...Lucille opened the door and dashed into the dark night. On her escape from the Magic Shop, she noticed that every other store in view had closed for the evening.
"Peculiar," the Zafara remarked as she continued her run. Really, though, the entire evening had been odd -- it was certainly her most memorable Valentine's Day (though her previous ones were entirely forgettable).
As she turned the corner of the marketplace, she sighed at the sight of an unsettling emptiness where the chocolate rosebush had been minutes before. "It's no longer there," Lucille said as she tried to calm herself down.
"All of your worries are over, Lucille."
Deep within her conscious mind, however, she knew that her problems were far from over. That plant had replaced Kauvara for some unknown reason, and the chocolate Chia was in a dire situation there with the physical, lifelike embodiment of the otherwise stationary bush.
She returned to Kauvara's Magic Shop, a look of fierce determination masking her anxiety. "You," she said as she entered the door and pointed at the counterfeit Kau, "what have you done with the real Kauvara?"
"Why, whatever do you mean?" the voice of the unearthly bush sounded from the "magician's" mouth. "And where did you run away to? I have all the roses right here." Kauvara picked her renowned hat from her head. Chocolate roses filled its velvet interior.
Lucille stared at the hat of roses, her mouth watering at the thought of the delicious taste she had previously experienced. Shaking herself off, she tried to distract herself from their elegance by focusing on other objects throughout the room. It was during this survey that she realized the chocolate Chia was nowhere to be seen.
Deciding she would inquire as to his whereabouts later, she continued the previous conversation. "I mean," the Zafara said, "I don't believe you're Kauvara."
The Kau hesitated. "Well," the voice started, its anger increasing with every word, "So what if I'm not? You'll never be able to defeat me -- I'm much too powerful to be vanquished by a low-level Chocolate Factory worker." At that moment, stalks shot out from its eyes and mouth, and Kauvara's colors melted off like wax. The entity had become a bush again.
Lucille's first instinct was to run to the door, but on her way the bush shot a splintery tentacle out and blocked it. The Zafara started panicking (despite what books tend to say about panicking) and, without thinking, she ran up to one of the store's racks and grabbed the most dangerous-looking concoction she could see, then threw it at the beast. It didn't do anything. She threw a few more to the same effect (or, in this case, lack of effect). The bush laughed at all of her feeble potion attacks.
Finally, she picked up a bottle of red liquid.
"Hey, what are you doing?" the plant said to her as it cast out one of its roots in an attempt to knock the item out of her hand.
So this can defeat it, she thought to herself. If it couldn't, that beast of a bush would have no need to be frightened by it. Carefully, Lucille aimed the bottle at the plant and, just before it again attempted to sabotage her throw, tossed it right into the center of the mangle of branches. The bottle burst open and the red liquid covered the bush and its roots -- forcing the creature to consume it.
Wailing at a pitch more foul than anything Lucille had ever heard, the voice was gone and the entire plant -- its branches stretched to every corner of the store front -- lay limp, dead on the ground.
Lucille, breathing heavily, slouched down against the counter and tried taking in the entire situation. She got as far as thinking the plant was no more before she started hearing voices. At first she thought them figments of her tired, racing mind, but later found them to be real and coming from a supply closet that had been blocked by the plant. The Zafara got up and opened the supply closet door, to be met with the faces of a relieved Kauvara and chocolate Chia.
"Oh, thank goodness you stopped that plant," Kauvara said as she left the room. The Chia followed. "It had locked me in that room, and then him, but now it's gone and everything can return to normal!" she continued cheerily.
"Well," Lucille started, "about 'returning to normal'..." she said, holding up her chocolate arm.
Kauvara glanced at it, pulled a syringe out of her pocket, and poked its needle into the chocolate. Immediately grey fur began to grow back, and the chocolate hardened and fell off. "There," the Kau said with a smile, "that makes us even. You know, that problem is more common than people think..." she said with a wink. "Well, I'm awfully tired... I think I'll head back to my Neohome. I can clean these leaves up tomorrow."
"But, how did I defeat that plant?" the Zafara asked Kauvara.
Kauvara walked over and inspected the plant's damage. A thin red liquid covered it. "A Fire Jug," she said. "Fire does burn through plants. Now come, you two, it's time to go."
The three left. Kauvara walked away from the shop quickly, leaving the other two behind. "Er, thanks for saving me, you know," the Chia started. "My name's Greg, by the way."
"Well, I'm Lucille," the now fully Grey Zafara responded.
"Er, would you like to come over for tea tonight, or something? You must be parched from all the excitement."
Lucille gave the offer some thought. "Alright," she said as a smile crossed her usually-desolate face. It was definitely past midnight, and she thought that, for once, maybe she wouldn't have to spend Valentine's Day -- even just a part of it -- alone.
***
Greg sat alone in his Neohome. Lucille had already come and gone, and she had agreed to see him again at a later time.
His Angelpuss Yipp came bouncing over. "You know, Yippoe," he said, "I should have never genetically engineered that bean." His mind was filled with the events that had led to the bean's creation.
The Chia was a worker for the "Research and Development" division of the Chocolate Factory. While there, he conceived the idea that Neopians should buy chocolate seeds and grow their own tasty chocolate flowers. His prototype failed, however -- the rosebush that grew from one was intelligent and could speak, and it became violent and angry at its sad existence, making flowers just to be picked off and consumed by others.
To make matters worse, even the flowers were tainted -- the testing committee was turned to chocolate after consuming numerous amounts of them, angering the head Kiko, who had to pay Kauvara to turn them all back.
The project was scrapped and he was ordered to destroy his prototypes -- as a result, all but one that he wanted to keep for a souvenir were extinguished. Unfortunately, it got away from him and mixed with the line of outgoing beans.
There, Lucille must have found it. And then it grew, but he found her. At first he tried telling her that they tasted bad, as to scare her away and spare the Zafara from the tainted flowers.
Once she sampled them and her arm turned to chocolate, he decided to try and get her to turn the rest of herself chocolate -- that way, she would be silenced and there would be no risk of her exposing the plant to the public.
Finally, he decided she might as well undergo the same treatment as the others, even if she spread the story of her encounter with the "magic bean." In the end, it turned out to be a wise decision -- she had saved him and destroyed the plant, as well.
Greg's thoughts were interrupted by Yipp's meowing. "Yeah," he started, "I guess it's time for bed -- after all, it's almost 1:00 AM." Picking her up, he walked over to his bedroom and climbed into his bed.
Thoughts of Lucille filled his mind.
The End
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