(Alex's Pov)
-One Week Later-
I was currently working with Grime as we fixed up HopPops fence after a little incident that we had, which involved Sprig, Anne, Polly, me and a robot that had malfunctioned and decided to ram itself into the fence and broke it in many places as it continued to run around.
"I didn't think it would do that." Polly says and I put down the last log we were going to use for the fence.
"It rammed into the fence… it was like a chicken running with its head cut off." I say as I laughed a bit and held the post in place.
"To be honest, I didn't think that would happen either." Anne says as she watched us and I look at her.
"But taking a stick to it made it better?" I asked and she shrugged.
"If I had my racket, I think it would have been a done deal." She says and I look to see Sprig poking the robot with said stick and it smoked a bit and made a small explosion but not that bad. He flew back a few feet towards me and I had caught him and placed him on the ground.
"Thanks." He says and I nod to him.
"Yea, just be careful." I say and I grabbed the post again for Grime to hit it into place. We were almost done before HopPop came over to the house and started to ask what was going on when he saw the broken parts of the fence. Anne explained to him what had happened and he seemed to calm down a bit at this and asked if everyone was ok, which we were. There was a bit of a commotion going on and we go to see that the carrier fly had come back and it hands me a letter. I grabbed the letter and opened it then read it.
"We shall set out on the ship next week, make sure to come a few days early, only you and the Heart are allowed to come." I read out and groaned a bit then looked to Anne.
"It's fine we can figure something out." She says and I nod and look to Grimes and Yunan.
"Remember the ship we brought back?" I asked and they nod.
"We can follow behind as best as we can but I don't think we can keep ourselves hidden while out at Sea." Yunan says and I nod at this and look to Grime.
"We will try our best." He tells me and I nod at this. We then went over to the Planters house and I watch as Anne goes in through the basement door and I look to it then went over to my hut and started to pack up my bag and I look to my journal and sit down at my desk. I read over the book a bit and I rubbed my head a bit at the fact that we were going to do this. I guess someone had come in because I feel a hand on my back and I place my hand over theirs and look up to see Anne and I smiled at her gently as she smiled back to me.
"Hey." She says and I nod to her.
"Hey." I reply and I moved a bit. She moved her hand off my shoulder and I held her hand in mine and I kissed the back of her hand gently and I look to her as she blushed at this and I smiled at her.
"I think we should head out in a bit, but before we do, HopPop wanted to make some food for us to take." She tells me and I nod as I get up and I grabbed my bag and we went over to the Planters house and we go and take a seat in the kitchen and I looked over to Anne as she looked to Sprig who was helping Polly as best as he could and I looked at the robot head a bit.
"See this is why it messed up, the wires are all mixed up, did you mess with this Sprig?" Polly asked.
"No, you told me not to, so I didn't." He says.
"Hmm, a likely story." She says and I chuckled a bit at this.
"I didn't, I've matured a lot." He defended himself and I watch as she fixed the wires.
"I never get things wrong when it comes to Frobo and his family." Polly says and I look to Anne a bit as she had gotten up to help HopPop and I got up and grabbed the plates and utensils as well and I set the table for everyone, which required me to move the robot head from Polly and she follows me and I set the head down gently on the work table that was on the side of the house and she wrote some stuff down on a piece of paper and we headed back to the kitchen and HopPop had all the plates ready and I go take a seat next to Anne. We eat our food and they talk for a bit as I kept quiet and I ate little by little.
"Hey are you ok?" HopPop asked and I nod.
"Yea just… a lot going through my head you know?" I asked and he nods.
"Oh yea, I get that… reminds me when I was a young frog you know, was planning out how to deal with a family and trying to run my father's stand and such, lots to think about in life." He says and I nod and smiled. I don't think he understood what was going through my head. I get it he was trying his best to understand and I can't get mad at him about it for not knowing if I don't talk about it.
"I mean… I can kind of understand what you are saying but… it's a little different for me… I should say." I tell him.
"Oh of course I'm not saying I'm fully understanding of your situation but I do know when the mind is cluttered." He says and I nod at this.
"Yea sorry I didn't mean to make… me sound rude." I tell him and he waves it off.
"Nah I get it, but if you need to talk, I am here." He says and I nod at this. We all finish up and I helped with the dishes and once done I look to Anne as she grabbed her bag and I go grab mine.
