"Coming through, peasants!" Aurora bellowed as she, Snow White, and Cinderella descended the staircase and sashayed down the corridor to their lockers.

The other students bowed and stepped aside as the trio passed.

"Ugh, can you believe the riffraff Principal King is allowing into Magic Kingdom High these days?" Aurora sneered. "So embarrassing."

All around them, the walls of MKH were covered in scrolls announcing the Halloween Ball.

Cinderella sighed wistfully. "I wish I could go to the Ball."

"Why can't you?" Aurora asked. She opened her locker, disinterested.

"I don't have a dress," Cinderella said. "My stepmother is being totally rigid about my allowance."

"Why don't you ask your godmother for a dress?" Snow White suggested. "I bet she can conjure up something for you!"

Cinderella's eyes lit up. "Ooooh, great idea, Snow! Do you have a dress for the Ball?"

"I have a dress, but not a date," Snow answered. "I can't choose between Hunter and Prince. Hunter absolutely saved my life in Anatomy - the week we had to dissect a heart, remember that? But Prince is just so...charming." She let out a happy sigh. "How about you, Aurora?"

"You know," Aurora said, smirking, "Killian Hook is looking pretty yummy to me."

"Hook?!" Cinderella exclaimed. "The Captain of the rowing team? He's a total bad boy!"

"Mmmhmm," Aurora purred. "Sometimes a little villainy can be fun."

"What about Phillip?" Snow cried, aghast. "You guys were really serious! You shared true love's kiss!"

"Well, that was before varsity jousting gave him his third concussion," Aurora snapped.

Cinderella's eyebrows knit together in confusion. "If Phillip's on the jousting team...why isn't he a knight?"

"Oh my god, Cinderella," Snow scolded. "You can't just go around asking people why they aren't knights." She turned back to Aurora. "Is Phillip okay?"

"Yeah, he's fine," Aurora said, inspecting her nail beds. "But he's basically the village idiot now. Hot, but stupid."

"That is so wretch," Snow sympathized.

"What is 'wretch'?" Aurora demanded.

"Short for 'wretched'," Snow explained nervously. "It's, like, slang. From Medieval times."

They heard a sudden commotion coming from inside the Home Ec room, and Jack B. Nimble burst out into the hallway. "Somebody get Nurse Maleficent! Emma Pauper touched the spindle of the spinning wheel! She's unconscious!"

"Didn't people learn anything from your ordeal last year?" Snow asked Aurora, shaking her head as a few students ran off to find the nurse.

"She probably touched it on purpose," Aurora scoffed in disgust. "Just another example of commoners trying to imitate royalty and failing miserably."

She closed her locker with a bang.

Nurse Maleficent came running down the stairs. Suddenly, she tripped, toppled, and rolled head over heels to the floor.

There was a collective gasp, and several students rushed to the fallen nurse.

"What just happened?" Aurora cried.

"What made her trip?!" Snow exclaimed.

They glanced around, frantic.

Their answer sat innocuously on the staircase, reflecting the fluorescent light above: a glass slipper.

"Oops," Cinderella cringed. "My bad."

~ * ~