Okay, so I wrote this Monday. That's it. I got this and a whole one and a half other chapters done within that forty-eight hours between Saturday evening and Monday evening. My brain is fried, and I can't concentrate on school. I'm started to concern myself. If this is what being obsessed is, I'm a little scared. I am literally sacrificing all of my free time and more to this story, and it's very concerning. I think I've been possessed. Send help.

Aria, you are freaking awesome. I loved every one of your reviews!

PS. I COULDN'T DO IT! I usually wait four days between updates. But I couldn't take it this time. I had to post his or I would go crazy. Okay? Phew. Now I can focus on homework for a couple days since the next chapter is done too.

Chapter 19

"Lackluster Reaction"

"Lock!"

Lock opened his eyes and groaned, "UGH! What do ya want, Shock!" He was taking a nap. What the heck could she possibly need?

"Pour out my cauldron would ya?! I'm busy!" Shock's voice came from their closet/armory.

"What? Busy doing stupid girl stuff?" Lock prodded, annoyed that Shock told him to do anything. "It's your cauldron. You do it!"

"I'm cleaning the knives. You got blood all over them!"

"I'll do it later," Lock snapped, burying his face in the mildew smelling couch pillow.

"Nuh uh! I wanna. You dump out the cauldron."

"Since when do you want to clean?" Lock lifted his head and glared toward Shock's voice.

"Since we got a bunch of pretty new knives from the Mayor. Now shut up!"

"What do I get out of it?" Lock teased, swinging his short legs to the tree house floor.

"You can have the rest of Barrel's candy," Shock shouted.

Lock thought about it for a minute, "Eh. Sure. Whatever."

He walked past the closet, not bothering to check on the witch, and went into the kitchen.

Dead animals like rats and possums hung from hooks in the ceiling. They were starting to smell kind of bad. Good. Lock, Shock, and Barrel had been getting pretty hungry lately. It was hard to figure out what to eat without anyone to cook for them.

But it didn't matter with them being all alone. They figured it out when they needed to.

Lock's stomach growled for a moment. "Stop it," he muttered. He couldn't die from hunger, of course. But still. He eyed one of the dead rats, then shook his head.

Shock would kill him if he took something without sharing with the rest of them. And Barrel was out walking the bathtub. That thing didn't even need to be walked. But it made the kid happy, so whatever…

Sure, they might "hate" one another, but they stuck together, so that meant actually being nice to one another sometimes. They had to share basic stuff like food and prank ideas. Not the blame for pranks, of course. Barrel gets all of that.

Lock frowned when he glanced into Shock's witch cauldron. "Uh..hey Shock? You sure you need me to dump this out. It's a lot."

"Well, yeeeah," Shock called back.

Lock frowned dubiously. There were several things you try to remember when being dead in Halloween. The number one rule was that Jack was the boss, mostly. The number two rule was that you never mess with a witch's spell unless they tell you to do something very specific. Even then, it's best to avoid them.

"This isn't dinner is it?"

"No! Why do you think I need that thing dumped out?!" Shock sounded annoyed that Lock was taking so long.

Lock shrugged and grunted as he pushed the cauldron toward the drop-off.

One wall of the treehouse kitchen was completely missing, leaving the room open to the air and leaving them a nasty fall into the canyon. The wall was destroyed a while ago, and Lock, Shock, and Barrel hadn't had time to try fixing it. They didn't really know how anyway. Yeah, they built the treehouse, which is pretty impressive for a trio of kids, but Oogie Boogie had helped.

Well, he didn't help physically, but he told them what to get and yelled at them where to put everything and what to do. And he moved heavy stuff, so Lock figured he did actually help a lot.

But it was so long ago that Lock really couldn't remember any of the construction stuff. If he did, he would've built a new wall a while ago. Then the cold wouldn't get in while they were trying to sleep.

They probably could ask the wind to not blow near them at night. Seriously? As if the wind would do anything for them. Everyone in town were jerks.

The cauldron was heavy by itself, though it was relatively small. Unfortunately, the liquid and gunk in it literally had it about a hundred pounds heavier.

