The Lich (4 page)

‘No probs!’ Finn said cheerfully.

‘Hold on!’ Jake pleaded. ‘PB’s bed was
ON FIRE!
’

‘What?’ Finn roared. ‘Is she okay?’

‘She made it on fire,’ Jake whispered.

‘With a match?’ Finn asked.

‘No man. With her brain, I think,’ Jake wimpered. ‘Look, man. I’ll show you!’

Jake led Finn to Princess Bubblegum’s room. He carefully turned the golden latch on the door and pried it open. It was dark inside, and the princess was not in her bed.

‘P…P…Princess?’ Jake called.

‘Over there!’ Finn said. He pointed to a dark shadow slipping out from the bottom of the bathroom door. Finn and Jake tiptoed across the bedroom, and then stopped and knocked on the bathroom door.

‘PB? You in there?’ asked Finn.

‘I’m busy!’ a voice that sounded nothing like Princess Bubblegum replied.

‘See! It’s fine,’ Finn said to Jake. ‘She’s just having private time.’

‘I’m looking in!’ Jake said, trying to be brave.

Jake peered in through the keyhole. What he saw was so unbelievable, he knew that Finn had to take a look for himself, or he would never realise the truth about what had really happened to Princess Bubblegum when she fell into the Well of Power.

The view inside Princess Bubblegum’s bathroom was indeed shocking. The princess no longer appeared to be her candy self but a full-fledged demon. She used her long, black tentacle-like arms to pour the supplies Finn had brought her into her bathtub.

‘Hold on!’ Finn yelled while kicking open the bathroom door. ‘Princess!’

As the demonic version of Princess Bubblegum gulped up the liquid in the tub, she grew and grew until her ghastly body filled the room. Then, with enormous strength, she pulled the bathtub off the floor and tilted it toward her mouth, sending all of the concoction she had made streaming into her mouth.

‘Put down the tub!’ Finn ordered.

Princess Bubblegum obeyed. She slammed the tub onto the floor and then, with a swat of her hand, sent Finn and Jake flying through the bathroom wall. The Ice King waited on the other side.

The monstrous princess punched through the room’s ceiling and right through the castle roof. She stormed out of the castle, crumbling its walls, and lumbered through the streets of the Candy Kingdom.

‘Evil presence detected,’ warned the Gumball Guardian. ‘Must defend!’

Evil Princess Bubblegum wrestled the Candy Kingdom’s loyal guardian in a battle of mammoth proportions.

Back in the castle, the Ice King tapped Finn, who had been knocked unconscious.

‘Hey, Finn, are you dead or what?’ the Ice King asked.

‘Wh…what?’ Finn rasped. ‘Ice King? What are you doing here?’

‘Hey, I had to keep an eye on the princess because she’s being possessed by the Lich,’ the king informed Finn.

‘You don’t know that!’ Finn protested.

‘But I do,’ the Ice King said. ‘I saw it with my wizard eyes. In the well, I saw something come out of the Lich and go into the princess, but I wasn’t sure it was real, because when you have stanky old wizard eyes, sometimes you see things that are real, and other times it’s like
CRAZY, CRAZY, CRAZY
in your face all the time!’ He stopped to take a deep breath.

‘Guys, let me help you,’ the Ice King begged. ‘I don’t want my future wife to be…physically unattractive.’

‘Listen, you old poot. I’m not going to let you kill her twice,’ yelled Finn. ‘Get stuffed!’

Finn hopped onto Jake’s back, and they leapt out of one of the new holes in the castle wall.

‘We’re coming, Princess!’ Finn called.

‘Dude, I think we should let the Ice King help,’ Jake suggested. ‘He could freeze her, which could buy us some time.’

‘Dump that mess!’ Finn replied. ‘I’m going to set her free with my like-like sweater!’

Finn waved the pink sweater in the air as Jake galloped toward the princess. Then Jake lifted his hind legs and catapulted his friend Finn in her direction.

‘Do it!’ he shouted.

‘
I LIKE YOU, PRINCESS!
’ Finn cried as he sailed through the air.

