"The first story begins," Narrator said, "about five years before Empath smurfed home for good, when the likes of Gargamel and Hogatha started appearing in our forest. We had first encountered Hogatha when she had smurfed out into the forest on a rainy night wearing her great-grandmother Dogatha's magical locket, which somehow smurfed into the hands of Smurfette when she smurfed into the forest to find flowers for Greedy when he was sick. The locket somehow started to grant Smurfette her wishes without her knowing it at first, but when she realized that those wishes were smurfing true, she smurfed the locket away, only for it to smurf into the hands of the evil wizard Gargamel. Hogatha smurfed all over the forest to find the locket again and smurfed it back from Gargamel when he used it to capture all the Smurfs, but when the witch tried to force Smurfette to be her slave, we smurfed the magic locket away from Hogatha and smurfed it into the fire, which caused the evil witch to vanish...if only for a little while."
As Narrator went on with his story, Polaris saw in his mind the dark castle that Hogatha lived in, and inside the short dumpy old witch working in her laboratory, mixing up a concoction in her cauldron. Her pet vulture Harold watched silently as his mistress continued her work.
"Nobody outwits Hogatha the witch and gets away with it, and that includes those horrid little Smurfs," she ranted. "They made a fool of me. They destroyed my magic locket. They even robbed me of one of my nine lives. But luckily, I have eight more in which to get my revenge. And when I'm finished with them, they're going to wish they haven't crossed my path like that idiot Gargamel." She laughed and snorted at the thought of what she would do to them. "Now where was I? Oh yes...a blast of bat breath." She grabbed the bat that was hanging on a nearby rafter and forced it to cough a few breaths into the mixture. Then she took a bottle and added a few drops from it. "A dash of toad spit, and voila!" She scooped up some of the mixture onto a spoon and smelled it before the spoon disintegrated in her hand. "It's ready!"
Harold took a whiff of the mixture and found it smelling so foul that he ended up flying through a window to get away from its odor.
Hogatha filled a test tube full of the mixture. "Here's to the Smurfs, and their downfall," she said, raising the tube high before drinking its contents. She let out a burp when she was finished, but then she found herself falling to the floor and convulsing, gasping for air, as the mixture was magically transforming her from within. Suddenly, with a flash, Hogatha's original form was transformed into that of a male Smurf.
Hogatha looked at her hands and felt her face. "I...I...I did it! I'm a Smurf!" She leaped for joy and went over to the mirror to examine her appearance. "Oh, it's a perfect transformation," she said at first, until she looked at her behind and noticed something was missing. "...except that I haven't got a tail. Drat, I must have missed something when I put together the formula." She realized after thinking that there was nothing she could do magically to fix the error. "I guess I'll just have to make myself a tail." She headed over to the table while still looking at her behind, only to bump into one of its legs, causing her to look up and see how tall the table was now compared to her current appearance. "Oh my, oh...this isn't going to be easy."
She used all her strength to climb up the leg of the table until she reached the top, then pulled herself up onto it, taking some time to catch her breath afterward when she was safe. She looked around on the table for something she could use for a tail and noticed a dirty plate with a few peas still left in it next to a plate of bread. "This pea should do for starters," she said as she picked one from the plate. "I'll just add a splash of color."
She saw a jar of blue paint nearby and grabbed the paintbrush that was in it to dab color on the pea until it was the same shade of blue as her skin. "There. Now a spot of glue and..." She picked up the pea and went over to a jar of glue, dipping her finger and coating one end of the pea with glue before sticking it onto her behind. "...and presto! At last, I'm perfect."
After briefly shaking her behind to make sure her fake tail wouldn't fall off, Hogatha left her castle and headed out into the forest, which seemed to be much bigger than she was now in her current appearance.
"Now all I have to do is find one Smurf that will take me into the village...but where will I find one?" she asked herself, stopping to ponder her dilemma before the solution came to her. "Of course, a sarsaparilla field. It's a disgustingly sweet-smelling place, and it's sure to attract disgustingly sweet Smurfs."
She rubbed her hands in delight, laughing and snorting in anticipation of catching a Smurf.
"It smurfed her all night to find a sarsaparilla field that had a Smurf in it, mind you, but eventually she smurfed one in which our fellow Smurf Vanity was enjoying some quiet solace with himself, smurfing at his reflection in the water's surface, and that's where she decided to make herself known," Narrator said as he continued his story.
Then Polaris saw in his mind the location which Narrator spoke of, where Vanity was indeed enjoying some time with himself, looking at his reflection in the water's surface as he laid next to a pond. "Ahhhh...a smurf of beauty is a joy forever," Vanity mused while looking at himself. "If only I could smurf here forever and gaze at Mother Nature's work of smurfection."
Hogatha peered around a tree and saw just the Smurf she was looking for. Oh, brother, she said to herself before she stepped out from behind the tree to make herself known. "Hello, fellow Smurf," she introduced herself.
"Oh, hi there, fellow Smurf," Vanity greeted back. "Come to enjoy some time by yourself out here in the forest?"
"Why, yes, my fellow Smurf," Hogatha answered, trying to act natural.
"Well, come, have a sarsaparilla leaf while you're here," Vanity invited, handing her one of the leaves that was next to him while he took one for himself.
"Oh, sure, why not?" Hogatha said as she took a leaf and bit into it. The taste of the sarsaparilla leaf in her mouth was rather nauseating, to say the least. "Ugh, this is terrible...I mean, terribly good, that is." She tried to eat the rest of the leaf to keep Vanity from suspecting anything of her, but it was hard to mask how it tasted in her mouth. Vanity didn't seem to notice, though.
