Three days passed since Anne, Charlie, Marcy and the Plantars had taken on the first temple and charged one of the stones. Somewhere in Newtopia, General Yunan was preparing for another trip as she was going on a search mission that she elected herself to go on. King Andrias was informed by her that she just wanted to search for any other possible threats to inform him about which she lied to him about.
General Yunan was in a room, pacing back and forth with a lot on her mind. She was thinking about the uprising in the Valley, Captain Grime being at large and being aided by someone she hasn't met, the meeting of the toad lords but she was mostly thinking about the kind act that Charlie did for her, even when she attacked him.
"I tricked him, lured him into a trap, I taunted him, I threatened to spread lies about him or frame him for a few crimes, I called him names, I gave him a beating, we fought like soldiers in a boomshroom field, he knocked me out and when I awoke. He placed me under the roof of the ruins and left me water and rations along with an all miracle healing golden apple to heal me? What is he playing at?" said Yunan confused. "He's probably trying to lull me into a false sense of security and when I lower my guard, BAM! He'll get me! Or is he trying to be my ally and show me...love? What's he trying to tell me?"
General Yunan didn't know what to think. Was Charlie her enemy or her ally? She was on the fence about the situation and her feelings.
Back in Wartwood
It was a sunny morning in the town of Wartwood and Marcy had slept in the caravan since there wasn't an extra bed for her to sleep in the Plantar's house. They did feel hesitant about Marcy sleeping in the caravan but she reassured them that she's alright with it since she's grown used it to when ever she went on a road trip with her family back at home in an RV. Charlie knew that he could relate.
Marcy was really excited to experience her first day in the town but Charlie was the one to accompany her into town after she ran around in excitement both outside and inside the Plantar's home, flown around in the sky and landed in the town area of Wartwood when Joe landed on the ground. Charlie helped her down as he figured she could use a hand.
"Marcy, did you have too much sugar in your breakfast this morning?" chuckled Charlie. "You're a little hyper."
"I'm alright. Maybe not that time when I first had sugar at age five. I went nuts." chuckled Marcy as she taken a look at the surroundings. "It's so cute! It's got a folksy country vibe."
A random caramel male frog was digging a hole nearby and let out a loud burp.
"Colorful characters." Marcy listed off.
There were other frogs near a shopping stand who were chatting amongst themselves and letting out a loud burp altogether. She got a look at the statue that was located in the center of the town as she had an excited grin and had a twinkle in her big eyes.
"Gosh, Anne was right. It's the perfect little farm town!" said Marcy excitedly.
Marcy rushed over to a stand to introduce herself to Mrs. Croaker while Charlie was by her side. He was trying to make sure that Marcy didn't get too clumsy that would result in her getting into an accident or from anyone getting into an accident for that matter. She introduced herself to Mrs. Croaker so excitedly that the old female frog jumped with a started and dropped a few of her fruits from a basket she carried around her left arm. Charlie had helped place the fallen fruits back in her basket.
"Hi! My name is Marcy. What's your name?" asked Marcy excitedly.
Mrs. Croaker turned to look at Marcy and she had an annoyed expression on her face.
"Oh, great. Just what we need. An outsider." groaned Mrs. Croaker.
Charlie cleared his throat loudly and Mrs. Croaker saw that Charlie had a disapproving look that was from Mrs. Croaker's cold reception which had her expression change and blush.
"She's with me, Mrs Croaker." said Charlie.
"Oh." Mrs. Croaker uttered in surprise.
She wanted to say something to soften things up but she blushed and walked off as if too afraid or shy to say anything. She felt like she may have said the wrong thing to Marcy. Marcy looked to see the male frog at the fruit stand and waved at him to greet him. He was about to grab hold of a lever but Charlie crossed his arms.
"I...I...I." the male frog stuttered.
"Sir, I would heavily advise against that." Charlie told him.
The male frog immediately removed his hand from the lever and he obeyed as he sensed that Charlie was trying to have him be nice to Marcy since it was her first day in Wartwood.
"Sir, has the town of Wartwood been going through-"
"Hey Charlie, your friend just ran off." the male frog interrupted.
Charlie turned to see that Marcy ran off to interact with more of the townsfolk as he shook his head with a groan.
"I'll ask later." said Charlie taking off.
Charlie caught up with Marcy as she was talking to at least three silverish blue polliwogs.
"HI there! My name is Marcy. Do you have any time to talk about what's unique architectural history?" asked Marcy eagerly.
The three polliwog children stood there stunned as they didn't understand what Marcy was talking about. Charlie sighed as he knew that this was probably going to be a long day for the both of them.
"Marcy, they're polliwogs." Charlie reminded.
Marcy snapped back to reality and realized she was asking children something only teenagers or young adults would know. She blushed and put her notebook away.
"Whoops." said Marcy uttered.
"Are you a-" one of them began.
