Stunning Performance

Hello and like always welcome back sorry for the long wait like last time this was a surprisingly long chapter and took me longer then expected but hopefully the longer time means this chapter turned out good so lets get right into this this

Again I do not own the right to Mario or Mario Strikers Charged all rights belong to Nintendo and Next Level Games

It was only a few minutes before game time and Mario and company were now in their red uniforms with blue and white accents with protective gear on.

Mario was in his old striker gear with his red jersey with an orange fire spread across the bottom right half, dark blue soccer shorts with red and white on the sides and his gray soccer cleats with a large M logo on the outside of the shoes.

New to his look was a large red chestplate made out of metal protecting the upper half of his chest and back with his team emblem of his red M logo in a white circle engulfed in flames on the top middle. It annoyed him that the chest protector hid his number on the back of his shirt but it was solved by putting his number one on the back of the chestplate. Another new addition to his gear was his big steel gloves he swapped for his regular old white ones and they were light and comfortable to his surprise.

Mario looked up and saw his team getting their uniforms and armor on making sure they were on tight and fit on. Kenny had a basic red and faded blue shirt and shorts on with matching generic soccer cleats for his uniform. For his protective gear he had a durable plastic chest protector covering most of his chest with symmetrical white lines following the borders of the chestplate before stopping at the middle top where the M on Mario's cap was at showing he was on his team. The other new gear was his shell shield. It covered all of Kenny's shell made out of the same material his front padding with a huge M in a white circle on it covering most of the shell guard with red painted on the rest.

Henry basically had the same getup as Kenny as his jersey and shorts were exactly the same except a little bigger, his cleats had the same design only difference being Henry's were a little bigger and the same chest armor and shell shield again the only difference was they were a little bigger and thicker. The only gear Henry had that Kenny didn't was a helmet but instead of his normally worn green hat Henry has a red and white version of headgear that was secured safely on his head by the brown chinstrap that wrapped around his head.

Mario was the most worried about Dean based on his decision to wear minimal gear. First he only elected to wear shorts which were all tattered up and his cleats were all ripped up and had holes in the front of them leaving his boney feet visible. Like the jersey he didn't wear a shell shield like Kenny and Henry he opted to paint his shell red and paint on the M logo to match the rest of his gear. Dean had a front chest protector but like his other gear it was all beat up and had cracks all over it not to mention it was all faded of its color with some paint that looked to be scratched off and one of the straps that held the chestplate in place broke off and was barely hanging on. Lastly Dean wore a mask type helmet that covered most of the top of his head only having large holes in the front for his eyes so he could see.

Finally Kingston had his goalkeeping gear loving his armor and the new he had a white football face mask that covered his mouth and new steel goalie gloves that were not only strong but flexible as he was easily able to move his hands wiggling and moving his fingers with ease. Next was his red shoulder pads that were firmly strapped on and his also red chestplate with a big white skull and bone design all over it. To finish the look Kingston had his brown belt with a skull belt buckle he normally had to hold up his pants around his waist.

A knock then was heard on the door of their locker room then was opened by a toad who had a purple hat on his head and was wearing a matching purple vest.

"Team fireballs are you ready?" asked the toad to the soccer team.

"Yes we are" replied Mario as he stood up from the bench he was sitting on.

"Ok then Mario follow me" said back the purple toad

The mushroom man then turned his head to the others "You four just go straight to the field" he informed the rest and they all nodded and walked out to the pitch as Mario went with the toad assistant in the opposite direction.

Kenny, Henry, Dean, and KIngston were now the arena where they were going to play. The Wastelands was its name, the pitch with its purple colored surface was not the only weird fact about it. The entire surface was incredibly slippery and you could almost glide on the ground with just sheer momentum.

