(no subject)
Fandom: Fairly Oddparents
Canon or AU: AU
Fic: Operation Timantha
A/N: I told you I was working on this. XD I started a couple of days ago.
This chapter is shorter than normal because I wanted to get it out. It’s the first chapter since August 31st, thanks to real-life shenanigans.
----------------------------
Anti-Cosmo had consulted the multiverse timelines before making his move. It also inspired the anti-fairies to concoct this plan in general-in another realm, any magical creature could suffice as a godparent if a godparent quit. That wasn’t technically the case here, but Anti-Cosmo decided that Jorgen refusing to assign certain children godparents qualified. He would take that gamble.
About a decade ago, the anti-fairies began marking children upon discovering their alignment (good luck, neutral, bad luck.) Sometimes, bad luck could be reversed, but it also depended on what their multiverse counterparts’ fates were. Sometimes, such as with Timantha, the anti-fairies got lucky. All of that unused potential, where Timantha had Cosmo and Wanda as a boy in other worlds, meant that power gathered around Timantha whether she knew it or not. Coupled with her resentment, misery, and loneliness, Timantha was amassing magic. Her little stunt at lunch hadn’t surprised him, though he wondered whether Cosmo and Wanda had seen the blue magic surrounding Timantha. At the time, they’d had other concerns.
The playground that Cosmo, Wanda, and Chloe had stumbled upon featured the babies whose souls they had chosen for this plan. Once the anti-fairies had weighed their potential, they either marked them or sent them on their way. Working under Jorgen’s nose, such a large-scale operation meant that the anti-fairies had his tacit approval, if not explicit. Anti-Cosmo was suspicious since it also suggested that the Fairy World Council condoned their plan.
Anti-Cosmo knew there was a shortage of fairy godparents-for one thing, no new fairies were being born in Fairy World. Fairies were immortal but weren’t immune to ailments or lethal injuries. In the latter case, it usually had to be inflicted by steel, caused by magic backup, or the unlucky fairy had no access to magic. The population was declining, and unless the Council repealed the fairy baby ban or opened the qualifications for godparents up to pixies, anti-fairies, elves, and the like, it would continue to decline.
The pixies, however, had their own 30-year plan in motion. Anti-Cosmo wasn’t about to step on proverbial toes by interfering, not to mention he didn’t particularly care what the pixies did so long as they stayed out of his way.
Right now, Timantha had reached the point of no return, though she had no idea what was happening. All of those negative emotions, coupled with the anti-fairy marking, left her vulnerable to dark entities. She was unwittingly attracting demons and evil spirits. Though the anti-fairies chased them away (she belonged to them), Timantha was absorbing their magic. Ironically, Jorgen had created the monster he was trying to avoid. Or perhaps not avoid, since Anti-Cosmo remained skeptical about Fairy World’s lack of involvement.
Timantha was hiding out in the girls’ bathroom. It had a giant water fountain/sink in the middle. Depressing a bar near the floor released the water. The soap dispensers and cheap paper towels were on a nearby wall. Timantha ignored those. Instead, she stared out the window, which looked at one of the other school wings and the busy street outside. Her misery was palpable.
”I wish I’d never been born,” Timantha whispered. She balled her fists. “Dad always wanted a boy. I’m not good enough.”
”Who says you’re not good enough?” Anti-Cosmo said, revealing himself in his normal form to her for the first time. The bathrooms had no cameras, and besides which, he’d magically sealed the exit and placed an “out of order” sign on the door. That ought to deter everyone but the most determined.
Timantha jumped, banging her hip into the counter behind her. She hissed, and her aura flared blue. Oh, how Anti-Cosmo loved to see that.
”You’re plenty good enough,” Anti-Wanda added. Her eyes narrowed. “It’s just them awful humans and special kids with fairy godparents who don’t understand.”
Timantha straightened up, glancing from one creature to the other.
”What are you? I thought fairy godparents were, well, a fairy tale. You’re telling me they’re real. That’s impossible.”
”I ain’t impossible!” Anti-Wanda huffed, flipping upside down in midair. “The ceiling’s the floor!”
Anti-Cosmo sighed. “Yes, dear.”
To Timantha, he said, “We are anti-fairies, the evil counterparts to fairy godparents. The dark to their light. The ones who care about the children left behind by Fairy World’s arbitrary selection system, for which children get fairy godparents and which ones get left behind.”
