A/N: I had this oneshot planned since last year, and I was originally gonna release it for April Fool's Day 2024, but I was super busy. But I got around to finishing it this year! I originally posted it on AO3 in case it looks familiar.
Anyway, I've been kinda wanting to write April Fool's parody oneshots for franchises I don't normally write for. So here's The Cat In The Hat But It's 2025!
Disclaimer: I don't own The Cat in the Hat he belongs to Dr. Seuss yadda yadda yadda
Without further ado, let us begin...
The Cat in the Hat But It's 2025
The sun did not shine. It was too wet to–
Actually, I'm kinda used to it.
If it was 1957, me and my sister Sally would have been absolutely bored out of our skulls. We would have been sitting in front of the window just staring out at the rain as it fell. Sure, it was too wet to go out and too cold to play ball, but that didn't bother us.
Not one little bit.
Because it wasn't 1957. It was 2025, where we had all kinds of new technology to busy ourselves with while our mom was out working at her day job. So we were either chilling on our phones or playing Rocket League and Fortnite to keep ourselves busy while we waited for our mom to get home. It was no big deal, really.
During my fourth match of Rocket League, I heard a bump from somewhere. At first I thought it was part of the music in my game, but I heard footsteps running to the door, followed by the familiar chime of our Ring doorbell. I took off my headphones and got up.
"Nick?" Sally called. "Why is there a giant anthropomorphic cat at the door?"
"A wha– Also, since when did I become Nick?"
"Since The Cat in the Hat Knows a Lot Abo– Waaait."
"What is it?"
"We're not supposed to open the door to strangers, especially furries."
"Well, lucky for you I'm not a furry!" the Cat in the Hat said as he magically opened the locked door and strolled inside. He leaned his umbrella against the wall. "I'm a real flesh-and-blood cat. Anyway, you're probably wondering why I'm here. Well, I'm just as confused as you are! But it might have something to do with the fact that you were bored deep down."
"How do you know that?" I asked.
The Cat shrugged. "I know a few ways we can have fun that do not involve any screen time whatsoever! So… Have either of you been to the circus?"
I rolled my eyes. "Don't care, didn't ask…"
"We're flat-out broke," Sally said. "We don't have money for the circus."
"Well, you're in luck, because I am the circus! I'm bringing all the fun to you! I'm part of Fun Things That Are Funny Enterprises, and best of all, your mother won't mind at all if I do."
"Somehow I highly doubt that…" I said.
Just when things couldn't get any weirder, they did. Our goldfish popped its head out of the water and SPOKE. It spoke to the Cat in an alarmed tone.
"Where is your common sense, mister?" he asked. "Why are you breaking and entering in the middle of the day?"
"Breaking and entering?" the Cat asked, sounding amused. "I didn't break anything. The door was unlocked."
"Then what were those bumps I heard outside?" the fish asked.
"I slipped. The front porch is wet. Nothing big. Anyway, we are wasting time! Who wants to play Up-Up-Up With A Fish?"
"Not me!" the fish said, but the Cat didn't seem to hear. He balanced his fish bowl on the handle of his umbrella, then grabbed a large Walmart ball from seemingly out of nowhere and expertly stood on it. Sally and I watched in shock and astonishment as he grabbed several books, a cup, a rake, a fan, a gallon of milk, and even a whole cake and balanced them on his hat, in his hands, and even on one foot. It was impressive, but more importantly, it was incredibly dangerous.
"Are you seeing this, kids?!" the fish complained. "This is why I kept telling you guys I didn't want to live in a bowl! I wanted a 50-gallon fish tank!"
"Don't worry, I won't let you fall!" the Cat promised.
"Is this a new TikTok trend?" I asked.
"Mom said not to play ball in the house!" Sally shouted.
"And how are you balancing a whole cake on your head?" I asked. "Where did you even get a cake? I know Mom didn't make one, and besides, it's not even our birthday!"
"A magician never reveals his secr–"
Those were the Cat's last words before he accidentally slipped. The next few seconds were utter mayhem.
The cat landed on his head with a bump, and everything that the Cat had precariously balanced fell to the ground. The ball bounced around, nearly knocking over some china on a shelf, as the cake fell into the carpet. Even worse, the fish fell into a random pot that was sitting on a table.
