When Peach woke up, she was alone in a room with stone walls. The air was stuffy and almost unbearably warm. The last thing she remembered was going to sleep in her own bed in the Mushroom Kingdom. Where she was now, she had not a clue.

Judging by the size of the room, she was probably in a cell of some kind. Her head ached, and she had trouble focusing her eyes. She could only assume she had been drugged. Wincing at the pins and needles in her legs, she got to her feet and stumbled to the door, which had no knob or handle. There was a small window a bit higher than her face, and it was blocked by iron bars showing signs of rust where they joined the cold metal of the door. Peach pushed the door outward and then took hold of the bars and pulled, but it would not move.

She stepped back and looked around the room, which was featureless save for several pipes running across the ceiling. One was significantly larger than the others, and the insulation that cushioned it against the edges of the opening in the upper wall appeared to be rotting.

Peach considered her situation. If she was alive, then whoever had taken her from her castle didn't want her dead. Still, her cell was completely empty, and the only light came through the bars on the doorway. Although Peach could hear a steady rumbling from somewhere far away, there was no other sound except that of her own breathing. She couldn't hear anyone outside the door, and there was no indication that she was being monitored. Even if whoever put her here didn't want her dead, they didn't seem to care if she was alive. In a worst case scenario, they might leave her here until she was starving before acknowledging her existence.

She didn't want to wait that long. If she could remove the loose insulation, she might be able to see past the edges of the large pipe. That would be a start, at least.

The pipe was too high for her to reach. Still, she would have to try. She backed up, took a running start, jumped onto the wall, and used it to spring herself higher. The tips of her fingers just barely grazed the edge of the pipe's insulation. Encouraged, she tried again, and again, and again, until finally, exhausted, she came down awkwardly and scraped one of her knees against a jutting portion of the stone wall, drawing blood. Her body was still weak, and her head spun. The passage of time grew strange.

After an indeterminate span that could have been hours or mere minutes, she finally heard the heavy swing of a door opening. Footsteps echoed outside her cell, drawing closer. Peach's momentary panic was quickly replaced by a decision to feign sleep. It would be useful to know what her captors would say if they thought she wasn't listening.

The footsteps stopped outside of Peach's room. There was no clanking of weapons or armor, but the heavy silence that followed was disconcerting.

"I would think you were sleeping," a voice came from the other side of the door. "But you are breathing heavily, and the blood on your leg is fresh. Stop playing with us, Princess."

The voice was thick and oily, like some sort of viscous liquid being forced through a twisted valve. The vowels were strange, the consonants were sharp, and the tone was not kind. Peach remained as she was.

After a pause, the voice continued.

"I came to let you out, but it looks like you're enjoying your game. As you wish. I'll come back later, but I can't tell you when."

So the voice said, but Peach could not hear anyone actually moving away from the door. She was being threatened, but she was being threatened politely.

Peach opened her eyes and climbed to her feet.

"What do you want?" she asked, summoning as regal a tone as she could manage.

"I want to take you out of this storage closet and transport you to a place where I can keep an eye on you, and I'd like to do it now."

Peach shot a quick glance at the insulated pipe. It was no use; there was no other way out. She had nothing to lose.

"Well then, let's go," she said, crossing her arms over her chest. "I'm waiting."