Apprenticeship [An SMG4 Fanfic]

Chapter 16: The Lord of the Internet Graveyard

Depresso groaned, holding his head as he looked around the enclosure he was in. The walls moved, pulsing with anti-meme energy and something else. There was a rusty cage with SMG1 and SMG2 struggling to get free while chains held them to the ground, and finally he saw the man behind it all.

Exubus.

"What the hell?" He snapped, standing up and walking towards the black gooey creature. "I had them right there!"

"You didn't," Exubus spat back as he leaned down to be eye-level with the clown. "If I were able, they would be here with beside you. Sadly, there's not enough memes or anti-meme energy in here to give 1 and 2 enough power to drag everyone here."

He stood up, walking towards the two meme guardians. "What I don't understand is why Mr. Puzzles would refuse my offer."

"What's so special about him anyway?" Depresso asked. "I mean, seriously. What do you need that TV-headed idiot for anyway?"

"Every hero needs a villain," the gooey monster said. "Luckily for us, SMG4 has two villains."

"What the hell are you talking about?"

"SMG4 makes the perfect hero for this world. He's meant to protect Mario, save the world from danger, hell he was taming memes the second he came to the Mushroom Kingdom. SMG3 makes a perfect villain. The perfect foil for SMG4. Their rivalry was perfect! Their destinies complete opposites. SMG4 with the living memes, and SMG3 with the dead memes. Opposite sides of the same coin, bound to fight one another for eternity. Until SMG1 and SMG2 came along and forced them to work together," he said, turning a glare towards the two of them.

"And then there's Mr. Puzzles. Another great foil for SMG4. His abilities were fantastic! He could have continued to control the cast behind the scenes! Being an even bigger villain! He could have even teamed up with SMG3 if he were still living up to his full potential." He looked back over to Depresso. "The villains, forever alone and bound to have things taken from them. Do you not see? I need SMG3 and Mr. Puzzles to be my perfect villains."

"I still don't understand..."

"Of course you don't. You don't know what the fans want. They adored their rivalry! If I can manipulate the code of this world to make everything perfect, then there will be countless people willing to tune in and watch our universe."

"What?"

"Oh you stupid thing," Exubus laughed. "You still don't get it. Do you even know who made the SMGs? Who is the true power behind whether a meme is dead or alive? The viewers of this show! The world outside of this one! If they stop watching, our world fades to dust whether the avatar lives or not."

"Not true!" SMG1 snapped. "If people stop watching-"

"You should shut your mouth," Exubus hissed as fleshy tendrils covered 1's mouth. "I've been around longer than even SMG0. I was around before you meme guardians started dropping from the sky. I know more than you pathetic little bugs do."

He stood up again before motioning with his hand, causing the two meme guardians to hold hands. "Now, I need to check up on our precious Lord of the Internet Graveyard."

SMG3 looked around the cafe. It was a pretty dull day, as per usual now. Was he doing something wrong? Why was no one coming anymore?

SMG5 hummed the theme to Luigi's Mansion as they went around doing a deep clean of the cafe, since there was no one there at the moment. They looked behind them to see 3 staring out the front door blankly from behind the counter. It really upset them to see him so defeated over this.

They stopped cleaning before pulling their iPad from their pocket, scrolling through some of the drawings they had done. They checked their bank account again. They had just enough for this.