Chapter 16: All Aboard the Crazy Train

The fact that the scent of cinnamon and vanilla, two of the best perfumes in the world, took over the darkness, meant that Audrey was finally some sort of pleasant dream.

She looked down at herself. Thankfully, she wasn't in some kind of blood-covered dress but in a dress variation of her vest. She looked around her and saw that she was in some kind of dream version of the Fall Festival, where everything from the park to the decorations were carved out of glowing spinel gemstones. The party attendants, all shining in their statuesque forms of shining pink material, were laughing and dancing away, completely ignoring Audrey as she moved towards the blue-crystallized version of the gazebo, where a figure was waiting alone.

When Audrey put a foot on the steps, she heard a splashing sound. She looked down and was temporarily alarmed to see the blood pouring down the steps transform into red vines that sprouted lovely magnolia flowers. A hand picked up one of the blooming beauties and tucked it behind Audrey's ears, prompting the latter to lift her head up at the gazebo figure.

He looked familiar. Yes, he looked exactly like the human duality of the demonic portrait that had captivated Audrey back in Lydia's studio. The dork-like mortal that came before his demonic self. Though Audrey found the source of the pouring blood, his stained and cut arms, she was too distracted by his dark chocolate brown eyes. She didn't pay attention to his hands staining hers because she was too charmed by his sudden, gentle kiss on her hand, causing her to feel as if her own blood had boiled to the heat of lava. He was so silent, too mysterious, obviously a dream idealization of someone already dead that Audrey never knew, and Audrey didn't hesitate one bit when the silent but smiling man courteously dragged her around the gazebo in a waltz… Animosity still came to Audrey at the thought of her family, but she still recalled what meeting men like these in dreams…

Her dreamy waltz came to an abrupt stop, however, when a glass-cracking sound took over. Audrey looked away from that enchanting devil and saw that all the partying crystal figures had turned into withered ghouls of shattered glass, cackling and hissing as they mobbed a crying Beatrice Deetz.

"Beatrice!" Audrey pulled herself away and ran down the gazebo steps. The crystal ghouls melted, phasing from burning mineral to a boiling pool of blood. "BEATRICE!" Audrey felt the tears coming down as Beatrice helplessly drowned and Audrey was pulled back up the gazebo. The environment darkened, the gazebo became one of cold stones, and the enchanting man was no longer there. The despising, red-cloaked demon who still kept his features shadowed and only his indifferent smile showing, had reappeared. He was the one who had pulled Audrey away.

"Leave me alone! I got to save Beatrice!" Audrey cried.

"Save her from what? She's still sleeping in her bedroom." The demon shrugged.

"But she's drowning in my own nightmare!"

"That's Macabretown for you. When one person dreams the worst for someone they dislike, it manifests into others' dreams as nightmares. And not a lot of people enjoy the mischievous darling. You just happen to be among the few dozens of people who got their sweet dreams interrupted because Augusta Gloop is currently fantasizing about our favorite hybrid drowning in melted red velvet cake."

Audrey frowned. Come to think of it, the red liquid surrounding the gazebo did look a lot chunkier than the previous pools of blood she had witnessed in her previous nightmare encounters with her demon. She cautiously bent down and dipped her hand in it; against all sense of reason, she went on to lick her soaked hand and was surprised to see that it did taste like a melted red velvet cake with massive hints of cream flavors. "Wow. As a calories-promoter, Augusta Gloop makes some very weird dreams."

"You're lucky you never had to witness Vincent Salt's daydream of croquet-playing squirrels chasing Beatrice. When it infiltrated Hannibal Lecter's slumber, it made his nightmares far too insane, even for me."

"Why are you even here?" Audrey grimaced as the air finally became filthy with lemongrass odors.

"You know the answer to that."

"That you only show up to talk to me in some stupid disguise in my nightmares and you're begging to pass a contract." Audrey rolled her eyes. "I get it. It's inevitable, but I'm not in a rush.

"You have been made aware while in this town that time in Hell works differently than on Earth," the demon said matter-of-factly.

"Duh. But I also know that I still won't give in easily!"

"Well somebody has her adrenaline spiked up!" The demon sounded satisfied. "How did it feel to punch that pathetic Vincent Salt?"

"Like he should have backed off when he had the chance. Beatrice is my friend!"

