Author's Note: Not much to say this week, I'm fairly fixed on my idea for the end to this story now so all's that's left to do is write it. Read, Review favorite and enjoy!


Chapter 54: You're my hero, Robin Hood

Apple wasn't entirely sure about what she was expecting when she entered a book full of fairy tales, but she was decently sure this wasn't it. Standing inside of what suspiciously looked like the headmaster's office, words were written on everything from the walls to the furniture. Everything that was there that is. As if the entire scene was merely stain on a window there were... cracks, gaps in the scenery, revealing when one looked through it not outside of the office or even outside of the school, but rather another dimension of some sort or another, composed of faded shades of blue. Perhaps most strangely of all, was who was sitting in the Headmaster's chair, for that was clearly not Milton Grimm, but rather Morgan Konigan, wearing a business woman's suit and working at a type writer.

"Raven's Mother!? What are you doing here!?" Morgan looked up from the type writer, revealing the word 'narrator' written across her face. "Your not Morgan." Apple noted realizing that there weren't any words written on her. "What are you then, are you like that person who Maddie switched with a while ago?"

"I'm a book not a person." 'Morgan' stated going back to the book.

"Why do you look like Raven's mother?" Apple asked turning her head in confusion.

"I look like the most recent guardian of the Book of Legends." The 'Book' explained not even looking at Apple.

"Then shouldn't that be Milton or his brother?" Apple asked looking confused.

"You're thinking of the current guardian's father Milton, the role was meant to be passed onto her, but she refused to complete the transition, probably explaining your confusion."

"Milton's Morgan's...!?" Apple was about to say something angry, but breathed in and out calming herself in the process. "I don't have time for this. I need to be somewhere, there's a curse trying to destroy the school and the answer is suppose to be inside of my story."

"Watch your step." The 'Book' pointed into a room Apple thought to be the study.

"The curse affecting the Headmaster's brother, it was hidden inside of the book." Apple started to explain but was cut off.

"Complete your story, and you will find it." The Book stated still ignoring Apple's presence by as much as possible.

It wasn't long though that Apple found her first obstacle, a ravine that had formed from the cracks in the dimension.

"Well, here's hoping you guys can fix the book."


A arrow attached to the end of a rope was fired into the Headmaster's Balcony, and a bow was used to zipline into that balcony. What surprised Sparrow more then that someone thought of doing it but that he couldn't, use the Zipline that is, it was some kind of illusion.

"Huh. I was wondering about that." The curse is meant to repeat the same day over and over again, the undead are meant to serve as stand ins for the people who died on that day, the question was then what about the people who got out of this nightmare pit alive, the obvious answer was that illusions were being used to fill in those particular gaps. The real question was how useful would they be, and perhaps more importantly, who this guy was, dressed in black clothing and wearing a hood. Perhaps less concerning then the man in black who was content to hang from the balcony was the one standing inside of the Headmaster's office, though Sparrow felt hesitant to call him a man. "So that's gotta be the Draug, now how do I get inside." Sparrow initially planned to do the same thing as the man in black, but he ran the risk of the Draug noticing them, then again that guy got out of this mess in one piece. "Decisions, decisions." Sparrow went through his goody bag, and pulled out a potion arrow filled with red liquid, and promptly notched it on his bow. "Alright you ugly butt pain. Lets do this."

The Front door wasn't locked, and the Draugr's weren't much of a match against Mira's healing potions, so getting to the headmaster's office was the easy part, though Sparrow wished he hadn't when he looked inside.

"Oh wow, this guy's got some messed up hobbies." That was putting it mildly, hanging from hooks in the sealing, one might at first assume that Blue Beard was keeping women's dresses in his room. Then Sparrow saw dried, mummified flesh sticking out of it the dresses, breasts, feet, hands, small amounts of black smoke were coming out of the top of those headless bodies. "The heck is...?" Then the Draug, Blue Beard, adjusted what could have been his belt, and what resembled a pipe came out of his groin... "MMM!" Sparrow dumped out a flower pot and used it to muffle the sound of his own vomit.

