Author's Notes: I can't beileve I'm writing this much! Anyway, in this chapter, the Eds face the (brief) trials of getting off the remains of space rocks, get introduced to a interstellar crew, and visit their first galaxy! As always, enjoy and please revew!
Chapter 3 : The Traveler's Guide to Intersteller HitchHiking.
Space. A vast sea of stars and constellations that spanned from now until the end of time. Out here, there was the remains of the late planet destroyed in its prime; resident to three small boys trapped within its scattered boarders. Sitting on a small stump as a stool, the small Ed groaned as the sounds of frantic digging was heard in the backgound. Double D had given into despair and taken a reclusive spot on the edge of the plantiod, wallowing in his sarrow. Ed, deciding to take a proactive approach, had taken to digging his way out of his situation. However, the tall Ed had simply forgotten that the gravity of the area and it's spherical shape made any attempt at escape fruitless. This was proven after he popped up from the ground akin to that of a gopher, dirt spilling off of his clothes. The Ed then proceeded to pull himself up and then begin clawing his way back down again.
"Ed, would ya give it a rest?" Eddy asked "You've been at it for eight hours and haven't gotten anywhere."
At that time, Ed shot back up from the ground and turned towads his friend.
"I know I'm getting close, Eddy!" Ed said with a half smile before disappearing back into the ground.
The short Ed groaned and returned to staring out into space. The Eds had been on the hunk of rock for what seemed like hours, if not days; stuck in the same pace without getting anywhere. It was suffice to say that the experiance had started to weight on Eddy's nerves and Ed's annoying digging wasn't exactly helping either. He'd managed to keep it under control...until Ed popped from under him and sent him flying onto the down-side of the sphere. Eddy, now flaring mad, proceeded to run towards the top-side and began to wrap his hands around the Ed's head, stranggling him throughtly as he shook with anger. At any other time, Double D would have scorned his friend for such behavior, but he was now staring at the sky with wide eyes. He immediately jumped to his feet and started pacing backwards, following the object in the sky as it continued its trajectory. In his entrancement, he failed to looked behinde himself and slammed smack into his two friends.
"Ow! What's with you, Sock-head?" Eddy shouted, rubbing his afflicted areas.
Double D simply kept staring at the sky, which made Ed and Eddy curious about what he was gazing at. The two of them looked skywards and also gave a look of disbelieve. Floating above their heads was the shattered remains of a vaguely recognizable shape, with only the presence of a wing helping to indentify it.
"We need to catch it! Ensnare it somehow and ground it." Edd explained
"And how do we do that, smart guy?" Eddy retorted
Before Double D could answer, Ed grabbed his friend and threw him up into the air. Edd screamed as he hurled throught air, his scream were cut short as his body abruntly hit the surface of the object he had syped from below. He quickly scrambled for a grip and managed to latch his fingers around the fin, usig it to pull himself up. Sighing, Double D quickly asked himself the most obvious question at this point: how was he going to get down?
"Great! Now how're we gonna get him down!" Eddy asked
Ed answered by grabbing his friend and pulling him tightly, strecthing out his body in the process. He then twirled him round his head like a lasso and slung him around the object. He then grunted and pulled down the object onto the plantiod. Emerging from the weakage was an enraged Eddy, now steaming mad and egar to plant his fist into his friend's face.
"Well, while I disprove of Ed's method of retrival, I've still more than glad to have this." Edd said, runnig his hands across the smooth frame.
"What? A piece of junk?" Eddy blurted
"No, Eddy. I'm sure you'd remember it if you had the full structure but this is not other than The Explorer 2000!" Double D shouted, joy filling his every word.
Eddy blinked a few times and stared hard at the steel wing in front of him. Sure enough, his memories ame rushing back, memories of their breif exploits in the craft returnng. Immediately the Ed beamed at knowing that now they had a sure-fire way off the rock.
"Wait a mintue-" Eddy briefly searched the area "where's the rest of it?"
