(AN: This chapter SHOULD have come sooner… but I got sidetracked, and I wound up going home for more weekends than I planned, rendering me unable to write. So… I apologize. But here's the next chapter, still earlier than most of the other chapters have been!
And hey, I actually have a neat title for the chapter that I came up with BEFORE I wrote it! The song "Accidentally in Love" by the Counting Crows seems to fit the chapter, so I thought I'd steal the chapter. As usual, I don't own anything that is well-known, famous, or popular, so please don't sue me.
Oh yeah, one more thing… you know, I thought that if one didn't like a story that they read, they wouldn't continue to read it. Common sense, right? And yet I got lucky and got the same guy to flame my story twice. The first time I was amused, but now I'm just confused. (Hey, that rhymed.) First of all, I'm a girl. A girl who doesn't know the meaning of the word "azz". (pulls out dictionary) Hmm, a-z-z… nope, not in there. Also, now correct me if I'm wrong, but I believe that this site is called fanfiction-dot-net. Fanfiction, noun: stories based on an existing work. If I'm going to write a story based on something else, it stands to reason that I'd use some of the characters from that work, right? Otherwise, I'd be on fictionpress-dot-net.
Whoops, sorry about that. (turns down level on sarcasm meter) There, I should be good now. ;p To those still reading and enjoying, thanks bunches, and here's chappy ten!)
O.o.O
The scenery was gorgeous—never had there been greener grass, waving lightly in the gentle breeze; never had there been a bluer sky, patched symmetrically with perfect clouds; never had there been more beautiful purple mountains, topped with snow, like frosting on a cupcake; absolutely perfect.
But it all paled in comparison to Joanna.
Roy watched her, dumbstruck. How could such a beautiful, perfect being exist in this imperfect world? Wasn't such a combination enough to cause the entire world to crumble, unable to handle so much perfection? The world didn't deserve Joanna; the GALAXY didn't. She transcended all of it.
It almost seemed as if she was in some other, perfect world, but, seeing Roy, she turned her head and smiled—a smile from her! Roy nearly fainted. What wonderful thing had he done to deserve that little slice of heaven?
Still smiling, she approached him, flowers popping out of the ground from each place where her foot was placed, birds fluttering all around her—songbirds, not chickens, although the songbirds looked drab compared to Joanna—all the while Roy was frozen in place, staring, staring, she's coming here!...
She was right in front of him! beams were shooting from the ground! too much to handle!
"Roy… I love you!" she said in her angelic voice.
The whole ground seemed to shift… huge heart shaped balloon-like things shot out… and Roy, finally able to move, took her in his wings, and—
"Breeeaaakfast!"
Roy's sleep-caked eyes cracked open, while his vision was madly trying to adjust—it was Kiral, holding a worm out in front of him. "Rise and shine, sleeping beauty. Here, have a worm!"
"frummumblegrumbleyoujustruinedagreatdreammumble," Roy inarticulated.
"Jeez, and I thought we kids were supposed to be the ones who slept in late," said Sheldon. He and Booker were wide awake and slurping down worms.
"You've got a lot to learn, shell-boy," said Booker. "Not only do they act like zombies, but they look like them too!"
"Oh, now I wouldn't say that!" said Kiral in a friendly tone.
"…ugh…where's my coffee?" Joanna muttered in a low growl, wiping crust from her eyes and trying to smooth out her rumpled feathers.
"Ugh!" cried Roy, who could now see relatively clearly. "You woke me up from a fantastic dream to see that? Quick, get me back to sleep! Y'know, Joey, there's a job opening at the haunted house—"
"Shut the hell up," snapped Joanna.
"Ooohh, burn!" Booker and Sheldon cried in unison.
"Ouch… there went my heart again," muttered Roy, quietly enough so that no one could hear him.
"Here, Mom, have a worm!" said Booker, handing his mother a worm. "Maybe that'll work as well as coffee."
"Doubt it, but I'm famished anyway," muttered Joanna, snatching the worm from her son's wings. She slurped it down in an instant.
"Have as many as you want," said Kiral with a smile. "I've got plenty."
"I'll take a few with me," said Joanna, grabbing a fistful. "It's a long way back to the farm."
"The farm?" cried Booker in disbelief.
"Yeah, it's that place where we live, remember?" joked Sheldon.
"I'm not going back there," said Booker fiercely. "I absolutely refuse. I'm going to live out on my own, catching worms and living my own life! I'm my own rooster now, Mom! You can't keep me tied down anymore!"
"You're not fully grown yet," said Joanna, in a tone of voice that clearly indicated that she was stating what she found to be the ridiculously obvious. "And even if you were, you're the farmer's property."
"I won't go!" cried Booker. "I'm staying here and that's final!"
"You'll go, and you'll like it, buster!" Joanna roared.
