Chapter 7: Halloween Trilogy, Part Three

LuLu Belle
Through the Haunted House entry, a cobblestone walkway led up the hill to the graveyard. Midway up the path was a large, wide, circular spot, where LuLu Belle was staged, and this was where Tinsley was so excited to get to. While her cohorts and several dozen other Lookzens (Looking-Glass citizens, i.e., students and faculty) — whose tickets were also for the first round of the evening — sauntered casually up the hill, Tinsley waited with uncharacteristic patience. She clasped her hands together in front of her, as she stood dutifully in front of a large, tarp-covered lump with only a sign that read “Caution: Sleeping Dragon,” to indicate that her beloved LuLu Belle was underneath.

Once the crowd had gathered, LuLu Belle’s caretakers came to remove her tarp. 

Addressing the audience, one said, “We need everyone to be very quiet so we don’t startle LuLu Belle. Waking a sleeping dragon is a very tricky business.” 

With great sincerity, and in a very small voice, Tinsley replied, “Okay, we won't startle her.” 

If you are not familiar with LuLu Belle, she is an animatronic dragon that was built as a greeter for the fifth-annual Haunted House. Each year, the students have given her a thorough refurbishment, as well as adding features and capabilities such that she is now a very complex and articulated robot, rivaling anything you might find at a world-class theme park. By the way, LuLu Belle is based on a design submitted by Tinsley when she first started at the Glass. 

As the caretakers worked on pulling back the cover, they performed a skit, making it seem like their work was a highly complex and delicate matter. 

Once the dragon's head emerged from under the tarp, Tinsley began prancing and softly whispering, “Cao Lu, Cao Lu, Cao Lu.” 

Now, I don’t know why she refers to 'her' dragon as Fiestar’s Cao Lu, but I would venture to guess it is because sometimes people call Cao Lu “LuLu;” any other connections are a complete mystery. At any rate, as is tradition, when LuLu Belle first opened her sleepy eyes, she looked at Tinsley and smiled like a happy puppy greeting her favorite person. As she does each year, Tinsley squealed and attacked LuLu Belle with a big hug. (Since this is a big moment for her, she is always given some time to embrace her oversized, fire-breathing pet.) 

Once Tinsley reluctantly released her grip on LuLu, her operators unveiled one of this year's surprise upgrades: a big, wet, slobbery tongue installed in the dragon's mouth, which they used to give Tinsley a sloppy kiss. Naturally she was quite startled when the enormous pink appendage came out and soaked her (they had the water turned up a bit too high). Tinsley staggered back, with her makeup smeared and her Wednesday Addams wig half off. Now, the crowd was rather shocked, but they held their response until they knew how Tinsley was going to react. Tinsley collected herself, pulled her wig the rest of the way off, and shook away some of the water. 

With LuLu Belle staring at her, tongue still hanging out, Tinsley squealed “Cao Lu!” and rushed back in for another hug. 

The audience laughed and cheered. When Tinsley finally let go, LuLu pulled her tongue halfway back in and craned her neck. Then, laughing, sneezing, and shaking her head, she doused the crowd with a healthy dose of dragon slobber before she went on to do her little show.

A Dragon's Tale
The first part of LuLu’s show consisted of her trainers getting her to do simple tricks, like balancing a bone on her nose before flipping it into the air and catching it in her mouth. This time she also performed a song and 'dance' routine with Jimmy, where they sang the “Puttin’ on the Ritz” bit from Young Frankenstein (LuLu covered The Monster’s parts). This initial phase of the show let the student engineers, fabricators, and operators show off what LuLu could do. 

After putting their dragon through her paces, things changed gears when a Lookzen, who was chosen in secret, stepped up to feed Lulu a poisoned cookie. Once Lulu ate the tainted cookie, she transformed from a friendly dragon into a fierce, fire-breathing monster. LuLu’s transformation was intended to allow her to be a kindly greeter for the Lumplings during the first part of the evening, and then to become a scary monster for the last half of the night, when the visitors to the Haunted House were adults and older kids. Because this was the opening night, LuLu would do this skit for each round of visitors, who were all Lookzens. On the remaining nights, she would spend the entire first half of the evening as friendly LuLu Belle and transform into fierce LuLu Belle just once for the second half of the evening. LuLu’s transformation was really quite amazing. At first she was a bit pudgy, with big, doe eyes, and an affable demeanor. Through some clever lighting tricks and sophisticated animatronics, Lulu Belle could become a lean, mean, fire-breathing beast, who was surprisingly scary. 

