AN: Fluff… just, pure creativity and not-canon-sh*t to get away from Hogwarts and digest something that isn't remotely wizard-ish.
God, it feels so good to just write something creepy/hilarious with no restrictions or canon-styles to stick to. To just throw up your hands and say "F*ck it! F*ck Dumbledore! F*ck Hogwarts! F*ck canon! And F*ck this! Take my f*cking chapter!"
…
I think 2020 might be getting to me…
…
Elegant and refined as always,
-Crow
"~Deck the halls with blood and bodies, fa la la la laaaa la la la-la.~"
"~Tis the season to be gorey, fa la la la laaa la la la-la.~"
Laughing Jack merrily sang as he put the mishmash of colorful socks/stockings with everyone's names lovingly stitched on the fireplace foyer, sometimes even taking a hammer to nail them through the brickwork (to Slender's ire). Smoke gently wafted out of those holes, as a fire gently crackled in the fireplace. Harry snickered, seeing Laughing Jack's 'stocking' was probably quite-literally a stocking. As in, a woman's nylon stocking, black-and-white-patterned, that ran almost 3 feet long.
"He does realize nylon is extremely flammable, right?" Adrian asked, eyeing the 'stocking' stocking dangling dangerously close to the fire, over his mug of hot chocolate.
Harry shrugged, "Meh, if his goes up, I'm not sharing my candy this year. He'd probably spike the rest to 'claim' it, too."
The pair chuckled, as they glanced around the living room.
The Mansion at the Holidays was a magnificent affair each year. It was like that movie with the Santa Claus Skeleton that tried decking Halloweentown with tinsel and reindeer. A macabre and grisly imitation of the holiday, but still preserving its own take on the feeling of joy and wonder.
Chains hung in loops from the ceilings. Tree ornaments were spider or bats or ethereal-spirits-trapped-in-glass-orbs. Mistletoe was forgone (for obvious reasons), replaced with a sprig of hemlock as a sentimental nod to the tradition, sans the affectionate exchange. One year, Jeff tried a tradition of 'Lightly Stabbing under the Mistletoe', but it was swiftly put down by Slender.
The exterior was still as drab as ever, but snow would be let through the wards (Sally would likely mope for the rest of her afterlife if Slender didn't let a perfectly-untouched patch of snow fall right in their backyard). It sometimes gave the Mansion a warm glow in the night, that made it just a tad less Haunted-Mansion-y.
This year, though, something was a little different.
"Hrrrrrg, there!" Toby exclaimed as the creaky bear trap snapped into place. The trigger clicked as it loaded the tension spring and he slid it just in front of the fireplace's opening.
BEN mumbled under his breath, referring back to a page of notes he'd had EJ bemusedly look over, before adding a small vial's-worth of clear liquid into a tall glass of milk and stirring it in briskly with a spoon. Sally gleefully sprinkled something that looked like sugar-sprinkles onto a plate of cookies, but the jar that was clearly from EJ's lab storage hinted at something else.
"Hey, BEN, what's with the snare trap, too? Won't the cookies take care of it?" Toby asked, knotting a little loop just in front of the cookie tray.
"Well first, it's a classic," BEN explained matter-of-factly. "Second, we need to cover our bases if I miscalculated the body-mass-to-dosage ratio and he escapes."
Toby edged closer to the fireplace, the orange flickers dancing in his eyes, "Why not just turn up the gas on the fireplace-"
"Are you crazy!?" BEN exclaimed, "If we did that, the bag might catch fire and destroy all the loot! You gotta think things through, you pyromaniac."
"Awww," Toby dejectedly huddled on the floor, staring forlornly into the fireplace, idly twisting the gas gauge key this way and that to watch the fire roar and fall.
"Huh, why didn't you guys do this years ago? I would've loved to join in," Harry commented from the side.
"Because we didn't think Santa was really real!" Sally exclaimed excitedly.
Toby nodded eagerly, "Yeah! I mean, we always knew a lot of things existed, but that was like monster-under-the-bed and urban-legend-curses and stuff. This year, we found out that there are actual dragons and unicorns! If so much of that is real, why not Santa?"
Harry turned to BEN with an eyebrow raise as the virus huffed stubbornly, "Santa's for little kids, but if it works out, then it's free loot. What kind of gamer am I to turn the other way when loot is right in front of me?"
