"Ugh." said Thorn as she opened her eyes, her vision blurry and unfocused. Her body ached all over and she had a pounding headache ringing in her head. She rubbed her head as she sat up, just about making out two other people standing in the room nearby. Her eyes were just regaining focus when one of the figures rushed towards her and tackled her in a hug; the sudden movement making everything go blurry again.
"Thorn! You're alright!" exclaimed a voice Thorn immediately recognised as Dusk's, who was presumably the one hugging her.
"Oh thank God." said another voice Thorn recognised as Luna's, her voice filled with relief.
After a few seconds more of blurriness her vision began to clear again, the blur being replaced by a large blonde explosion of a pigtail blocking her face. Perplexing Thorn for a moment, before she remembered Dusk had grown her hair out a ton recently when Gus got them to change their performance outfits.
Though what did Dusk mean about her being alright…oh yeah, the speaker! That oddly dressed weirdo calling himself the Phantom had crashed their concert and threatened them to have it be their final show. They'd defied him and continued playing anyway and in response he'd hit the speaker with some kind of energy projectile, or she thought he had, hard to be sure as everything had happened so quick. The speaker had then fallen on her and the last thing she remembered was the impact of it hitting her back followed by her head making contact with the floor.
How the hell had she survived that? She should be dead, or at least seriously injured. Yet aside from her body aching and her headache she felt fine.
Maybe it was due to…
Thorn's thoughts were then interupted by Dusk being pulled back and lifted off her by, as she could see once the giant pigtail was out of her face, Luna. Revealing also that she'd been moved to some side room and had been laid on an old couch.
"You ok Thorn?" asked Luna caringly as she sat down on the couch beside her.
"Well I ache all over and have a really bad headache, but other than that yeah somehow I am." answered Thorn with a smile, trying to reassure Luna a bit.
"Somehow is right, I don't know how you survived that." said Luna, at lost for an explanation for once. "You should be in hospital, yet the medic who checked you over said you hadn't any serious injuries and just needed to rest it off."
"Thorn survived it because she's a Hex Girl Luna, we're badass like that!" explained Dusk with a grin, causing Thorn to openly laugh in response.
"There's your explanation Luna." joked Thorn.
"Well I suppose it's better than any I've come up with so far." replied Luna with a smile. "So I'll guess we'll just go with that explanation for now."
Luna then stood up from the couch, before turning and extending a hand down towards Thorn.
"Do you think you can stand?" asked Luna.
"Yeah I think so." replied Thorn, though her tone was unsure. She then took Luna's hand and, with her friend's help, managed to get to her feet. She tried to give a reassuring smile to Luna. "See told you?"
"Well I'm glad." began Luna before suddenly pulling her into a tight hug. "I was so worried about you Sally." Thorn hugged her back tightly. She knew Luna meant her words, they never called each other by their real names unless it was over something serious.
"Well don't worry any longer Luna, I'm fine now." said Thorn, trying to reassure her fellow Hex Girl.
"Good thing you are. Gus was having a panic attack after you went unconscious earlier." commented Dusk. "Thought he was going to have a mental breakdown."
"Of course he did, Thorn could've died there!" responded Luna as she ended the hug and turned to face Dusk.
"Wait, Gus cared that much?" asked Thorn in surprise. Recently their manager had got rather controlling. First pushing them to change their performance outfits when concert attendance and record sales fell. Then when they fell further insisting it was because Thorn was losing her touch with song writing and so he hired a songwriter to write their songs instead of her, something Thorn was still angry over. She almost dumped Gus as their manager there and then.
"Surprisingly, yes." replied Dusk.
"It's probably since the last thing our band needs with the state it it's in currently is for our lead singer and guitarist to get taken out of action." said Luna, her tone indicating her own recent dislike of their manager. In Luna's case mainly due to the pinkish white wig which was now part of her performance outfit, she utterly despised it and Thorn didn't blame her.
Though the issues their band was going through really wasn't a topic she wanted to talk about currently.
"Can we please not talk about that." pleaded Thorn, not wanting to talk about the negative topic currently. "Don't really want to think about those issues right now."
"Gotcha." replied Dusk.
"Yeah sorry, not the time to bring stuff like that up." said Luna apologetically, Thorn merely smiled in return whilst Dusk leant down and grabbed something off the ground.
"And here's your icepack back." said the drummer as she handed it over to Thorn. "Fell off your head when you sat up suddenly."
"Thanks Dusk." replied Thorn as she took the icepack, feeling the instant subsiding of her headache as she held it up to her head. The headache was still there, but at the least the cool sensation lessened the pain.
Now she could think more clearly, bringing her thoughts back to the earlier question of how she survived getting hit by the speaker. Maybe her survival was due to her magic? Admittedly other than the one time a few years back when she imprisoned Sarah Ravencroft in her spellbook she hadn't cast a single other spell or bit of magic. She was trying, she spent a lot of time and money tracking down and buying both old and new books on magic and magical related stuff in the hope that at least one of them was telling the truth and wasn't just made up rubbish. So far all of them fell firmly in the made up rubbish category. But she knew she at least had the potential.
After Ben Ravencroft first cast a spell and unlocked his magical abilities he'd shown increase physical attributes, being able to leap large distances effortless and was a lot more durable. Maybe the same had happened to her? Sure she couldn't leap large distances, but maybe it had made her a bit more durable and allowed to be relatively unharmed after having the speaker fall on her?
Thorn was about to voice her thoughts to her bandmates when suddenly the door to the room opened.
"Thorn darling you're up!" said a voice Thorn immediately registered as their manager's. She'd barely turned to face him when he had quickly crossed the room and hugged her. The sudden affection surprising her. "Thank goodness you're ok chicklet! I was in such a tizzy over worrying about you."
"Yeah I'm fine now Gus." replied Thorn with a smile as Gus released her from the hug, happy his concern for her appeared genuine. "Just have a headache."
