Chapter 17

"Rosalina! LOOK OUT!"

Rosalina heeded Mario's advice only too late. With a single swipe from his powerful claws, Cy-Bowser swatted at her saucer as it whizzed over his head.

"NO!" Vanellope yelled as the saucer and its six passengers were sent spiraling towards the ground. She leapt out of her kart moments before Cy-Bowser could take a swipe at it, and plummeted in the saucer's direction.

"No! Vanellope!" Mario screamed after her, but now she too was gone. Landing the Ice Screamer on the bridge, he started after the other heroes, but found himself instantly caught by the scruff of the neck.

Cy-Bowser held his prisoner up to his face, and looked him squarely in his giant eyes. "Your ignorant resistance is pointless, Mario!" he snarled. "You're about to learn what happens to fools like you in MY arcade!"

Sprouting his wings once again, Cy-Bowser took to the sky with Mario in hand, struggling to escape. Mario scanned the ground for signs of the others, but he couldn't spot them. What had happened?

"Heh heh heh… that looks like a perfect place to finish you off!" Cy-Bowser chuckled. Instantly, Mario found himself being dropped. He fell for what seemed like ages, and then landed on his back on a large pile of stones.

Picking himself up, Mario took in his surroundings. He appeared to be on the top of a tall structure. A really tall one…he couldn't see the rest of Sugar Rush from up here; couldn't even see Cy-Bowser. All he could see were the stones that lay scattered throughout the area. Wait… those stones simply looked too uniform to be scattered…

Something was off. These were no ordinary stones. They had a pleasant, lemony smell to them. Inquisitively, Mario took a bite out of one, and his suspicions were confirmed. These aren't rocks, he realized. They're Mentos. Then his ears registered a volcanic rumble from under his feet, and the whole thing hit him. He was standing at the top of Diet Cola Mountain, Vanellope's former home.

Instantly he realized exactly how he was going to defeat Cy-Bowser. Once again, he was about to lay his own life on the line. It was the only way, he realized, to stop him…

Just then, with a mighty roar, Cy-Bowser flew in to greet him. At long last, he was once and for all about to silence his nemesis.

"You and your friends are dead," he growled. "GAME OVER!"

Mario smiled.

"You know what-a, Bowser? You're right. It IS Game Over!"

Cy-Bowser shot him a cockeyed look. He wasn't sure exactly what kind of game Mario was playing.

"Game Over…" Mario repeated. "…For BOTH of us! Together!"

The message sunk in. This time, Cy-Bowser realized, he was the one who had stepped in the trap. With no other choice but to fight, he began to charge his attack.

Mario, with the power Vanellope had given him, rushed his corrupted arch-nemesis. For a moment, time seemed to freeze as the ultimate forces of good and evil collided.

…

Having saved the other heroes using her glitch, Vanellope was now running fast to keep up with them as the group made a mad dash for Diet Cola Mountain.

"Guys, wait up!" she yelled. "For once in my life, it's not a race!"

"We don't have much time!" replied Ralph. "We have to warn him what happens if he triggers that eruption!"

Calhoun, who had been well ahead of the group, stopped dead in her tracks.

"Bad news for you, chief!" she replied back to Ralph. "It looks like he's about to figure it out!"

With looks of shock and terror, everyone peered up at the top of the mountain. A large explosion had occurred, obscuring Mario and Cy-Bowser and sending fragments of Mentos flying in all directions. The heroes just stared, and a long silence ensued- only to be broken by sudden, violent rumbles from within the mountain.

"Oh dear," Felix murmured.

With the force of a bomb, the eruption began. The dust from the explosion had finally settled, only to be replaced by a massive pillar of hot diet cola. Caught in the midst of the pillar, with a wide-eyed look of agony about him, was Cy-Bowser, who frantically struggled to escape the deadly soda, knowing full well he was failing.

"NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!" he roared, as the final surge of the eruption blasted him backwards into the mountain's volcanic core. Defeated, unconscious, and sapped of his Cy-bug powers, Bowser plummeted to the bottom, finally hitting it with a resounding thud.

With a sickening sizzle, the jet of volcanic cola gave way to a massive cloud of smoke. The eruption was over. Bowser was finished. But… where was…

"MARIOOOOO!" Luigi yelled at the mountaintop. An uneasy silence followed. Luigi's brother was nowhere to be seen.

Silently, it set in. Mario had to have sacrificed himself once again.

"He's… he's gone...!" said Felix, more astonished at his courage to utter the words than at the truth they conveyed.

Peach, who had rejoined the heroes in their pursuit of Mario, concealed her face in her hands and quietly began to sob, leaning against Rosalina for support. Candlehead sank to her knees and proceeded to wail hysterically. Even Felix and Luigi found themselves weeping- Felix for the friend he had known since the arcade's earliest days, and Luigi for the brother who, up until now, had never left his side.

Luigi, grief-stricken, turned to Vanellope. Tears were in his eyes. "All these years and I can't-a believe he's gone…"

"Aw, come on, guys!" said Vanellope. "Why's everybody so sad all of a sudden? Cheer up! Can't you see? He's not gone!"

"Vanellope," interjected Ralph, "Listen, kid, this is hard to explain, I know, but there are some things you just have to-"

"No really!" Vanellope cut him off. "He's NOT gone! Look! LOOK!"

Everyone did so- and in effect, the smoke cleared from the mountain, revealing the brave hero of the Mushroom Kingdom standing triumphantly atop its summit.

"Did you all-a miss me?" he called cheerfully. In unison, his onlookers responded with cries of "He's alive! He's alive!", followed by cheers and cries of impassioned joy.

It was the usual routine- with the final boss defeated, the victory fanfare was played, fireworks were sent high into the sky, and Mario's signature hat flip was given. Yet on that day, those who saw it say he punctuated it with the mightiest "YAHOO!" of his life.