Ivor's eyes widened in shock. "And you didn't say anything?!" he exclaimed, throwing his arms into the air.
"When would Jesse have even had time to tell you? She was fighting off a bunch of monsters with you guys in Sky City, and then she had to go off and kick Aiden's butt," Cassie pointed out.
She paused a second later. "Well, not that she actually did kick his butt, but you get what I mean."
"Yes, Cassie," Sparklez said, sounding a little too amused. "We do get what you mean."
She stuck her tongue out at him.
The Blaze hybrid arched her eyebrows. "Yeah, I'm actually going to have to agree with Ivor on this one!" she responded, crossing her arms and glaring playfully at Jesse.
Lukas frowned. His tail twitched. "Did... I not mention it either? 'Caaaaauuuuuse I could've sworn I said something."
"No, Lukas. You didn't mention it."
Real-Lukas took a leaf out of Cassie's book and stuck his tongue out at Maya. She grinned at him.
"And we were trying not to die via Ghast and creeper and who knows what else was up there back on Sky City, so when would I have had any time to say anything about finding the portal?" Jesse pointed out.
"She does have a point there," Otto muttered.
She grinned and started jogging in the direction of the portal, increasing her speed gradually. "C'mon!"
The other three dashed after her, and Jesse suddenly threw out all six of her arms in a slight flailing motion as she put on the brakes, the Eversource squawking as it flew in front of her before tripping and landing flat on its face.
Real-Isa patted Benedict on the head.
Lukas threw himself forward, his claws unsheathing and digging into the dirt at his feet, keeping him from plowing straight into Jesse. Ivor barely managed to skid to a halt just in time. Petra didn't and collided full force with Ivor, making him trip into Lukas, and making the whole group crash to the ground with a series of yelps.
"Huh. You can be clumsy. Who knew?" Jace told Petra.
She put him in a headlock and gave him a noogie.
The spider hybrid gave a sheepish smile when she saw her friends had all sprawled into a huge pile. She turned back to the front at the sound of a cluck to see that Benedict had gotten back up from her fall. "Oh! Hello," she said to the chicken cheerfully.
"Ah!" And Jesse looked up and over to see Isa coming over, eyes softening. "There you are!" She looked up and gave Jesse a slightly sheepish smile. "So sorry about her," she apologized.
Jesse waved it off. "That's okay, looks like she's having fun running around," she said, looking down at Benedict, who was indeed running around in little circles and fluttering her wings with a cheerful series of clucks.
Isa smiled down at Benedict as well. "Yes, I think she took it pretty well when I told her she didn't have to be the Eversource anymore."
Everyone looked at Real-Ivor, expecting him to look pretty irritated about that. They were surprised to see that while there was a faint scowl over his face, he still looked generally pretty neutral.
"You're taking this surprisingly well," Soren murmured, surprised.
Ivor gave a noncommittal shrug. "I mean, after seeing how much trouble this thing can cause..." He shook his head at the thought of that, shuddering slightly. "No thank you."
"... actually, I see his point..." Gabriel mumbled under his breath.
Isa put her hands on her knees and gave the Eversource a bright smile. The screen suddenly glitched to show a younger Jesse giving Reuben the same smile, before back to Isa.
Jace's fists had tightened, and Real-Jesse was now leaning into Lukas's shoulder with her hands trembling in her lap. However, neither of them actually said anything.
Onscreen-Jesse's eyes had widened in shock. The screen switched back to show Isa with that bright smile, cooing to the chicken happily. "What are we gonna do with you now, huh?" she cooed. "What are you gonna do now? Besides continue to be adorable of course... but that was a given."
Everyone in the audience blinked.
"Uhh..." Milo blinked again, scratching his head a little bit. "Well, I honestly can say that I didn't think you had it in you to do that."
Isa chucked a pillow at him.
"Yeah, what are you gonna do now?" Lukas asked, having gotten back to his feet and frantically fluffing at his hair to get dirt out of it.
