[center][h3]Who’s the Boss[/h3]
[i]starring Bowser and Peach[/i]
[b]Word Count:[/b] 5672 (+6)[/center]

When Mewtwo arranged the matchups for the team’s sparring matches, the names of the assembled heroes whirled around like symbols on a slot machine, quickly building anticipation in the onlookers. A veteran of countless Mario Parties, minigames, and other events where everything came down to random chance in the end, Peach knew the feeling quite well, but the display kept her riveted regardless. In just a few short moments, she would be assigned her opponent among the Seekers of Light, but rather than enthusiasm the princess felt something more akin to dread.

Under ordinary circumstances, the task of a soldier fighting his or her leader probably sparked feelings of fear or even resignation. After all, one’s boss was the person who ought to know best, who commanded the most knowledge, skill, and experience, more than likely responsible for teaching the underlings what they knew. What Peach knew, however, was that the heroes around her had nothing to fear, and really, nothing to look up to.

For her whole life, she hadn’t been much of a leader. The day-to-day tasks of running the Mushroom Kingdom -what little that entailed- she left to her subordinates like Toadsworth, leaving her with nothing but free time. Possessed of an empty title, and ignorant of her own ignorance, she lived a life of vapid luxury interspersed with easy, pleasant sports and games as her sole source of competition. Without even the pride to care very much about the dozens of times she’d been kidnapped by Bowser, reasoning that Mario would just save her any time, she’d been content with that life. Only after the Seekers arrived to destroy Megadragonbowser, almost a week ago at this point, did she finally begin to realize what a leader should -and shouldn’t- be. A princess wasn’t someone who sat on her cushions while her people suffered, fighting and dying for the amusement of a tyrant, whether that tyrant be Megadragonbowser, or Galeem itself. From that point she tried to take responsibility, to be the commander of the campaign to save the worlds, but even after a dozen crash-courses in leadership out in the field, she still felt like an impostor. She couldn’t take charge when the team needed or fight well enough to swing the tide of battle; the team seemed to accept her, but it didn’t feel earned. That’s why this fight mattered: this time, the princess needed to be on the ball, and prove herself worthy of her role. All these thoughts raced through her head in just a couple seconds, at the end of which the holographic names slotted into place.

[i]Bowser.[/i]

The eponymous villain, splitting image of a source of her inspiration and woes both. Stood among his sub team he was a picture of everything a leader should and shouldn't be as well as something of a thorn in the side with his assertions of authority. Truly, there could be no more appropriate challenge to test how far she’d come, and how far she had to go, than the Koopa king!

So it would have been a lot more dramatic a moment if he had been paying attention. Instead, as far as Peach could overhear, he was in the midst of arguing the virtues of a very very very big umbrella as a counter to the timefall rain, a plan that only the long suffering Kamek seemed to see the problem with. To add insult to injury the reason his attention was drawn to their names coming up next to each other on the slot machine was as a distraction by said Magi-Koopa to derail his hair brained scheme

[color=FD0000]”Ha, well that hardly seems fair!”[/color] was the king’s response to seeing the matchup, before he either uncharacteristically  or very characteristically (depending on the intent) added [color=FD0000]”Though you could say that about anyone who had to go up against me! The rest of you got lucky!”[/color] boastfully a moment later.

Peach grimaced. As much as she didn’t want to hear it, she couldn’t exactly deny his words. It wasn’t a fair fight by any stretch. In terms of size, reach, defense, constitution and [i]especially[/i] strength, there was no contest between her and the Koopa King. His addendum painted his initial comment as a product of ego applicable to anyone, but it still stung. To not be taken seriously as a rival, or even a threat, hurt her developing sense of pride. For a moment she almost despaired; was she really destined to be dominated by this big idiot, over and over again, for eternity? Peach put a hand on her chest and she breathed in and out, slowly, trying to calm down. [i]Forget about everything else,[/i] she told herself. [i]I just have to do my best. Fight with everything I have.[/i] Her eyes cracked open to find that Bowser had already stomped off, despite not knowing where any of Alcamoth’s arenas might be. Peach narrowed her eyes and jogged after him, making sure to draw up alongside him and then pull ahead. “Follow me,” she told him. “I know a good spot.”