"New to Wartwood?" Charlie chimed in.
"Sure." the polliwogs said.
"Yes." said Marcy.
Charlie had an idea to break the confusion as he started to mimic the sound of a person farting loudly and that made the three of them laugh.
"I think uncle Zed had too much beans with his burrito again." said Charlie mimicking a goofy clown like voice.
The three polliwog children laughed so hard at Charlie's humor that it lightened the mood and atmosphere for them. Marcy suddenly saw another residence of the town and ran off to talk to them but Charlie saw she ran and was starting to get annoyed by that which he made sure that three polliwog children got to their parents and their parents were glad to see that they were safe and sound and that Charlie made them laugh. Charlie caught up with Marcy as she was talking to Wally.
"Oh, my gosh. Are you a vagrant? Is that an accordion? Is that eye really gone?" Marcy asked rapidly.
"Too many questions." said Wally looking nervous.
Wally was sitting on a barrel and got up as he tossed his accordion at the window which shattered.
"Wally, I wouldn't." Charlie advised.
Wally jumped through the broken window and was gone in a flash.
"No worries, Charlie. I'm alright, when I haven't lost my mind." joked Wally.
Charlie breathed a sigh of relief that Wally wasn't hurt but he turned to see Marcy hanging her head down in a sigh. She was feeling down about the fact that people in town were not very fond of her which left her hurting. She was feeling dejected. She went to sit down near the statue. Charlie walked over to her while Anne caught up with them. Marcy tried to appear like she wasn't affected.
"Hey, Mar Mar. How's your first day in Wartwood going?" asked Anne curiously.
"Oh, great. Did you know this entire town is built on top of a swamp but never sinks? That's because the designers knew exactly how heavy to make everything." Marcy explained looking optimistic.
"That's cool fact what else do you learn." said Anne blushing.
Marcy's happy expression changed to dejection as she was showing she was feeling down.
"I also learned that small communities like this don't take kindly to strangers which mean's I don't have a chance." said Marcy sadly.
Anne went to sit down next to Marcy as she placed a reassuring hand on her back.
"Don't be ridiculous of course, they'll accept you." reassured Anne.
Charlie cleared his throat and when Anne and Marcy looked up, shook his head towards the right and that's when they saw an angry frog mob who carried pitchforks, flaming torches and Polly was sitting on top of one of their heads.
"Guys, come on she's with us." reassured Anne annoyed.
Charlie cleared his throat loudly once again and the mob of frogs and Polly were looking at Charlie who gave them a disapproving look and shook his head as if telling them to stop making Marcy feel worse. Their expressions turned to surprise and blushed.
"Drop the pitchforks." Charlie advised.
Any of them who had a pitchfork on them had dropped them to the ground like Charlie told them.
"Put the torches out." Charlie continued.
Any of them who had a flaming torch used a bucket of water nearby to douse the flames in a loud sizzle.
"Polly." said Charlie sternly.
"Okay, okay, I'm coming over." said Polly with a sigh.
Polly hopped over to Anne, Charlie and Marcy while the mob appeared to be unsure how to respond to Charlie and Anne getting them to be nice to Marcy since they were a little stunned and let out a loud hiccup and walked off. Marcy let out a sigh of sadness while Anne wrapped an arm around her to console Marcy.
"They will warm up to you, it just takes time. It was the same with me." said Anne.
"How did it go for Charlie?" asked Marcy.
They went silent and knew that the answer to her question might not make her feel any better or possibly might make her feel worse.
"Charlie was kind of marvel to them. They never met a male human before which they were kind of showing more interest than shock. I know this won't sound better but the only reason why they warmed up to him instantly was because he was immediately doing a lot to help people. Helping the elderly, watching out for others children, suggesting natural remedies to anyone who had an injury, an illness or some kind of condition that was treatable, a lot of women around here were flirting with him. He even fought against toad soldiers when ever they attacked. Him and the mayor didn't get off to a good start, the mayor used to be at conflict with him. He was on the shy side of things and he didn't like talking about his problems. He's was kind of like a little kid in a new town." Anne listed off. "Charlie used to be afraid of a lot of things. He used to be afraid of Hop Pop, you should've seen how he confessed his love to me. It was quite a romantic sight."
Charlie blushed and cleared his throat. Anne stopped and saw that Marcy wasn't feeling too optimistic about how Charlie's experience in adjusting to Wartwood sounded.
"I'm not helping, am I?" asked Anne rhetorically.
"I know you're trying Anne." said Marcy.
"Well, it just takes time. It was the same with me." Anne reassured.
Marcy placed a hand on her chin and tapped her right index finger on her chin for a moment. An idea popped into her mind.
"Time or maybe a strategy." said Marcy with a grin.
"Gonna say time still." said Anne and Charlie in unison.
