Critical Binge

(via $QUIZ: How Indecisive Are You, On a Scale of 1 to Hamlet?)

...I asked my mom, and without a moment’s hesitation, she renamed me -

Fionna wrinkled her nose as she peered over Prince Gumball's shoulder. Every time he turned a page, she'd peer over to see its contents. No illustrations. No conversations.

What a stupid book. It's not worth reading if there aren't any pictures or dialogue. At least, that's what Fionna thought. Apparently though, Prince Gumball didn't share her theory. He'd been bent over that old book for near two hours now and dare she say it, but Fionna was beginning to get bored.

She considered making a dandelion chain with the little flowers that sprung up around where she sat. She could even add a few of the fluffy white parts too- whatever those were called.

After a few minutes of braiding the stems together, however, Fionna was abruptly interrupted. A flash of blue and white blurred past, pausing a moment beside the hedge opposite where she and Prince Gumball sat. It was Ice Queen, Fionna realized with a start, dropping her six inch dandelion chain onto the skirt of her pale dress.

The white-haired woman glanced behind her before pulling out a golden pocket watch from the folds of her gown. It clicked open silently and Fionna observed the red crystal on its lid- one that perfectly matched Ice Queen's tiara she currently wore.

Sensing eyes on her, Ice Queen glanced up, catching Fionna's gaze. Swiftly she pocketed the watch again and just nearly dove into the hedge beside her.

Without a second thought, Fionna grabbed her green backpack and leaped after Ice Queen, following her through the brush that seemed to be deeper than Fionna had thought it would be. Once she broke free on the other side, she had no time to pause and be surprised by the grand castle in the distance nor the treetops that created a thick canopy below her before her foot slipped from the edge of the cliff and she began to fall.

Head over heels and heels over head she tumbled down the cliff side, her dress catching on twigs here and there before she finally somersaulted to a stop at the base of a giant mushroom. It loomed twenty feet above her head, the small accordion-like folds on the underside quivering.

Fionna blinked and then blinked once more. That tumble rather hurt, actually. Not to mention she'd landed on top of her backpack and crystal sword- not the softest cushions ever.

She pushed herself up, dusting her skirts to remove some of the dirt when a dusting of silver wafted down around her. The powder itched her nose and caused her to sneeze. Over and over. The mushroom had rained spores down on her, the tiny shiny specks clinging to her dress, hair and rabbit ears.

Fionna coughed, a cloud of silver spores escaping from her lips.

"Oh my glob, that is disgusting," an annoying voice spoke up from somewhere to Fionna's left. She turned and stared for a moment, not trying to be rude but merely surprised. Floating above a much smaller mushroom cap was a purple puff. Almost like a cloud, really, except he had eyes and hands, a mouth and a gold star upon his forehead.

"Excuse me?" Fionna retorted, slightly offended.

"I said that was disgusting. Anyway, who are you?" the sassy purple lump demanded rudely.

"I'm Fionna and you-"

"You may call me Lumpy Space Prince," the frumpy floater interrupted.

Fionna huffed, not much enjoying the supposed Prince's company. "Fine then. Now, where-"

"What are you?"

"Excuse me?"

"You heard me, my glob! What are you?"

"I'm afraid I don't understand?" Fionna shifted, shrinking the slightest away and leaning lightly against the base of the giant mushroom. What a queer question.

"What is there to not understand? What is a simple enough word, is it not?"

"Well, yes, when you're not using it about me, but-"

"Well then, what are you?"

Fionna had just about enough of this Lumpy Space Prince's nonsense and was ready to end the conversation then and there. "Not saying."

"But, I must know! I can't stand not knowing what you are, even more-so than knowing who!"

What? Fionna's brain could hardly keep up with the Prince's words- words that weren't making much sense and so she marched away into the surrounding woods, her backpack slung over her shoulders once again.

Mushrooms, dandelions, clovers and ferns grew at unnatural heights throughout the woods, Fionna noted. Colors of all hues composed the landscape around her- red and blue mushroom caps, followed by orange and green furls of leaves, a bouquet of yellow blooms next to a cascade of dried purple stems. After being doused in mushroom spores thrice more, she decided that walking beneath the mushroom caps simply wasn't worth it. She would just have to avoid them, or at the very least walk around them.

