Giygas- Mini Statue

	On the other hand, there was one stand in particular that was doing extremely well–that ominous Bio-Ness Burger stand. “Yes, twenty Bio-Ness Burgers here!” “Ten double cheese Bio-Ness Burgers, and five large Bio-Ness Coffees! Coming right up!” The stand's ten employees spoke in loud, hoarse voices as they hurried to and fro. They were so busy it was dizzying. “Hey, you–I was next, don't cut the line!” “That other line keeps moving, this isn't fair!” “Aah, hurry up, I can't take this anymore!” The customers were creating an uproar of piercing voices, too. There were customers who stomped their feet in frustration, and customers who tried switching lines. There was a child who could just barely reach the counter, and an old woman who appeared to have gotten in line just to talk and who would explain things in a loud voice to anyone nearby, even when they hadn't asked. A lady who was carrying a very heavy-looking bag of burgers in each hand suddenly became too afraid of the jealous stares from the people all around her, and she dashed off in a panic.
	Ness and his friends looked over at the picnic tables, and each and every one of them was filled with people opening up the bright red wrappers of their Bio-Ness Burgers and chomping down on them in a daze. One person had a mountainous pile of burgers beside them and was tossing them into their mouth one by one. Another held a burger in each hand and seemed to have something caught in their throat as their eyes darted about wildly. Yet another was rubbing their painfully swollen belly while sluggishly taking more bites of their burger. And there were others who had finally eaten themselves into exhaustion, rolled over onto their backs, and were groaning things like, “Please, someone, call me an ambulance!” There were people all around them, but not one of them looked up at Ness's group. They were all too desperately focused on eating!
	“Hang in there, we'll get you some stomach medicine, okay?” said Ness. He had been trying to help one of the people who had collapsed on the ground to sit up, when suddenly, he cried out in surprise. “Oh! You're–”
...

“...Oh, this is so cruel! I couldn't possibly eat another bite! …But I just want to keep eating!”
	“Please try to control yourselves!” said Ness, sternly. “This stuff is dangerous, so please, whatever you do, don't eat any more!”
	“Whaaaaa~t?”
	“...B-but...”
	“That's impossible...!”
	“I need to eat more...”
	“I gotta have more!”
	“You're only going to get fat!” said Paula. Her voice seemed to crack through the air like a whip. “And you'll just keep getting fatter! You'll get so fat it will ruin your good health, and all your senses and reflexes will slow down. You won't be able to put on a proper show at all anymore!”
	The Runaways were suddenly very quiet.
...

	Meanwhile from just behind them...
	“I'm very sorry, but we'll be sold out very soon!” came the shout of one of the Bio-Ness Burger shop assistants. This was followed by screams, angry roars, and violent booing. “There are only two hundred burgers left–only two hundred left! From here on out, we're limiting it to ten burgers per person!” “We're very sorry for the inconvenience, but if you are behind the twentieth person in line, and you must, absolutely must have your burgers, please head for our other location to the south!” Upon hearing this, the customers immediately began to leave in droves.
	“Maybe Micheal will be safe after all,” said Jeff, with a relieved sigh. “I'm sure his mother would rather just go home than stand in another line.”
...

They rushed straight over to the Bio-Ness Burger stand. The tricolor awning was now folded up and stored away, but all those flags still fluttered in the night breeze. Jeff unlocked the stand's rear-door employee entrance. They crept inside.
	The thin yellow beam of their penlight revealed a stainless steel sink, some shelves, and a huge refrigerator. They opened cabinets and drawers as they went. They found plastic containers, paper boxes...straws, cups...
	“...I don't think there's any actual food here.”
	“They did say they were sold out, didn't they?”
	“Hey, wait a minute...the alien detector is going off!” said Jeff. The watch on his wrist was making a quiet beeping sound. It was the watch the Mr. Saturns had given him, and it was far more technologically advanced than it looked. “It's here...in this huge tank!”
	“This thing?”
	“Is this...water?!”
	They loosened some screws and took apart the tank's hinges. Then, heaving with all their might, Ness and Jeff opened the lid. They aimed their light down inside.
	“There's something in there,” said Jeff. “Down at the bottom.”
	“It's glowing!” said Paula.
	“I'll try to get it,” said Ness.
	“Do you think that's safe? What if it bites, or something?”
	“I think I'll be alright,” Ness replied, and he reached down into the tank. He found a small, hard object. It didn't seem to be a living thing. It was bumpy and uneven. He pulled it out.
	“A golden...statue...?!”
	That's right, it was a small replica of that Evil Mani Mani–a Mini-Mini Mani Mani! A miniature model of that unsettling figure Everdred had wanted so badly, and which had made Carpainter lose his mind!
	As I'm sure you remember, dear readers, we last saw the original version of this statue near the increasingly girthy and terribly sickly Pokey!
	“This isn't gold,” said Jeff, reading the screen on his watch. “It looks a lot like gold, but this is something a little different. It's emitting some kind of faint aura. It seems like an isotope, or something. But the watch isn't displaying its atomic number. Hey...no matter how you look at it, this isn't any kind of earthly substance, Ness!”
	“And it was in the water!” said Paula, as she clapped her hand to her face. “That means this might not only be affecting the burger shops! What if they planted something like this in the town's water supply...?”
	“He probably wouldn't do that, to avoid getting affected, himself,” said Ness, coldly. “If it's only been laced into specific hamburgers and coffees at specific shops, he'll be perfectly fine as long as he avoids eating and drinking there, while everyone else loses their minds.”
“Who do you mean by 'he'?” asked Jeff.
	“The one profiting off these things,” Ness replied, furrowing his brow.
	“...Pokey?” Paula whispered, in a hushed voice.

- MOTHER 2: Giygas Strikes Back, chapter 6