Vivian had found the next Crystal Key and forged new bonds in the process. But as she was separated from her new friend, she would soon find herself reunited with her old ones. What had her party been up to in her absence? And what would become of her new friend now…?
On any other day, the Comet Observatory was a place bustling with the Luma's childlike laughter. But today a tense silence had fallen over it.
"What do we do?" one Luma whispered. "Mama's never cried before!"
"Polari says she has," spoke another, "but we're all too young to remember…"
As a matter of fact, their mama had quieted by now. But she was still in her bedchamber, loafing in bed in her nightgown. It had proven strangely difficult to get out. The pillow still smelled of the Peachy Peach perfume that Vivian had liked to put in her curly pink hair. Rosalina had never cared for perfume before meeting that woman, but lately she'd found herself missing the strangest and smallest things – like the way the Lumas had made Vivian giggle when they floated upside down. Or the way Vivian's cute little Adam's apple bobbed when she got flustered and her voice went all shaky and scratchy. Or the way Vivian clicked her tongue every time she turned the page in a book. Or-
Rosalina forced these thoughts to cease. This was ridiculous. True, she had often fantasized about having a partner during her adolescence – and had once even had a fling with a talking signpost. Talk about being starved for choice. But Rosalina was far too old to be acting this way now (If you counted universe resets, Rosalina was over nine hundred trillion years old). No, she had not had feelings like this in a long time, and she knew she wouldn't again for a long time, either.
"How are you holding up, old friend?" Polari was the first Luma brave enough to float into her bedroom.
"I'm perfectly alright." Rosalina made it a point to sit up and speak in her normal, stoic voice. "Just worn out from the day's events, that's all."
Polari looked like he wanted to argue, but all he said was, "Let me make you some tea. That always- Ohh!" There was a soft thud.
" Polari? "
Shortly, there was a role reversal. Now Polari was the one in the bed, and Rosalina was the one handing him a mug of tea.
"Rosa… What happened?" Finally, the Luma's eyes reopened. They weren't shining as bright blue as normal.
"You seem to be having trouble keeping afloat." That stoic, steady voice was a lot harder to manage all of a sudden.
"Ah, yes. That. I hadn't wanted to tell you. You've had enough on your-" The rest of the sentence became a coughing fit.
Rosalina had never heard a Luma cough before. "Polari, if there's anything I can do…"
Polari's eyes met hers and managed the faintest of glows. "You know perfectly well what I want you to do. I'd set you up with that rabbit-girl who dresses like you if it'd keep you from being alone." He laughed, but it turned into a cough.
"I'll be alright. I promise." Rosalina shook her head. "Whatever the cosmos will. Some people are simply destined to be alone…" But her words didn't steady the coughing.
The moment she was out of that portal, Vivian was surrounded by friends. She very nearly squashed Goombella, Mario-style.
" Vivian! " They were back in the hallways of the Palace of Shadow, it seemed. Goombella was the first at her friend's side, choking Vivian with the force of her telekinetic Goomba-hug.
"Where you been, girl?" Cathie brought up the rear, followed by TEC in his Hunkbot body.
"My sensors identify my emotions as relief and joy," said TEC.
"We knew you'd find your way back to us." Goombella released Vivian before she could go from purple to blue. "We kept looking for Crystal Keys while you were gone. Wasn't much else we could do with that curse on us. And- And look, we made new friends!"
"Yeah." Vivian found herself touching her yellow lips. "Me, too." She hid her newly acquired picnic basket and weighted blanket within her Shadow Veil before her friends could think to question the items.
"Say hi to Quackers the Cataquak and Dave the New Donker!" At Goombella's words, two new party members approached. The first was a duck-like creature, though it'd be more accurate to say it was a giant duck head with legs and nothing else. The second was a human being in a tailored suit and fedora.
"Quack quack quack!" said Quackers.
"Hello," said Dave. "I'm an accountant." From his voice, a more appropriate career would have been reading out the side effects of medication in commercials.
