Tiger: It's been a while, hasn't it?

Mary-Sue: Indeed it has, with all of your side projects going on you seem to have lost sight on the important ones.

Tiger: That's over now though, because now I can go back to writing Domino Effect.

Mary-Sue: Wait, I thought you were talking about the romance where I fall in love with Cody or Bailey and live happily ever after.

Tiger: I've already done that, and I'm sure my readers are eagerly awaiting the fall out of that last big surprise.

Mary-Sue: I suppose you have a point, but with all this adventure going on, why don't we slow things down a bit and do an in-depth study of the interpersonal relationships that blossom in this mist of this chaos.

Tiger: This can't end well. Gary, come to the disclaimer before your sister completely ruins this story.

Gary-Sue: Warning, the author cannot be held liable if reading this in public causes you to randomly burst out in laughter, which may attract strange people wanting to start a business along with random stares. In addition, the author cannot be held responsible for what will happen to any food or drinks you choose to consume while reading.

Mary-Sue: On with the romance!

Tiger: I guess this means this will take place in the world of Domino Effect after chapter 10 and will show the characters in ways that may not be accurate. This can't end well…

Chapter 4: Broken Hearts and Broken Fourth Walls

February 10th 2010 6:45pm

It had been two days since the horrible monsters had attacked the ship, and for the teens that had fought off the assault, they would never be the same again. Fortunately, the twins had their powers, which allowed them to survive the attack, but they couldn't have done it alone. The powerful elemental Altinia came just in time to stop the enemy leader once the twins were pushed to their limit. She also brought two dimensionals who had the power to heal the wounded.

With all the chaos of the battles and death, it seemed like things would never return to normal. Cody sat in the classroom, studying, not caring that class was canceled after the horrific battle. He just wanted something normal to get his mind off all the death and the history of the renaissance was just the thing. He didn't even notice the door opening behind him.

"I wondered where I'd find you," a soft voice said breaking him out of his studying induced trance.

"Hey Bailey, how are you doing?" he said as a warm smile spread across his face.

"Not bad I guess, I just thought you'd like to go to dinner since you've been in here for two hours."

"Sure, I could use a break," he said putting the textbook away and joining her. Their walk seemed surprisingly serene considering the stench of death still cast a grim shadow over the ship.

Once they reached the ship's restaurant, they began talking over a dinner of shrimp, cabosh, and several other foods that Bailey didn't know were even edible, but she was soon amazed by the taste. The two got to know each other, and Cody was captivated by her intelligence. This had been the only first date he had been on where they had been able to talk about quantum mechanics and the Taylor theory without her jumping out the window. It was as if they would make the perfect couple.

After dinner, they took a walk on the moonlit sky deck, surrounded by beautiful music that came from the grand piano that seemed to randomly appear on the ship. "Where did that come from?" Bailey asked.

"It's likely that the author decided this scene needed some romantic music," Cody answered logically.

"Then why is it playing Kamelot's Soul Society?"

"Because the author has no idea how to write romance so just picked the first song that came to mind," Cody answered, having a surprising insight of the random way the author worked. This was also the reason why he wasn't surprised that refrigerators were randomly falling from the sky and into the ocean.

"Regardless of the fact that a piano would normally be unable to play a power metal song like that, I had a wonderful time tonight."

"Me too," he said as she wrapped her arms around his neck. "We should do this again soon."

"Yeah." At this, he had begun to lose his voice, captivated by her eyes. The embraced in a gentle kiss before breaking apart and heading to their respective rooms. With this somewhat lame ending to a romantic night, we soon travel elsewhere on the ship.

After many hours of despair at seeing her students taken from her in the horrible attack, Emma Tutwiler's phone began ringing. Once she saw the name on the caller id, she ecstatically answered it.

"Hi boyfriend." Just hearing his voice made any sadness from the day fade.

"Yeah, I'm okay, but a lot of people were hurt badly," she said just glad to here a calm voice. However, the news he gave her completely devastated her. "What do you mean you're breaking up with me!" After an explanation of how hot his new girl friend was and that long distance relationships were too much, she slammed her fist into her coffee table, breaking it and scaring some of her cats while letting loose a blood curling scream.

