“Somebody call the paramedics!” one girl screamed over Roy’s slumped over body.
“Somebody call the police!” another girl shouted before fainting.
Mena caught the girl so she didn’t fall over and crack her skull open. Laying her on the floor, Mena asked the question everyone was wondering, “Who do you think could’ve dunnit?”
“Me!” a zany voice cried from behind them.
Roy G Bivion stood by the entrance. He sported the same rainbow wizard hat, robe, and kaleidoscopic glasses, but there was one difference. He was completely translucent
Everyone gasped as he leaned on the doorway. “Surprised to see me…or more like, surprised to see through me?”
Everyone was dead silent, as the seeming ghost of Roy G. Bivion marched through the students back into his body. Once he had gone back into it, his solid body began to writhe again. “Today kiddies,” he said with a self-satisfied smirk. “I’m going to teach ya how to discorporate.”
The tiny rainbow wizard flashed a finger gun at Janus. “Thanks for playing along, Miss Bones.”
Janus held her hand to her face, giving a pixie-like giggle. “I’m happy they didn’t see through my act.”
Roy G Bivion laughed like a nutcase. “They sure did mine.”
Everyone glared at the two partners in crime for being pranked. “Anywho,” Roy said. “I betcha kiddies want to learn how to do that. And even if you don’t, you’re gonna hafta anyway.”
As soon as everyone was seated, Roy G Bivion began his lecture. He asked everyone a very important questions. “Do any of you kiddies know what the word discorporate means?”
Immediately, Janus raised her skeletal hand. “It means to leave your body”—Janus closed her eyes and grinned proudly—“There’s a lot of that in my daddy’s profession.”
Most of the girls moved away from Janus again, but Roy gave her two thumbs up. “Very good, Miss Bones. Of course, with my kind of out-of-body experience you actually come back…well, most of the time.”
Roy G Bivion produced a piece of vegetation from his pocket. It was a stalk with an oily rainbow texture to it. Most of the girls gasped, though Janus giggled happily. “Know what this is?” Roy asked them.
Mena nervously raised her hand. “Rainbow rhubarb. Didn’t they teach us about that in our W.A.R.E class? How we should never take it?”
Roy chortled, and said, “Yes, but what they didn’t tell you is there is medical rainbow rhubarb too. It’s often used to keep you in control and soothe your soul when you discorporate.”
The girls all exchanged uneasy looks. Mena, in particular, was beginning to think that Roy was the unscrupulous character her W.A.R.E class warned her about. Roy pointed at Mena. “Since you know what it is, you twitchy witch. How about you try some and be our first mini-pig?”
Mena did indeed convulse in horror over the prospect of trying an illicit plant. She tentatively shuffled up to Roy and he gave her the rhubarb. It swirled ominously as she moved it closer and closer to her mouth. Roy pulled up a chair, and as she bit it, she dropped into the seat.
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Suddenly, she was lighter and airier. She was blissful in her mind too. Mena turned around and saw her body sitting in the chair. She looked at her arms—they were see-through. “Wowie zowie,” Mena exclaimed. “Is this my soul?”
“Yes indeedy do” Roy responded, rubbing his hands togher.
Mena was overcome in a fit of giggles. She pointed at the other girls and laughed. “For all of you who said I have no soul, feast your eyes on this!”
She looked at her pasty arms. “Though I must admit,” she said curiously. “It’s a lot paler than I thought.”
All the girls gasped as Mena’s soul began to lift off the ground. “Whee!” Mena said, enjoying her new buoyancy. “Wait, where am I going?”
Mena’s soul lifted higher and higher towards the ceiling. “Oh nosy!” she said, her hands to her mouth. “I’m discorporating!”
“Quick,” Roy shouted, suddenly panicked. “Breast stroke back to your body so I don’t get sued.”
Mena did her best breast stroke like she was taught in gym class, but it was even harder than swimming in water. It was like moving through gelatin, having to push back against the material world. Slowly, she got closer and closer and with an enthusiastic headfirst dive, she launched back into her body. At last, she opened her eyes and she was in the physical realm again.
After shaking off her dissociative dizziness, she exclaimed, “And this is why we don’t do drugs, you madman!”
Roy giggle nervously asking. “Any other takers?” All the other girls shook their heads except Janus who nodded happily. “Only one problem, Miss Bones,” he said to her. “Unlike pasty here, you actually have no soul.”
Janus frowned; Roy laughed. ”Now how bout we write about the medicinal qualities of RR for the rest of the class instead. Oh, and don’t forget to hand in your homework.”
Mena, still feeling light headed, headed down the auditorium for play practice. If Scalia getting into a finny fit and Roy G Bivion nearly killing her wasn’t enough, now she’d have to deal with the trouble she and Janus caused the night before. She was hoping desperately that everyone would forget it, but once she entered the dark hall, two floating eye robots scanned her. “NO WEAPONS,” one said in a mechanized voice.
Mena prayed they couldn’t read her mind, because it was currently consumed in guilt and panic. Once she got to the foot of the stage, Mena encountered Stellaris, Electra, and a frantic, frazzled Caligari. Red beams from Eye Robots scanned the stage. “H-h-hi professors,” Mena stammered. “What’s going on?”
“Mena,“ Stellaris said, her face lacking the warm smile it usually had. “Professor Caligari was attacked last night.”
“Oh nosy,” Mena gasped, more afraid of being found out than caring about Caligari. “Who was it?”
Pulses of green ectoplasm charged up on Caligari’s hands. “Someone wanted to take my life. They even know how to properly catch a phantom.”
Mena held her hands to her mouth. It was a very phantom specific trap indeed. That fact alone would easily get her and Janus indited.
“I don’t deserve it,” Caligari moaned like a child half her age. “I’ve already lost someone important to me and now someone is out to destroy me.”
The phantom professor’s eyes darkened as she smacked fists of goopy ectoplasm together. “But I’ll get them first. Death to all who oppose me!”
Mena gulped and took a step back. Even if Caligari now knew how it felt to be despised for something she didn’t do, she clearly wasn’t going to take it lying down. Caligari’s fury was interrupted by an Eye Robot who zoomed up to them. It had a fragment in its red eye beam. “MADAMS AND PROFESSOR CALIGARI”—it said, causing Caligari to grimace—“I HAVE FOUND AN OBJECT NOT BELONGING TO THIS AREA. IT SEEMS TO BE A SHRED OF GRASS FROM THE MIND JUNGLES THEMSELVES.”
“The Mind Jungles?” Stellaris said, stupefied. “Someone must’ve been here last night. We have quite a few students who originate there.”
Caligari confidently raised her fist, her eyes blazing with green fire. “Excellent. We will locate this student—and once we do, we will send them to the headmaster and her expelled!”
Mena shuddered as Electra clapped her hands. “Chop chop, Julianna,” the boisterous woman said. “Play practice is still on, murder plot or not.”
But Mena was lost in her thoughts. If she was found out, she and Janus could be expelled.