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"Yeah, she was my friend, we used to have playdates at her playground. But then her mother and my mother had a falling out over my falling down, and I haven't seen her since. It was so long ago it was practically 'once upon a time,' you know?" Rory carefully took the feather and put it back in its place. At the very least, Marceline being interested in They Definitely Are Giants put him at some ease. They had something in common!

"Oh! There's one last place I can show you. There's some really neat stuff in the wreck room." Rory opened the door and ushered Marceline out into the hallway. They walked past a mirror that showed them Heath Burns checking out his hair in the mirror of his locker. "Looks like the dance is going to start soon. Hopefully, mother will be back pretty quick so we can eat."

At the end of the hallway, Rory opened another door.

"This is the wreck room. Or, as I used to call it, the mirror hospital!" Inside were dozens of mirrors, leaning against walls, sitting on benches and tables. Some were smashed. Others were black, like a turned-off TV. And still others sparked and shot out tiny quibbles of energy randomly. "This is where mother engages in her hobby of mirror repair. She fixes broken and defective magic mirrors. And other things."

Rory rubbed his arm unconsciously.

"Some of the mirrors are smashed or messed up by the person on the other side. Sometimes, mother can repair them back to almost as good as new." Rory showed Marceline some fused pieces in a frame. It was like assembling a shiny, reflective puzzle. "And some of them are just defective. These black ones I think just stopped working. Either that or they're facing a really boring wall. And those-"

Rory pointed at the sparking ones.

"Well, I'm pretty sure one of those belongs to Glen on the other side. I'm not sure what sort of Mad Science he tried on it, but..." A tiny mushroom cloud-shaped explosion erupted from the surface. "Yeah, mother's trying to fix that."

Rory led Marceline over to a corner where an oval-shaped mirror sat on an artist's easel. The mirror was shattered, and pieces of it were missing. The empty hole in the middle formed the shape of an angular, jagged heart. The frame was beautiful and ornate, but tarnished and old.

"Can you guess what this is?" Rory asked, sort of expectantly.

Rory looked a little crestfallen.

"This....uh, this is the mirror that, uh...I mean...it's..." He stuttered, finding himself at a loss for words. "This is my heart."

Rory put a hand over the right side of his chest.

"He's showing you the mirrorverse equivalent of baby pictures." Marceline nearly jumped out of (what was left of) her skin as Mary herself appeared suddenly in the room behind the two of them. "This mirror belonged to his father, and the shards of it form his heart."

"Yeah!" Rory agreed, relieved his mother was there.

"Witches have different ways of having children." Mary informed, picking her way across the room. "I don't know how you Loa do it, but the witch way is much less messy than the normie way."

She looked at the mirror and sighed. "He was an amazing man, but also infuriating. Now, you two," Mary suddenly changed topics. "We will be eating in twenty minutes. Hagetha has to taste everything she cooked while I watch. I suspect some of it is poisoned."

"It is NOT!" A shout came from down the hallway. "It's all delicious and healthy and you should get your butts over here and eat it NOW!"

Mary gave the two kids a weary eye-roll.

"At the very least, the strawscary shortquake is poisoned. Strawscarries aren't bruise purple. Hexcuse me, and, DO be scareful in here." Mary gave a very pointed look at Marceline. "Everything in here is very fragile and needs to be handled with great care. EVERYTHING."

And with one last glance at Rory, Mary walked out.

"All right!" Rory grinned, oblivious. "Twenty minutes! Oh hey, you want to see something weird?"

Rory showed Marceline one of the walls of the wreck room, covered in the blacked-out mirrors he'd described earlier as defective. In the middle of the black mirrors was one that was, inexplicably, completely white.

"See that? Isn't that weird? It's a mirror to an empty dimension. It's completely blank!"

