The Lake

The Lake (, Lake) is the sixth stage of The Subspace Emissary.

Overview
After punches  out of the way of 's Dark Cannon, Diddy lands in a jungle. He is jumping through the jungle and he lands by a vast lake. He sees a crashed Arwing, the same one shot down by the Halberd in the Sea of Clouds level, and goes over to check it out. The lake then vibrates as Rayquaza rises from the lake, and threatens Diddy. Apparently, Diddy violated Rayquaza's territory, so the legendary Pokémon wants to make him pay. Rayquaza engulfs the crashed Arwing in flames with a powerful energy blast. Grabbing Diddy, the Pokémon prepares to finish off the little monkey, when jumps out of the Arwing and uses his Fox Illusion technique to liberate Diddy. Fox lands, his name is shown, and then he gestures to Diddy to help him fight Rayquaza.

The player has the choice between Fox or Diddy Kong, and Rayquaza must then be fought. In a cutscene after the boss fight, Fox will attempt to leave, but Diddy Kong will try to appeal to him, with no success. Then Diddy Kong decides to drag Fox away with him. Again, the choice between Fox or Diddy Kong occurs, and the level continues. The level is full of day changing doors. At the end of the level, the player will fight a false version of Bowser. After defeating him, a cutscene will occur where the real Bowser comes in and attempts to use the Dark Cannon to turn the two new teammates into trophies. Diddy Kong prepares to fight Bowser, but Fox grabs him and dashes away, knowing they can't defeat Bowser. After beating this level, Fox joins the party.

Playable Characters

 * (Joins team after level)
 * (Joins team after level)

Returning enemies

 * Goomba
 * Koopa Troopa (Green)
 * Koopa Paratroopa (Red and Green)
 * Hammer Bro
 * Borboras
 * Giant Goomba
 * Towtow
 * Hydro Jyk
 * Bullet Bill
 * Mites

Enemies introduced

 * Auroros
 * Bucculus

Bosses

 * Rayquaza
 * False

Music

 * When Fox enters in the opening cutscene,  plays.
 * During the battle against Rayquaza,  plays.
 * During the following section of the stage,  plays.
 * When the characters are on the raft in the river,  plays.
 * Following that,  plays.
 * During the False Bowser battle and ending cutscene,  plays.

Trivia

 * An unusually high level of care was taken by the developers to ensure that one specific door puzzle cannot be skipped, being the one that requires the player to enter and defeat an ambush, to reveal a bomb block that will break open a hole in the ceiling to reveal a button. Not only will the button not spawn until the bomb block is detonated, but unusually, there is an invisible ceiling just below where the cliff wall's collision ends. This means that even with hacks that alter blast zone positions, it is not possible to go above the stage to access where the button is without detonating the bomb block first, despite the button not having spawned in yet. This is the only instance of such a failsafe in The Subspace Emissary.
 * During the raft segment, there are 2 rafts present, one which spawns at the start of the segment, and which the player spawns on by default, and one which spawns below the bonus room door. Regardless of which raft is in use, both rafts are present, fully modelled and animated, and both are solid. This can be seen through the use of camera hacks and blast zone modifiers.

El lago