Femme.
Femme.
How long had it been since he'd seen that smirk?
' Hey, Mew-mew.' She said and Gumball had to stop himself from wincing as he realised he could still tell when she was faking her attitude. She wasn't nearly as relaxed as she was attempting to appear to be.
He wanted to say something, to speak, but his memory was flooding his brain with so much information there wasn't enough room for oral planning. The sound of that low, vaguely accented voice brought back so much. She'd only changed superficially in the slightest, her hair had been just a little longer- but she could change it at will so it wasn't like she couldn't be exactly as he remembered in the blink of an eye.
He could recall the way that hair felt between his fingers. He could recall the way her fingers felt between his. He could recall the feeling of her nails in his shoulders, her knees locked tight against his hips with the denim of her jeans rubbing his skin raw.
He remembered how odd it had seemed that her mouth didn't taste sweet when sweetness was the only flavour he'd ever really known.
The way they had been together, how they had talked and how she'd constantly evaded his efforts to understand her. How hurt and hollow he had felt when he saw her with that gobdamned woman. He had never known why, and he had stopped wanting to know years ago.
But seeing her again made him remember. He didn't want to remember what he had buried.

' What... What are you doing here?' He managed to condense all his thoughts into that. She knew what she had done to him so how did she think she could just smile at him like that?
' Marshall-lee needed my help. I was around so I... figured I would stop by.' She replied, her words more tentative than her greeting had been. It mollified him somewhat, to realise she hadn't forgotten, but he was in no way appeased.
' I.. I, uh-' Gumball shook his head and dropped his papers on the desk, adjusting his glasses with his free hand.
' What... What did Marshall-lee need your help with?' Ever the gentlemen, even in his shock he wouldn't go right for the jugular. Femme blinked at him, then closed the door next to her, hoping that the lab was soundproofed. Given that he hadn't noticed her screaming at EB and co. while they were carrying her up the stairs, she figured it was likely. She could lie of course, to avoid giving the game away to Fi, but Gumball had always had an uncanny knack for telling when she was bullshitting.
Gumball flinched slightly when she took a couple of steps towards him, her heels pacing out a slow beat across the floor as she folded her arms.
' Marshall's in love with your... errand girl? Fionna.' Femme stopped a couple feet away from him and sat down on the edge of the worktable. She glanced at him then looked at the floor.
' You know what he was like with women. He's afraid of how he's feeling, so much so that he's run off to the Nightosphere. Obviously I can't go down there so I'm waiting here until he gets his shit together.' Gumball hesitated, a couple of different questions appearing in his mind. He chose to ask the safer ones first, carefully thinking how he'd phrase them in his mind to avoid confrontation. He wanted to get angry at her, he wanted to let her know that she had cut open a very, very old scar with that smile of hers. But he also didn't want a fight.
' Fionna's not my errand girl, she's a friend. But how were you supposed to help him?' Femme unfolded her arms and leaned forward, balancing her elbows on her thighs. Gumball nearly winced again at the sleek line of her back, exposed by the short jersey. He recalled that bloody well.
' He, well. He wanted me to take him to a bar so he could y'know, get it out of his system 'cause he figured it was just that. It had been a while and she was there, that sort of thing. Of course it wasn't, but I didn't find that out until he got drunk and went a little bit insane. I guess after centuries of casual relationships, real ones don't come so naturally.' She answered, glancing around the lab casually.
Gumball didn't rise to the bait. Femme knew that he knew she was smart enough to only do that deliberately, not accidentally. Their brain power and intuition was pretty well matched.
' What does Fionna know?'
' What makes you think I've spoken to her?'
' Boredom and curiosity. You never did hold up well against temptation.' He said coolly, with just the slightest touch of wry cynicism. Femme frowned slightly and began mentally nursing that burn. They were fighting without fighting, both of them were subtle enough not to just blurt out their thoughts and smart enough to realise what the other was thinking anyway. Gob, no wonder she had found it difficult when they were so fucking metaphysical.
' She's... confused. Marshall tried some things on with her-' Gumball stiffened.
' Is she okay?' He interrupted worriedly. Femme raised a hand, nodding and Gumball relaxed slowly, looking vaguely disapproving.
' But obviously, considering how much of a pussy he is when it comes to emotions, he didn't tell her he wasn't just being a horny bastard. I'll make him sort it out when he comes back.' Gumball raised his chin in understanding then studied her guardedly, taking hold of his second question.

