We Have Free Cookies

Carrie presented the poster to her new club supervisor. “Bask in my genius!” She exclaimed expectantly. “Surely this will be sufficient enough to post around campus?”

Phoenix cocked his head, staring blankly at the page. “Lotta words.” 

She leaned in. “Excellent, go on!”

The teacher cocked further, cracking his neck. “No colors or pictures?”

“Any imagery of the Great Old One embeds insanity into any who view it! We have no use for far-gone acolytes in our club! This poster is meant to inform, to inspire, and to educate! It must serve no other purpose than to ensnare the hearts and minds of those foolish enough to read its words and pull them towards their eternal salvation!” She slammed her foot on a chair, using it like a soapbox to raise herself upward with her fist in the air in triumph. 

Phoenix slouched in the same seat, spitting her dress out of his mouth. “Cool. Where do they meet?”

The fanatic looked down. “Here, of course! Where else?”

“Don’t say so on the paper,” he said, looking at it again just to make sure.

Carrie snatched the poster from his hand. Skimming through the wall of text proved Phoenix correct. “Oh- uh..well, Flabby One, that may be true, but—”

“And what’s the name of the club?” 

“…T-The poetry club!”

“And what do you do in the poetry club?”

“Erm, read poems? Duh?”

“Whom’s poems?”

“Uh. H.P. Lovecraft…?”

“And what are they about?”

“W-worship.”

“Oh. So you call it the poetry club while you’re obviously only running it for worship?”

“It—!” The young woman raised a finger. Her cephalopod mask hid her open mouth, gasping to finish a single word. “I— you know… o-one thing I… I sh-”

Phoenix slouched patiently. He wondered if all club leaders were this enthused. 

She put the finger down. “Excuse me for one moment.”

“Of course.”

She hunched over, ripping open a sharpie pen. Hastily, she scribbled something onto the bottom of the poster. She blew on the wet ink profusely the moment she finished, despite her mask not having any air vents. She pulled it up for the teacher to read again: 

Phoenix smirked. “Nice. By the way, you baking homemade cookies or buying from the store? They put artificial coloring in most of them. Red 40 is hella bad for you.”

“Red 40? Red 40!? Ohhh, this is all for naught!” Carrie threw the pen down to the floor. “How should anyone take me seriously if my frugal advertisements aren’t enough to win them over? And how am I supposed to take you seriously if all you care about is eating!”

“Huh, wazzat?” Phoenix mumbled with his mouth full of cheese puffs, suspicious red dust coating his fingers, sweater, and half of everything he would touch today.

Carrie wailed. “My club is doomed!” She sank to the floor, joining her pen in the choir of hopelessness. Phoenix wiped himself off (it didn’t help) and stood up.

“It’s not all bad. I didn’t say no when you asked me to vouch for your club; the Admins didn’t understand your passion. We can do something together to keep your club from shutting down. All you need is four members.”

“Nonsense,” the fanatic shook her head. “Though I may be grateful for you to have offered my place of not-worship a second chance, I cannot continue to rely on your assistance, Flabby One. Why, one who is not cultured in the ways of the Great Old One could never truly be fit to become my disciple.”

The teacher did that weird blink again. “You mean the books? I read ’em.” 

His face was suddenly squished up against a green silicone squid mask. “You have?!” Carrie asked, pushing further into his squishy face.

“Erm, I thimk zo.” His feet were suddenly swept into the air, and his arms were tied close to his belly in what would be a rib-crushing bear hug if it wasn’t for his unnatural pain tolerance. 

“Yippie—! I mean, Huzzah! A man of culture!” Carrie ejaculated. “You! A reader of the sacred texts, shall aid in my calling as Messenger for the Great Old One, Cthulhu! Together, we shall rule this forsaken academy and convert every last one of those heathens beyond these doors! Come now! We must commence at once! Here, take my copy of—on second thought, you had better cleanse yourself of… the red forties first. You’ll stain my sacred texts.”

Phoenix stared at his grubby, stubbed fingers. He shrugged nonchalantly. “Bet. What will you do over the weekend?”

“Me? Oh, I have only concocted the grandest plan known to heathenkind! I will photocopy more of these posters and hand them out myself! I will scour every corner of the campus and make my message known! Copy after copy, thousands upon thousands, even the rats and roaches lurking under our sewers, will face the light of the Old Ones’…poetry! Then, with a face behind the club’s name, I shall lure my disciples in with a false promise of sanity, non-worship, and cookies! Then, all of ERA will—”

“—Like every club does.” Phoenix picked at the edge of his eyelid. 

“They do what!” Carrie lost her balance. She tripped off the soapbox, landing with a huge thud. 

He flicked some eye crust across the room. “Yeah. Like. That’s what clubs are supposed to do. You know. To advertise. Get members. Not die.”

“The heathens continue to sabotage me! I must leave at once!” The non-cultist scurried out of the library’s clubroom on all fours, attracting the dirtiest look amongst its regulars. 

---

Carrie’s shoulders buckled under the weight of her words—that was to say, the giant stack of papers she was forced to carry with all the might of her two frail arms for the fourth time this week. The edges of the paper creased her worn, silken white gloves and dug into the skin beneath. Sure, It was discomforting, but no pain was comparable to the eternal damnation she would single-handedly save the school from. 

However, that statement was no longer entirely true. Now, Carrie had a disciple. 

Ah, yes. The disciple—an unlikely surprise, to be sure, but a welcome one. Finally, after all the years of devotions and offerings and warnings and spreading the terrible gospel of the Great Old Ones, she had attained her very first follower. A follower who would undoubtedly convey his undying support for her and her lord, who would sacrifice every material possession in his pocket to be saved, who would offer his services for as long as he lived and answer to her every beck and call. Yes… that’s what her disciples were meant to do. 

