The Tales Of The Troublesome Three

Reformation

Hugo was the first to finish his food and decided to stay an wait for the rest to finish. They all sat in silence until Alaya started a conversation. "You still mad about the entire ordeal?" She chuckled. "I'm not mad." Tom grumbled. "Not according to the look on your face, you're not." Hugo added. Tom stayed silent. He sighed. "Doesn't matter," He smirked. "since I have this." He pulled out a bright, small blood stone.

Hugo and Alaya start fuming at Tom for a solid minute until Alaya calms down. Hugo still is fuming at Tom though. "Boys! Calm down." Alaya stops them both. "How 'bout we just try to figure out what the imbedded instructions in the scroll." She says, framing as a command more than a suggestion. She pulls out the scroll from her scroll case.

"You'll have to get twice as much for the box and the host. So, do we have to put the souls in the gems?" Alaya scratches her head. "I think so." Matthew says as he pops out behind Alaya, scaring her. "oops, sorry." Alaya sighs. "It's alright."

"Should we try this?" Martha says, appearing as well. Along as all the other souls. "Sure. It's worth a shot. Who'd like to try?"

"Pegs, would you like to try?"Alaya asks. Peggy nervously chuckled. "Ya, I'm not ramming my head on that hard piece of stone." She backs off, crossing her arms. "I don't know Pegs. It's shiny. isn't there a research that if something is shiny, people are more likely to ram their heads on it?" Tom joked. Peggy pouted but then the pout quickly turned to a smirk. "Yeah." she said.

"Holy shit. It's real??" Tom asked, startled. Peggy chuckled. "Yeah, but it came out inconclusive because they only used Toms as their test subject." Alaya tried to contain her laugh. Hugo laughed and gave Peggy a high five. Tom snarled.

Once they all regain their calm state, Peter speaks up. "If none of you want to do it, I will." Everyone agrees and Peter takes his stance. A few minutes pass and Peter still hasn't moved. "Hun, you have to move at some point." Martha says.

"Still calculating th-" Martha cuts him off by placing a finger against his lips to shut him up. "Just." She removes her finger. "Move. It's not a math problem."

"But if you think ab-"

"Move." Martha pushes Peter encouragingly. Peter takes a big breath and charge towards the gem on a stone that Tom found. He passes through the gem like it's thin air.

Alaya sighs. "Now what?" Matthew attempts to pat her on the back to only have his hand pass through her. "It's alright Al, as Earnest Hemmingway says; the first draft of anything is shit." Martha says. Alaya smiles at Martha.

"I have an idea." Hugo says. everyone turned to Hugo. "How 'bout I play a song?" everyone scratches their head in confusion. "As much as I like a good tune, I don't see how this will work." Matthew says. "Yeah, we're not living in a musical, Hugo." James says. "It would've been lovely if we did, wouldn't it?" Jake says.

"Well, it depends what musical you are in. It would've sucked to be living in les mis." James contradicted. "But it would be great if we could resolve our problems in song." Jake argued.

As the two bickered, everyone else is staring at Hugo, confused. "What? In my old village, they called me in to play a song that apparently, binds a soul to an object." He says as he pulls out his lute. "You have one strange town." Tom says. "Worth a shot."

Hugo pulls out a piece of crumpled parchment. he uncrumpled it and places it on his lap. he starts playing mourning the dead. The twins stop bickering and turned to see him play. One by one, the souls closed their eyes and get sucked into the gems. The gems glowed once the respective souls entered them, not that usual shine, the glow was more earie and it illuminated party's faces.

Hugo smiled and played the song faster. The glow on the gems start to separate from the gem, turning into a glowing ball.

"Holy shit. What the hell am I?" The purple ball glowed. "Peggy?" Alaya asks. "Doesn't look like it!" The ball flickered, Peggy seemed anxious. "Pegs, calm your tits." Tom deadpans. "I don't got no tits, Tom! Not anymore!"

"This is.." the navy ball in what seems to be Peter's voice starts. "different."

"Hun, that you?" The glowing magenta ball glowed. "Martha?" Navy ball asks.

"I'm light blue. Huh. Feels odd." The light blue ball says, sounding exactly like Matthew.

"Guess that leaves us two." The golden ball, with Jake's voice says to the quiet dark black gem. "Guess so." The dark gem or James says back.

"Wait wait wait." Tom says stopping the chatter of all the souls. "So, Jake is golden. James is black. M-"

"That came out a bit racist there, bud." Hugo says, placing his lute back in his back.

"Didn't mean it that way.." Tom mumbled. "Matt's light blue, Martha's magenta, Peter's navy and pegs' purple." Tom continues.

"Yes." Everyone else says in harmony. "Good to know."

"Hey, Al, why can't we just meet our families while we were in our ghost state?" Matthew asks. "Well, no one but us can see you." Alaya responds. "Oh."

"We'll get there when we get there, alright." Hugo says.

Tom's almiraj, Shadow, popped out of Tom's backpack and sat on his lap. It stood on it's hind legs and rubs it's stomach.

"You hungry, bud?" Tom says as he pulls out a potato for her.

After talking awhile, everyone went to bed.

...

The next morning, everyone woke up feeling better and set off to go to the forest.

They reached the front of the forest and stopped in their tracks. The forest was dark. The trees was a special type of tree. It was a blood red colour and well known being expecially buoyent, making it amazing for boats. It's called a yana tree.

A long time ago, there were yana trees everywhere. Back then, yana wood was used for making boats for the what now is the lake of death. The population of the yana tree decreased incredibly. No one seemed to care though, the yana wood was not really used much after the lake of death incident. This forest seemed to be the one motherload.

Alaya and Hugo enter before the rest. "Guys, aint it dark in there?" Tom asks struggling to see Alaya and Hugo in the dark. "We have night vision." Hugo yells out from somewhere in the dark.

"I'm a human, dimwit." Tom yells out.

Alaya opens the box where the souls and the gems have been staying. "Matt, Pegs, could you go help Tom out?"

"Sure thing." Matthew says. They both leave the dark forest to see Tom sitting on a rock, drawing in the dirt.

A/n
Happy chinese new year for the ones who celebrate it and happy day for the ones who dont. :)