A/N: I would like to thank my friend Shimmering Star/Eternal Dragon's Tear/Aqua Bear for his help in creating the character of Marine Bear, who belongs to both of us.
Chapter 7: Magic Discovered
Love Heart turned and was surprised to see another animal like himself and Alex, a young male badger this time, about Alex’s age and well built for his size; he was wearing a t-shirt and shorts. The odd thing, at least to Love Heart, was that the badger’s fur was normal colored, for a badger anyway, he was black and while striped rather than being an odd color like Love Heart’s lime green fur, or Alex’s fiery red fur.
Alex obviously knew him and was clearly not happy that the badger was here; he didn’t even turn to look as the badger spoke again.
“Well, Alex, it seems you’ve made a new friend, unless that’s one well made animatronics bear over there.”
“Oh can it Daniel!” Alex shouted, continuing to look away from the badger towards Wascana Lake.
Love Heart wasn’t sure of the history these two shared, but it was obvious to anyone that they didn’t like each other one bit. “I’m very real,” Love Heart said, standing up, “and your name is Daniel then?”
“Yep, my name is Daniel, and I guess you know this enrage lunatic pretty well by now,” Daniel the badger said. Alex said nothing but his face showed he was clearly angry, just doing his best to hold it back for no other reason than that eh found interacting with Daniel more annoying than trying to ignore him.
“I wouldn’t say he’s a lunatic, I mean yeah he’s annoying and gets angry at the least little thing-“
“Oh just shut up and leave me be!” Alex said, interrupting, getting up and storming off closing to the edge of the lake to sit and brood to himself.
“Strange, usually he responds with violence,” Daniel observed, “So why are you hanging out with him?”
“Honestly, because other than him, and you, he’s the first animal like me that I’ve met, other than my father,” Love Heart explained, “I’m just searching for others like me, and now I’ve found two.”
Daniel smiled, Love Heart was certainly an interesting person, “Well then, tell me about yourself, it’ll be nice to get to know someone who isn’t always flying off the handle for no reason.”
As Love Heart told his story to Daniel, leaving out the parts about magic for now, a figure stood nearby among the trees, a blue bear wearing just his fur (not that it really mattered), and a blue drop of water for a symbol on his tummy. He wasn’t interested in the three animals near the lake instead he was watching the humans, looking on in disgust.
“Humans,” he said aloud, his voice full of hatred, “They sit here, oblivious to what they’re doing,” he watched angrily as a young boy tossed a wrapper from a candy bar onto the grass, only for a light wind to carry the wrapper into the lake, “They leave their garbage everywhere, pollute the water, always, destroying what life might be there,” he raised his hands, “but not anymore!”
Daniel nodded and sighed, saddened by the tale Love Heart had told him. “That’s quite a story,” he said, “So do you think you’ll see Dusk Heart again?”
Love Heart clenched his hands and bared his teeth, surprising Daniel with this sudden display, “He will, and when I meet him again, I’ll make him pay for what he did to me and my father!”
Daniel did his best to change the subject, “So why are you hanging out with Alex, I didn’t think it would be possible to get to know him without getting hurt.”
“Actually, the first thing he did to me was to punch me in the face,” Love Heart admitted, “and honestly I’ve been fighting the urge to just leave him and be on my way.”
“So why are you still hanging out with him, Love Heart? You’ve only known him for one day,” Daniel asked, having learned the green bear’s name when he told the badger his life story.
“A sense of duty mostly, he may be an annoying little brat but he’s the only other animal like myself I’ve ever met, other than you and my dad,” Love Heart explained, “That and Sage Heart left me instructions. He told me to seek out others like myself, and I don’t want to be alone anymore.”
“Well I certainly won’t leave you alone with him,” Daniel said, “but I’ll have to see how things go before I make any definite decisions.” Alex continued to watch the lake, doing his best to block out the conversation between Daniel and Love Heart.
Was the lake boiling? He could see the center starting to bubble up. No, it was more like the water was piling up on itself, getting higher and higher. Other people were starting to notice and were pointing when suddenly it erupted into a massive pillar of water.
People were shouting and screaming as the pillar smashed over the sides of the lake, leaving a huge imprint where it hit.
“What the heck is that!” Daniel shouted, but Love Heart already knew the answer.
“That’s magic!” Love Heart said. Seeing that almost every human was fleeing, Love Heart began to charge up a lightning bolt which he unleashed at the pillar of water, causing some of it to evaporate.
Daniel and Alex weren’t quite sure what they were seeing, but Daniel decided to run with it and shouted, “Keep that up, if the lightning hits the water it will cause electrolysis!”
“Elec-what?” Love Heart shouted as he dodged a line of water that was fired at him frot he column of water.
