Chapter 5: Where the Heart is
Larry slowly awoke to someone whistling in the bedroom. One sluggish glance around later, he noticed Popples who just got suited for the day. When hearing moans, the obeanian turned around to face the waking punk.
"Hey, boss! I hope I didn't wake you up, see?" He greeted, adjusting his beret.
"No, it's fine. I had to wake up eventually." Larry yawned, getting off his bed.
"Well, I'd like to chat a little more but I gotta go, see? Later, boss!" Popples said, heading out the room.
Taking his sweet time, the punk suited himself for the day as well as taking his sidebag. He was already ready to head out for his mission so he went to the door and twisted the doorknob, upon opening the door, he saw Princess Peach standing in front of him.
"Princess Toadstool…" He sighed, although smiling.
"Before you leave, I'd like to invite you for breakfast." The princess suggested, smiling back.
"You know me too well, princess. I'm in." Larry said, walking out the bedroom.
As the two headed to the dining room, they passed by the blue rescue team briefing some of the survivors that made it to the castle. Among them was Popples which Larry supposed the others were part of the effort of cleaning the streets as well. An odd addition, Private Goomp, also talked to the captain.
"Are you sure you don't want me to help you at the front? Is it because of what happened yesterday?" He asked, tilting his head to the left.
"Rest assured, private. Mistakes happen and I got off fine. From what I've heard of you, you'll be better at scouting ahead and avoiding conflict than trying to fight those monsters if you so wish to help us." The captain replied, looking at his hand that now had a band-aid.
Larry and Peach entered the dining room where Mr. Toadsworth was sat at the table. He had with him on the table a strange radio he was tinkering on as in flipping switches and twisting others. The radio only emitted loud static and long buzzing noises but nothing coherent. The others took seat at the table.
"Trying to find a decent music channel, old man?" Larry joked.
"The kind of music I'd like to hear right now would be a cry for help." The old toad said back, still checking on the radio.
"I thought you said all communications were shut down." The punk reminded, raising an eyebrow.
"The main ones, yes, but I'm trying to reach for the emergency ones. Those can't be sabotaged and have unusual configurations on their channels so it'd be practically impossible for anyone to accidentally fall on one of these." Toadsworth explained as a toad chef arrived with dishes full of food.
The chef, pushing a tray filled with full plates, passed by to deliver the guests at the table meals of eggs and toasts along with glasses of milk.
"Here you go, your highness. I wish I could offer more on breakfast but, with how things currently are…" The chef apologised, putting away the tray and returning to his kitchen.
"Thank you, chef. As long as we have the sufficient nutriments to go through the morning, there are no reasons to apology." Princess Peach reassured, picking up her fork to start eating an egg.
The eggs being scrambled, Larry shoveled the eggs onto one of his two toasts and put the other toast on top to make an improvised sandwich.
"So, Princess, where are your plumbers? They should've been here long ago." The punk commented, taking a bite out of his sandwich afterward.
"Indeed. In fact, they should've been with us during the meeting but they didn't show up." Toadsworth corrected, turning and pushing buttons on his radio that played more incoherent melodies.
"So, what happened to them?" Larry asked before taking a sip from his glass of milk.
"We don't know. Today, we plan to check on them at their house to see if they're there." Peach said, just finishing her meal.
"You think they forgot about the big day?" The koopaling brought up, finishing his meal as well.
"That'd be impossible. The Federation Force specifically asked them to attend the meeting." The princess said, putting away her dish at one corner of the long table.
The radio Toadsworth was working on began beeping which caught the attention of the others at the table. The beeps ranged from short ones to lingering ones.
"Tally ho! We got something, lads!" The old toad cheered.
"Those beeping, that's Morse code!" Larry commented, surprised.
"I'll be right back. I'll go get a pen and paper." Peach said, leaving the table and searching in the kitchen.
The code played out and the two at the table eventually recognize when the message began looping. Once the princess returned with the pen and paper, she took note of the code with dots and lines with the others telling her what they heard.
