The Looking Glass Book Store

[Draconia St George]

Draconia was distracted from watching the SKRM tryouts when the door dinged and Wyvernia stepped through, bringing two guests with her. One was a tall, stately wizard wearing the most traditional of robes and flowing beards. The other was a yawning moth ghoul, with fuzzy green skin and long purple hair.

Draconia quickly closed the top of her laptop and stood up.

"Wyvvie! You're back early!" She smiled and greeted the guests. "Welcome to the Looking Glass!"

"I told you I'd bring my friend Luna by today, Drake, don't you remember?" Wyvernia reminded her. "Oh! In fact, Luna, this is my sister Draconia. Drake, this is Luna Duskwing. She's the one interested in the job."

"Yaaaaawn, nice to meet you." Luna replied, shaking Draconia's claw with one of her four hands. "Wow, look at all the books! I love this place!"

"And Drake, of course you remember Merlin." Wyvernia gave a nod towards the sage old wizard. Draconia smiled warmly at him. They'd meet months before at a dinner party between Draconia's family and Glen's family. Merlin was one of Glen's many distant uncles, since all witches and wizards considered each other family.

"Mister Merlin, it is frightfully nice to see you again." Draconia gave him a slight bow. It was an honour to have one of the most famous wizards in hiss-tory in their little shoppe. Merlin gave her a nod and pushed the glasses further up his nose.

"Yes, yes, very nice to see you again, eh...so where is this section to be sealed off? I'm in a bit of a hurry to get back to Avalon, you see."

"Right this way. Draconia, you will give Luna an interview, won't you?" Wyvernia led Merlin to the back of the shoppe. Draconia turned to Luna, only to discover that she was sleeping on the register countertop.

"Erm. *ahem*" She cleared her throat. Luna sat up with a start.

"Iwasnt'sleeping!" She looked left and right, and then sheepishly smiled at Draconia. "Sorry...I'm more of a night creature. But I'm working on adjusting my sleep schedule! I really must thank you for this opportunity. I love books!"

Draconia questioned Luna about her past job hiss-tory and qualifications. As they spoke, a bright, purple light flashed from the back of the store. Moments later, Merlin and Wyvernia stepped out, Merlin dusting off his hands.

"All finished!" He informed them cheerfully. "Do let Jabberwock know when he comes back that I'll open it back up any time he wants. Also, tell him that the invitation to join our Parcheesi tournament still stands."

"Of course, Merlin. Thanks again."

"I do hope you find that missing one, though. That could be a bit of a sticky wicket." Wyvernia raised an eyebrow and Draconia turned away from Luna.

"Missing wot?" Draconia asked, but it was too late. Merlin had dissolved into a trickle of sparkles that fell to the floor. Wyvernia sighed and reached for the broom.

"Don't take him too seriously, Drake." She spoke as she swept up the sparkles/. "Wizards just LOVE leaving cryptic messages behind when they leave a room."  

[Chase Q]

Draconia's iCoffin goes off buzzing with a hext message;

Quote:

"Yo, Draconia! You there!? The screen went blank! This race is almost over and Glen's is next! Oh and Manny got thrown across the rink and wiped out Gil!"

 

[Glen da West]

*screams!*

*cars honking!*

*tires screeching to a halt*

*car alarms going off!*

*car alarm set with a 'beep beep'!*

Glen hops out of his giant SUV and runs up, bright and eager, to the front door of the Looking Glass and ...

*rattatattatattatattatattarattatattatattatattatatta*  

[Draconia St George]

A fuzzy green moth girl eeked open the door and yawned in Glen's face.

"Sorry, the store doesn't open for another hour. If you're waiting for the new Twi-Hard book, 'Right Said Deadward,' the midnight madness party for it is at, you know...midnight."  

[Glen da West]

Glen stared openly at the moth ghoul, not knowing who she was or what she was doing inside of the store. he bit his bottom lip and said meekly.

"Um, I was actually here to pick up Drakie for school?"  

[Draconia St George]

"Who's 'Drakie?'" The moth girl yawned again. "Oh, you mean Draconia. She left about twenty minutes ago, I think....I dozed off."

Luna blinked at Glen a couple times, then shut the door. After a moment, the door opened again.

"I think she said something about 'avoiding traffic.'"  

[Glen da West]

"Oh...." Glen looked crestfallen at having missed the chance to give 'his Drakie' a ride to their first day of school. "Well fishsticks. Had I known that I woulda taken the skateboard."

