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“KAREN!”
It was not an unusual sound to hear emanating from The Chum Bucket, even on a good day. Plankton’s yelling appeared to be an integral part of his personality, and when he was quite as determined to finish this plan as he was, he found it the quickest way to get his wife’s attention for assistance.
On command, Karen wheeled herself into the room, and let out a digital sigh. “Yes?”
“Karen,” Plankton repeated, not even turning to face her in favour of letting himself be far too caught up in his work, “I need you to fetch me my supersonic crowbar, the Destructo-3000, and my favourite wrench.” Or spanner, as he’d often heard Squidward call it. “It’s vital. Nothing’s going to stop this plan from success!”
He was just about to burst out into his usual evil laughter when he was stopped by Karen’s less than enthusiastic response. “I thought you were writing a shopping list.”
Well, that was what he had told her, yes - and it was true! To a degree. “I was! I mean- I am!” Despite not having told the whole truth, he still looked put off. “It’s a shopping list… but not a regular one, no… it’s going to have this special gizmo inside that-”
Upon turning around, he stopped. Plankton was not usually the observant type when it came to other people, so it was a Christmas miracle he noticed anything at all, really, but he just happened to catch sight of Karen’s front left wheel twitching.
“What’s with the wheel.” It was phrased like a question, but the flat tone of his voice made it sound more like a statement. “Are you broken?”
He’d always struggled with kindness, so in spite of the fact he was attempting to offer his support, it came out rather cold. Quite fitting for the time of year, though.
“No - not that you’d have much good quality oil to loosen up the joint if that was the case, though,” she pointed out, “But to answer your next question, I’m just a bit worried.”
Plankton rolled his eye as he endured the first half of that remark. No good oil? Please. His own concoction was perfectly fine, because he was a genius; he went to college! Who better was there to stir something up that worked and also saved a bit of money? He only did it to help their finances, anyway. What they could save now meant all the more for funding plans and schemes later… Or the shiny new can of oil he felt slightly angry about buying properly that he was keeping secret in order to gift it to her at Christmas (trying to be better around the holidays made him think Santa may see him in all his greatness).
Selling chum to prisons worked for the most part, but when business got slow and they were a little short of a treat, he preferred to not tell his wife lest she nag him, or worry. As it were, this tactic seemed not to help, because she was currently in the midst of both. Scoffing, Plankton tried to brush it off, “Worried? What for? We had twenty-three prison sales so far, and I’ve got at least six new schemes. Business is booming, metaphorically speaking. Although, I hope Krabs’ will be in the literal sense once this plan succeeds…”
“It’s due to your aforementioned plans that I am worried,” Karen interjected, “You’re spending far too long hunched over that desk and scribbling away. It’s not good for you, all that vengeance floating around inside you constantly. I mean, it’s the holidays, Sheldon, come take a break.”
“A break? A break?!”
“...Yes, a break. You know, those things where you stop doing something for a while for your own benefit.”
The very suggestion that he might not know the definition of a simple word seemed to get on Plankton’s nerves, and he snapped back accordingly. “I know what a break is!! What I was clearly referring to through the use of aggrieved repetition is that fact that I do not need a break, and am quite - really - irritated that you would even dare to suggest someone of my genius would require them in order to do a good job!”
He wasn’t even angry enough to warrant that kind of response. Most of it was just to flex his vocabulary. He did go to college, after all (had he mentioned that yet?).
“What would I even do on a break, anyway?” he continued, admittedly a bit curious on what she had to say.
Karen had heard enough of his silly little rants in her time married to him to be used to it and block them out, so made no comment on challenging his previous statements. Arguing was usually futile, and she’d rather not waste her digital breath. Instead, she made a suggestion, “How about a game?”
“A game? A game?! How could you dare to suggest tha-”
“We already did that bit, Sheldon.”
“Oh.”
“But fine,” Karen conceded, throwing up her arms in exasperation, “You don't want to play a game. If I'm being honest, really I was just making an excuse to spend time with you.”
If you looked very, very closely, you may have seen Plankton's feelers twitch. It was a blink-and-you'd-miss-it moment, but definitely one that had happened. Being cared about was something he really felt he didn’t deserve whilst he was such a failure, let alone taking a break to play some stupid game.
