Karana Belle: hello. I'm back again, with my crazyiness. Well sort of. But I'm doing this one shot in honor of Halloween. Hope you all enjoy it! And Magus will sometimes be OOC. You have been warned. This story has many references to Alfador the Easter 'Bunny' so if you want to understand them, I suggest reading it!!!!!!
Alfador, and His House of HorrorsOnce again, our poor group of heroes is stuck in the End of Time, bored. Bored beyond all reasons. Bored of trying to figure out how to kill Lavos. After all it had already taken them nearly 65 million years to kill him; if you count all the years they had skipped around.
But only one person was sleeping, Gaspar. Everyone else was staring blankly at the endless black, thinking of nothing in particular. That is until Magus decided to yell out.
"Where did Alfador go?" He frantically looked around for his best pet in the world. No need to think of the fact that it was his only pet.
Marle just shrugged, "I wouldn't worry. Gaspar probably sent him off to go hide more eggs. Like last time."
Lucca shook her head, "No, that wouldn't be possible. After all, it's not anytime near when Easter is. You can't do an Easter egg hunt if it isn't Easter!" Marle just stuck her tongue out, deciding to ignore her friends coment.
"Isn't Halloween soon?" Everyone turned to Crono, surprised that he had even remembered that.
"Now that I think about it. It is close to Halloween. But what does that have to do with Alfador?" Lucca trailed off into her thoughts, ignoring everyone around her.
Marle looked around herself fearfully, "Hey, isn't Halloween the time when people are hanged because they couldn't pay off their debts?"
Magus' eyes opened wide, "What? They come after you if you have debts? But what if that's what happened to Alfador?"
Crono tilted his head to the side, "But I always thought that you got candy on Halloween. How could my mother trick me like that?"
Frog jumped up, "Shalt ye accuseth thy mother of such vileness?"
Crono turned to Robo, "Um, translation Robo?"
Robo beeped, "Will you accuse your mother of such evil?" his eyes whirred.
"Thanks," Crono turned back to Frog, "No. of course not, I was just wondering."
Frog turned his back on Crono and ribbited.
Magus turned to the crestfallen Crono, "Don't worry about his attitude. He always does that when he is wrong."
Lucca finally came out of her little world, "Were you just nice again, Magus? Wow. That's twice in one year. That has got to be the world record."
Magus glared at the purple haired woman, "Now I think that it was you who catnapped Alfador. After all you tried to take him from me near that chicken egg hunt day, or something."
"I've already told you! It's Easter Egg Hunt! It has nothing to do with a chicken!" Lucca shook her finger under his nose, "And I didn't take Alfador from you. That's a very stupid idea, considering he already likes me."
"You just wish that he did." Magus shot back.
Sensing a full scale argument Crono jumped in, "Alfador was probably kidnapped by the evil men who hang people who have debt."
"What are you talking about Crono?" Lucca looked at him; Crono just pointed to Magus who then pointed to Marle. "Marle? Have you got anything to say?"
Marle looked at her feet, "No. I didn't say anything. Who are you going to believe? Me or Crono?"
Lucca thought for a moment, her finger on her chin, "Um...I think that I'm going to believe Crono. After all, I've been his best friend since forever."
Marle spluttered, "But...but...we're friends too! I thought that you liked me!"
Lucca shook her head, "Of course we're friends, but I've been friends with Crono longer. Anyway, don't you have something to say to him?" Lucca pointedly looked at Marle.
Marle glared back, but soon she shifted under the smarter one's gaze, "Okay. Fine. Crono. Magus. I lied to you. They don't hang you if you have debts. Well, they don't for Halloween," Marle then smiled evilly, "But ghosts do come and haunt people on Halloween."
Magus' face paled, but no one noticed considering his face is pretty pale already. "What if they hanged Alfador and then his ghost will come back to haunt me for the rest of my life?"
Lucca rolled her eyes, "Magus, will you just be quiet? Alfador was not hanged. The only thing that could've happened was that he was run over. But I highly doubt that."