The Founder hesitated, looking down at Benedict with that smile on her face. "After so long being 'the Founder' and 'the Eversource', now we can just be Isa and her best friend..." Isa bent down and took off the tiny crown, the chicken clucking away cheerfully. "Benedict."
Ivor scoffed. "That's a boy's name!"
Real-Jesse giggled a bit. "Magnus said that the first time he met Benedict, too."
"Always have to ruin the moment, Ivor," Harper joked.
Ivor muttered a bit, his cheeks turning a bit pink in embarrassment. The rest of the Order glanced at her in surprise. They'd half-expected him to snap at her.
Onscreen, Jesse chuckled a bit. "Ah. I... actually called her 'Evie'. 'Cause. You know. Eversource..." she trailed off, a bit weakly.
Isa tilted her head thoughtfully, diplomatically avoiding Ivor's comment about Benedict's name and holding the crown in one hand thoughtfully. "Hm... Evie. Not bad." She looked at the crown in her hand a moment later, as if remembering it was there, and extending it out to Jesse. "Jesse? I would be honored if you would take this. As a small token of our gratitude." And she set the small ring of gold down in Jesse's palm.
The spider hybrid nodded and smiled, putting the crown carefully into her pocket. "Thank you," she said gratefully. The Founder nodded, and scooped the chicken up into her arms.
"Come on, Benedict; we've got a lot of life still left ahead of us," and she walked back off in the direction she and Milo had gone earlier. Jesse watched her pass, and her eyes dropped onto a bunch of little pink pigs walking around in the dirt.
Her jaw tightened, and her eyes misted over with tears that she refused to let out.
Real-Lukas wordlessly pulled Jesse into a hug. After a few seconds, she twisted around and buried her head into his shoulder, one hand inadvertently keeping her squashed between Lukas and her in the impromptu hug. He tolerated it for a few seconds, before letting out a little oink to remind her that she was there. She quickly pulled away, shifting around so that her back was resting against Lukas's chest, the little pink pig snuffling cheerfully away in her lap again.
Jace quickly dashed a hand across his eyes before anyone could see the tears forming in his eyes, before glancing over and looking at Jesse. She returned his gaze a few seconds later.
They were going to save him.
Onscreen, Jesse suddenly started as a hand came to rest on her shoulder. "Jesse? You okay?" Lukas asked, looking a little concerned.
Jesse nodded a bit, still staring blankly at the pigs snuffling around in the dirt. "Yeah- I-I just saw those pigs, and... y-y'know."
"Oh... yes," Ivor said, his voice going awkwardly quiet at the end of the statement as he watched the girl just stare blankly at the little pink pigs snuffling around in the dirt.
Petra reached out and squeezed Jesse's other shoulder. "He would be really happy to know you're still having adventures like this," she told her, comfortingly.
The spider hybrid's shoulders sagged a bit as she sighed, before she made a soft "mm" sound in surprise a moment later and looked up.
Maya and Gill were tentatively approaching the group.
Lukas scowled when he saw them, ears rotating so they were flat against his head. "What do you want?" he asked, sharply.
Gill and Maya exchanged worried looks, before Maya stepped forward a bit. "Lukas, we are..." she paused, biting her lip, before plowing forward, "we are so sorry about what happened with you and Aiden. We should've stepped in or tried to help, but..."
Gill picked up. "We were idiots."
Maya sent him a deadpan look.
"We were!" he exclaimed at her, shrugging and splaying his hands out a bit. "There's no way we can avoid it. We just kinda... stood by and watched. We didn't try to help you out," he directed this back at Lukas, "or to stand up for you, or to try to calm Aiden down, or even try to stop him. We were in the middle of the whole thing, but it was like we were just... bystanders, I guess."
Maya sighed a bit and turned back to Lukas. "Yeah. We were just hoping things would get better without trying to fix it, and... we're sorry. It was wrong." She paused for a second. "We have no excuse."
Lukas stared blankly at them for a minute or two, and the two of them just cleared their throat awkwardly and looked away, twisting their hands together, completely unsure of what to say.