"Grime and Yunan will be heading to the ship after we leave, we should be by the castle in about two days if they kept it in place." I explained to her and she nods as we wave bye to her family and we head out to get to the castle. As we walked through the woods a bit, I would look to Anne sometimes and then back to face what was in front of us.
"Are you sure you're ok Alex?" She asked and I look to her.
"Yea I'm fine." I tell her.
"Alex… I can tell you're lying." She says and I look to the front of me and sighed.
"I… I honestly don't know why I am feeling the way I am right now… I don't know if I'm scared or just… worried." I tell her truthfully.
"I'm scared too, but if we can get Marcy back." She says and stopped talking for a bit and I sigh.
"I'm scared that something bad might happen in your temple… we don't know what it's going to do, the writing on the walls weren't specific, it just seemed like it was a half-assed plan that they didn't finish because they thought 'Oh hey these thirteen-year-old kids should be able to take down a bunch of dead dudes that possessed their friend.' I mean for fuck sake Anne, I couldn't even punch that stupid thing because it's using Marcy as a host, it's a fucking parasite." I say getting a bit pissed.
"And fucking Andrias… he used her emotions against her, he fucking used the fact that she just… she didn't want to leave us… she just wanted to go on more adventures with us and… he just didn't care about her." I ranted and rubbed the bridge of my nose.
"I know, it's irritating… I should have found a way to get back earlier but I didn't… it's my fault." She says and I shake my head.
"No, no it's not, don't go blaming yourself for something you couldn't control." I tell her.
"But-."
"No, no buts about it Anne, it was not your fault… this is all that things fault, this is Andrias fault, this is everyone in that stupid family's fault." I tell her.
"I… I know but there had to be a reason why." She says and I look at her.
"He's over a thousand years old Anne, he had plenty of time to grow the hell up instead of literally stabbing a thirteen-year-old girl, and forcing her to be possessed by a fucked up Hivemind." I tell her.
"I know I get it, I really do but there is always something that causes actions like this… I'm not giving him an excuse but I just want to know why." She says and I nod.
"Sorry if I was sounding like a dick." I mutter and she pats my back.
"It's ok… and hey at least you're talking and showing emotions instead of being a zombie all day." She says and I laughed at this.
"Well, that's a good thing other wise I'd have to eat your brains." I say as I extend my arms out and walked a bit stiffly and she laughed at this.
"Ahhh, Zombie." She says and waves her hand a bit and we just laughed at this and I held my stomach a bit at this.
"Oh… I missed this." I say quietly.
"Missed what?" She asked and I look to her.
"I missed hanging out with you… just the two of us… I miss hanging out with Marcy too, I just… I miss when it was all of us you know?" I asked her.
"Kind of." She says and I think.
"Don't think I'm being mean but… the Planters can be a bit… hectic? I mean… for all we know they could be following us again, but they're…. I can't explain it." I mutter and sighed as we walked.
"They just worry about me is all." She says and I nod.
"I get that, I really do… I'm just not use to it I guess." I tell her.
"Welp get use to it, you'll be family soon." She says and I smirked at this.
"Oh, my I didn't think you wanted to get married so soon." I say fanning myself a bit and she shoved me.
"Dude." She says and I laugh a bit.
"It's ok Anne, I accept the proposal, so what day is the wedding?" I asked her and she groaned at this and I laughed some more.
"I'd rather marry a rock right now." She mutters.
"I can arrange that." I say and she placed her hands to her face.
"I'm just messing with ya." I say and rubbed her back gently and she sighed.
"My mom kept asking me about when I'll date, when I'll get married and then the same thing with HopPop too." She tells me and I nod.
"You know they care for you; they just want you to be happy." I tell her and she nods.
"I know, I know." She says quietly and I looked at her as we walked some more. She looked a little down and I tried to cheer her up a bit.
"Come on Boonchuy, tell me more about home." I say and she sighed a bit but she talked a little more about home.
"You know you never told me much about what happened here." She says and I shrugged.
"Same thing every day, fighting, trying to get Marcy, plans fail or succeed, not that exciting." I tell her.
"Are you kidding me? it's better than hearing me talk about going to school, getting a degree and still living with my parents." She says and I laughed.
"Ah but you know they love you and want to help you anyway they can… you are their only kid." I tell her and she looked to me.
