A/N: Thank you for all of the support from everyone who reads, follows, and reviews! Also, Scooby Doo
and the Witch's Ghost is arguably the best Scooby Doo movie, tied with Scooby Doo on Zombie Island.
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Charlie had a normal day, thankfully. Asteria was glad to see him pull up the drive no worse for wear as she finished a big pot of chicken noodle soup. It was good for the soul, after all. He hung his coat up and took his boots off while Asteria ladled soup into a bowl for him. She took a discreet glance in his boots as she handed him his soup, checking to see if you could tell her spell was in there.
"They stink that bad," Charlie asked as he took his bowl.
"No, I was just wondering if you needed new ones for Christmas," Asteria replied. She patted herself on the back for her quick thinking. "It'll be here before you know it."
"Let's get through Thanksgiving first," Charlie said as he dug into the soup. "You know I love your cooking, kid, but what are your plans for Thanksgiving? Were you thinking about going back to see Liam?"
Asteria paused for a long while. She really hadn't given much thought to it, and it made her uneasy. "I don't really know, Charlie. I haven't talked about it with him at all. Wouldn't that leave you by yourself for it though? I wouldn't want you to starve to death or anything."
Charlie rolled his eyes at her. "I've been surviving just fine this whole time. I don't want you to miss out though, if you wanted to go back home."
Was that Asteria's home? Or was Charlie's house now also Asteria's? Was home where her parents had raised her, and this whole time she had just been kicked around from one spot to another? "I'll talk to him to about it, maybe," Asteria said. "We haven't really talked in a while so I'm not sure what the best plans would be. It might be easier to just stay here."
Liam and she had definitely not left things on the best of terms, and she struggled to remember the last, tense text sent between the two. Asteria understood he was still mad at her for spiraling out of control over junior year, but he was also not the most supportive person in her life. It had lead to a lot of butting heads and she wondered if they would ever repair their fractured relationship. After all, he was estranged from the family for years before her parents passed and gave custody to him.
Charlie frowned at her. It seemed like the chief had picked up on the tone of her voice. "Everything okay between you two," he asked.
"Yeah, it's fine," Asteria said. "We just didn't leave things on good terms, and he's kind of busy with his job a lot-,"
"I don't know exactly what went on last year," Charlie interrupted her. "But you're a good kid. He needs to start seeing that."
Asteria gave him a small smile, "thanks, Charlie."
"Do you want me to talk to him about it," Charlie asked her.
"No, thank you though," Asteria said while shaking her head and stirring her soup around in the bowl. "If it's fine with you, I'd rather just stay here for Thanksgiving. There's not much back in Wisconsin for me anyway."
Charlie nodded, letting the matter drop. Asteria sighed in relief as she took another bite of soup. He usually wasn't prone to emotional probing, which made Asteria wondered what got into him. Maybe a marathon of Dr. Phil came on at the station all day. Either way, she finished dinner quickly to avoid any further awkward conversation.
"You know," Charlie said as he broke the silence. Asteria mentally cursed in her head; she had her empty bowl hovering over the sink, literally seconds from making a clean getaway. "Would you mind cooking Thanksgiving dinner for four?"
"What do you mean," Asteria asked suspiciously.
"Well, Billy and Jacob don't really do Thanksgiving either. I usually meet them up at the diner every year. We could still go to the diner if you want-," Charlie said.
"No, that sounds great. I don't mind having them over," Asteria replied with a smile.
She hadn't seen much of either of them since that night they ate together at the diner, which felt like forever ago. Asteria had been spending a lot of time out with her friends during whatever playoff season had the boys camped out on the couch, and since then Charlie and Billy had typically been out fishing. It had to have been weeks since they were over.
"I'll let them know next time we're fishing," Charlie said.
"Eager to invite them over," Asteria grinned at him.
"It's already half way through November," Charlie told her. "You've got about a week before Turkey Day."
"Oh, shoot," Asteria said. "I'm already behind."
Charlie laughed at her. "Just don't forget to make some berry cobbler."