“When electricity hits water, it causes water to turn back into its base elements, hydrogen and oxygen!” Daniel called back.
“Hey, if he does that then there will be nothing left of the lake!” Alex called back, “That’s if there’s any end to the water!”
Love Heart had to agree with Alex, so instead he concentrated. He reached out like Sage Heart had taught him, feeling any source of magic nearby. He got a very faint signal from Alex and Daniel, a larger feeling from the column of water, and connected to it…
There was someone nearby controlling it. “There!” he shouted, turning towards the strongest feeling and running towards it as fast as possible, pulling out the nail file of his and charging it into sword form. Both Alex and Daniel couldn’t fully process what was happening, but all they knew was that what Love Heart was doing was unlike anything they had ever seen and dashed after him, hoping to find out what was happening.
The blue bear who was controlling the water saw Love Heart’s electrical attack on the water, “Magic,” he said, irritated. He saw that Love Heart was approaching and turned to face him as the green bear ran up sword in hand and letting the water he had been controlling fall back into the lake.
“Another Care Bear,” Love Heart said, surprised that the one behind the attacks was another one of his kind.
“I don’t know what a ‘Care Bear’ is and I don’t care,” the blue bear said, “but why are you protecting humans?”
“Why are you attacking humans,” Love Heart said, holding his sword ready to fight.
“Because, humans are destructive monsters!” the bear declared, holding his hand out as a sword of ice formed in his outstretched hand, “they pollute the water, killing animals and plants that live there! And I’m going to make sure that none of them have a chance to do that again!” He charged and swung at Love Heart. Love Heart tried to dodge aside but forgot he was wearing his heavy backpack and got cut on his arm, the cold made it hurt a lot and in retaliation he swung at and shattered the ice sword the blue bear was holding. The blue bear dropped the hilt that was melting in his hand and glared at Love Heart.
Love Heart just glared back, “I can’t believe you thought an ice weapon would stand up to a real one. Just who are you?” he asked severely.
“My name is Marine Bear, and I promise you, I’ll be back,” Marine Bear turned around and took off running into the tree filled part of the park, leaving a confused Love Heart standing facing the direction the blue bear had run.
“Alright, what the hell was all of that!?” Alex demanded, as he and Daniel had caught up to Love Heart by now and had seen and heard the brief encounter between the green and blue bears.
“And what’s a Care Bear exactly?” Daniel asked.
Love Heart realized he was still holding his sword and retracted it into its nail file form, putting it back in his pocket, “I’ll tell you all later, for now I think we should get out of here before any police show up.”
“Love Heart makes a good point,” Daniel said, “I’d rather not get caught in this and try to explain to the authorities what happened here.”
“Alright fine!” Alex said, irritably, “Let’s go to my place, com’on!” Alex took off, forcing Love Heart and Daniel to take off after him.
Some time later when the authorities arrived some time later, they found nothing out of the ordinary except that the area surrounding the lake was wetter than it should have been considering that it was a cloudless day. Various witness reports of the lake attacking them and even flashes of lightning were discounted as none of it made sense, and why would it?
Alex showed Daniel and Love Heart to his house, which was on a wide corner in a small neighborhood near the closest thing the city had to a freeway. Alex walked up the short steps to his house and unlocked the door.
“You know I always thought when I saw your house it would explain a lot about you, but this place is so, normal, doesn’t explain much,” Daniel commented.
“Oh can it will ya!” Alex shot back, opening the door and letting them in. The inside of the house wasn’t sparsely furnished, a large television on a makeshift TV stand, a small coffee table, an L shaped couch in the back-right corner from where they entered, and a door leading to the kitchen on the left.
“Nice place,” Love Heart commented.
After removing his shoes, Alex immediately walked over to the couch and flopped onto the corner cushion, his favorite spot. “So, Love Heart, mind explaining just what happened back there?” he asked, sounding both ticked and curious.
“Yeah,” Daniel said, sitting down on the edge of the couch to the right of Alex, “I’m still trying to figure out just what the heck that was.”
“Well,” Love Heart had gone over how to explain this several times in his head and with no one else around and not other explanation he just told the direct truth, “it was magic.”
A moment of stunned silence later, Alex spoke up, “IF I hadn’t seen it myself, I’d say you were insane.”
“Indeed,” Daniel chipped in, “but there we have it, and I can’t think of any other plausible explanation for it.”
Love Heart sighed in relief, this was good. Honestly he had been wondering how he’d show these two that he could use magic and that magic was real, and he said so aloud.
“That’s one issue out of the way,” Love Heart said.
“So,” Alex said, “Think you can teach me how to use magic.”
“Teach us,” Daniel interjected, “I’m not letting you learn magic without me.”
“You? Ha!” Alex laughed derisively, “I didn’t think you could learn magic.”
