Hansel: The Boy Who Won (Written by Mark Borne)

Author's Note: This is a highly whimsical retelling of the fairytale "Hansel and Gretel". Hope you enjoy its cringiness! 

“How are we going to survive?” Gretel whispered to her brother Hansel. While neither of them preferred to talk about it, their future wasn’t bright. Their parents pretended they didn’t even exist, and to top it off, food was becoming expensive…too expensive. Which begged the question, how long before the two twins starved?

                Hansel knew. Or, he had a hunch. A strong hunch, even, and his hunches were never wrong. He’d had a hunch that Jack was having fun, and when he looked out his window, he had seen a giant beanstalk that had ripped out of the ground and reached to the clouds. He’d had a hunch that his friend, Ella, had gotten lucky, and the next time he’d seen her, she was a princess. He’d also had a hunch that something really, really bad was going to happen to him and Gretel, and now they were in a tight spot. His next hunch was that he wouldn’t survive for longer than three days, which seemed odd since he knew many who went longer than a week without food. But a hunch was a hunch, and with Hansel, a hunch might as well be fate.

                So when his parents took him and his twin sister deep into the woods, he began squirming in his seat. They were dropped off without so much as a goodbye.

                “Let’s make our way back,” Gretel reluctantly suggested. “One of the other villagers might accept us. Maybe Adam?”

                “He’d point at us and shout wolf,” Hansel pointed out.

                “Right, right,” Gretel remembered. “How about Aurora?”

                Hansel thought for a moment. “I have a hunch she’s under a sleeping curse.”

                “What about Jack, then?” Gretel desperately suggested.

                “Probably fell down a hill, we wouldn’t want to bother him,” Hansel sighed. “But I’m sure there’s someone who would take us in. Let’s go.”

                The two walked solemnly back, but quickly encountered a house made out of…candy? It was like a large gingerbread house, with frosting and gumdrops. It looked like a dream come true and a worst nightmare at the same time, and Hansel’s hunch was strangely silent. In fact, he thought about Jack and Aurora and Ella and everyone he knew. All his hunches were gone. “Maybe we should leave,” Hansel suggested.

                “No, this is our only shot at survival,” Gretel told him. “It’s a long way to the village. Soon, it’ll be dark, and the wolves will come out, and not Adam’s kind. The real kind.”

                Hansel shuddered and followed Gretel to the door, where the girl promptly knocked. The lady who answered was obviously old, and dressed in a dark outfit. She had strangely large hands, her face seemed extraordinarily long, and overall, she just seemed big. She definitely wasn’t your traditional grandma. “My, my, come in, come in!” she politely invited in a strange voice. It sounded like a dying beaver. The twins thanked her as they entered, and promptly Gretel was tied in rope. Hansel jumped out of the way and avoided the old woman. She took off what appeared to be a mask, which revealed a wolf’s face. “Come on, kid, I lost Little Red Riding Hood, so I’m kinda desperate, here! Help an old wolf out, will ya?”

                Hansel darted around the wolf and fled, abandoning his sister and trying to escape everything he knew. Then, it hit him: a hunch. A hunch to stop and wait. He obeyed, and felt his old self returning.

                “Your sister is held hostage by a wizard-wolf,” a voice told Hansel. He turned and saw a strange ghost. It looked like an old man dressed in strange robes. “I’m an expert on killing villains, trust me. I killed this red-and-black dude named Maul. Can you believe it? Anyways, I can help you out of this mess!”

                “Who are you? Hansel wondered.

                “Obi-Wan Kenobi,” the man told him. “Listen, when you go back, sneak through the back door. There’ll be a thing there called the Elder Wand. Use it to defeat the wolf, but be warned, you’ll have to give something up. It’ll become clear when you get ready to cast the spell; just be ready to choose. And remember, may the odds be ever in your favor!”

                Hansel obeyed the old man and found the wand. He proceeded into the living room, where the wolf was getting ready to put Gretel into a stew. The wolf dropped Gretel on the ground and exclaimed, “Put that thing down, and let’s settle this some other way! A dance-off, maybe? Maybe compete to see who can say, ‘I am Groot’ the most?”

                Hansel prepared to cast the spell and realized what that Kenobi guy meant. He couldn’t simply defeat the wolf, because that would make him a dark wizard. But also, that was the only way to free Gretel. Then an idea occurred to him; he cast a spell, banishing the wolf to a place Hansel’s hunch told him was called Cloud Cuckoo Land. Then, he cast a protection spell on Gretel so she wouldn’t be killed by any wildlife or by starvation. Immediately afterwards, he cast a spell to destroy all magic in the nearby area. That included the house, as well as Hansel.

                Hansel knew Gretel would be crushed by his sacrifice, however he also knew that in order to save those you love, it’s well worth it. However, he didn’t vanish like he should have.

                “Your forehead!” Gretel exclaimed. “It’s got a lightning-bolt shaped scar, now!”

                It’s especially worth it if you survive the sacrifice, Hansel also realized.