"Ono!" shrieked Swiss, a small Cheese-weasel. "What are we going to do? We can't afford that!" She was arguing with a cheese vender in the market-place. The shortage of cheese was raising the prices even higher.
"Well, I'm sorry," the vender snapped back. The rising of prices was hurting his business. His customers were dropping like flies, and if he lost many more, he would soon be gone as well.
All of the Cheese-weasels were extremely upset. And rightly so, because over the past few years of the cheese famine the weasel population had dramatically decreased. Then finally one day...
"I deem it time we revolt!" shouted Cheddar, King of the Cheese-weasels. He was holding a rally at the ABC Cafe.
"You say you want a revolution?" asked Havarti, a wise elder Cheese-weasel. "Well ya know, we all want to change the world... but how do we?"
"He's right!" shouted 50% Reduced Fat Colby. "We don't have any power!" There were murmurs about the room, and soon every weasel in the Cafe was shouting.
"QUIET!" shouted Cheddar at the top of his cheesy little lungs. "We can do it, but we have to try!"
Suddenly, he and his assistant Provolone burst into song:
Do you hear the weasels sing?
Singing the song of moldy cheese?
It is the music of the weasels who will not beg or say 'Please,'
When the drooling of your tongue
echoes the growling of you belly,
there's a revolt about to start for cheese that's smelly!
And so, the revolution began. The Cheese-weasels took on the peaceful Kingdom's army. Soon the weasels were out of ammunition (ironically the King's Cheese-Heads, which they shot out of cannons,) and had few survivors. The weasels gave up the revolution, but devised a more destructive plan.
Meanwhile at the Sand-Castle-on-a-cloud, a baby was crying incessantly. Her father was cradling her in his arms, singing, and trying, unsuccessfully to put her to sleep. He had, however, put his wife to sleep, who had during the past few sleepless nights, appeared to be only half dead.
"Polly?" he complained with a whine, shaking his pleasantly sleeping wife. "Wake up, it's your turn."
Polly, unwillingly, got up. Paul handed her the crying child, who, as soon as her mother held her, stopped crying. "I hate you," complained Paul, half asleep.
"Oh, you don't mean that," she replied, smirking.
"Of course I don't," he comforted. "What I meant was that I REALLY hate you," he added, lying down to sleep.
Polly carefully set the baby down in her crib. "Alright Julia, you've had enough fun torturing your father, but now you need to get your beauty rest. We need to keep the good looks running in the family, now don't we?" she said softly. A few moments later, Julia was peacefully sleeping in the crib, and her mother had just begun to doze off in a chair, when suddenly the door burst open.
"Yes! Finally, after all these years! It's over! No more cheese!" George exclaimed as he ran into the room with Itsy. "No more trading, or inventing, or exploding cheese factories on Pluto, and no more bovine cattle!" he finished as the baby began to cry again. Paul groaned. He sounded like he was about to cry as well. "Oh, sorry," George apologized, empathetically.
"It's alright," Polly said picking up the baby, who once again instantly stopped crying in her mother's arms. "Lately Paul's been being more of a baby than Julia."
"I can see," commented George. Paul groaned again.
"At least I'm not naming all of my children after myself," he shot back, irritably. "Right, George?"
Itsy laughed. George glared at her.
"That was all Itsy!" the King shouted. "I had nothing to do with that -- except for George Jr. But let's not get into a discussion about that now. Let's celebrate! The Cheese-weasels have been defeated!"
Paul reluctantly got up and went downstairs with George and Itsy to celebrate the victory, while Polly stayed with Julia until she was asleep.
As soon as they made it downstairs, Itsy remarked, "What's that smell?"
"George!" accused Paul, but both George and Itsy hit him for the remark. "Ouch!" he whined, "Sure, so you can pick on me all the time, but if I say one word, I get beaten up. It's not fair!"
"Life's not fair," commented Itsy.
"Yeah, well wait 'till you're dead, it only gets worse," remarked Paul, bitterly.
Then Itsy and George's youngest son, Georgi, came running up to them. He stood there, trying to find the right words to say. He was only two or three.
"Smoke!" he finally made out, "Fire!" He pointed to the room next to them which was quickly being engulfed by flames.
"Ono!" Paul gasped, running upstairs to save Julia. He would save Polly, but we all know a little fire wouldn't bother her much, but Julia was in danger. Itsy also dashed upstairs to round up her other three children.
"We did it! We did it!" sang the remaining Cheese-weasels as they danced around. They were very happy, they had successfully started the Sand Castle on fire.
"Swiss!" exclaimed Provolone, "What's that puddle under you?"
Swiss looked down and shrieked, "You've got one too!"
"Ono!" Cheddar cried, "We're melting! What a world, what a world!"
