I: Preparing For Another Meeting
"Only yesterday, the Mosaic Group along with Team S.M.B.X had bested Bowser and the Koopa Troop once again, maintaining peace in the land. However, the two groups both had no time to rest, as today, they both had new business to attend to."
Inside the Mosaic Group's house, they were rather busy. Hoops was already ready, not needing to do much to prepare and had put himself in a laid back position on the sofa, throwing a red rubber ball across the room at the wall over and over out of boredom, waiting on the others along with Berry.
"As usual, Rosy is taking her sweet time..." Hoops said out of annoyance.
Meanwhile in Berry and Rosy's room, Rosy was trying to make a decision.
"Hmm...what look should I go with today?" Rosy contemplated as looked over her makeup options. "I could try that blush today," she considered. "No, doesn't appeal to be honest. Or i could dye my fur black or red… Not enough time," she then decided. "Hmm...i think i look good just the way I am so...let's just use the same look we did yesterday!" Rosy then decided, pulling out her fur treatment gel and applying it.
Mosaic got onto the phone in his room and dialed a number. The person on the other end of the line shortly picked up after a couple rings.
"Hello! What's-a up Mosaic?" The voice on the other end said.
"So Mario, how are things going with the cleanup of the airship parts at Grassland?" Mosaic asked.
"Oh, well…" Mario started, only for another voice to chime in.
"It's going pretty well from the looks of it!" the new speaker said, being Peach.
"Yeah, and we should be able to make it back home by tonight if we keep this up and finish it today," a third voice on the phone added, being Toad's.
"That's great news!" Mosaic replied. He then asked a question that had been on his mind. "Hey, actually I had a question," Mosaic began. "Did you see Bowser and his minions anywhere in the wreckage?"
"Actually...oddly enough, we didn't-a see them anywhere, they seem to-a have slipped away," Mario replied.
"Ah, I see," Mosaic responded to this.
"Umm excuse me, but, who are you guys chatting with on there?" A fourth voice then asked, being Link's.
"We're-a chatting with Mosaic," Mario replied.
"Ah, I see, could I talk with him for a second?" Link asked.
"Sure-a thing Link!" Mario replied, handing him the phone.
"Hey Mosaic, I wanted to mention something to you," Link started.
"Oh? What is it?" Mosaic asked.
"If you and the others find anything interesting during your meeting with them, think you'd want to show us?" Link asked him. "It sorta sucks that i can't see what you and group are, as I would have found it interesting to, so could you?"
"Sure Link, i'll try to remember," Mosaic responded to this.
"That's all i wanted to say, now I'm going to give Mario back the phone so he can finish up, alright? So bye!" Link said, then handing it back over to Mario.
"Okie dokie, so with-a that, we're going to get-a back to what we're-a-" Mario started to say, only to be cut off by a fifth voice.
"Umm, are you a guys talking to Mosaic?" this person asked, being Luigi.
"Yeah, we-a were, and we were just-a finishing up," Mario said.
"Oh? Could I get-a word-a in?" Luigi asked.
"Of-a course!" Mario said, giving Luigi the phone.
"Umm Mosaic, I just wanted to-a tell you, be sure that you, Hoops and the-a others are careful okay?" Luigi said to Mosaic nervously.
"Luigi...we'll be fine, we do this all the time," Mosaic responded.
"Ah...I guess-a so," Luigi responded. "Umm, i'm going to hand this back to my-a brother, okay?" he continued.
"Alright, cya," Mosaic responded.
Luigi handed the phone to Mario so that he could finish up for real this time around. "So with all-a that said and-a done, we're going to get-a back to our-a work so we can-a finish up this up today and we can all head home," Mario then said, trying to finish up. "So with that, see you and the others-a later Mosaic! Bye!" Mario finished.
"Okay Mario, see you later too!" Mosaic responded, then clicking the 'End call' button on his phone.
"Now, with that taken care of, let's see if the others are ready yet," Mosaic said, starting by knocking on the door to Rosy and Berry's room. "Rosy? Are you finished getting ready yet?" Mosaic asked through the door.
"Pretty much, I was just putting the finishing touches and should be ready to go," Rosy answered.
"Okay good, be ready soon, we're meeting them really early," Mosaic said.
"I will," Rosy replied.
Mosaic afterwards headed down stairs, then saw both Hoops and Berry were on the sofa.
"Oh? You guys are both already finished preparing?" Mosaic asked them.
"Yeah," Hoops responded.
"We're just waiting on Rosy now…" Hoops said.
"I see," Mosaic replied. "Also Hoops," Mosaic continued.
"Yes Mosaic?" Hoops responded.
"Where are you keeping that Rainbow Star until a point comes that we need it?" Mosaic then asked.
"Oh that, i'm just keeping it in a box in our room," Hoops informed.
"Okay good, that should work out then," Mosaic said.
Berry then asked a question in his language.
"Oh? What is it Berry?" Mosaic asked.
Hoops then translated for Mosaic. "Oh, he asked where we're getting ready to go again." he answered.
"Oh yeah that, we're heading to Desert Land today to meet with Glow and Beryl," Mosaic answered.
Berry shuddered fearfully upon Mosaic's answer.
"Berry? What's the matter?" Mosaic asked.
"Umm, Mosaic, did you forget? Berry's afraid of Glow." Hoops reminded Mosaic.
"Oh, he is? Why is it again?" Mosaic asked Hoops, not remembering the reason why himself.
"Well, he's a Cobrat, and Berry's afraid of Cobrats," Hoops explained.
"Wow, I had completely forgotten," Mosaic replied. "We can't really let him stay home with all of us out though, he's only seven years old," Mosaic stated. "So Berry, sorry, but you'll need to come along," Mosaic told him.
Though he didn't want to come, Berry said in their language "Alright i guess..."
"At this point," Mosaic started. "Rosy should be down here about any minute, as soon as they are, we can-"
"We can leave?" someone else interrupted. This being Rosy, who had already come downstairs, ready to go.
Mosaic looked at Rosy a bit, trying to think about what he was trying to say, and then said, "Yes, we can get going now." and then continued, "Come on Berry and Hoops, let's go," Mosaic told Berry and Hoops, walking over to the door while doing so, in which Berry and Hoops got off the sofa afterwards.
Mosaic went through the front door with the rest of the group, making their way down the path, however, instead of taking the path to Vibrant Park like yesterday, they instead took the path leading the opposite direction.
"So...why are we taking this path again?" Hoops asked Mosaic.
"We're going this way so we can take the warp pipe to Desert Land, Glow and Beryl's place of residence," Mosaic explained.
"Ah, I see," Hoops responded. "So, why do you think that they wanted to meet with us today you think?" Hoops then asked.
"I don't know," Rosy replied.
"Rosy, I wasn't talking to you necessarily," Hoops unamusingly responded.
"I was just sharing my opinion on your question," Rosy responded.
Hoops rolled his eyes a bit, saying, "Whatever," after doing so.
"To be honest, it could a number of things, considering how they want us to meet them bright and early, it's possible they just want to eat breakfast with us," Mosaic said, sharing his speculation. "Or, they could also have discovered something interesting and want us to come take a look at it, that's another possibility," Mosaic continued.
"Either way, I personally hope that's it's something that I think is intriguing," Hoops said.
"Me too," Mosaic replied.
The group continued to make their way down the path, passing more buildings and continuing down the concrete path eventually coming across a green warp pipe, this very one leading to Desert Land. "Alright, here it is. To Desert Land we go!" Mosaic said, then jumping into the pipe, in which Hoops, Rosy and Berry one by one followed his lead.
II: Deserted Desert Land
Upon the four making to the other end of the pipe, the four of them wound up in Desert Land, a region in which it's climate was practically the opposite of Mushroom Plains, or to say, it had similar traits to Mushroom Plains, such as being plentiful in ? blocks, bricks, note blocks and warp pipes all around, but a number of things were very different. Mushroom Plains had generally warm days, but Desert Land's on the other hand were hot. Mushroom Plains was lush and green, plant life growing from the dirt and soil as far as the eye could see. Desert Land on the other hand was covered left and right with sand and a tan climate instead with the only plant life being a cactus here and there. While Mushroom Plains had spontaneous bodies of water in it's landscape, Desert Land only had the occasional oasis. Overall, compared to Mushroom Plains, Desert Land wasn't the most visually stunning place to be in, however, it was where they were meeting with their two friends at.
"Alright, now that we're here, let's go find them," Mosaic informed the group, in which they nodded.
After a bit of searching without finding the two anywhere, they end up near some walls made of sandstone, on them were markings imprinted in the shape of a flame, while they were there, eventually Hoops brought up a question.
"Mosaic, are you sure they told us to meet with them in desert land?" Hoops asked Mosaic.
"Well...i'm pretty sure anyway," Mosaic responded.
"Oh? Well…did they tell you where to meet them here?" Hoops then asked next.
