"Larry..."
But I am too faint to stop him.
The patient is shrouded in the lacy curtains of a King-sized canopy bed. A giant television is softly blaring the coverage of some Mushroom Kingdom sports game. The nightstand is covered with a Fire Flower bouquet and various medicine containers. RoBootussin and codeine syrup and the foil of punched-out antihistamine tablets and a prescription bottle of Shroomicillin, which is sheer idiocy on the doctors' part, as antibiotics are absolutely useless against viral infections. But in a hospital where root canals are gouged out with bloody and unsterilized instruments, why should I be surprised...
Larry crawls under the canopy, and I can see the bump of his shell rise up behind it as he climbs up onto the bed. What am I supposed to do now... well, I suppose it is only proper that I hear out His Majesty's last words. Any good King would do the same, would they not? I would presume, but I am still very new to this role...
I pull back the canopy and leap unto the comforter. The heavy curtains fall shut behind me, blocking all light sources from the interior. I reach out to the nightstand to grab a Fire Flower. This bouquet includes both the blue ones that grow in the Mushroom Kingdom and the orange, tulip-shaped variety that is endemic to Dinosaur Land. The one I hold is a blue one, which glows just brightly enough to see Larry's face as well as the lump of His Royal Carcass beneath the quilt.
I am standing on it.
I feel the mound rising beneath my feet as the soon-to-be-fallen King takes a deep, labored breath, almost a snore.
"My... my sons... Roy? Morton?"
"No, Bowser." I pace up to his chest and hold the flower over his face. Even in the dim blue Fire Flower light I can see the signs of illness in his face; the sunkenness, the pallor, the sores on his cheeks, the inflammation near his nose and eyeballs and lymph nodes. I reel at his breath, which assaults my olfactory with the cadaver-stench molecules being formed by the putrefying noma that is just beginning to rankle in the soft tissues of his face. I rescind my previous sentiment about the Shroomicillin.
I put my claws to his puffy eyelids and pull them open. They are swollen and pink with infectious conjunctivitis, rolling dazed in their sockets. He is still conscious, just barely, barely conscious...
"It is I, Prince Ludwig von Koopa the First. The Crown Prince. Your eldest issue. Your Heir."
"Ludwig..." He groans and twists his neck in agony, more, it seems, at the memories and thoughts dredged up by that name than at the physical discomfort of the lymphatic swellings in his neck.
I scramble as Bowser rolls over to his side. Larry stumbles and falls off the edge of the bed. I help him up as he climbs up the quilt he had caught on the side after falling over.
"My son... my firstborn..." he mutters, his voice distant, almost practically talking in his sleep. "He... I... I wanted my first born to be the... the King I never was... the King I was never meant to be..."
Well, he certainly got his wish. Hearing him speak of me in third-person feels a little like eavesdropping, but I continue to listen.
"I... I made quite a mess. My own parents were hardly ever in my life. I had to rule at a very young age... Too, too young... when I finally started to grow up a bit, the once-glorious kingdom of Dark Land had become... a glorious nothing..."
I see. He had never gotten around to telling me that story...
"As I said I... I had finally decided to grow up some and... and settle down, and start a family. A great big happy harem, as is Koopa family tradition..."
A tradition that he as absolute ruler had the power to abolish, but did not. And he is now paying for it, ever so dearly...
"But... but the first born... the heir... I wanted to make sure to do it right. I even asked Kamek to use his hocus-pocus... that woo to find me the right one... and she... she took off with my firstborn... but I allowed it. I allowed it because that for the time being was best for the Prince, best for the kingdom."
I gasp a little, shocked. Just a little. Or maybe a lot...
"I... I couldn't just leave my first son over there in the land of frilly pants and powdered wigs and pianos forever... the Crown Prince of Dark Land must be raised in Dark Land, to know Dark Land tradition and laws from an early age. I fought and I fought to have my son back... and I got him back."
My eyes narrow in resentment. My breath is tense and coming out in snorts. "Go on," I mutter, despite knowing that he is too far gone on sedative medications to respond.
"I was overjoyed to have my eldest son living here in the castle with me and his brothers and sisters. But he... he just didn't seem happy. He was miserable all the time. All he wanted was to lock himself in his room and make frilly pants music all day. He didn't get along with his siblings... he... I tried everything... I took him to the damn shrink... I made him go out and play with his siblings... I even ordered Kamek to fill the Castle library with the kinds of books he likes since he knows better about that kind of academical stuff than I..."
Oh, so he... noticed. Well, it was more than obvious how miserable I have been, but I had not quite given him even that much credit.
