Luffy still hadn't grasped the finer points of being unable to swim (i.e. you end up drowning) so five minutes later Zoro and Sanji were climbing back onboard, one carrying Luffy from his failed impromptu rescue attempt while the other brought the figure in red. Sanji unceremoniously dropped the plump creature in the middle of the ship, facing upwards.
It was a man, of the kind Nami would think of as "a silly uncle"; he seemed shorter than Luffy, but older, and had the most well-trimmed, well-kept, well-waxed, very-stupid-looking mustache she had ever seen, just below his big and round nose. Somehow, she also noticed, his mustache was black while his hair was brown.
There was something about his unconscious face that made you want to pinch, poke, and stretch his nose and cheeks, and that is exactly what Luffy was doing as soon as he had recovered.
"You guys think he is dead?" he pinched stretched one of the man's ears and yelled directly into it "OI, MISTER! ARE YOU DEAD?"
"L-Luffy, be careful! We don't even know who he is!" Usopp took a step back, which in total put him 15 steps as far as possible from the newcomer, and behind the mast. He had already been attacked by an inanimate object today, thank you very much, and he wasn't about to be attacked by a fat pirate on top of that.
"I say we toss him back out, or at least lock him up" Sanji puffed some smoke "Usopp is right, we don't know how dangerous this guy is, and we already have to keep an eye on those two there."
Zoro turned to face them.
"You two. You never answered me, what are you two doing here?"
"Ah, we are taking them to their town." Luffy was still engrossed in playing with the man's face, and answered without turning. It was weirdly malleable.
"Why?"
"No reason. Hey look, I made an Usopp!"
All he had really done was pull and stretch the man's nose until it was pointy, but he was laughing heartily at it. After a few seconds, the nose went back to its original shape with a 'sproing' noise.
"That's our captain to you. As for you two," he grinned at them "you must be thinking about backstabbing us. What are your names?"
The freeloaders were taken back at his blunt assertion.
"I-I'm Mr. Nine"
"M-miss Wednesday"
"Ah? There is something familiar about these names, now what was it…?" he was still grinning, slowly leaning closer to them, causing them to back away.
"WOAH!"
The impromptu interrogation as cut short as the crew turned to face Luffy and the man. He wasn't asleep anymore, and as a matter of fact he was mid-air, falling.
He landed on one knee, facing down, his face hidden under his hair. Luffy was smiling wide-eyed.
"That was awesome! Did you guys see that?!"
The man looked up slowly and dramatically to face them, and as one man, the Strawhats and the two freeloaders snorted. The dramatic effect of his slow rising was ruined by Luffy's handywork on his face, which was fully pulled and stretched in various directions, including his mustache, which the captain had made into a twirl, giving him a ridiculous appearance. There was a 'sproing' noise, as suddenly all his features returned to the way they were before.
Luffy was still drooling in emotion, sitting cross legged at the ground;
"No, really did any of you see that?! He was just asleep and laying down and then suddenly he was like WHOOSH into the air! Hey, hey, can you teach me to do that?!"
The man, whoever he was, didn't say much. Or rather, anything at all. The first thing he did was take his hand to his forehead, and then he seemed surprised with something. He quickly started feeling his head while looking around at the ground.
"Eh? You lose something?"
The man faced him, then pointed at his strawhat with his right hand, and at his own head with the left hand. Luffy reacted by holding his hat firmly.
"What? No way, this one is mine, go find your own!"
The man shook his head and looked around, trying to find help from the rest of the crew, but got little more than weird looks from them, and a yelp from when he looked at Usopp.
He ran quickly to the side of the ship to scan the sea.
Sanji, showing a distinctive lack of social skills, commented out loud "This guy doesn't seem to have all the screws in place."
If the man heard it, he showed no signs of being offended, still looking intensely at the sea. There was a small 'click' as Zoro slightly removed his topmost katana from its sheath.
"Oi, you, you better start telling us exactly what were you doing in the middle of nowhere like this," He had a grin carefully calculated to be frightening, "If you don't want any trouble."
"Aaah!" that was the man, apparently surprised at something on the ocean. He did not look back to face Zoro, which irritated the swordsman; he had dealt with smugness, with underestimation, with looks of superiority, bluff callings, and death threats, but this was the first time he could remember when he had just been completely, utterly ignored. To make matters worse he heard that ero-cook snicker.
The man, still fixing his eyes at the sea, took a few steps back from the side of the ship, and took a determinate stance.
"OI! I'm talking to you, here!" Zoro had fully unsheathed his sword, and was pointing it at the man.
The man started running at the side of the ship.
"W-what is he-" Usopp started, but didn't manage to finish before becoming speechless.
The man took a jump. It was a very impressive jump, of the kind he'd seen Luffy, Zoro and Sanji take in the past, during fights; just about high enough to go over someone's head. This isn't what made him speechless.
What made him speechless is the way the man fell precisely on top of the handrail on the side of the ship, and used the speed from his head start to immediately jump a second time;
"YA~HOOOO!"
The second jump was gigantic. The man was cleary able to leap small buildings in a single bound. He had opened his arms slightly, and was smiling like someone having the time of his life. He fell at the sea and disappeared.
"See? SEE? Like I said, he just WHOOSHED like that!"
Nami was impressed.
"Was that… a devil fruit power?" she seemed unsure.
"The Jump-Jump Fruit?" Usopp started wondering "Or the Leap-Leap Fruit? Is there even a devil fruit that grants 'super jumping' as a power."
"If it was a devil fruit, he was quite suicidal." Sanji puffed some smoke. "Jumping at the sea, I mean."
Luffy reacted shocked.