Grumbling, he straightened himself up from where he'd been hunched at his desk, and stared at his wife, almost accusingly. “Okay… I- I may be able to hinder my genius endeavours for a little while. Maybe. What did you have in mind?”
Karen took a moment to process the information she'd just been given. Making it this far was a supernatural phenomenon in itself, so perhaps if she just told him straight - “It's been snowing outside, actually, and I thought we could head out there and have some fun, to get in the holiday spirit.”
“Bah!" Plankton scoffed, “Holiday spirit is a made-up notion promoted by the media-” He suddenly glanced up at the sky and looked rather apologetic. “Sorry, Santa, I didn't mean it! Bring my present, still, please!”
Karen's monitor line stayed perfectly still.
Having adequately made his case to Father Christmas, he cleared his throat to address the rest of her point. “And absolutely not. You know what happened last time.”
Ah, yes. Last time.
In an attempt to harness the power of snowflakes to take over the world, Plankton had unfortunately been buried within the stuff, and had to wait for Karen to notice and come to his aid.
“The snow's come to a stop,” she reasoned, “and nothing would happen anyway since you're so light. Besides, if you did sink or get covered, I'd be there to prevent it from going any further.”
Well that all seemed perfectly logical and safe, but… “Still no. It's not worth the risk. You can spend time with me by fetching that wrench though.”
A frustrated spark emitted from the side of Karen's head, along with an appropriately matching whirring sound. “Oh, fine! Apparently now it's too much to ask to want to build a snowman with your husband! Ugh.”
Plankton perked up. “A who-y what now?”
“A snowman,” Karen repeated, “I spoke clearly for sure. Have you forgotten to clean out your ears again?”
“No!” Plankton spat, positively offended, “I heard you fine! What I was inquiring was to whether or not you could explain what that snow creature is.”
“You mean a snowman? It's a representation of a humanoid-like figure, created through the medium of snow.”
Not a moment since she’d finished explaining, you could already see the cogs turning in Plankton’s head. “You mean to say I can fashion some kind of minion through this process?”
Karen wanted to elaborate that it wouldn’t be able to move, but gave the simple answer as to avoid further aggravation in clarifying. “More or less, yes.”
A broad and unsettling crooked smile spread across Plankton’s face, his hands now deviously rubbing together at such a pace you’d think he were trying to start a fire. “My very own snow creature…” he murmured.
“Snowma- Oh, forget it,” his wife shook her head, not bothering to correct him, “Why do I even bother?”
Mind already swimming with fantasies of hundreds of snow creatures overthrowing the Krusty Krab, Plankton leapt up onto the metal box he’d priorly been working on, and extended a finger. “I shall accept your request to build a snow creature together, Karen; whilst your system is not designed to be one to mould such creations as I, I cannot deny that you can be rather skilled when aiding in the construction process.”
“...Thanks,” Karen replied, not entirely thrilled with how much Plankton’s ego shone through, but still rather excited by the fact that he’d agreed to one of her ideas and not claimed it as his own - and complimented her, to boot.
Still, it didn’t detract from the fact that he’d actually agreed to one of her ideas in the midst of a plan. They were no strangers to spending time together, truth be told. They’d fairly commonly go for walks on the seafront to discuss their plans of world domination and hierarchy destruction, but the same standards were near to never held when he was in the middle of something. When Plankton was locked in on a project, hardly anything could tear him away. Heck, he’d forget to eat or even blink sometimes, so what chance did she have with trying to pull him away to play some Seaopoly?
Yet, he was actually going through with this. And that was something Karen deemed worthy of celebrating. Plankton always considered the notion of breaks as stupid, regardless of the many times Karen told him otherwise, because he really had… never done it before, so had no point of reference. If this experience, trying it for the first time, was to go well, Karen hoped, then it could be the gateway into the pair getting to share more quality time with one another, seeing as it may be something Plankton could want to do again. All she had to pray for now was that he wouldn’t sink.