Both Mario and Peach's teams were on the field with Mario's on the left side and Peach's on the right side with kritters each standing at goal as the electric fence was turned on signaling the start of the game. Around the outside of the soccer field in the stands forty to fifty thousands fans which were made up of many creatures like toads, shy guys, birdos, goombas and many more were already cheering excited for the game. It seemed more Mario fans were in attendance by the many people who were wearing Mario merch and some went the extra mile by making signs with a big red M showing which team they supported and cheered for.

"You pink wearing losers ready for this blowout we're going to hand you today" Henry yelled at Peach's sidekicks trying to get in their heads. None of them spoke and just stretched before the start of the match.

"What? To tongue tied to talk back?" Henry said while taking a step forward and not one more as a pink blur suddenly landed from the sky. Peach got up from her crouched position and looked directly at Henry.

"What did you say bird face?" Peach asked threateningly not finding the insults particularly funny. Cameras started to spin around her and grabbed her attention and she started posing telling them to take her good side.

"Well um.." said back Henry stupidly not knowing what to say back and took a step backwards back to where he was originally standing.

"Guys look!" Kenny said, interrupting Henry from his bumbling. Henry and Dean looked over to Kenny and saw he was pointing up in the sky. Henry looked up and squinted his eyes trying to see what Kenny was seeing.

It's Mario it's Mario" shouted Henry pointing up as well now and jumping. Dean and the crowd of fans noticed too as they started cheering loudly at the red plumber's arrival. Mario was high in the sky with his arms stretched out once near the ground he got ready to land and landed perfectly on his feet.

"Come on" said Mario in a low voice showing he was ready to throw down.

Everyone walked over to their positions Mario and Peach stood where they dropped in front of the steel ball. Kenny and Peach's pink toad walked over to the left side of the field not saying a word to each other and just looking at their respected captains. Henry went over to his position eagerly on the right side and lined up a second later the pink dressed shy guy he remembered seeing at the classroom about a month earlier lined up in front of him. Henry tried to trash talk him but to his disappointment he stayed quiet and simply ignored him, Dean and Peach's pink skinned birdo walked backwards showing they were playing fans were ready to see some action. Dueling Mario and Peach chants started pouring in from the crowd. With everything set a horn was set off signaling the start of the first half of the game.

Instantly when hearing the horn Mario and Peach made a dash for the ball. Peach got to the ball first thanks to her superior speed. Mario knew he wouldn't beat Peach to the ball so he tried the next best thing and lunged forward attempting a check. Peach knew exactly what Mario was trying to do and easily dodged the plumber's attack by jumping right over him with a perfect looking somersault making the plumber look silly.

Peach landed back on her feet and quickly passed the ball up to her toad sidekick who was still on Peach's side of the field.

Now with the ball the toad ran to Mario's half of the field hugging the electric fence as he ran down the field. He was stopped by Kenny with a slide tackle and stealing the ball and maintained his momentum and got himself up back on his feet and started running to Peach's goal running down the sideline. Peach's kritter in armor that looked exactly like Kingston, the only difference being it was pink rather than red, saw Kenny running towards him and started to move over to his left notice the pink wearing kritter movement and passed the ball with now a orange hue off to Mario. Mario now had the ball in his possession and started to charge the ball up seemingly like he was going to take a shot on goal instead Mario passed the fully charged ball to Henry. Henry was at the bottom side of Peach's side barely over the halfway line, he saw the ball rolling to him and pulled one of his trusty hammers off his shell shield and swung his hammer at the ball taking a powerful shot at goal aiming for the left side of the goal.

After the shot out of nowhere the pink birdo dove towards Henry hitting him right in the chest sending pain all through his body and knocking him right into the electric fence adding more injury to injury for the unfair hit. Mario's team was awarded three green shells for the late hit. Peach's goalie was able to dive to the left fast enough to block the ball but wasn't able to catch it. The ball ricocheted to the top right corner of Peach's side of the field and speaking of the princess she came running through and regained possession of the steel ball that was still fully charged glowing pure white.

