"What do we do now?" Petra whispered to Jesse, worry dancing in the Blaze hybrid's eyes as she leaned in to talk to Jesse. "I mean- Lukas isn't the White Pumpkin. How are we supposed to prove it?"
Jesse thought about that for a few seconds. "Well- the White Pumpkin has to have some sort of lair or base of operations or something here in the house- we've got to figure out where that is. If we can figure out where it is, there's got to be some evidence that proves that Lukas didn't to it," she whispered, at last, voice sounding firm and authoritative.
If Onscreen-Jesse was feeling anything like Real-Jesse was feeling, though, she would've much rather liked to run around in circles and scream.
The redhead simply nodded a bit, before moving off to go and inspect the walls.
Jesse watched her go, before simply collapsing into a nearby seat.
Most of the audience blinked at that, half of them in concern and the other half in just pure confusion. And about 3/4s of them out of both.
"Uhh, you okay, there, sport?" Hadrian asked Real-Jesse, frowning at her a bit in what most people would probably have interpreted as concern but what Mevia knew was mostly just curiosity.
Real-Jesse stared at her onscreen-self blankly, before looking over at Hadrian with a slight shake of the head. "I have no idea."
Lukas hugged her.
"Uhh, you okay there, Jesse?" the narrator asked, tentatively, making the black-haired girl look up at the ceiling with a tired sort of look. She stared for a moment, before sighing and letting herself flop back.
"How did we ever get involved in this?"
There was a pause as the narrator- and also the rest of the audience - tried to figure out what the spider hybrid meant. When they didn't understand, they continued tentatively, "Jesse-?"
"How did we ever get wrapped up in- in a murder mystery?" Jesse muttered, staring blankly upwards and going dead to the world. Stampy probably could've been shouting in her ear, but so long as he wasn't in her field of view she probably wouldn't even notice. "Of all the things to get wrapped up in- we end up getting tied into a murder mystery. I'm not the type of person who likes killing or death or anything, y'know? So..." She trailed off, before making an uncertain gesture and allowing her hand to drop right back into her lap.
There was another pause as the narrator considered that. "... a sacrifice," they stated at last.
Onscreen-Jesse was not the only person to blink in confusion at that.
Jesse sat up a bit straighter now, brow furrowing a bit in confusion as she continued staring up at the ceiling. "What do you mean a... sacrifice?" she said, slowly, green-and-red eyes narrowing at the ceiling.
"So many rules were broken to accommodate this world. So many things were changed for the sake of this story," the narrator mumbled, sounding almost as if she was in a trance.
"Uh, Narrator? Y'all right there, bud?" Jesse whispered up to the narrator, frowning at her in a bewildered way. (Well, 'her'. The ceiling... oh you know what I'm talking about!)
"... ah, it's nothing."
Magnus grunted in irritation. Ellegaard correctly guessed the source of it and whispered to him, giving him a severe look, "Magnus, I know you're mad about the 'cliffhanger'y thing going on, but at least wait until the episode is finished to discuss it."
He mumbled something along the lines of "meh" but complied, cozying up to Ellegaard. She absentmindedly set her hand on his knee. Without thinking, Magnus looped his arm around Ellegaard's waist and pulled her in, the young woman scooting over a bit to give him a bit more room without squashing him.
Soren sent Gabriel a somewhat ecstatic grin, before subtly making a few gestures that conveyed his meaning perfectly.
About time.
Gabriel rolled his eyes, but he was grinning.
Honestly, he felt the same way Soren was feeling.
Jesse frowned, crossing her arms slowly and giving the narrator a suspicious look. "What do you mean, it's-"
"Perhaps I should make myself a bit clearer. It's nothing. I.E., none of your beeswax. Not right now, anyway," the narrator responded, tersely.
"She's a regular little pixie, isn't she?" Mevia muttered, making Otto grin at the sarcastic comment from where he was sitting next to her. Not only because the comment was a bit amusing, but it was... nice.
