“So yeah, I’m going to have to stay a moment, apparently. But Mary’s probably on her way, so you can go on ahead, I’ll catch up no problem,” Shida’s voice came out of Chak’s phone after a quick call. “Long as I have my phone I can also pay the driver, so you should be all good to go.”
“Oh… okay…” Chak replied with a nod, “I’ll let them know. Just be careful and… don’t take too long.” Leaning away from her phone she met the driver’s gaze in the rear view mirror, “She says she’s going to have to meet up with us later and that you can take the rest of us to the Lights’ residence. She’ll be sure that you’re still paid.” she notified before bringing the phone back to her ear, “Good luck.”
A hand clasped down on her shoulder reassuringly.
“Still willing to take the brunt of the conversations with the Light folks, don’t worry.” Zithra comforted as he saw the clear concern on the princess’s face.
Chak nodded, though being left with a Manarian struck her mind, at the very least she wasn’t alone in this endeavor.
The vehicle then started back up and began its way onward in the relatively short drive to their final destination. Though considering where they were going, Chak didn’t know if the short ride was a comfort or not.
“There we are, Casa delight,” their driver announced happily, although his eyes turned almost foreboding as the many, many lights of the Christmas decorations reflected in them. “Looks like Mary’s home, so at least you won’t have to face the awkwardness. Well then, I wish you best of luck. If you need me again, just use the app. I’m driving all day and also basically the only one in this town that does, so chances are you’ll get me again. Be sure to tell your friend to leave a good review when she can!”
“Will do boss. Thanks for the ride!” Zithra farewelled as he opened his door and stepped out.
“Yes, uhm, thank you! And we most certainly will if it’s needed.” Chak said before following the disguised Manarian out and hurried along towards the front door behind him.
“Guess I’ll do the honors.” Zithra volunteered as he lifted his hand and gave the door a festive knocking pattern, “Does the green hair really look weird?” he quickly asked the woman next to him as they waited for someone to answer.
“Uh- wh- uhm… no?” Chak replied in surprise as she was torn from being mentally somewhere else, “It-it’s fine.”
After a short while of no one answering, Zithra raised his hand to knock again but Chak grabbed it to stop him.
“Wait…” she requested as she leaned her head closer to the door, hearing something.
Muffled argumentative voices, the loudest being a feminine one that is consistent strained accusatory shouts. The other spoke in a softer but more stern tone. So Mary was here and arguing with someone? Was it with Dagon? She couldn’t tell.
Letting go of Zithra’s arm she moved down the side of the house to perhaps sneak a peek in through a window. After the third she finally got a view, catching sight of Mary in the Kitchen.
She was with her mother. Chak still couldn’t make out what was being said, but Mary looked as though she was just letting words dump out of her mouth in absolute vitriolic anger. All the while her mother stood there shaking her head, seeming to casually dismiss everything Mary was saying. Looking around more she hoped to spot Dagon, but instead a larger man came walking down the corner of the hall.
At first Chak thought it was Mary’s father, as her brain refused to process the absurdities of the individual. It took her a second, but she noticed the clear long upward curled horns, the massive hunching posture, and the dragging tufted tail.
Backing away in fright, a part of the frame crossed over the menacing figure and erased it from visual existence.
Running back up, Chak frantically searched once more, finding not a scrap of evidence of the demon’s presence.
Dashing back to Zithra she went ahead and knocked harshly against the door.
The second the door cracked open Chak forced herself in and dashed into where she saw the beast. Following her lead, Zithra ran in after her expecting danger. And in a way, they both found it.
All the lights were off. All of them. There was just a faint greenish blue illumination from the windows. The air was dead silent, with all the decorations silently resting without an ounce of the festive joy they were supposed to portray.
-Naughty-
Chak removed her weapon and aimed around the dead, dark house. She expected to see the monster or undead reindeer to appear and charge her, but there was nothing coming her way,
“Zithra?’ Chak spoke up, her voice feeling as though it bounced off of nothing around her.
“I feel it…” he confirmed darkly, “It wants me to keep you here…”
Chak lifted her pistol at the man defiantly, to which made him raise his hands quickly.
“Whoa! Whoa! I’m not gonna! At least not willingly!” he assured in a bit of panic.
Staring him down she slowly lowered the weapon and tilted her head to the door.
“Open it.” she ordered.