Peach ran over to Mario's half of the field dodging Mario and Kenny's defensive attempts to regain the ball back. Thunder suddenly was brewing in the sky as the sky started to grow dark as black storm clouds were now over the soccer pitch. Peach took a shot at goal right in front of Kingston but in combination of the ball not being charged at all now in its weakest color purple and Peach's already poor shooting ability the shot was painfully weak and slow. Kingston caught the ball with minimum effort and held the ball in his right hand after the save. Kingston took a step forward getting ready to throw the ball but didn't like where his teammates were standing so he pointed with his hand and waved his arm signaling he wanted them to go further downfield. Suddenly lightning struck, hitting KIngston point blank, sending electricity through his body and dropping the ball by his feet.

Luckily Dean was able get to the ball first and passed the ball off to Kenny. Kenny with the ball now just like last time ran to Peach's side of the soccer field hugging the left sideline and drawing the pink armored kritter out towards his left post. Kenny seeing this did a lob pass passing the white glowing ball to Mario. Mario who was in the middle of Peach's side of the field in front of the goal saw the lob pass coming his way and jumped in the air and kicked the charged ball with his right foot aiming for the top right corner of the net. The pink suited kritter doved to the right but in combination with him being on the opposite side the net, the metal ball being fully charged and powered and Mario's decent shooting abilities the ball flew right passed him into the net and horns were set off when the ball was in the net.

Mario soaked up all the cheering from the crowd while lightly jogging back over to his side of the field and clapped his metal gloved hands before raising his right hand that was now in a fist and lower his head then saying Mario time.

"Great goal captain, what a way to score" Henry said praising his red capped captain raising his hand up for a high five. Mario high fived his hammer bro sidekick's hand but his mind was elsewhere

"Hey-a Kingston you ok?" Mario asked the red goalkeeper who was struck by lighting not too long ago.

"Yeah Mario I'm ok a little lighting won't stop me" the red armored kritter said defiantly to his captain.

Mario and his sidekicks laughed at the red dressed kritter tenacity and went back into position ready for play to resume. Now with everyone back in position and Peach in the middle of the field with the ball as the announcer of the stadium announced over the PA system.

"Mario's Fireballs one Peach's Monarchs zero Mario scored at the forty two second mark" It's only been forty two seconds? Mario thought as he looked over to the scoreboard and sure enough there was still four minutes and eighteen seconds left in the game.

The horn was set off resuming play as Peach passed the ball to her shy guy.

The pink shy guy was hit by Henry with one of his hammers and intercepted the ball running down the right sideline to Peach's goal.

While running he saw the pink birdo from before who was in the middle back of Peach's side of the field was running towards him thankfully she was a slow runner like the hammer bro giving him enough time to plan accordingly. Henry threw three green shells hitting the birdo dead on knocking her right off her feet. The pink birdo did a kip up getting back on her feet quickly and saw Henry running straight at her. The birdo like last time lunged straight at Henry leading with her head that sported a matching pink bow. Henry was ready this time and pulled out a large hammer and smashed the birdo knocking her back quite a distance. Now with space Henry cut upwards running towards goal and stopped when he was close but not too close to the pink wearing kritter and was in front of the goal at a right angle. Henry took one of his hammers off his back and started charging his shot. A second later he performed his hammer throw and buried the opposing kritter in the ground and scored an easy goal.

Henry ran back to the left half of the field and saw the pink princess walking in the same direction with her head slightly lowered. Once he passed Peach he turned around now facing the princess and lifted his hands up in the air with his pointer fingers up with a smirk across his face then gloated.

"Less than a minute and we are already two up, it's going to be a long game for you" as Henry turned around with his shell now facing the Mushroom KIngdom princess laughing and heard the blonde mumbling something under her breath with a scowl on her face but he couldn't make out what she said.

"That was awesome high five me" Dean said with his hand raised above his face. Henry high fived his teammate's white gloved hand thanking him for the praise. Mario and Kenny also told Henry well done and got back into position to resume play. Henry's goal took all of eight seconds off the clock so when play resumed with four minutes and ten seconds left of gametime.