Seeing Mevia act a bit like the way she had before the Games.
Onscreen, Jesse simply shook her head with a sigh, looking back down and staring blankly at the huge White Pumpkin portrait on the opposite wall. In this one, the White Pumpkin was perched in a chair and wearing a suit, holding an Ender Pearl in their hand as they stared at the person who'd painted the portrait.
"Are you not going to press it, then?" Axel asked with a frown. "I mean, I'd think that was pretty important."
"So would I, Axel- but the narrator doesn't seem like the type of person to dish out hints casually. If they're going to tell me something, I feel like she'll just tell me or hint at it- she wouldn't just dish out random hints," Jace pointed out, frowning at the screen.
"... well, I mean, I guess," Axel mumbled, sounding slightly reluctant.
A few seconds passed, when she blinked suddenly, and touched her knuckles to her chin thoughtfully."... huh. So far, the only paintings that were vertical contained a secret passageway... and this portrait's in pretty easy reach."
"Oh yeah. How'd we not notice that?" Dan wondered, leaning forward and squinting at the screen in curiosity.
Onscreen, Jesse pushed herself to her feet, slowly walking towards the painting and regarding it with a curious look.
Finally, a mischievous grin spread over her face. "Welp- won't deny that this'll be fun." And with that, she drew her upper arm back, her muscles ensing a bit.
Gill grinned, catching on rather quickly. "Ahh, are you doing what I think you're about to do?"
Real-Jesse grinned back cheerfully, having also caught on. "Most probably."
Lukas frowned at that for some reason.
Jesse proceeded to punch violently through the painting, the painting smashing into thousands of little splinters as her fist slammed right through it, destroying it quickly. Stampy leaped up as if he'd been set on fire, Lizzie whirled around from where she'd been perching in her seat, Dan toppled out of his seat, and Stacy whipped around to stare at Jesse, expression falling into an almost comically shocked one.
Jesse smiled pleasantly at the towering ceiling of this secret passageway. "Huh. That was fun," she said cheerfully.
Petra let out a low whistle as she approached, resting her hands on her hips. "Wow. Another secret passageway, huh?" she mused, softly.
"No, really? I thought it was a zombie," Hadrian muttered, voice practically dripping with sarcasm, before wincing as Otto's elbow caught him in the ribs and made him catch his breath.
Real-Petra scowled at Hadrian, Jace following suit. Jesse looked at the slightly-glaring brown-haired boy sitting next to her, before also joining in on the 'group' glare. Lukas glanced at Jesse before following her lead.
Gabriel repressed a small smile at that. If this kept up it'd turn into a game of Follow-the-Leader.
Onscreen, the spider hybrid stepped inside the passageway, taking a look around. Not too far ahead was a set of iron doors, three picture frames on the wall adjacent to it, with a spiderweb, a poison-tipped arrow, and a sand block.
"What's that for?" Facemeat wondered.
Real-Jesse blinked at him. "You don't see?"
"See what?"
"The puzzle?"
"There's a puzzle?"
"... never mind then."
Onscreen, Jesse absentmindedly popped all three of the objects out of their respective picture frames, weighing them as she regarded them silently. Behind her, the YouTubers- and Petra- were coming up to have a look as well. With hardly a pause, Jesse popped the tipped arrow into the first frame, the one closest to the door- which made the door click a bit.
"Strike one," she hummed, before tossing the sand block into the middle square- almost literally. Another lock clicked as it disengaged. "Strike two." Neatly, she slipped the spiderweb into the final picture frame, the door springing open the literal second the spiderweb locked into place. Had Jesse actually been standing any closer to the doorway, the door and her face would've exchanged a rather painful greeting. "Strike three, and you're out!"
"You are a dork," Petra told her, voice slightly teasing, but still containing some sort of irritation. Jesse glanced up at the taller Blaze hybrid, and looked a bit startled to see that her eyes were pretty much glowing with ire. She gave Petra a worried look, but the moment Petra spotted the look she just looked away.