"Yeah, they told me 'Meet with us at the sandstone structure with the markings on them' Mosaic started to respond. "But...now that I think about it, they didn't tell me what the markings looked like," Mosaic continued.
"They...didn't?" Hoops asked.
"Not that I remember, no," Mosaic replied.
"Oh no...this is not good, does that mean we'll just be wandering in circles until we find them?" Hoops said.
"Umm Hoops…" Rosy started.
Ignoring Rosy's statement, Hoops continued. "We could be looking for them for hours, days, weeks even!"
"Hoops…" Mosaic stated.
"We could then eventually start seeing mirages, and then we'll all lie on the ground from exhaustion, and then eventually-" Hoops continued before being interrupted.
"Hoops, slow down…" Mosaic said.
"It's alright, I was just fooling around, i'm pretty sure we'll find them soon," Hoops replied.
"Oh...I hadn't realized," Mosaic said in response.
"Well, let's keep looking for them, we don't want to keep them waiting," Rosy said. "After all, you need to remember, maybe they just didn't remember the-" Rosy started to say, before she ran into something prickly, or to be more accurate, someone, hurting her a bit. "Ow! Watch where your-" Rosy began to say, looking up, stopping when she realized whom and what she was looking at.
They had ran into a tall plant like creature resembling a cactus, their body was separated into four roundish segments, each one around a bit under two feet in height, all over these segments were short thorns protecting their body, and on the top segment was a face, which consisted of two round eyes and a small mouth below. The creature notably also had no limbs; A pokey. However, this wasn't just any generic pokey, though pokeys were normally green, yellow, or orange, this one in peculiar's body was instead a shade of brown, and their eyes had a silver hue to them. This was Beryl. Beryl turned around once this happened and looked down.
"Oh! Hey Rosy! Thought you'd guys show up eventually," Beryl said. "Oh...and also, sorry about that," Beryl said. As he said it, his body faded from his normal brown to a hot shade of pink for a moment.
"Hey Beryl, there's no need to be embarrassed, it was an accident, and i'm fine," Rosy said.
"Ah, you've noticed, I can never hide my feelings from you guys, given that i seem to change color when i'm feeling a certain way," Beryl informed as his body reverted back to his normal brown.
"Hey Beryl, what'ssssss going on?" a voice said. Everyone looked in the direction the voice came from.
The voice came from a creature. This creature had a serpent like appearance; Their body was limbless and scaled, their eyes large, white, and round; And they sat their body upright, bringing them to a bit higher than a human's height. A cobrat.
This cobrat specifically however was a special case, the scales that ran down a cobrat's body were commonly red, however this cobrat's scales were instead teal in color. Along with this, their underside was green as opposed to the regular tan color. Their eyes were also a gleaming yellow as opposed to the normal black. And perhaps the most notably detail of all, they wore a red handkerchief around their, or more specifically, his neck. This was Glow.
"Oh great, the Mosssaic group'ssss here!" Glow continued.
"Yeah Glow, I was just talking with them because a little accident happened with me and Rosy, but everything's fine," Beryl answered Glow.
Berry, upon seeing Glow, let out a fearful whine and then rushed over to Mosaic for comfort and put his arms around his leg.
"It's okay to stay near me if you feel you need to," Mosaic quietly said to Berry, acknowledging his reaction. Mosaic then turned his attention to Glow and Beryl, mainly the former however to talk with them. "Hey Glow," Mosaic started "So how's has it been going?" Mosaic then said, stretching his hand out to give Glow a handshake despite his lack of.
"Not much really," Glow replied, as he used his tail in place of a hand to shake "hands" with him.
"Yeah, eventfulness for us has been rather...SLIM, am I right Glow?" Beryl said, cracking a pun, then laughing a bit at his own joke, becoming a shade of green for a bit while doing so.
Glow looking in his direction responded, "Yeah, I guessssss you could sssssay that."
"Glow, if i may ask, could you give us a bit more accurate directions next time?" Mosaic asked.
"Huh? I told you to meet us here, 'on the walls with the markings on it', didn't I?" Glow asked in response.
"Yeah you did, but I feel it would have helped to tell us what exactly the markings looked like," Mosaic explained.
"Ah I ssssssee, my apologiesssss, i'll remember to give you more details next time," Glow replied.
A low growl then came from somewhere. Glow then realized it was coming from his stomach. "Oh...we sssshould eat breakfassssst actually," Glow said, a bit embarrassed.
"You haven't eaten yet either huh?" Hoops asked Glow.
"Nope" Glow responded. "And neither hasssss Beryl I believe, correct?" Glow asked him.
"I don't remember doing so," Beryl replied.
"I feel that we should before we show you guys what we found," Glow continued. "Come on, follow me," Glow then finished.
Once he finished, he starting slithering away with the upper half of his body arched upright, leading the way to the others, with them following.
III: A Little Grab N Dash
A bit of time later on, Glow made it to where he lead them, this place being the inside of a rather small pyramid. The interior was a little small, however, it was still a tad bit cozy.
"So we're eating breakfast in this small place?" Hoops asked, not the most excited to hear his answer.
"Yessssss we are," Glow answered Hoops' question.
Despite not considering the pyramid the most desirable place, he graciously gave an, "Okay…" to Glow.
The Mosaic Group observed the room to figure out where to sit, quickly noticing a table surrounded with five chairs in the corner of the pyramid, in which they sat and waited for the food to be ready.
"So, what do you guys think they're going to serve?" Mosaic asked the others, in an attempt to make conversation while they waited.
"Well...what do cobrats and pokeys eat?" Rosy asked.
"Don't think that's what we should be asking, considering their preparing stuff for us," Hoops stated.
"True," Mosaic replied.
"To be honest, i'm not all that sure then," Rosy said.
"Me personally? I'm going to make a wild guess and say their going to serve fruit and eggs of some kind, probably you know, melons, bananas, yoshi eggs…" Hoops started.
As soon as Hoops said the third thing, Berry began to put up a fuss. Hearing him however, Hoops quickly stopped him and justified his words.
"Hey, calm down Berry, I was just messing around, I'm pretty sure they wouldn't actually serve that, especially with you here." Hoops explained to Berry.
Berry understood, but asked if he could please not joke like that in his language, in which Hoops said he'll see.
"Alright guys, here's the food," Beryl said, balancing it on his head. Realizing he didn't have a simple way to put it down, Beryl made a statement. "Also, LOOK OUT BELOW!" Beryl yelled, then throwing the plate off his head and towards the table, as the plate fell, the Mosaic Group ducked to avoid it. After they had risen back up after it had passed, they saw the plate had landed safely, along with it's contents. On the plate was many slices of fruit. There were slices of apples, oranges, bananas, honeydew, and watermelon on it.
"Yep, I was right," Hoops boasted, seeing that his prediction on the food was correct.
"Half right actually," Mosaic stated. "We'll see if your completely right once-" Mosaic continued before being interrupted.
"And here'sssss the other food," Glow said, sliding into the room, holding a platter in his mouth. He then loosened his grip on the platter and set it on the table alongside the fruit.
On this platter was food that based on how it looked seemed to be sunny side ups.
"I...hope my other prediction is wrong but..." Hoops began, seeing the look on Berry's face. "Glow? What kind of eggs were those made from?" Hoops asked with nervousness in his voice.
"I made them from birdo eggssss," Glow answered in response, sounding sincere.
"Phew...that's a relief, I thought for a sec those were...were..." Hoops started to say.
"Yosssshi Eggssss?" Glow asked. "I would never do that knowing you were bringing Berry along," He then explained.
Hoops remained a bit silent, wondering what response he should give. "Eh alright then, let's eat," Hoops said, dropping the conversation.
After everyone had gotten some food and eaten a bit. they started chatting about random subjects.
"Glow, I realized something," Rosy started. "Because of how barren this desert is and due to that there isn't much to eat around here, where do you and Beryl get most of your food?" Rosy asked.
"Oh, we usually go to this market around three miles north of here and buy stuff from a grocery store," Glow replied, answering Rosy's question.
"Three miles? Isn't that kind of far without any kind of transportation?" Mosaic asked.
"Well, not necessarily," Glow responded. "Beryl has a magic carpet he usually uses to get around which gets us there in around ten minutes or less most of the time," Glow continued.
"How often do you guys go?" Hoops then asked afterwards. "We ussssually go around once every week," Glow answered.
After a bit more silence, Mosaic eventually asked Glow another question. "So, when are we going to see what you guys found?"
"Yeah, and what exactly is it you want to show us?" Hoops added.
"Both of you guysssss ssssshould get an anssssswer after we have breakfasssssst," Glow answered both of them.
"Alright then, i guess that'll do," Mosaic and Hoops said simultaneously.
"Hah! That's the second day in a row, you owe me a Golden Leaf now," Hoops said.
"Oh no...wait a minute…you're joking again right?" Mosaic asked.
"Of course," Hoops responded.
As the group continued to eat, Berry had eaten all of his food, that is, except there was something on his plate he avoided, being his apple slices.
