Bowsette: A New Life

Chapter 29
Bad Fortune

Mario woke up fairly early as per usual for him. He knocked on his bedroom door where the Koopa Queen was sleeping for the night. "Ugh… 5 more minutes…" Bowsette groaned. KNOCK KNOCK "Alright already!" Gradually she managed to drag herself out of bed, her hair a complete mess and Bowsette couldn't care less right now.

Bowsette had tossed and turned quite a bit last night. Erotic dreams featuring a certain red clothed plumber kept shocking her out of her sleep. Try as she might, Bowsette just couldn't get these thoughts out of her head. KNOCK KNOCK Groggily she walked over and opened the door. "WHAT?" Bowsette roared.

Mario just stared. "Um… ah…" That's when Bowsette noticed his gaze was transfixed not on her face, but lower. She looked down… and realized she was wearing only a towel around her. "Eep!" Bowsette slapped Mario across the face and quickly shut and locked the door. Red with embarrassment, she quickly threw on her undergarments and one of the new dresses on before stopping herself to think.

"Wait, why do I even care?" Bowsette wondered. Only a couple months ago she had been a guy and would've been ogling a girl like her without a hint of shame and wouldn't have wanted to get slapped for it either, though he would've accepted it as the price to pay. "Why do I care if he sees my assets? That pasta freak should be honored." Bowsette shook her head. She had acted so… stereotypical of a woman without thought and she had found it revolting. Bowsette had accepted the fact that she was a woman now but that didn't mean she had to act like one.

Bowsette sighed and left the room. Mario was standing nearby looking ashamed but didn't speak. Bowsette looked down at the hand she'd slapped the plumber with and at his guilty face. "Pasta F… Mario?" Mario looked at her in the eye and Bowsette steeled herself. "What I'm about to do takes more courage than anything else I've ever had to do in my life." Bowsette stalled. "I'm s… I'm… so…" Bowsette struggled to get the word out while Mario looked at her confused.

"I'm SORRY okay!?" Bowsette forced it out in a shout. "I shouldn't have hit you." Bowsette's cheeks were red. 'There, now I can stop feeling guilty about acting like that.' She reasoned. It certainly wasn't to spare the plumber's feelings. Bowsette grunts. "Now let's have breakfast and get out of here." She tried to deflect. "Um… okie dokie." Mario said. The awkwardness stretched for a minute before Bowsette huffed and turned to get food.

The fridge was full, which was fortunate since the Koopa Queen was likely to eat her fill. Mario made a simple breakfast of bacon and eggs for himself while Bowsette naturally just cracked open a pack of bacon, grabbed every strip in her hand and ate it raw. The rest of the egg carton suffered a similar fate with Bowsette just tossing eggs into her mouth and crunching them in a way that made Mario wince as he prepared his own meal. Bowsette was too ravenous to bother cooking anything and she wasn't going to do so herself anyway. That's what she had servants for!

BURRRRRP! Bowsette belched. She grabbed a random carton of some kind of juice out of the fridge and didn't even bother opening it, she just bit holes into it and downed half of it instantly. "So!" Bowsette began. "How're we going to find this Merlon guy now?" Bowsette asked as she grabbed a ham out of the fridge. Mario stared as she breathed fire onto it for a minute and just ripped bits off of it once was defrosted, not even cooked. "Helllloooo! Mushroom Kingdom to Pasta Freak!" Bowsette growled.

"Oh! Um… Well…" Mario thought for a moment. "Last I knew-a Merlon's granddaughter Merluvlee lives at Shooting Star Summit just-a off of Peach's Castle. Maybe they'll know." Mario shrugs. "If they're not-a there either, there's also Merlee in Dry Dry Outpost." Mario noted. He finished his food and washed up.

"Yeah yeah…" Bowsette waved dismissively. "Do you want to-a find Peach or not?" Mario asked. "Of course I do. I'm just not optimistic this Merlon can help even if we do find him." Bowsette sighed. "We should hurry. Who knows that other you could be doing to her right now. What if she's hur…" Bowsette clammed up. 'Okay, maybe I do still care about that woman for some reason. I can't let him know that!'

Mario hid his grin with his gloved hand. He was surprised that Bowsette had the same thoughts Mario had last night. He was even more surprised that she seemed to actually care. As far as he knew Bowsette just… kidnapped Peach but couldn't care less about her. Mario had thought that Bowsette kidnapped Peach just to irritate him, but now he was all but certain she had another motivation.

Mario finished the cleanup and changed his clothes. "Let's-a go!" Mario said and got an idea. Before Bowsette could respond, Mario took her hand and led her outside. 'This should keep-a her quiet and out of trouble.' Mario thought and he was right. Bowsette was too flustered to say much but her thoughts were different. 'Smooth, really smooth Pasta Freak.' The two entered the pipe to take them back to Toad Town with Mario holding her hand as they traveled through Toad Town.

