Five Years Later, Kamek's Garage, Dark City, Darklands
The seventeen-year-old Bowser ducked out of the way as his green-scaled, muscle-bound Kremling personal trainer, Klubba, brought down his massive, spiked cudgel to the floor.
The weapon was made of wood but had rusty spikes sticking out of it. Despite its shoddy construction, it was a deadly weapon and cracked the floor of Kamek's old garage—now Bowser's dojo.
Sensing an opening as Klubba struggled to dislodge his cudgel, Bowser made a spinning jump into the air, shrinking his head, legs, and arms into his shell.
The rotating shell struck Klubba from behind, its spikes tearing into his flesh.
Bowser then extended his head, arms, and legs out of the shell and pushed forward, gathering strength in his fist before he slammed it into the dazed Klubba's jaw.
The massive Kremling fell to the floor.
Bowser pounded his left fist into his right palm and bowed, as Klubba had taught him.
The instructor did not respond due to being out cold.
Bowser smirked.
He had once feared Klubba, but the Kremling had proven to be something of a gentle giant.
Klubba would always go through his moves in slow motion with Bowser before enacting them for real. He would also make Bowser practice the appropriate responses before engaging him.
The prince had taken more than his fair share of hits in the early days of his training, but now won more often than not.
The moves had become muscle memory.
Furthermore, Klubba made Bowser run laps every morning. They had started with three laps around the neighborhood five years ago—now they were up to three miles.
The Koopa could bench press 783 pounds and execute a thousand push-ups by this point.
The shell on his back made sit ups difficult but Klubba compensated by focusing on the other muscles in Bowser's body, while still forcing Bowser to work his abs to the maximum.
The prince looked at himself in dojo's mirror as he waited for his trainer to wake up. He liked what he saw.
Flexing his bicep, around which he had taken to wearing black bands, he made a fist.
This was a body that Koopa girls loved and Koopa males envied.
Bowser was proud of his record as a lover as he had managed to get three Koopa cheerleaders from his high school pregnant within the past year.
He named the first-hatched Ludwig after his beloved brother. Next came Lemmy, who he'd named after Kamek's uncle. He decided to let the mother name the next one, and she had already picked the name Roy if it was a boy.
Yes, Bowser had much to be proud of. However, an attractive body and physical strength were only perks.
The reason for his intense training was to protect his family—namely Kamek and his brother Ludwig.
While Bowser lived with Kamek, he had seen precious little of his elder brother this past year—he'd been off at college studying his core courses and majoring in Toad, the language of the Mushroom Kingdom.
It made sense—the Mushroom Kingdom was Darklands' closest neighbor and trade partner.
As a future ruler—or even as the next heir apparent—Ludwig would have to host important state dinners with Mushroom Royalty.
It was probably for the best, Bowser realized.
State dinners bored him. Any state function did really.
He just wanted to see his brother once in a while.
Heck, he still felt closer to his brother and Kamek than he did to either of his two already-hatched children—he could hardly acknowledge them without creating a scandal—let alone be a part of their lives.
No, it was just him, Kamek, and Klubba.
Well, Bowser still had his daily phone calls with K. Rool.
He was still starstruck over the Kremling King.
K. Rool ruled his country with an iron fist and was practically worshiped for it. No one would think of harming him or anyone he cared about.
If you could have power and security like that with the title, then why be a monarch at all?
By now, Klubba was starting to regain consciousness. He shook his head and muttered something in Kremling.
He blinked as the blurry sight of the Koopa Prince came into focus.
"My Prince," he said picking up his cudgel and propping himself on it.
"I believe there is little more I can teach you."
"You mean, I'm unbeatable?" Bowser said cracking his enlaced knuckles.
Klubba took a swipe with his cudgel knocking Bowser off his feet. The prince landed on his shell.
Bowser was now in the most vulnerable position a shelled-Koopa could be in. It would take him a while to pull himself up to a standing or even sitting position. He was fighting against gravity as the heaviest part of his body lay on the floor.
"Apparently you have yet to learn not to get overconfident," Klubba said.
"Important lesson," Bowser grunted in agreement as he struggled to lift himself.
Klubba was silent as Bowser managed to get into a sitting position.
Resting his elbows on his knees, Bowser jumped to his feet when Klubba said, "I wish to return to Crocodile Isle."
Bowser could feel the rage boiling within him.
"Why?" he shouted. "What about my training?"
Klubba looked at Bowser solemnly, and replied, "As I have said, there is little more you can learn from me."
"But who am I supposed to spar with?"
Bowser had a point—he needed an opponent to practice against.
"I want to see my family in Krem Quay," Klubba said looking down, "but I live to serve King K. Rool, and he has commanded me to train you."
Upon hearing Klubba's reasons, Bowser felt his heart thaw just a bit. After all, the Prince had been lamenting his own lack of time with his family.
Lowering his head in defeat, Bowser nodded, and said, "Ok. You can take two weeks off."
Klubba smiled—something Bowser did not think possible.
The Kremling dropped his cudgel and embraced Bowser, almost knocking him over.
"Thank you! Thank you, my Prince!" Tears of joy dripped from Klubba's eyes.
Bowser suddenly realized that his trainer had never taken a day off in five years.
"Ok, ok," Bowser twisted out of his trainer's grip. "You've more than earned some personal time."
Klubba wiped his tears away and said, "Please forgive my outburst."
"No," Bowser said, "I get it...five years is a long time."
Indeed, when the giant muscle-bound Kremling had first arrived, he'd towered over the preteen Bowser. Now the seventeen-year-old Dragon Koopa was the taller of the pair—if only slightly—and almost as strong.
Suddenly, the door to the dojo swung open.
"Bowser!" Kamek cried, obviously shaken.
"What is it, Kamek?
