Chapter 2 - A Problem Rises

On my way up to the bathroom to take a shower, I tripped over our cat, Rose. She was an old cat, one of Daisy’s favorites. Our other animals were Petunia and Pansy the cats, and Lily and Sakura the dogs. We also had a rabbit, Daisy called that one Tulip. I almost got to name Tulip, but Daisy was afraid that I wouldn’t name it after a flower, and pounced on the opportunity. She names everything of hers after some flower.

“Sorry, “I told Rose. But she hissed at me and sped off. I didn’t curse after her or anything, because how would you like to have a grown man kick you in the stomach and then sprawl over you?

I reached out to grab the bathroom door, but I heard that someone was in it. I would have got to use another one, but it was across the castle and would take five minutes to get there. Besides, I heard the toilet flush inside; signaling that whoever was occupying it was almost done.

“Just a second,” came a girl’s voice from inside. How did she know I was there? I didn’t knock. But the door opened, restricting my pondering time.

A girl stepped out. She was a slightly tanned girl with dark brown hair that reached to her waist, and eyes the same color. She was as tall as I was, and was smiling profoundly. What I thought was the strangest about her was her shirt. It was black with a picture of some rugged-looking prisoner that said, “Have you seen this wizard?” I recognized him as Sirius Black from the Harry Potter movies. She was wearing simple jeans with it.

“Ah, I was looking for you.” She said.

“How did you-“ I began, but she held out her hand.

“I’m Lauren, I’ll be designing your robes.”

“Oh!” I said, taking her had and shaking it. “Nice to meet you. Have you talked with Daisy yet?”

“No,” Lauren replied, bored. “She had some kind of village business to attend to this morning.

“Ah.” I said quickly.

“Well,” Lauren said, “I’ll wait until she gets back for us to start getting the clothes done. In the meantime, I hope you don’t mind if I…er… explore the castle a little?”

“Oh, go ahead,” I said, pointing toward the staircase. Lauren let out a little squeal and then rushed past me.

“Kay,” I said quietly, and went into the bathroom to take my shower.

After making myself look decent and leaving the bathroom, I heard Daisy grumbling to herself in the foyer.

“Stupid hicks… can’t make any good choices…” and then something about a swimming pool.

I stood on the little balcony of the second floor that overlooked the foyer. Daisy was digging around in a large duffel bag, still muttering about how someone was a loser.

“Hello,” I said. Daisy looked up and made eye contact with me. She smiled.

“Good morning!” she said, obviously in a brighter mood. I walked down the final staircase and met up with her. She planted a kiss on my forehead, and I felt my face go red.

“What have you accomplished this morning?” I asked her.

“Ah,” she said, seemingly getting agitated again. “Well, the people out in the Subcon want to have a museum built. Of course, nobody wants to pay for it. That little town doesn’t have many imports… they just wanted me to sign a contract, anyway…”

“Who’s going to pay for it?” I asked, getting the hint that the contract had gone through.

“Only the richest man in the kingdom,” she said, smirking and patting my head. These gestures hinted that it was someone I knew. And boy, did I.

“Waluigi?” I asked. “But isn’t he really stingy with his money? He wouldn’t just donate a couple million!”

“His parents live on that side of the kingdom,” she explained casually. “He does a lot of things for them.”

“I see, “I said quietly.

“So!” Daisy chirped, perking back up again. “We’re getting our royal outfits today! I can’t wait. Is the designer here?”

“Yeah,” I said, pointing my thumb at the second floor. “She said she was going to go look around the castle a little.” Daisy chuckled a bit. “Yes… fascinating place, isn’t it?” she said sarcastically.

“I’m still getting used to it,” I said. “There are rooms I haven’t been in yet, I’m sure.” Daisy snickered again.

“Well, okay, we better go find her. I know her well enough… I think I know where to look.”

“Okay…” I started, but Daisy was already out of the foyer. She didn’t realize it, but she walked very fast. I followed her to the third floor hallway, where sure enough, Lauren was gaping at Daisy’s Harry Potter collection. Daisy liked Harry Potter a lot. Probably because there are people in it named Lily and Petunia… she named one of our cats and one of our dogs after them.

“This is incredible!” Lauren whispered to Daisy. “How do you get all of this stuff?”

