A/N: Okay so if you haven't been living under a rock you probably saw the Nintendo Direct. You also probably know that Cloud Strife from Final Fantasy 7 was announced as DLC for Smash Bros. You also probably want to see my thoughts on this (because I'm a very interesting person). Well tough you'll have to wait. Enjoy chapter 35!
Robin POV
"It goes like this…" And of course it was at that point the other Robin and Lucina burst into the room, breaking through the lock.
"Were we really that oblivious to so many people following us?" Mewtwo mused. "First Palutena and now these two…I'm losing my touch."
"Robin!" The other gasped, ignoring Mewtwo and breathing heavily like he'd been running. "I saw what happened! Are you okay? Is it really you?"
"Well if you hadn't interrupted we might actually find out!" Shulk snapped. When six pairs of eyes swivelled to his he backtracked. "Um…I…I'm sorry I didn't mean that. I'm just on edge that's all. Anxious even."
"Well you have every right to be. I mean I could just be bluffing like Shulk says but allow me to explain. Trust me." Silence. "Does everyone here trust me?" I looked to each and every one of them, receiving some sort of indication they did. Shulk hesitated slightly but soon nodded his approval.
In fact the only one I didn't receive any indication from was Lucina who, in fairness, had gone to close the now busted door. She remained by it, holding it closed. I tried to make eye contact but she kept averting them. Had I done something to her as Reflet? Not all the memories had come back at once. I hope I hadn't done anything to offend her.
"So…" I began. "Let's start with the most obvious question. Do I remember what it was like to be Reflet?" No one said anything so I continued. "Yes…and no. It's very difficult to describe."
"Difficult how?" Lucario asked.
"It's like I was aware of everything she was doing and feeling but like looking through a one way mirror. Or maybe being underwater? I knew everything she was doing but I didn't have control over it. It's like…when you think you've woken up from a long sleep but you're actually still half asleep. You're aware of everything going on around you but with it all voices feeling far away and feelings…disconnected somehow. You can't move, only observe if that makes any sense." Palutena nodded.
"I think I know what you mean. I was put to sleep by Medusa but I could still communicate with Pit even though I couldn't move my real body. Was it like that?"
"Sort of. Like I said it's hard to explain. I couldn't make Reflet do anything but I think I could make her feel. Things like hope and fear."
"So like a living consciousness then?"
"Yeah…maybe."
"Is that where Reflet is now? Is she now part of your subconscious now that she's gone?"
"…I've got absolutely no idea. What I do know is she was brave in the end, perhaps braver than I would've been. She chose to die so that I might live."
"But all those things she said," Shulk countered. "Everything she said and did was to hurt other people and put others done. She said it herself that she didn't care about other people, only herself." I shook my head.
"That may be true but like I said I could feel what she felt whenever she lashed out. That's exactly what it was…lashing out. Fear leads to violence. She was just scared…so scared of losing her memories in the same way I had that she tried to keep everyone away from her so they wouldn't hurt her. She was terrified." I looked past the group and out of the window, a faraway expression on my face. "And yet she chose to die. She worked through her fear to do the right thing. Every day for the rest of my life I'll pray for her. I owe her my life." Though we said nothing aloud we all collectively bowed our heads as a mark of respect. Even Shulk joined in though I could tell he wasn't completely convinced. As if to prove that he was the first to break the silence.
"Do you remember everything then? Everything she said and did?" Again I shook my head.
"Not quite. Having a couple of days' worth of memories suddenly forced into your head does tend to disorientate you slightly. They're still pretty jumbled so it'll be a while before I can make sense of all of them. I…I apologise in advance if she…I…said or did anything to any of you that hurt you in some way."
Out of the corner I saw the faintest hint of a tremble run through Lucina. So far she'd been the only not to say anything and I got the strangest feeling she really didn't want to be here; she likely just followed in the wake of the other Robin's pursuit of our group and was forced along, I surmised. Having said that I still didn't know the reason she was so uncomfortable around me. I'd done something as Reflet, that much was clear, but I still didn't know what exactly. It must've been bad.
