So, a short while later, all nine of them were in the mess, sipping their first glasses of whisky (or pineapple juice, in the cases of Five and Adrian) and getting stuck into some of the android's pumpkin pie. It was really good, and she'd even found some whipped cream to go with it. Five had also hooked up the music player she'd managed to fix, and started playing one of the CDs of old Halloweeny music she'd picked up from some antique shop. As well as the pumpkin pie, there were roasted pumpkin seeds, fairy cakes with little iced pumpkins and bats on them, iced biscuits in the shape of skeletons and ghosts, and various other spooky, tasty goodies. The treat-givers had also brought the bowls of spare sweets from their rooms, which ranged from chocolate balls wrapped in foil that looked like eyeballs, to jelly worms and spiders.

Three and Four were still kind of grumpy to start with, about being forced to participate in the festivities, and about the others TP-ing their rooms and jump-scaring them.

"Can't believe you jerks violated our privacy like that," Three grumbled. Looking at Five specifically, he said, "Thought I told you about that way back when you snuck in my room to steal my bullets."

She just grinned back cheekily.

"To be fair, you deserved that too," One said, making Three turn and glare at him. One just smiled pleasantly back.

"I did tell you all that I was not taking part in this event," Four said, sounding a little disgruntled. "Therefore I don't find it very fair that I was included in this 'trick' for not participating in the 'treat' when I had already clearly expressed that I wouldn't be."

"Oh, stop complaining, both of you," said Six in exasperation. "It's just a bit of fun. And it's only toilet paper!"

Sensing that Three was about to grumble some more, One quickly stepped in and pushed another chocolate cupcake towards him.

"Here, eat cake," he said.

Three still looked a little grumpy, but he didn't say anything, and just rolled his eyes half-heartedly, picked up the cake and started eating it. One smiled.

"You've gotta admit," Two said, "even if you're not into this Halloween stuff, the pumpkins look pretty cool."

The android had turned the lights a little lower in the mess so that they could get the full effect, and it did look really awesome. All their unique carved faces shone with warm orange candlelight from inside. There was something different, though, and it took them a second to see it. Then Five gasped.

"Solara! Your pumpkin –!"

She looked at the bodyguard in astonishment, and One, Two and Six joined in. Because her pumpkin wasn't blank anymore – it had a demonic-looking face carved into it. She gave a small smile and shrugged.

"It looked so boring next to all the others," she said in explanation.

Five was grinning widely. She looked like she kind of wanted to try and hug her, but knew that wouldn't be a great idea. So instead she just smiled back at the pumpkins.

"Well, it looks awesome now!"

"Thanks."

"Now there's only one odd one out," Six said, giving Four a meaningful glance.

Four just glared back. "I never said I would come to this party to start getting involved in this festive nonsense."

The others all sighed.

"Well, at least it's right in the middle," One pointed out. The way it had worked out with their ordering, Four's blank pumpkin was right in the middle of the line-up, with four carved pumpkins either side. "Kinda looks intentional."

Five saw that he was right, and smiled a little. "Yeah, it does."

Adrian was nodding too, looking approving. "Yeah! It looks so good now!" he said, and he turned to smile at Solara. "Thanks to you fixing the line-up."

As he sipped his whisky and looked over at Adrian, Three seemed to notice his lack of alcoholic drink and frowned a little.

"Hey – why are you drinking that boring shit?" he asked.

"Huh? Oh…" Adrian gave a little sheepish grin. "Uhh, believe me, it's for the best. Me and alcohol don't really… mix so well. I mean, you know, I'm already pretty, uh, fidgety, in general… Add alcohol and, well… it's kind of a nightmare. Plus I'm a major lightweight."

"It's true," Solara chimed in, with a jaded look. "God, that was a long night…"

Adrian grimaced awkwardly at whatever memory she was talking about.

"Right… Guess that makes sense," Three said, smirking a little. "You're already loopy enough even without alcohol."

"Exactly," Adrian agreed, with a little nervous laugh.

Three then seemed to belatedly take in his costume, and snorted, making Adrian look at him again in confusion.

