The devil sat dejectedly on his throne, biting his nails from stress.
"Hiya boss," Henchman yelled, strolling into the throne room, "it's that time of year again."
Henchman pulled a zombie mask from his pocket and put it on.
"Happy Halloween!"
"NO!" the devil shouted, grabbing his pitchfork and blasting the goofy mask right off Henchman's face, "No Halloween."
"Aw come one boss," Henchman said ,"why don't you like halloween, all the mortals up their all go outside and celebrate the forces of evil!"
"Is that really what you think?" the devil questioned, "you really think those silly little costumes and those silly little decorations and giving the little kiddies candy is meant to be a tribute? CAN'T YOU SEE THEY'RE JUST MOCKING ME!!!!"
"Jeez boss, I've never looked at it that way." Henchman replied.
"Well why not?" the devil asked angrily, "look into my eyes! Are these the eyes of the kind of person who likes to watch acts of generosity, fun and happiness. Are these the eyes of the kind of person who wants to be memorialised by CANDY ADVERTS AND STUPID GOOFY CARDBOARD CUTOUTS!"
"Well... um... actually, yo...
"SILENCE!!!!" the devil screamed ,"i shall no longer take this kind of disrespect. Luckily i have hatched a brilliant plan."
The devil snapped his fingers and a classroom blackboard dropped down from the ceiling along with a piece of chalk. Then the devil explained his plan using the blackboard to draw visual aids.
"I will commandeer a house and infest it with the scariest ghouls I can get my hands on. Then when the little kiddies come up for their candy, we'll scare them silly and then take their candy. Any questions?"
Henchman applauded.
"Now, time to execute."
***
In some random house, on some random street, a small family was readying for halloween.
"Remember timmy," said the mother, "look both ways before crossing the street."
"Yes mum," said the child.
Suddenly, in a puff of smoke the devil appeared in the middle of the room. Just before they were all about to scream, the devil spoke first.
"Yes yes, I know, I'm the devil. Now out."
Using his pitchfork he nudged the family out the door and then shut it in their faces.
"Well that's that sorted," he said ,"now, I just need to haunt this place."
The devil teleported onto the roof and placed down a sign that read free candy for ghosts that haunt this place!! . Within a second the devil was surrounded by ghosts, all drooling at the mouth.
"Perfect," the devil remarked, pulling a jar of sherbet lemons out of his pocket and tossing it on the floor, "now get to haunting!"
***
Cuphead Mugman and Chalice all burst out of the cottage's doors all wearing halloween costumes. Cuphead was dressed as the devil, with little red horns and a garden pitchfork. Chalice was in her newly recovered ghost form and also underneath a white sheet with eye holes cut out, going as a monster she called the "double ghost". Mugman was going as a fairy godmother with glittery wings on his back and an outfit to match.
"This is going to be the biggest haul of candy yet!" exclaimed Cuphead, "you finished with that plan yet mugsy?"
"Yup," Mugman replied ,"I have plotted out the optimal route for candy collection as well as a few tips to get maximum candy."
"Welp, let's hear them mugsy." Chalice said.
"Ok, if there is ever a bowl of sweets that says take one, take the entire bowl. If someone holds out a bowl for you to take some, grab as many handfuls as possible. And finally, if you see any opportunity for more candy, take it!"
"Nice work mugsy," Cuphead congratulated ,"we shall be the greatest trick-or-treaters in the land."
The cup trio started their rout. They soon reached the first house and knocked on the door.
Without warning, the owner of the house swung open the door and yelled "BOO!!" while wearing a skeleton mask. Not one of the cups flinched.
"Trick or treat!" they all yelled, smiling brightly.
The owner of the house smiled.
"Sorry about that," they apologise, "i can't help myself."
They then plopped some candy into each cup's designated candy sack and closed the door.
"Hey mugsy," Cuphead said ,"how come you didn't get all scared back there?"
"Well, I have been practising," Mugman answered.
"Uh hu," Cuphead replied, "and how exactly have you been practicing?"
"Well...
