Twice Fractured Fairy Tale

Once upon a time, in a kingdom most absurd, lived a Princess named Unrelia who possessed the power of the fourth wall. So whenever her parents, the King and Queen Narrat, tried to betrothe her to some goodly prince, she would turn to an oblique angle and say something like “Can you believe this folks? My parents are positively medieval!” as if there was an audience just out of sight, invisible to everyone else. Such was her confidence in these pronunciations that no one ever challenged or interrupted her. And those good princes, and their families, would inevitably get cold feet about the strange princess and her pronouncements.

In her own mind, Princess Unrelia Narrat was the heroine of the land. When she strode to the fourth wall at the end of a long day, she would announce things like: “Today, I returned the ancient tomb of knowledge to the people from whom it was stolen” or “I burglarized a bear’s house just to prove I could.” When in fact what she’d done was return a library book, then bought honey and porridge at the grocery store. Unrelia saw herself as the protagonist, but everyone else only saw a young girl spinning stories.

Of course, she wasn’t the only silly character in this fantasy land. A brief look of some of the cast of characters:

• A fairy godmother named Dominitra (who was godmother to literally everyone in the kingdom) and her magical rival, a witch named Sardonica. Their magic is based on the power of sarcasm.
• The foulmouthed town crier, who swears during every one of his proclamations. Though, for mysterious reasons, each of his curses are censored by a loud beep. So, for example, he might announce “No rain again today! Drought threatens the land! We’re all *bleep*. Everyone knows him as “The Bleeping Crier.”
• The Great, Greedy, Green Dragon, who served as banker for the whole land but charged 1% more on fees than was standard industry practice.

They all lived in a storybook written in 2008 when fractured fairy tales were at the height of their popularity. The author dreamed he could pen a quick children’s book with a bit of humor for both kids and adults, and get an animated film optioned off it within a couple years. Unfortunately, the market was flooded with similar tales, and prospective publishers labeled the wordplay “too highbrow” for the children who fell in love with Shrek. With interest scant, the author eventually moved on to superhero stories.

But the fairy tale characters lived on in scribbled notes, word documents, and cloud storage. And they continued to have adventures, even as their author forgot about them. This happens often with misplaced ideas, so you might want to check in with your old drafts every now and then.

Little did Princess Unrelia, or any of the other characters, know that their destinies were set in stone, or rather, established by thematic convention. The princess would never have real adventures, only mundane pursuits that she’d embellish after the fact. For that is how her character was originally written, and that was how she was named.

Similarly, The Great, Greedy Green Dragon could never choose generosity. The town crier could never say “shucks” or “darn.” The Sarcastic Witch could never be earnest. It was all in how they were written, and how they were named. And they might have stayed that way forever, slowly growing dissatisfied with their lot without realizing what was wrong. That is, if it weren’t for Unrelia’s penchant for driving away her tutors…

The critical day came about when King and Queen Narrat sent for a new tutor for their unruly daughter, a legendarily disciplined instructor of writing and grammar known only as The Saurus. He was a six foot tall, bright red Allosaurus who wore a silk tophat and spoke the queen’s english.

Unrelia had planned to skip class and run down to the river “to save the dam from saboteurs” (i.e. look for toads and lizards.) But she was so entranced by the thought of spending the morning with a dinosaur, particularly one so erudite, that for the first half of her lessons she stared at him intently, only occasionally turning to the fourth wall to say something like “This class is so jurassic” or “I hope he doesn’t plan to eat me for lunch.”

The Saurus barely acknowledged these asides, though occasionally he cleared his ample throat to call the princess’s attention back to the front. He was going over the parts of speech, a dry subject but a necessary building block. Occasionally he tested Unrelia to see if she understood the basics and, to his surprise, and in repudiation of her reputation, Unrelia proved focused and knowledgeable on the subject. They summarized a full year of lessons in just a couple hours.

For lunch, the princess had leftovers from last week’s feast, including a venison-and-marmalade sandwich on rye bread. The Saurus ate a salad of mixed greens and root vegetables out of a bowl, sticking his mouth in to take large bites because his arms were obviously too short for utensils. Unrelia stifled a giggle at this scene, not even realizing how odd it was that an allosaurus was eating vegetables.

After lunch, The Saurus took on an informal tone as he said “You made it through the dry part of the lesson, now let’s move onto the fun stuff. In fact, my favorite subject: synonyms and antonyms.”

Unrelia was entranced at first, for whatever a dinosaur's favorite subject was must be exciting indeed. She was less enthused when he recited the definitions of synonyms and antonyms. She turned away and muttered “can you believe this guy?”

