Xavier had been with the Bureau for around thirty years and in all that time he had been extremely loyal to his country and fellow agents, despite the constant mocking of his belief in aliens.
Right now, he was probably breaking that loyalty by not telling them that there was a portal in the middle of a warehouse, leading to a world that had tried to invade several years ago.
He turned to his scientific advisors, Terri, Dr Jan, Ally and Jess.
"So do we have any idea of how this portal is here?" asked Mr. X looking at the four women.
"Well, if anything the portal should have closed when the generator shut down." said Terri, her eyes had bags under them, after returning from the other world she had gotten to work on trying to figure out what had happened, staying at the warehouse investigating what had caused the portal to remain open.
Terri continued, "There's only one thing that could keep this open…" Terri let out a yawn, "and that's the power the box had, since those gems are gone now, unless someone on the other side of the portal did something well I don't know."
Mr. X stood there looking at the portal, He needed to get people here to make sure nothing came through.
"Ally, Jess, Is there something about the set-up that could have opened the portal?"
Ally shrugged, "Nothing, It's the same as the other times we've opened it,"
Xavier sighed and turned to Jan, "Did our contacts say anything?"
"Manson e-mailed us saying we should close it before anything bad comes, Star Butterfly said the same, Gravesdale still hasn't responded and anyone else has said nothing, basically nothing." said Jan
Xavier stood there looking at the portal, this was kind of hard to accept, This whole thing had only just been to send a small message, just a phone call, now he had a giant portal in the middle of L.A. to deal with.
He kept squeezing the railing he was holding on to, part of him had a feeling he might just crush it.
"Everyone, Go home, Get some sleep, We need to be ready for whatever happened next."
He heard the noise of footsteps walking away.
"I don't regret it." said a voice from behind him.
Mr. X turned to see Terri standing there.
"What?"
"I don't regret, opening the portal, I know things are a little worrying, but we got Anne back to Amphibia.
The Senior F.B.I. man stood there looking at her oddly for a moment, then smiled.
He was with the Boonchuy and the rest of Anne's human allies after the girls returning from Amphibia ten years ago, he watched the three girl standing there, each holding on to the other, each of them crying, He saw the Boonchuy try to talk about them and asking where the Plantars were?
It had only caused Anne to hug them deeper.
He vowed then and there to help get Anne to contact that world one day, He told her on her eighteenth birthday and had been the one to suggest to his bosses that a small portal would do no harm, they had agreed.
Things had not gone as planned.
He still smiled, Another new world, something had gone right.
Turning to Terri, he nodded, "Go home, get some rest."
Terri looked at the portal, "If you don't mind, I want to stay and work on the…"
"Trust me, your wife would prefer it if you went home."
Terri turned to see Jan looking at her concerned, Terri laughed and rushed over to her, before turning back, "I'll be back after I've slept." with that Terri left the room
Mr. X sighed, it was just him and Jenner.
"You ever get the feeling we should have just took the Gravedale investigation? Things might have ended a lot better."
Jenner's was about to respond when All of a sudden he heard the noise of something zooming towards the portal, Pulling out his stun gun he started to walk towards it.
He saw something fast moving to the portal, however he noticed something on top of it, two familiar figures riding… A snail?
The Snail stopped a few feet outside the portal and Anne Boonchuy got off of it, followed by Sasha, the two women rushed through the portal.
"Mr. X," said Anne stopping next to him, "Is everything okay?" she asked.
"Well no giant mantises had walked their way through just yet, so yeah they're fine, speaking of which, how's things over there?"
"We met the Plantars, they're fine, I'm going back, I need to call work and…" Anne froze and winced, "Ask for a week's vacation on extremely short notice."
"Yeah, this isn't going to fly well with them."
Mr. X just stood there, "You girls do know I work for the government, right?"
They both turned to him, "What do you mean?" said Sasha.
"I can just call your worked places and say that the F.B.I. needs you for some tasks, We'll reimburse them."
Both women looked at him and then hugged him.
"Thanks Mr. X."
"You're the great government official in the world."
Mr. X smiled, "You're welcome, Just be careful, This portal seems weird."
Both girls rushed to the other side of the portal and got on the snail, Anne yelled something, and they were off.
Mr. X and Jenner stood there watching the portal, It looked quite beautiful.
"Jenner, set up security cameras, I think we need to start documenting this, Until then we need to come up with a cover story for Sasha and Anne, I'm thinking we say we need them to help capture a Frog boy terrorist?"
Jenner's' just looked at him blankly.
Mr. X Sighed, You're right, They won't believe that excuse twice."
…
Sprig was currently sitting at the town fountain waiting for Anne to return, a part of him wanted to follow her, but ultimately he decided to wait for her to return, only a few minutes he had realized that maybe Anne wouldn't be coming back, maybe the portal had closed again, the shock that thought out of his head, there was no reason to worry about this.
"Hey Sprig." said a voice next to him.
The frog turned to see Marcy sitting in front of him, her tablet in one hand, a stylus in the other.