“Ah, if you wail juuuuuuuust enough,” Daisy joked, “You can get anything you want.” Lauren beamed.

“I’ve got to try that sometime,” she said. She picked up a little plastic doll of Scabbers getting his head chewed off by Crookshanks. “I like this one a lot,” she commented. Noticing that I was standing behind them, she turned her attention from the little wizard dolls and cards and pulled a notebook out of nowhere.

“Okay, then… I’ll get the blueprints out.” She slapped a few pages on the table. “Fill these out,” she said. I grabbed one form, Daisy the other, and looked it over. It was a form that asked for our sizes and such. Of course it would be. I got a pen from the vase on the table.

First question asked for my name. Mario, Luigi, I wrote.

Second for shirt size on a scale of small to extra large. I circled medium.

Third asked for my pants size. 34, I wrote.

The form asked for the rest of things such as shoe size and hat size. I finished my form much earlier than Daisy did. Apparently, they wanted more information from her… Cup size? Hah, hah.

I folded my form up and handed it to Lauren, who said, “That was fast! Now, let’s look at our options for you.” she opened the notebook and flipped to a yellow tab.

“Now…” she started. “I know your signature color is green.”

“Of course,” I said, with a quick glance at my shirt sleeve.

“So, I assume that you’ll want some green in your clothes?”

“Whatever works.”

“Okay…” She flipped a few more pages. “And you can also shoot lightning out of your palms?”

“Yeah,” I laughed, and shot a spark out of my index finger.

“Very nice,” she said, eyes following the spark. Thunderbrand, right? I’m a master of the Firebrand. Anyway, so I’ll put that as some sort of token on there somewhere. And you’re Catholic?”

“Yeah,” I said.

“Good, good,” she said, scribbling something on an index card. She started mumbling quietly to herself, I could hardly understand her. But I did catch the words “Black shoes,” “metal” and “cape.”

“Daisy, you finished?” she asked. Obviously, she was done with me.

“Just a sec…” Daisy said, and set her pen down. “Yep.”

“Good,” Lauren said, taking the form from her. “Now, you like yellow and orange?”

“Yeah,” Daisy said. “Do I have the option to have pants instead?”

“You can have a shorter skirt…” Lauren started. “See, I was planning on giving you a large sash, and the slacks wouldn’t hook right…”

“Short skirt.” I pleaded in my mind. “Say short skirt…”

“Well, I’ll go with the short skirt, then.”

Woohoo!

“Okay, better for a tomboy anyway…” Lauren said, scribbling more on her index card. “You want boots or high heels with that?”

“Boots,” she responded. “Can you make them tall?”

“Of course,” Lauren said. “That’s all I need. You’ll get your outfits this evening.”

“Today?” I asked. “Gee, that seems quite fast…”

“Well, for the royals of Sarasaland, we put those on the top of the to-do list.” Lauren said, smiling. “See you guys later!” she took a quick bow, and left.

“Well,” Daisy said. “What do you want to do now?”

But the doorbell rang. I could see through the stained glass windows, that there Lauren was, with two large boxes.

“No way…” I whispered. “She left five seconds ago!”

“That girl must be sort of a psychic,” Daisy said, amazed, as Weston answered the door and let her in.

Maybe she was a psychic, though. I mean, everything was hinting that…!

“Daisy, do yo-“

But she had already bounded downstairs, and was scribbling something on a clipboard.

“Come here!” she shouted to me. “Get your box!”

But she changed her mind quickly, and ran upstairs with my package. She stuffed it at me, and ran with hers down to her room.

After taking a second to catch my breath, (since it had been whacked out of me by this rather heavy box,) I went to the bathroom to change. Once there, I opened the box, put on the robes inside, and was amazed by what I saw.

The entire outfit was made of silk. It was a deep blue with a silver collar and stripe that reached all the way down to my waist, and ended at the metal lightning bolts attached to the top of my pants, which were also blue silk. A cape that reached down almost to the floor was attached to my shoulders by gold medals, and a small silver cross hung from my collar. At the bottom of the box was a tiny golden crown. I stared at myself in the full-length mirror. I’m not the modest type, but I have to say, I looked pretty good.

I stepped out of the bathroom and crashed into Daisy.

