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Ah... Wincing as Riley rather violently lost the contents of what the nergal assumed was her stomach, he scooted just a little bit away from the mess, eyes once more drifting to the dragon next to him. Offering a weak smile to Aksaja, he turned back to Riley. Jack...she'd better be all right, though it seemed as though Maladore was taking care of everything now, now that it had decided to step in. Glad that the plague doctor was once more taking care of their resident mindflayer, the blond boil straightened his clothing. "Well...let's not do that again, shall we?" He murmured, trying to make it sound light in the face of the rather unnerving moment that they'd just shared.

((Insanity))

Alwine was trembling from watching Riley. She had no doubt that the mindflayer would be able to do something wretched to her, even though she was a ghost.

I PROMISE I will get to ALL of you! Why won't you all just WAIT!

Alwine started to back up, but it was too late. Riley had focused her static-filled eyes on the ghost.

"No..."

Yes. I've grown tired of looking at that vacancy on your neck. It's time I showed you your true form.

This couldn't be real. Malodore was wielding its FEAR-bound book, but it seemed to have no effect on the mindflayer. She merely lifted her hand, and that is when all of the students, including Riley, disappeared from her view.

Pain started to form in the ghost's neck. Pain for ghosts felt different than those with physical forms, but it still hurt. Though she couldn't see it, she felt something... bubbling.

Her neck was bubbling, large swells of pus-like ectoplasm starting to seep through the fabric on her neck. It was completely visible even though her body was, for the most part, invisible.

Alwine started to rip some of the bandages from her arms and tried to wrap them about her neck, but they only fell uselessly around her feet.

"Hee hee hee."

It wasn't Alwine's voice. This voice was much higher-pitched, and had such a condescending tone in her voice. The headless haunt wasn't worried so much about that, though, as the fact that the voice came from inside of her.

"You thought I wouldn't come, right? You've been trying to hide me all this time... but it's too late now! Your voice will be heard no more..."

Alwine's shoulders hunched in a spasm as she started to feel something seeping out from her neck. A horrible squelching sound oozed through the air as it started to get longer. Eventually, Alwine's fingers were able to clasp at the offending growth. Her fingers wrapped around flaxen, lifeless blonde hair. With trembling digits, she decided to pat the top of her neck.

And they were almost bitten.

On the top of Alwine's neck was a tumor, rapidly growing. It had a face with wide, empty eyes and a mouth oozing with ectoplasm.

"I'm here, Alwine! You cannot stop what is only natural. Everyone needs a head, after all..."

Alwine just continued to grope at it, shrieking in terror and disbelief.

Arachne continued to be harried by her mother's voice, whispering, hissing, even shouting words at her. She tried to drown them out, shaking her head, thinking of her dorm room, her Skitters waiting for her back at the Academy.

You won't listen? the voice paused.
Then you will see..
As it drifted away, Arachne felt a cold weight drop into the hand that wasn't clinging on to Sepheran, and she lifted it, seeing her crystall ball. She stared at the whirling smoke just under the surface of the glass and let out a gasp. They were all dead, she could see them in the glass and in her mind's eye. Twisted, broken, bloody bodies. She was standing in the middle of them, holding Sepheran's hand - but he wasn't attached to it.

You tried, but every time you did, another died.
The insidious voice of her mother was back.
Your actions killed them. Don't you see? You can't act on a vision. You'll make it come to pass

A sob bubbled from Arachne's lips and she sank to her knees, trying to drop the ball but it seemed to be fused to her skin and no matter what she did, she couldn't tear her eyes away from the 'visions' of her friends, of every student she'd ever met on this trip dying horribly over and over again. She screamed;
'Stop, make it stop!'

Riley's eyes turned down when she felt that first touch. She could tell it was hesitant, and she assumed she had disgusted it. Her assumptions were blown apart when Malodore's arms wrapped around her without a care for what had just occurred - her breathing hitched, before it stopped altogether. When it explained what it's hallucination had been, her eyes widened and fogged slightly while it watched a fast paced version of what it had seen. That was.. that was..

Impossible. She breathed out, expelling the breath she'd been holding.

Alwine's screaming barely reached her, but she flickered her eyes at the headless ghoul, who was clawing at the space above her neck. Obviously, someone else was suffering another hallucination.

In a brief attempt to try and bring humor to an otherwise terrible moment, she lifted her finger and pointed up at the ghoul.

Neeext.

Her other arm snaked around Malodore, pulling him down against her with a fervent force. Not you though. You stay with me. I need you. And she did.

