Chapter 2: A Visitor From Afar


It was a quiet night in Hawkins, Indiana. Crickets chirped. Leaves and underbrush rustled as animals scurried about in the dark. The night air was warm with the summer of 1985.

Suddenly, above a desolate, quiet street, crackling blue electricity appeared from nowhere. The bolts were drawn to each other. More bolts appeared, all being drawn toward a specific spot where they collided.

Then, the air distorted and shimmered like a heat mirage, and opened. A five-pointed star-shaped hole in the fabric of time and space appeared above the empty street of the quiet town.

High-pitched screaming would have been heard by anyone, if anyone had been around to hear. Suddenly, a certain pink Puffball plummeted out of the star-shaped tear in space-time, hitting the ground face-first and bouncing twice, finally landing a few feet away.

The air around the rift distorted once more, and the hole in space-time closed. Within a few seconds, it looked like nothing had ever been there.

The Puffball began to speak.

"Ugh... p-poyo..." He whimpered. The small spherical being pushed himself unsteadily onto his large red feet, rubbing gravel off of his face. Kirby opened his deep blue eyes, taking in his surroundings.

The surface beneath his feet was odd. It was sort of like the cement pathways around a few of Dedede's old castles, but black with white lines of different sizes all along it. Kirby looked upward, as he turned around.

No rift. No way home. Kirby sank onto his belly in despair, and began to cry. He didn't have any clue where he was, his friends were probably still fighting Magolor, but without his help, and as long as that mean liar was around, Dream Land, Planet Popstar, and the whole universe were in trouble.

Kirby had gotten out of many situations. Many situations like this, in fact. He had been in unfamiliar environments with no apparent way home before. As a matter of fact, his most recent adventure, before the one involving Magolor, that was, in Patch Land, proved that.

But almost as soon as he had landed there, he had made an ally. There was no one around here. He could always look around, but he was so sad right now. Maybe it was because this place was dark, while Patch Land was bright and happy from the beginning, just like his home, Dream Land.

That may have had something to do with it. Kirby had once heard Meta talking about how stuff like that was "subconscious". Oh no. He just started thinking about what was happening right now.

"Oh, Meta, poyo..."

Kirby's crying grew worse. Magolor could have sent him anywhere! Oh, he should've just listened to Landia! His NOVA-darn habit of attacking first and asking questions later always got him in trouble! He usually fixed it and made everything alright, but what if he couldn't this time?!

If Magolor had wanted to stop Kirby and his friends from stopping him from taking over Popstar, than the portal Kirby got sucked through must have sent him somewhere far away from there. But...

Kirby blinked.

Magolor hadn't just been trying to take over the planet, had he? He wanted the entire universe.

Kirby's stomach suddenly felt very cold.

What if he wasn't even in his own universe anymore? Magolor would have surely sent him to the most locked-down world possible, not somewhere with an easily-accessible gateway back to Popstar's universe, like the Mirror World or Patch Land.

Kirby's crying grew even worse.

Suddenly, though, he heard a sound behind him. It sounded like... a Wheelie? No, that sounded like a Grand Wheelie. Kirby wiped his face of the tears, stood up, and turned around. Way down there, at the other end of the stretch of black concrete Kirby was standing on, a very bright light was approaching, and fast.

Kirby's natural curiosity took over, and he tilted his head slightly, a questioning "Poyo?" coming out of his mouth. As the light got close, the sound got louder. As it continued approaching, Kirby could see that the big light was actually two separate lights.

It was getting too bright. Kirby had to squeeze his eyes shut and look away. He knew he should probably get away, too, but at this point, he didn't think he'd be able to. The lights were blinding him even through his eyelids.

Before Kirby knew it, something that felt like cold metal slammed into his face. His small, bouncy body was sent flying.

All Kirby could do was scream. "Poyoooooooo!"


"What the fuck?", a gruff voice muttered. Billy Hargrove was bewildered. He had felt his car hit something, then some kind of pink blur went flying after the front of his car had hit it. He could swear he had heard screaming, but that was impossible.

Billy didn't know what it was he hit, but it wasn't a person, and that was all that mattered to him. He wouldn't let whatever the fuck had just happened slow him down. He had somewhere to be.

He had some...

At the thought, he purred.

