After the last bites of the mousse had been finished off, Master Hand appeared and whisked them off again with his magical white pill, this time to a strange-looking map. Metal structures covered the place, and at a far part of the map, there seemed to be some strange flying machine parked there.
It didn't take long for someone to figure out where they were, namely Samus.
"Halo 2…" she said firmly, not looking too impressed.
"With the original Halo's physics engine and weapons." Master Hand replied.
"So what, we're supposed to shoot each other up over here?" asked Candy.
"Yes. Slayer Pro, that means you need 25 kills to get the win. All weapons are on the map. Everyone spawns with an Assault Rifle, Pistol and Grenades. You can dual-wield Plasma Rifles, Needlers and Plasma Pistols but not the M6D pistols-that makes them too overpowered. Launchers are not as powered, but have lock-on. Campers will be shot…seriously. The tie-breaker will be decided on deaths, and then medals, but we shouldn't need to worry about that. Oh, and kills will be displayed in a Soldat/CS fashion, i.e. X killed Y with a rocket launcher."
"Uh, Hand, shouldn't you give us a little rundown over the weapons instead of leaving us in the dark?" asked Fox, scratching his head.
"And dual-wielding Halo 1 Needlers and Plasma Rifles make them overpowered as well…" added Roy, always the Halo master having played it quite constantly back at the mansion.
"Shut up, Roy!" mumbled Master Hand and Roy smirked.
Master Hand snapped his fingers again and suddenly, a TV popped out, and demonstrated each of the uses for the Halo weaponry, ranging from the "overpowered pistol which can kill in three headshots" to the "almost-as-overpowered one-hit KO rocket launcher" to the "not-so-overpowered Plasma Pistol which nevertheless was useful to go with" and the "Assault-Rifle-which-is-almost-as-useless-as-its-Halo-2-think-happy-thoughts-counterpart. After around twenty minutes, the clip ended and Master Hand removed the plasma-screen TV, and in its place, came a stack of Spartan suits, luckily in different sizes and in different colours as well. Pope, for once, didn't add with another insult, and Master Hand teleported them around the Ascension map, and Round 3 was underway.
The early parts of the game were dominated by the more experienced players of the game such as Roy, Falco and Samus. Roy had opened with a series of aggressive headshots from his pistol, while Samus racked up some easy close-range kills with her shotgun. After a few minutes, they had drawn ahead to 8 kills each, two higher than Falco who was three higher than the four people tied on 3 kills.
However, soon, a few others began to pull themselves in as a threat. Ganondorf, after two wooden spoons to kick things off, was starting to aim well with his plasma weapons, and Mewtwo, even with his psychic powers blocked, was throwing grenades well and got a fine headshot with the sniper on Roy, who had been ducking up and down behind cover while looking for enemies to pick off. Zelda was also working things over nicely with her pistol, almost in a way similar to Princess Leia's style with her sporting blaster. Master Hand, bored at being in free-view, decided to change to first-person camera…
Fox:
Fox reloaded the clip on his pistol, and headed across the metal structure. He spotted a target ahead of him, and they both fired at each other at the same time. Fox shot first, and was more accurate, getting in a few quick headshots to get the kill, despite the loss of a couple of health bars. As he reloaded again though, he was promptly bashed in the back by Luigi, and the Assassination medal appeared above his head…
Luigi:
The green plumber automatically picked up the clips that had been dropped from Fox's pistol, and switched to his plasma pistol. Not fast enough. He was shot at from behind by a rocket launcher, and blown high into the air…
Falco:
Falco aimed a couple of bursts at the person the level above him, and tossed a couple of grenades up in their general direction, jumping and dodging out of the way of the fire. As the grenade exploded, a kill was credited to his name, bringing his total to 8. He quickly viewed the score, and saw that he was three kills behind Roy, who had squeezed to the top. Scavenging the weapons that had been dropped by the Spartan corpse of Bowser, he took the sniper rifle which had four bullets left in it, and zoomed up and in. he could see a character making a move for the Banshee. He pressed the trigger, gave the opponent the facial, and was given his ninth kill. But before he could hit the next person who was moving towards it, he was smashed from behind, totally unaware that Kirby had snuck up on him…
Krystal:
Krystal jumped into the unfamiliar flying vehicle, otherwise known as the Banshee. She took a few moments to figure out the controls, but settled in nicely-she soon figured out how to steer, and put the Banshee through a couple of spins. After getting a feel for the Banshee's dual plasma cannons, she veered down low, to look for a target. After finding one, she got a nice little straight behind them, and in typical star-pilot fashion, nailed the target with a hail of plasma. As an instinctive move, she loop-the-looped and then barrel-rolled back upwards to dodge any possible fire. She quickly lined up her next target, but as she fried the person, a rocket flew from the sky and blew her Banshee into bits…
Malon:
Malon had fired the rocket, which had surprised her that she had managed to hit the aerial target, as she didn't quite know about the launcher's lock-on ability. She turned around, and looked for any other hostilities. One came, and was met by another rocket. Then another one came, and eliminated her as she was reloading…
Nana:
Nana picked up the rocket launcher, with two rockets left. She didn't have much time to use it, as she was taken out by a shot in the head from a sniper rifle…
Captain Falcon:
Captain Falcon drew away from Nana's body, and searched for someone else. Gazing around from his hiding spot, he spotted Marth jumping around, shooting at Popo. He aimed carefully, and picked off Popo with another headshot. He aimed again, at the still-jumping Marth who was aware of a sniper's presence, and got him through the top of the head. But before he could continue, he was suddenly struck by…a bolt of lightning. The message appeared above him: "You have been pwnz0red by the Hand!"
