THUD.
The horseshoe bounced off the peg set in the ground, landing a couple of feet away from its target.
"Aw, breadballs!" Simon groaned. "How'd I manage to miss that one?"
"My turn!" Finn exclaimed, tossing his own horseshoe. The iron crescent sailed through the air, landing on the peg with a triumphant CLINK. "HA!" He crowed. "I'm just kicking all your butt at this game!"
Finn would normally have rolled his eyes at the idea of passing up further exploration of Uuu for the sake of passing the time playing a game of Horseshoe toss in Monster Castle's courtyard - or Centaurshoe Toss, as Simon had called it. Exploring probably wasn't a good idea while Simon's glasses were still being fitted with with new lenses, though, so Finn was content to wait. There was no rush, at least not now they'd delivered the parts that Bonnibel had needed to fully restore power to the castle's laboratory.
"Eh, I'm normally better than this," Simon replied, sizing up another throw as Finn added another tally mark to his side of the chalkboard. "I'm throwin' without my glasses here, remember?"
"Hey, I thought you said you only had trouble seeing up close without your glasses?" Finn said, squinting.
"I… lemme have my pride here, okay?" Simon replied, chuckling. "I need some reason to be off my game."
Finn was about to reply that maybe Simon wasn't off his game and that he was just better at it than him when they were interrupted by Jake's arrival.
"Okay, so I got us some lunch, but there's a problem," Jake said, holding up both arms, plus a third arm he had grown from his belly. Attached to the end of each arm was what appeared to be a disembodied maw of teeth, each clamped tight around Jake's hands. "I bought some fries for us, but they won't let go of my arms."
"Don't tell me," Simon laughed. "You tried to sneak some fries from our portions onto your own, right?"
"Just a couple." Jake said plaintively. "It's not like you guys would have even noticed them missing!"
"Yeah, well, the fry containers in the Monster Kingdom do notice," Simon replied, taking hold of one of the fry containers attached to Jake's arms with both hands. Pressing on both sides of the container, he pulled it free, the maw emitting a happy gurgle as it opened wide, revealing its tasty cargo. "Fry theft is serious biz in this city by royal decree."
"I'm betting Marceline's dad is to blame for that," Finn said as he accepted the offered fry container, sitting down in the grass.
"Mm-hmm," Simon replied as he detached the other two fry containers from Jake's arms. "I don't know if it happened just once or a bunch of times, but I guess it made an impression."
"Like the impression I made in O'Malley's face?" Finn asked, bisecting a fry with his teeth.
"Well, technically, you left bruises, but yeah," Simon said with a slight chortle, sitting down beside Finn.
"Speaking of that guy, why didn't you take your chance to clobber him for all the stuff he did? If he had a punching coming from anyone, it was you, but all you did was talk to him for a minute!"
"Eh, you guys clobbered every inch of him already," Simon replied, digging in his bag with one hand as he balanced his fries in the other. "Plus, there's easier ways to mess with someone..."
The rain stopped falling on his face. It wasn't a particularly welcome change, however - the cool water had been soothing his pummeled features.
"Oh, wowzers. Finn didn't leave one inch of you unpunched, did he?"
O'Malley cracked open one blackened eye to glare balefully at the figure holding an umbrella over him. He could barely see through the swelling, but he didn't need to see to know that voice. "Oh, 's you. Thought you'd wandered off while that other kid laid into me. I'm assumin' it's your turn on the punch train?"
"Actually, I just wanted to ask you about this before they drag you off to jail," Simon replied, kneeling down beside the waterlogged fist crater O'Malley was still lying in. In his umbrella-free arm, he was carrying a familiar book.
"My notebook? Look, if it's about that drawing, it was a slow day an' I was bored, okay?" O'Malley said.
"Actually, it's nothing to do with the criminal stuff," Simon said, flipping through the pages one-handedly. "I'm actually more interested in the amount of mayoral stuff in here."
"I had to do the actual job to keep my cover, is all." O'Malley shrugged, immediately wishing he hadn't as pain shot through every muscle used for shrugging.
"Oh, yeah, but you got WAY into this for a simple scam," Simon replied. "Look, you okayed several new parts of the junkyard for being turned into new houses, you had that system of fire-shield gems put in to protect the town from forest fires, and you had their well renovated so the townsfolk didn't have to filter all the rainbow filmy grossness from their water before drinking it. Why'd you go to all that hassle if you were just out to leech money off of them?"