...Business, to attend to. It wouldn't do to be late, now would it?


"Poyoooooooo!" Opening his eyes, Kirby found himself sailing through the air, high above a big forest. The kind of pain he was dealing with was similar to whenever he stubbed his foot. It made him want to puke. He'd dealt with worse, though.

Kirby flipped around in the air so that his feet, rather than his back, were facing the ground. Then, despite the pain it caused his body, Kirby opened his mouth wide and inhaled some air into his mouth, before closing it.

Instantly, the pain increased as his skin, which couldn't bruise but surely would have if he was like, say, Dedede, stretched due to his body inflating like a balloon. Such was one of his most basic abilities, Hover.

https/youtu.be/ON9XAIZzn2A

It would all be smooth sailing from here. His sore skin wouldn't appreciate it, but Kirby could stay like this for as long as he needed. He didn't need to breathe, so, naturally, he could hold his breath forever. Flapping his stubby arms, Kirby rose a bit higher into the air.

If he was in an entirely new world, it would probably be a good idea to scope it out from above. Continuing to flap his arms whenever he started losing altitude, Kirby looked down at the land below.

He was pretty impressed. His deep blue eyes sparkled. There was a very big town down there! It was bigger than most in Dream Land! Sparkling lights went on in many directions for... well, not miles, he supposed, but it was still big!

It seemed like the place he landed in was... what was the fancy word for "lived in" that Meta liked to use? Inhabited? Yeah, that. That meant he would have someplace to stay! And new friends to make! And people who could tell him where he was, and help him get home!

Oh, yeah. Kirby's mood had definitely been lifted. Things were looking up!

Suddenly, something caught the corner of Kirby's eye. Some lights were directly underneath him, separated from the rest of the town. Was it a little house, all by itself? Looking at the nearby stretch of black concrete, Kirby saw another set of bright lights moving away, away from whatever structure was below him. Out of curiosity, Kirby stopped moving through the air and let himself slowly float down toward the ground.

Once he got within a few feet of the ground, Kirby spat out the air that had been in his mouth. It came out in the form of a small, white, cloud-like poof, an Air Pellet, that quickly dissipated. When Kirby spat it out, his inflated body went back to its normal proportions, and he dropped down to the ground head-first, bouncing back up onto his feet.

In front of Kirby was a small cabin with lots of lights on inside. Electricity wasn't unheard of in Dream Land, but it wasn't common either. Castle Dedede had some, though. Kirby thought about knocking on the door for about a second before he remembered it didn't make any loud noise.

He didn't want to just barge in, though. So, he stood at the front door and called "Hello?" After several seconds, there was no response. Kirby tried again. "Hello?" After several more seconds, there was still no response.

Kirby walked around the house, analyzing its exterior. Maybe he could get someone's attention through a window? While walking around, Kirby heard a young female voice very clearly. He heard a weirdly-distorted male voice as well, saying something about being followed by a dad's car in an annoyed, yet joking tone. He looked around, but no one was there. Maybe it was coming from an open window?

As Kirby got closer to the source of the sound, he discovered that a window was open about halfway, yellow light spilling out into the night. Kirby could now hear the female voice a lot clearer. "I wish I was still with you," the voice said in a fond way.

Then Kirby heard the other voice. It was crackly, like it was coming from a walkie-talkie or something. "I know. Me too. But I'll see you tomorrow, all right? First thing!"

"Tomorrow." The girl's voice confirmed. Kirby jumped up to the window, grabbing onto the windowsill with his stubby arms. He hoisted himself up to it he could see into the house. It was a pretty nice room. The walls were painted a nice shade of green, and everything was organized very neatly. Meta would probably approve.

It kind of reminded Kirby of his own house, the tidiness. Well, then again, he supposed he just didn't have a lot of things in his house. He spent most of his days out and about with his friends.

Oh, right. Speaking of friends, he should probably say hi to the girl living here. Kirby had already looked around the whole room, so there was only one other place to look: down.

So Kirby looked down, and saw a bed. But most importantly, the person laying on it was a Human. That was rare. He had only met, like, five of those, counting Samus. What was most important, though, was the fact that she was currently staring up at him.

He stuck one of his nubs through the window while hanging onto the windowsill with his other one, and waved.

