Hello, everyone! I'm back again with another chapter of this AU! This is a two-parter, because we had such a grand idea that it would be a huge chapter if it were just one part. It could actually be two chapters: Marco's plot, and Janna's, but eh. I like writing both. The second half is in the works - and if you feel like "man, that just cut off real suddenly!" than it's because it did, it's literally smack in the center of the chapter.

More notes at the bottom, as usual. As always, thanks to SirKyleLenn for helping me. Enjoy.

To be a surgeon, it usually takes over a decade to complete the base education requirements. You have to complete four years of undergraduate school, four years of medical school, and anywhere between three and ten years of training. Suffice to say, high-school student and resident "safe-kid" Marco Diaz was not qualified to perform advanced surgery in any context.

"Alright, just a little to the left, and…" Marco muttered, wiping his brow with his free hand as he was arm-deep in the subject. His sleeves were rolled up, and his lack of gloves ensured that he could feel every nook and cranny - every mushy bit of day-old food, every stray mote of skin. Lacking both the proper equipment and the experience, his situation was made that much more grim.

"Just a little further…" He could feel his fingertips brush against the obstruction. Now was the critical moment, one wrong move and it could be lost forever. Marco mentally prepared himself, as this next action would spell either the success, or the failure of the whole operation. He held his breath, and-

"What are you doing?" A voice right beside him asked. Luckily, he was able to keep his composure and-

"Are you fishing for the remote or something?" Janna asked as she leaned over to look, bumping his arm in the process. With that, said remote plummeted into the abyss. Taking in a deep breath, Marco reeled his arm out of the recliner, and turned to face her.

"I was." He stated blankly, giving up on ever seeing that remote again. "It's… gone forever." He was silent for a moment before finally addressing her. "Well, what do you want?"

"So you're not gonna ask me how I got in?" She frowned, clearly expecting a bigger reaction.

"Well considering that you break in here at least once a week, no." He replied in an almost bored fashion. "And can I have my keys back? I had to climb through the window again."

"Yeah, fine." She tossed him the keys and crossed her arms. It was obvious it was time for her to step up her game, judging by the lack of angry sputtering and rants. "You'd think you would have made a spare set by now though."

"I did, they're in your room." He smirked. "And you call me the creep."

"Oh I totally am, but the difference between you and me, Diaz, is that I don't try to hide it."

"But I… You… ugh." He scoffed and rolled his eyes, not having anything to swing back with. "What do you want?"

Her face changed from a smug grin to an excited smile as soon as he asked.

"Oh yeah, Marco, you gotta see this!" She said, digging through her pocket for her phone. "Check it out!"

"Oooh no, nuh-uh." Marco said right away, grabbing her arm. "Not in here, remember our agreement?"

"Yeah yeah. Any magic, intentionally destructive or otherwise, is not to be used within a one-block radius around your house." She recited, as if she'd had to many times before.

"That's right," He nodded. "If you want to show me your spells, we're doing it at your house, not mine."

Only a few minutes later, and they'd arrived in the space formerly known as Janna's backyard. To say it was a yard would be doing it too much credit. Barely meeting the parameters of a yard prior to Janna's spellcasting, one could imagine that it might've been improved by the dozen or so craters that were now peppering it. It certainly improved the geography of the landscape.

"Alright, so stand there," Janna directed, "and check this out."

Marco took a step back behind the blast shield. It was knee-high, cobbled together from a seriously-rusted wheelbarrow, a destroyed lawnmower chassis and a couple spare plates of scrap metal, but, well… something was better than nothing, right?

"Alright, watch. Panzie." Janna snorted as Marco ducked his head and carefully peeked over the top of the barrier. "Corpus Levitus - Levitato!"

Her voice rang out, and Marco looked around for what she was levitating before he realized it was her. She was slowly floating off the ground… a few inches up. Then a foot. Then two feet. She spun towards Marco, doing a sort of aerial pirouette, and grinned. "Pretty cool right?"

"Woah…" Marco was speechless.