"Done! Now if we translate the message, we get: Help, Koopa, Castle, Bunker, Stop." She cited, deciphering the lines and dots she scribbled on the sheet of paper and writing the words.
"The Koopa castle, eh? I might pass by some of the lands in between before getting there. Well, I got to go, Princess. Thanks for the breakfast and see you next time!" Larry said, standing up and heading to the door.
"Wouldn't you like to us the warp pipe?" The princess proposed.
"Since when do you guys have a warp pipe going straight to the Koopa castle?" The punk asked back, baffled.
"It was one of the many agreements between the nations of Amarioca in the peace treaty: a warp pipe connecting the castle of both kingdoms." Mr. Toadsworth explained, turning off the radio.
"Well, lead the way then." The koopaling said, waiting for the others to go.
Princess Peach was the first Larry followed downstairs to the maze of corridors. From where they entered, they took a right then three lefts until they reached a dead end. The princess press on some of the dark green bricks making the walls and a secret passage opened up at the end of the dead end revealing a big green pipe.
"Would you like some help, Larry? We fear the number of dry creatures there may be too much for you alone to handle." She proposed but Larry began climbing the pipe.
"Thanks but I'd rather not. I won't be there to clean up the place if it happens to have fallen. I'm just there to check that distress signal first then evacuate the survivors. Besides, the less people I bring with me, the easier it'll be to sneak around." The punk said, about to jump down into the pipe.
"Good luck then, Larry. Please, return to us unharmed. Once you return, press the bricks in the opposite order I pressed them." Peach bid before closing the secret passage.
Going down the pipe, he was travelling at a ludicrous speed through a glass pipe with lights in it. Sometimes, he could see cavern systems around him though, most of the time, he could only see the rocks and dirt wrapping the pipe. In a matter of an hour, he felt like slowing down until he got flown out of the pipe.
He then found himself in a new room, a large square one with a tunnel leading into the darkness. His first move was to reach in his sidebag for the orange wand.
"Lawrence!" A voice shouted as he grabbed the wand and pulled it out the sidebag.
The light he emitted brightened up the room made of dark bricks, a color and architecture Larry recognized too well. He ventured into the corridor that brought him up and around until he reached an odd looking wall. The wall in question was colored like a parchment. The punk pressed his hand on it but, going forward at the same time, did not expect to go through the wall. He found himself falling on the floor of a massive bedroom. Look behind him, he noticed he got through a painting that became unrecognizable after he passed through.
"Whoops! I hope Dad's note gonna kill me for that." He said, grinding his teeth as he looked at the damage he caused.
He got back up and went to the only door in the bedroom. The room being bright enough, he put away his wand and no longer shined in orange light. Opening the door, he took a peek at the other room which was a corridor extending left and right, both sides filled with bones.
"It happened here again but something's strange. It seems like someone else's here." He thought, leaving the room.
From there, he made his way to the right and walked down the corridor until he reached the throne room from the back. More broken bones were scattered around but the breaking points were done in a predictable and specific pattern.
"Was someone looking for something in the fallen?" He wondered, taking a closer look at the broken bones.
He went all the way to his bedroom where, on the way, only met half a dozen to skeletons he avoided by sneaking around. In his bedroom, he grabbed another hoodie to wear and checked in the other rooms just in case one of his siblings happened to be here as well.
"Not surprised none of them aren't here. After all, we were all gone for the big day." He whispered after checking the last room.
He paused for a moment and grunted in frustration, clenching his fists in the process.
"What took him to call me too young to attend a meeting? And why did I survive this blue fire?" He mumbled, angry and confused at the same time.
After calming down, he made his way back to the throne room where he went to the other side. On the other side, a set of stairs lead down into the dungeon where only three skeletons resembling koopas were roaming around. He lured them around to line them up and used his shell dashing technique to break them in pieces. At the end of the dungeon, he saw a big circular and metallic door with a circular handle on it like a safe from a bank. An intercom was installed on the wall next to the door. He first tried to spin the handle around but it did not budge.
