Friday, April 11, 2008

Creating mythology, part two

Last time in the planned fic I once had, we learned that Bumble had a strict mom and made a childish wish to only do what she wanted when she became Queen, which she then lived up to, or something.

I've read a couple of fics where, after the events of The End of Flutter Valley, Bumble went back to her old ways. While I suppose it makes sense, in my version, she made good on her promise to be nice, mostly because Sting was there to hold her to it. Part of her reformation included revitalizing the dwindling Bee population (for reasons I still haven't fully decided, but mostly due to her selfishness, Bumble hadn't given birth for the entire time she had been queen). Now, part of my obsession back in the day involved looking up facts about actual Bees, a few of which I incorporated into my planned story (one cool thing is that bumblebees, unlike honeybees, are shortsighted and only make enough honey for a couple of days at a time), such as the fact that the queen can make as many workers as she wants all by herself, but to make princess bees, she needs a male. The secret story that if I ever wrote it would only be for me is that the male Bumble picked was not actually Sting, but Pointer ^_~. Speaking of Pointer, after TEoFV, he and Sting finally buried the hatchet, mostly because Pointer, having had a taste of being Bumble's right-hand bee, decided Sting was very welcome to it.
I only semi-sorta wanted to write up the various plot bunnies that watching the rest of the series gave me in relation to Bumbleland, but the only one I even really fleshed out was based on The Magic Coins. Since that episode involved a drought, and the sun apparently being hotter than it usually is, I figured that this would mean two things: one, Flutter Valley would actually wither away because of the sunstone, and two, Bumbleland would start to thaw out. Due to those circumstances, the Flutter Ponies would take up temporary residence in Bumbleland, which would probably wreak a little havoc on the lives of the Bees (I never really fleshed this part out in my mind), but Bumble, distracted by her imminent egg-laying, doesn't notice. She would notice Sting and Morning Glory being close, though, and get a little jealous ^_~ And Rosedust would act as midwife when the time actually came (just before the rain at the end of The Magic Coins, naturally).
I actually came up with quite a bit about the bees that hatch from that first laying, 13 eggs in all, including one princess. As par the course, the princess would be good-natured, if a bit impulsive, and she actually becomes the lynch pin in rebuilding the trade routes, plus forging some new ones, as the princess of the largest nearby kingdom becomes obsessed with her, and they become friends and write to each other a lot.
The other 12 bees are all named after wildflowers, Alyssum, Aster, Bramble, Chicory, Clover, Cypress, Flax, Lupine, Mallow, Sage, Vervain, and Yarrow. I wrote down basic personalities for them all, but they mainly serve as foils for the princess, whom they would be very close to, being born from the same batch of eggs and all. She likes to solve their problems, although the only arc I planned was for Alyssum and his ground fixation (they ended up sitting in trees a lot).
Once the princess grew up a little more, one of two things happened. Either Bumble retired and handed over ruling to the princess, or the princess, egged on by her peers, orchestrated a coup d'etat and overthrew her mother, although she did negotiate a corner of Flutter Valley for the "older bees." Either way, she became queen before her mother died, and Bumble became known as Queen Bumble the Reformed.
I really thought of all that to get to the next Princess, Bumble the Reformed's granddaughter, but more about her next time.

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