As they made their way over to the entrance of the Chum Bucket, Karen’s wheel squeaked slightly in her leisurely-paced movement so as to not overtake her husband, considering even at this slow speed he was having to scramble to keep up. Plankton was rambling on about something else now, but Karen wasn’t really listening - whatever it was, it surprisingly wasn’t about the formula, though. He had a certain tone to his voice whenever he brought that up, and this wasn’t it. All in all, perhaps she would’ve benefitted from actually paying attention and contributing to the rant, but - sue her! - she was just too excited to focus. So much felt like it was happening; snow rarely came around these parts, and Plankton equally as rarely actually wanted to go outside for non-plan reasons. A tingling feeling emanated from deep in her circuits, one that she was quick to run a diagnostics on to identify as elation, and embrace with all her motherboard once they got started. Before that, even, why not?
“-Right, Karen?”
“Hm?” Only then did it occur to her just how much of his little speech she had missed, and was now struggling to create a response. Having been so wrapped up in her own thoughts, she’d barely had time to tune in on the noises being fed into her audio receptors. Thinking quickly, she initiated her sound playback feature, which had only just managed to catch the tail-end of what he was saying - luckily.
“It’ll be fun to get out there and construct our own snow creatures, right, Karen?”
Ah. So he still thought there were called-
Oh, it didn’t matter. She uselessly cleared her throat and nodded. “Yes, Sheldon, it will! Let me just boot up my self-heating system so my servos don’t lock up.”
“Good idea,” Plankton conceded, brow slightly furrowed in remembering the last time that had occurred. He’d had to sit around monitoring the hair dryer he’d stole- uh, borrowed for nearly two hours until the ice melted… which had, evidently, been a bad idea once he succeeded because the water leaked down into her central processing unit, and she’d short-circuited.
Naturally, she was built to run smoothly underwater, but the way she was set up had it very vital that a pocket of air was maintained in that specific spot. Plankton had gone to the trouble of water-proofing most of her gadgets on the outside to stop it getting in, but hadn’t betted on one stray droplet of water diverting its course right onto the only place he really needed it not to be. Either way, he was back where he started because another three hours after that were spent fixing and rebooting her (not to mention the thirty minutes SpongeBob had invited himself in and been a nuisance by accidentally restarting the process), and once that was finished, the earful she gave him had him wishing he’d just left her hanging a little longer.
So, yes… Definitely a good idea to wrap up warm, so to speak. And clearly Karen thought so, too, as she opened a small draw by the front door to pull out a miniature woolly hat and scarf. “I took them out of a doll’s playset,” she explained, computer head held high, “Quite a good idea for you, I thought, since we still can’t find a place that does clothes in size minus-five.”
“Absolutely not!” Plankton snapped for the second time that day, recoiling from the offending items. “I’ll look a fool! I’m not a child!”
“I didn’t say that,” Karen retorted, shoving the clothes toward him. If he didn’t want to co-operate, she wasn’t going to force him - there was no use worsening the mood before it even got good. “Go on, wear it if you want, but don’t blame me when you catch a cold if you don’t.”
“I won’t!” he said in a carefree, sing-song-y voice, “Let’s just get out there and- ah-”
Having opened the door and stepped out into the snow, Plankton discovered why Karen had been trying to get him to wear something to preserve his body heat. It was utterly freezing. But he couldn’t turn back now! So what if it would take about ten seconds and was only three or so steps back! He’d come so far, and not to mention that Sheldon J. Plankton could never, ever, be proven wrong.
Karen, slightly smug, wheeled up beside him. “Not cold, huh?”
Plankton had icicles hanging off his antennae. “Not at all.” His voice came out raspy from the frost that had lodged itself within his throat in the last second.
“Riiiight…”
That sounded an awful lot like disbelief, and Plankton frowned to show his opinion on such a reaction, but when nothing came of it, he moved past the response and got on with the task at hand. The bottom of his feet were not thanking him in the slightest for not covering them with something or other as the icy mush he stepped upon gently pulled him downward into a shallow sink and bit at his ankles with their frozen teeth. Ignoring the slight blue-tinge that was beginning to develop and the slowly-growing-in-intensity pain, Plankton heaved himself back up and dashed across the snow to stand beside Karen, trying to keep his movements speedy and short, hoping this would make a good remedy to his sinking problem. He couldn’t sink if he didn’t give the substance enough time to draw him in, now, could he? Would it work? Probably not, but it was worth a shot.
