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Star Hill was, and likely always had been, an enigma to those who dwelt upon the land. Its blue, cratered surface was vastly different from any of the ordinary grasslands surrounding it, its luminescent flora could be found nowhere else in the world, and quite frankly, its geography made no logical sense. It supposedly bordered the same central lake that the Mushroom Kingdom and other locales overlooked, but there was no shore to be found anywhere. To outsiders, it took the appearance of a large meteorite surrounded by bluish fog, but visitors would find nothing but clear air and a series of flat planes connected by mysterious, star-shaped gateways. Though Star Hill’s beauty was undeniably striking, the area as a whole was still utterly baffling to most of those who laid eyes upon it.
To Geno, however, it felt like home.
The star-possessed doll stood atop one of the gentle, crater-pocked slopes that overlooked the field of wishes given physical form. His sky blue cape rustled slightly in the soft breeze, and his large, faintly glowing eyes were half-lidded as he watched flecks of stardust periodically swirl by. Part of him yearned to abandon his borrowed wooden body and join them in flight, but he refused to allow himself to fall victim to distraction. As he’d told the others (seemingly countless times), amusement-seeking was just going to have to wait. If they dawdled too much and failed to collect all seven Star Pieces in time, Smithy would surely see to it that any levity to be found in the world would not survive.
Even then…he supposed it wouldn’t be overly catastrophic if he merely took a few moments to savor a view that reminded him so much of home.
Admittedly, Geno felt slightly guilty that he had quietly slipped away from the others as they searched for the odd flowers that served as keys to the gateways between areas of the Hill. He was well aware of how lucky he had been to find as many as four strong companions who were (mostly) willing to help him on his quest to repair the Star Road. Perhaps it had been rude of him to leave them to their work while he simply stood around and stared at the landscape, but something about the scenery had struck him deeper than he thought he could explain out loud.
Three Star Pieces, they had managed to find. Each and every one of them thus far had been guarded by strange, weapon-like creatures of some sort or another, and though there was no indication that the Smithy Gang had breached Star Hill in search of the fourth one, Geno had the sinking feeling that things were only going to get all the more difficult when it came to the last three. He had already come so far, and yet they were barely at the halfway point of their journey. There was still so much left that needed to be done, and he was loath to allow himself to rest until they could all be sure that the world would be safe.
Geno took a long, deep breath that his wooden body did not actually need. “Everything will be fine,” he murmured to himself. “You can do this, ♡♪!?. You can do this.”
“Hey, Geno? You okay?”
He felt his heart miss a beat - however that worked - at the sound of the sudden, small voice behind him, and he quickly whirled to face the newcomer, straightening his posture and struggling to pull his surprisingly pliable wooden face into a mask of nonchalance.
“Mallow,” he coughed, looking down at the little ball of fluff standing before him. “I’m sorry about that, I was…lost in thought. Did you need something?”
“Uh…” Mallow blinked up at him, frowning. “Well, no, not really…but I guess I was kinda just wondering where you were? I mean, we were all looking for those star flower things, and then I realized I hadn’t seen you in a while, so…I thought I’d come look and see if you were okay?” His words were tentative, as though he was afraid he’d accidentally interrupted something important.
Geno couldn’t help but smile. “I’m alright, Mallow, don’t worry,” he assured the boy, lightly patting him on the head. “I suppose I’m just…feeling a bit homesick, that’s all.”
“Homesick? Oh…” Mallow nodded with a sagacity that looked almost comical coming from one as young as he was. “I can understand that. I feel that way about Tadpole Pond sometimes…Grandpa says that it’s okay to be sad and cry when that happens, even though I promised him I’d always be strong.” He paused briefly. “Geno, you’re always really strong, but…maybe you need to be sad and cry right now too?”
“I’m…not sure whether or not crying is physically possible for me at the moment,” Geno chuckled lightly. He sank down into a sitting position, gesturing for Mallow to join him. “But I suppose you could say that I’m allowing myself to take a moment and be sad for a bit, true.”
“Oh…well, that’s good, I think.”
Soundlessly, Mallow plopped down on the ground beside him. For a time, the two of them silently gazed out at the expanse of midnight blue, allowing the soft whispers of ungranted wishes to reach them on the breeze.
“...hey, Geno?” Mallow spoke up quietly after a while. “This place…does it look a lot like your Starway?”
“Er…Star Road, Mallow. But…” Geno shook his head. “Yes and no. It doesn’t look exactly the same - Star Road was much more colorful, for one, and a bit busier compared to the tranquility found here. But I find that it evokes a similar feeling all the same. The wishes, the stardust, the glowing lights under a dark sky…it’s all very familiar.”
So familiar that it almost hurts, he thought.
