And I'm back! Lots of homework has gotten in the way (well...homework, getting sick, other stories, and finally reading the Harry Potter books and watching The Princess Bride) - but the chapter is up, and I hope you enjoy! A lot of people have been excited for this one, and I think you guys will like it.

(Disclaimer - see chapter 1)

Chapter 9:

No Consistency

"They're here, Princess."

"Really?" I said. "Oh, I gotta get ready! My horn needs polishing, my fur needs combing, and – oh, I hope they like me!"

As quickly as I could, I ran a blue-colored brush through my tail and ran outside to the balcony of the Dog. Just like always, Cloud Cuckoo Land was pastel, crazy, and out of any executive order that Lord Business could ever issue.

Perfect, I thought.

I looked down at the cloud's entrance, and a ragtag group had formed. It looked like it consisted of a construction worker, a man in all black, a girl in almost all black (really, what place did the color black have in Cloud Cuckoo Land?), and an old wizard in Crocs – wait…was that Vitruvius?

After looking again, I confirmed for myself that it was Vitruvius, so I began to hop from building to building to get over to the group.

"Hi!" I said, jumping down to meet them.

"Uh…" the construction worker stammered. "Hello?"

"My name," I explained, "is Princess UniKitty, and I welcome you all to Cloud Cuckoo Land!"

I waved my arms like I was finishing a showstopper in a play.

"What are your names?" I asked, turning back to the people.

"Well, I'm Emmet," the construction worker said. "This is Wyldstyle, and this is Batman, and I think you already know Vitruvius."

"I'm Batman," the man in black said.

"Yeah, Vitruvius and I go way back," I said. "Now come on! I'll give you a tour!"

We walked up a path through Cloud Cuckoo Land. Like always, I couldn't help but admire the colors bursting everywhere – it was like an explosion of pastel pinks and blues and greens. The construction worker, however – Emmet, his name was – seemed less impressed and more concerned.

"But there's no signs or anything!" he finally said. "How does anyone know what not to do?"

I turned to him. "Well, here in Cloud Cuckoo Land, we have no rules! There's no government, no babysitters, no bedtimes, no frowny faces, no bushy mustaches, and no negativity of any kind!"

Wyldstyle looked skeptical. "You just said the word 'no,' like, a thousand times. And you're a princess, so about that whole 'no government' thing –"

"There's also no consistency!" I explained.

She shrugged and continued walking.

"Everyone has their own way of being creative, and here in Cloud Cuckoo Land, we encourage stimulating that creative energy," I said. "Lots of people don't get it, but here, anything is possible."

"I hate this place," Batman said.

"And any idea is a good idea – except the not-happy ones," I said, starting to get a little overexcited. "Those – we push deep inside where you'll never, ever, ever, EVER find them!"

Emmet looked the teeniest bit startled.

"Oh – did I go into angry mode?" I asked, and he nodded. "I'm sorry – that happens when I think about anything bad."

"Oh, that happens all the time back in Bricksburg," he said. "You wouldn't believe the number of times that people have done that at the coffee shop."

I giggled. "The other Master Builders are in the Dog."

He smiled, then frowned. "Wait…what?"

"The Dog," I said. "Come on!"

He raised an eyebrow, then shrugged and followed me onto another path heading towards the Dog.

"Here we are," Vitruvius said. "Welcome, Emmet."

The Dog loomed over us, covered in the same pastel colors that covered Cloud Cuckoo Land.

"Whoa!" Emmet exclaimed. "Is that Superman?"

I looked in the direction that Emmet was looking, and sure enough, there was Superman, flirting with the Statue of Liberty. Suddenly, an overexcited man in a green suit came over and butted into the conversation.

"Hey, Green Lantern," Superman said.

"Hey – do you wanna sit together at the meeting?" Green Lantern said excitedly, almost like a schoolchild wanting to sit next to a friend during class.

"No…uh, I have to get back to…Krypton," Superman stammered before flying away.

"Didn't Krypton explode?" Green Lantern asked, following Superman out of sight. I couldn't help but giggle – the two of them were very funny whenever they were paired together.

Vitruvius snuck through the crowd and made his way up to a platform.

"Hello, and welcome, Master Builders," he said. "Including, but not limited to…"

He then proceeded to go through a laundry list (Vitruvius was amazing at laundry lists) of some of the Master Builders, including a 1980's-something spaceman who found it necessary to say "Hello" when he heard his name.

"You have travelled far to be here for a moment of great importance. We have learned that Lord Business plans to end the world as we know it."

"That isn't news!" a man in all red, with a yellow lightning bolt on his suit, called out. "He's been planning that for eight and a half years!"