' So... why can't you go into the Nightosphere?' Femme's face took on a pained expression and she looked at him carefully, their eye contact remaining unbroken for some time.
' I don't think you want to know that right now, Gumball.' She eventually said in a brittle, strained tone.
' Don't I?' He replied impassively, his face unreadable and cold.
He was still mad. He was still really mad.
He still cared.

Femme swallowed, feeling like she was going to start tearing up and she didn't want him to see her cry. She didn't deserve to, not in front of him. It was her fault.
' No.' She stayed frozen where she was for a second, then abruptly stood up and walked over to the door, stopping with her hand on the handle. She twisted around to look at him. Gumball's expression hadn't changed.
' If I come back later, tomorrow, at some point- Will you throw me out?' She asked directly, looking straight at him. Gumball just looked at her for a second, then rubbed the back of his neck.
' Not... immediately.' Femme laughed once, with only a small amount of actual amusement.
' Heh. I suppose that's better than yes. Bye, Gumball.'

' Dude, why did you shut the door on us!?' Fionna yelled at Femme as she ran after her when the shapeshifter stalked out of the room and quickly down the hall, completely ignoring her.
' Femme! what happened in there, we couldn't hear a thing-' Femme snarled at her loudly and whipped around to face her, grabbing the sides of her denim jacket and ramming her against the wall. Fionna blinked rapidly and reflexively clamped her hands around Femme's wrists, anxiously scraping the toes of her boots against the floor as Femme held her aloft.
' Listen here, you meddling little bunny rabbit, you fucking know nothing, okay? You should not have made me do that because now I have to do it again, and it's all your bloody fault because you just don't know where to stop and let well enough alone. I didn't need your help, and I didn't want it either.' She sneered cruelly, baring her teeth with her face only inches away from the terrified adventuress. Femme dropped her roughly and the ground shock caused one of Fionna's knees to give out, and she dropped onto it at Femme's feet. Femme huffed at her derisively, then flicked her hair and began to walk away again, less desperation in her movement this time.
' And I'm not your friend. The only reason I decided to mess with you was because I was bored.' Fionna had slowly picked herself up off the ground as Femme trotted down some stairs, and she swallowed firmly before she replied, eyebrows pulled down sharply and eyes hard.
' Mess with me?' Femme didn't answer her, rounding a corner in the corridor and disappearing from sight.

Cake suddenly appeared again, pawing insistently at her side. Fionna patted the top of Cake's head reassuringly, her eyes never leaving the corner where the shapeshifter had vanished.
' Fionna, how do you know her?'
' She's a friend of Marshall's, Cake. That's all you probably want to know.' Fionna told her picking her up and starting to walk out of the palace, consciously choosing to take a different path than Femme had. Cake noticed this, as well as Fionna's choice of words, and looked up at her suspiciously, her paws tucked over her chest protectively.
' Is that all I need to know though?' She questioned. Fionna realized what she had done, and flashed Cake an annoyed glance.
' Well, I don't know, but I ain't telling you more than that either way. Can you leave it?' She grumbled with no small amount of exasperation. Cake's ears flattened back against her skull and her eyes looked almost too big for her face. Then she looked away from Fionna, her lower lip trembling. Fionna was too concerned with her own worries as to what Femme had implied with her words, and she couldn't concentrate on Cake enough to give the apology that would be required.
The walk home was silent.

As soon as she had made it out of the castle, dodging quickly through the palace garden and stumbling into a patch of rose bushes, Femme thumped down onto the ground between the thorns and started to cry, ignoring the pricks and scratches on her skin. It was the kind of unrestrained sobbing that made her gasp for air and every sound that left her mouth became strangled and watery. Tears flowed unimpeded down her face and her nose started running, her hands shook violently against her knees.
She didn't know whether it would've made her feel better if he was totally apathetic. Maybe that would've been worse. She had hoped, but not expected he would've forgiven her, but then again, that also could've been worse. Because both of those options would've meant he had moved on. But that anger, that hurt he clearly still held showed that he hadn't.
He hadn't moved on enough to let go, and he hadn't moved on enough to just not care anymore.
The knowledge that after so much time had passed, he still cared, maybe as much as she did, sent waves of regret straight through her. What had she lost, in all the years she'd been running and pretending that she was over him? And was it possible to get back or had she stayed away for just a little too long? Because even if he did still care, the feeling might have stagnated. Changed from passionate and lively to withered and ashen, crumbling away at the slightest touch.

