A/N: Welcome back! Sorry it took so long to get these chapters out; I probably would've had them posted at least a week earlier if not for a battle with some holiday season writer's block, and a round of aggressive fact-checking (and, in some instances, changing) to make sure details I'm writing now in "MGT" mesh with stuff I established months ago.
Before we get into the new chapters, time for one final "previously on 'Deadpool: Guardians of the Multiverse: The Continuation'" segment, since as of New Year's Eve, that fanfic is now complete.
In the epilogue, Deadpool and the Guardians were searching the multiverse for the variant of Cad Bane who ended up in the MGTU when a tear in the multiverse appeared and sucked in Harley Quinn, one of the team's members. Deadpool went off on his own to try to find where she went; unbeknownst to him, she ended up being the variant of Harley who was summoned to Bowser Jr.'s Fiery Flotilla by Kamek's spell in the Mario's Galactic Tale Annual from last August. All this is leading up to the Mario-Deadpool crossover I've been mentioning for a while now – I promise, we're getting close! As the end of World 3 approaches, so too does the crossover.
Also, the fanfic "All the World's a Toybox" that the Lumas are reading in this chapter is not my own creation. It's an actual fic on FFN written by Straightjacketed. Check it out if you're a Gravity Falls fan, it's really good!
Please read, review, and enjoy!
I do not own Super Mario.
Chapter 56: A Hostage Situation
I woke up to see Lubba leering over me, his giant face taking up my entire field of vision. Yay, this was exactly what I wanted to wake up to.
"So, you're awake," he sneered. "I was wondering how long it would take. We're winning, in case you were wondering."
I tried to lunge at him, but found that I'd been tied to a chair. Wait, so I was a flippin' hostage now?! This could not get any worse!
He floated away from me far enough that I could see my surroundings. I was in my old bedroom/the former prison, which I guess was still technically a prison since I was trapped in it. Tied up in another chair on the far side of the room was Percy, who had been gagged too. Elsewhere, two Lumas were building what I could only guess was the torture device for Percy that Yoshi had mentioned, and another one was doing something on a laptop. Where the heck was there a laptop on Starship Mario that I'd never seen it?
To my right was that stupid Star Ball, with a gaping hole in the ceiling right above it. The sounds of battle drifted through the hole. Well, this battle wasn't lost yet, then; it was just looking really, really bleak.
Lubba turned to the Luma on the laptop. "Have you finished your research yet?"
"Yes and no," the Luma said. He spun the laptop around so Lubba could see it, but not me. "So I was doing my research, but then, you know me, I got distracted reading some fanfiction. I came across this one called 'All the World's a Toybox' based on my favorite show, Gravitoad Falls, and…well, take a look at Chapter 10 here. The guy who wrote this basically did all our work for us."
Lubba took the laptop. "Hmm, interesting. Veeeery interesting. Lead, pliers, snakes…half these things I've never even heard of."
What the flip was he going on about? Lead, pliers, and snakes? Was he trying to MacGyver himself a bomb or something?
"Crocodile Shears," Lubba said. "What are these things?"
The Luma pushed a few buttons on the laptop. "Let's just say Mario reeeeally won't like them."
I struggled against the ropes holding me in place. Percy, who had a clear line of sight to the laptop, gave a muffled quack of horror. "What are they looking at?" I shouted at him. "What the heck is going on?"
Percy looked like he was trying to chomp on the piece of fabric gagging him, whatever the flip that meant.
You know, if Bowser ever kidnaps me again, like me did back in 2006 when Peach had to rescue me, I will not complain about it. Because as much as I hate Bowser, he's straightforward. He's got a problem with you? He punches you or sets you on fire. His habitual threat of choice is squashing me into nothingness or space bits or whatever, but I know he never follows through on that. He doesn't play these flippin' mind games designed to scare me by keeping me in the dark about what he's planning. Granted, I think that's really just because he doesn't have the mental faculties for playing mind games, but that's beside the point.
Lubba chuckled. "Oh, yes, I like these things. Any thoughts on how we can make some of our own?"
"The closest things we have are some alligator clips," the Luma replied. "I could try modifying one of those."
"Good thinking. Go, do that. Mario isn't going anywhere."
I struggled against the ropes again as the Luma flew out the hole in the ceiling. "What are you talking about, you creep?" I asked.
"Well, I figure it couldn't hurt to tell you," Lubba said. "You'll be more terrified if you know what's coming."
How flippin' bad was this going to be that knowing what he was going to do to me would be worse that not knowing?
Lubba floated to the center of the room, and I knew he was about to give some sort of stupid monologue. "I'm sick of this war between us, Mario. And the way I see it, the only way for it to end, and for me to finally prevail, is to strike a blow against you and your mutineers-"
Oh. My. GOSH! YOU ARE NOT CAPTAIN!
"-so swift and terrible that you can't possibly hope to hurt me worse in the future, and are finally beaten into submission. So we're building a version of the Rack over there to use on Percy." Lubba pointed to the device the two Lumas were building. "But that thing can only hold one of you at a time. And honestly, you've done more to wrong me than Percy has. The Rack is too good for you."
