Spirits of the Glitch Part 1: Palutena (Smash Possession/TF) (Patreon)

Hey folks!

Writing away, not got much to say! I hope everything's going well for everyone out there - and maybe I'll have more to ramble on about next week xD

In the meantime, have a story where someone asked me to write a tale of Smash girls getting possessed and transformed by unconventional spirits, and I went so overboard it got split into multiple parts.

Really gotta stop doing that. But they seemed to like the result, so... enjoy!

-----

Shockwaves ripped through the earth, and the sky trembled. Ancient stone pillars cracked and threatened to crumble. The roar of battle was overwhelming, blades and blasts shooting back and forth without cease. The crack of blocked attacks and the thrum of magic made it difficult to hear anything other than the occasional screamed battle cry.

“Explosive flame!”

“Avavago!”

“Hi-yah!”

“…!”

An explosion of magics separated the four fighters, each retreating for cover before scrambling to try and regain the advantage. Smoke and sparks drifted through the air, hovering through the sudden silence – only for both to be scattered as a green haired goddess flashed through, her staff already swinging.

“Take this!”

A crack echoed across the arena as the staff slammed down – only to be intercepted on a shimmering shield.

“Nice try, luv.” The dark haired witch grinned up at the surprised goddess, before delivering her counter, her heel catching her attacker’s chin as she flipped over backwards. “But not this time.”

Tournament fighters weren’t easy to take down – they’d all been chosen as some of the most powerful contenders in the multiverse – but with the witch’s counter curse slowing her reflexes, the goddess couldn’t respond fast enough to her follow-up. Her staff faltering, shield sent flying, the green haired woman was smacked back again – this time over the edge of the arena, sent toppling towards defeat.

Towards, perhaps – but not straight into. The drop was a long one, and there was plenty of time yet for a recovery. A goddess was not so easily overcome, no matter how powerful the (mostly) mortal spellcaster was. With a gritting of her teeth, the woman tightened her grip on her staff and jumped off of thin air itself, shooting back upwards-

Only to meet the witch’s kick slamming down the other way.

Palutena let out a very un-divine sounding grunt as Bayonetta’s foot connected with her chest, knocking the wind out of her lungs and the upwards momentum out of her attempted recovery. This time there was no reversing fate – her damage % was well into the triple digits at this point, and the solid hit drove her straight down into disqualification, a beam of light blasting out in her wake to confirm her loss.

Above her, the dark haired witch smirked as she landed back on solid ground, dusting herself off casually before turning to find where the other two fighters had gone. She didn’t have to look far.

“Hya!”

“Hn!”

The pair had splintered off to a different part of the arena, setting themselves upon a horde of assist items that had been provided by the tournament sponsors. As Bayonetta watched, she saw the two hurl stars, wands, and space blasters at one another, before they both reached for their trump cards…

Boink!

Daisy and Shiek stared with resigned dread as the two bombs that they had just thrown at one another collided in mid-air, bouncing and rolling back to their feet. It was, alas, far too late to escape the blast radius.

BOOM

“Toodles, ladies.” The Umbral witch just waved as she watched her last two opponents blast off, both of them flying well over the horizon, and out of the contest. The announcer’s voice roaring “GAME!” a moment later confirmed what she already knew.

“Winner: Bayonetta!”

“Well naturally.” She flicked her hair back and adjusted her glasses as the other three were teleported back up to the centre of the arena, grudgingly applauding the victor. “No hard feelings, right girls?”

“Of course not.” Palutena’s smile was tight – though that could have just been a result of the clobbering she had just endured. “It was a battle well fought. Though next time it might not go so much your way.”

“Heh. Bring it.” The witch flashed a confident smile. “It’s not as if an angel is ever going to be a threat to me~”

For a moment sparks seemed to fly between the two, while Shiek and Daisy did their best to ignore them. It was no secret that these two competitors didn’t get on. Rivalries and grudges weren’t rare things in the Smash Brothers Tournament – no match with both Samus and Ridley competing ended with its arena intact, for example – but it was rather uncommon to see so much antagonism between two women from such different worlds. Alas, Bayonetta had a distinct dislike of anything ‘angelic’ thanks to her personal history, and Palutena had long lost patience with how the witch treated Pit as free target practice, so…

Well, fights between them tended to attract an audience, and they’d had plenty of chances to upgrade their dislike into a full-blown enmity! Which just sold more seats in the stands, so the tournament organisers weren’t complaining. Neither were Daisy and Shiek, though that was only because one was a Princess, and thus had far too much etiquette training to speak so thoughtlessly, while the other was a silent ninja (and also, secretly, a Princess, so she was double dipping).

