Disclaimer:Do not own the show, blah blah blah, etc.
Blame this on my recent re-addiction to the show. I used to be OBSESSED with Ed, Edd n' Eddy when I was about nine, and it seems to have resurface lately for some reason. Maybe it's a last-ditch attempt to reclaim my childhood before my rapidly-approaching birthday, maybe I just spend too much time on Youtube. Who knows? XD There is some OC romance going on, but nothing absolutely crazy, because they are twelve in this particular story. Rated T for a bit of language, some violence and slight adult humour. I hope you like Saffy, I've worked hard on her! Some side pairings will be happening too. ^-^
Enjoy!
It was one of those days that's so humid that you could probably fry yourself a nice breakfast on the tarmac, if you were so inclined or just had no access to a kitchen.
Peach Creek was responding to the weather in the typical suburban way- kids were riding on bicycles or scooters, jumping over sprinklers, playing with a rope. The only exceptions to these omnipresent summertime activities (aside from Rolf, who was busy trying to finish his mountain of chores involving various farm animals, as usual) were the boys who were known by their collective term: The Eds. Their destination?
Double D's house.
"Ed!"
An unnecessarily loud voice interrupted the tallest Ed just before he was about to leap, yet again, into the gutter, as he was enjoying the way the water from the sprinkler was running steadily down the road and splashed around his ankles before returning persistently to its destined route, chuckling good-naturedly all the while.
"Quit foolin' around over there!" barked the shortest Ed at his friend, his finger still pressing on the doorbell of the house they were standing before. "Get over here!"
"Sure thing, Eddy!" grinned Ed, running towards his friend.
"Eddy, do you realize how much electricity you are wasting by refusing to remove your finger from the doorbell?" demanded a voice belonging to the third Ed as he wrenched open the front door of his house, wearing his trademark sock-hat and a disgruntled look.
"No!" came Eddy's blasé' reply. "Hurry up, will ya? We got kids to scam!"
Double D rolled his eyes, but didn't bother correcting Eddy's deplorable grammar.
"Splashy, splashy splash splash!" giggled Ed, resuming his road-hopping.
"ED!" Eddy yelled, annoyed.
But before the temperamental Ed could rebuke his yellow-skinned friend further, Jonny suddenly came running down the street, waving his arms and shouting. WHAT he was shouting was intelligible, but apparently it was very important, or important enough that he was so distracted that he ended up smacking straight into Ed.
"Hi, Johnny!" the largest Ed grinned, not bothered at all that the smaller boy had just slammed straight into him. Then again, Ed probably only noticed because of how Jonny noisily bounced to the ground afterwards. "You are loud today!"
"No time to stop, Ed! I gotta tell the others!" Jonny said, a trace frantically, and sprinted away again.
"What was that all about?" Eddy demanded, looking annoyed.
"Yes, that was rather...peculiar." Double D agreed, crossing the lawn to join his friends. "I wonder what an earth could have startled Johnny so badly?"
"Let's go find out."
Upon following the general direction Jonny had run off to, they eventually spotted the large-headed boy
"It's the witch-girl!" Jonny was crying out to the others, waving his hands in what seemed to be intended to be dramatic, but really just looked rather ridiculous. "Plank and me were by the creek just now...and we found...this!"
And Johnny held up a shoe, that he had been carrying by its somewhat dirty laces. The assembled kids all gasped.
"Another victim!" trembled Jimmy, who was standing beside Sarah. "Oh, the horror! The horror!"
"Just what's all the freaking commotion about?" Eddy complained loudly, in order to announce the arrival of himself, Ed and Double D to the group.
"Who invited the three Dorkateers?" Kevin asked, purely out of habit rather than actual spite, folding his arms over his chest.
"It's awful, guys!" Nazz explained, blissfully oblivious to the way each Ed looked a tad flustered as she addressed them directly. "There's, like, something really weird going on by the Creek."
"W-weird?" Double D managed to say, although his throat felt oddly constricted.
Such as the way around Nazz- other symptoms included profuse sweating, becoming tongue-tied, blushing, light-headedness and even fainting.
"Plank says that he saw weird, flashing lights in the woods yesterday!" Johnny burst out, looking at his 'friend'. "And we saw something running away when we went to get a closer look- it was that girl!"
"Girls are weird." Ed randomly stated.
"It is no girl!" declared Rolf, having apparently either abandoned or finished his chores to join the others. "It is...a phantom!"
Everyone looked confused.
"A ghost?" Double D said, after a pause.
"A ghost!" Jimmy squealed, hiding behind Sarah in terror. "She haunts the Creek at nighttime, desperately seeking revenge upon young, succulent flesh!"
"What a crock." Eddy deadpanned to the other Eds, but the wheels in his mind were spinning rapidly; "A ghost? HA! I ain't afraid of no ghost!" he boasted loudly, puffing out his chest and jabbing it with his thumb.
