"Baby, seasons change, people don't…we don't fight fair"

-Fall out boy: The take over, the break's over

Disclaimer: I don't own the show or the song above.


 The night air bit my ankles.

"It's not usually cold around here," I remarked, silently musing to myself that the sudden cold fit the situation perfectly. She had warned me, scolded me. Melded my mind around the phrase 'don't get too attached'. I knew, I knew that she was referring to Kuzco and Malina. I digested every minute of my half-life being around them keeping this in mind. Whether it helped or not, I'm still not sure, but even so, they're only half the reason I'm leaving.

The walls she taught me to put up, the barriers, they never extended around her. It was that, it did me in. Her screaming, her awful laughter, lingering in my mind, and somehow projecting more worry lines on her features. It wasn't her wrinkles or her smarts, it wasn't her constant scheming, the evil. No, it was the way I could sometimes see a forgotten ghost of a smile dancing on her mouth, even when things went badly.

Snapping out of my reverie, I still had not received a reply. Her eyes glazed over, cloudy, lost in thought. That was the reason I was leaving.

It was the night of graduation. We returned to the lab knowing we had failed. That there was nothing more. Kuzco had graduated, and inherited the fortune; nothing we could do could stop him.

And oh, all those years wasted. Those years scheming against a person I held dearer and dearer each day. The guilt weighed me down like nothing I had ever felt. But her, Yzma, the puppetmaster. Something inside her was snapping.

I jumped slightly as she began speaking. "There are still ways, Kronk. We can still win. Sure, he may be the emperor; he may have inherited the thrown. He may be stronger now…" She looked momentarily thoughtful, "He… We…"

I felt sick. So very, very sick. I felt a smirk take refuge on my mouth, a smirk that didn't belong there, and momentarily I would have imagined that I looked quite deranged. "What's your plan Yzma? Turn Kuzco into a goat? A kitten? A speck of DUST?" I snapped as I felt myself lose control, "It's over! We're done. We've lost, and if you can't see that, well…" I tried to calm down.

She showed no sign of even hearing what I said. All at once it was like her irises melted, leaving a cloudy texture where eyes might have been. "A potion…" She muttered, "a potion… yes. But a stronger one—turn him into something… forever." The words rolled off her tongue, but still she made no motion of seeing the man in front of her.

"Yzma," tears pricked at the corner of his eyes, "I'm done. I…quit."

But all he heard in response was a cheap shot at convincing him that maybe turning Kuzco into a frog was the answer.

Kronk closed his eyes and tried to tell himself in vain that they hadn't tried that before.

Xx

"Oh Malina!" He called, stretching out the syllables on purpose.

The woman in question bounded down the stairs in response. A broad smile lighting up her face as she spotted the man at the door. He handed her a large bouquet of flowers and she her expression became unreadable, "Oh my…" She choked, "you really shouldn't have… why did—"

"Why did I come here, or why the flowers?" He asked with a playful expression he hoped was hiding the pain he felt. She nodded at neither in particular. "I came here because I thought I heard…" He lowered his voice, "rumours about… well-known people turning into animals."

She looked at him hollowly for a few seconds, and meekly asked, "Why didn't you ever write?"

How could she understand? How could she understand that the reason he never wrote was a good thing? He had spent years working with the intent of betraying Kuzco. He was a spy, and even if he hadn't seen Yzma in over ten years, he was still a traitor. He didn't write because he felt the need to distance himself from the people he wronged… to run. Frankly, the threat of Yzma was the only thing that could make him break that pact with himself.

Expertly changing the subject, he asked, "So, have you spoken to Kuzco lately?" To his surprise, he could see the way Malina racked her mind, trying to place the name. He knew for a fact that they hadn't talked since graduation, but that was another story.

Xx

She had brought him to the market partially because she needed groceries, and partially because he kept hinting at it. He needed proof that Yzma was back, and he knew that the best place to find it would be in a public place near where the sightings had been made.

Almost instantly, Malina had pointed to a cloaked woman, and whispered, "Isn't that…?" It was almost too easy.

