fandomhigh | Practical Folklore, Monday 2nd period

"Welcome to your final," Jon said once everyone had settled in. He was holding a stack of papers like a dork, and the Danger Shop was configured like a boring classroom for the moment. "Today we'll have a brief exam and some essay questions." He gestured at the woman standing next to him. "Along with some help from our guest lecturer."

Liliana gave the assembled class a small, pleased smile and a nod.

He passed out the papers to each of them. "First of all, I'll be using this room to call up a few examples of each being we've discussed, and I'd like you each to look at them, speak with them if you wish, and determine what they are and how you'd deal with them, and write that down." Call it a mixed practical and written exam.

Surely this could not go badly?

Jon went back up to the front desk and punched buttons, and an assortment of beings with shirts labeled "1", "2", "3", and so forth appeared before the class. He looked to Liliana to make sure the zombies seemed okay.

With an examination that would make an art appraiser proud, Liliana looked over the zombies that she'd helped input into the Danger Shop and nodded her approval. Tony was right, this had been easy.

Not that the zombies were alone. There were zombies, vampires, women perched on rocks combing out their hair and singing, men with eyes that shone lambent in the light and looked a little shaggier than one might expect and many, many more.

"Right. Here we go." Jon pressed a button, and the beings came to life and started milling around. Ask your questions, students!

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Did you guess #4 was a siren? Because they were now putting the moves on #3, and...huh, that was apparently a werewolf. #6 (a probable vampire) looked a bit scowly, and #7-10 (definitely gremlins) chomped on #12 (fae). Wait...those were fake gremlins, right? Right?

Welp, now two fae and a vampire were ganging up on the werewolf, the siren was trying to start a cabaret with a witch (lovely singing voice) and a golem (no voice, nice legs).

And then it tripped over a werebadger. Fur flew. Fangs flew. Vampires flew. This...was not good.

"Stop it!" Jon dove for the control panel and tried to turn them off. More gremlins appeared. Stupid Danger Shop.

"Jon," Liliana said, taking a step forward, forehead furrowed. "Jon, what's happening?" She shouldn't be able to actually feel her zombies, Jon. They were supposed to be illusions, Jon.

Three of the zombies leapt upon the very nice witch, dragging her down to the ground, screaming. Several more turned and started menacing some of the students and Liliana raised up a hand, stopping them in their tracks, one of them with their mouth open to bite. "What's happening, Jon?"

"I don't know!" Jon pushed another button, and when it did nothing, hit the console. "I think the gremlins got into the machine!"

And here came a few more! Jon yelled and jumped up onto the console. If the buttons wouldn't help, maybe he could at least keep his ankles out of reach. "Right, everyone out of here! I'll try to...um...hold them off!"

Somehow. Look, he had no idea what he was doing at this point, but he wasn't letting his students get hurt. "STOP," he ordered the nearest creature, and it halted abruptly. He wasn't sure how many of them he could order at once, though.

"Jon, darling," Liliana said, voice falsely pleasant, "do let me know what the plan is?" All of the zombies stood up in unison, eyes glowing bright purple, flanking out to guard various students. A werewolf lunged at her and a zombie intercepted it, both of them hitting the ground with a muffled thud.

"The plan was for them to ask questions and this thing to behave normally!" Jon snapped back. Plan? Had you met him? "I...I can probably stop them one at a time if you can kill them!"

Assuming the students didn't jump in the middle of things as Fandom students were wont to.

"Okay, you heard him!" Liliana snapped. "Either get out or help take them down!"

One hell of a final exam. Her old professors at Witherbloom would be thrilled.

Edited 2023-12-18 16:52 (UTC)

Several of the creatures advanced on Charlie. She held her phone out. "I have the Gale Aunties on speed dial. I wouldn't if I were you."

They all quickly (and smartly) retreated.

"Did that actually work?" Arden asked, from where she was hiding behind two of the zombies, which was definitely a weirder experience than she'd anticipated.

"Yep." Charlie held her phone out towards the zombies. "I'm not kidding. They can be here in minutes."

"No, no, these are friendly zombies!" Arden said quickly, holding onto their sleeves. "The scary--um. I mean. Ms. Vess has them keeping the rest of the things off us."

And Arden was just fine with having ablative zombie armor, thank you.

"Ah, sorry zombie friends, carry on," Charlie said. "Not exactly what I expected for today's class, you?"

"Nope! Definitely not," Arden said. "I didn't expect mortal danger."

Charlie laughed. "We're supposed to be safe in the danger shop, but who even knows how this happened. We'll be fine, though. Threats seem to work well and I can do some defensive charms if necessary."

Arden gingerly patted her zombies again. "I'm very glad that our exam isn't to kill everything in here. I'll settle for getting away."

"Better to get away and live to fight another day," Charlie agreed. "But I think something just went wrong with the Danger Shop. I'm sure it will be fine soon!"

Practical Folklore, Monday 2nd period

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