"Come on guys, people are just another puzzle to solve, operation connect with Wartwood engage." said Marcy getting up to strike a pose.
She had one of her feet standing on the outer edge of the statue but just when she felt her footing slip, she fell backwards and landed on the bottom of the statue, knocking it down as it broke off from the legs and landed on the ground to the right. It landed in a loud thud and clatter while the left arm and hand that shown to hold a cane broke off.
"'What the, the town founder whose name I don't even know, how dare she." said a male frog in shock.
"It's that clumsy outsider." said a gruff male frog.
"She will knock the whole city down before she's through." commented an annoyed female frog.
Everyone in Wartwood gasped as they came running to see what was going on. They were all gathering around and looked at Marcy enraged. Anne and Charlie were ready to calm the residence down. Charlie sucked in a big amount of air and let out one of his loudest operatic singing notes to get the residence attention and to possibly simmer them down. He stopped afterwards.
"Everyone, it was an accident. If we let one little accident get in the way of meeting new people that are kind and harmless, than we'll never get to know anyone that way." said Charlie attempting to get through to them.
"No problem, no problem, I can fix it." Marcy interjected.
She pulled out two hand sized vials and walked over to the fallen statue. The vial in her left hand had some red liquid while the vial in her right had blue. She placed the tops of them together and mixed the liquid up till it turned vibrant purple. She dabbed a few drops of the purple liquid on all the broken pieces and placed the hand that was on the cane and the cane that was attached to the bottom of the cane's stem.
She than got out a rope that she tied around the statue's waist. Marcy ran over to what was probably a wooden street light as she jumped up onto a wooden box and jumped over the wooden street light as she tied the other end of the rope to a large and coal colored grubhog pig around it's waist. She slapped it on the butt, causing it to squeal and run which pulled the statue up off the ground and back on the part of it's legs it broke off from which also had the purple liquid on there. It was standing up straight as the purple liquid acted like an adhesive while Marcy got out some sand paper to clean the statue of any dirt, grime, and to everyone's astonishment. The statue was looking as clean as the day it was built.
"Alright, Wu train!" cheered Anne and Charlie.
"Oh, she fixed it." said Mrs. Croaker with a grin.
Everyone was looking thrilled as they saw Marcy had fixed the statue and felt their anger vanish and was replaced with admiration.
"Whoa, when did you learn how to do that?" asked Anne looking amazed.
"I took a sculpting class in Newtopia." answered Marcy.
"You too, huh?" said Charlie.
"You two been taking classes?" said Anne surprised.
"I actually took Charlie to one of the sculpting classes while in Newtopia and I got to admit, he sure was good at it. Everyone there was shocked to see his skills. Didn't you try to take classes or anything?" explained Marcy.
They heard a lot of the people leaving as they ran while holding onto their crotch areas as they obviously needed to use the bathroom. There was a random female frog that stood nearby who had on a tan shirt and blue overalls with her hair up in brown braids pointing up. She had buckteeth.
"You seem alright lady. For an outsider, anyway." said the female frog.
She spat in approval and walked off while she looked back at Charlie to wave at him with a wink and smile. Charlie blushed at that and watched her walk away. Marcy suddenly felt a spark of ideas forming in her head as she hugged Anne and Charlie.
"Oh my gosh guys, I just got a spit of approval. I did win the Newtopians over by improving their city, I bet I could do the same thing here in Wartwood." said Marcy getting excited.
"I guess that can work." said Anne with a hint of optimism.
"Come on guys, show me all the cruddy things to wrong with this town." said Marcy running off in excitement.
"Where do I even start?" said Anne and Charlie in unison.
They went around town to fix the problems that Wartwood was currently experiencing. The first was potholes one a dirt road path. Anne and Charlie both carried a large and plump looking bug that they used to squeeze out a thick and viscous brown liquid from them to fill in the potholes and Marcy would use a hand float to smooth it over.
A random male frog walked over and fell through one of the holes that apparently was deeper than the other holes but Charlie managed to grab him and pull him out to safety. He hugged the small male frog who hugged back and walked off afterwards while he was watching where his feet would go.
"We should've started with that one." said Marcy.
"Jōdan arimasen." Charlie replied.
The next thing they did was fix old, out of date street lamps which Marcy saw the glass to the street lamp was broken and the candle burned out. She got out her tools and within no time at all. The street lamp looked like it was made of steel with gold all over it, the glass was replaced and the candle was replaced along with it. Marcy placed a sticky note on it that read "Marcy Wuz Here!" with a drawing of her face on it.
They fixed some broken fences and even given them a new and fresh coat of paint. The wooden stocks that they used to give misbehaving townsfolk a time out was which was looking old and falling apart was now given a fresh coat of paint, the wood sanded and refurbished and it looked like it was given a new lock while she placed both a vase of flowers nearby and her sign below the stocks. There was a large male frog who was in the stocks and looked like he got a makeover with lipstick on his lips, pink press on nails, blush, and got his eyebrows and eyelashes done.