"Hiiii~"

The girl gasped and launched herself off the bed, standing up and facing him with an outstretched arm and a glare. The next thing Kirby knew, some invisible force had him in a crushing grip and had yanked him through the window.

Then, whatever was holding him threw him against the wall, face-first. That was the second time he had been hit by something face-first tonight. No, wait, actually, it was the third. He had landed face-first when he first emerged from the Dimensional Rift.

Ragardless, his whole body had been flattened by the impact, and he peeled off the wall and slowly floated downward like a sheet of paper. Upon landing on the ground, his body suddenly popped right back into its normal shape.

"Huh?" The human girl asked. She walked up to Kirby, who was laying on his back. As she approached, Kirby sprang up onto his feet in a battle stance. This girl must have been the one to have done that! She had extended her hand like Puff Vader and everything!

"Hey! What was that for?!" Kirby demanded. "I just said hi!" The girl jumped back. It was then that Kirby noticed her nose was bleeding, causing him to relax a bit. It was a Human thing. Adeleine's nose had done that before. Notably, both times that he swept her legs out from under her when she had been possessed by Dark Matter, and she went tumbling end-over-end.

Not many creatures in Dream Land bled. Dedede, along with Adeleine and Samus, was one of the few people he knew that actually had blood. Well, Kirby also knew lots of other Humans as well, Like Mario, Link, Ness, Princesses Peach and Zelda... Samus just so happened to be the only one out of all of those who had visited Popstar at one point. Actually, no. If he remembered correctly, Mario, Peach, and Mario's brother (Kirby couldn't recall his name, but he believed it started with an "L") had spectated during his first battle with Dedede. Kirby also remembered that Mr. L whatever-his-name-is had been one of the people Dedede had put one of those weird brooches on to keep him, Kirby himself, and only a few others alive during the whole Subspace incident during the Brawl Smash tournament.

Speaking of which, now that he was thinking about it, when he counted all his fellow Smash Bros. competitors, he knew a lot more than five humans.

Whatever! He was getting off-track. The gist of it all was, those were the only people he knew that had been to Dream Land and had blood. Well, that wasn't technically true, he knew one other person, but he didn't like to think about him very much.

Back to the matter at hand (not of the Master variety, heh, heh), though.

The girl's look of shock faded into curiosity. There was still caution and a bit of fear there, though. Slowly, as if not wanting to scare him, she got down onto her hands and knees and slowly crawled toward him, stopping a few feet away.

"You... can talk?" She asked in a quiet voice. Kirby relaxed fully, letting the glare fall off of his face. "Yeah," he said. The girl flinched again, like she had been expecting that the first time she heard him speak was in her imagination, or something.

She visibly swallowed. "What... are you?" She asked. Kirby frowned. That was kind of a long story. He'd explain it all to her soon enough (...maybe...), but for now, he settled for...

"I'm Kirby!"

She blinked. "Kirby?" She asked. Kirby smiled and nodded. "Yeah! What's your name?" He asked. "I... I'm Eleven," she said. "El for short," she finished. "Your name is a number?" Kirby asked, head tilted to the side curiously.

The girl blushed.

Kirby noticed she was gripping her left arm, near her hand. "I...um..." She began awkwardly. Kirby connected the dots. It must have been something personal. "I-it's alright. You don't have to tell me anything if you don't want to," he reassured.

The girl looked relieved.

"Can you tell me where I am?" Kirby asked. "Hawkins, Indiana," the girl responded. Kirby blinked. It looked like he really was far from home. He had travelled all over Popstar and all across Dream Land, and neither of those names sounded familiar.

"What planet is this?" Kirby asked. Now it was the girl's turn to blink. "Um. Earth," she said in such a way that it sounded like she thought it should have been obvious. Kirby tilted his head. He had indeed never heard of a planet called Earth, and he had travelled all across the Gamble Galaxy, for NOVA's sake! He really was somewhere new.

"Huh," he said. An idea then struck him. If he was still in the same universe, then knowing what galaxy he was in would help him narrow down his search for Popstar. "What galaxy is this?" Kirby asked. Now the girl looked really confused. "The... Milky Way...?" She answered.

Oh. Never mind. Kirby had never heard of that galaxy.

