Chapter 2 - Chapter 2

Happy Halloween.2



Disclaimer: See chapter 1



(Whee, new chapter! -awkward silence- Okay, okay… on with the show!)



It was already three o'clock on Thursday and still no sign of Junior. Nina was hunched over a coffee table, her chin rested on her crossed forearms as she wordlessly watched at the face of the battery-powered alarm clock that sat in the center, while Jack was looking out the window with an impatient air hovering about him. Nergal Junior's school got out at two-thirty, and it was a ten minute walk to Jack's from the school, so where was he? Jack growled and finally broke the silence: “Where on earth is that boy?!” Nina lifted her head and looked over at the man who appeared to be stuck in the medieval era, clothing-wise.



“Mmm,” she shrugged and turned her stare to the door expectantly. Nina shifted her weight to sit on her heels as Jack grumpily stalked over and slumped into a wooden chair. The demon ragdoll didn't understand how Jack could put up with those old fashioned chairs, which she found only slightly more comfortable than sitting on a pile of rocks. She yelped and fell on her back as the door abruptly swung open and slammed against the wall, Jack stood up slightly while still clutching the arm rests to get a better view of the intruder.



“Hey! Didn't you ever hear of knocking?!” Jack feigned complaining with a smirk. Nina propped herself up on her elbows to see who it was, “Junior!” She cried happily when she saw him stringing his scarf on the coat rack. Junior's head hung as if he regretted something and Jack frowned suspiciously at that fact. The hybrid staggered over to another nearby chair and sunk into it. Nina dreaded what his behavior meant; it probably foretold another day closer to Halloween and still no prank. The boy's shoulder began to tremble as if he were crying.



About to say something as consolation, Nina's jaw dropped as Junior's head snapped back and he began to laugh outwardly. Jack joined into the laughter, which made Nina snap her head over to him. He reached for a string that Nina had saw him attach to the chair Junior was currently sitting on a few hours ago and began to howl with laughter along with the two boys. Jack gave the string a hard tug and a leg was torn off of Nergal Junior's chair, causing the whole thing to collapse.



Junior hit the floor with a loud grunt, but only laughed harder. When the laughter finally died down, Nina wiped away a saline tear and stared at Junior with a smile and asked, “So, did you come up with anything?” Junior casually pulled splinter from his palm and looked up at the ragdoll with an eager grin, showing off his vicious looking fangs. He rummaged through the ruins of the chair to free his schoolbag. The green-eyed boy tugged at rolled up piece of paper wedged between two text books until it finally was free of its shackles.



After pulling the rubber band off of the paper, it snapped against his hand causing him to howl in shock. Jack and Nina stared as he began to waggle his hand in the air before they registered what had happened and they erupted into even more laughter. Junior growled reproachfully and shot the rubber band at the pumpkin-headed prankster and grinned triumphantly as it hit Jack on the side of his head. Such a hit certainly shut him up, but it only made Nina crack up even more.



A startled hush fell over the room as a voice with a Jamaican twang resounded through the room: “Hello, whatcha got dere?” Junior let out a yelp when he realized that Grim had appeared right behind him and accidentally threw the paper on the ground. The paper unraveled and Grim leaned down to see it, but Nina threw herself on top of it before he could realize what any of the markings were and whistled innocently. Jack stepped away from his chair, face contorted with rage.



“How the heck did you-” He cut himself short when he saw that the door had been forgotten and was poised half-way open. Jack's eye twitched in annoyance and faced the Grim Reaper with the same expression of fury he had lost a moment ago. He began to speak in a venom-laced whisper, “Stop spying on us… Stop pestering us… and one—more—thing,” his voice abruptly transformed into a shout that shook the foundation, “GET OUT OF MY HOUSE!!!” Grim would have jumped out of his skin if he had any, giving Junior enough time to grab the distracted reaper by the hood of his robe and roughly `escort' Grim to the door and promptly kicked him out.



Grumbling something under his breath, Junior closed the door with a flick of his wrist. “Wow, NJ, a little bit malevolent, isn't it?” Nina called to the half-demon who was in the process of calming down. He wheeled around to tell Nina that Grim got what he deserved when he noticed she was glancing over his Halloween plans. Jack was peering over Nina's shoulder to get a better look at the plans when Junior snatched them away and spread the parchment out on the coffee table, moving the alarm clock out of the way. Jack's eyes widened at the strange device scrawled out on the sheet of paper.