"Could you look up, you've got a great pose.
"Oh," said Sprig confused, he looked up into the sky, he knew that device she had was for drawing, and it was nice to be the subject of her sketch, so he obliged.
It was hard for Sprig to stay in once place for more than a nanosecond, he needed to do something.
"So, What happened when you got back to earth back then?" asked Sprig.
Marcy was still focusing on drawing, however, she still answered his question.
"Well I stayed in L.A. for a month but well then we had to move," she let out a little bittersweet laugh, "I didn't run away this time."
"Oh, so you did move away."
"Marcy was quiet for a second, "Oh yeah, but it's okay, I meet a friend of ours in Connecticut and well, I made new friends, You remember Luz?"
"Yeah," replied Sprig, remembering the young witch.
"Well, We became best friends over there."
"Wow, so Luz became what like your third-best friend?"
Marcy laughed, "Yeah, made lots of friends over there, I formed the RPG Club."
"Woah," said Sprig he had no idea what that was, but he was still impressed, "What about Anne and Sasha were you still able to hang out still."
The artist shrugged, "Kinda."
Sprig's eyebrows rose a little with that response, "What do you mean Kinda?"
Marcy shrugged, "Well, For about two years we always called each other after school, visited each other in during the holidays, we still were friends, then one day we kind of stopped hanging out as much."
"What?"
The artist, still drawing, nodded, "Yeah, I think it was when I was asked to DM a stream once and well I missed out on the meet up.
"And that's what killed your friendship?" said Sprig, terrified.
"Eh, Not really, Anne was busy volunteering at the museum and Sasha was on a date so basically none of us were there," the artist sighed, "After that we started to do other things, we drifted, We changed."
Sprig sat there, after everything that had happened, how the three had fixed their friendship he figured they would be friend forever, but as it turned out that wasn't true, friendships could just die, a brief thought about his relationship with Anne entered his head, it had been ten years.
"Nah," he said out loud.
Marcy looked up, "Nah, what?"
"Oh, nothing, but your friends now, right?"
"Yep, But it kind of became harder to spend time together when we were separated."
Sprig gulped.
Marcy knew she messed up, she was going to say something to Sprig when all of a sudden she heard the noise of something coming towards them, she turned to see Micro-Angelo riding up.
"Woah, Micro-Angelo." said Anne who was sitting up front, Sasha was sitting behind her, smiling.
"So you guys okay?" said Sasha, who jumped off of the snail.
"ANNE." Shouted Sprig, who jumped onto the snail.
"Hey Sprig, everything okay?."
"Sure, Best friend, everything fine best friends where do you want to go best fried?"
Marcy sighed, she was going to have to make this up to Anne.
"Well," said Anne, "I want to go to the woods."
Sprig smiled, Part of him wondered why Anne wanted to the woods after all this time he remembered the times she complained about it back when they were younger, but whatever it was what she wanted to do.
"Sure, Let's go." Sprig then jumped to the snail, he was caught by Anne, who held him slightly away from her.
"Whoa buddy, love the enthusiasm, but I need to get some supplies first."
"Supplies for what?" asked Sprig
"Well, You know how I'm a Herpetologist?"
"Yeah, Marcy said you were a frog lady."
Anne laughed, "Yeah, Well I want to get some things from the woods to bring back to my world, Stuff like Bugs, Plants, anything really."
Great!" said Sprig happily, "We can go to the story and get your equipment after all now we're…"
Sprig stopped talking, only for a voice in the far distance to say, "We're rich."
"Have a good time you two," said Sasha, I'm going to spend the day in town, You know, catch up on a few things."
"And I'm going to look for… Something good to draw, See you guys later." said Marcy.
"Okay, See you later girls, said Anne.
The two other humans said their goodbyes and walked off.
Anne smiled and jumped off of Micro-angelo she took the snail's reigns as if to lead him somewhere.
"Good, I'll go and park Micro-Angelo and You go get the supplies, I need jars, some scissors and a note pad." said Anne
Great." said Sprig, just about to run off, he stopped and turned back to Anne. "What about Polly, Frobo and Max?"
"Eh, They'll be fine, After all, Polly can handle Max."
…"
"How could we have lost him already?" said Polly frantically
"Well he said he was going to go to the bathroom and didn't come back," explained Frobo, "Kind of obvious really."
Polly glared at her mechanical brother. "Thank you for pointing that out, We gotta find him before something happens to him."
Frobo looked at his sister a bi concerned, "I mean he's probably going to be safe, why do we have to worry?"
"Because if I lose him, Anne's going to be disappointed, I can't mess up on her first day back." Said Polly worried.
Frobo looked at her, if there was one thing that had remained in his evolving programming over the years, it was loyalty to his older sister.
"Okay, maybe we need to think like him."
Polly nodded, "Okay, doing it now."
The teenage frog sat down and started to think.
"Okay, I was able to understand how he thought earlier, Maybe I can do the same thing again."
She scrunched her face up to a look of concentration, trying to replicate the mind of a ten-year-old.
