Chapter Text

 The scenery takes place right after the daring, life threatening, nightmare inducing adventure Marcy Wu had with her best friend Anne Boonchuy and her adopted siblings Sprig & Polly Plantars. The whole ordeal with the ghosts trapped beneath the castle in the basement left all of them drained of energy to keep their fake courage up and the whole gang admitted to one another that they indeed failed the dare and turned yellow by the end of the sleepover, thus committing themselves to write their names in the book of “Losers”.

 “And there’s mine” - Polly stated as she finished the last stroke of her name - “You know if I had the advantage of a pair of working legs like the rest of you, I wouldn’t have to write my name down” - the purple tadpole manage to muster one last excuse as to why she lost the dare.

 “Nah Polly, you would have screamed in terror whether you had legs or not” - Sprigs interjected as he, just like the rest of group, saw right through his sisters lousy justification why she was holding onto Sprigs for dear life when they ran away from the horrific spirits just ten minutes ago.

 “Would not!” - the youngest Plantar shouted back, throwing her hands in the air as if she couldn’t believe they weren’t buying her bluff.

 “Whoa dudes, chill” - Anne finally stepped in, stopping this rambling before it blows into a full on ruckus - “I think we gave our throats a run for their coin with all the screaming and shouting we did tonight. I’m amazed we didn’t wake half the castle yet and it would be best to keep it that way my guys, now come on, scoop!…” - Anne picked her littlest sister from the floor with both her hands and held her up like the precious ball of life she was - “Time for bed you two, this is as any good spot to end this crazy party.” - with those words Anne stood up from the stoned floor and turned around towards the bed, Sprigs following suit by jumping just a couple of times and ending up the first one to dive right into the king sized mattress. The force from his landing was strong enough to cause the pink frog to flop up and down on the cushy mattress a couple of times, looking like a fresh fish pulled straight out the water onto dry land, before the motion stopped and Sprigs got to spread like a starfish across the white, soft, cozy royal bed.

 “Oh yeah, sleep, I’m ready for you to take me aw…” - the short frogs muffles were cut short as they were replaced with barely audible snoring that managed to escape from underneath the boys face-planted head. He was out cold already.

 “Ugh, fine, I do need my beauty sleep” - Polly agreed with her human sister, allowing herself to be carried away as the tiny amphibian gave one last yawn before bed, barely managing to cover her mouth with her fin like arm. “Still, if I had legs I could’ve dodge all those freaks and get away bruise and fear free” - the tadpole rambled, her eyes lazily blinking, out of sync with one another as both purple eyelids closed and opened on complete opposite moments.

 “Yeah you totally would have Polly, and you know why?” - Anne asked with a proud smile across her face as she reached the edge of the humongous bed and lowered her adopted sister down on a pile of pillows stacked by the edge from the bed from when they had that pillow fight - “It’s because you’re the bravest and toughest little frog not only in Wartwood or Newtopia, but it the whole wide Amphibia. High five girl” - she praised, now lifting her right hand for a signature human move that she managed to pass down to her family.

 “Hehe, and that’s a fact” - Polly snorted at the appraisal, already halfway to going utterly limp as her brother as the toll of tonight's adventure was settling on her body. Still the purple girl tried her best to give Anne the high five, but her little body only had enough strength to lift her little arm up, after that the gravity did most of the work as the fin like appendage started to fall back down. Anne was fast enough to dip her arm under and make it a down low.

 “Damn right you cute little barbarian” - Anne whispered, settling her sister arm down on a pillow and giving those adorable, purple cheeks a good night pinch. She looked over both of the frogs, that were now fast asleep, and her cheery smile lowered into more natural one that only had the edges of her lips curl up. She looked down on both her sibling with quiet pride on how well those two handled themselves today, even when scared half to death they didn’t froze in fear and managed to do the right thing to stop those horrid specters from escaping the basement.

