Hey guys! Thanks so much for support and love the last chapter got, y'all are the best as usual. *tosses plates of free pancakes to everyone*

I managed to finish revisions and finalizations for this one before June, so here we go. It's actually much longer than I expected the final draft of it to be, so, enjoy I guess!

As you can see, this chapter is about the girls coming to terms about what is happening to them. Since they're all different, they all respond very differently to it. And things certainly aren't easy as they grapple with their own mortality.

Since you guys thought that changing the rating of the story so late into it was probably moot point, I decided to keep the rating here T once and for all. So, to make up for it, I'll just add warnings to this and the following chapters. All right, chapter sixteen, here we go!

Warning: This chapter contains smoking, underage drinking, alcohol abuse, and language. If any of those things bother you, take heed!

Disclaimer: I do not own any characters, settings, or properties from The Powerpuff Girls.

Sorry for any errors!


Chapter Sixteen

-Blossom's POV-

How do you live when the days that you have left have an exact, precise, cruel number?

I didn't know how it was possible, but things had actually gotten worse.

I thought that losing my powers would be the worst thing to happen to me. I thought it would be something that I could emotionally never move past, something that I could maybe arrange my life around but would always think about when I was alone in bed at night and nothing could keep the creeping misery away. I thought it would be like a phantom limb that was inside of my body somewhere, something that didn't exist anymore but still felt so vital for me to use that there would always be a certain emptiness in my everyday activities.

The part of my soul that yearned to feel the air whistling through my hair, whipping past my skin like fingers lifting me higher into the air, feeling the biting wisps of clouds evaporate against me—perhaps it would've always felt unfulfilled and sad.

But there could have been ways around it that I would have been willing to do. Almosts. There were many human equivalents of flying. Sky diving. Bungee jumping. Cliff jumping. All ways of falling through the sky. They seemed so close to the real thing. Maybe it wouldn't have been quite enough. But it would've been something that I could do.

And when the emergency shots were still a possibility, of course I knew they wouldn't be permanent. But I still could've lived a tiny piece of my existence from before, in short little increments once in a while. And maybe that would've been okay—not quite enough, but just enough to get by. Just enough to survive.

I was just learning to be mostly human. I was just learning to work around the physical inconveniences that humans always dealt with. I didn't like it, but I was doing it. I could've become better at it with time. And now it would all be pointless.

I was dying.

My dazed shock had finally worn off after a couple of days, and once it left, I found myself wishing that it would come back. That it would come back and shield me with its' cold numb walls.

The knowledge of what was happening to my sisters and I hung over my head like a phantom at all times—watching my every move, surrounding my consciousness, filling my every breath with the understanding that I only had a certain amount of time left to keep breathing.

A few days had passed, and yet I still hoped I would wake up from this nightmare.

My sisters and I stayed home from school every day to stay under Professor's close observation. We didn't leave the house, either.

As for the boys, they reluctantly went to classes daily after all three of us, and Professor as well, implored them to carry on with their studies. After their respective days of classes were finished, though, they drove over to our house immediately and stayed with us overnight instead of at their dorms.

To stay occupied during the day, I stayed constantly busy. I kept every inch of the house clean, scrubbing and vacuuming and mopping every chance I got, the moment it started to look less than perfectly spotless. At one point during one late afternoon, I became frustrated with how the mop seemed to not get the kitchen floor clean enough—so I got on my hands and knees with a bucket of soapy water, gloves and a sponge and scrubbed it myself. Scrubbed and scrubbed and scrubbed until every single scuff and spot was gone. After an hour or two, distantly, I felt Brick standing in the kitchen doorway, watching me with concern, and telling me to take a break. I ignored him. I kept scrubbing.

When I took my rubber gloves off after I finished, my hands were calloused and cracked, bleeding black. I only stared down at them, unfeeling, waiting for them to heal themselves instantly as my wounds had for my whole life.

They didn't. They didn't heal at all.

Another day, when I had taken a break from cleaning and I didn't have my face buried in one of my multiple books from my bedroom bookshelves, Brick and I sat on my bed, talking. Our backs rested propped up against my headboard, our legs stretched out the length of my bedspread.

At first we talked about unimportant things. The weather. Whatever was coming on television that night. Even some upcoming movies we wanted to see. Anything to distract us from talking about what was happening to us.

Then, out of the blue, Brick broke our unspoken rule of avoidance.

"I had a nosebleed this morning."

The forced smile on my face dropped away immediately. Nausea rose in my throat. I asked to confirm, "A Chemical X nosebleed?" I looked over at him in time to see him nod slowly, his lips pinched. My throat went dry as I stared at him.

He continued, voice grim. "Boomer had one yesterday in class. We're waiting on Butch to have one next."

I looked away from him silently, not trusting if I could hold it together if I said anything in reply.

I felt him staring at me. "Professor gave me a drip. I'm okay now."

Swallowing hard, I managed a nod. Then, with a quiet voice, I corrected, "For now." At that, Brick stayed silent, too.

With one of my bandaged hands, I reached across my soft, plushy bedspread, taking his hand in mine. Then I leaned my head against his shoulder. We didn't say anything more to each other, just sat in my quiet, cold bedroom.

#

"Yes, hello, may I please talk to someone in the registry department?" Over the phone, my voice rang out more confident sounding than it had in nearly a week. The person on the other end of my university's official office line told me to hold. They probably never even suspected that something might be wrong.

I had put it off long enough. There was no use putting it off any longer. It was time.

A chipper voice greeted me on the other end of the line after a few nerve-wracking minutes of listening to classical hold music passed. "Hi, this is Katie from Warner University's registry office, how may I help you today?"

I forced myself to smile. If I smiled, then she would hear me smiling, and then she couldn't hear the grief that was crawling its' way up the back of my throat. "Hi, Katie. This is Blossom Utonium. I need to request emergency academic leave of absence for my sisters and I."

There was a moment of pause when I heard some papers shuffling in the background. "Okay, I can do that for you. What is the reason for this leave?"

My throat tightened. I kept the forced phony smile on my face. "Medical reasons."

