Chapter 3

The Hands

Marth trudged through the woods. He had seen Samus crash and heard a loud boom, but he had also heard a loud boom about two seconds after. He wasn't sure, but he thought one of THEM had been involved.

When he had voiced his opinion to Roy, he had been told to stop worrying so much. As far as he knew, there was only one of THEM left, and it was sealed behind the sacred door... which reminded him why he had started this tournament in the first place. Looking back on all the details, Marth hoped that Roy was right. Another one of THEM in this dimension meant that a lot of bad things had happened.

Link looked around. He recognized Mario, Luigi and Yoshi, having fought beside them on one of his adventures, but the rest were strangers to him. The pink one with a ballad head was staring at him. "Who are you?" Link asked.

"He can' exac'ly talk," Falcon informed him.

Link turned to Captain Falcon. "Who are YOU, for that matter?" he asked.

"Me? I'm Captain Falcon, star 'a the F-Zero Grand Prix. Now, who 'r YOU?" Captain Falcon responded.

"They call me Link. I am the champion of Hyrule," Link told him.

"I ain' never heard of no 'Hyrule,'" the Captain informed him.

"I've never heard of your F-Zero Grand Prix. I've never heard such atrocious English, either," Link countered. Mario chuckled, and Falcon scowled.

Kirby looked over at the Captain. He looked angry. Kirby wondered why. He saw Jigglypuff looking over at him, so he waved both arms over his head, stood up and shouted "HAAAAAAAAAAAAAAIIIII!" Sweat began to form on Jigglypuff's brow as she looked at him, and she began to wonder what he was on.

"Jig jiggly jiggy jig?" Jigglypuff asked him. Now sweat began to form on Kirby's brow as he wondered what she was on. He walked over toward Captain Falcon, just so he could make sure he was safe if the balloon got a bit violent.

"Well, come on!" Luigi said. "We're 'a bein' wanted at the 'arena, ya?"

"Yoshi!" Yoshi shouted in agreement. DK grunted.

"I think the arena is off that way," Link said, pointing behind him.

"Here 'a we go!" Mario shouted, as the 'band wagon' got moving.

"We're getting close," Roy said.

"Good," Marth replied.

"How much further?" Fox said, still angered.

"Not far," Roy stated.

"How can you tell?" Fox asked, angrier then ever.

"If you'd stop complaining and listen, you'd hear their footsteps too," Marth told him, getting a bit angry himself.

"You'd also hear a car engine and hoofs banging against the earth," Roy stated.

Roy thought again about what Marth had proposed. He had shrugged it off as paranoia, but you could never be sure. It could very well be that IT had escaped and gotten its hands... that is, its body... on something it could manipulate. If that were true, there could be hundreds of them by now. Perhaps even thousands.

Roy shuddered at the thought. "What's eatin' ya', guy?" Fox asked.

"It's nothing. And please call me Roy," Roy replied.

"Touchy, touchy, touchy! You need to relax," Fox told him.

"I've got a lot to think about," Roy stated.

"Fine," Fox said.

Kirby looked straight on, speaking gibberish and swinging his arms as he went. A great smile would have been plastered on his face if his mouth hadn't been busy babbling, but Kirby was simply to happy to be moving toward the arena to stop himself. "Would you jes' shut up?" Captain Falcon asked him. Kirby looked over at him, wondering what was wrong. He tilted his 'head' sideways, trying to figure Falcon out. "Gawd!" Falcon shouted. "I jes' HAD ta' get stuck with a talkin' balloon!" he shouted. Kirby looked away, a red flush coming over his whole face. He stuffed his 'hands' in his 'ears' before he got even angrier.

Link rode on through the trees. The woman, or at least she said she was a woman, sitting behind him was trying to make conversation with him. "So, tell me about your greatest adventure," Samus said, still quite taken with Link.

"It's a long story," Link assured her.

"We've got time," Samus told him.

"No," he said, smirking, "We don't." Marth and Roy were growing in the distance. Link knew who they were, but had never actually met them. He slowed his horse and prepared to stop.

"It's 'a Roy!" Mario shouted.

"Yoshi!" Yoshi shouted, gleefully.

"Let's 'a go!" Luigi said, as they continued to grow.

"Piko piko?" the yellow rat said, as it tried desperately to hang on to the side of Yoshi's saddle.

"Yoshi?" Yoshi asked in confusion. The rat breathed a sigh of insufferable pain. Jigglypuff floated along behind them, somehow managing to keep up. DK sprinted as hard as he possibly could, trying his best to keep up as well.

Finally, the caravan of heroes stopped. Marth and Roy stood in the path ahead of them, not ten feet away anymore. Link dismounted and walked over to them, leaving Samus still on the horse. "I'm here," Link said.

"So you are," Roy stated.

"I want my written apology now," Samus demanded. Behind her helmet, she was glaring at Fox. "And my money," she finished.

"Sod off," Fox said, glaring back. "I'm keepin' what's mine until you can make me give it up!"