__________________________
Mugman grabbed a loaf of bread out the cupboard. He cut a slice from it and stuck it in the toaster. He then got a pen, taped it to the back of his head and then leant against the wall, waiting for his toast to be done.
When the tost suddenly popped up, Mugman jumped in fear. The pen taped to the back of his head drew a line up the wall. Mugman then grabbed his toast, measured the line, jotted it in a log book and ate his toast.
______________________________
...I repeat this process every morning," Mugman explained, "you can see my progress."
Mugman pulled his log book out his pocket and gave it to his brother. Cuphead and Chalice flipped through it, skimming through Mugman's stats.
"I knew you had it in ya buddy," Cuphead congratulated, "and good thing too because tonight is about serious candy collection."
The trio continued to walk down the inkwell streets, collecting more and more candy as they went. Mugman's planned route proved to be perfect. He can collect data from previous halloween on when certain locations like to stop giving out candy and factored that into his plan, making sure to get to those locations early.
After an hour or so. The cups reached a slightly suspicious looking house. Just a little suspicious looking with blue glowing windows, cobwebs lining every corner and a lawn covered in crying children.
"If you spent this much on decorations," Chalice reasoned, "you kind of have to be giving out candy."
She walked up to the door and knocked but the door swung open by itself.
"Hmm," she remarked, "I guess they've prepared something inside."
The cups all walked into the house. Weird ghostly noises echoed all around them and floors creaked where none of them had stepped.
"Laaaaaaame!" Cupehad shouted, "just give us the candy already!"
"Cuphead!" Mugman hissed, "if you're rude they wont give you candy."
As they walked along the stupidly long entrance hallway, ghosts kept sticking their heads out of walls, screeching at ungodly decibels and doing all manner of creepy stuff. The cups just ignored all of it.
At the end of the hallway was another door. Chalice reached out to open it but someone behind it opened it. Out jumped the devil, wearing a cartoony devil mask. He was about to grab the cups' candy bags before realising who they were and stopping mid grab.
"Trick or treat?" Cuphead said uncertainly, unable to recognise the devil.
The devil steeled his resolve and snatched the bag of candy from each of the cups' hands then promptly slammed the door.
"OI!" all the cups yelled and began to bang on the door.
"That jerk!" Cuphead cried, "he took our candy."
"No one takes our candy without consequences!" Chalice declared, "what we need is some well planned revenge!"
***
The devil stood in the middle of the room wondering what he had got himself into.
"What the heck am i doing," the devil said to himself ," those cups have defeated me before, on my home turf and while one of them was dead, i can't stand up to them now. They'll kill me.''
Suddenly the devil had a bright idea. (This doesn't happen very often so savour the moment)
"What if I make sure those pottery based dumdums don't know it's me they're dealing with. It's not like they're going to spend ages hatching a revenge plan on some random candy thief!"
The devil then went down into the basement and then began to totter down a huge flight of steps before remembering he can just teleport to the bottom of them. At the bottom of those stairs was a large metal vault. The devil opened said vault and placed the bags of candy inside of it, adding to the momentous pile of sweets inside.
"Safe and secure," the devil said to himself and then slammed the door shut.
***
"This is a lot of work for a revenge plan for some random candy thief," Mugman remarked.
"It's about the principal Mugsy," Chalice explained, "if we let this guy get the best of us, next thing you know the shopkeepers will be stealing from you and clueless pedestrians will be taking your money. You've gotta put your foot down somewhere! It's called trick-or-treat for a reason and that bozo chose trick."
They had all ditched their costumes for practicality reasons, except Mugman who liked his fairy wings enough to keep them on.
Chalice did the finishing touches to their master plan and then, along with the other two, retreated back into the bushes. Before long another set of unsuspecting trick or treaters began to approach the house. They entered the house and screamed in fear a few times at the horrifying ghosts inside.
The cups heard the sound of a door opening then some children screaming before there was a sound of a rapidly moving rope. The ensuing sharp squeal from the candy thief was the cups' signal. The cups leapt out from behind the bush and ran into the house. They barreled past the group of children and the devil who was stuck in Chalice's snare and hanging from the ceiling.
The cups ran past him and into the house ,determined to regain their candy.