"Oh, Berry? Issss there sssssomething wrong with them that i'm not aware of?" Glow asked Berry.
Berry was hesitant to give an answer, not just because of his fear of Glow, but that he didn't want to be rude.
"Berry, If something's wrong with it, you can tell me," Rosy suggested to Berry.
Berry henceforth explained himself to Rosy in his language.
"Oh, so you don't like apples all that much huh?" Rosy said, having understood him.
"Well, if that's that case, I could take care of that for you if you wanted," Rosy offered, starting to reach her paw towards his plate.
"Nah, Rosy, I think Berry should eat them, even if he doesn't like them," Beryl intervened.
"Oh…?" Rosy responded.
"Yeah, it's because I heard apples are a good source of water," Beryl started to explain. "And especially when you're living in the desert it's important that you stay hydrated...to your core!" Beryl then stated, taking a chance at another pun. Not realizing the pun, everyone was silent for quite a bit of time. "Umm...get it?" Beryl asked, starting to turn a bit purple again. After more time passed with no response, Beryl started to speak. "Well, guess i'll explain it, basicall-"
"Wait...wait wait wait, don't tell me, i think i may get it," Hoops interrupted. "Is it because...apples have a core?" Hoops then asked.
"Exactly," Beryl answered.
"Hmm, I suppose that was kinda clever," Hoops said in response.
After everyone had finished their food, the six all made their way out of the pyramid, and Glow lead the group to their next destination.
"Phew...glad to be out of there," Mosaic stated aloud. "Have plans of moving into a new place someday?" Mosaic asked Glow.
"Well, I ssssssorta plan to sssssomeday, it'ssss jusssst that it'sssss the bessssst I can afford assssss of now," Glow answered.
"Well, I hope that day is soon, because I'm with Mosaic, it was a bit cramped in there, especially considering the lack of windows," Hoops added to the conversation.
After a brief pause, Hoops then asked, "So...where are we going now?"
"We're on our way to the place we wanted to show you guys I believe?" Beryl stated.
"Yeah, that'sssssss what we're doing now," Glow said, affirming Beryl was correct.
After treading through the dusty landscape for a bit longer, Glow and Beryl eventually lead the Mosaic Group to a large door, reaching around Glow's height. The door looked a bit more decorative than the average door however. This door was red in color, near the edges was a golden border that went along the door, forming a rectangle shape, and the door's knob looked to be made of solid gold.
"Hey...isn't that a door to..." Rosy stated.
"Sssssubcon," Glow responded to Rosy, knowing what she was going to ask.
"So the thing that you want to show us is in Subcon?" Mosaic asked Glow.
"Correct," Glow affirmed.
"Then what are we waiting for?" Hoops stated as he made his way over to the door to open it. "Lets GOoooooooh!" Hoops yelled after opening it, as though he hadn't realized it until it was too late, the door lead to nothing on the other side, which caused him to start falling.
"Wow looks like he accidentally...took a trip, huh?" Beryl said. "Guess I'll need to follow," he then said. However, as soon as he saw his height compared to the door, he realized he'd need an accommodation to fit. "Hey Glow? Think you can help me out?" Beryl asked.
"Sssssure thing Beryl," Glow answered, sliding next to Beryl so he could do so.
Which he did by removing a couple of Beryl's segments and dropping them down through the door, shrinking him down enough to make it through the door.
"Looks like you really...cut me down to size, am I right?" Beryl said, then dropping down the door, hoping to land on top his separate segments upon landing.
Afterwards, Rosy along with Berry made the jump down as well.
"Well alright, here goes!" Mosaic said, and then jumped through the door and down to the terrain below.
As Mosaic fell, Glow prepared to go next, he eventually darted himself through the door, plummeting down as well.
IV: Same Landscape, Different Land
One by one, each of the six fell, Hoops was first to land, having been the first to enter the door, and landed gracefully on his feet. Next up was Beryl, or atleast, half of him anyway, who landed right atop his two other segments like he hoped, after doing so, though he had become a yellow hue a bit, he momentarily changed to a light gray shade before finally going back to his regular brown shade, having been relieved to be okay. The next to fall were Berry followed by Rosy, whom bounced off Berry, breaking her falling a bit.
"Thanks Berry," Rosy said.
Berry didn't give much of a response, not realizing what she was thanking him for.
Mosaic fell next, and landed right on top of a cactus.
"Yeowch!" Mosaic yelled after doing so. "Talk about an unthankful landing!" Mosaic retorted.
"Hey Mosaic don't worry about it, that cactus may have been a THORN in your side, but now it's all good now," Beryl said.
"Eh…" Mosaic said, unassumed, but saw Beryl was trying to make the best of his scenario.
And finally, Glow fell from the sky, his slender body flailing about a bit as he did so. Everyone watched as he did, assuming he'd have a soft landing, however, he didn't. Upon hitting the ground, the large serpent spun into a ball and ran into a vase, unraveling upon hitting his head against it, dazing him a bit.
"Ow...that wasssss a painful landing," Glow stated, still feeling pain from the impact.
"Well...maybe if you were more careful that wouldn't have happened, so maybe remember next time?" Beryl stated, sounding a bit discouraging while saying so.
Rosy mentioned however to Glow. "Hey, don't worry about it, you're not alone on having a disconvient landing, Mosaic didn't land all too well either," she explained.
"Yeah...I didn't…" Mosaic stated.
"I ssssssssee," Glow said, having now have gotten his body arched back up and recovered.
By now, the six had made it to subcon, the place in subcon however looked rather familiar. This place was a desert like where they just were, however, there was a number of clear differences, for one, there wasn't a single brick, ? or note block nor warp pipe in sight. It seemed that in place of this the landscape was riddled with vases, both large and small all over the place. In the ground, on the hills, in the sky, just about everywhere. And as well as that, there seemed to be bones lying here and there too. However, other than that, the other scenery looked quite familiar, there was water nowhere to be seen, there was a cactus here and there, and the ground they stood was of course just sand and dust as far as the eye could see. In general, it visually wasn't much of an improvement over Desert Land.
"Alright, now to ssssshow you guyssss what we found, thissssss way gang," Glow informed, continuing to lead the group.
As they made their way to it, Hoops started up another conversation. "To be honest, this is starting to feel kind of redundant, I feel you guys have keep us in suspense long enough, what did you guys find?" Hoops asked, bored of all the walking they've been doing.
"I suppose we should tell them," Beryl suggested.
"Ssssure, fire away," Glow told Beryl.
"So basically," Beryl started. "We found some odd pyramid," Beryl explained.
"A pyramid huh?" Mosaic replied. "What was so odd about it?" He then asked.
"Well, what we mainly found odd about it is where we found it," Beryl continued.
"Where did you find it?" Rosy asked, wanting to be a part of the conversation.
"Well…" Beryl began to say, only for Glow to say it first.
"We found it in a ravine with a sssssign next to it sssssayingm 'Caution! Large pit! No Trepassssssssing!'" He explained.
"And yeah, the sign actually said those things," Beryl mentioned.
"Wait, if it said to trespass, why'd you guys go down there?" Hoops questioned.
"Well, it wassssss kind of a funny ssssstory," Glow began to explain.
"Hey Glow, maybe we show and don't tell? I feel we've been keeping them waiting," Beryl interrupted.
"Ah, your ssssssorta right, i guesssss we'll just show the way there," Glow replied.
Eventually Glow and Beryl lead the four to the ravine they wanted to show them. They saw that the ravine looked like a sorta big drop, as it was around twelve feet deep at least.
"So, this is the ravine you guys found it in?" Mosaic asked.
"Indeed," Glow answered.
"Well, if it's such a long drop, how did you guys get down there?" Hoops then questioned.
"Oh, umm it'sssss becausssse umm...Beryl sorta accidently fell down there a bit earlier, and I had to go after him, and it was down there that we found the pyramid," Glow explained.
"And how did you get back out?" Hoops asked next.
"Oh, we found a way out of there," Beryl explained.
"Alright," Hoops answered. "Now, how did you get down there to help Beryl out?" Hoops then asked Glow.
"I sssssorta jusssssst...jumped down there to help him out," Glow answered, a bit hesitant.
"That's what I was afraid of…" Hoops answered.
"Hey, we're both in one piece, what'sssss the isssssssue?" Glow asked confusingly.
"Now I'm not sure how we should go down the ravine without just taking a straight up leap of faith," Hoops explained to be the problem.
"Hmm, that ssssorta issssss an issssssue," Glow replied. "What could be a good sssssolution?" He then asked the group.
"Well, we could try finding something around here, like a long vine or a springboard that'd ensure us a safe landing," Mosaic stated.
"Or...maybe I could fall again and break each of your guys falls?" Beryl inputted.
"Nah, let's not do that, it's fine," Hoops told Beryl.
"Or we could get in the same way that Glow and Beryl got out?" Rosy then suggested.
After Rosy said this, everyone froze.