"That's not all we got," added Cathie. "Check these babies out." She flashed a pair of keys – the amber Garnet Key and the seventh, rainbow-colored Crystal Key.
"Oh, right, right. I got another one, too." Vivian, in turn, held up the Sapphire Key. It was weird, getting back into the headspace of being trapped in the Palace of Shadow, hunting for Crystal Keys. It felt like she'd stepped into a time machine.
Goombella practically sprang off the ground. "That makes seven!" Vivian did some mental math and realized her friend was right: The Diamond Key from the University of Goom, the Emerald Key from The Mushy Mushroom , the Gold Key from Crump and Grodus, the Ruby Key still inside TEC's Hunkbot body, the Sapphire Key from inside the Comet Observatory's Beacon, and then the final two keys from her friends' adventures without her (Vivian would later learn these had come from a New Donk City accounting firm and from the Cataquack mating grounds respectively).
"We'll tell you all about our amazing adventures to get the last two keys," Goombella continued, "but business first. Remember those weird princess flashbacks that happened each time we got a key? They haven't been triggering without you here. But maybe now we can watch them all at once?"
"I'm down for a mystery-princess backstory speedrun," said Vivian.
The gang backtracked to the room with the portrait of the moon. It felt like forever ago that Vivian had last been here. She held aloft the Gold Key, which glowed pure white, and then…
…the party was back in the bed chamber of that mysterious princess. When they'd first seen this place, Vivian had been stunned how bright and clean it was compared to the current day Palace of Shadow, but with each flashback it seemed to get dingier and dingier. Vivian could swear those familiar cobwebs were already sprouting.
At the center of the room stood two women that Vivian recognized as the mystery princess and her gothic Toad maid. The two of them seemed healthier and in higher spirits today. Maybe it had something to do with the fact that they were standing mere inches apart.
"Ta da! All fixed." The maid handed over what was unmistakably that music box from before. "See, told you I'm handy with machines."
"Oh, that's interesting," remarked Goombella. She had spawned inside a potted plant, so it looked more like the person speaking was a big clay pot with a ghostly transparent ponytail. "Women from this time period weren't known to do stuff like that. Wasn't considered very ladylike. Didn't they mention before that the queen used to fix the music box, too, before she died? Hmm…" Even from inside a potted plant, you could see the archeology-nerd gears turning in Goombella's head.
"Bolette," said the princess, "how can I ever thank you?" And then she did something else that wasn't considered ladylike. With tongue.
"O-Oh." Vivian drew back from the ghostly pair as they kissed. It was a lot… livelier than the kiss Rosalina had given her.
"Called it," said Cathie, arms folded. "These two were giving off those vibes in the last flashback."
"I have identified a strange reading from my sensors," said TEC, "similar to the one I experienced when I made Peach dance with a hologram of herself."
"You know, it's the darndest thing," Goombella spoke again. "There actually are some surviving manuscripts that refer to a princess being close with one of her Toad maids, but the historical consensus was that they were just really good friends and roommates…"
Perhaps fortunately, the flashback cut off there, and Vivian's party found itself back in the portrait room.
"We must continue this narrative!" beeped TEC. "It is imperative!" He led the way to the next portrait room. This one's portrait was of a New Donk City skyscraper.
"Ah, home sweet home," said Dave. He retrieved the rainbow-colored Crystal Key from within his fedora.
Goombella shuddered at the portrait. "You're lucky you missed this one, Vivian. We had to fill out so much paperwork to get that Crystal Key."
Again, the key glowed white, and again, the group found themselves in the ancient version of the palace. They were in the foyer this time. Bolete was walking down it until someone grabbed her and shoved her into a broom closet.
"M-My lady?" Bolette squeaked in that high voice that Toads had. "What's gotten into you?"
With this being an intangible vision and all, Vivian and the others were able to poke their heads inside to follow along.
