? What do you mean by that?"

The caterpillar did not answer, but Ness already had an idea of what it could mean. Then again, his so called ideas were just conspiracy theories created for the fun of it.

But isn't this whole quest just a conspiracy theory?

Ness thought about it. It definitely was not A or B. While that was the logical choice, this was a game show. The last question was always a trick question. He had heard rumors about a mythical creature called Sanic, but whenever he asked about it, he was told to ask Sonic. When he asked Sonic, he would always start crying. Neither he nor Sonic knew why.

Maybe Sanic is connected to the fourth wall...? Nah. Ness moved on to choice D:Nintendo. He had never heard the name in his life, but it seemed familiar. It had a sort of mythical vibe to it. He quite liked the name. That's why it had to be right!

"D! Nintendo!" Ness yelled triumphantly. When he said it, he felt a chill go up his spine.

"Correct!" The caterpillar threw up his hands. "We have a winner!" The crowds started cheering, and confetti was blasted everywhere. Ness soaked up his victory, doing poses and singing "I Am The Champion" at the top of his lungs.

"Now, follow me..." The caterpillar snapped his hands(?) and a tunnel appeared at the wall in front of him. It radiated a white light so bright that that Ness couldn't see what was on the other side, try as he might.

Rhyme.

Oh yeah.

Ness gulped. His heart skipped a beat.

Before he let his mind convince him otherwise, he walked into the light.

Toon Link

"Come back here!" Toon Link had been chasing the bunnies for weeks! Days. Hours. Minutes.

He was getting tired of getting tired. Having run out of chocolate rations long ago, he was only crawling towards the bunny.

"Please... Wait!" Toon Link yelled, collapsing on the floor. The bunny stopped a few feet in front of him, just out of reach.

"Aw... What's the matter? Can't handle all of this?!" The bunny flexed its ears. "Aw ye..." The bunny hopped away.

Toon Link scrambled to his feet. "There's gotta be another way to catch this thing..." He emptied the contents of his pockets. Bombs, arrows, a rabbit catching manuel, rabbit catching traps, a rabbit magnet... Nothing that would help him.

The bunny had hopped back to Toon Link. This time, it said nothing. It just shook its head and started hopping away.

For some reason, this made Toon Link angrier than the constant insults that the bunny had thrown at him. He hated being ignored.

He grabbed the only thing left in his pocket, which happened to be his clawshot. With a single shot, he grabbed the bunny's butt with the clawshot, and dragged him in.

"Finally! I have caught the beast!" Toon Link yelled, raising the bunny in an even more grand way than when he pulled out the master sword.

However, his victory was short lived, for the ground soon started shaking beneath him. The bunny hopped out of his arms as a hole in the ground opened up beneath him. Instead of leading to the other side like the other holes had, this one ended in a bright white light.

Toon Link screamed his very distinct scream as he flew into the white light...