While everyone was enjoying friendly LuLu’s playful antics, a dark-cloaked figure appeared from behind her. With his face hidden from view and in a very creepy voice, the sinister figure demanded that everyone stop having fun and that they get their “big, slobbery, winged mule” out of there as she was “disturbing the slumber of the dead.” Now, while everyone present knew the drill, they didn’t know the identity of the unpleasant curmudgeon. Regardless, as is customary, the crowd booed and insisted that their fun be allowed to continue. 

“Very well. You will rue the day you crossed sabers with the likes of me,” the interloper replied, whereupon he threw back his hood revealing that he was none other than Dean Eobseo. The Dean then held up the traditional skull-and-crossbones cookie that he would feed to LuLu to induce her change of character. 

The crowd gasped and Tinsley stamped her foot saying, “Dean Eobseo, how could you!” 

The Dean winked at her and she winked back. 

Even Though the audience exclaimed, “No, LuLu, don’t eat the cookie,” she opened her mouth and extended her new tongue, onto which the Dean gently placed the means of his revenge. LuLu closed her eyes and deliciously consumed the treat. 

Victor began rubbing his hands together and laughing like he had gone completely mad. “Yes, yes, good dragon, eat the nice cookie,” he muttered between fits of crazed laughter. 

At first LuLu seemed to be enjoying the cookie, but before long she began shaking. Her face became gaunt, her skin changed from soft pastels to dark red and black, and smoke began issuing from her nose. 

While Lulu was transforming, her handlers were scrambling about trying to contain her and urging the crowd to step back. Just as one handler tried to place a giant muzzle on her snout, her eyes — now yellow and snake-like — popped open. Spreading her wings, LuLu reared up and shot a bright flame into the sky, while letting out a terrifying roar. 

“To the crypt! We must fall back to the crypt!” one of the handlers cried, and everyone began retreating into the graveyard. 

Looking back, they could see Dean Eobseo standing at LuLu’s feet, laughing as his shadow cast by the light of the dragon’s flame flickered on the ground. Before their very eyes, LuLu looked down at him, opened her mouth, and attacked him. The Dean fell to the ground, screaming, and LuLu belched out a great wall of fire, briefly obscuring their view. When the flames cleared, only his cloak remained — that and his leg, which dangled from the corner of her mouth. 

“We are not safe! We must keep going!” the handlers shouted as LuLu menacingly turned her gaze toward the audience.

Tunnel of Doom
With the terrible dragon roaring and spouting fire into the air behind them, everyone made their way deeper into the graveyard, where they were met by spooky, glowing apparitions, goosebump-inducing wails, and glowing eyes peering at them from every angle. LuLu’s handlers led them to the crypt whose granite doors were cracked slightly open, leaking a red glow and boiling fog. As they approached, the doors slowly opened on their own, with the sound of stone grinding on stone as they went. The thick fog poured out (along with a few bats), and ghostly wails could be heard emanating from within. 

“We have to go in!” one handler cried. 

Suddenly, harsh and rather terrifying disembodied voices that seemed to be coming from everywhere loudly whispered, “Come in, we’ve been waiting for you!” Whereupon the rolling fog was instantly sucked back into the crypt. 

“Come in! Come in!” the voices demanded. 

There was a bit of hesitation on the audience's part before they proceeded into the crypt because, so far, this was the most convincing and impressive Haunted House build yet. As they warily stepped into the unknown, Tinsley stood like a statue, staring back at LuLu Belle, who was still fuming and snorting fire. Tinsley's friends gave her all the time they could, but soon they needed to bring up the rear and go into the crypt. 

Tabitha patted her on the shoulder and said, “Come on, Buttercup, she’ll be there when we get back.” 

Tinsley muttered, “Okay,” and then started waving at LuLu, shouting “Goodbye, Cao Lu, saranghae!” 

