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UNSPOKEN
A Dreamworks Trolls Fanfic by C. Prince

It's a small fandom. Please review when you read!

Never Again

"You will never love again."

Poppy stopped swinging her legs and sat motionless on the exam table. She stared, wide-eyed, at Dr. Moonbloom.

"Until this is healed."

"Oh." Poppy sighed in relief. "For a second there you really had me going. Never love again, haha! Pfft." She flicked her hand and rolled her eyes. "So how long we talking? A day? Two?"

"I'm afraid it's not that simple dear," Dr. Moonbloom said. "Your heart is completely broken. Shattered. Crushed into a thousand glittery pieces."

Poppy maintained her smile, but as the explanation went on her furrowed eyebrows betrayed her true feelings. She clutched the little jar of shining broken fragments between her hands.

"I'll be honest dear, yours is a rare condition these days. I've seen cases of heartbreak, but that was twenty years ago before we moved here. Even then, I've never seen a heart broken this way."

Poppy looked away. "And the piece that's missing? It's not just going to grow back, is it..." It should've been a question, but she already knew the answer.

Dr. Moonbloom shook her head. No. The missing half was gone.

Poppy hopped off the exam table with a grin, shoving the jar back into her hair. "I'm sure it's nothing a few hugs won't fix! Even if it takes hundreds, or thousands, or hundreds of thousands! Better get started!"

She burst out of the room and strolled through the group of worried friends in the waiting area, speed hugging every single one of them. "Don't worry, I'm fine! Everything's fine! Just gotta give it some time." And she was gone.

Smidge turned to Dr. Moonbloom. "Ok. So everything is clearly not fine. How can we help?"

The troll doctor exhaled and adjusted her glasses. "The thing Poppy needs most right now is a good friend."

x x x

Branch flailed his arms in a desperate attempt to escape the thing attacking him from behind. "Ahhh! Help! Something's got me!"

Poppy let go. "Relax, Branch. It's just a surprise hug."

He scowled and made a show of brushing himself off before collecting the seed packets he'd dropped thanks to Poppy's sneak attack. "At least warn me before you do that next time."

"Uh, okay, one: that totally defeats the point of a surprise hug, and two: SURPRISE HUG!"

Branch grunted as Poppy latched onto him again, though not nearly as tight this time. He was still frustrated she'd managed to sneak up on him in the first place. It had barely been a week since they'd returned from Bergentown. Had he become so soft that even Poppy could get the drop on him? That was concerning.

"Aww, Branch," she said, still with her arms wrapped around him. "It's like hugging a very small, very grumpy tree. Or maybe a rock." She released him. "We'll work on that."

No problem. "All I need is another life-or-death situation and a big musical number. I'll be dishing out warm, affectionate hugs in no time."

Poppy's eyes grew wide and sparkly, but before she could belt out in song Branch put a finger to her lips. Her behavior was far too sugary, like she was overcompensating for something. "Or you could tell me what this is about? I can tell this is about something." He put his hand down and folded his arms.

"Well, I hugged every troll in the village. You were the last one. So let's see the results!" With a flourish Poppy reached into her hair and pulled out a jar.

Branch peered at the container, now curious. "Is that… chunky glitter?"

Poppy sighed. She tucked the jar away before he had more time to analyze it. "It may as well be. Thanks anyway."

All of her enthusiasm was gone. She turned and walked away.

"Woah woah woah," Branch circled around and cut her off. "You come all the way to my fields, tell me you've hugged every troll in town, and then show me a jar of sparkly bits? And now you're upset. Poppy, what's going on?"

Poppy wouldn't meet his gaze. She turned away slightly. "To be totally honest, I don't think this is something I can talk to you about right now."

Oh.

The quiet, hopeless way she said that stung his heart. Was he being a bad friend? Did he do something wrong? Unsure which it was, he grasped at the first thing that came to mind. "Does this have anything to do with what we, ah, discussed last week?"

Way to go Branch, bringing up that awkward subject.

Poppy's blues cleared up as she thought about it. "Uh, no," she decided aloud. Then she grinned. "Although it was very cute listening to you try to explain how you love me as a friend, and not, y'know, something else. It's fine! I tell my friends I love them all the time. See?" Poppy pinched his cheek. "I loooove you."

She suddenly backed off and mused, "Huh. That's surprising. I guess only romantic love is affected. I don't feel any different about my friends. Still love them."

Branch rubbed his cheek, unable to make sense of what Poppy was saying to herself. He was still supremely embarrassed about how the whole 'I love you but not like that' conversation had gone – or why he thought he needed to explain it in the first place. Of course Poppy understood what he meant by singing True Colors. Trolls sang about love all the time. But romance? If he was going to pick a romantic song, then…

"Are you okay?" Poppy was saying. "You're making a very weird face right now."

