Lucas' Doll

Chapter 3

I swiftly rolled out of the way just as the Master Sword struck the bloody carpet. I felt the fresh wound on my limb swell up, causing me to flinch back in pain. I winced, watching the wielder of my sword staring at me.

It was the eyes again.

Those big round eyes so perfectly white and blue stared at me. Through a menacing smile, I could see the evil that had possessed that doll. Mikey was no longer a childish keepsake, but a killing machine.

The doll pulled the large sword out of the floor and lifted it up high again, preparing to bring it down on me. I cried for help, but knew that there wouldn't have been enough time. My only option was to fight back, but being immobilized, protecting myself wasn't going to be easy.

In a last-ditch effort, I pulled out my lantern and blocked Mikey's swing with the metal casing. The glass shattered upon contact, causing shards to fly in all directions, some of which even got in my eyes. Luckily, my attempt at defending had knocked the sword right out of Mikey's hands, leaving him unarmed. It wasn't enough though.

I could tell just be being in its presence that the doll wanted me dead. But somehow, I couldn't find a legitimate reason as to why. Blinded by glass, I had no choice but to retreat; I crawled up against the door, letting my weakened leg dragged in front of me. Hard cold hands soon felt their way around my neck and I found myself struggling to fight back. The doll was trying to strangle me to death. Regardless of Mikey's smaller hands, his strength was superior to mine. Somehow, the doll had gotten a hold of my Golden Gauntlets, which I had left on my night stand. It also explained how it had managed to wield a sword twice its own size.

It surprised me how intelligent and resourceful this creature was.

Having none of my other weapons on me, I had no choice but to struggle again. I remember my breaths becoming short; my face was more than likely turning an unnatural color. It made me wonder where on earth this doll had come from and for what purpose. Using what strength I had left in me, I brought my good foot in, and kicked Mikey square in the face. The force of the attack caused him to lose his grip and fly across the room, smashing into the dresser. I quickly pulled myself to my feet using the doorknob and attempted to unlock the door again.

My heart froze in fear when I saw Mikey pull out my Kokiri Sword from the splintered wood of my drawer. It looked at me with that awful smile and that awful stare. I could feel tears running down my face as I fought to open the door that I had so stupidly locked in the first place.

Mikey sprinted across the room at an incredible speed and swung at me with the smaller weapon. I dodged narrowly but lost my balance, which led to my falling to the floor on the broken glass. When I looked up, Mikey had the sword pointed at my face, as if he was going to allow me my last words.

I stared at the jagged edge of the Kokiri Sword.

I stared at the doll holding the sword.

It stared at me with that smile again.

"What... are you?" I asked through cut lips.

Mikey cocked his head to the side but retained that insane expression, as if he was questioning me.

"Why are you doing this?" I said. "Why?"

My salty tears didn't seem to give the doll any sympathy. As soon as those words left my mouth, Mikey reeled the sword back, preparing to drive it into my skull.

"NO!" I cried.

Just as he lunged, I moved, causing him to stab the wall and leaving himself vulnerable at the same time.

That's when I struck.

I punched that doll right in gut, knocking it off my sword and onto the floor where it belonged. Using the locked Kokiri Sword, I pulled myself to my feet once again, but this time, I had no intention of falling back down. With Mikey on the floor, I had only one command circulating through my mind:

"Kill it."

I soon discovered a newfound power inside me. I had no idea what it was or where it came from, but if I were to describe it in one word, I'd call it vengeance.

Instinctively, I put on the Golden Gauntlets that Mikey dropped, reached for the corner by the door and grabbed my Megaton Hammer, the hammer that I promised Master Hand to never to use in a brawl. I lifted the large weapon high, glancing at my reflection in the perfectly tempered steel. And then I went to work.

I pounded the head into the ground, smashing Mikey's face open right in my own room. I smashed him again. And again. And again. Each and every consecutive strike felt better than the last. The sound of cheap fabric colliding with one thousand pounds' worth of steel was music to my ears. I screamed and shouted for what seemed like an hour. I couldn't stop myself. The hammerhead flattened the doll to bits, but I did not feel sorry for it, oh no! I was alive! I was alive and I wasn't about to let some mindless toy take that away from me!

After slamming Mikey for the umpteenth time, the Megaton Hammer fell from my grasp and I collapsed to the floor. Mikey had been reduced to one large blotch of blood. Or was that my blood? I couldn't really tell if it was mine or if it was the dolls, if possessed dolls even have blood. No, all I remember after that... I laid back and closed my eyes.

My body was too weak to unlock the stupid door.

