Phazon: I think I came off a bit harsh in the last chapter because of the feedback, and for that, I apologize. I should accept the criticism as opposed to not listening to it and trying to justify myself. Anyways, I'm surprised I updated this as quickly as I did, and this is a very long level, so the chapter's a bit longer than most. I tried to implement a bit more humor so reading this detailed thing doesn't seem like a chore. We're getting closer and closer to the end of Neo Star, so get ready! And I want to go on the record and state that I've been mistaken this entire time: I've been thinking that the Pteran creatures were those pink birds, but they are actually the purple pterodactyls; Bronto Burts are the birds. Anyway, that's the only mistake, so let's move on.

Disclaimer: The characters, storyline, setting and all of that in Kirby 64: The Crystal Shards belong and are the sole property of Nintendo and HAL Laboratories only, and I don't have them locked away in chains anywhere. Best to get the legalities out of the way before someone tries to sue. I aim to give the readers something to enjoy, but not have my story deleted by an NOA executive.

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Afraid of Heights?

"To think that Adeleine would run off like that when we're high up in these mountains," Kirby muttered as he started throwing a Punc creature up into the air. Puncs were Spike elemental creatures that looked like green hedgehogs with yellow spikes protruding from their bodies. They would roll up into a ball and charge forward, but their movement was very slow.

"Kirby," Waddle called as he moved up another rock, "would you really call these mountains?"

"Well, they're not your average mountains," Ribbon entered as she flew to Waddle's side, "but they just look like a bunch of well put together rock formations, like that thing over there," she pointed over to what would be perceived as a mountain, but really just looked like three GIANT rock pillars that ascended into the air in the formation of a mountain.

"I don't think these are mountains," Kirby challenged as he caught the Punc, which looked like it was getting motion sickness, "if they were, where are the white snowcaps?"

"Not all mountains have to have white snowcaps, Kirby," Waddle Dee told him, slapping what would be his forehead.

Kirby looked back to Ribbon as he threw the Punc into a bouncing Cairn, creating a combination of Rock and Spike. "Do they have mountains on Ripple Star?"

Ribbon just shrugged as she flew. "You tell me; I know about the planet from reading about its history, but I haven't actually seen all of it for myself."

"But the mountains in the books look so much different than what these weird thingies are," Waddle said to Kirby.

Dedede couldn't take it anymore; he slammed his hammer down, crushing a rock and getting the attention of the others.

"ARE WE GONNA SPEND ALL DAY ARGUING ABOUT WHETHER OR NOT THOSE THINGS ARE MOUNTAINS?!?!?!"

"………no," Kirby weakly replied.

"Good," Dedede coldly said, putting his hammer away.

Waddle walked ahead, now fearful of the king of Dreamland, when a Sandman popped out of the ground and began taunting him.

"You never gonna get the rest of them there Crystal Shards, ain't gonna NEVER--"

Dedede approached the Sandman and ended its life with a mighty blow from his hammer of doom.

"You killed my best friend!" Above them, situated on the blocks, was a Bonehead: skulls with black wings and eyes. Their only attacks, if that's what you called them, were swooping down on their enemies. If that failed, they would clumsily try it again…only to be defeated.

This case was no different, as Kirby drilled the Bonehead in two when a devastating drill appeared out of nowhere as a result of the power combination he had created.

The gang continued up the rocky pathway, Kirby having to blast away some Mariel spiders that tried advancing on Ribbon, and yet another Punc that was feeling lonely without its mate. The trail began getting a bit rockier as they ascended higher, now having to contend with dropping rocks.

Ribbon shrieked as one of the said stones, a rocky creature by the name of…Rocky: stones with eyes and feet that would drop from greater heights, landed beside her. IT also felt the force of Dedede's great hammer. Apparently, the ruler of Dreamland was in a bit of a sour mood.

"I think it was that water with the red dot on it," he explained when he saw the others cower in fear.

Another Rocky dropped down; this time on a strange looking orange platform. When Kirby thrust himself forward with the drill, he not only obliterated the Rocky, but the platform as well, sending him downward into a hidden area that was housing a Crystal Shard.

Ecstatic, Ribbon looked on as the shard began to glow even brighter. "Looks like we're about half way done…maybe more than that."

Waddle Dee began bouncing from Bouncy to Bouncy, suddenly landing before a Propeller: happy little blue blobs with propellers on top. That Propeller wasn't so happy when Kirby disposed of his combo and absorbed him instead.

"What was that for?" Waddle Dee enquired.

Kirby patted his stomach as he suddenly belched…ice cubes. "Well, Neo Star does have a volcano, so why not?"

"Can't argue with that," Ribbon agreed.

Continuing along, Dedede got a case of the hot feet when he stepped on a very hot stone. The source? A Pompey: miniature brown volcanoes with yellow tops that shot stones out to bother anyone that got in their line of fire.

Kirby cautiously approached the Pompey. "Excuse me?"

