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“Lester, why do I need a coat?” The small, blonde girl asks, looking up at the young man currently busy buttoning up the Lil’ Sparky’s winter jacket.
“It’s ‘cause without it, you’ll get too cold out there.” He casually replies, pulling his scaled hands back once he was done.
“But can’t I just use my electricity to warm myself up instead?” Watt continues, fiddling with her pale blue jacket until she was all snug in it. “I promise that it’s strong enough to warm me up!”
“Oh, believe me, I know that.” The Lakitu answers, now going to grab Watt’s tiny mittens and earmuffs from where they had been left by the coatrack. “But we also don’t want you to accidentally shock anyone else either.” He adds, handing them to the girl.
“I won’t. I can control my electricity, so I wouldn’t hurt anyone!” The girl argues, crossing her arms as she pouted.
Realizing that this wasn’t going anywhere, Lester decides to try a different angle to reasoning with Watt. “Y’know, the more time you spend in here, talking with me, the less time you’ll have to play out in the snow before it gets dark out.” This revelation makes Watt gasp, the Lil’ Sparky going to put on her mittens, earmuffs, and boots as quickly as she could, before hurrying to open the door and float outside. The young man couldn’t help but laugh slightly at just how quickly her stance on the matter changed before going to get himself bundled up as well.
After putting on his own snow boots, as well as an insulated leather jacket and a pair of gloves, Lester steps outside, immediately hit by the cold, late afternoon air. It was fairly tranquil, with the snowflakes glimmering in the soon setting sun as they slowly fell from the sky above. There wasn’t too many people out this late, aside from a few Star Kids, as well as the caretakers responsible for watching over them. Fortunately, this also meant that Watt wasn’t too hard for Lester to find, having gone not too far from the Toad House the party had been staying in.
When he walks up to her, the Lakitu notices that the girl was busy trying to mold something out of the soft, fluffy blankets of snow. “Hey, whatcha makin’?” He asks, leaning slightly forwards to try and get a peek at what she was doing.
“A snowman~!” Watt chirps, revealing the small mound of snow she had made before her. “I really wanted to make one, just like the ones we saw outside of Shiver City. But, um, I’ve never actually seen snow before now, so I don’t really know how to properly do it…” The girl admits, frowning slightly at her sad lump of snow. “Lester, could you help me build a snowman? Pleeeeeease?” She then asks, looking up at him with pleading blue eyes.
Now, Lester wasn’t exactly fond of cold weather. Having been born and raised in Flower Fields, which was pleasantly warm year round, he was probably the party member least used to snowy weather, aside from Watt herself and maybe Sushie. He could never figure out the appeal of it, aside from the occasional pretty scenery. It was cold, wet, and made navigating the skies a total pain — had he not been travelling with the party, he would’ve been more than happy to stay as far away from snow as he possibly could for the rest of his life. Yet, seeing just how hopeful Watt’s face was as she anxiously awaited his answer, Lester couldn’t help but bite the bullet and tough it out.
“I can’t say I know a whole lot about building snowmen, but I can certainly try my best to help you out.” Hearing this, Watt’s face lights up with pure glee.
“Thank you, thank you, thank you!!” The Lil’ Sparky squeals with joy, bouncing up from where she was sitting down to and running up to hug Lester’s leg, small, harmless sparks of electricity crackling off of her hair from her sheer excitement.
“It’s no problem. Just don’t be too disappointed if it turns out that I’m not very good at it.” He chuckles, patting Watt’s head, ruffling her hair as she did.
The two quickly got to work, rolling up the snow to make two spheres, one big and one small. “Yaaay, we did it!” Watt cheers as she watches Lester lift the smaller snowball on top of the larger one.
“Almost. We still need to give them a face, remember?” Lester points out, stepping back and brushing the excess snow off of his gloves once he made sure that the head of the snowman wouldn’t fall off.
“Oh, you’re right! We gotta make sure Mr. Snowman can see!” The girl exclaims before zooming off to collect any nearby sticks and stones she could find.
After a few minutes, Watt returns, now carrying a pile of twigs under one arm and a couple of flat stones within the other. Lester, now leaning back against a nearby tree, watches as she quickly gets to work. She gave him buttons, a nose, and a small smile, before doing something that the Lakitu didn’t really understand. “Whatcha givin’ him now?” He asks, trying to figure what the twigs the girl was placing on the side of face were supposed to be.
“I’m giving Mr. Snowman sunglasses, silly!” Watt responds, looking to Lester with a peppy grin as she places two large, flat rocks for the lenses. “I, um, want him to be super cool, just like you, so I’m giving him one just like yours!!” Hearing this brought a genuine smile to the young man’s face, a warm, fuzzy feeling welling up inside his chest from Watt’s words.
