This chapter will introduce LSP as a vulnerable young lady, Finn is a hero with a sensitive heart... Why no Flame Princess? Well, it is just a story...
Finn pounded into the dark, the uric acid rain stinging his cheeks and blinding his eyes, thunderclouds clapped overhead, illuminating the fields with and eerie light, where monsters and ghosts haunted the neitherworld. The cold air he brought in to his tight chest in heavy pants burned his lungs with a salty acrid taste, he felt sick to the pit of his stomach, gasping and running blindly.
Finn kept on running, though by now the mud and slush was up around his thin ankles, kept running his eyes tight shut into the wilds.
He knew where Lumpy Space Princess lived. Ever since her falling out with her haughty parents she had been slumming it as a tramp in the woods to the east of the grasslands. Finn understood LSP, her parents were royalty, and they wouldn't ever let her just be herself, hang loose with her mates and dance and have fun with other lumpy girls her age.
The sounds around him gave him goose bumps, there were eerie calls of terrified animals in the forest, and cries of frogs and salamanders, who, despite being used to the rain were unused to the sulphurous tang of the water poisoning their swamps.
Finn used his demon blood sword to clear the fallen branches and undergrowth as he pressed on further into the unforgiving night, lightning still sending out forked spears over head, the tortured cry of a distressed fox echoing in his ears. Finn felt bad, he wanted to help it, and all the animals, and to be a hero, but he had to stay with the mission at hand, though every cry burned his soul just as the lightning flashes burned his retinas.
Thunder shook the ground like a monster belching. Finn had heard lots of belching monsters and that really was how they sound. The storm was close, and the bitter north wind blew down from the Ice Kingdom, slapping Finn's face with stinging branches, Finn winced, grateful for his awesome hat in this cold, and wiped at his streaming eyes, not knowing if he was crying or not, noticing a tang of blood in his mouth from a cut lip he hadn't noticed and wondering in his subconscious what it would be like to be a vampire. The thought soon fled with the next crash and lighting flash, when a tree fell in front of him, jerking his reflexes into action, tight and wired, and a howl from his throat. Finn's feet were sinking in the mud, now almost to his knees, as he tried to get a grip on the trunk, it was an old tree, like a giant redwood, with a girth nearly as wide as Finn was tall, he clawed at it and scrambled up on top, surveying the view deep into the forest. Then he sank to his knees breathing deeply, to gain his composure, before he sprang off of it again, landing knee deep in the effluent, and willing his body onwards.
The water was getting deeper now, and he could feel a current. He could feel there was something in the water brushing slimily against his bare knees, looking down and forcing his eyes to focus he saw fish, some swimming in vain against the current, their arms and fins crawling through the thick, sticky acrid water, those with legs wading, little shrieks coming from their tiny fishy mouths. A river must have overflowed, thought Finn, and sure enough, there were water lilies and reeds about his waist. Finn hacked into them blindly with his sword, clearing a path for himself, as he felt the icy sting of hailstones of his thin bare arms, and his fingers freezing to the bone until he couldn't feel them.
'LSP,' he said under his breath. 'Where are you?'
He knew he was near. He shrugged his backpack off and fumbled inside for his phone. Finding it amongst his provisions, now ruined by the hail of urine, he flipped it open and pressed redial, hoping for the reassurance of LSP's deep voice on the other end. It didn't happen. The battery was failing, with just one red bar, and the rain had seeped in, fogging up the screen, with no warning the phone died. Finn let it slip from his hand, and bubble into the brown abyss below.
With a lump in his throat, Finn called out at the top of his voice.
'LSP! LSP! It's me Finn!'
His voice seemed so alone.
'Hello! LSP?'
He called again, wading out into the river.
'LSP? Lumpy Space Princess!?'
No answer. He waded further still calling, his high strained voice cracking as he screamed out.
'LSP!, It's me! It's Finn!' tears were in his eyes again. 'I've come to save you'.
Finn made it to where Lumpy Space Princess had been camping since she ran away, the place she felt at home and had her freedom. There were baked bean cans floating in the water, and some soggy supermarket bags that she used as dresses. There was her blue purse, her piggy mug and remnants of her belongings scattered by the storm all around, but no sign of LSP. Finn sighed deeply, sinking slightly and resting his hands on his knees for support. A clump of hair had found its way out of his hat, slapping his face and making his eyes sting even more, he pushed it back, wiping at his streaming eyes with the back of his hand. Then he heard something coming from under a fallen tree.
'Oh my Glob, Finn.'
The usually bombastic mannish voice sounded weak and resigned.
Finn instantly brightened, before noticing the familiar voice came from under a falling tree. The branches had covered her sleeping bag on her makeshift bed, pinning her to the ground. 'LSP! Oh Glob, are you OK?'
LSP let out a pained groan.
'I'll get you out of there.'
Finn began to chop away at the creaking branches with his trusty sword to free the princess, but they were thick and did not cut easily. He decided to try to pull the tree off of her. Finn was very strong for his age and size, and within minutes he could see the shivering lilac body lying in the mud, panting deeply and praying to Glob.
'Take my hand, LSP, I can pull you out now!' Finn reached down to her, and she reached a freezing lilac hand to his, but they missed by inches.
'Can you float LSP?'
'I don't know, I don't feel so good,' she sighed, her body shuddering.
Thunder clapped overhead and brought a fresh wave of hailstones, now getting bigger and more violent. As they hit Finn repeatedly, taking his breath, they began to hurt.
Then they began to hurt a lot.
Then he realised they weren't hailstones at all. It was the Stuff.
LSP's eyes were closed and her lilac lumps were covered in cuts and bruises, the little golden star on her forehead was beginning to grow dim as her breath became shallow. Finn's heroic heart stopped for a second as the threat of the princess's death reared its ugly head inside his mind. He had to get her out of there. Failure was not an option.
Clambering over the debris and branches, and flinching from the bruising hail of the Stuff, he hauled up LSP's limp body using brute force, straining every sinew, surprised at her dead weight. LSP always made floating look effortless, like all lumpy space people, she was arrogant about her floating skills, proud and bombastic. The body Finn pulled out of the mud just looked sad and close to death.
Dropping on to his haunches, he shielded her body with his against the storm, whilst he fumbled in his backpack for a sweater. Everything was wet with uric acid. He tipped the contents out with disgust. Nothing there of use anymore, squished sandwiches, a few crumbling biscuits and a water bottle whose lid had not been screwed on properly, and his yellow sweater a soggy mush. Finn hissed through his teeth. Had he failed? Globdarn it.
'Stay with me LSP'.
The princess's breath was now hardly visible, and her star jewel on her forehead had ceased to glow.
Finn picked her up in his arms and clasped her body tightly to his chest, giving her his warmth, willing her with all his heart to wake up. 'No. No. LSP...Stay awake. Stay awake' His voice trailed away.
He was breathing heavily, she wasn't breathing at all.
His voice shrieked out in the darkness.
'NOOOO!'