10Calamity's Survival
7. Trip to the Archives
Disclaimer: I do not own Amphibia
Another day, another adventure set in Amphibia.
Or a few to have been set really. Bit of time passed for the people of Wartwood with the Plantars and their humans having to deal with a variety of situations.
Firstly being that Anne had accidentally instigated a full-blown civil war for the town and the townspeople. About half the people had gotten split between two sides of the conflict when Anne showed everyone a romantic movie on her phone. Apparently their was a lovers quarrel as part of the plot for the movie and the people of Wartwood were split between who should fall in love with who, including putting Sprig and Polly at odds with each other as the defacto leaders of both sides.
Honestly Jackson was completely floored with how the people were so into serious shipping as they were. Both he, Anne and Hop Pop did what they could to try to mediate the situation and fix everything but a lot of it was not going well. It wasn't until their was a massive ambush planned by Sprigs forces that he realized he cared more about his sister than a stupid ship and promptly took a fruit, or vegetable Jackson wasn't paying attention, to the chest in defense of her. This snapped the people out of their state and things turned back to normal. To make sure things didn't go crazy again, Anne chose a different movie to show everyone but this time one that wouldn't lead to the potential of everyone freaking the hell out. Jackson made sure her choice wasn't going to do so.
Another even that took place was the apparent reelection campaign for Mayor Toadstool. While the people of Wartwood were annoyed with the toad, he was technically the only one that was running for Mayor so he would have won by default… if Hop Pop hadn't decided to run for Mayor himself. Both humans and the Plantar kids decided to help Hop Pop win the election as it would help him get out of his sad funk for losing the fruit stand and because he had the backing the people on his side. Much the challenges were hectic and sometimes scary but the old frog went about it like a champ and passed with flying colors and overall stomped Mayor Toadstool. Jackson even gave Hop Pop some advice on how to best survive in the woods with nothing in his possession, not even the clothes on his back. It was only a few hours later that Hop Pop had returned unscathed and having mastered nature while Toadstool was struggling harshly.
The final challenge ended in a boxing match with Toadstool bribing the old frog with a new stand but Hop Pop wouldn't have it. The old frog won the match and won the votes of all the people of Wartwood for his side.
Unfortunately it just so happened that the rest of the frogs in the valley were also voting for who to be mayor and it ended in a landslide for Toadstool since Hop Pop never campaigned in the other towns and villages. While it was disappointing to see Hop Pop lose, the rest of the townspeople of Wartwood truly appreciated Hop Pop for the attempt and work he did and gifted him a new stand. Albeit it was shoddily made but was able to stay up and allow Hop Pop to continue his fruit stand business. All in all a nice time for them and gave Hop Pop a reason to be taken out of his depressed state to see the townspeople care for him so much.
The last adventure they had involved a blue moon shell, a smitten and in-love Sprig for a girl named Ivy, and a thief.
Basically Sprig found a cool shell and wanted to give it to this Ivy for her birthday but it was soon taken without their knowledge. What followed next was Anne and Sprig playing detective to try to figure out who would take the blue moon shell. Jackson kept out of it as he knew things were not going to end well when it became apparent that Anne was a little too enthusiastic in her interrogations and Sprig was way TOO enthusiastic in interrogating everyone. They eventually pissed off a southern tusk frog named Gunther that raged out and started chasing and attacking them. Eventually Sprig apologized to the angry frog and he forgave them, much to their relief and Jackson as he was not looking forward to fighting the guy. With that done, they eventually found out it was actually Ivy who took the blue moon shell as she wanted to polish it for Sprig and make it nice and shiny for him.
It was also at this time that Jackson finally met Ivy.
Several days ago…
"Oh hey! So this is the guy that beat up all those toads during tax day." Ivy calls out, pointing to Jackson once she gave the shell back to a nervous Sprig.
"Oh right!" Anne suddenly shouts in realization. "You haven't been properly introduced to one of my best friends. Ivy, this is one of my oldest friends back from my home Jackson. Jackson, this is a good friend of Sprig and mine and constantly likes to ambush the little guy when he least suspects it." Anne finishes the introduction by patting his head.
"Hey hey hey stop it." Sprig annoyingly brushes her hand away.
"Well now, good to finally meet you." Ivy greets and walks up to him and extends her hand for a handshake. He smirks and reciprocates the handshake but soon she narrows her eyes, holds his hand tightly and leans in close to him with a smile. "Do you like being randomly attacked?"
While she means it as joke, Jackson very subtly has a moment of fear and worry before he soon gets his composure again and offers her a smile. "No, not really."
"That's an understatement." Anne comment as she walks up behind him, elbowing his arm with a smile on her face. "Remember that time when our gym coach tried to scare everyone on Halloween.
Jackson looks like he has a war flashback at what she says.
As it turns out, over a couple years ago before the group was sent to Amphibia, their gym coach in a veritable mood of Halloween spirit, proceeded to turn off the lights in the gym and the locker rooms when everyone was done changing into their uniforms and with a mask jumped out from around a corner to scare the living daylights out of everyone in their class.
What he wasn't expecting was for Jackson and the girls to be at the front and with Jackson proceeding to absolutely deck their coach through the mask as soon as he popped out.
Barely a minute later, the lights are back on, the assistant coach staring down at the head coach, along with everyone of the other students staring at him, including a horrified Jackson as he holds his hands to his mouth and stares down at his teacher with a cracked and broken plastic oni mask next to him.
