5 become 1 even more. Let the games continue ;)
Episode 6 (Part 2)
"Where are we?" Yoshi asked, his voice echoing as they walked on. The four players found themselves entering a corridor as they ventured into the metal door, the atmosphere dark and endless and the stench in the air far from pleasant.
"I believe we are in the sewers of Delfino Plaza," Luvbi said, her face showing displeasure.
"If our next game is going to be like the one we just played...geez," Wario told them, being the first in line and leading the others down the hallway.
"What else can we do?" Goombella pointed out. "It's our mission. We have to play this."
"Well, we played it and someone died!" Wario exclaimed, stopping in his place and at the same time turning around to face the others.
"She did not die," Luvbi said with exasperation. "And if anything, it was you who ran first to get your key, starting the timer for all of us. You caused it."
"So?" Wario said. "I was rushed and there was a freakin' timer counting us down! And if I didn't go get the key, then Yoshi would have gotten it first!"
"Yeah right!" Yoshi argued. "I didn't even get my key until the end. You got yours before all of us. Technically, you ran first, and we all saw you."
"Oh, so you're calling me guilty for getting my key first?" Wario snorted. "At least I wasn't the one freaking out in that cell. I wasn't scared cause I knew this is all just another stupid mission." Wario then faced Luvbi.
"And you were planning to press that red button before all of us, weren't you?" Luvbi stopped for a second, a small smile forming on her face which in the dark was imperceptible to the players around her.
"Absurd," she replied.
"Guys, we're not going to get anywhere with bickering and fighting," Goombella stated. "We don't know what's in store for us, so might as well calm ourselves down before we come upon it." Turning in the right direction, the players were lead down yet another corridor, but this time instead of a dark pitch black that finished the path ahead of them, a light could be seen at the end of the passageway that gave them all a slimmer of both hope yet uncertain anxiety. Stepping hurriedly, Wario was the first to reach the end.
"Should we open it?" Wario said, holding his breath.
"Why hesitate?" Luvbi retorted.
"All right, I won't," Wario said, and with his might, pushed the door open.
The players came across a room, five times larger than the one they had initially started in. The first thing the players noticed was a pile of boxes in the middle of the room, stacked in the shape of a pyramid and outlined by a yellow box inscribed into the floor. Immediately to their left and protruding from the same wall they were entering from was a large sewer pipe, great in size and colossal enough to take in a mini-van if it had to. Above it, a blank timer screen was situated.
As the four of them carefully made their way deeper into the mysterious room, they noticed that the remaining walls of the room all held doors, a lock visible on each one. Luvbi made her way to the nearest door, playing with the metal lock and knocking on its metal front.
"Well, the doors are locked," Luvbi noticed. "Maybe these are passages to the next room."
"That's a huge pipe," Yoshi said nervously, looking at it and peering into its darkness. Just like the corridor the players had gone through, the pipe seemed to have no other end to it but an orb of pitch black.
"I wonder what these crates are for," Goombella said curiously, approaching the boxes in the middle of the room. Seeing the yellow line that outlined the pyramid of wooden crates, she stepped away from it cautiously.
"Let's crack one open," Wario suggested as he went up to one of the boxes. "It's not like we'll ruin the game or something.."
"The yellow line is telling us not to interfere with it," Luvbi noticed, turning around. "It's a psychology trick. We're not supposed to touch it...yet." Lubi inspected the line even more.
"Ah, the box holds a static threat," she said with a nod, looking at the small symbol that littered the inside of the yellow line.
"Then what do we do in this room?" Wario inquired. "This room is just more baffling than the first one we were in. Nothing makes any sense!"
"Well, at least there isn't a potential threat located in this one," Goombella observed with relief, looking around the room.
"How about the doors?" Yoshi said, looking at the end of the room. "If they have locks on them, that means there are keys. Right?" Each door held a handle, but also had a lock attached to it that prevented it from being swung open. Above the door at the end of the room the players noticed a screen, sunk into the wall.