 Yeah, these two are no chickens - Anne thought to herself, happy to have such amazing frogs as her family. And speaking of relatives she should probably follow their example of passing out, this night was long as it is and she really doesn’t need to drag it out. Not that there was much of the night left when the sun rays could be seen through the widow just beyond the horizon, so she carefully crawled over Sprigs, trying not to plant her hands or knees on his spread out limbs, lowering herself down on her back right besides her best buddy. Everything seemed in place for her to finally take her rest, all except for one person - Marcy, the one whose idea was this crazy sleepover, was standing still next to her study table, flipping the pages of the book they all signed tonight. While Anne wanted to point out that Mar Mar wont find anything other than their own two names written from start to whatever page they were already on, that idea was suddenly pushed aside by the realization that the raven haired ranger was going down the memory lane. Stay stayed up this late already, so what a minute remembering the past will change? With that thought Anne simply observed her friend in silence.

 Marcy did indeed was remembering all the other slumber parties she had with Anne and Sasha back home, on earth, how fun they were just doing dumb stuff till midnight, gossiping till early morning and sleeping in till noon. She even enjoyed the occasional dares Sasha used to come up with just to see the other girls trembling and shivering with fear and unease. It was all harmless fun, just like today if you don’t count the basement incident. Just another amazing sleepover with friends, one more wonderful night with her best friend Anne.

 It really did felt like most of those adventures were just Marcy and Anne, the book of scaredy pants seemed to agree with that too being filled with only their names, fighting the odds to try and do something brave or stupid. Or both at times. Sure their blonde bestie was there too, but she never showed any fear on her face, much less her body. Probably because she was always the one coming up with all the best dares so she always knew what to expect, leaving them to experience the bones shivering chills, the unease eyes jumping from one corner of their sockets to another, the unreasonable fear of being alone in the dark and the dreadful horror of the off chance that you are not alone in the darkness. So yeah it did felt like it was just the two of them – Marcy Wu and Anne Boonchuy against the world.

 Marcy Wu and Anne Boonchuy against the world? Jeez that sounds like a cheezy cartoon - the makeshift title of sleepover horror stories succeeded in its purpose - forcing a half a second chuckle out of Marcy’s throat, but by the sound of it, it didn’t left her lips. Even so she has to agree that with Anne by her side it did felt like they could take on what ever life threw at them. They sure as hell took on those barbariants! They really were the best duo…?

 “Marbles, you coming or what? As much as this night rocks I still wanna get some shut eye so I don’t sleep the entire day” - a murmur from behind her finally brought Marcy back from her day dreaming, or was it just regular dreaming, her mind taking back control of the body after a short break. Now her brain got to feel the well acquainted heaviness of fatigue where her limbs felt heavy, her head numb and heating and every blink making the eyelids feel heavier and heavier. Just like back home. If not for the medieval age society, talking frogs, newts and toads and various beasts and insects that want to kill you every step of the way Marcy probably couldn’t distinguish this sleepover from the ones she had back on earth, so for a brief moment it did felt like they never stole the stupid magic box and got zapped into utterly new and unfamiliar universe. Everything felt normal just for a second.

 “Yeah” - Marcy responded as she finally closed the book, turned around and began making her way to the bed. Well more precisely she was dragging her feet more than walking, and doing so Marcy would dare to say that she was still being graceful when compared to other times when she stayed up late due to studying, playing newly released game or binge watching her anime's where she had to crawl, roll, pull herself, pass out halfway to bed. So yeah graceful she was getting to the edge of the bed, sitting down on it and dropping herself on her back on the sheets. She lifted her feet from the ground, bend her knees and brought her heels on top of the frame of the enormous bed, using the metal frame to help the teen girl push the rest of her body up the mattress.

 “Here I am” - Marcy said just low enough so that only Anne could hear, rolling her head to the left just enough to where she could see her best friend, now meeting the others gaze as the friendliest thai girl had the same idea.