“Oh yeah, well I bet I could kick your ass with or without magic!” Daniel shot back, his arm tensing as if ready for a brawl.
“Oh yeah, you wanna go!” Alex said, his anger rising.
“Enough!” Love Heart said, “yeesh what’s wrong with you two?”
“What wrong with us?” Alex asked, “What about you, Love Heart, you wander around carrying a hidden sword and with special powers you can just pull out whenever and you ask what’s wrong with us?”
Love Heart’s eye’s narrowed, “What’s wrong with magic, it’s something I spent years learning, not something I was born with.”
“You wanna knock it off, Alex, or he might not teach us anything,” Daniel added, trying to stem the argument he had inadvertently started.
“Hey stay out of it, Daniel!” Love Heart snapped.
“Why should I, I’m not going to just sit here while you two argue about nothing,” The badger retorted.
“It’s not about nothing, it’s about magic!” Alex shouted back.
The argument went back and forth for another hour, stopped only when Love Heart’s stomach growled and all three of them noticed how hungry they were.
“Well that enough arguing for now,” Alex said, calming down faster than Daniel and Love Heart would have expected, “How about I make us some dinner.”
“You mean heat up some pot noodles and microwave some bagels,” Daniel taunted almost reflexively.
“No,” Alex said, surprisingly calmly, “That may be what you’re forced to eat when you have to cook but I’m going to make some real food.” Alex got up and walked over to the kitchen. Love Heart and Daniel, both intrigued by the fox’s sudden change in attitude, got up and followed him, standing at the door to the kitchen and looking in. The kitchen was simple, there was a fridge built into an alcove in the left hand wall, a counter along the right hand all with cupboards along the bottom and top, a stove with a microwave hanging above it, and a sink near a window on the back wall. Their attention was drawn to the file cabinet that was next to the fridge, which Alex was rooting through with focus they though was unusual for him.
“Here we go, beef vegetable stir fry, perfect!” Alex said, pulling out a sheet of paper and sliding it onto a clip on the front of one of the cupboard that had been unnoticed until that point. Alex pulled out a microwave rice cooker, measured out four cups of water from the sink and then, using a step stool to reach it, pulling out a large jar of rice and adding two cups of it to the rice cooker. Putting the lid on the fox set the rice cooker in the microwave and set the timer for 30 minutes.
Love Heart and Daniel watched the fox move about the kitchen with almost liquid fluidity, pulling out a huge wok, pouring some canola oil on it, and setting it on its stand over a burner. Turning the burner on he went to the fridge and pulled out a bunch of vegetables, carrots, cucumbers, and other things the bear and badger couldn’t identify along with a small packed piece of beef. Alex pulled a cast iron frying pan out of a drawer underneath the oven, sprayed it with some cooking spray and set it on another burner, turning it on and letting it heat up while he began to chop up the vegetables with a speed that they two observers would not have believed if they had not seen it.
Love Heart and Daniel especially noticed that Alex’s face was more focuses than they had ever seen, no anger or frustration showed as he chopped up the vegetable and set them aside one at a time. Clearly, Alex knew what he was doing and was very good at it.
Sensing that the pan was hot enough, Alex emptied the beef strips into the pan and carefully began to fry them as he finished the vegetables. Alex then went to a spice rack next to the doorway that the two animals hadn’t seen until then, grabbed a couple jars of spice and a couple jars with liquid in then and began to mix the contents together, making a stir fry sauce. All this time, Alex only briefly checked the recipe; he had obviously made this before and was just checking the recipe in order to make sure that he wasn’t missing any of the details, and making sure that the beef strips cooked evenly.
Alex opened a drawer and grabbed a large stir frying spatula, then took the vegetables he had been cooking and dumped them into the wok, which began to sizzle with the oil and vegetables in it, then began to stir them with incredible speed and grace as his guests watched, slack jawed. When he deemed it right, Alex dumped the stir fry sauce he had prepared over the vegetables, keeping up the rhythm of stir frying while still keeping the beef well cooked. When the timer for the rice went off, Alex dumped the beef from the pan into the wok, turned off the burner for the pan, and kept stir frying for a couple more minutes before deeming it ready. He pulled a large bowl out of a cupboard along the ground and carefully dumped the contents of the wok into it before shutting off the last burner and removing the rice from the microwave and pulling the lid off, letting the steam billow out from it. Alex then carried the food items, one at a time, past his stunned observers and setting them on the coffee table before pulling out three plates, three forks, three knives, and three glasses and setting them on the coffee table next to the bowls with the food in them. To finish, he went to the refrigerator and pulled out a half empty jug of orange juice and a small bottle of soy sauce which he set on the table before sitting down, serving himself a big spoonful of rice and some of his stir fry with a little soy sauce.
