"It's been a while." Sean mumbled. He was already a couple . . . several . . . a dozen or so hits into his vodka bottle when he curled up on the couch and turned on his Wii. It had been a few years since the last time he'd played Super Mario Bros. 3 but he still had a lot of pleasant memories from his youth tied up in the game. It brought a smile to his face to reminisce about when he used to disconnect the Nintendo from the television so he could take a break or go to school without his parents turning the system off. He had to remember to be careful and place a controller or something where it would block the red light that would have given the fact that he left it on over night or while he was away at school. Sean remembered the first time he'd seen that angry sun glaring down at him angrily and instantly knew that this was about to get really bad really fast and the first time he'd seen a mega goomba. "We'll nobody should be bothering me until Monday or so, that should be plenty of time to rip through this."
There was no real way of telling how long passed between when Sean settled in to play Mario and when he woke up but when he did he was more than a little annoyed. "You've got to be fucking kidding me." Sean stood up and took a look around, everything was massive at least twice the size that it should have been and ridiculously bright. It reminded him of when Dorothy stepped out of her house into Oz only he didn't remember her eyes stringing from the super saturated Technicolor landscape that was about to blind Sean. "I'd ask where I am but I have a feeling that I really don't want to know."
Sean didn't really have any doubts about where he was but it was completely confirmed when a walking brown mushroom with a mouth full of fangs caught sight of him and started waddling incredibly quickly towards him. "Oh fuck me!" In the games goombas weren't even a threat much less intimidating. Of course Sean had never really noticed that goombas were a little big bigger than Mario until he was face to face with the ferocious fungus. He had enough time to spin on his heels and run headlong into a wall, twenty maybe thirty feet tall. With his back against the wall Sean looked around for anything, he didn't have the first clue what he was going to a six foot tall and probably as big around mushroom. It might as well have been a mouth with legs hungrily waddling towards him. The idea of punching it exited his mind must as quickly as it had entered, especially when he decided he could simply run around it. Football had never really been his sport of choice but he did have enough moves to juke a waddling mushroom. A short sprint brought him to an obstacle every bit as impassible as the thirty foot wall, a chasm at least as far across as the wall was tall. "That's not even fair." Sean mumbled glancing over his shoulder. The goomba didn't seem to have caught on just yet but there was no where to go. The ground he was standing on seemed to be some kind of floating island, there were lots of them and a castle off in the stance with a flag. "At least I know where to go."
Sean slumped his head slightly and looked around hoping there was something he'd missed. This wasn't the first, second or twentieth time that he'd found himself stuck in a video game. It never ceased to annoy him and each time he swore no more vodka and video games. He could usually break the rules a little. The waist high walls that stopped the heroes were trivial; he could and would waste a rocket launcher opening doors instead of trekking all across creation for a red crescent key. Here though, here his human limitations seemed to be actual limitations. He couldn't jump that high or that far and there wasn't a tree or bridge or anything. "What am I supp. . ." Sean trailed off. Just a few feet away there was a golden box with question marks scrolling around it like a marquee. "Booyakasha." Sean hissed and rushed towards the box ramming his shoulder into it as hard as he could manage.
Just like he expected the lights on the box went dim and out popped an enormous egg covered in white spots. "Wasn't I playing. . ." Sean couldn't help but roll his eyes. He'd accepted a while back that apparently these video games were at least in part influenced by how he remembered them and that occasionally lead to some ridiculous mix ups. This was at least a pleasant surprise.
The egg shook violently for a moment and then dark blue dinosaur emerged wearing a pair of oversized triangular shades. "Yo, wassup?"
"Yoshi?" Sean tilted his head slightly. The fact that there was a roughly twelve foot talking dinosaur in front of him wasn't really any odder than the enormous fanged fungus that was once again angrily waddling toward him. The glasses, deep voice and attitude however were.
"Listen here tool, don't act like a fool. I'm not a punk like Yoshi, the name's Boshi!" Boshi leapt down off the box and walked over to Sean taking a closer look. Sean was acutely aware that this Boshi could easily swallow him whole. The main thing that was keeping him from running was the fact that he didn't have anywhere to run and even he did he probably couldn't outrun the dinosaur anyway.
"Okay. Since you aren't going to kill me I don't suppose you can you know, get rid of that goomba and then maybe explain to me what the fuck is goin' on here?" Sean pointed.
The dinosaur looked where Sean was pointing and an unsettling smirk crossed its lips. "Of course I'll handle that and save your ass but you need to understand I won't take no sass!" Boshi's impossibly long tongue shot out and stuck to the goomba and swallowed it in a single gulp. "Now on this sitch you should ruminate but in a minute I'll just illuminate the reality. Now the Mario Brothers of world wide fame got beat until they were laid lame. So-"
"Dear God enough. No more rhyming or rapping. What do I need to do to get out of here?" Somehow Sean kept himself from trembling when he stared up at the dinosaur.
