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KOOPALINGS: THE TEENAGE YEARS

by Eightane

CHAPTER XV: MAELSTROM

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His throne was quintessential humble-brag; the pasty yellow mage in his glittering blue robe, bejeweled with tiny sparkles. A dust Kamek himself had conjured, like that of fairies, had they existed. Two other men in glasses held up lily-white leaves, fanning either side of him. The fronds had to be thus coloured; by his orders they'd bleached them before this. Green would never be welcome to him, it was what he cursed, and sat on the throne he should own.

His cheek rest on his fist; head cocked to that side, he was neither bored nor tired. Pensive, maybe. This seat underneath was flattering, sure... Ivory, expanding upwards, a seashell with his dwarvish form 'holding it down'. But it would be destroyed, once victory came. A brittle, almost mocking reminder of the transience, his exiled state.

He concluded thoughtful repose by snapping toward the left-side servant. "You will learn proper rhythm, or this continues!" He lifted ever-so-light his wand, and a beam transferred to the now-sweaty magikoopa. The cerf felt himself... Shrink. Odd, how it felt down low on him. He broke concentration to find what had happened... His face drained of blood and complexion. His legs were wooden. Furrowed and dark, and the flesh of his beltline and higher sprung from what looked like oak or hickory. He screamed through the time-span of a frond's wave.

Kamek had distaste for loudness. With another flick of the armed wrist, the rest of that man became as his legs and hips. Now no more than a decoration. He swiftly went to calling out the cause. "*Sigh*... If he'd been of stronger fiber and corked himself... But of course. I'm surrounded by geldings." A few of these, always standing by, nervous as any doomed prisoner, rushed in to pick up the new statue, carry it off. Another 'lucky' underling picked up the unharmed leaf and took up the post.

Kamek shouted after them, mouth wide and with serrated teeth. "To my second collection hold! The first is for the fallen of war, if you place him wrongly you'll find out where the first group's failure took them!" He mentioned the five who had taken a dead man to a place improper. They had wished to defy him, and bury the bloke. Rumour had it that they lay somewhere in Giant land, throats red with the slitting ear-to-ear, hidden in desolate forest. Gossip wasn't always lies or errant.

At least one toadie - helping these mage men to tote off an oak statue - wondered in silence why a house made of sticks and mud was kept so grand. He understood being out in the woodlands, forgotten edge of the kingdom... Eyes would never reach they or their cult-leader, until he wanted that, if ever. But a man who could make plant from skin, fire from air, and taught his disciples to lesser strengths alike, could have this stronghold be as heaven, opulent and peerless.

The squat, vindictive Kamek had reasons, alright. No getting comfortable where he didn't belong. Anyone to ask him - before he quieted such insolence - would hear that and no more. To him, it encapsulated all.

"I feel my scout is poised to set a smile on my face..." In a new gladness he glanced to the other, enduring fan-servant. The man wagged his head up and down, valiant in this and wet from brow to robe. He'd make no mistakes. Kamek didn't mean it was him, though, who put a better mood onto now. The conjuring czar used him as a sponge for confessions now, the suitable sort. "Clairevoyance is the nectar of godliness. I worry not, if it happens I knew always. If it doesn't, I never held that it would." He faced the man, and his head tilted slow and eerie. "You understand this power, do you?"

The lower magikoopa nodded forceful again. It didn't matter if he said so or no, yay or nay, Kamek got that he could wrap his head around it. It did matter as to giving him a future.

A satisfied lord and sorcerer expounded. "You honour me, and you will see the day when it turns your foes to dust. As for now... Ten seconds will pass, and I'll give you further faith to hold!"

He knew he hadn't lied, however often that was fact. The precise number of 'ticks' later, in walked the red-robed ranger, indelibly spirited. Almost a bounce in his step... This faithful right-arm of wickedness counted any day where blood spilled as a day well-done.

Kamek leaned forward, kaniving. "How many were erased for that smile on you, Y'lunn?"

The man cackled; through his teeth, hisses were succinct. " Fill a water pail with ball bearings. Have them pour out the top, and if one is each a soul, they would not equal my doing."

"Splehhndid-" Complete with a clap of Kamek's hands, this news on which he'd waited. His wand's base was banged to the dirt of the floor... Dust kicked up, but it vaporized the moment it annoyed him. "They will feel it, though they're ignorant yet. Give it three slim hours."

"I give it what you wish, ever my king." The red one bowed, though never quite as deep as others at the feet of the elder one. His head went back, nose turned up. "Do you now see as far as our golden days, or will it be longer 'til we have our revolution's broadcast?"

Kamek was unangered, but nonetheless stern. "Only images and fleeting details emerge. Soon we will have it set in mental stone. But 'until' is the word you were looking for." He smirked, and somehow this had chills to send more than would a permeated threat. "Damned fool contractions are the squatters' tongue. You have higher bloodlines."

"Indeed. And apologies to my saviour." Kamek heard this, and cooled to casual fits of laugh and palm-strike on the throne's arm.

"Soon not any of this will matter. I sit on this calcified chair, and it is NOT my own. Mine is the perch from which all luxuries flow." He proceeded to mention just what. "That grotesque turtle will soil his knees in front of me, and they'll be routed like all his blind ones. Nettles in my toes, each and all."

The fanning servant who'd been eager to soothe him, had impulse to ask. "Where do you believe he'll run when we descend like locusts?" It filled him with glee, the very notion.

Kamek's head dropped in his hand. The ranger leaned back, knowing the strike of energy would come, and that it did. Purple waves shot toward the hapless slave. At first, fine, until his arms withered, and fell off, and just as his legs began to, all of him exploded into bloody, cursed rivulets. Puddles of his gore steamed up from the ground. His essence extinguished, his very soul snuffed. Tens of loyal ones around stifled all of their shock... Not a peep arose.

The grand mage took head out of hands, and drew a spiteful breath. "I resent beliefs. He should have known. Hoping one way or another, it's pissing in the wind." His gaze, the cold, beaded stare, met the red one again. "I suppose I could still attend him posthumously, for you and mine." He addressed the many subordinates, this elite one and their sheepish ranks.

His hands and fingers met, mirrored. He devined a prediction, seeking foresight. To him, the future was a moth or other flying pest, he could just reach out and snatch from air. When he did this, now, they all breathed a level of relief. His laugh was high enough that only pure joy could bear it on.

"Better than I'd ever want! Ohhh the stars are aligned like never before!!" He spun on one heel... An effete glimpse of whimsy, and the red-coated ally held out his hand, 'rolled' it forward, as if to nicely beg it into words.

Kamek stepped forward. His hands touched either shoulder of the day's high killer. "Fortify our ranks, but we have little need to plan a second strike today. They have a walking hell on their menu, under their grotesque snouts. And he comes with timing sublime."

***********************************************

Vigil was kept for Ludwig by two unlikely specimens... Todd and Morie were the other two now filling his recovery room. Todd sat on a clean white chair, legs well-apart... Head down halfway, rubbing his chin's fuzz. And a man that soon-before was a mark of irritation, came to offer equal service or condolences. He stood, though, never mind that there was another chair off in the corner. Hospitals weren't pleasant to him, moreso than most. Smells and unsettling blandness that he never elsewhere saw, all around him... Basically he sucked it up and did what he thought right.

On the gurney, barely a true 'bed' below him, Ludwig's legs shifted. A thin white sheet billowed when he stirred, and deflated slow its rushed-in air. Todd started to rise, but the prince was still out, just maybe dreaming. He sat down again. His first thought came out a whisper to Morie. "Wonder what you see when you're down by that kinda stuff. Must be some trippy dreams."

"Could be." Morie looked out the window; a long way down, but they faced behind the castle. Many things he didn't have to see right now. His tone was blank as the walls. "You think she'll come here? You know, he's her own clan."

"Wendy you mean?" Todd noted how the question had been halfway-fractured... Plenty on the man's mind, it looked like. "Well... Maybe not? I think if she knew, we'd be here second." He spoke something else, a tiny smirk coming on. "Y'know the sun doesn't rise and set by her."

Morie's head swayed, an attitude between amused and impatient. "Who are you talking to, you think?"

Todd's eyes fluttered, and chin went up once, confident. "Somethin' you wanna say, man? Just, like, overall?"

The man tethered to a princess did indeed, but right now, he looked nowhere but out and down. The grass blew around... Must be windy all the sudden. "Close. She's gonna hear some things from me. But I'd want it to be here, and when Ludwig wakes up." He scuffed one foot, steady and quiet-ish. "Don't think I could explain right now why. Trust me on it."

"Uhhh, sure? I mean it doesn't make a problem either way... Just..." He wanted to go on, but had nothing to say. It just felt at the time that he should.

Todd's eyes went down, to his thumbs. One was skinned a bit... He'd have to fix that splinter on his boardside.

***********************************************

The first strike was a dry bones'. He had been in line, on the front of Bowser's army at his very gates... There was no fracas until he launched himself, a femur in his hand, raised to strike the plumber and fell his gourdishness.