It looked like Finn’s like was unrequited because the princess met it with a punch to the face that sent Finn flying in the other direction. He landed back in the castle and slammed into the wall near the Ice King, the pink sweater falling to the floor on impact.

‘Liking her didn’t work,’ Finn realised. ‘She’s unstoppable. Unless….’

Finn needed to come up with a plan quickly. At the moment, his fellow adventurer, Jake, was getting tossed around by the princess. Princess Bubblegum was stomping on the magical pooch as if she were crushing grapes into wine. Or grape juice. Or even grape jam.

‘Gah,’ huffed Finn. ‘Ice King, I…I need you to freeze Princess Bubblegum. Will you help me?’

‘Are you sure?’ the Ice King asked.

‘Yes,’ Finn admitted reluctantly.

‘Great!’ cheered the king. ‘Whee!’

The Ice King grabbed Finn by the arm and dragged him out of the castle. They soared over the Candy Kingdom, hand in hand.

‘I’ll distract her up top, you freeze her legs,’ said Jake to his new partner in princess rescuing.

The Ice King tossed Finn toward the weirded-out princess.

‘I’m a cat!’ Finn cried. ‘I’m an agile cat!’

Princess Bubblegum was stretching Jake’s neck like toffee between her hands.

‘Jake! Duck!’ called Finn.

Jake immediately got small and dropped from the princess’s hands. Finn landed on a lock of Princess Bubblegum’s hair and used it like a bungee cord to swing up to the top of her head.

‘Meow, Ice King!’ Finn commanded.

Ice King landed on the ground at the princess’s feet. He raised his arms and sent two frigid blasts that entrapped Princess Bubblegum’s legs in ice. Then the Ice King howled as he used all the power within himself to fully encase the princess’s now-humongous body in a block of ice.

Fortunately for Finn, a bird was flying overhead right when the Ice King was blasting the princess. The bird grabbed Finn in its claws and flew off before Finn got trapped in ice, too. He liked the princess a lot, but he didn’t want to spend eternity frozen to her.

‘Thanks, bird,’ Finn called after the bird dropped him softly to the ground.

Finn looked up sadly at the icy statue. He thought about all of the adventures he and the princess had shared – like covering up her zombie problem with a Candy Kingdom slumber party. And the time Finn uncovered Ricardio’s creepy secret plan to take the princess’s heart as his bride. And the time Finn accidentally tossed a spell bottle through the castle window and turned Princess Bubblegum green and bald! Boy was she mad!

Finn was relieved that teamwork had prevailed and that he and the Ice King had stopped the evil PB from destroying the Candy Kingdom, but he also knew he was going to have to find a way to get Peebles back to her old self. That would be mathematical!

The citizens of the Candy Kingdom flocked from their homes and joined Jake, Finn and the Ice King by the iced princess’s side. Mr. Cupcake, Chocoberry, Peppermint Butler and Cinnamon Bun all came out to cheer for Finn’s victory. They loved their kind ruler, Princess Bubblegum, but they also knew what might have happened if she had continued to be possessed by the spirit of the Lich.

‘Woo hoo!’ shouted Gumdrop Girl as she patted Finn on his back.

‘You did good, Ice King,’ Finn said proudly.

‘Oh, yeah?’ the Ice King asked, surprised that Finn was even smiling at him, never mind praising his work.

‘Yeah, man,’ said Finn.

Jake nodded and smiled at the Ice King, too. They would probably be fighting against him tomorrow, but for now, they were united in their quest to stop the Lich.

A festive celebration filled the area as each citizen stopped by to shake the heroes’ hands and congratulate them. The crowd stopped ooo-ing, however, when the icy statue began to tilt backward.

Gumball Girl gasped as the frozen Princess Bubblegum leaned back, and back, and back even more. Starchy screamed in horror when he saw her tumble to the ground, taking the Guardian of the Royal Promise with her!

The ruler of the Candy Kingdom was spread out all over the ground, shattered into a million bubblegum pieces. Scattered within those pieces were the remains of the Gumball Guardian. It was a sight that the citizens of Ooo, especially its pair of heroes and their ice-cold nemesis, could never have foreseen.