Chapter 1 - Xavier the Bandit (G&G)

Darkness. To many, it was a symbol of the unknown. To Xavier, however, it was quite the opposite. In fact, darkness was all he had ever known. In times of hopelessness,  darkness had always been there to help him reach a new day. It did not always work in his favor, however. The darkness had also allowed the bandit to keep his inner fears and emotions bottled up, which prevented him from learning to function in society. As this train wreck of emotions spiraled out of control, feelings of violence arose within him. The darkness had taken full control of Xavier, and he needed to unleash his rage on the owner of this cursed establishment. It was too bad he was such a failure of an assassin.

“At long last,” mumbled Xavier, “I shall complete my task.” Crouching on top of scaffolding near the ceiling, the sneaky bandit prepared to drop a light on Chubba, who was in the middle of hosting a battle. “At long last… victory shall be mine!”  With these words, Xavier used a hammer to strike the cord holding the light with all his might. Unfortunately, all his might wasn’t enough. The hammer collided with the cord and bounced back into his face, causing him to lose his balance. He fell to the ground with a yelp, landing right in front of his overweight target. Indignant, Xavier scrambled to his feet and raised the hammer over his head for a direct hit, only to be knocked out by the light whose foundation he had loosened. Barely phased by the fifth murder attempt that week, Chubba simply waited for the failure’s teammates to carry him back to his room.

Several hours went by before Xavier returned to his senses. He sat up in bed, quickly recognizing his location as the red major league room. Then the events that had occurred earlier that day came back to him, and he fell back again. “Why is it that I always come so close to achieving my goals, yet make a fool out of myself in the end?” he muttered, closing his eyes again. All of a sudden, the door to the room slammed open, and in came his energetic boo teammate.

“XAVIER! XAVIER! WAKE UP!” Skelloetta screamed.

“I’m not sleeping. What do you want?” he mumbled, refusing to open his eyes.

“I SAID WAKE UP! WAKE UP, ALREADY!” She began rocking the bed to the point that she accidentally flipped it. Enraged, yet too depressed to get up, Xavier screamed back at her.

“I’M AWAKE! GOD, WHAT’S YOUR PROBLEM?”

“Well. I’m just really excited because…” Skelloetta started, proceeding to relocate right next to his ear. “IT’S SNOWING FOR THE FIRST TIME THIS WINTER!”

The sheer intensity of the girl’s shriek caused blood to flow from Xavier’s ears. His head rattled, and he struggled to catch his breath. “Why… would I care… about a little bit of stupid snow?”

“Well, we’re all having fun out there, and we wanted to know if you-”

“Let me stop you there, sweet cheeks. First of all, rolling around in a bunch of solid water in the midst of freezing weather isn’t exactly my idea of ’fun.’  Second of all, I could care less about what all of you think of me. I have a mission, and this mission is all that matters. Now if you’ll excuse me, I’d like to get some sleep.”  With that, Xavier rolled over so his back was to her.

Usually, the bubbly ghost would just shrug off a remark like this, but this time around she appeared to be genuinely hurt. Xavier, noticing this out of the corner of his eye, felt something odd as well. It was almost as if he felt sorry. His inner darkness, just like with all his other feelings, quickly hid this emotion away. He had no reason to feel bad! After all, he was a mighty king, a master of his craft! Feeling invigorated by his ignorance, he jumped up to his feet, only to slip on a blanket and slam into a window. With a groan, Xavier adjusted his mask and took in the scene that was taking place in Glitzville. Skelloetta wasn’t lying-- there was several feet of snow on the ground, and every other battler was out playing. Their joyfulness was disgusting to him. The lack of cautiousness they practiced could easily lead to someone falling right off the edge of the island.

That’s when it him. A grin spread across Xavier’s masked face, for he had just developed a new plan that was sure to succeed. As he burst out into the hallway, he thought to himself that this would finally be the day that his name would cease to be the butt of mockery among the others;  he would at last reign supreme.