The tale of one

The main hall of SMG4’s castle was bathed in the warm, golden glow of a lazy Saturday afternoon. It was a rare moment of tranquility—a vacuum of silence that felt almost alien to the residents. Usually, the air would be thick with the smell of scorched pasta, the sound of incoherent screaming, or the impact of a heavy Italian body crashing through a drywall.

Mario was gone. He had mentioned something about a "top-secret spaghetti clearance sale" three kingdoms over, and for once, nobody had questioned the logic. They simply enjoyed the peace.

SMG4 was slumped on the far end of the velvet sofa, his laptop closed for once. Beside him, Tari was focused on her handheld console, the soft clicks of the buttons the only rhythmic sound in the room. Bob and Fishy Boopkins were arguing in hushed tones about whether anime girls could legally run for office, while Saiko leaned against the wall, idly tuning her guitar. Meggy was tossing a Splat-ball into the air and catching it, her eyes half-closed in a rare state of relaxation.

Luigi, however, sat stiffly on the edge of a recliner. He was nursing a cup of tea, his eyes darting toward the massive, high-tech television screen that dominated the room. He felt a strange, prickly sensation on the back of his neck—the kind of dread that usually preceded a ghost encounter.

"Man," SMG4 sighed, stretching his arms behind his head. "I love the guy, but I didn't realize how much my ears hurt until Mario left the building. My internal monologue is actually at a reasonable volume for once."

"It is pretty chill," Meggy agreed, catching the ball with a soft *thwack*. "I think we all needed a 'No-Mario' day. Even the castle feels... sturdier."

Suddenly, the television screen flickered. A sharp burst of static hissed through the speakers, making Tari jump and drop her console.

"Whoa! What was that?" Tari squeaked, reaching down to retrieve her device.

The screen didn't show the usual colorful splash screen or the castle’s security feed. Instead, it faded into a grainy, washed-out video. The quality was poor, reminiscent of an old VHS tape found in a basement.

Luigi’s tea cup rattled against its saucer. His face went pale, a ghostly white that rivaled his brother’s favorite power-up. He knew this footage. He hadn't seen it in decades, but the flickering shadows were burned into the back of his eyelids. He wanted to reach for the remote, to smash the screen, to do anything to stop what was coming—but his muscles were locked in a cold, paralyzing fear.

On the screen, a small figure appeared. It was a toddler, barely old enough to walk, wearing oversized red overalls and a cap that fell over his eyes. He was sitting on a cold, wooden floor, playing with a cracked wooden block.

"Is that... Mario?" Melony asked, tilting her head. She had been dozing on the floor, but the sudden shift in energy had woken her. "He looks so small."

"Aww, look at his little mustache!" Boopkins cooed. "He was actually kind of cute before he started eating trash."

The lightheartedness in the room died instantly.

A shadow fell over the small Mario in the video. It was huge, towering, and jagged. Then, a voice erupted from the speakers. It wasn't the high-pitched, jovial "Wahoo!" they were used to. It was a deep, guttural roar—a voice like grinding stones and thunder.

"GET UP!" the voice screamed.

The little Mario flinched so violently he fell backward. He scrambled to find his footing, his tiny hands shaking.

"I TOLD YOU TO FINISH THE CHORES! YOU ARE A DISGRACE TO THIS FAMILY NAME!"

The screen shook as if the person filming was trembling. A large, gloved hand entered the frame, grabbing the child by the collar of his shirt and hoisting him into the air. Little Mario’s legs kicked uselessly in the air.

Then came the screams.

They weren't the "Mama Mia" screams of a man falling off a cliff or getting hit by a blue shell. These were the raw, piercing shrieks of a terrified child in genuine, agonizing pain. The sound of a heavy belt snapping against fabric and skin echoed through the castle’s high-tech speakers, punctuated by the booming, hateful insults of a father who saw his son as nothing more than a burden.

"Stop it," Tari whispered, her hands flying to her mouth. Her robotic eye flickered rapidly, processing the data but failing to comprehend the cruelty. "Please, turn it off."

SMG4 scrambled for the remote, his thumb jamming the power button repeatedly. "It’s not working! It’s bypassed the system!"

The video jumped forward. Mario was older now, perhaps seven or eight. He was sitting in a dark corner, his face bruised, his eyes fixed on a singular bowl of cold, watery soup. He didn't look at the camera. He didn't look at anything. The vibrant, chaotic spark they all knew—the madness that defined him—was nowhere to be found. Instead, there was a hollow, haunting emptiness.

"He... he never told me," Meggy said, her voice trembling. She stood up, her hands clenched into fists. "He never said anything about this."

"He doesn't remember most of it," Luigi whispered, his voice cracking. Everyone turned to look at him. The green-clad plumber was shaking, tears streaming down his face. "He pushed it all down. He made himself... the way he is... so he wouldn't have to feel that anymore."

The screen shifted again, a montage of years passing in a blur of gray. Every clip was the same: Mario being pushed, Mario being screamed at, Mario being told he was worthless, stupid, and a failure. They saw him trying to smile for a photo, only to be shoved aside by a large hand. They saw the light in his blue eyes slowly dimming, replaced by a thousand-yard stare that looked through the world rather than at it.

