Back with the trio...
Mario, Luigi, and Aaron just got out of the pipe and were behind a gate back near the town. They hit a button that deactivated the gate, and when they walked by they were met with Prince Peasley on his winged bean, who they greeted.
The prince said, "I searched high and low for you three! I feared that you'd met a terrible fate!"
"We almost did." Mario said, "We found the Beanstar but we ran into some trouble. Then a Peach bot made the Beanstar act out again."
Luigi followed, "We were carried way up above the kingdom. We fell off and the Beanstar broke apart into four pieces."
Aaron finished, "We landed on Oho Oasis. We had to get some weird but cool powers to get to this pipe."
Peasley said, "The Beanstar spit apart...It is sad, really..."
"Hey, we can help find all the pieces." Mario said, his brother and Aaron agreeing with him by nodding.
"Hmm, of course, I would be most appreciative...but actually, I'd like you three to go to Beanbean Airport."
"What for?"
Peasley laughed a bit before saying, "You see, Princess Peach is blessing our fair land with her presence!"
That got the three stunned. They knew the state the princess was in now with her now literal explosive vocabulary.
"A dignitary of Princess Peach's stature visiting our kingdom is a very serious affair. And THAT is why I would like you two in attendance to greet her Royal Loveliness. As such, you must head for Beanbean Airport immediately."
"Mhm." "Oh yeah." "Sure thing." the trio replied in order.
"I must head there myself immediately, so I'll see you there." The prince then flew away.
"Which way, Aaron?" "South of Beanbean Castle." he answered Mario.
The three then made their way to the airport.
It didn't take too long, and Luigi had to use his Thunderhand power to activate a bridge to get there, but the three made it to the airport.
They went past the gates and went straight to the runway where Lady Lima was.
When she saw the heroes, she greeted them before saying, "Queen Bean was most pleased by your efforts at the Hooniversity! By the way...There has been a slight hiccup in our plans to welcome Princess Peach. You see, nasty Piranha Plants have dug their roots into this runway. Her airplane can't land!"
The three looked to the right and saw two Piranha Plants growing out of the runway, confirming what Lady Lima was saying.
Luigi and Aaron went over to one of them and tried to pull it out, but had no luck.
While those two kept tugging, Mario said to Lady Lima, "Why hasn't anyone started on repairs?"
"Well, with the Cackletta incident, it didn't seem to be a priority...But enough about that! You must do something about these disgusting Piranha Plants!
For the sake of the princess! You can't refuse, can you?"
"Well-"
"Well, then! Show me that Mario Bros work ethic I've heard so much about!" Lady Lima then left.
Mario looked at his brother and Aaron, who were beside a Piranha Plant having a drink due to them being tired out from all of the pulling. Luigi was drinking a cup of coffee, and Aaron was drinking a thermos of iced sweet tea.
"C'mon, you two. We have a job to do."
The two finished their break and the three of them went to deal with all of the Piranha Plants. However, whenever they tried fighting one then K.O. it, a new one would grow back in it's place.
This happened for a while.
"How do we do this?" Luigi asked at one point.
Aaron thought about it before saying, "I got an idea."
The Bros followed him to a water dispenser and Aaron said, "I read a book on enemies and it had an interesting fact about Piranha Plants. They go back underground to avoid getting shocked by lightning when they get wet."
"So if we got them wet," "Then I shock them with my Thunderhand,"
"We can send them back into the dirt."
And so, they did just that.
They filled Mario's body with water, he sprayed it all over a Piranha Plant, and Luigi zapped it with his hand power.
Aaron, not having anything to do, looked around.
He then noticed something weird on the runway; a big, spotted, egg with a leafy underside.
He noticed the roots coming out of the leaves disappearing as he saw the Mario Bros get rid of another Piranha Plant.
When the last one was gone, the egg cracked. Then some more.
Then spooking Aaron off his feet when the egg cracked open was a massive Piranha Plant with two vine-like tentacles for limbs extending from a leafage, and a large fragment of the egg left over on it's head.
The was the leader and mother of all of the Piranha Plants on the runway.
The brothers in red and green saw what happened and ran to help Aaron back up.
Play the Battle Theme 'Come on, Again! DX' here.
"That is one angry momma." Aaron said as he was helped back on his feet.
Mom Piranha started the battle with two Piranha Plants in front of her.
First, she closed in on the Trio and swept her vine-like tentacles back and forth at them. The three of them dodged the attack by jumping over them.
Right after, the Piranha Plants each shot fire out of their mouths at the three of them, making them jump to dodge again.
