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[Transcript]

        The front door of Davy’s mansion creaked open with reluctant languor. The Hijacks’ squinty eyes squinted still further; they hadn’t realized they’d been somewhere much, much darker than the night

        As their borrowed sight adjusted slowly to the dusk, the Hijacks cast their gaze up at the building left behind. Its aggressively angular, modern facade jutted out from the side of the hill just like its owner’s ample chin. Impressive as it was, in a spooky, fascist sort of way, the structure was too small to fit even a fraction of what Hijack saw inside it.

        “Another power of my dad’s,” Cody commented in a whisper. “I don’t know what sort of haunted something he’s pulling it from, but he can squash and stretch and shape places around him like they’re putty.” He smiled, looking still more subtly monstrous underneath the stars’ faint glow. “...Don’t get used to me explaining everything for you, though, Hijack. We won’t be able to chat freely where we’re headed... and I’ve shared just about all the information that my dad didn’t command me to keep secret.” Cody gave his pet goldfish a wink. “In other words, the dirt dear father doesn’t know I dug up in the first place!”

        The Hijacks steeled themselves as best they could. After all the worry that they’d surely put the Doc through, they owed her as much intel as could possibly be found.

        “...Mr. Cody?”

        Across the winding driveway, past a manicured roundabout profuse with pitch black flowers, leaning against a police car with a limousine’s proportions, a pair of cops snuffed out their cigarettes.

        “Was... was there something that you needed, sir? My liege? Er, um—m-master junior?” the slight, bespectacled one asked. Both cops seemed more surprised by Cody’s clothes than by his presence.

        “A ride to the PTA meeting, of course,” Cody replied, approaching swiftly. His affable smile was gone, replaced with a mask of impatient disdain. “Why is it you two failed to fetch me? Now I’m going to be late

        The stout cop was already sweating bullets, releasing it, as police were wont to do with all such discharge, at the slightest provocation. “B-but, uhh, boss. Miniboss. Mr. Boss-to-be—uh, Cody, sir. We’re on babysi—babyguardin’—*AHEM* BODYGUARDIN’ duty tonight. The honor of watchin’ the home front, the chief said. Wasn’t any talk about takin’ you to no meeting—”

        Cody scowled, and both cops shuddered. “Do you need my dad to order every single breath you take? Or are you both just gluttons for his punishment?”

        The officers exchanged a glance, then nodded sheepishly in tandem.

        “...Let’s cultivate more shame around confessing things like that,” Cody said with a sigh. “Look, I don’t have time for this. Some orders are so obvious that they remain unspoken. Or would you rather find out what my dad will do to you when he finds out you’re the reason I’m not there on his big night?” He leered. “...Don’t nod again or I’ll exsanguinate the both of you.”

        Davy Jones’ big night... that was the most Cody told Hijack, too—the most that he could tell him. Eavesdropping and subtle signs had revealed to the young vampire that his father’s plans would culminate tonight. There was to be a gathering, a grand reveal, the launch of some great scheme (at some sort of PTA meeting? Perhaps a moot of evil parents and cruel teachers—Cody failed to elaborate on the subject any further

        The junior Jones had apparently made a big rebellious stink about refusing to attend, so that his sire felt he had no need to order his son’s absence... a clever ruse Cody had hatched once he’d deduced he wouldn’t be invited. The plan had worked like a charm; instead of vampiric compulsion, the only obstacle to infiltrating his father’s soiree was two pushover henchmen.

        Cody’s smile seared into his prey. “Are you going to open the door for me or not? Unlike my dad, I won’t just wait around ’til you invite me.”

        Davy’s Faveys scrambled to comply, unaware how close they were to fumbling the title

        “R-right this way, Mr. Cody, sir! Sh-shall I take your, um... your goldfish, sir?”

        “If you want me to drain your blood as a snack instead.”

        “N-no, sir! Of course not, sir!”

        The door of the police limo shut tight. Hijack breathed a bubble of relief; everything was going just how Cody had arranged it.

        “If we’re going to sneak out of here to try and find my mom—” Cody had said, pacing the placid saturation of his room.

        “Your mom, who is a werewolf,” an awestruck RB interjected.

        “My mom who is a werewolf,” agreed Cody. “If we’re going to sneak out to try and find her, we need to lure my dad into a false sense of security. The first obstacle is the fact that, a long time ago, my father commanded me not to leave home without permission or an escort. That would be binding, but...” He smiled. “With you two puppeteering me, there’s no order I can’t break against my will.”

        LB pushed up his glasses. “You mean to say... that you want US to run away inside YOUR body?”

        “Yep! We’ll have to get you working like one brain again to pull that off—but we’ll have plenty of time to reforge your bond in the fiery crucible of Wii Sports

        What the Hijacks could no longer communicate with instant sprectalectrical signals, they transmitted to each other with a glance: they would now both do anything for Cody, the boy who’d promised them the coolest training montage they could possibly imagine.

        “The real problem is my heart... whenever my dad feels it beating fast, he drops everything to make sure that I’m safe.” Cody let his hand rest on the scar his clothes concealed. “So we need to make sure that he’s sure I’m not in danger... without having to chase me down to check

        “H-how are we gonna do that?”

        Cody laughed. An impish grin spread wide across his face. “Easy! The only word my dad trusts is his own... but he really, really trusts it. I need him to demand that I stay safe inside my room with a sentence SO strict... that my dad couldn’t DREAM I’d ever manage to escape!”

        “You... you want your dad to ground you with a vampire command...?”

        “I want him to ULTRA SUPER MEGA EXTRA ground me,” Cody beamed, “and I can’t think of any better way to get him to do that than by ruining all his best laid plans tonight!”