Where A Bird Once Nested
By: Tesla2251
All of Bricksburg was cloaked in a sea of darkness the beautiful night had brought with the light glow of the approaching dawn just barely starting to show on the horizon. In his apartment, Emmet Brickowski laid peacefully. The Master Builder and his friends had only just finished in destroying the enemy force of Duplo aliens that had threatened the safety of the universe. All was right with the universe once more.
Suddenly came a sound that disturbed the minifigure's rest. The rhythm of it made him figure it was his alarm clock beeping. He reached out and smacked the top with his clawed hand to silence it. But the sound came back a second later. He smacked it again, and still the sound continued. Emmet sat up quickly and glared at his clock.
"What is with you?" he angrily asked the inanimate object. Then it hit him it wasn't his alarm clock beeping, but it was someone knocking at his own front door. Emmet glanced at his clock and saw it was 6:08 in the morning.
"Who'd be here this early?" he asked himself, yawning. The Master Builder climbed out of bed and walked down the stairs to his living room, yawning and muttering a few 'hellos' to his various apartment pieces as he went. When he opened the door, he saw who his early visitor was; Princess Unikitty.
"Unikitty?" he asked in surprise, having not expected her to visit at such an early hour.
"Hello Emmet!" the bright pink kitty said cheerfully. "How is your day going?"
Emmet looked up at the still dark sky then back down at Unikitty. "Uh… Unikitty, I don't know if you noticed, just saying, but it's still dark out. I was asleep."
"Oh you were? Oh, I am so, so sorry! As you remember, in Cloud Cuckoo Land we…," she suddenly fell silent, and her smile fell like one of the countless buildings Emmet has knocked over in his career.
"Never sleep?" he said finishing her sentence. The sudden drop in attitude was something he'd never seen before.
"Uh, yes! That is right! Still, so sorry for waking you up but could you please do one little favor for me?" she asked, suddenly brightening up.
"Uh… sure. What is it?" Emmet asked, wondering if something could be bothering the fellow master builder.
"Well… I was wondering if you could help me build a boat, or a small ship? You see I'm not used to such… ordinary brick colors. You know me, bright and cheerful colors are my thing," Unikitty giggled, looking up hopefully at Emmet.
"Uh, well…." he said, nervously scratching the back of his head. He had planned to have his first official date with Lucy that following day but he couldn't really say no to the cute master builder. "Okay, I'll help you."
"YAY!" Unikitty shouted in joy, some magic radiating from her horn as she bounced around. "Thank you, Emmet! Thank you thank you thank you!"
"But could you wait a while? I can't exactly go out in my pajamas."
Unikitty came to a stop and sat down on the porch. "Oh, of course. I'll just wait here for you," she giggled. Emmet gave a soft chuckle before turning back inside to get dressed.
As the sun began to rise over the horizon, the slapped together ship plied one of the oceans in the world toward an as yet unknown location. Since Bricksburg had no seaport, Emmet had needed to build a boat from an Octan fuel truck to suit his purposes (which he had borrowed and had promised to rebuild it back into a truck when he was done). Being 'The Special' had its perks. While the ship plied the sea, Emmet noticed that Unikitty was always staring up at the sky as if looking for something.
Emmet yawned, having still not gotten that last hour of sleep. He'd left a voice mail on Lucy's phone telling her where he would be and that if she wasn't too upset with him to reschedule their first date to tomorrow to call him back later.
"Emmet! Stop here!" Unikitty called from the deck.
Emmet shut the engine off and stepped outside the wheelhouse. Unikitty was looking forlornly up at the sky. Emmet followed her gaze and looked up at the sky, wondering what the pink cat could be staring at. He then noticed what it was; a large empty expanse of sky where Cloud Cuckoo Land had once been.
"My…. Home…," Unikitty whimpered to herself before shaking her head. "No, no! Think positive! Take a few deep breaths and think positively!"
This was followed for another few moments by a series of quick deep breaths followed by saying something random and sweet. Emmet sighed, she'd tried this after they had barely escaped Bad Cop and the robots when he'd unwillingly brought them to her peaceful kingdom, and saw the remains floating down to the sea bed through the windows. It hadn't worked then, and it certainly wasn't working now for the normally upbeat feline.
"Huff…. huff… huff… Flowers! Huff… huff… huff… Marshmallows! Huff… huff… huff…Rainbows!" Unikitty gasped, her pink face starting to look a little pale from her heavy breathing.
"Uh, Unikitty. Maybe you should slow down a little? You could pass out," Emmet asked, walking up to her. Unikitty suddenly turned around, her face twisting from a mix of forced happiness and sorrow to anger.
"Slow down?! My entire home was destroyed! And it was all your fault! If you'd known you were being tracked, maybe my home would still be standing! You still have a home to go too! I don't! AND IT WAS ALL YOUR FAULT!" she shouted angrily, her blue eyes turning red and her fur turned a deep crimson.
Emmet stumbled backwards and fell on his rear. He'd only seen Unikitty lose her temper once, and that time it happened she'd been able to bite through Micro Manager robots like they were made if tissue paper. If she lost control again, it was most likely she could chomp the whole boat in half and maul him into his separate pieces.
"Whoa! Unikitty calm down! If you lose control here, you'll chomp me and the boat to bits! Not to mention killing me, you'd be left in the middle of the ocean with no way home."
Unikitty slowly relaxed some, her fur and eye color returning to normal with a few tears rolling down her cheeks. Her angry snarl fell and she stared down at the deck, chocking back a few silent sobs.
