I do not own any of the characters from Fairly OddParents or Jimmy Neutron!
A/N: Betty "sleeps" with Jimmy; Timmy takes a another, "closer" look, at Tootie; and Veronica wants to get "rolled!" Lia prepares to move her base of operations east with Jorgen's help!
Fix Me . . . Please!
Chapter 37: The Secret of Magic
That same night . . .
As soon as they returned home, Lia and Betty-bot rushed down to her gravity room to see if Jorgen and the others were still there. Everyone had already left except for Jimmy, who was curled up in a little ball, shivering on the floor of the chamber.
"I forgot to tell them I had set up sleeping places in my games lab." Betty checked the make-shift control console to see if anything had been changed.
"Cindy's dimensionator is gone, so I guess she and Libby went to the transporter pod and converted it back into a camper again!"
"And knowing how they felt about Jimmy, that left him nowhere to go. I'll bring him up to the lab, and he can sleep on the fold-out sofa!"
"Let me do it!' Betty offered, "I feel responsible for him, and he's like my 'daddy'!" giggled the android. Lacroix raised an eyebrow.
"Daddy?! But didn't he try to . . .?"
"Awww, yeah but he knows he won't be able to get away trying that again! He's beginning to see me as something other than his former robot servant!" Betty picked him up in her arms, "I'll let him sleep on your fold-out bed in the games lab, and stay with him tonight."
In spite of how Cindy and Libby felt about Neutron, the android recalled with some fondness that his was the first face she remembered seeing as she became cognizant. The android remembered being hooked up to numerous cables as Jimmy, her creator, programmed her to walk and move her arms and hands. He really was like a father to her in the beginning, but he bored quickly when he couldn't get her to learn fast enough. That was until Cindy developed the micro-chip that did wonders for his first true love, his robotic dog, Goddard. But if he really loved Goddard, why would he have bothered to pull the chip from his metallic canine, and put it into her? He did many things on a whim, some of his more interesting inventions were made for some fancy that he had. Jimmy liked the real Betty Quinlan, but he knew he couldn't have her. Real Betty was a flirt, constantly playing off all her crushes against each other, most noticeably Neutron and Nick Dean. The Boy Genius built android Betty as a way to satisfy his bruised ego, and gain a measure of revenge. Betty-bot took a step forward, and a portal opened up to the games lab. She and Jimmy entered, then vanished.
With Jimmy and Betty out of the way, Lia continued studying the six remaining stelae. Each stele opened a different time portal, and destination. Her on-again-off-again robot ability allowed her to keep going without sleep, which meant Betty was going to try to sleep with Jimmy in her games lab. It was fine. The android had never really experienced actual sleep before, just a state of reduced activity to conserve power. But she now had a cold-fusion reactor inside of her, and no longer needed her wafer batteries. The reactor provided instantaneous power on demand, so Betty could wake up in the blink of an eye.
The Blue Powder
Although she had been up all night, Lia did not feel the urge to rest, and so examining the metallic monuments would not be a problem. She did wonder if Jorgen was going to return, and as soon as she thought it, he appeared.
"Pulleeng an all-nightuh?"
"Betty wants to try sleeping, and took Jimmy upstairs. Like you said, when she wants to try out being human, I become a little like her machine-self temporarily." Jorgen looked around the room, trying to appear nonchalant.
"Did Jimmee mention anytheeng to you about your leetul trip through the portal?"
"No, when we got back he was already asleep on the floor, so Betty took him upstairs to my lab. There's a bed there he can use." Jorgen gave a sigh of relief, which Lacroix picked up on. "Was it something important he wanted to talk to me about?"
"Uh, no no! He was just curious about whether you experienced the same theengs that he did!" Lia smiled, then turned back to studying the towers. Jorgen was hiding something from her. But the mission was a success, and she wouldn't bug him about it.
"I've discovered a little secret about your fairy magic!" she smiled smugly.
"I am not suhprised, but tell me anyway, and I weel tell you eef you ah on the right track!"
