A/N: Again, sorry for the massive pause. Busy student, here! I hope you enjoy. Oh! And thank you for almost 10k views! I know this story isn't crazy popular, but it makes me happy to see some people enjoying it!
Thank you for sticking with me. I love this story and I won't abandon it, I promise! Please review if you enjoyed! I have another chapter ready to post, so be ready!
"Do you truly expect me to go easy on you after you chose to sleep in?!"
Peach tried to hold back a yawn, but gave in quickly as her exhaustion tried to pull her back to bed. After a drawn-out stretch, she groggily turned towards her instructor.
"I didn't choose to sleep in. I can't even tell what time it is!" Peach sleepily defended with an annoyed gesture to the direction of the room's stone walls. "Can't we take it a little easier today?"
Peach struggled to keep her eyes open. A few days had passed since her last talk with the king, but she remained both emotionally and physically drained by him, and felt numb to the idea of being productive. Instead, her body felt heavy and desperate for some down time to recover.
Ever since he had stormed away from her, it was as if she were staying underground on her own accord, as the two had not crossed paths since, and he hadn't even dared look at her. He seemed to be keeping himself out of reach and away from her senses.
The phantom's treatment of her, as well as the near-death experience in the lake, had drained her of any ambition...much to her mentor's disliking.
Ludwig vigorously shook his head while hopping up onto his feet. He stood on his usual stool and reached the height of the actress's shoulders.
"I refuse to even consider allowing you to slack off!" He nagged. "We have a deadline, and I will not be sending up an under-prepared, lazy actress as our star!"
Ludwig crossed his arms and fanned out his copy of the script before eyeing the start of their newest scene.
Peach groaned and snatched her messy copy off of her night stand, clumsily dragging it to her lap. She lowered her feet off the bed and flipped through the pages.
Ignoring Ludwig's nagging, she finally found the correct page. They were still rather early in the script and not even close to completion. She sighed, looking at the number in the bottom right corner of the page.
7
Peach flipped through the pages and landed on the last page. Her eyes widened as she read the number.
247
When she had skimmed the pages in her opera house room above, she was filled with motivation to memorize each line. Yet, sitting in the dimly-lit, dusty prison-of-a-room, she felt despair at the lengthy number.
Peach's script fell to her lap. How long was she going to be down here rehearsing in the dark?
"Well?" Ludwig groaned. "Are you going to begin?"
Peach grumbled under her breath as she turned away in a huff. Ludwig took that as compliance and quickly requested she stand front stage with a demanding point of his index finger. With a roll of her eyes, she complied.
"I don't see why I need to do all of this. I'm sure everyone knows I'm gone by this point. Just tell...your dad...to let Kamek hire some other human," she mumbled rather bitterly. Peach put her hands on her hips with an annoyed frown. "If I'm going to be kidnapped, I shouldn't have to work on this...waste of time."
Peach continued mumbling to herself under her breath. She was well aware that her role was one of the small reasons she was kept alive, but that didn't stop her from sulking over the fact that she was stuck doing it 20 feet underground without anyone to support her.
She wasn't sure where her sudden hatred of the play had come from, but she couldn't deny that part of it stemmed from the phantom and her imprisonment. What was she thinking? Of course she hated doing what he wanted. Any passion she held for the play had drained away the more she realized how little it mattered to her, and how much it mattered to the one locking her away.
Ludwig, on the other hand, was pale with horror at what Peach had just said.
"Waste of time?!" He cried. "This is only one of the largest productions that the Darklands has ever seen! Only the most important production of my life! You are the star, and your expertise rides on my shoulders! There is no way I will allow father to replace you with some random, unskilled, average, nobody-"
"Well, why don't I fetch you a blonde wig and you can take my place," Peach offered blandly. "Or, we can just shave my head and glue it to yours."
Ludwig's rant calmed to a halt as he tapped his chin in thought. He looked Peach up and down before shaking his head.
"As much as I would truly love that, that is simply not plausible." Ludwig paused as he hopped next to Peach. He examined her and then himself before shaking his head again. "I am clearly not human, and you are a noticeable amount taller. It would be foolish to do such a thing and be ratted out on the spot. But, we can dream!" He sighed in disappointment.
Peach's face was blank in shock at how oblivious the koopa was.
She looked down at him and frowned at his eagerness to jump on board with her sarcastic idea. She had meant to make a coy comment, not boost his ego even further! She frowned, knowing exactly where he inherited that annoying trait from.
Her stare fell into confusion as she noticed something briefly shine on the brim of his shell. Within a few seconds, it was covered by his head. Something metallic was around his neck, hidden by his shell. Before she was able to get a good look at it, he hopped away back to his stool, clearly disheartened by the fact that he wouldn't be able to steal her role.
Peach quickly put two and two together, remembering her earlier conversation with Iggy. She released a loud, vocal sigh of lost tension, realizing that the king didn't have the keys, which took a few pounds of weight off her shoulders. Ludwig gave her an odd look so she played off the sigh as an exhausted yawn.
The idea of talking to the beast after their last conversation made her skin crawl. She knew he wouldn't have been...ecstatic to see her again. He made that pretty obvious with the way he had rejected her.
Thank goodness… She thought to herself with pure dread. I don't think I can even look him in the eyes anytime soon.
Not that he ever had the most soothing of eyes.
Ludwig having the keys was, of course, the far easier choice of the two. Yet, was she really going to steal from him? There was no way she could just snatch it...and she doubted she could ask for it, as he would surely report to his father about her suspicious behavior.
