He landed with a thud inside a large cathedral-like building, vaguely reminiscent of Notre Dame. There were seven pedestals positioned evenly around the room, each with the carved visage of a star set on top. They were so realistic he felt that if he called out they would respond, but they were only statues, and so the power to speak was logically deprived of them. Everything was in faded tones, such as those that might suggest as though the place had only existed in the past.

Suddenly a crude hovering machine flew down from above, thus creating a hole and causing chunks of ceiling to rain down. He threw his arms over his head to keep the falling concrete from colliding with his head. The machine swooped down, now he could see that it was piloted by an odd monster unlike any he had ever seen before. The monster grabbed a rod from the center of the room, and electricity seemed to flow through his veins to create the intense, red lighting that split all the walls of the structure.

As the building crashed around him, he had a thought in his mind that he was sure was not his. 'We are weakened by this monster's power. You must journey to a place where you can reach out and touch the stars. There may we converse freely.'At that moment, he awoke.

Cal sat up and looked around at the small, sparsely furnished dorm room. His bed sat above the rest of the room, hovering on a lone post and the farthest corner in the room. He looked out through the window at the slowly falling moon and contemplated the dream he had had only moments before. It was only then that he noticed that the sequence in its entirety had taken place in only two dimensions. Thinking about the remarkable resemblance to the opening sequence of the original Paper Mario, he simply dismissed it as the effect of a late night filled with video games and caffeine, and returned to his slumber.

The moonlight streamed in through the brilliant stained glass windows, dappling a stone island floating in a sea that flowed in from waterfalls at either side of the room in a white, watery glow. He stared at the domed ceiling, painted to show the sky at all points of day. Seven golden candles hovered in the center, suspended by an invisible thread. It was due to this contemplation of the ceiling that he did not notice the window breaking until several seconds after it had already happened. A hooded creature flew in on a broomstick and looked around, cackling evilly. Then the window crashed in and it left again.

At this point, the seven statues situated around the room were suddenly lifted off of their pedestals and swirled in the air. "What's going on?" He yelled to the empty room, "Why are the statues moving?" They floated in the air, defying gravity, and a light began pulsing from within them and they broke open to reveal their celestial counterparts. An old looking star floated from his pedestal to the center of the chamber and spoke.

"We are the star spirits: guardians, teachers, symbols, and leaders. Bowser has stolen the happiness from this place, and we need you to-" At that instant the hooded creature returned and pointed his wand at the star. He instantly disappeared, leaving behind a frame containing his image. The creature flattened the others into portraits as well, cackled and evaporated in a puff of smoke.

Peter awoke in the dark. He laid in bed for a while, staring at the lamp hanging from the rafter beams like an extinguished, blue sun, but then built up the will to rise and prepare for the day at hand. He groped around for the light switch, feeling the stucco with his fingertips until they touched cool metal. Light flooded the room, illuminating the kitchen counter, the futon, the sculptural staircase, and the compact, white star hovering inches above his bed. He screamed. The star returned the scream, waking Cal, who joined in the chorus of screaming.

"What's going on?" Cal asked, looking around for the source of the chaos.

"Do you not see this- this thing on my lap?" Peter yelled back at him.

"I am a starchild," the star said, "I am here to present a message from the star spirits.

"The star spirits," Peter asked, "You mean those things from Paper Mario that I keep dreaming about?"

"You too?" Cal asked from his perch.

"I see I must explain," the starchild stated calmly, "Let me begin." and he launched into a lengthy, in-depth explanation of exactly what he was there to do.

20,361,405 miles away, the mushroom kingdom was - unknowingly - beginning to fall apart at its seams.