A Roswellian Halloween
The Challenge-
Must include:
Everyone in costumes- check
An alleged haunted house- defenitley check
A group of jocks playing a joke on the others- I hope by others you mean pod squad
Raw eggs (preferably ending up on someone)- oh so check
TPing a house- yep
Someone getting arrested- yeah- I hope fake-arresting counts.
Something unexplainable happening- maria let michael drive the jetta! and max & liz recognized their inexplicable mushiness
And no one can be drunk- damnit!
Quick Note: Its foofy. Sorry. If you're in the mood for something thought provoking, you've come to the wrong fic :-)
"Liiizzzz!!!" Maria yelled from the back room of the Crashdown exasperatedly.
"Hold on a second!" the dark-haired girl yelled back, "I need to finish my makeup!"
Liz studied herself in a mirror with a smile. She was dressed in a maroon Victorian ball gown, making the black in her hair look even more mysterious, with pale powder all over her face, and her long black hair put up in a glamorous bun, black tendrils falling around her face. Isabel had helped her with the temporary "dye"... it would come out as soon as she "washed her hair". Well at least that was what she had told her dad.
She stepped into her ballet slippers and proceeded down the stairs to meet Maria. Her eyes widened when she saw her best friend, dressed in a thigh-high plaid skirt, knee-high socks and a button-up white blouse, tied at the side. Her hair was in pigtails going out to either side, and boy, did she go heavy on the eyeliner.
"Maria! Wow, you look..."
The blonde bombshell grinned impishly.
"Oh-so-britney? I know. And you, darling, look maahvelous."
Liz blushed.
"I wonder what Max is." she said idly, joining her friend at the bottom of the stairs. They walked out to the Jetta, waving goodbye to the Parker's and heading towards the Evans, the agreed meeting place for that night.
"Oh you know- doctor, lawyer, something nice and normal.... or maybe-" Maria had a glimmer in her eyes, but she kept her mouth shut.
"Maybe what?" Liz asked anxiously, leaning in closer to her friend.
Maria didn't speak.
"Maria!!" Liz shrieked, hitting her on the arm repeatedly.
Maria still didn't speak.
"Oh come on," Liz whined, "I take back the big-fat-nose thing."
"If I'm right, you'll find out in a few minutes." Maria replied smugly, pulling up in front of the Evans. She noticed a motorcycle, an orange VW rabbit, and a police car parked out front. She sighed. Her friends...
Liz casually got out of the car, waiting for Maria to walk inside.
"Don't tell me you haven't been wondering what Michael dressed up as."
Maria sighed again.
"Somehow, I don't think he's the kind to dress up."
"Oh come on, give him a break. And even if he couldn't think up a costume, I'm sure Izzy was delighted to have another real-live-boy model to fool around with."
"What?" Maria asked, stopping to look at her friend.
"Well you know- Alex let her pick out his costume. So I'm sure she did Michael's too."
Maria grinned brightly as she walked inside the Evans open door, cracking a fake whip at the air in front of them. Liz's delicate face contorted with laughter, and as the smaller girl took her friends arm, the two teenagers proceeded happily into the Halloween-decorated living room.
Liz smiled, surveying her friends. She started with the loveseat, and she had to try and stop from bursting out into laughter. Alex and Isabel were on the loveseat together. Isabel was wearing a long 60's-esque sundress, lots of jewelry and she had obviously put extensions in her hair. Alex was sitting next to her, in a bell-bottoms and vest combo, grinning like an idiot at Liz. Sonny and Cher. She should have guessed.
She moved on the the couch, which contained Tess, Kyle, and one stunned-looking Michael. Kyle was in his football uniform, complete with black grease streaks under his eyes and his helmet by his side. Tess was sitting next to him, rather close, Liz noticed, wearing a cheerleaders uniform. She had to keep from laughing again. Tess. A cheerleader. It was perfect! The bouncy hair, the uh... bubbly... personality. She could just imagine Tess at the top of the pyramid, cheering at all of Kyle's games. She grinned to herself.
Liz had a hard time figuring out what Michael was supposed to be, but whatever he was, the outfit shocked her beyond anyone else's costume. He was wearing a nice pair of kakhi's, a black leather belt, and a tight black shirt. His hair was actually combed nicely once, making him look like a normal, preppy guy. Scary.
It didn't take Liz very long the notice the absence of one certain Czechoslovakian.
"Where's Max?" she asked, disappointed. Had he decided to sit out on the group bonding?
Michael shrugged, though she noticed a light in his eyes.
"Said he had to go pick something up."
Maria stepped forward, still smiling.
"And what are you supposed to be Michael?"
