In a garden in the centre of a mountain village, the little girl stacked two wooden blocks upon one another and giggled at the way she had managed to make something out of two things that were smaller. She reached for another, and shifted one of the first two blocks so that the two on the bottom supported the top together. This was a new discovery - the way she could use the blocks in different ways to create new shapes.

  A sudden gust of wind caught her small tower and threatened to tip it over. The blocks wobbled for a few seconds, before settling back into their motionless state, much to the girl's glee.

  "You can play with me if you want!" she said.

  Samus realised the girl was talking to her. She had appeared in this garden and had been watching this girl for the last few moments, unaware that she was visible. Her Power Suit was gone, leaving her in the Zero Suit.

  She knelt down and picked up a block. "What are we playing?" she asked.

  The little girl smiled. "We're building things, of course."

  Samus nodded, and picked up a pair of blocks. "What would you like to build!"

  "The biggest tower we can!" the girl announced. "Who are you?"

  "I'm Samus," she said. "I'm..." There was no way to explain herself that would make sense to this child, so she landed on "just passing through. What's your name?"

  The girl smiled. "I'm ********."

  Samus frowned. "What was that?"

  "*********. My name is ********, Miss."

  "You won't be able to hear it." Samus realised that the Master Hand was floating behind her. Its voice had lost the same booming, reverberating quality that it usually did - Samus felt that this was the first time that giant hand wasn't putting on airs.

  "Why not?" she asked.

  "I don't remember her name anymore," the Master Hand said. It sounded sad.

  Before Samus could ask any other questions, the sky darkened as though the sun had been snuffed out. Dark clouds now filled the sky, moving and roiling as though they contained something that was trying to escape.

  A woman appeared at the end of the garden, who looked like an older version of the little girl. "********!" she yelled. "Come here, now!"

  The little girl nodded. She waved to Samus and then got to her feet, scrambling through the grass to reach the person who must have been her mother.

  Then the rain began. Perhaps rain wasn't the correct word, exactly, but Samus didn't know any other word to use. The raindrops were more like particles of darkness which fell slowly, like their was almost no mass within them. Several landed in front of Samus, and began to quiver, then joined together and formed humanoid shapes.

  Dozens of these creatures appeared in front of Samus, grown from the dark particles. They were shambling, robotic humanoids with thick brown gloves and boots, blank red eyes peering lifelessly from a spherical black head. From their backs emerged a writhing mass made up of more of those particles, which twisted in a way that matched the creature's body.

  "Primids," the Master Hand said.

  The creatures began to shamble towards the little girl, cutting her off from her mother. Without thinking, Samus grabbed her Paralyzer and fired several shots. The Primids that were hit fell, but more rose up quickly to take her place. The ones that came in a replacements seemed aware of her and began to walk slowly towards her, but the rest treated her like she didn't exist and went after the little girl. Samus kept firing, dropping Primid after Primid until most of them were focusing on her. The little girl reached her mother, who scooped her up and ran from the field.

  Samus turned her attention to the Primids who were swarming her. She activated her Paralyzer's Plasma Whip and swung it wildly, cutting a few of them down but leaving more to take their place. She backed up, swinging wildly. For every Primid she defeated, there was another one to take its place, and there seemed to be no end to them.

  "This fight isn't for you," the Master Hand said. "We'll go now."

  The scene changed. Samus stood in the centre of what had been the village, which was now burnt to the ground. It seemed like this had happened some time ago, by the way the rain had already soaked into the wood and extinguished all of the fires, leaving only the scorch marks as a sign that it had burned at all.

  Stolen novel; please report.

  "What happened?" Samus asked.

  "Destruction," the Master Hand said. "A battle of Light and Darkness spawning something else altogether, which only wishes to tear apart the battlefields before they exist. If this wave hadn't come, then years later this place would have been one of those battlegrounds. Light and Dark would have clashed in this very sky, and it would have done far worse than this."

  "You're saying this was the best outcome?" Samus asked. "If you hadn't taken me away, I could have stopped it?"

  "I said it wasn't your fight," the Master Hand insisted. "That fight happened a long time ago, Samus. You can't change the things that have already happened."

  Samus was about to answer when she heard a cough. Someone around here was still alive, she realised. The cough had come from beneath the wreckage of a nearby building, so she ran over and began digging furiously through the rubble.

  "Help me!" she demanded, but Master Hand didn't move.

  She pulled aside a large piece of stone and gasped. Here lay the little girl from earlier, badly beaten and burned but taking steady breaths as she clung onto life. But the thing beneath her... that couldn't be her mother, could it? Samus had seen some horrific things, but somehow she knew that she wouldn't ever forget the sight of this body.