"Looks like it's jammed. Let's try the speaker." He concluded, leaving the door alone.
He held down the button on the speaker but something did not feel right. He was expecting a noise once he pressed the button but no sound was made. Despite that, he thought it could have just been an issue in the circuitry.
"Hello? Is anyone in there?" He spoke through the speaker.
He released the button and waited a little but nothing happened. Frustrated, he raised his fist and punched the door. He was not expecting the door to break in his hands but he needed to vent out at something and the door was the only thing that would do. The only thing he seemed to have accomplished at first was to hurt his hand but, after a few seconds, the speaker began emitting some statics.
"Hello? Is there someone outside the bunker? If yes, please knock twice on the door." A voice from the speaker asked.
Larry could not believe it. The distress message led him to a survivor but, the speaker quality being poor, could not recognize the voice. Like the voice from the speaker asked, he knocked twice on the door.
"Finally! We've been days in here since the big day! Have you tried opening the door? We can't open it from the inside. Knock once for no and twice for yes." The voice from the speaker rejoiced.
The punk was shocked when the voice spoke as if there was more than one survivor. He knocked twice on the door again.
"You did? Crud… And I presume you also tried the speaker if you're communicating with us by knocking on the door. Okay, so, there's a way to open this door in case it's closed shut like that. You know where the king's office is, right?" The voice asked again.
The koopaling knocked twice on the door once again.
"Good. Once you get in here, boot up the computed. Just press on the desk and the monitor should fold out of the desk. The password to access the desktop is Clawdia with a c capital, zero, eight, three and an asterisk. Once on the desktop, click on the search engine and type c, m and d to open the command board. A black window will open and, once open, type koopa dot castle dot bunkerdoor dot overridelock. It'll then ask for a password which is Geno with a capital G, five, one and two exclamation points. You got all that?" The voice explained.
Larry did indeed retain all that and knocked twice on the door.
"Excellent! Once all of that is done, make your way back here. We'd like to thank you a lot for helping us out." The voice concluded.
Larry made his way back to the throne room then behind the throne where he took the first door to his left, one with seven chairs across the corridor. He entered the office and got on the massive chair fit for the koopa king where he pressed on the desk with both hands to cause a monitor to unfold out of the desk. With all the instructions he had been given, it did not take long for him to enable the lock override function. Once done, he folded the monitor back inside the desk and returned to the metal door but it was still closed shut. He knocked twice on the door to make sure someone was still in the bunker.
"Yes, we heard the door unlocking but we're too weak us two to open it up ourselves. Can you lend us a hand from the outside please?" The voice from the speaker said.
The koopaling knocked twice and grabbed onto the circular handle ready to spin it.
"Thank you so much! Now, once I get off the intercom, count three seconds and start turning." The voice said.
Larry counted three seconds after the voice was done speaking and began turning the wheel. This time, it worked and he was getting more and more anxious the longer he spun the handle. At some point, the handle could no longer be spun so he pulled it back. The door opened, metallic creeks echoed in the dungeon. He moved out of the door's way and, just as he could see what lied behind the massive door…
"Larry!" A childish voice spoke, Prince Bowser Jr emerging from the bunker.
"Junior!?" Larry exclaimed as the prince hugged him.
The punk was in a private bathroom in the castle, his hairs combed down, his eyes wide open, staring at a mirror, his hands gripping on a sink. He had the door closed to not be bothered.
"What am I doing with my life?" He whispered, looking at his reflection for an answer.
He turned on the sink and grabbed some water to splash his face with. The cold liquid made him tenser as it hit his face. He grabbed the sides of the sink again, this time looking down, struggling to look at his reflection again.
"I can't go on like this." He whispered.
He splashed his face with water again, grunting at the cold caressing his face. He tried to look back in the mirror but ended up avoiding his reflection.
"Things have to change." He whispered.
Someone knocked on the door from the outside startling him.
"Who is it!?" He screamed, backing away from the sink and immediately reaching for a towel.
"Larry-o? Is that you?" A familiar girl's voice asked.
