Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

Letting out a soft groan, Goombella’s eyes fluttered open and her vision gradually began to clear up enough for her to take in her surroundings. To her left, she could hear the low hum of a TV, only displaying intermittent static, and the sound of a rocking chair being rocked back and forth by a surprisingly harsh breeze. 

Right, that's where she was; the topmost floor of the Creepy Steeple’s bell tower. The place where that bothersome Duplighost had apparently decided to exercise his squatter's rights at.

But with that small realisation aside, Goombella’s mind only began racing even faster at the brand new onslaught of questions she suddenly had. Where were her friends? Where was the monster that they’d just defeated? And – the most pressing of all – why had she just been lying face-down on the floor, her entire body aching?

The Goomba barely suppressed a scream, making a noise that sounded more like a strangled yelp, when she finally glanced down at her own body. Or, at least, what was supposed to be her own body. She was… physically the same, at least. The stubby legs and rounded torso were unmistakably hers and she could still feel the familiar weight of her hat resting atop her head. 

The only difference was that her entire body was formed entirely of deep purple shadows. Just like how that Duplighost had looked after it copied her appearance… 

“Hold on…” Goombella muttered aloud, “Don’t tell me that…”.

She cast her mind back to the fight, their first encounter with the supposed monster of the steeple. All things considered, he was actually pretty wimpy, far from the most difficult opponent they’d had to face so far. Just as the Duplighost was beginning to look tired, he had prepared to use some sort of secret technique he had up his sleeve. 

Of course, seeing a chance to end the fight as soon as possible, Goombella had immediately started charging towards him, ready to take him out with a swift multibonk before he was able to pull off whatever his big trick was.

Ah. Goombella was starting to put the pieces together.

The flash of light, the strange feeling in her body, the shadowy version of herself that the Duplighost had transformed into, the way she passed out the moment the fight was over. It suddenly all made perfect sense to her now.

They’d swapped bodies. No, even worse, her body had been stolen .

Goombella tried her best not to freak out. Or, rather, she tried her best to not freak out too much . The mere idea of even being in a body that wasn’t hers but felt exactly like hers was already creepy enough, dwelling on the fact that the creature who had been slowly turning all the townspeople into pigs was now occupying her body seemed like it would only make things worse.

No, everything would be fine. There was nothing to worry about. Besides, she’d been more than capable taking on all the other weirdos and monsters that had shown up on their quest so far. One measly Duplighost was nothing, no matter what his powers were!

All she had to do was… Well, she wasn’t exactly sure what she had to do to get her body back, but the most obvious course of action was to catch up to that body-snatcher and get some answers out of him. Granted, he probably wouldn’t want to give back her body, but a light headbonk or two would hopefully change his mind if it came down to it.

With a concrete – albeit shaky – plan in mind, Goombella felt like she could finally calm down, just a little. Yeah, being on her own in a place like this was still pretty scary, as it would be for anyone, but she felt more confident in her situation. At least, she felt like she was more confident. Which was still good, right?

Goombella shook her head. Now wasn’t a good time to just stand around thinking. If she wanted to catch up to that imposter, she needed to get moving as soon as possible.

=–=

“My my,” Madame Flurrie tutted to herself as she watched Koops slam himself into a weakened Crazee Dayzee, clearing out the last of the foes in their immediate vicinity, “Admittedly, I had hoped that our return trip would be a little bit less… intense than on the way here.”

The response from Mario, the ‘unofficial official’ leader of their little group, conveyed a similar sentiment, although he seemed to have a more upbeat view of it all. He made sure to point out that at least they were getting some much needed star points from it all.

“Hey, guys. Up ahead!” A voice called out to the others as the team’s snow-coloured baby Yoshi scurried back towards them, narrowly dodging the myriad of trees in his way, “It’s more of those nasty rock guys, like three of ‘em.”

“Rock… guys?” Koops repeated back, before his face lit up with realisation, “Oh! Those guys! The uhh… the ummm… Goombella, what were those things called again?”.

‘Goombella’, the final member of the quintet, was snapped out of her brooding by the sudden attention. “Huh, what! ? Whaddya want?”.

“Uh, umm,” The Koopa winced at the curt reply from his usually cheerful friend, “I was just asking if you could tattle those guys up ahead. I sorta, uh, forgot what you said about them last time.”

“Tattle? What is that supposed to…” The inhabitant of Goombella’s body began to ask, before realising that it probably had something to do with the book they had been carrying around, “Oh, right, right . Tattle. Yeah, tattle. I can do that, yuk yuk yuk!”.

The imposter bit down on their bottom lip a little too hard as they began frantically flipping through the hefty green encyclopedia, briefly scouring each page for something that vaguely resembled the creature in question. The longer they spent fruitlessly flipping through pages, the harder they bit down on their lip. 

‘Hold on a second,’ they internally reasoned, ‘It’s not like what I tell them has to be true…’.

Sure, things hadn’t gone exactly as planned, but it wasn’t like them to miss out on a chance to have a little fun.

“Right, got it!” ‘Goombella’ suddenly announced, catching the attention of her party members, “Those things are called uhh… mossy clefts. According to this book, they’re the exact same as normal clefts, except for their distinct green colour, so I guess we’ve got nothing to worry about! Nope, nothing at all! Yuk yuk yuk!”.

“Oh? The exact same?” Flurrie innocently queried as the nearest of the three creatures began to produce a subtle rainbow glow, “Are you completely certain about that?”.

“One hundred percent sure!” The imposter lied, “That’s what the book says, by the way. So if I’m wrong, it’s totally not my fault!”.

Sure, Flurrie didn’t seem very happy when she ended up getting hit by two fully charged up clefts in a row, but the Goomba struggled to feel any sort of guilt over it. Besides, it was funny! It wasn’t their fault if Flurrie didn’t get the joke!

=–=

“That's right, you little twit, so get cracking!” Beldam screeched at her youngest sister, sneering as she turned to the other member of their trio, “Come, Marilyn. Let's leave this useless little fool to her chore.”

“Guh-huh…”.

Without another word, the two older shadows sunk into the ground, leaving Vivian alone on the dirt floor. She could get up from the ground – and hopefully keep her gloves from getting too dirty – but she just couldn’t muster up the energy to even think about moving.

Terrible. Everything was absolutely terrible .

She didn’t have the superbombomb, she’d never had the superbombomb. Beldam knew that, she was sure that she must’ve known. How was she supposed to find something that she never even had in the first place? What did her sister even expect from her? Or was this one of those unwinnable situations Beldam loved to put her in? One where – no matter what she did – she’d just end up getting yelled at and punished for anyway.

Slowly, shakily, Vivian floated up to her normal height, her head hung low to hide her tear–stained face from the newly un-cursed townspeople that were milling around the area. For as much as she wanted to sink into the floor and stew in her own self–pity for the rest of the day – maybe even for the rest of her life, if she was being dramatic – she knew from experience that it would only make her punishment worse. There was no other choice than to look for the bomb, wherever it might be.

The shadow squeezed her eyes shut, accidentally letting a few more tears trickle out in the process, as she tried to rack her brain for a memory of the last time she’d seen the item. Beldam had definitely had it the entire time they were in X–naut fortress, that one was easy, but after that was where things had started to get hazy.

She couldn’t help but mentally scold herself for not paying enough attention to the bomb. She should’ve known that Beldam was going to drop it. All that time lamenting over whether or not it was ‘okay’ or not to use something like that on Mario and his friends should’ve been spent keeping her eyes laser-focused on her sister. Oh no , had Beldam been right? Was it really her fault after all?

Vivian let her arms go limp, falling down to her sides as she started floating over to a nearby assemblage of barrels – as good a place to start looking as any. The shadow sighed to herself. She was so… tired .

=–=

Goombella liked to think she had a pretty accurate memory, especially when it came to remembering directions, but her journey back through the twilight trail was really starting to make her reconsider those thoughts. To her own credit, she hadn’t gotten totally lost yet. Actually, she’d even made it out of both the metaphorical and physical woods, with Twilight Town barely visible way off in the distance, but that didn’t mean that the journey had been easy… or quick. She’d be more than happy to never have to see another Crazee Dayzee for the rest of her life.

All things considered, she was a competent fighter – her time at Glitzville had made her more than aware of that fact – but this was perhaps the first time since their adventure began that she’d fought battle after battle completely on her own. Competent fighter or not, only being able to attack her foes one by one with her headbonks started to show its flaws when she was all on her own against an entire horde of Dayzees.

There was still a considerable distance between where she currently was and Twilight Town, and her stubby legs were gradually starting to ache, but the rest of the way back was going to be far easier, a small mercy that she was infinitely grateful for. 

After another twenty minutes of walking, and only a single run-in with a particularly irritating Hyper Paragoomba, she finally made her way to the outskirts of the town, marked by the same dilapidated wooden shed her party had searched through earlier. 

Goombella breathed a sigh of relief. Sure, there wasn’t really anything to be relieved about, she was yet to actually solve anything, but just knowing that she was back near some sort of friendly civilization was enough for her.

“Hey, what's up, Slick? About time you showed up, I’ve been waiting forever for you to get here!”.

Goombella knew who was speaking to her before she even noticed them hop down from seemingly nowhere, it was hard to not recognise her own voice, even with how strange it sounded coming out of someone else’s mouth. 

“You!” She yelled at the imposter, completely forgetting that her usual mean glare was totally indistinguishable from the rest of her new face, “You better give my body back right now, you hear me? That’s mine!”.

“I know, I know,” The imposter shrugged her off, chuckling to themselves, “Listen up…Goombella, right? Yeah, listen up, Goombella, I’m not exactly jumping for joy either, y’know?”.

The shadowy Goomba gawked in response, caught off guard by the imposter’s answer, “Huh, w-what?”.

“That body-swapping curse was supposed to hit the other guy!” The Duplighost complained, sounding almost childish, “You know, red hat, mustache, big famous hero type? Now that’s the kinda person whose body I’d love to take, not some smarty-pants bookworm sidekick, but you just had to get all up in my face and mess up my aim!”.

Goombella was almost speechless at the display that the monster in front of her was putting on. This was… not how she expected their confrontation to go. At all.

“But, on the other hand, I can’t say that this outcome is all bad,” He seemed to reconsider his words, “I mean, you really don’t have to do any work, do you? All I gotta do is pretend to read some words from this book and then I get to sit back and relax while your friends go and do all the fighting.”

The shadowy Goomba gritted her teeth. That was not true; she did way more than that!

“And besides, I’m sorta locked into this bOdy now. Trying to switch again would just make things way too complicated, so I’ll just make the most of your identity for now, yuk yuk yuk!”.

“As if!” Goombella defiantly yelled, “No way am I just gonna let you take my body!”.

“Yeah, yeah, you’re gonna heroically defeat me and get your body back. I get it, Slick,” The shapeshifter dismissively replied, “But there’s one little caveat I forgot to mention. Even though I stole your name and you can’t use it anymore, it’s still technically not mine yet. So, if I wanna go back through that pipe to Rogueport with all your little buddies – which I do – I’m sorta gonna have to… erase you. Permanently.”

“E-erase me!?” The Goomba repeated, her mouth agape, “You’re even worse than I thought, you freak!”.

“Tough break, Slick! That’s just how things work.”

Goombella gulped. She’d expected it from the start, but it was pretty obvious by now that there was no way she was getting her body back without a fight. Usually, that wouldn’t be too big of a problem, but after making her way all the way back from Creepy Steeple, and with no items on hand, she wasn’t feeling as confident as she usually would be.

“Buuut,” Her imposter sing-songed, clearly enjoying the situation they had found themselves in, “I’ll cut you a deal. See, as long as someone doesn’t know my name, I can make myself practically untouchable. So – here’s the deal – if you can correctly guess my name in one try, I’ll give you your body back, no strings attached!”.

From the ear–grating laugh he let out afterwards, Goombella could tell that he was just messing with her at this point. Guess his name? Yeah, as if she’d be able to do that. How was she even supposed to know it in the first place?

“Go on. Guess, guess! This is your big chance, yuk yuk yuk!”.

She was really starting to get sick of this guy. 

“Gah! I dunno!” She yelled out in frustration, before an idea popped into her head, “Is it, uh… ‘Slick’?”.

It was a poor guess, but it was also the only one she had.

“Pfft! Wrongamundo, little nobody! Who'd name their kid that?” The fake Goombella laughed in her face, “Well, there goes your chance, Slick. Guess I’ll just be getting rid of you, after all!”.

Before she could even react, the impersonator ran up towards her, launching themselves into what she could innately tell was her very own headbonk. She didn’t even have time to guard before the first hit, only barely having time to attempt a half-hearted block for the second bonk.

The Duplighost hopped back, stumbling a little as they started to get accustomed to fighting in their new body. Goombella noticed their unsteady footing and took it as her chance to get in a few hits of her own. A well-executed multibonk could give her the upper hand she so desperately needed.

Despite her exhaustion, a burst of adrenaline accelerated her forwards, her head meeting the other Goomba’s before they even realised what was happening. She got in one hit… two hits… three… four. It was only on the fifth bonk that she misaimed her landing, making a sixth hit an impossibility. 

Still, those five would’ve surely dealt enough damage to…

“Gah! Wh-what!?” She spluttered out as she watched her imposter snicker at her, going completely unharmed from her onslaught of attacks.

“Don’t you remember what I said, Slick?” The Duplighost mocked her, “Un-touch-able! Your attacks won’t do anything if you don’t know my name!”.

Goombella shrank back. If they were just unproven claims and boasting, she’d probably just laugh in their face for being so cocky. But she’d actually just seen the proof of those claims in real time. She was faced with a completely unwinnable fight and she knew that there was only one thing she could do.

She ran away.

=–=

“Stupid body-snatching scumbag,” Goombella grumbled to herself as she stopped, just past the main gate of Twilight Town, to catch her breath, “How the heck am I supposed to figure out his name? …I guess I’m not supposed to, that’s the point.”

For as much as Goombella wanted to immediately seek out her party, she knew she couldn’t do that. The threats that the Duplighost had made were very real, and she was sure that if she tried to explain herself to her friends, her imposter would just accuse her of being the liar; an accusation that she, sadly, couldn’t exactly disprove all that well.

No, as much as she hated it, trying to confront her friends directly without a way to even fight back against that monster would just put everyone in danger. She’d have to somehow figure out her copy’s name all on her own.

Within just a few minutes of arriving in the town, she had come to the depressing realisation that it would probably just be best to keep her head down and avoid drawing attention to herself. None of the townspeople were directly aggressive to her, per say, but it was clear from the passing glances that most of them had immediately clocked her as ‘suspicious’.

She was sure that the other Goombella had gotten a far warmer welcome.

The only real stop she made was in the local shop, spending the meager amount of coins she had on her to pick up a few items. She wasn’t exactly able to afford much, but anything was better than the empty pockets she’d been dealing with so far. 

To tell the truth, Goombella wasn’t quite sure why she’d decided to stick around and explore the rest of the town. At first, she’d been hoping that maybe someone might have some sort of information on the monster, or a clue as to their name, but that possibility was seeming more and more unlikely. The few friendlier–looking people that she’d talked to had been completely clueless, and far too distracted by the great news of their newly lifted curse to pay all that much attention to her.

With her expectations set understandably low, she made her way to the west side of the town, where something – no, someone – immediately caught her eye. Not too far away, hopelessly searching through the small patch of foliage near the town’s exit pipe, was Vivian, the shadow creature that Goombella and her party had fought against back in the Boggly Woods.

She should’ve been more careful – more apprehensive – when approaching her. Were it anyone else that she’d fought in the past, she probably would’ve been; she might even have ignored them completely. But she didn’t. There was something about the way that the other girl nervously wrung her hands as she peered from shrub to shrub that melted Goombella’s heart. Between that and the way Vivian had seemed reluctant – even unwilling, at times – to fight her the last time they met, she was pretty confident that the other girl wouldn’t try to hurt her.

“Uh, hey, excuse me. Are you okay?” It was a pretty stupid question to ask. No, obviously, she wasn’t, but Goombella really wasn’t sure how else to try comforting the shadow.

In response, Vivian, who seemed as though she had been frantically muttering something to herself, jolted at least a foot into the air, caught off guard by the sudden voice. “O-oh, um,” Vivian sniffled, turning to let Goombella see her tear–stained cheeks and wobbly mouth, “I-I’m supposed to be looking for something important, but I have no idea where it could be. If I don’t find it soon, my sister’s gonna punish me again…”.

