Chapter 3: Expanding Horizons – Day 3: Steps 7-8

"Hey, MH? Do you ever feel like you were abandoned for a really, REALLY long time?" Crazy Hand asked his brother. Master Hand considered this for a moment.

"I…suppose so… Yes, I've been feeling that way lately…until right about now, actually."

"Hmm. Speaking of now, our universe is Fun Size," Crazy Hand stated. "Which means it's not very fun at all."

"Don't worry," Master Hand said as he referred to the world creation book. "'Step 8: Make everything larger. Basic dimensions provided in apparatus.'" He bobbed up and down slightly. "You see, I've begun to accept the unusual simplicity of this book," he told the other hand proudly, "simply because it actually works. I shouldn't be complaining about something that makes our job easier! Right?"

"Left," Crazy Hand said, giving him a weird look. "Left."

"…Okaay…" Master Hand flipped back through the book a couple of pages. "Before we make everything bigger we have to get them in the right position. Step 7: Set up orbits." He directed Crazy Hand to take the sun and move it as far away from their floating platform as possible; he didn't want their new temporary home—a large tent—to get burned down, too.

"A little to the left!" Master Hand called to his brother out in the distance.

"What?" Crazy Hand yelled at him.

"A little to the left!" Master Hand boomed.

"My left or your left?" Crazy Hand responded in an equally-loud voice.

"My left!"

"You don't HAVE a left!" Crazy Hand bellowed. Master Hand paused, irked, before shaking himself back and forth. He turned around so his back was to the left hand.

"A little to the right!" he yelled.

"My right or your right?"

"My right!" Master Hand told him. Since he probably wouldn't have a right, thought the hand, amused.

"I do TOO have rights!"

Master Hand turned to look at him in surprise. "How did he even hear that?" he wondered aloud as he watched Crazy Hand floating back towards him, the Sun now in place. Crazy Hand mumbled to himself bitterly, shooting his brother an indignant look.

"Says I don't have rights, he does," Crazy Hand muttered as he retrieved the scale-model earth they'd made just a few days before. "I have every right he does, except a right hand because that wouldn't make sense because I'm a left hand myself—and lefties are the besties—"

Link nodded exuberantly in agreement for some reason.

"Huh? Haw haw! So you will marry Malon! Great!"

"UAH!" Link shook his head frantically, waving his hands in front of his face.

"You sure seem excited about it!" Talon laughed. "Let me go get Malon first!"

"EH?"

"—and a left hand can't have a right hand because hands can't have hands I mean unless they have baby hands of course because only hands can have baby hands—well technically only babies have baby hands—unless someone cuts babies' hands off and takes them, but that's really downright wrong and anyways that's not even what I mean to say—" Crazy Hand's ludicrous chatter—which had grown in volume the farther off on a tangent he got—finally drew out of earshot of Master Hand, who sighed in relief. He watched as Crazy Hand set the earth down carefully, tilting it like the book had said, and attempted to spin the large sphere. "It worked!" Crazy Hand yelled back to him. "Though I thought it would spin faster than that…"

"Yes…of course it worked…" Master Hand said. He picked up the small moon and brought it over to his brother. "So it says I'm supposed to set this over here…"

"Move it over two blocks," Crazy Hand said. Blocks? Master Hand wondered. He moved the moon over a bit. "There! That wasn't so hard, was it?" Crazy Hand flicked the moon lightly and it began to spin slowly as well. "Mission complete!"

"Hold on, Crazy," Master Hand frowned as he read through the instructions. He nudged the tiny moon and it began on its orbit around the earth. "Ok, now we start the earth's orbit…" He moved over to the earth and immediately felt dwarfed by its mass; to think it was still considered small when it was more than fifty times his size! After a moment's consideration, he took a deep breath and balled up into a fist. He focused and charged up the shot before launching a powerful punch at the globe.

"WOOT! Master Hand used Focus Punch!" Crazy Hand cheered. "Oh hey…that's a really good name for a move…" He took out a notepad and scribbled it down happily; he planned to copyright it as his own, perhaps even patent it. Crazy Hand snickered. Maybe if somebody wanted to use it badly enough he could sell them the rights and make a lot of money.

"Did…Did it w-work?" Master Hand asked. He floated over to his brother shakily, struggling to keep his balance.

"Oh yeah. That thing's moving," Crazy Hand stated, his scheming thoughts interrupted for the moment.

"How can you tell?"

"I'm psychic!" The left hand flaunted himself pompously.

"…I'll leave it at that."

Now it was time for the step they'd been waiting for; making everything bigger. The brothers Hand situated themselves on a spot of their small earth where they could see the sun and the moon.

Master Hand read over the world creation book again. "Apparatus…? Crazy Hand did you see any equipment of sorts anywhere? I didn't see anything come with the book…"

"Pshhh. Lemme do this!" Crazy Hand said, taking the book from his brother. "Open says me!" he commanded it.

