"You have got to be kidding me" the Princess said flatly.
"No, I'm serious; everyone on the island is in the Pianta Syndicate!" Frankie Pianta tried to explain desperately, though with as quiet a voice as possible. He, Peach, and his wife Francesca had gone to a café nearby to try and explain how the island worked to Peach, but she simply did not believe them.
"The whole system is corrupt; the president, the cops, and especially the judge. Why do think no one goes to jail here? It's because everyone just bribes their way out!" Frankie said.
Peach just rolled her eyes incredulously in response. "Alright, let's just say everyone here is part of your 'Syndicate'" she said, using air quotes to emphasize the word 'syndicate'. "Then why aren't they open about being criminals? If everyone's an outlaw, then who is going to turn you in?"
Frankie shrugged and said "Tourism, mostly".
"That's it?" Peach asked, still not believing any of this.
"Would you have come here if you knew everyone was a crook?" asked Francesca. "Half this island wouldn't exist if it weren't for you flat-heads spending all your money here…no offense hun".
"Yeah, but it's not just that though" continued Frankie. "We're two of the only people who know that everyone's in the syndicate; everyone else thinks just like you do; 'There's no way everyone is in the Syndicate'".
Peach's eyes were still rolling like grapes in a tumble-drier; she was quickly growing tired of these two insulting her intelligence. "I'm sorry, but I think I should be going now" she said, standing up from her seat.
"Wait, I'll prove it to you!" Frankie said. "Pick anyone here, absolutely anyone, and I can get them to do a hit".
Peach decided to play his little game; after today, she could use a good laugh. She began looking through the passing pedestrians, trying to find a suitable candidate. "The old woman?" she thought. "No, too obvious. The big guy? Nah. The workers over there? Oh, I know!"
"Excuse me, miss!" Peach called out to a pregnant, blue haired Pianta woman, who was walking through the streets with two small boys. "Could you please come over here for a second?"
The Pianta woman told the two blue haired boys, who were presumably her sons, to stay where they were before walking up to Princess Peach. "Is there something I can help you with?" she asked, a bright smile on her face.
"Yeah," Frankie said quietly, "I need you to 'take care of someone' for me".
"Okay Don; would you like the 'ole concrete shoes, or do they need to be made an example?" she asked quietly, her sweet mood not at all hampered.
Peach's mouth was agape, unsure of what to say next. She looked back over towards Frankie, but he just stared back behind his boxy sunglasses with a grin a mile wide on her face.
"You know what? I changed my mind" Frankie said, once again addressing the pregnant Pianta. "You just get your little coconuts home, alright? Wouldn't want them getting caught up in something illegal, now would we?"
"Yeah, I'm going to try to make sure my boys don't end up like me" she said, looking down for a moment. "Call me if you change your mind though" she added just before leaving.
"Wanna pick someone else? We can do this all night if we have to" Fankie asked.
"No, I think you made your point" said Peach, her faith in sentient life severely shaken. "But what does all this have to do with Mario?"
"I told you; the judge is corrupt!" said Frankie.
"We think someone bribed the judge to keep Mario in the slammer, and we want to help get him out" added Francesca.
Peach's eyes suddenly brightened up. "Really?" she asked. "Thank you so much; I didn't know what I was going to do if I couldn't get Mario out of jail".
As quickly as it brightened up though, Peach's expression suddenly rotted. "Wait" she said. "Why are you doing this? I'm not going to have to do any 'favors' for you in the future, do I?"
"No, no, not at all" said Francesca. "If it wasn't for your pal Mario, me and Frankie here wouldn't even be together". She emphasized this by leaning over and giving her husband a loud kiss on the cheek, which caused Frankie to blush like a tomato.
"Y-yeah, we owe the guy" said Frankie, trying to maintain his composure. "And I am nothing if not a loyal back-stabbing crook".
"Okay" said Peach. "What do I need to do?"
"Just show up at the courthouse tomorrow morning, and we'll take care of the rest" said Frankie.
With that, they each got up from their table and parted ways, Peach heading back to her hotel, and the Piantas heading back to wherever they came from. Just before Peach got out of earshot though, one of them suddenly called out to Peach.
"Oh yeah," yelled Francesca. "Don't forget to bring some coins!"
F.L.U.D.D.'s cameras restarted, its motors started turning, and its processors all started running to indicate that it was a new day in Ricco Harbor. The robot was currently plugged into an outlet in one of the cabins on Captain Elmo's handysize, The Nautical, after losing most of its power running around yesterday.
Captain Elmo had insisted on having F.L.U.D.D. stay the night aboard his ship, but the android did not have much choice in the matter; most of the harbor was still out of power because of Gooper Blooper, so it did not have much elsewhere to go.
F.L.U.D.D. walked out into the halls, where it had to be careful not to be stepped on by any of the burly sailors going about their day.
"Excuse me" it said as it walked through the cramped halls towards the captain's quarters, many sailors bumping carelessly into the robot as it squeezed its way through. By the time it made it to Elmo's room, F.L.U.D.D. was practically covered in sailor sweat, and strongly resisting the urge not to hose itself down right there in captain's quarters.
"How do organics deal with this stuff?" F.L.U.D.D. wondered as it shut the door behind it.
"Ahh, my boy, good to see you!" said Captain Elmo, looking up momentarily from his substantial cheese omelet. "What's first on the adventure schedule today?"
"Well, firstly, we need to track down the man responsible for clogging the harbor these past few weeks" said F.L.U.D.D. "Do you know where that might be?"
"Maybe, um…" the captain paused for a few seconds to finish swallowing his food, which caused F.L.U.D.D.'s motors to seize in disgust. "Maybe he has something to do with that new spill that appeared in the harbor last night".
