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peaches2217 · 2 months

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Bowser is evil. This is objective, unarguable, a solid-state fact. What’s more open to interpretation (depending on what side of his kingdom’s borders you’re on) is whether he’s actually a bad guy or not.

His citizens near-unanimously see him as a good person; he cares for their well-being, makes frequent public appearances to interact with common folk in all corners of the kingdom, personally leads his armies into battle. In their eyes he’s stern and maybe a little trigger-happy (he’s all too happy to dole out capital punishment where he sees fit), but ultimately fair. And his kids — oh, don’t get me started on his kids! You wouldn’t expect someone so tough and fierce to be affectionate towards anyone, but he dotes on his children openly and without restraint. It’s largely for their sake that he seeks world domination. The more territory trapped within his scaly fist, the more he can give to them as future rulers!

The thing is, if you’re not Bowser’s kids or a citizen of the Darklands, you’re expendable. He’s hotheaded, but he doesn’t even particularly hate anyone (though he admittedly delights in the suffering of anyone he deems an enemy). Anyone that stands in his way is little more than a nuisance. Age, gender, species, none of this matters to the Koopa King. If you have something he wants, he intends to take it. If you resist, he will kill you. Needless to say, those who end up in his line of sight are… less likely to consider him a decent person.

Peach, for example, has nothing good to say about him. She was his earliest target for a variety of reasons: proximity, the abundance of native-growing power-ups in her kingdom’s wildlands, the lack of resistance he knew her citizens would put up, the petty joy that came from the thought of taking down someone so powerful and beautiful and reducing her to a withered husk of her old self. After many years of sending in random ambushes in the hopes of lowering her guard with their predictability, he finally swooped in and took her by force, vowing to murder her and everyone she held dear unless he was given total control of her kingdom — twice in the span of two years. His first attempt was humiliatingly thwarted just days after the princess’ abduction; his second attempt, while nearly successful, just about ended in his demise, because apparently the only force stronger than a fire-breathing dragon-turtle is a plumber in love.

So ever since his recovery from that fateful fight, Bowser has moved onto other conquests. But he always tells himself and his kids that, once he’s taken over the rest of the world, he’ll have more than enough resources to kill the Mushroom Queen and thwart that pest that stands in the way of his greatest, most well-deserved victory! It’s just… going to take time. All things take time! It’s not that he’s scared of some human who just barely clears 5’, or that he still feels phantom pains from getting his shell split clean open by said human’s bare hands, of course not! What, are you trying to say he’s weak?! Blasphemy! To the gallows! To the gallows with you all!!

#introducing my new marioverse lore tag:#peaches’ illustrious lore #I wanna make more posts like this one! even if my ‘lore’ is more ‘bore’ or ‘snore’ I have fun writing it out #so now all of y’all are gonna suffer 😌#peaches has opinions #super mario bros #smb

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peaches2217 · 3 months

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💪 Mario bridal carrying Peach for the win