***
The devil watched as the cups ran past him, unable to do anything without giving away his identity. Once they were out of sight he transformed into a tiny version of himself, allowing him to slip out of his bonds and then transformed back into his original size.
"What have I gotten myself into!" the devil exclaimed, "those cups are running rampant in the house and i've placed the candy they are looking for, in hell!"
The devil pulled his pitchfork out his pocket and tapped it gently against the wall, making a sound like tapping a glass with a knife. All of the ghosts he hired for haunting immediately appeared and stood to attention.
"Stop those cups!" he shouted desperately, "and if you do i will give you num nums."
The ghost, captivated by the prospect of num nums immediately dashed off into the house, determined to stop those cups.
***
The trio casually strolled through the house. They unflinchingly walked past blatantly gory and horrifying nicknacks, like a skull with a candle in it or a suspiciously bloodstained teddy.
"We'll search from top to bottom," Chalice planned, "that way we'll cover all possible hiding spots."
They soon came upon a spiral staircase that presumably led to the upper floors of the house.
***
The ghosts observed the intruders as they scaled the staircase.
"Perfect!" said one of them," the stairs are the best place to scare. Is everybody invisible to those mortals? Make sure you're visible to fellow undead so i can signal you but those mortals can't see you."
"Yup," all the other ghosts replied.
"Good, let's get to work!"
***
Chalice watched as the ghosts had their meeting.
"Hey ding dongs!" she muttered, "do you see them ghosts?"
Cuphead and Mugman looked and where she was pointing but saw nothing.
"Nope," they both said.
"Hmm. I must be able to see them because I'm a half ghost. Follow my lead."
Chalice watched as one of the ghosts positioned themselves to remove one of the steps below where she was about to walk, in an attempt to make her fall down. to counter this she took a little jump and cleared the step she knew was set to fall beneath her. The other cups followed suit leaving the step to fall harmlessly down, causing no harm to any of them.
The ghosts tried the same trick again but once again they all simply stepped over the trapped step.
Next the ghosts tampered with the steps, further up the staircase, above the intruders, setting them up to fall on the cups' heads. In response Chalice simply readied herself and once the step fell, she caught it and placed it on the floor next to her.
She heard the ghosts mutter curses under their breath and smirked.
Next the ghosts set themselves up to remove an entire section of the staircase, she saw the ghosts set this up and had to think for a while before she got an idea. Just as she was about to reach the danger zone, she jumped up and grabbed onto the stairs, on the layer above their head, she then swung on the underside of the steps like monkey bars, clearing the danger zone entirely. The others followed suit and before long they were all on the other side, leaving the ghosts utterly baffled.
"Ok, i'm done!" one of the ghosts exclaimed. The ghost floated down to the bottom of the stairs and pulled out a ghostly chainsaw and pulled on the chain.
***
The entire staircase crashed down to the floor as the cups watched, safely standing at the top floor of the house.
"Are we in danger?" Mugman asked entirely calmly.
"Nah," Chalice replied, "i can spot ghostly antics from a mile away. Let's get searching"
~!!Montage time!!~
1: Cuphead opens a cabinet in the bathroom. He looks at the shelves that are covered in various jars and bottles, most of them with long sciency words on them that he hadn't heard of before. He grabbed one of them and noticed that it was full of brightly coloured sweets. He popped one into his mouth and began to chew.
Needless to say, he promptly spat out the false sweet and continued the search
2: Mugman was walking down a corridor when the form of a ghost, with an emaciated body and in tattered clothes, rose from the floor.
"Eerm, excuse me," Mugman said politely, "would you be able to let me through, I'm trying to look for my stolen candy."
In response, the ghost lifted its head, revealing its horrifying face.
"REEEEEEEEEEEEE!" it scratched.
Mugman then proceeds to completely baffle the ghost by sneezing, covering the ghost's spectral clothes with milky snot.
"Oh i'm terribly sorry!" Mugman apologise, "you see i'm allergic to dead people, i best be on my way."
And with that Mugman walked past the ghost and continued the search.