"I'll never complain about my fish bowl again…" he muttered.
"I thought cats always land on their feet," Sally pointed out, clearly as unimpressed as I was.
"Yeah, maybe you really are a furry," I added.
But before the Cat could speak, the fish went off on him.
"Look what you did!" he ranted. "Look at this mess that you made! You sank a toy ship deep in the cake, which is already ground into the carpet! You even bent our new rake that these kids' mom bought like two weeks ago, and… and I don't even know how I'm still breathing right now considering I'm out of the water, but if I had hands, I would call your manager and sue the Fun-Things-That-Are-Funny company or whoever you work for and get you fired! Now get out of this house!"
There was a stunned silence for a while until it was broken by Sally.
"C'mon, let's go back to our games," she said before she started to leave. I followed her, but then the Cat stood up and hooked the end of his umbrella around my wrist to keep me from going anywhere.
"Aww, but I'm just getting started!" the Cat protested. "Besides, I'm here because you were bored, remember?"
"I'd like to not remember," Sally said, rolling her eyes.
The Cat wandered around the living room, glancing around at the carnage he had caused. "Y'know… in the five minutes I've been here… I've come to like this place. I like it a lot. It's like a second home to me already. And I don't wanna leave, not because I'm sentimental, but because it's raining and cats hate rain. Actually, y'know, that reminds me… there's another game I wanna show you guys. You'll love it, I swear! I'll be right back!"
And with that, the Cat ran out the door. The fish wasted no time in jumping into action!
"Lock the door, quick!" he exclaimed. "Don't worry about me, just don't let him back in here!"
"I got it!" Sally called as she ran toward the front door.
"And put me back in my fish bowl while you're at it!" the fish added.
As I ran to get his fish bowl, I happened to notice the Cat pulling a giant wooden red box out of the back of his SUV.
"…I thought he just said cats hate rain…" I noted. "Eh, whatever."
But right as Sally finished locking the door, and before I could pick up the fish bowl and fill it with fresh water, the Cat broke through the front door again, carrying the wooden box on his shoulders. He must have been using it to protect himself from the rain, or so I imagined. But he was bringing it into the house.
"You guys wanna take a guess about what's in here?" he asked.
"It's not 2003 anymore, you're not fooling anyone," Sally commented.
"Yeah, and besides, they don't make physical games like they used to," I added.
"You sure about that?" the Cat said with a mischievous smile. "Now you're gonna love this one. Get this, it's called Fun in a Box. There are two things you should know about this game." He began to unlatch the box. "One…" he paused for a few seconds for dramatic effect. "And Two."
As he spoke, two new individuals stepped out of the box. They had blue wigs and wore red onesies, "creatively" labeled Thing 1 and Thing 2.
"Oh wow…" Sally facepalmed.
"Now you brought in actual furries…" I groaned. "Just when things couldn't get any worse…"
"Well, lucky for you they're not furries!" the Cat declared. "Oh yeah, don't worry about them. They won't bite you, they're just here to have fun and let out all their excess energy."
"Look, I'm not worried about them biting us, they don't even have teeth," I said. "I'm more worried about how they survived the car trip here."
"Now now, no need to worry about little things like that," the Cat said. "Here, would you like to shake hands with them?
Against our wills, Thing One and Thing Two shook hands with us, and the whole time I was expecting there to be a catch. But surprisingly, there was none; nothing happened.
"You know the Ring doorbell caught all of this, right?!" the fish exclaimed. "And besides, it's bad enough to let strangers in the house while your mom's at work, but now a stranger's letting in strangers!"
"Awww, you worry too much, Mr…" the Cat said, forgetting what the fish's name is.
"Just 'the fish'," the fish explained. "Dr. Seuss never gave me an actual name."
"Oh, that makes two of us!" the Cat said with a big smile. "Look at us, we have so much in common! We're gonna be besties, I just know it!"
The fish just groaned in response. He couldn't argue with the Cat, especially since he didn't seem to listen to him.
"So yeah, you met Thing One and Thing Two," the Cat announced to the room. "You know what they like to do most? They like to fly kites. What's that, you say? It's too wet to go out and too cold to play ball? And there's also no wind? Oh, that won't stop them. Not one little bit!"
"But where's the logic in that?" I exclaimed.