"I had to drink that water too, genius," O'Malley snapped. "What's your point?"
"I'm just saying," Simon continued, "that you REALLY got into the whole 'benevolent mayor' thing. Like, it looks like it went way beyond a cover. Are you sure you weren't, oh, I dunno, enjoying getting positive attention for doing a good thing for once?"
There was a long pause.
"Are you tryin' to turn my own words back on me, boy?" O'Malley said.
"I'm just calling it like I see it, bro," Simon replied, standing up again. "Although if you want, you could call this a long-overdue wake-up call. Your choice."
Without waiting for O'Malley's response, he walked away.
"I'm pretty sure he just dismissed everything I said," Simon concluded, sprinkling salt from the pouch his bag on his fries, "but I wanted to at least try to get through to him, y'know?"
"He'll have plenty of time to think about it in jail," Jake replied through a full mouth.
"Yeah, hopefully," Simon said. "Unless he, like, installed some sort of escape route or backdoor in those cells or something, in case he got caught," he added, yawning. "In which case I'm gonna kick myself for not noticing something like that while I was down there."
Finn watched Simon blink hard several times, then rub his eyes. "Hey, are you okay?"
"Hm? Yeah, just… just kinda sleepy," Simon replied. "Haven't slept since we left the treehouse yesterday."
"Geez," Finn said. Considering all they'd been through since then, it was pretty impressive that he'd managed to stay awake. "Maybe you should grab a nap while your glasses get fixed."
"I'm fine, really!" Simon protested, digging in his bag again. "And anyway, I've gotta read through these." He pulled several aged-looking notebooks out of his bag. "The guys in Junkyard Town said I could have them. They found 'em in O'Malley's stuff- maybe he wrote down where he stashed Marceline's instruments in one of them."
Finn and Jake watched Simon squint as he flipped through the notebook for a few seconds. Jake was the first to speak up.
"You said you can't see close up things without your glasses, right? How can you read without them?"
Simon paused, a look of embarrassed realization crossing his features.
"Clamballs. How the heck could I forget something like that?!" he groaned, facepalming.
Finn chuckled, taking Simon by the arm as he stood up. "Because you're zonked out on no sleep, dude. C'mon, you'll adventure twice as hard after you get some rest."
"I think there was a free bed in that room we left Gunter in," Jake said. "They can be sleepy bros together if Simon takes a nap with him!"
"Yeah, but I don't..."
Simon weakly protested all the way into the castle and up to the door of the bedchamber in question. He didn't want to sleep- he'd gone much longer without sleep before just fine. Thanks to the rocky start they'd had, he had Bro Time with Finn to catch up on- Bro Time that could be cut short if Bonnibel's current theory about transdimensional bloat turned out to be valid(something she'd only just told him about on returning to the Monster Kingdom). Of course, the chance of that happening was pretty low, but if he could just tough out the waiting period to be absolutely sure...
As Finn opened the door to the bedchamber, they were greeted with a rare sight. A sight that convinced Simon that Gunter was subconsciously in cahoots with Finn and Jake.
"Woah. I didn't know Gunter could clone himself in his sleep!" Jake said, eyeing the pile of penguin clones, just as asleep as Gunter himself. "I think the clones sort of swallowed up the other bed, though… not sure where Simon's gonna sleep now."
"Sweet mother of Glob," Simon breathed, his eyes locked on the mound of plush, soft-feathered, sleeping clone bodies. "I think I have to take a nap now. Gunter hardly ever forms a penguin pile in his sleep, and it's the coziest nap spot in the known universe! I CANNOT RESIST THE PENGUIN PILE," Simon declared as he flopped down onto the pile.
"Wait, really?" Finn said, flopping down beside Simon. Immediately, a look of pure joy crossed his features. "Wooooaaaah, it's so comfy! It's like I'm lying on a sofa made of baby chicks! Except I'm pretty sure lying on baby chicks might hurt them."
"Even if they didn't, they'd probably mind a lot more than Gunter does…but that's still a pretty close comparison," Simon said as Jake joined them. "Man, this almost feels like an extra reward for getting through that whole mess in Junkyard Town, huh?"
"You probably saved up all your good luck for now," Jake said, squirming a little to get himself extra comfortable. "And you unleashed it at the best time of all- bro time. Now we all get to share the good times!"
