At the end of autumn, usually around when the first snowfalls begin to happen, Cap creates a bonfire right in the middle of the training ground for everyone to enjoy together. This wasn't just some little bonfire that petered out by the end of the night. It would rage for several days, serving as a communal gathering point throughout its duration. Due to the size and heat of the flame, he always had to get permission from Hand on when to start it. Hand would then check the weather for the next few days to make sure there wouldn't be a sudden warming, lest they be stuck with a massive fire on a hot day. Then he would designate a spot out of the way enough so that no one would be getting cooked like a marshmallow during their training. From then on, Cap was allowed to go as crazy as he wanted, provided the fire itself didn't stray outside the designated boundaries. This was becoming a problem this year with Incineroar around.
"It's so hot you're melting all the snowflakes before they reach us!" Palutena yelled. Cap and Incineroar had just dared to heat the flames up even more, far beyond the comfort level of anyone nearby. Everyone picked up their blankets, graham crackers, and hot chocolate and backed away from the flames. What little flurries that were falling that evening were being vaporized by the flames long before anyone could admire them.
A little further away, where the oversized bonfire only lightly warmed them and the snow could make its way onto the tables, Leaf, Bowser, Samus, Fox, Link, and Zelda were all gathered bundled up in winter jackets and thick hats.
"I think I get him now," said Leaf.
"Who, Cap?" Link asked.
"Yeah. He can be an idiot sometimes-."
"Or a lot," Zelda added.
"-but he's been a great help this whole time. I don't think I'd be sane at this point if it weren't for his constant distractions."
It had been several weeks since Samus, Ganon, and Wolf had conducted their little adventure to the socialite party downtown. Samus had relayed what they had discovered to Bowser, and the other two had informed whoever they had recruited for help, but beyond that, no one knew of the discussion between Catherine and Adam. They had expected something to happen within a week, whether it was Kaitlin finding some evidence to indict them, Adam dropping a bombshell report, or Catherine making a move, but so far all was quiet. It was a nervy silence, but the longer it drug on, the more hopeful they became that the storm would pass. Even the mood of the complex had lifted some once winter arrived and nothing drastic had happened.
Zelda tightened the one arm she had wrapped around herself and the other stirred her hot chocolate. She had intended on just grabbing a cup to be part of the festivities, but Lucina had demanded she spike it to help with her nerves. Clearly, Fox wasn't the only one to have noticed how she had been looking.
Here they were, at the time Hand feared the end would come, and they were surviving well. The doubles matches continued to hold on as a lifeline of committed, die-hard fans, and the interviews were getting more and more popular with a wider range of reporters now attending and incorporating them into their articles. Then there was what she and Hand had called the "Leaf Phenomenon" which they had done their best to apply to some of the other champions they discussed, starting with Cap. The effect hadn't been quite as monstrous, given it wasn't those girls Tori and Adela and their influence machine cranking out the stories, but the bump in ratings their next few matches was evidence enough that their little hypothesis checked out. Still, successfully treading water wasn't ever a comfortable place to be. It only took one blunder, a cramp per se, that could send them back under. Until they got out completely, they had to be vigilant.
"I think I have been taking his idiocy for granted," said Bowser, looking over at Cap, who was now trying to contain the flames some. A bubbly Squirtle was standing at the ready by his right leg. "It really takes a special kind of stupid to be able to make everyone completely forget about the situation they're in."
"Was that an attempt at a compliment?" said Leaf. Bowser raised an eyebrow at her snark.
"You certainly seem to have settled down," said Fox.
"Yeah, what happened to 'Oh my gosh! Peach! Could you sign this Pokéball? It would make me so ha'-OW!" Link convulsed as Leaf drove her foot under the table into his shin.
"What happened is I got stuck in the same building as you people for six months," she retorted.
"Yeah, that'll do it," Samus sighed.
Zelda glanced over at her. "You sound as dead as me." When all Samus gave in return was a shrug, she stood up and said, "Good thing a friend just told me how to fix that." She left for the table with all the drinks and food.