Sprig, Ivy and Anne are laughing goodheartedly at the story with Jackson crouched on the ground with his face huddled into his arms.
"Hahahaha! C'mon man! You know he forgave you." Anne proceeds to try to help her friend but Jackson just groans at the memory.
"Uhhhhhhh…" He mumbles in embarrassment before he slowly peeks his eyes out from his arms. "I couldn't look him in the eyes for a month after that. I decided to skip gym instead and just play hooky with Marcy whenever she wanted to."
Despite the embarrassing story, Ivy was happy to meet them, even happier still when Anne nudged Sprig and he gave the yellow frog the blue moon shell as he had always intended. She opted instead to hang it up on the side of the Plantar house so that way whenever she was making her way to their house, the shininess of the shell would be a beacon for her to know she's getting close to her friends house.
A sweet gesture all in all.
Now on this day, the group has decided to go somewhere to hopefully research what they need in order to get the humans back home. Jackosn still opted out of his armor so he's just wearing light clothing, his sword and his cloak. No need to carry armor when they are going to just read at what is essentially a library. All of them are sitting on top of Bessie as she slowly moves her way along the road to their desitnation.
"Now, remember, gang. The mountain pass will clear up in one week. Meaning, it's almost time to leave this valley and find Anne and Jackson a way home." Hop Pop informs the group of the plan.
"Whoo! Love that!" Anne joyously voices her happiness at the potential to go home.
"Man, feels like I just got here." Jackson comments, earning him a small push from Anne.
"Excitement!"
"Sights!" Sprig and Polly shout what they are excited for.
"And you know the best way to start a quest?" Hop Pop asks the group of them all.
"Danger?" Sprig answers.
"Weapons?" Then Polly.
"Information?" Jackson adds.
"Research! Oh wait, that's probably the same thing. Nice job Jackson." Jack smiles smugly at being right from Hop Pop.
"Ughhhhhhh." The others though are not as enthusiastic about this.
"Oh, come on, gang. We'll never get these two home if we get bitten to death by a venomous snake fly."
On cue, a venomous snake fly appears and hisses at them. Jackson quickly grabs the handle of his sword and is ready just in case.
"Or eaten to death by a camouflaged sod skink.
A sod skink appears and kills the snake fly, making Jackson look weirdly at the scene and the convenience of their appearance.
"Or crushed to death by a sand liger."
A sand liger appears and kills the sod skink and roars.
"…Uhhhhhh…" Jackson moans in confusion at the craziness he just saw and the sequential nature kills. He learned about many of these creatures, but he legit was not expecting them all to appear so… suddenly. He slowly relaxes when the liger makes no move against them.
"Okay, okay, okay. Enough death already. Sheesh. I'm beginning to think you guys are obsessed." Anne mutters, not really in the mood to see any more potential creatures that would kill them all easily enough.
Soon enough the group has made their way to the "Historic Wartwood Town Archives." The place doesn't look like much as theirs the sign, the statue of the founder, and a small stone staircase that goes down to the depths.
Sprig groans. "The town archives? This place is dustier than Dusty's dustbin." Sprig complains out loud as he slumps in the seat.
"Who?" Polly questions the person Sprig referenced.
"Come on. You know Dusty. Local dust merchant. Friendly, always smiling, sells dust."
"Oh, yeah, yeah. Right." Polly agrees but it doesn't really feel like Polly wholeheartedly agrees with her brother on the matter.
"He sells dust?" Jackson asks incredulously. "Why?"
"It's actually a very lucrative business." Sprig replies with a smile.
Jackson stares at the frog in confusion and tries to make sense of that sort of business setup. He sighs and shakes his head at the absurdity.
"I get this place. It's like a library from my world. Zoobooks and manga, here I come!" Anne states with a grin.
"Anne I highly doubt they are going to have anime stuff here, or at least not our version anyway." Jackson comments. And now he's got some images in his head of frog versions of anime characters. He shakes his head at the thought as Hop Pop gets their attention.
"Enough chatter, you four. Time to hit the books." Hop Pop opens the door for them. Jackson jumps off of Bessie as Anne grabs onto Polly and brings her with her.
"Wait! Wouldn't we be better off preparing by diving headfirst into deadly situations?" Sprig proposes for them to do instead. Jackson looks at the pink frog weirdly as he doesn't like the idea for them to do.
"Huh. Yeah. Maybe Sprig's right, Hop Pop. Research is overrated." Anne brushes the idea of reading off the table and actually wants to go on some death-defying adventure.
"I wouldn't say it's overrated Anne but research can be pretty useful." Jackson gives his own two cents on the idea of learning from an ancient library of sorts, and mostly because he doesn't want to intentionally put his best friend in harms way.
"Overrated, eh?" Hop Pop begins to say as he looks at them skeptically. "How's diving into adventure been working out so far?" He asks her.
"Hmm." Anne purses her lips as she recalls from her memories of past adventures.
Before, Anne and Sprig hiding from a fire-breathing giant mole.
"RAAAAAAAHHH!"
"AAAAHHHH!" Anne and Sprig scream while the mole is spraying fire at their cover spot.
Another time they are with Bessie and are caught in a mudslide.
"AAAAHHHH!"
They scream some more as they slide and roll down the hill.
Next they are all tied up, minus Jackson because he wasn't there for that, under a giant skunk as it prepares to spray them.
"AAAAHHHH!"
"No, no, no, no, no!"
