Wizard Fumblethorp adjusted his crooked pointed hat for the fifteenth time that morning and squinted at the scrying crystal that absolutely refused to show him anything useful. Instead of revealing the location of the dreaded Dark Lord Maleficus, it kept displaying what appeared to be someone’s breakfast—a rather nice omelet, actually.

“Perhaps if you tried not holding it upside down?” suggested Elara, his long-suffering apprentice, who despite being twenty years younger possessed roughly thirty times more magical competence.

“Nonsense!” Fumblethorp declared, flipping the crystal right-side up, which immediately caused it to show someone’s feet. “I graduated from the Prestigious Academy of—”

“You attended for three weeks before they politely asked you to leave after you turned the headmaster’s beard into a family of particularly aggressive squirrels,” Elara reminded him, gently taking the crystal and muttering the proper incantation. The surface cleared, revealing a dark, imposing tower wreathed in ominous storm clouds.

“Ah yes, well, that’s exactly what I was trying to do,” Fumblethorp said, stroking his own beard nervously—a habit he’d developed after the Squirrel Incident. “Now then, we must make haste to stop Maleficus before he… er… what was he trying to do again?”

“Summon the Dread Kraken of Infinite Tentacles to destroy the kingdom,” Elara sighed, shouldering her sensibly packed traveling bag while watching Fumblethorp stuff random items into his: a rubber chicken (for emergency situations), seventeen different colored socks (none matching), and what appeared to be a wheel of cheese.

“Right! Can’t have infinite tentacles running about. Terrible for property values.”

---

Meanwhile, in his Tower of Malevolent Brooding, Dark Lord Maleficus was having his own difficulties. He stood before an elaborate ritual circle carved into the floor, surrounded by flickering black candles and arcane symbols that he was fairly certain he’d copied correctly from “Demonology for Dummies.”

“Master,” wheezed his faithful minion, Grobnik, a creature of indeterminate species who looked like someone had tried to draw a goblin from memory after being spun around blindfolded. “Are you absolutely sure about the tentacle thing? Because last time you tried to summon something aquatic, we ended up with that very polite goldfish who kept apologizing for existing.”

“Silence, you doubting fool!” Maleficus snapped, his black cloak catching on the edge of a candle and briefly setting him alight. He patted out the flames with dignity. “I have studied the ancient texts! I have prepared for months! I have—” He paused, squinting at his notes. “Wait, is this symbol supposed to look like a chicken or a duck?”

“I believe it’s meant to be a kraken, my lord.”

“Yes, but does a kraken look more chicken-y or duck-y? It’s important for the resonance.”

Before Grobnik could answer this profound theological question, the tower door exploded inward with a tremendous crash. Through the smoking rubble stepped Wizard Fumblethorp, his robes singed and his hat now completely backwards.

“Halt, evildoer!” he proclaimed dramatically, then immediately tripped over his own staff and tumbled into the ritual circle, accidentally kicking over three candles and smudging several crucial symbols.

“No, no, NO!” shrieked Maleficus. “Do you have any idea how long it took me to draw those? The circle must be perfect!”

“Oh, terribly sorry,” Fumblethorp said, scrambling to his feet and trying to helpfully straighten the symbols, somehow making them worse. “I don’t suppose you could wait a moment while I deliver my heroic speech? I practiced it all the way here.”

Elara appeared in the doorway, assessed the situation with the weary expression of someone who had long ago given up on anything going according to plan, and began quietly preparing a defensive spell.

“You’ve ruined everything!” Maleficus wailed, frantically trying to repair his summoning circle while Fumblethorp continued to “help” by adding what he thought were improvements.

“Is this bit supposed to be so… wiggly?” Fumblethorp asked, poking at a symbol with his staff. A small puff of purple smoke emerged.

“Don’t touch that! It’s the binding rune for—”

Too late. The smoke expanded rapidly, filling the room with the scent of brimstone and what might have been vanilla cupcakes. The ritual circle began to glow with an eerie light that pulsed in a rhythm that sounded suspiciously like a polka.

“What have you done?” Maleficus demanded.

“I was trying to stop you from summoning the Dread Kraken!” Fumblethorp protested.

“But I wasn’t summoning the Dread Kraken anymore! Thanks to your meddling, I’m now summoning…” Maleficus consulted his ruined notes with growing horror. “Oh dear.”

The air above the circle began to tear like fabric, revealing something that was decidedly not a kraken. What emerged was approximately the size of a large elephant, covered in what appeared to be rainbow-colored fur, and possessed of roughly forty-seven eyes, all of which blinked in sequence.

“Hello!” it said in a voice like a brass band falling down stairs. “I am the Moderately Annoying Beast of Somewhat Bothersome Inconvenience! I have come to… to…” It paused, looking around the room with several of its eyes while others examined its own furry appendages. “Actually, I’m not entirely sure why I’m here. This is awkward.”

“You see?” Maleficus turned accusingly to Fumblethorp. “This is what happens when you interfere with delicate magical workings! Now instead of a world-ending monstrosity, I have… whatever this is!”