"Oh please no," Samus groaned when Zelda returned with a whole bottle of peppermint-flavored alcohol.
"If I gotta do this, so do you," said Zelda, snatching her hot chocolate and pouring a generous amount in.
"Don't let Cap see you guys do this, or he'll have a heart attack," said Link.
Samus watched Zelda top off her cup with a moody expression and only half-heartedly took the wooden stirrer when handed it.
"Ah, screw it," said Fox, grabbing the bottom for himself and refilling his cup with it.
"You know," said Leaf, "this has probably been the best six months of my life-."
"Don't you start with that," said Bowser. "You were the one saying how we needed to stay positive, weren't you?"
"Yeah I know, but I'm just saying-."
"Nope, no getting sentimental," said Link, taking the bottle from Fox. "Tonight you're only allowed to have fun."
Samus had cast a glance at Bowser after what he said to Leaf. Since their argument a while back, she had made an effort to better study him and Leaf's relationship. She still approached it with the assumption that he was getting something out of it, but the more she observed, and the more subtle questions she asked Leaf during their training, the more she began to realize Leaf genuinely looked up to the guy. How someone so sweet could see a villain as her role model was completely beyond her, but she couldn't deny it had made a positive impact on her. In fact, given her wild temperament when it came to losing, the incredibly difficult circumstances she was already up against as a newbie, and the broader stress going on at the complex, it likely wasn't Cap's occasional antics that were keeping her sane. It was Bowser's constant training regiment that occupied her focus and drained her so much every day that there was no energy to stress out with. Eventually, she had to come to terms with the fact that, even if Bowser did have ulterior motives, he was undeniably a positive force for her these past few months.
Meanwhile, what had she done? Sure, she had started to help train Leaf, but only as a part of a bargain, not out of any inner altruism. Outside of that, all she had done was skulk about Hand letting Ridley into the complex and stressing about any potential contact with him, which to be honest had been near zero the entire time. Even her fighting performance had taken a hit, most notably after Fox had cleaned her out in their last battle. So here she was, only helping out of contract, agonizing about something no one else had the time or energy to worry about, having to be babied by Zelda into-.
"Oh, to hell with it," she said aloud, and once five pairs of eyes turned to her, she downed her entire drink, snatched the bottle from Link, and poured an entire cup of it.
Unfortunately for her, this little outburst had been noticed by Cap, who had finally submitted to letting Squirtle tame the fire some to prevent it from torching everyone. Some of the champions swore he had a radar for unhappy people, and Samus had just set it off. He jumped two separate tables on his way to landing right between Zelda and Link, the former of which tried to shove him off, only to knock Link off the bench.
"He-ey! I don't see you doing this often! Are you sure you can handle it?"
"You really think this is going to affect someone that's genetically engineered that badly?" She held up the cup that she had already half drained before Cap's arrival.
"Cap, for the love of…" said Zelda. "You smell like a pile of ash."
Cap ignored her. "So you're saying that you're good for more?" He grabbed the bottle and poured his own cup.
"Hate to break it to you, but it's going to be more than you can handle," she said.
"Let's test that theory."
Samus finished her cup, slammed it down, and got up to follow him to a table more in the center of the crowd.
"Should…they be doing that?" Leaf laughed a little nervously. "It doesn't seem like a good look…or safe."
"It'll be fine," Bowser snorted. "They'll be laughing and shouting so much that they'll forget about their competition long before it gets out of hand." He looked down at Leaf, who was back to staring at the fire with a kind of longing expression. "Oh, come on, you. Like Link said, no more being sentimental."
Leaf yelped as Bowser picked her up by her fluffy winter jacket and stood her up.
"You made me spill my hot chocolate!"
"Whatever, c'mon you."
"Did Bowser just quote me?" said Link, amazed. He also got up to follow them to the table with Samus and Cap.
"I did not quote you, you blockhead."
Once they were out of range, Zelda let out a sleepy groan and smacked her head on the table.
Fox jumped. "A-are you okay? There's no way you've had that much."
"I'm fine," she muffled back. "It's just the past few months catching up me."
