☾ ☽
"What is under here?"
Oh, boy. Oh, she's really not letting this go. We have just seconds until the evil ones are out of the building and if they catch us, we're literally dead. Fortunately, Eddie's not letting her see what we're hiding. "I don't want you to see," he says to her.
"Oh, why ever not?" Trudy questions.
As she goes to move it again, Fabian exclaims, "It'll spoil the trick!" I send him a strange look, holding my end of the green drape.
"Trick?" Trudy repeats.
"For Alfie's magic act," he lies. "For the open day." Okay, that works.
Trudy looks at us, still slightly suspicious, but she seems to buy our story. "Hmm, okay." She takes her hands out and I let out a breath I didn't realize I was holding. "Well, far be it from me to ruin the magic." KT thanks her and we start to go on our way, but Trudy says, "That looks heavy. I'll give you a hand." She's all smiles as she unwittingly helps us roll along Robert Frobisher-Smythe—toward the school. "You'll want this in the common room. Up on the stage for everyone to see."
"Sure," KT says nervously, giving me a wide-eyed look.
"That sounds great, Trudy," Eddie adds.
"Oh, hold on," Trudy stops suddenly, and I'm praying to whatever gods exist that she's suddenly decided to leave us be. "We'll need someone to meet us there. I'll give Victor a call. He'll lend us a hand."
Okay, that's definitely not what we need. As she takes her phone out of her pocket, we all look at each other and mouth various things in an attempt to come up with a plan that stops her from calling Victor; mine is to just dropkick the phone out of her hand and throw it far into the bushes, and when she's retrieving it, we get out of dodge. Fabian immediately shoots it down, mouthing 'are you insane?' while at it, but suddenly, he lets go of the wheelbarrow and he's letting out cries of pain, clutching his hand.
"Fabian, are you all right?" Trudy asks.
"I think he caught his hand," Eddie says, but as Fabian moves his hand and Trudy walks around to look at it, the drape comes down. Eddie and Alfie fix it so that it's covering the head in the tank before Trudy notices.
Trudy examines Fabian's fake-injured hand. "Try not to move it."
"I think it's broken," he says, still moaning in pain.
"Okay, okay, just wait here," Trudy says. "I'll go get some help."
As Trudy runs off into the school, KT says quickly, "The kind of help we don't need."
"Okay, let's get out of here, quick," I say to them, lifting my end of the wheelbarrow.
—
"Once we get Frobisher into the crypt, we should be fine."
We follow Alfie's map to the above-ground entrance to the crypt. It's not what I expected. I think I was looking for a mausoleum in the woods with a secret door. KT remarks the same of how it looks on the outside. "And here I thought it would be all spooky, ha," she says sarcastically.
"Okay, awesome, we're here," I say, letting go of the wheelbarrow as I put my hands on my hips. "So... now how do we get in?"
"I have a pretty good idea," KT says, taking her key out of her pocket.
"You always carry a key to a musty old dead-people hang out?" Alfie asks.
"That's the kind of girl I am," KT responds.
"Be careful for zombie stragglers."
"Alfie," Fabian says as KT sticks her key into the lock she's seeing, "we've talked about this. Zombies don't exist."
Alfie throws a hand toward the tank. "But there are such things as sleeping Egyptologists? I'm so confused."
"He's got a point," I agree. "Frobisher's the closest thing we're ever gonna see to a zombie. Doesn't mean he is one."
"Et tu, Ashley?" Fabian says. I shrug.
KT unlocks the door with her key, and it opens with an eerie creaking sound. She sighs deeply, glancing at us. "Well... now or never."
—
It takes us fifteen minutes to carry the tank into the crypt, where hopefully it would remain safe until we return for it at night. "Okay," Fabian says as I let go of the tank, now directing them to where they should put it for now, "so all we have to do now is wait 'till nightfall."
"That's still a long away off," Eddie points out.
"Seriously, guys," KT says, "you can go now. We have everything we need to reawaken my great-grandpa. I can take it over from here."
I shake my head. "No. We're not doing that."
"We're all in this together, KT," Eddie adds.