"A TV!" The others turned to see a monitor located above the locked door at the room's opposite end, opposite of the gigantic pipe. The four of them made their way to it.
"Okay, turn on!" Wario shouted, waving his hands in attempt to find an sensor. Goombella turned around and saw that the door they had entered the room from was left ajar, still open a slight crack. She looked back at the TV screen.
"I'm sure that closing that door will start the game," Goombella guessed. "It's the only thing here that we're able to change, and it'd probably lead to the TV turning on, which will probably inform us of our rules." All four players faced one another.
"Well, is everyone else ready?" Luvbi asked. Goombella slowly nodded, while noddied as well.
"I don't really have a choice here," Wario said with an irritated voice. "Somebody go close it. Let's play." Goombella walked over to the other end of the room, closing the door decisively. Immediately the lights in the room faded out, and static whooshed into the air, causing all players to look up at the wall in front of them. McHallyboo appeared yet again.
"Hello, and welcome to your next test," he spoke from the screen, as the players listened carefully. "The walls in this room hold three doors. These are your shelters. To access a shelter, a key is required. These three keys can be found within the stack of crates, located in the center of the room. Don't worry: the static barrier for the crates is now disabled. However, work quickly, because the pipe at the other end of this room will be activated as soon as this game begins. It is a vacuum. When the timer for that pipe expires, its power will reach maximum force, and all within this room will be sucked into its abyss." The players stared at the screen with incomprehension.
"The only way to avoid this fate is to enter a shelter. Be in one of the three shelters when the clock hits zero, and you will be safe. Four walls build a home, but which one will you be sucked into? With only three points of safety, which of you will be the odd man out? Make your choice."
As soon as the tape ended, a whirring sound could be heard from behind the players. The four of them all turned around uneasily to see the pipe, now started and producing a sound that startled each one of them to an unhealthy amount. The timer located above the pipe flashed on, telling the players just how much time they had in order to survive: 60 seconds.
"Oh dear," Luvbi said, her face looking alarmed.
"Hurry!" Goombella shouted, as all four of them headed their way to the boxes in the center of the room. The pipe was now acting like a vacuum, picking up bits of dust located at its entrance. Yoshi put his hands on one of the crates, but then stopped with realization with a strange look.
"Wait," he thought. "There are only three keys hidden in these crates. One for each shelter in the walls. If that's so, then that means-"
"It means it's survival of the fittest!" bellowed Wario, and with his right arm whacked at the pyramid from its midsection, causing boxes to both break and fly amuck. Goombella shrieked, dodging the pieces of wooden splinter that flew into the air. Luvbi grabbed a crate into her hands, and then threw it onto the floor, cracking it open.
"Nothing," she said, then turned to see the remaining twenty-five crates that now littered the room. Yoshi pounced onto one of the boxes, breaking it open and looking at its contents.
"Nothing!" he said, then went to pounce on another.
"This one has glass in it!" Goombella told the others with anxiety, cracking one open to see shards of glass within it. "Stop! We have to play carefully."
"Then play that way and be the one without a shelter!" Wario shouted, "cause I'm getting a key before all of you!" He punched two crates in a row vertically, sending wooden pieces everywhere. The pipe held a timer with forty seconds left, as the four fighting players continued to bash the crates within the room, all in search for one of the three crucial keys that would guarantee safety.
"Oh my goodness," noticed Goombella. As the pipe got slightly stronger and more debris was picked up, the vacuum pulled apart the pile of wooden splinters on the ground and revealed a shimmer of metal. A key was on the ground, and Goombella ran up to it.
"Tenth box!" Wario yelled, breaking into one of the boxes with his fist. As Yoshi stomped onto another crate in attempt to find a key, Luvbi was the only other one who noticed Goombella pick up the key from the ground and run to the door on the right side of the room. As Luvbi began searching the debris on the ground, Goombella attempted to use her key to open the door before her.
"Doesn't fit," she said in panic.
30 seconds.