"Betty managed to distill some of your fairy magic out of Timmy, in the form of a blue powder, which she shared with Vicky. Vicky placed a fingertip of that blue powder on Sandy's forehead, then made a wish that she would get better! Am I on the right track, so far?"
"So far, so good!"
"The magic is activated by making a wish, and once applied to a human, it becomes the property of that person, or in this case, the one who extracted it!"
". . . I should not be telling you thees, so I'll say eet only once! Ordinarily eet remains weeth the person eet was granted to, but usually they do not know that they still have eet een them. Especially children, when they learn a lesson from makeeng a bad wish, they weel wish everything to go back to the way eet was. Timmee deed that a lot! He thought eet was Wanda or Cosmo that returned theengs to normal, but eet was he himself doeeng eet weeth the magic he was granted, his fairy godparents only went through the motions!"
"Oh, but if a child was very conscientious and didn't fritter the magic away, could they retain the magic until adulthood?" Jorgen held a finger up, and shook his head.
"No, because the magic remains viable only until the child reaches the age of fourteen, then eet disappeahs, . . . evaporates, foevah! Besides, eet eez as I said, no one evah realizes they still have eet een them!"
"But Timmy's already fifteen! How did Betty manage to extract the magic from him?" Jorgen was on the verge of being exposed, and fidgeted nervously.
"M-maybe he had s-some tucked away under a toenail! Eet eez rare, but eet does happen!"
"Hmm. Betty did not extract it from his toe!" She searched his face and body language for a clue.
"W-why would you say sometheeng like that?"
"Because if you had done something to Timmy which left magic in him after he turned fourteen, then you are at least partly responsible for having saved Fairy World! It was your magic dust that helped save Sandy, wasn't it?" Jorgen flashed a surprised look for an instant, then recovered nicely.
"Well, yes, of course! Eet was part of my plan! We fairies ah forbidden by 'Da Rules, to save a life weeth our magic, but once the magic eez 'gifted' to someone else, eet becomes their property, and they ah allowed to do weeth eet as they please, and that includes saveeng someone's life! No human, until now, has evah figured thees out, and since I cannot take back the magic, I weel keep watch over Betty and Vicky to make sure no abuses take place!"
Magic was indeed a potentially dangerous power in the wrong human hands. Lia pondered a moment on the stelae before her, and was torn between studying them further, or returning them to the void in which they were found. No other human besides herself and her little group of friends, knew of their existence. The information they held could be a boon to human society, or its destruction.
"My dad told me he had a bought a large warehouse near the school I'm going to, and he's already had the upper floors renovated for my living quarters. The bottom remains empty, so I can continue working on my research project, and hobbies. I'm thinking of moving all my projects and equipment over there, but I'm worried about security."
"Do not worry, that eez my speciality! I owe you some favuhs for helpeeng save Fairee World, and no human weel be able to crack my fairee codes! Leave eet to me, and I weel help you move all this stuff ovah!"
"Thanks, I'd really appreciate that!" Jorgen raised his wand in the air, and brought it down, crashing to the floor. In an instant, all of Lia's equipment and the stelae, disappeared to some secret warehouse near Princeton.
Spooning, not "forking"
Neutron was shivering even as Betty tucked him in under a blanket. The temperature had changed suddenly since winter was nearing, and Lia's private laboratory was not exactly the warmest place in the house. Her massive banks of computers, when running, required an arctic like climate to keep them cool. The android lay down next to her creator, feeling him shiver uncontrollably. She got up behind him and raised her own body temperature to make him a little more comfortable, then threw her arms over him. Spooning with him seemed foreign at first, since she had sex with him only three times since her creation, and that was merely to make sure her "female functions" were working properly. Jimmy never tried to have sex with her after that, and apparently had built Betty-bot over some emotional hurt that human Betty had inflicted on him. That would explain why he stored her in the closet, and made her do the most trivial, demeaning chores around the lab. He used her as a foot rest for hours on end, and occasionally as a coffee table while he watched TV. She was angry when he all but tried to rape her in the bedroom, severing her motor functions, leaving her powerless to stop him, but thinking back on all the good he had done in building her, the android was still satisfied with the outcome. He was her creator, after all, and if not for him, she would not have been able to make friends with the people she found here in Dimmsdale, especially Poof. She sighed and wondered when she would be able to see him again. Her psychic link to her human "sister" told her that Fairy World had been saved, but not when Poof would return.
