( this chapter is cringy but I love it )

"Let's see, if I were the queen of pop uniting the tribes, where would I go first?" Barb leaned against a tree and observed a map, ignoring the shenanigans going on between her father and Riff in front of her.

"GIVE ME BACK MY DRUMSTICKS!" Riff demanded Thrash, hanging upside down from a tree. He got himself stuck trying to get vanilla ice cream from a bird.

"Nope." Thrash banged on a stump, playing the drum part of the song Crazy Train.

"The one group must be doing the east side of Trollmerica." Barb thought, thinking back to Satin who mentioned they were headed to Techno City.

Riff gripped the tree's branch and reached down towards Thrash and far as he could without falling, but reached nowhere close.

Thrash stuck his tongue out and showed off his skills.

Riff admitted that Thrash was good, but claimed he was still better- which was true. Riff was the best drummer in all of Volcano Rock City. Possibly even out of the entire country. Although no one know's of any other drummers.

Well, there will be another rock troll in the book later who is can play several instrument,- but we'll get to him later.

"So there must be another group of Troll covering the west side." Barb circled the west parts of the map: funk, country, jazz, and classical.

Riff held on to the branch and hung down, but yet wasn't anywhere near retrieving the drumsticks.

"Riff, if you want them so desperately- get down here! Oh, wait, YOU CAN'T!" Thrash laughed at him and played the bah dum tss.

"So they probably began at funk because it's the closest to Pop Village..." Barb continued figuring out Poppy's plan.

Riff growled at Thrash and tried pulling himself up.

"So they must be headed towards country and jazz next..." She drew a line across the page through the three places.

The thing none of the pop trolls were aware of was the fact that their scrapbook was outdated. A few years ago, the jazz tribe relocated to a nice calm river in a canyon, just because the mountain was too cold. They needed to let it go. Good thing Poppy, Branch, and Biggie are going to figure that out before they climb up the mountain.

"Take them." Thrash threw the drumsticks at Riff's hands, causing his grip to loosen and him to fall out of the tree and right on Thrash's drum set.

"Rad..." Riff groaned and feebly did the rock hand pose.

"LOAD UP BOYS! We're going to Classical City!" Barb closed her map and looked at them in confusion. "Can you two go five minutes without bickering?"

"No." They agreed.

Barb groaned, then whistled, calling more rock trolls over. "We're gonna take the Boogie Beetles to them to get their string, and we'll most likely come across the pop queen, her boyfriend, and her other friends on our way to country. We give them a friendly reminder that time is running out, then resume collecting the strings. Then when time is up, we return to Pop Village, and that's when the real fun can begin." She let out a small cackle and flashed her Grinch grin. (Her Grin-ch.)

Thrash joined the cackle, knowing exactly what she meant by "fun".

Riff stupidly laughed and followed some other rock Trolls to get the Boogie Beetles.

"Let's get this party started." Barb rubbed her hands together eviLy and walked towards she and Thrash's beetle and saddled it up.

~

"We're.. so... close..." Branch flipped through pages of a scrapbook and yawned between every word. He concealed the book cover with fabric he borrowed from Satin and Chenille, not wanting Poppy to see. It was a scrapbook filled with romantic proposal ideas, because he was still unsure on how or when he should do it.

He hadn't slept in days, and he probably won't sleep for another few days with piloting the balloon.

"Branch, are you okay? You look and sound really tired." Poppy turned around from admiring the sunset to express her concern for him.

"Mhm, I'm filled with energy!" Branch held his hands up to prove it, but that became a yawn too.

Poppy closed the book and set it down on a spontaneously placed table and set up a small bed on the ground. "Sleep."

"No! You can't fly this!" Branch protectively held the wheel and refused to let her fly.

"I know I can't, but I'm a quick learner. I don't want you to have to stay awake to drive this. I'm taking over." Poppy walked him over to the small bed and set him down.

Branch collapsed right on the floor and instantly started snoring obnoxiously, but looked very happy.

"It's gonna be a long evening." Biggie sighed and covered his ears, then looked through the scrapbook to research the country trolls.

"I think we'll make it to Lonesome Flats before the sun completely sets which means we'll cover two places in one day!" Poppy whisper cheered.

Of course no one but Mr. Dinkles heard her.

Poppy sighed and stopped paying attention to steering and curiously took Branch's book. She opened up to the title page and read the title. "Perfect Princess Proposals?"

She looked at him and started wondering if he actually was going to propose to her. She always seeked for her true love, but doubted shed ever find it. Could Branch really be her one and only?

Some pages had things highlighted or circled on them. "During a life-threatening situation or when she needs cheering up." She read, the two scenarios he couldn't choose between.

Poppy blushed and smiled at him, then returned the book to where she found it.

She played around with the wheel and didn't think it would make a difference.

Of course the strange flight pattern it took messed with the air movement and sent the basket of Trolls crashing to the ground.

Biggie screamed and grabbed on to the basket. "I'M NOT READY TO DIE!"

Mr. Dinkles turned his hat into a parachute and jumped off the balloon, then floated to the ground softly himself.

"MAYBE BRANCH SHOULD'VE CONTINUED FLYING THIS ANYWAYS! HE DID WAY BETTER THAN ME!" Poppy hugged Biggie and looked over at Branch who continued sleeping on the other side of the basket.

