The Powerpuff Girls woke up in a daze. They felt as if there was something different about today. Somehow, they kept thinking that this wasn’t the right day for them and they should be staying home instead of fighting crime. They remained lying on the bed and not wanting to get ready for school.
“Oh, girls. Wakey, wakey now, girls,” Professor Utonium knocked the door and let himself in. The girls remained on the bed, not moving at all. “It’s time to go to school.”
“I don’t feel like going to school, Professor,” Blossom groaned.
“Yeah, I feel like I’ve been drugged all of a sudden,” Buttercup agreed, pulling the blanket over her.
“I don’t feel well, Professor. I don’t wanna go to school today, please?” Bubbles begged with her big blue eyes.
“Now, now, girls. If this is about being angry with the fact about Mojo Jojo, I…” Professor Utonium tried to reason with them but was stopped by the girls’ raised hands simultaneously.
“Please, Professor, it’s not about that,” Blossom replied. “It’s something else. We just can’t go today.”
“Can’t we just stay at home?” Bubbles tried her luck again. “Pretty please?”
“Yeah, Professor. Just tell the teacher that we’re sick or something!” Buttercup agreed.
“Now listen here, girls, I will not tolerate people playing truant, especially when it is my girls!” Professor Utonium has lost his patience and pulled the covers off the girls. “Now you march right up to the bathroom and get yourselves cleaned up and ready for school! Now march!”
“But—”
“I mean now!!” Professor Utonium’s voice was firm. Nothing could change his mind now that he had used that tone. The girls put on a long face as they cleaned themselves and brushed their hair and wore their clothes and had their breakfast and all the way to school. To make sure they didn’t decide to run off, Professor Utonium sent them to school himself.
The girls sulked all day long. They didn’t—couldn’t—pay attention to anything they were taught throughout the whole class (which made the teacher really mad), they didn’t participate in any of the games during recess and they certainly couldn’t get to mood to speak to anyone in school. No one could figure out what was wrong with the Powerpuff Girls. Sure, there were a few crimes that they didn’t hesitate to solve, but all in all, they weren’t too enthusiastic about it.
Just as they thought that everything couldn’t go any worse, someone greeted them from behind, “Excuse me, little girls. Are you the Powerpuff Girls as in Blossom, Buttercup and Bubbles?”
The girls sighed and said with a ‘Duh’ tone in their voices, “Yes, we are. Who wants…to…know…?” Their voices trailed when they saw a grim-looking man wearing a large cloak over him and a hood over his head. On his left hand was a really, really long scythe that didn’t seem anywhere near to a normal harvest scythe. No, it was longer and bigger than that. He had a gleam in his eyes and he was so thin, the shape of his whole skeletal structure was jutting out.
“Who…are you…?” Blossom asked. Buttercup braced herself to punch the lights out of the mysterious man. Bubbles hid behind Blossom, tears welling up in her eyes in fright. The citizens of Townville looked at them as if they have gone mad. Blossom was quick to comprehend that they were the only ones who could see him.
“I am the Messenger of Death, and I’m here to claim your soul,” the man replied, brandishing his scythe.
“It can’t be! We can’t die! We’re super heroes! It’s not our time!” Buttercup protested, her fists ready to fight.
“…Is it?” Bubbles asked, hesitant.
The Messenger of Death nodded (we’ll just call him Death for short), “Have you ever felt that you’re going to have a rough day today and nothing seems to excite you anymore? That’s the sign. You girls are going to leave Townsville forever.”
“Under what circumstances?” Blossom asked.
“Well, let’s see,” Death said as he took a large black book out from inside his robes. “Blossom, Bubbles and Buttercup…Blossom, Bubbles and Buttercup…Blossom, Bubbles and Buttercup…ah! Here we are! Your cause of death will be fatigue and heart failure.”
“No way! That’s too ludicrous! We’ve been fighting villains for goodness knows how long and we still survive until today!” Buttercup snarled, hardly believing her ears.
“Yeah, and we’ve never been sick before,” Bubbles protested, then remembered something, “well, only once when the Amoeba Boys carried that serious flu and gave it to us, but that doesn’t mean we’ll die of heart failure!”
“Sorry, my little super heroes, but that’s what was written in the book,” Death replied as he closed the book and put it back into his robes.
“Screw the book, man! I told you, we’re super heroes! We can’t die!” Buttercup was in a fit of denial.
“It is not my call to say who dies or not. The Big Boss does. I’m just doing my job,” Death replied apologetically. “Everyone has something against me, but you can’t blame me for doing my job. And my job is to take you away. Even super heroes die, don’t they? Like Batman when he gets way too old for crime-fighting and all?”
“Don’t…Don’t we get any last words or something…? Or to do things we want to do?” Bubbles whined.
“As a matter of fact, you girls do,” Death replied. “But for only 24 hours, so if you have any unfinished business, now is your chance. At dusk tomorrow, I’ll have to take you away.”
The girls looked at each other. He was right. They did feel awfully weird since this morning and it just wouldn’t go away, and after meeting Death, they realized that the weird feeling had quite subsided. And he was right about super heroes. They have super powers, but it doesn’t mean that they have immortal lives. Even super heroes need to eat and rest sometimes. After all, they are human.
“Alright,” Blossom finally said after much contemplation. “We will follow the rules, but you must promise that we get our 24 hours, or we won’t go with you.”
“The clock is already ticking,” Death said as he pointed at the hourglass that was hovering on their heads. They were pretty much surprised. They never notice that before. On the hourglass marked the number ‘24’.
“Let’s go, girls. We get to do whatever we want today!” Blossom tried to cheer up. Buttercup and Bubbles nodded reluctantly and flew off with their eldest sister to fulfill their wildest dreams.
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