By Mario Fan
Chapter Four: Beyond the Vista Sea
And what is light and shadow shall pass away by both water and flame, lightning and thunder. The Golden City of coming history shall be drained by the flood of a Plitian Charybdis and the influence of the Executioner. What fire, then, can stay the spread of madness? Validia…
1. Uliania, Tropacine Isles
A young Pianta named Taber waddled up the stone walkway to the thatched-roof farmhouse of his best friend on the island. Exotic flowers imported from the other landmasses in the Tropacine archipelago mixed colorfully with indigenous varieties to either side of the path and up from rectangular pots positioned on the cottage’s windowsills. The dawn had just risen over the pastoral valley community, and all was peaceful except for a bit of strange mail Taber was charged with delivering to his neighbor.
“Alec!” he shouted and knocked on the front door loudly. “Alec, it’s me, Taber! You’ve got some mail, and it’s pretty important, ok?”
The frenetic adolescent stood on the ends of his large feet and peered desperately into one of the windows. It did not appear that anyone was home. “By the Sun Sprites! Where could he have gone this early in the morning?”
“Stop your shouting, young one,” called an aged voice from around the house. An elder Pianta walked out of the fruit orchards stretching to the east, carefully prodding the soil with his cane. “Alec left a couple of hours ago for a trip through the forests beyond the boundaries of his land. Something about a shooting star falling there… Nonsense, if you ask me!”
“A shooting star?” Taber asked excitedly. “Wow! Nothing interesting ever happens around here. At least now I’ve got an excuse to tag along.”
“Don’t you even think about it, Taber. Those woods are no place for that darned Koopa fool, let alone a growing Pianta. We’re meant to live under the sun, with fruit and cool water. It’s just not natural, and why, when I was boy, we never—”
“I promise to be careful, Grandpa,” pleaded the young boy. “Besides, I’ve got to deliver this letter right away. Mr. Haberow said it was very important!”
“You’re not going, Taber, and that’s final. Now that your parents are gone, I’ve been charged with looking after you, and I know from experience that the forests, if anything, have grown more dangerous over the years.” He sat down on a rotted stump with a grumble of fatigue. “I have heard screams from the edge of that place that I’ve never dreamed of in my deepest nightmares. Something evil is festering in there, something older than Uliania itself. It’s our job to keep out and try not to stir it up.”
The young Pianta’s eyes sparkled mysteriously for an instant, but he soon drooped in disappointment. “Ok, Grandpa, if you say so. I won’t go in. Can I at least wait here until he gets back, though?”
“I suppose so, but if he’s not back by tomorrow morning, I want you to come on home and let me know,” said the old man. “I’ll go to the altar later today and ask the Sun Sprites to intercede on his part for the Star Spirits. Maybe they’ll convince them to watch over him and deliver him back to us safely.”
Taber waved farewell to his guardian as he left down the dirt road towards the town square. Every morning the elders of the village would gather at the courthouse and discuss local events and their farming endeavors. It was the epitome of a placid existence, and no one ever thought that it might be broken.
As soon as his grandfather was well out of view, Taber strolled around to the back of the house and entered through the rear door, which Alec always left unlocked. The early morning fire the Koopa had undoubtedly started was beginning to dissipate, sending its last thin layer of charcoal against the dusty brick of the chimney base. Even the half-washed pots and pans from Alec’s dinner lay scattered around the sink, covered in grimy filth and soap bubbles. Whatever had happened, it was urgent enough to warrant an immediate departure.
Now, Taber thought, I have to go and find him. Grandpa’s just worried, that’s all. If he doesn’t want to accept that I’m almost an adult, then that’s ok, but I can’t let it stop me from helping Alec out.
Resolved to strike out across the orchards against his guardian’s wishes, the Pianta stepped over a few foreign pieces of furniture to the practice mat where Alec often showed him how to execute fighting and defense maneuvers he had learned while traveling abroad. There he found his heavy, linear cudgel, a weapon that the Pianta were renowned for being skilled at. He wielded it calmly, swinging it back and forth in devastating sweeps and jabbing upwards to the front and rear of his central focus point, letting all of the precise combat knowledge Alec had imparted to him flow through his mind and body.
“I’m more than ready for this,” Taber said confidently.
