Part II: The Great Boggly Tree
Chapter 14: Spirits of the Boggly Woods
It was at that moment that the serpentine golden arrow appeared on the magical map again and began winding its way through the illustration of the ruins once more. With a disgruntled shake of his head, Matthew took up the lead again, sighing, "Here we go."
The map led them past the overgrown fountain into what must have once been a beautiful garden that was now populated by Piranha Plants and Munchers. The adventurers steered clear of the floral pests as much as they could though occasionally they had to bonk a few of them to clear a path. Punio seemed really nervous around them as he would repeat in a squeaky voice, "Don't let them eat me! Don't let them eat me!" He calmed down once they were past the infestation. As a matter of fact, he became excited upon entering a grove of tall, twisted trees without any leaves on their branches, exclaiming, "Hey, wait! I remember this place! We're going the right way, I think! This is where I came from!" and leaping from Koops's hand to charge ahead.
"There should be a hollow tree stump somewhere in here," he declared as he scurried into the trees. "That's how I got here. It's like some sort of warp gate going from the Boggly Woods to... wherever this is."
"Whoa, wait up, little guy!" Koops exclaimed. "Don't get yourself lost! Slow down!"
They chased him until suddenly they came upon a large pond with a hollow tree stump on a tiny island in the center of it. A brick bridge connected the island to the mainland.
"There it is! There it is!" Punio jumped with excitement about two feet into the air, which put in Matthew's mind the image of a flea and set him to scratching his scalp in response. The little Puni cried, "Come on!" and scuttled toward the bridge.
"Not so fast, Punio!" Koops cried, charging after him. Punio dived into a hole at the base of the stump and Koops dived into the hole at its top, his voice echoing from it, "Wait for meeeeeeeee!" Once his voice had petered out, Goombella hopped inside, and, after waiting the two seconds that Professor Frankly had advised, Matthew jumped in after her.
He hadn't really known what to expect when the pipe disgorged him into the Boggly Woods. All of the "haunted" woods he'd ever seen had skeletal trees with leering faces and luminous eyes that peered from the shadows. These woods, on the other hand, had an entirely different take on the word "eerie." The trees weren't dark at all but were instead a faded, pale color - ghostly, you could say, underneath the dusky sky and against the ground black as pitch - he wasn't quite sure how black pitch was, but if anything was this black, it was pitch. He took a closer look at one of the trees, knocking on its bark and found it to be as solid as a normal oak tree, but he could also see water flowing through the xylem underneath the bark.
"That's so weird," he murmured to himself, pressing his face against the transparent wood.
Goombella glanced around, her ponytail snapping to and fro as she tried to comprehend this aberrance of nature. "This is not natural," she whispered. "This is not natural. These trees... this is not natural."
Koops gazed around more ponderously, giving each ghostly tree a thorough look. At last, he said, "Well... it's not as... creepy as I expected... but it still is kinda spooky..."
"Welcome to the Boggly Woods!" Punio exclaimed, drawing all of their attention. "This is where I live, inside the Great Boggly Tree. Everything was great until all those weirdos in white showed up."
"And you said Lord Chump is their leader?" Matthew asked, who never forgot a silly name.
That's when Goombella snapped out of her daze. "Whoa, whoa, wait a minute! Guys in white led by someone named Lord Chump? Don't you mean Lord Crump?"
"The X-nauts?!" Matthew cried. Suddenly the Punis' little problem didn't seem so little anymore. He had never made the connection before now. He had assumed this "Lord Chump" was just a fancy title for a rival Puni looking for a bit of real estate.
"Yeah, yeah!" Punio hopped excitedly, seeing that the three of them were more invested now. "They just showed up out of nowhere and began attacking us. Before that, I think I heard Lord Crump say he was looking for something... that Crystal Star thingy..." This last bit sounded a bit forced as though he was willing it into his memory.
Yet any doubt the three of them had was gone. If Lord Crump was here, that meant he was looking for a Crystal Star, and it was up to them to find it before he did.
"All right, Punio," said Matthew, his tone resigned, "take us to your tree... and leader," he added before he could stop himself.
"Oh! That's uh..." The little Puni shuffled his legs, glancing around the woods uncertainly.
"Never mind," Matthew told him when the map flashed, "the map's got this. Let's go, everyone." And he led the way through the ghostly grove.
"Hey, Punio!" Goombella barked as they were walking along. Koops had scooped up the bug-like Puni into his hand and was carrying him. "You'll tell us if we were in any danger, right? Anything we should be on the lookout for?"
"Well, there are the Piders," Punio told her, "and the Pirahna Plants, and maybe the Snatchler except that I think the Elder might have made that one up to scare us into staying inside the Tree. Turns out the Tree wasn't much safer than the outside."