After a while of simply walking, Fionna began to wonder where she was, and more importantly, where she was headed when she came upon a quaint leaf-covered path. Up the path a way she could just catch a glimpse of sunlight filtering in through the flora. A little clearing. In the middle of said clearing basked a content spotted cat, warm in the shaft of sunlight she'd found. The cat sprung to its feet, startled by Fionna's sudden presence, before she sat back on her hind quarters and gazed evenly at the girl. Then the cat grinned.

"Are you lost, bunny?" she purred softly, almost warmly. It was the kind of purr you'd imagine a cat using to greet a friend.

"Yeah... kind of. Which way should I go?" Fionna wondered.

The cat smiled a little wider, "That would depend."

"Depend? On what?"

"On where you want to be, sweetcheeks."

Fionna considered the cat's words. Where did she want to be? She wasn't sure. She'd followed Ice Queen into this mess of a world- Ice Queen!

"Do you know which way the Ice Queen went?" Fionna turned to face the spotted cat fully, a glimmer in her eye.

"Well, naturally. Girl, I get it, really. I get that you're new and all, but get with the program, hun. I'm Cheshire Cake, Queen of the Crossroads."

"Then why are you sitting in the middle of a clearing?"

Cake rolled her feline eyes and looked from left to right. "This clearing is the cross-road, girly. You and I are stood at the center of it."

For the first time since Fionna had entered the clearing, she actually stopped to look around. The grass clearing stretched about ten yards in any direction, and at the edges, the woods sprung up again. Every so often a pathway cut into the woods. Spinning in a circle, Fionna counted thirteen paths in all. Each looked the same as the next, but each was at the same time unique in their own way. Vines formed a net over the pathway of one, a log nestled across the pathway to opening left of it.

"Well, where did she go, then?"

Cake's Cheshire grin faltered slightly, her green eyes flickering behind her before she sighed. Nodding her head a little, she began to lead Fionna to a pathway lined with singed leaves. "This way," Cake prodded, settling down on a clump of clover. "Follow this path, it'll lead you to where you should go."

Fionna offered Cake a grateful smile before dashing onto the path. Footprints were singed into the fallen leaves and tea light candles left scorch marks upon the looming rocks that blocked the flames from the breeze that would otherwise put them out.

Step by step, the pathway slowly progressed into a set of stairs which started out spread out before quickly reverting into steeper stones that grew narrower and narrower still. Then suddenly the steps stopped. Fionna who had been looking at her feet for the last five minutes to make sure she didn't fall upon her face finally looked up only to lock eyes with a living flame.

He wore a white vest and trousers, his feet bare as were his arms. His skin glowed a brilliant orange and from the top of his head sprouted a flickering fire. Sat at a long table covered in burned baked goods, his eyes shone with annoyance, his fists gripping the armrests to his chair where the once smooth velvet was now charred. Beside him sat a doughnut, crispy around the edges, and next to the doughnut sat a small blue cube. The cube and Fionna's dress were the only cool colors in the room-

When had the path through the woods turned into a dank hallway? Fionna wondered. She hadn't realized until now as she took in her surroundings, but she was definitely no longer in the wilderness, surrounded by thriving plants. Instead, stone floors stretched further into the distance than the light illuminated- light that, she noted, appeared to emanate from the glowing boy sitting on his once lavish chair.

She pulled the bag from her shoulders that had started to get sore and set it next to the door. A cinnamon man materialized out of thin air beside her, surprising her as he slipped a white apron around her waist before blending back into the shadows.

"Are you the baker," the doughnut not so much asked as stated, catching the girl off guard.

"Baker? No, not really."

"What do you mean not really?" the doughnut questioned skeptically. The small blue box next to him beeped curiously, its lips pulling down into a subtle frown.

"I mean I don't really bake much. I'm not that great at it."

"Then why are you here?"

"Excuse me?" Fionna bit out, offended.

"Why are you here?"

"Because Cheshire Cake told me to-"

"Cheshire Cake? Is that what she told you to call her? Crazy cat..."

"Well, what else would I call her?"

"You're a strange girl," the flaming boy spoke up for the first time. He tilted his head to the right, his fiery hair persisting to keep straight to the world as he studied the bunny ears that sat atop Fionna's own head.

Fionna scoffed. "Excuse you! That's mean."

The flame boys eyes widened before narrowing again.

"Excuse yourself!" the doughnut yelled, outraged. "That's no way to talk to the Flame Prince!"

"Flame Prince?" Fionna repeated, looking back now to the orange boy. Sure enough, a red jewel glowed in the center of his forehead, much like the Ice Queen's own crown- Fionna's eyes widened as she remembered the reason why she was there. "Have you seen Ice Queen come this way?"