"...that's…" Hoops started. "Actually a good idea…" Hoops finished, somewhat hesitant to do so.
"So, how did you two get out of the ravine after you found the pyramid?" Rosy then asked the two of them.
"Ah, we'll show you where we found the way out, this way," Beryl answered, tilting his head as he strafed to lead them towards it.
Beryl and Glow eventually lead the group to what was their escape ticket out of the ravine was. Showing that they found a vase that lead all the way down to the ravine, seeing that it was rather well hidden under some sand.
"So the two of you made it out the ravine through here huh?" Mosaic asked.
"Yeah, I had a pretty easssssy time ssssslipping through, being a cobrat, as did Beryl as he just needed to detach his segments to fit, so we should easily be able to do the same again." Glow answered and proceeded to then explain.
Soon enough, the six were making their way through the vase, which despite the outside's look, was oddly roomy on the inside.
"Wow, the outside really isn't what matters huh?" Mosaic commented.
"Indeed it'ssssss not," Glow mentioned.
The rest of the trip through the vase for the most part was rather quiet, not that anyone minded all that much. Before long, the six had each made it to the bottom and into the ravine itself, Hoops then looked up, seeing the view above.
"Welp, here we are, that wasn't so bad," Hoops mentioned.
"Now, to the pyramid!" Beryl declared, himself and Glow then once again continuing to lead.
Shortly after, the group made their way up a hill where the pyramid was located, with Beryl making it to the top first, upon doing so however, he saw something that didn't agree with him.
"Uh oh, guys...It looks like we have some company," Beryl informed the group, asking them to come take a look.
Presuming it'd be important, the rest of the group came to take a look, and indeed what he saw didn't look so good.
There was several different figures there, each of which had different appearances. Some of them were fairly short and wore robes in many different colors such as red, blue, etc. and the most characteristic feature of all, their masks, which were white in color and had holes in a shape that resembled a pair of eyes and a mouth, and along with it they also wore shoes coming in multiple colors such as brown or purple. Shy Guys.
There weren't only shy guys there however, along with them, there were also several other creatures. Some looked very similar to Shy Guys, they had all the same features a shy guy did, the only difference being that their masks were dark grey as opposed to white, and the hole that normally resembled a mouth instead had an extended nozzle in place of it, these were snifts.
There were several others that had somewhat star shaped bodies, were generally black or purple in appearance, and had small teeth that stuck out of their mouths and were also rather short, these being ninjis.
There were also bird like creatures that, like shy guys wore masks with a beak part on them, as well as being around the size of shy guys along with that, these being tweeters.
And finally, there was one particular strange looking creature whom's body structure resembled that of a yoshi's, however, with many notable differences. they had a rounded white belly, with the rest of their body primarily being a single color, which in this case was red. Other visual features included the bow on their head, which generally varied in color, this one's bow being orange, and unlike Yoshis, this creature's spikes that ran across their tail as opposed to head as was the case with Yoshis. Unlike Yoshis, they also wore no shoes, revealing their feet, which had short, rounded claws per each toe, and on each of their fingers was a claw nail, though not too notable, they had small spots on their cheeks. And finally, perhaps their most notable anatomical feature, on their face they had a funnel shaped mouth. This strange creature was known as a Birdo, whom seemed to be leading the others there, as they were holding a notepad seemingly with a list of sorts in one hand.
V: It's Not Always Simple
"Hmm...that could be a bit of a problem..." Mosaic stated. "And I presume they weren't here already when you guys found this pyramid?" Mosaic then asked the two.
"Not that I'm aware of, no, they weren't," Beryl answered.
"As I thought; this could be a bit of a problem, what should we do?" Mosaic then asked the entire group.
"Maybe they won't mind our pressssssscene there and they'll let usssss inside," Glow suggested.
Berry stated in his language that it doesn't hurt to at least try.
So as such, Glow slithered over and got the Birdo's attention. "Excusssssse me umm...umm...mam?" Glow asked the Birdo, unsure of their gender.
Looking up from their work, the Birdo responded, "Sir, also, what is it?"
"Umm, do you think you could let usssss in the pyramid?" Glow asked as polite as he could.
"Name?" the Birdo then asked.
"Umm, Glow," Glow replied.
"Glow who?" The Birdo asked, sounding a bit impatient.
"Glow, Glow the Cobrat?" Glow answered.
The Birdo then looked down at his notepad, seemingly consulting a list of names.
After reading over the list again, the Birdo looked up and gave him an answer.
"You're not on the list, no name, no entry. If you wanted to be a part of the pyramid investigation team, you should have asked King Wart about it at the beginning of this week," The Birdo told Glow.
"King Wart? He means...the leader of the 8-bits doesn't he?" Hoops thought to himself.
Glow seemed to realize who they were talking about too, and wanting to avoid getting into trouble, just acted casual about it. "Oh? I understand...I guess we'll need to come back later," Glow told the others, starting to turn around so they can leave.
As the group began to leave, Hoops ran in front of Glow and stopped him and began to explain something to him.
"Glow! Why are we turning around now?" Hoops asked.
Glow began to answer their question, "Well, they ssssssort of got here firssssssst, ssssssso we'll need to wait for them to leave and I prefer to not get into trouble with-"
"You realize who we're talking about though, right? These guys...they work for Wart, so they must be up to no good, am I right?" Hoops interrupted and explained.
"To be honest, Hoops has a point," Beryl told Glow. "You and all of us shouldn't be such doormats and let them walk all over us," Beryl continued to explain. Glow wasn't sure of the answer to give yet as Beryl then continued. "Plus, just because you don't got backbone, doesn't mean you can't have...BACKBONE, am I right?" Beryl said, being punny as usually.
As Beryl and Hoops continued to explain why they shouldn't just leave because the 8-bit members said so, eventually, said people started to overhear the conversation they were having, and began to walk over their direction, which Rosy noticed.
"Umm guys, they're hearing us…" Rosy said. Her warning however fell on deaf ears as the group continued to discuss. At this point, the 8-bits were just a meter from the group, and listened in on their conversation.
"I guesssssss you two are right, we ssssssshouldn't jusssssst let them control ussssss," Glow finally answered, starting to agree with Beryl and Hoops' statements. "let'ssssss not take denial of entrance ssssssitting down...and...go...give them...a piece of...our...mind?" Glow started to say, however slowing down when he turned around and realized the 8-bits were right next to them and could hear everything they were saying.
"So, you want to do things like that huh?" The Birdo said, unamused, throwing the notepad they were holding behind his shoulder where it landed on the ground.
Seeing the opportunity, Hoops decided to boast. "Yeah, you got a problem with that?"
"A big problem," the Birdo responded. "Infact, why don't we make a deal?" The Birdo continued. "How about you guys versus us? The winners are the ones who stay, and the losers leave," The Birdo offered.
The group thought about this and decided to discuss it a sec.
"Should we go through with their offer?" Beryl asked the others.
"It'sssssss honesssssstly a real inconvenience for usssssss, however sssssssomething tellsssss me it'sssss the only way they'll let usssss through, sssso we unfortunately don't really have a choice here," Glow explained.
"So what this basically means is…" Hoops started.
"We're going through with it?" Mosaic finished and asked.
"Well, seems so," Rosy answered their questions.
"Alright then" Hoops said, the group then breaking from their discussion and turning back over to the 8-bits. "We've discussed and know what? We accept your offer," Hoops informed them.
"Very well, we'll begin on the count of five, so you better get your boxing gloves or whatever ready," The Birdo said, then proceeding to count. "Five...four...three...two…" However, instead of the Birdo saying one and then go, they then fired an egg at Mosaic, which seeing it flying his way, quickly kicked it away.
"Hey! That was four! You cheated!" Mosaic called out.
"And? What does that matter?" The Birdo responded. "8-bits! Charge!" The Birdo then commanded, which the Shy guys, Snifts, Ninjis, etc. responded by rushing towards the group.
"Let's show these 8-bits what were made of!" Hoops said, signaling the others to be ready to fight them, in which they agreed with, leading to the battle's outbreak.
Hoops started the brawl off by plucking a stray mushroom block off the ground and hurling it at a tweeter, knocking them out. Hoops looked upwards, and saw a Ninji sticking their foot out flying through the air in his direction. Seemingly in an attempt to jump kick him. Seeing their idea, Hoops thought outside the box and let them come. Once the ninji was point blank of him, Hoops grabbed them by their ankle with one front hand and grabbing the ninji by their waist with his other front one, then elevating them above himself in both hands, then, with a bit of effort hurling the struggling creature at a shy guy running his way, knocking them both out. A stray bullet went flying Hoops' way from a snift, barely missing, seeing the direction it came; from a snifit sporting a gray suit, Hoops ran their way.