"Speaking of loopy… What the hell are you meant to be?" he asked with total lack of tact. "I didn't notice your 'costume' before…"

"Oh." Adrian's hands fidgeted a little embarrassedly. "I'm, uh, an adventurer that got bit by a vampire."

Three laughed, but it was fairly clear that it was out of pure amusement, not mockery. Or not much, anyway. "Oh, right, that totally normal Halloween costume."

Adrian grinned sheepishly. "I couldn't decide…" he muttered. Three just laughed more and nudged him playfully.

"At least he's wearing something," Six said, giving Four another pointed look.

"Yeah – even I'm wearing a costume, man!" Three said, pointing at him with his own sword. "Step up!"

Before Four could respond, Two looked at Three with a suspicious expression that turned slowly into realisation.

"Hang on… Your costume is a pirate," she said. "Pirates hijack ships and steal their stuff. We hijack ships and steal their stuff. We are basically pirates! You just dressed up as an ancient version of us!"

As the others realised that was true, they all turned to give Three similar disdainful looks.

"You really didn't put any effort into your costume at all, did you?" Two said wearily.

Three looked a little offended. "I didn't think about that, I just thought pirate! You think I would've made that connection?"

"That's a good point. He's not that deep of a thinker," One conceded, making Three give him an irate look.

"Hey! Want me to make that costume into a reality, Pretty Boy?"

One just chuckled. "What, kill me and bring me back to life?"

"Something like that…" Three muttered darkly.

"Well, at least you're bringing me back – could be worse," One said, smiling when Three just scowled more intensely.

"I really like all our costumes," Five said with a smile. "Even if Three's is a little… basic."

"Thank you," said Three, looking way too proud given the addendum.

"We did all have some great ideas," Six agreed.

Three narrowed his eyes at him a little. "Why are you a cowboy anyway?" he asked. He pondered for a moment, and then a look of clarity came over his face. "Oh, I get it, are you a sheriff? Because you're a cop?"

Six shrugged, looking a little confused and flustered. "No! I mean… I'm just a cowboy. I saw the hat when I was looking around and thought it'd make a good costume."

"I think you make a good cowboy," Five said, smiling at him.

He smiled back. "Thanks."

"Better cowboy than cop," Three muttered into his glass.

As Six gave him a look of indignation, One quickly intercepted with some more food, pushing the plate of biscuits towards Three. Three eyed him with slight suspicion even as he picked one up and took a bite.

"Are you trying to get me fat?" he asked.

One grinned a little as he picked up the whisky bottle and topped both of them up. "Just trying to get you less grouchy."

As he crunched down a skeleton biscuit before picking up another, Three mused, "Well… I think it's working."

-o-

They kept making their way through the food as they chatted and joked around. Three and even Four gradually started to loosen up and get over their disgruntlement about the earlier events. On Three's part that was largely thanks to One force-feeding him sugar and alcohol until he stopped being grumpy. After a few whiskies, both he and One were considerably more cheerful. And the others were getting increasingly playful as well. After a bit, Five and Adrian managed to drag Two, Six and the android up to dance, while the rest of them watched in amusement. They weren't at that stage yet, and just stayed at the table, drinking and snacking and chatting.

After a while of watching the dancing and talking about how silly they looked, Three frowned at Solara curiously.

"Hey, I thought you weren't joining in with all this kiddy shit anyway?" he said.

She looked at him and shrugged. "As long as I got to freak some people out, I'm cool with it," she said.

Three took that in and then nodded in understanding. "Makes sense."

One couldn't help chuckling a little as he thought back to their trick, and how terrified Three and Four had looked. Three turned and gave him a dirty look.

"What?"

"Nothing," One said, but Three kept glaring at him until he explained. "Just… thinking about how fun it was, scaring you."

"Oi!" Three jabbed a finger at him, making One bite back his continued laughter. "That was not fun! It was mean, and totally uncalled for. Right, Four?"

"Yes – definitely uncalled for," the Prince agreed.

Three looked satisfied, and nodded decisively at One, who managed to keep down the rest of his laughter.

"Right, right," he murmured. He couldn't entirely stop his smile though.

