A/N: I had this mostly complete for a while.
"I wanna be a cowboy, baby." Ophelia said as Rastus shook a tiny vial. The Report was in less than an hour and Rastus had to rush to the studio as Ophelia had downed one of Rastus' potions instead of taking a sip as he instructed.
"Here drink this." Rastus said, Ophelia took the potion, squinted at it and downed it. The princess shivered and looked around.
"Is the Report over?" Ophelia asked.
"It's just about to start." Justine said, sitting at a table. She was playing a game of checkers with Quinn.
"Knight to K4, check." Quinn said as he moved his piece.
"Quinn, this is checkers." Justine said, Quinn huffed and stood up and left. Justine sighed and leaned back.
"Alright everyone the Report is about to begin." Lynette said, adjusting the fashion glasses she was wearing. The woman headed on stage.
"Where is Serenity?" Rastus asked as tossed the vial in the trash and made sure Ophelia wasn't spouting nonsense anymore.
"She's with Captain Pearce, she was concerned when she didn't get the list of the Selected. Speak of the devil, here she is." Justine said as Serenity walked in a concerned look on her face.
"Pearce, doesn't want to tell me anything either." Serenity said, the young princess looked slightly concerned. If Pearce didn't know then only Georgios would know and Georgios was back at the Palace, too occupied with ensuring that the palace would be secure for it. There were no more rebels in Illea, not since the caste system was abolished but that didn't stop some idiot from trying to assassinate someone in the palace.
"We're live!" Someone from across the studio shouted. Serenity and her siblings stood up and stood to the side of the stage, to watch and wait for their cue.
"Good Evening, Illea! How are you all doing tonight?" Lynette yelled as she walked to the center stage. The back dropped decorated with gaudy golden hearts and crown. A large screen, showing the Illean map right above her.
"Welcome to the Report! This is where we find out all the juiciest secrets of the Illean Royal Family and ask the hottest question and this is a very special report. Where we find out which bachelors will be joining us and competing for the heart of our beloved Serenity! Are you folks ready?" The crowd cheered and Lynette smiled as she took her seat.
"Now then, let get right into it. Every say hello to our beloved royal princesses and prince. Serenity, Ophelia, Justine and Quinn!" Lynette cheered as Serenity walked out waving, Ophelia blowing a kiss, Jusine smiling warmly and nodding her head and Quinn, eyeing the crowd walking with his hands behind his head. All four of them sat down on a cream-colored sofa.
"So, to recap just a few weeks ago Serenity announced her choice to have a Selection, which created a lot of buzz and talks. I'm sure we've heard it all so we probably want to get started on this so. How about we get started with the Selected." Lynette said, a brief flash of panic showed on Serenity's face she didn't know who her Selected were.
"Or how about we pick them out right now! That's right folks we've decided to shake things up a little and pick out the Selected live! Isn't that exciting? Not only that but having Serenity herself pick her Selected would be long and monotonous so we're having some help from her siblings." Serenity looked absolutely shocked. Her siblings looked away with mischievous smiles. Serenity couldn't really do anything since the recording was live and she didn't want to make herself look like a fool.
"Alright Serenity since it's your Selection we'll let you pick the first province." Lynette said standing up, pulling Serenity to her feet. The Princess was dumbfounded, stilling processing the fact that her siblings were going to pick her suitors.
"I... um... l-let's start with Angeles." Serenity said. Lynette laughed and said something about her home province and clap. A young redheaded guard came with a large fishbowl, filled to the brim with small slips of paper, each neatly folded in half. Serenity stared at the bowl and pulled a name from the very top of the bowl. She opened it and cleared her voice.
"Who's our lucky man from Angeles." Lynette said as she leaned down to see the slip of paper. Serenity looked up.
"F-From Angeles, Hasani Leonardo Adair, an Egyptian Demigod." Serenity announced. The screen above her stopped displaying the map of Illea and shifted through several portraits of various men and a woman before settling on a picture of a man that Serenity assumed was Hasani. He looked handsome enough, Serenity sensed an air of snootiness from him but perhaps that was just the way he stared at the camera, or maybe it was his smooth looking dark skin?
"Wow! What a hunk. Could we be looking at the next Prince Consort? Which divine parent does he have? Is it the wise god Thoth? Or the beloved sky god Ra? Maybe Ra's guardian Isis?" Lynette said cupping her face. By the time her rant had stopped Serenity had sat down and Ophelia got up.