"Mm-hm, yeah, sure," Harry snickered as BEN pulled out what looked like a finely-crafted plan of the Big Man's possible entrance-and-exit strategies. The virus's eyes gleamed with a challenge… and a little Christmas-Eve excitement.
"Well, have fun, guys. I'm going to bed," Harry announced. "Don't forget~ He knows when you're awake~," He called behind him.
BEN and Sally's urgent tones suddenly shifted to what time their prey would arrive and how to balance being asleep with preparation work.
Turning upstairs, Adrian grinned wickedly as he flicked his finger towards the fireplace.
*fwoosh!*
"AIEEEE! My stocking!"
"Okaaaay, let's see now," Slender murmured to himself as he sat in one of the less-used rooms of the Mansion. He'd let it go so unused that it largely became storage for odds and ends he collected over the years and had nowhere to put them.
He had to brush off a couple cobwebs and set aside a 12th century mace, but in the end, he finally buckled down in front of a peculiar boxy device on a desk he'd gotten not that long ago (relatively). A keyboard cable snaked down to the large, gray box (a 'tower' if he remembered correctly), all of which connected to a white box-monitor with the glass screen facing himself.
Pressing the button, he idly swiveled in the chair as the device whirred loudly and beeped. Blocky gray text shone from the glass on the monitor and a charming little image of an hourglass tilting upside down for a minute or two let him know the computer was working.
With a musical tone, the 'desktop' appeared. It was very blank, but still had the basics.
"Hmmm, ah! 'Internet Explorer'. How helpful, it has 'internet' in the name. Must be it," Slender decided, dragging the rectangular 'mouse' device (how anyone named that odd device with the rubber ball underneath after a rodent, he'd never know) to manipulate a little arrow icon across the image. Pressing one of the two square buttons at the end, he 'clicked' on the icon.
The device whirred loudly and for a moment he was nervous, particularly of the smell of hot dust, but eventually the screen loaded a white page with a colorful icon labeled 'GOOGLE'.
"Alright, so I just 'type' on the keyboard and it should…" He mused, cautiously typing out 'N-I-C-O-L-A-S F-L-A-M-E-L' with his pointer fingers one at a time. He frowned in frustration at the confusing arrangement of the letters, slowly searching through the 'keys' for the right one. "And there it is!"
Pressing enter, the device again produced the loud whirring sound, accompanied by the smell of burning metal, before the screen began loading something again. Slenderman hummed as he examined the list of 'websites' presented to him.
"Well, if it's all the same… I'll choose… this one," He decided, clicking on the closest one at hand.
The screen blanked for a solid minute as line-by-line began painting a picture of a website from the top-down. Then, mid-way through, the loading stopped, a blocky-gray text box appeared in front.
Slender peered at the message.
"Your Device Has Gotten An Virus. Click Hear to Fix. [OKAY]"
"What in the Creator's name is this nonsense?" Slender scratched his head. He knew BEN was a computer virus and understood the general concept, but… why would a software message be so poorly written?
Shrugging, he clicked the message.
The pop-up disappeared and his device and the box whirred very loudly.
Then a new pop-up appeared.
"Canadian Pharmacy; New Pill to Enlarge your-"
"What on EARTH?!" Slender exclaimed, horribly offended.
Another pop-up.
"S3XY_R3DH3D643 wants to know-"
"Free P0Rn CliK-"
"I am holding your dog hostage. Send $25,000 to-"
"Hello, I am a prince from the Nigerian royal-"
"Get rid of belly fat in these easy steps-"
"Never need another password again!"
"CONGRATULATIONS YOU WON!"
"ErR0R! Err0R!"
The screen filled with pop-up after pop-up.
Confused, Slender moved the 'mouse' a away from the boxes, but a line of new windows kept opening one after another wherever his mouse moved, preventing him from doing anything.
The screen kept fritzing with colors!
The speaker set blared noise in garbled gibberish of thousands of offers, sound effects, and horns!
The tower smelled like sparking copper!
Then, the screen then fizzed over with static, the motherboard gasping in distress as Sigma radiation obliterated the circuitry. RAM faded out of existence with a pitiful wail against an onslaught of high-energy photonic bombardment.
Slendeman's true mouth opened like a stygian fissure in his head.
"ARRRRRRRRRGHHHHHHH!"