He equipped a strapped carrying sheath for the cudgel and shoved it in resolutely. Then, with his chest thrown forward and his head full of heroic thoughts, he ventured out into the open air and through the first few trees of the fruit orchards. The sweet scents of apples, pears, and grapes flooded his awareness, and it was many a time that he took a short break just to open one of the crops and further the size of his breakfast.
All in all, however, the orchard was fairly small, so it was not even noon when he reached a vast clearing separating the terminate of Alec’s property from the brush and towering trees of the forest. Taking a deep gulp, he started through the long grass, passing by several clear ponds and inadvertently scaring off animals that had rarely seen sentient life forms. It was only then that he realized how far removed from the village and his own house he was becoming.
I can’t let a little darkness frighten me! thought Taber angrily. Alec most likely needs my help, and if he went through it ok, then so can I.
He entered the forest with his eyes partially closed, his fists tightly clenched, and his legs trembling in a way that betrayed any semblance of courage he was hoping to convey. Just to assure himself, he pulled out his cudgel and held it defensively to one side. Branches and brittle leaves deadened by the lack of sunlight and water crunched underneath, and the echoes built up all around him due to the relatively enclosed environment. Most strangely, he thought he heard something breathing—a rough rasp or growl that increased and decreased in uneven intervals.
“Hello?” he called, immediately regretting the unwise outburst. Get a grip, Taber! Don’t do anything stupid, ok?
The breathing had stopped, or at least tapered out of his hearing range, and the silence of the unknown poured in around him. It was the final fear of a mind racing with thoughts of the primordial prey, of the mice that shrieks as it is carried way by an owl’s silhouette through the thickness of the night air. He felt himself began to perspire, and he could no longer control the relentlessness with which his damp hands clenched around the base of his club.
Despite it all, though, he went on, slowly at first, measuring each step with the bareness of a strand of hair, but then hurrying, dashing through dense underbrush and weaving in and out of oak rows. He stopped after awhile, his lungs no longer full of the air needed to sustain his flight, and slouched heavily against a tree trunk, breathing deeply. It was then, though, that he heard the same breath, lower and more menacing, as he had sensed near the edge of the forest. Closer this time, it filled him with a paralyzing fear, and he crouched low to the ground with his cudgel held tight against his chest.
It’s nothing, he told himself over and over again. Just stop it! Stop it!
His thoughts ceased, too, when, from out behind a wide tree off to his left, appeared the massive head of a red-eyed, black-furred wolf and its two-clawed forepaws. Taber instinctively ducked lower to the ground, but the resulting noise caught the beast’s attention, and its head swiftly turned towards where he was hiding. It crept along the ground, now failing utterly to conceal its hideous growl.
Oh! Don’t see me! pleaded Taber. Go away!
The monstrous carnivore, however, need not have seen the young Pianta. It could smell him with its keen muzzle and hear every vibration that his body made just by remaining alive. That was the essence of this ultimate killer, this supreme purveyor of cold death and exact vengeance against anything that challenged its ancestral dominance. The grounding of the earth and the dew on the very leaves of the shielding canopy fed strength into its muscles and mechanical mindset, releasing it to its morbid task as a fateful blast of inevitability.
Rearing back on its well-developed hindlegs, the creature leapt into the air, fangs bared, claws outstretched, and body wracked by the urge to tear into flesh and bone. Taber shot up and braced his cudgel laterally before his face, cringing and suddenly giving way as four claws tore into each of his broad shoulders. Screaming, the Pianta felt his eyes flash open, and he shouted more loudly into the snapping, salivating mouth of the beast that was now barking viciously and chewing on the dense length of his weapon. He attempted to roll to the left, but the strands of muscle in his shoulders were deeply and painfully entangled with the monster’s claws.
Barely able to maintain his thoughts, Taber released his grip on the club, and all of the reserved force slammed violently across the wolf’s head, causing it to lift up and back, finally snapping the staff in two splintered halves. While the beast was disoriented from the blow, the young boy staggered to his feet and wavered weakly towards a nearby tree. His arms were so numb with pain that he only heard a slight buzzing as he used them to slowly climb his way up the bark, and after what seemed like several minutes, he came to a thin branch and fell heavily over it. The wolf, meanwhile, was pacing wrathfully below, kicking up dust and bits of dead leaves as it sprinted back and forth in a delirious bloodlust.
This isn’t real, he told himself, shivering as forks of searing pain crept through to his consciousness. It was like it was waiting for me, just sitting there at the edge of the forest.