Charlie came over to him and freed him from the stocks as he gave him a nervous grin which the male frog he freed was looking a bit surprised by how he looked.
"Sir, if you want to, it washes off with soap and water." Charlie kindly suggested.
The large male frog looked at his makeover and smiled.
"Actually, I kind of like it, honey. Wait till Randy sees me now." said the large male frog in a strangely effeminate voice.
The large male frog even blew a kiss to Charlie and waved at him.
"See you later, doll-face." he told Charlie.
Charlie blushed as he just found out a large, masculine looking male frog turned out to be effeminate and preferred the company of other males in a relationship and that he was hit upon by him. He brushed it off as he was hugged and kissed by Anne.
Everywhere in Wartwood looked like it it gotten all problems fixed up. Everyone was wide eyed with astonishment.
"Marcy, you make Tim "The Tool Man" Taylor look like a tackle box compared to this." said Charlie with a grin.
"Looks okay, I guess." said Mrs. Croaker not looking too impressed.
"Still not completely sold on this outsider, well, not yet." chimed in Mr. Flour.
"Here here." chimed in Wally.
Charlie looked at the three frogs with a stoic expression which their looks of unamusement turned to wide eyed guilt and surprise. Charlie appeared to be trying to get them to be nice to Marcy, especially for what she's doing for them.
"Thanks for improving around the town." the three frogs told her.
Charlie made the prayer sign with one hand that pointed up, pointed point and moved his hand left and right. They could see that Charlie didn't like having to get onto people who are not being very kind others or new people to the town but they could see that he was right about their behavior being cold-hearted.
"Oh look, there's a corner. I'm gonna go sit in it." said Mr. Flour nervously.
Anne and Charlie turned to give Marcy a pat on the back for all she's doing with everything that was broken being fixed and everything looking new and improved.
"Nice dude! The town looks great." said Anne and Charlie in unison.
"Thanks guys but I still haven't done enough. I need to go bigger." said Marcy.
"Did someone say bigga!" came a loud male's voice.
They looked up and saw a huge hot air balloon that was floating from the sky to the ground. The balloon was shaped to look like Mayor Toadstool and Toadstool was riding in it's basket. Once it landed on the ground, he climbed out of it.
"Never seen that balloon before." said Anne.
"I have, it looks just like Mayor Toadstool. Anyone here in town can spot it a mile away like the lights to the empire state building." said Charlie giggling.
"Marcy, meet Mayor Toadstool. He's like if the Monopoly Man had a baby with a piece of fried chicken." Anne introduced.
"That better be a compliment, Boonchuy." said Toadstool hopefully.
"So you're the local toad?" asked Marcy.
"Right on the money, huh? And speaking of money. Are you the one whose been making these delightful little improvements to our town?" asked Toadstool looking eager.
"That's a me." said Marcy with a smile.
Toadstool came to Marcy's side and placed a hand on her back and actually kissed her on the cheek and on her hand. This made her blush.
"Don't worry about the kissin, it's just a greeting. I gotta hand it to ya. I find your work mighty impressive. How's you like to help me make some even bigger improvements? I have an idea to make this poor dump little town into a real money-making tourist A-ttraction." said Toadstool looking around the town with his eyes.
Marcy had the biggest twinkle in her eyes. Her face lit up like a Christmas tree with a lot of lights flashing on and off. She gasped in excitement while Charlie and Anne felt like this might led to disaster. Anne and Charlie knew that Toadstool was still new at being a better person and is still working up to it but his razzle-dazzle ideas were screaming "Uh Oh" to Anne and Charlie.
"If I help make this town super successful. Than people will have to accept me." said Marcy wide eyed.
"Uh oh." said Charlie under his breath.
"Yeah, sure, whatever. Toadie!" called Toadstool.
Toadie came running with a rolled up paper that had a golden seal wrapped around it. He gave it to Marcy for her to take a look.
"Here are the plans, take a look, think it over." Toadstool advised which he snapped his fingers. "Fetch the balloon Toadie."
Toadie and Charlie saw the balloon and it was drifting away from them into the sky.
"Uhhhh problem." said Charlie and Toadie pointing.
Toadstool looked up and that's when he saw what problem they pointed out. The balloon floated away so far that it was shrinking into the distance. Toadstool groaned and shook his head.
"That's the third time it's happened today." said Toadstool exasperated.
"Third time?" said Charlie surprised.
Toadstool turned to see Charlie and that's when he froze up. Everytime Toadstool saw Charlie anywhere in Wartwood, he'd freeze up, his mind would go blank, his heart raced and he blushed deeply. He gulped loudly with a nervous grin.
"Oh...uh...you've been a standing there for how long?" asked Toadstool nervously.
