Disclaimer 1: That '70s Show copyright The Carsey-Werner Company, LLC and Twentieth Century Fox Home Entertainment, LLC. The 10th Kingdom copyright Babelsberg International Filmproduktion GmbH & Co. Beitriebs KG and Hallmark Entertainment Distribution, LLC. No money's being made through this story. Simply written out of the love for the two series.
Disclaimer 2: I have taken great pains not to reproduce any of the narrative from The 10th Kingdom novelization by Kathryn Wesley. The narrative (i.e. the words) of this story are mine with the exception that some of dialogue has been retained from The 10th Kingdom for the sake of story clarity.
CHAPTER 12
THE BOAT'S A CRUISER
Hyde's plans to score himself some Dwarf moss were cut short. Donna found a small wooden yacht further down the riverbank, and its owner didn't seem to be around.
"Guys, we can totally follow the mirror on this," she said. "Maybe we'll even catch up."
Forman shook his head. "But, Donna, what about the guy who owns the boat? Won't he be upset if it's missing?"
"Who cares?" Hyde unmoored the boat from the dock with a satisfied grin. Stealing was almost as much fun as having a circle, and swiping something this big was a nice first for him.
"So..." Forman said once everyone had boarded, "how do we drive this thing?"
Jackie waved at the mast. "Okay, Donna, since you have those lumberjack arms, unfurl the—"
"No... no!" Kelso said. "Who said you get to command this ship? I'm the only one with a rank here."
"Yeah, and I'm the only one who's had experience on boats, Michael."
"Wha—so? If I still had my badge, I'd—"
Hyde had no interest in this fight, so he took himself on a quick tour. The boat was a good size. It had a shelter in the middle of the deck, and stairs inside the shelter led down to sleeping quarters. He found two bunk beds there, a sink, and a craphole. Decent. He finished the tour by claiming the top bunk farthest from the stairs.
All was relatively quiet when he returned above deck. The choice of captain, apparently, had been decided.
"Michael, go into the cubby and start up that weird steam engine," Jackie said and pointed to the shelter. "Donna, unfurl the mainsail. Eric, take control of the rudder."
The boat pulled away from the dock without sinking or throwing anyone overboard. Jackie was definitely the right person for the job. If Kelso had won that fight, Hyde would've mutinied, but he had no intention of taking her orders either. Her captain's voice was as abrasive as her normal one. She used to yap to him about the summers she spent on "Daddy's" yacht, about learning how to sail, how she sunned herself on deck. But her "great tan" was never the main event of the stories. It was the sky. She always described the sky in such freakin' poetic terms, like she was in love with it. If that crap was gonna start up again, he'd have to find something to stab his eardrums with.
"Subtle movements, Eric," Jackie said. "Donna, keep up the tension on that line. Michael..."
Hyde leaned over the boat rail and watched the river flow by. In a few minutes, he'd be able to block her out—
"Don't let them get away!"
That wasn't Jackie's voice. He looked back toward the dock. The Troll King was pointing at the river, and his dumbass kids were charging ahead of him.
"Michael!" Jackie ran into the shelter.
Kelso's head popped up. "Wha—holy shit! Eric, watch out!"
The three Troll kids leapt off the dock and crashed into the water just behind the boat. Bluebell and Blabberwort thrashed around ineffectually, but Burly pulled himself onto the rudder and started to climb up.
"Somebody do something!" Forman shouted.
"You're dog meat!" Burly was halfway onto the stern.
Hyde searched the deck for something, anything he could use as a weapon, but Jackie barreled out of the shelter with a wooden board. She screamed like a maniac and bashed it against the Troll's skull. She hit him again and again until he slipped off the rudder.
Burly struggled to keep his head above water while his siblings swam back to land—and to their pissed-off Papa. Hyde smirked. The Troll King would probably shove his foot up their dumb asses.
The boat drifted farther and farther away, and everyone onboard shouted sailor-worthy burns at the uggos except for Jackie. She was breathing heavily and the wooden board was shaking in her hands. Her takedown of that Troll was pretty badass, but Hyde kept his mouth shut. One wrong word, and his skull was next.
The dock was no longer visible on the horizon. Forman did a good job steering the boat, and Hyde left him to it. The water they sailed on gave a smooth ride. Mountains rose along the river, and mist drifted from them into a hazy sky. This trip would've actually been enjoyable if there weren't so many things out to kill him. The farthest out of Point Place he'd gone was Vegas, but gambling and boozing and watching strippers didn't give him the same mellow that nature did. Or his stash.
