#welony

Because I actually want to get this done in a pretty decent time, I will, in fact, NOT be torturing myself and writing a ficlet every time.

Obviously, Dark Meta Knight further explains to everyone what happened. The present and future gang already know that the Abyss being involved is bad news, and it being unaccounted for after the timelines shattering? Even worse news. It's pretty easy for them to deduce that they have to find the pieces of the hourglass.. but of course they then run into the problem of names.

There are three Marios, and two SMG3s and SMG4s.

For my sanity's sake, know I will not be tagging them all like this, this is just for written form;

Mayro (Present Mario)

Mareo (Future Mario)

Mario (Past Mario)

Glitchy (Present SMG4)

Snitchy (Present SMG3)

SMG4 (Past SMG4)

SMG3 (Past SMG3)

Reminder that the past versions are pre-Waluigi arc. Meaning it was still incredibly episodic. Meaning.. basically no character development. The present and future versions known how stubborn, prideful, and many other things the past versions are. So the presents and futures just agree to.. let them have the current names. After introductions, figuring everything out

Wisely, for this first one, its decided to keep the past versions back so the present and futures can assess just how bad this all is. Ofc, it takes Abyssal having to assert her authority as an admin (aka scaring the shit out of the past versions) to make them stay. And even then she gives DMK express permission to hit them upside the head if they follow. And so? They could through the first door.

They appear on, what seems to be.. a beach! They explore for some time, but don't find anyone. Until..

---

"There is so much sand," Welony mumbled as she stared down at her feet, and the sand that had decided to stick itself to her.

"Honestly, sand is very welcome after the hell we've been through," Lily responded, watching Mareo gather sand in his hand and chuck it at Glitchy, who snorted and tossed some back in return.

"How is everything there?" Snitchy raised an eyebrow.

"Shit's fucked."

"Fair enough."

"Ah.. hello?"

Everyone turns their heads to see..

"Oh you have got to be kidding me," Lily deadpanned.

---

Yup, the first alternative version they meet? It's Lily!

She, of course, doesn't know them. In fact, she doesn't even recognize them! Why? Because this is Princess Lily Sonata Marianna-Thalassa, Princess-Heir to the throne of Pacific Empire. Though she'd.. prefer it if they just called her Sonata, though, since they clearly have another Lily. After thoroughly explaining their situation to her, it turns out she does have an answer to their troubles, does in fact believe them.

You see, her current guardian, Queen Diana Sinfonia Marianna-Thalassa had captured someone who was a bright color like Abyssal,,, which doesn't bode well, because if an Admin was captured, it meant that Abyssal can't protect them as well as well as she hopes.

Sonata leads them to the castle, thankfully with no incident!! Namely because we have relatively smart people here who understand they probably shouldn't piss off the princess of an Empire. They soon arrive to the underwater castle with only minor difficulty (pirates) and they meet the queen herself!

Queen Diana is understanding but very wary. She tells the group she does have an inkling of an idea about what they may be looking for, and proceeds to pull out two things!

A piece of the Hourglass (specifically the bottom wooden base) and also..

---

"CLUSTER!??!" everyone shouts in shock as the former Admin is dropped unceremoniously to the ground. Everyone steps behind Abyssal out of instinct, who summons her chains. The Admin, however, can't even get a word out before--

"PUT ME BACK IN SOLITARY CONFINMENT. PLEASE."

Everyone stops and stares.

"... What?" Glitchy's eyebrows shoot to his hairline.

"PUT ME! BACK IN! SOLITARY! CONFINMENT!" Cluster scrambled to their knees, looking at the group with wild eyes. "Put me back in their! I am begging you! If I have to spend another day around the Abyss, around Cookie, around DialUp, around Black Doom, I AM GOING TO GO INSANE!!!!"

Queen Diana sighed. "They have been like this since I found them attempting to steal the object."

Abyssal blinked owlishly. "You.. you want to go back in solitary?"

"Anything," Cluster whispered harshly, "is better than having to be around THEM!!!"

The murmurings of surprise came from everyone.