"I'm bratty, I think I know better than others, I'm at least thirty percent evil, I'd be looking to cause some trouble-"
All of a sudden, Polly snapped her fingers, "He'll be looking for something fun to do, so that mean's he'll be in the center of town.
"Really?"
"Trust me, let's go." said Polly, already running to the Joke shop, Frobo followed closely behind.
…
Anne and Sprig were currently walking through the first, the unlikely pair were wearing backpacks full of specimen jars and paper, Anything Anne could use to document the strange life in Amphibia.
Sprig had to be honest he was surprised to see Anne willing to do this, Sure she had told him last night she had gone to the jungles on earth, the forests in Amphibia seemed kind of lame in comparison.
That when just by chance the oddest question entered his head.
"So, who did Constance choose in the end." said Sprig
Anne was currently looking a centipede crawling on a long when she turned to face Sprig. "What?"
"You know?" said Sprig smiling, "Love choice."
"Oh, that, I don't know, everyone was disappointed, so they had to make an even worse sequel, I only watch them because they're kind of funny." said Anne returning to look at the centipede.
"You don't even like Love choice anymore?"
Anne shrugged, "Oh I do it's just they're not as fun anymore, also there's talk about a reboot, that's the sign to stop watching these movies."
"Oh," said the Frog man, a little confused, Anne used to gush about her favorite movies, now she didn't like them.
He shook it off, it wasn't that weird, it's not as if it was the only thing.
Sprig stood there awkwardly, He started to look around for something to pick for Anne, she mentioned plant may there was something that could help her with her job on earth?
She started to look around for something to pick. Eventually he found a flower, he picked it up and placed it in a jar, he walked over to Anne, "Hey Anne check this out."
Anne turned around and looked at the Jar he was holding, "Oh, that's nice, but it's just a flower."
"Just a flower." said Sprig. "I thought you wanted plants?"
Anne looked at him with an apologetic look on her face, "I mean plants that are unique to this world," she then turned back to the centipede.
"Oh." said Sprig, "I'll look somewhere else.
Sprig walked a few steps away from Anne when he got an idea that he knew Anne would respond to, he took a few steps back and then ran towards Anne, he knew his best friend would catch him, and they'd laugh about it.
Things did not pan out.
Instead of Anne catching him, he just slammed into her back, causing Anne to slam to the floor, Sprig found himself on the floor the next second, when he looked up he saw Anne angry face looking down at him.
"Sprig, What the heck?" said Anne angry.
"Sorry," said Sprig worried, It's just that…"
Anne turned around to see the centipede she was looking at, it was gone.
"Great, It's gone," said Anne annoyed.
"I'm sorry Anne," said Sprig trying to apologize
Anne was stood there for a second, Sprig couldn't see her face, he cursed himself for messing up so badly on his first day with her again.
Eventually though, he heard her sigh and turn around again, "Whatever." she said annoyed.
With that, Anne walked away.
Sprig watched and cursed himself for being so stupid, But another part of him wondered why Anne didn't just catch him, She was usually fine with him jumping on her, using her as a sort of extension, She had stopped loving her favorite movies, and he couldn't even find the correct flower she needed, What was wrong?
Was Marcy right? Maybe they were growing apart.
The was possible who knows how much Anne had really changed, outwardly they had been fine for the first few hours they had met, but maybe Anne had changed more than he thought, he had to do something.
That when a thought entered his head.
"Anne, Anne, Anne." shouted Sprig.
Anne turned and looked at him, "What Sprig?"
"I know where we can find some rare flowers, Heron's Bane."
Anne stood up, "Heron's Bane, the flowers that only grow near Heron's nests, That's crazy" she said looking at him for being insane, "We'll be killed, and I don't really want to nearly die during my first day here."
"Okay, but what happens If I told you there was a Heron's nest that was empty."
"Really, Where?" said Anne interested.
Sprig smiled, "Those two herons that stayed on earth, we found their nest, and it's empty, The Flowers still grow."
Anne thought about it for a second, "Are you sure that this is a good idea?"
"Of course it is," said Sprig, who then pulled a cute face, "Does this look like a face that could deceive you."
Anne laughed, "Still trying to be cute after ten years, Alright, lead the way."
…
Max had to be honest the frogs of this town seemed really nice, a lot of them waved at him as he walked by, Many of they seemed to just think he was connected to Doctor Boonchuy, a part of him liked that, the whole son thing had only seemed to be something thought of by Sprig but who know maybe he could play it to his advantage
As he walked down the market, he heard a familiar voice.
"Keep an eye open for him, Frobo, He's around her somewhere."
Max dove near the fountain kneeling just behind it, he briefly looked up to see Polly standing on top of Frobo's head scanning the town square for him, He sighed, Polly didn't seem that bad, but he didn't need a babysitter, he knew if she found him he'd probably never leave him alone, he looked around for somewhere to hide, he eventually spotted an alley, and ran towards it.