“I see…I guess all this just makes you want to find the Star Pieces even faster, then? So you can fix your home?”
Mallow could be surprisingly perceptive for a child.
“Exactly,” Geno sighed. “I…understand if my haste has been a burden on the rest of you, and I apologize for that. It’s just that…well. Like you said - the Star Road was my home. Granting wishes was my life. I came down here knowing that my quest would be difficult, or even just short of impossible. But…for the sake of everything I’ve ever known and cared about, I knew I needed to do it. And now we’ve had some successes, though they were hard-won at best. I feel as though, if we dare delay at any point in this journey, we could lose any number of chances at getting our hands on the other Star Pieces, and if our luck ran out completely, I’d - “ Geno paused, realizing that his hands were clenched so tightly that some of his wooden joints were popping. Taking another unnecessary breath, he slowly relaxed them and finished lamely, “...I guess I don’t really know what I’d do then.”
Mallow turned and looked up at Geno, scrutinizing him with slightly narrowed eyes. “...I think I’m starting to get why Mario always calls you a ‘doll-shaped bundle of stress’ behind your back,” he said finally.
Geno blinked.
Ah, the bluntness of youth.
“I, ah…suppose he’s not all that far off the mark,” Geno admitted, though he made a mental note to have a talk with Mario later. “But I - “
“I don’t blame you, though,” the fluffy former-frog interrupted before the star could defend himself. “I mean, if Tadpole Pond had been destroyed, I’d be running around like crazy trying to fix it! At least…I would until somebody like Grandpa or Mario stopped me and calmed me down. Then I think everything would seem a little better.”
“Oh?”
“Yep. That’s the thing, isn’t it? You can be all upset and stressed out about something, and it’ll make you feel like you’re all alone - like when Croco stole my Frog Coin back in the Mushroom Kingdom! I felt really bad, like I’d let my Grandpa down, and I didn’t know what else to do, so I just sat down in the middle of town and cried, and cried…it’s kind of embarrassing, now that I really think about it.”
“But then,” Geno added softly, “Mario found you.”
Mallow grinned, flashing the little buck tooth that was usually hidden by the fluff of his face. “Yeah, he did! He made me feel better so I could stop crying, then told me he was going to help me get my coin back. He was so nice about it, too! He didn’t make fun of me or anything, just helped me up and went with me to go after Croco!”
Geno smiled. “His reputation as a hero certainly isn’t for nothing, it would seem.”
“Definitely! But…you know what the funny thing is?” Mallow looked down, poking at some of the silvery-blue stardust scattered across the ground. “Mario never would’ve even known I’d needed help if he hadn’t seen me sitting there, crying. It was embarrassing, sure, but in the end, it led to me not being alone anymore! And since I wasn’t alone, everything seemed okay again, and we got that coin back easily! So…you see what I mean?”
Geno looked at Mallow for a long time, studying the earnest smile on his face. Though the little ball of fluff didn’t look like much at first glance, it was clear that there was a special sort of wisdom that lay behind those beady, black eyes - a wisdom that could only come from a child with a matter-of-fact view of the world that most adults could no longer reach.
Not bad, for someone who’d once wholeheartedly believed he was a tadpole.
“I believe I do,” Geno answered, nodding. “What you’re saying is that stressful or frightening situations are less so when there are others by your side to help you. But in order to receive said help in the first place…you’re going to need to swallow your pride and show your vulnerabilities. Did I get that right?”
“Yes!” Mallow exclaimed brightly. “Exactly! So, I guess what I’m trying to say is…we’re all here for you, you know? You can tell us when you’re freaking out, or worried, or sad, or…anything, really! And then we’ll make you feel better, like you guys always do for me. It’s kind of like you making a wish, and then us granting it!”
Though logically, Geno knew that his borrowed body did not, in fact, possess an actual heart, he was still certain that he could somehow feel it melting. Smiling softly, he reached out and placed his hand on Mallow’s head once more, ruffling his curl of pink hair playfully.
“That, my fluffy little friend, means more to me than you’ll ever know,” he said sincerely. “Thank you, truly. Not just for this conversation, but also for embarking on this journey with me in the first place. Speaking of which…” He straightened and held his hand out to help Mallow up. “Now that I’m feeling better, thanks to you, I suppose we should return to the others? We’ve still got work to do, and they’re no doubt wondering where we’ve gone.”
“Right!” Mallow agreed, taking Geno’s hand and springing to his feet. “Don’t worry, Geno, with all of us working together, we’ll find that Star Piece in no time!”
“Alright, then!” Geno chuckled as the two of them walked side by side across the strange yet beautiful, midnight blue surface of Star Hill. “Let’s get this show on the road.”
~ The End ~