Now, LuLu Belle has cameras in her head so that her operators can see things from her perspective and, as you might expect, videos of Tinsley waving and shouting like a nutcase were posted even before she had finished going through the Haunted House (which makes me wonder what the real Cao Lu thinks of all of this... that is, of course, if she ever saw the videos). At any rate, making matters worse, LuLu’s operators made her flash Tinsley a heart sign, which resulted in her cohorts having to physically drag Tinsley into the crypt. Once they were finally inside the mysterious portal, the doors began to shut, forcing them to press on and catch up with the rest of the group.

Now, the crypt was much too small to accommodate all of the people who went into it, and it was actually the entrance to a long tunnel leading into the basement of Ravenhurst. The floor of the stone room sloped gently downhill, becoming a hallway with a series of “S” curves that not only allowed wheelchair access, but also served to disorient visitors, making it very difficult to know where one was headed. Taking a collective deep breath, Tabitha, Tinsley, Kari, Bess, Analey, and Amber entered the fog and began groping their way forward, calling out to Jimmy as they went. At first they could hear only a din of screams, wails, and giggling. However, as they gained ground on the rest of the group, they began to make out individual voices and felt sure that they would be bumping into Jimmy at any moment. The initial bit of the Tunnel of Doom was strangely empty, with nothing by way of spooky displays, which made them rather nervous as they knew that the moment they let their guard down something would pop out and scare them.

Jimmy’s Tree-Monster Thing
Sure enough, the lack of displays soon ended. They were moving along the tunnel at a pretty good pace when Bess, who had ended up at the front of the group, abruptly stopped. From the fog directly in front of them, came a deep, terrible moan, and a glowing something appeared in the cloud. As they watched in amazement, a weird, white, tree-like creature seemed to materialize in front of them. At first they were frozen, as their brains tried to work out what had appeared in their path, when suddenly the creature's tentacles flared, it let out a louder and even more terrifying moan, and then began thrashing wildly about. Panicked, they turned and started to race away in the opposite direction. However, before they made it very far, they found their path blocked by a pair of creepy gray aliens that emerged from the haze. Wheeling around, they saw that the tree thing had disappeared. Screaming, giggling, and tripping over each other, they bumbled back the other way, only to have the tree thing reappear before them. 

Trapped and unsure of what to do, they huddled together, nervously prancing and shrieking. Soon the aliens behind them slipped back into the fog, the tree disappeared again, the tunnel became uncomfortably quiet, and the lights dimmed to near-darkness. Alone in the gloom, they began wincing at every little sound as they anticipated the next scare. Their wait wasn’t long because suddenly strobe lights flashed wildly, followed by a droning alarm and spinning amber emergency lights like the hallways of the self-destructing Nostromo near the end of Alien. The scare was brief and ended as quickly as it had begun, with the red, glowing fog and tomb-like silence of the tunnel returning once more. This disorienting distraction worked perfectly as the girls headed the wrong way, once they had worked up the nerve to move on.

“Wait a minute, I think we are going uphill,” Tabitha declared. “We should just about be back to the crypt by now.” 

Sure enough, just around the next bend, the stone walls of the crypt could be seen. 

“Oh great, now we have to face those creepy aliens and Jimmy’s tree thing again. I really don’t like it, I mean what the heck is it?!” Amber exclaimed with frustration. 

“If we are ever going to catch up to the rest of the group, we need to get going. Come on, we can just power our way through the aliens and the tree monster,” Kari said with confident resolve, whereupon she scampered back down the tunnel. 

“Oh, this is bad,” Bess muttered. “Having Kari up front is never a good thing at a haunted house.” 

The group, despite their misgivings, turned and followed Kari back down into the Tunnel of Doom.

Crumpet Down
At about the point where they had encountered Jimmy’s tree thing and the aliens, they now found that the hallway was instead empty, but that its walls were beginning to close in, via soft, inflatable panels. 

“We must go on! We have to go on! Kari shouted back to her followers. 

Other than being a rather claustrophobic feeling, squeezing between the squishy vinyl pads was actually kind of fun; Bess likened it to sliding through a very long sleeping bag being crushed by a marshmallow monster. By the time they emerged from the squeezy part of the tunnel, they were laughing and having a pretty good time. 

“Oh my gosh, my hair is so staticky,” Bess declared. “And I must say that Kari being in front is going reasonably well. But just in case, Analey, you should probably be between me and her.” 

As Kari’s travel buddy and best friend, Analey was duty-bound to be the buffer and early warning signal should Kkab-Kari make an appearance in the dark, confined space of the hallway. 

