Sorry, I really don't have much of an excuse for not updating in forever. Please accept a new chapter as my apology. Merry Christmas?
Master Hand snapped his fingers, and the lights flickered on in the dark room. There were thirty-two platforms arranged in a circle. All the contestants filed into the room and stood around, waiting for instructions.
"No one is absent?" asked Master Hand. He looked around to see if there were indeed thirty-two contestants in the room, then spoke again. "Then I will explain the rules.
"For those of you still unacquainted with the Hunger Games: this is a contest of survival. Your goal is to become the last man standing by eliminating all opposing competition.
"Any method of eliminating an opponent is permissible, if it is within the usual rules of Smash. Thus, you may bring your usual weapons onto the battlefield."
Master Hand turned around and pointed right in the center of the room, in the middle of all the platforms. "More supplies will be located there at the Cornucopia.
"You have sixty seconds until the Games begin. Do not leave your platform before then or you will immediately be disqualified."
Pit raised his hand like he was in a classroom. "Like, will we blow up or something?" he asked.
"Yes, you will be incapacitated and removed from the battlefield."
Pit and a few others looked on with shock. To them, it sounded like they would actually be killed.
"Are there any other questions?"
Silence from the contestants.
"Then step onto the teleport platforms and prepare yourselves for battle. The countdown will begin shortly."
One by one, the Smashers warped above ground and into the arena. The sun was relentless and blinding, but they paid it no mind: All eyes were focused on the big horn in the center of the clearing, the Cornucopia.
Once all the contestants were in the arena, the announcer's voice came over a speaker.
"60... 59... 58..."
The anticipation was reaching insane levels. Time seemed to fly as everyone waited for the starting signal.
"...3..."
Shulk reached for the handle of his sword.
"2..."
Robin gripped his Thoron tome a little tighter.
"1..."
That one last second seemed to stretch on forever. Shulk felt a bead of sweat roll down his face.
The two partners glanced at each other, tense. Robin raised his eyebrows with a question. Shulk nodded in answer. He held his breath, and finally-
"GO!" The sound of a gong resounded throughout the arena.
"Monado... Speed!"
As the rush of adrenaline kicked in, Shulk's hearing faded out. All he could hear now was his heartbeat. He broke into a mad dash for the Cornucopia.
Someone grabbed him and threw him to the ground- who was that?- but he got up and kept running. He glanced at Robin. He was dashing away from the Cornucopia, into the woods. Good. If Shulk could just grab some Smart Bombs, they would be doing great.
He looked up. Captain Falcon had already reached the platform, and was grabbing all the Smart Bombs. If only he could run faster- and to make things worse, the effects of Monado Speed faded. He gritted his teeth and kept sprinting.
Someone yellow was running in his way. He took the Monado off his shoulder and swung at them.
"Back Slash!"
"Eek!"
The Smasher flew forward, then crashed to the ground face-first. Shulk used his side smash on them to finish them off, then kept running.
There was a faint cannon sound in the distance.
Shulk looked up again. Captain Falcon and Fox had gotten into a fight over the Smart Bombs. Samus got to the platform, took a Bob-Omb and threw it at them both. The Smart Bombs instantly detonated.
Three more cannons sounded. Shulk cursed in his mind. No more bombs. Samus must have blown them all up on purpose.
He was deviating from the strategy now, but he would have to get something else. Think, think, think... I'm about five seconds away. There has to be something I can grab...
Another cannon sound.
Shulk finally got to the Cornucopia. Come on, think fast... He grabbed a backpack, a handful of Fire Flowers and two Lip's Sticks, and made a break for the woods.
Robin had gone further into the woods than Shulk had thought. There was no sign of him at all- no white hair, no black coat, nothing.
He looked up through the thick canopy, at the tiny glints of light that poked through the shield of treetops. The sun was still beating down; in fact it felt even hotter now that he was in the woods. He pulled at his shirt. It was super humid in here, and where was Robin, anyway?
Out of the corner of his eye, he saw another glint of light. It wasn't coming from the canopy this time, it was coming from the ground.
Is that...?
Shulk tiptoed over to the glinting light, with one hand on the Monado just in case. The light was coming from behind a small wall of shrubs. Maybe someone was trying to set up a trap...
Making as little noise as possible, he pulled the Monado off his back. The light glinted once again. Shulk burst through the shrubs and thrust the sword forward-
"TWEET TWEET!" Robin screeched out of instinct. He was crouching on the ground with his hands up, looking like a bird in the headlights.
"Oh! Sorry," Shulk said. He put his sword up, then kneeled on the ground with the tactician. Robin put a hand to his chest and let out a deep breath. Feeling a little calmer, he started to speak.
"Did you get the bombs?" he asked.
Shulk shook his head. "You heard the explosion, right?"
"Yeah."
"That was Samus. She blew up all the bombs... I think she took herself out too."
"Darn. There goes my plan."
"Sorry again."
"No, it's fine. You couldn't do anything about it," said Robin. "Did you get anything else?"
"I just grabbed the first things I saw." Shulk laid the Fire Flowers and Lip's Sticks on the ground in front of Robin. Robin surveyed the goods, then put a hand to his chin.
"We can work with this, I guess." The tactician picked up a single Fire Flower. "Steadily deplete their stamina, and if we can't finish them off, someone else will."
"Hmm."
"Did you get hit?" asked Robin.
"...I don't remember. Everything's a blur now." Shulk pulled at his shirt again. It stuck to his muggy skin for a second before finally coming off. Eww.
"Doesn't look like it," Robin said.
"I got lucky, I guess." (It was true: The power of plot armor had protected Shulk from being eliminated early on.)
The conversation trailed off at that point. Shulk and Robin were left with the constant drone of crickets and the faraway rustling of leaves. Two more cannons fired off, sounding even more distant than before.
