One shot ho! Because I adore writing little irrelevant scenes that could easily fit most places in the later series. Send me prompts! I'm starting to run out of one shot ideas.
'Math' was actually a pretty stupid way to describe something really cool, Bonnie decided.
Because math was hard and unrelenting, because math didn't have any spectacular end product the way physics or chemistry did. She couldn't pull something cool out of her lab to amaze people with and say "I made it with math!" because that isn't how math works.
But math was necessary. It would be impossible to do any of the cool bits without math, math was the framework that her spectacular science draped over; the boring underbelly of the fascinating devices she loved to create. Bonnibel felt she should love math more. Like she was a bad scientist for secretly hating math and she'd lose her badass scientist cred if anyone ever found out. She also felt right then that maybe math deserved someone better than her, it needed to be with someone who loved it properly the way a good scientist should. Maybe that was just the sleep deprivation talking.
Which was probably why she was so indignantly defending math and its multitude of benefits when Marceline was being difficult about the amount of time she spent on it. If she was just good at math then she wouldn't still be trying to work out this damned problem.
"Just because you wouldn't recognise the Euler-Mascheroni Constant if it danced naked in front of you..." the princess trailed off as cool fingers slipped under the neck of her shirt and began gently massaging her shoulders. They did kinda ache.
"Speaking of dancing naked, you promised to stop and come to bed at midnight. That was two hours ago."
Cool sweet breath flickered against her cheek and despite all of her protestations that math was important and science didn't sleep so she shouldn't either, Bonnie let her chair be wheeled away from the desk and strong arms to ease her to her feet.
"You're so distracting." she muttered. Her vampire just grinned happily in reply.
But a brain so full doesn't stop whirring that easily. Bonnie was busy working out exactly how many hours she could guarantee to work on her project tomorrow if Marceline went to sleep straight away verses staying up just a tiny bit longer and making absolutely sure she'd sleep like the dead until at least midday, no pun intended. In the end the decision was taken out of her hands anyway; somehow whilst rubbing her back Marceline had managed to unhook her bra. Staying up longer was definitely going to happen, then, and she wasn't at all sorry about it.
The first fragile daylight flickering along the eastern horizon found her pouring over her books and calculations again. It was winter so sunrise was a little later in the morning than it would have otherwise been. Bonnie considered that excellent proof that she'd slept as much as she needed. If by some miracle Marceline woke up before lunch she'd just claim to have only been awake for a half hour herself. It was the perfect plan, completely and absolutely foolproof.
Or... not. The early morning peace was shattered as Cinnamon Bun came crashing unannounced through the bedroom door, bearing a tea tray and wearing- oh Grod who gave him a sexy PVC maid outfit? He was even wearing fishnet stockings and thigh high stripper heels. He had a feather duster tucked into the back of his tiny skirt like some kind of freaky tail. Bonnibel pinched herself to make sure she wasn't having the weirdest wet dream ever.
"Hey sleepover buddies! I brought you some tea!" he bellowed cheerfully as he clattered into the room. He tripped just inside the doorway and flung the tea straight into the still sleep confused face of Marceline. She hissed angrily and shot up to hang from the ceiling, spitting like a cat and mercifully transforming into her angry bat-monster form because Bonnie couldn't remember if she'd bothered to redress when they'd finally gone to sleep. At least she'd had the presence of mind to close the curtains.
"Cinnamon Bun, what the stuff are you doing?!" she yelled, reluctantly turning from her desk when it became obvious that Marcy wasn't going to do more than just hide on the ceiling and hiss. This was the direct opposite of what she wanted to happen today.
"I- Peppermint Butler said you had company last night so I thought I'd bring you breakfast tea and I found this sweet breakfast server uniform in the kitchen and and- did I do it wrong? I'm sorry I spilled your tea princess. It was cold anyway, I couldn't get up the stairs very fast in the pointy shoes."
Bonnibel pinched the bridge of her nose for a second to try to forestall the inevitable headache that always occurred when she had to deal with Cinnamon Bun before she'd even had chance to look at her camomile tea. It was now steadily dripping off her probably-naked girlfriend and a vocal but often ignored part of her brain was very interested in the combination of the two things she liked most to find in her bedroom. Cinnamon Bun was still staring at her like a kicked puppy and now Peppermint Butler was peering cautiously around the door frame and -yeah, of course - there was a messenger from Castle Lemongrab with him and she was still just wearing her pyjama shirt and some frilly panties-
"OUT! All of you! Out of my rooms, NOW! I'll be dressed and downstairs in a few minutes but for now GET OUT! Not you!" she added hastily, grabbing Marceline's wing as she swooped for the door. The others trooped out into the hall; Peppermint Butler was muttering angrily at Cinnamon Bun who was trying to stammer his defence, the messenger just looked confused. At least Peppermint had the presence of mind to swing the door shut on his way out, shooting her a look she was more than capable of interpreting.
Don't let her get you distracted.
As if the vision of Cinnamon Bun in fishnets and a mini skirt was going to get either of their engines running. She snorted to herself and turned to help a retransformed Marcy clean herself up. Her naked girlfriend, however, might just stand a chance of distracting her.