Crono opened his mouth, but instead a rumbling sound was heard. He looked abashedly at his stomach, "Can we go to my house? I want to eat some of my mom's cooking."
Everyone else rolled their eyes, and Lucca sighed, "Well, lets all go then." They all piled into the Epoch and went to Crono's house where his room looked like a tornado had gone through it.
Lucca looked around, "do you know how to clean your room Crono?"
Crono glared and folded his arms, "Of course I do. Why are we in my room anyway? Aren't we supposed to be eating?"
Frog ribbited, "Thou hast takenth us here."
Once again Crono turned to Robo, "Translation again, Robo?"
Robo beeped, "You took us here."
"Thanks. Well, then let's just go down to the kitchen." Crono led the way down the stairs and into the kitchen where his mom was cooking.
"Good moring Mom." Crono called out.
"It's the afternoon dear, and when did you come home?" Crono's mother smiled while moving the pan off of the fire.
"Oh. We just came in. Can we have some food?" Crono's stomach rumbled, seeming to second the statement.
"Of course dear. Just let me cook some more for you friends." Everyone found some seats to wait for the food to finish cooking.
Thirty minutes later found everyone just finishing off a rather large dinner consisting of fried potatoes, corn, some fruit juice that Crono's mom had in the ice box, and some rolls. The team made as if to leave, but Crono's mom spoke up.
"Did you come to go to that Haunted House?"
Lucca looked up curiously, "What Haunted House?" Crono nodded in agreement with Lucca.
Crono's mom smiled, "The one that just popped up this morning. It was really sudden, I never even saw any signs for it before today. And look I've even got a flyer." She went to a desk in the corner of the room and pulled up a small piece of paper.
Presenting Alfador's:House of Horrors
The most frightening way to spend your time.
With many scary, breathtaking moments. It'll be a thrill for your whole family!
So be sure to come to this amazing place and all in just one large tent.
Come quickly, cause it only lasts for two days!
There was unmistakingly a picture of the one and only Alfador, holding open the door of a stripped tent. Magus made a strangled sound, almost as if his air circulation had been cut off.
"Alfador...?" Once again he became pale, but still no one noticed. "What did they do to you? They hanged you and made you do this horrible thing?"
Lucca rolled her eyes, "How much more stupider could you get? If Alfador was hanged then how could he be on this flyer?"
"And also how could he be right outside that window?" Marle said pointing to the open window. And sure enough Alfador could be seen jumping from the window sill. It took a moment for Magus to fly out of the front door, the rest of the team following.
The walked for about five minutes before a large stripped tent, like the one in the flyer, loomed ahead of them. Magus was about to walk into the tent when he was jerked back by his cape.
"What are you doing?! I know that Alfador went in there so I need to save him!" Magus glared at Lucca, the one who had almost choked him.
"Magus, we have to know what we are going up against before we just march in..." She trailed off as she saw that Magus and herself were the only ones still outside. Her grip on Magus' cape slackened and soon only she was left outside.
Muttering under her breath she ran into the tent, trying to catch up with the rest of the team. The inside of the tent was a little unnerving, after all Lucca couldn't see anything at all, and in just a second of coming in through the tent flap had her running into someone.
"Sorry." She said, almost subconsciously. A voice from the right carried over to Lucca and she could her the rustle of moving cloth.
"Lucca?" an almost tentative voice said, "Is that you?" it was definitly a girls' voice, and with the process of elimination Lucca placed the voice as Marle's.
"Yes Marle? Are you the only one here?" Lucca narrowed her eyes, trying to decipher anything in the dark.
"No." came Marle's answer, "I've got Robo just a little bit behind me and Frog is sitting on the floor in front of me. Do you know about the others?"
"I'm here." Crono. His voice seemed to come from the left, opposite of Marle's location.
"Ayla here. And got big bump on head. It hurt bad."
