Wonderworlds
By Laura Schiller
Disclaimer: Star Trek: Voyager belongs to Paramount. Various fairy tales are in the public domain.
/
1. Beauty and the Beast
The monster's scales scrape against the dungeon walls, torchlight striking silver from the shadows. Her voice rattles like rusted metal in her throat.
"Consider your bargain, sir: a life for a life. If you stay, you stay forever."
The merchant's son presses his father's freezing hands through the cell bars, turns away from the older man's imploring eyes, and stands. "Let me see you first."
Clawed forelegs step into the light, followed by a snakelike neck and fanged muzzle - but her eyes …
They are human, bright blue, and infinitely lonely.
He steps into the light, facing her.
"I will stay."
/
2. The Frog Prince
"Princess," the frog croaks, "Remember your promise! Let me in!"
Her face burning, she throws open the doors to the banquet hall, letting the muddy pond-dweller she was sure she'd hallucinated hop inside. Laughter and disgusted squeals echo around the dinner table.
"Who invited this slimy creature?" the courtiers sneer.
He blinks up at her with round hazel eyes, so small for all his bravado. Her humiliation, she realizes, is nothing to his.
"He is my guest." She swoops down with rustling skirts, picks him up, and meets their mocking eyes head-on. "You will treat him accordingly."
They all comply.
/
3. Cinderella
She has not danced since before her father died, but it comes back to her step by step. The Prince's hands are warm, and he leads so lightly, her glass slippers might fly.
"What is your name?" he asks.
"I have none." At his concerned frown, she adds: "I am named for my work."
"Oh? So am I, I suppose." He smiles ruefully at the thought of his title. "And what is your work?"
Ashes. Garbage. Dust. "I prefer not to say."
"Fair enough." He shrugs and twirls her, silk whispering. "Shall we both be nameless for tonight, then?"
"Agreed."
/
4. The Twelve Dancing Princesses
The children dance in unison through a forest of green-lit silver. The mistress of ceremonies nods her bald head to the music, leading the dancers by unseen strings, feeding from their life force like a spider in its web.
Their would-be saviour shivers in his invisibility cloak.
He cannot look away from the eldest sister. She pushes herself to higher leaps and tighter spins. She protects her younger siblings all she can. Her eyes and cheeks are hollow. He knows that look. As a veteran soldier, he has seen it in the mirror.
He must free them - no matter what.
/
5. Snow White
The last time he saw her, her face flushed pink as they sang together.
Now she lies in a glass coffin, white as snow.
"She was poisoned." Her small friends are red-eyed with weeping. "We came too late."
"Not until everything has been done," the healer-prince snaps. "Move aside, please."
The apple is still stuck in her windpipe, easy to dislodge. After that, it's a matter of breathing for her, praying it will be enough.
She coughs.
Her friends sob and cheer as he lifts her from the coffin.
The next time their lips meet, their breath will be shared.
/
"Computer, end program."
The clearing in the forest, the glass coffin, and everything else shimmers away into a rain of stardust, swirling back into the gold-rimmed pages of a book that lay open on a table. The book closed itself with a slow, dignified motion, and in the blink of an eye, all that could be seen was the empty holodeck grid.
"Again!" Miral Paris bounces up and down, staring up at her godparents in wide-eyed awe.
"Play it again! I wanna see the dragon, and all the pretty dresses, and the creepy lady with no hair and, and … "
"You've had quite enough, young lady," the Doctor says, eyes twinkling beneath a thin layer of sternness. "I don't envy your parents when they try to settle you down tonight."
"Our time slot is almost over." Seven moves to open the door, but the Doctor gets there first.
As it slides open to show the busy corridors of one of San Francisco's public holosuite, he gives Seven and Miral an elaborate, hand-sweeping bow.
"After you, princesses."
Seven gives him a look that says You're being ridiculous, but the corners of her mouth twitch upward.
Miral giggles.