Two days later, Mario, Luigi, Peach, Toad, and Toadette were gathered in front of Peach's castle, ready to start their party. They had invited Princess Daisy, Yoshi, Rosalina, Wario, Waluigi, Donkey Kong, and Diddy Kong to the event. Mario, Luigi, and Peach were mingling with their guests. Toad and Toadette were standing on a stage, adjusting their bow ties, getting ready to start the party. On the stage were four raised platforms in four different colors (red, blue, green, and yellow) a wheel with three different pieces on it, and a lottery machine filled with ping pong balls. Each ping pong ball had each guest's personalized emblem on it. Gruber and Kamek were hiding behind a nearby tree.
"So how are we gonna do this?" Kamek asked.
"I've seen these things," Gruber said. "They're gonna pick four players at random. We'll take the place of one of them."
"Which one?"
"I don't know yet. Let's wait and see who they're gonna pick."
Kamek nodded. It was about all he could do.
Toad cleared his throat, and he and Toadette stepped to the edge of the stage.
"Attention everybody!" he called out. "Welcome to our Super Mario Party! Now since you've all been to these parties before, you all know the rules."
"Four players are chosen at random," Toadette said, "and these four players will take turns rolling dice, and moving around the board. The goal of the game is to collect as may stars as you can."
"Toadette will be on the board, holding the stars," Toad said. "Each star costs ten coins. Once a star has been purchased, Toadette will move to another space on the board."
"Why?" Waluigi asked.
"To keep things interesting," Toad said, shrugging.
"Sounds stupid to me," Waluigi said again.
"Everything sounds stupid to you," Daisy said, rolling her eyes.
"The player with the most stars is the winner," Toadette said. "Are you ready?"
Everyone shouted in the affirmative, and Toad and Toadette turned on the lottery machine. The first ping pong ball that came up had a red M on it.
"Player number one is Mario!" Toad shouted.
"It figures," Wario grumbled. "Mario's always first."
"He always wins, too," Waluigi grumbled. "This game is fixed!"
"Oh, hush!" Rosalina shouted, giving Waluigi a bop on the noggin with her wand.
Toad and Toadette ignored everything that was going on in the audience. The next ping pong ball that came up had a gold crown with two blue gems and one red gem on it.
"Player number two is Princess Peach!" Toadette shouted.
Most of the audience applauded and cheered. Wario and Waluigi booed. Everyone else ignored them. Toad activated the machine again, and the next ping pong ball had a green L on it.
"Player number three is Luigi!" he shouted.
"Boooooooo! Hissssss! Boooooo!" Waluigi shouted.
"Knock it off, Waluigi," Mario warned. "Unless you're looking for a fat lip!"
"It would go beautifully with his fat head," Daisy quipped.
Waluigi gave Daisy a dirty look, and watched the ping pong balls fly around the lottery machine, waiting for the last one to come up. When it did, Toadette took it, and looked at the emblem. It had a yellow flower with a green center on it.
"Our fourth and final player is," she said, "Princess Daisy!"
"Oh yeah!" Daisy shouted, pumping her fist into the air.
The rest of the guests applauded, and Wario and Waluigi skulked away. Being the sore losers that they were, they weren't going to hang around and watch, since they weren't chosen to play. The others just let them go. They were used to this kind of behavior from them.
"Okay, everybody," Toad said, walking over to the wheel. "Time to spin the wheel to see what board we'll be playing on! Toadette, will you do the honors?"
"Okay!" Toadette shouted, and she gave the wheel a good, hard spin. It turned for several revolutions before it finally stopped on a picture of a pineapple.
"The board we'll be playing on today is Megafruit Paradise!" she shouted.
"Wahoo!" Mario shouted, jumping up happily. "I was hoping for that one!"
"So was I," Gruber said.
"Why?" Kamek asked.
"That board has four separate islands," Gruber explained. "One of 'em is a hollowed out, fake watermelon. We can hide our target in there, and no one will know."
"Yeah, great. But which one are we gonna replace?"
"Hmmm . . . ."
Gruber watched, as everyone left in order to head toward the board. Toadette stayed behind for a moment or so. She was looking a little nervous. Luigi noticed this, and walked up to her.
