James sat on one of the many buses taking the refugees to safety. He only caught a glimpse of the chaos they were running from, Phillip ordering the plants to retreat. He hoped his plant pals were alright. Then again, they've probably had worse battle than this. He looked over at Kaia, who was sitting next to the window.
"I wish we could go home." She said. James hugged her and said, "Me too." A person walked over to James and handed him a phone.
"It's for you." He said before walking back. James held the phone to his ear and said, "Hello?"
"Hey, mmMph-ames." Phillip's voice said from the other end, sounding muffled and otherworldly. "Sorry, my transla-mmmmmph-took a hit. You okay?"
"Yeah, I'm fine. Did you win?"
"Mmmm-barely. Got some hel-mmmmph-from one of our best plants. We're all-mmmmph. Oh, for the love of-! Ugh, We're all fine here."
"I'm glad to here that." James said. "By the way, where are theses buses taking us?"
"They're-mpph mm-" Phillip started but was cut off by a distant voice saying, "Give me that, Phil." Some shuffling was heard from the other end and Mia's voice spoke out.
"They're taking you to the far ends of Neighborville. We have that area under complete control. You'll hide there until this all blows over. Hold on." A muffled conversation was heard before Mia said, "Well, gotta get going. Stay safe. Phillip says 'bye'"
"Bye." James replied before hanging up. He returned the phone to the man and sat back down. He was glad that Phillip and Mia and the other plants were safe. He wondered what the zombie apocalypse would be like without the help of those sentient plants. Probably very bad. James stared out the window, watching the world fly by as his mind wandered, thinking about all the events prior to this.
Mia examined Phil's translator. She'd taken hers off since they weren't currently with any humans.
"I'm no tech nerd like Austin, but that is definitely busted." She said.
"Ah, well." Phillip said with a shrug. "Austin can make more." He removed it and tossed it in a garbage bin. Citron approached them and said, "You did a good job protecting those humans."
Phillip nodded and said, "Thank you. We would've lost if it weren't for you."
"Sorry if this is a bad time, but you were A-MAZING!" Mia complimented. Citron chuckled as Phillip sighed.
"I kind of a big fan. Especially with your fighting moves." Mia said. "I've taken everything I know from you. Well, with some slight changes."
"Well, want me to show you how I do them?" Phillip guessed if Mia's scarf was removed, she would be beaming. But if her scarf was removed, she'd also be pretty angry.
"Yes, please!" The Nightcap replied. The two plants walked away, engaging in conversation. Phillip turned back to Penny and sat himself on the couch. He thought about Crazy Dave and where he was.
"Penny? Your the closest to Crazy Dave. I mean, he literally MADE you. Do you have any idea where he is." Penny stayed silent for a moment before saying, "No, Phillip, I don't. I have one memory of User Dave telling me he was going on an important journey. He had no crazy garble or nonsense after that. Just 'Penny, I have to leave. It is important. Watch over the plants for me, will ya?' Probably the first time I've ever heard him speak without mentioning tacos, squirbos or stuff like that." Phillip nodded. He was busy giving Mia a tour of the base when Crazy Dave left. Phillip knew that Kernel Corn was the best option when it came to commanding the plant forces here but he slowly began seeing doubt in even the Kernel. He hoped Dave would come back soon before the plants completely crumbled.
"I could run a scan across Neighborville if that would help." Penny said. Phillip shook his head. "Penny, you know that he is not here. Someone would've seen him here at some point." After that, it was silence. Phillip removed his hat and examined it. Then he noticed something. A tiny scorch mark on the hat towards the back. Confused, he felt around on his head and yanked his pea pod away when he felt something hot. He looked at his pods to see some tiny embers crumbling off of it.
"What?" Phillip gasped.
King Gnomus sat on his throne. Suddenly, his advisor burst into the room, not even bowing. King Gnomus knew if that happened, it was something urgent.
"Your majesty!" He said. "Someone has opened a portal to the Gnomiverse! Trum-dee-traw!"
"WHAT?" King Gnomus said. He turned to his guards and said, "Guards! Find this portal and close it!" Before the guards even nodded, the advisor spoke up, saying, "It was already shut by the time I came to tell you, my lord! But something came through. Tra-la-la!" Two gnomish soldiers hopped into the throne room and presented the king with a folded, slightly dirty white blanket. It had two eyeholes, a opening for a mouth and a small hole at the top.
"Just a blanket?" King Gnomus said. "People are using this place to throw their trash here?"
"No, your majesty." The advisor said. "The zombies opened the portal. This could mean something!" King Gnomus nodded before saying, "Leave me, all of you." The advisor, soldiers and the guards bowed and left the throne room, leaving the gnome king alone.
Citron and Mia were sharing battle stories. Citron was surprised about how much the little Nightcap knew, not that he doubted her, it was just surprising. Mia wrapped up her story about how she was nearly pummeled by gargantuars, massive zombies that used telephone poles as clubs, when she tricked them into hitting each other when a weed interrupted them.
