Chapter 1: Marshmallow Accident
The sun brightly shone on the group, the sky bare of clouds. It was simply a good day for an outdoor activity.
Finn felt himself spring into the air over and over, struggling simply to not spill the tea in hand. Princess Bubblegum was hosting a Mallow Tea Ceremony, which he simply had to participate in to have some quality time with her. Though, when he first heard the invitation, he thought it just meant they were making hot chocolate- not using large marshmallows as a sort of trampoline. The chair underneath him repeatedly smacked his butt in such a force it was a miracle no bones were broken. But of course, he held his tongue for her. Complaining now would only be rude. Looking over, he noted that Jake wasn't doing much better. Whenever he was on the verge of stumbling, he'd stretch his legs out to keep his balance. The candy princess was unsurprisingly handling it well, her and her chair landing practically in sync. Hot Dog Princess, a red weiner dog, was emptyhanded, most likely due to her lack of thumbs. "Oh yah, this is great.", Lumpy Space Princess remarked in her usual sarcastic sounding tone as her and the candy princess cheers'ed teacups. Considering her usual unhappy demeanor, it was a bit of a surprise to see the lumpy princess having an ok time.
"This kinda hurts, but thanks for the invite, Princess.", the human boy grabbed the light violet chair underneath him with one hand in an attempt to create the same sync as the candy princess. "Oh don't worry about that Finn. This took me quite a couple years to master. You have no idea how many times I've fallen on my face in the past.", she snickered. "Hey, I think I-", before he could finish his sentence, he found himself tumbling backwards onto the grass, his spine aching from hitting the chair in the fall. "You aren't wrong about this being difficult to master…", he groaned as Jake landed on his back beside him, commenting "Second that man." "Eh, it's not that big of a deal.", LSP scoffed, Princess Bubblegum retorting "Hey, you're just floating you faker." The candy princess wasn't wrong- the lumpy princess had been levitating around the group that entire time, sipping tea and watching them. But then again, Finn had never seen her walk, let alone jump. As far as he could tell, she lacked both legs and feet.
"Well, obviously I'm not a faker. Like, watch." Breathing out deeply, the yellow star on her forehead faded to the lavender color of the rest of her skin. Looking down, she mumbled "Oh sh-" before plunging into a marshmallow below her. Her body unsteadily ricocheted off of it as she continued to speak words of panic under her breath, landing on Jake with a grunt of pain.
"What the hell man?", the magical dog cried out, wincing as he looked down at where she landed. Her top teeth had clamped onto his left leg, not seeming to leave a dent at the wound. "Oh jeez, sorry." LSP spoke, her voice muffled. The two made eye contact, barely processing the sudden turn of events. "Wait, why am I still doing this? Sorry, this is so embarrassing.'' The lumpy princess wrenched her mouth off of his leg, which was notably swollen unevenly. She awkwardly levitated above him, the forehead star returning to its usual yellow color. "Dude, are you ok?" Finn stood up and helped Jake to his feet, concern bubbling in his mind. He wasn't a health expert by any means, but surely a swollen limb could mean nothing good. "I dunno man. I think I might be allergic to LSP.", the dog shrugged, his yellow fur notably bristling from his barely contained worry. "Nah, it's not allergies. It's definitely an early stage of the lumps.", the lumpy princess observed his wound, sighing as though she'd seen this scenario play out hundreds of times before. "The lumps? Is that serious?", the human boy asked. At that moment, all he wanted to be told was if his bud would be ok or not. "Oh yah, real serious. My bite is turning him into a Lumpy Space person as we speak. Uh, it's like, zombie rules or something." She poorly imitated a zombie pouncing at its invisible next victim, audibly saying "rawr" as a sound effect. "What? You seriously think I'd go all lumpy like that? I'm clearly just having an allergic reaction over here." As though by irony, the instant the magical dog stopped talking, his left arm swelled up in the same bump-filled manner as his leg. "Finn, this is scaring me.", he quickly added. "Uh, I'll beat the lumps out of you." The dog backed away from the human boy, stammering "I don't think that's going to help."
