Chapter Text
“Alright, it’s almost the end of the month. You all know what that means!” Eda said, standing in front of the family gathered in the living room.
The front door swung open, and Hooty chirped happily, “It’s time for my monthly cleaning, hoot, hoot!”
Everyone else groaned.
“And as per usual, to make this fair, a randomly chosen bet will determine which loser is stuck with the task,” Eda continued. She thrust a hand out. “Rainestorm, the betting ball.”
Raine brought out a crystal ball charmed for this specific situation from its hiding place. They were one of very few people in the house to be trusted not to rig the bets in someone’s favor to avoid chore duty, especially a despised chore like washing Hooty. They set the crystal ball on the coffee table, and cast the charm to summon a randomly selected bet.
The family leaned in to see what the bet would be. The magic inside the ball swirled and swirled until it finally formed a string of words.
Steal something from Principal Bump’s office without getting caught.
Edric let out a whoop. “Alright! A heist!”
Raine picked the crystal ball back up and went to return it to its hiding spot while Eda addressed the rest of the family.
“Okay, you all know the drill. First person who gets caught stealing something from Bump’s office is the loser who has to clean Hooty,” Eda said.
TOH-TOH-TOH
With the bet determined, a randomly selected order was drawn. On the next school day, everyone took turns sneaking out of class to break into Principal Bump’s office.
King got the lucky first pick. He snuck into the school with Gus, and made his way to the principal’s office. It was quiet, so King assumed he was off talking to some other teacher at the moment.
The first thing that attracted his eye when he got inside was the gold nameplate that sat on the desk.
With a little ‘weh!’ he snatched it and ran to go brag to Eda, who waited for him outside.
From there, it was a process. Gus took Bump’s crystal ball, Willow coaxed his Snapping Cerberus plant in the corner to cooperate with her, Raine swiped his writing quill, Eda snagged his jagged dagger, and even Amity stole his Hexside graduation diploma.
Every time Bump returned to his office from some administrative task and saw something else had disappeared, he felt his eye twitch underneath Frewin’s aid. He had a feeling it was one of those days. While he wanted to stay in his office to catch whoever was involved, he had lots of duties outside the office he had to complete.
During Bump’s next absence, Luz took her turn. She looked around the office for something to take, but found nothing interesting that hadn’t already been taken.
Thinking of something, she snapped her fingers. “His closet counts as part of his office, right?” She asked herself, and threw open the closet door off to the side. Inside the closet, she found a few cleaning supplies and a worn hat under a dome. Luz gasped. “Witch hat!” Rushing forward, she attempted to take off the dome, but found it wouldn’t budge. She withdrew an ice glyph and cast it on the dome, breaking it. Fearing Bump could be back any minute, she snatched up the hat and rushed out.
A few minutes later, Bump returned to his office and found Hunter in the middle of cramming a file, whether a student’s or a common school file he’d have to check later, down his shirt.
Hunter froze as his hand finished tucking the file away, and he visibly slouched in defeat. “Aw farts…”
Bump drew a spell circle, and abomination goo sprung from the floor to encase the boy. “Explain. Now.”
“The house had a bet to decide who washes Hooty this month. We had to steal something from your office without getting caught,” Hunter answered, resigned to his future chore. He then rattled off the list of stolen things from the family group chat that had been going on throughout the day, and who took what. “Amity took your diploma, and Luz grabbed some hat from your closet just before I came in.”
Bump paled. “A hat from my-!”
TOH-TOH-TOH
“Luz, that’s the Choosy Hat!” Eda, who had been keeping score with the stolen items outside the campus, exclaimed.
“This is the Choosy Hat?!” Luz stared at the hat in her hands in horror. She had heard the story about it breaking free on her first day at Hexside.
Suddenly the hat formed a face with glowing eyes and fangs. “I am free, and now I feed!” Breaking free from Luz’s grip, it threw itself at her face.
Luz let out a shriek and fell back as she was attacked. Eda rushed over to help her while King hung back and messaged the rest of the family about the development.
TOH-TOH-TOH
As soon as the Choosy Hat was contained once more, Bump summoned the rest of the family that had stolen something to his office. They all returned the things they had stolen, and Hunter had been deemed the loser of the bet for getting caught.
“Make sure to get all my tight spots,” Hooty chirped on cleaning day.
Hunter grumbled, and dunked his wash rag in a bucket. At least a new rule had come out of this whole thing.
Rule XXX. When stealing things from Principal Bump’s office, anything goes EXCEPT the Choosy Hat.