Chapter 2: Prehistoric Paradise
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Peach applied the last bit of frosting to the cup cakes before she ran her finger across the stuff that had stuck to the inside of the bowl. “This is one of the best parts of baking.” She licked the frosting off.
“I thought the best part was decorating them,” Toadette shook a small jar of sprinkles over the cupcakes. “Or would it be eating them.”
“I prefer to see the face of my friends when they eat them,” Peach used the butter knife to scrape up the rest of the leftover frosting. “I like eating the leftover batter and the frostings.”
“Those are yummy,” Toadette nodded. “Are these going to be any specific gift?”
“Right now these are for anyone who wants them, but I plan on taking some with me on my vacation to Dinosaur Land.”
“I almost wish I could go,” the pink-haired girl placed maraschino cherries on the cupcakes. “But I already promised my aunt and uncle that I would visit them in Rougeport.”
“I’ll take plenty of pictures.”
“Will Toad and Toadsworth be going with you?”
Peach shook her head. “There are a lot of flowers there that Toad is allergic to, and Toadsworth said he has to many things to do around the castle.”
“I’ll ask Toad if he wants to come with me,” Toadette’s smile grew larger. “Why don’t you invite Maria and Pauline?”
“That’s a great idea,” Peach smiled. It had been months since the last time she had seen them, and they came to her world to fight against Bowser again. “It would be nice of them to just come to our world for a visit, without them having to fight anyone or performing any kind of a rescue.”
“I hope they arrive before my ship is scheduled to leave.”
“I’ll go and contact them right now.” Peach placed the bowl in the sink and washed her hands.
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There were only two things that Maria wanted to do once she arrived home. The first was to take a shower, running around the café for over eight hours had tired her out and made her sweaty. The second thing she wanted to do was have a nice dinner someone to gripe to about her day.
“Hey girly,” Pauline greeted her. “Dinner is ready, everything is on low on the stove.” She was on the couch with a large book on one side of the coffee table and envelopes of pictures on the other end.
“Thanks,” Maria placed her cap on the hook. “What’s for dinner?”
“I put one of those family size things of Salisbury steaks in the oven.” Pauline removed a picture from the envelope. “And I cooked up one of those bags of frozen veggies and made some macaroni and cheese.”
“Sounds great,” Maria removed her apron. “Whoever said the following about the longer the order equals the bigger the asshole is right.”
Pauline looked up from what she was doing. “What happened? Did some old lady give you a hard time?”
“Not really old, mid to late thirties dressed to the nines had a Gucci handbag and she ordered a grande almond half decaf cappuccino made with soy milk, two spoons of sugar, two shots of chocolate and topped with soy whip cream and a dusting of more chocolate.”
“Wow,” Pauline blinked. “Whenever I go in there I just get an iced coffee drink, and I thought the customers added the sugar themselves?”
“I kindly informed her of the location of the preparing station where you can add sugar and get napkins are but we can add the sugar this time. Then I also had to tell her that we don’t have any soy whipcream. She then asks for fat free whipcream and then I tell her all we have is low-fat whipcream.”
“So she wasn’t a vegan?”
“She was very skinny and when I told her that she just rolled her eyes and said ‘very well,’ I mean who says that. Then it came to her telling us we didn’t put enough chocolate dust on top and then she bitched that it was too cold and we had to remake it and then she complained the we charged a few cents per shot. I mean hello. It’s on the menu.”
“Ouch,” Pauline cringed. “If I ever think about doing retail or food services I have to remind my why that is a bad idea.”
“They are not all bad,” Maria headed to the shower. “I have a bigger share of nice ones than the sucky ones and all of my regulars are nice ones.” She paused to turn around and watch as Pauline used a roll on glue stick to apply an adhesive to one of the pictures and placed it on the open pages of the book. “What are you doing?”
“I’m making a scrap book of our adventure,” Pauline selected another picture. “I’m going to be taking plenty of pictures of our trips whenever we go to that world.”
“Well maybe the last time was the last time,” Maria said and stepped into the shower.
The warm spray of the shower calmed her down and made her forget about that one woman. She thought about what Pauline had said and remembered the last two times they were in that other world. Each time they battled against strange turtles and mushrooms. The last time also had ghosts and skeletal turtles and there were those odd kids of Bowser. She also thought of Mario and Luigi. She still felt connected to them for some reason and she wondered why Mario continued to stay with them.
“Maria,” Pauline called out to her.
