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It all started when Capybara Scout Kronk was late to the Squirrel Scout awards ceremony.
He’d worked extra hard in the Squirrel Scouts for his troop to gain the right amount of badges to reach their grand prize: a meeting with the Emperor! His junior Chipmunk Scouts were super excited.
Only, Grandma Quack had needed help with her aquaduck on the way out of the village. A little girl couldn’t find her dolly. A squirrel had gotten bad nuts from a tree and needed consolation on a lost snack stash.
So he was running late to a ceremony at the palace and had no idea where to go.
Kronk slowed to a light jog in front of the large, imposing doors of the palace. The guards on either side stood as still as painted statues.
“My good man,” he went up to one, maintaining light footed cardio, “can you tell me point me at the ceremony hall?”
He got a dead fish eyed stare back but held cheerful eye contact until the man started to sweat.
“West side, take a left, then a right, then two lefts, down a flight of stairs, straight past the solar disk, and then fifth arch on the far right.”
Kronk grinned and gave him a squirrelly ‘thank you.’
“Do you think he got that?” muttered one guard to the other. His partner shrugged.
Kronk went towards the west side of the palace, took a left, then an immediate right, then two lefts, descended a steep staircase, admired a solid gold solar disk, and then entered the fifth arch on the closest right side.
He heard a cacophony of voices in the adjoining room, overpowered but a high pitched voice’s frustrated orders.
“Enough!” Men and women draped in purple uniforms cowered away from her, using writing tablets and abacuses as shields. “You!”
She pointed straight at Kronk in the archway.
He pointed to himself, ‘me?’
“Why are you running?!”
“To keep my heart rate up,” Kronk responded, jogging in place. “Cardio is important for a healthy lifestyle.”
“Ugh! Stop! You’re making me dizzy just looking at you.”
“Alright,” he said, slow to a halt like a spinning ride powering down for the night.
The woman went back to her attendants but had barely barked any orders before she was pointing threateningly at him again. “You! What are you doing now?”
Jump cut back to Kronk mid quad stretch. “Stretching after exercise--”
“Enough,” she interrupted with a frustrated sigh. “Get rid of this buffoon and bring in the next test-- I mean, applicant.
“Let us see if anyone competent has responded to my ‘ad’.”
Her ad, referencing the banners of her face, taller than buildings, she’d commissioned hang at key spots in the town square. Kronk had unknowingly run over one on the way there; someone had cut the hanging wires in protest of ‘not understanding modern art’. Therefore, her pool was even smaller than normal.
“Why did Fifo have to fall - I mean, retire to live with his pet mongoose in the country?”
She lamented as attendants swarmed around her like a kicked ant hive, falling with the grace of a villainess into the pillows of a chaise longue. “How hard is it to remember a simple drink order?”
“Your steamed yak’s milk tea with two sugars, a cinnamon stick, and ground cloves, ma’am!” Piped up a small voice of a scraggly young man with knocking knees, offering a steaming cup only vaguely shaped like the skull of her enemies if you squinted and ignored the purple glitter.
“No, you fool!” Liquid splashed on the floor as she shoved it away. “I want steamed goat’s with three sugars, whole cloves (halved), and ground cinnamon!”
In the background, Kronk was finishing his neck stretches by following their exchange and her ensuing throttling attempt.
Eventually, the attendant was dragged away and the spill was cleaned up, and she shouted, “Next!”
“A steamed goat’s milk tea with three sugars, halved whole cloves, and ground cinnamon on top,” Kronk stepped up and offered out of nowhere. He’d drawn a small squirrel on top in latte art style.
“Yes, thank you,” she took it absently, and sipped.
Only to spit-take it in his face a moment later.
“You!”
“Me?”
“Why are you still here?”
The big man titled his head to the side like a confused dog. “You asked for steam goat’s milk with three sugars, whole cloves (halved), and ground cinnamon instead of steamed yak’s milk with two sugars, a cinnamon wand, and ground cloves in your tea.”
“Yes, yes, you got it right,” she waved her hand dismissively. And paused, looking at him in a new light. “You got it right.”
“Yes, ma’am, your order was steamed goat’s milk with--”
She steepled her fingers together and grinned, rhythmically tapping each long incisor against its spindly counterpart.
“Fetch me a stone pillar.”
He came back with broken debris.
“A large fish.”
It smacked her in the face before flopping wetly at her feet.
“Fire from a mountain!”
Returned a cooking stove with burnt marshmallows on sticks that crumpled into dust and left their faces covered in ash.
“A llama.”
She was covered with a tapestry made of llama wool. “Ma’am!”
“It’s Yzma.” She corrected, grinning in a way she clearly thought was nonthreatening, even charming, but instead showed a shark’s rows of teeth.
“Anything else, Ms Yzma?” Kronk asked, surrounded by piles of fetch quest rewards.
“You’re hired.” Yzma told him, and instructed her other attendants, “Throw the rest out!”