 “Yeah, I can see it” - was Anne’s response, her face now sporting a genuine smile that Marcy knew all too well - honest happiness being here.

 “Thanks for coming today Anni. It was really fun.”

 “Heh, I should be thank you for inviting us over Marbles. Even with real ghost this slumber party totally rocket” - Anne agreed, managing to curl up a bigger smile that showed off the bottoms of her teeth to emphasize her excitement - “Also, wasn’t Anni like the evil space wizard wrapped in black leather?” - she asked teasingly, picking on Marcy’s new nickname for her that just began to stick a couple of weeks before the whole calamity box shenanigans. And it took awhile for thai girl to pick on that name since she only saw the first three episodes.

 “No. Well he was… He was a Jedi not a wizar…” - with a defeated sigh Marcy realized this wasn’t the time or the place to explain the plot of the Star Wars universe, no matter how much her geeky side was mustering the energy to do exactly that - “If you watched the prequels and Clone Wars series with me like I asked about ten times you would know that Anakin was amazing, kind, brave, loyal and friendly Jedi. Just like you.”
 “You know what…” - Anne started, her eyes looking down so that she could guide her right hand closer to Marcy’s left, the raven haired ranger doing the same so that their hands could meet half way and soon she felt her hand getting clasped within her besties palm -“If we manage to get home I’ll gladly watch all of it with you” - Anne finished, now looking back into nerdy rangers eyes, reassuring that this wasn’t just a silly promise.

 “I’ll keep you on that word Anne” - Marcy stated, returning a tired smile to her friend and a reaffirming squeeze on the hand hold. The hand hold that was so calming, despite being such a simple act. For reasons unknown to Marcy just holding Anne’s hand put her at ease, like everything will turn out OK and as long as they’re together nothing can harm them in this toad eat frog universe. That feeling alone made one last thought blossom inside Marcy’s that the despair she felt the first day she got teleported to Amphibia was not only fading away when she managed to convince the king of Newtopia to not only believe that Marcy is a capable ranger, but also help her in her research of the music box, but it was utterly replaced with a new hope of getting back home when she got back with Anne. To put it simply why she felt so confident about getting back to earth was, well, it was once again Marcy Wu and Anne Boonchuy against the world. With that warm thought in her mind Marcy finally felt like falling asleep, her eyelids slowly closing with full intention on staying shut till waking. The last thing that the raven haired girl picked on was that Anne was still looking at her with open eyes.

 Always have to be the last one to fall asleep Anne? That’s so you to take care of others before yourself. You’re such a care Anne…

 …

 …

♫Here comes the sun, do, dun, do, do☀Here comes the sun, and I say♪

♫It's all right♩

 The stars above began to fade away as the sun's rays took their rightful place in the night’s sky, hiding the pitch black void of the universe behind a calming curtain of light blue. Alongside it the dead silence of the night also vanished, the chirping sounds of grasshopper like bugs were getting replaced by the sound of Newtopia itself waking up, the rising sun bringing much needed warmth for the cities cold blooded inhabitants. The waking newts and toads soon filled the streets with pleasant greetings to one another, buzzing sounds of snails driving, vendors promoting their items, cafe's filled with the clings of silverware and casual chatter. Even the guards of the king’s castle added to the sounds of living city by releasing the night guards off their duties, with a salute, for their well earned rest.

 The racket of Newtopia got all of its locals awake by now, except for four youngsters who were taking slumber at Marcy’s bedroom. The sounds of the citizens daily life was rather faint at the royal bedroom, no louder than the sound of a dropping needle, only heard by those who were listening for it. And the gang was far away from being aware of any sounds, even their own snoring wasn’t registering, all of them were still knocked out cold. Sprigs hasn’t even moved a muscle from the position he passed out, still flopped on his belly with his arms and legs spread out as much as possible, the pink frog doing amazing imitation of a starfish. Polly had rolled on her left side and had her mouth gaped open, letting out small snores as a trail of drool down her cheek puddled on the pillow she was sleeping on.

