"Good morning, Pascal." Once everyone was awake they made their way to the dining room for breakfast, "You know, aside from the fact that we were nearly replaced by evil doppelgangers last night, the house of yesterdays tomorrow offers a pretty good nights sleep."

"Well, it's certainly the coziest seashell shaped inn I've ever slept in"

"I've stayed in a cozier one, no wait, that was a seashell shaped like an inn." Artemis eyed the short old man with a hint of worry, "How did you possibly—"

"Uh uh, best not to ask." Eugene stopped the teen from pursuing answers. She nodded, he was probably right.

"Five stars"

"Oh, wait a minute. The door." It was just…gone.

"It was right here yesterday."

"Now, everyone relax, there's a solution to every problem." It was when lance started laughing nervously that everyone shared a look of worry.

"It's no use," the poor guy was banging on the shell wall, "we're trapped, it's all over. Okay, what's for breakfast?"

"Wow…did you hurt your neck making that turn, Lance?" Artemis looked between him and the rest of her friends with a confused yet sarcastic expression.

"Come on guys, there's gotta be another way out of here." The princess walked in one door and out another, "Except in this case…" Cass cautiously opened another door and almost got sucked in,

"Cass!"

"That's not an exit." Eugene tried the next door only to find a room full off what looked to be junk…and glowing red eyes?"

"Dogs…Dogs, dogs, dogs!" Rapunzel quickly slammed the door, "A dog kennel. I mean, why not, right?"

"Well, at least we can take that door off the list."

"Hey, I found a way out." Everyone looked at Shorty but shrugged it off and followed. Stepping into the room it was like a giants toybox or something, "What is this…"

"Shorty, this isn't a way out."

"Well not with that attitude it's not."

"Well look, the adults would like to find a—" everyone split off Fromm Cass, leaving her to watch Shorty bounce around on the trampoline, "Oh great…" Artemis looked at a few of the odd stuffed animals, they weren't dissimilar to ones she herself had had as a child,

"Hello, my name is Eugene fitzher…bear. Rawr." Artemis looked over to see what Rapunzel was doing and cracked up.

"Wow, yeah. Your teddy bear voice could use some work, not to mention your pun skills, blondie."

"Okay, fine, fine, but isn't this crazy? Whoever all this belongs to is one lucky kid."

"One lucky, spoiled, kid."

"Oh, Eugene. There's nothing wrong with indulging a kid every now and then."

"Uh uh, now that's a slippery slope. Kid's need boundaries, you gotta let 'em know who's boss. Otherwise they turn out like Artemis, snarky and always ready to trip you up."

"Hey! I resent that remark. Especially coming from a former thief!"

"Oh, you gotta let them know who's boss, grr." When Rapunzel pulled the bear away Eugene was gone, "And he's gone…"

"Okay, play time's over."

"Come on, Cass. lighten up. When do we ever get the chance to play with amazing toy swords like this?"

"You do realize we do have actual swords, right?"

"Yeah, but since these are just toys—" Lance hit shorty's boat, spinning him a few times, "They don't hurt." Cass, smashed into Lance and knocked him to the ground, stealing the wooden sword. "Ha! Sure about that?" Lance looked up, defeated, "Okay, sword time's over."

"Now, come on. Enough messing around. We've gotta find an exit—" Cass suddenly gasped, "No way! I used to have a top just like this, I love these things."

"Uh, Cassandra? You like tops?" lance asked through bouts of laughter. Narrowing her eyes she glanced down at him, "Got a problem with that?" Suddenly terrified, the man raised his hands defensively, "No, by all means, spin away." Artemis came over to see the spinning top she was talking about as Cass pushed the button on top.

"Look at it go!"

"Does this seem weird to anybody else?" the top started to glow, and everyone knew, if it glowed it was bad news.