"Gah, come on!" he growled, kicking the cast-iron pot when it refused to move anymore, then shouted expletives and hopped around on one foot. Lock snarled, his sharp teeth showing while his tail lashed in frustration.

He wasn't about to give up. If he made Shock do it, then she would just call him a wimp and use magic or something to move it in a second. No way was he going to admit it was too heavy.

Eventually, he got it to where he needed it at the edge of the floorboards a foot away from the chasm and got to work tipping it.

Sludge sloshed out, but he had to be careful not to tip the little cauldron into the chasm. Shock would literally bury him "alive" then.

"Come on," Lock groaned.

Finally, the cauldron was emptying at a steady rate, green gunk plopping in chunked down the abyss. Lock held it steady, feeling rather proud of himself.

That was until an enraged shriek echoed from the canyon below him.

Lock pulled the cauldron back in surprise as Shock flew up from inside the chasm on her broom.

Lock tried not the laugh at the sludge covered witch who was glaring vicious daggers at him.

"What the hell do you think you're doing?!" Shock screamed at him, "I was working on that! And I was down there getting your stupid pitchfork you idiot! You RUINED IT and got it ALL OVER ME!"

"What's the big idea?!" Lock yelled back at her. "You told me to dump it out! And my pitchfork is under the couch, you dummy. I didn't tell you to go get it! I didn't drop it."

"Why you little…yes, you did!"

"NO, I DIDN'T you dingus!"

Shock jumped off her broom and throttled him, knocking them both down.

They somersaulted into the living room, screaming and trying to claw each other's eyes out.

"You messed up my spell! I was working all week on that!"

"Then you shouldn't tell people to dump it out!"

"I DIDN'T!"

"YES, YOU DID!"

"NO, I DIDN'T! Gack!" Shock stumbled back as Lock kicked her in the stomach.

"Yes, you did! You were cleaning the knives in the armory! And told me to dump the cauldron out!"

"No. I. DIDN'T! I haven't been in the armory all day you stupid excuse for a demon!"

"Uh, guys?" Barrel mumbled, having just walked in the treehouse to see his friends ripping into each other.

The bathtub backed up a bit then fled the scene and hid in its corner.

"SHUT UP!" they yelled at him.

"Okay…" Barrel said carefully, "Um…what happened?"

"LOCK sent me to get his stupid pitchfork he dropped in the canyon and dumped my spell all over me!"

"No, I didn't! My pitchfork is under the couch and Shock made me empty out her cauldron."

"You touched her cauldron?" Barrel mumbled dubiously with a troubled frown. "Lock…"

"She told me to!"

"No, I didn't!" Shock said right before she bit Lock, making him let her out of a headlock with a shout.

Barrel edged away from the fight and headed toward his candy bag. He needed a snack to watch the show with. He picked it up and freaked out. "HEY! Which of you took my candy?!"

"Lock did it!"

"Nuh uh! Shock did it!"

"It's all gone…" Barrel gasped in horror, "You jerks!"

"I didn't do it!"

"SOMEONE did!"

"Well, it wasn't me!" Shock's voice snapped.

They suddenly stopped, and the entire treehouse was quiet.

Shock's mouth hung open.

They all heard that, right? That wasn't Shock. Yeah, it was her voice, but the boys were watching her mouth, and it wasn't her who said that.

Their eyes shot toward the armory.

Shock let go of Lock and held her finger to her lips. She wiped sludge out of her eyes and shook her hat out.

The boys nodded and shifted around. They knew where all the creaky steps in their home were.

Locked reached under the couch for his pitchfork then gasped and looked underneath, groping in the darkness. "Where is it?"

"Shhh. Shut up!"

"You shut up! They took my pitchfork."

"Who would be dumb enough to mess with us?!" Shock hissed.

"Shhhh!" Barrel and Lock shushed Shock.

After another round of glares and shushing, they managed to sneak around until they were all right outside the armory door holding Shock's broom, Lock's baseball bat, and Barrel's plunger.

"On three," Lock whispered.

"One," said Shock.

"Two," added Barrel.

"THREE!" They all shouted together and charged into the room.