Fortunately for those, two, though, they didn’t have to endure the tension between their fellow fighters for long. After a few moments for the audience to clap and cheer back at the stadium, the cameras switched off, and the teleporter to return them to their dressing rooms appeared, a small glowing circular pad on the floor in the design of a Smash Ball.

With a quiet pair of relieved sighs, the princess and the ninja hurried over and stepped onto the pad, vanishing into beams of light, followed a moment later by the goddess and the witch – who both tried to get to it first and ended up having a brief squabble over it before disappearing into the light together.

Perhaps, with each of the four ladies obviously in such a hurry, it was understandable that all of them were completely oblivious to the strange, glitchy flickering in the design’s lines – of the way it buzzed between red and black, between blocky and smooth. If any of them had been paying attention, they surely would have hesitated to make use of the clearly faulty device!

But they didn’t, and so they did – and they’d surely regret it before the day was through.

-

The fact that something was wrong was obvious immediately once they had emerged out of the other side of the portal – or at least, it would have been, if two of them hadn’t been distracting the others with an increasingly loud argument about who was in who’s way. As it was, it was a good thirty seconds before Shiek noticed that they had not, in fact, arrived in the back stage areas of the Tournament, but rather in a bizarre looking void made up of mis-matched islands floating in an otherwise empty black and green sky.

It took a good five minutes for her to draw the others’ attention to this fact. Sometimes this whole ‘Silent Ninja’ thing she had going on really wasn’t worth it, family tradition or no.

But eventually… Eventually… The bickering died down, and the group acknowledged their awkward situation.

“Where are we…?” Daisy was the first to speak up about it – as long as you didn’t count Shiek’s silent attempts at communication, anyway.

Palutena was the one who came in with an answer. “It looks like a glitch world,” she said, peering into the broken landscape with concern. “A place made up of discarded ideas and forgotten dreams. The teleporter must have malfunctioned somehow and dropped us here…”

“Mm, very fancy.” Bayonetta was, of course, utterly unimpressed, folding her arms and giving the goddess a flat look. “Ideas and dreams are all good and well, but I don’t suppose you know how to get out of here? I know it’s not an issue for you, but I was planning to have a nice little celebration of my latest win once I got back to my room.”

The green haired fighter’s eye twitched. “I’m afraid it might not be that easy,” she said, determined not to let herself get put off by the other woman’s attitude. “This is a realm that exists on the line between reality and imagination. To get out, we’re going to have to find an area closer to the reality side of the spectrum, and hope that we can find a proper exit there-”

“Blah blah blah, find an exit somewhere, got it.” The witch waved off her dire tone, striding forwards with her ever-typical confidence. “I know you like to look wise and mysterious, dear, but it’s just going to give you wrinkles if you keep nattering on like that.”

“Hold it.” Before she could advance more than three steps, she found Palutena’s staff pressed against her chest, barring her path. “I wasn’t finished. This place is dangerous. The normal tournament safeties don’t apply here.”

“Which is all the more reason you should get out of my way, now, isn’t it?” Batonetta snorted, knocking the staff aside and turning to face the goddess full on. “Though if you’re looking for a repeat of our latest battle first, you’re certainly going the right way about it.”

“Ladies, please!” Daisy intervened, stepping between the two to try and forestall any violence. “We’ve all had a long day, right? I’m sure we all want to get home, so let’s just work together for now, okay? Lady Palutena, what were you saying?”

The green haired goddess gave the princess a grateful smile. “Thank you, your highness. Now, as I was saying, we’re going to have to find an area close to reality, but that won’t be a simple journey. I recognise some of these islands. That over there is the old Planet Zebes arena,” she said, stepping over to the edge of their island and pointing with her staff towards a distant isle, one made up of floating metal platforms and lit by burning flames from below. “And that over there is Pac-Maze, I believe…” Her staff swung to the right, where, even further away than the last isle, one could just about make up the blue glowing lines of a certain infamous labyrinth.

“Both of them used to be Tournament stages, though they’ve been discontinued. Compared to some of these other islands, they’re realer than most. They’re our most likely places to find a way out.”

Daisy nodded happily, glad to have some concrete direction. Shiek was already assessing a route, eyeing the ways they would have to cross through this strange glitchy void. Some of the islands were close enough to jump between, and others seemed to be connected by teleporters, so it was at least possible to plot a route – assuming those teleporters were trustworthy, at least, which maybe couldn’t be taken as a given at the moment…

Bayonetta, though, was not done taunting the angel-lover. “Well I’m glad to hear that your advanced years allow you to have some use to us, but I’m really not seeing why you’re acting so cowardly. If you’re afraid of a little stroll through the scenery doing in your back, so be it, but I, for one, don’t have an issue with a little island hopping.”