"Then that leaves Magus." Lucca said, and was about to ask if anyone had heard him when once again there was a rustle of cloth, directly in front of her. Lucca swallowed a scream when she saw pale skin seemingly glowing in a small light.
"Alfador is in here somewhere." A small red light in Magus's hand grew bigger and after a minute the whole room was lit. The room was bare except for three doors on the wall. The floor was just dirt, and the walls just like the outside of the tent, stripped with blue and white.
"Wow. I haven't been in a tent for a long time!" Marle sighed, "it reminds me of the Millenial fair."
"But the fair is still going on." Crono pointed out.
"Oh." Marle blinked, trying to look non-chalant.
"Okay." Lucca rolled her eyes, "Let's just forget about the fair right now and try to devise a plan..."
"Why don't we just split up?" Marle suggested.
Lucca thought for a moment, "Well, I guess that would work, but..."
"Well. What are we waiting for?" Marle interrupted, but it seemed like she didn't even notice that she did.
Lucca sighed, "Fine. But we'll need to be evenly spread out, just in case something happens. I just really hope that there won't be some big monster at the end of this..."
"I'm going with Crono!" Marle shouted, grabbing his arm, which made him stumble.
Lucca shook her head, "I think I have a better way to split everyone up." She dug into one of her pockets and pulled out seven straws.
"Where did you get those?" Crono asked, while pointing to the pink, white, blue, red, brown, black, and purple straws.
Lucca adjusted her glasses and laughed, "These are from the Easter Egg Hunt. I kept them just for something like this to happen."
Magus blinked, "You mean, you knew that Alfador was going to be kidnapped?"
"No! I meant that I kept them just in case we would need to be split up again." Lucca didn't wait for Magus to respond and just continued talking, "So whoever has blue, red, and brown go together; whoever has white and pink are a team, and finally the black and purple straws go with each other."
Everone grabbed a straw out of Lucca's hand. The color/people are as follows: Crono/white, Lucca/purple, Robo/brown, Frog/red, Ayla/blue, Marle/pink, and Magus/black.
"So, does everyone know who they are going with?" Lucca asked.
"Yep. I'm going with Crono!" Marle jumped, smiling while Crono just stood there, looking at his stomach.
"We art a comradeship." Frog pointed to Ayla and Robo.
"Then that leaves me with...Great, just great. Why do I have to be stuck with Magus of all people?" Lucca sighed and glared at the purple straw that she was holding in her hand.
"Well, it is kind of your fault since you told us to split up this way." Marle pointed out.
"Let's just get this over with." Lucca sighed, "The different teams will go into one of the doorways." They all headed through the different doorways, with their respective teams.
Crono and Marle only had to walk for a few minutes in the dark hall. Soon a small light appeared before them and after walking for a couple more minutes they came through another door. They both blinked; trying to adjust to the sudden light.
Finally looking around they noticed that there was a big pit right in front of them. It took up the whole floor space except for small platforms suspended in the air that lead to what looked like solid ground about 100 meters away from where Crono and Marle were standing.
Looking down the pit showed only darkness. The bottom of the hole was nowhere to be seen.
"Well, it looks like all we have to do is cross this gap. And don't fall down." Crono studied the platforms for a minute, while Marle was trying to determine how deep the pit really was.
"It looks safe enough to use those platforms." Crono turned to Marle, "Are you ready to make our trek across this expanse?"
"I guess. I don't really see how time could change this room, so let's just go now, while it's safe..." Marle trailed off in a whisper that went unheard.
Crono looked at the first platform, judging the distance to it. "We should be able to jump across these. Come on." Crono grabbed Marle by the wrist and jumped across the gap to get to the first platform; dragging Marle behind him.
"CROOONOO!" Marle screamed, until a second after she started her feet landed on the platform.
"Oh." Marle smiled sheepishly, but she quickly glared at Crono. "I could have fallen!"
