Bean loaded one last bundle with the rest of the clothes and boxes in the back of the truck. She turned to Peasley as he waited in the front seat. "Okay baby, we're going," she told him.
On the waterway, Luigi waited and then he saw a swirl of water far in the distance. He tensed as the swirl got closer. It was a truck, an armoured truck. He used his Godly sight to verify that it was the same armoured truck that Slim Bankshot loaded his Gold Flowers into. The front windshield had been blown in. The truck stopped around fifty feet away from Luigi and Waluigi stepped out from it. The older God threw a Gold Flower, which landed in the film of water between them.
"Bonjour," mocked Waluigi. "You take this truck; you take your Gold Flowers and you go live your life. No one's coming for you. I fixed it."
"And you go kill the boy," pointed out Luigi. "That's how you fix it."
"That's how," nodded Waluigi. "You got your life back; you better think right now what that's worth to you."
"My Life? Your life," clapped Luigi. "Becoming you."
Luigi raised the Poltergust and fired, but Waluigi was too far away. The blast just scattered away. The old man flinched and backed away. Luigi walked forward towards Waluigi, stepping over the Gold Flowers in defiance.
"You stupid little moron!" cried Waluigi. "You let him live, he's going to take away everything that's yours, everything that's mine! You've seen what the boy's going to become! I showed you!"
"I haven't seen that yet," muttered Luigi and he fired the Poltergust again. This time, he was close enough to draw blood off of Waluigi's heartless chest, knocking the old God back. As if out of nowhere, a bike careened around the van and clipped Luigi's leg, sending him violently off the waterway. Luckily, he did not land on the field. The bike shot off down the waterway before Slim Bankshot pulled it to a stop and spun it around.
Luigi was hurt, he felt it. He wasn't King K. Rool yet where he could resist so much pain. He grappled for his Poltergust as Slim gunned the engine, devolution gun in hand. Slim leveled his gun and he was as steady as a rock. Luigi fired the Poltergust, but the blast scattered, Slim was too far away. Slim fired, his beam hitting dangerously close to Luigi. Panicked, Luigi started to fire at the watery ground around him, sending off shot after shot to break the pavement, using what little he knew of his own telekinetic abilities to make the scattered pieces rise up in a whirl of dust.
In the dust cloud, Luigi heard the bike roaring down upon him. He covered up and when he heard it pass, he fired the Poltergust. A moment later, the bike emerged from the cloud without a driver before skidding and crashing. A moment after that, the dust cleared with Luigi stil lying still with his arms on his head. He looked at the broken body of Slim Bankshot in the water for just a second. He painfully rose to his feet when he realized that Waluigi had gone.
Bean started the truck up. "Here we go, baby," she said to Peasley. "We can wave goodbye." They rolled down the road that led to the waterway but at the end of it, at a distance but walking towards them, was the dark violet figure of Waluigi. His Poltergust was in hand. Bean hesitated for a second but then gunned ht engine straight for Waluigi.
"Stop," said Peasley.
"Duck down, baby," Bean told him.
"Stop, please. He can shoot us."
"Just stay down."
She had half the distance closed, but Waluigi was still far off. A shot cracked the front grill and another cracked the front windshield.
"Stop!" cried Peasley and the truck lurched horribley. It flipped straight back in a graceful arc, landing upside down. Hanging by their seatbealts, Bean and Peasley were dazed, but only for a second.
"Are you okay?" asked Bean.
"I'm sorry."
In the rear-view mirror, Bean spotted the approaching figure of Waluigi. "You're okay," she said. "Come on, baby, we have to run now." She unfastened herself and them him before climbing out of the truck. Waluigi stopped suddenly, taking aim. Bean pulled Peasley behind the flatbed for cover as two bullets glared off the overturned truck. Waluigi lowered his Poltergust and ran for them. "We're going into the fields. I want you to run, I'll be right behind you, don't look back. Okay? Go!" They both sprinted off the road.