Going upstairs, Asteria realized she needed to wrap this entity business up quickly. She wanted everything over and done with by the time they had company over; it would be just her luck to ruin the holiday with something witchy.
Sitting down on her bed, Asteria began to map out a plan. She wrote down different ideas, crossed them out, and then circled several before rewriting them in a cohesive order. Her own Scooby Doo trap was set. Velma and Fred would be so proud.
The first step would be to lift the protection spell that already surrounded the Cullens' old house. Asteria was sure she had seen some instructions in the book of shadows on how to remove a spell, and wasn't too worried; that would end up being one of the last things anyway.
The next step was actually straight from the old lady in the occult shop. While using her incense earlier Asteria had remembered all of the woman's advice; cumin mixed with sea salt would keep the entity from showing up anywhere she didn't want it to. That meant she could funnel it right into their trap.
That's exactly what step number three was: a mirror trap, more than likely made with a sigil on the back of the mirror, to lock the entity inside. Asteria had seen some neatly written instructions from an ancestor named Lillian, Ailis' daughter, which showed how to create your own sigil. She was sure pairing that as a one-two punch with something else would definitely get it where it was supposed to.
Of course, it was going to be tricky to shove the right thing inside the mirror. Wouldn't it be just fantastic if Asteria got her own soul trapped in the mirror before it smashed to pieces? She figured there had to be a way to lock her soul safe inside her body. Yet another spell for me to make, she thought with sarcasm.
The next part was going to be the most fun: launching that sucker straight at the wall once it was trapped in the mirror. The only place for it to go once it got out of the mirror would be straight through the portal, since that's exactly what she was breaking the mirror against. After that she just had to break the sigil that created the doorway to their world, and she'd be free once and for all.
It felt productive to have a plan, even if she wasn't entirely sure how to execute it. It was like buying office supplies; it gave Asteria a false sense of accomplishment. She spent the rest of the night going over various points in her plan to make sure it was foolproof, and even came up with the sigil to draw on the back of the mirror. The sigil would lock the entity in, but she needed something to force it inside.
Oddly enough, Asteria had sudden inspiration from the least likely source. She had been joking around with Charlie the week before and turned on a marathon of Cops to annoy him. The only part she had seen before Charlie changed the channel was a SWAT team throwing tear gas into a house. Supernatural tear gas sounded like the perfect way to subdue something that powerful.
Full of weird ideas, Asteria grabbed her laptop and started searching the internet for how to make a smoke bomb. As nice as incense was, she just didn't think it was going to cut it this time. It looked easy enough to do, and she was sure she could throw in powdered sage and a few other things without affecting the recipe. Weaponized witchcraft was beginning to look like her forte. She wondered if her ancestors would be proud of her for it.
Feeling very satisfied with herself, Asteria finally decided to catch some sleep. She slept peacefully thanks to her dream pillow, which helped ease a lot of her stress. Asteria couldn't remember her dreams when she woke up, but she was aware neither Brigid nor Ailis had visited her. They were still on the astral plane looking into what she should do about the entity, and she was eager to tell them her plan. She wanted their insight to see if it would work.
Asteria felt invincible, which was a complete one-eighty from the day before. Maybe it was too early to celebrate, but she felt like she had already won with her plan all laid out before her. She blared "Yellow Flicker Beat" by Lorde as she barreled into the parking lot and reclaimed her parking space, which did not go unnoticed by the silver Volvo she cut off.
"Now we're even," Asteria said as she opened her car door.
"You hold plenty of grudges, don't you," Edward asked her with a hint of annoyance.
Asteria smiled at him as she sipped her coffee.
"Someone's in a good mood today," Rosalie commented.
Asteria shrugged. "I've got everything all figured out." With that, she started walking to class, knowing it would annoy the Cullens.
"Care to elaborate," Emmett asked her.
"Of course," Asteria said with a grin. "After school, though. There's a lot of details, and I was hoping I could use your kitchen for it. I think Charlie is off today."
"I have to wait the whole school day," Alice grumbled. "Why can't you just tell us now?"