The arena was getting more dangerous. As the timer hit thirty seconds, the pipe reached an even stronger level of force, its suction stronger as broken wood flew into the air and attacked the remaining players. Goombella, closest to the pipe, was pulled back by its force and fell to the ground with a scream. Blinded by the flurry of splinters, Yoshi tripped over one of the crates, falling with a yelp as well.
"Hah!" Wario chuckled, seeing him fall as Wario punched one of the remaining five unopened boxes located in the room. Recovering and getting up quickly, Goombella used her key to quickly open up the lock on the door before her. The lock fell to the ground, and as the shelter opened, Goombella shouted with relief and hurried inside. With ease, she closed the door behind her.
"Yes," Luvbi whispered, breaking a crate open and seeing a key inside. She grabbed it hurriedly and made her way to the end of the room, farthest away from the pipe as possible and also towards one of the doors. She looked behind her, noticing both the predicament as well as the timer on the wall: 20 seconds.
"I found one!" Yoshi shouted happily, spotting the final key before him and slowly getting up to his feet. As soon as he got his stance back, Wario used his foot to swipe the ground before him, tripping Yoshi yet again and sending him to the floor. The last key fell to the floor, and as the wind got even stronger, Wario ran up to the key and took it into his own possession.
"No!" Yoshi cried, crawling on the floor in his direction and fighting the vacuum of the pipe. "Give that back!" Wario too was struggling to make his way to the last door on the left side of the room, but as he finally did, he turned back to face Yoshi, a grin of satisfaction and triumph on his face.
"Looks like I played this game after all," he shouted to him over the whirring sound of the wind, sticking the key into the lock as the door flung open. "I guess one of us had to be left behind."
"You're right," came a voice from behind him. "One of us does have to be left behind. And it's you." With little hesitation, Luvbi let go of the crate that she was holding in her hands. The strong force of the pipe vacuum caused it to fly towards the other end of the room, and as it did, it hit Wario square in the stomach, knocking him several feet back and closer back to the pipe than Yoshi was. The pipe now even stronger than ever, he was unable to stand up from the ground.
"WHAT was that for!" Wario bellowed with rage. "You cheater! You...teamworker!"
"Strategy," corrected Luvbi. With a final available spot and the last door already unlocked by Wario and wide open, Yoshi crawled towards it slowly, gasping as he fought against the pipe's power.
10 seconds
Luvbi looked backwards, seeing the pipe holding just ten seconds left until its final power was to be unleashed. She hurried to her door at the end of the room, closing her eyes from the strong wind as she stepped inside her shelter. Closing the door behind her, she huddled into the small space that provided safety, just as Yoshi made it to his own door and threw himself inside. All three shelters were taken, just as the timer above the pipe hit its limit.
0
"No!" Wario hollered. "I was supposed to go on!"
A deafening sound erupted from the pipe's entrance, being at a volume too loud even for the players who were safely behind their doors. But as soon as the sound appeared, Wario's body was flung into the air backwards, just like a piece of debris as he was sucked into the pipe and pulled into its unknown darkness. The three remaining players covered their ears as the immense suction noise continue, feeling as if three eternities passed before the sound finally started to fade out. Within just a few seconds, it disappeared completely. It was Luvbi who was the first to push open her door and exit her shelter.
"Is it...over?" Goombella said, carefully opening her door from her side of the room and coming out of her own shelter. She looked at Luvbi, then at the pipe at the end of the room.
"The storm is over," Luvbi confirmed, as both of them turned to the final door. His door flung open during the storm, Yoshi stumbled out of his own shelter and fell to the floor, gasping. Goombella turned to him in surprise.
"Is Wario...?" Goombella started, but Luvbi just gave her a look that made her understand.
"Well, shall we go on?" Luvbi said. In the center of the room and previously covered by the pyramid of boxes was a square, protruding from the ground. It was a trap door.
"Where did that door come from? Yoshi asked curiously.