Real-Maya and Real-Gill shared discomfited looks. It looks like Lukas was taking this really hard if he just didn't want to accept the apology. Or even gloat. Well, then again, Lukas wasn't really a gloating person...
Finally, Maya stepped back a little bit, making as if to leave. "Well, um, t-take care of yours-"
Lukas suddenly darted forward and threw his arms around both of them, making the two of them stagger back in shock before catching themselves, the flying tackle he'd just delivered nearly being enough to knock the three of them to the ground.
Jesse smiled a bit in relief.
A moment of shock passed, before the two Ocelots reached up and hugged Lukas back, the ocelot hybrid's tail curling in on itself, before he released them both. His eyes looked a little watery when he smiled at them weakly, and he took the tip of his tail and dabbed them at his eyes a second later. "You guys... you guys take care of yourselves, okay?"
Maya nodded, tears in her own eyes. "You too."
There was a slightly awkward silence between the three of them, before the two Ocelots raised their hand in a slightly awkward wave at their old teammate, and walked off as well.
Real-Maya had tears in her eyes, and she glanced back at Gill to see him surreptitiously wipe a few tears away. "You old sap," she whispered to him.
"I could say the same to you," he whispered back, and she had to concede the point.
Onscreen, Lukas let out a little huff, his shoulders dropping. "I'm not sure I entirely forgive them yet." He looked back at Jesse, and a slow grin spread across his face. "I will not lie, though, that made me feel a lot better."
Jesse smiled a bit and clapped him on the shoulder, before the group continued until they reached the edge of the hole that led to the portal, and she extended her hand to point at it. "See? Just like I told you. One portal back home."
And the whole group carefully descended into the hole, Jesse carefully extracting the flint and steel from her pocket. "Okay, gang... let's go home," she said, sounding very satisfied, before kneeling down next to the portal opening, and clicking the flint and steel together.
A shockwave of white-blue energy spread out from the hot spark the flint and steel spit out, the portal flaring to life with glowing blue swirls. She stood up and turned around to see the rest of them grinning at the portal in relief, before turning back around and walking into it, starting to speak as she did so. "Wait 'til Axel and Olivia hear where we've been, they'll never believe-"
Her feet landed in a dark area, and her voice suddenly cut off. The screen panned up to show Jesse standing there, wide-eyed, staring at something.
"Wait- what's going on?" Dan asked, frowning. "Shouldn't they just be home by now?"
Hadrian, Otto, and Mevia glanced at each other significantly.
Here we go.
Lukas fell through a second later, opening his eyes and looking up. His eyes also widened, as Ivor and Petra followed the two of them through the portal, their eyes widening in shock as well.
Jesse finally spoke again, slowly. "That's... not... what I was expecting," she said at last.
Slowly, the screen zoomed out, showing a pair of portal doors. Then another set. And then more, and more, zooming out faster and faster, until their figures were mere pinpricks at the end of the hallway they were in, a hallway that seemed to be a mile long stretching out.
And the walls were lined with portals.
The screen abruptly blacked out.
The title screen slowly reappeared onscreen.
"I... guess that's the end of that episode?" Slab said at last, when it seemed clear that no one was going to say anything.
"I guess so-" Cassie was interrupted by a "First it was you a few months ago, now it's Gom. What's happening around here?"
Two blue figures literally materialized in front of the screen. Another memory or something had decided to pop up.
Jesse recognized the two figures; Ariza and Red. Tentatively, she made to get up from the floor- and then found that she couldn't. She could feel something slightly cool and wet almost wrapping around her wrists.
She glanced down to see what was keeping her from moving- and stifled a scream when she saw a strange tentacle of black ink ensnaring her wrists and her ankles, keeping her trapped against Lukas and the ground.
A moment later, words formed on the ground next to them.
Don't worry. Just keeping you here so you don't dissolve.