Double D sighed in exasperation. Of course he didn't expect Eddy to understand the significantice of this find. Sighing, he resumed speaking.
"Eddy, the fact that we found this peice at all means that there's a good chance that the rest are somewhere nearby." the smart Ed explained. "Now all we need is a way to travel from this plantoid."
"Like that star I found?" Ed said cheerfully.
The two Eds looked at their dirt covered friend as he smiled at them absent-mendedly. The boy then popped himself from the ground and led his curious friends to the 'star' he had supposedly found. And there it was, floating seemlessly above the ground. The star was the appropiate gold with five-points ending in a gold spheres, a smaller star circlig inside it. The two Eds looked speechless at the star and then to their larger friend, Eddy responding with a sharp blow to the tall Ed's head in anger.
"Why didn't you tell us about this!" Eddy shouted, shaking his fist in anger.
"You never asked?" Ed replied with a confused look.
Edd wasted no time with his bickering friends and jumped into the spinning star rings. For a few breif moments, he was weightless, gravity completely void of any control over him. He couldn't help but let the inner scientsit within him make him question the nature of how the device woked. As anyone would be when in zero gravity, the Ed instictively kicked at the weightlessness beneath, enough to cause him to fly from the star to throught space, yelling at the top of his lungs. Double D had never in his life been more afriad, despite many of the things he had been througth, waving his arms about as he flew through the aieless space. Suddenly, he managed to lock his eyes on a fast approaching planetoid coming into veiw. Edd quickly realized that his impact was immenatie and tried his best to get some type of better landing position, but he found that it quite useless as his path seemed to refuse to allow him to flip. And during this, he made freash contact with the surface of the plantiod and was sent barrel rolling into a nearby bush.
Quickly recovering from it, the boy proceeded to spit out leaves and pull out twigs from his hat.
"Well that was...exhilerating." he said in a flat tone.
After finishing removing the twigs and plant bits from his person, he beganed dusting himself when a shadow slowly appeared below him, steadily growing along with a familiar shout of laughtar. He let out a small meep before Ed and Eddy collectively dogpiled on top of him. Ed gave his biggest grine of satifastion as he had fllfilled his dream of flying throught space just like Lothar, The Space Barrian, when he heard mufffled grunts from beneath him. He rose, letting Eddy fall to the ground and Edd gap for much needed air after having Ed's bulk under him.
"That was aewsome! Let's do it again!" Ed shouted until Eddy gripped his fingers around Ed's lips.
"Shut it, monobrow." he hissed before releasing his grip on the tall Ed.
Stiarthing his his lips, the tall Ed looked over to see Edd gawking over a glass dome, rambling on about its marvoulous condition and structural strenght or some other science babble Ed didn't understand. It was only a few moments later before Ed used his mammoth strenght to lift up the half sphere an take it to the the star. Floating breifly in zero gravity, he kicked and was lanuched back to the previous plantiod. A loudd thud resounded followed by the sonds of Ed returning back to his friend.
"Good. Now then, let's move on to the next one, shall we?" Edd asked politely.
From that point now, the three had spent the better part of a day in search of parts to the destroyed Explorer 2000. While some parts were usable, others had been broken and fractured beyond repair. It seemed like an eternity before the Eds had finally gathered enough usable peices in order for the genius Double D to use. Armed with nothing more than a wrench he'd statched inside his hat, the smart Ed went to work.
It was only after for hours of hard, un-interrupted labour that he managed to piece together the magnificent vessal. Or at least a vessal anyway. True, he was in a bit of a rush, and lacked proper tools to connect certain parts, and was without quite a decent amount of parts but he had managed it regardless. Whipping his head of sweat, he becokned his two friend over and they stood in front of the craft. With a push of a button, the door hissed opened and allowed the three to board. Each Ed hopped into one of the only three seats aboard, their chairs creaking loudly as they struggled to support their weight. Edd ordered a full system's check, flippnig on switches, twisting knobs, and pulling levers. Then, he pulled back on the ignition and the thrusters roared to life; sending the craft up and into the vast darkness of space.