"Toadette?" he asked. "Are you okay?"
"Yeah, I'm okay," Toadette said. "Just a little nervous, that's all. I have an icky feeling that Goomba might show up."
"Well, if you don't feel up to this, we can always postpone the party. Or get another Toad to take your place."
"No, I'm fine. I can handle it."
"You sure? I wouldn't want you to do anything you didn't want to do."
"Yeah, I'm sure."
"Okay. But if you do feel like you can't handle it any time during the game, let one of us know, okay?"
"Okay, Luigi. And thanks."
Toadette gave Luigi a big hug, and the two of them followed the others to the Megafruit Paradise board. As they were walking, Toadette suddenly stopped, and turned to Luigi.
"Ummm, Luigi?" she asked, a little apprehensively. "Do you think you could do something for me?"
"Sure, Toadette," Luigi said. "What is it?"
"Would you . . . . hold my hand until we get to the board?"
Luigi smiled, and took Toadette's hand. Toadette sighed with relief, and the two friends went to catch up with the others. Gruber saw the whole exchange, and seethed. He turned beet red, and burst into flames.
"HOW DARE HE?!" he bellowed. "How dare that wrench jockey steal my girl?! Ooohhhh, I'll get him for this! I'll make him pay!"
"I take it we've chosen a target?" Kamek asked.
"You bet we have!" Gruber said. "Come on! We've got to get to him before the game starts!"
Kamek and Gruber jumped on Kamek's broom, and zoomed over to the board before the others could get there. They had to figure out how they were going lure Luigi away from the others. Gruber immediately spotted something at the starting place. There were eight dice laying there. Four of them were standard dice in different colors, and the other four were custom dice, created especially for Mario, Peach, Luigi, and Daisy.
"Perfect!" Gruber said, kicking a green die, and balancing it on his head. "Come on! We'll take this, and wait for Green Stache to come looking for it!"
"I don't know if this is such a good idea after all," Kamek said. "You know Mario's very protective of his brother, and . . . ."
"His brother happens to be a home wrecker! Now come on! You wanna get paid, or not?"
Kamek sighed, and followed Gruber to a spot close to the watermelon island, but far enough away so they wouldn't be seen. Now all they had to do was wait.
Shortly afterwards, Mario, Peach, Luigi, and Daisy took their places on the starting space, while Toad took his place on the judge's stand, and Toadette stood on a podium on a random spot on the board.
"Are we ready to begin?" Toad asked.
"Wait a minute!" Luigi called out. "I'm missing my custom dice block!"
"That's weird," Toad said. "I told Norman to get the dice blocks ready when we had the four players chosen!"
"Maybe he forgot," Toadette said, shrugging.
"Hey Norman!" Toad called out to a yellow Toad. "You forgot Luigi's custom die!"
"No I didn't!" the yellow Toad shouted. "I put it there!"
"Well it's not here now!" Toad shouted. "And I doubt it grew legs and walked away!"
"Don't look at me," Norman said. "I know I put it there!"
"Never mind," Luigi sighed. "I'll go look for it. Maybe Wario or Waluigi took it as a joke or something."
"Okay, but hurry up, bro," Mario said. "We're almost ready to start."
Luigi nodded, and went looking for his dice block. It didn't take him long before he spotted it next to the giant watermelon.
"Here it is," he said. "How did it get all the way over . . . ."
Before Luigi could finish his sentence, he was grabbed from behind, and a wet rag was pressed against his nose and mouth. He let out a scream, but it was muffled, and he was unable to break away from his assailant. Suddenly, he began to feel sleepy. He fought against the feeling, but it was quickly overcoming him. Still, he kept fighting against it.
"This is taking too long!" Kamek shouted. "Do something, will you?! This was your idea!"
"Oh, fine," Gruber grumbled. Luigi looked up, and saw the Goomba walking up to him, and he looked extremely mad.
"This is for trying to steal my girl, Green Stache!" he shouted.
"Hmmph?!" Luigi shouted. Before anything else could happen, Gruber jumped into the air, and used his head to smack Luigi directly in the forehead, leaving the plumber seeing stars.
"Mmmmph . . . ." he mumbled. Finally, the chloroform took effect. He went completely limp, and lost consciousness.