"Of course she is. She has the natural desire of being social and having friends who appreciate her as she is and not for her status. If I didn't know her so well, I could easily be jealous of that strong friendship bordering on symbolic sisterhood. You never show me any positive feelings."

"Why should I?" Audrey rolled her eyes. "The only times I talk to you, it's when you show up in my nightmares and you act all creepy!"

The demon shrugged and sat down on the steps. Audrey stepped back to make sure she had at least 12 inches of separation from him. "I should warn you, though. Auradon hasn't totally given up on you. They recently managed to have a bounty hunter infiltrate across the mist. He's currently pacing around the urban cities between your next stop and where Beatrice must take you in the east. He's from the Isle of the Lost."

"How is that possible?" Audrey frowned. "Only those who never intend to go back can cross the mist."

"How he did it, I don't know, but he promised he'd bring you back to your ex-family. So take my advice well for once, my Queen of Mean. When you leave this morning, stay as close to your friends. Avoid the overly-sugared treats the hosts give you. STAY away from the boy with grey hair who bears the twin dagger of Gothy Gothel's."

"Gothy? What does she have to do with it?"

Compared to the way he had ended their previous conversations, the demon's faceless manifestation had disappeared without a trace, leaving Audrey in total darkness and to open her eyes around 5am, in Beatrice's bedroom, with the Bloody Bambi sleeping and acting as Audrey's pillow.

Later in the morning

As Beatrice had said previously, only one train left Macabretown every week. When the Deetz parents drove the expanded group to the Macabretown train station, the newcomers had the confirmation. In Audrey's perspective, the train was almost half the length as the highway that led her old castle to Auradon Prep, compiled by more than forty wagons and a locomotive that were each nearly twice as big as Beetlejuice's car. Because the train only left town once a week, there were usually hundreds of passengers boarding it (according to Lydia Deetz), but because of Willywaffle Wonka's important trip, nearly thousands of his family's Oompa-Loompa employees were running around cautiously carrying crates into the dozens of cargo wagons.

It took nearly thirty minutes for the Deetz parents and Beatrice to break up their tearful hug, remind Beatrice how much they loved her, to not forget giving phone calls, and of course the extra food and clothing they had packed for everyone. By the time everyone had boarded, the train was leaving the station.

To Audrey's shock, the small wagons were more expanded on the inside to the point where anybody could have fit a series of hotel. Heck, even the cabins were fancy hotel rooms that could be modified based on the passengers' tastes. Naturally, Willywaffle proved further his 'generosity by letting the girls and the Bloody Bambi stay in his reserved VIP cabin, aka the whole wagon.

"The train is planning on making additional stops in ten other towns before we reach the Troll lands," Willywaffle said as he helped Gothy put the last suitcase in a closet. "I cross my fingers that, at worst, we get there before tomorrow at dawn."

"Wow! It's that far?" Gothy was stunned.

"Well at best, we could get there before midnight if the weather doesn't add on to the numerous train station stops, but you never know with the wild environments that still occupy the areas that aren't big towns or small cities."

Beatrice shuddered. "To think we could reach the desert by dinnertime! Sandworms are known for emerging out of the ground at the time… and the train tracks are literally suspended in midair by pillars that the sandworms can strike at anytime!"

"That, but the train also goes over the Jungle of Jumanji." Crystal flipped through a brochure that was sitting on the coffee table. "I haven't seen that jungle in a while. Do you think we might spot stampeding rhinos or people who eat combustion cakes?"

"Ooh, maybe we'll spot some treasure hunters escaping the temples of El Dorado!" Beatrice stopped shivering and clapped her hands. "Oh, maybe we'll see the ruins of Egypt from the time the plagues struck!"

"Those are further south," Willywaffle said bluntly.

"The Troll lands are part of the Dream Peninsula," Beatrice continued talking to Crystal as if she hadn't heard Willywaffle. "We might be able to spot the Dragon Lands when we get there!"

"My gosh, isn't it the time of year when the entire Peninsula go on into daily festivals and parties?" Crystal finally turned to Willywaffle. "You wouldn't happen to be catering for the biggest fiesta in the Peninsula, would you?"

"It's none of your business!" He snapped and made his way to the corridor. "Now if you'll excuse me, I need to go stress-baking!"

