Episode 199 - Boiling Over

## Synopsis

A crowd had assembled in the Dining Hall, in front of the stage that been set up there. Efrosyni sat to the side, while the candidates stood at their podiums. A professional looking Cyndra stood to the left, a normal looking Mira stood in the middle, and a terrible looking Bailey stood to the right. Several members of the audience wore the brass circlets given to them by Winsler and Serinepth. The midday sun shone through the large windows, as the students waited in silence for the symposium to begin.

Efrosyni stood and said, *"We will now be hearing from the candidates themselves. They will be stating for all of us some of their goals and ambitions, should they become president of the Event Planning Committee. We will be beginning with our current president, Bailey Blue. Please, let's hear it for our current president, Bailey Blue."*

Mira watched as Efrosyni stumbled over her words, as though she had very little energy, and whatever she had left was fading rapidly. However, when she mentioned Bailey's name, her eyes lit up and she spoke to the crowd with much more conviction. Mira realised the Network was likely influencing anyone who was a part of it to believe in Bailey. Her eyes shifted towards him, seeing his figure slouched over the podium, tired eyes wandering across the students.

Bailey gripped the sides of the podium to steady himself. *"Uh, hello everyone. I am the current event planning committee president, as our wonderful moderator said. I've been in this role, this will be my third year. I... slave away during Autumn's End, and during the start of a semester, as any of you who have started here in the past, throughout my entire time as president will know. You had orientation meetings, there are tours, your assembly with the headmaster to be selected and put into teams, your meetings with mentors. Again, any– any– any..."* — Bailey stared at the lectern in front of him — *"Anything that has happened on this campus, not done by faculty, not done by the administration, has been handled, has been helped, has been planned, has been orchestrated by me. And if you've not seen my hand in any of it, it is because I am doing the greatest job that I can. If you wish for things to continue the way Autumn's End happened at the end of last year in such a grand way – larger than it has ever been before, thanks to the help of Headmaster Crowe. If you want things to continue with that trajectory, if you want things to continue to work and work properly, things to be happening, events such as the club meetings or club fairs, happening when they are meant to and without any big problems, there is no candidate other than me who can make that happen."*

Bailey looked towards the crowd, standing straight for the first time since his arrival, then looked towards Efrosyni. She nodded and said, *"And that is it for Bailey Blue, our current event planning committee president. Thank you very much Bailey. Um, now for his two members of opposition, we'll be beginning first with the first year who threw her hat into the ring during Bailey's time as event planning committee president. Mira Marchand, if you would like to tell everyone about what you aspire to do as club president, should you be elected."*

Mira smiled. *"Yes, absolutely. Oh, and I'm a second year by the way. Hi there, so my name is Mira Marchand, you might all recognise me from the tournament victory, planning the 954 golem party – I recognise some familiar faces who were at that party – the event planning committee. Some of you know me from book club, foreign languages club, and of course the music club. I am committed to planning events, helping out my fellow students, and encouraging others. I was described by Headmaster Crowe as 'altruistic', not only did I plan the golem party, but I am also behind the scenes responsible for the optimisation of many of Mr. Blue's events without credit. For example the vendors at Autumn's End, I did this at the same time as winning the duels. I have spoken to some students about the things that matter most to you, things that we as a school are currently not doing as much as we should be. Things like control over your class schedules, greater support meeting for study groups, and other things like that.*

*I have several pieces of my platform. I want to talk to you guys about social events, you know, as the student body we don't get much interaction with students in other years except for duels and the occasional club, so to facilitate more friendly student interaction, make the school feel like a more cohesive body, I pledge to organise and improve a large number of social events on campus. You might start seeing things like dances, game nights, club recruitment fairs, and other similar events becoming more common place, which can give you guys a little bit of time to kick back and relax after our intensive classes.*

*Speaking of those intensive classes, I want to talk about getting more educational resources out for you guys, like first year is really hard right? A lot of us have never been in the school environment before right? Totally, and now we're suddenly in the same place as spells and arcane history, and other things we may not be familiar with. And even in the upper years as classes get more specialised and difficult, because classes get so much smaller there aren't a lot of resources in those classes right now. So as president, I'm going to work with the student body and professors to provide a greater wealth of resources for students. This might include organising regular study sessions for introductory classes, recruiting volunteer note takers whose notes students can borrow, and more.*