As she held him in front of her, Betty began to sniff Neutron's hair, then his clothes to make sure all his testosterone concoction was all gone. He smelled like shampoo and body wash now, the kind Lia used, a delicate scent that wasn't too overpowering. She nibbled on an exposed earlobe to see if she could get a reaction out of him, and was pleased when he moaned softly. The android thought about her fairy friend, Poof, and when they would be together once more. Should she feel guilty for cuddling up to Jimmy? Poof had told her before he left, that it was okay to find other "friends" like him because it was the only way for her to grow. "Goodnight, Jimmy." she whispered, then shut her eyes while holding him tighter, and for the first time in her electronic existence, she fell asleep.
Take the bus . . . it's bigger
"Ahhhhh! Get it out! Get it out get it out get it ouuuut!" Veronica screamed. Trixie calmly placed her hand just above her panicked friend's pubes, and with a quick push downward, the banana squirted out, and slid across the kitchen floor.
"There! All better!" she giggled. Ronnie gathered her clothes in a huff, and made for one of the Tang's many bathrooms. "Oh dear! I do believe she's angry with me . . . again!"
Ron was indeed fuming, as she rinsed off the sticky mess, and couldn't wait to tell her oriental friend just how pissed she was. "We'll see who has the last laugh, Trixie! Before this week is over, I'll be the one looking down at you as you grovel!"
She flew out of shower, her hair still dripping wet, and gave it a cursory rub with the towel before throwing on her clothes. In the meantime, Trixie had cleaned off the mess on the floor, and the island. She was busy watching some financial news on the television when Veronica came storming out of the bathroom, mad as a wet hen.
"You bitch! You did that on purpose!"
"It was just a joke," Trixie smiled, not even trying to hide her amusement, "don't you appreciate a good joke? You played one on Lia, too, remember? And Janet, and Charlotte, and Mimi, . . .!"
"Lia again?! What is it between you two?! They all got what they deserved! And you'll get yours, too! Once my dad's company begins selling our new electronic line in a few days, you'll be under my heel as well! Bwa ha ha ha ha!" Her eyes rolled back in her head, like a girl possessed. Timmy didn't call her the "crazy one" for nothing! Trixie had seen it all before, and yawned.
"Hmmm. Your father's company is Star-Evolution-Inc., right?
"Yeah, so what?!"
"You'd better take a look at this newscast before you get too far ahead of yourself."
[Newscaster: ". . . and Star-Evolution-Inc. is poised to take a monstrous tumble when Wall Street opens on Monday! With a half million units already on their way, and no solution in sight, investors are leaving like rats deserting a sinking . . . Star Ship!" (laughter in background)]
Veronica watched silently, her once puffed up cheeks deflated, her mouth hung open. She picked up her things, and quietly shuffled out towards the front door, her dreams of grandeur smashed to bits in front of her future underling, and childhood friend. It was pathetic. Trixie almost felt sorry for having played such a nasty prank on her, but decided against running after Ron. Ronnie needed a taste of her own medicine to stop being so obnoxious.
"Shall I get you a cab?"
"No, . . . I'll just throw myself under a bus . . . it's bigger."
Buns
Timmy was "single" once more, but still feeling down in the dumps. He and Lia had been going steady for a little better than a year, but now that they had broken up, he felt strangely empty, and alone. His mother was very understanding, and offered advice from a girl's point of view. His dad, however, compared the break up to getting rid of toenail fungus. He was never any good at this sort of thing.
Timmy wanted to set things right. He could understand why Lia had to leave school and go straight to college, but what he couldn't understand was how she managed to exchange personalities with Betty, the android girl. If anything, that freaked him out the most, and caused their uncomfortable parting. Maybe a talk with Vicky would settle him down a bit, so he donned a heavy jacket, and made his way down the few blocks that separated their homes.
