A FRIGHTENINGLY FRACTURED FAIRYTALE: AN FKFIC CHALLENGE
AND THE FRACTURE BECOMES SHATTERED BONE...
Standard disclaimers apply. These characters aren't mine,
I'm just messing with their lives a bit. Permission is
granted to archive on fkfanfic.com, and the ftp site. This
story is in response to Kyer's Frighteningly Fractured
Fairytale challenge. And boy, is this one fractured...
Just to warn you, this has not been beta read by anyone
except myself, and I do believe that my warped sense of
humor has gotten away from me on this one... Oh well, the
product was... interesting :)
Comments, questions, feedback, and all that good stuff may
be sent to Diane Harris at [email protected]!
AND THE FRACTURE BECOMES SHATTERED BONE...
'Once upon a time...'
He stared down at his laptop and groaned. That was sooooooo
bloody clichéd... Jamming his finger down on the delete
key with such force that it was surprising the poor thing
didn't squish into a pile of electronic scrap, he tried to
think of something that wasn't so damned predictable.
'It was a dark and...'
NO!!! He snapped his fingers repeatedly, trying to get SOME
inspiration. Any inspiration at all...
'It was the best of times...'
But he failed to get it. What to say? What to say? He
pinched the bridge of his nose, completely absorbed in
thought as needed circulation was cut off from the
appendage.
He needed... motivation. He needed...
"LaCroix... I need help..."
Yes, help. He needed help. Help would be good... He had
never been much of a writer... Oh!!! Someone was speaking
to him...
"Not now, Nicholas. I am in the middle of writ..." LaCroix
paused as he looked up at his blond protégé. Waaaait...
This might be all right! "Nicholas, I require your
assistance..."
"But..." Nick looked confused. Silence reigned for what
seemed like an eternity until finally LaCroix's protégé
spoke, quiet and hesitant. "I don't get it..."
Sigh... Did he _ever_? It was a debatable question... "I
need your help," he rephrased his words evenly, hoping that
eventually Nick would get it on his own.
A whole weird string of emotions flickered across Nick's
face until finally, there was at least an inkling of
understanding... "Help? You?" he asked incredulously.
"Yes, help," LaCroix confirmed, quickly becoming irritated.
This was not how he'd imagined spending the night... In
fact... before this bloody inspiration to write something
literature-like struck his mind, he'd fully intended to sit
back and give a nice long depressing monologue on CERK about
why buzz cuts were good for aerodynamic flight...
"Well..." Nick paused. "Ok," he said with a shrug. "There
isn't some catch to this," he asked suspiciously, "is
there?"
"No," LaCroix replied. This was getting tiresome.
"Uh huh..." Nick said warily, crossing his arms over his
chest in the perfect, 'HA! I defy you!' stance. "Fine," he
said finally, "What do you want..."
"Help. I thought we had already gone over this," LaCroix
growled in response. Damn, but that boy was dense...
"No! I meant, what did you want help on?" Nick clarified,
quickly saving himself from LaCroix's menacing glare of
death. Even so, he retreated backwards a few steps.
"Well, see, I am trying to convert this script into a story,
and I'm just not seeing anything here. I need motivation!"
LaCroix cried, his fists in the air, suddenly quite
emotional. Well, it was his first writing experience, he
was bound to get excited. Gosh, he'd never written anything
before that would qualify as intellectual. This was an
experience!
Nick looked perplexed. "Ok... So what the heck am I
supposed to do about your writer's block?"
LaCroix snapped back to reality and stared at Nick. "Well,
do you think that maybe we could act it out? You know, so
I can get a feel for the dramatic overtones..." he gestured
frantically between them as he explained.
Nick rolled his eyes in response. "Sure... sure why not...
It's not like I've got homicides, a crazy captain, and an
overcaffeinated partner to deal with already..." he grumbled
softly, snatching the script from LaCroix's firmly clutched
hands. His eyes darted left to right as he read the page
over. And over... And over... He apparently doubted the
literary content of such a fine work. "LaCroix... you can't
be serious?" he asked, his eyes questioning.
"I'm absolutely serious! It's an admirable work of
symbolism and art! I want to do it as much justice as I
possibly can!" LaCroix exclaimed enthusiastically, hovering
behind him. "Could you read for that part? I'll do this
one..." he said.
"But..." Nick protested.
"Look, you have acting experience, it seems logical to me
that you get the bigger part..." LaCroix explained, trying
to get Nicholas to see the big picture. The dramatic
picture. The literary picture!