"Yes, Master!" squeaked a taken-aback Booker.
"Sheldon, dear, you hold some too," said Joanna, handing a few worms to Sheldon. Sheldon obeyed without question—he always did, but it would be insane to argue with her today.
Joanna gave Booker a half dozen worms as well. "Don't eat them all at once," she reminded him. She then turned to Roy. "Well, Roy, are you coming with us or not?"
"After the way you yelled at me, he'd be idiotic not to—" Booker began.
"But I'm your mother. I can make you do whatever I want. But I'm not Roy's mother." Joanna smiled. "So, how about it?"
Roy flicked at his worm. "Oh, I think I'll just stay here… why on earth would I go back to the farm, I'm not wanted there!"
"Do you know how many times you've said that, but then it turns out that you're wrong?" Sheldon reminded him.
"Things are different now," said Roy with a sigh. "All those other times I ran away? You only wanted me back because you didn't have a rooster. But since Buffy Bucky's there, I'll bet no one's even noticed that I'm gone!"
"But—!" Joanna began.
"That's the way it goes with us roosters," Roy continued, not acknowledging Joanna's interruption. "It's a constant struggle for the top wrung of the ladder, and this is one battle that I lost. I have accepted it. But not all hope is lost!" he cried, dramatically throwing his wings around Booker and Sheldon. "You, my sons, can overthrow him once you're all grown up! The hierarchy that I worked so hard—okay, I didn't work at all for it—to maintain will be restored! Promise me that you'll fulfill my last request, boys!"
"Uh…" said Booker and Sheldon in unison.
"Oh, for the love of cornbread!" Joanna yanked Booker and Sheldon away. "Roy, trust me, if you come back with us you'll be welcomed back with open arms. By this time he'll have made an enemy out of everyone on the farm! By the time I left, even the sheep hated him!"
"You honestly cannot use Lanolin as an example here," said Roy defiantly. "She hates everything that has a pulse."
"I meant 'sheep' in the plural sense," said Joanna. "The male wasn't too fond of him either."
"And you've got to admit, if even Bo doesn't like someone, then that someone ain't that popular!" said Sheldon.
"You've got a point…" said Roy thoughtfully.
"Besides," said Booker, "for all we know, Tonya might have driven him off the farm by now anyway."
Joanna raised an eyebrow. "Tonya? What gives you that idea?"
"Come on!" cried Booker. "Tonya hated the guy the minute she laid eyes on him! And with you gone, she was left free to unleash all kind of terrors on him! You know Tonya!"
"That's right, I did leave her in charge," said Joanna, thinking to herself.
"You did WHAT?" cried Booker.
"Mom, you're insane!" yelled Sheldon.
"Well, Booker," said Joanna briskly, "I hope that you're right. Tonya's very good at dishing out punishment to those who deserve it—although it's usually to those who don't deserve it—"
"Mom!" Booker sounded aghast. "You're actually encouraging her… her… her Tonya-like behavior?"
"Why not?" said Joanna, shrugging. "It'll put that darn rooster in his place."
"Uh, question from the ignorant rooster in the room," said Roy, raising his wing. "What exactly is Tonya-like behavior?"
Sheldon started to laugh. "Oh, I don't know… maybe that time when she sprung that trap that had you hanging by your ankles for two hours, Booker… or that time she tricked you with that exploding worm… or when she discreetly stuck that 'Throw boulders at me' sign on your back?"
Growling, Booker added, "Or that time she tried to drill a hole in your shell?"
"Do you know how long it took me to patch that thing up?" cried Sheldon, sounding mortified.
"Well… I certainly see which of my chicks takes after dear old Dad," said Roy, smiling like the proud father he was. "She sounds like a chip off the old block for sure!"
"Unfortunately," muttered Booker.
"We don't have time for this." Joanna grabbed Booker and Sheldon by the wings again. "We need to get going now so we'll have as much daylight as possible. Are you coming or not, Roy?"
Roy sighed in desperation. "You guys try to make it sound so simple, but you don't understand—I'm shamed! I'm disgraced! Even if everyone back there does like me better, it doesn't matter! Buck won, and I'm the outcast—I can't go back."
Joanna sighed. "I'll never understand roosters. Well, come on, boys. Thanks for keeping us for the night, Kiral."
"It was my pleasure," said Kiral. "Pop in and see me if you're ever in the area again!"
"Sure thing. Bye, Roy, nice knowing you." Without even pausing to give Roy one last look, Joanna hauled Booker and Sheldon out of the mole hole.
Roy blinked.
"They sure seemed in a hurry," Kiral chuckled to himself. "Well, Roy, you're welcome to stay here as long as you want. Or do you plan on being a wandering vagabond?"
Roy stared at the ground, all his movements and thoughts frozen. "I plan… I plan…" He jumped up very suddenly and dramatically. "I plan on following Joanna to the ends of the earth!"