This was all it took for Anne to completely backtrack on her desire for adventure
"I can still smell that skunk juice." Polly has a look of PTSD about her as she shudders with Anne, who also has the same look.
"Yeah. Fair enough. Research it is." Anne is now wholeheartedly onboard with the idea of reading, learning and general research doing.
"What did you guys do while I wasn't here?" Jack asks out loud although they don't tell him what they did exactly, no doubt not wanting to relive the memories in much detail.
Sprig looks at her incredulously and overall not believing what he's seeing of his best friend. "What? You're siding with Hop Pop?"
"This trip is gonna take us beyond the valley, Sprig. Who knows what we'll run into out there?
"Careful."
*Thunk*
"Ow." Jackson was a little too late in warning Anne from the low clearance of the archives doorway. Since the place was made with frogs in mind, tall folks like the humans of their group would no doubt need to crouch or lean forward a little in order to fit in. She grumbles as she rubs her head before crawling in.
"Uggghhhhhhh!" Sprig groans loudly and annoyed at the prospect of learning before he turns to Jackson. "C'mon Jack. You gotta side with me on this man?"
"…" Jackson stops and stares at the frog with a raised eyebrow. "…Sprig, I almost got skewered by a giant scorpion, nearly swarmed by Cicada's and fly's, scaled the inside of a mountain, and almost was made a meal of by giant spider, arachnid, whatever that was." He continues walking forward and beginning to crawl in. "No offense but I don't want to be caught off guard again. Ngh!" He momentarily chokes as when he passes by Anne inside, she grabs onto the back of his shirt and stops him in his track.
He turns around to look at her to see her staring at him with a cross and slightly annoyed look. "You didn't tell me you went through all that to get here."
Jackson looks at her like a deer caught in the headlights and smiles at her nervously. "… I… Didn't want you to worry about me?" It comes off more as a question than an actual answer but he hopes it somewhat appeases her. She breaths sharply and walks into the archives. "Man." Jackson groans as he walks in after, followed by everyone else. The group of them make their way down a winding staircase with several mushrooms glowing on the walls to provide illumination.
They all find themselves in the old ancient structure. Anne lets out an impressed whistle at the state of the place, which isn't that bad considering the age of it. Theirs a couple statues, some paintings, more glowing mushrooms of different color types, even ornate guardrails for second floor along with spirally decorated pillars all over. Theirs even a fireplace in the middle. But most of all theirs hundreds of books and scrolls littering the whole place and filled to the brim with shelves for them to pick from.
"Ugh. The archives." And still Sprig is annoyed at the place.
"This place seems pretty cool to me." Anne comments and Jackson is inclined to agree with her. It does look pretty good. Much better than any other library he's been to, which isn't many but that's beside the point.
Sprig just about rolls his eyes at the perceived naivety of them. "Sure, it seems cool, until you realize all you do here is read other people's cool adventures." He reasons why this is not a good place.
"Okay, enough prattle. We gotta get a move on before we're locked in here." Hop Pop warns them all.
"Alright sure." Jackson walks forward, intent to get moving… until he stops and realizes what was said. "Wait, what?"
"Uh, come again?" Anne is also curious and wants some explanation, alongside a slightly worried Jackson too.
"The door to this place is set on a sunlight timer. It opens when the sun rises and deadlocks when the sun sets." Hop Pop informs them of the situation as he points to a crystal lens above the door with several gears set about with it, then points the center of the ceiling where theirs a small crystal that's the focus for several mirror crystal lens that refract light from the sun through a whole in the ceiling to the one at the door.
"That is some steampunk-y nonsense right there." Anne says bluntly.
"What type of locking system is that?" Jackson questions the idea of such a setup. He is also very much considering the idea of speed reading as much information as possible or straight up taking some books with them before they are locked in. While the system does look pretty cool and kind of awesome, Jackson does not fancy the idea of being stuck there.
Sprig groans at the place. "Ughhhh. Boring old books smelling like dumb old words." He continues to complain.
Anne is already going about reading a plaque etched into the side of one of the walls.. "Mycroft Newtback, archives founder. This structure, originally Newtback's home, was turned into the public archives after he died violently attempting to travel beyond the valley."
"…" Everyone straightens up.
"… If that isn't a sign then I don't know what is." Jack comments and immediately makes his way to some books on the shelves.
"I'm gonna go hit those books." Anne points in another direction and gets moving to start reading.
"Uh, reading time." Polly hops away to start learning.
"Better get to it." Even Sprig was momentarily scared and encouraged to read.
"Get my hands on those books." Hop Pop joins in and starts looking at some of the books. "'Only nature facts.' Fair. Well, now. Hold on. 'Older than the old ways.' Now this I gotta read." He begins to pile several books into his arms.
On the other side of the room has Polly hopping about to look for something, till she backs up to stop and start looking at a shelf labeled 'History of Weapons.'
"Hot mama." Needless to say she is happy as she gets cracking.
Jackson is now looking at the cover of one book. "'Pharmacognosy of Amphibia.' Hm, okay that could be useful." He takes the book and starts reading it up.
Anne is sitting in a cushiony chair and looking at a book diagram of a carnivorous plant. "Ew." She comments at the look of it, not wanting to be within close proximity to the plant as it shows it biting a poor frogs eyes.
"Hi, Anne. What ya doing?" Sprig tries to distract Anne from her work with eyes drawn on his fingers and talking through hand/
"Get out of here, man." She brushes him off to keep looking at the book.
