Chapter 4 'the Decision'
Mac got out of the house easy enough. He had tied his bed sheets together to make a rope, and then he ran. He ran to the wooded lot not too far from his building. He sat at the base of the innermost oak, where he promptly put his head between his knees to calm down.
The cool night was soothing his pounding head. Not too far away, his neighbor's imaginary friend was being his usual stupid self.
"GOTTAGOGOTTAGOGOTTAGOGOTTAGOGOTTAGO…" Cheese was the stupidest imaginary friend that Mac knew. Running in circles, he did look pretty comical.
Suddenly, a small hand touched his shoulder. Mac jumped. It looked like the same creature that had been out the bathroom window.
The word came back to him. Fairy…
"Could you help me?" the creature asked.
"What," Mac was a little scared. "I…I don't-"
"Please!" the creature didn't look threatening; she looked positively harmless, actually. "I don't know who I am. There was an explosion, and-" She cut off, lost for words. Her voice was small, abnormal, as if human wasn't her first language.
"Come with me." Mac could think of only one thing to do. And that was to go to Foster's, and turn her in as a friend.
"FRANKIE!!!" Mac called as soon as he entered through the door.
"GOTTAGOGOTTAGOGOTTAGOGOTTAGO…" Cheese had followed them all the way there. His obliviousness was actually kind of comforting.
"What do we have here?" Mr. Harriman came out of his office that was to the right of the big double doors.
"I found her out in the Oak by my house. She doesn't remember much, just an explosion." Mac was always a little nervous when he talked to the chairman of the house, so he said this looking at the floor.
"A good specimen indeed," said the giant imaginary friend who had been imagined by the founder of the house when she was a little girl. "I think she'll…Good grief, Master Mac, what happened to your face?!"
"Wha-" he hadn't looked at himself in a mirror before he had left. He knew his eye was swelling, but he didn't know how the rest of his face looked.
"Hey, what's happening guys, I…Mac, your face!?" Frankie walked in from the kitchen door. She was still wiping her hands off with a dish towel when she had notices the unsightliness on Mac's face. "What happened? Mac it looks like you've been put through a shredder!"
He touched his face. "Nothing, but…"
"Frankie, you always overreact to trivial things," Bloo said coming down the stairs, "He's fine, silly, why do you always-YIPES!!" Bloo saw Mac's face at that moment. "What have you done with Mac, you hideous beast? Go back to the void from whence ye came!!"
"BLOO, it's me!"
"But, your face…"
"...Is hideous, I know, but there are more serious matters than my ugliness right now!"
Frankie noticed the little person standing behind Mac then. "Oh, my gosh!"
"I know, as I was saying, quite a good specimen indeed." Mr. Harriman didn't like being cut off in the middle of one of his evaluations.
"Specimen," Frankie was confused, and suddenly comprehension, followed by anger flashed across her face.
"Mr. Harriman, could I have a private word with you in your office." Fake sweetness was laced in Frankie's voice.
"But, see here,"
"Now, rabbit!" Annoyance was quite clear on her face.
Frankie grabbed Mr. Harriman by his ear, and dragged him off to his office.
In Mr. Harriman's office Frankie and Mr. Harriman were discussing what to do with the small newcomer.
"I think we should put her up for adoption immediately!" Mr. Harriman always took the 'practical' side, as he saw it.
"Are you crazy? She's not a friend; she's a fairy, stupid. You know the rules! We can't expose the fairy world to the human world! That would cause a cross-species war!"
"Miss Francis, I'm quite sure I know the rules, and I'm also quite sure that she is not a fairy! She would have told us, or more likely, stayed out of Master Mac's way!"
"You heard what Mac said! All she can remember is an explosion! That's probably the one Bloo caused earlier! Remember the Windex©? She was probably shielded, but the explosion caused her to forget everything and become visible again!"
(What Frankie was talking about, shielding, it's from "Artemis Fowl". It's where a fairy vibrates at such a high frequency, that the naked eye can't pin down exactly where the fairy is)
"Miss Francis, you have the biggest imagination I have ever seen!"
"Ask my grandma, she'll know. But until we find out, we are NOT going to put her up for adoption, and that's final!" She stomped out into the main foyer where Bloo and Mac were talking to...Frankie realized that she hadn't even asked the creature her name.
"...And that's how Bloo came to stay here at Foster's." Mac was finishing up his story with a bag of frozen peas on his face. Wilt was standing near them. He had helped Bloo and Mac tell the assumed fairy the story.
"Well, Frankie," Wilt had noticed she was there, "I'm sorry, but is it ok if we give our little friend here the Foster's tour?"
"Of course it's ok, Wilt," she smiled at the little figure sitting in the armchair by the stairs. "She can have the room right next to yours that just opened up."
"Okay! Well, you're pretty acquainted with the main hall, so, let's go look at the rest of the house. It's a pretty amazing, and confusing place. I guarantee you'll get lost more than once..." Wilt's voice trailed off as he led the girl off towards the dining hall.
"So, Mac, what DID happen to you?" Now that the newcomer was taken care of for the moment, she had time to worry about the kid who was like her little brother.
"Yeah, Mac," Bloo said a little shakily, "Why does your face look like mince meat?"
"Terrance's buddies got bored, and needed someone to pound on. Since I was so convenient, I was the obvious choice." Mac wasn't about to release all the details of his night. "How bad do I look?"
"Let's go up to the bathroom and get the blood off your face, and so you can evaluate the damage." Frankie was resigned to let him withhold any details he saw fit to. She knew he would open up to her sooner or later.
Bloo, on the other hand, wasn't going to let Mac go without relinquishing the juicy details. "No, seriously Mac, what happened? Was it a gala-"
"No, Bloo, it wasn't a Galactic Overlord! It was just Terrance and his stupid friends.
Bloo decided, like Frankie, to let it go for the moment, but Mac was in for a good pestering tomorrow.
A/n: He, he! Galactic Overlord!