"But that's not all…" she turned out towards the yard and framed her hands, like she'd done the last time Marco had seen her practicing the levitation spell. "Levarato!" Unlike her usual commands, this one boomed out, and the area in front of her shimmered before a new crater suddenly appeared. There wasn't an explosion - more like an invisible ball had just slammed into the ground. It threw up a dust cloud, which quickly engulfed the still-floating spellcaster.

"Janna!" Marco shouted. She turned, ready for some manufactured lecture on just how "unnecessarily dangerous" it was… only to see him standing up behind the barrier, in awe. "That was amazing!" He grinned.

"You ain't seen nothin', yet." Leaning forward, she began zooming around the yard, and shouting spells.

"Rubber rubble extravaganza!" she called. As if on cue, rocks from around the yard bounced up with a life of their own, and flew off of everything - from the dented shed, to the mostly-destroyed fence posts, some of them flying up and off, into the rest of the neighborhood. Marco quickly took cover behind the barrier again.

"Stinging Dart Deathblast!" A rain of darts flew out from her outstretched hands, flinging themselves into the fence.

"Incendio!" That was a real command, not just a manufactured spell. And it was obvious, as flames engulfed the entire backyard, rushing outwards in a blast of heat before subsiding. Aside from fresh scorch marks, she hadn't even set anything on fire.

Janna hovered herself back down in front of her friend, and he stood up to greet her. "How's that for practice, huh?"

Marco opened his mouth to respond, when there was a gruff throat-clearing noise beside them. Janna fell out of the air (only about a foot) to the ground as they spotted King River, with a severely singed beard that he was still patting out the flames in.

"Mhm, yes, very impressive!" He said jovially to the girl as he approached, patting out the last flames.

"King River!" Marco said in surprise. "I didn't know you were still… here!"

"Sorry about your beard." Janna halfheartedly apologized.

"Not to worry, not to worry!" The king responded happily. "In fact, that sort of thing is exactly why I need you, my dear!"

"You need… me?" She asked hesitantly.

"Well of course!" River exclaimed, before quieting down as if he were sharing a secret. "Between you and me, my men are outnumbered ten-to-one, and we could really use your help against those monsters that are after my hide!"

"Yes." Janna said without hesitation.

"So, what do you say?" River asked. "Fight some monsters, save a dimension? Us bipedal humanoid analogues have to stick together, after all!"

"Yes!" Janna restated her response again.

"Oh it'll be dangerous of course, but I can assure you, you have absolutely nothing to -"

"YES!" Janna shouted, interrupting him.

He chuckled happily. "Marvelous! We leave tomorrow afternoon! To glory!" He shouted.

"Hm." Marco chimed in. "Well, is it a multi-day trip? Because we'll need some time off of school. We'll have to pack extra clothes… oh, and food! Will we need a tent? Because I've got a spare one that we could probably -"

"Hububub!" The king interrupted. "Mango, my boy -"

"Uh, it's Marco." Marco corrected.

"Right, erm, Marco. My boy… there is no easy way to say this, but where we're going is dangerous! The Forest of Certain Death is named that way for a reason! So, as much as I would like to have you along, I'm afraid this battle will be no place for a child such as yourself."

"But Janna's the same age as me!" Marco responded, annoyed. "I can handle it!"

"Ah, but she is a magical child!" River beamed. "I'm afraid I can't in good conscience allow you to come. Far too dangerous."

He turned back to Janna. "My dear, we must set out at once! And by at once, I mean tomorrow, at the crack of three-thirty!" He went just a little cross-eyed as he exclaimed this.

Janna nodded. "Three-thirty."

"Onwards! To adventure! Three-thirty, tomorrow afternoon! Tally ho!" River exclaimed, before he abruptly turned and left.

As soon as he was out of earshot, Marco confronted Janna. "Janna! You can't seriously want to go! You'll miss school! You'll be in danger! You're going to leave this dimension!"

Janna smirked. "Yeah, sounds fun, right? Too bad you can't come." Marco scowled, and she placed a hand on his shoulder and continued. "Look, real talk? I think you'd be fine. But the King doesn't want you along, and I guess that means you can't come. I'll… bring you a souvenir or something, alright?"