"You sure darling?" Gus asked with concern in his voice, clearly not believing her.
"Ok well I ache all over too, but that aside I'm somehow fine." answered Thorn, happy for the first time in a while she was having a positive conversation with her manager.
"Somehow indeed. Looks like you're a lot less delicate than you appear." commented Gus as he peered down at her, before clapping his hands together happily as he turned his attention to Dusk and Luna as well. "Well that aside, came to fetch you dears as it turns out some friends of yours were in the audience. The groovy chicklets who've helped you out before, the ones who hunt ghosts."
"Mystery Inc.'s here?" said Luna in relieved surprise.
"Yay that means Scooby Doo's here!" said Dusk excitedly, having grown a fondness for the dog when they'd met in the past.
"Well looks like we have nothing to worry about now then." said Thorn, happy to know their mystery solving friend were nearby. Both since she knew their friends would help them out and because it had been a little over two years since they last saw Mystery Inc. when they'd invited them to their music video shoot in Romania. "They'll deal with our phantom problem."
"Certainly does Thorn darling." replied Gus, obviously pleased at their response to his news. "Though I don't know how they got past security and into the backstage area."
"Who cares how, let's go see them!" said Dusk as she practically bounced up and down in excitement.
"Indeed let's." said Gus before turning and heading towards the door. Thorn took three steps forward to follow him before stumbling and falling backwards.
"Woah!" said Thorn in surprise as she fell, before thankfully feeling someone catch her.
"Don't worry Thorn, I got you!" said Dusk, Thorn thankfully for the drummer's quick reaction.
"Thanks Dusk." said Thorn gratefully as, with Luna's help, Dusk helped her get back up on her feet.
"Don't mention it." replied Dusk with a smile.
"Looks like you can stand but can't quite walk yet." commented Luna.
"I guess I'm still a bit dizzy." replied Thorn as she looked down at her feet clad in black high heeled mary janes shoes. "And these high heels probably aren't helping."
The dark haired guitarist then looked up as she felt both her arms getting grabbed, seeing Dusk and Luna had each taken hold of one of her arms.
"Well we'll help you instead." said Luna with a kind smile.
"You bet we will!" added Dusk.
"Thanks girls." said Thorn as with her bandmates help she walked forward and followed their manager. Thankful and grateful that she had such good friends as Dusk and Luna.
"Perfect, Daphne's our Phantom bait." said Fred casually.
"Oh this is so exciting!" responded Daphne happily, before her tone changed to one of irritation. "Wait, bait?"
"Well how else will we catch the phantom?" replied Fred, oblivious to Daphne's irritation. "You'll disguise yourself as Thorn and go on stage instead of her. Then when the Phantom strikes again we'll trap him!"
"But today's concert kinda ended." said Dusk as she put her hands on her hips.
"And given how the crowd ran I don't exactly see them coming back tonight." said Luna, saddened by the memory how terrified their fans had looked as panic had broken out in the hall after the Phantom's attack. Thankfully though none of them had been hurt in the panic.
"Thorn could go out and try get the concert goers to come back." said Velma. "Seeing Thorn's alright will reassure them, and I'm sure she can convince them to come back for at least one more song."
"Indeed that'll reassure the little chicklets I'm sure." chimed in Gus.
"Definitely, I'll lure them back alright." said Thorn with a sultry smile. "Before that though I'm going to whip up a quick herbal remedy to help with my headache."
"Perfect, that gives us plenty of time to set up the trap." explained Fred confidently.
Luna found it amusing how quick their friends had got down to business about how they'd deal with the Phantom. They'd barely finished greetings, hugs and expressing concern about Thorn before they'd got right to it.
"And plenty of time to get Daphne looking like Thorn." said Dusk, her tone betraying her eagerness to do so.
"Especially since we need to find a wig like Thorn's hair." added Luna, knowing that'd be a difficulty. Black wigs were easy to come by and style, finding one with highlights like Thorn's would be an issue.
"It shouldn't be that hard." commented Fred. "We've whipped up disguises with less before."
"Yeah but those were probably low quality disguises." retorted Thorn, a slight hiss to her voice as she continued. "If someone's being disguised to look like me they better look damn good."
"What Thorn's saying is her vanity won't let it be a quickly done thing." said Luna as she rolled her eyes. "Got to have Daphne looking exactly like her."
"That's not…" began Thorn, annoyed at having her vanity called out.
"I'm fine with that." interupted Daphne excitedly. "It sounds fun! Except for the whole being bait bit…"
"Cause it's going to be fun!" said Dusk excitedly. "We get to goth you up again like we did in Romania."
When they last met the gang in Romania after the vampire problem was dealt with they'd done Daphne up fully in gothic makeup and dress for a later part of their Want to Wed But I Fled music video. It had indeed been fun except for the brief argument Luna had with Thorn over wherever they should apply black or purple eye shadow to Daphne. A rare occasion where Dusk was the one breaking up an argument between herself and Thorn instead of the usual situation of Luna breaking up arguments between her fellow sisters.
"Except this time you're being made a rockstar instead of a vampire bride." said Thorn as she gave a fanged smile.
"Even better." replied Daphne with an excited smile.
"Well now that all you darlings got that sorted I've got a meeting to attend." said Gus with a wave as he headed for the dressing room's door. "Later chicklets."
"What meeting?" asked Luna, less out of a desire of curiosity and more out of desire to annoy her manager by delaying him.
"With the Mayor, called and arranged it not long after the concert was crashed." said Gus as he span back around to face them. "Something about the upcoming concert, don't worry your pretty head about it chicklet." He then turned back around with a spin and exited the dressing room.
"Oh great." commented Velma dryly. "Now the Mayor's getting involved in this case."
"Huh?" said Thorn and Dusk in unison.
"The Mayor has a habit of trying to exploit monsters and ghosts like this to make money for the town." explained Daphne.
