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🏈

It was friday night and the football match was about to begin on the Miskatonic university's grounds.

The air was buzzing with excitement and the overall atmosphere was pleasant. Everyone on the field and in the stadium was looking forward to having a great night.

The Miskatonic team was called the Chimeras and their opponent for that night were called the Jumping Jackalopes, they had the reputation to be quite slick in the game, so the Chimeras coach huddled up his team in close, to give some last good advice and encouragement.

The stadium was pretty crowded, almost every student and some relatives and friends had come to see this game. It almost had the feeling of a night out with the family.

Someone who was not enjoying the current situation was Jonas Grayson. He sat close to the field, trying to look as sick as he felt nervous.

He was supposed to play tonight but faked a stomach flu to get out of playing. Which resulted in him getting an earful from his coach, his brothers and a very angry call from ma Grayson.

He sighed deeply, hopefully it was all worth it. He gave a soft nudge to his backpack which contained his priced teacup pig Lottie, who gave a sweet soft squeel as her answer, which made Jonas smile for a moment.

His roommate Joey was supposed to come and join him if he, Mike and Jay got all the supplies they needed for tonight.

Because tonight they would crack the case of the Haunted Miskatonic Mascot, at least, that was the working title Joey gave the case.

Because to be frank, it was a strange case. Nobody knew who was in the mascot suit, not even the teachers or staff at the university. There was ofcourse the obvious reason that if the game went south for the home team, the mascot was an easy target for the public to vent their frustrations on it. It wasn't uncommon that the mascot became the verbal and even physical punching bag if the games continued to go bad for the Miskatonic team.

But it was still a strange case, no names ever came up as to who was in the costume. No one ever admitted to it, not even in the yearbooks. The mascot was just, there, at every sports event, but always without showing who was wearing the mask.

The game was about to begin and cheerleaders from both teams did their routine to hype the public up and to remind everyone to show good sportmanship. This night was supposed to be about having a good time, no matter who would win or lose. The mascots from both teams did a little play to make clear that there was no bad blood between them and ended in a funny twist.

The Miskatonic mascot was named Miska Quimera and was a mixture of a wolf, boar, fox and a ram. It was a mascot that had it's likeness displayed all over MU. Posters, flags, hoodies, mugs, keychains, even plushies. That thing was everywhere.

There was the signal and the game began. The Jumping Jackalopes made the first move trying to break through the defence of the Chimeras but were quickly overpowered by home team. Which resulted in a big cheer from the audience.

Jonas slumped in his seat, not feeling the mood at all, he was more focused on the movements of the mascot. The mascot did it's job and cheered along in a silly way to get the audience to laugh and cheer even harder.

Jonas looked up when he got a nudge from his roommate, who quickly seated himself next to Jonas, followed by the other two men.

"Do we have to sit so close to the field?" Mike wondered aloud.

"Best seats to keep track of our mascot but,..." Joey paused and looked around to see all eyes were on Mike. This was because he was local royalty, so to speak. He got noticed everywhere he went. "Yeah, I can see what you mean, Mike, but, just be your usual charming self and they will lose interest fast." Joey winked. Earning him a death glare from Mike.

The game eventually ended in a win for the home team. Not by a landslide but it was still worth celebrating, a win is a win.

The audience started to leave the stadium to join the after party or just go home for the night.

🏈👻

The mascot was done giving the team high fives and was ready to leave, walking in the opposite direction of the changing rooms.

"Maybe they'll change in their dorm? Or car?" Jay questioned out loud.

"We're about to find out. Keep your stuff at the ready guys." Joey leapt to his feet and started following the mascot.

When they were outside the stadium, walking on the parking lot, Joey called out to the mascot; "Hey! Miska! Wait up!"

The mascot turned around and stood still, letting the boys catch up to it.

"Good game tonight, neh? You really brought your a-game in cheering the team on." Joey continued meanwhile scanning the mask of the mascot, trying to see it's owners real eyes.

The mascot silently pretended to giggle and mimed with one arm as to say; oh you~. Being bashful.

"I guess, I just wanted to ask; who can we thank for all this cheering, this support, hmmm? Can I have your name?" Joey tried again, trying to make the mascot feel at ease.