“Jeez, you guys, I think we only have about one more leg of hallway to go, and I am completely calm,” Kari stated in response to her mates’ concerns. Then with undiminished enthusiasm, she pressed on into the next turn. 

Around the bend they came to a rickety wooden door, designed to look like the entrance of an old mine shaft. On the door was a crudely painted sign that read “Danger, Do Not Enter,” so Kari opened it and rushed into the cave-like tunnel. 

Analey followed her in, as did Bess, although she was muttering, “Way to follow the warning sign,” as she did. 

The mine was dimly lit by old-timey lanterns and lined with timber supports. 

“This is pretty cool,” Amber remarked as they ventured further in. Things were going well until they began encountering spider webs hanging in the corners of the supports. 

“Eww, gross!” Kari shouted, and Analey dropped back a bit, fully aware that things might get bouncy.

Analey’s concerns were spot-on, as just around the next bend was a darker section of tunnel, filled with faux spider webs and lots of little rubber spiders designed to stick to those passing through. Kari, who had stepped up her pace so as to get through the spidery bits more quickly, ran right into the thickest part of the nest. Immediately she began screaming and flailing wildly. 

Analey, who had misjudged her distance from Kari, quickly responded by shouting out a warning to the others. Unfortunately, before she could get out more than “Kkab!” Kari spun around and, in the darkness, hit Analey squarely on the nose. 

Kari realized what she had done the second she made contact with Analey’s nose and shouted, “Heol, mianhaeyo! Crumpet down! Crumpet down!” 

Instinctively everyone pulled out their phones and turned their lights on.

Analey had staggered back and was now leaned up against the wall, with blood dripping from her nose. 

Kari’s eyes were as big as saucers. “Oh, no, no, no, Analey, are you okay?” she stammered with great concern. 

Bess pulled out a tissue and began dabbing away the blood. 

As her mates worked on her, Analey insisted that she was okay. “I’b pine, don’t borry, dis isn’t the birst tibe Kari has hid be,” she told them, shooting Kari a bit of a grin. 

Kari started pacing nervously. “I know, I know, I have hit you so many times, I’m such a monster!”  

“Doe, you’re hypur, band I got too cose. I doe you bidn’t bean it,” Analey replied, and fist-bumped her (which did little to ease Kari’s sense of guilt). 

The tunnel’s operators, who saw the whole thing on their cameras, brought up the lights and used the PA system to ask if they needed assistance. 

“I think we are okay. Is the mineshaft display the last in the tunnel?” Tabitha asked them. 

“Yes, we will have medical head your way,” they replied. 

“Biriously, I’m pine,” Analey asserted, trying to reassure her mates. At her instance, the group rallied to make their way out of the tunnel. 

“You don’t need to be a hero,” Kari said as she looped Analey’s arm over her shoulder and practically started carrying her. 

When they emerged from the tunnel into the dungeon room, they found a group of several monsters in the middle of ‘working out,’ all of whom stopped and stared blankly at the disheveled and bloodied group. Before anyone had a chance to say anything, the medical team came rushing in from the Wine Cellar and began working on Analey despite her instance that she didn’t need anything more than a damp washcloth. Once the medics were convinced that she was going to be okay, her cohorts whisked her away to Finkelstein's for a slushie, leaving the bewildered monsters to their exertorture.

When a winded Dean Eobseo arrived at Finkelstein’s, he found the girls sitting around a table. Analey had a cotton plug shoved up her nose; Kari was apologizing non-stop while she pointlessly dabbed at Analey’s blood-stained top; Tinsley was missing her wig and half of her face was smeared with makeup; and the rest of the group looked a complete mess with frizzy hair and ruffled costumes. 

“Oh dear, what have I done?!” Victor exclaimed. 

“Dean Eobseo, you’re alive!” they all shouted. (Well, except for Analey, who shouted, “Bean Deopseo, du abive!”) 

Of course they all knew that LuLu Belle hadn’t really eaten him. After all — according to Tinsley anyway — she is a vegetarian. 

Once they had calmed and reassured the Dean that they were all fine, and that the Tunnel of Doom was perfectly safe (provided that Kari isn't in it), they relaxed and Hildie rolled over with a tray of orange and purple slushies. Victor took a quick drink, got brain freeze, and headed back to LuLu for the second installment of the evening. After they said goodbye to the Dean, they began excitedly reviewing the events of the tunnel. 