Then Tari's eyes widened. "Hey, did Cluster just mention the Abyss?"

".... awh shit."

---

The first one they meet, indeed, is Cluster. And wisely, they decide not to fight when they are vastly outnumbered, but also because they just really want to get away from the Abyss and their whole entourage.

Our gang gratefully takes both the Hourglass piece and Cluster, thanking both Sonata and Queen Diana before leaving. Only to return to a time room in absolute chaos because Mario decided to charge into one of the doors after the Future and Present groups left, it didn't work, and now everything is on fire.

Yes, Effi did put in a minor failsafe before passing out. No one else can enter any timeline once one group has entered, which does mean everyone has to be sure about their choices, since they have no clue what any timeline is.

There's been a string of high-profile thefts over the past week, and all evidence points to Meggy, so the police detain her despite her having alibis for most of the incidents. It's up to Luigi and Hal, assisted by Welony and Lily since they were nearby, to investigate and clear her name!

Eventually it's discovered that the culprit was... Inkling Meggy? In her Western Spaghetti outfit!?

As you might imagine, it's more complicated than that. This is actually a young Inkling girl who happens to look almost identical to Meggy's original form, and who stumbled upon one of Mr. L's lairs he forgot to clear out when he moved to the CCC servers. Here, she found a corrupted, but mostly complete, archive of the Western Spaghetti simulation, which L had been combing through to find the source of the equipment.

Due to the interference of a mysterious Benefactor, the Inkling got electrocuted by the equipment, somehow transferring data from the simulation into her brain. This caused her memories and personality to be overwritten by the fabricated memories Wren used to prevent Meggy from realizing what was going on before his Torment started.

Or rather, an alternate version of those memories, from an earlier build where he would've been the heroic sheriff and she would've been the dangerous outlaw, before he and Mr. Puzzles realized it would've been too out-of-character for her.

And so Dead-Eye Meggy was created, and proceeded to go on a crime spree both to frame the real Meggy and ruin her reputation and run some "errands" for her Benefactor... and also because that's just how she's programmed.

She gets away, but there's more than enough evidence to clear Meggy, so now we're left with a new mystery.

...One that's at least partially solved for the audience, as we get a flashback to the scene in the alley during A Snake in Horseland, where after the Crew teleported after Ozzy and Garyboy the severed super suction ear slithered off like an actual snake once night fell and froze partway under a dumpster when it heard something approaching. It turned out to be a Rabbid, who spotted the ear snake, mistook it for a normal plunger and grabbed it to play with it.

This turned out to be a horrible mistake, as the ear sprung back to life and lunged at the Rabbid's neck (as much as it has one anyway).

The Rabbid screamed in pain and fear and the shot jumped to the alley wall, where the shadow of the Rabbid's futile struggles could be seen.

Rather than simply dying to the venom like you'd expect, the shadow instead became distorted as the Rabbid was somehow transformed, becoming larger with more exaggerated propertions.

Eventually the screams gave way to rasping laughter, and the shadow on the wall, still somewhat recognizably a Rabbid (albeit an oddly shaped one like some of the major ones in the Mario + Rabbids games) but with disconnected ears and large, three-digit claws in place of mitten hands.

Dead-Eye Meggy's put together a gang of Rabbid Bandits and they decide to ransack Steve's Farm... and run a-fowl of Welony's Trained Attack Cuccos. It'll be a war for the ages.

SMG3: Depersonalization

Marcy: Locking in

Toad: Thursday

---

Irene: I come from a long line of people who should not have had children but did anyway.

---

Tulip, about Ren: I think I want to wake up next to him for the rest of my life.

Alice: He gets up at 5AM and you barely sleep at all.

Tulip:

Tulip: ...I want to see him at some point during the day for the rest of my life.

---

Vee: I love the phrase "with all due respect" because it doesn't specify how much respect is due. Could be none. Bitch.

---

Mario: Oh, sure, blame the guy who's a huge idiot who causes a lot of problems again!

---

Abyss to Juliano: Dude, I know it's my fault, but can you stop being consumed by the darkness for five seconds and help us deal with the situation at hand?

