When Writers Go Bad: Chapter Three
"What sort of a name is Shadow13?" demanded Le Fantom de l'Opera. The girl nudged at the straw with the toe of her shoe, blushing.
"A pen name," she muttered, embarrassed.
"I'm Lita," announced the girl who'd been buffing her nails. "It's a pleasure, I'm sure."
"I'm Ellen!" shouted the one stuffing sugar in her face. "That's Shadow!" she said, pointing at the girl dressed in black, who was angrily plucking at her glove. "And this," she announced, picking up a bunny, "is Steve!"
Shadow13 turned and gave the alter ego an odd look. "No, it's not. He's the plot bunny for my Les Miserables fic."
"And his name is Steve," added the sugar crazed teen.
"No," corrected the bandaged one again. "He doesn't have a name. He's just 'That one plot bunny for my Les Mis fic.'"
The girl seemed heart broken. "But I named him!"
Now it was Lita's turn to question. "Why?"
"Because!" she cried, snuggling the bunny. "He's just so cute! He deserved a name!"
"But why Steve?" asked Shadow13.
"Why not Steve?"
"Because Steve is as far from Les Miserables themed as it gets!"
Ellen looked up at her creator with large, puppy dog eyes. "But....but...but!"
"Oh fine!" she shouted, flustered. "Keep him, name him! I don't care!" She placed a hand to her bandaged temple and tried to compose herself. "Look, you've gotten me completely off track."
Ellen had ceased to listen. Instead, she was now cooing to "Steve," and ignorant of everyone else's existence.
"I'm sorry about the accommodations," said Shadow13 guiltily. "I really didn't mean for it to be like this. I had the plot bunnies cleaning up spare rooms in the castle. But they're such slow workers and demand two hour lunch breaks, so...." Here she drifted off to glare at several bunnies who'd congregated around her feet, looking up at her with a triumphant smirk on their bunny faces. "Stupid plot bunny union. Well, I didn't know where else to put you all, and I didn't want you to walk out the wrong door, and zip! Off the cloud, so I thought, why not put them in a cell?"
"But why all of us in one cell?" asked Christine.
"I only wrote one up. I didn't really think I'd ever use them....." It was then that Shadow13 finally realized something. Doing a double take, she noticed Erik sitting in his corner, plucking at his sleeve. She then angrily whirled on Ellen, who was so surprised that she dropped Steve, who fell to the floor with a thud. "What's he doing here?" she demanded.
Ellen looked carefully at the phantom. "Sitting."
"We can all see that, dear," sighed Lita, patting the girl's arm.
"I mean, why is he in my cell? I didn't want to abduct him!"
"You said to grab people that looked important."
"And you thought he looked important?"
Ellen shrugged, and pointed at Christine. "She was crying over him, so I guess so."
"That doesn't change the fact that he throws terrible temper tantrums while threatening to blow up an opera house, and that I hate him!"
"Hate's a rather strong word," whimpered Erik.
"You keep out of this!" she shouted, whirling on the phantom. "You nearly killed Raoul and the Persian, so I have every right to not like you very much!" She then drew from her pocket a pad of paper and a pencil, and was about to write something to the effect of "And then, unfortunately, a random piano fell from the ceiling and onto the Opera Ghost's head," when Shadow quickly snatched the pencil out of her creator's hand.
With a cry, Shadow13 lunged for it, flailing her arm at the stronger girl, who was holding her back at an arm's distance. "No maiming characters. It's in the book of respectable writing. And you made the pact, remember?"
Shadow13 looked away and mumbled something.
"I can't hear you," teased the black clad girl.
"I remember!" she shouted, grumbling. "But that doesn't change facts!"
"If you won't let other rabid fan girls hurt Raoul, you shouldn't be able to hurt Erik."
"But Raoul didn't nearly kill anyone!" she protested.
Erik coughed and muttered that he had shot at him in the dark on his balcony that night, but Shadow13 wasn't listening.
"Come on, Emily, let's hear the pact," tempted Lita, who could never resist seeing someone squirm.
"I solemnly swear not to maim a character simply because I don't like them whether this entails making them out of character in order to get a pairing I want, or to physically change them, or hurt them in any way," she grumbled, reaching forlornly for the mechanical pencil again.
"Very good," teased Lita, who patted her on the cheek. She quickly drew her hand back when Shadow13 visibly winced. Her eyes then blacked slightly.
"I don't feel very well. You guys take care of them and answer whatever questions they might have," she said, clutching at her head and stumbling out of the room.
A few of the confused characters would later swear they heard her shouting at someone as she walked down that hall, with words very similar to "Can't you wait until we at least get to a wall that isn't made of rock? Bashing my head against a table hurts badly enough!" They could then her a few terrible cracking sounds, and a muffled cry. But no one decided to mention anything to anyone. Better to keep such odd things to themselves.
"So....." started Shadow. "Any questions?"
"Yes," responded Raoul promptly. "Why are we here?"
"Good question!" said Lita, quickly answering before Shadow could open her mouth. "For years, your characters have been bashed and trashed in poorly written, or at least, ill conceived fanfictions. It's just plain hard to keep you all in character. Even the best of writers can screw it up. So, Shadow13 decided to protect you from bashers by abducting you and keeping you forever safe in this castle. It'll be as though you never even existed, and you can just be free to do whatever you want. Shadow13 will write whatever you want for you."
Javert gapped at the girls. "You can't do this!"
"On the contrary; we can. It's already been done," responded Shadow.
"But you can't just horde us your entire lives! Our stories are made for everyone to read, bashed or not!" cried Valjean. "This isn't right."
"Relax," soothed Ellen. "You'll like it here. You really will. It's loads of fun. This way, you can be protected forever."
"But what if we don't want to be protected?" asked Cosette gloomily.
"You're taking away our basic right as human beings: the right of choice!"
"I'm afraid all your revolutionary friends are stuck back in your old time line, monsieur Pontmercy," responded Shadow coolly to Marius display of patriotism. "You're in a written castle. You will stay in a written castle. You will do what the creator of that written castle dictates. You'll come to enjoy yourselves, I'm quite sure."
"You can't do this!" Chauvelin piped in, starting the protesting afresh.
"I suggest you all settle down," advised Lita, taking the key from her belt and inserting it into the door, ushering the plot bunnies and two other egos out. "Your rooms will be ready shortly. Then you have time to clean up and get ready for dinner. We'll be back shortly."
With that, she closed the door, locking it, leaving the ten characters even more confused than ever.