This gave her true pause. Even without seeing her face, I could tell I had caught her off guard. She had, of course, known who I was just from my name. I stiffened, anticipating any questions she might throw at me, my press-mode in full effect even though she wasn't a press member at all. Finally, she said politely, "I'm very sorry to hear that."

I let out a breath of relief at her generosity.

She continued, her professional aura intact. "It looks like all three of you qualify for a leave, you're all in good standing based on last semester's grades. And you're just making the cutoff for leave requests. Can I ask how long this leave might be?"

My breath hitched. Somehow, I hadn't given this any thought at all. Why hadn't I realized I would need to give them an approximate amount of time the leave would be?

The dark thought arose from the very back of my mind before I could stop it: How long would it take for us to die?

The single dangerous thought overwhelmed me so severely that I lost my voice.

"Hello?" The kind voice at the other end rang out after a few long moments. "Blossom, are you still there?"

Breaking through my fog, I forced out, "Yes, I'm sorry. I was just thinking." I swallowed hard, a response finally leaping from my rational mind. "The leave will be one semester."

One semester. The rest of January, February, March, April, May. Five months.

By then, we could most certainly be dead. And the news would get out about it, spread to every corner of the world, and the University would know that we would never be coming back. That we would never be going back to school again. Every grade we ever got, every essay we ever did, all for nothing with no graduation—they'd be sealed up in a tomb with us, along with the rest of the things we would never finish or accomplish.

I squeezed my eyes shut as Katie described to me which forms I would have to print out on the University's website for my sisters and I, fill them out, and bring them to the main office to get signed by an advisor. Then it would be done, and we'd be university students no longer.

I answered her in affirmation, and then we hung up. Then my cell slipped from my hand, rattling against the wood surface of the dining room table as I collapsed into my folded arms. The uncontrollable sobs rose out of me before I could quell them or suppress them.

The dining room echoed with my hysterical sobbing.

#

The next day, sitting down heavily in the passenger seat of Brick's parked burgundy car, I slammed the door shut after I settled inside. I closed my eyes and leaned my head back against the leather seat. "Well," I said to him after a few moments, where he had been waiting for me in the driver's seat. My voice was bleak. "It's done."

His voice was quiet. "You did what you had to do."

I drew in a breath, then exhaled for a long time. "You mean what I was forced to do." Getting those forms signed in my university's main office, then turning them in and setting them free, had been one of the most difficult things I'd ever had to do. And as a leader, I had done plenty of things that were hard before, so that was saying something.

Brick was silent for a moment. Then I heard him lean over in his seat, and then afterwards, felt his lips press to my forehead. The scent of his aftershave drifted to my nose. Comforting. After he pulled away, he said, "Let's go somewhere else."

Finally, reluctantly, I opened my eyes. I had been trying to block out the sight of my beloved campus, the campus that I would never set foot on ever again. Goodbyes were never my strongest suit. "Professor said to come back home after dropping off the forms," I reminded him, frowning.

"Yes he did," Brick allowed, turning the key and starting the car's engine again. "But he also didn't say we couldn't stop for ice cream afterwards."

Unable to help it, one corner of my mouth quirked upward. "Brick."

He looked at me, ruby eyes round and innocent. "Bloss?"

"It's 34 degrees outside," I told him, lifting my hand and pointing at the small thermometer on his dashboard. "Fahrenheit."

"So?" He shifted from park to reverse.

His feigned deliberate ignorance choked a chuckle out of me. It made me feel a little better. "So, it's too cold for ice cream."

Brick scoffed, starting to pull out of the parking space we'd been stalled in. "Says who? Killjoys? Or bellyachers? Sourpusses? Faultfinders?" He shot a quick playful look at me before his eyes locked on the rear view mirror again. "Maybe you're a faultfinder," he said to me.

This time, a genuine laugh bubbled out of me. The knot in my stomach loosened further. "Okay, okay," I relented. "Stop using words from yesteryear."

"Curmudgeon," he added quickly.

I snorted, restraining another laugh. I folded my arms. "Fine. Let's get ice cream."

We left the parking lot for the main office, and then we left the campus. I restrained the urge to look back at it. His face lit up with a big grin at my response, then reached to grab my hand with his free one, keeping one hand firmly on the steering wheel. "That's the spirit."

Although I wasn't particularly hungry, I appreciated the distraction. He knew I needed this, and that's why he was doing it. Distracting us both from the despair hanging over our heads. We both needed it, in truth. We needed to do something fun, even if it was small.

As we drove away, I closed my eyes again, squeezing his hand tightly with mine.

#

I leaned over the selections of ice cream flavors on the other side of the glass, considering each flavor slowly and carefully. My gloved hands pressed against the clear barrier.

The family owned ice cream shop, Pop's Ice Cream & Gelato, was basically deserted, the opposite of how I was sure it would look on a blistering summer day. The only person here besides us was the lone teenage girl running the cash register, who dolefully had looked up from her phone's screen when we had walked in, along with a less than enthusiastic obligatory customer greeting.

Brick, coming over to me from the other end of the display of flavors, came up behind me, close enough that his breath stirred the strands of hair that hung in my face as he talked. "Did you look at the gelato?"

"Not yet," I answered him, my eyes switching between the bubble gum flavor and the strawberry shortcake flavor. "I was looking at these flavors first. Do they have a lot of it?"

"Yeah." Gently, he pushed the hair that hung in my face behind my ear. "You should come see." He took my hand.

Hands connected, we went over to the opposite end of the flavor displays where all of their gelato selections were. They had so many good sounding flavors—dark chocolate, raspberry, hazelnut, peach, tiramisu, and a few more.

As my eyes darted over them eagerly, taking in the extra creamy delicious looking concoctions, a thought occurred to me. I asked Brick, turning to look at him, "Wait, isn't gelato more expensive than regular ice cream?"

"Ours is," the girl behind the counter butted in, acknowledging us for the first time since we'd come in. She eyed me with a glazed over disinterest, popping her chewing gum. "Ours is homemade with exported ingredients."

