Link to Life Chapter 11

Chapter 11 – Monkeying Around

Out in the deepest reaches of outer space where not a soul stirred, a lone starship was lazing where nothing could ever find it. The ship was tiny, smaller than even car, and it was shaped like a yellow star with a little glass orb as a windshield. Inside, its occupant was adorably cute and pink. He was small, pink and spherical with red feet and stubby arms. The space traveler was fast sleep, snoring peacefully, almost like it was this for decades and seemed it would stay like that for years to come – at least until a loud alarm went off in its ship. He woke up with a start, looking dazed with his large eye as red lights flashed in his face. A screen flicked on with a picture of a world. The traveler stared at it confusedly when a computerized voice announced, "Hyperspace travel permitted. Activation in 3…2…."

The traveler barely had enough time to scratch his head before being flattened onto the back of his spaceship as it entered hyperspace.

---

"I spy with my little eye…" Rika said slowly, eyes lolling around, "something…black."

"I-i-is it da-da-da-the Heartless splatter on the w-w-windshield?" Porky asked as Daffy swerved the steering wheel and ran over dozens of Shadows.

"Yep." She nodded nonchalantly.

Daffy stuck his head out his window and shouted, "Out of the way, you road hogs!"

"B-b-but you're on da-da-da-the sidewalk," Porky deadpanned. A woman with a tall beehive of blue hair, carrying two brown bags full of groceries, screamed and jumped to the side as the white Volkswagen zoomed on by. Porky also stuck his head out his window. "Ex-ex-excuse us!" he apologized.

Rika groaned, slapping his forehead. "I think we're causing more damage than stopping it." Suddenly, her eyes widened and looked around. "Hey. Where are the Warners?"

Daffy and Porky's eyes shot open, as well. "I-I-I haven't se-se-seen them since th-th-they sucked us up in their va-vacuum."

"Which I'm still bitter about," Daffy muttered. "Did something happen to them?"

"I hope they're okay," Rika added. A cold silence fell among the three…

…and they burst out laughing.

"We're free of those annoying brats!" Daffy cackled, pounding a fist on the steering wheel.

"N-n-n-n-no mo-mo-more 'special f-f-friend' treat-treat-treat, behavior," Porky exclaimed.

"I think I'm going to cry tears of joy," Rika said as she pumped her fists.

However, a dark swirling vortex materialized out from the top of the car. Rika, Daffy and Porky stared in bewilderment as three objects dropped out of it, and then the vortex vanished just as easily as it appeared. Eyes blinking confusedly, Yakko, Wakko and Dot Warner stared back at the three. "Where…the hell did you guys come from?" Rika finally asked slowly, as if trying to realize what occurred actually happened.

"We're – not entirely sure," Dot said as her green-faced brother Wakko pulled out a brown paper bag and vomited into it loudly.

"My friends," Yakko said, holding his hands up almost reverently, "I believe my siblings and I had entered and escaped from what is known as – a plot hole."

"Oooh," Rika, Porky and Daffy intoned.

---

Inside the cathedral, Pinky was pacing through the empty corridors. The Brain placed him on patrol outside Ansem's study to keep watch. However, in reality, he wished for Pinky to stay out of his way. Pinky was blissfully unaware. "Golly, it sure does seem like Brain is going to finally do it this time!" he said cheerfully. "Ooh, he'll be so happy. Narf!" Not paying attention to where he was heading, Pinky accidentally crashed into another rat. "Oomph! Whoops. Pardon me, stranger. Poit!"

Unlike Pinky, the other rat was gray and resembled more like an ordinary rat compared to Pinky's anthropomorphic status as one. "Um, yeah. Sorry about that," the rodent apologized. "The name's Remy. Sorry, but I'm a bit in a hurry."

"And I'm Pinky, pleased to meet you, Remy!" Pinky then noticed that Remy was carrying a large ham, cheese and lettuce sandwich over his head. "Wowie! That sure does look pretty appetizing. Where'd you find it?"