 Anne and Marcy, on the other hand, actually managed to muster enough energy over the night into a more snuggly position with Anne cradling her human best friend between her arms, her right hand wrapped under and around Marcy’s neck and her left hand draped around the shoulder. A hold you’d see on a toddler holding its favorite plushie. The Newtopian ranger herself looked naturally content with the position, her hands resting right beside her chest, her whole body shifted down just a few inches just so she could almost nestle more than half her face in the crook of Anne’s neck.

 Maybe it was just a human thing, maybe it was the two months separation from one another or perhaps it was all biological and they were just looking for warmth in the night in this cold blooded amphibian world, but the two of them were spending the morning close together. In comfort and safety that was coming closer and closer to an end as the bright rays of the sunlight seeping through the window started to crawl their way down from the ceiling to the back wall, going lower to touch the frame of the bed and now the morning light was caressing Marcy’s midnight oil black hair. Now if this were last week then Marcy would have used the intrusive light as sort of alarm for when to wake up, her eyes would twitch at the irritation before opening up and greeting the new day. Simple as that, but today, this morning after the slumber party, when the light finally reached those beige eyelid Marcy’s entire face muscles seemed to flinch at it, her body unanimously stating that it did not want to be awaken. It needed just 5 more minutes…

 Just 5 more minutes…

 …

 But the morning wasn’t giving those extra minutes that Marcy’s body demanded, the light was still trying to its best to penetrate the thin flesh between it and the girls eyeballs. It just didn’t stop bothering her and yet Marcy refused to wake up like she did just a few days ago in same situations. So her body started to take action independently from the brain turning the head to the side to move the eye sockets away from the stream of light and bury the entire face into the sheets. That did the job … half way through as it was just an unfortunate fate that Marcy was sleeping in such a position where only she got the sun's direct light coming from the window, the rectangle shape of light splitting her and Anne with a direct line, meaning even if Marcy had half her face turned away the ever growing nuisance that was the morning still poked at her eyelids from the corners. In last ditch effort the entire began to wiggle, pushing itself forward at snails pace to get away from the warm radiance, unbeknownst moving deeper into the snug embrace of a fellow warm blooded being. Soon the gap between Anne and Marcy was none existent, the two of them now pressing themselves firmly against one another. None the less Newtopian ranger got what she wanted – shade, escape from the turmoil of awakening, an oasis where her dreams can live on just for those few precious instants.

 In that moment of retreat, the motion that was uncoordinated with the brain, Marcy had pushed a bit too far into the crook of Anne’s neck, the light brown chin now was barely in contact with her forehead got nudged up, tilting the Wartwood heroes head back as the whole jaw now took rest on top of the raven locks. Naturally Anne’s own body responded to the unexpected shift, her eyelids twitch as new strain was put on the back of her neck, causing quite a bit of discomfort. Instinctively she tried to correct her face, lowering her chin down to where it was before, pushing against the top of Marcy’s head now. It didn’t go straight down, but made an arch around the frame of Marcy’s own face, Anne’s chin going along the forehead, passing the temple and ending up just above the cheeks. Now Marcy’s eye finally got their needed blockage from any source of light, blissfully covered by someone else, unmindful of the fact that her entire face was now used as a pillow for Anne. And as if the particular nerve was prodded Anne’s hands shot forward as her legs stretched down, as if there was a reflex spot hidden under the apex of the lower jaw that now held her entire body tense like a string. Even her diaphragm joined the action as it began pushing out the air out of her lungs, those brown nostrils barely flaring up from the increased torrent of air now blowing out of them, all that precious, body warm oxygen now spreading alongside the back of Marcy’s raven head. It lasted for a whole 5 seconds before the entire body loosened up, Anne taking a rather deep breath in her sleep, her legs bending at the knee slightly to bring her feet back to a comfortable positions, her hands curling back up, but now tighter that before since Marcy pressed herself against Anne’ chest and her frame was the limit to how tight the hug was. Now those coiling arms were back around Marcy’s neck and shoulder. If there was any space left between the two friends now it surely vanished into the thin air – Anne’s own flesh made sure of that. Surprisingly neither of the girls were awakened by one other’s actions, both of them soundly asleep, both faces sporting expressions of absolute calmness. At least Anne’s was while Marcy’s features were buried under her friend. Still from underneath Anne’s messy brown hair came silent snoozing sounds, Marcy unbothered by the fact that she ended up in a rather possessive hug at the end of all the shuffling, the hug akin to a child hugging it’s care bear… To Anne hugging her Mar-bear…