"It's okay," Brick told me immediately, giving me an encouraging look. "It doesn't matter. Pick whichever kind you want and I'll get it for you."

Smiling up at him and squeezing his hand gratefully again, I turned back to the numerous flavors to make the nearly torturous decision of deciding on one.

#

We sat at a table in the corner of the shop, deciding to stay inside to eat our cold treats instead of eating them out in the cold car.

I had finally decided on the raspberry gelato in a bowl, and Brick had gotten the dark chocolate gelato in a cone. The girl behind the counter went blissfully back to whatever she had been doing on her phone before we'd come in—once when I took a glance at her, I saw her posing and taking a picture of herself with her phone's camera. Brick and I ate and enjoyed each other's company in the nearly quiet space. The only sounds came from the counter girl, the scraping of my plastic spoon against my plastic bowl, and the low adult contemporary music that came from overhead speakers.

Then, maybe fifteen minutes after we had sat down, some unexpected company came in, disrupting the quiet.

A little girl with a curly dark ponytail and a bright yellow winter coat and her mother entered the shop, making the bell above the door ring with their entrance. The girl behind the counter rolled her eyes and put her phone down again. "Welcome to Pop's Ice Cream and Gelato," she droned automatically.

"Hi!" The little girl said back to her, grinning a gap-toothed grin. "I wanted a ice cream cone even though it's cold outside, and my mommy said yes!"

Her mom smiled at the counter girl in chagrin. "She's very excited to try some ice cream from this place, we've never been here before." The teenager nodded back at her in polite phony interest, seeming like she couldn't care less.

Brick and I exchanged a look of amusement across the table at each other.

The little girl turned around, probably to see if there was anyone else there in the shop, and she spotted us at the table. Cheeks rosy, she gasped in delight. "Mommy, look! The Powerpuff girl and Powerpuff boy are here! They're eating ice cream when it's cold, too! Look, look!"

Caught off guard, Brick and I flinched at the sudden recognition. We exchanged another look—mine in surprise, Brick's in embarrassment, probably at being called a Powerpuff boy.

The mother grabbed her daughter's hand, keeping her from coming charging over to us in her excitement. She stared at us too, but in apology. "I'm so sorry," she said, then she looked down at her daughter sternly. "Now, sweetie, leave them alone. Just because they're superheroes, it doesn't mean they don't want to be treated normally. They deserve their privacy."

I smiled at the little girl warmly, then at the mother. "It's all right, don't worry about it. We don't mind."

The little one was still staring at me very intently, the gap between her two front teeth on full display. Then, abruptly, her smile faded. She frowned in what looked like concern, her eyes wide. "Mommy," she started, her voice softer, "What's wrong with the Powerpuff girl's face?"

A jolt of hurt went through me, then confusion. What was she talking about?

The mother gasped in horror at what her daughter had said to me. "Shelby," she began to scold her. She looked up at me, probably to apologize, then she froze. Her free hand came up to cover her mouth. "Oh dear," she said.

"Bloss," Brick said suddenly, getting up from the table. When I looked over at him, he was staring at me, too. In fear. "Let's go. Now."

I looked up at him, alarmed. "Why—" The sensation of something dripping onto my bottom lip interrupted me. Quickly, I brought my fingers to my lips, then drew them back. Black liquid. I froze, staring down at it on my hand and saying nothing, fear beginning to surface inside of me. This hadn't happened to me in public before, and now it was happening in plain sight. With witnesses.

Brick, his hands suddenly completely free of his gelato, came over to my side quickly. "Let's get you home. Come on." His arm hooked around my back underneath my arms, drawing me up and out of the cold metal chair. He turned me away from our small audience, hurriedly ushering me out of the door.

Just above the ringing of the bell announcing our leave, I heard the disturbed voice of the counter girl saying to the mother and daughter, "Did you see that?"

I still felt the gazes of the mother, little girl, and even the counter girl on us through the front windows as we rushed through the cold, got into the car, and tore away from there.


-Buttercup's POV-

Pulling the ends of my sleeves down over the tips of my fingers, I pushed out of the back door. The frigid late January air greeted me with an icy smack to the exposed skin of my face. Throwing a glance behind me to make sure no one had followed me, I pulled the door shut behind me.

It was noon, and the sun was high in the sky, but it did nothing to dispel the frigid cold. The white light it provided only kept it from feeling like night.

Eagerly, I freed my fingers from their sleeve prisons, exposing them to the freezing air but not caring. I reached into the pocket of my sweat pants, tugging out the box of cigarettes that was inside. Next, I reached into the other pocket for my lime green lighter.

Smoking was not something I had always done. I had only taken it up a few weeks earlier, when the tormented thoughts of losing my powers had become too much for me. I had needed a release. When Professor had broken the bad news to us a week ago, though, it became more than just a habit for me.

I needed the soothing burning in my lungs. The rush that it gave me throughout my body kept me sane. It kept me feeling like I wasn't totally losing my mind. And most importantly, it kept my mind off the things I didn't want to acknowledge.

It helped me escape just for a little while from the weight of my impending tragedy.

And at least if I had lost control of nearly every aspect of my life, this was maybe the last thing I had control of. It was one of the last things that felt like it was truly mine.

I held the end of a fresh cigarette between my lips, then flicked on my lighter, shielding the tiny flame with my free hand from the cold breeze. The other end of the small stick lit up, and a corner of my mouth twitched up in quiet satisfaction.

As it began to burn, I took a slow, savoring drag. Held it. Felt the warmth spread throughout my body. The anger and tension inside of me released. With a sigh of relief, I blew out the smoke. It floated up and away from me.

I did this again, then again, standing and staring out at the quiet backyard. Glancing to the left, at our neighbor's backyard—the Smiths—for a fleeting moment, I wondered how Crystal-slash-Julie was doing at her fancy Citiesville college. We hadn't heard from her, Aimee or Victoria in months. I guessed some distancing between high school friends was common after starting college. I wondered if the Smith parents still hated us. Probably. They'd probably hate us until they lived in a senior home, and maybe after that, too. I blew smoke out with a silent, humorless chuckle.