Glow and Beryl meanwhile took on three shy guys and a snifit themselves. Glow inhaled, seemingly in preparation for a certain technique of his, then proceeding to exhale the air, except that instead of exhaling air, Glow had exhaled flaming breath, which he used to scorch two of the shy guys, neutralizing them. Beryl handled the remaining shy guy along with the snifit via rotating the segments of his body rapidly, which swiftly fired the thorns down at the shy guy and snifit. Not wanting to be hit, the shy guy and snifit fled, as they did so however, the snifit turned their head in Beryl's direction and fired a bullet. Seeing the shot coming however Beryl moved aside to avoid being hit.
"Let'ssss give them a tasssste of their own medicine." Glow stated, breathing in again preparing, not to breath fire again, but to fire a projectile from his mouth, this projectile being a bullet of their own.
This bullet however missed the snifit, in which Glow realized meant they'd probably have to take things closer up. Asking Beryl to come with him, Glow pursued the shy guy and snifit for close range combat.
Meanwhile Berry and Rosy fought a group of 8-bits, namely a tweeter, a ninji and a shy guy together. Berry had plucked some red grass that he found buried and had gotten his hands on a veggie that could be used as a projectile, which he held in his hand and waited for the right time to use it. Rosy on the other hand had no need as she had her natural abilities such as rolling to use, which she used to ram into the tweeter as it was coming her way, knocking them back hard into a wall and hitting them unconscious.
As Rosy landed, she yelled advice to Berry. "Berry! Use it!" she yelled.
Realizing what she was talking about, Berry hurled the veggie at the shy guy, which after hitting them bounced off them and hit the ninji as well, taking down both. Rosy and Berry then saw Hoops fighting a snifit and had the feeling they should help him out, so they ran his way.
Mosaic was engaged in a fistfight with the leader of the group, being the Red Birdo, they traded blow after blow with one another, however Mosaic was the one landing most of the hits while the Birdo wasn't. The Birdo eventually suddenly backed up and then began to unleash a barrage of eggs as well as fireballs on Mosaic, most of which he dodged with ease, then countering by using his chillokinesis techniques and hurling and firing numerous ice balls the Birdo's way. To block this the Birdo fired further flame balls at the ice balls hoping to melt them only for them to get the opposite effect and for the fire balls to be solidified in ice and land on the ground. Mosaic used this as a chance to pluck the ice blocks off the ground and hurl them at Birdo, which he hurled 3 consecutive blocks at him, dazing the dino.
Mosaic then looked around at the other fighting going on, seeing that Hoops, Rosy and Berry had just defeated a snifit and didn't have any baddies left that they were dealing with. He then saw what Glow and Beryl were doing and saw that Glow had grabbed a snifit with his tail. Which he saw he then switched his grip on them over to his mouth and spun around and hurled them at a wall, knocking them out.
"Well, it looks like you guys are losing," Mosaic began to inform the Birdo. "What do you say? You want to let us through while you guys leave?" Mosaic then himself offered.
It didn't take long for the Birdo to make a choice given his condition. "Know what...sure, you win…" The Birdo said. "8-bits! We're off duty! Retreat!" The Birdo announced to the other 8-bits, then quickly running to the vase leading out of the ravine with the rest of the 8-bits quickly following his lead as well.
The six then regrouped in a circle in front of the pyramid once the 8-bits had left.
"See Glow? That wasn't so bad," Hoops apprised.
"Well, I guesssssss sssssssso," Glow replied.
"I guess you could say they...chickened out?" Beryl said, trying to make another pun.
"But Birdos aren't chickens…" Mosaic stated in response.
"Eh, but their still bird creatures of some kind," Beryl rebutted in an attempt to justify his pun.
"I guess so," Mosaic just answered. "Now, with them gone, what are we waiting for? Let's explore this place!" Mosaic then proclaimed.
which the others gave a, "Right!" in agreement.
Afterwards, the group all at once made their way into the ancient secluding, eager to see what it had to offer.
VI: Puzzling, Isn't It?
The inside of the pyramid looked how a pyramid generally would. The walls were tanish brown and looked as if a bunch of building blocks were stacked atop one another, sort of like a brick wall's bricks. There were along with this many pillars of the same color as the walls that lined the corridors of the pyramid, seeming to be something that keep the structure standing. The floor, though it had quite a bit of sand, there were also a few spots that instead had golden brown flooring made of stone or a similar material. And along with this there was inconceivable writing all over the walls, as if it was written in some ancient language of sorts.
"Hard to see with it so dark," Hoops stated.
The group however was in luck, as Glow could see well even in the dark. "No need to worry Hoopssssss, with my night vissssion, i'll try to find a light ssssssource the resssssst of you guyssssss can ussssse," Glow told Hoops.
"Yeah, that'll help out alot," Hoops replied.
Glow looked around for a short while and eventually found on the wall a wooden rod that had a flammable looking tip. "Hey, I think I found a torch," Glow told the others.
"That's great Glow! Could you point where it is?" Mosaic asked.
"Right here," Glow answered, using his tail to pinpoint it. Mosaic picked up the torch but realized something about it.
"Wait, this torch isn't lit," Mosaic stated. "Glow, think you can help us out?" Mosaic then asked.
"Oh ssssure thing Mosssssaic," Glow answered, then breathing in and exhaling fire onto the torch, which lighted it successfully.
"Glow, you accidently hit me too," Mosaic annoyingly said, coughing a bunch between words.
"Oh...ssssssorry about that," Glow remorsefully said. Despite not responding, Mosaic acknowledged him and accepted his apology.
Not to much time later, as the group continued to explore the pyramid, they eventually passed by a panel on one of the walls, which Hoops noticed.
"Hey, what's this?" Hoops said, thinking aloud.
"Oh, Hoops, what is it?" Mosaic asked, then turning back around along with the rest of the group to see what he was looking at.
"It seems to lead deeper into the pyramid from the looks of it," Beryl said.
"What makessss you sssssso ssssssure?" Glow asked. "I don't know, just a feeling," Beryl replied.
"We should try to open it," Rosy suggested.
"That's a good start," Mosaic said in agreement.
The group then proceeded to try to open it, starting with pushing it aside, but to no avail.
"Maybe there'sssss a sssswitch or sssssomething we're ssssssupposed to pressssssss," Glow hypothesized. Because of Glow's speculation, the group looked around the room a bit, but found nothing.
"I don't see a switch anywhere in here," Beryl said.
"Any other ideas?" Mosaic asked the others.
"Maybe we're supposed to break down the door," Hoops somewhat sarcastically suggested.
"Actually, let'sssss not okay?" Glow said, against Hoops' idea.
"Once again, I'm just joking," Hoops replied.
"Well I'm honestly stumped at this point," Mosaic declared.
"Me too," Hoops said.
Berry gave a me three in his language.
"Me fourth?" Beryl said, assuming Berry's words.
"And know what? Me fifth," Glow joined in.
Rosy then thought a bit, and said, "Before I say me sixth, let me take another look at the panel," Rosy said.
"Oh, go ahead Rosy," Mosaic told her.
Rosy then went over to the panel and thought to herself, "It's all i can think of at this point, but it won't hurt to check if there's one here," Rosy looked over the panel again, and found just what she was looking for towards the bottom of the panel, a keyhole. "Hey guys, take a look at what I found!" Rosy shouted to the others.
After hearing her, the others rushed over to see what she was talking about it.
"Well would you look at that, it's a keyhole!" Mosaic stated.
"I guess you could say...Rosy found the KEY to the puzzle, eh?" said Beryl.
"Good one Beryl," Glow said, acknowledging Beryl's pun.
"Back on topic, i believe that this implies that there's a key hidden somewhere in this pyramid and we'll need to use it to get the panel to slide aside so we can get through," Mosaic then explained to the group.
"Thinking about it, wouldn't it help out if we split up to look for it?" Hoops said, making a suggestion.
"That's not a bad idea," Mosaic replied in agreement. "I think the best thing to do here so that no one's alone but we're covering as much ground as possible is for us to split up into pairs," Mosaic continued.
VII: Scavenger Hunt
"Beryl, you and Berry search together," Mosaic assigned. "I'll search the pyramid with Rosy," Mosaic continued. "And Hoops, you look for the key with Glow," Mosaic told Hoops. "Now, is everyone okay with this?" Mosaic then asked everyone.
"I'd say so," Beryl said giving his input.
"This works pretty well," Hoops then answered.
Berry then replied yes in his language.
"You bet!" Rosy answered.
"I don't ssssee why we wouldn't be," Glow inputted.
"Actually, I've thought of a reason why we wouldn't," Beryl said. "Mosaic, how are me and Berry supposed to see with it so dark? You're the only one with a torch," Beryl pointed out.
"I actually didn't think of that." Mosaic stated. "Glow, do you see anymore unlit torches?" Mosaic asked Glow.
"I'll look and see if I find any," Glow replied, then looking around a bit.
As he looked, Hoops made a sarcastic statement. "If we don't find another torch, maybe we could have Glow light Beryl on fire so they can see," Hoops said.
"Umm, how about no? You don't want to see me maroon right now do you?" Beryl replied.
"I didn't mean it…" Hoops nervously said.
