Rockslide! The huge boulders tumbled down the slopes of Mt. Maim, rushing straight toward them with a loud rumbling sound! Was this the end? It was all over for our heroes! Or was it?
CHAPTER 2-3
The Chase
"Every man for himself!" shouted Bowser, running away from the mountain.
Peach, looking quite annoyed, responded "No, I think we should help each other."
"Like me?" asked Luigi, who was about to be flattened by a giant boulder. Mario quickly dive-tackled his brother out of the way, but in doing so, the brothers were unable to move for a few moments. In that time, another large rock came careening down the slope toward them! "Run!" shouted Luigi. They quickly ducked to the side.
"Let's go in front of this mountain," advised Tippi. "We can avoid the rocks there!"
The others carefully followed her until the mountain shielded them from the oncoming rocks. However, they were safe only for a few moments, for after a few moments, the rockslide completely stopped.
Peach began, "Well, it looks like we're s-"
"LOOK OUT!" shouted Mario. Peach narrowly dodged the falling boulder.
"What!?" exclaimed Bowser. "There's falling rocks here, t-OOF!" Before he could finish, a huge rock landed on top of him.
"I'll get him!" announced Mario. "You guys see if there's any more safe spots. ...And try not to get crushed!" Mario walked over to Bowser and tried to release him from the boulder's crushing weight. "This rock is heavier than you, Bowser!"
"Keep your insults to yourself and just get me out of here, got it?"
Mario hadn't even realized he had insulted Bowser, and was about to apologize, when he managed to slide the boulder off. "Uh, thanks, Mario. Now let's get going."
They followed the others, eventually reaching a narrow ledge.
"Uh oh!" uttered Luigi. "How are we going to get across this? We'll either be crushed on the ledge or speared on the rocks below! Probably both!"
"Why don't we just go back to where we started?" suggested Tippi. "The rocks aren't falling there anymore."
"Good idea," agreed Mario. Tippi and the heroes went back to the valley and walked toward Mt. Maim. But as soon as they did, rocks began falling again!
"This can't be a natural rockslide!" remarked Mario. "The boulders seem to appear wherever we are!"
"Who is doing this?" wondered Peach.
"Maybe the Ruff Ruffians on Mt. Maim are trying to stop us!" shouted Luigi, almost smashed by a particularly large stone.
"That must be it," agreed Tippi. "But how can we get there?"
"Wait for their rocks to run out!" answered Mario.
The other four looked at Mario like he had a screw loose. "What?"
"I said, wait for their rocks to run out. They can't have an infinite supply of them, can they?"
"Hey, you have a point!" supported Peach.
They continued dodging rocks, but after a while, they grew tired of it. "We've been doing this forever! Do they have an infinite supply?" inquired Luigi. Just as he finished speaking, the rockslide stopped. "Well, I guess not!" he exclaimed cheerfully. He began calmly strolling up the slope, when suddenly he was tripped and flipped over backwards by a sudden assault of millions of small rocks! He flew backward and crashed into Mario, and the two were overrun by the stones.
"Yes!" cheered Bowser. "We won't have to worry about THEM anymore!"
Mario and Luigi, with difficulty, managed to stand up in the rockslide. "Oh, darn it!"
"We can't wait this one out!" announced Peach. "There's just too many of them!"
"Then what do we do?" asked Bowser.
Tippi thought. "We've got to make a mad dash over the narrow ledge over there. Once we run, they'll realize we moved, and send boulders down over there, so we've got to be fast!"
The other four looked at Tippi like she had a screw loose. "What?"
"I said...oh, you heard me, right? It's certainly safer than waiting this one out."
"I must admit, she does have a point," agreed Mario. "Let's do it."
As fast as they could in the raging rockslide, our heroes scrambled over to the other mountain and reached the ledge. Their backs to the wall, they carefully sidestepped as fast as their fear would allow. Soon enough, the rocks began falling, but our heroes were close to where the ledge ended, so they were safe. But just as Peach was about to step off of the ledge and onto firm ground, a stone hit her and she fell, gripping onto the ledge with one hand!