It wasn't until a few minutes later that my sweet silence was rudely interrupted with a voice. "I knew I've been smelling nicotine on you lately." I whirled, facing my intruder. Butch was leaning against the wall next to the back door, arms folded, face blank except for subdued amusement in his eyes.

He'd been so quiet. How long had he been standing there? I appraised him with a scorn that I couldn't seem to help. "How the hell did you know I was back here?"

"Since you've been acting all suspicious and sneaking away at random intervals during the day, I decided to follow you," he said simply. His eyebrows rose, disappearing behind his raven hair. "Hello, by the way."

Realizing I was glaring at him, I forced my expression to lighten. With a sigh, I cleared my throat. "Sorry. You just surprised me." I had been somewhat avoiding him lately. Maybe because of his first Chemical X nosebleed a few days earlier. I hadn't been trying to avoid him on purpose, really. It was just that the unsettled fear I got when I looked at him now made it hard to forget what was happening to me. To all of us.

Butch remained against the wall, and his eyes slid down to the cigarette between my fingers. He nodded at it. "You don't seem like you're new at that. You handle it like a pro."

Sheepish, I shook my head. "I just started this month." I lifted an eyebrow. "You're not gonna blab, are you?"

He shook his head. "I know you don't want me to say it, but," he paused, unfolding his arms and putting his hands into his hoodie pockets, "You're probably not exactly in the best shape to be doing that right now."

I blinked at him, then turned back around to face the open backyard, shrugging. "Guess not," I said. I brought the cig back to my lips to punctuate the uncaring tone of my voice.

There was a pause as I exhaled, then footsteps approaching me. Slowly, his arms wound around my shoulders, bringing my back flush against his warm body. I hadn't realized how badly I had needed his touch until that very moment, when I felt all the cords in my back relax. Sighing, I tilted my head back to rest against his collarbone. He leaned his face down, and understanding immediately what he was doing, I lifted my hand higher so he could reach.

His lips closed around the end of the cigarette I held as he bummed it from me, and drew. He held it. Then he brought his hand gently to the underside of my jaw, cupping it, tilting my head back so his lips could meet mine. They opened, and the smoke drifted lazily between my open lips and into my mouth. His lips and the bitter, burning smoke—both of my vices mingled. My toes curled.

Butch broke the kiss, drew from the cigarette again, then blew his smoke out just as I blew out the smoke he'd passed on to me. He looked down at me seriously, despite the dry smirk on his lips. "Guess we're both screwed."

A slight, dismal smile appeared briefly on my face. Closing my eyes, I tilted my head back to press a small, soft kiss on the exposed skin of his neck. Then, dark smile dropping away as quickly as it came, I turned my eyes back to the slate gray sky. I took another drag, holding it for a long time, then releasing it.

"I'm cold," I said after a long silence. I turned my head slightly towards his, where his chin rested on my shoulder. "Aren't you cold?"

He gave me a lifeless shrug. His eyes stared ahead, sightless. "Doesn't matter, anyway. I'm always cold these days. A little extra cold doesn't make much difference."

Slow, I nodded. I understood. I felt exactly the same way.

#

Soon, after all three of the boys turned in their formal leave of absence to the University of Townsville and started staying home all the time, the cigarettes weren't enough for me anymore.

The slow, sweet burn of their poison wasn't enough to heal me. I needed more.

"Do you know what Professor will do to me if he catches us?" Butch whispered to me. He kept taking glances through the dark living room and up at the top of the stairs for any signs of movement. "Buttercup, I wouldn't have to worry about this whole Chemical X thing anymore. His wrath would be swift and merciless." He paused, then muttered, "On second thought, maybe dying this way would be better."

Ignoring most of what he said, including the super tactless joke, I rolled my eyes as I turned to face him, whispering back, "We're in college. We can't be expected to just stay home all the time like some elementary schoolers. Besides, I would be the one he'd get mad at. Don't worry yourself about it."

A noise came suddenly, and we jumped to look at the source of it. Our mystery was immediately solved when a car's headlights passed through the front window and then faded away along with the sound of the car's engine. We both let go of the breath we'd been holding.

Turning to me, he answered one of my arguments with a counterargument. "Yeah, but it's midnight. I doubt that leaving in the middle of the day and leaving at midnight would be the same thing to your dad."

A swift, sudden wave of annoyance and bitterness hit me at once. "He's not my dad."

"What?" He looked at me in confusion. "What do you mean?"

I said curtly in a quiet voice, "He's human. I'm not. He's not my father. Don't call him that." Keeping the hard, callous expression on my face, I turned back toward the front door. "Now, come on. You said you wanted to make me happy. This will make me happy. And since you're so damn paranoid about getting caught sneaking out, let's just get out of here already."

Wordlessly, he followed me as I quickly opened the door and walked into the frigid night. Settling into his car as he started the engine, I took a glance at him. He was frowning. Knowing that I couldn't ask him what he was making that face for without being questioned myself, I kept my mouth shut.

The drive was silent.

#

We exited the 24-hour liquor store, our purchases in a plastic bag, and sat back down in his car. Back in the darkness of the car, I pushed the hood of my sweatshirt back down, not needing it anymore to hide my face to keep from being recognized. I glanced over at Butch in time to see him do the same with his coat hood.

I reached down underneath my seat, grabbing the tall paper bags I'd stashed down there. I handed one to him, then grabbed the watermelon flavored bottle of vodka Butch had bought with cash—along with an old fake ID he had used to buy booze back in his villain days.

Taking the paper bag from me and taking out the bottle of whiskey he'd gotten for himself, he glanced up at me. There was a hesitant light in his eyes. "Are you sure you want to do this?"

I rolled my eyes, putting my bottle into the paper bag and wrapping my hand around the neck of it, making the bag bunch underneath my fingers. "Lighten up. It's just a drink. I'm not jumping off a bridge or something." He said nothing, just directed that same frown at me. I leveled a scowl at him, turning to open the car door again. "If you're going to keep looking at me like that, I'm taking this outside."

