Luigi's Mansion 2: Dark Moon

Chapter Twenty Six: The Dark Light Device

"Okay, where is it?!" Luigi exclaimed as they entered the main room of the cabin. "Come on, Toad, they're right behind us, where is it?!"

"Keep your shirt on, jeez." The assistant replied, moving toward the still crackling fireplace. "I hid the dark light device right over here, and boy oh boy, is it gonna knock those ghosts' socks off."

It felt like forever had passed between the old rusted cage elevator passing up into the rocks above the crystal mines, and arriving back at its destination which was surprisingly well hidden in the main room of the cabin where the green plumber had first arrived. The thing literally rose out of the floor right about where the polar bear rug had been laying, and as nice as it was to be back on the surface, those supercharged ghosts couldn't be very far behind. If only that emergency generator hadn't been so loud… now what was Toad doing? The assistant had gone up to the fireplace, stepping up onto the stone slab where the poker and shovel were stored, reaching up toward the stuffed moose head that hung above the center.

"I don't remember this being so high before." The toad said, straining to reach it. "I guess its easier to do things when your life depends on it, huh?"

"It does!" Luigi yelled, rushing over and reaching up to remove the moose head. "Without this thing, we got no way to defend ourselves from those ghosts!"

As soon as he removed the moose head, aside from a cloud of dust being kicked up from lack of cleaning, a small device similar in size to the strobulb came tumbling out into his gloved hand. Their pursuers still hadn't reached the top of the shaft yet, so the green plumber took the Poltergust off his back, turned it around… and wondered exactly where he was supposed to plug in the dark light device. When installing the strobulb back in Gloomy Manor, the spot it attached to was obvious, but now he struggled to find a part on the vacuum's frame where the odd shaped plug on the bottom could be inserted… and now the elevator was starting to go back down. Were the supercharged ghosts using the elevator instead of just floating up… why?

"I don't know how to install the darn thing, I thought you did!" The toad yelled, looking over the Poltergust with him. "I was just sent here to pick it up… I'm just a janitor!"

"Professor, we got a problem!" Luigi shouted into the radio. "We got three really strong ghosts coming up here to stomp us, and we don't know how to install the dark light device!"

"I knew your daredevil ways would get you into a pickle." The old man's voice crackled through. "I told you over and over again, boy, you need to slow down and do little things like think, and I don't know, read the instruction manual. But no, you're the great Luigi, some kind of 80's action star who only needs cheesy one-liners and giant biceps to succeed in life."

Taking a second to look at his own arms, which were in no way large, the green plumber started apologizing for all the stuff the Professor somehow thought he always did, and now… hey, the elevator could no longer be heard moving. Oh, that was probably because it reached the bottom, and a few seconds later the mechanisms could be heard moving again, meaning that now the ghosts were coming up. Unfortunately, even though it would take a minute for the rusted cage to reach the cabin, installing the dark light device was not as easy as screwing in the strobulb, requiring Luigi to actually open up the Poltergust's main unit to where it would be set on the inside.

"It's longer than the strobulb attachment." The Professor explained as the elevator kept moving up. "I didn't want it to get snapped off during your exploits, but I also didn't expect for it to be installed under fire."

Thankfully, the outer casing that was normally up against the green plumber's back was easy to remove, but instead of screwing in the dark light device in its slot, the whole thing had to be lined up exactly, and then clamped down with a pressure seal like an old jar of plums. Of course, the slot and place to insert the device were small, and Luigi's fingers were a bit big for the task, so he was still kneeling on the floor with the vacuum open by the time that the elevator rose up in the center of the room. Yes, all three of the supercharged ghosts had for some reason decided to take the elevator up instead of floating, and now as they casually floated out into the room, all of their glowing eyes slowly turned toward the green plumber.

Lining up in front of him and appearing to crack their spectral knuckles, that strange pattern across their bodies seemed to glow more intensely to the point where it lit up the whole room. Taking the open Poltergust with him as he scooted backwards across the floor, Luigi desperately fumbled with the dark light device, but the darn thing just wouldn't fit into the slot unless it was perfectly, and I mean perfectly lined up… something that was even more difficult to do while a group of supercharged, very angry phantoms were floating toward him. Suddenly the ghosts stopped, however, their glowing eyes shifting down toward the floor where a frightened looking Toad was attempting to stop them.

"Hurry up with that device, would'ya?!" The assistant exclaimed, his knees shaking with fear as the three came toward him. "I don't think I can hold them for long!"