Simon didn't respond. He stared ahead, his eyes glazed and half-open. Finn was about to ask him if he was okay when a soft noise emanated from his mouth.
He was snoring.
"Is he… aw, gross, don't tell me he falls asleep with his eyes open too!" Jake groaned. "It was creepy enough on Ice King!"
"Ice King does that too?" Finn said. Simon had mentioned falling asleep with his eyes open before in one of the letters- he'd claimed it happened sometimes when he was struggling to stay awake - but he couldn't recall Ice King ever doing it.
He reached over, gently closing Simon's eyes with two fingers. It was pretty creepy.
"You don't rememb- Oh, yeah, you were in that astral trance thing, huh?" Jake replied. "It happened when he used that freezing potion on us that on time."
"Oh yeah," Finn said. He was about to ask Jake if he remembered the fantastic and altogether interesting way they'd gotten themselves out of that situation when he was cut off by the door being flung open violently.
"My instruments detected a Gunter-clone pile! Am I too late to- aw, ding dong dangit!" Bonnibel stood in the doorway, breathing hard, with some sort of mini-computer clutched in one hand. "You guys got there first!"
"I think there's some room by the lamp if you wanna get in on this," Jake said, stretching an arm to point.
"It's not the same if I can't stretch out!" Bonnibel huffed. "At least I got all the repairs to the dimensport-box fixed in time for you guys coming back with the fuses. That was a total nightmare-scape of a situation," she added, sighing.
"Yeah, about that… me and Jake are gonna be staying for a couple days longer so we can hang out with Simon and Gunter. Are you cool with that?"
"Hm? Oh, sure!" Bonnibel replied, her focus more on the screen of the apparatus in her hands. "It'll give me a bit more time to-"
Suddenly- and without moving in the slightest- the room seemed to lurch. The movement was accompanied by a feeling of utter wrongness which encompassed the senses of everyone conscious. Without taking her eyes off the small screen, Bonnibel's expression changed from cheerfully focused to that of someone who had just realized that a Horrible Thing was occurring.
"Uh oh." Bonnibel dropped the mini-computer, grabbing Finn and Jake by the arms. "Change of plan, guys- you have to go back home. NOW."
"What?!" Finn exclaimed. He looked back at the still-sleeping Simon as Bonnibel dragged them out of the room and down the hallway. "But what about-"
"Nope no time c'mon let's go hurry your butts!" There was another motionless jerk to reality, stronger this time. "If we can reset the balance of mass before it's too late, the space-time gag reflex should dissipate!"
"Wait, space time what now?" Jake said. "You're talking like the universe is gonna barf or something!"
"Exactly," Bonnibel replied, pushing open the lab door. "Too much trans-universal mass accumulating in one place at once without expulsion of similarly-sized mass causes universal bloat- it's like when you drink too much soda."
"So... us being here is gonna make the universe burp?" Finn said. It didn't sound too awful.
"It's gonna burp you out through a black hole if you don't hurry!" Bonnibel retorted. "Along with the rest of Uuu!"
Finn paused. He didn't have a fourth-dimensional sword to deal with any possible black hole this time, and he doubted Simon did either.
As if for emphasis, the room spasmed without moving again.
"I... am gonna feel like such a jerk for not saying goodbye," Finn said.
"Pretty sure he'll understand," Bonnibel said, opening the door to the Dimensport-box. "Don't worry, I'll fill him in..."
When Simon woke, it was dark outside.
Cursing his sleepy body and brain, he half-sat up. "Finn, get your foot outta my side," he mumbled, rubbing his eyes.
"Huh? Oh, sorry, Simon," A voice- one that definitely did not belong to Finn- replied sleepily, as the foot in his side was removed.
Simon looked over to see a blurry pink-and-white figure sitting up in the pile of still-slumbering penguin clones beside him. "Oh, hey Bonnie." He should have known Bonnibel wouldn't have been able to resist a penguin pile-based nap. "Where'd Finn and Jake get to?"
"Oh, I sent them home hours ago!" Bonnibel replied. "By the way, I stopped Jumping Spider from shoving these up your nose while you slept," she added, handing Simon something small that he identified by touch as his glasses. "I guess the repair guys sent him to deliver them."
"Okay, but… did you seriously trick Finn and Jake into going back to their own universe so you could get more space on the penguin pile?!" Simon said, putting his glasses on. "Now I'll have to send a note telling them it was a false alarm so they'll come back and-"
"I didn't trick them!" Bonnibel protested, digging a handheld computing device from her labcoat pocket. "The whole universal bloat thing I told you about went down! Here, peep the data if you don't believe me!"