Alex was about to dig in when he suddenly remembered he had company. He looked up at the stunned looks on Love Heart and Daniel’s faces and said, “Sit down, dig in, trust me you’ll like it,” with a smug look of triumph on his face.
Daniel and Love Heart were indeed stunned that the fox knew how to cook, and even more so a minute later when they tasted the food and found it tasted good, really good!”
“Wow, this stuff is really good!” Love Heart commented, beginning to shovel the stuff down with relish.
“Who’da thunk it, the fox knows how to cook,” Daniel said, seemingly wanting to start and argument, but Alex was having none of it.
“My grandma taught me how to cook all sorts of things,” he explained as he finished his first serving and reached for a second, “Believe me when I say I know how to make good food.”
“No argument here,” Love Heart said, polishing off his serving and loading up his plate again.
The three strange animals finished their food and sat back, satisfied, “That was good stuff Alex, guess I was wrong about you,” Daniel said.
“I’ll take that as an apology,” Alex said. Having finished cooking and eating his disgruntled attitude was starting to return, albeit not as severe as before, “So Love Heart, are you gonna teach us magic?”
“Of course,” Love Heart said, recalling the mission his dad had imposed upon him, “But you’ll have to wait until tomorrow, I need to rest a bit and finish reading the book my dad gave me.” Love Heart glanced down towards his tummy, at where his symbol was hidden by his shirt, “Maybe it’s time I gave you two your proper names.”
“Proper names?” Daniel was incredulous, “What’s that supposed to mean? We have names.”
“I think he means a name like his,” Alex said, his tone suggesting that Daniel was an idiot for not figuring out what Love Heart had meant right away.
“A name that describes how we are eh?” Daniel said, leaning back in his seat, “Well how about you go by Annoying Heart Fox.”
“You should be called Smug Heart Badger!” Alex retorted.
“Just because I speak my mind all the time it doesn’t mean I’m smug, Hothead Fox!” Daniel shot right back.
“Hey why don’t you just shut up, Snarky Heart Badger!” This was getting out of hand and Love Heart decided to end it.
The green bear stood up and shouted, “Enough!” silencing the two arguing animals, “Yeesh, why we’re supposed to be called Care Bears I have no idea but since I was given this job I’ll pick your names, besides I think I know what you two should be called.”
“Oh yeah? What’s that?” Alex asked, cocking an eyebrow incredulously.
“Yes, you,” Love Heart pointed to Alex, “Should be called Anger Heart Fox, and you, Daniel,” he said, pointing to the badger, “are now Defiant Heart Badger.”
Before either Alex or Daniel could speak up or protest, they were interrupted by a glow that seemed to be emanating from Love Heart’s tummy. Love Heart looked down at the glow and before anyone could comment, two beams shot from his tummy, going through his shirt and striking both Alex and Daniel on the stomach; the action had been involuntary as Love Heart could neither stop it nor had he started it. A moment later the light faded, leaving a distinctive pattern on both the fox and the badger’s shirts; both lifted up their shirts to check underneath and sure enough the symbols were there too, both as part of the fur pattern and something akin to a tattoo on the skin underneath. Alex’s symbol was a heart with a fire burning inside of it and Daniels was a flag with a heart on it and a pair of cartoonish curved swords crossed beneath it.
“Huh, looks kinda like a jolly roger,” Daniel pointed out, tracing his symbol with one finger.
Alex looked up at Love Heart and blinked, “Hey Love Heart, that doesn’t look like your symbol,” he said, pointing to his tummy. Love Heart blinked and looked down, the beam had somehow left an imprint of Love Heart’s tummy symbol on the surface of his shirt in the exact spot it was on his belly, but it wasn’t the eight hearts of various sizes. Love Heart lifted up his shirt to check underneath and sure enough the symbol itself had changed as well. The symbol was now a large red heart with three smaller pink hearts aligned diagonally inside the big heart and about a dozen tiny red hearts surrounding the larger heart.
“Well that’s certainly weird,” Love Heart said, but he smoothed his sirt back down. His symbol had changed, and it didn’t really matter to him, as long as it didn’t keep happening.
“Well then, Defiant Heart Badger, I think I could get used to that,” the newly named Defiant Heart Badger commented.
“It certainly fits you,” the fox now called Anger Heart Fox commented smirking.
“Why was that a compliment, Anger Heart?” Defiant Heart smirked, “if anything your new name seems to fit you perfectly.”
Anger Heart just scowled back at Defiant Heart and muttered something rude under his breath. Love Heart sighed, well he’s found some new friends and the learning would start tomorrow. The bear had to wonder though, how many more were there and would they all take this concept of a new name and a tummy symbol as well as these two?
