Bubbles knew that there really was no going back now. She had made a plan and now she had to follow it through, she thought as she put up another stack of papers on another wall she had found. She had sneaked out early this morning so that she could continue her work before her sisters woke, since today was a school day.
She only just managed to dart back to her spot on the bed after hastily taping the last of the papers in the stack she carried, before the alarm rang.
Groggy and weak from lack of sleep, Bubbles clumsily glided down the stairs almost colliding with a wall as she reached the kitchen where the professor had just finished putting the final touches to a simple breakfast that seemed to contain eggs and some marmalade covered bread.
"Bubbles, did you not sleep well last night. You look tired." he noted, raising an eyebrow. Unable to bring herself to think up a lie on the spot in front of the professor, she simply shrugged as she drifted into her chair and began trying to raise her energy levels for the busy day of school ahead as best she could, trying very hard not to make a mess despite how her poor sight made everything seem blurry.
Her sisters soon followed her into the room, and sat beside her to eat, giving her curious looks when they saw how her head seemed to lurch from one side to another and her eyes were barely open, and even seemed a bit red. She once again shrugged, realizing that unlike the crafty Blossom or even Buttercup when they needed an excuse for one reason or another, she was sadly not a good liar.
"Bubbles, tell us what's wrong. You don't look well and we just want to help you." Blossom eventually asked, breaking the silence that had settled over the table this morning at breakfast. Bubbles gazed up at Blossom slowly, and Blossom stared back, clearly getting more impatient by the second. And Bubbles shook her head sadly, too deep in her thoughts to think of anything to reply.
"Is there something bothering you, Bubbles?" Blossom asked once again.
Another shake of the head.
"Just leave her alone Blossom, I'm sure its nothing and we'll be late if we don't finish eating." Buttercup stated, intervening before any further interrogation could take place.
Blossom gave Bubbles another worried glance, but nonetheless dropped the matter and continued nibbling into her bread.
The bus came soon enough, as the three sisters quickly washed their faces and proceeded to sprint outside, bundling quickly into the rundown and tacky old yellow vehicle so as to get a seat where they could sit together.
Bubbles sang no joyful song to entertain herself as the bus slowly drove forward towards school. She paid no heed to the conversations the other passengers were having about the fireworks display three days from now. She ignored Blossom when her sister tapped her arm, clearly trying to get her to give up the cold shoulder, her only protection against her plan being outed.
Instead she began to think. Even if the tensions against the mayor escalated enough for some sort of riot to occur, it would mean that mayor had won. If her plan was to succeed, she had to not only convince the citizens who already had it out for the man, but the so called "bad guys" who were very likely to still be against anything she had planned. It was ironically they who held the power to really decide what would really be the future of Townsville, even after the mayor stepped down if he did.
This meant convincing them that if she did eventually manage to take the shot at the next elections and then somehow succeed, that she would give them a far more fair and honest treatment than mayor would ever be able to. That her changes which she had planned for if she did somehow take charge, would benefit not only the city they would likely still hate for some time ,but would give them what each of them wanted deep down truly and honestly.
The Gangreen gang for instance wanted a way to make a living while still doing legitimate business which would give them better relations with the people who despised them solely because of their skin color and ungentlemanly mannerisms from lack of educatio and most likely a tragic childhood they refused to talk about or share.
Morbucks, the spoiled rich girl who was a fellow student as well as a common antagonist for her and her sisters, just wanted to be noticed. To be given attention and credit for the contributions she made, whether they were good or bad. But most of all, a good friend who was ready to talk to her calmly and patiently, taking her crap as she vented out her feelings until she eventually began to feel better about herself so that she felt no need to brag anymore and could start being her own person. Which was probably at least to Bubbles, a fairly modest and frisky girl with only a few bad ideas.
Mojo needed to know that he was missed and valued by the professor still. To realize that he had done good in the past, even if it was only due to a fluke accident. To come to terms with how the girls were as much his family as the Rowdyruff boys who he later created as a ploy to get back at the professor and prove himself superior. And lastly he needed to accept that family watched each other's backs, and gave each other a second chance even if they didn't agree on everything.
