Writing Resources from Fifteen Minutes of Fiction

The New King

The king looked down upon his kingdom with worry in his heart. His land was in disarray and his people were in dire of help. He slammed his hand down on the sill and with a look of resolve stormed out to summon his advisors.

Once assembled he began an oracle,
"I would not treat this meeting lightly if I were you. Hear me now, if you don't come up with some answers heads will roll."
He could see the fear in their eyes and thought 'this is good now maybe I will get some results.' The king instructed his council they had twenty-four hours to come up with a plan to bring his kingdom back into prosperity.

The next day he lined up the nervous underlings and one by one demanded to know what plan they had devised. The first being Secretary of Health, said they should give the people free health care and once they were all healthy they would be able to work harder thus increasing productivity there-by adding to the wealth of the kingdom. The King said the plan had merit and that the Secretary should put his plan into action at once. The second was Secretary of Industry; his idea was to offer large rewards for trading in old worn out wagons for newly made wagons. The Secretary's thinking behind this was, the wagon industry was stagnant in the land and when they weren't producing, wagons not only were their employees not working all of the industry that made parts for the wagons were idle also. The King said it was a good idea and sent him on his way to get his plan on its way. The Secretary of Banking said the kingdom should assume all of the bad loans the banks had made thus freeing up capitol to make new loans to industry.

And so it went Secretary after Secretary each had a stimulus program designed to help turn the kingdom around to prosperity. However, the last to speak was the Secretary of Finance,
"Your Majesty I beg to disagree with my learned colleagues, our coffers are bare now. Just where will we get the money to pay for all of these plans? We need to move more prudently or surely we will bankrupt the kingdom."
The King held up his hand to silence his Secretary,
"You are but an old fool whose time has come and gone. If we need more money to finance these wise programs we will simply print more, it is just that easy. Guards take this man to the dungeon where he will remain until we lop off his head."

At first, the plans did just as they were designed and all were happy in the kingdom. Alas, the problem started when other kingdoms would not recognize the kingdom's currency because of how much it had devalued. In the end, the kingdom was in worse condition than before all the stimulus packages were put into place. The King realized that the Secretary of Finance had been the only advisor that had given him prudent advice. He called for his guards to bring the Secretary of Finance to him at once, but it was too late for he had been beheaded that very morning.

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