"Whoa…"

"Oh no…" everything was starting to look so much bigger,

"Well, we'd better keep looking for a way out." Rapunzel and Eugene heard childish laughter, and the cringe on Eugene's face was evident, they saw a Band of kids dart out of the room and followed them into the dining room.

"Wait…are those—"

"Our friends?" Lance and Cass were chasing each other around, "Can't catch me." The tow ran around the room and Cass threw raw eggs at Lance who hid behind a chair, Rapunzel's eyes were drawn to the now very small Artemis who sat off to the side, watching hesitantly.

An egg hit the side of Eugene's face as Cass laughed, "Tag, you're it! Fitzherbjerk."

"Yup, definitely them." Artemis ducked out of the way as Cass climbed up to one of the chandeliers, "Best. play time. Ever!" and threw another egg.


Lance was stacking random things into what Cass and Artemis could only guess was supposed to be a sculpture.

"Okay, Okay, something in this house has turned you all into children, so if we're going to turn you back, we're gonna need answers." Rapunzel held onto the now baby Shorty and the toddler Artemis who seemed fascinated that their hair was similar in color,

"Neh, neh, neh." Cass mimicked Eugene, sliding off her chair, "hey, you wanna play chase?"

"What, play chase? No. we need to know what happened so…speak up."

"Uh, Eugene, maybe you'd better let me talk to them." She passed him Shorty and Artemis who merely stared up at him curiously,

"You have long hair." He stared at the small girl in his arms, "Well, at least one of you is well behaved."

"Hi, Lance, so I see you're making something very tall, doesn't that look fun." Lance merely shrugged and went back to building, "So, lance, sweetheart, can you tell us how all this happened?"

"How what happened?"

"How you were turned into kids."

"Who turned into kids?" Rapunzel merely kept her smile as she tried to keep child lance on track, "How you were turned into kids." Lance merely scratched his head in confusion before leaning forward,

"Why do you have a bird in your hair?"

"Oh, well because I like birds and—"

"What kind of bird's are they?"

"Well it's not really any kind of bird, it's more of a simple design."

"Why's your hair so long?" As Lance and Rapunzel had their back and forth Artemis tugged on Eugene's vest, "I bet it's because you're really, really old…" Looking down at the little girl again, he quirked a brow,

"What is it, kiddo?"

"Cass pushed a button on something and now you're all big…"

"Cass pushed a button on something?" Artemis nodded, "What did that something look like?" The small blonde contorted her face, seemingly in concentration, "It was green and had all kinds of other colors on it."

"Okay, this is good. Anything else you can remember, kiddo?"

"It went whoosh! And it spun super-fast, then there was this shiny gold light and everything got bigger, like a fun house." Eugene nodded, "So it was colorful, and it spun…alright, we can work with that."

"Cass is gonna smoosh the cake…"

"Wha—Cass! you need to come down from there right now."

"Sure, I've been wanting to tell you something anyway." Cass motioned for Eugene to get closer before flicking him in the ear and running off again,

"Well it's nice to see that young Cassandra is even more pleasant than Cassandra classic." The baby shorty burped and both Eugene and Artemis looked disgusted,

"His breath is stinky… and why does he have a beard?"

"I don't know, kid." Cass launched herself into Lances sculpture thing, sending the tower of items toppling to the ground,

"Hey!'

"Cassandra, that was not nice. What do you have to say for yourself?"

"I have to say…I love the boom sound it made!" the tiny Cass giggled "Ten out of ten!" Lance and Cass quickly recuperated and started chasing one another again.

"Kids, kids, kids, kids, kids. The princess is not a maypole." Artemis looked at Cass and Lance as Eugene set her down, she looked around at the shell decal and smiled,

"Ooh, a lizard!"

"Ooh, I wanna hold him, I wanna hold him." Noticing Pascal jump off Rapunzel shoulder to avoid Cass and Lance, Artemis wandered over the corner of the room.

"Okay, okay, Lance be careful, he's not a squishy toy."

