End of the school year was boring but busy. I worked on this chapter while I was at the beach. One of my longer chapters. Hope you enjoy! I own nothing!
Chapter 8 (Goodbyes, "Magic" rocks, and The Separation)
Brick's POV:
Today we leave for Scotland. It usually takes about ten days to make it, but I believe we can make it in eight. (A/N: This is where it gets good!) The sun shines brightly down on the carriage that the princesses will be riding in. Servants load the carriage with food and other supplies while my brothers and I stand by watching.
"Can I help you with that? Do you need some assistance? That looks really heavy can I help?" Boomer wanders around the line of servants trying to find something to do.
"Forget it Booms they're not gonna let you help." Butch moans getting annoyed of Boomer's desire to help.
"Well at least I'm TRYING to DO something instead of leaning against the wall in shadow looking like a creeper." Boomer shot back. I try my best not to laugh, but I do crack a smile.
"Why you little….. Come here!" Butch pushes himself off the wall and starts chasing Boomer around. They bump into servants and Boomer uses one as a shield and ducks behind the poor guy. Butch and I both know that chasing Boomer is pointless because our little bro's just too fast. Back when we were little whenever we played tag Boomer always won. No matter who played.
"Hey! Watch it!" A stuck up voice echoed in Butch's direction. I look to see a puff ball girl I saw earlier. "Oh, it's you again." Her tone softens when she sees Butch. She gives him this disgusting look that I think she means for it to be attractive. Let me be the first to say; it's not.
"Uh… I'm engaged..." Butch stammers. The puff ball girl looks down disappointed. I decide I'm going to go 'help.'
"Butch don't you remember I told you that was nothing but a dream." I walk over and pat his shoulder. Butch gives me his infamous death glare.
"So he's single?" The girl wheezes. I shiver. Her voice is the MOST HORRID thing I've EVER heard. I nod my head.
"Single and ready to mingle,"
"You're dead." Butch whispers in my ear. I laugh nervously.
"He said you're cute." I egg on my fun for all it's worth because I know I'm gonna pay for it later.
"He did!" Puff ball screeches. I see Boomer pop up from behind her and gives me a questioning gesture. I signal for him to come so Boomer skips happily over.
"I'm Brick, this is Butch, and this is Boomer we're..."
"The legendary Jojo brothers I know! I'm Princess and it's a pleasure to meet you all." I put on my best fake smile.
"If you need any assistance call on us, or just Butch if you prefer." All the color in Butch's face drains away and transfers to Princess's face.
Buttercup arrives right before lunch wearing traveling clothes. She put all her personal things in the carriage and then walks over to my brothers and me.
"King said for you guys to come eat lunch with us before we leave." Buttercup announces striding up beside me.
"We would be honored." I bow. Buttercup takes my hand and pulls me up.
"Please don't do that it's just me."
"It's just you; the heir to the throne?"
"That's more Blossom than me." She glances down for a moment. She looks up with determination in her eyes, a look that I've only seen one person have, my father. "I want something more exciting than a life in the palace." I smile at the twinkle in her eyes. Buttercup doesn't have the personality of a queen, but if she wanted to she could be a dang good one.
Bubbles' POV:
I can describe lunch in one word, silent. Even with the guys at the table no one dares to even breathe; well, that's until… I see Butch lean over and whisper something in Buttercup's ear. She starts to laugh. Butch smirks. Buttercup covers her mouth with both of her hands.
"Is there a problem, Buttercup?" Dad clears his throat.
"Actually, yeah there is. I need to speak my mind for once." Buttercup calmly rises out of her seat with a smirk on her face.
"Buttercup please, don't" I whimper.
"Sorry Bubs we're about to leave and marry some Scottish scumbags, so I'm not going to keep everything in about this…"
"No! I'm going to speak!" Father stands up, his face turns purple and his whole body shakes. "I am tired of your stubbornness and your temper tantrums! All of your life you have been messing things up around the palace, harassing the servants with your endless pranks, teasing your poor innocent sisters, and flat out embarrassing all of my knights! You are no princess! I promised your mother I'd take care of you but I can't handle your incompetence any longer! Now leave this castle, get married to your suitor, do one thing good with your pitiful life and never return!" The room echoes with complete silence; that is, until I hear someone giggling.
