The Intervention

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I'm back! I took a bit of an unscheduled break. Moonfall has been my main writing project for the past year (!) so I needed some time away from it to work on some other things. You'll likely see some non-Sing stuff finally pop up on this account. Not to worry, though – this is still my main focus. Buckle up! This is a meaty chapter.

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"Oh, Mr. Moon!" Ms. Crawly bawled, squeezing the koala so tight he thought he might pop like a balloon. "I'll miss you when you're in the big house!"

"Nothing's set in stone yet!" Buster managed to gasp. It took assistance from Johnny to wriggle out of the iguana's iron grip. Ms. Crawly collapsed to the floor and dramatically reached out for Buster.

"Don't go," she whispered. "Don't go. Don't go..."

"I'm not going anywhere yet," Buster murmured, patting her on the head. "There's still time for this plan to work."

On the bus ride back to Redshore City, Cleo and Buster agreed to an alliance and hatched a plan, an intervention for Jimmy Crystal. A last-ditch effort. The bus didn't reach the city until well after the sun retired, so all Buster really had time to do when he got home was reassure his troupe that he was okay. It wasn't until the next morning when he gathered everyone in the house, along with Clay, Ryan and Nooshy, that he explained exactly what went down in Calatonia and how the situation changed. Now the villa's den had once again served as a makeshift war room.

Ash, perched on the couch and chewing gum, didn't say much during the initial explanation, but the wide range of emotions parading across her face said she had plenty on the mind. Plenty she was now ready to express.

"I still can't believe you apologized to that guy," the porcupine said with a look of mild disgust. "You did a whole song and dance, and he still threw it in your face."

"There was no dancing," Buster corrected her, though he started to rub his chin in thought, "but maybe my apology would've been more successful if there had been."

Ash blew and popped a defiant pink bubble before saying, "Either way, he's the one that should be apologizing to you."

"I've been running away from my part in this from the start. My own faults aren't absolved just because Crystal did something worse in response. I messed up too and I needed to own up to that. It wasn't a mistake to offer him an olive branch even though he didn't take it."

Clay, sitting next to Ash, said, "Mighty big of you to admit that." His face was relaxed and radiating warm pride. It reminded Buster of his father a bit. "There's hope for you yet."

Nooshy had raided the kitchen, and now she was sharing a bowl of snacks with Meena and Porsha. "Moon-man, I know optimism is your thing, but you really think you can rely on this Keller lady?" she asked. "She spent all this time trying to manipulate Crystal into being a better bloke and it blew up in her bloody face."

"That stunt in the theater with the paint blew up in all of our faces," Buster retorted. He saw the guilt twisting the lynx's features as she lost her appetite and he regretted how that came across. "I'm not blaming anybody. All I'm saying is we're not in a position to judge her. The problem is we haven't been acting as a united front. We've either just been reacting, flying off the handle, or surviving ambushes. But with Cleo on our side, we can be an actual unit. We can stage this intervention, and I'm sure it'll work because we're using our secret weapon this time."

"Me," Porsha said. "I'm the hairpin, right?"

"Linchpin," Buster said with a nod. "I know you can reach him because he took time out of threatening to ruin my life to show me one of your baby pictures on his phone."

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