"Lance always loved animals as a kid." Eugene and Rapunzel turned to see Shorty on top of the China Hutch cuddling a duckling before rolling off, thankfully Mr. Mathews caught him before he hit the ground.

"Okay, that answers the question about Baby Shorty… but where did Artemis go?"

"'m right here…" She poked her head out from behind the white-haired man, "Fancy zis, I see someone has got into ze nursery. Ah, ze old top of time. Oh look at ze baby!" Artemis trotted over to Eugene and Rapunzel, grabbing onto their skirt and pants leg respectively, "He has a funny accent." Artemis commented,

"Artemis!" Startled the blonde tucked herself behind Eugene, "That wasn't very nice young lady, you apologize to Mr. Mathews." Artemis poked her head out from behind the former thief and stared at Mr. Mathews with big gold and blue eyes, "Sorry Mr. Mathews…"

"It is quite alright, my accent is a bit funny, isn't it?" Artemis merely blinked at him before hiding behind Eugene again.

"Now, now, now, would you look at zis mess." Mr. Mathews sing-songed as he looked at Cass and Lance

"He did it."

"She did it." The two children pointed fingers at one another, "He's lying."

"She's lying."

"Ze older you are, ze younger it makes you. Zis one must have been ancient." The older man laughed, Eugene and Rapunzel were not amused.

"Mathews, how do we turn our friends back and get out of this place? We want answers."

"Vell, is zat what you want or what you need?" the baby shorty pulled on Mathews' mustache, "Stop zat…" he scolded,

"in many cases zey are two very separate things…stop zat…however, in zis case it's most likely ze same thing." He pulled the baby away from his face again, "Will you stop zat?! You have ze mustache of your own."

"Mr. Mathews, please. Do you have any idea how to change our friends back?"

"Surely, it's a cinch. Simply find zat top and spin it in reverse."

"Okay, that seems easy enough."

"Of course you only have on hour to do so or zey will remain kids forever."

"And why is it that there's only just one hour to reverse these things?"

"Or you could leave sings as they are. You know what zey say, to be young again is good. It's a poor saying, what do you want from me, oui? I'll leave you to it zen. Now, now, now, don't forget—"

"We know, one hour to corral these kids back into the nursery or they'll be like this forever."

"No, I was just going to say, somebody went poopsie." Eugene looked down at Baby shorty with repulsion, feeling a tug on his pants leg and looked down,

"Papa said magic always comes with a price…but every price is different, right?" Mr. Mathews, Eugene, and Rapunzel looked down,

"Zis one is a smart child, no?" Rapunzel smiled, "She's one of our smartest." Artemis looked up at the two, "Is this gonna be like a scavenger hunt? I like Scavenger hunts; you always find something you didn't know you needed."

"That's…very wise, Artemis. All right, let's get back to that nursery." Cass and Lance were sneaking out the door, "Kids?"

"Well, at least two of them are still here." Rapunzel chased after them, tying them up in her hair.


"Now, Lance, Cass, even though you're children, your voices matter. This is a discussion so whoever holds this gravy boat gets to talk, okay?"

"This is—"

"Wait, wait, wait…I have the gravy boat, Eugene and I only want to help turn you back to normal, but we can't do that if you keep running off. So I think from now on we should stay together. Alone we are strong, together we are stronger." Cass raised her hand up, trying to get Rapunzel's attention, the princess handed over the gravy boat and Cass snatched it away, blowing raspberries at the princess. Handing the gravy boat over only started a fight between Cass and Lance.

"Okay, Okay, very funny. Now it's time to—"

"Can't talk without the gravy boat." Cassandra crawled out of the hair trap and urged Lance to throw her the item. Watching the Gravy boat get tossed back and forth made Artemis feel dizzy,

"Okay, guys, we've only got thirty minutes left—"

"Achoo!" Suddenly a black rock sprouted up from the floor, "Blond—WHOA!" Eugene quickly swiped artemis out of the way, holding her out in front of him with a worried expression,

"That's new." Cass' eyes lit up, "Cool! Do it again!" Artemis looked at her funny, "I dunno how…"

"Lame!"

