Tatanga lazily opened his eyes and found himself in a room that he had recognized from his childhood. It was the room he lived in when he was a kid.
"Oh...I'm still here..." Tatanga softly spoke and raised his upper body up. Near the end of his bed were numerous bags of candy that he placed there a while ago.
He looked out his window to find that the sun was shining bright and saw kids playing around with each other on the streets. He sadly sighed at this.
"Right here, all the beauty...all the smiles are fake. There is no such thing as happiness...it's all just a bunch of bullshit that's implanted into our heads once we reach the age of mere elementary school children." Tatanga said in a plain voice. "I have no more feeling left inside of me...I can't even remember anything like joy, sadness, anger, pain...love."
After he says this, Tatanga quickly snatches a Snickers candy bar from one of his bags and desperately unwraps it, then eats it. About a minute after he devours the entire candy bar, his stomach makes a huge gurgling noise and Tatanga covers his mouth. He jumps off his bed, runs out into the hallway, and rushes into the bathroom. He pulls up the toilet lid and proceeds to throw up into the toilet. After another minute passes, he manages to flush the toilet and falls to the ground, breathing heavily.
"Why me? Why does it have to be me out of everyone on this forsaken planet?" He asked to himself. He steadily got himself up, hanging on to the sink, in case he fell down again. He suddenly heard thunder and slowly turned his head to his bathroom window. He saw a bunch of gray clouds slowly moving forward, the sunshine slowly fading.
"Looks like a storm is coming..."
"Tatanga?"
"Huh?"
"Tatanga!"
"AH!" Tatanga shrieked, falling out of his chair. He realized that he was no longer dreaming, and back in the present world. He stood up and saw Dimentio staring at him oddly.
"Um, were you just daydreaming?" The jester asked.
"N-no I wasn't! I was just spacing out...happens to me all the time! Heh heh. Um, right, what did you want now?" Tatanga asked.
"Well...err...I came to tell you that I...uhh...failed in my mission of retrieving the Sapphire gem from those annoying heroes. That damn Count Bleck was there and he completely threw me off! I wasn't expecting them all to be so strategic considering at least half of the people in that group are very dim-witted, especially Peach!" Dimentio said in sorrow, clearly disappointed with himself.
"Oh! Um, don't worry about it, Dimentio. They still have 8 more gems to go, so I really doubt they'll be able to get them all. Even if they do, they likely won't have enough time to come here and fight me, because my secret weapon is already underway."
"Secret weapon? Sounds very intriguing! May I have a sneak peek of this secret weapon, perhaps?" Dimentio said in immediate curiosity.
"Not yet, Dimentio. It's still in the early stages of being worked on. I have some of my minions working on it right now actually. But don't worry, I'll show it to you once it's ready. Those damn heroes are going to be in for a major shock once I unleash this onto them. They will NEVER see something like this coming, not in a million years," Tatanga said with an evil smirk.
"Hoo hoo hoo! That sounds quite lovely! But, back to the Gem topic...what's our next move? I imagine those heroes are already on their way to getting the second gem so we have to do something right now so we'll get a better chance of getting the gem this time," Dimentio asked.
"Hmm, if I remember correctly, the second place they were gonna go to was some haunted mansion. And if my memory serves me right, that Luigi guy owns a haunted mansion." Tatanga said with another smirk. "So, this time, I want Doopliss, Marilyn, and Beldam to go to this mansion and find the gem for themselves. I want you to go tell them that."
Dimentio frowned in disappointment. "Oh...you don't want me to go with them, Tatanga...?"
"Sorry Dimentio, but as your punishment for not getting the gem, I won't be allowing you to help retrieve the gem," Tatanga said as he turned away and stared out his window.
"Oh...I understand...I'll go let them know right away..." Dimentio said, sadness in his voice.
"Oh, and Dimentio? Don't even think about trying to sneak away. This scepter I hold has become a lot more powerful than it ever has been, so if I find out that you went with them, you're gonna wish that you had never met me," Tatanga threatened. Dimentio didn't respond and slowly exited the room.
Tatanga gave a sad sigh and dropped back down in his chair. "I don't think I'll ever be able to forget that lonely 1994..."
Grodus was in a room all by himself in the bunker building. His room wasn't anything special, it had a dirty bed with a cracked window and some old nightstand. He made sure the door was locked tight and plopped down on his bed and got out an old book. Grodus couldn't help but grow a wide smirk as he stared at it.
"I finally have the time to look at this. It's a good thing I kept it with me all this time..." Grodus whispered to himself as he opened the book to the title.
The title of the book in bold letters was simply titled 'Black Magic'.
"Tatanga...you may have given me my body back, but you've taken everything else away from me. You stole my minions, my scepter, my pride, and my plans of world domination. You have been treating me like some peasant ever since I joined your little group. But that's all going to change very soon. You better count your blessings, buddy. Because sooner or later, I will take you down and destroy the world all by myself. Just give me time..."
EOC.
Yeah, I know it's a lot shorter than usual but there's not really much to delve into yet because it's too soon in the story to give a lot of background info on the villains, so I think this is a nice start. What do you think happened with Tatanga in his past? And do you think Grodus will become successful in trying to defeat Tatanga?
Oh, and since this chapter was pretty much short and didn't have a lot of information, I'll tell you readers some important plot points that are going to happen in the future of this story:
1. Some of the characters back at the hospital will join the main 13 on their journey later in the story.
2. Count Bleck and Tippi are going to meet up again, and their relationship will play a crucial role in the future.
3. Grodus' revenge arc is going to take place and slowly build up throughout the majority of the story, and will reach its climax near the final quarter of the story.
4. More of Tatanga's history will also be slowly revealed throughout the story. It will explain why he has become the villain that he is.
5. A certain character will be introduced much later that will be shown to have had some type of relationship with Tatanga, thus revealing more about his past.
6. The MimixRoy relationship is going to play an even bigger role than the BleckxTippi one. It's going to cause some major distress between them and a few other characters, and it may cause a death.
7. One of the main 13 characters is going to die.
