"Freddie, you show off, stop showing off!" Carly vivaciously narrowed her eyes at him as he strained to hold his focus. It had been a week since the incident at the Taozhou Bazaar and the studious boy had been slowly but surely mastering his new talents.
"Mwo! Kewp doin wrt yur doin. Aw wike irt!" Sam protested, her lips moving in an effort to speak around a mouthful of food. Sam chewed and swallowed, opening her mouth once more. "Fruit me!" At her command, a parade consisting of a green grape, a cubed piece of swiss cheese and a strawberry slice hovered above the kitchen counter and floated across the room, circling around Sam's golden curls in a playful dance before dropping into her mouth one by one. Sam moaned in pleasure, "Oh my god Freddie, how come I never realized before how studly and brilliant of a guy you are? We should totally date!"
Freddie's once focused expression cracked into a hopeful smile. "Really? Well I have next Thursday night ope-"
"Ew. Grody. No. You wish. That was like… a joke... a really bad one." Sam's face contorted in repulsion.
Freddie scowled at her in vexation, "Your face is like a joke… a really bad one." He toppled backwards as soon as the sofa pillow smacked into his cheek. "That's not funny Sam. SAM. NO. STOP IT. STOP IT SAM. IT'S NOT FUNNY."
Carly scooped up the plate of the remaining ingredients that hadn't been sent aflutter to Sam's mouth and poured it into her salad bowl, tossing it lightly. She added a spritz of orange vinaigrette and the brunette happily skipped to the couch that Sam was previously occupying. She used her knife to fold a romaine salad leaf over her fork, before daintily bringing it to her mouth.
"OH GAWD. OH GAWD SAM, I CAN'T BREAF." The blonde was straddling a suffocating Freddie who was gasping for air underneath a throw pillow.
Carly delicately chewed her dinner.
"I'M DYING SAM. I'M DYING." Freddie managed to squeak out as he briefly strong-armed the pillow out of his face. It was fastidiously forced back into place.
Carly studied her fingernails. She frowned slightly as she realized her nail polish was chipping off. She made a note to herself to repaint them later.
With a final shudder, Freddie's legs jerked and kicked once more before his body finally stopped moving. With a grin, Sam flopped herself onto the couch right next to Carly. She plucked a julienne piece of chicken from the brunette's bowl before throwing it up in the air and catching it in her rapturous jaws, biting and chewing the morsel like a shark in water.
"Should I begin penning his obituary? Fredward Benson, RIP, always fought the good fight. Hope for the cure for the common cold died as he did." Carly gave a somber speech.
"Or Fredward Benson, RIP, dating-age girls everywhere rejoiced when he croaked," she snickered. "Nah. He's just dozing." Sam clarified, "I put my sleephold on him."
"Mm." Carly looked behind the couch at the brown-haired boy who was sprawled out on the floor. She smiled. It was just like Sam to choke Freddie until he was comatose and still be thoughtful enough to slide the throw pillow underneath his head and tuck him in with the living room blanket. His soft snores quietly thrummed throughout the room while he peacefully slumbered.
"Hey." Sam whispered as she pulled Carly up from her seat. "Come up to the roof with me. I wanna show you something."
Sam nimbly harvested three soda cans from the blue recyclables bin and rapidly crumpled them together into a tight sphere the size of a golf-ball. She picked out three more cans and repeated the motion. Sparks flew out between her fingertips at the rate she was folding the metal in on each other until she finally had a nice collection of approximately twenty-two tin balls. The twenty-third ball, she couldn't use because it bursted into flames at the speed and strength the blonde had been manipulating it with. Sam paused to look out over the lighted view of Seattle before setting down the makeshift golf ball. She situated herself behind Carly, wrapping her arms around the slender girl, setting her arms and legs straight before backing off to let her swing.
"Sam, about what happened last week…" Carly swung at the ball, smacking it a pitiful twenty feet over the side of Bushman Plaza. "I don't want you taking that kind of risk again. It's not safe out there. You're not always going to get so lucky."
Sam took the golf club from her and eased into a batting stance easily. She hit a drive with all her might and watched as it cut through the night sky, sparkling briefly in the moonlight before it faded from her vision. "How far do you think that went? About seven miles?"
The brunette sighed. "Don't change the subject. I'm serious, haven't you heard about the stuff that's been in the news lately. Like the masked robbers who've been holding up gas stations and burglarizing pawn shops? You're not invincible Puckett, no matter how strong and fast you are, you still bleed and bruise and get sick, just like the rest of us."
