Part I: A New Beginning

Chapter II: Sabotage

Labarus was beginning to get cold. He checked his watch and noticed it was ten minutes past midnight, and as far as he could tell there was no one else in sight. With the exception of the one hundred other Sarasalandian guards of course, who were assigned to guard the massive ship that was due to set off from this land in under a month from now.

Labarus looked around to see there were no other guards on this part of the deck, though it was hard to tell considering the massive amount of fog that was quickly building up around him. The massive ship in front of him, or at least the very small part of it that he could see, almost looked like one of those haunted ships that he had heard of in ghost stories when he was a child.

As far as Labarus knew, the ship was still unnamed. The Chancellor of the Mushroom Kingdom had given the choice of a name to Mario and Luigi, the "great heroes of the Mushroom people" as he called them.

"Where the hell are they?" Labarus whispered to himself. He was beginning to get tense. This was probably the only night that they could possibly hope to sneak in to plant something on the massive ship, and his shift ended at 1:00AM.

A part of him hoped that they wouldn't show up, he was only working to sabotage the voyage that would take the greatest heroes and warriors of the United Plit out to new worlds because of his intense hatred for the Goombas, whom he had hated ever since they attacked his village as part of the Koopa Troop's invasion six years ago. He had disagreed strongly with Sarasaland and the Mushroom Kingdom on their decision to allow the Goombas into the United Plit two years ago. He thought that it was insane to allow a race of creatures that only a few years ago had attempted to help destroy us suddenly be allowed to become our allies. Many Goombas would be among the crew of hundreds that would be on this ship that now sat in front of him, and he couldn't allow that. His hated of the Goombas really began when they raided his peaceful village in western Sarasaland six years ago, which had killed his mother, father, and his only sibling, his sister Adia.

Despite his hatred, or intense dislike as was the more accurate term, he wasn't sure he wanted to go through with it anymore. The problem of course was, if he bailed out, he would likely be hunted down. The government of Sarasaland was still weak and likely wouldn't be able to protect him for very long, especially from the group that he had gotten himself involved in. On the other hand, The Mushroom Kingdom, and possibly Sarasaland as well, would collapse if this ship was destroyed.

He looked up at the ship again. It represented a symbol of hope for the Mushroom Kingdom, Sarasaland, the Mushroom World, Nimbus Land, and many other places across the continent of Plit. It represented the hope that there was other life in the unexplored regions of Plit, where there might be a civilization that could help them in their recovery from the devastating attack that had nearly destroyed them six years ago.

"What am I doing?" He suddenly asked himself, upset at himself for his own treason. "This ship is our key to recovery. I'm supposed to be helping prevent a catastrophe, not cause one. I can't go through with this."

He couldn't understand it, how had he been so easily persuaded? Not too long ago he was looking forward to seeing the ship sail away, bringing back someone who could help the great Sarasaland, then just a few weeks ago, he became involved in a sabotage attempt…

He knew anyway that he had to warn his superior of the attempted sabotage that was supposed to occur tonight. He began to run across the wide wooden platform, looking for a fellow guard to tell him where his superior, Nym, was.

He took a look at his watch, which now read 12:24. He stopped after running for a while, for he was terribly out of shape.

No guard in sight still, he thought. This was not a good sign. He stood on that spot for a while, looking around at all around him. To his left, the great open waters of the Sarasa Sea, to his right, the massive ship that still had a while to go before he got to its end, and in front and behind him, the incredibly long platform that spread the length of the ship.

After he ran a few metres longer he finally thought he could see a fellow guard walking around, about twenty-five metres ahead of him. He ran quickly, hoping he could find out where his superior Nym was, or could at least let another guard know of the attempted sabotage.

"Hey!" Labarus yelled, coming closer to what he could now see was definitely a Mushroomer. "There's going to be a sabotage on the ship tonight! We have to find where all the bombers are!" He slowed down a bit, but then noticed a dead Mushroomer lying two feet away from the guard, a large puddle of blood lying right beside his head.

"What the hell happened?" Labarus asked his fellow guard. Then suddenly he looked at the dead Mushroomer, noticing that his head was a light shade of green. This was the same light shade of green that he had noticed about the guard who he had talked to just two days ago. Labarus looked at the Mushroomer he thought was the guard, and spotted the black Mushroom head associated with the terrorist organization he was planning to aid tonight.

The imposter suddenly turned around, revealing a heavily scarred and ugly face, but nonetheless the face of the same Mushroomer he was supposed to meet.

"Good evening Labarus. So nice to see you tonight."