“Right, right.” he agreed as she tugged on the door. It opened without issue, but a void of blue and green lights akin to the aurora borealis was the only thing there to meet them. Lowering his foot, Zithra confirmed there was no invisible ground, “Nadda.” he reported over his shoulder.
“You don’t know how to get out? Did it tell you?” Chak demanded.
“Nope. But… there must be a way out if it’s telling me to keep you here. Maybe we quickly look around? Before things get more bad? Warn Shida before she gets trapped too?” Zithra posed.
“Yeah… come on.” Chak ordered as she started the search within the warped dark-realm house. Pulling out her phone she wasn’t surprised to see that it won’t connect to make calls.
First, Chak checked where she saw Mary and her mother arguing. The kitchen had half-prepped food across the counters, but they were without scent and cold to the touch. Moving on, she patrolled the entire first floor before entering what looked like a teenager’s room. On a writer’s desk chak could see a binder labeled with Mary’s name. Taking it, she opens it finsind nothing but educational papers with written mathematics.
Something about this room still called to the princess however, so she remained while Zithra stood at the doorway.
“Wild place…” he uttered before looking down the hall in paranoia, “I’d say we could split up… but that gives me a bad feeling.”
“You’re staying with me.” Chak responded as she got down on her knees and bent down to peek under the bed.
A solitary book caught her eye, reaching out she took it and dragged it free. Opening it up she quickly started to scan what was revealed to be a personal journal. Most of it lacked context that the Cali could fully understand, but one thing became clear across the words and doodles. Sadness. Feeling trapped. Wanting to be somewhere else. Not being seen or heard.
The woman stood with this item in her grasp, unsure why it felt like it held significance to this place. But it did… somehow.
Where to go next? Upstairs? No… wait…
“That’s it!” Chak said in hopeful realization as she turned and hurried past the Manarian.
“Where to?” Zithra asked.
“The basement. In the normal house I felt safe down there. At least before the father came down with wine. I think the way out is-” before Chak could finish the man behind her let out an all too familiar scream.
Looking back she saw him clutch the sides of his head and stagger forward.
“Zithra!?”
“We gotta go! Now! It doesn’t want you going there!” he warned in a furious roar.
Not needing another word Chak bolted across the house with Zithra running right behind her. Though by the growls he started to make she became less and less confident that he wasn’t following anymore, but rather chasing.
Her wet boots slid as she made a tight turn to where the basement door was awaiting. She reached for the handle, only to have a furry green one grip the back of her hand in a crushing grip. Spinning her around Zithra snatched her up by the throat with his tail and lifted her free off the floor. His full demented Manrarian form thrummed in hellish glee.
“Zithra!” Chak choked before she drew her pistol to aim directly at his forehead.
The glee twitched away from his visage, but the madness in his eyes persisted.
“The sounds they play, I’m sorry they are drowning. They won’t go away, and my mind is clouding.” he said before a loud huff rang out down the hall, followed by the sounds of clattering hooves. Chak could only see the growing red light against the corner wall, but Zithra had a clear view.
“They want me to feed the beast, make everything ‘right’. But… you won’t be made a feast, you go and I’ll fight!” he said as the anger spiked across his face.
With a yank the basement door was torn open and Chak was casted down the steps in a harsh toss. She saw the image of a beast clashing with her green ally before the darkness claimed her into the unknown.
-
Shida looked up at the house with big eyes as she closed in, having been held up a bit longer than she would’ve liked.
Something about it felt…ominous. More so than before. But maybe that was just her general developing dislike for the holiday combined with the excessive amount of decorations. However, a more concerning thing was that Dagon’s car didn’t appear to be here.
Just where in goodness’ name had he run off to?
Well, one thing at a time. She should at least get Chak and Zithra before finding that out. Maybe they had gotten Mary back to sanity in the meantime.
Wasting no time, she thundered her fist against the door in a loud knock, feeling a slight jolt of pain coming from her wounds as she did so and the force reverberated back into her arm. A few more of these and she would be seriously compromised…
“Mary, I can see your car!” she yelled out after a few seconds of no reaction. “I know you’re in there!”
After what sounded like background bickering, Mary cracked open the door. Seeing Shida she almost closed it immediately, but thought better of it and fully opened it. Shida could see that the woman was still expelling sparkles, like a torrent of an endless well.
