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Summary: An Invader Zim one-shot. The story of a nasty old witch, her equally-nasty tower-bound daughter, and a prince who will bring some sunshine into their lives, whether they want it or not. Keef/Gaz friendship/romance.
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Once upon a time in a kingdom far, far away there was an old, foreboding skoolhouse inhabited by an even older, more foreboding witch named Dame Bitters. She rarely emerged from the dark building, yet still served as the terror to everyone else in the village, who avoided the overgrown grounds of the skool as much as they possibly could.
Well, except for one.
"Let's see, just about...now!"
Membrane pulled the plants from the ground just as all the hands on his pocket watch came together, holding his prize up dramatically.
"Mandrake extracted exactly at midnight on the night of the full moon! Success!"
If he had been talking a bit more quietly, maybe he would have heard the slight whoosh as the shadow slithered up behind him, or noticed it rising up in the tall, slender form of a hook-nosed old woman. She growled, narrowing the yellowed eyes behind her spectacles and causing the man to jump in surprise.
"EGADS! Oh, um—hello, Dame Bitters."
"What are you doing?" the witch snapped, leaning down over him.
"Oh, I was just borrowing a few things from your garden. I trust you don't mind, my dear withered hag?"
ZAAAP!
Membrane's clothes and thick spectacles fell into a pile on the ground. A green toad stuck its head out from among the heap of cloth.
"Hmm...perhaps you do," he mused.
The witch bent down, picking up the Membrane-toad between her bony, steel-gripped talons. Membrane made a sharp choking sound.
"But you don't understand! I need these plants! FOR ALCHEMY!" he said, trying to pose dramatically with his webbed hands and doing about as well as you would expect.
"Well, if you want something of mine, you have to pay for it," Dame Bitters said in a droning growl. "And due to the dictates of our backwards, feudal economy, the only way one can achieve anything is through control of forced human labor in a corrupt system of serfdom."
"Serfs? I don't have any serfs," Membrane said, rubbing his green, slimy chin. "All I have are a few children."
"Children? Hmm..." Dame Bitters eyes wandered away thoughtfully for a moment. "Fine. You can keep some of my lettuce in exchange for one of the kids."
Membrane regarded her warily. "How much lettuce?"
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So Membrane handed over his younger child to the wicked witch, but his intrusion had still been the last straw as far as she was concerned—having grown sick of dealing with trespassers every decade or so, Dame Bitters decided to move away from the village, finding a new home deep in the nearby forest. This new home worked out fairly well until some wandering brats tried to eat the place, at which point she decided to move into an even more remote location, namely a tall tower that could not be entered except for one window on the very top floor. It was dead cheap, too, what with being pretty much impossible to live in.
Dame Bitters brought her new adopted daughter with her during these moves. She had named the child Gazpunzel, after one of the types of plant that Membrane had taken in exchange for her—one could take this to be a symbolic choice, but mostly it was because Dame Bitters was just too lazy to come up with anything better. As the years passed Gazpunzel grew up to look much like her new mother, ugly and troll-like, with a sour expression and perpetually-narrowed eyes. This pleased Dame Bitters, since obviously she did not want one of those nasty, cheerful sort of children running around to annoy her. As it stood the two of them were content to stay out of each other's way. Neither liked being around another person, and since that technically included each other Dame Bitters would spend most of her time away from the tower, leaving Gazpunzel alone in the dreary, empty building.
Which would have been just fine if there had actually been something to do.
Gazpunzel held up the picture that she had just drawn. It was of a little piggy—one standing amongst the wreckage of a straw house, being bloodily devoured by an angry wolf. Gazpunzel sighed, throwing it into a pile of other pictures that had grown taller than she had over the years.
"I'm bored."
"Quit your whining," Dame Bitters growled, preparing to depart for the day. She bent down and picked up a length of Gazpunzel's dark purple hair from the floor—she had very long hair, more than fifty feet or so, sprawled all over their domicile. Neither she nor Dame Bitters had ever cut it, mostly on the grounds that doing so would involve some minimal amount of effort, and anyway it offered an easy way for Dame Bitters to get in and out of the tower.
"But I have nothing to do. EVER," Gaz grumbled, glaring at the floor.
The witch gave an annoyed growl, then snapped her fingers, conjuring up a small device. "Here," she said, throwing it to Gazpunzel carelessly. The girl caught it, examining it quizzically.
"What's this?"
"An anachronistic video game. Waste your time with it."
"Huh. Okay."
Gazpunzel sat down and began punching buttons, her eyes glued intensely on the screen. She was so absorbed that she did not even bother to look up as Dame Bitters wordlessly threw her hair out the window and climbed down, leaving her young daughter alone for the next several of days or so.
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Now it came to pass that one day, the prince of the kingdom came riding through the forest where the witch and her daughter lived. Or at least, "riding" in a broadly-defined sort of way.
"AGH! WHOA, HORSEY! WHOA!"
"NEEEIIIGGGHHH!"
WHAM!
Prince Keef's head slammed into a tree branch, knocking him off of his steed as it continued to thrash wildly through the forest. By the time the young prince had sat up and shooed the little birdies away from his head it had run off, leaving him alone.
"Whuh—no, come back, horsey! Our ride isn't supposed to be over yet!"
Prince Keef got up and began running cashing after his beast, but he had little success; not long passed before its pounding footsteps had faded, and not long after that the prince found himself hopelessly lost (and not for the first time, either). He frowned for a moment at this realization, then forced a smile back onto his face. "Oh well. It's not so bad!" he said cheerfully, starting off down the forest path again. "Just look at how nice the forest is today! Hi animals!"
He waved at a pair of blood-red eyes glaring out at him from the shadows. They blinked quizzically as the young prince took a sandwich out of his pocket and walked off, happily eating.