The faintest memory dancing around the fringes of my mind showed a few blurred images of Lucina and I being alone together but there was no more than that. A feeling of…warmth maybe? I'm sure I'd find out and make amends in time. The other Robin's voice snapped me out of my trance.
"Okay that's all well and good but I still want to know how you did it. What exactly happened between you and Ganondorf to cause you to change back?"
"I think I can guess," Palutena said, prompting Lucario and Mewtwo to round on her. Their voices weren't filled with accusation…more an enquiring tone than I expected.
"How would you know anything of the dark arts?"
"You are the goddess of light, yes? Pray do tell how you came by such knowledge of your opposite?"
"When you've dealt with Medusa and Hades as much as I've had to then you tend to pick things up. Now if you've quite finished I'd like to hear the rest of Robin's story." That tone of voice…I couldn't describe it. It wasn't pressuring exactly but I got the feeling she intended it to be. In fairness there'd been a lot of interruptions and if she hadn't basically told everyone to be quiet than Shulk would've. Still…
"Yes well…I sort of had help from Rosalina."
"I thought she couldn't interfere in our lives like that?" The other Robin exclaimed.
"It was really more of a hint than anything," I defended. "She told me who my match was against and I put two and two together I suppose."
"Yes but what exactly was the 'two and two'," he insisted. "I don't understand what I saw. It was some sort of transfer of energy I know that much but what caused it?"
"I read up on the subject last night and found that if my mind had indeed been corrupted by dark magic then exposing it to an even greater strength would wrench control away from it. There's no greater source of dark magic I can think of than Ganondorf himself."
"So wait…dark magic was the problem but adding more of it was also the solution?"
"As strange as it sounds you're completely right, Robin." I said. "Maybe I can use a metaphor or simile to explain it better. Imagine my body as a lit candle and the corrupting magic as the air that keeps the candle alight. The flame needs the air to burn, right? They all nodded. "But if the air starts to move and it becomes windy, the air will blow the candle out. That's what happened today. Too much dark magic in my body and 'POOF' it cancelled itself out."
"Or it could've ripped your body apart by the colliding forces? You were very lucky that didn't happen." Palutena pointed out. A general nod of consensus went around the room but I shook my head again.
"I thought that as well but I think Reflet was clever than all of us."
"What do you mean?"
"The safety field. All the matches we fight in have a safety grid put in place by Master Hand. The dark magic within me literally couldn't destroy my body while I was in the field so it did the only thing it could and faded out of existence.
"That's…actually very clever. Well done, Robin, for figuring it out."
"Well technically it was an alternate variation of me but yes…I suppose by transitive property I am very clever."
"…..But that doesn't answer the big question though, does it?" Shulk stressed.
"I know what you're going to ask and the reason most of you are here but I'm sorry I can't. I've got no idea who made me lose my memories."
"But I thought you said the memories were coming back to you?"
"They are," I insisted. "But most of them exist at least in some blurry image or something. "I just remember getting the note and then going into the library and…."
"Wait what note?" I dug around in my pocket before pulling it out (albeit a lot more crumpled than before). "Here." I handed it over but Mewtwo caught it with his psychic grip and levitated it in front of every one.
"To save us passing it around the room," He explained. Another general murmur of agreement. Lucina was still pretending not to be here. Seriously…what had Reflet/I done that caused her be like this. Though I felt a little bad I really wanted to bring the subject up but I knew it was neither the time nor the place. Lucario was the first to respond to the note.
"It says that 'S' was the one responsible for the note. We can assume it was written by Shadow the Hedgehog considering he was brought into the hospital wing around the same time as you."
"You think he wrote the note?"
"Actually no." All eyes turned to the other Robin. "That's actually the other reason I wanted to find you so badly, Robin. Shadow regained consciousness during your match."
"And…?"
"While he didn't experience any of the split personality you did he was still missing the memories of how he ended up in the library or who brought him there."