Timantha stared at him blankly, and Anti-Cosmo sighed. He’d forgotten that, despite Timantha’s potential, she wasn’t the sharpest tool in the shed. Nowhere near as bad as Anti-Wanda, but not exactly an intellectual equal to Anti-Cosmo. He’d have to explain more than he’d anticipated.
“Fairy World claims that it assigns fairy godparents to children who are ‘miserable,’” Anti-Cosmo said. “How it determines who is more miserable than someone else, we don’t know-we’re anti-fairies, after all. That has nothing to do with us.
”Naturally, some children who deserve fairies are left behind. We’ve noticed this happening more often, and we thought that if Fairy World chose to forsake them, then who are we to let that happen?”
Timantha’s eyes narrowed. He knew she detected something “off” about his explanation, but she couldn’t pinpoint where the problem was. He didn’t intend to let her find out.
”Fairy World believes that children ‘tainted’ with bad luck deserve whatever comes their way because bad luck is considered the providence of anti-fairies. They abandon them after they’re born without even giving them the chance to appeal to or seek supernatural help.
”We’ve been watching these children, especially those absorbing dark magic from their resentment and mistreatment. You may not realize it, my dear, but your father is emotionally abusive. That alone would’ve been enough to qualify you for a godparent had Fairy World not already forsaken you. Add to that Vicky, your status as a social pariah, and now, losing those sketches…”
He shook his head in mock sympathy. “I can understand your despair. Cosmo and Wanda had no business poking around in your backpack, much less setting something on fire.”
”Cosmo and Wanda?” Timantha echoed faintly.
”Since you are marked by the anti-fairies, you are exempt from Da Rules, which is the rule book Fairy World uses to keep its godparents ‘in line,’” Anti-Cosmo said. “That means we have carte blanche to tell you things that would otherwise be secret.”
”Like what?” Timantha said. He’d caught her attention. Hook, line, and sinker. She was his, just like he’d planned.
”Chloe Carmichael has fairy godparents named Cosmo and Wanda. Our counterparts,” Anti-Cosmo said, scoffing. “Those two idiots are responsible for multiple screw-ups throughout history, but let’s just focus on this one. When you threw them into your backpack yesterday, they started poking around. Whether they intended to or not, they destroyed your livelihood. They destroyed the only thing that made you happy, your escape from this horrible world.”
Timantha nodded; her gaze was fixated upon Anti-Cosmo.
“It doesn’t matter if it was malicious,” Anti-Wanda added. Anti-Cosmo facepalmed. He didn’t see how Timantha could take her seriously when she dangled upside down, and he gently righted his wife before she made herself dizzy.
“They still did it,” Anti-Cosmo agreed. “They made your life worse. And for what? Aren’t fairies supposed to make children happy? Isn’t that the general idea behind a fairy godparent? Or do they only help children when it’s convenient for them?”
”I…I don’t know…” Timantha said. She balled her fists in her skirt. “I feel like I should know them somehow. It doesn’t make sense.”
”You should have known them,” Anti-Cosmo agreed. “Fairy World cheated you out of happiness. They determined that simply because anti-fairies took an interest in you, you were unworthy of godparents. How many other children do you think likewise suffer from things like this? How do you measure misery and compare it? You don’t. No compassionate person can.”
Anti-Cosmo prepared to hammer the point home. “Fairy World may have abandoned you, but the anti-fairies have your back. We’re aware of your bad luck, but we can work it in your favor. We can project your bad luck at other people and teach you to use the dark magic you’ve already absorbed as a result of your miserable life.”
”What do you get out of it?” Timantha asked, dubious, but Anti-Cosmo could tell her curiosity was winning over her suspicions.
“We get to help you enact your revenge against Fairy World,” Anti-Cosmo said. He smiled cruelly. “As well as ours. We were unjustly imprisoned behind a magical barrier for centuries and only allowed out on Friday the 13th. Like you, we were discriminated against due to our nature, which we cannot change.”
Timantha’s blue eyes shone. “Suppose I agree to help you. What does this mean? What can I do?”
Anti-Cosmo beamed and wrapped an arm around Timantha’s shoulders. “First, why don’t we start small? I believe Cosmo and Wanda deserve punishment for poking their noses where they didn’t belong and causing you so much strife. Like my wife said, it doesn't matter whether they intended to do so or not. The point is that they did, and they got away with it because, as fairy godparents, they can do whatever they wish as long as it’s not against Da Rules.”