Marco slumped over and she patted his shoulder sympathetically, before running into the house. "I've gotta pack!" She exclaimed. "Talk to you later!"

As the next day rolled around, Janna was ecstatic. She was going to be the first human… wait, was River a human? Anyway, the first earthling to leave her dimention. While scientists were trying to figure out how to leave their solar system, she was going to hop into a whole other dimension! It was a shame she couldn't tell everybody about this, because she would be rubbing it in all their non-magic-believing faces. Starting with her sister.

Marco, on the other hand, wasn't quite so happy. You could even go as far as to say he was legitimately angry. Not angry at King River or Janna, not even angry at himself. He was just, well, mad. He was tired of constantly being looked down on by everybody. But on top of that, he was tired of the fact that people had a reason to underestimate him. He was a safe kid, and it was about time to change that.

It was hard for Janna not to notice as they rode the bus to school. She did feel a little guilty for leaving without him, but this was just too good an opportunity to pass up!

"Look, Marco," Janna started. "I'll take pictures of everything I see out there. I know you want to come, but King River-"

"It's fine, Janna." He interrupted. "It's cool. Just… be careful, okay?" He crossed his arms and slumped over, scowling.

Janna frowned. It was most certainly not cool. But human relations was not exactly her area of expertise. She was still patting herself on the back for even noticing Marco was mad. She was drawing a total blank on what she could say to make him feel any better. So, she shrugged, and didn't say anything.

The rest of the day passed more-or-less uneventfully, until the final period, as she was heading home.

The front of the school was flooded with students, and she looked around for Marco, who had disappeared as soon as class had let out. She had a time to keep, and was hoping to say goodbye. But he was nowhere to be found, until…

"Attention, everyone!" A voice rang out from… directly above her? Swallowing down a small amount of dread about where Marco might've been, she looked up. And sure enough, there he was, on the edge of the roof.

Around her, the other students took notice as well, as one would while a student stood above your head and proclaimed his greatness.

"I, Marco Ubaldo Diaz, am about to prove once and for all! That I am not and never have been a safe kid!"

He took a further step to the edge of the roof. There was a collective gasp from the crowd, and some girl screamed. The sound of somebody getting elbowed in the stomach echoed, and then a half-hearted: "Oh, wait, don't do it, you have so much to live for…"

Taking a deep bow, Marco overextended, and immediately toppled off. Janna gulped and held her breath, paralyzed, and someone screamed.

Marco fell in seemingly slow motion, and Janna's heart skipped a beat as he disappeared into the crowd… before bouncing back up and doing a graceful frontflip, and landing on his face in the grassy lawn of the school.

He put an arm out with a thumbs up, and the crowd dispersed, among mutterings of "well that was a ripoff…"

Janna ran over and kneeled down next to him. "Marco. Dude. What the heck were you thinking?" She looked back and saw the cheerleading team's trampoline, mounted at an angle. "Why did you do that?"

Through a muffled mouthful of grass, Marco replied: "I'm not a safe kid!"

Out of nowhere, Skullnick appeared. "Oh no, Marco has fallen." She said in a deadpan, uncaring voice. "The law requires that I care. Come along Diaz, to the principal's office." Taking his wrist, she dragged him along, flipping him over to be face up.

Janna watched, halfheartedly wishing she could go with him. Then she remembered once again that she had a time to keep with King River. She opened her mouth, took a step towards him, and then turned away. There was nothing for it, she'd just have to talk to him when she got back.

Marco sat outside the door to the principal's office, still stewing in his own anger. The nerve of these people! He'd fought monsters! He'd helped Janna master her spellbook! He wasn't a safe kid! What the heck was a safe kid?!

"Well, well!" The principal opened the door to his office and looked out at the latino boy. "Marco 'safe kid' Diaz! I don't have a new exchange student for you, so what brings you to my office today?"

Marco glared at the principal and tapped his foot before bursting: "Imnotasafekid!"

The principal shook his head. "Oh, so that's what this is about! Come into my office and we'll talk about it."

