A/N: Welcome back to the latest chapter. As always, please read, review, and enjoy!

I do not own Super Mario or Harley Quinn.

After about a minute of walking down the darkened tunnel, it occurred to me that I should've brought my night-vision goggles with us so we could at least see where we were going. But at that point, there was no way I was turning around and heading all the way back across the lava fields to get them. That was just asking to get caught at this point.

So Waluigi and I kept going down the tunnel into what felt like the bowels of hell.

The passage was flat at first, but soon it started to slope down. The incline was slight, but still noticeable.

"Ow!" Waluigi shouted from behind me. "Son of a Poochy!"

I spun around. "What happened?" I could vaguely see his outline hopping around in the dark.

"I stepped on something!" he grunted. "Something sharp!"

"Well, that's what you get for stripping down to your underwear."

"I told you, I was getting hot. How many times are we gonna go around this?"

I took a step towards him and kicked at the ground with my boot. Something crunched and snapped under it. Whatever it was, it wasn't a rock. I bent down and felt it with my hand. It felt like…bone fragments.

Well, that was not reassuring in the slightest.

"What is it?" Waluigi asked.

"I think it's bones," I reported. "Someone must've gotten stuck down here."

Waluigi snorted. "More like they were planted here by Bowser to try to ward off people like us doing what we're about to do. It seems unlikely that someone would die down here, like, a minute from the exit. Not to mention Bowser's always had this obnoxious habit of leaving bones and skeletons strewn all over his castle d uring every Mario Kart tournament. He says it's to 'create an atmosphere,' but I'm pretty sure he's just trying to give everyone else flat tires so he wins."

I stood up. "Wait, you…." I tried to coherently form my question. "…your Mario Kart tournaments take you into Bowser's Castle?"

"Yeah. So?"

"…Forget it." I swear, every new thing I learned about these Mario Kart tournaments made me question how the hell they had ever ended up becoming a yearly tradition in the Mushroom Kingdom. Like, seriously? The racers were willing to enter Bowser's Castle and just hope that Bowser didn't decide to slam the gates shut behind them and trap them all?

What in the hell was wrong with this world?

I turned around again and…oh crap, which way had we come? Which way was forward?

Wait a second. The path slopes down. Whichever way takes you down is the way forward.

I turned back around again and snapped my fingers. "This way. Let's go."

We had only been walking for another minute or so when I saw a faint orange glow coming from ahead of us. I squinted. The light was outlining another hole, about the size and shape of the one we'd entered the tunnel through. But it looked like it was blocked by something.

A tapestry. That's right, the map showed that there was a tapestry blocking the other end of the passage.

Suddenly something clattered behind me. I turned around to see a pair of yellow pinpoints of light rising from the ground and floating down the hallway towards us.

"You see that too, right?" I asked Waluigi.

"Yellow eyes," he said. "A Dry Bones. That must've been what I stepped in back there. A dormant Dry Bones, and that woke it up."

"A dormant what?"

"Dry Bones. They're undead Koopas. And there's no way to defeat them without certain power-ups that we don't currently have. Come on, let's go; they're hard to kill but they can't move fast."

Then the Dry Bones made some noise that I could only describe as a clacking, raspy whistle.

And above us, dozens more pairs of yellow eyes blinked open.

"Parabones!" Waluigi shouted. "Run!"

We took off down the tunnel. Behind us, the eyes (and the bodies I couldn't see but assumed they were attached to) dropped from the ceiling and followed us. Alarmingly, the horde of Parabones was moving faster than their walking counterpart. The sound of flapping wings filled the tunnel, echoing off the walls.

Then, ahead of us, I saw something: a tall, narrow outline, about the same size and shape as the hole we had entered the passage through. A thin border of flickering orange light surrounded it.

That's gotta be the way out. The map showed that there was a tapestry covering the secret entrance to the dungeons. That must be why I can't see past it.

I pointed ahead. "You see that? There's the entrance!"

"I see it," Waluigi confirmed.

As we ran down the final stretch of the tunnel, I turned around. The Parabones were still following us. We were slightly outpacing them, but not by enough to stop, listen, and slowly peek out from behind the tapestry to see if the coast was clear like I would've liked to do. We were gonna have to go into this blind and just hope for the best. I rushed through the crack and pushed the tapestry aside….