"Peach!" exclaimed Bowser. "My about-to-die-if-I-don't-do-something-fast wife! I'll help you!" He ran over to Peach and gradually pulled her up, watchful of more rocks. When she was safe, the heroes quickly ran around the perimeter of the mountain, toward Mt. Maim, dodging boulders all the way. When they reached the valley in which they had originally walked, they saw that the boulders had stopped, even as they hiked further up Mt. Maim. "They must have run out," said Tippi.
"We may have, but we're still not letting you take it!" came a voice from above them. Our heroes looked up, and saw what appeared to be the leader of the Ruff Ruffians, along with several henchmen, on horses. They were camped on a ledge above them.
"You're the leader of the Ruff Ruffians, aren't you?" demanded Bowser. "I just took out all of your cronies back at your base! You should've SEEN the carnage!" He did a tough-looking pose.
"There goes our chance to recover the Pure Heart through diplomatic means," lamented Tippi.
"Why not?" asked Mario. "We need that Pure Heart to save all of the worlds!"
"You can't fool us! We were told you guys would come here to steal it and use its power to get rid of us!"
"Get rid of you? We've never even heard of you until we came here looking for it. Who was it that told you?"
"This strange guy. He had a black-and-white mask and purple and yellow clothing, and he gave it to us. Who knows who he is, but he sounded like he knew what he was talking about!"
"Dimentio!" shouted all five of the group simultaneously.
"Dimentio? Do you know that guy? He must be a rival of you guys or something. Anyway, we're not letting you take this!" He displayed the yellow Pure Heart.
"We're not using it for evil!" shouted Luigi. "We need it! Now, please hand it over!" He jumped up to the ledge, and the Ruff Ruffian's leader quickly pulled the Pure Heart out of Luigi's reach.
"Still want it? Fine, you'll just have to catch us! Let's flee, y'all!" They sped off on their horses, away from the heroes.
Mario began running after them as fast as he could, but the horses were too fast for him. He huffed back to the others. "What do we do now?"
The others thought for a few moments. "Well, since they're heading down the mountain," Tippi began, "they have to travel in a spiral path since the mountain is so rugged and because they're on horses. But since we're on foot, maybe we can wait at a certain section of the mountain and just jump down, and maybe we can catch them."
"Well, I don't know how you intend to 'catch' them," remarked Bowser, "but it sounds like a plan. Let's see what they do." Our heroes observed the Ruff Ruffians, who were indeed traveling in spirals down the mountain. When they neared the bottom, Luigi observed, "This seems like a good time. Let's slide down!"
The other four looked at Luigi like he had a screw loose. "What?"
"Well, how else do you think we're going to get down?"
"It's called Mt. Maim for a reason," noted Mario. "Still, I don't see what choice we have, so...let's go, I guess!"
They jumped down the nearest ledge and started sliding down. Before long, though, the slope abruptly ended, forming a cliff that had several sharp rocks below it!
"Whose bright idea was this?" asked Bowser.
Tippi and Luigi looked at each other.
"Jump over here!" yelled Mario, pointing to a small, flat ledge near them. They jumped with all of their force and managed to land on the ledge. Mario looked down. "There they are!" he pointed. The Ruff Ruffians were just below them. The leader noticed their presence.
"You guys just don't give up, do you?" he demanded. "Fine, then! Let's see you chase us now!" He and his men ducked into a small alcove in the rock, and it took the heroes a few moments to realize they had gone into a tunnel within Mt. Maim. Climbing down, they noticed a hole in the rock, hidden by crags and boulders, that they never would have noticed had the Ruff Ruffians not climbed into it.
"A cave?" asked Peach. "Hopefully it'll be safer in there."
"Yes," agreed Tippi, "with any luck, they'll run into a dead end in there, and we can do what we can to get the Pure Heart from them. Not a very smart move of them, I'd say." Our heroes walked into the cave, unaware of how very wrong Tippi was.
-END OF CHAPTER-