————-

Three hours.

Epel and Deuce had been missing from class for 3 hours now, and it didn't sit right with him.

From what little information he had, Epel had run off when Vil wasn't paying attention sometime around lunch after being berated about what he could and couldn't eat one too many times.

Sure, in Deuces case, it was something to do with an assembly, and sure it got called off because something was taking too long, but the entire thing itself already bugged him.

Why not just give a safety demonstration on stage about blot, instead of send the 12 involved with an already painful incident into a wild card Labyrinth?

The final alarm bells in his head went off when he received a text from Vil, requesting for him to look for Epel, as he couldn't seem to get in contact with Rook to confirm his location.

After getting the go ahead from Coach Vargas, he set off. 

Pretty much blanks everywhere. The journey around the campus was a great workout, but it didn't settle his unease.

Especially when he finally caught it.  Down by the graves near Ramshackle. Deuce and Aces weren't far off, but he chalked that down to the two being at Ramshackle pretty often.

When Deuces friend's familiar, a chubby raccoon, began trying to pull him further into the woods, he took it as a sign they were trying to get their owner help, and followed.

They lead him far off campus, 3/4th down the mountain and into the woods, and finally, to a small hatch in the ground, hidden in leaves and dirt.  It reeked of rot, dried blood, and rust.  Not a good sign.

Brushing off a few leaves, he tried to make sense of the inscription, but it was far too rusted to make sense of anything, so he spun open the latch.

The scent wave of rot nearly made him puke, but he wasn't about to turn back.

It wasn't the most wide, so climbing in was a struggle. As he finally made it down, the latch likely closed behind, taking all the rooms light with it.

5 small glowing dots, magestone sized, in the corner, Red, Red, Darker Red, Lavender, and Blue. As he let his eyes adjust, those lights revealed their owners.

Ace, Deuce, Elephys, Epel and Vyr, shivering and unconscious, cuddled around what he assumed was Ramshackles prefect.

After hearing about what she did for Heartstabyl, Jack had admittedly wanted to meet her, but not like this. Maybe during Alchemy, or at Lunch or something....

Not the point. It was deathly cold in here, and reeked of rot. He needed to get them out of here, or at bare minimum, find a way to keep warm while waiting for rescue.

A shiver went down his spine when he noticed a couple moving things emerging from the dark, something that should not be able to emerge in the first place.

Weirder still, from their positioning, it seemed like they were...protecting the group? Keeping watch?

Something along those lines.

————

"Rescue...Dog..?"

Ears flattened, Jack stumbled on his words. Could you really blame him?

Seven whole corpses stared-ok, three turned their empty eye sockets in his direction, but same thing.

The one that talked moved its head to the side, a stretching fleshy sound following the movement.

With one bony finger, it pointed to Epel and Deuce.

"Fluffy, White...You...Jack? Friend of Blue and Purple?"

What . the . Actual . Fuck.

"Yea—-Yeah? Thats me."

He nodded shakily, and the six others dropped their makeshift weapons to their side. Except one, whose arm fell off, to which their buddy picked up and slapped them on the head with before trying to tie it back on with medical..tape?

No.  It was a strap.  Dead people, Cold, Rot, Dried Blood, Strap. It all came together.

This was an abandoned morgue. 

The leader corpse was the current vocal vessel of a Necromancy User (?), or was given borrowed sentience in trade for protecting this group, and was the leader of the pack.

One popped off their hand, the bony object motioned like it was cutting an invisible string, then started poking at Ace, who was sprawled across the prefects lap, head close to what looked like a small shattered potion.

"Red, Awake now. Lying."

The gingers eyes shot open upon realizing that he had both been found out, and poked at by a disembodied hand.

"The hell was that for?!"

For Seven knows what reason, the corpses made the most dry, yet genuine sounding "Yay." Jack had ever heard in unison.

"Friend here. No more pretend sleep. Get help."

"Ok, first of all-"

With a quick movement, the hand pulled a shining blue tablet out of the prefects pocket.