Simon's heart sank as he took the offered console from Bonnibel. The data displayed on-screen confirmed it- there indeed had almost been a universal bloat event, and not too long after he'd last checked his watch.
"Is… is there any chance I could send a note to Ooo to-"
"Not yet- can't risk sending anything solid back or forth for a while now. Otherwise we might end up causing the whole thing to happen agai-" Bonnibel was interrupted by an echoing crackle-BANG from somewhere above them. With a cry of "NOOOO, NOT MY BEES!", she leapt to her feet and sprinted out the door, leaving Simon with the mini-computer in the pile of penguin clones.
The noise had awoken somebody else. With a myriad of yawns, the Gunter clones all started shifting and blinking themselves awake as their master copy emerged from the center of the pile, rubbing his eyes.
"Blimey, I cloned in my sleep again?" Gunter said, looking around. "That hasn't happened in a while. Definitely didn't expect to do it with how tired I was..." Gunter then noticed that Simon wasn't listening. The human boy sat in the pile of clones, his chin resting despondently on his knees. "Simon?"
"Finn and Jake had to go back home," Simon replied, quiet.
"Oh, that's a shame," Gunter said. "Well, cheer up- I'm sure they'll come back for a visit when they get whatever they've got going on cleared up!"
Simon shook his head, closing his eyes. "They can't come back. Them being here nearly caused a black hole."
"What? But… they were here for almost two days! Surely if a black hole was gonna form, it'd have formed before now!"
Simon didn't respond. He didn't feel like going through the specifics- while he might have a basic understanding of things like 48-hour danger periods, cross-universal matter transferral and the full theory of transdimensional bloat, he simply wasn't in the mood to try and explain it to Gunter right now.
Right now, a single thought occupied his mind.
I didn't even get to say goodbye.
Two Weeks Later
Simon slouched in the oversized beanbag next to his reading space, flipping idly through his current reading material. It was taking him far longer than he had expected to get through O'Malley's notebooks. They hadn't seemed very big, sure, but the further he delved the more he found himself cross-referencing books on abbreviation and criminal terms to make sense of things. It was hard making progress in deciphering the more hastily-jotted pages when you were unsure if the author's references to "bread" meant money stolen from a bakery or actual bread.
Of course, it didn't help that the notebooks were a reminder of those two wild days with Finn. It seemed like every other passage he read reminded him of the other boy, whether it was a reference to a place Finn had mentioned as the site of one of his adventures in one of his original letters, or some comment of O'Malley's that Simon could just picture Finn's response to.
It also didn't help that the content of the notebooks often felt like being stuck in a room with O'Malley. No matter how hard Simon tried, he couldn't separate the words on the page from the old dog's voice, and depending on the section it made reading the notebooks anywhere from slightly unsettling to downright emotionally exhausting. Especially when Simon came across a reference to himself, which had happened a couple of times already.)
"So did you get to the bit where Dumbledore dies yet?" said a voice from above him.
Simon snapped the notebook shut, irritated that he hadn't noticed the other presence in the room until it had spoken. Sure enough, when he looked up he saw Finn-Ice perched on top of the bookcase.
"Finn-Ice, did you break the front door down just to try and spoil a book I've read like ten times already since I was eight?" Simon said, frowning. "We just got the door fixed last week!"
"Naw, I didn't break the door down!" Finn-Ice grinned. "I broke a window."
"That's just as bad!" Simon gritted through clenched teeth. Finn-Ice's presence was not what Simon needed right now. He sounded similar enough to Finn to make Simon almost guilty for getting angry at the Ice Prince for breaking his window. "Doors, windows, it doesn't matter- Vandalism is wrong."
"Well, geez, who peed in your snow?" Finn-Ice retorted, huffing. "I oughta just take this letter back to Bonnibel and say you weren't in!"
"Wait, letter?"
"And then, when you're walking all the way to her lab, I'm gonna make it snow all the way there," Finn-Ice continued. " And I'll block the roads so you have to walk uphill both ways, and-"
Simon sighed. "Or you could just tell me what's up with this letter biz."