"In a sec, sis!" The punk said through the towel he was used to clean his face.
He put it back on a towel rack, turned off the sink and opened the door. There, Wendy stood with her hands together, worried. The two began walking down the corridor with its windows getting light from the moon. Even at night, Wendy wore her ribbon on her head.
"Are you alright, Larry-o? You've been acting so different since papa returned from his business trip." The girl asked, concerned.
"When archmagister Kamek told us he disappeared, I wasn't expecting him to return at all or even with that egg." Larry replied, looking away.
"Larry-o…" His sister said, stopping on her way.
No longer hearing her footsteps, Larry stopped walking as well and looked at her sister. The latter was on the verge of shredding a tear.
"Does it have something to do with why you've been so absent from us so often?" She asked, her face twitching like she was crying.
"That's not it, sis. I was a problem child and struggled with lots of basic things children at my age back then shouldn't have issues. I had to be sent to different specialized schools before I could make it to a public one." The punk explained nonchalantly.
"Don't you like us?" His sister asked again, a tear shredding from her eyes.
"No! I just told you why I couldn't be with you and the others! Why do you have to assume that…" Larry began.
When he noticed it only made his sister cry more, he immediately stopped and changed tone. He first approached her to give her a hug which began comforting her. Wendy began calming down but still twitched from her sadness.
"I'm sorry, sis. I didn't mean to make you cry." Larry reassured but his sister gently pushed him away.
"You were lying, weren't you?" Wendy assumed.
"Yeah…" The punk confessed, his head lowered.
"Listen. I'm not going to push you to spill the beans. If you don't feel comfortable enough to tell the truth, I'll just wait." His sister said.
"Thanks, sis…" Larry said back, now his turn to cry.
"There you are, you two! The egg's about to hatch!" An annoyed voice echoed through the corridor, Kamek emerging from the darkness.
As the old koopa got closer to the children, he noticed they had been crying.
"Are you two alright? Just because the king will have a real son of his doesn't mean he'll ditch you and the others. Now, if you still want to see what an egg hatching looks like, you two should make haste to the living room." The magikoopa said, gesturing the children to follow him.
The two children followed Kamek and wiped the tears off their face as they headed to the living room. There, all the other children were already present with Bowser sat down on the floor and, surrounded by everyone in the room, an egg squirming on a pillow. The egg began cracking, pieces falling off the egg, creating small holes in the egg. For now, those were too small and dark to see anything inside but some golden scaly fingers occasionally emerged from the holes. Then, the egg cracked in half and lifted up, revealing a baby koopa sharing traits with most of the koopas in the room. In fact, the baby looked like a younger prince of today.
"It's a boy!" Kamek whispered in joy as the king wrapped his new child in a blanket.
"What are ya gonna name him?" Roy asked.
"I'll name him… Bowser Jr." The king answered, keeping the child to his chest.
"Why did I even bother to ask?" Roy grunted before leaving the living room.
All the other koopalings stayed a little longer to stare at the new child in awe. Most of them left save for Larry who stayed. From the outside, he looked jealous that he was no longer the youngest and would be ditched in favor of Bowser Jr. The reality, he saw it completely differently.
"Junior… I'll stay at your side all along… I'll teach you how to handle anything life throws at you… I'll make sure what happened to me will never happen to you…" He whispered.
"Oh, but it will." A sinister voice spoke.
From here, the punk saw a shadowy silhouette emerging from behind Bowser, growing bigger and engulfing the king with the new prince. Neither reacted to his presence, even less to his action. Larry tried to fight it but only managed to drown into the darkness, the sinister voice laughing.
"Junior, wait for me! We don't know what… Larry!? What are you doing here!?" Kamek asked, hastily leaving from the bunker as well.
"Since when have you begun calling him Junior?" Larry asked back.
"That doesn't matter for now. I thought you were in Grassland during the big day." The magikoopa pointed out, dusting his robe with his hands.
"Well, I was but a series of events led me back here." The punk explained with the prince still hugging him.