BEN shuffled down into the kitchen, early that morning. Outside the window, the rosy gray of dawn was barely lightening the skyline.
Well, this was 'early' by most people's standards. He'd actually been up all night, finally deciding to stop his game when his ethereal eyes stung just looking at the screen. Problem was, he was too hopped up on adrenaline, leftover energy drink, and the body-clock-boggling after-effects of high-blue-light exposure.
So, he went down for a glass of milk he could microwave for a couple seconds… Oh, sue him, it worked!
He pulled the glass out of the appliance, taking a few cautious sips as the drink cooled when he realized the smell of something burning was wafting through the kitchen.
Confused, he followed it to the kitchen trash bin.
Heaped inside was the remnants of a computer… he thinks...
It was a mammoth, nay a dinosaur the Smithsonian would probably have to carbon-date to get an accurate reading. The monitor was smashed in, glass shards digging into the bag and cables and an ancient-looking mouse hung over the sides.
The lid didn't completely cover it all, exposing the small mountain peeking out.
BEN blinked in confusion, seeing the device give a pitiful little spark and puff of smoke.
…
The kid turned on his heel, glass of warm milk in hand, and 'noped' out of there.
Nobody questioned the smoking mess in the trash can that morning at breakfast. Masky dutifully took it to the curb without a word. Nor did anyone comment on Slender's frustrated mumblings about 'devil-boxes' over his morning tea.
Chamomile.
His 'Calming' tea.
Dave, the former pizza delivery guy, former 12 AM to 6 AM overnight security guard, and former lab technician/zombie-survivalist (among several less-noteworthy retail/customer-service jobs) sat alone in a room that could probably house his former apartment five times over. It was a lounge, with detailed, geometric decorations that looked native American. The wide-open space was empty save for chairs loveseats, and a chandelier from the ceiling.
He eyed the room, uneasily. The entire place was dead silent even as the snowy winds sighed outside.
*crreeeak*
He jumped as the noise of creaking wood echoed through the room, but then the sound groaned in relaxation as the wind died. Just the wind buffeting against the walls outside. It happened all the time in old places, and heck this hotel saw flapper showgirls back in the hey-day so it was old.
Dave shuddered as he gripped a blanket he stole from one of the random rooms to huddle into and sipped a steaming cup of coffee.
The job was a no-brainer. It was a winter job to stay in this creepy-ass hotel in the middle of drop-dead nowhere, so far from civilization that the 'scenic route' was the most direct route.
A couple routine maintenance fixes around the place, a couple checks on the heating system, …er, something he couldn't remember right now, and the occasional late-night walk-around was all the job entailed. No yardwork, no heavy maintenance, no god-damned animatronics.
Just Dave, the hotel, and the pervasive sense of loneliness.
He couldn't even get a proper signal out here. His only form of communication was a HAM radio set in the manager's office he could chat to a park ranger miles out in the mountains once every couple of days.
His plans to basically watch Netflix all winter and get paid were thrown out the window the day after he was officially shut-up inside and a snowstorm knocked out the internet connection. The park ranger said people closest to the hotel were fine, so the break was somewhere on the 50-odd-mile stretch of road. And like hell would a municipalities team scout out there in the dead of a Colorado winter.
So, he was stuck.
In a hotel.
So deep in the Rockies that his nearest neighbor may-or-may-not be Bigfoot.
Alone.
*creeeeeak*
He shuddered again as the wind shifted some of the ancient timbers.
God, he hated this place… but he knew he had to lay low.
They hired him on the spot, no intensive background checks, not too many waivers, and no references. It was better this way. He had to apply to a job like this under a pseudonym.
Or they might come skulking around again.
The Jeep rumbled underneath him. He nervously kept glancing at the fuel gauge. He hadn't properly stopped once since leaving that city. Not just the facility, but the whole freaking town, zombie-inhabitants and all were just blipped out of existence. Not even a news report that a city vanished.
Stopping in one of those internet cafes somewhere in Cincinnati, he looked the place up… and it never existed. Google Maps showed a blank stretch of land that might as well be unhelpfully labeled as 'nowhere, USA'.
After that, he got scared. He kept running from town to town, only stopping in backroad diners and the occasional gas station.
But he kept to the highway now… his backroads expeditions found an abandoned diner up in Minnesota…
God, what in the hell could leave bodies skeletonized like that?
