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Luigi’s shoulders sagged as he huffed, amused, watching his brother practically bunny-hop along the path home to his left. The trophy, looking half the size of the plumber and was no doubt made to make the winner feel like the winner, glinted in the light of the rising sun.
“Couldn’t-a even take it easy on-a me, huh?” He could still feel the impact of the red shell hitting the side of his cart from what couldn’t have been more than a foot or so, accompanied with the caught-in-the-moment glare and wicked smile Mario had given him as he sped by with a laugh.
Mario let out a small chuckle, earning a roll of Luigi’s eyes as the green-clad man mouthed his brother’s predictable next sentence. “I-a come to these-a races to win, bro. No way!”
“Pft-Wow. Wowwwie. Okie-dokie. I-a see how it is.” A moment of silence before Luigi snorted again, and the two giggled. Mario shook his head, preparing to change the subject as he hugged the trophy closer and began hopping a bit higher. “Oh, hey! Did you a-see Wario after I passed-ta him on Moonview?” And he burst out laughing, high pitched and if he wasn’t holding the mushroom-topped trophy he’d be flapping his hands. “He looked-a sooo mad!”
Luigi held back a I think I’d be screaming curses at you too if I got hit with a Blue Shell three feet from the finish line and laughed along with Mario. If it was Waluigi there was no doubt in his mind– and likely everyone elses’– that he’d pull the exact same stunts. The path split into two, and Luigi started to veer toward the right to his older brother’s confusion.
“Eh, Weegie?” Mario tilted his head and, placing the trophy down for a moment, pointed down the left path. “House is this-a way.”
“I’m aware! E.Gadd asked if I could-a sweep through the mansion.” Luigi gestured around him with his left hand, pointing his thumb behind him with the other before waving dismissively. “Weekly thing, you know.” Mario ‘oh!’-ed and nodded vigorously, picking the trophy back up with relative ease.
“Okie-dokie! See ya then, don’t-a get too spooked!” And the red-clad plumber took off with a quiet laugh at his tease. Though he was too far to see, Luigi waved him goodbye before taking off himself. He stilled the tremors coming to his hands as the trees along the dirt road gradually began to lose their leaves, becoming darker in hue and taking on more gnarled appearances. Coming up to the mansion’s entrance, he took a breath, ignoring how the tree bark to his right looked sorta like a grimacing face. Trick of the light. It’s fine. He’s Luigi! One of the Mushroom Kingdom’s heroes! He’s been here before anyway, so really there was no reason to get unnerved by the surrounding greenery.
…Or would it be called purple-ery? Luigi shook the thought out of his mind before he spent too much time on it, and leaped the rest of the way up, skipping the stairs to the mansion doors.
A somewhat warm, but very rushed, welcome later he was pulled by the arm into the room E.Gadd set up most of his equipment, and as rude as it probably was he opted to tune out the old man’s drivel. He’s taken care of the ghosts that seem to be attracted to the area plenty of times before. The fact he leaps out of his skin everytime he sees one doesn’t mean Luigi doesn’t know what he’s doing! He took the Poltergust G-00 out of Gooigi’s hands before it slipped through the gelatinous clone and hit the ground, smiling at the lookalike. It waved at him with a happy sounding trill before going into its chamber on the vacuum. E.Gadd finished talking and pushed Luigi out of the room with a cheerful ‘Good Luck!’, before slamming the door shut and leaving the poor plumber to all the ghouls that most definitely heard the echoing boom of the wood hitting its frame. He sighed and started charging the flashlight. That old man’s really pushing his luck. Just-a wait ‘till I get hurt and you have to take care of the ghosts while I’m outta commission!
--—--—--—--
“Take-a care, Professor!” He waved with both hands, smiling wide as he walked backwards away from the now ghost-free mansion. For now, anyway. Luigi took a deep breath, then held it as he wished for there to not be enough ghosts coming back for him to return next week. Maybe in two weeks. Maybe a month? He exhaled, looking at the moon, not quite sky-high but nowhere close to the horizon either. Maybe he could ask Mario to come along with the 5000. Or Daisy, though that opened up the worryingly likely possibility she’d try to punch a ghost and end up leaving a hole in the wall. But still! Either way it’d certainly take less time than just him and Gooigi. He shoved a hand into his pocket and brought the other up to his face, covering a yawn when suddenly the sky became blindingly white and-
BOOM. Luigi stumbled, letting out a small shriek and looking around wildly. A very large amount of smoke and debris flew up in the air, at a distance–or rather, a lack of distance– that Luigi felt was far too close for comfort. He started to shuffle away, hoping to make it home before his conscious caught up to him, but to no avail.
Well, wait, what if it’s a Luma? He scrunched his eyes shut and groaned. They’re practically invincible, little superstars! It’ll be fine. He started walking again, but found himself turning around and looking at the wall of dust steadily rising. …Ah, but that doesn’t mean they don’t get hurt! And there’s smoke, too— what if a fire starts? Wouldn’t wanna be responsible for a fire getting out of control, Weegie!
With that final goading from…well, himself, Luigi hopped off the path and made his way to where the dust was dissipating, being swept away in the slight breeze. The crater was now visible, and with a sigh and another push from his inner thoughts, Luigi crouched down and very slowly slid down. He crept up to the center, where he could just barely make out a figure, that was...much bigger than any Luma could hope to be. He tried speaking, but his words stuck to his throat and he opted to take a few deep breaths and try waving. The figure, which was either curled in on itself or very round, didn't move. One more deep breath and Luigi's throat loosened up enough to get its attention.
