A science thing
"Man! How heavy can a guy, who can fly, be?!" complained Jake. He and Finn were carrying Ice King up his mountain after he had passed out while trying to kidnap Fish Princess in the underwater kingdom.
"His beard is probably half the weight." said Finn and shrugged. Jake stretched out to ten times his normal size, and suddenly he could carry Ice King in one hand and Finn in the other. In just one big step he was up the mountain too, and he shrunk back to dog-sized Jake again.
"Why didn't I think of that befo-". Jake lost his words, because in front of him was something truly unexpected. At first he and Finn just stared, but soon their curiosity took over their shock, and they started to move slowly toward the people standing in the middle of the room. Finn couldn't put his finger on it, but somehow he recognized them, all three of them. It was as if they had met before, in the past, or rather in a dream, or a fairy tale… A fairy tale!
"F-Fiona?" he said carefully in the otherwise quiet room. The girl in blue's eyes widened at the sound of her name, and she stepped forward, covering a white and brown cat who could only be Cake, and a pink boy who Finn assumed was Prince Gumball. Finn smiled at the thought of a girl version of himself, but his smile faded quickly when Fiona pulled out a sword and pointed it at him.
"Hey, you! I demand that you tell us where we are! And don't come any closer, I warn you!" Fiona shouted at them. Her voice sounded like it was about to break, but didn't.
"Wow, wow, wow! Can you, like, put away the sword so we can talk without me worrying about Jake peeing his pants?" Finn said.
"Hey!" Jake exclaimed, but didn't say anything else when he saw Fiona lowering her sword.
"I'm Finn, and this is Jake. This is gonna sound super weird but…" Finn said and continued explaining about Ice King's fanfics where everyone in Ooo had the opposite gender, and his obsession with trying to make the stories come alive. Somehow he must have made it work. Finn talked so fast that there was no time for any interruptions; all the newcomers to their world could do was to stand with their mouths open, taking it all in.
"Wait… So what you're telling us is that our entire lives have been written by this total creep, the Ice King? That's bull, dude!" Cake protested, and Jake jumped at the sound of her voice. It was something in it that made him want to listen to it all day long.
"Hold on, Cake, we can't know that for sure. And, either way, our lives are pretty awesome! I think this Ice King sounds like a super-mega-rad guy!" Fiona said and turned to Cake. By this time Prince Gumball had worked up the courage to say something.
"Excuse me, but I have a duty to my kingdom. I have to get back to our world, where we belong," he said, trying to sound formal and in control. The fear and confusion in his eyes gave him away, though.
"I think that's easier said than done," Princess Bubblegum appeared in the door opening to the next room. Finn suddenly got very aware of his body, as he always got when he saw her, but he told himself that he didn't have the time to be distracted right now. "Ice King kidnapped me a couple of days ago, and since he seemed to have forgotten that he did so, I took the liberty to investigate the mountain and monitor his actions. Ice King couldn't be the one who brought you here, because he hasn't been doing anything special at all the last few days. The only thing out of the ordinary was a fluctuation in the gluon field-"
"A fluctuation in the gluon field!? But wouldn't that indicate that we are from-". Prince Gumball lost his formal voice and sounded as excited as a puppy on sugar and caffeine on Christmas Eve.
"From a parallel universe, yes!". Princess Bubblegum and Prince Gumball were now jumping up and down, making indescribable noises. Fiona, Finn, Jake, and Cake just stared at the pink blurs.
"So, what has happened here exactly?" Finn and Fiona said at the same time. They looked at each other, but hurried to look away.
"Science history has happened here, that's what! You are the first people ever documented to have travelled between parallel universes! The first evidence that parallel universes exists!" Princess Bubblegum said and sounded as bubbly as her name.
"Aw, yeah!" cried Jake and Cake and high-fived. To Jake's surprise the short touch lingered on to him, as if he had gotten an electric shock. Bubblegum was just about to say something else, when a terrifying shriek filled the room.
"FIONA!" screamed Ice King while floating towards them in an incredible speed, flapping his arms. "It's you, it's you, it's really you! You're not just an illusion made by my craziness this time, it's really you!" He hugged her so tight that it looked like his fragile arms were about to snap.
"Oh! You must be the Ice King!" Fiona answered, "It's so cool to meet you!". Ice King missed her hilarious pun and instead just looked like he was about to pass out from excitement. Finn stared at them with disgust, and looked to Jake to share the look, but Jake was staring intensely at Cake.
"Dude, stop it! What about Lady!" Finn whispered to him.
"I can't help it, man! She's the most incredible thing I've ever seen," Jake answered, a little bit too loudly, because Cake blushed and then winked at Jake, whose knees started shaking. Finn seemed to be the only one not happy with the situation. Was he the only one of them who saw problems with all of this? The girl version of him can't like Ice King, Jake and Cake are basically the same person, so they shouldn't like each other, and how the flip would they get them back to their own world? He decided that the last problem was the only one who wouldn't offend anyone, so he said it out loud. Silence fell in the crowded room. PB and PG's smiles faded and they looked at each other.
"We don't know… yet! Come on, let's go look at my equipment," PB said and pulled PG away to the other room.
Finn knew that he wasn't invited to either one of the three pair's conversations so he just stood, grumpy and alone, and stared at Fiona. Was she really that much like him? Fine, the sword part maybe, and they looked a bit like each other, but Finn had never, and would never, ever, get along with Ice King! Fiona got sick of Finn staring at her after a while and left Ice King with his heart shaped eyes to go talk to Finn.
