"Lemme get this straight. You want me to mentor another vampire?"
"Actually, she specifically asked for you. Well, in truth, another cosmic being asked for her, having pried into her mind."
"Ok, I'm starting to regret this, can I-?"
"YouagreedalreadyI'lljustsummonherupshe'syourrespo nsibilitynow."
"Wait, wha-?"
"Also, she has a brother."
Marceline barely has time to register the fact that her dad has tricked her again before there's a flash of light and then there's an unconscious figure-no, two unconscious figures-on her kitchen floor.
"Fuck, dad, again!?"
Marceline ends up putting both the girl and her brother on the couch.
They wake up almost immediately.
"Fuck, what am I sleeping on, a fucking rock?"
"Ow…"
"Now that you're both conscious, let's get down to business. You two," Marceline gestures to the girl, who has short, copper-brown hair, the usual red eyes, and looks to be about fifteen, and her brother, who is covered in a fine layer of deep blue fur that gets thicker on his head, has deep brown eyes, and who seems roughly thirteen, "Are my charges, and will do as I say."
"Wait up, you look familiar…Is your name Marceline Abadeer?"
"Yeah, why?"
"I…I don't know. I think…I can't remember…Something about….an axe…Fries….And….A-a princess? A door….A door with heaps of-of faces?"
"How do you know this?" Marceline's voice is a low, deadly whisper.
"I-I don't know…I can't stop….A boy, a normal human boy, a prank…a dress made of…of why-wolf hide, a man with a crown, ice, a promise, a little girl, she's…She's crying… a stuffed bear, a demon, a bomb, a curse, a pink girl, a kiss, a secret-"
"STOP!" Marceline bellows, because this is going too far, getting too close to fresh wounds, and she's panicking because this girl knows, she knows!
"Jane, don't!" says the boy at the same time.
"I-I'm sorry, I didn't….I couldn't stop. Thank you."
The boy looks at her.
"Jane? Are…Are you okay?"
"Yeah, man, I'm fine…I'm fine…" She sounds uncertain, like she's trying to convince herself.
Marceline takes a deep breath.
"Okay…So, your name is Jane?"
"Yup."
"My name is Charlie." The boy says quietly.
"I won't tell, and neither will he. I'm guessing we struck on something touchy there?"
"…Yeah. In any case, welcome to power training 101."
"So, do you feel it? In your belly?"
"Yeah, I do. Do I just, sorta…Pull it?"
"Yep, you grab that feeling and try to spread it all over your body, and hold it there."
"Like this?"
Jane closes her eyes and starts to hover slightly.
"And from there, you just kinda…will yourself forwards."
She moves a little, then falls down, puffing.
"Damn…"
"Hey, Jane, check it out!"
Charlie is grinning as he twirls his arms unnaturally, and then he stretches to about forty times his size.
"Dude, that is freakin' awesome."
"Hey, guys, wanna go for a ride?"
"Hell yeah!" Says Jane.
"Fine." Says Marceline, mildly interested.
He reaches down and picks them up, putting them on his shoulder, which stretches into a couch, and then scrunches up his face in concentration.
Slowly, his arms start to morph into wings.
His body shrinks until he's a couch with a face and massive wings, which promptly start beating.
Marceline starts to smile; she has to admit, this is way cooler than anything Jake's ever done.
"Hold on guys, it's gonna be a wild ride!"
Seatbelts grow out of the couch and around the girls.
The Charlie-couch starts to fly uncertainly, wobbling a bit, but soon he seems to get the hang of it and is flying quite smoothly.
They pass over many places, but when they pass over the Tree-Fort, Jane's eyes widen.
"Stop here."
"Why?"
"Because I know this place."
Couch-Charlie Flies lower and lower, and then sprouts two hands, which grab the girls and set them down in front of the Tree-Fort.
Then he pops back into his normal form and shakes himself.
"Ergh, having no limbs is not the nicest sensation. I won't be doing that again."
Jane walks over to the fort and knocks on the door.
There's a lot of thudding, thumping and strangely enough, sizzling sounds, and then Finn opens the door.
"Hey, Marceline! Who're you?"
"Jane and Charlie, Adventurers-to-be."