  "It's been three days since we were last here," Master Hand said. "That little girl lay injured and afraid in her mother's arms all that time, waiting for someone to come for her."

  Samus carefully picked up the girl, careful not to cause her any more pain. "It's alright," she said. "You're safe now."

  The girl's eyes slowly opened. She winced as the rainwater hit her face. "Miss... Samus..." she said. "Is that... you?"

  Samus nodded. "It is," she said. "You're going to be okay."

  "You didn't..." the girl took a rattling breath. "You didn't say that before... but you did say... that you'd come back."

  Samus frowned. She didn't remember saying anything like that. But she could figure that out later.

  "Are the... others okay?" the girl asked. "The ones that said they were... your friends. The boy and the knight. Are they okay?"

  "I..." Samus didn't know how to answer. She didn't even understand the question. "Yes. They're okay."

  "That's good," the girl said. She closed her eyes.

  "Samus," the Master Hand said. "You need to put her down on the ground."

  "But I can still try and save her!" Samus snapped.

  "You can't!" the Master Hand insisted. "I told you, this has already happened. I know you want to save her, but she's beyond saving. You need to see what happens next!"

  "Why are you showing me this?" Samus rounded on the Master Hand. "Are you making fun of me? Showing me a girl who lost everything just like I did? Is this a punishment for asking questions, to make me relive the worst day of my life?"

  The Master Hand was silent for a second. "No," it finally said. "That wasn't the reason. I showed this to you, and only to you, because I hoped you would understand."

  "Understand?" she asked. "What is there to understand."

  "Put her down," Master Hand said. "And you'll see."

  Against Samus's better instincts, she lowered the dying girl to the ground and laid her upon the wet grass, before taking a few steps back. A few moments later, the rain clouds parted slightly, just enough for a column of pure light to shine down on the girl.

  "There was no hope left for her," the Master Hand said, as the light lifted the girl into the air. "But she had what the Light wanted, a strong soul and a mind for creation. And so it took them both for itself."

  The girl was enveloped in a cocoon of light that burned Samus's eyes to look at, but she found she couldn't look away. "The Light needed soldiers," Master Hand continued. "But they have to come from somewhere."

  The finger of a large gloved hand pierced the edge of the cocoon, and Samus gasped as she finally realised what she was looking at. Then the scene was gone, and she was standing facing Master Hand in a white void. Her armour had returned, and she had half a mind to turn it on Master Hand now. But she didn't.

  "That was you," she said. "That was all you."

  The Master Hand didn't answer her directly. "The Master Hands like me are meant to create and spread light. My first assignment for the Light was to create a world for the first time. I created this world, this world of Smash, and I brought together fighters like you and the rest."

  "Why?" Samus asked.

  Master Hand hesitated. "I suppose Captain Falcon was right about his guesses. I am still a child amongst the Master Hands. I hold immense power, but I still wanted to have fun. I created a world where I could see battles between the greatest warriors in all of the worlds." Samus felt suddenly that she was being stared down, even though the large hand had no eyes. "I know the things you talk about. This is, after all, my world. I know what happens in every inch of this place. I know you want to fight me, but if you do I will have to defeat you with my full might. Because if you defeat me, the Darkness will sense a weakness within this world. They'll come for this world, and it will become a battleground."

  "And if we don't fight you?" Samus asked. "What happens? Do we stay here until you get bored? Are we right, in thinking that you'll just keep bringing in more fighters forever?"

  "Yes," Master Hand admitted. "I'm... childish. Imperfect. And beholden to greater powers than yours. Understand, I'm sorry for what I have done, but that doesn't mean that I regret it, nor would I change my actions if I had the chance to perform them again. I will continue to bring fighters to my world, and you will all continue to fight for my amusement, and for the amusement of the Light."

  "Then we'll fight you," Samus said.

  "I have explained the risks," Master Hand said. "None of you can withstand my full power. And a greater calamity awaits even if you do win. But, I will allow you to bring this choice back to your friends. Let them decide. And if you decide to face me, then you may do so tomorrow, once the fights of the day have been concluded."

  It sighed. "It is a shame. I shall have to procure an entirely new group of fighters to replace all of you."

  Samus blinked, and she was back on Planet Zebes. Captain Falcon's Falcon Punch struck her hard in the stomach, and she flew backwards into the acid that surrounded the battlefield.

  "Game!" she heard. Master Hand was back in the sky, and she was back in the audience. "There will be another brief recess before the day's final match."

  The fighters reappeared in the sitting room of their mansion. Samus stood up, and cleared her throat loudly enough for eleven pairs of eyes to swivel towards her. "We need to talk," she said.