He didn't call the cops, who could he call? How many cops were in on this? The place looked overrun with weeds anyways, so no one came around to look in on this place. So, he just booked it. He kept running and running day and night, too afraid to crash at a friend's place or with his parents' in case it put a target on them.
And now he was here, in a Utah desert, staring at the empty stretch of road ahead of him, with barely an eighth of a tank of gas left and no clear sign of life for miles-
*BANG!*
He jolted as the car suddenly silted to one side and seemed to pick up every bump and buck in the road. Barely able to hold the car steady, he managed to finally stop at the side of the road.
Uneasy, he walked out, blinking in the harsh, arid desert of Utah. His rear tire was shreds of black rubber sagging against the sun-bleached, scorching asphalt.
He groaned, "Aw, sh-"
*click*
He stiffened up as he heard a small noise behind him and slowly turned around. His eyes crossed at the nose seeing a gun's barrel inches from his face.
Letting his eyes uncross, he focused further up the gun to the figure holding it. He looked like the kind of guy who'd pull out a neuralizer and keep 'flashing' Dave until he was asking when Preschool would let out. Nondescript official-looking guy in an all-black suit, close-cropped brunet haircut, and so perfectly-nondescript facial features that they had to be plastic surgery. Sunglasses reflected Dave's terrified face and shielded any indication of his eyes.
"Up."
The word was barely above a murmur, but it sounded like the kind of voice booming from Death, itself. Dave slowly and deliberately stood, arms raised in the universal 'I surrender' pose, as the guy's gun still trained itself at his head.
"Secure," The man instructed into an earpiece.
Keeping his gun level with Dave, they waited in tense silence until a black SUV rumbled into view from down the road, screeching to a stop at the downed jeep.
"Search it." The man ordered into an earpiece.
The doors opened and a guy who looked like the psychotic cousin of Arnold Schwarzenegger hopped out of the black SUV alongside another Nondescript Guy (this time, blonde). The ripped guy flashed a paradoxically "friendly" and "I'mma-kill-you-and-think-what-to-get-for-lunch-later" smile as he raised a semi-automatic in the air like a mock toast.
The two immediately began tearing into his car, ripping out the glove box, the change drawers, the seats, everything. Eventually, they popped the back hatch and the psycho-killer guy grinned.
He tore out a tarp kept in there and he and the agent started picking jars out of somewhere in the trunk.
As Secret Agent #2 came around en route to a biohazard cooler set up outside the SUV, and Dave caught a glimpse of the freaky tapeworm-thing suspended in an off-green-yellow solution.
The creature spasmed inside the jar, lamprey-like mouth sticking and sucking against the glass.
He jolted. That had been in his backseat this whole time? "H-holy shi-"
*click*
"Don't."
Shaking, Dave complied and remained stock-still. The ripped guy sauntered over, a little pyramid of jars in his hands. Secret Agent Brunet's face twitched in what was probably the first sign of emotional response.
"Put those down, Petrov. Each of those specimens is worth more than you are alive."
The machine-gun guy, Petrov, 'pshed' dismissively, "Relax, it's all fine. We uphold our end of bargain, da? All I'm caring for is the paycheck per jar of tapeworm." A heavy East-European accent lilted his words.
"The agreement was for the job total. Lump sum," The Secret Agent Blonde began arguing.
"Details, details," Petrov shrugged, careful not to disrupt his pyramid of glass. "First, let us secure the goods and decide what to do with... ah, our little delivery boy, here."
Dave swallowed harshly as all eyes returned to him.
Oh, God, those jars were from Umbrella, weren't they? That meant these splinter-cell guys were either heavily involved in them or rivals or something. Either way, they knew where to get him and knew what they were after.
People who could make a city disappear would have no problem with one measly, little wimp like him in the dead-ass middle of the freaking desert.
Secret Agent Brunet sighed mockingly, "I guess he's fulfilled his task. And I always tip well."
Lips twitching in what might've been a sadistic smile, the man leveled the gun to his forehead-
*crash!*
The group turned to see Secret Agent Blonde staring at the shattered remains of one of the jars. The worm sitting in a puddle of the preservative juices.
...
