Welcome To Mario Kart, Part 5
(Ok, so this probably wasn't the best game ever made but I personally find it pretty darn entertaining and can only dream of the day the DOT installs item boxes for the nation's freeways in selected cities…don't laugh, if this ever comes true yours could be one of them….lol)
To The Next Level
Some people in line were placing two dollar and four dollar, and a few had ten dollar bets on the winner. Seemed Wario was getting the best draw so far. Next was Bowser, then Yoshi.
"That little froggy thing practically blows people off the course with his speed." said one fan to another.
"What about that big ape?" The other fan pointed to the photo of D.K. on the program.
"He's got size enough to knock'em around but he's too dumb. Doesn't have any strategy, and he gets way too many bananas."
Award music plays in the background, and Yoshi takes the gold in Mushroom Cup 100cc.
"YO-YO YO-YOSHI!" he says with joy, and the fans cheer him.
Battle
"It's very important that I get in!" said Geno as he showed a photo of Mario and Luigi to the ticket booth attendant. "I was their guardian when they were just little babies. I don't need to have a ticket, they know me! I have something very important to tell them…please, let me in!"
"I'm not authorized to let you in or anyone else, sir, without you purchasing a ticket." the attendant said after shutting the gate and locking it. "The tournament has already begun anyways. And it's a full house, standing room only."
The attendant walked away, leaving Geno and Mallow at the entrance.
"I think we have no choice but to go in without a pass." said Mallow. "We'll be clear once we find Mario anyway."
It was not Geno's intention to perform any kind of magic but knew he wouldn't have a choice if it meant getting into the arena to see Mario. He said some words then raised his hands and wiggled his fingers, and the gate that was in front of them magically disappeared.
"Where's the stone?" asked Mallow.
"In my pouch." answered Geno. "Safe."
"We have to do this?"
"Yes Mallow. We must. It's a matter of life or death for someone in there."
Mallow contained himself and followed Geno through the entrance and stayed close as not to become lost. He didn't want to think about how they had just come from one of the worst places in Mushroom World, streets littered and air boiling in dank stench and the ground sprouting acres of poisonous and hallucinogenic mushrooms. Hard to believe the Princess had been there so many times in the past few weeks, but Geno held the stone that would show images of her trip there, mingling with several lakitus who supplied her with the mushrooms in exchange for gold, and she was seen dancing with some goombas and sharing a drink or two at a bob-omb bar with none other than Lemmy and Iggy Koopa. The stone also showed a lakitu handing over two bottles that looked like potions and some kind of small booklet, and she hugged him in return! Why did she do that? Mallow had no answer but he was extremely affected by this and couldn't think up any reason why Princess Toadstool had gone to visit the lower half of Mushroom World in the first place. A closer look into the stone gave a clear view of the items bought by the princess—two bottles of shell explosives, some deadly power rocks, and one book of cheats and shortcuts. Could the princess have been so serious about winning that she was willing to kill? And who was she going after with these explosives? Wario? Or was she finally going to put a permanent end to Bowser?
Thank goodness one of toad servants had placed the stone inside Peach's broche to record her every move before her travels to "the bottom.."
"They've started already." said Geno as they approached the main lobby inside the arena. "We'll have to run. Come on."
As Mallow and Geno were on their way backstage, Luigi, Mario, Bowser, and Peach were at their starting positions on Block Fort. Peach appeared to be especially ready, and she floored the gas pedal just as soon as Lakitu's signal went blue, shooting straight toward the kart which was Mario's. Luigi and Bowser went their own ways, getting item boxes and going up the ramps to a color-coded block. But Mario—he couldn't get away fast enough before Peach ran right into him once, then surged ahead to pick up an item box and came back around to find him and shot off three red shells. These shells repetitiously blew Mario twenty feet into the air. Scared the crap out of him too. Bowser and Luigi had been battling between themselves until Luigi looked across the fort and saw Mario seemingly trying his best to get away from Peach, who kept running over item boxes and loading them and Bowser stopped long enough to notice she was pouring some sort of additive into the shells then packing them in beside her. Then again, she raced to catch Mario and when she did, she sent off more shells then put down an upside down question box, and as Mario came tumbling down from the air and hit the ground, she ran over him, flattening him like paper, and then she did it with vengeance, again….again….and again….