"Crazy, the book is already open," Master Hand pointed out.

"Whoops. Did it wrong," the left hand said. He made a throat-clearing sound and tried again. "Open says me!"

Master Hand frowned. "You just said th—" A strange whirring promptly sounded from the book, and Master Hand watched in disbelief as a large depression appeared on the blank page opposite of step 8, revealing a flashing scanner. "What in the world is that?"

"Don'tcha mean what is that in the world creation book? Seems more fitting," Crazy Hand mused as he took out the device. Master Hand peered over at its flashing red screen, where two simple words were printed in a large font that took up the whole display: TOO SMALL.

"…"

"Told you it was too small," Crazy Hand said, passing his brother the scanner.

"This must be the apparatus the book was talking about," grumbled Master Hand. "But when it said 'basic dimensions provided'…I wasn't expecting this." Knowing better than to question it, he pointed the scanner at the distant sun.

"Calculating," a distinctly female mechanical voice spoke up.

"Whoa! It talks!" Crazy Hand yelled excitedly. "Say more things!"

"Calculating."

"Yay!" Crazy Hand beamed at the machine. On the other hand, his right counterpart watched the machine distastefully as the results showed up on the screen: "TOO SMALL".

"You would think it wouldn't take that long for it to calculate whether something is too small," he said, wholly unimpressed. He sighed. "That's it, then. We'll just enlarge everything until this little machine thinks it's the right size…I can only wonder how accurate it is…" Using telekinesis to keep the scanner pointed at the sun, he turned to his brother. "Well?"

"My body is ready," Crazy Hand said in a creepy voice, clenching into a fist and slamming himself on the ground. He flexed his fingers into a claw as an orb of energy began to form in the center of his palm, and Master Hand did the same. They moved closer together as the energies expanded, until they had merged into one large ball of energy. "Ha…DOUKEN!" Crazy yelled. The hands thrust their palms forward and sent a wave of energy rushing towards the sun. The gaseous mass began to swell to a tremendous size. Master Hand gazed up at it as it grew. He worried, for a brief moment, what would happen when it got large enough to reach them; obviously it would burn them to a crisp. Maybe they should stop.

"Oh don't worry," Crazy Hand said nonchalantly, still focusing the energy at the sun. "Everything's getting larger to scale… The earth—and the moon for that matter—is moving away from the enlarging sun! Come on, MH. This is basic. Don't be such a kid."

"Oh," Master Hand chuckled nervously. "Of course." He continued to watch the bulging sun unsurely before a beeping sound interrupted his thoughts.

"Just right!" rang the mechanical voice.

"Crazy Hand, stop!" Master Hand broke off the energy flow and Crazy Hand turned to look at the scanner.

"Just right? What about just left?" he pouted. Master Hand shook himself amusedly.

"Let's deal with mini moon now," he told his brother—he'd actually grown rather fond of the name. They pointed the scanner at the moon and gave it time to calculate how the moon was too small before reassuming the position. The balls of energy merged and surged between their palms.

Crazy Hand laughed. "I'MA FIRIN' MAH LAZER!"

"Wait wha-?" But before Master Hand could ask any more a large stream of energy blasted off and hit the moon. It didn't take as long as before for the scanner to beep and say "Just right!", and the brothers were able to stop the energy flow sooner. Crazy Hand shed a tear as he beamed at the sun and the moon.

"They grow up so fast!" he cried.

"Uhh…how about we do the earth now?" Master Hand suggested, attempting to get to the point. "We don't even have to send a beam out into space this time."

"But that was the fun part…" moped the crazy hand.

"I noticed…" Master Hand said. He set the scanner down on the ground and let it calculate the earth's "too small"-ness. "Pay attention, Crazy. All we have to do is prop our fingers on the ground like so…"

"Like pretending to be a spider, 'cept with only five legs instead of eight?" Crazy Hand copied his brother's stance.

"…Yes, like that. And then instead of creating a ball of energy, you can just direct it to the ground through your fingertips."

"Got it! All systems are go!" The Hand of Destruction glowed faintly as he conducted his energy into the earth, and Master Hand did the same. The right hand felt a sense of pride swell up inside him. They were almost done. It was almost over. They'd created a whole world. Never before had he felt so important, so powerful. He was ecstatic. This is great! He was confident. I've achieved so much! He was getting cocky. I'm practically a god—!

"OOF!" Master Hand was jabbed squarely in the palm by a tree protruding up from the ground, and the shoot sent him shooting up into the sky.

"And it's outta here!" Crazy Hand called out as he watched his brother go flying through the air. "Guess I forgot to tell him after all."

Master Hand braced himself for impact as he crashed down through the trees. He landed on his back with a thud, and lay dazed amongst the leaves and broken branches. He groaned, wondering what else could possibly go wrong, when he heard the ominous sound of splitting wood coming from behind him. "Oh n-" CRRRAASSH!

BEEP!

"Just right!"