 And so the time passed on…

 …

 5 minutes passed.

 …

 10.

 …

 Whole half hour passes until the halls of the castle itself start to echo the sounds of waking occupants, all rushing to finish at least one of their many tasks from the crack of dawn. And being that the whole castle was built out of stone blocks every step, every word and command, every sound of chores being done bounced their way down the other end of the hallway, evidently even reaching the doors to Marcy’s bedroom. Every little bit of noise wiggling its way through the oak wood and metal reinforcements, using whatever little power it had to fill the empty space in Marcy’s chamber with itself. The efforts of such struggle didn’t go unnoticed, Anne’s ear twitching slightly, barely visible to the naked eye, as her earlobe picked up on the intruding faint din of the castle’s maids, butlers and guards. She was finally awake to notice it all – how the room was bright from the morning light, how the air around her skin was warming up, how the noises coming from the halls were rousing her brain awake. So she woke up, not immediately, but gradually over the next coming minutes her eyes began to flutter, opening half way before shutting back down and repeating the process, letting they eyes adjust to the light and providing the sclera (white part of the eye) with much needed moisture. Alongside the eyes Anne also smacked her lips and stuck her tongue out, licking them before they parted ways as Anne began to yawn. That’s the last thing she needed to finally open her eyes and greet the day and the first thing she saw was nothing more but one of the stone walls of Marcy’s room.

 Huh? - the singular question rose to her mind. You’d think that falling asleep among your friends the first thing in the morning you’d see would be one of their faces, but all Anne had the view of was the smooth, dark gray stone stone blocks built together to form a solid wall. It wasn’t until a few moments later that she picked up on the fact that her head wasn’t on either a pillow or the mattress, it was perched up on something warm, something solid enough to keep her head raised up but soft as to be delightful to rest on. What the…? - Anne’s brain was still warming up so it was no where near fast enough to put the pieces together, all it knew that it needed more information on the matter, Anne needed to see what was underneath her. So the first thing she tried to was lift herself up on her right arm, but that idea was quickly turned fruitless when she felt that her arm was hindered by something, something had it pinned down just above the elbow. Instead she had to opt out to putting her neck muscles to work and power lift her head up, just enough to where she could turn it and look down on the mystery object she ended up sleeping on. The solidness? Cheekbones. Softness with some squish to it? Beige skin. Warmness? The blood running underneath the flesh. It was Marcy. Her best friend was beneath her, keeping her right hand trapped, keeping herself this close to Anne. And if the pink imprint of Anne’s chin on the side of Marcy’s head had anything to say, is that the two of them have been in this position for long enough for it to not be considered an accident. That was the point where red lights of a critical alarm started to flash across Anne’s head. Marcy was sleeping on top of her arm, and she was so close to her that she could still feel the Marcy’s breathing. She was too close! And realization started to catch up with Anne, her eye’s widening like saucers, mouth dropping down in other shock as the blood that was meant to go to her brain took a quick detour around those light brown cheeks, forming a line light shade of red under Anne’s eye that met in the middle of the bridge of the nose and went around to head to the girls ears.