In the few years that his former babysitter had enrolled in med school, she had become more lenient towards him, though why his parents kept hiring her to babysit him was beyond his grasp. He was already fifteen, after all. Vicky was calmer now, even if their past history had made them uncomfortable together. Up until recently, she was still punching and poking him out of force of habit. He no longer minded. Football was way rougher than she could ever be now, and what kind of jock would he be if he couldn't even take a couple of hard shots to the ribs from a girl.
Gerald had come back into her life, if only temporary, but Turner was surprised how quickly the two reconnected. Maybe his time with Vicky was at an end. "What the hell," he thought, "maybe I should stick with girls my age. Maybe she still sees me as a kid." Her car was still in the driveway, so he knocked on the door anyway. Maybe she'd at least be willing to give some advice on his breakup. Tootie appeared shortly, looking bright and chipper. She was dressed nice and warm, and seemed to be on her way out.
"Hi Tootie! I was wondering if Vicky is around." She shook her head.
"Oh, sorry, Timmy! You just missed her! She and Gerald left for a day of celebration!"
"Celebration?," he asked, a bit taken off, "What kind of celebration?"
"Yesterday, Lia asked her to visit a little girl at the hospital, and apparently the girl, who was dying, recovered miraculously after Vicky's visit. Vicky was so happy when she found out, she called Gerald to take her out for lunch today! They may be out for the rest of the day!" Timmy's face drooped.
"Gerald, huh?" Tootie could see the disappointment on his face, and took him by the hand.
"I'm going for a walk down to the strip mall. It's a bit chilly, but I want to stretch my legs before it totally begins snowing. Why don't you come along, and keep me company!" His mood immediately brightened,
"Sure! I think I'd like that!" Tootie giggled as she locked the door behind her.
"Come along, then. I've a feeling you need a shoulder to cry on this time!"
He gave out a sigh, then smiled. Girls were scary like that, what with their built-in radar, and intuition.
Tootie was clearly in a good mood, however, something Timmy really needed to see at the moment. Maybe some of her cheerfulness was infectious, and would rub off on him. As they walked and talked, she would dance a little, skip around him, and hook her arm around his, quite different a personality from Lia, and even Trixie, or Vicky. All of them had similar traits of one another, and only now did he realize what attracted him to the four girls. Besides their looks, all of them were aggressive to varying degrees. If he had to rate them, Tootie would be number one, followed by Trixie, Vicky, then Lia. When they were younger, Tootie practically threw herself at him with almost reckless abandon. That scared him at that age, because as everyone knew, girls were always looking to spread their cooties on the nearest boy. Thinking back on it, Timmy began to snicker, and a smile curled a corner of his lips. Trixie was more deliberate in her approach, with subtle innuendoes, fluttering eyelashes, and perfectly timed touches that made his legs go weak. She was still very much a flirt, and the sexiest of the four, but at least he knew she liked him now.
Surprisingly, he placed Vicky at number three. She had changed a lot since her babysitting days when all that concerned her was money, and how to get her hands on more of it. As a teenager, she really wasn't much to look at until late in her junior year, and her newly acquired looks only caused her to retreat into a shell as boys began calling on her. Gerald became her first, and only real, boyfriend, so as jealous as he found himself, Timmy had to admit if anyone was really responsible for turning her around, it was him. When he left for college, Vicky dated other guys, but found a new passion in medicine, a very profitable career if she could cut the mustard. If she was aggressive, it was very methodical, and structured, like any business-woman should be. She would have made an excellent Mafia Don, if she was so inclined!
Lia on the other hand, was aggressive in very different ways from the others. She was tenacious when it came to things she liked to do. When she first came to Dimmsdale, one of the first things she did was to join the chess club, whereupon she absolutely destroyed everyone mercilessly, and was banned. She wasn't mean or anything, it was the way she was: competitive. Very competitive. Just looking at her, one would never suspect that a she-tiger lived in her soul. Heaven help him if she decided she wanted to play arcade games! And she was very brave when it came to standing up for friends she cared about, like when Bear Branson was about to hit Tootie, and Lia got up in his face, all ninety-five pounds of her. Not much she could have done against a three hundred pound gorilla, though, and Turner was glad she didn't get much more than a black eye.