And immediately stepped on the tripwire and rung a bell. They should have known. Rookie mistake.

Ropes that crisscrossed the room whipped around them in a flurry until three small screaming cocoons were hanging from the ceiling rafters.

"OW!" Shock shouted and added a few colorful words as she knocked into Lock and Barrel. Her hat was lying on the ground while she hung upside down right above it.

"I can't move!" Barrel cried out.

"What the heck!" Lock snarled and tried wriggling. But that didn't work.

As the room stopped spinning, they noticed three objects against the wall behind the door they just burst through.

There was Barrel's candy (in one of their other Trick-or-Treat bags), Lock's pitchfork, and Shock's cauldron.

The pot was still full and untouched, the sludge sitting quietly.

They were silent for a moment, swinging in the backroom.

Shock licked the side of her mouth, tasting the mess that Lock had dumped on her.

"This…um…isn't my spell…"

"No DUH!"

"OW. Stop kicking me!" Barrel whined.

"Shut up!" Shock shrieked.

"Hey look." Lock titled his head toward a pair of new scissor sitting just within reach if they could find a way to swing for it. Taped to the scissors was a note.

"Ugh. I can't…what does it say, dingus?!" Shock snarled as she tried to twist around to see.

"Shut up! I'm concentrating! It's upside down!"

"It's not upside down! You're upside down."

"I know!"

Lock squinted and tilted his head as much as he could as he struggled to make out the shaky handwriting.

"It says, Thaaaanks fooor the… scissors? Er. You three were a lot of…he..help two weeks ago... Trick or Treat….Love….Anna…"

The three kids stared at each other for a long moment.

In the kitchen, Anna snickered as she dumped out the rest of the fake potion from the small cauldron Helgamine let her borrow and booked it as she heard the three kids explode into screaming banshees in the next room. They shouted every bad word they could think of and added her name to as many curses as they could with their tiny lungs.

"Aw. Cute," Anna sang as she jogged back to town.

The Gatekeeper looked up as Anna came back through the front gate, a pleased grin on her skull. A small cauldron was held in her arms.

"Should I ask?"

"Plausible deniability," Anna chirped, wincing at a nasty headache that came from using her Tricks. It took a lot to build up to that. A week of practice, just to figure out how to make cocoons really fast. She had built up a little tolerance, but that was a lot of strain.

"For a skeleton, you certainly have guts."

Anna snickered.

"Did you…"

"Yes, I stayed away from the Hinterlands. Zelda told me so before I left."

The Gatekeeper nodded and closed the gate behind her. "Have a horrid day Anna. I would say not to do anything I wouldn't, but a suspect we're a little late for that."

Anna gave him an impish grin and waved goodbye.

When she got to the Witches' shop, Anna quickly greeted a few customers before ducking into the back.

Helgamine and Zeldabourne watched as the skeleton set the small potion cauldron down on the kitchen table.

"What did you use it for, dearie?" Helgamine asked.

"As a prop."

"What kind of prop?"

"Pranking Lock, Shock, and Barrel kind of prop."

Zeldabourne almost cut off her own thumb at that.

"What?!"

"I'm going to visit Sally for a bit. If those three come looking for me, tell them I'm upstairs, please. And don't go in my room."

The witches gaped at Anna for a long moment, too dumbstruck to speak until the skeleton was long gone.

"Well…" Zeldabourne said after a long silence, "It was nice knowing you, Helga."

"Young girls getting us killed is turning into an unfortunate pattern…"

Anna poked her head back through the curtain. "What the heck is that supposed to mean?"

"Just go, Anna. And be back before dinner."

"It's like six in the morning," Anna said dubiously.

"Then I'm sure you can keep yourself busy," Helgamine said. "If you made Boogie's Boys mad, I don't want you anywhere near the shop for a while. I'm half tempted to make you sleep outside tonight!"

Anna snickered. "Are you serious?"

"Possibly. Whatever the case, I'm putting wards on the house tonight so be home before eight or I actually am locking you out."

"Kay!" Anna said. "Love ya!"

The witches looked at each other in complete confusion.

"Love?"