The two took seats on opposite sides of the desk, and the principal adjusted his name plaque, reading a note that Skullnick left before continuing.

The principal continued. "Marco, I think you need help. And I'm not the one to give it to you! So what I'm going to do is schedule an appointment with one of our counsellors…"

He thumbed through his calendar on his desk, and tried to find a free date. "...in February! You're in luck, only five months away! Wait a minute…"

He took another glance at the calendar before clearing his throat. "Uh, nevermind, those are the premium slots. Looks like we're booked until May, unless you'd like to pay for an advanced session."

Marco looked at the price, and sighed. "Can't I just take a detention or something?"

Principal Skeeves stroked his mustache with his finger and thumb, seemingly deep in thought. "Well you didn't exactly do anything wrong, but I don't see why not. Detention can be very therapeutic at times, and I heard the janitor could use some help lately. So, how about it? Detention for the rest of the week?"

"Um… yeah, sure!" Marco replied. Safe kids didn't get detention. This would dispel those rumors!

"Excellent, then it's been a pleasure doing business with you!" Straining his tiny body to reach over the desk, he shook hands with Marco as if they were closing a business deal. "Now get out of my office."

Janna, for her part, had arrived in her backyard precisely when she intended to: twenty minutes late, with a backpack half-filled with supplies and clothes, and a hurried note to her family "explaining" where she went (a school field trip with Marco! For an undefined period of time! There was nothing suspicious about that, right?)

So she hadn't exactly prepared as well as she could've. But as a famous procrastinator once said, "why do today what you can… well, I should probably finish that thought later."

But she tapped her foot in annoyance as she realized that King River was later than she was! The nerve of some people, taking twenty minutes to arrive. She checked her phone, where Glossaryck was once again playing Jewel Quest and draining her battery power, and was just starting to wonder how Marco was doing when a portal tore open before her, and the royal ensemble piled out. River and his eleven-or-so men, all armed, armored and prepared for war.

"Janna, my girl!" The king greeted her. "So sorry we're late! Hope we haven't kept you waiting!"

"Uggggh." Janna groaned. "I've been here for 40 minutes!" The king looked at her and frowned, before she chuckled and shook her head. "I'm messing with you. I've been here like, five minutes, tops."

"Ah, very well than!" The king pulled out a pair of scissors and cut the air in front of him, tearing open a new portal. "We're off! To adventure! Tally ho!"

Stepping through the portal, Janna prepared herself. River was a king. From another dimension. Hopefully, that meant there'd be more magic. Specifically, the dark, brooding kind. The kind that infested one's soul and drove them to madness. Sounded like a fun weekend, to her.

So, when she realized that they'd stepped out onto a grassy knoll that looked like it could've been anywhere on Earth, she was a little disappointed. Some rudamentry tents had been set up, presumably as a base of operations, but there were no dragons, no magic, not even a monster in sight. A jackrabbit scurried through the field at the edge of her vision.

"So, this is Mewni, huh?" She asked the king, trying (and failing) to act exciting.

"Yes indeed, my dear! Home, sweet home, with all of it's monsters, and wars, and smallpox…"

Janna shivered.

"Welp, anyway, I'm going to get to unpacking, so which tent is mine?"

"Oh, no my dear. This is only the first stop on our adventure! We're simply here to drop off my warriors! They'll be doing reconnaissance while we perform another, much more… personal mission."

"Personal?" Janna asked.

"Mm, yes," the king looked vaguely uncomfortable, and glanced around at his men. "I can't share all of the details with you here, but suffice to say, don't unpack just yet. We leave again tonight!" With that, he turned and began issuing orders to his men, leaving Janna with just a little bit too much time to wander off and get into trouble.

Back on Earth, the first day of Marco's counseling-d10 had begun, and he was annoyed to see that virtually nothing has changed. The other kids still walked around him like he was safe. They still talked around him like he was safe. And it occurred to him that maybe they didn't think he was actually that much of a safe kid. Maybe they just thought he was… normal? Nah, that couldn't be it, he immediately thought to himself.

Walking up to the school's head janitor, Marco cleared his throat. "Hey, I was supposed to come report to you for my detention?" He puffed his chest out a little at that last word.

