The Catacombs

[Ronan Aalto]

Atomica Servo

Ronan consulted his map, squinting in the gloom to make it out with only the feeble light of his phone.

"this way?"

Atomica huffed and yanked a burning torch from one of the walls, thrusting it into the Selkie's hand.

"Didn't even bring a torch" she huffed more to herself than anything.

Ronan opted to tune out her complaining, but he mumbled a faint, but no less grumpy "thank you".

Grasping his new light source in one hand, the highly flammable paper map in the other, he headed off down a dank tunnel.  

[Atomica Servo]

As for Atomica, her eyes turned a bright neon green as she switched to viewing things outside of the normal light spectrum. In this view, Ronan turned into a ghostly infrared figure with a slightly glowing outline. The torch he was holding burned bright white.

On the ground, small Things skittered about, running away from the light of Ronan's torch. Eyes blinked as curious Other Things peered from corners and crevices, looking at the strange interlopers in their domain.

"Look, I found a key on the ground!" Atomica bent over and shooed a large spider off of the half-buried key, pulling it up. "That probably counts as something uhh-mazing enough to write our report on, right?"

"The map says down here that the ground is littered with mysterious keys here." Ronan replied, holding the torch closer to the paper to read the scrawlings. "But none found so far fit any of the doors found. That doesn't sound like much of a discovery."

"Hmph." Atomica took the key, which had a very pretty, ornate handle shaped like a teacup, and put it in her skirt pocket. If nothing else, it would make a nice vintage souvenir for Gryff. "Well, what about these ghastly carvings on the walls? We could write our paper about them."

Atomica's eyes flashed as she took several digital pictures of the carvings and stored them on her hard drive for later. The flashing spooked some of the critters, and a creepy skittering sound could be heard. Ronan cringed.

"Great. Now every time I have an itch I'm going to think there's a bug crawling on me." Ronan complained as he reached up and scratched his nose. "I don't think wall carvings are interesting enough to count for the assignment either. We're barely even IN the catacombs yet."

"Well at least I'm TRYING to find something GOSH." Atomica replied, flouncing a bit and causing more skittering sounds.

"The map says there is an abandoned Mad Science lab about half a metre down this corridor." Ronan pointed the torch one way. "And there's a blocked-off passage down this way."

He pointed his torch in the other direction.

"An undead end?" Atomica asked.

"Don't know. The map says there's a sign there telling monsters to stay out."

"I-I think we should go look at the Mad Science Lab." Atomica's voice modulator skipped a little bit. "I'm s-sure there are plenty of interesting report-worthy things there."

Instead of moving, though, Ronan held his torch closer to the map. He wanted to be very, very sure of a direction before he made a move...And it probably didn't hurt that the longer he took, the more it bothered Atomica.  

[Glen da West]

"Hey how far down do you think that goes?"

Glen mused as the two witch cousins peered over the side of a creaking, rickety bridge crafted of worn away, chipped stone (and no handles or sides to hold onto!), and clear down into a dark abyss that the lights from Glen's wand and Rory's candle could not begin to pierce. Dorothy, perched still on Rory's head for comfort, dropped a pebble over the side and they listened and heard as it 'pinged' against the cavernous nothing below and simply faded away to nothingness.

"I betcha it's bottomless, huh Rory?" Glen asked. "Rory?" Glen blinked and looked at his favorite cuz who was frozen in place, teeth grinding and arms straight. It was almost as if he were afraid of something. But what was to be afraid of? Okay admittedly the two boos didn't even realize they were on a bridge, or could have walked off the side without noticing, until Rory had glanced 'down' and made quite the squeak of surprise.

Glen stood up and cupped his rigid cousin by the arm and helped him across the rest of the bridge as bits of stone on the underside chipped and fell away and they reached the other side and stalked through an arched doorway to find...

"Wooooooow!" Glen gushed as the two boos found themselves at the center of a very large, circular style room with sealed doors all around the area, like a clock.