During their download, Amber paused and said, “Say, where’s Jimmy at?” 

At that very moment, Jimmy emerged from the crowd. It seems that when he found out that Analey had been hit, he raced over to Crumpet Hall, where Yulia handed off to him Analey’s stuffed bunny, TamTam (yes, it is a copy of the one that 2NE1’s Dara has). 

Jimmy gave TamTam to Analey, who got a little misty-eyed and cooed nasally, “Oh, Bimmy, du are da best!”

Preposterous Parade
After they finished their slushies, Tabitha pointed out that Sarah, Enid, and Yulia needed to be relieved so that they could attend the fourth and final round of the evening. She offered to go by herself so that the others could either stay at Finkelstein’s, or finish going through the rest of the Haunted House, but in the end, they all decided to go with her so that she wouldn’t feel like she was missing out. They also wanted to get Analey home before Kari’s head popped off from worrying about her.

As the group rallied to head out, Kari, acting like Analey was in critical condition, insisted that they form a protective perimeter around her so that no one could bump into her on the way out. 

“I doe you peel bad, but I’m donna be okay,” Analey said. 

Channeling her inner-mother hen, Kari replied, “No, you’re not. Now let's get you home.” 

“Uh, about this protective perimeter, you're going to be a part of it, right?” Tinsley asked Kari. 

“Of course. Gotta protect my unnie, ya know,” Kari replied, completely oblivious to Tinsley’s cheekiness. 

Tinsley tried to press her point that since Kari was the cause of Analey’s injury, her being part of the protective perimeter was a bit peculiar. However, she only got out, “Seriously, you don’t see the–” before Tabitha poked her in the ribs and gave her a “don’t even say it” look.

You may not know it, but Analey and Jimmy had developed a quirky, common sense of humor and had — without discussing it, mind you — decided that a little over-acting would make for some fun videos to tease Kari with after she was over being completely freaked out. With Jimmy in the lead, using a flashing red light on his chair to clear the way, and Analey clutching TamTam whilst trying to look as pathetic as possible, the group got under way. As they waded through the sea of Lookzens who had been, and still were, hovering about with curiosity (word of the incident had traveled quickly), their fellow students cheered for Analey and even for Kari, whom they knew was feeling terribly guilty. Fortunately, for the sake of fun videos, there were a few Lookzens (especially those in the second group who had just emerged from the tunnel) who were unaware of what happened and were rather shocked at the sight of bloodied Analey and her entourage, and these were the folks who Analey’s and Jimmy’s theatrics were for. 

“What happened?!” and “What’s going on?!” many of them asked with shock and concern. To which Jimmy would dramatically answer only, “No time to explain now,” even though he was purposely moving quite slowly.

Back at the ranch, EnSaYu (and KySi) were watching the preposterous parade on Jimmy’s video feed. (He told them to watch for it when he was there getting TamTam.) 

“I don’t know who I feel worse for. I mean, Analey took the hit, but Kari couldn’t look more remorseful. And what’s up with Bess? She looks as guilt stricken as Kari,” Yulia said as they watched their mates return. 

“Bess is a manager and one of her girls was injured on her watch” Enid replied. 

“I’m not trying to make little of Analey’s injury, but she is a bleeder. I mean, she can get a nosebleed just by thinking about too much,” Sarah interjected, adding, “Not to mention that she is a pretty tough girl. Bess shouldn’t feel too bad; we are all used to bumps and bruises.” 

“No kidding. Remember the time Analey ran into the closed sliding door that she thought was open at Tabitha's parents house?” Yulia recalled. At that, she and Sarah started laughing. 

“I know, right? She got a nosebleed, but not a single scratch from all the broken glass. Poor thing, she is so accident prone,” Sarah said, trying to stifle her laughter. 

Enid interrupted, “Shh, shh, shh, here they come!”

The Oechineun Sisters
When AnAmKaTabTinBeJi came through the front door they were greeted with great concern. 

“Is everyone okay?” Enid asked, with a sense of urgency. 

“Yes, we aren’t as bad off as we look,” Tabitha reassured her. 

