Universe: Dark Tournament Universe
Leaf smiled as she watched her fellow Smashers cheer as Lucas stumbled through the door. The kid had done it yet again.
Mario quickly grabbed a chair and moved it over for Lucas, who slumped into the chair, exhausted. Corrin ran up to him with a heal staff in hand.
"You did it! You defeated Psycho Hand!" she said. "Hold still, I'll heal you!"
Lucas just gasped and nodded weakly, the healing rays of Corrin's staff mending his wounds as she focused on her work.
After a few minutes, Corrin stopped.
"All right, that should be it!" she said.
"Thanks," said Lucas.
"All right, everyone," said Leaf from where she stood near the whiteboard. "Thanks to Lucas, it comes down to the final tiebreaker match."
Leaf looked over the VIP lounge that they had been given. Over the rest of the gathered Smashers as their celebrations began to quiet down, then out the window that overlooked the arena, before finally turning her gaze back to the whiteboard. The plan. The dream. The purpose of this whole stupid tournament.
Apparently, the other Hands in the universe didn't like the whole "Super Smash Bros" thing that Master Hand and Crazy Hand had started. Which had led to them coming out of the sky one day, and capturing the two, and dragging them away for a mock trial. Of course, it had been a kangaroo court, and they had been resoundingly convicted of some completely bogus charges.
But there had been a hole in the plan of the Hands. See, having a trial by combat clause in your constitution meant that one had to be careful when kidnapping the leaders of one of the most prestigious fighting organizations in the multiverse. Care that had not been taken. Which was how they'd ended up here.
An 11-round trial by combat. 11 champions from each side. Whoever won the most matches would be declared the victor.
The Smashers had been quick to select their champions. Mario. Link. Cloud. Sonic. Captain Falcon. Ryu. Mewtwo. Palutena. Bayonetta. Steve. Meta Knight. Amongst the greatest champions known across the multiverse.
And then both Mewtwo and Ness contracted E. Coli within the span of 24 hours. Set to fight a hand with powerful psychic powers. And with no other psychic types or PSI users to call upon, the burden had fallen to Lucas.
The tournament had been a very close affair. Mario and Link had come out strong with early victories, but Palutena, Bayonetta and Steve had been defeated in quick succession. Sonic had managed to pull out a last second win to tie things up, before Captain Falcon and Meta Knight fought their matches to a draw. Ryu had also fought his opponent to a draw but had officially lost on a technicality that Leaf was very certain was a controversial call, even by Hand standards.
Which left the Smashers down 1 win with 2 more matches to go. And it had been Lucas's turn to fight.
Lucas was the one who everybody was the most worried about. They needed a telepath of their own to avoid an instant loss to the Hand's telepath, and with the much more powerful Mewtwo and the much more confident Ness out of commission, it had come down to the timid Lucas or nothing. And despite all of that, the power of PK Love prevailed in the end.
"All right, Cloud," said Robin from the opposite side of the white board. "You've got this. You've beaten Sephiroth on multiple occasions, and you can beat Emperor Hand too. Just get out there and do your thing. Be yourself, fight the way you always do."
"That's right," said Leaf. "We're all cheering..."
The door burst open.
"What is the meaning of this?" demanded Robin as several hands floated into the room. "Emperor Hand! Will you not abide by the rules of your own tournament?"
"We detected temporal energy around one of yours," said Emperor Hand. He pointed towards Leaf. "You have been time travelling!"
All eyes in the room fell to Leaf.
Leaf just cracked a grin. "So, what if I have? Show me where in the rules of the tournament where time travel is forbidden? You can't because I read and reread the entire tournament rule set four times, it's not there."
"Time travel? Leaf, how did you..." started Captain Falcon.
"It's not against the rules, Emperor Hand," repeated Leaf.
"That's cheating," said Emperor Hand. "Nobody would allow such an outlandishly unfair advantage in a Combat by Trial!"
"And yet you seem to have failed to ban it!" said Leaf. "Even though time travel is theoretically possible and is something your scientists are researching, you didn't account for it. That seems like your mistake."
"You!"
"See, Emperor, you barge into our world, take our leaders and then force us into a trial by combat against the most powerful enemies we've ever faced to save them. Stronger than Tabuu, the Master Core, Galeem and Darkrohn. I'd say this is only fair."
