Reply to Guest: Well, that's assuming Buttercup gets another medical examination. Either way, there's plenty of drama to be had. Funny you should mention that the name 'USDO' would be obsolete... very interesting indeed :) But I guess I just love to troll my readers sometimes. You never know.
A/N: Anyway, happy new year guys! (GMT +8) This is the last chapter I'll be posting for 2019!
Chapter 75: Homecoming (Part 2)
The City of Townsville. Suburbs. The House.
01 MAR (Wednesday) 1989. 2102.
The doorbell chimed. Then again, and again. It'd chimed for a minute or two while Professor Utonium and Selicia had to scramble out of their room and down the stairs, still trying to throw on whatever fresh clothes they could get their hands on in haste.
"Who could it be in the middle of the night?" Professor Utonium uttered in open wonderment.
"At least we know for sure it isn't some dictionary salesman," Selicia commented.
"I'd rather have a dictionary salesman at this point," the professor said. The answer was instantly recognizable when he opened the door to a huge man taking up much of the door's dimensions. General Blackwater, except he was dressed in his general's uniform rather than the usual SWAT gear he was found in most of the time. To the professor, who had known the man for many years even if much of their relationship was characterized by cold hostility, constant disagreement, and reluctant cooperation, it was very uncharacteristic of the man, who tended to be very practical with everything he did, right down to his attire. Now, he was decorated in a uniform with shoulder marks denoting his rank, award bands, of which there were many, decorating one half of his chest and all sorts of silver insignias pinned on his collars. The formal uniform of the USDO was of a shade of dark gray, something which the professor never liked. It'd reminded him of the confederates from the civil war from whom the Foundation could trace its ancestry to.
"Professor Utonium," the huge man greeted the relatively smaller one.
"What are you doing here this time?" the professor 'greeted' the general cautiously. General Blackwater took off his beret. He was searching behind the professor for… something.
"I'm here to check in with Bunny. I want to know how she's been settling in," the general declared his intentions openly. "And while I'm at it, I will be briefing the Girls in person."
"Briefing them on what, sir?" Selicia asked. She was still buttoning up her shirt, a small detail the general caught, and it'd teased nothing but a frown from him.
"Now wait just a second," the professor insisted on stubbornly standing in the way of the general when he tried to get into the house. The general had stayed out, which was another unusual move; generally, he'd get his way, whether by the force of his authority or his muscles. "Just what the hell is going on, Blackwater? Why do you even care if Bunny's settling in at home? You sure didn't give an atom about Blossom, Bubbles, and Buttercup when they first moved in!"
"I'm not sure if you're even aware of this," the general said whilst pointing fingers at the professor. "But 'your' Bunny is now a full-fledged soldier, promoted to private at the end of her training. Did you know that?"
"No, but-"
"No? I guess that speaks volumes about how good a father you are," the general accused before giving the professor the benefit of his answer.
"Says the man who canceled my Girls' psychiatric session today," the professor countered. "It was supposed to be Bunny's first."
"Bunny does not need a shrink. Everything she needs is right here. She's my soldier, my responsibility. I don't know what you think is going on, Utonium."
With that, General Blackwater forced his way into The House, shoving the professor aside. At the same time, Blossom was running down the stairs, towards Dad and Mom, looking rather troubled. It was the worst time possible to be troubled.
"Blossom, go up to your room!" the professor said, pointing her back up the stairs.
"But Dad, I really need to talk to you!" Blossom protested, looking worst after being turned away - again.
"General Blackwater wants to talk to you first. All of you," the professor explained, his voice lowered, but Blossom could hear him well because of her sharp ears, second only to Buttercup.
"But I really need-" Blossom insisted, and the professor insisted harder:
"Go up to your room, Blossom!" the professor raised his voice at her. The look on her face made him regret it, but there was nothing he could say as she'd already flown away, back to her room. Although it was Blackwater who'd unbalanced him, he could only blame himself for his mistake. He soon found himself on the couch, with Selicia beside him.
The City of Townsville. Suburbs. The House.
01 MAR (Wednesday) 1989. 2106.
When Blossom returned to her room, she had to face up to what she had done. Both Bubbles and Bunny were looking at her like she was a car accident, while Buttercup was sitting in their bed, snacking on nuts meant for a tea party that never came into fruition while she continued to watch with an unsightly smirk on her face.
