Author Notes - A few years back, I wrote a fanfic called 'Thirty Years Later'. It has become one of my only creations I outright hate. Why? Because not only is it just poorly written, even for the time, but it's obvious I was too concerned with making the story as dark as possible for no reason. Mia suddenly dies of an overdose? Sure, why not! And that's not even getting into what I did with Oona. Turning her into an absolutely cynical jerk and treating her amputation like an inherit tragedy was just the beginning.

I bring this up because this is another story taking place about thirty years after the show ends. Consider this a 'spiritual successor'. However, in this story, the band was real and it wasn't just a TV show the Guppies acted in. One day, I may rewrite 'Thirty Years Later' and do a PROPER job addressing the life of child actors. For now, though, have a much more lighthearted (but still sometimes dramatic) story inspired by the 2011 Muppets movie!

CHAPTER ONE - A NEW FAN

A young Guppy, with a turquoise spotted tail and green hair that reached past her shoulders, burst through her bedroom door. As soon as she closed the door behind her, she collapsed to the floor and began to weep.

Why were the other kids in her school like that? Why did they have to be so mean to her? And why wouldn't her parents listen to her worries?

She lifted her head up and wiped the tears from her eyes. A poster on her wall was staring back at her. Molly - her favourite person in the whole world - was smiling at her. Molly, the lead singer of the best band in the world, was there for her. The young girl sniffled and approached the poster. Reached out for it.

Her frown slowly turned into a smile. Without any thought or second wasted, she swam over to her music player and pressed 'play'. She couldn't even remember the last song she had played, but she nonetheless recognised the next one from the first few notes alone. Even before the singer began to sing.

'Let's play music now,' The singer sang. 'Pass the instruments around…'

The tears on the young girl's face stopped trickling down her cheeks and her face began to dry. Just hearing that voice made her spirit soar. Six wonderful albums by the world's greatest band. Molly was her favourite, but the band simply wouldn't be complete without the other six Guppies - Gil, Deema, Goby, Oona, Nonny, and Zooli.

Six albums. Six albums filled with the best music she had ever heard, and it only got better from there. With how fantastic that sixth album was, she could hardly imagine what the seventh album would sound like!

Imagine her disappointment when she found out the band had broken up about twenty years ago. Long before she was even born. That brilliant seventh season never happened, and never would.

But that didn't stop her from loving and appreciating the music there already was.

Brianna swam out the front door and took a deep breath. Her parents needed some bread, and she had offered to buy it herself. After all, she was ten now! She could do it. Once she closed the front gate behind her, she popped on a pair of headphones and connected them to her phone. Making sure the volume wasn't too high so she could still hear the traffic, she hit shuffle on her favourite playlist.

'How do you know what's going on? When something tastes good or smells really wrong?'

She swam with a swing in her tail flaps, humming the song to herself. The song had taught her all about her senses before school did! Years had passed since she first listened to their music, and since she found out the band had broken up long before she was even born, but it hadn't changed a thing. Was it a little embarrassing to still be listening to their music at her age? Maybe. But she didn't care. If it made her happy, then it didn't matter what other people thought of her.

The music helped pass the time until she reached Downtown Bubbletucky. As she swam through the streets, she couldn't help thinking about how the Bubble Guppies themselves used to swim down these very sidewalks and go into those very shops. Her destination was the bakery. It was her favourite shop on the whole street, thanks to the delicious smell that caked the walls. Catching just the slightest whiff of that delectable aroma as she approached the doors was enough to get her stomach rumbling.

'I like them all, but one's just right! Gotta go through all I knooowwww!'

With a delightful little song about colours playing in her head, Brianna swam into the bakery and found herself just a little overwhelmed by the delicious aromas.

'Don't get distracted, Bri,' She told herself. 'Just buy the bread and go.'

Or, at least, that was the plan. She caught sight of a gorgeous cake behind the glass and wasn't looking where she was swimming. It wasn't much of a surprise when she bumped right into someone else, who had been looking through what buns to buy.

'Oh my!' The other person said.

Brianna was so surprised that she almost fell over. It took a lot of effort not to tumble to the floor.

