Me: And so it begins….. Hi! I'm baaaack! I hope you like the beginning of this story. Please R&R, 'cause I really wanna know how I did! Oh, and-

Oogie: Disclaimer: She does not own the nightmare before Christmas. She only owns Andromeda, and several other characters.

Me: I hate you.

Andromeda: Get in line behind me.

It has been 1 month since Oogie Boogie went to live in Halloweentown. He was adjusting to life rather quickly, considering the fact that pretty much everyone detested him. He got along with the adults well enough, but he kids were a different story. The teenagers (and there were many) loathed him, and constantly made fun of his weight. The younger children resorted to throwing things at him, and calling him a "meanie" for kidnapping their favorite girl in town, Andromeda, which brings us to her story.

Andromeda Skellington was the only heir to the Skellington throne. She was almost 16, and would rule Halloweentown at age 20. About 3 months ago, Lock, Shock and Barrel kidnapped her, and brought her to Oogie. Oogie decided to keep her alive, only to achieve ransom. But Andromeda was clever enough to trick him into letting her go. Once he did, she told her dad, and Jack was going to go kill Oogie (again). But Andromeda stopped him, obviously wanting to tell Oogie a few more things on her mind about the abduction. But Oogie felt remorse, and decided to repent. No one really fully believed him, until a fire (courtesy of Lock, Shock, and Barrel) was set to the Skellington Manor. Oogie saved Andromeda, and half the town. He decided not to tell anyone that Boogie's Boys did it, so Jack (in his infinite wisdom) decided that it was definitely a "forest fire," as the humans referred to it. Since then, many of the adults had thought much higher of him, except the mayor. The mayor and Oogie had never gotten along in grade school, and certainly not in their adult life, partly because their personalities were exact opposites. Oogie's was gruff, slightly depressed, modest, (as of late), and kept a cool head in difficult situations. The mayor's was worried, anxious, not cool in any sense of the word, and hated Oogie, mostly because he was terrified of him. Oogie hated him mostly because of his "stupid megaphone," as he called it.

"Halloween is in 21 days! Halloween is in 21 days!" said the mayor from his megaphone. Oogie groaned. He was sitting on his favorite bench in town, and was watching the other members walk around. The elected official had already stated this message 21 times (go figure). Oogie was exercising his every strength not to grab the god forsaken megaphone from the mayor. But he wasn't the only one who hated this as much as he did.

"Will you turn that thing off?!" yelled a female voice from above. Oogie looked up, and his stitched lips turned up in a smile. The voice came from a young woman from her high bedroom window, who was glaring daggers at the mayor threw it. He had looked up as well, and cowered under her gaze. "We know that it's almost Halloween, and some of us have it permanently plastered INSIDE OUR BRAINS!!" She slammed the window shut. Oogie chuckled low under his breath. Andromeda Skellington had given the mayor the telling off that no one in Halloween town had the time to do. The mayor seemed to realize this, because he stood in the middle of the town for a while, before giving away to shouting "Halloween in 21 days!" in a weak and scared voice.

After a while, Oogie gave in to noticing what the other members of the town were doing. He did this often; he had nothing better to do. Oogie didn't really have a social life, unlike most of the members of this world. For some reason that he could not put his (non-existing) finger on, ever since a couple months ago, Oogie had gotten slightly depressed. He found food to have no taste, and constantly had a sad look on. Even the members of the town started to notice this. This was considered odd behavior on Oogie's part. He had always been high in spirits, in a sadistic way, of course; always pulling pranks on people, and such. They had always found him to have an extremely evil and misogynistic nature. But this, sad boogieman with no personality at all, his behavior very appropriate, and even kind.

Anyway, Oogie could see that everyone in town was busy for the upcoming Halloween: Andromeda would not come out of her room for about 3 days a week; Jack kept holding secret conversations with Dr. Finklestein, always glancing at his daughter; the mayor was red in the face, and trailing after Andromeda like a stray dog, asking for her help and impute on everything. Since she was the Pumpkin Princess, she was obligated to help with the preparations. But this job suited her. She was excellent at handling stress, had very particular opinions about the decorations, and could handle any mishaps better than the mayor. So far, she had given everyone a very specific job to do, except him. Oogie could guess the reason. She was probably still furious.

After a while, Andromeda emerged from her elegant mansion. She stretched her arms lazily gazing at the sun in a pleasant way. Recently, in the last month, she had cut her thick brown hair, so that it now hung just above her shoulders. It curled naturally at the tips, framing her slightly tanned heart shaped face perfectly. Her deep blue eyes widened, as though wanting to absorb as much sunlight as they could. Andromeda had also grown abut an inch in the last week, making her come almost to his chin now. It wasn't much of a change from neck to chin, but Oogie had been the first to comment about it. Andromeda had blushed scarlet, making the fiery red dance below her doe-like eyes. Today, she wore a white shirt with a picture of a pumpkin on it, low and V-necked, above low cut jeans. She looked very happy to be out of her house, probably done with her secret contribution to Halloween that she told no one about. That was one of the things about her that Oogie liked: she was secretive, and mysterious. Andromeda smiled one of her fantastic smiles, showing all of her pearly white teeth, next to her lovely blood red lips. She only smiled like that when she was really happy, Oogie had noticed. She stretched out on her porch, spreading out her body and tanning her grinning face.