"Your mom is a jerk." She mutters.
"And my dad to an extent, but I wont dwell on it." I tell her.
"But doesn't it hurt?" She asked and I was a bit confused at what she meant by that and it finally clicks.
"A little, but I shouldn't expect much from my parents, I mean they kind of split up when I was with them, but they weren't right for each other, I'm a little happy that they probably found other partners to start a family with but… sometimes I wish they'd work together, seems like they didn't when we went missing." I say to her.
"Not as much… and Marcy's parents moved so I doubt they care." She muttered.
"I can beat them up, no one will know I did a thing." I say and punch my fist into my open hand.
"Oh god no please don't." She says and I smirked.
"I'll take it as a secret yes." I say quietly.
"Alex, I don't want to have to bail you out of jail… even if Marcy's parents deserve it." She says and I look to her.
"Pfft, I'll break out of the prison, no bars can hold me." I say flexing and she pats my shoulder a bit and we both laughed.
"Hey do you remember when we were younger… and all those sleepovers we had?" Anne asked and I nod at this.
"Yea, we would stay up all night talking about girly things and watch scary movies." I say as I recall one sleepover we had when we were about nine, we stole one of Mr. Boonchuy's scary movies and we all couldn't sleep for a week after that.
"It's funny but… once we get back, I'd like to have a sleepover at my place… just us three." She tells me and I look to her a bit and I nod.
"We will… Marcy can nerd out about any new games they came out with in the past ten years, and we can watch scary movies… get some therapy that way." I tried to joke but I couldn't even laugh at that. It was true, Marcy would need a lot to talk about when it comes to her time spent here. She was betrayed by someone she could trust, though to be fair I was also part of that problem, I had betrayed her which resulted in this whole situation, had I not maybe things could have gone different, maybe Anne and Marcy would have believed me when I said the king was evil. Instead, they didn't after what I did. All the terrible things I've done to both of them.
"Hey Anne." I say and she turned to look at me.
"Yea?" She asked.
"Did… did you talk to anyone about… Amphibia? Or… just everything that's happened?" I asked.
"I tried to but they wouldn't believe me, they thought I hit my head and made it all up… heck some people even thought you and Marcy died and I was just trying to cope with it… that I ran away because I couldn't deal with it… I mean at first, I thought Marcy was dead to be fair." She tells me and I keep looking at her.
"I mean she was literally stabbed in the back through the chest… I was… depressed for weeks… heck when both of your birthdays passed I just… cried." She tells me and I patted her back gently.
"I didn't know if I would ever see you two again and I felt horrible, I couldn't save Marcy, I couldn't… I couldn't get back to Amphibia to try and save you, I tried but… I just felt like crap." She tells me.
"Hey it's fine… you're here now and we're going to save our Mar-Mar, and you're going to give her the biggest hug in the world… or even a kiss." I say with a smirk and Anne shoved me a bit and she looked to me.
"Do you think she would be ok with it?" She asked and I looked to her.
"Dude, I think she would be thrilled that you kiss her." I state.
"No, I mean… would she be ok… with all of us… together… you know?" She asked quietly and I shrug a bit at this.
"I think she would be, but if not I'm cool if you and her just date." I answer honestly.
"But-."
"Ah, don't say anything, I am being honest here." I tell her.
"But… you won't be happy." She says.
"Dude yes I would, let's be honest here Anne, I don't think Marcy would be comfortable with being in a relationship with me, and that's fine, I'm not going to force her to like me like that… plus I'm happy right now and I'll cherish the happy memories to come." I state to her.
"But… you would like to continue this right?" She asked as she motioned between the both of us.
"Of course, I would… but again I'm being honest, you and Marcy would be better off with each other, without me… besides I'm still contemplating weather I should stay here or go back home… and if I stay here well… it'd be a pain to try and visit me a lot." I tell her honestly.
"But what if she does want to have a relationship with the both of us?" She asked.
"Then it would make the decision of staying or leaving a bit easier… but not one hundred percent." I tell Anne truthfully.
"We could talk about it… before we go home, we can talk to Marcy… see what she thinks of the idea." She tells me and I nod.
"It's the right thing to do." I say and we keep walking.
"Remember when we played Mario Party and we would joke that you're Princess Peach?" Anne asked out of random and I groaned.
