Super Princess Peach

Ch. 8

The piranha plant was over eight feet tall, towering like a building over the toads. Most of its head consisted of a gigantic mouth rimmed with knife-sharp teeth, glinting sharply in the bright morning sunlight. His branch-like hands flapped up and down, intimidating the tied-and-gagged toads. The poor people were quaking in their boots before him, desperately trying to maneuver out of his way. A wall of what looked like tangled roots surrounded them, enclosing them inside with the merciless monster. 

"So!" the piranha plant cackled in a thick southern accent. "You're from the Mushroom Kingdom, eh? And you think you can just bust up on my Plains, yeah? Well you got another thought comin'!" He snapped his teeth menacingly, making the toad at the very front squeak and squirm, as if he were trying to wrench free from his bindings. "Nobody messes with Petey Plains!" 

The piranha plant had still not noticed Peach yet, and she estimated that they had about one to two minutes before one of the toads saw her and started panicking. "Perry!" she whispered. "That guy... Is that Petey?" 

"Yeah, he must have been that guy who deemed Ladida Plains 'Petey Plains'," Perry murmured. He looked at the huge piranha plant in worry. "He looks really tough...and country. He might be hard to defeat." 

Peach glanced back over to Petey in worry. He was still threatening the tied-up toads. Peach wondered if there was a way to sneak up on Petey and attack him from behind. While the toads held his attention, this was the best time to strike while they still had the element of surprise.  

Peach turned back to Perry. "Listen. I'm going to sneak up on him and see if I can attack him with the Rage Stone from behind. If my attack is successful and Petey is distracted, I want you to go to the toads and untie them all quickly. We won't have much time. We have to get down to the bottom of the cliff and deal with the Goombas if they're still there." 

Perry looked doubtful, but he nodded. "All right. But...are you sure, Princess? You've already used the stones a couple of times today. Are you sure you have enough energy left to save these folks?" 

Peach grimaced. "Even if I didn't, do I really have a choice? I'm not going to let this piranha guy terrorize my toads." 

Perry nodded. "All right. Good luck to the both of us." With that, he slipped from under her arm and around the edge of the cliff, just out of Petey's eyesight. Peach walked in the opposite direction, coming up on Petey's blind side. The piranha plant was still cowing the captive toads, flashing his scarily sharp teeth and offending them with incomprehensible, Deep South insults. Peach gripped her necklace and picked out the red one.  

"You blitherin' idiots!" Petey shouted in his country twang. "You're as annoyin' as Bowser's Goombas!" 

Peach snuck up a little closer, tiptoeing unnecessarily. One of the toads spotted her and began bucking in his bindings, struggling to shout through his gag. Panicking, Peach quickly put a finger to her lips, desperately hoping that the toad would calm down. He did, reluctantly, but his huge eyes traced Peach's every move. 

"You hear me? YOU! I'm 'specially sick'a you! Stop cryin' and squirmin' like an infant!" He raised a leaf-shaped hand to slap the toad that was watching Peach. 

Peach activated the Rage Stone. "Stop right there!" she shouted angrily. She could feel anger boiling in the center of her chest like hot lava, and the feeling spread throughout her whole body. Flames rose among her clothes out of nowhere, not harming her, but making the grass around them catch on fire.  

Petey whirled around, mouth agape at the sudden appearance of a girl on fire. "Who the heck are you?" he demanded as the toads behind him craned their necks for a look. When they saw Peach, they began to wiggle and squirm in their bindings and cheer through their gags. Now that Petey's back was turned, Peach saw Perry float over to the toads and start to pluck through their ropes using his handle.