What the hell could possibly be worse than having your limbs slowly ripped out of their sockets?!
"So I assigned that Luma with researching forms of torture throughout history," Lubba continued. "And he showed me a rather interesting contraption called the Crocodile Shears. They were used in ancient times on Toads who tried to kill their leader, and since you've done that to me, I figured it would be a fitting punishment."
…What?! When had I ever tried to KILL Lubba? I'd thrown Whittles at him. I'd stretched his pants and then snapped them back against his body. But nothing deadly!
"See, they're basically shaped like a small pair of crocodile jaws. Cylindrical in shape. And you can open them up and clamp the teeth of the shears down on something. Something cylindrical in shape, that is then ripped off your body by pulling on the shears."
Oh God.
"You're gonna rip off my middle fingers?" I cried. "No, they're my favorite fingers!"
Lubba appeared confused. "What? No! Why the heck is that where your mind would go when I mention a cylindrical part of your body I'm going to rip off you?"
…
Ohhhh….
Ohhhh, nononononononono….
"NO!" I shouted. "Not that!"
"Yes, that!"
"HELP! BARTHOLOMEW, HELP! THEY'RE GOING TO CASTRATE ME!"
"I'm a bit busy!" Bartholomew shouted back through the hole.
Unbelievable, that guy!
"Sir, we're finished," one of the Lumas working on the Rack declared. "It's all ready for Percy. Should we put him on it now?"
"No, no," Lubba said. "Wait until out Crocodile Shears are ready. I want to punish him and Mario simultaneously."
I continued struggling against the ropes. Why is it always so much easier for people to break out of these situations in movies?! There's always some loose thread or something for them to pull on to undo the knot; where the flip was my loose thread?
The Luma flew back through the hole in the ceiling with an alligator clip. "This was bigger than I thought it was," he chirped. "It might be big enough and sharp enough to do the job. I mean, Mario's got that whole macho, manly attitude complex. He's gotta be overcompensating for something."
Why, I oughta-
"Drop your pants!" Lubba ordered.
"I can't; you tied up my hands, you moron!" I spat. "And I don't have pants, I have overalls!"
"Don't backtalk me!" Lubba floated over and grabbed the sides of my overalls, then yanked on them. The flimsy fabric put up little to no resistance, and Lubba threw the tattered overalls to the side. Great; now if I made it out of this alive, I'd have to buy yet ANOTHER fake Super Mario costume!
Lubba took the alligator clip from the Luma and went to yank down my underpants.
Suddenly, the alligator clip vanished from his appendage.
The Lumas looked up and behind me in confusion. I followed their gaze to see Yoshi standing at the edge of the hole in the ceiling, the alligator clip stuck to his tongue.
"The cavalry has arrived," Yoshi said.
Unless "has arrived" means "has been here all along, but finally overcame his crippling cowardice and decided to join the battle" and I just wasn't aware of it, then Yoshi doesn't get to say that. Because saying "arrived" implies that you were off doing something worthwhile that was legitimately occupying your time, not just wrestling with your own cravenness.
"Toad Brigade, mobilize!" Bartholomew shouted as he leapt into the hole. He did a superhero landing on the Star Ball, then extended his spear and aimed it at the Lumas. "Stay where you are. Get away from Mario."
Ugh. You were having a dramatic moment, and then you had to go and fudge it up with that sort of stupid line.
"I can't simultaneously stay where I am and get away from Mario," Lubba said. "Where the heck is your head?"
Jacques, Blue, Daniel, and Hugh leapt into the room after Bartholomew, all of them striking bizarre martial arts poses as they landed.
"None of you move or Percy loses his flippers," Lubba said.
"Wanna bet we can't get to you before you untie Percy and get him on the Rack?" Bartholomew retorted.
Yoshi shot his tongue again, grabbing Percy and hauling him onto the helm, chair and all. "Hey!" one of the Lumas chirped. "Give him back!"
The Toad Brigade charged Lubba and the Lumas. Yoshi leapt after them, using his tongue to swing down from the ceiling. He landed and grabbed me with his tongue, then swung me into the wall. The chair shattered and I was freed, only to almost have my eyeball stabbed out on a light switch. I sat up and rubbed my head. "What the flip, dude?"
"Well, it was the quickest way I could think of to free you," Yoshi said. "I mean, I know it's not ideal, but neither is being tied up by Lumas and almost having your junk cut off."
Which was, sadly, a fair point.
Bartholomew whacked several Lumas aside with the Extendable 8-Foot Spear, then broke away from the others and started hacking the Rack to smithereens. Suddenly, Lubba reached into a pocket on his pants and pulled out-
Oh you've gotta be kidding me.
The nail gun from my first night on the Starship.
"You thought I never found this, didn't you?" he taunted. "Well I did!"
…Okay, so maybe I did try to kill him once. My bad. Forgot about that. I honestly don't even remember what I was gonna do with that thing if I'd made it into Lubba's room undetected. Was I gonna go for a lethal blow, or just shoot him in the junk or something?