"Jack hold door open and move friends, Red make call."

"I doubt Ace knows—"

He turned to the sound of it being unlocked in seconds.

"Oh, I know her password, alright. Atleast now I do."

After tapping on his own phone for a few moments, Ace refocused on hers, and pressed call.

——————————

Makab had done his best to give them a general gist of where they lost their two freshmen, self-tasked with carrying Lonnie (after Rook decided that knocking him out was a totally genius idea.) but considering the movement of the walls, the info likely wasn't going to help.

What did seem to help ended up being Cater walking straight into a wall and dropping his phone from where he had been holding it up.

A concerning amount of notifications went off, then a distinctive ringtone.
--
🂡𝐴𝑐𝑒🂡 ℎ𝑎𝑠 𝑎𝑑𝑑𝑒𝑑 𝑌𝑜𝑢, 𝑈𝑛𝑘𝑛𝑜𝑤𝑛, 𝑎𝑛𝑑 3 𝑀𝑢𝑡𝑢𝑎𝑙 𝑐𝑜𝑛𝑡𝑎𝑐𝑡𝑠 𝑡𝑜 𝑎 𝑐ℎ𝑎𝑡 𝑎𝑡 7:23 𝑝𝑚.
--
🂡𝐴𝑐𝑒🂡 𝑛𝑎𝑚𝑒𝑑 𝑡ℎ𝑒 𝑐ℎ𝑎𝑡  *𝑊𝑒'𝑟𝑒 𝑓𝑢𝑐𝑘𝑒𝑑.*
__
🂡𝐴𝑐𝑒🂡 : 𝐼'𝑚 𝑔𝑜𝑛𝑛𝑎 𝑢𝑠𝑒 𝑂𝑝ℎ𝑒𝑙𝑖𝑎𝑠 𝑡𝑎𝑏𝑙𝑒𝑡. 𝑆ℎ𝑒𝑠 𝑔𝑜𝑡 𝑏𝑒𝑡𝑡𝑒𝑟 𝑑𝑎𝑡𝑎.

𝑆𝑒𝑛𝑡 𝑎𝑡 7:24 𝑝𝑚

He never pressed accept so fast in his life.

Whatever room Ace was in was dark enough for the footage to be grainy, but his voice to come through extremely clear.

"Pick up, Pick up, Pick up—"

"I picked up already, hon!"

"Great! So Good news or Bad news first?"

Peeking over at the rest of their group, he mouthed the question, but they all seemed mostly indifferent, so he went with the flow.

"How about some good news? We could totes use it!"

"Good news is: We found an exit."

A collective cheer internally circled around the room. Plus a very loud "Merci!".

"The bad news is, it's in a room full of dead people-"

"Take this more seriously."

There was a rustling sound, probably the device being transferred to the unknown very deep and very gruff voice.

"Jack Howl here. We're currently located in an abandoned morgue, Down the Mountain, Far Northeast of the Campus Graveyard-"

"Uh-Hold on a second, 'Kay?"

Holding the phone away for a moment, Cater looked around in disbelief.

"Theres a Campus Graveyard? Thats a thing?"

Head tilting momentarily in confusion, Makab just blankly stared back.

"Always has been. Why?"

"Babes, most people don't have graveyards on Campus!"

Lilia let out a chuckle that was somehow less surprising than it should of been.

"Not that they're aware of nowadays."

Each aggravated tap of Riddles foot echoed down the hall.

"Now is not the time for your cryptic nostalgia. Are you confirming there is a Graveyard located on campus?"

The smile he received belonged straight in a horror movie, leaving him half expecting the lights to flicker.

"Only at Night Raven, as they say."

Did he choose then to turn into a bat, do a lap around the group, teleport everyone but Rook, and then fly off for dramatic effect?
Knowing Lilia, it's about a 70% chance.

—————————

Usually, one expects the literal living dead to be scary or hostile, not watching him make a call like they witnessed a miracle, or seemingly, if you're the group in the back, trading and testing out eachothers limbs for shits, posing with them and / or whacking eachother with them.

