Chapter 109 - Damaged Friendship

"You!?" Petunia exclaimed after seeing Von and Lei backstage with a bunch of guards which she needed assistance from on one side and the performers on another.

"Oh no, cat alert!" Lei said and faced his back at Petunia while blocking Von's view of her.

"What?" Von said while curling his eyebrows because of what Lei said. "What did you say?" he repeated while trying to see what Lei was preventing him from seeing but Petunia already made up her mind to approach them so Von still saw her despite Lei's efforts.

"Oh! It's the traitor! Everyone arrest that puny little cat!" Von said and waited for the guards to move but none of them followed his order while Petunia was just shaking her head at them.

"Can two of you come with me?" Petunia asked the guards who immediately followed after her which confused Von even more.

"Wha-? Why are you listening to that traitor and not me?!" he said with his ears turning red out of anger and confusion. "Are you guys traitors too?!" 

When Lei also realized where Von was going with this conversation, he immediately stood in defense against the guards who were not paying them any attention at all.

But unlike the guards, Petunia, on the other hand, could not tolerate Von and Lei's ignorance from the whole plan anymore so she stopped in her tracks and approached them silently.

"No, they're not traitors, and neither are we." Petunia said while rolling her eyes, "Everything was just part of the plan that we made to save this island from crumbling to the ground, thank you very much." 

"What now?!" Von's face turned even sour while shouting this at Petunia's face. "Is getting us abducted by the Crones and suffering in their hands also a part of that great plan you got there?!"

"Yes," Petunia answered honestly, "You guys did well." She added without showing many emotions which made Lei and Von more aggravated.

"If this was all just part of a plan then why didn't you guys at least inform us about it beforehand? You could have at least told us to let ourselves be captured so we wouldn't try to escape just to get betrayed by you guys-"

"You see that's exactly it," Petunia said, cutting Lei's words, "If we told you guys do you think they wouldn't find it weird for you to cooperate on their 'kidnapping you' shenanigans?"

"And you helping them isn't weird?!" Lei said, spitting out the grudge he was hiding deep inside his heart before it gets even deeper. "We thought you guys betrayed us! Out of all the people which we already started opening our hearts to!" 

"That's right! I even defended you guys from Lei's accusations only to get betrayed by you again for the second time!" Von added, confessing the same words he told Lei to not spill because it was embarrassing for him to expose.

"Third time actually, Petunia betrayed us three times." Lei inserted, trying to get the facts straight which didn't really matter as of the moment.

"Who knows how many more times we'll get betrayed by the Queen's pet cat!" Von added, purposely shouting so loudly for everyone at the backstage to hear and make a commotion about.

"That cat is the Queen's pet?!" 

"Whattt??!!"

They all freaked out which satisfied Von for getting the attention he initially intended on getting just to humiliate Petunia.

"I am not just the Queen's pet! I am a master chemist! And I am human!" Petunia tried to defend herself but nobody was listening to her.

"Is that her? The talking cat?!" the people gossiped even more without paying attention to Petunia's words all except for the fact that she can talk.

"Grr." Petunia glared at Von.

"Hmph!" Von said and crossed his arms at Petunia.

In the end, Petunia just let Von and Lei think whatever they want and scooted out of the backstage knowing that she did something wrong herself for enjoying the fake betrayals she made to the boys.

But since her pride was way above the sky, Petunia knew she would either ruin this new friendship with Von and Lei easily by being herself since she spent so much time in the woods on her own, Petunia really did not know how to maintain and manage relationships anymore.

"I'm doomed," she thought and hit her head for being so stubborn and overthinking too much, "I don't want to make a dent in our relationship but I already did it without even realizing! I don't even know how to manage one, what more how to fix it with this pride of mine?! Aaaaa, I'm doomed!" Petunia complained to herself.

"I'm sure if the tables turned they would probably also do what I did, right?" her optimistic self came in.

"I wish that's the case, or else I'll end up being alone again…"

"I think if they forgive Fily they would also end up forgiving me… since at the end of the day we're still teammates here and I did not actually betray them…" another one of the voices in her head said.

"Or they won't and we'll be awkward forever!" The devil in her mind spoke of her fears which gave Petunia a mental breakdown on their way back to Fily and her personal subject.

"Wait!! Stop overthinking Petunia! We don't care! Whatever happens! You're still the eldest in the group and you're still teammates, and Fily's here, you're not alone!" Petunia said out loud while hitting her head and getting her thoughts straight.

"You okay?" Fily suddenly asked which woke Petunia back to the reality that she had already arrived back to Fily's spot without even realizing it thanks to her floating mind.

"Huh? Oh, yes, I'm fine." Petunia said and flashed a fake smile to Fily which took her back from seeing her weird cat smile for the first time in forever even if it was only fake.

"You're definitely not okay." Fily concluded while nodding and looking at Petunia with concern etched on her face, "Let's go," she added and guided Petunia back to the backstage where Petunia decided to keep the frozen scientist in check before asking for Halma's permission to grant her wish.