"Fine... fine! Jeez... I swear though, if you ever breathe
a word of this..." Nick threatened.
"If you do it I promise not to torment you for at least a
week..."
LaCroix was not given a chance to finish, however. Nick put
his hand up and silenced him. "Ok! All right... Let's
see..."
Nicholas looked over the script for a few moments and then
placed it down beside them on a nearby table. He cleared
his throat several times, seemingly dislodging any and all
mucus that could've possibly been there to prevent him from
entering his...
"Nichola! LaCroix! What are you doing in here?" Janette
asked as she entered the room.
LaCroix visibly deflated at the interruption, and his jaw
slackened in disappointment until he realized... "Janette!
Here, look at this," he said, grabbing the script off the
table only to shove it hastily into her hands. "Read that
part..." he said, pointing.
Silence.
Janette cocked her head, her eyebrows raised in inquiry.
"Is this a game?"
Nicholas coughed, an odd look on his face. "LaCroix
needs... uh... inspiration..."
"Ah..." she responded. "All right then..."
Janette took a deep breath and turned to Nick. "Grandma is
ill," she began, a questioning look on her face. "Take her
this basket of cakes, but be _very_ careful. Keep to the
path through the wood and don't ever stop. That way, you
will come to no harm," she cautioned, but then she turned to
LaCroix.
"LaCroix... this does not seem like a logical play..." she
began. "Why would I want to give a sick person cakes? I
thought the mortal standard was chicken soup..." she
explained, suddenly confused, but LaCroix just waved her
off.
"Never mind that. Just keep going..." he prodded.
Janette nodded, however reluctantly, and turned back to
Nick, recomposing herself.
Nick again did that funny 'clearing of throat ritual' before
he began in what had to be the cutest little falsetto
LaCroix had ever heard, "Don't worry! I'll run all the way
to Grandma's without stopping!" he cried enthusiastically,
and then despite the smirk on Janette's face, Nicholas gave
Janette a peck on the cheek and skipped off to the other
side of the room, where he bent down, peering at an
imaginary object that only he could see.
"What lovely strawberries! And so red..." he claimed,
picking up a 'strawberry' in his hand and plopping it into
his mouth.
While Janette was trying furiously not to laugh, Nick
continued to bounce around the room as if suffering a
stronger than normal sugar high, going this way and that,
pointing out everything off the path that he had so
earnestly promised his 'mother' that he would stay on, until
he literally ran right into LaCroix.
LaCroix, normally, would've been exceedingly annoyed. But
he merely smiled a sly smile. "Where are you going, my
pretty girl, all alone in the woods?" LaCroix asked,
smoothly.
"Um... to Grandma's; she lives at the end of the path" Nick
replied nervously, looking this way and that, anywhere but
into LaCroix's eyes.
LaCroix smiled. "Does your grandma live... _alone_?" he
asked, trying desperately to keep the menace out of his
voice.
"Oh yes! She _never_ opens the door to stran," Nick's voice
cracked back into his normal tone, but he quickly fixed it
and continued. "Strangers," he finished.
"Ah then. Goodbye. Perhaps we shall meet again..." LaCroix
whispered forebodingly and then bounded off. "I will eat
the little girl's grandmother!" he cried, explaining his
sinister plan.
"LaCroix?" Nick asked hesitantly in his regular voice.
"What???" LaCroix snapped, suddenly annoyed. Things had
been going quite well until this interruption...
"I believe the correct line is 'I will gobble the
grandmother first, then lie in wait for the grandchild'"
Nick said matter-of-factly.
LaCroix growled. "Perhaps _you_ would like to be the wolf?
Hmmm?" He tapped his foot. "This is a HARD role! I can't
relate to it..."
Janette coughed.
"Well, I can't!" he whined. "I've never been a furry
carnivorous quadruped..."
Nick shrugged. "Hey, two out of three..." he said
reasonably, raising his hands in defense as he backed slowly
away.
LaCroix raised an eyebrow. "Are you implying that I'm a
quadruped?" he asked, his voice low and angry and very
dangerous all-around.
"No..." Nick replied honestly.
"That I'm furry???" LaCroix cried incredulously.
Nick said nothing, and LaCroix was about to pounce on him in
a fit of rage.
"ANYWAY," Janette interrupted loudly, saving Nick from
certain dismemberment. "Why don't we start again here?
Everyone knows this part..." she stated reasonably.
"Fine..." LaCroix grumbled, settling down once again to act
out the scene.
