Chapter 72: Anne and Bernardo

Tomorrow's the big day! We're headed for the third and final temple, which Marcy tells me is located in the heart of a (hopefully dormant) volcano. Now, I've kinda noticed a pattern here… the first temple seemed designed to test Marcy, specifically, and the second to test me.

You… kinda see where I'm going here. The elephant beetle in the room, so to speak.

Three temples. Three girls who got sent to Amphibia. And two of us have been tested. Marcy. Me.

That means, (and I could be wrong, but I don't think I am), that the third temple is for Sasha.

And we still have absolutely no idea where she is. None of the King's trackers have been able to locate her. It's as if she's dropped off the face of the planet. Which could be possible! Amphibia could be flat. You don't know.

I guess there's a chance we can do this without her, but I don't really like our chances.

Anyway, going once again by process of elimination, the theme for this temple is "strength", which I'm assuming is gonna mean a lot of fighting. So, today is all about getting ourselves ready. We're gonna need to come at this place loaded for mantis. Weapons out the wazoo. Maybe it's even time to break Tritonio's sword out of storage. Honestly, 'm not sure why I haven't been using it. Maybe it's too nice? It does seem to do this cool glowy thing.

Also Marcy's been on me to look into new battle armor. I don't know why, the ol' St. James uniform's done the job pretty well for the last few months. Maybe it's gotten a little ripe… and crusty… but that just makes it better for protection!

But she's not taking no for an answer. She's called in this big-shot armor designer from Newtopia and well, she's going through all this trouble so I feel like I have to humor her… not that that's done me much good in the past.

Took weeks for my hair to grow back….

So. Take a newt, cross him with Elvis, and give him an unidentifiable European accent. Boom, you've got Bernardo.

He shows up packing racks and racks of some of the post painful-looking outfits I've ever seen. And it seemed like he made me try on every single one of them. It was like one of those fashion montages from the movies, only every outfit could potentially kill you. Or more likely me. This first one he showed me was covered in poison spikes. Who would wear something like that? And they all came with gross accessories like this staff topped with some kind of animal skull. Here's a tip from your ol' pal Anne: those things don't smell better without the flesh.

And there are so many more to go. Stuff like this is why I don't like going clothes shopping with other people. They'll just shove outfits into your hands and you're obligated to try them on. I'd much rather do this kind of thing on my own. But what else can I do? It's kind of a fact that if the third temple is all about combat, then there's no denying that I'm gonna need some type of protection, so I gotta just grit my teeth and get on with it.

What are those… bug suits? Oh, I am not gonna enjoy this…

So, you won't believe this, but I finally found something!

So, after at least a dozen outfits that totally weren't me (not to mention ridiculously heavy and bulky and with lots of complicated and dangerous moving part – like, there is no way you should trust me around a gauntlet that launches flaming rocks… 9/10 I am gonna wind up blowing something up. The last one was this model that Bernardo called the Golden Centurion armor, and like everything else he had, it was heavy, really restrictive to move in, and came with a helmet that made it impossible to see anything. I was just trying the thing on when we heard something going on outside. Sprig told me that somehow a fire started and it was getting close to our stock of boomshrooms, at the same time as a bawk (half-bat, half-hawk; remember when things used to be one thing?) had carried off Micro-Angelo (Polly's cure little baby snail), and Bessie had pulled off an absolutely spectacular rescue and put the fire out at the same time… not that I saw any of it! I spent the whole thing flat on my back because I fell over as soon as I got outside and couldn't get up again until they pulled off all the armor. The only thing left was the breastplate… which, honestly, if they'd just given it to me first, all this could have been avoided. The breastplate's a bit heavier than I'm used to, but it fits perfectly and doesn't restrict movement all that much, but most of all… I can still see me when I look in the mirror.

Funny… I never really used to do that much. Maybe it's because I'm not the kind of person who likes to reflect on things… at least I wasn't. Since coming to Amphibia, I've had a lot more time to myself, and more time to think about who I am.

All this time, Marcy's been talking about me reinventing myself, becoming something new, but… I guess I already have, haven't I? Not into some kind of fantasy figure, but more like… a newer me. And I'm starting to realize that I like the new me I've become. Weird… I've never really thought about that kind of thing before. I've always been content to just… be what everyone expected me to. It took less effort that way. Heh… I wonder how Mom & Dad'll react. Will they even recognize me?

One temple to go. Can't believe I've come all this way…

A.N.:

Gloyd: I suppose that Anne and Marcy would've had one, but maybe they never developed it because Sasha would've called it "cringe" and she did seem to be the dominant one in the group. And your explanation of how Anne would know about the Scorpileo makes sense.

Jose: Rumor has it Jumpo was the funniest of the brothers. But we'll never know for sure.

Next: The Third Temple