I sprang out into the cold night air again, then slammed the car door shut. I glanced around the parking lot. Still as empty as it was when we'd arrived here. The small liquor store was off of a quiet street that wasn't a main one, and barely any cars drove past. No cops, either.

Turning away, I hopped up on the neon green hood of Butch's car, sitting there with my legs folded up. Wrestling the top of the bottle open, I discarded the cap and then eagerly brought the bottle up to my lips, tipping my head back and taking the first blessed sip.

It was at once tart and heady with the taste of melon, and then biting and unpleasant. Then it went down so burning and delightful that I shuttered. Quickly, I took another sip. Savored it. Then I took a gulp.

I felt the vibration when Butch opened the driver's door, then felt it slam as I heard it close. "Take it easy. Don't want you to hurl on my paint job." I glanced over at where he stood beside the car. He had an unreadable look on his face this time.

I blinked blankly at him, then turned my eyes away. "Does it look like I care?" I muttered. The air pulsed with the monotone bitterness of my words. A heavy three seconds passed. I took another sip. The liquid was beginning to take its' hold on me—my stomach and chest began filling with sleepy, comforting heat, and I welcomed it.

Finally, Butch's feet disconnected from the pavement, and he climbed up on the hood of his car, sitting next to me. In my peripheral vision, I saw him tip his concealed bottle back, taking a thick gulp of his whiskey. Another quiet few minutes passed. Then, in a low voice, he asked me, "Does watermelon flavored vodka actually taste better?"

I sighed heavily. For some reason, more than anything else, I wished he would stop trying to talk to me. "It does the job," I said flatly.

"More than regular vodka would?" There was a teasing tone in his voice. It irked me for some reason.

"Are you gonna keep asking me questions?"

A moment of silence passed, then Butch 'hmm'ed as if something about what I'd said had confirmed something for him. "Well, seeing as you haven't been very chatty lately, I just thought I'd try to make some conversation." He still sounded light and playful.

I took a big gulp this time. I gritted my teeth on its' way down. "Yeah, well, guess I'm not in the mood to talk."

"Why not?" Butch tapped his fingers against the bottle he held. The question he asked next was loaded with implication. "Is there something wrong?" There it was. His tone was suddenly dark, knowing, and immediately I knew he'd been leading up to this question the entire time. And I'd strolled right into it.

Unable to stop myself, I turned to stare at him, stone faced. He was already bleakly staring at me, face straight with seriousness, deep emerald eyes looking almost black in the dark.

I uttered the one word, filling it with as much warning as I could. "Don't."

He held my gaze, almost like a challenge. Then, slowly, he set the paper-wrapped bottle down next to him and leaned back on his elbows against the hood of his car. "Don't what?" He used the same tone. The one that told me that I couldn't worm my way out of this discussion.

I begged to differ. I would do anything to get out of this. Anything. "Just shut up. Okay?" My voice turned sharp as I turned away again. "You're annoying the hell out of me right now. Just shut up and let me drink."

"Oh? I'm annoying?"

I took another sip from the bottle. "Yes," I choked out bluntly after I swallowed.

"So you don't want me around?" His voice was getting sharper, too. I could feel his eyes boring into the side of my face.

I didn't answer him. I refused to. Just kept my gaze locked on the surrounding empty parking spaces, jaw clenched. Maybe I could ignore him. Continue taking swigs from that bottle as I watched my life fall apart around me.

In my peripheral, I saw him nod slowly and start to sit up from his reclined position. "So I'm annoying. All right. Too bad." I still felt his gaze on me, unrelenting. "And what about you?"

The sudden question threw me off, and I actually looked back at him, startled. "What?"

"Don't think I haven't noticed how distant you've been. Do you think I'm stupid? Where have you been lately, huh? Where have you been going?" He tapped his own head roughly with an outstretched finger, two impatient taps against his temple. "You're not here. Where are you? Where the hell are you?"

"Oh, fuck off." I turned away from him and tilted my head back, taking another long, bitter swig from the bottle. The burning flowed all the way down. Immediately afterwards, I began scooting off the hood of the car. My feet touched down on the dark pavement, legs buckling, and I began to walk. I had to move away from his proximity. It was starting to make me feel antsy, though I didn't really know why. My legs felt weak though, thanks to the booze, and walking straight was taking a concentrated effort.

I heard Butch scramble off of the car hood too, and then his footsteps against the ground. "Answer me. Buttercup, look at me. Hey," his hand enclosed on one of my hands, trying to get me to face him. It wasn't rough contact, but it was just enough to piss me off.

I tore my hand away from his. "I swear to God, Butch, don't touch me." My words were starting to slur and melt together. I stumbled to the side, my heel coming in crooked contact with the ground. Butch reached out to steady me, and I shoved his hands off my waist, turning to face him. "I said, don't touch me!" I shouted.

He jerked back, wide eyes staring at me in disbelief. I had not yelled like that at him in ages, and with so much poison in my voice when I did it. He squinted, not breaking his gaze. "What is with you lately?"

I swiveled away from his gaze again, avoiding it. I couldn't take the way he was looking at me. If I looked at him any longer, I would start to feel guilty, and I didn't want to be. "What do you care?" I shot back at him after a few moments. The vodka curling through my mind made it difficult for me to think of a response at first.

Butch sighed impatiently. "Spare me this whole thing, Buttercup, please."

I looked back at him over my shoulder again, sneering. "What whole thing?"

"Your whole 'woe is me, no one cares about me' act that you've started putting on with everyone else." He took another step toward me, scowl sharpening. "It's not going to work with me, so cut the shit."

His words had made a lightning bolt of shock course through me, giving me an uncomfortable smack of lucidity through my dizzy daze. I was snarling before I realized it, "Don't talk to me that way."

"Don't talk to you what way? Like I'm your boyfriend?" Through his glare, there was worry underneath. "Like I care about you?"

His last addition, along with the look on his face, made the lightning bolt strike me again, and I turned away once more, tilting the bottle back and taking another gulp to keep the feelings inside me dead. Aimless, I once again began walking away.