"Oh, come on." Sprig grumbles before he gets an idea soon after, popping up behind Annes chair. "Anne."
"Yeah, Sprig?" She asks, not even looking up at him from her book.
"Wouldn't it be better if we found some plants to fight?" Sprig proposes they do.
"Nope." And she immediately shuts that idea down. "Here, see if you can find a way to survive a tiger viper attack." She says as she hands him a book that is titled 'Snakes that eat you.'
Sprig lets out a loud groan as he falls off the chair and walks away. He is about to go see if Jackson wants to try something but from the intensity of his reading, plus some notes he's taking in a scroll, he knows he won't be able to convince the human. "Stupid books. Stupid learning. Don't they want a real adventure?" Sprig grumbles and asks out loud to himself, truly believing they need to have an adventure in order to learn rather than the books. He sits on the edge of the second floor railing until he spots the crystal lens on the door. "Hmmmmm." He looks up as he hears the clinking of gears.
Elsewhere, Polly has found herself engrossed in reading a book entitled 'Daggers and Where To Put Them'. Quite the grisly book title. "Yeee-eee-eees!" Although she is quite eager to learn of the books contents.
"All right, kids. Time for a lunch break." Hop Pop calls for everyone to come to him so they can rest up.
"I'm actually glad you suggested this, Hop Pop. I'm learning a ton about your terrifying world." Anne nonchalantly states without a care.
"Pretty standard stuff from what I've already seen and learned." Jackson comments as he walks over, book in hand before he closes it and places it on a nearby table. "Although some of those plants though…" He thinks to himself as he remembers reading on some of the plant life. Most of the lessons he learned under his master's tutelage revolved around medicinal plants and herbs to be used as bandages, disinfectants and so forth. The ones he just learned though also added more into helping with poisons, hallucinogens, and such, more debilitating ailments of this setup. Heck even found some plants that could be used as painkillers if need be.
"Did you guys know that there are 60 weapons in the Morningstar family?" Polly asks out loud.
"Wait really?" Jackson asks intrigued at the information.
"Oh yeah!" Polly enthusiastically states. "Different weights for the chains, the length, size of the handles, even whether you want to go with spikes or not, although that sometimes may affect the swing speed of the weapon and could lead to the potential of it getting caught on something you don't intend to." She begins to think as she starts thinking on the possibilities of the weapons.
"Do tell." Jack urges her to continue with him suddenly having the tadpole in his arms. Anne smiles at the bond the two now have.
"Guuhh!" Hop Pop suddenly gasps, gaining their attention to the elderly frog. "The door is shut. That's not right." True to his word, the door, the only door they have that's supposed to allow them to enter and leave, is closed shut. Even as both Hop Pop and Jackson try to open the door it does not budge. "Hmm." Hop Pop looks curiously at the door as not enough time has passed to warrant the door to lock at sundown. It isn't until he looks around for a sec that Hop Pop finds the reason why. "The lens is missing!" He shouts and points to the ceiling where the lens mechanism is supposed to be and used to angle the sunlight and determine if its day or night. The gears are there but the lens is missing.
"What? Who would trap us in here?" Anne questions.
"Eh-hem!" The sound of an exaggerated throat clearing makes them turn around to see Sprig sitting eerily on a nearby red mushroom. "Maybe somebody is trying to prepare us by forcing us to dive in… Me! I did it." He doesn't even wait for them to guess as he just seems so proud of having locked them in the place.
"Dude, have you lost your frog marbles?!" Anne loudly and annoyedly asks him as he jumps down. "Put that piece back!"
"Guys, reading these moldy, old books ain't gonna prepare us for squat. What we need is a daring escape from an old, underground library!"
"What we need is you putting that piece back."
"Yeah. Hand it over." Both Hop Pop and Polly are in agreement to get Sprig to quit messing around.
"Oh come on! I—"
"Sprig." The simple even tone of Jackson interrupts the frog, making him look at the human who is is staring at the amphibian. "Give it here." He holds his hand out.
"But I—"
"Spriiiigg." This time he answers in a more drawn out voice for him. "Give." This time his expression darkens just a little. "It." His voice now carries an edge now. "Here." The subtle threatening tone in his voice can be felt by them all. "I worked too hard to make my way out of a literal death forest to be trapped and entombed in a library." He says.
"Dude what did you do out there?" Anne comments from the side.
Despite the small threat, Sprig huffs and sighs in defeat. "Fine. Party poopers. Uh, mmm." Things start to not go according to the frog as he begins going through his pockets and start to come up empty. "I know I have it, somewhere."
*Crack*
His eyes widen, as well as everyone else's in the room, as Sprig takes one step forward and proceeds to accidentally step on the lens and shatters it.
"Well, that's not good." Polly points out the obvious.
"SPRIG!" Both Anne and Jackson yell angrily at the careless frog.
"Uh, maybe I can fix it." He quickly scrambles to start putting the pieces together. "Aha! Good as new!" In no time at all he manages to make a crude reconstruction of the lens— "Ah-choo!" And he promptly sneezes and the pieces fly everywhere. Jackson tries to track exactly where they fell but it seems like they broke even more and are sent everywhere. He even sees some of them fall into the cracks and crevices of the flooring.
"Dude!" Anne shouts.
"Are you freakin' kiddi—?!" Jackson cuts himself short and steps away, biting one of the knuckles of his gloved hand to keep him from going off on his anger at the situation. No point in losing his cool at their predicament as that would not help them at the moment.