In almost an instant, Goombella felt herself soften. Truthfully, she barely knew the girl, and her relationship with her sister even less so, but one interaction was more than enough to know how cruel her elder sibling truly was. Sure, by helping her, she’d technically be ‘helping the enemy’ or whatever, but, really, she couldn’t bring herself to see the other girl as an enemy. Her sisters, definitely, but not Vivian.

“Then I’ll help you look for it!” Goombella announced, before amending her offer with a, “If that’s okay with you.”

“Huh? I… But… You don’t… um,” Vivian squeaked out, before shaking her head and wiping away her tears, “Thank you so much. I think there’s a chance it could be somewhere in all of this grass. If not, then I really don’t know where else to look…”.

As Goombella reassuringly smiled up at the shadow, she found herself having to fight down some feelings she thought she’d left behind in the Boggly Woods. Now wasn’t the time. She needed to focus on finding the… whatever it was that Vivian was looking for.

She noticed Vivian sink down towards the ground and push aside a few ferns, looking marginally more invigorated than before, and took it as her cue to start searching. The first few minutes were entirely fruitless, with the two girls exchanging very few words as they fished through the shrubbery, until Goombella felt her foot make contact with something hard – metallic.

The Goomba almost yelped when she rolled the object out from its hiding place and saw exactly what Vivian had been forced to look for. She had a sinking feeling in her stomach that she knew exactly who that bomb was supposed to be used on. The idea of re–hiding it did pop into her mind, but she couldn’t. She’d rather risk facing another deadly situation than go on knowing that she was directly responsible for another one of Vivian’s ‘punishments’.

“Hey, over here!” She called out to the shadow, “Is this the thing you were looking for?”.

The relief on Vivian’s face when she floated over to the bomb was so palpable that Goombella couldn’t help but worry that she might start crying again. She picked up the bomb, weighing it in her hands as if to ensure that it was real, before smiling at Goombella for the first time since their interaction had begun.

“You… you really found it,” She beamed, the gratitude practically emanating from her body, “Thank you, thank you so much. I was so worried that I’d never find it and that my sister would–”.

Whatever she had been about to say was suddenly halted by a loud clicking noise as the bomb practically fell apart in her hands, a lone spring toppling out onto the floor. 

“Oh no! I-i-it’s broken! It must’ve broken when my sister dropped it,” The shadow began frantically rambling, her breathing growing faster, “What’ll I do? What’ll I do? Ohhh, why does everything have to go wrong all of the time?”.

Seeing the panicked state she was in, Goombella tried her best to reassure the other girl. “H-hey, it’s okay, it’ll be fine. I can um, I can try to fix it, yeah! We still have all the parts, so I’m sure it’s not totally beyond repair!”.

“No, there’s no point in trying, it’s completely busted. Even if you could fix it, my sisters will be back any minute now,” Vivian dejectedly muttered, before tilting her head up a little to show Goombella the tiniest of wobbly smiles, “But I really do appreciate your offer. Thank you.”

A few awkward seconds passed as Goombella wracked her mind for what to say; what – if anything – she could do to actually help the shadow out of her situation. 

“Hey, wait a second,” Vivian suddenly spoke up once again, “I never even told you my name. I’m Vivian. Um, and you are…?”.

“Oh, ohh , yeah! Names,” In the heat of the moment, Goombella had completely forgotten that the shadow had no idea who she was, “I’m –”.

The moment she tried to utter her name, ‘Goombella’, her throat felt as though it was seizing up. The only noise that left her mouth was something akin to a breathy gasp. 

“My name’s –!”.

The constricting feeling was even worse that time. Nope, she wasn’t trying that again. Apparently her impostor had been completely literal when he said that she couldn’t even use her name anymore. Her body let out an involuntary shiver at the thought.

“I’m sorry, but I couldn’t quite hear what you said,” Vivian innocently commented, her face shifting to concern as she stared at the Goomba, “Uhm, are you okay? You seem a little bit spooked all of a sudden.”

“Well, I’m not sure if you’ll believe me or not, but I can’t actually say my name,” Goombella explained, suddenly fully aware of how unbelievable her story sounded, “Some annoying monster just stole it.”

“Your name was stolen? I see... Well, I guess that happens from time to time...” Vivian nodded along, seeming to completely accept her story, until she paused for a second, “...Wait, no it doesn't! Your name was stolen!?”.

“Not just my name,” She sheepishly admitted, “That jerk stole my whole identity, even my body! Even worse, my friends all probably think that he’s me! Not that I blame them, but…”.

To say that the other girl was surprised would be an understatement. Her entire body momentarily bounced into the air as she suppressed a shocked squeal. “S-seriously!? Gee whiz, that’s… that’s terrible,” Vivian’s voice grew quieter as she seemed to think something over, “Something so horrible just happened to you, and yet you’ve been trying to help solve my problems this entire time… That’s… no one’s ever been so kind to me before…”.

Goombella opened her mouth, but no words came out. She hadn’t even thought about it that way. She’d just seen Vivian in the state she was in and… well, she just wanted to help her. Her own situation quickly became the last thing on her mind. It didn’t seem all that strange, she would’ve reacted that way if it was anyone, right?

“All right, that's it !” Vivian pumped her fists and smiled down at the shadowy Goomba, “I'm gonna help you get back your name… and your body! And your friends!”.

“You… will?” Goombella hesitantly questioned, as if she was scared that she’d misheard, or that the other girl would suddenly rescind her offer, “But what about your sisters… and that bomb?”.

“Don’t worry about any of that stuff, it’s not what's important right now,” Vivian reassured her, “Besides, I’m not sure I really want to stay with my sisters anymore, anyway. We aren’t very happy together…”.

The shadow trailed off, chewing on her bottom lip as she considered her next words, before pushing forwards and opening her mouth to speak once again.

“...Things were never exactly perfect between us, but ever since I realised that I was their sister, not their brother, their bullying just got worse and worse,” She explained, her face showing an expression that Goombella couldn’t fully parse.

She understood what those words meant. Or, at the very least, she was pretty sure she knew what the other girl was alluding to. Goombella had initially thought that there was nothing in the world that could lower her opinion of Beldam more than it already was, but… she stood corrected. 

“Honestly, I don’t think you should be going back to your sisters, like, ever !” Goombella grumbled, before deciding to instead try cheering the shadow up a little bit, “Oh and uh, by the way, Vivian is a really cute name. I like it!”.

“Mmm hmm! It is, isn’t it?” The shadow happily hummed, the compliment seemingly elevating her mood, “I feel like I need to repay you for all of your kindness. That's the right thing to do, right?”.

Goombella was going to tell her that it was fine; that her helping her get her name back was more than enough repayment, but quickly found herself stunned into silence as the other girl floated up to her and planted a soft kiss on her cheek. The kiss was brief – Vivian’s lips seemed to shy away the moment they made contact with her cheek – but it was still enough to dispel every other thought from her head, leaving the microsecond of bliss as the only thing that remained.

Vivian happily giggled to herself as she moved away from the other girl, her cheeks burning even brighter than usual. She’d never been shown kindness like this before; she couldn’t help but feel ecstatic.

For the first time, Goombella was the tiniest bit relieved to have her new body, if only because it kept Vivian from seeing the embarrassing state of her beet-red face.

“So, hmm hmm hmm hmm...” Vivian’s smile seemed more resolute than ever as her body happily bobbed up and down, “Let’s go get your body back!”.

Chapter Text

“Are you sure, Goombella?” Koops asked, raising an eyebrow, “I-I mean, I get what you’re saying, but shouldn’t we focus on getting back to Rogueport as soon as possible?”.

“No way, out of the question,” ‘Goombella’ immediately countered, “I’m telling you, I saw that stupid Goom– that stupid imposter creeping around outside town. As heroes , shouldn’t you guys be focusing on keeping this town safe? You agree, don’t you Mario? There’s no way we can leave this place until that troublemaker is dealt with for good!”.

Mario put a gloved hand to his chin, humming as he mulled over his party member’s suggestion. Sure, Goombella had been acting a bit… odd recently, but if she really had seen the monster who cursed the villagers outside of town, could they really just ignore it and head home?

The other members of their team waited in silence, awaiting their leader’s input. The moment Mario opened his mouth, really to voice his opinion, 'Goombella' quickly spoke over him before he could even get a single word out.

“See? Mario agrees with me! Or are you guys gonna disagree with him , too?”.

“But Gonzales didn’t even say anythi–”.

“Right. Here’s the plan, then,” The Goomba interrupted once again, “I’ll stay here and keep watch over this crystal star while you guys, uhh… protect the town. Yeah, you guys go do that! Yuk yuk yuk!”.

=–=

“So, um,” Vivian peered down towards her new companion as they aimlessly wandered through a more remote area of Twilight Town, away from most of the townsfolk, “Do you have any sort of idea how we could get your body back from that monster? I’m guessing we can’t just go up and ask them to return it…”.

“Yeah, I do have one idea. From what they said, I have a feeling that saying his real name might be his big weakness. The problem is, I don’t actually know his name, and I have no idea how I’d even figure it out in the first place,” Goombella explained.

Vivian left out a soft hum as she poked a finger into her cheek. “His name, huh? Well, I’m not sure if it’ll work or not, but I do know one way we could possibly get some more information on that body–snatcher.”

“Wait, really?” The Goomba gawked, “What is it?”.

“Hmm hmm!” She nodded her head, floating over towards a nearby tree, “Here, follow me. I’ll show you.”

Once they were both standing a few feet away from the tree, Vivian spoke once more. “You see those crows?” She asked, only continuing once Goombella gave her a simple nod, “Most people think that birds like these are pretty unassuming, but they’re pretty chatty when people aren’t around. With all that flying around they tend to do, they’re practically full of random tidbits!”.

“I don’t think it’s too unreasonable to assume that they could know something about that monster,” Goombella nodded along, her hope rising by the second, “But, uh, if we’re here, they won’t say anything, right?”.

“Yup, but that’s where my powers come in!” The shadow excitedly explained, seemingly more than happy to be useful to her new friend, before she paused for a second, taking on a more hesitant tone, “But, um, I hope this doesn’t feel uncomfortable for you or anything. It shouldn’t , but I’ve never really… taken someone else with me before…”.

Goombella probably should’ve asked what exactly she meant by that, but instead she just gave the shadow a quick ‘I’m sure it’ll be fine!’ as a go–ahead. After a brief moment of hesitation, Vivian floated over towards her, getting about as close as she could get to her without physically touching her, before she pulled Goombella into what she thought was a hug. It definitely felt like one.

Just as Goombella was about to question what exactly was going on, a feeling of overwhelming weightlessness overtook her body as the ground itself practically swallowed her up. She felt Vivian’s grip on her tighten. Not to a painful degree, but as if the shadow was scared that she’d accidentally come loose from her hold. Goombella opened her eyes – not remembering when exactly she’d shut them – and observed her new surroundings. 

They were right where they’d just been; under one of the trees in Twilight Town. Only now, she was seeing it from underneath the floor, her vision slightly marred by some sort of purple haze. The world above her was muffled, but still audible. Just as Vivian had said, the crows were indeed saying something aside from their usual ‘caw’s, but she couldn’t really bring herself to focus on that at the moment.

Vivian’s body was warm. It was the same feeling she’d get when wrapped up in a heated blanket on a cold night, except… nicer; more comfortable. The artificial feeling of an embrace was replaced with a real one, with arms that felt like they were holding onto her for dear life. For a brief moment, she felt as if they were the only two people in the world.

Just as Goombella was finally starting to relax into her new situation, she felt herself get pulled back up to her usual height; her body feeling noticeably colder than it had felt a moment prior. 

“Um, was that okay?” Vivian cautiously asked, backing away from the other girl’s personal space, “It didn’t hurt at all, right?”.

“Nope, not at all!” The Goomba replied, perhaps a little too quickly, “It was surprisingly comfortable, actually.”

“Oh, phew,” She breathed a sigh of relief, her body dipping towards the ground as she exhaled, “It’s a shame that we didn’t get any relevant info from those crows, but I do agree with what they were saying. Solar energy really does seem like the best way forward. Although, I’m not sure if it could be used somewhere like here…”.

“Uhm, what?” Goombella tilted her head, confused by the sudden change in conversation, “Where did that come from?”. 

“Huh? But the crows were talking about… n-never mind.” 

The next twenty or so minutes or so were spent in a similar fashion. The two of them would track down a new murder of crows, The shadow would pull them into the shadows and they’d listen in on whatever the birds had to say. Vivian would try her best to ignore the subtle feeling of longing that bubbled up inside of her each time she had to let go of her new companion.

Over time, Goombella found herself getting more and more used to the ability and even started to actually pay attention to what the crows were saying, instead of just waiting for Vivian to regale their words to her. 

Eventually, just as they were beginning to fear that the crows were as clueless as they were, they found themselves eavesdropping on a very interesting conversation. 

“So that Goomba, the one that’s been going around bragging about how she got the last hit on that bad guy, that's actually just the bad guy hiding in her body, right? Somehow no one has figured it out yet. These humans are so dumb, it makes me want to peck their noses.”

“Yup. And I heard that the only soul who knows his real name is trapped underneath Creepy Steeple. As long as no one knows his name, these fools probably aren’t gonna catch on to his scheme any time soon.”

“Hmm, I wonder how this whole thing is gonna end up… As long as he doesn’t bother us, I don’t really mind.”

“Didya hear that, Vivian?” Goombella excitedly asked once they had emerged from the shadows, “Creepy Steeple! We can find his name if we head down below Creepy Steeple. I know where that is, my friends and I were just there!”.

“Well, what are we waiting for, then?” The shadow replied, “Let’s go get your body back from that meanie!”.

With a clear course of action finally obtained, it didn’t take too long for the two girls to make their way out of Twilight Town, passing by the old shed that marked the outskirts of the town. As they walked past the small wooden structure, an inexplicable feeling of dread welled up inside of Goombella. Just as she was about to make a comment about the ‘spooky atmosphere’, she was stopped in her tracks by a familiar voice.

“Hey, what's up, Slick?” ‘Goombella’ suddenly appeared on the path in front of them, causing Vivian to jump backwards in surprise, “Been waiting for you!”.

“I really should’ve known…” The murkier of the two Goombas groaned under her breath.

“Running away last time was a pretty lame move, you know!?” The imposter stomped their foot onto the ground, as if he was moments away from throwing a tantrum, “I would’ve gone after you back in town, but that wouldn't have been a very good look, would it?”.

“Yeah, it would’ve shown everyone how cruel you are!” Vivian balled her hands into fists, her voice as close to a yell as she could muster, “Now give her body back already!”.

“Hey! Can the chatter, missy!” Vivian shrank back as the imposter chastised her, before shifting their attention to Goombella, “So, you wanna take another guess at my name, or are you gonna let me pummel you already?”.

Goombella furrowed her eyebrows. She’d have to run again; there was no other option. She used her foot to nudge the shadowy tendril of the girl beside her, hoping that she would actually be able to feel it. When Vivian, after a second nudge, finally looked over at her, Goombella used her other foot to point further down the path, past the other Goomba.

The shadow didn’t say anything, but from the affirmative nod she gave, Goombella was sure that she’d caught on to what she was trying to say.

“Not gonna answer me, huh? Wow, do you hate fun or something?” The Duplighost mocked her, “Guess I’ll just skip straight to the pummelling then, Slick! Yuk yuk yuk!”.

Just like the last time, the imposter immediately charged towards them, Goombella specifically. The moment they were in the air – setting up for a headbonk, no doubt – she dashed off to the side, quickly beginning to make distance between her and the Duplighost. 

She spared a glance backwards when she heard her own voice cry out in pain, having landed head first on the ground, just in time to see a purple ripple emanate out from the ground where Vivian had previously stood. Good, Vivian had understood her after all.

The other Goombella yelled something out, most likely some strand of threat or insult, but she was too far away from them to make out anything intelligible. 

Once she felt like she’d ran far enough away – for now, anyway – she skidded to a halt, panting as she caught her breath. They had a long walk ahead of them; it would be a pretty terrible idea to overexert herself this early. The flash of purple that suddenly appeared in her peripheral vision and the tell-tale sound of her unveiling from the ground let her know that Vivian was safe, and had managed to keep up with her.