He looked down, turning red, and mumbled something under his breath.
"What was that?" Maria asked, walking over to the couch and sitting on the edge of it.
"abackstreetboy."
"Hmm?" she asked, clearly enjoying his discomfort.
"A Backstreet Boy." he said louder, his face still bright red. "It was Isabel's idea."
Maria's eyes widened, and then she started laughing, falling onto the couch next to him. She leaned on him, laughing into his shoulder.
"Oh-my-god" she said, laughing so hard she could barely breathe.
Isabel grinned from the loveseat.
"Well I heard what you were going to be, so I thought, Britney Spears, Backstreet Boy..." she smiled, "worked out well, didn't it?"
"Yeah." Alex agreed, smiling brightly. "So haunted house, then tricking?"
Isabel nodded.
"Lets wait for Max though." she smiled at Liz.
The group idly chatted for a while, Maria still laughing so hard she was almost crying, and Michael looking thoroughly embarrased, but enjoying having the blonde on his arm. Alex was having the time of his life, obviously happy that Isabel had chosen him to be her match, and not Michael. Though Alex happy was not something to be brushed off. Alex happy was like... Maria happy, but on crack. Liz kept staring anxiously at the door, waiting for Max.
After about ten minutes, they heard someone coming down the stairs, and Liz perked up, praying it was Max. Then the alien teenager walked through the door quietly, with a bright smile on his face. Everyone execpt Maria and Isabel looked shocked. Liz could barely breathe. There was Max, standing before her, in the true form of what he had always been to her.
A knight, in shining armor.
The eight members of the pod squad got into their respective cars, Alex & Isabel taking the rabbit, Max & Liz the jeep, Kyle & Tess in his dad's patrol car and Michael & Maria, as always, in the jetta. Maria looked over at him, still trying her hardest to quiet the hysterical laughter that was building up in her. He looked at her for a moment, and then they both burst out laughing, Maria leaning into his shoulder. She caughed, trying to get a hold of herself.
"Ok. We have to calm down, or we'll never get to the haunted house..."
Michael nodded, and started up the car.
"I can't believe you're actually letting me drive." he said, in awe.
"Oh, you know- just felt that it was finally time you gave the jetta a spin. You know, with my consent."
He looked over at her again.
"So," she said with a glimmer in her eyes, "wonder how Max and Liz are doing?"
They shared a grin.
"So..." Liz said, letting her voice trail off. She kept sneaking glances at him, wondering if maybe she was just hallucinating. She felt all hyper and flittery. Though maybe that was just the perfume Maria had mixed up for her, but...
"Yeah." Max said, a warm smile spreading across his face as he looked at her. She smiled back a little, then they both kind of blushed and looked away at the same time. She laughed.
"Why do we always do that?"
"No idea." he laughed.
"Anyway- did Isabel help you with your costume?"
He shook his head.
"Isabel kind of- inexplicably- loosens up around Halloween. She had her hands full with Alex and Michael, so she just kind of gave Maria tips. It was mostly her."
Liz grinned.
"No one like Maria, is there? She did a great job..." she smiled.
Max smiled too, but then noticed Michael and the lady in question, in the jetta, had pulled up into a driveway before a large manor. Max frowned.
"This isn't the haunted house..."
Liz shrugged, stepping out of the jeep.
"Maybe they got lost or something. Hey Maria!" she called, running to catch up with the pop-couple. "Max said this isn't the right house."
"Yeah we know." Alex said with a smirk, coming up behind her with Isabel. "We'll explain when Kyle and Tess get here."
A few minutes later the police car pulled up. Kyle's grease was smudged, and Tess's hair was a little mussed, but otherwise they looked perfectly normal.
"Sorry." Kyle said, breathless, "Slight detour."
Michael groaned and Tess giggled. Alex sighed.
"Anyway, you're probably wondering why we're here. Michael and I decided instead of going to that fake haunted house, we should try a real one." he said with a grin.
"What?" Maria shrieked, casting a glance towards the mansion. "That place is really haunted?"
Tess looked cautiously around the corner, a little bit jittery and just about ready to use her powers to make herself invisible. She hated this- she was scared out of her damn mind. Where was buddah boy when you needed him? She heard a noise, and spun around.
"Excuse me, miss." said a low voice, one she didn't recognize from the wall panel behind her. She was too scared to turn around.
"Yeah?" she said, her voice almost a whisper.
"I'm afraid I'm going to have to arrest you..." it continued, obviously amused.
Tess raised an eyebrow. This was defenitley not a ghost. She turned to face the empty wall.
"But I didn't do anything."
