Max’s eyes widened as Malik’s tar-like form spewed forth what seemed like a never-ending swarm of clawed monsters. Their grotesque shapes emerged from Malik’s black pool to immediately leap away, attacking the first-year students. The Dining Hall erupted into even greater chaos than before, the inhuman chittering of the creatures melding with the shouts of the students.
A wild melee broke out as the students tried to defend themselves from the biting, slashing little monsters. The prohibition against first years using their powers unsupervised was completely ignored in the interest of self-preservation.
A girl near Max, her eyes glowing a vibrant blue, unleashed a torrent of ice from her fingertips, trying to freeze the nearest monsters. But her aim was wild—jagged icicles impaled a table, sending splinters flying. Another student, a boy with flickering flames for hair, hurled fireballs at the advancing creatures. His flames found their mark, incinerating several monsters, but a stray fireball set a table ablaze, adding to the pandemonium.
In the midst of the fray, a student with skin shimmering like steel stood like a fortress, his arms outstretched as if summoning an unseen force. Metal objects began orbiting his body—trays, utensils, even a couple of inert servitors—forming a protective barrier. But as a monster lunged at him, the student hurled a servitor too forcefully, making the android knock a group of students over like bowling pins. The fallen students were promptly swarmed by monsters.
Across the room, a group of students had banded together in desperate defense. A girl manipulated liquid from spilled drinks, creating whips that lashed out at the monsters. Beside her, a boy whose hands sparkled with electricity zapped creatures that came too close, his bolts sometimes missing their targets and hitting other students.
Max, still armed with a metal tray, swung wildly at any creature that dared approach, obliterating more of them than he could count in clouds of stinky smoke. Beside him, Damian moved with calculated precision, his steak knife a blur as he fended off the relentless assault. Meanwhile, Gene was utterly aghast at the unintended consequences of her attempt to stop Malik. Overwhelmed, she flailed her hands helplessly, getting in the way of Max’s and Damian’s efforts.
The relentless monsters swarmed over tables and chairs, their chittering growing louder, more frenzied. The first years fought back with all their might, but their lack of experience and control over their powers was evident. Energy blasts went astray, wind gusts overturned tables, and flung objects hit as many students as they did monsters.
In the heart of the maelstrom, Malik’s puddle-like form seethed and roiled as more and more monsters boiled out of him.
Near Max, a thick swirl of purple smoke suddenly contributed to the choking smoke from the spreading fire and the rancid fumes of the obliterated monsters. The purple smoke cleared in an eye blink, revealing Professor Arcane and Stiletto. They had appeared out of nowhere.
Stiletto, scanning the chaos, wolf-whistled appreciatively, like the wild melee was a gaggle of glistening male strippers.
“Oh look, Matilda,” she said to Professor Arcane. “The first years threw this lovely shindig and didn’t bother to invite us. How rude. If the castle’s mystical incursion alarms hadn’t gone off, we wouldn’t have known to crash the party.”
Professor Arcane’s eyes blazed with a purple energy as she surveyed the wild scene. Her nose wrinkled with distaste at the chittering monsters.
“Imps,” she said. “Nasty buggers. One of these geniuses opened an interdimensional rift to let them in. I’ll do what I can to close it while you secure the scene.”
With a flourish of her hand, Professor Arcane was consumed by another swirl of purple smoke, and was gone.
She reappeared high in the air, directly over Malik’s pitch-black bubbling form. She plummeted like an anvil, her robes flapping, long black hair trailing her like the tail of a kite. She plunged into the center of Malik’s bubbling mass, and disappeared.
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Stiletto turned to Max and his companions. With casual flicks of her wrists, she sent six throwing stars twirling toward leaping monsters, each star arcing toward a separate target. All six monsters popped like balloons and disintegrated.
“You heard Morticia Addams.” Stiletto’s cheery tone indicated she was having the time of her life. “Let’s secure the scene. Ms. Fletcher, you fluttering around uselessly like this is making my uterus shrivel up in secondhand embarrassment. You’re a Villain, not a helpless maiden. Here, take this.”
