It's All a Bit Spooky (Open)

[Merlin Emrys]

Merlin was actually pretty proud of himself. He had some pretty effective zombie makeup on, and lunging out of the darkness at people as they walked through the haunted house had so far resulted in quite a few scares.

That wasn't why he was proud though, it was the other screams echoing through the place that made him proud, even if it was in a quite a weird way.
It was hard work, he had to admit, focusing on jumping out and scaring people, while also keeping a constant eye on the spells he had placed around the rest of the 'ride' (he was hyper aware of the possibility that something might go wrong, so he was keeping very tight magical control on all the creepy effects he'd put in place), but at least it gave his zombie character an appropriately brainless look.

As the students walked through the house, they'd be greeted by eerie mists, shadowy figures that wandered aimlessly through the halls (and occasionally through the people), magical noises that ranged from maniacal laughter to wolf howls to blood-curdling screams occasionally popped up whenever they weren't expecting it, and of course Merlin and his fellow scarer would jump out as they walked past, as well as all the usual haunted house decorations.

[Deleted]

Usually Della was the absolute last person to have anything to do with school carnivals. Usually she drew the line at Prom and had absolutely no intention of going to any dunk tanks or shooting at fake ducks or whatever it was they were planning on doing around here. However, word on the street was that the Haunted House, the one area that would have been mercilessly mocked the most by her, was getting a helping hand from her favorite wizard. With an arched eyebrow when she had heard this, she made the decision that this was worth checking out.

See, Della had been watching the classics in horror since she was about seven. Night of the Living Dead was a Halloween tradition at the Miller's home when a good amount of her classmates couldn't even handle spiders or clowns (Della just thought that their phony attempts at being funny were irritating, at most). Now, she wouldn't say she was an expert, but she would say that she wasn't at all the type to scare easily, and that would mean that this haunted house had to be pretty girl to impress her, and she was just curious enough to give it a whirl.

Her verdict? Sheer brilliance. Not that she freaked out nearly as much as some of her fellow "foolish mortals"...truth be told, the fact that she was at a Haunted House that was actually pretty freaking scary was thrilling. Even the best classic horror films lost their shine after a while. This was not only new, but it felt so real...and considering Merlin's magic, it was debateable of what really constituted as real, you know?

So in spite of the fact that she knew her friend was hard at work, when she came out, passing his "zombified" self (just icing on the cake, as far as she was concerned), she had to say, "You, Merlin, have been holding out on the world, this is the most genius I've seen in a haunted house...well, ever."

[Merlin Emrys]

It was actually his turn to be startled when, instead of jumping and running away like most of the students so far (some screaming, some giggling, but all of them getting into the spirit of it at least a little bit), the person he'd just jumped out at actually complimented him.

"Oh, Della!" He grinned at his friend - the cheerful effect somewhat spoiled by the gruesome makeup "You like it? We all worked really hard on it..."
Knowing that it had been scary enough to impress Della made him even prouder of the whole thing, since he knew she liked her horror movies, and getting special effects that were actually scary in real life was a lot harder than most people realised.
It helped, of course, when you were a wizard.