Tom was having a relatively normal morning. He was curled up with one of Marco's books and Marshmallow in his lap when he got a call from Star, only to find out that she was sobbing over the fact that Pony Head was having a bad birthday at St. Olga's.
"Best friends don't let best besties have bad birthday days." She blew her nose on a tissue. "And Pony Head is having the worst one ever."
"Um, that sucks, but it's not like we can do anything about it," he said with a shrug. Pony Head was kind of a friend, but he didn't care that much about her.
She looked at him, offended. "Tom, we have to get her out of that prison."
Marco popped his head through the door. "Is somebody talking about a breakout?" Tom blinked.
"Yeah, Pony Head is having her birthday day at . . . that place," Star whispered fearfully. Seeing her dramatic expressions on his face was still really bizarre.
"I've seen every prison escape movie ever made," Marco said confidently. He walked over to a drawer and searched around for something. "We only need three things. Patience, brains, and the ever-famous, multi-faceted bobby pin."
"Well, I'm out," Tom said with a fake salute. "You can't really rely on me for any of those three things."
"But we need you for the wand!" Star protested.
"We?" he voiced.
She spun around and did some demonic chanting—hey, she'd been getting better at that—and the fire portal appeared on the balcony. Star stepped on. "We," she agreed. "I vote we use the dimensional scissors to go straight to her cell and get her the heck outta there."
"Okay, sure," Marco agreed, pulling them out. He sliced a hole, and the three of them walked through. But it wasn't into a room, but outside, with spooky black rocks and stuff. "Uh, this isn't Pony Head's cell."
Tom frowned. "You're usually pretty good with those things. What went wrong?"
Before anyone could answer, another portal opened, and a carriage came thundering out. They all yelped and jumped off to the side before it could run over them. It went around, towards the gate, and started unloading princesses. Wayward princesses, he guessed.
"Ah, yes, the newbies have arrived," some dude said. He had a light eye-patch. A light-patch. "Welcome to St. Olga's School for Wayward Princesses." Thunder crashed, and Star screamed.
"New arrivals?" Marco asked. "If we could just blend in somehow, we could sneak in unnoticed."
Tom clucked his tongue. "I gotcha. Devious Demonic Disguise!" He did Star first, and she got a black corset shirt, a funky eyepatch that covered two eyes, a skirt, and spiky boots. She grinned.
"Whoa! Do me. Do me," Marco said excitedly, so he did, with a smirk. He got a massive ponytail and a poofy pink dress. He pouted. "Oh! You couldn't turn me into one of those guards with the cool masks?"
"I don't know," Star interjected. "Pink is definitely your color."
"Now just me," Tom said. "Devious Demonic Disguise!" He, naturally, put himself in a jagged red shirt and ripped black pants, leather boots, a bunch of random chains on a leather jacket, and he enhanced his mascara. Then he realized that was maybe a little too boyish, so he reluctantly lengthened the shirt into a short dress and turned the the pants into ripped leggings.
Marco pouted even more.
They snuck behind, with all the newbies, and the guy from before called, "Single file. Miss Heinous is eager to start the reformation process." So the line of princesses went in, with one prince and one human in line as well.
Star shrieked ever so quietly. "Marco . . ."
"Try not to blow our cover," he said from the corner of his mouth.
Tom stayed silent.
There was a princess orientation video to watch, and he hated every second of it.
"Don't allow your noble lineage to be thrown away. Here at the tried and trusted St. Olga's . . ."
"St. Olga's . . ."
". . . we have a plethora of foolproof security measures. No dimensional scissors, no magic, no boys . . ."
"School . . ."
". . . and etiquette are the main focus for . . ."
"For . . ."
". . . your troubled, wayward princess."
"Wayward princesses."
"We turn undisciplined behavior into perfection."
"Perfection."
"That free-thinking, one-in-a-million brat will become a one-of-a-million emotionless rubber stamp that your bloodline can count on."
He stuck out his tongue in disgust at that.
And then, Miss Heinous was in front of them. She was a strict-looking, older woman in a tight purple dress. "Every one of you is here for a reason." She walked up to look at each of them. "Too wild. Too opinionated." She popped a bubblegum bubble from one of the princesses. "Too bubbly.