"Aww.." the two admired him then noticed they were about to hit the ground.

So they shut their eyes tight and hoped they wouldn't die.

-

"A-Are we dead?" Biggie opened one eye and his other senses came back.

Poppy was still hugging him tightly. "I don't think so! I can smell manure." She held her nose and looked around.

A yellow Troll was staring at them, aiming a shovel full of poop towards them. "I t'aint afeard to use this!" He threatened.

"Woah, there's no need for that!" Poppy hoped to reason with him. "My name is Queen Poppy! I'm the leader of the pop trolls! This is my friend Biggie and- where did Branch land?"

Biggie checked to make sure he wasn't sitting on him. "He was sitting on the opposite end of the balloon. He must've been flung somewhere else."

"What are y'all doin' here? M'yor Delta Dawn don't like other tribes around here." He lowered the shovel, feeling a little more comfortable, but still remained alert.

"We're uniting all the Trolls to stop Queen Barb from wiping out other kinds of music!" Poppy said, hopping out of the trough and wiping her dress off.

This Troll was luckily rather friendly and desperate to do something other than watching moonsters all day. "Name's Hickory, and it'd be my pleasure to assist you in the venture." He tipped his very tall hat a little and bowed on his four hooves. "I reckon Delta won't be as eager to help. She ain't fond of trespassers at all. She locked a jazz troll up yesterday for crossin' the street."

"I'm sure we can get her to listen!" Poppy said optimistically.

Hickory smiled at her. "That's the spirit! I can lead you to our town of Lonesome Flats." He waved at his moonsters and trotted out of the pasture to show the two pop trolls around.

The two moonsters smirked at each other and waited until Hickory was out of sight to do something they've waited hours to do. They burst open like a pinata to show that they were just disguises, not actually moonsters.

Two rock trolls jumped out and grinned at each other.

Barb had sent some rock trolls to gather the strings she didn't already have while the majority of them attacked classical.

"They're gonna lead us right where we need to be." The one female rock troll said as they stealthily began to follow them.

"He could be anywhere!" Poppy looked at every spot they passed, carefully examining everything for Branch. She looked in troughs, barrels, and other things everywhere they passed.

"What if he's inside a building?" Biggie pointed at a saloon, where right on cue the doors swung right open.

"AND STAY OUT!" An orange female country troll with tall magenta hair shouted in Branch's ear before tossing him on the ground.

"Oh, found him!" Poppy helped him up. "This is Hickory! He's going to help us!"

"Oh, good, because the others won't." Branch shuddered as he looked back at the building he was just kicked out of. "They tried to murder me."

"I can be very persuasive, let me try!" Poppy took a deep breath then skipped into the building with her hand out. "Hi, I'm Qu-"

They kicked her out of the saloon, flinging her right into Branch.

Mr. Dinkles (who by the way had a great landing in Hickory's hat) shook his head. "S.Mew.H."

"Way more difficult than I expected." Poppy groaned and stood up. "We'll just keep trying and keep a positive attitude!" With determination, she began to storm back into the parlor- right up until the doors flung open and the country trolls jumped out grinning.

"Howdy!" The orange country troll, Mayor Delta Dawn, greeted acting like she didn't just throw the two out. "I'm Mayor of Delta Dawn of Lonesome Flats, this here is deputy Dickory," She pointed at the yellow Troll that looked identical to Hickory standing next to her. "And you're already aquatinted with Hickory." Her tone at the last part showed that she wasn't very fond of Hickory.

Hickory wasn't very popular around the country trolls. He was excluded from a lot of activities. He tried his best to fit in with them, but always tried so hard to make them like him, he only made things worse.

( we know nothin' 'bout him other than he doesn't much care for smooth jazz. I can make him relate to mE if I want. then you'll see the world from my point of view muhahaha)

Hickory looked down and stepped back with a sigh. "Poppy, tell 'em about yourselves."

Poppy was happy to. "My name is Queen Poppy of the pop trolls and we're here to invite you on our expedition to stop Queen Barb of the hard rock trolls from destroying all music except rock! If all the tribes work in harmony together to stop her, I'm sure we can't fail!"

Branch and Biggie waved at her and smiled innocently.

"But how do we know yous are telling the truth?" Dickory asked in his German accent.

"You don't know, you just need to have trust in us." Branch looked at Poppy and gave his cute grin.

Poppy gave him a goofy grin in return and held his hand. "Couldn't have said it better myself."

"Aw.." Some random useless nameless country trolls put their hands over their hearts.

Delta was still hesitant to agree. "I dunno, we've been lied to in the past," She glared at Hickory, "I don't wanna risk that again."

Hickory looked down and sighed. "I respect your concerns, ma'am, but you can trust these folks. They're tryin' to protect all of the Trolls, not only themselves."

"Yeah! We don't want everyone to be devastated if she succeeds." Poppy couldn't bear to think about only being able to hear rock music for the rest of her life and her failure cause future generations of Trolls to have to listen to rock only too. "I don't want to let anyone down."

"'Pologies, but I 'oughta do what I think is right for my town." Delta stepped forward and looked down at Poppy who was slightly shorter than her.

"Uh oh.." Biggie began backing up, but walked right into Dickory.

Branch stood in a defensive stance, ready to attack, but a tiny blue country troll with a lot of teeth snapped at his toes.

"So, is that a yes?" Poppy gave a sheepish smile.