 What? H-how? When did we… When did we…? We didn’t? No we couldn’t!… - the question now began to pile up on top of another, all demanding explanation, some sort of answer to this situation, but all her brain could come up with was…

 “AAAAAAAAAAAaaa!” - out of all the possible things to do her brain made the executive decision that a loud, panicked, top of the lungs scream was the best course of action in this situation. A scream that was better than any alarm clock or drill sergeant at waking the rest of the gang up.

 Polly’s eyes shot open in a snap, as if the tadpole was just woken from the dead. The veins in her eyes would dare to say that that was the case.

 Sprig jumped on all fours like a canine who just heard fireworks. And just like a pup his head darted in all direction, mouth gaping and breathing like he just did 10k. One would say he just woke up from a nightmare.

 Marcy sat straight up in less than a second, her head twisting left, then right, her eyes scanning the room for any potential danger be it new or from the current night. But there were no monsters, no ghosts and no enemies trying to take their life, just good old Marcy’s bedroom with the whole gang sharing the over sized bed that could even hold the King in. Now it begged the question ‘Why the screaming?’ and who better to answer it than her friend Anne? Marcy turned to her left, pushing Anne into view only to see that her thai friend looked like she was on a verge of a total freak out – face flushed red, eyes looking like they are about to pop from her head, her mouth gaping open and breathing heavily.

 “Anne what happened?!” - and as if on queue both Polly and Sprig looked at Anne, the brother frog peeking over his shoulder and the little tadpole rotating her reddened pupils to look at the back of her adopted sisters head, ready to burn two beady holes through it if Anne’s excuse wouldn’t suffice. And Anne felt it, all the eyes in room were on her, she was the only one on the stage, she was in the spotlight. Her brains were on the fritz trying to not only handle the embarrassment, but now newly weighted pressure of coming up with an answer. The blush that lined her cheeks now spread across her entire face, her mouth closed and opened as it failed to form any sound resembling a proper word, her eyes couldn’t focus on anything, looking around the entire room that would hint at what she should say. And she found it, her escape from this awkward situation - her right arm. It still had the imprint of Marcy’s cheek for when she slept on it and her head, which, for the records, got her into this hot mess, came up with an excuse that sounded just feasible enough to work.

 “Aaah, y.you were sleeping on my hand Mar Mar! Pins and needles, pins and needles! Hehe…” - Anne managed to explain, lifting her right arm up and letting her forearm to dangle freely from the elbow for greater effect, really selling the whole idea that the flow of blood was cut off and now she couldn’t feel or control half of her arm. Nothing but TV static there. And now she prayed for it to work, prayed to finally escape from all this awkwardness.

 “Oh…” - Marcy trailed off, her eyes focused on the Anne’s hand, particularly the red spot barely above the elbow. It did looked like something hefty was pinning the appendage so she, for one, had no reason to doubt Anne - “Oh sorry Anne, does it hu…”.

 “YOU WHAT!?” - came a hot, angry, maybe even furious shout from behind the bush head girl bringing everyone's attention. It was little Polly, sporting a pair of red eyes that looked like they could shoot daggers. Not to kill of course, but to teach Anne a lesson to never wake a tired tadpole without a good reason - “You screamed just because someone slept on your arm?!?!?! And what even are pins… what even are th…” - the rant cut off as fast as it began, the legless frog only having enough energy for this short burst before she passed out again. Like a firework that had its big explosion and then was consumed by the silence of the night.

 “I’m with Polly on this one” - Sprigs piped up, the pink amphibian finally rolling over from being on all fours to lying down on his back, lifting himself on his arms – “Like why would you ever scream like that if someone was… was…” - the little frog couldn’t finish the sentence as a yawn took over, and midway though breathing in all the extra air Sprig thumped down back on the bed, copying his little sister and passing out.

 And the room was quiet again.

 “Well that was strange” - Marcy was the one to break stillness after giving it a few moments - “You think frogs need specific amount of hours of sleep or did these two dropped dead for other reasons?” - she pondered out loud, leaving an open question that invited Anne to join. And the other human girl was more than happy to finally change the subject.