Timantha’s eyes flashed.
”Think of all that power, used so carelessly and impulsively, turned against you,” Anti-Cosmo said. “Doesn’t it enrage you? Doesn’t it make you want to lash out? None of this would've happened if they hadn’t started spying on you, especially Wanda. You’d still have your sketchbooks, and I know how important they were to you. They destroyed the only thing that made you happy.”
Timantha nodded slowly. “They did.”
Anti-Cosmo smiled. “They caused you to destroy your comic books and think about how your father regards you. They brought back all of the bad things about your life.”
”They wronged you and deserve to pay for it. If it hadn’t been for the anti-fairies interceding on your behalf, why, you’d just continue to suffer from their impulsivity and carelessness.”
”I guess…” Timantha said. Anti-Cosmo could tell she wanted to believe him. She released her skirt. “So, what do we do first?”
”First, my dear, we need to start planning,” Anti-Cosmo said, squeezing her shoulders. “After all, Rome wasn’t built in a day.
“Cosmo and Wanda are the problem, but they’re not the whole problem. Fairy World is. Don’t worry. Other children like you have also been screwed over by Fairy World. Once we have our revenge against the small fries, it’ll be time to strategize and fight the others.”
Timantha frowned, looking less confident now, and Anti-Cosmo raised his eyebrows.
“You do want to punish Fairy World for denying your happiness, don’t you? For seeing you in all your misery and turning their backs on you? For giving children like Chloe Carmichael, perfect little Mary Sue, fairies when she hasn’t done anything to deserve them? You have. Where’s the justice in that?”
Timantha nodded. Anti-Cosmo knew Timantha’s dislike of Chloe was irrational and rooted in jealousy. He also knew he could exploit it.
“I can help you if you’ll let me,” Anti-Cosmo said, flashing his fangs. Slowly, Timantha nodded again and held her hand out.
“You have a deal,” she said. Anti-Cosmo smiled. She had no idea how much making a deal with him was like making a deal with the devil. One way in and no way out.
------------------------------------
Meanwhile, Chloe was sequestered in a different bathroom across the school from Timantha. She was on the phone with her parents, pleading with them not to go. Wanda’s heart ached for her, and she and Cosmo exchanged uneasy looks. Chloe could ask her parents not to leave, though Wanda knew that would be treating the symptoms and not the underlying problem. What bothered Wanda more was how desperate Chloe became the longer the call went on. The blonde girl was in tears and paced across the bathroom near the sinks and mirrors. She tried to put on a brave face, but the fairies weren’t fooled.
Wanda wanted to talk to Chloe, but she couldn’t interact with Chloe and risk her parents overhearing their conversation. They were stuck.
“Why do you have to go away all the time? It feels like you’re out more than you’re home!” Chloe blurted. “I know I’m ‘mature for my age,’ but that doesn’t mean--”
Wanda missed what Connie said in response, but Chloe blanched, her knees shaking. When they no longer supported her, she collapsed to the floor and landed on her knees. Cosmo and Wanda, double-checking that the bathroom door was locked, sidled up beside their goddaughter. Chloe whimpered, and they hugged her.
“It feels like you care more about other people than me,” Chloe mumbled. “Like you’re doing all this charity work for brownie points.”
Chloe gulped, nodded, and listened to her mother. She sniffled, and Wanda handed her a tissue. Chloe glanced at her briefly, then looked away, her lower lip quivering. It wouldn’t be the first time Cosmo and Wanda disliked their godchild’s parents, and it probably wouldn’t be the last. It didn’t lessen the sting, though.
“Okay,” Chloe muttered, sounding defeated. “I’ll see you in three weeks. Right. I love you, too.”
The call ended abruptly, and Chloe threw the phone onto the floor. Then she huddled, arms around her knees, and wept. Cosmo and Wanda hugged her tighter.
“Sometimes,” Chloe mumbled, “I wonder if they love me. Or if they’re just as fake about it as they are about their charity work.”
Wanda glanced at Cosmo. Since her ability to lie was nil, she hoped he could pick up the slack. He shook his head slightly; this was too big a whopper for him to attempt.
“Sometimes, I wonder if they even wanted me at all,” Chloe mumbled. “They don’t act like they want me now.”
Wanda stroked Chloe’s hair. Neither fairy knew what to say. It wasn’t like Chloe was far off the mark, either. They’d suspected for a while that Chloe was low on her parents’ priority list, if not dead last. Having it confirmed didn’t make them feel any better.
