“Good point, mate,” Lagoona said, with an audible sigh of relief. “He probably dyed the critter in Mad Science just to mess with us.”
As the entire room relaxed, Rochelle noticed something attached to the cat’s collar and approached. It was a small piece of rolled-up parchment paper, just like the one they had found inside the doll of doom.
“Regardez, there’s something on its collar,” Rochelle whispered to Venus.
“Ms. Kindergrubber, I would like to volunteer to take this animal down to Headmistress Blood-good’s office,” Venus offered politely.
“So would I!” Rochelle added.
“Me too!” Robecca chimed in.
Once the trio was safely in the hall with the kitty, Venus pulled the yellowed piece of parchment paper out from the animal’s collar.
“There are spider threads on this too. Those critters certainly do get around,” Venus said as she unrolled the paper.
“What does the note say?” Robecca prodded Venus impatiently.
“ ‘They will be our downfall. Just you wait,’ ” Venus read before lifting the paper to her nose. “Rose and lilac…”
“Is someone trying to warn us about Miss Flapper? And whoever she’s working with?” Venus thought aloud.
“You mean the perfume is a clue to lead us to Miss Flapper?” Robecca speculated.
“Or the notes could smell of Madame Flapper because she herself is writing them?” Rochelle interjected.
“Eek! This whole thing sure does make my pistons pump!” Robecca babbled. “I know we said we weren’t going to talk to Headmistress Bloodgood or Miss Sue Nami until we had concrete proof, but I think we need to rethink that.”
“I agree. I vote for Miss Sue Nami. She’s always been more suspicious of Miss Flapper,” Venus responded.
A light sprinkling of rain blanketed the luscious lawns of Monster High, making the green stalks of grass shimmer in the faint afternoon light.
“Where is Miss Sue Nami? I’ll start rusting if I stay out here any longer,” Robecca whined from beneath her umbrella.
“There she is,” Venus called out, spotting Miss Nami, along with three trolls, working diligently to remove a large banner from the wrought-iron fence that surrounded the school.
“Miss Sue Nami, we really need to speak with you—” Venus started, before being unceremoniously cut off by the brash woman.
“If you see Hoodude, tell him he has detention in the no-fungeon forever,” Miss Sue Nami barked as the trolls pulled down the I FRANKIE STEIN poster.
“No heart anymore,” one of the trolls grunted before ripping the banner in half.
“Non-adult entities, it’s against school policy to skip class, so I’m going to have to ask you all to accompany me to the no-fungeon for mandatory detention.”
“That’s absolutely fine with me. Anything to get out of the rain,” Robecca whimpered.
Once safely back in the main corridor, Venus explained that they had Ms. Kindergrubber’s permission to leave class and transport the white cat to her.
“If that’s true, non-adult entity, then where is the cat?” Miss Sue Nami inquired aggressively.
“As my ghoulfriends are a bit superstitious, I placed the cat in my satchel,” Rochelle explained and then pulled out the small, puffy ball of fur.
“Normally the sight of a white cat causes my skin to crawl and my legs to shake, but seeing as this is nothing more than a prank courtesy of Henry Hunchback, I couldn’t care less,” Miss Sue Nami declared, before turning to a troll. “But nevertheless, get that feline off campus.”
“Miss Sue Nami, we think there’s more to the cat. We recently came across a couple of ominous notes, both of which smelled faintly of Miss Flapper’s perfume,” Robecca explained.
“Stop right there. This is the work of a prankster, nothing more. So quit imagining trouble where there isn’t any and get back to class,” Miss Sue Nami instructed firmly and then stormed off down the hall.
Still damp from their trek outside, Robecca, Rochelle, and Venus decided it was wise to quickly change clothes before returning to class. However, just as they turned down the dormitory corridor, they noted the unmistakable silhouette of Miss Flapper outside their door.
“Madame Flapper,” Rochelle said, startling the dragon, “is there something we can help you with?”
“Oh no, I was simply coming by to see if you might join me for tea after school,” Miss Flapper explained. “I just picked up some delicious blueberry crones.”
“Thanks, but we have a lot of homework to do,” Venus responded in a less-than-friendly tone.