“That body-snatcher must’ve been waiting there for us to show up,“ Goombella spoke aloud, taking a small pause to glance at their surroundings, “There’s no telling if he’ll keep following us this time, so let’s get moving!”.

She took a few steps forwards, expecting to hear the barely-audible hum of Vivian’s tendril sliding across the ground. Except, she didn’t. Turning around, she noticed the other girl, unmoved from her spot, visibly deep in thought. Although, what she was thinking about was completely imperceptible to Goombella.

“Vivian?” When she didn’t immediately react, the Goomba couldn’t help but grow concerned, “Hellooo? Vivian?”.

“Huh? O-oh,” The shadow finally responded, turning to look at Goombella with a faintly troubled look on her face, “S-sorry, my bad. I was just… thinking about something… Yeah, l-let’s get going. To the steeple!”.

Vivian frowned, her brows furrowed. She recognised that Goomba from somewhere, she was sure of it. The problem was that, beyond a vague sense of familiarity, she had no idea who she was, or where she recognised her from. Was she someone that she’d met before, or was just a passing face that had stuck in her mind?

She really had no idea. But why did that leave her with such an ominous feeling?

=–=

Most people probably wouldn’t agree with her sentiment – and it even felt a little bit wrong to think, considering the predicament that her new friend was suffering through – but Vivian couldn’t help but find their journey trekking through the twilight trail to be… fun? Was that the right word to describe it? Pleasant, maybe? Refreshing? She wasn’t really sure.

Vivian liked her new, un-named, companion a lot. She was sassy, and could be brutally honest at times, yet she still seemed to radiate an overwhelming kindness. Although, Vivian supposed, any sort of kindness would be overwhelming to her. The Goomba was chatty, she could probably talk for hours, and while some people would probably have some sort of issue with that, Vivian couldn’t call herself one of them. 

Listening to the other girl talk was so enthralling that she found herself forgetting to speak back for minutes on end, only being pulled back when the shorter girl would posit a direct question, or worry that she was getting bored of listening – which she wasn’t.

Over time, the barren clearings and dirt pathways were replaced with tall grass and trees so imposingly large that their leaves and branches blocked out the moon itself. Trees turned into more trees and Vivian felt herself jumping at every small noise. It was hard to not feel at least a little bit scared, even with her new friend by her side – the forest just had that type of atmosphere.

“We’ve been… walking for so long,” Goombella huffed aloud a few hours in, her legs practically burning, “I think we should find somewhere to take a break.”

“Yeah, that sounds like a good plan,” Vivian nodded along, sending a sympathetic smile down at the Goomba. She wouldn’t say that she was as tired as her. Sure, she was tired, and her tendril was certainly aching, but she could probably keep walking for a while longer if she really had to. Although, in fairness, this was apparently the Goomba’s third time making this trip; a notion that made the shadow empathetically wince.

After a minute or two more of wandering through the forest, the two girls stumbled upon a clearing, hidden a fair ways away from the main path and currently vacant of the types of creatures that usually inhabited the rest of the woods.

Goombella shuddered, the forest feeling much colder than the rest of the trail had been. “Secluded area, no Dayzees around; this seems like the perfect place to stop if you ask me!”.

“Mmm hmm,” Vivian nodded as she made her way into the centre of the clearing, gazing up at the sky, “And we can even see the moon from here!”.

The other girl’s eyes followed where she was looking and, sure enough, she saw the same imposing moon that seemed to always hang above Twilight Town and its surrounding environment. Was it just her, or did it look even bigger than before?

As the Goomba rested her legs, scouring through her inventory for… something, Vivian returned to the forest edge, going from tree to tree and picking up any fallen branches that looked big enough to serve as firewood. Truthfully, she wasn’t cold, she was only really doing it to give herself something to do. In fact, she didn’t know if the other girl even wanted a campfire.

Not having her orders immediately barked at her was a strange feeling. Vivian just felt like she had to do something helpful, something she knew she wouldn’t mess up.

The shadow found herself heaving a sigh of relief when she noticed the Goomba shivering; she was doing something worthwhile, after all.

“Umm,” Her hands were completely full as she made her way over to Goombella, gently dropping the firewood nearby, “I-if you’re cold, I could maybe start a little fire for us… if you wanted me to…”.

“O-oh?” Goombella finally pulled her head away from her supplies and over to the other girl, sending her a grateful smile, “Yeah, it is a little – very – cold right now. I’d r-really appreciate a fire, thanks!”.

The shadow happily hummed in response and began gently relocating the branches over to a small area of the clearing where the usual grass had given way to a patch of earthy rock. Perfect, she wouldn’t have to worry about accidentally setting the grass on fire.

Just as Goombella was about to resume rifling through her bag, she decided to instead shift her weight to keep the other girl in her sights. “Sorry about making you get the firewood all by yourself. If I’d known that you were doing that, I would’ve helped out, really!” She sheepishly commented, as she watched Vivian meticulously stack the branches atop each other, “Oh, but I wasn’t just lazing around either! I’ve just been trying to figure out what we should eat.”

Vivian found herself perking up at that. She knew she shouldn’t get her hopes up, but with how lacking her usual food intake was with her sisters, she couldn’t help it.

“And now I just need to…” Vivian mumbled as she finished tidying up the firewood.

Goombella watched in silent fascination as the shadow rose back up to her full height and pointed her left hand towards the pile of kindling, extending a single finger. She stayed completely still for a second – perhaps two – before a small flame practically erupted from her outstretched finger, setting the campfire ablaze.

Almost instantly, the Goomba felt a relaxing wave of heat wash over her. The fire was warmer than a normal fire. Or, at least, it felt that way – perhaps due to its magical properties. Either way, Goombella found herself being able to relax for the first time since… since she’d first arrived in Twilight Town, probably.

Goombella let out a little cheer, as if the other girl had just performed a magic trick for her – which, in a literal sense, she had. Vivian blushed a little, hiding her face behind the brim of her hat, but her small smile was still clearly visible to the world. 

She played along with the act, giving a quick bow, before she sat down on the grass near Goombella. There was still a notable distance between the two of them – something that Goombella almost commented on – but Vivian seemed content, if not a bit out of place, as she watched the shorter girl place down a few items, using her bag as a makeshift table.

“Yeah, I know it’s not much, but the rest of my money is sorta, y’know, in the pockets of my actual body” Goombella awkwardly noted as she nudged the bag over to the shadow, before sighing to herself, “Now that I think about it, I really should’ve picked up a maple syrup or two…”.

“I-is this a super mushroom!?” Vivian gawked as she hungrily stared down at the blue mushroom in front of her, “Are you really letting me have this? Thank you so much!”.

Goombella sheepishly looked away; she didn’t like being earnestly praised for something that she herself considered to be a pretty lousy meal. Although, if she was being fair, most things would look a little underwhelming when compared to her current diet of Glitz Pit hotdogs and Zess T.’s incredible cooking. 

They both ate in relative silence, with both girls being far hungrier than they’d even realised. To be honest, Goombella was still a little bit hungry, and she was heavily debating the idea of figuring out if the contents of a spite pouch was edible or not, but she eventually ruled against it. Besides, she only had one of them. It wouldn’t really be fair to Vivian.

Before long, the two girls found themselves sitting in front of the campfire, with the forest air seeming to have grown even colder than before. 

“I was wondering,” Vivian broke the silence, curiously gazing over at her companion, “I know you can’t tell me your name, but won’t you tell me some other things about you? You’re an adventurer, right?”.

“I guess so, yeah, but I’m actually studying to be an archeologist,” Goombella explained, more than happy to talk about her interests, “This whole adventuring thing is pretty new to me.”

“An adventurer and an archeologist?” The shadow grinned, “Gee whiz, that’s even more impressive!”.

“Well, I s-suppose it is,” The Goomba bashfully averted her gaze, “But I didn’t really come here intending to go on some huge journey; it just kinda… happened.”

“It just… happened?” Vivian parroted, urging her to keep going.

“Yeah, I originally only came to Rogueport for my studies. One of my Professors is currently staying there and the town’s sewers are packed with history – most of which is kinda poorly documented – so it was pretty much the perfect place for me!”.

Vivian listened with keen interest as the Goomba recounted the beginnings of her time in Rogueport. She described her first few weeks in town, meticulously listing all of the things that made her want to immediately pack up and go home, before a ‘famous hero’ showed up in town one day. Apparently, he’d helped chase away some thugs that were bothering the Goomba and they’d teamed up pretty soon afterwards.

She couldn’t help but notice how vague the other girl was being about certain parts of her story; not saying much when it came to the ‘famous hero’ or their team’s first new member, a Koopa, and not going into much detail on exactly what they were searching for. Of course, Vivian didn’t doubt the other girl’s story – no, that wasn’t it. She was sure that they were just… things that their team had agreed not to tell strangers much about. Yeah, that had to be it!

“That baby Yoshi sounds adorable!” Vivian found herself chiming in as the Goomba wrapped up her tale, her eyes sparkling, “And that wind spirit you talked about seems so kind, I’d love to meet them both someday!”.

“You totally should, they’re the best!” Goombella replied, her mood slipping a little as she was once again reminded of the current predicament her friends were in.

As if she’d sensed what was on the Goomba’s mind, Vivian spoke up. “Having that imposter take them away from you… that must be horrible…“.

“It sucks, majorly , but that’s not really the part that bothers me the most,” Goombella admitted, tentatively chewing on her bottom lip, “It’s just… it’s even worse that they think it’s me , y’know? I can only imagine how terrible he’s being to them, and as far as they know, that’s all coming from me…”.

Vivian winced sympathetically; she hadn’t even thought about it that way. “I’m sure they’ll understand,” She settled on, “Once this is all over and you get your body back, I’m sure they wouldn’t even think about holding anything that imposter says against you!”.

Being entirely formed from shadows, it was hard to make out the Goomba’s expressions most of the time, but Vivian felt the slightest bit relieved to see the small smile on her friend’s face.

“Really,” The shadow continued, feeling as if she had to say more, “I’m sorry. Losing your body, your whole identity, not even being able to say your name. It’s… it’s just…”.

“The worst? Yeah, I wouldn’t recommend it,” Goombella joked, trying to ease the other girl’s concerns – and her own, if she was being honest. As her mind searched for something else to say, she found herself being reminded of something Vivian had said earlier, something she’d been wanting to ask about ever since.

“Back in town, when you were talking about your sisters, you said that you, um, realised that you were their sister, not their brother. That is what you said, right?”.

“Mmm hmm,” Vivian affirmatively hummed, until a sudden wave of nervousness seemed to overtake her, causing her to tense up, almost defensively, “Y-you don’t have an issue with that, do you?”.

“Wha–? No! No , of course I don’t!” If Goombella had arms, she would be frantically waving them in front of herself, as if it would physically destroy the misunderstanding, “I’ve just been wondering… the reason why your sisters are so cruel to you, is it because of that?”.

“Uhm,” Vivian paused, a more somber expression taking over her features, “...Sort of? We’ve never really been a ‘happy family’. My oldest sister, Beldam, has never really liked me, for some reason. And Marilyn, my other sister, never really says much, I never know what she thinks of me. But I don’t think things were as bad back then. At least, I don’t remember it being as bad.”

“But then, over time, I started to realise things,” The shadow’s voice was softer, as if she was worried that someone was listening in on her, “Nothing really connected together at first, but, eventually, I figured out why I was so unhappy with myself, and who I really was. I was so excited to tell them; I thought they’d be so happy to learn that I was their sister…”.

She stopped speaking. However that interaction with her sisters had gone, Goombella could tell that it was something that Vivian didn’t want to repeat out loud. That alone was more than enough for Goombella to infer from. She shifted her weight, shuffling herself to sit closer beside the taller girl. It was a small action, but she hoped that the sentiment would make its way across to her.

“...It took quite a while for Beldam to start using my name, and even longer for her to use it regularly. I suppose I should be happy that she does it at all, but… I can tell that she wishes she didn’t have to,” Vivian tried to ease the uncomfortable feeling in her chest by fiddling with her hands, rhythmically interlocking her fingers, “...She still refuses to call me her sister, though. I think that part hurts the most.”

Vivian swallowed, frowning. She didn’t know why she was opening up her heart to this person; someone who was practically a stranger to her. But maybe – she thought to herself – it was because she was the only person who would let Vivian open her heart up to them. Her sisters certainly wouldn’t, and everyone in the X-Naut fortress would just probably ignore her like usual. But this person would listen.

Goombella's mouth formed into an almost perfectly straight line. Vivian hadn’t said anything that she hadn’t already expected to hear; but even with that, she found herself racking her brain for the right response. It wasn’t that she had nothing to say – quite that opposite, actually – she just didn’t know what words would matter to the other girl, especially after she’d just been so open with her.

“I… I know it’s not so simple, but you really shouldn’t listen to anything that sister of yours has to say, ever . Especially not about you,” The Goomba stated, her gaze drifting over to the open flame in front of them, “You gave her the luxury of seeing the real version of you. However she feels about that is her problem, not yours. If she won’t accept you as her sister, then you shouldn’t keep sticking around her in the hopes that she’ll one day change her mind.”

“R-right,” The shadow clenched her fists, a resolute look on her face, “If I stick around them forever, I know I’ll just be miserable. Just being here with you, away from them… already feels so much better.”

The Goomba tensed up, the offer for the shadow to stay with her and her party permanently balancing on the tip of her tongue, but going unsaid. 

“Besides, your sisters sound totally lame to me. If you’d told me that, I would’ve broken out the confetti immediately!” She grinned, hoping to lift the shadow’s spirits, even if just a little.

“I think that might be a little bit overboard,” Vivian smiled back, her cheeks practically glowing, “But thank you, hearing you say all of that really does mean a lot to me…”.

That smile would probably stay in Goombella’s mind for a long time.

Their conversations turned a lot lighter from there, with Goombella going on to recite the basics of Archeology to Vivian, before going in depth on the storied history of the Crystal Palace – a site that she’d been interested in for years, but had never gotten the chance to visit. 

The shadow couldn’t help but feel a little bit out of her element at first, but the Goomba had a way of explaining things that made Vivian – who knew absolutely nothing about the field – feel like she was actually understanding things.

She didn’t really get what carbon dating was, but the rest seemed to make sense – a little!

“So, um,” Vivian queried, tilting her head to the side, “Those creatures you talked about – the Albino Dinos – were they always native to the palace? Or were they put there by the Crystal King when he overtook it?”.

The silence she received in response was surprising. Despite having been awake only a few seconds prior, when the shadow looked over towards the Goomba, she was peacefully sleeping, her body slumped forwards. “U-uhm, ahh…” Vivian nervously mumbled to herself as she fretted over what to do. Her immediate thought was – naturally – to just wake her up, but with how exhausted she’d looked for the past few hours, it seemed almost cruel to disturb her sleep.

She glanced around the clearing, eventually getting up to peer through the trees. No sign of Dayzees. No sign of… anything, really. They’d gone uninterrupted for the hour or so that they’d already been there for, so they probably wouldn’t suddenly find themselves overrun by enemies, right? Right… she hoped.

With one problem somewhat dealt with, she made her way back to Goombella, gently moving the Goomba so that she was lying down, her bag acting as a makeshift pillow. Vivian imagined that sleeping slumped over like she had been wouldn’t exactly be great for her spine. 

Vivian’s eyes flickered over to the fire, the last order of business before she settled down herself. While part of her did want to put it out, if only just to quell her fear of accidentally starting a forest fire, she couldn’t help but remember how aggressively the Goomba had been shivering earlier. With nothing to substitute as a blanket and no way to keep her friend warm that didn’t feel like it would be heavily invading her personal space, Vivian eventually conceded to let the flames naturally fizzle out once the remaining firewood had all burnt up.

She considered sinking down into the shadows – she often slept like that – but instead opted to sleep on the ground. If the other girl woke up before her, her new friend would probably have no idea where she was. Vivian slunk down onto the grass, a few metres away from the Goomba, and curled in on herself. 

As her eyelids grew heavier, and she felt a wave of tiredness overtake her body, Vivian couldn’t help but smile to herself. When was the last time she’d felt this content?

=–=

“Vivian!” Beldam’s shrill voice yelled out, causing a few of the passing Twilighters to wince and cover their ears, “ Vivian! You’re trying to avoid me again, aren’t you? Well, I won’t be having that; get out here and face the consequences of your actions right now! ”.

“Guhhhh…” Marilyn pointed out, scanning the town square.