The rest of the many characters questionable in moral standing, Bubbles would take in account later but for now all she needed to know was that though they would be more difficult to persuade, their influence on how everything would play out was too great to be ignored. Princess in particular had the power to seriously swing the eventual result by a gigantic leap, but Bubbles didn't want simple bribery to be the decider for the eventual winner in the battle for control.
Though occasionally such tactics had to be used, Bubbles hoped she didn't need it.
And anyhow she would first have to make princess drop the hatred she had built against in particular against Buttercup over the years they sold short her request to be another member of their superhero team because of mostly Buttercup's pride and vanity, and Blossom's stubborness to see changes occur, and to accept that the status quo was not god. She would have been quite glad to have princess as their first additional member, it could have set the benchmark for other children willing to stand up against injustice to come and join the fight, and those nice gadgets Princess had used in her first, and later fights against them did seem awfully useful and shiny.
"Princess was right about one thing." Bubbles secretly admitted to herself when she felt for sure no one was listening in "You can buy superpowers with money. Really good ones actually. It might be useful if we had some of those nice machines. We might not need chemical x after all for finding new recruits since chemical x is really hard to find. and really dangerous and risky."
But who was she to talk. Blossom would probably just undermine her idea, stating that they three were good enough to handle threats by themselves, and that any "artificial powers" were an insult to what a Powerpuff stood for.
It was clear to Bubbles that Blossom had dozed away during the section of the lesson where the teacher explained the concept of many modern foods such as noodles, drinks and even organically grown oranges had been made available by artificial means and that without many of these products, life as we knew it would be very different indeed.
So was Blossom sharing in Buttercup's silly vendetta just because Princess was a new face that had made a slightly bad first impression. Bubbles might never know.
But now the bus was pulling up in the driveway by the Pokey Oaks kindergarten, and the students were screaming Yay as they ran from the crowded vehicle, three at a time so that they almost jammed up in the doorway. "Time" Blossom announced, as she too rushed out, with Buttercup quickly following.
Bubbles nodded briefly to show she understood, before following their example, albeit somewhat slowly since she was still engrossed in her thoughts of what was to come.
As she slowly stepped towards the decaying edifice that was her main school building, she was disturbed by an interesting argument that had gotten underway between a large group of students, who appeared not to care that they were speaking loud enough to be heard from quite a distance away.
"I'm glad some grown up or whoever finally found the guts to stand up to that selfish man" a young brunette stated smugly "Sometimes I'd wish I could have done it myself. I really don't like him." She sighed. "If only I was old enough."
"Yeah. I'm with you." A tall boy with glasses replied. "Mr Mayor really needs to go. He's fat, he's ugly and he keeps making bad ideas which get me mad. One time he even evicted my parents from our shop, so he could tear it down and put in a tanning salon there which he only used for himself. That man really has no idea what running a city is about. I mean look at our police teams, oh wait, what police teams? I don't see any police teams, or if I do, they suck." There was a seething, but quiet anger in his voice.
"I'm sure if he treated some of the people better, we wouldn't have half the amount of problems that we have now." a third speaker, a short blonde boy chimed in. "This rebellion fighter really knows what they're talking about. I'd love to meet them."
"They're brave, they stand for what they know is right, and in general I think they would certainly make a much better man in charge than the one we have now." Yet another glasses boy shouted, as he walked over to join the circle where this interesting conversation was underway. "I really think that even Che Gue, Che whats his name would be proud of what they're doing now. It's good to see that even in these bleak modern times, we have people that agree with Che, and are willing to take risks."
Bubbles would have loved to stay and listen. She was happy that her sleepless nights spent gluing flyer after flyer around the city, had not been wasted. She had been doing this 3 nights in a row by now, knowing that it would be harder to evade the attention of her sisters during the day.
This was a start, but not enough to draw Mr Mayor out just yet. But it was indeed good to see other children, especially ones in the same school as her agreeing with her, even if they were young like her and powerless to really do anything since they could not even vote yet.
But Bubbles was indeed familiar with the old saying, look after the pennies and the pounds look after themselves. And even small rebellions led by weak, non affluent children who no one listened to, could well mean the difference later when push came to shove.