"As part of a noble lineage, you don't have the luxury of being an individual. So by the time I'm done with you, you'll all be fixed. Every last one of you, whether you're from Pixtopia, or Mewni." She touched one of Tom's heart emblems, and he felt it freeze and crack. He winced.
"And don't even think about escaping." She grabbed a pair of dimensional scissors from another princess. "These are useless. We have a Tramorfidian Crystal in Tower 3. No rift can sustain itself within our walls. So you might as well cough up the scissors you smuggled in."
All the princesses groaned and dropped them, and Tom was suddenly very relieved that Marco carried their pair. He wasn't dumb enough to drop them.
"That concludes your orientation," Heinous said. "I'm confident that you'll all become perfect princesses. One way or another." And on that totally not menacing note, she left.
"Now to get everyone checked in so we can start sucking the individuality out of you," the guy from before said.
Wow, they just had to phrase it the most suspicious way possible, didn't they? It was a wonder they didn't get kings and queens screaming at them, though he guessed only the crazy kings and queens would send their daughters here.
Marco was the genius who realized that checking in would be very bad for three unregistered 'princesses'. In a high-pitched voice, he said, "I hear the first one checked in gets her own room." All the princesses chuckled and ran off to be the first.
"Respect the queue! Respect the queue!"
And they slipped around a corner to start searching.
"This place isn't what I thought—" Star started, though Marco shushed her. The three of them hid behind a massive vase as a guard walked past.
"Yeah, breaking out Pony Head is gonna be a breeze," Marco said, standing up. "It's just a high-surveillance prissy finishing school."
Then why hadn't he seen any teachers, besides Heinous?
"No, Marco, it's worse than I imagined," she corrected. "Look." She fearfully pointed to a room with a big princess facing away from them being forced to dance with silly animals and stuff. Oh, there was a teacher, she just looked unfortunately strict.
Marco pushed her along, and Tom followed on his own time. "You know the kind of girls who get sent here," the human said off-handedly. "They could totally benefit from this."
They found the dormitories, with bars on the windows. He was thinking somewhere between Star's and Marco's perspectives. It wasn't a horrible, despicable prison, but it definitely wasn't just a finishing school. He was getting bad vibes from this place.
"You know, this place has some seriously luxurious digs," Marco commented.
"Have you gone mad?"
"Come on. Look at the intricate floral ornamentation on that armoire." He gasped. "The rich mahogany of the canopy bed. And there's enough velvet on that bedspread for me to swim in."
"Don't you see what's going on here?"
". . . dancing?"
"Let's just find Pony Head and get outta here," Star sighed.
Tom pointed at the door he'd been peering through. "Done. Found her while you two were bickering." Marco picked the lock with his apparently super-awesome bobby pin, and they walked in.
Of course, Star was first, so she immediately started singing at a loud volume. "I am here 'cause I have to say, Happy Birthday on your birthday day!"
Both boys immediately hushed her up, Tom doing so with a slight glare. "Sorry," she whispered sheepishly. "Hey, Pony Head." The princess didn't move. "Hey, it's us, here to break you out, so we can par-tay."
The unicorn spun around very suddenly, and he flinched, taking a step back. Not the Pony Head he was used to. Star yelped at the sight, and Marco looked concerned. "My deepest apologies, but I must abstain, as partying is for the unrefined," she said.
"That's not the Pony Head I know and love," Star murmured, her uncovered eye wide with horror.
Marco stepped up. "I got this. Hey, Pointy Head. It's Earth Turd!" He pointed at himself, and Tom snorted at that nickname.
"Such language belongs in the gutters of Galafamor." She chuckled all primly.
Star looked horrified at this point, and both boys were unsure what to do. Pony Head wasn't his favorite person, but . . . when you know someone and they do a complete personality flip . . . it's pretty disturbing. He could only imagine what Star was feeling right now.
"You know, I kinda like her better this way," Marco commented, and Tom thought that Star might kill him. Well, that was the face he usually wore when he wanted to kill someone, so, you know, something like that.
She whimpered and ran up to her best friend. "Snap out of it, Pony Head. Snap out of it!" She shook the unicorn roughly.
Her only response was a horsey laugh. "Would you care for some crumpets?"
Star turned around to stare at the boys. "See, guys, this is what they do to you here." She looked genuinely scared, and he couldn't really blame her.
"Relax. Once we disable that crystal thing and get her outta here, she'll finally be a benefit to society," Marco said, seemingly oblivious to her freaking out.