"What are you looking so upset about?" Milo wondered, glancing over at Petra with a curious frown on his face.
Petra just shrugged, looking slightly bewildered. "Well- why are you asking me? I don't know."
Milo felt his cheeks flush a bit as he realized the truth of that statement, and he gave a couple of awkward coughs. "Oh. Yes. Right."
"Oh wow!" Stampy exclaimed, putting his hands on his hips and sounding rather impressed, "you got it open!"
"Yeah," and Petra nodded, turning to face the others and putting her hands on her hips, "you guys should stay here- it could be dangerous."
"Nooo," Stacy drawled sarcastically, "I totally want to follow you into your friend's creepy secret passageways."
Real-Stacy winced apologetically at the look on Lukas's face- something between irritation and just being upset. "That was... needlessly confrontational. I am so sorry."
"Also, if no one had been murdered before this point," Jesse added, "we'd all probably be finding the secret passageways really cool or something. I know I would."
Lukas grinned, the odd look on his face turning into one of amusement. "True. And Ivor would definitely find them pretty awesome."
"I like secret passageways," Ivor said mildly, not even trying to deny the statement. (Harper couldn't help but just grin like the Cheshire Cat at that.)
Lizzie thought about it, before nodding. "Yeah, I see their point. It'd be kind of cool if the house wasn't rigged with traps... and if Sparklez didn't get murdered." She paused. "And TorqueDawg, I guess."
Several members of the audience snorted at that.
"Ugh- seriously?!" Petra snapped back immediately, sparks spitting out and flitting off of her in anger. "You really think LUKAS did it?!"
"Thanks, Petra," Lukas told the redhead, barely able to keep the huge amount of relief in his voice out. It was nice to know that in this whole murder-mystery-mess, he still had people who believed in him.
"No problem, Lukas." Petra gave Lukas a reassuring grin.
"You haven't proven he didn't yet," Stacy shot back.
Jesse quickly put all of her hands up into a surrendering motion. "Hey- cool it!" she exclaimed, although her voice had adopted a placating tone and she looked more calm and comforting than anything else. "We're all in this together, aren't we?" Petra shot her a small grin at that.
Lizzie put her hands on her hips. "Depends. Are you on the White Pumpk- I mean... 'Lukas's' side, or ours?" she asked, in a voice that clearly said she did not believe them. (Real subtle, Lizzie. Reeeaaaal subtle.)
Real-Lizzie let out an incoherent groan and buried her head in her hands. "I am so sorry."
Onscreen, Petra's smile fell right off of her face, turning into a glare in the span of half a second. "Ugh. You know what? They're not worth it. Come on." And with that she whirled on her heel and stalked into the room past the iron doors. It was pretty easy to see that she was fuming- mainly because there was literally clouds of smoke now spitting off of her.
"Oooh..." and Jace winced. "Looks like you just pissed Peets off."
Petra gently smacked him. "Don't call me Peets," she scolded, although she sounded more amused than irritated by the nickname.
Onscreen, the spider hybrid glanced at them apologetically from where she'd been watching Petra. "I- um- sorry, it's a bit late. We've gotten almost zero sleep. We're all getting a bit high-strung."
Dan nodded, shrugging slightly. "Sure. C'mon guys, let's go wait in the living room." And he trotted out of the little hallway again, the others turning around and following him.
"At least one of us is giving them the benefit of the doubt," Sparklez mumbled, sounding a little relieved about that.
Dan gave Sparklez a really, really sheepish smile. He'd really have to apologize to the guy after the episode was over.
The moment they were out of earshot, Jesse turned around and trotted after Petra into the room beyond the iron doors. There was a huge hole leading down seemingly endlessly, going darker and darker with each foot it went down, until after a certain area it turned black as squid ink.
