Kalmar nodded weakly, fatigue setting in. He quickly made himself a small meal and threw the plates against a wall.

"Well, i'm off to bed," he said tiredly, opening a random dorr with relief at finding it devoid of enemy life as he passed out on the rather large bed.

"All right..." Matt said when everyone managed to squeeze inside, including the Toads. He hit the gas. "Let's go!"

The world screamed by.

"Too...fucking...FAST!" Hugo shouted, as they all were thrown into their seats as their car burned down the road.

"Fuckfuckfuckfuckfuckfuckfuckfuck!" Matt yelled, as he did his absolute best to control the car which seemed to be driving on his own.

Alasea was screaming as she pinned herself to R.D., her arms wrapped him tightly. He couldn't help but wrap his arms around her as well.

"Slow the fuck down!" R.D. yelled at Matt as the world became a blur outside.

The car lurched foward as it made a sudden, complete stop, and all present in the car smashed into airbags that deployed just before impact.

The aftermath felt like crap.

"Didanyonegetthetruckofthatlicenseplate?" Matt slurred, barely managing to open the car before tumbling out and landing on his face. Reeling, Mario and Luigi stumbled out, moving in haphazard circles in place.

Helena leaned her head on the bag, fighting to keep her lunch down. ...I never want shotgun again.

R.D. and Alasea stumbled out of the vehicle, with Alasea still clinging to the amnesiac teen and trembling. As several parts fell off of the transformed car, R.D. gave Matt a sour look.

"Don't you start..." Matt's pointing finger leaned to the left, and his star wasn't entirely focused either. "...with me."

When everyone had recovered, they faced the building they had stopped in front of-large and sophisicated, it stood proud, with a large sign above the doors. "Woohoo University?" Helena read. "Is this where Cackletta was headed?"

"Sure sounds like it," Matt remarked, looking over his glasses in determination and what he also thought to be a really nice way of looking at things. "Wonder if Peasley knows this is the place."

"Well, let's get this over with," R.D. said as he opened the doors and entered the building, drawing a Phase Blade.

Kite was examining his gunblades, There's something odd about that Kalmar fellow, i'm going to get to the bottom of it...

Blazen sat down with a sigh of relief against a wall. He leaned his head back against it, looking at the decade ceiling. He merely nodded as everyone spoke, too tired to know if it were to him or not. He hardly cared at the moment.

Blazen turned his head to the darkness outside, seeing and hearing the bats again. They returned for them, thinking them as a meal. Though the group fortunately made it, leaving the bats confused. They merely began flying around stupidly and harmlessly now.

Blazen's eyes began to close slowly, darkness of sleep taking him. He sighed as he put his head up to be more comfortable. He then hung his head and waited and waited. Finally the bliss of sleep came as he remained up against the wall, snoring loud enough to be heard by anyone within the main room.

==== Later ====

Kalmar awoke, and the first thing he noticed was soreness. Weariness seeped into his bones, but he reluctantly rose anyways. He looked around, trying to spot his companions. He saw Blazen, passed out against a wall in the main room, but he could not find Kite or Blane.

Blazen soon woke, disturbed by the light the sun gave from the window. He looked ahead of himself, blinking several times to relieve himself of sleep. He yawned slightly and stood up, stretching. He could feel some soreness, but too much refreshness to be bothered. He turned to the window seeing the sun shine over the ravages of Italy. He couldn't tell if that was a good sign or a bad one.

"Stay here and flag down Peasley if he comes by," Matt said to Hugo as he walked in.

"Just don't take too long," Hugo answered, as the Toads moved to stand near him.

The rest of the group ventured inside, walking through the dreary, deserted hallways-it certainly looked better on the outside. Only when they had turned a few corners did they notice bean people sprawled all across the floor, knocked unconcious. This senseless violence caused Mario to tighten his fist in determination, and caused Luigi to become ever more jittery, the green-shirted brother now glancing around nervously.

"So, I guess we just follow the bodies," R.D. muttered, looking at each unconscious bean person.

Meta was panting a little, not really tired by the fight but merely making their act seem a little more convincing, and she pulled it off quite well. She smiled a little shyly and answered: "I... my name is Meta. Princess Meta." She looked around at the others around her. "And... this is my... guard."

They did follow the bodies-the carnage became more and more dense as they went on. Finally, they stood before a set of thick double doors, the main draw of the large room they had walked into. "Looks like this is the main laboratory," Matt said after reading the sign above the doors. He turned toward the group. "Okay, here's the thing. Cackletta holds the aces right now, because she's probably trying to activate the Beanstar right now. We need to get Princess Peach outta there so she can't do that."

