1Olimar was starting to get the hang of this now. He was making good progress: He was recovering at least two parts to his ship a day, if this continued, he would be off this planet in a week. The sun seemed to shine a little brighter on the Distant Spring today. He even started whistling a gleeful tune. To his surprise and amusement the pikmin started to copy him and whistled along. What wonderfully strange creatures.
He was following the pikmin with the Ionium Jet #2 back to the ship when he passed the land mass where that peculiar egg was sitting.
The egg was gone.
It was just gone. Nothing was present to confirm it even existed in the first place. Olimar looked around and saw nothing that wasn't there before. He felt a chill down his spine. "If it hatched I would see the broken shell right?" He told himself. He couldn't shake a cold feeling of dread. He rounded the bend after his pikmin and froze.
Something big was lurching around the landing site. It had no shape or form. His eyes had a hard time focusing on it, it's "Skin" kept moving, like a living shadow. A foot of an Onion was going right through its "body". It slowly turned and two gleaming blue eyes fixed themselves on Olimar. He caught the last remains of a pikmin spirit drifting away.
As a kid Olimar had been told stories about a monster called the Progg that would hide under children's beds, waiting for them to fall asleep before eating them. Though not quite the same as the monster in Olimar's stories, the two eerie, bloodcurdling, icy blue eyes were straight out of a nightmare.
"No." he whispered. He realized he had sent almost 30 pikmin back to the onion with the spoils of war throughout the day. Were they all dead? He saw no pikmin anywhere near the landing site. The Pikmin carrying the Ionium Jet were still making their way toward the ship when the thing started to move toward them.
Snapping out of his funk realizing the awful danger Olimar sprinted forward, feverishly whistling for the pikmin. He managed to call them to his side just as the thing swept over the Jet. "No!" He yelled. He hoped it wasn't damaged. Gritting his teeth he launched three yellow pikmin at the monster to find a weak point.
They melted into the creature's hide on contact without a sound. Three little blue spirits drifted heavenward. Olimar's heart hit the floor. What happened? Did they disintegrate? Its whole body was covered in that horrible moving shadow he couldn't think of anything to do. Was there any weak point to this thing? Despair settled in at the image of this hulking nightmare moving ever closer.
Get the Pikmin to safety, he thought. He had too many to lose out in the open. "Cmon!" he yelled and whistled for his pikmin to follow him around the Progg toward the landing site. The Progg was relatively slow and that was what he was counting on. The pikmin obeyed and followed as close behind Olimar as possible. The leafed pikmin were falling behind though. "Cmon" Olimar thought again desperation setting in.
A couple feet later he reached the landing site. He screeched to a halt under the blue onion and turned to order all the blues to pile in. As he did he saw the Proggs hulking body no more than a foot away. Fear stabbed his heart. How did it get here so quickly? Was it faster than it looked?
"HOME!" he ordered his pikmin, voice cracking, hoping they would understand but knowing they wouldn't. Without looking back to see if the blues were okay he rushed to the yellow onion to order those pikmin home. He turned around.
The Progg was already at the blue onion.
Dozens of delicate blue spirits drifted to heaven. Their sordid screams were almost in unison, Olimar would never forget that. Guilt, anger, shame, deep sadness; all these emotions accosted his soul in rapid succession but there was no time to grieve. He hesistated, than rushed to grab two yellow leaf pikmin lagging behind and gently threw them to the top of the yellow onion hoping they would make it. He then bolted to the red onion and ordered the remaining pikmin into it. He turned and saw the blue onion empty of pikmin. He prayed some had made it. The Progg lingered a bit, probably looking for more pikmin but had now moved on to the yellow onion.
"FASTER!" Olimar screamed through tears at his pikmin but they couldn't hear him. His ears rang from the sound inside his helmet. They didn't climb faster.
The Progg easily covered the distance to the onion and "ate?" several more pikmin before the rest escaped. Luckily this gave the red pikmin, of which there weren't many anyway to excape safely but Olimar felt no peace. The Progg was moving on to the red onion and Olimar ran. He ran up the ridge a good distance away and didn't look back until he was safe. It didn't matter, the Progg didn't seem to be interested in him. It instead moved toward the ship.
"No no please please!" I prayed, "The ship will be okay, the ship will be okay." He repeated to himself. He didn't dare approach after seeing what that thing did to his pikmin in an instant. If his suit burst even a little it would be game over for him.
The Progg "sniffed" around the ship but didn't seem to damage it. It was terrifying to look at. Olimar began to worry. It would be sundown soon and he would not let himself be trapped on the surface again. He hung his head in his hands. "How many did I lose" he sobbed. All those souls gone in an instant. How could he have been so careless?
The Progg was still examining the landing site. 2 minutes passed. Olimar didn't dare approach it; not when it was so close to the Dolphin. 5 minutes passed. Olimar fidgeted. He still had time to wait for the Progg to leave but it looked as if it never would. 8 minutes passed. The Progg seemed to slow down and started to wander a little. The sun was down, Olimar figured it was now or never to make a break for it. After a moment's hesitation, he bolted to the ship as fast as he could. The Progg turned slowly and looked him straight through to the soul. Olimar inwardly screamed and dove through the cockpit into the Dolphin, starting liftoff as fast as he could. He chanced a glance out the window and saw that the Progg had not moved but had centered, staring straight at the Dolphin. Olimar gulped as the main rockets fired and the familiar pull of gravity tugged at him as he launched into space. The onions obediently followed suit. They seemed fine. Olimar breathed a small sigh of relief.
It was over. Olimar took off his helmet and put his head in his hands. What was he going to do? Would he ever be able to go back to the Distant Spring? How many- he choked. How many pikmin died today? One thing was clear.
He realized that he had a lot to learn about this planet.