When he peered back down to where the beast was, he only saw a ravaged cluster of mud dampened by his own blood and the wolf’s saliva, with crumpled veins of vegetation strewn among the mix. All but his own breathing and the ceaseless buzzing that had begun ever since his shoulders were pierced was siphoned of its sound, so when the wind and the rain started, the rustling branches and twigs shattered everything with their whispering malice. Now was the luminescent tongue of lightning, now the soft report of distant thunder. A modest silhouette and swinging lantern approached from the east.
It was a cloaked, elderly Noki, he saw, rare in the Pianta-dominated Uliania. Taber tried to call out, but he underestimated the last of his strength and toppled out of the tree, smashing against the pliant forest floor and into darkness.
~*~*~*~
He woke to the clink of a metallic stirrer scraping the inside of a coffee cup. Flames crackled, splitting wood in a chimney that was glowing, and the bubbling chorus of boiling stew served as a pleasant compliment. The old Noki appeared over him and squinted its tiny eyes, effecting a short grin.
“Awake, are we?” he asked. “Lucky I found you. Without cleaning, those wounds might have been the death of you.”
“Huh?” Taber asked. “I mean, who are you?”
“I used to have a name, but the forest has stolen it, along with everything else I was known for,” the Noki said, reminiscing. “Funny how someone you once were has so tenuous of a hold on you. All of our existences are held only by a thin thread of recognition. If nobody knows us, then how do we know we’re really us?”
“I’m sorry, sir,” said Taber, “but I got lost in the woods, and a wolf attacked me. Is it…”
“Still raining?” finished the Noki. “Why, yes, I’m afraid. Quite a pouring out there. Soup, will you?”
“Oh, yes, thank you,” said the Pianta eagerly, taking the proffered bowl. He quickly lapped it up, abandoning the wooden spoon that was also provided. “It’s great!”
“You’ll find that all the things one is left with in seclusion becomes one very well, after several years,” said the old man with a smile. “There’s more, thanks to the bounty of the woods. They always seem to be growing further outward… Hard to tell, since I’ve always been right in the middle. Odd, though, that they’d grow evenly on all sides. Almost as if my old bones are radiating some sort of life yet, eh?”
Taber nodded uncomfortably and sipped at a mug of coffee the old gentleman had provided while musing over his circumstance. “How long have you lived out here, sir?”
“Too many years, I think,” he said, looking up from disturbing the stew’s surface. “Never can tell, actually, but I begin to feel something like death creeping over me. Too bad, I can never go back to the villages. All the Noki have left for their underwater cities, anyway. A Koopa that came through earlier told me our capital was hidden and thought by many an old myth.”
“A Koopa?!” Taber shouted, sitting up. “Alec was here?”
“You know him, do you? Well, he wasn’t here, but I passed him on my way to bumping into you. He might be through to the other side by now if… well, if that wolf didn’t get him first.”
Taber stood over the side of the bed, trying not to show the pain in his arms. “I have to go and find him. Do you know a safe way through the woods?”
“Well, yes, there is a path behind my house, but it’s still raining, and the night is here. You’d do better to wait until morning.”
“Well, yeah, I guess so,” Taber said reluctantly. “If it’s not too much of an inconvenience.”
“None at all, young sir,” the old man said as the Pianta drifted off to sleep. “You can stay here tomorrow, too, in fact, and the next day, and maybe, just maybe, forever.”
His eyes sparkled unnaturally, and the
flash of new lightning shed a brief darkness on all but the roaring fire.
2. Lavalava Island
Kolorado woke up bright and early and strode into the midst of his expedition’s base camp on the steep side of Mt. Lavalava. The hired laborer Yoshis from the village in the valley were carting supplies from tents to the morning’s initiation point, and several of the assistants and fellow professors were synchronizing electronic gadgets and calibrating the equipment. Down by the spare river trickling through the campsite, water was being gathered in thermostatic skins to preserve at least some of the coolness while in the sweltering heat of the volcano.
The habitually brazen Koopa twirled one side of his prominent mustache and reached up, settling his hard hat. As he came to a stop, the two top aides beside him followed suit and ground roughly in the dirt behind him. He turned around extravagantly, fingering the hilt of his ceremonial saber. “A tip-top day for the beginning of our little expedition! Quite opportune, wot, wot?”
“Indeed, sir, it is. The barometric pressure seems to be—oof!”
The less talkative aide had jabbed his companion in the underbelly. “What he means to say, sir, is, quite so!”
