A young girl of 9 years named Tracy was walking through the streets of Onett at night with her big brother's dog, King. She hadn't seen her brother in a few months, because of the tournament he was attending, but she still wrote to him occasionally, and he wrote back. She was jolted out of her thoughts by King barking. Sighing, she turned her attention back to walking the dog.

A few minutes later, she thought she'd come far enough, so she turned back and started to walk back to her house. However, as she waited patiently to cross the road, a noise distracted her. In the distance, she could hear brakes squealing, but she couldn't see any cars. She sighed loudly, and remembered the problems the police had been having with boy racers. Seeing no cars down the street though, she decided to walk across the road. However, she had barely gotten halfway before the sound of brakes squealing distracted her again, and two cars hurtled around the corner towards her.

Tracy screamed, but found herself paralyzed in fear. The two cars couldn't stop in time, and swerved wildly. Luckily, after a few seconds, Tracy started to run out of the way. However, her legs tangled in King's lead and she tripped and fell onto the ground. Frantically trying to push herself up, Tracy turned around just in time to see the side of one of the cars heading straight for her. She closed her eyes and ducked, but soon afterwards felt herself flying through the air after impact. After landing on the grass, everything went black.

...

"Mail's here!"

Captain Falcon staggered into the main hall, bringing with him a large sack of letters. Slamming it down on the table, the Smashers began to rummage through it. Once every month, they would get a new sack of letters, some from their family and friends, and some from their fans. Unsurprisingly, Link and Pit usually collected the most, whereas Ness himself would usually get under a dozen. He didn't mind though, as it made him feel more grateful to the people that did write.

"Here," muttered Mario, handing Ness all of the letters with him name on them. Ness smiled and opened the first few, but when he came to one, he stopped. It looked more official than a normal fan letter. To start with, it called him 'Mr Ness' and he recognised the address. It was the hospital branch in Onett.

Beginning to panic, he opened the envelope and read the letter. As he reached around halfway, his face fell, but before anyone noticed, he ran from the hall and up to his bedroom, slamming the door. Those who did notice assumed that he was leaving to train; after all, he had a match against Peach later on.

Ness didn't return until the first match of the day had begun. Walking slowly into the room, he was breathing heavily and obviously upset at something, but the Smashers were all too busy watching the match to notice. Ness swallowed his fear and took a seat next to Samus.

"Whose fighting?" he asked quietly, getting the response, "Fox and Zelda," from Samus.

Ness tried to calm down and enjoy the match but he groaned when he saw the arena. 'Port Town, Aero Dive'

Normally, this arena would have been fun to watch, but not for Ness. At first, the fight went smoothly, but then Fox kicked Zelda down onto the track just before the F-Zero cars raced past. Zelda gave a small scream in defeat as she was struck by them and flew out of the arena, meaning that Fox had won. However, as the rest of the Smashers applauded, Samus noticed something wrong with Ness. Instead of cheering, he had closed his eyes and was breathing deeply.

"Ness, are you ok?"

A startled Ness opened his eyes and stuttered back, "Yeah… I'm fine…"

As Zelda and Fox returned, Donkey Kong and Lucas went to start the next match. Ness tried to calm down again, but groaned again, this time louder, when he saw the next arena. Mario Circuit.

As Donkey Kong and Lucas landed on the figure-eight track, Samus noticed Ness turning away again. Tapping him on the shoulder, she asked if something was wrong again, but again he shook his head and shakily went back to watching the match. After a few minutes, a meteor smash from Donkey Kong sent Lucas down into the track, and he was struck by the racers, sending him out of the arena. Ness cringed loudly, prompting Samus to give him an awkward look once more.

After a few minutes, Ness had to try and block out his other thoughts, because now it was his time to fight. As he and Peach stepped into the portal to be transported to a mystery arena, he took a deep breath and closed his eyes, but when he opened them, he was exactly where he didn't want to be.

Location: Onett.

Letting out an audible groan, some of the Smashers watching were wondering what Ness was doing, but they quickly became more interested in the fight. Peach quickly jumped towards Ness and aimed a smack at him, while he rolled out of the way quickly and swung at her with a baseball bat. The roar of a passing car distracted Ness as he ducked and shivered, despite being safely on the roof. Peach was bemused, but took advantage of this to aim a kick at Ness while he was low on the roof.

Ness took the hit and flew backwards, but recovered in mid air and screamed 'PK Fire' to shock Peach into taking a few steps backwards. Unfortunately, she was on the end of the roof. Letting out a startled scream as she fell, she hit the ground hard and gasped for breath. She heard the beep of an approaching car, and tried to jump up, but found herself stunned by a 'PK Thunder' long enough to paralyze her to the ground.

As Ness saw the car approaching Peach, he screamed. Now the audience knew that something was wrong. Ness jumped down to Peach and tried to pull her out of the way, but the skidding car caught her feet and she found herself flying out of the arena. Ness didn't know whether it was Peach's blond hair, like Tracy's, or the reckless skidding car, but all of a sudden, what he had read earlier hit him, and he had to let something out.

Peach wandered, dazed, out of the portal back to the main hall, only to find the Smashers still staring at the screen.

"What is he doing?"

"He's getting his baseball bat!"

"Why isn't he coming back?"