Trying to ignore the way he was progressively losing all sensation, he pressed Karen on how one of these “snow creatures” appeared, and was surprised to learn that that could take any form the builder desired, and it would still count but whatever the name of the thing that was being depicted was usually tagged onto the end. Snow-amoeba, for instance.
Plankton did like the sound of that, but worried an accurately-scaled amoeba would be a little small to seem intimidating to the jerk across the street, and opted to go for something a little more traditional. Professional villains had standards, thank you very much, so if he was going to invade Krabs’ place this time of the year and nab what he oh-so-wanted, he was going to at least make it festive so it was not only memorable, but horrendously embarrassing for those on the receiving end. Losing to a snow creature - bah! Hopeless.
Which was exactly how Plankton wanted his sworn enemies to feel. An unnerving smile spread onto his face. Perfect…
Not wanting to waste another moment, the scientist kneeled down to pile up some of the snow. Ohh, yes. Krabs wasn’t going to know what hit him once he sculpted this into the shape of… of… Well.
Sheepishly, he looked back up at his wife, muttering a request for her to tell him what a typical snow creature looked like. Karen huffed out a laugh, having been rather positively amused by her husband’s eagerness, and complied, displaying a picture of the finished product on the right side of her screen, leaving the left side room to fit in a few graphics that effectively showcased the process.
Nodding thoughtfully, Plankton got back to scooping up the snow, but as it trickled off the little stubs he called hands, it became rather obvious that this method was not going to get them anywhere fast. Thankfully, Karen was struck with an idea as a result of a gag on a television show she’d seen the other day whilst channel surfing (it was such a fun activity for robots, she really needed to do it more often), and took up some of the fallen flakes, moulded them into the rough shape of a ball, and placed it at her wheels. If Plankton couldn’t lift a lot of snow up into the right shape, then he could run atop the thing and let it gather enough matter to become the right size. Plankton was pretty speedy for his height (or lack thereof), so he was naturally thrilled with the idea, even toying with the notion of building it up so large that he could just run over the Krusty Krab and crush the crustacean, but Karen talked him down. One step at a time.
A little deflated by his plans being strewn aside, Plankton began grumbling, but heaved himself up onto the snowball anyway. It took him a few moments to get his footing, but as soon as he did, he was off, the ball growing larger by the moment, especially so with the speed he was going at. Karen would’ve warned him to slow it down if she wasn’t busy herself with a similar process, except instead of running across the thing, she was tall enough to just use her hands.
Not too long later, the sphere (or perhaps “blob” would be a more befitting term, given that it wasn’t the most smooth-sided) Plankton had been working on was complete. He was naturally proud of his work, but another detail had suddenly caught his attention. A detail on his face, to be specific; namely that he was smiling. Genuinely. It was not a common occurrence for him to actually enjoy himself, so he was certain that it wouldn’t last, and, just as he hopped down to inspect his handiwork, he was proven right, as the ball he’d neglected to halt first ran straight over his body with a crunch, leaving him to groan and pull himself up, an antennae slightly bent.
Shaking himself off, he got back to his feet and glared at the object in front of him as if it was the snow’s fault. The only reason he didn’t demolish the thing right where it sat was because he didn’t particularly feel like re-doing what felt like quite a lot of time’s progress, and due to the fact the idea of snow and violence in the same thought gave him another branching one. Looking out of the Chum Bucket’s window last winter, he’d noticed those two buffoons SpongeBob and Patrick “playing” with the stuff. They’d shaped it into little miniature versions of what he’d just made and had been tossing it at each other like bullets. At the time, it had looked like just another one of their moronic, brainless inventions, but since he was already learning a lot about the things that came along with this “Christmas” business, he figured that maybe it could just be some sort of winter protocol.
…He couldn’t find out without giving it a shot, right? Literally.
Splat!
Karen yelped at the sudden frozen ball that invaded her personal space by splashing against her framework, a stark contrast to the inner warmness she’d built up, the collision emphasising as such by letting off a brief waft of steam. Spinning around, she was greeted with her husband’s self-satisfied grin, and another snowball above his head.