The girls watched silently as he left and slammed the door. "Stress-baking?" Gothy frowned.

"A lot like stress eating, but instead of eating junk food, he bakes a lot of pastries." Beatrice jumped off the couch and started running up the stairs. "Last one to the pool is a rotten egg!"

"Oh, no!" Gothy ran after her. "I will not stink of egg salads because of you!"

"Hurry it up then, Gorgeous!" Crystal tagged along. While the three ran upwards laughing, the Bloody Bambi silently followed Audrey as she walked her way to the room she and the other girls shared. Thanks to the train's weird functions, they could each customize their bed sheets, so Audrey had no difficulty identifying Gothy's crimson red bed. On the bed, Gothy had left her red purse she had brought along and stuffed in her backpack since the beginning of the journey. Definetly a purse sewed out of red patches of silk from the Isle of the Lost with golden lines forming the Sun Flower.

Audrey cautiously looked at the Bloody Bambi. It turned to look at the door, as if to be on the look out. She sighed and immediately unzipped the purse, and the first thing that caught her eye was the shine of a silver dagger, big enough to carry in her hand and with thinly curved ends for the cross-guard. It was very likely that Audrey had seen this dagger before, and after some further thinking, she recognized it from the history books, where among the graphic images of heroes fighting villains, there was the illustration of Mother Gothel stabbing Rapunzel's man with a dagger just like the one that Gothy had hid in her purse.

"Wonder who has the twin dagger," Audrey said to herself as she took a picture of the dagger with her phone before hiding the dagger back where she found it and dashing out of the room with the Bloody Bambi."

2 hours later

"So what do we do next?" Beatrice asked once the girls were done with lunch. "I already beat Gothy in pool."

"The conductor said we'd be moving above the jungle," Crystal said. "I want to see the rhinos stampeding. Heck, I'd like to take the whole stampede back home so it can trample all over Jareth, but I don't want to get trampled by angry animal activities."

Audrey looked on as the waiters carried off the dishes. "Willywaffle hasn't stepped out of the kitchen since we left. Shouldn't we check on him?"

"Nah." Beatrice shook his head. "He stress bakes a lot. I wouldn't be surprised if he refuses to come out until we arrive. And he's anti-social."

"But then how the Hell are you two friends?" Gothy frowned.

"It's one of those 'I only tolerate you as my friend because of my history as your grouchy babysitter since I was thirteen' kind of relationships."

The others were so caught up with Beatrice's story about Willywaffle babysitting her, they didn't notice Audrey silently leaving the dining area with the Bloody Bambi. She wasn't sure why, especially after she had witnessed yesterday how condescending he was to Beatrice, but perhaps by recalling her own experience of shutting herself after the Queen of Mean incident, Audrey wanted to make sure that Willywaffle wasn't driving himself into further insanity. They already had the train speakers constantly playing different versions of the song 'Crazy Train'. She found the door to the kitchen and was immediately overwhelmed by a cascade of sugary scents the moment she opened the door. The kitchen, practically as big as the one she had back in Auradon, was almost hidden due to the piles of countless cakes, cupcakes, éclairs, parfaits, shortcakes, muffins, shortcakes, cookies, brioches, breads, brownies, smores, and other pastries she couldn't pronounce. The only things that weren't completely hidden by the mountains of pastries were the heated oven, two shelves of books that didn't hold just cookbooks, and a counter where Willywaffle kept baking. His eyes were surrounded by black areas that made his tiredness very clear as he tossed a dirty bowl of batter into the sink with the other endless piles of dirty dishes and picked out a new bowl.

"If you're here to taunt me that I should take a break, go ask someone else, newbie." Willywaffle coldly said as his eyes were still glued to the eggs he cracked in the bowl.

"How'd you know it was me?"

"Spending my time in the kitchens has sharpened my senses the same way the perfume industry has perfected the Grenouille family's sense of smell." He mixed some mint extract into the wet batter. "Nearly everyone smells like a pastry to me, but you smell like a Black Forest cake with an overdose of salt that would be ignored even on the top shelf of a shop and only an exploiter would feast on it due to his immunity against sweet personalities and cravings for individual desolation."