“Sorry…” I began, but was immediately taken breathless. She looked so amazing! Her costume was all orange and yellow, like she asked, with her trademark flower charm stuck here and there. It was also made up of a ruffled miniskirt, and the top was almost like a leotard. Flower petals (or what looked like them) hung off her shoulders, and a gold band was around her neck. Her white boots reached up almost to the skirt, and the white gloves only to her wrist. The same golden crown that I wore rested in her hair.

“Wow,” was all that I could muster to say. But she seemed to be gaping at me, too.

“You look so cool!” she finally squealed. “This is awesome!”

“I’m glad you like it!” I said. “What do we do now?”

“Change back, I suppose.” Daisy said. “We’re supposed to save these for after the induction.”

“Oh… okay.” I said, and turned back to go into the bathroom. I changed back into my normal clothes and went back down to the second floor. Lauren was still there, scribbling something on a notepad in front of Daisy.

“There you are, Luigi,” she said to me. “I was looking for you.”

“You were?” I asked blandly. “What for?”

Lauren grabbed my wrist and slapped a gold band on it.

“W…what’s this?” I asked, starting to get a little nervous.

“Oh, nothing. It’s just… see this mark?” she pointed to a little etching on the band that I didn’t recognize. “It’s a…” she looked around suspiciously… “Boo mark.”

“Boos?” I asked, feeling sweat drip on my face.

“Oh, yes. I heard all about your haunted mansion ordeal. See, this band attracts Boos… they love the charmed gold. I would like to see you capture some of them.”

“WHAAAAT?” I shrieked. “You can’t… you can’t do that! I don’t have a Poltergust or…”

But I couldn’t talk anymore. All I could see was a white light. A funny blue light was bursting out of the gold band and making its way up my arm. But as the light traveled up my arm, my clothes were changing…

My normal gloves turned to shiny white silk, and as the light made its way up my arm, my sleeve turned blue. This all happened rather fast, the light made its way to my neck, and then made its way down…

I recognized what was happening to my clothes. These were my king’s robes. But why was I wearing them?

Finally, I felt my hat shrink into a small, gold crown. The white light clouding my vision was gone, and I could see the room again. Daisy was amazed and whispered, “Ooh, impressive”, but Lauren was beaming.

“All right!” she cheered. “It worked!”

“Hey, what’s going on here?” I asked, getting more confused by the second. I hated it when people had planned things to happen to me that I didn’t know about.

“See, that band…” Lauren said, “It’s no Boo-attracter.” She snickered. “Actually, it’s programmed to check your pulse. When you get too nervous or scared, and your pulse gets rapid, the band reacts, and automatically changes you into those clothes. You look more intimidating to predators, etc. Bit of a defense mechanism, if you will.”

“Oh,” I said, completely relaxed. “I get it. That’s pretty cool. But how do I change back?”

“Take the band off,” Lauren said casually. “You’ll still be able to change into your actual robes when you normally get dressed, this is sort of a portable version.”

I clicked the band off my wrist, and sure enough, was immediately flashed into my normal clothes. Except, my hat was on the table.

“Okay,” Lauren said, “I’m done here. I believe this is yours?” she picked up my hat, but it immediately burst into flame.

“AUUGGHH!!” I screamed. The band on my wrist turned hot, there was a flash of light, my king costume was back.

Lauren was laughing. “You’re a little too high-strung, sir,” she said. My hat wasn’t in her hands anymore.

“You-“ I panted. “You toasted it!”

“No,” she said. “Don’t worry. Once you take that band off and return to normal, your hat will be restored.” she snickered. “Well, best be going. Bye!” she zoomed out of the hall and I heard the castle door slam. But before I could say anything, the doorbell rang again.

“Ugh,” I said, taking the band off of my wrist, which returned me to normal, and clicking it back on. “What now?”

After a second of waiting, Weston approached Daisy and me. He seemed a little paler than usual.

“We’ve got a problem,” he said slowly. “In the Mushroom Kingdom.”

I laughed on the inside, but made sure that outside I looked serious. It wasn’t too hard to guess what most likely happened. Daisy snapped me back into reality by grabbing my arm.

“Come on,” she said. “Let’s go investigate.”

I followed her to the foyer, and once there, was surprised into shock when I saw both Peach and Mario standing there.

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