He made it to a foot apart, and in a crash his skinlessness broke apart. No one had seen Mario lift a finger. Because he hadn't. Millions of volts had shot forth, a jagged pulse from one knuckle. Dry bones collapsed into splinters. This was not rebuildable... It wasn't there to regenerate. Hammer bros recoiled; knees tottered. Even the elites, under suits of steel, pushed back.

Mario just put down another foot. Forward, seeing all the proof he needed. Next to this defense, a power star was much like a wooden bucket. Another step, and half the 'marauders' facing him tripped back on each other, beaks and eyes turgid. But a few were braver... Many had little outside of this. No one they were tethered to, be it husband, wife, descendants. Those would be the ones to cut the distance down. Three fire bros were oncoming, two from the left flank, one jumping straight over the weak-of-heart. They cast heat so harsh it dripped tears of lava... The one from 12 o' clock to Mario had the grimace of hell itself. He'd been on city patrol. He'd seen this fat bastard so recently.

He became a splash of gristle; Mario held out a palm, such a natural defense measure. the bro had fell on it chest-first. Parts of his ribcage blew through the crowd. Two parakoopas fell limp, unlucky enough to be pierced through skulls. One armoured troopa was safe, but screamed. Slivers of a red muscle stuck to his headpiece. Pieces of a heart, shredded to party streamers.

The more those who had courage threw themselves on him, the more beyond who thought of strength in numbers did so. They threw themselves on the enemy. Clocked the sun off this invader. At least one of them thought the man might be Superman, getting strength from the light above. They had no way to know. There was movement in the pile, but down every side, from all on it. Those still back from this melèe thought gravity or struggles shook them. But all the tackler's eyes were spazzing. Too wide... They were dead the moment they'd fallen, electrocuted.

Flying troops AND grounded ones jigged left and right, spears and hammers up and waiting, boomerangs and fireballs held out. Then those on top of the pile rose up and rolled to every side, from him standing. Now there were more screams than willing infantry... Mario's boots crushed dead noses, chins, wrists, stepping off the corpse pile. He breathed hard, now that he wasn't suffocating. The brown of his glare burned hotter than all of Dark World...

... Except one man's gut, up on his throne room's veranda, wringing his hands. A shyguy held up a Mojito, sweating into the brim. Bowser didn't care. He took it, slung the whole thing to his tonsils, and the glass was shattered on the wall by the time his throw and booming yell were inflicted. He couldn't bear to look anywhere but down there. "ANOTHER ONE, YOU MISERABLE-..." He stopped short of any one label to give the Shyguy. If he was focused in fury, he knew also where that belonged. "-AND A TRIPLE!!... I won't rue what I don't remember..."

Mario's hands curled; flaming yellow and blue formed from them. Fire and the fatal charge, and one bolt of current headed for the left flank. It cut a path of burns and blood, concussive on top of everything, bowling through tens of men and women. Paragoombas were knocked from the sky, two different limp koopas had been lobbed and struck them hard. A red koopa lay prone and still, twisted around in ways he shouldn't be. To the rear of this hellscape an elite troopa collapsed, in sense of duty and the literal, head down. Another of his kind lay on his lap, eyes shut. They'd enlisted together. Never imagined this.

Mario peeled charged fire from all fingers. Ten at a time, ending and eviscerating just as many minions every ticking second. Each throw tore a line to fragments.

They barely nicked him; hammers and SO much more showered his position. More than half missed from nothing but fear. The few getting through would tear some skin, maybe, but pure slow going. It was a full minute before they drew blood; it felt like days to those still on their feet, with thoughts and life to give.

He threw toward a random elite; the man's hands covered himself. They were blown back... Not blown off. A scorch hit his belly plate. He still stood.

This had been unnoticed, while red flecked the plumber's cheek. Much of it was spray, splotches from his victims. But a crease had shown up. A nick had broken clean-through... The enemy saw this, and a new, bright trail down from it. He was still mortal.

Many who heeded this forgot the bodies they walked over... Or ran past, not away but for the glory of war. Sneers appeared before Mario. His look had been conviction, but they saw moisture on him, the first yet. He cut more paths into the evil hordes. Some still fell, but less and less. They were marching. He dodged mallets... His hair blew back as one tagged his temple, a glancing blow, but his eyes rolled once.

He barely shook it off before squealing his brogue on high... A buzzy beetle jumped and sliced through his shoulder like looseleaf.

A savage grin was made a hundred feet up; the king had his time at last. Tiny they looked on the grass and stone walks, but even lesser was he, the gnat who vanished under scores of earwigs... Mario was overwhelmed. The fighters were tingling, but sharing the faded shock. Fists landed on Italian cheeks, ears, eye sockets. Lumps swelled on him, the blows swung his head in every direction. All awareness left him, dizzy almost to unconsciousness. Most assailants were grinding teeth, barking insults. Some were crying... They would make him feel their loss.

He hollered out like a cow struck on a highway. His calf was on fire. A hammer struck it, not thrown from a hand but inside one. A sledge bro and his huge weapon had found his legs. Mario gathered force, and striking those who lay into his head, he got air enough and leverage to slug their throats. It scattered the suffocating beatdown. Turtles staggered back with coughs. A goomba rolled to his crown, the newly-punched divet on it hemmhoraging.

He won the battle with the dogpile, but only since they saw their giant helper at his shoes, slinging that sledge and crushing muscle and bone.

The bro had points to make... In a rasp, he got them off his chest. "Should have NEVER come back, abomination!! PAY for what you've trashed!!"

Mario squealed as the metal sheared his toes... One went flat, pancaked. But he backed himself. The next swing went left of his knee, missed by a hair. His moustache twitched. He planted two hands - one bleeding, one scratched to hell - and made it to his shaky, agonized feet. But they didn't fear him.

Bowser's smile dripped orange... And a bit of green from another drink, this one slower to go down. Some binoculars he held up, and saw even less reason for skittishness than the front lines. Years had passed without this. The plumber was rusty... Or whatever else, it mattered none. Today could be the day, when finally...

... A siren came to every ear on the ground. So light at first, but louder as the source got closer. Mario kicked and headbutted his way through legions. He socked them, they socked or clawed back. He winced as a fireball tagged the right thigh. Smoke ascended with the smell of burning overalls. But they fought on with some eyes turned to his left. Behind him. He didn't care now... That shrill siren was helping. It didn't go away.

It got harder to ignore, though. As it pitched higher, he knew how close it had gotten, and then stayed level. The sound kept on but where it came from stopped moving. More and more soldiers were distracted. More of them he plowed through, but it was no use. If they forgot him for this... What the loving fuck was to thank for that...

He didn't turn his head, but the answer came anyway. Running right past him, koopas in white coats. The soldiers had all but stopped their barrage. He had no idea why this... And what could be in their hands, but a mobile bed... At last it got to him. Like slow motion they passed, held up by many there to kill the human. He froze like hundreds to his every side.

Bowser's voice thundered; he had binoculars AND bullhorn as his arms for this, and now the second plunged his tones to the ground. Shyguys in his chambers slapped sockhands on their ears. "MAINTAIN, NO GETTING DISTRACTED!! HE IS MARKED FOR DEATH, GRANT HIM THAT!!" Above the cowering Shyguys in his room, three dry bones fluttered their wings, took up their place around him with pewter shields held high. They had no voice, fleshless as they were, but still one tracked the curves of a vein on the side of Bowser's head, risen and throbbing. The monarch's teeth had been bright, but he seemed now to calm. His shoulders relaxed. The snarl went down.

But the vein pumped faster than ever. And the colour on his face was red so strong it stopped even the heaviest green from tinting it with complexion. Something had hit the king's mind.

A short koopa lass ran in, hair stringy behind her, winded from the long stair climb. "Your majesty... I have new reports... When they found the wreck, in the country-"

His hand went up and blocked half the sun from the archway he looked out. The messenger shut her mouth, and he opened his, weightily. "I deduced, thank you. I see who's routed and attentive as my army." He spoke it with finality, like a finished thought, but held back the full story. Mario had seen blood and contusions on the royalty before... He'd caused the majority, father and children. Bowser paused to look down on Morton... On this unidentified friend of his... Binoculars showed the Italian stand tall, like a man at peace to see the end result of a scene. Something that pleased the overall'd bastard would play out.

He'd been there when it happened.

The men in white ran in through the gate, troops giving them and their bedded cargo space and closing it off upon right when they cleared. Bowser motioned the messenger girl away... She held her chest, feeling it untense. When she'd first reported them being found at roadside, and in what condition, Bowser had cast shadows like he'd pick her up and wring her spindly neck. He thought better of it... Yes, he'd wanted to, but not exactly his way, for a simple chamber courier, no. And now she sprinted away, desperate to leave this, choke down her tears and maybe drown them in an Arbor Mist in the floor tavern.