"Oh, that?" Finn Ice replied, having seemingly forgotten what had inspired his plan to annoy Simon with snow in the first place. He dug about in his tunic front with his non-ice arm, producing a thick envelope he'd apparently been keeping in there. "Yeah, Bonnibel gave me this letter and told me to deliver it to you- At least, I think it's for you. They spelled your name all sorts of wrong, but I don't know any other big nerds!" Finn-Ice giggled, handing the envelope to a suddenly very wide-eyed Simon.
Sure enough, the writing on the envelope confirmed Simon's most fervent hopes:
To Professor Coldstone (The Big Nerd!)
Simon looked up at Finn-Ice.
"I'll let you completely empty the cookie jar in the kitchen if you don't bug me while I'm reading this," he said.
A look of utter, unadulterated glee crossed Finn-Ice's face. He mimed zipping his mouth shut, then, with a contradictory cry of "COME TO MY MOUTH, COOKIES," he stampeded off in the direction of the kitchen.
As carefully as he could with trembling hands, Simon tore open the heavy envelope and let the contents slide into his lap- a letter, something small giftwrapped with altogether too much tape, a handful of photographs, and a second envelope, sealed with a glittery, rainbow-winged cat sticker that looked suspiciously like it might also be glow in the dark.
Simon started with the letter.
Hey, Simon!
I'm sorry me and Jake had to bail on you like that - your PB said that if we didn't leave for home right away, the universe was gonna puke all of Uuu out through a black hole or something like that. I woulda woken you up to say goodbye, but you really needed to sleep, dude! Sleep's good for your bod and your brain!
Speaking of PB, our PB was kinda mad that we blew out all the power in the lab without fixing everything, but we're cool now, I think. She says it'll be safe to send letters and small packages again soon, so I'm gonna write this now so I can send one right away! Oh, and she says we can only visit each other when there's something or someone being sent over on the other end to balance us out, but I dunno if she's gonna do anything like that soon, so I guess we're back to writing to each other until then! (Keep ahold of that basilisk head, though! Maybe when you get a chance to visit, you can bag a sweet trophy too, and then we can swap them over!)
Not much else is going on over here- Lumpy Space Princess says she met the most beautiful girl in the world, whatever that means. BMO says he'd like a copy of that detective game Football has, but the weird thing is, neither of us mentioned the game to him! Weird, huh?
Speaking of sending stuff over, what was in that sandwich you made me for our trip to Junkyard Town? That was mad tasty, yo.
"Tell BMO I will trade him for a copy of Compy's Castle," a voice next to Simon's ear said.
Simon looked over to the robot perched lightly on his shoulder, folding the letter shut so she couldn't read any further. "Football, don't read over people's shoulders," he said with feigned annoyance. Really, he was having trouble feeling much negativity through the barrage of good feelings the letter had given him. "Although ten out of ten on the stealth- I didn't see you there till you spoke."
"That's because I am a deadly killing machine," Football declared cheerfully, hopping from Simon's shoulder and trotting off.
Simon watched her leave, idly wondering what "Compy's Castle" was before returning to the letter. The rest of the letter was written with a different pen.
Okay, so I couldn't think of what to write next for two whole days and I was about to just tell you about your present and sign out, but then I remembered that you hadn't seen anyone from Ooo, right? So I grabbed my camera and went around taking some photos!
Assuming this was a cue to look at them, Simon picked up the photographs and shuffled through. The people within looked so familiar, and yet so weird- a crownless Marceline, jamming out in what looked like the cave Bonnibel lived in. Bonnibel in a crown and regal gown, surrounded by a group of candy people (was it just Simon's imagination, or did that cinnamon bun man have a similar expression to Jumping Spider?). Jake surrounded by a group of fully grown half-dog, half rainicorns, with "Me and my pupsters!" written on the photo border. A female fire elemental in a dress of finest ember-silk, waving to the camera and smiling. A Lumpy Space Princess that… looked exactly like the Lumpy Space Princess he knew.
Noting that someone of particular interest to him was missing from the photos, he turned his attention back to the letter.
If you've looked at the photos, you probably noticed someone was missing. Well, I kinda wound up telling Ice King there was someone from an alternate universe who wanted to see what he looked like, and he wound up writing you a letter of his own!
The present's actually from both of us- I only had a basic set, but he wound up digging around in his basement and giving me a bunch more of them to fill the rest of the spaces up! Hopefully we didn't miss anything out!
Write back soon, ok?
-Finn
Simon rolled his eyes, still smiling as he picked at the tape holding the package together. eventually, he managed to get enough tape off to tear at the paper properly, pulling the wrappings back to reveal the contents.
