Lifty stared with uncertainty towards the escalating steps that led to the library, edginess transparent on his features. Flaky gave his hand a supportive squeeze and spoke words of encouragement. This was a step for the better, but he was dubious and uncertain if he'd go along with it, or deny any help. He feared his abrasive side would be called out and he'd refuse the help of the war veteran he so truly detested. His brown nosing behavior made him irritable to say least, and he willed that he wouldn't get bothered.

The irksome soldier was not going to get on his nerves—he hoped for that much.

He looked sideways at the waiting redhead, her bright eyes saying that he had all the time he needed. She was so kind, he couldn't let her down. She wouldn't mind if he failed on his first attempt, it was bound to happen, but he wasn't hyped to feel the sense of disappointment that flooded into her. It was time to either work up and try to correct the mistakes of his path or delude the other two into thinking he was fixed; the former was the goal he wished to achieve.

"Are you ready? I a-already called Flippy beforehand and asked if he'd be alright with doing this," said Flaky seeing his concern. "If you don't want to do this you don't have to. We can a-always go back home—" Home; that was how he referred to it now. "—and watch a movie. Really Lifty, don't think I'm forcing you to do this."

"You're not forcing me to do anything," Lifty snapped back annoyed that she was questioning his will to do this. But upon seeing her solemn face, the girl biting her cheek from inside from the outburst, he reminded himself that he needed to be patient. Patient and kind was the way, Flaky had said, and he needed to learn that. "I didn't mean it like—it just came out—ugh." He wiped a hand down his face and huffed. "Look, you're not forcing me to do anything okay? I agreed to this myself, and I'm not gonna be a pussy and wimp out right now."

Flaky turned her eyes away, staring apprehensively at the elevating stairs and fretting over the worry of the two butting heads. Yes they had gotten along somewhat decently at the fair—if that meant they dealt with each other's presence for five minutes before the bickering started up again—but that didn't mean that Flippy would show any niceness to the twin anymore. It had been a once in a lifetime opportunity, the two of them standing the other, but that had passed on. Currently, she was fearing what would go down should one let the wrong thing slip.

"Okay, but if you want to leave at any time just tell me. I'll t-tell Flippy we have something planned, I think he'll understand, and we can go home in a—"

"Flaky," Lifty grabbed her moving lips to shut her up, "stop thinking of the worst. I don't know why you're the one panicking anyways, soldier boy likes you. You're not the person that he wants to stab and break their bones, are you?"

No matter how true that was, she couldn't conceal her bubbling unease. What if Flippy stabbed him with a pencil? What if he did it in the eye? What if because of the stab, Lifty would have to get a glass eye? And the glass eye wouldn't match and fall out sometimes and—"I'm not panicking," Flaky smiled coyly to hide her obvious fear. "I'm just wondering, u-um, what would you like for lunch?"

The trek up the steps was like the previous one—Lifty exaggerating and complaining that they should just put a seat lift and Flaky unfazed by it. She held open the glass doors, Lifty becoming anxious as he walked through them, sticking to and waiting for her to come inside before moving on. The library was vacant as always, except for over the shelves where he saw a sailor hat. He was going to ask Flaky if she had a clue who they were, but she had rushed on to the checkout counter.

"Egh," the twin had trouble repressing the gag of disgust as how the vet's face lit up as he saw the redhead. No doubt they were talking about boring topics again, and it was barely the beginning of their meet. He went and sat on one of the red plush couches, the kind that he would find at an old retirement home, and it was about as comfortable as if he'd been sitting on wood. It was always the squishy looking furniture that turned out to be hard as a rock.

"So where is the little ass—" Flaky glowered at Flippy, preventing him from finishing his affectionate nickname for the other. "I mean . . . butt. Where is he, thought I saw him come in after you."

The tables where she'd thought he had sat at were empty when she looked, leading her gaze to the couch he occupied. "There he is," she covered her mouth and held back a giggle as, while trying to get comfortable, his back cracked audibly.