"Ah, I found one!" Glow stated a bit muffled, coming back with an unlit torch in his mouth. "Now all I gotta do issssss light it and we're good to go!" Glow proclaimed. After lighting it, he handed it to Berry, telling him to be careful with it.
Berry nodded and quickly made his way over to Beryl.
After everyone got into their respective pairs, Mosaic said, "Alright everyone, now let's go scavenger hunting! Yeah!" Then running through a corridor in the pyramid with Rosy only to trip and fall down a flight of stairs. "I'm okay…" Mosaic then stated.
"Well, Berry, the sooner we get this done, the sooner we can open the door. So let's get hunting!" Beryl said to Berry.
Berry then speaks a word in their language, though he doesn't understand him, Beryl assumed he agreed and let Berry stand on his head, and went down a different corridor from Mosaic and Rosy.
Hoops looked around for a different route to use from the two of them, and eventually noticed a chain dangling from the ceiling that seemed to lead down another path.
"So...Glow, how about we go up there?" Hoops suggested.
"Lookssss like a good place to look, sssssso i'd say we should go for it," Glow answered Hoops.
Which the two then proceed to then make their way to the chain and climb up it, Hoops with his multiple limbs, and Glow by circling his body around it to wind up it.
Meanwhile, after a bit of time had passed at this point, Berry was once again still standing on top of Beryl, holding the torch in the air to get a better view of the ruins and a lead on the key's location, unable to find anything.
"Huh, I don't see the key anywhere." Beryl stated. "Any ideas?" they then asked Berry.
Berry just shook his head.
"Also Berry, be sure that your careful with that torch, we wouldn't want me or you to get burned alright?"
Which Berry understood and was sure to remember.
After examining the room a bit more, Beryl eventually took notice of a ledge high up that seemed to lead to another part of the pyramid.
"Hey Berry, think you could do me a favor?" Beryl asked, waiting for Berry to give a response. Once Berry acknowledged him, Beryl proceeded to ask him. "You think you go to that higher up ledge over there and see if you find the key up there?" they asked. "It's too high for me to reach my self which is why I'd like you to do that if you can while I continue to look down here," Beryl continued explaining.
Berry gave a response that Beryl interpreted as him agreeing.
Which after doing so thanked him for agreeing and moved jumping distance of the ledge so Berry could reach it.
In a different part of the pyramid, Mosaic and Rosy hunted for the key, looking in each nook and cranny to see if they can track it down. As they did so, Rosy eventually brought up something important to Mosaic.
"Mosaic, I realized something," Rosy started.
"What is that Rosy?" Mosaic responded.
"The scenery of these ruins look very similar. And with how similar everything looks in here, couldn't we easily get lost in here?" Rosy explained.
"We could now that I think about it…" Mosaic answered.
"Do you have something we could use as a trail marker? Rosy asked.
"Actually, it's funny that you asked, because I actually do," Mosaic replied, then digging into his pocket and pulling out a blue marker.
"You were just keeping that on your person?" Rosy asked, surprised to see that he had it with him.
"Yeah, I keep stuff to draw or write with on me alot." Mosaic explained.
"Hey, that's really handy," Rosy replied.
"It is," Mosaic responded. "Anyway, my idea is that we write a mark on the wall and to make each one look different so that we know where we've been," Mosaic then explained.
"Why do I feel like Beryl would have used that as a chance to make a pun if he was here right now?" Rosy said. "But yeah, that's a good idea," Rosy then stated, getting back on topic.
"Alright, we'll just draw an X here," Mosaic said, then doing just as he said he would. "And there we go. Now, back to hunting!" Mosaic then said, then going down a corridor they presumed to not have explored yet.
At a corner of one of the corridors, Mosaic and Rosy took notice of the wall. It looked as if there was a large crack on it.
"Wow, look at that wall," Mosaic started. "It could let over with ease if we had something with enough force," Mosaic then said.
Rosy looked around and saw some red grass sticking out of the ground, and under this...the top of something purple and round. "Hey, we could use those bombs to see what's behind that wall," Rosy said, pointing at the bombs.
"Then what are we waiting for? Let's go!" Mosaic said, then beginning to go over to the bombs.
"Wait Mosaic, i'm not sure yet," Rosy said, stopping Mosaic in his tracks.
"Oh you weren't? What's the reason?" Mosaic questioned.
"Well...i'm not sure if we should blow up because it could alarm the others," Rosy explained.
"That is sort of true, maybe we should discuss this a bit more," Mosaic realized.
As they discussed however, they hadn't realized, but a mysterious figure in the darkness had been watching them from afar. They ran off after a bit for some unknown reason.
"So basically, I don't believe blowing up the bombs will be a problem since we can just tell them later on what the explosion was if they ask," Mosaic explained to Rosy.
"I suppose we can do that," She responded.
"Alright, now let's blast this barricade!" Mosaic stated, then, along with Rosy, preparing some bombs to hurl at the wall.
Meanwhile, Hoops and Glow searched for the key, with Glow leading the way thanks to his night vision.
As they continued to search, Hoops asked a question. "So Glow, i have a question, how does your vision look when your seeing in the dark?".
"Oh, why do you assssssk?" Glow replied.
"Just wanted to check that it's more reliable than using a torch," Hoops explained.
Glow then started to explain. "Well bassssically, the way that I sssssee isssss-", however as he was talking, mid sentence, they suddenly heard a loud explosion come from elsewhere in the pyramid.
"What was that?" Hoops stated.
"It sssssssounds like it wassssss an explosssssio,." Glow replied, then continuing, "But I don't think we ssssshould worry about it sssssince it ssssssounded like it came from sssssomewhere-"
"No! But we should. Considering how that explosion sounded, it could very well cause the pyramid to cave in and we'll all be trapped in here! Or worse…" Hoops said loudly, to signify he was being serious.
"Wow Hoopsssss, you're right, I guessssss we ssssshould proceed with caution from here on out," Glow responded.
After the two explored the pyramid for a while longer, they eventually came across a large golden brown double door on one of the walls, with a torch on either side.
"Hey, it's one of those large doors," Hoops said.
"Hey, I've ssssseen doorsssss like thissssss too, I feel like thisssss isssss a good ssssign that we're getting warmer on the key'ssssss location," Glow added.
"To be honest, I agree, we should check this room out," Hoops responded. Agreeing that it's a good lead on the key's location, the two entered through the doors of the room.
And right they were, across the room they indeed saw a shiny gold object, this object being the key they were looking for.
"Hey, there's the key!" Hoops exclaimed.
Glow thought it was great that they found the key as well, however noticed a worrying detail. He noticed several masks on the wall, each of them looked the same. They were round, dual-golden colored and had a creepy smile of sorts on their faces. These were phantos. Glow doesn't mention it to Hoops as he presumed that he remembered as they went over to the key altar.
"Well, you've caused us enough trouble, but it ends now!" Hoops said to the key, about to snatch it negligently off the altar, when Glow stopped him.
"Hoopssssss, we really sssshouldn't jusssssst ssssnatch the key off," Glow told him.
"Why not?" Hoops asked, a bit annoyed.
"We've been in pyramidsssssss like thissssss before, and you realize keyssss like thissss are alwayssss guarded by phantossss right?" Glow explained.
"I'm sorry but umm, what are phantos again?" Hoops asked.
"Bassssssically, throughout ssssubcon, unlike the musssshroom kingdom, keysssss are commonly guarded by phantossssss, and if we removed the key, they'll go after ussssss," Glow answered.
"So they're basically key guardians?" Hoops asked.
"I guesssss you could ssssay that," Glow replied.
"Well, if they bother us, we can just beat up them," Hoops said, snatching the key off the altar.
"Wait, Hoopssss! It'sssss not that sssssimple!" Glow said in an attempt to stop him, however, it being too late at this point, one of the phantos' eyes glowed red and then removed themself from the wall and looked at Glow and Hoops. "Run!" Glow said, then rushing quickly out of the room along with Hoops, holding the key overhead.
"Umm, don't you mean slide since umm...you don't have any legs?" Hoops said as they fled.
"You know what I mean!" Glow responded as they continued.
Meanwhile, Mosaic and Rosy had gotten back out of the wall they just blew up.
"It's funny that we found an ice flower back there isn't?" Rosy stated.
"It is kinda funny," Mosaic replied. "But it'll really help us out if we run into any 8-bits in here," Mosaic pointed out.
"Considering we still haven't found the key yet, do you think we should retrace our steps so that we can regroup?" Rosy then asked.
"To be honest, I was thinking the same thing," Mosaic replied.
Mosaic and Rosy after retracing their steps a bit, noticed Beryl and Berry. The latter just as they were looking to get on the former's head so that they could get down.
"So, did you find anything?" Beryl asked them.
Which Berry responded in their language to have not and only finding a dead end.
"Based on the look on your face, I'm guessing you didn't?" Beryl then asked, in which Berry nodded. "Hey, that's fine, maybe the others found it," Beryl said to help Berry not feel so bad.