Sure that he would soon find another passing traveler to help him, Prince Keef walked for the next hour or so, humming under his breath, until he finally emerged into a large clearing where a tall, circular tower loomed ominously over him. The young boy's smile grew even wider. "YAY! Someone who can help me!" he cried, running out from the trees. "I'll just knock and see if I can get some directions and maybe a quick snack and a game or two of Monopoly before I—wait...huh?"
Prince Keef walked around the base of the tower, but to his confusion he could not find any sort of door by which to entreat entrance. He blinked and circled the tower again, and was halfway through his third rotation when he heard something happening on the opposite side.
"And next time, bring me a game that doesn't stink so much!"
"Meh, ungrateful little..."
Prince Keef ran around the tower just in time to see Dame Bitters gliding off into the woods with her back to him as a long rope of purple hair flew up the side of the tower. Taking several steps backwards he was able to make out a window near the top, into which it vanished.
"Ohhh!" Prince Keef grinned, sucking in a deep breath before shouting.
"HEY! YOU UP THERE!"
A moment passed before a face appeared. From several stories below it was hard to make much out, but her glare was so powerful that it could probably have been felt unseen through a castle wall. Her pale face was framed by long purple hair. She was holding a Game Slave in one hand, barely tearing her eyes away from it to regard the stranger below.
"...What?"
"HI! MY NAME IS PRINCE KEEF! WHAT'S YOUR NAME?"
"...Gazpunzel."
"OH!" A beat passed. "...HI!"
The girl stared for a moment, then turned to disappear.
"WAIT, DON'T GO! CAN YOU GIVE ME DIRECTIONS TO THE NEAREST VILLAGE? I'M KIND OF LOST...again."
"Go back into the forest and keep walking until your not here."
"OH, OKAY!" Another beat. "...HEY, CAN I COME UP THERE FOR A LITTLE WHILE?"
"NO!"
"AW, COME ON! PLEASE?!"
"No way in—AGH, MY GAME!"
For it had come to pass that the Game Slave had slipped from Gazpunzel's hand, falling to the ground below. Prince Keef quickly leapt forward, falling onto his stomach and throwing out his hands—the Game Slave fell into his combined palms, undamaged. Smiling at his luck, Prince Keef carefully stood up (trying to ignore the grass stains on his colorfully regal outfit), holding the console up so that the lady above him could see it.
"DON'T WORRY, I CAUGHT IT!"
"Good! Now send it back up here!"
"OKAY!" Prince Keef looked around for a moment, then frowned in confusion. "UM...HOW? !"
"Duh, you just—oh, crud."
Realizing that she had no other choice, Gazpunzel let down her hair to allow the idiotic prince entrance. He stuffed the game into his pocket and started to climb, continually falling and giggling about how this was just like gym class while Gazpunzel ground her teeth in frustration. Finally she pulled the hair up herself and he managed to clamber through the windows, falling to the floor and panting.
"Wow, that was weird, wasn't it? I've never climbed hair before! But I think your hair is good for climbing—it's all coarse and rough and kind of dirty, do you wash it often? I guess it must he hard to wash that much when there's so much of it, I don't even have that much hair and I only wash it once every couple of—"
Prince Keef was suddenly pulled up by the collar of his tunic, feet off the floor as he gazed down at Gazpunzel's pale, twisted visage.
"Where—is—my—game?"
"Oh—right here!"
He fished it out of his pocket and handed it to her, smiling. She snatched it up and let go of Prince Keef's collar, causing him to crash unceremoniously onto his fundament. He looked up to see her instantly immersed in her game again, wandering across the room to sit on a dilapidated couch with her long hair trailing behind her. She seemed to have completely forgotten that he was even there.
Prince Keef looked around—the tower had a single round room, all gray stone, with just the one window providing any kind of light in the gloom. Gazpunzel's hair alone took up a large amount of space, lying carelessly on the floor, while a huge pile of papers stood against the wall. Trash was everywhere.
"Wow! This place sure needs to be cleaned! And maybe painted! Hmm, and maybe if we add a couple of skylights, ooh, and a puppy! And then we can get a little kitty-cat to be his friend and dress them up in little tuxedos and have them play together and—hey, where do you go to the bathroom?"
"Go away. NOW."
Prince Keef looked up as Gazpunzel kept her eyes on her video game, her lip curled into a contemptuous girn. Suddenly she growled and threw the game away; it hit Prince Keef on the head and knocked him backwards, stunning him for a moment. Gazpunzel crossed her arms angrily.
"Stupid game!"
Prince Keef recovered, blinking dazedly as he held up the console. "What's the matter? You having trouble? Maybe I can he—"
Gazpunzel snatched back the game. "I don't need help. I've beat this game over a thousand times. That's the problem." She sneered at the game, then looked up to give her malice to Prince Keef instead. "Now get out of here."
"But I—whoa!"
Gazpunzel picked Prince Keef up, carrying him effortlessly above her head and over to the window. The next thing he knew he was flying through the air, giving him a minute to scream himself hoarse before he crashed and formed a prince-shaped crater in the ground below.
"...Ugh, I'M OKAY! I GUESS I'LL SEE YOU LATER, THEN!" he called dazedly. Gazpunzel, meanwhile, was already slamming the shutters of her window closed.
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The next day Gazpunzel was working on beating her game for the 1,004 time when a small rock came flying through her window. That alone wouldn't have been enough to illicit more than a twitch out of her, but when it was followed by two more in short succession she decided to get up and see what was going on.
She poked her head out and dodged as a fourth stone nearly beaned her. "WHOOPS! SORRY!" Prince Keef called, failing to notice Gazpunzel grinding her teeth again. "SO ANYWAY, I THOUGHT THAT MAYBE WE COULD HAVE LUNCH TOGETHER!"
