Fumu knew she could make it back to the castle without her brother catching up. There was too much distance between them. She zoomed through the castle gate and was about to climb the first stair when BLAM!
"Agh why!" Escargon and Fumu fell from the force of their collision. "And just what are you doing, Missy?!" Escargon got up and brushed himself off as he noticed something. "And why in the world are you wearing Meta Knight's clothes?"
Aware that Escargon was a dangerous person to be around right then, Fumu was shocked to see that she had dropped Meta Knight. Just as she stooped to pick him up and run away, Escargon saw the ball of yarn. "What's this?"
He tried rolling behind Fumu. "No please no."
"Woah! That's not him, is it?" Escargon made a grab for him, but Fumu picked the knight up and held him tightly.
"Mine. If you'll excuse us." She made a dash, hoping to catch the snail off-guard, but he snagged her by the spaulder.
"Oh, no you don't. Show him to me."
"No! It's his secret and I don't get why everyone has to be so forceful about it! Until we get him back to his regular form, I'm not letting anyone see him!"
A muffled voice came from Fumu's chest, "You tell him!"
"I don't care! Finally, the king'll stop bugging me if I learn this!" And Escargon lunged forward and tried to wrench Meta Knight from Fumu's grasp. She held on tightly, not willing to let his secret get out.
"Ungh..." Meta Knight quietly groaned in pain. He did not have a long enough spinal cord, if he even had one, to go to the chiropractor, let alone two who were fighting over him.
"There they are!"
"Poyo!"
Bun and Kirby came out of nowhere and tackled Fumu to the ground and Escargon fell with the force of his own strength being played against him, a blue ball of yarn in his hands with a face that was covered by his left hand.
Fumu struggled to get out under the weight of Bun and Kirby as Escargon was cut short of turning Meta Knight around when he forcefully leaped out of his hands and got wedged in one of the pillars near the ceiling with a wonderfully executed jump. Everyone in the hall gasped.
"Are you okay up there?" Fumu shouted up concernedly.
A cascade of sneezes echoed down the hall. "Yes-" Sneeze. "The dust is getting in my lungs, though. Why don't-" Sneeze. "People ever clean the pillars?!"
"Just try blowing it away. You could be up there for a while with these pickled loons after you."
"Hey!" Bun objected. "Get off me, that armor's hard!"
"You're on me you idiot!"
"We're not pickled loons! Where'd you get that idea?!" Escargon glared at Fumu.
She rolled out from under Kirby and Bun and yelled, "I don't understand why you can't just leave the poor guy alone! After all he's done for you... Honestly!" Fumu stomped down the hall, passed Meta Knight's pillar and rummaged around in a storeroom closet as Kirby, Bun and Escargon banded together as temporary allies.
Fumu came out of the storeroom closet and breezed past the huddle as she rushed up the stairs. While she was gone, the guys tried to figure out a way to get Meta Knight down from the notch on the pillar.
Escargon glanced at Kirby and got an idea. "Kirby. I'll throw you up there and you see if you can float and carry him down for us."
Kirby cocked his head. "Poyo?" But he was already being snatched up by Escargon.
"Fire!" The weak mollusk launched Kirby... But only about ten feet.
Bun went over and picked Kirby up. "You're weak. This is how it's done." And he hurled Kirby all the way up the pillar and to Meta Knight's notch.
"Whee~" Kirby disappeared over the ledge. A few seconds of silence, then Kirby was sent yelping in pain off the edge, backgrounded by a quick apology with a Hispanic accent. It caught Bun and Escargon off-guard as they shuffled around the hall, trying to get in a position to catch the puff. Bun got in the position he thought was right and held out his arms to catch Kirby, but he flew over him and knocked Escargon to the ground.
Kirby helped Escargon up, who glanced at the pillar where the knight was hidden and asked, "What'd he do to you?"
Kirby held up his left paw, which had a small cut that seemed to be in the midst of teeth marks. "Bit..."
Bun ran up to him. "Does that mean ya saw him?"
Kirby shook his head.
Bun groaned in disappointment.