The princess held her maid in the darkness and cried, "Oh, Bolette! My father has promised my hand to Prince Mush the First! But how could I ever be with anyone but you?"
At this news, Bolette faltered, then brought a hand to the princess's cheek. "Perhaps… Perhaps we should tell him? If he truly loves you, he'll want you to be happy, right?" The words echoed across the closet.
"Ooh, that'd be a real bad idea," said Goombella, wincing. "Doesn't take an archeology expert to tell you what attitudes were like back then…"
The flashback ended there, and Vivian's party was returned to the New Donk portrait room. The flashback magic was kind enough not to stick all their heads halfway through a closet door here in the present.
Vivian pulled her hat further over her face. "I hope everything worked out for that couple." But even saying that out loud, she knew it was not so.
The next portrait room depicted a beach full of Cataquaks. As the group approached it, Cathie said, "Fun fact, did you know that when a Cataquack chooses a mate, it runs up and flings them twenty feet in the air with its bill? Because I know that now." Quackers gave her an apologetic quack.
The Garnet Key did its thing, and this time Vivian's party found themselves in what must have been the king's throne room. It was the only part of the palace that hadn't gotten any dingier over the years. The king from before was here, though his moustache had grayed considerably. The princess stood across from him, scowling. The two seemed to be locked in a shouting match.
"That servant girl is boarding the next boat to the Beanbean Kingdom!" the king bellowed.
"Not gonna say I told you so," said Goombella, as if the princess could hear her.
"Bolette was the one good thing in my life!" the princess shot back. "The rest of this town can rot for all I care!"
The king's face, once so gentle, now contorted with rage. "You seem to have forgotten your one, singular destiny, my child. Now go to your room and get back to your magic studies!"
At those words, the scene faded away. At first, Vivian thought this vision would be as short as the last one, but actually, this vision contained a second scene. Once the memory world came back into focus, they were again in the princess's bed chamber. It was pitch dark out the windows, and the only light came from candles scattered about the room. They seemed familiar to Vivian, and it took her a minute to realize where she recognized them from – the Shadow Queen's coffin.
The princess stood tall at the room's center, the candles casting an eerie underlit glow onto her face. She held a book open in her hands. The cover was as black as the dress the princess was wearing, and it was lined with red. Her high heels stood on a hardwood floor. The princess had torn out her room's carpet to reveal the floorboards underneath. She had presumably done this so she had a nice surface to draw a big chalk outline in the shape of a five-pointed star.
"Oh, I'll get back to my magic studies, alright." The princess held the tome high and called out, "Creature! As prophesied in the Dark Prognosticus, the one who performs this ritual shall summon you from the Underwhere!"
The candles glowed brighter and brighter… and then the flashback ended, and Vivian's group was returned to the portrait room. Vivian's heart was left racing.
"Omigod, wait, I totally get it now!" But Goombella didn't share her dread. "Little Miss Princess summons the Shadow Queen, and the town gets buried. Bing, bang, boom."
"Well, we have two Crystal Keys left," said Vivian. "There must be more to this story."
"Yeahhh, I guess we'll finish up, but I pretty much know the gist of it." Goombella chuckled, pleased with herself. "I'm kind of an archaeological expert, y'know."
Vivian led the search for the next portrait room, and did it so absently that she nearly let some Dark Bones get the jump on her. They were soon Fiery Jinxed out of existence, though.
This portrait room appeared to have once been someone's bed chambers, though Vivian only knew that because she could make out the shape of a bedframe. Everything in here had been smashed to pieces. The portrait was up on the wall facing the entrance. Vivian had known what it would depict, but her heart still fell into her stomach. It was, of course, a painting of the Comet Observatory.
"Is that where you got the last Crystal Key?" Goombella waddled up beside her. "That place looks cool! Hope I get to see it someday."
"I hope so, too…" Vivian touched the portrait, but now that they had retrieved its key, it was a regular canvas.