“Yes, Marilyn, I know that Vivian isn’t here, you oaf,” The older sister snapped, grimacing, “But I’m sure the little nitwit must be hiding somewhere around here. Oh, her punishment this time is going to be terrible…”.

As her elder sister continued to rant to herself, Marilyn floated over to a clump of grass that had caught her attention. Sure enough, when she pushed the greenery back, she could clearly make out the broken Superbombomb on the floor.

“Guh! Guh-huh!”.

“ What , Marilyn?” Beldam scowled as she slowly hobbled her way over to her sister, “I don’t have time to look at bugs with y– Gaaaahhh! The Superbombomb!”.

Beldam’s face, previously marred by shocked horror, quickly contorted into an expression of indignant rage as she angrily clenched and unclenched her fists over and over again.

“That incompetent twit !” She screeched, glaring down at the destroyed bomb, “Every time I trust that scatterbrain with anything, it always gets ruined! Well, that’s the last time I go easy on that nincompoop. Marilyn, change of plans! Ignore that Mario guy, we’re going to be giving that unbearable maggot the punishment of a lifetime!”.

“Guh-huhhhh…”.

=–=

Goombella wasn’t sure how much time had passed when she finally woke up; the sky was just as dark as it always was, as if time itself had stopped moving. The only indication that any time had passed at all was the smoldering remains of their campfire, the small fire barely staying aflame.

Glancing to her right, she noticed Vivian, face obscured by her oversized hat, her chest slowly rising and falling. She should probably wake her up, they needed to get moving soon, but the Goomba decided to let her rest for just a little while longer. In the meantime, she busied herself with the menial tasks of reorganising her bag and stomping out the fire for good.

Eventually, she woke the shadow and the two girls continued back on the main path, feeling significantly more refreshed than before. There were a few enemies in their way, most of which Vivian disposed of with sneak attacks, but their journey was – for the most part – fairly uneventful. 

“Hey, look!” Vivian pointed upwards, using her other hand to lift up the brim of her hat, “That spire over there, is that it?”.

Sure enough, as Goombella peered through the treeline, she could make out a vague triangular shape, towering far above the rest of the forest. That had to be the roof of the steeple’s bell tower; she was certain of it!

“It is! It totally is!”.

They still had a decently long walk left until they actually reached their destination, but just seeing a brief glimpse of the steeple was enough to speed up their pace, excited to be done with the Twilight Trail. At least, done with it for now – Goombella didn’t want to even think about the eventual return trip.

“Is this it? It definitely looks… steeple-y,” Vivian commented as the rows of trees finally parted to reveal a building Goombella felt very familiar with, “Not to mention the creepy part!”.

“Yup, this sure is the right place,” The Goomba confirmed, as she ushered her companion over towards the hole in the outer stone wall, passing by the well as they went, “Now what did those crows say again? They said we had to go under the steeple, right?”.

“It was ‘The only soul who knows his real name is trapped underneath Creepy Steeple!‘ or something similar, I think,” The shadow recalled, doing her best impression of the birds, “Does this place have a basement? Whoever we’re looking for could be down there.”

“There is a basement, but we already explored that last time the first time we came here. The only souls locked down there were those… Boos,” Goombella hesitated, the gears in her brain turning, “...Who were trapped inside of that chest.”

All two hundred of them.

If her theory was right, this was gonna be a real pain.

Chapter Text

Vivian let out an involuntary shudder as the steeple’s front doors closed behind the two girls with a headache-inducing creak. The loud bang that followed didn’t help to ease her nerves. While the stained-glass mural and large stone pillars certainly caught her attention, she couldn’t help but focus on the inhabitants of the steeple; the Boos. There were a lot of Boos.

“Um, so,” The shadow hesitated to ask her question, worried that she already knew the answer, “You think that one of these Boos might know that imposter’s name?”.

“I’m not one hundred percent certain, but it would match up with what those crows said,” Goombella responded, seeming a little more used to the steeple’s atmosphere than Vivian was, “My friends and I searched underneath Creepy Steeple last time we were here and the only ‘soul’ we found were these Boos.”

Vivian nodded along. What she was saying made sense to her. If the Boos were the only souls trapped underneath the steeple, then one of them had to know the body-snatcher’s name.

“That being said,” The Goomba continued, scrunching up her face, “I’m not exactly looking forward to this. Having to question all two hundred of these guys sounds like a complete nightmare.”

“T-two hundred!?” Vivian gawked. She hadn't put an exact number to the Boos when she first saw them, but – looking around – two hundred did seem right. “Do we just… go up and ask them? Surely it’s not as simple as that, right?”.

“It… probably won’t be,” Goombella made a shrugging motion with her head, “But there’s no harm in trying… hopefully. They weren’t directly hostile last time, just annoying .”

The shadow gave an affirmative hum as she floated towards a small statue at the other end of the room, where a few Boos were clustered together. “E-excuse me,” Vivian began, not completely sure what she was actually supposed to say, “Would any of you happen to know, uhm, the name of the monster that was living here recently?”.

She couldn’t help but shiver a little as the ghosts all turned towards her in unison, a curious look on their faces. Of them, a single Boo floated over, stopping just in front of the girl’s face.

“Hmm, a monster? Living here ? But this is our home,” The ghost seemed to be having fun as they bobbed up and down, inches away from Vivian’s face, “Ohoho, you’d better not be trying to call one of us a monster!”.

“N-no, that’s not what I meant,” The girl rapidly shook her head, “There was this monster who was apparently hiding out in the bel–”.

“Hey, who are you, anyway,” The Boo cut her off, glancing back and forth between the two girls, “You two better not be here to bully us. We don’t tolerate bullies.”

“We’re obviously not,” Goombella frowned, already growing tired of the ghost, “I’m one of the people who let you out of that chest, remember? Why would I come back here to bully you?”.

The moment the words left her mouth, Goombella felt like she may have misspoken a little. Sure, she was one of the people who had freed them, but…

The Boo narrowed their eyes at her, scanning over her appearance. “Liar! There was a Goomba, but she looked nothing like you. You’re just trying to mess with us, aren’t you!?”.

“No, hold on! That’s becau–”.

“Heeeeey now,” For the first time, a different Boo spoke up, also hovering over to the two girls, “If she wasn’t one the ones who let us out, then how does she know that we were trapped? …You don’t think that she’s…?”.

“She sure seems like it!” A different Boo called out.

Another one spoke out from somewhere above Goombella. “The nasty guy who trapped us in that chest did say something about shapeshifting, did he not?”.

It was only in that very moment that Goombella realised that their little conversation was being intently listened in on by all two hundred of the Boos, all of which seemed to have come to a similar conclusion.

“Come on, guys!” The Boo in front of them called out, rallying the horde of ghosts, “Let’s show this meanie exactly how we get our revenge!”.

Before she could even react, a dozen Boos phased out from the floor underneath Goombella, slowly lifting her up into the air. She tried struggling, but it was pretty much useless. Her feet had already left the ground – making headbonks an impossibility – and she didn’t have any direct attacking items on her.

“H-hey! Cut that out!” Vivian yelped out, sounding far less confident than she would’ve liked. The shadow raised a shaking arm, extending a finger outwards, aiming towards the Boo directly underneath Goombella. She squeezed her eyes shut as a burst of energy left her fingertip, propelling itself towards its target before manifesting itself into a powerful flame.

As the ghost cried out in pain, Goombella used the brief moment of distraction to slip free of the cluster of Boos, bonking a few on the way down. Before she could even look at Vivian, let alone thank her, a bitter, echoey laughter rang out from the swarm of spirits.

“Heee... Hoooo... Heee… That was a real cheap shot!” Their voices came out in unison, as all two hundred Boos swirled together into a single translucent cloud, “Let’s get them, guys!”.

“U-uhm!” Vivian squeaked out, frantically wringing her hands, “What exactly are they doing!?”.

Goombella’s mouth flopped open as she watched the swarm of Boos slowly morph into a single large mass. What had just been a mass of two hundred different forms was now a singular Boo, far greater in size than she had even thought possible.

As much as her body was screaming at her to run , her feet stayed glued in place. “Vivian!” She called out to the other girl, pulling her out of her shocked stupor, “We’re gonna fight this thing, okay?”.

“H-huh? We are !?”.

“Yeah!” The Goomba tried to sound as confident as possible, “Don’t worry, I’ll… I’ll figure out a plan!”.

The first course of action was to figure out what they were up against. Pulling out her tattle log and flipping through the pages was practically second nature for her by this point, but she couldn’t help but pause for a brief moment when she actually saw her book. 

It was shadowy, just like her. The pages were made of shadows, the words were made of shadows, yet somehow she could read just as easily as always, despite the fact that each word should have been completely indecipherable from the next.

Well, at least there was one good thing about her new body.

She read the information on the ‘Atomic Boo’ aloud to Vivian, racking her head for ideas as she did. There were no obvious weaknesses listed, and the two of them weren’t exactly stacked when it came to items. Their best bet would probably just be to try dealing enough damage to take it out before it could get too many hits in.

As she was rummaging through her bag, looking for anything of use, she pulled out the last item she had, a plan rapidly forming in her mind. “Hey, I’ve got an idea!” The shadow turned just in time to catch the spite pouch the Goombella carefully tossed over to her, “Use this on me and I’ll take all of their attacks! If we just keep hitting them with our best attacks, the extra damage from this should help take that thing out even quicker.”

The shadow hesitated, worried about her friend putting herself in such danger for a relatively low reward, but reluctantly nodded. “Alright,” She untied the pouch and dumped its contents over Goombella, the powder dissipating the moment it made contact with her shadowy visage, “B-but if you take too many hits, I’ll be veiling you away immediately!”.

Goombella tensed up when the Atomic Boo floated above her, its form so large that it practically engulfed her in darkness. Luckily for her, the Boo slamming its body down on her didn’t hurt nearly as much as she feared it would. She couldn’t help but let out a small cheer as the Boo recoiled back, the spite pouch giving it a taste of its own medicine.

Before the ghost could even recover, Vivian veiled out from the floor behind them, hitting them with a flaming punch before retreating back. Goombella followed up with a strong multibonk followed by the kickback from the Atomic Boo’s next attack.

They went for another round of the same routine – shade fist, multibonk, tanking an attack – before the Atomic Boo seemed to lose its temper, clearly close to being KO’d. The Boo giggled to itself, before turning transparent. Vivian’s punch completely missed, causing her to almost lose her balance, and Goombella didn’t even bother trying to attack – she knew it would just miss.

In an instant, the ghost returned to usual and seemed to eject a team of Boos out of its body, deflating its size just a little. The Boos – maybe around twenty of them – circled around Goombella, not giving her a chance to escape. 

The Atomic Boo wasn’t attacking her directly, so Goombella knew that her spite pouch would be useless. She’d have to guard this attack, otherwise she’d probably end up suffering a pretty nasty hit. She was sure that such a large group of Boos all attacking at once would pack quite the punch.

Suddenly, she felt something wrap around her, pulling her downwards until she was one with the floor. Vivian; it must’ve been. Goombella watched from below, her vision hued purple, as the circle of Boos grew smaller, whatever attack they had tried to do completely missing.

As the Boos returned back into the body of the Atomic Boo, Vivian hauled the two of them out of the ground, letting out an audible sigh of relief. “Phew, I was worried for a second there that I was gonna be too late.”

With Vivian’s burn coming into effect, the Atomic Boo suddenly let out a yelp, its gigantic form appearing as if it would tear itself apart at any moment.

“Graaaaaah!” The Boo screeched, its voice seeming to multiply over itself, “You losers are the worst .”

“Wait, hold on!” Goombella suddenly called out, causing the Atomic Boo to pause its ‘death’ with a rather unamused expression, “Can you at least answer our question before you… explode? We really need to know the name of that monster.”

The ghost let out an irritable groan, almost pouting, before it started talking in hushed whispers with itself. “Look, I just asked around, no one knows anything about this monster or its name. Heck, some of these idiots don’t even know their own names!” The Boo snickered to itself.

“Huh?” Her eyes widened in disbelief, “But one of you has to know, you were all locked under the steeple!”.

“Well, that’s unfortunate, because we don’t . Guess you’ll have to ask someone else,” The Atomic Boo replied in a monotone voice, “Oh, anyway. As we were trying to say before you so rudely interrupted us – Waaaaaah-gack!”.

With an obviously fake look of pain on its face, the Atomic Boo split apart, with all two hundred ghosts flying out in different directions and phasing into the closest wall or floor, leaving the steeple completely empty, aside from the two girls.

“Geez,” Vivian let out an exasperated huff, “It’s like those annoying ghosts were trying to waste our time! All that just to tell us that they don’t even know anything…”.

Goombella let out a long groan, hoping it would be enough to express her sentiments without actual words, before turning directly to the other girl, almost awkwardly. “But, uhm, thanks for helping me out there… twice,” She had a guilty grin on her face, “I can sorta get a teensy little bit in over my head sometimes.”

“Y-you don’t need to thank me for that!” The shadow insisted, waving her hands out in front of her, “Besides, you did pretty much all the work in that fight back there, I spent most of the fight just hiding out in the shadows!”.

“Puh- lease , you set that ghost on fire! On. Fire, ” Goombella drew out those two words as much as she could, determined to make the other girl accept her compliment, “I wish I could do something as cool as that! All my attacks do is leave me with a migraine.”

Vivian let out a single snort, one that quickly turned into a small bout of full-blown laughter. Honestly, if it were anyone else, Goombella would probably be worried that she was laughing at her, but with Vivian, it was pretty obvious that she wasn’t. “Okay, okay,” Her sudden burst of laughter died down, “You win, you win. Let’s just say that we both did a good job!”.

“Sounds good to me!” The Goomba replied, her mood soon turning more serious, “Still, that was a total dead end. What do we do now?”.

The taller girl tapped a finger against her upper lip, “Um, are those Boos really the only living – er, in this case, undead – things underneath the steeple?”.

“Yeah! I’m sure of it,” Goombella insisted, “We checked every room we could find, I promise!”.

“O-oh, no. I w-wasn’t doubting you,” Vivian assured her, “It’s just, maybe it isn’t referring to the basement directly. Maybe there’s some kind of… secret entrance – like a back route of sorts!”.

“A secret entrance…” Goombella repeated, thinking over it. It was a pretty decent idea. Okay, no, it wasn’t just a pretty decent idea – it was actually a really good idea, the kind Goombella wished that she herself had come up with. Of course, if there really was someone who knew that Duplighost’s name, that jerk wouldn’t make it easy for her to find them.

But where could a secret entrance even be? She and her party had scoured pretty much the entire steeple – save for a single completely locked door – the first time they’d been there. Could it be outside? Outside, there was… there was…

“The well!”.

=–=

“Stupid Goombella… Big meanie…” The albino Yoshi grumbled to himself as he absentmindedly kicked a small rock, “Who does she think she is, bossing us around like that, huh!? ”.

“Now, now, dear,” Flurrie gently reprimanded the baby Yoshi, “You shouldn’t go talking about your friend like that behind her back.”

The two of them were in the outskirts of Twilight Town, idly waiting around while Mario and Koops searched through the old shed, just in case the town’s menace had claimed it as its new hideout.

“Well she isn’t acting like my friend,” The dinosaur indignantly folded his arms, before letting out a defeated sigh, “...But I know . I’m just mad that she’s being such a bully. She’s never acted like this before!”.

“Yes, she has been in a rather foul mood as of late, hasn’t she?” The wind spirit nodded in agreement, “I do hope that the run-in she had with that monster hasn’t shaken her up too much.”

“Huh? You think it’s that creep’s fault that she’s been so cranky recently?” The Yoshi ruminated on the thought, humming to himself, “I suppose that could make sense. So what, we just gotta defeat that guy again and Goombella will quit actin’ crazy?”.

“Well, I can’t say for sure, but if that is what’s gotten her all riled up…”.

“Nope, no luck here. Nothing changed since last time,” Koops announced as he and Mario exited the small shack, rejoining the other two, “What were you two talking about?”.

“Goombella,” The youngest member of their group simply answered, “Flurrie thinks that if we get rid of the monster that’s been bothering the town, she’ll stop being so mean!”.

“It was simply just an idea,” Flurrie clarified, “But it isn’t out of the question, is it not? It could explain her recent behaviour…”.

Mario seemed to agree with the idea, noting that something must’ve caused Goombella’s mood to shift so drastically. It was entirely possible that the creepy atmosphere was getting to her a little too much.

