Red and Blue
Long ago, a great war had become the death of a great kingdom once known as a great place of peace and harmony - a place of sanctuary for its many citizens. The kingdom of Gellictos was once a home to thousands upon thousands of gummy bear citizens, all called Jellybear people. They once lived together, all shapes and sizes, all colors and flavors, side by side in a harmonious, fruit-scented community. They had never once believed that their way of life was in any danger until the Jellyworm citizens felt a great threat by there being more than one type of jellybeing.
The Jellyworm emperor, Lord Byron, had sent his many troops to pillage and destroy what the Jellybears called home. Overthrowing the king and destroying palaces were easy enough for Byron, but the difficulty was the citizens. In individual groups, Byron noticed the Jellybears, sorted by color, were much easier for his troops to control.
"I'll collect the yellow, while you gather the green!" they would say, rounding up color by color. Byron had decided that from this point onward, the Jellybears would serve him. His people's lack of limbs, being Jellyworms, was very inefficient if he wanted to claim this kingdom, so he enslaved the Jellybear people, forcing them to build their own districts, sorting themselves off from each other, making citizen control much simpler for Lord Byron.
One day, whilst inspecting the work of one of his five Jellybear districts, Byron was pleased to see the blue Jellybears had been toiling hard, building their own homes, keeping their walls sturdy, and even preparing weaponry for his next pillage. Out of the corner of his eye, the large Jellyworm spotted a flaw: one of the bears was not blue.
"A mistake! An error has survived in my presence?" Lord Byron said, looking down to the small Jellybear, purple in color.
"I'm sorry, my Lord... I believe I was meant to be blue, as I smell of blue raspberry... but... perhaps some redness may have..."
"Enough! Take this abomination to the melting pot! I will have no blemishes in my kingdom."
Byron's command, like wildfire, spread through the districts, and eventually, all five of them had come to discover that there had been a purple Jellybear. To prevent such gossip, Byron had decreed that a stronger, more solid barrier separated the districts. Since then, generations had come and go... and eventually, each type of Jellybear began to believe that only their flavor existed. No red bears had ever met a green or blue, and no yellow had ever laid eyes on a red or orange. In the red district, only red Jellybears were heard of - ever - and none of them had ever questioned the reason as to why or how, except one.
Lo, a Cherry Red Jellybear stands at his post, more intrigued than he ought to be. Remembering a story that his parents had told him when he was a child, Lo finds it interesting to think that there could be other colors of Jellybears out there.
Looking up at the sky through a large glass dome over a tall, steel wall, Lo watches the jelly stars jiggle softly and glisten in the night.
"Lo! Daydreaming again?" says a familiar voice.
"Oh! Haha... uh... yeah, a little. Sorry, I'll get back to work here..." Lo says to the red Jellybear approaching him. "What are you still doing up, Jami?"
Jami stretches her arms over her head, "Oh, you know... I just got off my post, too. My arms are so tired. I had to roll about three hundred yards of taffy today just to make spears for the Jellyworm captains."
"Yikes... three hundred? They really ought to send a Jellyman to your post," Lo says, stepping closer to his post: a table with Jellyworm weaponry and armory neatly placed upon it - most of them rather clean, "A Jellywoman could take care of something less stressful, like..."
"What... a Jellywoman can't do it?" Jami laughs, "I'm fine. Just tired is all. It's all good! How'd yours go?"
"Tiring as well..." Lo sighs, "Polishing the spearheads and shields... you'd think they'd want us to use something less... sticky." Lo picks up a sheet of a fruit roll, covered in lint, hair, and dirt, showing Jami the smear marks on the shields, "Maybe I'll talk to the captain."
"Wouldn't hurt to try," Jami smiles, "So... what were you daydreaming about over there?"
"Eh, just stories my grandparents would tell me," Lo says, sliding the gummy sheet over the shield, "about the assorted colors of Jellybears."
Jami snorts, "W-what?!" she laughs, "Assorted colors? That's hilarious!"
"It's real! My grandparents told my parents that their_grandparents told them the story and that they _saw it!" Lo explained, "There were... orange ones, blue ones, yellow ones, green ones... and a purple one!"
"Lo, that's ridiculous. Everyone knows that there's only one color of Jellybear, and it's red, and we're right here," Jami giggles, "Your grandparents, no offense, but they seem a little... low on corn syrup."
