The house Mario and Luigi shared was no larger than the one they'd had back on Earth, but compared to that eyesore of a place, it was luxury. Surrounded by lush grass, with a red-tiled roof and clean, cosy interior, it felt more welcoming, too. And it had a private warp pipe that took them straight to Toad Town.
Mario had viewed the pipe with animosity at first. All that came to mind when he saw it was the accursed toadstool tube responsible for bringing them here. For a while, he and Luigi had chosen the mile-long walk to town over placing any part of themselves in that pipe.
However, things were different now. Though Luigi persisted with squinting at the pipe and cursing it half-jokingly, Mario had discovered the ride to be rather enjoyable. Once he jumped in, it took mere seconds for him to be spat out in front of the gates of Toad Town. He did enjoy the walk, so it wasn't something he did every day, but refusing to acknowledge the usefulness of the pipe just seemed silly.
He no longer resented his new life, so why hold a grudge?
Still, a tiny part of him (and a bigger part of Luigi, he'd wager) hoped to see that toadstool-patterned pipe reappear somewhere, ready to take them back to the familiarity of their own world. He missed the little things about it. He missed the rain and storms most of all; the Mushroom Kingdom was generally a mild place with little weather variation. And he'd never been able to locate his favourite brand of spaghetti sauce in the shops.
Long after his fight with the nefarious Bowser, he continued to have tea with Peach every Saturday, and their bond grew stronger. Twined with his usual fondness for her ran an undercurrent of protectiveness. The idea of risking hurt or humiliation for her sake did not concern him. And Peach? Well... nothing about her manner really changed, but she would occasionally bring up the Bowser incident even weeks later, and there was a tinge of admiration in her eyes when she spoke of Mario's battle, which never failed to make heat flood his face.
Though he loved their evening get-togethers, he longed for time with her outside the confines of the balcony. And one lucky day, he got some.
'Princess?' he said, looking at her uncertainly. He'd just jumped onto the balcony like clockwork, only to pull up short when he noticed that she was wearing a different outfit. Something more casual, consisting of a shorter skirt, high boots, and a short-sleeved shirt.
'I was hoping you might accompany me for a walk,' she said, smiling.
'O-of course,' he replied, mentally swatting himself for the stutter. Not wishing to make her feel uncomfortable, he forced himself not to look at anything besides her face. He didn't want to lewdly eye her up, to let his gaze roll over every centimetre of exposed skin and imagine what lay beneath her clothes. He wanted to sink into her beauty, to bask in the gentle radiance that seemed to flow from her, to admire her like he would a sunrise.
They left the castle grounds and walked into a wooded park at the edge of town, one that Mario had never actually set foot in. It was a sea of rolling green broken by oak trees and a single rippling pond. A few children, mostly Toads, were playing nearby. One had a small Chain Chomp on a leash and was walking it around.
'I, ah, I'm surprised they let you leave the castle like this,' said Mario, breaking the not-uncomfortable silence between them.
Peach gave a mischievous smile. He loved it when she was sweet, but loved it just as much when she was playful. All the sides of her were worthy of respect, he thought, because they made up the depth of her character: something more than just the ruler of a kingdom.
'Toadsworth tried to stop me, but I reminded him that you were able to save me from Bowser, and he calmed down after that. He's still worried, but he knows I'll be OK.'
The fact that Peach's nervous, protective advisor entrusted Mario with her safety was a surprise in itself. He should have just kept his mouth shut and appreciated the trust, but he couldn't stop himself from saying: 'But I don't know if I can beat Bowser again. I might lose next time.'
'I know you won't,' she said softly. 'You have to believe us when we say that no-one has ever defeated him so easily before.'
He lifted his head and breathed slow and deep, drinking in the fresh air and the smell of wildflowers. 'I'll try my best, principessa.'
She smiled again and blushed a little. 'I like it when you do that,' she confessed.
'Hrm?'
'When you... slip into Italian like that. It's so cute!'
Mario hadn't even noticed the slip, his mind being preoccupied with thoughts of Toadsworth's trust and Bowser's fury and Peach's voice. He had a habit of dropping Italian words and phrases into otherwise English sentences when he wasn't paying attention, his brain defaulting to the language of his family instead of the one he'd only picked up as a teenager.
'Ah... I'm happy it doesn't bother you,' he said.
'Not at all. In fact, I wouldn't mind if you chose to speak it more often.'
'I should not. I don't want to forget how to use this language the right way.'
'Could that happen?' she said, laughter in the back of her voice.
'It could, I think,' he said, able to admit that it was a possibility. The idea of suddenly finding himself unable to properly communicate with Peach was rather alarming. 'And that would be bad.'