"That can be arranged very easily!" Samus shouted, leaping off the horse and toward Fox. Marth held his sword out between the two.

"You'll have plenty of time in the arena," he said.

"There's an idea! I'll give you your money, IF you can beat me in the tournament!" Fox shouted.

"It's a deal!" Samus shouted back. Neither had the will to allow themselves to lose.

At length, the group made it to the grand arena. A huge wooden building stood at its rear, somewhere from eighty to one hundred yards from the arena. In front of that was the building in which the showers and changing rooms were. In front of that, a great stone wall rose fifty feet into the air, and was at least five hundred feet in diameter. There were only two gaps in the wall, the front door and the back door, both of which were huge double doors made from oak.

Roy led them all inside the walls. There were bleachers rising all the way from ground floor to the fifty foot top. There was a large space that the seats hung off of. Link guessed that was the place audience members moved about buying food and getting to their seats.

Link's gaze was immediately taken off the seats when he saw the arena. A three-hundred-foot by three-hundred-foot arena made of stone blocks stood in the center of the stone circle. It was lined with steel, which came off in stairs at some points. He stood for a long time, his jaw dropped, looking at the splendor of this place.

"You like it?" Roy asked him, snapping him back to the present.

"It's... fantastic..." Link replied. A chorus of agreements followed those words.

Marth smirked. "I'm glad. This is where you'll be doing most of your fighting."

"Most? Where 'r we gunna' do the res' of it?" Falcon demanded.

Roy smirked. "Follow me," he commanded. They went outside the arena, into the building with the locker rooms. Roy gave them the grand tour, starting on the ground floor and ending with the roof. There was one area on the roof that interested all the fighters: A fenced off area with eight archways inside. Link was the first to ask about it.

"What's that?" he asked.

Again, Roy smirked. "Those are the Warp Gates," he informed them. "Wanna' take a closer look?" he asked. Yes's and nods flooded in around him. Roy's smirk turned into a broad smile. "Let's go, then," he recommended.

Roy unlocked the door and stepped inside. Lights automatically appeared from the ceiling, but there were no lamps or bulbs. "How..." Mario began.

"Magic," Marth answered him.

"You know magic?" Link said, impressed.

"Not extensively, but we have connections," Roy said. "This spell came from a scroll."

"Oh," Link said. His gaze shifted to the eight archways. One was bound in chains. "What's that?" Link asked.

"That's the Sacred Door. We're not opening it until we have a champion," Roy told him, his face going from happy to grim.

"Sacred... what?" Link asked. Marth and Roy exchanged glances. Both nodded, and began their story.

"About two years ago, Marth and I found this place," Roy said. "At the time, it was running wild with a race that called themselves 'Hands.' They looked exactly like giant, white hands. More like gloves, actually."

"That was when we held our first tournament," Marth continued, "But the matches were interrupted by the Hands so often that we had to cancel."

"With a LOT of help from some friends of ours, we were able to clear out all the Hands but one..." Roy started again.

"The Master Hand," Marth finished. "We were only able to defeat that one by sealing him away in an alternate dimension."

"We didn't know what to call it at first, but eventually, we decided to call it the 'Final Destination,'" Roy told them.

"Why's 'a that?" Luigi wondered.

"Because when we name a champion, he goes in there to have a duel with it," Marth answered him.

"You see, we need to defeat the thing before it escapes," Roy told them. "So far, nobody we've put up against it has been able to beat it."

"That's why ya' hold these tournaments? To find someone 'at can beat the livin' heaven outa' Master Hand?" Captain Falcon asked.

"Yes, that about sums it up," Marth said.

"Well, I think that the others and I have already done that," Link said. "You said that these hands look like giant gloves, correct?"

"Exactly like giant gloves," Roy assured him.

"Yep, that's the one we beat," Link told him.

"Aren't we quite the hero today..." Fox grumbled.

"Are ya' tryin' 'ta get kill'd?" Falcon asked him, "'Cus you managed 'ta make enemies with jes' about everyone here!"

"Hey, Mr. 'F-Zero Champion,' you want a piece of me?" Fox demanded.

"'Ya see what I mean?" Falcon asked.

"Calm down," Link said.

"Don't tell ME what to do, pointy!" Fox hissed.

Link walked slowly and menacingly toward Fox. "We'll settle this in the arena, you great bag of bull crap," he said. He then walked over to the sleeping quarters to get some sleep.

"What did he just call me?" Fox demanded.

"'A bag 'a crap," Mario informed him, and he coolly walked toward his room to sleep as well. Fox gapped at the nerve it took to call HIM, the LEADER of the FOX TEAM, a bag of crap! Fox would show him. He'd show them all when he defeated Master Hand!

One by one, the fighters started filing out of the warp-gate room to their quarters. They had all been through a lot that day, and in the morning, as Marth and Roy informed them, they would be drawing lots to see who would be fighting who when.