“I prefer ‘Kevin,'” the beast said helpfully. “And I believe I’m supposed to cause mild disruptions and occasionally rearrange people’s sock drawers. It’s not much, but it’s honest work.”

Fumblethorp brightened considerably. “Well, that doesn’t sound so bad! Kevin seems quite reasonable.”

“Reasonable?” Maleficus’s voice cracked. “I’ve spent months preparing to terrorize the kingdom! Years planning my rise to power! And now I’m stuck with a creature that organizes hosiery!”

“If it helps,” Kevin offered, “I could reorganize them incorrectly? Make all the socks slightly damp? I have some flexibility in my contract.”

Elara, who had been watching this exchange with the fascination of someone observing a particularly elaborate disaster, stepped forward. “Excuse me, but might I suggest—”

“No!” both Fumblethorp and Maleficus shouted simultaneously.

“The wizard and I are handling this!” Maleficus declared.

“Yes, we’re… wait, we are?” Fumblethorp looked confused.

“Of course we are! This is our problem to solve! You may be incompetent, but you’re MY incompetent nemesis!”

“That’s… actually rather touching,” Fumblethorp said, wiping away a tear. “You’re my incompetent nemesis too!”

Kevin began to hum tunelessly while examining the various dark artifacts scattered around the tower, occasionally moving them slightly to the left for no apparent reason.

“Right then,” Maleficus said, rolling up his sleeves with newfound determination. “How do we get rid of Kevin and summon something properly menacing?”

“Oh, I know this one!” Fumblethorp exclaimed, pulling out a scroll that immediately began to unroll across the floor like an eager carpet. “We need a banishment spell! I’ve got one right here that I’ve never tried before.”

“Absolutely not,” Elara said firmly. “The last time you attempted a banishment, you accidentally sent Mrs. Pemberton’s cat to the Ethereal Plane for three weeks.”

“It came back, didn’t it?” Fumblethorp protested. “Eventually.”

“It came back speaking ancient Draconic and with an attitude problem.”

“Those might have been pre-existing conditions.”

While they argued, Kevin had wandered over to examine the dark lord’s bookshelf and was helpfully rearranging the volumes by color rather than subject matter. Several ancient tomes of forbidden knowledge now sat next to “Cooking With Sulfur: A Beginner’s Guide.”

“Stop that!” Maleficus shrieked, rushing over to restore order to his library. In his haste, he knocked over a small table covered in delicate glass vials filled with various sinister substances.

“Oh, I’ll get that!” Fumblethorp declared, lunging forward with his staff to catch the falling containers. His staff sparked with uncontrolled magic, and the vials froze in midair, glowing with an ominous purple light.

“Don’t—” Elara began.

Too late. Fumblethorp attempted to gently lower the floating vials, but his magic hiccupped, sending them spinning in a tight formation around Kevin, who watched with several of his many eyes while continuing to hum.

“Fascinating,” Kevin observed as the vials orbited him. “This tickles.”

The magical energy from the vials began to resonate with Kevin’s own otherworldly essence. The beast started to glow, and his humming became more musical, almost melodic.

“Oh no,” Maleficus whispered. “Those vials contained concentrated essence of banishment. If they react with Kevin’s extra-dimensional nature…”

The humming grew louder, more harmonious. Kevin began to fade around the edges, becoming translucent.

“I say,” Kevin called out cheerfully as he grew more transparent, “I believe I’m being sent home! How wonderfully efficient! Thank you both for the lovely visit!”

With a final, musical note that sounded remarkably like a choir of angels sneezing, Kevin vanished completely, taking the spinning vials with him.

The tower fell silent except for the gentle crackling of a few remaining candles and what sounded like Grobnik weeping quietly in a corner.

“Well,” Fumblethorp said eventually, leaning heavily on his staff. “That went better than expected.”

“Better than—” Maleficus stared at him. “You do realize we just accidentally solved the problem we accidentally created with our combined incompetence?”

“Yes, quite efficiently too,” Fumblethorp agreed. “We make a good team.”

Maleficus considered this for a moment. “We really do, don’t we? Perhaps we should join forces more often.”

“Excellent idea! We could be like… like…”

“Partners in bumbling?”

“Perfect!”

Elara cleared her throat diplomatically. “While I hate to interrupt this touching moment of mutual incompetence appreciation, might I point out that Maleficus is still technically a dark lord trying to conquer the kingdom?”

Both men looked at her blankly.

“Oh, right,” Maleficus said. “I suppose I should continue being evil and plotting your doom, shouldn’t I?”

“Well, yes, that would be traditional,” Fumblethorp agreed. “But perhaps we could schedule it? I’m free next Thursday.”

“Thursday works for me. Shall we say two o’clock? That gives me time to redraw the ritual circle properly.”

“Wonderful! I’ll bring tea.”

And so it was that the kingdom was saved by the combined incompetence of its most inept wizard and most bumbling dark lord, who accidentally discovered that friendship and proper scheduling could solve even the most otherworldly of problems. Kevin, meanwhile, returned to his home dimension where he was promptly promoted for completing his assignment with unprecedented efficiency, though he was never quite sure how he’d managed it.

Elara made a note to take a very long vacation.

---

The End