“Well, then, I trust you chaps are ready, as well,” said Kolorado in his usual peppy, aristocratic voice. “Today’s expedition will be of monumental importance. I came here some time ago but was interrupted by the unexpected eruption of Mt. Lavalava. Why, yes, I did manage to come away with an artifact, yet, again, it only spawned further questions. These, in fact, were more urgent to my explorer’s curiosity! Until now, I know, you and all the rest have reckoned there is no connection between that treasure and my sudden wish to come back, but there is. That prime artifact was only a message, you see, a collective admonition determined by the contents of the treasure chest to not come any farther. I, however, do not fear such ancient hocus-pocus and am sure if we had dug just a bit deeper, the real prize would have been ours. It will be soon enough, though, so neither of your chaps worry.”
The senior apprentices Champlain and Krueger nodded cheerfully and fanned out to give the finishing orders for the debarkation term. “All an old curmudgeon like me needs is a set of ruins to explore and two loyal apprentices for soaking up exposition,” said Kolorado with a chuckle. “Now, then, back to a spot of breakfast.”
He walked easily over to his command tent and pulled back two heavy flaps, peering in and quickly glancing over a makeshift table and several plates of freshly cooked food. His personal aide-de-camp Henry was anxiously taking stock of their supplies and packing them tight into the carrying bags. All around him as he sat down were the sounds of loud orders from the military escort, especially the boisterous Colonel LaSalle, as well as clinking pots and pans, rustling ropes and bags, and countless other pieces of excessive equipment.
“You know, Henry,” said Kolorado, jabbing his fork into a thinly-cut sausage, “these meals are jolly good stuff. Perhaps you should have been a cook, eh? Of course! Yes, top-notch idea, I must say.”
The furiously occupied Goomba laughed nervously and went back to tossing articles of clothing into a khaki sack with his head. “I’ll be ready momentarily, sir. Should I fetch the carrier Yoshis?”
“Yes, yes, whatever you see fit.” The Koopa thoughtfully chewed on a scraping of scrambled Goonie egg. “By the way, have you heard anything from our meteorologist friend, the distinguished Mr. Hibbard? I’m hoping for smooth climbing all the way, naturally.”
“He seemed fairly confident of the weather conditions. Said something about a spot of rain, but I gathered it wasn’t anything to concern ourselves over. The jungle canopy on the way up would keep most of that off.”
“And the cosmologist, I suppose, has stopped complaining? I promised her we’d be at the top before nightfall, and that should please her if all else in the world wouldn’t!”
“Rather content so far, sir,” Henry muttered. He knew Kolorado was slightly old-fashioned, and the prospect of having a female professional, especially one that was keen on constantly offering suggestions, along on the possibly hazardous expedition still frustrated him.
“Mary’s an old bird, like me,” he said nostalgically. “We might have once had something going for us before she turned into a star-obsessed number cruncher. Mathematicians and their celestial charts—pah!”
“Indeed, sir,” said the faithful Goomba with a sigh. “Have you about finished your breakfast?”
“Almost, Henry,” Kolorado said, stabbing at a last bit of biscuit and gravy. “You know, I was thinking after we make it to the second pass of the mountain, we might have a few minutes to look over the miniature shrine, where we found that raven-jewel last time. Those Ravens know more than they’re letting on, I’ll wager. We should really have employed one of them as a guide.”
“I doubt if they aren’t willing to give their information for free,” Henry said, “that they’d be too cheery on relinquishing age-old secrets for cash, either. Besides, didn’t we conclude last time that their treetop villages don’t even have a currency?”
“Yes, now that you mention it, I do believe we pieced that out,” said the old Koopa, pushing his plates away and leafing through a journal replete with scratchy notes. “Odd little tribe they have up there. If they were not so talented with mechanical inventions and biological architecture, I’d think them uncivilized. Still, as far as their records go, Raven knowledge does not seem to extend beyond the emerald borders of the deep jungle. Legends of the volcano are probably immaterial to their society.”
“Perhaps,” said Henry, slightly more interested. “Well, I’m off to the initiation point. See you later, sir.”
“Yes, yes. See you then, Henry.”
Watching the Goomba leave, Kolorado quickly got up from his table and rummaged through his personal pack, which even Henry was not allowed to carry. From it he pulled a large, antiquated scroll, dusty and brittle with the strain of passing years. The private excavation near Land’s End paid off, old chap. Just another day, and we shall discover the greatest archeological find ever to be uncovered on this planet!
