Desperate to get some quiet alone time while on holiday, Hyness finds his way to Originull Wasteland in the middle of the night. He ends up in someone's company anyway.
Minor Kirby and the Forgotten Land spoilers.
I had one (1) thought while playing Kirby and the Forgotten Land and now I'm here. I have more of these two in the works but I'm honestly not sure if they'll get out of it. We'll see.
Also Sillydillo is only referred to as "the creature" bc Hyness doesn't know its name. Or that it has a name for that matter.
If there was one thing the new world was, it was noisy. The bustle of visitors in Waddle Dee Town was annoying, though understandable. Hyness figured it made sense for the town to be busy with everyone in Dreamland and their grandmothers visiting. Heck, he couldn't even exclude himself from that group - he'd only come along because Kirby invited the Mage-Sisters to visit, and Zan had said it might be a good place to relax. But between the business of Waddle Dee Town and Void's near-constant chattering when he wasn’t off trying to poke who-knows-what, relaxation seemed like a distant dream. Then there was that new friend of Kirby's. Hyness hadn't bothered to learn his name. The magical and psychic energy radiating from his soul was strong enough to give him a headache from the other side of town. He was thankful Francisca and Flamberge were so eager to explore the rest of the new world, because he didn't trust that flying teal alien within an inch of his life.
While he was content enough to explore the new world with his family, he really wanted some alone time. The best he had gotten was sitting on the roof of Waddle Dee Café with an energy drink while the girls stopped Void from eating a Car Kirby cake that had fallen on the ground nearby. And that was three days ago. So, by impulse, there he was, in the middle of the night, on another continent exploring a valley separating a desert from an active volcano.
How he'd found the energy to wander over to the nearby continent and through the desert, he wasn't entirely sure. He guessed it was the desire to have some peace, quiet and proper alone time. Then again, the cold wind nipped at the parts of his face left unprotected by his hood and veil. Maybe that was keeping him up. It was a question left unanswered until he saw artificial light coming from a nearby tunnel. Whatever was in there, it certainly intrigued him enough to go explore it.
The tunnel was dimly lit by lanterns strewn about the floor and walls. It wasn't exactly evenly lit, but it was close enough that Hyness found it easy to navigate without smacking face-first into a wall.
At the end of the tunnel was a giant hole leading to a cavern with an open wall. It looked out over the other side of the valley and allowed moonlight to shine through. Glancing up at the ceiling, though, it seemed like there should have been a floor above the cavern. The cut strings still dangling from the crevices in the ceiling and the various bits of junk thrown into heaps around the edges of the cave indicated as much.
Standing at the edge of the cavern and facing the open sky was some sort of round armoured creature. It seemed to be staring at the moon and idly swishing its tail across the ground. For what reason, he didn't know. Hyness peered into the hole to get a better look at the creature as it raised its head and sniffed the air. It then turned in place to reveal a pair of unnervingly large eyes pointed in his general direction. Hyness recoiled a bit at the sight. The creature blinked, then waved at him as its mouth opened into a wide grin. Well, whatever it was... it seemed friendly enough.
Even so, Hyness decided to err on the side of caution as he floated down to the creature. It was much larger than him, and he felt that if he got any closer than a few feet near it, it could easily grab him with the long claws it had on each hand. He doubted that even the darkness between the stars would know how it would react to him getting any closer than he decided to. His magic was strong, yes, but he had no idea how it affected the denizens of the new world.
Hyness cleared his throat and greeted, "Bonjam. Do you... understand what I am saying?"
The creature stared blankly at him for a second before cocking its head inquisitively.
"I will assume that is a no," Hyness muttered to himself.
The creature's gaze drifted from him to the ceiling of the cavern, where it hung for a few seconds before returning to Hyness. It pointed at the ceiling and let out a soft 'skee?' In turn, Hyness looked up at the ceiling, processing the combination of action and vocal tone for a moment. He figured it was asking how he managed to get in. Either that or how he came down without breaking his skull.
The few moments Hyness spent thinking his answer through seemed to come off the wrong way to the creature, as it began to claw the air, as if trying to grab something. Ah, of course! It must have wanted some of the junk on the upper level! Hyness nodded to the creature, and he hovered back up. He looked around for a few moments, noting the large tunnel off to the side and the lack of room to stand around the edges of the cave. Using a basic levitation spell, he grabbed a few old signs, some balls of various sizes and a piece of scrap cardboard. Hoping it would enough to make the creature content, he returned to the lower cavern. The creature's eyes followed him curiously as he floated down and set the junk down in a pile in front of it. It set the cardboard to the side and gave it a gentle pat before it started parsing through the rest of the junk and separating it into two piles.