With one hand, Stiletto flicked a few more throwing stars to dispatch more imps. With her other, she pulled a long spiked mace from the folds of her outfit like it was a magic trick. She shoved it at Gene, instructing, “Go tell the girl over there to stop giving other students frostbite, and to instead use her ice powers to extinguish that fire before it asphyxiates us all. Not sure why the fire dousing system hasn’t activated, but there’s no use in crying over non-spilled fire suppression foam. Use this mace to cover Ice Princess while she’s distracted. Vamoose!”
Gene gulped, nodded, and trundled toward the ice-flinging student. Grace cleared a path through the imps with sweeps of the mace, destroying the creatures left and right.
“Draconis, your file says you know how to wield a blade.” She thrust her katana into Damian’s hand. “Protect my backside while I do what I do. You too, Opie. Resist the temptation to stab me in the back.”
The dagger Stiletto gave Max appeared to be different than the one she had given him to stab Sheriff Barker with. Though Max loathed Stiletto for kidnapping him, he was relieved she and her competence were here to battle the imps. The enemy of my enemy is my friend, he thought. For now.
Stiletto slid her hands into her robes. When she pulled them out, she wore metal knuckledusters. Four-feet-long black flames sprouted from each, like the knuckledusters had become the cross-guards of flaming swords.
“Your jumpsuits should mostly resist the imps’ teeth and claws,” Stiletto advised, “so mind your exposed hands and heads. Let’s go to work, boys. Allons-y!”
With Max and Damian protecting her back, Stiletto began slashing and stabbing the imps with her black flames, mowing them down like they were so much helpless wheat before scythes. If Max hadn’t been so busy stabbing monsters with his dagger and swatting them away with his tray, he would have marveled at Stiletto’s artistry as she swept around the room. She was a master at work. Damian acquitted himself well too, competently wielding Stiletto’s katana with one hand, stabbing imps with a steak knife with his other.
As Stiletto fought, she sang:
> Come along, get ready, wear your grand brand-new gown,
>
> For there’s going to be a meeting in this good good old town.
>
> When you know everybody and they all know you,
>
> And you get a rabbit’s foot to keep away them hoodoos.
>
>
>
> When you hear the preachin’ has begin,
>
> Bend down low for to drive away your sin;
>
> When you get religion you’ll wanna shout and sing,
>
> There’ll be a hot time in old town tonight!
She only stopped singing long enough to bark orders at other first years, getting them organized. Soon, there was an entire phalanx of first years around her, fighting far more effectively now that they had a leader.
Maybe it was Max’s imagination but, after what seemed like an eternity of destroying imps, he thought the swarm of rampaging creatures was thinning.
Then, after dispatching his umpteenth imp, another monster didn’t leap in front of him.
Max twisted around in panic, fearing a feint.
But it wasn’t a feint.
The imps were all gone.
The Dining Hall looked and smelled like a circle of Hell. The air was thick with the stench of vanquished imps and burned objects. Overturned tables, their surfaces scarred and ashy, lay strewn about. Chairs had been reduced to kindling. The stone floor was slick with spilled food, drinks, and darker stains Max didn’t want to contemplate. Several servitors, their android bodies twisted and torn, sparked intermittently, their electronic eyes dim.
Students were scattered about like extras in a disaster movie. Some were sitting or standing in shock, others lay unconscious or worse, with their fellows hastily tending to their wounds. Whimpers and soft moans filled the air. Max was bleeding from his hands and neck, and the wounds throbbed.
In the midst of this carnage, Malik lay prone. His muscular body was back to normal, but it smoked as if it had been dragged off a hot griddle. His chest rose and fell unevenly, indicating he was still alive despite his ordeal.
Professor Arcane, her eyes closed in concentration, hovered above him, her legs folded into the lotus position. Her hands moved in complex patterns. Glowing mystical symbols dripped from them as she weaved a spell over Malik. The purple glow of her magic cast eerie shadows across the debris-laden hall, adding a bizarrely ecclesiastical hue to the devastation.
Behind Max and Damian, Stiletto spoke loudly. Max couldn’t tell if her singsong was meant for all the first years, or just him and Damian specifically.
“Ooooooooooo,” she keened. “You guys are in soooooo much trouble.”