"Oh come!" Shulk hissed. "That's beyond unfair! The one time we might actually have decent lead in this whole mess and it gets snatched away before we've even begun."
"Calm down, Shulk," I said, placing my hand on his shoulder. He glanced around to me, his eyes filled with an indescribable pain.
"I know I should…but I just want whoever did this to you to pay." I raised an eyebrow.
"So you believe it's really me?"
"W-well…" His face reddened significantly, the blush stretching up to the tips of his ears. "I guess I do. Welcome back, Robin." I anticipated the embrace before it came but that didn't make it any less gratifying. His warm arms wrapped around me, pulling me close and I did the same to him. "I was afraid I'd lost you," he whispered into my ear. "I swear…we'll bring whoever did this to justice."
"We will together," I whispered back. "Trust me." We stayed like that, perfectly still and enjoying each other's warmth before a small cough informed us the rest of the room had been watching the whole exchange.
"Are we interrupting something?" Palutena asked playfully. The two of us sprang apart, more than a little embarrassed.
"Yes, yes how touching but if we could focus please."
"Oh…sorry," Shulk mumbled.
"You need not be. Let's move on to dealing with this situation."
"How do you propose we deal with it?"
"Let's start with what we know, shall we?"
"Well we know there's at least three of them," Shulk offered.
"You do? How?"
"I managed to control some of my visions to eavesdrop on their conversations," he explained. "There was a male and female but they were disguising their voices."
"What did they look like?" Palutena asked. Shulk's shoulders sagged.
"No idea. They appeared as silhouettes or shadows. It was hard to tell."
"You said there's a third?"
"At least but there could easily be more. They spoke about a 'spy' they had among us."
"And they didn't try to hide it," I added. "Back before when I fell asleep in the library the female outright told me they had one."
"So they want us to know then?" Lucario hypothesised, the blue aura around his paws intensifying. "But why?"
"Maybe they're over confident?"
"Or maybe it's misdirection and they don't actually have one?"
"Could be." I sighed. We were just guessing at this point, not actually making any headway. "And I'm not sure of motive either. They don't see…overtly evil."
"Agreed. From what I've been told they could've kept you under the nightmare's influence and disposed of you in one night but for some reason it's been dragged out over a period of time."
"Except the nightmares have gotten less intense as the nights have gone one, like their power is fading or something."
"But they can corrupt my Monado but not sustain dream states for a long periods of time. Overspecialisation?"
"Could be." I was right…just guessing now. Trying to beat back an ever growing feeling of desperation I turned to Lucina. "Lucina…what do you think."
"Oh." She seemed mildly surprised I'd spoken to her at all. "Um…well we don't know 'who' or 'why'."
"How about something we do know?" I shot Shulk a look before turning back to Lucina.
"We do know 'how', I believe. At least one of them is versed well in the dark arts."
"And they have a wide range of skills so maybe they aren't overspecialised at all…" The room fell silent. Shulk and I were the only ones to have actually had some form of contact with our adversaries but we'd said all of our points already.
"…" Or had we? "I…remember," I murmured.
"You do?" Shulk said, barely containing his enthusiasm. "About your attack?" I waved him off.
"No nothing like that." His face fell as quickly as it had lit up. I almost felt bad watching the brightness in his eyes fade away. Still…it couldn't be helped. "I remember what they said during our visions. 'I'm doing this for all our benefits.'" I recited.
"Our?" Who is 'our'?" Palutena asked. "The Smashers?"
"But so far they haven't helped us in any way. If anything they're the bad guys, remember?"
"So it's another group of individuals then?" The other Robin hypothesised. "The picture looks to be bigger than we thought. Do you remember anything else, Robin?" I always liked it when he used my name like that. Like we were equals.
"I owe you everything but isn't this going too far?"
"So they have doubts? How interesting."
"And it sounds like one of them is indebted to the other but won't act on their doubts because of that. What are we dealing with, exactly?"
