"Oh, it's just you two." Peach stood in front of the pair, one eyebrow raised. "We were wondering where the insane laughter was coming from. Right, you'd better hurry. The Yoshis are just about to summon the Mythical Yoshi of Legend."

"I told you he exists," Luigi muttered to Yoshi as the two of them scampered over the soft sand, but he was grinning. Sure enough, pattering footsteps behind him and a hand on his shoulder told him that all was well.

Every Yoshi on the island was there, even those who were dubious of the existence of the Mythical Yoshi of Legend. They were accompanied by the wayward travellers, Parakarry and Porgal. "This is going to be fascinating," Parakarry declared as he winged over to a small sand dune on the shoreline, dropping down next to his great-uncle. He stuck one hand in his shell, his brow furrowed as he concentrated. His tongue was sticking slightly out as he rummaged through his things, muttering under his breath. Within a matter of minutes, Parakarry had crossed his legs, a sketchpad perched on his lap. Last but not least, he removed a sharpened wooden stake from the depths of his shell and excitedly began scrawling. "I'm going to have to add these notes to my log."

"Yes, indeed, my intelligent great-nephew. Yes, indeed." Porgal squinted toward the lavender-tinged midnight-blue horizon, as if scrutinising the skies. "That is, of course, presuming the Mythical Yoshi of Legend does exist."

"Of course he does!" retorted a taken-aback Parakarry, but Porgal only shrugged in reply.

--------------------------------------------------------------

Meanwhile, Lila was talking with Alber, Mera and Violet.

"This is your first time to see us summon the Mythical Yoshi of Legend, isn't it, Alber?" Lila asked the small red Yoshi, who nodded excitedly.

"Yeah!" he cried happily, clapping his hands. "I always wanted to see what he looks like."

"Well, his scales shine all sorts of colours," Mera pondered thoughtfully. "It's really beautiful at sunset or when the moon is incredibly bright and shining."

Violet glanced upward, her cheeks flushing for unknown reasons (actually, she'd caught sight of Yoshi chatting with the travellers), up at the moon, which was the colour of churned milk at this hour. "Well, it's too pale now," she told the other three, "but I think we'll still be able to see them."

"He's never missed it once in every month of these twenty-eight years," Lila explained to the younger Yoshis as they walked along the seashore. It was the Yoshis' habitual custom to sit on the shore rather than in trees or the vine-ridden benches they had built for travellers while they watched the Mythical Yoshi of Legend do his thing. "Even during storms and some of the worst Junglestream weather ever. He'll be here."

Alber glanced eagerly at Violet and Mera, his blues eyes shining, glowing. "Is that true?"

Mera rolled her eyes playfully at him and winked. "You can bet your boots on it, Alby."

The young Yoshi glanced down at his berry-blue boots, wriggling as he tossed back his head and midnight scales in anticipation. "Wouldn't be a good idea, though."

"No, of course not," Lila acknowledged with a laugh as she dropped to her knees. In that sense, Lila was different from most Yoshis – when the Yoshis were watching and waiting from the Mythical Yoshi of Legend on these wonderful Junglestream nights, she never sat. She always squatted or kneeled instead.

When the Yoshis were sitting side by side and neck to neck with the travellers, the Yoshi chieftainess raised one hand for silence. The buzzing voices stopped; the hum that filled the air dissipated. Lila glanced at each and every one of them behind her shoulder, just as the chatter dispersed. When everyone - humans, Yoshis, Paratroopas – had been looked at in the eye by the chieftainess, she gave a small nod. Instantly, Lila delivered the rousing cry for the Mythical Yoshi of Legend:

"Feathers!"

It was an amazing midnight stream of blue jewel peacock feather upon silken feather, all streaking toward the fine grains of sand that made up the far end of the shoreline; all clashing, drifting, spiralling, floating, spinning, zooming, floating, coasting, cruising, smashing, surfing, cutting, wafting toward and with each other, a seemingly neverending waterfall of feather after feather after feather. They were caught in a single, warm updraft, tossed toward the Yoshis; they were then chased back down by the wind – to be chased back up again.

They finally came, drifting, toward the thickly-knotted crowd – and suddenly pressed deeply into the sand, sinking into its granular smoothness. A great hush fell over the onlookers, which had been previously crying out and yelling in uncontrolled excitement. Finally, the last feather had been sunken into the subterranean - and then, out of the shadows, a figure appeared.

It was exactly as Lila had said it would be. He was a tall figure for his fifteen Yoshi years of age, slightly taller than the chieftainess - but man! The way that guy could dance was simply amazing. He span and pirouetted, jumped and streaked, waxed and waned, elusive as the moon itself in his time of honour. Just as Mera had assured the young Alber, he did indeed shine with every colour of the rainbow – his scales glittered, shined, shimmered, glowed, brightened and darkened with every feather of the blue jewel peacock that floated his way or was updrafted in another direction. He appeared, disappeared, materialised, vanished, as untouchable as the setting sun itself – or so it seemed to everyone in the vicinity.

Finally, he stopped, his underside - paler than the rest of his sparkling, rainbow-coloured body but just as colour-shifting - rapidly heaving up and down as his arms slowly extended from his long body. His tongue was out and splayed across the shore, so much like a bent and twisted length of liquorice. The scales behind his head, so multicoloured and vivid under midnight's light that it was hard to discern their true colour, were small and rounded; they were triangular, all right, yet they ended in smooth stubs rather than points. But, in spite of his body's ever-changing colours, you could tell what colour his eyes were: a jumping, dancing, dark cerulean blue that literally brightened and darkened with the moon and his scales.

The Mythical Yoshi of Legend grinned, nothing but happiness in his eyes. His lengthy tongue flopped feebly on the shore, but still lay, snaking along the ground like a ruby-coloured snake.

"Mythical Yoshi of Legend!" he cried, and with that disappeared.