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Marceline looked over her boofriend sympathetically; poor thing was so scared she could have sworn she heard his glass teeth chattering. She looped her arm through his and led him and the rest of the party into the sitting room, where Maman Brigitte had set out an array of gore-d'oeuvres, and sat down with him on a purple velvet loveseat.

"Well, three brothers in all." She answered Rory. "But don' worry; Criminel is the worst of 'em. The other two are... well, I wouldn't say they're better but..."

She paused, noting Rory's eyes widening, and let out a sigh.

"You're fine, don't worry. My family will just adore you! Now, here, try the gray stuff -- it's delicious!"

Emerelda busied herself, chatting with Scarie and Baron Samedi as well as Maman Brigitte, and try as he might to make his way over to where his fiends were socializing, it seemed that Glen's mom was not about to let him out of her sight. Why, he didn't know! She didn't even know about what happened with those normies -- and despite what Aunty Scarie claimed, she wouldn't either.

Hopefully.

"I admit that I am quite pleased that you agreed to host us for Fangsgiving." Emerelda smiled as she had a sip of blood red wine that the Baron had poured for her. She turned her head and a perfect eyebrow rose as she asked, "But forgive me for asking, but why did your plans change, Scarie? I've never really known you for altering any plans once your mind was made up."

"Oh... we'll discuss it later." Scarie shook her head and held a hand up to innocently ward off any further questions. One glance at Glen, at his mom's side, emitting a monstrous yawn gave her all the reason to try and keep this under wraps for as long as possible. It would be best so that they could celebrate the howliday without any dramatics.

"Oh Glenny, I'm sorry." Emerelda said as she too noticed her son yawning. "We're not boring you with our adult chat, are we?"

"No." Glen rubbed at his eyes. "Just a little sleepy. Ran out of Red Ghoul."

"You ran out of..." His mom looked astonished, but more so in a sarcastic, playful sort of way. "How on earth did you manage that? You took enough of that swill to flood the Boover Dam."

"Ha ha." Glen chuckled sleepily. "Such a kidder."

"Well, maybe you can go over dere wit' de rest of the children." Scarie took him by the shoulder and steered him around and away from his mother's grasp. She then leaned in and whispered into his ear. "An' get dat cousin of yours to hurry off to some place to get you some of dat stuff to wake your self up!"

Glen forced his eyes open and senses alert as he weaved through the spacious area of the room and over to the goody table where Rory was with Marceline.

"Scuse me, Marci? Can I borrow my cuz just for a few moments?"

"Oh, er, sure?"

Rory looked from Glen to Marceline and he said, "I'll be right ba-ACK!" before Glen grabbed him by the arm and whisked him away and around the corner into the foyer of the grand home.

"Glen, what's wrong?" Rory asked, rubbing his arm the moment Glen let go of him. "This is my first howliday with Marci and her parents and I don't want to... say are you okay?"

"No, I'm sleepy Rory." Glen whimpered. "I was up all night levitating and burned up a lot of energy with that magic. Al the stores are closed in the states and I neeeeed a Red Ghoul reeeeally bad!"

"Gosh Glen, I wish I could help but..." He frowned, noticing Glen wavering on his feet and his eyelids drooping. "Wow. You really ARE zonked out, aren't you? I-I don't know what I can do to..."

To leave, even for just a few minutes? But, not helping family out when you can -- that's rude too, isn't it? Of course it is, but how...

Rory then found some cash shoved into his hand and Glen pointed to a large mirror on the wall of the foyer.

"It'd just take a few seconds, Ror. Please?" Glen pleaded. "Canadark's convenience stores will still be open... just a quick pop in and pop back? I'll cover you! Please?" Glen then opened his eyes and... oh no. The werecub eyes! And with his sad little sleepiness welled up in them, they were even more potent than normal!

Rry blinked, then frowned as he looked down at the cash, at the mirror, then at Glen and he sighed.

"That really shouldn't work on me." Rory shrugged. "But if you'll cover, I can make it fast."

"Thanks cuz! You're the beast!" Glen gushed and hugged Rory tightly before hurrying him off toward the mirror, cash in hand! Glen turned around to keep a close watch out for his cuz in case Marci came a looking, when Glen heard a rippling noise, the tell-tale sign of a body moving through a mirror ala magic, but then he also heard...