"Lunch?"
"YEAH! SO LIKE—LET DOWN YOUR LONG HAIR, SO THAT I MAY CLIMB THE VIOLET STAIR! OR WHATEVER."
"No! Go away!"
"BUT I BROUGHT PIZZA!"
Gazpunzel had just started to turn back into the tower when she paused, glancing back down as Prince Keef picked up a pizza box from the grass and held it over his head for her to see. Her stomach growled. So did her mouth.
As soon as Prince Keef came through the window Gazpunzel snatched the pizza box away from him, storming with it over to the couch. Prince Keef smiled and happily joined her, oblivious to the aura of doom that began to spread around him as he took a slice out of the box and began to eat. And, of course, jabber endlessly between every bite.
"Yay! This is fun, isn't it? It's like a picnic, except that we're inside, but we're still out in the forest so it still sort of counts, you know what I mean? It must be so cool living out here with the animals and the fresh air and everything, like—"
"Keef? Shut up."
Gazpunzel shoved the last of the pizza crust into her mouth and shut the box, picking up her Game Slave again. The sour look on her face made Prince Keef blink, then grin as he began to dig through his pockets again.
"Oh yeah! I almost forgot, I brought you something else too! Ta-DA!"
Gazpunzel looked up, and her narrowed eyes opened in awe. "It's a Game Slave 2!" Prince Keef explained. "It's like a normal Game Slave...but TWOIER! It's supposed to be a lot cooler, so I figured if you're bored with your first one, you might—whoa again!"
He dodged as Gazpunzel's old Game Slave suddenly went flying by his head, sailing out the window and crashing far below. In seconds Gazpunzel had snatched Prince Keef's gift and had her eyes glued to its screen, fingers dancing around the buttons with more enthusiasm than she shown in a very long time.
"Oh, I'm glad you like it! Nothing but the best for my bestest friend!" Prince Keef squealed. "Hey, can I watch?"
"Meh."
Prince Keef's grin widened as he scooted closer to observe the game over Gazpunzel's shoulder.
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Prince Keef returned the following day and again the day after, and each time Gazpunzel reluctantly let him into her tower, because hey, it didn't bother her too much when he babbled on incessantly and asked ten thousand questions about her games. Her patience was rewarded when he began bringing new games for her to play, and to her own surprise she actually began to look forward to his visits; they at least cut into the endless tedium that came from being stuck in the same room every day. And he went out of his way to make her happy, which was saying something when even she was too lazy to usually bother.
"Gee, you sure are good at this game!" Prince Keef squealed as Gazpunzel effortlessly beat the Pork Knight yet again.
"This one isn't much of a challenge. I've already beat it, like, twenty times." She typed G-A-Z into the high score table, which was already filled with nine identical abbreviations.
"Oh. ...Hey! Can I play then?"
"You?"
"Yeah! Pleeeaaase? Pretty please with sugar on top and a cherry on top of that and maybe some hot fudge and crushed up little bits of cookie and—?"
He was cut off as the Game Slave 2 slammed into his chest. He gasped in pain, then grinned as he started a new game. Gazpunzel rolled her eyes. After a moment, though, Prince Keef's goofy expression had focused, his tongue sticking out between his teeth in concentration. He winced as the game let out a moaning tune, a GAME OVER message flashing across the screen.
"No—you can't use your sword on rock monsters. You have to avoid them until you get your first magic item."
"Oh, okay."
A moment later the tune sounded again.
"And you need to level up more before you go into the first cave. And pick that item up, it'll save you time later."
"Thanks!"
This went on for several hours before Prince Keef managed to get a general feel for the game. As afternoon drew toward evening he was bent down over the console, fingers moving rapidly as Gazpunzel stared over his shoulder, eyes fully opened in muted excitement.
"Okay, now, use the Sword of Kashrut—no, wait until he opens his visor—there! Now go for his eyes!"
Prince Keef giggled manically, pressing the attack button rapidly. "Take that, hoggy fiend!"
Triumphant music played a moment later as Keef pumped his fist into the air. "Yes! I did it! Just like that time I tried to slay that dragon, except that I won this time!"
Gazpunzel blinked. "Wow...you even got a high score," she said, actually sounding mildly impressed.
"Wow, cool! But only because I had the bestest helper ever! Thanks so much, Gazpunzel! Here, let me give you a—"
"No hugs, Keef."
He frowned in disappointment, but still grinned as he sat back down and typed his name into the high score table with his friend's.
He did not notice, but beside him Gazpunzel gave the tiniest hint of a smile as well.
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During all this time Gazpunzel had not mentioned her daily visitor to Dame Bitters. Frankly, Gazpunzel did not care much whether or not her mother would approve, but Gazpunzel knew that the witch could find a way to keep Prince Keef from returning, or worse, harm him in some way. (Why this seemed worse was somewhat of a puzzle to her, however; the gifts and broken boredom would stop either way, so why should Gazpunzel care which method Dame Bitters used?) In any event it was not hard to keep her secret, as Dame Bitters' visits were infrequent, and she usually left before the prince would arrive.
However, one day Gazpunzel failed to take Dame Bitters' rather acute senses into account.
"Gazpunzel! Let me up already. You know I can't survive long in the sun."
"Ugh, just a second."
Gazpunzel threw her Game Slave 2 onto the sofa and dragged her long hair across the room, letting it out the window for Dame Bitters to climb. As soon as her long, beakline nose was in the room, however, the old witch began to sniff, and kept sniffing as the rest of her bony body followed, a sneer curling on her lip.
"This room stinks of children."
"Gee, thanks," Gazpunzel muttered, dropping her armfuls of hair onto the floor.