"God you two would make jokes about that… actually didn't I come out to you two when we played that game?" I asked as I tried to recall the memory.
"Yea… we were joking about how pretty of a princess you would make if we could find you a pink dress like hers, Marcy was making plans to cosplay and you said and I quote 'Well Peach is going to have to be a guy because I'm a guy'… at the time I thought you were joking but you looked so serous." She tells me and I nod.
"But then you came to love me for me… thanks for… not being a dick about it." I mutter.
"I mean to be fair I didn't understand it until you showed me the links and talked about it… and Marcy also explaining it… I just never knew anyone trans, so it was new… but I wasn't going to be a dick about it, you never changed." She tells me.
"Yea… strange how people think 'Oh well they're not the same as they were' like dude I'm still the same person I just identify this way doesn't mean my brain was like 'welp you're going to be an asshole now because you thought to change your gender, time to ruin societal norms and bring chaos to the world'… fucking dicks." I mutter and Anne laughed.
"Yea fuck those people." She says and I smiled and chuckled. It took us about two days to find the castle it seems they moved a bit closer to Frogvalley than we thought, but it was a good thing since we had limited time to get here anyway but bad because they were getting closer to the townsfolk. The castle ends up dropping down a few hundred feet before Andrias comes out and he glares at us as he looked around a bit. I was a bit pissed that he had the gall to make that expression, he's the one causing all these problems to the people, he's the one that stabbed Marcy, he's the one who betrayed the people, yet he wants to act like we did this to him.
"Finally, here, we will take you two, to the ships, we set off the instant we are on." He says and I glared at him.
"Where is Marcy?" Anne asked.
"Darcy is waiting for us on the ship." He says and I glare at him as he takes us to the ocean. We get on one of the many ships and out come Darcy as they smiled to us.
"Welcome, seems like you two made it just in time, the blood moon seems to be appearing early this time of year so we have to leave now." They say and the ship starts moving. I glare at the helmet that has Marcy captive and I looked away. I hated that we have to travel with that thing.
"Hmm seems like strength is a bit mad." They say and I glare at them.
"If it weren't for us your friend would be dead after the stunt Andrias pulled, had we not built the rejuvenation tank your friend Marcy would be in… oh heaven as you call it? Actually, it seems more fitting she would be in hell." They laughed and I glare at them and clench my hands into fists.
"Why did you call him that?" I hear Anne ask and we both look to her.
"Pardon?" They asked her.
"You called him Strength, and in the letter, you said heart… were you referring to me?" Anne asked them. I was a little interested in this topic, though I knew why they would call us that, seeing as how I remember my temple.
"Ah, dumber than a bag of rocks as always, I would say you should have read Alex's books." They tell her and she looked to me.
"It's based off of our gems, my temple was physical strength so that's why they called me that, Marcy's must deal with being smart so brains or something would fit her, and your temple must have done something with your emotions and stuff so Heart." I explained to her.
"Why don't you just call us by our names?" She asked and they just shrugged.
"Eh don't feel like it, besides Alex doesn't go by her real name." They say with a smirk pissing me off a bit.
"His name is Alex, and he will be Alex." Anne says.
"I always wondered, why call yourself Alex hu? Was it because you wanted to start with A to match Hearts?" They asked and I shake my head. I didn't want to tell them anything about myself.
"Oh, come on, Marcy won't tell me a thing anymore." They say and I keep glaring at them.
"I should blind your other eye… nice patch by the way." They tell me and I shook my head and looked to the ocean a bit then back to Darcy.
"Marcy and Anne gave me the name Alexander… but I just go by Alex for short." I tell them and they smirk.
"Interesting, anyway, what do you know about this temple?" They asked. I didn't want to tell them anything.
"Nothing much… don't really know how it will affect us, could be good could be bad… temples were half assed." I mutter.
"Hmm, so sad that my son and his friends didn't do so well with these temples." They say.
"Wait, you said one of you made the temple in Newtopia." I stated remembering what they had said before.
"Right, I lied, wanted to see how smart you were, but it seems you can't tell if I'm lying or not… easier for me to manipulate you then." They say as they come up to me.
"See my son made the temples with a few old friends of his, though I guess he didn't do a well enough job if you say they were… half assed?" They asked with a smirk.
"Just means this temple might be the same, and should be easy for you three to pass it with flying colors." They tell us before they leave. We traveled the sea a bit by the time night had come by and we see the blood moon.