Hyness watched as the creature made its piles. There didn't seem to be any organization, but maybe he was just looking at it the wrong way. Kirby had told him and the Mage-Sisters to keep an open mind a couple of days after they moved to Dreamland; maybe this was just one of those times he needed to heed the pink puff's words. It was either that or the lack of light present made it hard to make out the shapes within the piles.
Once it was done, the creature stared at the two piles for a few seconds. Hyness couldn't tell if it was thinking or just zoning out until it started drawing something in the sand between the piles. It first drew a squiggly line, then some small circles. Hyness cocked his head curiously as he stared at the drawings. The creature pointed up to the upper level again. Seemed it wanted something else from the upper level... String? He figured that was what the squiggly line represented. And perhaps the small circles represented small balls. If he was wrong, he could always go back up and try again. He nodded to the creature and returned to the upper level.
Finding the string and the small balls was a harder to do in the low light level provided by the lights hung around cavern walls. He did find a couple of bundles of string and a few balls scattered next to them soon enough, though, and returned with them in tow. The creature seemed satisfied with it, and sorted the bundles of string and the balls into the piles it had established. Then it did something Hyness wasn't expecting. It pushed one pile over to him.
Hyness stared at the pile he'd been given with wide eyes. If it had offered him some of its own belongings, then it mustn't have thought he was a threat at all. But, what exactly was it trying to say by the act?
He looked up from the pile to see the creature arranging the junk into a shape vaguely reminiscent of itself. It caught his gaze, smiled and pointed to and from his pile of junk and the thing it was building. Ah. So it wanted him to... make something? Out of the junk? Well, he supposed there were weirder things he could be doing. He levitated a large ball out of his pile and placed it nearby to sift through the rest of the junk. His bundle of string was quickly set next to the large ball, and he soon sorted the pile into several smaller ones based on what he could make of their shape in the moonlight. Looking at the junk as it was, it was hard to see what he could form it into.
He looked back at the large ball and the bundle of string next to it. If he had some glue, then maybe he could stick the string onto it? He looked back at the rest of the junk. There was half a street sign he could use as a mouth, but what would he use for the eyes...?
A loud shuffling from the upper level snapped him out of his thoughts. He heard the creature softly growling to itself, then call out with an 'aah! aah!'
Hyness floated back up to the upper level and gave the creature an inquisitive hum. The creature pointed to a cart resting against the left wall. Hyness levitated it and moved it over to the creature, who grabbed it and proceeded to pull the lid off with ease. It then scooped out a gigantic gob of whatever was inside, then returned to the lower cavern through the tunnel nearby.
Hyness wasn't sure if the curiosity that grabbed a hold of him was morbid or not, but either way, he approached the cart, rolled up a sleeve and cautiously poked the substance inside. Sticky. Either it was glue, or it could be used like glue. the latter would be good enough for him. He retracted his hand, used his levitation spell to grab a small ball of what was probably glue and floated back down to the lower cavern. The creature was already sticking various parts onto its creation with its glue. The giant gob was sitting on the ground next to its creation.
Hyness would have kept his own ball of glue levitating if he had gotten any sleep before entering the creature’s home. He let the glue fall to the ground beside the large ball, then scooped a small amount out of it and started drawing a squiggly line with it. He did this a few more times, eventually having the lines overlap in several places. The string was then placed onto the lines of glue; even though it went all over the ball, there was still a lot of it left once he was done. He snapped the loose end of string apart from the rest of the bundle before grabbing the broken street sign. He scooped some more glue out of the ball and slathered it onto one side - it didn't really matter which. He then stuck onto the ball, but not without it almost rolling away first.
He stayed in place for a moment as he stared at his in-progress creation before turning to his junk pile. He sifted through the sub-piles before finding two... things he hadn't regarded until now. He had no idea what they were, but they were small, dark circular, so he figured they would work well enough as a pair of eyes. He turned back to his creation, smeared some glue onto the things he'd picked up and stuck them on above the street sign mouth.
There it was: a statue of questionable quality and statue status of Void. Knowing him, Hyness doubted he'd be impressed. Not that he planned on showing him. The fact of the matter was that he was the first thing that came to mind and he really couldn't be bothered thinking any harder.
The creature turned to look at him, then pointed at the statue and let out a ‘skee?’ Realising that he was standing in the way of the creature's view, Hyness moved over to the statue's side. As soon as it could see all of it, the creature's face lit up with excitement. It gave him a round of applause interspersed with cheerful chirps.
He doubted that even the darkness between the stars could have seen any part of that night coming.