A second later, the shop door opened and closed.

Anna did eventually visit Skellington Manor, after a…little detour.

She looked at the empty town square, eying windows and alleys.

She slowed. Eyes downcast. Gingerly, she glanced to the side and put out a hand.

Gently, a finger touched against the rim of the large scrying cauldron.

Yes. She knew it was against the rules.

Jack didn't want her aware of what the Real World was doing.

But…little peeks wouldn't hurt, right?

She stood there, considering.

She really needed to visit Sally for breakfast. That's where the witches expected her to be and if she wasn't there and they asked Sally about today, then she would be in so much trouble. Because she got caught that first time by a tattle-tale cat, they would know she was using the cauldron. The witches hadn't told Jack, but they did give her a warning. A silent warning, but a warning nonetheless.

She almost ignored the cauldron. But…it had been hard lately. As things slowed down and she had more time to think, she realized that she really missed her family. Having officially done a successful prank didn't help much.

"Just…one look."

No one was in the square at the moment, and Anna was getting pretty good at guessing the best times for sneaking to the scrying cauldron. After a few close calls, she almost had the town's schedule down pat. It only took her two weeks.

"Show me…Dad." Anna glanced around nervously. The water rippled, and Anna huffed in relief. This was only the third successful attempt. She was getting the hang of it. The first time only showed Jillian and James' first hour back to school from the hospital, complete with some nice kids and some jerk kids. The temporary school was set up in the community center until the town could figure out how long it would take to build a new school. Or at least a new wing. Half the school was restorable.

The second successful attempt only gave her a few precious, yet very boring, minutes of Mark driving somewhere in his car. She had to stop the scry to avoid the Mayor catching her.

This time, she watched in anticipation as the picture focused on her father. She almost cheered in glee to see him again!

He was working. No surprise. It looked to be the middle of the day back home. Or the late morning. Time zones were wacky between this world and that.

Anna frowned and leaned on the cauldron's edge, her fingers gently brushing the water.

Harold Grisholme looked tired and a little ragged. That wasn't much of a surprise either, though it made Anna a little depressed.

The tired man sighed and put his hands on his forehead and elbows on his desk. After a moment, he reached for a bottle of pills on his desk and dry swallowed a few.

Anna knew what they were. Antidepressants.

"I'm so sorry, Daddy," she murmured. She wasn't expecting her family to get over her death easily. But she hated seeing them so sad.

"Show me Mom," she whispered after a few minutes. It hurt her to say it, but Dad wasn't doing much, and she didn't know how much time she could risk using.

The water rippled for a moment.

"Hi Mommy," Anna whispered, lightly touching the water. She hadn't seen Thida since the morning before she died.

She was so happy that the cauldron was working for her now. She kind of wanted to cry. It was a 50/50 chance to get anything to work for her.

It really took forever to get enough control of her powers to pull off that prank on Lock, Shock, and Barrel. And she still had horrible headaches.

"Thida, I need those reports by today," a man said, passing by Anna's mother's desk.

"Of course."

The man stopped and gave the woman a look. He turned and came back to sit on Mom's desk. "Thida, look I know these last couple of weeks have been hard, but I really need you to at least fake a smile. For the customers. For me? Can you do that? Please."

"Of course."

"Thida…"

"Greg. Thanks for the concern, but I'd like to get back to work please," her mom said tersely.

Anna stiffened as she watched Greg squeeze her mom's shoulder.

"I'm always here for you, Thida. Remember that."

Anna didn't like "Greg." She met him when his wife invited the Grisholmes to a barbecue about a year ago.

Barbecue…ironic.

Anna grimaced and shook her skull.

Greg had a crush on Anna's Mom. It was disturbingly obvious. Of course, Mom never requited and even told Harold and the family about the flirting.

Dad kept an eye on the guy and foiled a few so-called "business" dinners Greg set up by secretly inviting a few of his wife's other coworkers to join. Anna may or may not have assisted. Once they even invited Greg's own wife.

Greg found it hard to get close to a woman when her husband was suspiciously friendly, and her kids made it very clear they hated him. Especially the oldest with…a penchant for being a town trickster…

But that brat was gone now. And Thida…needed someone in this trying time.

