Vestiges

Happy New Year… Happy New Week? Meh.

Apparently, I've made a resolution to conclude my longest running fics between now and next year July. It's actually not a long time because I still need to juggle normal life and its usual crap.

It means more sporadic updates for Suo Potentiale.

Since that's the case, I'd better try to make this update a damned good one.

9.

Her chin rested in the palm of her upright hand, the fingers tapping against her chin as her mind wandered in thought. Whilst she leaned into her hand that was supported by the ground itself she was lying on, she wrote down ideas and notes on how to beat Hekapoo's challenge. It was filled with stray jottings and observations she learned whilst combating the demigoddess; her strengths, possible weaknesses, anything that could be useful.

Some things were practical, such as the realization that the demigoddess had increased her blind spot by donning a hairstyle which completely covered her right eye. Other things weren't welcoming; due to her short-ish stature giving her a low center of gravity, Hekapoo was nearly impossible to ensnare in a ground-trap whilst running. With all things considered, Higgs knew of a few dozen ways to blow out Hekapoo's flame, but they were all nullified simply because she had a lack of resources and procedures for carrying it out.

With a sigh of deep frustration, the squire drew a circle so hard on the paper that it nearly ripped, outlining Hekapoo's name. "Damn! How can I beat her, much less find her and pass the challenge in one year?! It's impossible!"

That was the raw, plain truth. To get her own dimensional scissors, she'd already made eight attempts. Failed attempts. In all of her endeavors, she'd come closest on her most recent one, and she'd collapsed from sheer physical exhaustion and mental fatigue after six years on the foray.

What more would one more effort do to her, if she failed to pass within a single year? Would she die, as according to the Vulcan scissor-maker? While this carried serious ramifications, that of death, what really bothered her… was the frightening fact that she did not care.

Of course, she did not wish to die, and she knew that she had no intentions of literally dying just to see Marco. What baffled her was that she did not care for the dire warning she received and was still more than willing to risk her life regardless. That was a clear difference, yet… why would she even be willing to put her life in jeopardy, for Marco no less?

Was Hekapoo right? Was she actually falling for the Diaz?

Higgs shook her head as she picked up the paper and sat up against the wall behind her. "Nah", she muttered to herself as she looked at the Diaz's bedroom door across from her. "I ain't. Just a good friend. That's all."

That's right. A friend…? She was positively sure that she wasn't infatuated with him in the least. To concede, she did have a strong desire to reunite with him, but that didn't play anything along the lines of love or affection. Furthermore, simply because Hekapoo was a demigoddess did not mean that she was incapable of erring and making mistakes. She could be wrong about her (Higgs) liking Marco far more than just in the manner of being friends.

Since that was the case, what could be a reason good enough to warrant her longing to see Marco again? Even now, she was sitting in the hall across from his door and she got up to go stand before it, staring at the warnings plastered over it by the M.H.C.

They told her to stay out of the room, but it was already nearly impossible to enter due to the security set up by the Commission. To ward off magical attempts to enter the room, it was protected by a mystic barrier, and for physical attempts, the door and the walls in its vicinity was reinforced even stronger than the Royal Family's quarters. She had been coming here nearly ritually, only to stare at the face of futility. It was why she ached to earn her own scissors, simply because she knew that his scissors were in his bedroom… and might as well have been in another dimension.

It was a strange fuel that drove her to this point. Throughout the first of their interactions, they were acrimonious and acidic to one another. It was already a lifetime ago, from what she could remember, that they had clashed in Quest Buy over the purchases of items long gone from memory. She could recall that this sort of sour relationship had continued into their subsequent relations... and yet, he'd been the better person and gave her an assist. At first, she'd thought that he was just another goody-two-shoes, though this soon changed when she gained more insight into his character. The term 'good' was too plain to describe someone… but it was so strange to see that it fit him so well.

That did not mean that he was without fault. Like everyone else, he could exude confidence so high it could be likened to pride. He could lie, steal (that is, borrow without asking) and all the other traits that came with being a 'normal' person. Yet, how could he do it with such sincerity? Why would he do those things for the betterment of many, instead of considering himself first? What drove him to be who he was?