"Sorta like the fake Witch's Ghost was in Oakhaven." said Dusk in understanding.
"Exactly Dusk." said Velma.
"Except unlike this Phantom and those other ghosts my dad wasn't committing a crime." said Thorn in annoyance as she glared at Velma, who shifted uncomfortably in response.
"That aside, we should start getting Daphne disguised as Thorn." said Luna in an attempt to change the current topic of conversation.
"Yeah we want to act quickly before the Phantom can strike again." agreed Fred. "Whilst you do that we'll set up the trap and Thorn can try get the concert goers back."
"Works for me." replied Thorn as she stood up and finally stopped glaring at Velma, before walking towards the door.
"Are you sure you'll be fine walking about Thorn?" asked Luna, concern audible in her voice.
"Yeah we don't want you to fall over likely earlier." added Dusk with equal concern.
Thorn stopped walking away and turned to face them, putting her hands on her hips.
"I'll be fine girls." said Thorn confidently, before adding. "Besides I'm going to bring Tiny with me for security. If I fall he'll catch me."
"And if the Phantom shows up to attack you again Tiny will break him in half!" added Dusk, eagerness in her voice at the prospect.
"Exactly." said Thorn as she turned around again and headed for the door. "So don't worry about me girls, just focus on getting Daphne looking like my purple eyed twin."
"Like whose Tiny?" asked Shaggy in confusion as Thorn left the room.
"Oh he's our roadie." answered Luna.
"Despite the name he's huge!" added Dusk, raising her arms up in the air for emphasis. "And he's super buff. Like he's strong enough to punch a hole in a wall!"
"That's an exaggeration." added Luna as she rolled her eyes. "He's very strong Dusk, but he's not the Incredible Hulk."
"He totally could punch a hole in a wall!" disagreed Dusk.
"Regardless of if he is or isn't that strong he sounds perfect for protecting Thorn." interjected Velma.
"Right now let's get to work." said Fred. "If my trap goes as planned we'll have dealt with this Phantom before the night is over."
It didn't take too long for Daphne, Dusk and Luna to get to the dressing room. Upon entering Dusk immediately set to work rummaging through a duffle bag to find one of Thorn's spare performance outfits whilst Luna got out Thorn's makeup and laid it out on a nearby vanity table.
"So I was wondering." began Daphne. "Why did you girls change your performance outfits? I never heard any explanation in the news about it."
"Well it wasn't our idea." said Luna as she turned to face the fellow redhead.
"Our manager came up with it." added Dusk distastefully.
"Record sales happened to fall a bit." explained Luna. "So the solution he came up with was we needed a new look. Our record company backed him up on that."
"And he hired us a shitty songwriter." added Dusk, looking up at them for a moment before she turned her attention back to looking for Thorn's spare performance outfit.
"I was just going to get to that." snapped Luna, annoyed at being interupted. "Gus and the record company came to the conclusion Thorn was losing her touch at song writing, so they hired Daniel as our song writer. Who despite the reason he was hired hasn't been very good at writing songs."
Luna had nothing against Daniel personally, he was nice enough. It was just that he was terrible at writing songs. So terrible sometimes she wondered if he was writing them badly on purpose, as silly a thought as that was.
"Oh so that's why you're recent songs weren't too great." said Daphne in understanding, before her faced turned panicky and she quickly added. "Not that they were terrible or anything, music was fine I just mean the lyrics weren't up to the usual standard."
"Don't worry we get what you meant Daphne." replied Luna, with a smile to reassure her friend she took no offense from her previous comment.
"Yeah we get it. That's what we thought of those songs too." added Dusk.
"Though when did you notice it?" asked Luna, curious as to if for others the quality drop was immediately noticeable or if it had taken a few songs.
"Good Bad Girls." answered Daphne. "Was pretty forgettable compared to your other songs. It was a bit generic."
"What I expected, that was one of the first songs Daniel wrote for us." said Luna. "And yeah it is generic."
"It felt more like a song you'd write because you had to rather than because you had a good idea for a song." continued Daphne. "If that makes any sense."
"Makes perfect sense, that's how I feel about Good Bad Girls too." replied Luna with a smile. "Back to our new look though. Yeah the designs weren't our idea. Gus came up with them, with a tiny bit of input from Thorn."
"Her input was pretty much just the colour scheme." commented Dusk as rummaged through the duffle bag.
"Explains why each of your outfits is mainly red or black then." said Daphne with a brief laugh. "Except that time when she wore a purple dress I don't think I've ever seen Thorn wearing an outfit that wasn't those colours."
"I don't think we have either." said Luna with a laugh of her own.
"Here it is!" interupted Dusk as she held up one of Thorn's spare performance outfits, before carrying it over and dumping it on a nearby tables.
"Thanks Dusk." said Daphne with a smile.
"Now we just need to find a wig like Thorn's current hairstyle." said Luna. "Not going to be easy given I doubt there's any wigs with red highlights like hers lying around."
"Nah it won't be that hard. Just find a black wig and spray paint the right bits red." said Dusk casually.
"Well if it's so easy then you've got the job of finding and colouring the wig then." said Luna. "I'll be the one to do Daphne's makeup."
Dusk frowned put her hands her waist, looking like she was about to disagree with the task she'd been assigned before she stopped herself, seemingly realising now wasn't the time for that.
"Fine I'll find it." said Dusk a little reluctantly as she headed towards the dressing room door. "Shame we aren't disguising Daphne as you Luna, would be easy then as we could've used one of your spare wigs."
"Oh that's a wig." said Daphne in relieved surprise. "Thank goodness! I thought you'd dyed your beautiful orange her that weird pinkish white colour!"
"Yeah just a wig." said Luna as she took off the pinkish white wig and deposited it on the edge of the vanity table, revealing her normal bright orange hair in its backcombed hairstyle. "Originally Gus proposed dying my hair that colour, but there was no way I was allowing that to happen."