“Well, I’m sure he’ll be the coolest guy around now.” Lester reassures her, to which the girl beams back at him.
With the soothing quietness of the valley and the warm glow of the now slowly setting sun, Lester slowly found himself getting lost in his own thoughts as he watched Watt put the finishing touches on the snowman. While he didn’t consciously realize this himself, the Lil’ Sparky definitely did, a mischievous grin slowly growing on her face as she got an idea. Silently floating out of her companion’s range of vision, Watt scoops some snow off of the ground below her before carefully packing it together into a small ball. Sneaking around behind the tree, she carefully takes aim, before tossing the snowball straight at Lester’s flank!
Jumping at the sudden burst of cold, Lester swings his head around to see Watt, now in a fit of giggles from his reaction. “Oh, so that’s how you wanna play, huh?” He replies, smirking as he scoops a handful of snow off of the ground.
“Bring it on!!” The girl exclaims in response, hurrying to make as many snowballs as she could. The two proceeded to exchange frosty blows, though Lester was always sure to never toss the balls with enough force to hurt her.
Eventually, the little snowball fight they were having eventually caught the attention of the few Star Kids who were still playing outside nearby. Seeing how much fun the two seemed to having, they eventually all joined in their game, aiding Watt in bombarding Lester with snowballs. “Hey, now this isn’t fair!” He laughs, trying to block some of the incoming fire.
“Now, now, don’t go teaming up on him.” Frost T scolds the Star Kids, walking over to them alongside Karry, having gotten a bit distracted by having a conversation with the latter.
“Eh, it’s not a big deal, I don’t mind.” Lester reassures the Toad.
Turning around to see who was coming, the moment Watt sees Karry, the girl zips up to him. “Karry, Karry, you should join our snowball fight! Please?”
The tall, blond Paratroopa gives an amused, sunny grin in return. “Well, I don’t see why not! Though, I’m gonna go ahead and join Lester so he’s not alone, ok?”
“Okie dokie, but don’t expect us to go easy on you!” The Lil Sparky chimes back, a competitive flame burning in her baby blue eyes.
“Frost T, you should join too!” One Star Kid calls out, seemingly excited by the idea of a bigger snowball fight.
“Ooh, that’s a good idea! I’ll go tell the others that they should come out to play too!” Another agrees, zooming off to one of the nearby houses.
“Looks like this is going to be a big fight.” Lester thinks to himself, somewhat amused.
~
In the end, nearly everyone in the valley ended up coming out to join in on the snowball fight. After all, with so many of the Star Kids coming out to play, there had to be enough caretakers out to make sure nothing went awry, they figured they might as well keep them entertained, as well as have some fun themselves. The rest of the party ended up joining in as well, either happy to join in right away or swayed by Watt asking and giving puppy dog eyes. In the end, everyone ended up having quite a lot of fun, before heading inside one of the various houses for dinner, the sun finally sinking below the horizon as they did. Now, the party found themselves all relaxing inside the local Toad House’s parlour, curled up by a roaring fire.
“I really must thank you all.” Says Merle, who had come to see the party after dinner. “Ever since Bowser stole the Star Rod and the children were unable to rise up to Star Haven, they’ve been greatly worried that they may never be able to go up into the sky, so to see them be able to forget about their worries for a while and simply enjoy their childhood here in the valley means the world to all of us.”
“It’s no big deal.” Sushie replies. “I think it’s safe to say that we all had a good time out there. It certainly wore out our own small fry.” She adds, glancing over at the party’s own youngest members.
Goombario was currently curled up between Sushie and Mario, resting his back against Mario’s side while clutching the part of Sushie’s lengthy tail he was using as a pillow. Watt, meanwhile, was happily nestled up in Lester’s lap, using his usual, signature leather jacket as a blanket.
“Hey, Lester, if you don’t mind me asking, do you have any younger siblings?” Kooper, sitting at the end of one of the couches, asks.
“Huh? Nope, I’m an only child. Why do you ask?” The young man replies with a raised eyebrow, currently sat on his cloud rather than one of the chairs in the room.
“Well, you just seem really good with kids, so I was wondering if you had any experience from your family.” The blue shelled Koopa answers before taking a sip of his hot cocoa.
“Lester has always been pretty good with kids, so it must be some sort of natural skill.” Karry adds with a slight chuckle, looking over at his fellow turtles from where he was sat between Kooper and Bow.
“It’s not exactly something that first comes to mind when you think of tough guys...” The Lakitu says rather sheepishly, before looking down at Watt, unable to help himself from smiling warmly at the sight of her sleeping so peacefully, clutching to his jacket as if it were her lifeline. “…but, it’s also not something that really I mind either.”
Perhaps the snow wasn’t too bad after all.