Author's notes: This chapter is based off season 2, episode 16, Fairy Tale. I tried to give a plausible explanation for this episode, as it is so funny that I hated to just pretend it didn't exist. Also, this chapter takes place mostly from Mike's point of view, which was kind of an accident, but I liked how it turned out, so I kept it in, even though this story is supposed to focus on Peter and Micky.

The timeline gets really cut up here, as half of it is basically in flashback mode anyway. Every time you're reading something from the past, I have it marked, but when there is no mark, it means it took place in "present day" 1967-8, whenever this episode aired. Enjoy!

Groaning, Peter slowly came to. He looked around, he seemed to be in a hospital bed. He blinked in confusion. What was he doing there? Hearing a snore from across the room, he turned his head, only to regret it as a wave of pain came on him. He held his hand up to his head, his head was bandaged.

He still didn't know who had been snoring, so he tried again, this time moving a bit slower.

Davy, Mike, and Micky all were there in the room, sleeping. Davy was curled up like a cat on a soft chair, his small size making it possible for him to sleep on the seat without falling off. Mike was sitting against the wall, his arms folded across his chest and his head bowed, as if he had fallen asleep while stubbornly trying not to. And Micky was sprawled out in the middle of the floor, spread-eagle style, as if he had been trying to make a snow angel and had fallen asleep half-way through.

He reminded Peter somewhat of a squashed spider, and it made him laugh quietly.

Mike was a light sleeper, apparently, so the sound woke him up.

"Peter!?" He exclaimed, standing up. "You're awake?"

"I guess so," Peter said, smiling. "What happened?"

But Mike was too busy waking Davy and Micky to answer right away.

"Guys, wake up," he was saying. Davy jerked awake and hit his head on the arm of the chair.

"Ow," he said. "Mike, what'd you go and do that for?"

"Peter's awake," Mike explained.

Davy sat up. "Peter!" He said with a smile. "Micky, wake up, Peter's awake!"

"I don't wanna eat brussel sprouts," Micky whined sleepily. "Leave me alone."

"Come on, Micky, wake up!" Mike said, nudging Micky with his boot.

"Huh?" Micky slurred, sitting up slowly. "Hey, where'd the yeti go?"

"Never mind that," Mike said. "Peter's awake."

"Peter!?" Micky exclaimed, jolting wide awake. "How're you feeling?"

"I'm not sure," Peter answered. "What happened?"

"Don't you remember?" Davy asked him.

Peter shook his head. "The last thing I remember is sitting at the pad, looking at the job ads in the newspaper."

There was something else, though, he was sure of it. Something about a carriage...

"Well, if you don't remember, I guess we'd better fill you in," Mike was saying. Peter focused his attention on him and Mike began his story.

Malibu, CA, the previous day:

Mike sighed as he looked in the empty refrigerator. They were completely out of food again, the leftovers he had brought the night before from the restaurant where he worked as a waiter had been used up almost as soon as he'd brought them in the door.

Not that he blamed anybody, a few boxes of food split among four starving musicians was hardly enough to fill them. But still, he was hungry and unless they got a gig soon, they were going to have to resort to eating the furniture.

It had been slow business lately, and all of the Monkees had resorted to looking for other jobs. They had each managed to find one, Mike as a waiter, Micky stocking shelves in the shoe section at a department store, and Davy a salesperson at that same store. Peter had also gotten a job at the supermarket, but one mishap and an entire bin of ruined tomatoes found him back at the pad, poring over the want ads in search of a new job, preferably one that didn't involve perishable foods or precarious display bins.

That was when Davy and Micky came running into the pad, breathless and panicking, yelling something about danger and thieves and a plot and being followed.

"Wait a minute, wait a minute," Mike said, quieting the two down. "Start from the beginning. What's going on?"

"We were working at the store," Davy said. "And this guy came in with this girl, who was looking to buy a dress. She said she was playing a princess in a medieval fair, so I tried to tell her that we didn't sell anything that would work for that, but then the lights all went off and she screamed, and when they came back on, her locket was missing, the guy had taken it and ran!"

"Okay, so what does this have to do with the two of you?" Mike asked.

"Well, when all the lights went off," Micky said, taking over the story from Davy. "I was up on a ladder, organizing the top shelf. I still don't know how it always manages to get mixed up, nobody can reach it."