"Since the moment you arrived when you first spoke out in a melodious voice." answered Charlie.
Toadstool let out a nervous laugh as he remembered he was struggling with identifying his sexual orientation since he seems to have been experiencing a change or some changes since Charlie had been one of the first to have a positive influence on him. His reaction to Charlie right now was like how Charlie struggled with confessing his feelings to Anne.
"Mayor, you alright? You're sweating and it's not even hot out." said Anne taking notice.
Toadstool looked at Charlie once more and was about to say something in a response but he took off running in the opposite direction.
"Toadie, meet me in my office! I gotta take care of a personal thing!" lied Toadstool. "Hope to do business with you soon, Marcy!"
Toadie took off running after Toadstool as the three humans looked on in confusion.
"Has the mayor always been reacting like that?" asked Marcy.
"Nope. This is his second time. I have no idea why." said Charlie.
"This is it, guys. The way into everyone's hearts." said Marcy looking excited.
"I don't know, Marce. Any plan of the mayor's is sure to go belly up." said an unsure Anne.
"And I'm a witness. I still remember the last plan he had and lets just say that it left him falling on his booty." said Charlie in agreement.
Marcy saw the unsure looks on their faces and looked like she was starting to understand. She gave in and surrendered.
"You're probably right. Just out of curiosity. What happened last time Toadstool had a plan when you said it resulted him falling on his butt?" asked Marcy.
Anne and Charlie went silent as they remembered the last plan Toadstool had turned out to be making new back scratchers from the quills of a colossal porcupine which his idea was good at first but than it resulted in one of the colossal porcupine's offspring getting lost, wandered into Wartwood and it's mother was a little angry but Charlie and Anne managed to calm the mother and show that it's baby was safe but Toadstool accidentally fell from a wooden stool, landed on the ground which sent the baby flying four feet into the air and landing on Toadstool's butt, making him scream in agony from the sharp prick of the quills that were stuck to his overly fat butt.
"Just rip it off fast like a band-aid." said Toadstool breathing rapidly from fear of anything worse.
A slim female frog doctor had on thick, puncture resisting gloves as she was taking hold of the baby porcupine while Anne and Charlie managed to do something to help him focus on something over than the pain. Charlie gave him a stress ball while Anne gave him a clean towel for him to bite down on.
"Hold still, big and tall, you might feel stinging pinch." said female frog spoke in a German accent. "On the count of three."
The female frog doctor had only went on three and pulled the baby porcupine off Toadstool's butt which resulted him screaming loudly it pain which biting down on the towel managed to muffle the sound enough for it to not cause any form of damage to anyone's hearing.
Both Anne and Charlie looked at Marcy and blushed deeply at the memory of Toadstool's last plan.
"You don't want to know." said Anne and Charlie in unison.
Next Morning
As it was morning and the sun was shining. The locals of Wartwood were all waking up to see that the town all looked brighter and cleaner. A lot of the changes to it's appearance were just coatings over the preexisting buildings. The coatings looked like big white colored buildings with green shutters to their windows with beautiful pots of flowers around them. They even had reinforced windows.
There was a pink building that in the distance had a series of bushes in one spot to look like a frog's face was smiling. The pink building looked like a train station as a train passed by the building while setting off the train's horn.
Anne, Charlie and the Plantars shown up to see this while Anne and Charlie were wearing a hoodie jacket. The two human teenagers knew that Toadstool's plans and her influence on Marcy had their names written all over the area.
"What in tarnation is going on here?" asked Hop Pop curiously.
"Oh no. She didn't." said Anne and Charlie in unison.
There was a small group of frogs nearby a huge stage who were playing instruments as if to set off what was about to be explained to the townspeople. There was a huge blue covering on top of the stage with "New W W" on there in gold lettering. The frogs playing the music were playing some jazz instruments as a stage light shined on the center of the stage.
Marcy and Toadstool walked towards where the stage light was shining. Both of them were wearing sparkling red suits with black slacks and black, shiny shoes. Both of them wore a black top hat while carrying a black cane with a gold sphere on top of them.
"Anne, if something goes wrong." said Charlie worriedly.
"We'll be there for Marcy and the people." answered Anne.
"Good morning ladies and gentle-frogs." called Marcy.
"And welcome to New Wartwood!" said Marcy and Toadstool in unison.
Two pink puffs of smoke blasted on the sides of the stage like fireworks. The townsfolk were applauding and cheering for them at the sight of the spectacle.
"New Wart City is new and improved. Thanks to the work of myself and Mayor Toadstool." said Marcy twirling her cane.
"Gone the dumpy old fronts of old. Replaced by new ones made of Newtopian imported marble." called Toadstool pointing around the buildings.
"Feast your eyes on the new clock tower." said Marcy pointing to the left.
The clock tower looked like a golden statue of Toadstool laying on his stomach from the top of the building where it held the clock in the hands while the eye pupils were slits that went back and forth everytime the clock tower's bell would toll.
