Author's Note: This is an important chapter, because it introduces the power that will serve as Luigi's 'weapon' in the rest of the story (no Poltergust 3000, because the ghosts aren't enemies).

Also, I have changed this story's main characters to Luigi and Waluigi (instead of Luigi and King Boo).

Enjoy!


Chapter 11: Lunar

The storm had stopped.

To me, it felt like the world had ended. The crashing thunder, lightning, and howling wind were followed by this eerie silence... it was like everything had stopped, ceased moving, and there was nothing left to see or hear. It had taken a full hour for the worst of the storm to subside, and another hour for the downpour of rain to run dry. Although it had all ended, there were still many things left to remind me that the bad weather had caused considerable damage; sweeping through the dead forest, overturning trees by the dozen, knocking nearly all the tiles off the eastern side of the mansion's roof. It was impossible to forget the immense power of the thunderstorm when I saw the amount of harm caused by its ice-cold fury.

My mind was still buzzing with innumerable questions after my strange encounter with Waluigi earlier in the day, and I didn't even understand the questions well enough to know the answers. My cousin had saved me – and undoubtedly Jak too, yet I knew he still harboured many bad feelings for me. It wasn't for no reason that he had tormented Mario and I throughout our lives, but my recent meeting with him had allowed me to see past my hatred, wondering whether he was truly an evil person or not. And I couldn't forget the look in his eyes when he glared at me – the darkness, bitterness, unreadable emotion that seemed almost like desperation. There was something about the way he spoke that made me think he might not hate me as much as I had assumed.

But I couldn't trust him. I would never be able to. Despite being related, we had never shown the slightest amount of affection towards each other, and I had grown up with both Waluigi and Wario nearby, thieving and bullying constantly. I had never understood what sparked the lifelong hatred between myself and the younger of my two cousins. I tried to ignore it; I fought it every day, always hoping that Waluigi would give up his endless rivalry with me, but my hopes were mostly in vain. The closest we ever came to being friends was during the Karting tournaments, in the rare moments when we had ridden together in the same kart. In those times I had come to trust Waluigi and respect him for his enormous racing skill, but those feelings were extinguished as soon as the tournament was over.

It had taken me several years to understand that my cousin didn't want anything to do with me, but I never found out what had started the hatred between us; it was dark, sinister, and beyond comprehension. The best I could do was ignore him and try to forget all the battles he had fought against me throughout our lives. And yet, despite the way he treated me and Mario, I still wished that we could act normally around each other, perhaps even be friends, but Waluigi's hatred made even the thinnest friendship impossible.

'... Luigi? Are you still there?' I heard Jak say from a long, long distance away.

'Wh-what?' I answered, too quickly, as I snapped out of my daydreaming and turned to face the enthusiastic young Toad, who was running across the corridor to greet me, his arms piled high with dusty parchment.

'I brought these,' he said breathlessly, staggering over to me and throwing the parchment at my feet; I bent to examine them, but they were all written in a language I didn't understand. I picked one of them up and lifted it to eye level, at which point I realised that they weren't written in a different language after all – the handwriting was simply so small and cramped that I could barely read the words. I frowned slightly at Jak over the top of the paper, but his expression hadn't changed from its normal cheerfulness.

'GameBoo Advance asked me to deliver them to you,' he explained, still panting a little from the effort of running with all that weight. 'He refused to tell me exactly what they were supposed to be for, but he mentioned... Wario.' I couldn't help but notice the he shuddered slightly on that last word, but I refrained from questioning him. I briefly wondered if he had ever actually met Wario, and had a real reason to be frightened of him. 'Anyway, make sure you read them, because apparently they're urgent.'

'Thanks, Jak,' I said gratefully, kneeling down so I could gather up the rest of the parchment in my arms; it looked like there were at least four sheets. Had GameBoo Advance written all of these himself, or was he sending them to me because they had important information on them, perhaps regarding my brother's continuing absence?

I quickly glanced out of the nearest window and saw the darkness of approaching night beginning to creep up against the outside of the mansion; in likelihood, I was imagining it, but I thought the nights were much longer than the days here. I turned back to Jak and asked him, 'Are you going to bed soon? It's getting late, and we'll probably have plenty of work to do tomorrow.'

The young Toad took my suggestion without complaining, and simply wished me good luck before retreating into his bedroom and gently shutting the door behind him, leaving me to stare after him in surprise. Why had he said that? Did he think I was going to be in any danger tonight? I didn't plan on doing anything besides reading these old papers... maybe he was suspicious that I would go and visit Waluigi again. I shook my head and, strolling absently back into my own room, sat on the edge of the off-white bedsheet and promptly buried my nose in the parchment.

There were three sheets, and one of them resembled a map of what looked like a large house or castle, while the others looked more like hastily scribbled messages. Lifting up the first one and tossing the others onto my pillow to read later, I began to work my way through the tiny black handwriting – which was far from easy, but I eventually managed to translate everything on the parchment. It was indeed a message, and although it had clearly been written in a great hurry, the script was still almost perfect – carved out in shiny black ink, the letters all sharp and spiky, reminding me of those dead trees outside the mansion.