"Ah, come on!" Polly shouts in anger.
"Seriously?" Anne annoyingly states.
"All of you, stop!" Hop Pop shouts and stops everything from getting out of control. "Yelling at each other ain't fixing any of this."
Everyone manages to calm down some but their situation is still not very favorable for them. "So, what do we do?" Anne asks.
"Well, we wait for someone to visit the archives."
"Oh, okay. Well, when was the last time someone came down here?" Anne asks Hop Pop.
"Well, I checked the logs, and it says… three years ago." Just like that any hope they had of someone stumbling across them soon is out the window.
"Help! Get us out of here! Help! Get us out of here! Help! Help!" Both Polly and Anne run up to the door and frantically start slamming, beating and hitting the door in a desperate attempt to either get it open or have someone hear them until they tire themselves out and are panting to catch their breath.
"Enough of this negativity!" Sprig begins to give out some impromptu speech as he jumps onto some books to get a higher point in the room. "Come on, guys. This is our call to frog-venture right here. Did you forget who we are? This gang has been through a lot. And Jackson too."
"Hey!"
"And we're gonna make it through this too! I mean, we better. 'Cause if we don't, we'll be trapped here for weeks. No food, no water. Until they find our dehydrated, mummified bodies clawing at the door."
Sprig has absolutely no tact when it comes to trying to alleviate the others worry of the situation, making them all cringe at the picture.
"Sprig don't make me punch you to get you to shut up." Jack bluntly threatens the pink frog. No one contradicts him or tells him not to do so.
"Yeah, I probably could have ended that speech earlier."
"Let's just find a way out." Anne mumbles and begins searching around the room.
"That's the spirit!" Sprig tries to add some pep to their means of getting out. If only it were that easy.
First plan on the table was to simply try to ram the door down. The whole group grabs onto a large mushroom lamp and use it as a makeshift battering ram to knock the door down.
Problem is that the door has proven yet again how good and sturdily made it is as the lamp bounces off the door. Most of the group yells and groans as they are thrown into the wall from the recoil, all except Jackson as he let go once the lamp bent.
It still hurts though as everyone finds that ramming the door is not the way to go.
The next plan is for the group to simply dig their way out of the room. It's not completely made all out of stone and rock so the flooring has relatively soft dirt under the floorboards that they can dig under the door or walls of the archives to get themselves a way out.
"ROOOOOOAAAARRRR"
"AAAAAAHHHHHH!"
This plan still doesn't work as several giant worms bust out through the floor and roars at everyone. Jackson barely manages to roll out of the way but Hop Pop is grabbed while the others try to dodge the worms.
"Heya!" Without wasting a beat Jackson comes around and slices a few of the worms in half, freeing Hop Pop. Once the others scramble away he stuffs the wriggling bodies into the hole, stomping on them and covering up the hole while the others frantically throw dirt, wood and books onto the pile. "Yeah, we're not doing that." He wipes his blade clean and sheathes it.
"Hey, I should have thought of this sooner." Another plan is for Hop Pop to use his glasses as a makeshift lens to get the door to open up.
Unfortunately he proceeds to set a part of the library's ground on fire.
"Aaaaahhhhh!" Again everyone screams at the fire quickly going off.
"Holy smokes!" Hop Pop shouts at the accidental bonfire he started.
With everyone yelling, Jackson slaps the glasses out of Hop Pops hand and quickly rips his cloak off and quickly begins smothering the fire out, being careful and fast so as not to catch his own clothing on fire too. He finishes stomping it out as all that's left is the smoke.
"Can… we not… burn the place down… either? With us… in it?" Jackson tries to get his breathing in order, lightly coughing a little after being face first in the fire almost. Not to mention the room is pretty stuffy after all the time no one has entered the place
The group all sit together at the almost hopeless situation they find themselves in.
"So… Not good." Sprig points out the obvious.
"Urhhhh!" Polly shouts in frustration. "Why did they have to put the door on a stupid sunlight timer?" She complains about the whole setup the room has for a so-called security measure.
"That's it!" Anne suddenly gets an idea.
"What's it?" Jack asks.
"Light timer. Timer, sunlight, light, skylight! I bet we can get out through the skylight!" She proposes her idea and points to the roof, showing the skylight.
"Yeah! That's a great idea, Anne. Ha!" Sprig and her high five.
"Nice. Alright then." Jack walks under the skylight and looks up at it. He takes a moment to look before he starts to think of an idea on how to get up to it. He looks over at Anne, who tilts her head in confusion as he stares at her. "Okay Anne. I think if one of us boosts the other then we can possibly jump to get them up to the hole. Here." He gets onto the table and kneels before he locks his fingers together. "Your lighter than me so I should be able to pick you up to the skylight."
"…" Anne stares at him for a few seconds before she shakes her head. "Yeah no."
"Why? What's the problem?" Jackson asks her as he stands up, a little worried that he might have unintentionally insulted her or something along those lines. She stares at him silently before she grabs the end of her skirt with one hand and barely holds up the side. He looks down at the skirt, confused at first before his eyes suddenly widen. "Oh! Right… sorry." He looks away and rubs the back of his head nervously.
"C'mon, let me pull you up then." She proceeds to lean down and locks her fingers together on the table.
"Uhhh Anne. I don't think—"
"Don't worry man. I'm stronger than I look." She smugly states to him with an air of confidence.
With not much choice for them, Jackson sighs and pulls off his cloak and tosses it to Sprig, who was holding his arms out to catch it.