Cruising throught space, the largest vacuum one could fathom, one couldn't help but think. Double D, being the genius he is, found it hard to fight the uneasiness in his stomach. Every now and then, he'd glance back and here a sharp hiss of air befor in vanished just as quickly. Not only that, but it was much more, such as the compass would occansional go haywire while creaks and moans could be heard frequently. Because of this, he had one hand hovered over the emergency eject button, just in case something were to happen.
While Edd was busy worrying about the ship, Ed was busy looking out into space and looking at the vacuum with great fasicnation. It was been far too long since he experienced such a thrilling sensation as that one would get from traveling throught space, free of direction as oe was at the mercy of space. As he started to fantasize about what creatures might exist on the distant stars they passed, he noticed that outside his window was floating figure. It was shaped like a star with beady black eyes and a pale creame color. The star saw the Ed and Ed the star, responsing to it with a heartly wave and smile. The star also smiled...before it twirled and rammed itself into the right engine of the space craft.
"Ahh! What was that!" Eddy shouted, awaking from his nap.
"Eddy! Ed! It appears as if that explosion was our second engine." Edd shouted, gripping the stirring wheel.
Gripping his seat, Eddy panted quickly when suddenly the same star creature frm before appear out his window. Eddy gave it a confused look before shouting.
"Hey! Can you help us!" he asked
The star creature nodded and expressed a happy look, much to Eddy's relief. This soon changed to life-threathening fear as the creatre suddenly triwled and crashed into the back of the ship. The craft jerked wildly and Eddy found himself looking out his window to see the same creature. beaming a look of satifastion. Double D, meanwhile, struggled to gain some type of stirring with two of their three engines gone and the last on fire. He sweated propusly, sweat lubbing his hands and making it that much harder for him to grip the stirring wheel. He then looked u from the sparking control panel to the windsheild, seeing the star creature flashing it's cheerful expression before crashing clean through the nose of the shi, causing it to spark and explode. Now unable to steer, he and his friends could now only scream as they rushed towards the surface of an unknown galaxy. The star creature stood aside and watched the entire event before floating off into the deepest reaches of space.
Ed groaned, felling his back ache from being atop some hard and lumpy surface. When he heard it groan, he rose and pulled his two friends from underneath him. He gave his friends a small shake before they were consciouse again, embracing them in a sharp vice grip as he gripped them tightly. As per usual, Eddy delievered a sharoe blow to Ed's head, causing Edd and himself to fall to the ground. Eddy balled a fist but soon retracted it when he gave a glance around himself. No longer were they in space, but on a plantiod. The area was covered in lush grass and colorful flowers that ringed around a tall shack-like structure, complete with windows and light blue painted wood. But what got him was the sky. The sky was unlike anything he'd ever seen, seemingly a cross between night and day; deep blue background dotted with hundreds of stars.
"Breathtaking, isn't it gentlemen?" Double D mused softly, staring up in awe at the sky.
Eddy quickly shook himselfout of his tranc and turned around to see that the ship they'd arrived in was now only a smothering peice of hot metal, charred black and beyond repair. Edd, too, saw this gave a distrought look.
"I can't beileve this!" Double D said, gripping the edges of his hat. "Nearly five hours of hard work: gone! All stars to that meddlsom star creature!"
"Wait, you saw it too?" Eddy asked
"Me too. I saw him when he crashed into the engine thingies." Ed said
"But why? Why on, wherever we are, would such a creature want to destroy our ship?" Double D asked, thinking.
"I bet that backstabbing creep Bowser sent 'em!" Eddy yelled, balling his fist.