Audrey grimaced at his way of insulting her, he made her own demon's remarks about Audrey sympathetic. From what Audrey had heard about him, he was the son of the anti-hero from the same story where the original Four Bratty Kids led their flaws and egos become eternally traumatized by the anti-hero and his factory, and the Wonka cynicism had apparently worsened in the second generation of chocolatiers. Willywaffle was basically a brightly dressed emo with the hobbies of a manchild and the personality of one's grumpy elderly neighbor. Suddenly she found it to be a miracle that Beatrice hadn't mentally destroyed him if the hybrid was correct about him babysitting Beatrice since he was thirteen.

"I don't suppose you need help cleaning the dishes or doing something about all those pastries." Audrey gestured the invaded sink and, well, the entire kitchen.

"Do what you want. I don't care." Willywaffle shrugged.

Audrey rolled her eyes and summoned a spinel ball in her hand. "A sink full of mess, Must be spared from such despair, Let's save some distress." Pink sparkles filled the kitchen and the dishes automatically cleaned themselves in the sink full of bubbly water and put themselves back in their proper cabinets. Audrey stared at Willywaffle but he looked unfazed. He merely continued to finish his batter and pour it in a baking mold.

"Are you serious right now?" Audrey gasped.

"I'm sorry. I don't do standing ovations." He cautiously placed the mold in the oven before slamming the lid shut. Yet he still had the minutes to speak his sentence in pure indifference.

Audrey scoffed. "At this rate, I don't even understand why a violent jerk like Vincent Salt is terrified of an emotionless jerk like you!"

"You got a lot to learn then, newbie." He leaned on the wall. "There's a difference between a school bully and an anti-social recluse. A school bully would contend himself with either giving his victims endless black eyes or have his goons do the work because bullying others gives him a pathetic sense of accomplishment. An anti-social recluse would do better and enjoy the mental trauma as he gave his victims a fate worse than death, especially if the fate was to constantly survive while your body's muscles were constantly ripped from within." He picked up a chocolate cupcake covered in blue frosting and took a big bite out of it. "Vincent Salt and the others are a bunch of school bullies. I'm an anti-social recluse. They like to harass others; I like to watch them suffer in their punishments. I hate them and they hate me. And I dislike a lot of people. I dislike you."

"Why? Because I did the dirty work for Beatrice? Or because I enjoyed beating up Vincent?"

"No. Because you're Sleeping Beauty's daughter."

Bitter shivers went down Audrey's spine. "You don't have the evidence for that."

"Please. Besides that dog bite on your ankle, you clearly don't have the working skin of a commoner. And you already know how I barely even buy Beatrice's manipulative stories. After my chat with her at your first night at the Fall Festival, I did a better bribing on Aromus and Cologna. My proposition of a doubled-lifetime supply of chocolate and Everlasting Gobstoppers was enough for them to spill the beans. And I made sure to give them very scented chocolate!"

Audrey could have trembled in fright, but she held her ground. "What will you do about it?"

"Why do you ask?"

"Besides my friends and the twins, the only one who realized I was an Auradonian princess was Marius Bogfae."

This actually caused Willywaffle to be surprised and remove his back from the wall. "Bogfae spared you?"

"He's the one who told Crystal to have Beatrice have the twins extract my Auradonian stench so I'd go undetected. I just had to promise I wouldn't make a U-turn back in Auradon or he'd kill me, but it's not bound to happen. Nobody needs me in Auradon and thanks to the extraction, I no longer care about my ex-family and ex-friends. So we're good!"

"You… are… AN IDIOT!" Willywaffle quickly whacked her on the head. "A high authority and royalty like Marius Bogfae doesn't just give a free pass to someone like you! Just being royalty of that land full of fake family-friendly pests would have been enough to have him casually throw you into the crowd and get mauled! Did you even check to see if he hadn't sent his goons to spy on you?"

Meanwhile, a long distance ahead of the train tracks

The train tracks that go over the Jungle of Jumanji are known to be elevated at least a hundred feet above the ground on pillars harder than steel that can resist potential damage from the daily rhino stampedes. Unfortunately, Willywaffle Wonka was correct to imagine that Marius Bogfae had sent spies to keep an eye on Audrey. Though he knew she tried to change, the prince still didn't trust her enough. After his closest sidekicks, the goblin twins Kit and Junk, reported to him what they had spied from the group's trip between the Fae Moorways and Macabretown, the prince deduced that just to play it safe, they'd have to 'damage' the trip's easiness. As this is being written down, the twins were done weakening the pillars with Fae blades.

