Chapter 15-an army of one - chapter 16- hard work undone
‘Another dream?’ I looked around, when did I fall asleep? There I saw the queen of hearts and alice.
“for painting my roses red, someone will lose his head!” the queen shouted “y-your majesty, if anyone’s to blame, it’s him!” three of clubs pointed towards two of clubs.
“have mercy, your grace. It was ace!” The two of clubs pointed towards the ace. “So it was YOU.” the queen yelled in anger. Looking at the ace of clubs, the ace of clubs had a red paint bucket spilled over his head.
“Gah, no, it was the Two!” the ace of clubs pleaded “then he will pay.” the queen stated “It was the three, I say!” two shouted.
“enough of all of this. Off with ALL their heads!” the queen screamed “Oooooooh! Yaaaay!” people chanted as the cards were dragged away, the queen laughed “a fitting end. Color, you can’t mend.” two of diamonds sung “Everyone knows the roses should be red.” three of spades informed.
“But they’re just roses! Why won’t anyone stop the queen?” I mumbled “y/n, wake up.'' I heard deuce, my eyes slowly opened “the unbirthday party is today. If we’re late, well, you know…” I looked around, I fell asleep on the sofa, I sat up slowly stretching out “that’s right… the party’s today.” I said with a yawn, just then a knock could be heard.
“Hmm? It sounds like you have a visitor.” I rushed towards the door, I opened it to see cater “good mourning! Did you all enjoy your sleepover? Did you bond over pillow fights and card games?” Ace seemed to appear from behind me “oh, good morning, cater. We did play some cards, yeah. But only Old Maid, ‘cause that was the only one Grim knew how to play.” grim let out a groan “and I still got the old maid every time, dang it!”
“Let’s just say grim doesn’t have a very good poker face.” deuce snickered “well, you should get one of the tarts we made yesterday and go apologize to riddle. And you should probably hurry, because after the trouble yesterday, we're a little short-handed” cater hurried us “what does that mean?” ace questioned.
“Don’t worry. I’ve totes got it under control. Anyway, off to the party we go!” cater turned, grabbing onto my arm and dragging me along with him, I was dragged all the way to the mirror room, we found the heartslabyul dorm mirror, and teleported to the gates.
Cater pulled me closer, letting going of my hand and wrapping his arm around my waist, ace and deuce were carrying the tart we made “all right, so I’ll hand over the tart and say i;m sorry, then—” ace stared off with a look of surprise, I looked up to see a second cater “hey, it’s time I got back! Good to see me!” the cater with me giggled “and me! Looking good as always, me!”
“Bwyh?!” the three idiots shouted “th-there’s two caters?!”
“Are you guys identical twin?!'' Ace stammered “nope. Don't have any siblings. What I DO have is my signature spell, split card. It lets me make magic duplicates of myself” cater laughed “this must be how cater kept coming after we beat him over and over yesterday…”
“Welcome home, daaarlings.”
“Good to see you, y/n!”
“You’re late! I was worried sick!”
More and more Caters appeared
“Bwah! There’s more of them?” ace tried to hide behind me “J-S-Y-K, I’m actually the real cater. Making these duplicates is suuuuper exhausting, so I can’t maintain them for long. Anyway, if we’re late, heads will roll. And since we’re several people short, we’ll need your help. But when this is over, I promise I’ll take you straight to riddle” so the real cater is the second Cater we saw “what, MORE roses?” grim whined
“And here we go again!” Ace groaned “get the lead out, peeps! We need to get started!” they all began pulling out wand-pens, I blocked them out as they talked away about the roses, I was watching grim as he danced around, after a I began looking around at the other roses with amazement, how quickly did they get them done.
I heard panting behind me. I turned to see Deuce panting “well, this is going better than before.” oh they’re done “looking good!” Cater gave them a thumbs up before turning and pulling me to his side again and pulling out his phone “ooh, it’s almost time! Okay, all you sexy body doubles, that’s a wrap!”
All of the Cater clones yelling in unison “aye-aye Cay-Cay!” all of the Cater clones disappeared almost as if they never existed, Cater kept his arm around my waist as he pulled me along to the tea party, Grim, Ace and Deuce followed behind.