Not to mention the fact that he had plenty of appeal, not only in personality qualities, but he was incredibly good-looking…

Higgs covered her face with her hands as realization struck her. "Oh no…"

Oh yes. She had been falling for him… or had least started to. And why not? How could she not? She was a growing teen (notwithstanding her age in Hekapoo's dimension) and it was hardly as if the Diaz made it difficult for her to become infatuated with him. Despite her hardy attitude, she was still subject to her own feelings and hormones like everyone else her age.

But what could and would she do about it?

"You idiot!" she yelled as slammed her fist into the door. The sturdy door did not even give a millimeter and the skin above her bare knuckles burst, bleeding an imprint where she had struck at it in anger. She did not even flinch, although her bottom lip nearly quivered as she neared to tears. Instead of stemming from her physical hurt, it was more from her internal emotional hurt finally reaching its breaking point. "What a wicked game you played," she said quietly, "to make me feel this way. Even if it's not love or anything like that, I still miss you. I told you to leave damn well enough alone. I warned you that the M.H.C. didn't like what you were saying about the usage of magic. But you had to keep going and piss them off. And now, they've gotten rid of you. How long has it been for you and everyone else? Six months?"

Higgs slumped to her knees before the door, trying to keep herself together but was failing as her crushing disappointment and attachment issues threatened to overwhelm her. "For me, it's been almost eighteen years… I'm not like everyone else. I haven't forgotten… I haven't moved on… I can't…"

As she usually did, she sought for a peep through the keyhole whenever her disappointment and lack of patience caught up with her. It'd been a practice of hers that helped to remind her of what she struggled for, what she hoped for. She knew that Marco wasn't inside, but a glimpse of where they used to commune on their off-times helped for her morale.

This time, it was not to be. The keyhole was blocked.

Higgs could not find even find the words to express the mixture of her utter frustration and anger when she saw the blockage. It built up inside her but before she could yell an intelligible curse, she noticed that there was a bit of light around the impasse. "…Wait… is that…"

Already growing excited despite her common senses trying to quell her rising hopes, she pulled out her thin tanto-style knife and stuck it inside, working at the blockage. After feeling distinct turns inside the keyhole, she no longer tried to control her own optimism as it swelled out of proportion. Higgs got up to retrieve her paper from across the hall and stuck it halfway beneath the door, just under the keyhole's location. Working at the obstacle once more, she kept at it for another five minutes, scraping, digging and angling until finally, the knife slid straight through the keyhole up to the hilt. Accompanying this accomplishment, there was a tinkle of metal on the other side.

Higgs withdrew her knife out of the keyhole and took a deep breath to steady her nerves. In fact, she knelt there for a while, hesitating in the knowledge that she could be wrong… and daring to hope that she wasn't.

She took hold of the paper and tugged on it, bit by bit. Slowly, the sheet of paper revealed itself along with her notes. Gradually, the paper came and just when she thought that the paper's length had been retrieved with nothing on it-… when she just couldn't bear anymore…-there her goal lay on the very edge of the paper.

It was the key to the door.

It took a proper week before Higgs got a proper hold of Hekapoo once more. It was after one of her scheduled conferences that the demigoddess was found chatting with a fellow member of the M.H.C., Rhombulous. It didn't miss the squire's notice to see the security aficionado of the Commission give her a look of distrust when she asked to speak to Hekapoo privately, although she did not care much for the bias. She had far more important matters to expend her attention on, and at the moment, nothing could get her mood down.

After he left the two alone, Hekapoo took a sip of the fiery brew in her teacup whilst regarding Higgs with a curious stare. "So what's this about? It's not another challenge, is it?"

"It's another challenge," Higgs deadpanned in a monotone, not wanting to beat around the bush.

"No." The single syllable was plain as it was ultimate. Already, Hekapoo was making as if to leave and turned her back, but Higgs grabbed her by the shoulder.

"Wait…! You said that if I made another attempt, I could suffer a mental backlash and die."

"Yeah, I did say that." Hekapoo shrugged off the squire's grasp on her shoulder. Without even turning to look at her, she said her supplement. "Took you long enough… eight attempts? Apparently, you've finally realized that you're suicidal and a glutton for punishment."

The teen ignored the jab at her pride. "I'm not suicidal… but a glutton for punishment? Maybe. But you also said that I had a year at the most if I ever wanted to make one last effort to earn my dimensional scissors. I'd either have to blow out the flames of a hundred of your clones… or the original flame. Yours."