'Oh, sorry!' She said, brushing the hair out of her face. 'I wasn't watching where I was-'

She couldn't say another word. During her apology, she finally got a good look at the person she had bumped into. This other person was a woman with dark skin and purple hair. Her hot-pink tail reached up to her arms and had a spiral pattern.

'That's alright!' The woman said. 'Accidents happen.'

Brianna's jaw dropped. Almost all the way. So far that you could've tossed a baseball down her throat. The woman before her looked very familiar. Very familiar indeed.

'Uh, kid?' The woman asked. 'Are you alright?'

Brianna stared at her for a little longer. To make sure. So she could be certain. But there was no denying it. A massive smile crept onto her face and she practically yelled at the top of her lungs:

'OH MY GOSH! YOU'RE ZOOLI!'

The entire bakery was staring at her, but Brianna didn't even notice. Even if she did, she wouldn't have cared. There was nothing else in the world that she cared about more than the simple fact that Zooli - a member of the world's best band - was standing right in front her! And Zooli flinched as soon as she heard her name.

'Uh, yeahhh,' She said. 'That's my name. How-?'

Unsurprisingly, Zooli had changed a lot over the years. She was much taller, her voice noticeably deeper, and had colourful eyeshadow and lipstick decorating her face. But make no mistake, it was the same person.

'You were a member of the Bubble Guppies!' Brianna shouted. 'And that was, like, the greatest band ever created!'

'The Bubble Gup-?'

It took Zooli's mind a moment or two to dig up that old memory. A memory from over twenty years ago. Perhaps more. Then, she gasped.

'Oh my god!' She said. 'The band! I had totally forgotten all about that.'

Brianna's jaw, which had been closed for a moment, dropped again. If it kept doing that, it would probably break.

'How did you forget something like that?!' She cried. 'You were part of the greatest band. Like, the best. You can't forget something like that!'

Zooli looked around at all the people staring at them, feeling rather embarrassed. Fortunately, her dark skin hid the blush that was rushing to her cheeks.

'Uh, listen, Kid,' She said.

'Brianna.'

'Brianna, if you want to talk about this, maybe we should talk about this somewhere other than a bakery full of people.'

'I'm not supposed to go over to a stranger's house.'

Zooli sighed. 'I was referring to the park.'

Both Brianna and Zooli bought what they needed to at the bakery, and the two of them made their way to the park. As Zooli hoped, it was far quieter than the town and had significantly less people too. They sat down on a bench, near the pond so Zooli could admire the ducks and frogs. At least she tried to, but Brianna made that tough.

'I can't BELIEVE it!' Brianna yelled. 'I am sitting right next to a member of the Bubble Guppies! I know that Bubbletucky is the birthplace of the band and all. But still, I can't believe I'm actually talking to a band member!'

Zooli let out a long sigh. 'Brianna, you do realise that was years ago, right? Like, decades ago. I was so young when I was in the band.'

Brianna nodded. 'I know that. I mean, it's pretty obvious. You're, like, five in all the posters and stuff. And now you're, um… twenty?'

'More like thirty, actually.'

If it was possible to have your mind blown twice in a row, it certainly happened to Brianna. As far as the ten-year-old was concerned, that was an unbelievably long time. And at three times her current age, it was understandable to think that.

'Thirty?!' She cried. 'B-But that's so old!'

Zooli was about to tell her that thirty actually wasn't old at all, but she let it go unspoken. It didn't exactly relate to what Brianna was trying to talk about.

'I can't believe I'm hearing someone talk about that band,' She said, looking at the ground. 'It hasn't been relevant in years. Occasionally I'd hear a song or two playing on a radio, but that was it. I definitely haven't met up with a fan in so long. Mostly cos all those fans grew up and moved on.'

'I heard one of your songs on the radio once,' Brianna said. 'And I fell in love right away! Pretty lucky that all your songs are still available for digital download, huh?'

Zooli chuckled. 'Yeah…'

All her memories from being in the band were extremely faded. Of course they would be. It had been at least twenty years since she had anything to do with it. But from what she could remember, it made her smile. There was one thing she could never truly forget - the other six Guppies, even if their names escaped her.