"Sorry to interrupt but Kernel Corn needs to speak with you, Citron." The orange nodded and said, "Maybe we'll continue this later, Mia." Mia nodded and walked back to Phillip as Citron curled into a ball and rolled away. He uncurled himself and face the Kernel, who had arrived a few minutes ago, and said, "Sir. You wanted to see me?"
"Yes, Citron. Gather your men. We believe the position the humans have been compromised."
"The ones fleeing from here?"
"Yes. A large zombie horde moves to intercept them. You are to move in and protect them!" Citron nodded and rolled away.
Phillip wasn't sure what he was seeing. He walked over to a mirror and saw a tiny flame on his head. When he tried to put it out, it refused. Now his leaves were gone and in their place was a bigger flame. Phillip heard of fire peashooters before but they were all wiped out in different battles. Apparently he was one as well.
"Uuhh….." Came Mia's voice. Phillip turned to see the Nightcap staring at him in a mix of shock and confusion. "What is happening?" Mia, like all other plants, were fine with plants being on fire. If smoke wasn't emitting from the flame, it was perfectly fine.
"I am just as confused as you are, Mia." Phillip replied. "I think I'm a fire peashooter." Fire peashooters start off as normal peashooters until a certain age, when their leaves are eaten away by some mysterious fire and their green skin turns red. Mia stepped closer to Phillip and looked around.
"Look down here!" She said. Phillip did and saw the bottom of his stem was red.
"This is actually pretty cool looking." He said. "When do you think I start spitting fireballs."
"Hopefully not while you're using your peas to play catch with some of your fellow peashooters." Mia joked. Suddenly, a loud commotion sounded and the two plants ran outside of Penny to see all the plants rushing around. Citron rolled over to them and said, "Zomboss is attacking your human friends. We're moving to rescue them now." Phillip and Mia ran over to help and soon, Penny was filled with plants. They arrived to see the buses scattered across the road and zombies surrounding the humans. Penny sped to the ground and smashed into a group of zombies. She landed and the plants stormed out. The street erupted in combat and once again, the zombies seemed invincible. Citron wiped out most of the zombies as the plants formed a defensive circle around the cowering humans. The zombies weren't going down but were still being pushed back from the barrage of fire. Phillip fired a pea and half way through it soaring to it's target, it erupted in flames. It slammed a zombie in the face and it looked up to see its hair on fire. It screamed and ran around in a panic. Philip looked around as he was suddenly consumed by flames. He opened his eyes to see he was glowing. He looked down to see his skin was a bright red. His leaves and vines were completely gone and the peas in his pea pod were roasted. The battle completely stopped as they all stared at the fire peashooter. Phillip was the first to restart the battle, firing a fireball into the chest of an All-Star. The jersey was caught on fire as the All-Star panicked, finally deciding to run off a cliff into the ocean below. The battle resumed and Phillip caused it to turn from a fight to a rout. As the zombies retreated, Phillip heard James say, "Let go!" The fire peashooter turned to see James grabbed by the arms by Brian.
"Bring him and the girl back to baze!" He groaned. Phillip saw an engineer dismount his jackhammer and lift Kaia up and over his shoulder, who screamed in fear.
"James! Kaia!" James' parents shouted, running over. Phillip blocked them
"I got this! STAY. HERE." Phillip said. He turned to Mia and said, "C'mon!" The two plants charged the zombies as they boarded a ship. Penny zoomed in to block them but the ship just arced over the RV and retreated. Penny landed in front of Phillip and Mia and said, "Hop in." They did and Penny pursued Brian. After a long chase, Penny arrived at the center of Zomburbia, where Brian waited. Phillip jumped down before Penny could land and Brian laughed.
"You know that you can't beat me. Az long az the Zombie Revival Machine iz active, I am immortal!"
"That doesn't mean I can't still fight you!" Phillip called as he launched several fireballs. Brian dodged them all and returned fire with his Z-1 rifle. Phillip avoided all but the last one, which he burned with a well timed fireball.
"Imprezzive." Brian remarked. He flicked a switch on the rocket strapped to his back and he was launched in the air, landing behind Phillip and shooting some more. By this point, Mia was already on the ground and charged the engineer, who screamed in surprise before being kicked in the face. He was quickly dispatched, having been baited into charging straight into a barrel of highly explosive fuel. Mia began to free James and Kaia. Before she could however, Brian grabbed something from his back pocket. Phillip launched a fireball at this point and Brian pressed a button on the device. The fireball was blasted back straight into Mia's face and she yelped in pain as she was flung back, her purple scarf, singed and burning, floated to the ground.
King Gnomus stood at a balcony, staring out at his kingdom, Gnomight. He was not liking the amount of Gnomish energy he was feeling in the human world. He had suspected the zombies had something to do with this, afterall, they invaded the Gnomiverse a year ago, but now he was positive that the undead horde was up to something.