Before Jesse could wonder what that meant, she heard Ariza talking, and forced herself to look up to see Ariza thumbing the corner of her lip. "I don't know, Red... I really don't know. Let's see, we're just walking aimlessly here- where would she go unleash some-"
She suddenly stopped talking, head jerking up a bit, before snapping around to meet Red's widening red eyes. "The training room!" they chorused, and Red turned to leave- just in time to run into the third blue figure, who'd just stormed into the room angrily. Jesse recognized her, too- it was Gommie.
"Ow, what the hell, Red?" Gommie grunted, rubbing her head a bit from where she'd just knocked her skull against it.
"Ooh, I'm sorry, I didn't mean to run into you like that!" Red apologized hastily. "We were looking for you and-"
Ariza proceeded to interrupt him, putting her hands on her hips in a very feminine way.
"Where have you been?" she asked, and oh- now Jesse could see why she and Toni had joked around a while back about her 'momming' people.
"Training in the training room," Gommie replied simply.
Red frowned. "We know when you're lying, Gom. What were you really doing down there?"
Gommie sighed. "Fine, fine... I may have accidentally destroyed all of the dummies and I'm about to head out for wood to replace them."
"Gom. You never 'accidentally' destroy all of the dummies. What's really happening here?" Ariza asked, voice softening a little bit.
Gommie's teeth gritted for a moment, and her dark eyes flared angrily. "There's this b*tch on my dueling team who thinks she's Queen of the World and hasn't been nice since she moved here from Texania. I don't know what the f*ck I did to make her practically hate me so much, but last night's dueling match- that was the biggest blow of all," she nearly snarled.
Red glanced at Ariza, raising an eyebrow. Ariza just shrugged a bit, before returning their attention to the now-ranting Gommie.
"-she was the one who brought hoagies on board to serve as dinner since the walk was so long, and she doesn't give me one. There were extras in her bag, and she doesn't give me one. I skipped breakfast to go on a quick wood run, only ate half my lunch because I had to help the coach get the equipment, which I have to do every single goddamn time, and she leaves me to starve. Some of my teammates ask if I got a hoagie. I say 'no, I never got one.' She doesn't get the hell up off her lazy ass to grab me one. She was literally right there when I said I didn't get a hoagie. Like half a foot away."
Gommie flopped down onto the nearest couch (which happened to be Aiden and Cassie's), the occupants hastily scooting out of the way as if she was actually real. "I always feel like I'm forgotten. The last one standing to be picked for a quick match, even. But it seems like- some of the teammates, my teammates, people I've been dueling with forever- it seems like they prefer the new girl over me, and they don't do anything about it. They don't speak up about it. They don't ask her to lay off. They just don't do anything about it. And you know what my social life is like; I don't really have many friends and I can't even stand up for myself because Queen Asshole over here-"
Red's lips inadvertently twitched at the name.
"- is probably gonna be even more of a b*tch to me afterwards. I'm only lucky at least one of the coaches noticed so far. Last night, though, it was the worst because I felt like a ghost."
The audience all exchanged glances at that.
"An actual ghost. Like I died somehow during the match, and everyone still pretended I was there, except I know they wouldn't care if I died during the match." Gommie finished her rant and let out a long sigh, burying her head in her hands.
There was a long silence, before a loud pop sound seemed to go off outside, and Ariza let out an irritated grunt. "Okay, what the hell is going on outside? This group outside has been setting off fireworks for the longest-" She stopped, her face going blank as she looked out the window. "... never mind."
"What is going on outside?" Gommie wondered, getting back up off the couch and walking towards the window.
Ariza sucked in a deep breath, green eyes widening slightly. "Er, Gom, maybe you shouldn't-" And too late, Gommie was already peering out the window.
Her face suddenly went perfectly blank, freezing a little bit.
Red frowned and looked out the window himself, their reactions not having gone unnoticed. "Hey, isn't that your dueling team-?"
"On the victory parade without me," Gommie sighed, shaking her head a bit. "She was in charge of sending the message out to everyone... she must not have sent it to me 'on accident'." The burlier girl stared glumly out the window.