"The stampede should easily bring down the pillars, Your Highness," Kit said.

"Excellent." He said.

"I still don't get why you're doing this. Wouldn't it be easier to just drag the girl to your girlfriend? If she's such a concern, your girlfriend can easily dispose of her," Kit's twin brother Junk asked.

"No. Not until I'm absolutely certain." Marius Bogfae hadn't bought Mal's story about using Maleficent's scepter for petty vengeance. It's not that he didn't believe in potential case scenarios of children imitating the same dumb actions as their parents, but it's the part where Mal claimed to have attempted cursing Sleeping Beauty's daughter and the latter running away. He had immediately connected the dots since the last Auradonian royalty fugitive he had encountered was the blonde girl with the red stag, but he had gone with the game of pretending to know nothing. He had casually asked if the girl was some sort spoiled brunette cheerleader, and he noticed Mal half-lied again because he recalled seeing vague signs of brown roots in the blonde girl's head. And he had noticed how discreetly panicked Queen Leah and King Hubert when he casually mentioned Crystal Maze's new refuge friends and pretended that they were nothing.

Long story short, he was highly convinced that Mal had lied to save the girl's hide because the girl was the one who probably had used the scepter. But he had to make sure his theories were correct by convincing the twins to help him endanger her life. Otherwise, there would be no point in getting into conflict with a potentially powerful demon or dragging a useless corpse to Penna. So he wanted to see what the girl would do if the train would potentially plummet her to her doom.

"And the more times she goes through obstacles and survives, the more you figure out if she used Maleficent's scepter, and if she did, we capture her, Penna kills her and punishes Mal, and we all live happily ever after," Kit concluded after Marius finished summarizing his plan.

"Exactly." The prince exchanged a high five with Kit.

"Uh, but what if things go sour?" Junk pointed out. "She's not exactly a pro like your girlfriend in magic. What if she's not capable of surviving the train crash, or worse, she survives and she figures out we're onto her?"

"Willywaffle Wonka is on that train. If the girl hasn't figured it out, he will. And from what you told me, I wouldn't waste his life. His trip to the Troll lands is understandably important, so he'll ensure that they survive." Marius pulled out a invitation envelope from his exoskeleton armor and made sure that the twins could see the glittery seal. "Besides. When they survive, I have something to make them shut up."

Back on the train

The winds weren't that strong as Willywaffle, Audrey, and the Bloody Bambi climbed up to the roofdeck platform of their wagon. The humans held on to the fancy railing as they looked down at the massive jungle that spread out for miles. Falling down would definitely guarantee death if it weren't for the roofdeck gravitational functions.

"Fudge!" Willywaffle cussed.

"Maybe we should tell the others?" Audrey suggested.

"Suggest them what? That two goblins who were nowhere in the wagon are lurking somewhere?" Willywaffle widened his eyes in horror. "Why am I rhyming in such rotten timing? THIS ISN'T THE SEUSSIAN LANDS!"

"Will… please reassure me that this is just a small distant avalanche." Audrey begged as she pointed her finger towards the canyon far ahead of them, where a massive dirty-colored cloud moved downward. Unfortunately, Audrey got her own answer when the cloud, though still distant, revealed itself to be the stampeding cloud of thousands of rhinos that moved underneath the train tracks ahead of them… and caused the whole train to shake viciously.

"The pillars must have been damaged!" Willywaffle held on to the railing. Just then, one of Crystal's purple crystal balls bounced out and morphed into the princess, who had to be caught by Audrey before being accidentally blown away.

"We're screwed!" She shouted over the wind. "The rhinos busted the track and I don't think you want to picture the fireworks!"

"I got to find a way to evacuate the Oompa-Loompas!" Willywaffle panicked.

"Oh sure, let's not forget about the other passengers! I'm sure you'll be the next Macabretown citizen of the month!"

"ENOUGH!" Audrey shouted, her eyes glowing pink and her tone being loud enough to shut the other two. "Crystal, you and I are going to get Beatrice and see how we can seal up those tracks! Willywaffle, you and Gothy go see if you can slow down the locomotive!"

Willywaffle and Crystal nodded.

"Great," Audrey calmed down. "We're going off the rails of the crazy train."