The Simpsons

Tales by Moonlight

Prologue

Disclaimer: I do not own The Simpsons, so please, whatever you do, don't sue me.

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…This is their tale. This is the testimony of their bond together. Bart and Lisa create their own tale, their own world, about a band of siblings who must travel together and save their world, and their way of life…

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The silvery moonlight filtered through the window of the Simpson household. The lamp's light shone on the paper on the desk of the little desk. There were only three people in the room. The first was a boy, ten-years old, dressed in green top and bottom pajamas. He had spiked hair and a wide grin that masked the true deviousness in his head. The other was a smaller girl, his eight-year old sister. She wore a baby blue nightgown and her hair was in a spiked fashioned, like a starfish. Unlike her brother, her thoughts were well intentioned and imaginative. The last was also a girl, with the same hair style as her older sister. She was only a year old and dressed in blue baby clothes.

At the present time, the three were huddled over the desk, going over the small pile of papers on it. The boy said, "We've got a got story comin' up here."

"It's still a long way away from done," the girl said.

"I know Lis', I know," he said, putting up his hands in exasperated fashion. Lisa shot him a coy glance. "So where were we anyway?"

"We were building the story up," Lisa Simpson said to her brother, Bart. "…Three orphaned children, living in a fantasy world of Moonlight, having to fight the tyrannical dictator of the Moon and restore Daylight to the world…"

"Say Lis'," Bart began, catching the attention of his sister. "What are we going to call this thing?"

Lisa put a finger to her chin. Maggie sucked on her pacifier. Lisa smiled, turned back to Bart. "Tales by Moonlight…"

Bart grinned. "Sweet title."

"I thought so."

Bart picked up a piece of paper. "We've got three orphaned kids and… wait, where are their names?"

Lisa shrugged, gave a sheepish smile. "I couldn't really think of any."

"C'mon, we can't have characters without names."

Lisa sighed, turned back to her work. "Come to think of it, we don't really have much of a plot here." Maggie climbed up against Lisa's leg. Lisa looked down and picked the infant up, placing Maggie in her lap. "Bart, unless we have some direction, this isn't going to be a good story."

Bart picked up the papers and threw them away. "Then we go back to the drawing board," he said.

Lisa yawned. "Bart… I'm tired. We can't write a story tonight."

"Then let's stop writing," Bart suggested. "And lay down for a bit."

"Maybe we can talk story ideas," Lisa said. "I've got a few."

Bart nodded. Lisa climbed into bed, Bart and Maggie climbed in after her. "So," he said. "Let's hear the ideas."

"… Okay, but before I do, we need to lay the foundations for a good story…"

"Starting with the names?"

"Yeah…"

Bart sighed. "The three orphans are based off us, right?"

Lisa nodded.

"Then let's name the characters Bart, Lisa, and Maggie," Bart said. "Simple as that."

"We can't use our real names," Lisa protested.

"Why not?"

To that, Lisa didn't have a real answer. She didn't like it, personally, but there was nothing legally or ethically dubious about it. Had it been about something else, then it would be a problem. Still, self-insertions were a bit… off-putting.

"Look," Bart said, interrupting her thought process. "Let's just use our real names now, and later, when we write the story, we switch them."

Maggie picked up a notepad from the edge of the bed. Lisa noticed. "Good idea, Maggie. I'll need to take some notes before we start, just so we have something to write tomorrow." Lisa grabbed a pen from the floor.

"So what's our main plot again?" Bart asked.

Lisa said, "We have three children, one ten, one eight, and the other a baby, just like the three of us."

"And they're orphans, right?" Bart asked.

"As far as they know."

Bart was surprised. "What do you mean? Weren't their parents killed when the Moon Knights overran the region?"

"I think that's a bit dark, don't you?" Lisa asked. "If we're going to get this published as a kid's book then…"

"… Wait a minute," Bart interrupted. "I thought this was a young adult book."

"Young adult?" Lisa repeated. "Bart, surely we can do better than superficial, self-centered, and overtly emotional quasi-Byronic heroes with a one-track mind."