“We want you,” Wanda murmured. “We’re here for you, sweetie. We love you.”
“Yeah, no matter how often your parents leave, we’re here for you,” Cosmo added. “We’re not going anywhere. Unless you blab about us or break Da Rules so badly that Jorgen has to take us away or--”
“Not. Helping.” Wanda said from between gritted teeth.
Chloe nodded. Wanda wasn’t sure she’d heard Cosmo’s reassurances.
“I can’t wish my parents loved me, can I?” Chloe asked, and the fairies shook their heads. If only life were that simple.
“Can I wish myself along on their trip?” Chloe said, brightening slightly. “Maybe if we go on a rescue together, they’ll realize how much they care about me and how little they want to leave me.”
Wanda winced. Chloe’s tone had grown more desperate than during the phone call. She hated to burst her bubble, but things didn’t usually work out like that. Judging by Cosmo’s frown, he agreed.
“You don’t think it’s a good idea,” Chloe surmised, glancing from one fairy to another. Wanda hated how sensitive Chloe was to everyone else’s moods. Sometimes, Chloe couldn’t identify her feelings or needs, but she could usually hone in on others with no problem. One of the hallmarks of an emotionally neglected child.
“I’m afraid not, hon,” Wanda said, hoping her gentle tone would cushion the blow.
“I wish I could help Timantha,” Chloe said, startling them. That felt like a non-sequitur. Chloe continued, “She has to be as miserable as I am. Her parents don’t seem to want her, and she doesn’t even have godparents. I bet if we were friends, she’d be happier. And maybe we could get Fairy World to help her out. What do you think?”
“You already wished for it,” Wanda pointed out. She and Cosmo raised their wands, and they immediately deflated. They shook them until they rattled, but nothing happened. Frowning, she conjured Da Rules and pored over its contents. There was nothing in Da Rules forbidding it, which meant other magic was interfering. Wanda bet she knew whose.
“What’s wrong?” Chloe asked. “Why can’t you grant the wish?”
Wanda’s stomach churned. “I don’t know.”
“You have suspicions, though,” Chloe said, correctly interpreting Wanda’s troubled look. Wanda nodded reluctantly.
“The anti-fairies may have already made their move,” Wanda said uneasily. “If I’m right, then Anti-Cosmo and Anti-Wanda have set themselves in opposition to us.”
“What does that mean?”
“Anti-fairies have always resented the way Fairy World treated them. They’ve longed to take their revenge for thousands of years now. It looks like they might be in a position to make good on it, too,” Wanda said and gulped. “As far as I know, Cosmo and I are the only full-blooded fairies at this school. We’d make a good place to start.”
“But you’re good fairies!” Chloe protested, springing to her feet and indignant. “You would never hurt someone on purpose! I know you didn’t mean what happened yesterday. You wouldn’t have burned her bag if you could do it over.”
“You’re right, hon. We wouldn’t have,” Wanda said, sighing. “The point is moot. I think our anti-selves have gotten to Timantha and set themselves in opposition against us.”
“But--” Chloe started, and Wanda shook her head.
“Look at this way, sweetie,” Wanda said gently. “Imagine that your life has never gone right. Nothing you do is ever good enough, and your parents make no secret of the fact that they wish you’d been born as someone else. You’re constantly compared to someone else and feel like you’ll never measure up, especially when your parents keep moving the goalposts.
“Then you discover that there’s a reason you’re so miserable. Someone could have helped you, but they decided not to for an arbitrary reason. Your life is awful and continues to be because someone decided you weren’t good enough to be happy. Wouldn’t you want to enact revenge? Wouldn’t you be furious at being mistreated and then tossed aside?”
Wanda smiled humorlessly. “The anti-fairies are scapegoating us. Like I said, we make convenient targets.”
“But that’s not fair!” Chloe burst out.
“Haven’t you learned anything by now?” Wanda asked, hating how helpless she felt. “Even with fairies, the world isn’t fair. The best we can do is hope to mitigate the damage the anti-fairies are about to cause.”
Chloe froze. “They can’t hurt you, can they? Seriously hurt you?”
“What do you mean?” Wanda asked slowly. She thought she knew what Chloe was asking, even if she was edging around the point instead of meeting it head-on.
“Fairies are immortal, right? So, nothing can kill you,” Chloe said.