"Ice Queen?" Flame Prince muttered. "No, there has been no Ice Queen here. Ice is cold, and I am flame."

"Yes, your majesty, you are," the doughnut agreed.

"Then if she was here I would either melt her or she would put me out."

"Yes, sir, of course- what?" the doughnut nearly shrieked it was so startled. Fionna seemed to realize at last that this was not where she needed to be. Ice Queen was obviously not here, and perhaps she never had been here. Had the cat lied to Fionna back at the clearing?

Seeing Fionna glance at the bickering prince and doughnut once more, the little blue box plucked itself out of its chair and zipped over to her discarded backpack. It didn't really know Fionna well, but she seemed saner than the other two. Besides, the box was afraid it would short-circuit if it had to eat one more piece of burnt brownies. If only the duo had allowed it to bake in the first place. It was rather fond of baking.

Turning on her heel, Fionna picked her backpack from the ground and began to ascend the steep stairs. Only instead of the road flattening out like it should have, it began to spiral and grow steeper. Up, up, up she climbed before suddenly she stepped out into the sunlight once more.

It blinded her for a minute, and when she finally regained her sight she almost wished she could turn back around and descend again. She tried to, but she found the way blocked off by a stone wall. Fionna blinked.

Huh. Strange place. Turning back she looked around again only to find herself back in the clearing with the cat called Cheshire Cake.

Fionna looked around for a moment and then the stone wall was no longer there. Just thirteen lonely paths that wandered off into the woods.

"You lied, Cake," Fionna sighed and eyed the creature wearily. "You said that Ice Queen was that way but she wasn't."

Cake shook her head. "I never said you would find her there, girl. I told you it would lead you to where you should go."

"Lot of help that was," Fionna rolled her eyes, annoyed at the spotted feline. Getting an idea, she whirled around, her skirts following her fluidly. "Which way should I not go?"

Cake tilted her head, not quite understanding.

"Where should I not be? Where will you tell me not to go?"

Now a worried look flashed in Cake's eyes. "Don't go that way," she immediately responded, pointing with her front paw to a path that had a black iron gate. Green, black and blue colored the path beyond, the mushrooms pale and many of them white topped.

But Fionna just grinned, her bunny ears flouncing as she nodded her head. "Thank you!" she said and started towards the very gate.

"Hey! Wait! Why are you going that way?" Cake called out, running to catch up with the girl.

"Because," Fionna spared the spotted cat a glance, "you told me to follow the wrong path, therefore this path must be right."

Spinning on her heel, she nearly skipped through the black iron gate, leaving a frantic Cake behind her. The cat worried her lip for a few moments before exhaling slowly and gently stepping toward the path herself. "If she meets him it will be my fault. I'll have sent her straight to him. Catnip, Cake! You should've known she'd do that!"

Like mist, her white fur began to vanish, leaving a few brown spots and her worried face. Then as spot by spot began to disappear, all that remained were her dark cat eyes. They peered untrusting at the path beyond the gate before they closed and were gone.

Fionna didn't see why Cake wouldn't want her to come down this path- it seemed much lovelier than the others, and as the sun set slowly and the stars began to peek forth, everything seemed so much calmer. The breeze danced by, the cool tendrils flushing her cheeks as she inhaled the scent of roses it carried.

Roses...

As the path began to widen, she found the sides were lined with rosebushes. Beautiful, pure white roses. The blooms smiled up at her, displaying their glory in the untainted starlight. Here and there she found a light pink bloom among the rest, but then the hedge of roses appeared to suddenly turn bright, sinful red.

Fionna was so focused on the roses themselves she nearly ran over their caretaker, a peppermint fellow with a smoothed down suit jacket and a bucket of red liquid in one hand. With a start, she realized the reason these roses were red and the others weren't. He was painting them!

"Mr. Peppermint, what are you doing?"

"I'm painting the roses red!" he answered, not even sparing her a glance.

"But why?" she asked. "The white are so pretty-"

"The King wants them red."

"The king?"

"Yes, the King. And if the King wants them red, red they'll be, or else white I'll be," the peppermint paled slightly.

"White? What? I don't understand," Fionna murmured beyond confused.

"The King specifically told me to plant red roses, and these are quite obviously not red. So I'm painting them."

"I still don't get it."

"If they aren't red, I'll be in trouble! He'll have my red, instead!" the peppermint panicked, and began to paint faster, damaging a few of the blooms with his furious strokes.

