fandomhigh | Sex And Candy, Wednesday, Second Period

"So, one of the problems of fairy tales is that they are sometimes contradictory in the messages they try to teach," Cindy said, as students filed into the Danger Shop, set up to look like a vast forest with a single path winding through the middle. "Some of them try to tell you that so long as you follow the rules and work hard, everything will be okay. Others make a point of life's unfairness, where people even decent people get the short end of the stick and children die for getting dirty. While most of them stress how important it is to be kind to those you meet, no matter how lowly or common they appear to be, some show how easily kindness can be repaid by cruelty. Sure, most of those usually end with the bad guys getting their comeuppance, but most of those endings seem tacked on at the last minute. It's the suffering that gets most of the attention."

Of course, part of that could be blamed on sheer human nature and what people found most interesting to hear about, but that was a lecture for a different day.

"So, today, we're going to experiment with the arbitrary nature of fairy tales," Cindy continued, and please ignore that little grin she can't quite get rid of. "Your job is to deliver this basket--" and with the click of a button, there were a stack of picnic baskets by her feet "--through the woods to Grandmother's house. Stay on the path and don't forget--" She clicked another button and stopped biting back the grin. "--Your little red hood."

[Many thanks to

furnaceface for helping me iron out the OCD!]

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Forget the rules! There's an old woman calling for help!

Only when you get to where the noise is coming from, you don't find an old woman in danger--no, you find a hut on chicken legs (http://fc07.deviantart.net/fs41/f/2009/047/1/4/Baba_Yaga_by_YoitisI.jpg), with a cackling old woman sitting in a giant mortar (http://www.pastafairy.com/press/wp-content/uploads/2010/01/The_Baba_Yaga_by_Samolo.jpg) in front of it.

Great. It's Baba Yaga, and she wants to eat your face.

Maybe you should have followed the rules...

Edited 2011-06-08 08:39 (UTC)

Well, Baba Yaga is at least a little reasonable--she's not going to eat your eyes, for example--and is willing to let you go in exchange for doing two simple, easy, completely pointless tasks.

The first one is she needs your help in the pantry. Somehow it got infested with rats and she wants you to get rid of them. She's even got a broom you can borrow!

[If you saved the fox, she'll show up and kill the rats for you. Otherwise, it's up to you.]

Raven could've just teleported, but she was curious to see what tasks she would be given. The fox returned to help her out with the rats, but she politely declined, since she would not be responsible for those deaths, even if they were rats. She simply summoned up her Soul-Self instead and swept the rats inside, depositing them elsewhere in the woods with instructions not to return to the hut.

She knew it was going to be something like this. She knew that following a cry for help was going to mean trouble.

She took the broom, but was relieved when she saw the fox show up to help. (She had a problem with rats ever since that experience in the warehouse.)

She'd have to ask Derek later if there were such a thing as werefoxes.

It was a valid thought.

After meeting a duck who lived in a shoe this weekend, the hut gave Cally little pause. The witch who wanted to eat her face, on the other hand, WAS A LITTLE PAUSEWORTHY.

The helpful fox, on the third hand that she didn't have, was adorable and made Cally sad that she couldn't take it back to snuggle forever and give Nana a playmate. Look, sometimes she was just a girl.

Elphaba started by trying to lecture the rats out of the pantry... when the fox showed up to help, while she wasn't particularly happy with the idea, she thanked her for her help with a polite curtsy.

Alex took the broom up and set to whacking rats in the name of not having his face eaten, but when the fox showed up he was fine with sitting back and letting her finish the job.

Finally, all the rats are gone. Good job--not that Baba Yaga says that. Instead, she points to the floor, where the rats chews holes in several bags of grain. Now all the wheat, barley, and rye are mixed together! We can't have that!

For your last task, Baba Yaga demands you separate the grains.

[If you saved the ant from being eaten, he and a bunch of his friends are happy to help. Otherwise, well, good luck!]

On the other hand, she was more than happy to accept the help of the ants to separate the grains. "Thank you so very much," she said happily as they were finishing.

Take that, Baba Yaga.

Chloe was beyond thankful that the ants showed up because there was no way she could have solved this one on her own -- and she would have been stuck for days trying to take care of it.

She felt bad that she didn't have some sugar or something to give to the ants.

Cally was perhaps a bit too fascinated by the whole process, crouching over the swarming insects to watch as they industriously sorted the grains. "You should see if the witch would like to hire you on permanently," she said to the ant in charge. "Perhaps in exchange for a certain amount of seed for yourselves. Everybody wins!"

Dolf, you're to blame for this.

Elphaba had no help with this, and instead she crossed her arms.

"I don't see why I should help you even further," she said, defiantly. "This seems greedy on your part. How did the rats even become such a problem unless you let them?"

Yes. Getting snotty with Baba Yaga would totally end well.

Alex had no help with this because he'd let the ant get eaten, and neither did he have any idea what the difference between those three things were. He cursed in Greek and Japanese a lot as he examined them for the differences and started sorting.

This could take a while.

Screw that. Squall wasn't going to do any stupid tasks. He'd killed much more powerful Sorceresses than this, after all.

He put a hand to his forehead, was surrounded by a green light, and then thrust his hand out at the witch, creating a giant fireball around her. Baba Yaga, meet Firaga.

Scully glared at Baba Yaga, recognizing her, and grumbled under her breath, "This is not my day."

Sex And Candy, Wednesday, Second Period

Going to Help the Old Woman!

First Task--Rat Catcher

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Second Task--Organizer Extraordinaire!

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Re: Second Task--Organizer Extraordinaire!

Re: Second Task--Organizer Extraordinaire!

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Re: Second Task--Organizer Extraordinaire!

Re: Going to Help the Old Woman!

Re: Going to Help the Old Woman!