"Aaaahhh! It's dark! I can't see! I'm blind!" The pink frog completely underestimated the size of the clothing item as it completely covers him, freaking him out as he tries to get the garment off him but he just continues to entangle himself in it, rolling on the ground a bit as he screams about.
Jackson walks up to Anne, places one of his feet onto her hand and pushes.
"Oof!" Anne proceeds to fall forward and almost faceplant onto the ground. Jackson takes his foot back fast enough so he doesn't crush her hand. He stares down at Anne she remains on the ground in a heap not making a sound. Soon after she quickly pushes herself up and proceeds to brush the dirt and dust off her clothes. "Okay, that's not going to work." Both she and everyone else stare upwards at the skylight. "What now?" Anne asks out loud to everyone.
A plan that came to mind… was not one that Jack found himself particularly fond of. The Plantars went ahead and built a huge pile of books with some chairs too, which Sprig has taken the liberty to wrap his tongue around to steady it, which Jackson has climbed on top of to reach the skylight.
The tower creaks as he desperately tries to keep his balance on the rickety makeshift ladder.
"Just for the record… I hate this!" Jackson can't help but comment on the precarious situation he is in. Ironic since he was somewhat alright scaling the inside of a tall mountain yet the uneasy wobbly book stacks are bringing his anxiety levels up.
"Oh quit being a baby and climb already." Anne goads him on to keep going.
"Climb my goddamn as- Fu—!" He shouts as in the middle of his complaining the book tower shifts badly for him, resulting in him jumping up and grabbing onto the edge of the hole. "C'mon… stupid… freakin'… Sprig." While Jack does like the pink frog, he does not like the situation he put them in as he tries to pull himself up.
"You got it!" Sprig shouts in victory with his hands raised up.
"Easy does it now." Hop Pop carefully calls out and warns the human.
"Yeah yeah! Ngh! Give me a sec." He grunts as he slowly pulls himself up, thankful for his training to allow him to climb things easier. He shimmy's himself upwards carefully, being wary to not get himself stuck inside the hole as it's dangerously narrow for someone of his build. When his head and upper arms make it to the surface, he punches forward and pops the glass covering off the hole. To fully bring himself out, he even has to suck in his gut and let out the air in his lungs to get him to pull himself out. "Arhhh man!" He groans as he gets out of the hole. While the others cheer at him getting out, he takes the moment to breathe the open air with his legs dangling in the hole.
"Mrahh! Mrahh!"
"Hey Bessie." Jackson greets the snail as she comes into his view frame. She leans close to look at him so he gently pets her with a smile. This makes her coo at his actions. "Don't suppose you can go get some help?" He asks.
She completely ignores his request and looks at a floating butterfly. Completely enraptured by it, she slinks away and follows it.
"Okay, thanks. We'll… be here." Jackson lazily waves to her as she goes away.
"Heeey! Are you dead up there?!" Polly yells at him from down below.
"No I'm not!" Jackson replies as he pulls himself up and manages to stand. He stretches a little and looks around. Now that he's got a good look of the area and find himself properly outside the archives. "Alright! I'm outside. Everything looks good, although Bessie left."
"We'll get her back don't worry. I'm coming up." Anne replies and he can hear some shuffling inside the archives as Anne proceeds to make her way up the pile of books.
"Okay then." He looks out towards where he can see Bessie still following the butterfly, sometimes even in some circles. "Just be careful coming out of the hole. It's a tight fit and I was barely able to fit myself through it so just watch your—"
"Uh-oh."
"…" Jackson stops talking at Anne's words. He turns around and looks down.
Anne is still in the hole, staring up at him sheepishly. "Heeeeey." She nervously greets him as she waves a little, her arms pressed up against her chest with her hands just barely peeking over the edge of the hole.
"Oh Anne." Jackson sighs in defeat at his friend before he leans close to her and begins assessing her status. "…Your stuck."
"… Yes I am."
"Your stuck?!" Sprig asks loudly from inside.
"Great! We're going to die in here." Polly grumbles inside.
"Hush now." Hop Pop quiets the two of them down.
"Hold on Anne I got you!" Sprig calls out as he prepares to go up the pile of books to help Anne.
"Wait Sprig! I'm here with Anne I think I can—"
"Whoa!"
*Crash*
"Whoa! Abandon ship!"
"Whoa!" Polly and Hop Pop can be heard afterwards yelling and shouting, alongside some crashing sounds.
"…"
"…"
Both of them have uneasy looks on their faces at the sounds that came from inside.
"Uh, what just happened?" Anne asks loudly and slightly worried.
"Uh, nothing. Everything's fine." Sprig horribly lies as he holds onto Anne's legs.
Anne does not like the lie. "Sprig!" She shouts angrily at the frog.
"Okay, the books fell, and you're stuck and blocking our only way out." He explains to her.
"What?!" Anne loudly states in surprise.
"Oh come on Sprig."
"Don't worry. We'll rebuild the tower of books and get you down while Jackson up there will help." He tries to calm her and everyone of the situation.
Jackson groans before he begins to analyze Anne's situation. "Uh fine. Guess we got nothing better to do. Now let me see if I can—"
*BZZZZZZZZZZ*
This makes Jackson stiffen up and Anne get uncomfortable at the noise.
"What's that sound?" Anne asks as Jackson slowly stands up.
"Uh, it's cicadas coming out to graze. Which is totally fine. If you just stay super quiet, they should go away." Sprig quickly explains but Jackson is already getting himself ready.