"Where's the fun in that," Asteria asked. "By the way, I need to stop at a hardware store first."
"I don't think I'm going to like this plan," Alice said.
"Oh, sure you will," Asteria said. "It's going to be fun, come on. We're gonna be late for class."
The day passed by easily, although Alice spent the entirety of Spanish trying to get Asteria to fill her in. It was probably mean not to tell Alice anything, but it was kind of nice to see the shoe on the other foot for once. She could deal with it for a few more hours.
Asteria's good mood was even picked up by her friends at lunch, it seemed. "What's got you so chipper today," Natalie asked her.
"Can't I just be in a good mood," Asteria asked as she raised an eyebrow.
"Literally no. What is it," Natalie asked her.
"I don't know, I just feel like I've got things figured out right now," Asteria replied. "I'm on top of homework, I've got a social life, things are good with Charlie. It's nice."
"Good," Rachael said. "I'm happy for you. Does that mean you're going to that party in Hoquiam next weekend?"
"She's probably going back home for Thanksgiving break," Natalie interjected.
"Actually I'm staying here for break. I can probably go to the party," Asteria said.
"What about your uncle in Wisconsin? Don't you want to go back home and catch up with your friends," Rachael asked.
"Not particularly," Asteria said. She stabbed at her salad a little more viciously than she intended to and set her fork down. "Why, trying to get rid of me?"
"Of course not, I just thought," Rachael said. "Doesn't matter. It'll be a fun party to go to."
Their conversation drifted on to other topics, but Asteria didn't put much heart into it. She was doing her best to keep her good mood up where it belonged, and didn't need any reminders of her past. By the end of the day Asteria had regrouped and was ready to go.
"Do you want me to ride with you," Alice asked her as they finally reached the cars. It didn't take a mind reader to guess Alice's intentions; she was already sitting on the hood of the Camaro.
"I wouldn't mind," Asteria said as she unlocked the doors. "Jasper, did you want to come along too?"
"Thank you, but I believe Emmett already made plans with me," Jasper said kindly.
"He's about to get destroyed at Mortal Kombat," Emmett informed her with a grin.
"Best of luck with that," Asteria said with a shake of her head as she climbed into the driver's seat. "See you back at the house, I guess."
Their first stop was Charlie's, where she needed to pick up a lot of the herbs for her spells as well as her book of shadows. Of course, they weren't more than ten seconds into their trip before Alice demanded to know the plan.
"I don't want to keep repeating it," Asteria said with an eye roll. "Can't you just wait until I tell everyone?"
Alice's pout had no rival. "I just want to know what's happening."
"Ugh," Asteria groaned. "You're impossible. Fine, I'll tell you a bit. I'm going to lure the entity back to the house, trap it in a mirror, and then force it through the doorway."
"That sounds," Alice drug out as she paused to think it over. "Complicated. Are you sure it's going to work? It could get dangerous."
"I've got a good feeling about it," Asteria said. "I went over it all last night from different angles to work out the kinks and I think when the time comes it'll be more or less foolproof."
"Why not just force it through to begin with," Alice asked. "Why do you have to put it into the mirror?"
"I have my reasons," Asteria said. She saw the look of annoyance on Alice's face and continued. "The entity is desperate to go back through the portal to recharge its strength, but I don't think it's going to be easy. I have a feeling if this thing is even a little smart, it won't go anywhere near the portal if it knows we're in the house; it'll attack us first. It won't expect the mirror trap, I know it. Plus, when we break the mirror its gonna rip that thing to pieces."
Alice nodded thoughtfully. "So you think breaking the mirror is going to weaken it enough to force it through?"
"Huh? No, I was thinking I'm gonna enjoy shattering that thing into a million little pieces," Asteria said. She rolled her eyes when Alice gave her a stern look. "Besides that, it should definitely weaken it enough to force it through."
"Aren't you concerned that not all of the pieces will go through the portal," Alice asked. "I don't even know if that's possible, but what if some of it remains behind?"
"Good point," Asteria said thoughtfully. "We'll need something to clear the area after to be sure. Guess I'll make two bombs."