“You… you’re the cat alien I drove into town… right? I should’ve realized sooner when you confronted me in the station.” she asked in a surrendered voice, “Would you like to come in? Mom’s making turkey, mashed potatoes, gravy, deviled eggs. I think your friends are here too.” she stepped aside.
“What do you mean, ‘you think’?” Shida asked annoyedly as she marched past the woman and into the annoyingly decorated home, a number of candles immediately blowing out as she came inside. “They should’ve been here ages ago.”
Immediately, she strained her ears, trying to hear if any familiar voices were around, although the human disguise of course stifled her hearing quite a bit.
“Oh… I see! That’s so cute!” Chak’s voice came from the kitchen.
“Aren’t they? I know using gumdrops as buttons is a little ‘traditional’ but they work so well!” the mother’s voice responded.
“Mind if I…?” Zitha inquired.
“Oh course! Gingerbread men are not just for looking! Go right ahead, but I better see a clean plate after dinner!” the mother warned in a laugh.
“Hm! Yes ma’am!” an already stuffed mouth of Zithra replied.
“I’ve been in my old room, mostly. I think they came by earlier.” Mary said with a shrug before sitting herself down on a couch that seemed to favor aesthetics over comfortability.
Shida rolled her eyes slightly, before giving the woman a harsh look.
“You managed to get into contact with Dagon?” she asked with her arms crossed in front of her chest.
“No. Mom and dad said they haven’t seen him either. But they don’t seem worried. Mom already started asking about the ‘handsome officer’ I’ve been out all day with. Dagon… isn’t picking up his phone either.” Mary answered with another shrug, sending a revived wave of blackening sparkles around her.
Shida sighed in serious annoyance. She and that Bell guy really deserved each other. By she couldn’t worry about that now.
“Alright don’t move,” she ordered with a finger pointed right at Mary’s face. “I have to get the others real quick. In the meantime, think of anywhere Dagon could be looking for you.”
She then turned to move straight towards the kitchen. Chak and Zithra were both sitting at a table, a large tray full of seemingly baked goods in the vague form of human silhouettes and covered with colorful decorations was laid out in front of them. As she had heard earlier, Zithra had already bitten the head off of one of the things.
Shida furrowed her brow. This didn’t seem right. She knew Chak could act if she wanted to, but the endearment that she saw on her face there was a bit too real for a place that she had found so scary and uncomfortable before, especially considering there was a manarian sitting right next to her.
She just hoped that Rudolf hadn’t taken over in the meantime again, though if that was the case, she doubted Zithra would’ve remained so calm.
“You alright guys?” she asked loudly as she stepped in, trying to make immediate eye contact with Chak while entirely ignoring Ms. Light to the best of her ability.
“Didn’t think you were gonna make it! Police really must’ve held you up huh?” Zithra chuckled before he took another bite out of his decapitated cookie.
“Oh, good to see you! Of course I’m fine, Shida. I can take care of myself. But look! Don’t these cookies just look adorable?” she said in amusement while she pointed to the tray before nearly tempting herself to take one, “Ahh… I really shouldn’t. I’m going to struggle to just finish one plate as it is.”
“Smart woman!” the mother declared, pointed back with a used potato masher.
Shida’s eyes got even narrower in her confusion. Chak had called her by her name, so this wasn’t Rudolf speaking. But this still was all very strange. She wasn’t seriously considering staying here to eat…was she? She hated this place. She hated these people.
Unauthorized duplication: this narrative has been taken without consent. Report sightings.
“Any luck in contacting Dagon in the meantime?” she asked and glanced back and forth between her two companions in serious uncertainty, feeling like something was incredibly off, even though she could not point out what.
“Unfortunately not. It’s almost like he doesn't want to be bothered.” Chak replied in a sad tone.
“Oh forget him. That city boy was just trouble. Nice enough, but I don’t think he really embraced Christmas in his heart.” the mother commented.
“Well still, if we don’t hear from him by morning we should file a missing person’s report. It’s the right thing to do.” Zithra pointed out.
“Yes, of course. You’re right.” the mother granted before walking up past Shida with a platter of a hard boiled egg dish.