Tom stepped up to his ex-girlfriend (nope, not thinking of her as that, even now, it still hurt) and softly said, "Hey, we'll figure it out, okay? I'm sure something will be able to fix her. Don't give up just yet." She gave him a small little smile, and he relaxed a tiny bit. Marco, meanwhile, was grabbing random stuff. "Um . . . what're you doing?" he asked.
"I saw this in a prison movie," he said with a grin. "Escape From Jail Mountain. Trust me, this'll save our hides, just like it saved Hank Innocent."
He set up the water jug and the candle like Pony Head was still floating by the window, and Tom frowned. "That's . . . a very specific problem, especially for a human movie." But the other two hushed him up and they left the room.
"Oh, escaping is inappropriate," Posh Head said. "Guards. Guards! Guards! Yoo-hoo, guards." Star hushed her up.
Marco, who was leading the way, went around a corner a little too fast and a guard saw him (Tom was also in the way a little, though, so the human wasn't only to blame). The guard came rushing for them, and they ran back the way they'd come, past a chilling room.
All the princesses were learning how to do tea time 'right'. In an eerie unison, they said, "Keep your pinkies at 90 degrees. More tea, please." They all slurped at once. "Keep your pinkies at 90 degrees. More tea, please." Another slurp.
All three of them (Posh Head didn't care, of course) were staring in horror at the sight. "This is worse than my worst nightmare," Star said, her eye filling up with a terrified tear.
"Yeah. I see what you mean," Marco agreed, his eyes wide.
"I'm never drinking tea again," Tom murmured. He'd only drank it when he had to, at royal meetings, or the Silver Bell Ball, or stuff like that, but he was never doing it ever again.
Posh Head started adding into the chant, and an upset Star asked, "Why are you saying that? You don't even have pinkies."
Marco glanced back, and when Tom followed his gaze, the guard was coming back, so they rushed into the room, dragging the girls along, hiding behind the tables. The creepy chanting continued, putting his nerves on fire.
"Are we gonna blast our way out of this?" Star asked, holding up her hand like she was ready to summon a ball of fire. Tom's hand dropped to the wand.
"No. That'll only increase the heat on us," Marco said with a shake of his hand. In a better scenario, Tom would've snorted at the unintentional pun. "We need some kind of distraction."
"Well, they are not getting my individuality," Star said, standing up.
Tom could see the lightbulb go off in Marco's head. "That's it." He stood up and seized a cup, shouting, "It's not criminal to be an individual." He chucked the cup at the guard, spilling tea on his coat. "Come on. It's not criminal to be an individual."
For a second, it looked like no one was going to help out, but then a Pixtopian princess lifted up a cup as big as she was and joined in. "It's not criminal to be an individual."
After a pause, all the princesses were raising their cups and chanting, "It's not criminal to be an individual." They all started throwing theirs at the guard, too, and standing up and shouting it. Tom grinned at the chaos, and they rushed out.
"I think you just started something important," Tom informed Marco, but they were too busy running.
As they ran, Posh Head said, "Tee-hee-hee. He got scalded."
Star smiled. "She's laughing at an authority figure! I think the real Pony Head's still in there." She grinned at her friend, and Tom smiled at the positivity from the most optimistic person he knew.
They ended up taking a wrong turn at some point, and then an army of guards started chasing them. Tom put on an unexpected burst of speed, and he was the first one to start pushing stuff in front of the door they closed on the guards. "Quick. Find a place to hide," Marco ordered. The door looked like it might give way, so, in a burst of inspiration, Tom summoned a pair of Star's boots and hid them behind a curtain.
While the guards went to check that out, the four of them (Posh Head was turning into Pony Head enough that he felt he should include her) rushed out the door again. They found themselves in a bizarre room with a lot of doorways and arches, but before they could figure it out, they had to leave because of the guards.
Marco found a laundry chute, and Star and Pony Head went first, sliding down to the bottom. Marco tried to follow, but he got stuck, and Tom could see there was no way he was making it in in time for him to follow, so he gave up and ran into the hall, going a different direction.
He hid behind a corner and watched in horror as they grabbed Marco and dragged him back the way they'd come. A part of him was desperate to rescue the human, but the rest of him, the logical part, knew that was stupid right now, so he slipped off down another hallway.
