By Pteryx
5
Four Medallians
Since their departure from Grass Land was fairly uneventful, we rejoin Lakitu and Tineeko in Desert Land. They had found one of the numerous oases and were planning to take a swim when all of a sudden, three red Troopas popped out of a pipe. They were arguing with each other about something.
"Quick! Hide!" Tineeko whispered. They ducked into a pipe near a palm tree. This one, however, wasn't a warp. It was likehiding in a big, deep, metal barrel.
"I saw we try to force them to rejoin our side!" said one.
"No, that traitor'll never come back to us. I think we should fry him with Mario and the Princess!" argued the second.
"Well, if I get my hands on him, I'd kill him right where he stood," said a third.
"I guess it doesn't really matter. King Koopadoes want him brought to him dead or alive." At this point, Lakitu was in a cold sweat, shaking, tempted to pull into his shell.
"This time, he won't be able to float away in his cloud, or even swim away, thanks to this." Tineeko peered out of the pipe since Lakitu was too scared to do so, and saw one of the turtles hoiding a strange medallion.
"Speggy!" one of the Troopas yelled at the one with the item. "King Koopa will have your head too if he finds out you took one of his water control medallions! It took him months to make each of them, and if you lose this one --"
"All right, Tebbri, I'll return it when we go home, okay?" Speggy interrupted.
"Oh, okay, okay," Tebbri said. "Let's just hope Iggy and Lemmy don't have trouble using the Flooding medallion, since this Evaporation one is the only way to get of the excess water."
"Oh, don't worry," said the other Koopa. "If they get in trouble, they'll stop the water in time to save themselves. They don'thave to stand on a question block to use it or get limited to one usage a week like us, since they're directly related to our King."
"I guess you're right, Ronnipu," said Tebbri. "Still, King Koopa would get pretty mad to find it missing. Why don't you go finda warp to the Valley? Then we could put it back now."
Ronnipu went in the direction of the pipe Lakitu and Tineeko were in. When he looked in, he saw them, but Lakitu snagged him with his fished pole and quickly reeled him in. Before he could call for help, Tineeko pounced on him, took his shell, and gagged him with his shirt. Lakitu then tied him up with a vine from the tree towering above them. Tineeko then tried the red shell on.
"How do I look?" he asked.
"I think they're be fooled." Lakitu replied. "Now, go and saw that this is a warp to the Valley of Bowser and that you'll put themedallion back." He gave him a boost, and he hopped out, looking similar enough to Ronnipu jumping out of a warp that it would have taken about fifteen seconds of examination to tell the difference.
Disguising his voice, Tineeko shouted, "Here's a warp home!"
"Oh, good!" said Tebbri. Let's go."
"Uh, why don't I take the medallion for you?" said Tineeko, getting her to stop just in time. "You people can stay at our post while I return it."
"Good idea! Here it is." Speggy handed over the precious ornament, and Tineeko jumped into the pipe.
"Here it is," he whispered to Lakitu.
"Great!" said Lakitu. "It's a good thing we stumbled upon this. The Koopas could have tortured people by drying up their water supplies with it -- or maybe worse -- if we hadn't."
"What do you think we should do with it, Lakitu?" inquired Tineeko.
"Just keep it in safe hands, I guess, unless we have to use it." Taking a good look at it, Lakitu observed that it was an ellipse roughly 4 inches by 6 inches, and about half an inch thick. Its face had a picture on it of the sun and some wavy lines that were probably meant to symbolize water vapor. It had a slightly raised rim on the front that bore the inscription, "Desert sun, magma hear, do your worst today." On the back was a picture of a shell.
[A picture of the medallion belongs here, and will be placed when I am able to scan it.]
"If only there was some way we could figure out how this thing works," Tineeko said regretfully.
"Maybe we shouldn't use it at all," Lakitu said. "It might not even work for the better good, since Bowser made it."
"Good idea. Let's just keep it unless we're forced to use it." After putting his own shell back on, Tineeko gave Lakitu a boost out of the pipe. Lakitu used the fishing pole to help Tineeko out. Unfortunately, they had forgotten about Speggy and Tebbri!
"Hey, there's Lakitu! After him!" The chase went on until Lakitu and Tineeko lost them by hiding behind a block formation.
"Now what?" asked Tineeko.
"Now," answered Lakitu, "we go forward."
They "went forward" for a long time, having more than their share of scrapes along the way. One time, they started to fall into a pit when they tried to jump onto a lift that seemed to be the only way up to a warp zone, but they were fortunate enough to find a magic balloon that made Lakitu inflate and float the two of them straight up to the pipe. Another time, they found themselves cornered by moles, but Lakitu took off his shell and threw it at the, bowling them all down. These were typical of the problems they faced every five minutes. They made it through Desert Land and Water Land, and within two days they were on the island on which Giant Land resided. After a day of hiking over mountains, through caves, and meeting Koopas and a few distrustful giant mushroom folk, they met up with a rather angry-looking giant cook.
"Aha! More Koopas! I'll teach you to kidnap Prince Hugo, you tiny turtle fiends!" Too terrified to attempt to explain, they bolted. She then raced after them, coming rather close to crushing one or the other of them with each step. Fortunately, their map showed a nearby warp that led to a part of Giant Land close to their goal, which they quickly found and used. After that incident, they walked for a while down a path. Then, they encountered something rather odd.
"Look, there's a castle up ahead!" exclaimed Tineeko in surprise.
"A castle?! But there's nothing on the map but this path!" Lakitu pointed out.