Gumball was cranky. He was trying to revise some old documents concerning the building laws of the kingdom, so he could accommodate the growing need for housing, but he couldn't focus. Femme hadn't exactly given him a time when she would be turning up, and he had been glancing around corners fearfully all day, dreading the moment she would show up again until the sun had fallen and the moon settled into her navy blankets, knitting swathes of grey clouds around herself.
He knew he would get his explanation this time, it was the only reason she would want to come back. He hadn't allowed her to explain the day he caught her, the day he walked in and saw her with her legs around that woman's waist, her hands in her hair, her tongue in her mouth. He had figured she was a groupie, but who the other woman had been didn't matter to him. It was the fact that she existed, that there was another woman. That Femme either didn't care enough or just didn't understand that he wanted her to be loyal to him.

The candle in front of him was beginning to burn low, the light growing steadily dimmer and Gumball sighed apathetically and pinched it out, delving into his drawers for a replacement.
When he re-lit it and suddenly found Femme standing a few metres away from him, he swore loudly as he cringed in fright.
' For fuck's sake!' He hissed at her, a hand going to his chest. Femme took a step back awkwardly.
' S-sorry, I thought you would've heard me come in.'
' Well, evidently not!' He replied in exasperation, then sighed heavily and shuffled the documents into a neat stack, placing them on the desk then turning fully to face Femme.

' So.' He said expectantly, a statement and a question rolled into one syllable. Femme looked around herself, then gingerly sat on the edge of his double bed. He'd gotten a new one, this one was bigger than the one she had slept in with him.
She thought about where she should start, the apology or the argument, and decided that apologising all together would be easier than doing it twice.
' The reason I can't go back into the Nightosphere is because she was an incubus, a real one. Emotional vampire. It's forbidden for anyone but a demon to become involved with them because they can kill mortals, so if they do happen to accidentally seduce one the mortal in question is prevented from any contact in order to keep them alive. It's easy to become obsessed with them.'
' Is that your excuse? You couldn't help yourself because she was an incubus?' Gumball snapped harshly, his nails digging into his arms where he had folded them.
' No. No, it's not an excuse, it's a statement of fact. And you didn't let me explain why I did it!'
' I didn't want to know, not when you could probably still taste her in your mouth! The fact that you did it was enough to show me that you didn't care about us.' Femme snorted at him, her own annoyance destroying her game plan.
' Us? What us? You and I never established that we were like that, you never said to me that that was what you wanted.' Gumball recoiled from her, hurt clanging around in his suddenly hollow guts and prickling his eyes.
' Did it need to be said?' He questioned, and Femme could only hold his eyes for a second before she looked down at the ground between her feet.
' Maybe it did.'

' ...You didn't know?'
' I knew.' She admitted quietly, and Gumball's pain was suddenly overrun by fury.
' Then if you knew that I fucking loved you Femme, what the hell were you doing screwing around like that? If you didn't feel the same, you should've just told me!' He yelled at her and she went as white as a sheet of paper, her throat going dry and grating painfully when she swallowed before she spoke.
' You loved me?'
' You know that, you just told me that you did!' Femme looked down at the ground, tears suddenly beginning to well up in her eyes as she realised just how much she had caused herself to miss out on and probably destroy, with her absence the past two hundred, three hundred years.
' I knew that it wasn't just sex, not to you. Or to me. But beyond that, I wasn't sure how far it went. For either of us.' She clarified pointedly, her voice remaining firm even as a tear spilled down her cheek when she looked back up at him. Gumball watched her silently, his lips pressed together tightly and his brow pulled down even tighter.
' But that didn't mean you had to cheat to find out.'
' It wasn't cheating, we weren't a couple.' She shot back defensively, and Gumball only glared at her in disapproval.
' Why, then? Why did you do that to me, whatever you want to call what you did?' He said slowly, his words brimming with hatred and sorrow and anguish and regret. Femme continued to cry calmly, allowing the tears to fall easily rather than resisting.
' I didn't want to know how far it went. Other people were effective roadblocks. We were younger, Mew, a lot younger and I was even shallower than I still am. I didn't want to be in love with a nerdy wise-guy who just so happened to be a prince. If I never let myself stay focused on you long enough, I didn't have to find out whether I was.'