"You're getting sidetracked," Mike said.

"Well, I tried to climb off the ladder," Micky said, getting back on point. "But I missed the rung and fell off. I guess I landed on the guy who'd stolen it, 'cause then he yelled at me for a minute and ran off. But he dropped this."

Micky reached into his pocket and pulled out a gaudy-looking gold locket.

"Once he realized it was missing, he came looking for it," Davy said. "But I told Micky it had been stolen and we made a break for it. He saw us and chased us halfway across town before we managed to lose him at the bus station, and he didn't have any change for the bus fare."

"So what are we going to do?" Micky asked hurriedly. "It won't take long for him to find out where we live, we've gotta return it to Gwen before it's too late!"

"Gwen?" Mike asked, raising his eyebrows.

"Yeah, that's her name," Davy said.

"How do you know that?" Mike said, turning to Davy.

"Got her number, didn't I?" The younger man said defensively. "She wasn't too happy after Harold stole her locket and ran off."

"Wow," Mike said. "Well, I guess the thing to do is to return the locket to this Gwen girl and tell the police about Harold."

"How are we going to do that?" Peter asked him.

"Davy, you said she was going to play a princess at a medieval fair?" Mike asked. Davy nodded.

"Then I guess we'll go look for her there," Mike decided. "When does it open?"

Peter looked back at the newspaper, he had seen an ad on the fair while he was looking for a job. "It opens tomorrow," he said.

Peter listened to the story, enthralled and feeling a strange sense of deja vu. Gwen? Harold? A locket? This was all sounding very familiar. Somewhere in the back of his head, he could practically hear a voice, a very familiar voice. "Never let it be said that a princess didn't reward a favor."

"What happened at the fair?" He asked.

"Well, now, that's when it got interesting," Mike said.

Malibu, CA, earlier that day:

The Monkees showed up at the fair, Mike in front, the others bumping into him as they looked around at the fair. "Gee, what a weird place," Micky said, as a man dressed in a dragon-ish suit walked by. "I wonder what his story is."

"Well, we don't have time to find out," Mike said. "Let's just find this Gwen person and give the locket back to her."

"Oh no!" Davy whispered suddenly. "Guys! That's Harold!"

A mean looking man walked by as Davy and Micky ducked out of sight. Harold had never seen Mike or Peter, so they didn't need to hide.

After he had walked away, Mike turned to the others. "Okay," he said. "Here's what we're going to do: Pete and I are gonna follow Harold, and see what he's up to. Davy, since you're the only one who's ever seen her, you and Micky try to find Gwen and give her the locket. Got it?"

"Got it," the others all said. With that, they set off.

Mike and Peter followed Harold for awhile, and then he went into a tent, with the words "Mysterious Marlowe." Mike and Peter slowly crept up to the tent and leaned in to listen to what was being said.

"And then," They heard Harold say. "I shall enter the Jousting tournament. Do I win?"

"I see you, standing over all the others, and all of our business has paid off," Another voice said. "Yes, on this the spirits are quite clear, you will be adorned with silver!"

"Ah!" Harold said. "So it will work! I am so glad I found you! You have been right about every prediction so far."

"Quick, he's coming out!" Mike whispered, and he and Peter stood aside as Harold left the tent and strode away.

"Gee, Mike, what do you think that was about?" Peter asked. "I'm not sure," Mike said. "Let's go see this Mysterious Marlowe person in the tent."

He started to walk towards the tent flap, but Peter stopped him. "Wait," he whispered.

"What?" Mike asked.

Peter paused. "I don't like fortune tellers," He admitted. "They give me the creeps."

"Oh, don't worry about that, man," Mike said. "Fortune tellers are just regular people like you and me, they just put on some scary make-up and sit in the dark, and they make generalized statements that can be applied to just about anything. There's nothing to be afraid of."

Peter wasn't convinced, but he followed Mike as he went into the tent.

"Ah, I'd expected to get a visit from a few Monkees today," The woman in the tent said.

"Mike!" Peter whispered worriedly. "How'd she know who we were!?"

"Relax, Pete," Mike said. "She probably saw us perform somewhere once and remembered us from then. She's not really telling the future."

"Oh, okay," Peter said as the two boys sat down in front of what appeared to be a crystal ball.