When her insanity came upon her she accepted it like an old friend, for in a way it was. Oh sure she’d never seen it before but when the fog once again closed around her, Alwine slipping from her embrace and the voices of the other students fading, she immediately knew who and what the figure in front of her was. At least it wasn’t that voice, she consoled herself as she knelt down facing the apparition calmly. If anyone saw what she was faced with they would wonder how she could be so calm.

In front of her stood calmly a small drop bear ghoul, no older than six she knew, dressed in a winter coat and dress that where tattered and frayed from wear, shoes and socks missing. Her hair was in a similar state to her clothes and gave clue to the fact the damage wasn’t just from every day wear and tear with its freshly hacked ends and filthy mattered state when she knew it to be the ghouls’ pride. Everything was as she remembered, right down to the dried tear tracks ruining the ghouls elaborate face paint that she’d spent hours doing for her birthday.

Everything was as she remembered except for one thing that was.

Marring what memory said was truth was blood and exposed bone, a gory composition of near reality.

“So you did what I couldn’t huh?”

The ghoul nodded, face solemn and eyes filled with loneliness and a terrible knowledge.

“You should have you know. It would have saved so much pain.” The little ghouls voice was soft and welcoming, a contrast to her appearance that compelled Mandy to listen.

“Maybe. But you know it was never really our style. ‘Sides things are better now. Not perfect but better.”

The look the ghoul gave her made her feel like an idiot. “It’s also not our style to lie to ourselves. You know everything would be better for everyone if you’d done it. In fact it’s not too late now. There’s a cliff right over there. We could match!”

The ghouls words caused Mandy to frown angrily. “Hey now, just cause I may have thought that then doesn’t mean its true now.”

That look again. “Really? Do you think your any better for people around you now than before. You hardly have any friends,” here Mandy looked ready to protest but a sharp look stopped her, “ and Winnie would be better off. Just think on it – she doesn’t really need your protection all your doing is selfishly tying her to your needy and unstable self. Just look what you did to any friendship she would have had with Mac!”

There was no defence to that, this argument was new and unrehearsed, cutting her deep.

The ghoul knew it and at her silence a malicious smirk cut across her face. “Pff. Pathetic, Marilyn was right Mandy – we don’t deserve anything, where just a pathetic little needy powerless princess and you know what nature does to them.”

Cuts them out like a bad growth

Her eyes stung, the words hurt more coming from the little ghoul herself than a voice in her head. When did princess stop meaning someone who was strong, beautifully wild, charismatic and above all a leader – and instead become an insult. She used to want to be a princess at that age.

“Enough.” Her voice sounded hoarse to her ears, thick with emotion. “Enough.”

Instantly the ghouls faced blanked again as she nodded in acceptance. It wasn’t like she needed the fog to haunt Mandy’s steps, it just helped her along.

“I’ll be waiting when you finally come to your sense.”

“I know you will. You always are.”

Giving her a smile the ghoul turned and walked back into the fog, dissipating as she went.

“Goodbye Maria.”

Just for now Mandy.

---

Pushing up from where she kneeled in the ground Mandy spent a few moments dusting off her pyjama pants before sighing and starting forward to find the group again. That was when a familiar scream cut through the air. For a second she hesitated – words and wounds still to fresh before she mentally slapped herself and took off running towards the voice.

“Winnie! I’m coming!”

And true to her word a second later Mandy burst out of the fog onto where the group was arranged and eyes passing them over zoomed in on the ghost being held by Lizzy, bandages disarray.

"Winnie! Its Dee! Whatever it is isn't real!

As she practically shouted this she made the last few meters between them and sunk down to where the ghoul was, giving Lizzy a look before ducking under held arms and hugging Alwine.

"There is nothing sprouting. NOTHING." She replied firmly, frowning when the ghoul started to drop to the ground. Still keeping her hands down, she gave her hands a reassuring squeeze, "Keep telling yourself that its not real, because it isn't. Its all fake! Come on, Alwine, pull yourself together!"

She didn't know what else to say to comfort her.

"Talk to me, please," She pleaded- just as Mandy stepped in. Letting the ghoul's hands go, she frowned at Mandy, "Please take care of her! I have to find someone else..." Redundant words since it seemed like Alwine were in capable hands, but it reassured her to say them all the same. Then, sprinting into the fog as the voices started up again, she concentrated only on one thing - locating the Spiderkin. Shutting out the whispers in her head, she screamed, "Arachne! Arachne, its not real! WHERE ARE YOU?"

Petro put his mace away when Riley returned to her right state of mind. He let out the breath he hadn't realized he'd been holding, thinking it was over. A shriek, then another proved him wrong. At Lizzy's order, Petro was bounding towards Arachne's voice, granted with a visible limp that made his gait uneven, Jack damn could Lizzy hit hard.

"Arachne! Arachne! Where're y'?"