Author's Note: I know this chapter feels like a rehash, but it really adds to the characters, and this will be the only chapter [hopefully] that does this, so do not worry too much. Also, remember that if you have any questions, ask away! Enjoy the latest chapter!
What was up with Bonnie today? Normally, Marceline's pestering earned her a rebuke and an order to leave, but the little princess had seemed more put out than normal. The vampire paused just outside the window and listened as Bubblegum let out a sigh and mumbled something to herself.
Was the princess sad? She thought on the last time she had really seen Bubblegum sad-. She stopped that thought where it was, stopped it so hard that her face had scrunched up in concentration. There were guests to be invited, and things to be gotten ready, and thinking for too long would do none of that.
Luckily, the sun wasn't out today, as the thick clouds and the falling snow obscured it enough for Marceline to be out without her hat and gloves. She enjoyed the outdoors, and still missed being able to go outside and feel the sun on her without the agonizing pain. The ancient girl had long since learned to cope with the pain of the experience, but it was not worth it to endure the burning. So she loved days like these, when the sun was hidden, but it still shone down on Ooo.
Twisting around in the air, she set herself off towards the forest outside of the castle where Lady Rainicorn lived. She grinned and hoped that Jake would be there. Recently, he had become much less terrified of her, but if she was careful she could still elicit some terror from the dog.
As she flew through the air, the snow swirled around her in pleasing shapes and designs, and Marceline let out a rare laugh. One not born of humor, or of mayhem, but of pure childlike glee. While her skin was immune to the cold, she could still feel the snow hitting it and melting away. She started to twist through the air, leaving corkscrew shapes behind in the air.
She landed lightly, letting her momentum carry her to the door of the stable. She knocked, because while Marceline had interacted with Lady before, she wasn't terribly close to her, and she didn't want to endanger tonight. The door creaked open slightly, and the rainicorn poked her head outside.
She babbled something at Marceline, who smiled blankly. She didn't understand Lady, but she could be understood. Just as she was about to extend the invitation, she heard Jake's voice from inside. Launching herself over Lady, she transformed herself into a horrific bat-beast and landed, snarling. There was a shriek, and a yellow blur dived behind furniture.
Laughing uproariously, the vampire returned to her normal form. Lady shot the prankster a stern glare and said something to Jake. One eye poked over the edge of the couch, followed shortly by another and then a head.
"Not nice dude. Not nice at all." Jake stomped over to where Marceline floated, still laughing.
"I'm sorry Jake, I really am. I just! I just can't help myself!" laughed the vampire.
His eyes narrowed, and Lady said something to him. "Yeah. What do you want?"
"Uh, well… I want to invite you two over for a movie night. Bubblegum is coming, and I'm gonna go get Finn and Flame Princess to come also." She finished awkwardly, rubbing the back of her head.
Lady's long face instantly lit up, and she began jabbering excitedly at Jake. He nodded his head reluctantly, but turned back to Marceline.
"Alright, Lady wants to go, and so I'll go to." His face stretched over close to hers. "But you're on thin ice missy. Thin ice." He ended at a whisper.
"Uh. Great, I, uh, can't wait to see you there. Bring a snack or a drink or something for the movie." She waved and started floating out of the stable. "Oh! Do you know where Finn is at?"
Jake's face twitched as she said that, and something passed over his features. It was gone too quick for Marceline to figure out what it was, but there had been something. "Yeah, he was going to that frozen spring thingy. He likes to go there to think. Don't go and be all creepy though. The bro has got a lot on his mind, and he's just figuring things out."
The Queen raised her hands, warding him off. "I won't. I'm just gonna go tell him about the movie."
Lady looked at Jake, and murmured to him. "Oh, and Lady wants to know what we are watching."
"Heat Signature. I still haven't seen it."
Jake let out a whoop, fist pumping the air. "Yeah! Love that movie! Yeah-yeah-yeah-yea-yea-yeah!" Shaking her head, Marceline made her escape.
Finn sat below her, his head bowed, muttering to himself. Marceline had been sitting there for a minute above him. He had gone from looking sad to angry to sad and back to angry. This wasn't how Finn normally acted, and usually she wouldn't interfere, but this was way weird.
"What am I gonna do?" asked Finn, obviously talking to himself.
Grinning viciously, the old vampire lowered herself behind a rock, and floated out into his sight. "Come to my house tonight silly." She only grinned wider as Finn jumped into the air, dropping something to the ground.
"Marceline! Why the math did you do that?" His face was precious, a mixture of embarrassment and rage.
"To scare you of course," she said, barely managing to hold back laughter. She went down, and stretched out over a rock. The cold felt good.
He finally laughed, and Marceline let herself relax. He was acting more normal now. "What's going on tonight at your house?" he asked.
"Movie night." She said, intently watching his face. "You've got to get Flame Princess there," she paused a second as a guilty look overtook Finn. She continued, "at least if you want her there…"
His face flushed red. "Of course I do!" he turned around as he said that.
Sensing that he was thinking something odd again, without thinking she reached out to comfort him, placing her hand on his cheek. Realizing what she had done, and not knowing how Finn would take it, she forced herself to laugh. "You dweebs don't even know what love is, and you don't even know what love is." She leaned in close, to see how he would react. "Maybe I should see if I could suck some of that red out of your cheeks…"
A horrified expression settled onto the vampire. What was she saying? This was worse than touching him. He whirled around, and their faces were too close. Only because of her centuries of age could she keep her face blank. Normally Marceline didn't act this foolishly, but she needed to cover it up and not let Finn know she suspected something.