“Hey. Buddy!” Artemis, the cashier at the storefront, snapped her fingers in front of her mask. Carrie snapped to attention. 

“You! How dare you disturb my prophetic visions of grandeur!”

“Well they better be visions of clearing all of this mess from my walls! What kind of “grandeur” has shitty pamphlets all over a side corner store?!” Artemis pointed at Carrie.

The store they were standing in had been coated with wet glue and haphazardly placed sheets of printer paper all over the exterior window panes, blotching out the sun. Even the store’s new life-sized dolphin Therian cup noodle mascot wasn’t spared. If Artemis hadn’t known any better, she would have guessed Carrie was a devotee to Jackson Pollock. 

“Are all the redden-heads the same?!  Always questioning and defying me! You and your sultry outfits—!”

“Hey!”

“—You wouldn’t be related to my unfaithful dorm mate, would you?”

Artemis blew her lips apart, unamused. “I can’t even–” she threw her hands up. “I go on break for fifteen minutes, and I come back to this? What the hell are you doing to my store? To my mascot!?”

The mascot sneezed. A few posters blew off its shoulders.

Carrie shook her head. “Never mind your petty concerns about public maintenance! These are all posters for my Lovecr- Poetry! Poetry Club! Join and be saved! Or neglect and repent!” She set down her fat stack of posters on the counter, rattling everything not glued or bolted down. She pried the topmost copy off the stack and into Artemis’ face. The cashier begrudgingly paused, reading aloud.

“‘We have… free… cookies?’ Really? That’s your new way of brainwashing the school? Bet it’s those store-bought packs they pump full of seed oils and Red 40 in the batter!” Artemis crumpled the poster and tossed it behind her. The paper ball bounced off the cash register, hit the ceiling fan, smacked Carrie atop the forehead, and bounced dead center into the trash bin’s open lid. “If you hadn’t vandalized the entire store, I would almost feel bad you didn’t know there’s already a poetry club!”

Carrie scoffed, puffing out her chest. “Of course I know there’s already a poetry club. It is mine!”

“Uh, no.” Artemis wagged her finger. “No no no. There are two poetry clubs. Yours, the weird one, and Professor Mara’s, the cooler one. The one where you read something other than some racist old lunatic’s ramblings about octopi.”

The cultist slammed her fists against the counter, sending the stack of posters flying. “WHILE I STRONGLY WISH TO CORRECT YOUR GRAMMATICAL ERROR OF THE PLURAL FOR OCTOPUS, I WILL HAVE YOU KNOW IT IS A GIANT KRAKEN OLDEN GOD OF INEVITABILITY! NOT AN OCTOPUS, OR A SQUID, OR A MANIC FIGMENT OF MY IMAGINATION!” She swiveled, adjusting her mask covering her blushing, sweat-stained face. It was at the moment she interrupted her own mindless ramblings that the cashier’s words sunk in through the hard exterior of her mask. “Wait. What do you mean, ‘Professor Mara’s’ club? He is my disciple. It’s not… his club.”

Artemis rolled her eyes. “Uh, yeah, it is? There’s the old one you’re literally running into the ground as we speak. Then there’s his. A functional club. You know, the one where people aren’t forced to join out of fear. Or cheap, hazardous cookies.”

“Free cookies! And it’s for the same club!” Carrie threw her hands in the air, slapping half of what remained of the man-sized stack of papers all throughout the store. “Why didn’t my own disciple mention it was me who headed the club?! He’s supposed to serve me, not supervise me! This mutiny will not stand! I shall reprimand him at once!”

“Or, better yet, you take all this delusional garbage off my walls before I call security,” Artemis grumbled, her finger hovering over the silent alarm button underneath her register.  

Carrie stared coldly. “I’d urge you to consider option three: humor me, and I’ll humor your substandard studying habits in Biology II. Don’t forget who has the highest grade in class.”

Artemis clicked her tongue. “For a month.”

“Two weeks and the cookies?” She could feel the death glare from the red woman’s eyes and the Red 40 radiating from the box. “…You have a month.” 

Carrie unceremoniously turned and walked out of the store, the electronic bell announcing her exit. The statue held still for only a moment longer before slowly approaching the cashier, poster copies slipping off her oversized tail with every step and unloading an armful of ramen packs on the counter. 

“Just… don’t say anything this time.” The aquatic mascot whimpered on the verge of tears. 

---

Screw disciples. Having a henchman was overrated anyway. What was she thinking, relying on someone else to perform her duties as Abyssal Messenger? She should have suspected something was awry once he volunteered to commandeer her mission. Such a simpleton could never understand: it was never just about poetry. It was about something far greater! Something far more important than sitting in a circle, analyzing some dainty prose on a page. A cause so palpable even the lowest of creatures would eventually realize the weight upon the shoulders of the only one worthy to accept it. Unless, of course, one of said creatures was the Professor. 

Carrie stormed through the halls, swinging open the double doors against their squeaky hinges. Several students studying or browsing the shelves craned their necks to see who was disturbing ERA’s only public facility dedicated to quiet enjoyment. Though many more who knew better would avert their gaze from the source of their disturbance. 

One of the less informed assistant librarians rushed in to intercept. Still, before they even got a word out, they were hoisted above the ground by the collar of their shirt. 

“Take me to Professor Mara!” Carrie demanded, her third eye glowing ominously. 

The assistant choked. “I-I don’t know what you’re talking about!” 

“You’re in my way then!” Carrie tossed the assistant, sending them crashing into one of the study tables, snapping the polished wood surface in two upon impact. In her cacophony of pointless violence, the door to her club appeared in the corner of one of her eyes. Her march continued until voices from the other side gave her pause right before she burst through the doors. Familiar voices. 

