This is what I think should have happened in Descendants. My version begins on family day, during the confrontation with Sleeping Beauty's mother.
"You! How – how are you here? And how have you stayed so young?"
"Queen Leah, it's ok. Maleficent is still on the Island. This is her daughter, Mal. Don't you remember my proclamation to give the new generation a chance?" Ben reassured the old woman.
"A chance to what, Ben? Destroy us?" She looked at those around them. "Come on, you remember, don't you? The poisoned apples – and the spells? Spells. My daughter was raised by fairies because of your mother's curse. So her first words, her first steps – I missed it all!" Queen Leah turned away, nearly crying.
"I'm so sorry –" Mal started, but Chad cut her off.
"Go away! Stay away from her."
"Don't do this, Chad." Ben warned.
"What?" Chad asked, disbelieving. "They were raised by their parents, Ben. What do you think villains teach their kids? Kindness? Fair play? No way, ok? Uh-uh." He glared at Mal. "You stole another girl's boyfriend!"
"Hey – hey!" Ben started, but Chad didn't stop. He turned to Jay.
"You enjoy hurting people. And you –" Now he was looking at Evie " –you're nothing but a gold-digger, and a cheater." He looked smug.
"Mirror, mirror in my hand – who is the biggest jerk in the land?!" Evie said, holding her mirror up so that Chad could see his own face in it.
"What? Come on." He retorted, grabbing it from her and knocking her aside.
Jay leapt forward and grabbed his shoulders, yelling, and Audrey ran forward to back Chad up. Evie darted in from the side and sprayed Chad in the face with the sleeping drug that was part of their plan to steal the wand.
"Chad? Chad?! Chad!" Audrey cried, as he fell asleep and was lowered to the ground.
"Come on Mal." Evie said softly, putting an arm around her friend's shoulders. "Let's go."
"No, wait." Carlos whispered.
"Chad! Wake up!" Audrey said desperately, and the prince jerked awake.
"I feared something like this would happen." The King said, as if the villains' kids weren't standing right there.
"This isn't their fault." Ben protested.
"No, son. It's yours." He turned to leave, holding out a hand for his wife.
At that, Carlos stepped forward. He had already proven that he was a quick thinker when they broke into the museum and he covered their tracks. He was hoping that he could think quickly enough now.
"Don't you dare blame this on Ben!" He shouted, stopping the King in his tracks. "This isn't his fault – it's yours more than anyone's!"
That got everyone's attention.
"Carlos?" Jay murmured. "What are you doing, Carlos?" His friend ignored him, and rounded on Chad.
"Did you choose to be born the son of Cinderella and Prince Charming? Huh? Did you get to choose your parents? Cause I didn't. Since when was it a crime to be born? As a matter of fact – I didn't get to choose if I would be born at all! And you know what? Sometimes I wish I hadn't been!"
Jay took a quick step forward and grabbed Carlos's shoulder. "Hey, stop it. Let's go."
"No." Carlos shook his hand off. "They need to hear this." He glared at Chad. "It's not our fault that our parents are evil. But we are not our parents! We can make our own choices! Did that ever occur to you?
"So let's talk evil. Let's talk you. You may not be pure evil – but you can stop pretending to be good. So Evie's a cheater, is she? Let me remind you who it was that asked her to do his homework? Last time I checked, that was called – let me think – cheating. Which makes you a cheat, prince. And she's a gold-digger, too? Says the one who has had everything he ever wanted handed to him on a silver platter – and has never taken the time to see if anyone around him needs anything. I call that greedy and selfish. Wouldn't you?
"But enough about Evie. What about Jay? He enjoys hurting people, does he? At least he has the decency to use his fists when he hurts people. There's nothing hidden about that. But you – Mr. Goodness – you like to hurt people too. Only you don't bother to use your fists. You wouldn't be that open about it. You use your words and your actions. That's low – that's really low. Bruises heal. Words hurt a lot more than cuts and scrapes. And I would know, cause I've had both.