[center][img]https://i.imgur.com/qxMmWug.png[/img][/center]

When the fog cleared, Peach floated down with her parasol to alight upon the surface of the stage. Her nerves were electric with anticipation now that her match against Bowser was nigh, but the princess worked to get a hold of herself. The woman who stood here now, on familiar ground, was not the same spoiled princess who awaited yet another rescue six days ago. She’d been through hell on Blackwater Bay and the nightmares of the Bottomless Sea, and melded with her very soul were two fighters very used to taking on monstrous foes. The cruel resolve of Mr. Grimm and the military professionalism of Chao Ho stabilized her shaky legs, and tightened her grip on her Boomshot. It was time to begin.

Opposite her the Koopa king was a picture of calm, the tower of scales and muscles rolling the shoulder of his arm housing his new kinetic strike module to give it a stretch, and then flicking both hands to his sides bearing his claws as the new mechanisms in his shell clicked in and out of position. Then they seemed to jam, the king frowning and giving his shell a thump, which was enough of a placebo to get things organized again back there. With a grunt and a nod to himself he turned back to face her as the countdown started 

[center][h2]3[/h2][/center]

[center][h2]2[/h2][/center]

[center][h2]1[/h2][/center]

[center][h1]Go![/h1][/center]

At which point Bowser immediately lept for the rope suspended platform before him, the thing sinking rapidly under his bulk before he leapt for the central platform, clearly intending to just come straight for her. 

Peach inhaled deeply through her nose, then got to work. She let go of her Boomshot with her left hand and pulled out a grenaduck, which she lobbed across the pit to the center. Whether he waited for the opposite lift to lower or just tried to jump straight across, her explosive would blow up after a couple bounces, and it wasn’t her last bomb, either. With an upward flip of her heel behind her she popped out a torpedo, then span around while it flipped to smack it with a roundhouse kick and send it flying toward Bowser as well. Determined to start off with a bang, she finished off the explosive volley by pulling her [url=https://i.imgur.com/0jaWmAa.png]Agro Torpedo[/url] rocket launcher from her Inventory, a blast from which sent a fiery payload Bowser’s way.

[color=FD0000]”Ha, is that all you … uh oh!”[/color] Bower began to mock when the duck was tossed, only to change his tune when everything else came to follow it up, the king comically doing a complete about turn and running back the way he came as the world exploded around him, only to be struck in the back by her the rocket launcher and fully blown across the pit he had cleared, winding up right back where he started.

Bower’s shell was tough however, and so the main thing that was hurt was his pride. [color=FD0000]”Two can play at that game!”[/color] he shouted as he turned to face her once more, the top two segments of his shell rising up and four guns extending from them and then folding over his shoulders. The light also dimmed around him as he started to draw energy into his flashcanon reserves via the tentacruel orbs. As he charged, his guns opened fire and the king began to huck his slow moving fireballs across the arena, a fury barrage he’d end with a blinding beam should his light reserves reach full capacity.

For a brief moment Peach was surprised. She’d half-expected Bowser to shrug off her special deliveries and just juggernaut his way into melee range. Unfortunately for her, it wasn’t just close-quarters combat that her opponent excelled at. The princess balked at the entire arsenal that Bowser deployed to gun her down with, and the coarser part of her couldn’t help but blurt out her astonishment. “Goddamn…!”

Peach steeled her nerves as she tensed herself to move. She couldn’t push through this onslaught or run away from it, but with no water around and only a relatively narrow battlefield, she couldn’t strafe around as well as she would have liked to take advantage of Bowser’s less-than-ideal aim and projectile travel time. At least, not without a little ingenuity. As the barrage began, and the ground and scenery around her began to blow apart in the storm of cannonfire, she ran toward the edge while stowing her weapons. “Brave,” she muttered as she neared the precipice. “Be brave!” 

