Chapter Ten: Mario's Wedding Anniversary
Sorry for the delay in this chapter's release! Thanks to everybody who reviewed the last one. Just so that everybody knows, this story's been completely planned out in it's entirety. I've read a lot of long-running fanfictions which start to lose their purpose after a while and make it seem unlikely that they'll ever be completed. I don't want that to happen to this story. It's going to have a satisfying ending, no matter how long it takes me to get to that point!
The air in the moonlight Toad Town square was cold, but a comfortable kind of cold as opposed to an unpleasant one. Warm light from the Toad Houses spilled onto the cobblestone streets, illuminating the night. Luigi sat on the edge of the fountain, which had as of an hour ago had it's Bowser statue removed, basking in the light as he gazed around him in some sort of stunned shock. He could scarecly believe his eyes. He was in Toad Town, and, by the Star Spirits, the people looked positivly happy.
The Toads were running around the Town Square, laughing and shouting cries of jubilation. "Hey guys, we don't need this anymore!" cried a red-capped Toad gleefully, tearing a Koopa Empire banner in two.
"Who ever thought we'd under up heroes after all these years?" half-sobbed a middle-aged brown-capped Toad, who was sitting on a moss-covered piece of destroyed tank, sharing a Chuckola Cola with his green-capped friend. "Did you see what I did to that Koopa? Did yah?"
"Hey, don't go bloating your Mushroom cap like that, Toadafrey!" the green Toad chuckled. "Wish I could've got a video of my beat-down of that old Shy Guy who used to collect our taxes! That punch was twenty years in the making!"
"Jim, things are going to be real nice now, just you wait and see." said a blue-capped mother Toad with a child who looked about six or seven, walking down the street past Luigi. "You won't have to stay off the streets and keep away from the bad guys anymore! It'll be just like when I was a little girl!"
"Yippee!" the little Toad shrieked, leaping into the air with joy.
Luigi smiled as he looked up at the sky. It was a perfect canvass of stars and he could just make out the constellations of the Great Fire Flower and Starlit Bob-omb. "Feels like I've gone back in time." he reflected. "Just a couple hours of Koopa troop defeat and Toad Town finally feels like Toad Town again!"
"Hey, watch it with that thing, Toadbert!" came the voice of Billy, somewhere to Luigi's left. He turned to see the two Toads struggling to move a picnic bench into the square.
"By boggity, this thing is heavy!" Toadbert exclaimed as he set it down. Banktoad ran up, carrying a basket of food and a crate of drinks.
"All right, that's the first one taken came of!" he exclaimed, putting the food down. "Toadette's getting a crew together to deal with the rest. This place is going to become the hub of the party!"
"Yeah!" Billy exclaimed, leaping into the air gleefully before glancing around in confusion. "Hey, where's Mailtoad? I haven't seen him since we finished locking those creeps up in the castle dungeons!"
Banktoad chuckled. "Oh, he'll come around." he replied mysteriously. "Give him time. He's rigging up a huge surprise for all of us."
"Oh, gee, I can't wait!" Billy replied, his large blue eyes widening. Toadbert shook his head.
"This is going to be a long night." he sighed. "I'm getting too old for this."
As Luigi watched, more and more Toads came pouring in, bringing picnic benches, food, and drinks, and while speaking excitedly of the future and reminicing fondly about the best. One toad turned on his C-d player, and the upbeat tunes of "Break Free", a song sung by Pauline about Mario and Bowser's battle on the moon, became echoing around Toad Town. A gang of youths began to sing in off-key voices, and one especially excited young Toad began twirling his girlfriend around the square, both of them grinning even to the limits of their round faces. Luigi continued to watch the people, although he neglected to go in and socialize. "Mario..." he thought. "If...if only you could see this..." Then something dawned on him, something he knew he should have realized before but had long forgetten due to the former tedium of his life. "Today's September 13!" he realized, standing up in shock. "Today's your anneversary, bro!" tears welled up in Luigi's eyes as he gazed around the well-lit town square, watching the people laughing and celebrating with each other. For the first time since that day, Toad Town was actually celebrating. It...it was just...
"Hey, green guy." came a voice from behind Luigi. Luigi turned around to see Cobal, who was coming up to him dressed in a leather jacket. His face was, although perhaps more restrained then the naturally cheerful Toads, obviously in better spirits then when they had first met. "This cool or what?"
"Y...yeah, Cobal!" Luigi replied, turning around and clapping him on the shoulder. "It's very cool!" Luigi studied Cobal, who was gazing at the festivities with curiosity and maybe even a little bit of awe. This young reptile here...this kid who had never even had the chance to hear a news broadcast proclaiming yet another rescue of the princess by Mario, had been the one to set him on the right track...to have hope when he had none. The kid had spirit, Luigi realized...the kind of spirit that Mario had had. He thought nothing of making an enemy of a military superpower that controlled the world...whether he ought to or not. That kind of pure, reckless courage wasn't the kind of thing you found in an everyday individual. "I can't let this go to waste!" Luigi promised himself. "Somehow, I gotta help this guy! We're going to see this to the end, even if we have to face Bowser's entire army!" he shuddered at the thought, but surpressed his fear. It hadn't done him any good the last few years, and it sure wouldn't do him any good here.