Then Brie, a sort of smarmy, but trying to be shmarmy, weasel, saw his good friend Swiss begin to melt.
"Swiss!" he shouted, "Oh my God, what have I done, sweet Jesus, what have I done?!"
As he came towards her, Swiss sang:
Don't you melt, Monsieur Fromage,
and don't you worry please,
A little melted cheese will never make me sneeze.
You're here, and that is very swell.
But I think you should know
that you should really go,
and cheese will make your fridge smell...
The other weasels found this very touching, and also began to sing:
Melt with me to weasels past.
When were gone will we at last eat parmesan?
Here's to yummy cheese that went to our heads,
Here's to yummy cheese, and crackers in beds,
Here's to cheese, yellow, white, orange, or bleu...
That was the end of the Cheese-weasels and their sweet dreams of cheese.
The castle filled with dark clouds of smoke as Paul made his way down the hallway. He soon discovered that Polly and Julia were trapped by an avalanche of sand that had fallen from the ceiling. Paul and Polly began digging, trying to find each other and get their crying and coughing baby out. They couldn't find each other, but dug separate holes on opposite ends of the pile.
"Paul!" Polly yelled, sticking the baby out of her hole. He grabbed the baby as Polly shouted to him, "Go! Get her out! Don't worry about me, you know I'll be fine!" He gave her a worried and even kind of shmarmy look, then disappeared from her view.
"HELP!" a voice yelped from behind a door. "HELP ME!" Paul ran up to the door and turned the handle. It was locked. He stood back and kicked the door open. A tidal wave of smoke blinded him as he pulled a coughing Itsy and Julia out of the castle.
Outside, George and his children waited. As Paul came out with Itsy and Julia, George ran up and grabbed Itsy from him. Neither Itsy or Julia seemed to be alright. Polly stumbled out, looking a little charred, but otherwise fine.
"I stopped the fire from spreading!" she announced proudly, then fell over. "Look at the castle, it's not really sand anymore." Everyone looked up at it in awe. The Sand-Castle-on-a-cloud was now the Glass-Castle-on-a-cloud. "Isn't it beautiful?" said Polly with a sigh.
"Polly, dear?" Paul interrupted sadly. "I don't think the baby's alright." He handed her the silent child.
"What did you do to my baby?!" screamed Polly, "I told you to get her out!"
"She's just as much my baby as she is yours, Polly!" he snapped back, "And I had to save Itsy as well!"
"Oh," she mumbled, "Sorry. Thank you."
That night, they stayed at the abandoned ABC Cafe, which Polly and Paul remembered was the meeting place of their first adventure. But their shmarminess would have to wait; Itsy and Julia were sick, and Polly, Paul, and George were kept busy caring for them all night.
Julia cried (actually it sounded more like a hiccup because she was growing so weak.) "Paul, help me," Polly complained as she picked up the baby. "We need to get her to sleep. She's too weak." Paul left his game of 'Go Fish' against George to help her. When he got up, George peeked at Paul's cards and rearranged the deck.
"Well...?" said Paul.
"Well what?" asked Polly.
"What do we do?" he asked. Polly whispered something in his ear.
"Polly! This is hardly the time or place!" he said, looking disgusted at her. Polly smirked, then whispered in his ear again. He nodded, "Now that's much more appropriate." He counted off, "1...2...3..." and they sang:
There was a Sand Castle on a cloud but then some Cheese-weasels came from town. They lit a match and burnt it down. It's now the Glass Castle on a cloud...
By the end of the song Julia was asleep. Paul smiled, but then realized they'd lost her. "Ono!" cried Polly, tears streaming down her face. Paul tried to comfort her, but wasn't being very successful because he needed to be comforted as well. He decided that they could use some fresh air, so the two of them left George and Itsy alone.
"Take my hand," Itsy told George hoarsely. "The night grows ever colder..."
"Than I will keep you warm," he promised.
"For God's sake, please stay 'till I am sleeping... and tell the kids I love them...and I'll see you when I wake..." she said, growing weaker with each word. She fell asleep in George's loving arms, and then he realized that she wasn't ever going to wake up again. He could hear the door open as his eyes began to water.
"Oh, George!" cried Polly, "Not her too!"
He only nodded sadly and silently.
Paul sat down and shook his head. "Great," he thought. "First the baby, now the Queen. Who's next... me?" Then of course he thought, "Oh, yeah. I forgot with everyone DYING and all that!"
After that long, cold night, the Kingdom of the Sun was never quite the same. The Queen was sadly missed by all, but none nearly as much as George. Somehow, the King managed to keep the Kingdom in order and care for his children. Polly and Paul were also the victims of a deep depression, only being able to comfort the other with the promise that they'd never leave the other one's side. The Kingdom was never as interesting, colourful, magical, surprising, artistic, musical, beautiful, or wonderful as it once had been.
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