"Oh yeah?" Kevin sneered, just as Eddy had hoped he would. "Why don't you prove it?"
"What's in it for us?" the shortest Ed replied, quick as a flash.
Kevin gave the Eds a critical look for a moment, then he smirked.
"Fine. If you dorks can wait down by the creek until midnight tonight, I'll give you three jawbreakers."
"Midnight-?" Double D gasped, but he was cut off.
"Each!" Eddy demanded immediately, folding his arms.
"Get lost!" Kevin retorted, which promptly sparked off a haggling match between the two of them, while Double D face palmed at Eddy's recklessness (and his assumption that he and Ed would just simply go along with it) and Ed tried to touch the tip of his nose with his tongue, the entire conversation rendered unimportant to him. Eventually, though, there was a compromise.
"Fine, two each." Kevin conceded, very reluctantly.
"Done!" Eddy smirked, with a snap of his fingers. "C'mon boys-!"
"Hold it!" Kevin said sharply, holding up a hand. "We need proof, too. So we know you dorks didn't wimp out."
"Whaddaya mean, proof?" Eddy wanted to know.
"There's something down there that's causing all this trouble, and if you Dorks stay down there as long as midnight, you're bound to see something. So you've gotta take a picture of whatever it is."
"What if there is no phantom, or any other fictitious being?" Double D inquired, a slightly sardonic entering his tone, although he still looked anxious. "How are we supposed to prove we've remained in the Creek for the designated time?"
"You'll just have to figure out that out on your own." Replied Kevin, dismissively.
"That's stupid!" Eddy barked, although he seemed to recoil a little bit at the prospect of sitting in the dark for such an extended period of time. "I ain't stayin' down in some stupid Creek just 'cause you guys are all freaking out over nothing!"
It was Kevin's turn to smirk now.
"What's the matter, Dorky? Too afwaid of the scawy monsters?"
Kevin folded his arms triumphantly. The shorter Ed fumed and jabbed his finger at the taller boy with so much force he was inches away from poking Kevin's eye out, not that Eddy would have considered that too much of a travesty.
"Fine! We'll catch your stupid ghost, Shovel Chin!" he barked. "Come on, guys!"
He whipped around and stomped off, followed as always by Ed, who was already excited about the prospect of coming into contact with a real ghost/swamp monster/whatever recent creature had starred in his newest horror movie. Double D, meanwhile, was worrying over breaking his sleeping pattern by spending his night in a dark, possibly haunted creek.
"Kevin, do you actually think they'll do it?" Nazz asked her friend, peering concernedly after the Eds.
"Nope," Kevin mentioned casually, as the others began to wander away. "They're doomed."
Double D cringed for what felt like the hundredth time as his foot stepped into another particularly wet, squishy patch of grass.
"Eddy, I beg of you, can please return to the Cul-de-sac now?" Double D complained as he trotted after Eddy, who was striding relentlessly forward as if he owned the place. "We're not going to find some B-movie monster down here, and my shoes are soaking wet! I'll track MUD!"
"Put a sock in it, Double D!" Eddy said, irritated. "There's no such thing as ghosts, this'll be a cinch! Remember when we were in that 'haunted' house and it turned out to be some dumb prank from the Kankers?"
"Yes, but this is an entirely different-"
"This reminds me of the story 'Evil Swamp Succubus', where the evil spirit lures its unsuspecting victims into a swamp of sadness where they eventually sink and then they GET THEIR BRAINS SUCKED OUT!"
Edd and Eddy stared at Ed with expressions of confusion and exasperation.
"That's...nice, Ed." Double D said, after a moment, apparently deciding to humor him.
"You read too many comics, Ed." Eddy deadpanned, and then pointed in a random direction. "Look, go check over there, will ya?"
Ed, as usual, was absolutely oblivious to his and his friends' undesirable situation and ran ahead, chuckling good-naturedly to himself as always.
"Freaking idiot." Eddy muttered to himself, trudging after Ed, as he'd only pointed him towards the bushes to shut him up for five minutes. Or longer, depending on whether the tallest Ed could find his way back. Double D, however, heard Eddy's remark.
"Really, Eddy, you shouldn't be so impatient. Ed's only trying to help, in a...strange way."
"Right, like youunderstand what the heck he's saying when he-"Eddy was retorting, when he abruptly slammed straight into Ed.
"OW! Watch it, Lumpy!" the shortest Ed snapped, rubbing the top of his head.
"I saw something, Eddy!" Ed replied, thrusting a finger at a gap between some fairly nondescript bushes up ahead.
All three Eds peered at it for a moment in silence.
"I don't see anything." Eddy announced.
"Nor I." Double D added. "Ed, are you quite certain that you-?"