"Looks like we came in time." Anne says quietly.
"This seems like some shit out of a movie, like you know the whole 'Woah we came here at the right moment and didn't have to really search for anything.'" I say and she laughs just a little and I look to her.
"Yea it does seem like that… but at least we can get this done and over with faster." She says quietly. We did have to look around a bit in the ocean to try and find the temple, I'd say we were looking for a good three hours before we felt a bit of knocking waves hit the ship and Anne and I had to hold on to the railing so we wouldn't fall. As the ship stops moving from the rough waters, I look up to see a stone temple as it sat in the waters. It had some seaweed in come places made it look way older than it probably was. We hear Andrias come by and I look to see as he took the helmet off of Marcy who falters a bit and I grabbed her and glare at him.
"Hurry up and get charged up, then bring Marcy back." He says and I look to Marcy as I pick her up and I look to Anne who came over to us and moved some hair out of Marcy's face. I sighed a bit as we go over to the temple since it had a walkway built up to the ship. I thought it was pretty cool at least that it knew what to do. We walked in and the door behind us slams shut waking Marcy up.
"Hey guys." She says quietly and I set her down on the ground gently and I look to her.
"Hey… how you feeling?" I asked her.
"Ok for the most part… I'm guessing we found Anne's temple?" She asked as she looked around.
"Yea, we found it… we also found out that I messed everything up." Anne says as she comes over to us.
"You messed something up?" Marcy asked as she stood up a bit and I helped her keep her balance.
"Turns out I was supposed to come back ten years ago, we were supposed to defeat that thing but… I didn't come back in time." She explained to Marcy.
"How did you find this out?" Marcy asked.
"We went and talked to Mother Olm, long story but there was writings on the wall that explained what was supposed to happen, then something about you and me, and… well." I mutter and hand Marcy my old journal and she looked to it as I nod saying it was ok for her to read. She looked through the pages a bit and we watched her as she read.
"Ok, so these temples were never supposed to be reviled, we were supposed to defeat the core ten years ago, and then basically go home?" She asked and I point to a section in the book.
"No, it says something about the gems being used up, meaning there might not have been a chance for us to even go home." I say to her and she nods.
"Sorry missed that part." She says as she goes back to reading.
"Marcy missing something? That's… new." Anne says a bit sadden at this and I look to her.
"Oh, what's this?" Marcy asked and I looked to see the note Anne had written to me and I quickly grabbed the page and ripped it out and stuffed it int my pocket.
"Nothing, just… teaching Anne how to write in ancient Amphibian language you know." I tell her and she smirked.
"Are you two a thing?" She asked us and I shake my head.
"No."
"Yes." Anne says and I look to her as she looked to me then we both looked to Marcy.
"I mean… yes… just… uh." I tried to say something.
"I knew it, Anne, you owe me ten dollars." Marcy says and Anne sighs.
"Wait what?" I asked.
"Marcy and I had a bet when you came out that one day you and I might date, I told her no way, and she bet ten dollars and well… I was kind of hoping she'd forgotten about that." Anne says as she pinches the bridge of her nose a bit and I look to both of them and I laughed at this.
"Woah he's not mad?" Marcy asked.
"Nah I find it funny that you bet on my love life... sorry you lost ten bucks Anne." I apologized.
"It's fine… anyway what do we do now? The temple hasn't done anything." Anne says as she looked around a bit. I watched her as she touched one section on the wall and three rooms light up indicating our colors and some words appear.
"Think your heart is pure, but what about the other two, can they be truthful or will they keep lying to you and themselves?" Marcy reads and I read the words over and over again and looked to Anne then to the room that had my color.
"I… I don't want to go in there." I tell them.
"Alex." Anne says and I shake my head at this.
"If we go in there and Anne get's her powers then… I don't want to go in there." I mutter at this.
"We need to or we are stuck in here." Marcy says and I rubbed my neck a bit.
"Alex." Marcy says and I looked to the room and I take a breath.
"Alex please." Anne says and I look to her then looked back to the room and groaned.
"Fine, fine…. Let's get this over with." I say and Marcy heads over to her room and it shuts on her an I look to Anne who goes to her room and I look to mine and stare at it a bit. I take a breath and walked into the room and the door slammed down and I turn to look at the door and then heard something and turned to see that the room had changed and I was back at Saint James. I see some writing on the walls and I looked around to see if there was more.