"Luna was murderously opposed to the idea." joked Dusk just before she left the dressing room, slamming the door behind her with a bang.
"I would've been murderously opposed to it to if someone wanted me to dye my hair that colour." said Daphne with disgust at the idea. "You made the right call Luna."
"Thanks Daphne." replied Luna with a smile in response to Daphne's repulsion at the idea of dyeing her hair that colour.
"Anytime Luna." said Daphne as she returned the smile, before heading over and sitting down at the chair in front of the vanity table and surveyed the array of makeup before her. "Now c'mon and make me look like a rockstar!"
"With pleasure." replied Luna as she walked over to the table to do just that.
"So things didn't exactly go as planned there." commented Thorn awkwardly, not really being sure what to say after Daphne had got kidnapped.
"Yeah Fred's trapped sucked. It trapped us instead of the phantom." said Dusk in annoyance.
"I'm sure that wasn't intentional Dusk." said Luna as she crossed her arms and leaned up against the wall.
"Well duh, of course it wasn't." said Dusk sassily. "Doesn't change the fact it happened though."
"Yeah well it happened, no point getting worked up over something you can't change." said Luna. "I'm more frustrated by how we're having to stay here instead of being out there with the gang searching for Daphne."
After Dusk and Luna had been freed from the cages of Fred's trap Gus had rushed the three of them off to their dressing room. He'd insisted they stay there instead of joining the search for Daphne, citing the danger of the Phantom. The potential danger also being why Tiny was currently standing by the door to their dressing room, ready to stop any unauthorized entrance forcefully. Then once he was sure they were safe their manager had then gone off to book them a hotel room to stay in tonight instead of their tour bus, out of the belief the Phantom may target that too.
Thorn appreciated their manager's concern and agreed with booking a hotel instead of staying in their tour bus, but at the same time she wanted to be out their helping find their friend. Usually she'd have disagreed or argued with Gus, but after the events of this night she was too tired too. All she wanted to do now was go having a relaxing bath and then afterwards head straight to bed.
She wished she had her herbs to hand; some lavender or goldenrod would be great right about now. Annoyingly though all her herbs, with the exception of the usual mix of peppermint and clothes the three of them used before a show, were back on their tour bus and as such unavailable to her.
Thorn then frowned as she remembered that both lavender and goldenrod were amongst the herbs she was running low on, having not had a chance to top up her supply since the beginning of their current tour. Looks like her herbs wouldn't be any good even if she had them to hand.
There was then a knock at the door, snapping Thorn from her thoughts.
"Darlings I'm back." said the familiar flamboyant voice of Gus, following two more knocks on the door.
Tiny then opened the door, allowing their manager to enter the room followed by another man before he shut the door behind them.
"Chicklets this is Mayor Jones." said Gus as he introduced the man next to him.
"A pleasure to meet you girls." said Mayor Jones with a friendly smile as he extended his hand for a handshake.
"Nice to meet you too." replied Thorn as she reached out and shoke the Mayor's hand, giving a fanged smile in return.
She was wary of the Mayor, given based off what Mystery Inc. had said he was mostly likely just here to exploit the Phantom and their kidnapping for tourism. However even if he was that was the case there was no reason to be rude to him.
"Anyway darlings I was going to go to call and book you a hotel room where I ran into Mayor handsome here." explained Gus, motioning to the Mayor as he mentioned him. "He'd heard about the Phantom incident and had come over to see if there was anything he could do to help. I mentioned the need for a hotel room and the darling got you one at a nearby hotel for free with a quick call."
"Oh, well thank you." said Thorn as she gave the Mayor a sweet smile in thanks, looks like she'd misjudged the elected official.
"Yeah thanks." chimed in Dusk with a grin.
"We appreciate it." added Luna.
"It's the least I could do girls." said Mayor Jones with a grin. "After all you preforming in our little town has brought quite a bit of tourism in. If anything I should be thanking you."
"So where is the hotel?" inquired Luna.
"Oh its nearby, about a 15 minute walk down the street." answered Mayor Jones. "Head out the concert hall and walk to your right. Keep going in a straight line and you'll reach the hotel. It's a little bit passed the Crystal Cove Spook Museum, if you pass the Town Hall then you've gone too far."
"Thanks." replied Luna with a smile.
"What's the Spook Museum?" asked Dusk curiously.
"Oh it's a museum on the various paranormal and occult things, real or hoax, which have happened in our little town over the years. Has quite a comfy little café and bookshop too, along with selling various paranormal nick knacks." answered the Mayor cheerfully as he advertised his town. "It'd be right up you're alley actually. Recommend visiting it if you have the time whilst you're here."
"Sounds like it is our thing alright." said Thorn excitedly, though more by the prospect of what books the bookshop might hold than the museum itself.
"Definitely." said Dusk, sharing her excitement.
"We'll have to check it out sometime then if it's so nearby." said Luna, noticeably far less enthused by the idea.
"Oh please do." said Mayor Jones with a smile, before adding. "Mention to the owner I sent you, I'm a friend. May net you a discount."
"Anyway darlings we should get going to the tour bus and pack your stuff up before heading to the hotel." interjected Gus before Thorn could respond to the Mayor. "Given it's about time you chicklets get some rest after tonight's events."
"Fine by us." said Thorn, her fellow Hex Girls nodding in agreement. She then turned her attention back to the Mayor as Gus and Tiny turned to leave the room. "Was nice meeting you Mayor Jones."
"The sentiment is mutual." replied the Mayor with another smile.
Then Thorn followed Gus and Tiny out of the dressing room, Dusk and Luna following close behind her.
The hotel room wasn't quite what Luna was expecting. It was a single room with an attached bathroom containing one double bed with two side tables with lights on either side of it, a couch, TV, a desk with a wooden chair and a single overhead light lighting the room. The walls were all painted an off shade of green and there was a large window, flanked either side by blue curtains, which would give a view of Crystal Cove's beach if it hadn't been night.