Buttercup lifts up her head and laughs the hardest I've seen her laugh since the ball. She tries to play it off but I can see the shining tears streaming down her face.
"I always knew you hated me, but that, that was despising, terrorizing loathing. That was impressive 'O Father of mine. Nice show! Bravo! Brava! Congratulations! I honestly didn't think that you had that in you." Buttercups smile widens. "And to you my lovely audience," She turns her attention to the rest of us. A real smile plasters her face from ear to ear. "You've all been a lovely crowd. I'm terribly sorry but I'm going to have to bid you all a very fond Farwell." While she talks she slowly moves toward the door. "Until we meet again." Buttercup closes the door behind her during her last words. Father stands up and leaves in a huff.
"Did that really just happen?" Boomer's voice echoes throughout the large dining room. Butch rises out of his chair.
"I better go and see if she's ok." He leaves out the same door Buttercup did.
"I'll go and see if I can get Father to at least see us off." Blossom states and leaves the room. I just sit in silence. A small tear streams down my face.
Butch's POV:
Buttercup sits on a small, delicate swing in a secluded part of the garden underneath an apple tree. I go up and push her from behind. She grabs the ropes to keep herself from falling. When she looks up at me I barely recognize her. Tears stream down her face, eyes bloodshot and still watering; she looks somehow a lot older.
"What do you want?" She sighs and hunches her shoulders in a defeated manner. I shake my head thinking how stupid my idea is.
"I'm going to make myself look like a complete idiot trying to make you smile." Buttercup looks back up at me curious. "Here goes nothing." I smile. (A/N: I was writing and listening to random music and a song from Coraline came on so I came up with a parody for it and I'm gonna let Butch sing it to Buttercup. I own nothing!)
"Making up a song about my Sunshine,
She's a beast, she's real tall, she's a pal of mine,
She's as fierce as a lion in the eyes of everyone who ever laid their eyes on my Sunshine,
When she comes around adoring and I will never ever make it boring,
Our eyes will be on my Sunshine."
I finish; feeling like a moron. Then, Buttercup lifts her head and smiles. It's small and half-hearted, but it's still a smile. "Come on, we better get to the carriage before our siblings get all the good spots." I offer her my hand. She slaps it away and jets up from her seat with a mischievous smirk on her face.
"Race you!" Buttercup dashes off. I laugh and take off after her.
I follow Buttercup to the carriage. She tags the carriage and smirks.
"I win."
"That's only because you got a head start." I huff.
Bubbles already sits in the carriage. Boomer's strapping the horses to the carriage, and Brick leans up against a wall.
"You ok?" Brick walks over to Buttercup. She nods her head and smiles. "Alright, just a suggestion, unless you want to see your father again you'd better get in the carriage."
"Thanks Brick." Buttercup hops into the carriage and Bubbles gets out. Boomer goes to help Bubbles out.
I hear yelling and then a scream come from the front door of the castle. Brick and I exchange a glance and both draw our swords and rush inside. Brick kicks open the door and there lying on the floor holding her face is Blossom. Immediately Brick rushes to her side. I scout the area to make sure there are no immediate threats.
"What happened?" I turn to see Brick helping Blossom up. She's crying and holding her left cheek.
"I went to go and get Father. I found him fuming inside his study muttering about how much of a nuisance Buttercup is. He turned around and saw me then calmed down a little. I tried to talk him into coming down to see us off and he started yelling about Buttercup again. I started to defend Buttercup because I couldn't listen to any more of his remarks. Father dragged me down here saying I was just as bad as Buttercup, slapped me, and left…."
After hearing her story, I'm about to go kill that king myself. No king should treat his subjects, no less his DAUGHTERS like this. Brick put his hand on my shoulder.
"Calm down, this is not our fight." I realize that I'm shaking.