"So let's talk about Mal. She stole someone else's boyfriend, right? Pretty low. But wait – you, pretty boy, are perfectly content to play with girl's hearts. You're a man-whore. You bounce from girl to girl happy as can be – and even get involved with other girls behind your current girlfriend's back. How is that any better than stealing a boyfriend?"
Carlos paused, catching his breath from his long rant. "Let's recap, shall we? You are a cheat, you are greedy and selfish, you enjoy hurting people in the most painful ways possible, and you are a man-whore. So much for being the good boy! And that's just what I've learned about you in under a week! But maybe there is a little truth to your words. Maybe we are guilty of what you accused us of. Why are we the outcasts, and not you? If we deserve this treatment for our faults, how come you get off scot-free? You're just as bad as us."
Chad looked about ready to blow, but Carlos wouldn't let him speak. "No – you had your say. Now you will listen, and listen well! You want to know why we are the way we are? Why don't we take a little field trip to the Island! Everyone loves a field-trip, right? Hah. Let me tell you about the place I was raised. Let me tell you about 'home'."
He cleared his throat. "You see, our parents didn't have to teach us to be tough, and mean, and play dirty. All they had to let us do was go outside. Because the Island is rough. The Island is mean. And the Island definitely does not play fair.
"Girls don't walk alone. Anywhere. At any time. They find themselves an ally – someone who can protect them. If they are lucky, they have an older brother, a tough guy like Jay, someone who isn't looking for payment, to keep them safe. Barring that, they get themselves a boyfriend – preferably a gang leader, since nobody wants to cross one of those. And as long as they give that guy sex, he'll protect them. Probably. If he feels like it. Of course, he might get tired of her, or decide that she's too much trouble. Then he'll just walk away - or set his own gang on her.
"Girls who don't have a protector stay inside. Or they get gang raped. Or they stay home but the gang finds them and drags them out in the street to get gang raped anyway. If they can walk away after that, they are very lucky. And if they manage to walk away without carrying some hoodlum's kid – they are insanely lucky. It's not uncommon to hear screams from an alley, and watch people on the street just keep walking. Happens all the time." He paused and swallowed; his voice was getting thick.
After a moment, he continued in a normal tone. "There are two reasons that Mal and Evie aren't among those poor girls. The first – nobody would dare to touch the daughter of Maleficent, or the Evil Queen. They are just plain scared of Mal and Evie's moms. The second reason – Jay.
"Jay is their protector. You might have noticed that Jay only ever hurts guys. He has never once hit a girl. He's a fighter, and he protects us. He learned to fight to stay alive, and he does it very well. You think that he enjoys hurting people? Maybe. Or maybe that's all he's ever been able to do – hurt one person to save someone else.
"What about me? I'm little. I'm not intimidating, or strong. I'm fast. I can run away. That's what I do. While Jay watches my back, I get away from the trouble. If it wasn't for him, I would've been dead years ago. Guess what else being fast is good for, though? Stealing! That's my contribution to the group. Mal and Jay are tough, Evie is smart, and I can steal. There isn't much food on the Island. Oh sure, you guys send us a tiny bit each month, but it's not nearly enough to keep us all healthy and fed.
"Have you ever been hungry? And I don't mean 'have you ever whined at mom asking if it's time for dinner yet?' Have you ever been truly mind-numbingly, achingly, desperately hungry? Have you ever felt like you might actually die if you don't find something – anything – to eat today? Have you ever been able to lift up your shirt and count every single one of your ribs? Have you ever seen little kids lying at the side of the road, so weak they can barely move, and known that it might be you next month? Here you could at least eat grass or something if you were truly desperate. On the Island, we don't even have that option. There is literally nothing green and growing out there. My stealing kept us alive. Sometimes only just, but we managed.
"And then there's the cold. There's no wood out there, except what our houses are made of. And that's mostly metal anyway. There is nothing to burn, and there is no lovely gas heat. We don't even have nice warm coats to keep the cold away – our clothes are mostly threadbare. In the winter, people freeze to death every night. We would huddle together to keep warm, and we've had more than a few near brushes with death. Have you ever been so cold that you were terrified you might fall asleep and never wake up?"