"I know, I know," Vitruvius said. "But he's finally figured out how to use the relic he stole eight and a half years ago."

The crowd gasped.

"However," Vitruvius declared, "there is one hope. The Special has arisen."

The crowd gasped again.

"His name is Emmet, and he is here today," Vitruvius finished.

I gestured to Emmet like we had just finished a showstopper. Man, I love gesturing like I'd just finished a showstopper.

"Can the young man step forward?" a wizard in the stands of the Dog said.

"Of course, Dubbledore," Vitruvius said.

The man looked offended. "I'm Gandalf!" he said.

"It's Dumbledore," the wizard next to him said.

"Dubbledore?" Vitruvius asked, trying to pronounce the name correctly.

"Dumbledore," the wizard enunciated.

"Well, you're going to have to write all that down, because I'm not going to remember any of it, but here we go." Vitruvius took a deep breath and stepped off of the platform.

The entire room was cloaked in a tension-thick silence as Vitruvius walked in our direction.

"Come on, Emmet," he whispered.

Emmet's eyes widened, but he walked towards the platform.

"Hello," he said. "I'm Emmet. Oh, and this is the Piece."

He gestured to the red Piece stuck to his back, and the crowd went nuts. This was going great.

"Thanks," he said. "Well, I am really excited to be working with you guys on infiltrating the Octan tower and saving the world from President Business – and I know it's going to be really hard, but –"

"REALLY HARD?" a man with a seafaring accent called out. Oh, boy.

Suddenly, a large man with a body of garbage burst in the Dog. And when I say a body of garbage, I mean it. His body was made entirely of driftwood, treasure chests, and sharks. The only thing that looked like any of the other Master Builders was his head.

"Wiping ye bum wit' a hook fer a hand is really hard," he yelled. "This be impossible!"

"Who are you?" Emmet said.

"The name be MetalBeard," the pirate said. "And I'll tell yeh me tale of woe."

"Here we go again," Vitruvius said, exasperated.

And with that, MetalBeard – the pirate – told Emmet, as well as anyone else who wanted to hear, the story of how he and his pirate crew attempted to infiltrate the Octan tower and were stopped, MetalBeard only escaping with his head and his vital organs. I won't go into too much detail – you've probably heard the story before. It isn't like it's ever changed.

"So," MetalBeard finished, "if yeh think that it be a good idea to return to that forsaken place, what idea have yeh that be better than that of hundreds of our fallen Master Builder brothers?"

"Well, uh…" Emmet stuttered. "Technically I'm not…I'm not a Master Builder yet."

The entire room gasped – including me.

"WHAT?!" MetalBeard shouted.

Emmet's face was horrified at how quickly the tide had turned.

"No – no, please, you need to listen!" he called, and finally the room quieted down.

"I know, and it's true," Emmet said. "I'm not a Master Builder. I have almost no experience fighting or building. I'm not all that smart, and I'm generally unskilled. And you're thinking, 'He is the least qualified person to lead us!'"

He paused for a second.

"And you are right," he said.

The room nearly exploded with fury.

"This is supposed to make us feel better?" someone called.

"Wait!" Emmet said, his confidence failing him. "There was supposed to be a but…"

"You're a butt!" Gandalf called.

"I be abandoning this lost cause!" MetalBeard yelled as he ran out of the Dog.

Emmet looked heartbroken, and he started to walk off the platform dejectedly.

"Well, at least things can't get any worse," he said.

Suddenly, a white ball flew through the sky and crashed into the Dog, nearly crushing Emmet.

"I was wrong!" he cried as we ran out of the main pavilion.

We tried to run outside, but a police car was guarding the sky – probably Bad Cop. Sure enough, the man himself was standing on the top of the car.

"Wait!" I heard a voice behind us call. "What's that on his ankle?"

I didn't know which he the person was talking about, but I checked the three men in our group. Batman had nothing. Vitruvius had nothing.

A red light was blinking from the back of Emmet's leg.

"It's a tracking device!" someone called.

"He's led them right to us!" another person yelled.

"I had no idea!" Emmet called back, trying to clear his own name. "It was an –"

"Get them!" Bad Cop said from the top of the car.

"Run!" Wyldstyle said, and we obeyed immediately.

"To the Batmobile!" Batman said as we ran towards a window in the Dog. We arrived just in time to see a police helicopter shoot the Batmobile into oblivion.

"Dang it," Batman muttered.

Wonder Woman tried to get people to her own vehicle, but it also didn't work. There was nowhere to go.

Left and right, people tried to protect Emmet – and they were almost immediately captured or shot down. Superman and Green Lantern were stuck in a wad of chewing gum, for example.

"Come on, Batman!" Wyldstyle cried.