“How’s this for a game?” he challenged, taking a risk in hoping that she wouldn’t be angry.
Lucky for him, this was right up her alley. “You’re on, Sheldon!”
And so it began: the snowball fight. The amount of the things Plankton was able to throw in an appropriately-speedy timeframe was actually quite impressive for his size, but then again, he was a member of one of the strongest species on the planet in relation to which, so maybe he did have a tad of advantage over, say, a jellyfish. This by no means meant he was as quick and oddly skilled as Karen, though. The accuracy in which she threw each piece of icy ammo had him regretting the day he installed that feature into her, but as he dived aside into a small ditch in the snow to take cover, only to occasionally peek up to return fire, he had to admit that this was very, very fun. For a moment, he entertained the idea of doing this again with the assistance of some snow-throwing machine, but it was soon cut short when he popped his curious little head up and got hit square in the face, sending him flying backwards.
Before he could even ask for help up, Karen was by his side, making sure he was alright. He confirmed that he was, and tried to push away from the care she was offering him, not wanting to seem like he couldn’t handle a bit of a fight. She got the memo and rolled away a tad, not before suggesting that he at least take a seat for a moment to come to his senses whilst she constructed the main shape of their snow creature. Begrudgingly, he conceded.
Karen was always so kind to him.
There it was again - that smile on his face. He watched Karen as he sat on a nearby coral branch, trying to catch his breath; how smoothly she moved, how polished her screen was, how he robotic joints twisted and flowed oh-so elegantly into whatever it was she was trying to get done, how simply brilliantly she was built. And that wasn’t even a thought made for the purpose of bigging up his own ego, this was an honest one. She was really lovely, and it was starting to irk him that they didn’t spend time like this together more often.
“Are you feeling better now?”
He snapped his head up. Karen was standing above him, staring right back down - when had she gotten there? He wasn’t really sure, but he also wasn’t about to admit to having zoned out. “Yes, of course!” he asserted, hopping up like he hadn’t nearly met his fate, “A bit of compact ice can’t keep me down!”
“It did last year,” she pointed out.
She was right. Plankton baulked anyway. “Ha-dee-ha.”
Now that he was up, Karen was free to pluck the coral he’d been using as a seat out of the ground and snap it into two near-equal pieces. “For the arms,” she explained, “We still need a hat and the other facial features, though.”
Plankton’s antennae stood to attention. He had a very clear visual in his mindseye of what he wanted the snow creature to look like, so this part of the process being brought up couldn’t have come at a better time.
“Leave that to me!” he announced, beginning to jog toward the Chum Bucket, “And get some more coral for eyebrows whilst I’m gone - I’ve an excellent idea!”
That could mean absolutely anything with him, so Karen was between being intrigued to know what he’d come up with, and being terrified of the execution. And, knowing him, it could well be an actual one. Still, she gathered two more pieces of coral in the meantime as he’d requested, taking the four pieces she now had and cradling them carefully in her arms. Once she turned back to face the door, as coincidence would have it, Plankton walked back through, arms also full with all kinds of knick-knacks, the most prominent of which being a large, black top hat.
Clearly struggling, Plankton let out a small wheeze. “A little help?”
Karen retrieved a few of the objects from him and positioned them firmly in her grasp. “Why didn’t you just put them into the hat so it’d be easier to carry?”
“I…” Well, Sheldon? Why? “I’d thought of that! I just did not- feel like it.”
Nice try.
“It doesn’t matter! Give me a lift up,” he demanded, softening his tone when she shot him a stern glance, “Ple-a-se.” He’d always struggled to pronounce that, but Karen knew what he meant, so offered a free hand.
Plankton clambered upon it and ran up the length of her arm to her shoulder socket, where he made the daring leap upward to the base of her computer head, and hauled himself up on top like an acrobat. Jumping around with all that heavy machinery all day long certainly paid off in times like this. Dusting off his hands he gestured down to the objects he’d given her. “Put them on, then, yes?”