"That clock looks like it might scare the children." said Charlie under his breath. "And I usually clock towers."
"I'm with you. Not loving that clock." said Anne under her breath.
"And finally. May I present the new and improved town square statue!" Marcy continued.
Both Marcy and Toadstool pulled the huge blue sheet off and it revealed the town square statue had been replaced or re-modeled and instead of it being made of stone. It was made of gold and the statue of the town's founder stood up, looking like it was made to appear with a muscular body and carrying a weight with it's left hand. Mrs. Croaker was admiring the muscular statue which sort of made Wally feel uncomfortable.
"And for limited time only. Everything is free!" announced Toadstool.
An even larger puff of pink smoke from the stage's sides blasted out and fireworks shot into the sky and exploded into different colors of sparks as the town was cheering for the event and rushed over to experience the delight of the new and improved town that has been built. Very few of them people stayed behind as those who stayed behind sensed something wasn't going to end well. Anne, Charlie, Sprig, Polly, Hop Pop, Wally, Mrs. Croaker and others hung back.
Anne and Charlie walked over to the stage near the spot where Marcy stood as both Marcy and Toadstool looked excited and proud to see that the plans that were set were actually working.
"Oh we're gonna made oodles." said Toadstool walking off in excitement.
"Mar Mar, you sure this is a good idea?" asked Anne worried.
"Isn't it great? We completely transformed this place. Now everyone will have to accept me." said Marcy looking eager.
"That's not how this works. People will accept you when they accept you." said Anne trying to get through to her.
"Marcy, if you think they'll accept you for all this. It's going to blow up in someone's face the second something goes wrong. Now come down from there. Don't you remember what you've said about this town having too much or it'll collapse and sink into the swamp?" said Charlie also trying to get through to her.
Marcy was about to say something but than she remembered that she did say something about Wartwood and too much weight being put on the land. That's when the ground began to quake like an earthquake. In parts of the town, cracks were forming and water would sprout out from the grown like a geyser.
More cracks formed from the ground as if it was like they were experiencing an earthquake or some powerful tremor. The water that sprouted out of the ground even show Mrs. Croaker up into the air. The coatings of the preexisting buildings started to fall over and parts of the ground caved in. The town was sinking into the swamp from the excessive weight and Marcy saw the flaws of Toadstools plans.
"What the heck is going on?" said Anne in a panic.
"I knew it! I knew this idea was going to blow up in someone's face!" cried Charlie looking not very surprised but was shocked to see what was taking place.
"Oh no, the weight. We built too much. The town is sinking into the swamp." said Marcy now realizing the follies.
"I for one refuse to learn anything from this." said Toadstool about to run.
"Toadstool, you stay right there and don't you dare run off. Marcy, you might've wanted to do more for this town but Toadstool's plans led to this! Toadstool, I'm warning you, run off and I'll chase you down!" Charlie warned sharply.
"Yes daddy!" cried Toadstool in a panic giving him a salute.
The town looked like a lot of it's surroundings was sunk into the swamp while some of it was still able to keep itself afloat. Many of the residence were screaming in panic, running around, some were standing on buildings or land that were able to keep afloat so they wouldn't fall into the water while there was still geysers of water sprouting out.
"Well, they're definitely not going to like me after this. But, I can make sure that everyone lives." said Marcy attempting to fix a mistake. "Come on, guys."
"Right on!" said Anne.
Charlie picked up Anne into her arms and jumped up onto the stage where Marcy and Toadstool stood. Anne was feeling like she was in the arms of a muscular hero when he did this.
"Marcy! Call for Joe!" cried Charlie.
Marcy called upon the large bird by screaming his name and snapped her fingers. Charlie mimicked the call of an eagle's vocal sounds to call for him and Joe came flying towards them from the sky. When Joe made it to their side, that's when the two girls hopped onto Joe's back.
"Ladies, you take care of buildings. I'll take care of the people. Joe, keep my girl safe in the sky!" Charlie instructed.
Joe nodded at him and flown up into the air while Charlie uttered a mighty lion like roar as his eyes and hair turned gold and that's when Charlie would run around or swim in the water or jump to high heights to help rescue people in town as he was moving at lightning speed while Joe was being commanded by Anne and Marcy to fly down and grab hold of other people and take them to safety.
Charlie would have the powerful strength to carry at least eight residences of the place at a time while Anne and Marcy had Joe carry at least two residences of the town. They managed to get every single residence to safer and stronger ground. Charlie was able to run so fast that he could run across the water like it was the ground. Joe flew over the town as Anne and Marcy were going to try and stop the town from sinking completely.
"Okay. Now we gotta stop the town from sinking. You know, lighten the load somehow." said Anne.
"Exactly! And I think I know what needs to go." said Marcy with a grin.