"OH YEAH, he must have forgotten he'd drown! We have to save him!" Zoro grabbed him mid-air as he jumped after the man.
"LISTEN TO YOUR OWN ADVICE FIRST DAMNIT!"
Right at this moment, the man jumped back on board. Not climbed back onboard, *jumped* back onboard, somehow getting impulse enough to get airborne from the water. He had his right arm pointing upwards, fist clenched holding some red cloth.
"H-he came back? It's not a Devil Power after all?!" Usopp was trying his best to hide again. "And what is he, a dog?!" He added this as the man proceeded to quickly shake himself dry.
Luffy casually walked up to the man.
"You HAVE to teach me how to do that! Eh? What's this in your hand?"
The man opened his hand and unfolded a red hat, the same color as his shirt, which apparently had been floating at the sea. He twisted it dry and put it in his head. There was an "M" on it.
Luffy hit the lower side of his fist in his open hand, in a signal of understanding.
"Ooooh, Myrmidon! Your name must be Myrmidon!"
"Like hell it is!" that was Nami, cleary getting fed up with this nonsense. "You there, what is your name? And-" she pointed to all the yellow boxes and comet fragments which still littered the deck "what is this stuff?!"
The man looked at her and, with a cheerful and a tad high-pitched voice, said his first words in this new world.
"It's-a me, Mario!"
This was not going as expected. Not at all. At first the woman waited patiently to see if he would add something, and then asked.
"And what do you mean 'it's-a you'? Should we know something?"
Mario was famous. It wasn't prideful thinking or arrogance, just a fact; in all his trips around the world, the reaction would be 'Mario? You mean the Mario of the jumps?! And the green guy is with him too!'. In the Mushroom Kingdom all praised on him, in the Koopa Kingdom all cursed him, in the Sarasaland, Bean Bean Kingdom, Isle Delfino, even in Rosalina's–
Then it hit him. Of course, Rosalina's Observatory. He had gone into space; no matter how famous he were, there was still the final frontier for it to cross. Still, why was he still in space again? ("Oi!") He was sure he got to the center of the universe and there he… he did… ("OI, YOU!") there was some… stuff which… what had happened, again?
He rested his chin into his hand in a thoughtful stance, trying to focus, ("STOP IGNORING ME YOU PRICK") before being woken up to notice a green-haired man pointing a sword directly into his nose. There was a blond-haired man behind him apparently trying to hold his laughter.
The swordsman's eyebrows were twitching.
"You. Explain yourself. Now."
Mario looked up, thoughtful, thinking the best way to explain he was a plumber chasing a turtle-dragon that kidnapped the princess of all mushroom people from another planet and took her into space during a rain of candy star fragments.
He finally slapped his fist in his hand, as if to say "got it".
What followed as a long section of pantomime and mimicry, all of which just made Zoro get more and more ticked off, believing that this Mario guy was making fun of him.
First the fat man pointed to himself and started making motions with his hand as if he were fixing something. Then he spun around, and started acting like some sort of hunchbacked creature. He'd eventually stop and make noises with his mouth and gestures, as if he were spitting something. He spun again and started acting lady-like. He spun again and started acting like the hunchback spitting creature, laughing and holding something. He spun and acting lady-like, as if he were in distress and something was holding him. He then spun and acted like a small person being scared or outraged, then spun and acted as another small person scared or outraged, then again. He then pointed upwards, opened his arms, and started running around making "woooosh" noises with his mouth. Then he grabbed a piece of the candy-rock that were still everywhere in the ship, and pointed at it.
He then stopped and smiled, apparently very proud of being concise and to the point.
All the while, Sanji was laughing more and more at Zoro's lack of reaction, Nami was starting to worry if this would be a common occurrence at the Grand Line, Usopp was just confused, and Luffy…
Luffy had been sitting cross legged, watching him intently, and sometimes nodding as if in agreement. He would sometimes interrupt and ask stuff like "how big a turtle are we talking about here?" and "just mushrooms? An entire kingdom?", to which this Mario guy would answer by raising his hand up as if to say "this tall" or shake his head in denial and then act like a turtle, but with flapping wings.
After the farce was over, Zoro's still extended sword was shaking in anger, and he was about to burst when he noticed his captain. Luffy had a serious expression in his face, as if he had been just told an important secret. He got up, and as he walked the shadow of his straw hat covered his eyes. He put his hand on Zoro's raised and shaking sword arm and lowered it, to which Zoro complied; captain's orders, after all. He walked up to the newcomer, put his hands on his shoulders, looked directly into his eyes for a few seconds, and asked;
"Can you poop?"
A/N
You may be wondering "which Mario is it?" Not that I mean to imply you guys don't know Mario, but fans of the games may remember he changes drastically between them; the original Jumpman was not a plumber at all; the Mario from SMB was at full height as a small man and grew twice his size when he at a mushroom, which was changed to the mushroom being his normal size in later games; the Mario from Mario Strikers is a bloodthirsthy warrior out to feast in the blood of his enemie's children (and so are everyone else in that game), and so on. Then there are the cartoon Marios, the anime Marios, and the movie Marios.
'My' Mario is a bit of them all... but he is mostly Paper Mario. Not that he is made of Paper, but rather he will act as I always perceived Paper Mario did; not really caring about stuff. Paper Mario is the sort of guy who would walk into a village, hear about there being a thief stealing things from everyone, talk to the thief, and then proceed to ignore all that shit because he didn't really give two craps bout it, until someone directly came to him and said "Hey Mario, go after that thief!" at which point he would do it because... huh... stuff.
That being said, he also will have lots of bits from other Marios in him; the mimicry, for example, was directly lifted from Legend of the Seven Stars (though he was better at it in that game than in the fic).