She'd have to make it past thousands, though, to get one... Soldier men, leaving or returning and both trying to forget, or their wives and mothers, husbands, fathers, sons and daughters, paying to rid the mind of knowing fear. Not everyone would go for this 'medicine', but no one here went without a means to escape.

Bowser threw out his chest... The Dry Bones could barely squeeze through that window to follow him out on stone patio, just in front of and guarding him. The King's eyes danced over his platoons, either shredded and strewn or together and still holding their own. He talked so low that the Shyguys inside caught nary a whisper. "You speared me," he began, meant for someone far below him in several ways. "I want to shake your hand. You found the way to grab me again." The king's rage had respect, or his admiring was brutal... Either way, there was no clear winner of what he felt most. "Truly, I will hate this day when it's done. Though you'll be turned to ashes, there's the baggage. I'll have lost the one that long-pestered me. Inspired me."

His nostrils opened. He felt smoke in his lungs... Hot enough that breathing IN tried to ignite them. Three skeletal men wisely backed off to the side.

"You've done all you can to keep me fresh. And now you've done to my son what you should try to ME..." He was surely heard easier now, the last phrase burning up the courtyard with echoes. His lip curled. Mario's eyes came up once, still bashing goombas, beetles, armoured killers who failed. Crippled soldiers lay all about at random. One crawled away, his right hand shattered, having three fingers where there should be four.

An elite unit pulled himself along toward Mario. His legs were useless, spine was snapped at the waist. He punched the plumber's hip, hard and bitter. Mario reached back a fist, and the troopa's beak exploded as if seashells shot from a cannon.

An earlier victim lay under the many feet, going over or around her body, battling where she no longer could. Arteries lay wilted and empty, their blood drained into the grass from the gaping hole where her head should be, and had been. In the tumult, that crown of long brunette locks had been kicked away, punted down the hill on accident. No god or man could mince words for the look on her, frozen that way, the final fright and surprise where she met her darkness.

Hammers caught Mario's chest and shoulder. He tumbled back. He could jump out of this, but a goomba vaulted up and saddled his neck. His recoil gave it a chance to lean down, gnash teeth on his lower lip and rip off a good chunk. He yelped, and stuck its eyes with two digits. Hoardes of Sledge bros were on the way; it had rolled free from Mario but a careless soldier stepped on it. Friendly fire ended its days.

Bowser saw it all through the magnifiers, with no disgust... He would need the time to be sick at heart. He dove back through the arch to reenter the throne room... He rushed to every servant in their bashful bags, and hiked his arm with each command. "Fetch my headpiece! YOU, call down for my dragonsrobe! YOU there..." He approached the shortest of the Shyguys... Poor thing had his teenaged hands bent in, shielding himself like he could stop a fist or anything that came down on him. But Bowser stilled, and spoke soberly. "Walk over to the throne. Reach from behind. Underneath..." He kneeled, his weight was on all-toes. The Shyguy cowered like a child Bowser once knew, one that right now was in a hospital bed, bearing his last name.

"... You'll find my suit of glory. Quickly now."

There was almost placidity in him. Anger lived on, cold and correct, but what the pastaphile caused Morton was nothing. That and hundreds of the fallen, honourable souls, would be made right.

Bowser's mouth went moist. The risk itself, now quenching a thirst.

***********************************************

He looked up to the wavy ceiling... Ludwig's eyelashes pulsated. He knew he had lips, even though he didn't feel them.

Was the light fixture meant to do this? Scuttle around the white cracks of the ceiling tiles? It stayed in the grooves. It was a good train, following the crack. Good boy train.

... Todd looked over right about then, craning his neck, just reacting to the show. The eldest prince had his hand up, his healthy one... Fingers were making little trails in the air.

The skater looked over to his 'friend', at the window. "Hey check it, he's up and playin' like he dropped a wheelbarrow full o' sunshine."

Morie swung away from his scenic views outside... His eyebrow raised, almost to the very-not-moving ceiling. "He's on G2 morphine... They only use it here, I had an appendectomy. They said it's for their safety..." He strolled up, watching Ludwig do what resembled an invisible cat's cradle. "... Kinda surprised they'd use it for a VIP. Makes you useless and harmless for twelve hours after you wake."

Todd's eyes were on him, skeptical. He was far back from a point where he'd take Wendy's better half for his word, but the sincerity rang. If there was something to this utterance...

... Either way, Ludwig continued watching the light. It was okay that the lamp in the corner was laughing; it was just jealous anyway, it couldn't have a party on the grooves. That's right, Glowie - that would be the light's name, Glowie - he/she/it and this man on the converted stretcher were gonna have a good time. Rip this city a new one. Now when the fuzzy orange fleas that were crawling out the cracks in the tile's putty quit rappeling down, it would be a party... If they'd quit getting... Closer, landing on his nose...

"Man, look at him now!" Todd got to where he just slapped his knees. "He's swattin' shit that ain't there!" The koopa started to turn away, hide the snickers that blew spit on his muffling knuckles, but Morie stepped over to him, grabbed his shoulder. It almost became a spar, IN the recovery room. Todd flung Morie's hand off his neckline and recoiled. "-The fuck, man-"

"Shut. Up." All the sudden, like a man of forty more years and ten times as much moxie... Wherever he stored his cajones around Wendy, they sure came out now. He pointed to a sneering Todd. "Don't talk it up, he'll hear you and his consciousness gets screwed outta whack. Trust me, I remember the visions."

"You... You ask a lot of trust, dudeson." Todd itched to hike up his shirt sleeve... Respect for where they were saved them both from that idea. "I only let you up here 'cuz you said you worried for him. Why are you really here?"

This incensed Morie, beyond anything in months. He flattened a foot on the hardass ground, plagued by the dumbshit question. "Are you serious!? I just said somethin' to help Ludwig, and it's 'cause I know this place-" He hurt his own chest, jamming his finger into it, "-And you got the brain damage to call me disloyal?"

Todd's eyes went so large they had their own zip code. "I never said loyalty. Didn't call that out."

Morie was seething, but saw where Todd was taking this. "I know it's what you're thinking. What else would you think-"

"Take off your shirt."

"... What?"

Morie didn't know whether to rip his head off, or run...

"I said take it off. I wanna see your scar."

"The hell is this, see my-" Suddenly it made more sense to him: having his appendix out. But what with this delivery, no way. "-I don't have to prove shit to you. I'm here with you."

"And that worries me too. Hike up your damn top and let's get this over with." He was mad, reticent, a little bit of a lot of impatience. "I don't wanna see it, I HAVE to. So do it now or you're had, bro..."

Todd curled fists into balls. Morie didn't fail to notice. He was ready, mind and body, to match this pipsqueak pound-for-pound...

... In 'super Ludwig's world', the light made pretty rainbows. Even the rappelling fleas shifted around. Man the hospital knew how to budget, ALL places of care and healing should give you pretty colours. And they exploded too! There was the sound of a door squeak, and it echoed about fifteen times, and each time the old man on his cloud would throw naked molerats over Ludwig's chest, and they all did a mean meringue on the sheet blanket...

In reality the doctor Lakitu had entered the room, and seeing Ludwig's hands going crazy under the blanket, steadied them. At least they were too 'high up' to be doing what some G2 recipients were known to do. At least he didn't have to clean the bedding. Todd and Morie's eyes were all over him like he was the Grand Canyon, something indispensible to be taken in. He didn't understand; but their names were known to him. "Todd Ungers, and, Morie..."

"Anonymous." The taller one came back, fluffing his shirt even though he and Todd hadn't rumbled. It was instinct. "I left it off the visitors sign-in for a reason."

"I'm sure." The man was no-smiles, no-inflection. A bore even after two sentences, but for this there were reasons too. "My receptionist won't last if she keeps missing like that. But you should have read the board. Full disclosure or no visitation."

Morie nodded. After all this, he gazed at Todd, took his distracted hand and shook it hard two-handedly. Dubious, and... He walked out. Not one added word came from him, given up that easily.

Todd thought a few scattered things, about just what kind of man he dealt with... He, and in other ways Wendy, but that was ruined like Ludwig's grip on life at the moment. The prince licked his fingertip, touched his own ear and made a face like he discovered a new sensory jewel unknown to man or beast; in this state, it was likely.

The doctor had no clipboard, but empty hands, small but soft. MD's all believed in aloe lotion. "Is he family to the patient?"

"Huh? Oh, uhhh no." Too much today had Lemmy's friend off his talking game. "Unless you count... Steadies of someone in the family."

"I see. The law doesn't, so neither do we." Todd hoped that after this, he wouldn't ask the obvious. But of course he did. "And are you family?"

"Look sir, I don't know your name and I wish you didn't know mine," He blew through a surprisingly good phrase, nothing on the mind... Somehow it just came and he didn't stem the verbal flow. "Don't ask much and you won't have to hear straightedge answers, but I AM family. And that's a lie, but it's really not, y'know?" With quickness, he'd begun not to exactly help himself. He still didn't stop. "I know Ludwig's brother like the scrapes on my hands, I have for years and that's more than anyone else in here, 'cuz nobody else came." He had to stop, and lean a tad; he just now noticed that, yes, none of Ludwig's clan had time for him.

