HEY PEOPLE. It's me, Fredperson. Why? Because Fredperson is funny to say. Blah, blah, blah, I don't own Mario, you know the drill. Now, if you'll kindly oblige, LET'S GET THIS SHOW ON THE ROAD.

:::::

Outside the hospital, the party all looked around. Mario had almost forgotten exactly where they were supposed to be going. After a few moments he remembered why they were here, and immediately after he suddenly became weak in the knees. Snow was going to be as impossible as ever, and fifteen more years on her wasn't going to help at all.

Then he suddenly wondered: she was going to be thirty now. Why would she still be a singer? He thought. Shaking his head to clear his mind, he beckoned for Goomessa and Koopetto to follow him as they went back the way they had come.

"Why are we going this way, Mario?" Goomessa asked.

"We need to talk to Mame again," Mario explained.

"Who?"

Mario remembered again that the Goombette wouldn't know Mame in this time period. "Mame is the freaky Koopa lady," Mario told her. Goomessa nodded.

"Why do we need to see her?" she then asked after a few moments.

"To find the Central Music Hall," Mario sighed.

"But why do we need to-" Goomessa began.

"Hey, Goomessa," Mario cut her off. "Here's an idea: shut up."

The Goombette was silent. Feeling guilty, Mario conceded. "We need to go to the Central Music Hall so we can meet our next friend. Understand?"

"Sure," Goomessa answered briefly.

They soon found Mame again, sitting on the ground with her arms crossed and staring at the ground. She looked up at their approach. "Oh, it's you again," she laughed with a touch of scorn in her voice. "What do you need?"

"We need directions to the Central Music Hall," Mario told her, reaching a hand out to help her up. Mame stared at him.

"Well, if you just go left from here, and then turn right…let's see, and then straight to the next left, two rights, and it should be there. I could be wrong though. You might want to ask-never mind."

"What were you going to say?" Mario asked her suspiciously.

"Nothing, really, it's nothing, I just have…" Mame trailed off, looking suddenly dazed and distant. "I have to see my-good night…" she stammered, turning and running off.

"Mame! Come-eh, forget it," Mario cut himself off.

"What is with her?" Koopetto asked nervously.

"I was about to say the same thing," Mario said quietly. "But we have the directions we need, so we should go."

So the party started off to the hall where Mame had directed them. Along the way, Goomessa kept insisting that Mario tell her why they were going there. Mario kept lightly skipping around the issue of Snow being their next partner. He wanted it to be a surprise.

So when the gang finally reached the hall, what happened was not at all what he had expected. There was a large crowd congregated around the doors of the hall. Mario was confused. "Excuse me, what's going on here?" he asked to a random person close to the party.

"The concert just ended," the person replied before turning back around.

Mario sighed. Now they'd never be able to find Snow. We'll have to wait until tomorrow, he decided.

But his thoughts were interrupted when he heard the clanking of a stepstool against the ground. He looked up to see Snow herself stepping up so she could be seen be everyone. Mario blinked at least fifteen times. She looked exactly as she had when the party had first met her. She had dyed her hair white again. She was also wearing a pink ring around her neck with a red lace hanging on the side, which she fiddled with as she accepted pictures and affection from her fans. "Whoa…" he whispered. "There she is," he said quietly to his partners.

But he snapped back to reality when Goomessa suddenly cried, "What! That's her? How?"

"But we'll never be able to get her attention," Mario sighed.

"I know how," Goomessa told him. She sounded almost angry. Mario stood there, confused, as the Goombette stormed up, pushing through the crowd, towards Snow. He then hastily followed her, worried about why she could be agitated and vaguely aware that Koopetto was coming too.

Snow was turned so that she could not see Goomessa. The latter jumped up and bit on the edge of the lace on the former's neck. Mario noticed that the ring was like a belt-as you pulled the lace, the ring closed. He suddenly realized what Goomessa was doing as the ring tightened around Snow's neck, choking her and pulling her off the stepstool.

What could only have been described as a deafening silence ensued throughout the crowd. Mario, stared, horrified, at Goomessa and Snow. Looking at Koopetto, he discovered that his partner wore the exact same expression. Some people in the crowd began to take pictures again. Snow blinked a few times before holding a hand up, telling them to stop. "WHAT WAS THAT?" she suddenly shrieked rabidly, ripping the ring off her neck, hopping back to her feet, and looking around for the culprit with a glare on her face. Her gaze suddenly stopped on Goomessa, who still held the lace in her mouth.

"Snow T. Oracle," Goomessa muttered.

"Goomessa Finch," Snow whispered threateningly.

There was a collective "Ooh!" that resonated through the crowd.

"Goomessa, what was that all about? Why did you try to kill her?" Mario cried. "I'm just going to take a guess and say you two don't like each other…but why? I mean…what's going on? I thought you would love-"

"We have a history," Goomessa answered, meeting Snow's glare. "It started with some press mishap that she decided to use as a way to pretend to get angry with me, and it's gone downhill from there."

"Leave it to Miss Quack Quack to make it my fault," Snow laughed. Then she looked back at Mario. "And, like, I don't mean to be impolite in any way, sir…but who the heck are you?"

"Yeah, real polite," Goomessa chuckled sarcastically. Mario silenced her with a stern look and looked back at Snow.

"If you want to know who I am, then all your fans will have to leave," he explained. "I know it seems rude, but this is really important."

