A few weeks had passed since that rather unusual but not at all unpleasant night. Marshall had started making
frequent visits to see Fionna, which of course, were always very chill, and never anything serious, just two friends,
hanging out. Nothing unusual about that at all.

At least, that's what Fionna told herself.

"YO, CAKE!"

… Cake, after being woken up in rather loud manner, fell ungraciously off the ceiling fan she had been sleeping on,
and onto Fionna's lap.

"Fionna! What the lump, man! I was still sleeeeepin'." Cake grumbled as she picked herself up and lazily stretched
into a pretzel.

"I know. Sorry," Fionna apologized, and continued, "Buuuuut I wanted to talk to you about the
Celebration of Science ball that Prince Gumball is having next week! Normally I'd be dying to go with the Prince,
but now… I don't think I want to. Apparently he's going with the Prune Princess or something anyways.
Do you know if you're even allowed to go without a date?"

"Girl, no offence, but when have you ever gone to one of his dances with a date?" Cake questioned, rolling around on the bed.

"Huh. I guess that's true. I don't know who I'd go with anyways." Fionna sighed in a melodramatic teenage fashion.

"Why don't you ask your vampire friend?" Cake asked slyly, pouncing on Fionna's feet as she talked to avoid Fionna's
attempted punch, only to get stabbed in the belly by her toe.

"Shut up! No, I'm not going to ask someone to go with me! Besides, If he wanted to go, he would have asked me already.
I doubt he's even gonna go at all," Fionna replied defensively, crawling out of bed.

"Yeah, yeah, whatevs, lets break fast and get breakfast."

The two groggily made their way downstairs to the kitchen, talking about possible solutions for their morning hunger.

"I think we should make waffles."

"Pfft, your waffles taste like dumb."

"What? You taste like dumb!"

"What does dumb even taste like..?

"How am I supposed to know! You're the one tha-"

"…Well hello, ladies." A sleek voice cut into their apparently engaging conversation. Marshall Lee had entered the building.

Fionna, not missing a beat. gave him a wave and tossed a ripe apple at him. "What's up, oh revered Vampire King?"

He winked at her, and took the apple, sucking the colour out of it before replying,

"Not too much, oh esteemed Human. Just thought I'd see if you wanted to chill later today."

That was odd. Usually he would just show up and took her out somewhere, or they would hang out and played BMO
or something. In fact, Fionna couldn't remember him ever actually making plans with her to do anything, but she didn't think much of it.

"Of course, sounds like a party!" Fionna happily agreed.

"Alright, see you later then." Marshall winked at her as he left. He seemed to do that a lot (wink, that is).

Arriving home after a day full of rescuing princes (You would think grown men would be able to protect themselves),
Fionna and Cake walked into their tree house to find Marshall lounging about inside.

"Heya, Fionna," He said casually and nodded a greeting to Cake. "You ready to go?"

"Oh! Yeah, I suppose. Where the lemon are we going, anyways?" She asked, walking out the door with him close behind.

"Well, uh, I just though maybe we could go to my place and grab something to eat or whatever you people do, then go for a walk."

Usually, Marshall sounded smooth, confident, and totally in control. Of course, he was still acting like Marshall,
but Fionna thought he sounded almost… nervous? Something had to be bothering him, but she didn't bring it up.

"Sounds like a rad-radish time!" she replied instead, and they made their way down to Marshalls place,
joking about what Prince Gumball would do if Marshall were to suck the colour out of his red candy people.

Soon they had arrived at his house, and Marshal brought out some snacks, most of which were red,
but Fionna didn't mind. She was used to it by now, and besides, red things had a tendency to be particularly delicious.

"So, Fionna, did you hear about Prince dumb-ball's science dance thing?" Marshall asked in an attempted impassive fashion,
eyeing up a stray strawberry. Fionna, however, detected that nervous tone in his voice again.

"Who hasn't? You gonna go?" Fionna munched on some grapes and looked casually out the window.

"That depends." Marshall caught Fionna's eye and held her attention.

He was always doing that. Whenever he wanted to say anything serious, he would just look at her face
until she was forced to look him in the eyes. Although she had to admit, he did have rather nice eyes.
He had the kind of eyes you could just stare into for hours... Fionna blushed, embarrassed at the thought,
and dragged herself back to reality.

"Um… depends on what?" She asked quietly, still returning his serene gaze.

A small pause, then after a moment a soft voice answered, "If you'll go with me."
A moment later, with a tad more confidence, a subtle smile and a wink he added, "Like… as my date or whatever."