"No, not child. Children." Her eyes narrowed. "You haven't had anyone else up here, have you?"
"Why would I? Er..."
Gazpunzel looked down and noticed a pizza box next to her foot. She quickly kicked it under her hair just as Dame Bitters turned to stare at her suspiciously. Gazpunzel stared back, looking as cool and annoyed as usual.
Dame Bitters turned away again and began to slither along the floor, smelling out a path to the couch. She picked up the Game Slave 2, turning it over in her hands suspiciously. Gazpunzel felt her heart give an unpleasant jump.
"This isn't the video game I gave you. And someone else has touched it," Dame Bitters said, sniffing it closely. "It smells...ugh...happy." She kept examining it, and then her eyes caught something on the screen that made her pause. Her lip curled as she held it up for Gazpunzel to see: a high score table with every entry identical but one.
"Who is K-E-E?"
Gazpunzel did not answer, other than her face twisting into an angry pout. Dame Bitters growled.
"You let other people up here, didn't you? You know how much I hate people, and now they know right where to go to come to bother me!"
"So what?" Gazpunzel sneered, crossing her arms and giving her most intense, terrifying glare. "What are you going to do about it?"
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"HEEEEEEEY!"
Gazpunzel, her hair newly shorn to about shoulder length, went flying out the window, thrown with such force that she vanished off onto the horizon. Dame Bitters watched coldly as she went, then took the long purple locks in her hand and got them ready for her next victim's arrival.
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"Oh, wow, she already has her hair out? She must be waiting for me! Be right up, Gazpunzel, could you just—a little help from up there? Er..."
After a while Prince Keef managed to climb his way up the tower, falling through the window to discover a tall, ancient woman looming over him. He frowned.
"Where's Gazpunzel?"
"She's not in right now. I'm her mother," Dame Bitters grumbled.
Prince Keef gasped. "Really? Well, hi!" He suddenly grabbed her gnarled hand and began to shake it emphatically, grinning up at her lined, sour face. "I'm Prince Keef! Wow, it's so nice to finally meet you! And let me just say, it's easy to see where Gazpunzel gets her looks from—you're just as scary as she is!" He looked around the room, oblivious to the way Dame Bitters' expression was growing even darker than usual. "So, uh, when will she be back? I brought soda for her to try!"
"She's not coming back. And neither are you, boy."
Prince Keef frowned, politely confused. "Whuddya mean?"
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"AAAAAGGGGGHHHHH!"
Prince Keef was thrown out of the tower, falling straight down toward the tangled thorn bushes growing at its base.
"AAAGGGHHH I DON'T REMEMBER THOSE THORN BUSHES BEING THERE BEFORE AAAGGGHHH!"
WHAM!
"...Ugh...I'M OKAY!...again."
"Serves you right, you miserable little urchin!" Dame Bitters grumbled. "I hope you've learned a lesson about—"
Just then the rope of hair slipped from her grasp, falling down to land on top of the prince. Dame Bitters blinked as she gazed down after it, then looked around for some other way out of the tower. There was none, of course.
"Well, darn."
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Prince Keef, injured by the fall and unable to see, wandered through the forest in wretchedness, so miserable by this turn of fortune that he could not even think of any good "wandering through the forest while recently blinded" songs to pass the time. Chief among his misfortunes was the loss of his friend. For truly he had come to take great happiness in his visits with Gazpunzel, and now that he had no way to find her again he felt his joyful optimism sink into a dismal ennui. (Plus, you know, the blindness thing.)
After several days he managed to come to a nearby village, wherein there was a certain pub called Bloaty's Ye Olde Pizza Hogge. Unknown to the prince, it was at this very pub that Gazpunzel was now working, though she was finding the labor to be less luxurious than she had originally imagined.
"Stupid window," she grumbled, rubbing at a spot with her dirty rag. "Get off...grrr..."
Prince Keef happened to be passing by at the moment, tripping every other step, but suddenly lifted his head in amazement. "I would know that growl anywhere. Gazpunzel? Gazpunzel!"
"Keef?"
Prince Keef rushed over, gasping for breath as Gazpunzel came over to meet him. "Oh, Gazpunzel, thank goodness I found you!" He threw himself forward to wrap his arms around her—though instead wound up hugging the restaurant's mailbox. "Your mom threw me out of your tower and blinded me on razor-sharp thorns! I don't think she likes me very much."
"Let me see..." Gazpunzel pulled Prince Keef away from the mailbox, examining his face. "Your eyes don't look hurt."
"But I can't see anything!"
"Meh. The fall probably just knocked your brain out of place or something."
"Really? But then, how do I—"
SMACK!
Gazpunzel hit Prince Keef on the side of the head, hard; his face froze for a moment, but then he blinked and broke into one of his usual wide grins. "Hey, it worked! Thanks, buddy!"
He threw his arms around Gazpunzel and drew her into a tight hug. She growled.
"Remember what I said about hugs?"
"Oh, yeah, sorry."
And so Gazpunzel quit her job at the pub (or walked out without telling anybody, anyway) and went with Prince Keef to his palace, where his absence had been more or less ignored because frankly most people found him to be kind of annoying. Nevertheless the king and queen rejoiced and welcomed Gazpunzel, even though she scared most of the servants witless. And she and Prince Keef eventually married and lived happily ever after, which was really obvious for Prince Keef but sort of hard to tell with Gazpunzel, unless you happened to walk in on the two of them while they were playing video games together. Dame Bitters, meanwhile, was still stuck in the tower, but it was dim and dank and empty, so really, she was about as happy as she was ever going to get.