"Careful!" Fionna warned, kneeling to pick up some of the damaged petals.

A trumpet sounded from a little ways off, catching the peppermint's attention immediately. He all but dropped his paint, scurrying up the path followed by a curious Fionna who was being tailed by a reluctantly curious invisible cat.

They came upon a wide courtyard, also lined with the rose bushes, ten other candy attendants stood about the edges as a tall, grey-skinned boy floated around the center fountain. His tailored suit fit him finely, his black hair and combed and mussed just enough to look collected yet effortless. A bite mark adorned the left side of his neck. He floated toward the rose hedge and leaned over to inspect them.

"Peppermint butler," his voice snapped calmly, turning his attention to the cowering creature nearby. Reaching his hand into the hedge, the vampire king pulled back a single white blossom. The peppermint butler paled slightly as the king stooped forward and looked straight into his eyes. "These roses aren't red, are they?"

"N-n-not that-t on-ne, s-s-sir, b-but most of the o-others ar-re," the peppermint gulped, his thin hands shaking by his sides.

The king narrowed his eyes, "I said red roses, not white! I might as well suck the red right out of you!"

"Please don't! Mercy!" the peppermint trembled, hiding his face with his hands.

With a shink, Fionna drew her crystal sword, standing before the frightened peppermint butler and before the smirking vampire king.

"Ah, Fionna the Human, is it?" he chuckled, his eyes soft at the edges as he beheld her in her slightly light blue dress and baker's apron. His eyes flickered to her bunny ears before gliding along her golden fringe. "I've heard of you."

With the king's attention on the girl, the peppermint butler took this as his chance to escape, skittering into the hedge as fast as his little legs could carry him.

"Y-you have?" Fionna cursed herself for stuttering. She never stuttered! She was a heroine, for glob's sake! Heroines don't stutter. Ever. And yet she did.

"Mm," he hummed, gliding around her in a circle, inching closer by the second before finally hovering just beside her. "But I must say, the stories don't do you justice."

Fionna's head felt rather light and she wasn't quite sure why. Maybe it was because he was so close or maybe it was because of all the adrenaline pumping through her veins at that second- yeah, it was definitely the adrenaline.

"You just lost me my dinner," the vampire king continued, now in a normal voice. "Maybe I should suck the red out of you, instead."

"Fionna! Don't let him!" Cheshire Cake materialized on the girl's other side, her paws grabbing Fionna's skirt in an attempt to pull her away.

At the same time, Fionna felt her backpack jostle. Confused, she pulled it off her shoulders to find the little blue box from before poking its head out of the opening.

"Beemo?" Cake asked. "What are you doing here?"

Beemo simply beeped in reply before rummaging around in the bag some more and pulling out a small bag of fruit.

The king raised an eyebrow. "Strawberries? You're going to try buying me off with strawberries?"

Beemo waved the bag slightly and the king's face fell slightly before he snatched the bag. He opened it slowly and pulled a strawberry out, placing it between his fangs. Fionna watched as the strawberry turned snow white, the vampire king licking his lips as he finished sucking its red.

"Hmm," he hummed, looking at the little device that now sat in Cake's hands, "Maybe you win."

Just then Fionna heard a familiar cackle sound from somewhere behind her. Ice Queen stood laughing on a balcony across the courtyard, her eyes gazing coldly down at the scene that played before her.

"Are you following me, Fionna?" she taunted, before giggling once more and disappearing in the blink of an eye into the corridor beyond.

Fionna huffed and ran up the stairs to the french doors that opened up into the courtyard. They swung open as she swept the aside with her left arm, her crystal sword held firmly in her right hand and her backpack shifting against her shoulders as she ran.

But as she stepped into what was supposed to be a foyer, she felt nothing but grass beneath her feet and saw nothing but mushrooms, ferns and options.

She was back at the clearing.

How does this keep happening, she wondered, keeping her sword at the ready as she waited for the Ice Queen to show herself again.

She didn't wait long, however, as suddenly the grassy clearing shimmered and iced over, turning into a frozen disk. Looking down, Fionna could just make out a faint reflection of herself, but as she looked closer she realized it wasn't her at all. The mirror image was the Ice Queen herself, standing foot to foot with Fionna.

"Would you stop, please?" the Doctor asked slightly annoyed, turning to his companion. She paused her rhythmic drumming upon the ruins and pouted. Dare she admit it, but she was rather bored. Being bored is not a very common sickness one suffers from when they travel with the Doctor, but she simply was.