Within was a small leather wallet of a very familiar style to Simon. Sure enough, opening it, he was greeted with a set of lockpicks, quite similar to his original set. What took his breath away, though, was the number of picks that he'd either never seen before, or, in the case of the smooth, three-peaked, zigzagging rake, seen a few times in books but never managed to replicate on his own.
He tucked the wallet into its new home in his waistcoat before finally turning his attention to the second envelope. Peeling off the sparkly sticker, he opened it, finding within a second letter, some more photographs, and a makeshift booklet created from notepad paper carefully stapled together.
One glance at the front page of the booklet- emblazoned with a drawing of a girl with a rabbit hat and her cat, with the title "FIONNA AND CAKE - FULL ICE CONSEQUENCES" above it- informed Simon that he simply wasn't going to be able to resist annotating the story with spelling corrections and suggested improvements and sending it back for Ice King to edit. He put the booklet aside, redirecting his focus to the letter.
Greetings, transdimensional dork of impeccable taste who wants to hear about me!
Actually, from what Finn said, you know pretty much everything you need to, and I've got some questions I gotta ask:
1. Are there any hot princesses in the negaverse? I heard you snagged a real cutie. I ain't gonna kidnap her, don't worry, I was just wondering if there are any other single hot princesses hangin' about.
2. Is Finn pulling my leg about nega-him ruling the ice kingdom? What happened to negaverse me? Is he as awesome as I am?
3. How's negaverse Marceline? We should get them together and have them do a jam-off. It'd be awesome, right?
4. Is there a wrong way to eat a banana? Seriously, I've checked the internet but I can't find a clear answer. You're my last hope here, bro!
5. Finn says Gunter sounds like a tooth fairy in the negaverse. What does a tooth fairy even sound like? Is he trying to say Gunter TALKS in the negaverse? Man, that'd be weird. I get enough back-talk from Gunter as it is!
6. Most importantly… why did Princess Bubblegum make a portal to your universe and not the universe with Fionna and Cake in it? Seriously, what gives?!
Finn says you're a really smart nerdy type, so hopefully you can answer these questions. You'll probably be able to pick up how great I am from the photos, too. I even threw a really cute one of Gunter!
Write me back, okay?
-Ice King
P.S.: Why isn't Princess Bubblegum a princess in the negaverse? Or did she just say that to avoid me? That was weird, man!
Simon didn't quite know what to make of the letter yet, other than catching some similarities to Finn-Ice's speech in the way it was written. Pushing it out of his mind, he switched his attention to the photographs, the top photo of a penguin that looked very much like Gunter, albeit without the spark of full sentience in its eyes.
Flipping past that, he found… Oh, wow. WOW. and… is he using it to FLY?!
"Simon, Finn-Ice is eating all the cookies in the kitchen and he said you told him he could," Gunter said as he entered the room. "Did you really tell him that, or is he just lying again?"
"I spoke no lies, you butt!" Finn-Ice yelled from the kitchen. "Simon, tell him!"
Simon shrugged, trying his very best to hold back the impending grin. "Yeah, he's telling the truth." He handed Gunter the photographs. "By the way, check out these photographs Finn sent me!"
"Oh, good, you heard back from Finn!" Gunter said, flipping through the photos. "You've been worrying me with how depressed you've been these past two… weeks…" Gunter trailed off as he realized just what the photos contained.
"That's… oh, blimey, you could knit a full-length coat from that thing!" Gunter exclaimed.
"So," Simon said, fully grinning from ear to ear now, "that counts on our bet, right?"
"I think so," Gunter said, handing the photos back to Simon. "To be honest, I'm so impressed by that beard I'm tempted to give you a week of breakfasts in bed."
Simon tucked the photos back into the envelope they'd came in, along with Ice King's letter. Doing the same with Finn's letter, he gathered everything up and rushed over to the writing desk by the window. He figured now was as good a time as any to start writing back, and hey, he might as well write a reply to his his Ooo counterpart while he was there. Even if Ice King would probably get angry at him for critiquing his fanfiction, or at least he would if Finn-Ice's reaction to the same was any indication.
He could hear Finn-Ice bickering with Gunter in the other room over whether or not all the leftovers in the fridge counted as cookies, but for once it didn't bother him. Putting pen to paper, he began to write.
He didn't want to keep his pen-pal waiting, after all.
END