The Pompey's eyes narrowed towards the pink puffball. "You have something to say?"

All Kirby had to do was exhale, freezing the Pompey instantly in a solid block of ice. He made use of this and sent it sailing into another Pompey, obliterating both of them in one shot.

Waddle Dee jumped across the two separated mountains and landed on a strangely red and purple coated mountain. Raining down from above were Bumpy creatures, yet they didn't serve a purpose because it wasn't raining.

"But I can't say the same for headache guy right here," Waddle chuckled as he pointed at Dedede.

Waddle had no time to laugh when he suddenly felt a Hack: walking stone hammers with the Rock ability, slam into his back, sending the red puffball towards Dedede, causing both of them to topple over.

"Hah!" The Hack chortled. "I have beaten one of the great warriors seeking to save the world from darkness, and now I'll finish off this pink one by--"

Solidify!

The Hack didn't even realize it was encased in solid ice when Kirby simply breathed onto it. He sent the Hack hurdling into the Galbo.

The gang passed some bouncing Cairn creatures that fell prey to Kirby's icy breath; clearly Kirby was having a bit of fun with this newfound single ability. Approaching the chasm, the trek became a jumping game when having to jump from cliff to cliff.

"I feel like I'm back on Pop Star with seeing weird things like purple, red, or green cliffs," Waddle called to Kirby as he landed on top of another Cairn, taking out its three rocks.

"Well, Pop Star is known for being…dare I say it…out of this world?" Kirby laughed as he suddenly sidestepped to avoid being burned by a Bobo that was running back and forth. Who'd think that a Bobo, that spent its entire life aflame, would have something to complain about?

Dedede brought the Bobo to a halt when he crushed it with his hammer. He then looked to Kirby.

"That was a really bad joke you just said there, Kirby."

Pteran pterodactyls flew in from above, hindering the troop's progress, as well as chasms that seemed to get wider and wider. Dedede felt something sticky and gooey fall onto his royal coat and was about to complain, only for Waddle to push him on, as the little platforms they were jumping from instantly fell towards the earth a split second after landing on them.

"Dedede…keep GOING…" Waddle urged as they were soon balancing themselves on tiny poles that somehow stretched all the way up to the skies.

King Dedede obliged and eventually landed on solid ground, now ready to explode.

"DID THAT BIRD MAKE ON ME?!" He exclaimed.

Ribbon observed the foreign goo and just had to laugh.

"I wouldn't know…your sticky majesty, I've never seen the…leavings of Pteran pterodactyls on Ripple Star, so therefore--"

"THEREFORE," Dedede interrupted, "IT MARKED ITS TERRITORY ON MY COAT!!!"

"Could you guys keep it down? I'm trying to put the finishing touches on my hat."

Surely enough, in an isolated zone of the mountains, Adeleine was staring hard at a very detailed hat she had managed to paint in such a short amount of time. She didn't like it, however, when she heard Dedede's wails throwing off her concentration.

Ribbon approached the painter slowly and took her ear ever so slightly, causing her to shriek in surprise.

"Um…why did you feel it necessary to break away from the group…JUST TO PAINT?!"

Unlike all other times Adeleine was under the cruel hand of the fairy from Ripple Star, she smiled. The painter pointed to her right to a special area that she said held a special surprise if the others could decode it.

Kirby walked over to the large assortment of perfectly positioned and stacked together star blocks. He was about to freeze them all when he stopped in mid jump. He then had to think this out and remember why these blocks would be placed here out of all places?

Then he remembered: the last time Adeleine had done something like this in an awkward location, it was on Rock Star with those paintings of the fish, tree, and sun- all of which were images found in switches Kirby stepped on in order to find a Crystal Shard fragment. This had to be yet another puzzle. Now confident in what to do, Kirby looked to his right.

"Waddle, take a mental picture of that hat."

Catching on, the two puffballs began carefully breaking various blocks, being cautious not to shatter any ones that did would not coincide with what the hat looked like.

After a good seven minutes had passed, Kirby had shattered another block when Ribbon was suddenly blinded by a brilliant flash. In the empty center materialized a Crystal Shard fragment that she quickly snatched.

As Adeleine gathered her supplies, Ribbon couldn't help but be a bit skeptical.

"Um, Adeleine…how did you know--"

"Trust me; after Rock Star, I can figure out where and when the shards will show up."

Kirby rolled his eyes and walked on. "If that's the case," he muttered, "why didn't you say something after we got off of Rock Star?"

A Mahall: peachy blobs with green tops that popped out of the ground and blew bubbles at their enemies, popped out the ground, but it was ignored. Kirby stepped on the Mahall and didn't even notice it.

"What's the deal?" Waddle called as he jumped to the cliff Kirby was standing on. "We're high up in the sky, and it's almost like they want us to fall."

"Why else would they place these platforms so far apart?" Adeleine pitched in as she jumped off of the floating platform just in time as it fell towards the clouds.