Hekapoo would've laughed at the ridiculousness of the situation if had she not wished to remain cordial with the squire. She turned to fully regard the girl, trying to gauge her. "Mm-hmm… And you're going to do what you couldn't do in eight attempts… in eighteen years total… in only one year?"

"Hey… ninth time's the charm. If I can't do it one year, I'll bail and I'll never ask you again. Squire's honor."

"Squire's honor? P'shaw." The Vulcan scissor-maker chuckled at the thought. "I've seen some of the shit you guys do to one another when you all get competitive. But I've gotta admit… one year? Sounds promising. You'll never bother me about it again? Who says that I have to agree? I don't have anything to lose by telling you 'no'."

Higgs let out a long exhale and blew out Hekapoo's flame, much to the Hekapoo's annoyance. "See? I just have to do that in one year. It's not impossible."

Hekapoo's flame flared back into existence while she stared at Higgs intensely. "Is that so? Well… I have nothing else to do except for everything else," she remarked in an ironical tone. "Do you think that I don't have other things to do than to entertain another waste of my time?"

It was at this point that Higgs considered groveling but thought the better of it. She had her misgivings, but she'd always been a person of logic. "That's no excuse. You can make clones to do all of those 'responsibilities'. I think that the only reason why you're telling me 'no'… is because you're afraid that I'll only get myself killed. Only another tragic death to mark up as a failure to ever pass your legendary test. You've got nothing to worry about… except for me leaving a boot-print on your ass when I'm done."

"… You've got talk…" Hekapoo carefully measured the girl, wondering why she seemed so high-spirited this time around. Had she some new trick up her sleeve? A secret? This was almost normal for each of her attempts whenever the squire thought that she had some new strategy to beat her, although they had all failed. This time, however, didn't seem like a hope and expectation of success. It felt like a complete assurance of success, and it made a difference.

"I've got more than just talk. I aim to win."

Hekapoo grinned widely as the flame that usually burned between her horns flared back up into existence. "So you're the squire with the fire, huh? You're gonna beat me?" Taking one long drink from her cup, she brushed away at the traces of lava from her lips with the back of her hand before opening a portal with her scissors. "Alright, Higgs. We'll see if you'll get yo'self a pair of scissors to go visit your boyfriend."

"He's not my boyfriend," Higgs said sharply as she followed Hekapoo through the portal.

"Ho, ho. I'd believe you… but your lips were moving when you answered me." On the other side, Hekapoo stepped out into the barren landscape that was the beginning open area in her dimension (that is, dimension X-103), followed closely by Higgs whose body had instantly transformed and revamped as soon as she emerged. In a matter of a single second, the teen who she had more-or-less been at eye level with previously now stood head and shoulders above her, decked out in her warrior-esque outfit.

Said outfit was, whilst wearing a larger version of her blue tunic underneath, now consisted of a solid breastplate that protected her entire upper-torso, even as far as having shoulder pads that supported a far range of movement, although the lumbar area of her lower back was only chainmail to improve flexibility. In terms of chainmail, it was more of the same along the back of her legs, although the front was plated as did her upper body.

It was an armor that Higgs was proud of; she'd had it custom made by a pair of the best forgers in this dimension for a tall fee. In fact, Hekapoo could hardly even remember seeing the squire without it after her mid-twenties.

Now, she was taking it off.

"What are you doing, Higgs?" Hekapoo queried as she watched the squire seat herself on a nearby rock to remove her protective covering. "I thought you loved that armor to death. You know, besides being a bit of safe-freak whenever you're here."

"Have you seen some of the weird shit that goes on in your dimension?" Higgs asked rhetorically as she finished pulling off her chainmail from her legs. "I can't outrun everything… anything that I can't hide from or escape, I fight."

"Maybe you'd stand a better chance of running if you didn't have it on?" The tone was dripping with sarcasm, but Higgs only smiled.

"Exactly."