Seeing Bubbles cracking under what she had said minutes ago had melted her. Bunny was still holding her, and she was crying into her shoulder.
"Bubbles… I- I didn't mean it. I was just mad and- I'm sorry," Blossom apologized, knowing full well that it wasn't the first time she'd had a little accident with her anger problem.
"But why were you mad? I was just trying to- trying to-" Bubbles cried, still trying to snatch up elusive words. "I thought it's what you want? Us sisters together? Shouldn't that include Bunny?"
"Yes, but- I-" Blossom tried to come up with something, anything. But it was hard to do so when she knew she was in the wrong. Yet at the same time, her contempt for Bunny and anger at her apparent arrogance hadn't left her.
"I'm sorry, Blossom," Bunny apologized, even though she didn't quite understand what she had done. "I won't do it again."
Blossom stared at the brunette, trying to read her.
"But you didn't do anything…" Bubbles cried, her voice muffled as she continued to cry into Bunny's shoulder. At first, Blossom was glaring down at Bunny, seething mad, but her demeanor began to soften, surprisingly. Even she didn't want things to turn out the way it did. It hadn't been her intention. Things just went out of hand, and her anger got the better of her.
Blossom sighed. "I'm… sorry too. I just…" an excuse eluded her, for all her 'superior' intelligence. But rescue came from the unlikeliest of source. The door leading into the Girls' room opened and in stepped General Blackwater. Bunny shot up to her feet, standing at attention. The others turned around, surprised to see him.
"At ease, private," the general ordered Bunny to stand down. "Blossom, Bubbles, Buttercup… and Bunny. We need to talk."
"It's good to see you, sir," Bunny greeted the general enthusiastically. Next to the disappointing and harsh encounter with her sisters, the general was a huge relief, a warrior angel even before she returned to her family. At the very least, Blossom was too confused by Bunny's demeanor towards General Blackwater to be mad at her for being, essentially, a suck-up. The elder trio had always been afraid of him and informal in his presence due to their lack of military training. It didn't sit right with Blossom because of that.
"How are you settling in, Bunny?" the general asked the youngest of the quartet first."Is everything alright?"
He could sense that something was in the air, though he couldn't quite put his finger on it - his aptitude in parenting had undergone a slow decay over the years, with his own children grown up a long time ago, even his grandchildren too, not that he'd spent much time with them. There was a kind of smell in the air, and the Girls didn't look right to him, as if they were hiding some dirt under their carpet, and the kind of dirt wasn't very obvious.
"Y-yes, General Blackwater," Bunny answered simply that it seemed suspicious. The general knew her well enough to know that something wasn't right. Blossom rolled her eyes at the way Bunny addressed the general. 'Teacher's pet' was the closest term she would use to describe Bunny, even though Blossom herself had been suffering from the term in Miss Keane's class.
"Right. Now…" the general decided to let it slip regardless, as it didn't seem like something worth pursuing. "First order of business. Blossom, I'm promoting you to lieutenant."
"But… What does that mean?" the leader of the Powerpuff Girls asked, confused by the term. Bunny thought her lack of knowledge in military tradition was peculiar, but she didn't mention it out of both fear of Blossom's reprisal and respect for the general.
"It means that I'm making it official that you're a leader," General Blackwater explained.
"You are?" Blossom was surprised. She stood up when the general was pulling something out of his pocket. A batch of rank patches. He picked several from the selection and handed them to Blossom.
"Provisional lieutenant, just so we're clear," the general clarified. "Do you know what that means or do I have to school you again?"
"Pro…visional?" Blossom wondered about the meaning of the word.
"It means you'll have no authority over anyone or anything other than your unit - in your case, The Powerpuff Girls," General Blackwater explained, then grumbled in a low voice, mostly keeping it to himself: "That team name still sounds stupid." Buttercup could hear it very well owing to her enhanced hearing, and she secretly agreed.
"That includes Bunny. As for the two of you…" the general went on, before dispensing the other rank patches to Bubbles and Buttercup. "Congratulations, you're now both privates."
"The same as Bunny? Seriously?" Buttercup complained, attraction a sideways glare from the general, which was so fierce that it'd made her thought twice about her comment.
