Disclaimer: I do not own any of these characters. I Don't own Terry Pratchett. He owns me with his wonderful writing style. I dont own the story of Sleeping Beauty. This is a FanFiction (Der.)
Author's notes: There are occasionally numbers in parantheses that pertain to footnotes at the bottom of the page. Please view them, as they help to understand the story. They're also damn funny. Please Read and Review!
The Story of a Sleeping Beauty By Terry Pratchett
By Kyle Meeks AKA Maze Pha'len
The musty cottage was completely empty except for one small man huddled at his desk. He was very old, had a long white beard, and, had they been invented at the time, was the kind of man who looked like he should be peeping at old parchment over half-moon spectacles. Though the cottage was definitely empty, it seemed to suddenly fill with a dark presence(1).
"Hello, Death," the old man said, his windpipes making the sound of a creaking organ.
HELLO, MORTICUS.
Morticus turned around in his wooden chair to gaze at Death. He looked much like the pictures of the Grim Reaper, except the skeletal sockets weren't empty; they were filled with tiny blue dots. And today Death wielded a large, steely-silver sword instead of the usual scythe. Wizards, kings, and prophets got the sword treatment. The latter requirement was Morticus' profession(2).
"Bout that time, eh, chap?" Morticus asked, smiling that wrinkly old-person smile.
INDEED. Death reached inside his long black robe and pulled out an hourglass. The sand was almost gone from the top bulb. ABOUT TWO AND A QUARTER MINUTES. NOT MUCH TIME FOR TEA, I SUPPOSE.
Morticus just stared at Death for a second. One doesn't easily comprehend when the anthropomorphic personification of fatality makes a joke. Death was obviously not too comfortable with the idea of humor.
"Well," said morticus, turning back to his scroll-covered desk, "Guess I have time for one last prophecy."
PROPHECIES ARE ALWAYS A BOTHER, Death said, FORCING REALITY TO CONFORM LIKE THAT. YOU SURE YOU DON'T WANT TO PASS ON WITHOUT STRAINING YOURSELF BEFOREHAND?
Morticus laughed. "It's a prophet's right to write prophecies, and you can't bloody well stop me," he said, hurriedly scratching with his quill. "Besides, the kingdom's need uniting, and I intend to be considered for a posthumous Nobel peace prize. There," he finished with a flourish of his quill. "A princess Aurora will become queen and unite the kingdoms of Borealis and Whetherportsendale."
Death fixed it with his gaze, a grin on his face, though, his face being a skull and all, he didn't really have much choice. The ink had dried, and the prophecy was set. People were always clinging to life or obsessed with leaving eternal legacies right before the end. It was one of the only things that annoyed Death.
THEY DON'T AWARD POSTHUMOUS NOBEL PRIZES.
"They don't?"
MAKES IT A BIT DIFFICULT FOR ACCEPTANCE SPEECHES.
"Oh, bugger."
Death's sword fell as the hourglass's last grain of sand fell to the bottom.
As the ink of the parchment dried, the king and queen of the kingdom of Borealis finished the conception of a soon-to-be newborn girl. About nine months, give or take a week or two, later, amid kicking, screaming, bloody grossness, and a traumatized midwife(3), the baby girl lay in her mothers bosom, crying her fool head off.
"Shut up that singing!" screamed the king from his bedroom window. The people of the castle wouldn't shut up about hailing the king, queen, and the princess Aurora, pleading for health and wealth for the princess. "Stop that damned racket! You're not in a bloody musical!(4)"
The entire town was plunged into silence, except for princess Aurora, who continued to scream her fool head off. The castle drunk also found it hard to be silent, until the king snapped his fingers and a spear was gently yet forcefully shoved into his vocal cords. He stopped singing.
"They're just peasants, dear," said queen Borealis.
"Which is exactly why I can do that," said King Borealis. "Is it tea time yet?"
"No."
A young courtier-in-training burst into the room carrying a scroll. "There's a prophecy m-lord and lady!" he cried, panting from exertion. "About your daughter! We just found it in--"
"Who wrote it?" demanded Queen Borealis.
The boy looked stunned. He considered asking if it really mattered, if who prophesied it made it any less a prophecy, but then remembered the sound of a spear going through a town drunk's vocal cords, and thought better of it. "Morticus, the prophet," is what he ended up saying.
