Title: The Trial
Author: Zath Chauvert
Summary: a brief scene from The Scarlet Pimpernel as it might have been if it had been done by the Monty Python guys
Rating: G
Feedback: Yes, please! Any and all feedback would be greatly appreciated. Anything you have to say can be sent to "zathita AT hotmail DOT com", using common sense to put the "@" and the "." in their proper places, of course. Also, please include "FIC-FEEDBACK" somewhere in the subject line, because I get tons of spam and this makes the worthwhile stuff easier to pick out of the heap. :)
Disclaimer: Sir Percy is the creation of Baroness Orczy. The witch trial scene from Monty Python and the Holy Grail, is the creation of the Monty Python guys, as is the rest of the movie. The French Revolution is the creation of a bunch of disgruntled French peasants. :)
Warning: If you have never seen the movie Monty Python and the Holy Grail, then you are a very deprived person, and you have missed out on an important (and highly amusing) part of English speaking culture! Go watch it now!
By Zath Chauvert
Scene - A Paris Courtroom
[Fade In]
[The scene opens as a girl in an extravagant but ill-fitting dress is dragged before the Committee of Public Safety by a mob of French peasants, all speaking in the obligatory 'outrageous accents' of English people making fun of the French.]
Mob: (yelling at the tops of their lungs) "She's an aristo! Cut off her head!"
[Sir Percy Blakeney, baronet, who is disguised as a fish merchant, wanders into the court and watches the proceedings from the back of the crowd.]
Mob: (still yelling) "Cut off her head! Hang the traitor from the lamppost! She's a bloody aristo!"
Judge: "And how do you know that she is an aristocrat?"
Frenchie #1: "She made me wear froufrou!"
[Everyone turns to look at look at him and sees that he is dressed in the filthy rags typical to the Sans-Culottes, just like everyone else.]
Frenchie #1: (rather sheepishly) "I changed my clothes..."
[There is a brief but awkward pause as the entire mob falls silent.]
Frenchie #2: "Well she looks like an aristo! I say we cut off her head!"
Mob: "Yeah!"
Girl: "But I'm not an aristo. They dressed me like this, and this isn't my real hair, it's a wig!"
[The judge leans forward and lifts up the beautifully styled fancy wig, revealing short grungy hair beneath. Then he turns and addresses the mob.]
Judge: "Is this true?"
Frenchie #2: "Well we did add the wig..."
Frenchie #1: "And the ball gown..."
Frenchie #3: "But she's still an aristo! Let's cut off her head!"
Mob: "Yeah!"
Judge: "There is a way to determine whether or not she is, as you say, an 'aristo.' What do we do to aristocrats?"
Frenchie #2: "We catch them and we cut off their heads!"
Mob: "Yeah!"
Judge: "And what else do we have to chase down and deal with by removing its head?"
Mob: "Uhhhh..."
Frenchie #2: "Spiders?"
Frenchie #3: "Onions?"
Frenchie #1: "Very small trees?"
Percy in disguise: "A chicken!"
Judge: "Yes, a chicken! Very good! Therefore, if she runs as fast as a chicken..."
Frenchie #1: She... she must be an aristocrat?"
Judge: "Precisely!"
Percy in disguise: "And then we can cut off her head!"
Mob: "Yeah!"
Percy in disguise: "C'mon everyone, let's go find a chicken!"
Mob: "Yeah!"
[Everyone rushes out of the courtroom to go look for a chicken, and in the confusion Percy grabs the girl and carries her to safety.]
[Fade To Black]