"Save the princess." Boshi lowered his head. "C'mon the castle isn't far!" Boshi moved forward flipping Sean into the saddle on his back.
Riding on the dinosaur back wasn't nearly as pleasant as it looked in the games. It was like riding a horse only bumpier and with the jolts associated with twenty foot leaps. Sean was more than happy when the two of them approached the castle. Sean climbed down off Boshi's back and rested one hand on the blue dinosaur's shoulder. "You wait here. I'll either be back with a princess or I'll be dead. Either way with you out here someone will be left to carry on the fight or whatever." Sean tilted his head until it cracked. Behind his shades Boshi rolled his eyes but he didn't say anything. Sean took a single step towards the castle and drawbridge came crashing down missing him by just a few feet. "I guess I'm expected."
The castle was dark, only lit by the ominous glow of the many lava pits and the occasional torches. The games never really made a point of how suffocatingly hot the insides of these castles were but it wasn't wasted at all on Sean. The only reason he didn't turn back is it was nothing compared with the hell he'd gone through in Left 4 Dead years ago and since then he'd been to places that made Left 4 Dead look like a walk in the park.
And this was the first time he'd been able to fly. The fact that all he needed to fly was a blood red cape felt absurd but Sean had stopped doubting the power of the various magic totems of this world. If touching a flower could let him spit fire and dressing up like a raccoon could let him turn into a statue for a few minutes (and be used as a cudgel by his "friend" Boshi) he wasn't going to question why a cape would let him take flight. He did know he wasn't interested at all in touching that bubbling lava. Sean ran as fast as he could and took a leap of faith off the edge. For a moment he wondered what would happen to him if Boshi had been lying about the cape letting him fly. The dinosaur had sure found it funny to tell him that those enormous caterpillars didn't mind if you tried to ride on their backs. (They minded. They minded a lot and some of them spontaneously changed into angry butterflies) That thought left his mind though when he felt the air whooshing past his face realized he wasn't plummeting to his doom. Far from it he was soaring and beneath him Koopas were staring up at him hurling curses.
"Ha!" Sean laughed triumphantly. He'd regret it when he didn't notice one of the Koopas was larger than all the others. Larger even than he was and with a bright red mane on top of it's head. That one wasn't simply spitting slurs. It was spitting fire and one slammed into Sean's chest destroying the cape and sending him plummeting to the ground.
"Bwa ha ha ha. One more of the plumbers from Eagleland!" The massive lizard roared. "You won't make any difference. Not to me Bowser the King of all Koopas! I'll give you one chance to give up and leave human." Bowser sneered.
"You'll give me a chance to leave?" Sean canted his head slightly. "Allow me to make a counter offer. You give me Princess Peach and I don't dine on turtle soup." Sean reached behind his back and pulled a spare fire flower out. His overalls inverted from black on red to red on black. "Never mind. I'm kinda hungry."
Bowser didn't seem impressed with the cocky human standing before him. Just impress enough to inhale deeply preparing to roast the human. Sean pulled both his hands together forming an orb of flame between his palms and focusing on it. It quickly doubled in size, and then doubled again. Bowser's chest expanded and then he vomited up a wall of flames. Sean didn't flinch; he braced himself and threw his own plume of fire. For a moment the two blasts battled back and forth and then Sean shouted at the top of his lungs and took a step forward overpowering the lizard. "That wasn't so bad." Sean smirked at the smoke cloud.
"You're right it wasn't." A deep gravely voice replied. Sean's eyes widened. He should have known it wouldn't be that easy. The smoke hadn't cleared yet when Bowser leapt straight up out of the smoke. There was only enough time for Sean to realize what was happening before the enormous lizard came crashing down on his head hard enough to shatter the top layer of bricks beneath him. "Just like the plumbers."
The world blurred for a moment and Sean swore he felt something inside him snap. There was no need for him check his overalls. He knew that last hit had been enough to sent hi back to his Super form, he was just thankful he wasn't plain old Sean just yet. Bowser intended to rectify that by leaping up into the air intending to land on Sean again.
Sean barely scrambled out of the way of the thunderous lizard as he smashed through another layer of bricks. Beneath that Sean could see the glow of a lava pit. "God this better work." Sean thought aloud and ran towards Bowser. He ducked beneath a fireball and then leapt into the air and aimed his knees between the King of Koopa's horns. He could see that his gamble had paid off when Bowser's eyes widened. Then he heard the bricks supporting them crack then give way. Sean just had the wherewithal to grab onto the remaining bricks in time to keep from falling into the pit with Bowser. Sean groaned and pulled himself back up onto the platform rolling over to look down at Bowser. "You're fucking kidding." He pulled his head safely out of the way in time to avoid a fireball. Much to Sean's shock Bowser was alive and pissed off. It was going to take him a while to climb free of the pit but he looked like a man chest high mud. Inconvenienced and uncomfortable but that was about it. "Least that explains why the son of a bitch keeps coming back."
