Immediately Following the Last Chapter...

Now that the Hylians were out of the way and the fourth timeline was an established fact, K. Rool could get to the real purpose of his visit to this backward dimension.

Ganondorf's seal was supposed to be located herein the ruins of his tower, the spot that had once been Hyrule Castle.

I'd better help him conquer this world before those idiots rebuild it, K. Rool mused. A tower is fortified like a keep and keeps are better than castles.

They were, weren't they? K. Rool had a keep and Bowser had a castle with a keep. K. Rool couldn't stand that turtle always trying to upstage him. It would be good if he had a scary wizard ally who also liked keeps. King Boo was a scary ghost friend, but he just had a mansion. What kind of hereditary dictator used a mansion? K. Rool's ancestors didn't resort to that even when they were real monarchs. Anyway, he'd get Ganondorf's opinion very soon.

The charges that Andross gave him were balanced with matter and antimatter in a stabilized distribution, but with one click from the trigger that K. Rool held in his fist, and the charges would create the tiniest holes in spacetime, enough for Ganondorf to break through the seal.

Standing in the grass, ten feet away from the Tower's ruins, K. Rool took a nervous gulp. He was confident he and the spacetime box-thingy would survive. They were far enough away. He was concerned for his hearing though. He did not know how loud the explosion would be and eardrums were sensitive body parts. He didn't have external ears, but his hearing was as sharp as any mammal's and he wanted to keep it that way. Rock operas were one of the most pleasurable experiences in his life apart proving that he was the biggest bad in the multiverse.

He steadied himself and clicked the trigger.

Closing his eyes and falling backward on his own, K. Rool missed the force of the shockwave. The sound, however, it had been so loud that now he couldn't hear anything.

Panic seized the dictator-king's mind. He was deaf!

He was deaf…in Hyrule.

He'd lost his prized hearing because he had been stupid enough to take on this job personally. He would have to open his eyes and plot the course back to Crocodile Isle, but when he got there he would kill someone…it couldn't be Klump…keeping him around to mentally torture was just to fun…but someone significantly high ranking who could have warned him against this scheme. Them and their families…no…some one single individual from Klump's family. K. Rool kept his eyes closed and brooded on his comforting revenge.

He became so engrossed in his thoughts that he didn't notice that he could actually hear his pulse pounding in his ears. He slowly began to make out muffled words that he could not understand. His grasp of Hylian wasn't good enough to pick up whole words from word pieces.

He stood and shouted, "Would you shut up!? I can't make out Hylian when I'm part deaf, you insufferable moron!" only to notice his mistake too late.

The green skinned and red haired Gerudo wizard stood before him.

"Oh, allow me to help you," Ganondorf said, and waved his hand.

K. Rool's hearing was back to normal, but he was now in Ganondorf's magical grip.

With a wave of the wizard's hand he was tossed onto the side of a large piece of stone debris from the Tower. His breastplate absorbed most of the damage, but he was still sore.

"Really, this is how you repay the being who just released you from your seal? By crushing my pancreas?"

Ganondorf paused for a minute. Keeping his hand in the air to resume magical control when it suited him, he pointed at the obese Lizalthos.

"You freed me?"

Ganondorf then moved his hand to stroke his chin.

"Tell me, minion, how many of my forces are still loyal?"

This again? Zelda had been bad enough.

"I don't think you quite understand. I freed you because I have something far stronger than magic, and I have come to recruit you."

Ganondorf dropped his previous assumptions. This being clearly knew skills he himself did not and was no ordinary Lizalthos. But he had to make one thing clear.

"I serve no one."

"I meant recruit you as an ally. I would never succeed in controlling you." K. Rool was being entirely honest now. He had nothing that could match Ganondorf's magic, but Andross's technology was beyond either of them. All he needed to do was set the two against each other…

"I appreciate honesty," Ganondorf said, surprising the heck out of K. Rool with his tone. There was nothing threatening in it at all. He sounded completely genuine. K. Rool had created a work environment where everyone around him had to be superficially sycophantic if they wanted to live. He could get and demanded bad news, but it had to be couched in the right way. Few ever spoke to him with true conviction, but that was how he had just spoken to Ganondorf, and the dark lord was genuinely appreciative? He was supposed to be the most evil villain of all, but his next words were…honorable…

"I owe you a debt of gratitude for rescuing me from the seal, so please explain to me as best you can. I repay my debts."

"Hold on!" K. Rool shouted. "You are supposed to be Ganondorf Draugmire, the Evil King of the Gerudo! You're not supposed to honor anything! That's why I freed you! I wanted an ally as evil as I was!" K. Rool whined.

Before the Kremling King got another word out, the Gerudo King teleported in front of him and grabbed him by the throat.

"I have called myself evil, true, and to the Hylians I have been evil, but everything I did was for the good of the Gerudo!" Ganondorf shouted the last part at K. Rool.

"But what about Nabooru?" K. Rool gasped.

Ganondorf let go of K. Rool's throat and thought about that one. There were many painful memories there and he did not want to show weakness. He turned his back on K. Rool and spoke softly after carefully thinking on what he would say.

"We had different ideas on what was best for our nation." Ganondorf was not about to let this stranger see his tears. But how did the stranger know about him anyway?

Ganondorf turned again his eyes now blazing with fury.

"Who are you and how do you know so much about me? You are clearly not from Hyrule."

K. Rool smiled, exposing more of his fangs.

He bowed and held a hand out.

"My name is Krusha Roolenstein of Crocodile Isle, hereditary dictator of the Kremlings, but most people call me King K. Rool II. I'm from a completely different world."

K. Rool expected Ganondorf to open his jaw in shock. Dark Lord of the Gerudo, however, just looked on, bored.

"I gathered as much. Get to your point."

