The chapter in which Butch is en route for shenanigans.
Need you NOW.
Butch was in the air before he even opened the message.
He never questioned it when Buttercup called. That was part of the fun, not knowing what mood she was in. Sometimes he'd find her with a playful smirk, eager to start some bloodcurdling slasher film nobody else was game to watch. Other times it was a devilish grin, and he knew they'd be scrapping it, relentlessly brawling until dawn. In either case, their rendezvous were a surefire cure for boredom, and Butch would take any reason to escape his house, especially tonight.
Something in the air was making his brothers insufferable. Normally he'd blame it on the moon or some fuckery Him was up to, but he knew it was probably this prom bullshit everyone was talking about. He'd spent the last week watching Boomer perfect his not-so-secret prom-proposal—or whatever the fuck they call it—for Bubbles. His devotion to the project made Butch gag, and Brick was equally disgusted, saying his piece about how prom was some "idiotic farce" created to make high schoolers feel more important than they actually were. That story might've worked on Boomer, but Butch wasn't fooled by his brother's cynicism. He knew Brick had been working up the nerve to ask Blossom to the dance for over a year now, but his pride was keeping him from scoring some serious tail.
When Boomer asked if Butch was going to the dance, he could only shrug. It's not that he didn't think going to prom would be fun—he imagined smoking a bowl beforehand and secretly spiking the punch—but he didn't want to go stag when his friends already had dates, and he definitely didn't want some random chick cramping his style by fussing over flowers and the color of his tie.
Although, going to prom would increase his chances of getting laid…
He wondered how Buttercup felt about all of this. She hadn't mentioned a word about the dance since the posters went up, so he assumed she wasn't interested. It was a ludicrous thought anyway. No shot the green Powerpuff would put up with the dress and the corsage and the DJ's lousy choice of music just to attend some overpriced school function. She'd probably want to smash up old cars in the junkyard instead, or chuck footballs into the sky so hard they went into orbit. Butch grinned. Maybe they could race to Honolulu or pay old Fuzzy Lumpkins a visit—that hick was always up for a fight. Something in him started to buzz, and the more he thought about these chaotic, nonexistent plans, the better he felt. Fuck the prom. All he needed for a good time was a free night, no distractions, and his badass partner in crime. All he needed was a night kind of like tonight.
He was debating the feasibility of creating the world's largest surfable wave when he approached their clearing. Well, it wasn't so much a clearing as it was the ruins of ferocious battles past. What used to be a dense wood just east of Townsville—only five minutes if he was flying supersonic—was now ground zero for every superpowered expression of restlessness and frustration that riddled their senior year. Every time he caught sight of that massive crater of scorched earth and splintered tree trunks, he thought of the first time they crash-landed here, before they were friends and before this place had become sacred.
Fall had just begun, and they were trying to kill each other. Butch had started it, of course, but Buttercup had no issues fighting back. That always seemed to be the case whenever her sisters weren't watching, and Butch wasn't one to back down from a challenge. What started as a clash in the school parking lot quickly became airborne, and in moments they'd lost sight of Townsville completely. By the time the woods were beneath them, Butch had a seared shoulder courtesy of Buttercup's eyebeams, Buttercup had a shattered collarbone thanks to Butch's grip, and they'd impacted the earth so hard they'd struck groundwater, centuries-old redwoods collapsing beneath them. When the dust cleared, they had their hands around each other's necks, Buttercup pinning Butch to the ground with his knee digging into her spleen. At that moment, though, it occurred to them that they weren't trying to kill each other. No, they were close enough to see it in each other's eyes—that frenetic electricity so perfectly laced with sheer power and rage—they were actually having fun. They gazed at each other, stupefied. How had they never noticed this before—the thrill that came with meeting their perfect match?
They released each other with a grin. That fight ended in a draw, but the battles continued, and each time they found themselves chasing that same high.
The promise of a fight electrified Butch. He could barely contain his energy now, power pulsing at his fingertips. If Buttercup was looking to brawl, Butch was more than willing to provide, and he touched down in the clearing with a wicked smile on his lips and sparks dancing in his palms. He expected his counterpart to do the same.
Instead, he was met with a blank stare.
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