"What?" he stuttered and then stepped back.
She forced herself to laugh again then decided to try to bring up Flame Princess. "Maybe I should try to get some of Flame Princess's red…" Without realizing it, Finn had reached for his sword, obviously intending to protect her. So she was just overreacting, and she laughed at herself, her feet mauling the air. "You're too easy!" She left off the end of what she meant, finishing 'to read' in her head.
"I've just been feeling all mix-mushed up on the inside like mud. I'm not sure I could come tonight-"
She nearly roared at him, asking him what was the matter, but she had promised Jake. "Too bad!" she interrupted. "I've already invited Bonnie and Jake and Lady, and I said you were gonna be there…" Her anger started to get the best of her, and hair sprouted along her body. "So you'll be there or I'll eat you!"
A short tussle began, with Finn quickly gaining the upper hand. Vampires, and most especially Vampire Queens, did not practice at bodily combat. He laughed, and fell onto the ground. Marceline loomed over him, starting to drool. "There you go, you dork! What if I ate you?"
"Then I couldn't be at the movie tonight, and everyone would know that you ate me," he returned sharply.
Her eyebrows shot up in surprise. Usually Finn wasn't that witty. "And how would they know that?"
The boy lifted his sword and poked it at her. "I'd wait until I heard the movie start… and then… ALGEBRAIC! I'd cut out of your stomach and ruin the whole night!"
The thought of her stomach exploding mid-movie, with Finn coming flying out was more than enough to set off another bout of laughter. She raised her hands, pretending to attempt to fend him off. "Oh no! Not that!"
"Dude; that'd be so math if that happened." Finn sat down on the ground, and pulled off his hat. She was surprised again, generally he kept it on. Marceline could count the number of times she had seen Finn hatless on one hand.
"Yeah that would be except-," the thought of what she was about to say flew out of her head. Instead of Finn's long flowing hair, it was short and stubbly. She dashed over and started running her hands though hi s hair. "DUDE! When did you cut your hair all short! This is great, it feels like a peach." She continued for a minute more, before she again realized what she was doing and stopped.
Finn looked up at her, blushing again. "Uh. Thanks," he said, looking down again. She knew she was blushing also, what was wrong with her? She needed to get out of here.
"Yeah… I'll- uh- see you tonight at my place. Uh, don't forget to bring some snacks or something." As quick as she could, Marceline flew away.
It wasn't just Bubblegum and Finn that were acting strange; she was too.
The cave that surrounded her house was nearly always quiet; it was a good place to think. Marceline floated upside down, sitting on the roof of the cave. It was still hours before anyone would show up, and before anyone did Marceline wanted to get her head fixed. Why had she been acting so strange today? Her brow furrowed in concentration, and unconsciously her lips drew back, revealing her sharp teeth.
Or had it just been today? No, she decided, it had been for a while now. She hadn't really thought about it, but her music had been suffering, and she had stopped going outside her little house. While she hated thinking about herself, there wasn't a way to avoid it. What was the issue?
The vampire closed her eyes and tried to picture what could the problem. She hadn't seen her father in a while, but that wasn't a problem, that was good. She hadn't seen anyone in weeks, but that wasn't the problem, that was one of the symptoms.
Could it be her food? She hadn't found anything particularly red recently. Winter was always the hardest time for her to come up with red foods, but usually she wouldn't act this way if she was just hungry.
Was her father doing something then? Had he devised a plan to draw her into the Nightosphere and make her his heir again? She doubted it, usually he wasn't this subtle. He preferred to stop on a problem until it died rather than ponder and act introspectively. She supposed that this is where she got much of her attitude.
If none of those things were the issue, what was? After a few more moments, her eyes flew open and she hissed. She knew what was wrong.
The first to arrive was Finn and Flame Princess. The boy seemed to be acting better, and Flame Princess seemed more than happy with him. Marceline hadn't really had a chance to talk with her, so she sat FP down in a chair that she had made especially for tonight.
She smiled at the elemental, and made some small talk. She was interested in getting to know the fiery girl. They had little in common, but they did share a similar attitude about women and adventuring. Not long after Finn vanished into the kitchen, another knock sounded at the door.
Floating over to it, Marceline opened the door and greeted Jake. It seemed he had come without Lady, but with Flame Princess and Finn there she resisted the urge to try to scare him again. He had brought some kind of drinks, he said they were a secret family recipe, but Finn claimed that there weren't any secret family recipes. As the two began to good naturedly argue, Marceline returned to her seat near FP.
She leaned in, smiling wickedly. "So, how serious is you and Finn's relationship?" Flame Princess's face changed to a deeper red. "Have you kissed yet?"
"Yes," said FP in a small voice. "We have, but we can't anymore… At least, that's what we've been told. I don't know if there is a way around it or not, but I hope there is…" She looked positively downcast, and Marceline knew that she had asked the wrong question.
Trying to defuse the situation, the vampire floated over to the television to make sure that the film was ready to go. She fiddled with the settings more than necessary, to try to give the other girl time to return to normal. As she had decided that all the knobs and buttons were tweaked to her standard, the two boys reentered the room, now discussing the advantages and disadvantages of something or another. It didn't pique Marceline's interest.
Finn settled in the chair next to FP, and Jake nabbed the couch for him and Lady. She had figured that this would be the seating arrangement, and had left the two most comfortable chairs on the far side of Finn for her and Bonnie.
Just as soon as she had finished thinking that, there were voices outside, and Bonnie and Lady walked into the house.