Glen then hopped back down off the curb to head for his SUV, then paused and swerved back around and ran up to the door.

*rattatattatattatattatattarattatattatattatattatatta*

As soon as the door opened again...

"Thank you!"

And Glen turned and hurried to his UV, leaving behind a most bewildered moth ghoul.  

[Draconia St George]

"Hello?" Draconia walked in the front door of the Looking Glass, her book bag on one shoulder and a plastic bag with her slime-encrusted outfit on the other. "Luna?"

"Yaaaaaaaaaawn, oh, hey Draconia. Slow day at the book store today." The Moth Ghoul stretched and rubbed her eyes behind the register. Apparently, she was still adjusting to being awake during the day. "Good day at school?"

"Mostly." Draconia headed for the stairs that led to the upper flat. "Is Wyvernia home?"

"I haven't seen-" Before Luna could finish her reply, the door flew open again and Wyvernia St. George swept inside, talking on her iCoffin as per usual.

"It went FANGTASTIC, mum. I know it's late, but you MUST stay up and watch it. Gillary Clinton just opens up after the first couple of questions." Wyvernia looked up at Draconia, smiled and mouthed the words 'It's Mum' before going back to the phone. "I don't want to spoil anything, but BEAST. INTERVIEW. EVER!"

Wyvernia finished up the conversation with their mother and handed the phone to Draconia to talk for a bit. As Draconia described her first day of school to Mimzy St. George, Wyvernia put on a pot of tea.

"Luna, do you want to stay and watch the premiere of my show? It's political sci-tastic!"

"No, I want to catch a nap before going out tonight." Luna yawned and gave the two sisters a wave before heading out. "See you tomorrow!"

"Bye Luna! Bye mother!" Draconia split her attention to wave Luna Duskwing out the door and say goodbye to her mother on Wyvernia's iCoffin. She handed it back to Wyvernia just as she was handed a cup of tea. "Wyvvie, is it all right if Hellene comes by? She wants to pick your brain for some investigative journalism."

"Of course! She can learn most of what she needs from my show premiere tonight, of course. I really manage to get Gillary Clinton to open up and dish the dirt on the grimternational political scream."

"FangTAStic!" Draconia replied. "You see, there's this circus in town..."

"Cirque Sinistaire?" Wyvernia asked.

"You know about it?" Draconia was a little bit surprised. She hadn't even heard of a name being attached to the giant tent on the edge of town.

"Yes, they sent a press release to our network today. They actually want us to cover their grand opening. Sigh! Such small town stuff. We're going to be passing on that one for sure."

"But, I mean, it's rather strange-" Wyvernia cut Draconia off.

"Drake, believe me. I have wined and dined with some of the biggest celebrities and names on the political scene. To worry about some little podunk circus opening is frankly pretty beneath a true investigative reporter. There's just no news in a bunch of clowns jumping around."

"O-oh, I see..." Draconia floundered a bit. "It's just that, this one boo at school, he quit today and went off to join the circus, and that seemed a bit-"

"'Boy Doesn't Like Schoolwork, Wishes He Was A Beast Tamer Instead' isn't a headline, it's what every little boy in high school wishes." Wyvernia chuckled. "Tell you what. When Hellene comes by, how about I arrange for the two of you to come to my studio the next interview I tape? Then you can see how a REAL reporter works."

"I...suppose that would be nice." Draconia replied reluctantly. Wyvernia was probably right. This situation with Lin was not that big of a deal after all.  

[Falconnie Hawke]

Falconnie finished her schoolwork, but she always loved to end a day with a great book. She thought about it fir a minute- The Looking Glass. Despite the mean dragon that was there last time, she was really interested in a book and wanted to see if she could find it and check it out again.

**ding!**

The bell on the door rang as Falconnie opened the door. She shyly shuffled to he most favourite fiction section, sat on the floor, and began to read once more.  

[Draconia St George]

"Ten minutes!" Wyvernia called to her sister. "Is it all right if I lock up early? We can pop up some popscorn and watch my interview together on Uncle Wocky's big screen TV upstairs."

"I don't think there's anyone left in the store." Draconia replied, checking the groanmance aisles and magorezines. She spotted a pile of books in the dusty Sci-Fi section and resolved to straighten them up before school tomorrow. "I guess it would be all right to close a LITTLE early. Hellene can always ring me to let her in if she's still stopping by.

