by Guy Bass
Frog’s eyes flooded red and he too leaped up on to the table. “Take that back … take that back right now,” he growled.
“Can’t make me,” replied the Princess. “I’m a princess.”
“Give the order, my prince,” said the general. “Give the order and no one will question you, ever again. All this will be yours…”
Frog stared at the princess, her cheeks as red as his eyes. He thought of Buttercup … of the island … of the vegetable patch … of everything he’d left behind. Then he looked up at the gleaming white palace and remembered what the rarewolf had told him. It suddenly made sense.
“Others will try and decide your fate, Prince Frog. But you must decide for yourself. You must choose your own destiny.”
Frog took a deep breath of warm morning air and looked Princess Rainbow right in the eye. “It’s given. I mean, I given it. I mean, give it. I give the order!”
The Beginning of the End of the World
“You’re not going to regret this, my prince!” cried the general. He got to his feet, framed by the great Kroakan bipods. “The order is given! Begin the End of the World!”
“In your face, Princess Brain-slow!” cried Frog, swishing his royal cape. “Begin the End of the— Wait, what?”
The bipods suddenly burst into life, moving in large, slithering steps, scattering the panicking crowd. They turned slowly towards the palace and glowed so brightly that Frog was forced to look away.
“Fire the sunder-beams!” the general roared.
“Wuh…?” blurted Frog.
A moment later, a beam of green light streaked out from each bipod, accompanied by a shrill metallic shriek. The sunder-beams struck the topmost tower of the palace, which exploded in a burst of flames! A shower of white bricks rained down over the roofs and lower towers, crashing and crumbling on to the garden below.
“My palace!” shrieked Princess Rainbow.
The bipods fired another volley of sunder-beams, destroying three more towers and reducing one of the palace’s outer walls to rubble.
“Destroy it! Burn it all!” said General Kurg proudly.
“Uh-oh…” whispered Frog.
“We’re under attack!” shouted Oldasdust. He reached into his robe, pulled out a talisman and cast it to the floor.
It exploded in a shower of blue light, covering him and the Princess with a magical protective bubble. “Champion! Guards! To arms!” Oldasdust cried. “Slay these monstrous gobbins!”
“I … am … Man-Lor!” cried Man-Lor, drawing his great sword. The guards followed suit and rushed bravely towards the Kroakans.
Frog saw General Kurg take his weapon casually out of his holster. It flashed green and a bright, shrieking beam of light streaked forth, hitting a guard and immediately turning him into a very small quantity of grey dust.
“Man-Lor is going to need bigger sword,” said Man-Lor.
“Blast them to atoms! Hail, Kroak!” bellowed General Kurg. With one hand, he upturned the entire table, sending food and diners flying. The remaining Kroakan troopers drew their sunder-guns and opened fire, disintegrating the remaining guards in short order.
“Stop! Stop! What are you doing?” shrieked Frog.
“You gave the order, my prince!” cried the general. “The invasion has begun … this is the beginning of the End of the World!”
“But … you can’t just … do that – this isn’t what I wanted!” cried Frog. “This isn’t good! Princes are good because goodness is princely!”
“‘Good’? By the Cosmic Whirlwind! Who taught you these words?” scoffed General Kurg. “Being good has nothing to do with victory! King Kroak commands you to bring about the End of the World!”
“But the world’s got all the things I want in it, all the things I’ve been waiting for!” protested Frog. “Why would I want to get rid of it?”
“Why? So that we might rebuild it in the image of our glorious home world!” replied the general, looking down at Frog. “Because you are Prince Frog! Because it is your destiny!”
The Scorched Earth
As the air filled with the screams of panicking servants, the bipods wheeled away from the palace and began stomping through the panicking crowds, squashing servants hither and thither then blasting everything in sight with their sunder-beams.
“Burn it all! Scorch the earth!” roared General Kurg. He watched the bipods burn the gardens – setting fire to the ground itself. A moment later they took aim upon the fleeing herd of newnicorns.
