We'll Tell Happy Stories

By Francis Bass

Boa and Ardom are two refugees posing as ambassadors. With the help of a local captain, they and their daughter have survived for years pretending that their home country, Choroa, is still perfectly stable. When a royal edict orders that all Choroans must leave the country or face enslavement, Boa and Ardom must reveal harsh truths and spin fanciful stories in order to convince their hosts that they should be allowed to stay.

Running time is 70 minutes.

Cast is 3M, 2F.

This publication also includes an afterword by the author, describing how his university classes influenced this work, the origins of some of the character's names, and other trivia about the process of writing the play.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Francis Bass
• Release date: Aug 12, 2016
• ISBN: 9781370067817

Francis Bass

Francis Bass is a writer of science fiction and fantasy. His work has appeared in RECKONING, ELECTRIC LITERATURE, and others. He lives in Philadelphia.

Book preview

We’ll Tell Happy Stories

Copyright © 2016 by Francis Bass

All rights reserved.

This play is copyright protected. All rights, including rights to performance of any kind, are strictly reserved, unless written permission is granted by the author. For inquiries concerning performance rights, contact Francis Bass at [e-mail].

Title and byline font Lusitana by Ana Paula Megda

Subtitle font Flanker Griffo by Flanker

Distributed by Smashwords.

Table of Contents

Characters and Setting

Scene One

Scene Two

Afterword

Characters

BOA

Female, 31. Darker skinned.

MASO ARDOM

Male, 38. Darker skinned.

IMA

Female, 10. Darker skinned. The child of BOA and ARDOM.

DARRAK RO KACHOD

Male, 40. Lighter skinned.

TEDAR RO CHAKRUR

Male, 9. Lighter skinned.

Setting

A secondary world. The capital city of the Kurrod Kingdom, a large medieval state, technologically equivalent to fifteenth century Europe. The climate is temperate.

SCENE ONE

Set: The Choroan embassy to the kingdom of Kurrod. The building was previously a mess hall for soldiers. It is composed of wood and cobblestone. At stage right is a large wood door that leads outside, which is offstage right. There is a window that also looks outside at right. At left is a separate room with a door between it and the main hall, a library. The library holds two chairs and some shelves filled with scrolls and bound books. Additionally, the shelves hold Choroan artifacts, including a box of silver daggers, an array of pots painted with a few repeated, bright colors, and a very old, worn, stone figurine. There are more shelves in the main room, which contain more pots and more scrolls, as well as loose pieces of parchment. A map hung on the wall depicts Choroa, an empire composed of a large central island and a few smaller ones to the south. At center is a table with a rough wool cloth laid over it, though not covering all of it. Five chairs are pulled up to the table. At right is a writing desk and chair, with a few quills and a stack of parchment on the desk. A door upstage leads to the private quarters of BOA, ARDOM, and IMA. Big tallow candles light the rooms.

At rise: MASO ARDOM sits at the desk, a leaf of parchment and inkwell before him, a quill in hand. BOA stands behind him. They wear heavy coats over looser, lighter clothing. It is late winter, and the embassy hall is drafty.

BOA

But then—

ARDOM scribbles this down.

A great, powerful storm took the longboat, and rocked it from side to side …

She pauses to allow ARDOM to get this all.

and the whole boat flipped upside down … and all the rowers, the warriors, and the drummers perished.

ARDOM

As he gets this.

All of them?

BOA

All but the Fifth Founder, the Man with Wings of Silver.

ARDOM

Of course.

BOA

He escaped, flying up into the clouds … but the winds were worse there. He was blown east, west, south, north, and spun around a thousand thousand times … before his wings were too tired, and he fell back to the ocean. When the storm finally cleared … he found just one piece of the ship remained. He clung to the piece, and waited for the currents, the currents that rush forever to Amo, to take him home.

ARDOM

As he writes.

Is that true? All currents go to Amo?

BOA

Yes, why wouldn’t it be?

ARDOM

Because this is a founder story.

BOA

You don’t believe in founder stories?

ARDOM

I just think they’re exaggerated in places.

He finishes writing and looks to BOA.

BOA

So, the Fifth Founder, the Man with Wings of—

ARDOM

Can I just write the fifth founder? Or he?

BOA

I’m telling the story the way the storytellers do. They always call him that.

ARDOM

The way they did.

BOA

What?

Pause.

This is the way the storytellers back home tell the story. We can’t just ignore that because your hand is tired.

ARDOM

Laughing.

Carry on then.

BOA

The Fifth Founder, the Man with Wings of Silver—

ARDOM

Simultaneously with BOA.

The Man with Wings of Silver!

BOA

He had been thrown so far from the islands of Choroa, that it took generations for him to drift back—A thousand generations, say that.

ARDOM

As he writes this.

It took a thousand generations for him to drift back.

BOA

And in all that time, he forgot who he was, and where he had come from … and he began to believe that he was king of his driftwood … and that this was the only nation he had ever known … Finally, when he arrived on the shores of Choroa … and he could see the towering mountain of Amo’s eye … he … shit.

ARDOM

Huh?