Bowser releases a heavy, phlegm-choked sigh. "I think he never really even saw me as a father. I guess I couldn't blame him for missing his mother. I should've... should've taken Kamek's advice... should've gotten to know my son better. Should've gotten to know all my kids better. The youngest one... Larry..."
Larry runs across the covers to meet his father's diseased face. "Here I am King Daddy!"
Bowser raises his eyelids some. "Larry? Is that you? You're..."
Larry nods. The corners of Bowser's gangrenous snout rise, as best as he can manage, into a smile. His eyes say it all... that at this moment he is, in spite of it all, overwhelmed by joy and gratitude to see his youngest son walking and talking, a moment that he had surely up until now been certain that neither he nor Larry would live to experience.
Bowser's face suddenly twists into a grimace, and he roars, shallowly and wheezily, in agony. His face falls to the side, and the air remaining in his lungs sighs out in a gentle gust.
I blink. Several seconds pass. No palpable pulse or exertion of breath.
Larry tugs at his father's face. "King Daddy? You're gonna be all right! Wake up! King... Daddy? Pappa?"
Quite calmly, I wonder... if this is... it?
I jump, my feet alarmed by a sensation from beneath the quilt. A heart beat.
Bowser yawns, and, not without much tossing, turns over onto his back.
"My... fault... I blamed the wives... but I am the King after all so everything... I shoulder the blame for everything..."
Yes, everything IS your fault. I nod with satisfaction. Finally he admits it.
"I... I really don't deserve... but I... all the things I'll never get to do with him... I will never get to take him on an airship cruise... never get to camp out together, never get to go conquer other kingdoms together... his birthday is soon. I won't get to see the look on his face when he sees what I got him..."
Bowser's voice is choked with fresh grief at that last part. "I never even heard Ludwig say 'I love you'"...
"I love you King Daddy!" Larry hugs and nuzzles his cheek.
I... have nothing to say to him... he has, after all, done nothing to earn my respect or affection. Perhaps he very sincerely tried, but his efforts were an abysmal failure, and in my book, effort deserves no marks until it produces results. The compassionate thing to do, at the very least, would be to pat his head and tell him that it is not his fault, but that would be an egregious lie.
"All the things you don't realize until it is too late..."
Indeed. So it is true then; that when one is dying, one's words become steeped in the well of infinite wisdom, as has been portrayed in every deathbed scene of every play, movie or novel I have ever watched or read. He is speaking not to me, but to the being of the light at the end...
Sweet Larry, blissful in his infantile ignorance, patting and stroking Bowser, seemingly unbothered by his death odor, to assure him that he will recover. "You will get well soon King Daddy just like I did! We have come to make you all better!"
Larry looks up at me, smiling, his eyes wide and trusting, sparkling even in the Fire Flower's dull glow. At this age, he will follow me everywhere, and, even when I am brandishing needles at him, he will trust me with his life. He has not the slightest inkling that saving his father's life is , and has been since our arrival at this hospital, the furthest from my intentions.
We came here to save his mother. Ideally both parents, or that is the way that he would have it anyway; I have no problem whatsoever with allowing his female parent to remain alive, but it just so happens that the father's impending death is a very serendipitous event in my favor, and my number-one mission objective is to stand by and allow it to happen.
There is no use in denying that to myself for any longer.
Admittedly, my hopes that Amanda would be present at this hospital were all wishful thinking. She may already be buried for all I know. I cannot be blamed in the slightest for failing to save her though, as she has even taken great pains to make herself unavailable. Bowser, on the other hand, is not going anywhere. It would even be a lie to dismiss him as a lost cause at this point, being the very capable genius that I am, and have proven to be time and time again.
I withdraw my arms into my shell and pull out the dental syringe in one hand, and the vial of antiviral nanobots in the other. If these could deliver Larry from the brink of death, then by withholding them from Bowser, I may as well be driving a gates glidden into his heart.
Larry is cognitively developed enough to remember this event. Given time, he will wonder, and in due time he will know. Is it worthwhile to shatter the trust I have so carefully cultivated in him, so rightfully earned? This innocence will not last forever. Heartbroken at a tender age, he may grow into a treacherous backstabber, bent on seeing to it that I pay for this.
Oh, but I could easily, so very easily nip that in the bud. Even right now. My claws tighten around the syringe. I could very indelicately drive this needle into the wrong blood vessel, push the air through it hard enough to inflict an embolism, and watch as Larry convulses, the spreading hæmatoma blackening his skin, on his way down to his final resting spot at the morgue on the bottom floor. Easy as Apfelstrudel. There is nothing to stop me from doing just that.
And yet, there is...