Kiral nodded. "Good plan."
O.o.O
"Honestly, I don't want to go back either if Buck's still there," Joanna said to her sons, as she escorted them in the direction that she hoped that the farm was. "The more I think of him, the more I want to punch something. But… we are the farmer's property…"
"So? People have run off from the farm all the time," said Booker.
"We need to set a good example," snipped Joanna.
"Since when have you—" Booker began, but the unmistakable sound of a lovesick rooster crawling out of a mole hole (you know what I'm talking about, right?) cut him off.
"Joanna… you can't… make me go back there!" Roy squawked, slowly crawling on his wings and knees to them, nearly foaming at the mouth.
"I'm not making you go back," said Joanna, perplexed. "I said you could stay. Why the change of mind?"
"Because!" cried Roy. "Because—" He glared at Booker and Sheldon. "Mind giving us some private time?"
Booker grinned. "Hey, Rooster-Man, anything you can say to our mom you can say to us."
"Yeah," said Sheldon, with a smile appearing on his tiny, distorted face. "If you send us away, we're going to start guessing that whatever you're telling her is something really—"
"JUST GET OUT OF HERE FOR FIVE MINUTES!" Roy screeched.
Unfortunately, Roy didn't have the authoritative effect on the chicks that Joanna had. Booker turned to Sheldon, still smirking. "D'ya think we should leave?"
Sheldon pondered this for a minute. "Yeah, I guess we'd better," he finally said sensibly. "I mean, who knows what… gross stuff they might do that we don't want to see. If you know what I mean."
"Good point, hadn't thought of that," said Booker, making a face. "Alright, Dad, we'll give you and Mom some alone time. C'mon, Shel."
The two chicks walked off, over a hill, hidden from view.
Joanna jerked her thumb to where the boys had disappeared. "You know, they're probably there, eavesdropping on us. Not that that bothers me… what exactly were you saying?"
Roy felt his throat contract. Mere moments ago he had been so eager to tell Joanna how he felt that he had nearly torn a ligament in his leg trying to get to her. But now… now he felt ashamed again. He felt unsure, stupid, vulnerable…
"I was saying," Roy finally sighed in defeat, "that wherever you go, I have to go too. I completely and totally took you for granted when I had you to myself, but when Buffy Bucky came and threatened that, I realized…" Roy felt his shoulders sag as he revealed himself completely to her. "I realized that I'm absolutely batty with love for you!"
Joanna couldn't help it—she chuckled. "We're chickens, Roy. Chicken's don't love! Well, maybe they love their birdseed—"
"I know that!" cried Roy. "But if you haven't noticed, I ain't your average chicken!" He rather suddenly took Joanna's wing and said, in a very serious, soft voice, "Neither are you."
For the first time that she could ever remember in her life, Joanna was completely speechless.
"So you see, Joey, I can't just stay here while you leave. Now, I'd rather nail my own toes to the ground than go back and face Buffy Bucky, but if you're going back there, than I am too!"
"You know…" Joanna began thoughtfully.
"Uh… maybe I would if you finished your thought…"
"Is going back to the farm really that tough for you?" Joanna suddenly said. "I mean, what about your friends? That pig, that duck, those sheep!"
"They hate me!" cried Roy. "And furthermore… yeah, I miss them," he admitted. "And I mean I miss them,not just playing pranks on them."
"They don't hate you," said Joanna. "They wanted me to find you too. And also… come on, is facing Buck really that bad? You need to learn to stand up for yourself—to tell you the truth, I thought you could already. And don't you dare feed me that 'he's won the battle' routine—if Tonya's had her way with him, he's probably been reduced by now to a lump of jelly. So—" Joanna smiled impishly— "so what say we head back and finish the job?"
"As long as you're there with me!" cried Roy, throwing his wings around Joanna in a passionate hug. Joanna blushed at first, but soon found herself returning the affectionate gesture.
"Hooray!" cried Booker and Sheldon, jumping out from behind the small rise in the ground where they had been eavesdropping, just as Joanna had predicted. "We get to teach a jerk a lesson!"
"You've done that often enough," muttered Roy, letting go of Joanna in a slightly embarrassed manner. "Although usually I'M the jerk who's getting the lesson taught."
Joanna grinned. "Well, there's no use hanging around here any longer. Let's go back to the farm!" She confidently started off.
"Uh, Jo? Isn't the farm that way?" asked Roy, pointing in the opposite direction.
Joanna shrugged. "Your guess is as good as mine."
Booker smacked his forehead. "Oh great…"
O.o.O
(AN: Not much to say here, just typing the ending author's note out of habit. :) Next chapter will be back on the farm, with Orson, Wade, Tonya, Bo, Lanolin, and, of course, that despicable Buck. So see you then, farm fans!)