Mario's charm

The sun—or whatever passed for a sun in the Mushroom Kingdom—shone brightly over SMG4’s brand new, suspiciously expensive-looking castle. Inside, the usual chaos was in full swing. SMG4 was hunched over a computer, screaming at a rendering error; Meggy was practicing her combat drills in the courtyard; and Tari was peacefully playing a handheld game on the sofa.

Then there was Mario.

Mario was currently attempting to see how many raw spaghetti noodles he could shove into his nose while balancing a plate of meatballs on his head. He was halfway to a personal record when the air in the center of the main hall began to ripple like a heat wave.

"Ooh, spicy air," Mario muttered, his crossed eyes focusing on the swirling violet energy manifesting inches from his boots.

"Mario, get away from that!" SMG4 yelled, finally looking up from his monitor. "I didn't pay the insurance for interdimensional rifts this month!"

It was too late. The purple vortex surged outward with the force of a vacuum cleaner on steroids. Mario let out a startled "Wahoo!" as his feet left the ground. Meggy lunged forward, grabbing his hand, and Bob tried to hook him with a blade, but the gravitational pull was absolute.

"Save the spaghetti!" Mario wailed, reaching out a desperate hand toward his fallen plate before he was sucked into the void. The portal snapped shut with a sound like a wet balloon popping, leaving the castle in a stunned, Mario-less silence.

Mario didn't fall so much as he tumbled through a kaleidoscope of screaming colors and binary code. When he finally hit solid ground, it wasn't the soft grass of the Mushroom Kingdom. It was cold. It was hard. And it smelled faintly of oil and old pennies.

"Oof! My nose-a," Mario groaned, sitting up and rubbing his face. He looked down and realized he wasn't sitting on the ground. He was perched atop a mountain of twisted metal, glowing visors, and severed mechanical limbs. "Mama mia... these are some weird-looking Toads."

He was on Copper-9, a frozen wasteland of a planet where the sky was a permanent shroud of winter and the skyscrapers were skeletons of a dead civilization. Mario, being Mario, didn't seem particularly bothered by the mountain of corpses. He simply stood up, dusted off his overalls, and pulled a stray mechanical finger out of his ear.

High above, perched on the rusted girders of a collapsed bridge, two figures watched him.

Serial Designation J narrowed her sensors, her yellow eyes flickering as she zoomed in on the red-clad intruder. Beside her, Serial Designation V leaned forward, her silver pigtails swaying, a predatory grin spreading across her face.

"What is that?" V whispered, her voice a mix of mechanical static and genuine curiosity. "It’s not a worker drone. It’s... squishy. But it’s not a human either. It’s too round."

"It’s an anomaly," J replied, her tone professional but her gaze lingering on the strange confidence with which the creature moved. "The Company didn't mention anything about red-hatted bipeds. We should neutralize it."

V didn't move to attack. She watched Mario slip on a patch of ice, perform a perfect accidental backflip, and land with a triumphant "Yippee!"

"I don't know, J," V purred, her tail flicking with a sudden, uncharacteristic interest. "There’s something... rugged about him. Look at that mustache. That’s a high-quality facial sub-routine right there."

J scoffed, but she didn't look away. There was an undeniable charm to the way the stranger seemed completely unfazed by the apocalypse surrounding him. "We’ll observe for now. See if he’s a threat."

Mario, meanwhile, had decided that since there were no signs of a kitchen, he would simply walk until he found one. He hummed a jaunty tune, kicking a stray drone head like a soccer ball as he trekked through the snow.

He hadn't gone far when a sharp *clack-chk* echoed through the frozen air.

"Halt! Don't move an inch, you... whatever you are!"

Mario stopped and blinked. Standing in front of him was a small female drone with purple hair and an oversized railgun leveled at his chest. Uzi Doorman was having a very stressful day, and a fat man in a red hat appearing out of nowhere was the final straw.

"Ooh, a toaster with a flashlight," Mario said, tilting his head.

"I am not a toaster!" Uzi snapped, her visor flashing a series of angry red hashtags. "I am a bringer of death! I am the—"

She stopped. Mario had stepped closer, not out of aggression, but because he saw his reflection in her visor and wanted to check if he had any spaghetti sauce on his chin. He was inches away from her, his large, soulful eyes looking directly into hers.