“Don’t you dare…” said the princess, under the protection of Oldasdust’s weakening magical sphere. “Don’t you dare!”
Green beams of energy streaked forth. Frog watched in horror as the newnicorns burst into flames. Still they ran, wheeling in panic back towards the crowd.
“My newnicorns!” screamed the princess. “Bad gobbins!”
“I love the smell of burning life-forms in the morning,” said General Kurg.
“The sphere is weak! We must retreat!” the wizard cried.
A moment later, his protective bubble burst in a shower of blue sparks. Oldasdust quickly flung a whole handful of magical talismans to the ground, creating a flash of blinding light, a wall of water … even a distractingly large rabbit.
The flaming newnicorns stampeded past, trampling servants and setting light to whatever they touched. Man-Lor scooped up Princess Rainbow in his great hands and he, the wizard and the dozen remaining servants began running for the palace.
“General, shall we pursue?” asked Doctor Kull, firing after them.
“Let them hide! We’ll bury them inside!” replied the general. “Bipods!”
The bipods turned back to face the palace and all three began to glow green.
“You can’t! They’ll die!” cried Frog, grabbing the general’s leg. “Stop!”
“Stop, my prince?” said the general. “Why would we stop? We’re doing so well.”
“I said, no!” roared Frog, loudly enough that the general was shaken from his murderous reverie.
He looked down at Frog. After a moment his rasping laughter echoed around the garden. “Now that’s better!” he cried. “See how easily you draw your weapon? Perhaps your training isn’t as incomplete as we thought…”
“My what…?” Frog looked at his hand. Without realizing, he had drawn the sunder-gun at his side and was pointing it directly at General Kurg.
“Look, I don’t know how they do things on the outer-place plant, but I am your prince and you are my loyal subjects and I order you to stop trying to end the world,” demanded Frog, holstering his weapon.
“But—” began General Kurg.
“I mean it!” added Frog.
The general let out a grunting sigh. “Can we at least blacken the skies?” he asked.
“That doesn’t sound good either,” replied Frog.
“No – it’s very bad,” confirmed the general with a grin.
“Then, no!” cried Frog. “Look, just wait here. I’ll go and talk to the princess; I’m sure we can sort this out without blowing anything else up. Then maybe we can rule together! You’ll see, it’ll be great. Just don’t destroy anything else…”
General Kurg, the doctor and the confused Kroakan troops watched their prince hurry into the flaming palace.
“Great Suns of Kroakas! What kind of half-baked apocalypse is this? This pro-peace prince is going to stink up my reputation!” the general hissed.
“Reputation? If you don’t destroy this world, we are going to be turned into food,” hissed the doctor. “This prince is sure to doom us all. Unless…”
“Unless what?” asked the general.
“As of this moment, no one on Kroakas has any idea what transpired here,” the doctor continued. “The prince’s Keeper was extinguished in the crash … no one knows what happened to the prince. Perhaps … perhaps he could simply perish in battle. Heroically, of course.”
“You mean…” The general peered at Doctor Kull. “Doctor, w
hat you’re suggesting is … mutiny!”
“What I am suggesting for us, General, is that we make it out of this alive,” replied the doctor. “After all, the End of the World is the End of the World … with or without a prince.”
The Blackened Skies
“Princess?” cried Frog. “Lumps? Old wizard? Anyone?” he called, as he hurried through the palace. He could still hear the crackle and crumble of the burning towers and rubble falling high above them – but at least the Kroakans had stopped blowing things up.
“Princess! I’m sorry about the … about all that!” he cried. “I didn’t know they were planning the end of … the … world…”
The scorched earth … the blackened skies … catastrophe. Buttercup had spelled it all out to him before it happened. She spoke the very same words as the general. Could she have known who he really was? And if she did, why didn’t she tell him?
He was filled with a sudden sense of dread – and something that he’d never felt before.
Frog was afraid.
