The sun falls toward the horizon of Ooo. The citizens of the candy kingdom were finishing up their day and either returning to their homes or beginning their nightly lives. Princess Bubblegum let out a weary sigh as darkness started to crawl across the landscape. She was dreading this night.
She knew what she had to do. It was a necessity for the continuation of her kingdom. And it would only have to be once. One more time, now and forever. And then she'd be free of it. Free of... him.
Her eyes felt heavy and her limbs felt sore just from thinking about... Well.
She turned and hobbled back into her bedroom, going over to her bed, where her nightgown lay, folded and ironed, nice and warm for her to sleep in. Her faithful, if sinister and strange, butler stood by the door at attention and she gave him an almost pleading look. Peppermint Butler stared back into her eyes with a hard, stern expression.
There really was no getting out of this, she thought.
She picked up her nightgown and he cleared his throat. "I have made the necessary arrangements, your highness. The security bug has been planted and the mercenaries have received their forward pay to take the blame. By morning, when you... awaken... we will have ample evidence to support a move upon the King Of Ooo and his posse."
"Thank you, Peppermint Butler... that..." she trails off before taking in a deep breath and exhaling slowly to calm and strengthen herself. "That will be all tonight. Sleep well." The little circular candy butler bows with respect and turns on his heel, exiting the bedroom and closing the doors behind him.
PB looks down at her gown and is about to go to her bathroom to change when she decides to do things a little differently. She puts it down on the bed and undresses herself, removing her long regal clothing and dumping it in a pile by the door, exposing her smooth pink "flesh" to the cool evening air. She takes another deep breath and removes her undergarments, slowly and carefully. Her body glistens in the fresh moonlight as she dons her nightgown. She goes over to the mirror and examines it. With some thought, she loosens it partially and then rips it here and there. She looks over her work. Deciding that she looks suitably roughed up, she takes to her bed and lays herself in it, wriggling her toes and rubbing her feet against the warm, soft and delightfully fuzzy bedsheets.
As she lets the blankets and sheets and her perfect pillows soothe herself, she gives one last sigh and lets her mind drift... Though it takes some time, she manages to fall asleep.
Grey.
Only the gentlest of winds.
Nothing in sight for an eternity.
The ground beneath her feet is hard and dry, uncomfortable. She looks around. Nothing but emptiness. She can't even taste the air.
She looks toward the sky... and there is no sun. No clouds. No moisture or light. "So." she speaks at last, her voice carrying far in the emptiness. "I see your idea of your own personal utopia hasn't changed at all."
The first real feeling she has in this place is one she remembers from long ago, and that she was never used to. A sucking, choking presence. It stood behind her.
And his deathly voice, like gravel, chuckled above her. She shivered.
I've been expecting you, my dear.
Not loud, but certainly not quiet. His voice is eerie and ever pervading in this realm. "I know."
You sound mad. Are you mad?
She refuses to turn to face him, folding her arms with a quiet huff. "I think disappointed would be more appropriate. That and a little bit irritated." The landscape, the world... it feels as if it shifts ever so slightly. PB gains a boost of confidence.
Disappointed, you say? Now, if anybody should be disappointed, it should be me...
A seat of deathly leather and brittle bone starts to rise out of the ground, along with a table of the same material.
But I admit, it does make me curious. What disappoints you so?
"Just look at this place. Look at Ooo, and yourself. It's all still the same. It's been six thousand years..." she tells him, taking her seat and facing him finally. The Lich King. Tall, imposing, broad shouldered. His hunch belies his power. His skin is pale and withered, sticking close to his bones, and his eyes are nothing but two pinpricks of green hidden away in his black eyesockets. "And yet you're still exactly where you were when I first met you."
His thick dusty robes billow as he approaches the table, not a sound to accompany his movements.
The extinction of all life is no small task, my dear sweet Beelzebub.
Bubblegum's mouth twitches and she wrinkles her nose.
Life will find a way, as they say, and finding a way around that has been quite the pickle. Not to mention the rest of my goals... death is only a fraction of what I intend for the universe. Why, you know this, do you not?
"I don't want your excuses, Dumah. And I told you not to ever call me by that name ever again. It may be who I began as, but it's not who I choose to be."
Excuses, excuses.
She can almost feel... taste that smug grin of his as he mocks her. Cold, clammy, bony fingers touch and tickle at her neck and shoulders, one gently stroking her hair.
If talk is not what you desire from me, then clearly what you want... is action. Correct? What else could it be?
Her fists clench and she swallows, hard. His cooing tone is more than enough to put her on edge. She sniffs assertively and tries to brush the hand touching her hair away.
"Not that kind of action, Dumah. Now stop touching me!"
Stop me.
She bares her teeth and tries to muster a response. When words fail her, she tries to do exactly what he said. And yet... she cannot. Her friends would never know... but this hollow affection, this dark allure. She was repulsed, absolutely. But once upon a time... it was something she savoured, something she craved. All those feelings were bubbling up inside her once more, her body heating up. Craven thoughts and scandalous impulses began to warp throughout her mind, and it takes all her willpower not to break out in tears... and beg for his control.
When she opens her eyes again after steadying her hot breaths to silence her impassioned, unwanted shudders, the dead world around her has changed. He is trying to sway her, this she knows. Why else would he make the world into this? The familiar surroundings of an old gothic cathedral, strewn with parchments of disgusting human skin carved and decorated with hellish runic symbols and procedures...
