Chapter Twenty-Nine:

Depression and Hope

What became of his friends impacted Mario greatly.

In the days after, Mario returned to Nintendo. However, he was never the same and his state was nothing compared to when SMG4's Guardian Pod zapped him on the day they first met.

For the first time in what felt like a long time, Mario had truly descended into a deep state of depression. He'd gotten depressed before, but this depression was different.

He'd lost everyone, SMG4, Meggy, so many others he'd befriended or fought over the years. And the only ones left were his brother, Bob and Fishy Boopkins. Bowser was pretty much out of the question due to his canon state as Mario's nemesis, kidnapping Peach and seeking to conquer the Mushroom Kingdom.

Mario's depression was so severe, it never left when he went to Nintendo to develop their next game. When the producer called for him to call out the game's title, all that Mario would say was, "New Super Mario Is Very, Very Sad."

That got a laugh out of a couple developers, even Lawyer Kong found himself snickering, but the producer let out a scream of frustration, "NO! THAT'S NOT THE GAME OF THE GAME!"

He called for action and a Goomba came up to Mario, who stood still, even when the Goomba hit him in the leg. The Goomba called Mario out for not acting, telling him he was supposed to jump on him.

The Goomba's complaint prompted a sad Mario to place a crab-like creature on the mushroom enemy's head, which caused the Goomba to shriek as the creature devoured him from head-to-toe.

"No, that's not how you play the game!" The producer yelled, "TRY AGAIN!"

A Koopa came at Mario for the next take and rammed into him, with Mario doing absolutely nothing. "You're supposed to jump on me, that's what you're supposed to do..." The Koopa said to the plumber.

In response, Mario grabbed the Koopa, pulled out a magic wand from his inventory and swished it, conjuring up a portal that led to none other than the dreaded Backrooms which the evil virus Zero had dragged Mario, SMG4 and SMG3 to over a year prior. Mario threw the Koopa into the dreaded environment, watching as a monster came at the turtle, just before the Koopa closed.

The producer wailed in frustration and slammed his face on the side of his chair, crying, "WE WILL MAKE THAT NEW GAME WITH YOU, MARIO!"

A break was called and Mario headed off, his depression taking him over even more. One afternoon, Bowser flew up in his airship, declaring his dominion over the Mushroom Kingdom, and Mario threw Peach at him before going inside the castle.

He then traveled to Bob-Omb Battlefield, went up to the floating island near the mountainside where King Bob-Omb resided, and grabbed a Wing Cap. Mario leaped off the edge of the island and flew across the sky.

The plumber soared over the battlefield, his arms spread out like wings, and enjoyed himself, enjoying the thrill of it all, until a bullet from a hunting rifle wielded by a Nintendo producer took out one of the wings and knocked Mario out of the sky.

'Wow...' Mario thought, 'With all their talk about no guns in family-friendly games, those mamaf***ers can be hypocritical in instances like these.'

He left the battlefield and went straight to Nintendo's kart garage where he found his kart waiting, the plumber climbed into his ride and started the ignition, driving down the Mario circuit with his depression driving him.

The plumber rolled over several Monty Moles along with a pack of Goombas before ramming a Monty Mole into a wall, he did it to a few more until a Nintendo executive came up.

"Mario, my dear boy..." The man said in a Japanese accent, "Why? Why do you act like an angsty teen?"

The producer eventually walked off, muttering about grabbing a cup of coffee, leaving Mario to himself as he drove away, leaving behind a pile of Goombas and Monty Moles along with a pair of Koopa Troopas. Mario parked his kart in the garage, turned the engine off and then headed to the bathroom.

He walked inside one of the stalls, ready to relieve himself. Mario reached up to remove his hat, deep in his own thoughts, and just as he was lifting his cap off his head, he noticed a piece of paper falling out and caught it. However, when he looked at it a little closely, he noted that this paper appeared to be...

"Toilet paper?" Mario asked.

But then, he noticed the words 'Parody Contract', and then he noticed several more words. Mario was just looking at it more when he felt someone tap him on the boot, the plumber jumped back in alarm, seeing an arm with a blue sleeve sticking out of another stall. Mario yelped and stomped on it, but…

"Ow. Hey, man. Lend a guy some toilet paper, will ya?"

'Phoenix Wright?' Mario handed the man the piece of paper that he found in his hat and the hand retreated, just as the fat Italian thought of how it got there. Seconds later, there was a gasp, followed by a toilet flushing, and the door burst open.

Mario's eyes widened as he looked into the eyes of district attorney Phoenix Wright, holding the exact paper that the plumber had given him.

"Mario, this is a parody contract!" Phoenix exclaimed, "If you gave this to a judge, you could undo the DMCA and get your friends back! H-How did you manage to get your hands on this?"

And that was when it clicked! When Meggy was succumbing to the effects of the DMCA, when she was hugging him, she must have sneaked the paper into Mario's hat to ensure that Lawyer Kong didn't see it and rip it up.

Mario had heard of parody law before at one point, in fact, SMG4 and Meggy must have gone off to do research on it and formulate a contract to try and stop the DMCA's signing.

Everything clicked, from when the DMCA was signed, Meggy had formulated a plan to save the others and had chosen Mario to carry it out. Phoenix was in no doubt right, if Mario got this to an acting judge, then it could work.

The last time the gang was seemingly eradicated and it seemed Mario was alone, it turned out they weren't gone as the Internet Graveyard was a thing.

This time, they had a contract to save everyone from the jaws of deletion and they could still defeat that stupid banana-munching sack of shit that Nintendo called a lawyer. Oh, Lawyer Kong was about to have his victory ruined royally, just as SMG3's takeover had been short-lived. Mario looked at Phoenix Wright and winked.

"Mario's friends had a plan." Mario quipped, "Meggy, thank you, Mario knows what to do to get his friends back."

"Good luck, Mario! I know you can do it." Phoenix said. And with that, the attorney walked off, leaving the plumber with the parody contract in his hand.

It was time for action!