"You're not even supposed to be here! Having two strategists is an exception to our traditions! Only one strategist should be allowed for..."
"I wasn't Robin's assistant the first time around," said Leaf.
A hush fell over the room.
"I tried egging you into letting me be here the second time. It didn't work. Four tries later and I figured out that you were so arrogant that you wouldn't think twice about letting Robin have an assistant."
Leaf paced in front of the board, tossing a dry erase marker in her hand as she continued.
"It took me eighty-seven more times to figure out who had the best shot of winning against each opponent. We lost all of those tournaments. But I figured out that if Mario ground pounded Blazing Hand's armor, it would dent it enough to compromise the heat protection. Saw that if Link used enough Shock and Bomb arrows, he could wear down Warrior Hand. Saw that Bayonetta never won a fight, no matter what we tried. So on and so forth."
"Get to the point!" snapped Emperor Hand.
"You know, I was the one who contaminated Mewtwo and Ness's food."
"What?" gasped Mario.
"Mewtwo is far too arrogant and he never won a fight after 60-ish attempts, so I've actually contaminated his food 15 times. I thought Ness would have a better shot since he beat Gygas. On a whim, I gave Lucas a shot, and of all four times I got Lucas in, he never lost. Literal power of love. What a kid. I guess your psycho couldn't take the literal power of love."
"Is there a point?" demanded Emperor Hand.
"The point is that we got to this point, four times. Four times, we get to this exact moment. Four wins each side, two draws and one final match. And each time, Cloud loses. Do you know why? Because you sabotage him," said Leaf.
Emperor Hand froze.
"Under this arena is a device that drains energy. Palutena's light magic, Bayonetta's darkness magic, Steve's enchanted gear, and Cloud's limit. Between those four, for 102 tournaments, they've collectively racked up 8 total wins. 8 total. Almost half our team barely had a shot of winning their matches because this tournament's rigged."
"You have no proof!" said Emperor Hand.
"You said that last time," said Leaf. "And I wasn't prepared. But I've got it this time. See, last time, I only had my time travelling Pokemon. But now..."
Leaf reached into her bag and tossed a handful of Pokeballs.
Everyone gasped as several Pokémon filled the room.
"I reached out to some friends. A friend of mine got me a meeting with Rayquaza, and another got me in touch with Ho-Oh. A friend of a friend took me to the Slumbering Weald, and would you look at that, Zacian and Zamazenta are all too happy to help. A friend of a friend of a friend got me in touch with the Swords of Justice, and you know, it's in the name, these guys don't stand for this kind of backstabbery crap. Oh, and Magearna, Manaphy, Victini and Deoxys are some friends I made along the way. But uh, core concept. I figured out that there was no way to win the tournament. You've got it rigged and rigged good. So, I had to think outside of the box. You want proof? My friends here will go blow up the floor, and you'll have to go explain to everybody what the magic draining device is doing there."
"You set me up! How?" demanded Emperor Hand.
"Ah, right, I forgot somebody," said Leaf, reaching for another Pokeball, and tossing it.
Out popped a Minior.
"Whoops, wrong Pokeball. Hey Rocky!"
The floating rock let out a happy cry, before going over to float by Mario.
"Don't worry, I'll get you some snacks in a minute! I'm grandstanding here, you know! I haven't gotten to do this since I beat Blue in Alola, let me have my moment!" said Leaf as she rummaged through her bag. "Oh, here we are!"
She tossed a ball and a new Pokemon came out.
"You caught me the first and second times I time travelled with just Celebi, so I knew I'd need some more help. This here is Dialga! He's been helping me cover my tracks. So well, that when I realized that I'd need to get you to confront me outside the arena, I had him plant temporal energy for you to find. Twice at this point, this part is a recent development. I gotta say, you took longer than I expected to track me down, both times. Maybe you're getting slow in your old age?"
"Guards! Seize her!"
The crowd of legendary Pokemon took fighting stances and placed themselves in between the Hands and the Smashers.
"Aw man, Blue would be SO proud of me if he were here. And on that note, it's time for the curtains to fall on this sham of a tournament!"
Leaf pressed a button on a device on her arm, and light began to glow from it, surrounding Rayquaza.
Suddenly, the light burst, and Rayquaza let out a deafening screech, doubled in size and emanating powerful energy.
"Mega Rayquaza time, baby! Smell you later, Feraligatr!"