The Koopa Troop plodded through the mud, pulling their weary bodies after them. The only thing that kept them walking was the people behind them: had anyone stopped, they would have been trampled by someone else. The great koopa Bowser brought up the rear, and his plodding footsteps caused the ones unlucky enough to have been assigned to the back rows to scamper forward, pushing their fellows ahead not-so-gently. A koopa who had gotten shoved stumbled forward before bringing his elbow back into Pacen, his assailant, knocking him down. He sank into the mud, but managed to roll out of the way of Bowser's footsteps before he would have gotten crushed. Pacen pulled himself up and ran into the forest, there was no sense staying in the mud. Bowser would fry him to a crisp on his return trip. He was hopeless in the rest of the world, having no funds on him at the moment, but at least he had a better chance then with the Koopa Troop. Bowser didn't notice, he was too busy gazing at the flags flying above Peach's Castle, which were just now poking above the trees of the forest.

"We're all gonna die, we're all gonna die, we're all gonna die," muttered Brone, a regular everyday red koopa, wringing his hands. He'd been muttering similar things the whole way from Bowser's Castle, and fidgeting whenever he paused for breath. Most of the Troop around had given him a wide berth, content to let their footsteps drown out Brone's pessimism.

"We'll be fine." a chipper voice beside Brone started up again. It was Hia, a magikoopa. She had been trying to get Brone to quiet down the entire march. While she succeeded in eventually getting him to shut up for a short time, she couldn't get him to completely stop.

"This is a frontal all-out assault on Peach's Castle," Brone said back to Hia, louder than his muttering had been. "And you're saying we'll be fine?"

"Shushishishish…" Hia put a hand on his beak and clamped it shut, glancing back at Bowser. He hadn't noticed. "It's not as bad as it sounds," she continued, let Brone's beak go. "Plus, we've got air support." Hia gestured upwards at the fleet of airships above them. They were Bowser's new "stealth" type airships, meaning that they didn't make as much of a cacophony of propellers. However, nothing really stopped anyone from looking up and seeing a fleet of boats floating through the air towards them.

"That's just going to call attention straight to us." Brone retorted, not even glancing up at the airships. "And Peach's Castle isn't the problem. What if… what if he shows up?" Brone glanced around nervously.

"Don't think about that." Hia silenced Brone again. She glanced around herself, peering into the woods, hoping against hope that she wouldn't see a flash of red. "He won't show up. Bowser took precautions. Just forget about Mario." She whispered the name like it was death itself: to the Koopa Troop, it was.

Pacen ran through the forest, batting branches away from his face. He had to keep moving; he had nowhere to go, but he couldn't stay where he was. A small part of him hoped that he might find something, anything, that could help him in this situation. The rest of him knew that he was completely done for. He had no money, so even if he did make it to civilisation other than the Mushroom or Koopa Kingdom, he couldn't pay to keep a roof over his head or even feed himself. He might be able to steal something. Or maybe even sneak back into the Koopa Kingdom and gather his possessions. It would be risky, but he'd be able to support himself.

Slapping another branch out of the way and wincing as it came straight back into his face, Pacen stumbled into a clearing. The ground was covered in grass, just recently trimmed, unlike the long grass and fallen leaves that matted the rest of the forest floor. In the center was a house with faded yellow siding and a reddish roof. The chimney was letting smoke out into the evening sky, making grey loops and shapes against the orange of the sunset. There was a garden of flowers beside the house, housing all shapes and sizes of flowers. The entire clearing looked peaceful. The house was far enough away from Peach's Castle that the residents might even take him in for the night. He could continue his journey in the morning.

Walking around the house to the front, Pacen knocked on the door. There was no response. Pacen knocked a second time, and the door finally opened. The man who came to the door was wearing blue overalls and a red shirt. At this point Pacen couldn't care less what he was wearing, and opened his mouth to explain his predicament. He looked up at the man's face, and that was when he finally caught a glimpse of his cap.

M.

For a moment Pacen stood there with his mouth open, at a loss for words. He looked Mario up and down, who also just stood there, apparently as equally dumbstruck as Pacen was that a koopa would come and knock on his door. Then Mario leaped at Pacen, sending them into a tumbling roll back out into the clearing. Pacen dimly heard someone say "Mario?" from inside the house, and begged that Luigi wouldn't join in beating the crap out of him.

