Chapter Text
Trolls were positive creatures
They likes to stay happy! Focus of the silver lining and stay on the bright side!
So that’s to say complaining doesn’t come easy to trolls, even if there’s a problem, most trolls won’t say anything in fear of upsetting their friends.
So that make ruling kind-of a problem. We have no idea weather we’re doing a good job…or if the people are just too nice to complain…
SO!
they invented the Royal Review~
An anonymous vote! That allows any and all trolls to express their true feelings!
With a smiley face :)
Or…
a frown-y face :(
Dun dun duhhhhhh!
“Poppy…”
She was knocked out of her thoughts by her dad, standing in her doorway with a stern look on his face. He had his arms crossed over his chest, and giving her a worried-pitying look.
“Poppy…your stress-booking again…”
Huh?
She looked down and-
OH!
Whadda ya know! She was!
She was holding her favourite pair of sizers and a glue stick, with little bits of paper and glitter surrounding her. She looked at the scrapbook she was making and immediately slammed it shut.
The page had little troll’s being eaten by sharks, but rather than crying or screaming they were all saying phrases like “it’s ok” “we’re all good” and “nothing to worry about” and a little poppy standing in the distance with a confused look on her face. Dad was already worried about her, and if he saw this he’d just worry more,
She scooped up all her scrapbooking supplies and jammed them all into the closest box she saw. The box jammed for a second, refusing to close because of the amount of stuff in the box, she looked over briefly to see dad staring at her with the same worried-pitying look.
“Just a sec!”
She pushed the scrapbook down and jumped on the box, slamming it shut with a * Bang!* she ran a hand through her hair and made herself comfortable on the box. Giggling and trying to play it cool.
She failed…spectacularly
Dads expression became more pity than worry. He uncrossed his arms and walked over to Poppy’s side. He sat on her bad and placed both hands on his cane. Looking at her expectantly.
She held off for a moment before deflating and facing dad
“Poppy, sweetie, your worried about the royal review aren’t you?”
“Whaaaaaaat? No! No no I’m-“
“Poppy”
“…alright fine. So I might be a littttttttle worried about the royal review.”
Dad eyed the box she was sitting in and reached down to grab a piece of felt she missed when hurriedly putting everything away. She briefly cursed herself for missing it, but conceded that it probably wouldn’t have mattered weather it was there or not, dad saw her mid-stress-booking, and he might be old, but he’s not old enough to believe he hallucinated her making a whole scrapbook
Dad held up the felt like it just stole a cookie, and handed it to her. She avoided eye contact and took the felt, rubbing her thumb over the edge. The soft fabric helping her de-stress just a little bit.
“Sweetie I know your stressed but you shouldn’t worry about this so much. This isn’t even the actuary royal review, just a practice so we know if your ready to take over once you become queen, your still young, it’s expected that you won’t be perfect.”
Poppy stayed silent as she listened to peppy comfort her
He was right. It wasn’t a “real” royal review, just a practice to see if she was ready to take over or if she needed to improve on something. Most princes and princesses got one before they become ruler, and it was a rule that someone had to pass at lease 3 practice reviews before they could become king or queen.
From what dad told her, most princes and princesses had 4 or five before they could before king or queen. But she’d heard from the older trolls that peppy was the first Prince that only had 3 practice review’s. Meaning he got a prefect score. dad didn’t know she knew, and she was going to keep it that way…
“Poppy. Sweetie. Your worrying over nothing.”
She didn’t believe him. This was her first Royal Review! She had to get a perfect score! What would it say if she wasn’t! She was King Peppy’s daughter! He was the one that freed them from the Bergens! He was the one that rebuilt the village and ushered in fifteen of peace!
She looked away from dad and stared at the floor. Dad reached over and patted her shoulder, reaching around and hugging her. She melted into dads side and hugged him back. God, she loved dads hugs.
As dad hugged her, she felt her anxiety fall and her optimism return. It was going to be ok. She was a very popular and she can’t remember the last time someone seemed upset with her.
She felt dad pull away and he gave her a reassuring smile.
“Do you understand?”
“Yeah. I guess I’m worrying over nothing…”
Peppy’s smile became brighter and he patted her shoulder. She returned his smile and rubbed the hand on her shoulder.
“Now, why don’t you go hang out with your friends? Hmm? Take your mind off all this.”
“Ok, biggie did have a new recipe he wanted us to try.”
“Well that’s good.”
Back to her usually happy self poppy jumped up from the box and walked over to her closet, going through her outfits. Her usual pink dress just wouldn’t do, today was her first practice Review, she HAD to look nice.
She eventually found found a bright pink dress, with long sleeves that ended just above her elbows, the end of the sleeves turning from bright pink to a pastel pink, the skirt of her dress was a dark purple with blue and green embroidery on the bottom.
It was an experimental dress that satin and chenille had made just for her. Apparently the twins were trying different embroidery techniques and the dress was perfect for that.
She pulled the dress out and made to leave the room when peppy stopped her. He held up his hand and raised his eyebrows
“Hand over your glue stick, I don’t want you stress-booking again.”
Poppy held in a groan. Why did day have to be so perceptive? Even if she wasn’t planing to stress-book, she felt better with it on her. But with dad holding out his hand and looking at her expectantly, she gave in.
She reached into her hair and pulled out her glue stick, handing it to dad.