The final image was of a teenage Mario sitting alone on a curb, clutching a small, dirty plush mushroom. He looked up at the camera, and for a split second, the audience saw a flicker of the man he would become—not the hero, not the goofball, but a broken boy wondering why the world hated him so much.

The screen went black.

The silence that followed was suffocating. It wasn't the peaceful silence from earlier; it was a heavy, stagnant air that felt like it was crushing the lungs of everyone in the room.

Melony was the first to break. She let out a jagged, sobbing breath, her head buried in her hands. "That’s not fair," she wailed. "He’s so nice to everyone! Why would they do that to him?"

Bob, usually the first to make a joke or a snide comment, remained uncharacteristically still. His glowing eyes were fixed on the dark screen. He looked down at his blades, then back at the TV. "That... that was messed up. Even for me."

Saiko had gripped the neck of her guitar so hard that the wood groaned. "I want to kill him," she hissed, her eyes glowing with a dangerous, murderous light. "I want to find whoever that voice belonged to and erase him from existence."

Meggy didn't say anything. she just stared at the spot where the little Mario had been screaming. She thought about every time she had yelled at him for being an idiot. Every time she had lost her temper because he had ruined a training session or messed up a plan. She thought about the "stupid" look he often had on his face, and realized with a sickening jolt that it wasn't just stupidity. It was a shield.

"He’s always so happy," Tari sobbed, wiping her eyes with her sleeve. "He spends every day making us laugh, or getting into trouble, or... or just being Mario. How can he be like that after... after that?"

"Because if he stops being 'Mario', the memories come back," Luigi said softly. He had stood up and was looking out the window toward the horizon. "He chose to be the light because he spent so long in the dark. He’s not an idiot, guys. He’s just... tired of being sad."

SMG4 looked at his laptop, then at the empty sofa where Mario usually sat eating pizza and making a mess. He felt a profound sense of guilt wash over him. He was the one who usually documented their adventures. He was the one who often used Mario as the butt of the joke for his videos. He realized he had never truly looked at his best friend—not really.

"We have to do something," Boopkins said, his voice small and watery. "We can't just act like we didn't see that."

"What can we do?" Saiko asked, her voice harsh with emotion. "It’s the past. We can't go back and punch his dad in the face, as much as I want to."

"We can be there for him now," Meggy said, her voice regaining some of its strength, though it was still thick with tears. "We don't tell him we saw this. If Luigi is right, he doesn't want us to know. But we stop treating him like he’s just a nuisance. We treat him like... like he’s our brother. Because he is."

The sound of the castle’s front doors creaking open echoed through the hall. Everyone froze.

"IT’S-A ME! THE KING OF SPAGHETTI HAS RETURNED!"

Mario marched into the room, his arms full of several steaming boxes of discount pasta. He was humming a jaunty, nonsensical tune, his belly bouncing with every step. He looked exactly the same as he always did—covered in a bit of sauce, a wide, vacant grin on his face, and eyes that seemed to be looking at two different things at once.

"Hey, why are you guys all sitting in the dark?" Mario asked, pausing in the middle of the room. He blinked, looking at the tear-stained faces of his friends. "Did someone die? Is it Bowser? Can I have his stuff?"

Melony didn't wait. She lunged forward, wrapping her arms around Mario’s waist in a crushing hug.

"Whoa! Melony! You’re getting sleepy-juice on my shirt!" Mario exclaimed, though he didn't pull away.

Then, one by one, the others moved. Tari joined the hug, sobbing quietly into his shoulder. Boopkins grabbed his leg. SMG4 walked over and placed a firm, trembling hand on Mario’s shoulder. Even Saiko walked over and gave him a brief, awkward pat on the head, her expression softening for the briefest of moments.

Meggy stood in front of him, her eyes red. She looked at him—really looked at him—and saw the small boy from the video hidden behind the mustache and the bravado.

"Hey, Red," she whispered.

"Uh... hey, Meggy," Mario said, his grin faltering slightly. A flicker of confusion passed through his eyes—a moment of lucidity that suggested, just for a second, that he knew exactly why they were acting this way. But then, it was gone, replaced by the familiar mask of chaos. "Is this a cult? Are we doing a cult thing? Because I didn't bring my robes."

"No, Mario," SMG4 said, his voice thick. "We just... we missed you today."

Mario blinked, then let out a loud, boisterous laugh that filled the room, chasing away the last of the cold shadows.

"Of course you did! I’m the superstar! Now, who wants to see how much ravioli I can fit in my nose?"

As Mario began to enthusiastically demonstrate his "talent," the group slowly began to laugh—not at him, but with a desperate, protective kind of joy. Luigi stayed back for a moment, watching his brother. He saw the way Mario’s hand trembled slightly as he opened a pasta box, a tiny tremor that no one else would notice.

Luigi wiped his eyes and stepped forward, joining the circle of friends. The video was over, and the past was a ghost, but as long as they were here, the screams of the little boy in the red hat would stay buried where they belonged—silenced by the love of the family he had built for himself.