Peasley ran ahead toward the field, wih Bean not far behind. The ground beneath them was soft and their feet sunk in, this was a nightmare come true. Blasts from the Poltergust thunked into the ground and Bean stumbled, exhausted. Peasley turned back, he wasn't too far ahead of her, close enough for Waluigi to stop and steady his Poltergust. The gunshot cracked through the air and a fan of crimson blood sprayed from Peasley's head. His neck twisted and he crumpled to the ground.
"No!" cried Bean and she was stopped in her trcks. "No Peasley, no!" The topsoil of the ground around them rose in a fine dust. Waluigi barely reacted as the topsoil rose. Bean struggled to reach Peasley as he rose his head, the bullet grazed his jawline. It wasn't severe, but he would lose a lot of blood. The boy's eyes locked hatefully on Waluigi, blood soaked his shirt and far behind him, the barn splintered apart as if in a tornado. With a sudden jolt, the field rippld out from Peasley, like a stone thrown in a pond.
Bean was lifted into the air gently and Waluigi was hefted off the ground, his gun falling to the ground. Peasley stood, his back straight, his eyes intense, dark and in another place. While suspended in mid-air, Waluigi suddenly realized what was going to happen. He lifted his hand offensively and screamed an inhuman Godly roar. The time travel had taken much of his power, but he was supercharged now. There was no way that Peasley would be able to beat him. Peasley's face strained against the Godly telekinetic might of Waluigi and his face strained as he was about to scream. Yet, his face adjusted from Waluigi to Bean and she floated, still reaching out to him despite being frightened. She was yelling something he couldn't hear, but he could see her eyes.
Peasley's face broke. "Mom," he whispered, barely mouthing the word and in a final burst of his power, everything fell down. Bean, Waluigi and the ground all crashed. His eyes displaying his supercharge, Waluigi landed on his knees and practically created a crater in the ground.
Peasley ran to Bean and she sat up slowly, embracing her son. "You did good, baby," she told him. "You did so good. I love you." Behind them, Waluigi lustily rose to his feet, relishing in his unfathomable power. Had he wanted to, he could have made like Rool, teleported behind them and just ended it… but, no. There was a block on his powers and he felt his charge begin to fade.
The entire time Waluigi was in the past, he should not have been able to live. His heart was in the future, the heart in this time there was keyed to Luigi. He could step on the ground here; he could die here. So why was he able to use his powers here to such a degree? He realized it all with anger that he wasn't. The supercharge and all of the Godly might he just displayed… he was tapping in to Luigi's heart to use it. Luigi, who never used his heart for anything more than minor spells before, was still blocking him out. This was his life. Waluigi's was never meant to be lived.
"Into the fields," Bean ordered Peasley. "Run now, baby. Go."
"No," cried Peasley.
"Go, now."
"No, no mom, no!"
"You go!" ordered Bean, pushing him away and she ran. Then she turned, standing her ground directly between Waluigi and Peasley. Waluigi tripped in the mud and fumbled his Poltergust just as he saw Peasley approaching the safety of the field.
"Move!" he yelled at Bean and the old God rose with his gun. With Peasley just seconds from safety, Waluigi primed his gun. "I'm sorry," he whispered and he pulled the trigger. There was one solid gunshot and it moved with the wind in the field. Bean fell dead to the ground, giving Waluigi a clear shot at Peasley.
Just as Waluigi got the boy in his sights, Peasley breached the corn fields and was gone, vanishing in the stalks. Waluigi lowered his Poltergust, stunned but still frantic. He stumbled toward the corn, still far off, his face breaking. He tripped and fell into the mud; the corn field was vast in front of him and Peasley was gone. Waluigi had lost him. Waluigi held his pocket watch and sobbed. He had lost.