"Wait, you guys are gonna be adventurers?" Asks Marceline.
"As of five seconds ago, yes. What's your name?" The last question is directed at Finn.
"Finn the human, at your service."
Jane's face turns blank for about half a second, and then she looks at him oddly.
"Marceline, I-I can't stop it, it hurts to try…Finn…A-a wish…A crown…Ice…A family…A dog, a magic dog-"
"No, NO! JANE STOP! NO!"
"A girl, no, two girls, one on fire and one pink, the same pink girl, a choice, the girl on fire, - help me – a sword, a red sword, tin foil, a burning kiss, a mechanical arm pain fire ice death Lich a prince of ice asockmissionsself-loathingBMOJake – HELP! – a snailBillyMertenns-"
"Marceline, what's happening?!" Finn yells.
"I don't know, this only happened once before-"
Jane is now speaking so fast it's incomprehensible, just a blur of words.
"Jane, stop! You're scaring me!" Charlie says.
Jane stops.
"Charlie…?"
"Yeah, it's okay. We'll be fine, k?"
"Yeah…"
Charlie hugs her and she takes a deep breath.
"I-I'm sorry, Finn, I don't know why I do that, I'm sorry..." She looks distraught, but Jane's eyes are cold and calculating, and it gives Marceline the chills.
There's something wrong with her.
Marceline pulls herself together.
No, I'm just being silly.
"This is starting to freak me out. It looks like it only happens when someone you've never met says their name."
Finn pipes up.
"It's fine, Jane. Hey, maybe Poibles will know what's up with this!"
"That seems like a good idea, but what if she has another, um, fit?"
"We'll bring Charlie. He seems to snap her outta it."
"Who-?"
Jane doesn't finish her question.
"Should I bring Jake?"
"Let's introduce him first. Get it out of the way."
"JAKE! I NEED YOU TO COME MEET SOMEONE!"
"Coming!"
There's a heap of strange noises again, and then a yellow dog opens the door.
"'Sup. Who's that?"
After a brief explanation, Jake introduces himself.
("Should I try to hold it back?" Asks Jane.
"Nah, let it out. I have no secrets to hide.")
"O-okay…There's a bicycle…A puppy…A strange man, a rainbow-horse thing speaking Korean, a viola, a worm, jealousy, a dog in a straw hat, a burrito, bacon pancakes, a donut tree,-"
"Charlie, try to snap her outta it." Says Marceline.
"Jane, stop."
She does.
"Well, that went pretty good."
"Grammar, Finn. What about when Charlie isn't there? We should go see Peebles."
"That's what I think. Let's go."
Jake is the one who ferries them all to the Candy Kingdom, as Charlie is tired from his previous escapade.
Marceline sufficiently terrifies the guards into letting them all into the castle, and Jane makes a mental not to learn how to do that.
A smiling pink girl, the same one she saw when with Marceline, greets them.
"Ah, guten morgan, friends, visitors. I am Princess Bubblegum, ruler of the Candy Kingdom."
"No, don't-!"
"Jane, stop!" Yells Charlie, but it makes no difference.
"There's a…A skeleton, a smiling skeleton….Dungeons, with strange creatures and bubbling potions…A sandwich…A black t-shirt…zombies….A pink girl, only young, kisses a boy with a white hat, then grows old again…A lemon creature…the pink girl smiling, sweetness concealing darkness…"
Bubblegum goes deathly pale.
"Stop…" She whispers. "Please..stop…"
"A wish…Longing…A door with many faces…Serenades sung in the dark…Long black hair, a moon, wolves, a red axe, stolen kisses, the pink girl crying, regretting the hearts she broke, red eyes full of hatred, - STOP ME, PLEASE! – a sad, lonely king, silence, a bag of tiny people found on a hillside, regret, so much regret, she hates what she has become, science, laughter, tears relief sadness longing the girl sits on her bed crying bitter tears acid sleepless nights I hate you nopleasestopyearspassingautumnspringsummerwinterre peatastriped butlerhelpme-Save her, please she will self-destruct she's killing herself STOP IT MAKE IT STOP I'LL DO ANYTHING STOP IT STOP HER WHY DIDN'T YOU SEE?! WHY DIDN'T YOU SEE!?" Jane is screaming hysterically now and sobbing; "WHY DIDN'T YOU SEE!? YOU CALL YOURSELVES HER FRIENDS, BUT YOU CAN'T EVEN SEE WHAT IS HAPPENING IN FRONT OF YOU!? SHE IS KILLING HERSELF! DO YOU FOOLS WANT THAT!? IDIOTS! ESPECIALLY YOU!" Jane rounds on Marceline. "YOU OF ALL PEOPLE! WHY CAN YOU NOT SEE THE ONE YOU LOVE IS KILLING HERSELF!?"