Hekapoo's visible eyebrow raised ostensibly in incredulity. "You're going to chase me? 'Cause you've got longer legs and no more armor?" Even now, Higgs was obviously stretching to prepare for a run, even going so far as to 'catch' her now shoulder-length hair into a ponytail. 'Oh, this girl's ready to run. She WANTS to run…' "Alright. You wanna run? Are you gonna sprint to catch up to me? That's hilarious." Even now, clones were rapidly being formed from the demigoddess, continuing to the point of creating a hundred. "You've got one year, Higgs." With that said, every Hekapoo, original and the clones, began shuffling around with one another to confuse Higgs as to obscure which was the true scissor-maker. It was already unnecessary-… Higgs, for some reason, had closed her eyes when she saw that she had started to create clones, although the squire had stared at her specifically before the number became overwhelming. Hekapoo thought it strange, but she shook it off; it mattered little. "One… year…"

Then they all took off like a shot in every direction.

It was the same for years. They'd soon start entering portals to every corner of this dimension to conceal themselves, but Higgs couldn't help but smirk in the face of this discouraging challenge. She'd never thought of herself as devious, but it certainly helped to know that her own characteristics and habits had helped to mask her own intentions. In every attempt to earn her dimensional scissors, Higgs started off with a new tactic (that'd always failed) and by now, they'd served to make the demigoddess underestimate her. Furthermore, the fact that she now had a deus ex machina to solve her problems was another welcomed advantage.

There were two reasons why she'd played her line for removing her armor. For starters, she never lied to Hekapoo when she asked if she stood a better chance of chasing her, that much was true. However, this was all done to make the self-assured demigoddess want to 'prove' that she couldn't be beaten in terms of speed. Secondly, the small holster that she had carried with her from Mewni (secured just behind her on her hips to the left to ensure that Hekapoo wouldn't notice it), was underneath all of the armor that appeared on her the minute she transformed into her adult form. She needed an excuse to remove her armor, and the vulcan scissor-maker bought it.

Pulling off the holster, she then reached inside beyond the flap and pulled out a pair of sturdy dimensional scissors. Regarding it for a moment, she stared at it once more as she had done for the past week. From the sleek of the blades to the well-built blue loops to cradle the fingers, it was the tool that had stimulated her desires for the past seven days. It'd been that much harder not to simply use Marco's scissors to go see him. It'd been a difficult temptation, and the last few days felt even more difficult than the past eighteen years that she'd been striving. "Marco…" Higgs whispered to herself as she ran a thumb over the engraving of his name in the scissors. "It's only for a little while longer... after all, I've waited this long. But I'm going to risk your scissors to earn mine. Everyone will judge me for using your scissors to see you… but no one can say anything if I have my own pair to do what I want with it, whenever I need to. Help me… one more time…"

Higgs took a moment to picture Hekapoo in her mind, her horns, her flame, her ethereal fire-shaped dress… even down to the last trace of lava on her lips that she'd failed to brush off when she'd been drinking it. It was the one thing that set her different from every single one of her clones; they were produced from what Hekapoo looked like, but didn't replicate anything foreign on her person at the time. It was the only characteristic she had to go on, but it would be enough to mark her as the right target. The squire then got off the rock she was sitting on and took a deep breath.

"Here goes… everything, I guess."

She then reached out and snipped a portal open right before the rock, and instantly, a sprinting Hekapoo dashed through it uncontrollably fast and tripped over the shin-high rock into a terrible face-plant. A miles-per-hour dash was instantly reduced to zero in a split-second, and Hekapoo was nearly as angry as she was hurt. "Agh! What the fu-"

Higgs knelt down and blew out the Hekapoo's flame. "I'm not any good at passing your challenge like everyone else. But damn…" The squire grinned widely. "I'm the one who beat you the fastest. How long did this last? Two minutes?"

"Oh…" Hekapoo groaned angrily as she got up, not even bothering to dust herself off. "Hell has no fury like this bitch, Higgs! I'm going to-"

"Give me my scissors," Higgs finished calmly. "A long time ago, you told me that all is fair in love, war… and your challenge. There's no rule that says that I can't use a pair of scissors to help me earn another one."

Hekapoo folded her arms. "Just because of this, I don't have to make any scissors for you. And how did you get a hold of Marco's scissors-" She snapped her fingers in realization. "Star Butterfly. Rhombulous just told me that he gave her the key. She wanted it because she wanted to be able to hide out from her parents in Marco's room, a place that no one could get into without the key. That responsibility-dodging princess-!"

"The key was on the other side of the door when I took it out," Higgs commented lowly as she began to put on her armor once more, now that her trickery had worked. "So I don't know how she got out and left it there."