"I, uh, sort of…took it," Remy explained, his foot tapping as he looked anxiously over his shoulder.

Pinky gasped. "Isn't that – stealing?" he whispered harshly. Suddenly, a puzzled look dawned on his face. "Why do I have a sudden sense of irony right about now? Oh, well. Troz!"

"Okay, yes! It's stealing. And I'm not proud of it!" Remy snapped, looking distraught. "As if I didn't get this enough from Gusteau…."

"Who's Gusteau?"

"Oh, just the figment of my imagination that took the form of my late hero, Chef Auguste Gusteau," he answered indifferently with a shrug.

"I see," Pinky said slowly, and muttered to himself, "What a weirdo…. Oh, there's that irony again!"

Suddenly, the broken column next to them exploded in pieces. One small piece of debris smacked itself on Pinky's head, creating little stars to spin around his head. "Of course I'd love a dance, Miss Jolie!" He promptly passed out.

"Oi, Soldier! I found the rodent," an obnoxious, Bronx accent shouted. Running with incredible speed was a stringy man in a red t-shirt and a baseball cap, in his hands was a saw-off shotgun.

"Good work, lad! You've found the rodent!" another man ran behind the Scout, also carrying a shotgun. He shouted like a drill sergeant, and was dressed in a red heavy jacket and a war helmet that constantly was covering his eyes.

"WA-HA-HA-HA!" a boisterous voice cried. A large, bald Slavic man charged ahead of the Soldier. He wore a red shirt, a Kevlar vest, and an ammo belt across his chest. He laughed uproariously as he totted his massive minigun, firing rapidly in Remy and Pinky's general direction. "GIVE BACK THE SANDVICH!"

"Oh, snap," Remy yelped. He grabbed Pinky's limp hand and ran as fast as he could, bullets raining all around them.

"WA-HA-HA-HA-HA!" the Heavy's infectious laugh sounded. "CRY SOME MORE!"

---

The battle between Heartless and SeeD soldiers raged on throughout the marketplace. Yuffie hopped on top of a shop. She wiped sweat from her brow, her breath labored. Although SeeD was giving their all, they were in a disadvantage. They were greatly outnumbered and they also had to keep all the Radiant Garden citizens safe from harm. "This is looking pretty bad…" she whispered. Yuffie looked around the battlefield.

Ben Tennyson had transformed once again. This time into a gigantic dinosaur-like alien appropriately named Humongousaur that smashed through the Large Body Heartless with relative ease. "This is too easy," he declared, but then a terrifying roar exploded from the sky made even Humongousaur's spine tingle. "I may have spoken too soon." A beam of dark energy blasted down from the sky in front of Ben; he shielded himself from the overwhelming power of darkness. Finally, the energy died down and standing before Ben was a large gorilla-like Heartless. It was blue-furred, like a Power Wild Heartless, but was far more stronger-looking with powerful muscles in its arms and body. However, it had very little legs and had to rest on its fists. And, of course, the Heartless emblem was on its back and its eyes were a nasty, glowing yellow. It was a Power Arm Heartless. "Heh, I'm guessing you're going to be the boss of this fight, right?" Ben/Humongousaur asked with a smirk. "Well, bring it out!"

Humongousaur charged for the Power Arm, swinging his right arm for a hook. The Power Arm, however, easily avoided the punch by spinning to its left onto its hand. With a fluid motion, the Power Arm spun using its arm as a pivot and delivered a kick so strong to Humongousaur's face that it knocked Humongousaur right off his feet and onto his back. Ben reverted back to his ordinary human, groaning, "Ugh…that was stupid." The Power Arm stomped (rather, slammed its fists) toward Ben. It raised its fist, prepared to finish Ben off.