"What is one thing you truly desire?" I read out loud and think.
"I don't know, I'm content with what I got… this is stupid." I mutter and look around for anything.
"I think you need to tell the truth." I hear and grabbed my sword quickly and looked around to see no one.
"Fucking mind games again?" I asked pissed as I look around and then the room started to change. I was back in my old home and I looked around as I was sitting at the table in the kitchen and I looked around and saw my parents come in.
"So, Sasha how was cheer practice?" My mom asked. I didn't speak.
"Sasha?" She asked and I look at her and then looked to the table and put my hand on my face and I didn't feel my beard. I don't know why I was a bit sad that I didn't have it.
"Sasha answer me." She says and I look to her.
"Alex." Mutter.
"Not this again." She groaned and I look up to her.
"You are Sasha, not this Alex." She says and I look to the table and I nod a bit at this.
"Yes Ma'am." I say quietly.
"Good." She says and I keep quiet again.
"You still didn't answer me." She says.
"It was fine." I mutter and felt my face again.
"Why do you keep touching your face?" She asked getting a bit agitated so I put my hand down and kept my eyes to the table.
"Heather she's probably tired." I hear my father say and I look to him as he looked to my mom.
"She shouldn't be… maybe she should stop hanging around those two weirdos." She says and I look at her and glare at her.
"Anne and Marcy? They're her friends." My dad says.
"If she is tired, she shouldn't waste her time around them." She says as she picked up her glass of wine and took a drink.
"Simple as that." She says and she looked to me.
"Isn't that, right?" She asked and I look to my dad who says nothing and I look back at her. I wanted to punch her in the face for this.
"No." I tell her.
"Pardon me?" She asked as she set her glass down and I shake my head.
"No, you're wrong." I tell her and she gets mad.
"You are not to hang around those two-."
"NO, ANNE AND MARCY ARE THE ONLY TWO GOOD PEOPLE IN MY LIFE THAT LIKE ME FOR WHO I AM!" I yelled at her and she looked to me.
"WE RAISED YOU!" She yelled as she stood up from her chair.
"RAISED ME? FUCK YOU, YOU DON'T EVEN LIKE ME FOR WHO I WANT TO BE, YOU TWO GOT SO FUCKING WASTED AND FUCKED AND I WAS BORN YOU THINK JUST BECAUSE YOU RAISED ME WHICH YOU HAVE TO MAKES YOU A GOOD PARENT?!" I yelled at her getting more and more pissed off at this.
"YOU ARE A SELF CENTERED INTITLED BITCH WHO JUST DRINKS WINE AND BITCHES BECAUSE HER CHILD IS DIFFERENT AND DOEN'T WANT TO DO WHAT SHE WANTS, I HATE DRESSES, I HATE MAKE-UP I HATE GIRLY THINGS I WANT TO PLAY FOOTBALL NOT FUCKING WEAR A SKIRT AND JUMP AROUND FOR FUCKING PERVERTS!" I yell at her and she glares at me and I look to my dad who looked a bit shocked at this.
"I WANT TO BE CALLED ALEX, NOT SASHA, I FUCKING HATE IT BUT YOU DON'T CARE AT ALL, NONE OF YOU FUCKING CARE!" I yelled at both of them and looked at them both.
"I just want to be accepted… but you don't fucking care." I say quieter this time and I sit back down.
"You're to sick in the head, I forbid you-."
"YOU CAN'T FUCKING TAKE THEM FROM ME!" I yelled at her.
"The hell I can."
"FUCK YOU!" I yelled and grabbed the wine bottle off the table and slammed it down as I glare at her. The wine was being soaked up on the white table cloth but some of it drips to the ground and I let go of the bottle neck and looked to the table.
"They're all I have left." I mutter as I closed my eyes. I feel the ground shaking a bit and I look around to see I was back in the temple and I look to the door but it hadn't opened. I looked around the whole room but nothing. Only some words appeared.
'Though the world seems tough on you, at least you know you have friends right beside you.' It reads and I shake my head a bit.