The mascot wiggled one finger in front of its snout as to say; no, no, no~, I won't tell. Then ended by slightly tilting its head to one side.

"Pretty please?" Jay tried. "We just really want to know who you really are. You've been a huge inspiration to our school for such a long time. We just, like to properly thank you."

The mascot wiggled its head from side to side as if to ponder over it, but then quickly crossed its arms and shaked 'no' and turned around, ready to leave.

"F*ck it! I want to see your real face, with or without permission!" Joey growled and grabbed the mascots shoulder and forced it back to face him, then grabbed the edges of the mask, trying to pull if off. The mascot tried to keep its mask on by pulling in the opposite direction. Eventually the mascot kicked Joey in the stomach to get the man of its body.

Joey stumbled back and landed against Jonas's chest who steadied him by grabbing his shoulders. "You just couldn't be a little more patient?" Jonas hissed angrily.

"Guess being polite is over." Mike mumbled and started walking towards the mascot. The other men followed, walking with a steady pace towards the mascot.

The mascot almost spun on its heels after seeing them all approach and started running across the parking lot, making a beeline towards the edge of the forest.

The boys ran after Miska, trying to stop it from reaching the forest. Jay sprinted forward and tackled the mascot, grabbing the mascot by the waist and letting themselves fall to the ground. Jay moved fast and pinned the mascot so it lay on its stomach, both arms hold back by Jay while placing his bodyweight on the mascots legs, making it impossible for Miska to escape.

"Good work, Jay! Now hold it back while I unmask this freakshow!" Joey said almost gleefully.

Jonas joined Jay in holding the mascot pinned to the ground while Joey and Mike were busy trying to remove the mask.

The mask proved to be a challenge to get off, but with one final pull from the boys combined strength the mask was removed to show, nothing.

The costume looked hollow. Joey and Mike looked where was supposed to be a head, there was just air. "And? What does it look like?" Jay asked from the back and when Joey and Mike didn't respond right away, Jonas tried; "Something wrong?"

"It's empty." Mike replied.

Jay chuckled little confused. "What do you mean?"

"The costume is empty! There is nobody in it!" Joey screamed.

This statement made Jonas and Jay jump off the mascots costume with a shriek. Both men backed away from the costume.

"I-it's a ghost?" Jay asked with a small voice.

"That's what we're about to find out." Joey replied and started taking off his backpack to rummage through it. He took out an infrared camera and started filming the mascots costume.

"Ok, I don't see any obvious cold spots, Mike, take a step back, will you? Thanks. Some fleeting heat from the torso, strange. Whatever was there might have left the costume by now."

Joey pointed his camera up and started filming the surroundings, again nothing out of the ordinary.

Now Mike took out a EMF meter from his bag and started walking around the costume trying to pick up weird fluctuations in electromagnetic fields, nothing really made the meter spike and Mike looked a bit disappointed.

Jay grabbed a ghost box from his bag, turning it on so it would create some white noise, so that spirits could communicate with them. But after asking a couple of questions he got zero response, he shrugged his shoulders, looking a bit helpless at the other guys.

Meanwhile Jonas who had let out his teacup pig Lottie from his backpack to walk around freely, was moving around the costume with dowsing rods in both his hands, trying to see if the spirit would move the rods in the same way it would move a pendulum or a planchette from a spirit board. But whatever was in that costume was not in a talking mood and even the rods didn't move an inch.

"Now what? I mean, we can't force a spirit to make smalltalk if it doesn't want to." Jonas shrugged and the men looked at eachother deciding what to do next, with Lottie moving around, nudging each of the boys legs, trying to get some pets.

👻👹

They were so engrossed with their conversation on the abandoned parking lot and petting Lottie that they didn't notice the body of the mascot moving. It sat upright and started to make attempts to stand up again, without its head.

Mike was the first one to spot it from the corner of his eye and alerted the others of it, who all turned to see the headless costume brushing of some dirt of its clothes and actually started to speak, the voice seemed to emerge from the torso.