He hurried down corridor after corridor, through a courtyard and down a short flight of stairs, until he found himself in a large, well-stocked kitchen. It was lined with vast stoves and ovens, long tables filled with half-prepared food, and countless pans and utensils hanging from the ceiling.
“Princess! Where are you?” he called again. “Where are—”
“I am Man-Lor!” came a cry. The great barbarian burst out from inside a nearby pantry, swinging his massive sword.
“Yoiks!” screamed Frog, as the sword swung past his face and sliced the table in two. It lodged in the floor and Frog stumbled backwards into the wall.
“Chop him up to bits!” squeaked Princess Rainbow, emerging from the pantry.
“Slay him, Champion!” howled Oldasdust, following behind.
“Bad Greeny!” boomed Man-Lor, swinging his sword again.
Frog ducked out of the way just as the vast blade swung into the wall, inches from his head.
“Wait, stop! I’m not here to be mighty!” cried Frog, as Man-Lor struggled to wrench his sword out of the wall. “This is all a mistake, I don’t want to end the world!”
“You blowed my palace to bits,” snarled the princess. “You squashed everyone … you set fire to my newnicorns!”
“That wasn’t me! I didn’t want any of that!” insisted Frog.
“I wanted us to be friends … but you’re not my pet any more,” hissed the princess, staring him in the face. “And you still smell like turnips.”
Man-Lor abandoned his sword and clenched his fists. Frog hopped out of the way on to a nearby counter, but Man-Lor was deceptively fast – he swung a great arm backwards, swatting Frog across the kitchen and sending him bouncing to a clumsy halt in front of the princess.
“Listen to me!” said Frog, his head still spinning. “This was just a big mistake… I had no idea what the Kroakans were planning – I only met them today!”
“Chop his head off, Champ’un!” squealed the princess.
Man-Lor tore his mighty sword out of the wall. He charged at Frog, who was still struggling to his feet.
With a “Yoiks!” Frog sprung on mighty legs, back-flipping over the top of Man-Lor as he swung again.
“Man-Lor! Wait!” screamed Oldasdust, but it was too late – Man-Lor’s sword was moving too fast to stop. By the time Frog turned, the blade was inches from the princess’s head.
There was a flash of green light.
The first thing Frog noticed was that Man-Lor’s sword no longer had a blade. He looked down to see the sunder-gun in his hand. He had drawn and fired without thinking, reducing the sword to dust.
“You … you saved the princess,” said Oldasdust.
“Princes are good…” Frog panted, holstering his sunder-gun. “Goodness is princely.”
“You’re not good,” snarled Princess Rainbow. “You’re bad. You blowed up everything!”
“No, I stopped it. Do you hear any sunder-beams? I stopped them with an excellent royal order. Trust me.”
The pots and pans began to rattle. Then a rumble filled the air and the whole room seemed to darken.
“What the … what?” said Frog.
The princess headed for the stairs and began klik-klak-ing up them before the old wizard could stop her.
“Princess, wait!” Oldasdust cried, as he, Frog and Man-Lor raced after her. They made their way into a library overlooking the gardens, crept up to a window and looked out.
The bipods had indeed stopped firing on the palace. Instead, they had unleashed their sunder-beams upon the sky, blasting into the heavens. The sky churned with impenetrably thick black clouds, which spread like ink stirred into water. They had already blocked out the sun and cast the palace into gloom.
“The blackened skies…” began Frog. “But I gave a princely order … I told them not to…”
“Liar-head! Now they’re doing more badness,” hissed the princess in her angriest whisper.
“Prince Frog!” came a cry. Frog peered into the encroaching darkness to see General Kurg and his troops gathered in the garden. “I offer you this one chance,” the general continued. “Pledge your undying loyalty to King Kroak and you fulfil your destiny – you can rule the Ended World as its prince. We will destroy this wretched planet together! Refuse and you will be extinguished with extreme prejudice. The choice is yours. You have one kron to decide.”