Kicking hard with his legs, Pacen knocked Mario out of the ball that they had formed and onto the ground. Pulling himself up, he barely dodged a punch Mario had thrown, and he felt the wind it created whip by his ear. Pacen kicked out with his leg, catching Mario in the leg. Mario slid backwards slightly, but pulled himself back up without any difficulty. Launching himself at the koopa, Mario threw another punch, which Pacen barely dodged once more. Pacen thought that this would be an opening, but Mario threw two punches, so if Pacen had dodged one, he would have to blunder into the other. The punch hit him right in the middle of his shell, and he fell backwards. Mario, apparently not satisfied with just taking Pacen down, stepped over him and started pelting his face with punches.

"Wait…" Pacen choked, spitting up blood and wincing as another punch collided with his face. "Wait… I can…" Another punch. "I can… tell you everything… I can tell you… where the… rest… are." Pacen finally got his full sentence out. Mario slowed his beating down to a stop.

"The rest?" Mario inquired.

Pacen nodded. "If you… let me go." he added.

Mario stared at Pacen for a long while. "…Fine." he agreed, grudgingly.

Pacen gulped, and glanced behind Mario as Luigi came through the still-open door to investigate the scuffle. He stopped with wide eyes right in the doorway. "They're to the east… just go through the… forest until you find the mud path. The whole Troop is there… even Bowser."

Mario's eyes lit up evilly at the last word. "Good." he said. Then he picked Pacen up by the legs and swung him around twice before letting go. Pacen hit his head on a tree and slid to the ground, presumably dead. Turning to Luigi, he beckoned him over. "Come on, bro. We've got koopas to kill." Luigi glanced at Pacen's body forlornly before following his brother into the forest.

Ike gazed upon the orange sunset with gratitude. You just didn't get these views in the Mushroom Town. He shifted his guard spear and leaned against it. Everything about this scene was perfect. Trees swaying slightly in the breeze, birds chirping and flying back to their respective nests, the beautiful colors projected on the wispy clouds, and the promise of a piping hot supper waiting for him at home after he finished this guard shift. In the Mushroom Kingdom, it didn't get much better than this. Even the airship heading towards them looked pretty in this sunset.

Wait a second.

Standing back up in proper royal guard posture, Ike caught the attention of his post mate, and pointed out the airship to him. "Oh, come on, really?" was all that Ike heard from him before he himself walked into the castle to warn the princess.

Finally, after a seemingly endless amount of stairs, Ike made it to the princess' room, where he saw Toadsworth pacing in front of the door. He stood right in front of Toadsworth until he was noticed. It took him a good two minutes before he was.

"Oh, hello there," Toadsworth said, as if he had just noticed him. "What might you be here for?" he asked.

"I'm here to warn the princess of a great threat to her security." Ike stated, quickly and cleanly.

Toadsworth stared at Ike for what felt like an eternity, before saying, "Ah, you must be one of the new guards, ehm-" he made a motion with his hand as if trying to summon up a long forgotten memory.

"Ike, sir."

"Ah yes, that was it, Ike!" Toadsworth said, seemingly delighted before realizing that he actually had no memory of this person. He stared at Ike for another eternity. "On second thought, I'm not sure I do know you. I'm going to need you to stay here while I go check something. Sorry, but it's all this new-fangled stuff you youngsters call "security", ehrm…"

"Yes, Toadsworth." Ike sighed, mentally watching his time shrink.

Mario walked through the forest, slowing every now and again to let Luigi catch up. They had found a trail that seemed strategically reasonable; they could only hope now that they weren't too late. They stayed just inside the forest so that no one could see them easily.

"Mario!" Luigi cried.

"Shush!" Mario whispered, hopping back to his brother and helping him back up before kicking away the branch that he had tripped over. "We can't go around yelling and alerting everyone to our presence."

"Sorry," Luigi said in a barely quieter whisper. "I thought I saw a ghost…" he finished sheepishly, kicking at the ground.

Mario glanced around quickly before turning back to Luigi. "There's no ghosts in this forest, Weej. Come on, let's go." Luigi followed slowly, trying to look in every direction at once.

A few minutes later, Mario found what he was looking for. Legions of koopas were walking down the trail towards the two of them. None of them were in step with each other, and they all looked horribly tired.

Mario rubbed his hands together. "Get ready, Weejee. We just hit the jackpot."

Mario ignored the muttered "Oh no…" from behind him.