In the brief synopsis in his mind, he was starting to understand what attracted him to all four girls. There was a common denominator among them, and he was the hub of their wheel.
Tootie snapped him out of his reverie with her bouncing around. She had on a pair of faded, hip-hugger jeans that looked great on her, showing off the curves she had acquired since entering middle school, and Turner caught himself staring at her ass as she skipped ahead of him. He reddened immediately, and averted his eyes to the side. Shortly, she returned to him, and once more threaded her arm around his. Although Tootie was very athletic, she never went out for sports, much to the dismay of the girls track coach. Her abilities must have come from those all years of chasing after him.
Turner crossed his fingers, and hoped that she didn't catch him looking. The young girl no longer wore braces, those being removed several years ago, and she now wore contacts to replace those weird looking, retro-fashion teardrop shaped glasses. Her strange "floating" pig-tails were also gone, courtesy of Lia, via a makeover. Timmy smiled, thinking back to what she looked like five years ago, and in a way, he missed that little girl look. There was no denying, however, she looked really good now.
"So, Tootie, have you spoken to Cockett lately?"
"Yeah, yesterday! He wants to take me to a movie tonight at the Hudson Mall multiplex! It's called 'Twilight's Quest'."
"Sounds like something from World of Warcraft. Action/adventure?"
"No, it's . . ."
". . . My Little Ponies?" he snickered. She shot him an annoyed look.
"No! It's a vampire/werewolf chick-flick!" Timmy rolled his eyes, and chortled.
"Another one?! Cockett must be missing a Y-chromosome!" Tootie sighed, then belted him on the arm. She glared at him, before a smile slowly returned.
"Don't be mean! Personally I like a guy who's in touch with his feelings, and not driven by his hormones!"
". . . Y-chromosooommme . . .!" The girl pushed him away, playfully.
"Now I know you're jealous, but I still think its cute! So Rory's the romantic type! You just don't find too many guys like that, especially among . . . football players!"
"I'm a jock, . . . I may have my rough spots, but I'm trying . . ." Tootie placed her head on his shoulder, pulling him closer.
"Yeah, I know! Don't think I've forgotten what you did for me in the theater the other day. That was very sweet of you." That made him blush a little, and he turned away so that she didn't notice. "Now it seems to me that you need someone to talk to about your break-up with Lia." Turner hung his head.
"It didn't go quite as expected. She wanted to make love one last time, but I turned her down, otherwise I wouldn't feel right doing it! It was like she was a different person, Tootie, and I couldn't bring myself to do it!"
"Well, I give you credit for that, Timmy. Most guys would have jumped at the chance, regardless! I don't think she would have made the offer to anyone besides you."
"It's not what you think, though! Do you remember Betty, her adopted 'sister'?"
"Betty the android? What about her?"
"She and Lia are able to switch personalities with each other! When I broke up with Lia, she was in 'robot' mode, and to prove it, she even tore a nickel in half! A nickel! Can you imagine that?!"
"I don't know anything about that, but if you want, I'll give her a call, and find out what's happening with her."
"Thanks, Tootie. I promised myself I'd give her some time and space, and try not to call her too soon. I wanted to apologize for my behavior, but I thought it best to leave her alone for now."
"I talked to her this morning, and she told me she was leaving Dimmsdale earlier than expected to get her new living quarters ready. I'll try to get a message to her before that!"
"She's leaving already?"
"The Lacroix's are very well off, you know. Her dad bought an old warehouse complex close to the school, and had it fixed up. Lia's going over to pick out furniture and curtains, and start moving some of her things there."
"Wow. I had no idea! Her father always struck me as being a very down-to-earth kind of guy. Even I had no idea how wealthy they are! Lia never talked much about it!"
"She said he made his money off some very remarkable inventions, super secret government stuff, and if she told you what they were, people would visit you in the middle of the night, and you'd disappear from the face of the Earth!" The teen shivered involuntarily.
"God, that sounds scary!"
"She was laughing, so I don't think she was serious!" Tootie snickered.