Mira took a breath and was about to continue when Efrosyni hastily stood up again. *"Uh, Mi– Mira, thank you so much for–"*

Mira started talking over her as well. *"Oh I'm sorry, I just have one more platform thing to talk about."*

*"That's wonderful, we can go over it in a little bit–"*

*"So, campus security–"*

*"I'm sure someone can ask a question about it in a little bit. We're running on a bit of a tight schedule."*

*"Well it's actually a pretty big part of my platform."*

*"I mean, I'm sure if it was a big part of your platform it would have come up already. But thank you Miss–"*

Mira continued unfazed. *"I'm sure several of you have noticed among the classes here that sometimes there are some problems on campus. Sometimes ones that get noticed by the larger student body, and some ones that aren't. For some of the high achiever, high grade students at this school, do any of you guys remember some of your friends starting to disappear sometime around last year? And if not, you probably didn't notice and if that's the case, I'm why. Last year there was an Oblex running rampant in the school sewers, and it was actually me and my study group who helped track this thing down and defeat it, and if any of you have more questions about that Oblex, feel free to ask me during then. If any of you guys remember when there were all of those crazy fires across campus then they suddenly stopped, do you remember why? That was me and my study group as well. We are tirelessly working, not only above ground to deal with stuff like giving you guys events and better educational support, but we're also working behind the scenes to deal with threats to the school, that we'd like to continue to keep relatively invisible to you guys, so you can keep studying and living your normal school life. As event planning president, I plan to deal with these in a much more efficient capacity, and you can ask me a little about that latter, but that's me, I'm Mira, and see you guys after the Q&A."*

Mira turned around to see Efrosyni glaring daggers at her, as well as an expression of exhaustion and frustration on Bailey's face. Underneath the stage, Integrity crept towards Bailey and tied his shoelaces together with her invisible *Mage Hand*. Efrosyni tore her gaze away from Mira said in a cold voice, *"Thank you so much Mira. Anyways, next, moving onto our final candidate, Miss Cyndra Sunfire. A newcomer this year to the event planning committee itself, and also has thrown her hat into the... ring... uh, thank you, go ahead."* She sat down and rubbed her temples.

Cyndra opened her large binder and began her speech. *"Students gathered here, my name is Cyndra Sunfire. I am here for very few things. If I gain the presidentship of the event planning committee, I would like to start using the infrastructure to perform greater acts of good on the campus, to organise this committee into a larger student organisation, so that we can bring problems similar to what Miss Marchand mentioned in her address. Issues of student accommodations, people not having proper access to language resources, or having improper class schedules posted, or just the options to choose between professors in specific classes, the opportunity to– Have you as a student here, ever wanted to change your room? Have you disliked your roommate? Have you been put into a room that is improper for you? Because I guarantee you there are students on this campus, who have been put into lodgings that are inadequate for them.*

*I also do not believe that adequately reward the hard work of the students on this campus enough. There is so much work put in by you, my fellow attendees at this school, and I believe that something of more rewards than just good grades and kind words from professors should be organised, so that we can adequately promote that behaviour. In my time here at Wildcliff, I've received very few positive encouragements for my... And for that reason, I would suggest that we organise a partnering event during Autumn's End, one that commemorates not just the ability of people like Mira Marchand and their practical abilities and talents in just fighting people – which is an archaic tradition at this school – but something of like a merits or awards ceremony, for students who are academically gifted but not just getting into fights constantly."*

Cyndra began to flip through her pages for her next point, at which time Efrosyni stood up and said, *"Everyone say thank you to Miss Sunfire, who has thrown her hat into the ring–"*

Winsler yelled from the back of the crowd, *"Let her finish!"*

Serinepth shouted, *"You didn't say there was a time limit!"*

Efrosyni glared at them and muttered, *"I don't have to answer you people."* In a louder voice she said, *"Thank you to all three candidates, we will now–"*

