On a misty night, a feral stallion crawls through the woods, heavily injured, desperately hoping to find someone to help him.
He was kicked out of his herd for a crime he did not commit, and the smarty refused to listen to his pleas of innocence, ordering the toughies to punish him.
They only stopped beating the stallion because he had a stroke of relative genius, and played dead until they weren’t looking at him anymore.
Then he crawled away, and they soon forget about him entirely, because fluffies tend to be forgetful.
But he knows he’s just buying himself time. His wounds are too severe to be healed by hugs.
He’s hoping against hope that he’ll find a human, and right now, he’s not too picky. If they’re nice, they’ll help him. If they’re not, they may just finish him off.
To the stallion, that’s still better than the slow, agonizing death currently awaiting him.
As he crawls onward, the stallion reaches a wrought iron gate, hanging loosely open, and he can just barely make out the words above it, but of course, most fluffies can’t read, and the stallion is one of those fluffies.
The gate is flanked on both sides by statues. On the left, a tall skeleton, and on the right, a short skeleton.
Beyond the gate, the wounded stallion sees a small graveyard.
He can see a few people moving around in there, but he can’t make them out clearly through the darkness and the mist.
They’re the only help he can get, though.
The stallion summons what little energy he has left, forcing himself to keep crawling, silently praying for the Bestest Hoomin to give him strength.
Just as he crosses the threshold, he collapses.
whump
When the stallion comes to, he finds himself still in the graveyard, being looked over by a human, kneeling down over him.
The stallion’s vision is blurry, but he quickly notices that he can’t feel the pain of his wounds anymore, and that the darkness doesn’t seem so dark.
In fact, his body feels a lot lighter. And fluffies don’t weigh that much to begin with.
As his vision clears, he looks up, and immediately has to suppress the urge to scream in terror.
Because it’s not exactly a human looking him over.
It’s a human skeleton.
A walking, talking skeleton, wearing a tattered waistcoat, shirt and pants, and a bowler hat that has seen better days.
However, the skeleton’s eye sockets are still occupied by a pair of surprisingly fresh-looking eyeballs.
He speaks up in a growly, gravelly, drawling, yet jovial voice.
“Good, you’re finally awake.”
The fluffy trembles in fear, not noticing a certain soft rattling sound.
“H-hu am… w-w-wut am…”
The skeleton laughs quietly as he stands up straight.
“Take it easy, kiddo. The name’s Bo. Bo Nidle. Don’t worry, I ain’t gonna hurtcha.”
“H-how am yu still duin wawkies an tawkies? Yu am jus boneies!”
“Ah, that’s a good question. One we’ve been tryin’ to answer for a while.”
“We?”
Bo plucks one of his eyeballs out of the socket, an action that evidently doesn’t harm him, rolling it back and forth between his bony finger and thumb pensively.
“Why don’t you take a look around?”
The stallion does so, noticing more walking skeletons in tattered clothing, a couple dozen of them, all watching him curiously. Like Bo, they still have eyeballs in their sockets, but a couple of them seem to have misplaced a peeper.
One skeleton has a mishmash pair of eyeballs, one blue, the other green, and a yellowed, tattered striped shirt.
Some of them, with particularly yellowy bones, have lost some of those bones. One of them has attempted to replace a missing femur with a length of pipe.
Another of the skeletons is nothing more than just a skull and a pair of inexplicable eyeballs.
Bo pops his eyeball back in as he explains.
“This is the home of the Skeleton Crew, kiddo. Anyone who dies or is buried here… well, they get back up not long after. Might be voodoo… magic-rich soil… or maybe this here graveyard is just cursed. Some of us have been here for a long time, and we ain’t solved the mystery yet. And now, this is your home too.”
“But fwuffy nu am aww bonies wike yu.”
Then Bo chuckles.
“You sure about that?”
He pulls a cracked mirror out of his pocket, holding up so the stallion can see himself.
When the stallion gets a good look at his reflection, he gasps in shock and horror.
For he too has become a walking, talking skeleton, with the obligatory eyeballs being the only soft part of his body now.
“W-w-wut happund tu f-fwuffy?!?”
Bo laughs again, pocketing the mirror and spreading his arms dramatically.
“You’ve been transmogrified, kiddo! You died after you crossed the threshold, and the power of the graveyard brought you back. Well, sort of. Heckuva way to lose weight fast, huh?”
