Dawson hugs Cato, an awkward feat considering that Dawson's really short and younger than any of us.
We all stand by and comfort Cato, tears streaming down her face.
They're fogging her vision and pouring down like waterfalls, splashing down onto the ground.
No noise comes out, but we can tell she's really upset, by the way she buries her head into our shoulders.
Dawson sighs and the small girl leans over into the other room, her low dirty blonde ponytail dipping onto the polished cream floor.
She sees the sickening blood, just starting to dry on the floor next to the broken navy blue, auburn, and white vase, cracked and broken, chips and bits spilling over its mouth.
I gag at the metallic smell of the blood and back away, holding my nose and grappling onto my denim suspenders with my other hand, shaking my head rapidly.
I feel like passing out.
You know, maybe I could. I could just kneel over and faint right here, fading into oblivion and surfacing when this entire bloody mansion is gone from our lives.
But I don't. I won't let me.
I just shiver; face paling and ice shooting up my spine.
"Hey Raina, you okay?" Asher asks, then follows my gaze. He leaves the huddle and goes over to the blood-spewed message, followed by Dawson and I, leaving Chara to comfort Cato.
Asher goes back into the smoky wooden room. This mansion is basically just entirely cream-colored and polished colours of sandstone, tan, and other smeared colours clean and cool.
This just makes the blood stand out even more.
Dawson sinks to her knees and bends over the terrible-smelling substance, basically sniffing it.
"What are you doing?" Asher asks, cocking his head to the side and scoffing slightly.
Dawson shrugs, her marigold orange sneakers folding from underneath herself.
Brushing her dirty blonde hair aside, she dips in and wipes her fingers through the mess like its simple watercolors. Cato looks ready to pass out. I gag.
Dawson doesn't seem too bothered by the smell, just feels it in between her fingers curiously, like its paint she can use in her sketchbook. She looks at us and shivers slightly.
"Yup, it's blood."
Asher facepalms and Cato's face goes white against her cocoa skin.
I step towards Dawson, curling a stand of penny copper hair in my fingers.
"So, what does it mean? Whose blood is it even? You don't think that it's..." Suddenly my blood runs cold.
"You...you don't think that it's...Kyril's blood...do you?" Dawson stumbles backwards.
A sudden ring of the doorbell makes us all scream.
Shadows cascade onto the windows, just next to the door, and a giant pool of shadows cross the floor.
Chara screams and backs up. Asher rolls his eyes.
"Dudes, it's probably just some trick-or-treaters, we'll just say we're out of candy for them, let them leave, then look for Kyril, easily."
He opens the tan wooden door to reveal five other people, just a bit taller than us. Asher backs up and his mouth falls open slightly.
One of the people is in an almost black hoodie, streaked with shadows.
Outspread are over-taped fluttering paper wings, feathers folding over one another and curling into majestic bird wings.
The girl has black pants, simple shadowy sneakers, sky blue colored hair, and a smile on her face, dancing in her eyes. She flips down her hood and smiles shyly at us.
Another girl has curled blue aqua colored hair, short, and swirling down to her shoulders, where they spread and wave like a curtain.
She has a ton of makeup on...like, a ton. Small black marking in small upside down swoops highlight where she's put red and seafoam ocean green scale paint, spread across her face.
Turquoise eye shadow spread out, painted across her face, calmness washing over her almost bored face, dotted with ever so slight freckles.
She has an ocean green, turquoise, aqua in a mermaid costume, trailing down to the bottom, where the colour turns to an apple red, like a mermaid's tail.
Another one of the group, a taller boy, almost taller than Asher (which is almost impossible to become,) is in a simple military outfit, camouflaged clothes covering him.
A third girl has wispy blonde hair and an almost far-away observant look, smiling peacefully at us. Her hair is almost white, a few thin strands floating aimlessly in the air.
She has on puffy white creamy sleeves, a denim navy blue vest, and a fluffy feathery pirate hat, the feathers bobbing in the air wishfully.
The fifth and final person of the group, a boy, has a marigold yellow-orange cat sweater, simple sharpie marks streaking alongside his face.
One of the boys takes Asher's hand.
"Hi," The tallest boy in the heavy boots and camouflage greets, shaking his hand against Asher's darker one.
"I'm Zander, and that's Luna -" The girl in the pirate outfit with the almost white hair, "Salem -" The blackbird girl who I can only imagine is some sort of raven or a crow......eh, heck if I know...
"....um, over there's Autumn,-" He points to the girl in the mermaid costume, "and finally, the cat over there, that's Dakota..."
"Kota, you can call me just Kota," The boy interrupts, face red and flushed. Zander simply rolls his eyes.
He looks up over us, calm but authoritative, may just a few years older than are are.
"So...who's the host?"
Ice shoots up our spines.
Chara's P.O.V
"Um, one moment please," Asher laughs awkwardly, then basically shoves us all into the closet where we found the note.
"In, in, in, in, in..." He hisses, shoving us inside and locking the door to the costume closet.
Cato takes one look at the fake skeleton and shivers.
"What the bloody frick did you do that for!?" Raina yells, taking a newspaper roll from a costume box and hitting him with it.
"Here, put these on," he says, taking random stuff from shelves and boxes of the costume closet, handing it to us absentmindedly.
He hands Cato a bow and arrow, and some black suit with symbols on them, Raina a piece of tape, himself, a Pokémon hat and a vest, Dawson, a black hoodie with bones painted on it in the shape of a skeleton, and me a sharpie and a black wig, along with a small tan-cream t-shirt with mustaches stashed across.
"Why?" We all ask in unison.
Asher sighs like we're the biggest idiots in the world.
"Seriously? Guys, um, duh. Cato is Cato from the Hunger Games, Dawson is Papyrus from Undertale because she references him, like, all the time, I'm Ash from Pokémon, you know, ASHer, Raina's a nerd because she is one-"
Raina smacks him again with the crinkled crumbling newspaper roll.
"...and finally, Chara, I would have you be Chara from Undertale, but there's no sweater, so you'll have to be Phil...because...you like watching, I dunno, I didn't have a lot of time," he shrugs.
I punch him in the arm.
"What do you mean 'you'll just have to be Phil,' !? This is amazing!!" Dawson rolls her eyes at my pun as Asher laughs and rubs his newly bruising arm.
I smile.
"Okay," Asher explains, "We'll pretend like nothing's wrong, say we forgot it was a Halloween costume party, because...well, we did...and then tell them what's going on, okay?"
We all agree, sadly.
We all change and head outside towards the others, who are all talking in a circle. They melt and disperse when they see us.
Luna smiles warmly.
"So, you guys okay?" Salem asks.
"You guys look great," Luna comments, a small smile dancing in her eyes and on her face.
"Thanks," I say back.
"We've just simply forgotten that it was a costume party, we decided to change just now," Asher explains awkwardly, rubbing the back of his neck.
Asher then continues to explain what's been going on, and the others decide to help us find Kyril.
"So, where do we start?" Zander asks.
And then the lights shut off.
***
Chapter written by Goldendoodlegamer11