On its own, the Crystal Key rose from her purse, out of her Shadow Veil, and glowed white. It was far more eager than Vivian. This next flashback occurred in this very same room, and so the vision looked like a reverse time lapse video as everything faded into clean, non-broken furniture and decoration.
The portrait had changed into that of an elegant woman. The gray-stached king gazed at it. "If only you were here… You'd have known what to do…"
There came the creak of a door, and the princess entered. Her temperament seemed different. She was calmer, but it was an unsettling kind of calm. Like the calm before the storm. "Father, please forgive me for losing my temper. You were right, I must remember my one and only destiny as Mother wanted."
The pair hugged and made up, and then the princess brought her father a mug of hot cocoa and led him to an armchair by a reading lamp. "I'm sure I've tired you out. Sit, sit. Yes. Right there…"
The king rested in the armchair for a moment, head hung. "It's alright, my daughter. I lost my temper, too. Perhaps I was too hasty in my decision to-" As he spoke, he sat up, reaching for his cocoa. This caused him to bump his head against seemingly empty air. In doing so, a big, brown block revealed itself, floating above him. The bump caused something to emerge from its top – a mushroom. Before the king could react, the mushroom bounced off the back of his chair and touched him, vanishing in a cloud of purple smoke.
"W-What-?" The king collapsed to the carpet. His face had gone green. "Feel… so weak…" His gasping and gurgling was barely audible over the sounds of hideous laughter.
"Ah, gets 'em every time!" The princess's face had contorted into one not her own. A perfect crescent moon grin.
"M-My daughter…" Tears filled the old man's eyes. "Why…?"
His daughter knelt down, hands on her knees, to meet his gaze. "Say hi to your wife from me." The princess grinned at her father until she wasn't a princess anymore.
The new queen laughed. In fact, she was so busy laughing that she didn't notice who was standing in the doorway behind her until the Toad spoke: "M-My lady?"
The laughter stopped, and the queen spun to face the newcomer.
Bolette was staring as if she couldn't accept this to be the real woman standing before her. "I- I wasn't going to let them put me on that boat. I escaped. I came here to run away with you, but… what have you done?"
"Sorry, toots." The queen shrugged. "But you've seen too much." She pointed her finger at the Toad. It was a gesture Vivian instantly recognized: a Fiery Jinx.
Vivian closed her eyes in time, but she couldn't block out the sounds or smells.
After a minute, though, Vivian's eyes were forced open by the ground shaking beneath her tendril. The reading lamp had fallen off the bedside table. Books were tumbling off the bookshelves. Vivian looked out the window, but its view was obstructed by a rising wave of dirt.
"Earthquake detected!" beeped TEC.
"No," said Vivian. "Not an earthquake."
The flashback ended there, however, and so the ground stilled itself as the party was returned to the present-day bedroom. There was a solemn silence.
Goombella was the first to break it. "What the HECK was THAT?" She looked from one party member to the next, as if seeking assurance that they'd all seen the same thing. "So the princess went crazy and killed her dad and her own lover? And then the Shadow Queen chose that exact moment to sink the town? But if she summoned the Shadow Queen to destroy the town, why would the princess bother doing all that- that stuff?"
"Bella, look, let's get out of here…" Vivian led the group out of the room, holding the door for them.
"Yeah," said Cathie, "this place gives me the creeps."
Vivian was the last out. Her eyes lingered a while longer at the floorboards near the entrance. You could still see the charred wood.
There were some benches outside the bedroom, though most of them were knocked over and had to be righted. The group wordlessly decided to sit and rest a while.
"Let's clock out for lunch break," said Dave. He retrieved some sandwiches from within his fedora and passed them around. They were ham and cheese with mayo. A little dry but not bad.
The group munched in silence. Vivian barely nibbled hers. No one seemed to have much of an appetite.
"Query," spoke TEC. He had smushed his sandwich against his camera lens, leaving it to droop off uselessly onto the floor. "If that princess loved that servant girl, why would she murder her? There is still so much about love that I do not understand…"
"No, you're right," said Vivian. "That can't have been the real princess. I refuse to believe that."
