Before the Tournament
1 hour before the first fight
As the destined moment came toward fruition, Master Hand's faithful servant Pikachu set off to collect the eight fighters who were about to fight the most intense battle the universe had ever seen.
The first, Mario of the Mushroom Kingdom, was resting up for the tournament in his bed, until the pokemon woke him and he readied himself for battle. His new surge of power brought on by the experimental items filled him with the energy to overpower opponents using several abilities at once.
"Woah..." The plumber looked around in awe as he was transported to an enormous purple platform surrounded by an endless void. He waited with patient excitement as he wondered who else was going to be fighting against him.
The next fighter, Donkey Kong, was gorging himself on bananas before he was summoned. He spent his month exercising and consuming countless fruits with little to no rest. At this point, he was pretty sure he'd be able to survive more than a single hit. He had also perfected his punches, which were sure to give him an advantage in melee combat.
As soon as the ape was transported, he was face to face with his oldest rival. His checkered past with the carpenter-turned-plumber wasn't necessarily in a rough patch right now, but that didn't mean the two weren't exciting to fight once again.
"Heh... Should have guessed you'd be here." Mario said smugly, and D.K. nodded threateningly. The two roughly shook hands. "Better not kidnap anybody this time." He taunted. It was in good sport, though there was still malicious intent inside both of them.
The third fighter was Link, who was pulled immediately from his quest (see chapter 3 for more details).
The warrior stood tall as he faced his two fellow participants. He kept up a fierce visage as they all exchanged greetings, even though his still child-like brain was filled with wonder and excitement. Though remaining respecful, Mario looked at the heroes odd yet still human-like proportions in confusion and amazement, and Link seemed to be inspecting the plumber in a similar way.
As for DK, the hylian wasn't certain what to make of him. He was large and intimidating like many enemies he faced, but at the same time, he was strong and appeared to enjoy the basic competitive, not dissimilar to the gorons, who turned out to be important allies. Either way, Link was excited to face this opponent.
Next in line was the space bounty hunter Samus. She was still angry with the messenger for giving her a handicap, though thankfully she'd managed to regain a handful of her upgrades, at least enough to stand a fighting chance.
The armoured warrior appeared before the others, looking as intimidating as always. She respectfully greeted them though. "I look forward to fighting you all," she added at the end. All three of them coming to the terrifying realization that their melee attacks might not be enough to damage her seemingly unbreakable armour.
Mario nudged the ape with his elbow and whispered, "I'll give you twenty bananas if you can grab her once this entire tournament." He dared, knowing the Kong's pension for kidnapping women. As tempting as the offer was, DK backed away, knowing how impossible that would be.
The Yoshis were all fully prepared for a fun, low stakes battle, still not realizing the magnitude of the situation. Pikachu was pretty sure there was only supposed to be one, but since he wasn't sure which, he happily brought the six along.
The fighters watched as one by one, dinosaurs flowed into the arena. Mario happily came over and began socializing with his close friends and caretakers, while the others all thought about how horribly out of place the cute creatures were.
Kirby had just sat down to eat a large slice of cake, before the pokemon came and interrupted him. The star warrior swallowed his food quickly before following to the others.
Immediately, Kirby spotted Samus out of the growing crowd and ran to her, viewing her as an ally. Link and Donkey Kong both gave her strange looks, while Mario was still occupied.
"We helped each other on a mission once. This guy is a hardened warrior," Samus assured sternly. The two were too scared to comment when the puffball began cuddling lovingly up to the hunter's metal leg. Samus made no remark either, but she secretly adored the cute warrior and was excited for a head-on battle with him.
Finally, the mouse approached the Great Fox to get the final contestant. Fox had gotten ready to fight by having his mechanic Slippy build him weapons he could easily use, most of which being ship parts that he managed to safely equip to himself. When the messenger came along, he happily went with it and was transported to where the other fighters stayed.
"Well... If it the most popular bounty hunter in the galaxy," Fox said to Samus, identifying her immediately. "Should have guessed. Anybody who blows up planets for a living was bound to be on the universe's most powerful list," he taunted.
"Fox McCloud, right? I expected the opposite of you. Killing an ape shouldn't be enough to group you together with us," Samus retorted. "Come to think of it, this entire group is suspiciously mismatched..."
