Orcs are evil? Nah, they’re cattle-herding Texans!
Elves are aloof and British? Nah, they’re angry drunk Bostonians!
Let’s take stereotypes of fantasy races, shake them up, and see what stories we come up with for them!
During the last stream, a subscriber requested that we write stories by twisting the stereotypes of fantasy races.
Watch the edited recap here or scroll down for the stories.
The first twisted stereotype that chat voted on was angels not as benevolent beings, but angels as Karens.
Here’s what we came up with:
From the light of dawn, did an angel descend upon the town. Her glow as bright as sunlit clouds, her feathery wings pure snow white, her halo a dewdrop of the sun itself. She alighted upon the asphalt of the parking lot, whereupon flowers sprung from the caress of her blessed stride and flourished in her wake, as she drifted serenely toward the Starbucks entrance.
Three minutes before it was supposed to open.
Inside the cafe, the two employees gazed through the door at her with horror. They had been trained for this exact situation from their first day on the job. Dealing with angels was a necessary part of every retail worker’s onboarding process. Although Betty had hoped that she at least wouldn’t encounter one on her first day.
“You ready for this?” her supervisor Adam asked her.
Before Betty could even reply, the pounding started.
“Be not afraid!” the angel sang, pressing her face up against the glass and rapping her knuckles. “I know I’m early, but they’ve let me in at this time before!”
Adam nudged Betty. This was it. Just like the manual said.
“I’m sorry, your exalted holiness,” she said. “But we don’t open for two more minutes so—”
“How DARE you!” The angel’s voice resonated through the glass in perfect harmony with the pure parts of Betty’s soul. “The workings of heaven are mysterious and unfathomable, beyond the measurement of instruments of men – such as clocks and ‘smart telephones!’ I demand sanctuary inside this cafe immediately!”
“You can have all the sanctuary you want in two minutes,” Betty said. The angel threw her hands up to a choir of cherubs.
“Do not forget to show hospitality to strangers! For thereby some have entertained angels unawares!”
This time, Adam spoke up. “Ma’am, you’re here every day. We know you’re an angel. And we know you’re capable of waiting one more minute.”
The angel’s glow turned blinding. The cars and asphalt disappeared in a burning radiance of white, and the angel’s voice rang as if from every corner of the world.
“Are not all angels ministering spirits sent to serve those who will inherit salvation!”
Betty couldn’t handle this level of angel entitlement. She covered her eyes and turned away from the glory, while Adam did his best to stay strong.
“We don’t need salvation right now,” he said. “We need you to wait until—”
The clock struck opening time, and the state-mandated angel-warding sigils on the door deactivated. All of the light fizzled away, and the angel glided through, adjusting her blonde-hair bob so it hung perfectly to the side. Following her in was the usual morning crowd, all of them rolling their eyes and avoiding the trail of flowers she left behind.
Betty was relieved to have survived her first angel encounter, and was about to ask her what she wanted, when Adam interrupted.
“Sorry ma’am, but we have a mask-wearing mandate in this shop. You’re going to have to leave unless you mask up.”
The angel exploded into a ring of a thousand flaming eyes, with a bob cut dangling on top. All of the inside of Starbucks flashed a blinding white, and her rings played a cosmic melody as they tessellated at impossible speeds.“Angels fly because they carry no burdens!” its voice echoed from the space between atoms. “I will not be held tethered by a mortal face prison!”
Betty crouched behind Adam, who braced himself against the hurricane winds of triumph.
“I’m… sorry!” he yelled to be heard above her wrath. “But it’s… company policy!”
“Then I demand to see your manager!” the angel crooned in a tune so hauntingly beautiful Betty and Adam both couldn’t help but weep.
“I am… the manager!” Adam cried.
The angel expanded to fill everything. “Then I demand to see your manager’s manager!”
“Fine!” Adam yelled, his skin phasing in and out as the boundary between form and spirit lost coherence. “Executive manager, get down here!”
Suddenly, all was serene. The burning white oblivion was gone, and the angel was back to her winged-human shape, all of the other customers lying unconscious in the flowers around her feet.Standing behind the counter was the executive manager, God himself, glaring at her with his arms crossed over his chest hairs of pure gold.
“Kareniel,” God spoke disapprovingly. “What did you want to see me about?”
The angel was terrifying no more. Sheepishly, she adjusted her bob hair, stared at the ground, and spoke in a small voice.
“I’ll have one pumpkin spice latte extra foam, please.”