"Oh, Vivian, you're a genius!" Goombella cried out, spraying crumbs. "That wasn't the princess. She must've become the Shadow Queen's first vessel!" No one objected to the theory. Vivian hoped it was true. "So then that princess's body was the one destroyed by the four heroes when they sealed the Shadow Queen away. Guess that answers that."
"But there's still one more memory to view," said Vivian. "What about the Crystal Key inside TEC?"
But the rest of the party all seemed to cringe at this.
"That last flashback was a bit, y'know, disturbing," said Cathie with an apologetic shrug. "What more is there to learn, anyways? We all know what happened next once the Shadow Queen sank the town."
"Quack quack! Quack quack quack. Quack," said Quackers.
"That's an excellent point, Quackers." Goombella nodded her agreement. "We do need TEC at full power to take on the Black Ghost. We were waiting for Vivian to get back so we could all fight him together."
"We should not remove my power supply unless absolutely necessary," said TEC. "I have had enough heroic sacrifices for one lifetime."
"So do you guys really think TEC can beat this Black Ghost guy?" asked the Black Ghost through a mouthful of sandwich. He was sitting on the bench next to Goombella.
"Well, I- WAH! YOU!" Goombella sprang to her feet, and the others followed her into fighting stances.
"Hate to break it to ya, toots, but there's one little flaw with your plan," said the Black Ghost. "I'm a ghost, right? So I can do this ." In one quick motion, he reached inside of TEC's body and retrieved the Ruby Key.
"Hey, no fair!" Goombella tried to snatch it from him, but the Black Ghost had already risen into the air, unreachable.
"Later, losers!" The ghost sped off down the hall, cackling his head off.
Our heroes looked to TEC, horrified, but fortunately this wasn't another "heroic sacrifice" situation. "Backup power online." TEC gave a thumbs up. "I am considerably weakened, but still combat ready."
Vivian took a breath. "We'll have to try and fight him."
There was no question where the Black Ghost had run off to. They found him in the foyer, the place where Vivian and Goombella had landed when they first fell in that trap door. Naturally, the ghost was floating by the door with seven locks. It was nothing as grand as the Thousand-Year Door, but Vivian would still prefer it stayed closed.
"You chumps have done great." The Black Ghost let out one last cackle at the heroes' approach. With a swish of his cloak, all seven Crystal Keys floated into the air. "Now let's see this superweapon Queenie left behind."
Vivian tried to hold onto her Sapphire Key, but it squirmed out her grasp. In one quick motion, all seven keys flew into all seven locks. Vivian braced herself. The door creaked open, and…
"A music box?" The Black Ghost snatched up the box. He looked it over, checked that there was nothing behind it, and then finally allowed the disappointment to seep in. "Is it at least a magical superweapon music box…? Nah, nah, I don't sense any magic from this thing. Ordinary music box." He laughed again, but it was less "evil villain" and more "exasperated." "So this has all been a gigantic waste of time, huh?"
The Black Ghost tossed the trinket aside, allowing Vivian to catch it. Up close, there was no doubt, this was the exact same one from those flashbacks, albeit dustier. She stuck it in the "storage dimension" of her Shadow Veil for safekeeping (You might wonder why Vivian would also carry a purse inside her Shadow Veil, if the Shadow Veil itself could store things for her. The answer, of course, was that her purse was super cute and matched her hat and she'd found it for cheap at a thrift shop).
"So, uh, curse is lifted, I guess. You're all free." The Black Ghost waved his cloak vaguely in the party's direction.
"Um, thanks?" said Vivian. She felt a gurgle in her tummy, which she presumed was the curse exiting her body.
"We can still have a final boss fight if you want," offered Goombella.
But the Black Ghost shook his head. "Sorry, guys, I'm not feelin' it anymore. This is so embarrassing…"
Just then, four wads of purple paper unfurled their way into the foyer.