None of the nobility around them moved. Jay and Mal were standing on either side of Carlos, arms crossed, daring anyone to interrupt him. Evie was behind him, her hands on his shoulders, giving him her silent support.
Carlos turned on the King, suddenly, eyes blazing with fury. "What did I ever do to you? Is it such a crime to exist?"
He glared at Fairy Godmother next. "What was that question in your little "goodness lesson" the other day? Oh yes. 'If someone hands you a crying baby, do you: A) curse it, B) lock it in a tower, C) give it a bottle, or D) carve out it's heart.' Guess what? I was a crying baby, once. Ten fingers, ten toes, two eyes, two ears, a mouth, and a nose – just like everyone else. Only I didn't get a bottle. I got thrown away. I got locked up – not in a tower, on an Island. I got cursed – to live a life of absolute misery. I got my heart carved out, every day, as I stared at the mainland and wondered why nobody cared what we were going through. You're so worried about us passing your goodness class. Why don't you put your blessed King through it – see if he manages to pass! Somehow I doubt he would. And you know, Cinderella's step mother didn't treat her half as bad as the stuff we go through out there. How come being told she couldn't go to the ball warranted a fairy godmother, but starving to death doesn't?"
He rounded on the King again. "The truth is that our parents have had very little to do with our upbringing at all. What, did you think that villains actually care about their kids? Well, they don't. We're just tools for them, and we know it. Do you know what my mom said when we heard that I had been chosen to come? She said that she'd miss me – doing all of her work! I didn't even get a 'goodbye Carlos, cause as much trouble as you can!' like you might have expected from a villain. So if our parents didn't turn us into what we are, who did?"
Carlos paused, and laughed sharply. "You did. Don't you see? You threw us away. You stuck us on that horrible Island. You did this. And if you think that we hate you for it, you are absolutely right. Because we hate you. We hate you so much. So don't you dare blame Ben for this. He's the only one of you who is actually decent."
He paused again. "An argument might also be made for Fairy Godmother. I mean, she's suspicious and she never did anything to help us before we came here, but at least she hasn't treated us like freaks while we've been here. But my point remains." He took a deep breath. "I haven't made my choice yet. I haven't chosen good or evil. And the way I've been treated is only pushing me more and more toward evil. But I might choose good. If I do, it's only because of Ben. And whether I choose good or evil, Ben will always have my loyalty. He saw us when no one else did, and I can never truly thank him for that. If he ever needs anything, he can ask me and I'll do my best – or my worst depending on how dubious his request is. He's won my loyalty – and the loyalty of a villain's kid is not something to be laughed at."
"He's won all our loyalties." Mal interrupted. She laughed bitterly. "I bet you all expect us to pull off some grand scheme to make sure that he will never be King. That is the last thing we would do. With Ben as King, the Island kids would have a chance." She got a strange look on her face. "Let's go, guys."
The four turned and stalked off, leaving everyone dumbstruck in the garden. Ben could just hear Mal, right before they were completely out of ear-shot. "You guys, we have to talk."
Jay snorted. "Forget talking. We have to choose."
Ben turned to face his father, visibly shaken. "Dad – is it really like they say? The Island."
The King looked troubled. "I – I don't know."
His son's jaw dropped. "You've never been there?"
"Of course not. The Island is full of villains, Ben. The sort of villains who try to kill people like us!"
"People like us, Dad? You act like we're a whole different species!" Ben almost yelled. He turned away with a sigh. "I'm going to go find Mal." He glared at Chad. "I hope you're happy."
Meanwhile, the four friends were holed up in the kitchen. Mal had guessed that Ben would come looking for her, and they didn't want to be interrupted.
"Did we really mean it?" Jay wondered. "I mean, you said it, but you said it for all of us. Are we really loyal to Ben?"
Mal shrugged. "When you think about it, he's the only one who has ever cared about us."
"There's no one else that's earned our loyalty, except ourselves, of course." Evie mused. "Our parents certainly haven't. What does that mean for us, for being evil?"
No one answered for a long time. Finally, Jay said, "I'd rather do anything than go back to the Island. If that means being good, count me in I guess."
"We don't necessarily have to be good." Mal pointed out. "We don't have to go back if we get the wand. We could always just strike out on our own."
