Ludwig was concentrating so intensely that a bomb could have gone off behind him without his noticing. He had been hard at work in his room for the last day or so, and absolutely nothing would deter him from seeing the fruit of his labors. He was not reading from any instruction book or a recipe of any sort, oh no. An advanced scientist, he mixed various compounds he deemed would give him the result he desired.
He focused all of his energy, all of his being on one thing: his latest invention. This invention, actually a complex potion, was made of many rare substances of extremely exact proportions. With the precision of a brain surgeon, he began to measure the next liquid to be placed in the vial. Slowly, painstakingly, he emptied the measured ingredient into the vial, and an expression of triumph appeared on his face.
“Almost ready,” he said quietly.
Ludwig picked up a small bottle and placed it on the counter next to the vial containing the incomplete potion. He put his safety gloves on and opened the bottle, proceeding to measure out its contents in the same meticulous fashion he had with each of the other ingredients, syringe in hand. Though he really should have had those gloves on all along, he was confident enough in his abilities. He only put them on now as an extra precaution. Carefully applying the tiniest amount of pressure he could, a minimal amount of the chemical was sucked into the syringe. Placing the syringe over the vial, he muttered to himself.
“Just one drop at a time,” he said, using no more energy than absolutely necessary.
Suddenly, a loud knock at the door made Ludwig turn around. Shocked that he had been sidetracked, he turned his attention back to the potion. To his relief, he had not spilled any of the chemicals from the syringe. Knowing that the entire thing would be ruined if he did not time it right, he took a shaky breath and returned his focus on delivering the final few drops into the vial, doing his best to ignore the knocking at his door.
He was so intensely focused that he failed to notice the sound of his door opening. He remained unaware of everything except timing the addition of the droplets precisely, oblivious to the fact that someone had just entered his room. The intruder quietly crept up to him and tapped him gently on the shoulder.
Snapping out of his resolute trance, Ludwig whipped around instinctively. Horrified, he remembered what he was doing and turned back around before he could make out who was behind him. To his dismay, the momentary distraction had caused him to unintentionally empty the syringe entirely into the vial all at once. It began to bubble and foam. He groaned in frustration and smacked his head.
“Kooky?” asked a timid voice.
“WHAT?!” Ludwig snapped as he turned around again, ready to yell at whoever had just caused him to ruin his last few days’ work. For the first time he was able to recognize the intruder as Larry. Being the youngest of the Koopalings, Larry hadn’t recognized his obvious need for quiet.
“Clawdia told me to tell you that dinner was ready,” said Larry meekly.
Sighing, Ludwig felt his immediate anger drain out of him. Now that the need to concentrate was gone, he just felt tired from the exertion. “I’ll be right down,” he mumbled wearily. Larry left as quickly as possible.
Ludwig looked again at his potion, now ruined. It had bubbled right over the top and was fizzing viciously all over the counter. He cleaned the mess, leaving the vial and other equipment to be put away later, and retreated downstairs to the kitchen before anything else could go wrong.
***
Ludwig looked glum as he slowly ate his dinner. He didn’t know what he was eating, but was too preoccupied to really care. His potion was ruined and he was exhausted. He had planned on making a solution capable of rendering the Mario Brothers helpless, but once again another of his great ideas had been ruined before he could even test the final product. Of all the potential his great ideas had, only a small percentage of them ever seemed to work. It just wasn’t fair.
By the time Ludwig was done eating, he was more tired than ever. He decided he would put his equipment away and head straight to bed. He climbed the stairs and headed towards his room. He opened the door and stepped in, barely remembering in his drowsiness to shut the door behind him. All he could think of was making it to bed as he absentmindedly cleaned the counter of his tools.
He noticed the vial was still half full, but was too lethargic to really care. Taking it down the hall to the washroom, he promptly began to flush it down the toilet. A bit of the potion splashed on him. He didn’t even notice until he felt a burning pain in his right arm, the one he had been holding the potion with.
“Arrgh!” he yelled in a mixture of frustration and agony.
The vial shattered as it hit the ground; Ludwig had dropped it in his surprise. The liquid that was his ruined experiment began mysteriously spreading up his arm. Though he normally would have been intrigued at its rapid dispersal, the pain was suddenly the only thing on his mind. It was unbelievable, this pain. He knew he’d have to do something quickly, but was forced to stop for a moment as another searing jolt travelled up his arm.
He looked around desperately. Through blurred vision, he spotted the sink. Hastily, he stumbled towards it. As he groped for the faucet, a steady torrent of curses best left untold fell from his mouth. The pain almost seemed to infect his mind. Everything was becoming so confusing, so muddled, amidst the burning pain. He found himself gasping, not for air but out of pure agony.
After what seemed like an eternity, his hand finally connected with the handle. He struggled to turn it on, but his jerky movements were making it near impossible to do anything quickly. In his throbbing distortion, he only hoped that he’d found the tap containing cold water. Finally, the faucet handle turned.
