Mickey: We’re here today to investigate something we find suspicious – very, very suspicious. We came across a human folktale called “The Princess and the Pea.”
Cüinn: In the story, a princess in disguise is revealed when she is unable to sleep on a mattress that has a pea hidden beneath it. Her host goes so far as to give her ten mattresses, but she still can’t sleep.
Mickey: It’s really beyond me why they just didn’t remove the pea.
Cüinn: But the story doesn’t make sense in many ways. There’s no way a human would be able to detect a pea under ten mattresses. But a Cu’enashti would. So my theory is that the woman wasn’t really a princess – she was a Cu’enashti who hadn’t disclosed.
Cillian: Maybe it’s just a stupid story. Did you ever think of that?
Cüinn: But rather than just speculate, we can rely on science to test the theory. We’ll need to enlist the help of Ailann, the current emanation. Ailann, please go into the bedroom and create nine extra mattresses, and place a pea under the bottom one.
Ailann: What?
Cüinn: Just do it. It’s all in the interest of science.
Ailann: I hope this isn’t going to waste too much of my valuable time. Now what?
Cüinn: OK, get onto the top mattress.
Ailann: I can’t. The pile is almost to the ceiling, and it would be difficult to climb up there.
Mickey: Let’s try it with five mattresses.
Cüinn: You’re compromising the purity of the experiment.
Ailann: Five mattresses. Climbing on now.
Cüinn: Can you sense something strange?
Ailann: I’m atop five mattresses.
Cüinn: Can you sense the presence of a mysterious object?
Ailann: You mean the pea?
Cüinn: Ha! He knew there was a pea.
Ailann: I put it there two minutes ago.
Cüinn: Come to think of it, Ailann shouldn’t be the one doing the experiment anyway. He’s the Archon. We need a prince. Let’s recruit someone unsuspecting.
Mickey: We’ll get Valentin. His perceptions are particularly acute.
Valentin: Why am I emanated?
Cüinn: Do you sense anything strange?
Valentin: The bed has five mattresses?
Cüinn: Look for something more subtle.
Valentin: There’s a seed of Pisum sativum under the bottom mattress. I can smell it. It was probably grown in the Starfax Valley of the 4th continent of Skarsia, judging from the trace minerals.
Cüinn: Excellent, excellent. Now climb on the mattresses. Good. Now, can you sleep?
Valentin: No.
Cüinn: Ha!
Valentin: Cüinn, Cu’enashti emanations never sleep.
Mickey: Maybe the story is a cover-up. Maybe someone noticed that the princess in the story wasn’t sleeping, and to hide that she was Cu’enashti, she lied and made up the story about the pea.
Cüinn: But that’s not entirely true. Chase does sleep. We have to get Chase to emanate.
Chase: Huh?
Cüinn: Chase, get on top of the mattresses, and try to sleep.
Mickey: It’s dark all of a sudden.
Cillian: Chase has fallen asleep, you morons. Now we can’t see anything.
Tara: What the hell is going on here?
Chase: Huh?
Tara: What’s with all the mattresses?
Cüinn: Oh, this is a ripe opportunity! Chase, get Tara in bed.
Cillian: That’s about the best idea you’ve had in your entire existence.
Cüinn: No, wait, I mean try to see if she can sleep on top of the pea. She isn’t actually a princess, but she is Matriarch. So she can be our control group.
Lieutenant Graysal: Eminence, our security scans reported the presence of a strange object in your bed…wait, why are there five mattresses?
Tara: Don’t ask me. I just live here.
Graysal: Our scans of your bedroom have been doubly-cautious since the scandal with Prince Lucius. We’re detecting a hidden object of a size and shape that might indicate the presence of a microcamera.
Tara: The papis just keep getting bolder.
Graysal [removing object]: Peculiar. It’s rather large for a microcamera, and seems to be organic.
Tara: It’s a pea.
Graysal: It could be toxic.
Tara: It’s a pea, Graysal. Chase, is this some weird Cu’enashti sex kink?
Chase: Huh?
Graysal: I’m taking it to the SSOps lab for analysis. You can’t be too careful.
Mickey: So what, exactly, have we proved today?
Cüinn: The true scientist must be prepared to accept setbacks. Say, what is this other story about a frog prince?