"Oh, cicadas, like little cute cicadas?" Anne asks nervously as she looks around.
"No. They aren't. Please stay quiet." Jackson quietly and lowly tells her as he begins to take out his sword and holds it tightly with two hands.
"Why? They can't be that bad like- Oh, my God! That's huge!" A huge swarm of forest green cicadas the size of a small horse with red or purple eyes surround the duo.
"Anne!" Jackson yells at her as she shouts, one of the cicada's having moved in close and scared the hell out of Anne. A small horde of cicada's have moved around the two of them with Jackson standing stalwart and ready as the cicada's begin to nibble on the surrounding bushes.
"Aaahhh!" Including one as it gets uncomfortably close to her bushy leaf and twig filled hair.
"Too late." Sprig comments
"Get away from her!" Jackson comes up and kicks the giant bug away.
"I'm not food! I'm not food! I'm not food! Get me the heck out of here!" Anne cries out as Jack swings and kicks the bugs away from him and her. "Jackson watch out!"
"Ahh!" He shouts as one cicada jumps onto his back. He struggles and groans as he tries to throw the bug off him. "Get… off…!" He turns his sword into the reverse grip. "ME!" He stabs into himself at the side under his arm, missing himself and sending the sword straight into the cicada trying to take him down. He shouts in defiance as he throws the bug off himself. While its in the air he swings wide and cleaves the bug in half. He breathes heavily before looking at the group of cicada that begin to slowly encroach on them. He groans at the situation and tightly grips his sword. "Anne… I don't think I can help you right now."
"Hang in there you two! We'll figure something out!" Hop Pop shouts in trying to alleviate the humans worries as they try to pull Anne back down but to no avail.
"Ughhh!" Anne groans in frustration as Jackson stabs a nearby cicada and kicks its body away. "I can't believe this. I tried to do things the right way! And now I'm gonna die stuck in this stupid hole, watching one of my best friends fight for his life, I can't do anything to help and we'll never get back home!" She vents her frustrations out loudly and angrily, which is valid considering the situation for them.
"That's it!" Sprig suddenly gets a burst of inspiration. "This building used to be someone's home, which means, there was a bathroom!"
"Ah, good thinking, Sprig." Hop Pop says to her grandson.
"Bathroom?" Jackson says quietly in confusion for a moment. He quickly has to focus again as a cicada almost chomps its pincers on his head, forcing him back and to swing back at it.
"Bathroom? Now? Can't you just hold it? Aah!" Anne shouts as one cicada gets uncomfortably close to her, resulting in her desperately trying to blow air at it to get it back as it tries to bite her hair.
"I swore I wasn't going to let you die Anne! Hraah!" He cuts done a cicada down the middle and swings his weapon wide to force the others away from. "And I meant it!" He shouts defiantly before he yells again and stabs his sword into two cicada's at once before he swings them to the side and forces the bodies to slam into more of them.
"There was a bathroom. That also means there were—" Polly begins to get the same idea as her brother.
"Pipes! Aha! Here it is! The blueprints!" Sprig shouts triumphantly with the documents in hand as he manages to find the blueprints for the former home. A little ironic considering earlier he was very bored with trying to learn the information and now its going to save their lives.
"And look here. This is where the bathroom used to be, behind that bookcase. We just need to break it down!" Hop Pop points to a nearby bookcase.
*Crash*
"War cry!"
Polly comes in and smashes the bookcase, having used her earlier learned knowledge of weaponry to break the wooden piece blocking their way with a two-headed flail.
"Yes! Don't worry, you two! I'm on my way!" Sprig shouts as he begins to crawl his way through an old pipe.
"Sprig! Hurry up! We need some help!" As much as how skilled Jackson has become, theirs only so much he can do when it comes to the sheer numbers the bugs are sending at him.
Elsewhere back in Wartwood, the simple place of business of Felicia's Tea Shoppe is having a successful business day as usual. The tea shop is peaceful with many of its customers happily enjoying their meals with a pleasant tone of gentle music playing for everyone.
The owner of said tea shop Felicia is making her way to the restroom facilities to make use of them at the moment. She hums a little tune as she walks in and closes the door.
…
The toilet can be heard flushing.
"Aaaaah!"
"Sorry, sorry, sorry. Sorry, sorry, sorry, sorry, sorry, sorry."
What happened is Felicia backed out of the restroom screaming as the pipes backed up badly before she can even make use of them, with Sprig running out of the restroom yelling 'sorry' all the while. Apparently his efforts to find a way out of the archives found him in a very unfortunate and inconvenient location.
Either way, he's out and he needs to get going. His friends and family need his help.
*Shick*
"Arhh!"
"Jack!"
"Off me!" Jackson shouts as one of the cicada's came in low and stabbed its pincers into his leg. No serious injury came of it but it still hurt quite a bit. He kicks the bug off him before he stabs it into the ground and rips his sword back out. "Grrrrah." Jackson lowly growls as he kneels down with his sword stabbed into the ground. He breathes heavily in exhaustion from his efforts. If he was alone he would be able to properly fight and kite the horde of bugs, but with his best friends stuck helplessly he needs to force more effort into protecting her.
He's become exhausted and angry as he stands back up and growls at the horde, veins almost ready to pop as his eyes flash an eerie blackness.
"Yahoo!"
Suddenly, much to his and Anne's surprise, Sprig comes flying from out of nowhere and tackles one of the Cicada's away.