"What is the meaning of this?" a chest-spirit cried out.
"You're lifting our awesome curse?" cried another.
"Yeah." The Black Ghost hung his head. "This was a bust." The statement caused an awkward silence that lasted a solid minute.
Dave coughed.
"So," said the Black Ghost, "anyone wanna get some pizza-?"
But he couldn't quite finish that thought… because a bolt of frost struck him. The Black Ghost became the Black Ice Cube.
"Wha-?" The remaining group – Vivian, Goombella, Cathie, TEC, Quackers, Dave, and all four chest-spirits – spun at once to find a newcomer standing behind them. Or, more accurately, floating behind them, tethered to the ground by a shadow-tendril.
"So this is where you've been these past few days." Beldam pushed her way to the now-opened Crystal Key door, which now contained nothing but an empty broom closet. The same closet from the flashback, Vivian realized. The Thousand-Year Closet?
"You feel it too, don't you, Vivian? These Crystal Keys contain dark matter…" Now that Beldam mentioned it, Vivian did feel a bit energized from standing near those keys. Beldam must have too because she wasn't hunching nearly as much as normal. In fact, her posture was getting a lot better all of a sudden. "Being near them really brings out the demon in us, don't you think?"
Beldam waved her hands, and the seven keys obediently floated out their locks. They floated around Beldam in a circle, glowing. Vivian tried to step forward, but before she could react, Beldam waved her hands again.
At this, there came a cry from the group: "Waaah! What's going onnn?"
"Helllp usss-!"
The four cursed spirits… and the Black Ghost, too… All were being sucked into Beldam's body like she was the nexus of a black hole. As they touched her, they turned into some sort of purple plasma – dark matter, Vivian was sure – and then were absorbed into Beldam's body.
Vivian and her friends cried out. It wasn't that they cared about the Black Ghost's well-being, exactly, but Vivian would take him over this any day of the week. "Beldam… What did you do? "
"Ahhh, that was just what I needed." Beldam's posture wasn't merely improved, it was perfected. She stood taller than Vivian now. And her shadowy skin was so much smoother. She looked a lot like Vivian now, only leaner. And meaner. "I haven't felt this good in decades!" Beldam was beside herself with glee. "Finally, a back that isn't killing me!"
"Feels good not to be trapped in your own body, doesn't it?" said Vivian.
"Oh, put a sock in it." The remark had returned Beldam's attention to her sister. "Know the first thing I want to do with my new body, 'Sis?' Punish a traitorous prince. " A solid wave of ice barreled towards Vivian's face. Vivian shot back with all the fire she'd got, but it only barely managed to melt the attack.
Uh oh. Vivian was sweating already.
"Okay-" Cathie sprang in front of her. "-I've heard enough. Time to show you what we do to transphobes around here." A barrage of eggs blasted from Cathie' snouth, but Beldam simply ducked inside her own Shadow Veil. She emerged inches from Cathie's face, which surprised the dinosaur enough to let a fist be shoved straight into Cathie's still-open mouth hole. With a blast of magic, she was frozen solid from the inside out.
"Cathie!" Vivian wanted to thaw her friend, but she'd used up all her Flower Points melting that ice wave. She had to dig a Jammin' Jelly out of the picnic basket in her Shadow Veil.
Quackers was next in the ring with Beldam. The duck managed to sneak up behind the witch and fling her into the air with his bill. Unfortunately, Beldam's tendril worked the same as Vivian's, so all the attack did was make Beldam really tall. Beldam shot back to ground level like a rubber band, creating a shockwave of ice that froze the Cataquack solid.
Vivian was scooping jelly into her mouth as fast as her hands could scoop.
Goombella, meanwhile, frantically leafed through her Tattle Log. "Where's the stage? This isn't turn-based combat! How am I supposed to have time to Tattle? This is totally cheating-!" She was frozen mid-complaint.