Suddenly, a rustling noise sounded somewhere behind them. The Eds whipped around, but they saw nothing. An owl hooted somewhere.
"H-heh, I think you're imagining things, Lumpy." Eddy said, with a would-be casual chuckle. He backed away a little, as though he expected something to abruptly land on him and he was trying to discreetly avoid it.
"But I saw, Eddy! It was right over there and it was LOOKING AT ME!" Ed protested, his voice rising into a wail at the last three words.
"I told you, there's no such thing as-!"
But as Eddy backed up further, he ended up staggering into the bush that Ed had been pointing at, and an almighty yowling noise suddenly invaded their ears. A grey thing, too fast to be made out clearly, suddenly shot out of the bushes, and although they couldn't clearly see what exactly it was, they did notice it had a pair of great, big, orange eyes.
"IT'S THE MONSTER! RUUUUN!" Ed yelled at the top of his voice, and then took off as though he had a rocked strapped to his back.
"Ed!" Double D cried, one hand clamped over his head as though he was afraid the force of Ed's yell would knock it off. "Wait a second before you-"
"Ed, wait for me!" Eddy shrieked, in hot pursuit. He rounded a corner, trying to make out where Ed had gone-
And then he slammed straight into something. A warm, moving thing that was staring straight after him with big, wide eyes. Eddy took in a deep breath, then pointed and let out an almighty scream that went something like;
"AAAAAAHHHHHHH!"
Which was met with a;
"EEEEEEEEEEEK!"
Eddy stopped screaming abruptly when he realized that his victim was NOT a ghost, a witch or a swamp monster, or anything of the sort. It was just a girl- a rather pissed off looking girl, as she had apparently gotten over her own fear at roughly the same time he did. She got awkwardly to her feet, brushing dust off the knees of her pants.
"Watch where you're going!" Eddy said, crossly, embarrassed at being caught shrieking like a little girl.
"Me?" the girl asked, her voice rising in pitch with indignation. "I'm not the one who came screaming around the freaking corner, Shorty!"
"SHORTY?"
"Eddy?"
By now, Double D had finally caught up with his temperamental friend, although he was currently panting and gasping for air.
"Oh! H-hello...nice to...meet you..." He managed to say, albeit taking enormous gulps of air in between words.
Before the girl or Eddy could respond, suddenly Ed came skidding down the path towards them, having apparently circled around the area, before promptly crashing into Double D's back.
"I FOUND YOU!" Ed cried, not thinking to get up and off poor Double D, who was flapping beneath Ed like a fish being pinned beneath a large, rather stupid dog. "I thought the swamp monster had got to you guys, so I ran as fast as I could so I could pour salt on him and scare him away."
Everybody looked at Ed for a second, and even Double D stopped squirming for a minute to process what he'd said.
The girl frowned. She had on dark blue jeans, pale blue T-shirt that was exposing a chunk of midriff and green sneakers. A pale red belt was looped around her skinny hips. Her hair was in a shade of shocking violet that was in no way natural, and her slightly narrowed eyes were a cyan-blue. In her hair, a oddly cute-looking skull hairclip was visible, perched innocously on the left side of her head.
"I feel like I'm going to regret asking this, but...what?" the girl asked, and it became apparent that she had bubblegum in her mouth- whenever she talked, her jaw would make a quick, sideways motion as she chewed.
"Oh! Well, it's all rather silly, really." Double D said. "But first- Ed, would you mind getting off me?"
"Sure thing, Double D!" Ed complied, cheerfully.
He bent down and hoisted the skinny Ed up and started clumsily trying to brush grass off Double D's shirt, though really all he was doing was swatting at it ineffectually.
"Um, yes. Well, as I was saying," Double D said, after backing away from Ed a little bit. "The three of us where down here in order to examine the mysterious phenomenon that have been occurring recently. Unfortunately, owing to Ed's...overactive imagination, we began to think there really wasa monster down here."
Here, Double D chuckled nervously. The girl quirked an eyebrow.
"Monster?" she repeated in a flat, disbelieving tone, blowing an enormous bubble, which popped messily all over her chin. Unperturbed, she simply pulled it off her face and resumed chewing. "You guys have been watching too many movies or something."
"Well, what were YOU doin' down here anyway?" Eddy demanded.
"I was looking for Electra," the girl said, shrugging.
Eddy blinked.
"Huh?"
"My cat." She explained, looking away slightly. "She keeps coming down here to catch fish."
"You named your cat Electra?" Double D asked, before he could stop himself. "As in, Electra from Greek mythology?"
"Well it wasn't my idea to call her that." the girl grumbled. Whoever's idea it was, however, remained unknown as Double D suddenly recalled his manners.
"Oh! You must be new around here. Allow me to introduce myself! I'm Edd-"
"Otherwise known as Double D." the girl said, surprising them. She glanced at Ed, "Then you must be Ed, and you must be Eddy."
