Halloween. A time for spooks and scares, and even pranks, and most of all tricks or treats. Except, like pretty much anything in the world, but specifically in the category of holidays, Halloween has its share of various views.
Some people like to celebrate horrific things when Halloween comes around, but others take a gentler approach. Some might think it sounds strange, but think about it, do you really think it's wise to glorify evil? Maybe it's just paranoia, but one of the true scariest things in the world is the fact that we never truly know what is going on in people's heads. That's not to say Halloween can't still be fun for everyone. Depending on your age or preferences, you might celebrate Halloween in different ways, but the best in my opinion are getting candy, making jack-o-lanterns, and having an excuse to play Dress Up.
Halloween was actually a few weeks away, so everyone was preparing posthaste. There were pumpkins to carve, candy to buy, costumes to choose, and trick or treat routes to plan.
This was the first Halloween the Heartwood Family would be celebrating with the royal family. Goldie was so excited to dress up and go trick or treating with her friends.
"You didn't celebrate Halloween back on Verden?" Lamenta had asked.
"Nope." Goldie shook her head. "Around this time of year, we used to have this other holiday called Light the Night. It's a special time on the darkest night of the year where we light candles and catch fireflies to show the dark that it can't scare us. We did dress up though, but we usually made costumes out of leaves, flowers, and homemade stuff. And we cooked extra sweet fruit treats."
"Do you have to yell 'trick or treat' to get some?" Omega asked.
"No. Just say please and thank you, like any other day. But I did get to celebrate the last two years. My dad took me to this village where he was teaching some classes about wicked witch safety."
It was a lot of fun for Mariposa too because Halloween was the one night of the entire year she could go out without wearing her cloak. All she needed was a pair of fake antennae, and everyone would think she was just wearing a butterfly costume.
A certain girl named Mona Sommers had never celebrated Halloween before. So, she wasn't sure what to expect.
"Why do these pumpkins have faces?" Mona asked, holding up one.
"Technically, the faces were cut into them." Tech said. "However, the reasoning, to my knowledge, is that they are traditional for Halloween."
Tech looked oddly at one pumpkin with a silly face.
"Though I do question the significance of them."
"They're called jack-o-lanterns," said Anakin. "And the kids love them. See, Mona? You can carve any shapes you want in the pumpkins. Then we put candles inside them to light up the night."
Anakin brought Mona over to a table where Padme was helping Gabby with her jack-o-lantern, but Gabby was disgusted when she got pumpkin guts on her hands.
"Eww! Slimy pumpkin guts!" Gabby whined.
"What do you do with the goopy stuff inside?" Mona asked.
"We put it in the compost bin," said Padme. "They make a great fertilizer."
"We can also save the seeds," said Gabby. "I hear ducks love them, so we can feed them to the ducks at the park when we're done."
Mona liked the sound of that; she loved feeding the ducks.
"They're not the only ones who love pumpkin seeds." Crescent said, licking his mouth and munching on some seeds. "Mmm. Pumpkiny."
Preparing for holidays is hard work, no matter which one you celebrate. Some say the winter holidays are the hardest, but Halloween has its hard preparations too. What is the hardest part of preparing for Halloween, you might be wondering? It's not carving jack-o-lanterns, and it's not buying candy either. It's not putting up decorations or setting up haunted houses, or even making a map with the trick or treat route to the houses that give the best treats. The hardest part, without a doubt, is picking a costume.
"I can't decide if I wanna be a cowgirl or a princess." Gabby said, looking at costumes.
"Gabby, you are a princess." Boba reminded his sister.
"I know, but it's not everyday I get to wear a ball gown."
Goldie came out from a divider dressed like Princess Tiana in her blue dress.
"What do you guys think?" Goldie said.
"You look great in blue, Goldie." Gabby said.
Even the adults were looking for costumes to wear.
"Hmm… this seems to suit me." Tech said, looking at himself in the mirror.
He was dressed in a lab coat with black gloves on.
Hunter, on the other hand, was looking at himself as he tried on a cowboy costume, when he heard a voice call his name.
"Hunter, what do you think?"
Hunter looked at the divider to see Indira emerge in her human form, dressed in a red southern belle dress to match with her husband's outfit. The oldest Batcher couldn't help finding his wife hot in that outfit.
"Wow… you should wear red more often." Hunter said.
"And you should try wearing ascots more often." Indira said, adjusting Hunter's ascot.
Of course, she just used that as an excuse to pull him into a kiss.
"Look at me! I'm a magician!" Wrecker showed off, dressed like magician.
"Wow, Wrecker." Omega smiled. "You look great in a top hat."
"I know." Wrecker groaned when he struggled with his bow tie. "But this stupid tie keeps choking me."
"Hold still, Wrecker." Padme said, adjusting the tie. "There. Better?"
"Yeah. Thanks."
Mona, however, wasn't sure what to be.
"Maybe you can wear a pretty dress and fake antenna." Omega suggested. "Then you wouldn't have to hide your wings because everyone will think you're just dressed like a butterfly."
"I don't think that's a good idea." Mona said. "What if Mariverde tried to expose me somehow or someone figured out my wings are real?"
"Well, you could be something else." Goldie said. "Something that covers your wings. Someone who wears a cape, like a superhero."
"Or Little Red Riding Hood." Gabby suggested.
"You already got a wolf in your family." Boba joked.
"Except this one doesn't eat people's grandmothers." Garrett said.