"Every man for himself," he said, trying to fight off some robots.

"Come on!" Wyldstyle tried again. Finally, Batman joined her, ripped off Emmet's tracker, and stuck it onto a robot.

Suddenly, I felt a shift – almost like an earthquake was hitting Cloud Cuckoo Land. But we were in the sky – we didn't get earthquakes. Which meant…oh, no.

"They've hit our silly cloud stabilizers!" I called. "We have to get out of here!"

"Maybe we could build something?" Emmet suggested.

"I have an idea!" a high-pitched voice called. When I turned around, the spaceman from the Dog was standing in front of me.

"Hi!" he said. "My name's Ben, but you can call me Benny. I can build a spaceship!"

"We can't," Batman grumbled. "The skies are surrounded."

"Dang it," Benny said.

"Well," I said, trying to start an impromptu brainstorming session, "where can we go where we can't be found?"

"We could go underwater," Emmet said.

"Oh, that's ridiculous," Batman said. "We couldn't possibly go under–"

Suddenly, a lightbulb struck. I wasn't sure what it was, but I had a feeling he was remembering MetalBeard abandoning Emmet earlier.

"How about we go underwater?" Batman suggested.

"Great idea, Batman," Emmet said sarcastically.

"Come on!" I said with as much cheerfulness as I could muster. "Let's build a submarine – with rainbows!"

We got to work, Emmet following us randomly.

"What should I do?" Emmet asked. "Can anyone tell me what they need me to do?"

"You can't do that," I heard Vitruvius say. "You must embrace what is special about you."

It sounded so cheesy, but it gave Emmet an idea. Suddenly, he was darting around, putting piece after piece together.

"There he is!" I heard a voice call. When I looked up, Bad Cop's car/plane was hovering over us.

"Come on! Dive!" Wyldstyle yelled.

We closed up hatch after hatch as the submarine plunged into the water. I wondered briefly what it would look like to be underwater.

It looked gorgeous. The entire room was bathed in a turquoise hue, and waves of light travelled through the water.

That's when I saw it.

It started as a single brick, floating through the water. Then a slow trickle, each brick one of the many pastel colors that I saw every day in Cloud Cuckoo Land. Then it became a river – a river of the wreckage of the land that I used to rule.

"My home!" I called out. "It's…gone…"

The balcony of the Dog floated by, and I felt something I had never felt before.

"What…what is this?" I wondered aloud. "It's like…the opposite of…happiness – no! I must…stay…positive…"

I took a few deep breaths and tried to think about some things I liked.

"Bubblegum…butterflies…"

Then I made the mistake of looking out the window just in time to see the Dog break apart in the water.

"Cotton candy?" I whimpered weakly.

I kept on breathing in and out.

"Raindrops on roses and whiskers on kittens…" I said. "Bright copper kettles and warm woolen mittens…"

It wasn't working. Nothing could cheer me up – I had never felt like this before.

And then I heard another voice from behind me.

"Brown paper packages tied up with string," Emmet said.

I turned away from the window and looked at him.

"These are a few of my favorite things…" I whispered before running in for a hug.

"Gosh, I'm so sorry, UniKitty," he said as I tried to keep the tears from falling. Carefully, he sat me down on what felt like a large couch.

When I pulled away, I realized that I was right. It was a couch, connected to another couch by vertical ladders.

"What the heck is that?" Batman asked.

"It's a double-decker couch," Emmet said sheepishly. "I kinda spaced out – it's the only thing I really know how to build. But it has waterproof flip-top seats!"

The crew looked at him like he was loony. I tried not to meet his eyes – personally, I thought it was a good idea.

"Wait…why are my pants cold and wet?" Vitruvius said.

I looked down to the floor, and I noticed a trickle of water flowing in. Then the trickle, much like the trickle of bricks outside, turned to a roaring river of water.

"The walls are crying!" I cried. Maybe the walls felt empathy for me? I doubted it, but it was possible.

"This is not how Batman dies!" Batman called.

"Get over here!" Emmet yelled. Suddenly, I felt his hand grab my leg, and he pulled me towards the double-decker couch – wait…what had he said about the couch?

It has waterproof flip-top seats! he had said excitedly.

"Get to the couch!" I called, opening one of the seats and climbing in. Gosh, I hope this works, I thought.

And then the light around me disappeared, coating me in nothing but blackness.

Thanks for reading this chapter! I'm a huge fan of The Sound of Music, so I hope you enjoyed the reference. I always thought of that song whenever I watched this scene in the movie. I hope you enjoy!

Feel free to review, but please no negative reviews or cursing. (And please, NOTHING POLITICAL!) Thanks!