"You guys really are heartless!" The little guy that was Manny River/El Tigre slashed with his steel-hard claws across the Power Arm's torso, making it roar in pain as it back away. El Tigre landed next to Ben, in a suit styled after a tiger thanks to his mystical belt buckle that was embedded with the letter T. "Wow. That pun was terrible. What was I thinking?"

"Why didn't you turn into El Tigre earlier?" Ben asked weakly as El Tigre helped him up.

"Would you believe that my belt buckle disappeared into a vortex and only now just reappeared?" he said, looking rather confused himself.

"Sounds like someone screwed up," Ben muttered. "Watch out. That Heartless isn't out yet."

The Power Arm snorted, angry steam blasted out of its nose. It lowered its body closer to the ground, raised both of its fists, and quickly brought both down to the ground. The entire marketplace began quaking violently, knocking down all in the area to the ground. Ben and El Tigre both grabbed onto anything stable they could find. A crack began splitting the ground from where the Power Arm struck, growing longer and larger. The crack reached Ben and El Tigre, knocking them to dangling from the crack's edge. "We could use some help here!" El Tigre screamed.

"Don't worry!" Kim flipped through the air and grabbed the boy's arms, pulling them out of the crack. "I'm always…. Hmm. No, that's no good. Kim's here to save – no. That's no good, too. Ugh! I've got no good quips today!"

"Save it." Yuffie suddenly landed next to her, nearly scaring her out of her skin. "We've still got to take care of ugly over here." She jabbed a thumb at the Power Arm.

"Ooh, why didn't I think of that?" Kim pouted.

She and Yuffie leaped high into the air. Yuffie twirled her trusty shuriken while Kim delivered multiple kicks and punches. Ben activated his watch and transformed into a plant-like alien with petals that resembled a flame. Creating a ball of fire in each hand, Ben bellowed, "Swampfire!" and unleashed twin streams of fire at the Power Arm. El Tigre roared mightily, like a real tiger, and charged on all-fours. Yin, with her magic, and Yang, with his bamboo sword, rushed in. Samurai Jack ran into the fray as well, his sword over his head and giving his bellowing battle cry. Ron, meanwhile, was cowering under a fruit stand with his hands over his eyes.

Crawling out of Ron's pocket and onto his shoulder, a completely hairless rodent known as a naked mole rat made a few urging gestures. "Oh, what, Rufus? You want me to go out there and fight a monkey? No thank you, my good mole rat!" Ron snapped. Rufus slapped his forehead.

The screams of the girls, however, made Ron open his eyes. "Kim!" Ron sprung from under the fruit stand to his feet. Kim and Yuffie were caught in the Power Arm's massive hands, having the breath squeezed out of them. "Don't worry; I'll…do something helpful." Ron dug around his pockets for any sort of gadget he may have been given. Then he remembered that he wasn't given gadgets for that exact reason. "What do I do, Rufus?!"

Rufus poked his head out Ron's pocket. "I dunno," Rufus said in his own closest thing to speech.

Ron narrowed his eyes as a light bulb went lit up over his head – literally. A street lamp suddenly flipped on. "Rufus!" Snatching the naked mole rat from his pocket, Ron began aiming carefully at the Power Arm. "Ready, little buddy?"

"No," Rufus squeaked.

"Fast ball special!" Ron shouted, spinning his arm and finally launching his pet with all his strength. Rufus shrieked in terror as he flew through the air, the wind inertia blasting past his face, and right into the Power Arm's right nostril. If you knew what it was like to have a live fly go into your nose, then you probably would know how the Power Arm was feeling right then. The Heartless clawed at its nose, dropping Kim and Yuffie while trying to pick out the little rodent.

"That is both disgusting and oddly useful," Swampfire muttered, while El Tigre nodded sheepishly.

Ron took Kim's hand and helped her to her feet. "You okay?"

Kim smiled back. "Yeah."

Yuffie groaned as she stood up, rolling her eyes. "Break it up, you lovebirds."

Ron and Kim blushed when Rufus came flying into Ron's face, knocking him spinning backwards into the fruit stand he was hiding under. "Ron!" Kim gasped.