Daisy and Shiek winced. As a goddess, Palutena was ageless, and had been around for countless eons… But still. Some things you just didn’t say about a lady.

And it certainly showed. Palutena was practically growling as she turned away from the view to glare at her ‘rival’. “Listen, if you want to go out there and get yourself glitched, I’m not going to shed any tears, but you should at least understand the dangers I’m trying to warn you about.”

Shiek blinked, and Daisy tilted her head. “Glitched? What do you mean?”

Still eyeing Bayonetta for a long moment, the goddess sighed and looked to the others. “It’s not just forgotten stages in here. Every potential powerup or tricky trap that was considered for the Tournament exists in some form in these islands – especially the ones that were deemed too dangerous for use. The entire place is a hazard course… And that’s not the worst of it.”

She paused, checking to make sure her audience were actually listening. Daisy and Shiek were, of course, the brunette in particular hanging off her every word, and Bayonetta might have been making a show of looking elsewhere, but there were signs she was listening too. Good.

“Worse,” the goddess continued, reassured, “this place is infested with the spirits of those who didn’t make it into the Tournament. Every hopeful fighter, or absent assist… They hover through this realm as spirits, looking for a way to break into the contest proper, even though that’s mostly impossible from here.”

“Well so what?” At last, the witch interrupted again, still acting dismissive. “What do we have to fear from a bunch of fools who couldn’t even qualify? Even you three shouldn’t have trouble with that kind of trash.”

This time, Palutena didn’t seem to mind the interruption, possibly because it was a reasonable enough question. “Because here they’re not just failed fighters. They’re spirits, in a way, just like so many of our supports in the Tournament, but without any of the constraints placed upon the real deals. And just like we’re searching for a way out by finding a place bordering on reality, they want to become part of the Tournament proper by joining with and possessing the bodies of invited fighters – us.”

Shiek’s eyes widened, and immediately the ninja was on high alert, looking around for any sign of incoming threat. Daisy was a little slower on the uptick, though, rubbing her chin in thought. “Wait, so you mean, they want to…”

“Possess us, yes. To take our bodies and minds for their own, and then try to use them to escape. Though, I doubt that’d be possible.” The goddess shook her head, chuckling ruefully. “I think something like that would void our invitations and trap us here too.”

The princess, alas, couldn’t see the humour, biting her lip as she thought it all through. “That sounds pretty bad. Can it be reversed?”

Fortunately for her stress levels, Palutena smiled and nodded. “If we’re quick enough, yes. Eventually the transformation would be permanent, so we have to be cautious, but it’s a simple enough matter to deal with them if they get any of us. You just have to- Eh? What’s wrong?”

She’d paused because of the looks on her companions faces. Rather than looking relieved at her explanation, both Daisy and Shiek looked more worried than ever. In fact, Daisy’s expression was shifting into shocked horror quickly, while Shiek was reaching for her knives. Was there a threat? Frowning, the goddess turned around, thinking she might see what the problem was off in the distance.

Instead, she found herself face to face with an unfamiliar blue spirit. “Oh!”

It was about the size of a basketball, in the shape of a fat tear drop, with a happy face on its front like it had been drawn on as an afterthought. The thing was floating in the air, bobbling merrily up and down, having snuck up on her from beneath the cliff edge she had turned her back to. Not a problem, though, it hardly looked like a threat.

That was, until it began to stretch, its bouncy blue skin morphing like water as it grew upwards and outwards, pulling in all directions until it was as thin as a sheet of paper, and as big as

“Uh.” Nervously, the goddess tried to lift her staff. Too late.

Bloorp!

The slime fell over her like a sheet torn free of the washing line by a powerful gust of wind. She raised her arms, struggling, trying to dislodge it, but her every movement only seemed to entangle it around her worse. The ooze stuck to her skin, sank into her clothes, and in a matter of instants there was just a vaguely goddess shaped blue blob standing in the fighter’s place.

“Lady Palutena!” Daisy reached out, and Shiek finally threw their knife, but their only answer was a flash of bright light…

-

The sensation was a strange one. One moment she was fighting to break free of a pile of goop that had fallen on top of her, and the next she was drifting in a warm blue sea, the world around her having completely disappeared.

“What? Where…?”