There was an odd little doll with a horizontal zipper, and when it was opened a strange little robot sprang out. It consisted an accordion-like spring that enabled it to move, and a cylindrical head. The little eyes appeared to be lights above its mouth, which cut its head in half and a hinge allowed it to snap it jaws back to a 90 degree angle. A mechanical spider jumped out of the top of its head, but, sadly, the spider was labeled `only for show'. Nina saw that Junior was very excited about this little machine and finally asked what it was supposed to do.



“Well,” Junior began to explain with the grin on his face only widening, “Inside the mouth, there will be little bumps that fit together when it's closed. And-” Jack interrupted at this point to straighten something out.



“You mean like a waffle iron?” He quirked his substituted head to the side. Junior stared at him blankly for a moment before the relentless smile grew back into place. Nergal Junior jabbed a finger at him, the smile changed briefly into a confident smirk, and replied, “Precisely!”



Raising an eyebrow, Nina turned to Junior, who was returning to his original position. “You were saying..?” She urged, swirling her hand in the air as a signal for him to continue. He took a quick breath and continued to explain the strange device.



“Uhmmm - Okay, as for the eyes, we can place little sensors inside them and program them to go after only one thing, so that they don't just cause random havoc.” Jack and Nina leaned forward slightly, eyes widening with anticipation. “We can program them to go after one substance: sugar. That way, it'll only crush their poor little spirits instead of the trick-or-treaters.” Junior fought back the urge to laugh at the expressions on his friends' faces - they looked like little kids looking through the window of a candy store. “The spider, though basically useless, can cause a bit more mayhem.” Jack's face fell slightly when the `useless' spider was mentioned, and remained quiet for a moment.



“Nice plan, Junior!” Jack finally piped up again, but his grin began to fade into a concerned frown, “But where are we going to the materials? We can't afford all of that metal!” He knew very well that they would need a ton of those little robots in order to take a step towards repairing their currently wrecked reputations. Junior gaped at him with a fake look of insult, crossing his arms indignantly.



“Oh, yes!” He cried out sarcastically, smirking devilishly, “Let's completely forget about the boy who's immune to the temperatures of the earth's molten core and is able to pull liquid metals out of the magma for free. Let's just go down to the market and buy the exact same things for over a hundred something dollars!” Nina laughed at this comment, but quickly caught it in her throat and used her hand to cover her mouth at the glare she had earned from Jack. “Don't worry guys, we can handle this. Besides, what could possibly happen in a month?”



Mount Olympus



“Oh, much more than you think, my dear hybrid…” Eris crooned jeeringly, watching at the scene in Jack's home which was being shown on the skin of her Apple of Discord. Grim stood in the background, twiddling his thumbs nervously at the goddess' response to Nergal Junior's rhetorical question. “So those three twits think they can outshine me? Well, we'll just have to teach them a lesson, won't we, Grimmy?” She turned to the nervous reaper.



Grim flinched as she acknowledged him, he did hate the trio, but he didn't feel right spying on them. Eris had sent him to plant a small spying device in the cottage so she could find out what they were planning. “Hey, Eris!” He shouted resentfully, “I held up my end of the deal and put dat confounded t'ing in the house, now you have to throw dose pictures away!” Grim winced slightly at the mention of the blackmail. Eris rose an eyebrow and held up the disc which contained said pictures and smiled cruelly.



“Oh, do you mean these pictures?” She inquired, her voice dripping wait false innocence. “Listen up, Grimmy,” The Goddess of Chaos snapped, her tone turning venomous, “I have the disc, I am able to put them on the internet, so I decide when you can stop doing what I say! Got it?” Grim cringed at the new level of low his reputation would reach if those pictures were seen.



He nodded sullenly and stalked off, leaving Eris by herself. Eris looked at the scene again, trying to come up with a way to stop them. She froze the scene at a certain point and with the wave of her hand, it zoomed in on Jack. “Hmmm… I bet I could give this one a motive to work for me…” She began to cackle like a stereotypical villain, causing a few of her fellow Olympians to peer inside the deserted temple she used as her home, but the looks went unnoticed as her laughter echoed into the darkening sky.

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