"You've stolen the stars from the sky, and put them in your eyes." it said.
Tess laughed. That sounded way too much like one of Kyle's... getting the idea, she gave the wall panel a swift kick, and a hidden door swung open, revealing a very amused football player.
"Gotcha." he simply said.
*This is so dumb*. Thought Maria. Why they had to split up to make things more 'interesting' was completely beyond her. But, she decided with a gleam in her eyes, she was going to take full advantage of the opportunity to torture the spaceboy. She had secretly snuck a carton of raw eggs from the car- one that they were going to use tricking- and she had found a rusty old bucket in the basement of the mansion. With a little bit of string and a lot of ingenuity, she had rigged one of the doors so whoever opened it after it was shut got a nice little suprise. She grinned to herself. Now to make sure spaceboy came.
Michael leaned up against the wall, bored. He was still in the main entrence hallway- after they had split up he found his way back there and decided it wasn't worth it to do the whole 'haunted house' thing. Tricking was his specialty, and he was sticking to that. Suddenly he saw a wisp of white in one of the doorways. He moved closer, and he thought he could hear his name.
"Michael..." the woman's voice whispered, singing it more than saying it. He saw the wisp move further ahead, and he followed, entranced. He saw her beautiful shape outlined in the thin sheet- though he could never seem to see her face. He kept seeing glimpses of the beautiful figure until finally he saw her standing in a doorway, her face still covered.
"Come to me." she said one last time, in that come-hither voice he found strangely familiar, and shut the door with a grand sweep of her arm. He followed, almost running up to the door, cold with fear and yet intriuged. He opened the door cautiously and stepped inside. Suddnely he felt a flow of some warm liquid flowing down on top of his head, covering his body and drenching his clothes. He looked down. Egg. He had been covered in eggs.
Maria emerged from the closet, carrying a thin white linen bedsheet in her arms. She stopped dead as soon as she saw a very pissed-off looking Michael, and after a moment of silence burst out in helpless laughter. She dropped the bedsheet and leaned against the wall, laughing so hard she could barely breathe.
Michael growled. Literally.
"Its not funny. I should have known you'd have done something to me."
She just kept laughing, looking up at him and laughing some more. He moved closer to her.
"You know what Maria, I think I have a way to make you less happy about this whole thing."
She just looked up at him for a moment, arched her eyebrow, and continued laughing.
He took one more step close to her and grabbed her in a giant bear hug, kissing her for almost a full minute, dreching her clothes with egg and runing her makeup, and then he set her down gently.
She just stared at him, incredulously- and then they both started laughing.
Tess and Kyle wandered around together, hand in hand. They just enjoyed each other's company- and the feeling of warmth that spread from their palms down to their toes. Tess put a finger to her lips and squeezed his hand silently, motioning towards a sound she had heard. He nodded, and they moved towards the bedroom. Tess stepped inside, not using her powers, and saw that the bathroom door was closed. The sounds of laughter- Michael and Maria's- came from behind that door. She shook her head, silently trying not to laugh and pointed for Kyle's sake. He looked, listened, and then had to contain himself from bursting out in laughter as well. He leaned over, as close as he could get to her and whispered-
"Even here- in the middle of a haunted house..."
She nodded with a grin and took his hand, leading him away from the other couple behind the door.
"Michael, where did you learn to share?" Maria asked plantitivley, waiting for the soap. He turned to her with a rougish grin.
"I didn't."
She sighed, and leaned against the wall of the fairly large bathroom, trying to scrape the dry eggs from her face with a towel.
"This isn't going to work. We're going to have to actually get in the shower." she said after a moment, turning it on.
He turned to her and raised an eyebrow suggestively.
"Together?"
Her eyes widened for a moment, and then she began hitting him with the wet towel.
"Ugh! Get out." she said, pushing him out the door and shutting it decisivley.
He leaned against the bathroom door, with a sigh, crossing his arms and surveying the room.
Liz smiled as she studied herself in the full-length antique mirror. She felt like she belonged in this old mansion- wearing her old English gown she could just imagine herself walking down these hallways with Max, her knight husband... the scientific part of her mind reminded her that it was impossible, since this house at maximum was 100 years old, but she shooed it away. It was run-down enough to imagine that it was far older than that. She turned away from the mirror and began down the long hallway, towards two double doors looming at the end of it.
As she approached the doors she heard a sound... the faint sound of classical music, haunting yet beautiful. It seemed to fit perfectly with her mind's image of the house- and as she opened the doors wide to the sounds of the music, her breath was taken away.