He thought it was empty at first, but then he saw a small form crying behind a grandfather clock. He went over to the princess and sat down, concerned.
Before she saw him, she whimpered, "No, don't take me back, please . . ." Then she opened her eyes and saw who he really was, and she relaxed a little, wiping her eyes. "Oh. Another . . . princess."
Tom tried to keep himself from wrinkling his nose at the reminder that he was Star right now. "More or less." He sighed and leaned against the wall, looking up at the ceiling. "What're you crying about?"
She sniffled and looked away. "I . . . you won't tell anyone?" He shook his head. "I just . . . my tutor got really mad at me, so I got scared, and I ran away. She didn't like that I'd cut my hair." Her hair was boyishly short, but he couldn't exactly blame someone for wanting it like that.
Something about this girl felt familiar, though he couldn't for the life of him tell what it was. "What's wrong with short hair?"
"She says princesses shouldn't have short hair," she replied, and she chuckled without humor. She stared at him. "Has your tutor not told you the same thing?"
He shook his head. "I don't actually go here," he admitted, and he realized he'd just given himself away. She looked trustworthy, though. "We're breaking out a friend of mine." He looked down at the floor and, before he could think about it too much, he corrected, "My ex-girlfriend's friend, actually."
She looked shocked. "You mean, no one's forcing you to find a prince to be with?"
He smiled at her. "That would be weird, since I am a prince."
He was expecting confusion, concern, disgust, something like that. Instead, tears welled in her eyes again, and she grinned widely. "You're like me!" she said excitedly, happy tears streaming down her cheeks. "Oh, I thought I was the only one! My tutor, she . . . she said that I'm a princess, not a prince, and that I would never be a prince and that I was just imagining things, but you . . . you're like me!"
He realized with a pang of understanding that shewasn't a she at all. The royal before him was a he. Tom smiled again, and it felt really good to find someone even remotely like him. The other prince wiped his eyes again, his smile not fading in the slightest. "Oh, my corn. My parents sent me here because I'm a boy, but do yours not care?"
Telling the full truth here, that he was usually just a regular prince and that he was in a girl's body . . . that would probably not be best. "Nope, they don't," he said, and it was kind of true. They hadn't cared about Star being him for the moment. "They're great like that."
It occurred to him that that same sentiment, being stuck in a girl's body, was probably exactly how this other prince felt. They kind of were the same, in a weird way. "Oh, you're so lucky," the prince said enviously. "Everyone called me a freak, or dumb, or that I was just pretending. It's nice that you don't have to deal with that."
"Maybe . . . maybe you should try telling them more about it," he suggested. "I don't know. Some people are just dumb and will never change, but chances are, your parents will love you, no matter whether you're a boy or a girl."
He nodded a little bit. "I . . . thank you. You don't even know how much this has helped."
Tom smiled, a little bittersweet, though he didn't know why. "No problem. My name's Tom, by the way," he said, offering a hand.
The other prince accepted it. "I'm . . . Sam. Thanks, Tom."
"Like I said, it's no problem." He stood up and dusted himself off. "Now, if you don't mind, I'm gonna start running, since the guards are probably gonna start searching for me pretty soon. Bye."
"Bye!"
And he ran away.
A loud, girly scream rang through the air, and he recognized it instantly. Marco! He tried to navigate the halls without being seen as best he could, then he realized how much easier it would be if they just caught him and brought him to Marco.
At the top of his lungs, he started screaming. "IT'S OKAY TO BE DIFFERENT! IT'S NOT CRIMINAL TO BE AN INDIVIDUAL!" He ran around the halls, screaming as loud as he could get (and, since he was Star right now, that was pretty high). "YOU DON'T HAVE TO FIT THE SAME MOLD! THIS PLACE SHOULD HAVE PRINCES, TOO! IT WOULD GET WAAAAAY MORE TROUBLEMAKERS THAN THIS!"
And, sure enough, they caught him and started dragging him. And, just for fun, he continued screaming. "YOU'RE ALL JERKS, YOU KNOW THAT?! NOBODY SHOULD BE FORCED INTO THIS! THERE'S MORE THAN ONE WAY TO BE ROYAL!"
A guard smacked him on the head, and he whined. "Shut it, brat!"