She leaped into the open air, extended her arms, and began to [url=https://i.kym-cdn.com/photos/images/original/000/928/120/540.gif]float[/url]. As if gravity had forgotten about her, Peach scooted through the air in a horizontal arc, fast enough to make shooting her a serious challenge. When the princess sensed her floatiness running out, she pulled out and thrust her parasol upward, taking her even higher before the canopy popped open. At that point her speed decreased dramatically, as well as her chances of making it back to the stage–until she pulled out her Boomshot again, aimed it behind her, and let the recoil blast her back toward solid ground. The maneuver brought her close to Bowser again, which meant she needed to do something before he shot her down. With her Boomshot ineffective at such a range and her launcher still cooling down, that left only one option. She pulled out Mr. Grimm’s revolver, lined up a shot, and let loose the screaming Death Spawn soul shot, one of the strongest -albeit most difficult to land- weapons in all of Twisted Metal.

[color=FD0000]”Stay! Still!”[/color] the king demanded as the princess evaded his poor marksmanship only to go [color=FD0000]”Uh oh!”[/color] as the soul came screaming towards him. Having clearly learned, (perhaps too well given his earlier retreat), that the world of light had a lot of things that could hurt even him, the king crouched and then tried to leap over the incoming shot, which meant it detonated beneath him as an unintended rocket jump. The explosion blasted his boots apart and sent him flailing, the king losing control of his stored up flash cannon and sending a blazing beam of light wildy slashing across the stage.

Then he slammed down onto the central set of floating blocks with an [color=FD0000]”Oof”[/color] and scorched, bruised and most damning of all bare feet. 

[color=FD0000]”Hey, I liked those! I got them for our wedding! Ow ouch!”[/color] The king complained as he tried to haul himself up onto his hurt claws, gave up and announced [color=FD0000]”if I cant hit you, I’ll hit everything!”[/color] before withdrawing into his shell and beginning to spin rapidly, all 12 guns firing wildly as fired and indiscriminately unleashed a hail of fury spike torpedo from his back, his timed explosive spikes firing upwards and then showering down all across the stage.

“What!? Hey!” Peached holstered her revolver and held tight to her parasol for dear life as cannon shots whizzed by her. “H-how does this help you!?” She watched with wide eyes as Bowser himself spun around in a field of explosions of his own making, an impossible target. She couldn’t hit him like this, which meant she needed to get back to solid ground. In the midst of his volatile uproar, however, Bowser was laying waste to the terrain itself. His torpedoes and shells destroyed chunks of brick at a time, sent both suspended platforms plummeting down into the abyss, and knocked the rows of floating blocks from the sky. Peach veered back toward the area she started in, wondering if he meant to keep her from landing and force a win as she sank below the outer boundary. Well, he couldn’t possibly keep this up forever. After a moment Peach smacked into a row of bricks, climbed up, and promptly rolled away as a torpedo spike embedded itself nearby. “Ugh.” As the dust and rubble cleared, she called forth her revolver again. This time with both hands, she lined up a second shot at the epicenter of the explosive mayhem.

[color=FD0000]”Testing out Nadia’s thing!”[/color] came a semi informative roar over the din, a din which suddenly ended with a click click click of auto loaders trying to pull shells from stores that were entirely depleted. The same went for his back load of spikes, the king’s back presently as smooth as a koopa troopa’s. Well a heavily ornamented koopa troopa’s.

Now that the spin attack was over, rather than pop his actual arms and legs out of his shell and put up with sore feet right away, the king instead deployed the crab-like Dreugh legs from the back of his shell and used them to try and leap through the air towards her like an oversized Tektite. Peach gritted her teeth, adjusted her aim at the massive target flying her way, and fired. The screaming soul blitzed though the air like a railgun shot and walloped Bowser right in the torso, sending him right back the way he came. Unfortunately the recoil, which sent Peach into a wild spin while floating with her umbrella, now knocked her out of her inexpert firing stance and onto her back. 