He snapped back to reality. "I thought we were talking about you, not about my weird face," he quipped. "Look, if something's bothering you – and I can think of at least three things that should be – but you don't want to talk to me about it, maybe you could scrapbook it out."

Poppy already had scissors and paper in hand. Branch gently pushed down the implements of destructive creation. He finished what he'd been trying to say: "At home. Where it's safe."

The sun was starting to droop in the sky with sleepiness, casting long shadows over patches of tilled earth around them. His bunker wasn't far from the fields, but it was somewhat far from town, far enough he didn't have to hear the parties when he was underground. However, that did mean if Poppy didn't leave soon, she'd be travelling through the woods at night.

"I can walk you home," he offered.

"No, no, that's okay. I could use some alone time anyway." She said goodbye and dashed off towards the village.

Branch watched her go. Poppy? Alone time? He shook his head and turned his attention to the rolling planter he'd built, tearing the seed packets open and pouring them into the machine's hopper. As he pushed the planter along the row, he began to put the mental puzzle together.

They'd both changed. He had everything to gain from the new path a certain fuzzy sunshine had put him on. Yet lately he'd caught clouds covering that sun, Poppy's expression turning introspective while she silently gazed at rocks or flowers for no reason. The more he thought about what they'd lived through together, the more certain he was of the cause for that distant, lonely look.

If Creek ever showed his face again, Branch wouldn't be responsible for what he was going to do to him.

x x x

Lights of nearby pods illuminated the night like stars. For one of the few times in her life, Poppy wished she had a door on her pod.

She slung open the bottom drawer of her dresser and tossed the bottle of her broken heart inside. The jar rattled against the empty drawer's sides when she slammed it shut.

Over the past few days she'd been too busy to let herself process the pain in her soul. She did it now.

Everything Creek had ever given her, every memory she'd ever had of him, she tore them from the walls, off shelves, out of drawers. She grabbed the popsicle stick friendship portrait with him in it, the one with the heart, and pulled the photo out, throwing it in the pile.

The empty frame stared at her. In defiance she folded out all of the other sections and set the collection back where it was. The one small blank spot was now insignificant.

When it was all over she looked at how tiny and sad the pile of discards was. "Why couldn't I see it before?" In spite of herself she barked out a single, pathetic laugh. "I loved you Creek, but you didn't love me. Not in the way I wanted you to."

As she put each thing in a basket she was forced to relive the memories behind it. The festivals they'd been to, the dances he'd been by her side for, the late night talks under the moon. So, so, so many hugs. The tears were streaming freely now, but Poppy didn't make a sound. She had trusted him. She would have done anything for him.

In the end, his own safety had been worth more than hers.

Creek had truly liked her, once. Over time something changed. She was always the one to reach for his hand. He barely made any effort to find alone time for just the two of them. No matter what she did, he drifted further and further away.

One night alone in his pod she'd tried to kiss him like before, but he'd gently pushed away. His words echoed in her mind. "Sorry Poppy, I can't do this."

That should've been the end of it, but she kept hoping she could fix their relationship. Even up to the very moment he'd betrayed the trolls, betrayed her, she thought she could make it work.

Why, why, why, did she give him a piece of her heart? She wanted to take it back. But she couldn't. It was gone. The ache in her chest threatened to squeeze out horrible heartbroken cries.

Dr. Moonbloom was right. She'd never love again. Not like this. It hurt so much. How did people survive this?

Poppy took the basket of mementos down to the lagoon and dumped the contents into the water.

She thought that would be the end of it. She was wrong.

FOREWARD

Unspoken will update every Monday until complete. Please leave reviews with your thoughts as the story progresses!

Unspoken has been incredibly fun and rewarding to write, but it is also deeply personal both in its darkness and in its unconditional passion. I can finally say I've written a story about what I thought love was, what I wished it to be, and what I now know it is.

It was a huge challenge to follow canon as much as possible. The first movie, the holiday special, the shorts on Dreamworks' YouTube, and 7 seasons of Trolls: The Beat Goes On (ending with Gem Day) are canon to Unspoken. Anything past that point, along with the books and comics, is out of the picture. World Tour didn't exist at the time of writing except for trailers.

People either love or hate The Beat Goes On. Because of that I've incorporated key events into Unspoken directly so you don't need to watch the show to enjoy this fic. The show has many heartfelt moments that I skipped writing about in order to cover something new instead. I was reluctant to cut Branch's friends Thistle McCall and Baja from the first draft, but it helped strengthen his other friendships since the cast is already so large.

Lyrics in this book are original save a handful of references to Trolls songs. If I ever manage to create my songs, I'll link them.

Branch flutes: Jonny Lipford's YouTube channel gives the best impression of what one sounds like in modern music. The handmade look of a branch flute shows up better in an image search.

If you find any typos, DM me the chapter number and the misspelled word so I can CTRL + F and fix those suckers. I also appreciate writing-focused critique: tips that will improve my writing for the next time pen hits paper.

Thank you for reading!