“Iron,” Cosmo and Wanda said quietly, wincing. “Iron can kill us.”
“I thought that was an old folktale,” Chloe said. “Iron can’t hurt you, or you wouldn’t live in a city.”
“Ingested, it can,” Wanda said. “Or if we’re struck with an iron blade and can’t reach the hospital in time. Without a doctor's assistance, our magic can’t fully heal an iron-inflicted injury. We can die, sweetie. We just prefer not to think about it.”
“I’m too pretty to die!” Cosmo said. Wanda ignored him. His attempt to add levity to the conversation was irrelevant. She knew where Chloe was going with this line of questioning, and she feared to answer it.
“The anti-fairies wouldn’t kill you, though, right?” Chloe pressed. “They’d die, too, wouldn’t they? It’s like a light and dark thing. There has to be balance.”
“It’s not something that’s come up,” Wanda said, exchanging an uneasy look with Cosmo. “It’s also not something we prefer to think about.
“There are worse fates than death,” Wanda said, feeling chilled from within. As a mafioso’s daughter, she’d know.
“Why would Timantha align herself with the anti-fairies? If she has,” Chloe said. “You don’t know that she has.”
“No, we don’t,” Wanda said. “But I’m 99% certain that she has.”
She smiled sadly. “Scapegoating is incredibly effective, especially when you want any explanation for why your life is in shambles. It’s easier to project the blame onto someone else.
“I doubt Anti-Cosmo told her the truth about why she’s in this state. It would hurt his argument. My guess is he’s laid the blame squarely at our feet.”
“I’ll talk to her,” Chloe vowed. She straightened up and hugged her fairies. “You’re such good creatures that I don’t understand how anyone could hate you.”
“You’d be surprised,” Wanda said darkly. “Sometimes, people just need an excuse and a target for their frustration.”
“She’ll change her mind,” Chloe said. “Once she sees how you two really are.”
“I wouldn’t be so sure about that, squirt,” Wanda said, flinching. “People hear what they want to hear. Timantha has wanted to hear why her life has been so awful for a long time. Anti-Cosmo gave her the opening she needed.
“Now, we get to see how the cards will fall.”
She grimaced, looking aside. “And how stacked the deck is against us.”
---------------------------------------
Timantha sat in the lunchroom with Anti-Cosmo and Anti-Wanda at her side. They’d reconstructed her comics as her first “wish,” and they were on the lookout for their counterparts. Timantha was nervous but cautiously excited, too. It was about time that someone righted the wrongs in her life.
That didn’t entirely eliminate her unease. She sensed Anti-Cosmo had withheld information or lied by omission but needed him as an ally. How was she supposed to trust Tootie and Chloe when they’d lied to her for years? They’d been living the sweet life, and she’d been tossed in the refuse heap.
Jealous tears stung her eyes. She sniffed, straightening up. At least now, she could do something about it. She could punish Fairy World for ignoring her and acting like someone like Miss Mary Sue somehow trumped her misery.
People always talked about how “comparison is the thief of joy” and how “you can’t compare misery " (or trauma).
Screw that. Fairy World clearly had an equation, and she didn’t figure in. Glancing over her comics to ensure they’d been reproduced faithfully, she turned to Anti-Cosmo.
”What were you going to do first?” Timantha asked. “You invited me to join you but never offered a plan.”
Timantha blinked. She’d heard an echo of Anti-Cosmo’s voice, far off and almost inaudible, saying, “You’re our hero. Our big. Stupid. Hero.”
Shaking off her unease, she glanced at the anti-fairies disguised as an eraser and pencil. Since she had a new sketchbook, they didn’t look out of place.
Her gaze drifted to Chloe and Tootie. Chloe looked miserable and only picked at her ultra-vegetarian crap. It looked like Cosmo and Wanda were trying to console her, and Timantha’s temper flared. A blue aura surrounded her, and on the table across the cafeteria from her, where the two girls sat, their plastic lunch trays trembled like there’d been a small, localized earthquake.
Timantha glanced at the anti-fairies and then back at the girls. That hot ball of resentment burned in her chest, and, for once, she wanted to do something about it instead of stuffing it back in its little mental box. She walked over with the pencil and eraser clutched tightly in her fists and, double-checking that her sketchbook was safe, stopped at the girls’ table.
“What’s bothering you?” Timantha snapped rudely. She faltered when she saw how hard Chloe was crying. In her fist, Anti-Cosmo sneered.