"I doubt it, Eddy. Bowser seemed sure that he had destroyed us with that last attack. I say some other force is behinde this." Double D replied
"Look! A walking mushroom!" Ed shouted
The two Eds shifted their attention and saw that their was indeed a walking mushroom, a Goomba, marching about aimlessly. The Eds quickly hid behinde the large cylinder in the middle of the plantiod. The Eds slowly each peeked around the corne, seeing that the Goomba was still circling around its post. Retreating back behinde the tower, the Eds quickly and quitely began to discuss their situation.
"Let's just go out and get rid of it." Eddy whispered, slamming a fist softl into his palm.
"I'd advise agauist it, Eddy." Double D said "We aren't in any condition to pick a fight."
"It's just a stupid Goomba! All we've gotta do is jump on it!" Eddy whispered loudly.
"Um, guys?" Ed said, nervously pointing his finger behinde like game
The Eds turned and saw that standing in front of them was an army of Goombas, all staring at them with menacing eyes. The Eds gulped and restorted to their natural ability to run away, built in after years of being chased by the kids. But as they ran for their lives that had neglected to remember that this wasn't a strecth of land, but instead was a peice of it. This meant that they were frce to either come to a screeching stop or make an immediate and sharp turn; they decided to take the latter and whipped themselves away from the edge. A few Goombas weren't as lucky, falling off the platform and into space. However, most of the swarm had caught wise and turned, chasing after th Eds. Seeing that the swarm was hot on their heels, Eddy closed his eyes waving his hands aout as he tried to summon something that might have been of use.
Bonk!
The Ed turned and saw that one of the Goombas was stunned, dizzily walking about like a drunker. Stopping dead in their tracks, the Eds all looked on as the rest of the Goombas hesitated to approach at seeing one of their own stun by them. Then, Eddy held out hi hand again and watched as a Star Bit suddenly flew from his hand and into the Goomba, further stunning it. Grinning, Eddy pointed his hand in a gun like fashion and started to fire around wildly, causing the hoard to shatter about to avoid getting hit. Once close enough, Eddy reared back and kicked the creature, sending it into the air and then the groud, poofing into non-existance.
Eddy beganed a violent campiegn, kicking and shooting the Goombas like game. Only after a lenghty series of kicks and shots did Eddy finally find himself alone with his friends on the floating space rock, panting softly as he regained his composure. This was interuppted as his two friends dog piled on him, crushing him under their combined weight. Once he rolled the two off, he soon found himself and his friends laughing as they celebrated Eddy's victory.
"That was amazing!" a voice suddenly said.
The three Eds swung their necks around to meet the figure of a star creature. Unlike the previous, who was small and pale, this one was bigger and glowed a vibrate yellow that framed his face that over flowed with joy. The three looked at the strange figure cautiously, Eddy whipping out his finger and aimming at the creature.
"Oh, no! I'm not an enemy. I'm actually here to help you!" the star creature said.
At that statement, the star sprite glowed a powerful, bright light shine, blinding the Eds as they assuted their eyes. Seconds passed before they were able to open their eyes again; greeted to the sight a star pad where the star sprite had been.
"Go ahead, use me!" the star sprite said to them.
Nervous and uneasy about having their means of transportion talk to them, the Ed each reluctingl enered the influence of the star and kicked themselves throught space. Their flight path was interrupted, however, as the three quickly and sudden impacted with a small medeorite as the resulting impact sent star bits flying. As their flight neared its end, the Eds quickly flipped themselves and landed shakily on both feet. Quickly regaining his composure, Ed looked up and saw that the Eds were now on another planetoid, similar to the first differig only in the presence of a tall trio of hills.
Egar to continue throught the galaxy, Ed grabbed his friends and ran towards the first hill. A Goomba attempted to impede upon their path only to be shot away by a quick shot from Eddy's finger pistol. The short Ed then looked up and saw that the hill was far beyond his reach, not even his highest jump would be enough to clear the distance. But this was soon remedied as his tall friend scooped him up and chucked him over the edge of the hill, skidding to a stop across the grass. He was shortly followed by his two friends, who now all turned to face the second hill. This one was differet from the others by means of the obstcale that stood between them and the next hill. On the ground was a yellow outline,platforms raising systematically from its surface before travel to their fixed height and disapating into nothingness.