~*~*~*~
Two carrier Yoshis were complacently standing around when a jade-skinned friend of theirs trotted up, a heavy bag slung across his saddle. “We are preparing to depart,” he said in their native tongue, manipulating their species’ name articulately. “I’ve attempted to gather more information about their aims, but everyone is either kept in the dark or is being remarkably hush-hush about it. Any luck on your ends?”
“None so far, Ryok,” said his crimson-colored accomplice, Kino. “Whatever it is, they rightfully don’t trust us. Last time, that Koopa was too telling and way too wrapped up in our affairs. He’s wised up this go around, it would seem.”
“So we must wise up, as well,” said the slightly more brash firebrand Sulei. His orange scales flared brilliantly in the morning sun. “Now we are forced to follow them within the volcano on their egg-blasted mission, probably doomed to a ferocious Piranha Plant or a steaming river of magma. Intolerable, fool Koopas! We should have closed off this island long ago to all except the native Ravens. At least they know how to respect its secrets.”
Ryok rolled his eyes and laid a hand each on the shoulders of his companions. “Whatever the outcome, you’re correct, Sulei. It’s a necessity for us to follow them now. If nothing else, though, we cannot allow ourselves to lose sight of the purpose for this. We have to protect Lavalava at all costs, even if it comes to using brute force. No one will be murdered under any conditions, though. Understand that well. We shall not spill blood this day or any other beyond the shrine.”
“Agreed,” said Kino determinedly.
Sulei sighed in frustration, but eventually, and reluctantly, nodded his head in the affirmative. “Yeah, alright.”
They all parted and straightened considerably when one of the Koopas walked over, a light pack strapped over his shell. “Ok, fellows, we’re heading off. You all set and ready to ride?”
Ryok smiled in assurance, as they had all decided it in their best interest to pretend they were not able to speak the Koopas’ language. It was another reason the Island Elder had chosen them from a village Kolorado had not visited before. What the explorers did not know did not theoretically hurt them. At least, not in the foreseeable future.
So the thee Yoshis, with Sulei predictably dragging his feet, followed the Koopa into a rapidly moving line composed of about twenty workers, varied scientists, and archaeologists. Kolorado was somewhere near the front, they saw, pivoting his head excitedly around and taking in the primal air of the secluded jungle. Ahead of them loomed the rumbling Mt. Lavalava, rising like a fierce demon in the distance.
The ravens in the surrounding trees took to singing in their mystic voices as the expedition began climbing the winding trail toward the mountain’s base.
Le’ Valle’ Pusom carr, sey cal,
She’on, fare se mue le’con veir,
Ve on, ve seeg, ve shoon, le’mog!
Crystalline tones froze the wind and
dimness of the thickening canopies. “An omen,” Ryok informed his two comrades.
“They are advising us not to go any farther.”
5. On the Seas of Plit
Author’s Note: The two first scenes featuring the Jinx/Keb storyline happened chronologically before the Autumn Festival scenes in the very first chapter. That makes the events of this scene happen roughly at the same time as those of the Mushroom Kingdom’s flooding. Unless similarly noted, all subsequent scenes are occurring in about the same time frame, including the two presented above.
Two Days from Port
It appears I slightly underestimated the sufficiency of our supplies, or, rather, I underestimated the strength of Keb’s appetite. He has already consumed five times the amount of rations I allow myself, and I have attributed the voracity of his small frame to the comfortable living his father must make. Not a problem, really, as things are not exactly dire, and if they become so, a brief chastisement will be enough.
As to our activities, we have kept ourselves fairly busy with our own thoughts. Keb’s are, of course, a mystery to me, but I know my own have been devoted to the near certainty that our thieves have already reached the altar. I did not inform Keb, and probably will not anytime soon, but I was able to translate all of the scrolls. From this, I have ample reason to hope that the gates into the sacred place will not open to our prey unless the other three are opened. I just realize I have not told him of those either. Perhaps it is because the scrolls leading to them were never recovered by the old dojo masters. This seemingly impossible coincidence (the opening of all four simultaneously), however, is preordained by the prophecy of the scrolls, and so the hour of revelation may be sooner than I think.
There is one element of our plans that worries me, though. The scrolls gave no forthright indication of what terrible treasures lay and still lie beyond the gates, besides a few cryptic clues. Of them, my only guess is…
Keb approaches from up the stairs to my cabin. I shall find time to write more as it is allowed.