The End

Description

Summary: An Invader Zim one-shot. The story of a nasty old witch, her equally-nasty tower-bound daughter, and a prince who will bring some sunshine into their lives, whether they want it or not. Keef/Gaz friendship/romance.
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Once upon a time in a kingdom far, far away there was an old, foreboding skoolhouse inhabited by an even older, more foreboding witch named Dame Bitters. She rarely emerged from the dark building, yet still served as the terror to everyone else in the village, who avoided the overgrown grounds of the skool as much as they possibly could.
Well, except for one.
"Let's see, just about...now!"
Membrane pulled the plants from the ground just as all the hands on his pocket watch came together, holding his prize up dramatically.
"Mandrake extracted exactly at midnight on the night of the full moon! Success!"
If he had been talking a bit more quietly, maybe he would have heard the slight whoosh as the shadow slithered up behind him, or noticed it rising up in the tall, slender form of a hook-nosed old woman. She growled, narrowing the yellowed eyes behind her spectacles and causing the man to jump in surprise.
"EGADS! Oh, um—hello, Dame Bitters."
"What are you doing?" the witch snapped, leaning down over him.
"Oh, I was just borrowing a few things from your garden. I trust you don't mind, my dear withered hag?"
ZAAAP!
Membrane's clothes and thick spectacles fell into a pile on the ground. A green toad stuck its head out from among the heap of cloth.
"Hmm...perhaps you do," he mused.
The witch bent down, picking up the Membrane-toad between her bony, steel-gripped talons. Membrane made a sharp choking sound.
"But you don't understand! I need these plants! FOR ALCHEMY!" he said, trying to pose dramatically with his webbed hands and doing about as well as you would expect.
"Well, if you want something of mine, you have to pay for it," Dame Bitters said in a droning growl. "And due to the dictates of our backwards, feudal economy, the only way one can achieve anything is through control of forced human labor in a corrupt system of serfdom."
"Serfs? I don't have any serfs," Membrane said, rubbing his green, slimy chin. "All I have are a few children."
"Children? Hmm..." Dame Bitters eyes wandered away thoughtfully for a moment. "Fine. You can keep some of my lettuce in exchange for one of the kids."
Membrane regarded her warily. "How much lettuce?"
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So Membrane handed over his younger child to the wicked witch, but his intrusion had still been the last straw as far as she was concerned—having grown sick of dealing with trespassers every decade or so, Dame Bitters decided to move away from the village, finding a new home deep in the nearby forest. This new home worked out fairly well until some wandering brats tried to eat the place, at which point she decided to move into an even more remote location, namely a tall tower that could not be entered except for one window on the very top floor. It was dead cheap, too, what with being pretty much impossible to live in.
Dame Bitters brought her new adopted daughter with her during these moves. She had named the child Gazpunzel, after one of the types of plant that Membrane had taken in exchange for her—one could take this to be a symbolic choice, but mostly it was because Dame Bitters was just too lazy to come up with anything better. As the years passed Gazpunzel grew up to look much like her new mother, ugly and troll-like, with a sour expression and perpetually-narrowed eyes. This pleased Dame Bitters, since obviously she did not want one of those nasty, cheerful sort of children running around to annoy her. As it stood the two of them were content to stay out of each other's way. Neither liked being around another person, and since that technically included each other Dame Bitters would spend most of her time away from the tower, leaving Gazpunzel alone in the dreary, empty building.
Which would have been just fine if there had actually been something to do.
Gazpunzel held up the picture that she had just drawn. It was of a little piggy—one standing amongst the wreckage of a straw house, being bloodily devoured by an angry wolf. Gazpunzel sighed, throwing it into a pile of other pictures that had grown taller than she had over the years.
"I'm bored."
"Quit your whining," Dame Bitters growled, preparing to depart for the day. She bent down and picked up a length of Gazpunzel's dark purple hair from the floor—she had very long hair, more than fifty feet or so, sprawled all over their domicile. Neither she nor Dame Bitters had ever cut it, mostly on the grounds that doing so would involve some minimal amount of effort, and anyway it offered an easy way for Dame Bitters to get in and out of the tower.
"But I have nothing to do. EVER," Gaz grumbled, glaring at the floor.
The witch gave an annoyed growl, then snapped her fingers, conjuring up a small device. "Here," she said, throwing it to Gazpunzel carelessly. The girl caught it, examining it quizzically.
"What's this?"
"An anachronistic video game. Waste your time with it."
"Huh. Okay."
Gazpunzel sat down and began punching buttons, her eyes glued intensely on the screen. She was so absorbed that she did not even bother to look up as Dame Bitters wordlessly threw her hair out the window and climbed down, leaving her young daughter alone for the next several of days or so.
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Now it came to pass that one day, the prince of the kingdom came riding through the forest where the witch and her daughter lived. Or at least, "riding" in a broadly-defined sort of way.
"AGH! WHOA, HORSEY! WHOA!"
"NEEEIIIGGGHHH!"
WHAM!
Prince Keef's head slammed into a tree branch, knocking him off of his steed as it continued to thrash wildly through the forest. By the time the young prince had sat up and shooed the little birdies away from his head it had run off, leaving him alone.
"Whuh—no, come back, horsey! Our ride isn't supposed to be over yet!"
Prince Keef got up and began running cashing after his beast, but he had little success; not long passed before its pounding footsteps had faded, and not long after that the prince found himself hopelessly lost (and not for the first time, either). He frowned for a moment at this realization, then forced a smile back onto his face. "Oh well. It's not so bad!" he said cheerfully, starting off down the forest path again. "Just look at how nice the forest is today! Hi animals!"
He waved at a pair of blood-red eyes glaring out at him from the shadows. They blinked quizzically as the young prince took a sandwich out of his pocket and walked off, happily eating.