Distantly, I heard Butch right on my heels. I didn't bother turning back around when he spoke this time. "You've been snipping and keeping everyone at arm's length for the past two and a half weeks. Don't think I haven't noticed. Is this because you're hurting?"

I screeched to a quick halt at his question. I continued facing forward, reeling from the icy feeling that had crawled up my spine from what he'd said.

"I know this is hard for you. This is hard for all of us. I've avoided talking about it, like you wanted me to. But you can only avoid this for so long." There was fear in his voice.

I whirled on him again, then quickly closed the distance of a foot between us. The glare on my face felt wild and flushed as I said directly in his face, "Shut up."

He stared down at me, tone rigid as he said, "No. You need to hear this. And if no one else will tell you, then it will be me." His eyes were unyielding.

Shaking my head, I snapped, "I don't need to hear shit from you, Butch. Shut the fuck up."

Breaking his unnatural calm, like a thin thread snapping in half, suddenly he bellowed down at me, "Shutting up won't make this go away!"

I wheeled away, continuing my journey away from him with wobbly steps. "Stop!"

"Shutting up will only make this worse!" He continued to shout. "Do you really want to die with all of this anger and bitterness inside of you? Do you want people to remember you this way?"

I stopped walking, stooping down to squat near the swirling ground, the energy starting to seep from me and make my legs quake harder. "Shut up! Stop it! Shut up!" I tried to block out what he was saying with my one empty hand.

"Keeping this all in and pushing everyone away will only make you turn into an empty shell!"

I stood quickly, my head swimming and the ground rocking, and after I gained my balance, I stared up into his face, my voice breaking as I screamed back, "I already am!"

He gripped my shoulders, giving me a shake. "Then do something about it!" His dark eyes were bright and afraid. "Don't you understand how miserable this makes me? All I want to do is help! Stop pushing me away. Let me in!"

I pushed his hands away. I had started to cry. I didn't know when I had. "I can't," I told him through my breaking voice. It rose again. "I can't."

"Why not?"

My voice was wracked with sobs. "Because if I let you close I'll only hurt you more when I don't survive." The words, irrepressible, tumbled out of me before I could stop them. "You have to stay away from me. I'll only destroy you. Just get away."

The words I didn't say were implied—that if he were to go first, it would destroy me, too. And subconsciously I had been trying to prepare myself for the pain—to prepare us both for the inevitable.

Immediately, in the blink of an eye, the anger and hurt drained from Butch's face. A calm replaced it as he took in a deep breath and sighed. "I'm afraid it's too late for that," he said, voice gentle, with not the slightest hint of regret in it. The tiniest and briefest tug pulled at his mouth—unrepentant.

Through the haze of upset and alcohol, I stared at him, shaking uncontrollably.

He held a hand out to me, palm open. A truce. "Feel better now?" Slow, he tilted his head to the side. He looked at me softly. "Can we stop?"

Just like that, I stopped. Frowning, and awareness flowing back into my brain, the anger drained out of my body like quicksand. And immediately I realized what I had been doing.

The half empty bottle fell from my hand. Inside the paper bag, it shattered against the ground, spilling the rest of the vodka across the pavement.

He'd done it on purpose. Fought with me so that I'd feel better. He knew how upset and how on edge I had been, and he knew that I couldn't physically spar to relieve all of my stress because of how weak I'd been. So he'd picked an argument so that not only I'd feel better, but I would also know to stop avoiding him. To take refuge in him. That even though I didn't want to burden my sisters with my pain, that didn't mean he wanted the same fate.

He couldn't take away my pain completely—the alcohol hadn't, and maybe at this point nothing would—but he would shoulder it, too. Take on my burden with me. Make it not so crushing and oppressive. We would shoulder both of our pain. Together.

Because maybe that was all we had left.

More tears blurred my vision. Unbidden, and stumbling, I closed the distance between us once more—this time, wrapping my arms around his neck as his arms closed around me.

"I'm sorry," I sobbed into his chest, my face buried in the soft cotton of his black shirt. My voice shook with helplessness. "God, Butch. I'm so sorry."

Butch pulled me snug against him. "We're okay now, huh? There we go. That's better." He turned his face into my hair, smoothing hands across my shoulders and my back as I sobbed harder, hiccupping and choking on my own tears. His cheek pressed against the top of my head. "Shh. Stay with me, Spitfire. I'm right here. I'll always be."

In that cold night air after midnight, we stood there for a while, letting the alcohol fade from our systems.

As I continued to weep everything I had kept buried inside of me, feeling my soul cracking and developing fissures, the most beautiful person I had ever known held the pieces of me together so that I wouldn't fall apart.


-Bubbles' POV-

168.

That was the number of indentations I had counted in the ceiling so far.

Sometimes I lost count. A lot of them looked identical, and I would get them mixed up and accidentally count a few of them two or three times, and I would have to start over. Sometimes a noise would distract me, particularly someone that was trying to talk to me. I would ignore them until they closed my bedroom door again, and then I would start counting again.

I had been playing this game for three weeks now. I found that it helped. It helped keep the spiraling panic and misery away from me. It helped distract me from what was inevitably happening to me and my sisters.

It wasn't healthy, I knew. But I wasn't particularly healthy right now either. And now that we all knew that nothing would change the state of our health, what was the point of trying? My body was giving up on itself, and there was nothing I could do. So why even do anything?

So I just kept playing my games. When counting indentations on the ceiling started to grow stale, instead I rolled over onto my side, closed my eyes. Sometimes I would sleep, but when I couldn't sleep, I thought of scenarios.

Thought of lives that weren't my own. Imagined lifetimes where I was a dancer in the New York Ballet, lifetimes where I was a world famous fashion model, or a gold medal gymnast. The President, making decisions that changed lives and history forever. Or even just continued my life in the sorority house with my 30 house sisters and Liz. Having spa nights and giant sleepovers in the living room, gossiping and watching movies and laughing until one by one we fell asleep.

I thought up fantastic lives where everything I did or said was perfect, and Boomer was right beside me, and we had the picture perfect life. Nothing would ever be wrong, or hard, or painful. Life would be blissful.