“Wait … they can’t extinguish me – can they?” Frog muttered. He felt frozen in a moment of impending doom. He pondered the choice he’d been offered – to be the Prince of the scorched earth … of the blackened skies … of the End of the World.
“Pfff … not this prince,” he said. He prised the crown from his head and threw it to the ground.
“What did the gobbin say?” asked the princess.
Frog clenched his fists. “Did you ever have one of those days when you think you’re a prince, but then you find out you’re not, but then it turns out you are, but you’re not in the way you wanted so you’d be better off not being a prince in the first place?”
“No,” Princess Rainbow replied.
“Well, I did,” he said. He turned to face the princess. “Someone told me this was going to happen. He said it was a prophecy. He told me I’d have to make a choice.”
“Did he tell you that you were a horrid gobbin who ruined everything?” asked the princess.
“He told me I’d have to choose my own destiny … and I have,” Frog replied. “I’m going to save you. Then, after that, I’m going to save the whole world.”
The Excellent Plan to Save the Princess and After That the Whole World
“I do not need saving,” cried Princess
Rainbow. “I’m the Princess of Everything!”
“Well, I’m going to save you anyway,” replied Frog, watching the Kroakan troops make their way up the garden. “OK, we’re going to need an excellent plan and some skilled-up mightiness.” He glanced down at his slick Kroakan armour. “First – there’s no way I can save the world dressed like a baddie – it’s unprincely.”
Frog immediately started undressing.
“Gah! Naked gobbin buttocks! Avert your eyes, Princess!” cried Oldasdust. He wagged a finger at Frog. “Must you insist on exposing yourself at every given opportunity?”
“Man-Lor help reduce nakedness,” said the barbarian. He reached behind his back and pulled Frog’s catastrophe pants out of his furry loincloth. “Man-Lor jealous of pants because Man-Lor’s loincloth itchy…”
“Nice work, Lumps!” said Frog. He reached out to take the catastrophe pants – and noticed his broken stick, still tucked into his belt.
“Basil Rathbone … I wish you really were a sword,” he muttered. He shook his head and pulled on the pants. “Right, the next step is finding Sheriff Explosion…”
“Who?” squeaked Oldasdust.
“My sheep,” Frog replied. “He’s white and woolly. Looks like a sheep.”
�
��A sheep?” repeated the princess. “Who cares about a smelly-head sheep?”
“I do, he’s the only trusty steed I’ve got,” replied Frog firmly. “Now, do you know where his is or not?”
“I’m afraid your sheep suffered the fate of all uninvited guests,” Oldasdust began. “It was locked in the Tower of Tallness.”
“You locked up my steed?” cried Frog, shooting the wizard a withering look. “Where is this tower?”
“It was at the top of the palace,” huffed Princess Rainbow, crossing her arms. “Until your best-friend gobbins blowed it to bits.”
“No … we have to get up there!” Frog cried.
“Go towards the destruction? What madness!” Oldasdust protested.
“This is not a dress for going to blowed-to-bits places,” confirmed the princess, smoothing her sparkly skirts.
“Well, I’m going,” Frog replied, attaching his sunder-gun to his catastrophe pants. “And since I’m the only one who is a) dressed for catastrophe, b) has a mighty weapon and c) is a skilled-up prince from outer place, then I reckon you’re best sticking with—”
“Time’s up, O Prince!” came the general’s cry. The Kroakans were striding towards the palace. “Join us and live as a prince, or die a short but immeasurably unpleasant death with the rest of these pitiful creatures!”
“Now what is he saying?” tutted the princess.
“Nothing important,” replied Frog. “Let’s go!”
Frog, Princess Rainbow, the wizard Oldasdust and Man-Lor the barbarian hurried through the burning palace. As they sped across the central courtyard, Frog looked up. He saw the sky seething with coal-black clouds – and the ruin of the Tower of Tallness.
“Hang on, Sheriff,” he began. “I’m—”
A sunder-beam streaked past Frog’s head. He glanced back to see Kroakan troopers only thirty paces behind them.
