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The roof, the roof, the roof is on fire.354 words
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Boys and Girls of Ev-er-y Age

The house in front of the kids was relatively small, but none of them had ever seen something quite so imposing. There weren’t any fog machines visible, but the place was enshrouded in an eerie mist that seemed to tingle up their spine any time they started to move through it. There appeared to be small; almost child-sized handprints and drag mark - like streaks leading toward the road in what looked like a great hurry from the house made of some dark substance, long dry now. More worrying was that it looked like something had seized the poor soul by the legs and dragged them off the path and onto the lawn. From there, the drag marks transitioned into deep, desperate gouges that marked up the soft earth leading up to the full plot on the far left before the dark stain got much larger, and then disappeared altogether. There were four burial plots total - two covered in fresh earth, two empty. The dark mahogany, silk lined, very real looking coffins were lined up with the open and remaining holes and leaning against the house. One fully opened, the other closed. There was a simple sign that sat in front of them staked into the flower bed, it was marked in elegant script that read:

Open for tenure to those who would dare trespass.

If that all wasn’t enough, there was a faint melody playing that simultaneously filled all five of them with dread and beckoned them closer.

“I don’t know about this place Pip, it’s pretty creepy; I don’t think I want to know what they have for loot.” The small, red-haired girl's typical lisp was overshadowed by the stammer of fear. She was dressed in a dapper purple tux with a ruffled cream Ascot and brown top hat, and looked for all the world like she was ready to bolt at any moment.

“These ladies just moved in here about two years ago, last year their place was almost as creepy, but they give out full candy bars, full bags of chips, and cans of pop!” Defended Pip, dressed in his customary pirates’ outfit. This year he had a peg leg, eyepatch and appeared to have been promoted since last year from Captain up to Commodore. The hat had a very nice feather in it. “The coffins are new” His voice trailed down to a whimper.

“Are they nice?” Squeaked Sweetie. The petite singer had decided to go as Belle from Beauty and the Beast this year. Partially due to her older sister's unfortunate run in with a well to do young man who quote: "Held such promise, so unfortunate that he was such a fiend. Oh, why aren't there any real princes out there!" Rarity had then spent the next day and a half binge watching the various prince-themed Disney films and wailing into her ice-cream bucket. The fashionista then decided that her little sister deserved to be a princess, regardless of Sweetie's own wishes. She had wanted to be a lion.

“Not really. They’re kind of insane.”

“Who cares if they’re nice if they give out loot like that?! Come on ya ninnies; it’s just some silly decorations.” Scootaloo bellowed. The tough act fooled exactly no one, considering how badly she was shaking. The girl’s purple hair had been temporarily dyed green, and she was wearing a pair of white coveralls over a brown turtleneck sweater.

“Scoots is right, ah don’ wanna pass down loot like that jus’ because of a few decorations. For all we know, they jus’ really like Halloween!” Since Sweetie had wanted to go as the Beauty, she had bribed Apple Bloom into going as the Beast with promises of a quarter of her candy. Bloom’s pick. Visions of double full sized candy bars and pop made the normally level-headed girl think with her stomach. It was a rare occasion indeed where she didn’t get sweets with an apple attached to them.

Decision made, the group huddled together in close quarters and made their way up the short walkway. Steadfastly ignoring Sweetie Bell’s mutter of “For all we know, the reason they like Halloween so much is ‘cause people ignore the screams more.”

They noticed that as they got closer to the house, that eerie song got louder, and had double the effect. By the time that they reached the door, it took three tries for Pip to be able to knock loud enough to be heard. They all mewled out squeaky “Trick or Treat”s as the door slowly creaked open.

There was no one there, just an inky darkness, just as Pip was going to call out again, a husky voice started chanting. The white mist around them changed to a deadly, malicious green.

“Twist the bones and bend the back.”

Two voices joined in with a nonsense rhythm in counterpoint. “Itch-it-a-cop-it-a, Mel-a-ka-mys-tic-a.”

“Trim them of their baby fat,”

“Itch-it-a-cop-it-a, Mel-a-ka-mys-tic-a.”

Oh god, the lot of them realized, the other two voices weren’t in the house, they were outside. Right. Behind. Them!

“Give them fur, black as black.”

“Just” This voice, different from the first, lighter. The children realized with mounting dread it was the voice that sang the first tune that drew them closer.

“Like” A darker, more rough voice joined in with the first two. Promising malice.

“This” All three, in harmony, and ending in a hiss, before the biggest black cat that any of the intrepid candy hunters had ever seen leapt out of the darkness and hissed at them. His red eyes nearly glowing with malice. Those fangs looked very, very sharp.

The lot screamed, dropped their bags of candy and ran for their lives. Pushed to move faster by the insane cackling of the residents.

“Zim, you did that perfectly! Who’s my good demon kitty?” Sonata squealed, and swooped to pick up the now purring and thoroughly pleased with himself cat. Her long hair was, for once down and cascading around her shoulders in very loose curls, and she was dressed in a light pink, the low cut bodiced dress that got darker toward the skirt. “I love this holiday! So much candy.”

“The food we can get from all the fear isn’t half bad either.” Purred Adagio, her garnet coloured eyes shining with sadistic triumph as she came out of the darkness of the house. She absentmindedly reached out to give Zim a friendly scratch under the chin and around the ears with her long, sharp and well-manicured nails for his part in the play. The Siren leader was dressed in a form-fitting, high cut hunters’ green dress. Her great blonde mane had been wrangled into an upward curled bouffant by Aria, but a few errant strands fell around her neck and chest in defiant curls.

Aria sauntered out of her hiding place in one of the coffins with a grin; her lovely blood red dress was entirely overshadowed by the up-do that she somehow managed to wrangle her hair into- something reminiscent of a witches hat made of a rats' nest. “Maybe next year we should just go all out and make a real haunted house. I bet that way we could get a real meal out of the chumps in this world. I don’t know about you, but I don’t find these scraps filling at all.”

Adagio gave an oddly tender smile toward her sister. “Hm, maybe. This is, after all, our favourite night.”

Author's Note:

Happy Day of the Dead all. And Happy (late) Samhain and All Hallows Eve / Halloween.

(1)Willy Wonka seemed fitting for Twist.

Yes, the girls were indeed dressed as the Sanderson sisters from Hocus Pocus. It’s one of my all time favourite Halloween movies, I watched it every year with my sister growing up, and I watch it every year now as a form of solidarity. I thought it was fitting. Seriously, the personalities are very similar.

***EDIT*** I made the idiotic mistake of hitting publish before the read through. Sorry guys! Made a few changes.

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