"Screw you, Master Hand!" he yelled.
"That's for being a camper! Now go suck on your two deducted kills from your total!" Master Hand fired back…
Master Hand:
The giant Hand yawned. Roy was still holding steady in the lead, at 15, and needed ten more to win. Falco had snuck up on Samus and they were level on 13 kills, and Ganondorf was eager to get points up, and was on 12. Then, there was a pack of three people on 11, and Ness was struggling on three kills.
"Guess he's not used to using guns and real weapons…especially after all that time wielding baseball bats and slingshots…kind of like that Jiminy Cricket guy…from Cat In The Hat…" he mumbled.
Captain Falcon, who was still in a non-corporeal state after having been killed off for twenty seconds, flatly corrected him.
"Jimmy Hopkins. Dog Eat Dog."
"Shut up and get back into the arena." Master Hand snarled, teleporting Captain Falcon back five seconds before he was supposed to. He was really getting annoyed at being outwitted by the Smashers.
The F-Zero Racer grinned.
Master Hand grumbled and clicked to another player…
Samus:
Samus drew back, reloading her two Needlers as she did so. Rifle fire blew past her, and she waited for her shields to recharge before moving back into the open again. She was in the small structure with ramps leading out in the front, and Wario had come up those stairs, still eagerly giving chase. Samus was ready though, and gave Wario a faceful of needles, blowing him up. Kill number 15, but Roy was galloping away now, at 19, so Samus decided that second would be another good result. But then again, Roy was absolutely powering away with the contest at the moment, and at 44, he really needed to be stopped if anyone else was going to have a chance of catching up.
The bounty hunter produced another kill with her Needlers before she got too close to Ganondorf holding a shotgun. Unfortunately, she didn't have the Morph Ball…
Ganondorf:
Ganondorf watched as his counter went to 15, and then cursed as Roy got number 20 and 21 with his grenades. He checked the ammo left in his shotgun. Twenty shells, plenty considering the average lifespan in a 24-player Halo 2. He spotted Kirby coming in from his left, and jumping out of the way, he pumped off one round, then another. However, Kirby had a plasma rifle, and managed to reduce his shield and drop a frag grenade before he was killed off, and Ganondorf was promptly blown into the air moments after he was credited the kill.
Kirby:
Kirby respawned with the customary Pistol and Assault Rifle, and seeing that Candy was near the respawn point, started firing almost immediately. And so he showed the power of the pistol, and five well-placed shots dropped Candy. He headed up, and tossed two grenades at the battling Link and Ness. Link killed Ness just before the grenade exploded; taking out his shield, and Kirby wiped him off with the Pistol. As he did so, Roy shot up to 22, and Samus got up to 18 as a result of a double kill coming from a plasma rifle, then a plasma grenade.
He suddenly realised he was getting squirted at by plasma from above, and he immediately started jumping and strafing. The Banshee, pilot by Popo, swooped down at him, and Kirby got a good long burst of assault rifle at him, steadily reducing the Banshee into a smoking heap. However, Popo had done the same, and had fried him steadily with the Banshee by the time it blew up. Unfortunately for Kirby, the destroyed Banshee swooped down, and crashed…on him. Amusingly, the message showed a reasonably accurate picture of a Banshee next to Kirby.
Roy's kill count rolled to 23.
Popo:
Popo had respawned into a big firefight. He got one shot in, before he got rocketed. Ja, das ist sehr cool, nein? The kill was given to Pikachu.
Pikachu:
Pikachu fired another rocket, and then jumped about while reloading. That rocket hit Bowser in the head. Although Pikachu did well to dodge the fire as he waited for a rocket to appear, he was stuck by Marth. Cursing, he counted to two, before he charged at the nearest person, firing a rocket to his left as he did so. The two resulting explosions cleared up most of the crowd, and gave Pikachu a triple-kill, taking him to 14.
Marth:
Marth respawned just as Roy crept up to 24. He immediately saw how he had earned the frag, by bashing up Link. He decided to ambush him with his pistol and grenades, but he didn't assess him properly, and didn't notice the shotgun. Roy finished things off as he started, and that was convincingly…
Soon, everyone had been teleported back to the mansion, back in their clothes and out of the Spartan suits, to the relief of a few. Master Hand pulled up the scoreboard, and no real surprises to start with Roy at 25, and Samus getting 21. Falco had come in at 18, and nobody had made any real moving from the early stages. Ness was last on 10.
"Right, so now, we have the presentation. Don't be surprised-naturally, we have Master Chief i.e. John i.e. Spartan 117 presenting the trophy…a gold version of the Halo ring…" Master Hand said.
Roy groaned loudly. Master Hand smiled…somehow.
"Kidding. You get a gold grenade trophy." Master Chief said, appearing from nowhere.
"Damn you, Hand." Roy replied, before grinningly accepting his trophy from the Spartan.
"Whatever."
Master Hand presented John with a plasma sword and a delightful ham, before teleporting him back to the Halo universe. Then, he pulled up the official scores, and unsurprisingly, Roy was still ahead, shooting ahead with a 9-point gap.
"You guys can have some rest, but the next event will require a lot of physical fitness, so don't slack and eat too much…KIRBY!"
And with that, Master Hand disappeared.
"Asshole." Captain Falcon mumbled.
