AN: Look, the Mario movie was really good. Please enjoy some fluff. 

It had been a long week for the Mario brothers. Even after defeating Bowser, there was still constant work to be done, from salvaging from the broken buildings to repairing the roads and sewage systems. On the bright side, Mario and Luigi found plenty of business opportunities after all the mayhem. As the newly titled "Saviors of Brooklyn", businesses everywhere flocked to them for help fixing their plumbing systems. It gave them the jumpstart to their careers they needed, but also a lot of hours of work.

As far as the rest of Brooklyn went, Princess Peach and the toads were happy to help rebuild. Seeing as how Mario risked his own life to save their home, they figured the least they could do was help restore his own. That meant that the brothers and Peach got to see eachother often, even as they worked in their own world. It made it easier to introduce their family to their new found friends, and opened the door for them to explore a world unfamiliar to them.

Since the disaster that revealed the existence of this alternate mushroom world, it was hard to hide the warp pipe connecting the two places, so citizens from either side were free to come and go as they pleased. Mario and Luigi even started talking about how they could possibly move into a house in the mushroom kingdom. Costs were a heck of a lot cheaper there than Brooklyn, and they had always talked about moving out of their families apartment once their business took off. Once they were finished with everything in their world, they could move there. An entirely new world, but at the same time just a few minutes walk from their parents' place. What could be better than starting a new life in a new world while still being close enough to their old one to visit a few times a week?

They were getting ahead of themselves though, after all, there was still much work to be done. After a grueling week of working round the clock, the brothers finally decided to take some time off. Mario wanted to see how Peach was doing back in her old world with her own kingdom. Despite volunteering to help rebuild Brooklyn, her and the toads still had their own home to take care of. Fortunately, it hadn't taken nearly as much damage, but what damage was done she still had to coordinate repairs for. No matter how much work the brothers had done, they knew she had to do nearly twice as much.

Peach let them know that they were welcome to come visit the castle whenever they got the chance, and the day finally came that they chose to take the evening off. After work they hopped into the warp pipe to meet the princess outside the castle. It was a long walk to get there, and as they passed by tall, colorful mushrooms, fascinating creatures, and beautiful mushroom homes, Luigi started to realize just how much he had missed out on when he and Mario had been separated.

"So instead of trees there are just mushrooms?" He asked his fifth question since they had gone through the pipe. They had been jumping from mushroom to mushroom, slowly but surely making their way to the castle.

"I think so," Mario answered. "For the most part at least. There are a few trees near the castle, but it's mostly fungus."

A statement like that would have been terrifying in their own world, where mushrooms were usually growing on rot and decay. Here though, they seemed to spring up like any other tree would, and their bright colors and bouncy surfaces were whimsical to look at.

"It's not like this everywhere though," Mario continued. "The Kong Village was full of trees. It was like going to Hawaii, except with more monkeys."

"Wow, really?" Luigi slowed down to catch his breath and give his knees a break.

"Yeah. And there was this big rainbow road we had to drive karts around to make it back to the kingdom. Oh, just wait until you see the castle Lu, you're going to love it."

Just then, Luigi looked up to see that he could just make out the castle in the distance. It was just as breathtaking as Mario had said: a humongous structure on top of a giant hill that overlooked the town below, a stark contrast to the place he had unfortunately landed in when he first got to this world.

"Oh, and you've got to try the power up mushrooms when we get there," Mario continued. "They give you powers that make you super tall and strong. It felt like I was a superhero when I tried them! Well, after I got over the horrible taste."

Luigi thought about his first experience in the darklands, running from walking skeletons that refused to die, dodging lava, and eventually getting kidnapped by these small guys in masks and red cloaks. Was his luck really so bad that he missed out on all of this in exchange for that nightmare inducing experience?

He stopped walking all together.

"You mean to tell me that while I was trapped in a cage, you got to ride go karts, visit a castle, and get actual super powers?" He pouted.

Mario stopped in his tracks and turned to his brother. He grimaced for a moment. "Well, when you put it like that it sounds way better."

Luigi always seemed to get the short end of the stick when it came to the brothers' collective luck. Mario was the one who got to go on an adventure in an amazing, colorful world, while Luigi got sent to the darklands and got captured by an actual monster. Mario won the highschool long jump their senior year, Luigi got last place because he face planted into the dirt after tripping at the jump line. Mario landed a date to prom, Luigi third wheeled and ended up having to go home early because he got food poisoning. He wasn't surprised by his luck at this point, but that doesn't mean he wasn't frustrated about it.

He gave an annoyed huff as he sat down on the bouncy mushroom they were currently on.

"Why am I always the one with terrible luck?"