Luigi -

I have to be quick because I don't think I have much time. I have discovered some old papers, and one of them is a map. A map of this mansion, in fact. I don't need to tell you where I found them, but I think they'll be useful to you. The map shows every room and corridor in this house, as well as the gardens and courtyard in the back and front.

Now look closely at the top-left corner of the map. You'll notice that there's a big room up there shaped like a crescent moon. I've never seen that room before, nor have any of the other ghosts visited it. All the years we've lived here and we never found it until now.

I've been doing some heavy research today and I discovered a lot of things that you might find interesting... very interesting indeed. Look at the other sheets of parchment, and you'll figure it out soon enough.

If you need me for anything, I'll be in the Observatory.

- GameBoo Advance

P.S. I also happen to know about your little... meeting with your cousin earlier, during that thunderstorm. I warned you to stay away from him, so don't come crying to me if anything bad happens because you've been talking to him. He can't be trusted.

I finished the message, but my eyes continued to stare at the last paragraph as though they were glued to it. There was something annoying about GameBoo Advance ordering me around and telling me what to do, but I didn't want to ignore his warnings in case they turned out to be real after all. I vividly remembered my small conversation with Waluigi a few hours ago, and various parts of it had become stuck in my mind: the sound of that heavy book landing in his hands, his sneering voice, the sinister, unreadable emotion I had seen clearly in his eyes as he glared at me from under the shadow of his cap.

GameBoo Advance's constant warnings, bordering on frantic, seemed almost disturbing in my thoughts. I had come up with several theories on why he mistrusted Waluigi so forcefully, so furiously, but I didn't have any evidence that they were true. I knew that Jak didn't like my cousin either, but his dislike was nowhere near as strong as the old ghost's. Perhaps Waluigi had been an enemy of GameBoo Advance's a long time ago, and now he was out for revenge. I decided not to worry about any of this yet, though. There was a good chance that I would find out the answer to all these questions eventually, but I didn't want to waste time wondering about them now.

Stretching out in a more comfortable position on the grimy bed, I grabbed the nearest sheet of parchment and quickly scanned it. It was handwritten, but the words were so small – even smaller than GameBoo Advance's – that it was almost impossible to read what they were supposed to say, even when I was so close that my nose was touching the parchment. Although it took me nearly half an hour, I eventually worked out the entire message, which I guessed had been torn out of some ancient book.

What I read was both exciting and terrifying, and the two feelings combined into a sort of thrill I had never experienced before.

The paper gave out a lot of information on a kind of magical 'power' I had not heard of until now. Something else that I took notice of was that way it repeatedly mentioned the Moon Phases, and the supposed magic they held. I learned that, for unknown reasons, the moon changes its phase more often in Forever Forest than it did anywhere else; in fact, it changed every few days. But that wasn't the only piece of information I discovered after squinting at the almost-indecipherable handwriting for a long time.

The Moon Powers. Ancient, strong and dangerous, potentially lethal when used by the wrong people, and highly magical. The more I learned about them, the more strange and sinister they appeared. I became deeply absorbed in the parchment, trying to read and understand everything, but I failed to comprehend even a small amount of information. But it was simply too much to take in at once.

The Moon Powers could be used by anyone, but their strength and effect varied depending on the current moon phase. They were most powerful during the Full Moon; least during the Waning Crescent. If they were used by someone with bad intentions, they often backfired and caused unspeakable destruction, to such an extent that they could reduce an entire town to blackened, smoking, lifeless ruins. And if they were used by someone who did not have the skill to control them properly, they often had unintended side-effects.

At first, the prospect of being able to use the Moon Powers was exciting and appealing, but after I had read everything about them, they seemed more menacing than my original thoughts of them had been. Much more.

The discovery of the Moon Powers opened up a hundred more questions inside my mind to accompany the old ones, and I couldn't honestly answer any of them. I had a wish to find out more about them, and at the same time, I didn't want to meddle with something that could very well be tremendously dangerous. I was torn between two desires, two hopes, two fears. I had two options left to me, and neither of them showed a clear path through the newfound darkness that I had stumbled upon.

I had learned much about these strange, supernatural powers. I knew that they had a wide variety of different effects which changed depending on the current moon phase, and that a skilled person could twist and shape the powers to do their bidding. For a moment, I imagined myself storming through Forever Forest without any fear of the darkness, following a trail of light that led straight towards my brother... I knew that finding other people was one of the stronger powers, among those that could only be used at the Full Moon. I stared at the pile of parchment lying on my pillow in front of me and tried to think properly about the situation.

So far, I hadn't had much luck with finding out what had happened to my missing brother. GameBoo Advance had given me vague hints, but even he didn't know for sure where Mario had gone. Waluigi had provided me with a few cryptic clues as well, despite the well-known fact that he hated me; he had always hated me as far as I knew. But even if nobody else knew where my brother was, I could find him easily... using the Moon Powers. Was that the reason GameBoo Advance had sent these old pages to me – to help me rescue my brother, in a way that might actually work?

It was a very long time before I had exhausted myself enough to sleep, the memory of the mysterious magic lurking at the edges of my dreams for the remainder of the night.