The goddess tried to look around, but there was nothing to see – only endless blue, stretching off into infinity. What was this? Where had she been taken? Despite all of her godly wisdom, this place was completely unknown to her.

Well, she had no intention of staying. A flare of her divine aura should be her ticket out of here, or at least a way of illuminating the exit. All she needed to do was-

Oh! What was that?

She shivered in surprise as she felt a ghostly touch brush against her arm. Was something else here? Her eyes darted around, her head snapping left and right, but there was no sign of anyone. Palutena was completely alone.

Or was she? She certainly began to doubt it as she felt another touch, this time along her shoulders. Her hair swirled in the liquid as she tried to peer around. “Who’s there?” She called out. “Show yourself!”

There was no answer to the bubbles her words left floating up through the sea. No figure emerged from the endless blue. There was nothing here save Palutena.

Nothing save the sea itself.

The goddess’s eyes widened as she realised the truth. This was no mere ocean. This was… Slime?!

She started to panic as she felt the ‘water’ around her grow thicker, binding her in place, her arms and legs gently splayed and held. Naturally she tried to struggle, but the slime’s strength was far greater than she expected, and the goddess quickly found she couldn’t move, much to her horror.

But whatever she was anticipating never came. Instead, she simply felt that touch on her shoulders again, gently squeezing on both sides, before releasing. Squeeze. Release. Squeeze. Release.

Was… Was it trying to give her a massage?

That certainly seemed to be the case, as the strange sensation spread down her arms. And it was hard to argue that her muscles weren’t tense. Being trapped under a slime ocean would do that to anyone’s posture. But why would it…?

Oooh… That… That actually felt pretty good…

Biting her lip, Palutena nervously laid back – not that she actually had a choice in the matter. The slime’s embrace was gentle, but she couldn’t forget that she wasn’t supposed to be here. She had to find a way out, not… not get distracted by this peculiar massage. No, she’d been on the right path with that aura idea. A surge of that would surely blast this slime away and give her some breathing room.

Ah! Oohh, she’d had that knot in her shoulder for an absolute age, wow. This stuff really knew what it was doing…

Hm. W-well… Did she really need to blast it away? Surely that would only anger the stuff, and there was an ocean of it around her. Maybe it would be more sensible to just… play along. Let it give her whatever massage it wanted. The slime didn’t seem to want to harm her…

Mmmn, and it really did feel quite good…

Tension started to leak out of her as the gentle massaging sensation spread further through her body. A warm, soothing back rub drew a relieved sigh from the goddess, and she couldn’t help but moan as the space between her toes was stroked through her sandals. She really couldn’t help it – this stuff was very good at this.

Mmn… So relaxing… It was a full body massage like she’d never experienced one before. Of course Pit had always been enthusiastic about giving her those, but he’d never quite mastered the technique. The goddess couldn’t help but giggle at the memory, and then moan again as another knot of tension was skilfully excised from her body.

Palutena’s eyes sank to half mast, steadily sliding closed as she grew more and more relaxed. More and more sleepy. It was so easy to let herself drift away like this. So easy to just let herself be carried by the soft, warm embrace of the slime tide. Why should she resist when it felt so good?

Her eyes were practically slivers by the time she noticed anything was amiss.

It was her dress that caught her attention, just as she was about to give in completely. Her white robe, her holy raiment, the symbol of her divine status and a sacred garment in its own right… Was turning blue. She could just see it, where the fabric was drifting up from around her legs.

The sight was so unusual that it brought a little focus back to her, and she blinked, focusing her gaze downwards. And to her surprise, she realised it wasn’t just her robes that were acting strangely. Her sash, her staff, even her shield, all of it seemed to be turning blue – and, more worryingly, starting to melt away, dripping at the tips like melted candles. Before her startled gaze, she saw the entire head of her staff seem to disperse into nothingness.

Alarm sparked in her heart again, this time distant and muffled by the ongoing waves of relaxation that still filled her. Her clothes were dissolving away, vanishing into the blue slime. And it wasn’t like they were being eaten, she realised. No, it was more… It was more like they were becoming part of the slime itself?

The goddess stirred. Nn… This was… Bad. She needed to… focus. Ah, a blast of her aura would put a stop to this, right…?

She felt a tickling sensation in her ears.