Because of the eggshell on her head, they couldn't attack Mom Piranha with attacks that involved jumping because it did less damage. So that left their hammer swings, Trio Attacks involving hammers, and their Hand Powers.
Well, not Mario's. He tried his and it ended up healing one of the Piranha Plants. That left Luigi and Aaron. The former with his Hand Power, and the latter with the Super Chopper move.
After they attacked, Mom Piranha shot a big orb of energy and fired it over Mario. When it came down, he knocked it back with his hammer, and the radius when it hit Mom Piranha, hit one of the other Piranha Plants and it got K.O.'d, leaving just one.
However, that one Piranha Plant spat out a fire ball that landed on the mother and healed it a bit.
Mario queued the Super Launcher move with Aaron, then Luigi did the Knockback move with his bro, then Aaron used the Chopper move with Luigi.
The Mom Piranha shot out another orb of energy, but at Luigi this time, and when he counterattacked, the orb's shockwave hit the Piranha Plant, K.O.'ing it. However, a second later, two blue Piranha Plants grew out of the ground in front of the mother.
Only, these shot lightning instead of fire that the trio had to jump over.
The plants weren't the only thing that was blue; Mom Piranha had also now turned blue.
Knowing what the color meant, Mario now could use his Hand Power on her, and he did.
And right after Luigi used his Super Knockback move, Aaron used his Hand Power, Mom Piranha was K.O.'d along with the two plants in front of her!
Cut the music!
After the fight, Mom Piranha looked tired out and back in red. She then shrunk until she was the size of a tennis ball.
Seeing this, Luigi just went ahead and sat on her, making her poof away like most enemies.
The three cheered for themselves and did a three-way high five. The Superstar Trio wins again!
The went over to Lady Lima, who congratulated the three of them saying, "Well done, you three! Now we can welcome Princess Peach to our fair kingdom!"
As if on cue, the runway lit up. Then in less than a minute, coming in for a landing was the princess's plane.
Later, in Beanbean Castle Garden...
The trio was waiting along with two Beanish servants.
In came Lady Lima saying, "Hush, everyone! Princess Peach, representative of the Mushroom Kingdom, brings greetings!"
In came was the princess, and Toadsworth right behind her.
She did a curtsy, before opening her mouth to say something. This alarmed Mario and Luigi who both yelped before running in circles around Aaron in a panic.
But-
"Mario! Luigi!"
They stopped in their tracks and the three of them looked at each other shocked and confused. When did she get her voice back?! Shouldn't there be word bombs coming out of her mouth?!
"Mario! Luigi! Thank you so much for all you've done! I'm so relieved that the two of you are safe."
The tree of them immediately started bombarding the princess with questions, making her giggle behind her hand.
Toadsworth then said before laughing, "Oh, terribly amusing! Yes. Come now, don't be so startled! You see...I must tell you...
Princess Peach's voice...was never stolen!"
"What?!" the three said.
Prince Peasley came in saying, "I knew Cackletta was after the royal voice, so I beat them to the castle and warned the princess."
He then walked to the other side of the garden saying, "This is the Princess Peach whose voice was stolen!"
A second Princess Peach then came in. In a puff of smoke, it turned out that this Princess Peach was actually Birdo.
"So that's why the Beanstar went mad when it heard her voice, it wasn't Peach's!" "Correct, Aaron!" Peasley said.
At that moment, Birdo blew a kiss at Toadsworth, who moved to avoid it. Then at Peasley, who reacted the same way. The then persued the Beanish assistants, who ended up being chased by Birdo out of the garden and out of the castle.
Then, Queen Bean came in and said, "As you can see, every card in our hand truly was better than theirs." She then laughed.
Then, Peach went to Aaron and said, "And you must be Aaron. Thank you for assisting Mario and Luigi on their journey."
"Always a pleasure, princess." Aaron said, bowing.
"Yes, thank you Master Aaron."
"Uh, Toadsworth, sir? You can just call me Aaron. None of this 'Master' stuff. Feels too formal for my tastes." "Oh. Of course."
"Oh, now it makes sense." Mario and Luigi said. So that was the reason no one called Aaron, 'Master Aaron'.
Peach then said, "I'm sorry to have caused you three such trouble. When the pair of you came running to the castle, I intended to tell you the truth immediatly, but Bowser beat you there. And I lost my chance to spill the beans...so to speak."
Heh, 'spill the beans'.
"But you defeated Cackletta nonetheless! And that is something to be congratulated for!" Toadsworth said.
The trio then had proud looks on their faces.
A job well done!
Well, not yet, but for now, a job well almost-a-quarter-away-from-being-halfway done!