"Look, if we're gonna get this done we should really think about being more firm, trust me, kids respond to Authority." Rapunzel narrowed her eyes at her boyfriend as he set Artemis back on the ground,

"Uh, trust me, Eugene. Kids respond best when they feel like they're being heard. Give them the freedom to express themselves without talking down to them and they might just surprise you." The gravy boat smashed, revealing a tired looking Pascal,

"All right, listen up! Here's the plan, kids. We're all going to go into the nursery, find that top and turn you back to normal. We will not be running off, we will not be breaking things, and for the love of all things big and small we will leave that poor frog alone. Is that clear, are there any questions?"

"…isn't he a chameleon?" Artemis asked quietly, Eugene looked at her annoyed and she shrank back, "Sorry…" there was a small pang of guilt as he looked at the girl,

"Can I go to the bathroom?"

"Again, can't it wait?" Lance shook his head, "Come on, Eugene. He's just a kid."

"Fine, I'll take lance to the bathroom. Raps, you take the others to the nursery, we'll be there in five. Let's go, lancey, you don't wanna be a kid forever." Once they walked off Rapunzel looked at Cass, "You know you two, Eugene shouldn't be so rigid with Lance, that's why I'm glad we approached our relationship with a mutual respect and built a solid rapor—and she's missing again. Okay then, all right"


"Cass, where are you?" the baby version of shorty was crying as he reached for a wooden ducking on one of the tables, "I think he wants the ducky, I got it!" Artemis climbed onto the chair and grabbed the duck, passing it to Rapunzel, "Eugene was right, you're so well-behaved."

"Varian and I climb onto each other's shoulders to reach high up things. Hey…where is Varian?" Rapunzel froze, she didn't know how to answer the question in a way a child would understand, "Uh…Varian is…he's uh…in a time out." Artemis was likely to believe that, right?

"Was he bad?" Rapunzel looked into her mis-matched eyes and felt a serious pang of guilt,

"Yes, he was very bad, he hurt someone."

"That doesn't sound like Varian…except when it comes to bullies, he chases the village boys away." The princess' expression shifted, "What do you mean he chased the bullies away?"

"They pick on me 'cause of my eyes." A sudden laugh caught their attention and suddenly artemis felt herself moving really fast, "Rapunzel!"

"Artemis!" The small girl was hanging onto the makeshift sled for dear life when it suddenly flew out from under them.

"Okay, come on. We're running out of time."

"You can't touch the floor, it's made of lava. You're burning." Shifting Shorty to her shoulder Rapunzel looked annoyed, "Cassandra, we only have about 15 minutes—"

"You're burning!"

"Shh." The baby was crying, "Aww, I thought my voice mattered." Rapunzel sighed, climbing onto a table and Baby shorty crawled off after the wooden duck. Artemis just looked confused, "What's lava?"

"It's really hot and it'll kill you til you die!"

"Cassandra!"

"What, not my fault she's stupid." Artemis frowned, but bit her tongue, "Oh no, the baby's heading straight for the lava lake, oh no!" Rapunzel tried to get off the table to go after him but Cass scolded her, "No, that's lava!"

Narrowing her eyes, Rapunzel hopped form table to table to grab Shorty, "not bad huh, Cass?" hearing no response the princess turned around, "Cass?" the girl was off swinging like a monkey through the halls, "Hey, Cass, I think the Lava's gone now."

"You know what, you're right, it's Acid!" Rapunzel groaned as Cassandra took off again, "Yes, zey are a handful aren't zey? but mozerhood suits you."

"What?"

"I'm just suggesting zat should you fail to acquire ze top In time, it wouldn't be ze worst sing in ze world. After all, you make a darling family" He ruffled Artemis' hair, "And zis place would make quite ze home for a family. Don't you agree?"