Assurting himself as leader, Eddy bravily volenteered Ed to go and test out the platforms. Ignoring the scoldful looks he recieved from his smart friend, Ed cheerfully ran towrds the platform and hopped aboard. He breifly waited before his platform sloqly but surely rose into the air, laughing all the way to the top where he disembarked. His two friends followed shortly after. As they stared up at the final hill that stood at their way they watched as the duel platforms rose beneath them and elevated them to ground level. Hopping off, they finally made their way to the next star sprite who instantly turned into a launch pad upon seeing the trio.
The three Eds soared through the skies before landing once again on another unknown plantiod. Unlike the others, however, this one was radically different. Green grass and flower were replaced by barren and bleack sand, patches of green grass alertnating between the desert-equse landscape like oasis kolidescope. Double D and Eddy both sctrached their heads while Ed looked around and noticed that th ground and a shadow was steadily growing around. Using his movie-based logic, Ed looked back and saw a giant slab of stone approaching, as expeted. The tall Ed grabbed his two friends and dived for the gras; narrowly dodging the slab by an inch.
"Geez, what's up with this place?" Eddy said as he saw numerous slabs of stone rolling across the sand patches.
"It's one of those levels they throw in to keep you on your toes, guys." Ed exlained as he rose from the ground.
"...Ed, what on earth (or where ever we're currently at is called) are you saying?" Double D asked quizzily.
Wondering about his friend's outburst no longer, Double D dusted himself and followed his friends towards the next set of stone slabs. As Ed had said, the entirity of the plantiod had kept each Ed alert and ready to go at a moment's notice. The sands were occansionally mixed with water, effectively creating marshes and slowing down their movement, Eddy nearly falling into such traps nearly every time. Winged Goombas offered little restistance or threat and were easily dealt with with a snipe of Eddy's finger pistol, their angelic white wings shedding and sending them falling into the black hole beneath. Blowing on his finger after an excellen shot, he turned back towards his friends.
"Nice, huh boys?" Eddy said with a cocky smile.
The flashing outline of his friends were all he could see where they were once standing and he snapped his head to his right to see that they had already boarded the launch pad and kicked themselves off to the next destanation. Growling under his breath, Eddy stormed off toward the star sprite and kicked himself furiously behinde his friends.
Double D sighed to himself as he sailed through the air with Ed close in tow. He had enough Eddy's constant show boating of his Star Bit ability and decided that being left behinde for a while would do himself and Eddy some good. Looking forward, he noticed that the place they were approaching now was coming into view. It appeared to be a lare sphere with hexegonal tiles of stones with grass wedged between the creavices. And on the very top was a large yellow and green spotted egg. But what he hadn't realized was that he was heading striaght towards it.
Ed! Quickly, lean to your left!" the smart Ed yelled.
Normally, Ed would simply smile and shout out some random phrase but he managed to understand the command and leaned far to his left, despite the powerful force of the lanuch path. Following suit, the smart Ed managed with increased difficultity to pull himself out of the direct path and onto one of the tiles. Double D cringed as he landed on his feet, but was other-wise un-harmed; same as Ed who had landed head first. Pulling his head from the dirt, Ed turned and awed at the giant egg, eyes lighting up brightly as he thoght of what might rest inside.
"I'm glad that we managed to avoid that-" Double D said, only to have Eddy land feet first on top of the egg.
"Alright, what's the big idea about leaving me behinde back there?" Eddy screamed, pointing an accusing finger at his friend.
His ranting contnued but fell soundly on deaf ears as the two both looked at the egg behinde him. First, the crack grew larger, than the egg shook, and finally two green, stubby appendeges broke free and whipped at the new found air. Double D stammered while a large smile crept onto Ed's face as he saw a pair of white teeth peirce the thin shell.