The janitor was wearing a blue suit, and had a thin, blond, squiggly mustache. It was pretty distracting to be honest. He had a skinny build and was slightly above average height. He was currently soaping up the school's notorious "fall hall."

Glancing over at Marco, the man simply nodded and continued his work.

"But I've gotta warn you," Marco continued. "I'm a little bit of a rebel. So don't expect much help. I've been known to… not play by the rules."

He popped the collar of his hoodie, only to realize that he didn't have a collar to pop. The janitor just shrugged and kept mopping. "Good for you." He responded quietly.

"Yeah," Marco pretend smirked. "So don't expect me to do any work. I'm Marco Diaz… bad kid!"

The Janitor sighed and set his mop back in the bucket for a moment. "Listen, kid, I know you. You're the safe kid. So stop trying to remake who you are."

Before Marco could respond, the bell rang, and students began rushing to their first class. In front of him, the Janitor's oh-so-carefully laid trap fell into place. One, then two, then three students slipped, slamming to the ground on their backs with a scream.

The Janitor held his blank expression and took out a notepad, where he set out three more tallies. The students, now slightly soapy, damp, aching and just a little uncomfortable, quickly slid their way through the trap, and into their respective classrooms.

Marco, watching all this silently, waited for the last of the doors to close before confronting his new overseer.

"Hey, that's dangerous!" he exclaimed. "The school could get sued or something!"

"Not a safe kid, huh?" The Janitor only replied, before gesturing to a rusted, small, and extremely hard-to-read "CAUTION: WET FLOOR" sign that had been stuck inconspicuously between a pair of lockers. He gestured to a second mop, which Marco begrudgingly took to help him mop up the soapy mess of a hallway.

"So… why do you do that?" Marco asked. After all, he had an A in Psychology! The best way to fix something, was to solve the root of the problem.

"It's my way to unwind." Came the response.

"By hurting kids?!" Marco exclaimed again.

The Janitor stopped, and sighed heavily. He cast his arms up and down the hallway. "Safe kid, look upon my kingdom. Tell me what you see."

To student-Marco, it looked like a normal school hallway, just the same as it always was. But with the mop in his hands, to Janitor-Marco, it looked a little bit different.

Dirty footprints covered the hall. Trash was strewn about at the edges. It wasn't particularly clean by any stretch of the imagination. "Oh. But… isn't it your job to clean?" He asked.

"Imagine if, every day, you were supposed to come into work, and set up a house of cards. And it was blown over. And you set it up again. And it was blown over again, but this time there's poop." The Janitor had not stopped mopping, but he also didn't look particularly perturbed.

"Oh." Marco resumed as well, and together they slowly began to create a clean patch on the floor, working outwards from their former soapy puddle. "So you just… mess with the students?"

"Yup."

"Oh."

There was a silence between them, and Marco allowed himself to drift off into his mopping duty, wondering how Janna was doing, and still a little annoyed that his safe-kid reputation had reached even the Janitor of all people.

"Marco."

Stirred from his reverie, Marco looked up, and focused on the hall. They'd been mopping for half an hour. It was spotless. "Huh." He smiled a bit, proud of his work. Then the bell rang, and students flooded the hall as they moved from Homeroom to their first elective. The tide of bodies parted around the two moppers as if they weren't there.

Before long, the students were back in classrooms, and the hall was once again a mess of dirty footprints and trash. Marco frowned, but the Janitor just sighed and set his mop aside. "Every day," he said flatly. "Come with me. We have other things to do."

With a rip and a tear, a portal opened up, and two figures stepped through. King River and his young magical companion, and as Janna looked around, she could only think that this was more what she had in mind when she thought "otherdimensional."

The landscape before her was coated in purplish grey ash, with spires of obsidian jutting up, each one fifteen or more feet tall. Vents in the ground were letting out clouds of dark gas, which had completely obscured the sky above, forming a ceiling over the landscape. Here and there were hovels of different sorts - caves in the ground, ramshackle houses, and scattered about, the mansions of the dimension's wealthy, decorated with chrome and black.

