Fic: A Reframing

[mrsluigivargas]

A Reframing
So it turns out getting trapped in portraits a few times changes your opinion on other types of magical paintings, too.

Fandom: Super Mario
Rating: General Audiences
Characters: Mario, Luigi, Peach, Daisy
Relationships: Mario & Luigi
Additional Tags: Hurt/Comfort
Length: 1,830 words

~~~

As she usually ended up doing, Princess Daisy managed to completely derail what was meant to be a casual, low-key affair using little but her natural exuberance.

She was visiting Peach’s Castle for the week, for what was nominally a set of diplomatic meetings and functionally a set of “I haven't seen my closest friends in a few weeks so let’s hang out and shoot the breeze for a while” meetings. Today, such a meeting took form as brunch, with time spent afterward walking and talking around the castle.

Their meandering pace up and down the hallways took them through the foyer, where Daisy stopped short upon seeing the perfectly circular spotlight centered on the perfectly octagonal rug. “Girl, when’d you install a skylight in here?” Despite her question, she was over the mezzanine’s railing before Peach could properly answer. The Mario Bros quickly followed her, and Peach ran down the stairs to join them just in time for Daisy to step into the center of the spotlight, despite Mario trying to drag her away from it.

“Or maybe it isn’t a skylight?” Daisy stared up at the light’s presumed source. “I can barely see...wait I think there’s something up there —”

In the next blink, Daisy vanished. Luigi screamed, backing away from the scene with wide eyes. Mario lost his footing, now that the arm he’d been pulling had abruptly vanished. Peach, meanwhile, sighed heavily. “I really need to get that fixed,” she muttered to herself.

Thankfully, it was only a few seconds more before Daisy reappeared in almost the exact spot from where she’d disappeared from — though her hair was maybe a touch frizzier. The first noise out of her mouth was an inarticulate shout, followed by a “What the heck was that?!” yelled with eyes fever-bright with delight.

At the sign her friend wasn't irreparably traumatized by her abrupt departure and subsequent arrival, a smile twitched onto Peach’s face. “It’s well...it’s a bit hard to explain...”

“Aw, come on!” Daisy mock-whined, interrupting her own theatrics with a brief-but-wide grin to Luigi as he worriedly fluttered around her, and a pause to wait for him to weakly smile back, “Gimme your best shot!”

It was Mario, then, who stepped up to describe one of the more memorable of Bowser’s attacks on the Mushroom Kingdom, where he’d not only kidnapped Peach, but had also stolen all the castle’s Power Stars. And, Peach added as Mario’s explanation tapered off, he’d used their power to corrupt her paintings so he could hide them in the created worlds therein. And in other secret places around the castle, too, like the one Daisy had just discovered.

“I left a lot of those paintings up, to be honest,” Peach mused. “Even though some have been turned into portals, I’d worked hard on those. And a lot of them still have Power Stars hidden inside, anyhow.”

Mario started, a guilty look on his face. Peach waved off his apologetic glance. “No, don't worry,” she said kindly. “Hidden isn't a terrible place for those Power Stars to be for now; we have plenty available to make do with as it is. Actually, I’ve been meaning to see if I could grab a few more here and there, but I keep putting it off.” She laughed self-consciously.

Now both Mario and Luigi were frowning at her. “We still wouldn't mind grabbing them,” Luigi said. “You don't need to add that to your plate if you don't have to.”

“Yeah!” Daisy ducked out of Luigi’s fussing range to land a friendly punch on Peach’s shoulder. “Don't worry your pretty blonde head about it; we’ll be on the case!”

Peach really shouldn't have been surprised by her friends’ kindness, considering the people they were, but she found her heart warming regardless.

“And I bet I’ll get the most out of all of us!” Daisy continued, and ah, there it was.

At Daisy's proclamation, Mario scowled. He reached over to shove her. “Don't deny it!” she cackled, moving with the momentum and shoving him back. Mario scowled harder and swatted at her, very much continuing to deny it.

“W-well, Mario’s already done it all before, s-so...” Luigi blurted out in his brother’s defense. He immediately regretted doing so as Daisy turned a raised brow to him.

“What, you don't think I can do it?” she teased.

“Ah — no, you — I mean —!” It was easy to tell when Luigi realized Daisy’s offense was feigned by the moment his face turned bright red. Even Mario paused in trying to antagonize Daisy to ruffle Luigi’s hair about it.

Peach giggled behind a hand. “Shall we make this a proper competition, then?”

Daisy cheered. “Boys vs girls; you’ll eat our dust!”

Mario rolled his eyes. Yeah, right.

“Meet back at the end of the day?” Peach asked, and the others agreed.

“What do we win?”

“...Bragging rights?”

Daisy thought about it. She shrugged. “Good enough for me!”

With that, she grabbed Peach by the wrist and sped off. Peach’s protests about going to the upper floors of the castle faded away as they disappeared up the stairs. Luigi, on the other hand, ran for the nearest door on the first floor and threw it open, Mario following close behind.

The room Luigi stepped into was moderately sized; carpeted red with a raised checkered platform in the center. On the far wall, though, was a row of Bob-ombs marching single-file in one of the best paintings Luigi had ever seen, in his opinion. He hurried to it to read the plaque beneath; Bob-omb Battlefield, it said.

