Raven snorted and spat out a mouthful of feathers.

"Rotty, just because we're siblings doesn't mean you can just strip down right in front of me...seriously..TMI" she said, shielding her eyes and her brother dressed down for the night.

He often revelled in the sick ironic pleasure of sleeping in Apples bed during the holidays. And now that he was her villain it was even more satisfying. The feather littered room was a beautiful work of art in his decision, and he humphed at her.

"Don't ruin the fun, Raven! I want to get me revenge on Apple for forcing me to listen to her savagely butchering and entire musical soundtrack during our muse-ic class presentation. Seriously...I was 'wishing, to throw HER down the 'wishing well'..." He spat.

He was about to hop into the bed and laugh himself silly at the thought that Apple White was going to be sleeping on the same bed he'd sat his undies-only butt on for a few weeks, while he laced her bed with timed booby traps...

But THEN...

XxXxXxX

The three girls fell, as gracefully as possible out of the mirror portal and then their attention was sadly, and unfortunately brought to the semi naked red headed villain, who was frozen to the spot like a turkey in the rain...

Which is more or less what he transformed into in a panic after everyone in the room took turns screaming, and he gobbled, and clucked, and scurried around the room, dragging his feathered cloak in his sad little beak.

Cerise stared at the foul little bird and decided if her appetite hadn't been thrown off, she would probably have eaten him for that!

"What the heck? Cerise? What are you doing here?" Raven stood up, not in her pyjamas yet.

He took a quick glance at her pathetic brother and then added, "he's my brother... It's hard to explain..."

Coming back to reality as best as she could, Cerise took a deep breath and then spilled all the information she knew.

"Oh...no..." Raven finally said after a few minutes of diligently paying attention as the girls gave her the situation.

"He's trying to take Daring out of the picture, and replacing Dexter with a FAKE to replace HIM replacing DARING?!" She stammered out, her aura glowing a violent shade of purple.

She stood upright and screamed, turning the bed posts to dust behind her.

"This is the LAST STRAW!" She said firmly, calming herself to a glowing simmer.

"Normally I don't care how people choose to live, but this is a case where everyone has NO choice, and I won't stand for it. No one, not even kings and queens, not even PARENTS should be allowed to do this!"

Twyla and Howleen had been very used to displays of angry magic, and were the first to speak up.

"Well, what should we do? Do you have any ideas of how we can get Dexter out of the mirror?" Howleen asked, while Twyla attempted to feed on Ravens negative energy to reduce her stress.

"I have an idea..." A male voice interjected.

They all turned to the direction of the two long mirrors at the end of the room and gasped.

"Dexter!" Raven cried, rushing to him, "Oh my godmother, I promise I'll get you out of there somehow! How long have you been away? Where are you?" She began to interrogate him, with a cross of relief, anger and hysteria dying her tone.

"Whoa, whoa, calm down Raven! Getting me out isn't what's important right now!" He said, feeling bad for cutting her off, but he knew that time was truly of the essence.

Raven took a deep breath and then in an almost exasperated voice asked, "What? What is possibly more important than whether or not you DIE?"

Dexter winced but cleared his throat and continued. "As you all know, I was planned to be the beast once upon a time. Naturally this meant I was gifted upon my birth a magical mirror that can show me anyone or anything in all the world. You need to find that mirror, and use it to find Daring."

Cerise perked her ears and stood closer to the mirror, the ghouls joining to hear the plan.

"When you find Daring's location, take the mirror with you so I can come too. My father is planning to throw an early engagement party for Apple and my double. If we turn up to the party with Daring, then my father will be revealed as a liar, and Daring can state his case."

"Of course! And then we can show the whole Kingdom how they tortured and mutated him for their own selfish desires!" Cerise growled viciously

"I'll say! I dunno what is up with this world, but the people in charge here are freakier than full moon fever!" Holween spat.

"What do we do after that though?" Raven asked, already grabbing magical items and emergency packs from the room to use on their endeavour. "What about you?"

Dexter grinned and replied, "Cupid and I figured that out! Since I can't leave the portal, you'll have to snatch my body from the party after using Daring as a distraction and push IT into the magic mirror with a basic portal spell! Then, raven, you follow him through and we reunite 'me' back together again." He explained feeling proud of his plan.

Raven couldn't help but flush a little in the cheeks, having always underestimated her princely boyfriend. Apparently when things got serious, so did he.

She pushed that to the back of her mind for now and then rallied up the rest, "okay! You heard him, we have no time to lose! We'll need to sneak into Dexters dorm room, and Darings too. I know where they are, so this first phase of the mission shouldn't take long."

"Come with me!" She said, as she marched out the door having handed each girl an emergency pack (courtesy of apples insane need to heal every single injured animal she sees) and a magical protection item (courtesy of protecting herself from back when her brother and Apple had gone through a horrific prank war)

They all nodded and marched out the door single file, ready to save the day.

"Don't forget to summon me!" Dexter called, "I really hope this works..." He sighed.

XxXxXxX