3: Chalice stuck her ghostly head through cabinet doors, saving herself the hassle of opening them. She floated back out the room and drew a little chalk X on the door, so she knew that that room had been checked.
Below her the ghosts and rigged up explosives beneath the floor.
"I heard scraping!" one of the ghosts exclaimed, "one of them is above us, do it, now!"
Another ghost pulled a big red leaver, setting off the rigged explosives.
The explosion made Chalice jump slightly, but since she was in ghost form, no harm was done. She snickered slightly at the thought of how frustrated the ghosts must be.
4: Cuphead opened a cupboard to check it for candy. Just as he was opening the door a ghost stuck its head out and said "BOO!"
Cuphead blew a raspberry at the ghost and then closed the cupboard door on its face.
(montage end)
The cups made their way through the entire house, checking every nook and cranny while the ghosts tried to stop them. They had soon swept the entire house and the only thing left was the basement.
Mugman yawned loudly, "I'm tired."
"Don't worry mugsy," Cuphead reassured him, "most basements aren't that big."
The trio of cups stepped into the basement and quickly surveyed the area. Nothing. Cuphead was searching behind some cardboard boxes when he saw that the boxes were being used to conceal a doorway. He kicked them to the side revealing an ominously red stairwell leading downwards as far as the eye could see.
"Uhg!" Cuphead groaned, "MORE STAIRS! My legs feel like rubber hoses."
"I have a solution," Chalice offered, "but..."
"YES!" Cuphead screeched with glee ,"just do it, I'm sick of stairs!"
"Welp," She said uncertainty ,"you asked for it."
She then pushed Cuphead down the stairs, watching him tumble down, before purposely tripping herself up and then falling down with him.
Mugman watched as the two tumbled down the stairs, screaming in pain the entire way down. He tried to think of a safer way of getting down, without taking ages. He noticed that there was a thin hand rail running along the side of the stairs. Mugman seated himself on the handrail and began to attempt to slide down it, before falling off and tumbling down the stairs with the rest of the cups.
"I JUST WANTED CANDYYYYYY!!!" he screamed as he fell
***
The devil was sat in his throne trying to calm himself down. There was no chance of those cursed cups being able to get down into hell. He had tasked ten of his finest demons to block and guard that exit at all costs.
As he was having this internal conversation, those very ten demons who he had ordered to block the stairs staggered into the throne room, as drunk as anything. The devil did a double take upon seeing them, completely baffled by the fact that these puny demons would dare disobey him.
"WHAT ARE YOU FOOLS DOING!!" the devil screamed, "YOU'RE MEANT TO BE GUARDING THE STAIRWAY!!"
"We'll we were," recounted one of them, their voice slurred with alcohol, "but the stairs was long and the drinks was goooooooooood."
"Boss boss!" Henchman yelled, "the cups are coming down the stairs at 20 miles per hour!"
"Imposable!" the devil replied ,"no one can run down stairs that fast. They must be coming here on some sort of infernal device or rabid animal! We're doomed!!!"
"What should we do boss," henchman asked, jittering with fear.
"Take all the candy and place it at the foot of the stairs as an offering," the devil said fearfully, "they have to know it's me by now if they're coming here at that speed. If we're lucky, maybe they'll have mercy on me."
***
The cups all landed in a painful heap on the floor.
"Well," Cuphead said weakly, "that certainly was faster."
"You hollow headed imbeciles!" Mugman exclaimed, "we could have died. Now let's go find our ca..."
It was at this moment, Mugman saw the huge pile of candy laid out before him.
"What the heck!" Cupehad exclaimed.
Suddenly a furry black hand stuck out the candy pile, waving a white flag.
"I come in peace," said a muffled voice.
From the pile jumped the guy that had stolen their candy in the first place.
"I come in peace!" the man said again ,"take this candy as a peace offering. Please don't hurt me."
The cups looked at the man quizzically.
"Ooookayyy then," Chalice said, "I guess we'll be off."
Each filled their arms with as much candy as they could carry. They quaked under the weight of it and they turned to face the stupendously long staircase they must scale to make it back home.
"Uh oh." they said as the screen fades to black.