Winsler and Serinepth clapped very loudly for Cyndra, the students around them began to join in until they drowned out Efrosyni's words. Behind them, Winsler heard the doors creak open then close, but not any footsteps. Instead, he recognised the flapping sound of tiny wings, turning around to see the homunculus that he and Integrity had made, flying through the door. It climbed into the eaves of the Dining Hall, Winsler pointed it out to Serinepth and quickly explained why they had made it. It began to circle around the stage, upon which Mira and Bailey stood. She saw her friends panicking at the back of the Hall, heard a flapping sound above her, and looked up to see the homunculus. It circled several more times, looking confused towards Bailey, Efrosyni, and the other members of the event planning committee. It dived towards the stage, Serinepth threw her hand out and cast *Levitate*, it floated back up to the ceiling with a small, sad cry.

Efrosyni announced that they would be opening the candidates up to questions, letting Bailey go first. He looked to Mira for a few moments before he spoke. *"Mira, I'm apologise if I never mentioned this to you, or made more clear how appreciative I was of your help last year in the event planning committee. But the things that you brought up, like helping with vendors and organisation during Autumn's End when I was swamped with other things, those were just regular components of being a part of the event planning committee. I really appreciate your gumption and your aptitude for it, and by all means I would love more help from you this coming year during Autumn's End. And Miss Sunfire of course, mentioning that we should have a student award ceremony, such things have been discussed in the past, however most of the time professors are unwilling to go along with such things due to time constraints. So novel suggestions from the two of you, but by no means are they out of place or unorthodox for members of the event planning committee, or ideas we've had already."*

Mira said, *"Oh of course. It's just that, Mr Blue, in your opening speech you told the audience that these plans were single handily yours and I just wanted to– I understand a lot of audience members might not know that other members of the event planning committee do a lot of that organising as well, and I just want everybody to know that I was responsible for a lot of the events that went well, as well as some events that you Mr Blue – I understand that you're very swamped with schoolwork – weren't exactly present for. I mean I know that a very large percentage of the Autumn's End festival was performed by us, and I mean I was swamped as well. We won that duel, you can imagine how busy we were. I just wanted to communicate exactly how that worked so that people understand that, as president, I will be very very capable, and not only will all of the events that you loved this year continue to run, but I'll make sure that far more is available and the kinds of events you guys might like to see, whether that's academic, social, and everything in between."*

*"Yeah, that sounds wonderful, doesn't it. I was under that impression that, yeah, you sounded really swamped during Autumn's End, Mira. If I'm not mistaken you were doing duels, helping out with event planning committee obligations that you had already agreed to. There was a little thing, oh what was it, organising to steal from other teams? Their items if I'm not mistaken."*

*"Excuse me? No that's–"*

*"And even now at the start of the semester, when there's so much going on with the event planning committee, organising to break into other students rooms in the night and do who knows what."*

*Oh Bailey... I really enjoyed working with you in the event planning committee this year and I feel really disappointed that you have to resort to lying and attack ads to try to win this election."*

*"It's by no means a lie, I'm sorry to say."*

*"Bailey, come on."* Mira looked around the crowd, trying to convince them this was all some big desperate lie. *"Come on."*

Serinepth whispered to Winsler, *"This is really embarrassing for Bailey."*

He whispered back, *"Yeah, I can't believe he would lie like that."*

The crowd chuckled in disbelief, Bailey ground his teeth and glared at Mira. Under his breath he murmured, *"You're really just trying your hardest aren't you?"*

*"Sorry I didn't quite catch that?"*

*"Oh, nothing, nothing, nothing. Sorry, I guess bringing up those things is kind of below us in a position like this, I apologise so much for bringing them up. I thought they would be more pressing than talking about, attention awarded. But I guess that's on on ones head, and talking about academic warning that people have received in the past year, this isn't the place for that, you're so right Mira, yeah."*