"New spill?" F.L.U.D.D. asked. "Where?"
"Eh, one of the old sewer tunnels from underneath the city district started spewing out more of that gunk last night" he said before taking another bite. "It hasn't reached this part of the harbor yet, but it looks like things are going business as usual soon enough".
F.L.U.D.D. ran outside to get a better look and, sure enough, the whole harbor around the city district was once again covered in in a layer of oil graffiti.
"This isn't good" thought F.L.U.D.D. "Swimming over there would require too much energy, and the graffiti would likely clog my gears if I tried".
It wasn't long before Captain Elmo stepped out on deck behind the robot, giving F.L.U.D.D. the chance to ask for help. "Do you know of any way I can reach those tunnels?" it asked.
"Sadly, no. My boat took enough damage getting here yesterday, and the old sewer system has been closed off for years now; turns out dumping your sewage into the harbor isn't exactly great for tourism. Shocking, I know".
F.L.U.D.D. continued to scan the area for any way to reach the sewer, but to no avail. F.L.U.D.D. refused to stop looking though; it could not just let the harbor be clogged up again though, not after all the effort it put into cleaning it yesterday. Eventually, F.L.U.D.D. spotted something else out of the ordinary, but not in the direction of the town.
"Big Daddy's Blooper Surfing Safari?" F.L.U.D.D. said as it read the colorful sign out loud. The sign depicted a smiling Pianta man with orange hair giving a thumbs up next to a row of three water-spewing, multicolored squid creatures, one pink, one green, and one yellow, flying past him like water powered rockets.
"He's back already?" asked Elmo, a confused look on his face. "You'd think after what happened that no one would want to go blooper surfing".
F.L.U.D.D.'s processors then almost audibly clicked as the robot realized how it could reach the pipe, and it immediately leapt off the deck towards the warehouse docks and Big Daddy's sign.
"Hey, wait for me!" Captain Elmo called behind it.
Standing there at the end of the dock, next to all the brightly colored squid creatures, was the man from the billboard, wearing a casual blue shirt and a small straw hat. He couldn't help but smile widely when he saw F.L.U.D.D. running towards him with its eyes on the bloopers.
"Whoa there kid, slow down" he said. "How can I help you?"
"Can these creatures efficiently traverse oil and goo as they can water?" asked F.L.U.D.D.
"Why sure they can!" said Big Daddy. He wasn't actually sure, but he'd say anything to sell something to a costumer. "Bloopers are practically half goo anyways, they'll have no problem".
"Good, I shall take one" said F.L.U.D.D.
"Alright; that will be sixty coins per one full day rental, and Big Daddy's Blooper Surfing Safari (TM) takes no responsibility for any injuries that may occur while using our product" Big Daddy said as quickly as he could.
F.L.U.D.D. once again found itself regretting not carrying any coins on him, but that problem was quickly solved the arrival of a panting Captain Elmo. "Make that two surfing bloopers" he said, taking out his wallet and passing the one hundred twenty coins needed. "Thank you; with these bloopers, the Elmo Adventure Team (TM) will insure that Ricco Harbor will be safe for residents to live in yet again. Onwards!"
With that, he took a step out onto a pink blooper, which immediately sped off and collided into a nearby concrete pillar, with the captain still on riding on its back. Bid Daddy chuckled nervously, and said to F.L.U.D.D. "I recommend the yellow models for beginners; much easier to control".
"Thank you" F.L.U.D.D. before stepping into its blooper and rocketing off into the harbor. The blooper was very hard to control at first, with its tentacles flailing everywhere and high speed acceleration making it hard to steer, but eventually F.L.U.D.D. realized it worked fine as long as the robot kept its center of gravity low.
When the moment of truth came and F.L.U.D.D. reached the edge of the oil graffiti film, the blooper kept moving through the water as if the goo wasn't there at all, which relieved F.L.U.D.D. immensely. As much as it would hate to admit it, the robot did not calculate any back up plans in case this one failed.
That relief did not last long, however, as soon F.L.U.D.D. found itself hurtling through the dark tunnels under the city district with nothing but its small flashlight to guide the way. It didn't take F.L.U.D.D. long to hit something and catapult itself forward, landing in a pile of oily goo and long dried sewage. The android quickly stood up and tried to wash itself off, though the oil graffiti was still resisting its sprays.
F.L.U.D.D. honestly couldn't figure out which of the two substances was more disgusting, but ended up deciding it was best just to not think about it. Although the tunnels were quite labyrinthine, it was not very hard for F.L.U.D.D. to find the goop generator; all it had to do was follow the flow of graffiti back to its source, much like how a farmer finds rotten eggs by tracing their scent. It didn't want to follow the trail, but knew it had to before things got any worse.
Sitting there at the end of the tunnel was a goop generator much like the one F.L.U.D.D. found in the hot springs of Bianco Hills, but the robot wasn't going to make the same mistake as it did then by firing at it as soon as it came into view. Instead, it locked onto the generator with its targeting software and then turned off its cameras before shooting its squirt nozzle at the amorphous blob. As predicted, a Shine Sprite blossomed from the goop generator and filled the tight tunnels with a blinding amount of light.
The robot couldn't help but move its plastic lips upward as it watched the Shine Sprite speed through the tunnels to rejoin its siblings in Delfino Plaza, but that quickly faded as well when F.L.U.D.D. realized it no longer had a way to get itself out of the tunnels.
"Oh Gadd" the robot said out loud before heading in the direction it thought the Shine Sprite went. "I'm going to be here a while".