"I don't get it. You are supposed to be this kick-ass girl version of me, and instead you're hanging out with Ice King! What's up with that!" said Finn and sounded more like an annoying child than he meant to, but Fiona didn't seem to notice.
"No! I don't get it! You're supposed to be this mega-rad boy version of me, but instead you hate on this harmless old man who is all alone and is just looking for someone to love! And, who obviously loves you enough to flippin' write stories about you hanging out with him! Geez, Finn!". Fiona turned all red when she talked, and she looked like she was about to pull out her sword again and slay Finn. In a way, Finn started to understand Jake's fascination of Cake; this was something different, indeed.
"I- I- I guess I've never thought about it that way…" Finn said in a lowered voice, ashamed of himself. Fiona looked surprised for a moment that Finn had given up so quickly, but the expression on her face soon changed to a victorious one.
"Mhm!" snorted Fiona. She walked back to Ice King with her head held high, and soon they were laughing again. Finn was very confused now, was she just saying that because Ice King probably was her creator? Or was she right; was Finn himself the bad guy in all of this? His thoughts were interrupted by PB and PG walking back into the room again.
"Okay, so this is what's what," said PG. The others straightened their backs, but soon sunk back into their normal positions again when they realized that they couldn't understand a single word that came out of PB or PG's mouths.
"Pleeease, can you two speak English for two seconds! What does this mean for us?" Fiona was tired of their complicated science words, which just made them feel stupid.
"Right, sorry. We don't know how, but thanks to, or because of, a thing..." PB looked to Finn to see if he approved of her choice of words. He nodded for her to go on. "…you have crossed over to this world, but the problem is that if we don't reactivate the thing with this other thing I happen to have in the next hour, you will all be stuck here forever," PB's voice faded out and she stared at the ground.
"YEEEY!" Ice King screamed. "We will live happily ever after, Fiona!". He grabbed her hands and started dancing around in the room, happier than ever.
"Yes, Ice King, we will," she answered and stopped the dancing man, "But only in the way we've been living up until now. You still get to hang out with me in your stories, and there we can do whatever you'd like to! So much more than just living happily ever after! But I have to get back home. It's where I belong," Fiona's voice cracked and she turned away so that they wouldn't see her cry, she had to stay strong. Ice King clearly didn't care about staying strong and even Finn felt sorry for him when he saw the pain in his face. But, he didn't feel sorry for him for long, because soon Ice King's expression shifted from sorrow to anger.
"No! I won't let you go!" Ice King shouted. He summoned his powers, and after a blinding flash everyone was unable to move thanks to ice blocks covering them from their feet to their shoulders. "Now look what you made me do!" he added and sat down on an ice block next to the block trapping Fiona. Then he started crying again, and soon his chair was gone due to the melting effect of the salt in his tears.
"Ice King! Let us out of here! Or I will-" Finn said, and then stopped himself when he realized that he wasn't in the position of making any threats. He looked to Jake, but Jake didn't say anything; he didn't even look angry! Was this what he wanted too? That Cake stayed captured the hour out so he could keep her in this world? That was so not math! Finn looked to Fiona instead, who had started to panic.
"Hey! You know I'm afraid of water!" Fiona screamed while trying her hardest to get out of the ice, with no result to show for. Everyone looked confused for a moment. "Ice is water!" she added. Finn had never thought about ice being scary, and wondered why Fiona thought so, and he didn't.
"Oh, my love! I'm so sorry!" Ice King answered and melted the ice surrounding her, and as soon as he did so Fiona threw herself at him, sword first. She had tricked him!
"Let the others go, or you will be more than sorry," she said, poking Ice King's throat with the sword. Reluctantly, he did as she told him. Since they didn't know how long time they had until Ice King regained control of the situation, Bubblegum ran to the other room to get her 'science thing'. Gumball's and her hands started moving all over it, pressing buttons with speed and precision. They were done in a matter of seconds, and what Finn assumed was the portal to their universe appeared in the middle of the room. The shimmering cloud of light blocked his sight of the opening in the mountain to the outside world.
"I want you to have this," PB said and handed over some form of equipment to Gumball. "Then, maybe one day we'll meet again," she said and hugged him goodbye. He nodded and disappeared through the portal, and it was as if he hadn't been there at all.
"So long, handsome fellow!" Cake said to Jake, kissed him on the lips, and she was gone too. Jake looked about as gone himself. Fiona backed away slowly from the Ice King, towards the portal and Finn. Not until she was just a few feet away from Finn did she lower her sword, and only then did Finn realize that she was crying.
"Take care of him, okey?" she said to Finn, and before anyone could react, she was gone from their world. PB closed the portal, and the four of them who were left just stood there for a while, listening to Ice King's muffled crying. Only when the shock had started to fade did they realize that something was lying on the spot on the floor that the portal had been levitating over: Fiona's hat! Finn picked it up and walked over to an emotionally wrecked Ice King.
"Here. You should have it" Finn said and handed the only thing left of the Ice King's loved one to him. Maybe the hat would remind him that Fiona was out there, that love was out there, thought Finn. Maybe the next time he felt alone and sad he would remember that fairytales can come true, knowing that just because the characters are fictional, doesn't mean that they are not real. Just as real as Finn and Jake.
"It bothers me that I still don't know how they got here, though," PB said to Finn and Jake on their way home. "I guess it was one of those phenomenons that happen, even though logic and physics state that they shouldn't. Some sort of magic, unknown to us today," she continued. "Maybe it's best that we don't tell anyone else about this,". They walked the rest of the way home in silence, watching the starry night sky as they went. If they had just tilted their heads a bit more then they probably would have seen Ghünter, a few feet away, kissing the female version of him. Next to them was PB's lab equipment.