*"I mean, I certainly wouldn't want to say negative things about your character Bailey. If we're bringing those things up, I would be– I wonder, I'm sure I mentioned this earlier*"*—*Mira looked out at the crowd of students—*"that some of you might even have remembered going missing yourself, losing your memories or this happening to your friends. You might be wondering about the fire that happened, and I can tell you all about that. So last year, some friends of my classmates, high achieving students, began to go missing and we started tracking it down. We learned there was an Oblex, so we went down to the school– and if you're wondering about my detention, it's because we went down to the sewers because last year's administration wasn't really acting to help, so we took that upon ourselves. We actually found Mr Blue there, who had also broken into the school and somehow evaded detention–I'm very impressed with you there Bailey–and he said that he had actually created this Oblex and that he wanted to—"*

*"That's just untrue, I did not do anything like that."*

*"You absolutely did Bailey, as part of a school project if I remember right—"*

*"A pet, yes. A pet I cared for, and it broke away into the school—"*

*"And then you let it go free into the school."*

*"Because it was a creature of great power Mira, and I was doing my best to recapture it—"*

*"And then we fought it."*

*"I was doing the same thing as you were, and if I recall I didn't get detention for that kind of act—"*

*"Yeah, I remember that."*

Winsler shouted from the back of the room, *"So you admit that it was yours?"*

Efrosyni stood and asked him not to yell, saying they would take questions from the crowd later.

Mira carried on, *"So I was down there, and Bailey was there, so even though it was not our responsibility we took it upon ourselves to help anyway. Let's see, we went and it attacked Bailey, and I don't think he—"*

*"Is this relevant, Mira?"*

*"—did anything to help, and what else?"*

*"Mira!"*

*"Oh, so back to the fire. When I announced my intention to run for president, I believe Bailey said some stuff about how he was not going to stop at anything to defeat us, how he was going to make something similar to the Oblex—"*

Bailey's voice lost all trace of politeness. *"I didn't say that."*

*"—I think he said something about 'I did it once, I can do it again'—"*

*"Now you're spreading lies. Now you are spreading lies"*

*"So, I went to his room, his dorm room to come and talk to him last night, because I wanted to clear the air because I don't want to—"*

*"I was in a state of distress last night, because of some horrible things that have been happening."*

*"So I came to his dorm—"*

Bailey yelled, *"You broke into my dorm to attack me and my friend!"*

*"No! I knocked on the door—"*

*"You broke my door open open! You and your friend Serinepth Sinderman broke me door open!"*

*"Nope. I came, and I knocked, and I spoke to Bailey with the intention to clear the air, like I don't want this to be a campaign based on attack ads or anything like that. Then his friend –* Jakov *I believe it was – attacked me and Serinepth, who was just there because we were walking together because we're friends, attacked us, broke the door and I remember falling unconscious. The last thing I remember is the dorm was set on fire. To be completely honest I didn't want to bring this kind of thing up, because I think I can win this on my own merits, but with Mr Blue starting to spread frankly very untrue things about me, about the campaign, I think it's necessary to bring up the fact that I think some of Bailey's actions are a threat to student safety. As someone who has a history of combating these threats in the school, I think it is my responsibility to tell all of you this. I'm really sorry, I didn't want to have to stoop to this, I really think that my platform should speak for itself, I just wanted to give you all that warning."*

Cyndra started, mouth agape, at the two of them. Efrosyni sat in her chair, looking generally frustrated at the situation. Bailey was shaking his head vigorously, muttering about how this wasn't what he wanted, how he didn't want to run, and that now Mira was forcing his hand.

He said, *"I've run this club as well as I can. I've done the most that I can do to make things go off without a hitch, and they have. If small moments outside of that in the past year, tending to a pet who I saw the good in, and then working towards the destruction of that thing when it became a threat. If that's something that we're going to look down upon, we're going to lie to one another and to everyone gathered here about what happened last night, about the actions, if we're going to paint them in the colour of you being some hero here... yeah. Mira, you're forcing my hand."*

*"Bailey, I'm really sure I don't know what you mean here. Like I said, I would love to run this smoothly, I don't want to be digging into your past, into the harm you've put the student body in because I don't think it's about that. But if you start bringing up things about me, like a detention here and there, trying to not only attack my qualifications but my character, then I have to bring this stuff up, because I really think it's relevant to the election. But if you're not interested in going down that route, why don't we forget everything that's been said about the Oblex or the fire that you and your classmate set in your own dorm, and we can just talk about our platforms. I'm more than happy to do that."*

Bailey took a deep breath. His eyes flickered over the crowd, settling on various people, including Winsler. He sighed, *"Now we could do that Mira, maybe that would be the smart thing to do here."*

Winsler and Serinepth realised that part of what Bailey said was genuine, he truly believed that putting this behind them might be the right thing to do. The second after he finished speaking, a purple flash crossed his head, and his eyes started to glow.