Jackson's look of anger turns to astonishment as both he and Anne look him. "Sprig? Wait. How did you get out?" Anne tries to figure out how he did in fact get out.
"I don't wanna talk about it." The pink frog looks very very uncomfortable all of a sudden.
"Sprig!" Jackson shouts the frogs name, making him look at the human. His eyes widen as Jackson proceeds to bring his sword up above his head and heave it straight at the frog with almost blinding speed. He stands there as the weapon comes towards him…
*SHINK*
And imbeds itself into the cicada that was sneaking up to the oblivious frog. The cicada flips the through the air before it lands on the ground with the sword still sticking out of it. Sprig blinks a couple times before he looks back at the dead bug behind him. "Yeah! Nice aim Jack!" He compliments the human. Jackson just gives a tired smile before he rolls away from another cicada and moves close to Anne, ready to still try and protect her while Sprig moves to start scaring the rest of the bugs away. "Whoo-hoo!" Sprig comes in and proceeds to use the cicada he tackled as a steed and charges the rest of the group surrounding them. Jackson jumps onto and covers Anne's head with his body as Sprig bowls over the rest of the cicada's around them, forcing them all to finally depart and fly away as Sprig does a flip off the bug. "See you later, cicadas!" Sprig boasts and shouts at them as they run away.
"Finally." Jackson grunts as he collapses on the ground and can finally catch his breath next to Anne.
"Thanks, Sprig. That was a close one."
"I'm just glad you're okay." Sprig is happy to see them relatively alright.
"Yeah, so am I."
"Me too." Polly and Hop Pop inexplicably walk up and voice their relief as well.
"You guys made it out too?" Jackson comments the rest of their group back together.
"We couldn't wait. So we took the pipes too." Polly nonchalantly explains.
"I seen things." Hop Pop looks just a little freaked out as to what they had to go through to get out.
"So we did it! We dove into another adventure and escaped! I told you it would work." Sprig completely tries to make light of the situation turn it around that he was right.
Everyone glares at him.
"Spriiiiiig." Jackson lowly growls at the pink frog. No doubt he would make true on his earlier statement of punching the amphibian if he hadn't just been trying very to save himself and his fellow human.
"We didn't dive in. You pushed us." Anne bluntly tells him.
"Yeah, but—"
"No, Sprig. Listen. This trip out of the valley, it's more than just another adventure. It's our chance to get home. I can't mess this up." Thanks to Anne's words, Sprig actually looks a little down and guilty for what he pulled. "So if that means doing a few things I don't like to help me get ready, well, then…"
"Then that's what we'll do, together." Sprig is on board now as he agrees and even hugs Anne's head.
Anne chuckles and is happy to see him looking at things their way. "Aw. Thanks, buddy."
Suddenly the ground begins to move slightly, making everyone's eyes widen as Polly and Hop Pop back up.
The ground caves in with Anne and Sprig falling in.
"GUYS!" Jackson dives forward and catches the two of them with his hands, his upper torso just hanging over the edge. "Ohhhhh my god." Jackson groans painfully as he bares the full weight of Anne and Sprig while exhausted. Anne may not be the heaviest person but she's still a human being and right now Jackson is in pain.
"Hold up. We got you." Hop Pop and Polly quickly grab his legs and make sure he doesn't fall in. While he is pulling them up, Anne and Sprig quickly begin pulling themselves up Jackson's arms until everyone is out of the hole in the archives.
"Wow. That was close." Sprig happily says as he looks at the hole. "Thanks for the save man." He nonchalantly thanks the human.
"…" Jackson doesn't respond at first, just laying there on the ground face first into the dirt. They look at him worriedly until he raises his arm into the air.
*Smack*
"Bleugh!" And promptly slaps Sprig on the back of the head, making the pink frog face plant onto the ground. "I… deserved that." He says and accepts the hit.
"You okay man?" Anne asks Jackson, not all that worried about Sprig, especially considering the amphibian deserved that since this was his fault to begin with. She's more worried for her friend who was just almost fighting for his life trying to save her.
"Can we go home? Todays pursuit of knowledge hurts… a lot." Jack replies, his voice slightly muffled from the ground.
"Sure thing bud." Anne pats his back to comfort him.
"I'll go find Bessie." Hop Pop goes off to find their mode transportation.
"I'm gonna go take some of those weapon books with us." Polly hops down the slope towards the entrance of the archives.
"I'll… be here." Sprig informs them from his spot on the ground.
All in all the day that was supposed to be a simply information gathering mission went way off-track than what Jackson was hoping for. Still, as long as they get the information they needed, then he can deal with whatever life in Amphibia throws at him.
Safe to say that their instance of knowledge hurts, went pretty accurately, and completely off the books of what they had originally intended to do. Not a massive change from the original episode but I'd say I hopefully made things interesting and nice for Jackson's inclusion.
And of course it's always a pleasure to write out scenes of Jackson's exploits in combat. Was fun writing it and him covering the others.
Loserkiduwu: Thank you. I hope you continue to love it as it progresses.
ThunderBasilisk: I appreciate it. Considering all the stuff they have to deal with, in time Jackson will do well in increasing his skill playbook.
Merry Christmas everyone and I hope this year was a good one for you all. Here's to good fortune and hopefully and a good 2024 for everyone. Thank you all for your continued support. Go ahead and fave, follow, review, whatever you wish. I hope you all have fun reading, but most of all, have a great day each and every one of you, and have a Happy New Year.