[Mr. Game & Watch]

The conference room hadn’t seen much action since the meeting of the minds that was behind the Leader rescue mission, dubbed ‘Operation Enter the Bull’s Ring’, however, it had once again found itself bustling with some of the Life Sphere’s elites. Each seat at the round table had a marker displayed in front of them, showcasing both the name and the job title of its occupants.

By going around the table, one would read the labels as followed: “The Goomba(?), Mayor of the Black Market District”, “Toadsworth, Mayor of the Rainbow Square District”, “ , Mayor of the Brightwing Lane District”, “Nurse Joy, Lightweather’s Chief of Medicine”, and “Captain Falcon, Chief of Police.” At the head of the table there was one last label, but there was nobody to match the name to as the seat was absent. It read “Chancellor E. Gadd.”

The four mostly sat in silence, Nurse Joy and Captain Falcon fiddling with their pens out of boredom, Toadsworth was already a couple rem cycles into his nap, and the Goomba very stoically had his titanic arms crossed. The quiet atmosphere didn’t last for too much longer as the Goomba’s stern gaze fell upon the empty chair that was labelled to be for the Mayor of Brightwing Lane. “The Goomba wants to know who is and why they were allowed to skip this meeting. The Goomba is missing the grand opening of Moundo’s exhibit in the Life Sphere museum for this” the mayor grumbled as his brow continued to furrow.

The sudden introduction of noise was enough to snap the elderly mushroom man out of his slumber, denoted by the popping of the snot bubble that grew and shrank with the rhythm of his snores. The disturbance was enough to make him stumble forward uncontrollably, mostly due to the giant mushroom cap that was pasted to his cranium. “What the-” he croaked as he was brought back to the land of the living. It took a couple seconds for the old man to process what was said, though he sort of leered at the Goomba regardless of his question. “Considering that our conferences will be filled with ruffians such as yourself from now on, they probably made the sensible decision and resigned” the elderly toad scoffed with his brows held high.

The Goomba continued to display his distaste for Toadsworth by furrowing his consistently grumpy face further. Before the verbal skirmish could commence though, a wispy voice intervened with “half right. The mayor feller took a temporary stress leave that eventually turned into an indefinite one. That was long before our muscle bound friend took office though” E Gadd informed as he scampered into the room with a hefty bundle of papers clamped under his armpit.

“If their mental health was being impaired from stress related issues they should have visited Lightweather, I would’ve prescribed that they sucked it up and did their job” the nurse stated, initially sounding like the kind hearted Joy that most knew and loved before deteriorating into an ornery tone.

The chancellor chuckled a bit at the nurse’s comment, though didn’t break his stride until reaching his seat. A powerful thud followed after he tossed the bundle of papers onto the table. “Hehe, yes I’m sure that would’ve got ‘em back on the job in a jiffy! Anywoo, my apologies for the delay” the professor continued pleasantly as he got himself situated on his chair. “There was a lot more… data to go over than I originally expected. You’ve all been quite busy during your time in power!” E Gadd laughed as he patted the stack of stationary.

Captain Falcon’s triangular eyes narrowed down on the rather loose and chaotic mess of pages, briefly wondering about its contents and what it had to do with their meeting. Come to think of it, he had no idea what this meeting was about. “So, uh- what exactly is this meeting about?” he asked without much confidence and then looked around the room briefly to note that he wasn’t the only one there, thus he didn’t want to seem unprofessional. “I mean, I’m totally up to date with everything so far, just want a refresher in case somebody here is too embarrassed to admit that they skipped the seven paragraph introduction and went straight to the time and date” he added, sounding quite sophisticated. “Which is definitely not what I did” he prefaced whilst laughing it off.

The professor nodded along with Captain Falcon’s statement, and then added “well, I would hope you did because that letter has nothing to do with what we’re talking about today!” he chuckled like the mad scientist he is. “We’re doing a group performance review!” he announced whilst raising his arms in the air in celebration.

Meanwhile, the reaction of every other party in the room was either a sigh of disappointment or a roll of their eyes. The Goomba seemed especially flabbergasted. “The Goomba will not be played like a puppet! The Goomba sees behind your two-faced schemes!” the creature exploded as he slammed his fists against the hardwood.