But sometimes I would imagine them too hard, and they would feel so real that I would open my eyes and realize with a jolt of shock that it was all gone. And a lump would rise in the back of my throat and an insatiable ache would grow inside of me when I inevitably realized that it was fake and a life like that would be impossible. That I was dying. That even living my real life wouldn't be a possibility for me anymore.

So when that happened—as it always inevitably did—I would lie on my back, turn my eyes back to the ceiling and start to count again.

One. Two. Three. Four.

#

One day, however, the counting wasn't enough for me anymore.

The counting didn't smother the despair and the writhing loud questions in my head. They didn't get rid of the pain, the confusion, the hopelessness. And I decided I couldn't lie there any longer.

That early morning, slowly, I sat upwards in my bed. I sat like that for ten minutes or so, letting my blood flow adjust, letting the dizziness leave my head. Then, one by one, I shifted my legs so that they were dangling off the edge of the bed. Underneath my baggy blue pajama shorts, they were pale, even paler than they would normally be this time of year. White against my pastel blue satin sheets.

I stood slowly, as slow as I could muster, and still my legs buckled. I had barely moved off of my bed for three weeks, only to bathe and hobble up and down the stairs for meals, and my muscles were all protesting. I stood still, flexing my joints to let them get used to my weight on top of them all again.

Once I felt like I was ready to move again, I knelt down next to my bed where there was a large, flat plastic storage box of belongings Professor had brought down from my old room at the sorority house. He had done that for my sisters from their dorm room, too—and then had decontaminated them so that there would be no chance of any of us picking up any outside germs.

Opening it, I reached down inside the clear box, taking out my favorite light blue hoodie. I was cold, so I put it on. The feeling of wearing it helped ground me a little, too—helped me feel as if things were more normal, even if they weren't, and would never be again.

I stood again, reached for the portable pole that my nighttime Chemical X drip was hanging off of and grasped it, and with it I began to make my slow journey out of my room. I opened the door, left through it, and left my bedroom behind.

The house was still peacefully quiet the way that it always was early in the morning.

I began to make my way past my sister's bedrooms. Blossom's bedroom came first, and her hot pink door was cracked open slightly. Through it, I heard the sound of Blossom sleeping, and the sound of Brick next to her on her bed, awake and restless. Staying as quiet as I could, I moved away from her room and further down the hallway, my IV pole wheeling next to me.

I came upon Buttercup's shut checkered green and black door next. It didn't surprise me that I didn't hear Buttercup inside. She and Butch were probably elsewhere, just like she had been the past few weeks. I knew it should've concerned me, but I also knew that she would be back when she felt like it. All of us had figured out long ago that Buttercup won't stay where she doesn't want to be—even if being in said place was for her wellbeing. Butch would make sure she would be okay, anyhow. He wouldn't let her out of his sight.

Keeping my face turned away from the next open doorway, I passed the boys' dark guest room. I knew without looking that it was empty.

I started making my way down the stairs, my hand glued to the railing in a steel grip, my other hand lifting and setting my IV pole down on each step next to my feet. It took some time, but I managed to make it down without fumbling.

Shuffling through the living room and the kitchen, my focus was resolutely fixed on where I was heading. So much that I hadn't taken a good look of my surroundings.

Just as I was reaching for the knob on the door that lead down to the basement, I heard a voice.

"Where are you off to, Princess?" Boomer.

I turned slowly, and there he was, in the kitchen, sitting in one of the chairs at the kitchen table, mussed and in his pajamas like I was. There was a full, untouched mug of coffee in front of him, but he had his ankles crossed and his arms folded, the way he sits when he falls asleep in a chair. I hadn't even realized that was where he'd been, although I probably should have guessed that he was awake someplace else when he wasn't in the guest room.

Hearing his voice had snapped me out of a stupor. "I'm going to talk to Professor," I said finally in a foggy, soft voice. It felt like it had been ages since I'd even spoken.

Boomer nodded slowly, then blinked at me. He was examining me. When was the last time I had showered? It had to have been days. I probably looked crazy, but I couldn't bring myself to care lately. He asked me, "Are you all right?"

Of course I wasn't, but I knew how he meant it. He wanted to know that I wasn't in pain. And at that moment, I wasn't. "I'm okay," I told him. "Just needed to get out of my room for a little while." I tried to manage a smile, but my face barely moved. I wondered if I even knew what a smile was anymore.

Seeing my change in expression, he returned it. Also not quite a smile, but close to one. "Of course. As long as you're okay," he said. His head reclined back, hanging over the back of the chair he sat in, but his gaze never left me. "I'll be there for you when you get back."

I nodded at him, then I turned, finally turning the door knob and journeying into the basement where I knew Professor would be, taking my careful journey down stairs once again. Once I made it down, my bare feet made no sound against the freezing tiled floors. The only sound was the wheels of my IV pole squeaking.

When I didn't hear any sound of movement, I finally called out softly, "Professor?"

There was a moment of continued silence, then a gentle voice responded to mine. "In here, Bubbles."

I followed where his voice had come from, padding further into the laboratory part of the basement. Hidden on the far end of it was a small office where there was a white desk, along with a white desk chair, endless shelves of thick, heavy books, and a large whiteboard. Sitting at the desk was Professor's form, his white lab coat disheveled and wrinkled and his head in his hands.

As I walked in, he looked up at me, a wary look in his tired eyes. "Hi, sweetie. Do you need more liquid for your drip? Are you in any pain?" Despite the fear in his voice, I could tell he was trying to stay level-headed. Reassuring. For me.

"No," I told him right away, doing some of my own reassuring. "I feel okay. Just tired. I just wanted to come talk to you."

At my reassurance, slight relief crossed his face. "Of course," he said, then he stood up from his chair and gestured to it. "Here, sit down."

I went over to sit in his warm desk chair. From it, I looked up at him. He was examining me the same way Boomer had been just minutes earlier. Reluctantly, I asked, "What is it?"

"Nothing," he said quickly. Unconvincingly. My eyebrows rose skeptically. Then he sighed, starting again. "Well, sweetie, I'm relieved to see you. But I've just been worried about you. You haven't been very talkative lately. Well, you've barely talked at all lately." His lips pressed together briefly before he said, "You haven't been yourself."