Armed with a rusted fire poker in one hand, and holding the old metal lid of the cabin's trash can in the other like a shield, the Toad swung the fire poker ineffectively at the skinny blue ghost, before raising the lid to keep himself from being grabbed by the big red one, but this did nothing as the big red hand went right through it to grab him. The assistant cried out in fright when he was lifted off his feet, turned upside down and shaken violently, until he dropped both the poker and the lid, the red ghost casually tossed the assistant over to the green ghost, who smacked him upward over to the blue one as if they were playing with a volleyball.

This went on for a few seconds until the Toad was passed back to the red phantom, who raised up its arm and spiked the assistant again like a volleyball, causing the Toad to slam into a stack of snow shoes and wooden sleds over in the corner. The three supercharged ghosts chuckled to themselves for a second, before turning their attention back to Luigi, who was sweating bullets as he fumbled and fumbled with the dark light device as his three pursuers closed in. Glaring at him with those glowing eyes, the red ghost was just starting to reach out to grab him, when there was a soft click from within the Poltergust, and then everyone, including the green plumber, screamed in surprise when light erupted from the vacuum head.

Unlike the strobulb or even overloading the unit, this was more like an almost fluid rainbow of different colors, illuminated so brightly that it was almost as if the sun had come up inside the cabin. The fluidic beam passed over the three supercharged ghosts, turning their cries of surprise into that of panic and terror, and when the light finally faded, the strange patterns across their bodies were gone. Now the ghosts were just floating there, their normally yellow eyes glowing white as if they had been blinded by the rainbow light, and even Luigi was still having trouble seeing as he reached for the vacuum head.

As expected, the dark light device had overheated the Poltergust so that none of its lights would work for a while, but the vacuum was still fine, so he clicked the button, managing to catch all three of them at the same time. Catching the tail of the blue one, the arm of the green one, and the face of the red one, the three formerly supercharged ghosts made an attempt to flee, but all they did was run into each other and flail around, making it easier for the vacuum to trap them. Even after being hit with the strobulb or an overload, the phantoms always managed to recover pretty quickly once the vacuum started sucking, but this time they were still dazed when the last bit of the big red one vanished down into the hose, secured inside the main unit.

Having been hit with some of the dark light beam himself, the green plumber's vision was finally starting to brighten up again by the time the Toad assistant managed to crawl his way out from under that old wooden sled, and between the two of them they got the panel put back on the Poltergust, even though the thing was still overheated. Now the two of them just sat there, trying to catch their breath after such a close call, and… and wow, this thing was taking a long time to cool down. The Professor was saying something over the radio, but Luigi wasn't paying attention, he just wanted to rest for a few minutes before…

"I can't believe it!" A voice interrupted, startling him and Toad. "All that work, and all that time to beef up those losers, all of it destroyed by some stupid toy!"

Turning his head toward the noise, the green plumber gasped when he saw that Boo-ya had returned, floating his way back into the cabin through the wall. Looking down at the vacuum, Luigi saw that it still hadn't cooled down yet, but the white rounded ghost was still keeping his distance. He continued to gripe about how hard it was to make the assistant break up all those crystals and do all that work, picking up a snow show and throwing it at the Toad as if it were his fault, hitting him in the head and making the little mushroom man fall down. By this time the Poltergust had been reassembled, so the green plumber put it on his back and aimed the attachment at Boo-ya as if it were operational.

"That's right, your whole plan here is finished." He said, trying to keep his voice from cracking from fear. "Now give me the Dark Moon piece, or I'm gonna do the same thing to you that I did to your test subjects."

"No way, 'Green Mario'." The Boo replied, moving to the side and still keeping his distance while his body started to crackle with purple light. "Unlike those losers, I still got the Dark Moon, and I'm gonna use it to crush you under a hundred tons of ice and rock. So 'let's-a-go', you mustached moron!"

Spinning around rapidly and rising slightly upward before passing right down through the floor, all was quiet for a few seconds after Boo-ya vanished, but then the whole cabin started shaking. The fire in the fireplace went out just before the chimney began to crack and crumble, same with the walls as cracks began to let the cold air outside into the room, so Luigi ran over toward where Toad had fallen, knowing they had to get out of there before the whole place collapsed. Helping the assistant to his feet, both of them stumbled over toward the door as the cabin shook underneath them, and then it was just gone.

The floor simply fell out from underneath them, causing the furniture, walls, and even the roof of the cabin to go along with them, falling down into the darkness until hitting an ice slope similar to the one used to enter the crystal mines. Toad and the broken pieces of the cabin slid along with him toward… toward something big that seemed to be tunneling its way down deeper into the frozen mountain… something that spun around slowly as it drilled through the ice while looking up at them with its angry, black eyes.

"Welcome to the ride of your life, losers!" Boo-ya's now deep and echoing voice taunted as they slid closer to it. "Now, do you wanna be crushed to death or eaten alive? It's up to you!"