"It must have opened when the vacuum's timer ended," Goombella noticed. Also unveiled after the storm was a message in small letters, imprinted on the floor, and as the players stepped up closer to read it, it only confused them even more:
Well, to do so is a win to deny
"Thank you Luvbi," Yoshi said meekly, as the three of them climbed down a metal ladder through the dark. Going towards their next game, the players found a temporary moment available for discussion within their chaotic game.
Luvbi: I was sure there would be an exemption at the end of this. That's how the games were working out, in my opinion.
"I'm so happy you stopped Wario from getting that last shelter!" Yoshi continued. "I owe you." Luvbi just rolled her eyes, while Goombella listened with curiosity, being at the top of the ladder's length. Suddenly, Luvbi banged against one of the metal rungs of the ladder.
"Ow," she said softly, catching the attention of the two players above and below her.
"Are you okay?" Yoshi asked.
"I'm fine, thank you," Luvbi replied. "But, my arm is twisted in one of these rungs...you can go on, Yoshi. We'll catch up." Yoshi continued his way down the ladder, as Luvbi let out a sigh.
"Now I almost regret saving him," Luvbi said finally, as Goombella faced her with a puzzled look. "But, it was the better choice, I guess."
"What did you do anyway in that room?" Goombella questioned, staring down at her while keeping her voice low. "Did Wario fail on his own?"
"I prevented Wario from going on," Luvbi said simply, "and instead, brought Yoshi with us."
"Why would you do that?" said Goombella, her face looking even more mystified than ever. "What purpose does that hold?" Luvbi looked in the direction below her.
"Because the weaker the player we are playing with," Luvbi said, looking carefully at the player climbing below and nearly at ladder's end, "the easier it'll be to eliminate them." Finally understanding, Goombella faced Luvbi fully, her face showing the tiniest bit of trouble yet agreement.
"What the fruit...?" Yoshi started, opening the door to their third room as all three players stared into it with confusion. The room was mostly empty, larger than the one they had started in but a significant size smaller than their second. Towards the right end of the room, the players noticed a table with objects upon it, each of them holding no definite shape. In the corner, a television was present. But the thing that confused the players was the existence of an enormous boulder at the end of the room, behind it the outline of their only door to an exit. Luvbi immediately stepped into the room, noticing a poster on the left wall as she went up to it.
VIVIAN: 103 LBS
YOSHI: 118 LBS
LUVBI: 102 LBS
WARIO: 166 LBS
GOOMBELLA: 109 LBS
"Quite personal, if you ask me," Luvbi commented.
"Why is our weight being displayed?" Yoshi questioned.
"Guys...it probably has to do with this," Goombella said with dismay. The three of them turned to see something they had all surprisingly initially missed: a pit was located directly in the center of the room with a five-foot diameter, reaching down at least thirty feet into the sewer ground. On the wall of its inside was a ladder, letting them all know that climbing down into it would be a necessary action.
"The ladder probably means we have to climb into it," Yoshi said slowly.
"Or fall into it," Luvbi said softly, keeping her eyes on nothing else but the pit.
"Or throw into it," finished Goombella, who was looking at the table located just ten feet away from the pit. Her eyes narrowed when she realized that the table held nothing but a pile of rocks upon it. As Goombella looked closer, she saw that the weight of each rock was engraved on its front.
"Fifty, seventy-five, a hundred..." Goombella counted. "That's…400 pounds in total."
"So, rocks and pounds," Yoshi said, scratching his head. "Now what? There's a freaking pit in the middle of the room and a gigantic rock blocking our way! What are we supposed to do now?"
"We won't know what we have to do! Unless we close the door," Luvbi said, looking at the open door they had entered from.
"But let's figure this out first," Goombella said, both suddenly and quickly. "If we analyze a part of this now, we'll have more time to think later as the timer ticks down. We're probably going to be timed in this game. Just like in our past games, right?" Her question was answered when she saw a blank timer clock at the end of the room, near the ceiling but not directly above the boulder.
"And what is there to think about?" Luvbi said forcefully. "We'll know everything when we hear the rules. By tampering, we could mess something up. Let us begin." Finally giving in, Goombella turned around and walked to the start of the room, giving the room one last quick look as a whole before closing the door. The lights immediately dimmed down, and the three remaining players turned to face the television that flashed on.