Kirby frowned. "Poyo..." he said sadly. He was either in another galaxy, or in another galaxy in another universe. Either way, he was really far from home... "What... What's wrong?" El asked. Kirby met her eyes. "I'm just... a long way from home," he said. "I'm trying to find a way back."

"Where are you from?" El asked curiously. Kirby perked up. Talking about Popstar always made him happy! "I'm from Popstar!" Kirby said, jumping up and down happily, causing small yellow stars to pop into existence as he did so, much to El's confusion and slight alarm. "Popstar?" El asked, an eyebrow quirked.

"Yeah! It's the best and brightest place in the whole wide universe!" Kirby answered. "It's... another planet?" The girl asked. "Yep!" Kirby answered happily. El suddenly smiled. "Dustin would love to meet you," she said.

"Why? Does he like aliens?" Kirby asked with a slight smile. El's smile got just a bit wider. "Yes. A lot." She said. "Well, then, he better get ready to meet the coolest one in this galaxy!" He said, jumping and flexing the nonexistent muscles in his nubs; mimicking what he'd seen Dedede do with his arms to show off his "guns". He wore Dedede's classic smirk, albeit a toothless version, as he did this as well. El giggled.

Soon enough, though, her smile faded. "Where are you going to stay?" She asked. This caused Kirby's smile to fade as well as a look of thought replaced it. "I don't know," he noted. Then, he perked up. "Hey, El! Do you have any room?" He asked excitedly, jumping up and down.

El bit her lip. "I could set something up under my bed for you for tonight. I'll have to figure out how to introduce you to my dad, though," she responded uncertainly. "He's out getting groceries right now," she added. That arrangement sounded good to Kirby! He was pretty tired!

"Ok!" He replied cheerfully.

So El went and got some blankets for him, and put them under her bed. Kirby assured her he didn't need any more than that. He liked to nap in the wilderness, after all. He didn't need much to get comfortable.

Kirby yawned, getting a nice, good stretch as he did so. "Well, I'm pretty tired, so... g'night, El!" He said. El smiled at him as she left the room to go watch something called "T.V", turning the light off as she went.

"Goodnight, Kirby," she replied softly.

A/N, PLEASE READ ALL OF IT FOR IMPORTANT DETAILS! Hi, guys! This is my first ever fanfic. I know it sounds weird and like a total crackfic. I mean, Kirby and Stranger Things? Well, at the end of the day, I decided to write this because I'm a fan of both series'. I've searched high and low for any crossover fics but, unsurprisingly, I've really found none. This fic is the first of its kind (that I've ever managed to find, and believe me, I've looked). They say "be the change you want to see in the world", right? So, yeah. Anyone who reads this, please, please review! I'm a newborn author (lol) so I would really like some feedback and constructive criticism! As a side note, Kirby games' extra modes are canon in this universe, though Meta Knight fighting himself or his own crew isn't. Thus, the Metaknightmare! mode in Nightmare in Dream Land didn't happen. In that same vein, the contexts the non-canonical scenarios take place in didn't happen in this universe, but the scenarios themselves did. Meta Knight did indeed fight Galacta Knight and Marx Soul was a thing that, unfortunately, existed, there was just no Arena or True Arena that, in the games, led to those battles happening; in this fic's universe, those encounters just happened. Also, Extra Mode didn't happen in this fic's canon, but that HR-D3 fight with Metal General still did, because that was awesome.

Anyway, I'm also sorry if Kirby and El's meeting was sort of, I dunno, short? I just feel like she took it way too well and it was a bit unrealistic for her to just be like "lol ok", but I didn't really know how she'd react to Kirby beyond attacking him with her telekinesis on sight. He did scare her, after all, and she hasn't exactly had the best interactions with otherwordly creatures before. Sorry for the short length of this chapter, but you can expect a meatier one tomorrow! Get ready for Kirby to meet the other kids! (and Human Dedede-I mean, uh, Hopper) Also, just for clarification, Billy was not on the way to his little rendezvous with Karen. He was on his way to somebody else. You know how he rolls. Just thought I'd introduce him early as foreshadowing though. Considering that foreshadowing scene involved him hurting Kirby, well...

Take that as you will.

Chapter title is a reference to the cutscene where Magolor crashes onto Planet Popstar.

With all that said, I will, as our dearly-departed Meteorz used to say, see you guys...

Next time...