“I must say, Madame Flapper, I am most surprised you would come by at this hour to ask us for tea. After all, it’s the middle of the school day,” Rochelle pointed out, her suspicion clearly piqued.
“Normally I wouldn’t, but I just received an e-mail from Jinafire saying that the three of you had left Home Ick early. So I thought now might be a good time to ask you,” Miss Flapper said softly, before floating gracefully into her room.
“Jinafire is spying on us, keeping Miss Flapper abreast of our comings and goings,” Venus whispered upon entering the Chamber of Gore and Lore.
“Boo-la-la, this is most disconcerting,” Rochelle mumbled dejectedly. “It appears Jinafire and Skelita are most definitely under her control.”
After changing into dry clothes, the trio made its way down the creaky pink staircase en route back to Ms. Kindergrubber’s class. However, they were quickly distracted by a sudden jolt permeating the walls.
“What was that?” Venus asked Robecca and Rochelle while motioning for them to follow her into the hall.
Standing in the middle of the main corridor, surrounded by a plethora of trolls, was Miss Sue Nami, looking absolutely irate. So livid was the waterlogged woman that she was actually foaming at the mouth. And upon inching closer, the trio noticed that the trolls were not simply surrounding Miss Sue Nami but holding her back, stopping her from throwing her “wave” against the wall again.
Just as Robecca opened her copper-plated lips to inquire about what was happening, she spotted the large black letters scrawled across the lockers. The message, like the others she had seen, was short and to the point: THEY ARE WATCHING YOU.
“Vandalism is against school policy!” Miss Sue Nami shrieked angrily.
“Miss Sue Nami, you must calm down! I fear your head might fly off your body, and while that is a common occurrence for me, the same cannot be said for you,” Headmistress Bloodgood cautioned as she looked at the graffiti. “Although I certainly understand your fury toward this prankster.”
“Someone get me Henry Hunchback!” Miss Sue Nami hollered.
“He home sick today, no him,” one of the trolls grunted in response.
“I always thought pranks were contagious, and now I have proof!” Miss Sue Nami shouted. “And when I find out who did this, I am going to suspend them, ban them from taking part in next week’s Hex Factor Talon Show, and sentence them to cleaning the trolls’ quarters!”
It wasn’t long before the school’s biggest blogger, Spectra Vondergeist, had picked up the story, going so far as to name the anonymous culprit Pranksy. Within days, a new phenomenon known as Pranksy Guessing was sweeping the school. Students spent every free moment trying to guess the identity of the mythical scribbler. And as the number of messages increased so did the curiosity surrounding Pranksy.
“What is wrong with our classmates and teachers?” Venus asked her roommates with understandable frustration while listening to a bunch of nearby creatures babble about Pranksy. “How can they possibly believe this Pranksy nonsense? Do they really think this is all the work of some secret artist?”
“I heard that some of the pumpkin heads are even planning on singing a song about Pranksy at the Hex Factor Talon Show,” Robecca said, shaking her head incredulously.
“Sadly, the Pranksy situation can be summed up quite simply,” Rochelle stated somberly. “Those who don’t remember the p
ast are doomed to repeat it.”
no more meow! No meow!”
“Bad kitty! Bad kitty!”
“This way! No, this way!”
“Cat deaf? Why no listen?”
It was a terribly amusing thing to see: trolls herding cats in the halls. Cats, much like trolls themselves, do not listen to anyone; they change their minds at the slightest whim, and they generally look to please themselves before anyone else. So it was hardly a surprise that cat herding had become a most irksome addition to the trolls’ workload. But in light of the sheer number of white felines appearing on campus each day, cat herding was an undeniably necessary part of patrolling the halls.
After removing the small parchment notes from the cats’ collars, the trolls then released them at the edge of town. Unsure how to handle the feline epidemic, Headmistress Bloodgood had created a plan, dubbed Normie Loves Fluffy, whereby the animals were taken to shelters in neighboring normie towns. As normies were very fond of fluffy cats, especially white ones they could name Snowball, Headmistress Bloodgood considered this to be a very sound solution.