Phoenix. 

Her knees dropped to the floor. She slammed her silicone face to the keyhole, desperate to catch the man red-handed. And not from that WD-40 dust.

“…that’s enough Dickinson for today. Thank you for coming, and be sure to join us tomorrow for Poe’s The Raven and whether or not he was actually writing about a real Therian in his life or a bird.” 

People packed their things; most were headed for the free cookies on the side table. A familiar face approached the traitor, adjusting his large, rounded glasses.

“Hey, Prof,” Hugo said, unable to contain his snickering. “I thought of something hilarious during the meeting.”

Phoenix turned. “I like funny. Shoot.”

“Ok, so- you know Emily Dickinson, right? Was she ever friends with…” he burst out laughing. “Was she friends with E. E. Cummings?”

The professor chuckled. “Hah. Sex.”

Oh no. That was terrible. They’re ruining my club!  How could this get any worse? Carrie continued to peek through the keyhole, her blood boiling. 

“Ahah, yes, hilarious.” A third joined the conversation, appalling the cultist. Skyber gently nudged Hugo away with her wing and stood by the professor. “I must say, it’s very refreshing to finally have a poetry club with a semblance of class befitting its name. Today’s meeting was enjoyable—I might catch myself arriving at the next one.” 

Carrie couldn’t even hear Phoenix’s response over the ringing in her ears. She gripped the handle, her knuckles turning white until it suddenly gave way. The door burst open with a slam, and Carrie fumbled into the room. Her awkward entrance adjusted with each aggressive stomp toward Phoenix, concluding with an accusatory index finger driving into his pudgy stomach. 

“I KNEW IT!” She screamed.

“Ah. And there goes the class. It was fun while it lasted.” Skyber scoffed, turning to the door before her lovely afternoon would be further soiled by a cult-induced migraine.

Hugo jumped like a loaded spring. “C-Carrie?! What are YOU doing—oh, wait. You’re supposed to be here. But why such a dramatic entrance, you didn’t have to E. E. Cum-ing through the door so fast!”

Carrie held a fist to his face. “Say something like that one more time, and I swear on each of my tentacles I will knock your teeth out.”

He pushed up his slipping glasses. “Right. Leaving now.” He made his exit, catching up to Skyber like his life depended on it.

Phoenix blinked. “Knew what?”

“Don’t play coy with me, you fat bastard!” Carrie returned her attention to the professor.  “You’ve been conspiring against me from the very beginning! I’ve given you a finger and you’ve consumed my entire arm!”

He felt her little finger wiggle around in his folds. Which wasn’t nearly as uncomfortable as seeing a small crowd form around him and the previously absent club leader. “Not sure that’s how the saying goes.”

“Admit it, heathen! You’re no disciple. You’re an affront to the Old Ones, the epitome of heresy! You know exactly what you’ve done, and yet you stand before me and the rest of my would-be followers without a hint of shame! And worst of all, you invite HER, the false prophet, to MY domain?!”

“Last I checked, ma’am, this is public property,” an authoritative voice corrected the cultist. 

Carrie turned, worried for a split second that one of the librarians had actually hit the security button this time. Only to find, however, it was much worse than the Feds: it was her Biology teacher. 

“Care to explain why you’re throwing people across the library and screaming at my colleague for doing his job?” Professor Goldman crossed his arms. His voice remained level yet exceedingly firm. Despite hiding behind her mask, her face felt exposed. She couldn’t stop sweating. 

“P-professor, I—” Carrie stammered, finally understanding her current predicament. “You see, I— urm… as I always say…”

Goldman raised an eyebrow. 

“…Excuse me for one moment.”

“Of course.”

Carrie turned, ran, and hurled herself out of the clubroom window. Phoenix and Goldman rushed behind her, looking down to see Carrie safely landed headfirst in a bush. They stared at each other. 

“Do club leaders normally get this enthused?” Phoenix asked his colleague.

“…No. What?” Goldman confusedly shook his head. “Call security. This woman is getting out of hand.”

“I’ll show YOU out of hand!” Carrie declared from the outside, now on her feet again. “The Flabby One stole my club! He stole my trust, my place of worship, and my only chance of giving these fools their undeserved salvation! He is no Messenger—he is nothing but a fraud! I’m the Old One’s Messenger! I’M THE ONE WHO MESSAGES!”

“W-well!” Goldman called, propping his upper body out the window. “Consider your perfect biology grade up to reconsideration! And your library card has been revoked!” He tried to turn back to Phoenix with a triumphant look. But he couldn’t. Half of his body was stuck through the window. When he looked ahead again, Carrie was already gone.

“Need help getting out?” Phoenix asked. 

Goldman deflated. “Immensely.”

---

A heavy glass of Kool-Aid slid on the polished wood and bumped against Carrie’s arm. She could see the bartender’s concerned gaze from the corner of her eye, a shallow gesture for some measly tip, most assuredly. At least she didn’t forget the drinking instrument this time.

“Oh, spare your sympathies, Sardined One.” Carrie stuck the straw between the tentacles and drank her sorrows away. “I should have known from the start. Everyone in this damned institution is plotting my downfall. I was foolish—too desperate to notice the Flabby One’s masterful deception. It was all too good to be true… he only helped me so he could take it for himself!”

She slammed her fist for the third time this evening. Sybil ran to the glass as it rolled off the counter, catching it right before it hit the floor. She wanted to be angry. The bartender knew she should kick her out, but one look at the slobbering mess sent her sympathy to the roof. Lily was right. She is too nice.