Marceline just stands there, gobsmacked, for a second, anger growing, then she explodes.
"Do you honestly think I didn't know?! DO YOU THINK I JUST STOOD THERE, OBLIVIOUS, AS SHE HOLED UP IN HER LAB FOR MONTHS ON END!? DO YOU!? BECAUSE I WAS THERE FROM THE START! I TRIED; I TRIED SO FUCKING HARD TO HELP HER! AND DO YOU KNOW WHAT HAPPENED!? I GET A CALL FROM MY DAD FOR NEGLECTING MY DUTIES! VAMPIRES EVERYWHERE RUNNING RAMPANT, KILLING! AND STILL I TRIED! I PUT HER OVER EVERYTHING, EVERYTHING! AND SHE BROKE MY FUCKING HEART IN RETURN!"
Marceline is literally growing, transforming into a giant bat-demon.
"You should've tried harder, you pathetic fucking worm." Jane spits, unintentionally growing in return, sprouting reptilian wings and a long, demonic tail.
Her hands rip into claws and her teeth sharpen and lengthen.
"WHO ARE YOU CALLING PATHETIC, YOU WORTHLESS PIECE OF SHIT!? I AM THE FUCKING VAMPIRE QUEEN AND I WILL FUCKING DESTROY YOU!"
"Marceline! Jane! Stop, you're upsetting Peebles!" Yells Finn, and they both stop.
"I'm outta here." Mutters Marceline gruffly.
"J-Jane…" Charlie has tears streaming down his fuzzy face, horrified.
Why would his sister just attack her like this?
Marceline has been so nice to them!
Jane gives him a look (the same fleeting look she used when Dad started hitting her and he tried to stand up for her and she told him to stop and just go to his room and stay quiet because she could handle this and him getting hurt was pointless,) and she turns and flies out after Marceline, presumably to apologise, pausing only to utter a quick, "I'll be back soon. Stay in this kingdom, ok?"
He nods.
He turns around to walk out of the room and sees the pink girl.
Bobblehead or something? Oh, yeah, Bubblegum.
She's crying.
Charlie reaches out his blue hand to her.
She looks up through her tears.
"Thank you."
He sees such utter loneliness in her eyes that before he knows it he's bent down and is hugging her tightly.
"It's okay," he whispers (like Jane would whisper to him while she'd tried to clean his wounds after Dad was especially angry, even though she was beaten up far worse than him.)
Finn raises his hand tentatively.
"Uh, Peebs, what did Jane mean by the, um…love thing?"
She flinches, only slightly, but enough for Charlie to feel.
"Not now." He says, and helps the princess stand up.
"Where's your bedroom?"
It's the early months after Mom died, the time when Dad was still Daddy, when he still tried.
"Daddy? I drew a picture for you, Daddy. Wanna see?"
"Sure, sweetheart. Wow, this is great! You're gonna be an artist one day, kiddo!"
"Really?"
"Sure."
"Does Mommy like it? Where is Mommy?"
"Mommy loves it." The reply is curt, sharp.
"Why isn't Mommy here for tea-time anymore, Daddy?"
"She just isn't."
"But that-"
He snaps.
"She's not here and that's that! Now take your stupid fucking picture and go somewhere else!"
Jane starts to cry and she runs away, tears washing away the illusion of a happy family.
Jane flaps her wings.
The wind feels so good, like accidentally scratching an itch she didn't know she had.