He abandoned Malina and strutted over to the woman. In front of her, I crossed my arms and waited for her to say something… Anything.

"She's back you know," She said with a sickly, aged smile, "They say she has a new trick… That it's the best…"

He blinked sadly, trying to pretend that she wasn't talking in the third person. Maybe even momentarily pretending that he was talking to someone else. It was no use. "What are you going to do now?" He paused, liking the way his next words sounded on his lips, "Yzma?"

Xx

The young emperor splashed jubilantly in the pool. He tried hard to grasp the glee he felt sliding along the waves, but as soon as he stood up, the happiness seemed to stream away with the excess water.

The news troubled him considerably, after going 11 years without being turned into a beast. There was someone new out there, a Yzma copy-cat, or perhaps Yzma herself, back for round two.

He had no time or desire to delve into that world. That careless, happy teenaged world. He was a man now, an emperor at that. Was he in danger of being fed a potion under his nose? Perhaps.

Even more troubling, the sightings of prominent men transforming into animals were taking place on the closest island—where his old friend Malina was living. Did he dare leave his post to go visit her—warn her?

Did she even care to see him again?

Xx

Any person serving under the reign of Kuzco could tell you that he wasn't a very responsible leader. He proved that again the day that he went and got himself turned into… a frog—on his way to visit a woman whom he hadn't spoken to in over a decade.

"It's foolproof Kronk… I know it this time. Once he drinks the potion, there is no antidote, and it never wears off. He loses the ability to speak English, and the only way he can be returned is if someone were to kiss him!"

"I hope you realize that you have nothing to gain from this, Yzma. You invested your life into something that you will never profit from. I hope you're proud of yourself."

XxXx

Malina sat on a rock by a local pond, singing silently to herself. "À la claire fontaine, m'en allant promener, j'ai trouvé l'eau si belle, que je m'y suis baigné." She heard a simple croak, that of a frog, and she wondered heavily why Kronk had left so soon.

"Chante, rossignole, Chante, toi qui a le cœur gai." Another croak, "Tu as le coeur à rire, moi je l'ai à pleurer."

Gingerly, she stood up and walked gracefully to the edge of the water. In front of her feet, she saw the most peculiar looking frog, complete with dangling earrings. The frog, upon noticing her, and what Malina deemed as purely her imagination, seemed to brighten up considerably. She nearly jumped when she heard the frog mutter a pathetic attempt at what might have been "help me" in French.

She bent over so that she could observe it at a closer proximity. It squirmed and repeated its bad French. Without thinking, Malina felt a very English "how?" escape her lips, and feeling stupid she repeated instead "Comment?".

She felt suddenly as if she had been in this similar situation before, and just as she expected, the frog suddenly started flailing in frustration. She picked it up and looked at it with disgust as a memory of the "frog prince" danced in her head.

But then suddenly the creature was retched out of her hands by the cloaked individual she had encountered with Kronk weeks before. "There you are!" She cried in what seemed like a long shot from a sane tone. As Malina's eyes met hers, she stiffened considerably, and muttered something about it being her son's pet that escaped.

Be it because of a feeling in the gut of her stomach, or the way the frog squirmed in her grasp, Malina knew she had to do something. She took what she hoped would seem like a non-menacing step towards Yzma, and put on her best sugary sweet voice. "Oh, and how can you tell? May I see it for a moment?"

She looked at Malina grudgingly, but with no good reason to say no, she silently slipped the slimy creature into her hands. Yzma's eyes boring into her, Malina quickly brought the frog to her lips, and before Yzma could stop her, the frog had turned into a very confused Kuzco.

"You… you kissed me." He said with momentary shock, quickly composing himself by moving his eyebrows up and down.

"You silly, silly girl!" Yzma shrieked as she roughly grabbed Malina by the arm and shook her, "you've ruined everything!"

Kuzco wasted no time prying Yzma off, and the rest, as they say, is history.

Oh, and this time, Kuzco and Malina stayed in touch, if you know what I mean. hint hint