"And another thing!...What are you guys staring at?" Eddy asked, cutting his rant short.
He turned and grew wide eyed as he saw green and yellow petaled head pop from the shell and into the outside world. Cowarding in fear, the small Ed stepped back and saw the full scope of what had been awakened. It was still mostly inside it's shell save it's short, stubby legs and purple and pale pink spotted head with bright green lips. The creature look surprisingly like a Flower Dragon, if except in toddler form. The creature gave a shrill whine, tossing it's head backward and int the air. The Eds covered their ears and closed their eyes as the high pitche whine bore into their heads.
"Jebus! What's with this brat?" Eddy screamed
Finishing its cry, the creature turned its attention towards the trio of Eds in front of him. It gave another cry before charging right at them head first. Reflexes kicking in, the Eds each rolled out of the way and allowed the rampaging creature to pass them Getting up from the rough tiles, they managed to see the creature turn around and once again chased after them, this time fllowing them as they ran around and around the sphereical plantiod.
"Eddy, since your such the excellent shot, distract the creature while me and Ed try and find a weak point!" Double D shouted
"Are you crazy!" Eddy shouted
Before he could protest further, Eddy found himself alone and at the mercy of plant creature. Growling and lowly muttering an obscencity, he turned back and fired off a dozen rapid shotsfrm his finger only for the ronds to rickorchet off and disapate. He turned and kept trying his best to somehow make at the very least a dent in his target's surprisingly thick shell.
Meanwhile, Ed and Double D chased behinde the creature, trying to keep pace with the infant giant. They ha easily discvered its weakness, a large exposed area of fleash located appropriately on the backside of the creature. Double D had breifly cuckled at the irony of it all, as all the creature needed was a good kick in the pants, so to speck. Eddy had quickly caught up with creatur and delivered and quick and harsh kicked wth his foot, sending a wave of pain coursing throught its body.
"Take that Mister!" Ed shouted
As theplant creature cryed in pain, it turned towards the source of the harsh blow to find Ed shaking his fist scoldingly. Growling, he approached him only to be kicked again from behinde, shreiking in pain from yet another harsh blow. Shaking its head, it instantly bolted off, away from his attackers.
"Where do ya think your going!" Eddy shouted, chasing after the poor infant monster.
Double D watched as Eddy simply chased after the creaure before catching him and givng him a sharp kick in the backside. Again, the plant raced off, this time at speeds that esily out-matched anything Eddy was capable of. Sighing as he watched his friend chase the creature around and around, he ran in the opposite direction. He was almost immediatey met with the creature and gave stern look at it.
"You sir," he started as the infant stopped and turned around in an attepmt to escape "need a time out!"
With that, Double D gave it his hardest kick he could muster, sending the small creature flying into the air before coming crashing back dwn to earth. Ed and Eddy both laughed in victory as they approached their friend.
"Nice one, Sockhead!" Eddy shouted and patted his friend roughly on his back.
Double D only returned wth a sharp hiss as he gripped his foot, pounding with pain from his previous kick. Whatever convinced him that this was a good idea to kick such a large creature was beyond Eds swiveled their heads when they saw that the plant creature was now on it's last legs. Suddenly, his body lit up bright and th Eds sheilded their eyes from the harsh light. When they reopened them, they found that the plat was gone and in its place was a bright yellow star, beady eyes staring blankly out at star stood there, momentlessly floating above the ground, waiting for one of the Eds to reach for it.
Curiosity taking over, Ed reached out for the bright object and watched in awe as the star floated into his grasp. And that's not all that was floating! Somehow, the star had nulled gravity, causing Ed to lift slowly from the ground as well as Eddy and Double D. Then, with a bright flash, the trio rocketed off towrds some unknown location.
Author's Notes: So sorry for the extended wait, I really been distracted, but I'll be making it real soon with a surprise. TTFN!