Jinx
Seven Days from Port
It has become increasingly clear to me that some divine intervention placed Keb as my journeying companion. I say this, unfortunately, not from any convincing evidence, but from the same unreliable premonition that so often lures sentient creatures into pain or impropriety rather than prosperity and pleasure. On the other hand, I am not one to lend myself to every fancy of the head, so it may be said that some truth, perhaps, simply eludes me. Whether for good or otherwise, though, this sprightly, remarkable young Goomba remains a passenger with me on our vessel, stranded at sea.
By my novice estimates and the scant understanding I’ve gained through celestial charts, we seem to be rounding the curb of the Mushroom Kingdom’s eastern coast. I have also noticed, to my disconcert, that Toad Town remains invisible to even the sighting range of our telescopes. Also, the land maps in our possession have the sea level too low, it would seem, when we compare the structural make-up of the cliffs running along the coastline. Though unrelated, there has been a rapid decrease in the former concentration of ominous-looking clouds, as well. (Forgive me for not mentioning them earlier; they wore too heavily on my mind.)
These events do not seem to be related, but they are peculiar, and considering the possible ramifications of the gates being opened, I find myself looking at every aspect of our voyage as having some hidden relevance.
Mentioning the oddities on paper brings the mysteries stronger to my thoughts. I must take time to consider them further.
Jinx
Eleven Days from Port
After considering the circumstances discussed briefly in the last entry for the past few days, I have reached several conclusions—none of which I feel comfortable writing down. For one, they could be far off the mark and thus useless, and secondly, worrying over them will do us no favor, as we can do little about them, even if they do turn out to contain some validity.
Anyway, Keb has become more silent and introspective than at the start of the journey. Reasonably, actually, remembering that we shall catch sight of Kooparian within a few days’ sailing. We shall of course be setting anchor in the ports of Sea Side, which, ironically, bears a name almost identical to that of the town we left. In administration, however, it is hardly similar. Princess Wendy rules over the region with iron claws, so the sailors say, and non-Koopas are treated harshly.
From there, it will be quick and stealthy bursts of traveling through hostile territories for a few days until we find secure transport. I’m sure a freelance pilot will be willing to fly us over to the Iced Land, where the location of the altar is concealed in the frozen mountain ranges.
I have already given my plan to Keb, and he hopefully appreciates the danger involved. In all likelihood, we shall be too late, and the chances of survival are just as dim, I’m afraid. Actually, the more I ponder our hopes, the more I wonder if I should have been completely honest with Keb from the start.
Jinx
A Fortnight from Port
Several trading ships and military escorts have already passed us by peacefully, and the harbors of Sea Side become more and more visible with each passing hour. Our long and thankfully uneventful journey is coming to a close. We may not be out of the fray yet, though. More unfriendly clouds are swarming over our heads, and it has begun to intermittently rain on the bare deck.
I hear thunder approaching. Keb is calling for me from starboard, but why is it so dark this early in the afternoon?
Jinx
The caped warrior vaulted from his disproportionate chair and rushed up the steps to the deck, his speed quickened and punctuated by a second call from the Goomba above. When he threw open the door at the top and stepped into the dark air, he nearly reeled as he saw a thick fog ring surrounding them completely. The sound of crashing waves and breaking thunder battered his ears, and they made him realize just how close they had been.
“I woke up, and all of this was here,” said Keb. “I’m sorry, I was only asleep for a few minutes. It just, just… what are we going to do?”
“Not panic, primarily,” said Jinx and began to secure the loose items sliding over the deck. “Start packing everything small enough into the cabins. Once you’re done, come back up with the fastening ropes. We have work to do, as we’ve probably been swept back out to sea a few miles… hrm?”
The Goomba looked up. “I didn’t say anything.”
Something deep and rumbling emanated faintly from under the ship, and the wind and air were still for a few scarce moments until it tapered off to nothing. A brief spark of heat lightning illuminated the backs of the clouds, and a large wave lapped against the portside. Jinx hurried to the edge of the boat and looked over into the densely clustered fog tendrils and murky waters.
“W-what was that?” asked Keb.
“Nothing beneficial, to be sure.” The small warrior paced uneasily along the railing, guiding his hands over the banisters and peering carefully into the depths. He then removed a smooth stone from his belt and dropped it into the ocean, reacting indifferently to the resounding plunk! Several dark bubbles soon crashed to the surface, as if the sea itself was boiling hot. “This is not good.”