… Mmmn, yes, it’d be easy to stop, so she could afford a few more seconds to enjoy it…

Alarm faded, Palutena’s panicked expression sliding back into a relaxed smile. Yes, there was no need to worry. She was completely in control of this situation, she was sure. That was why she was confident in taking things nice and slow. Nice and slow, just like her thoughts, which were starting to grow rather sparse and simple…

And the reason for that would have been clear, if the goddess had looked around again, instead of simply laying back and closing her eyes once more. If she had, then she might have felt that peculiar sensation in her ears, as if a certain fluid had slid down them, straight into her head…

But she had no need to worry about such things. Not when she was feeling so very nice and relaxed. Not when that warm, soothing massage feeling was spreading through her entire body, even dripping down into her very brain! Heehee, ahh, it was like the slime was directly starting to massage her mind itself~

That was a silly thought, though, and she didn’t dwell on it. In fact, it seemed to vanish from her head almost as soon as it formed, squeezed and squished into nothingness. Just like so many of her thoughts, in fact – vast expanses of divine knowledge and holy wisdom simply melting away as her mind seemed to grow simpler and simpler, emptier and emptier.

She giggled again as bubbles drifted up from her ears. It was just so very relaxing to let herself stop thinking, after stressing out for so many centuries being a goddess of wisdom~

Unseen and uncared, her clothing completely vanished, leaving a nude, giggling goddess to soak in the sea of slime, allowing the massage to stretch further across her body, to reach every sensitive knot and every hidden crevice. And soon, as she giggled and moaned, embracing every touch and stroke, it wasn’t just her clothes that were turning blue.

The tips of her fingers. The ends of her hair. Slowly rising through her ankles. Colouring her nipples, and her lips. The spread of blue was slow and steady, but also relentless and unopposed. And everywhere it went, the sensation of relaxation echoed through Palutena’s body.

Mm… Hadn’t she been going to do something about this? Something to do with her aura? … Oh well. She was far too relaxed to bother with something like that now. Better to just go with the flow…

That was her last real thought as her mind blanked out completely, her once magnificent brain turning to slime first, and leaving nothing but a stupefied smile on the goddess’ face as the rest of her melted away, blissed out and content. With one final sigh of release, her form wavered, and then relaxed completely, dissolving into nothing but slime.

And in her wake, spreading out from where she had vanished, the sea of blue began to take on a much greener hue – one just like the colour of the goddess’s hair…

-

The bright light faded, and the three fighters blinked to clear their eyes, all of them looking to see what had become of the goddess.

In Palutena’s place was a slime.

Not a slime like the one that they had just seen consume their friend, either. That one had been blue, and… small. This one was about the same height as Palutena had been, though, in fairness, it was quite a bit wider around the base – and it was green. The same green as the goddess’s hair.

“L… Lady Palutena?” Daisy was the first to speak up, her voice shaking as she retreated a step. Shiek still had a hand on her knives, but was clearly hesitating to use them, and Bayonetta… Well, she just looked kind of amused.

The slime turned towards them. It had exactly the same blank, painted on smile as the first slime, albeit bigger. Then, as they watched, it started to… grow.

Green slime flowed upwards, the creature morphing out of its teardrop shape, and instead taking the form of a more familiar, feminine figure. A torso appeared, sprouting arms, a head, and long, dripping hair behind it, with Palutena’s body being easily and immediately recognisable!

Although, the slime had not seen fit to recreate the goddess’s clothes, and her bare chest now stood proudly thrust forward, jiggling like the jello it was. In fact, if anything, she looked bustier than ever, the slime naturally taking a more curvaceous form…

“Palu!” ‘She’ said, voice bright and cheerful – with perhaps a note of a familiar woman’s tone to it.

Daisy swallowed. “Lady Palutena?”

“Palu!” ‘She’ slid closer to the group, legs not moving so much as gliding over the ground, her blank, painted on face smiling wide. “Palu!” Around ‘her’ head, a divine halo appeared, glittering gold as it hovered in the air. It was shaped rather like Palutena’s tiara.

“She’s been absorbed,” Bayonetta snorted, rolling her eyes. “Typical angel. Can’t count on them for anything. And we’d best get moving, unless you want the same to happen to us.”

With that, she started walking away, jumping off to the nearest island to start making her way out of the glitch realm.

“But…!” Daisy tried to protest after her, but fell silent as Shiek’s hand fell on her shoulder. The ninja shook their head at her. There was nothing they could do.

Closing her eyes, the princess nodded, and, now just as silent as her companion, went to follow after Bayonetta. Maybe if they got out of here quick enough, they could send some help for their fallen friend.

They left the green slime girl behind them, who didn’t seem to mind their departure. “Palu! Palu!”

What a happy soul it was.

The glitch world had claimed one contender – how would the other three fare?