A light snow gently blanketed the bears cave, making everything the snow touched look like a powdered doughnut. The bears, Grizz, Panda, Ice Bear, and Toby were inside getting the house decorated for the holidays. Tabes was off visiting family so she asked the bears to watch Toby until she got back. Toby was helping Panda and Grizz decorate the Christmas tree while Ice Bear was making hot chocolate for everyone. Toby gazed into the reflection of each multicolored ornaments; the different shapes and sizes fascinated Toby and each one seemed to sparkle in the light. When he used to live in the woods the thought of weirdly colored balls and strings of lights would probably have scared him. But seeing them on the tree now…he was amazed at how beautiful the tree looked.

As he stood there admiring the decorations he heard the door open and a small voice say, "Hi guys, sorry I'm late!"

"Chloe!" Toby heard Grizz and say.

Toby peeked out from behind the tree. He saw a human girl next to Grizz. She had short dark brown hair and had large glass circles around her eyes. She wore a hoodie and gray pants and red sneakers and spoke with a weird accent. The girl noticed Toby looking at her and asked, "Who's that?"

"Come here Toby." Grizz said.

Toby slowly walked over to her. "Chloe, this is Toby. Toby, this is Chloe. She's our best friend!"

Chloe smiled. "Hi Toby. Are you the bear's cousin?"

Toby shook his head.

Chloe asked Grizz, "Is he shy?" Grizz shook his head and told her that Toby couldn't talk like they can. "Oh," Chloe said, "So he's dumb."

Dumb? Dumb!? Toby wasn't dumb! He couldn't believe that she had said that! He growled at her. He wasn't dumb-she was for calling him dumb!

Grizz was upset as well. "Hey, just because he can't talk doesn't mean that Toby's stupid."

Chloe realized what she said then said, "Ha-ha, no, I'm sorry. When I said dumb, I meant that Toby is a mute-he has an inability to talk and speak. Dumb is another term for it."

Well, as long as she wasn't calling him stupid, Toby was ok with being around her. For now. He grabbed his notepad from off the table and wrote, it's nice to meet you Kloe.

Chloe giggled. "My name's spelled C-H-L-O-E." She rubbed her finger against her chin in thought. She grabbed Toby's paw and studied it for a bit. "Your paws might make it difficult, since their bigger than human hands, but I might be able to teach you some sign language." She saw the confused look on the cub's face and explained, "Sign language is used for mute people. You use your hands to speak instead of your voice."

"That sounds amazing!" Grizz said. "I think you should try it."

The thought of using his paws to talk sounded ridiculous to Toby. But…if he was able to speak without writing all his thoughts on paper… He wrote on the notebook maybe we can try it.

By now, Panda had come over to say hi to Chloe. "You're just in time," he said to her, "the tree is finally all decorated."

Everyone gathered around the Christmas tree and admired how amazing it looked. "You guys did a good job on it." Chloe said.

Ice Bear then came out of the kitchen and announced, "Hot chocolate is ready.

Everyone casually headed into the kitchen while Toby zoomed past everyone like a missile the minute Ice Bear said chocolate. He knocked over Chloe while making his mad dash into the kitchen. Grizz helped her off of the floor. "Man," Chloe said brushing herself off, "What's got him all excited?"

"Toby loves chocolate," Grizz answered, "it's his favorite food."

Everyone took their seats at the table as Ice Bear handed each of them a mug. Toby swiped the mug from Ice Bear's hands and took the tiniest sip. The minute the warm liquid hit his tongue his whole body just exploded with happiness. He didn't know how to describe this amazing feeling! He quickly chugged down his drink, even though the heat from the drink was scorching his throat. The sweet sugary combination of marshmallows and liquid chocolate in convent mug form wasn't entering his mouth fast enough. Within literally a second, he had polished off his drink. He held up his mug high in the air and roared at Ice Bear- a roar that demanded that he give him more of the delicious chocolaty liquid from heaven.

Everyone stared at him in astonishment as they looked down at their mugs. They only just had a few sips of theirs!

"Wow." Chloe remarked, "Toby reaalllyy likes chocolate."

Grizz laughed nervously. "Hey Toby, I think you've had enough sugar for one night."

"Grizz is right," Panda added, "the last thing you need is more sugar."

Ice Bear and Chloe nodded in agreement. Toby slammed his mug down at the table and frowned angrily. Chloe then suggested that they all go watch a Christmas movie. Everyone finished their hot chocolate and headed in the Livingroom while Toby sulked at the table. Grizz had told him he couldn't have any more of the amazing cup of happiness. Toby rolled his eyes-why did he have to listen to Grizz? He wasn't Toby's dad. He had powers! Toby could do whatever he wanted to!

He poked his head out of the kitchen to make sure no one was coming. Sure enough, the bears and Chloe were all smiling and laughing at the movie playing on the TV. Toby grinned mischievously. He went back into the kitchen and spotted the tea pot that Ice Bear had made the hot chocolate in. He grabbed it off the stove, went over to the table and sat in his chair, poured the liquid into his mug and was about to gulp it all down when a brilliant idea struck him. Hot chocolate was already good on its own, but, if he added even more chocolate to his hot chocolate, then his hot chocolate would become more than hot chocolate: it would be hot chocolaty chocolate!