The bodiless skull hops over, chiming in with a voice that sounds like that of a fast-talking, shifty Brooklyn car salesman.
“We all saw it happen. Never seen a fluffy come this way to die before, ya know. Animals usually stay the hell away from this place.”
Bo nods sagely.
“Most living folks what come around here only come when the sun is a-shinin’. We stay in our graves durin’ the day. We don’t wanna spook the skin offa those poor folks.”
The skull sighs wistfully.
“I miss skin.”
“I know ya do, Skullsy. We all do. But hey, it ain’t so bad around here. We gotta do what we can to make the most of this second chance what we’ve been given.”
Bo kneels down again, stroking the stallion’s nonexistent fluff.
“You’re in good company, kiddo. We’ll take care of ya. You’re part of the family now.”
The stallion shrugs.
“Fwuffy nu can gu back tu da hewd aneeway. Nu wike dis. Dey nu did wike fwuffy wen fwuffy wuz awive, dey nu am gunna wike fwuffy nao. Su, uh, wut du we du awound hewe?”
“We sing, we dance, we make merry. But first, introductions are in order. Come on, gang. Gather around.”
The rest of the Skeleton Crew gets closer, sitting on the ground, or on the gravestones.
One skeleton, wearing the kind of beret, vest and tiny sunglasses you’d usually find a beatnik wearing, pulls out a pair of xylophone mallets, and uses them to play a jaunty tune on his own ribcage.
Naturally, some of the skeletons start dancing to the tune.
Bo gestures at the skeletal beatnik, dancing along too.
“Deadbeat’s been with us since the 60s, and he’s one cool cat. He took the phrase starving artist literally, and died for his art!”
Then he gestures at two skeletons who appear to be twin girls, wearing a red dress and a blue dress respectively. They seem to already be enamoured with the new arrival.
“The Skullsen Twins have never been separated, in life or in death! They were born thirteen seconds apart, and died thirteen seconds apart!”
The Skullsen Twins both wave at the skeletal fluffy.
Then Bo gestures at another skeleton, who, judging by his black fedora and suit, riddled with bullet holes, used to be a mobster in life.
“Al Cabone here was tragically gunned down by his fellow gangsters after he was caught squealing to the feds! But that wasn’t the end for him, oh no!”
Al laughs, twirling his fedora on a bony finger.
“And I made 'em regret burying me here!”
Bo then gestures at another skeleton, who is attempting to drink a carton of milk, but is really just splashing it all over himself. He’s sitting on one of the gravestones, several empty milk cartons littered around it.
“This here is Cal Cium. No relation to the Cal you may be thinking of. Yeah, even we’ve heard of that guy. Our Cal heard that milk makes bones stronger, so he’s tryin’ to make himself invincible by… well, you can see. Don’t ask us where he gets all of that milk. We just don’t know.”
Cal the milk-drinking skeleton chimes in with a nasally voice.
“Aw, yiss! Zero damage, here I come!”
Bo disregards this remark and dances over to a skeleton who is dressed as a pirate. He’s wearing the mandatory eye patch over one eye socket, but his other socket is empty, and he has a skeletal parrot sitting on one shoulder.
“And this here is, well, we just call him Jolly Roger. He came here to bury his loot, but his first mate shot him in the back, and buried him with the loot. Roger, you’ve got your patch on the wrong socket again.”
Jolly Roger takes the patch off, revealing one intact eyeball, and puts the patch back on, over the empty socket.
“Arr, thank ye. Shiver me timbers, every time…!”
The skeletal parrot squawks, flapping its bony wings.
“Awk! Twelve and a half percent! Awk!”
“Yarr, Polly, ye still be gettin’ it wrong! It be pieces of eight, ye daft bird!”
Paying this exchange little mind, Bo turns back to the newly risen skeletal fluffy.
“Something just occurred to me, kiddo. You don’t have a name, do ya?”
The fluffy shakes his skull.
“Fwuffy am jus… fwuffy.”
“We’re gonna have to call ya something. As you can see, there’s, ah, a theme going on with us. It’s a rite of passage. Okay, gang, huddle ‘round. We gotta think up a good name for this lil’ fella.”
All the skeletons huddle together, and the fluffy plops down on his bony little bum, watching them.
He turns towards the gate, knowing that somewhere out there in the forest, there’s a home he can never go back to.
He’s not sure how he feels about staying here. Sure, there’s company, but he’s the only fluffy here.