"What is this place?" Rory asked, stepping up to one of the doors and leaned in, ready to press an ear against the old wood when something on the other side banged against it and a wailing moan came from behind! Rory jumped back several steps and bumped into Glen, grabbing onto his arm and almost dropping his candle.

"Search me." Glen answered, holding his wand up and closer to each door in turn. "But it looks like nobluddy's been down here for centuries. Maybe even longer! Hey I betcha there has to be something cool for our project behind one of these doors!"

"What!?" Rory blinked and stared wide eyed at his care-free cousin. "Glen, I don't know if we should open any of these doors. There might be something dangerous behind..."

"Hey check this one out!" Glen called and Rory sighed. When there was something interesting about, nothing seemed to deter Glen. It would be almost admirable if it weren't so dangerous.

Rory walked over to join his cousin at his side and held up his candle and peered at the ancient sign on the door, "Maximum Security Deadtention?" Rory read. "Do they put STUDENTS down here!?"

"Not in a few millennia I'd imagine, judging by the look of the door." Glen said as he inspected the door and the lock. "Sorta like when they finally released Johnny Spirit. Oo! Oo! I wonder what kinda cool monsters got held in here!?"

"Glen..."

"Whelp! Only one way to find out!"

And before Rory knew what Glen was doing, or could move to intercept him from doing so, Glen pointed his wand at the door and with a twirl of the hand, the lock glowed green and promptly fell to the floor with a loud clatter. Rory froze, and a smiling Glen moved to grab for the door to open it -- when it blew off of it's hinges and a storm cloud of monsters charged out, making Glen spin like a top and Rory ran for cover behind a pillar!

Glen stopped spinning, and as soon as his eyes did the same, he stared at the retreating forms!

"Wow! A Nachzehrer! Oo! A Black Annis! Hey wow, a Shrtriga! A Dybbuk! Hey! HEY! Rory! A Strigoi! After it! Those haven't been seen in ages!"  

[Rorrim Rory Bludworth]

"Glen?"

"Yes, Rory?"

"Did a one-eyed, one-horned, flying-purple-people-eater just fly past us?"

"I think so!"

"Glen?"

"Yes, Rory?"

"Don't you suppose that setting free a bunch of monsters - especially ones who have things like 'people eater' in their names - from Maximum Security Deadtention might possibly be-"

"Don't say it!"

"I'm going to say it."

"But I don't want you to say it!"

"Too bad, I'm saying it! It's DANGEROUS, Glen!"

Glen sighed. For once, his cousin was undeniably in the right. Oz only knew what those boos and ghouls had done to deserve Maximum Security Deadtention-ing! Whatever it was, it was definitely not just skipping class.

"Well...what should we do?" Glen asked. He had ideas, but he wanted to hear what Rory thought.

And Rory had a lot of thoughts. Even though Glen had never seen a Shrtriga, there were Shtriga out there somewhere in the universe, and they had peered into mirrors. That meant that knowledge of them was available to Rory - and knowledge was where his source of magical power was.

Rory didn't have the mastery of witchy spells and energy manipulation Glen had - he was trying to learn from his cousin, but he didn't have Glen's innate, inborn talent. Rory's talent was in predictions, prophecies and revealing hidden truths. It was his mother's power that fueled every magic mirror in all of the mirrored realms, after all. No witch or sorcerer or evil queen that spoke to a magic mirror would have any help at all without the magic that Mary and Rory wielded.

"Each of these former students was bound here by some misdeed they committed." Rory replied, his eyes beginning to glow with magical foretelling as he tapped into his power's ability to divine the truth. "They were not to be released until they had finished their deadtention, and then they would be released back into the student body."

"So....early parole, then?" Glen replied, a bit meekly. Rory's eyes glowed a little more intensely. "Maybe they're ready to be free, like Johnny Spirit."

"With darkened souls and unconquered fears,
They will bring Monster High down around our ears."

"Oh. You're rhyming...that's not good..."

"Revenge is on the minds of the pack
First against Rotter, and then Mr. Hack!"

"This is a prophecy, isn't it. That's not fair! You didn't even give me any fair warning by hiccuping first like you normally do!"