…and then immediately tripped on a taut wire stretched across the path right before the tapestry.

Son of a bitch, booby traps. Why the hell didn't I think of that?

I tumbled to the floor and rolled into the far wall. Right on my heels, Waluigi tripped on the wire too and landed right on top of me. Only he somehow got tangled in the tapestry on the way down and ripped it clean off the wall. Well, at least now he was covered a bit more, but I still pushed him to the side. "Get off me!"

The hall's floor was made of packed dirt, while the walls and ceiling were comprised of giant stones packed together. Intermittent tapestries, torches, and cell doors lined the hall. The few tapestries I could make out clearly depicted Bowser a) sitting on his throne, b) breathing fire and incinerating Mario, and c) raining cannon fire down on the Mushroom Kingdom from the deck of one of his airships.

So…these were just to screw with the prisoners, then? Make their situation seem even more bleak than it already was? In that case, I guess tapestries in a dungeon did kinda make sense after all.

But then a siren started blaring throughout the dungeon. A series of red lights descended from the ceiling, flashing in sync with the shrieking of the alarm. "Attention!" a deep voice growled over the alarm. "The Inner Dungeon has been compromised! Everyone, report to the Inner Dungeon and secure it in the name of King Bowser!" After a few seconds, the message started over again.

Meanwhile, inside the tunnel, the flock of Parabones had gotten bottlenecked at the narrow crack, at it seemed like two or three of them couldn't decide who should go through first. And now, with the tapestry gone and both torchlight and the red alarm light filling the hall, I could get a semi-decent look at the Parabones. In terms of general body shape, they were pretty similar to Kamek and Bowser Jr. and the other generic Koopas I'd run into at Bowser's Galaxy Generator. The only differences were the yellow eyes and the fact that they were – it seemed – made entirely of bones. Greyish-white bones, some with large cracks running through them, others adorned with pale green and yellow patches of some fungus or mold. I couldn't get a clear look at their wings…or their hands, for that matter, since they were wearing gloves for some reason.

I scrambled to my feet. It was only a matter of time before the Parabones made it through, and I didn't want to be standing here twiddling my thumbs when that happened. I looked up and down the hall to get my bearings. If I remembered correctly, the right-hand path led deeper into the dungeons, while going left led to the main exit.

"Come on," I said, turning right. "This way. It doesn't go on too long before it hits a dead end. If Luigi isn't down there, we'll double back and check the other way."

"Actually, how about we split up?" Waluigi suggested, getting up and (to my dismay) letting the tapestry fall off him. "You go right, I go left. We'll cover twice as much ground."

"But-" What if a bunch of guards show up? There's no way you're gonna be able to fight them off on your own. Forget it, you don't have time to be arguing with him. And he does have a point. "Alright, fine. Whichever one of us finds Luigi, we'll come get each other and then all three of us will get the hell out of here."

Waluigi nodded and took off running to the left. I headed right.

After about twenty yards, the hall turned to the right, followed by another turn soon after. I remembered this from the map. At the very end of the dungeon, the hallway spiraled in on itself. These were the first two turns of that spiral.

In other news, tapestries continued to line the hall, each one more excessively macabre and ominous than the last.

Bowser standing atop a giant, floating island-castle-thing, bombarding a bunch of multicolored fairies with fireballs and lava.

Bowser as a black, slime-covered, Godzilla-like monstrosity marching towards Toad Town amid a raging thunderstorm.

Bowser as a skeleton, grabbing Mario in a chokehold and burning his head off with a breath of blue flames.

Yeesh. Tell me you've got a lotta pent-up anger without telling me you've got a lotta pent-up anger.

I rounded several more turns until I finally reached the center of the spiral. All the cells I had passed were empty, and so was the final one at the end of the hall. Which seemed strange, because I would've thought for sure that Bowser would want to stick Luigi as deep in his dungeons as possible. But there wasn't anywhere I could've missed him on the way here. Which meant he was somewhere in the cells Waluigi was covering.

Or he's not here at all, and King Boo lied to you.

Which, much as I hated to admit it, was entirely possible. When it came down to it, I didn't really have any reason to believe what he'd told me. Besides, he'd even admitted that the Boos have a hive mind. For all I knew, even though he was safely trapped in the Poltergust, he could've telepathically ordered a bunch of Boos to kidnap Luigi for him.