 “Well in their defense it was their first sleepover. I guess it was too wild for them”

 “Yeah, only we are experienced in partying all night” - Marcy added atop of Anne’s opinion, wiggling her head and hands by it in a groovy fashion to show off ALL that experience. It at least succeeded in making both girls giggle.

 “Oh wait what time it is?” - raven haired ranged perked up, looking at the fine silver clock mounted on the wall just above her study desk. It needles showed two minutes past eight.

 “Oh! It's already breakfast. C’mon Anne I asked the chef to make pancakes this morning” Marcy prompted, scurrying herself off the bed and towards the door. In any other universe Anne wouldn’t even think before agreeing to such a delightful offer - mouthwatering breakfast with her bestie? Sign her the heck up! But this wasn’t just any other universe, it was Amphibia, where she now had a family to look after, even if it was adopted one. And the grumbles and groans coming from both Sprig and Polly held Anne from following her nerdy friend down to the castle's dining room.

 “Actually Marce I’m gonna have to rain check on that idea. I feel that if I don’t get these two back to the hotel to get some sleep they’ll turn into zombies” - Anne joked as she looked back at her siblings, feeling a tad bit guilty for going all out on their first ever sleepover and now making the two frogs look like dead bodies. If not for the occasional snore and moan one would assume they were corpses. Just needed that authentic smell of decaying flesh and you couldn’t tell the difference!

 “Hmmmm?”- Marcy perked one eyebrow up, leaning back just enough to where she could see past Anne onto her two cold blooded guests and with a sharp breath in through gritted teeth it was clear as day that she couldn’t argue with the other on that topic “You think they’ll be OK? I don’t know much about frog anatomy, I only know that newts that lack sleep are prone to hallucinations. You think Sprig and Polly will suffer the same side effects?”.

 “You’ll be the first one I’ll let know if anything like that start happening to them”

𓆏

 “You sure you don’t need any help? I can give you a hand, the hotel isn’t that far from the castle” - Marcy asked as she watched her friend adjust the grip around the frog and tadpole held under the armpits.

 “Nah I got this Mar Mar. Plus its like you said - the hotel is like a 10 minute walk. It easy breezy” - Anne shot back with a confident smirk. She had Polly under her left arm, Sprig under her right and all their belonging stuffed into the backpack that on her back. Nothing and no one was missing and she had more than enough energy to haul all of them back to the hotel suite.

 “Hey Anne, thanks again for coming. It was fun to have a sleepover again. Even if it was a bit more than we asked for”.

 “I had lots of fun too Marcy. And thaaank yooouu for inviting us to a sleepover of a lifetime. And you know how I know that? That’s cuz I’m holding the evidence” - Anne joked as she hoisted Polly and Sprigs for the punchline. Their pain was her gain and neither Anne nor Marcy could halt their giggles from escaping their throats. It was pretty amusing to see two frogs sleeping out cold while being carried like a pair of leather handbags.

 “I best get going, don’t wanna torture these two for more than I have to” - Anne said as she turned to start making her way down the main road of Newtopia, delaying the walk just for a few seconds to turn her head back and get one last say - “I’ll see you later Mar Mar, OK?”

 “Yeah, see you later Anne” - Marcy responded and Anne took it as her queue to finally get going. If she had a third hand she would have waved goodbye, but for now Marcy would have two wave for two as the castles dark haired resident waved her old and new friends farewell, following them with her eyes for as long as she could before her attention was rudely pulled away by an even ruder stomach growl.

 Oh right, breakfast, almost forgot about that - Marcy thought to herself, returning back to the castle and making her way up to the dinning room where king Andrias and lady Olivia were probably already waiting for her and, the now departed, Plantars. And be it from sheer hunger or not wanting to keep the newt royals waiting Marcy was in rather quick pace. Not full on sprinting, but not a casual walk either, Marcy had a spring in her every step, looking like she was a tune and a red cape away from skipping down the hallway. The teen just had that much pent up energy in her that when the view of the dinning rooms door came into view the nimble ranger made a mad dash for it as she needed an outlet that bad.