“Oh… what’s the point…” Carrie’s voice died in a sigh as her head sank into her folded arms. “My club was doomed from the start. It was only a matter of time before the traitor would steal it or the corrupted Administration would close it down themselves! What choice did I have?!”

“Yeah, that’s rough, buddy.” 

Carrie shot up, bewildered. “Who said that?” Her face shot to Sybil, who bordered on the same level of confusion. “Was it you?!”

Lucas leaned up from just previously draping his back over a bar stool. “Now that I think about it—shocker, I know—what choice do any of us have?” He swiveled on the stool to face the masked woman. “I could’ve ordered anything from the menu, but everything would get me drunk, just the same!” 

He took a swig from his tall glass. “The illusion of free will… I don’t even know what I’m drinking. Nobody told me. Tall isn’t a drink. What does Tall even taste like?” 

Carrie scoffed, slowly scooting her tall-flavored chair away. “Leave me alone, Existential One. You’re making light of my sulking.” 

Lucas fought off the urge to make a joke about her third eye. “Aw, did I?”

“YES. And you’re still doing it! Didn’t you hear what I said before? It’s hopeless, all hopeless! My club is good as gone, and my mission to the Great Old Ones has failed! There’s no reason for me to live! No reason…at all! I’ll fall back to how I was in middle school, crying into stale peanut butter sandwiches and forced to take bi-weekly Pacer Tests!” 

She whimpered to herself, pulling out a small notebook of Polaroid photos. A tear ran down the silicone tentacles. “It’ll be no different than my dreaded goth phase.” She pulled one of the photos out, depicting a slightly smaller Carrie standing stiffly in the middle of a frame, wearing the exact same squid mask and a near identical black gown. “Horrible, isn’t it?”

“…Yeah.” 

The polaroid notebook snapped shut by a third party. The two green idiots met an irritated glare painted with old scars and pale skin under a hooded cowl. 

“Your crying was funnier in the club meeting. Now you’re just being annoying.”

Carrie groaned. “Another one? And I presume you’ve also come to mock me at my lowest?”

Lucas raised his finger. “No, no. The emo has a point. I was at the club too, you made the place feel a lot more… hm, what’s the word I’m looking for?”

“Braindead,” the girl spat.

“Genuine. Like, I felt like I was really in a cult! You don’t get that experience reading Shakespeare anymore!”

Carrie briefly wondered if this man was even more delusional than she was, then mentally slapped herself. Lucas winced. Sybil shined a glass. 

“Braindead is better than boring to death. Kind of a shame, had potential.” She huffed her overgrown bangs away from her eye. It fell back precisely where it was. 

The cultist slowly pulled her mask aside, barely enough to touch the rim of her glass onto her lips. She sipped her non-alcoholic beverage, quickly slipping her mask back into place to lament like a poor drunkard. 

“Don’t try to cheer me up. It’s far too late for niceties, Existential One and, er, Ms. Girl.”

“Lily.” She bared a set of fangs. 

“Wow, touchy,” Carrie leaned back. “And for such a flowery name, too, Thorned One. But sadly, you’re correct. My club had the potential to save this academy, to rid itself of the evils plaguing our modern-day society. All we had to do was pray, and repent. But alas, evil has once again overcome. Tuesday’s meeting is over and done with, and I fear it will be the last; by the end of this week, Administration will make its rounds and put every club in its system up for review. Under the hands of such a weak and absentminded leader, they will surely defund my program for good this time. It’s over.”

As the cultist moped, the two adjacent patrons exchanged a look.

“The hell are you talking about?” Lily questioned. “Have you spent your entire evening feeling sorry for yourself? Does it kill you to check your texts after every goddamn sob session?”

“Rude way to put it, but yeah, look here,” Lucas took out his half-broken flip phone with a worn out Dora the Explorer charm dangling from it. “The Professor sent out the email hours ago. He scheduled another meeting tomorrow morning since you fudged this one up so badly. He didn’t say that, but the subtext was pretty obvious. Seriously, shouldn’t it be your job as club leader to keep up with your supervisor’s announcements?”

Carrie paused, a brief glint returning to her once-devoid gaze. She tapped her fingers on the wooden counter. Sybil gulped. “You mean to tell me my actions… have given my club a second chance?”

“In a cosmic sort of way, yeah,” Lucas said. 

“Sure, let’s go with that,” Lily spoke simultaneously. 

The tapping grew louder. “Then, should I use this opportunity to my advantage, and in some chance where I prevail, you’d feel compelled to… prefer my presence over the Flabby One’s?”

“I’ll say yes so I can go back to drinking alone in the corner,” Lily huffed.

She slammed her fist into the counter. “Yes… Yes! One would say all is not lost! One would say my interception, my divine intervention, has allowed us to make a comeback! And we would be so back, one could say that we never left! And you two would support, nay, devote yourselves to me over the False Prophet! You will help me take back what’s mine at any cost, would you not?!”

Lucas and Lily exchanged another look. They felt it futile now to give a response. They weren’t given the chance. 

“Then there’s HOPE!” Carrie ejaculated, the glint in her eyes roaring into a three-pronged fire (literally, as her third eye involuntarily blinded the room.) Hoisting with each arm, Carrie lifted her new supporters over her shoulders and out the back door. Rubbing her eyes from afar, Sybil was so utterly shocked by the sight of it all she momentarily forgot that not one of them had paid for their tab. 

---

“Oh, we’re here now. Cool,” said Lucas, having absolutely no idea where they were. If he had taken a second to observe his surroundings instead of burying his nose in Carrie’s crayon box—trying to determine if the green one smelled like Green Apple or Lime Green—he might have noticed the endless expanse of pines, firs, and spruce trees above his head, or the crunch of dead leaves and branches under every step. 