As a teacup audibly shattered onto the grass in front of them, Princess Bubblegum landed onto the ground with ease. "The Mallow Tea Ceremony has officially ended, at least until we have dealt with the situation at hand.", she announced, stepping towards the group. "I suppose there's an antidote to this, right?" she questioned the lumpy princess. "Well, there is. It's in Lumpy Space, and we have to like, get it by sunset." "So the effects are permanent if the antidote isn't applied by sunset?" "Yah, pretty much." "Alright, can you please take us there?!" Finn practically begged LSP. With the time limit set in his mind, he felt himself filled with a lingering sense of urgency. He only had a couple hours at best to save Jake, and he'd do anything to cure his bro. Heck, he'd even sacrifice himself just to make sure he was alright. "Oh ya sure. I mean, there's a portal close by, just a short walk away or whatever." As she began leading the way, the human boy and infected dog followed her in a hurry. He hoped that she wasn't wrong about the antidote being a short distance away. His goal at that point was to cure his bud as fast as possible, and get the stress over with.
Chapter 2: Lumpy Space World
"Just don't, like, ever tell anyone about the portal. It's supposed to kind of be a secret."
"Where exactly is this portal?"
As far as Finn and Jake were concerned, LSP had led them to a random point in the middle of the forest. The magical dog's symptoms hadn't seemed to get any worse, but he was visibly antsy as they followed her and stopped at that specific stop, seemingly trying to use his stretch abilities to manually get rid of the swellings on his body. They would smoothen out for a couple seconds at most, before abruptly bursting back into view with a vengeance. "Dude, how long are we just going to wait here? I'm really freaking out right now." the dog paced in a small circle,anxiously grumbling to himself. "It'll only be a second." After she spoke, a turquoise green frog leaped onto an innocuous looking mushroom, ribbitting "Password please." "See? It was only a second." She turned her attention to the frog, pausing for a moment before yelling "Whatevers2009!", which could be quickly assumed to be the aforementioned password. With a small bow, the frog greeted "Good day, Princess. Is your father ok with your bringing these….non-Lumps to Lumpy Space?" it gave Finn and Jake a judgmental glare at the words "non-Lumps", before adding "I'm aware he's strict on the matter." "Uh yah, whatever. Just take us there already, jeez."
"Of course, as you wish." Sighing apprehensively, a long tongue shot out of his mouth and quickly wrapped itself around the trio. Before any of them could react, they found themselves pulled into its gaping maw, suddenly finding themselves on top of a light turquoise solid cloud, which was covered in bumps and lumps that varied in size. The sky was a rich dark purple, small white stars dotting the skies in constellation-like formations. Around them, similar clouds were positioned, and like snowflakes not one was exactly alike. Their colors ranged from a variety of purples, greens, blues, and yellows, which surprisingly didn't clash as much as one would expect. "Woah LSP, that was intense. Anyways, can you lead the way to the antidote?", Finn commented, his legs feeling slightly wobbly from disorientation. "Hold up now, we can't just waltz our way over to the antidote. It's on Make-Out Point, right about…" LSP pointed towards a hill-shaped cloud far off in the distance, with a lone tree standing on its top, "...over there." "Dude, are you serious? That's like, a thousand miles away." Jake complained, the human boy adding "I mean, I've jumped across cliffs before. But even then, this is impossible." "Yah, that's the point. You two just just fall into the Lumpy Abyss, probably, like, for eternity. I'll need to take you there by car." "You have a car, right?", the human boy questioned, silently hoping to himself that the answer is yes. Again, the main thing on his mind was to solve the dilemma as soon as possible. The skies around them didn't seem to reflect any specific point of time in a day, so he lost track of how many hours they had left. "Nah, my stupid parents won't let me take my driver's test. We're going to have to get the car from them. They can be lumping obnoxious, but like, I can deal with it. Come on, I'll show you my house while we're at it. It's kinda lame, but not as lame as your whole tree of a house." The 3 headed down a faded path, a lavender two story home coming into view. It seemed to be made of the same material as the cloud underneath their feet, with windows positioned haphazardly on the wall. The ceiling was visibly darker than the rest of the building, though only by enough to be noticeable.