“I mean, it makes sense,” Koops absentmindedly scratched at the bandage on his nose, “But what exactly can we do about it? We’re already scouting out for this guy, but we haven’t seen any signs of him at all.”

“I’m sayin’ that we stop sitting around on our butts waiting for him to do something!” The Yoshi started enthusiastically shadowboxing the air, “We go back to that steeple, put a stop to that loser for good, and finally head on back to Rogueport with our Crystal Star! That would make Goombella happy, wouldn’t it?”.

Koops and Flurrie shared an unsure look, eventually turning to Mario for his input. Being an established hero made his opinion on these types of things pretty valuable to them.

After a short pause, Mario gave a thumbs up, ushering his party back towards Twilight Town.

=–=

“Gee whiz, this place sure is… dark,” Vivian commented as a small flame ignited from her fingertips, acting as a makeshift light source, “And damp, too.”

Goombella hopped off of the rope that she’d been using to descend the well, thankful to finally have her feet on solid ground. Vivian’s flame wasn’t the best light source they could’ve had, but it was able to light up the surrounding area fairly well. The Goomba was especially relieved when she noticed the jump pad right next to where they’d descended; an easy way out for when they’d need it.

“Look, over there!” Goombella’s attention was diverted away from the jump pad by Vivian pointing towards an opening in one of the walls, leading further underground, “If this well really does connect to the steeple’s basement, then it should be somewhere in that direction!”.

The tunnel was rather short, with the two girls only having to walk for around thirty seconds before the cavern opened back up into a less claustrophobic space. Directly across from them, on the other side of the room, was a large iron grate, with some kind of artificial light illuminating out from whatever was behind it.

“ Great ,” Goombella huffed, eyeing the grate with irritation, “How are we supposed to get past that?”.

“Don’t worry,” Vivian reassured the other girl, making her way over towards the other side of the cavern, “I’m sure there’s some way we can get past it. Actually, I could probably tr– Ow! Wha–!?”.

“V-vivian!?”.

The shadow was immediately cut off as something small slammed itself into her – hard – followed by another. Madly waving her makeshift light source around, she finally noticed what had rammed into her.

Buzzy Beetles; the cave was full of them. Far too many to even think about fighting them in the darkness.

Instinctually, Vivian veiled into the ground, popping back up just in front of the iron grate. She could easily pass underneath it – it wasn’t even bolted to the floor – but her friend couldn’t , and she had no idea how to move around while veiling someone else. Looking over her shoulder, she noticed Goombella making her way towards her, having a slightly easier time avoiding the Buzzy Beetles than her.

“Any way to get through?” Goombella called out as she noticed Vivian looking back at her, stopping to hop over an oncoming shell, “Like – gah, back off – maybe one of the bars is loose, or something?”.

“U-uhm…” Vivian fumbled with each individual bar, hoping for something to happen, until she leaned her weight onto the bars, accidentally pushing the grate backwards with a disgusting metallic screech.

While she flinched, cringing back at first, an idea suddenly popped into her head.

“Yeah, I think I know how to get us past!” She exclaimed, a strained expression on her face as she continued pushing the grate, “I can pull us both underneath!”.

Goombella had reached her by now, standing just behind her and watching out for any oncoming attacks. The Buzzy Beetles didn’t seem too interested in fighting them now that they were no longer in the centre of the cave, but she still had her doubts. “I-is there anything that I need to do, or…?”.

“No, just stay where you are and I'll…” Vivian let go of the grate and rushed over to her friend, pulling her into the shadows just as the grate began sliding back into place. 

To an extent, her body was still not fully used to the other girl’s ability, yet Goombella couldn’t help but find it… familiar; it felt right . The confusion and anxiety that was there the first few times had completely vanished, leaving her with a warm, comforting weightlessness. 

She wondered how it felt for Vivian. Was she feeling the same weightlessness, or was keeping Goombella down there a struggle? She hoped not. She hoped that Vivian felt as safe in the shadows with her as she did.

Before she could linger on her thoughts any longer, she was above ground again, the floaty feeling replaced by the slight aching of her legs, from the many hours of walking. 

“We’re through!” The shadow cheered. Glancing back, the grate had returned to its original position, now just behind where they’d come up from. 

From there, the two girls found a door that led into a simple stone-brick room. Goombella’s initial complaints about the empty room were soon dashed when noticed the small crawl space that led out of the room. Unfortunately, while Vivian could just veil over to wherever that tunnel led, Goombella herself had no such luxury.

One painfully claustrophobic crawl later, she found herself in a similarly empty room. The first thing she noticed was Vivian, peering down a large hole in the middle of the room.

“Do… do we have to jump down that?” Goombella questioned, already fully aware of the answer.

“Mmm hmm, seems like it,” The shadow inched closer to the hole, preparing to go down, “But I don’t it’s too far a fall.”

Vivian hovered over the hole, her tendril shooting down into the darkness below, before she began to slowly descend down the hole, eventually reaching the bottom and calling up to the Goomba.

“Don’t worry! It’s safe to jump down!”.

Despite Vivian’s reassurance, jumping down a pitch-black hole that she couldn’t see the bottom of was, in fact, still very scary. She squeezed her eyes tightly shut, only opening them when she finally landed on the cold, stone floor below.

“H-hey!” Goombella’s eyes widened as she studied their surroundings, “We’re in the steeple’s basement! Look over there, that’s the chest those Boos were locked in!”.

Sure enough, as Vivian peered through the window frames that separated them from the other room, she noticed an opened chest. The room it was in looked to match the stonework of the steeple, too!

“Then, if we keep going down this corridor,” Vivian motioned to their right, “You think we might find whoever it is that knows that guy’s name?”.

“I’m not gonna get my hopes up too much,” The Goomba ironically smirked, recalling their previous incident, “But I feel like this has to lead to something interesting!”.

The other girl hummed in agreement as they made their way forward, using the light from the adjacent room’s torches to see. “It would be pretty weird for whoever made this place to go out of their way to make this secret area if there was nothing hidden here,” She cupped her chin with one hand, “Oh! Maybe there’s a super rare item down here, or a powerful magic weapon!”.

“Really? Personally, I’d be hoping for some kind of ancient treasure,” Goombella replied, “Or – wait, wait – even better, some musty old tome that explains how and why it’s always twilight here. Now that would be worth it!”.

“Hmm,” The shadow contemplated, “You know, for something so abnormal, I guess I just accepted the whole ‘constant twilight’ thing pretty quickly. It fits the atmosphere of this place so well that I didn't really question it all that much.”

Goombella nodded, ready to reply, when she noticed that they were walking towards a dead end, the corridor suddenly ending right in front of them. Just as she was about to voice her disappointment, she noticed a small opening at the bottom of the wall; similar to the crawl space from earlier.

“Whatever’s in there seems to be pretty well-lit,” Vivian noted after Goombella pointed the small hole out to her, “There’s gotta be a hidden room just past here!”.

Once again, Goombella crawled through the opening while the shadow simply just veiled her way into the adjacent room. Luckily for Goombella, it wasn’t an entire tunnel this time; she only had to crawl a few yards before she found herself tumbling into a new room.

“A-are you okay!?” Vivian fretted as she helped the Goomba up from the floor, having unceremoniously landed on her face.

“I’m fine – see, pillow,“ Goombella assured her, motioning to the plush seat cushion she’d landed on, “I’m sure glad that whoever was here last just tossed this onto the floor!”.

Brushing herself off, she looked around the new room she’d found herself in. The first thing that stood out to her, before the fancy-ish decor or the four treasure chests, was the other person in the room. Well – not a person – a bird; a parrot to be specific.

“U-uhm, you don’t think that this parrot is, y’know…?” Vivian spoke up, practically narrating Goombella’s thoughts, “The one who knows that monster’s name?”.

“Skraaawk!”.

“Well, it would be pretty weird for a parrot to be down here for no reason,” Goombella pointed out, her eyes trailing off towards the various chests strewn around the room, “It’s definitely worth a try, at least.”

“Yeah, you’re right! …Hello there, uh, parrot…ie,” Vivian gave the bird an awkward wave as she tentatively made her way towards their perch, “You wouldn’t happen to know someone’s name, would you? An evil, rude, shapeshifting monster, maybe?”.

“Pretty bird! Pretty bird!”.

“Y-yes! You are a very pretty bird, b-but the name…?”.

“Woah! Vivian, check this out, a power plus badge!” The Goomba practically squealed with excitement, having been unable to resist looting the chests for any longer, “And a… mr. softener, too. Ugh, is it moving!? ”.

The shadow scrambled to catch the item after Goombella reflexively tossed it away. “A power plus!? Really?” She questioned, prompting the other girl to proudly show off their new prize, “I can’t believe such a powerful badge was hidden down here…”.

“I know, right? Oh, oh! What’s in those two chests behind you?”.

“Huh, these?” Vivian motioned to the two fancier-looking chests near the parrot’s perch, getting an enthusiastic nod in response, “Okay, erm, sorry parrot, I’ll be back, I’ve just got to check these out first!”.

Despite her apparent need to apologise, the bird in question was completely disinterested in her words, stifling a yawn in response.

“Hmm, let’s see…” Vivian muttered to herself as pulled open the latches on the two chests, “A key! Uhm, maybe this will help us get out without having to use that well… hopefully? And in this one is…”.

The shadow stared blankly down at the object in her hands.

“What is it?” Goombella asked.

Vivian simply presented the object to the Goomba. “‘p’. Like, the letter; ‘p’.”

Goombella stared down at the letter with an equally blank look.

“I-is his name just ‘p’!?” Vivian suddenly burst out, her head spinning.

“I don’t think so? Well, I hope not,” Goombella replied, creasing her brow in thought, “Maybe it’s some kind of clue? Maybe there are other letters hidden around, and we have to put them together?”.

“Good morning! Good morning!”.

“Ah! The parrot, I almost forgot!” The shadow whipped her head back towards the perch and then back towards the shorter girl, “Do you wanna try? They didn’t seem all that interested in talking to me.”

“Hmm, oh!” The Goomba tapped her foot against the floor before lowering her voice and leaning in close to the other girl, “Why don’t we try doing what we did with the crows? Y’know, hiding in the floor and seeing if we can overhear anything!”.

“R-right, that could work!” Vivian enthusiastically nodded. They stashed their newly-acquired items away before Vivian veiled them both into the ground, silence washing over the room in an instant.

After a few seconds, the parrot seemed to re-focus their attention, glancing around the room. They eventually shrugged their wings and began to mutter to themselves.

“Skrawk? What happened to those weirdos who were just here? Aw, whatever...” The parrot began speaking, putting down their usual act now that they were alone, “It was almost nice to have some company...”.

The bird began rambling. Now that they were alone, it felt like the perfect time to air out all of their grievances. Being locked up in some musty basement sucked . Goombella found herself zoning out a bit as the parrot kept talking, but quickly found her attention being piqued once again by a certain piece of information.

“I really want a cracker… Doopliss, you're a big meanie. When's feeding time, huh?”.

Before the Goomba could even fully react to what she’d heard, an overexcited Vivian pulled them out from the shadows, causing the bird to rapidly flap its wings in shock.

“Skra-WAAAAAAAAAARK?!?” The parrot yelped, attempting to re-compose themselves, “Uh... Pretty bird! Pretty bird!”.

“Hmm hmm hmm hmm! We heard that! We heard you, little birdie!” Vivian happily clasped her hands together as she turned to Goombella, “Did you hear that? Doopliss! That's his name!”.

“And with that, we can finally take him down!” She couldn’t help but feel excited, knowing that they were in the home stretch.

The parrot, clearly distressed, proceeded to loudly squawk at them until they left the room, ending up in a hallway with a large yellow block.

“Gee whiz,” Vivian sighed as she pulled her hands away from her ears, “Honestly, I feel bad for that little guy. Maybe we should come back here with a box of crackers sometime…”.

Goombella went over to examine the conspicuous yellow block while Vivian used the key she found to unlock the door at the other end of the hallway, leading into the rest of the steeple’s basement. She regaled the news to the other girl as she floated back over to the yellow block.

“So,” The shadow cautiously knocked on the side of the block, testing its rigidity, “Do you have any idea what this is? It’s clearly out of place here.”

“Oh, yeah, my party and I have ran into a ton of these things, big and small ones,” The Goomba responded, “The only problem is that Mar- uh, one of the others usually breaks these things – I can’t do it, no matter how many times I bonk them.”

“I… could try,” Vivian offered, her hand already outstretched. After a short pause, a flame shot out, sizzling the side of the block for a few seconds before it finally collapsed, revealing the singular warp pipe that was housed inside.

“Woah! Nice job! Where do you reckon that pipe leads to?” The shorter girl questioned, her eyes scanning over the pipe until she noticed an interesting carving just below the lip of the tube,  ”Oh, wait, there’s something written on it!”.

“There is? What does it say?”.

“...To Twilight Town…” She read aloud, “This pipe leads straight to Twilight Town!? We can just go straight back!?”.

Goombella was more than ready to immediately hop through the pipe and finally confront that nasty Duplighost, but she found herself hesitating as she noticed Vivian become slightly more reserved, as if something had suddenly troubled her.

“Um, are you okay?” The Goomba simply asked, removing her foot from the entrance of the pipe and moving towards the other girl.

“H-huh? Me?” The shadow was caught off guard by the unexpected question, “Yeah, I’m fine. I just wanted to… I was just…”

She seemed to stumble over her words, eventually trailing off entirely.

“Y’know, whatever it is that you’re thinking about, you can tell me! I’m pretty good at listening, too!” Goombella tried to encourage her. It seemed to do the trick as the shadow continued speaking.

“Well, this might sound a little silly, but I’ve just had so much fun being with you. And hearing about your adventures and your friends, it all just seems so… nice,” The shadow shrank in on herself, just a little bit, “So, after this, when you finally have your body back, I think I want to stick around with you – and your friends – permanently. If you’d all have me, th-that is!”.

“You? With us? Permanently? ” Goombella tried her best to fight against the stupidly large grin on her face, “No way I’d ever say no to that! Of course you can stick with us! Honestly, I’ve been, like, totally itching to ask you myself this entire time.”

The shadow’s eyes widened, “R-really!?”.

“Yeah, obviously!” The Goomba let out a content huff “Why would I not want that?”.

“Thank you so much,” Goombella felt the familiar sensation of Vivian pulling her towards her, except this time – instead of veiling her into the shadows – it really was a hug. Yeah, she couldn’t exactly hug her back, but it was the thought that counts!

“So…” Goombella said once the other girl let go of her, gently placing her back on the ground, “You ready to go teach that Doopliss a lesson?”.

“Mmm hmm! You know it!”.

=–=

When they exited the pipe – sure enough – they found themselves in the interior of an abandoned house in Twilight Town.

“Who would’ve known that there was a direct pipe between the two this whole time?” Goombella murmured to herself, “It’s kinda creepy, actually.”

“Well, we won’t have to worry about that Doopliss using it once we’ve taken care of him!” Vivian pumped herself up, “Come one, let’s go and finally get your body back from that nasty doppelganger!”.

Right, they knew his name now. All they had left to do was confront him – maybe put up a fight if he tried to resist – and she’d finally get her identity back. She’d finally, properly, be Goombella again. She was excited, but there was a nauseous lump in her stomach that she couldn’t quite shake.

Goombella stared over at the shadow, making her way towards the door. They’d stick together – she was one of them now – they’d just promised that. But… 

How would she react when she found out? Sure, it wasn’t malicious, and she was only lying because she kinda had to , but – excuses aside – Goombella knew that she had been lying to Vivian, even if only by omission.

No , she shook her head and followed after her companion, through Twilight Town. Once she was back in her body, she’d explain everything to Vivian. She’d understand, hopefully.

Goombella was pulled out of her thoughts as the two of them passed by the gate leading out of Twilight Town. The old shed was just up ahead; this was it.

“Ready?” She asked the taller girl, grinning up at her.

“Mmm hmm!, you know it!” Vivian adjusted the brim of her hat, preparing herself for the confrontation.

“Hey, what's up, Slick?!” This time, neither of the girls were surprised when the figure suddenly hopped down from nowhere, ”Back again, are ya?”.

“Yeah,” Goombella shot back, her eyebrows twitching, “Here to get rid of you, this time!”.