"If the bodies returned, they can be reformed,
In three centuries time, so I'm informed."

"Rhyming 'reformed' with 'informed' isn't very good poetic form, Rory."

"Each student a challenge we shall have to weather
And only can accomplish by working together."

With that, Rory's eyes faded and he blinked a couple times at Glen. Glen grinned at him.

"You just prophesied victory for us, cousin o'mine!"

"I did?" Rory asked. He never remembered his prophecies.

"Yup! Well...sort of. You didn't really give any specifics other than that we had to 'work together' to get all the students we just released back into the Deadtention room."

"Oh."

"And if we didn't they'd destroy Monster High and get revenge on Mr. Hack and Mr. Rotter."

"WHAT?!"

"Don't worry, Rory! We got this!" Glen patted Rory reassuringly on the shoulder. "All we need to do is find the six escaped monsters, solve whatever challenge they have, and then we'll have saved the school AND our teachers! That's SURE to get us an A on this assignment, right?!"

Rory sighed and his shoulders slumped.

"Right..."  

[Perry Hartley]

Motthew Clendenin

Perry moved quickly, dodging spiked rocks and ducking outcrops as he sped onward.

"This way, almost there!" he called back to Motthew as a huge rumbling SNOOOOOORRRRR echoed around the chasm and sudden hot updraft caught them both.

As they both regained their balance, Perry grinned.

"What was that?" Motthew asked, glancing down into the dank gloom curiously.

"No idea, happens sometimes. Whatever's down there, it snores." Perry shrugged, beat his wings and dove off once more, shouting back "Don't worry about it! come on!"

Motthew frowned a little but followed.

"Wait, whatever's down there... wouldn't that count as something amazing for our project?" He asked as he caught up with the Peryton.

Perry snorted. "Hey man, you wanna go poke mysterious sleeping leviathans be my guest, i'll stay up here and not get eaten. Come on, there's an opening ahead, it leads to this whole labyrinth of tunnels. There's gotta be something cool hidden in there."  

[Motthew Clendenin]

Motthew just shrugged a shoulder as they headed for the opening. The beast below was interesting... but not at the risk of being eaten. He shook the thought away as they both landed in the opening. Ahead of them was a fork in the path, two tunnels that led down dark paths.

"Which way now?" Motthew asked his partner.

"Lets go this way," Perry said, starting down the right path.

Motthew looked around them before following. There wasn't much of note in the rocks, other than hanging stalactites. He just tilted his head, would they be able to find their way back out of the labyrinth? Even if there was some sort of clawesome treasure, how would they know how to get out again?

"Come on, don't fall behind!" Perry called.

Motthew blinked, "No chance I'll get lost alone down here!" he said, hurrying to catch up with him.  

[Glen da West]

Perry Hartley

Motthew Clendenin

Suddenly a group of VERY dangerous looking monster students blew right past Perry and Motthew, racing for the entrance to the Catacombs and thus, the school!

And right before the two boos could right themselves, Glen and Rory, both on Glen's flying skateboard, blew past them as well...

And zipped right back to the two boos, Rory shaking and holding onto Glen's shirt for dear unlife (even though Glen's skateboard had a binding spell on it so nobluddy riding it could fall off) and wincing as Dorothy had a life grip on his blood red locks. Glen? Oh he had a smile on his face.

"Sorry guys! Can't chat! Pre-apocalyptic situation! Nobluddy's fault! None at all! We got this!"

"Glen? We need to go!" Rory shook his shirt sleeve.

"Right! Good luck on your projects!" And Glen did a U-turn on his boogie board and sped away, then sped back to the boos, "Bye!" And sped off again.

The door to the catacombs was wide open, telling them that the freed monsters were each somewhere within the school halls! It was just lucky that the school day had ended and most students were elsewhere, but the teachers?

"Oh no! Do you think they left the school!?" Rory asked in fear. If they had, how would they find them?

"No!" Glen shook his head as he spotted a familiar face and knew he could count on her to lend a hand. "Your prophecy said they were out for revenge on the teachers and the school so they're somewhere in here! Hi Cleo!"