"Hey!" Lo snickers, "Come on, now... even if it _is_made up... it was still an interesting story."
"I guess," Jami says, picking up a gummy sheet and helping Lo polish some shields, "I guess it's cool to think about. What if there were blue Jellybears? That'd be so weird!"
"Haha," Lo chuckles nervously, hiding his sadness, "Yeah, so weird, right?" Lo looks down at the shield he polishes, releasing an inconspicuous sigh. He knows now that if he were to tell Jami how determined he is to believe that there are other Jellybears of different colors out there in the world, he'd surely lose a friend.
That night, when he and Jami part ways, Lo returns to his own home - a red cottage made of red gummy bricks and other red-colored candy pieces. As he touches his doorknob, he sighs, looking down at his shining, red reflection on his red door to his red home in his red district in his red world.
"Why... how is it possible? Not everything is red... am I the only one who notices the steel walls? They're not red... they're... bland. They're gray and not even made of candy!" Lo sighs, closing the door to his home and plopping into his red gummy chair. "And the soldiers! The Jellyworm soldiers are all multiple colors! Red and green in one worm! Or yellow and green, or white and red, or... just... more than one color!" Lo begins to sigh, crossing his arms and laying his head back, "There has to be other colors of Jellybear... the worms... they're jelly, too."
As the night settles, Lo lays awake in his bed beneath his gummy sheets, looking up at his ceiling made of gummy bricks - all of them red. There has to be more. There must be. A strange urge comes over him, remembering that there aren't many Jellyworm soldiers patrolling the nights anymore, since the Jellypeople of the red district have become so obedient over the years. Lo furrows his brow, flipping his covers off of him and swinging his legs out of bed. Tonight's the night. I want to see what's over that stupid wall... maybe we're not the only color and my grandparents' stories were right.
Lo locks his house and silently creeps through the eerily organized village where all the houses are lined up by number. Lo's house, number 45, slowly becomes smaller and smaller as he walks away, passing many red houses identical to his on his way to the district gates.
The gates are said to lead to emptiness and danger, creating the story that Lord Byron wants to keep his Jellypeople safe by keeping them enclosed in a secure district. Lo believes that to be false, and as he creeps closer to the gates, which are now in the distance in his line of sight. He keeps a lookout for guards, careful not to make any sounds. His flat, round legs and feet on the ground are quite silent, save the very tiny peeling sound as he lifts a foot to continue forward.
Having encountered no guards so far, he can see the gates a bit clearer. Two Jellyworm soldiers are positioned on either side of the doors inside the red district. One of them appears to be dozing off while the other is fast asleep. As Lo carefully and quietly makes his way to the gates, he notices that the Jellyworms are indeed multiple colors. The soldier on the left has red throughout the top of his body to the middle, and from the middle to his end is a clear yellow. The soldier to the left is orange at the top and green at the bottom. There's no way that only red Jellybears exist and rainbow Jellyworms are the only multiple colors...
Lo looks to the left and sees his work post. There are still red jelly sheets strewn across the table. The idea comes to him: he should disguise himself to better sneak through the gates.
Lo makes his way to his work post and begins rolling the jelly sheets into long, snake-like rolls. Licking the ends, he sticks one to his lower back, allowing it to hang down like a tail. Repeating this more and more, he soon ends up with a long gummy tail. With a shield to hide his Jellybear shape and a small helm to hide his Jellybear ears, he walks slowly to appear to be inching, and approaches the gates.
"Ah, good evening, gentlemen!" Lo says in a deeper voice.
"Evening' soldier," replies the half-sleepy soldier, "Why'd you leave your post?"
"I ah... was told to stand on the other side of this gate." Lo replies, a bit nervous.
"The other side, huh?" the soldier says, inching toward Lo, leaning over in a bit of skepticism, "Kinda short to be a soldier, huh? And where's the rest of your coloring?"
Lo's heart stops for a split second, then a daring idea comes to him.
"You think I don't know my green half is missing!?" Lo retaliates, "It's not like I wanted to be in that war! I wanted to stay here and watch the red Jellybears, but no! What do I get?! A spear through the abdomen!"
