Fake

   Lexia walked down the polished, silver, dark halls. Everything seemed erie about the place. She was dressed in a long, blue satin dress, with a large train made from tulle. She wore a hood to keep from showing her hair color, the only thing that could ruin the mission of her and her best friend. The only thing that kept Lexia sticking to the plan was the fact that she would get the throne. Mother has been queen for too long already, she thought.

Brooke, Lexia’s best friend emerged wearing a bright red dress, knee length with a hood over her head as well, to cover her hair. “Ready?” Brooke asked?

“Ready,” Lexia replied, putting her bravest face on.

They entered the throne room, where Lexia’s mother was seated.

“Brooke!” Lexia’s mother cried. “How wonderful it is to see your face!”

“Uh, it’s my pleasure too, to be in your presence,” Lexia replied.

If you haven’t caught on to the plan by now, Lexia is dressed as Brooke, and Brooke as Lexia, to trick Lexia’s mother into giving the throne to her daughter.

“Queen Volt, with all due respect, I would like to make an offer for you, Lexia started. “I uh, as representative princess of the Water Kingdom would like you to, er, step down from your throne.

The Queen of the Fire Kingdom’s eyes quite literally turned to fire. “How dare you insult me, in my own kingdom, Brooke!”

Uh, oh, time for Plan B, Brooke (the actual one) thought. “Mother,” said Brooke, “can I have a hug? I respect your decision not to give up the throne.”

The Queen of the Fire Kingdom looked at Lexia (really Brooke) suspiciouly. “You’ve never wanted a hug before, Lexia.”

“But I really want from from you,” Brooke retorted. “Please?”

For a second, Brooke thought that The Queen would refuse Brooke’s request. But then she leaned in, wrapped her arms around Brooke. . .

“Now!” Brooke shouted. She yanked her hood off, revealing her olive brown hair. She pulled the sharp knife from her pocket and held it against The Queen’s throat.

Then Lexia pulled of her hood, revealing her fiery red hair, as straght as can be. She held out her hand and set The Queen of Fire’s throne of bones on fire, the only thing supplying The Queens ability to control and manipulate fire, therefore not being able to counter Lexia’s blast of fire.

“You’ver held the throne for far to long, mother!” Lexia shouted.

“The people of the kingdom of Fire will not approve of this!” The Queen shouted back.

“They will never know.”

“You foolish girl. If you kill me, you get the throne. But if I kill myself, nobody will get the throne. Chaos will reign forever!” With that said, she took Brooke’s sharp knife and stabbed into her stomach. Her eyes rolled into the back of her head, and her intestines and blood oozed out.

“Oh mother, you only hurt yourself. I killed you.” Lexia then took her own knife stabbed her mother in the chest, and twisted the knife. Hearing the bones snap, she relaxed and stepped back to admire her work.

“That was beautiful,” Brooke marveled. Then he ran to the balcony overlooking all of the land. The trumpets sounded and she called out, “Behold your new Queen of the Fire Kingdom, Lexia Mal Volc! The past Queen died to . . .unforseen circumstances. Now let us celebrate!”

Deep down, Brooke and Lexia knew they hadn’t killed anybody. They were fiction. This entire plan was, well, fiction. Thet knew whatever they did to try to be real was. . .

fiction.

_____________________________________________________

Meanwhile, Dylan, the Prince of the Skies flew over the Kingdom of Fire, where he met Lexia, a few hours after the murder, in a small room, right under the Palace of Fire.

“How are the skies?” Lexia asked.

“The skies are full of oxygen, nitrogen, and methane.” Dylan retorted. “I suppose you have not called to me to this filthy place where I actually have to stand on solid ground. I’d rather be flying right now.”

“Okay, then. Let’s talk business here. But first, someone you might not like. Might not like at all. Someone you have already met and absolutely despise,” Lexia cautioned.

“Ooh! Ooh! Let me guess. Um, Maya? Is it Maya?”

“No.”

“Kahuna?”

“No.”

“Oh my. This must be. . .”

“Brooke,” Lexia finished. “Do not whine. If you whine, I might never let you out of this ‘filthy place.’”

“Fine.”

As if on cue, Brooke walks into the room and folds her arms. “Well, well, well, is that-oh my, it is-Dylan?”

“Why yes, thy deserving privileged princess of Water, it is I. Dylan. Dylan King.” Dylan said with his nose up in the air to imitate somebody snooty.

“I am not privileged! You are just poor,” replied Brooke back to Dylan.

“Guys, please, we have business to discuss!” cried Lexia, breaking up the fight. “As of today, The Queen of fire has been murdered by yours truly.” She paused for emphasis. “Which means, I am now queen. Which means I would like to honor both of you as my advisers.”

Dylan shared a knowing look with Brooke.

Brooke gave him a warning look in return.

“You know we’re just characters in a story, right? You’re not actually queen.” Dylan started.

Shut up, Shut up, Brooke thought, shooting Dylan a forewarning look.

“What?” Lexia asked.

“Dylan!” shouted Brooke.

“But it’s true! You are just-” Dylan didn’t get to finish his sentence.

The roof of the small little room started to crack. Rocks started to fall down.