…
"I don't like her." said Marcy Yunan carrying a bag of groceries
"Of course you wouldn't" said Lucian also carrying a bag, "She has a soul."
"Ha, So how's yours then, Has she realized how annoying you are?" replied Marcy.
"Actually, she's telling me some stories later, about her adventures." said Lucian smugly.
"Ah, looking forward to you talking about how amazing she is and causing me to drift off to sleep." replied Marcy.
"Bah, you don't know a good story if it bit your legs off."
They neared the entrance to an alley, there were two cans of garbage, So distracted by Lucian's failed quip, she walked directly into it.
"Stories don't work like that genius, try hard-Ahh."
Marcy started to fall, in the confusion she left go of the grocery bag, the contents of which spilled onto the floor, she expected to feel a sharp bit of pain when she hit the floor.
However, that's she felt something strong wrap around her body, she was pulled up, she turned to see Lucian standing there his tongue extended, pulling it back he smiled, "Are you okay?"
The frog nodded, "Yeah, thanks." she then looked at the groceries, "Sorry about those."
Marcy knelt down to start picking them up, Lucian joined in.
"It's okay, I'll lie to Grime about this, Besides you offered to help carry them."
All of a sudden they felt a shadow fall upon them, the two Amphibians looked at the figure towering about them, his skin was brown, his eyes were wide, he looked down on them, in someways he was a giant to the smaller frogs who only came up to his waist.
Marcy looked at him with fear, this creature looked terrifying to her, She knew that Marcy was at least not going to hurt her as long as her parents were here, but she didn't know about the others.
Lucian, however, looked at him like he was a god standing there in front of him, this could only mean one thing in his mind, he was chosen for something important.
The creature spoke.
"Do you know a good place to hide?"
That was not what either Frog or Toad expected.
"What?" said Marcy
"Do you know where I can hide?"
"I think I saw him near that Alley." said a voice to the side.
The human looked at the source of the voice annoyed, "Crud." he said before looked back at the two Amphibians.
"Please." he said with wide eyes.
Marcy and Lucian looked at the two garbage cans at each side
"I think I have an idea." said Lucian.
…
Polly arrived at the ally a few seconds later.
"Hey, have you two seen a small human run by?" She said to the two younger Amphibians.
"No," said Lucian, who started to whistle tunelessly.
"What's a human?" said Marcy, who was trying to not look at the garbage can on the left.
Polly picked up on their reactions.
"Oh, Marcy, are you trying to hide something from me."
Marcy was quiet for a second, the pause told Polly everything, "No." she said quietly
"So I shouldn't look in that garbage can," said Polly with a wicked smile on her face.
Polly lifted the lid of the can to see… that it was empty.
"Huh." said Polly, confused.
"We told you that there wasn't a human in there." said Lucian, smiling.
"Yeah, Yeah." Said Polly, starting to walk off.
"Why don't we check the one of the right." asked Frobo.
Polly shook her head, "If it was me hiding in the trash can, then I would hide in an empty one, not one that's full of garbage."
Frobo shrugged, "You know this wouldn't happen if you let me keep my infrared scan."
"The town didn't want you having that remember, apparently it was way too intrusive." said Polly, annoyed at the town right to privacy.
With that, the Teenage frog and Robot walked away from the two children.
All of a sudden, bursting forth from the full garbage can full of food waste burst the human. He was covered in f garbage, a lettuce leaf was on his head, he took a deep breath the first chance he got to taste clean non-trash air.
"Oh sweet god." said the boy, breathing heavily, "That was awful."
"Hey, you wanted a hiding place," said Marcy with a small smirk.
"Did we please you human." said Lucian, trying way too hard to please the strange alien.
"Yeah, you did," said Max, wiping off the remains of the food.
"Well with that over," said Marcy picking up her bag and turning to leave, "Goodbye, Come on Lucian before something else happens."
"Wait," cried the human, "Do you want to hang out?"
Marcy turned around to see him standing there, and sighed, she knew how Lucian was going to react.
"YES." cried the toad boy with a twinkle in his eye, he walked over to the human and took his hand, "Lucian Vor, At your service."
Marcy sighed, she knew this was going to happen, "Lucian, we have to get the groceries to Grime."
Lucian looked at her for a second and then back at the human.
"I mean, we can just dump groceries at Grime's house and then run back."
"Yes, let's leave the one-armed toad to carry things into his house."
"I'm seen him carry worse." said Lucian, "When would we have the chance to hang out with a human."
Marcy sighed, Not only were her parents focusing on humans but so was Lucian."Fine." she muttered
"Sorry, who are you?" said the human, pointing at Marcy.
"Marcy Yunan," said the Frog bowing slightly, Her mother still insisted she be polite when introducing herself to anyone for the first time.
"Huh, Do you know Marcy Wu?"
Marcy rolled her eyes, She knew this was going to happen, "Yes, my Mom's knew her ten years ago." She then muttered under her breath, "Not that they're let me forget it.
She didn't notice that Max heard that.
"But one we can hear later," said Lucian, "What's your name."