E Gadd lowered his hands, denoting the group to keep their composure. “Calmness, calmness, please. E Ga- er, I wasn’t doing this to insult the Goomba. If I told you all that we were going to have a performance review that would have influenced you do act differently than you normally would. A man of science like myself knows not to disturb my test subjects, ho ho ho! Doing this together in a group will also save time and coins, plus you can all learn off of each other! That’s the plan anyways. Let’s see it in practice!” the elderly scientist cheered. His foggy glasses immediately honed in on Captain Falcon, wasting little time. “Right then! Mr. Falcon, since you’re clearly ahead of the rest of us in this meeting, let’s start with you!”

Captain Falcon sat up straight and answered with his trademark grin and thumbs up combo, though it was soon washed away from E Gadd shuffling of papers. He seemed to have split the pile nearly in half and began to slowly scan over the new pile he made. “Oh you have kept yourself quite busy, my boy! You managed to catch that slippery Gamer Watch feller and turn him over to the Starvia Cure Development Team, provided transport to Team Slithery Snake and helped save the Leaders from Black Shadow, and successfully defended the Police HQ from a kremling invasion.”

The grin on Captain Falcon’s countenance shined through once again at the reminder of all his triumphs. Clearly nothing could go wrong in this meeting for him. “Yes, and hardly broke a sweat. All in a day’s work” he boasted whilst cracking his knuckles.

“Yes, yes, quite impressive indeed. Although, there are reports saying you were purposefully damaging Police HQ property during the kremling invasion to boost the insurance funds you’d receive. Any comments on that?”

Captain Falcon’s normally triangular eyes exploded into full on circles. He didn’t know anyone else had heard about that. He proceeded to cough in order to cover up his reaction and pressed on with “those kremlings are a crafty bunch! Clearly one of them must have been disguised as me in order to get my security clearance! Those scoundrels! How could they scrounge my name in the dirt like that!?” he expounded in outrage as he slammed his fist onto the table.

E Gadd nodded, babbling to himself on an inaudible level as he peered down onto the papers in front of him once more. “There was surveillance footage of you Falcon Punching a gigantic hole in the floor, very clearly not being a kremling” he replied in a rather matter of fact tone.

The chief of police merely shrugged and answered with “well you see, there was a kremling under there.”

“In any case, I suppose reckless behaviour can be excused every now and again, but insurance fraud is a bit questionable. Something else that was a bit questionable was the time you reportedly switched out the entire office supply of coffee beans for Hyper Candies and didn’t notify the rest of the police force. Nurse Joy, could you please shed some insight on the effects of an overabundance of Hyper Candies on a mushroom person?”

“I cure diseases, chancellor. The effects of giant diaper wearing mushrooms eating too much candy is none of my concern” she sassed while rolling her eyes.

“Insightful, thank you” E Gadd rebutted rather plainly as though he was actually given useful advice.

Captain Falcon wiped the sweat off of his forehead by trying to stroke it through his helmet. It didn’t work for obvious reasons. “I think that it’s a well-documented fact that the Toad Police force has been pretty… useless. A boost to their energy might’ve been enough to turn them around!” he answered energetically with a pump of his fist. “Didn’t work though” he sighed as his body deflated from his proper stance to a defeated slouch. “And they’ve only gotten worse ever since I started hiring Goombas onto the force!” he added in uproarious exhaustion as he placed his head in his hands. “They won’t stop protesting!”

The Goomba continued to look cross, as usual, though he slightly directed his vision Captain Falcon’s way. “The Goomba appreciates your attempts at stomping out oppression through equality. You are the only corporate puppet that the Goomba respects” he voiced rather sternly, crossing his arms further. “In return, the Goomba will put an end to the oppressors’ protesting, it is not good for community.”

The elderly mushroom man seemed to be steaming whenever the monstrous mushroom’s mouth opened. His seething hatred for everything that the brutish creature stood for being clearly displayed through his tiny beady eyes. As the Goomba finished his previous sentence though, Toadsworth slammed both his hands on the table and hopped onto his stumpy feet. “You won’t lay a finger on them, you mindless brute! I will take this case straight to Mario if I have to!” he blurted bombastically.

The Goomba’s massive arms unfolded themselves as his fists balled and tightened. Before so much as another word could be uttered, E Gadd whistled to get all of their attention again. “My, my, so dramatic. Ahem. Mr. Falcon, I believe that you make for a good officer, but your leadership skills may need some fine tuning. You will get a more thorough report once the meeting is adjourn” the elderly man concisely informed as he tossed away the hefty half of his stack of paper. The next victim that reflected off the dim lens of his glasses was Toadsworth. “Mayor Toadsworth, you seem eager to speak, let’s go over your accomplishments.”