The Power Arm looked furious; its eyes turned into a dark red. Baring its fangs, it rushed for the SeeD soldiers. However, Jack intercepted with his blade from the air. He swiped his supernatural blade across the Power Arm's face. It cried out in pain as purplish blood was splattered. "Nice going, samurai!" Yang cheered, pumping his fists.

"Isn't he dreamy?" Yang sighed lovingly.

Yang stopped cheering and made an aside glance to you, the reader(s). "Damn fan girls."

The Power Arm, however, recovered quickly, snatched the midair Jack, and smashed him against a wall. Before the others could react, the Heartless band handed them all, sending them crashing all around. The Power Arm was growing tired of all of this nonsense and was ready to end it. It held up the near unconscious Jack to its face, preparing to take the samurai's heart.

"Oy! How's about you pick a fight with me, ya great big ugly monkey?!"

The Power Arm turned its head and a massive claymore completely sliced off its arm holding Jack. It screeched in surprise and agonizing pain, as it clenched at its stump of a right arm. Jack, regaining his senses, landing on his feet and turned to his savior. His eyes shot wide open. "You!"

"Jack!" a large and boisterous Scotsman pulled Jack into a powerful bear hug, not much different from being crushed by the Power Arm, really. "It's been too long, lad!"

The SeeD group collected themselves and gathered around the two men. "Who the hell this guy?" Yang demanded rather obnoxiously – until he noticed that the Scotsman had a large claymore in his hand and a machine gun for one of his legs. "Holy crap, this guy is flippin' awesome!"

"This man is a friend," Jack explained. "We have fought together many times before and he has proven himself to be a mighty warrior." He turned to his old friend. "Tell me, Scotsman, how was it that you arrived on this world?"

"Ooh, ya won't believe it, Jackie!" the Scotsman thundered. "I was just mindin' my own business, playing a little limerick on me bagpipes, when suddenly this horned woman appeared out of great, green flames! Judging from them stories you told me about your journeys, me first assumption it was Aku in drag. However, she possessed a power not even Aku had. It freaked me out! Point is she asked me to join this little club of hers where it involved takin' over the universe and all that bullocks. I turned it down. It was the simple life for me! She didn't take it too well, and the she-devil sent me spiraling into this swirling dark pool of darkness! Yeah, I know I'm being redundant. No need to correct me, lads and lassies. Next thing I knew, I was here and I found my old pal, Jack!"

Yuffie's team blinked, completely baffled.

El Tigre twirled a finger around the side of his head. "Cuckoo-cuckoo."

"Right…" Kim intoned slowly. "But we still have to finish off that Heartless."

Yuffie held up her shuriken again and pointed it at the Power Arm. "Let's finish this!"

"Just like old times, aye?" the Scotsman said to Jack and he gripped his claymore. Jack nodded back, smirking. The Power Arm's eyes looked on pathetically as the group rushed in to finish their job.

---

Maleficent stepped lightly to the edge of the cliff of the Dark Depths, gazing in to the distant sight of the city of Radiant Garden; the site where she attempted to overthrow many years ago. Luckily for her, she was immortal and didn't have to worry about such a superfluous concept as death. Somewhere out there, a grim reaper just sneezed. "Radiant Garden certainly has grown," Maleficent said, a grin growing on her face. "It'll make the perfect military base."

"That's what you said last time," her henchman, Pete, reminded, stepping up next to her. "And we all know how that turned out!" Seeing the livid look on his boss's face, he flinched out of fear of her.

"You should've seen that coming," a colossal whale-like alien whispered into Pete's ear.

"Things will be different this time," Maleficent replied.

"Indeed, things shall be different," a man dressed rather sophistically agreed. He removed the cigar from his mouth and smirked. "With those two lab rats able to penetrate SeeD's security system unnoticed, they have created our army of Heartless. We'll be able destroy themselves from the inside out."

