Disclaimer: I don't own Luigi/Pit/Nintendo/anything. Seriously.
I'd also like to mention that any characters in this story who resemble real people are used in a 100% ficticious way. Please don't sue me and all that.
Rated: For heavy themes, including suggestions of suicide and general angstiness. Fun stuff. But on the upside, no swearing!
Author's Note: This is a parody of It's a Wonderful Life, and hey, granted that, I really wanted to have it done for Christmas. But I was really busy, and that didn't happen, so here, you can have it now. Luigi really does have a few things in common with George Baily, what with having a more heroic brother and all. And yes, Pit's the guardian angel. Go figure.
Metafic is a type of AU where the characters meet/live amongst their real-life creators. In the case of this story, it's the later.
EDIT: I know I've done my wacky crackfics in the past. This is not one of those. So let me extend an apology right now to anybody who came here expecting funny, because the funny is either not going to be here, or only in small and subtle doses. This story is supposed to be more dramatic/quasi-serious, or, ffffff, as quasi-serious as a freaking fanfiction can ever hope to possibly be. I'll do more crackfics later, pinky swear.
The streets of Kyoto were whipped with their common frustrations. People ran. They had many reasons, but often these were the same. Tight deadlines, traffic problems; different flavors of the same obligations. Along the way they snapped at one another, hurriedly exchanging important news. Over head the sky was low and matte white, threatening snow, and this alone was the only truly uncommon item among their discussions.
He shuffled low to the ground, dodging ill-placed legs with a skill that came from a lifetime of practice. Passerby didn't see him. They couldn't. He was invisible to anyone who didn't know the sterile langue of computers through which he was written into existence.
Luigi stiffened a moment, looked over his shoulder and acknowledged that he was truly alone. His coworkers rarely adventured outdoors, and the reasons why were obvious. It was uncomfortable. All of them were numb to natural phenomena such as the wind and the cold, and that coupled with their invisibility to strangers made the experience very strange indeed. That it was better by far to remain at company HQ was agreed upon all but unanimously.
So he was unlikely to be followed. He turned back around, wishing he could relax a bit. The simple plan wasn't enough. He would need some time to work out the details.
Unsurprisingly, the topic was avoided in conversation. Many of the programmers believed that the characters were all immortal (or at least, Luigi thought begrudgingly, that's what they insistently, desperately told them all), and that might have seemed true within the confines of the games themselves, but outside it was much easier for them to forget. Luigi remembered Mario and Link once, long ago, getting into some ridiculous squabble that ended with Mario being unceremoniously hurled from the roof of the building. He hadn't so much as bruised at hitting the ground, of course, but it didn't come as a surprise to anyone but him. Physical attacks were completely superficial. The only truly dangerous things were attacks against their programmed scripts. That was what Luigi was going to have to do.
The problem was how. The programmers were the farthest thing from morbid by nature, so they didn't often sit around and discuss all the ways that their characters could possibly be maimed. The closest example, Luigi thought, was years ago, when Mr. Tajiri, white-faced, had come around and begged his colleagues not to perform the famous Pokémon glitch, for fear that it might hurt Red.
Luigi wasn't naïve enough, as some of his colleagues were, to suppose that Red's glitch was the only one in existence. He had seen the others catch Mr. Tajiri later that day, hissing hoarse whispers that his warning may very well have done more harm than good…
He didn't know any applicable glitches, but Luigi was undeterred. He was only seeking to destroy his own script, and a glitch was only one means to that end. There were others.
Containers of water, for example, were strictly forbidden inside HQ, and Luigi figured there had to be a reason why. There was a gutter nearby whose few inches of clammy water had developed a thin skin of ice in the cold. A passing bus cracked the surface. He was intrigued.
Knuckles resting against the concrete curb, he stared and wondered. He wondered about a lot of things, really, which was something he had been trying to avoid. Wondering might mean dredging up memories. Worse, wondering might mean second thoughts. He was tired, though. A bit too tired to wonder, and certainly too tired to turn back. So he closed his eyes, and with a wavering sigh leaned forward—
"You're not honestly about to drown yourself in a puddle, are you?"
