SOMK: Halloween

“That’s the last of ‘em.”

Snocone sat her bag down in the snow and helped heaved Vark’s from him neck. He proceeded to shake himself out and give his neck a good stretching, “Goodness, that was weighing on me. I shall never know how bird-kinds around here allow themselves to be ridden, let alone be mail-carriers.”

Frosted Lass regarded them with a pleasant, happy smile. “Did you learn a about the jobs we offer here? Aren’t the guild staff so talented and dedicated?” She seemed to almost swoon with adoration.

Snocone wasn’t as impressed.

“Yeah, perfect. Absolutely wonderful. Not a buncha we--gguh!”

Vark buffed her right in the stomach before she could finish.

“It was a lovely experience. Your staff is impeccable. And we brought quite the bounty, wouldn’t you say?

“Yes, I do! You’ll have plenty to snack on for tonight. And thanks to you, all the Pokémon of the mountain will have their treats safe and secured!”

Snocone groaned and rubbed her tummy while he and Frosted Lass made merry. He sure was more cut out for that business. Almost like a butler or some posh service representative.

While they conversed, Snocone watched overhead as the stars began to twinkle into view. It was the only thing even slightly familiar here, but even that wasn’t truly so. The old constellations she’d named out in her papaw’s old junk heap just weren’t there. And it was weird how she could recall that when even her own name eluded her. It sure as hell couldn’t be “Snocone”. Her mommy and daddy weren’t that stupid.

Even birds flew in the night, too. Something she only knew of bats.

She squinted her eyes, thinking she might’ve just spotted one.

*Weird. Looks a little long for a bat. Kinda fat, too.*

It was then when it hit them.

A great rush of wind ripped at the fairgrounds, and something like the sound of canvas snapping roared. It zipped through with speed and elegance that did not suit it, and in its passing, an incredible itchiness took over anyone unlucky enough to be in its windstream.

All except Vark, Snocone and Frosted Lass.

“The hell was that!?”

“Was it a dragon?” Vark gawked in surprise. “It sounded like an especially large arrow--”

“Oh, no! Oh dear, the candy--” Frosted Lass couldn’t finish her sentence

Over in the plaza, a hand broke from the ground, grabbing and swiping the air and knocking about any stand or patron in its way. Amongst the screaming, it’d gathered a mound of goods, and when it was full to the claw with every speck it could pluck, the hand resubmerged, pulling every treat with it.

And worst of all?

“That flyin’ bastard nabbed our payout, Vark!”

Frosted Lass gathered her sleeved hands together. However, the patrons they’d helped all night came running, gathering as a real sort of scout team.

“We’ll take care of the hand,” yelled Flannery, “You go get that Breloom!”

“‘Breloom’?” Vark looked a little shellshocked by that, too, but Snocone was already yanking him away before he could get too caught on the details.

He did manage to stop her before his whole wing was just a mash of dessert in her hands.

“Wait! I know where they ran off to! Let’s go back to the frozen stream cove!”

“Why there? D’you see something I didn’t?”

He made an irritated sound in his craw.

“Just get going already! I’ll follow overhead!”

It was a bit of a run over, but just like he’d suggested, the perpetrator was there, hanging upside-down in their hovel and gnawing the bag by the neck. A thin stream of sugary runnings spidered down the bag.

“Asshole! You took my Jolly Ranchers!” Snocone threatened at them with her claws. “That better not be my bag, or I’m gonna rip that stupid hat off your head and shove it down your throat!”

The Breloom snapped open its broad winds, its dotty eyes glowing red in the dark.

“I have become one with the night! I have thrown off the cowardice of the day, and ascended to the form of the moon!” They gestured broadly with its conular claws. “Gone is the subjugation of the sun. My forefathers would be proud of me--can yours say the same, humans?”

That sent a jolt of something eerie through Vark and Snocone, though neither got around to expressing it for some time. Vark was the first to break from it, stating “What good does the taking of the poor Pokémons serve? Or are you just a common thief?”

“Sugar is the bones and blood of a fungus,” they seethed, “Fuel for the razing that will occur very soon. A reckoning will visit the mountain. The accursed light shared as much before it shunned me, and good.”

“Why? Why would you even say that? That can’t be what you truly believe, Shroomberto.”

The Breloom’s face froze in a flash of some unknown emotion--maybe it was anger, maybe confusion or fear.

But before he could act further, a spike of ice shot through Shroomberto’s chest, amd he screeched, only ceasing as the ice enveloped him.

He fell, thudding with the cadence of a paperweight. And the hovel fell silent. 

Vark and Snocone said nothing else. After carting the candy back down to base and making sure everyone was okay, they came back with a party to retrieve Shroomberto’s body. Frosted Lass seemed to take it well, assuring everyone that he was still alive--just in stasis.

Before they left, though, Vark noticed a tiny little crescent right underneath the crystal, caked in sugar.

It was a bloody tooth. A singular reminder.