Sure that he would soon find another passing traveler to help him, Prince Keef walked for the next hour or so, humming under his breath, until he finally emerged into a large clearing where a tall, circular tower loomed ominously over him. The young boy's smile grew even wider. "YAY! Someone who can help me!" he cried, running out from the trees. "I'll just knock and see if I can get some directions and maybe a quick snack and a game or two of Monopoly before I—wait...huh?"
Prince Keef walked around the base of the tower, but to his confusion he could not find any sort of door by which to entreat entrance. He blinked and circled the tower again, and was halfway through his third rotation when he heard something happening on the opposite side.
"And next time, bring me a game that doesn't stink so much!"
"Meh, ungrateful little..."
Prince Keef ran around the tower just in time to see Dame Bitters gliding off into the woods with her back to him as a long rope of purple hair flew up the side of the tower. Taking several steps backwards he was able to make out a window near the top, into which it vanished.
"Ohhh!" Prince Keef grinned, sucking in a deep breath before shouting.
"HEY! YOU UP THERE!"
A moment passed before a face appeared. From several stories below it was hard to make much out, but her glare was so powerful that it could probably have been felt unseen through a castle wall. Her pale face was framed by long purple hair. She was holding a Game Slave in one hand, barely tearing her eyes away from it to regard the stranger below.
"...What?"
"HI! MY NAME IS PRINCE KEEF! WHAT'S YOUR NAME?"
"...Gazpunzel."
"OH!" A beat passed. "...HI!"
The girl stared for a moment, then turned to disappear.
"WAIT, DON'T GO! CAN YOU GIVE ME DIRECTIONS TO THE NEAREST VILLAGE? I'M KIND OF LOST...again."
"Go back into the forest and keep walking until your not here."
"OH, OKAY!" Another beat. "...HEY, CAN I COME UP THERE FOR A LITTLE WHILE?"
"NO!"
"AW, COME ON! PLEASE?!"
"No way in—AGH, MY GAME!"
For it had come to pass that the Game Slave had slipped from Gazpunzel's hand, falling to the ground below. Prince Keef quickly leapt forward, falling onto his stomach and throwing out his hands—the Game Slave fell into his combined palms, undamaged. Smiling at his luck, Prince Keef carefully stood up (trying to ignore the grass stains on his colorfully regal outfit), holding the console up so that the lady above him could see it.
"DON'T WORRY, I CAUGHT IT!"
"Good! Now send it back up here!"
"OKAY!" Prince Keef looked around for a moment, then frowned in confusion. "UM...HOW? !"
"Duh, you just—oh, crud."
Realizing that she had no other choice, Gazpunzel let down her hair to allow the idiotic prince entrance. He stuffed the game into his pocket and started to climb, continually falling and giggling about how this was just like gym class while Gazpunzel ground her teeth in frustration. Finally she pulled the hair up herself and he managed to clamber through the windows, falling to the floor and panting.
"Wow, that was weird, wasn't it? I've never climbed hair before! But I think your hair is good for climbing—it's all coarse and rough and kind of dirty, do you wash it often? I guess it must he hard to wash that much when there's so much of it, I don't even have that much hair and I only wash it once every couple of—"
Prince Keef was suddenly pulled up by the collar of his tunic, feet off the floor as he gazed down at Gazpunzel's pale, twisted visage.
"Where—is—my—game?"
"Oh—right here!"
He fished it out of his pocket and handed it to her, smiling. She snatched it up and let go of Prince Keef's collar, causing him to crash unceremoniously onto his fundament. He looked up to see her instantly immersed in her game again, wandering across the room to sit on a dilapidated couch with her long hair trailing behind her. She seemed to have completely forgotten that he was even there.
Prince Keef looked around—the tower had a single round room, all gray stone, with just the one window providing any kind of light in the gloom. Gazpunzel's hair alone took up a large amount of space, lying carelessly on the floor, while a huge pile of papers stood against the wall. Trash was everywhere.
"Wow! This place sure needs to be cleaned! And maybe painted! Hmm, and maybe if we add a couple of skylights, ooh, and a puppy! And then we can get a little kitty-cat to be his friend and dress them up in little tuxedos and have them play together and—hey, where do you go to the bathroom?"
"Go away. NOW."
Prince Keef looked up as Gazpunzel kept her eyes on her video game, her lip curled into a contemptuous girn. Suddenly she growled and threw the game away; it hit Prince Keef on the head and knocked him backwards, stunning him for a moment. Gazpunzel crossed her arms angrily.
"Stupid game!"
Prince Keef recovered, blinking dazedly as he held up the console. "What's the matter? You having trouble? Maybe I can he—"
Gazpunzel snatched back the game. "I don't need help. I've beat this game over a thousand times. That's the problem." She sneered at the game, then looked up to give her malice to Prince Keef instead. "Now get out of here."
"But I—whoa!"
Gazpunzel picked Prince Keef up, carrying him effortlessly above her head and over to the window. The next thing he knew he was flying through the air, giving him a minute to scream himself hoarse before he crashed and formed a prince-shaped crater in the ground below.
"...Ugh, I'M OKAY! I GUESS I'LL SEE YOU LATER, THEN!" he called dazedly. Gazpunzel, meanwhile, was already slamming the shutters of her window closed.
___________________________________________________________________________________
The next day Gazpunzel was working on beating her game for the 1,004 time when a small rock came flying through her window. That alone wouldn't have been enough to illicit more than a twitch out of her, but when it was followed by two more in short succession she decided to get up and see what was going on.
She poked her head out and dodged as a fourth stone nearly beaned her. "WHOOPS! SORRY!" Prince Keef called, failing to notice Gazpunzel grinding her teeth again. "SO ANYWAY, I THOUGHT THAT MAYBE WE COULD HAVE LUNCH TOGETHER!"
