The next day was sunny. Grumpy awoke from a long, deep sleep with the sense that the storms were gone for a while. He got up, stretched out his aching limbs, showered, and picked up everything that had come out of his Carry-All. He spent the morning organizing it, and he'd just finished when there was a knock at his door. He gingerly got up and opened it to see Funshine. Instead of his usual sunny disposition, he looked worried.
"What's going on?" Grumpy asked, on edge at once.
"Share's having a cheering Cheer party. I said I'd come and invite you."
Grumpy frowned. "Is Cheer not cheery?"
"There was an incident yesterday during the storm."
"What kind?"
Funshine looked down. "She had a panic attack after the cloudquake. She's still recovering."
"Panic attack?" Grumpy asked in alarm. They'd had kids come who had panic attacks before, but he'd never known a Care Bear to have one. "What happened?"
"We're not sure. Cheer can't really explain it. She's in rough shape. So Share's throwing a party. You gonna come?"
"Yeah. Give me just a minute, and we can head out."
Grumpy did a last sweep of his Care-A-Van, grabbed his newly-organized Carry-All, and shut the door behind him. The two bears headed for the nearest Rainbow Ride to get to the Forest of Feelings. Funshine was a little despondent, and Grumpy patted him on the shoulder. The yellow bear looked over at him.
"She'll be okay. We'll help her get through this. I'll talk to her."
Funshine nodded. This was the exact kind of situation that Grumpy excelled in. He was great at calming people down and discussing what they had gone through, what they felt about negative situations. He was so natural at it, when even Tenderheart admitted that he'd had to learn techniques to help those suffering from trauma and panic attacks. Grumpy, on the other hand, had never had any formal training of any kind. He just did what came into his head, and it was usually perfect.
When they got to the Forest of Feelings, the woods were quiet. A sparkle sparrow glided toward them and flitted around Grumpy's head. Grumpy, in an unusual display of affection, held out his paws and the sparrow landed, twittering morosely. Grumpy carefully lowered one hand into his Carry-All and pulled out a small packet of breadcrumbs. The sparkle sparrow hopped twice, tweeting, and Grumpy handed the packet to Funshine.
"Open this."
Funshine was confused, but he obeyed, untying the string. It was one of the breadcrumb bags that Share occasionally gave out so other bears could feed the birds. When it was open, Grumpy held out his free paw, and Funshine dumped a small pile into Grumpy's palm. He held out the treat, and the sparrow began to peck at the crumbs. He stood very still until the crumbs were gone. The sparrow whistled her song then flapped into the air, leading the way to Share's cottage. Grumpy brushed off his paws, took the half-full bag, and retied it before stuffing it back into his Carry-All. Funshine stared at him, appraising the blue bear.
"Alright, let's go." Grumpy finally noticed Funshine's stare. "What?"
"You're never like that to birds. You don't like birds."
Grumpy blushed and shrugged. "She was upset and hungry. I just helped."
Funshine shrugged and walked with Grumpy to the cottage, but on the inside, he marveled. What was it about Grumpy that allowed him to pinpoint when people were upset and exactly how to fix them? It was like magic. Or something like it. Funshine himself often pretended to be happy when he wasn't, but Grumpy always knew. Then he'd ride bikes or skate or just talk with Funshine until the clouds were gone and he was his usual sunny self. Grumpy knew things about Funshine that no bear else had ever thought to ask about, including things that Funshine didn't like to think about at all. He wanted to erase some parts of himself, but Grumpy had told him many times that those parts were important in forming who Funshine was. The yellow bear disagreed, but he didn't have anybody else to talk to about the downers in his life.
When they arrived at Share's house, they saw that Tenderheart, Harmony, and Cheer were already there. Cheer was wrapped in a soft yellow blanket, her expression blank. She twitched at every noise and movement around her. Grumpy reached out a hand to snag a cupcake and he plopped down right beside her while Funshine hung back, afraid to upset her.
"Hear you had a rough time," Grumpy said.
Tenderheart frowned at him, but Cheer shifted to look at him through eyes that suddenly had a spark of light in them.
"Yeah," she said hoarsely then coughed.
"Tea with honey, I think," Grumpy said, looking at Share. Share quickly poured a cup of tea with two full spoons of honey. Grumpy took it and stirred the tea then set it in front of Cheer. "What happened?"
"I don't know."
"Mm," Grumpy said, biting into the cupcake. "That sucks. If we knew, we could help."
"I don't know," Cheer replied more forcefully. "Tenderheart keeps trying to help, but nothing he says is right."
"I don't doubt you," Grumpy said simply, reaching out to take a hot dog. He smothered it in relish and ketchup then took a bite. He chewed for a while without saying a word. Cheer watched him, her eyes dull.
