Tower buddies: chapter 5
Chapter 5: slice of (not so ordinary) life
Anne woke up, hyperventilating.
She'd had the dream again. The toads were experimenting on her in the tower again. She took a second to remember where she was.
For the past four days, she'd been staying in the plantar household, and was currently in the basement.
The hatch opened. "Anne, are you ok?" Asked hop-pop, his head sticking through.
"Yeah, i'm ok," anne said, standing up and stretching.
"Well," hop-pop said, pretending to believe this lie, "I'm going into town today. I've told people for the past few days that you're harmless, and what you did with the taxes. You want to come?"
"Sure." Anne was grateful of her time to rest after… the experience, but pretty tired of being cooped up.
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They took bessie into town.
"So, sprig, what do you guys do around here when you don't have work?" Anne asked, on the back of bessie.
Sprig shrugged. "Eh, not much really. Ever since the school was destroyed by ants a few years ago, we haven't really gotten any education. So mostly we just play sport, help out at home, buy groceries, hang out with friends, ya know."
Anne raised an eyebrow. "So what sport you have round here?"
"Eh, only really bugball."
"What?" Anne asked. "No tennis?"
"Ten what now?"
Anne gestured to her racket. "You know, racket, net, ball? You don't have it?"
Sprig shook his head. "As far as i know, nope!"
"Ugh."
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"So, Anne, small problem. From what you've told me about you seeing your friend outside a few nights ago, Sasha seems to have told the tower that you weren't here."
"And?" Asked Anne. "Isn't that good?"
"Well," said hop-pop, "i'm sure the toads will notice you next time they collect taxes."
"Ah," anne said in a deadpan voice.
"Any ideas?"
"Well," anne said, "in my girlscouts troop, i was great at building structures. I'm sure i could build myself a small enough house!"
Hop pop gained a kind look on his face. "If you want to do that, you can. But just remember that you're always welcome in the plantar household."
Anne walked up to the bakery to see maddie.
"So, maddie, marcy put her recipes in the back of your book, right?"
"Yep!" Maddie said excitedly. "I'm astounded! This portal potion is amazing!"
"Yeah, i was wondering if you had any of her vacuum grenades?" Anne asked.
"Oh, sure! I can whip one of those up pretty quick! How many do you need?" She asked.
"A solid 20 or so," Anne smiled.
Maddie grinned. "I'm not even gonna ask."
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Anne had found a perfect spot; a small cliffside in the forest near the plantar's house. She began excavating a tunnel leading to a circular area, perfect for a living space. She then went to Loggle's to get some materials. She began putting up supports and built a door. The interior was nearly complete.
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She awoke a few days later in the plantar's basement. The previous day she had finally finished the inside and built a bed as well as installed some mushroom lights. She went up to have breakfast with the others.
"Hey, Anne! How ya doing?" Asked sprig.
"Great!" Said Anne. Nearly finished building my house! Wanna come see?"
Sprig cocked his head. "House?"
Oh, frog. She had forgotten to tell sprig about the fact she was moving out.
"Sprig," hop-pop said, "anne decided she should move out so the toads don't find her. She's still gonna be working on the farm, though, and having dinner with us some of the time."
"Don't worry, dude!" Anne said, "i'm living, like 5 minutes away! Wanna see it?"
Sprig's eyes lit up. "Sure!"
"Still kinda skeptical of your building skills," said hop-pop. Anne put on a faux-offended look before leading the way.
"Welcome to mi casa," said Anne, opening the door.
"It's amazing!" Said sprig. The floor was panelled, and the walls were bare stone, but in a homely kind of way. There was a pot and a fire in the centre, a bed in one corner and a desk in another.
"Girl scouts really paid off," said Anne. "And the fact that loggle helped with a lot of it."
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Anne had unpacked, and was about to go to sleep in her new home, after a dinner with the plantars.
"As homely as that basement was, it's nice to be alone," she said.
Alone, again.
Huh.
The memories started coming back.
Well, this was great.
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Marcy was flying in her balloon, looking into the distance. She was looking for a place to land.
She then had a thought. During her experiments with some potions, she had figured out a way to connect her and Anne's phone. She had used a normal bug and used a transformation curse to turn it into a miniature zapepede. She had used it to crawl into Anne's phone without anybody noticing and used it as a miniature signal reciever to pick up her calls. But… why shouldn't it work?
She turned on her phone and opened up anne's contact. She went through a lot of different texts to send to her, but settled for a simple, 'hope ur ok :)'
She really did. She'd meet up with her soon, when it had all died down.
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Sasha was at toad tower, lying in her bed. She was riddled with guilt. As far as she knew, Anne and her had come to an understanding.
But she felt… so wrong.
Why?
The next morning she wrote a letter.
'Dear anne,
I don't know if this message will reach you, but i hope it does.'
Sasha paused, before continuing.
'When we first came here, i made a mistake. And I don't know if i can make up for it. And i'm sorry for everything that happened in that little cell of yours. And i know that i've taken so much from you. But i just want one more thing. Please, just give me a chance to make this up to you.
-sasha."
She ran to the plantar household in the dead of night, and left it at the door.
(It's all so pointless by yard act starts playing)
Ah yeah, how could I forget
Why my pants were soaking wet
When we'd been pissing ourselves laughing at the news
Did you see it too?
It was incredible, they played it on a loop, we couldn't believe it
Basically, thеy'd discovered that therе were others just like us
Other beings, other creatures, other planets with other species
Who had other gods that they believed in
And they interviewed all of them and everyone of them
Not one could give any hint of a clue what they were doing here either
It's all so pointless
It is and that's beautiful, l find it humbling, sincerely
And when you're gone
It brings me peace of mind to know that this will all just carry on
With someone else (someone else)
With something new (something new)
No need to be blue
Everything has already happened, time is an illusion
It's hippy bullshit but it's true
Come on, come on, come on, come on, yeah
Now we're off to meet them, so pack your weapons
Don't want them thinking they can pull a fast one on us
Now do we Graeme?
It's alright, I've fought more wars than I've had hot dinners
Sure you have, but the key to peace lies within us
And we'd already have achieved it
If everyone was as enlightened as me
It's hippy bullshit, but it's true
Watch me explode
It's all so pointless, ah, but it's not though is it?
It's really real and when you feel it, you can really feel it
Grab somebody that you love
Grab anyone who needs to hear it
And shake 'em by the shoulders, scream in their face
Death is coming for us all, but not today
Today you're living it, hey, you're really feeling it
Give it everything you've got knowing that you can't take it with you
And all you ever needed to exist has always been within you
Gimme some of that good stuff that human spirit
Cut it with a hundred percent endurance
It's all so pointless, sure is
And when you're gone
It makes me stronger knowing
That this will all just carry on
With someone else (someone else)
(Something new) something new
It's not like there's gonna be nothing, is it?
Hey guys! Just wanted to ask if anybody had any better ideas for a song? I just both like this idea and the whole 'There is a whole multiverse/ universe of people and nobody has any idea what the frog is going on' bit and how it kinda fits with amphibia. Please comment if you have any other ideas and I'll review them.