"The Window of All-Seeing, as you requested, my lord. Trum-dee-dum." A gnome said, carrying a large window pain. He propped it up against the railing of the balcony and bowed as he left. King Gnomus stroked his beard as the window warped and bended until it showed a massive metal box. Several gears were poking out of the sides and two metal cones stuck out off the top. Above that was a massive circle made of gnomish bricks. Several zombies patrolled the perimeter. King Gnomus gasped at the sight of all this.
"The zombies are using the power of the Gnomiverse for their machines!" He said. "Those undead fiends!" He knew this had to be stopped, for the sake of both the human world and the Gnomiverse but he couldn't just gather his armies and invade. Last time he did that in 1340 when he went to war with the fairies, he accidentally started a plague that wiped out millions of humans. He had to place his hopes on the plants his magic gnome created all those years ago. For now, all he could do was wait.
Phillip watched as Mia slowly got up. She shook her head and glared at Brian. Phillip only just realized that this was the first time he ever saw Mia's actual face. She still had her glowing pink eyes but also her mouth was decorated with pink lipstick. She had several nasty looking scars across her face and the rest of that shadowy ribbon like thing that trailed out from her head was wrapped around the very top of her forehead. She summoned more of her throwing moons and said, "Big. Mistake." She threw a moon right at Brian but he ducked, the projectile instead slicing his hat in half. Phillip joined into, bombarding the zombie with fireballs. He dodged them all and fired back. Phillip ducked and Mia jumped onto No-brainer's head. She threw a moon down the barrel of Brian's rocket, which exploded. Brian groaned, this time in anger instead of endless hunger, and pistol whipped Mia. She sprung back to her feet as Phillip fired a Chili Bean Bomb. Brian darted away from the blast radius and fired some more shots as he ran to cover. Phillip knew it was only a matter of time before the two plants were too tired to keep fighting. But he also knew no matter how many hits Brian takes, he won't die. Suddenly, he had an idea. He ran next to Mia and whispered something to her. She nodded and ran straight for the zombie. He jumped out from his cover and kicked Mia to the side as he ran. Mia threw a small, purple ball at Brian's feet and the zombie found himself in a dark purple, transparent sphere. He tried to move but he was weighed down. Phillip inhaled for a long time before unleashing a torrent of fire that slammed into Brian.
"I can't kill you!" The plant shouted. "But I can neutralize you!" Brian erupted in flames and soon vanished. After a long time, in which Phillip had freed James and Kaia, the flames died down and reveal a pile of ash with a very burnt zombie head on top. Brian looked around in shock and tried to speak but nothing came out.
"Now you will stay RIIIGHT here." Phillip said. Brian stared at his enemy, gawping as Phillip looked around.
"Strange..." He commented. "Zomburbia is empty."
"You worry about James and Kaia," Mia said, looking at her burnt scarf. "I'll search this place. Besides, I'm curious about this place!" later, when Phillip had gotten the two humans into the safety of Penny and messaged the Kernel that everyone was safe, Mia appeared in front of him and said, "No zombies anywhere! I walked right into Dr. Zomboss' office and nobody was there and nobody tried to stop me. I found this machine though and I thought I saw a blue light but it was gone in a second."
"Hmm...we better tell the Kernel about this. For now, let's get these two back home." Phillip gestured at the two humans and Mia nodded. Penny took off and flew into the night, leaving behind the empty streets of Zomburbia.
ONE MONTH LATER…
Kernel Corn sighed as he watched daily life go about Neighborville. The sun was shining, birds were singing, which was all normal but something had changed: The humans were outside going about their business, completely calm and unafraid. After a few weeks mopping up small hordes of zombies here and there, Neighborville returned to normal. He, as well as all the other plants, were surprised with Phillip's new looks but were happy nonetheless to see a fire peashooter once again. The Kernel was hesitant about telling Phillip about more the ancient fire peashooters from the early days of the war. He would have to consult Major Sweetie about that once she was finished with the Giddy Park relief organization she had put together. Kernel Corn looked down to see Mia chatting with another Nightcap, wearing her new glow in the dark scarf with pride. Kernel Corn noticed some change in the nightcap she was more open and social than she was a month ago and this made him smile. As for Piper, the kernel was still unsure what had happened to her. He believed she'd been taken prisoner by the zombies but couldn't track her down considering the fact that all the zombies had vanished, leaving once impenetrable zombie control areas abandoned. The kernel was thinking about organizing search parties to find Piper and possibly track down the zombies, who clearly were up to something. After all, the zombies had the plants pushed to the breaking point. But for now, Kernel Corn figured he should let his troops relax. After all the battles, hardships and dangers they faced, they definitely deserved it.
And this is where we stop, my friend, for the plants have won. but the adventures of Mia, Phillip and the other plants are not over...
THE END
A/N: BOOM! ENDING! yes, I know this was one of my shorter stories but I was really running out of ideas so I poured every single drop of my brain juice into thinking of a good way to wrap things up before I started another Origami Hyrule incident. I hope you enjoyed this story nonetheless!