The Saurus realized he was losing his audience, but had dealt with impatient children before and knew how to engage them when necessary. “How would you describe my arms?” He asked.

“Well, they’re tiny.”

“How else could you say that? What’s another word for ‘tiny’?”

“Well… little. Mini. Short. Itsy bitsy. Stunted. Small…”

“That’s quite a lot you’ve come up with-

“Petite, undersized, meager, lilliputian…” She went on for a while.

“Yes… very good. And here I worried you might not possess much vocabulary.”

“Oh I’ve been looking at your little claws all day, wondering how you managed basic tasks.”

“I manage. Though sometimes I ask for help from my friends.”

“Oh! Is there anything I can help you with?”

“Yes. If you would pack up my books, I would be most appreciative. We shouldn’t need any more for the day and my jaws aren’t the best for handling paper volumes.”

And so she did, placing each tome carefully in The Saurus’s velvet bag. And for the rest of the day they were more comfortable with each other. And Unrelia proved so focused on the task of brainstorming synonyms and antonyms, that she went a full hour without addressing her imaginary audience outside the fourth wall.

Finally, the school day was drawing toward a close. “My parents will expect me shortly for the naming ceremony of some bridge. I’d give anything to not have to go.”

“Oh, and what are they naming this bridge?”

“New Reliable. What a boring name.”

“I might have thought you’d think so. And so appropriate that it should be the antonym of your own name.”

“What?!”

“Unrelia: root of ‘Un’, meaning ‘not’ and ‘relia’, short for ‘reliable’. Synonyms: reckless, fickle, capricious, irregular.”

“Unreliable! Reckless! And some words I don’t know!” She exclaimed, then turned toward the wall and added “To be honest, that sort of describes me. But why would my parents name me that?”

“I doubt they were predicting your future, they probably just thought it sounded good.”

“Wait, but what about our family name? What does that mean?”

“Narrat… root of narrative. Synonyms: chronicle, story, recital.”

“I do love telling stories.”

“And your parents love narrating. I’ve attended a sports match where they described everything that happened as it happened. Found it quite odd.”

“Yeah, they’ll describe a procession of ants like it’s some big parade. Hey, do you think we love telling stories because of our family name?”

“That wouldn’t make any sense. You didn’t even know the etymology of your name before today.”

"The ety-what? But I mean, like it could be magic right? Surely there’s some magic in names.”

“I’ve only ever heard of magic based on the prime elements or sarcasm.”

“But there could be, right?”

“I don’t-”

“Like the Great, Greedy, Green Dragon. That’s his name. And he’s greedy and green.”

“I believe those are just descriptors.”

“But that’s still his name. Okay, what about The Bleeping Crier?”

“That’s his title isn’t it?”

“But he has a name too!”

“What’s his name?”

“It’s something nasty sounding, it must be why he acts that way.”

“But do you remember his name?”

Here Unrelia closed her eyes, trying to imagine the last time she’d heard The Crier’s name spoken aloud or seen it written. She moved her hand in the air, tracing the letters in her mind’s eye from when he’d signed a contract for another decade in his job.

“I’m not sure I can say it. It’s a weird name.”

“Could you spell it?”

“‘B… L… A… S… P… H… E… M… E… R… O…’ and then ‘V… O… C… I… F… E… R… O… U… S…’”

“Hmmm… interesting.”

“What does it mean?”

“It means you might be onto something.”

“We got a detective dinosaur here!”

“Look at me please, this might be important. You may have discovered one of the great secrets of the universe.”

“So?”

“I can’t believe I didn’t see this before. I’m not a theoretician, but perhaps names have some power unbeknownst to magic, theology, or science.”

“I knew it!”

“Not to be negative, but I doubt you suspected this.”

“No! I knew my name was a problem!”

“I can’t say you’re wrong.”

“I need to change it.”

“You parents might not approve.”

“But my name means I tell unreliable stories!”

“True. Very well, let’s talk about names then. What sort of name would you like to have?”

“One that gave me magic powers!”

“That may be possible.”

And for the next hour, they discussed various names, what they meant and possible implications. When the princess settled on her choice, she placed The Saurus’s hat on his head for him and they said their goodbyes for the day. 

Then, later that evening, the princess went to her parents with a proposition, one that would transform her and the land she lived in. It didn’t seem so much at the time, but just a week later the royal family filed the paperwork to have the princess’s name changed. From henceforth she was known as Omnisia Narrat.

And with her new name, Omnisia not only changed her outlook, but her destiny. She no longer spoke to the fourth wall, and no longer embellished her adventures. Instead, she became an oracle who assisted others, and she always gave just enough advice to help them find their own way in life, to forge their own path while maintaining the essence of who they were. But those are fairy stories for another day.