Fumu rushed down the stairs with a paper plate loaded with staples stapling a buckle resembling what one would find on a backpack with the latch that goes over one's chest. She went back to the storage room and hid behind the pillar as she approached it, tying a rope to her waist and tossing the other end of it, attached to a weight of some form, up, hooking across the other side of the notch Meta Knight was in. "I found a rope! Grab on, I'll lift you down!"
His voice floated down, "I don't think it works like that!"
"I know!" The weight on the other side was light enough so that Fumu could climb on her own and be slowly lowered down, but heavy enough so that she could stop and not fall at all with a finger pressed to the wall. She was only able to throw something her own weight at all because of the person she was retrieving, who had taught her how to concentrate her strength and had helped her improve on it.
"I'm coming up!" She took it one foot at a time after hooking the makeshift mask to the rope so she did not have to hold it.
Escargon sighed in defeat. "She got him. We can't see him. I was so close..."
Bun elbowed him. "She's still gotta come down, ya know! We'll catch her when she comes back."
Escargon perked up. "Oh, yeah!" And the three guys looked to the top of the pillar and watched the weight slowly lower.
When the weight was nearing the floor, King Dedede came up behind them. "Whatch'all doin'? Just lookin' at the posts ain't gonna dust em'."
Meta Knight sneezed again.
"We know. We're waiting for Fumu to bring Meta Knight down from there. He got turned into a ball of yarn and now he's unmasked, but she's bringing a paper plate to cover his face up." Escargon explained, forgetting he forgot to tell his king.
"Oh, really! Well, I ain't waitin' no longer ta see dat dere sight!" King Dedede puffed out his chest as he made his boast, using the worst grammar possible. He approached the pillar and used his Dedede Jump move, angling his jump so he landed on the weight, which allowed him another jump.
"Ack!" Fumu squeaked as she was launched upwards from where she was from the weight and force of the king's jump, which she had not expected he would actually do.
The next few moments happened in a blur.
King Dedede landed on the ledge where Meta Knight was and the knight instinctively jumped off yelling, "Kick off the wall!" Fumu did so and caught Meta Knight. She started going back down the wall as she strapped the mask on Meta Knight. She knew it would only help when she was carrying him, but she knew that to be the Meta Knight who was always cracking ideas and escape routes, he had to have the one thing that gave him confidence. The remake was not an exact copy, of course, but it got the job done. At the very least, his rosy cheeks were covered. His eyes remained white and she could see the skin around them, much unlike the cold, yellow eyes and dangerous, black masquerade always covering it.
Five feet from the ground, Fumu got hasty and untied herself, hearing footsteps and seeing a fat shadow above her, then she fell to the floor with a splat from her feet. She took off sprinting down the hallway, a cluster of nosy people chasing after her. She suddenly tripped from one of her stinging feet jerking out from under her, and Meta Knight flew out of her hands and to the end of that hallway. The hoard was too close for her to take off again, but she called out to Meta Knight, "Just run! Hide!" As everyone passed her.
Suddenly, King Dedede called out to two Waddle Dees that were passing, "Tie up dat girlie and bring her to da dungeon! Don't let her 'scape!"
The Waddle Dees reacted immediately, bringing out some rope and swiftly securing her arms to her sides, rendering her immobile. "This is child cruelty! You'll be hearing from Chief Borun after this!" But her threats were unheard as everyone passed the corner.
Meanwhile, in Meta Knight's predicament, he was panicking slightly because he was then extremely slow. He heard Kirby, Bun, Escargon and King Dedede approaching from behind, so he leaped into the nearest room with an open door. Meta Knight ducked and rolled under the nearest thing he could find and heard the footsteps rumble slightly past his room; they were apparently confused as to where the knight might have gone.
"Think he went in that room with the open door?" Escargon asked.
"Nah, he knows he's not allowed in my room."
Oh no. There was only one open door in that hall. If the king found out Meta Knight was hiding under the bed of royalty, then there would be a legitimate reason for King Dedede to see his face; as a punishment. He knew he had to get out of that fate as fast as he could.