It wasn't a bad hotel room by any means, just a bit basic. Luna had got just to the more fancier and luxurious hotel rooms they began staying in after their band became successful, it had been a couple years since she'd stay in any hotel room like this. She liked it though, it reminded her of when they'd just begun touring and it was still very much the beginning of their career.
Only one bed was going to be an issue though.
"This is it?" asked Thorn as she put her hands on her hips, a bit offended by the hotel room.
"We haven't stayed in a room like this in years!" protested Dusk, echoing Luna's previous thoughts.
"Well it is peak tourism season here girls, doubt there's many other rooms available." said Luna as she walked over to close the curtains. "This was pretty last minute."
"I guess…" replied Thorn as she walked over and opened the bathroom door, looking inside to check it out whilst Dusk shut and locked the hotel room's door behind them. "At least there's a bath."
"And we are staying here for free thanks to the Mayor." said Luna. "Don't expect something to be too great if it's free."
"Ugh I suppose that's fair." said Dusk irritably as she looked over at the bed. "So which one of us is sleeping on the couch this time? Since that bed can only fit two."
"I'm obviously sleeping in the bed." said Thorn as she walked over from the bathroom and sat down on the bed.
"Well duh." said Dusk. "Obviously you are after what happened today."
"I'd prefer to too Dusk if you don't mind taking the couch." said Luna as she readied herself for an argument. Usually when this issue came up when they began touring she'd opt for the couch to avoid an argument, yet after the events of this night she'd rather have a nice bed to sleep in. Even if that meant she had to argue to get it.
"Ok." said Dusk, surprising Luna. Dusk not starting an argument was a rarer than seeing a blue moon.
"Well now that that's settled then I'm going to go run myself a bath." said Thorn as she stood up and stretched her slender arms over her head. "I need one after tonight, my body still aches from earlier."
"I'll go do it!" said Dusk quickly before she ran off into the bathroom and shut the door behind her.
"Oh…umm ok." said Thorn in surprise. She then looked over at Luna. "What's up with Dusk? She's never that helpful or unargumentative."
Luna pondered the question for a moment before she replied.
"It's probably Dusk's way of showing she cares and doesn't want to stress us out more after tonight's events." answered the dark skinned pianist. "Just without her having to say it so she keeps up her tough girl act."
"Guess that makes sense." said Thorn with a smile as she sat down on her bed and took out her phone. "Wish she'd be like that more often."
"Same here." replied Luna as she sat down on the couch. "But then she wouldn't be Dusk."
"True." replied Thorn, though Luna could tell the guitarist's attention was now more focused on her phone than her.
"What are you looking at on there?" asked Luna.
"Oh just magic stuff." replied Thorn as she looked up from her phone. "I theorised why I survived the speaker falling on me earlier so unscathed was thanks to my magic."
"How? You didn't cast any spells." asked Luna in confusion.
"Remember when Ben Ravencroft had cast his first magic spell he became more durable. So maybe I did too?" explained Thorn, her tone indicating she was hopefully this was the reason.
"I suppose it may be." replied Luna, less pleased by the explanation as Thorn turned her attention back to her phone.
Unlike her fellow Hex Girls Luna wasn't as excited about the prospect of magic turning out to be real. Sure it was pretty cool to find out it wasn't just a thing of fiction, but she also found it a rather terrifying thought.
Probably didn't help but the experience where they found out magic was real wasn't a pleasant one, though after so many years they'd all overcome the trauma. It's only lasting impacts were that it inspired Thorn to write the song The Witch's Ghost, which had been a hit, and that it had tainted all of Ben Ravencroft's novels. All of them still enjoyed them and would list them among their favourite books, love the art not the artist and all that, but the evil man that Ben had ended up being left a spectre hanging over his stories.
That aside the main reason Luna found magic a terrifying thought was rather simple, she knew so little about it. She knew that witches and warlocks were real and some of the kinds of spells they could cast, but that was all she certainly knew. What other magical things/creatures were real? Thinking about that made her imagination run wild, ironic as in the past she had been a diehard sceptic towards the idea such things existed.
Were demons real? What about fairies and pixies? What about the creatures from native American legend, like the wendigo and skinwalker? Were zombies real? What about ents and nature spirits? And so on…
It wasn't something she liked to think about. There were enough human dangers lurking in the darkness of the night to worry about without factoring in magical dangers too.
Annoyingly though the only other person who shared that view and was at the Witch's Ghost incident was Mayor Corey. He much like Luna was unsettled by the idea magic was real, and wanted to put the incident fully behind him. He out right refused to discuss the incident as anything more than a fire, which was the official public explanation for how the Puritan Village was destroyed and Ben Ravencroft had died. Whilst both Mr. McKnight and Mystery Inc. both encouraged Thorn's research into magic, the guitarist's father was surprisingly excited about the prospect his daughter potentially had magical abilities.
So she usually tried to distract Thorn from researching magic for that reason, even if she knew it was selfish to do that. Well for that reason and the fact it annoyed her how much money her fellow Hex Girl wasted on buying books about magic by hack writers. Thorn spent so much she was probably keeping that lying industry afloat at this point, as no matter how many times the books ended up yielding nothing of truth she kept buying them out of the hope one day she'd find on telling actual real fact about magic. It angered Luna to see her friend exploited by those con-artists that way, though despite her best efforts she hadn't yet succeed in getting Thorn to stop buying them.
Thorn did occasionally buy some far older books on magic though. She had a few from the early 19th century, all of which had again yielded no truth about magic but at least they'd given Thorn some more knowledge about old paganism.
Luna then snapped herself out of that train of thought, she'd let her mind wander too much. Back to the issue at hand, how to distract Thorn from researching her magic. Both for her own admittedly selfish reasons and since if she didn't Thorn would inevitably later stay up for too long browsing online about various magical topics like she'd done in the past. Thorn needed to rest and Luna was going to ensure she got it.
