In no particular order:







This thing is FINALLY done. W00t.

Story text: (Download for better formatting)

“Awww, what the hell happened?” Orion said, blinking twice and dragging his muzzle out of the grass and dirt. It was dark out, nighttime, and he had somehow gotten outside. “Where am…” He said, but stopped mid-sentence as the entire night’s events came back to him in a rush. The house, the crowd, the nursery… Had it been a dream? He asked himself, but quickly dismissed the idea as he saw what he was wearing: the same pink, frilly princess dress that he had been magically dressed in by whatever horrors inhabited the walls of that dreaded house, which, he realized, he was standing right in front of, out on the lawn. Alex, the hyperactive blue and orange vulpine that he had become aquainted with before they had entered the room that had dressed the black fox up as he was, and regressed the later to the age of little more than a newborn kit. Alex was, to Orion’s great surprise, slumbering softly against one of the many folds of the black fox’s dress, and was dressed up as, of all things, one of those cute little conductor costumes that people buy to humiliate their kids. Everyone’s piece of mind was broken as the wailing of a baby broke the relative silence of the night. Everyone, for the entire original nine people were out in the yard, on the grass, immediately jumped to their feet, at least those who could did.
Rerim, the corgi, hearing the crying quickly rose to his feet, feeling possibly the weirdest he ever had. Looking himself over, the dog was incredulous to say the least, dressed up in what looked like a zip-up full body sleeper, beat yellow, and with black stripes running laterally along his back. He didn’t need to see the tail, which hung from the costume at about the same level where his super heavily padded rear bulged out of the otherwise skintight fabric to realize that it was a Pikachu costume. Aside from the diaper, it wasn’t really that bad. His attention was turned to the careening baby girl who had woken up the pack. It was the squirrel… the federal agent! Despite what had happened to all of them, Rerim still had a hard time believing his eyes when he saw the little basket on the hill. Inside it was the squirrel, crying her eyes out and dressed up in a costume that looked a bit like a caterpillar, if one could be imagined that was made of five green and yellow fluffy spheres, with a grinning face and antenna on the top one, right above the little squirrel’s head.
Next to her was the bratty undersized teenager that had been harassing everyone since they arrived and tried to vandalize the place. He was wrapped up in some sort of pink blanket, and had a big poofy bonnet around his head, puffing up his cheeks, and a pacifier strapped into his mouth so he couldn’t spit it out. He was whining and squirming to the best of his ability, but had no chance of escaping the tightly bound wrappings. Taking pity, Rerim picked up the basket by the handle and carried it back over to the rest of the group, who was starting to rouse.
Dexter and Argi, the two raccoons that had joined in with the intention of raiding the place were dead center, right at the bottom of the steps up to the porch, but it took a few seconds to realize that they were who they had been when they arrived. Both seemed to have been regressed, though to an age where they could still walk, talk more or less coherently, but do no harm. The oddly colored raccoon, pink and grey by Rerim’s eyes instead of black and grey, appeared to have been dressed up as himself, made up in a full body suit that looked as though someone had made a life-sized plushy of the raccoon, gutted it, and then put the real thing inside. Argi and Dex had been cuddling, wrapped in each other’s arms, and sobbing in their sleep before waking with a start and, with some difficulty due to the balance lost them by their costumes and diapers, wobbled to their feet.
Dexter, oddly enough, seemed to have been dressed up as some kind of bird. It had pure white feathers and long, elegant wings with hands at the end. There was a low-hanging hood with a heart-shaped face on it, but Dexter couldn’t seem to flip it up. In the corner, next to the raccoon, was the police officer that the squirrel had one-upped at every turn. He was up against the fence at the front of the yard, curled up in a ball, fast asleep, dressed up in a little girl’s playtime police officer getup, complete with a short skirt to show off his padding, and was, appropriately enough, sucking his thumb.
“Good evening, girls and boys,” came a booming voice from the ajar front door of the great manor. Everyone went silent and stern, even little Gemma stopped crying as the… thing started to slither out of the door. Rerim, Orion, and Deme, who had been slapped into a ridiculous looking pumpkin costume, the only ones in the group who were still anywhere close to adults, had a moment where they had to pick their jaws up off the floor, Rerim almost dropping the basket with the cubs in it in shock and terror as the weird, shockingly queer looking snakey-fishy-dragony looking thing floated, its tail fin propelling it forward as though it were swimming, out the door before stopping above the porch and examining the group of humiliated, babied, regressed and terrified youth and children. “I am Takinoue Rakkamaru,” it said, looking very regal, and opened its mouth to say more.
“What the heck is that?” Orion said to Rerim, slowly ebbing his way over there. The corgi shrugged.
“Silence!” Takinoue said, “you have all tried to invade this place, and you have been punished. Some,” he looked around, stopping for a second on Gemma and Ryan, “more than others. Nevertheless, your struggle is far from over. As some of you might have realized, those costumes are magically sealed. You cannot remove them, nor can any power you have access to.” There was a lot of grumbling going around the circle, a few of the people, mostly the adults, trying and failing to tug their costumes away even a bit. It was hopeless, and they soon realized it. “You are all in my power, and, unless you can convince me to release you from this curse before midnight… you will all be stuck at your new ages until you grow out of them.” There was a bit of a chuckle in the black fox’s throat as he realized that his age hadn’t changed, so he was basically home-free, but the dragon thing paid no mind, “for those of you who are still adults… there is an alternative punishment. I take it you’ve noticed what you’re all dressed in, yes?” he said, pointing to each of the four remaining adult’s heavily diapered rears, “those will be your punishment. A sign of your immaturity. Fail to please me, and you will need diapers forever.”
“W-What do you want from us?!” Deme, the green kitten said, stepping up and shouting.
“A very good question!” Takinoue said, snickering, “you’ve disgraced us and the holiday that we represent. You’ve acted like children, and you’ll be treated as such…” there was some muttering going around as everyone tried to figure out what he meant, but Rakka, the dragon-carp, silenced them all by speaking up, again, “for me to remove the curse, you’ll all need to suffer all the shame you deserve… and you’ll do that tonight, in the town, in your costumes. I sentence you, for the crime of discracing this holiday, to wander about in the town collecting candy from every house you can find. Do that, and bring the candy as proof, and I’ll remove your curse… But you’d better hurry,” Takinoue said, grinning, “it’s 11:00 O’clock. Time is running out…” he said, and laughed villainously before rushing back into the house with a whoosh, the door shutting and barring behind him. All that was missing was a thunderclap.
“Well, someone has a flare for the dramatic…” the white, avian figure said, slowly clapping and looking out the window, watching the group slowly collect themselves.
“Hey, you had your fun last year… This is my turn, I’ll do what I want!” Takinoue said, looking defensive.
“Oh, calm yourself, Rakka,” the owl said, walking over and patting the carp on the head, “are you going to go and watch them?” The group was trickling out the main gates, two or more kids to an adult, Deme having gone over and woken up Deadly, who promptly screamed to high heaven as he realized how he was dressed.
Takinoue Rakkamaru started air-swimming his way up the main steps, the ones right in front of the door, the ones that led straight to the steeple but nobody had ever bothered to try, “are you up for a nighttime flyby? I want to watch that red fox squirm a bit more.”
The owl laughed, then called with a stereotypical three-hooted song, “of course I am. Here’s to another successful Halloween.”