I could have very easily elected to withhold the use of my genius and allowed Larry to die of the illness he was born with. I could have done away with the entire wretched family - children, wives and all. Roy got lucky, but I could have been craftier and come up with a plot to not only poison them all, but ensure that Kamek would be convinced beyond reasonable doubt that it was his own doing.
And yet, I had not.
But why not? Have I not foregone the more sensible and rewarding route? What is it that is standing in my way?
Almost as if to answer, my mind drifts into reminiscing a particular moment back when I was living with my family in Wien, when I was having a discussion with Mutter. It is as if I am right there again... white walls, white carpet, white upholstery; tall bright windows with a view of the cobblestones and lampposts of our gated community on the outside; the smell of Kaffee brewing, desserts baking, and rosy potpourri in a crystal bowl shaped like a swan on the glass coffee table. I generally try to repress these flashbacks, as the word "nostalgia" has an "-algia" in it for a reason - the nostalgia comes in a wave that nearly takes my breath away.
"Mutter, when is Onkel going to be back?" I asked, pulling a monogrammed handkerchief out of the pocket of the itchy and stuffy but very fetching suit that Mutter made wear.
"He will be back, mein Liebe, he just needs to... spend a little time at the hospital to get better." She was stroking my hair as I sat in her lap on the sofa. "His brain is just a little more sick than usual right now, and it's a little more at the moment than we here at home can handle."
That Onkel was ill in the head at that time was obvious; he had nearly set the house on fire over a disagreement he had been having with the piano, which his paranoid mind often casts as an animate object.
"Mutter... why is it that I suspect that one of these days, you and Großvater and Großmutter are going to send him there to stay and never bring him back?"
"Oh Ludwig, just because they sometimes threaten to lock him up there for good does not mean they mean it. While it would be more... convenient for us if we did not have to deal with Onkel's... quirks, that would not be a very good deal for Onkel, now, would it? What do you think he would do if he had to live at a hospital forever and had no freedom, no laboratory of his own, no outlet for his brilliant mind, no friends, no family to care about him?"
"He would... I think his brain-sickness would become even worse."
"That's right. He is part of our Familie, and we love him very much, and he loves us very much. We would never abandon him or make him leave unless it was in his very best interest. If we had to let go of a member of our family, it would not be because that was what I wanted... it would be one of the hardest decisions I would ever have to make."
I vividly recall her playing with my hand at that moment, squeezing it firmly, rubbing her thumb over the back, entwining her fingers in mine, resisting my subtle efforts to pull free...
And then this bittersweet daydream comes to an end. It is all somewhat clearer now. Could it be that I actually feel something... something akin to... love for these Hell-spawned relatives?
The children are still young, and very malleable. They can grow into loving family members if they are brought up well, as I had been. At least while under my Mutter's care. I am still young as well, her rearing has not been completely undone yet, as will happen if Bowser continues to be the lord of our dysfunctional home. It is too late for him. He is ill-mannered, ill-educated, and inept as a parent, as a ruler, as a husband, and as a reptilian being.
But he is still capable of love. He may have done nothing to deserve mine, but come to think of it, neither have I done anything to deserve his. And yet he loved me before my egg was even laid. He had even exercised some restraint in choosing the mother of his heir - there was certainly no finer candidate than my own...
Your father really does love you, you know. He loves you much more than you will ever know... The non-voice of meaning in my mind echoes this, but it does not sound like my own... it must be Kamek's. It does seem like something he would say, one of the many things he would say after I have stopped paying attention.
"Ludwig?" Larry snaps me out of my mental soliloquy, gently tugging at my fingers.
I take a deep breath. I am truly of unsound mind for doing what I am about to do...
The syringe could use further sterilization, just to be on the safe side. I pick up the Fire Flower, hold the needle in front of it, and blow into the flower. Unlike a normal fire, a Fire Flower will flare up more instead of less when carbon dioxide is blown into it, due to a catalytic reaction that favors the reduction of excess concentrations of carbon dioxide by the magnesium in the Fire Flower's unique species of chlorophyll molecules - in philistine-speak, it burns on carbon dioxide instead of oxygen. The fire heats the needle almost to a glowing red.
I uncork the vial of nanobot fluid and place the syringe in to fill it up, every last drop. I cover my nose and draw closer.
In case I fail - I won't, and it will not register in his mind anyway - I lean in to his ear and whisper, almost hesitant, but by now, after much reasoning, almost certain of the sincerity of this statement:
"I... love you... King Dad."
I scrutinize his features, searching for an ideal spot to insert the needle; safe, yet amply circulated. I sigh, knowing that I will regret doing this time and time again, His Majesty will make sure of it.
But not as dearly as I would regret not doing this.