"What the heck is he talking about?" Yoshi asked.
Lubba shot a stream of nails after me, but I ran across the room and ducked behind the ruins of the Rack. Suddenly, Polari clone came hurtling through the hole in the ceiling and smacked into Lubba, screwing up his aim and making him shoot a blue Luma in the butt with a nail. The Luma whizzed into the wall with a sound like a deflating balloon and then flopped to the floor.
Banktoad and Percy leapt through the hole too. Percy leapt at Lubba, flipper-whacking him into the wall, which caused the nail gun to slip from his grasp. I emerged from my shelter and dove for the weapon. Another Luma got to it before me, but was hit between the eyes with the butt of Bartholomew's spear and fell over, unconscious. Yoshi grabbed the final non-Lubba Luma in the room with his tongue and swung him into my closet doors. He fell to the floor, groaning.
All of us backed Lubba into a corner. Percy quacked menacingly, while Bartholomew aimed his spear at the purple Luma and Jacques did the same with the nail gun, which he'd grabbed. "Stay. Where. You. Are," I said.
"No!" he pouted. "I had you right where I wanted you! How did this happen?"
"The cowardice of Yoshi, that's how."
"Marioooo…," Yoshi whined.
"Not now."
And then Lubba made the stupid move of trying to fight his way past us despite being outnumbered nine-to-one. Yoshi sort-of punched Lubba with his tongue by rapidly firing and retracting it, flinging him backwards. Most of the Toad Brigade held him down while Bartholomew leapt atop him and hit him in the face with the butt of the spear over and over. "Gotosleep, gotosleep, gotosleep, gotosleep!" he said. And after no less than a minute of being smacked in the face, Lubba finally obliged.
Jacques flipped him over and shot him in the butt with a nail.
"What the heck was that for?" Yoshi asked. "He's already out cold."
"Oh come on," Jacques said. "Live a little. It's just the butt. He'll survive. Forrest Gumptoad did, after all."
"Percy, Banktoad, what's the situation on the helm?" I asked.
"All the Lumas up there are knocked out," Percy reported. "Banktoad and I only came down once we had things under control up here."
"So what do we do about the mutineers now?" Yoshi asked. "There's really nowhere left to store them that's secure. I mean, there's the engine room, but the last thing we need is them being in there and sabotaging the Starship."
"Hmm…," I said. Then I got an idea. "Everyone, round up the mutineers and bring them to the Starship's left ear. Anyone starts to wake up, have Yoshi swing them into something to knock them out again. I know someplace these guys can go."
I headed to the back of the Starship and uprooted the tree stump that Willy stood on back when he was a passenger on Starship Mario. I brought that over to the ear, to the Warp Pipe down which Lumalee has set up shop. A few minutes later, Yoshi, Percy, and the Toad Brigade arrived, dragging the mutineers behind them. "What's the plan?" Daniel asked.
I pointed to the Warp Pipe. "Shove them down there."
"Isn't Lumalee down there?" Yoshi asked. "If he really is on our side in this whole war for Starship Mario, I don't think he'll take too kindly to having to share his room with the mutineers. And for that matter, Warp Pipes work two ways. The mutineers could just come back out at any time."
I pointed to the tree stump. "Which is where this baby comes in. After the mutineers are stuffed down the Warp Pipe, we shove the tree stump into the Warp Pipe to cork it so they can't escape."
"Is Lubba even gonna fit in there?" Blue asked.
"Baby Luma somehow got both him and Polari clone to fit in the Launch Star that used to be the Co-Star Luma, so he damn well better."
We pushed all the regular-sized Lumas down the Warp Pipe first, then finally Lubba. Through some improbable reality-warping hijinks, he fit down the Warp Pipe, and then I shoved the tree stump into the top of the pipe. And just like that, hopefully this war with Lubba would finally be at an end.
And by that time, I was thoroughly exhausted, so I decided to turn in for the night. I'd get back to work collecting Power Stars tomorrow and-
"Hold up, where's Baby Luma?" I asked. "Did those filthy mutineers capture him?"
"Not that I heard, so he's probably in hiding somewhere on the ship," Banktoad said. "Now we've just got to find him is all."
And so another hour and a half was wasted searching for Baby Luma before Bartholomew finally found him holed up in the vents. Then it took another half-hour for us to finally convince him that Bartholomew and the rest of us weren't Lumas disguised as Toads, a la Bowser's Not-Toad Brigade.
After that, I ordered another fake Super Mario costume, deactivated the Starship's forcefield once more, and then got in bed for the night, this time refusing Baby Luma's request to watch more Hallmushroom Christmas movies, and instead starting the new season of The Punishroom. I sat through those movies for six hours last night. Never again.
Oh, and time to add to my list of Lubba grievances:
52. Takes his captain hostage.
53. – 56. Threatens to castrate his captain.
Yes, I know that should only count as one grievance, but, like trashing my rooms, it was way more severe than a standard grievance. And if he'd succeeded at castrating me, that would've been no fewer than 50 strikes against him right then and there.