It wasn't long before they discovered something else to be on the lookout for. They thought they'd be able to hear anything for miles considering how eerily still the air was, but it wasn't until they were nearly on top of them that the party heard a shrill voice.
"Confound it! We've been by this tree a hundred times already! Are you sure we're going the right way?"
Matthew backpedaled, forcing his partners backward. In a confused sort of dance, they all scrambled to find trees to hide behind before the shadowy creatures they nearly bumped into noticed they were there. Fortunately, the three creatures were too distracted to notice and the three adventurers (plus Punio) were soon safely hidden behind the semi-transparent trees.
"Wha?" cried the smallest of the three. "We were just following you."
The stooped shadow whirled on her. "You mean to tell me you had no idea where we were going this entire time? Vivian!"
The one called Vivian cowered under her arm defensively. "I-I'm sorry, Beldam! Please don't punish me! I'll do better, I promise!"
"Yes, you'll do better," sneered Beldam, looming over Vivian, her stooped form becoming so large she looked positively demonic. "You will absolutely do better next time, I will make certain of that."
Vivian whimpered, shrinking to the size of a kitten as she awaited her punishment.
Alarmed at how this was turning out, Matthew leaped from behind the tree and shouted, "Now hold it one minute you two there!"
The three shadow creatures shrieked in fright, Beldam shrank while Vivian popped back to her normal size. The last one, who had been watching mutely, threw her arms into the air and then slid around to hide behind Beldam.
"Gulpin Ghosts, boy! You nearly gave us all heart attacks!" cried Beldam, patting her heart for emphasis. "Don't you know it's rude to startle delicate ladies like ourselves?" It didn't take her long to recover her shrill voice.
Matthew blushed when he realized his faux pas. "Oh, sorry... I mean, uh... where are you going anyways?"
"We're trying to get to the Boggly Tree," Vivian answered eagerly, "to wait for Mario and take his Magical Map."
Matthew's heart stopped and he felt the flush in his cheeks rise in heat. These things wanted the Magical Map, too? Were they in league with the X-nauts?
Beldam snapped, "That's enough out of you!" and slapped the back of Vivian's head, who gave a shriek though she sounded more surprised than hurt.
"Who's Mario?" Matthew asked. He mentally facepalmed when he realized what he had just done.
Beldam answered in a simpering voice, "Why, he's an old friend of ours! We said we'd meet up with him, but we seem to be a bit lost. Could we ask you to go out of your way to help three lovely ladies find their way to the Boggly Tree, hm?"
Matthew still had the Magical Map in his hand. He subconsciously started to tuck it behind his back as he answered, "I wish I could help you, but..."
He was startled when Beldam suddenly barked, "Hold up! What's that you got in your hand?"
"Nothing!" Matthew cried. "Just, uh... just a letter."
Vivian clutched her lip as she squealed, "Ooooh! Maybe he's got the Magical Map!"
"I don't know what you mean to talk about," the young man cried, too flustered to make sense again.
"Guh," said the third shadow, unconvinced.
"Well, let's see it then!" Beldam barked, snapping her fingers in an impatient gesture.
Matthew backed away, shaking his head. "R-really! I don't..."
Vivian swooped in behind him and snatched it out of his hand. "Hey!" he cried and reached for it but she was too quick. She presented it to Beldam.
"And what do we have here?" she snickered, taking it from Vivian's grasp. Then she frowned as she looked it over, flipped it over and then again.
"Why, it's nothing but a blank sheet of paper!" she snapped.
Vivian looked shocked. "Wha?"
The third shadow gurgled, "Guh?"
Matthew blinked stupidly. "Huh?" Then he caught himself and explained hastily, "I mean, yeah. Some litterbug just tossed it on the ground and I had to pick it up. Just doing my civic duty."
"Feh!" The stooped shadow tossed the map back at him. "Well, that's your responsibility. Meanwhile, we have an urgent appointment to keep, and if you won't help us..." She sniffed impertinently. "Come Vivian, Marylin. Let's not waste any more time here." She turned and began gliding away.
"Guh!" The thick one, Marylin, drifted after her. Vivian looked downcast before realizing a moment later that her sisters were leaving her. She hurried to catch up to them, saying plaintively, "But I was so sure that was the Magical Map..."
"Well, of course, you were sure, you dunce!" Beldam snapped. "You'd have thought a toothless Cleft was the Magical Map and it would transform if you gave it a kiss, you're that thick! Bah!"
The last thing Matthew heard from the trio before the woods swallowed their voices was Vivian squealing, "Ooh! What a pretty necklace!" and then they were gone. Then he sensed Goombella and Koops coming up behind him.
Goombella announced, "It's official, everyone. Matthew is one hundred percent crazy."
"She was going to hurt her!" Matthew protested, thrusting his arms out for emphasis. "I couldn't just sit back and watch! And clearly, she didn't deserve it..."