"How do you explain a feeling that's not yours?" she finally asked.
Grumpy shrugged. "Is that what it was?"
"Yeah. I think so. I remember feeling it before, but it wasn't my feelings… I think. I can't remember when, though."
"What does it remind you of?"
Cheer licked her lips nervously. "Something tight. Really, really tight, all bunched up together. And then something happened and it exploded."
"Like the cloudquake?" Tenderheart asked tentatively.
Cheer thought for a moment then nodded. "And when it went away, it balled up again. And I don't feel it anymore. But it scared me. It was too much. It hurt. It still hurts, but in an empty way."
"You're tired," Grumpy said, taking a large drink of tea to wash down the last bite of hotdog. "An emotional storm will wear you out. Whatever it was, it's not good. Do you know what triggered it?"
"She was fine until that last thunderclap," Harmony said, tapping her fingers nervously on the table.
"Last thunderclap? So when the storm ended? I must have been asleep."
"Nobody could have slept through that," Share said seriously. "That rocked the sky."
"I didn't hear it," Grumpy said, looking around at the food before selecting a slice of pizza.
"What were you doing?" Funshine asked.
Grumpy took a big bite and thought back to what he remembered. It must have been when he was locked up. But he wasn't going to tell them that.
"Eh, this and that. I was working on some small projects in my Care-A-Van during the storm. So this thunderclap ended the whole storm? And what happened then, Cheer?"
Funshine sat down, shaking his head. "Nah. The storm didn't end. Not exactly. The thunder and lightning stopped. The rain didn't. It was super quiet besides the rain. Kinda eerie."
Grumpy was surprised. "Really? That's… weird." He turned back to Cheer. "So you heard this thunderclap. And what happened?"
Cheer looked helpless. "I don't know! It was all tight inside then it exploded. And I was… afraid."
Grumpy chewed thoughtfully on the crust of his slice. "Afraid."
"I couldn't breathe," Cheer said. She shivered. "And then I was really scared. Like, I'm about to die scared. And confused."
Grumpy frowned. "Did something happen when you were younger? Something that really scared you? Did you almost die?"
"Not that I remember," Cheer said slowly.
"Why?" Tenderheart asked, clenching his paws together.
"Sounds like a flashback of some kind. Maybe you've repressed a memory."
"Like what?" Cheer asked.
"Something really traumatic, like a near-death experience. It could be PTSD."
There was silence as everybody digested this information. Grumpy took another hot dog, doctoring it with mustard this time. He chomped into the meat. Cheer sat very still, horrified.
"You mean I'm not really happy?" she asked faintly.
"Didn't say that," Grumpy said. "But that doesn't mean there's not a repressed memory that you have from cubhood that you don't want to think about."
"How do we discover this memory?" Tenderheart asked.
"It's probably something related to the stimuli. Maybe a bad storm when she was a cub. Could have been struck by lightning."
"Could have been a Thunder Bear," Harmony said quietly.
Grumpy paused in his chewing, glancing around the tense faces. Then he swallowed and took another bite, but the food was suddenly scratchy and tasteless. He didn't respond positively or negatively, just continued eating.
"I wonder what a Thunder Bear is," came a young voice behind them.
They all turned to see little Wonderheart holding hands with Grams Bear. She grimaced at their grim, horrified expressions. It was bad timing that Wonderheart was here, but Grams couldn't have known the topic of conversation. So Tenderheart sighed.
"It's time to tell you, I suppose," he said.
Wonderheart's smile faltered. Nobody else was smiling. Grumpy was eating, his eyes locked on the table. Everybody else stared at her with dark expressions.
"Are they bad?" she asked.
Tenderheart gestured for her to come over, sharing an uneasy look with Grams as the little cub climbed up beside him. He handed her a cookie and Share poured her a cup of tea. Wonderheart looked up at all the bears around her then across the table to Grumpy. He looked strange, and she wondered if he was okay. Then she turned to Tenderheart.
"They are bad, aren't they?"
"They're dangerous," Tenderheart said softly.
"What are they?"
"Long ago, before Benefare came and discovered Care-A-Lot, there were two tribes of bears who lived in the sky, far above the humans," Tenderheart began. "One tribe was our ancestors, and they looked down upon the world and wished to be able to help the children grow up and learn lessons of life, love, and caring. The other tribe did not have such good goals. They reveled in their lofty position, high above the humans, and they wanted to cause destruction and mayhem.
"When the great star appeared in the sky, each tribe was granted a wish. Our ancestors wished to be uniquely suited to help the children of the world, and so they were granted magic, which was channeled through their new belly badges. The other tribe wished for power, and so they were granted the power of storms. But since they did not ask to be unique, they were all granted the same power.