“I don’t remember asking for your opinion,” Shida quietly hissed at the woman, before shaking her head at this already irritating person. Talking like that about your daughter’s fiance without prompting while he was out trying to make sure she was safe? Yeah, nah Lady, not cool. But right now, she had to focus on the important things. “Well, anyway, Chak, Zithra, what exactly are you doing here? I mean, Mary didn’t even know you were here. And if Dagon’s not here and you’re not talking to her, why even stick around. I mean, you could’ve called me at any time and tell me there’s nothing left to do here. Would’ve saved me the way here. Or were you seriously just waiting for me to come and get you? Because we really don’t have time for shenanigans like that:”
She glanced briefly at the cookies on the table, determined to sweep them off if Chak made another notion to reach for them. She was told that she could live off of stuff like this, and Doodle was basically fully healed by just the smell of Christmas food stuff, so she was certain that it had to be tied to the magic somehow. And in that case, it had no place inside Chak’s body.
“I’m sorry Shida… my phone’s battery ran out the moment we arrived. I didn’t want to leave only for you to come here and find me gone. I would’ve used someone else's but I couldn’t remember that your number was. We just thought it would be easier to wait for you than call around.” Chak apologized, looking down at the table with her watering brown eyes.
“Hey, it was mostly my idea.” Zithra offered with an apologetic wave, “Plus the food smelled so g-”
The floor vibrated slightly, accompanied by a soft thump. The mother rolled her eyes as she stared at the floor.
“Darn those pipes… they keep freezing and dislodging. I’ll have dad go down and see if there’s any bursts.” she sighed in reference to her husband. She reached for her own cell phone to make a quick call.
“I’m actually a bit of a handyman, want me to check it out?” Zithra offered, already standing up to go to the basement door.
“Would you? That would be swell! Dad’s out in the shack so he’ll be a bit. Let us know if there’s any leaking?” the mother replied before leaning to Shida as she returned to her cooking, “I almost feel silly for the way I acted last time trying to set Chak here up with one of my nephews. Your friend’s fiance is such a sweetheart!”
“Right,” Shida mumbled disdainfully, before dismissing the woman and quickly dashing to block Zithra’s path. “And you’re not going anywhere, Zithra. Not before I figured out what in the blazes is going on here.”
Keeping her arm outstretched so he couldn’t weasel past her, Shida turned towards Chak.
“I mean, I guess I would’ve expected it out of him, but you Chak? You’re seriously telling me that you’ve just sat around here and boondoggled? What, did the food smell so good that you figured the freakin’ human sparkler in the other room that was the whole reason that you came here just wasn’t worth your attention? Come on, I’m not buying that. Something is going on here,” she pushed determinedly, not willing to let herself be shaken here. Something was majorly wrong, and she would find out what before it could make problems for them. Chak behaving weird in any way right now was worth her worrying. And even more so if she wouldn’t get out with the ‘why’.
“I- don’t know what to say Shida… I’m sorry… It's just been really hard, you know that. With all the things we’ve been doing I just figured… maybe we could just take one night to relax? There’s still plenty of time before Christmas and the parade business… I’m sorry, I let you down. We can leave now if you want-” Chak apologized earnestly before another vibration followed by shattering of glass rang from below.
“I should really check on those pipes, feel free to talk this out amongst yourselves.” Zithra said with a bit more urgency.
Shida wasn’t born yesterday. That was not the sound of pipes. Just why the heck was the Manarian pretending like there was any credit to that story.
“I said you’re staying,” she commanded firmly, not letting up her hand on his chest, before turning to Chak again. A night to rest? Why would she- If she wanted that, then why hadn’t she just- This didn’t make any sense. And even then, couldn’t a night to rest at least wait until after the woman in the other room didn’t look like breathing fireworks anymore?
“Chak you can always talk to me,” she said empathetically and looked at the Cali with a slightly softening gaze. “If that was what you wanted, why didn’t you just say something and-”
Shida paused for a second, as she looked into Chak’s wet eyes. At first, it was just because her heart ached slightly as she saw her cry. But then there was something else. She was still looking at a Cali there…right?
After a moment, the ground rumbled again. With a harsh movement of her arm, Shida pushed Zithra completely back into the kitchen, almost forcing him back into a chair, had he not caught himself on its backrest.
“You know what? I’ll go check on that,” she said as she turned in the direction of the basement door. “I’ve served on Navy liners. I know my way around pipes. You just enjoy your food.”
Zithra’s brow furrowed, but immediately corrected when Mary’s mother looked at him.