Play slowed down after the two rapid fire goals both teams fought for the ball. Peach's team played more defensively and aggressively not letting the fireballs get near her goal. Same was true for Mario's team but it was mostly Dean playing stellar defense whenever Peach and her sidekicks tried to create some offense the dry bones quickly snuffed it out and put a stop to it taking the steel ball back. Both teams got two shots off on goal including a beautiful bicycle kick by Peach but all attempts were saved by the goalkeepers.

Kingston threw the ball at Dean who ran with the ball for a bit then sending the ball to Kenny. Kenny was standing in the middle of the field when he received the ball and ran straight forward to the pink opponents goal. Kenny noticed that Peach and her birdo and shy guy sidekicks were all running after him and closing in on him from behind and his left and right. Kenny knew he didn't have much time and passed the ball backwards and right after the play the pink shy guy checked him on his right side of his body sending the koopa flying and rolling on the icey floor after landing.

Mario was the person who Kenny passed to and the italian plumber was standing on the top side of the field in the left corner of Peach's half of the field a little over the midfield line. Mario weighed his possible next move he could pass the ball off to Henry, no he couldn't. Peach has had it out for the hammer bro ever since his little taunt and had her team primarily focus in on him defensively not letting him even touch the ball once after his it hit him and started charging the ball, Peach wasn't particularly worry about what see was seeing even with the ball fully charged Mario shot was good but not powerful enough to pose any real danger of scoring from midfield and two out of three of his sidekicks were not currently available to pass to with his koopa still on the ground and that arrogant hammer bro being covered and followed by her pink birdo. His dry bones was the only safe person to pass to and she was completely fine with that option so the ball would get out of her side of the soccer pitch and she and her team could play some offense and cut down, tie or even possibly take the lead with a good Megastrike.

Horror hit her face when she saw Mario kick the ball high in the sky attempting the aforementioned Megastrike. Her and most of her team were nowhere near Mario to try and stop the red plumber beside her toad. The toad was running as fast as he could towards Mario but he was taken out by Dean who absolutely laid him out with a sickening check that earned an audible gasp from the crowd at the shear force sending the poor toad flying hitting the ground hard.

Mario with all the time in the world was ready and blasted off in the air with a fiery trail following right behind him. Now in his metal Mario form the sun appeared from behind the clouds and shined behind him while kicking the ball hard splitting it into many. Six steel balls went flying at the goal at a decently fast speed and all Peach could do was watch. It started off good for the pink wearing kritter blocking the first two shots but it quickly fell apart as he let the third ball go past him in the right side of the net and while he just stood there and watch it stupidly he stop the forth shot but he let the fifth and sixth shot in embarrassingly the sixth one hit the ground first and bounced right into his chest knocking him on his back and adding insult to injury the ball went right into the net with him.

Mario now back on the ground celebrated his three goal Megastrike score holding his left hand that was in a fist in the air and did two small jumps then a third jump bring both his arms down then raising them up in the air all while in the air with the crowd cheering him on.

Mario walked back only to be bombarded with high fives, fist bumps and pats on the back from his team, even Kingston walked out of his post to playfully rubbing his head roughly all of them telling him how awesome that Megastrike was and that he just scored a hat trick. Mario didn't take all the credit though he thanked Dean for the defense protecting him for long enough to do the Megastrike and patted him on his shell. Peach and company were not in good moods like the opposing team who walked back to center field in a defeatist way all of them sporting solemn faces walking back to resume play.

"With that amazing Megastrike Mario has achieved a hat trick and the Mario's Fireballs take a commanding five to zero lead but don't count out Peach's Monarchs just yet with three minutes and twenty two seconds left on the clock anything is possible with the almighty Megastrike" said the stadium announcer and the horn blared off resuming play once again.

Even with the five goal deficit Peach and her pink sidekicks played hard trying anything and everything to erase the five goal lead but very little offense was be drummed up with Dean keeping them at bay with his great slide tackling and devastating hits even Mario and Kenny played good defense making it rare that Peach or her team could even get past midfield.