"Shit," Lifty grumbled rubbing his now hurting back. He would need a chiropractor to fix his misplaced spine, and he didn't have time for that. "Hey, soldier, why don't you replace these damn couches? One day, someone's gonna break their back and sue you for it."

"Now why would I do that?" Flippy said. They sat on the cement seats, Flaky bolting up and choosing to stand rather than sit for an unknown reason, and the veteran muttering that maybe he would talk to the city about new chairs.

"Hm~ glad you're finally talking my advice instead of blocking me out like a dumbass."

"So now you're putting the blame on me for this? For your information, I don't sit on these chairs so I wouldn't know if they were uncomfortable."

"And whose fault is that~? I think you should take the blame—"

"And I think you should just be quiet before—"

Enough! She was not going to sit around and have the two boys who were supposed to get along this one time fighting! Sick of it, Flaky held her hand up to cover his spilling mouth. "Lifty, Flippy, stop. Be nice. Y-you two always fight and I can't . . well I can't stand it. Can you please keep yourselves for just an hour?"

Flippy winced at her punishing tone. "But Flaky—"

"It's not my damn fault—" Lifty interrupted.

"It's him who's being a jerk—"

"Soldier boy's being a big dick—"

"Stop it! If you can't behave . . j-just behave!" Flaky cried out. "Really . . . I think that we could all be g-good friends if you two just got along. We could get together, and Flippy y-you could show Lifty how to be nicer, Lifty, you could tell him about yourself. I don't understand why you guys always argue and . ."

Girls always had high dreams. They wanted the world to be lollipops and sunshine, but that wasn't how it was. At all. In their mind, they believed everyone should love everyone and nobody should fight. But if the world worked like that, did she really believe that the two green haired males would be giving her looks that contradicted it?

Lifty and Flippy exchanged sickened looks. Friends? With him? Please, not even in another world where they were the only two boys who could use friendship to save the world would they put their differences aside. It just wasn't possible, they were born to be enemies.

"No that wouldn't be such a good idea," they began, but being taken aback when they saw the full power of Flaky's eyes on them. Hope, pleading, and hurt were pooled in them as she whispered a small please, her hands cupped together under her chin.

It was disturbing how much this meant to her, and from the look on the other's face they wouldn't be the one to break the news to her. They wouldn't want to be known as the douche bag from now on.

"Well I guess if it means that much to you . . ." Flippy caved. "We can let it be, if just for a bit."

Such a kiss ass. Not to be outdone, Lifty leaned in front of him and smiled pleasantly. "Yeah Flaky, you don't have to worry~ I promise that I'll be on my best behavior for you."

"And I promise," Flippy's hand gripped the side of his face, shoving him back forcefully on the couch, "that I'll be extra nice today if it'll make you happy! You know that I like seeing you happy."

Lifty growled and slapped his hand away. "Oh really now? What if somebody, oh I don't know who, just came and kicked you in the shin. Here, let me give you an example."

"An example?-" The searing pain shot up the vet's leg, coming from his only boot protected shin and a result of the twin's anger kick. Flaky jumped at his groan. She hadn't been able to see the act of violence from her standing pose. Flippy rubbed the bruising spot absently and bared his teeth in a deep growl. "So funny. You are the laugh master.

"You know what would be funnier? Like super funny? I know that you'll just love this; you'll be dying from laughter." Immaturity and spite had taken control, Flippy leaning forward and grabbing the legs of the couch. He was bound to be punished by the staring redhead later, so why should he not carry on his plans.

A deep creaking and a stifled yelp were accompanied by a voluminous thunk.

"L-Lifty!" The shy girl ran to where the twin was sprawled back on the floor. He groaned and said that his back was cracked back in place, but now he would have neck problems. "A-are you hurt anywhere? Badly hurt?" Her delicate fingers were running over his chest and back, prodding to see of he felt pain.

"I'm fine," Lifty groaned and grabbed her moving hands from trailing over him anymore. "But that jerkwad did that on purpose. You think he's so innocent, well he's not."

The soldier's smile was as innocent as crying puppies.