Next up was three twisted stereotypes in one:
- Elves as stoned hippies
- Vampires are moonshiners
- Ents (treefolk) are rednecks
Here’s what we came up with:
The elves made their pilgrimage toward Dankwoodstock, more stoned than rockslide. As they walked through the woods, passing around their herb pipes and spewing out white smoke, they laughed and grabbed each other’s pointy ears, talking about how excited they were to see their favorite psychedelic band Mushroom Kingdom.
Meanwhile, the vampires were also making their way to Dankwoodstock, their veins running with more moonshine than blood. Each of them were sinking their teeth into jugs of the stuff, made with ninety percent alcohol, nine percent blood, and one percent of what Vlad called “Devil’s Pubes.” Between sucks, they all talked about how excited they were to see their favorite bluegrass band The Flaming Coffins.
Both groups reached Dankwoodstock at the same time, but there was nothing there except trees and a rustled old Ford pickup truck. Enchanted by the substances of choice, the elves and the vampires blamed each other.
“You freaking leeches!” the elves said. “You totally sucked the blood from Mushroom Kingdom. Not cool, man!”
“Now wait just one gosh darn minute,” the vampires said. “We didn’t ain’t do none of that. Y’all forest ballerinas done stuck your pointy ears through The Flaming Coffins like wooden spikes!”
“We don’t like give a crap about your flaming urethra problem or whatever, man,” the elves said. “Just give us our music back.”
“Don’tcha worry yer l’il fairy heads ‘bout it,” the vampires said. “We’ll teach ya somethin’ good while wer all waitin’ usin’ one o’ deez newfangled earpods.”
One of the vampires pulled out a smartphone and started playing some Flaming Coffins. The sounds of jug-blowin’ and jug-smackin’ made the elves cover their ears.
“Dude!” the elves cried. “These tunes suck more than you do. Like, try listening to something actually inspirational. Here!”
One of the elves pulled out a smartphone and started playing some Mushroom Kingdom. The sounds of string twangs and metal clangs made the vampires howl in pain.
“That ain’t music,” the vampires said. “That’s just one o’ dem compooters bootin’ up and dyin’!”
“You’ve spent too long in your coffin, old man,” the elves said. “You just don’t get it. The bloodflow to your brain must’ve got cut off, or something.”
“At least we use insterments in our moosic!” the vampires said. “Y’all just poke a bunch ‘o tinkerbells and call it a day.”
The elves were fuming now. “You totally sucked the soul out of Dankwoodstock!”
The vampires bared their fangs. “Well y’all choir boys shoulda stayed in church instead o’ lickin’ toads n’ toes!”
The two sides were interrupted by a rattling between them. The rusted pickup truck shook and a massive tree trunk slowly emerged from the window, grinning at all of them with its gnarled bark teeth.
“Well look at all the people who came to see Dankwood Forest.”
The elves and vampires stared gaping at the creature before them. It was an Ent, a redwood redneck, and one by one more and more of its family tree started sitting up in the trunk.
“Lemme introduce you,” the Ent said, pointing a branch to the back. “There’s Willow on washboard, Hawthorn on harmonica, Twiggy on triangle, then me Birch on Banjo, and there’s Stumpy who just kinda claps along.”
The vampires spoke up first. “But y’all wasn’t here last year for Dankwoodstock. That’s when we done saw The Flaming Coffins.”
“Or like the year before either,” the elves added. “That’s when we saw Mushroom Kingdom.”
“Yeah,” Birch said. “We Ents, we’re kinda slow about things. Took us about three years to get here, by my calculation. Looks like you tykes managed to have some fun in the meantime, but now, let’s show you some real dank music!”
Slowly, Dankwood Forest struck up a tune, the perfect combination of twangy-metal psychedelic and blowin’ flowin’ bluegrass. Both the vampires and the elves sat together to listen, arm in arm, fang in fang, ears in ears. The vampires shared their moonshine with the elves, and the elves shared their herb pipes with the vampires.
“Y’know what?” the vampires said as the Ents were four hours into their first song. “Y’all pointy-ears ain’t so bad after all.”
“And neither are you, leech-teeth,” the elves said. “Hey, actually, I’ve got an idea. Bro, you should like, totally make some moonshine from my blood. I’m like, high as balls right now. It’d be totally banging!”
The vampires smiled excitedly. “I like yer thinkin’. How ‘bout we put some o’ Vlad’s Devil’s Pubes in one o’ yer pipes too and see wut dun happens?”
Be sure to check out the video for some dramatic readings!
If you want to join us and help write a story by trolling in chat, or share your own writing for feedback, then we’d love to have you join us on Twitch.
And you missed the stream, you can still watch them on the YouTube channel or watch the full stream reruns.
Hope to see you next time, friend!
Featured image: Unsplash