And occasionally jutting up from the landscape were other monuments of progress - decrepit highways, and, strangely, polished chrome statues - everything from the likeness of monsters, to enormous engine blocks.

Janna took it all in. There was no other way to say it: "Woah. This place is super metal."

River, next to her, nodded. "Mmm, yes. Can't stand the smell of it. Or the… occupants. Let's get moving."

As they walked, the denizens of the plane began to investigate them. As Janna shooed off clouds of tiny imps, over and over again, she finally understood why River had told her not to bring anything but her clothes, and why he'd even left his crown behind. They'd gone so far as to even take the buttons off of her sweater.

After a few minutes of extreme entertainment on Janna's part (this dimension was so interesting!), a fortress came into view over the hill. For lack of better description, she couldn't help but think it looked like someone had crossed a victorian mansion with a maximum-security prison. Guards patrolled the ten-foot-high walls, and stood watch in the towers that dotted them. Hellhounds were barking inside the courtyards, and Janna caught glimpses of what appeared to be, strangely, the most delicious looking garden she'd ever seen. River, keeping his eyes forward, managed to push her past it before she could catch a better look.

The demon attendant that had brought them in (a sickly looking, stooped satyr in a spotless butler's uniform) spoke up as they entered the lobby. "Please - baaah! - wait here."

Janna gave River a glance and looked around the room. The chandelier above was made out of skulls and bones. Chrome candlesticks with electric yellow bulbs lined the walls. The floor was a polished grey checkerboard, and she noticed that both of them were standing on what appeared to be a solid, completely invisible surface approximately half an inch above it.

"When she arrives, don't say anything," said River intensely. "I'll do the talking and hopefully, we'll be out of here in a few minutes."

Janna stared at him, having never seen him look so intense. At the end of the hall, a door opened, and the butler quickly returned to continue escorting them. "She will see you." He said.

They strode forward, towards a set of enormous double-doors at the end of the room. Monuments that would be better suited for a giant than anything Janna had ever seen. Blood-red wood, embossed with designs of pain and framed by more chrome. They slid open without a sound.

In front of them, a long avenue to a throne laid before them, which the butler scurried up ahead of them. Janna stayed behind River, and when he stopped, she stopped.

River bowed low, and Janna followed suit, as the throne was illuminated. Sitting on it was a bored-looking woman, dressed in a dress made to appear as though it were made of cobwebs. Her face was old, but not wrinkled, her eyes showing that she'd been ruling for far longer than anyone could remember.

"Queen Ishtar," River began from his bow, Janna craning her neck to look up from the floorboards. "Thank you for seeing us."

"King River Butterfly, of Mewni." The Queen returned in a bored tone. "What an unexpected surprise. What brings you to my audience today?"

"Poor fortunes, I'm afraid," River replied, standing back up fully. "I'm looking for my daughter."

"Mmm. Star. Tom's old flame. Well, I can tell you right now she isn't here," the Queen said. "A spirit like that falling here from above… it would be quite a light show."

"Yes, Queen." River said. "But if I may, my goal isn't to seek out your own knowledge, but the eyes and ears of Prince Tom."

"Mmm." The Queen responded. "Very well. The boy is in his chambers, doing whatever it is he does. The butler will show you the way."

"Thank you, Queen Ishtar." River bowed again, Janna following suit, before they turned and left.

Behind a raised hand as they left, the Queen stopped the old goat-man before he could follow them out. "Who is the girl?" She asked. The goat shrugged.

Out in the main hall, Janna had about a million-and-a-half questions crowding into her brain, all of which were immediately pushed out as a demon boy crossed the hall. Three eyes, pale skin, horns, and a spiked leather jacket. "MOOM!" He shouted. "I'M GOING OUT!"

Then, he caught sight of the two visitors in front of him. King River's distinctive blond hair was something he knew well, considering that when he'd dated his daughter, it'd been a source of constant intrusion.

"Oh, King Butterfly!" He said in a forced, false tone. "How nice to see you….!"

