Here's chapter 4 of Murder She Wrote for your enjoyment, folks!
Responses:
Gunpowder Wizard: ...oops. I forgot about that...DON'T SUE! And what do you mean by "pulling a Matrix on you?"
Nintendo Nut1: Ok, now I'm curious. What is your name, anyway, even though you said you wouldn't tell in your profile? I'm very curious...
Anters: Of course. This is what happens when you watch lots of CSI.
"What do you mean; Nelson's Landing is New Orleans?" Link's eyebrows shot up.
"I am saying over what I said before: Nelson's Landing is New Orleans!" Master Hand said, this time rather forcefully.
"But how can that be possible?" Krystal asked.
"Just meet me in the study and I'll explain everything." Master Hand then walked...er, floated...out the door and left the crime crew with mixed reactions.
"That was interesting." Zelda replied.
"So-a, you want me to-a pull David's file-a?" Dr. Mario asked.
"That would be really helpful, thanks." Fox answered. "So, what now?"
"Maybe we should hear Master Hand's side of the story." Krystal told the others. "This New Orleans thing sounds really interesting."
"To the study, then." When everyone tramped out of the room, Dr. Mario and Falco were the only two left.
"You-a will help me with finding the-a file?" Dr. Mario asked off-handedly.
"Eh...no...I'm waiting for you to finish up and get movin'!" Falco said, rather harshly.
"Okay-a, okay-a, geez! Don't-a bite my head off-a..." Dr. Mario muttered, covering up the body with a sheet, and throwing off his autopsy gloves. "You-a need to be more patient."
"Well, sorry!" Falco said, with some theatrics and sarcasm.
By the time Falco had caught up to their friends, they were already gathered outside the study door. "Where were you two, huh?" Link asked.
"Yeah!" Zelda added. "We were supposed to be inside five minutes ago!"
"I thought that we should all go in together." Krystal said.
"Fine..." Falco muttered impatiently. "Whaddawe waitin' for? Go in already!"
Stepping through the large, ornate doors, the group stepped into a dimly lit room, the only light coming from the large fire that crackled and roared in the fireplace at the other end of the room. It was rather dark, but there was enough light from the fire to help the group see what they were walking into. The study was a room lined with bookshelves on the wall to their left, and in the center wall was a fireplace with various oddities and trinkets upon its mantel. A large painting of Master Hand and Crazy Hand, blackened by the smoke over time, hung over the fireplace. On the far-right wall were more bookshelves, but they alternated with glass boxes set with a small table underneath them; they served as display cases for the trophies they had amassed. A small writing desk with a lamp stood in the upper-right corner, and several chairs were scattered around the room. Master Hand was seated in an armchair facing the fireplace, which was roaring and crackling as if there was no such thing as tomorrow in its book. Krystal had taken up to seating herself in a nearby recliner, and told the giant glove, "We're here."
"Ah, good." Master Hand said jovially, snapping on the lights and putting out the fire in a blaze of glory. He swiveled around in the chair so that he was facing the entrance, and said, "Sit down, my friends. We have much to learn about the history of Nintendo."
Link was really confused at this point, but he held out a chair for Princess Zelda as the other people settled down in the other chairs around the room. Krystal blushed a little when Fox scooted over next to her. Watching Dr. Mario and Falco vie for a chair, she was really glad she bagged the recliner before it had occurred to anyone else to sit down. Master Hand cleared his throat (does he have one?) and started to speak in his familiar lecturing tone.
"Well, this tale starts about five years ago, a little after the accident case you uncovered." He began. "This planet, Nintendo, was once known by another name: Earth."
"Earth?" Zelda asked.
"Yes." Master Hand continued, "Earth was a beautiful planet: lush forests, beautiful oceans, and illustrious cities. But there was trouble lurking below its surface."
"Whoa, what do you mean?" Falco asked.
"I'm getting to that!" Master Hand said irritably. "Anyway, what was going on was the destruction the planet was suffering. Cities were razed by war; the forests were being cut down for growth, the oceans had all kinds of crap being dumped into it, and the people were, for lack of a better word, insensitive to the damage their planet was suffering."