"Good point, not that I understood a word you said." But Bart was still troubled by the "kid's" book issue. "But a kid's book, Lis'?"

"Maybe we it could be a little older," Lisa said. "But we stick to the main plot, try to keep the kids quest at the focus."

"And the kids' quest is to defeat the Moonlit King, right?"

Lisa said, "Let's start from the beginning. We've got the characters down. Now let's describe the immediate situation. The three kids are orphans, and, for now, their names are Bart, Lisa, and Maggie Simpson. They live in the Moonlit world, a place where nighttime is eternal and is ruled by the Moon Tyrant and the Moonlight Knights. The town they live in is called…"

"… It'll be based on Springfield, right?" Bart asked. "So for now, we just call it Springfield."

"Fair enough." Lisa wrote the information down. "And now, let's describe the condition of the world they live in."

Bart said, "Well it has to suck, right?"

"Well, of course," Lisa replied. "But we can't write down, 'Their world sucks', we need description." Lisa sat down, cuddling Maggie against her chest. The infant giggled. "It should be an economically depressed town."

"Meaning?"

"Meaning it's full of poor people," Lisa said, not looking at him and looking down at the notepad. "The world should be set back in an alternate Earth, maybe a Victorian world, where there are all kinds of mythical fantasy creatures."

"Lisa, I don't know all that stuff. What's a Victorian world?"

"Never mind." Lisa lifted her head and looked at her brother. "I mean, it should be this alternate Earth, maybe like the Industrial era mixed with medieval times."

"Okay…" Bart sat back and sighed. "What else?"

"There needs to be a plot, Bart," Lisa reminded him. "And it's a quest to…"

"… It's a quest to overthrow the evil Moon Tyrant," Bart said to her. "The kids move across the world and…"

"Why?"

"What do you mean?"

Lisa said, "I mean, why would they all of a sudden go on this quest to save the kingdom? There has to be a reason."

"Oh." Bart began rubbing his chin in thought. "Well, maybe the Tyrant does something that forces them to have to fight him."

Lisa snapped her fingers. "I've got it! There's a resistance movement against the Tyrant. This movement's activities against the throne force the king to have to clamp down on his citizens, including our heroes in the town of Springfield. And then…"

"… And then they run into this resistance movement, which convinces them to join in the fight against the Tyrant…"

"And they travel around the world to…"

"… To find the magical items to fight the Tyrant's dark magic…"

They looked at one another, smiling, their heads full of inventive thoughts and ideas. Maggie tilted her head in curiosity.

"We should give them weapons!" Bart declared.

"Bart, this is a medieval, Victorian world," Lisa told him. "They don't exactly have AK-47s, tanks, or warplanes here."

Bart said, "Well, what about the traditional weapons. I want my character to have a crossbow!"

"That's an interesting choice, instead than the clichéd sword," Lisa said, approvingly. "I want my character to have twin blades."

"What about Maggie?" Bart asked. "She's a baby, I know, but she should have something cool about her too."

Lisa shrugged. "Maybe, we can put that as a plot device later."

Bart snuggled into the pillow. "This is gonna be an awesome story, Lisa."

"I know it's gonna be, Bart," Lisa said.

Maggie crawled over her, ending up between the two siblings. Lisa pulled Maggie to her chest and Bart moved closer, enveloping his sister in his arms. Lisa buried her face into Bart's chest. Bart kissed her forehead.

"Hey Lis," Bart said.

Lisa's eyes were closed, but she murmured a, "… Yeah…?"

"This is our story, right?"

"Of course it is." Lisa opened her eyes and looked up to Bart. "It's our story, we made it, and tomorrow, we're going to write it."

"Y'know, Lis, maybe it's the excitement getting to me, but I love ya."

"I love you, too, Bart." Lisa's grin grew.

Maggie was already asleep and her pacifier had fallen from her mouth.

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Author's Notes: So, this is my next multi-chapter story. For anyone who can't tell, it's also a Bart/Lisa/Maggie brother-sister story as well. So, yeah, the usual, read, review, and enjoy.