To his infinite relief, the water was cold. He shuddered at first as the water connected with the wound, but the searing pain dissolved almost instantly. He let out a sigh of relief.
After a minute or so, Ludwig turned the tap off, nearly collapsing on the floor. As he leaned against the washroom counter, he looked down to inspect his arm. It seemed to be all right. The wound was not an open one, though he supposed he would have to treat himself for chemical burns. It definitely wasn’t totally all right; it still stung and hurt to move. Sort of like a sunburn, but on a way larger scale.
The adrenaline burst triggered by his temporary panic was wearing off. He was tired again, exhausted and hurting. He decided to leave it until morning. He was just too spent to do anything else that night.
“Maybe using that against the Marios would have been a wise course of action after all,” he muttered bitterly, rubbing his arm a little. This proved to be a mistake, and he cringed as the burn connected with his claw. Though part of him wondered if there would be any long-term effects to his arm, for the most part he was just too tired to care. As he lumbered down the hall towards his room, Lemmy rolled around the corner and nearly bumped into him.
“Oh!” he exclaimed, none to intelligently. “Ludwig, are you ok? I heard someone yell, and I came over to see if-”
“I’m fine, Lemmy,” Ludwig cut him off. “Just a minor accident involving a discarded potion.”
“That doesn’t look too minor,” Lemmy pointed out, noticing the shape Ludwig’s arm was in.
“Never mind that,” Ludwig said hurriedly, hiding his arm behind his back. He fought to suppress a grimace as it began to throb from the movement. “It’s none of your business in any case. I’m going to bed.”
Lemmy gave him a funny look, but rolled away anyhow. Yawning once again, Ludwig entered his room and collapsed on to his bed, grateful that the day was finally over. It was incredible; that amount of suffering had come from that one little spill. He tried to ignore the throbbing pain in his right arm as he drifted off in an uneasy sleep.
***
The next morning, Ludwig yawned as he woke up. Sitting upright, he stretched his arms out without thinking. Suddenly remembering what had happened the night before, he winced. But the pain didn’t come. No searing jolt up his arm, no stinging sensation, not even so much as a tingle of anything that remotely resembled pain. Surprised, he looked at his arm. It still looked frightful, but at least it didn’t hurt.
His first reaction was of relief. Pain was the last thing he wanted right then. But suspicion soon began to creep into his mind. What negative effects would those chemicals have on his scales, or more importantly, the skin underneath his scales? Scales were little more than hardened skin, but were indifferent to pain. This, he concluded, must mean that the potion’s corrosive ingredients had seeped farther down, under the scales.
And yet, if he had been in such pain last night, why didn’t it still hurt now? It still looked a mess. He gently prodded the burnt area with his claw. Nothing. In fact, he didn’t even feel the touch on his arm.
Shocked, Ludwig tried again, less gently this time. He braced himself for the inevitable sting. And yet, his arm didn’t not feel so much as the pressure of his hand touching it, let alone the pain that touching an unhealed chemical burn would normally cause. It was odd, to say the least. He went on to slapping his injured arm as hard as he could. No reaction at all, he couldn’t even feel the impact.
He clenched his right fist, flexed his arm. “Amazing,” he whispered to himself. His eyes were aglow with a certain sparkle they always had when he was exited. “Not even a muscle flexing is felt!”
Excited, he jumped out of bed. Running in to the hallway, he began to run downstairs. Midway down the staircase, he literally bumped in to Roy.
“Roy!” he exclaimed. He moved as if to continue down the staircase, when a thought struck him. He stopped.
“Excellent deduction, Sherlock,” Roy snarled. “Ya got any more scientific discoveries to announce, or can I go now?”
“Sorry,” Ludwig apologized quickly. “Roy, I have a huge favor to ask of you.”
“Oh yeah? Whaddya want? It had better be good, or you’ll be sorry.”
Ludwig showed Roy his arm, burned and scabbing from the chemical spill. Roy recoiled in disgust.
“So what, you smacked into me to show me what a freak you are?”
“Punch me,” said Ludwig. He wasn’t half as confident as he sounded, but he hid his uncertainty as best he could. “In the interest of medical science, I ask you to punch me right here.” He indicated his arm again, not even sure if he was totally right. If he was right, he just might have found a key weapon against the Mario Brothers. If not… He gulped.
For a moment, all Roy could do was stare. He looked at him suspiciously as he tried to absorb his older brother’s words. Was this some sort of trick? Perhaps King Dad was hiding somewhere, waiting to catch him in the act. Ludwig watched nervously as Roy stood there, seemingly weighing his options. Would one good wallop be worth a possible trip to the dungeon?
After what seemed like an eternity, the malevolent energy that was Roy’s violent nature seemed to have won the inward battle. A nasty grin spread across his face as he struck out, socking Ludwig in the arm for all he was worth. The blow knocked Ludwig to the ground and sent him tumbling down the staircase. Smirking a little at his latest accomplishment, he casually sauntered down the staircase to survey the damage. But to his astonishment, what he saw was unlike anything he’d ever have expected to see.