"Well, after locking the door, she can fly through any damn window as she pleases, now can't she? Now get the hell out of my dimension. I should've known that you were up to something when I saw how upbeat you were. I can't believe that I got tripped up by a rock!"

"Well, even the gods themselves can make mistakes," Higgs muttered carefully. "There's enough proof when they tried to get rid of Marco." She observed that Hekapoo became far more reserved, but she kept on. "And you helped them because I know that you're the one who creates the portals to get people where they need to go… or dump them where they don't want to be."

"It was out of my hands, and it wasn't my sole decision to make," Hekapoo said quietly, "you know that. But stop dodging the point I'm trying to make. You shouldn't have stolen his scissors to try to earn yours."

"I'm not stealing it. I'm the one who's going to give it back to him. And that's far more than anyone else has done…" the squire accused. "It's more than what you've done."

"I care about Marco as much as you do, Higgs, and maybe even more. You think he's just a preacher, hmm? Talking about we should 'stop using magic'? He's declared war on the Commission! Omnitraxus has been watching him, and he's not exactly the Marco you played buddy-buddy with. The guy's getting kinda unstable-"

"We've only known each other for a few months, but during the few weeks before he was sent away, we got to a point where he trusted me enough to tell what was going on. I know that he was starting to act a little less than that guy everyone knew, but the M.H.C. were the ones who were starting to lose their grips. So far as I see it, it's just like a few years back when there were a bunch of civvies demonstratin' about how the King and Queen were getting fat while everyone else was going hungry. Let's just say that we don't hear about those civilians anymore, and I'm not going to just imagine that the royal family gave in to what the people wanted."

"I know…" Hekapoo bit her lower lip for a moment, deep in thought about what she wanted. It was a question of duty versus personal desires, notwithstanding what the others would think about her if she did. After a pause, she made her decision and created a portal to her workshop, beckoning Higgs to follow her. On the other side, she noticed that the squire felt put-off slightly by being overwhelmed but now wasn't the time. Wielding on her powers of pyrokinesis, Hekapoo started to work on what she did best. She levitated a molten mix of metal infused with the golden blaze of magic from a special container and began to form a pair of scissors, meticulously and skillfully.

Higgs could only watch in awe and anticipation when she gazed at the scissors beginning to take shape from the crude glob. It was masterful, as in the fashion of a potter would create beautiful pottery from clay, a beautiful object being gleaned from coarse beginnings. It was completely enthralling, and after a glance at the squire, Hekapoo smiled in amusement.

"You oughta see your face right now. Well, let's get your name on this thing. 'Higgs', right?"

Higgs looked down at Marco's scissors still in her hands, noting that it was his first name engraved on the blade. The letters were almost stylized into something symbolic and reverential, and she felt that it'd be appropriate if her scissors were the same. Looking at her scissors nearing completion, she made her request. "Um… Hekapoo? Could you put my first name on my scissors?" she asked sheepishly. "I told you a few months ago-"

"I know it." Hekapoo began to will the name into the scissors and finished its creation before presenting the complete result to Higgs. "Since the first thing you're going to do is go pay Marco a visit… could you say 'hi' for me?"

The teen in the body of a woman merely shrugged as she took the scissors; not even taking the time to fully appreciate them, she immediately created a portal with a mental picture of Marco in mind. "Tell him yourself."

With that said, she was gone.

Left alone, Hekapoo sauntered over to her couch and took a seat, reaching over to the nearby table where a pot of tea laid. In a flare, she materialized the cup she had been drinking from before and poured herself another helping of the lava-like brew into it. After taking a sip, she smiled to herself.

"I just might."


Marco leaped up at the wall and performed a triple-step wall run, grabbing at the top to heave himself up easily. Once on the roof of the store, he took off again in a speedy dash to the adjoining rooftop next to it, leaping over the wide alley to cross. Soon he was forced to vault over the rooftop barricade and caught hold of a nearby fire-escape bar the next three-story-tall apartment building before he could hit the ground. It gave him a sense of accomplishment to perform this feat, however, and he then easily climbed to the top of yet another roof once more. Making a mad dash, he leaped off over the edge.

The wind tugged at him wildly as he had the sensation of flight-… Marco felt somewhat enlightened during the few seconds it lasted, appreciating the vista that he beheld. All too soon, it came to an end as gravity remembered him and pulled him back down to the earth. Without even skipping a beat, he executed a flawless parkour roll and started sprinting again as soon as his momentum and falling damage had been safely dispersed. In a blur, he was roving through the streets, maneuvering over and around obstacles nearly at breakneck speeds.

