A/N: Back to a blue and green chapter.
This part of the story however, became much longer and detailed than I had originally planned. :/ So although I tried my best to keep it into one chapter, it was becoming way too long and I decided to split it into two parts.
As much as I love the reds, in order for the story to work, I really need and want the blues and greens to have their special moment, too. :) And well, I'm also beginning to realize that as the story progresses, there is more to cover...hence the longer chapters. I really gotta work on my managing skills.
Anyway, suffice to say, I very much did overestimate myself thinking I could get much done during the break... and I'm sorry. I'm estimating about 4 chapters left to the story, but they will all most likely be of considerable length like the preceding chapters.
So yeah, with the semester starting and all, I didn't want to keep anybody waiting any longer. My updates will be unfortunately slow—if it weren't slow for some people already—but my passion won't die.
Thank you for your patience.
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P.S.: By the way, if any of you are interested, there is a comic version of Chapter 1 and 2 that I have drawn and uploaded on deviantart. They are not all completely outlined, but you are free to check them out if you wish to. Posting links apparently won't work on profiles anymore, so just search my pen name on the site, or leave a review/PM me if you want the direct link!
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"Dammit!"
Buttercup's outraged vocals stretched far into the darkness.
She hovered breathlessly over the border of the city skyline. But having no clue to where Blossom might have gone, she kicked her foot in thin air and slouched in vexation. Who knows how long it has been since she set sail?
She grumbled something inaudible and contracted her green pupils, carefully screening the overhead view of town with her night vision. Small lights from windows of yet sleeping town-folks decorated the nightscape, but Blossom's signature light was nowhere to be seen. Dejected and put out, the green puff let her eyes resume back to its normal state, but the rest of her expression sunk down from betrayal.
With everything coming to this, she just couldn't pull herself to absorb the situation. There was no denying that she and Blossom had come close to biting each other's head off over for the past crummy hours, but Buttercup had been so sure that Blossom would at some point come around her bossy brain and just admit she had been wrong for once.
As if. The green puff grouched and folded her arms at the outcome.
Yeah, she gets it. Her leader is usually the voice of reason when she tends to become an instigator, as they put it—what else was new? Even if that were true, what happened earlier was totally different! Her show of perhaps a bit 'reckless' rage back then was only from trying to protect her friend and citizens. As heroes, couldn't her pink sister understand that? She was there at the park, too. She saw what happened to Mitch! Sure, maybe she went a bit overboard when she chose to take her anger out on Blossom like that, but she honestly didn't mean to be so spiteful to her from the start...
If only Blossom had trusted and had appreciated her decisions more...
Burrowing her face into her palms, the green Powerpuff tried to muffle her stress and anger. How could she do this to her?
Now smart-girl had disappeared to find the red twerp without leaving so much of a word. How can she possibly reason her way out of this one? Whatever she had in mind, all Buttercup could conclude right now was that her leader deliberately went behind her back and toyed with her. Not all villains are guilty, huh? Well was that all worth LYING FOR and BETRAYING the team?!
"Aggghhhhh!"
Rendering her past effort useless, Buttercup unleashed her screams out to the sky, making violent air-punches on top of her head. But her frustrated fit was short-lived as she winced upon an angry complaint of a citizen demanding her to quiet down.
Sighing, the green puff trained a hand down the front of her face and collected her tired self. Her stormy expression in due time changed into that of disappointment to questioning.
Hold on...? Why would Blossom ever lie?
At that, her features twisted in growing suspicion. Yeah, why would she?
Now that she calmed her nerves, she could tell how weird it was for her to do that. Blossom being bossy about her being right was nothing unusual, but lying?.. For those punks?!—
Nononono...Buttercup shook her head and successfully dismissed the steam that was climbing back up her head. That didn't sound like Blossom at all. Strange. It's like she became another person...
…! Wait a minute!
Buttercup held down her bottom jaw at a chilling thought. What if those dirt-bags did something to her?
She bit the tip of her hand as she nervously sought through the possibilities. ...What if she was possessed?
Oh shoot.
Her face hardened like cold cement. There was only one conclusion to this:
HIM must have made their leader into a walking puppet!
I mean, who was she kidding! Come to think of it, there was no way Blossom would fall for some dumb boy and LIE about it, right?! At this very moment, those jerks might have her captured and Mojo could be brutally torturing her to give up Townsville!