At that very moment, Altinia was patrolling her deck, her bow ready to take down any monsters that would threaten the safety of the passengers. Hearing Emma's scream, she ran forward, and burst into the teacher's room, literally knocking the door off the hinges. She scanned the room, looking for the beast, but was instead greeted by the meowing of cats.

The elemental that looked just like Angelina Jolie felt all her rage leave her as she bent down to pick up one of the cats and gently stroked its fur.

"Can I help you?" Emma nervously asked the strange person.

It was then that Altinia remembered what she was doing here and (literally) tossed the cat aside before once again looking for anything dangerous. "There aren't any monsters here," she said trying to analyze the situation, "Why were you screaming then?"

"Oh, my idiot boyfriend just broke up with me for a girl with bigger boobs. Men are such idiots."

"Tell me about it," Altinia said shaking her head and sitting on the coach beside the teacher.

"What happened with you?"

"Oh, my husband just turned into a homicidal maniac that wanted to wipe out humanity, nothing major though."

"Wow, that must have been hard you on," Emma said putting a comforting hand around the other women's shoulder.

"It is," Altinia said letting a few tears fall. Normally she would never open up to a stranger, but for the sake of the plot, some things need to be changed.

"Well I'm here for you, if you ever want to talk about it," she said sympathetically.

"Thanks," Altinia said, glad that she had at least someone for emotional support

Gary-Stu: What, not even a kiss, I thought you were going to turn that into a hot passionate love scene.

Tiger: Well I was, but this seemed to be the only way to have it still have some resemblance of believability.

Mary-Sue: Yeah, listen to Tiger, he's such a brilliant author, he obviously knows what he's doing

Tiger: You just want me to get the part with the hot guys, don't you?"

Mary-Sue: *Nods head*

Gary-Stu: All you have to do is chalk everything up as the wild uncontrollable emotions of love, like this:

And the feelings of friendship burst into something more, as Altinia grabbed Emma's face before mashing their lips together. Emma was shocked to say the least, but she found the other women a better kisser than any of her previous boyfriends, so they decided to continue giving it to their spontaneous lustful desires

Soon they began aggressively exploring the other's bodies, taking in the divinely sculpted curves. In the incredible sensation, none of them cared that they had known each other for more then a few minutes or the fact that they hadn't even considered a same sex relationship moments ago. All that they knew was that it felt right, what ever that meant.

Realizing the couch wasn't the best place for this, Altinia gently lifted Emma and carried her to the bed where soon clothes and any remaining inhabitations were discarded and they took several cues from the previous chapter.

Mary-Sue: Happy now?

Gary-Stu: *Nods head*

Mary-Sue: Okay now that we have several happy couples, things can't just end that easily. Let's throw some more drama into this

The two brothers, Adian and Peter sat in their room, trying to rest from the busy day. After coming aboard the ship two days ago with Altinia, they used their powers to heal as many people as they could. It wasn't an easy task for the two teens, but they saved a number of lives. However, exhaustion was far from the last thing on the older brother's mind as he got up and paced around the room for what seemed like the seventh time in the past half hour.

"Dude, what's up?" Adian asked, looking up from his comic book.

"It's nothing," Peter said sitting back down on the bed and hastily gazing up at the ceiling.

"You like a guy don't you?" Adian asked knowing how his brother's mind worked.

"Yes," he said turning over and burying his face in the pillow. "Why does Cody have to be so hot?" he mumbled so Adian could hardly hear.

"Give it a shot then," Adian said placing his hand on Peter's shoulder to encourage him. "What's the worst that could happen?"

"You remember the Cole incident?" Peter said remembering the first time he told his secret to anyone other than his brother and how badly that ended up.

"Hey, I'm sure that won't happen here. Besides, I doubt he could say no after you healed him."

"You might be right," Peter said with a small smile before sitting up on his bed.

"Aren't I always? Go give it a try," Adian said.

"You're right, I will," Peter said marching out of his room before his fear could stop him.

Cody was walking back to his room after enjoying his date with Bailey, but was stopped by Peter when he got off the elevator.