Bowser’s shell bounced once twice and then skidded to a halt right before the precipice, such that when bowser’s head popped out the top it was straight up hanging over the edge. [color=FD0000]”Uuuuurgh, ok, not a good one”[/color] he groaned and then moved to pick himself of of the ground, the Dreugh legs helping with both that and, if he leaned forwards a bit, he could also use them to support his sore feet, giving him an opportunity to shake em both out before committing to his next move.

[color=FD0000]”Urg… that gun is nasty. So, I’ll be taking it now”[/color] he informed her polity, before squaring up, breathing out, and then breathing in hard, his inhalation turning into a twisting vortex that reached across the stage and tugged at her small arm, threatening to rip it from her hand.

With Peach’s focus currently on getting back up, she didn’t notice the vacuum until it was too late, robbing her of Grimm’s revolver. “No!” she lamented, grasping uselessly at the gun as it sailed away. While she didn’t think Bowser could use it thanks to his size, her win condition had been stripped away. On the plus side, however, she still had the rest of her weapons. With an angry scowl she pulled out her rocket launcher, holding tight the whole time. “Here, you can have this, too!” [i]FOOMP![/i]

The only thing that stopped Bowser getting a gut full of rocket was that he was considerate enough (if you could call it that) to not swallow her weapon and instead cut off the vacuum once it came at him and raised a hand to catch it. He failed, the gun bonking off of his nose and then clattered to the ground, but it left his arm in a perfect position for him to clench his fist and unfurl the shield of the mecha mit. The buckler sized energy barrier caught the rocket, blocking the core of the basalt, though the sides of it still rushed past and scorched his suit.

[color=FD0000]”Nice try,”[/color] the king said in not quite a taunt as one of his tentacruel tendrils plucked the stolen gun off the ground and stashed it in his suit. [color=FD0000]”But now let’s see how you handle me without that crutch,”[/color] he added before he started to storm towards her once more, but this time deploying his turrets and firing four beams of supersonic soundwaves from them to disrupt her overwatch fire.

Peach scowled, but rather than waste time on a snippy comeback, she put her full attention into what came next. Thanks to his suppressive fire Bowser could now reach her without issue, and even if she relied on remaining structure around her for protection from the aural assault, she’d only delay the inevitable. Without Grimm’s revolver, she possessed only one more possible win condition. The problem was making it happen, and no plan came to mind. Still, the princess needed to do [i]something[/i]...

As she retreated, hiding behind the pillars of brick, she began to pull vegetables from the ground two at a time. Thanks to their weight she could throw them indirectly from behind cover, and while most just bounced off Bowser’s scales, not all of them turned out paltry. Depending on their faces, some could deal a lot more damage and knockback than others, and Peach kept running and pulling until, just as she was about to run out of stage, she found what she was looking for. Instead of a bomb, she yanked a bob-omb from the ground, its fuse already sizzling as it struggled in her grasp. [i]Perfect.[/i] She produced both a grenaduck and a heel torpedo, and after tossing them into the air Peach whipped out Chao Ho’s giant fan to blow all three explosives at Bowser in a single mighty stroke. As the makeshift carpet-bomb flew Peach ran in behind them.

[color=FD0000]”Ow, oof, fine i’ll eat my veggies!”[/color] came a shout after the first few turnup-y projectiles, followed by bursts of vacuum breath and sounds of revulsion replacing the pain sounds that made it somewhat unclear if Bowser’s strategy was actually reducing the damage her vegetable projectiles were doing.

Then her bombs came flying and the tennis seve of a toss it gave him just enough time to realise that sucking these in would be a poor plan, and recognise the oh so faimiler sight of a bob-omb in the mix. Having blown all the cover to hell already, Bowser took the stubborn option. He held his ground and let loose a blast of firebreath at the incoming bombs, burning the wick of the bob-omb right down to the base in a heatflash and detonating it prematurely.