"That's deep," Jesse hummed, blinking a bit. "Guess it leads down to... whatever the White Pumpkin calls 'home'. Wonder how he gets down there-"
"Maybe," Petra snapped, throwing her arms into the air and nearly smacking Jesse in the face, "in addition to walking through walls, he can FLY for all we know. UGH!" And she whirled around on the spot and stormed as far as she could without walking right back out of the room.
"Whoa," and Gill blinked. "Something's really eating at you here, Petra."
"I see that," Real-Petra replied drily, although she was still blinking at the screen in confusion.
Onscreen, Jesse blinked a few times, looking slightly taken aback by Petra's loud outburst. A few moments passed, before Petra said, a little more calmly than before, turning back to Jesse, "It's just- I'm really worried about Lukas. Those people think they're all safe, but the White Pumpkin is still running around, and he could strike again at any minute!" Her voice started sharpening again. "Not to mention, those people out there have been so ungrateful, so petty-!"
All of the YouTubers (save Sparklez) winced in perfect unison.
Onscreen, Jesse reached out with one of her uppermost hand and clapped it onto Petra's shoulder, giving it a reassuring squeeze and cutting off Petra's rant midsentence. "Hey, Petra, I understand. Okay? I'm with you." And she gave a mild smile.
Petra deflated, slumping forward under Jesse's hand. The smoke stopped spitting off of her in such copious clouds of smoke, her gold eyes cooling from red-hot to simply warm. "You're right- I know you're right... phoof." She let out a long huff, the screen switching so that the audience could see her face in more detail. "Sorry, Jesse. I just really needed to get that off my chest."
The Blaze hybrid blinked suddenly, before looking down to see that Jesse had wrapped her arms (and I mean all of them, not just the uppermost set) around Petra tightly. "Uhh... J-Jess-?"
"You look like you needed a hug. You're getting a hug."
"Uh- well, thanks, Jesse." And Petra's gold eyes went back to their normal gold color, her arms finding their way around Jesse in a hug as well. Her lips twitched at the corners in a soft smile. "... thanks, Jesse," she repeated.
"No problem. Now-" and Jesse released Petra, neatly stepping back and putting one of her middle arms on her hip, green-and-red eyes sparkling a bit as she smirked at the Blaze hybrid. "Race you down there."
Soren let out a mix of a huff and a laugh. Honestly, sometimes it was hard to remember that some of these people were either young adults or- well- kids, really.
"I'm gonna beat you~" Petra told Jesse in a singsong.
"No you're not."
"Yes I am."
"No you're not."
Lukas and Jace watched the byplay with amusement, before Jace glanced up at Lukas. "My money's on Petra," he told the blonde.
"We all know, dude."
Onscreen, Petra blinked at Jesse's sudden change of topic... before grinning. "Oh, you're on."
The spider hybrid grinned, before dropping to all eights and shooting straight over the edge of the cavern, scuttling down at rapid speeds. Petra hopped into the empty space, hovering down as fast as she could without sacrificing safety. Despite Petra having more of an advantage, she did have to restrain herself- it would be bad to sprain her ankle just because she hovered down too quickly.
The screen blacked out. Harper let out a low sigh, leaning back into something warm (presumably her seat back) in slight relief. "Well, it's good to see there aren't any significant problems right now."
"I'd say that Lukas being accused of murder is kind of significant."
"Well, nothing life-threatening," Harper corrected herself, shooting Hadrian a slight glare. (Only slight because he did have a bit of a point there.)
"True."
Harper started a bit at the sound of Ivor's voice sounding right in her ear- was he leaning over or something?
The screen lit back up, and Harper couldn't help but glance over to see what exactly was going on with Ivor.
Her cheeks slowly began to flush red as she realized that the 'something warm' she'd leaned back into was Ivor's side.
Her cheeks went even redder when Ivor's arm absentmindedly wrapped around Harper, tightening slightly. "Uh- Ivor?" she whispered to him, hoping that nobody would notice.
(Most people didn't, but Jesse definitely did, and she had to hide the tiny evil smile spreading over her face. She now had blackmail material.)