"If we knew that none of us would be here, Palutena. Please try to keep up." She pulled a face at the genetics Pokémon (who simply turned away from her in response.)
"Anything else," Shulk asked me. "I don't think I've got anything to add to that."
"Just one. It was when I was alone with her in a nightmare. She said many things but one did stand out to me more than the others. '…take what is rightfully ours'. I've struggled over its meaning for the longest time now. Any ideas?"
"They clearly think they're entitled to something but whatever that something is not anything we've come across."
"Perhaps they've been wronged in some way and 'what is rightfully theirs' is revenge?"
"Possibly but this all seems much too complicated for a revenge plan."
"…" Once again silence fell, thicker this time. No matter which way we looked at it we simply didn't have enough information to go on. Out of the corner of my eye I could've sworn I saw something shift behind one of the other flower pots but with the sun rising to midday it was likely just a trick of the light. "I wish I could remember more," I said, frustration creeping into my voice again. "It's just…so hard to…I don't even know. I'm sorry."
"Oh don't say that," Palutena exclaimed. "I think you were amazing to have done all that on your own."
"But…"
"No buts, Robin. I agree with Palutena…"
"Group hug!" The Pokémon frowned.
"I don't agree with her anymore." Before I could react she'd pulled Shulk and I in, wrapping her arms around both our midsections. She looked over expectantly at the others.
"Actually I think I'd rather not…"
"And I've got to…"
"Get over here!" She insisted, beckoning them over. The two Pokémon shared a look.
"Thank you, Robin," Lucario went on. "You're tale was most informative. We wish you luck in discovering the culprit."
"Group…" The two of them vanished in a flash of light "…hug." The goddess frowned but didn't let either of us go. "Teleports take all the fun out of life, y'know?"
"Isn't that one of the moves you us in…?" Palutena pulled the other Robin over, arms flailing, before he could finish. "Lucina, dear. Help!"
"Um…" Lucina stood awkwardly to the side, clearly not comfortable with the idea.
"It's not that bad, I promise!" Palutena insisted. "You're enjoying it, right Shulk?" He shrugged as best he could with an arm around his waist.
"Could be worse, I suppose."
"That's the spirit! Come on, Lucina, it's just a silly hug. To celebrate Robin's return."
"W-well…" Still she didn't move, absent-mindedly clinging on to her own arm. "I think I'd rather not." I locked eyes with her from across the room.
"Lucina, dear…are you alright?" The other Robin observed, loosening his grip on Palutena.
"Yes I'm…" We didn't break eye contact. "…fine." Still neither of us backed down. What was hidden in the depths of those cerulean pools? An eternity seemed to pass before the slightest twitch gave her away; she was afraid of me.
"Lucina…"
"I have to go," she said shortly. "Please excuse me." And with that she turned slightly too quickly on her heel to seem entirely composed before leaving.
"I should go after her," the other Robin said (after some time had passed with us all still very much intertwined). He gently pushed Palutena's arm off of himself and walked briskly out of the door. Another silence.
"…I didn't realise everyone hated group hugs as much as they did. Someone should've told me." She giggled slightly but I could tell her heart wasn't in it. Even her usually playful demeanour wasn't enough to mask the strangest of what we'd witnessed. Shulk and her were none the wiser and I was too…to an extent.
Obviously I'd done something back before but I still couldn't figure it out. Obviously we didn't fight as I'd sure as hell remember getting cuts and bruises from somewhere. Thankfully I didn't but that just served to annoy me all the more as I racked my brains to figure it out.
"Well as enchanting as this was, guys," Palutena simpered, unwrapping her arms from us. "I've got places to be and things to do."
"More important than finding Robin's attacker?"
"A goddess's work is never done unfortunately. I'll see you around." With a playful wink she too vanished in a flash of light.
"Hypocrite," I could hear Shulk mutter under his breath. As was the custom another deafening silence fell over us but thankfully this one was a lot shorter lived. "…What's the plan now? Any ideas?"
"Not really no. And honestly I'm in no mood for anything involving intense thinking right now. After everything that's just happened I need to relax."