As her bombardment went up in smoke, Peach opened and slammed her fan, blowing the haze of ash, and brick dust toward Bowser in one big gust. Whether he choked on it or not, its acrid particles and sizzling embers could sting his eyes and obscure his vision, or so Peach really hoped. Because now, after closing and hurling her fan at the big brute like a caber toss, she was closing to melee range. She got as close as she dared in order to start the real fight with a bang.

[i]KRAKOOM![/i]

A short-range blast from her Boomshot scattered the smokescreen, but before she could see what damage it did to Bowser, Peach hurled the gun right at him. In a flash her parasol was in her hand, bundled up tight and held like a rapier. With her sincerity writ upon her royal face, the princess prepared to strike.

The blinded king stumbled back from the blast with an [color=FD0000]”Oof”[/color] followed by a [color=FD0000]”What”[/color] as the gun bonked off of his snout. He blinked repeatedly both to clear his eyes and because of what he saw.

[color=FD0000]”Are you for real?”[/color] he had to ask, he didn’t wait for a reply, instead cracking his neck and then throwing both arms out to his sides as his own weapons deployed, energy claws flicking out from the mecha mit while the kinetic strike module’s first deployed into place.

[color=FD0000]”You’ve got guts, I’ll give you that, lets see if you can back em up,”[/color] the king challenged her, before the afterburners on his new rocket fist and he started their melee with a jet propelled uppercut.

Fueled by raw adrenaline, Peach’s life flashed before her eyes. [i]This jerk’s trying to kill me![/i] The conclusion jolted her into action, and throwing all thoughts of offense to the wind, she flipped horizontally backward and out of the rocket punch’s way. She landed in a crouch to see Bowser carried into the sky by the force of his knockout blow, looming over her like a meteorite. With terror the princess pictured his iconic Bowser Bomb, capable of reducing just about anything to smithereens. In that moment, however, she also saw her fan, descending in her direction. Peach embedded her parasol in the ground and caught the fan on her shoulder, which she opened with a twirling overhead slam to send a gust of wind up at the Koopa King. “Back off!”

If all the stars aligned it might have pushed him back far enough to plummet straight down into one of the stage’s pits, but she’d happily settle for not getting squashed flat. Either way, she hurried to put the fan on her back and ready her parasol once more.

Bowser was a bit too busy being surprised by the sheer power in the gauntlet he’d just tried to slam Peach with to consider any follow up slams, his legs kicking under him as they failed to find purchase. Only at the gust of wind did his senses snap back as the part of his brain that paid any denizin of Bowser’s world had honed to a fine point if they wanted to live screamed PIT at the top of its nonexistent lungs. Either thinking fast or not thinking at all, bowser jammed all 6 sets of guns out of his shell and slammed them all into hydro pump mode. The  6 sets of jets might not have been able to all point forwards, but they had enough of an angle to add to his backwards momentum such that he cleared the pit. Oh and almost staged-outed himself anyway by going too far past it, the koopa slamming a claw into the ground to stop him slipping on the last few inches of wet stone out of the arena. 

[color=FD0000]”Close one,”[/color] he noted as he clicked the kinetic strike module back into storage position. Then he gave the stone a flame blast before rushing through the steam to hop across the gap, claw primed to reach out and grab her instead of smash her this time.

After a sound bombardment by Bowser’s hydro pumps that slammed her into the ground and soaked her to the bone, Peach staggered to her feet, bruised and ragged but holding her parasol firm in her grasp. Against a more conventional opponent she might have been able to make good use of her umbrella, employing her heightened dexterity and speed to beat her opponent down, but Bowser was anything but. Some other day, maybe. She braced herself as he bounded over the stage’s pits, then thundered toward her like a freight train. Her explosives weren’t ready; her fan and her turnips would do nothing. No cover remained around the stage for her to use for shelter, just scattered blocks and pieces of brick.