"Mother!"

Glen cringed and snapped his fingers in disappointment.

Nero cracked his knuckles and grinned at the feast in front of him. This was his first Fangsgiving but the rules seemed to be that of any feast. Maybe a couple more interesting dried-leaf arrangements than he was used to, and maman always plated everything before it got to the table so once people started passing the plates it was a little weird.

Nero grabbed a couple rolls of corndread and tried to decide which way to pass the basket.

"Pssss," Kai hissed, "counterclockwise."

Nero tried to hand the basket off to Glen and was confronted with a shrimp and greenscream casserole.

"Your other left," Kai sighed, "just give everything to me."

"Bro, I don't want to deal with any more maps."

"Well how do you do it at your house?"

"There's only the three of us, who needs a system? Everything else is a boofet."

He broke off a piece of corndread and tossed it under the table. He heard a subtle quack and dropped the rest of the roll. Quackford had gone to so much trouble to help them out, it didn't seem right to exclude him from the festivities. Scarie narrowed her eyes at Nero briefly and he responded with a sheepish grin.

And of course on top of this fangtastic feast, there was also the monumental task for Kai and Nero to keep Glen alert and awake, and not allow him to take a snooze in his smashed potatoes.

Much to his mom's surprise, Glen's plate, which was loaded to over flowing proportions (as usual) was left virtually untouched as he did not seem to have the strength to lift his fork, let alone keep his head up without one of his beast boos to lend a claw.

"Woop! Scareful there, minibro!" Nero chuckled in good nature as he hurriedly placed his hand on Glen's shoulder, pulling him back from drooping down into his plate and righting him.

Glen gave him a sleepy smile and his eyes drooped closed yet again and his chin lightly touched his chest as the meal continued, his mom keeping a close but worried eye on him. There were a few but rare instances where Glen was made to go without Red Ghoul for a hextended period of time, such as when Kai painted his portrait, but never was he quite this bad.

She shook her head. At least the howliday meal was fangulous, as was the present company.

"Senator da West..." Baron Samedi started to say but Glen's mom waved off the formality.

"Please." She said. "We are on howliday and you are our hosts. Call me Emerelda."

The Baron nodded with gracious acknowledgment and he continued, "Emerelda, might I wonder why your good friend and Glen's godmother did not accompany you? She was most certainly welcome to join us."

"Yeah." Glen piped up, temporarily awake. "Where is Aunty Glinda? I thought she was going to come with."

"Oh she wanted to." Emerelda answered. "But she decided to hold a little celebration for the Munchkins back at the castle. She brought the entire population of the village to the castle to give them a little Fangsgiving all their own."

"Dat's crazy. Scarie mused at the magnitude of the numbers as she had a sip of wine.

"That's Glinda." Emeralda smiled. She then turned to the boos seated across and said, "Kai. Could you please pass me the gumboo?"

"Oh, sure!" Kai answered and he then looked at where his one claw was perched on Glen's upper body to keep him upright in his chair, and his other hand reaching for the large bowl. "Um..." He tried to figure out just how he was going to manage this when an idea hit him. "Ah ha!"

And Kai grabbed one of the large bread sticks from the bowl in a woven basket in front of him and tucked one end under Glen's chin and the other against the table, propping his little green bluddy up. Only then did Kai stand up and happily offer the bowl to Emerelda, when a 'crack' was heard and his tail rattled, but too late when...

SPLAT!

And everybluddy turned and saw Glen snoring face-first in his green scream casserole.

"Oh, Glen!" Emerelda shook her head and Glen popped upright, eyes wide and face dripping casserole.

"What? What'd I miss!? Is it Cryptmas yet!?"

Marceline's family and their guests chuckled, despite the hint of embarrassment Glen's mom displayed as she whipped out her wand and with a twirl, Glen's face was instantly cleaned up. Then, seeing no other alternative, another wand twirl and the juice in Glen's goblet was replaced by...

"Red Ghoul!" Glen cried as he grabbed the cup with both hands. "Oo gimme gimme gimme!" And he started draining the cup all at once.

"Thank odd!" Nero mumbled and Glen set the cup down and his mom wasted little time in giving him a refill. Better safe than sorry!