“Silence, Homeless One!” Carrie spat. “Not only must we refrain from alerting the guard patrol at this ungodly hour, we must ensure the success of our ritual. The summoning requires my absolute concentration to perform.”

The mock cultist stood on all fours, clearing space for her crayon-drawn pentagram. Lucas could effortlessly distinguish the scent of Strawberry Season Red. If only the green ones were that easy. He didn’t even want to know what this whole summoning business was about. 

Lily pushed the candles into position with the sole of her boot, refusing to put half an ounce of effort to get this over with. She gnawed on the back end of Blueberry Indigo. 

“We were supposed to draw the pentagram with blood,” Carrie remarked, “but the byproduct of foreign child labor shall do just fine.”

Lucas whistled. “Jesus.”

“He’s not with them.” Lily slinked the Passion Fruit Purple from the box he was sniffing. Unfortunately, the taste contained no hint of passion whatsoever. 

“Anyway,” Carrie grit her teeth, lighting the candles with a dollar store lighter. “You two must now stand back. The ritual is about to commence. Should I succeed, we may turn the tide of our battle against the treasonous Flabby One once and for all.”

“Or start a forest fire.” 

“That’s cool too.”

“No, it’s not!” Carrie snapped at them, scrambling to her feet. “Hold your deranged thoughts until after we summon one of the foretold eldritch horrors! You know what, forget it; I’m starting anyway.”

She raised her arms ceremoniously. The wind began howling against them, battering against their warm clothes. The flickering flames of the candles surrounding the pentagram stayed alight despite the wind, adding to the ambiance—at least for the cultist. Lily scoffed, taking another crayon from the box, and Lucas was convincing himself it could have been a secret third green fruit. He had to find out before they were all sacrificed. 

“O, Great Old Ones!” Carrie cried to the night sky, chanting with the howling winds. “It is I, your most loyal Abyssal Messenger! Send me your strongest warriors; assist me in your toughest battles against the vile act of treason called modern bureaucracy!”

The winds cried louder, snuffing out the flames with their might. Carrie whipped to Lucas and snatched the box of crayons from his hand, tossing it into the pentagram.

“Hey!”

“Prithee, accept this sacrifice! Look down upon thine humble offerings and consume! If you agree to join us in the realm of us puny, mere mortals, the terms of my contract are but one: Help us take back what’s ours!”

A dark flame erupted from the box of crayons, enveloping the pentagram, much to everyone’s shock. This was undoubtedly a first for everyone. 

The hideous figure of a bulbous, fat beast formed from the fire, three heads taller than any of the young adults. Its body clumped together awkwardly, with a hairy thorax supporting two pairs of translucent insectoid wings and a plated abdomen, sheening a blackish emerald hue. A set of hideous, blood-red compound eyes adjusted to look down at the trio while its freakishly long antennae flickered about, sensing its surroundings. 

“Tremble, mortals. For I am Beelzebob, the Great Fly.”

Lily stared. “What.” 

“That worked?” Lucas’ jaw dropped.

“Holy shit! I-I mean—” Carrie stammered, scrambling to her feet. “O Great Fly, I beseech thee! Partake in our humble quest, and you shall be greatly rewarded for your efforts! We… er, we have free cookies!”

The demon looked down at the cultist, its limbs shifting idly as its eyes stared into her soul.

“Are they home-baked… or store-bought?”

“…God dammit!”

“Hey, wait a second,” Lucas stepped in, “you’re not part of the Lovecraftian mythos. What gives?”

“You drew a satanic pentagram, did you not? Who exactly were you expecting? Nyarlathotep?”

Carrie looked down. In her excitement, she made a mistake comparable to a mere apprentice: she drew the wrong fucking pentagram.

“Be that as it may, your foolishness amuses. And your sacrifice of Cactus Green suffices my lucrative yet niche palate in crayons produced by foreign child labor.”

Lucas snapped his fingers. “I knew it!”

“Beelzebub, I implore you!” Carrie sank to her knees, desperately outstretching her hands. “You must help us take back my poetry club before it shuts down! I have made a severe lapse in judgment by recruiting a non-believer as my disciple. Now he has betrayed me and is tarnishing everything I have worked for! He is forcing my would-be subjects to analyze ‘Dicks In Sons’ and ‘P. P. Cummings’! Everyone else in this forsaken academy has turned against me, and all I have left are these two idiots behind me! O Great Fly, what can be done to stop this madness?!”

Beelzebob, in all of his grotesqueness, shuffled his porous figure to contemplate her conundrum. His wings flapped, mimicking the sound of rattling bones. 

“You have incurred a great disease the likes of which your kind has seen unparalleled. This leech will only continue to fester until it leaves you with nothing. Unless, of course, you administer your pestilence a cure.”

“So we’re going to drug him.” Lily raised a brow. “Not that I haven’t thought of doing something like this before, but how is this supposed to get the club back?”

“The Traitor has claimed your club of poetic literature in his wretched hands; therefore, his punishment shall be worth his weight in sins. Revoke his privilege to read your gospel; the club will be yours again.”

“We’re going to give Phoenix dyslexia by shoving narcotics down his throat?” Lucas questioned. “That’s our third act? That’s not even how that works; overdosing just usually kills you.”

“I know that! Insolent fool. Nay, we must reach beyond such petty substances— only the most potent man-made pestilences could inflict such a curse upon this foul being.”

“…Crack?” Carrie asked.

“The other one.”

“AIDS?” Lily offered.

“Red-40. The blood-crimson dye of artificial food coloring. He who controls the dye controls the club.” 

Lucas shot a glance at Lily. “…does it do that? Does Red-40 make you dyslexic?”

“If you’re on Facebook it does.”

