A friend asked for something short for Jack-O-Lantern, I needed a break from the next major chapter, and so here we have the Prince of Spooky Scary Skeletons waking up from a nap. We also get to see what his actual face looks like in this, but it's not showing for long.

Also: Jack-O-Lantern, unlike other spirits, has to go into long periods of sleep (almost like hibernation) when it's not October. He has a love hate relationship with it. :/

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Darkness. It was all he knew. Smothering, endless darkness. He felt as if he should be suffocating, but he had no lungs that needed the air his head screamed for him to breathe. He pushed one skeletal hand upwards, pushing past rock and dirt and finally hitting the surface.

His other hand joined the first, then he himself rose up from the dark soil, rising up like some sort of zombie clawing it's way to the surface. He finally breathed, though he had no lungs to inflate with oxygen. Still, he breathed in the cold night air. Sitting still, in the middle of his pumpkin patch (no matter the time of year, his pumpkins continued to grow without pause), sometime in mid-July.

Jack-O-Lantern slowly stood up, listening to the crack and pop of bones and joints scraping together. His green pinstripe suit was clean with a snap of his fingers and a pop of orange light. He'd been asleep for a good long month, and it seemed by his undisturbed pumpkin cats that no one had tried to bother his realm.

He turned very slowly, stretching long arms above him as he surveyed his dark and dreary landscape.

During Halloween, this place would be lit up by bright lights and playful scares and laughter would be abundant. For now, in mid-July, it was simply a dark and creepy place.

It fit Lantern perfectly, and his pumpkin cats and ghostly ghouls could easily scare anyone away while he napped. A far colder breeze than before hit his back, causing him to turn to locate the source. Far above him, Jack Frost waved in greeting as he zipped past the infamous patch of land.

The Halloween spirit let loose a haunted howl in return, watching in satisfaction as the noise startled the much younger spirit. One of his ghouls slid up to st and beside him, a nightmarish thing that was more shadow than ghoul.

Jack-O-Lantern waved the thing off, watching pieces of it detach like smoke. It moved away with the sound of mournful weeping, soon leaving the old spirit in the dark and the biting chill.

He heaved a sigh, reaching up to pull off his grinning pumpkin and set it down on a nearby, table-like gourd.

Despite popular belief, he hadn't always been this murderous, psychotic vegetable wearing freak. He'd once been human, and his visage underneath his favorite accessory gave it truth.

Unbeknownst to the Halloween spirit, Jack had flown back over, suddenly finding himself wanting to talk to the older spirit. He froze (hahaha) in midair as the spooky man pulled off what Jack had thought to be his head.

He meant to turn and leave, but something about being able to see those orange and green eyes stopped him, as did the smoky grey hair, the ashen skin and the black marks around his eyes.

Jack-O-Lantern looked up suddenly, but Jack had already dashed away upon realizing he was the one being creepy now.

The Halloween spirit down in the pumpkin patch stood there for a long moment, a bit confused - he'd sworn he had heard someone gasp, though he supposed it could have been one of his more well hidden ghouls.

Shrugging it off, Jack-O-Lantern woke his minions with a banshee like shriek, his pumpkin already in place on his head once his little pets had surrounded him.

"Come on guys, October is close! We have to start preparations now if we're gonna be prepared for our best Halloween yet!" He cackled, causing his ghouls and cats to scream and howl in excitement.

As spiders crawled over the pumpkins, as rats skittered about underfoot, Jack-O-Lantern still couldn't shake the suspicion he had that someone had been in his realm earlier...when he'd taken off his headgear...

"Perhaps they'll come back for the party?" Ah well, it couldn't be helped. It had only been one day, but already Lantern found himself settling in his skeletal throne, eyes flailing shut for a quick nap.

(Spoilers: he wakes up two days later and is very angry.)