Insanity in the Realm of the Insane
Sleep was difficult to come by in the Realm of the Insane. Dalton and Lavos had their (minor) squabbles in the early morning, which was then accompanied by the ringing of the bell. Actually, it tended to be the strangling of the bell-ringer, even though most of the academy was already awake. Normally, Queen Zeal, who could sleep through almost anything, carried this out.
BONGGGGG! BONGGGGG!
"OUCH!" Charlotte yelped as a letter 'g' hit her on the head. It wasn't the sound that woke you…it was the extra punctuation and the extra letters. Insanity was omnipotent in OFAC.
BONGGGGG! BO---
"ACcckkkKKKkkk!" There went another bell-ringer. They were difficult to find.
"Is it morning already?" Hikari asked sleepily. She yawned and rolled out of bed.
Thud.
Charlotte sighed, and then followed suit.
Splat.
That's curious, Charlotte thought vaguely. Normally, people don't go 'splat'…
She opened her eyes lazily. It was suddenly very cold, and very white. Charlotte looked blearily around her.
Whaaa?
She was sitting in three feet of snow. Once more, her eyes bugged out very far. Then, she let loose a scream that could be heard all the way up in Zeal.
*************
Charlotte grumbled as she trudged through the snow. She was looking for a transporter-type thingy that would send her back up to Zeal. Sure, Charlotte had wanted to see more of the world, but this was not what she had in mind.
Stupid random plotholes…
Charlotte couldn't see three inches in front of her nose. She tried waving her hand in front of her face, but all she saw was a slightly grayish blur.
She trudged on. Suddenly, her face collided with something very solid. It was a wall. Not just any wall, but the wall to the transporter thing that would take Charlotte the Almost-Popsicle back to the Academy. After a few moments of grumbling, Charlotte used the door to get through a solid obstruction.
Stupid wall…stupid solid—thing…stupid cold…stupid snow…
A bright beam of light surrounded Charlotte as she was transported to the floating islands of Zeal. Warm air flowed over her chilled limbs when she materialized at the edge of the Academy's island.
*************
Charlotte walked through the quiet halls of the Academy. No one wandered in the halls, there were no friends calling loud greetings, no fangirls plotting how to attract their lust object's attention… there was only a forbidding sort of silence. Charlotte shivered in her soaked pajamas, while wandering aimlessly through the deserted halls.
Then, someone walked down the hall. Crono.
Curses… thought Charlotte the Crono-Luster.
"What are you doing wandering through the halls?" he demanded. "You should be in the Orientation meeting!"
He grabbed her forearm and marched her right up to the doors of the Great Hall.
"You'd better try to stay low. Cerberus will not be pleased."
Charlotte nodded, and then cracked the door open. Cerberus was explaining something to the students, but she was pointing at a diagram. While her back was turned, Charlotte slipped in, and sat quickly down in a seat. The Great Hall's tables were still in place, and most students seemed to have packets. Charlotte amused herself by staring at the walls. They were the same cream color as the rest of the University, and there was a decorative molding on the baseboards and ceiling. The molding was some sort of dark wood.
"Do we all understand?" Cerberus asked.
"Yes," the students chorused.
"Moving on, then," Cerberus said lightly. "Lavos has something he would like to say."
Lavos (in his Lavos Core state) walked over to the middle of a raised dais.
"I would like to say that my Evil class will be starting tomorrow,"
There was a large cry of protest from the audience.
"What?"
"Yes, my class will start tomorrow, and you will be there," Lavos said with great dignity.
"But…but…that's so evil!" a student, Circe, cried.
"Of course it's evil. I am evil, after all!" Lavos responded.
"You're not evil, you insignificant little parasite! I am the most evil of all!" Dalton stated, and strode up to Lavos.
"You? Evil? I laugh at your pathetic attempts at evil! You couldn't even keep a couple of kids from beating not only you, but you and your minions up!" Lavos retorted.