Mario felt his heart ache for his brother. He didn't deserve to go through the things he had, but the universe had a way of dealing him the worst hand possible. He sat down next to him.

"I know, Lu. I'm sorry you had to go through all of that." He sighed, putting a comforting hand on his shoulder. "But despite everything, you came out of it a hero."

Luigi turned to him. "Only after you saved me. Again."

It seemed like that's what always happened. He would get himself into some kind of trouble, either with school bullies or wannabe thieves on the street, and it was always Mario standing up for him. He was grateful for his brother's protectiveness, but sometimes it just made him feel like he was incapable.

Mario laughed in disbelief. "Do you not get it? YOU saved ME."

"What do you mean?" He asked, confusion in his voice. "You're the one who caught me before I fell into lava."

"But you jumped in front of actual fire to shield me using a manhole cover. A MANHOLE COVER! Do you know how heavy those things are?"

Luigi had to think back for a moment. Had he actually lifted something that heavy? In the heat of the moment he didn't even think about it. He just knew that his brother was in trouble and did what he could to help.

"Are you sure it was a manhole cover?" He asked, doubting his own memory of the events.

"Yes!" Mario exclaimed. "You were the strongest person I've ever seen, and you didn't even need a power up like I did! You didn't even realize how crazy that was, you just went in there and showed that monster who's boss!"

He ended his statement with a punch to his brother's shoulder. "You saved me, bro."

Luigi felt his eyes tear up. After all these years of his brother standing up for him, he supposed that he finally found the courage to do the same when he needed him.

"Aw shucks, I guess it was the least I could do. I couldn't have my brother get roasted like a marshmallow."

Mario chuckled, leaning back to enjoy the view. Even though they were only apart for a few days, it felt much longer, and the workload they had taken on was a heavy burden to carry. They had hardly gotten a chance to just relax like this, and it felt like it had been forever since he had seen his brother even smile. He knew that Luigi wasn't mad at him, he was just mad at the unfair situations he always seemed to get in. Even so, he felt like it was his job as the older brother to cheer him up.

He thought back to all the ways he would cheer Luigi up when they were kids. One way was with a game they liked to call "you think that's bad?", where when one of them had a bad day, the other would make up ridiculous scenarios that they had supposedly gone through that day too. For instance, at their high school track meet, the one Luigi face planted in, Mario fabricated a story that he had fallen face first into mud, a pile of feathers, and then blindly walked in on one of the cheerleading practices asking for help. Luigi always knew he was making things up, but despite that he couldn't help but laugh until his sides hurt at the ridiculous imagery. Usually they would go back and forth, coming up with more and more silly encounters until they were both laughing. This seemed like as good of a time as any to start up the game. The weird things they had seen on their adventure weren't made up though, so this round of the game would get pretty interesting.

"You know, my adventure wasn't all easy either," he prompted. "You think your day was bad? I got beat up by an ape, turned into a cat, and I fell a hundred feet into an ocean. Oh yeah, and after I almost drowned I got eaten by a giant eel after I saved the ape that beat me up in the first place."

Luigi felt a smile start to form on his face. "A cat?"

Mario looked down at himself, clearly still a human. "It got better. And why is the cat the part you're hung up about?"

Picturing his brother turned cat in front of everyone was already cheering him up. Mario could already see the change in his brother's mood as he started to play along, recalling the ridiculous ordeals he had to face during their adventure.

"You think that's bad," Luigi retorted. "I had to listen to a morbid star creature talk about the most depressing things I have ever heard, all while hanging in a cage over lava surrounded by penguins."

Mario felt his own smile start to form. "Well, I had to eat mushrooms to complete an obstacle course until I actually threw up. Right in front of the princess."

Luigi tried to cover his smile with his hand as he snickered. "Oh, the irony."

"I know! Why did it have to be mushrooms?"

Luigi did his best to suppress a giggle as he came up with his next reply. "I was interrogated for information about you and whether or not princesses found you attractive."

Mario couldn't help but throw his head back laughing. "No way! He did not ask you that!"

"Yes way! He even pulled my mustache to get me to spill info on you."

Mario gasped. "Not the 'stache!"

Luigi put a hand to his head as he finally laughed out loud.

"Hey, there's that smile!" Mario commented.

He had to cover his mouth again to stop the giggling from slipping through.

"I-I'm still mad." Luigi stubbornly stated, doing his best to keep a straight face.

Clearly he wasn't mad, but sometimes he would get stubborn during this game, not wanting to give in. It was a little brother thing, wanting to feel like he had won the game by making Mario laugh so much that he gave up and admitted that Luigi is the one that had the worse day.

"Oh really?" Mario smirked, a mischievous look in his eye. "You still think you had a worse time?"