"Hello, and welcome to your third game," said McHallyboo from the screen. "Hopefully, this task will make you realize what is truly needed in order to move on. To lift the boulder out of this room, five hundred pounds must be applied to the bottom of the pit before you. Apply five hundred pounds, and you will succeed. The rocks upon the table are for you to use, but they only give so little weight. It'll be up to you to decide just how you will fill in that pit, but keep in mind that once a rock is lifted from the table, a one minute timer will be activated before the lid for the pit closes, sealing all in and out. You have two minutes to figure this out, or the cord that lifts the boulder will snap, ending your chances of escape. What will be going into the pit of sacrifice? Make your choice." As the tape finished, all three players looked at each other slowly. The timer in the room turned on: 120 seconds.
"Shoot," Yoshi said, panicking. "Now what?"
"Okay, we need five-hundred pounds for that pit," said Goombella, going to the rocks on the table. "These rocks will help us."
"But they only provide four-hundred," Luvbi said, her voice sounding odd. Goombella hurried over to the poster on the side of the room, looking at their coordinating weights.
"The three of us don't reach five-hundred pounds," Goombella said weakly.
"Wait, can't we just all go inside the pit and carry the rocks in with us?" Yoshi thought. "That'd be well over five-hundred pounds, right?"
"I'm afraid that wouldn't work," Luvbi said, standing straight in her position and looking at him carefully. "Once a rock is lifted, a one minute timer begins until the lid closes. Climbing to the bottom of that pit and getting out before a minute expires would be...quite impossible."
"Well then," Yoshi said, looking strangely back at Luvbi, "What would that mean?"
"It means that whoever goes into that pit won't be coming out," Luvbi said slyly, turning to face Goombella, who in turn faced back at her with an uneasy look. "And after all, any one of us plus all those rocks will add up to five-hundred pounds. It would be just enough."
"Wait," Yoshi said with alarm, as Luvbi took a step towards him. "You're not...you're not going to..."
"Someone has to go," she said, and in one swift movement used her outstretched hands to knock Yoshi off balance. The dinosaur lost his footing on one of his feet and fell backwards, but managed to grab onto the edge of the pit with one hand, preventing him from falling the full thirty feet to the pit's bottom. Goombella stepped back with shock.
"Help!" Yoshi shouted, dangling from the pit's edge helplessly. Luvbi stood over him, letting out a slight chuckle before giving out a heavy sigh. She looked down at him.
"You thought I was doing you a favor, saving you from that other room," Luvbi said nonchalantly, as she rose one of her feet into the air to finally knock Yoshi down to the pit's floor. "But it was all just a plan. The weakest…will be eliminated!"
"No, the strongest will!" Goombella exclaimed, and with her head whammed directly into Luvbi. The startled player lost her balance and fell forwards, but unlike Yoshi failed to grab onto the pit's edge. Plummeting thirty feet down the hole, Luvbi let out a scream before she hit the bottom. To the relief of the two players above, the base was a trampoline, as Luvbi's body bounced slightly before resting fully on the ground, unmoving.
"Here!" Goombella yelled, grabbing onto Yoshi as he struggled to get back up. Finally pulled back to the surface, Yoshi fell to the floor, panting. He looked down into the pit, seeing Luvbi's body absent of motion.
"Is she…all right?" Yoshi asked.
"Yeah," Goombella reassured. "Maybe just unconscious." She turned to face Yoshi.
"Don't ask me why I did that," Goombella said, dusting herself off, "but the only thing I knew was that I couldn't go into the final stage with a person like Luvbi by my side. She would have probably attacked me next, in the final game. I would rather have someone like you."
"True," said Yoshi. "Thanks for saving me."
"No problem," Goombella replied. They both turned to the clock and saw their remaining time for the game: 58 seconds.