But now the bell rang, signalling that she and by extension the other children had dawdled outside for far too long. Miss Keane, their kindly teacher did not punish harshly, but Bubbles really preferred not to upset so nice a teacher. Even if Blossom was technically "the smart one" of the group, she too was just as invested in a good education. She hoped Buttercup felt the same way, since good marks in tests led to a good job and by extension a good life.
The lesson dragged on uneventfully. Bubbles did her best to put her thoughts aside as she scribbled note after note into her notebook as the teacher wrote them onto the board. She glanced over to see Buttercup, head down and slumped into her desk. She shook her head. This would really come back to bite her sister later in life when she got a constant streak of bad marks.
And weren't bad marks the reason why many people turned to crime in the first place, when they didn't get a good job.
Once in a while, a student would discreetly toss an paper plane at another when the teacher was facing the board and the other student would catch it and briefly giggle when they had read what was written on the plane. Bubbles did her best to ignore this distraction, until one such plane zoomed by and landed hard on her face, grazing her with a small paper cut where the sharp tip hit her cheek before she could catch it.
Bubbles glanced quickly up, to check that no important notes were left for her to take down before very cautiously unfolding the piece of paper. Why wasn't she surprised when she read the words "Mr Mayor is a no neck chump who isn't worth the space he takes up".
She glanced back at the thrower, a mischievous looking redhead, and nodded solemnly to show she understood and agreed before quickly opening her textbook to the page the teacher had specified in the time she had spent distracted. It was a good thing the teacher's back was turned to the board while all this happened.
Soon enough, lunch came and as Bubbles expected when she stepped in the dining area, Princess the rich girl in the school sat faced away from the large group that had gathered in a center table. She clearly took no interest in the recent going on's, and didn't care one way or another.
But Bubbles guessed that if it came to a vote, she would either try to claim the position of mayor for herself or if that failed, she would most likely play devil's advocate and do anything to sabotage Bubbles's campaign as a way of retaliating.
Princess needed to be won over, but not in a violent battle where her and her sisters ruthlessly pummeled her into the ground and left her to be locked in a cold dark cell.
It was time this silly rivalry came to a close.
But Princess would not be the only rival Bubbles would need to contend with.
There would be a lot of others trying to seize the advantage in the power vacuum that would no doubt remain if Bubbles stripped the mayor of his power. And as hard as it was to say this to herself, it was every competitor for themselves here.
A firm approach would be useful here. A firm but fair approach that was. The so called "enemies" her sisters and her had been forced to deal with had seen enough mistreatment and being misunderstood. It was time to give them their cut in of the cake.
And though Bubbles knew pity was not something she was meant to feel for a snobby jerk who constantly demanded attention for their misdeeds, pity was what Bubbles felt as she saw the lonely, vacant emptiness in Princess's narrowed eyes.
It was difficult to imagine Princess being surrounded by other children cheering her name. Hard to think of her being tossed up in the air, as citizens sung her praises. To see her shaking hands with Buttercup to put their differences aside, and to watch as they fought side by side against a common adversary rather than against each other, watching each other's backs like they might have done if Blossom hadn't been so resistant to the idea of a new addition to their already formidable team.
But Bubbles was confident it could be done. She wasn't the biggest fan of history but she had not forgotten the story of the united nations, her favorite lesson till this day.
Since surely if countries so diverse, that had gone through a long and bloody war could put their differences aside to find peace and common ground, why couldn't the many citizens of Townsville learn to do the same if it made the city a safer and happier place.
Thanks once more for reading. I apologize once more for the long delay but sometimes the hardships of life, and that nasty writer's block that keeps on coming to bite me again and again sometimes makes things difficult. So thank you guys for persevering with me and believing in me and adorable little Bubbles when we try our hardest to make Townsville a better and happier place.
So once again, thank you all and you know... A nice comment down in the comment's section would be really good for support.
I would also like to hear your thoughts of what you think could have gone better, what you think the outcome of Bubbles's hastily made plan will be and whether you think the dream of Princess and Buttercup finally becoming friendlier with each other will ever come to light.
Please answer by commenting, and thank you once again.