I nodded, taking in what he said. Then I half shrugged. "Do you really expect me to be?" I asked, my tone gentle despite the meaning the words carried.

"No." After a moment, Professor shook his head. "I suppose not."

A couple more seconds passed, and I decided to change the subject. "So, what have you been doing down here all night?" I didn't have to ask him beforehand if he'd been down here all night, getting no sleep. It was obvious in his bloodshot eyes, and the bags underneath them. His whole face was wan and exhausted.

Professor drew in a long breath, then sighed. "More research, as usual. I thought I'd found a good lead, but then I got stuck." He didn't seem to be willing to offer up more information than that.

I nodded once, moving on to my next question. "Have your leads been good so far?"

"Yes," he said. "And no."

I wasn't sure what to make of that nonspecific answer. But maybe it was better that I didn't know.

The next question weighed heavy on me. The last question I really wanted, needed, the answer to. After pondering for a bit if I should ask, I decided to ask anyway, figuring I was ready for whatever I was about to hear. "How long?" I asked.

From the heavy pause that came from Professor, I knew that he knew exactly what I was asking him. He hesitated, a frown on his face and solemnity in his eyes. He hesitated so long I didn't think he was ever going to answer. Then he drew in a breath and said, his release of each word slow and careful, "At your current rate of decline…I would say two months. At the very most." He blinked, finally meeting my gaze again. "But it might be closer to a month and a half."

I held Professor's gaze for a long time, letting that soak in. Then I looked at the ground. A minute or two passed without either of us saying anything.

I was the one to break the quiet. "You know what I used to wish when I was young?" I asked him suddenly, the question springing to my lips.

Professor seemed as started by my sudden question as I was. Then, very faintly, a smile. "What was it?"

I closed my eyes, remembering. "I used to wish every night that you could invent a way to give yourself superpowers." I opened my eyes again, looking back up at him. "I never told you this, but I wanted you to be a superhero, too. I wanted you to join us in battles and help us save the world."

Professor released a breath that was nearly a chuckle. His weak smile remained, though it still didn't reach his eyes. "That's adorable."

I went on. "You were always my hero, Professor. Even before now. But in a way, my wish has come true. Now, in your own way, you're the only superhero left among all of us."

All at once, Professor's face smile left his face as it drained of blood. Slight, weak amusement turned into fear almost instantly.

"It's up to you now," I told him. I reached toward him, taking one of his hands. I held them in between mine, looking up into his pale face with grave sincerity. "There's nothing that we can do to help ourselves. It's up to you. You're the only one that can rescue us."

He still didn't look at me. His hand trembled.

"Promise me you'll never give up. Tell me you'll keep trying. No matter what happens." I gripped his hand tighter, the tone of my voice imploring. "We're counting on you, Professor. You're our last hope. Promise me."

Finally, Professor turned his eyes to me again. And though the fear hadn't left his face, his eyes were stronger. Still held some will in them. Very slowly, he nodded. "I promise."

With the words that I had wanted to hear leaving his mouth, something tightly knit released in me. Leaning forward in the chair, I wrapped my arms around him and buried my face in his lab coat. No matter what, I'd needed to hear that Professor wouldn't give up on us. That was all I needed to hear. "I believe in you," I told him, voice muffled against him. "And I love you. No matter what."

Professor didn't answer, but his arms wound around me tightly. And I wasn't sure, but I thought I heard him trying not to cry.

#

Much later, after I eventually went back up the basement steps and left the lab, Boomer wasn't in the kitchen anymore.

I wandered back up the second-story stairs, ventured back to the hallway. He wasn't in the guest room, either. But when I made it back to my bedroom, there he was. Sprawled across my bed, chest rising and falling as he slept.

At the sight of him, for the first time in days, surprising me as it came, a genuine smile crossed my lips.

As quietly as I could, I went into my bathroom and shut the door. Carefully disconnecting my drip from my arm, I disrobed from my pajamas and took a relaxing, warm shower. After getting out of the shower, drying myself, and slipping into my fuzzy blue bathrobe, I came out of the bathroom. As soon as I walked through the door and back into my bedroom, I saw him sitting up on my bed, awake.

Taking in my newly clean, slightly damp appearance, he smiled at me. Automatically, completely unable to control it, I smiled back. "Hey," he greeted in a soft voice. "Told you I'd be here for you when you got back."

I made my way closer to my bed. "I know," I replied. "Thanks for keeping your promise."

His face softened, sobering. "I'll always be here for you. You know that," his eyes locked with mine, "Right?"

All I did was nod, as once again, the smile came back. The real one that only he could seem to give me, even when just a little while ago I thought I wouldn't be able to smile again.

"Good," he said. Then he scooted over on my bed, patting the space next to him. "Come nap with me?"

I climbed up on the bed, then I curled into his side as his arm came around me. He didn't say anything more, and neither did I. My eyes closed. Our breathing slowed, became even.

And as I had so many times before, I drifted off to dream land in his arms. In the dream I had, I dreamed of a place, a time, where not everything was perfect—but it was good. Things were good, and I was given the incredible privilege of normalcy. The gift of waking up in the morning, going to school, and then saving the day with my sisters.

I dreamt of paradise.


I hope you guys enjoyed all three of the girls' point of views this chapter. This will be the last we'll see of Bubbles' and Buttercup's POVs for...a while. The story will go back to just Blossom's perspective next chapter. The ones after...some unexpected ones might show up, that's all I'll say for now. Heh.

The songs for this chapter on the playlist are: Solitare by Marina and the Diamonds, Daydreaming by Paramore, Exogenesis: Symphony Part 2 (Cross-pollination) by Muse, and Paradise by Coldplay. To see the songs for previous chapters, along with explanations for them, check out the full playlist post on my livejournal!

The next update won't be until probably, I'm thinking, mid June at the very earliest. We'll see!

Don't forget to leave any feedback and comments, they are so, so appreciated! Every single one. I promise!

-MsButterFingers