"Well, that was a fun chase, though I should say, you guys were a bit slow with trapping me. I almost made it to the forest." The distorted voice chuckled. "Oh wait, silly me, I forgot my role just now." Jay's ghost box turned on again and the voice continued to talk more from the small radio device.

"Better, ok, let's do some small talk." The men were stunned by the whole event and forgot how to speak. The mascot sighed. " Urgh, I really don't want to do this monologuing. More interaction, please!"

One by one the men looked at eachother, trying to decide what to do next. Eventually it was Joey who spoke up; "How long have you been the mascot?" "Pfffft, off and on for a few decades now, I like to walk around mortals, see what you guys are up to and play a little. It's so much fun making you do things you really don't want to do~" Miska let out a low chuckle.

The mascot picked up its head and put it back on, but kept talking over the ghost box. "Can you tell us your real name?" Mike asked.

That made the mascot turn its head and look Mike dead in the eye. "You really think I'm that stupid? Naughty, naughty." The mascot wiggled its finger and then with a flick of its finger made Mike levitate a good 4 feet of the ground. "Don't move!" Miska growled when it saw the other boys trying to get closer to Mike.

"So, next question~!" The mascot said in a singsong voice. Jonas swallowed back his nerves and asked if this was Miska's true form. That made the mascot laugh out loud. "Oh you guys really, really don't want to drag this out any longer, huh? Fine, I'll throw you a bone."

And with those words, black goo started pouring out of Jay's radio device, that made Jay drop the ghost box like a hot potato. The costume started to twitch and you could hear bones cracking. One of the eyes turned black and started dripping black slime as well.

The hoof-like hands turned into long claws, the body grew a bit bigger, making the clothes rip. The creature let out a gutteral shriek, moving a bit closer to the men to stand in the light of a lonely lantern, marking the outline of the parking lot. Almost showing off this new form.

"Well?" The creature asked while dark saliva was now dripping from its mouth. "Good enough for your little ghost hunt?" It crooked its head in their general direction.

"Y-yeah, amazing! But can you, ehm, let Mike down now, please?" Jay asked as politely as he could without cracking his voice too much.

The creature looked at Mike like it only just now remembered it had put Mike there. "Nah, I think you should all join him." And again with a simple flick of its finger all the other men levitated from the ground. Gleefully it started chuckle at the helpless expressions in the guys faces.

"Playing with you mortals is so much fun!" It flicked its wrists now and the men were turned upside down and started to spin around, which caused only more distress.

The creature laughed and the frightened screams but couldn't enjoy its playtime any longer when it received a strong piercing bite in the ankles by the teacup pig Lottie.

It let out a small yelp and kicked the piglet away, thus breaking its control on the boys who fell from the sky when gravity started working again.

👹🧂

They took this small window of opportunity to grab their bags and ran towards the forest. With the creature in hot pursuit.

the group split up, trying to make a final attempt to cage this creature.

The creature had ripped even more of its mascots disguise, flesh tendrils were now sprouting from its back and from its arms, growing through the fur. Its mouth was more barren of flesh and showed large grotesque teeth.

"Where are you brats?!" Its distorted voice ringing through the forest. "I just want to play some more. See how much you guys can take before you break!"

"You have to catch us first!" Joey yelled from somewhere deep in the forest.

The creature moved slowly, sniffing the air, trying to pin point were all the men were hiding.

Jonas and Jay had moved ahead to an open space and had laid the trap, ready to immobilize the former mascot, while Mike and Joey put it on themselves to lure the monster and steer it in the right direction.

It was a weird kind of push and pull, hide and seek. Just showing enough to make the monster look towards a certain direction and make it move just a bit more to were they wanted it to be.

The taunts had already ceased a while ago and now it was just a game to see if the creature would take the bite and not back away or worse, lose interest and just fully abandon the hunt.

But surely enough, it still wanted to play, even nipping at their heels as if it likes to be teased.

When they were close enough Mike came out of hiding and started running in full view of the creature.

The former mascot almost laughed at this and gave chase and was even more delighted when Joey came and joined the party as well, running besides Mike.

The men ran with burning lungs but were so close now they kept pushing themselves further, feeling the creature closing in with every second.

The last part they sprinted with almost Olympic speed and just when the creature was about to leap and catch one of them it was stuck mid-air.