"Oh! Those two good-for-nothing koopas will get a firing they won't forget!" Kamek yelled, kicking into an outburst.
"They're gone, archmagister." Larry said, the prince getting off him.
"All the reasons to yell at them!"
"They're bones now, sir."
The odd answer cooled Kamek down but in confusion.
"What do you mean they're bones? How long have we been in here?" He asked, getting up close to Larry how flinched.
"Archmagister… We've been attacked. That meeting we had the other day? It was a ruse to… Junior, why don't you pick up a few toys from the bunker? I got adult things to talk with Archmagister Kamek." Larry said but eventually abstained to not talk such sensitive matter in front of a young child.
Junior nodded and returned inside the bunker.
"You mean they're all dead? Even his highness?" Kamek asked on the verge of crying.
"For now, my mission was to investigate a distress signal from the castle. So far, I've yet to see the king." Larry explained.
"Then let's not waste time! Junior, we're off!" The magikoopa ordered as he was about to take his leave but the punk held him.
"I have to evacuate you two to safety. It's too dangerous for you two to explore like that." The koopaling interrupted while Kamek struggled to break free.
"What do you mean too dangerous!?" Kamek angrily screamed at his bodyguard.
"The castle's full of monsters." Larry warned, trying his best to keep his cool but proved to be hard in front of an angry old man.
"Monsters!?" The old koopa stuttered, frightened.
"The victims came back to life like zombies. I must bring you two to safety." The punk explained again, releasing the magikoopa.
"But where are we gonna go?" Kamek asked.
"There's a warp pipe in the king's bedroom that'll bring you to the Mushroom castle." Larry brought up.
"Of course! How could I forget? Junior, we're off!" Kamek declared once again.
"For real this time?" The prince giggled as he left the bunker with a wooden ventriloquist doll wearing a blue bonnet and jacket.
"Yes, Junior, for real this time!" The magikoopa confirmed.
The three returned back upstairs, to the throne room, where the two who had been stuck in the bunker could finally see the broken bones scattered around.
"Did you do all of this?" Kamek asked, looking behind as they went behind the throne.
"Not me. Someone else must've been here but, before I investigate, I'll bring you two to safety." Larry said, nearing the king's bedroom.
Once there, the punk pointed at the broken portrait where the magikoopa helped the prince get into the tunnel and climbed into as well.
"Be careful out there, Larry! Please come back soon!" The prince bid before the two vanished deeper into the tunnel.
His main mission complete, the punk could now investigate the broken bones further. Since he already explored the main floor and the dungeon, he went upstairs. In the first corridor, he found more monsters broken down in the same pattern. When he neared the first door, he noticed the monsters further into the corridor were intact and roaming around. The door was slightly open so he took a peek inside and noticed a large figure wearing a white lab coat facing away from the door.
"Let's recap… So, the oxygen level here is normal and there isn't a present of any abnormal gas in the air. How can a gas evaporate so fast and reach so far?" The figure wondered.
Larry reached inside his sidebag as he opened the door and entered the room.
"Lawrence!" A voice shouted when he grabbed the wand.
The room in question was a large one with a long table surrounded by chairs. He pointed the wand at the figure who was at one end of the table.
"Drop everything you had in your hands and put them in the air where I can see them." He ordered.
The figure obliged and revealed its big clawed scaly green hands and slowly raised them up, placing its arms in Ls.
"Now turn around and face me." Larry ordered again.
Turning around, the figure revealed itself to be a crocodilian lifeform around the size of bowser and wearing black pants. The crocodilian lifeform's lab coat was not buttoned close thus exposing its round and cream colored belly with three spikes lined vertically nearly reaching its chest. The cream color reached its lower jaw and the beast stared at Larry with its two blood colored eyes.
"You…" The beast began.
"I ask the question here, sir. Who do you think you are trespassing on royal properties?" Larry interrupted.
The beast was unfazed by the wand pointed at him and did not answer the question he was asked right away. The koopaling noticed something moving on the beast's forehead. A third eye opened up on the forehead staring at the punk. The latter tried to look back at the whole picture but his eyes were fixated on that one eye. More so, his whole body was stuck in place.