Easily enough went the process of following Plankton’s orders on where to place the coal fragments he’d received for Christmas last year as eyes and a mouth, and the smaller coral branches that acted as angered brows. It was only when coming to the situation of the other facial feature that there was a problem. “Where’s the nose?” Karen questioned, skimming the lineup for a carrot and failing to find it.
“There,” Plankton said, pointing to the lemon, “And pass me the hat, would you?”
Not quite understanding what he was going for with the lemon, Karen silently passed him the top hat, which he was all too eager to grab. He was about to plonk it down in pride when he noticed his wife’s confusion, and stopped in his tracks. “What?”
“Why a… lemon?” she spoke her mind aloud, “Usually it’s a carrot.”
“You know I do not like carrots,” Plankton chided, shuddering at the thought, “And besides, it’s my- our snow creature, so it should be as dastardly as us. Well, no-one can quite top that, so near enough, at least. And it matches the hat.”
Karen followed his gaze to some relatively small lettering on the hat’s brim, which may or may not have been scrawled on with marker pen inside the house mere moments ago. “E.V.I.L.”, it read.
Plankton unabbreviated it out loud for her, just on the chance she’d forgotten. “Every Villain Is-”
“-Lemons!” she finished, having recalled that little shenanigan. “Oh, that was such a good idea, Plankie.”
“Naturally.” He smoothed his feelers back and let them ping back into place.
It had been a pretty good idea on his part, and the fruit was an ongoing factor in their evil plans, what with most of them being lemon-scented and all. The fact he’d thought to do this, to include something that connected them both, was overwhelmingly sweet, a contrast to the bitter product she stuck into the head of the snowman, securing it.
Adding the arms, she took a moment to question the last object left. “And this?”
The laser gun in her hand was the only thing she could be referring to, its bodywork gleaming in an ironically pretty way in the cold beam of the light above, glistening as though it had been sent from Neptune himself.
“That’s so the snow creature can battle to the death with my sworn enemies.”
“Ah, I see.”
That was all the explanation that was needed for Karen to know to hook the handle of the weapon into the branch with the more curved ends, giving the illusion of a skeletal hand holding it in place, before jamming the arms into the sides of the body once more to make sure they would remain in their current position. As she did this, Plankton finally let go of the hat he had been holding, and let it fall slightly askew onto the snowman’s head. Beaming, he rounded it to admire his hard work, close up as it may be.
Karen admittedly had the better view right now, Plankton recognised, so he tilted up his head in her direction to gain an answer on how everything was coming together. From her laughing and thumbs up in response, it was pretty clear the project had been a success - of course it had! They’d used that “te-am-work” thing SpongeBob had told him about! He and Karen were the best te-am in his eye, and given his high standards, that meant something, and that something was a lot.
He was just about to open his mouth and say something else, when he felt a fluffy pressure on the top of his head, slightly wet, but incredibly frosty. Pressing against the spot with his hand didn’t prove very telling either, as he came away with nothing but a wet palm. Brow furrowed, he took a look up at the sky at the same time Karen gasped in glee, clasping her hands.
“Snow!”
Oh… snow.
…Snow?
Snow?!
“TAKE COVER!” Plankton yelled, scrambling to dive under the hat he’d just placed and wiggling his legs wildly for speed, “YOU WON’T TAKE ME ALIVE THIS TIME, SNOW!”
Giggling at his plight, Karen lifted the headgear ajar to peek at her cowering husband. “Sheldon, it’s not going to get you. I’m here, and I’ll notice if you get trapped.”
Trying to look unbothered, Plankton puffed out his chest. “Who said I was scared? I was just… testing. Testing you, yes.”
“Sure.” She rolled her digital eyes and took a step away, which Plankton took as a sign to crawl out from his hiding place and take in what she thought was so wonderful to behold.
She certainly had a point. The snow swirled down from the heavens in sophisticated spirals of softness, whirling and twirling with the distinction of a practised ballet dancer, painting the scene around them with a gentle flicker and plunging everything into a greater festive vibe, evoking a satisfyingly spine-tingling appreciation in both witnesses. Breath hitched in his throat, Plankton looked to the robot he was experiencing this with to gauge her reaction. He hadn’t had the chance last time to see just how pretty this looked in action, so seeing it properly with her for the first time was quite something.