🧂🪄

With a dazed look it looked around and saw the glowing of the spell circle around them.

"F*ck" it muttered.

"Ha! Gotcha!" Joey got out after some heavy breathing. "Gah, that was close." Jay exclaimed and sighed with relief.

"It's not over yet." Jonas muttered and took a book out of his bag and gave this to Mike.

Mike slowed his breathing and started reading from the book.

After a few sentences the creature almost perked up its ears and raised an eyebrow.

"The Bible, really? Wrong book, sweetcheeks. That will only make me fall asleep."

Mike stopped reading aloud and looked annoyed at the creature.

"So, you're not a demon?" Jay asked.

The former mascot shrugged its shoulders.

"Let's try this one then." Joey took out a weathered leather bound book and started to recite an incantation in a old language.

The creature first chuckled a bit but then started to jolt and move erratically.

"Guess this one does the trick." Mike mused.

Small glowing strands started to wrap themselves around the creatures body till they fully cocooned it. The creature let out a last desperate shriek before it dissolved into thin air.

Only when Joey spoke the final words of the spell could the men finally breath again.

They stared at the centre of the spell circle for a moment longer before silently gathering their belongings, ready to go home.

Jonas looked around for Lottie, but couldn't spot his beloved teacup pig anywhere.

🪄🐺

From high upon a hill close to the open space four figures looked down at the group who were now cleaning up after the spell casting.

"Well, that could've gone better" Zwena muttered.

"It was the boss's choice to do this, can't really argue with them." Elaine sighed.

Jacinta made some hand gestures which made Aurélie chuckle.

"Yeah, the boss is now banished for a while, enough time to let them rethink their strategy. Not that they ever really learn from it." Aurélie shrugged.

"We could deal with those nosy men right now, be done with them." Zwena offered.

This made Elaine perk up. "No need for that, they're harmless most of the time. And besides, we don't have the bosses permission."

Zwena rolled her eyes at this. "Don't say you actually have feelings for them, or more specifically, for that Jay guy?"

Elaine avoided looking into Zwena's dark piercing eyes. That woman could read her mind like it was a paperback novel and she wasn't in the mood for it.

"It's not against the rules to mix business with pleasure." Elaine countered.

Aurélie sighed and started to strip herself from clothes, preparing to transform.

Jacinta made some more hand gestures which made Zwena sigh. "Fine, yes, we should wait till we have permission. Just text Valentino that we're done here and that the boss is banished. That should make his evening."

Aurélie body cracked and started to grow in size, turning into her werewolf form. When she was done, she let the other girls climb on her back, getting ready to leave.

Just then she noticed Jonas's teacup pig staring right at her. In her werewolf form she huffed at the piglet and started to turn around to make her way to the university grounds, when she felt something pulling her tail.

🐺🩸

Lottie held on to the tail for dear life but with one hard tug Aurélie pulled herself free, though at a cost. She let out a small yelp, she lost some fur, but there was no time to punish that piglet for the hair pulling stunt, she smelled that Lottie's owner was near.

With one last growl she sprinted away before Jonas could've seen the women leave.

"There you are, girl!" Jonas exclaimed. "You shouldn't run off like that. It's dangerous." He was ready to hug his precious pet when he saw the fur in the teacup pig's mouth.

He gently removed it and put the fur into his pocket for later examination.

Carrying Lottie down the hill he joined the other boys and they started walking back to the university grounds.

When the men finally came to the main building, ready to go their seperate ways to get some shut eye, they were met by the night security guard. Looking way too casual.

"You boys out for a midnight stroll?" Valentino asked almost mockingly. "You know it." Joey answered with a smile that never reached his eyes.

"Cute, next time you're going to beat up a mascot, be a more discrete about it, hmm?"

That made the men look at Valentino with wide eyes. "F*ck you, Barrientos! You can't proof anything!" Joey screamed.

Valentino laughed at the remark.

"First, you're still not my type, Lumen and second, who says I can't proof anything?" The older man gave the boys a toothy grin and walked away laughing.

🩸

This mystery was solved, the haunted mascot was banished and had never been spotted again.

Meme redraws are my passion