"Now listen here, the three of you!" General Blackwater bellowed all of a sudden, making the Girls, including Bunny, jump. "I know the three of you don't think too highly of the newest addition to your team-"
"That's not true…" Bubbles mumbled. The general was just a hair-trigger away from giving her a smack in the face when she interrupted him, but he merely went on:
"-But she is a part of your unit - your family now. I'm sure even your father will agree with that," the general went on. "That leads me to my next point. The three of you will train Bunny to use her powers. I want flight capability and ranged attacks within a few days. Is that understood?"
"Yes…" the Girls echoed their reply one after the other, almost simultaneously, with their heads bowed in submission.
"Very good," the general praised them emptily. "Now Bunny might be young, but she has already achieved great things under my training program. In fact, I'd say that she might even have greater potential than the three of you when it comes to law enforcement." In other words, the general was basically saying that Bunny was better than the three of them. It'd incensed Blossom the most, vacating her mind of all thoughts of coming back together with Bunny. "Any questions?"
"No…" the elder Girls said in unison. Blossom's face was practically twitching by this point.
"Well, at least the three of you have learned when to shut up. Now if you'll excuse me, I would like to speak to Bunny alone. Bunny?" the general gestured for the youngest of the quartet to follow him out the door. She obeyed without question.
The City of Townsville. Suburbs. The House.
01 MAR (Wednesday) 1989. 2124.
General Blackwater had taken some time to speak to Bunny, more so than the kind of time he'd spend in The House otherwise. Even the professor knew it: the general wasn't behaving the same way he used to, though the reason was beyond him, though he theorized that it could just be time doing its work on a mere human being.
When the huge man was finally descending down the stairs, with Bunny watching from above, the professor could almost breathe a sigh of relief. Almost. He didn't like having the general over, not after what he'd done to Bunny, and what he might have done to her. Just when he was ready to let bygones be bygones, like water under the bridge and all that.
Without even acknowledging Professor Utonium or Selicia beside him, the general went for the door before stopping when he was nearly there. He turned around.
"By the way, professor, Wiggums is dead. I just thought I should inform you out of courtesy," the general said in a rather cold and unfeeling manner. The professor didn't expect any empathy from the general, but neither did he expect the news. It'd hit him like a brick, and he could feel it in his knees; it was a miracle that the professor could still stand. "He was trying to defect to the FBI, for the lack of a better term, and was executed on charges of treason, dereliction of duty, abandoning his post, attempted dissemination of top-secret data and the endangerment of USDO agents."
With that, the general left, slamming the front door shut behind him. Professor Utonium went to the glass door overlooking the backyard after that, just staring out, just thinking. Just being shell-shocked. He lit his pipe and began smoking it. Selicia hugged him from behind when she noticed that he was distressed. Well, more distressed than usual. She kissed him in the back of his neck. The professor held her caring arms with his free hand. They stayed that way for a while before there was anything verbal being exchanged between them.
"I called him a worm the last time I spoke to him. A cowardly worm who's afraid of the light. I said that that would be an insult to worms," the professor finally said, his voice shaking with so much emotion. Selicia tightened her hug. "He died with that in his head and I know he was trying to do something for the Girls and he died-"
"Thomas, stop," Selicia comforted her other half. "It's not your fault he died. You couldn't have known he would have. You were just trying to help Bunny as a father should, and you were mad that you couldn't. You're the nicest, kindest man I ever know… surrounded by terrible people. It's not your fault."
"We were friends for eight years. Nine years, now. He's a smart man, could've… been my equal in the sciences but he chose supply chain management. I kept bouncing ideas off of him right from the start, and he listened… back when no one believed in me, not even half the damned science team. In a way, the Girls owed their creation to him. They owed a lot to him - he was there every step of the way for them, even when they didn't know it most of the time. Curse of being in logistics, I guess. You get taken for granted."
"Oh, Thomas…" Selicia said and wished she could say more. The professor succumbed to tears fully after that, and the two hugged. Meanwhile, Bunny was still sitting at the stairs, and she'd heard every word her Daddy had said. Even peeked at them a few times. It was easy to spy on them when her adoptive parents were so emotionally affected. Before they could see her there, however, she'd gone back up to her room, where her sisters were waiting.
The City of Townsville. Suburbs. The House.