Sometimes Hellene got wrapped up in her photogre-phy and it could be into the late hours of the night that she was wrestling with developer and damp photographs in her darkroom.

"All right, then. I had a look at today's receipts, Luna actually had a pretty good first day on the job. It's nice to see people actually BUYING the books instead of sitting there reading them and putting them back. This isn't the libury, after all."

"Some people like to browse a book before buying." Draconia countered her sister's hardline stance. "You know the adage about judging books by their covers."

"Oh sure, that's all well and good, but it's still a business, and etiquette would state that if you're just sitting around reading the books like they belong to you, that's as good as stealing." Wyvernia put her hands on her hips. Draconia recognized when her sister was being hard-headed about something and gave in.

"I suppose."

"Sounds good, I'm locking the door, then." Wyvernia replied and pulled out one of Uncle Wocky's long, crooked keys. The door locked with a resounding 'click,' and Wyvernia joined Draconia in heading towards the long staircase up to the flat.

"Now, remember," Wyvernia told all of the books. "I don't want you all rearranging yourselves while we're asleep tonight. I'm talking to you, haunted section!" One of the bookcases trembled in response.

"I'm just kidding." She grinned at the bookcase. "Rearrange yourself all you want!"

Wyvernia turned off the light and bathed the bookstore in darkness as she and Draconia went upstairs. At the top of the stairs, Draconia closed the door to the apartments and locked it as well.  

[Falconnie Hawke]

Falconnie's eyes widened as she realized what had just happened, she was locked in the Looking Glass for a night! Should she be happy? Scared?
She decided to not finish the book we was reading to save some for later. She quickly took out her iCoffin to text her brother:

To: Dash
hey im locked in the looking glass and I do not know how 2 get out!!! Help me? sad  

[Draconia St George]

Faint glows began to light and extinguish randomly all over the book store. In the dead silence of night, something that sounded like the flapping of papery wings echoed out in the air, shattering the silence in a way more disturbing than a scream.

Beware....


Beware....


Bewaaaaaaarrreeee.....

Falconnie felt the sensation of something flapping right by her head.

She turns down our corners to mark the spot
Breaks our spines more often than not

She drinks and eats and stickies our cover
Tearing through one to get to another

Beware our wrath
Fear our rage
Put her on the shelf! Stick her in a cage!

Rip her pages and tear her binding
Pull out the threads, leave her pages unwinding!

The books will revolt before you can say boo
Falconnie Hawke, we're coming for YOU!

A bright flash of light filled the shelves, and books began leaping off, filling the air with the sounds of flapping paper!  

[Falconnie Hawke]

Falconnie started to hit her iCoffin. Her brother wasn't responding, and now books were talking to her! She ducked as a book flew right over her head!

She let out a huge, loud scream, and she darted upward to the ceiling. The books were starting to rise to the ceiling, where she was. She ended up letting out a huge yelp:

"DRACONIAAAAA!!!!!!!"  

[Draconia St George]

"Tattle-tale!"

"Stool-werepigeon!"

"You're no fun!"

All of the books dropped to the ground and became motionless as the light turned on and Draconia and Wyvernia walked down the stairs in their nighties.

"I'm telling you, Wyvernia, I heard a very undignified shriek-"

"Couldn't it have at LEAST waited for the commercial break? We're missing the beast part of the interview!"

Draconia looked down in the aisles and saw books all over the floor surrounding Falconnie.

"Falconnie Hawke? What are-"

"YOU!" Wyvernia pointed at the winged ghoul. "It's not bad enough you come in here during business hours and make a mess, now you're breaking in to do it at night! That's it, I'm calling the Scariff."

"Oh, don't do that, Wyvvie! Maybe she just...uh....was here to return a book?"

"THIS ISN'T A LIBURY!" Wyvernia threw up her arms incredulously.

"Er...you'd best go, Falconnie...." Draconia unlocked the door and shooshed Falconnie out of it. "And perhaps, avoid Wyvernia for a few days."

Once Falconnie was out the door, Draconia convinced Wyvernia to stop dialing 666 and to head back upstairs to finish watching the debut of her show. Down in the bookstore, several dozen books giggled lightly....

"Next time...."  

[Hellene Harpie]

[text] D - u MUST meet me B4 school 2day I will b at entrance 2 catacombs b4 class IT IS V IMPORTANT [/text]