"Never really liked Morticus," the King said, taking the baby from her mother's arms. "He kept predicting these horrible crop failures. And the Bubonic Plague. That was probably his fault too.(5)"
"But it's about Aurora," the Queen said, taking the screaming child from the king's arms, "Lets have a listen."
The courtier-in-training unrolled the scroll and began to read. "A princess Aurora will become queen and unite the kingdoms of Borealis and Whetherportsendale," he said.
"Kinda short for a prophecy, don't you think?" he added, smiling in a joshing manner.
After a bit of silence and a bit of staring, the boy left, happy to leave with intact vocal cords.
"So, she's going to perform a coup and oust me as queen, eh! Not if I have anything to say about it!" screamed the queen.
"I'm pretty sure that's not what it means dear. Put down the chamberpot."
"Oh, right."
There was a crash of glass at the windows of the tower. The king and queen turned to see the three good faeries picking themselves off the floor and healing each other's cuts.
"How's THAT for an entrance?" cried out Flora, the faerie in the green dress.
"Next time, lets do something with less glass," said Fauna, the faerie in the blue dress.
"Yes, yes and less bleeding too," concurred the deep voice of Lola, the burliest and more masculine of the three(6).
"We've come to bless the baby," they chimed in harmony, Lola obviously singing bass. They each took turns waving their wands at the wailing child as the Queen laid her in her crib.
"I'll bless her with beauty."
"And I'll bless her with a high intelligence score and a 9th level spell!"
"And I'll bless her with sexual ambiguity!"
"Lola, that's an awful blessing."
"Oh, right. How about great strength?"
"That'll do."
"And now it's MY turn to bless the baby," cried out an evil voice. If the three faeries and the king and queen had ever seen a Technicolor purple and green flame spring up from the ground, they would've been able to perfectly describe what they now saw. Of course, they hadn't, and were at a loss for words. An evil faerie stepped out, holding an evil staff with her evil hands.
"Maleficent!" everyone cried in unison, except of course, Maleficent, for it would be silly for her to cry out her own name in surprise. "It's you!"
"Yes, it is I."
A dark Technicolor purple and green flame shot out from the staff and encircled the baby, lifting it out of the crib. Maleficent smiled evilly.
"That's a neat trick," said the king before yelping in pain as the queen jumped on his foot.
"And my evil blessing is that when the baby turns sixteen, she'll begin to like boys!"
"NOOO!" screamed the king. "But boys are evil!"
"That's no blessing, that's a curse!" cried out Lola. Everyone gasped.
"Wouldn't that already happen regardless?" asked Fauna.
"Oh, bugger, you're right. Guess I'll do the next best thing instead," Maleficent said, smiling a smile that dripped with evil. Flora slapped Fauna hard across the face.
"How's this? When she turns sixteen, she'll prick her finger on a spinning needle and die."
"Why're you doing this!" cried the Queen.
"No reason," Maleficent relpied(7). The flames jumped, did something magical, and vanished, along with a cackling Maleficent.
There was a stunned silence as everyone gazed at one another.
"Well, we're buggered," said the king.
"We've got faeries, dear, surely they can reverse the magic!"
The faeries exchanged nervous glances. "I'm dry," said Flora.
"I'm outta MP too," said Fauna. They all seemed to despair until Lola's voice rang out and said, "Good thing I didn't have a chance to cast my spell."
"REVERSE IT!" they all screamed.
"It's too powerful for that, I can only alter it," said Lola, rolling up her sleeves and exposing her extremely hairy arms. "I'll change it so she doesn't die, only goes to sleep, by spreading the death out to the entire kingdom, so everyone only gets a tiny bit. Everyone will wake up when someone kisses your daughter with her first real kiss," she added, though nobody really listened.
The king frowned. "So everyone goes to sleep in sixteen years?"
"Precisely," said Lola, who was really quite pleased with herself. "Romantic, eh?"
"Why not just get rid of all the needles in the castle?" asked Queen Borealis.
"Why not get rid of all the teenage BOYS in the castle?" growled King Borealis.
"She said needles, not pricks."
"Sod off!"
And so it was decided that they would do all three plans, which caused some grief in the hearts of the young maidens of the kingdom, as well as some anxiousness in the hearts of many young men who had been separated from their young maidens, and some very unhappy tailors. Every needle was banned; even pine needles, which made for some very sad and naked trees.