"Lunch?"
"YEAH! SO LIKE—LET DOWN YOUR LONG HAIR, SO THAT I MAY CLIMB THE VIOLET STAIR! OR WHATEVER."
"No! Go away!"
"BUT I BROUGHT PIZZA!"
Gazpunzel had just started to turn back into the tower when she paused, glancing back down as Prince Keef picked up a pizza box from the grass and held it over his head for her to see. Her stomach growled. So did her mouth.
As soon as Prince Keef came through the window Gazpunzel snatched the pizza box away from him, storming with it over to the couch. Prince Keef smiled and happily joined her, oblivious to the aura of doom that began to spread around him as he took a slice out of the box and began to eat. And, of course, jabber endlessly between every bite.
"Yay! This is fun, isn't it? It's like a picnic, except that we're inside, but we're still out in the forest so it still sort of counts, you know what I mean? It must be so cool living out here with the animals and the fresh air and everything, like—"
"Keef? Shut up."
Gazpunzel shoved the last of the pizza crust into her mouth and shut the box, picking up her Game Slave again. The sour look on her face made Prince Keef blink, then grin as he began to dig through his pockets again.
"Oh yeah! I almost forgot, I brought you something else too! Ta-DA!"
Gazpunzel looked up, and her narrowed eyes opened in awe. "It's a Game Slave 2!" Prince Keef explained. "It's like a normal Game Slave...but TWOIER! It's supposed to be a lot cooler, so I figured if you're bored with your first one, you might—whoa again!"
He dodged as Gazpunzel's old Game Slave suddenly went flying by his head, sailing out the window and crashing far below. In seconds Gazpunzel had snatched Prince Keef's gift and had her eyes glued to its screen, fingers dancing around the buttons with more enthusiasm than she shown in a very long time.
"Oh, I'm glad you like it! Nothing but the best for my bestest friend!" Prince Keef squealed. "Hey, can I watch?"
"Meh."
Prince Keef's grin widened as he scooted closer to observe the game over Gazpunzel's shoulder.
___________________________________________________________________________________
Prince Keef returned the following day and again the day after, and each time Gazpunzel reluctantly let him into her tower, because hey, it didn't bother her too much when he babbled on incessantly and asked ten thousand questions about her games. Her patience was rewarded when he began bringing new games for her to play, and to her own surprise she actually began to look forward to his visits; they at least cut into the endless tedium that came from being stuck in the same room every day. And he went out of his way to make her happy, which was saying something when even she was too lazy to usually bother.
"Gee, you sure are good at this game!" Prince Keef squealed as Gazpunzel effortlessly beat the Pork Knight yet again.
"This one isn't much of a challenge. I've already beat it, like, twenty times." She typed G-A-Z into the high score table, which was already filled with nine identical abbreviations.
"Oh. ...Hey! Can I play then?"
"You?"
"Yeah! Pleeeaaase? Pretty please with sugar on top and a cherry on top of that and maybe some hot fudge and crushed up little bits of cookie and—?"
He was cut off as the Game Slave 2 slammed into his chest. He gasped in pain, then grinned as he started a new game. Gazpunzel rolled her eyes. After a moment, though, Prince Keef's goofy expression had focused, his tongue sticking out between his teeth in concentration. He winced as the game let out a moaning tune, a GAME OVER message flashing across the screen.
"No—you can't use your sword on rock monsters. You have to avoid them until you get your first magic item."
"Oh, okay."
A moment later the tune sounded again.
"And you need to level up more before you go into the first cave. And pick that item up, it'll save you time later."
"Thanks!"
This went on for several hours before Prince Keef managed to get a general feel for the game. As afternoon drew toward evening he was bent down over the console, fingers moving rapidly as Gazpunzel stared over his shoulder, eyes fully opened in muted excitement.
"Okay, now, use the Sword of Kashrut—no, wait until he opens his visor—there! Now go for his eyes!"
Prince Keef giggled manically, pressing the attack button rapidly. "Take that, hoggy fiend!"
Triumphant music played a moment later as Keef pumped his fist into the air. "Yes! I did it! Just like that time I tried to slay that dragon, except that I won this time!"
Gazpunzel blinked. "Wow...you even got a high score," she said, actually sounding mildly impressed.
"Wow, cool! But only because I had the bestest helper ever! Thanks so much, Gazpunzel! Here, let me give you a—"
"No hugs, Keef."
He frowned in disappointment, but still grinned as he sat back down and typed his name into the high score table with his friend's.
He did not notice, but beside him Gazpunzel gave the tiniest hint of a smile as well.
___________________________________________________________________________________
During all this time Gazpunzel had not mentioned her daily visitor to Dame Bitters. Frankly, Gazpunzel did not care much whether or not her mother would approve, but Gazpunzel knew that the witch could find a way to keep Prince Keef from returning, or worse, harm him in some way. (Why this seemed worse was somewhat of a puzzle to her, however; the gifts and broken boredom would stop either way, so why should Gazpunzel care which method Dame Bitters used?) In any event it was not hard to keep her secret, as Dame Bitters' visits were infrequent, and she usually left before the prince would arrive.
However, one day Gazpunzel failed to take Dame Bitters' rather acute senses into account.
"Gazpunzel! Let me up already. You know I can't survive long in the sun."
"Ugh, just a second."
Gazpunzel threw her Game Slave 2 onto the sofa and dragged her long hair across the room, letting it out the window for Dame Bitters to climb. As soon as her long, beakline nose was in the room, however, the old witch began to sniff, and kept sniffing as the rest of her bony body followed, a sneer curling on her lip.
"This room stinks of children."
"Gee, thanks," Gazpunzel muttered, dropping her armfuls of hair onto the floor.