"Hey, Big L." Cobal said, tapping Luigi's arm and pointing at some of the tables. "Want to go get some snacks? You deserve it more then any of us. There's this absolutely ancient old granny...think her name is Tayce T...who's cooked up some crazy-smelling things. At least twice as good as the stuff Toadbert makes."
"Tayce T?" Luigi exclaimed in excitment, recalling the old baker who his brother had been very fond of. "She's still alive?"
"She ain't too pretty, but yeah, she's stirring that batter faster then an airship propeller. Don't know where she finds the strength to do it."
"Mama Mia!" Luigi sighed, catching a whiff of the delicious smell of freshly-baked pastry coming from one of the tables. "Let's-a-go!"
Scarcly a minute had past before Luigi and Cobal were devouring some delicious, chewy cookies freshly baked by Tayce T's oven, sitting together on one of the picnic benches with a bottle of Chuckola Cola each. As Luigi sipped the cool soda as he relaxed in the flickering light of the bonfire some of the Toads had recently lit (if you were going to burn the Bowser flags, you might as well get some use out of them), he had appreciate just how good it was. The watered-down stuff didn't cut it at all; this was Boom Boom's private stash from the castle kitchens. Luigi looked up as Toadette suddenly sat herself down in front of them, a big smile on her face and a bottle of the same cola in her right hand.
"Isn't this great, Luigi?" she asked, gazing around the town square. By now, the speakers were blaring out a boppy little tune that people always associated with Mario for some reason, and the Toads were dancing around to the beat of the music. "It feels just like how things were before Bowser messed everything up!"
"It's his anniversary, you know." Luigi put in with a warm smile, glancing up at the full moon which was shining above them, filling the sky with light. "I bet he's real happy to see us like this...him and the Princess, if she's dead too."
"Yeah, none of us know what happened to old Princess Peach." Cobal put in, taking another swig of his soda. "Maybe the Emperor's got her locked up in one of his castles just like he used to do."
"Well, if he has, we'll rescue her!" Luigi vowed, his grip tightening around his bottle as he thought of all the trials kind, sweet Princess Peach could have been undergoing in this Koopa-dominated world. "We'll...we'll make Bowser regret everything he's ever done!"
"That's pretty feisty for you, huh, Luigi?" Toadette smiled mischievously. "Shouldn't you be curled up in a ball and crying right now?"
"I've done enough of that for twenty years!" he replied, shaking his head. "It's-a me time!"
Toadette turned back to the castle, which was faintly shiloetted in the moonlight. The Koopas hadn't done a good job at maintaining it's electricity. While it was still just as beat-up as it had been since the day Bowser took over the Mushroom Kingdom, the atmosphere around the town was so happy that Luigi could almost imagine it was the shining, perfect, and beautiful home of the Princess once again. "Mailtoad should be almost done..." she mused to herself, eyeing the castle curiously. "Yes...it should be any minute now..." suddenly, a red light shot from the castle's highest tower. It traveled higher and higher into the sky, as Luigi, Cobal, and the other celebrators in Toad Town stopped what they were doing and began to follow the strange object's path into the sky. When it reached a certain hight, it exploded into a brilliant red firework pattern depicting none other the face of Luigi's dear brother. A second after the face of Mario faded away, a green firework shot up before exploding into the face of Luigi, which was followed by a pink one of Peach and a brighter green one of Yoshi. After that there, there were countless colorful fireballs coming out of the castle, many at once, blooming into mushrooms, stars, Fire Flowers, and more objects that everybody associated with the Mushroom Kingdom and the Mario brothers. Luigi just couldn't tear his eyes away from them. These were the same fireworks they always had at the end of their tennis or karting championships...but nobody in the kingdom had laid eyes on them since Bowser's conquest. Seeing them again after all these years was getting him all choked up!
There was the sound of footsteps approaching, and Mailtoad ran up, looking out of breath. Luigi could see that he'd just ran the whole distance from Peach's Castle to their table in the town square without even stopping once. "All righty, that went well!" he exclaimed, in between his rapid pants. "Can't believe that old firework launcher still works! I don't think those goons touched it once!"
"Mailtoad, that was beautiful!" came the sobbing voice of Toadbert from the table nearby. He had taken off his road spectacles and was more or less freely sobbing. "A...a true work of art!"
"Hey, all I did was stuff some dusty old fireworks in a machine and shoot them." he replied, blushing in embarrassment.
"Hey, don't be so modest!" Toadette smiled, clapping him on the back. Above them, the fireworks continued to go off, lighting up the whole night sky with rainbow-coloured explosions of light. "It really completes the mood, Mailtoad! Everybody appreciates your well-spent time!"
"So this is what the Mushroom Kingdom's supposed to be like." Cobal breathed in awe, as he gazed up at the fireworks, unable to take his eyes off the spectacle.
"This does it!" Billy exclaimed, standing up proudly to the astonishment of Toadbert and Banktoad, who were still beside him. "I'm tired of being the coward who just sleeps on the job! I don't ever want the Koopas to oppress anyone, ever again! I'm going to be like you, Mario!" he screamed into the sky, as a massive firework of Mario doing the thumbs-up exploded in the air.
"Mario." Luigi sighed, looking around the plaza, tinted orange by the flames of the bonfire and full of celebrating people, to the fireworks booming above the castle with tears in his eyes. "I swear...I'm going to bring this kind of happiness to the rest of the Mushroom Kingdom!"