"But, you see! That's why she's so secretive with me, living in that kind of environment! Maybe she's just being protective of me!" He let out a big sigh of relief, "And all this time I suspected she was going around behind my back!" Tootie punched him in the arm again.
"Idiot! I could say the same for you, you know! Lia's not that type! I mean, sure she acts a little naïve, at times, but you of all people should have learned that by now!"
"Sorry! Sorry! I-I didn't mean for it to come out like that!" he looked around sheepishly, "You're right of course. Now that you mention it, she's never, ever, shown an interest in another guy while she and I were together. I guess since we had that promise to save ourselves for each other, I became a little jealous, especially since I didn't live up to my end . . ."
"Oh, don't worry about it, Timmy," the ebony-haired girl sighed, "I think it was more important for her to keep her end of the promise." Timmy blushed, having admitted the deed, but Tootie was very understanding and non-judgmental.
Up ahead was the strip mall, a mere block away. "Are you here for a reason?" he asked.
"Just wanted to get out of the house for a while, and do some window shopping, maybe even buy some new clothes!"
"Is that all? I thought maybe you were going to meet . . . someone . . ." Turner was being over-protective again, maybe even, "possessive!" Tootie turned to face him, taking both his hands in hers.
"If I was, I wouldn't have asked you along!" She hugged him affectionately, and placed her head on his chest, "I wish you were like this when we were younger! Betty gave Libby a bunch of gold bars to convert to cash. Since they can't use our money in their dimension, she gave her share to me before they left! I've got a couple of grand to splurge! Woohoo!"
They gazed into each others eyes for a moment as Tootie's broad smile softened, and for a split second, he wanted to kiss her on those inviting lips. But he swallowed hard, and reluctantly removed his hands from around her waist. Tootie giggled at causing his discomfort, and gave him one last squeeze before releasing him.
"Why am I here if you're only going window shopping? I get the distinct feeling I'm gonna be your 'pack mule'!"
"The bonus here is that you'll get to see me in slinky new duds! Plus I'll treat you to lunch!"
"Lunch, huh? I need a better offer!"
"And there's a close-out on swimwear and . . . bikiniiiis! Everyones getting rid of their summer stock!"
"Urgh!" he groaned. Who in his school wouldn't want to take a look at Tootie's fit body in some spandex. "You win."
The first store they hit was a sporting goods shop, already putting out winter gear and skis. Tootie gleefully attacked the swimwear rack, and took several bikinis into the change booth. Timmy could see her feet from beneath the door as she shed her jeans to try them on. She popped out shortly with the one that she selected.
"Whadda you think?" she said as she spun around.
"I think its kinda cold in here for you to be trying on bikinis!" he snickered, as her erect nipples poked through the fabric of her top. Tootie smiled, but paid him no mind.
"I like this one! Maybe I can try it out in the Lia's heated pool!" She returned to the booth once more to try on a black and white patterned one-piece, and locked the door. It didn't close well this time, and slowly began to swing open. From the tiny crack that opened up, Timmy could see the curvy form of Tootie's hips and butt as she removed the bikini. He quickly, but quietly, pushed the door close, standing outside to make sure it didn't happen again, and he was damn glad the heavy jacket he wore was able to hide the boner that was now creeping up on him. He stood outside with his back against the door, and felt rather chivalrous for doing it. After a couple of minutes, Tootie once more emerged, and he stepped aside. She smiled curiously at him, and crossed her arms in front of her, concealing her "bullets."
"What were you doing?" she asked. Timmy scratched the back of his head nervously, and tried to explain.
"D-don't get me wrong, Tootie! You didn't close your door good, and I had to hold it shut!" The girl began to laugh.
"Admit it, Timmy! You were checking out my buns!"
End Chapter 37
A/N: So what did you expect? He's a guy, ain't he? I actually find that promise to save one's self for another, a little too old-fashioned, especially for someone as open minded as I imagine Lia would be.
Women carry two X-chromosomes, whereas men have an X and a Y-chromosome. (Just in case you're keeping track!). Scientists say in the future, the Y-chromosome will disappear, and we'll all become women! Where's the fun in that?!