Toby quickly, but quietly, dashed into Grizz's room, reached under his bed, and took out his secret stash of chocolate. He had known about this stash ever since the bears first found him. He grabbed a fistful of chocolate bars and zoomed back to the kitchen. He unwrapped the bars and held them over his mug. Using his laser eyes, he melted the chocolate into the cup and drank it…

His eyes grew large.

Time seemed to slow to a felt…weird. But it was a good kind of weird! He felt super shaky-like his powers were somehow strengthened. He felt his heart beating superfast. All this energy inside him…was AMAZING!

He burst out of the kitchen at supersonic speed and ran into the living room. He stood in front of the TV, blocking the bear's and Chloe vision.

Panda complained, "Toby, move, we can't see!" He then noticed that the bear cub was shaking intensely, like a popcorn popper ready to blow. "Uh…you ok Toby?"

"He doesn't seem to be upset about anything." Chloe said, "So he's not throwing a tantrum."

As Grizz studied Toby he noticed that his eyes were the size of basketballs, he wore a crazy happy grin…it was funny, it kind of reminded Grizz about that time at the library when they were helping Chloe study for her chemistry test, her eyes had gotten that big when he had tried to help her by having her eat a lot of-

"Toby's on a sugar rush!" Grizz exclaimed.

Toby's eyes glowed green and kept getting brighter and brighter.

"Uhh…what's happening to Toby's eyes?" Chloe asked nervously.

Grizz laughed nervously, "Heh, heh, well we were going to tell you…"

Green lasers emitted from Toby's eyes and blasted the ceiling. Chloe gaped at the large, smoking hole.

"What the what!?" She exclaimed.

Toby let out a roar that was a mixed between a battle cry and a deranged laugh and zoomed around the Living Room. He ran around the room at supersonic speed. Everyone jumped up and tried to catch him. It was total chaos, but Toby didn't care. He never felt this much power before in his life. Everyone around him looked like they were frozen. He could feel the energy everything and everyone around him. He was sweating a lot, and was starting to get a little dizzy from all of the running around. He heard a roar and stopped in his tracks. He realized that the roar was coming from his own stomach. He was hungry-and he knew that in order to keep this power going, he needed something to eat. He ran back to the kitchen and grabbed the pot filled with hot chocolate. He grabbed more chocolate from Grizz's stash and melted it into the pot. He was about to chug it down when he felt two sets of paws grab him by the waist and were holding him back. He saw that Chloe was the one who had swiped the pot away from him.

With a cry of outrage he madly swung at her in a mad attempt to reclaim his hot chocolate. Whoever was holding him captive was hanging on for dear life. There was screaming and frantic shouts of, "Don't let him have it!"

Toby shot lasers as fast as a machine gun. He roared and screamed and kicked. That was HIS hot chocolate! They had NO RIGHT to withhold it from him! He had SO MUCH POWER that their weak attempts to stop him were pathetic! He had the powers of the earth, the sky, and space! THE UNIVERSE ITSELF WAS WITHIN HIS GRASP-

Chloe and the other bears fell on the ground in complete and utter exhaustion. They all grasped for air and panted as their lungs couldn't get enough.

"It took almost two hours…" Chloe panted, "But he finally crashed."

Yes. For two whole hours, the bears and Chloe played a dangerous game of "keep away" with a tornado. They had to protect Chloe from Toby, who was trying to get his paws on the pot that Ice Bear had made the hot chocolate in, while at the same time avoid being blasted to death. Toby eventually broke free from Grizz and Ice Bear's grasp and pursued after Chloe, who was scooped up by Panda. Toby chased them all over the house-upsetting furniture, blasting hole in the floor and roof, swiping at anything and everything, overthrowing tables, messing up the bear's bedrooms, knocking down the fridge; if it was in between Toby and his goal, it was going to be sliced, diced, blasted, or destroyed. The bear cub had eventually, and thankfully, crashed and was now sprawled out on the floor like a wet mop.

As soon as she caught her breath, Chloe's face turned into a mixture of confusion and bewilderment. "What the heck was that!?" She demanded. "Were those lasers coming out of Toby's eyes? How'd he even do that!?"

The bear's got up off of the floor. Grizz gestured for Chloe to sit down. "Sit on the couch-it's a long story."

"What couch?" Chloe asked. She was referring to burnt pile of fabric scraps that was once the bear's couch.

"Right." Grizz said. "I forgot."

Horary! First chapter is up!

I send my prayers to the families who have lost loved ones in the awful shooting at the Florida school. I cannot imagine the horror and sorrow that they are going through. I hope that this story will help cheer someone up. Laughter is the best medicine-I hope that my stories are like medicine for people; something to help make them happy and to help make them feel better. I am in the process of making a My Life as a Teenage Robot story that talks about the issues, news articles, and discussions about guns. This story will probably be up within a month or two…but I'm not holding my breath. I have a couple of art shows coming up so I'll be busy getting ready for those.

Have a good day/night!