"Where's the logic in driving cars into balls the size of your garage door?" the Cat shot back. "You don't question that, but you question this?"
"Somebody stop them!" Sally shouted, and I turned to see that the two Things were already flying their kites through the house.
"Yes, get up and stop them right now!" the fish added. "They're gonna hit everything! They'll knock down all the pictures! Stop them!"
I must have blinked, because when I looked up, they were gone.
"Oh yeah, thanks for telling me I should make a TikTok out of this! Why didn't I think of that before?!" And with that, the Cat pulled out of his cell phone and hit record.
Sally and I ran out of the room when we heard the constant thud of the Things' kites ramming themselves against the wall, knocking down nearly every painting and object that wasn't properly secured.
"Forget about the mess, just stop them!" I heard the fish call from behind us.
Shaking myself out of my trance, I ran forward through the hall, and saw the Things running up the stairs. Their kites were flying completely upright as if there was wind, when there was no wind inside at all. And before I knew it, the Things and their kites were out of sight.
We both ran up the stairs, right as we saw the Things entering our mom's room. When we followed them in there, we saw that it had already become utter bedlam.
"Is that Mom's new dress on the kite string?!" Sally called.
"How is that even possible?!" I exclaimed.
Sure enough, the hanger that the dress was on was hooked onto the kite string, which should not have even been remotely possible in any logical sense. And even worse, one of the two Things ran right past us, nearly knocking us over, but not before his kite struck the top of Mom's bed.
"H-Hold on, hold on, I gotta record this!" Sally called as she ran to her room. She came back seconds later with her phone and started filming.
"No, you should call 911!" I exclaimed. "This is breaking and entering as well as destruction of personal property!" Although, I was a pot calling the kettle black since I didn't have my phone with me at the moment, and if I ran to get it, I would be wasting precious time.
As much as I wanted to record it too, I knew that the situation had to be stopped. I ran downstairs after the Things, and Sally followed. She made sure to film all the destruction they caused, as well as the Things themselves. And just when we thought it couldn't get any worse than Mom's room, it did.
One of the Things ran past us again, and the kite string ended up tripping Sally, but the most important part for her was that she kept recording.
"I hate furries…" I heard her mumble under her breath as she stood back up.
I ran after the Thing that tripped her, but he was so impossibly athletic that I had a very hard time keeping up. I was sure that he would outperform professional athletes the way he was jumping around. I heard the tremendous crash as an entire dresser was knocked over, and it wasn't even caused by the kites. No, the Thing physically knocked it over with his own strength.
But then I gasped when I saw that the other Thing had the fish in the pot strung through his kite string. That was no accident. No, it looked like it was intentional, like the Thing physically stopped what he was doing and threaded the kite string through the pot's handle.
"You know what, I'm going to forget this day ever happened…" the fish grumbled.
"You're missing the point of having fun on this cold, wet day," the Cat said. "Relax, lighten up a little!"
"No, you lighten up! This is a crime!" the fish retaliated. "What you're doing is a crime whether you like it or not!"
"So what do you call babysitters, then?" the Cat scoffed, not taking his camera off the Things as they continued their escapades around the house.
Even though fish don't have eyelids, the fish's eyes widened when he saw a familiar Subaru Forester pulling into the driveway.
"Guys! Your mom's here! She literally just pulled into the driveway, and the whole house is a mess! What are we gonna do?! Nick, Sally, do you hear me?! Sally, put the phone down and listen! Your mom's here right now, she's gonna be inside any minute! You gotta get rid of these guys like right now! Go, go!"
And then I suddenly remembered my dad's old fishing net! I immediately ran down to the garage, and came back several moments later with the massive net. Thing One and Thing Two were still running around with their kites, which provided me ample time to run and hide behind a corner, where I wanted for them to approach.
I heard two sets of footsteps approaching, and only then did it dawn on me that the net was heavier than I thought. Even when I held it with both hands, it was tough to hold it in position, and it was only by a sheer stroke of luck that I managed to plop the net down over the two Things' heads, trapping them both together.
"Hey! What are you doing?!" the Cat exclaimed as he ran over, still filming the whole thing.
"You need to get out of here right now!" I told the Cat. "It's not funny! It's… it's cringe!"
"It's just a prank, bro…" the Cat said, finally shutting off his camera and putting his phone away.