***

Mario and Bowsette made their way to Shooting Star Summit without much trouble. The toad guards that had been following them around decided to stay behind when they left Toad Town Bowsette noted. 'Thank the God of Koopas for that…' Mario let go of Bowsette's hand as they walked through the summit since they had to jump up a few places to traverse.

Mario's eyes shot wide open when they came to Merluvlee's house. The door had apparently been blasted off it's hinges and Mario could see signs of some sort of blast damage to the grounds around the building. That's when Bowsette caught a whiff of something. "Smells like..." Bowsette knew enough about destructive magic to recognize the scent. "fire magic. Someone has been blasting things around here. Recently too."

Even if Bowsette hadn't said anything a loud blast rocking the building would've made it not too difficult to tell what was going on. Mario rushed inside and looked around. It looked like there were signs of a battle within, another explosion guided the pair up the stairs toward little Merlow's room. Mario recalled Merlow was Merluvlee's little brother who loved Star Pieces.

Upon reaching the top of the stairs Mario and Bowsette saw beings in dark robes trying to blast the door to Merlow's room down. The figures casted blasts of fire magic at the door but stopped when they noticed the two. Their pink and merciless eyes fell on the duo, the only things visible of them inside their dark purple robes.

"Here we go." Bowsette dodged as the smaller of the two fired a typical magical bolt of lightning in her direction. "You gotta do better than that!" Bowsette charged forward and swiped at the small figure, only for it to teleport away. "Arg!" Bowsette felt something hit her from behind, more of a brief stinging against her than any real pain. Bowsette growled. "Not smart you little half pint!" She fired a fireball in it's direction which struck the figure dead on. The figure struck the wall and suddenly with a poof of pink smoke vanished.

Meanwhile, the larger robed figure, a woman Mario guessed, fired a stream of magic fireballs in his direction. Mario pulled out his hammer and batted the attacks aside. There wasn't much room to maneuver in here or jump high, so he focused on getting closer so he could strike. As Mario got close enough to get a good shot, he threw his hammer at the woman which forced it away with another fireball, but that was only a distraction while Mario got into range and punched the figure in the chest. Mario continued with a flurry of punches that caused the figure to collapse, also vanishing in a puff of smoke.

Finally, it was quiet. "Those things are really starting to annoy me." Bowsette noted. "Hello?" A muffled woman's voice called from the other side of the door. "It's-a okay. They're gone." Mario called back. Cautiously the door opened and two cloaked figures walked out. "Merluvlee! Little Merlow too!" Mario said happily. "Are-a you okay?" Merluvlee nods. "Mario! It's been ages! We're lucky you came along when you did."

"What happened?" Bowsette spoke up, and the two suddenly noticed her. "B-b-b-bowsette!" Merlow quickly ducked behind his sister. "Oh please, if I wanted you dead I'd have just left you to those shadow things." Bowsette rolled her eyes. "Actually, we're here for your help." Bowsette spoke plainly. "What kind of help?" Merluvlee asked flatly. "If you think we'd help a monster like YOU…" Bowsette growled. "You'd better if you…"

Mario interjected before this turned into another fight. "We need to-a find your grandfather Merlon." Mario said. "He's not at-a his old place in Toad Town and we could use-a his help finding Princess Peach." Merluvlee took her eyes off Bowsette briefly. "Yeah, sorry about that. He went to travel the world a year ago and I'm not sure where he is right now." She admits.

Merluvlee looks at Bowsette, the teller's expression unreadable beneath the shadow of her hood. She sighed. "However, I can help you. I can divine almost as well as grandfather, though there's been some sort of bizarre magical interference lately." Mario nodded. "I can't promise anything." Merluvlee said before Bowsette could say whatever rude and dismissive thing she probably was intending to.

"This way. I hope those things kept my crystal ball intact." Merluvlee grumbled. The group went downstairs and Merluvlee rummaged in a nearby chest. "Great, this one is still in good shape." She placed it on a nearby table which luckily hadn't taken much damage. "Alright…" Merluvlee begins her usual incantations for a moment, the crystal ball glowing in the air before settling down. An image forms on the crystal ball, but it's got heavy pinkish static on it making it unviewable. "Oh great, give me a moment to see if I can clear it up." Merluvlee says several more incantations, which do nothing.

Chink Chink! "Come on you useless hunk of glass!"Bowsette had simply reached over and knocked on the crystal ball. "What are you doing!?" Merluvlee said. "I've had a few screwy crystal balls over the years witch, you just have to give them a nice solid…" WHACK! Bowsette hits the ball hard enough it spins around the table before coming to a rest. Merluvlee was about to give a retort when suddenly the image clears up.

The group crowds around the crystal ball to watch. In it they see Peach laying on the floor inside some sort of cell in a dank, damp, and filthy with rusty pipes. "I'm not sure what we're looking at." Merluvlee admits. "Some kind of dungeon?" She guessed. Princess Peach was crying, her clothes badly scorched in places and filthy. "No. Not a dungeon." Everyone turned to look at Mario. "I know where-a that is."