Sorry this update took a while. I've kind of got a lot going on right now, and to be honest, I'm not terribly inspired to finish this particular story. But finish it I shall, just bear with me. ^_^
The Ice King's maniacal laughter echoed around Marceline's head as she flew from the Ice Kingdom as fast as she could. Fate could be horribly cruel, Marceline realised as she flew. She knew that nothing short of Simon biting the dust would ever make her accept that he was gone, so it was ironic really, that both of them were immortal. Marceline shuddered at the concept of the Ice King haunting her for all of eternity. She was bound to put a stake in her own heart after a millennium or two…
Once the Ice Kingdom was completely out of sight, Marceline slowed down and studied the electricity bill Gunter had given her. The address didn't make any sense to her, she had never even heard of most of the places it listed. She vaguely recognised the name of the city, from Simon mentioning it a couple of times back in the day, but that hardly helped her. Of course, Bubblegum would undoubtedly have the equipment to track down the address in seconds, but obviously, that wasn't an option.
Marceline frowned. Was she making this way too difficult on herself? Maybe she really should just apologise to Bubblegum. Then, if she didn't forgive her, she could help her out with finding the Enchiridion. Marceline considered it for a minute, but at the end of the day, it just wasn't her style. Besides, Marceline had a tonne of reasons to track down the Enchiridion for herself. If Simon had recovered it, it must have been wicked cool, plus, she loved the idea of seeing Simon's old home. She had asked him about it when she was a child, and he had said that he would show her if they ever found themselves in the city where he had lived, but they never did.
Marceline sighed, it was a lot of trouble she was going through, just to avoid saying 'I'm sorry', but she had always been more comfortable saying things with actions than words, anyway. Besides, with vampires more or less extinct, Marceline was in need of a new adventure.
Redirecting her attention to the problem at hand, Marceline began to race through everyone she knew and the resources at their disposal. There was still Simon, but even if he wasn't a sociopathic child with the attention span of a twig, locating addresses wasn't amongst of the crown's handful of non ice-related powers. Plus, there was the whole 'I never want to see you again!' issue. She could always sneak into Bubblegum's lab and hypnotise someone into helping her again, but using Bubblegum's equipment kind of defied the point of Marceline making up with her. Also, she'd already risked getting caught sneaking around PB's lab once, she wasn't crazy about doing it again.
Marceline floated down underneath a tree, sat cross-legged in the air and pouted irritably. All that left was Ash, and if he was going to be helpful with this, then… well… it would be a first for Ash. If anything, he wouldn't rest until he'd sabotaged any relationship she might have with Bubblegum. Even if he wasn't too dense to see that his relationship with Marceline was as good as dead, he certainly wasn't above spite and petty revenge.
Marceline sighed. She dearly wished she had never agreed to go out with Ash. He had brought her nothing but grief. As she dwelled on him, a sudden lightning bolt of realisation hit her. Ash's address book! How had she not thought of that until now? Ash kept track of his roaming, partying friends by writing their names in a magic address book, which would then lead him to them. There was every chance that, with the address, it would lead her to Simon's apartment… what was left of it, anyway.
Ash slouched on the couch in his house, watching TV. He was still recovering from the previous day's party. After he had watched Marceline flee from Bubblegum's bedroom, he had smugly convinced himself that he had scared Marceline away from her. Although he was, in fact, far too dense to notice that he was dead to Marceline and firmly believed that she was still into him, he was irritated by how little he had seen her since she found the Candy Kingdom.
Suddenly, the door flew open and Marceline floated across the room and into Ash's bedroom, without a word.
"Hey Mar-Mar, wait up!" He called, scrambling to his feet. "You've hardly been here lately! This morning I had to make my own breakfast!" He complained, sounding like Marceline had massacred his family.
"Shut up Ash, I'm busy…" Marceline muttered, opening up one of Ash's bags and tipping out the contents.
"Hey! What are you doing?" Ash protested.
Marceline rounded on him. "Ash, I need your address book. Where is it?"
"What? You can't have it…" He said, decisively. But for a split second, his eyes flicked over to a rotten chest of draws in the corner of the room, telling Marceline everything she wanted to know.
Marceline flew over to the chest of draws and retrieved the book, seconds later, but as soon as she did, it vanished into thin air. Ash reached up and snatched the book as it rematerialized in front of him.
"Babe, you don't need my address book! It's almost lunchtime! You can find the kitchen without it!"
Boiling with rage, Marceline shot forwards and punched Ash as hard as she could. Ash was unconscious before Marceline's fist even disconnected with his face. She caught the book before it hit the ground and left Ash to collapse where he stood.
"Jerk…" She muttered to him.
Marceline swore to herself that the next conversation she had with him would be her dumping his chauvinistic butt. And she would have that conversation just as soon as she found the Enchiridion. That probably wasn't stalling for time, Marceline reasoned. She did punch pretty hard after all, so Ash would probably be out for a while.
She pulled the electricity bill out of her pocket, opened the book to a fresh page and began to write out Simon's old address. Once it was down, Marceline looked around expectantly. After a couple of seconds, she patted the back of the book, like a TV remote with loose batteries. She opened the book to Simon's address. After a nervous glance left and right, she tapped the page a few times.
"Erm… this one?" She asked the book, uncertainly.
Suddenly, the book was enveloped with golden light, and a tiny, golden thread shot from it, though Ash's living room and out his front door. Marceline followed it through the house and looked out of the door, to see the beam arching off over the horizon.
"Oh…" Marceline mumbled. "That'll do…"