Kari, on the other hand, wasn’t so positive, saying, “We may be okay, but poor Analey has a broken nose and it is my fault!” Whereupon she started crying. 

“No, no, it’s all my fault!” Bess wailed. “I made her switch places with me and now her pretty nose is a mess, and she may never be able to sing properly again!” 

Sobbing, Bess and Kari both pulled Analey in for a hug, crying, “Poor, poor Analey! What have we done to you!?” 

“Por cwhying out boud, you two are boecheun bisters!” Analey asserted in frustration. 

There was a pause as everyone blankly tried to decipher what she had just said. Analey looked around as her friends all recited what she had said, counting the syllables with their fingers as they did (I’m not sure why or if it helps, but we all do it). 

“Beriously?!” she shouted in exasperation. She yanked the plug out of her nose and said, “Oechineun Sisters! I said Oechineun Sisters! 

Once again, her mates repeated her words and tried to figure out what she had said (except for Bess and Kari who were both focused on her nose, looking for any signs of fresh blood). 

Analey was too exasperated to say anything more, so she just stood there, waiting for her mates to either decipher what she had said, or to ask for clarification. 

After what seemed like a very long time, Sarah suddenly shouted, “Crying! Crying Sisters! Wow, your Korean is getting so much better!” 

“Thank you,” Analey said (and she meant it, as did Sarah). “Really, everyone, I am fine. By morning, I will be as right as rain.” Looking at Kari and Bess, she went on, “As for you two, I love you both, no one is at fault, my nose isn’t broken, and I am sure I can sing just as well as I could before the Tunnel of Doom. So please, stop beating yourselves up.” She pulled both of them back in for a hug.

While AnBeKa were hugging, Tinsley stared at Analey’s nose, her eyes narrowed. She started to say, “I don’t know...your nose looks a little..” but with a quick pinch and a harsh side-glance, Tabitha put the kibosh on her finishing her observation.

After conversing with the group for a bit, EnSaYu and Jimmy headed to the Haunted House. 

On their way out the door, Analey whispered to Jimmy, “Could you get me a rubber prop nose? I want to mess with Bess and Kari in the morning.” 

He winked at her and said, “Consider it done.” 

Before they made it to the Crumpet Hall gate, Tinsley, who was looking out the window at them, squealed “Cao Lu!” and raced out to join them, although she went with them only as far as LuLu Belle, where she remained until the Haunted House closed.

Gorilla Concert
The Crumpets’ debut Halloween season had been — minor injury and typically bad reviews from Eugene aside — going very well, and the girls had more fun than they could have imagined. Leading up to their big Goodbye Halloween (GBH) show, they had interviews (now becoming customary for them), variety show appearances, performances, and even a gorilla concert at Tabitha's old elementary school keeping them more than a little busy. 

What is a gorilla concert, you ask? Well, before I answer that, you should know that the girls intentionally misspell/pronounce “guerilla” as “gorilla,” and so will I; it’s just more fun that way because, after all, who doesn’t like gorillas? At any rate, a gorilla concert is basically an unannounced, surprise show for the people at a shopping center, business office, or school. The shows usually consist of just a few songs, and they don’t have a lot in the way of theatrics. In this case, the Crumpets used the LG’s mobile stage, which is a double decker bus with fold-out stage, complete with lights and a sound system, and it is quite possibly the second-coolest bus ever.

Now, back to their gorilla concert. Despite the fact that virtually none of the present elementary school student body had even been born when Tabitha was a student there, she was still really quite excited about going back to her old school. Tabitha got to see some of her old teachers and she hadn't been in the building in years. Certainly, and even though she would never admit to it, Tabitha found that it was pretty cool to go back to her school as an idol; they even had a picture of her in the hall with a sign that read, “Famous Alumnus.” Regardless of Tabitha being the center of attention, all of the the Crumpets found that performing for a group of kids — many of whom had never been to a live pop-music show, and all of whom were completely surprised by the event — was about as much fun and high-energy as could be had. In fact, the only downside was that they were so wound up after their brief show that they couldn’t relax. So when the Crumpets got back to the Glass, they — with Skeeter’s willingness to stay on duty and mind the bus — decided to perform a second gorilla concert, which was really just an impromptu karaoke party with their friends, many of whom joined the Crumpets on stage (just not all at once, cuz the mobile stage isn’t very big).

