A/N: My average chapter now hovers around 3000 words and as I get more involved with the story, longer chapters just seem to be writing themselves! (I'm so excited!) I hope you'll enjoy reading this chapter as much as I enjoyed writing it.

Toadsworth ran down the hallway as fast as his short legs could carry him. When he reached his intended destination, he knocked loudly on the door and cried, "Your Majesty, Your Majesty! The Princess…huff…has been…wheeze…abducted…again."

The King opened his door slowly and looked fondly at the elderly Toad. "I know," he replied calmly.

"What! Then we have no time to waste! We must call the Mario Brothers at once!" cried Toadsworth, somewhat disturbed by the King's lack of concern.

"Toadsworth, please come in and have a seat. The Prime Minister and I have been discussing this at some length and we think it is best if we do not call the Mario Brothers at this time."

"Forgive me Sire but, are you mad?"

"Hardly," said the Prime Minister. "Bowser has never given us any reason to fear for the princess' safety, and you've no doubt seen the tabloid articles about the planting ceremony."

"Yes but, the poor girl, she loathes the beast."

"I am certain she knows what must be done to rectify the situation, and though it may seem cold, the king and I have decided that calling the Mario Brothers would not be the best course of action at this point in time. If she is not back within twelve hours, we will place that option back on the table."

"Understood," said Toadsworth sadly. "And goodnight, Your Majesty."

Bowser paced his room anxiously.

"But Kamek, she's here, in that room, and I'm here, in this room. What am I doing? I should be with her!"

"Sire, please have patience. If you do not give this ample time to work, you may waste the whole plan. It may even take a few days, but you must not go in and intrude upon her. She knows she must talk to you before she goes home, so let her come to you."

"I don't know if I can take this. I don't know that I can wait!"

"You must be patient, My Lord. As you know, patience is a virtue and, like most virtues, comes with rich rewards. Patience is especially important when it comes to develop--" A soft ringing sound suddenly interrupted Kamek's lecture.

"The bell!" Bowser exclaimed as he ran out the door and down the stairs.

He nearly tripped over a Goomba maid as he was trying to answer Peach's call as quickly as he could. "Out of my way, Short Stack!" When he reached the double doors, he quickly stopped to catch his breath and slowly opened the door as calmly as he could.

Peach was sitting in bed with damp hair, looking apologetic. "I-I'm sorry, nobody else was around, if I could have, I would have just asked somebody else but--"

"Don't be ridiculous, that's what the thing is for!" he grinned. "What do you need?" If it's kisses, cuddles, and unconditional love from a studly king, then I know a princess who's in luck!

"Oh, um, I'm a little hungry. Sorry." Peach really hated asking Bowser for anything.

"Stop being sorry; we don't do that around here. What kind of food do you want? I'll have it made faster than a Yoshi can lay an egg!" he bragged, immediately cringing at his unsavory analogy.

"Oh, um, just soup would be fine, any kind will do."

"Okay, coming right up, you wait right here, and I'll come and bring it to you."

With that, Bowser left the room eager to show his princess he could be useful to her.

This is very weird. Peach almost regretted that she had tried the bell.

Soon after she heard some alarming crashes outside, Bowser appeared in the doorway carrying a steaming bowl of hot yellow liquid.

"Here you are, Princess, one bowl of spicy soup!" he said, proud of completing his first task.

"Thank you for your hospitality," she said, averting her eyes from his eager face as she accepted the deliciously fragrant bowl of soup.

However, she was unpleasantly surprised when, instead of leaving, Bowser took a seat on the edge of her bed, watching her intently. What does he want? Oh right, he wants to talk. She moved the bowl of soup to her lips to have an excuse for not talking.

"Be careful Princess," Bowser whispered to himself in a gentle, barely audible voice.

Peach took the bowl away from her mouth. "Pardon me?" she asked, although she was very sure of what she had heard.

"Um, uh, I said you should be careful! That soup is hot, you know! It's spicy too!" Bowser said, a little too loudly. "So, uh, you're reading a book! That's…well that's good. Uh, what's it about?" he asked, grasping for a conversation starter.

"Um, it's just something Daisy sent to me. Uh, it's about a shy baker and an outgoing girl and about how they fall in love," Peach said slowly; his nervousness was rubbing off on her. She was sitting in bed, talking to the Koopa King. This was just too bizarre.

"Oh, a love story," Bowser grumbled, forgetting himself and his manners. "It's like a book that celebrates some dumb weakness like it's something to be proud of."

"A weakness? Do you mean love? Love is the most powerful force in the world; of course it is something that is meant to be celebrated."

