𝓣𝓱𝓮 𝓡𝓸𝓬𝓴 𝓣𝓻𝓪𝓰𝓮𝓭𝓲𝓮𝓼 ~ 𝓗𝓸𝔀 𝔀𝓲𝓵𝓵 𝓽𝓱𝓲𝓼 𝓮𝓷𝓭, 𝓯𝓸𝓻 𝓾𝓼? | 𝓑𝓸𝓸𝓴 2

7. 𝓔𝓼𝓬𝓪𝓹𝓲𝓷𝓰

I was watching as the Guys were digging in the ground, Biggie still using Mr. Dinkles, and Branch used his tool. Poppy was up against the cell door, disappointment painted in her features, as she gazed at the ground.
Slowly approaching her, I sat down, up against the door beside her, I didn't say anything at first. I have hoped as much as she did, that this trip could bring every Troll together again.
My thoughts got interrupted, when I heard something, tap against the beams, we didn't get to react or even turn to look what was happening, before we both got send flying backwards. The door behind us disappeared. We were now laying, on the ground, facing the blue sky, the door behind us has fully disappeared. The both of up, tilted our head backwards, and saw a Troll with four legs and a cowboy hat as well. He was upside down from our view. "It ain't right to put you in jail because your music's different." The Troll spoke, his face was unclear, as his big cowboy hat was covering it. He took a hold of the straw, he had in his mouth. Both me and Poppy turned over, now looking up at him properly. "It seems some folks' round here don't appreciate a rad medley when they hear one." He tilted his head up, letting us get a full view on his face. He removed the straw from between his lips and winked at Poppy, her smile grew as she stood up, me following right after.
"Let's Skedaddle!" He spoke, untying the rope, he used to pull the door, from around the beams.
"Yes! Mission back on!" Poppy jumped up. "Branch, Branch! Biggie! You can stop rescuing us!" I yelled down to them, they've disappeared behind the suddenly deep hole, they have dug. Poppy took a hold of my arm and led me closer to the mystical Troll.
"Poppy, you don't even know who this is?" Branch reasoned, as he and Biggie has come up from their hole, and now stood, with good space between them and the Country troll.
The Troll took the rope and attached it to the fallen door and himself as a ride. Poppy sat herself on him as I sat down on the door. "My name is Queen Poppy and this is my sister Princess-" Poppy started introducing, holding her arm out to introduce me, but the Troll interrupted her before she could. "Princess Juniper?"
"Yes?" I answered, chuckling, very confused. He shook his head lightly snapping out of it. "Name's Hickory" He then answered as he put his straw back in his mouth. "Branch, this is Hickory, Hickory this is Branch and Biggie!" Poppy introduced them, trying to get Branch, especially, with us.
"Enough with the formalities, Let's go!" Biggie suddenly yelled, and sat down on the door beside me. "This is Mr. Dinkles, by the way." He then introduced.
Suddenly, the sound of a door get kicked up was heard, and there stood Delta with Country Trolls standing behind her.
"I said let's Skedaddle, Hyah!" Hickory spoke in a hurry, as he noticed he was caught. He took off running, but Branch wasn't on the door yet. "Branch snap out of it come here!" I yelled after him. "Go get them Clampers!" Delta said, moving her hand from her hip and up to her hair, where her niece was, as she sat her free. Her big teeth were showing and she was ready to attack Branch, running straight towards him.
Branch had to look twice, as he noticed the little Troll, running straight towards him. He jumped up and started to run after us. "Ahh. This was my Plan C, by the way" He spoke, as I reached my hand out for him to take, and helped him up on the door beside me.
As Hickory ran, the Country Trolls and Delta were following right behind. "Oh no, Hickory!" Poppy shouted, making my gaze look forward, I saw we were heading right towards a Cactus field. "I got this Queen Poppy!" He yelled back and ran in, shifting side to side avoided all the Cactuses, heading towards us.