"Well, you don't look like complete death today, for whatever that's worth."
Zelda tilted her head just enough to shoot him a glare out of the corner of one eye. "Oh, thanks. That makes me feel great to know I only look like a corpse rather than a skeleton. What's so funny?"
Fox had almost snorted some of his drink. "You just have a funny sense of sarcasm, that's all."
"Sorry, if I spoke more about how the power of friendship is going to save us all would that make me sound more princessy?"
"If you ever act like a princess then I'll know the end has come, and don't give me that look again, I've seen your handwriting."
Zelda rolled her eyes and threw a hand up in the air. "Oh, so my handwriting is what disqualifies me from being a leader?"
"Zelda, the fact you aren't some perfect princess is exactly why everyone thinks you're a leader. We all trust you because of it." Fox was just speaking his mind, but when he got a look at her reaction to this, he began his usual routine of trying to figure out if he had said something out of line. "Sorry, was that weird or-?"
"No," she said, looking honestly surprised. "Actually, that was probably the nicest thing anyone's said to me this year. Thanks."
"Um, yeah, no problem…"
They watched from afar as Samus deftly refilled Cap's drink while he was joking with Falco. Leaf had clapped her hand to her mouth at the sight of a mischievous Samus. When he looked back, there was a moment of conniption where he couldn't figure out if his cup had magically refilled, or if he was going crazy already.
Zelda folded her arms on the table and rested her chin on them to watch the fire. "I really don't want any of this to go away."
"You've done just about as much as you possibly can," said Fox. "At the very least you won't have any regrets."
"No, I will. I'm aware that I can do everything I can and still fail, but that's not going to stop me from wondering if I could've done something different to help these guys, something I didn't think of at the time."
Fox looked down at the fur hat covering her blond head on the table. "These guys…" When Zelda didn't respond, he added, "So you've been thinking of that as well?"
"Mhm."
Whenever there were cuts in the past, those who had been around the complex the longest were usually favored to stick around, barring any extreme circumstances. Several veterans, more than just the Big Eight, arrived a long time ago and have seen many members come and go. If there was going to be a drastic reduction in numbers, it was highly likely that they would be looking at that group being the ones left. The effort Zelda had been putting in this entire time wasn't to save herself, but the dozens of people who would be let go in a collapse.
It wouldn't be much different than the early days, but after the experience of a bustling complex with half a dozen floors containing several units of four champions each, the vast training grounds crawling with all kinds of fighters from every walk of life imaginable, and parties like this, going back to a single bedroom unit would be a somber transition. The dining hall at any given time would only have a half dozen people at best, all crowded around the same one or two tables just for an ongoing conversation to be possible. The training grounds would be a vast expanse, with sparring partners being few and far between. The thought of Cap doing his training on the recovery wall with no one there to hype him up was just one of many images that, despite being the case years ago, no longer sat right with them.
"So, what plan do you and Lucina have cooked up for your fight this weekend?" she asked.
"It's a surprise," he replied. When she cast him a doubtful look he added, "Just because I'm not telling you it doesn't mean we don't have one."
"That still sounds like someone who doesn't have a concrete plan."
"Well, it's not a 'concrete' plan-."
"There it is."
"-I'm just trying to let us have a bit more freedom in our strategy. More fun."
"More fun? That's your plan?"
"Don't worry about it." He waved her concerns off.
The huge fire kept them more than warm enough deep into the night. As Bowser had predicted, Samus and Cap had eventually abandoned their drinking competition and were now more concerned with who could take one of the chopped pieces of firewood and hurl it the furthest across the training grounds.
"You know," Leaf said to Bowser, "I don't think I've seen her unwind like this the entire time I've been here."
"She has more than enough reason to not trust people on a whim," said Bowser. They watched Samus hurl a log into the darkness. A single light halfway across the training grounds had turned on automatically when the first pieces landed nearby and revealed who had thrown them the furthest. "Even fellow veterans have a hard time getting through to her sometimes."
The log bounced off the ground just beyond where Cap's had come to rest. Samus threw her hands up at him and returned to her seat.