Well even if he took the glue stick she always had her-
“And the backup”
…
Sparkles
Pouting she reached down to her ankle, pulling off the Velcro strap that held her backup glue stick, and handing it to dad. Peppy looked at her in victory before gesturing to the door. that smug expression still on his face
She sulked out the door into the bathroom, to get ready for the day.
“Still stressed?”
“Whaaaaaat? No no no, of course not~”
Smidge just levelled her with an unimpressed look as she counted the preliminary-votes. They were sitting in smidge’s pod as she counted the preliminary-votes, she wasn’t sure why there was a preliminary vote since this was a practice royal review but she was thankful for it anyway
“Ok so maybe I’m a little stressed”
Smidge looked up from counting and gave her a deadpan expression before pointing at her ankle
“Your practice glue-stick is missing.”
“…ok so dad might have taken it to keep me from stress-booking, but I’m fiiiine! Promise!”
Smidge let out a sigh and, went back to counting the votes mumbling something under her breath.
As the seconds went on and Smidge kept counting poppy started pacing. Going back and forth from Smidge’s couch to her coffee table, basically having a one-troll race around the lounge-room. Poppy felt her anxiety rise again and she had to fight the urge to get paper and glue-
…
Right
She didn’t have her glue-stick
…
Aaaaaggghghh!
Poppy stopped pacing and turned to Smidge, a strained smile on her face and desperately asked her friend
“Are you almost done?”
Smidge groaned and turned to face poppy head on, looking her in the eyes and making sure she,was paying attention to what she was about to say
“Poppy. You are worrying about nothing! See-“
Smidge reached into the vote-box and pulled out a smiley face
“98! You have 98 smiley faces! You aren’t going to fail, everyone loves you. I can’t think of a single troll that wouldn’t want you as queen!”
Smidge handed poppy the smiley face and poppy hesitantly held it. she swears it’s staring through her soul holding it in her hand poppy let’s the feeling of relief flood through her…98
98 votes of smiley faces
I mean? That’s good. Really good!
Poppy felt herself smile and she handed the smiley face back to Smidge, suddenly feeling ridiculous about this. Why was she stressing about this so much? It’s just a practice vote. AND IT WASN’T EVEN THE ACTUAL VOTE YET! She was just working her self up over nothing
“Yeah…maybe your right”
Smidge finally smiled at her and raised her hand up, like she was showing poppy something
“Yeah! And I’ll prove it!”
Smidge closed her eyes and blindly reached into the vote-box and pulled out another vote, the face facing Smidge and its back to poppy.
“I hold vote 99! And as every other vote has been! It will be a-“
Smidge opened her eyes and froze. Staring intently at the face.
Suddenly the relief poppy felt before evaporated and a bucket of ice cold water was dunked through her veins. She felt the smile fall off her face as the seconds stretched on and Smidge didn’t say anything…
“Smidge.”
Poppy hesitantly stepped foreword and flinched as Smidge stepped back. Hiding the vote from her.
“Smidge”
“It’s nothing poppy! Honest!”
Poppy believed that about as much as she believed branch would let go of his grumpy ways and burst into song and dance
“Then let me see..”
As scared as she waswas is a frown-y face? she HAD to know for certain
Smidge swallowed and took a step backwards
“No.”
“No?”
“No! Poppy it’s for your own good!”
A second passed as they both processed the situation
Smidge was hiding the vote from poppy…there was something Smidge didn’t want her knowingoh GOD! It’s a frown-y face isn’t it!
…
Then- in a moment of hysteria- poppy lunged at Smidge
Smidge screamed and tried to run towards the front door
Poppy used her hair to block the door and tried to tackle Smidge again, but she used her smaller size to duck under her, running away from the front door and back towards the loung-room. Poppy ended up landing on her back, with her feet in the air after tumbling
She stood up and turned to Smidge, an unreadable expression on her face. She pulled her hair down and changed it to resemble a rope, before shifting it again into a lasso. She swung it around for a moment, eyes focused in Smidge. Smidge on the other hand was sweating bullets trying to find a way out of this without poppy seeing the vote
Poppy suddenly threw the lasso at Smidge and tried to wrap her hair around her wrist. Smidge ducked under her hair and crawled behind the couch, trying to stay out of Poppy’s sight. Poppy managed to grab a lamp in her hair and accidentally pulled it towards herself
As much as she wanted-needed- to see the vote, she wasn’t going to destroy her friend home to get it, so she carefully unwrapped her hair from the lamp and set it back on the floor. Having been distracted by the lamp, poppy didn’t see which couch Smidge crawled behind
Smidge has 2 couches and a recliner in her living room, all of which she was small enough to fit behind, so poppy would have to play Russian roulette to see which couch she was behind
“Come on Smidge. Just let me see the vote…”
Unsurprisingly, Smidge didn’t respond.
Poppy shifted her stance so she was further from the door but still blocking it. She tilted her head all the way right, behind one of the couches, and furrowed her eye brown in frustration when she didn’t see Smidge. On the bright side, Smidge was either behind the left couch or the recliner.
Poppy shifted nervously again before deciding to make a decision
Left couch
She ran as fast as she could and reached behind the couch, swinging her hair-lasso down to the floor to grab-
Nothing…
Poppy paused in confusion, before she realise: she guessed wrong
She looked over the couch to see Smidge making a break for the front door, just as poppy was about to curse herself for guessing wrong she noticed something, Smidge didn’t see the lamp.
She was running full force at the front door, so distracted by her victory that she didn’t even see the lamp she put down. And the lamp she was running towards…and would most likely trip over!
“WAIT-“