“Trick! Treat!” Rochelle hollered. “There you are! Deuce and I waited almost twenty-five minutes for you two. Did you forget you had a tutoring session?”
“The cats! The cats!” Trick cried.
“Cats everywhere!” Treat hollered, before the two took off after a rogue kitten.
“Not a pretty sight, is it?” Deuce joked as they watched Trick and Treat waddle away.
“At least they’re getting some exercise. Now if the cats could only teach them to clean themselves,” Rochelle teased.
“I wouldn’t hold your breath,” Deuce said warmly, patting Rochelle on the arm before greeting a fast-approaching Cleo.
While the sheer touch of his hand still gave Rochelle’s cold granite skin goose bumps, she wasn’t quite as madly infatuated with Deuce as she had been previously. In part because she had come to see that just as Mr. D’eath liked to be down, Deuce liked to be bossed around by Cleo.
“Bye, Deuce. Bye, Cleo,” Rochelle called out as she heard the soft ping of her iCoffin in her pocket. After pulling out the device, she paused, then wrinkled her brow and darted off down the hall.
Upon returning to the Chamber of Gore and Lore, Rochelle found Robecca and Venus lounging on their beds, reading the latest gossip about Pranksy on Spectra’s blog. As the messages and cats had continued popping up around campus, the enthusiasm for Pranksy had multiplied. So intrigued was the student body by the mythical monster, they had all but forgotten that the Hex Factor Talon Show was now only days away.
“Ghouls, today is Day of the Dad! I might have completely forgotten if not for the help of my trusty iCoffin. It really does keep me organized,” Rochelle proclaimed happily.
“That’s funny. My iCoffin doesn’t keep me organized. Maybe I need a new one?” Robecca pondered.
“I can’t believe it’s Day of the Dad already. I bet Pops is sitting by the pond, knee-deep in soil and enjoying the sun,” Venus imagined with a smile. “Nothing like a little photosynthesis,” she continued, before picking up her iCoffin to call home.
As Venus cheerfully spoke to her father, Rochelle cautiously dialed her parents’ number, taking special care not to let her claws crack the screen of her iCoffin.
With both her roommates chatting away happily, Robecca experienced something she hadn’t felt in a long time—homesickness. She missed her father. Just imagining his kind face made her eyes prick with tears, which promptly turned to steam. Not wanting to rain, or more aptly steam, on the others’ parades, Robecca quietly crept out of the room.
Longing to see her father, or even just feel connected to him, Robecca went to the only place she could think of that reminded her of him—the catacombs. Alone in the elevator, Robecca’s eyes steamed uncontrollably as she wondered if her father had become mechanical, allowing him to live on, albeit differently.
Stepping off the elevator, Rochelle wiped away pools of condensation on her cheeks before noting that half the letters on the welcome sign were now obscured by lacy spiderwebs. Miss Sue Nami really needs to get on top of the arachnid situation, Robecca thought, before wondering why she hadn’t actually seen any spiders, just their webs. How was that possible? Perhaps the spiders had found a means to traverse campus without being seen, she speculated.
Wandering the many dimly lit tunnels of the catacombs, Robecca thought of all the things she longed to speak with her father about: joining the Frightingale Society, her ghoulfriends, Skultimate Roller Maze, and most obviously about what was happening at Monster High.
A sudden burst of perfume walloped Robecca’s olfactory drive, instantly causing her breath to shorten and her ears to steam. And it was not because the scent was unpleasant or laced with some sort of dangerous chemical. It was simply the familiar aroma of Miss Flapper’s perfume, a delightful mix of lilac and rose. But as this was an odor Robecca associated with duplicity and even, to some degree, danger, experiencing it so intensely had quite a negative effect on the young ghoul. Leaning against the wall, next to Scarisian politician Charles de Ghoul’s fluorescent purple portrait, Robecca cringed painfully. The scent appeared to be physically ailing the ghoul, almost as if sand were being poured into her gears.
“I can’t believe how insensitive we were. Seriously, what is wrong with us?” Venus moaned to Rochelle, before throwing her head into her soft green hands.