The doctor half-corrected him. "I'd say his family, being who they are, knows to wait and show when the anaeshthetic's scheduled to wear fully off."

'Oh... Right.' Todd mused, a little flushed in the face.

Todd had been face-to-face with the doc. He didn't notice Ludwig had stopped moving and fidgeting around. He noticed this, and the two beds being rolled slowly in here, AND Ludwig's uncanny scream all together.

The sight - two new patients for the room - had shook the eldest Koopaling, and his drug stupor either left or harshed towards horrible thoughts. It was easy to trip on opiates or anything when two blackened shapes run into your space, shaped like men but smelling of smoke from destruction. Morton, his partner, both intanglibly scabbed and in many places carmelized, their vitals dim at best. Low, irregular wails left Ludwig, a grief with strange ends.

Todd hobbled back; he stuck fingers in his mouth, knowing it was coming. He ran to the window white in the face, dry-heaving by the time he could grab the bottom, lift it open. The doc dispersed facts onto this lone, sickened visitor. At least one time he elocuted over a pouring stream of Todd's vomit, chucked down the outer walls.

"I apologize. It can't be easy. Truth is, after all my time in care this is new to me. I nearly wish it was deadly, for their sakes." Todd leaned up, wiped his mouth, and the doctor maintained himself. "I'm glad your 'steady' friend left if his constitution's like yours. Since there's just one window."

This didn't strike Todd as acceptable levity. In his mind, he took the doc by his glaring white coat and shook him, to evacuate the cold ways. And in reality, he might've if not for Ludwig, whose bare feet hit the floor. He was quiet as a mute. The doctor lunged over, trying to take him gently and bed him back down. The prince was taller, younger, and wasn't moving anywhere he didn't mean to. His arms bent over one of the charred faces; his hands crookedly traced it. Though drugged he never pressed into the cheeks, or anything that would harm this critical victim... The doctor saw this but he knew it could change any moment, and his duty was to stop it. He pulled on Ludwig by the chest, he simply couldn't budge him.

Then Todd's arms went around the doctor's chest; he scolded like a parent. "Let him go!! It's his brother, man, it ain't yours to s-stop!!"

He fought off a tear or two; Ludwig brought a few to hit his knees, out below him as he knelt. Todd couldn't keep on the doc's back, and eventually knew he shouldn't try. Retreating, he put his face to the wall. Morton barely breathed. A hand went down the crusted clothes over him. Ludwig stroked his brother's back, face wet. The crown prince imagined he was on a mesa, looking down on Desert land. Displaced from all below him, unreachable. His nose sank onto Morton's forehead; it was like sandpaper on him. He kissed it. "I- Want you here... You're not here... Climb up to me! Morton, can- can you hear!?"

The doctor - twelve years under his belt - wept with a skate punk and a blueblood.

***********************************************

The soldier-princes felt wayward; freshly-minted in the castle as a pair of Rambo Jr.'s, and they'd known for many moons how the air made waves when a scorcher made it rise, but after hours following the edge of town they couldn't tell where that ended and exhaustion began. Ammo, check. Rations in their pockets, and the pocket blades to carve up game and have more, double check... They were on-course, where the general had said they estimate Kamek to be holed up.

"Lemmy?"

"What's the word bro?" The boarder-turned-soldier looked behind him. They were back-to-back, advancing in a crabwalk.

"You ever seen this?"

Larry had him turn to face what he had just now; A shining rock, a weak shade of orange emerged from dirt. It was alien in the tall sedges and bluffs outside the town's exurbs... They studied it, taking turns over swift looks around them. They'd learned from the east side of a three-headed snake, his three-check system: Check your skies, check your feet, check your privelege. The latter was sheer survivalism, cooking bugs and following sunlight and shitting in a hole you dig, The first two might sooner save their hides.

The rock was benign... Chipped away maybe, reshaped by landowners who didn't want a lawsuit for some toddler falling and scraping a knee. They moved on. Larry's gun aimed for the ground, but his partner put a red dot across buildings, trees in the patchy woods behind them. Where slums met wetlands, and Lemmy's scope would threaten all the head-height nothings to be seen.

"Lower the fuckin' thing!!" Larry barked in whisper to his ally in twin fatigues. "Some outbound cop'll catch you and mow us down, they don't always watch the news!"

Lemmy, always open and fair, didn't invoke those right now. "You think he wouldn't anyway if we're armed and just ready to lay waste?" He put his weapon low, but just to bring it up, perch to his shoulder and test how fast his reflex put it poised. "Besides, Kamek's ready. I feel it, ain't gotta BE psychic for that." In his eyes the emotion was glib, almost none to be found.

"Well good, 'cause you're fucking not...

... Hey. Lemmy."

It was still his brother saying that, but the pitch was terse. The skatefiend knew what serious sounds like... He left behind some vague fantasies, and faced down his twitchy comrade. The withdrawal was supressed; Larry looked like a million bucks, and felt like maybe a five-spot, sweaty in the sun and his thoughts of risk. A finger went right to Lemmy's nose. "It's not about fear. I know we'll bash that shithead into fragments, and we'll make a happy racket doin' it. I'm with a dude who dominated in Doom, and after how Triclyde shut his mouth about you, it's translating just fine."

This put murderous gladness on Lemmy's mouth, a wavy smile. Larry had his attention, and from this, got to the meat of his point. "My brain's around collateral damage here. Every magic bitch we don't frag's on us, but so is every hotel or house we raze. Any koopas we bring into friendly fire. That ring a bell?"

Lemmy's smile vanished. He stepped back, annoyed. "I don't need the podium out bro, I know all that." He raised his gun away from both of them, half-up, gesturing with it. "But you see anything out here like civilization? Any-damn-body guarding it for our side? You let me know."

To the younger man, it was fair enough. They made their way through grass... The further out from roads, the less they tarried or checked their back each second. And something else came evident: there was really no difference in sound.

"Lemmy?"

"Yeah, what now?"

Brief and snippy had Larry said that name, so both were on an instant defense. Lemmy didn't wait, he just dropped to the ground, muzzle of a lead tool scoping the air and faraway hills. They were in a bowl, valleys between Koopa City and a piedmont where nothing and no one made much of a life or appearance. Birds and bullfrogs got thicker; that was about it.

"You notice how we didn't hear shit back there?" He nodded once, toward where the city edge had cut by their path. Not a minute earlier they'd passed without a peep, and there were businesses up to the edge of asphalt.

It was exactly what came to Lemmy. "Y-yeah... Damn, don't tell me those fruits have it locked down out here, if I find out they're rounding up our people or poppin' them off-"

"I dunno, let's just take this one step at a time." Larry held him down symbolically by the back, not really 'holding' at all. He looked up, and sniffed the air. Afterward his body jerked, regretful. "Fuckin' hell, never wished I was a dog before. Ah well, I don't need the extra."

"Eyes, ears and two pair of those are good enough, eh?" Lemmy reached back, patting his sibling's back, firm, and getting less and less like the old, familiar Lemmy. Larry breathed hard, shook his head and said some quiet remarks. His jones for junk was manageable now, but what if his help's militance was more than acclimation. Lemmy was like any man, give him the wrong situation at the wrong time and he could crumble. Larry took it all in, held it as just a possibility to watch for, and rededicated.

"Three miles south, we hit the delta..." Larry's finger traced the moon, faded by the day and close to moving clouds, in danger of being useless should it slip behind one. "Gotta cross both rivers but there's rapids all up there. We can stay in the pinelands, I've walked the course before, a mile and a third more and there's an overhang. I say we slip under the waves there and ford it unseen. Hold guns just over the surface, goes without saying we're fucked if they're soaked. Pines on the other side too-"

"Yeah, I get it!" Lemmy sounded optimistic... It wasn't long before this proved false. "Crawl along and dig needles into our guts, until we get to where we simulate drowning." He glanced back at Larry blank-faced. "Nice plan!"

"Alright, I know I said I'm not worried about 'em, but I'm wary." He snipped, no longer looking around for caution. "Big difference, one of those is vital."

"Know that too, general." Lemmy reached a hand forward, up to his bangs, rubbing them frantic. It tousled them, and covered his face. Felt more secure to him, even if he was effectively hiding green in a parkland wilderness with rainbow-colour follicles. "You put 'I'd say' into that though, so I'm open to suggest shit."

"I wouldn't stop you. Go on then, let's hear it."

"The delta's gettin' up on the unknown country, right? And we're thinking he's gotta be there, so he's stronger out that way, with more eyes on it, right?"

"Sure is."

"Yeah, but it's also where two rivers meet together?"

"Y-yeah, but that's not a useful-"

"So it's a low point? You can flood it?"