Peach’s eyes narrowed. She went low and performed a [url=https://ssb.wiki.gallery/images/1/1d/PeachDSmashSSBU.gif]spinning sweep[/url] that kicked a number of bricks into the air. Then, with a powerful thrust from her parasol, she popped it open to send the debris flying toward Bowser. Despite her inventiveness, it unfortunately wasn’t enough. The tough guy took the smattering of masonry no problem, followed shortly by a thrust from Peach’s parasol as he reached out and grabbed hold.

“Guh!” The princess grasped as Bowser lifted her into the air, squeezed tight in his painful grasp. With just one eye open she could see his smug face, already sure of victory. Indeed, he could now end this at any moment. He could throw her off the stage, crush her beneath his weight, or just roast her right now.

But would he?

This wasn’t the first time Peach found herself grabbed by Bowser. This normally ended with him carrying her off over his shoulder, though at the moment he needed to beat her, not kidnap her. Still, the Koopa King was a sore winner, a gloat, and not at all the pragmatic type. That’s why Peach [i]wanted[/i] this to happen. Only once he grabbed hold her, determined to never let go of his prize…was he close enough for her to win.

“All..” Peach grabbed at of his scaly mitt, as if hopelessly trying to dislodge his grip. After a moment, however, her gloved hands reached [i]into[/i] his flesh, grasping at the core of his being–his spirit. Going through an extremity lengthened the process, but it also made it more painful, like slowly pulling off a bandage versus ripping it off in one go. Would he just stand and let this happen? She doubted it. But she had no other options. “...Or nothing!” And so the reaping began.

[color=FD0000]”Ah hey what is that?! It feels really weird!”[/color] Bowser complained as he felt existential pain for the first time, but the stubber fool didn’t let go. No instead he kept running across the center of the stage, not slowing the momentum that had brought him to her in the first place one bit, and jumped the last bit of distance before tossing her straight down, aiming to slam-dunked princess into the twin of the bottomless pit he’d only just avoided dropping into himself. 

Peach pulled and pulled, but she just couldn’t draw Bowser’s spirit through–like a tapioca pearl through too small a straw. “Dammit!” she screamed as the Koopa King hurled her down the pit. Full of helpless fury, she did the only thing she could, and popped open her parasol to bring her downward trip to a screeching halt. Yet that alone wouldn’t save her. She couldn’t jump or fly back up, or jump back and forth between these walls. All Peach could do was continue drifting downward, rankled by the laughter of her triumphant opponent, and await the lackluster finish. Unless…

Peach summoned a new grenaduck and stared at it for a moment before clenching her teeth. “Not like this.” Her grip tightened, harder and harder as the explosive began to blink, until it erupted.

From the cloud of flame the princess flew out of the pit, singed and tattered but alive and ready for more. She stopped her uncontrolled momentum with a well-timed float, facing Bowser for a brief moment. “Don’t pity me! Ha…” she cried, twirling in place. Then she burst forward, her rear extended for a mighty Peach Bomber. “CHA!”

[color=FD0000]”What?”[/color] was Bowser’s confused reply before he brought up his arms into an X guard to block her ass blast, before counter attacking with a four pronged strike with his  Dreugh limbs before he’d even dropped his guard back down.

The pincer attack struck Peach in the middle of her recovery and knocked her back to the edge of the pit. Wincing from the punishment, she fought to maintain her balance for a second, and she second she found it she charged again. Dragging the tip of her umbrella along the ground, she swept toward Bowser with a diagonal blow which the king simply raised his arm and took on his scaly forearm.

The king made a thoughtful noise as he stabbed at her with the carb legs again, really leaning into this style of combat and not even trying to use his fists for a bit. This time Peach yanked a struggling Toad out from nowhere to take the limb strikes for her, and return their combined damage twofold in a stream of spores accompanied by an ear-rattling scream. 

The lim stabs were fairly wimpy compared to some of the real damage the king could put out, but the resulting burst of spores and sound still sent the king reeling and coughing, breaking his guard for a moment as he covered his ears.

