"Hello? Is anybody home? Helloo-ooo?"

At the sound of a foreign voice Nareen jumped up. It was a thin and calm female voice that she had never heard before.
"Uhm... Hello? Who's there? Come in, please."

A small doll wearing a princess gown and a pink crown entered the livingroom. Metallic strands sparkled in her hair and there were strange creatures on her head. Butterflies with tails?
Nareen's heart pumped wildly.
"Good day. Who are you?"

"Good day to you, Madame Nareen. My name is Lady LovelyLocks and I came to discuss some matters with you. Prince Strongheart and I couldn't help ourselves but notice your newly acquired furniture from the other side of the study."

Nareen gulped. The newspaper slid from her grip.
"Oh. I see. Please, have a seat. The sofa is..."
"... quite comfortable? Yes, I'm aware of that." the lady said with a faint smile.
Nareen bit her lip and sat down too.
"Look, I was about to contact you anyway, Lady LovelyLocks. Please, don't call the police. I was just about to talk to my friend about this. Until I read the newspaper I had no idea of what she did."
"Maybe you should be more careful in picking your friends then." LovelyLocks still smiled, which made Nareen nervous.
"I... I really don't know how to tell you how sorry I am."

LovelyLocks made a small impatient gesture.
"Although I appreciate your sincere apology I'd like to cut to the chase right away, please. The way over here was long and hard and I'd much prefer not to run into your clobbering friend on the way back."
"I'm sure that was just an accidental slip of hers. Eternia really isn't brutal and..."
"Please, Nareen. Let me finish."
"Okay, sorry."
"You are a necromancer, are you not?"
"Well... yes, yes I am." Nareen answered, startled by the sudden change of topic.
LovelyLocks nodded. "And as such you are acquainted with the undead and their ways, right?"
"It's more complicated than that but overall you're right, yes. What does that have to do with this whole affair though?"
"We're willing to let the theft slide if you do us a little favour. You would even get to keep the stolen goods and we would not press any charges against your friend."
Nareen's eyes widened. "Wow! What would I have to do?"

"There are zombies on our premises. We want you to get rid of them." was the simple reply.
Nareen blinked. "Oh my! Were any of your friends eaten?"
LovelyLocks hesitated. "No. The zombies just stand there."
"What? That's all?"
"That's all. They are unnerving. Their cold stares make us afraid!"

Akshi came by and the necromancer smiled at her. "Akshi! Did you hear that? We can fix our problem and Eternia doesn't even have to know! All it takes is taking out some zombies! Hooray!"

LovelyLocks wiped her brow with a small handkerchief and asked: "So this is a confirmation? You will help us?"

"Of course I'll do it! Let's go! Show me the way!"

The LovelyLocks dolls occupied the top shelf of the showcase on the wall opposite to Nareen's dollhouse. It was a tough climb but Nareen and the Lady finally arrived at their destination.

LovelyLocks straightened her posture and cleared her throat.
"Surely our problem is more obvious to you now. Everyone is frozen to the spot. How are we supposed to look cute like this?"

Nareen looked at the assembly. All the dolls were pale and stood with their backs to the wall.
"It's pretty cramped here. So, where are the zombies?"

Two Lady LovelyLocks?! Everything's possible in the realm of dolls! ^^

"Over there!" Everyone pointed to the other end of the glass shelf.

The Pullip took a look and right on, there were zombies.
"It's quite spacy over there."

The zombies just stood and groaned.

"Aaaaaalright." Nareen felt a slight twitch in her eye. There was a good distance between both doll factions, and the zombies... just stood there. Kind of like potted plants. They didn't seem to belong to the brain-eating kind. This whole thing was kind of ridiculous but Nareen wanted to save Eternia, so she would not get into details.

"Before I start, just tell me one thing." She couldn't keep her mouth shut about this. "Please tell me... why the cuckoo is there a My Little Pony baby mixed in with your friends?"

"We hired him for dramatic effect. There are innocent children in danger here." LovelyLocks said straight-faced.
"Please think about the children!" chimed Maiden FairHair.

The twitching in Nareen's brow got stronger. She quickly went over to the zombies before the urge to laugh got too strong.

The zombies greeted her with blank stares.
"Uhm... hi guys." Nareen smiled sweetly.
One of the zombies grunted.
"Listen, the dolls over there are afraid of you. Do you think you could move to another place, please?"
The zombies just stared and seemed unwilling to move.

Dolltopia Archive 04 <-- # --> Dolltopia Archive 06