Getting attacked by flying teddy bears was perhaps the ultimate surreal experience. Because while the teddy bears were definitely creepy, with the ambience of an old and dessicated haunted house, they were also made of fabric and stuffed with fluff. So they rose eerily into the air, filled with malice, flew towards Jenny and Tania with wicked intent...and bounced off.

The only real problem was that there were hundreds of them. It was like walking through a creepy, cuddly snowstorm.

"This is more annoying than anything," Jenny said, pushing her way through the cloud of teddy bears.

"It's trying to disorient us," Tanya smacked another flying teddy bear away. "If we were using normal senses to get through this instead of your soul connection to Kyle, we'd definitely be turned around right now."

"Still this feels a little weak."

"Right. There's got to be a trick here. It's...woah!"

There was a sudden flare of power and Tanya conjured a thick piece of bark over her skin, just over her kidney. It shattered as a pair of rusty scissors bounced off it.

"There's blades mixed in!" Tanya called out.

"Ohhh that makes a lot of sense."

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Their progress slowed, as they stopped every so often to block a blade streaking through the cloud of distracting bears.

Then it slowed again.

And again.

"Why am I getting so tired?" Jenny panted, sagging to her knees. She batted a blade away with a bolt of magic.

"I don't know," Tanya sagged beside her. "But it's happening to me too."

She snatched one of the teddy bears out of the air and held it. It failed and struggled in her grip.

"It's because these damn teddy bears aren't just a distraction," she panted. "This thing is literally draining the life out of me. It's not much, but so many of them bouncing off of us over and over again is adding up."

"I KNEW gently slapping us with teddy bears wasn't dangerous enough for this spooky house!" Jenny said. "Get close to me."

They shuffled together under the onslaught of teddy bears and rusty blades and Jenny clapped her hands together, creating a burst of power that blew bears and blades alike away from them, creating a cleared out space. It was only for a moment, but it gave Tanya enough time to create a dome of energy to keep the flying bears off of them.

"We can't keep this up for long," Tanya said. "It's not draining power as fast when they bump into the shield, but it's still draining power. Even if you put your own power into the shield, it's gonna wear out eventually."

"I'm pretty weak now," Jenny stretched her arms. "But maybe we just start blasting?"

"They'll just spread out and swing back at us. Like a school of fish. But hold that thought. We might get our chance, depending on what we're up against. Give it a minute, and get ready to blast when I tell you."

It wasn't too much longer before the onslaught changed. The bears and blades pulled away, clumping together and forming into a huge shape. They molded and shifted together until, towering over their dome shield, was an enormous teddy bear with bladed claws. It raised a hand to crush the shield.

"Blast her now!" Tanya said, dropping the shield. Jenny obliged, firing a huge explosion of magician energy that slammed into the enormous teddy bear, bursting it into a cloud of burned fuzz and singed fabric.

"Got it!" Jenny panted, collapsing.

"Yeah," Tanya sagged. "Looks like we're alright."

"How did you know it would do that?"

"Total guess. But now we know a few things. For one thing, it's got a personality. If it was a mindless force, it wouldn't have gotten impatient. For another thing, it was still smart enough to play us."

"But we beat it!" Jenny said.

"Yes. But it didn't use any of the power it drained to attack us. Which means..."

"It's using the power somewhere else!" Jenny said, her eyes going wide. She turned and ran in the direction of Kyle's energy.