Luigi used his Godly sight to see a train on the horizon and then there was supposed to be Peasley, but he only saw a boy sitting in a darkened car with a bloody rag to his jaw. Peasley's face was bloody, dirty and his eyes were full of hate. The train rumbled toward the city and the voice in the back of Luigi's head told him it wasn't his responsibility. Why would he care if the boy became Fawful? He could crush Fawful like a gnat with his powers. The voice told him that he would see when Daisy never came for him, that he would he would give in, but Luigi watched Peasley in the train. There was no rage in Luigi's eyes at the moment, there was only sorrow.
Luigi watched, with sordid understanding and in all corners of his mind, he knew and so, he tapped into all of his powers. He did what Waluigi had mentioned to him in the diner and he pushed time back, just under a minute, it was all he could manage but it was also all that he needed. Peasley was running for the field again with Bean blocking him from Waluigi's Poltergust. Time was hanging, and he felt it then as the voice in the back of his head begged him to stay in the water. These were the moments that Waluigi had told him of, this was the day that the timeline split, and all hell broke loose. He had never been inclined to use his Godly abilities, for fear that he would become King K. Rool but now, he touched them, ever so lightly and he felt it. He felt the cracks and he felt the death of Wart as it happened, he felt Syrup's struggle and though it was not for him, he felt the invite pass through just like he felt the nexus' gates open.
So, he stepped on land and felt himself die. He saw as Waluigi disappeared and Bean stood there, shell shocked, but for only just a moment. She didn't process any of it, she just turned and yelled for her son.
With his dying breaths, Luigi gently touched into the timeline again. Waluigi was a cancer on it, his presence took advantage of its damaged state and created an impossibility that had metastasized on the nexus and allowed the crack in it to grow.
With him gone, the Muus could heal the damage that Bowser had done to it. Luigi ignored the pain, ignored the force pushing up inside him, splitting his body in two. For whatever would come next would either have the Muus would let the timeline heal and return to a state of singularity, or it would destroy it altogether, but no longer would it stay stagnant and corrupt all within it.
Peasley had stopped just short of the corn and turned back to see his mother, standing there and smiling at him. The bad man in purple was gone and so, Peasley ran back to his mother's arms and she lifted him up. She held him tight. She carried him tight as she walked towards a body in the distance. "Where's Luigi?" asked Peasley.
"He had to go away, baby," said Bean.
"He took the bad man in purple with him?" asked Peasley and she kissed him.
Bean stepped away and carried Peasley back to the farmhouse. She bathed her son and dressed the wound on his jaw. At night, she tucked him in and held him close, kissing his forehead. Then, when he was asleep, she emerged from the ruined front door and crossed the porch. She crossed the lawn and walked across the field, stopping at Luigi's body.
Suddenly, he was dying no longer. Had the pain of being dying finally passed? Was he dead? He no longer felt like his insides were collapsing in on themselves and as Luigi looked up at the blue sky, he laughed. He kept laughing, even as the sky turned dark and placed a star right above his forehead which detonated with a fury the likes of which he had never seen before.
Bean went to him, slowly.
Had he done it? Had he avoided the future? Waluigi was gone, but Lugi was still here and yet, this was the day, wasn't it? The day that Daisy would come back. He couldn't have been dead a year, not yet anyway, he didn't even feel a new captain of the Flying Krock. He didn't bother picking his head up.
Bean knelt by his body and noticed his rolex in the dirt. She opened it and recognized the photo of the Lockjaw Queen of the Koopahari within. The clock continued ticking away. Around and around.
He knew that Daisy would come for him this day, but if she didn't? He felt okay with it. If she didn't come, she would have her reasons. She would have a good reason. Maybe she was dead too. Maybe they were each other's unfinished business on the rowboat to the afterlife. He smiled as the rays of the moon shone down on him. He just had to wait. He would never become so hateful, so spiteful that he would become Waluigi.
Bean closed the rolex and touched his hair as she felt the wind.
After a long while, the New Sun broke through the clouds.