Toadsworth nodded at the suggestion, pulling out a handkerchief to wipe off his forehead. His last outburst seemed to have taken a toll on his energy considering how deep his breaths were. They were so heavy that one could almost see the mouth underneath his burly bush of a mustache. “My apologies, chancellor” he rasped as he sat in his seat once more. His head hung low, eyes half open. He did not have the same strength he had when he was younger.

The professor pulled out one page from the other half of his mound of notes, the lights in the room making it transparent enough to notice that there was barely a paragraph worth of information. “Oh yes, when I said that you all were busy, I meant collectively as a group. Some of you more than make up for the little that Toadsworth has done over the years. Outside of the Gamer Watch statue incident, there isn’t a lot you have done as mayor of the Rainbow Square District.”

The elder mushroom man began to scratch the back of his neck and mumble some inconceivable words. Once he had his bearings straightened out though, he turned to the head of the table. “How does one recover from that? There were widespread riots after that confounded thing was put up. The news had a field day with that story, after that point anything I would do would be scoffed at or worse” he solemnly stated, his upper eyelids seeming to be quite heavy.

Nurse Joy rolled her eyes once more, it happened so much during the meeting that it seemed the whole room was spinning around her. “Oh please. Are we here to have a pity party for the guy that gave an ego maniac a gold statue? You know, back when we had a third of the time and resources we do now” she sassed once more.

With a slam of his fist on the table, Toadsworth turned to the rather pessimistic practitioner. “He was a symbol of hope!” he exclaimed rather passionately and then proceeded to cough, raising his voice was beginning to strain him somewhat. “A new hero that the Life Sphere deserved. The slayer of Andross, the founder of many charity programs to aid those less fortunate, before he let ego consume him” he added whilst dusting off his glasses.

The Goomba crossed his arms even harder, his rippling biceps showing off his disapproval. “The Goomba heard word on the street that Game & Watch didn’t even defeat Andross during the first Stavia invasion. The Goomba thinks everything he has done was a hoax to push Leader propaganda” he rebutted in a rather matter-of-factly tone.

“Hey! I won’t just sit here and let my second best bro get thrown under the bus. He did all of that and much more!” Captain Falcon interrupted. As attention was taken away from him though, he pulled a tiny locket from his pocket and popped it open. “Only second best bro…” he silently wept as he gazed upon a tiny picture of Shiek, his true best bro. He hid it away before anyone could notice though.

In the meantime, E Gadd held his hands in front of his face, watching as the scene unfolded before him. He would occasionally pick up his pen and then scribble something down if he saw it as important to keep note of, but otherwise he seemed complacent. “Hrm, yes. Well, I suppose that can’t be helped, but you definitely need to get back onto doing your mayor-ly duties. Kind of important to do your job when that’s what you’re employed to do, ho ho ho!” the chancellor replied in a rather up beat manner. “Next down the line then, Miss Joy. Impressive as always. Leading researcher on Starvia, in addition to tackling any small job that opens at Lightweather. With how many Joys work at the hospital, it’s quite difficult to tell if you’re the right one!” he chuckled.

“Or it might be your dementia kicking in…” Joy muttered, though made sure it was audible enough, unlike some of the other council members in the room.

E Gadd continued to smile, showcasing what little teeth he had left. “That winning personality is hard to disguise though!” he chuckled again, though proceeded to pull up a couple pieces of paper, clearly more than what Toadsworth had, but less than Captain Falcon. “While discovering the Starvia’s Shadow Bug origins has been pertinent to the development of a cure, your bedside manner has much to be desired. Many patients had been reported to prefer taking their chances at naturally healing back at home than being under your care.”

Nurse Joy seemed genuinely shocked by the professor’s statement, placing her flat hand over her mouth. “Oh my! I haven’t been rude to them, have I?” she questioned seeming to be actually mystified.

Everyone in the room went silent for a good minute or two, waiting for some kind of sarcastic remark or some kind of sign that she wasn’t showing legitimate concern. It never came though.

The chancellor scratched at his scalp momentarily and looked down at his papers for some kind of answer, there was none. “Are… are you being serious right now?” he quizzed in a confused manner.

She removed her palm from her lips and placed both her hands onto her lap, taking a bit more of a lady-like posture to her seating. “Why, of course. A patient must be made as comfortable as possible, it aids in the heling process. I would never do anything to make one of my patients feel as though they aren’t welcome” Nurse Joy replied innocently, her doe-eyed expression reinforcing the legitimacy of her comments.

