Chapter 3: The Luigi Asteroid

Before me stood a giant, slobbering Piranha Plant with four legs. What the flip? Since when have mutant Piranha Plant bosses been quadrupedal? Dino Piranha and Petey Piranha were bipedal. Naval Piranha, according to the pictures she's in in my baby photo albums, didn't have legs at all. So where the heck was this batch of nonsense coming from?

The immature psychopath (IP) gave some cross between a hiss and a roar, then rammed into me and knocked me out of my daze. Great, I lost a wedge of health again! Then IP LAUGHED AT ME! Oh, ho, ho, now he'd gone and done it. I slid through his legs on my back, and while I was beneath him, I saw that his back end was covered in an egg. Was a long, Dino Piranha-esque tail hiding under there. But as I slid under him, a liquid dribbled onto my face and IP sighed with relief. EW! I'm pretty sure it's illegal to urinate on someone unless they've been stung by a Jammyfish.

I slid from under his rear end, and before he could make me his toilet again, backflipped up and, just because I was really P.O.'ed now, ground-pounded on his shell. It cracked open and he started whining and wailing and running around the planet like his diaper hadn't been changed or something. As he was running around, he approached me and I went to dodge, but then he turned around and aimed his glowing, bulbous butt at me. Was I supposed to attack him there? I Star-Spun into his butt because I feared he was moving too fast for another backflip-ground-pound, and he flopped over. Unfortunately, as soon as I Star-Spun into his butt, that forced a massive FART out of him that blasted me a quarter of the way around the planet! Un-flippin'-fair!

Basically I had to do that all over again (but thankfully sans urine this time, I learned my lesson about sliding under IP) and then IP flopped over again and exploded into a Power Star. I grabbed the Power Star and then the level ended.

I mistakenly hoped that I would end up on the Comet Observatory, like I did after collecting the first Star in my first galactic adventure.

NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOPE!

Instead, I ended up on an asteroid. A dumb, boring, barren asteroid that had been pelted with smaller meteors. No doubt Bowser was to blame, given his strange infatuation with using meteors as weapons. And then I noticed that the asteroid was populated with Lumas, including a huge, purple one wearing striped pants. Since when do Lumas wear clothes?

He floated over to me and said, "Hiya pal! I'm Lubba." Then he gave me some long, boring sob story I cared not to hear about how Bowser attacked and stranded him in space, oh boo hoo, poor him. He then proposed some lame alliance where we'd team up to get the Power Stars back and take down Bowser. "So whaddaya say?" he asked.

"No," I said. "Please direct me to the Comet Observatory and I'll do this on my own."

Lubba replied, "Aw, c'mon, Mario-"

How the heck did he know my name?!

"-my Lumas told me how brave you were trying to save the Princess from Bowser-"

Oh great, so that explains how he knows my name, but then the Lumas probably told him about the Paragoomba Incident too.

"-so whaddaya say?"

"NO!" I repeated. "Just tell me where the Comet Observatory is!"

And so Lubba repeated that creepy lecture before asking me the question for the third time. Good gracious, this guy literally wouldn't take no for an answer!

I reluctantly said, "Fine. Yes," and then the asteroid somehow…transformed. It sparkled green before transforming into a giant, green-capped spaceship with the Mario Bros.' signature giant nose.

"Welcome to Starship Mario!" Lubba said.

Starship Mario?! Uh…the cap may say 'M,' but it's GREEN! It looks more like Luigi!

"Okey dokey, cap'n," Lubba said, "We'll start heading after that monster to rescue your special one in the morning." Does he think I'm married to her or something? No! If I was gonna marry anyone it would be Rosalina! I walked away, utterly confused by this guy, and then I heard him yawn, "So…sleepy…." It was only 1:30P.M., according to the clock on the dashboard. If anyone had a right to be sleepy it was me, because by my watch a.k.a. the time back in the Mushroom Kingdom, it was 12:53A.M.

Lubba was proving to just be completely strange and not the type of company I could put up with for the duration of one of these epic quests. But as I was walking through the ship trying to find my cabin, I came across an area of the ship that was under construction – don't ask me how, given that just minutes ago it was an empty asteroid – and what was lying on the floor but a nail gun. Lubba should be more careful where he leaves his tools….

Given that I haven't even known him for a day, I already have a considerable list of reasons to hate Lubba that are compiled below:

Grievances Against Lubba

1. Gives sob stories.

2. Won't take no for an answer.

3. Knows about the Paragoomba Incident.

4. Has me confused with Luigi.

5. Thinks I'm married to Peach.

6. Gets sleepy when it's only the early afternoon.

So tonight while Lubba was asleep, I grabbed the nail gun and snuck down the hallway to his cabin. If he wouldn't take me to the Comet Observatory, I would take care of Lubba and then take this ship to the Comet Observatory on my own. Hopefully there would be room onboard for me to use it as my base of operations again.

I quietly opened his cabin door and crept into his room. I could just barely make out his gelatinous form lying in bed and ew! his pants were off!

7. Sleeps buck necked.

The horrifying sight of his big butt staring me in the face distracted me, and I tripped on a pile of books and fell to the floor. Somehow this didn't wake him up, but then my finger slipped and pulled the trigger on the nail gun, sending a nail blasting into the wall. This woke Lubba and he shouted, "Who's there?"

I slid the nail gun aside and said, "Me, Mario." Then, to make up a reason for being in his room, lied, "I had a bad dream. Would you please tuck me back into bed?"

I hoped and prayed to God he would say no, but he actually said, "Sure!" and thus began the most embarrassing five minutes of my life.

Now, maybe this is an unfair addition to my grievance list since I technically asked him to do it, but the fact that he agreed to it is still disturbing:

8. Tucks grown men into bed.

This morning I got up, had breakfast at a table on Starship Mario/Luigi's sideburns, and then…had to go pee really bad. I ran inside the ship and wandered around for about ten minutes looking for a toilet, but either there wasn't one or it was hidden really well for some reason. I realized I would just have to go out in the open. That isn't too big a deal in the Mushroom Kingdom; Toads do it all the time. I never have, though, because I, unlike them, have maintained at least a shred of my dignity.

I located Lubba on the underside of the starship, so I headed onto the top of the ship so he wouldn't see me peeing, and prepared to relieve myself off the back of the helm. And here's where things went sideways, given that these planets I explore can't universally agree on how their gravity works, so I never know what to expect. Somehow, the "stream" didn't fall to the ground like I thought it would, but parabolized around the back of the planet. What the flip?! How is the gravity here strong enough to hold me down, but everything goes haywire when it comes to urine?

And then it happened. The urine looped around to the underside of the planet, and I heard Lubba yell, "BLEEUAARGH! URINE ALERT! URINE ALERT! CODE YELLOW! CODE YELLOW!"

9. Made up a code for urine, which leads me to wonder how often this happens amongst the Starship's Lumas.

I ran to the underside of the starship and faked, "Oh, mamma mia! Are you okay?"

Lubba wiped the yellow liquid off his face and asked,, "Did you pee on me?"

"No," I lied, because I hadn't hidden that nail gun well.

"Oh, okay," Lubba gullibly agreed. "I'll have to document this in the Starship's Log. The Case of the Mystery Pee."

In that moment, I almost – almost! – felt bad for Lubba, having been urinated upon myself by IP. But at least I knew who peed on me there; not knowing who peed on you…shudder! That thought is just downright disturbing.

A/N: Thanks for reading; I hope you enjoyed it! Please review, I would love to receive one! Next up: "Storming the Sky Fleet," in which Mario is scared by – wait for it – Chibi Wanwan, then develops another theory about what the slime in the Sky Station Galaxy is!