As he drank deeply, Emerelda sighed, "Really, Glen! I can't imagine what has you so exhausted!"

"I'm sorry mom." Glen said as he set his glass down, hinting for a third. "I was just up so late with those mean normies."

You could practically hear the sound of a vinyl record coming to a scratching halt. Utensils clattered to plates, one person choked on something... and the eyes of every adult turned slowly to look at the teenage boos.

"Good Glen." Scarie nodded. "It would have been ridiculous to wait for the right time."

Bleak Friday.

7 AM.

At the New Goreleans French Gore-ter open-scare market.

Kai yawned. Like everymonster else in their group, he was tired. Yesterday had been a big day...a HUGE day, in fact, what with the howliday and the traveling and the rescuing of certain witch-boys from overzealous hunters. Kai would have been purr-fectly fine sleeping in, but Glen insisted they get somewhere that sold things for Bleak Friday.

Kai was not much for shopping; it involved too much decision-making. He made out his lists far, far ahead of time and stuck to them. Or he relied on his cousin Melody or his ghoulfriend Demona to help him decide what to get.

Neither of whom were with them today. Instead, Kai had Nero, head resting on Kai's shoulder, snoring slightly as the two of them stood in line behind Glen and Rory waiting for the rot-iron gate to the Open-Scare Market to allow them in.

Kai pulled out his iCoffin.

Nero was lounging in Scarie's enormous back yard spa, the marble columns reaching up towards a perfect azure blue sky. It was amazing that a witch leaving in New Goreleans would have columns carved in the Egyptian style, but Nero liked it. It made him think both of his parents' knick-knack covered home and the trips they used to take to the Valley of the Kings.

He stretched out contentedly on a giant pile of pillows. Kai and Glen had tried to talk him into going to some Bleak Friday event but after the bro'ad trip they'd had, Nero couldn't really take it. He could just picture his bros, struggling to stay awake in an endless line.

Scarie sauntered over with a silver tray, waving away the supermodels that were fanning Nero with palm fronds.

"We don need you right now," she said imperiously, "it's perfectly nice outside."

The supermodels all pouted but quickly all got into the nearby pool and began splashing about.

"Well boy, I see you dint tink to go shopping wit your friends."

"Oh no. I mean, II wouldn't mind helping my bros out carrying a thing or two, but it's just too nice out here."

"It is at dat. Can I get you anyting? I have lemonade, or de zombies can make someting else. What do you tink?" she asked, offering the tray.

Nero raise an eyebrow.

"Mrs. Robinscarie - you are trying to refresh me .... Aren't you?"

She merely smiled at him as held out a glass. The supermodels all turned into ducks and began chasing one another across the yard.

"No, wait, all your bikinis are falling off," Nero mumbled, raising his arms. He tried to catch all the bikinis in his arms and held onto them as tightly as he could.


"Bro! hrk! BRO, I can't....hrk, breath!" Kai gasped in the headlock.

Just as the final drops of energy drink swirled down the funnel into Nero's gullet, the gates started to cr-r-r-reaaak open.

"Hey!" Kai directed his bluddies. "I think we can go in!"


"YESSS!" Glen shouted as the funnel vanished with a 'pop' and he hopped back down onto the ground. "CHAAAARRRRGGGE IT!"

Glen dashed forward, and managed to be the first monster in the gates of the market. He looked left, right, north, south, up and down taking it all in. Whatever plans and methods of seeking things out he had crafted were completely forgotten.

"Which way? What do we want to buy? Where do we go? Do you smell crepes skullzette?!"

To the left, near an embankment by a small stream flowing past the park the market was set up in, Kai spotted several canvases sitting out on easels.

"Oooo, art!" Seeing something that caught his grimterest, Kai wandered over that way.

Meanwhile, Rory, trying very hard to stay out of everymonster's way as they all started lurching into the market, spotted a vendor with a blanket laid out just off the path. There were several lovely rot-iron frames in one corner. One of those just might be perfect for the mysterious blank mirror he'd given Marceline!

Rory wandered over that way, to the right, hiccuping all the way.

Meanwhile, Glen, right in the middle of the flow of foot traffic, suddenly realized he was on his own.

"Uh....guys? Hello? Helloooooooo...."