"Hey Beryl! Did you guys find the key?" Mosaic yelled and asked.
"Wow, that's what I was going to ask you guys," Beryl replied.
"Wait, so you guys didn't either?" Mosaic asked.
"Unfortunately, no," Beryl replied.
"Oof, that leaves Hoops and Glow then," Mosaic responded.
"Yeah, it would be good to find the two of them as maybe they found the-" Rosy said, only to be interrupted.
Hoops and Glow suddenly came rushing into the room they were in, out of breath.
"Or...they'll find us?" Rosy said.
"Glow! Hoops! It's surprising you two are here but, why are you hyperventilating?" Beryl asked. "Just because this place has no air vents doesn't mean you need to...hyperventilate," Beryl said, making another pun.
"Also Glow, did you and Hoops by any chance find a key?" Mosaic asked the two.
"Firssssst off, yesssss we found a key," Glow answered Mosaic.
"Really? That's great-" Mosaic began to say.
"Sssssecond off, i'm not hyperventilating, the reassssssson i'm panting sssssso hard issssss that when me and Hoopssssss got the key, a phanto ssssstarted chasssssing ussssss," Glow continued explaining. "And we need to find where the key sssssslot wassssss quickly sssssso we can get rid of the Phanto!" Glow continued to inform.
"But how would we-" Rosy was about to question.
"I don't have the time to explain, we need to flee them!" Glow interruptingly explained, then going the direction he believed the key hole was and signaled everyone followed his lead, which they do.
After running a bit, Glow threw the key out his mouth. "Mossssssaic! Catch!" Glow shouted.
Mosaic managed to catch it successfully but then asked, "Wait, why do i have it?"
"Bassssically, the Phanto only chasssesssss whoever'ssssss holding the key, sssssssso by usssss passssssing it around like we are, it'll help usssss to hold onto it," Glow frantically explained.
"That's actually a good idea," Mosaic replied. "In that case, Berry! Catch the key!"
Tossing the key over to the baby dino, whom caught it with his tongue and held it in his mouth after having held it for a bit, he then spat it out to Hoops, whom caught it with ease. The group continued to outwit the Phanto with this strategy until they eventually found their way to the keyhole and inserted the key inside, which caused the panel to slide right over and open the way to the room, which the group then proceeded to quickly rush inside. After doing so, the Phanto seemed to have mysteriously vanished.
Upon their realization that the Phanto was no longer chasing them, the group took a moment to catch their breath. "Phew, it'ssssss a good thing you guyssss followed my directionssssss and asssked quessssstions later, otherwisssssse that wouldn't have turned out ssssso good," Glow said.
"So, you're going to explain to us why you hustled us without explanation and knew that the Phanto would disappear?" Hoops asked.
"Yeah, sssssso bassssically, i've heard rumorssss that for ssssome odd reassson, phantossssss ssssseem to disssssappear when you insert a key their guarding into a door." Glow educated the group.
"Does anyone know where they go after they vanish?" Rosy asked.
"That's something to wonder; and along with that, why do they vanish?" Mosaic then added.
"To be honessssst, no one's really sssssure why either of thosssse thingsssssss happen, but it'sssss definitely sssssomething to wonder," Glow answered, responding to both of them.
The Mosaic group found this interesting, but Beryl seemed to have his attention elsewhere.
"Guys...you might want to pipe down a bit," Beryl said quietly.
"Wait a minute, why is-" Mosaic started to ask.
"Ssssh!" Beryl said. "If you want to know why, why don't you guys come take a look?" Beryl suggested to the others.
The rest of the group came to take a look at what Beryl was looking at, and see a mysterious figure in the darkness, that unbeknownst to them, was the same one spying on Mosaic and Rosy earlier, they saw that the figure was a tweeter. And they were talking to someone much bigger than them. This someone was limbless and scaly, like cobrats generally were. Except that they had other notable features. They were blue scaled and had an underside shaded tan. Their more notably biology came from however from the fact that they had not one, not two, but three different heads. The group recognized the creature as Tryclyde.
"Sir, it seems like we're not alone in this pyramid," The tweeter began to explain to Tryclyde.
"Oh? Isssss that sssso?" Tryclyde replied.
"I was looking around earlier, and saw two individuals here, that i'm pretty certain aren't supposed to be here."
As the group spied on this conversation, Berry seemed to display fearfulness and cuddled next to Rosy for comfort.
"You're scared of him huh?" Rosy asked.
In which Berry responded in his language that he is.
"Well it's okay, you have nothing to worry about, not with me here," Rosy encouraged Berry. Rosy then noticed something about Hoops. She noticed he seemed to be shivering. "Hoops, you seem to be shivering for some reason," Rosy mentioned.
"I'm not shivering! You're shivering!" Hoops replied defensively.
"No need to hide it Hoops, your scared of Tryclyde as well, you and I both know that." Rosy replied, knowing he's trying to deny his true feelings.
"I hate it when Rosy's right…" Hoops said to himself quietly. Sighing, Hoops then said "Y-You're right, i am s-sorta scared of them," Hoops admitted.
"Well, did you need a bit of comfort?" Rosy offered.
"Naw, i'll get comfort from Mosaic thank you," Hoops replied, shooting down his offer, then skittering over to Mosaic and climbing up to his shoulder for safety.
"Anyway, we should discuss what we're going to do about them," Mosaic said.
"Well, our main objective here isssss mainly to get them out of the way, so…" Glow started, before being interrupted by Beryl.
"Guys! We really need to stop being this loud, because…"
"What wasssss that?" Tryclyde said, hearing the noise, then looking around suspiciously along with the tweeter.
At this point, the group had realized the noise they were making and had hidden behind a wall and tried to be as silent as they could.
"Ehh, it wassssss probably nothing," Tryclyde said. "The ssssliding panel isssss locked, sssso whoever thosssse guyssss you ssssssaw in here were probably couldn't get in," Tryclyde then mentioned.
Just as their about to go back about their business and forget about the noise, Berry couldn't hold it in and let out a sneeze, alarming them.
"Ahaa! Ssssso there issssss sssssomeone here," Tryclyde said. "Why don't you guysssss come out and ssshow yoursssselvessss? We know you're there," Tryclyde then continued.
Realizing there was no point in doing otherwise, the group came out of their hiding. "Wait a minute…" Tryclyde stated. "I know who you are, you're the Mosssssaic Group." Tryclyde continued, sounding mad. "And with you are a pokey, and…" Tryclyde continued, seeming to then pause mid sentence and give Glow a peculiar look.
They don't pause for too long however as they then continue, "And a cobrat with you as well."
"Hey, we have names you know, i'm Beryl and this is Glow," Beryl said.
"Oh...hey, but umm, why are we introducing ourssssselvesssss?" Glow asked Beryl.
"Not actually too sure to be honest," Beryl responded.
VIII: Brawl Beneath
"Well alright then, Beryl and...Glow," Tryclyde continued. "We don't need you two and the Mosssaic Group meddling in our affairsssss," Tryclyde continued. "Now spy," Tryclyde said to the tweeter.
"Yes sir?" The tweeter asked.
"Let'ssss have backup help usssss out with dissssposing of thessse meddlers," Tryclyde told them.
"Right…" The Tweeter replied.
"Back up?" Hoops stated.
"And what would this backup be?" Mosaic then asked.
"Thisssss back up right here," Tryclyde said, pointing to another part of the room, where they see a pair of cobrats; one red and one blue; and a pair of snifits also one red and one blue.
"So it looks like we are fighting…" Hoops said.
"Now, 8-bitsssss, attack!" Tryclyde ordered, in which the 8-bits obey and run in the group's direction.
With quick thinking, Mosaic quickly told each of the group who to deal with. "Beryl and Berry! You guys deal with the snifits!" "Hoops! Rosy! You guys deal with the cobrats!" "I'll deal with the tweeter, and Glow, you deal with Tryclyde,"
"Umm Mossssaic, think you can sssswitch that around?" Glow asked.
Mosaic is puzzled at Glow asking this, but doesn't mind. "I guess we can do that," Mosaic anwsered.
"Thanksssss," Glow responded.
Mosaic is also confused by this statement as well, but realized there's no time to think about it and needed to deal with Tryclyde, who shoots some fireballs his way but he quickly dodged and prepared to counter with a ice fused punch.
Hoops and Rosy, despite the former's issues, worked together to outwit the cobrats. As they dodged the two cobrat's attempts to lunge at them, Rosy took this as a chance to ram into the red one with her spin technique, knocking them down momentarily, but them quickly recovering.
Hoops on the other hand decided on trying to confuse the blue one with their speed by running rapid circles around them, giving them a hard time keeping up, allowing Hoops to tackle them, flooring them for a short bit. While they were lying on the ground, Hoops took this as a chance to lift them up from the center of their body, twirl them around and hurl them at the red one once again knocking them and the blue one down just as they got up. With difficulty, the blue one recovered and shot Hoops with a fireball, which hit and knocked him on the ground. The cobrat then prepared another fireball, intending to inflict further harm, however before their fireball could hit Hoops, Rosy intercepted the fireball by hurling an ice ball at it, which froze the fireball solid. This allowed Hoops to make a recovery, then tossing the ice block back at the cobrat, knocking them down once more.
