Forbidden Palace

[characters displayed left to right: Rohit, Jon, Uta, Dyson, Wenbo, Vladimir, Eugene]

Once upon a time in the Garden of Victor, there existed 7 blind children: Rohit, Jon, Uta, Dyson, Wenbo, Vladimir, and Eugene. Because they were blind, truth and light didn't matter to them. Their lives subsisted in simple, harmonious pleasantry in the Garden of Victor.

In reality, they were not really blind. They just always had their eyes closed. One fateful day, Eugene opened one of his eyes and discovered that he had the remarkable gift of sight. At first, the children of Victor were skeptical of Eugene’s new power for they had never before come across anything so outlandish. It wasn’t until Eugene threw stones at each of their heads with such incredible aim that they came to believe him.

Eugene, delighted by his newfound powers, did not hesitate to produce fanciful narratives and exaggerative imagery in order to please his friends. But as weeks passed, feelings of ill-will and resentment built up against Eugene. It seemed to them that Eugene was filling their minds with lies. The children grew unspeakably envious of Eugene as he pranced around basking in the exclusive wonders of vision.

Only Vladimir, Eugene's lover, remained loyally by Eugene’s side. They held hands for hours, skipping together along the lush valleys of Victor. The other children branded Eugene a social menace, dismissing his act as one of deception and vanity.

One night while lying in the grass, Eugene cast his eye upon the beautiful Uta. She was standing near the bottom of the hill with a handful of flowers. Eugene had been watching her obsessively for a month now and was falling desperately in love with the girl. Unfortunately, Eugene was already in a committed relationship with Vladimir. He had vowed, in the name of all that is sacred, that he would never betray his faithful honey-bun! However, tonight Uta looked especially radiant and Eugene knew that he had to have her. He thus decided to pursue his passions for Utish-passion behind Vladimir's back.

Little did he know, Uta’s heart secretly belonged to the charming Wenbo. She was always seen in a dreamy state, blindly picking off flowery Wenbo-petals and reciting, "he loves me, he loves me not..."

She was playing with her Wenbo-petals when she heard Eugene's approach.

"Hey there good lookin'!" said Eugene.
"Wenbo! Is that you?"
"No, it is I! Eugene"
"Eugene? What do you want?"
"I would like nothing more but to hold your beautiful hand."
"Why?"
"Because you're my little sexy utishpenguin!"
"Ew! Get away!"
"Oh baby, I must have you!"

As Eugene tugged Uta towards him, Uta swung out her leg in a fury and kicked Eugene squarely in the leg. She stormed off, leaving Eugene moaning and coddling his wounded knee. She agreed with the others that Eugene was nothing but a disreputable villain.

Once Uta was out of sight, Rohit popped out from behind the bushes.

"I couldn't help but overhear you trying to woo Uta behind Vladimir's back," said Rohit. "If you give me your eyes, I shall keep my lips sealed!"

Eugene was surely surprised by Rohit's treachery to blackmail. He had no idea that Rohit was also deathly in love with Uta. Suddenly fearing the heartbreak of his beloved Vlady-pooh, Eugene quickly complied and gouged out his eyeballs on Rohit's command. Rohit took the eyes, squished them around in his fingers, and placed them neatly in his pocket.

The next morning, Rohit told Dyson and Jon everything that had happened. They all took turns touching Eugene's malevolent eyes, wondering how to activate them. But, days passed and they still couldn't overcome this conundrum.

It was during Dyson’s weekly berry-picking that serendipity lent a hand. Somehow, one of Eugene’s eyeballs had made its way into Dyson’s berry-picking basket and as Dyson commenced with taste tests for the week’s sample, he incidentally swallowed the unfortunate eye. Before he realized what he had done, he was struck by the most peculiar urge to leap into the air. So he leapt; he leapt and leapt until he was no longer conscious of the ground. After about 30 seconds of airtime, it finally dawned on him that he had accidentally leapt off of the Victorian cliffs. A few seconds later, Dyson was a messy blotch on the jagged rocks below.

Fortunately, Dyson was a thieving crackmonger. He was the one responsible for super-gluing everyone's eyes shut while they were sleeping. Dyson had secretly been able to use his eyes and see the world since the beginning of Victor's garden.

After two weeks of Dyson's absence, the superglue on Rohit's eyelids wore off. He discovered that his eyelids could open if he wet his face. All he had to do next was wipe off the goo from his eyes. After this amazing finding, Rohit urinated on everyone's face causing the superglue on the children's eyes to dissolve. Only Eugene, with eye balls torn from his sockets, was left in the dark. The rest of the children rubbed off the goo, adjusted their eyes to the world, and discovered that all their friends were, in fact, hideous.

THE END.