His voice changed, becoming more authoritative as he addressed the crowd. *"Everyone, I need you, just for a few moments..."*— His ear began to bleed, and the tentacle scars reappeared around his neck —*"I need you all, just– just a moment of peace. Just– oh please, get out of my head. I need you to all sleep."*

The crowd began to sway as Bailey's *Mass Suggestion* started to take hold. Mira strummed her lyre, just barely managing to *Counterspell* him in time. *"Woah hold on, did you just try to cast a spell on the crowd?"*

He turned to Mira with bloodshot eyes, desperation and fury creeping into his voice. *"I was. I was trying to cast a spell on the crowd, because I needed to deal with you privately, and not in front of—"*

The stage broke up from underneath them as Integrity leapt up and stabbed at Bailey with her Squall, smacking it into his palm and sending lightning coursing through his arm. She tried to see if he had the jade dagger with him, but the folds of his robes hid any sight of it. The crowd began to scatter and run out of the hall. Serinepth yelled at them all to get out, kept concentrating on keeping the homunculus afloat, grabbed one of the brass circlets, and ran over to Efrosyni. Winsler looked at the objects in the room, his eyes settled on the podiums, and two of the chairs on the stage. He pointed his hand towards them and they grew feet, the podiums waddling over to surround Bailey Blue, while the chairs surrounded Efrosyni. The purple energy surrounding Bailey arced towards Integrity and the podiums, Integrity felt a brief stabbing pain in her mind, before Bailey waved his hand and purple tentacles started writhing under his clothes and tearing off his cloak.

Integrity stared at him and begged, *“I know who you are, and you don’t want to do this.”*

Bailey stared back, his eyes purple and bloodshot. Integrity felt almost as though he wasn’t entirely there, like something else was controlling his actions. She pulled out her rope, tied his arms behind his back. and whispered, *“Bailey, if there’s anyone in this world who can understand what you’re going through right now, it would be me. You don’t want to go down this path, and we can try to help you! I know there’s some part of you that doesn’t want to do this, someone who’s afraid, I know it!”*

He turned his head to face her. *“Get away from me, Integrity Idleberry.”*

Mira shouted out to the exiting crowd, apologising for Bailey’s instability, and promising to take care of it. She then turned towards him and strummed her lyre. Musical notes floated around Bailey’s head as she cast *Dispel Magic*, until eventually the purple faded from his eyes, the tentacles covering his body retracted, and he slumped to the ground. She yelled for someone to get a circlet on his head quickly. Over to the side, Efrosyni was coughing non-stop on the ground. She let out a horrible retching sound and vomited what looked like a large slug with a beak for a head. It writhed around for a moment before lashing out at the nearby chairs. The responded by kicking and stomping on it with their feet. Serinepth held the circlet and looked at the two figures collapsed on the floor of the stage. She ran towards Bailey, he looked at her with dead and bloodshot eyes as she slipped the circlet onto his head. His eyes rolled back, but the tentacles around his body didn’t retract further.

Winsler teleported next to Cyndra. Her eyes were wide as she stood frozen, trying to comprehend the scene in front of her. He assured her they had it under control, and promised to keep her safe.