"Max Doe," said the boy.
"Very well, Max, I'll take you to the coolest part of town.
With that Lucian ran off followed by Max and Marcy.
…
Heron's Bane were considered some of the most beautiful flower in Amphibia, they were also rare and never really welcomed as a gift.
They only really grew in places where herons nested, even when the Herons were gone the flowers would continue to grow, they were a blood-red.
Of course to many the flower was considered an omen of death, or that devastation was coming, For others it was a reminder of what they had lost.
To almost all Amphibians, they were the sign of the cruelty of nature.
For Sprig, right now, they were the sign that he could restore his friendship with Anne.
"Ta-dah." said the frog, gesturing to the abandoned nest.
The nest was a tangle of logs and vines, Anne had seen nests like this back on earth but not this big, around the logs there were the red flowers, Anne walked towards them her, eyes wide, trying to fight off a smile from appearing on her face.
"Dang, Kind of forgot how big the wildlife gets here."
"Yeah, Remembered that water snake." said Sprig, laughing.
"Or the Manta rays?" Said Anne, laughing back.
"Or Bear Hornets."
Anne looked at him confused.
"Oh yeah, you didn't see the bear hornets, they're not nice."
Anne got closer to the nest, Everything seemed quiet, but she never knew, she briefly turned back to Sprig to see if he was alright, "Hey Sprig, you sure you want to be here?"
"Yeah, Why?"
Anne froze, "Well, these are the creatures that kill your folks."
Sprig stood there for a second and then smiled, "A little, but you know, we kind of worked that out when we save your parents."
Anne smiled, The Plantar family hunting dance had saved her family several times, and had saved her once or twice on earth. (She was still impressed that the snake had been distracted by it.)
She continued to walk towards the flowers picking a few off logs, she placed a few in some of her jars, she then pulled out her phone and started to take some pictures of the Flowers, she panned across the various log, until she came across a Sprig who was hanging upside down on a log with his tongue hanging out of his mouth, Cross-eyed."
"Dude seriously?" said Anne laughing.
"Ah, come on, you know you love it."
"Fair enough, Hey, how about a quick picture?"
"Sure." responded Sprig.
The two rushed over to the entrance of the Nest and stood there, Sprig jumped on Anne's shoulders, this time the human just smiled, She pulled out her phone and set it to selfie mode, both friends smiled, and Anne pressed the photo button.
On the phone was the photo that continued two friends smiling at the camera, most would consider this a wonderful moment showing their reunion.
That would be if they ignored the third head in the picture.
Towering above them was a Green oval head, with mandibles, attached to it was a long green neck, Anne hair cut off the creature's body from the picture, but the two scythe like claws still appeared in the picture.
The two adventures looked at the Photo and slowly turned around.
Standing there was a green Mantis, Anne briefly thinking about the first day she met Sprig remembered seeing a smaller version of this about to attack the town's people when they had her tied up, However this one was bigger than even the red version that had attacked them
"Huh." she said nonchalantly.
"Kind of nostalgic, really." responded Sprig.
The Mantis did not give such a glib response, instead it roared a ferocious roar that reminded Anne and sprig of that feeling that their lives were in danger, which was also nostalgic but one that knew how to deal with.
They turned around and ran.
…
Polly Petunia Plantar was continuing her search for the newest human in Amphibia, Part of her wondered if she was this annoying to look after when she was younger, She doubted it, she was way more charming than him.
"Gah," cried Polly, "He can't be this smart." said Polly annoyed.
"Maybe she should ask for help?" asked Frobo standing next to her.
"From who? If we tell anyone we lost him, Anne might find out, And I don't want her to think I'm irresponsible."
"Yeah, why would she think you're irresponsible? Just because she knows you?"
Polly glared at Frobo, "I'm going to have to alter your sarcasm settings."
"Hop Pop and Sprig said the same thing about you." said Frobo.
"Frobo, take this seriously, Anne can't know that Max is missing.
"Max is missing," said a voice from behind Polly.
"Polly winced and turned around to see a tall blonde standing there.
"Oh Hi Sasha, What's up." said Polly nervously.
Sasha looked at Polly, "I'm fine, Where's Max?"
"Oh, well He's gone missing, but I'm on it, Relax." said Polly trying and failing to reassure Sasha.
"We have to find him."
"That's what I've been trying to do, He's almost as hard as me to find… Which I won't lie is impressive." said Polly.
All of a sudden, a scream came from the center of town. The three ran towards the sound, around the fountain there was a crowd standing there, the three pushed their way to the font,
The fountain was still working, however the water was now blood-red.
…
One hour ago, Max Doe was trying to enjoy the company of the two frogs he had found.
Trying being optimal word.
On the one had Lucian seemed like a guy, he did however ask way too many question like what earth was like and how holy Anne, Marcy and Sasha really were.
He tried to answer him to the best of his ability, but Lucian kept asking more and more about them, eventually however they came to the statute of Anne and Lucian started to give a long speech about how Important Anne is, Max was nearing the point he was going to faint.