An exaggerated illusion of a suffering Blossom hitched up as a lump in her throat. HIM and Mojo were lurking in the background; Blossom's hands were bound and a gag was across her mouth, all while twisted images of the Rowdyruffs sniggered and threatened to pour down a bucket full of revolting slime.
"Oh no, Blossom!" Buttercup shrieked in panic, her thought clouds disassembling. "WhatdoIdowhatdoIdowhatdoIdowhatdoIdo!"
The overly imaginative Powerpuff regretfully trailed her eyes down at her trembling palms for not listening to her leader's advice. Unlike moments ago, her face was engulfed with dread. How could she have not thought of this? She was so engrossed in her anger that she failed to think through and see other possibilities. In the worst case, they might all be waiting for her and Bubbles to come for her any second! She scrunched her eyes shut. Only regrets were left from the thoughts of their previous argument... First things first, she had to get her blue sister and let her know of this, too.
Uh-oh.
Bubbles! Buttercup directly yanked her palms up and smacked them onto her two cheeks in terror. Oh no. She left her alone, she might be in DANGER!
So after showing off a dramatic yet rather comical variation of expressions in a short period, the brute Powerpuff finally pieced her scattered brain back together. Turning back the way she came from, she was ready to-
"Heya, whimper-puff."
-stay exactly where she was.
Before long, the puff wobbled forward from her arrested momentum as she almost came face-to-chest with someone in front of her. She groaned at the guiltless ground.
Ugh, don't tell me it's porcupine-head...
The green girl flipped her head back up.
Much to her hopes—porcupine-head, or Butch to be exact, was looming just over her eye level with eyebrows lowered tensely to form a scowl. The bitterness was apparent from their foregone fight—up to the extent that seconds ago he had brusquely woken up from her screams in his earshot, hustling over as fast as possible.
However, his reasons unbeknownst to the green puff, she jumped back and marked him with promising death, mistakenly thinking he had come to claim they had her sister. Looking around to find no red flags of an ambush, the puff narrowed her eyes and prepared for combat. This was probably for the better; he sure wasn't smart enough to come to her on his own feet!
"YOU." Her voice was low and gravelly when she readied herself.
"Yeah, remember me?" the antagonist greeted, "We have unfinished business. The round hasn't ended!"
His lame clarifications however, did not get past the barrier of her attention. Ignoring all nonexistent formalities, the puff pulled back and launched herself above his level.
"WHAT HAVE YOU DONE TO MY SISTER?!"
"Wait, what?!"
Butch watched as her growing shadow cloaked over him. His surroundings dissolved to a blur as he was swooped down and thrashed on to the hard pavement.
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Whimpers of a distressed Powerpuff resounded on the far side. Bubbles, in similar procedure, had long lost track of where Buttercup disappeared, and no doubt, the frightened Powerpuff was desperate to know what was going on. In the night of the sky, her eyes were rapidly welling up with large blobs of tears as her small frame shook frailly. Although she willed to stay strong, she always felt helpless in the darkness. She knew it wasn't a good idea to leave the house! That was until-
"Aggghhhhh!"
Like a beacon in the night, her green sister's incensed cry blared in her ears as guidance.
Half glad, half worried, the Powerpuff blasted off to the direction, wasting no moment of indecision. But as soon as she was about to open her mouth to call for her sibling, she bumped full force into a floating object, knocking it back.
"Ow!" It yelped.
"Eeep!" The girl screamed, bracing herself. What did she get herself into? A monster in the dark?!
But far from her fear, she peeked through her arms and perceived that the object was actually the blond ruff, completely flabbergasted and rubbing the sore shoulder that she collided into. If she hadn't mistaken, she thought she saw his face transform from total apprehension to slight reprieve.
His voice was raspy and shaky as he spoke, "W-watch where you're going, blondie! Sheesh! I was scared out of my wits!"
"Boomer…" Bubbles murmured in shining appreciation for his presence.
She took a moment of awe—then she entrapped the Rowdyruff in her arms. "Oh Boomer, I'm so glad it's you!"
"H-hey! What do you think you're doing?!"
Having expected the least, Boomer's face flustered wildly as he wiggled in her tight hug to no avail. He only managed to escape and catch his breath when Bubbles freed her arms from his waist. Frazzled, the Rowdyruff worked his best to calm down his red-tinted cheeks as a prior feeling of wariness washed over him.
