Hello again, readers! I've got a new story, and this one is probably going to be better than Survivors' Accounts from the Wormhole Crisis, though some of the events of that crisis will factor into what goes on here.
Disclaimer: I do not own any of the SSBM fighters, or characters from their home worlds; I own only the ideas of how they interact with one another.
Mario's Dream
It seemed like an ordinary walk in the moonlight to Mario, who was quite accustomed to walking through the Mushroom Kingdom at night, from all his quests. Casually as ever, Mario looked up at the sky above him, which was filled with twinkling stars in spite of the nearly-full moon that shone behind him.
Something was odd, however. There was a star to the north that was usually one of the brightest in the night sky—but tonight it appeared to be fading out of existence!
The sight of the fading star alarmed Mario—it was never good when stars faded at night before the sun rose, but the fading of a bright star in particular was a very bad omen indeed. Before he could think, Mario sprinted off his path to the place below the fading star, hoping that it would not diminish completely before he reached the spot above which it disappeared.
Over the top of a hill, Mario saw a great fountain and ran to it, hoping at least for some answer as to why the star faded from the sky. Just as the last light of the star went out, Mario reached the fountain. But this was no ordinary fountain: it was one that flowed with tears instead of ordinary water, and Mario could see what was unmistakably a shattered sword lying in the fountain basin. He had just extended a hand to retrieve the shards of broken metal when he noticed a bird perched on the edge of the fountain almost directly opposite the place where he himself stood. The fairly large bird that appeared dark gray in the moonlight must have been a bird of prey; it had a sharp curved beak and razorlike talons. While Mario seemed to look to the bird for answers, the bird hung its head for a moment as if it might add its own tears to the fountain if only it could before spreading its long wings to fly away…
"Mario? Mario, wake up, it's nearly ten in the morning," came the voice of Mario's younger brother, Luigi, in the sleeping plumber's ears that woke him from his troubled dream.
As he sat up and tried to rub the sleep out of his eyes, Mario was slightly disturbed at the tears that streaked his face from the outer corners of his eyes to his temples. Sensing his older brother's discomfort, Luigi could not help but ask, "Did you have a bad dream? Is that why you woke up with tears in your eyes?" When Mario told Luigi about his dream, the younger plumber brother replied, "Well, I guess the fountain of tears in your dream explains the tears in your eyes now, or maybe vice versa—but I really don't know how the fading star would lead to a fountain of tears, or why there was a bird and a broken sword in your dream."
It made no sense to Mario either. Maybe Peach can figure it out, or maybe I need to go to another one of my fellow SSBM fighters for information, Mario thought with some uncertainty as Luigi led him to the kitchen for breakfast.