The Moon Calls

24

"Xavier!" Varian called as he came into his shop. "Did you give Pascal and Maximus a potion?"

"I did." He said shamelessly. "The tonic brings out the opposite of your defining personal characteristics."

"Why?!" Varian frowned.

"They were constantly bickering, and I wanted to help Maximus and Pascal teach them a lesson." He said, setting down his work.

"It completely changed Rapunzel! She's mean!" Varian threw a hand out.

"Well, the effect should have subsided by now." Xavier said with a frown.

"What?" Varian frowned.

"I told them 'one drop each'." Xavier explained.

"...The bottle Ruddiger found was nearly empty." Varian groaned. "Ugh, Pascal!"

"There's some bad news. If it was truly almost empty when the bottle was brought to you, then this will be in effect for days."

"Days?!" Varian shook his head. "No, that won't be good! There's a welcoming party tonight, a peace event! If Rapunzel goes to it as she is now..." He groaned. "That's it. I'm going to have to make her sick. They're all going to be too sick to be there, that's the only way I can...oh, but if they didn't get the lemonade...I'll just have to knock out everyone at the party. Yeah, that's it."He turned to go. "Come on, Ruddiger! I need to make more knockout bombs, before the party begins!"

--

"Varian, if youdon't let me out of this goo right now, I am going to give you such a sound—"

"Will you shut up?!" Varian snapped. "I'm trying to work!"

"Hey, don't yell at her!" Eugene whimpered.

"Shut up, Eugene!" Rapunzel snapped. "Did you just tell me to shut up, Varian?!"

"Yeah, I did." He turned to her. "Got a problem with that, sis?"

"NNgh! Nngh!" She struggled with the goo. "You can't keep me in here! What are you even doing?!"

"Making that banquet a sleepover." Varian went back to his work.

"A sleepover?! With pillow fights?! That's the best idea EVER!" Cassandra said cheerfully.

"Stripes, hey!" Hugo ran into the lab. "So, uh, bad news, the barrel is covered and it's with a bunch of others so we don't know if we can stop people from drinking it. What're you doing?"

"I'm going to knock out everyone at that party." Varian nodded to help. "Help me make more knockout bombs."

"Got it!" Hugo got to work.

"When I get out of this goo..." Rapunzel growled.

"Whoohoo, teamwork!" Cassandra cheered.

"Rapunzel, come on, he's just a kid. You can't hit a kid." Eugene said nervously.

"Didn't I say to shut up?!"

"Shutting up now!"

Varian groaned and tossed a knockout bomb over his shoulder at them all. Without moments, they were asleep.

"Blissful silence." Hugo said, and Varian nodded in agreement.

--

Of course, knocking them out was a last resort. Varian decided to go with his two alchemist companions to talk to King Frederic about what had happened.

"And so, because Pascal is a butterfingers, what would've lasted only a few hours is going to last days. Therefore, I propose it might be a good idea to postpone the banquet due to..." Varian looked thoughtful. "Sickness! There's a sickness in the castle, we won't want it spreading."