"SHIT!" Secret Agent Brunet cried, whipping his gun towards the mess, but it was too delayed. The worm-creature suddenly lunged at Petrov's face, causing him to drop the entire pyramid of jars to drop on the ground at once. The tapeworms released in a swarm writhed around haphazardly, screeching against the scorching, sunbaked asphalt.
Secret Agents Blonde and Brunet both pulled out their pistols, starting to shoot the creatures in little bursts of green ooze. But the writhing made it like trying to hit flopping spaghetti, and only made them more agitated.
Dave scrambled away towards the SUV, pausing just long enough to grab a cooler beside the car half-full of specimen jars and launching it in their direction before slamming the driver side door shut.
The jars smashed against the asphalt behind the agents, the specimens inside flinging themselves at their unprotected backs as they dug into flesh and tore into what their suction-cup mouths could reach.
Dave floored the gas pedal of a (thankfully) well-maintained and gassed-up SUV as he blasted away from the grisly site.
Behind him, Petrov ripped a specimen worm off of his neck with a small spurt of blood, stomping his way up to the abandoned Jeep. Tire or no tire, he revved the engine for a bumpy ride. That little bastard was gonna die, one way or another.
Not even fifteen feet later, the engine sputtered and died.
Petrov froze in disbelief, seeing the fuel gauge arrow dip suddenly to empty.
They coordinated an ambush for this guy... he had to shoot a moving vehicle's tire out with a sniper rifle... and all they had to do was wait another 30 seconds.
"Heh," he snorted humorlessly.
*thump*
He looked up wearily at a tapeworm that wriggled its way onto the windshield. Then another, and then more, all drawn to the smell of blood he trailed behind him. The interior of the car was black with how many there were, and how large they'd grown after eating those two agents' corpses, effectively blotting out the sun.
Their wormy bodies undulated as a clear secretion foamed out of their mouths. Whatever those geneticists and chemists cooked up in their little labs, apparently it could handle any kind of glass that wasn't whatever those jars were made of.
The windshield cracked and hissed as the secretions worked their magic. A harsh, acrid smell permeated the cabin as the fluid dripped through the cracks and fizzed on the dashboard.
"Shit," He muttered.
The glass shattered.
So, yeah, super-creepy hotel in the middle of nowhere?
Or splinter-cell that may be looking into 'eliminating witnesses'?
He settled further into his cocoon of blankets. It was just until Spring, then he could ease into figuring things out. Plus, it wasn't like this place was that bad. There was heat, there as light, there was electricity. There was enough food to last the apocalypse (not that he'd really notice if it happened from out here).
And he had plenty of time to mull things over.
All he had to do was stay put-
"Hello, Davey."
His flesh erupted in goosebumps as he leapt and stumbled out of the constricting blankets to stare disbelievingly at the sight of two twin girls in powder blue dresses staring blankly at him while holding each others' hand.
...
"Come play with us, Davey... come play with us..." They spoke in unison, an impish smile on their faces.
"Forever."
"And Ever."
"And Ever..."
...
"NOPE!" He shouted loudly as he barreled past the creepy vision and to his room. Slamming what limited stuff he took with in a suitcase, he strode determinedly out of the room.
"NOPE!" He roared, stalking past the image of a gorgeous naked woman, who immediately morphed into a decaying, water-logged corpse, sagging arms limply gesturing his way as he stomped past her.
"NOPE!" He didn't even glance at the ballroom, now decorated with skeletons and cobwebs.
"OH, SO MUCH NOPE!" He cried, speed-walking past an elevator rushing with blood.
He slammed the entrance to the hotel behind him as he got to the snowcat and tossed his suitcase in the passenger side. He turned the key doggedly, hearing the machine whir and complain underneath him, its cold engine refusing to start.
"Oh, f*ck this!" He roared, pushing the key again and again.
Screw the hotel.
Screw the contract.
Screw the creeps in suits.
Screw the boiler-
...
Wait...
BOOOM!
As if on cue, through the open garage doors, he saw the hotel erupt into a fireball.
He stared blankly at the ruined remains as flaming pieces of debris rained from the sky.
...
Oh yeah, that's what he forgot to do.
...
"Whoops."
...
He turned the key again, earning a satisfied roar as the engine started and began driving the snowcat through the blizzard around them. In retrospect, it was a good thing he set everything up under that on-the-spot pseudonym.
He rumbled along the long trek back to civilization where he wouldn't file a police report.
Where he wouldn't stick around town.
