Dai: I know, this is overdone. Still, couldn't resist.

Tsukaimon: Besides, she needed something to keep her from spazzing over her demo of Pokemon Omega Ruby and Alpha Sapphire.

BlackGatomon: You know the spiel, nothing owned here.

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The girl looked at the present. Super Paper Mario, the game she'd begged for for years. She'd seen walkthroughs of it, watched her friends play it, and now she could have it for herself. Immediately, she ran upstairs and fired up her Wii.

When she started up the disc, the screen went black, as she was expecting it to. Then came the odd part. Her Wii began to talk.

Cecilia Winterson, do you wish to continue? You may be unable to return.

Now, thinking this was some sort of joke, she laughed. "Of course! I'm not afraid!"

Her last thought when the television sucked her up was that she really should have expected that.

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When she woke up, she was surrounded by members of the Koopa Troop, and she recognized exactly where they were. In other words, the intro to the game.

She eyed a Koopa and a Shy Guy warily, nearly bumping into some others.

"If they don't wake up soon..." The Koopa trailed off.

The Shy Guy laughed, revealing herself to be female. "Kendell, you worry too much. Bowser gets married to Peach, we get our happily ever afters. You can leave the Koopa Troop, while I continue pulverising my enemies."

"I'm not sure it works like that, but fine."

Cecilia wandered towards the back of the crowd, nearly tripping over Luigi, but stopping herself just in time. She was a fangirl, but the polite kind. The kind that didn't trip over their favorite characters if they could help it.

It was about fifteen minutes later when the wedding started, and no one seemed to notice her. When Luigi stomped on the Chaos Heart, she sighed. That had been a bad move. Then she realized exactly what would happen.

She would be forced to join Count Bleck, either of her own free will, or under Nastasia's command. Neither sounded pleasant. Not to mention she might have to interact with Dimentio.

He was a memorable bad guy, and quite funny, however, it was dangerous not to take him seriously. That was the last thing she remembered before the explosion.

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When Cecilia regained consciousness, she told herself to stop getting knocked out so much. Then she remembered the real issue. She was in Castle Bleck. Nastasia would find her any minute if she stayed in one place.

She decided that, given the choice, she'd rather maintain her free will. Sure, they might find out she wasn't really on their side, but better than brainwashing. At least, she kept telling herself that.

It probably didn't help that she had no sense of direction. There wasn't even a way to tell the areas apart. She realized she could be stuck in the maze from the last chapter, and have no way of getting out.

Fortunately, or unfortunately as the case may be, she ran across Nastasia without even trying to.

"Um, you gonna join willingly or be brainwashed?" Apparently, she had been through all this many times before.

"I'll join willingly."

"K. Give me your personal information, swear undying loyalty to Count Bleck, and you're in."

"Fine. My name is Cecilia Winterson, also known as Cici, sixteen years old, born March 18th, and I'm allergic to nuts. Yeah, I'm loyal to Blu-Count Bleck." Nastasia lifted an eyebrow at Cici's mistake, but said nothing.

"K, you're in. Minion rooms are down the hall to the left,K? You can't miss it."

And for once, Cici found someplace without getting lost.

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Well, it wasn't quite that easy. Apparently, there was one hallway for each species, with the more humanoid ones that no one could tell what they were in the human hallway. Well, at least they were being used for something. The rooms, not the minions.

Each hallway had rooms on both sides. One side for the boys, another for the girls. Cici walked into the first one on the girls' side that didn't appear to have anyone in it, and sighed.

It was so drab, just black, white, and the occasional shade of gray or purple. Plopping down on the bed, she decided to figure out exactly what happened.

Well, she was obviously inside her new game. No clue how that had happened. She was also now a minion of Count Bleck. And while she felt sorry for the guy, that didn't mean she wanted to serve him. Not that she had had much of a choice at the time.

A bit later, she saw Nastasia and O'Chunks go by, dragging Luigi, who was still struggling against the brainwashing. Why they hadn't felt the need to stay in the same place, she had no idea.

"What's going on?"

"It's a wee bit confusing, but Nastasia says she's trying something new with the lad."

"New?" So she was curious, naturally. Luigi, meanwhile, had fallen unconcious.

So Nastasia revealed her idea about creating a new personality so that strong emotions might not be enough to jolt the brainwashing. Cici nodded.

"I see. As for the new personality for this guy, how about we call him L? You know, because of his hat. It would make it a bit harder to figure out it's him. They can't be all that bright." Or maybe hanging around Bowser for too long fries your brain cells.

"Lass has a point. New name for new guy." That was honestly the smartest thing O'Chunks had ever said.

"K."

Cici walked back into her room, whispering as she closed the door, just low enough that no one could hear, "I'm sorry, Luigi."

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Dai: This is all that is keeping me from setting Mega Glalie on that Tropius that keeps popping up. Just one more month... Just one more month...