Five had started trying to teach the others some really old dance she'd discovered called the Macarena, which went along with one of the songs. All five of them were laughing as they tried to remember which order to do all the moves in. Then there was another one called the YMCA, which involved shaping those letters with your arms above your head. They were both rather strange, and One had no idea what 'YMCA' was meant to stand for – but they looked pretty fun, too. After not-really-mastering those, they went back to their own individual dances. For Five and Adrian, this was doing whatever ridiculously silly moves they could come up with. Two and Six were dancing more normally, which, for Two, meant quite a lot of hip-swaying and tail-swishing – and which was, well, pretty enjoyable to watch for One and Three. The android seemed to be doing some kind of weird half-bowing movement with her arms flinging around that was definitely not a real dance, but she seemed to be having fun.

A few more healthy whiskies later and even the rest of them were starting to get into the music. After a little while of watching the others, Three was at the point of wanting to dance, and after trying to force the rest of them up for a while, to no avail, he went by himself. Honestly, a part of One wanted to join him but… he just wasn't quite drunk enough yet.

So he, Four and Solara stayed sat down, and just watched and laughed as the others danced around like idiots. Three was particularly awful, and it was just hilarious to watch. The others were soon cracking up laughing at him too. They started all dancing together again, Three – and Six, following his lead – grabbing the girls' hands and swinging them around like it was some mediaeval ball, until they got dizzy and had to stop.

A little bit later, Three came back over.

"You guys coming or what?!" he said loudly over the music, which someone had definitely turned up quite a lot at some point.

Four and Solara just groaned and stayed firmly sat, but Three's eyes were locked on One, as though sensing some wiggle room in him. He grinned widely, and One returned an uncertain, conflicted expression.

"Come ooooon!" Three said, still grinning as he leaned down towards him, holding out his hands. "You know you wanna! It's fun!"

Even though he did want to, and he was fairly drunk at this point, One still felt pretty awkward. He wasn't exactly a super confident, showy sort of guy, and dancing in front of everyone…

"Oh, come on, Pretty Boy," Three said almost pleadingly. "Don't be a party pooper."

At that, One gave him an affronted look. "You're the one who refused to do anything more than half-assed up 'til now! And we had to drag you to this party!"

Three just kept smiling and holding out his hands expectantly. "Don't wanna kill the vibe for me now I'm finally enjoying it, then, do ya?"

One glared at him half-heartedly. Then, with a small sigh, he lifted up his own hands, letting the victoriously grinning Three take them and pull him to his feet, and onto the makeshift dance floor.

One still felt more than a little awkward at first, as Three kept hold of his hands and tugged him along in all his dancing next to all the others. But as Three started doing all his ridiculous moves, even so much as marching them around the floor and twirling One under his arm, One was soon in total hysterics, along with the others, blushing more than a little but one hundred percent past all his awkwardness and discomfort. Three's silly carefree-ness was kind of catchy. He was an annoying, stubborn asshole a lot of the time but, when he finally let that oafish wall fall away, he really was a hell of a lot of fun.

One let Three do all his silly dancing with him for a while, the two of them only pausing to top themselves up on whisky and snacks. The others were doing the same, with Five and Adrian keeping themselves steadily supplied with chocolate and sweets – and soon, all the adults were well and truly hammered, and Five and Adrian were totally hyped up on sugar. Then things got really nuts. Adrian had put his vampire fangs back in and started going around alternating between pretending to bite people and whipping them with his whip. Five was running around screeching and fending him off with spells, accompanied by Two who was aiming cat-like scratches at him, and the android who was flailing her four arms around and claiming her usual alien mind-control powers were failing her. The others mostly watched and dodged and laughed their heads off.

Eventually those three humans got tired and went to sit down for a bit to get their breath back. Six, One, Three and the android stayed up dancing. The android was doing all sorts of weird alien and robotic looking dances while making 'meep, moop' noises, and in the end the others started copying her, at first because she looked ridiculous, but then because it was just really fun. Then Six started showing them all some kind of cowboy dance, which mainly involved linking arms with each other and swinging around in a circle, before moving onto the next person. It was surprisingly fun for something so simple. Five and Adrian soon ran back up to join in with this, and they all swung each other around until they got dizzy.