"I should hope not." Mariposa said.
Decorations were another thing to set up. Since this was the Heartwoods' first Halloween with their new friends, they decided to get some new decorations. Mona and Goldie accompanied their parents to the store, but as they looked through decorations, one of them scared Mona. It was a hanging decoration that looked like a vampire bat that flapped its wings and flashed red eyes when you got near it. It made Mona scream and rush to clutch Garrett's leg.
"Mona, settle down." Garrett said calmly. "It's just an animatronic bat. It won't hurt you."
Mona still held onto Garrett's leg though, so Garrett had to do his best to walk with her on his leg until she screamed again when she came face-to-face with a hideous swamp creature mask.
That sent Mona running, freaking out as she got tangled in some fake cobwebs, got her dress caught by a fake witch hand, and then an empty box fell over her. That was the scariest thing to happen to her then.
Back with Mariverde, Mona recalled being trapped in small boxes as punishment for "misbehaving," which gave her claustrophobia and a terrible case of PTSD.
"HELP! GET ME OUT!" Mona shrieked as someone quickly arrived and got the box off of her.
Mona was curled up in a little ball, shaking and whimpering.
"Mona! Are you alright?" Mariposa said, kneeling down to her daughter.
Mona only responded by crying, prompting Mariposa to pick her up and hug her.
"Shh. Shh. It's okay, Mona. You're okay." Mariposa said quietly.
Other people in the store either looked at Mona like she was overreacting or looked sympathetic when they saw her crying.
There was one thing Mona had not been prepared for where Halloween was concerned: getting scared.
No one was sure how they didn't take into account that Mona would be scared of Halloween. Not in the fun kind of scared like when you feel adrenaline running through your veins, like on a roller coaster or watching a thriller film. Scared, as in terrified of something; a fight or flight reaction, like when you see a vehicle speeding right toward you, or you find a big spider in your bed.
Mona experienced traumatic types of fears all her life and nothing else until Hunter rescued her.
Emeraldi nuzzled Mona while Indira took on pegasus form and held Mona in her wing and gently rocked her in a way that Sarmi used to do when her adopted daughter was little. It was a hard wing technique to master, but Indira was a natural. She was going to be a great mom when she and Hunter had kids someday.
Indira hummed "A Whole New World" as she rocked Mona, and it seemed to calm her down.
"She got scared of a few decorations?" Crosshair said.
"Give her a break," said Anakin. "Mona probably had it even worse than Mom and I did back on Tatooine."
Hunter took Mona into his arms, and Mona rested her head on his shoulder.
Shmi picked out a candy from a bowl and found a chewy gummy lollipop that looked like an orange slice and gave it to Mona.
Mona was still crying a little, but licking the lollipop calmed her down a little more.
"Mona, it was just a box. It can't hurt you anymore." Hunter said. "Mariverde can't hurt you anymore. You're okay. There's nothing to be afraid of."
"You weren't there." Mona said. "Why would anyone wanna invent a holiday just to scare everyone?"
"It didn't start out like that." Mila said. "Halloween was originally when people thought they needed to dress up to scare away ghosts. But now it's a holiday for dressing up and getting candy. Unfortunately, some deem it as a holiday that glorifies evil. But to some extent they're right. Although, that depends on how you look at it and celebrate it."
Mila took out a children's book about Halloween and showed some pictures in it of cute versions of things normally associated with Halloween. Pumpkins, bats, ghosts, and black cats.
"See, Mona? Everyone is afraid of something, and Halloween is celebrated in different ways. Some like to use it to, unfortunately, glorify evil or mess with bad things like ouija boards. Others, however, may see it as an opportunity to face their fears."
Mona became curious then. Even though she'd never celebrated Halloween before, this being her first one, she never thought of it that way.
Everyone is afraid of something, most often from a bad experience with them.
"I became afraid of elephants after a frightening experience with them when I was around your age," said Qui-Gon.
"I'm not scared of spiders anymore," said Gabby. "But I am afraid of roaches. They're just so… creepy!"
"Wrecker's afraid of heights," said Hunter. "Echo's afraid of enclosed spaces…"
"And Hunter's afraid of balloon animals." Crosshair teased.
Ever since that incident where no one could stop telling the truth, Hunter's brothers wouldn't let him live it down.
"I'm not scared of the balloons!" Hunter defended. "The sound they make when you shape 'em just hurts my ears."
"You know, Mona," said Mariposa. "When I was little, your grandfather used to tell me that the things you're afraid of are often more afraid of you than you are of it."
Mona was confused.
Mariposa picked up a fake spider to demonstrate.
"Let's say you were afraid of spiders. To you, this spider, if it were real, would seem like a monster, and you want to hide from it. But, if you think about it from the spider's perspective, you might find it's more afraid of you, because, how do you think you look to the spider?"
Mona looked at the little fake spider and thought.
"Like a giant?"
"Exactly."
"Then they're probably really scared of grownups."
"Probably." Mariposa chuckled.
Mona still felt a little scared by what happened. But, Anakin had an idea of something that might help Mona feel better.
"Hey, Mona. Do you wanna hear a story?" Anakin said.
"What kind of story?"
"A special one about facing your fear."
Mona liked the sound of that. So, she and the other kids sat down. Anakin chuckled. No matter how big the kids got, they always gathered like a kindergarten class to hear a story.
Anakin sat down and began the story.
"Once upon a time, in a world much like yours or mine, there lived a family with some rather… unique features."