“As if! Listen up, Slick. I’m getting real tired of this whole ‘running away’ shtick, so I ain’t letting you leave this time, no matter what!” The faux Goomba’s words, despite being said in their usual tone of voice, had an edge of seriousness to them, “I’m erasing you for good this time!”.

She knew they had the upper hand, but Vivian couldn’t help but shuffle herself slightly closer to her friend anyway, just in case they needed to veil out of danger at a moment’s notice.

“But first, please amuse me with one more guess...” They taunted, snickering under their breath, “Watching you squirm in futility as you try to guess my name is the best part!”.

“G-guess your name!?” Goombella pretended to panic, “Gee, lemme think… uhm, uhm…!”.

“Come on. Hurry up, Slick!”.

“...Doopliss.”

“ Pfft! ” The imposter snorted, “What a terrible gue– Wait, what!? What did you just say!?”.

“She said ‘Doopliss’!” Vivian answered, “That’s your name, isn’t it?”.

“It.. it can't be...” Doopliss gawked, his mouth hanging open, before he began frantically yelling, repeating the same few phrases over and over again as if he was broken. 

“Wha-what do we do now?” The shadow turned to Goombella, “I-is this supposed to happen? Are you getting your body back?”.

“I… I think we won, maybe? ” Goombella squinted her eyes at her impersonator, trying to figure out what exactly was happening, and if it was good for them or not.

“I'm...feeling...faint…” He finally mumbled, having stopped his panicked yelling. Before either of the two girls could react, he rammed into them, temporarily stunning them, and dashed off further down the Twilight Trail, in the direction of Creepy Steeple.

“H-hey! Come back!” Vivian called after the Duplighost, even though he was already long gone, ”We’ve gotta go after him!”.

“Wait, Vivian!” Goombella motioned for the other girl to stop, “The pipe, remember? He’s probably heading back to Creepy Steeple. If we go through the pipe, we might get there in time to catch him off guard when he arrives!”.

“Oh, ohhh , right!” The shadow clasped her hands together, “We shouldn’t waste time, then! Back to that pipe!”.

The two girls practically sprinted back towards Twilight Town, reaching the town’s outer gate before they knew it. The house with the pipe was pretty close by, so they wouldn’t have much further to go from there. Sure, Doopliss was fast, but even he was no match for the instant transportation of a warp pipe.

The house came into their vision. It was right there.

“There you are, you nasty little worm ! Do you have any idea how much time I’ve wasted looking for you!?”.

“Guh!”.

“H-huh?” In an instant, Vivian ground to a halt, as if she had been physically glued to the ground, “...Sis?”.

Rippling out from the shadows, blocking their path, came Vivian’s two elder sisters; Beldam and Marilyn.

Chapter Text

Vivian’s shadowy tendril started to involuntarily jitter as she stared down her two older sisters. While Marilyn looked as aloof as always, the barely-contained rage on Beldam’s face was even more intense than usual. It was obvious that her sisters weren’t there for a friendly chat, or to wish her luck with her newfound independence. No, it was clearly time for another punishment .

The feeling of her newly-acquired confidence slowly leaving her body was like an extra punch to the gut.

“H-hey, sis…” Vivian mumbled, her eyes glued to the ground.

“Don’t you ‘hey sis’ me!” The elder shadow screeched at her, ”Did you think I’d just forget about what you did if you ran off for a little bit, hmm? Do you really think I’m that stupid!?”.

“Huh? No, that wasn’t what I– Listen–”.

“I know that you broke that superbombomb, you bumbling idiot!” Beldam cut her off, her hands twitching at her sides, “No, no, I bet you broke it on purpose , didn’t you!?”.

“Guhhh…”.

Vivian reeled back, “Wha–? H-how could you think that!? Why would I do that!?”.

“No offence, lady – actually, full offence, lady – but Vivian really doesn’t need to make you look incompetent,” Goombella spoke up, her demeanor much calmer than her companion’s, “You seem to do a good enough job of that on your own.”

“ Huh!? ” For the first time, Beldam turned her attention to the outsider in their conversation, “Scram, whoever you are! I’m busy dealing with this blithering worm, I don’t need some mouthy Goomba bothering me!”.

Vivian glanced back and forth between her sisters and her new friend, the only sounds coming out of her mouth being that of anxious babbling.

“Well, we’d love to get going, actually,,” The Goomba explained, impatiently tapping her foot, “Vivian and I are in the middle of something super important right now, so it’d be great if you two just moved out of the way.”

“Don’t you even think about it,” The eldest sister snapped her eyes back to Vivian, who hadn’t even moved, “I don’t know why you think I would allow you to slack off with this irritating loudmouth, but that ends right now. Oh yes, your punishment is going to be even worse now, so sorry!”.

The youngest sister raised her voice, desperate for her sister to actually listen to what she had to say. “Sis, l-listen to me! I–”.

“Silence!” Any dregs of patience that Beldam had been holding onto were completely gone now, clearly pushed over the edge by Vivian’s retaliation – minimal as it was, “We’re heading back to the X-naut fortress immediately, where you’ll be answering to Sir Grodus directly . After he’s done with you, I’ll be dishing out your punishment for destroying that superbombomb, and for galivanting around with this… odd–looking Goomba. Do you understand me, Vivian!?”.

As she went on, the shadow’s tone morphed from an infuriated howl to a forceful command, not leaving any room for the younger shadow to defy her. To Goombella’s horror, Vivian’s head was slumped downwards; her previous indignation replaced with a look of conflicted defeat. 

Right, she was probably too overwhelmed to deal with them on her own – that was understandable. In that case, she would just need to–

“I… I understand, sis,” Vivian eventually muttered, her miserable tone of voice aggressively tugging on Goombella’s heartstrings, “I’m sorry…”.

“Guh, guh-huh,” Marilyn nodded at the youngest shadow, appearing much more sympathetic towards her than Beldam was.

“Huh!? W-wha?” Goombella jerked backwards in shock, her wide-eyed stare bouncing between the three sisters, “V-vivian. What are you saying? You don’t really wanna go back to these jerks, do you?”.

“...N-no,” The shadow whispered, her voice barely loud enough for the Goomba to hear, “But… but I, they…”.

“You’re not stuck with them anymore, remember?” Goombella did her best to look the shadow in the eyes – where she thought her eyes would be, anyway – “You wanted to come along with us, right? Then don’t let that horrible sister of yours boss you around! Whatever happens, I’ll be here to help you out!”.

Vivian tipped her hat downwards, obscuring even more of her face than usual. Her friend was right; she was exactly right. Vivian did want to go with her, did want to get away from her sisters – obviously – but the terrible feeling that she couldn’t , that she had to go with her sisters, no matter what she wanted, just wouldn’t go away. 

Still, it was just a nasty feeling; an impulsive feeling of defeat built up from years of bowing down to her sister’s every whim. When she thought about it, thought about what she really wanted, her answer became pretty simple. It was scary – the much harder route, for certain – but it was what she wanted more than anything else.

“I…I’m not going back with you, sis,” Vivian straightened out her posture into a defiant stance, “I don’t want to stay with you any longer. The way you treat me, the cruel things you make me do… I hate all of it! I’m sorry sis, but I’ve made up my mind; I’m not gonna let you take control my life anymore!”.

Her breath hitched in her throat as those last words left her mouth. She’d repeated similar sentiments in her head many times before, but finally saying it out loud – right to her eldest sister’s face – felt so much different. It was scary yet freeing, mixing together into an overwhelming feeling that she couldn’t quite find a name for.

Vivian was pulled out of her thoughts by the mellowed thud of her sister’s tendril slamming itself into the ground.

“What did you just say to me!?” Beldam gritted her teeth into a disgusting grimace, “I don’t know where this selfish attitude of yours came from, but if you don’t drop it right now, I’ll have to knock some sense into you myself!”.

“Oh-ho, no way,” Goombella defensively put herself in front of Vivian, shielding her from the two other shadows, “You two better go away right now, or I’ll have to show you just how tough this ‘odd–looking Goomba’ is!”.

The oldest of the three shadows clenched her fists. She’d clearly been itching for a fight before the Goomba had even said anything. Her piercing gaze snapped over to Marilyn, who immediately understood what her sister wanted.

“I see, then,” Beldam paused for a moment, as if she was preparing something, “How unfortunate… for you. Mmmweee hee hee hee!”.

A sudden torrent of ice-cold wind shot out from the shadow’s outstretched hands, aimed directly towards the two girls. Reacting almost instantaneously, Vivian pulled Goombella into the floor, popping out once the magic had dissipated into the air.

“I knew you’d do something like that, sis!” Vivian balled her hands into fists, moving her body into a haphazard battle stance, “I don’t wanna do this, but if you won’t listen to me, I’ll have to fight back!”.

With a small moment of hesitation, she veiled into the ground and popped back up right in front of her eldest sister. In one swift motion, she ignited her fist and slammed it into her sister, burning her in the process. Ever-so-slightly wincing, she veiled back to Goombella before Beldam could counterattack with her own magic.

“Gack! You insolent little twerp! ”.

“Woah! Nice one, Vivian!” Goombella exclaimed, her eyes shifting over towards the most powerful of the three shadows, Marilyn, “I better get the read on you first.”

She’d already tattled the three shadows – Vivian included – back in the Boggly Woods, but a refresher couldn’t hurt. Besides, she had a hunch that they’d grown stronger since last time she’d fought them – if her observations about Vivian rang true for the other sisters, that was.

As Goombella was shutting the book, with a quiet mutter of “Yup, definitely tougher than before,”, she noticed Marilyn disappear from her line of sight. She barely managed to dodge out of the way when the shadow appeared in front of her, clapping the air where Goombella had previously stood.

With a frustrated grunt, Marilyn retreated, with Beldam veiling forwards to take her place. She swung at Vivian – her fist enveloped in a frosty haze – and found herself recoiling back in pain as the younger shadow perfectly countered her attack. 

She’d never consciously thought about it before, but now that she was actually facing off against them, Vivian was realising how ingrained her sisters’ attack patterns were in her head. Years upon years of her elder sister getting them into frivolous tussles with random strangers would lead to that, she supposed.

Vivian still didn’t feel all too thrilled about fighting her sisters in the first place, but if she had to – and she did have to – she may as well use her knowledge to her advantage.

“We should probably focus on knocking Beldam out first,” Vivian informed her partner, keeping her voice low enough to be out of her sister’s earshot, “Some of her spells are pretty nasty, and if we let her power Marilyn up too much, we’ll be in for a world of hurt!”.

“I get to wail on the mean old hag first? Sounds good to me!” The Goomba smirked, fishing her tattle log back out from her pockets, “Let’s see what we’re dealing with here…”.

As Goombella was flipping through the pages of her book, Vivian hit her sister with another shade fist, veiling back just as the Goomba was confidently shoving her book back into her pocket.

The two sisters swapped targets for their attacks, with Marilyn grunting in pain after a backfired clap and Beldam forgoing a direct attack to instead poison Goombella with her magic.

“A-are you okay!?” Vivian fretted, veiling over to her friend’s side.

“Ack! Bleh!” Goombella involuntarily spluttered, “Yeah, I’ll be fine, just regretting not having a tasty tonic on me. But there’s no way I’m letting her get away with that!”.

With a running start, Goombella threw herself at the blue–hatted shadow, hitting her with a flurry of headbonks, one after the other. Seeing her chance, Vivian positioned herself behind her sister, hitting her with an attack of her own the moment Goombella missed her landing.

Vivian couldn’t help but wince as she watched Marilyn charge herself up, followed by a ‘growing’ spell from a thoroughly beat–up Beldam. Vivian had seen this trick before.

“W-what are we supposed to do about that!? ” Goombella gawked, staring at the large, glowing shadow that towered above them.

“Y-you should be able to finish sis off with your next attack,” Vivian informed her, wringing her hands, “There’s no way we’ll be able to effectively guard against Marilyn’s attack, and it’ll be super strong, so I’ll hide us both in the shadows.”

Sure enough, four bonks in, Beldam fell to the floor with an enraged screech, barking out some final commands to Marilyn. Vivian had kinda hoped that the middle sister would just back down after they took care of Beldam, but deep down she knew that Marilyn was far too loyal to their eldest sister to ever disobey direct orders.

“S-sis–” Vivian began, abruptly cutting herself off when she noticed Marilyn’s fingers involuntarily twitch – a small action she always did before casting – and instead swooped over to the Goomba, pulling her into the ground with her.

Despite going completely unharmed, Goombella swore that she could feel the bolt of lightning as she watched it strike down onto the ground above them, a miniscule electric shock briefly running through her entire body. Once they veiled out from the floor, it was their chance. With Beldam out cold, all they had to do was pool their attacks onto Marilyn.

Interestingly, when Marilyn next attacked, slamming her palms into either side of Vivian’s head, she seemed noticeably weaker than before. Whether she had worn herself out from such a huge attack, or it was a small act of mercy towards her younger sister was impossible to tell, but Vivian found herself wanting to believe in the latter.

She was keeping track of her companion’s multibonks – four, five, miss – when she took her chance to throw a flaming punch into her sister’s face, taking out the last of her energy.

“Guhhhh…” Vivian couldn’t help but cringe back a little as Marilyn slumped to the ground. She’d be completely fine – Vivian knew that – but she couldn’t stop herself from feeling bad about it anyway.

“Phew,” Goombella exhaled as she let out a deep breath, the final lingering effects of the poison finally fizzling out, “What a fight. You all good, Vivian?”.

“Mhm, hmm! A small bruise or two, maybe, but I’m all good otherwise. W-what about you? Sis’ poison magic can be pretty rough,” The shadow fussed over her friend, “We really should go pick up a mushroom or two for you… oh, and maybe some honey, or syrup, or whatever they sell here.”

“I’m fine, I’m fine. I’ve dealt with way worse than a little bit of poison,” Goombella reassured her, “Although swinging by that shop over there doesn’t sound like a bad idea to me!”.

“Right! Let’s get ourselves healed up and then we can get back to chasing down that awful Doopliss!” Vivian exclaimed, taking a moment to gaze down at her two sisters, “Sorry, you two… M-maybe we should get out of here before they wake up?”.

“Yeah, gotcha. Those two have already caused us enough trouble, I don’t really wanna wait around for them to wake up.”

Despite everything, Vivian still spared her sisters one last glance as she walked away, Goombella by her side.

=–=

“Yeah, I’m telling you! He was right there, I’m sure that faker will be here any moment now!” ‘Goombella’ informed her party members, as they all stood around in the steeple’s belfry, “And, even worse, he's got an accomplice this time; some sort of strange shadow girl.”

“A… shadow girl?” Flurrie questioned.

“She was pretty wimpy-looking, all things considered, but you better take her out when she shows up, too,” The Goomba walked over to the rocking chair and hopped onto it, her hat drooping further down over her eyes, “I dunno who she is, but she looked pretty witch-like, so she’s probably got some kind of magic.”

Shadow, witch-like…

Mario hummed in thought as he pondered his party member’s words. That description certainly sounded familiar. Really familiar, actually. It perfectly fit the three shadows that they’d encountered back in the Boggly woods – except this time, according to Goombella, there was only one of them to worry about.. 

Although, if that was the case, it was pretty surprising to him that Goombella seemed to not recognise them. Based on the affinity she’d had for the youngest of the three, and her general knack for remembering faces, it was pretty strange for her to completely forget about them.

Regardless, he shared his idea with the rest of his group.

“ Oh yeah, those creeps! I remember you were telling me about them before, Goombella,” The Yoshi kid chimed in, before lightly tugging at his tuft of curly, blond hair, “So, whaddya think? Was it one of ‘em or not?”.

“Huh? The three what? Uh, I mean…” The impostor fumbled over their words for a few moments before eventually recomposing themselves, “Psh, I dunno, she might be. It didn’t seem worthwhile to pay attention to her, so I didn’t bother! Yuk yuk yuk!”.

Mario couldn’t help but find it… strange . Goombella’s behaviour really wasn’t right, not at all, but he really had no idea what to do to help her. Her drastic shift in attitude, her opinions on certain things flipping on a dime, her poor memory; whatever it was, it wasn’t right. 

He couldn’t shake the idea that the Duplighost they’d encountered before – the one they were currently staking out the Creepy Steeple for – must have something to do with it. Maybe that’s why Goombella was so focused on defeating it.

Either way, once they finally put a stop to that troublemaker, getting Goombella back to normal would be his top priority.