"Don't let them get away!" Delta yelled from behind, as Clampers, her niece, were biting her way thought everything that got in her way. She suddenly got dangerously close, Hickory noticed, he shifted direction again, and jumped over the Mine, making us on the door fly up. We all held into each other not to fall off. Clampers on the other hand didn't jump over it, and fell right into it.
"Oh, yeah!" Hickory yelled in victory. "Come on Growly Pete, do your thing" I turned around and saw what Delta mean't. He used his moustache as Lasso's trying to get us. He threw it and got a hold on Branch's leg, Branch tried to shake him off and I tried pulling in the hairs. Growly Pete sat both feet in the ground and started to pull back, making Branch get pulled at, almost falling off. "That Tickles!" Branch giggled, he couldn't hold on much longer. "Branch, hold on to Mr. Dinkles!" Biggie yelled, and I took Mr. Dinkles, while Biggie held into me.
Branch held the other end of him. He was fallen so much behind that Mr. Dinkles stretched out.
In the distance some of the ground, started to move form underneath, and out came Clampers. She sprung up and bit into Branch's butt, he screamed out in pain, as I winched.
"Hickory, look out!" Poppy shouted as we were running straight towards a cliff. "We're not gonna make it!" Poppy shouted out and hopped on to Hickory's hat, making it fall over his eyes, blinding him.
"Oh yes we are!" Branch yelled back, moving Clampers from his leg and made her bite over the moustache that was still attached to his foot. The pressure of the bite made Branch fly back and pushed the door into Hickory, which made us fly over the cliff. We were flying mid air as the rope around Hickory loosened up and made the door fall down. We all looked down and saw a river, the door disappearing into the water underneath us. "Well. I hope Pop Trolls can swim." Was the last thing Hickory said, before we fell down, right into the river.
~~~
I took in a deep breath as I've reached the surface again. My gaze landed on Poppy and Branch, breathing heavily in as they laid on the sand higher up the coast.
Branch heard the splashing of me, getting up from the water, and right when his eyes met mine, he got up and ran to me. "Sunshine, are you alright?" He bowed down, pulling me fully out of the water, and let me catch my breath again.
My gaze shifted to Biggie and Mr. Dinkles as he tried to wake Dinkles up. He had swallowed a lot of water as he has gotten all thick. He suddenly woke up and spat out all the water, making him tiny again. "Oh, Mr. Dinkles, you're alive! For a minute there I thought you kicked the bucket" Biggie said as he sighed in relief.
I finally collapsed on the sand in exhaustion, turning around to lay on my back. Branch laid down, right beside me, both of his arms swung out to both sides.
"I'm really glad you came with me and Poppy." I spoke, my breathing back to normal, my gaze shifted to him, while his was already on me. "Me too" he spoke and smiled in return, reaching his hand out to grab mine, our palms touching.
Our little moment got interrupted, as Hickory has found us again. The water has dragged him up, somewhere else alongside the river.
he stopped right in front of us, making sand fly up from the pressure of his hooves, sliding across. All three of us, stood up, Branch got sand right in his face. He began spitting the sand out, he got in his mouth.
"Whoo! I think we lost them, we should be all right." Hickory sighed in relief, adjusting his hat on his head.
"Thank you. I don't know how we can ever repay you!" Poppy spoke up. ""Oh, wait, I do!" I spoke up, Hickory's gaze landing on me, I pulled something out of my pocket. "Gumdrops!" I stuck out the pieces candy to him, my gaze meeting his. "Gum what?" He asked, looking questioning down to my palms. "Oh, well, thank you Princess, Queen" He thanked, pulling down in his hat as a thanks, before taking the candy into his own hands. He plopped one in his mouth as he tasted it. "Whoo, that's got a zing, don't it!" He was about to take one more, but Branch cut him to it.
"It's not candy time, it's question time!" Branch started, before his bracelet chimed and he dropped the candy as he turned his wrist.
"Hug-time!" Poppy yelled as Biggie ran over to us. We all gathered together in a hug, Hickory too. Pulling Branch in with us, made him kick his feet, trying to get out of the hug again.