Carrie stepped forward, clasping her hands to her chest. “Alas, O Great Beelzebub, the traitor… consumes Red-40 on his own accord. In great amounts, too!”

“Oh. He’s built immunity. Where did you even find that creature? Nevermind, that is irrelevant. There exists one other substance that even demons fear— it was crafted in the Sixth Circle of Hell, where heretics burn alive and the walls ooze green slime–”

“Get on with it!” Lily called from below.

“MAROON-50!!”

Thunder boomed from the heavens. The trees shuddered in fear, the leaves ducked for cover, and the smell of mediocrity filled the air. 

“See what I mean, guys?” Lucas nudged Carrie. “Worst third act ever.”

---

Carrie and Lily thought it best to forget all about the convoluted baking montage (Much to Lucas’s disappointment), filled to the brim with countless hours of balancing the batter between too dry and too wet, the Great Fly periodically throwing flour into their eyes at the sight of them slacking off, blaring overplayed pop music from their phones, and copious amounts of satanic artificial food dye. But lo and behold, they finished their secret project just in time. By the next morning’s sunrise, the Maroon-50 red velvet cookie pizza was ready for delivery. 

“This sucks,” Lily said. 

“You think we should write a little apology note on the top?” Lucas asked. 

“He won’t be able to read it after we’re done with him,” Carrie replied, “all according to plan.”

“He’d appreciate the sentiment, I think.”

“It’s ironic in a fucked up way. I like it, actually.”

“Ugh! Fine. Write the note.”

“Sorry… for… your…loss. Should we add sprinkles, or is that too much?”

“Go big or go home.”

“We could add hearts colored with Maroon-50.”

“But wouldn’t that blend in with the-”

“ENOUGH!” Carrie snapped. “We have no time for frivolous decorations! The traitor continues wreaking havoc on my club and tempting my would-be followers as we speak! And we’re sitting here wasting our fleeting morning! The meeting could end at any moment, and if we aren’t there before it does, all is lost! We must stop him RIGHT NOW!”

The rest of the group begrudgingly put down their buttercream frosting piping bags. Carrie was right: they had a nefarious plot to proceed with, and the frantic mess in Lily’s dorm kitchen only proved how carried away they got. It was good that Artemis and Sybil were working overtime so they wouldn’t have to deal with the scolding just yet. 

Lily found an empty pizza box she neglected to throw away last week and opened it for Lucas to drop the cookie pizza into, letting the bottom of the dough soak in extra flavoring from the cold residual grease stains. Everyone nodded to each other in approval. 

Time to give someone a reading disability. 

Carrie, Lily, Beelzebob the Great Fly, and Lucas marched out the dormitory, down the hallway and several flights of stairs. They ignored all the odd looks from people in the dorm lobby and kicked the front doors open, wincing from the first beams of sunlight they felt in over twelve hours. Lucas grew confused, however, when it had absolutely slipped his mind how exactly they made it to the library during their badass slow-motion walk. Maybe he shouldn’t have sniffed all those Cactus Green crayons last night. 

Maybe he should have questioned why an Archdemon from the Bible appeared from Carrie’s fruit-scented dollar store crop circle to help give someone dyslexia via artificial food dyes. Maybe he shouldn’t have been a part of any of this, but it was too late to quit now. Nobody leaves during the third act. 

In fact, it seemed that they couldn’t leave at all! A horde of students (like, six) had surrounded them during the homeless existentialist’s mental soliloquy. 

“Hi guys,” Hugo said from the bunch. “What, uh… what are you guys doing here?”

“Loitering,” uttered Beelzebob, the Great Fly.

“Cool… cool.” Hugo nodded slowly. “I meant like… Carrie, specifically.”

“Loitering with malicious intent.”

“Ah. Yeah, that-that checks out.” He clicked his tongue. “Can you, um… not? Or maybe like, do that somewhere else?”

“No,” Lily stepped forward. “You don’t see me telling you to fuck off every time we meet.”

“…yes, you do.” Hugo fixed his glasses. “Anyway, me and the gang think that if you’re going to cause more trouble in Professor Mara’s poetry club, you shouldn’t be here.” 

“Isn’t causing trouble the whole point of us being here?” Lucas whispered to the Great Fly. 

“We’re not telling them that.”

Carrie stepped forward, pushing Lily aside. “Stand down, Stringed One. I’m only here to… apologize. With this cookie pizza. It’s freshly made and not store-bought. Just how the Trai—er, the Flabby One likes it.”

Hugo could hear her teeth grit from behind the mask. He gulped. “Okay, n-no one in their right mind is buying that. You’re here to sabotage the club like last time, and well… let’s just say I’m not gonna let you Edgar Allen Poo on our parade again!”

Carrie proceeded to knock his teeth out with one swift sucker punch. Hugo literally spun to the floor. 

“Oh shit-”

“Jeepers!” Lucas cried. 

“Niiice…!” Lily fist-bumped the air.

“I WARNED YOU! I WARNED YOU NOT TO SAY SOMETHING SO MIND-NUMBINGLY STUPID!”

The club members looked on in horror. 

“Oh my God!” one said. “They killed Hugo!”

“You bastards!”

“We gotta stop these assholes!”

“Don’t let ‘em get to the Professor!”

Carrie screamed, her third eye flashing white. “There is no God for you HEATHENS! Prepare to repent in the name of the Old Ones!”

Lucas jumped back as Beelzebob, in all of his grotesque glory, shoulder-bashed two members flat against the wall while Lily, baring her teeth like a rabid dog, pounced onto another poor soul screaming for dear life. Upon hearing the commotion, more students emerged from the library, some running, some joining the fray. Carrie slipped her gloves off, dodging a left hook and headbutting someone’s face with her surprisingly sturdy mask. He could almost make out the fight cloud he’d seen in cartoons. 