“Usually I’d argue that it’s only right for a man to do a man’s work, but let her give it a shot hun.” the mother directed to the green haired man, seeming to simply want the festive-buzzkill to be the one to leave.
Shida then walked with harsh steps, although she made a brief detour to poke her head into the hall.
“Mary! I’m checking on the basement, would you come for a moment?” she yelled out, before making her way to the familiar door without waiting for an answer.
Exhaling shortly, she wrapped her hand around the handle, the other one ready to summon the sack and Doodle should she need to. Then she pressed down.
The first thing Shida saw were colored glass fragments of a bottle, but as the ceiling to the basement rose up past her line of sight she saw the shelves had fallen down and the books spread all across the floor soaking up multicolored wines and boozes. On the floor amongst it all was a prone lifeless body of a human Shida, her head caved in from the side, leaking out a black pitch substance that joined in with the other liquids.
With a full blackened wine bottle in one shaking hand, a bleeding disheveled Terran Chak grasped for her pistol that had been dislodged from her in the altercation. Limping slightly she scooped it up and aimed it in a panic at the descending Shida and Mary.
“STOP!” she ordered in rasping pants as the pistol primed, her eyes filled with terror, guilt and fury, “STOP RIGHT THERE!”
Shida stopped and lifted her hands, the scene only slowly sinking in as she fully looked around at it all, while the creeping feeling of dread of what was behind here also began to manifest in her mind.
“Whoa, Chak, it’s alright! It’s me!” she said loudly but calmingly and did her best to appear non-threatening while giving Chak a moment to come to terms with that. Then again, she would also have to hurry, before the things behind her would be getting any ideas. “It’s me! It’s okay! It’s…woah that thing is freaky. Like looking into a horrible mirror.”
She glanced at the corpse on the ground for a second.
Chak’s red eyes released dropping lines of hot tears as she kept her pistol up.
“Prove it! I-I want to believe you! But I almost believed her!” In a swift motion she pointed the pistol and fired into the corpse’s back to make sure it was dead before refocusing her aim, “Prove it’s you Shida! I just escaped some freak ‘horror mirror’ house! Zithra’s still there! So please… please be you this time!”
“Well, your own clone was pretty convincing at first as well,” Shida announced, although she had little doubt that this Chak was the real one. Then she thought about what she had said. “Mirror house? Clones…I guess we better ask the expert here.”
Slowly, so she wouldn’t seem threatening, she twisted one of her hands, before making a loud, intentful snap with them. There was a bit of a delay, but after a moment, lights and sparkles erupted together with the smell of cinnamon, butterscotch, and….cheap booze?
She herself was dipped into a plume of smoke for a second that reeked so strongly that she began to cough, doing her best to still hold her hands up as her body curled from the spasms.
“D-Doodle?” she asked in between coughs and tried to see through the smoke, hoping that her summoning of the elf had worked.
Sitting as though he were mid-watching T.V, Doodle lifted a hand to shield himself from the comparably bright lights. Wearing nothing but his jingling boots, hat and tidy-whities he rolled over and groaned.
“By Kringles toy sack!” he moaned, as he pushed himself up off the ground, “One would think a warning would be-” he said in slurred speech before eyeing the dead ‘Santa’, “Oh ginger crumbs…” with a snap of his own fingers he was redressed, but was still a little wobbly on his feet.
Seeing that all play out, Chak lowered her pistol to aim at the floor.
“Shida? This… this isn’t another trick? Oh stars…” she dropped the weaponized wine bottle and nearly fell backwards, catching herself on the island bar.
“Well I could’ve just ordered you to put the gun down, but you probably would’ve hated me for it,” Shida said, slowly recovering from her coughing fit while hurrying down the stairs towards her friend. Giving the corpse that looked like her only the briefest glance, she was quickly crouching before Chak and looking her over. “Keep your gun around, there’s clones of you and Zithra upstairs as well.”
With that she turned to Doodle.
“Speaking of which, anything you can tell us about those?” she asked pressingly and gave him a serious look. “Or any, uh, mirror houses?”
“Ohhhhh sweet saint nicolas… I’m glad to be drunk on nog right now… Uhm… Kram-kram is a demon with its own space, ‘realm’ if you want to be fancy. It can create all sorts of trickster minions from there… you know, like you have me it has these… it’s just… first time seeing or even hearing of this much of an effort put in. A Santa minion? Unheard of. I suppose we should be lucky there’s just the one.” Doodle explained as he pulled out a small candy cane from his back pocket and popped it into his mouth. He circled around the body, keeping his distance.