Fifteen years passed, and Princess Aurora grew to be very beautiful with long flowing blonde hair and beautiful blue eyes and long thin legs and supple skin and…. Ahem… Anyway, she had a high intelligence as well, and loved to use her 9th level contained nuclear explosion spell on her handmaidens. The only thing the fifteen year old girl liked about her handmaidens were their stories of young men and their charms. She'd never seen a young man, and was occasionally restless with a desire to be held in strong arms.
One good thing about outlawing young males was the fact that King and Queen Borealis didn't need to explain where babies came from, because there WERE no babies. Some people missed the creation of babies, but nobody dared question the King's authority for fear of sharp and pointy spears being thrust into their vocal cords.
But soon, the fateful day came when Aurora became a young woman, not an annoying teenage girl. It was her sixteenth birthday, and the presents kept pouring in.
"What do you really want for your birthday, dear?" the Queen asked.
"A boy," she said in a beautiful voice that sent warm shivers down young men's spines and made them blush(8).
"The plan failed!" the king cried, breaking down into tears, "She STILL likes boys! Listen to me, young lady, you are not allowed to date until you're married!"
"Date? What do you mean?"
"Nevermind dear, just go to your room," the queen said wearily. Aurora left, her hair shimmying side to side along her back as she walked. The king and queen sighed. "At least we beat the curse. There aren't any needles in the entire kingdom."
Aurora stalked up to her room, exploding handmaidens all the way up the stairs. She desperately wanted to meet a boy, like any boy-depraved sixteen-year-old girl, but knew her overprotective parents had something against pricks and needles. It had never been explained to her, she knew very little of the existence of the faeries and absolutely nothing of the curse. So when a creepy woman was already awaiting Aurora up in Aurora's room, she didn't recognize her as an evil faerie.
"Did my parents send you!" Princess Aurora demanded. "Is that the way its supposed to be? Are girls supposed to be with girls only! Are handsome young men and their strong embrace just a myth! Because if it is, I'll shall be sorely disappointed. I don't think about girls the way I think about those young male myths."
Maleficent just stared. "What the heck're you talking about?" she finally demanded. "Of course girls aren't supposed to like girls like that!"
Aurora blushed, embarrassed. "Well, good. Because I don't." Long pause. "So, if you're not hear to explain the whole love thing, what are you doing in my bloody room?"
Maleficent conjured a spinning wheel, the sharp needle a very large and prominent feature of the entire contraption. "Stick your finger on the needle, ho-bag," Maleficent demanded.
Aurora was wary at first. "Why?" she asked. Even people who knew absolutely nothing of evil faeries had the instinct to be suspicious of a person in dark robes with pale green skin and horns. "What's the point of pricking my finger on that needle?"
"Boys."
Aurora slammed her finger on the needle with no hesitation, and instantly fell asleep. Maleficent cackled evilly. "And now she's dead! I shall watch her die, and enjoy every minute of it! Haha, what a wasted childhood, never feeling the strong embrace of a young man, never the warm breath and the soft kiss and…. Anyway, I shall watch the life drain from her body!"
Aurora's bosom moved slowly up and down as she breathed lightly, sleeping soundly.
"Any minute now."
Still, Aurora breathed.
"Reeeeeeally soon…"
And so it continued as the three good faeries secretly began to complete Lola's spell, putting everyone in the kingdom to sleep. And still Maleficent waited for Aurora to die.
A hundred years passed, and still the entire kingdom of Borealis slept. Nobody corresponded with it, and nobody really cared what went on in it. Until one day a restless young man wandering the countryside came upon its border. He happened to be a prince on a journey to discover himself.
"I say, old woman!" called Prince Charming(9) of Whetherportsendale. He was talking to a prone figure on the ground.
"Man, sorry. Who lives in that castle?"
Silence.
"What?"
Silence.
"Well, I can't just call you man."
Silence.
"I didn't know you were called Dennis!"
Silence.
"Look, I'm sorry about the old woman bit, but from behind…"
Silence.
"Well I AM Prince."
Silence.
About this time Prince Charming's horse decided to kick him in the head. Charming awoke several hours later and had completely forgotten about Dennis the mistaken old woman.
"Lets keep exploring, Horse," Prince Charming said. They did. Soon they came upon the castle. Had Charming ever seen a zombie movie, he would have described the scene before him as the creepy scene where there are tons of dead-looking bodies lying everywhere, which give off the ominous feeling that they are preparing to come to life in at the drop of a hat. However, Charming had never seen a zombie movie, and had nothing with which to describe the castle. A real pity, because it looked exactly like that scene with zombies in.