"Hey Cody, do you have a minute," Peter asked, hoping his resolve would hold out long enough for him to tell Cody how he felt.

"Sure, what's going on?"

"Cody, I'm not sure quite how to tell you this but..." Peter looked to the ground, feeling his voice suddenly leaving him. His heart felt like it was about to jump into his throat and strangle him.

"What is it?"

"I love you," Peter blurted out before he could think about it anymore.

Cody looked at him in shock, never before had he had a guy say that he loved him. He hadn't even considered guys as a romantic option, but he couldn't deny that Peter was quite attractive with his sandy blond hair and crystal blue eyes. Even so, he couldn't ignore the fact that he'd just gone out with Bailey.

"I know, you probably think I'm just a sick fag," Peter said walking away, but was quickly stopped by Cody placing his hand on his shoulder.

"No, it's not that; I was just surprised."

"I guess I can't blame you." After all, having someone randomly proclaim their love for you is something that doesn't happen everyday.

And just like in any story that involves confessions of love, their eyes locked, and before they knew it, their lips were growing closer together. They weren't sure who initiated it, but before they knew it, they were kissing and wrapping their arms around each other. Soon Cody broke away, not sure of what he had done, but he knew he liked it.

"Sorry, I have to go," Cody said breaking from Peter's arms.

"You're not mad, are you?" Peter nervously asked.

"Not at all," Cody said with a grin before turning and running a different direction, a thousand thoughts running through his mind.

Mary-Sue: And just because this story isn't complicated enough, let's add another subplot that won't have any real impact on the story!

Tiger: I blame you for my slow updates…

"Stupid thingy!" London said kicking her desk that she had tried to reassemble after it was destroyed in the battle with the zombies. Moseby had all of the maintenance workers taking care of the major damage, so she had to actually do some fixing herself. After figuring out which end of the screwdriver to use and that you didn't need one with a nail, she finally had it put together, except for the fact that she was missing one of the legs and looked (un)surprisingly unstable.

"Is something wrong?" Aaron asked after hearing her outburst.

"I just can't get this table to work. You're a guy, you fix it," she said handing the tools to the other teen.

"Um, okay," he said as he began to examine her attempt at fixing things. He had heard stories that London was not the sharpest tool in the shed, so her failure didn't surprise him but he had to laugh at her attempt.

"Looks like I'll need a saw, and a few nails and a two by four and I should be able to salvage it.

Instantly London pulled out her phone and called the ship's storage. "Hello, I need nails, a saw, and a two by four, what ever those mean…How long I'll need them; I'd say a while, since I'm building a desk with it." She got off the phone and looked to Aaron who was stifling a laugh.

"What's so funny?"

"Oh nothing," he said, before going back to work in disassembling the desk.

Once the supplies arrived, Aaron got to work doing what he loved while London assisted and admired how the deft movements of his hands could build something so fluidly. It was amazing to her how some people were gifted with a mind that could analyze how things went together and how they could use their hands bring the images in their minds to life.

"Almost there," Aaron said as he attached the last leg to the table, before wiping the sweet off his brow.

"Awesome," she said, noticing the sweat adding a glistening glow to his face. That combined with his short brown hair, ocean blue eyes and cheerful smile was an image of perfection. And as we all know, attraction instantly equals happily ever after. "Kiss me," she ordered, to which he didn't have any objections.

An omnipresent aww could be heard as we move back to Cody.

Mary-Sue: I just came up with a great idea!

Tiger: Unless it has something to do with them not ending filming of SLOD this week, I don't think I'm interested.

Mary-Sue: Actually, it has come to my attencion thanks to a certain im that the show may not be ending after all.

Tiger: Is that even possible?

Mary-Sue: According to the article, "She was just expressing her sadness that the 3rd season is over to her fans it was not intended to say anything about the future of the show."

Tiger: So there is still hope for more after all, though I question the validity of the article...

Mary-Sue: But back to my original idea, let's split this chapter into two so we get even more reviews from our wonderful fans

Tiger: I like that idea, considering there wasn't as much random comedy in this part, but it will be in the next chapter.

Mary-Sue: So please review, since more reviews mean faster updates!