Bailey craned his neck to look at Mira as he pleaded, *“I’m so sorry, I’m so sorry. She’s in my head, I can’t get her out of my head Mira.”*

She told him to stay out of their way, they would talk after dealing with the slug creature. He dropped his head to the ground, exhausted. Integrity carefully stood guard over him, ready to attack if he moved. The chairs kicked at the slug again, but were unable to land a blow on it until it slithered closer to Winsler, letting one of them get a solid kick to its beak and killing it. The stage fell silent, except for the people catching their breaths after the fight and Efrosyni’s coughing. Bailey lay unmoving on the floor and Cyndra started to collect herself again. Serinepth grabbed two more circlets to give to Cyndra and Efrosyni. Integrity began to feel around Bailey’s discarded cloak with her foot, finding the jade dagger within its folds.

As she took it back, Bailey’s voice shook, *“She gave that to me, she gave that to me to kill people with, she gave that to me to kill Mira with, I don’t— she— something— she’s still in my head.”*

Mira asked, *“Is she listening right now?”*

*“I don’t know, I don’t know. She went away when you cast spells on me but– but– but“* — He gestured to the tentacles covering his body — *“There’s still these, these are her’s, I don’t know if they can hear me, she did something to Efrosyni, she put– I don’t know who else she did it to, she– she killed Jakov. She’s controlling me, I’m not in charge anymore, I didn’t want to hurt people, I just wanted to help, to win. Mira–“*

*“So you went and sought this pact for the election is that right?”*

*“Yes, that’s right, I thought she would advise me, or give me wisdom, but she made me poison people, she made me– She drowned me, she speaks to me in my dreams and my waking hours it– it all went so fast… I don’t want this, I don’t want this…”*

Integrity’s voice was softer than before. *“That’s what they want you to feel.”*

Efrosyni kept coughing on the floor, like she was about to throw up again.

Mira sighed. “*You’re too pathetic to be mad at. Look, we have experience with this stuff, with warlock stuff. Well… We’ll figure it out, and then you’d better be dropping out of this.”*

Bailey just stared at the floor in defeat. *“I don’t want this anymore this isn’t– I don’t want this. There’s no” — He looked at Mira — “I don’t want her in my head anymore. That’s all I want, I don’t care about any of the rest of this, it’s all gone too far, just get her out of my head please!”*

*“We will. Look, I’m not a warlock, but I know the feeling of having someone who wants you to do something, be in your head, and it sucks. We will– We will fix it. Keep the circlet on, she’ll probably still be able to listen to you, but it shouldn’t be as bad, keep that on and… What do you know about her, do you know if she had any weaknesses or anything?”*

*“Weaknesses… I don’t think she can be outside–“*

Another flash of purple energy went around his head as he jerked back in agony. He sounded on the verge of tears as he said, *“I can’t talk about it she can still hear me, she’s still in my head! She’s connected to me, she knows– The circlet isn’t doing anything she’s still knows– She can hear it, she can hear it! She’s plotting against you guys right now!”*

Integrity turned to Mira. *“I really don’t think that the circlet will work on him the same way that– It’s just like entangled in him, with or without the circlet. What did he do to her?”* She pointed to Efrosyni.

Serinepth was trying to help her as she lay in spasms on the ground, but whenever she touched her, Efrosyni snarled, *“Don’t touch me!”*

Serinepth forced the circlet onto her head, slowly her coughing subsided, still present but not overwhelming.

Winsler asked Cyndra if she knew of any safe and private rooms in the school. She stammered that maybe there would be empty classrooms or places in the Archives, then asked what was going on. Mira briefly explained that there were dangerous things under the school, and how Bailey had made a pact with one. Serinepth suggested the Cannon Lab, and finally stopped concentrating on holding the homunculus aloft. She and Integrity held and steadied Bailey, while Mira summoned a massive hand to pick Efrosyni up. The homunculus flew down onto Bailey’s head. It grabbed handfuls of his hair, turned to Integrity and let out a small cry. They walked out of the Dining Hall to find a crowd of nervous students looking to see what had happened. Mira marched confidently forwards, assuring them that they were safe and the threat was being handled. The crowd seemed to relax slightly, but still glared at Bailey as he went by. When they had left the crowds behind, Cyndra asked if Bailey and Efrosyni would be ok. Winsler promised they would try to get them the help they needed, but suggested she keep Yog close by for safety. Serinepth reminded her to keep the circlet on at all times. All together, they made their way towards the Cannon Lab.