---

Staccato: *internally* Ohh, it's gonna suck when they finally realize I'm irredeemable.

Roll, the one person who knows everything she's done in horrifying detail: *internally* I love my awesome friend <3

---

Bob: Mario has been kissed by at least two canonically transgender women. I have to surpass him.

---

Juliano: The human body is incredible. Right now, if I so desired, I could do 15 percent of a backflip and wreck my shit right here on the sidewalk.

---

Rodney: It's shit being a superhero when you know the multiverse exists. You spend all day saving people, you're tired, you want to go to bed, and right before you fall asleep someone says "the High Evolutionary is going to turn everyone into a werewolf!"

Rodney: And every bone in your body says “Fucking. Maybe we can be the werewolf dimension. The Universe Where Everyone Is A Werewolf. There are infinite dimensions where everyone isn’t a werewolf. It could be fine. It could be good even.”

Rodney: And you fight the High Evolutionary and you win and your world isn't the Werewolf Dimension. But the thought was there.

Rodney: God the thought was there.

---

Tulip: Few understand the importance of having a sickass jacket that everyone remembers you by.

---

Irene: SMG3 diagnosed me with divine madness.

Timmy: Any other diagnoses you'd like to share?

Irene: Autism.

---

Reboot Saiko: Why does that clown who's obsessed with turning everyone into emotionless husks call you babygirl?

Luthor: How about we stop talking for a while.

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Desti: *shoots up in bed* SHIT I'M LATE FOR SCHOOL- Oh wait I'm an adult. *lays back down*

Desti: *jumps completely out of bed a minute later* I'M THE TEACHER!!!

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SMG4: What if mayo came in cans?

Lil Coding: That would suck because you can't microwave metal.

Lily: Good morning to everyone except you two...

---

Root: Could you at least try to see this from my perspective?

Lily: *crouches down*

Hex: *kneels down*

Welony: *sits down*

Floyd: *phases halfway through the floor*

Root: ...

Root: I hate all of you.

---

Cole: Would you slap you best friend for 100 dollars?

Arle: I'd slap Sora for free.

The gang's all here!

So the Gummi Ship team manages to get through the Firewalls undetected and find themselves in what looks like a labyrinth of maintenance tunnels. They start the search, sneaking their way past the Twilight monsters and Brobots that patrol the halls, but for obvious reasons they're not exactly sure where it is they're supposed to be going. That is, until Cursor starts getting command box messages from someone called "Waypoint," giving them directions and alerting them of incoming guards. Obviously they're suspicious, but they go along with it for now due to a lack of better options.

As they go deeper, the Twilight and Brobots are joined by other, much more intimidating robots. Ones that Samurai Bob recognizes as minions of his world's version of Worm. Definitely concerning, but they don't have time to investigate.

Eventually they reach the room with the keys, where they finally meet Waypoint. It turns out he was there with them the whole time, as a little green snail stuck to the inside of Rob's hat. He assumes his true form, a vaguely humanoid shadow thing about the same size as Mickey with big pink eyes and a green hooded cloak, and introduces himself as Overseer's offshoot who's been stuck in here and became what he is now ever since Renata was taken. He wants to get himself and Tulip out of here, and decided to help these guys when he realized why they were here. Anyway, the keys await, and the only way to get them is through Comedy and Tragedy.

As you'd expect, two relatively weak Programs (even if one of them was specifically designed for combat and damn good at it) and a bunch of character-levels (one of which is a seemingly ordinary, if blocky, child) against two Programs designed to be the assistants of Firewalls is a bit rough. Rough enough that it leads to a very interesting reveal.

So, Rob kinda gets smashed at one point. The little shadowy creature that's actually Rob is pretty badly hurt and the scarecrow body is damaged beyond repair. This of course upsets Steve and Welony quite a bit. And in Welony's case, it reveals that her reincarnation didn't get rid of all of Majora's power, because her eyes change to that burning orange and she starts cycling through her inventory until she hits a collection of Mob Heads. She puts one of them on and suddenly Tragedy has an extremely pissed-off enderman all up in her face.