Rescue (TW: Blood, Injury)

~~~

Steady footsteps, pounding rapidly against stone. A strong, racing heartbeat. Deep but quick puffs of air. After two months hearing nothing but the drip of stale water and the scrape of metal trays against a dungeon floor day after day, these sounds were like music to Peach, drowning out the slow roar of magma and the panicked shouting of soldiers scrambling to reassemble their ranks.

It was foolish to assume that she was safe now, and she knew this well, yet she was all too happy to call herself a fool. She could die this very moment and she would die happy, so long as she never left the sanctuary of Mario’s arms.

She buried her face into the junction of his shoulder as he ran and inhaled deeply. Blood. All she could smell was blood, its sharp coppery tang permeating through layers of grime and sweat and charred skin, and she breathed it in greedily. It enveloped her senses and protected them from the acrid stench of sulfur.

She had never seen so much blood pour from a single source. She hadn’t known the human body was capable of such a thing.

“Hang on tight.”

Pleasant tingles sparked through Peach’s body at his command. His voice — it was exactly as she remembered it, solid and sure, only the slightest bit strained from exertion. She obliged, tucking her legs tighter over his right arm and repositioning to wrap her arms around his neck; he in turn hoisted her closer, his left arm bracing against her back and pressing her chest securely to his.

Sweat trickled down her neck, and dizziness threatened to steal her consciousness away, the sweltering heat of Bowser’s fortress almost more than her compromised body could handle. This didn’t stop her from clinging tighter to Mario. His warmth was so much softer, so much gentler, and she welcomed it with open arms.

From there he broke into a dead sprint, his feet so quick that she may well have been floating through the air. They passed plenty of soldiers in the midst of their escape, Koopas and Paratroopas alike, but most were too busy fleeing or chasing deserters to pay them any mind. The few that did gaped in awe, like they had seen the dead come back to life.

Peach understood their shock all too well. She had felt it only minutes earlier.

It all happened so quickly. The crash of metal against metal, her cell door being flung open. The whisper of her name, so weak yet so relieved, its source so disfigured that she didn’t want to believe it was truly him. But the gentle smile that had graced Mario’s lips as he collapsed onto the cold floor left no room for doubt or denial.

She had scrambled her way into an ever-growing pool of blood and pumped every last ounce of magic she could muster into his motionless body, cradling him and urging — no, begging him not to leave her, not now, not ever. And she had been too horrified by his deathly pale and blistered and burnt face to notice the bleeding crawl to a stop; in her mind, she was failing. Two months starved and sedentary had weakened her too greatly for her to hold any meaningful amount of magic.

Yet she gave her all anyway, and she had screamed out in agony, in sorrow, in terrified uncertainty. She didn’t stop until her body forced her to stop, at which point she slumped over him, shaking and on the verge of blacking out, willing the Star Spirits to bring him back or else let her die alongside him.

There had been silence save the sounds of her pitiful weeping. There had been stillness. Then, a hand reached up and brushed her tears away. From his place in her lap, Mario had smiled up at her once more.

Now his heart hammered against her chest as the gloomy stone fortress and the blinding lava surrounding it faded farther and farther into the distance. She shut her eyes and buried her face into his shoulder once more, and she thanked him in her mind for heeding her pleas. Thank you, thank you, thank you, I love you—

She had almost said it in the dungeon. She wanted nothing more than to pull him into an impassioned kiss and babble words of love against his lips. He hadn’t given her any time. The moment he realized he wasn’t dead, he scooped her up and ran.

When he put her down, she decided. As soon as her feet were on solid ground once more, she would kiss him and set years worth of words unspoken free.

But he didn’t put her down, not even as the choking smell of sulfur faded and cicadas sang out into the peaceful night. His sprint slowed to a run, then a jog, and with each passing minute his breath grew more labored. When his arms began to tremble, he just tightened his grasp, and the constricting pressure against her legs and torso might have been painful were his strength and presence not such a comfort.

Peach did her best to focus on these sensations, because she knew she would fall into catatonia if she let herself process any of today’s events, and she couldn’t afford that until she was home, at least.

Home. Her dearest friend and the love of her life carried her through an increasingly dense forest as a groom might carry his new bride, and he was taking her home. Peach’s saving grace — the only distraction potent enough to keep her from crying once more — came from Mario’s lips.

“Mario?”

It happened again: a small noise of distress, then another, and another. With each one his pace stuttered until he slowed to a stumbling walk, each footstep taking notably more effort than the last.

Sympathy panged deep within Peach’s chest. The magic that had brought him from the brink of death still coursed through his veins long after, giving him the stamina to carry them both to safety, but now that magic was wearing off, and with it the pain of his injuries was returning. Before she could suggest they were far enough from the Darklands to rest, the last of Mario’s energy evaporated, and he sank to one knee in the grass with a pained whine.

Peach remained tightly clutched against him.

“S— sorry— hold on—” His words came in breathless pants, and he shook so violently that Peach was impressed he could still hold onto her. At this rate, she truly feared he might pass out.

“It’s okay,” she soothed, her voice low. “You can put me down. We’re safe for now.”

For just a moment, he squeezed her even harder, and though she knew it was selfish, she found herself hoping he’d ignore her completely, that he would hold her here in the dark wilderness until the sun peeked through the treetops.

Eventually, he grunted in agreement, lowering his other knee so he could place her on the grass. The movement was surprisingly gentle given his state; he slid his right arm from beneath her legs once her backend made contact with the grass, and his left hand lingered for a moment at her spine to ensure she was steady.

Then it slipped away, and he slipped with it, crumpling heavily onto his side.

“Mario—!” Peach twisted to face him and brought her hands to hover over him. She had coaxed him back once. She would do it again if she needed to. Not once did she stop to wonder if she actually could.

But he was stable, if only barely. His clothes were torn in multiple places, and blood still seeped from the cuts they revealed. Undoubtedly there was even greater damage beneath those layers. But the puncture in his side, the primary source of his brush with death, now looked like nothing more than a nasty gash — painful, something that would need medical attention quickly, but not immediately life-threatening. He groaned and quivered as he lay there, but he drew deep and somewhat consistent breaths with fairly little difficulty.

Already his face looked so much better than it had in the dungeons. Not unscathed, not by any means; it was still littered with scratches and angry red burns, but the blisters and charring that had rendered him near-unrecognizable were nowhere to be found, the work of her lingering magic. This was the face of her Mario. Her champion.

Only when she cupped his cheek did Peach realize her hands were trembling. No, it was her entire body that trembled, and splotches of black began to dance in her field of vision. With a nauseated moan, she lowered herself to the ground beside him. Their journey home would have to wait a while longer.

Once she was situated across from him, her palm returned to his cheek, rough with stubble and warm from trauma. Already her heart raced, and its pace only quickened when his eyes fluttered open. Those eyes, deep blue and filled with tenderness… she had dreamed of them every night for the past two months. And she had begun to believe she would never see them again.

“Hey,” she whispered, because she really wasn’t sure what else to say.

For the third time since their reunion, Mario smiled at her, and she was certain her heart would burst. The pain etched into his features melted away as he met her gaze. It was as if everything was alright in his world now. And as he lifted a tremoring hand and mirrored her touch, his tattered glove meeting her cheek, Peach realized that everything was alright in her world too.

“Hey,” he whispered back. That one word wasn’t weak and feeble, like his dying whisper of her name had been. Its softness came from timidity, a timidity she knew all too well.

That was it. That was the final push Peach needed to overcome years of shyness, dancing around social etiquette and expectations and uncertain affections. She was going to pour her heart out to him, right here, right now, consequences be damned.

Once again, he didn’t give her any time.

He kissed her before she had the chance.

#tw blood #tw injury #tw burns #we're back with the peaches2217 marioverse lore! on this episode: peach's second and final kidnapping #there is absolutely a follow-up to this but none of it is relevant to the Bridal Carry prompt #so that's for another time~#super mario bros #smb #mario #princess peach #mario x peach #mareach #peaches' fancy fics #peaches’ prodigious prompts

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