Bowser quickly got up from the bed and paced the floor. "Of course you would say so, Princess. It must be grand, being in love and having the fool love you in return. I've never experienced love that way before, so all I can see is that it's weak and stupid," he growled. He was ruining his moment already. How did they get on this stupid topic anyhow?

"I-I don't understand. Nobody has ever, been in--in love with me before," Peach stammered. This is so awkward…did he really bring me here to talk about this?

"How about that idiotic plumber?" Bowser asked sullenly.

"Oh, uh, I don't think so. I mean, I don't think he cares for me in that…way. But what about you and your, um, kids? I mean, those kids had to come from somewhere, um, I think."

"Well, it's not the place you're thinking of. Koopa royalty has been 'lab created', for lack of a better term. Some science geeks find Koopa mates that are supposed to be perfect genetic matches based on you and whatever you would want in a kid. Then, they copy their DNA to make some eggs, and the 'mothers', if that's really what you want to call them, leave."

"Oh, I'm so sorry."

"Don't be. That's just how it works," Bowser said carelessly, taking a seat on the plush bed again. "People expect their leaders to be great and powerful so they can lead the kingdom into prosperity. They've gotta be as close to perfect as it gets. Of course, now with all of the recent advancements in genetic engineering, a bunch of the upper class citizens are doing it too. Can't blame 'em though, they just want to give their little squirts all the opportunities they can afford. My dad, he wanted a kid who was strong. My mom was a good lady, but if she'd have been my biological mom…well for starters I'd probably be balding and blind as a bat. But my dad loved my mom; he turned down an arranged marriage just to be with her."

"Hm, many people assume that Mario and I will get married one day. Do you really think that he is in love with me?" she asked in a curious voice that felt like a stab in the heart to Bowser.

He lowered his voice. "Yes Princess, I do. Why else would he always come around, trying to be your stupid little hero?"

Although Peach was excited to learn for the very first time that someone might be interested in her, she could sense the pain in his voice and decided to leave the topic alone. She knew he and Mario obviously did not get along, but she never realized how deep those feelings of hatred apparently ran. The conversation became less awkward as Peach asked polite questions about Bowser's children and other neutral topics.

Minutes crept into hours and, around midnight, Bowser stopped in the middle of his story about his fishing trip with his kids to notice that Peach had fallen asleep. She looked so serene and angelic with her golden hair strewn about on the white pillow beneath her head. He wished he could curl up by her side and stay with her until the morning, but he knew he had to leave.

He stroked her cheek softly and whispered, "Goodnight, my princess." before he slowly slinked out of the room and into the hallway where he proceeded to do a small victory dance.

Mario got up from his bed and stretched his aching back. A quick reality check reminded him of the situation he had created for himself last night with his parents. He could hear Mama, Papa, and Luigi we already down stairs talking about their favorite TV programs, probably waiting for their breakfast to finish cooking. Mario sighed and sat back down on his bed. Luigi was probably furious at him for lying to Mama and Papa. He would never understand.

Mario thought about Pauline's picture and the note on the back of it. For some reason it was just haunting him. He made his way over to the closet and pulled her picture from its usual spot. Then he flipped it over and read the phone number again. Maybe he would try to see her while he was here. After all, he probably would not want to stick around the house with Luigi. He slowly picked up the phone and dialed her number. The phone rang once before a woman's voice answered the phone.

"Hello? Yes? Oh, I'm sorry dear, Pauline moved out a few years ago! May I ask who's calling? Oh, Mario! I thought you sounded familiar! We haven't heard from you in such a long time, I'd almost forgotten what your voice sounds like! Here, let me give you Pauline's new number. She moved away to the Mushroom Kingdom to perform on stage. She'll be so happy to hear from you!"

A small tapping on the door awakened Peach at around ten o'clock. Kitty, the Boo, had entered with a tray of food.

"Good morning, Peach! It's lovely to see you again!" said Kitty happily. "Here's your breakfast in bed, courtesy of His Majesty!"

Peach opened her eyes slowly, sat up, and adjusted to the daylight.

"Well, just between you and me, the king actually made this breakfast himself, so I'd stay away from the porridge, but everything else should be pretty good," said Kitty with a bow. "Enjoy!"

As the Boo exited, Peach looked down at her breakfast. It smelled delicious, with golden fluffy pancakes covered in strawberry syrup and powdered sugar, and a tall glass of some pink juice, fruit salad, and a small bowl of some scary looking gray porridge, which the chefs could not convince Bowser to leave off the tray. There was even a small yellow rose in a vase at the top of the tray.