He'd been free-running at full-tilt for two hours.

His strength was already noteworthy as was most other aspects that made him up, forcing him to consider improving his efficiency. For the past few weeks, he'd been hard at work to improve his longevity, agility and overall usefulness via free-running in his neighborhood. After hurting himself multiple times and being mistaken by the police to be some sort of fleeing criminal more than once, he'd finally begun to hit a new peak. He was faster than he'd ever been, not to mention far more nimble. It had also done wonders for his reflexes in order to avoid accidents.

Yet, there was nothing that could prepare him for what happened next.

A portal opened at an adjacent just a bare meter ahead of him and a girl roughly his size stepped out of it. Being at such a close distance, he couldn't stop or even change direction out of his sprint.

"Get outta the way!"

"What the hell- OOF!" Both went down in a tangle of limbs into the grass on someone's open lawn, although it hardly detracted from the physical hurt the collision had caused. Higgs was the first to react from below whoever had 'tackled' her and grabbed her antagonist's wrist by the shoulder and planted her boot in her oppressor's gut. "Get the fuck off of me!" She heaved him off with a shove-kick and got up quickly, already pulling out her knife as she settled into a stance. The boy was the same as he rose to his feet, putting up his fists. "You oughta watch where you're going-… wait…" Her eyes widened as she took in the form of the teen before her. "Marco?"

Hearing her voice his name in familiarity, Marco dropped his fighting posture and studied the person before him. There were a few changes- her hair had begun to grow out, among a few other cosmetic changes, but it was still undeniable once he saw the upturned almond-shaped emeralds that were her eyes. "Higgs? Higgs!" She slid her long knife back into its scabbard and held her arms out to welcome him as he approached her.

"Damn, nerd, it's been ages!" She embraced him tightly as soon as he got close enough, an act he returned in kind. In doing so, he couldn't help but notice that the time that they'd been apart had done her more than just a few 'tiny' changes, particularly in the ways of a womanly growth; he had to quell his rising feelings of fuego in himself.

"Yeah… it's been a long time," the Diaz mumbled. "Nearly seven months…"

"That's how long it's been for you," she whispered into his ear. "I've been waiting to see you for eighteen years."

"Eighteen years?" Marco boggled as his head rose sharply to look her in the face. "But you still look as young as before… then that means…"

She wore a smug expression as she finally released him to retrieve a pair of scissors from her pocket and held it up. It was a hardy looking pair of scissors with a small curve towards the pointed ends, with maroon-colored oval loops for the fingers. "I got my own scissors."

Marco astonished at the fact, even as he watched her close the portal she'd come through. "They're legit… you got your own dimensional scissors? Wow. But you took eighteen years…"

"So you took sixteen. Big whoop. Besides, I meant that I spent eighteen years total for nine attempts. Kinda sucks, but here I am." Her lackluster explanation did little for his confusion, but he urged her to follow him to his home seeing that it was a few doors down the street. "Looks like you haven't changed much from what I remember…"

"Really? I guess you shouldn't have taken so long. Eighteen years?"

"We roughly the same age!" Higgs defended fiercely. "I only hit thirty-three, and you're basically thirty-one. Since I'm older now, it means you should listen to me more. Unlike what you did before you got your ass sent packing back to earth. I warned you that they'd take action." She gazed around carefully in observation, seeing the front lawns and the well-kept houses of the neighborhood and shrugged. "Doesn't seem like much of a punishment. It looks like a nice enough place."

"It is. Sometimes. But I'm not going to listen to a cougar- AGH!"

"Cougar?!" She wasn't amused by his inane joke, and he suffered a punch to his shoulder for it. "I'm only two damn years older! I'll have you know that my last attempt only took two minutes to beat her. That's the fastest anyone has ever done it!"

"Wow. That's impressive," he admitted while laughing cheerily whilst rubbing his chin in thought. "Feels like we've been spending lifetimes to earn these things. I wonder what you looked like at thirty-three years of age…"

"Since you keep bringing that up…" She took out his scissors from the holster where it had been kept and dangled it in his face to taunt him. "I won't give these back to you!"