"Who? Me?"

xXx

"No! You're doing it wrong, who told you to do that? Are you even listening to the steps I'm telling you?"

The aggravating goody goody's voice was right in his ear as he pointed out the mistakes he had made. An hour later and the air conditioning cut off forty minutes ago, this was already turning into a bust. Lifty strongly wanted to learn what to do and what not to do when it came to real life situations, but the constant correction was freaking annoying.

Like, beyond annoying.

It was like his mom coming in the morning before a school day. She knew that he would be tired and hoping to sleep in, but she insisted on opening the damn curtains all the way. Added to the sunshine and pep that was too high to begin with, she'd abruptly change moods and yell at him to get up. Just an example, but it fit just fine with this.

"I'm just doing what you told me to do." Lifty growled. He pulled out the chair and beckoned Flaky to sit.

"Well, you're not doing it well enough," contradicted Flippy. "After she sits down you don't just stand there like a buffoon and make ape faces, you take your own seat. Haven't you ever acted as a gentleman? Oh right, you haven't, my bad, but I would've thought you'd know the basics of being polite."

"I gave her a compliment, what else do I need ta know?" He took his own seat and planted his face on the table. This was so stupid, he wouldn't need to know how to be nice to a girl in life. He'd like to think he wouldn't, anyways, so he'd have a reason for believing this was a waste of energy. Giving girls an endless stream of compliments wasn't what he had signed up for, he already knew how to do that, he had signed up for learning how to resist the temptation of stealing.

Flippy sat on the table, tugging his dog chains. "Really now? And what was the compliment he gave you, Flaky?"

"I-it was a nice one," Flaky stuttered, taking interest in her fingers as if they were engaging, "he told me that . . my hmamir . . ." Her bangs dropped to hang and block her eyes. The last words of her sentence coming out murmured, Flippy nor Lifty could hear her.

"What? Flakes you have to speak louder, I can't hear you. Please repeat what you said."

"I said that he told me my hair looks clmeamer . . ." Color rising into her face, Flaky coughed into her fist and smiled weakly. "H-He said my hair looked cleaner." A rude to some compliment, but she took it warmly. The last thing he had said about her hair was she needed to wash it before people started thinking of her as dirty.

The veteran scowled at the meager compliment. He snapped his fingers at Lifty, knowing that she deserved something better than being acknowledged by her clean hair. "That's another point I'm docking from your score, you don't tell girls that their hair is only cleaner. What are you trying to do? Make them think they aren't pretty?"

"N-no Flippy I really don't mind; I don't think h-he meant it like that. I know my hair is . . I-I thought it was a nice compliment—"

Groaning, Lifty took his own seat, infuriating Flippy even more when he saw the twin's elbows on the table. He put a stop to the conversation as he admitted the worst thing possible: Defeat. "Maybe I'm not cut out for this, honestly. You two can go be good people and help the world or some shit like that, but I don't know if I can." He had badly wanted for Flaky to be proud that he had put effort into it, even if he didn't show it, and it was embarrassing that he had quit so easily.

It was a challenge though, and he wasn't one for challenges. He enjoyed the easy way in life where any and all things he wanted were just an arm's reach and swipe away. But he didn't want to resort back to stealing, he was refusing the urges to get his hands on possessions that weren't guarded and jack them. Unless this little session would magically cure him of the greed disease, that was the easiest path in life.

The person who spoke up and called bull on his statement was the one he thought would let him slip by, Flaky.

Flaky shook her head in refusal at the testimony of defeat, denying his request of giving up. "No, Lifty, n-no. You think you can't do this, but I know t-that you can. You just . . need to try harder! I know that part of you don't want to do this and you might think it's d-dumb, but I know there's also another part that really does want to change!

"If you just tried harder," she went on, her voice growing stronger, "I think, that in a-a few weeks you'll break this habit! I know they say old habits are hard to b-break, but I believe with some encouragement this will be a thing of the past."

Lifty turned his head to her, an uplifted eyebrow and turned down lips regarding to the small motivational speech she gave. Stare flickering to the awestruck solider who had let his straight stand slip into a hunch, he glanced back at the determined redhead. She wasn't looking detoured by his silence, her hands clenched as her hard gaze bored into him.