As they got close to it, a lumpy man who Finn assumed to be Lumpy Space King pulled up close to the home's garage, his body taking up most of the car he drove in. He was the same color as his daughter with an identical star marking, though he was significantly taller than her, his glasses and tie giving off a similar appearance to the middle aged men from the VHS tape shows. He took one look at the trio, before scolding her "Daughter, why have you brought these smooth people into our domain? I specifically told you they aren't allowed." At this point, it was made clear to the human boy that he'd be dealing with quite a bit of racism on the journey. It couldn't be a coincidence that he and Jake had been commented on in seeming contempt twice in a row. "Dad, they need my help, like, a lot. I may have accidentally infected the dog. Also, don't lumping yell at me like that!", she retorted, irritation burning in her voice. "Don't talk back to your dad like that. It's very rude.", a brunette head attached to the middle aged lump chimed in, most definitely his wife. "Lump off, mom!", the lumpy princess blurted out, causing both to reel back in disgust. "Dude, the car.", Finn whispered to LSP frantically, realizing just then that she and her parents could probably argue for hours on end. "Oh right, uh, can I borrow your car?" "Not with that kind of blasphemy, daughter. You are hereby banned from the royal car for the time being." Pulling the car into the garage, the couple stormed into the house without so much as a second glance.
"Oh, lump it! I told you my parents are obnoxious.", she huffed. Jake's eye briefly bulged, as though even his disease was frustrated at the current events. "Do you know of anyone else here that has a car?" Finn sighed, trying to keep his composure as well as he could. "Yah for sure. I have this friend named Melissa, but-" "Call her now. We don't have much time.", he interrupted her before she could go on some sort of tangent, probably about a romance drama that has nothing to do with the problem at hand. "Ok, ok. Jeez, don't be so pushy." Pulling a phone out of nowhere(?), she said to it "Call BFF 66." After it rang about 2 or 3 times, another teenage sounding girl answered "Hello?" "Hey Melissa. So I'm, like, trying to help out some friends. Could we borrow your car for let's say, 30 minutes?" she responded. "Oh Glob, your timing is awful. Don't you know what day it is?" "No, what the lump is today?" "Tonight's the weekly promcoming, duh. It's gonna be flippin' awesome, you have no idea." "Oh yah, I must've forgot." "We don't have time for whatever you've planned." LSP didn't seem to listen to Finn's protest, incoherently mumbling "Oh." over and over. While she was distracted, he snatched the phone out of her hand, exclaiming in his best imitation of her "Melissa, like we should totally for sure go to Make Out Point. I'm in the mood to make out with boys." "Glob, you're so baaaadddd…I'll be there in a sec!" After hanging up, the lumpy princess snapped back into focus, blurting out "What the lump?" "I'm sure Melissa'd understand if we took the pit stop to Make Out Point before the whatever you planned. It'll only last a second.", the boy tried reasoning with her, having stopped trying to imitate her voice at this point. "Ok whatever, but this is only for the Jake situation alright?" "Alright." "I don't mean to sound delusional and all, but I think we're gonna make it just fine. Heck, the symptoms haven't been too bad lately, so-" before Jake could finish, he flinched in pain as his right eye bulged a second time, somewhat larger than before. "Damnit…", he groaned to himself as he forcibly shoved the eye back into position, smaller bumps pushing out of the sides of his head as a result.
"Hey girl." Melissa, a pink lumpy teen girl, pulled up in front of them in her car, which had the words "SXY-LMP" flaunted on its license plate. "Heyyyy gurlll.", LSP greeted back, Finn adding "Ok, let's go!" Him and Jake leaped into the back of the car, both landing on the seats face-first. "That was a bit aggro, but whatever. Making out with boys sounds really hot right now.", the pink lumpy girl remarked. Once the lumpy princess seated herself at shotgun, the vehicle shot off into the dark skies. A radio was turned on, which blasted a sort of electronic music. The best way to describe it would be if a beeping microwave was thrown down a cliff and violently exploded. "Finn, this music sucks.", the magical dog remarked bluntly, before suddenly bursting into dance and rambling on "Wait, like, on second thought, this music rocks. I love the sound of dying microwaves. Also, maybe we should TP someone's house later. That sounds real fun.", in a tone eerily similar to the lumpy girls. He froze, eyes widening in shock as if he simply could not believe the words that came out of mouth. "Oh my Glob, I'm losing it.", he said in his normal tone of voice, sitting down once more. His fur had started bristling again, once again a sign of his barely contained panic. Breathing deeply, he added "Look man, I don't know how long I'll be