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"Oh, I do hope he's ok, poor lamb," Rap sighed, chewing the toffee from a toffee apple.

"Poor lamb?!" Rave exclaimed, battling to separate his teeth, "he's a sixteen-years old soon-to-be minion of Hell, not a defenceless toddler!"

Rap looked sad, "yes, but he's been whisked away to goodness-only-knows-where all by himself."

"Weeell, we know where: Hell. Outer circle anyways. It's like work experience, innit? Do him good."

"I dread to think what awful things are down there."

"That suckie is down there," Rave said.

"Exactly! And you know that big grey dummy, he'll be puckering up in no time, getting his soul chewed on like a Wham! bar..."

They ambled down the corridor, dodging flitting bats and trying not to step on fat, hairy spiders that skittered across the shiny flooring. The other students gave them a wide berth - Rap and Rave were well-known in the faculty now, rumour was that they were real dinosaurs, though everyone knew they were just large lizards really, as dinosaurs were all extinct from the big meteor. Except Nessie. Nessie was real, they'd seen the blurry photographs, and the scientists all said she couldn't really be a dinosaur, so that meant Nessie was DEFINITELY real, if the experts said she wasn't.

The pair had been apple-bobbing and it had been fun, though a bit too easy thanks to long, slim jaws. They'd missed Anar not being with them, because he'd have been useless at it, and watching your friends fail spectacularly was the highest form of entertainment. He'd have snivelled about getting his lovely hair wet, and blown bubbles with his snout when it was submerged in the water and he was unable to breathe, and Rave would have dunked him in for a laugh.

"But how will he get back, without us there to help him? Mind you, I say that, but I don't have my evil repelling wards and positivity-blessed things with me anymore, do I?"

Rave got a batwing to the face, paused, and pulled off the screeching, flappy mouse, dangling it from a claw. "What was the plan with those things of yours, exac'ly?"

"When we find our doggy security friends, you'll see, dear."

"Ok," Rave let the bat go, it swooped off ahead. "Why are bats scary?"

"I honestly don't know. Maybe because they come out at night."

"So... moths are scary?"

"To some people, I daresay."

"And badgers?"

"Could be scary. I think anything can be scary in the right setting."

"Like big ears is afraid of being alone?"

Rap nodded, "yes. And he's terrified of the Council of Sorcerer's."

Rave stopped, "why's he afraid of a bunch of old men in dresses and long beards, waving magic sticks around? I thought they were nice? They hand out those pretty necklaces and stuff."

Rap shrugged, "I haven't got a clue, but if he says their out to get him, then they can't be as nice as everyone thinks."

"What did he do?"

Rap shook his head, "don't worry about it, dear. It's probably for the best that you don't listen to a word he says."

"I hear him! My dad hates me, I don't want to be a demon, I don't want to go to Hell, my family don't love me, don't turn off Home and Away, what's for dinner? That's Anar in a nutshell, that is."

"There's a bit more to him than that, you're just too busy insulting him to see it."

Rave mumbled his doubts.

Cackling laughter echoed down the corridor, bright green flashes lit up doorways and the pale forms of spectres drifted from room to room accompanied by surprised yelps and nervous laughter. Hallowe'en trickery and spooky surprises were around every corner.

The wall panels began seeping blood.

"Glad I'm not the one to clean that up," Rave joked.

Rap watched the crimson drops soaking down to the floor. "Anar's supposed to be making a blood sacrifice later. I hope he gets back in time for it. He's meant to be doing that offering to the Dark Lord, too. Wait a minute," Rap grabbed Rave's elbow, "there's a link to the Underworld, isn't there? Ghoulies and ghosties are coming up to us, and all the gifts to Satan are going down."

"What, like a supernatural elevator?"

"I guess so. Anar's down there! We could find this link and go get him!"

"Do we have to?" Rave complained, "it's been nice, just me and you, it can wait 'til after pumpkin carving, yeah?"

"I really want him to do his offering, it's something he's been fretting about for a while now, and it's the perfect time for our security pals to get involved, too." Rap walked into the laboratory; bubbling colourful liquids in large glass tubes and flasks filled the room, a large metal coil that stretched the length of the classroom hummed and vibrated, the crow who ran the department was wearing a white lab coat splattered with viscera, adjusting a nozzle from a ray of some sorts.