Shida frowned at that. Now she had to wonder if those things were connected somehow. Did the ones upstairs know what’s up? Were all the Lights minions as well or just the clones? So much to think about…
“And is there any way we can get in there?” she finally asked, feeling like going back up right now would most likely lead to further problems. They could defend themselves a lot better if those things had to come to them. “If Zithra’s still in there, we have to do something about it. I got plenty of magic, right? Has to be a way to tear that open, if he can pull people into it.”
“By my lords and saviors Snap, Crackle and Pop… I… really, really, really don’t want to tell you… but you're the boss so I have to. These minions are made up of the Kram-kram’s side of the magic, like how I’m made of the good magic. Basically how it traverses between worlds is by having a small item made of the good magic, that good magic naturally wants to be here and not there so with a little willpower portals can be opened between the two. Simple… if you had access to something made of Kram-kram’s mojo.” Doodle explained, reluctantly thumbing to the body.
“Easy enough,” Shida agreed and walked over to the corpse. Before doing anything with it, she snapped her fingers again, making the magic sack appear with a lot less fanfare than the elf did.
“My gun,” she ordered. The sack had at this point apparently given up on sassing her, since it quickly obeyed and spit out the small rifle. “Guess as a good new neighbor, I should go and say hello.”
With that, she knelt down and briefly dipped her fingers into the black liquid that was oozing out of ‘her’ head, feeling really grateful right about now that her people had never quite developed the ‘uncanny valley’ although her human disguise did its best to convince her that she should be alot more freaked out about seeing something that looked so much like herself dead than she actually was.
Making a portal would probably mean applying this stuff somewhere. Luckily, the walls had already been made blank by the earlier confrontation, so a little extra paint probably wouldn’t hurt.
Putting her hand onto it, she left a nice, nasty black handprint on the plain wallpaper. As she did so, she turned to Chak.
“You’re already hurt, so I won’t ask you to come with me,” she mumbled, concentrating the best she could on the vague concept of ‘making that magic want to go home’. “But I won’t turn you away either.”
Something started to tingle on her hand. The stains of black ‘blood’ that still remained started to cool, almost like alcohol evaporating off of you.
Pushing herself off the island, Chak limped right to Shida.
“I’m coming. Who knows where I’d end up next after separating from you.” She said without any doubt in her mind, “Wow… This adrenaline thing is really… something.”
Shida nodded before glancing back.
“Gonna take a hard guess and figure you probably can’t really go there or something, huh?” she suggested in Doodle’s direction. Although these things could exist her, on ‘their’ side, something about Doodle’s situation felt different.
“I could… but I’ll submit a ‘no’ request to that boss because I have no idea what would happen if I did! Instead, how about I… uhh…” he turns as Mary descended the steps, her face starting to twist into a shocked scream, with a snap of his fingers her eyes roll back into her head and she collapsed towards the steps unconscious, but just before she could crack her skull a sparkling caught her and gently carried her limb body all the way down. With another snap of his fingers Doodle created a mop and padlock in either hand.
“I’ll clean this mess up and stall for time?” he posed.
Shida exhaled as something started to happen on the wall, it seemingly turning into a weird, rippling surface that was almost like a liquid, but standing upright.
“Well, you are immortal,” she mused with a look up the stairs. “Just be careful with those copies, no idea what they’re going to do. Also, Krampus and I had a little custody-disagreement earlier, and Mary’s christmas-spirit got majorly screwed up. Maybe have an eye on that as well, if you can.”
Then she turned, reaching her currently not bloody hand out to Chak.
“Let’s not lose each other in there,” she suggested as she moved her other hand towards the portal, holding her rifle pointing ahead.
“Wouldn’t dream of it.” Chak smirked as she allowed herself to be guided back through to a horrifying land that she had only just escaped from.
Crossing through, the two women stood on the dark steps that would normally lead to the basement. But behind them was nothing but a black open void.
Slightly above them at the end of the steps was the thrashed door, the gray colorless wood barely held together from deep twisting violent gashes.