“Come now, Existential One!” the cultist cried out, repeatedly kicking someone else on the ground in the fetal position. “Partake in the divinely justified violence!”

At that moment, Lucas realized that perhaps sinking his time and attention to a literal cultist assaulting innocent students with a cannibal and Beelzebob, The Great Fucking Fly From The Bible wasn’t a great cause to be affiliated with. Hilarious, but not a great one. And he had a cold bench calling his name very, very far away from here. 

“I’m… good, thanks.” Lucas turned and walked away. But not before bumping into a bouncy wall of worn cotton and plush fabric. He was taken aback, readjusting himself before seeing who he just so conveniently crossed paths with. 

“Oh, hi Lucas,” Phoenix waved.

He blinked slowly. “Ahhh, shit. I mean, hey! Just the guy we were looking for, well, they were looking for, uh…yeah, this doesn’t look good for me, does it.”

Phoenix shrugged. “Was hoping you three would show up, but not like… this. Who’s the big guy?”

“Oh, you mean the giant disgusting bug creature of biblical proportions currently Bautista Bombing the woman in the pink checkered jacket? Yeah, I think we all know by now.”

“Hah. Yeah, I do. Sure you’re not with them anymore?”

Lucas threw his hands up. “Listen man, I thought it was funny at first, but then they lost me with the fly business, and the crayons–you know what, you’ll figure it out without me. She’s all yours, buddy. Rooting for ya.” He patted the Professor’s back, slipping by the man and thankful this was the end of his plot relevance. 

Phoenix cracked his knuckles, taking in the sight before him. Perhaps his club leader was a little too enthused. Otherwise she probably wouldn’t be throttling someone’s neck while shoving them headfirst into a garbage bin. At the very least she managed to recruit three more members on her own. Disregarding the fact that the hooded girl and the beautiful freak of nature were taking turns decking people in the gut while the other held them by their shoulders. Maybe Carrie should have just stuck with the flyers. Something finally told the man enough was enough. 

The teacher cleared his throat and unleashed the loudest “Ahem” he had vocalized in the last decade—which wasn’t very loud, but enough to freeze the action on the spot.

“Hey kids. How’s the uh… light reading?”

The cultist’s neck craned as she twisted towards the source. The victim slipped from her fingers and fell motionless to the floor. 

“Why, hello, Professor,” she called in a sickly sweet voice. “You’re just in time.”

“Doesn’t look like it.”

“Nonsense! We came all this way just to deliver you an offering of apology!”

He eyed the student on the floor, who managed to scramble away from the cultist as she got to her feet and approached Phoenix.

“You sure I need it?” 

“He’s onto us,” Beelzebob advised.

“Shut the fuck up, this is the best part,” Lily whispered.

“N-Nevermind these HEATHENS! They were just in my way—too selfish of their own mindless mortal needs to understand the greater picture behind my true intentions for MY club! Why, bringing people together to submit under my thumb was all we ever wanted. Now, we’ve accomplished that goal together! Here!” Carrie knelt down and picked up a battered and bruised pizza box, about a week old. She opened the cardboard lid, revealing an overbaked amalgamation of processed chemicals and egregiously red cookie batter. In buttercream frosting, a message spelling, “Sorry 4 ur loss (xP)” was shakingly scribbled on. 

“Take this as a token of my appreciation to you, disciple. Eat it.”

“Ah… yes, I’m flattered, but I’m…not eating that.”

“WHAT!” The box fell to the floor. “Why not!”

“I just won’t.”

“WHY NOT, YOU STUPID BASTARD?!”

Lily groaned, pinching the bridge of her nose. “Just drop it, moron. He’s not buying it, maybe ol’ flying fatass here gave it away.”

“Hey. Take that back.”

“No! The cookie pizza is perfectly fine!” Carrie stomped. “What, you think it’s not SAFE? You-you think I POISONED this thing with advanced food coloring that causes dyslexia so you won’t be able to run my club? NonononoNO, don’t be SILLY! I ate half the batter myself! It’s delectable!”

Lily and Beelzebob’s faces dropped, each staring at the cultist with widened eyes.

“What.”

“Carrie. It’s poisoned,” Lily uttered, a broad, sadistic grin rolling on her scarred lips. She could barely contain her laughter. “You ate the poisoned cookie, you beautiful, psychotic little whore!”

Carrie stomped her foot in defense. “First and foremost, rude. Second, I get munchies when I bake! Would it make such a difference to sample the batter when it’s sitting right in front of me? Am I really going to go dyslexic with a single nibble? Or two? Or five? Or…oh.”

Carrie looked to Phoenix, offering no consolation. She then looked at her shaking hands. Then, back to Phoenix. Then, to her group. Suddenly she felt sick. 

“You know, th—” she stuttered, her voice slurring. “If… wh- I… as I– always…”

The edges of her vision blurred, faded to blackness, then started to collapse in on itself. She felt her own thoughts elude her. 

“Excuse me for one second.”

“Of course,” everyone else said. 

Carrie fell to the floor, unconscious. 

---

She awoke with a start, sweat dripping from the edges of the mask down to the creases of her upper neck. The first thing she heard was the faint beeping of a heart monitor picking up. The first thing she saw was her upper body dressed in a blue dotted gown, the bottom half covered by a soft weighted blanket. 

From the sleep in her eyes blurring her vision, Carrie made out two figures standing in the room, talking to each other and occasionally shooting glances at her. 

“…and she did all of that as her body was reacting to the chemicals? That’s… concerningly impressive.” One of them had a more authoritative, professional edge to his voice. The other turned. 

“Hey. You. You’re finally awake.” This voice just sounded inferior. 