“What does it matter?” he retorted. “You know she’s still better off than you. You know she’s still happier than you. Why does she have the right to happiness when you don’t?”
“You!” Wanda snapped, apparently deciding that since the anti-fairies had made their move, it was safe for her to speak. “What lies have you been filling her head with?”
“It’s hardly lying, my dear, when Fairy World has abandoned her,” Anti-Cosmo said smoothly. “After all, she doesn’t have fairy godparents, or haven’t you noticed? Jorgen and the Fairy World Council have turned a blind eye to her suffering, yet this little perfect princess gets you two. I wouldn’t call that fair, would you?”
“You’re twisting the truth,” Wanda countered. “Chloe isn’t her enemy, and neither are we.”
“Oh?” Anti-Cosmo said. Though he was in an inanimate form, Timantha could envision him arching his eyebrows. “Is that so? Then why does Chloe get fairies and Timantha doesn’t?”
“Why did you mark her?” Wanda snapped.
“What?” Timantha said, glancing at the pink lunch tray and then at the eraser in her palm. She put the eraser and pencil on the table. “What is she talking about?”
“You’re going to believe her over me?” Anti-Cosmo snorted. “Why would she tell the truth when it doesn’t benefit her? After all, if the so-called good fairies cared about you, why would they leave you in the dust?”
“If the anti-fairies cared about you, why would they mark you with bad luck?” Wanda shot back.
“I’d know if I were marked,” Timantha snapped. She didn’t like that Wanda had introduced doubt into Anti-Cosmo’s story, and she wanted to believe Cosmo and Wanda were the enemy. Timantha glared at Chloe and Tootie, swept her pencil and eraser off the table, and moved to return to her table. Tootie grabbed her wrist, and Timantha flushed. She didn’t often receive physical affection, much less physical contact. She wasn’t sure how she felt about it.
“Listen to her,” Tootie pleaded. “Wanda knows what she’s talking about.”
“Unlike me!” Cosmo piped up. “I never know what I’m talking about!”
“I can make up my own mind, thank you,” Timantha said coldly, trying to pull her arm away. Tootie released it, but she gave Timantha a significant look. Uneasiness crawled along Timantha’s skin, and she glared at Cosmo and Wanda before storming back to her table.
She stopped a few steps short, and her stomach dropped. She’d left the sketchbook open to the last page she’d been working on, and the popular kids, along with a few Timantha had seen hanging around Vicky and feeling her intel, were reading it out loud in mocking tones that carried throughout the cafeteria. Timantha’s heart was in her throat.
No. No, this wasn’t supposed to happen. The last thing she needed was for the school and Vicky to know what form her escapism took. They’d never let her hear the end of it, especially Vicky. It was too late to snatch the book back; they’d seen too much.
“See?” Anti-Cosmo said in a triumphant tone. “This wouldn’t have happened if Cosmo and Wanda hadn’t destroyed your original sketches. You wouldn’t have been so careless to leave them out if you weren’t already upset over losing them once.”
Timantha bit the inside of her lip, which hurt with that bucktooth. Trixie Tang brushed sparkling dust off her shoulder, and Timantha’s blood simmered. She’d seen that sort of dust before around Tootie and Chloe. Trixie Tang had a fairy godparent, too. A crown floated above Veronica’s head and then vanished.
Timantha’s chest tightened, and it was hard to breathe. She was furious and wanted to lash out. In one of the old Crimson Chin comic books, they’d mentioned fairy lore that said that fairies could conceal physical attributes or disguise them with something called “glamour.” That had to have been what Veronica was using to stay with Trixie.
Timantha couldn’t believe it. Trixie Tang merited a fairy, but Timantha didn’t. What was so wrong with that poor little rich girl that she needed supernatural help? Timantha’s rage grew. The cafeteria started shaking again, harder, like it was in an earthquake of at least 3.0. Plates fell off the tables, and the clock above the doorway slipped and broke. Utensils clacked in the kitchen, and Timantha trembled, too. Tears burned her eyes, and she ignored them.
She couldn’t confront them about their fairies, could she? She didn’t know how the rules worked yet. That didn’t stop her frustration or jealousy. It didn’t prevent her from swallowing back more fury as she realized just how little people thought of her. No one cared about her. Anyone who claimed to was pretending or using it to make fun of her like the popular girls and their companions did.