"Of course this is our fight! We're the princess's knights, are we not? We're their protectors. This is our fight more than anyone else's!" I start shaking even more. "You might not care for any of them but I sure as heck do! I'm not just gonna leave now!"
"Butch, you're being over emotional."
"Over emotional? Over emotional? I think you're not being emotional enough. That 'king' just slapped Blossom in the face! Aren't you just a little bit angry?"
"Of course I'm angry!" Brick screams. "I'm angry over all of this! The king, having to go to Scotland, the suitors, all of it! You're not the only one with feelings Butch!"
"But I'm the only one who will use them! You keep it all hidden; sometimes it even makes me wonder if you care about anything! You want to know the reason Boomer never comes to you about anything? He thinks you won't understand you're too cold for him!"
"At least I don't blow up over every little thing!"
I grab Brick's shirt, push him against the wall, and bring back my fist getting ready to punch. Brick struggles in my grasp.
"Butch! Brick! Stop right now!" Before I can stop myself my fist comes barreling down. A shadow moves in front of Brick's face. SMACK! The shadow falls to the floor. I back up, room spinning, and fall to my knees. A blurred Brick kneels beside the shadow. I grab my head and gradually the room stops spinning.
Vision clear I look at the shadow to see that it's Buttercup. She lays on the floor not moving. My eyes widen. I jump up and run to her side. Brick pushes me back.
"Stay back! You've caused enough damage!" I stand; too stunned to reply. Buttercup's eyes are closed; a large, red and purple whelp forming on her face. I can't believe I did that, wait a sec, I did that. I run a hand threw my hair and take a deep breath. My hands start to shake; not from anger but from guilt.
Buttercup's good eye flutters open. The other is swelled shut.
"Dang Butch, you got a good right arm." She smiles. "Dude, you look like you've seen a ghost. Calm down, I'm fine." She struggles to get up. Brick tries to help her. "I can get up by myself!" She pushes him away. I still don't move. Buttercup gets up and waves hand in front of my face. "Hello, earth to moron, wake up!" I blink and back away.
"Let's get to the carriage, we need to leave now. Before anything else happens or anyone else does something they regret." I make my way out the door not listening to Buttercup's echoing voice calling me back.
Blossom's POV:
Overall, today sucks. We're in the carriage making our way to Scotland. Brick said we won't be able to cover much ground today since we left so late. I look out the window.
The sun sets over the horizon. All types of trees blur together. Apple trees, orange, cherry, and oaks all fade together as I focus on the sky. Colors of beauty tower and melt together. Purple, pink, blue, and red all spread together like the water color paintings that Bubbles likes to do.
"We'll camp here for the night and start again first thing tomorrow." Brick states as we all gather around out little campsite. I walk up to Brick as he starts a fire.
"How long does it take to reach Scotland?" I sneak up behind him and ask. The fire starts up and burns Brick. He puts his burnt fingers in his mouth.
"It usually takes about ten days, but I think we can reach the shore in eight." Brick explains with his finger still in his mouth which made him hard to understand. I laugh. "What?" He asks; his fingers still lodged in his mouth. I continue to laugh and he crosses his eyes. "Oh," He realizes with a jolt, yanks his fingers, places them beside his legs, and yelps with pain. I bend over and grab the part of his hand that's not burnt.
"Let me see." He obeys and extends his fingers. The tops of both his index and middle fingers are a blistering red. "You need to go put your hand in the river. Don't keep it in there too long or you might deaden the nerves in your hand." (A/N: I'm not sure if that's true or not.) Brick gets up and starts to walk over to the river.
Butch decided he was going to take the first watch so here I am in my tent, alone, while Buttercup goes over to argue with Butch and Bubbles night fishing with Boomer. Brick's who knows where and I'm just sitting here bored. I'm not usually a diary type of person but with everything that's happened of late I kinda think writing down my life might be good.
Boomer's POV:
Originally, I wanted to go night fishing but now it turns out we're looking for sea shells in a RIVER. I love Bubbles and all, the perky personality, the way everything she does is sweet, and how she looks so cute when she laughs. Although I don't love freezing my fingers off in a river looking for stupid shells!