Hyde considered going below deck to take take a nap, but then he spotted Jackie on the bow. She was sitting there all alone, caressing the Troll King's shoes. Her pupils were dilated, and he was tempted to loan her his shades 'cause she looked like a total burnout.
He sat down beside her, but she didn't seem to notice. Her eyes were too busy flirting with the air.
"You do realize you have no makeup on, and your hair's flatter than Forman's ass," he said.
She gazed at the sky. "I'm still prettier than anyone here."
"Yeah..." He didn't know if she meant this boat or the whole of the Nine Kingdoms. He brushed a few strands of hair from her face. "Yeah, you are."
She finally looked at him and put a hand over her heart. "Oh, Steven! You still think I'm bea—"
He made his move. He snatched the shoes from her and flung them into the river.
"No!" Jackie shouted. "No, no... NO!"
She ran to the boat railing and swung a leg over it. She was determined to have those those shoes even if it meant drowning, but Hyde yanked her back on deck before she could jump.
"Jackie, just chil—"
She elbowed him in the ribs, smacked his jaw, elbowed him again. His grip on her arm was slipping. If she got free... He pinned her to the deck, using the weight of his body.
"Why did you do that?" Jackie's voice shook as if he'd cut off her foot—or her hair.
"'Cause it had to be done," he said.
She rammed her knee into him, inches from his 'nads. He sat up and straddled her waist, grabbed onto her wrists. He hated this, having to restrain her—having to be so damn close to her—but letting her drown was the only alternative.
"You threw away my shoes!" She managed to kick his back. Freakin' cheerleading.
"You were gonna put them on tonight, weren't you?" he said.
"Yes!" Jackie said. "I—wait, how did you know that?"
Her body finally relaxed, and her pupils were shrinking to their natural state. She'd be back to her normal self soon, which was good because he was tired of having to deal with her.
"Magic shoes—Jackie Burkhart," he raised an eyebrow, "how could anyone not know that?"
Kelso couldn't believe how quickly his luck had changed. He'd gone from lowly prisoner to captain of a mighty ship in a matter of hours. Jackie had abandoned the job without explanation. And just seconds ago, Eric left the rudder to follow Donna below deck—even though her joy at seeing him alive seemed to have worn off. She'd made fun of his shiny new choppers, got pissed he'd given up the I.D. bracelet 'cause "You shouldn't have been wearing it in the first place, dink!" and stomped downstairs. And that was how Kelso became captain. Captain Kelso and his doggy first mate, Fez.
"Mr. Fez," he said, "how does the water look?"
Fez was staring at the river over the rail. "It looks wet. Kelso—"
"Call me 'Captain'."
"Captain Kelso," Fez said, "thank you for trying to free me, even though you failed so miserably at it."
"Aw, think nothing of it, buddy." Kelso patted Fez's head. "I'm a cop. That's what cops do."
"Yes, and you are my friend. Does your back still hurt?"
Kelso shifted in his seat by the rudder. "A little... Hey, listen. Don't tell Hyde about it, okay? 'Cause he'd just hit me. And then he'd laugh. And I'm not really in the mood for that."
"Don't worry. I won't tell him."
"Because we're friends?"
"No, because he doesn't understand anything I say." Fez sighed. "I have missed so much. "Donna and Eric are no longer together. Jackie and Hyde are back together—"
"Uh, no they're not. They're totally over. Hyde hasn't even looked at her in months, which is great since I plan on doing it with her here... as much as humanly possible."
"Then you will have to get past Hyde because he's keeping a close watch on her."
"He is?" Kelso stood up and looked toward the bow. Hyde and Jackie were wrestling over something. But then they fell onto the deck, and Kelso couldn't see them anymore. "Oh, man, are they about to—I am the captain of this boat!" he shouted across the deck. "There will be no doing it unless I am involved!" He tried to get a better view, but the shelter was in the way, and he wasn't about to leave his post. Fez couldn't steer with his paws.
Moments later, Jackie and Hyde were on their feet. Neither of them were naked, but Jackie did seem a little dazed. She went below deck alone while Hyde joined Kelso at the stern.
"Hey." Hyde leaned against the rail and crossed his arms.
"What were you and Jackie fighting over?" Kelso said.
"Nothing that matters now."
"You know," Kelso jerked his thumb at Fez, "my first mate thinks you guys are back together."
