Chapter 12: A Harrowing Haunting

The Kong crew was pretty fired up by the time they got back to the giant Kremling threatening to destroy their island, using Chunky as their ride. Even Chunky was ready to whup the snot out of the scaly bugger. Howling like an angry chimera, the Kong cluster charged at the behemoth, only to be stopped by Candy pointing a bazooka at them.

"Now you all stop right there and listen to me!" she screamed, cocking the bazooka threateningly.

The Kongs obediently shut up, giving her bewildered stares. Tiny spoke up, "Hey, Candy, what gives? We're here to pound this oversized creep into a pancake."

"That's what I'm trying to tell you," Candy barked. "He's not actually a creep. He's really just a poor soul that that jerk K. Rool strongarmed into smashing up our island. He's actually a really sweet guy.

The Kongs all exchanged looks. Cranky whapped Chunky's head in exasperation. "A Kremling sweet? Sure, and I'm a flying banana! Come on, everyone, time to give that colossal critter his comeuppance..."

But no one was paying him any attention. They were looking at K. Lumsy, who was on his back, cuddling Kiddy Kong and giggling like a giddy kid. He saw the others staring at him, and he flashed them a gap-toothed grin and waved timidly. Dixie spotted the group and skipped over to them, her ponytail whipping around behind her in a show of sass.

"It's okay, guys," she told them. "It's cool. He really is a sweet kid who fell in with the wrong crowd. He shouldn't be a threat anymore. I promised him we were going to take care of that rotten K. Rool."

"Don't tell me you mush-for-brains actually believe that!" Cranky griped. "You just wait, the minute our back is turned..."

"Well, that's less time we have to waste," said Diddy, sliding down Chunky's leg. "We've wasted enough time as it is. I say we hurry over to that hunk of junk out there and put a stop to his plans once and for all."

"Well, then, what are we waiting for?" Tiny screeched. "Let's go over there and teach those leatherheads what it means to mess with the Kong family!"

So they headed toward the beach to confront K. Rool and his diabolical doomsday device. Dixie opted to stay behind to keep an eye on Kiddy and K. Lumsy. Once the Kongs all arrived on the beach, they rode on Chunky's back and head while he paddled them all to the dreadnought, significantly reducing the commute time. But while his massive size was good for covering distance, getting inside Crocodile Isle was another matter altogether. Fortunately, Cranky had the antidote, a blue potion that tasted faintly of eucalyptus and curdled milk that went to work on Chunky's insides where each of his internal organs were unpleasantly pinched and called nasty names. But it worked. Even as he squirmed in the water, he shrank down, getting smaller and smaller until he was small enough that he could climb onto the metallic island without turning it over. Now they just had to go inside, find that island buster, and shut it down for good.

...Except none of them knew how to find it. That raised the question that hadn't been relevant until this very moment: where was Snide? Having him to guide them inside the dreadnought would have been helpful, but he was gone now and it was up to their own wits to figure out how to find it. Diddy's wits led him to point out the obvious cannon jutting out from the metal Kremling's chest, which seemed as good a place to start as any, so up they climbed.

Now it has been said that the restless ghosts of Kremlings who'd met a violent end were prone to haunt the halls of Castle Clapjaw, accosting all trespassers and threatening them with all manner of supernatural tricks and horrors. What did this have to do with the Kongs invading the invading Kremling's warship, you ask? Well, you see, K. Rool had gone and upset the resident demons there at Castle Clapjaw by taking some of the materials there and incorporating it into his warship - this in a show of bravado after suffering one of his episodes of identity crisis and insecurity. Yet it worked out in his favor because it was this that caused the Kongs to became trapped in a nightmare just before the ultimate showdown with the self-proclaimed boss of the Kremlings... but we're getting ahead of ourselves. For now, let us settle on the unsettling feeling of dramatic irony as our heroes the Kongs climbed to what they thought was the place where they would stop King K. Rool's diabolical plan in its tracks but was in actuality their own doom.

And it all began with a cry for help.

"Help!"

"Dixie!" Diddy cried. It was clearly her voice echoing through an exhaust vent.

"Candy!" Donkey exclaimed. Her voice had come from behind a barred window.

"Wrinkly!" old Cranky warbled, hearing her frail, tremulous voice through a porthole.

And so it went as each Kong at different stages of progress up Crocodile Isle heard a voice of dubious origin call for their help that only they could provide. Chunky heard Tiny's voice while Tiny heard Kiddie's voice. And Lanky heard Candy's voice too except hers was coming from beneath the panel of a gun port. Each of these voices of special interest in the hearts of these lovestruck primates drew them in, effectively bypassing the reasoning center of their brains that otherwise would have stopped them from falling for this obvious trap. And the moment they entered the dreadnought, they found themselves in the exact same vision:

Castle Clapjaw.