Luigi gasped, wrenched his eyes open, scrambled backwards on his palms. Pit was above him, craned over with his head cocked and watching him curiously. "You!" Luigi snapped, cross.
"It's kind of pathetic, really," Pit continued, pretty gracefully ignoring him. "You're already gonna off yourself, it's not gonna kill you to try and put a little romance into it, is it? I mean, well, sure, it's gonna kill you either way, but honestly, if it's the last thing you're ever going to do, I'd at least make a quasi-effort. People'll look back and be like, 'Oh yes, Luigi, I remember him, he's the one that drowned in a puddle.' Not the greatest of legacies, it's all I'm saying."
Luigi had already dusted himself, gathered the choked remains of his dignity, and begun staggering off. But Pit leapt ahead of him and caught his collar. "Hold up, now, I'm in no hurry."
A hit from the elbow and Luigi shook him off. "What are you even doing out here?"
Pit shook his feathers, and Luigi stepped back, a little put-off. "I'd figured it was pretty obvious from the whole comment about offing yourself," Pit said lackadaisically, "But I'm here to prevent that."
His next question finally managed to catch him a bit off-guard. "Why?"
"Why?" Pit sputtered. "Why? What do you mean, why? It would suck, that's why!" Luigi seemed unmoved, so with a huff, he continued, "It would create a huge deal of bother, what with having to console your grieving, hysterical family. They'll all want to be assured, over and over repeatedly, that you didn't do it to hurt them, and that you're in a better place, and that—God help us all—that it's not their fault. And frankly Luigi, asking your friends to shoulder such grotesque lying on your behalf is an awful selfish burden to place on us, notwithstanding all the other affairs you'll leave for us to set straight. Well, at least one would be a lie, anyway; and another I wouldn't be certain of. But I could answer quite honestly that it wouldn't be their fault. No, Luigi, that act of glittering stupidity would be assuredly all you. And," Pit added as a sort of cherry-on-top, because at this point Luigi was finally beginning to look rightfully ashamed, "And while I'm not an expert on the matter, I'd certainly imagine, anyway, that this particular endeavor wouldn't be pain-free."
"Alright," Luigi said, readjusting his hat over his greasy hair. He straightened himself and examined Pit's face, completely stoic, but he didn't find much in Pit's titled, expectant little grin, either. He crossed his arms. "You just…suppose for a moment that I do grant you all that. But so what? So what. My life has been a simple series of mediocrities and disappointments strung together, among the company of characters who forget me, by programmers who don't care. That's a fact, Pit, and I know you may live quietly, but you can't relate, and you can't even try. You don't know me, and you never can."
"Bull!" Pit shouted, and he stomped his foot in consternation. The great weariness that Luigi had felt at the cusp of this journey was beginning to return to him, and he sighed. But Pit, still craned over with his back twisted awkwardly in order to look at him eye-to-eye, was not about to leave it just at that. "I might not know you now, but I can figure you out. No offense, but you're no bomb rocket. You're a character. From a children's videogame. Your life isn't complicated, and it definitely isn't miserable, and of that I am absolutely certain."
Luigi did not have the gumption to try and deny any of that, although he didn't believe it either, and so he just stood silently, waiting for Pit to tire of him and leave. Pit, however, merely sighed.
"I'll broker you a deal," he said finally, straightening his crooked back with a little grimace. "I'll find a way to show you how valuable your life is, and you're going to listen. And then after that, you do whatever you want. Off yourself. Or don't." He considered that for a moment longer and added, "But don't drown yourself in a puddle, because that's just not a good choice from any angle."
Had either of them been mortal, they would have realized suddenly the flat chill in the air, and looked up to see that the white sky had just dropped a few dusty flecks of dry snow. Around them, the Kyotians pulled their coats tighter and quickened their paces. Pit and Luigi, however, were not mortal, and as it was, they looked only at the faces of one another. Luigi was tired; he had been tired for years. With that came a reluctance to fight anymore. And so, with only the vague hope that whatever he was about to be shown wouldn't consume all of the waning sunlight left in the day, Luigi took Pit's hand and allowed himself to be walked back to HQ.