"No, not child. Children." Her eyes narrowed. "You haven't had anyone else up here, have you?"
"Why would I? Er..."
Gazpunzel looked down and noticed a pizza box next to her foot. She quickly kicked it under her hair just as Dame Bitters turned to stare at her suspiciously. Gazpunzel stared back, looking as cool and annoyed as usual.
Dame Bitters turned away again and began to slither along the floor, smelling out a path to the couch. She picked up the Game Slave 2, turning it over in her hands suspiciously. Gazpunzel felt her heart give an unpleasant jump.
"This isn't the video game I gave you. And someone else has touched it," Dame Bitters said, sniffing it closely. "It smells...ugh...happy." She kept examining it, and then her eyes caught something on the screen that made her pause. Her lip curled as she held it up for Gazpunzel to see: a high score table with every entry identical but one.
"Who is K-E-E?"
Gazpunzel did not answer, other than her face twisting into an angry pout. Dame Bitters growled.
"You let other people up here, didn't you? You know how much I hate people, and now they know right where to go to come to bother me!"
"So what?" Gazpunzel sneered, crossing her arms and giving her most intense, terrifying glare. "What are you going to do about it?"
___________________________________________________________________________________
"HEEEEEEEY!"
Gazpunzel, her hair newly shorn to about shoulder length, went flying out the window, thrown with such force that she vanished off onto the horizon. Dame Bitters watched coldly as she went, then took the long purple locks in her hand and got them ready for her next victim's arrival.
___________________________________________________________________________________
"Oh, wow, she already has her hair out? She must be waiting for me! Be right up, Gazpunzel, could you just—a little help from up there? Er..."
After a while Prince Keef managed to climb his way up the tower, falling through the window to discover a tall, ancient woman looming over him. He frowned.
"Where's Gazpunzel?"
"She's not in right now. I'm her mother," Dame Bitters grumbled.
Prince Keef gasped. "Really? Well, hi!" He suddenly grabbed her gnarled hand and began to shake it emphatically, grinning up at her lined, sour face. "I'm Prince Keef! Wow, it's so nice to finally meet you! And let me just say, it's easy to see where Gazpunzel gets her looks from—you're just as scary as she is!" He looked around the room, oblivious to the way Dame Bitters' expression was growing even darker than usual. "So, uh, when will she be back? I brought soda for her to try!"
"She's not coming back. And neither are you, boy."
Prince Keef frowned, politely confused. "Whuddya mean?"
___________________________________________________________________________________
"AAAAAGGGGGHHHHH!"
Prince Keef was thrown out of the tower, falling straight down toward the tangled thorn bushes growing at its base.
"AAAGGGHHH I DON'T REMEMBER THOSE THORN BUSHES BEING THERE BEFORE AAAGGGHHH!"
WHAM!
"...Ugh...I'M OKAY!...again."
"Serves you right, you miserable little urchin!" Dame Bitters grumbled. "I hope you've learned a lesson about—"
Just then the rope of hair slipped from her grasp, falling down to land on top of the prince. Dame Bitters blinked as she gazed down after it, then looked around for some other way out of the tower. There was none, of course.
"Well, darn."
___________________________________________________________________________________
Prince Keef, injured by the fall and unable to see, wandered through the forest in wretchedness, so miserable by this turn of fortune that he could not even think of any good "wandering through the forest while recently blinded" songs to pass the time. Chief among his misfortunes was the loss of his friend. For truly he had come to take great happiness in his visits with Gazpunzel, and now that he had no way to find her again he felt his joyful optimism sink into a dismal ennui. (Plus, you know, the blindness thing.)
After several days he managed to come to a nearby village, wherein there was a certain pub called Bloaty's Ye Olde Pizza Hogge. Unknown to the prince, it was at this very pub that Gazpunzel was now working, though she was finding the labor to be less luxurious than she had originally imagined.
"Stupid window," she grumbled, rubbing at a spot with her dirty rag. "Get off...grrr..."
Prince Keef happened to be passing by at the moment, tripping every other step, but suddenly lifted his head in amazement. "I would know that growl anywhere. Gazpunzel? Gazpunzel!"
"Keef?"
Prince Keef rushed over, gasping for breath as Gazpunzel came over to meet him. "Oh, Gazpunzel, thank goodness I found you!" He threw himself forward to wrap his arms around her—though instead wound up hugging the restaurant's mailbox. "Your mom threw me out of your tower and blinded me on razor-sharp thorns! I don't think she likes me very much."
"Let me see..." Gazpunzel pulled Prince Keef away from the mailbox, examining his face. "Your eyes don't look hurt."
"But I can't see anything!"
"Meh. The fall probably just knocked your brain out of place or something."
"Really? But then, how do I—"
SMACK!
Gazpunzel hit Prince Keef on the side of the head, hard; his face froze for a moment, but then he blinked and broke into one of his usual wide grins. "Hey, it worked! Thanks, buddy!"
He threw his arms around Gazpunzel and drew her into a tight hug. She growled.
"Remember what I said about hugs?"
"Oh, yeah, sorry."
And so Gazpunzel quit her job at the pub (or walked out without telling anybody, anyway) and went with Prince Keef to his palace, where his absence had been more or less ignored because frankly most people found him to be kind of annoying. Nevertheless the king and queen rejoiced and welcomed Gazpunzel, even though she scared most of the servants witless. And she and Prince Keef eventually married and lived happily ever after, which was really obvious for Prince Keef but sort of hard to tell with Gazpunzel, unless you happened to walk in on the two of them while they were playing video games together. Dame Bitters, meanwhile, was still stuck in the tower, but it was dim and dank and empty, so really, she was about as happy as she was ever going to get.
The End