"But we must be wary of the Keyblade girl," another man that seemed otherworldly, almost ghostly, said. "I had my fair share of dealings with teenaged heroes, and they tend to be rather troublesome."

"Oh, get a cat, would ya, Plasmius?!" a shadowy figure snapped. His entire body was cover into some sort of synthetic cloth that was completely black, making him resemble a full-body silhouette. All that was distinguishable was a pipe in his mouth.

"Spare me your blather, Father!" the ghostly Plasmius sneered.

"You keep complaining about that Danny Phantom kid!" the silhouette man named Father mocked, waving his hands. "It's always 'Danny Phantom' this! Or 'Danny Phantom' that! And 'I shall have my revenge on that blasted Danny Phantom'! Geez, it's pathetic! At least he's a teenager who respects his adult figures. I have to deal with these little brats who fight our 'tyranny'."

"And you call me pathetic," Plasmius muttered, rolling his eyes.

"What'd you say?!"

"Silence!" Maleficent thundered, hushing to two bickering men. "The Heartless army should be completed soon. Then, we shall finish what I started a long time ago…."

---

Chase Young peered through a strange-looking device that looked like an eagle-shaped binocular, spying on Maleficent from over the distance as he stood atop of the castle, Hollow Bastion. "Maleficent, so predictable."

"If I didn't know better, I'd say you two dated once and she broke up with ya!" NegaDuck cackled.

"Knock it off, NegaDuck," Syndrome said. "You don't want to piss off this guy."

"Whatever." NegaDuck rolled his eyes.

Another member of Chase's group stepped over to the edge to observe the city. He wore fairly ordinary Japanese white robe with large, and carried a short katana with an 'S' shaped guard in a sheath. He was unusually thin, with just as unusually silver hair. But the most distinguishing feature about his is his facial expression: his eyes narrowed to slit and an ever-present grin that stretched widely. "Ah, this place reminds me so much of Soul Society…." He took a deep breath. "Can't wait 'til we burn it all down."

"This guy's creepy…" Jack Spicer whispered to Zim.

"Ooooh, I think I like him," Zim grinned deviously. "For a filthy human-pig, that is…. We shall bring this world to its utter doom!"

"I'm gonna sing the 'Doom Song' now!" GIR said happily, standing beside Zim. "Doom, doom, doom! Doom-ie, doom, doom!"

"Can you possibly focus this once, GIR?" Zim moaned miserably at his misfortune of a sidekick

"Quiet," Chase said in a tone that didn't require him to raise his voice to be obeyed. "I think I have spotted something potentially dangerous to our goal."

"What is it, Chase?" Jack asked, trying to swipe the Eagle Scope from his boss and spot it as well. "Is it that cute Keyblade chick?"

"No," he answered, easily keeping the binocular device out of his minion's reach and glowering at him. "Something a little more…prehistoric."

---

Rika shuddered.

"W-w-w-what's wrong, R-Rika?" Porky asked as he attempted to wrestle the accordion Wakko was playing out of his hands.

"I just feel like this really creepy guy called me 'cute,'" Rika said. "Bur! Gives me the chills."

"Why, cause you aren't?" Daffy smirked. She slammed the handle end of her Keyblade at the back of his head.

Ooh, I like him. He's funny.

"I don't need your commentary, you oversized paperweight," Rika hissed quietly to herself. Dot and Yakko exchanged looked. Both twirled their fingers around the side of their heads, the cuckoo sounds were made themselves.

I just thought I'd give up an update, and tell you I'm feeling a disturbance.

"What, in the Force?" Rika asked grumpily. "If you hadn't noticed, an army of Heartless has been invading!"

Not that.

Rika perked up her ears. Stardom Key was starting to sound concerned. It was never concerned.

It was like back at Traverse Town….

Rika realized what Stardom was talking about. "Keep an eye out, guys," she said, summoning Stardom Key to her hand. "This battle's just about to get worse."