"Lance, show me some hustle!" Artemis and Rapunzel both looked towards where Eugene's voice came from, "Mr. Mathews, I—" the odd man was gone, "Do not go jelly legs on me, you stand up right now! Blondie, why you just hanging there?"

"Oh, you know…the floor is Acid."

"Ah, Acid, Acid, Acid!"

"That's all I had to do?" Baby shorty started crying again, Artemis climbed up into Rapunzel lap and started making funny faces to get him to stop.


Finally they were back in the nursery, Cass and Lance continued to chase each other around and Artemis stayed behind Eugene and Rapunzel to avoid being shoved over, "Oh look, there's the top." It was exactly where they'd left it…until Lance ran up and took off with it.

"My turn."

"No, you get to play with—"

"Okay, okay, guys." Rapunzel was too late as they ducked around her again, "we only have like 5 minutes, so maybe we—"

"Give me that top, right now, young lady!" Cass and Lance both stopped, looking up at Eugene, Cass looked slightly frightened, "1…2" Cass still held the top, "Two and a half…two and three quarters. Give me that top."

"Eugene, yelling at them won't get the top back."

"Oh? What should I do, coddle it out of 'em" Artemis snuck up behind Cass and took the top from her, tucking it under her arm as Eugene and Rapunzel started arguing, "What's that supposed to mean?"

"It means you let these kids walk all over you."

"And bossing them around seems to have worked out really well." Artemis looked at Cass and Lance as they got into some type of cart, "Lance was doing just fine until he was back under Cass' influence."

"Somehow, I find that hard to believe. You know what, let's just spin that top and get out of this place."

"Fine!"

"Fine."

" 'Punzel…" Artemis tugged on her skirt, the Princess turned, irritated, "What?!" Artemis held the top as her eyes watered, "Oh…Oh no, no, no, no…Artemis, don't cry." The blonde sniffled and inched away from Rapunzel,

"Good Job, Blondie." Eugene replied sarcastically,

"Shut it, Eugene. Sweetheart, come here." Artemis eyed her warily, "I…I got the top…" Rapunzel took the toy from her, "Thank you, Artemis." The Cart sped off and right into the dog kennel, Rapunzel and Eugene quickly took off after the two kids,

"And this is why I'm a cat person."

"They have big, twitchy ears, and fluffy faces!" Artemis whispered excitedly, Eugene wondered if she was talking about the dogs or cats.

"You get Lance and I'll get Cass. we have to get them out of here before the dogs wake up.

"Hey, Cass, Sweetie, I know you're very brave but you're in an unsafe situation right now, so I need you to please exit the kennel."

"Uh huh, you're not the boss of me." The dog started to growl, "No, no, I'm not telling you what to do, but I am strongly suggesting that you reconsider."

"Wow, Eugene was right, you do let us walk all over you. You guys are going to be disasters are parents."

"Lancie poo, come with me this way."

"Why that way?"

"Because that's the way to the door and we have to go bye bye."

"Why?" Rapunzel narrowed her eyes and got up, grabbing Cass in mi-air as she made a jump towards one of the dogs.

"Okay, listen up young lady, Play time is over! You get your rear end out of this kennel right now and walk on those tip toes." Cass narrowed her eyes, "But."

"No buts. Out. tip toes. now!" Rapunzel scolded,"

"Yes, ma'am."

"Listen to me, we have got to go. Why can't you be like Artemis and just do what you're told?"

"Because I'm a kid."

"And kids need to feel like they're…being heard… Okay, Lance. What do you wanna do, huh buddy? I'm listening."

"I dunno," he wiped his nose, "Play chase?" Eugene smiled, "I was hoping you'd say that. Tag, you're it." The former thief took off, Lance ran off in the other direction, "No, no, no, you're supposed to chase me." He quickly steered Lance towards the door before he could wake the sleeping dogs.

