NightIntent: This isn't really one of my better stories. It kinda bores me. Hope you like it anyway.
Disclamier: I don't own the fairy tale, only Damsels, Inc. and its employees. And Richard, can't forget him.
"So now we have to deal with idiot princesses as well as princes, huh?" Beryl asked the air around her. "Very well." She walked to the door of her office, holding the letter that had sparked her comment. Sabrina was walking in the hallway. "Perfect! Sabrina, you're going on a job. Alone, this time."
"I have to go alone, huh?" Sabrina asked. "All right. What am I supposed to do?"
Beryl grinned and said, "Come in here and I'll tell you."
"Stupid, stubborn, vain, idiotic princesses," Sabrina mumbled as she walked. "What in the world possesses them to do things like this? What make them think they're so clever, so intelligent, so beautiful, that they can get away with crap like this?" She rolled her eyes as the castle came into view over the hill she was climbing.
Sabrina settled down in a nearby forest, waiting for the next idiot to try his luck with the princess's royal command. The very next day, a young man came hunting in her forest, carrying a large, unwieldy rifle. Sabrina, as Beryl had instructed, changed into a raven. She flew in front of the man, trying to make herself painfully obvious to him. He saw her, and leveled his gun at her.
"Please, sir, please don't shoot me," Sabrina begged. Luckily, ravens never show much emotion, so she didn't need to put her poor acting skills into play. "I have a family waiting for me, to bring them food. Please, if you spare me, I will help you!"
"Fine," the man grumbled, lowering his gun and walking on. Sabrina followed him. When he got to a lake, Sabrina changed into a big fish. She leaped out of the water, then, much like a dolphin, rolled onto her side and stared at the man out of her one visible eye.
When the man once again leveled his gun, Sabrina cried, "Don't shoot, don't shoot! If you let me live, I'll do something for you in return!"
The man glared, looking disgruntled at his two failed hunting attempts, but he lowered his gun anyway. Sabrina once again followed him. When he was almost at a clearing, Sabrina turned into a fox and shoved a thorn into her foot. Limping, she walked into the clearing just as the man walked in. He fired at her and missed.
"Can you take the thorn from my foot, kind sir?" Sabrina queried. When the man did so, he leveled his gun at her again, ready to take another shot at her. But Sabrina said, "If you don't shoot me, I will repay you somehow."
So the man turned and went back to the castle. Sabrina, well satisfied, turned into a cat and curled into a ball to go to sleep.
The next day, the young man came running out of the palace, straight to the forest. He called, "Raven, raven, come here!"
Sabrina obliged, changing into her raven form. "What is it you want, so early in the morning?" she demanded, as if she didn't know.
"I spared your life, now you must save mine!" the man announced, for all the world as if he was a prince.
"Hmm, now, is that so? Let me think about this for a bit," Sabrina said. She put up a great pretense of thinking very hard, rubbing her wing over her face, shifting from foot to foot, and all the while she knew exactly what she would do. Finally, after letting the man sweat for a bit, Sabrina cried, "I know! You can get into an egg from my nest!"
Sabrina flew into the forest, grabbed a broken chicken egg that she'd taken from Damsels, Inc., and put the man into it. She then sat on it.
The princess that Sabrina had been complaining about earlier walked by her magic windows. She didn't spot the man's hiding place until her eleventh window. Then she ordered the raven to be shot and the man brought to her. Sabrina flew away before the soldiers got to her, and thus escaped her death. She'd known that would happen.
The next day, the man got another chance. He ran to the lake, where Sabrina was waiting for him. He called, "Fish! Come here now!"
Sabrina, much annoyed by this command, came to the surface of the lake, glared at him as much as her fish face and eyes would let her, and demanded, "What do you want this time?"
"This time?" The man looked puzzled, but let it go quickly. He had more pressing matters to attend to. "Since I let you live, so you must help me live."
"Fine. The raven told me you might do this. You can hide inside me." So Sabrina swallowed him and swam down to the bottom of the lake.
The princess found her hiding place at the twelfth window. She ordered Sabrina to be killed once again, and the man be brought to her. Sabrina, though, spat him out and swam away, turning back into a human.
On the third day, the man came running to the forest for the last time. He arrived at the clearing, where Sabrina was waiting as a fox, and called "Fox! I need your help! You are my last resort!"
"I'm a last resort?" Sabrina inquired. She let it go. "Fine. Come with me." Sabrina led the man to a small spring. She said, "Jump in here and you will turn into an animal. I will turn human, and I will show you my plan."
So they both jumped in. Sabrina turned into a human, and the man turned into a monkey. Fitting, Sabrina thought. They clambered out. Sabrina grabbed the man-turned-monkey and went to town with him. She had the monkey perform random little tricks. The townspeople were delighted, and all came to watch the little animal jump about, performing its charming antics.
Finally, the princess came down from her palace to see what all the excitement was. When she saw the monkey, she wanted it. She offered Sabrina a large sum of money, and was given the monkey. Before she handed the monkey over, Sabrina whispered to him, "When she looks through the window to find you, hide under her hair."
So the princess went to her windows, and looked through them. At the eleventh window, she was getting nervous. At the twelfth window, she still could not find him. In a fit of rage, she threw the monkey to the floor and yelled, "Get out of my sight!" The monkey obliged, running to the spring.
"You are the most cunning of them all," the young man told Sabrina the fox after he'd turned back. "The raven and the fish are stupid compared to you." He ran off. Sabrina glared at his back. An hour later, she heard that the princess and the man she'd helped got married. Shaking her head and muttering about the vanity of princesses, Sabrina went back to Damsels, Inc.
At Damsels, Inc., all was chaos again. Richard was back, being chased by Guinivere and Tara, and Beryl's office was a jumble of papers again. Sabrina smiled at the comfortable familiarity of it, and went to her room to get a decent few hours of sleep. Curling up on the ground is no way for a human to sleep, even in animal form.
NightIntent: I have two questions. One, what kind of idiot would try to shoot a fish in water? Two, why do I enjoy tormenting Guinivere with Richard so much? Please review.