Joe let out a loud bird like whistle and he used his strong and powerful talon like feet to grab onto parts of the newly built town that was causing the sinking and collapsing and would toss them far away from the town while what was tossed away ether went off far onto the forest or off a cliff.
The bird took off the head of the golden frog that was on the clock tower while Toadstool felt like a little bit of him died inside by the sight of it. Marcy got out a rope and used it like a lasso to wrap around the golden weight that the golden statue held. Joe tried to fly off with it but it was proving to be heavy.
"Come on, Joe Sparrow! I believe in you!" said Marcy with a word of encouragement.
Joe felt his inner strength kick in from Marcy's words and he pushed harder as he flew off with the new statue ripping off it's mantel and flew over a good distance away to drop it off a cliff, literally. The huge bird panted while Marcy informed him that it's all over and he can rest easy.
The town risen back up and all of the buildings or all of the originally existing buildings and ground area had came right back up. Joe landed on the ground where Charlie ran towards their side and his hair and eyes changed back to their normal color. Anne and Marcy slipped off Joe's back while Charlie caught them and held them land on their feet.
"We did it guys. Total success." said Marcy with a grin.
They were interrupted by a loud clearing of one's throat. They all turned to see many of the townsfolk looking at Marcy with irate expressions while Charlie knew that one or more of them was probably going to yell at Marcy and he could already imagine her crying her eyes out from the heartache and suspecting that no one likes her in town.
"Wait, guys, don't be mad. Marcy just wanted to help." said Anne attempting to simmer them down.
"Guys, now Marcy may have made a huge mistake that's affected you all or made you more P. than I was when I fought against the toad army when they tried to apprehend me the first time. But she's really sorry but Marcy is kind of an emotionally fragile girl right now. Anything your going to say to her will only make her feel worse than she already feels." Charlie came to her defense.
"It's alright guys. I can face the music on my own." said Marcy looking brave.
"Before you do that. Toadstool! Front and center!" Charlie commanded.
Toadstool came running over there and stood next to Marcy as he shown a little fear and guilt as he knew he was just in big of trouble as Marcy was. Marcy took in a deep breath and began to show a guilty face.
"I'm so sorry, everyone. I mean, you are all very important to Anne and Charlie. I know how much you love them like family and I guess I just wanted you to like me too. But I took things way too far. Anne has done so much for all of you and risk her life to help all of you. Charlie has helped the elderly around here, looked after others children, administered or suggested natural cures and remedies for anyone who had an illness or injury they were suffering from. I know this will sound like jealously and even though I don't intend to make it look that way but like I've said. I took things way too far and went about as overboard as a ship that sunk into an ocean. No pun intended." said Marcy apologetically.
Mrs. Croaker was the first to approach Marcy and she was afraid she was about to be yelled at.
"Marcy was it? I think I speak for everyone here when I say we're all pretty mad at you." said Mrs. Croaker sternly.
The townsfolk were murmuring in response but Toadstool chimed in as he knows that he is just as guilty.
"To be fair. I shoulder just a bit of blame here. Marcy may have wanted to go bigger with the improvements but I'm the one who financed it all and planted the idea of the plans you saw into sweet little lady's head. So she's not entirely to blame." said Toadstool nervously taking responsibility.
"Zip it, Toadstool! We'll get to you later." said Mrs. Croaker sharply.
"Yes ma'am." said Toadstool giving a frightened salute.
"As for you! You're a walking disaster who doesn't know when to quit, you nearly destroyed this town and killed us all in the process." ranted Mrs. Croaker.
Marcy felt her heart and spirit break as she hung her head in shame. Charlie pulled her in his arms in an attempt to console her as she looked like she was on the verge of tears. The townsfolk looked on as they saw that Marcy was about to be in tears from the harsh criticism she was receiving and their expressions changed into guilt but they had a word of comfort for her.
"In other words, honey. You're just like Anne when she got here. Or only when she first arrived here that is." said Mrs. Croaker giving her a grin.
Marcy looked up and was now confused, wiping a tear from her eye as the townsfolk were now feeling guilty that they almost made Marcy cry.
"Yeah, that means we'll probably get around to liking you eventually." said Wally with a comforting smile.
"Yeah, whether we want to or not. Am I right?" said Albus.
Many of them were laughing as they knew they were laughing about the happy memories of bonding with each other, Anne, Charlie and bonding with Marcy now that she was seeing they were forgiving her.
"But if you're wondering. At first, we didn't treat Anne very kindly at first when we first met her. We saw her as...a monster but only because we never saw nor met a human before. Very few of us were kind to her but a lot of us were unfairly mean to her and when she fought against toad soldiers to help us, we saw that she cared about us and we saw her as a hero, a friend, someone to love. We were guilt ridden at how poorly we treated her in the beginning. Even when we apologized to her and begged for her to forgive us. We sort of suspected she wanted to punch us in the face for how we treated her so poorly at first which some of us felt like we deserved to be punched in the gut for it all. And we wouldn't blame her if she did. But she forgiven us all. Even though we didn't deserve to be forgiven. Also, Anne, we all are still very sorry for how poorly we treated you in the beginning." Mrs. Croaker explained and told Anne.
