ONCE COUPON A TIME
~~~~~~~~~~~~CHAPTER ONE~~~~~~~~~~~~~
A long time ago, in the faraway kingdom of Babahl, Colias Palaeno had to do paperwork.
"My goodness," said Colias Palaeno as he stared at the foot-high stack of papers in front of him, "I can't believe how much paperwork I have to do."
"It can't be helped," said Manny Coachen, the man on the other side of the desk. "If you don't fill all this out, you can't get selected as the ambassador to the United States, no matter how qualified you are. And you know that I'm pulling for you, don't you, Colias?" Coachen's wrinkled face creased even deeper as his grin broadened. "You're simply the best person for the job."
"Now you're just flattering me," said Colias, suddenly looking serious, "I couldn't handle any of this without you here to run the day-to-day things."
"So? Ambassadors never do things like that anyway!" Coachen sneered, pounding the desk, "Colias, buddy, you got more important things to do, and that's what YOU'RE good at. Now fill out those papers. I'll be damned if Phoebis Statira gets the ambassadorship; that micro-managing asshole would be too busy analyzing how much ink I use on my business cards to do his own goddamn job."
"Manny, come on, don't use language like that," Colias pleaded, "You're getting all bent out of shape. Whattaya say we relax for a while and get back to the paperwork when you're not in such a mood, hm? I know just the thing to cheer you up! Are you thinking what I'm thinking?"
Manny replied, "I think I'm thinking what you're thinking."
"Well, if you think you're thinking what I'm thinking, you probably ARE thinking what I'm thinking."
"Oh, so you think I'm thinking what you're thinking?"
"I think so."
((IMPORTANT AUTHOR NOTE: Neither of them were thinking about homosexual buttsex, so all you ladies out there getting hot and bothered can calm down and get your hands back up on the keyboard. Except for the hot ones over 18, who should PM me.))
((IMPORTANT AUTHOR NOTE: Don't really PM me.))
((IMPORTANT AUTHOR NOTE: I'm worried that I may have upset the flow of the story with all of these important author notes, so to remind you where we left off, Colias had just asked Manny if he (Manny) was thinking what he (Colias) was thinking.))
Nearly in unison, Colias gleefully shouted, "SHOPPING SPREE!" while Manny's deeper, huskier voice bellowed "BRING OUT THE WHORES!"
An awkward silence followed, broken in a few seconds by Manny Coachen muttering, "Or, uh, yeah, a shopping spree would be nice too. Because of how many coupons you have."
((IMPORTANT AUTHOR NOTE: OK, this next section of the fanfic is a daring and bold experiment in which I relentlessly push the boundaries of "what is fanfic?" much like Pablo Picasso might have done if he wrote fanfic. Essentially, the next section of the fanfic takes the form of an 80s movie montage, so you readers out there ought to queue up a song in your media player of choice, or open a YouTube video. I've gone through several songs with the following scene in mind, and I give my recommendation to "Vacation" as performed by The Go-Go's. If you have that song, please listen to it while reading the following scene, otherwise find a song that works for you and listen to it while reading the following scene. This promises to be a groundbreaking moment in the development of fanfiction; are you as excited as I am?!))
As the opening riff of your montage song of choice begins to play, Colias and Manny pull up in front of a shopping mall in a beautiful red sports car. Manny is driving and Colias' hair is waving in the breeze. A woman with 80s hair, legwarmers, and too much makeup winks at him and Colias blows her a kiss.
During the first verse of your montage song of choice, Colias and Manny are seen in a men's clothing store. Colias goes into the dressing room to try on different outfits. As he comes out of the dressing room in different suits, Manny shakes his head to indicate his disapproval for the outfits, EXCEPT for the last suit, where Manny tilts his head to one side with a thoughtful expression on his face and finally gives the thumbs-up to indicate that Colias Palaeno is a SNAZZY DRESSER who the ladies are in love with. Which ladies, you may ask? ALL OF THEM.
During the chorus of your montage song of choice, Colias and Manny are at a karaoke bar singing the chorus of your montage song of choice. Every time the chorus plays in the song, the same scene takes place, except each time around, Colias and Manny are visibly more drunk than they were the last time.
During the second verse of your montage song of choice, Colias and Manny are at a roller derby and are the last two contestants in a limbo contest. After both of them alternate going under a lower and lower limbo bar, they finally both attempt to go under the limbo bar at the same time and crash into each other. The owner of the roller rink declares a tie and they share a trophy that says "ROLLER LIMBO CHAMPION."
((IMPORTANT AUTHOR NOTE: The previous montage scene is super funny if you listened to Yakety Sax (the Benny Hill Theme) and pictured everything running at double speed.))
Later, after the shopping spree was over, Colias Palaeno listened to Eye of the Tiger by Survivor and got SO PUMPED that he completed all of the paperwork in an hour and a half and got picked to be the Ambassador of Babahl.