Nick nodded and cleared his throat again. "Grandma! What
a deep voice you have!" he exclaimed, bouncing up on his
tiptoes as he brought his clasped hands to his cheek in the
classic, 'I'm a dainty little girl' maneuver.
"The better to greet you with..." LaCroix replied
mysteriously, his voice oozing low and smooth from his lips.
"Goodness, what big eyes you have!" Nick exclaimed, his
falsetto tone so high it was probably up in the rafters
somewhere communing with the local insect inhabitants.
"The better to see you with..." LaCroix said, growing more
agitated as the conversation wore on.
"And what big hands you have!" Nick stated, awed.
"The better to hug you with..." LaCroix replied, his voice
low and irritated now.
"What a big mouth you have!" Nick exclaimed.
"THE BETTER TO EAT YOU WITH!" LaCroix cried, leaping
forward. He snarled and grabbed Nick, chomping down hard on
his supple neck. Ecstasy followed as his protégé's blood
flowed into his mouth and down his throat. It burned him;
his entire body shivered in intense feeling, until Nick
slumped lifeless to the floor with a loud hollow thunk.
Seconds past. Minutes...
LaCroix merely stared intently at the floor where Nick lay
motionless as if he expected something to happen.
"Um, LaCroix? We forgot to cast a hunter... the hunter is
the one that saves him by killing you..." Janette said
hesitantly. "I think he is stuck there until then..."
LaCroix looked up at her, surprise marring his usually stony
gaze.
Janette flipped through the script, reading it over,
mumbling softly as she went over it. "Yeah... no hunter
means no Little Red Riding Hood..."
Oops...
"Ah well," LaCroix said, "I suppose that is enough anyway.
I think I have inspiration for now..." he said, stepping
spryly over Nick's lifeless form and back to his laptop,
which was still waiting patiently on the table for him to
type something of import.
Janette shrugged.
Oops, indeed.
*****
Nick opened his eyes and groaned, very hungry, so hungry he
couldn't really move. "LaCroix?" he asked as his stomach
growled relentlessly.
"Not right now, Nicholas... I'm still writing..."
"But..." he protested, trying to sit up and dismally
failing.
"NOT RIGHT NOW!!!" his sire growled.
Nick sighed and tried to relax. This was going to be a long
day...
THE END
AND THE FRACTURE BECOMES SHATTERED BONE...
Standard disclaimers apply. These characters aren't mine,
I'm just messing with their lives a bit. Permission is
granted to archive on fkfanfic.com, and the ftp site. This
story is in response to Kyer's Frighteningly Fractured
Fairytale challenge. And boy, is this one fractured...
Just to warn you, this has not been beta read by anyone
except myself, and I do believe that my warped sense of
humor has gotten away from me on this one... Oh well, the
product was... interesting :)
Comments, questions, feedback, and all that good stuff may
be sent to Diane Harris at [email protected]!
AND THE FRACTURE BECOMES SHATTERED BONE...
'Once upon a time...'
He stared down at his laptop and groaned. That was sooooooo
bloody clichéd... Jamming his finger down on the delete
key with such force that it was surprising the poor thing
didn't squish into a pile of electronic scrap, he tried to
think of something that wasn't so damned predictable.
'It was a dark and...'
NO!!! He snapped his fingers repeatedly, trying to get SOME
inspiration. Any inspiration at all...
'It was the best of times...'
But he failed to get it. What to say? What to say? He
pinched the bridge of his nose, completely absorbed in
thought as needed circulation was cut off from the
appendage.
He needed... motivation. He needed...
"LaCroix... I need help..."
Yes, help. He needed help. Help would be good... He had
never been much of a writer... Oh!!! Someone was speaking
to him...
"Not now, Nicholas. I am in the middle of writ..." LaCroix
paused as he looked up at his blond protégé. Waaaait...
This might be all right! "Nicholas, I require your
assistance..."
"But..." Nick looked confused. Silence reigned for what
seemed like an eternity until finally LaCroix's protégé
spoke, quiet and hesitant. "I don't get it..."
Sigh... Did he _ever_? It was a debatable question... "I
need your help," he rephrased his words evenly, hoping that
eventually Nick would get it on his own.
A whole weird string of emotions flickered across Nick's
face until finally, there was at least an inkling of
understanding... "Help? You?" he asked incredulously.
"Yes, help," LaCroix confirmed, quickly becoming irritated.