Gumball considered her for a long time after this, and neither broke the silence as it stretched seemingly into oblivion. But then he bit his lip thoughtfully and tilted his head to the side.
' You didn't come to see me voluntarily, did you?' He stated matter-of-factly, all of the anger from his words before having disappeared as quickly as it had come. Femme was surprised to realise she still recognised these abrupt changes in mood, so she adapted to the new tone easily.
' Sort of yes, sort of no.'
' Fionna made you tell her, didn't she? A story for a story, if you're helping her with Marshall-lee then she must've figured out that you knew me too.' Femme frowned, remembering her cold words to the adventuress from earlier and was surprised to find that she felt a bit guilty. She had told her the truth and she hadn't seen what Fionna's face was like at the revelation, but she could conjecture and it actually made her feel bad. Maybe the spunky blonde girl had wormed in under her skin more than she had thought, with her insistent, caring nature and trust. So much unlike her that it made her feel inadequate.
' Yeah. I don't think I'm helping much though. Marshall's head over heels, he just won't admit it, and she's just anxious to make him like her 'cause she has no clue, no clue at all.' Femme laughed to herself. ' She'd learn to say the alphabet backwards if I told her it would help her nab him.' Gumball's face became slightly concerned, but she didn't notice the warning.
' So you haven't told her that Marshall already cares for her?'
' Course not, where's the fun in that?' Femme replied carelessly, then realised what she'd done as she glanced nervously at Gumball and saw that he was getting angry again.
' So you're playing with her? Making her run around like a dog for you entertainment until Marshall-lee comes home and ruins your 'fun?' Femme opened her mouth but Gumball scowled at her, roughly running his fingers through his hair, then placing one hand on his hip and gesturing to her with the other.
' This is how you treat someone like her, someone so precious and innocent, even when you also know that your best friend is in love with her. Everyone but you is just a pawn in your big game of Who's head Can I Screw With Next.'
' Bartholomew, how I treat someone I barely know and you and me is completely differ-'
' Shut! Up.' He cut her off curtly, and started to pace back in forth in front of her, like an animal stalking prey as he glared at her accusingly.
' Did you cheat on me because you were afraid? Or is that just your pretty little lie you've conjured up now to make me forgive you so you can fuck me over again once Fionna's no longer avaliable for you to mess with? My gob, when you're constantly lying and changing like the shapeshifter you are, doing Gob know's what bloody hell if I know's where, how do you expect me to trust in anything that you say? You probably never even cared about me, not at all. And that's why you've only come to see me centuries later because someone else, some poor little girl who thinks you're a friend to her is trying to do the right thing. You use people, and then you discard them behind you when you get bored, and you don't even look over your shoulder to see if there was anyone there to catch them.' Gumball finally finished, stalking up to her. He was breathing raggedly, and his fist clenched and unclenched before he jabbed a finger at her face.
' You're despicable.' He growled under his breath, daring her to challenge him.

Femme was panting shallowly, tears flowing in earnest down her face because really, she couldn't disagree with anything he had said. The way she felt about him was the exception rather than the rule, and she held little regret for the centuries that had passed. It was why she was so surprised to realise she felt bad for treating Fionna the way she had when the girl had genuinely had no agenda other than love when she had shoved Femme into Gumball's lab. That lack of ulterior motive was so rare, and it was possibly the only reason that Femme hadn't already written her off as just another faceless nuisance, forcing her into a evil situation that she now knew was a necessary one.

