President Bowser was found unharmed in a hotel in New Por-
*BZZT*
-as police are still at a loss for words at the death of Princess Rosalina, recen-
*BZZT*
-hunt for Mario continues. All citizens are advised to lock their-
Toad finally turned the television off. He had had enough. The only thing in the news these days was about murder and tragedy, made worse by the fact he personally knew some of the people hurt by these incidents. He sighed as he laid his fat head against the left arm of his apartment sofa. Bowser had been kidnapped, Rosalina had been found murdered, and his longtime friend Mario had been blamed for it all. The stress may have gotten to him a little much, as he could feel a bowel movement coming. With a sigh, he got off the sofa and headed to the restroom.
He pulled his trousers down and plopped his little rump onto the toilet seat. His butt felt a little cold sitting against the porcelain bowl, but he didn't really care about that, he just wanted this dump out of the way. He pushed, and it got really hot where he sat. He waited for the poop to come all the way out, but all he could feel was his seat getting hotter, and he heard no splash in the toilet water. Oh. Oh no. He had been so distracted by the sad recent events that he'd forgotten to lift up the toilet lid. He was sitting on a closed toilet, with feces smearing out of the tight space between his buttocks and the toilet cover. Some servant to Princess Peach he was. But this was the least of his problems at the moment. Because as he was scrambling for toilet paper, he could hear somebody opening his front door. Fuck. Someone had come to silence him for all he'd seen and done.
"That wasn't very nice of you, Toad," an Italian voice croaked as the chain bolt to the door snapped off, "I thought you were supposed to be my friend." Toad couldn't believe who he was hearing. Was it really Mario showing his face in these dark times?
"Mario? You're alright? They haven't hurt you or anything, have they?" Toad in his state of surprise slid off the toilet seat, the splattered shit acting as a lubricant to slide him off, and he fell flat on his face on the linoleum floor.
"Yeah," Mario replied as he pointed the barrel of a Model 37 Ithaca shotgun at Toad's bewildered face, "I feel good considering I was betrayed by someone like you. And no, they haven't hurt me, but I'm sure going to hurt you."
"What's the meaning of this?! What the heck are you doing pointing a gun in my face?! I thought we were friends!"
"Yeah, that's what I thought," the fallen plumber muttered, "but friends don't betray each other."
"Betray? What are you talking about?! I'm as confused on the matter as you are, the whole city is going crazy over Rosalina's dea-"
Mario interrupted Toad's desperate cries by pumping his shotgun.
"Save it for God," Mario spat on the floor, "he'll show you more mercy than you deserve, almost as much as I'm about to show you, which is barely any at all! I knew I'd done bad by cheating on Peach with Rosalina, and she deserved to die for bewitching me, but I have done nothing wrong! I have been framed by the corrupt system! She had seduced me into giving into my basest instincts as a human being, I've done nothing wrong. More than that, I am not a murderer. Well, not yet, anyway. But I will get to the bottom of this, I will unravel this conspiracy, and it all starts with punishing you for your misdeeds."
"Sorry to say," a gravelly voice from behind Mario croaked, "but that's my line, and more importantly, my job."
Mario had less than a second to dive to the side as Frank Castle, the terrible vigilante operating as The Punisher, unloaded his MAC-10 submachine at Mario. All his bullets missed, however, as Mario had successfully jumped out of the way to hide behind a sofa. Unfortunately, the bullets intended for Mario tore into the helpless Toad, whose body produced spouts of blood like tiny sprinklers on a lawn. Mario looked at the corpse of his former friend and, with tears of hatred in his eyes, turned his attention to the Punisher.
"You sonnuva bitch!" Mario cried as he pushed shells into the bottom of his pump action firearm, "you murderer! How could you do this?!"
"I am no murderer, I am THE PUNISHER. It's my duty to punish evildoers like you."
"Evil? Goddammit, I was framed! I never murdered anybody, there's obviously a conspiracy against me! I'm a war hero from the Subspace Crisis, why would I suddenly turn my back on humanity?"
Punisher pondered this for a moment, before slowly lowering the barrel of his Uzi. With a sigh, he placed it into his weapons holster.
"You have a point, plumber. It wouldn't make much sense for you to suddenly turn face and become a wicked force of evil. Fine. You're off the hook, for now. Just stay out of my way."