"Why are you helping us?" Branch asked, as he has wiggled himself out of the embrace, making us pull away too. His bracelet chimed again, but he quickly slapped it, making the little flower on it, close again. "What's in it for you?"
"Branch!" I send him a warning glare, it was not the time to be suspicious of the Troll, who has just helped us escape, and given us a whole new change, to stop Barb.
"I'm sorry about our- associate." Poppy apologised to Hickory, placing her hand on his back, leading him forward. She turned her head, giving Branch a glare, then turned back around to talk to Hickory.
walking up to Branch, I looked at him, he looked hurt by her words. "What is up with you?" his gaze turned to me, but he didn't answer my question, instead he just huffed and walked forward following the others. I quickly ran up beside him, catching up, I could feel the hurt of him just huffing and shaking me off.
"I loved your message about music bringing Trolls together. You guys may be Pop, and I may be Country, but Trolls is Trolls." Hickory spoke to Poppy. "Trolls is Trolls, wow, deep." Branch mocked him in a low tone, and swayed his arms, as his eyes rolled.
If he was going to ignore me, his own girlfriend, I could play his game.
I caught up with Hickory and Poppy, walking forward and turned around, walking backwards as I spoke. "This is the beginning of a partnership between Trolls, that's going to save all Trolls!" I spoke up as Hickory stopped walking, making me stop in front of him.
"You're darn Skippy." Hickory complimented me, in his language, he said I was smart.
I giggled at his words, as I started to play with one of my red locks, which has fallen down in my face. I heard a groan of annoyance from Branch, behind us. "Okay, we need to get to the Funk Trolls before Barb does." Poppy spoke up, she was about to pull out her map again, until Hickory pointed out. "Well, quickest ways is down this river. I'll build us a raft!" He walked past me, and went around the beach, trying to find materials. Branch scoffed. "This ought to be good. Guy probably doesn't know the first thing about building a raft-" He started but got cut off by Hickory quickly starting on the raft. He has found some rope and big logs to use, big leaves for roof and funny enough a coffee machine.
Branch was wrong, he really knew how to build a raft, it was ginormous.
"Cappuccino anyone?" He asked as he turned on the coffee machine he installed on the deck of his boat.
"Cappuccino!" Poppy spoke in awe looking up at Biggie who had the same expression.
"Cappucci-yes!" I answered her, as the two of them walked onto the raft.
looking backwards, i saw Branch's expression. His jaw was almost resting on the ground, which made me giggle. "I do want one, but I am not happy about it!" Branch scoffed, his eyes landed on me, as he noticed me laughing at his reaction.
He walked forward, but stopped beside me. He stuck out his hand for me to take, I was hesitant, he was being a bit of a jerk.
He noticed my hesitating look, down at his hand immediately. "I'm sorry, Hickory is a stranger, and we don't know why he's exactly helping us." Branch started, his hand still sticking out from me to take. I crossed my arms over my chest, still holding my gaze at him.
"And maybe I got jealous of him being so good at everything." He admitted, I send him another glare, knowing he had another reason to react like that.
"And, I guess I got jealous, of him trying to take you away from me." Branch mumbled the last part, I could still see he wasn't happy with Hickory, but was truly sorry for huffing at me. My gaze shifted looking down at the ground, I didn't like fighting. Releasing my hand from my chest, I reached down and took his hand in mine, as he looked up into my eyes again. I leaned in and kissed his cheek, making his cheeks heat up, into a red colour.
"That's all I wanted you to admit. But, please take it easy on Hickory. I genially think he only wants to help." I spoke, I could feel his hand tightening around mine, giving it a reassuring squeeze. We walked together, approaching the raft. He helped me onto it, as Hickory handed him a Cappuccino.
~~~
It has become nighttime already, the moon standing high above us. We have been on the river, the rest of the sunny hours.
I sat on the edge of Hickory's raft, looking out over the water, Hickory has sat a Lantern beside me, so I could see what I was doing. I had brought a scrapbook with me as I sat and drew in it.