“What?” Maria had just lathered up her mesh poof. “What’s going on?”
“You are not going to believe this.”
“Is Johnny Depp on our doorstep?” The only thing she would end her shower would be for him.
“It’s not him.”
“Then let me finish showering.” She continued to scrub herself.
“It’s Princes Peach.”
“She better not be joking,” Maria worked in a little shampoo. “Tell her I’ll be there in a few minutes.” She didn’t care if Bowser had set Peach’s castle on fire. She was not going to just run out of the bathroom covered in lather. She rinsed off as fast as she could and dried herself off halfway before she put on a clean change of clothes.
“She’s in the mirror,” Pauline pointed to the oval hanging mirror in the middle of their hallway.
“Hello Maria,” Peach was wearing a pale yellow apron over her pink dress. “Sorry I interrupted your shower.”
“I managed to finish it.” Maria’s hair was still wet and she left the towel in the bathroom. “At least we aren’t meeting like we had the last time.”
“I’m still sorry about that,” Peach blushed.
“Don’t sweat it,” Pauline said.
“Yeah, what’s Bowser doing this time?”
“Nothing,” Peach smiled. “Things have been quiet and there as been no signs from Dark Land.”
“Wait,” Maria blinked. “You mean there is no emergency? Bowser isn’t trying to take over the Mushroom kingdom or any other kingdom?”
“None at all. I called to give you an invitation.”
“Is it an invitation to a ball?” Pauline asked.
“It’s not a written invitation. I want to invite you to go on a small vacation trip with me to Dinosaur Land.”
“Dinosaur Land?” The place sounded like a theme park. She imagined rides like a volcano themed rollercoaster, a waterfall log ride where they would get wet. There would be cute places to get food, names like Stego stake. There would be kids with dinosaur shaped balloons and stuffed animals and people dressed up as the mascots. “What are the rides like?”
“I was just about to ask,” Pauline said. “How much does it cost to get in. Maria and I still have our stash of gold coins at the Mushroom City bank.”
“There no rides and it doesn’t cost anything,” Peach seemed confused and she laughed. “Oh I see. It’s not a theme park. It’s another land like Pipe Land and Desert Land.”
“Wait,” Maria blinked. “If this place is like the other lands then that means…” She couldn’t finish.
“Real dinosaurs?” Pauline gasped. “Are you telling me there are real dinosaurs in your world?”
“Yes but only on Dinosaur Land,” Peach said. “We’ll travel there by balloon, we’ll have a picnic and go exploring. There is this one real friendly species called Yoshis.”
“Are there any velociraptors?” Pauline asked. “Are there any kind that spit poison?”
“What about Rexes?” Maria asked.
“There Rexes there.”
“There are tyrannosaurs rexes at this place and you want to go?”
“They are just called Rexes,” Peach explained. “And I don’t think they are like the ones in your world.”
“What are the ones in your world like?”
“They are about seven feet tall, purple and orange, have small, useless wings and a big spike on their noses.”
“These are different.” Pauline was relieved.
“As long as we don’t provoke them then they won’t attack us.”
“Sounds good,” Maria wasn’t too convinced. “I hope we pack some power ups for just in case.”
“There are plenty of power ups on the island.”
“Maria,” Pauline poked her in the back. “We have got to do this. When will we ever get another chance to see real dinosaurs?”
“You just want to take pictures of them,” Maria gave her a look.
“I do,” Pauline nodded, “But don’t you also want to go?”
“I do have the next three days off,” Maria nodded. “A picnic does sound nice and I am not lying when I say I want to see a few dinosaurs.”
“Great,” Pauline turned to the mirror. “When do we leave?”
“You can come by tomorrow.”
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Mario rested on his shell in the hammock next to Larry’s castle. There was not much to do. Dinosaur Land belongs to the Koopa Empire, and has been for a month and no one tried to overthrow them. Luigi lives at Wendy’s castle on Chocolate Island and he occasionally visits. Mario has visited the other kids. He also made routine patrols, made sure his soldiers were in top shape and visited Dark Land twice to check on mother, uncle Kamek and see little Junior. He also came by to see Ashley, at least for a few dates before he finally broke things off. He had to be honest with her. He just didn’t feel the love.
“Goal,” Larry shouted as the football soared between the two trees and landed in one of the mud puddles. “Larry’s super squad scores another touch down.”
“Who’s winning?” Mario asked when Larry ran up to retrieve the ball.
“My team is,” Larry said. “You want to play?”