"Sweet lord I'm never gonna be able to un-see that!" Sparrow loudly thought as he peered around the corner and saw that the Draug finish with the corpse hanging from the ceiling.

"Hello little Robin Hood." Immediately Sparrow ducked back behind the corner, thinking he had been found out. "Came to rescue that whore's girl?"

"That's rich coming from you Blue Beard!" The man in black climbed up the balcony and stood on the railing, the pregnant girl standing in the corner of the room looked confused on what she should do, as made evident by the way that she looked between her captor and would be rescuer. "So what shall I remove first? Your eyes, your balls? Or should I just start taking you apart joint by joint you god forsaken piece of garbage?"

While Sparrow found his ancestor and this monster snarling at each other fascinating, he still had work to do, he saw the stand that the Book of Legends was kept on and the dusty tome in question. Blue Beard fortunately was content to immediately close the distance with the hooded rogue in question bull rushing him and the both of them going straight out the window.

"Well that was easier then I expected." Sparrow immediately went up to the case in question and removed the book. "I'm traumatized for life, but it was easier then I expected." As Sparrow was about to leave, he looked over to the pregnant girl who was looking down on the two individuals fighting in the courtyard. "Oi can you hear me?" Sparrow went up behind the pregnant girl and waved his hand in front of her face. "So the illusions can't see us, and we can't touch them."

"RAAAAAGGGHHH!" Sparrow looked over the balcony and saw his ancestor put arrows into the shoulder of Blue Beard.

"But they can touch those undead monsters? That's good to know." Saying that Sparrow took off down the hallways.


Apple long ago decided that she didn't have the time to waste waiting for the book to be fixed, lord knows they've waited long enough for that stupid thing to get fixed. Instead, Apple forced the book shelf off to the inside into the doorway of the study and pushed it over, one loud crash later and Apple had a bridge across the dimensional gap allowing her to walk across it into the mirror. After forcing her way through the film like mirror Apple found herself somewhere else, the courtyard of a castle town, and yet so obviously not, none of the people had any faces and the cracks indicating the presence of the broken book were everywhere including on some of the people.

"Where is this place? This should be the start of the Snow White story."

"Hear he Hear he ladies and Gentlemen!" A man walked onto the balcony of the castle, his arms spread into the air, and once Apple had her glasses on she could read the words written across his chest, 'the Good King.'

"So that's the original Evil Queen's husband?" Apple asked keeping her glasses aligned with her hand.

"You could say that." Apple turned around to face a familiar sight.

"Baba?" Apple asked staring in shock at the appearance of Raven's grand mother, thought it took a minuet for her to catch on it didn't seem to matter to the story book character.

"The book updates itself with every new person to sign it, didn't the Narrator explain this to you already?" The 'Evil Queen' as noted by the line written across her chest, explained in a monotone voice. Speaking of her chest, she wasn't exactly wearing a outfit worthy of a Queen, in fact it was much closer to the monk's robe that Mira was wearing when they first met.

"So Morgan never signed the book?" Apple asked cocking a brow at the character opposite to her.

"The most recent person to sign the book simply reads 'Screw you Old Man!'" The 'Evil Queen' explained with a casual shrug.

"Figures." Apple could only shake her head in approval.

"If you're done now I do have to get going." The Evil Queen stated as she moved to walk passed Apple.

"Ah no! No! We need your help actually." The Evil Queen cocked a vaguely interested brow at Apple. "We need information from one of the past Evil Queen's about a curse she created: Sabrina's Crucifixion."

"That curse was created to protect a vital choke point within our nation's border's I won't divulge that information easily." The Evil Queen stated narrowing a glare.

"I know I know but some friends of mine need the information to beat Blue Beard." That surprised the Evil Queen, much to Apple's confusion. "Did you know him?"

"If you knew anything about that name you would not bring it up so casually." The Evil Queen closed her eyes, breathed in, and opened them again. "See this story to the end, then you will have your answers. Now if you excuse me, you're holding up the story." Apple looked around, no one was moving, like time had stopped, like the story had been interrupted, like a child had talked during story time and the story teller had stopped to avoid having to speak over her.