"I can make a cortado, macchiato, latte-" I heard Hickory brag to Biggie, around the fireplace he has sat up on the second floor on his boat.
Boys. I shook my head, smiling to myself.
"Let's get our grub on. Food's ready!" Hickory shouted, as I stood up, putting my book back up into my hair, as I made my way upstairs. Poppy was walking in front of me with logs under each arm. "Well, I'll bring more kindling!" she spoke acting like him, a Country Troll, She was so sweet.
As I was about to walk in I got stopped by Branch, who was hiding, sitting with a binocular, spying on Hickory. "June, maybe it's just me, but are you getting a weird vibe from Hickory?" He asked me, both our gazes looking up, examining Hickory.
"No, why? Are you?" I asked. "I just- I don't know, I don't trust him." He whispered, What a surprise... Hickory noticed us looking at him, he waved sweetly at us and mentioned for us to come and get our food.
"Well, yeah, but you don't trust anybody Branch." I reasoned, chuckling a little. "Hey, I just want us to be safe!" He lowered the binoculars from his eyes, and looked up at me. "And you know what's not safe? Putting too much trust into a complete stranger!"
"Branch, you promised me."
"I can't help it June, this is who I am." He just answered, looking back at Hickory, examining his every move.
"Oh, I see. It's not Hickory you don't trust, it's me and Poppy, isn't it? Do you not think I'm a good Princess and she a good Queen?"
"Wait what? I didn't say that!" I grabbed my upper arm, looking down at the ground, with my eyebrows furrowed. Branch didn't waste another second, before standing back up and pulled me into a hug. He held me tight against him, not liking how much we fought recently.
"I thought you supported our decisions.." I spoke up, never wrapping my arms around him. Branch pulled back again, looking me in my eyes, with his own eyebrows furrowed. "I do support your decisions, but sometimes it's important for a close one to speak up and tell if they think you're making a mistake." Chewing on his words, I looked away again. But our little discussion got interrupted and our focus got distracted by a melody.
"Do you guys hear something?" I spoke up as I caught Poppy's gaze. all of us turned our full attentions on the sudden melody, everyone approaching the edge of the raft and saw pink bubbles and candles in the water.
Branch stepped in front of me, holding a hand over me, as Poppy spoke up. "Huh, look at that guy's chest hair-" she pointed out, but she suddenly turned all weird, her pupils grew just as Branch's. My eyes landed on this guy, red hair, beard, chest hair, Clarinet, but my focus went away as I heard the smoothness of his music.
"June, I can't feel my face." Branch spoke up slapping his cheeks lightly.
"It's like I'm being paralysed but it's smoothness." I answered, as the sun was rising. That was fast?
I was suddenly sitting on a beach, the raft was gone, Biggie, Hickory and Poppy was gone. I looked down at myself and I had a rope on. I looked up and a tiger ran over the sky, as a body without a head poured a blue liquid in a glass to me. I took it and leaned to my side, seeing Branch with the same liquid and the same rope on. We clinked our glasses together and looked lovingly at each other.
Suddenly Mr. Dinkles came up from the sand beneath us, with a big strong arm on and a phone in hand. It was ringing as I picked it up. "Hello?"
"Hello, it's me!" Branch answered through the call,  with his own phone beside me. He giggled lightly and swayed his feet.
"Look narwhals!" He suddenly spoke pointing to the sky, my jaw dropped as Narwhales came jumping up from the water.
"Totally gnar-gnar!" I spoke, it was like I couldn't speak properly. I heard a voice calling my name. "Juniper!" I was Poppy.
But I couldn't react. Branch picked up a piece of rise, with a kind of fish on top, and thing inside looking like him, but smaller. He was feeding it to me as I opened my mouth.
Before it came into my mouth we suddenly snapped back into reality. We were tied up on the raft beside Biggie and Poppy. Branch holding a stick in front of me. "Juniper, how'd you like the sushi?" Branch ranted, but snapped back to reality shortly after. He quickly dropped the stick, embarrassed. I gazed around, noticing Poppy and Biggie on our side. "Guys! Where were you at?" I asked them.