"No it's not! Mom's home and the house is a mess!" Sally exclaimed.
The Cat sighed. "Well… that's the problem with today's generation. You guys don't appreciate good wholesome fun like they did in 1957. Get in the box, Things. We're leaving."
"Yeah, get in the box, Things!" my sister added.
Without a word (not that they said anything the whole time they were at our house), the two Things filed their way into the box, and he sealed it up and carried it outside.
"Are we not gonna talk about why you keep them in a box? They can't breathe in there!" my sister said.
"Wasn't a problem in 1957," the Cat mumbled as he disappeared into the rain.
"Um, the bigger question is, what are we gonna do now?" I asked. I let out a sigh and looked around at the damaged living room. There was cake everywhere, the family photos had fallen off the wall, and there was no time to pick anything up.
And then we heard it:
"ZA WARUDO!"
"Huh?!" I exclaimed as I ran to the window. "Hey, Mom's standing still outside!"
"You're right, kids!" the Cat said as he drove this completely unrealistic vehicle through the front door. "I stole The World from Dio for this story because that's the only way I can explain how I drove through your door when your mom is literally right outside in the original story."
I blinked. "What do you mean, 'original story'?" I asked.
"Never mind," the Cat said. "I'm on my redemption arc, so don't try to stop me!"
With that, several hands came out of the large holes in the vehicle as they swept the floor and picked everything up and put everything back where they went in record time.
"Um, aren't you forgetting something?!" the fish called from the floor.
"Oh yes, sorry!" the Cat said as one of the vehicle's hands picked him up and tossed him back into his bowl.
"Remind me to invest in proper real estate…" the fish mumbled.
"And now, I must take my leave," the Cat said as he drove outside. "And see how much I make off my newest TikTok video!"
"Bye! Never come back!" Sally called out the door.
"You wish!" the Cat called. "My next appearance is literally a book called 'The Cat in the Hat Comes Back!' And you may want to get back inside, 'cuz time's gonna unfreeze in a few seconds!"
Sure enough, as the cat drove away, time unfroze, and Mom walked in through the door.
"I'm home~!" she called.
"Hi, Mom!" we both said at the same time, trying not to show any sign that anything had happened.
"Sorry I was gone for so long! Did you guys have fun while I was gone?" she asked.
"Um…" I said aloud, having no idea how to answer. Of course, I couldn't just tell her that a random stranger broke into our house, trashed the place, and let random pets run around inside.
"Yeah, we were just playing Rocket League," Sally said. Whew, that was a close one.
"Oh, by the way, you know Fun Things That Are Funny Enterprises?" she asked.
My heart skipped a beat. "Yeah…?"
"I just found out on the way home that they got a Chapter 11 bankruptcy, and they had to lay off some staff, so there may be some disgruntled employees in costumes roaming around town looking for work, so if anything happens, let me know, okay?"
"Okay," we both responded before we went back to our games. To think that the Cat was a terminated employee from some entertainment business…
I eventually came to the realization that she would have never left us at home alone under normal circumstances, but she did because that's how Dr. Seuss planned it, not the author of this story.
Furthermore, it was a wonder that she never bothered to check the security footage that day. Or maybe she did, I don't know. Me and my sister were too busy playing Rocket League and Fortnite and scrolling TikTok to care. We weren't sitting in front of the window bored out of our skulls.
Because it wasn't 1957 anymore.
It was 2025.
"Sixty-eight years later, Stardown took 3,322 words, twisted them, and turned out THE CAT IN THE HAT BUT IT'S 2025, a little volume of stupid randomness that worked like a karate chop on the weary little world of Nick, Sally, and the Cat in the Hat… except it didn't, because you can't beat the true wit of the original story. #DrSeussIsAwesome" –Stardown, Stardown Enterprises, Apr. 2025
From this magically absurd brain mush came the concept of April Fools Day parody stories, exacting blends of words and concepts that encourage people to click on another story instead – all by themselves. Hailed by Stardown himself and his reviewers, these enormously random stories are now used in fanfiction sites throughout the English-speaking Internet.
A/N: Yup, it looks like I still got my old 2018 style after all these years!
Anyway, feel free to check out my current fanfic Tranquility and Order: A Sonic X Rewrite, and there's also a link to my Discord server in my Twitter bio. See you guys next time!