"Who are you to talk?" Dalton shouted. "They beat the snot out of you, too!"
"At least I died with dignity!"
"Dignity? What dignity? You practically rolled over and died!" Dalton responded.
"Did not!"
"Did so!"
"Did not!"
"Did so!"
"Did not!"
"Did so!"
The argument ended as they always did. Three flaming meteor showers and two fireballs later, the students were huddled under tables while Lavos and Dalton once more tried to be more evil than the other. They both failed at it most extravagantly.
"You little sniveling, insignificant, moronic maggot! How dare you mock me!" Lavos shouted, and more flaming meteors rained down upon the Great Hall.
"You spiky porcupine! You're pathetic! My grandmother could make meteors better than you!"
With a rapid gesture from Cerberus, the other teachers began to round up the students and lead them out of the Hall while the meteor shower stopped briefly.
Unfortunately, the meteors started again.
Charlotte crouched under the table, thanking the Powers That Be that she wasn't as unfortunate as poor Josh. The poor mage had been knocked out from under a table, and couldn't find any others that would let him in. He had to make do with running for his life while dodging flying objects.
Lucca managed to weave her way through the Hall. She poked the students.
"If you would like to get out of this mess, follow me," she whispered. "And do try not to be hit. I really don't want to have to drag someone out of here."
After a few minutes of general chaos, the entire Academy was evacuated from the Great Hall. Injuries were mild. The only somewhat-serious injuries were sustained by Josh. After all, one could only take so many fast-flying rocks to the head. Fortunately, his concussion was relatively light, and he had been sent down to Selima to be patched up.
The students stood in the hallway outside of the Hall, waiting with surprising obedience. The teachers were having a mini staff meeting on what was to be done.
Brief snippets of the conversation were overheard by those closest to the assembly. Most of the conversation was either over where to shove the students, what to do with Dalton and Lavos, and Miss Cerberus nearly weeping over her poor Great Hall.
Then, Miss Cerberus's cell phone rang.
"Hello?" she said into the phone. "Okay. Yeah. What? I'll be right over!"
She began to give orders in a very sharp tone.
"Get me as many Mini-Lavi as you can!" she ordered Miss Semp and Oma-Ona.
The students were very confused.
"Could you tell us what's happened?" Lucca asked, slightly irritated.
"The Harry Potter continuum's broken. Meir Brin has called for some help," she explained hurriedly. She reached into another pocket and brought out the Big Freakin' Gun ©. She snapped the ammo into place just as the Mini-Lavi arrived.
"Great, that should be enough," she nodded. "Copy-Write, Shcala, Mistic, and Darkmatter, stay up front. The rest of you, fall into the student-hunt formation I told you about! Now!"
The Lavi fell into position. Cerberus held up the Gate Key.
"I'll be back eventually," she said to Oma-Ona. "Hold down the fort, alright?"
Oma-Ona nodded, and Cerberus disappeared into a Gate.
The students looked around in mild boredom. Oma-Ona cleared her throat loudly.
"Hey!" she cried. "Hey, students! We're going to dismiss you by last name! You can head to the Library, Arcade, or wherever! The Arcade has just been put in on the second floor, right across from the Library. Stay out of the Great Hall.
"Now, A-J, get out of here!"
After a relatively short while, the students had cleared out. Most went to the new Arcade.
The staff walked back to the Staff Section, their thoughts mostly on Cerberus and the outcome of the battle for the Harry Potter-verse.
"Hey, Lucca," Oma-Ona said worriedly, "Cerberus forgot her ammo, didn't she?"
Lucca sighed and rubbed her temples. "I think she did. Well, at least she has the energy bolts I installed."
"Did she replace the battery?"
"I certainly hope so."
[A/N- See previous A/N. Meir Brin owns herself, and she also owns the Harry Potter Fanfiction Academy. I own the Big Freakin' Gun (BFG, for short). Also, Mini-Lavi and Moving Pillars are available for adoption! E-mail me, and I'll send you a list of the names.]