Carlos raised an eyebrow at her.
"What? I'm just listing our options."
"What if we don't have to choose?" Evie asked suddenly.
"What do you mean?" Jay asked in a monotone.
"I mean…What if we could just be what we are? We're not evil, but we're not good. We're…bad." She grinned suddenly. "The baddest of them all! Who says that we have to change? Can't we stay here without being good? They can't make us go back, after all. We're too powerful, and we have Ben on our side. If we owe our loyalty only to him, we can be whatever we want to be in our free time, and just help him when he needs it."
"That… That has merit." Mal decided. "This is why you are the smart one."
A knock on the door interrupted them, and then it opened and Ben's head appeared. He looked relieved to have found them. "There you are."
"Um, yeah. Kind of busy." Carlos told him. "Lots to do. Plotting the demise of your dad, the rise of the Island, stuff like that."
Ben clearly wasn't sure what to say to that. "Um…ok? Should I come back later then, or…?"
Mal laughed suddenly. "I think we were just about done." She glanced at the others. "Do we vote? All in favor?"
Jay grinned. "What is this, a democracy?"
"That settles it, then." Evie smirked.
"Uh…Settles what?" Ben looked more than a little lost, and just a little apprehensive.
"We're not picking good or evil." Mal told him, mostly because she wanted him to stop looking at them like they had grown extra appendages. "We like the way we are, and we don't want to change just because someone else thinks we should. We're not going to be good, or evil. Just…Bad."
"We're rotten to the core." Jay half-sang.
The four all-but danced out of the room, and closeted themselves in the girls' room to finish their plan. They were still stealing that wand.
The next day, as they were heading out to drop Mal off with Ben, Evie leaned over and whispered, "Hey, is he still under the spell?"
The boys glanced at each other. "Shit. We forgot."
Mal face-palmed. "Great. We'll just have to use the wand to cancel it after the ceremony."
Everything went without a hitch. Ben was crowned, and then Mal snatched the wand. She blew a kiss to Ben's dad, shot a spell at Ben to cancel the love potion, and transported herself to stand by her friends.
"This wasn't really being used anyway..." She called down to Fairy Godmother. "And, you know, it's not wise to keep something this powerful anywhere that villains or their kids could get their hands on it. Since we assume there will be most kids from the Island coming over, we thought we'd just take care of it for you."
"After that whole speech yesterday?" Chad yelled.
Mal smirked. "We're not evil, Chad. But we're not good either. We're just - bad."
Evie began to sing, just loud enough for the whole gathering to hear. "Mirror mirror, on the wall. Who's the baddest of them all?"
Mal looked straight at the cameras that were filming the whole thing. "Mother, I know you're watching. And I know what you're thinking. And no, I'm not coming for you. You can stay on that Island and rot, for all I care. Goodbye."
All four of them laughed, and Mal raised the wand just as the guards were finally able to push through the masses of people and run straight at them. With a flash of light, the four were gone.
As long as Ben was king, the kingdom enjoyed a time of curious peace. New villains cropped up all over the world every now and again, and would cause destruction and damage, but none dared come near Auradon. Villains understand power, and they knew that - for whatever reason - the Rotten Four had claimed that small patch of the world as their own. They were the only ones allowed to mess with the inhabitants, and would respond fiercely to anyone else that tried.
They did love to mess with people. Once Auradon Prep woke up to find that overnight everything had turned either black or white - even the people. Every now and again, people would start acting very weird, and make complete fools of themselves. Then a stack of brownies would appear in their general vicinity. Once these were eaten, they would be back to normal. And these were just two of the many, many tricks and pranks that they played.
Ben, never having told Mal that he loved her, learned to let her go. He saw that the only love she was capable of was reserved for her friends, and left it at that. Eventually he married Mulan's daughter. Their children would enjoy the same peace - and mischief - that had prevailed during their father's reign.
And, every few years, King Ben would know that the Rotten Four were keeping their promise and protecting his people. Because every few years, he would find a bowl of bright purple strawberries, a tiny stuffed dog, something leather, or a glass mirror on his bedside table.