Nightmares (FioLee)

Chapter Nineteen

Fionna drew her sword, and Marshall kneeled in front of her.
"Now, let's see..." Timothy muttered, before his voice grew too quiet to hear.
Gumball shook his head slowly. "Something's going to go wrong."
"What do you mean?" Cake asked him.

"A simple abdication ceremony would have worked. If the sword thinks Fionna is the true heir, this is going to backfire on them." Gumball noted. "Tepes is too stubborn to see that, as usual."
"What do we do?" Cake pressed.
Gumball leaned back. "We wait, and then we fix it when it goes awry."

The sword in Fionna's hand began to fade from purple to more of a cool blue, before a beam of light shot out of the sword and hit the far wall.
Timothy looked up anxiously. "That was not supposed to happen."
"This wasn't supposed to happen either." A new voice snapped behind them.

With the exception of Marshall, everyone turned to see a doppelganger of Fionna's scowling at all of them. "What exactly are you doing?" She demanded.
"See? I told you Tepes would muck it up." Gumball muttered to Cake.
The doppelganger glared at him. "That's not what I asked. You, kneeling one. What's going on?"

"Fionna was about to transfer my title back to me." Marshall replied, a biting tone in his voice. "What's it to you?"
The woman's eyes narrowed to slits. "I went to all this trouble for the crown to be callously given back to the vampires? That was not supposed to happen after the heir was awakened! How dare you mess this up!"

"It's not his fault." Fionna argued. "Who are you, anyway?"
The woman straightened. "I am known as Caoilainn. I was the first queen of the vampires."
"How did you get here, and why do you look like me?" Fionna pressed.
Caoilainn frowned at her, then gave the rest of them a scathing look. "My father was a dhampyr. As terrible as those creatures are, I can't deny that there are... certain advantages to this. And you look like me because you are clearly my descendant."

"We still need to do a blood test." Timothy offered.
Caoilainn glared at him. "That won't be necessary. I am almost certain that she is my descendant. Now, if you would kindly step aside so I can kill the usurper..."
"Nope. Nope nope nope." Marshall said. "I'm out."
"No one is killing anyone." Fionna snapped. "And if I'm your descendant, how was I human?"

"Was?" Caoilainn blinked in surprise. "Was...? Well, for starters, I made sure that my line was never tainted by vampires again after my grandfather. Now, what do you mean, was?"
"If you hate vampires so much, why did you become their queen?" Gumball asked.
Caoilainn glared at him. "Because uniting them all under a set of laws was better than letting the monsters wander the world, ravaging the land."

"Rude." Marshall huffed.
Timothy adjusted his glasses. "But you had an unparalleled reign of peace and prosperity. How could that be if you openly hate us and all that we apparently stand for?"
Caoilainn scoffed. "Because vampires are self-destructive and hateful. It's a wonder the kingdom still stands when they took over. Now, back to the was...?"
"I accidentally bit Fi, and now she's a vampire, and I'm not." Marshall clarified. "Can we get back to how crazy you are?"

"She's a...? And you stole his vampirism?" Caoilainn asked skeptically.
"Not on purpose." Fionna argued. "It just sort of happened. And I don't have to answer to you!"
Caoilainn was silent for a minute, before shaking her head. "At least no dhampyrs resulted... now, you see, this is a pity, because I have to kill you."
"What?!" Fionna and Marshall said in unison.

"I mean, your reason for trying to kill me was slightly less crazy, but why Fi? She's awesome!" Marshall argued.
Caoilainn narrowed her eyes. "Because my bloodline has clearly become tainted by you. That's why. And I can't let this continue."
Gumball cleared his throat. "If I may?"

Caoilainn whipped around and glared at him. "What bearing do you have on this?!"
"Not much. It's just that, immortality isn't exactly a human feature and there are currently no humans left, so there is no way that you'd have any purely human descendants following Fionna. Besides, vampires are now the most biologically similar species to humans. If there was any hope of surviving offspring, they'd have to be at least part vampire." Gumball explained.

Caoilainn frowned for a minute, then replied. "So? This already turned out worse than I had anticipated."
Fionna raised her sword. "Then fight me."
Caoilainn shook her head. "I won't. I want this over and done with, and you actually look useful and as if you can put up a fight. No, I will end this far earlier."

With that, she disappeared.
"What did she mean, end this far earlier?" Fionna asked.
Marshall paled. "You're starting to disappear."
"What?" Fionna's eyes widened.

"Dhampyrs can time-travel... Lady Caoilainn clearly can as well..." Timothy said softly. "She can erase Lady Fionna's existence entirely."
"No no no no. C'mon, Fi, you've got to stay with me." Marshall said, pulling Fionna to him.
She hugged him. "Bye, Marshall. Bye, Cake. Bye, Gumball."

She disappeared completely, and then everything reset, as if she had never existed.

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Marshall Lee plucked softly at the strings on his bass, before frowning. "No, that doesn't sound right either... something's missing... I guess a love song's no good if you're not in love."

Across the land of Aaa, Cake sat with Lord Monochromicorn. "I think I'm going to see Charmiane soon. It's been a while." She noted. "I miss my sister."

Gumball sat against the wall of the Ice Queen's dungeon, eyes closed.
"Are you alright, Prince Gumball?" She asked. "You look sick."
He opened one eye. "I believe I'm entitled to a bit of rest. Do you know where Cake is?"
"Cake? Not coming." The Ice Queen replied. "Not that I know of, anyway."

Gumball closed his eye again. "Then I shall rest. Perhaps if I'm not good company, you'll let me be."
"That's not how it works."
"Isn't it? It's not as if I can fight back, or anything like that. I need to get back to my people as soon as possible. If I'm not interesting, wouldn't you let me go?"
The Ice Queen frowned. "It's not exactly a matter of interest, it's--it's... I don't know! I don't think it's supposed to be like this!"

Gumball shrugged a little. "Reality is often different from our expectations. May I have a blanket, please?"

The last person of note was the Lich, which after years of imprisonment, was finally accidentally released by someone stumbling into its lair. As one can imagine, chaos ensued.

*Author's Note*

Hmm... nineteen chapters. I usually stop around here. And I've already used a bunch of OC's. To use anymore would simply be overkill, and no canon characters can (or would, at this point) bring Fionna back.

...what's that? You're moaning that I lured you in with adorable fluff stories, and were surprised by my sudden betrayal and sobbing? Ha. I live off of anger, fangirl tears and chocolate. It's part of why I, a two thousand year old witch, have managed to retain my youthful appearance (unfortunately, acne included).

But in all seriousness, I try to avoid angst myself (beyond trolling for a chapter or two). And I'm a sucker for happy endings. And while I tend to get a little... dark... when you think about it, it's never bad enough to erase a character (a main canon character, at that) from the story's existence entirely.