"Cass, Lance, Artemis, wait outside for us. That is an order!" The three kids took off as Rapunzel and Eugene went back for Shorty. The baby version of Shorty tugged free the wooden duckling from the dogs mouth, waking the huge animal, "600 pounds of fur and slobber heading our way!"

The three dogs charged Eugene and Rapunzel who quickly climbed onto the crates to avoid being mauled, Cornered, Rapunzel Snatched Baby Shorty off one of the dogs Eugene tried to psych them out, "Here boys, here. You wanna treat, huh? Yeah? Yeah you do, go get it!" the dogs briefly looked where he tossed the imaginary treat before looking back unimpressed,

"Alright, well you're smarter than you look and I apologize for underestimating you." Artemis looked around outside the door before finding one of the strange bone sculptures, snagging a bone from it, she hurried back to the door,

"Hey! Look what I got!" She waved the bone in the air, getting the dogs' attention, "Fetch!" she threw it as hard and as far ash she was able, distracting them long enough for Rapunzel and Eugene to get out of there.

"Good thinking, Kiddo! Lance, get the door!" Eugene shouted,

"Why would you…I meant go out the door!" Lance tried the door again,

"It's locked."

"Why would you—!"

"Im just a kid." Artemis took the top from Rapunzel and set it on the floor and Pascal snapped his tongue out, hitting the button and making it spin. The light filled with a bright gold light and the dogs turned into—

"Puppies!" Eugene and Rapunzel smiled as the kids played with the little dogs, picking up the top the two shared a look, "Okay, it was fun babysitting for the day, but let's get you guys back to normal, time to add about 16 years…well in shorty's case about…60 years? How old is shorty?"

"forty fi…seventy fiv…I have no idea."

"And Artemis…Wait…hold old are you, Artemis?" The small blonde held up 5 fingers, "So 9 years for you." Rapunzel turned the top in reverse and pressed the button, dropping it to the floor and watching as everyone returned to their normal age.

"Hey, I'm still missing a couple teeth."

"You were always missing a couple teeth."

"And you smell worse now than baby you did…how is that possible?" Artemis remarked, inching away from the old man.

"Hey!" he sniffed himself "No, you're right." She shook her head at his antics. "We can keep the puppies, right?"

As the group headed back to the main area Eugene tried another door and it revealed tentacles,

"Still no way out, and it's gonna take us forever to check this whole place."

"Well, I guess we'll just have to stay here another night. Today was really tough, but you know, even though we didn't always agree on everything, I think our different approaches ended up being…complimentary in a weird way."

"Blondie, I completely agree, and if we ever do decide to have kids, Assertiveness—" Eugene pointed to himself and then to Rapunzel, "Compassion."

"And a whole lot of love."

"Tag, you're it!"

"You do not know who you're messing with!" Lance and Cass chased each other around, Artemis kept to the side, watching.

"Hey, Hey, Hey, no running in the house."

"Hey, go easy on 'em."


Rapunzel and Eugene stopped in front of Artemis, leaning next to her "So, what's the deal with you? You weren't rambunctious or disobedient and you clung to us, and I mean a lot."

The blonde smiled,

"I remember a lot of things about being little, Playing in the Dark kingdoms Palace, my dad leaving mom and I…Moving to Old Corona, the Village kids picking on me, Meeting Varian…but I don't remember a single moment in my life where I wasn't mild mannered, my mom used to tell me I had an air of calm around me, like the moon. I would rather let people walk all over me than to get angry."

"But that day in Old corona, you seemed pretty mad."

"I'd lost everything, wouldn't you be mad? But I'm starting to realize now that we're out here, the little things aren't what matter, it sucks what happened to my mom, and I know I'll never get to see her again, but I'm finding my way in the world. You know, she used to tell me Family doesn't always start with blood, sometimes it's the people you meet on your journey through life that become the family you didn't know you needed. I'm glad that I'm out here with all of you, even if we get on each other's nerves sometimes, or say cruel things, I wouldn't change a minute of it."