“Wh… wuh happen..?” she slurred out, barely suppressing the urge to hurl.

The taller figure walked closer. Carrie could now make out Dr. Goldman’s round glasses and dark freckled face. He was holding a clipboard— the way she always remembered pretentious doctors held them.

“Well,” he sighed, “in layman’s terms, after your adrenaline spiked from assaulting at least four students, your body finally collapsed from the, uhm… Materials you’ve ingested, aaand, uhm…” He tapped his pen on the clipboard. “Stomach failure!”

Carrie grumbled along with her stomach. She could now make out the second man in the room but was too tired to move a finger, let alone leap from her hospital bed and pounce upon the traitor with sweltering fury. 

“Yeah, your pals mentioned something about, uh… Maroon-50? Is that like, the sequel band?”

“No!” Carrie moaned out. “It’s a demonic substance from the sixth circle of hell where the walls ooze green… or something!”

“That would explain the pint of lamb’s blood in the cookie.” Goldman mused, flipping through the pages.

“And the crushed up Songs About Jane CD,” Phoenix added. 

“So am I dyslexic now?” She tried to reach for Goldman’s clipboard. He snatched it away from her feeble grasp. 

“…No.” Goldman shook his head. “No. You’re not. Just very sick. Nobody loses their ability to read properly from ingesting artificial food dyes. Next time, perhaps listening to a literal demon wouldn’t be advised.”

“To be fair, Beelzebob was very convincing,” Phoenix reasoned. “We’re going out for golfing later. And I hate golf.”

Carrie and Goldman stared at him for a moment before returning to the subject at hand.

“Well then, you’ll be staying here until you restabilize. Your condition has improved already and fortunately for you, the assault charges were dropped thanks to your lawyer— something about psychedelic-induced insanity.” He fixed his glasses. “Unfortunately, he’s very good at his job.”

There was a brief knock on the door before it opened. A tanned-skinned nurse with blue bangs covering her eyes peeked her head into the room and gestured for Dr. Goldman.

“If you’ll excuse me,” the doctor stood, putting his clipboard away, “I have other patients needing my attention. A horde of students (like six) just got the snot beaten out of them. Busy day, isn’t it?”

He left the room, giving one last glance to each of them. Carrie especially. The door shut behind him, leaving Phoenix and Carrie to fend for themselves. The heart rate monitor beeped noisily in the corner.

“What’s going to happen to my club,” Carrie broke the silence, turning her head. 

“Hrm? Oh, nothing, I guess.”

She scoffed. “Save it, Flabby One. It’s ruined. They have their new club leader now. I’m out of the picture. No Lovecraft, no worship, no Carrie Thompson. You won.”

“Uh… yeah, no. Wrong.” Phoenix scratched his scraggly beard. “I didn’t want your club.”

“You… you did,” Carrie argued. “The Overworked One told me everything. You renounced your discipleship. You made everyone think you were their leader. They loved you. You’ve even brought my immortal nemesis to gloat your superiority over me! You’ve had the Stringy One make a mockery of my subject of devotion!”

The teacher took a minute to put everything together. Perhaps several. A few blinks later, and he sort of got the gist. 

“Oh. I see.” He breathed out. “Here’s the thing: you know how when you advertise a club, people show up?”

“That was the idea, yes.”

“They did. On their own. Including your nemesis or whatever. All I said was to come, and everyone did.” He explained, crossing his arms. “Except you. You must have been, uh, busy with the posters still. I was stalling with Dickenson until you showed up.”

Carrie recalled back to her visit with Artemis at the store. Come to think of it, printing all those papers one at a time from her laptop did take much longer than she expected. 

“Then you began screaming and chased everyone out before defenestrating. Good form, by the way. So I rescheduled the meeting.”

“To Wednesday, the morning after,” she clarified. A pit grew in her stomach as the cogs began to turn in her head. 

He nodded. “Tried to call you. Email, even. Was your phone off? You didn’t pick up.”

“No,” she sighed, “it was on. I was just drinking. And summoning Beelzebub.”

“Ah. Beelzebob. That’s where they came from. Anyway, I was happy you came, even brought your own friends, but uh… well, you know the rest. I didn’t ruin your club.”

“…I did.” Carrie sunk into her bed, staring into her open palms. “You were only trying to help. That’s… that’s all you ever did. For me. You were the perfect disciple. And I mucked it up.”

“Yeah, pretty much,” he said flatly. “Don’t feel bad, though. You got four students to join your club on your own. Four plus a leader means they can’t shut down the club.”  

“Wh…Huh. I suppose you’re right.” Carrie looked up. “What of you, then?”

He shrugged. “You can handle it on your own. You don’t need me. Just stop tweaking.”

Carrie lowered her head. She looked deep in thought. “…four?”  She began counting on her fingers. 

“Me, Existential One, Thorned One, Beelzebub the Grea-”

She stopped.

“Beelze… Bob? BeelzeBob. But, he doesn’t… all the lights a-and the pentagram and the-the-the Bautista Bomb, the SIXTH CIRCLE- no! It was real, it couldn’t have been—”

“FREEDOOOOM!” Beelzebob the Great Fly, who had been watching from the window this whole time, charged away with a cacophonous serenade of bagpipes. His grotesque form evaporated in smoke, leaving behind two students in an illusory trench coat: the bottom one wrapped in a hulking crystal golem suit and the top leading the way with her magical wooden stick. 

It all made sense. She can’t summon demons from hell, she’s devoted to the Great Old Ones! 

“Gyssabob!” She frantically waved her fist in the air. “You played me for a fool! You sabotaged my most trusted disciple! Where did you even get the LAMB’S BLOOD?! Come back, you! YOU-