Midnight Fright!
You are still lost in your wonderings when Veles returns with what he was looking for- a jar of peanut butter. He ignores the look of further confusion on your face and bids you to follow him again, leading you out of the store room and back into the shop. As he peers out the front window to check the status of the chaos and discord outside, you open your mouth to ask him just how he plans on the two of you surviving, wielding only a shield, a banana, and peanut butter against candlewax monsters that seem to reform no matter what, but he cuts in quickly, before you can speak.
“Come with me. Quickly, quickly," the weapons' master urges, waving you through the back door and into an alley that the wax monsters seemed to have overlooked. Silently, you creep forward with Veles, soon enough coming to the mouth of the alley. There are still residents running around frantically, trying to fend off the eerie little creatures, which were now shrieking gleefully and chucking gobs of vanilla cookie scented wax at people.
“You go that way,” Veles instructs, pointing toward the right. You quickly glance that way, surveying the scene. The creatures are everywhere, and you spot Professor Ng crouching behind a trash can, trying to pry dried wax from her tail. You turn to speak to Veles, but see that he’s already headed off in the other direction, so you turn and dash toward Professor Ng.
“Good, I’m glad you’re here,” she says, continuing to pick wax out of her tail as you approach. She eyes your weapons skeptically, shaking her head.
“Well, I see that you’ve spoken to Veles since this happened. Oh, well. No time to worry about it. Come with me. We have got to get this under control.” With that, Ng strode off, leaving you to follow. Suddenly, out of nowhere, one of the little wax monsters comes flying at you, catching you off guard. With no time to think of what to do, you thrust out your hand and attack it - with the banana. The fruit smooshes and oozes out of its ruptured peel, getting all over your hand and the little candle wax creature.
Well, that was useless! you think in dismay, taking a step back and noting that vanilla cookies and bananas is not a good scent mix.
After a momentary pause, the wax creature comes at you again and you jump back, swinging the only weapon you have left at it. The button shield merely grazes the creature, sending warm wax shavings flying. At that moment, Ng pulls a miniature, stoppered decanter from one of her many pockets and pulls out the cork, dumping a green-yellow liquid over the monster. At first it doesn’t seem to do anything, then the little wax figure freezes where it is and drops to the ground. Eyes wide, you turn to Professor Ng.
“Professor, what was in that tube?” You ask as she bends to pick up the frozen wax creature.
“An assortment of chemicals… and peanut oil,” she replies, pocketing it. That was why Veles had brought the peanut butter with him!
“But how did you know?” You say, looking confused.
“These little Wickletts were Lunas, originally,” she explains. “But sometimes the fog that rolls in around this time of year is thick with something that reacts with their wax, and causes them to come alive with mischief. This has only happened twice since I was here. The first time was horrible. We had to wait until the fog went away. The second time, I had anticipated the incident and worked out several possible ways to stop them, and this was the one that worked. After that, we stored them away someplace safe, but it looks as if they have gotten out.” She pulls a few more vials from her pockets and offers them to you.
“Now hurry, we have wasted enough time already. We have got to change them all back to Lunas before all of Cruithne is covered in wax.” Without waiting for you to answer, Ng turns and strides off, wielding a trash can lid. You watch as she whacks the Wickletts with the lid, and then pours some of the solution over the stunned creature. Encouraged, you begin to do the same with your button shield.
Working tirelessly for several hours and with the help of a few citizens, you, Veles, and Ng finally meet back in front of the Armoury. Ng has returned to picking wax out of her fur.
“I think we’ve finally gotten them all. I received word from Harena that the fog quickly disappeared shortly after it arrived. So no Wickletts there, thankfully,” Veles says, looking around to survey the damage.
“I’ll set about gathering them up, and return them to Io in the morning,” Ng states, throwing some more wax onto the ground. "And those in Harena are lucky. This could have turned out much, much worse than it did."
“I’m just glad that’s over,” you confess. You’re tired, a little weirded out by the events of the night, and you smell like cookies. You’d like nothing more than to go home, clean up, and take a nap.
“Indeed.” Professor Ng agrees, adjusting her glasses.
“Now all we have to do is clean up all this wax,” Veles says.
And, so you, Ng, and Veles stayed and tidied up Settlement One. The annual Halloween trick-or-treating was postponed until the next night, where dozens of settlers dressed up in interesting costumes. However, there was one little settler that dressed up as a Wicklett. Let's just say he definitely attracted much of a crowd!
Happy Halloween, Cruithneans!
To help celebrate this scary day, a few items have been brought back from previous years!
      
The Pumpkin Beanie, Skeleton Beanie, Baby Vampire Beanie, Green Haired Zombie Teenager Beanie, Blue Haired Zombie Teenager Beanie, Ginger Zombie Teenager Beanie, and the Zombie Shop Assistant Beanie have been released yet again in the Marketplace!
Wait, is there more?
The Candigolin pet species has been spotted! Be sure to adopt one very quickly - they will go back into hiding soon!
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