"... I mean... With time enough and some bigass rocks 'n' shit, you could maybe spill it through the valley." He chucked Lemmy on the haunch though, playful. "Can't start to say what the hell advantage that is though. Are we fighting hydrologists?"

Lemmy looked through the scope on his gun; then back out of it, then in again, testing his eyes' adjustment. Things he hadn't been open to check in their castle-depth crash course. "We fight whatever the hell we can think of. That means if we can dream it up, so can they. Kamek knows, man, if there's an attempt made on him, we're not charging in when he could do anything from explode us in a heartbeat to shift molecules 'til we're two giant chickens that lick their own asshole."

"I... I kinda get that, but... What?"

Lemmy's head dropped throughout his sigh. "I mean how do you think the boys and me kept free in the city, skitchin' every rail and corner that's nonbreakable? Distrations. People don't cuss you for splitting a bench when you just picked up their kids' ball outta the highway."

In a quick measure of breaths, the wisdom came to Larry. "... And you don't get turned to goo by scouts, when they're busy with a dam, wonderin' what's up with it."

"Ding-ding-ding-ding!" A petulent Lemmy ribbed his brother. Now, something more substantial came to mind, and then voice. "Here's my thinking: Kamek gets his panties wadded because King Dad must be building a reservoir, just close enough to cut down his land or water troops of ours. He sends lackeys out to destroy the damn thing, it shows either spite or how he rules the roost here, and we're already up in the woods by then. Hell, if he slims his perimeter by dispatching enough, he's a sitting duck all the way 'til where-the-hell-ever he's sittin'. And what do we know about how he does war?"

Larry didn't recall; already a bit impressed, he forthrightly tossed up hands.

"That he's a sucker for overkill, Larry!" He said it like it disappointed him that only he took that to heart. "Before he turned his colours he had our armies' steering wheel, to coin a phrase. You remember him helping Wendy over Revia? Miss water queen got swamped by hordes of ours. He sent out so much death she swam in severed heads before hers even hit the ground."

"... Jesus, she did..." A gapemouthed Larry looked up, revisiting things caught by his past mind.

"So I'll give you the deal here. I head not thirty seconds west to town, punch out some walls on the derelict places-" He lowered his brow, speaking up a little sly. "-Since they won't miss 'em, and I carry it myself to the stream. I ask you - since I do us that solid - to scoop some dirt and fill in holes. Any idiot can stop up a river, it's like derailing a train."

"Heheh, that's pretty right I gotta say..." He was amused, but also would be mum about wondering from where Lemmy knew that comparison.

"A little extra work for a ton of assurance, or at least more than Blind Willie's shrimp swim up the wilderness."

"H-hey, be cool dude!" He tagged Lemmy's shoulder with his fist; it was all lighthearted.

The more comfy prince laughed, and gazed around before rising. "I'll be back. If I'm not go on anyway, I'll catch up. I know the same directions you do."

"I... Alright, but I'm better with 'em. Just so it's established." A knowing smile stayed on Larry; he watched Lemmy's back, and the green-grey camo parted reeds and grass, before they closed back vertical, hiding him.

Larry felt rising notions, and denied them. He wouldn't get sanguine, not here and now. He stuck low; without Lemmy he could only crouch-walk, happy when a cloud went over and shaded him. Hell, a colder man would know that Lemmy would make noise freeing rocks and debris in town and be happy for that; A slight lowering in the chance he'd be marked if someone evil lurked and looked for them w/ sound. But Larry worried more with this to bear.

He put into the task of reminding himself, going through the instructions he'd gotten. Five miles as the crow flies, from the castle toward sunrise. Two of those behind them, and they'd started when the hot sphere was climbing, where they needed it; the hardest two, paralleling town and rooftops everywhere to be struck from. They'd been blessed, no bogeys, neither one sniped. Now, what came after that... A league and a little more, up Bass River. They might just have this covered easier and faster than Triclyde made it sound. He couldn't know they'd MacGuyver their way through it... Or Lemmy had. Holy mother, he was a different man today.

Only Larry knew why. He no longer questioned if this frontiersman was the real thing. Harsh days drove something hidden in Lemmy out to premiere.

One thing stuck in Larry's mind, pressing lungs on the wet ground, too low for anything but field mice to see. This is it, he thought. We make it, and if he falls we all go on. It's fuckin' tied to us. Everyone back there, all they are or will be. Fuck, I shoulda brought clean briefs.

Suddenly his gun went up; his eye twitched and he aimed it behind him. Glad he had the speed to react, but gladder to see someone he didn't need to shoot. Lemmy was back already.

"Man, you scared me shitless! Was I sittin' here that long?....."

He had a long pause to end that. Lemmy's cargo came to view after he did. It wasn't rocks, pieces of wall or furniture. Larry edged back, almost crawling on his ass in reverse. He stopped quick and spoke the same way. "... That's a girl."

It was a stark reality, like Lemmy's face, forlorn and wet. The koopa lass couldn't be more than six or seven. Fully limp, face pale as the moon they'd followed. Lemmy lowered her, laid her gently between their knees. Her tiny limbs covered peat and clovers. Larry put his nose in his hand; it muffled his grief. "Sh-she was just there? In a house?"

"Yeah. But open her mouth." Larry looked at him confused; he reiterated. "Go ahead, it's relevant."

Larry's careful, nervous fingers closed over the cold chin. He pulled, fighting the child's rigarmortis. Inside her mouth was tongue, black as coal. He almost recoiled a second time.

Lemmy had no vigor now, but showed minor shock. "Man, bro. You hung out with Roy in the shadows and you never saw death?"

"N-not a kid, never... But you're right. Looks like she was poisoned."

Lemmy put his hand on her hair; ran his hand through the golden locks, like a friend's goodbye. "Her mother too. This townhouse at a corner, the windows had cobwebs. They didn't live there, they were hiding there. Like their dad, but he had a chest burn. Dead as a doornail, it looked like someone... Blew his ribs out from inside."

"The fuck!? Like, not a bomb or anything?"

"Nah, no way, the place stood and had windows. Plus if it was something blunt it'd have to hit him from behind the way it looked. The chair was fine, the one he was slumped in."

"... Do these fuckers have an energy cannon?"

Lemmy stood up; Larry motioned frantically, wanting him down and hidden again. The skater wasn't in that headspace... A suffering took over him. He said more, never taking his eyes off the girl, her peace in her eternal sleep. "I told you man. They have whatever we can dream up. If we don't get moving, an air fleet couldn't save us."

Larry had seen the 'mercenary' in his brother go dim, with this. Their city had been more than still... Terrible things had come before them. And were coming after them.

He rose to stand, vigilant for Lemmy. Mud caked their boots, either side of an innocent casualty. "I'm going back with you. We'll both load up, the Bass River meets the Ternic so dammin' it up takes major manpower."

Lemmy's arm extended; he took his bro's hand in a hard grip. "We got that covered." They bumped shoulders. "Untouchable. We'll make it up to her."

He looked down to the girl's corpse; thereafter he was straight-ahead, remorseless. Wind was from the north; it might be welcome if it shifted, but could go either way. And one case or the other, they knew how to account for shear and fire clips through it, cut down unrepentant filth with prejudice.

***********************************************

Wendy's tires screeched to a halt. Not that anything kept her from reaching the castle, returning with Roy... Quite the opposite, it was getting there that had her relinquish speed, faced with real war.

It wasn't her first time. Soon as Roy could take off his shades - gape-mouthed as koopas and shyguys, tweeters, ostros alike all poured down on the one prime Enemy-of-state - Wendy had her wits on her. Out of the Trans Am with her door slammed, she reached over the convertible backseat, slammed her manicured hand onto an armrest, hit a tiny button and out popped a Colt peacemaker. She had it in her left hand... She walked slow as could be toward the front lines, no cover nearby, but nothing between her and Mario. Quills from a former paragoomba drifted by her bangs. Bullets from a soldier sprayed the ground next to her shoeleather, the last it would unload having an owner struck down by plumber's treads.

Roy called out to her, but his voice was quiet as a scream across oceans. She had things to remember... Ponder and scrutinize, and reconstruct.

'You think you can come back now, and take him down? You never will, no point to it. I'll enjoy this.'

She cocked the barrel. It was ready. Cold, shining, on the palm. It had been a while, but the pressure so familiar, the shape her hand knew like a glove. She fought impulse to close her eyes and relish it; there was trash to take out.

Roy's voice got louder, somewhere in her mind that barely broke her surface. "-telling you, you won't-...-if you can't, and you get splattered-...-without you, how?"

She knew what it meant, it was pieced together easy enough. But her eyes saw overalls, and within her, things she hadn't seen in years clawed their way in. The petite nose. The hair. Eyelashes and their flutter when words of joy came forth. The joy of speaking Wendy's name, the love for a daughter.