"Bubbles, could we please go back to the campsite? I think my fingers might be getting hypothermia." I whine as a determined Bubbles searches throughout the dark water.
"Are they turning purple and blue?" Looking down I see that my hands are bathed in a light blue and my fingertip are a light dark purple.
"Yes." I shake my head up and down furiously.
"Then you have hypothermia." She simply states. I start to panic.
"Bubbles, please, please, PLEASE can we go back?" She doesn't even acknowledge me. Her face stares straight into the water. I grab hold of her hands and bury my face in my arms. "See how cold I am? Look at my hands! PLEASE Bubbles; I don't want my hands to fall off! I really like my hands…." I start to whimper and wipe my now teary eyes.
During my whole little episode, she never moved. Her face stares into the water.
"What are you looking at?" I ask now interested.
"There's magic here." She finally looks at me. Wow, her eyes are glowing. Not, like, metaphorically but for real. "Look, in the water the glowing rocks. I thought we were looking for shells, but I guess not." Once I look in the water I completely forget about the hypothermia on my hands. There, in the water, are six glowing rocks. Two rocks glow a light and dark blue, two others a light and dark green, and the last two a pink and red. "I'm gonna get them out." I just nod my head still mystified by the glowing rocks. Bubbles hand collects all six of the magic rocks. "Now we can go back."
I walk up to Butch and tell him what happened and this is his reaction.
"Ha ha ha ha….. Dude, really, magic rocks. That's a new one." Butch leans against a tree one hand on his stomach.
"I'm serious!" Butch just pats my head.
"Oh my little brother, this is the best imaginary thing you've come up with yet! Magic rocks, how stupid of an idea is that? Am I right Buttercup?" Butch looks around. "Buttercup?" He walks around the tree with a confused look plastered on his face.
"Lost something, big brother?" I ask a smile sneaks it way onto my face.
"Shut up." Butch mutters and hides his eyes with his hair, like he always does when he's embarrassed. "You're going to help me find her. You got it Boomer?" Butch pins me up against the tree. This is a very eventful tree, anyway, on with it. "This is payback for your and Brick's little prank earlier today. Help me find her or I'll beat you so hard you won't be able to walk for a week. Come to think of it that will be kind of hard since we have an eight day journey." A smirk appears on his face.
"Fine, can you put me down now?" Butch plops me on the ground and I fall on my butt.
"Stupid Butch, now I have to search in the dark, creepy forest…" An owl hoots. The moon's light is covered by a cloud. Wind whistles through the trees. A branch snaps. "…. Alone, at night…" Something jumps down on me and I yell.
Buttercup's POV:
Once I attacked the weirdo I saw earlier, he screams like a little girl.
"Please don't hurt me vampire…. Or, or werewolf….. I'm sorry if I offended you in any way." The weirdo whimpers pathetically. Man, I thought a dude out in the forest alone with a SWORD might be more of a challenge then this. The moon shines down through the branches. I realize the weirdo is Boomer. He looks up through his blonde hair and flinches when I move. "Why haven't you hurt me yet?"
"Boo!" Boomer screams again and I laugh. Boomer looks up.
"Buttercup?"
"Yeah, Dorko who else?" I help him up. He gives me an embarrassed smile. "Some knight huh? Screaming and curling up at the first sign of danger, not a good move bro."
"I'm just not very good at night, that's Butch's thing." Boomer murmurs still embarrassed.
"Whatever." I shrug and we head back to the campsite.
Nothing happened last night. Today we head off again. I help the guys pack up the heavy stuff. Right before we leave Bubbles gathers us all together.
"You're probably wondering why I gathered you all today." She starts off.
"Yes we are." I interrupt.
"Anyway, I decided I'm going to give you all gifts!" Bubbles beams.
"Great…." I roll my eyes. Butch laughs.
"Here is yours Buttercup…." Bubbles hands me a green medallion. "….and Butch..." She gives Butch a belt with a dark green rock in the middle. She hands a matching pair of the medallions to herself and Blossom, except with all of our signature colors. She gives belts to Boomer and Brick. Then she walks off to the carriage.