Peach narrowed her eyes–this was it. Judging by her burns, bruises, and fatigue, maybe her last chance. She leaped into the air, and with her parasol thrust as hard as she could toward the space right between her opponent’s eyes. 

The king went cross eyed as the tip of the umbrella went between them and smacked him right between the bushy brows with a “thonk” that sent him into a stumbling fall, closer to the edge. Then those crab legs  lashed out behind him instead of infront, correcting over his tumble and sending the thick koopa’s noggin careening towards the princess.

When it looked like Bowser was about to fall, a spark of hope galvanized Peach’s faltering muscles into pulling out her rocket launcher in order to blast him off. But her opponent catch himself too quickly, and put his momentum into a fearsome headbutt. Peach turned the Agro Torpedo horizontally as a makeshift shield, and when the hammer fell she planted her feet and pushed back with everything she had. “Grrrrrrrrr…” she grunted, the visceral sound direct from her innermost being. “..rrrrraaaaaah!”

In the end she lasted only a second. Her arms gave way, and as her legs buckled beneath her Bowser’s headbutt smashed her flat. Parasol and rocket launcher both bounced away amidst a spray of shattered bricks, and Peach lay in the dust barely clinging to consciousness, unable to move a muscle.

[i]GAME![/i]

Bowser for his part stumbled backwards fists raised in a boxer’s guard, still mostly out of it for a few more moments and then a few moments later realized that no more violence was happening. He shook his head clear, then gave it a tap for good measure and then saw the consequences of his actions.

[color=FD0000]”Oh. Uh. Are you alright?”[/color] he crouched down and poked her with a claw.

Fog swept in across the stage, swallowing all in its path. It rolled over Bowser, Peach, and all their wanton destruction with the speed and indomitability of a tidal wave. Then it passed, leaving the fighters out in front of the archway they’d used to access this pocket dimension. A handful of spectators had gathered around, and when the two royals arrived they met with a handful of cheers, and applause. Revived with about a quarter of her total vitality, Peach got to her feet to find herself offered congratulations and sympathy. Even as she struggled on her own against an overwhelming opponent, many of them had been cheering on the underdog, and now she even got some praise for her smart moves out there. Bowser got his share of admiration too, but Peach didn’t even notice. Losing had been inevitable, but if some people actually thought she did a good job out there, and respected her for what she achieved, it was all worth it.

Bowser, of course, noticed his own fans, giving them a flex of his scally guns for show alongside a [color=FD0000]”Yeah, I’m pretty awesome”[/color] before being tapped on the shoulder by one of his tentacruel tentacles while the other presented him with the gun he’d stolen from Peach.

[color=FD0000]”Oh, right”[/color] he said, plucking it from the tendril’s grasp and then turning around offering it handle first to Peach, the small put ever so powerful hand cannon held between his fingers [color=FD0000]”Here your gun back, that thing’s got some bite”[/color]  he said, rubbing his chest subsciously where it had hit him. [color=FD0000]” You’ve come a long way,”[/color] he told her uncharacteristically when she took it, and then finally adding [color=FD0000]”but maybe get something nastier than an umbrella for poking people with, yeah? Ooo or put spikes on it, that’d be cool!”[/color]

The princess did not look happy to see him, with some trace of resentment haunting her eyes, but she accepted the revolver without complaint. When she looked she would find that her Boomshot, fan, and other weapons were all back in her inventory where they belonged. “...Thank you,” she told him. The rarity of a compliment from the Koopa King did not escape her. Rather than shake hands she crossed her arms, an unsatisfied look on her face. “Maybe I will. Next time, you’ll have to take me more seriously.”

[color=FD0000]”Already am”[/color] the king replied pretty nonchalantly, before stretching and saying [color=FD0000]”Now let's go find Blazermate or someone to patch us back up to full…oh and then a snack, fighting always workers up my appetite!”[/color] and moving to stomp off and do just that.