Well, semi naked. She was still wearing her vest and a sulky pout that somehow just made her look even more adorable.
"So you're currently mostly undressed and covered in my favourite beverage. I can't help but think this is not as terrible a way to start the day as it could be." Bonnie murmured, tugging the soaked vest off. Marceline just stared at her in horror.
"I saw Cinnamon Bun's PVC-clad buns. So don't even think about starting anything, I need to go and scrub myself down in the shower. I feel... kinda dirty." Marceline choked out, still looking shaken and confused. Well at least she'd not asked about the ti-
"And what time is it, anyway? You're awake and working and I can't help but feel that it's too early in the day." She glanced at the cuckoo clock above the bed, "Yep it's not quite eight yet. Why are you awake? Do you actually want to die of sleep deprivation, Bonnie?"
"I don't think you can actually die from lack of sleep." Bonnibel muttered, embarrassed at being caught out. "Besides, I'd have needed to be up anyway. There's a messenger from Castle Lemongrab downstairs waiting for me to go solve whatever problems the Earls have come up with this week and I need to track down whoever slipped that horrifying outfit to Cinnamon Bun. I have a feeling it was probably Jake because you'd have gone for a sexy nurse or something and nobody else I know has access to the kitchens and a seven year old's sense of humour."
But Marceline had stopped listening and floated across to the wardrobe, still extremely naked. She pulled a periwinkle blue dress out and some cream leggings, then a comfy pair of shoes and deposited them all on Bonnie's bed. The princess made a face; not a single item was even a little bit pink. Typical Marcy.
"I'm going to shower the tea out of my hair. When I'm done I'm going back to sleep. You are going to get dressed and go sort out whatever crap the Lemongrabs have sent to annoy you with today, then you are going to go back to sleep. It's not open for debate." Marceline held a finger up to forestall the argument already on Bonnibel's lips. "You are not going to drop dead from exhaustion on my watch, princess."
And she swooped off into the bathroom, completely ignoring Bonnie's stutters of protest. The princess huffed to herself; she didn't much like Marceline laying down the law like that. But the vampire had a point, she did need to go and see what the messenger wanted. After that, well she'd see about sleep. She'd not actually had chance to agree or disagree with Marceline's plan so staying up to try to wrestle her brain around math wasn't technically breaking a promise, just the spirit of one. That was bad too but... yeah, she needed to finish the math or it would drive her insane.
Only a bit sulkily Bonnibel pulled on the clothes Marceline had picked out and made her way downstairs to speak to the Lemon messenger.
It took hours to work out all the details with Lemongrab's representative. He wanted to increase the rate of tax on imported candy goods to Castle Lemongrab and Bonnie refused point blank to even consider it. Not because she was stubborn or angry about it and certainly not because she was sleep deprived. It was just bad economics; increasing the tax on candy goods would slow demand which would negatively impact their own economy and it would cause a spike it theft and fraud for the citizens of Castle Lemongrab. That would mean less general safety and yet more government meddling in the minutiae of their lives. Bonnie would rather break her own leg than be any way complicit in helping the Earls enact yet more tyranny on their people.
Finally, dissatisfied but convinced that her only answer was 'no', the messenger left and Bonnie was free to return to her math. She trudged back to her room slowly, dreading the sheets of cramped numbers and symbols that seemed to dance before her eyes tauntingly when she stared at them for too long.
Quietly pushing open the door to her darkened bedroom so as not to disturb Marceline, Bonnie tiptoed to her writing desk and switched on the small lamp. She stared at the sheets of paper that were sitting exactly where she left them.
They were covered in a messy scrawl, not her own carefully looped calligraphy. They were, when she looked closer, also finished.
There was a long thin note with a strange round hole in the top sitting on top of the papers; that had definitely not been there when she'd left that morning. She picked it up and scanned it, struggling in places to make out the words.
Bonnie,
Your four dimensional projection gun doesn't work for a really simple reason; because the energy output is greater than the input. If you were trying to pull something into a fourth dimensional energy layer it would probably work but when you're trying to project a fourth dimensional field around a three dimensional object it would need more energy than the kingdom currently produces in a century, or a miniature nuclear reactor. You're not going to build a miniature nuclear reactor ok? So the gun just isn't going to work. I read your books while you're asleep sometimes when I'm bored and I have a photographic memory and math has never been difficult for me. Please never mention it again for either of our sakes. Hang the other side of this on the door and come to bed.
Marcy x
PS the Euler-Mascheroni Constant was completely irrelevant for these calculations. See what happens when you don't sleep?
Bonnibel blinked a couple of times to clear her swimming vision. Seriously? She was having trouble processing that Marceline had known the answer all along. In the end she just shrugged, too tired to care, and flipped the bit of paper over.
In big letters on the other side it read "DO NOT DISTURB UNTIL MORNING." and underneath in smaller writing "Bring more camomile tea, wear flat shoes and overalls." Bonnie left it on the door handle and snuggled up next to her sleeping girlfriend, who was also apparently a closet genius and terribly embarrassed about it.
"You're totally math, you colossal butt." she whispered into Marceline's ear before she let herself relax and close her eyes.