(And it echoes in her head, goodgoodgoodgood, reverbing off the hollowness inside her)
She almost forgets what she's got to do, but then it comes back and she hates that horrible moment of nothing, where she can't remember anything, like she wasn't and then she just was.
Just… existed. Out of the blue.
She hates how empty she is, but how crowded too, how she's all bright anger and concentration on the outside but there's just so much in her head and not enough in her heart.
(And there are so many ideas and things she shouldn't know jostling her and she's lostlostlostlostlost)
She can see herself in the girl who's all pink, how she's burning up everything just to keep warm, how she's hurt, the hurt all infected and wrong.
(Not right, not right, her mind chants, and it's all wrongwrongwrongwrong)
She remembers Charlie's sharp white-blue fear, the girl's almost-purple desperation.
(And she hates herself, hates how she injures people, hates how much it hurthurthurthurts)
Bubblegum sits on her bed, eyes puffy but otherwise fine.
"You're lucky she went fire, not lava."
"Pardon?"
"You're lucky she only went fire. Lava is bad. Really bad."
"I…I don't understand…"
"Fire is just that, fire. She gets mad, does something, and regrets it. It burns out really fast. Lava…Lava is when it builds. Lava can go on for hours, just rampaging, breaking everything. But not me. She never ever hurt me. When Dad got angry at her when she was lava-"
Charlie realises he's said too much and shuts up, fast.
Bubblegum looks up.
"Can I ask…Does she have any…Issues?"
"It's a long story."
"I have time."
Charlie sits down.
"We're not actually from here," He says.
"I kind of guessed that."
"No, like, not-from-this-dimension not from here. The theory I have is that we were from the distant past, and were sucked into the future by a rip in time."
"Oh, wow, what did it look like?"
"I don't remember. I'll start at the beginning.
"We were born as humans, Jane and I.
"Our mother died when we were little, and we grew up …..In a bad home.
"Jane basically raised me. Fed me, watered me, bathed me, all that stuff.
"One day, I found a…I'm not really sure what it was. I called it a glitch. I found it. It shouldn't have existed. I can't describe what it looked like, because it had no shape.
"It gave off darkness like a lamp gives off light.
"I called Jane over and we looked at it.
"To this day I don't know what spared me, but something in me told me not to keep looking at it, not to stare.
"I turned away, and then I realised that it had been hurting to look at it, like a noise you don't know exists until it stops.
"I yanked Jane away, and I'm pretty sure I saved her life.
"She looked at me and her eyes, oh, god, I'll never forget her eyes. I asked her what she'd seen that made her look so scared.
"To which she replied, 'Everything.'
"She laughed, and it was wrong because it was true, hearty laughter, and she still had this horrified expression on her face.
"The next day she was in the same place, glancing at the glitch.
"Not a full-blown stare, but glances. I guess some part of her knew how dangerous it was too.
"I asked her why she was doing that.
"She smiled that smile, the one which was just wrong, and walked away. For the rest of the day she acted fairly normal, but sometimes said odd things, like the time she told the teacher his voice was too old and yellow and crumbly. This repeated every day for almost a year, until one morning she replied.
"She told me that she was learning things, and that it hurt, but that was okay because she sort of liked the hurt, and then turned around and walked straight into the glitch.
"I ran after her, and bam! We're in…Where are we?"
"Ooo."
"Bam! We're in Ooo."
"Sounds like synaesthesia, possible damage to the left side of her brain, logic impairments…" She says, tears forgotten, mind abuzz with exciting new possibilities.
Charlie attempts to look like he knows what she's talking about.
"Synaesthesia is commonly characterised by perceiving sounds as colour," Explains the princess absently. "Can I ask if she's shown any variance?"
Blank look.
Princess Bubblegum sighs.
"Any links with colour and places or people, etcetera."
"Oh! Yeah, each person has a colour, and the colour changes from person to person, and from there it differs in shade, which is apparently linked to their mood."
"Any examples?"
"She told me once not to panic because 'it made my blue screechy'. Anger seems to be brighter, despair darker, happiness both bright and peaceful, depending on the kind of happiness. Her words, not mine."
Jane lands on Marceline's house, and then climbs down into it with surprising agility, transforming back into herself as she does so.