Keb was going to open his mouth to inquire exactly what was not so favorable, but a more menacing groan from closer beneath them effectively paralyzed his tongue. Something large tapped the underside of the ship, and the pair steadied themselves as the deck suddenly shifted up on its left side, straining the woodwork.
“That can’t be what I think it is,” said Jinx to himself, hopelessly lost in his own thoughts. “Much too massive. It’s something else…”
“Jinx?” asked Keb, looking out to starboard. “Uh, Sensei?”
“I thought perhaps a Giant Blooper, but no tentacle could cause that much sonic momentum, no matter how record-breaking,” explained Jinx, again mostly to himself. “The prophecy? No…”
“Well,” said Keb between another two moans and rolling growls, “whatever it is, shouldn’t we, like, consider abandoning ship? If it’s as big as you say it is—”
“What is it, young one? You’re paling.”
“Look, Sensei! Something is breaking the surface of the water over there. I can… yes, I can see it clearly. It’s huge!”
Jinx rushed over to where Keb was and glanced keenly in the direction he was indicating. A dark, twisting silhouette was slowly arching from out the waves and descending powerfully from his sight. Immediately, a heavier sheet of constant rain swept over the deck and the two companions’ misted bodies, obscuring the atmosphere even further. The lightning was but a sharply reflected blanket of light, and the thunder grew like the strengthening heartbeat of some creeping malefaction.
“Perhaps he has left us in search for more appetizing prey,” said Jinx aloud, catching himself. “I mean, whatever it was. Again, much to large to be any beast that I know of. Unless, again… no, no, that is legend!”
“A new weapon of the Koopas, then?” asked Keb, nervously. “Why’s it heading back towards land?”
“I’m not sure that way’s land,” said Jinx. “We’ve gotten so turned around, in fact, that any way could be where we were headed. Until this fog clears out and the stars become visible once more, there’s little left for us to do.”
“That’s not so assuring. What if that thing were to return when we’re sleeping? It might sneak up on us unnoticed, until it’s too late.”
“We heard it even when it was deep below us,” said the warrior. “It’s far off, for now, anyway, and we should be safe until the morning—”
A mind-numbingly immense black tentacle shot through the center of the deck, tearing the meager ship in two splintered halves and sending its two passengers slamming through the cabin walls. Choking ink flooded through the wide gashes and rivulet cracks in the hull, pervading every crevice and exploding wood and the stone furnishings of the rooms. Two more of the soaring appendages burst through the water, shooting towering waves in all directions and sizzling the very air at which they grasped and sucked.
Jinx struggled onto a shred of wood, gasping for breath and rubbing the mammoth Blooper’s blinding ink from his face. “Keb!” he shouted, coughing up the black discharge. “Keb, where are you?!”
A blaring, trumpet-like roar that split the fabric of the sky and heavens blasted from the beak mouth and terrible presence of the monster, failing to be softened even by the water it was buried in. The eighteen final tentacles, shorter but no less thick and devastating, broke through the ocean and flailed about madly. They seemed to spin around, faster and faster, and at the rapidly forming nexus of the emerging downward spiral Jinx could see the snapping maw of the bloodthirsty predator. Keb was farther down, frightened beyond measure and stiffly clinging to a falling plank of debris.
“What demon of the Inferno are you?” whispered Jinx, building a sphere of light energy above his head. He was readying it to send down into the central cavity of whatever snapped and spat below him. Great pieces of their broken and battered ship whistled as they were flung by at the mercy of the horrifying cyclone. Both the lightning and thunder were now dangerously close and meshed together with the broiling clouds. Jinx persisted. “Speak, devil! Open your mouth and receive dark eternity!"
The beast roared and sent black flames licking all about the air, torturing the weight of the clouds and the wind. Jinx could no longer make out Keb’s small figure in the cataclysmic tempest. He did, however, know why the waters near Toad Town were higher. This creature, or whoever had gained control of it, had flooded the Mushroom Kingdom’s eastern coast. Suddenly, all the prophecies found at the Breaking Shrine did not seem so distant.
A single suction cup on one of the stretching tentacles swelled and pulled him in, altering the flow of matter with its colossal influence. He gasped, feeling the air in his lungs painfully rush out, and let loose the energy bomb as he fell into twilight.