A Tale Of Love And Trust

Chapter 4: Welcome To Flipside

"..."

"...rio..."

There was a faint voice. But Mario didn't know what was going on. His vision was blackness, and he couldn't move.

"...Mar...."

The unknown voice was soothing. Calming. It almost felt relaxing. Then, another voice. It seemed much more faint than the other one, but he could hardly make out the noise at all. The new voice... seemed welcoming. It was a very different tone than from the other voice, and he couldn't make out any words at all. The other voice seemed to get louder the longer Mario heard it. He could make out a couple of words of it.

"Hey! .... Buddy!"

"Mario!"

Mario didn't know what happened, but he just... woke up. That first voice had called out to him, and the other one disappeared. No trace of its existence.

As soon as he woke up, he stood up and looked at his surroundings. He was in Bowser's Castle. After a few seconds, his memories of the previous events came flooding back to him. What happened to everyone?

He looked in a different direction, and there was a small, floating, and rainbow butterfly in front of him. For a few seconds, there was silence.

"Are you awake?" The butterfly asked in concern.

"Hello..." Mario said, apprehensive. "Just... who are you?"

"My name is Tippi... I am what is known as a Pixl... A sort of fairy..." Tippi, the butterfly explained. "Mario... I came to find you..."

In the past, most people who said they needed to "find" Mario almost never had good intentions; so it wasn't a surprise when the plumber moved into a fighting stance, even though he wasn't sure if the butterfly could do anything.

"I am no enemy..." Tippi reassured. "You met Count Bleck...and he captured a princess and an evil king... Is this not so?"

Mario gasped. He remembered more clearly now. While he did know that Peach was kidnapped, he could only guess if the others were too. "Yeah, I'm pretty sure they were." Mario nodded.

"Then that means Count Bleck is even now beginning to form The Void..." Tippi explained. "We haven't much time... You must come with me... Yes, if your friends are to be saved, you must come..."

Mario nodded in agreement. He didn't know what The Void was yet, but it sounded dangerous. Before he could do anything else, he felt himself get whisked away...

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The robot glared daggers at Timmy. He was mostly unfazed as he turned to everyone else in the class. "Okay, what the heck is that?" He pointed at the robot.

Chester got out of his seat and ran up to the robot. "Wow! Another new kid!" He exclaimed in excitement.

However, the robot's right arm quick turned into a small laser cannon that was ready to fire. Thinking quickly, Timmy pushed Chester out of the way, knocking both of them to the ground. The ground was charred in the spot where the laser hit. They both quickly got back up and faced the robot.

"Who shoots deadly lasers!" Chester quickly added, now in fear.

"Okay, class. New assignment!" Crocker said in a panic. He ran over to the chalkboard and quickly began writing words down, while saying what he was writing. "Run for your, darn this chalk, life!" After underlining the sentence, he let out a scream.

Crocker and nearly all of the students quickly ran out of the classroom, except for one. Timmy. He had taken to hiding behind the teacher desk. Unfortunately for him, the robot quickly grabbed the desk and crushed it into bits, as if it were sand.