Chapter fourteen
The five and the one
Pit's room was shrouded in darkness, which he was grateful for.
Back on Skyloft, every hour of the day was interminably bright, their elevation guaranteeing no cloud cover and very late sunsets. Even laying under the covers and turning off the lights, as he was doing now, still allowed some light through. The Halberd, by contrast, was much darker, especially as they travelled through space to their next planet. The porthole in his room didn't have any blinds, but that was all right when the only light shining through was from distant stars.
He had abandoned the chair some time ago after sitting there for too long had caused him to become sore. The doctor had warned him that the same thing would happen if he stayed in the bed for too long, so he shifted his position every couple of hours. Right now, he was lying on his chest, his 3DS on the bed in front of him. His bracelets were discarded for comfort – his arms were too thin for them now, anyway. He was fairly confident he wouldn't be interrupted for some time – instead of three times a day, he had convinced MK's servants to only bring him food when he asked for it. That wouldn't be for the rest of the day – although what's even a day in space?
It was liberating, in a way – he just slept when he wanted to, unmoored from any social obligations or environmental cues. There wasn't much to do as they traveled from planet to planet, but sleeping was as good a method as any to kill time. It wasn't too different from what he'd been doing at home; he just had more of an excuse now.
He wasn't having fun, strictly speaking; the game he was currently playing was one he had beaten twice already. But he surely wasn't suffering, either, and that was fine by him. That was how most humans lived their lives anyway – neither in pain nor euphoria. Once they beat the whatever monster, things would go back to how they were before anyway, so what did these few wasted months matter?
Knock knock
Pit frowned. Now who could that be? "Coming," he said, noting the scratchiness of his voice and taking a drink from his bathroom sink before heading to the door. He opened it and looked around, then down.
"Poyo!"
"Oh hey, Kirby. How's it going?" he asked, putting his hands on his knees as he bent down. He had gotten into the habit of smiling whenever he opened the door – it cut down on the worried looks.
"Poyopoyo poyo!" Kirby responded.
Pit scratched his head. "Um…do you want a fight?" he guessed.
Kirby shook his head. "Poyo."
"Okay, not that. Uh…" Pit struggled to think of what he might be trying to say. With proper context, it was usually easy enough to make an educated guess, but there was no context of any kind here.
Kirby leapt up and grabbed his hand. "Poyo!" he said insistently.
"Oh, you want to show me something?" Pit said. "I'm kinda tired right now, can it wait until…" Again he struggled, this time to think of a future time where he might be more willing.
"Poyo!" said Kirby again, starting to drag him.
"Okay, okay, I'm coming," he said. He glanced back at his room wistfully as Kirby dragged him away.
xxxxxxx
He panicked for a moment when they opened a door and reached the deck of the ship. With the open air exposed to space, it took a moment for him to remember the ship's artificial gravity and oxygen systems worked out here as well. That said, it was poorly lit, with only a few dim lights illuminating the deck. Through the gloom, he could just make out three other figures in front of them.
"Oh, hey guys," he said, shoulders drooping. "We doing this again?"
The four of them had been trying to get him out of his room repeatedly – this would be the fourth time – to do some kind of fight. It was absolutely good to see them again, but with each attempt he'd grown more exasperated. It was especially frustrating when one of them, usually Kirby, tried to get him to eat something.
"What's the scheme this time?" he asked wearily. "You guys gonna…"
He trailed off. As his eyes adjusted to the gloom, he registered what they were all doing.
Yoshi was sitting, and Mario and Link were lying on their backs. All of them were looking up into the sky. Pit looked up and saw nothing but the starry sky. Then it hit him.
"Oh, you're stargazing?" he said. The others nodded. "A bit low-key for you guys, isn't it?"
None of them responded, which was to be expected.
"I guess we could look for constellations," he said. He craned his neck upward. "Like there's…uh…" He looked around, searching for the familiar star formations, finding none of them. "Oh yeah, we're in space. Guess we wouldn't see the regular ones, anyway."
Kirby ran up to him, carrying a sheet of paper and shouting excitedly. "Poyopoyo!"
"What's that?" Pit asked, taking it in hand. It appeared to be a connect-the-dots puzzle, with a group of dots connected into the shape of a stick figure. He didn't quite understand it, until Mario got up and grabbed his arm, angling it until the dots lined up with a couple of especially brought stars.
"Oh, you're making your own constellations?" he said. Mario and Kirby nodded. "That's kinda cool. What do you call this one?"
Mario and Kirby looked at each other, then shrugged. It made sense; the figure wasn't proportional to anyone from either of their homes. In fact, the stance kind of reminded him of…
"What about Magnus?" he offered.
The two of them pondered for a moment, then nodded. Kirby took the paper back from him, scribbling what Pit assumed must be the name next to the constellation. Meanwhile, Link, still lying on the deck, nudged Pit's leg and motioned for him to lie down. Once he did, Link pointed at a star, then drew a semicircle with his finger, connecting five stars in an arc.