"Don't worry. I held onto your wrist. There's no reason to get mad, since you didn't get hurt." Crono once again looked at the next platform. "We should be able to make it across again. And this time you'll know that we are jumping."
"Are you ready?" Crono asked. Marle just nodded, and they both got a running start. They were jumping across the gap when there was a small pulse of light far down in the darkness beneath them.
"What is that?" Marle asked hurridly. But then she saw that it was a spout of fire, and it was almost to the two of them. And they were only half-way to the next platform.
Without thinking about what she was doing Marle threw an ice blast down towards the fire. Right when Crono touched the ground of the platform, Marle just a millisecond behind him, there was a big explosion. The air that flew past Marle's body was warm, but at the same time icy cold.
"We were really lucky that you saw that when you did, Marle." Marle looked at Crono and just smiled.
"I know. Good thing I was looking." But we might not be as lucky next time...
"We're just about to jump again, are you ready Marle?" Crono held out his hand, which Marle took. Might as well get it over with. The two of them continued on across the platforms, encountering more spouts of flame and they sometimes came across giant spiders which were killed by combining lightning and ice magic.
They finally made it to the far side of the large bottomless pit, both exhausted from the use of magic.
"Can we use an Ether, now?" Marle asked as she was bent over, her hands on her knees.
Instead of wasting his breath Crono pulled out a Shelter instead. Soon they were both refreshed and Marle was smiling again.
"Hopefully that was all we had to do." They both then continued on through the door that was opposite the one they had come in.
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Robo, Ayla, and Frog walked only for a foot before lights came on. Ayla looked around frantically, trying to find the source. And when she did Ayla tilted her head to the side. The light was coming from Robo's head, which, since he is a robot, was built into his maintinence.
"We should continue on." Robo said in a mechanical voice, a beep and a whir following it.
Frog just nodded and walked on, Ayla following about a minute behind; she was still trying to figure out just what Robo had down. And after putting it down as that pretty and dangerous stuff that Crono did sometimes in a battle (in other words magic) Ayla ran after the diminishing light.
They walked only for a moment when they came to a fork in the tent. Frog stood there a moment contemplating when Robo spoke up.
"Analyzing of the surroundings has been completed." Once again Robo beeped, which is usual for Robots to do.
"What 'an-a-lie-sing' mean?" Ayla asked as she sat down on the ground.
Robo's eyes whirred, "The surrounding area is a maze. I have the data needed to make it through."
Frog nodded, "Thou art intelligent to figure that. I shalt follow thee." So Robo just walked forward and turned right, Frog following, and Ayla, once again, coming a minute later.
Thanks to Robo's ability to map mazes without even going through them, the trio soon made it to the end.
Ayla stopped, "I hungry. We stop? We eat?" Ayla had a hungry gleam in her eye.
"Hark, thou shalt have to wait. Precede." Frog then walked through the door that was right in front of the three of them.
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They had been walking for a long while, and there was no change in their surroundings, besides the fact that the stripes were moving by. Magus had been using his magic continuously since he had lit up the anteroom of the tent.
"How much longer are we going to walk? I'm beginning to think that I'm walking in the same place." Lucca complained, and it didn't do any good that she had Magus for a partner either.
"Maybe we are." Lucca started, Magus hadn't said anything since they had entered this tunnel, and now here he was agreeing with her.
"And if we are..." Lucca trailed off. Let's not go in that direction.
"Then we could be stuck in here forever." Lucca wasn't sure but she thought that he sounded pleased at the thought.
"But, then we wouldn't have any food, or have good hygiene. And I am not going to eat you!" Lucca was getting angry. I don't think I can stand having to spend so much time with him!
"And we aren't going to have that problem."
"What are you talking about Magus?" When Lucca looked up at him all he did was point ahead of them. Lucca also noticed that Magus didn't have a ball of magic hovering above his hand either.
"Is this the end of the tent? Do we have any farther to go?" Lucca really hoped that they didn't, after all, the last who knows how many minutes had been very boring.