While waiting for Cater to finish doing whatever, Ace curled right back in next to Ophelia and Deuce, hoping atleast one of the two would wake up soon.

He prodded the glass remains of whatever the hell Vyrs "Prototype." was.  Wondering to himself how the hell someone his age, younger by a few months technically, managed to get a master's degree in the most complex damn thing possible without breaking a sweat. 

Yea, maybe he shouldn't have played with the glass, because two seconds later he had a cut.

Noticing a small bit of red on his finger, he watched in mild horror as the weird sludge from before evaporated in to his finger with a golden shine.

Out of pure curiosity,, he tested this on the sludge on Ophelias hand, which had the same reaction, then on Deuces, which, again, had the same reaction.  He got halfway to clearing it off Epels when the tablet went off again.

This time, it seemed they had collected into a group so everyone was seen, instead of just Cater taking up most of the screen, and had moved somewhere alot darker.

"Took you guys long enough."

Wait..It was obvious who was missing, so why not crack a joke about it?

"Did Bat guy get voted off the island or something? Where'd he go?"

The terror the chuckle from behind him caused nearly had him joining the dead in the room.

"Look above for that answer, if you dare."

Yea, he may have walked straight into that one, but who the hell decides that kind of a jumpscare is a great idea in this situation?!

————————-

How strange.

It had been a few centuries since he'd witnessed necromancy, but whomever did this chose such an odd methodology of doing so, he couldn't pin it down.

No symbols, Glyphs, Talismans, Prayer Beads, summoning or ritual circles, no grimoire in sight, and not even a burnt out stick of incense or a melted candle or two.

Something gave him the impression this was a ranged spell, a unique magic.  

No matter, they had other issues to attend to.

The Knave seemed far more intent on watching over his companions, passing off the glowing device at just the moment our Yuu and White Rabbit stirred once they moved all to above ground.

If he thought Lilia missed him picking up the first, and dragging the second, down the hill in an attempt to discreetly whisk them off to somewhere the boy deemed safer, he was a fool.

Alas, it was somewhat clever, as nightfall was fast approaching.  Being closer to the village ensured less risks of those in the wild that choose to strike in the dark, and bringing along companions oft leaves those in the streets to switch targets.

The beastman boy, (Jack, was it?) trailed, Vils quite unwilling protégée attempting to trail him, and the young alchemist going along with it, and after some conversation, their fae companion joined aswell.

Those children truly have some entertaining antics.  Worrisome at times, much to the woe of Heartstabyls Resident Mother Goose, known by name as Trey.

For Lilia, he was certain Malleus and Co. may begin to panic should their favorite bat not return, and the time left til sundown was far from much. 

Perhaps taking everyone but that suspicious little hunter without warning was a tad dramatic too. 

Riddle certainly thought so, but Lilias statement that it wouldn't do well to simply have little o' him being the only upperclassman around for the little freshman in a time of crisis seemed to bring his rage down a few notches.

——————

The second she woke up to Ace lifting her on his back, the instantaneous notion of something had gone wrong seemed eminent. 

"Y'know, I'm starting to think getting knocked out is a hobby for you."

After a few seconds, she realized she was being carried off somewhere, so instinctively resisted, and near contemplated Ace-homicide when it failed.

"Put me down."

He didn't even stop moving when he answered.

"Yea, no."

"The fuck you mean, no?!"

"You're injured, dipshit."

"I can probably walk."

With an eyebrow raise, he dropped her.

She tried to stand, and near screamed from the pain that shot up her leg, and the one in her wrist when she tried to pull herself up.

Ace, surprisingly, lacked the smug grin she was expecting, but something of a genuine face of concern, which was in all honesty weird to see on him.

"You wanna admit you need help for once?"

"I would, but this situation is somewhat awkward, therefore I choose death."

She was yoinked back up, wondering when the fuck Ace became as physically strong as Deuce.

"Vetoed."

"I hate you."