"Okay, like, not happening," Snow answered angrily. "I don't know you guys, and what if-"

"Do it now!" Goomessa shouted. Snow winced.

"Fine," she conceded after a few moments. Then addressing the crowd, she continued. "I'm sorry people, and I've had a great time here, but I need to be alone for a while. I know it's sad, but please?"

Amongst quite a few growls and grumbles, her fans eventually dispersed. Snow wheeled around and glared at Mario. "Talk," she commanded.

"Okay, that's one thing," Mario told her, annoyed. "You can't just tell people what to do and think they'll obey you like little rats."

"Oh yes they will," Snow said matter-of-factly. "Because my dad has a silver mine and people who don't do what I say get to go there and never come out." Snow suddenly assumed a wide-eyed expression with a long grin.

"Snow!" Mario shouted. The Toadette snapped back to attention. "Anyway…I have to tell you a long story, and I really need you to listen."

"Uh, yeah. Like, no promises," Snow answered, filing her fingernails. "Whenever you're ready, moustache."

"Hate. Her," Goomessa whispered in Mario's ear. He glared at her again and she remained quiet as Mario began to tell Snow of the whole party's trials prior to and following Kat's switch in time. She seemed slightly interested through most of it, especially when Mario mentioned her ability to create fire and ice by singing. She even tried it out, gaining the awe of Goomessa and Koopetto.

"That's such a cool story," Snow giggled when he was finished. "I'm glad we don't have to go back to Lucifer's Isle, though, because that place is really dangerous at this point. Something like five years ago, some health freaks closed off the island for 'renovations'. But honestly I don't think they'll ever get done. That was an awesome story, though."

"Although…" Mario said, mostly to himself, "I wonder what it would have been like to see Levi."

Snow had heard him, however. In a sudden change of attitude, she sank to the ground and began to weep softly.

"What's wrong?" Mario asked, worried.

"Levi…I haven't thought about her in years," Snow wailed.

"What about her?" Mario persisted, confused.

"She hasn't talked to me in ten years," Snow told him. "I don't know how, but I guess I was never very nice to her. And now she hates me. It's not even fair. It's like she's waiting for me to apologize, but I could never face her, knowing that I'm just a jerk who…"

Mario tried to look sympathetic but wasn't sure if he was doing a good job. "Is that how everyone sees me?" Snow continued. "A jerk who gets everything she wants?"

"Took you that long?" Goomessa asked.

"I can do without the sarcasm," Snow sobbed. "I just never thought about it, and now that you mention my sister, I guess I've figured out why Daddy and Mother are always away."

"Always away?" Mario repeated.

"Levi raised me," Snow continued. "Actually, I kinda raised myself, because I never wanted Levi to. "Our parents were always either at meetings or business trips or at friends' houses in Paris and London and Bombay and India and Cairo…"

"Makes it a lot easier to feel sorry for you," Koopetto said expressionlessly.

"I just think it's cool that you're still singing," Mario voiced his thoughts from before. "Fifteen years down the road, I thought you might be on something else by now."

"Oh, she was," Goomessa laughed. "She was never able to hold on to anything."

"She's right," Snow sighed. "I gave up singing when I was nineteen to be an artist. But that wasn't much fun, and I wasn't very good anyway, so after two years, I went to law school…for, like, a year…And when I was twenty-two, I became a movie producer. After five years of that, I went back into music, and here I am."

"You've led a sad life, Snow," Mario commented sadly.

"Hey! That's-well, yeah," Snow agreed miserably.

"Who is this Levi person anyway?" Koopetto asked.

"She's…well, she's…I don't remember much about her," Snow admitted. "But Harriet does."

"Her name is Louisa," Mario reminded.

"You really are from a different time period!" Snow cried. "I keep thinking you're psychic or something!"

"I guess we should go then," Koopetto suggested.

"Good idea," Mario agreed. "Hey, does anyone know what time it is?"

"Six thirty," Snow replied, checking a diamond watch on her arm. "Why?"

"We need to get to Ferris Airlines," Mario explained. Snow looked disgustedly at him.

"I hate Ferris Airlines," she told him. "There's this freaky old Goomba who sleeps all the time. He weirds me out."

"Sorry," Mario said unsympathetically, "but we have to go to Ferris Sands."

"Well, I guess it's okay then." Snow shrugged as the party began to make the trek back to the pipe to Paratonis.

:::::

Back out of Ritzeltown, the gang started off towards what they thought might be Ferris Airlines until Mario remembered that he still had a map. Telling his partners to hold on for a second, he pulled the paper out and looked it over. Near the middle of the map was a little airplane symbol, next to which read "Ferris Airlines".

The party started off in the direction of the symbol from where they were currently standing at a community swimming pool. After about twenty minutes, they reached the large airport. Snow bought them first-class tickets and they got on the plane just as it was about to leave.

We're more than halfway to being back to normal, Mario thought, relieved. Then, seeing Goomessa and Snow glaring daggers at each other, and Koopetto with a bored look on his face staring out the window, he added to himself: Normal, of course, being a relative term.

:::::

That's it for today, folks. Sorry I made you wait so long for such a short part, but I've got writer's block, and I expanded this part too much as it is. I hope that's okay, though. I promise, we'll get back to normal wait times and normal-sized parts eventually.

So tell me what you thought, please, and…

See ya!