We arrived just as Riddle arrived, a trumpet could be heard “all hail our leader, the red sovereign himself… Housewarden Riddle!” a green haired student yelled, all ove heartslabyul stood up and saluted “we salute you, Housewarden Riddle!” they shouted.
Riddle began looking around, slowly walking to the roses and giving them a touch “hm. The garden roses are red–” he walked over to his seat, the largest seat at the table meant for him and looked around “the tablecloths are white… this seems a proper unbirthday indeed.”
He turned his head to Trey “is there a dormous asleep in the teapot, as there should be?” Trey nodded “of course. And should it become necessary, we’ve also prepared the jam to spread on his nose.” Riddle gave a slight headnod “very good.”
Grim jumped up into my arms and I pulled away from Cater’s grip “Myah! Those are some fancy duds!” grim admired “these are heartslabyul dorm clothes. Aren’t they fierce?” cater gave me a nudge “at the forefront of fashion, and they look great on Magicam”
There was a flash of light and suddenly Cater was no longer wearing the black school uniform but instead his outfit matched everyone else's, with a white suit with a heartish shaped collar, a black sleeve and a checkered sleeve on opposite sides “one of the Queen’s rules mandates formal dress on part days. As a show of kindness from a beloved mentor, I’ll help coordinate your outfits.” With another flash of light all four of us wore the same clothing as everyone else, even Grim’s collar changed to match it.
“Whoa!” Deuce shouted as Ace looked around at himself “lookin’ sharp!” Grim began hopping around “myah! So cool!” I smirked and gave a small bow “as they say, clothes maketh the man.”
Cater chuckled and wrapped his hand around my hips and pulled me closer “now, let’s tear this part up! And don’t forget to give Riddle the tart.” Cater let go of my hips and walked away towards Trey.
I pulled Ace and Deuce to a table near the bushes, and sat down like everyone else was, Riddle looked around “before we begin the croquet tournament, let us make a toast. Does everyone have their teacup? On this most significantly unauspicious of days, I bid all in attendance… A very merry unbirthday!” Riddle raised his teacup and so did everyone else “to a very merry unbirthday!” everyone shouted.
At some point Trey and Cater came and sat with us, leaning over towards Ace “Ace, this is your chance!” Ace nodded “right…” Ace stood up, me, Grim, Deuce, Cater and Trey all coming with him, carrying the Tart “uh, housewarden, sir…”
Riddle turned his head towards Ace and crossed his arms “ah, it’s you. The tart thief.” Ace started rubbing the back of his neck “yeah, so, I wanted to apologize for eating that tart. We made you a new tart to replace it.”
Riddle raised his head with curiosity “hmm? And what kind of tart is it?” Ace smiled widely “I’m so glad you asked! It’s a chestnut tart, and I swear, we weren’t stingy with the chestnuts.”
Riddle’s slight smile quickly turned into a frown “A CHESTNUT tart?!” he shouted
“What?!” Ace jumped back slightly grabbing my sleeve, almost seemed as if he was trying to hide behind me “the Queen of Heart’s rule 562: one must never bring a chestnut tart to an unbirthday tea party. This is an utterly flagrant rule violation! Do you understand what you’ve done?! You’ve ruined an otherwise perfect unbirthday!” Riddle slammed his hands down onto the table and quickly stood up.
“Rule 562…?!” Deuce seemed concerned
“How many rules are there? You have all of them memorized?” I questioned, honestly how in the fuck did he do that, Riddle snapped his head towards me “there are 810 rules in all, and housewarden, I can of course recite each and everyone one of them.” Did Riddle just call me housewarden…
“Wow, T-I-L… this could be bad. Trey, were you aware of this?” Cater whispered behind me “I was only able to memorize the first 350 or so. Well, we really botched this one. Big-time” I heard Trey whisper back.
“As housewarden of a dorm established to honor the Queen of Heart’s rigor, I cannot ignore this.” Riddle slammed his hands down on the table again, this time now addressing everyone at the event “destroy the offending tart immediately! Then throw these rulebreakers out of the dorm!”