'You weren't here to make it so... But...' Wendy's lip contorted; it would purse and curl, where the mind's eye balled assumption and rage. '... You caused it anyway. Think of the stress you made... Daddy retreated... And I saw, when he walked behind the carriage, her coffin... He wanted this for her...' Wendy's arm went straight; aiming first to the sky, down gradually to a fighting plumber. She had sunlight on her face and shining out the tear on one side. '... She should have seen this... Might have saved her... And nothing saves YOU!!"

She said the last of it aloud... But they were not her thoughts completely. Rather, reimagined, after Roy finally started getting through to her. He was sprinting up, lumbering the way of someone his size. Her gun aimed to Mario but she never had a clear shot. Roy took down all chance of this, grabbing her armed hand, taking her and shaking her shoulders more than once or twice.

"I said, what happens when you miss and hit one of ours, so he breaks through, sees you and snipes y' with fire? Nothing saves you then, sis! Fantasy's over!" He steadily wound down the jerking of her body.

She broke out of his grip before it fully stopped... He'd just about hurt her on accident, so a quick right-cross to his jaw was appropriate thanks. He wiped the blood off his lower lip, she breathed to stop the nausea upon getting the wind shook out of her. He hadn't knew what she dwelled on, the invasion of darker snapshots she wished she didn't see every day. She knew, though, why he brought her back to now. That he cared, and walked up on the same dangers just to keep her close, and safe. She didn't lash out any further, but let him have his bellyaches.

"And the next time you bring a sidearm to an infantry fight, I'm knockin' you cold and drivin' you to Giant Land!" He barked it, but had a vestige of a smile go and start on his face. "That clear?"

She looked more 'together', troubled still. In looking towards dirt, and a clover bloom half-tagged by a burn - singed by weapons no doubt - she forced a smirk. "Sure, but wake me up and stay a while there, we can both find dates."

"Say what? I don't, uh..." Roy was puzzling it out, and then the 'Giant' part of the name jumped out at him. He raised his head, looking down on her playful. "Oh you suck!"

She giggled, always happy to pull off a gay joke towards him since he made it fun. Seconds later, something buzzed her head. She flailed at it, startled. Roy then laughed his chunky arse off... She'd almost swatted down a parakoopa, yellow, blustered, flying down from high and safe verticals over the deathbrawl. He would've thought the History channel beamed telecasts of missiles bombing helicopters in front of him. Wendy huffed, Roy sighed his cavalier sigh, and the parakoopa butted in like it paid a million bucks to talk as fast and serious as ever he may. "Hide yourselves, it's a day of reckoning!! The Italian's arrived-"

"We can see." Piped an impatient Roy. "Now where's my youngest sib's. Which heads are they knockin'?... C'mon now!" He fixed his jacket cuffs, only halfway-imposing so far.

The messenger's cheek took on a sweatdrop. "Well... That's my wish also, had they been here-"

"GODDAMNIT!!" Roy's body jerked as fast as he'd formed the reply, the rage overpowering.

Wendy reached out for his shoulder but missed it, and appealed vocally. "Roy, it does mean they're safe... We have to look on the positives."

"FUCK that!! You can try if you want, I was born OVER that idea!!" He lunged for a brick-and-mortar wall; his fist made cracks like a spider web through it. Pieces of steel 'tink'ed on the other side, remembrance of demolished armour from a snuffed troopa stopped by brickwork for a thankless man. Roy's teeth ground themselves down; there would be no goodbyes to his fave two rascals. He may not have listened well to Wendy, but the venting worked itself out, and logic eventually won him. "... They're filling Kamek's turdo's with hot lead. Maybe that's better."

"I... Yeah, no doubt!" Wendy adjusted to being happy for this, if it helped the big galute. The messenger crowded around her left shoulder; having seen Roy for many moments now, he knew who was less likely to pick him up and spike him over bad news. He might trust Wendy to a slight overkill, though... Her hand stayed ready to jab him between the legs, hard, if he got too cozy.

But he stayed clean, so also un-struck; he had more of his job to do. "They are on their way finding the deserter, yes. There is a chance Iggy may be with them."

He felt the princess cast eyes over him, and they burned his cheek. "... Chance, you say. So he's not here either."

"... Y-yes, your highness... I mean no... You're right..." His fingers locked in, twiddling with the nervous spoken stumbles. He looked up to the sky, the only blue and comfort to be seen. "In all the confusion. he slipped out, it seems..."

"What? What's that?" Roy had his hand to his ear. It was drama, exaggerated like his steps toward the hovering mouthpiece. "It seems like what he did? That li'l dork who barely leaves the palace?"

"Roy, stop. Now you're getting all-in with it." She was glanced up at, over his shades; he knew what she always meant when that phrase left her.

This is not to say he cared terribly much. Goombas in earshot cried out with last gurgling words, and he addressed not that but this tiny slight. "Nah, I'm sorry! I just wanna know the how and why, right? When the basement-rat of the clan breaks habit and comes up, and there's a goddamn WAR or two on us-"

He stopped short as his temper when the arm in a labcoat came up, not ten feet away. Iggy had a mellow face but a rigid stance... Something was amiss, but like everything with him it was controlled. He lifted and tossed the grenade round in his hand, not active or dangerous, just ready. In this case, to be shown off. "I was correct. If you showed up, it was naked and in the open."

Roy couldn't be happy like he wanted, if this weird sentence just crossed him. His brow curved up. "The shit are you on about, I'm wearin' clothes!... Or..." He straightened up, 'getting it' in record time. "Y'mean unarmed."

"Hah, I thought you were one who appreciates the street lingo. Chalk up one for me." He looked cocky, and to Wendy and their hulk-of-a-bro', the look would take time to wear in.

Roy walked up and just socked him in the ribs, light enough. Iggy still wrenched back a tad, truer to form. "Ig's, I'd laugh if there was time so let that tell you something. What is that thing you SO clearly want me jizzin' my jeans over."

Wendy shuddered, and Iggy had the smirk he'd wore deep since finishing work below. The ivory-looking thing was in his palm, held still now. Iggy's company absorbed its details: grid-pattern down the shell, waffled with symmetry. Not a seam on its fabrication. Without fumes or warnings etched on, but it mattered none, they could just feel the danger he was clutching, an 'egg' in his delicate fingers. Screams of bloody murder came from yards clear of them; there were front-row seats at ampitheaters that were further from the main action, and Wendy's cringe renewed for each bone crunch and death rattle. Fighting was fun and fine, this rich a soundtrack to expiring was not. A splash of red hit the ground by Roy's right shoe, and he did move that sneaker back an inch, which is more than Iggy did, strangely even-headed, if only for the miracle he believed to have made.

His sis faced him down. "Get ON with it Iggy, I'm shocked we don't have flaming shrapnel landing all over us!"

Iggy nodded, way more steady than his inner fear should able him. "Hope it doesn't, that would spell some unkindly doom for my limb here. This, dear ones, is death in a sphere."

Roy's nostrils flared, intrigued, but a shrug soon came. "Looks more like a white chocolate pineapple."

You could cut the sly looks of judgement with a knife; even the messenger's. And it was right about now that he felt most like a third-leg... They were focused on each other, so he casually made the flaps to exit. Iggy went right on without him. "I'll just say it's a mean acid, get some on any part of somebody with an organ nearby and they're finished, indubitably."

Wendy heard this and wasted no time. "D'you have the gun for it with you, or ya just load the same size caliber from the armory with it?"

"The latter, I made it standard-issue... Mostly." She looked less-than-impressed by the last part; he defended while scratching his nose. "Hey, I'm not a whole factory in one guy. It'll spread the grisly doom you want. LONG-RANGE ONLY." He almost yelled that part; and with awkward tone shifts, they did hear it loud and clear, to his credit.

"Cool, got the stressed part." Roy was no-nonsense in his entirety by now; reached into Iggy's hand, and while the science geek responded "HEY!", he looked over the dandy thing. Squeezed it a bit, it held together, that's all he cared about. He lobbed it back to Iggy, who dropped it. They gasped. It was a well-done item for the using, though, the shell held safe and sound. Iggy lifted his hand to slap Roy right in the clammy cheek.

Roy just stopped him short with his own hand. Holding the 'slapper' still and miffed with relative ease, he gave soft orders. "Load up the first launcher in my closet, the one with an Anthrax sticker."

Iggy's nose wrinkled. "I won't do your bidding, I don't even see you that mu-" He suddenly had bigger fish to fry, within this. "... You're not taking out my creation to test. Nuh-uh. No possible way." Pride swelled him, or he felt taller anyway.

"You're right, I'm not." Roy looked down his nose at his shorter sib', releasing his arm. "I'm runnin' it for Larry and Lemmy. If I catch up to 'em and get it handed off, their odds go from stupid to smarter."