"Oh my I got carried away! I apologize. Ophelia thank you for participating. Please pick a province." Ophelia smiled as she tapped her chin.
"Let's go with Atlin!" She said, the red headed guard walked away and another guard came with a smaller fish bowl. Ophelia eyed it as if it was a national treasure. She stuck her hand deep in and pulled out three slips of paper. Two slipped out of the princess fingers and she kept the one that remained. She opened it and looked to the crowd.
"From Atlin, Maxim Jackson Ryland, a human." Ophelia said, waving the paper around like it was a lottery ticket. The screen switched from Hasani to a new face. A pale young man with neatly parted brown hair and sweet brown eyes.
"What a cutie!" Lynette said looking up at the picture of Maxim. Serenity felt like she had heard his name somewhere before. She shrugged it off
"Justine, our bookworm princess. I'm always interested in what you have to say." Lynette said as she beckoned Justine. The youngest princess smile and stood, she walked over to Lynette.
"Always a pleasure Lynette, although I don't have much to talk about. Let's break the cycle a bit I'll go with Columbia!" Justine chirped and waited for another guard to come with a fishbowl. Justine looked at the folded bowl and reached in picking up a name.
"From Columbia, Neil Connor a..." Justine's face turned to one of confusion. Lynette looked over at Justine, looking equally puzzled.
"What is it Justine?" Lynette asked. Justine took a short breath.
"N-Neil Connor a 93.75% vampire?" Justine said, the crowd mumbled amongst each other. Lynette took the small slip of paper.
"What?" she said looking at the paper. Justine shrugged
"That's what it says!" Justine said, the screen flip to show a profile of a red eyed vampire. His skin being slightly darker than the near ghost-white paleness of vampires.
"Well it's nice to see that some of our bachelors are well aware of their pedigree!" Lynette laughed glossing over Neil. The crowd awkwardly laughs.
"Now for our young prince, Quinn come on and pick a province." Lynette, said Quinn came up.
"Fennley or something..." Quinn said, another guard came with Fennley's fish bowl. Quinn reached in and held a large amount of papers. He let a large amount of them drop back into the bowl. One slipped onto the floor, Quinn let the rest of paper fall back into the bowl and picked the one off the floor.
"From Fennley, Sora Kurokage, A kitsune." Quinn said and walked back to couch. Lynette blinked and rolled her eyes.
"It seems we have a Kistune joining us folks!" Lynette said, she knew who Kurokage was and who his family was but kept her mouth shut. She looked at the screen.
"And what a handsome kitsune too! It seems like our next Prince consort is going to be handsome no matter what!
Serenity's mind drifted as her siblings continue picking names from fish bowls.
"From Allens, Soraes Winstron Maverick, a half vampire!"
"Remus Blakesley from Calgary"
"Catalen Onyx Ayton, a Lycan from Calgary"
"Ezequiel, a half angel from Kent!"
"Seymour Butts from... Hey!"
"Jinnar Ortega, a Half-elf from Lakedon!"
"Hikori Kojiyama, A kitsune from Sota"
"Asra Spearman, a half angel from Waverly"
"Tex Jacob Lands!" Quinn announced
"And with that we have our Selected folks! I can't wait to find which of our hunky men will win Serenity's heart. Will it be a dashing angel? A mysterious vampire? Or perhaps a cuddly kitsune. I can't wait to find out!" With that Lynette signed off. Serenity rolled her eyes.
"That went well..." Rastus said walking over to the four.
"Was it your idea to have my sibling pick my Selected for me?" Serenity asked, Rastus laughed and shook his head.
"It was Delilah's idea, I WISH I came up with it though, your face was priceless!" The mage laughed.
"Make one more quip about it and I will tear out every feather out of your peacock." Serenity threatened, Rastus gasped
"You wouldn't dare." He said
"Try me, wizard boy." She said
"Fine, come on let's go home." He said. Serenity nodded, stood up and promptly walked away. Justine, Ophelia and Quinn sat for a moment longer.
"How about we dump her in the woods." Quinn suggested
"I like the idea; we could just say she fled with a palace guard to New Britain or something." Ophelia joked
"Enough, let'sgo before they leave us here." Justine said
A/N: Boring chapter I know, but the next chapter will be the party planning and party! Yay. God it was such a pain getting this posted, first my laptop broke, then this got lost in the mail. Finally I have it posted though.