"Yeah speaking of everything that's just happened…care to explain what was going on with Lucina?" Any other time I might've panicked and lied or frozen up but I was too drained to care.
"I said relaxation, Shulk. Whatever's going on with Lucina is much too complicated to deal with right now. Even if I understood I'm in no mood."
"I completely understand. You've gone through a lot lately so I'm gonna help you relax in the best way possible." I gave him a look.
"I'm not sure whether to be excited or alarmed."
"Trust me…you're gonna love this."
3rd person POV
"…Tell me the bad news, kid."
"Wow you're good. You didn't even turn around."
"I don't need to, do I? Stop beating about the bush and tell me."
"Yeah…about the Robin situation, Boss. It turns out she managed to reverse my spell." Now the figure turned. Expecting an outburst, the female braced herself. Perhaps surprisingly the retribution never came.
"She what?" He said, calmly.
"She deliberately took a warlock punch to the chest to dispel my influence."
"Warlock punch, eh?"
"It's one of Ganondorf's m…."
"I know what it is!" He snapped. "How did she figure it out so quickly?"
"Beats me. Are you…mad at me?"
"Of course but I'm willing to put aside your stupidity for the success of our plan. Update me." The female could be heard to breathe a small sigh of relief. His outbursts were never fun.
"I've stopped the nightmare production for now. Too many of the Smashers were becoming resistant to them so I've switched to a different angle. I actually did my trial run today on the one with the Monado."
"And?"
"Successful as far as I can tell. The asset has taken care of most of the job."
"Well that's something I suppose. Everything on my end is in position," he said, gesturing to the crates behind him. "But it's all down to you. Don't you dare fail!"
"…I know I've failed in the past but this time I'll get it right, I swear."
"Good," the male warned, leaning close to her. "Because if you do fail you know what that means for both of us, don't you?" She nodded. "I sure as hell don't want to go back to that life and I'm sure you don't either."
"That wasn't life…it was sickness."
"Then don't fail, kid. Or it'll be the end for both of us."
A/N: So you know I said I was going to share my thoughts on Cloud in Smash bros? Well you have to wait until I've spoke about this chapter AND responded the reviews first. Of course there's nothing to stop you skipping this and scrolling down (be honest who reads the review responses that aren't their own? I tend to just to on other fics see what others think but maybe that's just me.) So yeah scroll if you want but we all that's cheating. No cheating!
So this chapter. Actually last chapter I got reviews saying I should've completed the fight scene between Ganon, ROB/Shulk, Robin. That's a fair point I guess. Here's my reasoning for not: Fight scenes are legitimately the hardest things to write. I don't know if that's true for all writers here or again just me. Unlike dialogue and descriptive work and plot, fight scenes require a lot more planning. For the fight scenes I've written (in total about 5-ish) they take up at least seven times as long to write.
There's just so much going on at once and it has to flow and be action packed and interesting and logical and...too many things. Point is they take so much work that the posting of the chapter would be delayed considerably if I included every last thing. I also don't think they're my strength so I don't want to spend ages writing something which people aren't going to enjoy. Maybe I'm over thinking this but the fight scenes are almost a bonus as they don't contribute to the plot so much. The exception would be the last one and once it stopped being interesting as Robin came back I thought 'I can't add anything more to this and it wouldn't be good for anyone to read' so I just dropped it back to Robin and Shulk winning. Then the plot could move forward again.
I hope you understand. Don't get me wrong I'm going to write at least three more full fight scenes because of the way the plot works and I still enjoy writing them but it they're draining on me. It just gets hard to think of new ways to describe them. Please forgive my weakness.
This chapter continues off the last chapter's cliff hanger. Nuff said. I hope you understood Robin's (and indeed anyone elses) explanations but if you don't just say or drop me a PM and I'll do my best to clear anything up. I think I made it pretty clear but hey ho I don't know what you guys think unless you tell me. Why does Lucina not trust Robin!F? Think back to Reflet and Lucina's 'exchange'. I might add that chapter has the most amount of page views per day of any chapter before or since. You guys are dirty...and I love you for that. Also Palutena likes group hugs. Mewtwo doesn't.