"Hello? Marceline?"
She can sense the bloodred in her bedroom, so she goes upstairs.
(The red is bright, too bright, it hurts like when Dad was mad and he'd hit her and lock her outside with Charlie and she'd hold him close and he'd cry, burning tears that ate into her like acid an fuel the sharpbrighthurtanger inside her.)
The red is in the bathroom, so Jane sits on Marceline's bed, and goes over the fighting that the Wrong taught her.
She isn't dumb.
Pretending she knew nothing about being a vampire made her less of a threat to the queen, and to befriend her, she had to earn her respect.
Being a natural fighter seemed like a decent way to attempt that.
And so, Jane had pretended to be far stupider than she actually was.
She'd lost her temper, badly, but according to the Wrong, everyone did that. Besides, she'd seen some pretty nasty stuff in the pink girl's name.
The Wrong was dangerous, yes, but it had held a wealth of information, and Jane was never known for her caution.
It had been lonely and scared, and she saw herself in that.
Thus, Jane befriended a sentient glitch in the universe, and the Wrong taught her many things.
How to see people's colours was one.
How to dimension-hop was another.
She'd visited many an alternate universe, and this one was the one she liked the best.
The strange land of Aaa had simply confused her, and the vampire there was an asshole.
And so, Ooo was the perfect escape.
She'd been planning it for a while.
The Wrong had helped her, guided her.
Even Charlie following her had been planned.
The name thing, however, had not.
Jane's so caught up in her pondering that she almost doesn't notice the bloodred moving out the bathroom door, but she does, and she sits up.
"You!" Marceline snarls, eyes suspiciously puffy, wrapped in a towel.
"Yep, me." Says Jane dryly.
"What are you doing in my house?!"
"I came to apologise."
"Well, I'll-wait, what?" The statement takes the wind right out of Marceline's sails.
"I came to apologise. I saw some pretty fucked-up stuff in the pink girls' name, and I'd like to apologise for taking that out on you."
"Why? I tried to kill you." Now she's just confused.
"Justifiably. You tried to kill me justifiably. You were defending your honour. I can understand that."
Marceline sits down, trying to take this in her stride.
"Apology accepted."
"Brilliant. Are we friends now?"
"Wha-How-Why would you wanna be my friend?"
"Why wouldn't I? You seem cool."
"Well, I'd assume that the fact that I tried to kill you would be a big off-putter."
"Justifiably."
"Ok, I'd assume that the fact that I tried to kill you justifiably would be a big off-putter."
"Oh, Marceline," Jane seems different now, and Marceline realises that she is different- her features are sharper, her posture better, and her eyes seem clearer, but so sad, (sadder than Simon's eyes when he spoke of his Betty) and so weary -"Didn't your mother ever tell you it's rude to assume?" The voice she uses is far too old, so very old, and so tired, (the voice of someone eons older then time itself, someone Marceline fears, right to the core of her being, primal fear ingrained in her DNA) and she just wants to run—
And then Jane is back to her immature and more than slightly insane vampiric self.
"Well, she did, but then she died." Says Marceline, waving off the subtle differences as her imagination.
Jane sobers up.
"Oh. Sorry."
"S'fine, I got over it centuries ago."
"Okay, back to the matter at hand." She looks at Marceline quizzically, eyes curiously bright. "Are we friends?"
"We can try, if you like?"
"That is acceptable."
Jane smiles.
"Perfect. Now, go get dressed."
Marceline laughs.
Ice King is lonely.
Well, he's always lonely, but this lonely is different.
It's a scary lonely, one of the ones where he hates himself, and the things only he sees are ecstatic at his misery.
Maybe he can jam with Marceline again?
He flies into the room of memories and looks around.
Now, where were they…?
"Aha!"
He holds up his box of papers and pictures and decides that yes, this will do perfectly.
Humming randomly, he sets off.
Jane is making small talk with a fully dressed Marceline when all of a sudden a ginger cat with green-amber eyes leaps onto the bed and settles on her lap, purring loudly.
"Dammit, Tomtom, stop doing that!"
The cat looks at Marceline, and then, slowly and deliberately, starts to knead Jane's leg.
Jane sniggers.