Ludwig had indeed taken the brunt of the blow. And yet, he was not moaning in agony, or even nursing his injured arm. His shell had taken the impact of the wall, and after crawling out of the large indent he nonchalantly got to his feet and began to walk off.
“I suggest you mend that,” Ludwig grinned happily, eyeing the huge dent. “If you don’t want to have to explain it King Dad, that is.”
Roy let out a whimper of disbelief and slowly backed away, hardly daring to believe it.
Minutes later, Ludwig burst through the door to Bowser’s throne room with a loud bang. He rushed in, nearly tripping over himself in his excitement.
“King Dad!” he shouted eagerly. He was too excited to stay in one spot, jumping up and down impatiently.
“Huh, Ludwig? What is it?”
“The most extraordinary thing has happened!”
“Yeah?” asked Bowser. It was then he caught sight of Ludwig’s burnt arm “What happened to your arm?”
“That’s just it! I spilled a ruined potion on my arm last night. When I woke up this morning, I discovered that the arm is now indifferent to pain!”
“Yeah, whatever,” said Bowser, suddenly losing interest.
“But it’s true!” stomped Ludwig. “Roy punched me in the arm, and I didn’t even feel it!”
Bowser didn’t answer, and clearly didn’t believe him. He waved his arm to indicate the door.
“Fine!” Ludwig muttered under his breath. “I’ll prove it to him.”
Retreating to his room again, he tried to recall each of the ingredients he had used in the potion the previous night. It took him only a few minutes, and soon he was working to recreate the potion. He stayed there for a long time, doing a few days’ work in merely a few hours. When he was finished he made sure to add a certain chemical to dull the pain caused upon use.
He was going to test in on himself, but he grimaced remembering what had happened before. It soon became apparent that he needed a guinea pig.
“But who?” he wondered to himself.
Not Roy. He shuddered as he imagined the resulting apocalypse. Not Larry either, he’d probably guess that there was a reason Ludwig didn’t want to use it himself. Getting an idea, he gathered the beaker and walked out into the hall.
“Iggy!” he called out, seeing him walking in the opposite direction. Iggy turned around. “Do you know the whereabouts of Morton?”
“He’s outside in the garden, talking to some of the plants,” Iggy snickered.
Sure enough, Ludwig found Morton outside standing the in the garden. He seemed to be reciting a speech to one of the Piranha Plants that was not yet old enough to fight. It covered its ears with its leaves, but dared not complain to one of Bowser’s kids.
“Morton!” called Ludwig. Morton stopped short and looked in his direction. The Piranha Plant gave a sigh of relief as Morton walked over to Ludwig.
“Hi, hello, hey, greetings, salutations!” answered Morton, happy to have someone else to talk to.
“Morton, I have a favor to ask of you,”
“Yeah? What do I get out this? Some kind of reward, prize, payment or incentive would be nice.”
Ludwig had planned on this, but it wasn’t going to be easy. “I… I will…” he found himself tripping over the words. “Listen to one of… your speeches.”
For once in his life, Morton didn’t know what to say. He certainly hadn’t expected to ever hear those words. Well, not from anyone who had met him before, in any case. Finally, he was able to choke out: “Sure!” without even asking what the favor was.
Even after Ludwig told him what the favor was, Morton was still willing to do it. Heck with willing, he was downright eager. So, Ludwig sat and listened to one of Morton’s speeches. It wasn’t too bad… except that it lasted all day. When it was finally over, Morton asked him what he thought of it.
“Astounding!” he responded automatically, snapping out of his coma. “You should really go into business.”
“You think?” asked Morton hopefully.
“Of course! But now it’s time for you to hold up your end of the deal.”
“Of course, certainly, no problem, yes!”
Still clutching the beaker, Ludwig carefully squeezed a drop of the liquid on Morton’s finger.
“It tingles,” noted Morton, too fascinated to think of any more verbs. He watched curiously as the strange substance glittered strangely and spread across his whole hand. Then it seeped under his scales and disappeared. “What’s happening?” he asked, seeming to expect something more.
“That’s it?” Ludwig peered at Morton’s hand. “It didn’t hurt?”
“No…” answered Morton slowly. “Was it supposed to?”
“No!” cried Ludwig elatedly. “Now, exert a minuscule amount of pressure to that hand.”
“Huh, what, pardon, excuse me?”
“Pinch it.”
“All right, if you say so,” answered Morton doubtfully. He pinched his hand lightly. To his surprise, he didn’t feel a thing. He told this to Ludwig, who began to jump up and down.
“Yessss!” he exulted. “I just may have discovered the ultimate weapon! Thank you so much!” And with that, he ran off, leaving behind one very confused Morton.
“Now, what was that all about?” he wondered, still staring at his hand. He turned his hand around, looking at it from all angles.
To Be Continued...
Rachelle Davison, 2001
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