"Hey, that looks like a bow!" Pit said. "What was that one of yours called? The Bow of Light?" Link nodded. "That's neat! Hey, Kirby, write that one down!" Kirby obliged, while Pit started looking at the stars himself. "Hey, Mario!" he said, pointing straight out in front of him at a cluster of stars. "If you ignore that little one, doesn't that kind of look like a mushroom?" Mario squinted, then nodded. "Put it on there!"
Kirby scribbled hastily. Pit resumed his scan of the sky, occasionally calling out a new constellation. Mario and Link looked at each other, then exchanged a conspiratorial grin.
xxxxxxx
Above and beyond the deck, near the main cannon, a dark figure watched them from the shadows. He glowered down, burning with hatred and jealousy as the five of them enjoyed their utterly mundane activity. He couldn't hear them from here, but the sight of Pit was enough to boil his blood. Without taking his eyes off the group, he began to undo his sleeve.
"Oh, is this spot taken?"
Jumping at the voice, Dark Pit hastily retied his maroon sleeve. He spun around to see Bayonetta sauntering out of the gloom, holding a bottle inside a paper bag.
"What are you doing here?" Dark asked.
"I could ask the same of you," Bayonetta replied, swaying slightly. "How about we both lie and say we're just bored?"
Dark rolled his eyes. "Never mind, I don't care," he said. "And I am bored. Everyone's fucking bored."
"Come now," Bayonetta said with a raised eyebrow. "You seem like the type to cut through the nonsense."
Dark Pit was about to ask what she meant by that, until he realized that he'd already drawn one of his blades reflexively, before she'd even approached. "Maybe so," he muttered, plucking at his sleeve. "I hear it's fashionable."
"Well, forgive me for not assuming the absolute worst the moment we met," Bayonetta retorted.
Dark Pit stared at her paper bag. "There are worse things."
Bayonetta scoffed. "Everyone drinks, child. Absolutely everyone."
"You drink more than all of the others combined," Dark retorted.
"And you seem to hate yourself more than you've made everyone else hate you," Bayonetta fired back.
Dark Pit held up his blade and looked at his own reflection, then down at Pit far below. "Can you blame me?" he asked bitterly. "I'm a copy of him. And I hate him. How do you think that makes me feel about myself? To know that I owe my existence to the one guy I hate the most? To look in the mirror every day and see-"
"Oh, fuck off with that emo bullshit!" Bayonetta snapped.
Dark Pit blinked, stopped cold. Bayonetta pinched the bridge of her nose.
"Bugger me, this is why I hate dealing with children!" she murmured. She punctuated her sentence with a sip from her bottle.
Dark Pit clenched his fist. "I told you, old lady, I'm not a-"
"Yes, yes, of course," said Bayonetta, taking an even longer sip. "How old are you, then?"
Dark Pit looked away. "It's not important," he muttered, ears burning.
She snorted.
"Look, lady, if you just came here to insult me, I don't have to take that," Dark said, putting his hand on his other blade.
"I'm not here to insult you, boy. Didn't you hear me?" She knelt down rather unsteadily. "I'd like to make a deal with you."
Dark Pit raised an eyebrow. "Oh really?" he said.
"I can see what you're trying to do with Pit and Pal, and I'd like to help you," the witch said.
"How so?" Dark asked. "You wanna hold Pit-stain down while I beat the stupid out of him?"
"Come now, be serious," Bayonetta said. "You've seen what's wrong with them."
Dark Pit folded his arms. "Course I have. Everyone has. They're such gigantic dumbshits that they've forgotten they need to eat. That's not my problem."
"Don't play dumb, boy. You've made it your problem."
"You're delusional," he spat at her. "Why should I care if my enemies decide to starve themselves?"
"I don't know," Bayonetta said. "Why should two plates that you carried out of the dining hall end up in front of their doors?"
Dark Pit froze. His face turned red, and a hundred new denials died in his throat. "What, did you see that out the bottom of your wine glass?" he muttered.
"It's quite commendable, actually," Bayonetta said, looking satisfied with herself. "By my count, you're 1 for 3 with your efforts, and that's better than anyone else on this bloody ship."
"Okay, okay, I get it! What's your stupid deal you wanna make?" Dark Pit muttered.
"Simple," Bayonetta replied. "Leave Pal to me."
"Huh?" Dark said.
"You can't get through to her, she's too stubborn," Bayonetta said. "Not you, not Pit, not all the princesses in the world. But I think I can."
Dark Pit smirked. "Pretty arrogant, thinking you can change a god's mind. I think they call that hubris."
Bayonetta grinned right back. "Hubris, dear boy, is the greatest tool in my arsenal."
"All right, it's a deal," Dark Pit said. "You go ahead and try to get through to your girlfriend."
Bayonetta snorted. "Really, boy? That's how you're going to be about it?"
The boy nodded.
"Very well, then. In that case, I'll leave your brother to you."
Dark Pit was taken aback. As Bayonetta turned to leave, he tried to turn his confusion into anger. "Hang on, lady, you got the wrong-"
"Best of luck, boy!"
With a wave of her hand, she disappeared into the gloom, leaving only the faint scent of whiskey behind.