Then there was Marcy the frog.
Max did not know what he had done to annoy her, but whatever it was it probably amounted to murder, every single time he looked in her direction there was a look of extreme annoyance, like he was something disgusting that was on the bottom of her shoe that was singing an annoying tune off-key.
He was wondering if he could sneak away from these two when there was the sound of someone groaning.
Turning around, he was a large jar slowly moving across the street. Walking away from the statue, (Which mercifully caused Lucian to stop talking) to see what was causing the jar to move.
On the side of the jug was a small ball with arms and legs, on the ball's face there were Frills, the ball looked exhausted.
"Are you okay?" asked Max
"I'm Fine," replied the ball, not looking at Max.
"Hey Nicole." said Marcy in a friendly tone.
The Ball now identified as Nicole stopped pushing the jar and looked at Marcy, "Oh Hi Marcy, How are you?"
"Fine, just hanging out with a human."
"My names Max."
"Nice to meet you." said Nicole, who then went back to pushing the jar.
Max was a little put off by the fact that Nicole didn't seem to be bother there was a human in front of her, but decided to ignore it, Mostly because she seemed to be struggling while pushing that jar.
"Do you need help?" Max asked.
"Would be nice." replied Nicole.
Max got to the side of the Jar, and started to lift, Lucian willing to follow his new human friend followed, Marcy joined to help out Nicole.
The was heavy and full of liquid, Max had to be honest he had no idea why a small Newt was carrying this.
"What are doing this for?" ask MAx confused.
"It's my job for the day." said Nicole, who was holding on to an edge of the jar, not helping with the actual lifting
"Huh?" asked Max confused.
"Nicole does different jobs in town." said Marcy, "It's her thing."
"Why though?"
Nicole let got of her side of the jar, "Why not? Don't you want to figure out what you're going to do for a living before you get older?"
"I mean, I guess" said Max, kind of seeing her point.
"That said I don't think Postal worker is for me, hey were really rude when they rejected this jar of red ink at the accountants, they wanted green" said Nicole dejected.
The words Red Ink made Max raise an eyebrow, "Red ink, huh?"
Before Nicole could respond, he noticed the nearby fountain.
"Does anyone know where the reservoir for this fountain is?" said Max, smiling.
"It's a few meters over there." said Marcy pointing to the left, "Why?"
"Oh, no reason, I just figured out what we can do with this red ink."
"No," said Marcy, already figuring out what Max was planning.
"Why not, I mean the accountants don't want it and let's be honest it would be easier to carry this jug if it was empty." said Max, a smile appearing on his face.
Marcy glared at Max and then turned to Lucian, "Come on, Lucian, we don't need to stick around for this."
The human watched as the two Amphibians walked away, He already knew what he was going to say. "Okay, See you later, new Toad best friend."
Lucian turned around "New Best friend!" said the toad enraptured, he ran over to Max and hugged him
"Oh you little piece of… Nicole, come on, we don't have to stay here and join in with this prank."
"Nah, I'm staying," said the young newt."
The frog turned around and looked at her in shock, "What?"
"Sounds fun." said Nicole, smiling.
Marcy just stood there looking at them like they were idiots, Just because a Human said to do something didn't mean they had to do it.
"Fine, Get in trouble, I don't care, I'm out of here."
Okay, I mean avoid doing something cool." said Max thinking of an idea, he had heard her mention Marcy underneath her breath earlier, it was a risk, but he needed to stop her from potentially snitching on him.
"I will."
"I guess you'll be like the other Marcy, then."
The frog stopped in her tracks. "What?" she said, slowly turning around.
"Oh, Nothing, it's just I can't imagine Marcy the human doing this, could you?"
The frog just stood there for a second, she had never heard of any pranks being pull by her namesake from her parents.
"I mean If you want you to be like Marcy I guess that's okay, I mean there could always be two Marcy the humans."
Marcy was conflicted, On one hand there was getting into trouble just because a human said so, however was she really more like Marcy the human than she thought?
"Well, I guess we're going to the reservoir without you, See ya." said Max with a wide smile.
The three turned when Marcy cried out.
"Wait."
The tree friends turned around and saw Marcy looking at the ground.
"I'll do it." Marcy muttered.
"Glad to see you've changed your mind," said Max cheerfully.
…
It had been easy to dump the ink in the reservoir, running back to town center, Max and co sat at nearby a café.
Lucian had brought him a drink with his allowance, Marcy brought both her and Nicole drinks and a cake, Max meanwhile sat and watched the fountain, he fought the urge to cheer the moment he saw red start to flow out of the fountain.
The first scream caused everyone to look at the fountain in terror, in a matter of moments half the town was looking at the fountain
"What could it mean," said Old Lady croaker.
"My guess it's an omen we need to start sacrificing more often." said Wally.
"We're not sacrificing anyone to fix the water." said a worried mayor Toadie, "Remember what happened last time?"
"You still hold a grudge, don't you?" complain Wally.