"They… they still probably hate me… Anne is just too nice." I mutter and took a seat on the ground and looked to where the door was but it still didn't open. I placed my head to my knees and closed my eye and kept quiet. I didn't know how long I was in here for but I know I didn't like this place. I hated all of our second temples, they play to much into our emotions, it hurts sometimes. It hurt to relive that moment in my life. I hated my mom more after she said that about Anne and Marcy. They weren't weirdos they were… are my friends, they called me Alex when I told them how I felt, they accepted me for who I am, my mom though… She only wanted me to be the perfect daughter but I couldn't be. I just wanted to be their son, why couldn't they understand that? Why is it that at thirteen Anne and Marcy were more accepting and would even help me rename myself. Why is it that they couldn't just take the time to listen to me, to learn.
"Alex?" I hear and I look up but see nothing but the vast lands of Amphibia.
"Alex?" I hear again but it seemed more distant so I get up and look around. I hear my name being called again and I head to where the sound was coming from. I looked around more into the woods where it was getting louder and louder and I get to a swamp area but see no one.
"Alex?" I hear again and put my hands to my head to stop hearing it but I was still able to hear it and I wanted to scream.
"Sasha?" I hear and I go to my knees.
"Sasha get up." I hear and I feel tears in my eyes.
"SASHA ELIZABETH WAYBRIGHT GET UP NOW!" I hear someone yell and I look up to see my mom and I back up and look to her.
"GET UP!" She yelled and I look around to see the other cheerleaders looking at me and I look back up to her.
"Alex?" I hear and I looked around and I panic a bit and look back up to my mom as she glared at me.
"Sasha." She demands and I look down to the ground and I hear my name again.
"Alex it's ok." I hear and I feel hands on my shoulders and I shake my head.
"She… I hate her." I mutter.
"It's ok." I hear.
"No… I just… why can't they… my mom won't accept me." I cried and covered my ears again when the voice says it's ok. it's not ok it's never ok, she'll never care, my dad doesn't and didn't try either and it hurt. They're my parents, they're supposed to take the time to understand but they don't.
"We accept you." I hear and look up to see Anne and Marcy as they sat in front of me. We were in Marcy's room and I look around a bit.
"Yea, this is going to be fun, did you pick out a name already?" Marcy asked and I look to the ground.
"No." I mutter.
"Is it ok if we suggest names?" Anne asked and I shrugged.
"Hmm… how about… Harold?" Anne says and I look up at her as she smiled and I laughed a little.
"Not a cool enough name for him." Marcy says and we think for a bit.
"Hmm, what about… Link?" Marcy says and I smiled a little.
"After that video game character?" I asked.
"Oh right, sorry I have Legend of Zelda on the mind." She says and I smiled a bit.
"Sounds cool but it doesn't fit me." I say.
"What about… Alex?" Both Anne and Marcy both say and I think about it. It felt right, it felt normal to me and I nod at this.
"I like it." I say and they smiled at me and they both tackle me into a dog pile and I laughed.
"Alex." I mutter as I look to the ceiling and it changed to the stone ceiling of the temple and I lift my hand up a bit as I lay on the ground and I sighed.
"They accept me… Grimes accepts me… the others accept me…. but not mom and dad." I mutter and sighed as I place my hand to my stomach and I keep looking at the ceiling.
"Why should you care about them?" I hear and look to the side to see Grime and I sigh.
"Because they're my mom and dad… they had me… even if it was a mistake." I mutter.
"Well, if they don't care about your wellbeing then you shouldn't care about them, they sound like terrible parents, and that's saying something." He says and I look to the ceiling.
"It's… complicated… I guess I just wanted them to think that I wasn't a mistake, that they could be proud of me… that they would love me at least enough to take the time to understand me… I guess that's why I became manipulative because I wanted the attention… it made me feel good at the time but… now it makes me feel sick." I mutter.
"It just means you're growing to be a better person." I hear and look to see Marcy and Anne to my other side.
"Its weird talking to illusions about this… I wish I could really tell them." I mutter.
"I think you should tell them." Marcy says and I keep quiet.
"You don't have to say it now but… I'd think they'd want you to be happy… just do it when you're ready." The illusion Anne says and I nod.
"Yea… they deserve to know." I say and the door opens and I walk out to see Marcy already out of their room. Anne then comes out of her room after I come out and I look to her.
"Did it work?" I asked and Anne nods as she clenches her hand into a fist to show blue like flames.
"Oh yea." She says and I nod and the temple begins to shake and we looked around quickly.