This was not how he'd imagined spending the night... In
fact... before this bloody inspiration to write something
literature-like struck his mind, he'd fully intended to sit
back and give a nice long depressing monologue on CERK about
why buzz cuts were good for aerodynamic flight...
"Well..." Nick paused. "Ok," he said with a shrug. "There
isn't some catch to this," he asked suspiciously, "is
there?"
"No," LaCroix replied. This was getting tiresome.
"Uh huh..." Nick said warily, crossing his arms over his
chest in the perfect, 'HA! I defy you!' stance. "Fine," he
said finally, "What do you want..."
"Help. I thought we had already gone over this," LaCroix
growled in response. Damn, but that boy was dense...
"No! I meant, what did you want help on?" Nick clarified,
quickly saving himself from LaCroix's menacing glare of
death. Even so, he retreated backwards a few steps.
"Well, see, I am trying to convert this script into a story,
and I'm just not seeing anything here. I need motivation!"
LaCroix cried, his fists in the air, suddenly quite
emotional. Well, it was his first writing experience, he
was bound to get excited. Gosh, he'd never written anything
before that would qualify as intellectual. This was an
experience!
Nick looked perplexed. "Ok... So what the heck am I
supposed to do about your writer's block?"
LaCroix snapped back to reality and stared at Nick. "Well,
do you think that maybe we could act it out? You know, so
I can get a feel for the dramatic overtones..." he gestured
frantically between them as he explained.
Nick rolled his eyes in response. "Sure... sure why not...
It's not like I've got homicides, a crazy captain, and an
overcaffeinated partner to deal with already..." he grumbled
softly, snatching the script from LaCroix's firmly clutched
hands. His eyes darted left to right as he read the page
over. And over... And over... He apparently doubted the
literary content of such a fine work. "LaCroix... you can't
be serious?" he asked, his eyes questioning.
"I'm absolutely serious! It's an admirable work of
symbolism and art! I want to do it as much justice as I
possibly can!" LaCroix exclaimed enthusiastically, hovering
behind him. "Could you read for that part? I'll do this
one..." he said.
"But..." Nick protested.
"Look, you have acting experience, it seems logical to me
that you get the bigger part..." LaCroix explained, trying
to get Nicholas to see the big picture. The dramatic
picture. The literary picture!
"Fine... fine! Jeez... I swear though, if you ever breathe
a word of this..." Nick threatened.
"If you do it I promise not to torment you for at least a
week..."
LaCroix was not given a chance to finish, however. Nick put
his hand up and silenced him. "Ok! All right... Let's
see..."
Nicholas looked over the script for a few moments and then
placed it down beside them on a nearby table. He cleared
his throat several times, seemingly dislodging any and all
mucus that could've possibly been there to prevent him from
entering his...
"Nichola! LaCroix! What are you doing in here?" Janette
asked as she entered the room.
LaCroix visibly deflated at the interruption, and his jaw
slackened in disappointment until he realized... "Janette!
Here, look at this," he said, grabbing the script off the
table only to shove it hastily into her hands. "Read that
part..." he said, pointing.
Silence.
Janette cocked her head, her eyebrows raised in inquiry.
"Is this a game?"
Nicholas coughed, an odd look on his face. "LaCroix
needs... uh... inspiration..."
"Ah..." she responded. "All right then..."
Janette took a deep breath and turned to Nick. "Grandma is
ill," she began, a questioning look on her face. "Take her
this basket of cakes, but be _very_ careful. Keep to the
path through the wood and don't ever stop. That way, you
will come to no harm," she cautioned, but then she turned to
LaCroix.
"LaCroix... this does not seem like a logical play..." she
began. "Why would I want to give a sick person cakes? I
thought the mortal standard was chicken soup..." she
explained, suddenly confused, but LaCroix just waved her
off.
"Never mind that. Just keep going..." he prodded.
Janette nodded, however reluctantly, and turned back to
Nick, recomposing herself.
Nick again did that funny 'clearing of throat ritual' before
he began in what had to be the cutest little falsetto
LaCroix had ever heard, "Don't worry! I'll run all the way
to Grandma's without stopping!" he cried enthusiastically,
and then despite the smirk on Janette's face, Nicholas gave
Janette a peck on the cheek and skipped off to the other
side of the room, where he bent down, peering at an
imaginary object that only he could see.
"What lovely strawberries! And so red..." he claimed,
picking up a 'strawberry' in his hand and plopping it into
his mouth.