"Hey Thorn." said Luna in an attempt to get Thorn's attention whilst she tried to quickly think up a topic of conversation to distract her with.
"Hmmm." acknowledged Thorn as she looked up from her phone, just as a topic came to Luna.
"Who do you think is the Phantom?" asked Luna. "Since you know it's got to be a guy in a mask like all the mysteries the gang encounter."
"Well it's got to be someone who hates us, or at least hates me." said Thorn as she put down her phone. "Someone jealous of my looks maybe?"
"I don't think anyone's so jealous of your looks they'd go as far to try kill you." said Luna, before quickly adding before Thorn got offended knowing how vain she was. "And if they were they'd just go after you, not threaten the whole band to stop preforming."
"Hmmm that's true." replied Thorn as she ran a hand through her black hair. "Maybe it was Wildwind? They probably at least dislike us."
"I wouldn't put it past them to try crush you with a speaker, given they did leave us in a random spot in the Australian outback." replied Luna, shivering at the thought of the unpleasant memory. "But they're in prison still and won't be out for years, if at all. So it couldn't be them."
"The Fortescu brothers?" suggested Thorn. "They certainly hate us for profiting off their family's legacy or whatever it was they said."
"They're still in prison too." replied Luna, pausing brief to think before continuing. "And given the only other person it could be following that pattern is Ben Ravencroft, who's dead, I doubt it's him either."
"Probably dead." corrected Thorn. "Sure the spellbook burnt, but we don't know truly how the whole being trapped in a spellbook thing works. Maybe he's stuck in another dimension or space?"
"Ok he's probably dead." said Luna reluctantly, wishing it was definitely the opposite. "But even if he is just stuck in another dimension that means he wasn't at our concert tonight dressed up as the Phantom."
"True…frustrated or jealous singer maybe?" suggested Thorn as she shrugged. "There's bound to be plenty singers jealous of us, since not everyone can make it to the top."
"That's probable. But I don't know anyone who'd do that." said Luna in reply. "All the singers we know are also successful and wouldn't have any reason to be jealous of us."
"What about Zander? She's a singer who is jealous of us." suggested Thorn half-heartedly. "I mean ok she doesn't professionally sing, but she's definitely jealous."
"She's definitely jealous of us but there's no way she'd be the Phantom." replied Luna, quick to shoot down that idea. "For a start her anxiety is way too bad to appear in front of a crowd that big, even if she had her back turned to them."
"Yeah she'd have broken out in hives and had an anxiety attack before she even attempted to threaten us." agreed Thorn. "It's such a shame she can't overcome it since she's a good singer, not as good as me of course but who is."
"Secondly." began Luna, ignoring Thorn's last boastful comment. "Even if she is super jealous she's still our friend and would never try stop us preforming. Neither would she try injure you, especially since she admires you so much."
"Yeah she'd never do that." agreed Thorn as blushed in embarrassment, obviously feeling a bit bad at even half-heartedly suggesting Zander could be behind the attack. Before she quickly looked down at her lap, her black hair falling across her face and hiding her blush. "Besides we pay her to run our fan forum, doubt she'd want to lose that extra income when she works at the grocery shop back in Oakhaven."
"That's a good point." said Luna, feeling a bit bad Zander had a job like that when she had a good amount of talent as a singer. "Maybe it was a failed actor?"
"What actors have we pissed off?" asked Thorn in confusion as she quickly looked back up at Luna.
"None, just a guess since you have to be good at acting to pull off that Phantom persona convincingly." answered Luna.
"Not really when it comes to monsters. The gang's come across people from all walks of life convincingly pretending to be monsters and succeeding at it." replied Thorn as she brushed her hair back into place. "Obviously can't be that hard if even people like bank managers and fishermen can manage it. I mean my Dad's a pharmacist and yet he was pretty convincing as the witch's ghost."
"Hadn't considered that." replied Luna as she leant back against the couch. "Guess it isn't as hard as it looks after all."
"Maybe it's someone against our eco-activism?" suggested Thorn eagerly, Luna knowing why easily. If someone would be going to these lengths to stop their activism then it would show their efforts had a large effect.
"Maybe." agreed Luna, the idea wasn't that far-fetched. "But who?"
"No idea, could be loads of people. The head of an oil company, a politician, logger, factory farmer, head of an industrial mining company, someone who tests products on animals…" rambled Thorn eagerly as her green eyes lit up at the idea, loving the thought that she'd pissed people in those categories off to the point where they'd try to retaliate against her.
"I get the idea Thorn." interupted Luna, cutting her bandmate off before she rambled further. "Not that unlikely the motive would be stopping our activism."
"Especially since we're donating all the proceeds from our final concert of this tour in two shows time to an anti-hunting charity." continued Thorn excitedly. "Might be a hunter trying to stop us doing that, stop me turning the youth of today against their evil hobby."
"I admit, the motive is there." commented Luna. "But a hunter would've just shot you if they were going to go this far to stop us preforming. Dressing up as the Phantom is too unpractical for a hunter."
"That's why they would. No one would look at that wack outfit and assume it was a hunter." explained Thorn as she crossed her arms, obviously satisfied with her explanation.
"I guess there's some logic there." replied Luna, not entirely convinced.
"Well who else could it be, an out of season Trick or Treater?" asked Thorn, causing each Hex Girl to laugh.
"Perhaps." replied Luna after laughing. "I still don't know how you got me to agree to that anti-hunting charity concert."
She may call herself an eco-goth, but Luna didn't take that to mean she had to be against hunting. Provided the animals hunted got eaten at the end of the hunt and weren't endangered she didn't see the issue. Especially since the money raised through issuing hunting licenses could be used effectively for funding conservation. Plus certain animal populations did have to be culled to keep things balanced, may aswell make some money off it.