"Well, aren't you handsome?" She coos.
"His name is Tom and if cats took career tests, he'd come up with 'lazy blob whose only ambition is to eat, fart, and get as fat as physically possible to annoy Marceline' every time."
Tom purrs loudly and Jane inclines her head towards him.
Jane snorts.
"What's so funny?"
"He says that Schwabl already has that down pat. Then he explained who Schwabl was. Really? A zombie poodle? Cats are cooler."
"Wait, you can understand him?" Marceline looks worried.
"Can't you?"
"No. Tom, if you tell her anything, I swear, I will-"
He purrs louder and gives a small meow.
"Oh my god, seriously!? That's freakin' hilarious!" Jane starts cracking up.
"Oh, shit."
Tom makes a sound that's a cross between a meow and a purr, and Jane laughs even harder.
"Every night!? Like, a ritual?"
The cat nods and Marceline buries her face in her hands.
"Oh, god. What did he tell you?"
Jane wipes the tears from her eyes.
"About the pictures."
"NO! Goddammit, you useless excuse for a Christmas present, why!? Just tell her about the freakin' secret, why don't you!?"
Tom looks at her slyly.
"Oh, no, please, don't I'll feed you tuna and the best chicken for a month but please don't tell her about it-!"
Tom purrs at Jane.
"No…" Says Marceline.
"Don't worry; he said that even he wouldn't do that."
"Thank god. Snack?"
"Sure."
As Marceline walks away Tom meows.
"Yeah, I know that's not what you said, but she's my friend. That would just be mean. Kissing pictures of the people you love before you go to bed I can understand, but hand puppets?! And she acts shit out with them? That secret must never see the light of day."
"Meow. Prrrrrrprrr purrrrr?"
"Drinking red? Just like drinking a milkshake, but tastier. I'm gonna be an adventurer, y'know."
"Mrrowl. Purrrrr."
"Really? You sure? My brother will be there too, y'know."
"Mewl. Ppprrr."
"Sweet. Let's tell her. Marceline, Tom says he's adopted me as his human. We're gonna travel 'round as adventurers. I'm a bit unsure as to whether or not that's ok with you, but he says he'll follow me anyways, so we'd better tell you."
Marceline sighs.
"Looks like I'm gonna have to travel with you guys too."
"Why?"
"Well, who else is gonna keep you outta trouble?"
Tom drapes himself around Jane's neck and she grins.
"So, what does this one do?" Charlie looks at a strange cup-like thing.
"That's hydrogen fluoride. Don't touch it."
"Isn't that the highly corrosive acid?"
"Yep. I had to engineer an entirely new compound to create a holder for it."
"How did you do it? Metal alloy or polystyrene?"
"Polystyrene laced with diamond alloy nanotubes."
"Wow. Chemically compounded?"
"Yep."
"That's impressive. What d'you intend to do with it?"
"I need sulfonic acid to make Acetohexamide."
"Why do you need a medication for diabetes?"
"It's merely a precaution. Besides, I want to know more about such things. I found an old pre-Mushroom War medical book, and I'm trying to see what other effects there were."
"I see. Can I help?"
"Well, do you know anything about it?"
"Acetohexamide lowers blood sugar by stimulating the pancreas to secrete insulin and helping the body use insulin efficiently, but the pancreas must produce insulin in the first place for it to work and Acetohexamide has been associated with increased cardiovascular mortality. It's not even certain it would work on species other than humans."
Bonnibel Bubblegum is, for the first time in a very long time, speechless.
"How old are you?"
Charlie smiles sadly.
"All we had to read was a few old medical textbooks and our schoolbooks. I read whenever I could, but Jane was more of a fighter. She used to go out to the dump and build castles there. We'd sometimes live there for a day or two. We stored our books in them, and she used to make weapons and fight off the gangs of kids who'd try to steal or break our stuff. I even got a computer working, using an old manual. I hacked things a lot. I am, by the way, sixteen. We're twins, and I was always the sickly one."
Bubblegum reels.
"What kind of childhood did you have?!"
"A very magical one. And a very tragic one."
The glassy silence of the night is shattered as Jane swoops, hollering, and Tom hisses and digs his claws into her shoulder.
