I usually don't like Narnia much, but I just re-watched Prince Caspian and I couldn't help it. Caspian and Susan are just so awkward in that movie, but that somehow inspired me to write something about their flimsy relationship that didn't actually exist in the book universe. I actually have all of the Narnia books, but I rarely read them through, so some things might not fit accordingly.
This is set in that heaven place where Lucy, Edmund and Peter get sent to. I know Susan hadn't passed away yet at that point, and she had became some gossipy, superficial idiot, but I'd like to think that after she had died, many years later, she would be sent there, seeing as she was once one of the adored rulers of Narnia, and she had her virtues too. After all, her siblings and cousin died in a railway accident when she was twenty-one. She has plenty of time to regret her mistakes.
Technically, this would mean she would see Caspian. This idea just snowballed from there.
To a third person's point of view, the two monarchs sitting down together on the clearing would have looked at peace, content, maybe even happy. Oh, how appearances can fool people. On the contrary, they were in a rather heated debate at that moment.
"So, basically, you gave up on Narnia, moved to America and went on to become some girlish simpleton?" Caspian X asked skeptically, quirking an eyebrow.
"Hey, it was tough trying to cope with being a queen in one world and a normal girl in another," Susan said defensively, crossing her arms in front of her chest.
"I had to cope with my uncle trying to get rid of me for several years, but I didn't blatantly ignore fifteen years of my life," he insisted.
"Arguably, in our world, that was only a few seconds. It was easy to deem it a mere hallucination, or a game we had invented," she said stubbornly.
"Still, it was fifteen years. Surely it would've been hard to try and imagine that that entire period of time had been a mere imagination of your siblings and you?" Caspian said, frowning.
"I make my conclusions based on logic. It simply wasn't possible for me to have grown old in another world, returned to ours and magically returned to my original age upon departure."
"Susan, you're pretty much staring at the proof that you were an idiot, and yet you insist upon denying it. Look at us! We're in Narnian heaven!" he exclaimed, throwing his hands up exasperatedly.
"Okay, so I was wrong in believing that Narnia wasn't real," she relented slightly. "But I changed after that! I had to go through lots of misery too! My family died in a train crash when I was barely in my twenties!"
"You would've been in that train crash if you had a little more faith and courage!"
"That's ridiculous! That's like saying you wanted me to die sooner!"
"At least then you would've died with dignity, knowing that it was the right path to have taken," Caspian said.
"I died with as much dignity as I would've if I had died in a train crash. Illness and old age! That's better than dying from something like choking on a muffin, right?" she said, scowling deeply. They paused for a few seconds.
"I'm sorry. Mentioning your death was crossing the line," Caspian said, the first one to apologize as usual.
"Well, it's a sensitive issue," she said, sniffing. "But I'll forgive you, even if you're a jerk and everything."
"I'm a jerk? You're the most stubborn, headstrong, idiotic woman I've ever met!"
"And yet, you still liked me that time during the Second War of Beruna," she retorted, raising an eyebrow in a challenge.
"What?" he asked, throwing his hands down in exasperation. "Why are you bringing that up? I was a hormonal teenager! You were the only girl I had seen outside of the castle that was human. Besides, it's not like you weren't attracted to me as well."
"You were charismatic, that's all," she tried to shrug nonchalantly, but her flaming cheeks gave her away.
"And intelligent, and attractive, as well as possessing the wondrous qualities of a born leader," he smirked, crossing his arms triumphantly.
"Not to mention arrogant," she snorted. "How does your wife stand you anyway?"
"Lilliandil is patient, kind and caring. She knows better than to throw hissy fits at my flaws like some other people."
"What kind of name is Lilliandil? Besides, I've never thrown hissy fits at anything, let alone your stubbornness and inflated ego."
"I never said you did, I just stated that some people tended to throw fits in anger," he pointed out calmly. "And it sounds like somebody is just being jealous that I have an awesome wife when she doesn't."
"No shit, Sherlock," she deadpanned. "But I do have an awesome husband."
"That arrogant prick?" he asked skeptically. "His ego can barely fit in the throne room."
"Says the person with the most inflated ego on Earth," she retorted angrily, unwilling to let him have the last word.
"What is this 'Earth' you speak of?" he asked sarcastically. Susan frowned, knowing that all four siblings had already filled him with to the brim with stories of the world they came from.
"A biologically diverse planet with many nice people not as mean as the person I'm staring at," she said in a mockingly high tone.
Caspian sighed and pressed a hand to his aching right temple. Susan was too stubborn to apologize, and she hated admitting that she was wrong. He would have to make the first step of forgiveness.
"I'm sorry," he said sincerely, pulling his hand away from his temple and laying it on her shoulder in a good-natured fashion. "Our respective spouses are equally virtuous, though you became superficial and idiotic since you've last left Narnia, since the shocking death of your esteemed siblings, you've changed much and have certainly became a wise person, no doubt regretting your past silly actions."
"That was a long speech," she said, a small smile on her lips, and Caspian knew that she had finally let go of her old grudges.
"I excel at them, I was told," he grinned, holding out an arm, which she graciously accepted. "It's just about tea-time, how about a visit to your siblings' house?"
There was a moment of calm silence, the two of them walking along the mountain road in peaceful companionship, Caspian trailing along slowly behind as Susan wandered ahead. She halted abruptly, noticing a figure in front of her suddenly.
"Hello there, Edmund," she said, looking up in surprise. "We were just going to visit you and others."
"We?" he asked, furrowing his eyebrows, before his vision fell on Caspian walking around the corner serenely. "You two seem to be getting on remarkably well."
"Appearances can fool people," she snorted, putting her arm around Edmund's shoulder. "Caspian was extraordinarily mean."
"Hey, I can hear you from here, you know!" the man in question shouted exasperatedly, waving his two hands around like a raving lunatic.
"You were meant to!" she shouted back, before tugging along her brother as quickly as possible in the opposite direction. Caspian frowned and stomped off after them, cursing and swearing with a most colourful language.
Pretty short snippet, please leave a review on your way out about how awesome/fantastic/okay/horrible/vomit-inducing the fic was. Constructive critiques are appreciated, but unnecessary flames will be snorted at and extinguished.
I'd also like to apologize to those still waiting for a new chapter on my Filch-centric story, Downhill slope. No, I'm not on a hiatus/quitting/whatever assumptions you might've made. I just have supreme writers' block. Reviews with some refreshing ideas would be much appreciated though, and I'll work hard at getting the fourth chapter delivered as soon as possible.