How did Ganondorf know this? He'd only been familiar with the Sacred Realm and the abyss between dimensions, hadn't he? K. Rool would have words with Andross about this.

"You're not shocked that another realm, just as mortal as yours exists in parallel?"

"I've seen stranger," Ganondorf said, forming a green fireball in his hand, "Now please get to the point of this meeting. What do you have that is beyond magic?"

K. Rool paused for a minute to go over his answer. He caught the space time mechanism out of the corner of his eye.

"That," K. Rool pointed, "is how I came here. Tell me, Ganondorf, how familiar are you with the laws of nature?"

Ganondorf unwrinkled his angry face as he grew contemplative.

"How mean you?"

K. Rool smiled. He was now the teacher and Ganondorf the pupil. He wanted to keep that power dynamic going for as long as possible.

Confidently walking forward, K. Rool said, "Have you ever considered why objects fall, why it is easier for someone that weighs less to run than someone who weighs more?"

Honestly questions like that had not occurred to him, Ganondorf had to admit.

"They attempt to study such things in a way that can be tested is known as physics, and the attempt to study the tiniest building blocks of matter," K. Rool pointed to himself and then touched Ganondorf on the shoulder, "is quantum physics." K. Rool now circled around the Gerudo King. "And the study of time is temporal physics."

Ganondorf now smiled.

That's good, K. Rool thought. You've whetted his appetite. Now withhold things from him. Soon he will be a puppet in your—

"Could you bring me to your world to learn of these matters in detail?"

What a sucker, K. Rool thought.

He's using this a way to control me, and thinks I fell for it. What a sucker, Ganondorf thought.

Confident in his hold over Ganondorf, K. Rool said, "Of course, but first let me tell you about my master plan…"

Ganondorf felt all sense of wonder at the new technology leave him, to be replaced with inward laughter at the words "master plan." This K. Rool was not a leader. He was a child in an adult's body and seemed to think evil was something to aspire to rather than a necessary part of leadership. He was pathetic and hilarious.

"My world is not the most technologically advanced. In fact, I was sent here by Andross, Emperor of Venom. His people have the technology to travel the stars, and it was his device that enabled me to come to this specific point…" K. Rool paused for dramatic emphasis. He would shock Ganondorf to his core with this.

"Let me guess…in time?" Ganondorf didn't say it like it was a question.

Dang, K. Rool thought. He had under-impressed his student. He was in trouble now.

"I was just defeated by a Hero who wields a time-traveling ocarina. It seems like technology took a long time to accomplish what magic already can." Ganondorf ran a few fingers threw his hair, clearly bored and dismissive.

K. Rool's sore eye bulged with fury.

"Remind me again, why my technology saved your ungrateful but when your own magic couldn't help?"

So, there was some fight in this…Kremling, was it? Ganondorf could play this game.

"Very well, I will concede that Andross's technology may be more advanced than my magic, but you haven't demonstrated your own abilities, K. Rool."

K. Rool's rage reached ever lower and lower depths within his soul. His green scales began to turn red, and Ganondorf noticed.

"Hit a sore spot, did I?"

"Hey, shut up!" K. Rool shouted. He couldn't rupture a blood vessel. That had happened to his eye when he was hatching. That, along with his gut, caused everyone to make fun of him.

"I may not compare to Andross as a master of technology, or even less than you as a master of magic, but I've dabbled in both and the idea of combining them originated with me!" K. Rool panted as his scales cooled. "I think outside the box. This alliance between you, Andross, and me was my idea!" K. Rool lied.

Ganondorf, thought for a minute. He doubted that K. Rool was intelligent enough to come up with this plan on his own, but this Andross intrigued him.

"Ok, K. Rool, relax. Combining magic with technology is an intriguing idea, especially when you are talking about the ability to travel the stars. I want to meet this Andross and give your idea a try."

K. Rool saw his way back in.

"Oh, I'll take you to Andross, and then you'll see exactly why you need me." He sneered and chuckled.

Ganondorf considered for a moment that he had misjudged the Kremling King.

"Why exactly do I need your help?" Ganondorf asked with just a touch of dread.

"Because…Andross is certifiably of the wall insane."

"Very well," the seven foot Gerudo looked down at the six-and-a-half-foot Kremling.

"Take me to your master," Ganondorf commanded.

K. Rool swallowed bile.

Ganondorf was a human—the spawn of a demon king's curse—but a human, nonetheless.

K. Rool was used to doing the towering. He was certainly taller than Peach, the plumbers, or the two Hylians he had just met...

Ganondorf gazed at the time travel device as K. Rool moped.

"Now!" he said, intimidating the shorter villain with the protruding belly.

K. Rool sighed and said, "Very well, stand on the panel with me."

The semicircular panel attached to the device was large enough for K. Rool or Ganon to stand on, but it could support both of them?

K. Rool narrowly got both feet on facing Ganondorf.

"Keep both feet on the panel at all times," he said to his companion.

Ganondorf adopted K. Rool's positioning.

Now the two evil kings faced each other.

"Great," Ganondorf muttered, "Now I have to stare at you the entire way!"

"Oh, just shut up," K. Rool said, more annoyed than angry. He was too depressed to be angry. The Hylians regarded Ganondorf as evil incarnate in three separate timelines—the inhabitants of Mushroom World didn't regard K. Rool that way in even one.

However, as he flicked the switch and the blue currents of temporal energy surrounded them, he knew his chance would come.

Ganondorf, for all his physical and magical might, was scientifically illiterate.

K. Rool's intellect towered over Ganon's and soon the multiverse would know it...

"You're too close to me, fatso!" Ganondorf said as they disappeared from Hylian spacetime.