"You don't know that. Didn't you hear them? They were waiting to ambush Mario and take the Magical Map. Clearly, they're bad guys..."
While the two of them argued, Koops asked the bug in his palm, "Did you recognize those guys, Punio?"
Punio shook his head. "I've never seen them before in my life, but I don't like the look of them. I think we need to be careful."
"Me too," Koops agreed with a nod. He and Punio turned to Matthew and Goombella who were just wrapping up their altercation. "Nice guys finish last, Matthew. It's sad but true."
"Yeah? So what if it is? I'll just... make a difference... change it..." Matthew's countenance fell. Then he shook himself and lifted the map. "Come on, everyone. Let's just find that Boggly Tree."
The map flared to life once more and the four of them followed its magical guidance. On the pitch black ground, none of them noticed the three shadowy pools as they crossed over them, and once they passed, the three pools rose into three shadow sisters.
"I knew they had the Map!" Vivian exclaimed, almost accusatorily.
"Well, of course, they had the Map," Beldam sneered. "You really think I'm so stupid as to fall for one of the Map's tricks?"
Vivian's face fell. "Oh. But then, why did you..." She hesitated, realizing she was treading on dangerous ground.
"Why'd we let them go?" Beldam snickered. "It's called a contingency plan, my witless, little flower. The more we have trying to get that door open, the greater the chance that at least one of them will succeed.
Vivian's mouth fell into an O. Marylin nodded solemnly. "Guhuh."
"Ah yes." Beldam spun around to face the direction that the four adventurers had gone. "It won't be too much longer now. With all these idiots scrambling around for those Crystal Stars, it won't be much longer before that door is open. And the look on their faces when it does!" She laughed.
...
Matthew and the rest figured that a tree with the word "Great" in the name would make it instantly recognizable once they reached it. They weren't wrong. One minute they were winding their way through ethereal woods and the next they were in a clearing containing the largest tree any of them had ever seen, whether it was on television (Matthew), in an encyclopedia (Goombella), in an old-timer's tall tale (Koops) or the fact he had lived in it (Punio).
For the first time in his life, Matthew understood where the term "skyscraper" came from. Although, this tree didn't so much scrape the sky as it did support it with its massive crown. He could easily believe this tree sat in the center of the universe and kept it from falling on top of everyone's head.
Goombella shrieked, "This is where you live?"
"I-I-I think so?" said Punio hesitantly. "I've never really seen it from the outside before, but... yeah, I think so?"
"This thing could fit an entire city!" Goombella gushed. "It's massive! How long has this thing been growing? Millions of years?"
"Maybe it's Yggdrasil," Matthew suggested, instantly wondering if he was pronouncing the name correctly.
Goombella gave him a strange look. "Huh?"
"You know. The World Tree. In Scandinavian mythology."
"What in the world are you talking about?"
That's when a thought occurred to Matthew and he shook his head. "Never mind." Then he continued in a business-like tone, "Anyways, the X-nauts found their way here, huh? Guess we'd better be careful."
"Understatement of the year," Goombella responded. Her tone was condescending as it usually was, but it also dropped in volume, betraying her fear. After his heart gave a flutter of nervousness in response, Matthew took a deep breath and started forward toward the Great Tree. Koops and Punio, and eventually Goombella followed behind him.
In their awe of the colossal size of the tree, it took them a while to discover something out of place. But they found it soon enough as they were searching for the entrance into the tree. It was a metal door bolted into the roots with a keypad where the handle would be. Cold, dark iron contrasting against the misty coloring of the wood. This was definitely the work of the X-nauts.
Punio was in shock. "What did they do to our tree?"
"Convert it into a high-tech base, would be my guess," Matthew answered, studying the keypad.
"Then, uh, h-how are we supposed to g-get in?" Koops asked.
Goombella tossed her head. "We can't give up so easily. A tree this size has GOT to have more than one entrance. Come on, everyone! Let's go look for one!"
But the X-nauts, it seemed, were quite thorough in converting trees to secure headquarters. Any other possible infiltration route was either patched over with iron or sealed with a solid grate. They eventually came back to meet at the door with their disappointing news.
"Tight as a vault," Matthew reported.
Goombella stomped her foot in frustration. "But how? This tree is so big! How could they have secured it so fast?"
"The power of teamwork," Matthew answered wryly.
Punio wailed, "Now we'll never save my friends!"
"Oh, we'll save them," Matthew quickly assured the bug with as much confidence as he could muster. "We've just got to think of a way to get inside..."
The four of them furrowed their brows in concentration. Then Matthew said suddenly, "Hold on. I think I can slip inside. Literally slip inside."'
"Your curse!" Goombella gasped as the realization hit her.
The young man nodded. "Exactly. We'll just have to search the tree again. Find one of those grates. Then I can slip inside, go to the front, and unlock the door for everyone else."