Dedede grunted as he jumped onto the green cliff and smashed a Hack before it could charge. "If you ask me, we're headed ALL the way down if they wanted us to go up so high."

They began ascending up the purple, red, and green cliffs, cautiously avoiding the sleeping Galbo, but having to push the singing Chacha off of the mountain and towards certain doom.

"Oh, bloody no," Adeleine groaned as she slapped her forehead in frustration. Before them was a set of platforms, floating platforms that looked like they wouldn't support a lot of weight if even Kirby set foot on them. Luckily, fluttering up and down between the platforms were some Bronto Burt birds: pink looking bowling balls with eye and wings.

Kirby and Waddle each grabbed onto a Bronto Burt. The birds at first put up somewhat of a fight in order to get the puffballs off of them, but after realizing that slowing down would cause all of them to fall towards the ground, they flapped their wings like their was no tomorrow; steadily ascending towards the pink cliffs with the obscure looking green structure with holes carved into it.

"How…about…now?" Dedede yelled as he rapidly hopped from one platform to the next…with Adeleine on his back. The king could hear the platforms shaking and then plummeting towards the earth.

"Just a few more steps," Adeleine responded as she held onto the king's coat, occasionally making sure she hadn't gotten her hand covered in any Pteran stuff.

When everyone landed, Kirby and Waddle began scaling the platforms next to the green structure, careful to avoid the Fishbone that was firing its scales at them.

Adeleine landed on top of the mountain and looked off into the distance with a telescope she painted; there was not much more sky to cover, but the jumps looked as if they would only get wider and wider.

"Come on, then" Kirby proudly said to the gang as he walked onward, completely ignoring the teetering platform he was about to step on.

Ribbon raised an eyebrow when she saw the familiar weak platform and shouted. "Wait…Kirby LOOK OUT!!"

TOO LATE!!!

The instant Kirby's foot hit the platform, it fell downwards, but remember: Kirby could always float in midair, and when he did, he was clutching something he hadn't been holding when he went down.

"Why would a shard be hidden in such an obscure place?" Adeleine asked as she scratched her hat in confusion.

No one could explain exactly how bouncing Kacti cactus had made it from Rock Star all the way to Neo Star, but it didn't matter right now. They were mere obstacles that only hindered the gang's process. They probably would've preferred the hot, blazing sun of Rock Star than being frozen for all eternity under Kirby's ice powers.

Another long set of winding, far apart platforms now lay before them. As before, Kirby and Waddle Dee made use of the Bronto Burts, but…the flight over such high altitude took a toll on the pink puffball.

Kirby moaned and used his free hand to rub his gigantic stomach. "I'm hungry; being up so high makes me wish I was on a plane with in flight dinner."

"Kirby, you've never even seen a real life plane before," Waddle said to him as they landed on a very large "K."

Ribbon landed next to the two puffballs, while Dedede had to take even LONGER jumps across the large gaps with Adeleine in tow.

"Well, this seems pretty simple for the end," Kirby said cheerfully as he jumped from one large unfamiliar shaped rock to the next. None of them noticed that the maroon rock was a "K" shape that the bright red rock was an "I" shape, the purplish one was an "R," the black one a "B," and the "Y" green. No one noticed the strange rocks spelled out Kirby…who would've thought?

After avoiding the swarm of Bronto Burt birds, the gang found themselves in a clearing.

"Wow," Adeleine exclaimed as she wiped a bead of sweat from her forehead, "seems like Neo Star doesn't stop with the craziness if you ask me."

"We're not asking you!"

As you'd expect, Dedede and Adeleine got into a shouting match that soon turned physical.

"YOU'RE SUPPOSED TO BE THE STRONG ONE!!" Adeleine spat.

"YOU'RE SUPPOSED TO BE THE STUPID ONE!!" Dedede yelled back.

"STRONG ONE!!"

"STUPID ONE!!"

"STRONG ONE!!!"

"STRONG THIS!"

Dedede punctuated that last word with a powerful shove that the painter near a cliff. The fight stopped when the shard began reacting wildly.

Ribbon flew before the gang, clutching the shard. "It's as if…it's being directed…towards…under us?"

The source of the shard's agitation was the dormant volcano nearby.

"You're kidding, right?"

"It's the only way," Ribbon explained, "now everyone get close to me. If the volcano is not dormant and we run the risk of being burned, we'll be protected by the shard's magic, which has enough energy to protect us from flames.

In a flash, everyone was surrounded by brilliant energy that formed a barrier around them. The barrier flew towards and in the volcano.

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Mere minutes later, Kirby tossed and turned, awaking as he unexpectedly slapped Ribbon in the forehead. He looked around and saw that he was not on top of the world, metaphorically speaking, but within the confines of Neo Star's volcanoes. Magma and lava swirled everywhere and it was incredibly hot. This wasn't Pop Star anymore and somewhere within here lie the final shards of Neo Star.