"Treasure hunt?" he squawked, adjusting his safety goggles.

"Yes, ta. What's the prize?"

"Tube of smarties for every participant. Find all the hidden relics and I'll let you have a go on the transmogrifier."

Rave immediately wanted to touch everything and dip his claws into the vials.

"A hands-on scientist, I see. Excellent! The finest scientific minds throughout history have been their own test subjects."

Rap smacked his partner away from the foul-smelling concoctions, "no!" he snapped.

"Why can't Anar do mad scientist lessons?" the big raptor wailed, "I like it in here!"

"Magic is overrated," the teacher ruffled his black feathers, "I can do amazing things with a few ingredients, or with a jolt of electricity. Necromancy? Pah! With a few thousand volts I, too, can reanimate the dead without any icky zombieness involved. You want to control someone's mind? I have a potion for that, it leads the drinker into a stupor, leaving them open to your command, unable to refuse. Alchemy? No problem, I can give you gold out of almost anything, with this deconstructor. It rips apart the elements of whatever you put into it, all you have to do is put them back together a certain way and you have riches beyond belief."

Rave's eyes were wide. He was giddy. "Money? From... anything?"

"Almost anything," the crow confessed, "and you may only get a few atoms of what you want, but in theory, sure."

"Rave! We've got what we want," Rap shook the treasure hunt paper, "come along, now."

"But... look at it! Look at the bubbly stuff. Don't you want to know what it does?"

Following his green, scaly finger, the blood-splattered lab technician half-walked, half flapped to the spiralling tubing filled with brightly coloured bubbles that had caught Rave's eye. "This is the transmogrifier! Its liquid scrambles human and anthro DNA. The deconstructor is for inanimate objects. This beauty, however, is designed for living subjects. Not permanent; that would be unethical. No, this is temporary. When it works, at least." The crow looked down at his stained coat. "It's... still in the testing process."

"Gives me the heeby jeebies!" Rap huffed. "Mixing bits of animals up."

The crow hopped up closer, "isn't that just evolution, though? Look at you, look at me, we're all an amalgamation of species - human and animal. Even the so-called superior humans have ancient genetics from the monkeys they came from: a tail bone at the base of their spine, and webbing between their pink fingers from the sea creatures they once were. Why would a drink that lets you experience what it is like to be, say, a wolf, or a horse, or a squirrel be such an awful thing? With one little tweak, you could be anything, we're all merely a different shuffle of the same amino acid pairings, after all."

"I wanna be a squirrel!"

"Rave, you are not allowed to be a squirrel, and that's the end of it. Look at his lab coat! You'll be a messy smear!"

"Look, you can have your weejee club, and I can have my evil scientist thing, ok? I want to fire a laser at summat!"

"Aren't lasers amazing?" the teacher enthused, "healing magic is a thing of the past, we can make the blind see with laser eye surgery, now!"

Rap grabbed his partner, who was almost frothing at the mouth at this point, and dragged him toward the door. "If we find all the relics, you can have a play later. Without Anar, you won't find anything!"

"What? Well, what we waiting for? Let's go find big ears! He's in Hell, yeah? Easy peasy, let's go..."

Rave trotted along; his thumping, wide-splayed lizard feet shaking the building as he went.

"What's the rush, lads?"

The glow of a spark-shooter lit up as they rounded a corner. The security jackals in their High-Viz jackets blocked the way. "Oh, it's you! Having a fun Hallowe'en? Where's the grey fella?"

"He's been sent to Hell by Crowley as part of a prank," Rap explained as Rave tried wrestling past them, impatiently. "We're going to help him get back."

"Steady on! It's restricted access past this point, big guy."

Rave bared his teeth.

"Look, boys, it's all well and good trying that on the students here, but we're security, and trust us, you're not as scary as some of the shit we deal with on the regular."

"We need to find the Underworld link, please," Rap asked sweetly, playing with his skirt. "It's ever so important."

"We're sure it is," they said softly, being nicer to Rap because he was kind and gentle. "But there's Directors in the room ahead..."

Rap and Rave both tried to push their noses past now, "Directors? Does one of them look like our grey friend?"

"We don't know. Even we're not important enough to have any dealings with them."