myself. If for whatever reason, I go full Lump, I-" "I know dude, you don't have to say another word. It might hurt me alot, but I'll still put you out of your misery. I'll bury your body by our treehouse so you won't have to leave my side.", Finn interrupted him, warmly smiling as he thought of the good times they've had together as bros. "Woah, woah, woah, I didn't mean that man! You're crazy! I was going to say that if I do go full Lump, I just think we should learn to live with it, ya know?". Reeling back a bit, the human boy assured "Dude, I can't let that happen." Leaning towards the front seats, he asked "Are we there yet? We're burning daylight here." Leaning back, Melissa shrugged "We've been at our location for like, 5 minutes now. Hey, aren't you that Finn guy LSP's told me so much about? Heyyy." she waved at him, the lumpy princess responding "Yeah, that's the guy." She turned towards the two in the back seat, adding "You two were like, so distracted having a nervous breakdown, you probably didn't see us park." "Oh uh yeah, guess I was the one burning daylight here." Finn stood up, observing the area to possibly catch a glimpse of the antidote. Instead of the hill with the lone tree he had previously seen in the distance, he was met with the sight of a two story home. "Hey, this isn't Make Out Point. Where are we?" "Brad's place, duh. He's such a hottie." bright blush appeared on the pink lumpy girl's face. "Oh, shut it Melissa. I can barely look at Brad, not since he cheated with you. Hmph." "Oh come on LSP, he was never happy when you two dated. It was better off that way."
In the midst of the two lumpy girl's bickering, Finn leaned in closer to Jake. "Don't worry bud. I'll make sure you end up ok.", he attempted to comfort the still visibly panicking dog, as the two embraced. "Thank you so much. I couldn't have asked for a better bro than you." The human boy could feel his shirt grow slightly wet as the dog faintly cried into him. "Heyyyyyyyyy." The two were immediately snapped out of their emotional moment by the sound of a second teen approaching. They looked over to see a pale blue lumpy boy, which featured visible legs unlike the other two lumpy teens the human boy knew of. "Hiya Brad.", Melissa giggled as the two shared a kiss. LSP gagged, levitating away from the flirting couple and squeezing beside Finn and Jake. "I cannot with that cheater.", she grumbled under her breath as the car pulled away from land and resumed its driven journey.
Chapter 3: Make Out Point
Finally, after what felt like hours of frustration and unnecessary romance drama, the group finally made it to Make Out Point. The hill was much smaller up close, as it seemed Finn could climb to its top in less than half an hour. "Here we are.", LSP spoke up as they exited the car, seeming to be trying her hardest to avoid eye contact with Melissa and Brad. "Wait, like, before you go, I need to warn you of something. The antidote is currently being held by…" the lumpy princess lowered her voice to a whisper as she continued explaining to Finn and Jake "...smooth posers. If you can deal with them, it'll be a straight shot to the cure." "Ok, note taken. This shouldn't take long", the human boy commented as he and Jake darted up the hill. All around them, couples were conversing, making out, or doing something that he was too disgusted to describe. The magical dog briefly fell behind, panting in pain as the small bumps on the side of his head combined into larger ones, and his chest segmented into similar bumps. Once at the top, he encountered who he assumed the lumpy princess was referring to when she mentioned "posers". A lumpy pink teen boy with dirty blonde hair and noticeable ache stared intently at a slim green humanoid donning casual wearing. An indigo blue fish-like teen wearing glasses stood beside them, just as interested in the humanoid and the clear orb he was sitting on. "Hey, you in the middle. You're looking real smooth today.", Finn greeted the trio as casually as possible. They didn't seem as awful as the lumpy princess seemed to perceive in her mind. But then again, considering her tendency to exaggerate situations, it would be best for them to take her words with a grain of salt. "Uh, is that a compliment?" The green humanoid paused, visibly confuzzled. "Uh, maybe, yeah. My best friend contracted the lumps, and we were hoping you had the antidote with you.", he explained calmly in response, some of his stress fizzling out. It shouldn't be long before my bud's ok, or at least that's what he thought. "Oh, you mean the orb? Hey Lenny, your time's up. Hand it to me." Lenny complied, tossing it over to the ache ridden teen as his body shifted to a navy blue form similar to him, minus the acne and hair. "So the orb is the antidote?" "Yeah, pretty much. We take turns using it to feel…smooth I guess." the trio shrugged nearly simultaneously. "Would you be bothered if I borrowed it for a second, for a friend?" The boy discreetly pointed at the magical dog, who was fidgeting in place. "Yah sure, just give it back ok?" "Sounds like a deal to me."