"Let's find another hiding place and wait it out," suggested Robin. "If I counted right, seven of them got KO'd already. At this rate, there's going to be at least ten gone by tonight."
"No one's gonna find us?"
"...Hopefully not."
Meanwhile, in a dark room, a boy who loved memes sat watching Smash Channel on his TV. A bag of chips lay on his disheveled bed, but he hadn't touched it. He was too engrossed in watching the Smash game to remember he had food to eat.
He was so into it, in fact, that he didn't notice his door had been opened and his dad was poking his head in the room.
"Hey, Skyler, it's time for bed-" The father heard a cannon sound from the TV and glanced over to see. "Oh, you're watching that, uh... Super Bash Sisters thing again?"
"...It's Super Smash Brothers, Dad."
"Oh, I see. Sorry. Guess your old man's still not with the times, huh?"
The man looked over again and noticed a boy with blonde hair on the screen. He was running for the woods while holding some flowers.
"Oh... isn't that, uh, Shark? Shark, right?"
"Shulk."
"Ah, sorry. I was close!"
"Yeah."
"Oh, wait a second! They're playing the Hunger Games, aren't they?"
"Yeah."
"Ah, that's cool!"
And so the meme-loving boy and his out-of-touch father stayed up till the moon rose watching Smash TV.
It was getting late. The blinding sun had disappeared behind the canopy, and a crescent moon had taken its place. Shulk pushed another wall of branches aside and wiped the sweat from his forehead for the zillionth time.
"Can we stop now?" he asked. "I'm pretty sure no one's going to find us here."
Robin emerged from the dark forest, his coat tied around his waist (as if that would make him any less sweaty). He surveyed the little space they had found. Shulk started to make a groaning noise, but Robin held up a hand to make him keep quiet.
No fires, no suspicious rustling, no glimmers of light. Just the moon, the canopy, and the sound of crickets.
"Yeah," Robin finally whispered. He set down the Fire Flowers and Lip's Sticks. "There's no guarantee, though. And there's the problem of hiding our things..."
Shulk plopped down on the ground. "Just leave them. No one's gonna find us, right?"
"I guess so." Robin sat down on the ground as well, but not before taking his coat off and folding it haphazardly in his lap. In a moment of silence, he realized how chilly it was and just put the coat back on.
"It's pretty cold," he said, looking up at the stars.
"Yeah," Shulk said.
"So..." Robin started twiddling his thumbs. "I was thinking... maybe we should..."
"Yeah?"
"You know, um..."
Robin put his arms around himself. Shulk didn't understand.
"Hugging ourselves?"
"No no no. I mean, like... you know..."
Robin scooted over to Shulk. He started making those weird hugging gestures like you're trying to hug this person... but they have this invisible no-touch barrier, so you can't hug them... but you still want to hug them- I think you get it now.
But Shulk had a head denser than lead and still didn't get it.
"If we sleep with our arms wide open, wouldn't we lose more body heat?"
Robin put his arms back in his own personal space. "L-like..." He let out a sigh; he didn't want to play charades with this guy. He needed to put his man pants on and spit it out.
"I think we should sleep together. As in, cuddling. The closer in proximity we are, the warmer we'll both be, so we both benefit."
Shulk just sorta looked at Robin. There he was, acting strange again.
"...Why don't we just sleep in shifts and use the Fire Flowers to stay warm?" he asked.
Robin deflated, his face beginning to go red.
"...Yeah, good idea."
"You don't look too good. Should I take watch first?"
"Sure."
"G'night, I guess."
"Goodnight."
Robin laid on his back and rolled on his side so Shulk couldn't see his tomato-red face. Shulk got up and walked back a little ways into the forest, still confused about Robin's antics. And thus the potential warm fluffy moment never happened.
As Shulk was keeping watch, the faces of the KO'd Smashers appeared in the starry night sky.
Pac-Man - Fox - Captain Falcon - Pikachu - Wario - Jigglypuff - Little Mac - King Dedede - Duck Hunt
He smirked seeing Mac and Cheese's face up there. Must have been another blow to his man-pride, getting eliminated before the first night was over.
He must've gotten too confident with his side-B again, Shulk thought. What, did he KO himself at the edge of the arena or something?
He walked around the area, a Lip's Stick grasped in his hand, and checked to see if anyone was there. So far, no one had shown up and tried to kill him, so he thought he was doing pretty good. At least, for now...
"...So now that you've seen all the tributes in action, it's time to vote! The most popular tributes will receive Sponsor gifts tomorrow. Go to www-dot-smashtv-dot-com to vote- and kids, don't forget to get your parents' permission!"
The father reached for the remote and switched the TV off.
"Okay, Skyler-"
"okey" the boy interrupted.
"Okay Skyler, the show is over, so now it's really time to go to bed."
"But Dad, I wanna vote!"
"Skyler..."
"Dad..."
"Skyler..."
"Daaaad..." The boy put on his best pouty face.
"...Alright, you can vote. But you're going into the bed no matter what after that."
"YES!" the boy said like Captain Falcon.
In a flash, he opened up his computer and pulled up the Smash TV site. The poll the announcer had mentioned was on the front page, reading "Who's Your Favorite Tribute?" in big bold print. Without even glancing at any of the other names, he voted for Shulk.
"I'm really feeling it," he whispered.
His dad then tucked him into bed and left. And as he laid there in the dark room, he wondered if Shulk might actually win the tournament this month.
Does Robin know how socially awkward he is? Yes! Will Shulk defeat any memelords in this tournament? Maybe. Will I release another chapter within a month?! ...Uh, that's a pretty good question.
Next time on I, For One, Welcome Our New Supreme Meme Overlord! "Hunger Games Simulator 2K15 (Part 3)"!