Of course Thorn disagreed with her. To the guitarist all life was sacred, especially her beloved animals. They'd clashed over their differing views about hunting in the past whenever it came to supporting anti-hunting charities and organisations, making the bands verbal and financial support of the anti-hunting cause a solitary activity of Thorn till now. The final concert of the tour was first time it'd be seen as the whole band taking that stance.
"Don't you remember? I sent you pictures of sad baby animals to guilt you." answered Thorn, before smirking mischievously. "Guess I've got to send you more so you remember!"
"I'd rather you didn't." replied Luna in slight annoyance at the memory of having her phone go off with so many notifications every hour, and almost all of them being sad baby animals Thorn kept spamming her with. Usually with captions like "I'm sad a hunter shot my Mum." or something similar. "That got so annoying so quick."
"But I succeeded, I guilted you into having that anti-hunting concert!" said Thorn with a grin. "So that's what matters."
"You didn't fully succeed there." replied Luna. "I only agreed to stop you spamming my phone with those pictures every hour, not because you managed to guilt me."
"Ok fine I didn't manage to guilt you into supporting it." agreed Thorn reluctantly. "But you're still supporting an anti-hunting concert, so that's a victory in my book."
"A one-time thing." said Luna.
"Not if I send you sad animal pictures again." teased Thorn with a smirk.
"If you do that I'll just block you." replied Luna with a smile.
"Fine I won't do that." said Thorn with a pout, before smiling again. "I'll just do it by verbally guilting you instead."
"And if you remember that doesn't work. Despite how you try guilt me and Dusk over not being zealots like you over eco stuff all the time." replied Luna.
"I don't do it all the time." said Thorn, a bit offended at the accusation.
"Yeah you do." said Luna. "Like that time when we watched Bambi at your house and at the beginning when the hunter shoots his mother you yell THAT'S YOU! YOU'RE LIKE THAT HUNTER LUNA! YOU'D KILL BAMBI'S MOTHER TOO!"
"But you have shot deer when you've gone hunting before!" protested Thorn in defence of her action, though Luna could tell she was a bit embarrassed at being called out about the Bambi incident. "If you shot a female one then you are just like the hunter who shot Bambi's mother."
"Thorn I've never shot any deer before, I've shot moose and then only two of them." retorted Luna calmly. "And they were both male."
"Well you've still gone hunting before. So my point still stands." replied Thorn accusingly, before adding a bit less confidently. "Sort of…"
"Only twice Thorn, and I'm not doing it again since it wasn't my thing." explained Luna, noticing Thorn smile as she said she wouldn't do it again.
"Good." said Thorn with a smile, clearly satisfied with that response. "Since eco-goths don't hunt animals and neither should the Hex Girls."
"Thorn we're the only people who call ourselves eco-goths." replied Luna in amusement. Despite Thorn's efforts she'd never managed to get the term eco-goths to catch on, much to her friend's annoyance.
"Ugh that's true, but my point still stands. Hunting is bad, evil, horrible and we don't do it!" said Thorn defiantly.
"Fine, but you didn't disprove my statement about you trying to guilt me and Dusk all the time there." said Luna. "If anything you reinforced it."
"You gave only one example, that doesn't prove anything either." said Thorn as she examined her nails, feigning disinterest.
"Ok I'll give more examples then." began Luna. "Like how whenever me and Dusk eat fish you bring up dolphins getting caught in fishing nets, and before you've claimed there's dolphin mixed in with canned tuna."
"Well that's true! The poor dolphins do get caught in fishing nets." refuted Thorn passionately. "And…"
"Also nearly always whenever me and Dusk eat meat you bring up factory farming, even though we make sure to eat only free range meat." interupted Luna. "Just because we aren't vegetarians like you doesn't mean we don't care about animals."
"Ok but one those two examples are both food related. So that's effectively only one example." said Thorn as she brushed back a strand of her hair which had fallen out of place. "Two there's nothing wrong with me trying to encourage you to switch to a diet which is kinder to animals."
"Fine I'll give a non-food related example then." began Luna. "There was that time when I wore a jacket trimmed with fur and you completely blew up at me over it, even though the fur was fake fur as I repeatedly told you at the time."
"But lots of fake fur is real fur passed off as fake though." defended Thorn.
"Maybe for cheaper clothes, but that jacket was expensive Thorn. If it says fake fur then its fake fur." said Luna. "And you screeching about it in that hotel's lobby was super embarrassing you know."
"Ok I may have gone a bit far there." said Thorn as her face went a little red in embarrassment. "I admit that. But wearing fake fur is still slightly supporting wearing real fur since it still normalises wearing fur as a fashion. And wearing clothing of animals as fashion isn't something I support."
"Maybe, but if so you're a hypocrite there." replied Luna. "Since you say you don't support clothing made out of animals or harming them, yet you wear leather clothing. You outright refuse to even have fake leather clothes just because you say they feel cheap. You've even sent back clothes you've ordered plenty of times when you discovered they were made of fake rather than real leather."
"I...Well you…ummm." stammered Thorn as she tried and failed to think of a response to being called out on her hypocrisy. Luna just smirked at the sight, satisfied at how she'd caught the guitarist out.
Just then the bathroom door was opened by Dusk.
"Hey Thorn, your bath is ready." said Dusk cheerfully, seemingly enjoying being helpful for once.
"Great! Thanks Dusk." said Thorn as she suddenly dashed past the blonde drummer and into the bathroom, swiftly shutting the door behind her.
"What's up with her?" asked Dusk in confusion, oblivious to the prior conversation.
"Oh we were just talking about how she's an eco-zealot." answered Luna. "I called her out on being hypocritical about how she wears only real leather after the fake fur incident came up."
"Aww I missed that." said Dusk disappointedly as she pouted. "Thorn's funny when she goes into eco-zealot mode, especially how she goes when you catch her out on being a hypocrite over some eco thing."