"Woah, woah! At ease, soldier! I didn't know... ah... look... don't ah..." the soldier leans forward a bit more to whisper, "Don't tell Byron about this okay? It's a long job... I just got back from the Orange district and they're way more energetic that I can ever be... I'm off today... no hard feelings?"
Orange district! There are other colors! I knew it! "Ah... sure... no problem, Soldier... just don't be goin' around making fun of Jellyworms' sizes! I don't need to be reminded of that... h-horrible event!"
"Of course." The jellyworm backs up and retakes his position, straightening his segments, and standing guard, "Careful back there. If you wanna know which district is which, the doors are color-coded. Straight on down the path is Byron's palace - best not to disturb him."
"Gotcha. Thanks, Soldier. At ease!" Lo says, passing through the gates of the red district with no troubles at all.
As Lo passes through, the large, steel doors close behind him, slamming shut. All that is before him now is a large dirt pathway and not a single gummy brick in sight. Looking around himself, Lo drops his Jellyworm soldier costume, admiring the wilderness around him. Granted he is still safe between district walls, there is much more nature here than within the red district. There are trees, green grass, and even birds who land on the ground, peck, and fly away. Lo watches in amazement as one of the birds, a large, black raven flaps its wings, soon soaring over a large, blue door.
"If this is red district... that must be... blue," Lo thinks aloud heading down the dirt path, further and further away from the red door, "and... there's green... and orange... yellow... but there's no purple."
Thinking over the stories his grandparents told him, he begins to doubt that all the things they told him were true. How could purple Jellybears exist when there is no purple door? There's no purple district at all.
"Ah... I knew it'd be a matter of time," says a dark, deep voice from behind Lo, "I've had my men scouting you out for a while, but I should have known they'd be too stupid to follow a simple direction."
Lo turns around quickly to see a massive, large, thick Jellyworm with a cloak woven with black gummy threads. Atop his head is a rather impressive crown, symbolizing that he must be Lord Byron.
"It... it's you..." Lo gasps.
"And, it's you," Byron sneers, "You've been a hassle for many years, do you know that?" he scolds, inching closer to Lo, "While I have you here, as I knew you'd eventually come, I should dispose of you the same way I dispose of all the other conspirators."
"C-conspirators?" Lo whimpers, "I'm not conspiring! I just... I just wanted to see... if..."
"If there was more to life than the color red? If there was more variety of Jellybear in existence?" the large, green Jellyworm raises himself erect and towers over the small Jellybear, "That's conspiring, little bear. And for this, for becoming a threat to my order, you shall be melted."
"No!" shouts a small, feminine voice from the distance, "Let him go!"
"You again!?" Byron hisses, "How do you keep escaping?!"
A blue Jellybear leaps over Lo and lands on one knee before Lord Byron, looking up at him with a scowl on her blue-raspberry face, "It takes more than a few candy worms to keep me down, Lord Tyrant."
A blue Jellybear! I knew it! I knew there had to be more! "Are... are you... real?"
"Of course I am! Now shut up and help me!" the blue Jellybear reaches into her leg, pulling a steel dagger out of her soft, corn-syrup filled limb. She licks her thumb and strokes the slit in her leg, sealing the candy fibers together instantly, her leg being good as new.
She leaps into the air and screams horrifically as she stabs the dagger into the worm king's flesh, dragging it down with her as she falls, splitting Bryon's chest and thorax, leaving a large, open gash.
"He can't seal it! He has no arms! You!" the blue Jellybear calls to Lo, tossing her dagger to him, "Get the other side! Hurry up!"
Staring blankly at the dagger in his gummy little hands, Lo snaps out of his disbelief and does as the blue Jellybear says - after all, this Jellyworm was threatening to melt him down to a thick syrup. Bravely and with little thinking, Lo leaps as high as he can, clinging to Byron's back and jabs the dagger deep within his candy flesh, dragging himself down, slicing the dastardly worm in two. Like ribbons, Lord Byron's body falls to the ground, leaving him in a "Y" shape on the ground.
"My soldiers will have your heads for this!" Byron's two halves shout simultaneously, "Size them!"
Out of nowhere, Byron's Jellyworm soldiers arrive, coiled around their spears with no actual means of holding them.