Creep.

Anna managed to crack a smile as she watched her mom glare at Greg's back as he walked away.

"Spot the Greg" was sort of a family game and one of the few times when Anna's parents were more than okay with her pranks.

She didn't doubt her mom could handle him. Even grieving. Worst comes to worst, Dad could beat him up.

Anna frowned again, "Show me James."

James had been doing…fine, she thought. For the most part. He had been taking on a lot of responsibility. It was a little strange. He stopped talking to a lot of his friends and focused on his school work more. He was very protective of Jillian.

Anna had the bad, or good, timing to catch him in the cauldron confronting a couple of bullies at the community center after someone teased Jillian their first day back. Yeah, he ripped into them. It used to be that James was the one getting bullied. Now he wasn't taking anything from anyone.

Anna was broken out of her memories as a voice was heard.

"Yeah, I know," James said in the middle of a sentence.

Anna started. Oh. He was in the graveyard. Visiting her apparently.

"Shouldn't you be in school, bucko?" Anna groaned.

"I just figured I should pay you a visit, sis," James said, unknowingly answering Anna's question. He was holding a little flower.

"Are you alone in the middle of town?" Anna asked in annoyance at the eleven-year-old.

James didn't answer this time. He stared at the daisy in his hand. Suddenly he gripped it in his hand and slapped it against the tombstone.

"I'm so sorry," he ground out. "Those jerks are getting away with it!"

"Who?" Anna muttered. She just wanted to take his arms, hug him, and tell him not to be upset. But she couldn't, of course.

"Those…monsters…"

Anna caught her breath on instinct before she shook her head at herself and almost facepalmed.

"They're going to get away with killing you. I'm sorry I couldn't stop them. Them and those stupid lawyers. Yesterday, th-they had the audacity…yay vocab words…to..to…blame us for what happened! Jillian was just sitting there, crying. And that lawyer jerk looked her in the eye and asked her to consider taking responsibility instead of blaming a couple of boys for an 'unfortunate accident.' She was crying, Anna! I couldn't do anything…they were all 'let's not ruin' anymore lives because of a 'lapse in judgment.' Are you kidding me?!"

"James…"

James froze and squeezed his eyes shut. Suddenly he turned around and buried his face into Mark's shirt.

Anna straighten. As the spell's vision moved to follow her brother, she finally saw that Mark and Jillian were there too.

Mark had been standing behind James, just out of view.

Jillian was sitting alone and quiet on a nearby bench, her head bowed and hair covering her face.

Anna wanted to cry. When she had last checked on them, she hadn't heard Jillian say a single word.

"It's not fair!" James sobbed.

"Yeah, I know..." Mark mumbled, hand on James' head, "But everything will get better okay? Those lawyers aren't convincing anyone. Those guys aren't getting away with it. I'll make sure they don't."

Mark looked up at Jillian. "You guys are late for school. You sure you don't want to say anything, Squirt?"

Jillian just shook her head and started walking ahead to the car, arms tucked.

"She won't say anything," James muttered.

"I know. Give her time. We all need it."

"Thanks for bringing us, Mark. I think Mom and Dad hate coming here. Dad said parents should never have to visit their kid's grave."

"Give him time. It's only been two weeks," Mark said, "You go on ahead. I want to say something."

James nodded and sniffed as he followed his twin.

"Show me Mark," Anna said quickly as the picture started to follow James. If she was lucky, she'd finally get a chance to see almost everyone. Anna was hoping to check on her friends, especially Sarah, but she had to be careful.

Mark stood still for a moment. He kicked at the dirt.

"I'm so sorry Anna."

"Yeah don't flatter yourself, Roman," Anna snorted, "This wasn't your fault." She wiped her eyes and joked. "It's good to see you." Her voice cracked. She couldn't describe how happy it made her to see Mark taking care of James and Jillian like a big brother.

"I promised that I would move Heaven and Earth for you…I didn't mean literally. That's not possible, right?"

"Of course not." Anna was a little confused and hoped he would say more.