Luigi turned to address Mario, who had stopped by the door with his eyes also locked onto the painting. “Wow, Peach really did amazing with this, didn’t she!” he exclaimed. But as Mario noticed his gaze, that’s when Luigi saw it — Mario’s posture straightening, his shoulders jerking downwards into something that could pass as relaxed, his face smoothing out into a grin that almost managed to finish hiding the dread peeking through his eyes despite his efforts to wrestle it down and out of sight.

Luigi’s brows furrowed. “You good, bro?”

Mario nodded, walking further into the room with deliberate steps. He was still watching the painting, even as he stopped at the edge of the platform. And despite his best efforts, he still looked wary of it. And if Mario was nervous...

Luigi’s face paled. “There’s a whole war behind there, isn't there?” A war between bombs, no less! “We’re not gonna die straight away, are we?!”

Eyes widened in alarm, Mario shook his head rapidly, waving his hands out in front of him for good measure. This was the first world, after all; nothing super dangerous should be waiting for them, he was sure of it!

Oh. “So what’re you so nervous about, then?” Luigi asked. Mario shrugged, a non-answer. His hands were clenched into fists by his side.

Luigi hummed, turning back to the painting. He pressed a hand to it, and the surface rippled like water. Luigi marveled at the effect. He kept one eye on Mario, though, who’d flinched and taken a step backward as the painting’s movement had started. At this point, Luigi would normally want to turn around and really press Mario as to what exactly was up with him. But for one thing, getting Mario to the needed level of vulnerability for that conversation was a pain when he got to this point of digging his heels in denial about his own feelings, and then of course getting him to actually talk about it was its own brand of difficult, and not just because of the obvious. And for another thing...

...they were kinda in the middle of a competition right now.

So Luigi pressed his hand more firmly into the painting, which didn't give way. Must take more force to break through, then. He backed up to the center platform.

“I dunno what you’re scared of,” Luigi stated, despite beginning to have an inkling about what Mario was scared of. “But it’s okay! I can pop in there to get the Stars, and you can look around the castle for some!” A terrible idea if they were trying to win — Luigi had no real idea what was behind the painting, and Peach would definitely have home-field advantage when it came to locating Power Stars in her own castle. But if Luigi was right about the main issue at hand, then his brother just needed a little push to get through it, and he knew if Mario thought there was danger, real or presumed or otherwise, then he wouldn't let him endure it by himself if he was able.

And Mario obviously knew Luigi knew that, judging by his frowning at him. Nonetheless, as Luigi got his running start and lept through the painting, he couldn't help the fond grin on his face at Mario’s scrambling footsteps right behind him.

For a few frankly terrifying moments, Luigi was floating in a white void. But then the sheen-sparkle of star power curled around his ears, and then there was a sky to fall out of, and a ground to careen towards. Luigi would like to say he stuck the landing, but that would make him a liar. He rolled to a stop in the grass, one of the Bob-omb Buddies wandering over to see if he was alright.

Mario’s landing was, of course, better. Though he still ended up on the ground, his legs giving out as soon as he landed. He was still sitting there when Luigi approached him.

“Apparently there are Silver Stars,” Luigi told Mario as he sat down in front of him. He watched Mario wrestle his breathing back under control, reaching out a hand for his and squeezing it. Bit by bit, the tension bled from Mario’s frame.

When Mario finally looked up, Luigi’s soft smile was what greeted him. “Talk about this later?” Luigi asked, making it sound like more of a request than it actually was.

With a sigh, Mario nodded. Luigi squeezed his hand again, and Mario squeezed it back.

Mario shook his head as if to clear it, then got to his feet. He pulled Luigi up after him; they leaned into each other for a few long moments, until a distant shimmer caught Mario’s eye. He squinted off into the distance, and what he saw had him pulling at Luigi’s arm for his attention.

“Hm?” Luigi peered at the tree Mario was pointing at. “Is that —?” Something was bouncing and spinning above it, and his dawning excitement upon recognizing it had him bouncing in place as well. “Oh! A star, right? What color is it?!”

Mario’s face brightened to match Luigi’s energy. With a grin, he pulled Luigi along by their still-linked hands towards it. He could save his feelings about his earlier freak-out until later, he decided as they ran.

For now, he and Luigi had a competition to win.

~~~

This fic was inspired by this little comic, where Mario is afraid of portraits & paintings in a post-Luigi’s Mansion world.

I like the idea of the skylight that gets you into the Wing Cap level just being a workplace hazard every few months, lol. Don’t look up at the light; the time it’ll take to get you out will eat into your lunch break!

Honestly, I don't think Mario himself realized he was afraid of jumping into the paintings until he got to that room and actually thought about what he would have to do to get to Bob-omb Battlefield, upon which he got a surprise spike of terror about it that he didn't know how to deal with. So he defaulted to trying to pretend it didn't exist. Which was a poor choice, in the presence of the person who knows him the best besides himself, haha.

And I didn’t want to have Luigi confront Mario about his fear, because one thing that’s kind of lame in other Mario & Luigi stories is that scenes like this tend to be super overwrought and melodramatic, lmao. And I’d personally rather die than go that route. So! We swerve around it!