As Finn was tossed the antidote orb, he could hear someone frustratedly huff behind him "What is taking you two so long? I'm sick of Melissa and Brad making out in the car." He turned around to see LSP a couple inches away from the top of the hill, looking more impatient than usual. "Hey, good timing. I just-" he was interrupted by Lenny snatching the orb out of his hands. "What was that about?" he swiveled around to see the trio giving him a betrayed glare. "Jeez, you're friends with her?" the navy blue lumpy teen spat in contempt. "Oh come on, it's not my fault you three are posers. Just give the antidote already.", the lumpy princess bluntly scoffed. "I-I don't think we will.", the indigo teen softly retorted, the acne ridden teen adding "Yah no, we better get going." As the trio floated off into the distance, the human boy turned to face the lumpy princess, a combination of irritation and stress reaching a boiling point. "What the junk, man? We were so close to getting Jake cured.", he chided her, as she simply sighed in response. "Like I said, it's not my fault they're posers. What, are you taking their side?", she retorted with a rising bitterness in her tone. "If it wasn't for whatever beef was between you and them, Jake would be happy and healthy. But Nooooo, you just had to bully some guys who were probably minding their own damn business. It's not their fault you think they're posers. I'm tired of this, you know that right?", he ranted, her expression changing from contempt to fury, and finally to taking pure offense as she listened to him. "Just wow, like I didn't know you felt that way about me. I thought that if I took you here, to the exact location of the antidote you've been begging my ear for about this whole globbin time, then maybe you could appreciate me like a friend or whatever. I wasn't trying to drive those idiots away- they've had this weird vendetta against me since I got the rest of the lumpy teens to ditch them. They were posers back then, still are now, and very well may still be in the future. But like, I actually wanted to help you out here. Why should I care if this is the thanks I get?! Come on Lumpy Jake, we're going to the promcoming.", as she finished the rant of her own, she began floating off back to her car.
"I dunno what's up with her, but I ain't ditching you." In a third, more unfortunate act of irony, after Jake finished speaking his body began shifting and molding in front of Finn's eyes, as though he were clay being manipulated for pottery. As it ceased, the former dog nearly resembled every other lumpy teen the two had encountered, the only salvaged parts being his facial features and floppy ears. His fur had been dyed a bright magenta and his legs reduced to short stubs that vaguely resembled the stingers of a jellyfish. Taking in a deep breath, he exclaimed "I'm coming peeps. Just gotta ditch Finn." Doing exactly that, he levitated off into the distance, leaving the boy completely alone. "Jake no- we still have time! We can still…." his calls for the magical dog fell on deaf ears, as he was already out of sight. "He's gone. My bro's gone….forever probably….." his legs buckled from underneath him as he collapsed onto his knees. "I'LL KILL YOU LUMPY SPACE, YOU, you, uh- you jerk!", he cried out into the endless sky, bashing his hands against the grass under his feet. He then proceeded to take several deep breaths, regaining his composure. What was he supposed to do now, since he was essentially stranded on an island in an unfamiliar world around those he knew nothing about. He couldn't stay there forever, considering he'd just slowly be killing himself from dehydration or starvation, but at the same time there was no feasible way to leave the island without falling into the abyss below. He hated to admit it, but the situation seemed hopeless.