Hyde scratched Fez behind the ears. "You want her, boy? She's all yours."
Fez wagged his tail.
"No, he can't." Kelso grabbed Fez's tail to stop it from wagging. "I already have dibs. Anyway, she doesn't do doggy style. I tried that with her one ti—ow!" Hyde had frogged him. "What was that for?"
"Just glad you're alive, man."
Kelso smiled and rubbed his shoulder. "Me, too. I'm glad Trolls didn't eat you."
"Yup." Hyde pushed himself off the rail and stood again. "That would've been a downer." Then he returned to the bow.
"Damn. Now I'm hungry," Kelso said.
He rifled through the pockets of his prison-issue jacket. He'd stashed some dried beanstalk sticks somewhere, but instead he found Clayface's soap. Three guys, two chicks, and a doggy were carved into it like tiny action figures, and on the base were the words: The Six Who Saved the Nine Kingdoms.
"Cool," he said, "but it looks nothing like me." He chucked the soap sculpture into the river.
"What was that? Was it candy?" Fez said.
"Nope. I would've eaten that."
Donna awoke to a terrible, unrelenting clamor. Kelso was banging on a metal pot—was it morning already?—and she covered her ears. She'd slept on a bunk below deck, and it wasn't a bad sleep. But now she was getting a headache. Kelso had taken his captain duties seriously. He'd stayed by the rudder all night, although she had a feeling he'd slept through most of it. And he kept banging on that damn pot.
"Kelso, would you cut it out?"
"Not until everyone's awake, Donna!"
Eric was twisted in a blanket on the bunk across from hers. Fez was curled up at the end of it, but one bang of the pot by his ears made him jump off. Another bang, and Eric finally shot up—he'd always been a heavy sleeper—and hit his head on the the bed above him.
"Ow!"
The front panel of a dresser crashed down next to his bunk. Behind it was a fish tank with a large, dead fish suspended inside.
"What is that?" Kelso dropped the pot and ran to the tank. "Whoa, that's one hell of a fish. Look at the teeth on it."
A golden plaque was screwed onto the dresser. Eric read it out loud. "World Famous Golden River Gold Fish."
"Let me guess—it's magic?" Hyde spoke from the stairs, and he sounded cranky. Spending the night above deck couldn't have been pleasant. But with Jackie sleeping down here, Donna understood why he'd done it.
"Hey, guys, check it out," Kelso said. Fez was standing next to him, wagging his tail. "Fez says this is the famous, anything-you-touch-will-turn-to-gold fish."
Donna crept out of bed and went to the tank. Another plaque was screwed into the dresser, and a small red hammer lay above it on hooks.
"Warning: Do not break glass except in case of financial emergency," the plaque said.
"Look!" Eric pointed to a curled piece of paper inside the tank. On it was a poem:
Stick your finger in my mouth.
Then turn around 'til you face south.
Touch a thing that you would prize,
And you will not believe your eyes.
Here is magic to behold.
All that glitters can be gold.
Eric and Kelso looked at each other in awe.
"All right!" Eric said.
Hyde crossed his arms. "Super."
Jackie leapt out of the top bunk, fully awake, as if the poem had been an alarm.
"Gold?" she said and grabbed the hammer off the hooks. "You mean, I could touch anything?"
Donna snatched the hammer from her. "We don't need to turn anything into gold. What we need is to find some food. Water isn't enough."
"But, Donna," Eric said, "gold is gold. The guy who owned this boat's probably living it up in some castle somewhere. I could—I could touch a boulder. A boulder of gold!"
"Or a mountain!" Kelso said.
"Or yourself, moron!" Hyde said. "You'd end up forgetting you had a magic finger, pick your nose, and become the golden statue Moronicus."
Kelso glowered at him. "I wouldn't forget, Hyde. If anything, Eric would turn Donna into gold."
"I would not, you dillhole!" Eric slapped Kelso on the back, and Kelso cried out in pain like he'd been hit by someone with actual strength. "Donna," Eric said to her, "I wouldn't."
"That's right because I'm keeping this thing," she shook the hammer in their faces, "far away from you idiots."
Eric and Kelso's expressions fell in disappointment, but she really would have to find a sneaky hiding spot. Dink and Doofus were completely capable of turning one of them into gold.
"If either of them try to take that hammer away from you," Hyde said, "hit 'em in the jewels with it."
Donna tapped the hammer on her palm. That was good advice.