“Oh, sweet Mary! Jesus Christ! St. Veronica!” cried Dylan, along with many other references to people in the Bible. “Everyone hold on to me!”

Brooke and Lexia grabbed his hand, and he flew them through the narrow passageway, twisting and turning them, trying to get them out of the Palace. “How do you get to the exit? This place is bigger than the temple in Jerusalem!”

“You’re religious, aren’t you?” Brooke asked.

“Yes! Now Lexia, where is the exit?” Dylan cried.

Lexia guided him through the hallways, twisting and turning until they found an exit.

“Oh no,” said Brooke.

The Palace of Fire was. . .gone. It never existed. It was fiction.

_____________________________________________________

Echo woke up in a place that smelled like latex. The hospital. Oh yeah. The “friendly duel.”

Earlier that day, Echo and Maya, the Princess of the Earth, were out training in their training room (duh). While Echo played with lightning and electricity, Maya was growing venuns flytraps, and vines that could squash you in a second.

“Will you ever put your earth manipulation powers to use?” Echo asked Maya. “You’re like Poison Ivy without the villain part of her.”

Maya simply replied, “I’m not a villain. I am a character in a short story which is a work of fiction.”

Echo smiled. Oh, simple-minded Maya. Without thinking, Echo said, “Let’s have a friendly duel.”

Maya hesitantly and suspiciously agreed, and the two set off to find the perfect place to fight. Maya suggested that they should duel in the forest, but then realized Echo would hurt animals if her bolts of electricity struck them. Echo suggested a dry clearing, but Maya said that she couldn’t grow anything from crackly, dry dirt. Finally, they agreed on a clearing by the edge of a cliff.

“Are you sure it’s a good idea?” Maya asked. “I don’t know if it’s a good idea to ‘duel’ near the edge of a cliff.”

“It’ll be fine,” Echo reassured her. After all, what could possibly go wrong (obvious foreshadowing)?

The two were havbing a good time, shooting bolts of electricity (Echo) and making plants larger than a typical sized tree (Maya).

All was well until Echo fell off the cliff.

Thank God that Maya caught me with one of her plants before my head exploded, thought Echo. Now can I please get out of this plastic smelling room? SHe tried to move her arm, but looked down to see that it was rusted, and not able to move. I really should have taken it to Dylan to fix earklier this week. She foud that she was not able to move the rest of her body either. SHe was paralyzed.

Just then, the nurse walked in. “Oh, thanks heavens you’re awake!” She had an accent that made Mary Poppins sound like a troll. “We thought you were in a coma!” She then quickly explained that Echo had hit her head on a sharp rock, causing excessive bleadeing, and brain damage. Then the nurse left to giver Echo some rest.

Echo stared at the ceiling, thinking about how stupid she sounded, challenging somebody to a friendly duel. By a cliff. With a drop more than five-thousand feet. It seemed like she fell asleep, because a second later, she jolted awake.

The hospital was now rumble, with only her and her hospital bed was the only thing standing. But that was the thing. There was never a hospital. It was all fiction.

_____________________________________________________

Kahuna was not a royal at all. She was a young mage, a mage that refused to take lessons to improve his magic powers.

However, Abigheet, his mother, insisted that he learn how to be a wizard, a powerful one. “You could be the king of the country!” Abigheet would say. “Maybe you could rule instead of that Fire Queen, Lexia, or that Brooke, who doesn’t know how to control her anger!”

So Kahuna sat through his lessons, biting his fingernails, and creating giant speheres of poison with his hands, and making it disappear. I’m not even close to some magical being! Those-they don’t exist!

Kahuna’s father had died in The First War (which was really not the first one). His father was the King of Magic. When he was killed, his kingdom ceased, and the Kindom of Magic was no more. There was never a kingdom of magic.

This only made Abigheet more determined to coninue their family’s legacy in magic. This day, however, was a different one for Kahuna. He had decided to skip magic school today to play in the fields. After all, he was only about twelve.

When he got to the field, he found that he had a good view of a burning palace. He quickly formed a water sphere and threw it as far as he could. He only threw it about ten feet, so it exploded and gotten him soaked.

To make matters worse, a breeze had picked up, making him shiver. Strangely enough, none of the other trees’ leaves’ were waving in the wind. “What is going on?” Kahuna yelled. “Help!”

He closed his eyes, and the next time he opened his eyes, the field that he once stood in was gone. But that was the thing. The field had never existed. It was fiction.

_____________________________________________________

In every piece of literature that is written, something ties all the characters together. So Brooke, Lexia, Echo, Maya, Abigheet, and Kahuna, walk into an imaginary forest. They all met in the center and well, looked surprised to see each other, knowing they were enemies.

“We are just people. Not even that. We are a figment of somebody’s imagination. And just as the settings in this story disappeared, So shall we,” Brooke marveled.

“A story is for people’s enjoyment,” added Lexia.

“We were never real, and we never will be,” Echo and Maya said at the same time.

“Magic is a part of a real human’s wishful thinking,” Abigheet wondered out loud.

“Nothing is real here,” finished Kahuna.

And with that, the characters of this short story vanished.