Her first "lab".
She could not help but glance around the building. She recognized every nook and cranny, every pile of scraps, every low light candle. But what caught her eye, and her breath, was the altar. A vile block of stone, adorned with as much death symbolism as was possible without it coming across excessive...
Terrible memories of her nights here flashed through her mind. They were impossible to repress, no matter what she did or how hard she tried to forget.
She found herself walking towards it slowly.
Isn't it lovely? Isn't it... comforting? This deep recess of existence. This house of dreams and nightmares, each equal.
She stops herself, planting her feet on the ground and clenching her fists. "No. No it's not. I left this behind, Dumah, and I left it behind for a reason. It was wrong... it was flawed."
It was perfect.
"It-" she tried to argue, but her words died in her throat. Her expression faltered, and those hands of his crept around her waist, rubbing her soft pink belly and tickling at her ribs.
You can't even bring yourself to deny it, can you? You know it was perfect. And that it still is.
She is slowly inching toward the altar.
The perfect order that is death. The peace of silence. Not a light in the dark, not a blade of grass on the plains, not a bird in the sky. Perfect stillness. You still adore that idea, don't you? It's why you exist. To bring order to the universe... as do I exist for the same purpose. You may convince yourself that an empire of the living, a controlled setting, will work. But deep down you know as well as I do that the only way to achieve true peace... is to create emptiness. To remove all numbers from the equation.
Princess Bubblegum reached out and let her fingertips touch the altar surface. She clenched her teeth, squeezed her eyes shut and gave out a hissing groan as memories roared through her mind, ghosts of sensations and experiences long past... and so close once more.
To add to this mounting titillation, his hands rubbed up and down her body, his left brushing the underside of her supple breasts and his right using his middle fingers to stroke her abdomen, lowering slowly. Unable to resist such torment, such teasing, such... promise... she felt her body betray her and loosen into his arms.
You miss it so sorely, don't you? Our melding. Our unity.
"I... I do..." she couldn't help but moan out as his rubbing and stroking began to intensify, her hands gripping his arms desperately. His touch reached her womanhood, both parts, and her legs pressed together as she grew weak in the knees, breathing heavily and hotly as her heaving chest was gripped and squeezed by his hungry hands.
It's not too late to do it all again, you know. I forgive you, after all. It's hard to stay mad with you. All you have to do for now... is let me in.
A third hand grips her by the jaw and gently pulls her down, forcing her to face the altar again as she opens her eyes. Inside, she moans and wails passionately, begging to let go, to submit herself unto the Lich. God how she wanted to be one with him again, to feel that pleasure, that power, that unbridled satisfaction...
She lowers herself onto the altar slab, turning to face him as he bends over her and leans toward her, still pleasuring her enticingly. Her bare feet scrape roughly against the stone as she squirms with delight and lust, and for a moment as his dry lips touch hers she fears she won't be able to do what must be done.
Her mouth sucks and slides against his, her tongue eagerly pushing toward his own withered snake for a tongue, and she moans breathily into the kiss, wrapping her arms around the back of his neck to pull him closer... He is upon her now, and she can feel his black, putrid spirit edging against her own, burning with a desire to push inward evermore and intermingle in all the right ways... and the wrong ways too, as their bodies would writhe together in this realm in a perverse fit of lust and intent. She feels a simmering burst of pleasure starting to rise within her... and she knows it's time.
She breaks away the kiss, grabbing his arms to stop them.
"I will not. I understand what you're saying, and I feel it too, but I just can't go through with it. I have to find another way. Death can't be the only solution." she asserts, before sighing as her body itches to be scratched, pushing the feelings down and swallowing her otherworldly desires. "This is the last time we will speak, Dumah. It's over. No matter how much I want it, I cannot let myself be a part of your methods. I will not succumb to the easy way out... no matter how good it feels."
The Lich just smiles an inhuman smile, the crackled corners of his mouth curling up like the Grinch himself.
So be it, my sweet. It is of no consequence to me, for there are others I may call upon. But know this. Even as time and space themselves shrivel and die, you will always have a place at my side and inside my soul...
He leans in close, his blood curdling breath wafting directly into PB's nostrils... she breathes deeply, knowing it is the last time she will ever taste it.
And until then, I bid you a forlorn farewell... until next time we meet... my dear, my sweet, my own Princess Bonnibel Bubblegum... my Beelzebub.
Tears pool in her eyes. The Lich's thumbs jam themselves into her eye sockets with a sharp squelch and for the briefest instance she is in agony.
She awakes with a tortured, throaty gasp for air, her blankets tossed across the bedroom and her body withering and wrinkled. She pants desperately and blinks the sweat out of her eyes, her breathing raspy and hoarse.
She did it.
Gulping to try and moisten her throat, she strains to glance toward her window to the porch overlooking the city. The doors hung open loosely, the lock broken. Just as planned.
Of course, she had succeeded in her goal to defy the Lich King and solidify her position in the cosmic process, not to mention keep him out of the way, but she was still dying and that was a problem that ought to be remedied.
With her strength waning she smacked her panic button next to her bedside table and concentrated on holding herself together, her half naked body melting into the bedsheets. This was perfect. With the setting complete, all evidence would point to her current state being the result of an assassination attempt by that clownshoes egotist, the King Of Ooo. With the public rallying behind her, she could finally put that schmuck away for good. Two birds, one stone.
And after that, it'll be back to business as usual.