"There was a riot on campus at your brother's college..." Kamek looked away.
Bowser felt a chill crawl up his spine at the same time the pit of his stomach dropped.
"Kamek what happened?"
An hour later, Bowser's Room
It had happened again. A Koopa Royal had been killed by unhinged activists, and seventeen-year-old Bowser found himself second-in-line to the throne of Darklands, without an older brother.
A group of fifteen Bob-omb protesters had ganged up on Prince Ludwig and detonated simultaneously. One Bomb-omb explosion could severely injure any one of another species, but there was no surviving that many concentrated in the same place.
Ludwig was gone.
As a depressed Bowser buried his head in his pillow, he remembered the promise Ludwig had made at their father's remarriage: he would always be there to protect Bowser from the responsibilities of the throne.
He had broken that promise along with Bowser's heart—a heart that had just spent five years mending.
Bowser burned with fury at Ludwig.
Bowser rose and breath a torrent of fire into the air, expending his anger.
The last time this had happened, Bowser had been with his mother.
He could have protected her and blamed himself for failing to do so.
This time was different.
Ludwig carelessly took his safety into his own hands and paid the price.
Why should the second-in-line go to the same college as Bob-omb radicals protesting "Koopa privilege"?
Hadn't Bowser's idiot of a brother been listening when they called the monarchy, "The ultimate symbol of Koopa privilege?"
Ludwig, you idiot! Bowser screamed in his head, loosing another fire breath.
He faced his pillow again and ran his fist through it, imagining it was Ludwig's gut.
He wanted to give the moron a piece of his mind about his recklessness...only to realize that conversation would never come.
Ludwig was gone.
Sadness replaced anger and a single tear slid down Bowser's right cheek.
"I only wanted to stop you from going," Bowser said, realizing that he was lashing out at the memory of the Koopa who mattered most to him...a Koopa he would never see again.
There was a knock on the door.
From its softness it could only have been Kamek.
"Come in," Bowser said, burying his face in the rent pillow.
Kamek walked to Bowser's side and sat next to him.
The Magikoopa gently took the prince's much larger hand in his own.
No words passed between them.
None needed to.
Thirty minutes of silence and interlocked hands passed.
By the end Bowser had accepted the unpleasant reality. Now he had to act on it.
"Leave me, Kamek," Bowser said gently. "I have a call to make."
Kamek nodded and left silently as Bowser pulled his green shell-shaped cell phone out of the shoulder of his actual shell.
He dialed K. Rool's number.
"Bowser," K. Rool said gravely upon recognizing the number, "I've been expecting this call."
"I don't want any sympathy," Bowser said, "I want to be all business."
"I will respect that," K. Rool said, striking a tone between sympathetic and matter of fact.
"Five years ago, my mom was killed by some Koopa arch-conservative pro-royalist nut. Earlier today, my brother was killed by anti-Koopa privilege nuts." Bowser got angrier with each phrase.
"The flaw of allowing multiple extremist points of view. Whether as emperors or dictators, my family has always seen the danger inherent in democracy." K. Rool said.
"Well now, two members of my family have been killed by radicals from both extremes!" Bowser yelled, impatient with K. Rool for stating the obvious.
"Your family will always be in danger as long as radicals on both extremes are tolerated," K. Rool tried to choose his words carefully. He couldn't let anger cloud his stooge's vision.
"I'm well aware of that!" Bowser was on the verge of losing all patience.
Now was K. Rool's time to strike.
"Then why tolerate them?"
Bowser felt his mouth fall open.
Why did the royal family tolerate political extremists on either side?
Wasn't it part of his grandmother's duties to moderate in presidential debates?
"I don't know," said.
"Well, now that you will one day be king, you can change that," K. Rool said, steadily building Bowser up as the King who would save Darklands from the political radicalism that had killed his family.
"Yes...lay down rules for what parties can say and do," Bowser thought excitedly.
"Go further," K. Rool said, "Control the parties."
Bowser then felt a nagging weight pulling on his shell.
"But I'm only seventeen. Dad will be the next king, and he's to stupid to do anything," Bowser started to display worry in his voice, which grated K. Rool.
"Quit whining and see this as an opportunity!" The Kremling King snapped, "Remember where your weakness got your mother and where your brother's own weakness got him!"
K. Rool now changed tracks. Having broken through Bowser's wall of self-pity by tearing him down verbally, he would build him up again.
"You experienced these tragedies in your family—one conservative, one progressive—to understand why a strong king is needed to save Darklands! You know your father can't be that king! Do you not understand, Bowser, that you are the chosen one! The savior of Darklands!"
Bowser suddenly had an answer to why these tragedies kept happening to him.
They were preparing him for his reign. There was just one problem.
"What am I going to do about Dad?"
"Don't worry about him for now. Focus on improving yourself."
Bowser nodded, mostly to affirm the notion to himself. K. Rool could not see the nod of course, so Bowser audibly said, "Right."
The future king felt his confidence surge as he dedicated himself to a course of action.
"Finish high school, and study political science in college, especially Darklands politics, and tell me about every lesson," K. Rool commanded. "As long as you impress your father and get him to listen to you, you will be the power behind the throne!"
Bowser smiled at that. It sounded cool.
K. Rool smirked. No one would know that he sent provocateurs to incite the Bob-ombs. He'd been sending agents to prompt extremists on both sides of Darklands political spectrum for years now.
It made sense for K. Rool to focus on Darklands. The Boos were already his allies and tended to follow the Kremling lead. Similarly, there was no chance of influencing the Mushroom Kingdom.
With a tyrant installed in Darklands however, he could normalize the age of tyrants, and have a freer hand to conduct Kremling affairs as he wanted—as the villains of his favorite movies would.
His smirk spread into a toothy smile.
Everything was going to plan.