"ACCOUNTING ATTACK!" Dave avenged his friend by hurling his briefcase at Beldam's head. It bounced off without so much as knocking off her hat. Dave was promptly swatted aside and frozen.
"My, my!" Beldam howled with laughter. "I believe this is what they call a TPK?"
"Not quite!" beeped a voice. Before Beldam could turn to her next opponent, she got a faceful of missiles.
"Agh-!" They actually knocked Beldam off balance and took a chunk of her Heart Points to boot. Younger and prettier as it may have been, Beldam's face distorted with the same old ugly rage that Vivian had always known. "You wretched robot!"
The biggest ice-blast yet struck TEC, but he shrugged it off. He flexed his mechanical Hunkbot muscles. "You fool." Had TEC been wearing glasses, he'd have no doubt pushed them up the bridge of his nose with his middle finger, causing them to turn pure white from reflected light. "These temperatures make my processors run at peak efficiency!"
Another round of missiles pummeled Beldam into the dirt. Vivian couldn't see her sister's exact HP since Goombella's Tattle had been interrupted, but it had to be close to zero now. TEC readied one last attack, and then…
… a bolt of lightning struck the robot. TEC cried out in pain before shutting off and toppling over. A cloud of smoke emerged from his circuitry.
A shadowy figure stepped into the light, revealing itself to be… a shadowy figure.
"Marilyn…" At the sight before her, Vivian allowed her next spoonful of jelly to fall to the carpet.
"Guh," said Marilyn. It wasn't a hateful guh or an angry guh. Just a sad one.
"See, that's what a good sibling looks like." Beldam put an arm on her middle sister's shoulder. "Now, Marilyn, be an even better sibling by feeding your new queen. "
Marilyn didn't have time for one final "guh" before she was absorbed, too.
Vivian gawked at the display before her, paralyzed. "Beldam…" She could hardly make her voice work. "You're- You're worse than the Shadow Queen!"
"I am, aren't I?" That last absorption had caused Beldam's body to become distorted. At first, her shadows wiggled and shifted… but then her arms grew longer. "In fact, you could say, being next in line…" Her back grew even taller and even thinner until she was scraping the ceiling. Within her shadowy body, stars were forming. "...I am the new Shadow Queen!"
But Vivian was barely processing the transformation before her. She was a bit preoccupied with her own. "Our own sister, Beldam? After all the second chances I gave you… I can't forgive you. I won't forgive you ." Vivian's gloves, so carefully hand-stitched back together, burst again. She was tall as her sister now, with arms and fingers as long and shadow-skin as star-filled. " You can rot for all I care. "
No Jammin' Jelly was needed – a sheer inferno erupted from Vivian's mouth. Stronger than anything she'd ever done before. Stronger even than the breaths of Hooktail and her siblings.
But it was met with a barrage of ice every bit as strong. "Your brain didn't grow with your body, I see. We both carry our mother's essence. You can't fight me with my own essence!" The ice was overtaking the fire. "All you've done is allow me to absorb you, too, you gopher-brained oaf!"
The fire caught in Vivian's throat the same as all the words she wanted to say to her sister. It was Vivian's turn now to be pushed towards her sister. Tendrils were ribboning off of Vivian's body and funneling into Beldam's. Vivian could feel herself returning to her normal shape and size – while growing smaller and smaller like an unraveling sweater. She tried to squirm, but there was no escape.
Soon Vivian would be nothing but the stripey pink witch's hat that had brought her so much euphoria. She closed her eyes and let her world become darkness.
But in the darkness, there came a smash . Like the sound of a sledgehammer.
Vivian opened her eyes. The hammer swung again. Beldam fired back, but then cried out as a pair of boots clomped her right in the face. The owner of said boots and hammer did a backflip and landed next to a stunned Vivian. He shot her a thumbs up before returning his attention to the creature before him, which had once been Beldam.
The newcomer straightened his red cap. "Let's-a go."