"Nothing, I guess. It's the first one mother found like this. There's just...nothing on the other side. I uh, I sort of felt bad for it." Rory pointed at the rot iron frame around the white mirror. "So I gave it this. I mean, it's totally useless, you know? It's a mirror that doesn't even reflect anything. At least these blacked out ones can be repaired. This one's just...blank."

From the dining room, there came the sudden sound of a sqwaking yell.

"OKAY, FINE! The shortcake is just a LITTLE poisoned, okay?! I thought a little food poisoning would help if the situation got awkward during dinner, all right?!"

Rory gave Marceline a shrug.

"I think it's almost dinner time. Hey, you know what?" He pulled the blank mirror off the wall. "I got this frame for this mirror because it reminded me of the gates outside of your house in New Goreleans. Delicate and artistic, but tough, you know? Maybe you could...I mean, could I give this to you? As a gift?"

BOOM!!!

The sudden explosion sent the mirrors on the wall shaking until they slid and hung at odd angles ... the crystal chandelier above the dining room swayed heavily, sounding like wind chimes until it settled ... the water glasses shook and the contents sloshed over the rims and to the table cloth below.

Had he not been in front of both his mother and Marceline, Rory had the undesirable urge to dive under the table for cover! But diving itself was dangerous ... wasn't it?

"What was...!?" Rory yelped and Mary stood up, about to investigate, when the dining room door swung open and in stomped Hagetha ... covered in flames and smoke and soot!

"Oh no!" Rory cried. "She burned the fudge cake!"

"I did not burn the fudge cake!" Hagetha shouted in retort. "I never burn anything!"

"It would appear that you're burning something right now." Mary quietly observed. "What happened?"

Hagetha pointed right at Rory and said, "Message came for him! Little... er, he's needed at the school immediately for that foolish dance!" Hagetha turned around and started to storm back toward the kitchen.

"But ... what ... happened?"

Hagetha turned and snarled, "Well I imagine that cousin of his wasn't hexpecting me to intercept his call, that's what!"

And through the door she stomped.

"Oh, hey, Marceline, could you please-" Rory managed to say, before vanishing completely.

Saturday

Motthew had been up most of the night, Friday night, after he and Doriana had left the SKRM match. He'd been trying to think of what they could do for their first date. The idea just making him smile as he flew under the moonlight.

He got back to his doomitory room just before the sun was coming up. Once he was in his room, he got an idea. He'd heard everyone talking about the Coffin Bean, he flew past it too. It seemed like a good place for a date. Plus, he hadn't been there yet. As he laid back on his bed, he took his iCoffin out and sent a message to Doriana, hoping he wouldn't wake her.


To Dori: Great idea!
Date night 2nite? Coffin Bean sound good?
Srry if is early. Night owl. Er Moth.
Let me know. Hext you when I wake.
Mottie wink

Motthew grinned as the message sent. He yawned then, his phone slipping from his fingers as he fell into a peaceful sleep.

Ronan gulped a few more times, staring at his reflection for the last time, adjusting his hat and pushing the hair out of his eyes.
He took a few deep breaths, it would be fine, this was going to be fine. He tried hard to reassure himself. Meme was clawsome, she was patient, she'd tolerated him up to this point, but he couldn't shake that fear of getting things so wrong she'd never speak to him again.

He checked the time, he was going to be late if he didn't leave right now.

"Du ta deg sammen, er det skal være i orden..." He muttered to himself, before picking up the basket he'd prepared earlier and heading down to the common room to meet Meme.

He smiled anxiously as he saw her.

"Meme. I am sorry, I think I am a little late... "

"Hey Ronan, Hi Meme!" Roswell, waved to the couple as he passed them to get to Melody's room. "Where are you two off to? I'm just here to pick up Melody. I was thinking i could take her to a boovie or the scream beach. Or Both! It's going to be stellar!"



Roswell was charged up form all the rest he'd gotten and was more exited to go out with Melody. It had been nearly a week since he was able to take her out. But finally he'd received his very first pay check form the Die-ner and couldn't wait to spend it all