"Do you suppose the Koopas built it since they decided to invace?"
"If that's so, it can't be too strong a stronghold. Let's find a way in." Then, they suddenly heard a loud cry for help.
"Somebody help me! I'm in huge trouble! These two small turtles and their tiny followers lokced me in here! I'm oh, so verycramped! Someone, do be so kind as to help me!"
"Whou could be cramped in that place?" Tineeko wondered out loud.
"It must be Prince Hugo! We've got to save him!" Just then, Iggy, Lemmy, and some of the Sledge Brothers appeared!
"Look! It's Lakitu!" said Lemmy.
"Do you think we should use the Flooding medallion?" asked Iggy.
"Sure! Do you remember how to use it?"
"Yeah!" With that, Iggy pulled out a medallion similar to the one that Lakitu and Tineeko had taken, thrust it upwards, and shouted:
"Thunderstorms, tidal waves, come invade the land!"
With that, the amulet glowed a deep blue and show a blue bolt skyward and dark clouds began to appear and quickly grew. Lightning flashed, and they started to port water in sheets with a sudden clap of thunder. It begain to food the land within seconds, rising at a rate of about an inch every two seconds. Our two friends were shocked by the power of the large, magical, coinlike item. Lakitu gasped and shouted to Tineeko over the noise of the artificial storm:
"Help, Tineeko, I can't swim that well!" Indeed, he had rarelyneeded to swim before, so he was only good enough at it to do it for pleasure in calm lates. He had never imagined a situation like this! Meanwhile, Iggy and Lemmy were facingtheir own problems:
"The tower's washing away!" Iggy shouted.
"Well, duh! I knew we should have tried to find some cement instead of using mud!" Lemmy yelled.
"But King Dad said it had to be done in two days! We didn't have time!"
"Well, you should have told him that!"
"Me?! I'm not that stupid! You know how he is about orders!"
"Well, I wasn't about to go and face him!" And so on, and so forth. Soon, the water lifted everyone concered off the ground, washing away the Sledge Brothers. Tineeko helped Lakitu onto a block, and the two Koopa kids struggled onto another one. Iggy then yelled to Lemmy:
"Do you remember how to stop the effects?"
"Yeah, I think so." Taking the medallion and holding it upside-down in his hand, he closed his eyes, concentrated, and touched the shell picture on the back. As the strange device softy glowed, the wind died down and the rain began to let up. The clouds and the water, however, remained. Right about then, Tineeko, swimming with all his might in the powerful current caused by the water rushing towards the sea, manafed to get close enough to the tower to shout:
"Prince Hugo! The bricks are loose! Try to fight your way out!" In a burst of stones flying through the air, the giant ruler broke out of his little cell. One of the rocks hit Lemmy, who lost his grip on --
"The medallion!" Tineeko hastily swam over to the place where it had fallen in, dove, and resurfaced with it in his mitts. This one was similar to the one found before, but it had a picture of high water and a pouring rain cloud on the front along with a different inscription. Paddling as best as he could one-handed, he gave it to Lakitu.
[A picture of the medallion belongs here, and will be placed when I am able to scan it.]
"Have you still got the Evaporation medallion?"
"Yeah, right here, but --"
"Use it! Now!"
"But don't you remember what the Troopas said before?Unless you're directly related to Bowser, you have to be on a question block to make it work, and the only one I see is too high to jump onto!"
"Oh, is that all?" Prince Hugo suddenly butted in. "I can help you with that." He then lifted Lakitu up to a height from which he could access the block. Once atop it, he held it up and screamed the inscription:
"Desert sun, magma heat, do your worst today!"
The medallion then glowed red, shot a beam upwards, and the wind blew the clouds away, revealing an especially hot sun. The water began to boil, Tineeko and Prince Hugo sought refuge on blocks, and steam began to rise. The water evaporated away about half as quickly as it had come, and afrer a few minutes everybody in the area felt as if they had been in an industrial-strength steam bath. The question block Lakitu was on had been drained and was now just another block, and Lakitu, most probably from wielding the powerful amulet, was exhausted. He had just enough energy left to deactivate the magical device before he collapsed. Prince Hugo gently lifted him into his hand, brushed the two medallions onto his palm with him, and brought him down. As Tineeko walked over to him on the now normal-as-ever ground, Iggy and Lemmy began to sneak off. As they went, though, Tineeko heard them whispering about something.
"At least King Dad still has the medallions of Inversion and Fog," said Iggy.
"No, the Inversion one got lost somewhere, remember?" replied Lemmy.
"I hope he doesn't --" started Iggy.
"-- lose the last one," Lemmy completed. Since Tineeko and the Prince had to tend to Lakitu, they couldn't give chase. Afterthe two Koopa kids had long since disappeared over the horizon, Lakitu began to come out of his daze.
"ohhh... too powerful... Huh? What happened? Where are the Koopa kids? Did we defeat them? Did anyone drown?"
"You managed to reverse the flood, but the Koopas got away," Tineeko explained. "No one was actually hurt, but you fainted after using the medallion."
"Seems like it was made by Koopas, for Koopas, but still happens to work for me, good thing."
Prince Hugo then said, "I must go home. My subjects must think that I've been hurt by now. I'll be sure to put in a good word for you two." He then set out in the direction of his castle.
"Well, I guess now's as good a time as ever to find that warp to Yoshi's Island," Lakitu remarked. They walked for a little while, then found the pipe and used it just as the sun began to set.