I woke up in the hospital wing in a coma exactly one week after that horrific event. According to what Master Hand told me thereafter, I had been lying in my room for six hours before anyone realized I had gone missing. Apparently, Zelda had stumbled upon my body and a mess of blood after using her magic to unlock the door. Since then, I had been in the care of Dr. Mario, who had been so generous to not charge me anything for my injuries. Master Hand told me that at the scene of the incident, they found two of my swords, one of them smeared with blood, the other stuck in the wall. They found shattered glass everywhere near the front door. They also found my bloody Megaton Hammer lying on the floor near my body.

Strangely, the spot that I had been hammering at the whole time only had smears of blood on it.

There were no torn arms or legs, no stuffing knocked out, no plastic eyes, no yarn. There wasn't even a single strand of red hair lying about anywhere. Any remnants of what I did to that doll seemed to have disappeared after I fainted.

Sadly, no one believed me. As far as anyone knew, Link, the Hero of Time, went insane in his own dorm room. He killed a small animal, like a rat or something, flattening the poor creature into the ground. Some thought this to be true while others wanted to believe otherwise. I sure as hell didn't. But it didn't matter anyway because I was stuck in a hospital bed for the remainder of the month, forced to not partake in any form of brawls whatsoever.

The funny thing was that none of this was even my fault.

One day, Lucas decided to pay a visit to me in my lonely hospital room; he looked rather happy to see me.

"Hi Link," he greeted with a smile. "How are you feeling?"

I looked at my bandaged leg and sighed.

"I'm feeling great. In fact, why don't we go for a jog outside? It's a nice day out," I replied.

Lucas giggled at my joke and joined at the bedside.

"That's good. Mario said that you're going to get better really soon," he said.

"Best news I've heard all day. What about you? What are you up to?"

"Nothing much. Just thought I'd come say hi to you." Lucas' smile soon faded and the scared little boy I remembered returned. "Link," he said hesitantly. "I'm sorry for what happened."

I frowned at him.

"Now you're sorry. I was the one trying to save your life the whole time, and now you say you're sorry."

"You don't understand!" he replied distressfully. "I... I was being controlled. No, I mean... I can't remember what happened. I wasn't being taken over or anything. Mikey... he just... he needed me."

"Save it," I said bluntly. "I didn't fight for my life just to hear excuses. You have some explaining to do. Tell me... where did Mikey come from?"

Lucas looked at the floor and shuffled his feet a bit nervously.

"He came... he came to me in a dream," he said. "He told me that he would be able to help me stand up to people I was afraid of. He said he could help me become a better person." The boy started to increase his pace. "So when I woke up, Mikey was sitting there next to me. He told me how he never had a home and that people always treated him bad. So he said that he didn't want the same thing to happen to me. All I had to do was carry him around with me everywhere. I had to keep him safe... all the time..."

I recalled how Lucas had the pile of pillows in his bedroom. It explained perfectly what he meant by protecting the doll.

"Mikey told me that he was going to help me stand up for myself. But I never thought he would do that by hurting you! Link, I'm so sorry!" Lucas cried. "I'm so sorry, Link! I'm so sorry!"

The boy cried and hugged me tightly, and I had no choice but to hug him back.

"He wanted to help you stand up..." I said quietly. "And by that... he was willing to kill everyone who you feared..."

"I'm afraid of you, Link!" cried Lucas again. "I'm afraid of them all! They're all scary! They'll all hurt me if we fight! I can't stay here anymore!"

Lucas broke free from me and ran out of the room, tears flooding his face. I watched him go, but felt no sympathy for him. Some things were just meant to be.

I leaned back, reflecting on the incident as a whole. From the previous events, I deducted (and partly assumed) that Mikey was some sort of reincarnation from Lucas' late brother Claus. From what I knew about the boy, Claus was the one who always helped Lucas to stand up for himself. But after the death of both his mother and brother, I guessed that Lucas couldn't take it anymore. Slowly, it ate away at his person, and slowly, he began to crumble apart.

When he came to join the Smash Brothers, he was afraid of everyone, thinking that they would beat him up and that no one would be there to protect him. His abnormally strong PSI powers must have created for him the embodiment of his greatest fears, hence the birth of Mikey. That doll was supposed to represent the part of Lucas that wanted to stand up and fight. And it did so by attacking me with my own weapons.

When I killed it, it bled like a living creature.

When I destroyed it, any evidence of it being here had disappeared, along with the only hope of courage Lucas ever had.

I was content with the fact that Lucas wasn't a brave guy, so long as nothing like Mikey were to happen again. But even with the death of Mikey, Lucas still somehow managed to find the courage he had been longing for the whole time on his own. And as much as I'd like to tell that story, I have a feeling you already know about it.

After all, everyone's familiar with the Subspace Emissary.

Author's Note: Thank you for reading and I hope you enjoyed my short story. Please feel free to leave a review.