The audience had no idea what Ness was planning, but when Samus looked closely, she could see something in his eyes, a mixture of sadness and madness. She was still wondering what he would do, but when the audience heard the beep of the oncoming car, they saw Ness pull back his baseball bat and prepare to swing. They leaned forward slowly, but jumped back quickly when Ness let out an angry scream and swung his baseball bat as hard as he could, just as a car passed. The bat smashed straight into the car's body, and it span for a few metres before coming to a stop.

The Smashers thought Ness might be finished now, but as another beep was heard, he pulled his baseball bat back again. By now, they knew what would happen as he swung again, violently smashing the windscreen of this car as it passed, sending it crashing into the wall of a tunnel. As Ness charged up another swing, the Smashers realised they had to take action.

"What's the matter with him?"

"What the heck is he doing?"

"I'm going in."

The last response made the audience turn around to see Samus heading into the portal in her Zero Suit. Although Samus seemed isolated at time, she considered the other competitors some of her closest friends, and had got to know them well. Now, she wanted to find out what was making Ness go mad like this.

Samus landed agilely in Onett on a rooftop moments before Ness lashed out at another car. Calmly walking up behind him, she addressed him in an equally calm tone.

"Hello, Ness."

Ness ignored her and whacked another car as hard as he could, knocking a tire out and making sparks fly across the pavement as the car skidded to a halt.

"Ness, what are you doing?"

Ness stayed silent, preparing his next strike, but Samus could see him up close now, and she saw grief, waiting to be let out.

"Ness, these are innocent people."

Samus was saying bolder statements, but keeping her calm tone. Ness had ignored her up to now, but he let off a small growl before replying.

"These people are not," he began as he charged up another attack, "innocent. These people are bastards!"

Some of the Smashers were shocked to hear Ness using such language, but Samus kept a cool face.

"Ness, what did they do?"

By now, some of the drivers had gotten out of the car and were angrily screaming at Ness, but he and Samus ignored them.

"Ness, tell me what they did."

Ness ignored her again, but his face was falling. His rage was gradually wearing down and his swings were becoming weaker. His last hit barely dented the side of a car before it had to slow down to avoid the huge pile-up he had already caused.

"No," was all he said.

Samus sighed and unfolded the letter Ness had absentmindedly left on his chair. It immediately got Ness' attention, but it didn't distract him enough to stop him from attacking more passing cars. After a minute of awkward silence, Samus folded the letter back up and dropped it next to Ness.

"Ness, I'm sorry to hear about your little sister."

The mention of Tracy stirred up anger in Ness again, and he swung even more ferociously at the next car, smashing it's headlights and sending glass across the ground.

"Ness, this isn't the way you should deal with it. You're just making things worse."

Samus' words were having an effect on Ness as angry tears began to stream down his face while he tried to attack more vehicles with his rapidly decreasing energy.

"Ness, this isn't going to help Tracy to recover."

Ness paused for a second, then angrily threw his baseball bat away and collapsed in tears. Luckily, Samus was there to kneel down next to him and give him a hug. He rested his head on her shoulders as he slowly whispered out,

"She was hurt… and I wasn't there…"

More tears escaped Ness as Samus kept comforting him, patting him on the back and telling him it was ok. The angry drivers were slowly backing away as Ness' wails grew louder, but eventually, he started to calm down. It could have been a matter of minutes or hours, but Samus didn't mind, as long as she would help her friend through until he was feeling better. Gradually, his breakdown became nothing more than a small sniffle.

As Ness was getting calmer, Samus lifted up his head so he was facing her and whispered, "Do you want to go and see Tracy?"

Ness thought for a second, then nodded, only for Samus to quietly reply "Ok then," and take his hand, walking him to Onett Hospital. There, they sat in the waiting room for a few minutes, rather Ness sat in the waiting room while Samus talked to a receptionist, and before too long, Ness found himself slowly entering the room where his little sister was.

Nervously stepping up to the hospital bed, Ness tried to crack a smile. He knew that Tracy was well enough to hear him, but some apparatus over her mouth prevented her from speaking.

"Hey Tracy…"

Tracy looked up and smiled when she heard her big brother's voice, before she lay back down in bed and waited for him to walk to her side. When he did, she gave off a bigger smile.

"I'm sorry about what happened… I got the letter about it today…"

Ness couldn't help but smile when he saw that his sister was ok, and he became more positive and confident in speaking to her.

"If you like, I'll come visit here more often while you're here. It's pretty handy having a portal above the town center."

Tracy nodded at Ness' suggestion, leaned her head to one side and smiled at Ness more. He just seemed to be relieved that she was ok, but he decided it was best not to keep Samus waiting too long.

"Well, I'd better go, some of the other competitors are here. I'll see you tomorrow."

Tracy raised a weak arm and waved towards Ness as he walked to the door, until he turned around, cheekily grinned, and muttered, "I'll bring my yoyo."

As Ness left the room, he found Samus reading a magazine in the waiting room. A few people were staring at her, as she looked a lot more different that other citizens of Onett, but she didn't seem to mind. As she saw Ness approaching, she put down the magazine and said, in the same calm voice,

"Ready to go?"

Ness nodded silently and took Samus' hand, walking back out to the drugstore of Onett. Some of the cars were being towed away, and Ness began to feel guilty.

"Samus, I didn't hurt anyone, did I?"

Samus shook her head. "Don't worry, it's all taken care of." Ness later found out that the other Smashers paid the bill for the damage as a sign of their sympathy for him.

"Samus?"

"Yes?"

"Thanks."

"No problem."

Ness smiled as he and Samus headed back to the main hall, knowing that even when he went a little mad, he had friends who cared about him.