'You're obviously not in the band anymore,' Brianna said. 'But, if you don't mind me asking, can you tell me what you are doing now?'

Zooli gave her a smile. 'Well, after the band broke up for reasons I don't even remember anymore, I didn't really want to stay in the music career. I was always much more interested in animal work. So, usually, I travel the world to study creatures and have made some documentaries about it!'

Brianna gasped. 'You made wildlife documentaries? Since when?'

'I've been doing it for a few years now. While I was filming one in Australia, I met this lovely woman named Bindi. So, uh, I have a wife now. See, it's rare for me to stay in Bubbletucky much anymore. But it's still my home, so I come back now and then with Bindi. Lucky you, you caught me during one of my short stays.'

By this point of the conversation, Brianna was bouncing up and down in her seat. A reaction that Zooli was strangely familiar with seeing in a fan, despite not being in a famous band for so long.

'This is incredible!' Brianna said. 'Oh, you have to introduce to the other Guppies at some point! It's been a dream of mine for years to meet them. I'd love it if you did that!'

Zooli's smile dropped right down at the corners, and Brianna knew almost in an instant that she had said the wrong thing. But she remained silent. Zooli scratched the back of her neck and looked away.

'Look…' She said, sighing. 'I don't know how to tell you this, but I haven't seen the others in years. I can't even remember the last time we had a reunion. I can make guesses as to where the rest of them are, but it's not like we're really friends anymore.'

'... W-Why not?' Brianna asked.

Zooli leaned forward in her seat and tried to look Brianna in the eyes. Try as she might, it was near impossible.

'That's what happens when time passes,' She replied. 'You just kinda… drift apart.'

'Yeah…' Brianna said with a shrug. 'I guess that's true. Someone I knew in preschool already has a new best friend.'

'Believe me. If I could get the chance to get the band back together again, even if just for a day, I would.'

Brianna smiled. 'Well, why can't you! Even if it didn't quite work out, it'd be worth a try. Who knows? Maybe you can do it! You'll never know if you don't at least give it a try. That's what you guys taught me, anyway.'

Zooli breathed in deeply through her nose, closed her eyes, and tried to imagine all the great moments she had with her friends. She may have been a very late arrival, having been there for only about a third of the time, but that didn't mean that she didn't have lots of wonderful memories. Memories she had to dig deep for. Most of them had faded away, shadows of their former selves. But there was one thing Zooli could remember easily: her friends.

Nonny's rare but adorable smiles and ability to know seemingly everything.

Oona's gentle nature and shining optimism.

Deema's goofy dramatics and wild sense of humour.

Goby's curiosity and imaginative stories.

Gil's silly games and charming jumpiness.

And, of course, Molly's leadership and fantastic singing voice.

All welcoming her into the band despite her late arrival. She smiled just thinking about them.

'You really wanna do it,' Brianna said. 'Don't you?'

'It… would be nice to meet them all again,' Zooli said. 'Maybe we should give it a try.'

'Really?!'

Brianna shouted so suddenly and so loudly that Zooli almost jumped right off the bench.

'That's awesome!' Brianna shouted. 'Oh, this is going to be epic. We should start right now!'

Zooli flinched. 'N-Now?'

Brianna hopped off the bench. 'The dinosaur museum is really close by. That would be a great place to look!'

'Dinosaur museum?'

But Brianna didn't elaborate. She simply dashed away with all of the speed of a cheetah. Zooli stood up so fast she almost toppled over.

'Stop, Brianna!' She said, swimming after her. 'Wait for me!'

Zooli had a feeling she may regret this.

Author Notes - Fun Fact: Brianna is named after Brianna Gentilella, who you probably know as being Molly's original voice actress (S01-02) and her singing voice throughout almost the entire show. Who I have just found out is 29 years old now, apparently? Oh boy, that makes me feel old and I'm only 23. So to any new fans who are wondering why Molly's last name in fanfics is usually 'Gentilella', now you know why!

This story has no connections to the future seen in the second half of 'Separate Ways'. There will be some similarities, mostly in the Guppies' career paths, but it is its own thing.