Timantha didn’t realize that she was floating slightly above the floor or that she glowed a bright, intense blue. Then again, only children with fairies could see, and Timantha wasn’t focused enough on herself to notice. She just knew that she hated her life so much that every injustice felt like it was raining down upon her anew.
Timantha grabbed her sketchbooks away from the stunned crowd when the earthquake subsided and darted into the bathroom. Her chest heaved with suppressed sobs, and it ached with tension. Anti-Cosmo had said this was Cosmo and Wanda’s fault. If they hadn’t destroyed her stuff, she wouldn’t have left the replacements out for all and sundry to see.
This was their fault.
Wanda had to be lying. There was no “mark.” She wanted to discredit Anti-Cosmo and protect Fairy World.
Once she was safely inside the girls’ bathroom, Timantha barricaded the door and turned to the anti-fairies. Anti-Cosmo wore a knowing smile.
“How…” Timantha swallowed back frustration and rage. “How can I make them pay?”
Anti-Cosmo smiled magnanimously. “My dear, you’ve come to the right place.”
-----------------------------
Wanda was extremely uneasy after the mini-quake. Usually, magical eruptions like that happened around untrained fairies, not humans. Moreover, humans shouldn’t have had any magic, much less enough to produce a localized earthquake. Whatever the anti-fairies had done to Timantha, beyond singling her out for bad luck as an infant, had far worse repercussions than Wanda had thought. If Fairy World knew about this and concealed it, they were complicit in the anti-fairies’ scheme. Wanda didn’t want to believe that. However, she didn’t like the many loose ends and unanswered questions.
“Anti-Cosmo is blaming you?” Tootie said, incredulous. She was a little shaken, as were her classmates, and they retook their seats like they might fall out from under them. “Seriously?”
“I should have spoken to Timantha myself,” Wanda said. She would’ve shaken her head if she hadn’t been disguised as a lunch tray. “Anti-Cosmo is warping the truth and manipulating Timantha for his own gain. That’s what anti-fairies do. They twist things and use people as pawns in their schemes.”
“Maybe we should try talking to her again,” Chloe suggested dubiously. She slumped on the bench, and Wanda wished she could hug her. Her goddaughter looked utterly dejected.
“She won’t listen,” Wanda said, grimacing. “She’s made up her mind. We need to talk to her without the anti-fairies around, but they’re liable to stick to her and contradict anything we say.”
“I can try talking to her again,” Tootie said. “Not Chloe. Me. She might listen to me after some time to cool down.”
Wanda frowned. She wasn’t sure about that, either. This was so frustrating--she wasn’t used to working at counterpurposes to the anti-fairies when it came to maligned human children. She also wasn’t used to Fairy World failing so badly when it came to helping children.
Chloe had a different concern.
“Crocker’s fairy detector can pick up you guys, right?” she asked. “Can it also pick up anti-fairies?”
“I…I don’t know…” Wanda admitted. “It’s never happened before. Then again, normally anti-fairies don’t involve themselves so closely with humans.”
“Great, something else to worry about,” Tootie grumbled.
“We’ll cross that bridge when we get to it, hon,” Wanda said, trying to cushion the blow.
“Or burn that bridge when we get to it!” Cosmo added, and Wanda groaned. Cosmo and his malapropisms.
“What do we do now, though?” Chloe asked. “I don’t know how Timantha caused that quake; it doesn’t make sense.”
“It doesn’t,” Wanda agreed. She frowned. “We’ll have to figure out something quickly before something worse happens.”
“Like what?” Cosmo said. “What could possibly go wrong?”
Wanda rolled her eyes. “Oh, I don’t know. All those children the anti-fairies marked could join them and try to take over Fairy World. Something like that.”
Cosmo scoffed. “That’ll never happen. Right?”
“I don’t know,” Wanda said, grimacing. “I would’ve said before that I didn’t think so, but after that little display, I’m not so sure.”
She needed to figure out how to isolate Timantha from the anti-fairies, so she’d have to consider a diversion. It’d have to be something the anti-fairies would find impossible to resist. She’d also have to craft her argument in such a way that Anti-Cosmo wouldn’t immediately be able to nullify it. This would take time; unfortunately, she wasn’t sure she had as much time as she thought.
The anti-fairies’ plans were clearly underway, and Anti-Cosmo’s cryptic reference to the pixies hadn’t gone unnoticed, either.
She hoped they weren’t about to bite off more than they could swallow.
Wanda also hoped that somehow she’d get through to Timantha before it was too late.