"Wait!" He tried to snatch the scissors, but she retracted them out of his reach before he could. "I'm sorry! Please! I need them-"

"Nah, you don't. Besides, you're all anti-magic now, aren't you? I just needed to see if you still felt the same. Looks like you don't."

"I still do, I really don't want to use anything magic related and help to make things worse. But I need my scissors to get back to Mewni, just this once." He came to a stop and directed her to his house. He let her in through the gate before him (ignoring her quip about him being a 'gentleman') before they both went up the walkway.

"I reckon that you've got a good thing going on here. Why don't you just forget about Mewni, huh? Looks a whole lot better here… even smells better. Not to mention you must've gotten over your hang-over for the princess since you're not around her…"

"What? Who told you about that?" Marco demanded. "I'm not hung-over for her."

"Doesn't matter who told me. But I believe you." Secretly, Higgs delighted in hearing his negative response. At least this meant that he was available, both relationship-wise and emotionally. Wait… what? Hold your horses, Higgs, she told herself.

"I need to destroy the Wellspring," the boy declared. "That's a must. If I don't-"

"I get you, Marco. Apocalypse. I know already. It's all you ranted about before they kicked you out," Higgs deadpanned. "But it almost feels like you're doing this because you don't like the Butterfly family anymore. Besides, who said that this apocalyptic crap happens in your lifetime? It could be dozens of lifetimes and generations from now."

"So I'm going to let my kids worry about it? Or their kids? Or their kids?" Marco argued. "I admit that the royal family pissed me off, but it's obvious that they want to consolidate their power. That's a big fat 'no', and I'm going to stop the usage of magic. They just decided to throw me out, and that was only when I was giving warnings. You should've seen them! They were judging me, trying to belittle me… all I did was warn people, and they put me out like a dog. If that's the case, then-"

"That's enough of that." Higgs interrupted his line as they made it to his front door. "I don't wanna dwell on that. Just take your scissors. It's yours, anyway." She handed a pair of scissors to him, mistakenly giving him hers. "You earned them, so do whatever you want with 'em."

He took the scissors from her. "Fine. Wait… this isn't mine." For the first time, he was now seeing the name engraved on her scissors and he was surprised to see that it wasn't the name he expected. "Hmm… that doesn't say 'Higgs'." He looked back at her, then down at the scissors. "Huh… now that I think about it…" he remarked, already beginning his tease, "I was wondering if your parents mistook you for a boy or something when they named you- OW! Damn it!"

"You wanna make another wisecrack?" She brandished her fist threateningly, slightly pleased to see him try to placate her, lest she should punch him again. "Do you?"

"No, no!"

"I'll have you know that 'Higgs' is a unisex name on Mewni, even though it was just my last name!"

"Alright, I get it! Sorry, okay? Damn, your punches hurt like the devil." They swapped their scissors to rectify her error, and they both secured them on their persons.

"I haven't been slacking off. Now, are you going to show me inside?" At this, Marco grinned widely as he pulled out a key from his hip-pocket and unlocked the door, opening it to permit her entrance into his house.

"Welcome to my home… Sienna."


And that's a wrap. I was considering entertaining suggestions for her first name, but this one seemed to be the most appealing for someone like Higgs (orange hair and personality) that made her more… feminine? It was also a bonus that it wasn't prissy like a princess's name or common, like Rose, Ginger, or Amber.

Felt relevant to her ethnicity, too. (Midieval?) As a precaution, I 'claimed' that her name (Higgs) is unisex, like 'Jessie' or 'Hayden' or 'Sydney'. It means that the names are applicable to both genders, basically. I haven't wrecked the fandom by giving her a first name… besides, the fandom's already been wrecked for a long time. Nefcy is sitting cozily at her home, drinking a warm cup of fandom tears while she reads SVTFOE tweets from miserable fans.

Besides that, I hope you all enjoyed the chapter. Miggs is definitely underway now (they feel so comfortable together) and I feel like I can pat myself on the back. I successfully fleshed out a minor character from only one airing episode whilst avoiding future retconning. I'm a happy f-fiction writer. Time for the harder shipping, Markapoo. Oh, and plot. And drama…

Now that I've made up my mind and am committed, I figured that it's time to add some tags. In any case, tell me what you thought.

Into the New Year and beyond,

MRAY 4TW.