"Well that was random." Butch commented.
About an hour later I hear a thud.
"What was that?" Blossom grabs the bottom of her seat.
"I don't know but I'm gonna check it out." I hop out the back of the carriage while Blossom calls for me to come back.
The first thing I see outside of the carriage is Boomer.
"Buttercup?" His eyes widen then he shakes his head. "Never mind, just get back in the carriage." I don't move. "Now!"
"Not until I know what's going on." Something big hits the carriage and I see Butch ride up beside me.
"Let me guess, she won't go inside?" Butch asks out of breath while he fights a random guy on a brown horse. Boomer nods. "Fine, she can help.."
"You know I'm right here." Butch continues without acknowledging me.
"She's a good fighter, but she needs to keep control."
"Like you?" Boomer interrupted.
"Whatever, we need to fight." Butch finally knocks the other guy off his horse. "Ready?" Butch extends a hand to me. I nod and take his hand. He pulls me so fast I almost don't make it on Titan. "Do you have your sword?" I nod again unsheathing my blade. "Good, be ready I'm gonna let you off in a second." He rides on without looking back.
"I really don't see what the big deal is. It was just one…." I stop myself once we get a small distance in front of the carriage. At the bottom of a small hill about fifty men stood with weapons ready. "…guy." I whisper. "Is anyone driving the carriage?" I ask remembering Boomer in the back and Brick in front of me fighting ten guys at once.
"Boomer's got it. Trust me." Titan comes to a halt. Butch and I hop off.
"You're not gonna tie him up?" I question. Butch shakes his head.
"He knows what to do," Butch smirks at me as he draws his sword. "Watch this, Titan fight!" Titan whinnies and takes off after one of the approaching men. The man raises his sword and Titan bucks. Hitting the man square in the jaw, the man fell on the ground with his mouth bleeding and jaw bent in a weird way.
"Best horse ever." I stand gaping at Titan.
"I know." Butch closes my mouth. "Although I don't think now would be a good time to be in awe of my horse. He's right. Now I need to be focused on the task at hand. Beating the crap out of every single one of these guys.
I slash the first guy I come into contact with. First things first, go help Brick. The guy's really struggling. I charge at the first man. He turns and blocks my first blow. Analyzing of his strength complete. He's weak; the only thing that makes him semi-strong is his weight. His small yet wide size doesn't help his agility. He's weak there as well. The small, fat legs make him unbalanced. Overall analysis, this guy is toast. I cut the back of his knees and he falls to the ground. I knock the guy on his head with the hilt of my sword. He's not getting back up.
I finally make it to the middle of the huddle.
"It looks like you needed a little help." I call out as I jab a man in his side.
"I was fine." Brick replies stubbornly. I man sneaks up behind him and gets ready to stab.
"Brick look out!" I try to get to him but it's too late the man stabs Brick…..in the leg? I jump and slash down the man's back. All the men around Brick and I are lying on the floor. I kick one to make sure he's dead.
"Told you that you needed my help. All these guys…" I gestured to eight guys out of ten on the floor. "… My kills."
"Whatever, now we just have to wait on Boomer and your sisters."
As if on cue Blossom rides up on one horse. Blossom's clothes are battered and torn. "What happened?" Brick demands as Blossom comes off the horse. Blossom starts off trying to catch her breath.
"Boomer told us to stay in the carriage. We did but we heard a thud and I looked outside. I saw Boomer fall and a man in black looked at me. I closed the window right before a man knocked down the back door. He threw me off and kept Bubbles. I blacked out. When I woke up Boomer helped me to my feet. He told me to ride a horse and find you." She gasps at the end of the last sentence.
"Where's Boomer?" I ask.
"He said something about going to find Bubbles." Well I'm about to go find Butch. I sneak off into the trail.
Brick's POV:
I help Blossom to a tree. She collapses out of exhaustion.
"Ok Buttercup, Butch will find us soon we just need to stay…" I turn around to find Buttercup missing. "…Together….Really? I'm just trying to keep everyone safe and she walks off." Great, now we have to find everyone.