Koops gave a nervous chuckle. "Wow. Turns out your c-curses are pretty use-f-ful, huh?"
They went around the tree again. This time, with a plan for infiltrating the tree, their search bore better fruit, for all they needed was a grate and Matthew could slip inside.
His heart thumped wildly as they all approached it. He had no idea if this would even work. And there were a million ways this could go wrong. What if he got stuck in the middle of the grate? Like the one time he got his arm stuck for two hours in the vending machine while reaching up for a snack still in the dispenser, and he had to have the vending machine service technician unhinge the bar to free him, with everyone in the school watching. Not something he wanted to repeat. But it was his idea and he couldn't back out now.
He took a deep breath. Then he said bravely, "Well... here we go." He kneeled in front of the grate and reached for it with his finger. Then he had second thoughts and leaned his face close to the grate. After another deep breath to brace himself, he pressed his face against the cold lattice.
It was like sinking into cold water except that he could breathe. His nose pushed through one of the squares and the rest of his face squished in after it, the skin prickling and growing ice-cold. After half a minute, his head was through. Now he had to get the rest of his body through, so he used his feet to push himself in. Eventually, his feet came off the ground and... he didn't go farther in.
He was stuck. The passage he had slipped into was not large enough for him to move his arms. As a matter of fact, without his curse, there was no way he could have fit inside this vent. And he had nothing to push his legs off of to move him farther inside.
"I'm stuck," he tried to say, but his lungs were constricted and all that came out was a dry wheeze. Unable to talk, he kicked his legs instead, hoping the urgency in the gesture would communicate the message.
Goombella was the first to react. "He's not going in! Come on, everyone, he needs a push! And heave!" She slammed her head into his feet, but all it did was bunch up the legs of his pants before they slipped back out. Matthew kicked even harder.
"Okay, uh, l-let me try." Koops tried to pass Punio to Goombella except she screamed that she didn't want bugs crawling around in her hair, so he set him down instead and then reached for Matthew's legs with his hands. "All right, M-Matthew. I need you to stop k-kicking so I can push you in... here..." He caught Matthew's feet and then, with a grunt, pushed him in.
He went farther in. Like a snake through a drain pipe, he slid into the passage until his feet were past the grate... and there he stayed.
He wriggled. He squirmed. He writhed and tried to scream his panic but it was no use. Now he was stuck for sure with no way out. He was claustrophobic and this was his worst nightmare come true. He would suffocate to death in here. He was going to die!
Outside the grate, Goombella, Koops, and Punio watched the Wiggler-like Matthew squirming inside the passage. At last, Punio said, "Uh, guys, I don't think he's moving."
"Oh no, he's s-stuck!" Koops cried, clapping his hands to his head. "Wh-what are we g-going to d-d-do?"
"Don't panic," Goombella declared. "We just need to think. Uhh... someone find a stick! We'll use that to push him! Hurry! We don't have all day!"
But that didn't work. The only sticks they found that would fit between the bars broke too easily when they tried to push him. Even Goombella at this point was running around in circles. "Okay, so that won't work, that won't work, and that won't work! Come on, guys, we need to think of something else! How are we going to get Matthew out of there? Think!"
But nobody could think of a good idea. They didn't even bother to try having Punio squeeze Matthew through because there was no doubt he wasn't strong enough to push him and he was barely too big to squeeze through the grate anyways. But when someone came up with the idea of blowing Matthew through the vent (which showed just how desperate they were at this point), Punio exclaimed, "Wait! I know someone who can blow Matthew through! Her name is Madam Flurrie! She's a wind spirit who occasionally visits the Tree. She's a really nice lady."
Goombella raised an eyebrow. "You say she's a wind spirit? As in, she controls the wind? I find that hard to believe."
"But it's true!" Punio protested. "She can blow a gale so hard she knocks trees flat! ...er, that's what I've heard, anyways."
The sassy archaeologist sighed. "Sounds like a long shot, but we don't have many other options, so Madam Flurrie it is." She then drew herself up, "All right, Punio! Lead us to this Madam Flurrie."
The little Puni stammered, "B-but I don't know where she lives! I've never stepped foot outside of the tree before now!"
Goombella stomped her foot. "Then why did you mention her? You can't even be properly helpful when you have a semi-useful idea!"
Koops stepped in. "Kn-knock it off, Goomb-b-bella. It's not his fault."
Sounding humbled by the irate Goomba's rebuke, Punio suggested, "May-maybe we can use that Magical Map you were using before to find her?"
"Except that Matthew was holding it and now it's stuck in there with him," Goombella pointed out. "Jeez, can anything else go wrong today?"
It was a foolish rhetorical question that begged to be answered with a hearty "yes" by mischievous and malicious forces, but in a strange twist, they were not answered by miscreants but by the very person they sought the help of.
"Did someone call for Madam Flurrie?" trilled a voice.