Luigi tried to not let out a laugh as he put down his hands, though he was having trouble keeping the grin off his face. "Yes, yes I do."

"Well, I guess you win then. And clearly, you still need to be cheered up." He started to put up his hands like claws, wiggling them towards him.

Luigi's eyes widened. If his brother's mischievous smirk and voice didn't give it away, the wiggling fingers certainly did, and they could only mean one thing.

"Wait, Mario, hold on." He stammered.

"No way, Lu. If you're "still mad", then I have to make you happy again."

"Wait, I am hahahahapy!" He started giggling before Mario even reached him.

"Hmm, I don't think I believe you!" Mario teased as he finally brought his hands to his sides, squeezing and kneading.

"WHAHAHAHAHA! NOHOHOT THAT!" The dam of laughter that had been building up finally burst as he felt the familiar sensation of tickling fingers.

"Not what Lu?" He continued scribbling his fingers up and down his sides.

"YOU KNOW WHAHAHAT!" Luigi fell to his back as he tried to curl into a ball to protect himself.

"I don't think I do, you'll have to tell me."

Tickle fights were pretty common among the brothers. This was one of Mario's personal favorite ways of cheering up Luigi when he needed it, but Mario was commonly on the receiving end of it as well. Luigi tends to poke at his stomach, trying to surprise a laugh out of him whenever he could, something he hadn't seemed to do since before they started their journey. Mario had to admit, he kind of missed it. But what he missed more was getting to be the one doing the poking and prodding.

"Mahahahario, don't!"

"Don't what?" Mario asked, setting up the classic trap.

"Tickle me!" Too easy.

"Tickle you? Well why didn't you say so!" Mario's smirk grew as he targeted his brother's knees. A weak spot, but not his worst. Something that would get him laughing, but wouldn't take him out too quickly. It had been a while since they had last had a tickle fight like this, and Mario didn't want to overwhelm his brother right away.

"Ahahah! Why?"

"You know exactly why," Mario chuckled. "You said you were still mad. What am I supposed to do?"

"Nahahaht this! He tried to kick his legs away from him, narrowly avoiding giving him a knee to the forehead.

"Yikes!" He said with relief. "Looks like I'm in the strike zone. Better try somewhere else. Somewhere. Like. HERE!"

He quickly targeted his stomach, quickly kneading and squeezing wherever he could. Luigi cackled as the sudden change left him defenseless. He attempted to roll back over into a ball, but Mario pinned one of his hands to the side so he could only helplessly try to swat him away with one hand.

"Come on, Lu." he teased. "This isn't even your worst spot."

"Ack! DOHOHOHN'T YOU DAHAHARE!" Luigi squealed.

"Challenge accepted."

Just as quickly as he had switched to tickling his belly, he shot his hands up into his underarms. Luigi threw his head back in hysterics.

"OHOHOHKAY! I'M NOT MAD AHAHAHANYMORE!"

"You know what to say to keep the tickle monster at bay." Mario sang as he prepared to slow his tickle attack. The brothers never took their fights too far, always stopping when one of them tapped out. That required the signature word for declaring defeat.

"UHUHUNCLE!" He finally gave in, finally reaching his limit.

Mario immediately stopped his scribbling fingers, but Luigi had clamped his arms down tight, making it impossible to remove them without tickling him more.

'Lu, I'm going to need my hands back." Mario chuckled.

"Ihihihihi know!" He exclaimed, still feeling the residual giggles bubbling up. "Just give me ahahaha second."

He finally found the strength to lift his arms for Mario to finally back away. Immediately after he brought his arms back to his sides, trying to get rid of the tingling sensations still lightly tickling away at him.

"You know what the hardest part of my adventure was?" Mario asked when he saw Luigi had finally caught his breath. "It was being apart from you, not knowing if you were okay."

Luigi smiled as he got up.

"I know. I missed you too, fratello."

He held out a hand to help him stand as well. Mario took it, lifting off thes ground and onto his feet, only to suddenly feel Luigi's hand poke at his own stomach.

"Hey!" He laughed, swatting his brother away. "No fair!"

Luigi laughed triumphantly. "Got ya!"

"Alright, alright," he said as he put his hands up in defeat. "Let's call it a truce."

Luigi turned back to the castle towering in the distance.

"I'll race you to the princess." He challenged, ready to continue on to the castle.

"Oh, you're on!" Mario exclaimed as he got in a starting stance.

"Oh, and if I beat you to the castle I'm going to tell Peach how ticklish you are."

"Wait, what-" Mario stammered, distracted as Luigi dashed forward into a sprint.

"Get back here, you!" He laughed as he ran to catch up with him, and hopefully beat him to the castle.

Yep, it was definitely nice having his brother back, bad luck and all.