The feeling of pure stupidity and embarrassment on her part made her go completely quiet, but also feel slightly bad for Deuce when she noticed he was being dragged by the collar down the mountain while she received the fancier treatment against her will (kind of).

——————

"Hey. Do us a favor?"

After building a small fire, the student looked over at the Green Vice and Red Vice, tilting his head slightly.

"Depends. What is it?"

"Make sure they all get down safely, but in their own groups. Use your unique magic again if you so wish."

The boys breath hitched for a moment, eyes then sharping with concealed fear.

"How?"

Diasominas Vice stuck one hand directly in the fire without a flinch, fixing around the wood with his hand.

"My dear, Necromancy as powerful as yours can only be concealed until you cross paths with someone whos aware of what to look for and whom to ask.
After all, the Dead are terrible gossips. Most would offer you volumes of information to hear about a little modern drama."

Lilia smiled, patting the boys shoulder lightly.

"Worry not, lest you use it for the worse, then we have no intention of reporting it.

If anything, I must thank you for not only keeping the freshman from harm, but finding a clever way of freeing us.
My, how surprised I was to find I was once more able to teleport after finding the Labyrinth blocked it."

The verdette placed another log on the fire, staring off the mountain with a stern expression.

"Look, what Lilia and I are asking is just to make sure they get to town safely, but make sure the trouble trio stays in their own group."

"Why?"

"Call it a Vice Housewardens Intuition, but I think we both have a feeling they have stuff they need to talk out."

"Well, it's more a caretaker's intuition in my opinion, the intuition of the fatherly, methinks. Our reasoning stays the same, however."

Trey sighed, fixing his glasses, glancing to Cater, Lonnie and Riddle in the distance, talking about something or other, for a moment, while the not blackmailed but kind of blackmailed student put a hand to his chin.

"So, you're asking me to use the powers of Necromancy... for therapeutic reasons?"

"I guess you could say that.."

"Melktert."

Heartstabyls Vice blinked quietly in confusion for a moment.

"...Huh?"

The student poked a stick on the dirt below them, drawing some unknown scribble.

"Sorry. I just remembered you're a baker, and then I thought of baked food I like."

"Is this you asking me to make you..what was it?"

The response was a nod, then the younger walking off into the woods, as if that nod answered the question, but Lilia did, luckily.

"I believe he said "Melktert". Its a Dessert dish from the Sunset Savanna. Translated, it would be "Milk Tart", I believe."

"And here I thought I knew every flavour base of tart.  I guess I'll give it a shot when we get back-What are you doing?"

Lilia peeked up from where he was sifting through a bag that Trey was pretty sure wasn't there before, a familiar tablet and notebook tucked in with care, which seemingly could not be said for the rest of the bags unceremoniously strewn contents.

"Someone has to watch over the 3 man army, no? The Strategic move for him is to focus on the group of four, as they have the advantage as of now."

"Also because we can't be sure we can trust the guy?"

"Yes, that too.  Should it come to it, tell my boys I'll be gone for....3-4 business days at most, and a few hours at least. 
If Malleus seems disgruntled, perhaps see if Al-Asim is able to invite him over for Ice Cream or ask to discuss Gargoyles. That should give you two or three hours to prepare for possible total devastation. Or have Silver call me and give him the phone."

Brushing ash off his hands, the Hatter Knows why he got it after only putting his hand in a bag, the fae stood on a large rock on the very edge of the mountainside, waving.

"Toodles!"

If he wasn't aware of Lilias ability to turn into a flying creature, Trey would have had a heart attack upon the fae tilting himself back, allowing himself to fall off the mountainside.

Admittedly, it was a close call on that, since he didn't see it was a magenta bat come back up until at least a minute later.

—————————-
_______

NOTES:

——

I think I made it too obvious who the Necromancer was, but oh well.

Also hehe, it's not technically Necromancy, if you can guess what it actually is, you get a cookie.

It's kind of very specific so I do doubt y'all guessing it, but who knows!

Also not me dragging Jack into this bullshit (Sorry bro its for the Savannaclaw build up I promise)

Anyway, LETS GO!