Brone muttered under his breath about the horrible things that were going to happen to them. Hia had given up on getting anything better than this out of him, and was even becoming rather frustrated herself. She hiked up her cloak again; she had let it drop into the mud.

That's when it started. She heard a gut wrenching scream, which cut off suddenly with a violent crunch! Everyone's heads turned toward the sound, which was followed by more and more of the same scream crunch! scream crunch! scream crunch! The entire Koopa Troop started radiating in all directions away from the screams.

"STAND. YOUR. GROUND!" Bowser bellowed, punctuating the last word with a stomp and a breath of fire. The Koopa Troop slowly turned back to face the whirlwind of death, Mario. Ironically, they were now stuck between their worst enemy, and their own commander. "MAGIKOOPAS, IN POSITION!" Bowser continued. A select group of koopas, including Hia, floated into the air, standing atop two paratroopas each. Once they were in position, Bowser gave the command. "FIRE!" he yelled.

Hia focused, channeling all her psychic energy into her fighting wand. She had brought her most powerful wand with her for the occasion. She couldn't do fancy illusions with it as easily, but the bolts of energy that came from it were much more painful and debilitating than just a normal wand. The wand glowed with energy, and she thrust it towards the red blur of death that was Mario. At first, nothing happened. Then the wand grew even brighter before releasing a bolt that headed straight for her target. The same was true for each of the other magikoopas as well. Hia began focusing another bolt.

The first wave of bolts all hit Mario straight on. He fell backwards into the mud and skidded for a few feet. After a moment's hesitation, the surrounding Koopa Troop began swarming him, eager to be one who could say they killed Mario. However, this was Mario. He swiped his leg under the nearest koopa, knocking him down. Grabbing hold of the koopa's legs, Mario hopped to his feet and swung him around to clear out the koopas around him. Letting go cleared a path straight out to Luigi, knocking him over. Mario paid no attention, but turned instead to the magikoopas with a look of hate.

Hia released her second bolt towards Mario, but this time he was ready. He jumped over the wave of bolts, which collided with the Koopa Troop behind him, causing further chaos among them. Then he jumped on top another koopa with a dreadful crunch and used him as a platform to get at the paratroopas higher up. He grabbed their legs and swung up and around to their top, kicking the magikoopa off to be trampled down below. Then he jumped to the next pair of paratroopas to repeat the manoeuvre.

Hia, realizing that Mario would get to her in no time at all, focused on a different spell. With this wand it wasn't as easy to do, but she managed to slow time down to about three-quarters of what it would normally be. Exhausted, but with slightly more time available to her, Hia assessed her options.

She had to get off the paratroopas, that much was obvious. Once she was down, she needed to abandon the Koopa Troop and get off the battlefield: on the ground, only a chomp could even think about engaging Mario. She couldn't go back: Bowser was still standing there yelling orders. She couldn't go forward: Luigi had stood himself back up and now stood as a one-man blockade on the trail. He just looked at the Koopa Troop and they cowered. Her only chance was the forest, and it wasn't a good chance. She knew nothing about it or it's inhabitants. But that was beside the point.

Where was Brone? Hia searched frantically for him, before finally spotting him standing in one place, biting his nails. What a way to get yourself killed. He was within jumping distance, so she could potentially jump at him and turn it into a roll before teleporting into the forest and turning invisible to divert attention. It was a long shot, especially with this wand, but it was the only shot she had.

Brone glanced upwards, then did a double take before being barreled into. He punched his assailant reflexively, but it didn't seem to faze them. Then suddenly his stomach dropped out and he felt like he was falling faster then should be possible falling falling falling fallign falilgn…

Brone came back to after a couple seconds. He looked around to try and get his bearings. He was in a forest somewhere. He wasn't far from the massacre that Mario was causing: he could still hear the fighting going on, as well as Bowser yelling his top off. Brone went to push himself to his feet, before realizing he couldn't see his hands. In fact, he couldn't see any of his body, though he could still feel it. Brone toke a deep breath.

And screamed.

"Shut up!" hissed a disembodied voice, and an invisible force clamped his beak shut. "Stay quiet. It's just an invisibility spell, your body is perfectly fine."

"Hia?" Brone whispered.

No one said anything for a second. Then, "Oh, yeah, I forgot that you can't see me. I nodded."

"W-why did you…?"

"That's a long story, and right now we don't have time for it." Hia said. "We've got to move: we're on our own now."