Aiden, who was also closer to the window they were standing near, stood up and peered through them to see a crowd of ghostly blue figures dancing by, although right now they were still pretty close to the building.
Ariza looked at Gommie, then out the window, and then turned on her heel. Red noticed her go. "Hey, Ariza, where are you going?" he asked as the girl walked right towards the door.
"Nothing you guys have to worry about. I'm just feeling up for some dueling."
Another group of people had been walking into the room, and they all blinked and looked at Ariza mid-conversation when they heard that. Jesse recognized most of them from the party she'd inadvertently taken part in earlier today. "Dueling...?" Toni asked tentatively, the boy's eyes narrowing.
"Yeah... I thought you don't like violence," Sammi added, shaking her head a bit. "Actually, I thought you rather hated dueling."
Ariza gave a light shrug. "Well now I'm in the mood for it. Be right back." And she nipped out the door.
A few hesitant minutes passed, Gommie still staring listlessly out the window with Red having moved away to explain to the others what was going on. Aiden had tentatively moved into place where Ariza and Red had been earlier, watching the 'parade' dance by as well, when suddenly he saw a figure storming right out of the mansion.
"Ariza...?" he wondered aloud.
Gommie had noticed this too. "Hey, isn't that-" she never finished her sentence; her phone suddenly went off.
She flicked it out of her pocket and pressed the 'receive' button with a sigh, nothing even bothering to check the caller ID first. "Who is this?" she sighed into the phone.
Not even half a second when she flinched back with a curse, drawing the rest of the group's attention and dropping her phone. The phone hit the speaker button, and the voice speaking over the phone suddenly became much louder and much more familiar to every occupant of the room.
"Alright, who exactly was the person who brought the hoagies the other night?"
There was dead silence on both ends of the phone. Jesse was pretty sure everyone on their end had stopped breathing, it was so perfectly silent.
Finally, a voice spoke. "Did you need someth-"
They never finished the question as a loud explosion of noise came over the speakerphone, making everyone jump.
Something must've blown up or something- Jesse thought at first, wildly- and then realized with a start that the explosion of noise was enraged shouting, and the person doing the shouting was the usually calm, collected Ariza. After a few seconds, her voice became much more coherent.
"- DID YOU SERIOUSLY NOT GIVE GOMMIE A F*CKING HOAGIE AND COOKIE WHEN YOU EXPLICITLY BOUGHT THEM FOR THE REST OF THE TEAM!? I'm sorry, I don't even know you, but what the f*ck is that?! It's one thing to do it because she did something rude to you, but if you're just being a b*tch about it for no good f*cking reason, then that's just being a rat's bastard."
"Who are you to-"
"SHUT UP!" Ariza's commanding voice blasted through the speaker, effectively shutting up the girl who'd started speaking. "Just shut up! If you say one word before I've finished, I will literally summon a demon and get it to drag your f*cking ass to hell. Do we have an understanding? Wait, you know what, DON'T SPEAK. I'm sick of your voice already."
Gommie stared at the rest of the group in silent shock. Ariza usually was much more polite than this.
"Gommie is one of the nicest people I know. She's one of the people who I can always count on to cheer me up or make me feel better. She's one of the people I can actually be myself around, and only Notch knows exactly how precious few people who I can do that with. She tries to be nice to EVERYONE, even if they're not nice to her, which is apparently what you've been doing. You can insult me. Mess with me all you'd like. I don't care. That's completely fine by me. But mess with one of my friends, and you've apparently just decided to summon Satan to come kick your ass to hell and back."
"I don't care if you're the freaking Queen of the World; you do not hurt one of my friends, because then I get mad. And I'm not saying like right now. This... ha. This is nothing. Consider this a thunderstorm. Keep this up, and you're going to be thrown headfirst into the middle of a hurricane. Let me give you a little advice- if you don't want to be f*cking lectured, don't be a b*tch to people who are much better than you."