Two came back up to join them in a little bit, and she'd even somehow managed to convince Solara to come with her. She still looked fairly reluctant, but after a while of being there with them all being silly, she gave in and joined in too, and started getting into her demon character again and trying to freak everyone out. Vampire-adventurer Adrian decided to team up with her, and then the chaos resumed. Five continued waving her wand around and making up incantations, and while she distracted them Six managed to sneak round and steal Adrian's whip, which he then tied into a lasso and started spinning around his head and trying to catch the monsters in. One went proper zombie again and started meandering slowly around with his arms out, moaning and trying to eat people's brains – mainly Three's. Three seemed to find it both hilarious and kind of endearing, and he got in on the fun too, getting into his pirate character, holding up Four's sword and swashbuckling away to fend One and the others off. That is, until there were a few too many close calls and Four suddenly appeared and took the sword off him 'before he decapitated someone, or himself'. Three looked a little pouty, which made One laugh – but then Five noticed Four was there and she refused to let him go back to his seat. So, after a bout of vehement persuading, he sighed loudly and agreed to stay. And after a little while, laughing at how ridiculous everyone else was being as they danced and messed around, even he couldn't help enjoying himself just a little too.

-o-

They stayed there long into the night. But eventually, at about 4am, pretty much all of them were close to dropping, so they had to call it a night.

They left the messy table to be dealt with tomorrow, and all started to head out into the corridor. As they did, One happened to glance at the pumpkins, and he saw that every single one had a carving in it now. At some point Four had done his – with the sword, by the looks of it. A couple of jabs for the eyes and a slash for the mouth. It wasn't much, but it was something. One smiled as he followed the others out of the room.

They started to head back to their quarters, most of them clinging to each other for support as their wobbly legs were not to be relied on. Five and Adrian, like the sugar-hyped kids they both were, despite age, were running ahead, still playing their characters and giggling madly, while the android tagged along making her alien noises. Two and Solara were both trying to be independent and not get any help, but every so often one of them would wobble and the other would put out an arm to steady them without a word. Four had been mostly fine on his own, but when Six kept stumbling and bumping off the walls, he stepped in to give him a hand, letting the larger man lean on him. And One and Three had totally lost all their reservations and were clinging to each other like their lives depended on it, tripping down the corridors after the others.

When they had to part to head off to their separate rooms, they all stopped at the junction to say goodnight.

"See," Five said smugly, grinning widely at everyone. "Told you Halloween would be a great idea."

"It was amazing!" agreed Adrian, still extremely jittery from all the sweets and practically bouncing up and down.

"Yeah, yeah," Three said slurrily, rolling his eyes, one arm still wrapped around One's shoulders as he leaned quite heavily on him. "Still not happy with you assholes."

"Me neither," Four said, trying for a glare, though his eyes appeared to be having trouble staying open.

"Oh, come on," Two said, smirking at them. "You had fun and you know it."

"Yeah – you were the one trying to get me to dance, remember?" One said to Three.

"Well, that's 'cause I was drunk," Three insisted. "Everything's fun when you're drunk."

"Oh, yeah. Sure," One said, rolling his eyes light-heartedly.

"Speaking of being drunk, we'd better get to bed before we all just pass out right here," said Two.

"Bed sounds good," said Three wistfully. Then, as though that had reminded him of something, his features suddenly dropped into a scowl. "Hey, hang on! How the hell am I meant to sleep when you dickheads TP-ed my entire room?!"

When Four registered his words, he joined Three in his indignation. The others just laughed, having completely forgotten about that as well.

"Oops," said Five, grinning sheepishly.

Three glowered at her.

"I mean, toilet paper's not exactly known for being really hard and uncomfortable," One pointed out cheekily, "so I think you'll be alright until morning."

Three turned the glower on him, and wobbled backwards as he did so, making One snicker as he righted them both with some effort.

"We'll help you clean it up tomorrow," Two promised.

"Fine," said Three grumpily. "Jerks."

So with final goodnights, the nine of them parted ways, all going a little slower without anyone to help them along. But eventually they all made it back to their beds. And as Three flopped down onto his toilet-paper-covered bedspread with a satisfied sigh, he had to admit… Halloween wasn't so bad after all.