"H...h-hello?" He winced at the higher pitch and stutter that came out with the word. Ah well, he never said his speech would come out dripping with confidence. His hands started trembling as the lack of response continued. Obviously such an impact would scare away anything nearby, but even knowing that it was far too quiet and it freaked Luigi out so much, he was making a conscious effort to not use Thunderhand. Another moment. He shuffled forward an inch and reached a hand out, his entire body shivering and static crackling between his fingers on the hand drawn to his chest, grasping at the fabric covering where his heart was pounding.
“Hel-?” The figure rose quickly, and Luigi just managed to muffle a shriek, jumping back and tripping over his own feet, hitting the ground with a thud. He hissed at the blunt pain, though looking up it went away as shock, confusion, and admittedly a bit of fear took its place.
“Wa…” He didn’t… look how he did earlier, in the stands watching the race and heckling everyone as they drove by. Of course it had been several hours and it wouldn’t take very long to change, Luigi knew that, but then the plumber couldn’t recall a time where his self-proclaimed rival ever wore, or even mentioned owning, a dress. Luigi tilted his head, eyebrows furrowing and one eye scrunching up, and his voice came out wavering.
“Walu-igi??”
Luigi watched, subconsciously shuffling back, as Waluigi lifted his head from where it was nestled in his hand, looking right at him. Ooh boy. Maybe he shouldn’t get the attention of the guy who seemed to have a constant hate-boner for him. The dress, a dark desaturated purple that Luigi thought looked very soft, trailed onto the ground, hiding the much taller man’s lower body entirely. His shoulders were bare, and the sleeves puffed out before trailing to just behind his wrists. Waluigi’s hand clenched, and Luigi shifted his sights to the wand in his grip. He hardly got to wondering why exactly he was holding that– he wouldn’tve taken it from Rosalina, right? When would he have gotten the chance anyway?– when suddenly Waluigi was right in front of him, inches away from his face. Luigi yelped and tried scrambling back. To no avail, Waluigi grabbed his upper arm and pulled him back to where he was. Oh boy.
“Why are you out here? Did you figure it out?” …Huh? Fading fear mixed with an influx of questions kept Luigi from giving a response. His eyes trailed to the top of Waluigi’s head. Why was he wearing a crown? …Did he manage to rob Rosalina?
“Hey. Don’t have time for this, Princess. If you don’t have the Heart situation figured out, why are you outside? I thought,” with an exasperated huff from Waluigi, the plumber was somewhat roughly pulled off the ground and onto his feet. “That you said you were putting your all into solving this.”
“I-. Um.” Princess? They came up with mean nicknames for each other to varying degrees of effectiveness—Seriously, what kinda insult was Mr. Eyeballs? But of all things, princess was a bit…
Hold it. Heart situation? Luigi’s eyebrows scrunched up again, and yet his vocal cords stayed useless when he opened his mouth to ask about it. Waluigi’s eyelids lowered in annoyance, and he let go of Luigi’s shirt, and the plumber fell a good few feet to the ground with a soft thud.
Another weird thing. It was more than common knowledge that Waluigi towered over almost everyone, and certainly everyone who resided in the Mushroom Kingdom, but even if Luigi was face-to-face with the man, he wouldn’t fall that far. He was only, what, two feet shorter? A little less than that, actually. His eyes looked at the trailing end of the dress, and he realized that there was no way Waluigi was touching the ground, even if his legs were freakishly long Luigi knew they weren’t that long. Luigi forced himself to look up.
Waluigi was pushing the hair off his face (Which was also weird, since Waluigi spoke far too much about how much work he puts into keeping his modern quiff up and out of the way. It wouldn’t be hanging and sticking to his forehead like it is now.) and with another big sigh, Waluigi looked down, barely moving his head. And as his eyes widened Luigi felt another tremor crash through his body. And then another, twice as strong, as Waluigi floated down to him.
“Oh…” Waluigi brought his face closer to Luigi’s, and the phasmophobe turned his head slightly, grabbing the trim of his hat and pulling it down to avoid eye contact with whatever this was, because in no world would it be Waluigi. The person (could Luigi still say that?) grabbed the cap off his head, and Luigi’s protest came out as a squeak as they floated up, studying the cap as though it was the piece to solvest the world’s toughest case. They looked back down, and Luigi wasn’t fast enough to look away and found himself flinching at the gaze.
“...My apologies. I think… Rather, I don’t think I’m…” The lookalike lifted their head and stared down the moon. With a small hum they went forward, passing Luigi’s right with a half-twirl that ended with them hanging their head back to look at the plumber. They lifted the cap and Luigi suddenly remembered that it belonged to him. His body resumed motion and he jumped up with his hand extending. “...U-...Um..”
“I’ll be taking my leave now.”
“W-wai- Um, wait, th-that-that’sa my-” But his voice came back to him too late, and suddenly the lookalike had flown off and they were too far to chase and too high up for Luigi to jump after. He stood still for a moment, then another. And then his shoulders sagged and his body went along with them, head hanging low as he let out a deep sigh. That was one of his favorite hats, too. It fit better than the rest of them.