Before she could think further though, Donkey Kong ran over to the duo, overhearing the ape comment. Fox pulled out his blaster with no hesitation, aiming it directly at the gorilla. Samus scoffed, "Good to know you still as reckless and speciest as ever."
Fox growled, putting his gun away. "Says the genocidal bird..."
Before a preliminary fight could breakout though, the platform below the fighters began to rumble, and they knew they were about to meet the one that brought them here. Out of the black void, a large, white glove materialized, and loud voice boomed out among the crowd. "Attention, you eight strongest fighters in the universe! I am the one orchestrating this event. You may refer to me as Master Hand. You will all be participating in a basic, non-lethal tournament in order to decide who is the most powerful among you! Some of you were told about a reward in your invitations. I did not want to reveal right away, but whoever wins gets any prize they please, so try your best! Now, without wasting your time, let's get right into... Wait, something's wrong..." The hand finally broke up his speech to address a very concerning issue. "Why are the so many Yoshis?!" He demanded angrily, turning to his rodent partner who shrank back in guilt. "This ruins everything! You'll all have to wait a while so I can sort out the new brackets..."
Before that could happen though, a rift ripped open in the sky above and four individuals poured out. Of them, a small child was the first to recover, looking up at Master Hand full of fear. Mario noticed his brother and ran to help him, and both Fox and Samus recognized Captain Falcon, a fellow bounty hunter, and he naturally flocked to them, hoping to get a better understanding of the situation. Meanwhile, Jigglypuff locked eyes with Pikachu, her self-proclaimed rival, though he didn't seem to acknowledge her at all.
The glove yelled once again, "What is the meaning of this? This is a private event!"
Ness squared up, putting on a confident face as he spoke. "My friend sensed that some of these people are crossing dimensions in order to be here, and I came to make sure nothing evil was going on." He said, somewhat warily.
The hand contemplated this, and also noted that the other intruders seemed to be getting along with each other. He let out a deep sigh. "Fine... We are having a tournament to determine who is most powerful among these individuals. And as punishment for interrupting, you are all forced to join. There's a strict no-killing rule, so you don't have much to worry about. Now, talk amongst yourselves for a while, I need to go change the match-ups..." He disappeared, leaving the fighters to entertain themselves as the prepared in the final moments before the fighting began
AN: First things first, I apologize for my hiatus. Keeping this story up is a lot harder than I initially thought... Bright side though, in that span, I've started four additional fics! Yeah, I have lots of ideas going on. Anyway, there's one based on Smash ultimate's World of Light, a crossover between just Star Fox and Metroid, one that gives origins to the masks in Majora's mask, and a Godzilla one, just to broaden my resume a little, and because I love Godzilla as much if not more than Nintendo, if you can believe that. The stories will go up simultaneously with this chapter, but after that they will be updated sporadically depending on my mood. Self advertisement out of the way, here's some chapter notes! First off, I know that technically Star Fox, Metroid, Kirby, and F-Zero are not all within the same canon, but there's no way I'm gonna have three individual space bounty hunters and not have them all know each other. The universe is big, but not that big. Also, Samus is in Kirby Dreamland 3, so I'm counting that as canon. Also, I seriously wanted to mention Samus and Link's cameos in Mario RPG just as a joke, but they didn't flow into the story, so I cut the references. If there's any other connections I missed that link these characters, please let me know. And no, James and EAD from F-Zero don't count. Although, Octoman from F-Zero is in Star Fox Command... Last thing I want to mention is the Yoshis. I have several reasons for making each colour a character. Firstly, I decided to do this for every character this applies to. Alternates like Falcon's Blood Falcon alt will not be separate, as it is only a reference. However, Meta Knight's dark alt will be counted separately, as in Ultimate, it looks 100% like a separate character beyond just the colouration. Also, back to the Yoshi thing, I really wanted to pad out the roster. Twelve fighters would make things go by too quickly, so I figured I'd add a little to it. Plus I don't want to get rid of anyone too early. I.e. if I do Samus vs Falcon or something, I wouldn't want either to go down in the first round, but this way, a majority of characters will have at least two fights. And Yoshi will have six. Anyway, that about wraps things up for now, remember to give feedback, like, comment, subscribe, and have a nice day!