' What, no smart reply? No denial, no retort? Where's that sharp tongue of yours at now, Femme?' Gumball cackled hysterically, and Femme could see he was on the verge of tears too. There was nothing she could say though, so she could only wait as Gumball struggled with himself, his chuckles beginning to sound more like sobs.
' You're such a horrible person. You're so mean, and insensitive and careless. I always believed it was just a shell, a cover for the frightened girl you sometimes seemed to be when you let your guard down but when I caught you, my belief faltered and I just wasn't sure. And I'm still not sure. I can't tell whether you're actually as cruel as you seem or whether you just stop at nothing to protect yourself from being hurt.'

He sat down on the bed next to her with an ungraceful thump, and Femme could no longer tell if his shoulders were shaking from laughter or tears.
' And the worst thing, the craziest, stupidest thing is that it doesn't matter either way.' He looked at her and Femme gazed at how the snail trails on his cheeks glowed in the candlelight, a new teardrop glittering like phosphorous sea water when it rolled down his cheek.
' Femme, if you're still the same girl who called me Mew-mew no matter how many times I told her not to, still the same girl that ate my hair when I held her and could argue about the theory of relativity for hours- If you're still that girl...' He shook his head, his expression caught somewhere between dismay and amusement, and it was one of the most melancholic emotions Femme had ever witnessed.
'...then I'm still in love with you.'

They didn't sleep with each other.
They didn't even kiss.
But the sun was still rising in the sky when Femme finally took her leave after a silent, contemplative night spent holding one another, lying on top of the covers in the middle of Gumball's bed. She didn't know when he had fallen asleep exactly, nor when she had, but he was still unconscious when she was roused. His sleeping face hadn't changed at all either, though it looked a bit more worried than he used to, but she chalked that up to their conversation.
She eased herself out of his grip, and laid a tentative kiss on the palm of the hand that had been stroking her hair, then turned into a nightingale and flew out into the pale morning light.

She considered the placement of the sun on the horizon as she decided where she should go, to the treehouse or to Marshall's cave. Fionna would probably still be asleep, if she had slept. Femme's comment about messing with her and Fionna's easily worried sense of self-confidence could have combined to make her believe that she had no chance with Marshall at all. She had another apology to make. Though actually, she had never said to Gumball that she was sorry. Then again, did it need to be said?
Femme laughed at herself as she turned towards the ruined city streets that lead to the overbridge above Marshall's home.
Maybe it did.

However, all planning for the day ahead was immediately disrupted when in the middle of fixing herself some eggs, the front door banged open and in walked a very dirty, disquieted Marshall-lee, heaving what might have been the same duffle bag he left with if it weren't for the fact that it was scuffed and frayed immensely. Femme blinked at him in shock as he dumped the bag on the couch and then turned to look at her, huffing at his fringe.
' Hello. I've been flying through an extremely claustrophobic, stalactite-ridden cave for four hours. My washing machine is out in the shed-room to the right of the backdoor.' He pointed to Femme, and she gulped, having picked up from his tone that the Vampire King was in no mood for bullshit. Though she did not see how his laundry was relevant.
' You need to dump the entire contents of this bag that is fabric into that washer. I need to take a shower.' He floated up into his room and then his head suddenly popped out through the ladder and he narrowed his eyes at her, pointing again.
' And then we need to talk.'

Author's note: Really, did you think I could bring back Marshall in any manner less than completely fabulous? He wasn't gonna just turn up through a portal guys, I said it was hard to leave the Nightosphere. I ain't usin' bug milk cheats here. Seriously though, I've been looking forward to that paragraph, and I enjoyed writing it far more than I probably should've, seeing as it's just one paragraph.
As to the rest of the content, well, I love my slightly OOC Gumball and Femme together just as much as Fionna and Marshall. If Fionna and Marshall are the imperfectly perfect (Mismatched but right) couple, then Gummy and Femme are perfectly imperfect. Both of them have huge personality flaws, and they're both smart enough to recognise their own and each other's, but they can't help fallin' in love. Ugh. They're just... it's like ugly cute, I ain't explaining that anymore.
Two chapters in six days is kind of impressive I feel, but I don't know if I can keep this rate of production up. So motivate me, leave me a review and tell me everything! Don't spare the details, I read as fast as I write. Wait, that's not a good comparison. Uhm. Bye.

-WRA