Peach pretended to quickly skim over her script as she tried to think what to make of the situation.
What was she going to do? Ask for them? Snatch them? Peach rolled her eyes at how ridiculous she was being, as it wasn't going to be that easy. She had to play smart, which wouldn't be too hard, since Ludwig was the person she needed to trick.
"Must you take that long to read a few lines?" Ludwig nagged, clearly on his wits end. "I could do a read as simple as this with my eyes closed!" He joked.
Peach flinched and quickly looked up at the koopa. She was already being suspicious!
However, her eyes lit up as an idea came to her. With a cheeky smile, Peach shook her head and sat down on the bed.
"I'm afraid so," she cooed in the irritatingly-girlish tone her father had conditioned her to use when in the presence of company. She stared at her tutor with a saddened smile that was cheesily fake, but he seemed to eat it up. "Seems that I'm just not experienced enough to memorize these difficult lines! What should I do? I have no one talented and smart enough to show me how to perform them."
Peach dramatically placed her outer palm against her forehead with a deep frown. She let out a little snicker as she realized how her awful performance was, but managed to cover it up with a longing sigh.
Ludwig practically leaped off of his stool with the widest grin she had ever seen. He landed with a little stumble before staring at the actress with stars in his eyes.
"Oh, but you do!" He cried in bliss. "Honestly, Peach, if you needed help directly from me, I would have been more than overjoyed to assist you! It would be an honor to perform for you. I suggest you take notes. You have a lot to learn."
Without waiting for an okay, he hopped to the center of Peach's room, taking a deep breath and clearing his throat, ready to start blurting out lines.
Peach quickly called out for the koopa to wait, as she wasn't exactly ready for him to start. His eagerness was admirable but was going to ruin her goal.
"Aren't you forgetting something?" She asked with her best attempt at innocence. Peach gently batted her eyes at her mentor, knowing exactly what she was doing. If she needed to play dirty, she wouldn't mind getting her hands soiled.
Ludwig glanced over his shoulder at the woman and tilted his head in confusion. He stared at her for a few seconds before shaking his head, assuming it was a trick question.
Peach shook her head and numbered off several routine steps he had overlooked. While she wasn't a professional, she had been in enough local productions to know he was skipping many steps that she was accustomed to.
"Stretches? Vocal warm ups? Taking off personal belongings?" Peach rambled, adding the last one rather quickly. "You know, the basics. You wouldn't want me to think it's normal to skip the necessities, would you?"
Ludwig rolled his eyes as he was looking forward to the expressive part of acting, not the nonsense that came before it.
"I suppose I can show you a demonstration of a proper warm up and other precautions," he dryly mumbled. "Again, I expect you to take notes and follow accordingly."
After a few minutes of basic stretching, awkward vocal warmups, and annoyed huffs, Ludwig bitterly completed what Peach deemed an adequate warmup. He hadn't realized how stiff he was, and the stretches surely helped, but he was far too frustrated to admit such a thing.
Peach tapped her chin as she reminded him to remove any personal items, as stated earlier, which he happily complied with, eager to start. Without hesitation, he reached into his shell and basically threw his belongings on his stool out of annoyance.
A few coins, jewels, and other treasures landed on his seat and a few clattered onto the wooden floor, but he seemed unbothered. Peach's eyes fixated on what she wanted, however: a long chain with a few keys attached to it gently hanging off of the stool.
It was an ugly key, the kind that was used to lock criminals behind bars. Even so, she had no doubt that it was the key Iggy had described to her.
"Now, your eyes," she smugly reminded her mentor without removing her own eyes from the stool.
Ludwig quickly squinted his eyes shut with a concerning amount of force. It was amusing, seeing how serious the little challenge was for the koopa, but she didn't let that distract her from what sat on the stool beside him.
The young koopa instantaneously started spewing out lines from the script. His words were booming and dramatic; not Peach's cup of tea when it came to acting. Nonetheless, the kid was right, he was experienced.
Peach held her breath as she tiptoed across the room. Her feet gently pressed against the wood, occasionally releasing a squeak from the old surface, which made her face cringe in fear. While she was small, she wasn't the best at sneaking.
Thankfully, it wasn't hard to maneuver around the koopa, as Ludwig's confidence was fogging up his senses quite effectively. If she left without a word and came back in a bit, she had no doubt he would finish the entire act without noticing.
Peach shook her head and continued forward, now only a few steps from the stool.
Without hesitation, Peach gently shoved Ludwig's jewels and other belongings to the side and off of the large key. She gave one final glance over her shoulder before snatching the key by the chain and clenching it in her fist.
Unlike the small iron key, this key was far larger and seemed to be worn down quite a bit more in comparison. It was rusted and its surface scratched against her palm. Its bronze surface was worn down from use and it was densely heavy. It was a bit warm, having just sat in Ludwig's shell.
Peach's heart raced as she squeezed the rusty key in her palm.
Peach rushed back to her bed, slid the key under her pillow, and sat beside it. She sighed after looking up, seeing Ludwig continuing to spew out his lines.
However, as if on cue, Ludwig started panting for air. He, undoubtedly, was out of breath from the amount of passion he was exerting.
The oblivious koopa put his hands on his knees and turned to the human. He forced a small, smug smile as a bead of sweat fell down his forehead.
"I told you I was an expert," he spewed between heavy breaths.
A/N: I'm sorry if this is a bit fast for my usual writing! I didn't want this scene to drag out...I want the fun stuff to happen! Thank you so much for waiting for my updates. It really does mean the world to me. Please leave a review if you enjoyed!