E Gadd continued to take notes, not entirely sure what was going on, but he had to record it for future purposes. “Interesting… Joy, is there any improvements to the Lightweather facility that would improve your working conditions?”

The nurse’s fluttery eyes looked around the room momentarily, she seemed like she was in deep thought, but by her expression it didn’t seem like she was thinking about anything. Once her gaze fell upon Captain Falcon though, her expression shifted to one of annoyance. “Could someone please reinforce the walls with Nintendium so that helmet head can stop busting in whenever he wants?” she asked in a condescending manner as she pointed towards the chief of police.

Captain Falcon flinched a bit by the conversation suddenly turning on him, not to mention getting tonal whiplash from the previously pleasant Joy. His eyes became shifty, but then he made his rebuttal “my second best bro is in there! I gotta see him once in a while!”

The eyes of the chief of medicine squinted as her face contorted to something more snidely. “You make an appointment then. Being chief of police doesn’t give you some sort of special permission to barge in whenever you please!” she told him off.

At this point, E Gadd’s head was plastered against the table in defeat. His arm very lazily rose from his side and then he pointed to the last of the four interviewees. Before the professor could say anything though, Toadsworth raised himself onto the hardtop yet again. “Wait a coin flipping minute! Before we go into this one, I want an explanation of how this brute managed to raise himself to our ranks” the elderly mushroom man inquired.

The Goomba grew a surly expression, sneering at the old man who dared to question his credentials. He figured that something like this would happen, so he pulled out a document of his own and slammed it on the table. For good measure, he picked a tiny pair of spectacle and flicked them open before applying them to the end of his non-existent nose. “Sub-section b of article 342, the Life Sphere is an Oligarch society, allowing for multiple parties to co-exist and share power. So long as there is a group of peoples to be represented, there is allowed a leader who represents them” he read in a scholarly manner. “If you will all remember, that is the ruling that started the Gang Wars. When the Gang Wars failed, the Goomba rallied the peoples to help save the community” he continued to explain as he neatly folded his glasses back up and stowed them away. “The Goomba loves his community” he stated with a confident gaze back at Toadsworth.

As Toadsworth withdrew, Captain Falcon listened to the District Mayor tentatively. He clasped his palm around his chin and began to tap his finger in curiosity. “Wait, shouldn’t that mean you’re supposed to be a Leader? That’s what the Gang Wars was all about after all” the chief of police questioned.

The Goomba crossed his arms once again, though acknowledged Captain Falcon’s question. “Yes, but crooked chancellor refused to give the Goomba Leader status” he informed as he pointed to E Gadd menacingly. “The Goomba settled for District Mayor, not wanting to be tied up in the shady practices of the Leaders. The Goomba would’ve never tried to make a deal with Black Shadow and he definitely wouldn’t have kept it a secret to community. Besides, the Goomba still has to be inside the system in order to tear it down.”

Toadsworth still seemed rather perplexed by the Goomba’s mere presence in the counsel room. “Every District Mayor has to be screened and approved by the Leaders, how could you have possibly passed that inspection!?”

“The Goomba has impressive resume.”

The professor rose from his head desk moment and adjusted his glasses accordingly. “Indeed, the Goomba has been meeting deadlines and excelling where previous District Mayors have failed. Most impressive actually” the chancellor explained as he continued to adjust himself. “Not that he has much competition, mind you. However, this new trend of Trophy-Locking has become a wide-spread epidemic in the Black Market and you’ve seemed to have done nothing about it.”

The Goomba rolled his shoulder and barely even changed his expression at the criticism he was receiving. “The Trophy-Locking has been happening to problematic citizens that are a danger to the Goomba’s community. The Goomba feels that it isn’t a concern until an innocent citizen has become a target. It is clearly being enacted by an anonymous vigilante, which is supported by Life Sphere’s government” the Goomba expounded upon very clearly.

E Gadd was rather visibly rubbing his forehead, quite clearly nursing some sort of headache that was prompted by the meeting at hand. He winced a bit and then looked up at the group once more. “Right, right. Ahem. That’ll be all then, meeting adjourn!” he announced with more excitement than he probably should have.

The four began to slowly shuffle out of their seats, the Goomba being the first out the door, while Toadsworth very cautiously followed a few seconds afterwards for the sake of his safety. Joy and Captain Falcon left together, Captain Falcon attempting to bring out the nice side of Joy once again, but was only met with scolding.

The professor looked down to the page in front of him, eying the box that was labelled ‘Recommendations.’ Without a moment’s hesitation he scribbled “FIND REPLACEMENTS ASAP.”

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