This didn't mean Mario and friends we having it easy either they couldn't get the ball past Peach's pink goalie mostly because they too couldn't get near the goal because of the pink birdo so they opted for some long distance shots but even with the ball glowed white their shots wouldn't get through because they shot so far away from goal that gave the goalkeeper enough time to prepare and react and block or even catch the ball with his pink steel gloves.

Thunder started rumbling in the sky again as black clouds started to form over the stadium. The two teams didn't even notice the impending danger before it was too late. The pink shy guy currently had the ball and was running along the bottom sideline and was about to enter Mario's side of the field only Henry stood in his way and was ready to stop him and was running towards him. Before either could plan their next move lightning stucked the field again hitting the shy guy dead on and since Henry was near the said shy guy he was also caught in the radius and was also electrocuted.

While the two of them were being possibly paralized Dean came running in and took away the ball. He was on the bottom left corner on Peach's half of the field and started up charging up the ball. Dean then kicked the ball with his right foot sending the ball surrounded with electricity to the goal. The ball hit the opposing kritter sending volts of electricity through his body with his skeleton showing like an x ray.

The ball was coming back to Dean after hitting the pink goalie glowing bright white because it fully charged he then saw the pink birdo running directly at him. Dean knew from this distance he wouldn't be able to clear the goalkeeper anyways with his weak shooting and the impending big hit he was going to take sealed the deal on his next move. He jumped up in the air and headed the ball not for a shot but passed the ball upfield to Kenny. Kenny was standing in front of the goal when he saw Dean pass the ball to him, the ball being fully charged was not needed as the pink goalie was still busy with being electrocuted and Kenny was easily able to score his first goal of the game.

Kenny ran back to his team side of the field and raised his hand up and looked at the crowd on the left side and thanked them for the cheering then turned his head to the right side doing the same and thanking them as well.

"Good goal Kenny" Dean said congratulating his teammate and long time friend

"Thanks for passing but why didn't you just take the shot?" asked the curious koopa

"Are you kidding? If you guys are having trouble scoring with a fully charged ball from half field what kind of chance do i stand?" the dry bones said laughing at his little dig at himself

"Don't worry I'll set you up and you'll score a goal too" Kenny promised, holding is a fist out. Dean fist bumped him telling him he's going to keep him on that promise.

Play resumed with two minutes and thirty five seconds left on the clock and needless to say things got rough. Peach and her team started checking illegally and gave Mario's team items. But Mario and his sidekicks weren't playing like angels either; they soon realized what was going on and started roughhousing as well giving the pink team items too. Items then started flying around giant green and red shells traveled all over the field bouncing off the electric fence crushing whoever was unlucky enough to get caught in it's way. Bananas were thrown all over the field tripping up anyone on their slippery nature. Bombs big and small dropped hitting anyone with the ball and sending them high in the air and landing hard on the ground at best and sending them into the electric fence at worst even a chain chomp came down to wreck some havoc on Peach's behalf.

During all this chaos Mario somehow managed to get the ball from Henry who passed the ball across from the opposite sideline with a beautiful chip pass. Mario then saw he was alone with nobody near him and decided to put the nail in the coffin for any chance of a Peach comeback. He sent the ball high in the air and readied himself for another Megastrike and once ready he went soaring in the air with his same fire trail following right behind him. He again transformed into metal Mario and split the ball into six sending them at goal for the pink wearing kritter to try and defend them. The pink goalkeeper started off on the wrong foot letting the first shot get past him after overestimating and jumping over the ball diving to the left but he quickly rebounded stopping the next three shots swatting two of them with a big swing of his hand unfortunately the next two shots made it past him and in a more embarrassing way then last time the sixth shot got past him because he jumped too high and the metal ball hit him right in the chest sending him backwards hitting the top crossbar spinning him twice then hitting the floor face first hard again making him dizzy and dazed.