"I can do that," Helena offered.

Matt visibly hesitated, rubbing the back of his neck. "I dunno...I don't wanna freak Peach out." He gestured to Mario. "Have Mario go with you, okay?"

"Okay."

"Good." Matt pointed to the others. "Rest of y'all, we're gonna run interference while Helena does that, okay?"

With a slight squeeze of his hand, R.D. activated his Phase Blade.

"C'mon, Matt," Alasea said rather lightly, "This team is all about interference."

R.D. motioned towards the door. "After you," he said to Matt.

Edited by RisingDragon on January 22, 2007 at 20:44:42.

Matt slid his hands in his pockets. "Let's rock."

With a mighty "MUDAAA~!", he lashed out with his foot and smashed the double doors with one powerful kick, blowing them off the hinges. Inside they saw the laboratory, walls surrounded by various machines, the floor covered in strips of bolted-down metal. In the center, hovering in an energy field generated by the dome-like machine underneath, was the Beanstar-and strapped to the dome machine was none other than Princess Peach.

"Game over, Cackletta!" Matt shouted, pointing at her. "We're gonna put an end to this!"

"Pests!" Cackletta growled, bearing her pointed teeth. "And at the worst possible time!" She made a big gesture. "Fawful! Take care of them!"

"You will not make mincemeat out of the beautiful meat patty that is Cackletta's plan!" Fawful snapped, rising into the air via his headgear. Sections along the headgear opened up, and more fanged tentacles slithered out, brimming with green energy. "For you I am producing the big guns!"

He let loose with a brilliant emerald volley, littering the room with energy blasts. "Crap!" Matt shouted, tumbling to avoid the hail of attacks. "Take him out!" Luigi scrambled away in fear as Mario summoned the power of the Firebrand, weaving and lobbing his own fireballs to cancel Fawful's attacks whereever he could.

"C'mon, Helena!" Alasea said to the girl, "We've got to get the Princess to safety!"

R.D. shot forward as Mario covered them, and stopped a ways behind Fawful. He spun his blade in his hand and leapt up to Fawful's level.

"Game over, freak! Ryuuenjin!"

R.D. slashed upward as he passed Fawful, his Phase Blade swathed in flame.

Fawful was incredibly agile with that headgear, and so he swooped out of the way of R.D.'s Ryuuenjin. "Fire is not the mistress I am having!" He began launching volleys directly at Mario and R.D. now, Mario still trying to land an opening in the constant fire.

Matt gestured with both of his hands, and suddenly he held the tips of swords in his hands, five on each side. "Then suck on THIS!" He flung the first five swords at Fawful with such aim that they all flew at Fawful tip-first. However, the minion was fast enough to quickly rise above the wave of blades, and then to the side to dodge Matt's next volley.

With Alasea, Helena ran toward Princess Peach, only to stop when Cackletta suddenly appeared before them. "Just what do you think you're doing?" she demanded, her fingers crackling with purple electricity.

Helena grit her teeth as her fangs painfully came in. "Get Princess Peach loose!" she said to Alasea, then leapt with amazing velocity at Cackletta, the two flying across the room.

"Right!" Alasea said, running over to the machinery and started climbing and vaulting her way up towards Peach. Once she reached the Princess, she drew a short sword and started cutting away her bindings and helped the Princess down from the machinery.

"C'mon, we've got to get out of here!" she said to Peach.

R.D. dropped to the floor and created a barrier. She spotted Alasea freeing Peach, and shouted to get Mario's attention. "Go with them, I'll hold of this freak!"

And with that, he thrust his sword blade-first into the floor and threw a pair of plasma bursts at Fawful, then started rapid-firing his homing Annihilator Beams at Fawful.

"Okay!" Peach said.

Cackletta's eyes widened as the girl on top of her began to transform into a terrible scaled beast. "What the-?! Get off of me!" With a blast of lightning, Helena was sent flying right at Alasea, which was also bad timing as her wings unfurled, smacking away Mario as he was rushing in to help.

Matt reached behind his back, and pulled out two futuristic machine guns. Gritting his teeth, he held down the triggers, firing rapid bursts of lead at Fawful. In response Fawful soared around the room-it had become a virtual dogfight as he flew to avoid Matt and R.D.'s attacks, launching his own in reply.

Alasea shrieked and tackled Peach down to the ground, saving them both from being crushed by Helena's weight. Alasea got up into kneeling position, helping the princess up, and drew her weapons, stepping between Cackletta and Peach.