While Janette was trying furiously not to laugh, Nick
continued to bounce around the room as if suffering a
stronger than normal sugar high, going this way and that,
pointing out everything off the path that he had so
earnestly promised his 'mother' that he would stay on, until
he literally ran right into LaCroix.
LaCroix, normally, would've been exceedingly annoyed. But
he merely smiled a sly smile. "Where are you going, my
pretty girl, all alone in the woods?" LaCroix asked,
smoothly.
"Um... to Grandma's; she lives at the end of the path" Nick
replied nervously, looking this way and that, anywhere but
into LaCroix's eyes.
LaCroix smiled. "Does your grandma live... _alone_?" he
asked, trying desperately to keep the menace out of his
voice.
"Oh yes! She _never_ opens the door to stran," Nick's voice
cracked back into his normal tone, but he quickly fixed it
and continued. "Strangers," he finished.
"Ah then. Goodbye. Perhaps we shall meet again..." LaCroix
whispered forebodingly and then bounded off. "I will eat
the little girl's grandmother!" he cried, explaining his
sinister plan.
"LaCroix?" Nick asked hesitantly in his regular voice.
"What???" LaCroix snapped, suddenly annoyed. Things had
been going quite well until this interruption...
"I believe the correct line is 'I will gobble the
grandmother first, then lie in wait for the grandchild'"
Nick said matter-of-factly.
LaCroix growled. "Perhaps _you_ would like to be the wolf?
Hmmm?" He tapped his foot. "This is a HARD role! I can't
relate to it..."
Janette coughed.
"Well, I can't!" he whined. "I've never been a furry
carnivorous quadruped..."
Nick shrugged. "Hey, two out of three..." he said
reasonably, raising his hands in defense as he backed slowly
away.
LaCroix raised an eyebrow. "Are you implying that I'm a
quadruped?" he asked, his voice low and angry and very
dangerous all-around.
"No..." Nick replied honestly.
"That I'm furry???" LaCroix cried incredulously.
Nick said nothing, and LaCroix was about to pounce on him in
a fit of rage.
"ANYWAY," Janette interrupted loudly, saving Nick from
certain dismemberment. "Why don't we start again here?
Everyone knows this part..." she stated reasonably.
"Fine..." LaCroix grumbled, settling down once again to act
out the scene.
Nick nodded and cleared his throat again. "Grandma! What
a deep voice you have!" he exclaimed, bouncing up on his
tiptoes as he brought his clasped hands to his cheek in the
classic, 'I'm a dainty little girl' maneuver.
"The better to greet you with..." LaCroix replied
mysteriously, his voice oozing low and smooth from his lips.
"Goodness, what big eyes you have!" Nick exclaimed, his
falsetto tone so high it was probably up in the rafters
somewhere communing with the local insect inhabitants.
"The better to see you with..." LaCroix said, growing more
agitated as the conversation wore on.
"And what big hands you have!" Nick stated, awed.
"The better to hug you with..." LaCroix replied, his voice
low and irritated now.
"What a big mouth you have!" Nick exclaimed.
"THE BETTER TO EAT YOU WITH!" LaCroix cried, leaping
forward. He snarled and grabbed Nick, chomping down hard on
his supple neck. Ecstasy followed as his protégé's blood
flowed into his mouth and down his throat. It burned him;
his entire body shivered in intense feeling, until Nick
slumped lifeless to the floor with a loud hollow thunk.
Seconds past. Minutes...
LaCroix merely stared intently at the floor where Nick lay
motionless as if he expected something to happen.
"Um, LaCroix? We forgot to cast a hunter... the hunter is
the one that saves him by killing you..." Janette said
hesitantly. "I think he is stuck there until then..."
LaCroix looked up at her, surprise marring his usually stony
gaze.
Janette flipped through the script, reading it over,
mumbling softly as she went over it. "Yeah... no hunter
means no Little Red Riding Hood..."
Oops...
"Ah well," LaCroix said, "I suppose that is enough anyway.
I think I have inspiration for now..." he said, stepping
spryly over Nick's lifeless form and back to his laptop,
which was still waiting patiently on the table for him to
type something of import.
Janette shrugged.
Oops, indeed.
*****
Nick opened his eyes and groaned, very hungry, so hungry he
couldn't really move. "LaCroix?" he asked as his stomach
growled relentlessly.
"Not right now, Nicholas... I'm still writing..."
"But..." he protested, trying to sit up and dismally
failing.
"NOT RIGHT NOW!!!" his sire growled.
Nick sighed and tried to relax. This was going to be a long
day...
THE END