"Nope! IT'S NOT CRIMINAL TO BE AN INDIVID—" He got smacked again, harder, and he rubbed it. "Okay, fine, ow."
They brought him to the room, where Marco was being very rapidly shown a slideshow on how to be a proper princess. He grinned at Heinous, a chaotic (and slightly unhinged) look in his eye as they released him in front of Heinous. "'Sup, Heinous?" he asked, using some Earth slang Marco had taught him.
(It was taking all his effort not to look at Marco. He was furious enough as it was, but seeing it first-hand would definitely be enough to push him over the edge. He wouldn't be surprised if he got so unbelievably angry that his demon powers generated even when he wasn't a demon.)
"You! You were working with her!" She jutted a finger to Marco, and Tom very purposefully didn't look that way. "How dare—"
At that moment, just to spite her, he pulled out the wand and shattered the glass with a thought. Heinous shrieked. "WHERE DID YOU GET THAT WAND?!" He just grinned back at her and summoned a massive snake that coiled its way over to her and wrapped around her. She shrieked again.
Right on cue, Star and Pony Head, who must've recovered from being Posh Head, showed up in the vents. He shot a purple blast up there, letting them out, and he grabbed Marco from the chair and forcibly dragged him out of the room. The human, confused, mumbled, "Are they gonna let me keep the dress?"
"I gave you that dress. Now, come on!"
They were running through the halls, and Marco tiredly told Pony Head, "I'm glad you're back to normal, by the way."
"Aw, you too," she said. "Now I can make fun of your ugly dress."
"Hey! I made that dress!" Tom complained.
They passed the princess quarters, where they were all standing by their barred windows and tapping teacups up against the bars. "It's not criminal to be an individual." They were still keeping up the chant, after all this time. (Tom was proud to see some of them shouting his catchphrase that he'd screamed while being dragged in, "there's more than one way to be royal". He saw Sam among them, and he grinned at the prince.)
"Man, I can't believe it, but you sure worked some turd magic on these girls. They are in it," Pony Head said with a grin.
"I did tell you," Tom said with a shrug. "You started something big."
"My work here is not done." He stepped forward and declared, "My fellow wayward sisters, I'll show you the way. They want you to be a rubber-stamp princess. I say we stamp on them!"
Before long, there was a swarm of royals rushing down the hall, with Marco at their head and the rest of the group not too far behind. The guards shoved the doors closed, but if they thought that could keep them out, they were dead wrong. They continued on as if the door wasn't even there, and then there was a massive fight in the courtyard of royals vs. guards.
Meanwhile, Tom used the wand to shoot down the tower with the crystal. "Balefire Panzerfaust!" It shot up, and the whole tower came crumbling down, and everyone dodged out of the way.
Star seized the scissors from Marco and ripped open a portal. "Let's get outta here." Then they all turned around to look behind them. "Whoa," Star said in shock.
"Whoa," Tom breathed.
"Whoa!" Marco exclaimed.
"Whoooooooa!" Pony Head shouted.
All the princesses were cheering and dancing over the corpses of the guards, in the light from the destruction of the crystal.
"Well, time's a-wastin'," Star said, gesturing to the portal. "If we hurry, we can still catch DJ Jump-Jump's set at the Bounce Lounge."
"Girl, I ain't goin' nowhere," Pony Head said. "The Bounce Lounge ain't got nothin' on this party."
"But it's your birthday day," the other girl protested, looking pleading. That looked really weird on his face, though he was starting to get used to the fact that every one of Star's expressions was weird on his face. His were probably weird on hers, too.
"And you gave me the best gift ever, and it's called, getting me my groove back. Look at me. It's back, babe." They hugged each other.
There was another little tussle with some more guards, then Star asked, "So you wanna stay here?"
"Oh, I gotta. I can't let what happened to me happen to anyone else. Right, Princess Turdina?"
"Get on with your bad self, my wayward sister," Marco replied, and Tom looked at him bewilderedly. Getting a little far into the act, wasn't he?
"Yeah! I'm gonna go bite some of those robot guards on their faces."
"Bite one for me!" Marco called.
"Make that two!" Tom added.
Then Star pulled both boys through the portal very frantically, and they were back at the Diaz household.
So, what do you guys think of Sam? I'm trying to find ways to add some representation to my fics, so I think it was pretty good! I dunno, though. Anyway, sorry for the wait, here you go!