R.D. deactivated and sheathed his Phase Blade, then bounded forward and slammed his fist, which had ignited into the Godhand attack, into the ground, launching himself into the air straight at Fawful. He erected a barrier to protect himself from Matt's bullets. As he rocketed up towards Fawful, he lashed out with his blazing fist as he came within range at the flying freak.

Cackletta sneered smugly. "You stupid girl. You don't think you can defeat me with those, do you?" She raised her hand, and from the ceiling, bolts of lightning rained down.

R.D.'s blow hit home-as it smashed into Fawful's headgear, he was sent flying, temporarily out of control as he screeched. Matt grinned, and punched the air with a rising diagonal fist. "Fist of Gaia!" The floor exploded as a fist of rock shot forth, smacking right into Fawful.

With a shout Fawful slammed into the wall. "Ugh!" Even though his headgear was severely damaged, it still managed to operate, albeit badly. "You...YOU PEOPLE WITH HAIRS THAT MAKE YOU STUPID IN THE BRAIN!" he shouted. "I HAVE FURY!" A light on his headgear flashed, and it began to transform, metal flowing over Fawful and assembling itself into the general shape of a miniature UFO. The attacking tentacles rearranged themselves to flow from the sides of the UFO, and a thin red barrier suddenly flickered to life around the machine.

"I don't like where that's goin'," Matt muttered. "Damn it, where the hell is Luigi?!"

Alasea acted quickly, slashing the bolts repeatedly with Reverser Strikes. As each bolt was slashed, it somehow turned into light, powdery dirt that drifted to the floor.

"I'm thinking... yes," Alasea said smugly, then spun her short swords in a circle and pointed both at Cackletta, firing thin concentrated flame rays at the sorceress.

R.D. looked up at Fawful's ship. "I can still shoot you, you know!" he yelled, combining a pair of plasma bursts and throwing the massive orb of energy at the ship.

"Really." Meta said in reply to Ryan. "Well, it's nice to meet all of you, Kouken, Juno, Derek, Reckoning, Dokuro..." She gave each of them a slight nod. "Thank you for your assistance. We're really grateful for that." She took a deep breath and let out a sigh. "However... I am afraid I cannot accept further help from you. The danger is too grave." She turned around and walked over to Shujou. "We shall leave now." She told him, loud enough for the others to hear, but luckily, they couldn't see the wink she gave her ally. "We need to vanquish Xastra as soon as possible." She turned around again to face Kouken, Reckoning and the other three. "I cannot forgive him for what he has done to me, us, and everyone."

"The others may not notice it, but it doesn't take an idiot to figure out who and what you really are, Kalmar..." Kite said walking up behind him,"So tell me am I right?..."

Kalmar slowly turned, half-eaten sandwich in hand as he heard Kite's words. He calmly put the food back as his blood red eyes glinted in the morning light, "I am who I am, no more and no less. No man could expect more."

A small smirk appeared on his face as he turned, grabbing his sandwich as he began consuming it again.

Blazen looked to the two men who conversed. Blazen looked out to the outside again and wanted to be sure of how safe it was. His eyes darted back and forth through what he could see from the window. However that wasn't much. He turned back to Kalmar, one of the two men. "I'm gonna take a walk." He said, not caring if Kalmar heard or not.

Blazen walked out throwing the swinging door off its hindges. Blazen saw the reckage known as Italy before him, however no hostiles. Blazen took several more steps before seeing that all the man hole were closed again, but more windows were broken as glass scattered around the ground. Those demon bats did some damage going into the buildings for cover of the light. His lip twitched in thought as he continued forward.

As the flame rays struck Cackletta, the witch suddenly burst into a swarm of black bats, each with heads that looked like a miniature of her own. With an "Eh heh heh heh heh!" that hung in the air, the swarm attacked Alasea, biting and smacking into her whereever possible.

Meanwhile, Mario sat up, a hand to his woozy head. He took a quick survey of the scene before him-a swarm of bats was attacking Alasea, Cackletta was nowhere to be seen...what happened to Helena? He glanced to his left and saw something hunched over on all fours, and with an increasing realization that it was Helena completing her transformation, he quickly scampered away, deciding the best thing to do would be to find Luigi so they could work together.

The orb smaashed into Fawful's barrier and burst into rays that bounced at the walls. "Here I am laughing, for your attack is like a rock thrown at a dumb person who doesn't notice anything!" Fawful laughed, resuming the hail of green energy balls.

That barrier was going to be trouble...and Matt thought he knew how to take it out. "Keep him busy!" he shouted at R.D., as he reached into his sleeve.