Almost immediately after Andromeda came out of her "cave", two new voices that to Oogie were even more annoying than the mayor's were heard.

"Andromeda!" squealed two female voices. Andromeda lifted up her head, and smiled happily. "Hillary, Zellary! I missed you guys!" she replied happily. One of them rushed up to her and examined her face with a worried expression. "We were so worried about you!" she said quietly, in her high and breathy voice. But she seemed like the kind of girl that was quiet all the time.

"Well, Hil was anyway," scoffed a slightly stronger and louder tone of voice. A tall, punk-looking skeleton was grinning down at her two friends. Her height towered over even Andromeda's. She had cropped raven black hair, and had outlined her empty sockets with a great deal of pitch black eye liner. Her sleeveless T had been ripped dramatically at the arms and hem, and it had a picture of a skeleton with glowing red eyes. She was smirking down at her friend, Hillary, and the smaller girl blushed.

The teenager dubbed to be Hillary tucked a stray strand of fiery red hair behind her ear. She had green, scale like skin, and had wide, light brown eyes that could rival Andromeda's easily. She was much shorter that the skeleton girl, and only a few inches below Andromeda's neckline. She had big green lips that jutted out in a pretty sort of way. Her hands and ankles had signs of webbing, but nothing showed anything permanent. She had a very timid aura around her. Andromeda was always reminded of her mother, Sally, when she was around her. The contrast between Hillary and Zellary was comical. Zellary, with her towing height, and very punk/goth clothing, and Hillary, with her flowery red dress, under a white shirt. The young woman sighed. She glanced down at her outfit. The sparkling orange pumpkin smiled back up at her. She had thought that her outfit was very "in," but next to theirs, she was suddenly having doubt.

Andromeda sat up to face her comrades better. Her half sea creature and rock and roll skeleton friend were clearly opposites, but they all got along rather well, despite the fact that Andromeda was the one who usually paid for things at the mall, movie theatre, or, actually, anywhere else.

"What were you working on?" asked Zellary, sitting beside the Pumpkin Princess. Andromeda put on a mischievous grin. "Nah uh uh," she said teasingly. "I'm not telling. You're gonna have to wait until Halloween! But I finished anyway," she added modestly. Hillary jumped enthusiastically in the air, while Zellary remained stationary, looking nonchalant. "What are you working on?"Andromeda asked suspiciously. "Not gonna tell unless you do," was the smug reply. Andromeda grimaced, while Hillary watched them timidly. "I haven't started mine yet," she stated sadly. Andromeda sympathetically patted her shoulder, while Zellary mumbled something about not babying your friends. Andromeda glared at her, until she said somehing heartfelt. This conversation went on for a while, before Zellary glanced back behind her, sniggering, and saying, "Prince Charmin's lookin' at you again!" Andromeda looked quickly behind her friend's back, seeing Oogie whip his face in the opposite direction of them quickly. She turned back to glare at the sniggering duo. "First of all, don't call him that, it's disgusting," the two girls laughed even harder, "and second of all, I don't care!"

"Fine," said Zellary, shrugging. After that, they bade their goodbyes and Andromeda sat on the porch again, shaking her head and smiling. "My friends," she said quietly, and then laughed.

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Oogie was staring determinedly at his knees. He would never look at the princess to be disrespectful. Only to catch her smiling, or (as she so rarely did) laughing. She had the best smile in all the girls in Halloweentown. It was so light, and full of spirit. And her laugh was like a tinkling bell, feminine and sweet, but with a strong hint of mischief. Thinking of all this made him smile, but not before cursing himself silently for thinking this way. He looked up again when he saw two young women standing in front of him. Hillary and Zellary were glaring down at him. Oogie sighed, narrowed his sockets, and said, trying to sound as scary as he could "What?"

"Andromeda doesn't like you," retorted the female skeleton bluntly. Oogie blinked. "What the heck are you talking about?" he snapped.

"She hates you," added Hillary, sounded murderous, "So stay away from her, boogie boy." Oogie was narrowed his eyes more, and stood up. Even with Zellary's exceptional height, Oogie towered over her by a few inches. He was angry now, because of the nickname that the brazen girl had used. When Oogie met Andromeda, she had chosen to use that insult to make him mad and distracted. The two girls had inherited it from their comrade. Oogie knew that they hated him for kidnapping her, and could not understand why she hadn't kill him. Andromeda chose not to explain it, as she didn't really understand it herself.

As the boogieman opened his mouth to retort, he heard a much softer voice behind his enemies. "Alright, guys, you can stop the interrogation now," said Andromeda, breaking up her two friends. She added in a lower tone of voice, "I can handle myself when dealing with him, alright?" her friends walked away, muttering mutinously and glaring at Oogie's back.

The woman began to notice the town staring at the two of them. "Don't you all have work to do?" she said loudly. The townspeople began working again. She rolled her eyes and walked away. Oogie sighed tiredly.

