Chapter 25 Bonding with Family

For once in his life, Roy actually swept up in his room. Really, he probably should have done that years ago, as dust, gunk, and grime built up in the corners and along the sides of the walls. Roy didn't even remember bringing half of the stuff he found in. He saw at least twenty empty water bottles, a stress ball, a broken toothbrush, and….was that a dead mouse? Yeesh, and here Roy thought that the stink was just caused by massive amounts of BO.

Roy whistled as he worked, thinking that would help make the job a little more tolerable. It did on some level, as it managed to distract him from the musky, dead animal smell. The tune he whistled was quite an interesting one, honestly, as he didn't remember where he heard it from. Was it one that Ludwig wrote? Probably, as Roy's older brother was a very talented composer. Maybe he should ask him once the job is done.

Finally, Roy was all finished sweeping. He breathed a sigh of relief and stood up, allowing his aching back to straighten up. He had actually cleaned his room! All right; he was actually making progress when it came to being a better person! Now if only he could apply this same effort to kidnapping missions.

Roy thought about this little idea for a minute or two, blinking as he did. Then, he burst into laughter. What, effort from the Koopalings during a kidnapping mission? Please. That was never going to happen; even the lowest ranking Goomba could tell you that. Granted, they would probably be executed if they did decide to say that, but still.

Anyway, Roy looked around his room. Thanks to the spray bottle he had taken to the walls, the whole place shone like a diamond. The floors didn't have a speck of dust or a piece of trash on them. The furniture was spick and span.

The only thing that the burly Koopaling had left to do was his bed, as it was still unmade. Actually, now that he thought about it, he could probably stand to wash the sheets. They stank, pretty much like everything else in the room.

So, he removed the sheets from the bed and took them out into the hallway. He continued humming that tune, feeling extra chirpy as he did so. Seriously, where was it from? He really wanted to know.

Roy stopped at the laundry chute at the end of the hallway. It went straight down to the basement, and provided the Koopalings an easy (and honestly, kind of lazy) way of getting their dirty laundry into the washer. Roy dropped his sheets into the chute just as he heard someone coming down the hall. He looked and saw Ludwig, bringing his favorite cloak to the chute.

"Hey," said Roy.

"Hey," said Ludwig. He telekinetically opened the chute's door. He hesitated for a little bit, looking down at the Jasper button of his cloak. He gently kissed its surface, causing Roy to snicker. Thankfully, Ludwig was too preoccupied with himself to notice. He dropped the cloak down the chute and turned to Roy.

"Doesn't your girl get discharged today?"

Roy blinked. "What do you mean discharged? Judy's not in the hospital."

Ludwig rolled his eyes. "I meant Celia, dinkus."

"Ohhh." Roy nodded. "Yes, she does. I'll pick her up this evening."

Ludwig nodded. "Good." He cast the trendiest traces of a smile. "She really said she liked you, huh?"

"Yep! Isn't that great!"

Ludwig snickered. "I don't know if I'd say great. We might have to examine her head later on."

Roy blinked and racked his brain at that statement. Ludwig looked at him expectantly, as if waiting for the shoe to drop. It took about a minute and a half, but Roy finally realized that the statement Ludwig said was a joke making fun of him. He scrunched up his eyebrows.

"Hey!"

Ludwig laughed. "What? You can't say she's not insane."

"Can too!" Roy stamped his foot. "Just because she likes me doesn't mean she's crazy!"

Ludwig chuckled. "I know, I know." He smiled at him. "I'm only kidding; I'm really happy for you. It's nice that you got attention from a girl so early after the breakup."

Roy allowed his face to relax. He nodded. "I think so too."

Ludwig's face grew somber. "You make sure to hold onto her. I can tell you from experience that losing a girl you like is not fun."

With that, Ludwig began walking down the hallway. Roy, curious, followed him.

"What do you mean? Did you lose a girl you liked?" When Ludwig nodded, Roy's eyes grew wide. "Woah. I never knew that you dated somebody before."

"Oh no; we weren't dating. We were just friends." Ludwig sighed. "But I still ended up losing her." Ludwig sniffed. "Not a day goes by where I don't think about her."

Roy nodded. "Interesting." He tilted his head to the side. "What was her name?"

Ludwig seized up a little, hesitating as he did. He quietly said "Aria."

"Aria?" said Roy. He smiled. "Pretty name."

"Pretty girl," said Ludwig. He bowed his head down to the ground, clearly not interested in carrying on with the conversation.

So, the two walked in silence for a bit. Roy felt tempted to break the silence from time to time, but something told him it wasn't a good idea. After all, this was Ludwig; the guy who could burst into flames when he gets angry. Not someone who Roy was entirely comfortable talking with.

However, Roy had to admit that the silence was still making him a little antsy. He wasn't used to long, drawn out silences. They were awkward, and made his stomach squirm. So, while he wasn't willing to talk, he was willing to whistle. He whistled the tune that, at this point, he could safely say was stuck in his head. The tune bounced up and down like a happy toddler, and it felt cool on Roy's tongue.

Ludwig cast Roy a surprised look upon hearing him whistle it. "Hey!" He grinned, a rare occurrence. "That's one of my songs?"

"Really?" Roy grinned. "Ohh! That's where I heard it from."

"Yep!" Ludwig giggled, an even rarer occurrence than him grinning. "I wrote that when I was ten; it's one of my more upbeat pieces." His grin grew bigger. "It's called Dance of the Turtles. As you can probably tell, the tempo it utilizes is an allegro, but if need be, one can also sing it with a slower, more adage pace."