Toadie sighed, "Everyone just go back to what you were doing, I'll send some people to go and check out the reservoir, just keep calm.
"Should we sacrifice someone just to safe?"
"No," said Toadie.
"Oh please." said Loggle, "I've always wanted to build a giant wicker frog and…"
"I said No," said Toadie annoyed.
Max laughed to himself watching the town act weird, (Though this was normal by Wartwood standards.) he looked around at the three Amphibians sitting around him, Lucian seemed to be enjoying himself though Max knew that was to please Max, Nicole was smiling finally glad to have gotten rid of the Jar.
Marcy however looked terrified over what happened, like someone was going to come along and arrest her, Max knew she was a liability but quite frankly he needed her to be a part of this to keep her quiet.
"I'm gathering you have something to do with this." said a stern voice from behind him.
Max turned around to see Sasha standing there, Next to her was an annoyed Polly and Frobo who shyly waved.
"Oh Doctor…"
"Cut it." said Sasha, glaring at him, "Max, Don't mess with these frogs."
"I didn't do anything," said Max, "How could I make the water red?"
"Good question," said Polly, who stepped in front of Sasha.
The pink frog look into Max's eyes, before getting closer to him and whispering in his ear, "No Seriously, how did you do it? I've wanted to do something like this for years and-"
"Polly!" snapped Sasha.
Polly backed away.
Sasha continued to look at Max before sighing, "Listen, Max, I know things aren't easy for you-"
"Who says they aren't?"
"But, you can't just do stuff like this, No here, Your only punishment back home is Detention or a trip to visit me, But here doing something this bad might cost you your life."
Max looked at her for a second, the look in her eye told him she was telling the truth, he then looked at his three companions, out of all of them, Nicole was the only one who didn't look terrified.
"Fine." muttered Max, He wasn't really going to keep his promise.
"That better be the case," said Sasha, sternness returning to his voice before smiling, "Though I have to say this wasn't as impressive as the pranks I pulled with Anne and Marcy back in the day."
"Sorry." said Nicole, fear vanishing from her face only to be replaced with fury, "Did you say Marcy did this as well?"
Sasha nodded, "Oh yeah, back when we were-"
Sasha did not get to finish her sentence because right then Marcy leaped at Max and started to attack him with a paper menu.
….
The search for Andrias had been put on hold the moment she saw the lake and just how peaceful it was.
Marcy Wu had to be honest with herself, she needed more time to get out and about and bask in the wonder of nature, it made for great inspiration.
It had only taken just a quick look at the lake for her to start drawing it, the clear water, the various water bugs skimming on the surface.
Everything seemed fine.
All of a sudden, the peace was problem by a pair of screams mixed with an ungodly roar, she sighed, what was it now?
Marcy turned around to see a running Anne and Sprig running towards her, behind them was a giant green mantis, that seemed intent on eating them, it quickly dawned on her that all three were heading towards her.
"Well," she said to no one in particular, "Looks like keeping that gym membership was a good idea."
She stood up and started to runaway.
Eventually, Anne and Sprig joined up with her.
"Hey guys," she said like she was just meeting up with old friends,
Sprig took a moment to stop screaming, "Hi Marcy." with the greeting out of the way, he then resumed his screaming
"Any ideas of what to do?" said Anne, looking at her human friend.
"You're the Zoologist, don't you any weaknesses?"
Anne thought about it, "The females eat the males after mating?"
Marcy and Sprig looked at her with a mixture of disgust and bafflement.
"Soooorrryyy" said Anne sarcastically, "You come up with a better idea on the run after ten years of no dealing with this stuff."
"Wait, I have a plan." said Sprig
Before Anne could Anne the frog up, unleashing his tongue he wrapped it around a tree branch and swung a full circle, the Mantis kept charging past the branch Sprig was attached to, the frog let go and landed on the Mantis's back he started to slam his fists down on it. While it didn't do any damage to mantis, it clearly made it uncomfortable,
As the mantis tries to shake Sprig off, Anne knew it was up to her and Marcy to take advantage of Sprigs actions, she looked around and saw a branch, picking it up she charged at the beast's legs and started to hit it, Marcy picked up her own branch and worked on the other leg.
Sprig all of a sudden had a crazy idea, he jumped off the creature's back and landed on it's head, he punched at its eyes, causing the mantis to roar in pain, Sprig stayed on and then slammed his fist into the other eye.
He jumped off as the mantis was writhing around in pain.
"Move." commanded Sprig.
The three ran away from the temporarily blinded mantis, eventually they made their way to a clearing.
"I think we lost it," said Marcy, panting.
"Yeah," said Anne, relived.
They were quiet for a while.
"Well that was an exciting first day." said Sprig
"Dude, Seriously?" Said Anne annoyed.
"What?" said Sprig worried
Anne stood up annoyed, "We almost died, didn't you know about the Mantis."
"Sorry, It's been a while since I went there."
"So you took there not knowing?"
Sprig looked at Anne and realized how badly he messed up.
"Yeah," Sprig said letting out a sigh, he slumped his shoulders and looked down.