Glen zipped up to one of his beasties, Cleo de Nile, who was checking her makeup in her compact mirror with her boofriend Deuce at her side. But before Cleo knew it, Glen snatched it out of her hands. "Can I borrow this!?"

"Hey!" Cleo wailed. "Glen da West! You bring that back this..."

Glen zipped back around to her and said, "You and Deuce might want to get out of the school." There was a sudden crash from the depths of the dark coffin corridor and a scream. "Yeaahhh.... now would be good!"

Glen and Rory then took off into the murky shadows of the hall and Glen shoved the compact mirror into his cousin's hands.

"Quick! Can you find them!?"  

[Rorrim Rory Bludworth]

Rory glanced down at the mirror, and then turned to Glen.

"Glen, if you had been stuck in deadtention for 200 years, where is the VERY FIRST place you'd go?"

Glen thought for a moment....and then suddenly understood.

"Quick! TO THE BAT-ROOM, RORY!"

The two boos took off down the coffin corridor. They waved at Kai Merha and Arillena as they dashed by.

"Heyguyscan'tstayandtalkgottachasedownourCatacombsprojectKseeyabye!" Glen puffed breathlessly to them.


Near the Creepateria, the doors of the little boos and little ghouls rooms were still swinging. Rory turned solemnly to Glen.

"If anymonster asks, this is the ONLY situation I would ever...EVER go into the ghoul's bat-room for."

"Understood." Glen nodded, dead serious. Rory handed him Cleo's pocket mirror.

"You know what to do with this."

"Right!" With a 'pop!' Glen's skateboard appeared, and he hopped on. "See you back in the Catacombs!"

Glen looked in the pocket mirror, seeing Rory behind him, but when he turned around, Rory wasn't there. That meant he'd teleported to the other side of the mirror, his home realm of Mirrorverse.

As for Glen, he zipped back through the coffin corridor, passing Kai and Arillena again.

"Glen...everything okay, brutha?" Kai shouted at the disappearing green boo.

"Sure! Or at least it will be sooooooooooooooon!" Glen disappeared down the hallway and back through the entryway to the catacombs.

Kai raised an eyebrow at Ari.

Meanwhile, in the ghoul's bat-room....there were three sinister students washing their hands, each chattering wickedly about the revenge they were planning on Mr. Rotter and Mr. Hackington.

"Pssst."

The Black Annis, Shrtriga and the Strigoi looked up from their wet hands.

"Who daressss?"

"There's no one here."

"You would think that after all this time they'd have fixed that hiss in the plumbing here."

"At leassst they have INDOOR plumbing now!"

Out of the corner of her eye, the Black Annis thought she saw something move behind her in the mirror's reflection. She spun around.

"What was that?!"

"You're acting crazy! There's nothing there! Now, let's get back to talking about our-AUGH!"

When the Strigoi turned back to the mirror, Rory Bludworth smiled at her. His hands reached out of the mirror, and within an instant, all three of the deadtention students vanished into their own reflections.


Down in the catacombs, the mirror Glen was carrying suddenly sparked to life in his hands! Screeching to a stop, Glen held it up, and it spewed out the three deadtention ghouls.

"Oops! Too fast, Rory, I'm not back in the Deadtention room yet!"

"SSSCATTER!" The Shrtriga shouted, and all three ghouls took off down three separate caverns...

Kai Merha

Arillena

 

[Glen da West]

Glen looked wildly from left to right and down the center at the retreating form of the three dangerous students who he had (accidentally!) freed! Now he and Rory found the responsibility thrust their way via a 'Mirror prophecy' to retrieve the escapees, or face the consequences of not only the fate of Mister Rotter and Professor Hack, but the very doom of their beloved school!

Glen contemplated on what best course of action to take when Dorothy screeched and tugged at his hair, making him wince and stumble aside and just narrowly missing a magical zap that sailed right past him!

"Aw fishsticks!" Glen moaned. "I forgot Shrtrigas were witches!"