Roy nodded. "Mmm. Okay." Admittedly, he wasn't really familiar with what the terms allegro and adagio meant. It was just music mumbo jumbo jargon that Ludwig had used a million times, and yet Roy could never remember its meaning. He didn't know why this was; whether it was because it just fell on deaf ears or for some other reason.

Whatever. It wasn't that big a deal. Roy wasn't a music nerd like Ludwig is; it wasn't like he was going to use that information some time in the future.

The two of them finally go to where they wanted to go; the common room. Larry and Iggy were lounging around in there, not doing anything in particular. Lemmy was on the floor doing a 500 piece jigsaw puzzle. Wendy and Morton were nowhere to be seen.

Ludwig let out a breath and looked at Lemmy. "Oh great. You're here."

Ley looked up and flashed him a smile. "Yep! I'm here!" He gestured toward the jigsaw puzzle. "Would you like to join me?"

Ludwig snorted. "No thanks." He made his way over to the couch and sat back. "I've gone through enough frustration for one day, thank you very much."

Lemmy shrugged. "Okay. Whatever floats your boat." He looked up at Roy. "Would you like to join me? I could really use some help."

Roy gave him a weird look. "You know I'm not good at those things, Lems."

Lemmy giggled. "Yeah, you're right. Jigsaws are very puzzling for you."

"Annnd….that's my cue to leave," said Ludwig as he lifted himself up. "See you later everyone."

With that, he left. Roy directed his attention toward Larry and Iggy as they laid in smushy puddles on the couch. He went up and poked Larry, just to make sure that he was actually alive. Larry responded by sinking deeper into the couch.

"Don't interrupt my vegetation, bro," he said with a tone of voice that….actually made Roy question whether or not he was intoxicated.

"Indeed," said Iggy. "This is too great of an occasion." He sunk even deeper into the couch cushions than Larry did.

Roy gave the bespectacled genius a weird look. "Wait. You of all people like to veg out?" He shook his head. "That's so backwards."

Iggy just sighed. "My genius mind has been in overdrive recently. I think even I deserve the opportunity to be lazy."

Roy snickered. "Okay." He looked between the two. "I could take a picture of you two and post it online if I really wanted."

"Go ahead," said Larry with a wave of the hand. "I'm sure the rest of society will want to follow in our footsteps."

"Besides," said Iggy. "I'm sure I could hack a computer and get rid of the pictures if I really wanted to."

Roy nodded. He didn't doubt that for a second. Since Iggy was more or less the one who set up the Koopa Kingdom internet, he could pretty much do whatever he wanted with it. Heck, he was more or less above the law because of it. It was kind of scary, honestly.

"Yeah, you're right." He looked up at the clock. "Oh wow, is that the time? I thought it was still morning!" He looked around the room. "I need to head over to Stonebrim Hospital to pick up Celia!"

Lemmy smiled. "Okay, Roy! You do that, big buddy."

"Yeah," said Larry. "Just make sure that you bring me back some pretzels, okay? That would really complete my vegging time."

Roy nodded. "Okay. I can do that."

Iggy, however, didn't seem as enthusiastic as the other two. He sat back up and put his hands on his knees. "Why in the world do you wish to help that girl out?"

"Because she said she likes me. And it's a nice thing to do."

"Even still," said Iggy. "Considering the bad track record she has shown to us over the past few days, I do not believe frequently being around her is wise." Iggy cleared his throat. "Besides, why help her find her father? That seems a bit far reaching."

Roy hesitated. He never thought of his mission as being far reaching. It just seemed like a normal task. Sure, one that would probably take a while to complete, but still simple regardless.

Still, Iggy did bring up a good question. Why do it in the first place?

"I guess…." Roy hesitated, trying to choose his words. "I guess….it's...it's because I know what it's like to live without a parent. I know the pain that it can cause, and I want to help someone who has been hurting in that way for a while to not hurt anymore."

Roy stared at his two siblings, biting his lip. That was a good explanation. Right? Forget the fact that he just came up with it on the spot; it really was the truth. It just took him saying it aloud to realize that.

Iggy blinked his bespectacled eyes before doing something that Roy had not expected. He smiled.

"That is very noble."

Roy blinked. "Really?"

"Mmhm." Iggy nodded. "It shows that you have a very well developed sense of empathy. You put the needs of others first, and you relate it to your own struggles. That is very admirable."

Roy paused before smiling. "Huh. I never thought of myself in that way before."

"Honestly, I know what you're talking about," said Larry. He turned toward Iggy. "I always wanted to know what happened to our real parents. Did they die?"

Iggy shrugged. "I do not know, Lawrence. But that is a story for another time."

Larry blinked before letting out a huff. "Fine. Okay." He scrunched up his shoulders and crossed his arms. "I still want to know," he muttered.

Roy nodded. That was a truth that everyone in the Koopa family wanted to know. Unfortunately, they couldn't learn it anytime soon, given how they had no clue where to start. However, Roy didn't have time to think about that right now. He had to go pick up a hybrid. Not in a...date sort of way, of course, but in a "retrieving her and escorting her to her destination" sort of way. Important to not get those two definitions mixed up.

"Okay. Well, I really do need to get going. See you guys later."

"See you later bro," said Larry.

"Bye!" said Lemmy.

"You have my best wishes and blessings," said Iggy.

Roy actually smiled at that last one. With a nod of his head, he made his way out of the room.