Emmet stood up from the deck and walked over to her, saying, "I'm sorry, Unikitty. I truly didn't know I was being tracked. If I had known, I'd have done something about it. I mean, I didn't intentionally lead them there. Why would I do that?"
"I… know it wasn't… all your… fault. It's… just so… hard…. to shove this…. feeling down," she whimpered through her tears.
"I know, Unikitty. I know. But have you ever thought that maybe this is the one time you can't shove these feelings down? That maybe once it would be best to let them out?" Emmet said, stroking her back gently.
Unikitty looked up at construction worker with wonder. "But… what of my rule? No frowny faces?" she asked.
"You said none in Cloud Cuckoo Land. And you are not technically there, are you?" Emmet said, treading lightly on the topic of the totaled city.
"No," Unikitty said softly, "I guess not."
"Maybe once you could allow yourself to break that rule?" Emmet implied.
"Maybe…," Unikitty sighed before letting a few sobs out and crying her eyes out. Emmet turned her around and let her cry into his shoulder. For a couple moments they sat there, letting the waves take the sounds of sorrow away on their rise and fall.
After a few moments, the two parted. Unikitty dried her eyes with a handkerchief she made appear by magic, her tears spent. Emmet dried his construction shirt from the princess's tears, and felt a weight on his own chest release. He'd wanted to make the sad kitty feel better ever since she'd nearly broken down in the sub right before it started to sink. But in all the excitement, he'd never found the time or opportunity to fully apologize for being partly to blame for the loss of Cloud Cuckoo Land. Now he had finally done that. Tears had been spilt, but they had been necessary.
"Are you feeling better now, Unikitty?" he asked.
She looked and said with a whimper, "I… I think so. I'm not so sure yet." That answer would have to do for now for Emmet.
"Uh, if you don't mind me asking, why did you ask me to bring you back here if it hurts you so much?" he asked the pink cat/unicorn hybrid.
"I… I guess I came here to… get closure," Unikitty sighed, wiping a tear away with a square brick paw. "I never figured it would be so… painful."
"But, does it feel better to have gotten it off your chest? Even a little?" he asked.
Unikitty looked away for a moment, her ears slowly twitching back and forth as she searched for the answer. Eventually she looked up and said, "It does feel a little better. You were right, Emmet. Thank you for being there for me." She smiled softly and gave the master builder a warm hug. Emmet smiled, returning the hug, happy to have made the unarguably happiest minifigure feel so much better.
"You are welcome, Princess Unikitty," he said cheerfully. Unikitty gave a smile and once more turned her gaze to the churning ocean.
"Do you think Cloud Cuckoo Land will ever be rebuilt?" she asked the Special.
"That… I am not sure of, yet. Maybe it could be. But where would we be able to get so many…. sparkly, cheery colored bricks?" he said uncertainly.
Then, out of the corner of their eyes, the two master builders saw something on the horizon. From out of the morning haze a large dark shape appeared, taking a form the master builders knew from before. The large sails went slack as the pirate ship came to a stop a short ways off from the small boat, making it bounce up and down in the waves created. From the deck, a familiar shape turned to them.
"Ahoy there, me hearties!" the mechanical pirate called from the fore castle of his ship.
"Ahoy, Metalbeard!" Emmet called back. "What are you doing here?!"
"Arrr, I be here ta help ye with salvaging the poor kitties city from bottom of ol' Davey Jones Locker!" he replied.
"By yourself?" Unikitty asked, a little hope and joy in her voice.
Metalbeard flinched back a little. " 'By meself?' Now who said I be travelin' alone?" he asked, and on cue a host of familiar faces looked over the side. Mostly construction workers Emmet worked with, and Lucy.
"Lucy?!" Emmet said in surprise, "What are you doing here?"
"You said you were going to help Unikitty with something so I figured you'd be heading here," she replied.
"This fine crew be here ta rebuild Cloud Cuckoo Land once all them pieces be rested from the grasp of the deep blue sea," Metalbeard explained.
"How exactly will they do that?" the Special questioned. As if on cue, a few large crafts suddenly surfaced from beneath the waves a spray of sea foam. The hatch opened and a grey haired minifigure with crew cut hair stepped out.
"Emmet Brickowski, Captain Ace Speedman. Commander of the Atlantis Crew," he said, introducing himself.
"Uh, nice to meet you, sir," Emmet replied cheerfully.
"My men shall descend to the bottom of the ocean and bring up every last brick of Cloud Cuckoo Land. Once that is done, the rest shall fall to you," the captain said before dropping back down inside the sub and the subs disappearing from sight.
Unikitty leapt up in the air, squealing with complete joy. Her home was already in the process of being rebuilt. Soon her subjects could return to the place she'd built to be the happiest place in the universe and she would have a place to go back to once more. Emmet chuckled as she expressed her complete overwhelming joy.
"Hey!" Lucy called from above, "How about you join us up here for some brunch?"
"Sure thing!" Emmet called up to her, and a rope ladder was quickly dropped down to the deck. Unikitty went up first, followed shortly by Emmet. Once on deck, Lucy pulled him aside for a moment.
"So, did she eventually break down?" she asked. Emmet gave a slow nod, and added, "Yeah, you weren't the only one who built a wall around your true emotions either."
"Yeah…," Lucy said, looking away as that wasn't one of her prouder memories of trying to make herself into a tough, stoic master builder. "But I'm glad you were able to help her feel better."
Emmet chuckled, scratching the back of his head in bashful sense. Lucy reached out and took his hand, saying, "Come on in and eat. I don't think you left much time for breakfast before leaving Bricksburg."