"I was in Troll Village, but everyone was Mr. Dinkles" Biggie spoke up, before we got to say more, we got interrupted by the guy with the nice chest hair. "Got you, Pop babies." The Troll spoke up, he didn't look familiar, so what did he want to do with us.
"Soon, Barb is gonna have your String, and the world will be rid of cheesy, pointless pop music-"
His gaze landed on Poppy as he mentioned the string, but his gaze went to me, sitting beside her, his little smirk only growing.
"And soon, Barb is gonna have you, Princess Juniper." He approached me, only making me scoot further back, as far as I could, He placed his Clarinet under my chin, tilting my head up to look at him.
Branch struggled with the rope tied around his hands, he wanted to protect me, step in, but couldn't do anything.
"Hold it right there, Chaz!" Higgory jumped up, he wasn't tied up like the rest of us.
"And who are you supposed to be, Cowboy pants?" The Troll spoke, looking Hickory up and down. We gasped as we looked over at Hickory, waiting for his response. "My name's Hickory, and I don't much care for smooth Jazz." We gasped again as we turned back to look at Chaz, waiting for his response.
"Oh, yeah? Well, you've just never had, the Chaz experience!" Chaz said as he placed the clarinet at his mouth again and started playing his smooth Jazz to Hickory, expecting the same happening to him as it did to us. But Hickory didn't react, only letting Chaz play. The notes hit his face, as he closed his eyes. As Chaz was behind him, he kicked him with his horse legs, as Chaz fell off the raft and down into the water, his clarinet hitting him on the head.
"Gumdrops, soundproof and delicious." Hickory commented, taking the candy out of his ears, he have shoved them in to block out the music from the start. As he took them out of his ears, he then ate them afterwards.
"Smooth Jazz will be heard again! Smooth Jazz will never die!" Chaz yelled out before he sank down into the water, the melody of his clarinet was drowning with him.
Hickory ran to our rescue, helping all of us get free from the rope, untying our wrists and ankles. Hickory offered each me and Poppy a hand, to get back up. "Who was that guy?" Poppy asked, as she got back on her feet.
"One of the many bounty hunters out there looking for your string..." How did he know. "And you." A finger got pointed at me.
"Why me, why are they looking for me?"
"I don't know, Princess. Queen Barb has probably asked for it." Hickory answered making Branch more suspicious of him. Poppy's gaze kept down, looking at the floor of the raft, thinking about this whole situation.
"That was awful. So smooth and easy and awful!" Biggie frustratedly spoke up.
"I know big buddy, it's enough to put you off Jazz altogether" Hickory tried to comfort, tapping Biggie's shoulder. "All right that's it! We need to go home!" Biggie exploded. "Biggie, it'll be okay-" Poppy spoke up, trying to stay as calm as possible.
"Stop saying that and listen to me!" Biggie snapped at Poppy. "You only hear what you want to hear, and it puts us all in danger. How are you supposed to save the world if you can't even keep us safe?" I shot Poppy a look, the light in her eyes disappeared, as she knew, she disappointed a close friend. Biggie was right, Poppy wasn't the best listener, but he was going too far.
"You made a Pinky Promise to me, Queen Poppy, and you broke it." Biggie continued, Poppy's gaze fell, not daring to hold the eye contact.
"Biggie that's too far!" I snapped at him, seeing Poppy's reaction to his words. His gaze landed on me, with this serious expression, not to be seen that often. He pulled in Mr. Dinkles' small hat, making him shake, he sat him down in the water and stepped on to him, as he worked as a motor. Biggie went the opposite way the boat was sailing, on his way back home. All three of us leaned out, watching him get further down the river. He turned around to face us again. "What kind of Queen breaks a Pinky Promise?" He shouted, then turned back around and disappeared down the river.
"Biggie, no..." Poppy whimpered, still looking after his figure slowly disappearing from her sight.
As she leaned in again, I went to her side and hugged her shoulders.
It was all going to be okay, right?