In the meantime, Bubbles wiped her eyes of the remainder of previous tears. Despite everything, her happy eyes glistened in the dark and studied the sight of her counterpart. Hmmm… He seemed a bit… bothered?
"What are you doing out here?" she posed curiously.
"W-why should I answer that?!" the ruff's mouth sputtered like a lawn mower. "What are you doing here?"
Bubbles hummed and offered him her answer, "Well, I was looking for my sister."
"Y-yeah! That's what I was doing, too! Looking for my sis- I mean Butch, my brother!"
The blue ruff quivered and continued with his strange behavior. He anxiously surveyed the dark surroundings, as if frightened that anything would lunge out at him any moment. Bubbles looked at him quizzically. Then, gradual fascination seeped through her as she noticed how familiar his behavior was. She gasped and covered her mouth.
"Could it be that… you're scared of the dark, too?"
The Rowdyruff gawked at her guess, obviously giving it away.
"N-no! I'm not a crybaby like you!" He attempted to dart his eyes elsewhere, but dang it!—she was giving him that sympathetic knowing look again!
Shriveling in mortification, the boy came to a barely audible whisper, "Y..yeah. You better not tell anybody."
...Because god forbid his brothers found out about this! He'd be marked as a sissy for life!
The blond ruff trembled uneasily while the puff searched him with deep concern, her innocent eyes once again succumbing to sorrow. In his blue cloudy orbs, she saw herself moments ago mirroring his actions, and their similarity of fears. She wrung her hands together and let her sad eyes roam around for a while. Aside from the relief she felt for finding someone who was also afraid of the dark, she should probably try to appease him.
The blue puff re-locked her eyes on him, voicing out softly, "It's okay to be afraid," she said, "because deep down that's what makes you stronger... After all, being brave isn't about not being afraid of anything. It's about doing what you're afraid to do." (A/N: episode 'boogie frights')
Still, the blue ruff as well as his blond curls persisted to quiver in front of her eyes. The puff hesitated, but reached comfortingly to lightly stroke the end strands of his messy hair.
This was what the Professor sometimes demonstrated as a remedy to soothe her when she was really afraid. She would snuggle deep into his arms and seek haven from having somebody beside her.
Also, she had admitted to her sisters before that Boomer was cute. Observing the golden locks of hair similar to hers, she would at times lose her attention to them during battles. This, henceforth was easily on the list of what she always wanted to do. It was… soft.
"Wha..what are you doing?"
The blue ruff pulled back a few times to resist her touch, but with not much resolve.
He in the end sighed and stayed put. Again, the Powerpuff was bewitching him with her girly magic. But graciously so, her delicate words brought about a peaceful tune that appeased the storm of anxiety inside him. As it did to the Powerpuff, having someone else's presence close by brought him at comfortable ease.
Still playing with his hair, Bubbles hummed softly between her giggles, "So, did you find your brother yet?"
Boomer looked at her and shook his head, "Nuh-uh."
"Me neither. Do you think maybe they've met?"
BOOM!
Both of them flung forward from a thunder of explosion.
Without a second to spare, the two children cried frantically and dashed away to an open window of a random building. The inside was dark, but that hardly mattered to them. They rushed in and sprawled themselves on the floor, dragging their backs to a partition. They huffed heavily, eyes locked on the window.
It was smart of them, for not long after, hues of glowing green whooshed by the building and crashed elsewhere outside. Sounds of tumbling debris and the set off of car alarms reverberated throughout the atmosphere from their wake. Though what felt like a painstakingly slow process, the quakes gradually weakened and distanced away from their point radius. A few tense moments—and detecting the coast clear, the two blonds wiped the beaded droplets of sweat on their forehead.
"Well that answers our question," Bubbles exhaled. "Do you think we'll ever get to tell them… about us?"
"Hopefully never." Boomer panted in shock.
The blue girl let out another breath and cupped her face to the side in worry. She listened closely to the fierce battle taking beyond the framework of the building.
What Boomer said would be ideal in the short run—but if they kept this going, their siblings were going to find out sooner or later. Not only that, she really didn't like keeping things secret as if she was doing something wrong. How wrong could it be to hang out with one of her sworn enemies—who as a team are evenly matched to her siblings and come closest to, defeating…them?
Okay, putting it that way didn't seem too justifiable.
"It's even… d-darker in here."
At the ruff's trembling voice, Bubbles flicked her vision over to her counterpart and saw that he had regressed back to his unstable state.