"I see you are a skeptic," Marlowe said, looking at Mike.

Peter clutched Mike's arm.

"And I see you are a chicken," She said to Peter.

"How'd you guess!?" Peter asked, eyes wide. Mike rolled his eyes.

"I have a question, Mysterious Marlowe," Mike said. "I want to know what Harold was doing here."

"I... do not see this 'Harold' you speak of." Marlowe said.

"That guy who just left this place," Mike said. "What was he doing here, what did he want to find out?"

Marlowe narrowed her eyes into the crystal ball. "The spirits tell me you are down on your luck," she said. "They show me what they want to show me, nothing more. They say that you will succeed, but you will also fail. Long is the road to freedom, and it will never be noticed from a trotting horse. That is all. Good luck to you and yours, and remember that bad times are only times that are bad. Good day to you both."

With that, the two boys left the tent.

"See," Mike said. "Generalized statements. I told you there was nothing to be afraid of."

"What do you think she meant about a trotting horse?" Peter asked anxiously. "She said to remember that bad times are only times that are bad. Does that mean we'll have a bad time soon?"

Mike let out a deep breath. "Man, you'll believe anything you hear, won't you?" He said.

Peter nodded, eyes wide. "She said that we'd succeed, but we'd also fail. What does that mean?"

"I'll tell you what I'm wondering," Mike said. "I'm wondering what a gypsy fortune teller's tent is doing in a medieval fair. That doesn't make any sense."

"Maybe she's a witch in disguise," Peter said.

Mike looked at him. "...What?" He asked.

"You know," Peter said. "Since witches were always hunted down, maybe this one was a witch in disguise."

"A witch disguised as a gypsy fortune teller from the future?" Mike asked, raising his eyebrows. "Seems like they'd still hunt her down."

"Maybe she doesn't know that," Peter said.

Mike shook his head. "Let's just go find the others," he said.

"Do you remember any of that?" Davy asked, and Peter shook his head.

"No," he said. "But I'm glad I don't. He's right, fortune tellers do give me the creeps. What did she mean by the trotting horse?"

"Well, turns out, you decided she'd meant that you were supposed to enter the joust to try and make sure Harold didn't win," Mike said. "We tried to talk you out of it, but..."

Malibu, CA, earlier that day:

"It was foretold, Mike," Peter said seriously, as, dressed in knight's armor, he mounted the horse. "I have to do this, it's the only way to stop Harold!"

"Peter, there're plenty of other ways," Davy said from beside the horse. "Although, I haven't been able to find Gwen anywhere."

"She's probably languishing in some dim-lit cell some place," Micky said unconcerned. "Either that or she's found Harold and she's chewing him out for trying to steal the locket."

"Either way, Harold's got to be stopped," Peter said. "Wish me luck, everybody."

"Wow, and I barely know how to ride a horse," Peter said.

"Boy, you said it," Micky told him. "That was the quickest joust I think I've ever seen."

"What happened?" Peter asked.

"Harold knocked you off the horse, and you hit your head on the stone pavement," Mike said. "Knocked you out cold."

"But what about the locket, and Gwen?" Peter asked. "What happened to them?"

"Well, it turns out that Mysterious Marlowe had been using Harold to steal money from people," Davy said. "She would give him instructions by pretending to see his future, and then she told him to steal the locket so that he would get caught. I guess it worked, but she got caught too."

"She said something really weird though, on her way to the cop car," Micky said, frowning. "She said 'Remember your dream,' all creepy like. It didn't make any sense."

At the words, a flash of memory jolted through Peter, he had been dreaming while he was out.

"Oh, that's scary!" He said, eyes wide. "Guys, I just remembered, I had this really trippy dream while I was out. That must've been what she was talking about! She told you my future, knowing you would give me the message!"

"Oh, come on, Peter, really," Mike said. "There's no such thing as a fortune teller!"

"What was your dream about?" Davy asked.

"Well," Peter started. "We lived in this medieval village, and I was out of work..."

And so Peter relayed his dream to them, and it wasn't long before the four of them were laughing hysterically at all he remembered. And for years afterward, whenever any of them would reference Gwen or Harold or the locket, no one was quite sure which version of the tale they were talking about.

Peter learned an important lesson, however. He learned that a head injury, a medieval fair, and pain medication created really trippy dreams.