"When I got here, I always thought Red and I were coming from one of the craziest lives, but now that I've gotten to know a lot of you, ours look absolutely boring." She laughed at her own naivety. "It doesn't feel like it should be possible that you are all here at the same bonfire."
Bowser took a few sips of hot chocolate. "You'll come to learn that's what makes Hand one-of-a-kind. His ability to get people from a bunch of different backgrounds, even people who hate each other, is…unnatural."
Leaf curled up in her seat. "I wish I could do something to help him. He and Zelda seem so stressed whenever I see them, and I know now it's partly because he tried to bring on so many new champions…including me…"
"You ask Hand right now if he regrets bringing you here and you'll get a 'no' so resounding you'll realize how much of an idiot you were for even asking."
"You think so?"
"Positive."
Cap spun around while holding a log, causing everyone in range to duck fearfully, and let it fly out into the abyss. It reappeared in the light ahead, bouncing ahead of Samus's. He let out a triumphant roar on his way back to his seat. Samus rolled her eyes and got up to pick up yet another log. Before she got ready to launch it, though, she was stopped by Mario.
"Killjoy!" Bowser hollered at him. However, when Mario took the log from a disappointed Samus, instead of turning to take it back to the log pile, he faced the isolated light out on the training grounds. He grabbed the edge of the log, swung around just like Cap had done, and let it sail into the night. When it came back down, it only briefly flashed in the light before bouncing completely beyond it and back out of sight. The next light beyond turned on automatically and revealed it to be a considerable distance further than either Samus or Cap's previous attempts. Mario bowed to applause and returned to his seat with DK and Peach.
"I'm getting in on this," said Link, hopping up and grabbing one of the logs.
"Hmpf, show-off," Bowser snorted.
"Didn't you just complain that he was being a killjoy?" asked Leaf.
He brushed aside her point, "That doesn't matter anymore."
It was a good thing Cap had chopped a lot of firewood because soon there were a dozen champions launching pieces out across the training grounds. Leaf didn't get why so many of the veterans were getting a kick out of launching something as far as they could, but they were all really good at it. Perhaps it was just part of being a fighter on the field.
"Hmm," she mumbled aloud, a thought occurring to her.
"What's up?" Bowser asked.
"This might be a stupid question, but do you think I could ever fight on the field myself?"
Bowser looked at her in surprise. "You want to physically fight on the field yourself?"
"Well, I don't know if I want to, really. It was more of a hypothetical."
Bowser looked deeply into the fire for a moment. "Regardless of how you did it, you would inevitably have to get accustomed to taking some big hits. I would say that unless you can handle getting punched by Cap at full power, or resist Link's weapons from cutting you to pieces, there's not much you can do in that regard."
"Yeah, I guess that makes sense."
"The fact your little critters can take a beating like that already amazes me." Bowser looked over, fully expecting the flat look Leaf was giving him after referring to her companions as "little critters". "I'm messing with you," he smirked.
On the opposite side of the fire, where the cheering for those hurling blocks of wood into the sky was the loudest, Fox had left Zelda to some peace and joined Lucina and Palutena.
"Are you ready for this weekend?" he asked Lucina.
"Pfft, are you?" she replied. "When you told me that idea I thought something in your head had short-circuited."
"I can't tell if that's supposed to be you insulting my idea or my intelligence."
"Both will do."
"Thanks for clarifying."
"It's just, I don't know, unique? Like, we have no idea what the response is going to be, or if we can even pull it off?"
"Well, we're fighting Robin and Wario. They'll be stronger than our last battle, but their chemistry is…"
"Worse than ours?"
"Significantly."
Robin and Wario's duo was one of the wildest of the pack, with the pair almost immediately having communication difficulties after they started training given Wario's wild and improvised attitude clashing with Robin's strategic thinking. They would predictably line up with Robin behind Wario, but Robin wouldn't be doing much shot-calling. They would basically be two separate entities.
"So," continued Fox, "it'll be a good opportunity for us to try this, and I'd rather do it now vs later when we might not have the chance."