 “Goood morning everyone!” - Marcy’s greeted right as her head poked through the rooms door, her voice higher pitch that it needed to be, sounding more like the girl was on tryouts for a role in an opera house, the excitement in her tone unmistakable for anything else. At least her tryout had some audience to it, specifically a white bearded titan of a newt, who was holding his reading glasses with his right hand and parchment with today’s agendas with his left, and a green skinned, uptight newt, who had a sour look on her face as she has the displeasure of finding out that wet serviette wasn’t the best option to clean black marks on her face that came from certain “unknown” assailants that vandalized her face and few royal paintings this very night.

 “Ooooo good morning Marcy” - piped up the king himself, returning the same energy he receiving from the human girl - “Were you a gracious host for your get together?” - Andrias asked and without missing a beat, much less letting Marcy answer his question, he raised another question - “Speaking of gatherings, will the Plantars join us for breakfast?”

 “Oh, well you see, what happened was…” - Marcy trailed off as she made her way to the giant table that was big enough to seat at least two dozens of delegates - “We might have went overboard with the sleepover as it was too exciting for Polly and Sprig and the two of them could barely be woken up, so Anne decided to bring those two back the hotel so they can get some proper sleep, so to answer your question – no king Andrias, the Plantars will not be joining us for breakfast today” - Marcy finished with a big breath of air as that explanation was quite a mouthful.

 “Well that is most unfortunate to hear” - the optimism in Andrias voiced dialed back down to its routine tone fit for a king – “They seemed like a colorful bunch, especially your human friend Anne. They would have probably livened up morning with their stories from the farmlands. It’s been quite a while since I heard what's going on there from the locals themselves.” - the newt king added right before a small door at the end of the room opened up and a short, blueish lizard popped out of it, wearing a sleek black suit and a bow tie as he carried a silver platter with his right while his left was pulled up to his abdomen. He was carrying three white, fine china cups filled with hot, milky brown substance that carried a strong, pungent, yet addicting smell – the life essence of more than half of Newtopian’s.

 “Your morning bugaccino’s lady Marcy” - the servant newt proclaimed as he settled the silver platter next to a plate of warm pancakes and a small pitcher of blue beetle jam in front of Marcy. Food that the mentioned girl just now noticed.

 “Oh no thank you I’m feeling wide awake!” - Marcy tried to refuse, but the cups already made contact with the table and can now only be removed when either they or the table are empty. The small newt simply pulled the platter under his right arm and left without another word back to the kitchen.

 “That’s rather odd of you lady Marcy” - Olivia finally spoke after finishing scrubbing the ink from under both her eyes - “You’re usually drowsy until you had your daily coffee” she pointed out, having a rather detailed memory of Marcy’s daily routine since it helped the royal advisor the avoid the outsider for most of the time. She was a troublemaker after all.

 “That is out of the ordinary for you Marcy” - king Andrias seconded Olivia’s concern - “I don’t believe I’ve seen you go a day without drinking at least one cup of coffee, but today you look absolutely blooming with energy” - the leviathan newt complimented, a smile curving his lips as he now leaned in closer to the human ranger – “Did tonight events with your friends put you in such a good mood?”

 “Well I guess so, I mean…” - Marcy paused her answering just so she could finally cut a piece out of the pancake stack in front of her, drizzle it in copious amount of blue beetle jelly and stuff it in her mouth before her stomach makes any embarrassing rumbles before the king. But Marcy also used the short pause to run a quick comparison of tonight's sleepover with all the other ones she had. But in reality she didn’t need to do that, because deep down in her guts, she already knew…

 …

 …

 “It was the best slumber party I ever had.”