"Same to you," said Mario, as he placed his shotgun back into his trenchcoat. The scuffle between them was over, but something was amiss. They both smelled something. Something like... smoke? Specifically nicotine. But there was no fire, and there was no visible smoke in the room. Their instincts told them it was because the smoke was invisible, because it was coming from an invisible source. Through an unknown sixth sense, Mario detected the threat near his being, and performed a roundhouse kick in the direction of his threat. His foot slammed into what felt like solidified air, but after hearing something make a thud on the ground, the air became statically charged electricity, in the shape of a man.
"Well," Punisher smirked, "looks like we've had a spy watching us this whole time."
"And not just any spy," Mario glared at the man on the floor, "it's the BLU Spy, of all people!"
The man on the ground chuckled as he used his remaining strength to light himself a cigarette. The blue ski mask he used to hide his identity was useless here, as over the years he'd gained a reputation throughout the mercenary underworld as a professional killer. Mario and the Punisher both knew very well who they were dealing with. If Spy was involved, surely the other members of his Team Fortress weren't far behind.
"Do you smell smoke?" Mario asked as his big nostril sniffed the air.
"Of course," said Punisher, "Spy just lit himself another fucking cigarette. Damn, he may be a criminal, but those rich bastards in the drug corporations are the bigger evil-"
"No you moron," Mario scoffed at the skull-shirt-wearing vigilante, "I smell something burning. Wait, why the heck is smoke coming out of the floorboards?"
Spy's smile turned into a malicious grin, "It looks like my friend, ze Pyro, has come to aid me."
The plumes of smoke from the floorboards grew, as hellfire erupted from cracks in the floor. Outside the apartment complex, a muffled man in a gasmask cackled with glee. In front of Mario and Punisher, a ski-mask wearing assassin laughed, even as his cigarette fell out of his mouth and onto the floor.
"Are you fucking crazy," Punisher raged, "this apartment has at least forty tenants living here, they'll burn to death!"
"Ha, I knew you wouldn't get it, you brutish punishing pus." Spy guffawed as he lit himself a new cigarette, "This never had to happen. We were the ones who made the anonymous tip to the Smash Police HQ. All you had to do was eliminate Mario, ensure nobody would sneak around trying to uncover the conspiracy, and instead you ruin things. Well, no matter. She was right, she told us you wouldn't understand the bigger picture."
"She? Who are you talking about?" Mario stammered, "Who are you paid thugs working for?"
"It matters not," Spy laughed as he lit himself a cigarette, "for we will all burn to death in this apartment complex, and you shall die knowing you could never learn the truth!"
"We'll see," Punisher began as he pulled out a grenade launcher, "about that!"
An explosion in the wall. A hole was formed. The two heroes jumped out and fell four stories down and onto the streets below. Punisher slammed into the pavement belly flop style, he heard a couple ribs crack as he landed. Mario managed to end up on both feet with little strain put on his knees. Years of taking great leaps and falls had made him impervious to such fall damage.
"Well Mario," Punisher said as he patched himself up, "I would apologize for misjudging you and your true allegiance to the city, but I don't have time. I have to track down and punish the bastards that planned this heinous act."
"No," Mario looked at the bruised and battered crimefighter, "we have to track them down. We were both set up. I was framed for murder, and you were almost tricked into murdering an innocent man."
"Innocent? Toad is dead because of your actions."
"Me?! You bastard, I never shot him, you shot him!"
"Because I was aiming at you, you plumbing shit!"
"Dammit, it doesn't matter, more innocent people will die if we stand here and bicker!"
"You're right. It's up to us to find out who did this and stop them once and for all."
As the two warriors nodded in agreement, they set off down the city streets as the apartment behind them burned to the ground. From the roof of a nearby building, a clown watched. Not just any clown. A deadly clown. An evil clown. A clown whose burning hatred for the world was what drove him forward. This was not the Joker, but something much more dangerous. Long had he abandoned his dream of bringing happiness to the children with his ice cream truck, and instead used it to murder those who stood in his way. Sweet Tooth, the serial killing, car driving murderer, pulled a walkie talkie from his pocket.
"Mario and Frank Castle got out of the building before it could burn them to death."
...
"Those Team Fortress mercenaries failed in their mission, but we'll ensure such an event doesn't happen again."
...
"Yes. I see."
...
"Alright then. I guess we'll initiate Phase 2"
TO BE CONTINUED