Just at that moment a green imp jumped out of nowhere. Magus, having had an experience with a green imp that popped out of nowhere before jumped up and hid behind Lucca.
"No, I thought that I had gotten rid of you Imp!" Magus was breathing very heavily, and his hands were clutching Lucca's shoulders, making her wince.
The green imp's eyes widened, "You knew my son?"
Magus looked confused for a moment, "Then you are Imp?" he asked.
"No!" the green imp laughed, "Imp is my son's name. And mine is Wimp."
A light bulb above Magus' head seemed to light up, "So you're the Swedish father that Imp talked about. And you don't know Russian!" Magus once again seemed happy, for about a millisecond.
"Da! I am a Swede! But I still know some Russian." Magus' face fell.
Lucca, who up till now had just been standing in the audience, spoke up, "All right! What are you two talking about?!"
But she seemed to be unheard because Wimp just continued talking. "Did Imp call you Dushenka?" and at Magus' nod, Wimp became serious.
"I would be careful if I were you. Once a person calls someone his or her Dushenka you could be in deep doodoo."
Lucca seemed interested, "What does Dushenka mean?" Wimp finally seemed to see Lucca and smiled.
"I know not what it means, but my wife said it to me when I was young and foolish. Now I am hers forever whether I want to or not." Wimp shook his head sadly.
"How could I be in trouble from Imp calling me Dushenka?" Magus questioned.
Wimp laughed, "If Imp sincerely meant 'Dushenka' then you are his love for life. But I really highly doubt that he did. Imp's had thousands of Dushenkas. Another bad thing is if you call someone Dushenka. If you really meant it, then that person is your love, for life."
Magus looked as if he was going to be sick, but it really wasn't that noticeable because he usually looks sick when he is healthy.
Wimp smiled and laughed again, "So you had better not say Dushenka unless you know what you are doing. Sometimes I wish that I didn't say it to my wife all those years ago..."
"I HEARD THAT, DUSHENKA!!" came a voice from far off.
Wimp's eyes widened again, "I'd better be off. That's my wife, mad. Bye!" and Wimp ran off to where no body but his wife may know.
After he was gone Lucca blinked, "I'm very confused now. All that Dushenka stuff..."
Magus just shrugged and walked towards a doorway across the room, that was the same as the hall. Lucca hurried to catch up with him. The hallway after the room where they had met Wimp was very short compared to the first that they had gone through.
So after a few minutes of walking they both came to a big room that was the same as the anteroom of the tent. The only difference was that Alfador was in this room, right in front of what seemed like the exit.
"Alfador!" Magus ran forward and scooped up his pet. Lucca was about to go to Alfador too when she noticed figures in the other two doorways, on the same wall as the one that Magus and Lucca had come through.
After futher scrutinizing Lucca found out that it was the rest of the team, and all of them fine and dandy. All of them came together where Magus and Alfador were.
"Alfador! You weren't hanged!" Marle rushed forward to give the cat a hug but pulled back when Magus glared at her.
"Well, since we've found Alfador, I think that we can leave now." Lucca suggested. Everyone else nodded agreement and started towards the exit door. All except Magus that is, who was still holding Alfador.
Lucca rolled her eyes, "Magus. Magus! MAGUS, GET OVER HERE NOW!!" at the last yell Magus quickly got up and came over with Alfador.
Lucca raised her eyebrows, "Wow, the great Magus listened to a small little girl? What has gotten into you?"
Magus blinked for a second, "You're right! I'm getting to soft! I guess it is time to go into some extensive training again!!" And with that Magus ran out of the tent with Alfador, leaving Lucca to shake her head and ran to catch up with him, who was headed towards the Epoch.
Karana: well, what do you know, this is really long! Well, it's the longest one-shot I've done, but definitely not the longest chapter. But it is almost there. And what I said about 'Dushenka' is not real, the only thing that is is that it is Russian. And it means 'Love of my life' or 'Love of my soul'. Something like that.