#shishriona's fic tag

[shishirona]

OH MY GOD KIRBY TRYING TO PLAY HIDE AND SEEK WITH THE LARGE SIBLINGS.

Somewhere deep within a dense forest on planet Popstar, Kirby stands face-first against a tree with his hands covering his eyes and diligently counts to ten.

“One, two, three, four—seven—”

“Kirby,” Meta Knight, who’d refused to participate but tagged along due to the inclusion of two certain individuals and his concerns for the safety of his friends, gives a long-suffering sigh. “You mustn’t cheat. Now, start anew.”

“Aw,” Kirby pouts. “Okay…” This time, he counts to ten, and calls out to his friends that he’s coming to find them when he extracts himself from the tree. Meta Knight nods approvingly from the branch he’s sitting on, and Kirby takes that as the signal he’s good to go, dashing off in search of his friends.

First stop—a clearing deeper in the forest. With how often he plays hide and seek here, he knows all the good spots! And, well, for the ones he means to find, there can only be two places for them to hide!

Arriving at the clearing, Kirby is greeted by complete and utter silence. Strange, he thinks—usually this place is bustling with forest life, from his friends to the chittering birds and critters that live here. He walks over to the small lake in the middle of it all, a stray ray of sunlight bouncing off the surface and making it all the more obvious that there is something inside, nevermind how high the water has risen to the point where it overflows and threatens to drown the grass would it go on any longer. 

Kirby takes a huge breath of air and dives in. Sinking deeper, he comes face-to-face with something odd—a crescent gap of some sort, seeing only darkness inside. Giving it a poke, Kirby tries not to giggle when it slowly parts and soon bathes Kirby in the red glow of a massive eye, of which Kirby is barely bigger than the pupil. Kirby looks triumphant at the unnerving sight and makes a motion to return to the surface, quickly swimming back up from the dark, empty depths of the lake, where he’d seen fish desperately hiding somewhere on the bottom when he took a peek below.

Surfacing, Kirby jumps out of the water and watches as something massive breaches the surface. 

“I found you!” Kirby cheers, waving his hands up at Zero. “Now you gotta help me look for the others!”

Zero’s massive body blocks out the sunlight. They narrow their eye and lean down to look at Kirby more intensely. “WAS I… FIRST?”

Kirby nods. Zero makes an angry noise. “Yup! But it’s okay, I wanted you to be! Now we can search together!” Zero’s answering noise is one of defeat. 

“HMPH. SO YOUR PLAN IS TO USE ME?”

“Well, you’re pretty big! So you can see everywhere, right? If it’s us, nobody will defeat us!” Kirby beams. “C’mon, let’s get searching!”

Kirby’s vote of confidence appears to sway Zero a little and subdue their negative mood, at least for the time being. “VERY WELL THEN. I WILL PROVE VICTORIOUS YET.”

“We,” Kirby corrects. Zero doesn’t amend their words and instead hovers over to the cave in the clearing.

“TAKE A PEEK, PINK VERMIN,” they suggest.

“It’s Kirby!” Kirby argues with a huff, but he’s not all that bothered, as he’s quick to run inside the cave and do as Zero suggested. Sure enough, within the cave lies another entity, having forced all its inhabitants—even the scary ones that always chase Kirby out—to cower in the back, hiding behind stone pillars.

“Yay! Found you!” Kirby giggles, waving his hands at Zero Two. “Hi! Now you have to look for the others with us!” 

Zero Two silently follows Kirby outside, their wings tucked around themselves as they bounce on the ground and only take flight when they’ve left the cave. They shake off any excess dirt and spread their wings wide, stretching them with a few quick beats Kirby has seen Meta Knight do on occasion. But with Zero Two’s size, it causes a harsh gust of air that almost sends Kirby himself flying away if he hadn’t held onto a nearby rock. 

Zero’s huff borders on amused. “INDEED. JOIN THE WINNING TEAM, ZERO TWO.”

Zero Two speaks at last, their tone indistinguishable. “I HAD NOT EXPECTED AN EAGERNESS TO SWITCH SIDES FROM THE LIKES OF YOU. VERY WELL. I WILL LEND MY AID.”

Sensing an oncoming session of bickering, Kirby quickly speaks up before the short-fused Zero can retaliate. “Let’s go already! We gotta find everyone!” Maybe he’s a little too eager, but they’d planned to have snacks together after their game, so how could he not be? Kirby runs back off into the forest, and Zero and Zero Two split up to look from the air in different directions.

With their aid, it’s the fastest game yet. Zero finds Gooey within no time at all and Gooey is adamant about staying by his creator’s side, happy to help search from the air and blabber clues about where their other friends might be hiding. Zero Two finds several others, and while they might be able to fly, refuse to stay by the entity’s side out of fear, so Kirby takes it upon himself to join Zero Two.

When asked why, Kirby doesn’t even have to think about his answer, “Gooey’s with Zero, so I should be with you!”

The blinding brilliance of his happiness that day might have done away with some of the darkness in Zero Two’s soul. 

He interprets the strange look they give him as a smile.

“DO AS YOU WISH.”