You're getting ahead of yourself. Right now you don't know that King Boo lied. For all you know, Waluigi found Luigi already and broke him out, and they're on their way to find you.

I turned and headed back down the hall. But as soon as I rounded the first bend, I saw shadows marching down the wall at the end of the hall. Someone was coming. Multiple someones, at that. I glanced backward. There was no point hiding. No doubt it was a group of guards coming, and if it was, there was nowhere I could hide that they wouldn't find me. Better to make my stand here – and if it came to it, go down swinging rather than hiding in a corner. I grabbed the Fun Gun off my back and aimed it ahead of me.

Three Koopas rounded the corner a few seconds later. One lad a spiked blue cap and shell and a pair of wings, and clutched a spear. The other two were much larger; each of them had a green cap and shell, and wielded a giant black hammer.

But what surprised me the most was that Waluigi, who was at the center of their triangular formation, immediately pointed at me and shouted, "There she is! There's the intruder!"

What the-? Had that lowlife seriously sold me out? Goddamn it, I knew I shouldn't have trusted his ass.

"See, I told you!" Waluigi continued. "Now, uh, are you gonna let me go or not? I led you to the big fish, so isn't this normally the part where-?"

One of the larger Koopas punched him into the wall. He slid to the floor, unconscious.

The Koopa in the blue cap, meanwhile, pointed his spear at me. "You! Put down the gun and surrender now, and the His Royal Highness the Prince Regent may show you mercy!"

I blinked. "May show me mercy?"

The Koopa seemed taken off-guard. "Well, it…it really depends on what sort of mood His Highness is in. But I can guarantee you that if you don't surrender, there will be no mercy for you."

Hmm. That spear was looking mighty tempting. And if there was one thing those assholes back at Corto Maltese learned in the seconds before they died, it's that I am very effective at fighting with a spear (spear, javelin, whatever). All I had to do was get it away from him, and I was confident I'd be able to take down these three Koopas easy peasy.

So I said, "Okay. You've got me. I surrender." I made a big show of leaning forward and lowering the Fun Gun towards the floor….

…then immediately pulled the trigger and send a beanbag rocketing right into that blue-capped bastard's nuts.

The Koopa squawked and fell to his knees, dropping his spear and clutching his crotch. Then he fell onto his side and continued screaming and groaning. "Gahh…fuhh…moth…aaahhh!"

"Boss, are you okay?" one of the other Koopas asked.

The blue-shelled Koopa didn't respond, merely continuing his string of shouts and half-formed curses.

"What are you trying to say?" the other giant Koopa asked.

"Stah…fluu…gashi," the blue-shelled Koopa continued.

I just stood there, tapping my foot, waiting for something to happen worth reacting to.

The two large Koopas looked at each other, shrugged, then slammed their hammers into their palms and marched towards me. But as they passed by the blue-shelled Koopa, he raised a hand. "No…stop," he grunted. "I've…got this."

"Are you sure, boss?" one of the others asked.

"Yes." The Koopa slowly got to his feet, glaring at me. "You're going to…pay for that."

I raised an eyebrow. "Oh, really? Well then, come on, tough guy. Show me what you got." I pulled the trigger on the Fun Gun again, sending another beanbag hurtling towards him. But this time he lowered his head in the beanbag's path, spearing it on the center spike atop his cap. The impact drove him backwards a few inches, but didn't cripple him like the first beanbag had.

And before I could fire off another beanbag at him, he looked up and shouted, "BLUE SHELL!"

What sort of lame battle cry was that?

Well, as it turned out, it wasn't a battle cry, per se.

The Koopa's head and limbs suddenly retracted into his shell, which levitated in the air. The wings on the Koopa's back unfolded, and the shell zipped towards me. I frantically pulled the trigger on the Fun Gun again, but unfortunately the next round happened to be a spray of glitter instead of a beanbag.

Suffice to say, the "attack" did nothing to deter the Koopa.

Meanwhile, the shell whizzed towards me and stopped right above my head. I looked up to see it angling down like it was getting ready to do a nosedive onto my head. I lunged forward to avoid it.

And I did avoid it…sorta.

The shell slammed to the ground behind me, but as it did, it exploded in a giant blue blast. "Oh shi-," I started. Then the shockwave hit me and flung me backwards. I flew into the wall, and that was the last thing I remembered.