It was a glorious ballroom- fit for feaudalistic England. She shook her head. There was no way this fit in with old American architecture- she was sure Roswell had been a mining town originally. And a military base. There was no way- but yet the ballroom was here, with marble floors and a beautiful lit glass chandelier hanging down from the arched ceiling. It made little to no sense, but Liz didn't care. Actually, a few seconds after she had stepped in, she didn't care about anything but the figure before her.
Max stood in the middle of the ballroom, a broad smile on his face. He had changed from his armor into a more comfortable costume, fit with a sweeping forest green cape. He looked amazing standing there- Liz could barely contain herself as she slowly walked towards him. His smile grew even broader as he held out his arm to her, and she took it gracefully.
"Milady?" he asked, and she smiled even wider as she put her arms around his neck and they waltzed, the haunting music providing the perfect background to the beautiful scene.
Alex and Isabel walked side by side, not quite touching but very close to it. They were heading towards the back of the house, hoping to find a way outside and a place to meet the other. They came to a fork in the hallway.
"Alex," Isabel asked softly, "do you think we're lost?"
He nodded with a sigh.
"This house defenitley did not look this big from the outside." he paused for a moment. "Well, lets go left."
She nodded and they continued that way until they finally came to a glass door leading outside. They looked at each other and then Alex opened the door for her with a classic smile. She smiled back softly and stepped through the door carefully, looking around. There was a beautiful pond, with a waterfall flowing almost silently into it. She looked at Alex, amazed.
"There is no way they could have engineered this kind of thing as long ago as this house was built- is there?"
He shook his head in awe.
"This place just keeps getting stranger... and wouldn't we have seen some hint of this out front?"
"We should have- oh well, might as well take a look around."
She grabbed his hand and pulled him towards the waterfall, stepping daintily on the rocks. As she looked at the flow of water, she saw that there was a cave behind the waterfall. She motioned to Alex to follow behind her and then stepped in.
The cave was strangely large- it seemed completely unnatural, and as Isabel felt the walls she realized they were made of a type of stone she had never encountered for. Actually, it seemed as if the walls were more metal than stone. Suddenly Alex tapped her on the shoulder and pointed to a chest in the back of the cave.
"I wonder who would leave something here?" he asked.
"Well its a good hiding place." she said, walking towards it. She bent down and popped the two latches, wiping some dust off of them. She opened the top and was suprised to find what looked like a scrapbook and a journal inside. She put the journal aside and took the scrapbook in her lap. "Here, sit down." she told Alex, and she laid the scrapbook across both of their laps. She opened it up.
The pages were yellowed and dusty, but the writing beneath the pencil sketch, dried flowers, and the lock of hair was very legibile.
The caption underneath the flower read:
*Marcus gave this to me yersterday, the 15th. He insists that he has to leave, but he can't tell me why for security reasons. I don't understand exactly, but he says as soon as he finishes the business he must attend to, we'll get married. I can only hope he returns to me the same sweet man that he is now- he has been more troubled recently than I have ever seen him.*
There was a picture of a beautiful but short light-haired woman, and a handsome, smiling dark-haired man. The picture was black and white, and they held each other lovingly.
*Anna drew this picture of us- she's amazingly talented. She told me that I should preserve it and put it in a safe place- that way my ancestors could know what I looked like. Marcus only laughed at that, but she seemed very solemn and so I placed it in here.*
There were many more such captions- but none of them ever mentioned much about the time they were written. It was obviously before photography- but was Roswell even a town then? The further the book went the woman (Miriam was her name) became increasingly panicked about her fiance. He had not returned for years- and strange things had begun happening around her house. Rooms appearing where there had been none, voices, and images floating above her bed in the night. Underneath a scrap of fabric she wrote:
*This is proof. I have no dresses, curtains or linens of this fabric- and yet I found a piece of it upon my floor last night. There is something in this house, and if Marcus hasn't returned in two weeks, I'm going to sell the house and move in with Anna and Christopher.*
There was nothing after that. Isabel picked up the piece of fabric gently, running her thumb over it. Suddenly she jerked back her head, and images ran through her mind.
*Miriam asleep, as a dark shadow of a man loomed above her bed.*
*The shadow man following Miriam down the hallway, as she looked around nervously.*
*A single blood red rosebud, laid out on a plate on a grand dining hall table*
*Miriam packing, a woman and a man helping her carry her bags away from the house*
*The shadow standing in the door, watching them leave*
She fell back into Alex's arms, her head still pounding from the rush of images and emotions.
"Flash?" he asked gently, easing her into a more comfortable position against his chest.
She nodded, and turned slightly to look into his eyes.
"Alex, this place really is haunted."
TBC...eventually...
Home
Fanfiction Index