He made this? She hesitated, and then took a small bite of the pancakes. It tastes great but… this is so weird.

Soon, the princess had finished her breakfast and gotten ready for the day. She stepped outside of her room, half-expecting Bowser's guards to block her exit. To her surprise, she found nobody in the hallway. She wandered down the hallway to find Bowser sitting in a nearby room, building a castle of cards and talking with Kamek. As she entered, Bowser stood up immediately, causing his castle of cards to come crashing down.

"Peach!" he said, surprised. "You look like you're feeling better today, are you ready to go have some fun?" he asked hopefully.

Although it was true that she was feeling much better than she had been the night before, she still did not know what he meant by "have fun" and really wanted to go home. However, after he had tried so hard to be hospitable to her, she felt it would be quite rude to refuse his offer.

"Well, I'm really not sure what you have planned. I'm not really dressed for anything very active..."

"What you're wearing is perfect, I'm just gonna show you around my awesome kingdom for a little bit."

"Oh, very well then, I am ready."

"What? Really? I mean, right! Well, uh, let's get down to the hangar!" Bowser said, disbelieving his own luck.

The Clown Car always filled Peach with a sense of dread because usually when she saw it, it meant something bad was about to happen. Normally, she would sit in the bottom of the car and sulk, but today she was enjoying the warm autumn air as she looked down at the rolling green hills.

"I didn't know green grass grew in the Darklands," Peach said.

"Well, what color were you expecting? Blue?" Bowser joked, "I think you'll find that we have a lot more to offer here than just lava, but, I mean, we've got a lot of that too and it's pretty awesome."

The Clown Car lowered over a small town while the local Koopas looked upwards, pointed, and cheered.

"This is the agriculture district. We locally grow almost everything we eat, cuts down on costs and pollution and stuff. Luckily, it's not too hard to do; the soil's really great because of all the volcanic ash."

"Hm, your kingdom really does have amazing levels of per capita output, is this how you maintain it?"

Bowser smiled at the praise. "That's just one of many great things about my kingdom. It's like a well-oiled machine--thanks to my brilliant planning. Our next stop is Koopa U. You probably didn't know, but because of generous royal aid, ninety-eight percent of adult Darklandians are college educated."

Peach shook her head, she had always thought of King Bowser as nothing but a tyrant who ruled his people by fear, but it seemed that he truly cared for his kingdom and his people truly admired him. Moreover, she was shocked to find that the Darklands looked more like a normal kingdom than the hellish pictures of the Darklands she saw in her history books.

"Bowser," she started matter-of-factly. "Why is it that all the history books show the Darklands as a miserable, scorched wasteland? Now that I'm here and seeing it for myself, it doesn't look that way at all!"

"Well, my dad was the last in a long line of terrible and brutal emperors. Back before I was in charge, it really did look like all of that."

"So why aren't you so terrible and ruthless?"

"Oh, I am. I'm the baddest of the bad. But, that doesn't mean I have time to waste just destroying things for fun, being king is a serious job! Plus, who wants to be in charge of a bunch of wastelands? My kingdom needs to be great enough to glorify me!"

Peach shook her head again. What a humongous ego.

Suddenly, Kammy's voice was heard coming from the control panel, "Your Nastiness, I have just received word that the Mario Brothers are now on their way to come rescue the princess."

Bowser growled. "But I'm not done with my tour," he whined.

"I'm sorry, My Lord, I believe you promised the princess you would not wait until the Mario Brothers came before you took her home."

"I know what I promised, you stupid hag, so just magic over Peach's stuff. Over and out."

Bowser turned to Peach sadly. "Well, I guess this concludes our tour, I'll be taking you home now."

"Thank you for keeping your word, Bowser," said Peach as Buzzy and her book magically popped into her hands.

As the car descended towards the Mushroom Castle, Peach turned to Bowser, who looked a little sad. "Bowser, may I ask you a question?"

"Yeah sure, ask me anything."

"Why are you being so nice to me?" she asked bluntly.

Bowser turned red and tried to look very focused on piloting the car towards the castle. He turned his head towards her and said, "Look, it's just not nice to be hated, especially by--well, I just wanted you to see that we can be…friends, okay?"

Peach smiled and felt a little guilty. "Okay, well I'm glad that we can be, um, friends. Thank you for your hospitality." She smiled and slowly hopped out of the Clown Car, onto her balcony.

"The pleasure was all mine, Princess." He looked at her with gentle and longing eyes for a brief second, then piloted away.