01 MAR (Wednesday) 1989. 2129.
When Bunny was back in the Girls' room, Bubbles was suspiciously quick to take her by the arm and lead her out of the room again. Bunny, however, was trained to be observant, and she knew why her sweetest and kindest sister (by far) would do this - it was all in the eyes of Blossom and Buttercup, who looked nearly identical in their glares and crossed arms that had it not been for the color of their hair, eyes, dresses, and skin, they would have been indistinguishable.
Bubbles dragged Bunny to the balcony on the second floor. She had floated along the way to make it easier, but it had also worked to hold Bunny's attention as she had always wanted to be able to hover and fly like her elder sisters.
"Bubbles, what's going on?" Bunny asked one of her three elder sisters. She was beginning to like her more than the others. To her, Bubbles was the picture in her mind when she thought of sweetness, kindness, and love - right up there and next to Dad.
"Blossom and Buttercup are mad at you," Bubbles whimpered. The two most timid of the quartet looked out into the Suburban horizon, filled with snow, streetlamps and similar houses. Out in the corner, the husband and father of their only neighboring family, Mister Smith, had practically run back into his house upon noticing them. "You should give them some time to cool off. It's what I do when they're mad."
"Why did Blossom yell at you?" Bunny asked, finding it unthinkable that she was shaking in fear of the most extroverted of her sisters. "She wasn't like that before…"
"It's my fault… I did something bad. I was a bad girl," Bubbles admitted, and then and there, she told Bunny the story of how she nearly killed Dad and Blossom, just to get herself her next fix of His Secret 2.0.
Bunny could empathize. Bubbles might not know, but the youngest of the quartet knew that she wasn't the only one to have hurt Dad. She had yet to tell anyone, but it was something she would like to keep that way. She couldn't imagine what Dad would do - what her other sisters would do if they found out.
"You're not a bad girl…" Bunny tried her best to cheer Bubbles up. "You're nice to me. But Blossom…" she couldn't believe she was about to talk about Blossom this way. She knew what tough love was, but it didn't seem to connect that way to Bunny. General Blackwater had hurt her to teach her, but Blossom had gone off without a reason. "Blossom's being mean to you and me. She's the one being bad."
"Don't talk about Blossom that way," Bubbles snapped at Bunny, but gently, more worried about Bunny than angry. She didn't want the relationship between Blossom and Bunny to go down that road right from the start. "She's really, really nice. Well, usually. She just gets really angry sometimes."
"I guess things will be better tomorrow…" Bunny muttered lowly, as if afraid that saying it too loudly might jinx it.
The City of Townsville. Suburbs. The House.
01 MAR (Wednesday) 1989. 2203.
To let Blossom cool off, Bubbles and Bunny had steered clear of their room for the past half hour, instead of spending some time in Mom's gym instead. Although the room wasn't exactly built for comfort, they were able to nest themselves in a cozy space between two machines. Bubbles would teach Bunny all sorts of hand games - clapping games and concentration games - and it was surprisingly fun and Bunny couldn't believe that so much could be had without toys or equipment. The closest analogy to this she had was empty-handed martial arts. One does not need a weapon to do damage - especially when it came to Girls like them.
They would have kept going. They were having so much fun that half an hour had gone by like five minutes. The only reason they'd stopped was because of Dad, who'd called for bedtime the moment he found them in the gym.
"There you are! Awww, isn't that sweet? The two of you are already so close!" the professor would praise them while Bubbles leaped into his arms. Bunny, however, was keeping her distance for some reason, something that didn't go unnoticed.
"What's wrong, honey?" he asked with a worried tone in his voice; Wiggum's death and Bunny's abuse at the hands of General Blackwater were still fresh on his mind. "You can come closer you know, I don't bite."
Reluctantly, Bunny came up next to him, and after shifting Bubbles to his left arm, the professor put his arm around Bunny and pulled her up next to him while they were walking towards their room. He could feel resistance, but it didn't last very long. He simply laughed. "Aren't you the shy one. Looks like someone's stealing your job, Bubbles." Both he and Bubbles laughed at that, and Bunny followed along, albeit nervously.
At bedtime, Bunny and Blossom were lying down in bed next to each other. Both of them found it awkward, and Blossom had to resist pushing her away really hard. It didn't last by some miracle, however, and that miracle was Professor Utonium.