To wit, Iggy was surprised. He'd now seen Roy suggest to help someone else reach glory. The grenade lay in his lowered arm; he motioned behind. "I'm not saying you'd know 'smart'... Here, follow close." They had stood near a light pole, on the driveway... A simple press of a panel, half-recessed and hidden on it, and all three heard a sudden creaking. Roy's eyes grew; the asphalt lifted, and a stairway revealed, heading under the car path. Safely subterranean, where soldiers AND their target would touch nothing. A fiery wreckage did whoosh down by their heads now... Poor paratroopa sniped from the air, falling in tattered clothes and scarred remains. Wendy squealed. Iggy did too, a bit weaker than her. All six shoes were splashing in cave water the very next breath.

"Man I know this ain't on the castle maps." Roy half-stated-half-complained, ducking and punching at the cobweb that wrapped his face.

Iggy then took point, just brushing gently the webs and feeling around the utter darkness. "You retained that, eh? But you didn't see the memo Dad dispatched when he updated last year."

"'Course not, who am I to give a shit about remodels?"

Wendy grabbed his arm; the force was on his elbow, and he bit his lip. She nagged with purpose. "A guy whose bacon might've just been saved by one, so don't make me regret going for you."

It almost hurt Roy to hear. He reached out, didn't quite connect with her wrist. She got the message though, and in her eyes was a shred of apology... Had any of them been in light enough to see. Hands on the drippy wall, Iggy made slow, definite progress. "I'm glad you didn't attempt some trial out there with my baby, Roy. For all our sakes."

The bully koopa might've been nicer, if that didn't come off as another jab. So he snickered back. "He calls it his 'baby'... Think how you want, gallant, I was fine, coulda put Mario through a bomb-fuckin'-meat-grinder if I felt." He jeered, all the while tempering with slight friendliness. "It's your show, I give, you made the thing. I'll be big enough to say."

"Congenial of you, but I know you could annhilate him." Iggy made Roy smile, but such wasn't the purpose. The scientist felt through mossy cracks to advance. "You would liquefy our best in a twenty-foot radius, though. Acid doesn't stay suspended, even gaseous states."

"Oh?"

Wendy knew from experience the sound of his downplayed confusion. She took his giant wrist in her fingers. "He's saying basically the splash-zone is the kill-zone."

A humdrum 'poof' of air from Roy. "Sorta like thin lava, then... Shit, I can get down to that... Hah!" The more he thought on it, the warmer it grew on him.

"Hm, that's rather savvy... Kudos there. Now we know why it's distance-exclusive?"

"Tch, yeh. Get some on you and there's no more you." He scrubbed one shoe on the cold ground, for effect. "Great on magic traitors... So does it got a use against short-'n'-sassy out there, or is that hoping too much?"

Iggy stopped, they heard this, and were halted by the time he turned to face Roy sightless. "No need to care. Our couriers keep us up on it, and unless mine's been killed in the past minute or so, they were pushing him back last I heard. Five feet further from the gates than an hour ago..." He started on again, having this distract him from dour analyses. "... It's progress. We can't be picky."

"Iggy-" Wendy spelled out her slimming patience with a tone. "-Can you get a plan to get these to Larry? God knows they didn't tell me what the coordinates are, or when. Draw us a line for it, and we're still lost about where they are on it any given minute."

She, and Roy, should have known this was taken care of. He flashed a smile so bright it almost lit up the chasm for his company. "How recent's your last time taking the clown car for a spin?"

She got the message, and held up both hands, waving them. "Ohhh-h-h no. Daddy has me on a leash already, I don't want a chastity belt, a credit card embargo and parent-guilt to accessorize it."

Roy felt like laughing, but for some reason didn't. Strange tingles welled in his gut, behind the kidneys. He hoped the liver didn't have some fears about going it straight; 'fuck it', he thought, 'if Larry can manage, a real B.M.O.C.'s golden.'

But Iggy, in his way, was clear-as-a-bell serious. And by his voice trickled influx of pleading. "I won't depend on MY eyes hundreds of feet aloft. I can't count on Roy to drive a Big Wheel without crashing and burning..."

Roy glanced up, huffed the air, turned casually to Wendy. "You wanna say 'yeah' before honour demands I lay his punk ass out?"

She giggled, then sighed. "... You... Can't even imagine with that noodle of yours how you'll owe me."

Iggy stumbled, walking on, closer to the metal ring on a pullchain he needed. "I'll wash your leg warmers. And mix you permanent hair colour... Think tattoos for your 'do'." He knew just what to add. "... No roots."

"... I dunno... 'Til doomsday?"

"Hahah, until after!" He stated the obvious. "It'd have to be, seems like that day's freshly here."

Roy's eyes rolled like Iggy's calf on that last stumble. In a soft limp he reached the pullchain; grasped it, and a trapdoor lifted just over Roy's head. Same height and shape as the one outside, but now with servant's voices. Clearly they were in the main lobby, near the main kitchen access... Then a clanging pot thundered down to them, and as all three cleared the falling kettle, screams started overhead. Iggy was frozen at first, and later moved his mouth in meek acknowledgement. "Shit... Suppose I should install a horn or something, so they won't be walking over top of this."

Now, now Roy would laugh. Good for the injured cook above that this joy at his expense went unheard, with koopas all around helping him scoop up a ruined lunch.

Wendy popped up first, and the fracas died a bit, having this explain who had appalled them with a door encounter. Iggy was on her tail, and chin almost on her shoulder, remade as optimistic. "Out we go to the vigilante twosome then, eh?"

Her lipstick smooched his cheek; he rubbed this off, hating it, as she'd well-knew. "You wanna start paying me back, here's something: don't fuss like a baby when I bring us in under the radar. I'll be flooring it."

"Ah... Well, that's... Diligent, anyway, keeping a pace."

"Better than being shot out of the sky by the very first scout of K's to recognize us. Which here means just see us."

Roy slumped shoulders on the way up, and saw his geeky brother hunched, like his ears would fold if they could. Iggy tried on courage like a new suit. "Sis, that's... Certainly erudite..."

She loved needling nicely, but she did bluffing of her own at times. "Heh, thanks." This held no knowledge of what he'd called her. She trusted it was nice, itself.

... They had tunneled under dusty stones, flecks of blood and skin on daylit grounds, where the skirmish threw its gore and layered the forgotten.

Helmets, guns and fingers blown off, compelled to fly by physics, deposited here. Mario juggled them under his feet, the troops of darkness... His weak moment earlier sparked a rebel's mojo, and for this fact no hawkbilled hack at his disposal would live. Cannonballs whiffed his neck strands, red and black peach fuzz. They would go on to strike well-meaning allies. Friendly fire took out a corporal with a dagger... Close to landing a deep gash on the plumber's nose, but instead the forty pounds of hurling steel twisted his mug by the neck. Tendons and bones snapped like taffy. He fell fast and low, just another on the garbage pile. The ball hadn't stopped at him, but went on two feet to catch a young elite, in her second real fight ever outside training. The ball caught her throat, carried her by push and had one bounce off the ground, with her under it. She too went motionless, beyond help. A hand was brought down behind the castle wall, within its row of turrets... The cannonfire stopped. Nothing good had their tries accomplished.

Silence could not break over the field. Foes of Mario were few and scattered now, in their greatest stronghold, but fires lapped at piles of leather, and wrecks of innards, wicking fat and burlap to burn a sickly glow. Gunner turtles peeked out from the firing squares behind grey bricks; the castle would either save them all, or none of them. Mario didn't seem to approach. For now he looked around, and in effect the horrors facing him were the same as to the day's survivors. But he knew no friends here. There were no kind faces, no one to miss, and yet...

One troopa gasped from his peeking post; ready to fire but ceased by command like many close, he saw the human tilt his brim. Hat covered his eyes. For a minute, in the bowels of struggle... Murder was a sin. And the burning grass had its moment of silence, the fallen pawns, the families and so many torn or made fractions of before. More gunmen looked out, and some had time and mind to bow, in dry or eye-moistened prayers or questions. Dignity blew over them, and like such a chill wind, it left and the air was made empty. Clean, never, since this was his dynasty... The voice of an unclean one, to Mario, only disrespected death, and now it rattled bloody helmets, Bowser on high and in view. The King had casualties and his megaphone. Diplomatic bullshit had its day, and it would not be now. Hundreds had perished. The greasy bastard looked up at him from ground zero. Sweat drooped that filthy moustache while the fires raged. Glows of power still sublimated; Mario's shirt lit crevices in concrete, columns on the grounds to hold shelters or statues, now rubble, the cracked skulls of army lines at their feet.

Bowser entered afternoon with lines at his eyes, and spit in the megaphone.

"KILL, MARIO! KEEP ON, INDULGE IT! THERE'S MORE MEN TO TREAT LIKE BEETLE EGGS AT YOUR PLOW!!" Two of the eight living gunners in the castle foundation perked up, and not in positivity. Was their spiritual leader... Calling a bluff? "TURN THEM UNDER, FORGET WHEN YOUR CROPS BEAR! SOUND COMFY AND FAMILIAR!?"