"Hey, I didn't know you hated her that much.", he heard a voice behind him. Finn swiveled his body to find the source of the remark. To his surprise, the trio from before was watching him, their previous look of disaster replaced with one of interest. "Why are you still here? I thought you left." "We were gonna leave, but then we heard you hating on LSP, so we may have changed our mind about you. Name's Monty by the way.", the acne ridden lumpy teen explained casually with the antidote orb under his arm. Lenny and the indigo teen nodded in agreement. "Look, she was with me because she's the only person I know who could've brought me here. Truthfully, I don't normally go on expeditions with her. She can….a handful, let's say.", he cleared up the situation, realizing only then that the almost splitting off between the four was nothing more than a misunderstanding. "Yah, I second that. Like, the reason we stay here is because they'd bully us if they saw us." Lenny replied in understanding. "Anyways, sorry 'bout what happened earlier. Here, go save your friend.", Monty tossed the orb back to the human boy. "Uh, thanks. Do you know where this promcoming thing is?" He grabbed the antidote with an audible "oof" from the force of the throw. "You see that lump cloud below us?" The trio pointed below them to a rounded building, with spotlights and faint club music emanating from it. "That building's where the promcoming is. Problem is, someone like you couldn't possibly reach it by willpower alone." "Well, if I can't jump, what if I floated there, kind of like how you float around everywhere?", the boy suggested, an insane idea entering his head. It was insane, buy hey- an insane sounding solution was better than none at all. "Are you crazy? That's only a 50/50 chance at best." "At least 50/50? Those are some good odds." The trio stared at him with a look of shock, probably not expecting him to accept the risks so quickly. "Alright you three, bite me.", he continued, forcing himself in the middle of the group. As they gave him unsure glances, he assured "It'll be alright, guys. Jake and I will be able to cure ourselves once I get to him." Despite this, they still only fidgeted with their hands, visibly on the fence about purposefully causing infection. Without another moment's hesitation, he leaped at each member of the trip, forcing their teeth into his arms, legs, and chest. Landing back onto the group, he found himself starting to float, a mix of tingling and pain covering every inch of his body. Ignoring that and the distressed pleas of the trio, he rushed up to the edge of the island, and jumped.
Chapter 4: Cure at the Disco
"Jake! Jake, I made it! I have the antidote!"
The sound of a loud crash reverberated through the building as Finn crashed into it head first, floating up only inches away from the ground. Jake, who had been drinking a sort of soda-like beverage trending in that world, looked over at the wreckage. "Finn, what the- oh glob, what did you do to yourself?!" he yelped out in horror, his eyes widening as he stared at the human's swelled up body, his white bearskin hat resembling a soft cloud. "We don't have any time. Just sit on this orb and everything will be alright.", the boy hastily attempted to position the antidote under the ex-dog's floating body, only for him to move out of the way in a visibly annoyed manner. "Man, I know you mean well and all that. But I'm just kinda vibing here, ya know? You're, like, totally creeping me out." "Please, just do it for me. I know your brain is really messed up right now, but if there's any semblance of the bud I know deep down, I know you'd want this." "Jeez, do that freaky obsessed crap somewhere else." "Please just hear me out…my brain…I…", Finn felt himself fading in and out of consciousness before something in him just kind of…died…or something. "Eh, whatever.", he blurted out, grumbling to himself "This was pointless. Jake, forget about that stupid cure junk." The ex-dog tilted his head at the now also legless ex-human inquiring "So you don't, like, care for it?" "You seriously want it now? Despite all that crap from before?" "Uh yah, cause why not." "Then go get it. It's, like, yours now." Finn callously rolled the orb towards Jake. Taken off guard by the suddenness, he felt himself fall back first onto its cold surface. At that moment, something snapped in him. It was like a camera suddenly becoming focused- lucidity returned to his brain in an instant.
"Woah, am I cured now?" The dog looked down at himself. No bumps or swollen parts, not even a spot of weird coloration. Relief washed over him as he let out a heavy sigh. Looking over to Finn though, he noted the problem wasn't over. "Hey, bud. I'm so sorry for ditching at that hill earlier. I dunno what got into me then, but it wasn't good. Please bro.", he held up the antidote, hoping to maybe spark some of the ex-human boy's previous determination. To his dismay though, the boy flatly responded "Nah. Like, I'm not into that anymore." He turned away, about to dart away from the magical dog, only to rush face-first into a wall, passing out near instantly. Grateful for the coincidence, he gently placed his bro's unconscious body on top of the orb.
The sudden feeling of something cold resting on his spine jolted Finn awake. "Dude, we made it!" Seeing Jake back to his usual self finally put the human boy in a sense of ease,after hours of nothing but built up stress. "Oh yeah, we really did." Feeling behind him, he slipped the antidote orb from behind his back, and stood up. LSP, who seemed to notice the two in a healthy state, approached them and stated "Finn, I'm, like, really sorry I stressed you out with the whole cheating drama and whatever." "It's not a big deal. Everything turned out ok in the end." "No seriously. I realize now that I definitely made the whole ordeal more complicated than it needed to be." "Oh well, things happen. May as well just enjoy the night."