Goodbye Halloween
Wrapping up the Halloween season, on the night before the big Goodbye Halloween show, the Crumpets hosted a special last session of the Haunted House especially for the Familiars. Even though, at that time, there were over three hundred registered Familiars, only one hundred and fifty eight were able to go to the Haunted House (some lived too far away). Those who made it were treated to a one-time occurrence, because by the next Halloween, there were far too many Familiars to do this, and the girls would have to opt for a special concert instead. At any rate, it turned into a very fun event, including a bit where Bess and Kari got back at Analey for her rubber nose prank that had very nearly given them a heart attack. 

Yes, the morning after the Tunnel of Doom incident, to torment Kari, Analey had donned a very realistic, swollen and bruised nose (Kari actually nearly fainted and then cried when she saw it). So, to pay her back for that, as well as for all of the videos that Analey and Jimmy had posted (“Terror in the Tunnel: When Besties Turn Savage” was my favorite), KaBe had prepared rubber noses for all of the Familiars to wear when they emerged from the Tunnel of Doom. When Analey, who had been placed at the front of the group, turned around in the Dungeon Room, she was greeted by a sea of swollen and bruised noses, which freaked her out but good. 

KaBe didn’t stop there. They also wore — and had the other Crumpets wear — faux noses during “Bibity” at the GBH show. They slipped them on right as Analey was starting to sing her verse, which is the last: “Dancing through the mist filled air, binggeul, binggeul. Bibity-bobity-boo. Cast your spell, none can undo.” Poor Analey; she managed to get through the song without laughing, but it was really, really hard. 

Other than the nose bit, the GBH show was intentionally only a little different from the Halloween Comeback show because of the fact that most of the audience had not been at the prior show (it was a social faux pas to attend both shows, because doing so would prevent some people from getting to attend either one). Despite wanting to give both audiences a similar experience, there was a small variation in their opening bit, which the girls just had to do. The roof of the Iron Lady “opened” and the spinning cloud came down into the auditorium as it had before. However, this time, rather than the Crumpets emerging from the fog, it was six of the Raspberries. Once the little witches were in full view on the stage, they giggled and playfully ran behind the houses of Halloween Town. There they switched places with their corresponding Crumpet, who then ran out from the opposite side of the house, back onto the stage. This cute little trick was intended to make up for the fact that most everyone in the audience had seen on video or at least heard about the opening roof bit. Regardless, it was a delightful little change.

There is always a twinge of sadness when the Halloween Season ends. So to offset this, and because it is a tradition to sing a Winter Holiday song at the close of the GBH show, the final difference of the evening was that the Crumpets ended this show with TaeTiSeo’s “Dear Santa,” which included having all of the Raspberries, now dressed as elves, dance with them on stage. The crowd loved the whole thing, Eugene loved the Raspberries but hated everything else, and the Crumpets felt like they had worked hard and were worthy of any Hallularity they might receive for their efforts. 

With their Halloween debut at its end, the Crumpets returned home to the LGC where they went to the GBH party which was in progress at Thornbury Hall. Too tired to dress up, the girls just stayed in their stage clothes. (Enid & Bess weren't exactly thrilled about this, but they didn’t have the heart to make them change.) Upon their arrival at Thornbury, they were greeted with a boisterous cheer. 

“Huzzah for the triumphant Crumpets!” Jimmy announced over his microphone. 

Initially the enthusiasm of the other Lookzens got the girls pretty fired up, but it didn’t take long for the exhaustion of the past few weeks to catch up to them. When Jimmy and Amber, who had just turned the DJ console over to the Screaming Beets, went looking for the Crumpets, they found them piled up on a couch on one of the mezzanines that overlooked the main floor. Even though it was a decent-sized couch, it wasn't meant for six people, so they were quite a jumble of arms and legs. 

As they approached, AmJi could see that the girls were fast asleep. 

“Aww, look at how tired our little Crumpets are,” Jimmy said in a sweet voice. 

“They look kind of pathetic all piled up like that,” Amber responded. 

“I am guessing that it would be poor form to take pictures of them like this?” Jimmy inquired. 

“Yes,” Amber replied.

“So we are going to do it, right?” Jimmy asked.

To which Amber coolly answered, “Of course.”

Established October 2015   ​All Rights Reserved 

Established October 2015   ​All Rights Reserved