But his newfound skeletal housemates seem like a friendly bunch. He could get used to this.
When he turns back to the group, he sees them all smiling at him, and Bo, apparently being the leader, speaks up.
“Alright, kiddo. I think we’ve agreed upon the perfect new moniker for you.”
“Wets heaw it.”
“Well, we decided that it would be best to keep it simple, so how about… we just call you Mort?”
“Mowt, huh? Yuh, dat soun gud. Fank yu, mistah Boh.”
“You’re welcome, kiddo. Now, whaddya say we celebrate your arrival, and get this party really started?”
“Dat soun gud tu Mowt.”
“Deadbeat! Play us something so jaunty that even the dead can’t resist gettin’ up to dance along!”
Deadbeat nods.
“How about–”
“Not Spooky Scary Skeletons. We’ve done that one to… well, death.”
A few nights later, in a certain city, the Fluffy Cabal meets, in the meeting room of a certain superhero team’s headquarters.
Deston, sitting at the head of the table, gives the rest of the Cabal a… grave look.
“It seems that the Skeleton Crew has acquired another new member, people.”
Calvin shrugs.
“We’re not gonna have to fight them next, are we? Because we’ve got Freddy to deal with… at least those dudes’ skulls aren’t on fire… plus, Eddy and Al already had to fight their way through an entire graveyard full of undead…”
“No, Cal, we won’t have to fight them. They’re not really the malicious type, and they usually keep to their graveyard, so I don’t think they’ll become a threat to fluffykind, or the world in general. However, it’s very relevant that their newest member is, in fact, a fluffy. The first fluffy to join them, I do believe. That he is undead now does not mean his wellbeing no longer matters. I’m sure that they’ll treat him well, but just in case…”
“I should probably introduce myself some time. That graveyard… it’s got some weird power. Seems like something we’ve gotta be looking into.”
Deston nods.
“Oui, but up until now, I thought it was best to merely leave them be. They’re not hurting anyone, and they’re not causing trouble.”
Victor grins.
“Must be awful lonely, though, spending eternity in a remote graveyard. They do know that they don’t have to hide from the living anymore, right?”
“That’s why I think Cal’s idea has merit. We should introduce ourselves.”
Calvin smirks at Deston.
“And not just to see if any of them would be willing to join the ChaotiX.”
“Well, we have vampires, werewolves and zombies, walking skeletons wouldn’t be out of place.”
“Huh. Maybe we should recruit some other werebeasts too. Y’know what, deal with this first. So where is this graveyard, Des?”
Tommy lights up an atomica, having placed a Smoke-Sucker on the table.
“Cal, be real with me: you ain’t thinking about burying any fallen ChaotiX members there, are ya?”
“I wasn’t thinking about that, Tommy. Come on, I wouldn’t do something like that without permission! If you think I’d go around turning people into undead without their consent, you must’ve mistaken me for Dehak. Or Varney. Or Ianos. Or Necrosis. Or–”
“It’s cool, man, just had to be sure. S’alright?”
“S’alright. So where is the graveyard, Des?”
Deston steeples his fingers.
“That’s the interesting thing, Cal. It’s in Massachusetts.”
“Wait, you mean where the Eternal Gentlemen’s Club was? You don’t think it’s alchemy that gave that graveyard its power, do you?”
Victor shrugs.
“It’s not like we can ask Eli if he had anything to do with it. Well, we can, but you know how Des feels about going Down There.”
“Fair enough. If it’s near Salem, then witchcraft could be the cause.”
Deston chuckles.
“Cal, I must be honest with you: most of the people tried for witchcraft back in those days lacked so much as a single drop of magical power. Giles Corey is the most notable actual mage to be a victim of the Salem Witch Trials.”
“The guy who Corey University is named after, right? So he really was a wizard.”
“Indeed, he was. But I suppose that we will find the cause of the graveyard’s power, one way or another. I’m not ruling out the possibility of a Stone of Octavo being hidden there.”
Then it’s Cal’s turn to shrug again.
“Eh, I’ve ruled it out. There were already two on Earth, it’ll be too convenient if there’s a third one here. Couldn’t hurt to check, though.”
“You may be right, Cal. Which brings us to the next topic of tonight’s meeting…”
Deston looks at the big screen behind the seat of the table.
When Valerie presses a few buttons on her COMP, it lights up, displaying a photo of a dilapidated temple in a rainy jungle.
“…the mysterious disappearance of the Weaver’s Orb.”