"How terrible..." Krystal said.
"Yes, and the planet's situation had gone from bad to worse over the next few days. You see, the planet's core was becoming somewhat unstable, and-"
"Somewhat-a?" Dr. Mario asked skeptically.
"Okay, okay! It was fucked up! The core, I mean." Master Hand corrected. "At this time, weird phenomena started occurring. For example, geothermal forces killed all the fish and living things in Chesapeake Bay. The Millau Viaduct in France collapsed for no reason at all. Then, things went from bad to worse."
"How could things possibly get any worse?" Link asked. "I mean, everything dying and bridges collapsing? I don't think things can get any worse..."
"Well, they did." Master Hand muttered. "The economy was, pardon the expression, going south. The stock market in New York crashed, leaving people in a worldwide economic slump. Millionaires lost their fortunes overnight. Meanwhile, the core was becoming more and more unstable, and scientists thought the only way it would become stable is if the excess energy was released in a huge torrent of terrifying natural disasters. Unfortunately, this grisly fate came true the second the ball dropped in New York City, signaling in the year 2001."
"What happened?" Fox asked.
"The world was destroyed in a single night."
"Gee, this-a sounds familiar-a. Why does it-a remind me of Rogueport-a?" The troupe and Master Hand turned to see Mario standing in the doorway. "Are you-a telling the-a legend of Rogueport-a?"
"No, it's the legend of Nintendo." Master Hand corrected. "Want to listen?"
"Sure-a..." Mario replied, sitting in a ladder used to reach the books on the higher shelves.
"Anyway, great earthquakes shook apart the world. They were so strong that entire islands sank into the seas that very night. Cities like San Francisco, London, Paris and New York City itself were reduced to nothing but rubble. Tornadoes popped up in Los Angeles and Las Vegas, leveling both to the ground. Entire islands like Madagascar sank into the seas without any warning."
"That doesn't sound good..." Link replied.
"You-a said it!" Mario agreed.
"Also, many more people were killed in the earthquakes and the destructions of the cities." Master Hand noted. "Anyway, tsunamis tore through the coastlines of many continents, but the hardest hit was southeast Asia. Hong Kong, for instance, was reduced to nothing but metal shells because of tsunamis."
"I don't like where this is going..." Fox said.
"After that, thunderstorms rattled the world and took it by storm, destroying all that the earthquakes and tsunamis hadn't." Master Hand continued. "For example, a thunderbolt struck the Coliseum in Rome so hard that in split the arena into billions of stone blocks that decimated the entire population of just like that." He snapped his fingers.
"May Nayru be praised that we didn't have to live through that..." Link replied.
"Ironically, the people blamed the gods and goddesses for bringing this terrible destruction upon them, when it was their own hand that ruined the planet before the apocalyptic earthquakes began." Master Hand replied as Crazy Hand floated in. "Uh-oh..."
"Aha! Someone said irony!"
"Here-a we go again..." Mario said, rubbing the temple of his forehead with his hand.
"Let's pause to appreciate the irony of drowning in a tiny pool o water when you've got the whole ocean to drown in." Crazy Hand said. He then started humming that annoying music you hear in elevators.
"Someone shut him up!" Falco said.
"How ironic. It's full of irony. The irony is so thick you can cut it with...an irony-cutting device!" Everyone went silent at that; even the crickets weren't chirping. "LAUGH, DAMMIT!" Seeing that no one was, he bawled, "CURSES IS YOUSE!" He then sulked off to find another victim.
"What the fuck was that all about?" Falco had regained his composure faster than the others.
"Who knows?" Krystal said. "Please continue the legend, Master Hand."
"Of course." Master Hand replied. "Now, where was I..., oh, yes! After the natural disasters had come and gone, earthquakes once again shook the land, shattering all seven continents and breaking them apart into pockets of land scattered throughout the planet."
"Holy shit..." Fox said.
"Oh my god..." Zelda breathed, tears forming in her eyes.
"That ain't right!" Link said.