"Carly… I wasn't about to let that creep hurt you. End of story. Nobody touches me, my friends, my family or my food." Sam announced, very matter of factly.
Carly's strong resolve softened as she sensed the protectiveness in her friend's voice. Sam's headstrong attitude was one of the things that frustrated Carly the most about the shorter woman. But ironically, it was also the quality that the brunette found most endearing. "Okay, then I guess I should say thank you again for saving my life."
"Yup, that's twice this week cupcake, I betta be gettin' paid soon. Heroism doesn't just grow on trees you know." The fighter greedily submitted.
"It grows on a tree named Sam." Carly pecked her blonde friend on the cheek as she pulled the golf club away from her hand. "I had twenty bucks in my purse this morning and I know you already stole it, so I consider that ample payment."
"How did you know?" Sam defensively cried out.
"HELLO. Mind reader? You broadcasted it loud and clear while you were in the middle of committing the crime, Sam." Carly swung at her second ball this time with more determination. It flew twice as far as it did before, landing with three bounces on the roof of a lower building.
"See, I don't like your power. It's evil and unfair." Sam grabbed a handful of cans, twisting and molding them together like paper mache to form a pointy tin hat. She placed it on top of her blonde head defiantly. Gotta protect my brain. Gotta protect my brain. My brain is my brain, not your brain, so leave it alooonee.
"Not entirely." Carly assertively argued, "I don't really like to use it. You might not think so but I'm into respecting people's privacy. Especially yours, I know how much it means to you."
"Uh huh, sure you are." Sam quipped, not even pretending as though she believed the girl she was standing next to. Sam knew that if she had been in Carly's place, she'd be camped outside every ATM machine stealing passwords and rollin' in the Benjamins.
"It's true. How long have we been friends? You know I can tell when you're keeping something from me. Especially when Freddie's around us, I can sense you're closing something off about yourself. I haven't been prying though. I care too much about our friendship." Carly said before taking a third swing. She missed. Completely. The tin ball wavered back and forth as though it was teasing her for her error. "It's funny because my friendship with Freddie seems to be the complete opposite than you and I. I don't feel like he has any walls. Freddie's an open book with me. I actually... I haven't told either of you yet but I think… my empathy skill is expanding."
"What do you mean?" Sam curiously asked as she used her toe to nudge Carly's feet apart, correcting her stance.
"Well, the other day, Freddie was working on his homework in the living room when I was trying to come up with more iCarly skits with my note cards and then… I felt it."
"Felt what? The realization that we are friends with the geekiest boy alive, next to Stephen Hawking?" Sam sneered.
"Play nice." Carly chastised. "No. I felt how much Freddie wanted to ace this class of his. I felt the pressure he was put under to perform, to be a good student, a good son, how hard he worked to make sure he didn't disappoint anyone, including himself. I understood how much he wanted to make his mother proud, how in the back of his mind, he was thinking about her. I don't think he's a boy anymore Sam, he's grown up to be just this really great, mature, nice guy. I mean… I FELT that Sam, in my core. How is that possible? I just looked into his eyes and it all came at me at once."
Sam's stomach sank and she felt like she had a frog caught in her throat. "Um.. I… I don't know Carly. I mean, I guess I never really took the time out to see him like you do." Sam didn't want to try to explain her confused feelings.
Carly smiled at her friend warmly. "I know you and Freddie have always been at odds, arch-enemies and all, but sometimes you should lay off him a bit, you know?"
Sam decided to change the subject, "Oooh! Carly look." Sam grabbed the golf club from her and pointed its handle towards the night sky. "It's a shooting star! Let's make a wish!" Sam closed her eyes and clasped her hands together, looking hopeful.
Carly's gaze searched upwards before returning back to match the gaze of her best friend. "…That's a plane Sam."
"Oh."
Carly and Sam both fell down laughing and spent the rest of the night trading secrets, wishing on planes and hitting tin golf balls off the windy rooftop of the Bushwell apartment building. No two girls in Seattle could ever be happier. Freddie also had a very pleasant sleep that night. He dreamt about assembling electronic circuitry.