Donkey was stranded and all alone. The port of entry he used to get in here was gone and instead he faced a stone corridor that stretched out endlessly in both directions. On both walls were hung portraits of the castle's inhabitants, kings and queens that leered down at him with twisted expressions of contempt on their midieval snouts. Donkey began his journey to find the end of the hallway, his fists padding down on a bedraggled roll of carpet that had been royal purple once upone ye moderne tymes but was now dark with dust and so ravaged that surely history took note of ye Great Carpette Assaulte of ye Moths and Carpette Beetles. He cast his gaze down the hallway in an attempt to espy its end, hurrying as fast as he could to catch it, but as was the nature of endless hallways there was no end, and he only found himself traveling farther and farther down. The leers of the reptile aristocracy became toothy snouts turned up in mockery. Somewhere far far behind him he heard deranged laughter of the eternally cursed and he picked up the pace.

As Diddy ran, he scanned the walls for some sort of break in the illusion but all he saw was the sneering ancestors of King K. Rool, and the mad laughter behind him was getting closer. Where was that exhaust vent?

With no end in sight, Lanky tried in desperation ripping off one of the portraits, but that only got him a shrill scream from a Krossbones hiding behind it, who then jumped out and started chasing after him, waving a bone club and adding a bony clatter to the symphony of mad laughter.

Chunky, who was no longer big enough to punch his problems away and put creepy disembodied laughter at the top of his list of things that absolutely terrified him, ran as fast as his lumbering legs would allow him to.

As for Tiny, she was never one to back down from a fight, even if it was with an incorporeal spook. She turned toward the mocking voice, beat her chest, and screeched, "Come out and fight me like a man!"

She asked for it so she got it. At the end of the endless hallway she saw something huge that filled up the entire hallway crawling its way toward her. As it drew closer, she realized it was King K. Rool... or something that looked like him but much bigger. Catching sight of her with his giant bloodshot eye, he roared, "I've got you now, you filthy Kongs!" and he began crawling faster.

Donkey howled in terror at the sight of his mortal enemy in giant form coming for him and he began running for all he was worth.

Diddy leaped from the floor to the wall to the other wall and back again as he sought for an exit from this neverending corridor while the giant K. Rool wriggled toward him and snapped his jaws menacingly.

Lanky used his long arms and general clumsiness to launch himself forward in an attempt to outrun the massive K. Rool doppelganger but the manifested nightmare was catching up.

And Chunky raised his arms high and screamed as he tried to get his considerable bulk to move faster.

But Tiny decided to confront the fiend directly and so did something that was unexpected (at least for the ghost). She shimmied up the wall onto the portraits, and when the demonized K. Rool was close enough, she screamed, "I'm not afraid of you!" and launched herself at its bulging eye.

The moment her foot made contact, the giant K. Rool doppelganger went poof. What she kicked instead was Chunky right in the head, knocking him out cold. Diddy and Lanky collided into each other as they leaped for the opposite walls at the same time. Donkey skidded to a halt, leaving a dark skid mark on the metal floor, and came back to help the Kongs back to their feet. "Everyone okay?" he asked.

"We're fine, Donkey," Diddy assured him as Tiny patted Chunky awake, apologizing profusely for kicking him. Lanky groaned as he held a hand to his head. He looked around and then suddenly cried, "Cranky!"

The old ape was prone on the floor, his cane several inches from his hand, and he wasn't moving. Lanky hurried over and shook him. "Come on, Cranky, you old coot! Get up!"

Cranky snorted. He twisted in Lanky's grip. Then he woke with a flail of his arms and screeched, "Get away from me! I'm too famous to die!"

Lanky and the rest of them were overjoyed. "You're alive!" Lanky shouted and wrapped him in his long arms.

Cranky blinked. Then he gruffed, "'Course, I'm alive. You didn't really think a giant, fat cold-blood was going to do me in, did you? If I had my cane, I'd whap you for being such a ninny. Where's my cane?"

Donkey handed him his cane and then stepped out of reach. Lanky did the same. With no one in range of his whacking stick, Cranky had to settle for a tirade of the cowardliness of K. Rool, using a ghost to derail his foes. Thankfully, before he could really get a full head of steam, Squawks showed up with Snide.

"BRAAAWK! We've been looking everywhere for you all! Snide has the plans to the machine, and he's going to show us how to shut it down for good."

The slick weasel nodded. "That's right, Kongs. It's a little complicated but you've got the skills, I think, to pull this job off. First, let's find ourselves a safehouse before we're found by those leatherheads."

"Preferably somewhere that isn't haunted," Diddy muttered with a shudder.

Fortunately, Snide knew of such a place, being intimately familiar with the inside of the warship he helped to build. He led them away to where they could safely outline their plan to sabotage K. Rool's Island Buster and save their home. The final showdown had begun.