“H-huh?” A nearby sound, definitely coming from below, made Koops jump, “What was that!?”.

‘Goombella’ almost snarled, pulling her face into a scowl and hopping out of the rocking chair, muttering under her breath as she did so.

“If I had to hazard a guess,” Flurrie spoke up from beside Koops, “That may be the monster we’ve been waiting for.”

Though he didn’t say anything, the team’s Yoshi did a few small hops, raising his fists in an imitation of a boxing stance.

Less than a second later, a much louder sound – the sound of a jump pad being activated twice in quick succession, was followed by two figures hopping up into the belfry.

The moment Goombella’s feet touched the stone flooring, and her eyes took in the sight in front of her, she furrowed her brow, shrinking back a little. She’d known that it was a possibility, a very likely one at that, but she’d really just hoped that her friends wouldn’t be there; that she wouldn’t have to fight them.

She turned to Vivian, hoping to encourage her for their imminent fight, only for her heart to drop even further.

Oh no .

The shadow was completely still, as if frozen in place. Her mouth was agape as she gawked at the other people in the room. Her eyes were locked on Mario, then Koops, then moving over to Doopliss, then back to Koops and Mario and finally ending at her. She was looking directly at Goombella.

“I–” The Shadowy Goomba began.

“Hey, you again, eh, Slick?” Doopliss interrupted Goombella, taunting them, “Gotta say, you're pretty stubborn to follow me all the way here!”.

Goombella just glared at him, too worried about the girl beside her to even bother responding.

“Fine. Fine. I see. I get it. Let's just put an end to this, shall we?” The Goomba then turned to their party members, rallying them up, “All right, kids, put on your fighting gloves! Uh… Let’s get rid of these freaks for good, guys!”.

Mario nodded, pulling out his hammer. Although, he didn’t seem as resolute as usual.

“This shouldn’t be a problem for us,” Koops reassured his teammates, “That creep couldn't take us on his own, so he teamed up with the three minus two shadows!”.

“And we certainly won't be letting them do anything to our little Goombella!” Flurrie chimed in as she ruffled the Goomba’s ponytail, getting an irritated growl in return.

The Yoshi smirked, itching to start the fight already. “You better watch out, shadow guy, ‘cause you're about to taste the pain, Gonzales-style!”.

“Very good, my loyal ‘friends’,” Doopliss cackled, making sure to position himself firmly behind Mario, “How dare this nameless nobody challenge the great Goombella?”.

“G-goombella…?” Vivian finally spoke up. The pieces were all coming together in her head. Her new friend’s real body, the man in red whose name was on the tip of her tongue, the Koopa – who she could swear she’d also seen before, alongside the other two. Her gut had already put it all together, but she just needed to confirm it herself.

“Goombella… is that your name? …Are these your friends?”.

“I-I,” She couldn’t meet the shadow’s eyeline, instead casting her eyes down to the floor, “Yeah…”.

Goombella wasn’t sure what she expected to happen; how she expected the shadow to react. Would she feel sad? Angry? Betrayed? Honestly, all of them would’ve been completely justified, she wouldn’t blame her if she felt a mix of all three. But, when she finally willed her eyes to look up at the other girl, she saw only reserved shock, with the shadow nervously nibbling at her bottom lip.

Noticing the other girl’s gaze, Vivian’s expression turned blank. Fighting against her natural instinct to just hide away in the shadows, she instead began speaking in a slow, quiet tone.

“You… you knew who I was. You knew my sisters, knew that bomb was supposed to be for you. You knew that you shouldn’t have tried to team up with me…”.

Goombella gulped. Whatever Vivian was about to do or say next, she really didn’t feel prepared for it.

“But… you helped me anyway,” Briefly, her eyes flickered over to the other girl, making eye contact, before averting her eyes once again, “You helped me find that bomb, you gave me food, you helped me get away from my sisters – you even fought them with me… You’ve been so kind to me this whole time, more than anyone has ever been to me, even though you knew that I was your enemy?”.

Vivian’s tone was exasperated, confused even, but it wasn’t hostile. She wasn’t accusing Goombella of anything, nor blaming her. She was just… asking; trying to figure out why this was happening, if Goombella’s almost paradoxical kindness was real or not.

When the Goomba failed to answer, stumbling over her words to form some sort of suitable answer, the shadow asked a different question, one she cared far more about.

“Did you really mean the things you said to me?”.

“O-of course I did,” She responded with a weak smile, “I meant all of it. I’d never lie about any of that.”

Vivian believed her; she couldn't find it in her to not believe her.

“Then… then… let’s get your body back!” The shadow made up her mind. She wanted to stay by Goombella’s side. If she really meant everything that she’d told her, then she knew she wouldn't regret her choice, “I’ll fight by your side! I've... I've made up my mind! And I'm never turning back!”.

Goombella felt her eyes well up a little bit. She shook her head and beamed up at Vivian. “Thank you, Vivian, really!”.

“What's going on here, huh?” Doopliss yelled over at them, clearly impatient, ”Ya done fighting with your girlfriend?”.

“Wha- Huh!?” Goombella jolted back, “G-girlfriend!?”.

“Well, whatever. Can’t say I really care about whatever you two ghoulies are babbling on about,” The imposter shrugged, turning his attention over to his teammates, “Chop chop! It’s ‘bout time we got this over with. Yuk yuk yuk!”.

Goombella whipped out her tattle log. She wouldn’t need to tattle her party members, she already knew everything about their abilities, but getting a refresher on what exactly Doopliss was capable of seemed like a good idea. 

“Same as last time, besides having my moves now. Honestly, that’s kinda a relief…” She muttered under her breath, turning her attention to Vivian, “Let’s just focus all our attacks on Doopliss, okay? I’d rather not fight my party members unless we really have to…”.

“Mmm hmm, I don’t really wanna hurt them, either,” The shadow agreed, “It’s not their fault that they’re being duped by that meanie.”

Vivian dipped down into the floor, moving right underneath Mario and popping up in front of Doopliss. With her fist set ablaze, she swiftly jabbed the imposter before ducking back into the floor, reappearing next to the real Goombella.

“Yes! Nice one, Vivian!” The Goomba cheered her on, “That’s what he gets for trying to hide behind my friends!”.

Vivian smiled bashfully, cupping one of her cheeks with a gloved hand. She still wasn’t really used to her efforts being responded to with praise, as opposed to angry shouts to ‘do better!’.

“Hey, you!” Doopliss angrily called out to Koops, making him flinch, “Don’t them get away with that cheap shot, do something!”.

“O-oh, right. Sorry, Goombella,” He replied, warily looking at his opponents.

The Koopa receded back into his shell, quickly launching himself at the shadowy Goomba, who just happened to be in front. Goombella had no problem blocking his attack – she knew Koops pretty well – leaving the Koopa to rush back to his party, a guilty look on his face.

“Gah! Whatever!” The imposter sulked, “Guess I’ll just have to do everything myself.”

Doopliss pushed past his companions and jumped into the air, his aim focused on Vivian.

“Ah! Ow!” The shadow spluttered out as she was caught off guard by the first hit of the body snatcher’s headbonk, yelping once again as the second hit came down on her before she could even recover.

On their next turn, Goombella managed to hit the Duplighost with a pretty strong multibonk and Vivian kept him ablaze with another shade fist. Truthfully, the Goomba was starting to feel pretty confident about their chances, even with her friends laying down their own attack on them.

“Graaaack!!” Doopliss yelled out as Vivian’s burn flared up on him, “Hey, can you lugs actually fight them!? I’m hurting here!”.

“Yeah, yeah, we’re on it!” The Yoshi took a running start at Goombella, who was barely in time to block his ground pounds, while Mario held his hammer high above his head, catching both girls off guard as he slammed it into the ground, the impact shaking the very floor beneath them.

Doopliss was pretty badly beaten up by that point. If Vivian had to guess, she’d say that he would probably only be able to take another round or two of her and Goombella’s attacks. Still, though, while the imposter himself wasn’t a threat, his party members certainly were.

Flurrie’s body slam was no joke, as she experienced first hand, and Koops could launch himself at speeds that really tested the strength of her reaction time. Goombella was having significantly less problems than her, naturally, but she’d still taken a solid hit or two.

The shadow narrowly dodged around the Yoshi’s tongue, glimpsing Goombella’s attempt to guard against each hit of Mario’s power bounce out of the corner of her vision, and veiled over to Doopliss, letting a torrent of fire erupt from her fingertip, burning him.

“Goombella!” She called out, veiling back towards her as Mario backed away, “I think we're close! Do you have the energy for one last multibonk?”.

“Oh, totally!” The Goomba pumped herself up, preparing to attack, “Especially if you’re letting me hit the finishing blow!”.

“You’ve got this!”.

Goombella did a small hop before she leapt into the air, landing perfectly on her imposter’s head. Vivian watched on in awe as she counted each consecutive landing – she’d never seen her reach nine bounces before – with her target looking weaker and weaker with each consecutive hit. The Goomba couldn’t help but show off a little, doing a quick flip in the air before landing back on the ground.

“No... Why... How!?” Doopliss swayed back and forth for a few moments before collapsing to the ground, face first. The moment he hit the floor, the ruby star slipped out from his pocket, bouncing across the ground until it landed by Vivian’s tendril.

“Goombella!” Flurrie gasped at the sight of her fallen friend, glaring at the perpetrators, “I have no clue why you’re so insistent on taking her out, but if you think tha–”.

The wind spirit was cut off by strange energy flowing out of the downed Goomba’s body before it practically fell apart, revealing the Duplighost in its true form, lying on the ground where ‘Goombella’ had previously been.

“Huh!?” Koops, Flurrie and the Yoshi kid exclaimed in unison, as Mario jumped back in shock.

Looking to her side, Vivian watched as Goombella’s shadowy form radiated a soft red light before peeling itself away to return her to her actual body.

Finally, the curse had been undone.

Before anyone could properly process what had just happened, Doopliss jumped back up to his feet. His gaze snapped over to Goombella, his eyes widening, before he looked down at himself, seeing his usual white sheet.

“Rats!” He cursed, his eyes darting around the room for an escape route, “You killjoys!”.

Taking his chance, he dashed off towards the back of the room and jumped out of one of the windows, gliding away from the steeple as he held back a wave of frustrated tears.

“Wha… What just happened!?” The Yoshi was the first to speak up, frantically glancing around at each of his companions.

Mario, piecing things together to the best of his knowledge, explained what he believed had happened. The Duplighost must have swapped bodies with Goombella the first time they’d defeated him, and Goombella had only been able to undo the curse by defeating him again.

“I see, that would explain our situation,” Madame Flurrie cupped her cheek within her palm and shifted her attention to the real Goombella, “Is this true, dear? I don’t want to think that we might’ve been duped by that impostor, but…”.

“Yeah, Mario figured it out pretty spot on,” Goombella admitted, “I mean, we had to do way more than just defeat him, but that’s the gist of it, anyway!”.

“So they totally shellwinked us,” Koops sheepishly scratched the top of his head, “Ah, sorry about that, Goombella.”

“Please, there’s no need to apologise,” The Goomba reassured her party members, “It was all that nasty Doopliss’ fault, not yours!”.

“Ah, Doopliss,” Flurrie repeated, “So that was his name, was it?”.

“...So, who’s this girl, huh?” The baby Yoshi interjected, warily eyeing up Vivian, “Hey, Gonzales, didn’t you say that she might be one of those three shadows that you guys fought? If she’s one of those creeps, then do we gotta fight her, too?”.

“W-well, I, uh…” Vivian stuttered, trailing off when she noticed the other members of Goombella’s party shift their gazes to her.

“Wh– No . No way!” The Goomba rushed to her defence, immediately shutting the Yoshi down, “She’s a friend! She was only working with her sisters because she had to, and she’s already defected from her sisters and she’s on our side now, and if it wasn’t for her there’s no way I would’ve ever defeated that monster – I wouldn’t even have gotten close!”.

Goombella didn’t realise how quickly she’d been speaking until she had to stop to take a breath. 

“So, uh, yeah,” She awkwardly averted her eyes, “She’s… we don't have to fight her…”.

“Oh, Goombella,” Vivian’s voice was dripping with gratitude, “Thanks for sticking up for me.” 

“She’s not an enemy. Okay…” The small dinosaur adopted an embarrassed smile, sending the shadow an apologetic look, “S-sorry about that, miss. My bad.”

“So, you’re not gonna be sticking around those nasty sisters of yours anymore, right?” Koops asked.

“Yeah, even if I wanted to, I’m not sure I could go back to them anymore, anyway,” The shadow nervously played with her hands before speaking again, “A-actually, I was hoping that I could join you all in your travels, if that’s okay!”.

“She can, can’t she?” Goombella added on, glancing around at her teammates, “I mean, she’s helped me out so much, and her magic is super cool, trust me!”.

“Well,” Flurrie thought on her answer, “If you think so highly of her, then I see no reason to not let her join. What do you think, Mario, dear?”.

Mario paused for a second, a hand to his chin, before he thrust his arm forward, showing the shadow an affirmative thumbs up.

“Oh, thank you!” Vivian clasped her hands together in joy and, for a moment, Goombella feared that the shadow was about to start crying tears of joy, “Thank you so much, all of you!”.

The shadow dipped herself down towards the floor, scooping the ruby star up in her arms, and floated over to the team’s de-facto leader. “This is what you’re looking for, right?”.

Mario smiled back at her as he gently took the fourth crystal star from her hands.

Between the ominous atmosphere and the harsh winds, no one was particularly excited to stick around in the belfry for much longer. So, after some brief introductions between Vivian, Flurrie and the Yoshi, the party decided to make their way back to Twilight Town.

While the other four had already hopped back down to the steeple’s spiral staircase, Goombella and Vivian found themselves lingering behind for a moment longer. They enjoyed the sound of the breeze for a few moments before one of them broke the silence.

“They’re all so kind, especially Flurrie!” The shadow smiled, “And that little Yoshi is just as adorable as you said he was! I’m so happy that I get to travel with you all…”.

“Yeah, our party is, like, totally the best. And now that you’re here, it’s even better!”.

The shadow giggled. “Well, I think we should probably get going now. We don’t wanna lag too far behind the others, do we?”.

“Vivian, w-wait!” Goombella hurriedly called out, stopping the shadow in her tracks.

She tilted her head in confusion, “Hmm? What is it?”.

“Uh, w-well, uhm,” The Goomba took a few steps over towards the shadow. After a second or so of just staring at her, Goombella got onto her tiptoes and planted a kiss on the shadow’s cheek, “Thanks for helping me get my body back. I’m so glad that you’re gonna be sticking around!”.

With that, she hurried off, hopping down the belfry’s entrance and disappearing from sight.

“Come on, Vivian!” The shadow heard her call out, “I’m sure the others are waiting for us!”.

Vivian put a gloved hand to her burning cheek, a warm feeling spreading throughout her body.

=–=

“That good-for-nothing traitor… Oh, next time I see that twit, I’m gonna…” Beldam muttered under her breath, practically spitting each individual word out in disgust, “Marilyn! How could you lose to them!? Were you even trying!? ”.

“Uuh-guh, guhhhhhh,” The larger shadow explained, folding her arms.

“All I’m hearing are excuses !” Beldam scolded her, “I’d be far more angry with your screw-up if I wasn’t already so mad at that traitorous rat. Who does she think she is, running off like that!? It’s the three shadows, three! How can we be the three shadows if there’s only two of us? Thanks to that selfish little worm, we’re gonna need to find a replacement…”.

Marilyn was only half paying attention to her older sister. She was pretty tired already, and Beldam’s rant was just making her even more exhausted. As she looked around, scanning the corner of Twilight Town that they’d retreated to, she noticed an odd sight: a figure running towards them.

No, it would be more accurate to say that they were running by them, as they didn’t even seem to notice the two shadows that were directly in their line of sight.

“Guh!” The shadow exclaimed, drawing her sister’s attention towards the figure.

Beldam finally noticed the figure when they sprinted right past them, barely avoiding a head on collision. She instantly clocked the creature as a Dulpighost – and, if she had to guess, a pretty powerful one at that – though it seemed to be in a pretty pathetic state at the moment, running as if its life depended on it. 

Well, pathetic-looking or not… they did need a replacement.

“A Duplighost, hmm?” The elder shadow mused as she watched the fleeing ghost, the gears in her head already whirring to life, “Mmmmwee hee hee hee! Come, Marilyn. I think we’ll take a little detour before reporting back to Sir Grodus.”