"What's happening to me? Why can't I move?" He thought, now scared.
The beast lowered his hands and approached the punk, the third eye still staring at the small koopa. The beast, being much taller than Larry, had to kneel down so his hands could reach its victim.
"What's he gonna do with me?" Larry thought again, his body trying to shake but was paralyzed stiff.
The beast began tugging up Larry's right sleeve above the elbow where, with its two other eyes, examined the part of arm just above the elbow. It poked at a specific place on the arm which caused a drop of blood to emerge from the arm.
"Hey, it hurts!" Larry thought, this time infuriated.
The beast leaned back and looked with all its eyes at Larry.
"Alright, you can calm down now. I want you to relax your muscles. Once I close my third eye, you'll regain control of your body so, if you're still struggling, you'll experience muscle pain from instantly regaining your control." It explained.
With no other choice, the punk obliged and stopped fighting against whatever was locking him in place. The beast closed its third eye and, soon enough, Larry could finally move again but fell on the ground.
"Who do you think you are poking my arm like that?" He asked as he stood back up, pulling down his sleeve.
"You must not remember me, Mr. Mulan. At that day, I was wearing a mask covering my face when I vaccinated you." The crocodilian lifeform reminded, standing up to its full height.
"Vaccinated? Hold up! You must be…" The punk began.
"Doctor Kraig Brimstone of the Federation Force, at your service." The beast greeted, extending a hand.
"You already know me but… Larry Mulan Jr, captain of his highness' royal guard, pleased to meet you now." Larry presented himself, returning the favor by shaking Kraig's hand.
"I apologize for the inconveniences I may have caused but the Federation Force ordered me to investigate on what happened here." Kraig explained, reaching for a notebook he left on the table.
"Well, I'm glad you guys didn't bail on us after the big day. So, what have you found out so far?" The punk said, taking a seat at the table.
"Not much to be honest. Why I don't I show you with one of those monsters?" Kraig replied.
"Alright, lead the way."
The two took a right when they left the room where there were a few skeletal monsters left still intact. One of those monsters noticed them and screeched at them as it limped toward them. The doctor grappled it and held it by the neck.
"Notice how there's no organ tissue or flesh left." He pointed out.
"You don't say. They're all just bones." Larry said, unimpressed.
"That's not the point I was making. How about we take a look inside?" Kraig said.
With his other hand, he grabbed the ribcage and ripped it out. The inside of the shell was empty.
"So it's empty and?" Larry said, raising an eyebrow.
"There's no way a skeleton would reanimate without an outside source." The doctor explained.
"An outside source?" The punk asked.
"Like a parasite or a host."
"Why don't you crack the skull open? There must be something in here."
The crocodilian creature grabbed the jaw and tore it off. At this point, the darkness and yellow dots in the eye sockets vanished, the monster becoming lifeless. Larry took a closer look inside the skull.
"It's empty too. What do you think could be the cause if it's not the blue flames? He remarked.
"I'm not sure. I can't pinpoint what would cause the skeletons to reanimate." The doctor concluded, letting go the skeleton that fell down in pieces.
The two did not bother checking another monster. Larry trusted that Kraig already made all the research to come to that conclusion and walked away.
"Before you go, I'd like you to have my research notes." The doctor brought up, waving his notebook at the punk.
"Are you sure? These might be more valuable to your boss than to me." The koopaling said back, taking the notebook.
"I remember everything I've seen here very well. Before we part, tell me if the vaccine worked as intended." Kraig reassured.
"If it was to prevent people to be burnt to their bones, I can say it worked."
"That's all I needed to know, thank you. I won't bother you any longer. See you next time." The doctor concluded, waking away.
Larry waited a little before leaving as well since he would end up walking with the Federation Force member. He followed the doctor from a distance until he reached the king's bedroom where he went back into the tunnel and took the warp pipe to leave the Koopa castle for good.