"Say, didn't you love smurfing with Papa Smurf at the smurf yestersmurf?" Vanity asked.
"What?" Hogatha asked, sounding rather confused before she realized not to give herself away. "Oh, uh, yes, of course I did." What in the world is he talking about? she asked herself quietly.
"Well, we'd better smurf back to the village," Vanity said as he got up from where he was sitting and started walking away. "It's smurfing late and Papa Smurf might be worried about us."
"The village?" Hogatha said as she followed right behind Vanity. Oh, now we're getting somewhere, she quietly said to herself, laughing and snorting.
"Soon, Vanity had reached the village, not knowing who else he brought in with him along the way, and at that moment Papa Smurf had the Smurfs gathered together for a celebration dance that he was smurfing as its conductor while a few Smurfs provided the music," Narrator continued.
And as Polaris saw in his mind, Papa Smurf was standing on top of a small mushroom with most of the other Smurfs arranged in rows in front of him in the center of the village.
"Places, everybody, places," Papa Smurf said. "Make sure you follow the routine exactly as I have smurfed you. Is that understood?"
"Yes, Papa Smurf," the Smurfs said together, eager to get started.
"Oh, don't you just love dancing like this with your fellow Smurfs?" Smurfette asked as she stood next to Tapper and Duncan McSmurf.
"Aye, but I do prefer dancing solo even more, or rather with a partner, now that you're here among us as a Smurf," Tapper answered.
"Showing an interest in the lassie, aren't you, Tapper, my boy?" Duncan jested with a suggestive snicker.
"I'm only interested in her as a friend, my good Duncan, but I can only hope that it may someday become more than just a friendship," Tapper said.
"I don't know why Smurfette wants to hang around either of you all the time," Hefty said.
"Feeling jealous that she prefers the company of a Smurfsman, laddie?" Duncan asked.
"Smurfette is free to be with whoever she wants, my friends," Tapper said. "I will not be disappointed if she chooses to associate herself with any other Smurf in the village besides me."
Vanity and Hogatha arrived just in time before the dance would start. "Oh boy, it's time to celebrate the Smurfs' smurf," Vanity said as he joined the other Smurfs in formation.
And it's time for me to celebrate my revenge, Hogatha said to herself as she started to head off in another direction, away from the gathered Smurfs.
"You there! Smurf!" Papa Smurf said as he noticed Hogatha sneaking away. "Where are you going?"
Hogatha stopped in her tracks as she realized Papa Smurf noticed her right away. "Oh, uh, I was just, uh...," she started to say.
"Get back in line...the celebration is about to start," Papa Smurf commanded.
"Uh, yes, Papa Smurf," Hogatha said as she joined the other Smurfs in formation.
"All right, Smurfs, hit it," Papa Smurf said to Fiddler, Twanger, and Piper, who provided the music for the Smurfs to dance to. And as the three Smurfs played their music, the Smurfs in formation moved in time with the music, dancing and leaping and whirling in coordination with each other. Everyone, that is, except for Hogatha, who tried to follow along with everyone else, but ended up being a few steps behind. Her dancing eventually caused the other Smurfs in formation to stumble into each other until no one but Hogatha herself was dancing, snorting as she continued her act.
Papa Smurf was displeased with what he saw going on with the Smurfs dancing with each other. "HOLD IT!" he shouted, causing Fiddler, Twanger, and Piper to stop playing while he got off the mushroom to address the Smurf causing the disruption. "You were snorting instead of smurfing, little Smurf, and causing the others to smurf out of step with each other."
"Oh, uh, was I?" Hogatha replied, snorting as she laughed, causing the other Smurfs to laugh with her.
Papa Smurf didn't seem amused by her reaction. "You'd better go elsewhere, Snorty Smurf, until you learn to stop causing trouble," he scolded.
Hogatha realized it was her cue to depart from the other Smurfs, and so started to walk away. Stop causing trouble? But I've only just begun, she said quietly to herself, snorting and laughing as she walked away.
Tapper and Duncan watched as Hogatha walked away from the group. "Now where do you suppose that Smurf had smurfed from, laddie?" Duncan asked.
"I have not the smurfest idea, my fellow Duncan," Tapper responded. "I haven't heard any Smurf talk like that before anywhere in the village."
"Neither have I, and yet there's something very familiar about him...if I only knew where I last smurfed him," Duncan said as he continued to look on.
"We'll find out eventually, but something in my spirit smurfs me that something terrible is going to happen to us in the village," Tapper said.
"And you think that Smurf is going to smurf the cause of it, laddie?" Duncan asked.
"That's something I'm going to have to smurf to the Almighty about, Duncan," Tapper said. "For now, we should just treat him like any other Smurf until we know for sure."
"Oooh, doesn't that Smurf look handsome?" Smurfette said, looking at the Smurf named Snorty with such desire in her heart. "I wonder where he came from, and why I've never seen him smurfing around in the village."
"Probably because you're too busy with the other Smurfs to even notice him, Smurfette," Brainy said. "Come to smurf of it, there are Smurfs that I just don't smurf into on a daily basis that make me wonder..."
"So Smurfette's attracted to another Smurf in the village...so what?" Hefty said. "It isn't like any of them can really compare themselves to me."
"Or even to me, for that matter," Brainy said. "I mean, is that Smurf even as smart as me, or as well studied as me? Is there more to that Smurf than just what Smurfette sees on the outside?"
"Well, I'm sure that she'll smurf around and notice who the truly handsome Smurf is in the village after she's smurfed her share of that Snorty Smurf," Vanity said as he admired himself in his mirror.