"Hey, youngster! I've finished processing the security camera image," said Gadd. "Shall we take a look?"
Luigi set down his tea. "Might as well," he replied.
He, Fred, Zed and Ned gathered around the console as Gadd displayed the security image on the monitor.
"Oh—my—God," breathed Luigi.
Greenies, Slammers and Sneakers were imprisoned in red crystals, sporting frightened and confused expressions on their faces. Gadd looked positively sickened at this image.
"Holy [bleep]! What's all this?" he asked.
"Ghosts give me the creeps, but I wouldn't wish something like this on them," breathed Ned.
"Yeah—we don't hate them that much!" Zed chimed in.
"Did the Boos put them in these crystals?" asked Gadd. "And if so—then why?"
"For the Hell of it, I bet," muttered Luigi. "Boos are a sadistic lot."
"Ned—in your last report, you said something about the crystals having strengthening qualities," said Gadd.
Ned nodded. "Now, the Boos seem to be extracting crystals from that quarry."
"Yeah—I don't like where this is going," said Fred. "The Boos must have something terrible planned for those crystals—and the ghosts."
"You're right," said Gadd, "but why would they need those crystals? I'm as wary of this as you, Fred."
"You're saying that's a quarry?" asked Luigi. "I gotta find a way over there before the Boos overtake it completely!"
"Hey, you guys…" Zed said slowly. "What's that?"
Luigi followed Zed's gaze, and then the back of his throat froze. For cast on the icy ground was a large, round and ominous shadow—and a familiar-looking one at that. He blinked, hoping he was just seeing things, but the shadow was still there. Beside him, Gadd's face was drawn and gray.
"Professor," said Luigi, his eyes glued to that ominous silhouette. "Do you—do you still have him?"
"I—I…" stammered Gadd.
"King Boo's portrait," said Luigi, feeling nauseated. "You still have it, right?"
"Ah—oh, b—cks!" cursed Gadd.
"What's wrong?" asked Fred.
"D—mit! I've doomed us all!" spat Gadd.
"I don't follow," said Ned.
"The portrait—I sold it!" hissed Gadd.
"To whom?" asked Zed.
"Uh—two years ago, I was enduring a particularly stressful day, and then this fellow walked up, saw the portrait and wanted to buy it!"
"You gave the painting of a psychotic tyrant to a complete stranger?!" Luigi uttered in disbelief. "Are you f—ing kidding me?!"
Gadd snatched at his hair. "I'm so stupid!" he cried. "How could I forget something like that?!"
"J—s! I gotta…!" Luigi took out his cell phone, excused himself and began leaving frantic voicemails for Mario, Chad, Thad, Brad and Conrad.
"You've been forgetting a lot of things lately, Professor," said Ned. "Maybe it's about time you retire."
"Let's just—get this mess sorted out first, all right?" huffed Gadd, flustered.
Fred indicated the portrait in the sack. "They've been dragging that painting all over Evershade Valley!" he exclaimed. "Whoever's behind all this really cares about that painting." Something seemed to occur to him. "Dear Lord—do you think…?"
"I can't bear to say what I think," said Gadd.
He dismissed the photo from the monitor. "I'm done looking at this," he said. "What a macabre scene."
The Toad Assistants murmured in agreement.
Luigi pocketed his cell phone. "I don't like what was in that image. At all," he said.
"And that shadow," said Gadd. "I don't know if that shadow was real or not, but it appeared to be one of a larger Boo—commanding the Boos to put the ghosts inside the crystals."
"It looks like him," said Luigi.
"That sinister laughter coming from the bottom of the mine—do you think it came from…?" Gadd started to ask.
"I can't say," replied Luigi, "but this doesn't feel like some random event anymore. We gotta investigate and put a stop to this, and fast."
"That photo was taken just before you arrived, so they're probably still down there," said Gadd. "However, the only way to know for sure is to investigate the crystal quarry!"
Gadd worked quickly, mapping the location on the Dual Scream.
"You'll find my E-Gates on the way there," he went on. "Don't be afraid to use them!"
"I won't," said Luigi.
"Okay, Luigi—get to the bottom of the mine, and stop those Boos from doing—whatever they're doing!" said Gadd.
"Will do." Luigi felt an acute sense of foreboding as Gadd pixelated him back to the Secret Mine.
…
The Pixelator deposited Luigi in the chalet, where the elevator to the mine was located. However, he noticed that the rocking chair was missing, uncovering it with the DLD. As soon as he sucked up the Spirit Balls, out popped a Boo!
"I'm Booger!" said the Boo. "Why must you always pick on me?"
"Why do you always pick on me?" retorted Luigi as he exposed Booger to the DLD and sent them bouncing all over the chalet. Once Booger was disoriented enough, Luigi vacuumed them up and headed toward the elevator, purple fuzzy-like creatures tottering at his heels.