He wasn't going to let a girl beat him when it came to determination, no, that made him appear weak, and he wasn't weak. All he could do was suck it up and be a man—a man who wasn't feeling friendly towards the niceness rule.

"Alright," he finally got out, "if you're gonna get all motivation and willpower on me whenever I decide to give up, then . . . damn, you're smarter than you come along to be." He grinned widely at her humble blush, awareness coming back to her, and she hid behind her hair once more.

Pointing to the seat across of him, he said for Flippy to take a seat. "Guess you'll be stuck with me for a bit longer soldier, sucks for you~"

Flippy shook his head to rid it of the bad thoughts drifting inside. They were very bad thoughts. Very. "You seem smug about that," he pointed out before holding the same old wallet he had on their first meeting day in his fingers. "It's as though you think that this is going to be a challenge for me; because it's not. We're gonna start at the basics again, think you can handle that, thief?"

Challenge riddled and dripped from his tone, as well as flashing in his forest green eyes, something the twin couldn't ignore. The subconscious stinging started up in his hand, like his skin cells were recalling the abuse they had gone through.

He scratched the hand and imagined the irritated pink it had once been, the snapping of the ruler that sounded over and again.

"If you think that's the way to go, then why not. Lay it on me, and I'm not stupid enough to make the same mistake again." Meaning he wouldn't try the librarian again-what a fail that was. He liked the feeling in his hand, and he planned to keep it that way.

Flippy threw down the wallet, the leather money holder sliding to the middle of the table, and crossed his arms. Satisfied and almost sure of the crook's next move, he waited and nodded to say to reach for it.

Lifty wasn't going to be fooled that quickly though. Scanning under the table for some unseen ruler or torture device, he sat straight again after finding nothing of the sort. But he was vaguely aware of the knife in the army boy's pocket. "So I just reach for it? No tricks? Because I fucking swear, if you stab my hand, I'm gonna . ." He would be screaming out every swear in the book as Flaky tried dislodging the offending object.

"It's nothing like that, just get it. Go ahead, grab it."

Throwing caution to the wind and accepting any pain that would be inflicted on him, he reached and grabbed the wallet from its spot. His flinch was visible as he awaited the sharp snap of the ruler, a blade in his wrist, or any pain, but his waiting was proved vain for it never came. Instead, Flippy sat watching him with a slight smirk playing on his lips.

Suspicious, the twin checked inside it and found only dollar bills and a twenty. That wasn't the miniature laser to the eye trick or ink squirting pen he'd expected.

"What the fuck," he uttered dumbfounded. "What's the catch on this then? I took your wallet, now what? The point?"

"No point," Flippy answered coolly. "I just wanted you to look at it, now give it back. Can you do that? Just hand it back to me." His outstretched hand opened for the wallet, receiving it from a confounded Lifty without a fight or argument on his part. "You did great, now I want you to do something for me."

"W-wait slow down, what was all that wallet jizz for if I didn't even learn anyth—"

"I want you to go to my jeep and get my books from under the glove compartment. It's in front of the passenger's seat, you can't miss them. They're titled 'History of US' and the other is 'Temperamental Animals', can you do that?" The green head threw a set of car keys to the further confused thief. Without an answer to his repeated questions of what the wallet test was for, and a low mutter on how come he couldn't get his lazy ass to his jeep, he sent the other out of the library.

Flaky herself was processing why her friend had put him through a pointless test. If it didn't help or hurt him, then why was it important or even worth going through? Curiously she edged closer to the still smug boy and asked, "H-hey Flips, why did you do that? Was there a real p-point or were you just . . yanking his chain?"

"Oh, there was a reason for it," stated Flippy in a successful tone.

". . What was it?"

xXx

Outside, Lifty was passing every car in the parking lot and looking for the right vehicle. The massive jeep should have stood out to him first, but for an odd reason it was the last blended into the smaller crowd. Lame camouflage.