Whatever Anger Anne had vanished in a second, Something was wrong, and she didn't notice it before, she watched as Sprig walked to a log and sat down on it, She turned to Marcy who looked guilty.
"Sprig, Is everything all right?"
Sprig looked at the grass, "I just didn't want us to drift apart."
Before Anne could ask, Marcy spoke up, "This is my fault, I told him… I told him what happened to us." Anne looked at her, she was rubbing her arm, looking dejected.
Anne looked at both of them, Anne sighed she looked at Marcy and smiled, "It's okay Marcy, I'll handle this."
With that, she sat next to Sprig, "Do you honestly think we're going to grow apart?"
Sprig was quiet for a second, "I mean it happened to you, Marcy and Sasha.
Anne looked at him and sighed, "Marcy isn't wrong, but she's not exactly right."
"How come?" asked Sprig
"Yeah, how come?" added Marcy.
"Well We still have sleep-overs during vacations, We still talked, I still remember hearing Sasha go on and on about whoever she was dating,"
"In her defense, she didn't date Darrel." said Marcy.
"We do not talk about Darrel." shot back Anne with a glare, before looking back at Sprig, "Sure we didn't see each other every day anymore, but we were still friends, Like us."
"But you've…" started Sprig.
"Changed, Duh," said Anne, "But I can tell you there were a lot of moments I wanted you by my side."
"Really?"
"Yeah, Birthdays, Christmases, Graduations, My breakup with Darrel, all of it would have been a lot better with the rest of my frog family by my side."
Sprig looked at Anne and smiled, "Honestly, exploring the continent would have been better if you were there."
"So it's agreed we're not drifting apart."
"Yeah, It's just you didn't catch me earlier."
"In my defense, I haven't needed to catch a flying frog boy."
"Man."
Flying frog man in quite some time, So I'm going to be a bit rusty."
Sprig nodded, "Okay, next time you'll get a heads, up."
Anne hugged Sprig, "That's all I can ask for."
Sprig hugged her back.
"Ahh, that's sweet," said Marcy.
"You can join in as you know." said Anne, to which Marcy took her up on the offer.
They ended the hug after a few seconds, Then Anne looked down to notice something, she smiled.
"Hey, guy's I guess Really am back in Amphibia, I lost my shoe."
"No you didn't," Said Sprig pulling out a boot from his jacket, I picked it up while we were running.
"Oh." said Anne a little confused, she took the show and placed it on her foot.
They all stood there for a second, "This feels weird," said Anne.
"At least you won't walk at an angle anymore?" said Marcy
…
Polly Plantar couldn't help but smile as she watched Max being chased by an irate frog girl wielding a small paper menu as a weapon, Sasha was standing next to her smiling, Frobo just watched for fun.
Max was terrified of Marcy's fury, it was like something had possessed her, part of him wondered if he could take her, however just looking at the snarl on her face made him doubt it.
"Help." he cried, terrified.
"Die." said Marcy.
Lucian was chasing Marcy trying to calm her down while Nicole continue to sit down and helped herself to the three cakes.
All in all, it was a pretty confusing scene.
"So should we step in?" said Frobo.
"Nah," said Sasha, "I think Max you reap what he's sown."
That's when Ex-mayor Toadstool walked up to the three.
"What's going on here?"
"Oh, an avant-garde production of how the Core was defeated." said Polly.
"What?" said Toadstool, confused.
"Oh yeah, Max is playing the core, and the others are playing Me, Anne and Marcy." added Sasha.
"Is that why the fountain is producing red ink?"
"Yeah, that's the symbol of the moon crashing down on Amphibia."
Toadstool looked at both of them and shrugged, "Eh, never was one to understand art." and then he walked off.
"We're not going to tell Anne about this, are we?" said Polly.
"Nope." said Sasha, continuing to watch Max's terror at Marcy's vengeance with two wide smiles on their faces.
…
The Guardian woke in darkness.
It had been a few hours since they had been trapped here, after the core had spoken the women kept watching them, she had ignored them and only talked to the core, she said that the processes seemed to be working, and that while trapped in the box the cat was just an ordinary cat, albeit one that could talk.
She lay there, wondering how the core could have survived, they were sure there was no possible way it could have survived.
"Doctor Frakes is on their way." said a voice in the darkness.
"Not going to open your eyes." said the Guardian.
"No, replied the core, "You're exactly where you need to be."
That's when a door opened, a small amount of light entered the room, The guardian turned to see a short stocky woman in a lab coat, her white hair looked messy
"Ready to conduct the first test." said the gruff voice of Frakes.
"Good." replied the Core
"What test…" before the Guardian could speak their body felt a large electrical show, Pain flooded their body, it faded as soon as it came.
"What was…"
"Nothing." said Frakes.
"Again," said the Core.
The Pain returned, The Guardian looked for a way out, nothing.
Again the pain faded.
"What are you doing?" demanded the guardian.
"I need a portal, and you're going to help me." replied the core.