"No, it isn't." Master Hand said. "However, there was still hope for the world, because there were survivors in the world! But many of them were mangled so badly that some of them we-"
"We? What-a do you mean-a, we?" Dr. Mario asked.
"And how do you know so much about what happened to Earth, huh?" Krystal asked accusingly.
"I know because I was one of the scientists who figured out what was happening to Earth." The Smashers gasped. "I was also mangled up after the earthquakes, so the other scientists turned me and my brother into giant, talking hands to save us." The Smashers gasped again. "I also was the one that brought you all here to the tournament."
"Wait, you brought us?" The Smashers turned around, once again, and saw Pikachu's tiny frame in the doorway. "But...how?"
"I really don't know the specifics of it myself." Master Hand admitted. "But from what I understand, you were all living in different dimensions hidden away amongst the time-space continuum. We were able to bend it and observe you all by doing that, which leads to the next part of my tale."
"Which is...?" Pikachu asked.
"It is the rebuilding of Earth and how it transformed into the world of Nintendo." Master Hand said.
"Oh, tell us more!" Pikachu asked, curling up in Zelda's lap.
"Of course I will." Master Hand continued, "Anyway, the technology we had was able to bring your homelands and place them in the pockets of land scattered around the earth. Some lands had cities that were barely touched from the world destruction, so we used those as the capital of the lands we brought in from the different dimensions."
"That explains the bright light that we saw 4 years ago..." Link said. "It must have been when you were bring our land into Earth and placing them on the remains of the seven continents."
"That's right." Master Hand said. "For example, one of the few surviving structures after the great apocalypse was the Defense Work castle in Quebec. We used that and Lake Erie, which also survived the apocalypse, to form the modern-day land of Hyrule."
"Whoa!" Pikachu replied. "That's so cool!"
"We also used the surviving structures to our advantage when forming Nintendo." Master Hand continued. The remains of Australia became the Mushroom Kingdom and Rogueport. As a matter of fact, the two mountains on Keelhaul Key and Lavalava Island were the two halves of Ayers Rock. Eagleland was formed from the remains of the province of Ontario in Canada. Plus, Toronto looks so much like Fourside."
"That's-a so cool!" Mario said.
"I know." If Master Hand had eyes, you'd see quite a few twinkles in them. "At any rate, we used the remains of Africa to form Kanto, Johto and Hoenn. Corneria was formed from what was left of Hong Kong, along with Shanghai in China and Kuala Lampur in Malaysia."
"Holy crap...so that's how Corneria was formed..." Fox gaped in disbelief.
"Let's see...also, Yoshi's Island and DK Isles were formed from what was left of South America." Master Hand continued. "The jungles in Peru and the Aztec ruins there helped in the formation of both lands. Mute City was formed from the city of Dubai in the Middle East-"
"That explains why Captain Falcon acted like a terrorist in the Amazing Race." Falco said. Everyone had to laugh at this.
"Yeah." Master Hand said. "Three special lands we had a challenge with were Lycia, Sylvarant and Tethe'alla."
"How did you handle that?" Zelda asked.
"Well, we used mainly what was left of Asia and southern Europe to create Sylvarant. Besides, the port of Kaminia in Greece looked so much like Palmacosta." Master Hand said. "The city of St. Petersburg, in Russia, became Flanoir in Tethe'alla, and we used up part of Russia and eastern Europe to form that particular land. We used what was left of Europe to form Lycia." Master Hand sighed, and then said, "But one piece of land caught our attention when all was said and done: a small island left of what was the southern coastline of Louisiana. The city of New Orleans was perched there; I used that small island to build a small empire-"
"-which became the Smash Island." Link finished.
"That also explains how a city has two different names." Krystal reported. "Master Hand changed the name to Nelson's Landing."
"That's correct, my friends...and that is the Legend of Nintendo and the Smash Island." Master Hand finished. "Does that clarify things for you?"
"Yes, it does..." Fox replied. "Thanks."
"You're welcome." Master Hand said. "I suggest you get back to your crime solving, though. Just remember what I told you."