Mario did two small jumps then doing a third jump then spinning in the air and when he landed he saw the camera taping him and flashed a big thumb up to the people watching at home. Walking back like last time his team were all over him not believing he had seven goals of their nine goals alone and jokingly saying they might have to stop the game with a mercy rule. There were maybe on to something a lot of time had pass making a comeback on Peach's side even more unlikely and unportable a minute and eighteen were left of play time and scoring nine goals in that time would seem impossible but with being so much behind any item given to Peach would be really dangerous and possibly game changing so he told his team to try and not illegally hit anyone and they all said yes.

Play resumed and things already started hectic enough when instead of passing Peach ran straight forward Mario and Dean ran up to her but they were now in her clutches. Peach jumped in the air then suddenly four flying cameras appeared and started snapping photos blinding Mario and Dean and trapping them under three large empty pictures. With it now being five vs three Peach and her team were able to get some shots off but none of them made it past KIngston and about ten seconds later Mario and Dean were out of their photo prison and were able to stop the repeated shots on goal and regain possession of the steel ball. Items were still being thrown around and players were being sent into the electric fence with hits sending them into the dreaded fence. The crowd was still as hot as ever cheering for the big hits, goalie saves and the items that were causing even more mayhem.

Throughout all this Mario's team had the ball back in Peach's territory once again passing the ball around building charge in the ball. Kenny got the ball from Mario and was standing in the middle of the field at the halfway line having a clear path to goal. Kenny charged the ball and sent a big steel koopa shell on its way to goal smacking the kritter leaving him unconscious. The ball flew to the left side of Peach's side of the field back to the halfway line, Dean was in the right place at the right time and jumped up and headed the ball scoring the tenth goal of the game.

Dean got back down in the ground and did the worm and the crowd loved it and cheered him on. Suddenly his head fell off his shoulders but that didn't stop his good mood and just got his headless body up and walked toward his head and put it back on.

"I told you I would get you a goal didn't I?" Kenny said walking up to his undead friend.

"Yeah thanks I guess we're even now aren't we" Dean said jokingly giving his friend a high five as a thank you.

About thirty five seconds were left on the clock but it didn't matter, everyone knew who the winner was going to be and when the clock hit zero the Mario Fireballs had blown out the Peach Monarchs ten to zero. Mario and his teammates celebrated Mario ran and saluted the crowd, Henry like Mario was running but he had his arms in the air happy in his own words blowing out the snobby pink princess, Kenny and Dean were together standing in front of each other jumping up and down with their arms up in the air together and Kingston stood by his goal and turned around facing the fans who were behind him pumping his fisted hands up and down. The electric fence was shut off allowing the two teams to walk off and go back to locker rooms.

"What a game! There is no better feeling than smashing that snobby pink princess" Henry said sitting on a bench taking off his blue and red cleats off.

"I got to admit winning by that big does feel good" Kenny said responding to the hammer bro's bragging while unhooking his shell armor off. Dean and Kingston were having their own talk about the game talking about how great of a defense duo they were and how they wouldn't let in a single goal be scored on them. Mario was happy to see his team getting along well and that morale was high but he didn't want his team to get too cocky so he clapped his hands getting their attention.

"Great win today team but lets-a not get too confident next week lets-a have another great performance" The red captain said to his team and they all said they would always play their hardest. Once they were all dressed back into their normal clothes Mario and his team left the locker room and exited the now empty stadium getting ready to rest and train for next week to get prepared for their next game versus his mortal enemy, Bowser the king of all koopas.

Author's Notes

Wow what a long chapter but hopefully you enjoyed this new chapter and are ready for next chapter

Also if you are wondering no I do not dislike Peach only in the spinoff titles like Mario party and the strikers game she always seems to beat me and because of the she is my de facto nemesis in those games and I wanted to show that so I used Henry as my way to display this

On the next chapter It's a early season rivalry game as Mario and Bowser's team go head to head on a stadium that favors Bowser until then stay safe and happy see yah