"You guys could be risking your lives," KT tells us gently.
"Well, for some crazy reason, I think we all think it's worth it."
"Besides," I say, "we've risked our lives before for reasons crazier than this. We're not gonna stop now. Or...ever, probably."
KT smiles gratefully. "Thanks, guys."
Eddie's phone rings and he fishes it out of his pocket. "Three missed calls from Patricia," he informs.
"Did she leave a message?" I question.
Eddie puts the phone to his ear. "I can't get it. There's no reception here."
"Maybe she's trying to warn us," Alfie suggests.
KT gives a light shake of her head. "No one knows we're here."
"What if Denby has some special evil way to find out?"
"Alfie, I don't think so—" Fabian disagrees.
"But you don't know," Alfie retorts frantically. "She could come through that door any second now."
And the moment he says that, we hear a thud in the distance, and we freeze. Oh, crap. I think Alfie might have just jinxed us. Someone's found us!
"Move," Fabian instructs as we rush to grab the wheelbarrow. "Now. Quick!"
"Why am I always right about things?!"
"Shut up, Alfie!" I hush him.
By now, the sound's gotten louder. We can't move the tank fast enough, so we hide, waiting for our doom to arrive. I squeeze my eyes shut, pressed against the wall next to Eddie and KT, biting my lip. Then, Patricia's voice. "Why are you hiding down there?" I've literally never been more thankful for her existence than in this moment. "Haven't you got a ceremony to be sorting out? And why aren't you answering your phone?"
Eddie lets out a relieved sigh and comes out from our hiding place. "Ah, Patricia. I have never in my life been this happy to see you."
Patricia glances at him and then away, informing us, "Look, Denby's on the trail. She'll know we've got Frobisher."
"We're screwed," I say, shaking my head. "Unless... we can't do the ceremony now, can we? We're... technically in darkness."
"No, it won't work," Fabian denies. "If we get one part wrong, we fail. That's the whole point of the ceremony."
"Tonight is too late," Patricia insists. "The adults are going to realize we're missing and that we're responsible."
"I say," Fabian says, "we leave him here, we go back, and we act normal."
"No way!" KT exclaims. "Some of us need to stay behind and watch over until it's time. And the others can go back to school and cover."
Patricia and Alfie raise their hands and say simultaneously, "School."
"My heroes," Eddie remarks sarcastically.
KT nods. "All right, Alfie and Patricia, you need to make the adults think that we're somewhere else, anywhere else. Not here."
"But that means you'll be locked in," Patricia states.
"In a crypt," Alfie adds.
"For hours."
"With a spooky sleepy guy."
"Have none of you got a problem with that?"
I glance at my fellow stayers, shrugging. "I'm... I'm okay. I've seen weirder." Fabian, Eddie, and KT look over at me, their expressions blank. "I'll sit closest to him if that's what you want."
"Yeah, whatever," Eddie mumbles, rolling his eyes. He lays them back on Patricia and Alfie. "Look, you guys need to get back there, like, yesterday. Go."
"And, hey," I say before the pair leave, "could you tell Jerome I'd like a flamingo balloon animal?" Everyone gives me strange looks. "It's super hard to make. He'll end up giving me a poodle or something." Alfie just nods and shrugs, and they leave us alone in the crypt.
I sit on the floor closest to the tank, and the others sit next to me. KT cranes her head around Fabian to look at me. "So... you guys said Jerome knows about this whole thing, right?"
"Well, not this thing," I say, gesturing to the tank. "But yeah, he knows about Sibuna."
"He meddles," Fabian adds.
KT nods. "So... how does this whole Jashley relationship work when stuff like this happens? Before he meddles."
"Well, he asks me if something has to do with the Scooby gang," I answer, "I say yeah, he tells me to be safe. Pretty much how it goes at this point. We have a language."
Eddie scoffs. "Yeah, that includes you making fun of his balloon animals."
"He tried to make a leopard yesterday and gave me a worm."
( next couple of chapters take place entirely in the crypt, so they'll all be a little shorter than usual! though we are getting closer to the reawakening... )