Glen's skateboard levitated up once again, the decision having been made for him! The witch obviously had to be the first to get returned to the Maximum Security Deadtention Hall! He couldn't accomplish it alone, but he could kep her busy until Rory arrived -- but first...!

Glen soared not towards the three tunnels that the three ghouls had taken off in, but rather the direction of the Deadtention Hall itself! With Dorothy holding onto his collar for dear unlife, Glen arrived in no time at all and opened the compact mirror once again. Luckily, this belonged to Cleo De Nile, and thus, it had more than one mirror installed, the better to see herself from all angles while applying her makeup!

Glen popped out one of those small, oval shaped mirrors and set it in the middle of the Deadtention room's cavernous floor so Rory could port the three remaining boos directly into the room. Glen then did a U-Turn and took off out of the room and looked into the remaining compact mirror,

"Rory! Emergency! S.O.S.! The three ghouls split up and one of them's a witch! I'm going after her! I have one of Cleo's mirror's in the Deadtention room and one on me so you can join me!"  

[Ronan Aalto]

"Right..." Ronan began at last, pointing with his torch forward. "Mad science lab is this way then." He looked back at Atomica who seemed reluctant to move.

"Stop being ridiculous, it's perfectly safe down here. The school wouldn't send students down here if it wasn't..." He didn't get a chance to finish as a rather angry looking and completely unfamiliar monster barged past and continued running.

"Uh..." Ronan began.

Atomica looked more uncertain that ever. "There's still these rocks..." She held one up hopefully.

Ronan rolled his eyes. "Come on!" He headed off the way the other monster had come.  

[Perry Hartley]

Perry moved quickly, ducking outcrops and dodging stalactites... or were they stalagmites? He'd never paid much attention in geography.

"Not far now!"

A bright purple monster streaked past them, barging past Perry and sending him tumbling to one side before he could right himself.

He frowned, adjusting his glasses. "Hey! What's your problem man!" He yelled after the retreating figure but it was already disappearing into the dank gloom.

"You alright?" Motthew asked, finally catching up with the Peryton.

Perry shrugged. "yeah. Maybe the beast'll eat him huh?" He grinned a wicked fangy grin. "But.. didn't he barge past us already?... " He shook his head. Wierd. Maybe it was a different purple people eater.

"Just up here."

They both fluttered onto an outcrop of rock, where a ragged gash in the wall gave way to a winding labyrinth.

"keep up ok?" Perry ducked and disappeared into the darkness.  

[Motthew Clendenin]

Motthew blinked as the other boos zipped in and out quicker than he could really process what happened. Shaking it off, he just followed after Perry as they both fluttered down into the dark of the labyrinth.

Motthew looked around as they stood at an intersection, "Whoa, killer." He grinned, "You weren't kidding. Just look at this place!"

Perry just laughed, "Of course! Now come on."

Motthew grabbed his shoulder before he walked too far ahead, "Whoa, wait! How are we supposed to go through it without getting lost down here?" he asked, "Anything could happen in this labyrinth."  

[Perry Hartley]

"Where's your sense of adventure man?" Perry raised his camera and snapped a few more moody pictures of twisting tunnels. "You could try breadcrumbs" He laughed and moved off down one tunnel, glancing back. "we're not gonna get lost! I have an impeccable sense of direction!"

Famous last words.

fifteen minutes later the two of them were standing in a cavern that looked just like every other cavern and Perry was frowning deeply.

"Yeah.. I think it's safe to say.. we're lost." He admitted casually.

Motthew didn't looked impressed. "So much for that Impeccable sense of direction then."

Perry shrugged. "Maybe we should have used breadcrumbs... "  

[Motthew Clendenin]

Motthew sighed, shaking his head. He looked around them again, hoping to find another clue to how to get back out. The walls were the same on all sides, no sign or indication or direction. Folding his arms, he stepped back.

"Maybe... we could backtrack our steps?" Motthew suggested to Perry. Perry gave a weird look of uncertainty, but Motthew just shrugged, "Hey, its better than just standing here in the middle of a cavern waiting to un-die."

Perry sighed, "Whatever."

Motthew shook his head, "Hey, I'm not the one who got us lost."