"Bombs," Alice asked with raised eyebrows. "Please don't tell me it's what I think it is."
"Smoke bombs," Asteria said with a smug smile. She was pretty proud of herself for that particular MacGyver idea. "For incense. We could do it the normal way and waste twenty minutes, or we could do it the fun way where I make explosives."
"I don't like anything about this," Alice started.
"Of course you don't," Asteria said with a roll of her eyes. "If it makes you feel better there's no gun powder, so it's not like anything actually explodes. Probably."
"How comforting," Alice responded sarcastically.
They rounded up all of the supplies that Asteria needed, which was impressive considering Charlie was actually home. Alice was the perfect distraction, though, so it's not like it came as a big surprise that they left with everything on record time. They only needed a few things from the hardware store so it was easy to get in and out. It looked like a snow storm was on its way; bags of rock salt and ice melt were neatly stacked for sale by the doors. Getting sudden inspiration, Asteria grabbed a few bags of rock salt and threw them in the cart.
"What are those for," Alice asked.
"Go big or go home," Asteria shrugged. "We should probably run by the grocery store now too, though."
One trip to the grocery store for excessive amounts of cumin later, they pulled in the Cullens' driveway. The car was barely parked before Jasper was outside to help carry bags in. By the time Asteria climbed out she had just her own backpack to carry inside.
The kitchen counter was nice and clean, at least it was before Alice started unloading ingredients left and right. It looked like she was alphabetizing them, which was fine by Asteria. It wasn't like she knew what was going in where anyway.
"Goodness, do you think that will be enough," Esme said from the doorway.
"I know you're joking, but a fantastic amount of overkill is exactly what I'm going for. So, thanks," Asteria said. "I want it to be the equivalent of using a nuke to kill a spider."
"I don't like that at all," Alice said. "That's exactly how things go wrong."
"Ah, come on Alice," Asteria said as she lit some candles around the kitchen. They weren't for any particular purpose, but they did give the air a nice energy and peace to it. They helped ease Asteria's mind as well. "It'll be perfectly fine. I'll be in and out of that house in like twenty minutes tops."
"We'll," Alice said.
"What," Asteria asked.
"We will be in and out in twenty minutes," Alice said.
"Yikes, that's what I thought you said. About that-," Asteria started.
"Absolutely not! I already hate everything about this, there is no way you are going anywhere near that house by yourself. I promised to keep you safe," Alice sounded off. The force of her indignation made Asteria involuntarily step backwards.
Asteria sighed. "Alice, realistically speaking, what exactly are you going to be able to do to help? If the entity starts attacking you won't have any power to stop it. It's easier if I go in by myself."
Jasper shook his head. "You're not going in by yourself. That's final."
"It makes no sense to have you in-," Asteria said.
"This is not up for discussion," Alice cut her off. For being just barely above the height restrictions for riding in a car seat, Alice was menacing when she wanted to be. It was almost enough to make Asteria back down. Almost.
"Sweetie," Esme said. Asteria had forgotten she was in the doorway. "You know we would never let anything bad happen to you. We're not going to let you put yourself in danger on your own. The fact that you have to deal with this is bad enough; we would never leave you to it by yourself."
Asteria sighed. "I get it, I just don't know if it's going to do more harm than good to have anyone else there. If you can't help, and I get hurt, it's just going to make everything worse. I'm still not sure this is going to work."
Alice was about to respond, but Asteria's head whipped around to the side at that exact moment. She swore she caught something out of the corner of her eye, a white-gray blur stepping into the room.
"Shh," Asteria said as she focused. It was hard to do, but she could just focus out of the corner of her eye and follow the figure as it moved around the edge of the kitchen. "I don't think we're alone."
"What is it," Esme asked. She tried to follow Asteria's line of sight, as did the others, but it was obvious they couldn't see it.
The blurry figure floated towards the candle closest to it and a slight breeze blew out the candle's flame. Asteria could hear a soft gasp from one of the Cullens. "Looks like we have news," she announced.