He clicked the opening button on the keys and climbed into the passenger's seat, feeling weird that he was in his nemesis' car. Well the books weren't going to get up and cone to him, he figured and began shifting through the mess of papers the retired soldier had.

xXx

Flippy leaned back in the chair, its legs creaking in resistance under his weight. "I knew what I was doing Flakes, did you see how he didn't fight me back when I asked for him to give me my wallet? Don't you think that at any other time he'd argue against me and try to keep it because of the money?"

Flaky thought his reasoning over before his plan began unravelling in front of her eyes and it became clearer. It hadn't dawned on her that he had a cause behind his little test, but obviously he had planned two steps ahead. A skillful trait he had needed during the war, and it had only proved helpful in this session.

"Y-yeah I think I see what you did . . but do you think he was just doing it out of confusion . . or is he actually changing . . ."

xXx

Lifty had pushed aside all the clutter and was seeing the jeep carpet-about time. The two books were nowhere in sight though; he grunted at the extra work and began moving and piling more papers. "Damn vet, he needs to get his crap cleaned up." For a boy who was supposedly the best of the best, he was messy as hell.

The growling from the back seat hadn't reached his ears yet as he found and lifted the two books onto his lap. He read the titles, yawning afterwards at how boring they were, and was about to hop back out of the jeep. The deep and threatening rumble that sounded by his elbow froze him though, the twin slowly turning to see what company he had.

xXx

"That's for you to decide," He replied distantly, "if you want to think the best, then I believe he might be taking influence from you. If this continues on, you would be seeing a bigger change in him than you ever thought before."

Smiling at the thought of a transformed Lifty, Flaky brushed her hair away. "T-thanks Flippy, I didn't take you for psychiatrist type of person." She giggled and poked his arm teasingly, but grew curious again while remembering an unimportant detail. "Flippy, I need to ask, w-what ever happened to Pitch? After I told you I couldn't dog sit for you, y-you said you'd figure something out. Did you find a new pet sitter?"

That was when the joke seemed to get funnier, Flippy grinning enthusiastically now and laughing a throaty chuckle. The chuckle grew into a full laughter where he bent over the table, having to cover his mouth and body shaking at the inside joke. Flaky waited for his fit of laughter to be over before she proceeded in asking, "What's so f-funny?"

"O-oh, nothing," snorted Flippy. "Nothing at all.

xXx

Lifty was frozen as the gleaming yellow eyes held his anxious, almost fearing, emerald ones. They lowered to stare at the sharpened canine chompers the growling dog had, a dribble of froth and saliva dripping to the floor. So this was Pitch? . . . It was nice meeting him, definitely one of the more cuddly animals he had met in his life, but now it was time to high tail it out of there.

"Good dog," he said hushed, scooting back from it and worrying that his arm was going to have a jaw locked in it soon. "Good dog. I'm gonna go now, so just stay there while I get out and leave you alo—"

The dog's vicious barking told him that there wasn't a possibility he'd be able to talk reasoning into it; it really was time to get out! Screw the books! He bumped back against the closed door as the rabid animal climbed onto the arm of the seat, clawing the thin coverings beneath it and snarling at him. The clicking of all doors being locked as his elbow slipped and pressed the lock down was the sound of death bells to him.

Death by a demonic dog, what could be worse.

"Nice dog, good dog," Lifty whispered, hastily trying to open the door handle and failing in unlocking it effectively. "Stop it right now! Please?!"

His pleas were ignored as Pitch snapped his teeth and lunged for his vulnerable neck.

Lifty spun around to the window and began pounding on it using both fists, shouting as the space closed between them. "FUCK NO!"

xXx

Chehehe don't know where this chapter came from xD Don't have a lot to say except THIS STORY NEEDS TO DIE AND BE DONE WITH GRR. I really do hate making long multichapters . . . but I always have ideas for them! D:

*the song Sunshine Lollipops and Rainbows by Lesley Gore comes on* cuz you're in love, and love is here to staaayyy! *decapitates Crystal and Boony and putts their heads away using a golf club*