"This is too amusing, Byron... so much so that we can't stick around. Wouldn't want to end up like you - split at the seams," the blue Jellybear laughs, almost in a sense of self-praise. She looks to Lo and grabs his shoulder, dragging him with her, "Come on, before they think they can catch up to us - that'd just be unfair."
As Lo is dragged further and further away from the five colored doors, he finds himself stumbling, struggling to keep on his feet as the blue Jellybear tugs him along. Finally, the blue Jellybear stops, allowing Lo to fall to his knees and pant.
"What?!" the blue Jellybear scolds, "Don't you want to get out of here?!"
"I do but..." Lo pants, "I... I don't even know who you are... and... y-you're blue!"
"And you're red - from the red district," she replies, "I'm Kelce by the way - who are you?"
"I'm... I'm Lo," he replies, "Sorry about this but... I've just never seen another color Jellybear before."
"You've been trapped in your district your whole life, haven't you?" Kelce smiles, crossing her arms, "I've been free for a year now. Now that Byron's helpless, surrounded by armless soldiers, he can't seal his wound." Kelce turns away from Lo and kneels on the ground near a large tree, digging at the ground. "Met you on a good day, Lo. Everyone you know and don't know are gonna be free today. It's going to be one helluva rainbow out here."
"Rainbow? What do... I mean..." She's so brave. And she sliced up Lord Byron! "I'm just really nervous. Wait! What about the purple Jellybears?!"
"They're gone. They've been gone for ages," Kelce says sadly. "Red and Blue Jellybears haven't been able to breed, you know?"
Lo nods, admiring Kelce's honesty, watching her dust off a key covered in dirt as she walks away from the hole she dug.
"What's that for?" Lo asks, standing to his feet and dusting the dirt off his sticky knees. "To open the doors?"
"That's right. This key is the master key I nabbed from one of the soldiers. Not like he could have stopped me. Armless idiots, haha! Come on, back to the doors before the soldiers catch up to us.
When Lo and Kelce return to the doors, Lo stands behind her, looking out for soldiers. Whipping the green door open, Lo and Kelce rush inside.
"Green Jellypeople of the Green District!" Kelce shouts, "I am a blue Jellybear! This is a red Jellybear! Come with us and you'll be free from this oppression!"
Lo grows confused as Kelce makes her speech and leaves immediately - it's not a moment too soon that he realizes why. The green Jellybears, shocked and alarmed by the new color of Jellybear begin rushing to the gates for answers, pummeling over any soldiers who stand in their way. The very same happens in the Yellow, Red, and Orange Districts. Soon, every district is free of their confines, standing in a crowd in the forest-like isle before their doors. Jami notices Lo and runs to him, hugging him.
"Lo! You were right!" she squeals, "There are other Jellybears!"
"I know! Jami, this is Kelce - she's the one who saved us all," Lo says, introducing Jami to the blue Jellybear.
"Thank you, so much, Kelce... it's... wow. You're really blue!" Jami giggles.
The soldiers gather close, coiled around their spears, ready to strike. Kelce makes her way to the front of the many Jellybears, taking the roll of the leader.
"These worms don't even have arms! Take their spears and slice them up!" Kelce demands, followed by the many cheers of the Jellybears who take her command and gang up on the worms. Lo watches as Jami and the other Jellybears grab the spears away, stabbing them into the candy worms and slaying them where they stood. Needless to say, it didn't last very long. The armless soldiers being ganged on by this many bears hadn't a chance.
Upon Lord Byron's death, the Jellyworms admitted defeat once many of their soldiers fell. Backing away from the seat of power, the worms returned the districts back to the Jellybears.
Kelce and Lo watch as the Jellyworms work on removing the steel walls that divide the districts. Kelce turns to Lo and smiles, "You know, this might be sudden, but I've really always liked red."
"Yeah?" Lo smiles, sheepishly, "I've always really liked blue... do you maybe... want to um..."
"I'd love to go out with you, Red."
As peace and leisure is returned to Gellictos, as are the purple Jellybears, and other colors of Jellybears are welcomed into the kingdom - yes Kingdom of Gellictos, ruled by King Lo and Queen Kelce for their exquisite bravery and service to the public. As their son, Gregor learns to take his first steps and speak his first words, there is never a day when his shining purple existence leaves gummy smile on his parents red and blue faces.