These Fuzzballs, as Luigi decided to call them, began impeding him, so he caught them in his nozzle and gently launched them away, briefly fluffing them as he did. One Fuzzball was gold, yielding some treasure each time they were fluffed. However, one Fuzzball led him to another sapphire, so they weren't all that bad…
Luigi took the elevator down to the airway, stepping carefully along the icy ground toward the drift hall. From there, he continued into the prospector's crossing, where he noticed a sapphire partially frozen in the icy pond. With a couple of logs, he cracked the ice enough to free the sapphire. On the other side of the airway, he used his vacuum to catch one of the wires, which returned him to the elevator. Then, he hurried across the bridge and turned right, heading toward the crossroads.
Inside the crossroads, Luigi caught sight of a red circle with a small, green panel on top of it. When he flashed it with his Strobulb, the red circle opened, and a green glow emanated from inside it.
Was this one of the E-Gates Gadd was talking about earlier?
Tentatively, Luigi approached the glowing circle, first sliding a finger, and then his arm through it. When he saw his own hand sticking out from a similar glowing circle, he laughed. These E-Gates strongly reminded him of Portals! For several moments, Luigi goofed around with the E-Gates, waving hello to himself. It got to the point that Gadd had to phone him, reminding him of the task at hand.
Chastened, Luigi walked through the E-Gate to the other side of the crossroads, where he found a frozen key. Then, he had to go back through the E-Gate to melt the ice using a broken lantern. The thawed key unlocked the door to a skip slope, where the ground was almost entirely ice.
After vacuuming up some dollar bills and finding a golden bone in a barrel, Luigi slid down the icy slope, whooping with glee as he went. At the bottom of the slope was another E-Gate, which he activated, and a key. Going through the E-Gate took him back to the top of the skip slope, which he rode down a second time, emerging with yet another sapphire. Then, he unlocked the door to a smuggler's hideout.
A single burning log rested in the fireplace, which Luigi used to melt an icy wall. This, in turn, thawed a suit of armor bearing a spear, along with a window. Just as the wall completely melted away, a Sneaker and some Greenies charged through the window, leaving it wide open and beginning to re-freeze everything.
As the icy wind shrieked, Luigi did battle with the three ghosts. They were relatively easy to subdue, albeit the last Greenie was protected by a green paranormal shield. Once he captured all of the ghosts, he shut the window and used the log to melt the reformed ice, revealing a door which took him to the shaft.
Using the vacuum's blow function, Luigi lowered the shaft—and himself—deeper into the mine. During his descent, he observed some ghosts lugging around more of the red crystals he saw in the security image. He couldn't do anything to stop them, since they were out of the Strobulb's range. However, he was able to stun and vacuum up a Gold Greenie.
When he reached what was presumably the bottom of the mine, Luigi walked up to a red door with a wheel in front of it. Turning the wheel caused the door to flip over, tossing him into a coward's chasm. Luigi gave a small laugh at the irony of this before crossing the coward's chasm and walking into a deep hall.
The Dual Scream rang.
"Yello?"
Gadd's image and voice was mostly obscured by static. "Luigi—are you there?"
"Yeah."
"I can barely hear you! You probably made it to the very bottom of the mine," said Gadd. "So far, so good?"
"Yup."
"The crystal quarry should be nearby. Try to find a way a way in."
"Okay."
"But whatever you do, don't pa—t with cr—a—l!"
"Uh—I didn't get that last part, but I won't touch the crystals," said Luigi. "Ciao."
He hung up and ventured further into the deep hall, where his ears picked up some muffled cackling and screaming. Following the noise to a crack in the wall, he peered through and couldn't believe what he was seeing…
The ghosts that were encased in the red crystals were frantically pounding on them, screaming in fear and pain as their bodies glowed. Three Boos floated lazily about, leering at their prisoners and cackling at their suffering.
"Ghosts of Evershade Valley," said one Boo. "Hear me, and rejoice! You have had the privilege of being saved by your one true King! You may thing this is suffering. No—it is salvation. Liberation from the wicked whims of a mad scientist. Smile, and fear not—for even in this state, you are helping your King make this valley—and the world—a better place."
Luigi's stomach wrenched. He didn't like the sound of those words one bit. Pulling himself away from the crack, he took several deep breaths. Now that he knew what had happened to King Boo's portrait, there was a strong possibility that the vile Master of Illusions had freed himself from the painting's confines. And if he had freed himself, then how long ago? Was he spying on Luigi this whole time?!
He crossed the room and peered through another crack in the wall, where he saw a key and a Gold Greenie. When he stepped back, he tripped and fell, finding himself face-to-face with the Gold Greenie and a Sneaker. After defeating the two ghosts, Luigi descended into a pit mine.