Cal walked through the streets of Chinatown returning from his interview with the Asian family who owned and managed the Taozhou Bazaar. The police reports had been clear enough about what had happened. Three kids had found two criminals who were planning to burglarize the store after closing. They had an altercation and they were able to fight off the thugs. It wasn't in Cal's nature to underestimate people but it still didn't click with him how these three kids managed to leave with barely a scratch while the two men appeared to have been beaten to a bloody pulp. Something strange was going on and he intended to get to the bottom of it.
Cal kicked a pebble down the sidewalk and thought about the last time he had seen Seattle. He had been sitting in a smoothie shop with his four young friends and their teacher before the local cops recognized him and chased him out of the store. He remembered running until his legs ached, until his lungs gave out. The sleeve of his cardigan had torn on a metal wire as he jumped a fence and flung himself into a dumpster. The garbage reeked but he held his breath and desperately tried to keep in a wheeze, was determined to not give himself away with a sound. He had thought that he was home free when the cops' flashlights passed over him. It wasn't until he felt his collar being roughly grabbed that he knew he had been caught.
He had sat in a jail for two weeks seething. He was only twenty-four years old, how did he end up here? Those ignorant fools. Couldn't they see? Nuclear power was the wave of the future. So what if there was toxicity and pollution? So what if the energy harnessed was utilized by angry rogue countries to make bombs and start wars that spread chaos and suffering? So what if people died by the millions? IT IS A NECCESSITY. Society as a whole advanced when the masses lived in agony. This was the ultimate universal truth. In World War II, as millions died, technological innovation thrived and brilliant minds wept in celebration. How many things had been invented and discovered within thirty years? Aircraft, sonar, submarines, satellites, digital technology, space travel, radar, microwaves, fuel cells, surgical technology, vacuum tubes, flamethrowers, synthetic rubber, rifle scopes, Velcro, the invention of Penicillin to treat bacteria and wounds! Scientific knowledge flourished! In two thousand years of peace, what was it that Switzerland contributed to the world? Nothing but a cuckoo clock and a bar of chocolate.
When Cal had finally been taken from his holding cell and escorted to the interrogation room, he was sat down to face two stern looking FBI agents. He was sure that they were going to threaten him, to beat him, to put him on criminal trial for being a domestic terrorist. He never expected what was about to happen.
"Am I hearing this correctly?" His restless leg syndrome kicked in as the fugitive processed their offer. "I agree to work for the Federal Bureau of Investigations as one of their agents and my criminal history is wiped clean? I become a free man?" He slumped back in his chair in shock. The handcuffs grated harshly at his wrists.
"Be grateful that someone at the top thinks you're a genius Calvin Zimmerman. Apparently, we'd rather work with you than imprison you," the gruff voice of the dark-skinned man puffed in his ear.
"Yeah… okay, I agree. Where do I sign?" That was the day Cal, the misunderstood, prodigal, Ivy League drop-out, fugitive transformed into government scientist and FBI Agent Calvin Zimmerman, armed and equipped with a license to kill.
He rattled his dark trench-coat, trying to shake off the night chills. He couldn't afford to waste time reminiscing right now. He had a mission he was assigned to. An anti-gravity device… He rubbed his chin thoughtfully as he inspected the black and white screenshot photo in his hand. He didn't know who it was that anonymously tipped off the FBI about this new piece of technology but he owed this stranger a handshake. I'm taking this machine and I'll shoot whoever tries to stop me.
He stepped out into the curbside and raised his hand up, hailing a cab. He caught the eye of a driver and the yellow, checker-striped car pulled up in front of him. Cal opened the door and ducked into the vehicle, tilting the rim of his fedora hat down to avoid eye-contact. He gave the driver directions to return him back to his hotel. As the taxi-cab signaled and merged back into traffic, a tin ball fell out of the sky and cracked the windshield, startling both cabby and passenger.
"I was having all this trouble controlling my powers before because I didn't know how it worked." Freddie explained to Carly as he sat on a bean-bag chair facing her. "But now I do. I mean… when I do it, it looks like I'm picking something up, but that's not it at all. How do I explain it…" He looked around at the iCarly studio and admired how considerably cleaner it was compared to what it had been the last time he'd seen it, wrecked to bits. There were still holes in the walls with objects taped to it, but at least the floors were tidy. "I think we need a demonstration."
Carly picked up a nearby stuffed animal. It was a teddy bear dressed in a Navy uniform her father had given to her for her fifth birthday. "Admiral Fluffles would like to fly." She set it in front of him. "The Admiral would also like Sam and Spencer to be back from the Groovy Smoothie with our shakes too, 'cause his cottony insides are feeling kinda empty." Carly frowned, patting at her own lean belly.