She threw Eddy a rather scrutinizing look as she said this.
"That's...correct." Double D said, blinking. "But how did you know-?"
"Some kid in a baseball hat mentioned you guys," the girl said, vaguely. "Kyle or something."
"Kevin?" Eddy said, suddenly, his interest piqued. He suddenly got all up in the girl's face. "What'd he say exactly? Huh?"
"Not much. He said that there were three of you and you were all called the Eds. Oh, and also that you were the biggest trio of dorks in all of dorkdom."
Eddy's reaction to this was pretty predictable.
"He WHAT?" he yelled, actually managing to stay suspended in the air for a moment as he leapt up in indignation.
"Hey, I didn't say it." she said, raising her eyebrows slightly, but her tone of voice implied that she wasn't disagreeing.
"That JERK!" Eddy fumed savagely, mostly to himself. "Making us come all out here when he knewthere was no monster and sayin' that about us! Wait 'till I get my hands on that..."
Double D strategically reclaimed his position in front of the shorter Ed before the topic of Kevin had arose.
"By the way, I don't believe you mentioned your name?" he prompted.
The girl paused. Then, she smiled, for the first time since they'd been speaking.
"I'm Saffy."
"Goodness, I certainly am glad to be out of the creek. It seems so much more imposing at night..." Double D sighed with relief.
After realizing that Kevin had completely set up the Eds, they had made the unanimous decision to get out of the Creek, although Ed seemed a little disappointed that there had in fact been nothing paranormal down there at all.
"Wait until I get my hands on Kevin." Eddy growled, repeating his previous threat. "He completely played us! Probably paid Jonny to go running down the street in the first place, then he got all the others to go along with it...bet he put that stupid shoe there himself..."
"Does he always take everything so personally?" Saffy asked Double D, snapping her gum again. The skinny Ed flinched slightly at the noise.
"Unfortunately." Double D replied, deadpan.
The Cul-de-sac loomed into view, after what felt like a long time walking back from the creek. It still wasn't quite dark yet- the Eds found themselves grateful for the long days of summer. It had seemed much darker at the creek, with all the trees and bushes casting shadows about the place.
"Well, at least we won't get busted by our folks for staying out so late." Eddy said. "Bet Kevin didn't think we'd figure out his trick so soon."
Double D decided not to bother pointing out that it was more pure chance that they had happened to run into Saffy at the right time- he didn't think Eddy was in the mood to hear logic. But then he remembered something.
"By the way, Saffy, how did Kevin know that you would be down by the creek tonight?"
"He guessed." Saffy replied, shrugging yet again. "He saw me there the other night, although he didn't mention that the other kids thought I was a ghost."
"Or a swamp monster." Ed contributed, unhelpfully. He had a twig sticking out from the back of his jacket.
"Why are you hanging around the creek, anyway?" Eddy wanted to know, breaking out of his Kevin-related mood, at least for the moment.
"I ran away." Saffy said, a hint of smugness in her tone, as though this was some kind of rite of passage the Eds had yet to acquire.
"R-ran away?" Double D repeated, looking shocked.
Eddy supposed that the concept of doing something so disobedient and reckless had temporarily short-circuited Double D's brain. He looked at Saffy with a frown.
"Ran away? So where've you been living, then?"
"Around," Saffy said, evasively, not quite meeting his eyes as she said it.
"B-but that's-! Your parents! They must be worried sick!" Double D said, empathetically. "How can you be so cavalier about it?"
"Hey, it's fine. I can handle it." Saffy said, with an odd little smile. "There's plenty of places for a kid to crash in neighborhoods like these. You've just got to know where to look."
"Wait..." Eddy said, the cogs in his head slowly turning. "Don't tell me one of these places is-"
"Hey, look at that, looks like somebody waited up for you guys." Saffy said, backing away suddenly as a light snapped on- Ed's house. "I'll see you guys around."
And before any of them could prod her for more answers, Saffy turned and hurried away, just as a bright yellow rectangle of light spilled over the Eds, and a figure stood in the doorway. The Eds all cowered as one when they saw who it was.
"ED!" Sarah shrieked, in a voice that could shatter windows. "You get in this house RIGHT NOW! YOU ARE IN BIG TROUBLE, MISTER!"
"Saraaaah! I can explaaaain!" Ed wailed, scrambling to get away, but Sarah's arm shot out and her fingers locked around Ed's ear, before dragging him into the depths of the house and slamming the door, leaving Eddy and Edd in the semi-darkness once more.
"Now that," Eddy said. "Is the scariest thing we've seen tonight, no competition."
Double D sighed.
"For once, Eddy." He said. "I wholeheartedly agree with you."
If you have time, please review! Reviews are sparkly and awesome, unless they are flames, which are not awesome, unless they're really stupid, because then they are funny.
Till next chapter! :D