She giggled, a delicate hand briefly going to her mouth. When the laughter abated, she just gazed down at him with sparkling blue eyes full of affection. Neither the sea nor the sky could hold a candle to the beauty of those eyes, in his opinion.
Then, on a quiet evening six months after his battle with Bowser, something utterly unexpected and jarring occurred.
He was at home, eating dinner and trying to absorb himself in some odd cooking show, when a knock sounded on the door. It was quiet yet fast, a sharp pattering that instantly got his attention even over the noise of the TV. Frowning slightly, he went to investigate. Luigi had gone out for dinner with Princess Daisy and wasn't supposed to be back yet; had something happened to him?
But when the door swung open, it wasn't his brother's face that greeted him – it was Peach's.
'Mario, I've just found something I need you to see!' He had never heard her sound so urgent. He promptly abandoned his half-eaten lasagne and followed her out into the twilight.
She led him to the warp pipe outside his house, and together they rode to the gates of Toad Town. A few locals threw them surprised looks, probably wondering why their princess was running around town without guards to protect her. They didn't know that Mario could protect her better than any guard.
'Where are we going?' he asked, confused and a little concerned as Peach headed, not further into town, but towards the gates. There were nasty creatures out there in the wilderness...
'Not far, Mario,' she said, a little out of breath but seemingly determined not to slow down. He could do nothing but pick up his feet and follow her. The road that led away from Toad Town quickly became a simple dirt track rolling across the countryside; a river and bridge lay nearby, but Peach wasn't going in that direction. She led them off the track and into a cluster of trees and shrubs.
As he swatted a bramble out of his face and pulled up alongside her, he finally saw what she'd been so excited about.
A metal tube of red and white jutted out of the ground just behind the trees. It shone faintly in the dying light. The sight of it flooded him with memories and hard-to-dissect feelings. The last time he'd seen it had been the night his life changed forever.
He remembered his ramshackle house and the dirty little yard in which the pipe had first appeared. He remembered falling into it, dragged by an unseen force, and he remembered Luigi's cry of shock in the distance as he fell.
This pipe had changed everything. And now it had reappeared, its very existence a mocking joke thrown in his face. He was being presented with the opportunity to go home... but only after spending months in the Mushroom Kingdom and developing a heartfelt friendship with its princess. Going back now would mean more loss and sorrow.
No matter when and where the pipe appeared, its intention was to turn his life upside-down and steal away things he loved.
'You have to go, Mario,' said Peach. Her voice, so gentle yet so sad, jerked him out of his musings. 'It will take you home. You can be back where you belong.'
He dared to look up at her and was shocked to see two tears on her cheek, shimmering in the moonlight.
She had befriended him, given him hope, given him confidence, and helped him adjust when his life had gone pear-shaped. Losing her now would be almost as painful as losing his mother had been; Peach wouldn't be dead, but he'd likely never see her or speak to her again. He would be returning to the drab mundane of his previous life, alone except for Luigi, poor, and with almost no hope of a better tomorrow.
He shook his head slowly, aware that by doing so he had already made his choice.
'No,' he said. 'I have nothing to go back to. I want to stay here... if you'll let me.'
She gazed down at him, not understanding even as she wiped her tears away.
'But it's your home, Mario. When you first came here, you wanted so badly to find one of these pipes and go home. Luigi, too. Now you finally have the chance! You can leave our silly world and go back to the place you know best.'
'Your world isn't silly at all,' he said firmly. 'I like it. I like it much better than our old 'home'.
'What about Luigi?'
Mario hesitated. He wondered, with a jolt of worry, if telling Luigi about the pipe would mean losing his brother. Luigi's adjustment had been just as hard as his – harder, in many ways.
But he had Daisy now. And he'd made friends with Toadette, the cute Toad girl who worked at the local cafe. And he probably wouldn't want to lose his brother either.
'Luigi is like me,' he said at last.
Peach continued to gaze at him; a person not born into royalty might have fidgeted or asked more questions, but she was too refined for that. She must have been able to see the resolve in his eyes and, before long, understood that no words now could change his decision.
'I see,' she said, albeit with some lingering puzzlement. Did she truly not know how special she had become to him? 'If you're absolutely sure you'd prefer to stay here, I promise that I'll do anything I can to make your life in my kingdom a happy one.'
He smiled at her softly and murmured, 'You have already made life so much better for me, principessa.'
A movement on the sidelines jolted their attention back to the toadstool pipe. With a quiet sliding and grinding, it had begun to retreat into the earth. Grass was twisted and dirt clods were shifted by its movement. There was Mario's chance, maybe his last chance, of going back to Earth. But as he watched the last few inches of the pipe disappear, he felt no regret.
Only a quiet happiness and a glow of hope for where his new life might take him. And as he felt Peach's gloved hand tentatively slip into his, he knew he wouldn't be alone.