There was a conveyor belt and some sort of mill in the pit mine. After powering on the former by yanking a cord, Luigi spun a rotor which turned the mill, loading several rocks onto the conveyor belt. He watched as these rocks rode the conveyor belt through an E-Gate and then headed back into the deep hall, where the rocks were deposited. Thanks to these rocks, he was able to get a sapphire and access a cinder mine.
In front of him was the key he'd seen earlier, partially frozen. Luckily, a heated log, followed by some heated rocks, helped Luigi solve that problem. He pocketed the key in no time and returned to the deep hall, where he fought off some armed Greenies before unlocking the door to the crystal quarry.
That was when things took a turn for the worse.
The imprisoned ghosts were undergoing a visibly painful transformation. As they screamed and writhed and pleaded for this torture to stop, white marks began appearing on their bodies. Luigi remembered the Sneaker he'd defended Zed from in the Old Clockworks, who'd bore those same white markings. Had they also been experimented on, as well?
Luigi knew now, without a reasonable doubt, that the Evershade Valley ghosts were the victims of whatever this was, along with himself, the Professor and the Toad Assistants. They didn't have a say in this anymore; they never had a say in it from the beginning, since the artifact keeping them sane had been destroyed. Standing there and watching them go through such unimaginable agony, Luigi began to feel sorry for the ghosts.
He was driven out of his reverie when the Boos turned and looked at him. A sharp cry issued from his lips as he raised the Poltergust in defense. But then the Boos leered at him as the sounds from within the crystals grew more feral, the terror and pain on the ghosts' faces transforming into frighteningly savage expressions. Ominous crackling echoed throughout the quarry as the crystalline prisons began giving way.
Oh, no… Luigi thought.
Giving one last cackle, the Boos departed the crystal quarry, leaving Luigi to the mercy of the horror they'd created.
Laughing madly, the ghosts broke free of the crystals entrapping them, bloodlust in their pupil-less eyes. As one, they dove at Luigi, who stunned and vacuumed up as many of them at a time as he could. These ghosts had more HP than the ones he'd previously encountered, and their attacks dealt a lot more pain. Whatever was in those crystals had made these ghosts stronger—kind of like a performance-enhancing drug. But why would the Boos want to make them stronger? To use them as their personal attack dogs?
Luigi didn't know how much time passed, but it felt like an eon. He wrestled the last ghost into the Poltergust and then stood there, his entire body smarting anew. The Dual Scream's ringtone was barely audible above his heartbeat and heavy breathing.
"Y—yello?"
"J—s, Mary and Joseph!" balked Gadd. "WTF was going on in there?!"
"G—ghosts—the crystals—made them—stronger," huffed out Luigi. "I thought—I was gonna die down here."
"And the Boos fled the scene of the crime?"
"They—did. And they were—making the ghosts—take the crystals away…"
"Well, on the bright side, you managed to capture those powerful ghosts," said Gadd. "I'll need to study them. Okay, I'm bringing you back!"
"Ciao…" exhaled Luigi before hanging up.
His heart still thudded in his ears as he felt the Pixelator take him away.
…
"Good to see you back here, Luigi!" said Gadd. "Let's see what you've got."
Luigi dutifully emptied the Poltergust, wincing as he did.
"These ghosts aren't the real antagonists here," he said. "They're just a means to an end."
"And with Boos ordering them around, this situation has grown a lot more serious," said Ned.
"I've got a theory," said Gadd. "That strong ghost you captured back in the Old Clockworks—I think I know what happened to them. They were forced inside one of those crystals."
Quiet in the Bunker.
"Someone seems to be controlling all of the ghosts in the valley, but it doesn't stop there," Gadd went on. "They've also figured out a way to use the mine crystals to strengthen the ghosts! And if they've been extracting crystals this entire time and taking them elsewhere, then I fear we may be up against much stronger ghosts in the future! Luckily…" His eyes twinkled. "…you've collected enough treasure for me to whip up your final upgrade—the Super Poltergust!"
"The Super Poltergust?" repeated Luigi.
"It'll be just like your current model, except that you'll have more muscle when it comes to dealing with these stronger ghosts," Gadd explained.
Luigi slid off the Poltergust and handed it to the Professor. "The timing couldn't have been better," he said.
"But back to the subject at hand," said Gadd. "We still have no idea who's pulling the strings behind all of this! I mean, who could orchestrate such a thing?"
"Only one person comes to mind," said Luigi. "Someone who I thought was safely sealed away…"
"There's now reason to believe that the Boos had a hand in shattering the Dark Moon," added Fred. "They want to use the ghosts here for something far more sinister—but what?"
"I need to warn Mario about this," said Luigi, once again whipping out his cell phone. "If what I'm thinking proves correct, then he'll be in the most danger."
Gadd and the three Toad Assistants watched worriedly as Luigi retreated into the lounge.
A sense of foreboding filled the air, and it was only increasing by the minute…
Please R&R.