"So everyone's dead, eh?" Prince Charming said, presumably to his horse. The horse rolled its eyes.
I can't talk, are you daft? it thought. Maybe I gave the boy one too many kicks in the head.
"Hey, nobody is watching…" Prince Charming said with a conspiratorial look to his horse. He quickly dashed into a girl's bathroom, giggling with glee. "I've never been in here before!" he said, feeling naughty. "C'mon, lets go explore the REST of the castle!"
They explored for hours, every room, every lavatory. Never before had Charming seen so many girls and not nearly enough boys. None, in fact. "How weird is that?" he asked his horse.
How weird is it that you talk to a bleedin' horse! The horse thought.
Soon, Charming opened to door to the room at the top of the tallest tower. His Prince senses began to tingle(10). Something both evil and fiendishly demonic was behind the door, and behind that was something fiendishly beautiful. He drew his sword, and charged in, swinging with all his might at the horned old woman staring intently at a beautiful young woman.
"Any minute now, it must be any minute now," he heard the woman whisper right before his blade met her neck and removed it from her shoulders. He kicked the body over and out of the way, sending it crashing into a spinning wheel with a really big needle. The needle pierced her heart.
"Guess we should just point to the heart of the matter," said Charming, grinning(11). His prince senses tingled again as he gazed at the beautiful young woman who had to be a princess asleep on the bed. Just looking at her sent warm shivers down his spine and made him blush. With only a moment's hesitation, he gently kissed her cold lips. Instantly warmth sprang up from her body, her beautiful eyes opened and seethed with passion, and she wrapped her arms around Prince Charming, pressing her lips to his.
And thus we see that instinct tells young men and young women to passionately make out.
Between kissing and breathing, Aurora suggested they get married, and between kissing back and breathing, Prince Charming agreed. This is the best day of my life, he thought. Stuff like this never happens in real life!
And so, the kingdoms of Borealis and Whetherportsendale were joined by the marriage of Princess Aurora and Prince Charming. And they all lived happily ever after(12).
THE END
(1)The presence, however, wasn't a truly dark presence. Years of misunderstanding had turned the perception of said presence into an evil presence. The presence, however, wasn't evil, just incredibly good at its job.
(2)Though prophecy never really pays well and there is the occasional threat of being stoned or burned at the stake. In short, not a common profession.
(3)It was her first day on the job. It was set as a training day, but birth has a sneaky tendency to be unscheduled. She delivered the baby, but not without receiving mental scarring. It was she who, stark raving mad, set events in motion that started the famous Chicago fire hundreds of years in advance
(4)They actually were, but the smarter townsfolk were able to suppress the urge when the guards threatened them with sharp and pointy spears.
(5)It really wasn't Morticus' fault. He didn't actually prophecy that one, just thought a bit too hard on the matter.
(6)Now, I'm not dumb but I can't understand why she looks like a woman but talks like a man, but that's Lola for you.
(7)There actually was a reason. Maleficent had a horrible childhood. People made fun of her horns and her evilly green skin and her affinity for evil. It made her grumpy and cynical and psychopathic as she grew up, and has had a thing for ruining childhoods.
(8)It was such a shame that no young man in the kingdom had ever experienced the feeling before.
(9)The name Charming was coincidentally an accident. Childbirth puts a bit of a strain on the mother, so when Charming's mother's midwife asked for the name to put on the birth decree, Charming's mother accidentally said Charming instead of Charlie. Also, by complete coincidence, the same mistake has occurred hundreds of times. It made for very confusing situations at Prince conventions.
(10)Every heroic manly prince had them. It told them what to kill and what to woo.
(11)One of the drawbacks of being a prince is the horrible Hero Puns.
(12)Which is not exactly true. Though Queen Aurora and King Charming were passionate and claimed the title of Most Passionate Despots of All Time, they weren't necessarily good rulers. They went on a passionate military campaign to conquer the world, got as far as France, Poland, Sweden, and Eastern Russia when the insane Russian winter drove them back. Not even their steaming hot love for one another could melt the ice, and they were defeated soon afterwards. The prophecy was indeed fulfilled, and Aurora and Charming did lived happily, but they died horrible painful deaths. The Ever After part of the traditional ending is very rarely true.