“Guhh…”.

Chapter Text

Before heading back to Rogueport, the party decided to spend the night at Twilight Town’s inn. As much as they were more than ready to make their way back to Rogueport as soon as possible, exhaustion was really starting to set in, with Vivian and Goombella feeling the worst of it.

It wasn’t exactly easy to comfortably fit all six of them within the inn’s single room, but with Mario and the baby Yoshi offering to sleep on the carpeted floor, they eventually made it work. 

Despite the nervousness she felt from being around all these new people, as nice as they all were, Vivian found herself dozing off practically instantly. It was only when she was finally curled up on the very edge of the inn’s bed that she realised just how tired she really was. Adrenaline and heightened emotions had carried her along for the past few hours, but now that she was finally able to settle down for the night – without the fear of everything going wrong – she didn’t even have enough energy to keep her eyes open.

Upon waking up, she was a little embarrassed to find out that she was the last one up, by a wide margin, with Mario and Flurrie having already finished packing up the team's belongings and ready to head off. 

“Y-you really didn’t have to wait around for me,” Vivian told them, a guilty smile on her face, “I would’ve been totally fine with it if you’d just woken me up.”

Despite her protests, Mario assured her that it was fine; telling her that it was important for her to stay rested up. The shadow smiled gratefully as she helped her two new teammates carry their luggage out of the inn.

“Hey, there you are, Vivian!” Goombella shoved her book away and rushed over to Vivian the moment she noticed her, taking her own bag from the shadow’s hands, “Glad to see that you’re finally up. Honestly, yesterday totally conked me out, too. If I wasn’t so used to getting up early for classes, I probably would’ve slept in as well!”.

The shadow smiled down at the Goomba as they stood outside of the inn, waiting on Koops and the Yoshi to come back from… wherever they were – Vivian wasn’t quite sure. “I… really didn’t mean to,” She awkwardly grinned as she attempted to pat her bed-hair into place, “All that fighting just left me pretty worn out.”

“Don’t worry, today should be a pretty easy-going day, all things considered. Mostly just dealing with the usual busywork back at Rogueport,” Goombella explained, leaning back against the wall, “Oh, and putting the crystal star in the door, of course! I’m really hoping that map leads us to somewhere less creepy this time…”.

“I don’t really mind the atmosphere here,” Vivian commented, noting that the dim locale was probably a little more suited to her natural tastes, “But I’d be lying if I said I wasn’t excited to finally be leaving!”.

“Oh, absolutely,” The Goomba nodded, “The sooner we leave here, the sooner I never have to think about running into that yucky Duplighost ever again!”.

Right, at least that was one problem that they wouldn’t have to deal with any time soon. Although Vivian did find herself wondering about where exactly he’d ran off to.

=–=

Eventually, Koops and the Yoshi returned from their excursion – picking up some Twilight Town exclusives from the shop, apparently – and the party headed over to the pipe connecting Twilight Town and Rogueport, saying their goodbyes to the few residents that were milling around outside – none of whom Vivian recognised, but the others seemed to.

Upon arriving back in Rogueport’s sewers, Mario decided that their first course of action would be to head to the Thousand Year Door. They were already underground, after all. 

“So, what’s our next location looking like, Mario?” After the podium in front of the door had stopped glowing, and the map had been returned to Mario’s hands, Goombella waddled up to him, craning her head to get a good look at the map, “An island, huh? Sorry, can’t say I have any idea where this is. Guess we better ask Professor Frankly about this one, too!”.

Keelhaul Key was the name of the island, Professor Frankly had informed them, making sure to also note the unsavoury rumours surrounding the island; those of shipwrecks and undead pirates. If it wasn’t for everything they’d encountered on their journey so far, Goombella would’ve probably been a little more doubtful of such things.

Rumours aside, they quickly found themselves having to deal with the problem of how to actually get to the island. Unlike every other location, there was no pipe system or direct travel that would just take them there. If they wanted to get there, it was seeming more and more likely that they’d need to sail there by boat.

From there, their goals for the day were pretty simple: finding a captain willing enough to sail all the way out to Keelhaul Key, and stocking up on enough supplies to last them for what would most likely be, at the very minimum, a multiple week long skirmish.

As they made their way from shop to shop and vendor to vendor, Vivian found herself getting to know the other members of her party a bit more. Of course, she often found herself instinctually sticking close to Goombella, but she still felt like she was warming up the others, little by little.

It was so strange; getting so close to so many new people in such a short amount of time. It wasn’t something that she was used to, not at all, but it was something she definitely found herself cherishing. Learning more about Mario’s adventures, or impressing the little Yoshi with her ‘sick flame tricks’ – as he’d described her magic – they were all things that felt so… foreign to her.

Yet, throughout all of it, she found her attention constantly drifting back to the person who’d brought those new experiences into her life.

=–=

Vivian rolled over for what had to be the fifth time in the last ten minutes. She couldn’t sleep. Whether her mind was too active to allow her to properly relax or if she simply just wasn’t tired, she couldn’t tell. Either way, she’d been lying down, trying to sleep for long enough to figure out that she probably wouldn’t be dozing off any time soon.

It was night time. If she had to guess, it was probably close to midnight, if not already past then. They were resting in Rogueport’s inn. Though, unlike the one in Twilight Town, there was more than enough room, and enough beds, to easily fit their entire group.

After a long day of asking around Rogueport, it was only when they finally sat down at Podley’s – to formally celebrate the newest member of their party – that they found someone who could help get them to their next destination. He was, well, interesting – to put it politely –  but he was more than willing to comply with them.

And so, they’d be setting sail in around a week. More than enough time to finish any and all business they had in Rogueport, and even leaving them with a few days to spend earning money from the town’s ‘Trouble Centre’. All things considered, her first day on the team was a productive one; one that made her feel like she really belonged there.

As quietly as she could, Vivian shuffled her way out of her bed and silently grabbed her hat from the bedside table, taking a quick glance at her darkened surroundings before she veiled into the floorboards, popping back up outside the door of the inn’s upper story. 

The smell of brine was readily apparent, even so far away from the harbour, and the night air was chilling, but Vivian didn’t find herself being bothered by it. The cold wasn’t an issue to a fire magic user like her, after all. 

The nearby badge shop was closed, obviously, but she still found herself stealing a glance at its window as she passed by. She hesitated for a second, worrying about the ethics of climbing onto a stranger’s roof, before shaking the thoughts from her head and stepping up onto the roof of a nearby house – the home of a local chef, if she remembered correctly.

Vivian sat down, her tendril burying itself in the roof’s tiling, and let her eyes creep up towards the night sky. The sky was clear, the stars distinctly visible. In contrast to the grimy streets below, and the hostile atmosphere that the town held during the day, the view from up high was beautiful.

Out of everything, the ocean caught her attention the most, with the reflection of countless stars shimmering off of it. Aside from the few lone figures that she could barely see milling around the harbour, it was as if Vivian was the only person around.

She sat there, simply allowing herself to take in her surroundings, until the inn’s door was quietly opened, allowing for someone to tiptoe out, before gently pushing the door shut.

“Phew, there you are,” The sudden voice almost made the poor shadow jump. It was Goombella, she could tell immediately.

“O-oh, hi,” The shadow gave a meek wave, not expecting any sort of company, “Uhm, shouldn’t you be sleeping? Oh, I didn’t wake you up when I was leaving, did I?”.

“Nope, I’ve been way too restless to get even a wink of sleep. I think I might’ve heard you moving around, but I had no idea that you were out here,” The Goomba hopped up onto the roof as she talked, her voice a hushed whisper, “Honestly, it got me a little spooked when I looked over and saw that you weren’t in your bed.”

“I’m sorry for worrying you,” Vivian sheepishly responded, “I just wanted to get some fresh air, is all.”

“Oh, I totally get it. I’ve already spent a couple evenings out here myself,” The Goomba grinned, “The view from here is great; you can see everything from here!”.

Goombella sat herself down, sidling up to the shadow. She was close, closer than Vivian had expected. It wasn’t a bad thing – not at all, she liked being near Goombella – but it was a surprise nonetheless. Although – Vivian reasoned with herself – the Goomba was probably just cold; hoping to pull some sort of residual heat from her presence. Yeah, that made sense.

“Mmm hmm,” The shadow softly hummed, “I didn’t expect to see the stars so clearly.”

“I know! Nice view from here, don’tcha think?” Goombella stretched her stubby legs, leaning back with a content sigh, “Y’know, this place doesn’t actually look too bad at night.”

“Well…” Vivian put a finger to her chin, peering down at the main square below, “The dark does make it a lot harder to see all the trash that's been dumped everywhere.”

“True,” The Goomba let out a soft snort, “It’s a pretty terrible look for a town’s roofs to be less dirty than its streets.”

For a while, they didn’t say much, both opting to simply enjoy the atmosphere. Goombella, especially, couldn’t help but appreciate a peaceful moment coming from the otherwise bustling port town. Despite that, she found herself feeling restless, for more than just one reason. 

Well, She was never the type to just avoid the things that were bothering her, anyway.

“Hey, Vivian?” Goombella eventually broke the silence, “I’m sorry for, y’know, not telling you who I really was back there.”

“Huh? What do you mean?” The shadow looked as if she was genuinely confused, “I thought that you couldn’t tell me that. A-and, besides, I already said that I forgave you, didn’t I?”.

“Well, yeah, you did…” She averted her eyes, her mouth forming into a straight line, “But, still… I-I mean, at first, it totally wasn’t my fault – I tried to say my name, but it just wouldn’t come out! But then I started telling you about our party, and our adventures, and that’s when I started to, um, leave out some important details…”.

Goombella awkwardly shifted her body, moving neither closer nor further away from the other girl, “I realised that if I said too much, or if I just mentioned Mario’s name, you’d probably figure it all out. I was worried that if you realised who I was, you might’ve ended up running away – I was supposed to be one of your enemies, after all. But… if I ended up scaring you off, you’d…”.

“...I’d just end up running back to my sisters,” Vivian concluded, her mouth slightly agape as she stared at the Goomba, “...In that case, I think I’m a little glad that you lied. J-just don’t do it again, okay?”.

“My bad,” Goombella sheepishly grinned, feeling as if a weight had been lifted from her shoulders, “Hopefully I won’t be losing my name ever again, so that’s no problem!”. 

The shadow giggled, a sound that suddenly made the Goomba feel pretty accomplished, and decided to voice aloud a small detail that she’d admittedly been pretty curious about.

“Oh, uhm, there’s one thing I’ve been meaning to ask about all day,” She paused for a second as the Goomba tilted her head in intrigue, “That necklace that Flurrie has. Is that the same one I found in Boggly Woods? Was that why you wanted it so badly?”.

“Yup!” Goombella nodded, “Sorry for snatching it from you, but that necklace is super important to her. She wouldn’t even come out without it on.”

Vivian frowned, feeling more than a little guilty, “Sorry, I had no idea that she was looking for it. I just found it and thought that it would look cute on me… I’d assumed that its owner didn’t want it anymore.”

“I’m sure you would’ve looked totally adorable with it on!” Goombella flattered the other girl, “I mean, hey, we could always get you a necklace of your own at some point. I’m sure Flurrie could help find something that’d make you look even prettier than usual!”.

“Th-than usual?” The shadow pensively repeated, a small blush lighting up her cheeks, “You think I’m pretty?”.

“Yeah, obviously! ” The Goomba began to ramble on, with little consideration for her words coming out of her mouth, “You’re like, the cutest girl I’ve ever seen, I’m serious! I mean, when I first saw you in the Boggly Woods, I pretty much instantly had a crush on–”.

If Goombella had hands, she would’ve slapped them over her mouth in a sloppy attempt to muffle her words. Instead she just cut herself off, her mouth forming into a strained frown. She really hadn’t meant to say that.

“H-huh? What did you say?” Whether or not the other girl genuinely hadn’t caught on, or she was just playing dumb to give Goombella an easy way out of the awkward situation she’d landed herself in, she couldn’t tell, but it did at least give her a chance to back peddle; pretend she hadn’t almost said what she’d said.

“I mean, uhm,” Despite that, the moment she opened her mouth, she couldn’t stop herself from letting everything spill out, “When I first saw you, I thought you were like, the cutest! Having to fight you really sucked, but you still seemed way nicer than your sisters. I-it wasn’t anything huge, but I definitely had a crush on you – pretty much instantly.”

“And then, over the past few days, I actually got to know you… and now it feels like a little more than just a crush,” Goombella’s cheeks were already red-hot by that point. As much as she wanted to, she couldn’t keep eye contact with the other girl, “You’re so sweet, and compassionate, even though the people around you were nothing but horrible to you. I feel like losing my body would’ve been way worse if I didn’t have you there to keep me sane.”

Vivian gawked at the other girl, speechless. A gloved hand was held up to her mouth in shock as she just stared at Goombella, scanning her face for even the slightest sign that she was joking.

Her face only grew hotter when she realised that she couldn’t find even a hint of dishonesty on her features. She meant it. All of it.

Someone – no, not just ‘someone’, Goombella – really felt that way about her. The same girl who’d been told by her sister time and time again that no one would ever feel such things for her.

Her lack of an immediate response was making the shorter girl nervous. Vivian could tell.

“I…” She gulped, deciding to follow in Goombella’s footsteps and just lay it all out, “I’ve never had anyone like you in my life before. You’re so funny, and kind, and interesting – I feel like I could listen to you talk forever. Being around you has been so… freeing. Even though it’s only been a few days, my life is already so much happier now. I know that you’re to thank for that.”

“Listening to you, talking to you, being around you, it all makes me feel so warm inside. Wanting to be around someone, because just having them there makes everything feel so much more enjoyable, th-that’s part of what love is, right? I-I mean, liking , not love! Or, maybe love, or–? Is love too strong a word? Oh, I didn’t ruin it, did I? No, I totally did…” Vivian practically wilted as she trailed off, completely losing her steam..

“Is it okay if I kiss you?” Goombella cut through the shadow’s nervous rambling, her words quieter than usual.

Rather than saying anything, Vivian just nodded, not trusting her voice enough to produce anything other than a stammer. After a second or so of unmoving silence, the Goomba craned her head upwards, catching the shadow’s lips with her own. Goombella’s lack of arms made it so that Vivian found herself having to put in the work to maintain the kiss, cupping the other girl’s cheeks within her hands as she kept their faces aligned.

Eventually, the two girls reluctantly separated, their eyes still locked on one another.

The moment she felt as though she’d caught her breath, Goombella skipped straight to asking the most important question on her mind, not being able to wait even a second longer. “Um, so,” She tried her best to sound nonchalant, but crumbled almost immediately, “Does this mean that we’re… y’know, together ?”.

Vivian averted her eyes. “D-do you want that?” She shyly asked.

“Do you want that?” The Goomba peered at her expectantly – there was a hint of trepidation in her eyes.

The shadow simply nodded, an involuntary smile threatening to overtake her features. “I’d love that. A lot.”

Vivian couldn’t help but giggle as Goombella let out an almost shuddering sigh, her body practically deflating with relief. Though, a second later, the Goomba’s mood seemed to have changed, practically launching herself at the other girl as she nuzzled up to her – a common display of affection among the majority of armless creatures.

“It’s probably pretty obvious at this point, but I’d love that, too,” Goombella beamed, pulling back and instead opting to lean against Vivian, the shadow’s body heat staving off the chill of the late night air.

Vivian sat up, allowing the Goomba to rest her entire weight against her side. The rapid beating of her heart began to slowly but surely mellow out as she felt Goombella’s hair occasionally brush her back; her presence quickly feeling as though it had always been there.

Goombella could fall asleep right there, cuddled up to the shadow. But, then again, she could also stay awake for another twenty minutes, until the other girl would softly nudge her, telling her that they should probably head back inside and get proper sleep in proper beds. Either way, she didn’t mind; she was completely at ease.

She moved her head a little to look up at Vivian. For a split second, she could swear that she saw a pair of yellow eyes peeking down at her, but as soon as she noticed them, a gentle breeze pushed the other girl’s bangs back into their usual place. As she went to comment on it, she instead found herself stifling a yawn – she was finally starting to feel tired.

She let her eyes drift shut for a brief moment, letting out a soft exhale when she felt Vivian lean her head against her own, quietly humming to herself as she did so. 

Maybe it would be okay for them to stay there for a little while longer.