After switching off all the lights except the table lamp, fetching a book from the kids' library along the way, he'd sat down and opened the book and read to them a very interesting story, unlike the others.
It was the Greek mythological story of how Icarus and his father, Daedalus, came to be stuck in the latter's labyrinth of his own making, all to appease the tyrannical King Minos, who threw him into the inescapable maze with a murderous Minotaur for his troubles. After much misadventure and false starts, the father had crafted wings for both of them to escape…
It was a long book, despite being the story being rewritten for a young audience. After all the reading, questions and interruptions, Bubbles and Blossom were already drifting off, while Buttercup hadn't even been listening, and was just trying to get some sleep whilst tolerating the storytelling. That left Bunny wondering. The story seemed familiar somehow, even though she had never heard it before. Her escape into a fictional world, however, didn't last as her worries were too great.
"Dad, am I like Icarus?" Bunny asked. She saw herself in the teenage boy. In the refashioned story, there were scenes showing the familial love between the two Greeks, how they comforted each other as they tried to come to terms with King Minos' betrayal and the Minotaur's threat, how they worked together to build their feather-and-wax wings.
The professor had to sit for a moment and think about it. Bunny thought it strange that he had to.
"Yes, yes you are," the professor finally said, before planting a kiss on her forehead. "Welcome back, Bunny." But there was more he had to say, and he wasn't sure how to say it. He had to sink back down to his chair for a minute to think.
"Girls…" he started, and now even the drowsiest of the Girls were awake enough to wonder what he was thinking. "I'm sorry I'm not a better father."
"But you are," Bunny was the first to defend him, though she wasn't sure who Dad was talking to. She assumed it was all of them.
"Will you spend more time with us?" Blossom took the opportunity to ask.
"Yes. I'd love that very much. I've just been-" the professor went on, but he couldn't go on because his rambling had taken him on a difficult tangent. "I've been selfish."
"You're not, Dad," Bubbles said. "Stop saying things like that. You're the best Daddy in the whole world."
"Yeah, you were there when I need you," Bunny added, to which the Dad laughed.
"Well, I wish I could be there more, but I guess the past is past," the professor said, thinking that Bunny had got to be the most forgiving Girl of the lot, right next to Bubbles. Blossom and Buttercup wouldn't have let him off the hook so easily, he reckoned. Without knowing it, he'd reckoned right, as even now, both of them were resenting him in some way. "Well, from tomorrow onwards, I'm spending more time with the four of you."
"Thanks, Dad," Blossom said.
"Alright, I think I've rambled like an old man long enough. Good night Girls," the professor said before switching off the table lamp and leaving, remembering to leave the door open for the timid Bubbles, so that it wouldn't be totally dark.
Bubbles, being exhausted from the emotional rollercoaster of the day, had fallen fast asleep within minutes. Had it not been for Blossom, Bunny would have followed:
"Hey Bunny," Blossom addressed her younger sister.
"Yes, lieutenant?" Bunny acknowledged Blossom. It was then that they both realized that they hadn't really introduced themselves to each other properly, on equal terms, ever since the former had returned from training a more mentally fully-formed Girl.
"Can you not call me that?" Blossom said, a little irritated by the new term, which she didn't quite like as it was too formal, and it'd reminded her of General Blackwater, whom she couldn't really like because of their history and the distance between them.
"Yes, ma'am," Bunny corrected herself.
"Just Blossom will do," Blossom said, a little exasperated.
"Sorry, Blossom," Bunny corrected herself once more. "I was told to talk to superiors that way."
"That's better," Blossom said. "I'm sorry about what I did today. I feel bad about it."
What Blossom had said brought tears to Bunny's eyes. Bubbles hadn't let her down. She was right all along about Blossom. She could never believe that one of her sisters was someone she could come to hate, and Bubbles was right.
"It's okay. I've gotten mad before too…" Bunny said. "I'm sorry for making you mad."
"Don't be, Bunny. I just… get that way sometimes and I couldn't control myself," Blossom said. "Miss Alice is helping me with that and she said I'm going to be all better. I'll teach you how to fly tomorrow and it's going to be fun."
"I just think spending time with you would be fun," Bunny said, and while she did, Blossom had slipped an arm around Bunny's. With the past being put to rest in the past, they both soon fell asleep with smiles on their faces.
Things, indeed, will be better tomorrow.