Up close, Uzi realized he didn't smell like oil. He smelled like... oregano? And sunshine? Her digital heart rate spiked. A faint purple blush blossomed across her visor. She had never seen anything so weirdly... bold.

Mario noticed the purple glow on her face and gave her a wide, toothy grin. He leaned in and gave her a slow, exaggerated wink.

"Don't-a worry, little toaster. Mario likes-a the spicy ones," he said, his voice a deep, buttery baritone.

Uzi froze. Her railgun lowered an inch, then two. "I... uh... what?"

Mario didn't wait for an answer. He hopped right past her, performing a little skip in the snow. "See ya later, alligator!"

Uzi stood there, her cooling fans kicking into high gear. She turned slowly, watching him walk away. "Wait! You can't just... you're gonna get killed out here! Hey! Red guy!"

She started following him, her movements jerky and embarrassed. She told herself she was just making sure he didn't lead the Disassembly Drones to the bunker, but the persistent blush on her screen suggested otherwise.

Mario led his accidental stalker through a graveyard of rusted cars until they reached a wide, open plaza. Suddenly, the wind picked up, and two streaks of silver light slammed into the ground ahead of them, kicking up a cloud of snow and frost.

As the mist cleared, J and V stood tall, their wings flared and their claws glinting in the cold light. J adjusted her tie, her yellow eyes locked onto Mario with a terrifying intensity. V was crouched low, her tongue darting out to lick a drop of oil off her finger, her gaze scanning Mario from his hat down to his sturdy brown boots.

"Well, well," V said, her voice dropping an octave. "Look what we caught wandering out in the open."

Uzi stepped up beside Mario, her railgun shaking slightly. "Back off, you psycho bots! He’s... he’s with me!"

J ignored Uzi entirely. She stepped toward Mario, her heels clicking on the icy pavement. She was a head taller than him, and she used that height to loom over him, her sensors performing a deep scan.

"You aren't on the manifest," J murmured, her voice smooth and dangerous. "But I have to admit, your construction is... intriguing. Such a high density of... biomass."

Mario looked up at J, then over at V, who was now circling him like a shark. He didn't look scared. He looked like he was deciding which one of them looked more like a pizza topping.

"Mama mia," Mario whispered, looking J up and down. "You girls are very shiny. Do you have-a any snacks?"

V let out a sharp, glitched laugh, moving in close enough that her wings brushed against Mario’s shoulder. "I think you’re the snack, sweetie. I’ve never seen a drone—or a human—with such a... sturdy frame."

J reached out, her gloved hand hovering just inches from Mario’s mustache. "He is an unauthorized entity. By Company protocol, he should be dismantled." She paused, her yellow eyes flickering as she looked at Mario’s unfazed, goofy expression. "However... I suppose a field interrogation is required. A very... thorough... interrogation."

Uzi stepped between them, her face a bright neon purple. "Get your oily hands off him! He doesn't even know where he is!"

"Oh, I think he knows exactly where he is," V purred, leaning over Mario’s shoulder and whispering into his ear. "He’s in a lot of trouble. The fun kind."

Mario looked at the three female drones—the rebellious worker, the corporate leader, and the homicidal maniac—all of whom were currently glaring at each other while stealing glances at him.

"So..." Mario said, breaking the tension as he reached into his pocket and pulled out a slightly squashed mushroom. "Does this mean we're not-a getting pizza?"

The three drones paused, looking at the mushroom, then back at the plumber. In that moment, the fate of Copper-9 shifted. The Great Extermination was temporarily forgotten, replaced by a much more pressing question: who was going to claim the strange, mustachioed man in red?

"I'm taking him to the landing pod," J declared, her wings snapping shut. "For questioning."

"Like hell you are!" Uzi shouted. "He’s coming to the bunker!"

"I vote we let him run and I hunt him down," V suggested with a wink at Mario. "Winner keeps his hat."

Mario just sighed, taking a bite of his mushroom. "Mario's gonna need a lot more spaghetti for this."