Where 'Davey Torrence', a random guy with no past experience who was questionably hired to the hotel's winter maintenance position, could vanish with no trace or next-of-kin. And when people come poking around in spring, he'd be long gone and the hotel would be a cold, charred wreck and 'Davey Torrence' would be presumed dead.
Behind him, the Overlook Hotel burned beautifully in the night. A dark shadow writhing in the flames for just a second, before it, too, was gone.
Tim (AKA Masky) huffed quietly as he tucked his arms further into his elbows. Even with the jacket, the cold chill around him permeated through. He bitterly mumbled vague curses and threats towards Slender's higher-ups deciding now in the ass-crack of winter would be the perfect time of year to go skulking around a forest for a new creature alert.
Turns out, this creature had been around for a while. Sightings started off small, a couple years back, with hints of a sighting or two back in the 70's and 80's. Just an idle campfire story or occasional missing-hiker situation. Then some hot-shot on YouTube did a video on them barely a few months ago and now all of a sudden, shit hits the fan and this creature's the next-biggest thing.
Which, of course, led to more awareness of the creature, which led to more shit being produced, which means more boneheaded morons skulking around a forest at night trying to catch a glimpse of the damn thing… well, so was he, but this was his job dammit, not a hobby.
Couldn't these 'monster-hunters' find better hobbies to do? Something with less chance of death. Like bird-watching or stamp collecting or storm-and-tornado-chasing or volcano-bungee-jumping. Or LARPing.
His footing slipped on some icy, decayed tree limbs and he swore profusely as he gained balance and trundled towards a well-kept park path.
This whole place set him on edge. The trees were all dormant, casting long, thin, branched shadows from the moonlight overhead. Brush and bramble were dried up patches sparsely peeking over a few sad patches of snowdrifts.
He'd spent almost three hours in this place, stumbling around without a flashlight to not give away his position too much, guided instead by the bright moon (being a Proxy had its perks, better night-vision was one of them). He hadn't seen hide nor hair of the supposed creature. Supposedly, he should've heard it a mile away-
*bzzt-bzzt*
He stopped in his ambling walk to pull out his phone. He winced, blinded by the sudden spotlight blazing on his pixelated screen for a moment before he adjusted to see a message from Slender, calling him back.
Tucking it away and giving one last distrustful huff at the landscape around him, he shook off the uneasy feelings of being watched and stalked back to the Slender-port symbol etched into a tree.
A brief flash of Sigma and the Proxy vanished in thin air.
Leaving behind an empty stillness.
…
…
Beside the spot the human had just vacated, a thin "tree" split apart into a pair of long, slender, mottled-brown legs. The figure lumbered into the woods, its abnormal height and unnaturally thin physique mingled perfectly with the rustling shadows of the barren tree branches.
The forest echoed with the mournful, distorted warbling of a broken tornado siren.
Ottery St. Catchpole was a quiet town, and as such outside of an occasional drunk from a pub, there was little to no 'night life' as you'd expect in the big city. No parties, no night clubs, no all-night bars.
That's why not a single soul too notice of two black shapes gliding soundlessly onto the street in the predawn hours after midnight.
Touching down, the figures hopped off their broomsticks and rushed into an alleyway, holding their breath for a solid five minutes. But there were no voices, no lights, no rustling window curtains. The town was dead-asleep.
The figures pulled down their hoods to reveal Fred and George Weasley, glancing nervously around. George collected the broomsticks and lowered them into their mother's old expansion-charm 'Errands Purse' she had misplaced a long time ago. By the time the twins had found it in the attic crawlspace, she'd already given up on finding it and bought a new one second-hand, so they kept it.
Sticking to the shadows, they made their way to a small side-door to a particular building. The village was small, but somehow they had erected a library out of an old pub building some years before. It was a well-frequented place, but they felt it best to discretely visit with no nosy librarians or curious townsfolk interested in one of the 'reclusive families'.
Hence, sneaking out of the house in the dead of night.
Fred pulled something out of his pocket and tore the wrapper off of an Acid Pop. He licked it, briefly tasting very sour apple flavor and a mild tingle on his tongue, before sticking it to the lock on the library's side door. The treat hissed as it magically ate a hole straight through.
George waited a moment until the smell of metallic smoke stopped wafting from the lock before giving the door a budge and it opened easily. Fred tore off the lollipop and covered it in a wrapper to throw away somewhere a muggle wouldn't chance upon it.