Ivor glanced down at Harper, realized the problem with his cheeks turning the color of a ripe apple, and quickly removed his arm from her waist. "Uh- sorry," he whispered back.
"I-it's fine..." Harper ignored the fact that she was still leaning into him. And the fact that Ivor was surprisingly warm. Seriously, he would've made an excellent heater.
Onscreen, the screen faded into a dirty tunnel, Jesse leaping through a hole in the ceiling and landing expertly, before tensing her arms and using it to flip herself back to her feet as Petra dropped the last few feet as well. "Done!" Jesse called out, cheerfully.
"D- aw, man," Petra groaned playfully, letting out a soft laugh a few seconds later. Jesse shook her head, chuckling slightly and absentmindedly dusting some dirt off of herself. The Blaze hybrid hesitated, a softer smile coming over her face, before she looked down at Jesse. "Thanks, Jesse. I needed that."
"Dirt all over my armor?" Jesse asked, innocently.
Petra thumped her on the head, making Jesse giggle a bit. "The laugh, you dope," she teased.
Jesse smiled up at Petra, eyes crinkling up happily, before she reached out and gave Petra's shoulder another squeeze. "You're most certainly welcome, Petra."
A/N: New rule(s) added to the contest!
6. ALL FORMS ARE DUE BY AUGUST 5TH. Forms that are late will not even be considered, so don't turn 'em in late.
Guys, characters MUST be sent to me via:
The website (arizalucaphantasmagoria . wordpress . com minus the spaces; then go to 'Contact' or comment on the post)
Twitter (ArizaLuca)
DeviantArt (ArizaLuca)
Quotev (ArizaLuca)
Wattpad (ArizaLuca)
YouTube (ArizaLuca, go to the trailer)
You CANNOT post background characters in the comments section of HCM; that is NOT the point of me announcing the contest on here. Get your character to one of those sites.
11 more days until July 11th!
RQTC: Does anyone know how important Phantasmagoria is to me, by the way?
Responses to reviewers!
DarkPrincess2001: ... (grins) What do you think?
LittleAngelbun: That's awesome! :3 / Yee xD / (chuckles)
LunarStarMoons: Might've. :3 / (laughs) / Which is extremely unhelpful to the situation, to be honest. I mean, that might get the opinion that she's crazy, or that she's at least very unstable- mainly from the YouTubers, not her friends. / (laughs) / (LAUGHS) I had to put that in I am sorry xD
TheRealRedGaming: Stop it
RapidSammi: (laughs) / (cracks up) / Jesse's never had anyone who'd play the trick with her before, so she doesn't know about it very much.
Raven: (laughs) / Aww, thank you! I'm glad you like this :3
RWBYSTRQ: Which ones?
Emily The Avenger: (laughs) Uh, thanks Em. / (cracks up)
PoptartCrumbs: (laughs)
InsaneAcrobat: Lukas... isn't the murderer. / Eh, it's fine. xD / Dude, please choose a different last name, I don't want to be copyrighted. This is extremely serious. I'm planning on eventually releasing the comic as a published book, and if you use copyrighted last names that could get me into major legal trouble. / Alright, thank you, please do so soon :3
RavenBlaze4850: (laughs) / Ahhh. xD / x3
AquaK13: (laughs) / Of course Ivor's pissed, Lukas is actually decent to him xD
DarkbeastDend: (smiles)
J.M.M.: (laughs) / 1) Give your character a full name. / 2) Post it in the correct location. / 3) You have email, don't you? You can just contact me via the website.
Toni42: YEP
S4SH4L4SH4theGaMeR101: (chuckles) Don't worry it's a hard word. / Mmm, if you have an email could you just send it to me via the website?
GuestPerson13: Thanks! I'm glad you like it :3 / ... (smiles) / Thanks! / Oh, I definitely remember you! :3 I happened to look at the reviewer name and was just like "Wait a second" / Well, thank you, but could you submit to one of the locations in the A/N?
x.X. A.L.X.x