"Our ancestors became the Care Bears, and Benefare was descended from them and eventually founded Care-A-Lot. The others got what they wished for, and it was not good. They became Thunder Bears, and they grew jealous of the Care Bears' unique powers and the sign of their powers, the belly badge. But they had wasted their wish, and they could not take it back. So they began to fight our ancestors to try and steal our magic and get what they wanted. They drove us away as their rage and desire for power consumed them. And to this day, they fight our light and hope and caring ways with their powerful storms fueled by jealousy, rage, and hatred."
Grumpy felt sick to his stomach as he swallowed his last cookie. He looked up to see all the bears staring solemnly at Wonderheart, whose eyes were huge with fear. He gritted his teeth, fighting back tears because he knew that they would all one day look at him as Wonderheart fearfully looked at them The other emotions would be easy to imagine: disgust at what he was, anger at his lies, scorn at his pathetic attempt to be a Care Bear when he was destined to be nothing of the sort.
"Are they coming to get us?" Wonderheart asked. "Is that what that thunder was?"
"No…" Tenderheart said uneasily. Then he relented. "I don't know, little one. I remember those sounds the last time they attacked. But I was little, so I could be wrong."
"What?" Cheer looked startled. "You were here the last time?"
Tenderheart nodded, his expression grave. "It was terrible. The noise and the rain and the lightning are all blurred together in my memory. Grams will remember it better than I do. And Great Giving Bear will, too. They're both older, and they were around at the time."
"Never did find out what they wanted," Grams said. "But after a week, they left us to rebuild."
"Couldn't you ask?" Wonderheart asked.
"They didn't have a translator," Grams said. When Wonderheart and the others looked confused, she smiled. "They don't speak any human language. Not naturally, anyhow. Their tongue is Thunderspeak. It's the language of wind, rain, and thunder, the language of storms."
Funshine nodded, thinking of that cub again. He'd called him Inky, but he never could understand him. He didn't want to mention him, though. Tenderheart and the others thought he'd been imagining the cub because he was bored and lonely. He looked over at Cheer.
"So you might have seen a Thunder Bear?" he asked casually. "How old was he?"
"I-I don't remember meeting one. What do they look like?" Cheer asked, bewildered.
"Black fur all over. Yellow-white eyes and teeth, like lightning flashing. Big paws with claws. They're kinda wild," Funshine said absently, dunking a doughnut in his tea.
Tenderheart nearly choked on his tea, and Grams lowered the cookie she'd been eating to stare thoughtfully at Funshine.
"Now how did you know that?" she asked suspiciously.
"I-I wanted to be accurate?" Funshine stammered, his face hot; he shouldn't have spoken.
Tenderheart stared at him for a moment then laughed. "Oh, that's right. You had a Thunder Bear friend when you were younger."
Everybody blinked in confusion, so he explained. "When Funshine was a cub, he had an imaginary friend. He was a Thunder Bear, and they were best friends."
The bears all smiled, wistful with cubhood nostalgia like having an imaginary friend. Funshine laughed nervously, looking down at his plate.
"Really?" Grumpy asked, an odd note in his voice.
Funshine shrugged but didn't look up. If he had, he would have seen hope in Grumpy's dark eyes. "I know it's silly. I heard the stories and I thought it'd be cool, I guess. We had a lot of fun. Sometimes I miss him."
Grumpy couldn't believe that Funshine remembered spending time with him when he'd been left on Care-A-Lot all those years ago. Grumpy swallowed and looked down again, trying to keep it together. He was not going to cry. That would make him have to tell, and he couldn't bear to do that. He needed to leave.
He looked over at Cheer. "Well, if you can remember where and when you felt those feelings before, we can probably help you accept the event." He stood up and adjusted his Carry-All. "I've got to head out. Come by if you need to talk, okay, Cheer?"
Cheer smiled and nodded. "I will. But I definitely don't remember any Thunder Bears."
"Good thing, too," Tenderheart said grimly. "They're terrible."
Grumpy spun on his heel and walked away without another word. He heard his friends calling goodbye as he headed for the Rainbow Ride. He calmly rode back to the glen where he made his home, walked inside, and shut the door. As soon as he was sure that he was alone, he crumpled into a heap and began to cry. They were his friends now, but they would never accept what he was.
To have Tenderheart, the kindest, gentlest, most understanding bear in Care-A-Lot, call Thunder Bears terrible was heartrending. Because though he didn't know it, he was talking about Grumpy. And Grumpy already hated himself enough. His badge rumbled, and he let out a small rain cloud. It was black and angry, with little zapping lightning bolts shooting throughout the cloud. Rain poured out over Grumpy's head, and he was glad to hide his tears. He was ashamed of himself, and not just for crying. He was ashamed just for being alive. He couldn't fix that. And it only made him cry harder.