"Cooo-eeeee! Mister Warlock?!"

Security pushed a paw over Rap's flapping mouth, "are you mad? You'll get yourself turned into a puddle on the floor."

"Ok, take us to the link please?" he asked, batting his lizard eyes.

"I dunno..."

"YOUR SON'S DOING EVER SO WELL!"

"Crap, alright! We'll take you, just shut up for all our sakes!" The jackals whirled around, hoping the door wouldn't open and a work performance review would be imminent.

All was quiet.

They exhaled, and led the two green dinosaurs off into another wing of the college.

"Crowley is breaking College rules," Rap hissed to one of their dog friends as they walked. "You know you want to get Alexis in trouble because he's always so horrible to you, saying security is only for the unemployable and prospective homeless, well, if you come to the offering ceremony later, I promise you that you'll get to embarrass him in front of teachers and students."

"Really?" it seemed too good to be true.

"Really! It'll be great, promise."

"Hmmm, it is the day of trickery, I mean..."

"I would never!" Rap feigned insult.

The Underworld link was a bright blue ring of light on the floor, a series of written Infernal and unholy scripture holding a misty vortex within, sat on the floor like a magical sinkhole.

The security jackals nodded to the hooded figure stood adjacent to the mystical gateway, who then motioned for the dinosaurs to stand upon it, in order to descend.

The dogs gave them chummy thumbs-up, as a wall of light surrounded Rap and Rave and they dropped through the floor, suddenly, their stomachs turning, travelling to Hell to find their aardvarkian friend.

Noise and lights and smoke erupted from a stage, dancers spun and twirled in glittering, sequined leotards, skirts of mesh and ribbons on sticks caught the stage lights as succubi entranced the gathered crowd before them, putting on a fine display of soft skin and long limbs, porcelain faces and elegant lithe bodies.

Rave pulled a face, moving against the flow of the throng, Rap following behind.

"You think he might be here? He does like women with few clothes on," the big raptor asked, ducking out of the way of wings and tentacles and slender tails that had massive spikes on the end.

"I hope not, it'll be a bugger to spot him, everyone's got horns and wings and tails here. Lots of grey demons around, too."

"There's the big Hell Afterlife Services building, look. Where all the business demons go. It's really tall. Look at all that glass, like a New York skyscraper."

"It's rubbish. They've got a Starbucks at least. And a McDonalds. I wonder if there's an Unhappy Meal in Hell?' Rave joked. "There better be a pub."

Rap stopped on a corner where an imp was juggling chainsaws for donations of loose change. "It's weird here, that's for sure. Rather different to Ilchester."

"Bloody warm," Rave commented.

"I think that's the idea, yes, dear. Big furnaces where the tormented souls of evil people are incinerated."

Rave was confused, "I thought evil people worked here?"

"Don't ask me, it's all very complicated. Mortal souls are weighed up by some ancient Egyptian parrot dude and if your soul is too heavy, it's down you go."

"I should be alright then; I don't eat that much."

Rap scoffed, "yeah right, all those sweets you been scoffing! I don't think it's food that makes your soul heavy. It's doing bad things."

"Like not sending your aluminium drinks cans in to Blue Peter for the recycling appeal?"

"Yeah. Or not wearing a poppy on Remembrance Sunday."

"If Anar got into Heaven, do you think he would get into a scrap with his snotty little brother?" Rave asked.

"I don't think they'd let Anar in for security reasons. Could you imagine? Sweet, trusting, innocent angels everywhere, and then you've got him running about? He's been in college about a month, and he's been kissing a succubus and a teacher!"

"True, he does seem to be playing Snog Bingo and going for a Full House."

A cloud of dust appeared on the shimmering horizon, past the busy labyrinthine streets and shopping district, far beyond the river Styx and the Great Pit.

"What's over there?" Rap asked.

"That's the outer levels, that is, where we keep all our wildlife and things that like isolation," the goblin-like red imp chatted as he spun the chainsaws in the air, the buzzing and growling of the tiny petrol motors being drowned out by a deep rumbling that could be felt through the artificial ground.

The raptors looked at each other. "It's got to be, hasn't it? He can't just get lost in the outer levels, that's too easy, no, he's got to get dragged into some adventure or another. Come on..."