"YEOW! NO CLAWS, DAMMIT, NO CLAWS!"
"MROWL!"
Jane slows to a halt, demon-wings forcing themselves back into her spine, and concentrates.
She shrinks and sprouts pitch-black, long, silky fur. Her form distorts some more mid-air, and then Cat-Jane lands on the ground, turning to Tom and smiling unnaturally.
"Let's go."
Marceline sighs and transforms into a tiger.
"Catch up, you two."
She sprints off.
And only the moon sees the tiny smile on her face.
Charlie's rest on the spare bed in Bubblegum's room is disrupted by an earth-shaking roar.
"Stop showing off." Says a familiar voice, and Charlie wonders why Marceline is talking to a monst-
He never gets to finish that thought, because a massive, snarling beast bursts through the wall and lands on his bed.
A very un-manly scream tears itself from his throat, and then the monster shrinks into Jane, who is shitting herself laughing.
"What the fuck, Jane!"
"Sorry, man, but your face…" She dissolves into hysterical laughter again.
The Princess, whose hair is in a messy bun and is dressed in a grimy lab coat, bursts into the room with a strange gun in her hand.
"HOLD IT RIGHT THERE, MARC-!"
Jane turns and winces, laughter gone.
Bubblegum's eyes widen and they lock eyes.
Suddenly she's alone in those black pools, drowning in the depth of this girl's gaze, falling, drowning. She's only come across this once, when she asked Marceline about her past, and the vampire had fixed her with look, but that was shallow compared to this.
"Princess?"
It's Charlie, and Jane is wrenched out of those enchanting blue orbs.
They hold so many secrets, those contradictory eyes, so contrasting the pink of her.
"Tell me." She says.
"Pardon?"
"Tell me."
"Tell you what?"
"Tell me. Your eyes have secrets in them. Tell me them. Tell me the stories. Tell me what you've lost. Tell me what you regret. Tell me about the high points, and the low points. Tell me it all. Tell me everything you were ever afraid to say, because I won't tell anyone else."
And, without thinking, she does.
Charlie sits cross-legged, and so does Jane, like little children about to be told a story.
She tells them about the Candy Kingdom, about Goliad, about Stormo, about things she shouldn't have made, (Lemongrab) and things she wishes she had (The Elemental Stabiliser), and everything in between.
She cries as she speaks of pushing Marceline away, of Finn's crush and Flame Princess, and laughs as she tells them about pranks and summer days and fanged smiles.
Bubblegum speaks well into the day.
When it's done she feels like she's shed shackles that she wasn't even aware of.
Jane stands up, and smiles.
"Marceline, you can reverse the hypnosis. Charlie, I need you to take me to Finn's house, okay?"
The princess gapes.
"H-Hypnosis…?" She asks weakly.
"Yup." Says Marceline, who had apparently been there, invisible, for the entire time.
"Oh yeah! Marceline, you will tell her everything you remember. Within reason. After you are done you will reverse the hypnosis on you both."
"You little motherf-At the start, there was nothing."
Bubblegum giggles and calls Peppermint over to order some food.
This could take a while.
Sneaky little fucks. Thinks Marceline, almost proudly.
Charlie, whose arm is currently an umbrella shading Jane, is content.
Charlie's life has never been great. It has its moments, sure, but those are few and far between.
Perhaps his sister is crazy.
Perhaps one day it will matter more.
But for now, he's finally content, because he's with the person who means the most to him in a land that's rapidly becoming home.
There is, however, one thing that's bothering him.
"Hey, Jane, what's with the cat?"
"Hmm? Oh, that's Tom. He's my familiar."
"I thought only witches had those."
"Yeah, but it sounds so much better than 'pet', eh?"
Charlie snorts.
"Onwards!"
She runs off and he follows, trying to keep pace.
Yes, everything is right in his world.
And even though it might only be for a second, he's sure there'll be many more of these moments to come.
NEXT TIME:
"Charlie! NO!"
"So, you finally came for your precious baby, huh?"
"You!"
"Yes, me. Don't sound so surprised, sweety."
Don't forget to check out my poll, okay guys?