Quite something was also the view when he caught sight of her. She was even more gorgeous than he remembered with this active yet peaceful background setting, with snowflakes that spun around and on the other, tracing her figure and highlighting all the calmness and understanding that resonated in the very essence of her soul. Plankton considered souls and the like bogus, of course - when asked, he said he didn’t have one, or that it was black in colour, but if anybody actually possessed a soul, then it was definitely his wife at this very moment in time.
“Isn't it beautiful?” she sighed wistfully, snapping him out of his daze.
Plankton wasn’t looking at the snow falling. “Yeah…”
“You know,” she went on, allowing a few of the flakes to delicately brush against her screen, “They call them ‘Neptune’s kisses’, because they’re so soft.”
That got to him. “Neptune’s kis- OI!” Plankton yelled, pumping his fist up at the sky, “Lay off my wife, buddy! I don't care if you're a god, I'll-”
His insult was prematurely curtailed as he leaned forward too far, lost his balance, and fell face-first down into the already settled snow below, leaving a copepod-shaped hole in his wake. Karen was by his side in an instant. “Plankton! Are you alright?”
“Y-Yeah…” he stuck up his thumb shakily - he couldn’t let her see that he’d unintentionally made a fool of himself, “Just makin’ some… snow… shapes.”
“Snow angels?” Her screen displayed a face raising a brow. “You’ll get cold.”
“I’m fine,” he assured, moving his arms and legs up and down to create the desired effect. “Ya see?”
He was moving so quickly that small pieces of snow were shooting off in different directions, and one hit Karen in the screen, causing her to snort. This sweetness didn't last permanently, though, because it wasn't long before Plankton had curled his antennae into such a shape that the resulting mark in the floor gave the illusion of him having devil horns. And he looked unsettlingly proud about it. Not to mention extremely cold.
Karen knew it was time to step in when she saw his teeth chattering. “Come on,” she asserted, scooping him up, “You’re going to catch something if we don’t get you inside.”
Plankton wanted to argue back, but even he knew his limits, and the way he could no longer feel his feet was good enough reason for him to quit whilst he was somewhat ahead. Under his breath, he agreed, and let his wife carry him back to the living room.
Ten minutes later, Plankton was wrapped up warm on the sofa, his blue blanket draped soothingly over his shoulders, feet in a small cup of warm water, and an even smaller cup, containing coffee, in his hands. He was feeling much better by now so was actually quite grateful Karen had gotten him to stop when she did. Still, he couldn’t help but keep gazing out of the windows in the door whenever possible, trying to catch sight of his creation.
“So, when does it come to life?”
“Hm?”
“The snow creature,” he clarified, “when does it come to life?”
Karen paused in what she was doing, slowly turning to face him. “It… what? It doesn’t.”
Rage flared up in the pit of his stomach, offended that he’d been lied to. “You said it was a minion!” he barked.
“You said that,” she rebutted, accent now noticeable. It always did that whenever she got riled up.
As per usual, she was right, again. And as per usual, he grumbled about it and went into a sulk. She ignored him in favour of the task she was completing before he’d interrupted. Still, it hurt. Not the fact she said no more, no, the fact that he felt the previous activity had been a waste of time. What had been the point if not for crushing, suffocating, exceedingly painful revenge on the guy who brought so much darkness into his life?
Perhaps… perhaps other than spending time with the woman who lit it back up again.
Despite himself, Plankton had felt good being around her, which was only understandable - he’d married her for a reason, after all. But getting so caught up in all his experiments and schemes, he’d honestly forgotten what he was missing out on, and it stung, badly. His stomach tightened confiningly, and his body coursed with a horrible tingling sensation that left him feeling uncomfortable and on edge. Shifting in his seat, he weighed up his options. He still had much more work to do, and the formula was practically in his grasp, but at the same time, he had a wonderful wife nearby who was still willing to be around him even after how much of a jerk he could be. It was just a shame he didn’t really know how to go about bringing the topic up. If only there was some excuse to get closer and put his schemes on the backburner but still get them completed in a timely manner.
Oh, to kelp with it. His evil plans could wait.
“...Karen? We can play that game now, if you like.”