Mark groaned. "Hard times really bring out the crazies, doesn't it?

Anna wasn't sure what he meant but couldn't help but listen anyway.

"I don't know what to do. It's insane."

"Good insane? Or bad insane."

Mark just stared at the ground. "I'm not that desperate, Charmer." he snapped under his breath.

Anna looked up. She heard footsteps.

Someone was coming.

"I know. Rick is just…"

Anna quickly splashed the water and turned off the scry, before she heard, and darted away before she could get caught.

She went down a side street to cut around toward Skellington Manor.

All in all, it was a pretty good day. A little sad with her family, but good.

One of the cats watched from a nearby roof in pity. Stupid girl.

Later that night the taller witch coughed to get Anna's attention. "Anna?"

Anna looked up at Helgamine, "Hmm?" She closed her hand, extinguishing the purple flames she was flicking around her fingers.

"What did we say about the fire?"

Anna put her hand down.

Helgamine paused. "I met with Jack today. You have another lesson tomorrow."

Zelda glanced up.

Anna looked down and poked at the food, her relatively good mood from the day ruined. "Oh."

"You'll do fine, dearie."

Anna just scowled. "I haven't figured out how to do that Fade again, you know. And it's been two weeks."

"You'll get it eventually."

"You're very optimistic for a dead person," Anna joked, giving both witches a small grin.

"Thank you. And you are improving. You're splendid at your Tricks. I've seen you practice."

Anna shrugged. She sighed. "What am I learning tomorrow?"

"We're going to try the basic scare techniques again."

Anna was quiet, she leaned back in the chair they got for her, she crossed her arms and scowled at the table, "Because that worked so well last time."

"You're getting better."

Anna looked up again, her sockets disbelieving.

"None of these lessons are going very well. And you keep changing teachers on me. Is that normal?"

"Well…no…but…"

"Then what is normal?"

The witches shared a glance.

Helgamine sighed but didn't answer.

Anna frowned. She tapped her spoon against the bowl twice then gently set it down. She picked up the bowl and reached her long arm around Zeldabourne to put it in the sink.

"I'm going to bed."

"You can't be tired…"

"Watch me."

Zeldabourne glanced at Helgamine when Anna was gone, and they heard her door latch. "Why don't we tell her?"

"Because the Mayor asked me not to."

"What? When?"

"The day she got those rope abilities."

"I think you meant say Pumpkin Fire there," Zeldabourne scoffed.

Helgamine didn't say anything.

"Something is really wrong. Monsters are talking…We have laws. She needs help," Zelda stressed.

"Jack wouldn't be acting so strange if he didn't have a good reason."

"I agree. Don't think I don't. But bottom line, there's too many strange things happening."

Helgamine frowned at Zeldabourne, "Something tells me this isn't just a citizen temporarily gaining Pumpkin Fire or the King avoiding her."

Zeldabourne shook her head, "The pumpkins in the patch are wilting."

"...They always look wilted right after Halloween. The new ones haven't grown yet."

"This is different. Behemoth was worried. It was the older ones that have magic. The Jack O'Lanterns. He said the roots were rotting. Half of them closest to Spiral Hill are gone. And Glenn was hunting in the Hinterlands yesterday. Something was in there."

"There's always something in there."

"Would you listen?! I'm not just talking about Nachtmahr and whatever unfortunate animals manage to fall through. Glenn smelt something new. He left pretty quickly."

"Did the Wind say anything?"

"That's another thing. It's been around, but the Wind hasn't spoken to anyone in weeks."

"Does Jack know about this?"

"Of course. Don't tell me you haven't noticed anything?"

Helgamine was quiet again.

"Helga!"

"Okay! I was down by the lake two days ago, and I thought I saw people on a boat. I figured it was Gal practicing a scare."

"People? Like…"

"Human. Human shaped. I haven't seen them since."

Zeldabourne froze. "By Halloween! Why aren't we reacting? I swear if someone doesn't call a Town Meeting soon…"

"Just help me with this ward. Whether it's pumpkin-rotting-Hinterland-boat-creatures or Boogie's Boys, nothing is getting in tonight."