Mario had nothing in him to want some calm discussion salon. His neck craned to the lofty veranda, the torches on either side of green, royal ears. He projected more than the bullhorn had. "YOU TALK A LOTTA GAME, PEA-GREEN!! YOU SENT THEM TO BE KILLED!!"

This made... Inordinate sense to the soldiers. Against all they'd been trained for, some of them listened. On-guard, but through this exchange, they tended slightly away.

"WHY MAKE-A THEM PAY YOUR BOUNTY!? I HAVE THEM SLICE AT ME, I HAVE TO PUT THEM DOWN. YOU TELL-A THEM TO SACRIFICE, YOUR CHOICE BECOMES THEIRS." He ended with less 'punch' in the voice, but nominally. He didn't want to bluster on. This should be two ways.

Koopas stared on him, from all directions, intently. Some of them might doubt Bowser had proper answers, or even makeshift fodder for them.

The faithless in that vein knew their monarch little. He denied the infant mutiny. It never came to be; he spoke and those points apparent made short work of fools. His idle artillery gauntlet, his enemy, both heard the same words.

"-MY CHOICE, YOU SAY!?... FORGIVE ME, I SIMPLY SAW THE MOST DANGEROUS MAN, IN CLOTHES SUFFERING RAINBOW-SHIFT, AND THOUGHT TO BATTEN THE HATCHES!!" He had mirth in the tiniest share, but behind this, only hate. Veins twisted on the back of the hand holding his bull mike; any harder and the handle to it might splinter in his searing hand. "DISREGARD IF I'VE MOCKED YOU BEFORE, LOWLY PLUMBER... I SAY THIS TO YOU NOW IN PURITY. HAVE YOU SEEN YOURSELF TODAY!?"

Mario's teeth almost sawed themselves down, so heavily grinding. He pointed to the king like his finger could send voltage... Matter of fact, that it didn't was confusing. "I WAS HIT BY A BOLT FROM-A D'E SKY!! RANDOM SHIT I DIDN'T ASK FOR!!"

... If now, it made a tad more sense to the king, it was why he seemed less happy or driven. His megaphone drooped in his hand. "... PERFECT. SWELL TURN OF EVENTS." He swung back, glaring to his closest Shyguy slave. "Are there any effigies left from Freedom Day we'd light and turn to cinders?"

The slave didn't pick up on rhetoricals. "... If so, I guess we could fling it down on him? Good thinking, your Highness."

Bowser's lips 'poof'ed, level as the Dead Sea. "And able job security, ending that manner."

Mario didn't wait, but screamed more up at him. "YOU-A DODGE ME STILL, RIGHT UNDER YOUR NOSE!! YOU'VE NO RESPECT FOR-A WAR, YOUR PEOPLE, ME..."

He simmered, but Bowser's heat took on new dimensions. He had gazed down on so much tainted ground. Every fallen soul was in eye range. Smoke drifted up for miles from the loft of his viewpoint. Mario could take in narrow cones of this, but the lord of all close by was audience to massacre. And his speech cracked none. Lips and cheeks turned the hue of fresh lava, unto which the real McCoy burned in his guts.

"I. RESPECT. MY HOME, SO I PROP IT UP WHEN YOU COME. YOU KILL WHEN IT FITS YOU, FOR YEARS YOU PROVE THAT. EXPLAIN HOW YOU DIDN'T HAVE HITS JUST ON THE WAY TO OBTAINING THIS AUDIENCE! GO AHEAD!!"

He gave a five-second grace. Just as predicted, a lack of what he asked for was there to vindicate. The soldiers had quit heeding Mario, except to line up their projectiles in case a timid captain pacing behind them would renew fire.

Bowser stepped forward. Two of his aides breathed harder, and one even pulled on his arm, but no use. He was stepping out on that raised porch, with or without a shyguy hanging from a bicep. In his eyes were regrets. On his lips were the moral and maniacal. "YOU TAKE A STEP IN MY KINGDOM AND BIRDS FALL FROM THE AIR. I'VE NEVER FACED LOSS LIKE WHAT YOU BRING. IF YOU EVEN HAD YOUR NUGGETS OF SHIT TO SAY AND THAT WAS WHY I SEE YOU, YOU HAD YOUR DAY TO SPEAK THEM. AND YOUR END SHOULD BE IN MY PAST..."

Mario shaded his eyes; intense, but noticing shapes on Bowser that didn't come off... Normal.

"... I SALVAGE IT, THEN, AND FIX YOU!!!"

Mario, as the troops saw him, jerked backward. One gunner pumped his scaly fist, seeing true fear on a human monster. The three-foot 'savage' recoiled, and looked darker suddenly... But so did the ground encircling him... They couldn't see the outline, poised across from Mario, but a shadow was heading in. Bowser's feet checked the air, adjusted for wind, and trusted his armour as had the king's heart and mind. It was armour plating Mario had seen... And when the king crashed down, the Italian had three solid seconds of 'flight' through the air to scrutinize... But eyes were everywhere, jiggled by tremendous impact. Bowser grimaced, yanked and pulled each foot out of its seven-inch indent in the court lawn. His molten drool dripped, Mario's wooziness crested, soldiers in the 'dugout' hooped and boo-yah'ed. They had hopes for the 'home team' alright, some were even barked at by the captain, leaving their posts to lock in bets with craftier compatriates.

The human nuisance to the whole country looked... Duller. His coat glowed, but in tired rotations. A hand flashed yellow sparks, but if this be all that Bowser sees from him, at this point, closing in on the crash-flung foe... The yards he gained on each full footstep were pitifully good. Too easy to creep on the Italian. Remove his surefootedness, his element of surprise...

"... And the rooster picks the fox to confetti." These were thundering brags, Bowser's sentence when nothing else before was uttered. Mario's eyebrow went up; and then his whole face, concussed as Bowser threw an uppercut. Slammed from a hand sized like his whole chest, in silver sleeves, hard as the spikes on that king's knuckles.

Mario's teeth made the record by far that day, the furthest any piece of someone sailed. Bowser rumbled up, dressing down a man who bled from the gums, laying in slow writhe.

"Of ALL you'd take from me, you can't have this. Not the moment of seeing agony in you. It's mine-" He could have screamed the last word of that in Mario's ear, reaching down and feeling, caressing Mario's neck. The soldiers witnessing all saw this, testing the soft, sickly pallor of the glowing neck. Sparks coughed out from throatskin onto the touch, a stinging tickle to Bowser. He reared back to laugh this meager threat off; maybe somewhere inside he had less abandon, seeing all those who took the greater shocks, strewn about in worse condition the earlier they'd sacrificed. The king jutted his jaw, and the hand that tingled took its muscly sinew to cuff the plumber's neck.

Horsecollared and lifted, Mario sputtered breaths. His life's scourge huffed smoky lungfuls in his face... Even the smell of his own 'stache spoiled from the cloud of brimstone. It reeked of more than fire and rock, but sweet wrath and killing yearns, far stronger and along for the ride. Fumes evaporated, but more was brought on with the king's speech. "You've weakened. That 'bolt', CURSE it to hell, dimmed, and your hopes with it... Well, now, that's it, right? Your motive fed it. Or did emotion drive it, I wonder..." He drooled orange. Mario cried clear. Half tears, the kind that stress and heat draw out like stubborn salve.

Koopas in the castle perimeter were at universal silence. The scattered paragoombas above had sound only in wing flutters... Trained and loyal, their despondency they hid well, stifled every sniffle. There would be time later to mourn the departed. And their vantage point - higher, more open than even Bowser's on his high veranda before his leap to vengeance - brought atrocities out, streaks of red on the green, pink where heads were smashed in gory scatters... Had their eyes the width of vision for a straight panorama, they'd wish to fall from the sky, dead and joining their friends.

They didn't, and perservered. Their monarch spat in the face of heroes, and now literally, his foam running down the cheek and lips of a cringing human. Mario's face steamed; he didn't say a thing on how it burned.

Bowser's headlock went tighter, the whole pudgy neck of Mario's in one hot, scratchy fist. "I won't call out the lives that went on today, where neither of us follow. The years past suffice. Destruction..."

His grip wound tighter. Mario's hands went up, pulling at the wrist that wouldn't budge.

"... Depletion..."

Bowser thought, in a selfish moment, of gold he claimed, coins lost to plundering. And right after, more pertinent things arose.

"... Harming my sons... My daughter, a single OAF like you, who knows nothing-"

Mario clawed at Bowser, his fingernails not so much as scratching one scale on the breaks between silver platework. Not wide enough for his hand to squeeze in, even if strength had stayed. He was at full mercy, the very thing Bowser gave seldom and never to his bane.

The king's other arm raised. His tail with it, just reflex there, the kick of endorphins. On his tongue, this revenge. Talons bared and the kill blow was readied. "SUFFER, small one. You MUST have nightmares like me, SO CLOSE YOUR EYES AND DREAM OF GODS WITH MERCY!!"

To be continued...