“I’ve been feeling a little down,” Mario sat up.
“It’s about that girl you were dating?” Larry asked.
Mario nodded. “I thought she would be different, but when we got serious she just talked about me being the general.”
“But you are a general,” Larry pointed out.
“I’m more than just a general. It would be me like calling her mechanic. She’s more than that.”
“Were you certain she only saw what you were and not who you were?” Larry blinked. “There is nothing wrong with the person who are in love with being enthusiastic about what you do.”
“It isn’t just that,” Mario sighed. Was it that reason? Ashley was different from the others. Maybe he was just trying to find a flaw in her, but why? It couldn’t be because of Princess Peach. Sure she was beautiful and kind and has a good heart, but there had to be more. He wasn’t in love with her, and even if he was, she wouldn’t feel the same about him. They were two different species.
“Let me guess this is one of those things that I probably won’t understand until I’m a little bit older?”
“No,” Mario shook his head. “I think you understand it perfectly well .It’s that I don’t understand myself sometimes. I think my mind and my heart want two different things.”
“Oh,” Larry chewed is lower lip. “Is there any way for them to compromise?”
“I can try, but it will take a lot of deep thought.”
“Until then, how about a game of football?” Larry held up his football. “It will take your mind of what you are thinking about, at least for an hour.”
“Whose side would I be on?”
“Well since my side already has me then the other side needs a good superstar.”
“Sounds right,” Mario rubbed the top of his head. “Now lets see do I want to think about my lack of a love life, or do I want to get down and dirty and play football in the mud.” He smiled. “Larry Koopa, I hope you are prepared to lose.”
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Maria held onto the edge of the basket and felt the wind in her hair. She had wanted to go for a ride in one of these things for so long, but she could never find anyone to ride with her.
“Dom dom ,da dom dom, da de dom dom de dom,” Pauline started to hum the theme to Jurassic Park.
“What?” Maria opened her eyes and looked down. They were nearing a large island. “So this is it.”
“Welcome to Dinosaur Land,” Peach stood up to weaken the amount of heat and caused the balloon to go lower.
“Let me help with you that,” Maria said. She was going to allow her roommate to continue providing a soundtrack for their adventure. “I’m surprised your father and Toadsworth didn’t send some guards with us, or anything.”
“They think I’m safe when I’m with you,” Peach said. “They have a lot of faith in you two.”
“Time for a couple of photos,” Pauline took a picture with her digital camera followed by a picture with the disposable. “One for the computer and one for the scrap book.”
“You ever think about getting one of those things that prints out digital pictures?” Maria asked.
“They cost a lot of money,” Pauline said. “I get the people at the photo lab to do that.”
“I would love to visit your world,” Peach said as the basket and balloon lowered even a little bit more.
“It’s kind of boring compared to here,” Maria said. “There are no magical creatures, no dinosaurs, no power ups.”
“It still sounds like a nice place to visit,” Peach said. “I want to see how paper and plastic money works.”
“I guess what seems boring to us is exciting to you,” Pauline said. “We will take you to all the touristy places, show you all the landmarks.”
“I want to do it all,” Peach sighed.
The basket touched the sand and the three of them killed the heat before they took care of the balloon. Several dolphins were leaping about in the waves, crying out their clicks and squeals. When Maria looked at them she wore they were wearing snorkel masks.
“I have to get a picture of these dolphins,” Pauline brought held up her camera. “Smile guys.”
“Dolphins always look like they are smiling,” Maria said.
The dolphins cries grew louder and several were jumping and dancing. Many others had reared up and were waving their fins at them.
“They are trying to tell us something,” Peach said. “But I have no idea what.”
“Maybe they are saying so long and thanks for all the fish?” Maria shrugged.
“Maybe they are warning for bad weather,” Pauline suggested.
“That might be it,” Peach frowned and stared at the sky. “Although it doesn’t look like it is going to rain.”
“Maybe they are warning for hours or days in advance?”
“We can find out later,” Maria felt her stomach rumbling. “Lets set up for the picnic and if we see so much as a cloud we will move inland and find suitable shelter.”
“I suppose you are right,” Peach pulled out the blanket from the basket. “I do wonder where the Yoshis are. They tend to be a curious race.”
“Maybe they have an event inland?” Pauline suggested.
“I guess,” Peach said.
Maria shrugged. She didn’t feel as worried as Peach, but then again she was hungry. Once they have eaten she will think about the possible warnings from the dolphins
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