Chak’s breaths increased from a rising fear, but she placed a hand on Shida’s back to let her friend know that she was here with her, no matter what. Then with a creak from the unseen step, she started her way up with the feline.
The hall didn’t fare much better than the door. Along the walls and floor were markings, scratches, gouges and smears of black trailing away towards the den of the house. The two followed the carnage slowly, hearing nothing but absolute silence accompanying their footsteps until they made it into the den proper. Furniture including the one of many Christmas trees were upturned and shredded, but still no sign of inhabitants.
Chak jumped as her boot crunched down on a shard of glass ornament, but before she could even take a recovering breath a sudden blast of light and roaring static invaded the room in an abrupt ambush. Stifling her scream, the Chak jumped away from a crooked and cracked flat screen television as it lit up a loud wall of white noise. Clutching her chest, the Princess fought with herself to calm down.
Warped and blanketed by the mess upon the screen, words were spoken from the entertainment device. .
“Coming soon to Theaters and VHS, brought to you by Fallmark Entertainment!” the sentence popped and crackled at the end, “In the small town of Flakeville, Christmas night was just around the corner! But oh no, Santa's gone missing after a thrilling encounter of the 'extraterrestrial' kind!” the voice came clearer and clearer as faint images through the screen snow began to take shape. It was footage… of them? The human disguised versions of them, but they were dressed in subpar costumes that resembled their true forms.
“[Shida: What the heck did we just hit!? Where are we!?"]
[Chak: "Oh... I think we may have collided with a Terran Vessel but... Oh no... that's a lot of animal bits..."]
[Shida: Shoot... I think that small one is still alive...]” they said in short edited filmed clips on a cheap spaceship set. Chak tilted her head, not recalling even saying those words that way.
“Starring; Chakalata'Motaas as the endearing Princess of Space!
[Chak: "-but Shida, this was our doing! We have to make this right!"] And Shida, the tough cat-gal with a heart of gold!
[Shida: "Screw that. We need to figure out where the heck we are and see if we can track down the others-"]”
A loud shot loosening from a rifle’s barrel ended the broadcast, as the already destroyed device was violently thrown back from the impact of the round, torn into hundreds of shreds that scattered throughout the room.
Shida looked at it only briefly before bringing her gun back into a ready, forward facing position.
“Santa’s not missing. She’s right here. And she’s in no mood for freaking games,” she announced with a displeased chuff, before briefly turning towards her company. “You okay there, Chak?”
The Cali looked rather shaken by it all. Given that she had just earlier been attacked by an evil copy of her friend, that much probably wasn’t too surprising.
“No. None of this is okay. But I’m with you.” Chak replied as she adjusted her own pistol and gave the feline a nod for them to continue.
As they did so, turning down a hall that led to the kitchen they saw it. The lone head of the antlered beast laid in the middle of the hall, missing said antlers.
Before the Princess could even think to comment, the two heard a slightly muffled drawn cackling laugh of mischief ring out from above them.
“Yes! Haheha! Yes! Such an idea! An awful idea! I got a wonderful, awful idea!” a crazed Zithra declared.
Shida had instantly brought her weapon around and was now aiming up at the discolored extra furry manarian that hung underneath the ceiling like some form of lunatic spider with all his digits outstretched from his body.
Splotches of black blood stained large areas of his green fur, however in the semi-darkness it was hard to tell exactly where they hailed from. The crazed look in his red eyes was as jovial as it was desperately pleading for release.
“Whatever it is, it is probably a bad one,” Shida announced, hoping against hope that she might be able to reason with the magic-maddened man. “Zithra, how about you come down from there and we go back to fixing this whole mess together? Get rid of this whole magic thing, remember? You don’t want to stay green and rhyming forever, right?”
Zithra slowly started to crawl down before latching on to a shimmering chandelier, his clothes were poorly sewn together in random variants of reds and whites into some mockery of the Santa look.
His wide mischievous eyes widen even more as they look past Shida and onto Chak. Then a smile that unnaturally stretched his Manarain face literally spanned from plume to plume.
“If I can’t find a reindeer… I’ll make one… instead…” he giggled before dropping to the floor, hardly making a single sound as he did so. But he didn’t advance, clearly aware of the weapons drawn at him.
“Shida.” Chak whispered, knowing what the feline was ready to do, but was still hopeful they could reach the man.
Shida was staring the Manarian down.
Very softly, she warned,
“Don’t.”