When the Doctor had told her they were going to twenty-third century London she'd been beyond thrilled. That was before they arrived in the TARDIS only to be met by the shattered, desolate skeleton of a once bustling, lively city.

The old Snow Lane was all but shamble leftovers, as were the tattered four-floor buildings that used to line Giltspur Street. After quite a bit of stumbling, she realized they were heading in a Southeastward direction.

"Doctor," she spoke up for the first time since setting foot into twenty-third century London, "Where are we going?"

"St. Paul's Cathedral," was his curt response.

"Any particular reason?" she wondered aloud.

"Well, of course there is. We're tampering with the analytic side of the mind, you see. That's what I'm best at after all."

Indeed, she thought, continuing to look about her at all the rubble. The gravel street was riddled with cracks and random papers were strewn about the roads. Vehicles were overturned and graffiti littered most surfaces. Great trees were uprooted and tossed upon their sides. In all truth, the entire place looked like one big movie set. It was astonishing to think that this was all that remained of a city she once knew so well.

"Here we are," the Doctor's voice pulled her from her thoughts. Before them stood what remained of a once magnificent structure. The stain glass windows had long since been shattered, the colorful remains sparkling like misplaced jewels upon the ground. The beautiful architecture was reduced to a rotting corpse of a cathedral, the once mighty dome crumpled inward upon itself as though a mighty hand had punched it in from the top.

When the Doctor bent down among the rubble, she was only slightly surprised to see the object he pulled out from among the ruins. Perhaps what surprised her the most was the condition in which it was in.

The human skull looked fairly untouched by the destruction around it. As the Doctor weighed the skull in his palms, a slow soft smile stretched across his lips.

"Doctor," she whispered hesitantly looking from the skull to his face, "... whose was that?"

His ever-soft smile grew slightly as he turned to face her. "He was a British army doctor- and a brave one at that. Nerves of steel, this dear fellow had. In fact," he mused, tossing the skull and catching it gently with his fingertips, "I know just where this belongs. Keep up."

His long strides had a certain bounce to them that his companion did not quite understand, nor did she try to. Instead, she kept her silent wonderings to herself as she stumbled after the mad man towards his blue box.

Bored. That's what the young boy was- bored. After enraging two middle-age women, being nearly boxed in the ears by a grocer, and making four children cry, all he could think about was how decidedly dull every other human being on planet earth was.

Ruffling his curls with his fingers, he sighed. He needed an escape from reality, something to take his mind away from the monotonous and very often atrocious lives of those around him. Something to hold his interest that wouldn't react so foully to what he deduced.

Of course, he couldn't exactly continue his experiment with frogs that had been going so well. Father had eventually caved and thrown out the poor creatures when Mother began complaining about the smell coming from the fridge.

"Ah, just who I was looking for," a decidedly cheery voice spoke up from behind him.

Just as he turned around to firstly deduce the stranger and secondly tell them to buzz off, his piercing eyes locked onto the human skull the man held in his hands. For a moment he ignored the man and woman, instead focusing solely upon the skull. Quickly his mind whirred to life and began deducing from whom it came.

The man, according to bone density, was Caucasian, according to the viscerocranium in which there was a tiny chip. Antemortem seeing as it had tried healing but had not completely healed when the man died in his seventies- no, later. Perhaps his early eighties, yes that sounds about right.

As he studied the well preserved bone, it seemed to grow closer to him. It only took him half a second to realize that the stranger was holding it out to him. The curly haired boy glanced up into the man's face but for a moment paused in his deducing to lift a single brow in a silent question.

"Go on, take it," the man said, a half-smile curving crookedly across his features. "Believe me, this skull will become invaluable to you one day."

The boy highly doubted this stranger's statement seeing as the only item that meant anything to him really was his mother; he did not have the tendency most humans have of becoming attached to things that will eventually fade. Yet none the less, he took the skull, deleting the man's promise from memory without a second thought.

Weighing the skull in his palm, he contemplated its origins, failing to notice the absence of the strange man and his companion, whom the boy had completely ignored without even trying to.

"John Watson," the stout man had introduced just days earlier.

Now sitting across from him in their shared flat, the curly haired man who claimed to be a highly functioning sociopath weighed his precious skull in his hand.

Something was bothering him, pulling at his nerves and slowly making his dark brows dip into an unhappy crease. His mind was telling him he'd been wrong, something he rarely, if ever, was.