#eeeeeehhhhhh

"That dumbass…" Jackie muttered to herself, now alone in the Diaz household's living room. She stood looking at the tiny note Marco had scrawled out for her in his hurry to leave. He'd left to go fight Ludo and try to get the book and the little glossary guy back. Alone. Despite the fact that Jackie had said that she'd go with him. And he'd taken the only working pair of Dimensional Scissors on Earth, so there was no way to go after him. Fucking wonderful.

Jackie sighed. She knew exactly why he'd gone alone. For months, Marco and Star had been tighter friends than anyone else. They walked together, talked together, ate together, fought monsters together, everything. There were several people who thought they were dating, and, at first, Jackie had been one of them. It was an incredibly personal "friendship" that the two kept. If Marco had felt that he'd hurt Star in any way, he'd hate himself until he, and only he, had fixed it. Jackie had almost straight out told him that Star didn't feel loved. She was kicking herself in the ass for not realizing what she'd done until too late.

It also didn't help that Marco's self-esteem was almost non-existent. The majority of their first date had been him freaking out and worrying that he'd somehow not be worthy of her. He'd outright said that he'd expected her to dump him. It had taken almost an hour for him to stop freaking out and just enjoy the moment. He'd gotten better since then, but not by much. He wasn't tense when they went out, and he smiled more. But after two weeks, it had become clear to Jackie that it was going to take a long time to help Marco overcome his self-loathing. He'd probably ran off to help himself feel worthy of Star's love as he'd done it to show her his own. Dumbass.

Jackie shook herself out of her examination of Marco's mental and emotional problems. She wasn't Doctor Jackie, PhD. She was Jackie Lynn Thomas, the girl who was going to save her boyfriend from what amounted to heroic suicide. Spending three whole paragraphs of standing around wasn't going to save him.

So, how was she going to get to another dimension without any special scissors, track down Marco, and help him defeat a magical evil bird? Simple. Ask Star.

A few seconds and three knocks later, Jackie was staring at Star's door. She hadn't gotten any response. She knocked again. The muffled voice of the (usually) lively princess said, "Go away." She sounded like a mess.

"It's me, Star!" Jackie yelled, banging on the door again. "I need to talk to you!"

Star didn't respond. Jackie let out a huff and opened the door, saying, "Come on, Star, it isn't that ba-" The sight before her made her speechless.

It was hard to take in the entire spectacle due to how low the lighting was. Only a few candles lit the room, but they allowed Jackie to see the atrocity of room design Star had committed. The entire room was painted with only two colors: Red and Black. Small poems with names like "Pain", "Desire", and "Bitter Love" lay around the bedroom floor. Posters with teenagers posed with enough angst to start crappy bands in their basements littered the walls. The phrase "Love is Pain" was painted across the wall, overlapping some posters. Star herself was buried beneath a pile of pillows, apparently lying limp on the bed. The drama of it all almost made Jackie hurl.

"Uh, Star?" Jackie asked, awestruck. "What the hell?"

Star didn't look up. She simply deadpanned, "I am become death."

"Wrong phrase, but close enough," Jackie replied, still confused. "But that's not what I meant. I mean you usually don't act this… emo. Even when you're normally upset."

Star shrugged. "I'm a magical princess alien from another dimension who's been spending almost every waking second with Marco. And I STILL got fucking beat out by the popular girl." She glared up at Jackie. "I think I've got a pretty good reason to mope."

"Star, I haven't replaced you, Marco himself sa-"

"Jackie, stop," Star interrupted. She looked venomously at Jackie. "I can live with you being his girlfriend, I really can. But I can't stand being treated like a five-year-old. People have done that to me for years, and I'm sick of it. You won, don't try to pity me."

Jackie let out a huff of irritation. "Who are you right now? Marco is about to get himself killed just to prove that he wasn't full of shit when he told you that he loved you. And here you are, wallowing with enough self-pity to make a whole new Twilight series."

Star's emotional rollercoaster hit the decline into anger and she pushed herself up to look Jackie right in the eyes. "You don't know the-" Then her face went blank. "Wait, what did you say about Marco?"

Jackie's anger, born from irritation, came out in her voice as she scolded, "He ran off to try and get your stupid book and glossa-whatever. He's probably going to die unless you get up off your sorry ass and HELP ME SAVE HIM!"

Star looked at Jackie with big eyes. "You're really mad right now. Like, really weirdly mad."

Jackie wanted to scream at Star. She covered her face with her hands and muffled a scream instead. It was just so frustrating to deal with Star that she, she… realized that Star was right. Jackie never got angry. Never. Upset, sometimes, but not screaming in outrage. She took a few seconds to stare at her hands before looking up with almost the same expression that Star had: dumbfounded revelation.

"Uh, I, um, yes, you are correct. I, um, yes." Jackie coughed awkwardly. "Sorry. Just…"

"Yeah, no, I, uh, get it." Star looked around the room, taking it all in as though it was the first time she'd seen it. "I really, really get it."

"Well, it looks like Marco brings out the best in all of us," a smooth, sarcastic voice echoed from the doorway. Both girls jumped up, yelling profane language. They turned around to see the demon-prince Tom, dressed in clothes that looked like they came straight out of Hot Topic. He grinned mischievously at both of them. "Hi, Starship," he said gallantly, "and Hi, J… ackie? Is that it?"

Both girls stared at the demon for a full five seconds. Then Star's face went flat. "Tom, what the hell are you doing here?"

Tom's smile turned coy, but then relaxed casually. "Well, originally, I was going to ask Marco if I could borrow his computer for a few days. Mine broke during a game of Karate Kickers 5 after I lost 12 matches in a row." Tom clenched his hand and closed his eyes. "Patience is a virtue when it comes to owning expensive material goods, apparently." Then he clapped his hands, opened his eyes, and continued, announcing, "But then I come here, overhear that my best enemy has gone MIA, and that you two have no way of getting him back. Correct?"

Jackie blinked at the thing in front of her. With nothing else to say, she nodded and said, "Uh, yeah, sure."

Star was much more conservative than her human counterpart. Experience with Tom had made her wary. "Maybe. Why do you care?"

Tom blinked. "He's the closest thing to a friend I have. I need that asshole back to hang out and fight with."

Jackie looked at Tom. He seemed genuine, despite him being a demon. And after all, she didn't want to judge some being just on its species. That'd be racist. Or something similar. Probably. She nudged Star and gave her a reaffirming nod.

Star was still hesitant. "You aren't going to ask for anything else?"

Tom looked hurt. "Ouch. I've gotten over you, Starship. I've got someone else in mind now. Don't worry, I just want Marco back."