She snapped out of it—her peripherals quickly scanned the place they got themselves in, acknowledging a step too late of its lack of lighting. She gulped in fright. They seemed to be in an office but she could hardly tell. Turning the lights on however, might draw unwanted attention from their siblings.
She stood up and timidly raised her head over the partition she was leaning on. Her pupils panned on the deeper side of the room, but she couldn't muster enough courage to use her night vision. Obviously, it was completely dark, possibly darker than where they were sitting, but that part of the room was likely shielded better from view.
Even so… though her instincts told her nothing was lurking beyond, It was... scary.
Then came another blast of eruption.
Before any of them could process this, with gaining force, their siblings whipped dangerously close past the window. …Too close.
Bubbles just in time turned to see the window in front of them completely shatter from the shockwaves of their passage; Boomer yelled and jumped into her arms in a cradling position; small pieces of glass sprinkled on the ground before them—then silence. Boomer realized his position and embarrassedly ripped himself away.
Bubbles shivered and shook her head after examining the damage. Luckily, Butch and Buttercup seemed to have passed by without them going noticed. But they had to move further in or risk being a dead giveaway. In rising resolve, she took hold of Boomer's arm and tugged on it to lead him deeper.
"Come on, we have to go inside more, or they'll find us."
But once the ruff saw where they were heading, he tore his arm from her grip and wrapped them around his knees in front of him.
"N-no way! You don't know what's in there! Y-you can't make me!"
Chattering his teeth, he rocked his body back and forth.
Bubbles silently watched him without judgment, and knelt down to gently place her hands on his cheeks. She turned his head towards her.
"I know it's scary… I'm scared too." She spoke calmly into his eyes. "But together, it won't be as bad, I promise."
She pulled her hands away and gestured him her palm to grab onto. She smiled affectionately, "Trust me."
Boomer looked at her hand, and then back at her face. He could notice she was frightened too, but somehow she remained calm and composed. Even with her fear, she looked very brave to him.
The ruff suddenly felt ashamed and blushed furiously.
He thought of how dumb he might look like right now. Man, he did not EVER EVER EVER want to show this wimpy side of him to his insensitive brothers. They would be losing it altogether by now. But more so, he shouldn't be showing this part of him to any of his enemies—much less the Powerpuff in front of him.
Yet, she has already seen so much of his weak side than anyone else, but has never once made him feel bad about it.
Boomer felt his hands capturing his legs lose its strength.
To her, …maybe it would be okay. She had proved to him that she won't make a laughing stock out of him. And he had this gut feeling that if he just followed her words, she would make him feel calmer and braver again... like she did earlier that afternoon. He smiled meekly. Props to her girly magic.
So he took her hand, and hoisted himself up on his feet as she led him the way into the unknown.
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"Where's my sister?! TELL ME, NOW!"
Buttercup quickly soared and dived down to force Butch to ground level. But Butch wasn't falling for that again.
"For the last time, I don't have your stupid sister!" He swerved out of the way, leaving Buttercup with handfuls of air, still heading downwards. Their position switched; Butch now atop of her and gathering energy at a focal point to strike her down.
Making note of this, Buttercup immediately accrued more speed to reach the pavement faster. She did a flip and let the blast of energy strike just behind her as she landed on her feet, skidding to a touchdown with a long gash on the ground. She erupted back upwards and sent a fusillade of eye-lasers darting his way, barely giving passage for him to escape.
Before he knew it, the green puff was back to his altitude. Butch who didn't have time to spare from evading her lasers became susceptible to her blows. He threw his arms up to block her attacks, but her final body-blow to the stomach shot him backwards. He crashed into a row of streetlights, one by one, and reached a ringing stop back-first on a wide street sign.
He lowered himself and witnessed the lights in front of him in disarray. He growled at the reminder of a past event.
"How do you do that?!" He exclaimed, floating upwards.
"Do what?!"
Buttercup sprung her body to work, her arms out in the open to grab him. Butch saw this, and brought his arms in front of him to meet hers. The weight of the collision tilting sidewards, the two spun around in increasing speed. In the thick of their spinning tornado, Butch stirred and raised his voice,
"How does a wimp like you become stronger even when we take one of you losers down?!"
"What the heck are you talking about?!"
"I hurt someone special to you! YOU'RE SUPPOSED TO BREAK DOWN AND SOB LIKE A LITTLE PRINCESS!"