Berry and Beryl on the other hand were having a bit of difficulty with the snifits, multiple times, they only barely avoided the bullets they fired at them, and didn't have too many chances to fight back, in which Berry realized they needed to find something to use. Berry noticed after checking the room a bit that there were mushroom blocks present. After dodging a few more bullets, Berry lifted one of the mushroom blocks above his head with difficulty, due to him being one of the weakest in the group, and strenuously hurled it at the blue snifit, knocking them down.
Beryl on the other hand was trying to get into close range of the snifit so that they could headbutt them, but found that it was too risky. So instead, he spun his body rapidly and fired his thorns at the snifit, these thorns however flew all over the room, hitting not just the snifit, but the two cobrats and tweeter as well.
The tweeter had been contending with Glow, clearly having the short end of the stick in part mainly due to both Glow's superior size as well as firepower, it seemed to be a rather one sided fight for the most part, especially with them having now been pinned by several of Beryl's thorns.
"Sir, a little help?" The tweeter asked Tryclyde.
Tryclyde was busy fighting Mosaic, he earlier had dodged his ice infused punch, and their fight had generally been a war of attrition, anytime Tryclyde tried to hit Mosaic with fireballs, Mosaic would block them with ice balls, causing them to either freeze or disintegrate simultaneously with the ice balls.
"I'm not helping you right now, we're busssssy dealing with Mosssaic," Tryclyde told the tweeter. "Asssssk for asssssssistance from one of the othersssss," Tryclyde then proceeded to say afterwards.
The tweeter dodged a stream of fire from Glow and then looked upon the battle going on and realized; They were definitely losing here. The two cobrats had both been beaten down enough to the point that Hoops and Rosy were now helping out Beryl, Berry, and Mosaic with Tryclyde and the two snifits. And they then came to a realization at that point and told Tryclyde about it.
"Sir! We're wasting our time dealing with these nuisances! We already got what we're looking for!" The Tweeter shouted to Tryclyde.
"Hmm...thinking about it you make a good point," Tryclyde responded to them. "Throw the magic potion with you at the wall," Tryclyde then ordered.
After being told to do so, the tweeter pulled out a flask filled with an odd purple liquid, and hurled it at the wall, shattering the flask. Upon them doing this, a purple door, lined with a golden frame appeared. The Mosaic group along with Glow and Beryl stopped their fighting when they noticed this.
"8-bitsssss! Change of plansssss! Through the magic door!" Tryclyde said, then hustling over to the door, in which the cobrats, despite being beaten, the snifits, and tweeter followed.
"They're escaping! After them!" Hoops said, trying to chase after them with the rest of the group.
Before they could reach the door however, it was sealed shut and vanished.
"There they go..." Glow said.
"But hey we need to remember, with them gone, we can search this room now without a problem!" Beryl stated, turning a green shade before reverting brown again.
IX: Unboxing
The Mosaic group, Glow and Beryl began to examine the room to see if they could find anything that's worthwhile within the room. After looking a while however, finding nothing.
"There's nothing in here from what i'm seeing," Mosaic stated.
"Yeah, unfortunately it looks like we're going to leave empty-handed," Rosy added.
Hoops then began to add his own feelings on it too. "Well this was a big waste of time, we come all this way, do all of this waiting for something interesting, and what do we end up with? Absolutely-" "Oow!" Hoops then said, booping his head against something. "What the heck did I just hit my head against?" Hoops said. The rest of the group made their way over to where Hoops booped his head.
Mosaic realized that the object that he hit his head on was shaped like a box, and along with that, had alot of dust all over it.
"This thing...it's a chest," Mosaic informed the group.
"A really dusssssty one too," Glow added.
"This thing looks as if it hadn't been touched for years," Beryl inputted, giving his opinion.
"I guess Tryclyde and the others missed it when they were looking around this room," Mosaic hypothesized.
"Well, I'm personally curious as to what could be inside, I say that we open it," Hoops suggested.
"Are you sure about that Hoops?" Beryl asked, sounding a bit worried.
"What's the problem with opening it?" Hoops questioned.
"W...Well it's…" Beryl started, his body starting to become a shade of yellow. "I've heard myths about ancient treasures, one of those is that ancient treasure chests like this could have some evil spirit it in, and if it's true...we'll end up doing something like that!" Beryl explained.
Everyone is silent for a bit after hearing him say this, but eventually Glow spoke up.
"Beryl, that'sssss jussssst a myth though, I doubt there'ssss actually ssssssomething ssssealed insssside of here. I'm personally in favor of opening it," he explained to Beryl.
"I...I suppose your right," Beryl replied, starting to calm down a bit and revert to his normal brown color. "I suppose you guys can open it, being that it's sorta hard for me to help out," Beryl said.
"Alright, so me, Glow and Beryl say yes we open it, Mosaic, Berry, and Rosy. What do you guys say we do?" Hoops then continued.
Berry told Hoops something in his language.
"Your not sure if we should because of Beryl's superstition?" Hoops asked.
Which Berry responds is the reason.
"Berry, Glow just explained that that's a myth, other than that, is there any reason you wouldn't be in favor of opening it?" Hoops then asked.
Berry thought about it and then gave another answer in his language.
"Oh? So you would be otherwise?" Hoops replied.
"Well that makes four of us. What do you think we should do Mosaic and Rosy?" Hoops then asked.
"The only issue I really have is that the chest may be really dirty, but I guess I'll let it slide..." Rosy said.
"Now that leaves Mosaic. What do you think?" Hoops asked him.
"Well, considering all you guys want to open it, I don't see why not," Mosaic answered Hoops.
"Well in that case-" Hoops stated, trying to push over the lid to open it, but finding he had a hard time. "Umm, could I get some help please?" Hoops asked.
"Sure thing Hoops," accepted Mosaic. "Berry, Rosy, Glow let's help him out," Mosaic then told the others.
The five of them working together, they all strenuously pushed on it to get the lid off.
"Something kinda funny about you putting this much effort in, is that it gives you a chance to get your anger out," Beryl started to say. "A chance to...get things off your chest?" Beryl said, cracking another pun. "You get it-" Beryl started.
"Beryl sorry, but we're...sorta trying...to get this moved, we don't have time to hear it," Rosy explained to Beryl.
"Oh, sorry about that," Beryl said.
"Ugh, this isn't working," Hoops mentioned. "Everyone stop a sec," Hoops told the group. "Alright, on the count of three, all of us should give the chest lid a big shove, got it?" Hoops asked.
"Got it," the group replied.
"Alright, on the count of three. One...two...three...SHOVE!" Hoops yelled, in which everyone shoved at the same time, finally removing the lid from the chest. "Woo! Great job everyone!" Hoops said to the group. "Now, to look and see what we found," Hoops said.
Everyone got in a circle around the chest and peered inside to see what they uncovered. Inside they had found...a round frame for something, the only thing inside this frame being a needle pointing south and several odd markings on it, that not much could be inducted from.
"Huh, so this is all that's in here?" Mosaic said, holding the frame in his hand and looking at it.
"Apparently so…" Rosy said.
"It's weird that this thing was sealed away like this," Hoops stated.
X: Closure
Sometime later on, at this point the Mosaic Group, along with Glow and Beryl had made it out of the pyramid and had made their way back to Desert Land so that they could focus better.
"Ssssssso, isssss it a deal?" Glow asked Mosaic, as they had had a conversation about how to do things. "You guysss are going to sssssshow thissssss sssssstrange object you found to Team Sssssss.M.B.X to ssssssee what they have to ssssay about it while we ssssssspread the word on thissssss ancient pyramid that we found in the ravine?" Glow asked, wanting to check with him one last time.
"That's the plan here," Mosaic answered.
"Well, it wasssss cool hanging out with you and your friendssss Mossssaic, I hope to sssssssssssee you sssssome othertime!" Glow then said, giving Mosaic and his friends a proper goodbye as he left with Beryl.
"Yeah, see ya another time Mosaic Group! Just try to not...hang us out to dry if you know what i'm saying!" Beryl said, giving one last pun.
"Yeah, we'll try not to do that. It was nice exploring with you guys too. See you another time," Mosaic said. And as he, Hoops, Rosy and Berry made their way to the pipe back to Mushroom Plains, Hoops, Rosy, and even Berry each waved to them.
"And so with that, another quest came to an end for the Mosaic Group as they made their way back home to discuss with Team S.M.B.X what they found. What could this strange object mean? How would Team S.M.B.X feel about their discovery of this artifact? Where would their adventures lead them next? Find out next time on Mosaic Adventures!"
Next Time...Chapter 4: Mistakes Happen