Yugiohfangirl: Hopefully you understand now. If you don't just say. It is sad for Relfet.
MahNati: I will never not quote Sound of Silence. Deal with it. I think this chapter should help with the Reflet/Robin identity split. Hey you got your touching reunion scene this chapter complete with hugging. Don't say I'm not nice. Palutena is a naturally suspicious person but that can't be helped. She does genuinely care about others even if her playful personality hides it. Maybe she does that deliberately to mask the pain of losing people she cares about?
Waterbottle3k: I don't think I ever said I like this new username better than the old one. It flows better 'a mon avis' Hah French phrases. But anyway glad you liked it. Reflet was kind of a boss in the end wasn't she? Dying with honour is always good.
Wiltarrow: I'll admit most of what I said above was for you. Glad you liked the bits I did write but I hope you understand why I didn't write all of it. I was thinking of including a Metal gear reference but I did one in an earlier chapter so best not to overuse. Palutena has a strange way of doing things. She could've waited but her style is more about having fun and the fun was seeing if she could get caught. She's a very fun loving person. Waiting isn't fun. It's still suspicious but somewhat justified.
Heman2000: There's a reason Shulk was slower this time but it won't be touched on for a while. Good eyes for picking up on it, though. I did here about ProjectXZone2. Seems interesting. Seems like the poor man's Smash bros Crusade in terms of crossovers but I'm sure it'll be fun. See below for Cloud stuff.
Okay now Cloud stuff. I legitimately thought this has the best opening trailer of any Smash bros trailer. Excellent Music and feel. Like everyone, as soon as Final Fantasy 7 came up I knew it was Cloud. Because of the stars I thought maybe Wolf but no. I don't care about Wolf but it seemed obvious. I was wrong.
Moveset wise Cloud seems...uninspired. His meteor looks just Like Ike/Roy's. One of his taunts is basically Lucina's (though I'm told it's taken directly from FF7). He's got a similar thing with Japanese symbols that boost his moves like Shulk. What I assume is his Up special is a carbon copy of Marth/Shulks but then another one I saw looked same as Ike's. His final Smash is a clone of Ike/Robin/Greninja/Mii brawler except it zooms out at the end. Great.
Bottom line is he's a sword character with annoying range and priority. Like we don't have enough. It's not all bad though. He's got a cool projectile and cool hair. He's also iconic enough for people who haven't played the game (I only played FF 4) to recognise him. Some friends of mine didn't know who he was but at least knew Cloud was the spiky haired blond guy with the massive sword. His combo game also seems to very strong which is different. So...
Good: Badass reveal trailer. Cool hair. Big sword. Iconic character and game series. Good, unique combo game.
Bad: Boring final Smash. Another sword character with range, priority. Neutral moves are stock sword character moves. Subject to 'Anime fighter syndrome'; He's going to be swarmed by the yaoi fangirls shipping him with Marth/Shulk/Robin!M/Ike/Roy left right and centre. The fanfiction site will be swamped, guaranteed, with this. It's fine as long as there's also other Stories where Cloud is a total badass in fights and not a dreamy eyed hunk who likes d**k all the time.
Overall rating: 5/10. Still badass despite subpar moveset. Iconic. Definitely not the worst we could've had (cough-Shovel Knight-cough.)
If the 3 character DLC slot is to be believed then we've still got two slots left. I call Wolf (because it's easy to port him from Brawl) and either K Rool or Dixie Kong. I don't care for any of them but I feel like it's gonna happen. I'd actually rather Shovel Knight than Dixie.
P.S. I just had a brainwave. It's been just over a month since the ballot closed but Cloud looks almost done. It takes quite a while to animate and design a character so it makes me think this wasn't part of the ballot after all. Thoughts?
P.P.S inb4 'should've been Black mage'. Denied! See you next time.