"Hello, Tom." The King said. "Trust me, I'm not happy to see you either. But I'm looking for my daughter."

"Woah," Janna interjected, stepping up to the demon in front of her. "Uh… hi. You're way too hot to not know me. Janna Russo. Witch."

The demon looked at her outstretched hand, unimpressed. "Witch, huh? Boring. Call me when you're a princess."

He then turned back to River "You're looking for Star?" He asked, then looked around. "Come with me."

Considering he was a demon, Tom's room was remarkably normal, if totally extravagant. There was a pair of arcade cabinets, a ping-pong table, something that looked suspiciously like a torture rack (ok, so that part wasn't normal) and a bed. Of course this was all in a cave carved into the side of the mansion, and there was a stream of lava running down one of the walls, but still.

"So, this is your room, huh?" Janna asked. "Your… demon-room?"

Tom ignored her, and instead addressed the king. "So, Star's missing, huh?"

River nodded. "Gone, a few weeks before the war. I've spent my resources already, and we've found nothing. There are some places… my men can't go."

Not paying attention to this, Janna wandered across the room and picked up a ping-pong ball which, she hit across the table with a paddle. As if willed by the table, the other paddle picked itself up and whacked the ball back at her, narrowly missing her face. The ball bounced into a corner with a clatter.

Unperturbed, Janna set down the paddle and moved over to the torture rack, spinning it absently by the spikes on its edge, resulting in a "tick-tick-tick" as it circled.

"Well, she's not here," Tom shrugged. "I haven't seen her in months. Since the Blood Moon Ball. Which, if you see her, tell her I'm sorry about that, wouldya?"

He took a pause, before shouting "Would you STOP?" With a crash, Janna stumbled into one of the arcade cabinets, knocking it into the other one and sending them to the floor.

Tom's head steamed - literally - before he suddenly seemed to lose all his energy. "Out. Get out." He pointed to the door.

"Rude." Janna glared at him ruefully before leaving to go "explore" some other part of the house.

Further notes:

Long story short, I've recently had one of the worst weeks of my life, and I just wanted to say thanks to you guys for showing support for my work. Whenever someone leaves a review or faves the story, it sends a notification to my phone, and getting a notification that someone else enjoyed my work enough to take action brings a warm smile to my face and a fuzzy feeling to my chest.

To the one, single person who I know for a fact reads this during their breaks at work from time to time: I'm sorry for acting rashly. Someday, a few months from now, I'd like to be good friends with you, again, like we have been. But I can't grow as a person with you in my life, and that's not your fault, it's mine. I'm not mad, just sad. I hope you aren't, either. I'd message, but I'd rather say it in public. Someday, I'd like to get tea with you again. I hope you see this. Anyways.

Now that the other 99.999% of you read that paragraph and are left confused and wondering why you did so, on to reviews!

AACH: Oy mate, this is K+. I love the idea of Janna pranking him in that fashion, but it definitely wouldn't be that extreme. Still, I'll keep that in mind. Also, Ishkilthul stole the internet, so there isn't exactly anywhere for her to post it. Cool idea though. Could make for a fun little spit.

Guest: I mean, yes. There's a fairly popular theory that literally everyone at the slumber party except Starfan has a crush on Marco, and they all said Marco's name at some point while responding to the cube. And who can blame her? Marco is prime husbando material! Oh my god, someone shoot me, I can't believe I just said that. Thanks as always for the review. Get an account already!

Roguefoxx: Yeah, the timeskips... they're a lot more obvious in writing. But you're right. I'm trying to work on that.

Lelcar: No, not really. Guest nailed the actual hidden implication, the riddles were just whatever I could come up with on the fly. Speaking of which, there's another one coming up, and it's a doozy. So stay tuned for that.

Evolveelove: Hah! Canon? I've got your canon right here! No but seriously, I'm doing my own thing. It's the characters, and the setting, and the tone, but that's about it.

No preview for next week's chapter, it's just gonna be a continuation of this week. And it might actually get posted next week! Neat. Remember to fave the story if you liked it, and as always, I do take suggestions for chapters! If there was something you liked, or something you didn't let me know! Adios!