Freddie gifted Carly with a shy smile, "I've got a better idea."
Carly receptively tilted her ear to him, "You think we should lock them both out of the apartment for being sluggish snail-turtle-sloths?"
Freddie walked over to the stereo and switched it on, flipping through a number of radio stations before settling on some calming jazz music. He dimmed the lights with his mind, pulling the dial down. "Nope, why should Admiral Fluffles have all the fun when I can help you fly?" he asked, stepping closer to Carly.
"Me?" Carly brought her hand up to her chest. As soon as she did, she and Freddie shot into the air, their feet leaving the ground. Reflexively, she wrapped her arms around his shoulders and held onto him, panicked at the new experience. It felt like she was walking on water, her feet intuitively searched for a hard surface to push against.
"Easy, I've got you." Freddie chuckled as he held her close. He continued his lesson, "I'm not technically… doing anything to us. I'm just affecting the gravity around us. I just focused on a point in the space above us and willed it to become… heavy, kind of like a very weak black hole."
"I can push," Freddie described. Carly's body, suspended in air began to drift away from him. "I can pull…" She grinned, enjoying the ride as she floated back to him. "And… a few other things, I can dissipate gravity entirely." Everything around them began hovering upwards. "But that would be bad." At his words, the room settled back down.
"May I have this dance?" Freddie requested with a smile, holding his arm out to Carly.
"Yes you may." Carly gave him her hand and let herself be pulled against him. She looped her arms around him and he set his hands on the small of her back. Their bodies swayed together mid-air, circling slowly around the room. Carly looked at him in deep consideration, pursing her lips. She didn't know if it was just good lighting or something else entirely but Freddie looked… kind of handsome actually. His hair was swept to the side looking soft and feathery and not realizing what she was doing until she had done it, she ran her fingers through it.
The corner of his lips creased into a sheepish smile. He stirred closer, tilting his head and nuzzled his cheek against hers affectionately. "Carly, it's always been so easy to love you." He humbly admitted.
Carly's body froze. She didn't quite know how to respond to that. Freddie had always insisted that he was in love with her before, but she always took it as a jest. They were kids, they played house, they didn't know any better. But… the three of them were beginning to grow up now. They would soon be adults partaking in adult relationships. They way he just said it as he held her, his voice was so sure of it. It was so convincing. "Is something wrong?" His eyes hinted at worry as he looked at her.
"No…no, nothing's the matter Freddie. I'm just… I'm very flattered." She gave him a forced smile as she wrestled internally with her feelings. Love. Carly thought. Could it be?
Sam stared wistfully at the floating, dancing couple from the hallway, smoothies in tow. Don't be stupid Sam… You knew this was going to happen. You've seen the movies. The good guy always wants the good girl. They ALWAYS end up together. There's no story where an aggressive, maladjusted, seclusive juvenile delinquent like you gets a happy ending. You thought you had a chance? Not in this life. Sam set down the tray of smoothies in the middle of the hallway and ran off, fighting back her tears.
Carly's eyebrows knotted together. Something felt wrong. Really really wrong. Her stomach dropped and she was feeling… heartbreak. Why would she be feeling heartbreak? She began breathing heavily, it was suddenly difficult to take in a full breath of air. This was perplexing. Something told her to look up and her eyes automatically went to the glass door to see if anyone was there. Not a soul.
Author's Note: Thank you to ThePhantomHokage, RazzleDazzy and Shanny997 for your enthusiastic reviews. So, this chapter was mostly about setting up the love-triangle, explaining Freddie's powers further and introducing the villain of the story. I've already decided who the final pairing will be so you can stop campaigning. ^_^ I also need to mention that I find it so... strange how passionate you all are about the Seddie/Creddie couples you rep for. I'll end up alienating half of you regardless of which direction I go and there are a dozen new romance fluff stories every week about your prospective shippings so I don't know how big of a deal you should make of mine. This will not be OT3. As sockstar asked about, yes, eventually you'll see Freddie, "tear shit up with his mind powers." His real action is a few chapters away though because of the romance subplot implementation. I... I hate writing romance but it seems that it's what all the fans want so I will deliver.
I'm very happy with my following right now. I'll be responding to every PM I recieve and as always, as long as you keep reviewing, my fingers will keep clicking to bring you more chapters.