"I suppose she is a bit." said Luna, not quite agreeing with Dusk.
"Like that interview a few weeks ago where she completely freaked out on the interviewer. That was hilarious." said Dusk with an amused smile.
"No it wasn't, I was worried Thorn was going to actually assault him." said Luna, frowning at the memory. "And yet when I was trying to calm her down you kept goading her on."
"Because it was funny." replied Dusk in defence of her actions. "Besides Thorn is super weak, even if she had hit the interviewer she wouldn't have hurt him. Only way Thorn can ever hurt anyone is emotionally."
"I was more concerned about how that'd look publicity wise Dusk." explained Luna. "Assaulting interviewers isn't the look and style we want for our band."
"I guess." replied Dusk with a shrug before letting out a yawn. "Anyway now it's time to get your ass off the couch, I want to get some sleep."
After quickly shutting the door behind her and escaping being confronted by Luna about her hypocrisy Thorn surveyed their hotel room's bathroom. One wall was covered by white titles, which matched the colour of the bath that was positioned up against it. The other three walls were painted grey providing a contrast to the white sink, toilet and cabinet attached to them. The floor was tiled, coloured a shade of grey slightly lighter than the three walls. Above the sink was a simple mirror.
Once Thorn had disrobed she went over to the mirror and removed her makeup. She paused briefly when she finished removing it to take in how her face looked without makeup on, a face few people got to see. Then she got a towel and walked over to the freshly run bath.
Thorn placed down the towel on the bath mat before stepped into the bath before slowly laying down in it. The rockstar let out a content sigh as she felt the aches she had felt since the speaker had hit her subside as the warm water made contact with her skin.
As she relaxed Thorn thought back to the topic she'd discussed with her sisters as they walked to the hotel. When Dusk and Luna had been disguising Daphne as her they talked about their performance outfits change after Daphne had asked about it.
A question her bandmates said Daphne asked stuck out in her mind. Couldn't Thorn have just said no to the change?
Ultimately though Gus had been the one to propose the change to their performance outfits Thorn had been the one to make the decision. Sure Dusk and Luna agreed to the change too, but Thorn knew they largely agreed because she had. Though it was mostly unspoken she was the leader of the Hex Girls, and her bandmates would generally follow her lead when she made a decision.
However just because Thorn had agreed to the change didn't mean she liked it.
When Gus had proposed the change to her he'd been rather pushy, as he tended to be on occasion. At the time it had been understandable though, there had been a notable drop in their record sales and concert attendance. Nothing disastrous or anything like that, but it had been enough to make their manager worry. By extension it also made Decade Records, the record company they were signed with, worry too. Changing something had been a logical proposition and made sense to her at the time.
What hadn't made sense to her was hiring a songwriter, in this case Daniel. Thorn was incredibly insulted by the idea that she'd lost her touch at song writing, she distinctly remembered yelling at Gus when he mentioned the idea of hiring a songwriter for the band to her. Though it had been more an idea by Decade Records than Gus himself, though it was him who picked out and hired Daniel for the job.
Despite her dislike of the idea Thorn had agreed to hiring a songwriter alongside the changes to their performance outfits. But why had she if she was so against the idea?
It only took a brief moment of thought before she found the reason.
Gus had unintentionally asked her during a moment of weakness on her part.
At the time their recent new single Wanna Wed But I Fled hadn't done as great as Thorn had expected it would. It didn't do badly, but she'd got used to their songs getting very high positons in the charts whilst Wanna Wed But I Fled ended up only in the top 50. As such she'd been feeling a bit down at the time.
Also when Gus had asked her to a meeting about it she'd met him by herself, without Dusk and Luna with her. Despite the public perception of her Thorn wasn't as confident as she publically appeared. Or rather Thorn was, Sally wasn't. Thorn was her stage persona, that wasn't really her.
Well that wasn't true, it was her to an extent. She was just as confident as she was about her looks as she was on stage and in TV interviews. She had the same confidence when talking about her interests or her environmentalist beliefs. And of course she'd gone by the alias of Thorn for years before forming the Hex Girls, she'd first been called that name by Dusk in middle school.
The difference was Thorn as a stage persona was confident about everything else too. She had no self-doubt, she was dominant, didn't care what other people thought of her and she took being an icon her fans looked up to in her stride.
When in reality off stage she wasn't half as confident. She often questioned and doubted herself and her decisions. She cared about what people thought about her a lot and was easily embarrassed. Knowing her fans looked up to her and for some she was their role model put her under pressure, since she didn't want to badly influence any of them. When some of her fans had started copying her hair style, or at least how she did her red highlights it freaked her out a bit. She didn't mind people dressing similar or the same as her at all, after all it's always nice to have more goths around, but going as far as to copy her hair just felt weird to her. She viewed her signature hair style as her thing, seeing people copy it felt like they were trying to be her, which weirded her out.
Most of her Thorn persona confidence came from Dusk and Luna. It sounded silly, but just having them beside her made her feel confident. Partially since she knew she could always reply on them to back her up and defend her, and partially since they're presence was reassuring.
Thorn felt silly thinking back on how easily she'd been swayed to accept the changes. She'd been able to stand her ground and stand up to the Yowie Yahoo and his Wildwind vampires when they attacked their concert in Australia, stand up the Phantom earlier today and stand up to and imprison Sarah Ravencroft. It was silly she could stand up to fake and real supernatural creatures yet not a band manager and the suits of Decade Records.
If she could confront those former foes she could definitely stand up to Gus about the changes he'd made to the band.
In fact that's what she would do. Once this Phantom business was over with she was going to confront Gus about the changes and have them reversed. They were going to go back to their original performance outfits and firing Daniel as their songwriter, and that was final.
"I'm the leader of the Hex Girls, not him." said Thorn confidently, putting an end to that line of thought.
Thorn then turned her attention back to the relaxing feeling of the warm water on her skin, enjoying her well-deserved bath.