Life's a Glitch

Author's Note: Enjoy the story and R&R.

Disclaimer: I do not own anything related to or of the Super Smash Bros. series.

Summary:

Toon Link referees a friendly skirmish between two Isabelles, who inadvertently trigger the dreaded Infinite Assist Trophy glitch. After his Plan A fails to solve the problem, he turns to his Plan B, Bayonetta, for help.

"Hurry, Bayonetta! Something terrible is going down in Smashville!"

The Umbra Witch strutted purposefully slowly, the muzzles of her Scarborough Fair handguns clinking on the pavement as she walked. She couldn't believe she gave up slaying angels alongside Jeanne in Vigrid for such an awful venue. Too much colour for her tastes, and too many talkative personalities. It benefitted nobody, since the talkative types who crossed paths with her in the past tended to wind up dead. Just query the beheaded carcass of Fortitudo, decomposing in Inferno.

"It's up ahead!" Toon Link pressured.

Bothered the young Hylian had lured her away from her match against Wario (she'd hijacked his motorbike and was in the midst of burning rubber on top of his grisly mustachioed mug), Bayonetta placed her hands on her hips. She needed Cheshire. Babysitting was his department. For once, Luka wasn't swinging in out of nowhere with that absolutely impeccable timing of his.

"Explain to me again why you're drafting me, preferably coherently," she pried in her thick accent.

"I was refereeing a skirmish between two Isabelles. You've heard of them? From the Animal Crossing universe?" The elfin boy ushered her beyond Town Hall. "It was supposed to be a friendly battle, and everything was proceeding swimmingly until an Assist Trophy showed up!"

"Let me guess. An overeager Devil got loose, which is why you brought me here. Listen, little one, I don't know what the other kiddies have been telling you in Hyrule, but I do not entertain at children's birthday parties. My area of expertise is angels, with the occasional demon here and there. The sorts that threaten Armageddon. Not blue sods in spandex undergarments."

"See for yourself."

Bayonetta peered into the fenced community. The front lines were overrun with ghosts, coded red, pink, cyan, and orange: Blinky, Pinky, Inky, and Clyde. Hundreds of them hoofing it according to a predetermined itinerary.

"What on earth–?"

Huddling around Toon Link, the inciting Isabelles whimpered in worry, having escaped the calamity.

"Stop that. I hate crying babies."

The dogs obeyed.

"The Isabelles both cast their fishing lines, hooking the Assist Trophy together. Only instead of four ghosts, they won't stop multiplying!"

"And you didn't consider ringing Pac-Man?" the sorceress vituperated. Surely, the Namco mascot's insufferable waka waka waka'ing was better suited to combatting this crisis than the dark arts.

"Plan A didn't work out."

"Bugger. How's that?"

He clutched below the pommel of his sword, drew it, and pointed to the tide of monsters at the tip of his blade. Every so often, a podgy yellow shape bobbed to the surface like a lemon in a pond, before sinking back beneath the stampede. "Tried Pac-Man. He couldn't keep up."

"This is inconvenient." She tipped her glasses. "So I'm your Plan B?"

"B is for Bayonetta."

"Glad you know your ABC's."

"You'll help, then? Save Smashville?"

"I'm already here, aren't I? First, be a dear and retrieve Pac-Man, will you?"

An Isabelle did as she directed, throwing a line and reeling in the unconscious flapjack. Pac-Man was all mouth, so the assembly refused to give him mouth-to-mouth resuscitation.

"Neither of you would happen to have pocketed a Smash Ball during your fight, would you?"

It ticked her off that she even had to ask. This world's tosh limitations on her powers dragged her patience. Forswearing her soul seemed peachier a bargain.

Searching through their belongings, the Shih Tzus emptied their pockets onto the sidewalk. Among them a Franklin Badge, Beam Sword, and Star Rod.

Voilà! An unused Smash Ball.

She crushed it, prismatic fulgor flowing over her. "Take cover. My pet's a bit peckish, and the last thing you want to be right now is an uninvited dinner guest."

Once more, the trio complied without resistance.

"Let's dance!" Bayonetta launched herself aflight a heel slide. She spun and kicked ghost after ghost, feeling the amplitude of her magic escalating. Temporal currents lagging to a standstill, she corkscrewed about, slashing, pistol-whipping, and peppering her foes in bullets. Whilst in Witch Time, she diagnosed the source of the endlessly spawning antagonists – the intact Assist Trophy – and marked it for destruction as well. Gigatons of damage dealt, shattering the gridlock.

"AVAVAGO!" At the chant, her clothes unravelled, becoming living twisters of hair, the conduits for her summons. The Wicked Weaves, spurred by her pact honouring the swallowtail demoness Madama Butterfly, exited the realm via Bayonetta's infernal portals, re-emerging from different portals pulled tight around the breaching leviathan-beast, Gomorrah.

Its eight compound eyes bespeaking pernicious malevolence, and horned, rocky snout venting chthonian gas, the dragon fettered in strangling hair chomped down, plowing across the stage faster than Kapp'n driving his runaway bus.

Secluded at what they trusted was a safe distance, Toon Link and the Isabelles cringed testifying to the basilisk's unappeasable appetite. It gobbled ghosts tempestuously, devoid of remorse or gratification. An envoy of unadulterated consumption forking dupes with its forked tongue.

When none remained, Gomorrah masticated the Assist Trophy, putting an end to the freak accident. Its final vocation fulfilled, the reptile was vacuumed back through the invoker's spell arrays to the demon wood where it nested, Johnson Forest.

"Yaaa!" Toon Link hurrahed.

Bayonetta's hair curled itself and restored her outfit. She classily sashayed toward the three spectators, sucking a bloody rose lollipop. "There! Town-decimating disaster averted, albeit with some structural upheaval. I'm positive the villagers can pitch in to spruce it up. They're a resourceful flock."

She noticed Pac-Man was still out cold.

"Thanks, mummy!" the Hero of Winds and canine secretaries felicitated.

"Don't call me mummy."

"Yes, mummy!" they cheeped.

God, she could use a drink.