Ariza scoffed a moment later. "And the rest of you... I don't know if she's blackmailing you, or bullying you, or whatever it is that she's doing. But this... this has got to stop. You've known Gom longer than I have, but I already know that I would never just pretend this isn't happening. Because Gom's like family to me. And I would never let my family feel this way. If you lot don't fix this soon, I will." A short pause.
"... I butt-dialed you, didn't I, Gom?"
"... yes. Yes you did," Gommie replied, unable to hide the huge grin spreading over her face.
"And you heard every word of that, didn't you?"
"Yes. Yes I did."
Ariza's voice sounded much more playful when she spoke again. "... don't get a swelled head like Red."
"Hey!" Red joked, and the room's occupants laughed at the tease.
"I'll be right back in. I feel up for some soup to drink after all that yelling," and Ariza laughed a bit, voice sounding a bit scratchy now.
"Heh, yeah. And- Ariza?"
"Hmm?"
"... thanks."
"No prob, Bob. Be right back." And the phone clicked as she hung up, a wind coming in and gently dispersing the figures a moment later.
Jesse felt the inky substance ooze off her hand, and she looked down just in time to see a message disappearing into the wood floor.
WATCH THE NEXT EPISODE AT NIGHT.
A/N: Before you ask, yes, I am planning on including the fillers between the episodes as well; I'm just incorporating this one- the one between Episode 5 and Episode 6- into the next episode. The one between Episode 6 and 7... well we'll get there when we get there.
Oooh, what's this black substance coming from? Or, more accurately, who's it coming from?
(groans) Have NONE of you read Gregor the Overlander before, by the way? That bothers me. If you really want to figure out the code, just look up Gregor the Overlander and the Code of Claw and then look up the Code of Claw from there.
Ooh, but I will be revealing Azira sometime soon. :3
RQTC: If I were to make a blog, would you follow it to follow the development of Phantasmagoria or not?
LunarStarsMoons: (nods) / Yeah, that's why xD / Yes, that's my favorite part as well xD
pensuka: You're right about that xD It won't help that this episode will be a night episode, either.
sailor . mikuchan: (dumps a chapter) I'll work on the next time asap xD
RapidSammi: (laughs) Okay, I think you've punished Crispy enough. Now I think it might be time to PUNish him xD
J.M.M.: (laughs) I don't know if that was good or bad. / (nods)
the indecisive bird: Oh, the earlier hints weren't hints to the code. Just the one that was explicitly a hint to the code and the JESSE hint. / (laughs) I'm sorry. / Yep!
RavenBlaze4850: Yeah I was dying of laughter when I read this chapter as well xD / Yes, both of them are not to be messed with. / (finger guns) I have punnitis too.. xD
CrystalTearsofFaith: (laughs) Nice!
AquaK13: No, come to the dark side, Aqua. We have the best cookies. / Yes, get a Jace and scare the crap out of the arguing people xD / I'm not sayin' nothing x3 / Baaaaiii! / OMG lol xD
BeliTheGhoti0304: Thank you, thank you (bows playfully)
S4SH4L4SH4theGaMeR101: Well, it was his fault for 'insulting' her in the first place xD
RWBYSTRQ: I loved writing them lol xD
LegoGirl794: All will be revealed in good time.
Seastorm25: Heeheeheehee (giggles) / That's still a bit off in the future; we'll worry about that when it comes to it. / No, I'm not the narrator, I thought I said that already. / (laughs) I'm worried that no one else can get the code, to be honest.
Rabbits rule: (laughs) Thank you.
Emily The Avenger: You're right lol xD
Kaos Ruin: Expect more in the future xD
homeworkoverload: We've been tortured, but we move forward, this disorder kills our day! / That's wonderful! I'm glad to hear that! / (bursts out laughing) Nice.
DarkPrincess2001: Yep x3
InsaneAcrobat: (cracks up) They really aren't; I really wanted to make them seem less just outright bad and more... I dunno. Normal, I guess :3 / (grins) Well, it won't hurt that they're watching this next episode at night.
Baiii!
x.X. A.L. X.x