"Princess!" Luigi called as he grabbed her arms and Bowser helped him pull her out of her kart and away from Mario who was just beginning to recover from the attack..
"Whoa…." Mario huffed and looked at Peach. "What-a you try to do to me, Princess? Kill-a me?"
The crowd started chanting, "PRINCESS! PRINCESS!" because they didn't really know what was going on, and then Luigi heard something whizzing behind him. Just as he looked back he saw a leftover red shell spinning in the corner, then Mario pulled off, and Luigi couldn't do a thing but close his eyes and pray as the shell went after Mario, crashing into his kart and exploding like fireworks. The force of the blast was so strong that it ejected Mario from his seat, and he smashed into the wall then fell to the floor like a limp rag.
Luigi let go of Peach and ran to his brother then knelt beside him.
"HE'S DEAD!" Luigi yelled in a panic after hearing not a breath from brother's lungs. "SHE'S KILLED MARIO!"
…ooooooooh… The crowd rumbled.
And then Peach went unconscious, slid from Bowser's grasp and collapsed on the floor.
"MARIO! MARIO!…" a voice came calling from somewhere nearby. "MARIO! WHERE ARE YOU?"
Luigi looked up and saw Geno running toward him and Mallow coming close behind.
"Mario?" said Geno when he found Luigi. "…Uh….Princess?…" He then saw Peach lying on the floor underneath Bowser.
"She killed him." Luigi said with his eyes just starting to tear.
Geno's eyes rolled from one to the other. "No. She couldn't have….killed….Mario?…"
Mallow went immediately to see about Peach, and he found that she was indeed breathing, although very faintly, like she was in some kind of deep sleep. He quickly took out a packet of smelling salts and held them under her tiny nose, and Bowser held her as she came around. Her eyes fluttered open and Mallow thought she would certainly be all right, until she began to cough. At first she coughed twice, then started again, but this time it sounded like she was choking on something, then gurgling, and Bowser lifted her up to sit and shook her.
"Hey! Princess! AAAAAH AAAAAAGH!" he yelled. "Hey, you killed Mario! You weren't supposed to do that, I was supposed to do it!"
"Bowser!" Geno called. "We can't change that now. Princess Toadstool has murdered Mario—"
"Wait!" Mallow broke in. "Look!"
Mallow cupped his hands as Peach continued coughing, and she sounded even worse than before, almost like she was suffocating before he tilted her head down so she could spit up whatever it was, and he was amazed when he trapped a slithering yellow worm in his hands from her mouth.
"Geno!" he yelled. "A wiggler! There was a small wiggler in her throat!"
Just as Geno got up, the wiggler squirmed out of Mallow's hands and plopped onto the floor then shot forward like a desert snake, heading for Luigi…but no….it was going for Mario….
"Stomp it!" Geno yelled.
The worm was half an inch away from Mario's lifeless body when Luigi crushed it under his right shoe.
…eeewwwww…. went the crowd.
"Yuck." said Bowser.
Luigi raised his foot and saw the remains of a gooey wiggler stuck between the sole of his shoe and the floor like pizza cheese.
"That's what made her do it." Geno concluded. "Poor Princess, I don't know how we're going to tell her what she's done to Mario. But I wonder how that worm got into her."
"She ate it?" asked Mallow.
"Mallow, the Princess doesn't eat worms….not knowingly anyways." said Geno with disgust as he watched the ambulance drive up and two toad paramedics put Mario onto a stretcher and covered him.
"….Ma….Mario?" Peach said drearily, and when she saw the paramedics cover Mario's face with the sheet, she collapsed again and passed out cold.
(….Mario's dead…. Oh no! Will Peach be forced to pick out his tombstone? Or will they revive him in time to enjoy a huge Tombstone pizza with his friends by the end of Mario Kart 64?)