"We gotta move," she said, and the two of them darted behind them to the table full of rocks. Grabbing a twenty-five pound rock each, they lifted it and carried it towards the pit in the middle of the room, holding it above the hole they were about to drop it into.
"Wait!" Goombella said sharply, as Yoshi halted. "Don't let them hit Luvbi. Let's put them in the same spot." Standing next to each other, the two players dropped their stones in as they fell, landing near the side of the pit's bottom and a safe distance away from the unconscious player on the ground. A rumbling immense sound appeared behind the players, and as they turned to look, they saw that the huge boulder at the exit of the room was being lifted up just slightly.
"The boulder's lifting!" Yoshi said, turning to the table of rocks. "How many more do we need?"
"All of them!" said Goombella. "Luvbi's weight is the lightest." While she grabbed another twenty-five pound rock, Yoshi grabbed a fifty pound one, as the two of them made their way to the pit and dropped their rocks in once again. This time, the boulder lifted an increased amount, as the players went to get their third round of stones.
36 seconds
"Just two more!" Goombella said, as they faced the final two rocks that remained upon the table: 75 lbs. and 100lbs.
"They're too heavy!" said Yoshi, shaking his head. "We can't get them in on time!"
"Yes we can…lift the table!" Goombella said, but as they both attempted to lift a leg each, they realized that it was interconnected with the sewer's floor.
"It's stuck," Goombella said with dismay. "We don't have much time." On the face of the table was a message, unseen previously due to the fact that it was obscured by rocks. Now revealed, the two of them read it:
Hopefully these games did nothing but enlighten
"Get the lighter one," Yoshi ordered, and they both pushed their rocks off the table and onto the ground. As Yoshi attempted to pick his up, Goombella pushed against hers, using all her might to roll it closer and closer to the edge of the pit. She finally reached the center of the room and pushed hers in, landing it on top of the already-made pile of rocks within the pit.
"Help me!" Yoshi cried, attempting to push his own rock. Goombella ran over to his side, and at once, the two of them pushed with all their strength, moving the heaviest rock steadily and rolling it to its goal. At last, the two of them reached the center of the room, and with one final budge plunged the final amount of weight into the hole. An even stronger sound came from behind them, and as Goombella and Yoshi turned around, they saw a sight that made them both feel a sense of relief: their exit was unblocked.
10 seconds
"Run!" yelled Goombella, grabbing Yoshi's hand as the two of them made their way to the end of the room. Pushing against the door, it opened easily as they fell forwards with surprise, already entering the next room of their game unintentionally. As soon as they did so, a shattering noise came from behind as the two players covered their ears and ducked to the ground. The cord for the boulder had snapped, smashing the boulder against the ground behind them into large pieces. When they finally turned around to look at what had happened, all they could see was rubble, blocking their only way of going back.
"That was close," Yoshi said, sighing and getting up to his feet. But Goombella was more focused on what lay ahead of her, and as Yoshi turned around too, the two of them got a sickly feeling in the pits of their stomachs.
"This...is our last game" Goombella said, her voice showing dread. Ahead of them was their exit, clearly labeled with the word itself, "Exit," and at the long room's very end. But before the door to their freedom were ten machines, aligned on the left side of the room and going down the length of the hallway, making the room larger than any of the others they had encountered previously in their journey. Hoisted onto pedestals, each machine resembled the shape of a rectangle, except for one extra component: a sharp piece of metal jutted out from each one, pointing in the direction of the opposite wall.
On each machine, a label was present that discombobulated the two of them even more: ZB June.
The mission reaches its final game! What a tense one indeed D:
What must our last two survivors do to move on? Who will be victor? And what conclusions will be unveiled at the pinnacle of this mission?
The next week I'll be taking my finals (lol wut, I still have school? x.x) But I'm aiming to update at least once before the dreaded week arrives! I missed a picture clue for the beginning of Episode 6 x.x but whala, here it has come! Travel to my profile to check it out. What clue can you see that'll weigh you in on who the Mole is?
Stay tuned for the next part of this episode and this mission's conclusion!