A surprise gift

“You got a Grimoire Fantasia of your own, right?” Mario asked, “Write down an encounter you’d think I’d like in it and don’t tell me what it is.”

“You want a sex goddess to write you a surprise sexual encounter as an apology?” Vide mulled it over, “How do you know I just won’t go wild with it, hm?”

“Because it’s gonna be something that I’d like,” Mario reminded her, “Not something that you’d like. Otherwise, it wouldn’t count as an apology, now would it?”

“Sometimes I wonder if you’re too clever for your own good,” Vide smirked as she cracked open her Tome and opened it to a bookmarked page. A floating bottle of ink and a quill appeared nearby as though from thin air, “Hmm, I wonder what kind of entry I should make?”

She then cocked her head as though she were listening to a voice only she could hear and a smile slowly spread across her face, “That’s perfect!” She then scribbled an entry into her Tome, punctuating it with a jab of her quill when she announced that she was finished.

“Your gift’s waiting at the Castle,” Vidyhyne told Mario, “Don’t keep her waiting!”

Mario let out a short laugh as he turned down the street to start heading in that direction, “This should be good.”

As Mario made his way back to the castle, he noticed that the streets were a lot less occupied than they normally would be during this time of day. But when he saw the gathered throng of people at the gates to the castle, Mario understood. They were all excited for whatever announcements that Peach was going to make today. Not everyone in the crowd was happy, though. Mario spotted several older Mushroom people arguing over the previous days events with members of the younger crowd. The last holdouts of the conservative faction, Mario supposed. With some of the changes to the Kingdom that Peach had gone over with Mario and Toadsworth, and then Mario again, they would either be even more upset by the Banquet’s end or they would just have to accept that they weren’t the opinion that was in power anymore.

Vide, in the meantime, entertained herself by touching them and getting their bodies worked up. It must be nice, Mario thought, to be able to mess with people like that and them not realizing what’s being done to them. If Mario had that kind of power… it was probably for the best that he didn’t. The Tome of Fantasies was already corrupting his moral compass, if he had license to freely **** anyone with no repercussions, that would definitely be crossing one bridge too far.

Mario made his way to the gate, cutting ahead of the line. The guard was about to wave him through when a voice cut out above the noise of the crowd. Mario turned around, someone was calling his name, and the voice was awfully familiar. It didn’t take much searching to find the source: Mario could see Luigi’s green ball cap bobbing above the crowd. There were several multi-colored figures flying behind him that Mario recognized as the Pixls.

“Hey, hey, hey!” said another familiar voice. Mario recognized it as the voice of the bomb pixl, Boomer, “Make room here! If you don’t, I’ll explode! Don’t believe me, well then lemme show you! SSS-BOOM!!!”

In reaction to the voice, Toads removed themselves from Luigi’s path, some of them even diving for cover. Most of them looked pretty sheepish when an explosion wasn’t actually forthcoming. Mario could see Luigi clearly now, though, riding on another Pixl known as Carrie as she hovered just inches off the bumpy ground while the yellow pentagon Pixl Dashell sped them both along with his speed boost powers. Luigi was carrying something else, as well. Mario recognized it as Tiptron’s birdcage. The titular Pixl herself, however was riding on the brim of Luigi’s cap. Meanwhile, Luigi’s pet ghost dog, the Polterpup bonded along just behind them tongue lolled out in apparent joy.

Carrie came to a stop just short of Mario, the inertia nearly sending Luigi hurling forward, but he managed to recover just in time. Polterpup ran in circles around the brothers, evidently thinking that it was play time. Perhaps reading the mood, one of pixls picked up a nearby ball and floated off someplace to distract the dog with a game of fetch.

“Mario!” Luigi shouted in relief, “I finally caught up to you!” He hopped down from Carrie, who resumed her normal form of an emerald polyhedron map of a cube with wings. She and Dashell hung lower in the air as they normally would. Probably tired out from rushing over to the castle. The green-clad plumber grasped Mario’s shoulder and sighed, “Bro, I’m sorry for not believing you last night.”

“It’s okay, Luigi,” Mario shook his head, “If you had told me that you and Princess Daisy suddenly hooked up out of the blue, I probably wouldn’t believe you either.”

“That’s fair,” Luigi sighed, straightening up to his full height, a whole head taller than Mario.

“Come on,” Mario said, turning around to enter the Palace Grounds, “There’s other things that I need to tell you about before the Banquet starts.” Once they were free of the crowd, Mario continued, “I thought I’d tell you this now to avoid you being surprised later.”

“What’s that?” Luigi asked.

“Princess Peach is giving me her hand in marriage,” Mario told him, “And to avoid the other Kingdoms raising a fuss about it, she’s making the two of us Princes. As of last night, Marioland is a vassal state of the Mushroom Kingdom.”

“I, uh, what?” Luigi stammered and Mario had to resist the urge to laugh. He’d imagine that he’d have the same reaction in his shoes, so he couldn’t rag on his bro too much. “That’s, um… That’s a lot to take in,” Luigi finally replied as the Pixls floating around his head erupted into celebratory whoops and cries of congratulations.

Tiptron fluttered to Mario, “Congratulations, Master Mario. Or should I be calling you Prince Mario, now?”

“I’d rather if you just drop the titles altogether, Tip,” Mario replied with a sigh, “But if I had to pick one, Master is fine.”

“Preferences set, Master Mario,” Tiptron replied in her typical robotic monotone.

Mario sighed again. Honestly, he didn’t know what he was expecting. He turned back to his brother, “I would also be honored if you would serve the role of Best Man at the wedding.”

Luigi stopped and pointed to himself, “Me? But bro, I…. I ruin everything I touch. I can’t even rescue a Princess without royally screwing something up. I’d just bring the wedding down.”

“Nonsense,” Mario clapped him on the back, “I can’t imagine anyone else as my Best Man. You’re always going to be my number one choice.”

“…Thanks, bro, but…,” Luigi seemed to be battling with some dark emotions in his mind, “Can I have some time to think about it?”

Mario swallowed a sigh. He honestly expected this sort of reaction. His tall younger brother had a long road ahead of him to recover his lost confidence. So Mario instead smiled warmly at his brother and replied with, “Of course.”

“Hey, Mario,” a Pixl floated over to him. This one resembled a floating red-orange hand with blue fingers. This one’s name was Thoreau, and he was the second Pixl that joined Mario during his adventures in Flipside, “Me and the other Pixls were talking, and we were wondering if we could move into the castle with you. The cottage is great and all, but it’s kind of cramped for all twelve of us. Moving into Toadstool Castle would be a great way for us to stretch our wings, if you get what I’m saying.”

Mario rubbed his chin, “I’ll have to see what Peach says about it, but I don’t see any reason why she’d refuse.”

The Pixls cheered, and Mario tried to curb their expectations by saying that his words weren’t a guarantee, but they weren’t listening. Vidyhyne flew over and saw the Pixls dancing with amused interest, “Did I miss something?”

Mario didn’t answer, given that he was around other people at the moment and he suspected the question was rhetorical anyways.

“…Master Mario,” Tiptron said, “When you have a moment, I would like to speak with you in private.”

Mario looked sidelong at the rainbow-hued butterfly drone perched on his shoulder. What could she possibly have to talk to him about?