"Sorry." Apple stepped aside, and the Evil Queen had changed. It wasn't a significant way, but gone was the lifeless hollow look one could expect from the embodiment of a stack of paper, now was the angered face of someone who was wronged and set out to correct it, pushing her way to the front of the crowd while radiating bloodlust. Funny how much Jadis looked like her daughter when she was mad.

"My wife has been exposed as a witch! As such she has been punished appropriately." The 'Good King' a nickname that Apple quickly realized was massively inappropriate, revealed a severed head in his hands and promptly dropped it off of his balcony, bouncing a couple of times before stopping at the feet of the 'Evil Queen.' Said future monarch, fell to her knees tears coming down from her eyes as she made a effort to use her hand to stop her tears. "As such, I suddenly find myself single and in need of a new wife." The woman in question rose from her knees, a combination of her storming forward and the crowd backing away from the castle isolated the woman. Perhaps sensing someone was looking at him, the Good King looked down and saw his future wife approaching the castle. "Ah perfect a volunteer, guards! Escort that one inside!" Apple had followed the Evil Queen, even as the guard's seized her by both of her arms, confused as to what was happening.

"I don't understand, who is this woman your sister?" Apple asked examining the head that the Good King had so carelessly tossed away.

"That is the first part of your curse." The Evil Queen explained as time immediately stood still, and indeed examining the head Apple opened her mother's mouth and found a tiny piece of paper inside.


It felt like it had been a long time since Milton had seen the book, so many crazy things had happened since the last time he took it out of it's case to examine it. Every detail was exactly as he remembered it: Every page was immaculate, it's bindings perfect, the maroon leather enchanted to remain so fresh it even still had the same new book smell to it, it's golden corners shone with it's own internal light source and a pink lock shaped jewel had been embedded inside of the hardened cover of the book. It was amazing to the point of stupefying, it was so obvious that he was kicking himself for not realizing it sooner, all along the answer had been staring him right in his face and now he held it in his hands, the answer to all of their problems.

"Headmaster? Yo Headmaster?" Sparrow asked waving his hand in front of the Headmaster's face. "Is there a problem?"

"I have bad news and good news young Mr. Sparrow." The Headmaster trembled with anticipation, whether that anticipation was from fear or excitement was hard for his students to understand. Finally, after several moments for Milton staring at the book like he was looking into the face of a god the question was asked.

"Exactly what is this news headmaster?" Blondie asked her instincts as a reporter demanding that she ask the question.

"Firstly, this is not the Story Book of Legends." Milton's voice was filled with a maddened joy that his students, indeed perhaps no one bar a very few, have ever heard in the entirety of their lives.

"What!? I risked my neck to get that thing and you're only telling me now I got the wrong one!?" Sparrow was understandably enraged, not only because of what he told his classmates, but from the horrific sight he had witnessed which irredeemably marred that office and scarred him for life.

"Oh no you didn't Mr. Hood. You have gotten something much better." That Old Man's very clever daughter had all of them fooled from the beginning, she must have hidden the real book in his office and replaced it with this immaculate fake. She had laid the groundwork, for reasons that only she would ever know, but now he was going to seize on the opening she had created. Today he would at last make things right. "Young Mr. Sparrow, no, the Great Hero Sparrow Hood. With the power of this book, we are going to fix this broken world. Tonight!"


Review Section:

Zwei Eis: Let's just say for now that if she wasn't off of fairy tales for life before, she will be after this.

DJ: After everything she's been through it wouldn't surprise me. The ritual was for casting the curse that summoned the Dragir's to the school. I intend to, thank you for saying so.

Charlie: That's the great thing about being constantly put through apocalyptic crisis's you don't have time to think about your own personal crisis's. Fairly easy once the figure out what they got and who they're up against.

Wade: You can drop the air quotes, those two are pretty damn nasty. It usually does.