The magical restoration charm imbued in the candy, typically meant to restore tongues and cheeks dissolved by the extreme sweet, would also work to repair the lock in about a half-an-hour. All completely unTraceable.
They hurried deeper into the dark, empty library. Fred held a bluebell-flame lighter in his hand (also unTraceable), casting an ethereal, cerulean light over the space as they navigated the rows of books, tables, and sections.
They had been to the library before. Their dad had insisted on all of them having registered library cards, if for nothing else than the sheer muggle novelty of the little plastic cards. None of it caught on.
Their mother wasn't interested in muggle recipe books or muggle literature. Percy had appreciated the library's system and cataloging, but had only taken interest in a year before becoming engrossed in his studies. Ron would need to be tied down to a chair before he'd voluntarily read, and Ginny was more enthralled by wizarding pre-teen fantasy books (particularly ones detailing a charming, dashing, green-eyed, Boy-Who-Could-Probably-Carve-Their-Eyes-Out-With-A-Stapler).
But despite their mother's laments over their term grades, if they were challenged or interested, they could be quite brilliant.
Case-in-point, a small section of the library dedicated to computers. Computers they had self-signed-up to a few adolescent courses on how to use. Nothing major, but they could use a simple search engine, something most wizards would be dismally incompetent at, and save a Word file.
Thank Merlin their dad was banned from the location ages ago for messing with a copier machine. Who knows what he'd do if he got one of these? Could someone accidentally magic the Internet? Neither sibling wanted to chance it.
George logged on to the device, he having faster typing skills of the two, and opened a browser. Fred pulled out a piece of parchment they'd filled out one late night huddled over the Map.
One by one, they began quietly researching a list of names.
'Jeffery Woods... Tobias Rogers... Jack Nichols...'
AN: Okay, I lied a little. I added some Hogwarts stuff at the end, but in my defense I loved writing the twins technically-within-the-law shenanigans, so it was enjoyable.
Bonus: A scene I wanted to include, but didn't canonically fit in without giving Dumbledore a huge leg-up, so I had to leave it out! Enjoy!
The Headmaster smiled to himself as he found the spell he was after. A small charm, Phoenix-based that would allow a phoenix to travel instantly to any location despite the wards in place. Though with a caveat of only working on items, not living beings that aren't immortal fire-birds.
He gathered the Cloak in a bundle with his cryptic message in place before calling upon his trusty Phoenix. Fawkes accepted the spell and immediately flamed into a macabre impression of Christmas.
He dropped the present under the tree, trilling to himself as he noticed the obvious and rather laughable traps laid out in the room. As if they could catch a Phoenix.
He was about to flame out of the room-
-when a particular scent caught his attention. Chocolate, sugar, and doughy-goodness.
Milk and cookies?
...
Maybe just one...
AN: Fawkes barely flamed back to Hogwarts and passed out like a 70-pound bird right on top of the Headmaster's desk.
.
AN: Bad Adrian, somebody's getting coal this year.
*FWOOSH!*
… He burnt it.
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AN: Slender's computer setup I based off an old PC computer we played 'MYST' or 'SEVENTH GUEST' on growing up. It was a Macintosh my mom had back in the late 90s/early 2000s. I think it might still be up there, boxed away, but still working (technically), but I think if we hooked it up to the internet now it would implode on itself.
Fun fact, my grandmother was about as bad with computers. The first time she got a home computer and accessed the internet (back in the late-90's-early-2000's, probably), she wanted to go to the White House's website domain, because she was really politically active. But she put in 'dot-com' instead of 'dot-gov'… it was an adult website.
She never used another computer to the day she died.
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These last few months, I've gotten reviews requesting I include SirenHead. Sort of the newest creepypasta to our fandom-family. Not a lot of lore yet, but I've been appreciating the new games, fanimations, and pasta-stories developed lately and I wanted to at least fit him into the story somehow!
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I hope you enjoyed this chapter
-Crow
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(P. S. Merry Christmas-in-July or whatever... I swear, Halloween is the only bastion keeping Christmas from spreading any further back like a tinsel-and-mistletoe cancerous growth)
-Siren Head: based on artwork by Trevor Henderson
-The Overlook Hotel: The Shining by Stephen King