Butch used their spinning force to his advantage and threw her into a building. Wisps of smoke arised from the impact, but not for long.
"DON'T YOU GET IT?!"
Shaking herself out from the debris, Buttercup felt the haste to get his repeating question out of the way.
"IT'S EXACTLY BECAUSE THEY'RE SPECIAL TO ME!" she put forth, "I told you I care about them! They give me the purpose to fight—more the reason to get up on my feet!" Her irises shined bright green in the dark as residues of dust cleared around her. She stood up resolutely, reenacting her figure of speech.
Butch looked at her petrified. His stomach churned at the mention of the word care; prior day incidents, confrontations, they all relapsed on him like a panoramic sequence. He earned a headache, but he stirred his head, pulling himself together.
"That's gotta be the most pathetic trash I've ever heard!" he cried.
Buttercup jeered in mockery, "Speak for yourself, dingbat! You're no real fighter, you've got no reasons of your own to fight!" She eyed him with sly confidence, "You're just a convenient errand boy for HIM to toy around with!"
That did it for the green boy.
"I DO have a reason to fight!" he roared, "I fight to DESTROY YOU!"
"Why? Cuz your daddy told you?"
Butch charged towards his waiting counterpart with an outcry of fury.
They met with a loud collision; the building wrecked by Buttercup before became open to more destruction. The two battling super humans subsequently blew out from the other side, driving their colors to lace around and draw apart for several turns.
After exchanging multitudes of relentless attacks, Buttercup was the one to sock it to him last and body-check him out of the sky, into an array of skyscrapers. She paid attention to the broken skyline, unsure where he will come out next and jump at her. But in the middle of her precaution, she paused and stared questioningly at a distinct smoke rising from far out of the city. Was that smoke there before?
She blindly countered an attack from her male aggressor that came from the side. The puff once again knocked him away, all the while keeping her eye fixed on the suspicious smoke.
She cocked her head, managing to pull her distracted mind away from the battleground with Butch.
Something wasn't right. Spike-head really did seem ignorant of where her sister was. And—like she found out earlier—his brick-face brother for that matter, too. Was there truly no plot against them? Their red siblings just disappeared together?
Anger inscribed itself all over her face. She was right the first time!
The green girl approached closer to the faraway scene to view it over the skyline. It came from the outerside of the city—in fuzzy's forest!
"Take this, sissy!"
Just when Buttercup was about to head out to investigate, the green ruff returned with an attempted spike, but instead took a hit in the face. Buttercup shoved him away with her kick as he was now driven out of her interest. She growled and looked his way,
"If you really don't have Blossom with you, then I'm wasting my time here!" She raced towards the direction of the forest.
"Wait, where do you think you're going?!"
Butch gained up on her and blocked her in her path, but Buttercup deflected and headed forward. Infuriated by her outright neglection, the green ruff sped up and successfully slammed her into a wall of an edifice.
"You're not gonna bail on this fight again!" He took her by the neck and bashed her on the brick wall over and over. "I'm not letting you sissy your way out of this!"
Midway through another thrash, Buttercup came around from the onslaught and kicked him in the groin, causing the boy to let go and writhe in pain.
She straightened up, and held nothing back when she spat full-fire in his face; "I'M DONE WITH YOU! I don't care whether it's Blossom or BRICKFACE in that forest! I'm getting to them, and I'M PUMMELING THEM LIKE THERE'S NO TOMORROW!"
The headstrong girl soared sharply to the sky, before pausing and hurtling towards the established location. Her mind was set in obliterating that red criminal now. He hurt her FRIEND, he hurt her CITIZENS, and he somehow lured her SISTER into his dirty scheme!
Incensed, she motored up for more speed—that was until a flash of light captured her and smashed a ray of energy onto her body. She screamed and tumbled all the way down until she hit the road. Green smoke dissipated, and in its place, the puff coughed out of her crater, ending her experience with the asphalt.
She looked up to find herself in the green ruff's shadow. His dark eyes were glimmering green with newly lit determination.
"Listen sissy-pants," he stepped forward, "I can't care less about what you do over there. But if it's my brother you're looking for, then you'll have go through me."
"What?!" Buttercup got up and stared aghast at his complete change of behavior.
Butch smirked under the moonlight, "Guess I do care sometimes, huh?"
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I'll leave it with Butch's line there.
Part 2 is about half written, and will be uploaded... soon? I hope. Until next time!