“I must agree, even by blunt gargoyle standards, that was very dense of me to simply announce that it was Day of the Dad without even considering her situation,” Rochelle lamented as Penny glared menacingly at her, prompting the guilty gargoyle to quickly look away.
“We need to find Robecca. Can you imagine how sad she must feel right now? Ugh! I am so mad at myself. I deserve to be sneezed on a thousand times over. Absolutely nothing makes me gloomier than a friend being down except, of course, the environment being weighed down with chemical pollutants.”
“Venus, s’il ghoul plaît, let’s try to stay on track here. We haven’t time to discuss environmental concerns. Now let’s think, where could she be? She’s not allowed in Cy’s room. Do you think she might have gone to see Skelita and Jinafire?”
“No way. She knows that they might have fallen under Miss Flapper’s control,” Venus replied before pausing. “Unless, of course, that’s why she went to see them, to try to get more information about their relationship with Miss Flapper.”
“Boo-la-la, solo investigations are never a good idea. We’d better go!”
rochelle tapped her freshly polished pink claws against the door to the Chamber of Hairy and Scary, leaving small, almost imperceptible dents in their wake. The muffled sound of ghouls laughing traveled through the thick door, offering both Rochelle and Venus much-needed encouragement on their quest to find Robecca.
“Come in,” Jinafire called out loudly.
Venus flung open the door to the Chamber of Hairy and Scary with such gusto that she almost lost a vine in the process.
“Hello, ghouls,” a soft and rapturous voice beckoned from the corner of the tidy dorm room. “I just arrived with tea and crones. Would you care to join us?”
Lounging stylishly in a long silk kimono was none other than Miss Flapper—only she wasn’t alone; she had two trolls sitting at her feet like guard dogs.
“Sí, sí, please join us. We’re having a tea party,” Skelita said warmly. “And later I’m going to show Miss Flapper how to do her makeup à la Day of the Dead. I can do yours too if you’d like.”
“Actually, we’re looking for Robecca. Have you ghouls seen her?”
“Venus, you look a bit worried. Has something happened?” Miss Flapper asked tenderly, absolutely brimming with concern.
“No, she’s fine. We’re just looking for her,” Venus replied stiffly.
“I am very sorry to tell you, but I have not seen Robecca all day,” Jinafire said while fiddling with the green wisps at the end of her golden tail.
“Are you sure you ghouls can’t stay?” Miss Flapper inquired. “The trolls give excellent foot rubs.”
“Boo-la-la! I do not find that very enticing,” Rochelle replied candidly, imagining the trolls’ filth-laden hands touching her well-polished feet.
“Well then, perhaps another time. Don’t forget, I’m just next door.”
“Trust me, Miss Flapper, we won’t,” Venus said honestly—perhaps too honestly, judging by the look on the teacher’s face.
After finally escaping the anxiety-inducing fog of perfume, Robecca veered into Mr. Mummy’s classroom, a shortcut to the catacombs’ elevator. While walking between the brightly colored desks, she suddenly paused, paralyzed by what she saw. Scrawled across the wall in fluorescent pink paint was yet another message:
“Deary me! Deary me!” Robecca mumbled to herself as she ran toward the elevator, desperate to tell someone about what she’d found.
As the elevator doors opened into the main corridor, a flummoxed Robecca ran straight into Spectra Vondergeist. Ever the diligent reporter, the purple-haired ghost was once again in the process of uploading a blog post from her iCoffin.
“What’s the rush, ghoulfriend? Got a story? Want to share?” Spectra asked Robecca with a raised eyebrow and a curious smile.
“In the name of the bird’s beak! There’s another message!”
“Outside the Mad and Deranged Scientist Laboratory? I know. I’m just finishing up my blog post on it. I must say, Pranksy really keeps himself busy.”
“The Mad and Deranged Scientist Laboratory? I was talking about the catacombs!” Robecca explained before pausing. “Wait, what does the message by the Mad and Deranged Scientist Laboratory say?”
“Sorry, ghoul. You’re going to have to read my blog to find out,” Spectra said with a smile before floating away.
Without waiting a beat, Robecca pulled out her iCoffin, desperate to read Spectra’s blog.
Ghoulfriends Just Want to Have Fun Page 7