Lucina smiled a little. "It might actually be fun if we pull it off at least."
"Well, that is the intention."
She looked behind him at Zelda, who was still watching the log-throwing competition with her chin propped up by her arms on the table. Her eyes were glassed over. "Is she alright? She's not sick or something, is she?"
"No, I think the exhaustion is just finally catching up to her. Good idea with the peppermint alcohol, though. She's probably feeling very warm and cozy right now."
Lucina looked back to the fire. "And relaxed, I hope. She's been looking particularly bad this past week."
"Yeah, I let her know."
"You what?"
"Don't sweat it. She doesn't care when I say it. At worst she'll throw a sarcastic response back at me."
Lucina rubbed her face in exasperation. "Your total lack of tact aside…I hope this idea of yours does help things out. I know nothing has happened for a few weeks now, but I've been getting this really bad feeling…"
"Yeah, I know. I've been feeling it too," said Fox. While some had been taking the lack of news as a good thing, he only felt that the longer they went without something happening, the more likely that when it did, it would be devastating. Like a volcano building up pressure, or an earthquake building tension, it would be preferable to experience the occasional pain, if only to avoid the far more drastic alternative.
It said a lot that by the end of the evening, Cap had not once attempted to provoke or involve Zelda in any of the chaos. His roommates had followed his lead as well, and Zelda was able to slip off some time later back to the complex by herself to go to bed, swaying slightly.
Eventually, everyone acknowledged that before heading inside they needed to pick up all the firewood they had just launched all over the training grounds. As each person left, they picked up a few pieces along the way and returned them to the pile. By the time most of the champions were gone, the pile had been rebuilt, and Cap was carefully structuring the bonfire so that it would last throughout tomorrow.
After Bowser bid Leaf goodnight, ignoring her comments about him being an old man, she hopped over to sit next to Fox, who was also now alone. Palutena had completely fallen asleep on Lucina's shoulder before realizing they should probably head back.
"You seem to have patched things up with Lucina nicely."
"We'll be fine. Are Bowser and Samus still running you through the dirt?"
"Yep, although I've been having to do couples therapy for them now as well."
"Come again?"
"Like with you and Lucina."
Fox shook his head. "Couples therapy," he repeated. "You talk nice, but you really don't have a filter, do you?"
"I actually got that one from Bowser. He was yelling at you and Lucina after you got your act together for your second fight and ruined his bet."
He rolled his eyes. "That's…great to know."
Leaf looked back into the fire. "I know everyone talks about how Zelda looks like she's about to drop dead, but you could do with some relaxation as well. You've been pretty tense."
"I've been stressing over stupid, immature things," said Fox. "With that out of the way I've been feeling better. I just hope this idea Lucina and I have will help."
"I was telling Bowser earlier, I wish I could help some."
"You just worry about yourself."
Leaf looked back up at him, puzzled. "What are you talking about? This affects me just as much as you guys. In fact, it might affect me even more…"
Fox put a hand on her shoulder. "You're still a newbie. The only thing you should be worrying about is getting better and stronger. It's the veterans' job to keep you guys protected from all that crap and help you develop as a champion."
Leaf stared at him. "Are you saying…Bowser…?"
"Yeah, he's definitely been protecting you since the start by keeping you focused on training. He's not the only one either. After Bowser said something a few months ago, I noticed all the newbies had a veteran taking personal oversight of their training. No one planned it, but that's just how we operate. It wasn't until recently I realized that by keeping you guys preoccupied all the time, they were distracting you from all the negativity."
Leaf's jaw had dropped a little. For a moment she sat there, staring at the fire in bewilderment.
"I don't know what to think about that. I feel bad that he did all that just to shield me. I should probably thank him-."
"He'd tie you onto the front door and leave you out in the cold."
"Yeah, you're right."
Fox got up and dusted the ash and firewood fragments off his pants. "C'mon, let's head back. If we stay up too late, we'll knock our rhythms out of whack and we won't get any proper training done tomorrow, and I highly doubt Samus is going to go easy on you just because it's bonfire week."
"Ugh, probably not."