Once upon a time…
Robin and Cloud, two of the most powerful heroes in the land, defeated the most powerful Pokemon Trainer in history. They clashed atop the roofs of Saffron City, and though the Pokemon were strong, one after another fell to Cloud’s blade and Robin’s magic. The last defeated was Mewtwo, the monster, a corrupted clone of the progenitor of all Pokemon. Perhaps that grim science would lead to even more misery in the distant future…
Some time later, deep within the jungle, the monarch King K. Rool was plotting. Those two pesky fighters stood against any evil, but surely, thought King K., they could not withstand the power of what once was good. K. Rool’s magnificent plotting had already forced his nemesis Donkey Kong to serve the cruel rule of K. Rool (DK’s smelly chimp friend came as a free bonus), and he cleverly planned an all-out attack that would strip the land of their heroes. He would kill the heroes, marry a princess, and the throne would fall to him: King K. Rool, the Crocodile King of All Things. He and his green-garbed servants (for it was jade jungle juju that mind-morphed the monkeys) were plotting this when Robin and Cloud burst into the shack and slaughtered all three of them. Robin was a girl at the time, for some reason.
Meanwhile, in space, dark forces plotted to consume the universe…
Star Wolf, furious, enraged, ashamed by defeat after defeat, reached into the darkest cranny of the cosmos and pulled at the corners of the darkness in between the stars. From the Outside leaked corruption, blinding Wolf with darkness that poured black from the hole in his soul, shaping itself to the things he kept always by his side: misery and hatred poured into his cherished sidearm, and its scratched and polished parts alike crackled and snapped and glowed as it grew powerful legs, explosive arms, and a glowing, staring, cerulean eye. Everything left of Star Wolf congealed into a charcoal blob of hateful hunger that played with his empty body like a puppet. These three wretched creatures flew onwards towards civilization, where they would call from the cosmos more like themselves… that was their plan, anyway, but in a burst of light Robin and Cloud leaped through space and destroyed all three of them in an instant. Robin was a boy again this time, for some reason.
With the universe saved, the crown princesses of the Mushroom Kingdom and their dog decided to make a giant cake to celebrate the heroes’ victory and their return from space. Still cheering and weeping, their transmission clicked off, and the five shipmates gazed at the stars as the ship swept them towards home and pastries.
Weren’t there only two, you ask? Robin and Cloud? Well, that’s what the two of them thought, too. But a dribble of chaos muck clung to a crack in Cloud’s sword, a droplet of congealed hatred sank into Robin’s inkwell, a particle of primeval power slipped into the refrigerator, and neither of them noticed until it was too late…
Until they touched down and the hatchway opened to cheering and sobbing and tickertape-tossing (and a dog wearing a sweater)…
Until the cake had been wheeled out and the princesses and their dog all took out their claws…
The instant the first slice was cut, the three hosts, now hosting a vengeful virus, attacked the heroes in a frenzy of spite and spittle. Swinging and spelling furiously, Cloud and Robin (who was a girl again, for some reason) deflected the girls’ attacks away from the terrified crowds and led them up to the roof of the castle, where a furious battle took place between Earth’s exhausted saviors and the corrupt royalty. As Cloud clocked Isabelle into dreamland, the canine being the last to cling to consciousness, he turned to Robin and said something in Japanese. Robin nodded.
The two friends plopped down on the castle roof, the sun still high over their heads. Peach and Daisy were both snoring daintily. The evil had been defeated for good, disintegrated by the power of the morning sun. And downstairs, there was still cake.
Suddenly, they heard a repulsive voice from below.
“Wa-ha-hey there, heroes,” cackled Wario, wearing a tremendously awful cyan and magenta suit. Behind him stood a fat grey penguin and a fat grey crocodile, neither of whom looked quite real. “If you don’t hand over that cake, we’ll kill you and take over the world.”
“Fine,” Robin (who was a boy again for some reason) said grimly. “Try it. But let’s at least fight somewhere else. The people of the castle have seen enough brutality.” Downtown, Cloud got a haircut and a new black outfit, and the two heroes fought the fat warlord and his two monochromatic minions and were both horribly killed. Wario stole the cake, slit the princess’s throats, ate their dog, and plunged the world into terror. His belly and power grew and grew as his wa-ha-horrible rule consumed more and more of the innocent planet, until many many years later the whole world had been reduced to little more than the crumbling plaything of the wretchedly warped Wario and his white-washed warriors.
Some time later, two new heroes stood against the ways of weight. Dr. Mario and Wii Fit Trainer struck out for the planet’s center where Wario, transformed into a scaly beast, toyed with his fighters and with the Earth’s core alike. They fought for peace, for fitness, for the restoration of order and in the loving memory of those past heroes lost, but they, too, were defeated: dashed into the lava, where Wario’s roaring laughter drowned out their final words as they melted into the magma. And Wario reigned on, consuming rocks and oceans and cities until his fatness supplanted the land itself, and his triad of colorless enforcers (for there was a third now, a flat one, since Wario had very little imagination) erected atop the Wario World an enormous city, and from there ruled mercilessly in his stead. Eventually, Wario slept, as the land always does, and his grey giants gripped the world in their greedy fists.
And right on cue, into the city stepped Ganondorf and Bowser, vainglorious villains who had long ago set aside their differences—and perhaps even their evil hearts—to plot and scheme to rescue the world from Wario. They both claimed the reason was want of power, and that this was just a tactical maneuver, but—well, let me tell you the rest, and you can decide for yourself.
The two Kings climbed atop the tall city skyscrapers from which the fatlords ruled. The starlit sky shone bright onto the five massive fighters, each of whom could cross a rooftop in four strides, and they charged into battle: claws slicing, fists flying, boots exploding, bacon frying. Soon the two villains had dispatched two of the other three villains and stood there against the flat man, blessed with the very essence of the fat man, and twice as strong as the others. He said nothing, flickering in and out of sight near the building’s edge. And without a word, Ganondorf leapt forward, and the King and the Thing disappeared from the roof and plummeted together into legend.
Bowser quickly took the world for himself and ruled with an iron claw, launching the land into misery. It wasn’t as miserable as it had been under Wario, but things were still pretty awful for everyone except Bowser. It went so well for the new King that he went on vacation with his son and his pet plant to a tropical island. Bowser snoozed while Bowser Junior chased beetles and hunted for treasure in the sand.
“Now,” whispered a voice. Koopa Jr. exploded.
A man in red camouflage stepped out from behind a palm tree, and a second man in a green armless jacket leapt out of the shallow water. The missing Mario brothers were no longer missing.
Mario, tactical weapons expert, ripped the plant’s leaves off. Luigi, the vampire hunter, throttled the Koopa King with an iron chain whip, and the brothers set sail for home on Bowser’s pirate ship. Out on the open sea, the ship was attacked by a scary scarlet alien monster and its ridiculous red robots. Mario and Luigi danced around lasers and sidestepped fireballs, handily defeated the alien, and drowned the bots under the keel. Unshaken, the Mario brothers sailed home, retired from fighting, and built an era of peace and harmony and flying airships. And so it went for many generations…