They all nodded and murmured to Anne in agreement to apologizing to Anne.
"Marcy, we all see you had good intentions and that's alright. Some people have good intentions when they want to help others and everything may go swell at first but than things can go downhill at times. And we would also like to apologize for nearly making you cry. Sure, we were mad about what happened but Charlie is right. Anything we were going to say to you would only make you feel worse than you already feel since you saw that you made a mistake when you never intended for this to happen. We do hope that we too can be forgiven for nearly hurting you inside when you faced the music as you've said." Mrs. Croaker added with a word of comfort to Marcy.
Hearing this actually made Marcy feel better and she was curious to know from Anne about what Mrs. Croaker told her was correct.
"Anne, is that true?" said Marcy with a grin.
"Oh for sure man. I even set the whole town on fire once, no lie." Anne admitted.
"Burned me trousers off." Wally chimed in.
"I remember that." said Albus.
"I'm still on fire." said a random male frog.
Charlie managed to splash water on the frog who admitted he was still on fire who only had a spark on a part of his hair which put the fire out.
"I guess what was said about Charlie was correct." said Marcy.
"You know it. When we first him, he was hurt and ill, being out in the forest or jungle had sort of driven him half crazy out there. It would happen to anyone out there. The reason why we didn't treat him so poorly like we did Anne when we first met him was because we remembered that we made a huge mistake for treating Anne so poorly and that we shouldn't have been so mean to a sweet, innocent little girl. So we remembered that we didn't want to make that same mistake. That, and we never met a human male before, we were more fascinated than we were shocked to meet him. He's done so much for the people in Wartwood yet we couldn't believe how strong he is. He actually used to be afraid of Hop Pop or older men with canes." explained Mrs. Croaker.
"No lie, when I first met him, well, I wasn't very nice to him. He was terrified of me. He used to be afraid of many things." said Toadstool admitting the truth.
"Charlie used to feel so uncomfortable talking about his problems or showing grief. He was afraid someone was going to stigmatize him for it. But he's grown so much in his time here like Anne. Speaking of which, the whole time he was here, he was completely love-struck by Anne. The way he confessed his love to her, quite a romantic sight, that it was." said Wally. "He was crazy about her."
Charlie let out a huge hiccup as they mentioned this while Marcy saw that everything that Anne and Charlie told her had been confirmed about how things have progressed for them in Wartwood.
"Wow!" said Marcy.
"One, I see we made the same mistake in treating a newbie so poorly when first meeting them. But just be patient and I'm sure you'll fit in eventually." reassured Mrs. Croaker while she had a different expression on her face for a brief moment. "After a lengthy period of regarding you of extreme borderline paranoid suspicion, mind you."
Charlie cleared his throat loudly and he mouthed the words "dial it down" to Mrs. Croaker who immediately knew what she just said was a little too much.
"Well, think of it as we're still getting to know ya. It takes time for people to get to know someone they just met. You've been here for two days so after getting to know ya, you'll be fitting in like Anne and Charlie." Mrs. Croaker reassured.
Charlie let out a sigh of relief as Marcy knew they just need time to get to know her which she was completely alright with it.
"Fair enough. Thank you everyone. I'll do my best and in the meantime. Let me at least clean this mess up." said Marcy rolling up her sleeves.
Marcy sped off towards the town before anyone could utter another word and they all turned to see Marcy was rebuilding everything at such a fast speed limit just like Chuck and with every other building or location that was damaged or destroyed was rebuilt faster than anyone could blink. They were all wide eyed by this as if they witnessed something miraculous.
"There goes the Wu Wu train." chuckled Anne and Charlie.
"I gotta say. She's pretty amazing." said Wally with a grin.
"Yep, she's one of kind." said Anne.
Everyone murmured in agreement and that's when Anne and Charlie looked to their left and saw that mascot from earlier that looked like Toadstool. It made a muffled reply that couldn't be understood.
"Hey guys, what the heck is even in there?" asked Anne.
"Uh oh." said Toadstool with dread.
They all gotten their answers when they saw the mascot rip open and burst out as it was filled with a series of bugs. They all gasped loudly in horror.
"Bugs! It's just bugs!" cried Anne.
Everyone panicked and ran but Charlie whistled to Joe Sparrow and whispered an idea to him and the huge bird smiled in excitement as the bird started to eagerly feast upon the bugs that filled the mascot costume. Everything stopped and saw that the bird was feeding on the bugs like a feast which had them regain their calmness.
"Problem solved." said Charlie.