Andromeda was the only person in town whom he actually liked. The adults were okay, but the teenagers were vile. Not even in a good way! The girls were really superficial. Make-up dominated their facial features, and they wore tight, revealing dressed. Andromeda never wore make-up, and she had a beautiful face! She only owned one dress. It was black and purple, and was dramatically torn at the ends. But very appropriate, both for her figure and for Halloweentown. She was also very kind and generous, and had inheirited her father's melodious voice, along with his obvious wit and charm. No one could not think of a better heir to the Skellington throne. Well, except perhaps, Jack.

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The hours toiled on. Before Oogie knew it, the sun was setting, and a deep crimson was spreading across the sky. Oogie sighed, heaved himself of the bench, and started walking home. Another day, he thought to himself, another unproductive day.

On his was to his house, he met three of the werewolf brothers. They were among the age group that constantly made fun of his weight issue. Oogie could always silence their laughter by scaring them out of their wits. This almost always worked. But today, one of them was brandishing a cutlass. Oogie ended up knocking that one out. His cohorts went to get Andromeda.

After a couple of minutes, they returned, a very angry Andromeda in their wake. She walked up to Oogie (another good trait about her: she wasn't in the least scared of the boogieman) and demanded to know what happened.

"Did you knock out Buchcassidy?" she asked murderously.

"Hey!" replied Oogie angrily and defensively. "Benjamin had a knife!" He watched as her bright blue eyes found the cutlass in the teenager's hand. She grabbed it away. "You know very well that we do not use weapons in this town!" she yelled angrily. The one named Benjamin got a guilty look on his face, and hung his head in apparent shame. The other conscious one had a totally different attitude. He wolf whistled at her, and lecherously put one arm around her shoulder. "I just love it when you get all authoritive," he said, his face way too close to hers. Oogie stepped forward, growling and suddenly feeling very protective. What's wrong with me? he asked himself. But he wasn't that surprised. It hadn't taken Oogie long after he moved back in town to discover how men acted around Andromeda. Every man and boy seemed to fancy her, and was particularly intent on showing it, like the situation here. Oogie had fully expected her to have a boyfriend, and was genually surprised to find out the opposite. Judging by her behavior in town, Andromeda disliked every single one of them. Her lethal and disgusted expression right now said it all. It reminded Oogie faintly of the one she had given him when she first saw him, when he teased her with the same expression as the werewolf had here. It made his stomach jolt.

But the young werewolf's leer turned to one of fear, however, when the girl pointed the cutlass at him. He backed away several steps. "But I might be able to make an exception," she said wryly, grinning somewhat evilly at the scared boy. "Sorry," he mumbled apologetically, but his eyes never left the point of the sword. She smiled dryly and handed the weapon back to Benjamin. He still looked ashamed, even more so by the lecherous behavior of his friend. "Take him away. And I will be reporting your behavior." Benjamin nodded, and picked up his limp friend, before running off in the distance. "Yours too, Jacob," she said to the werewolf still there. He backed up until he was pressed against a tree. Oogie laughed raucously. Werewolves, medusas, and shark people, he thought happily to himself. All scary creatures pale next to the threat of Andromeda Skellington!

"Oogie, your not in trouble. you were just defending yourself," said Andromeda absentmindedly to Oogie. He swelled with pride and smugness. "Thanks," he said quietly.

When Jacob had left, Andromeda sighed tiredly, and started walking home. Oogie wanted to say something funny and witty, but nothing came to mind.

"You handled that well," he called after her, sounding in his ears very lame. She turned around, smiling confusedly. "That thing with Jake," he clarified. "I would have personally knocked him out, but to each his own." Andromeda laughed loudly. "Thanks," she said, wiping her eyes, "oh, and um, Oogie? I need to, um give you your assignment." She looked nervous, and Oogie motioned wordlessly for her to sit down. She obliged, staring at her hands.

"You don't have to," said Oogie quietly. She looked up from her fingers. "No, its fine, I might as well." She sounded as nervous as she looked. Andromeda looked from side to side, as though worried that they were being watched. "Can I be perfectly honest with you, Oogie?" she asked tentatively. Oogie looked both surprised and overjoyed. "No, I would prefer not," he said jokingly. Andromeda laughed again. "Well, um, uh, you see," her voice became hushed, "These people, well, their inventions are, well, nothing short of, well, boring. No originality, nothing new, just nothing. I'm talkin' centuries, Oogie, okay? So, I need you to come up with something original. Unique, you know what I mean, right?" Oogie nodded, standing up along with the young woman. "I know that you're the boogieman, so I trust that you can come up with something in time for Friday." It was not a question. It was a request. A request that Oogie knew he could not screw up. He felt very good hearing her praise. "You can count on me, princess," was his response. She smiled, and waved at him, making her way back home. Oogie watched her go, before turning and heading home himself. He was beginning to feel that the day might not have been a total loss after all.

Me: So, wathcha gonna make?

Oogie: I'm thinking….

Andromeda: (scoffs) Like you can come up with something in time!!

Me: If you two can't play nice, then you two can't play together!! Anyway, do you see the little blue GO button next to the sign that says "submit review?" Yeah, PLEASE PRESS IT!