Author's notes: and now we reach the end of the story, which will look familiar to some of you. I realize I probably didn't take this concept as far as I could but I feel it's more important to write a short, to-the-point story than to start something with no idea of when/if it will be finished. If any of you think you can do a similar story better than this, please feel free to try.

…

Baba Yaga had examined the eagle statue and Raven's mirror and had determined how to duplicate whatever made Raven and Toralei switch places. When Grimm learned this, he decided that he and Baba Yaga would personally take Toralei back to Monster High and then bring Raven back. They got Toralei and took her to Raven's mirror in Kitty and Maddie's dorm room. Since they knew about the time difference between worlds, they timed it so that they would arrive in the morning at Monster High, around the time classes would start.

Baba Yaga touched both the mirror and the eagle statue while Grimm and Toralei touched her back. All three of them arrived at the same spot in the catacombs where the switch had occurred. As Baba Yaga deduced, the accident had created a soft spot between worlds in the areas where it occurred.

"This isn't what I expected for monster school," Grimm said as he looked at the cavernous passageway.

"This is just part of the school's catacombs, jackass," Toralei clarified and then lead them to the entrance to the school.

"I'm going to enjoy never seeing you again," Grimm said contemptuously.

"The feeling is mutual," Toralei replied with a wide smile.

"In that case, you'll love this," Grimm said with a smile of his own as he turned to Baba Yaga. "Do it."

Baba Yaga brought her hands together and a light blue aura started glowing around her. She held her hands out and the aura went over Toralei.

"What did you do to me?" Toralei asked in panic.

"If Baba Yaga's magic worked...," Grimm started.

"Which it did," Baba Yaga interrupted.

"Then you have been barred from ever returning to our plane of existence," Grimm finished.

"Like I ever wanted to return to your crappy universe anyway," Toralei yelled then continued leading them to the school entrance. They made it there, opened the door and entered the halls of Monster High, gaining the attention of the monsters walking about.

"Not again," Manny cried out in frustration, not happy to see the unexpected arrival of more normies to the school. It took him a few seconds to get over this feeling and notice that Toralei was with them. "Oh, hey Toralei. The twins will be glad to know that you're back."

"Hey Manny," Toralei returned the greeting then turned to Grimm and Baba Yaga. "The headmistresses office is this way." Toralei lead them to the office and knocked. "Hi."

"Toralei," Headmistress Bloodgood said in shock at hearing the voice of someone who'd been missing for three days. She went to the door, opened it and briefly hugged Toralei. Despite being a massive pain most of the time, she was overjoyed to see her student come back. Bloodgood then broke apart from Toralei and noticed the people with her.

"This is Baba Yaga and Headmaster Grimm of Ever After High," Toralei introduced them as they went into the office and Toralei walked over to Bloodgood.

"You're not what I expected for someone running a school for monsters," Baba Yaga said in curiosity to Bloodgood. Bloodgood then removed her head and held in next to her chest. "That's more like it."

"Enough niceties," Grimm said seriously. "Where's Raven?"

"I'll get her," Bloodgood said and then took out her icoffin. Cleo had gotten one for Raven and then she and Bloodgood shared numbers in case of emergencies. She texted Raven that she needed to come see her right away. A few minutes later, Raven entered the office.

"Oh, you're here," Raven deadpanned as she saw Grimm.

"Yes Raven, I'm here," Grimm said in a tone indicating he was not pleased with Raven's initial reaction. "It's time for you to come home."

"About that," Raven said as she held up her hand. "Maybe I don't want to go back: maybe I like it here."

"What?!" Grimm exclaimed in shock and anger.

"You heard me," Raven said defiantly. "I've only been here three days, the first of which I slept through, and I've been accepted here more than I've ever been at Ever After High."

"Now let's talk about this Raven," Baba Yaga said calmly.

"All right," Raven replied with a smirk as she crossed her arms. "I might be willing to go back to Ever After High, provided some concessions were to be made about following my destiny."

"Unacceptable," Grimm coldly declared.

"In that case," Raven shot back with a glare, "please say goodbye to everyone at EA High for me. I need to get to class." Raven then turned around to leave the office.

"Wait," Grimm said with a hint of panic, causing Raven to stop and turn around. Typically, he would never negotiate with one of his students over following their destiny but it was incredibly important for Raven to play to her part in Apple's story. "What concessions are we talking about?"

"We'll talk about the specifics in your office," Raven clarified. "I want anything we decide to be written down on the really fancy stationary to make any agreements as binding as possible."

"Of course you do," Grimm said bitterly.

"But I want to say goodbye to my friends here first," Raven said as she pulled out her icoffin and started texting some of the ghouls to come to Bloodgood's office.

"That's fine," Grimm said then turned to face Bloodgood. "Meanwhile, we can talk about what this one," he angrily pointed at Toralei, "did at my school."

"What was it this time?" Bloodgood asked.

"She pulled a number of minor pranks on my students," Grimm began, "but more importantly, she attempted to spread dangerous ideology that criticized the infallibility of our status quo and encourage the students to think for themselves."

"I see," Bloodgood said calmly and faced Toralei. "What do you have to say for yourself?"

"This guy sucks ass!," Toralei defiantly cheered.

A fair counterpoint, though crudely put, Bloodgood thought. Between what Raven heard of how things worked at EA High and briefly meeting its headmaster just now, Bloodgood decided that she was justified in disliking this man. She was tempted to defend to Toralei's actions but that would probably involve Grimm staying around longer and she really wanted him to leave.

"I will make sure Toralei is punished," Bloodgood lied. A few minutes later, Frankie, Draculara, Cleo, Operetta and the werecat twins arrived in Bloodgood's office. Raven began hugging the ghouls she felt closest to and saying goodbye while the twins went over to Toralei and hugged her.

"Do you have to go?" Draculara asked. "We can work something out for you to stay here."

"I'm very tempted," Raven began, "but there are many issues involved with staying in this world that your generosity alone won't solve. Besides, I've talked Grimm into giving me some leeway with my destiny." Raven went over to hug Cleo. "Try that thing we talked about tomorrow," she whispered into Cleo's ear.

Cleo reclaimed the eagle statue from Baba Yaga. With that out of the way, the three people from Ever After exited the office and went to the catacombs. Bloodgood then faced Toralei.

"You'll be glad to know," the headless headmistress started, "that I'm not actually going to punish you for anything you did at Ever After High: I only said that so that Grimm would leave this school sooner."

"I figured you would," Toralei said with a grin, unsurprised that Bloodgood saw nothing wrong with her trying to bring Monster High's values to a school that desperately needed them.

"What did you do?" Clawdeen asked accusingly.

"It's quite a story," Toralei said with a wide smile.

Raven, Grimm, Baba Yaga went to the spot in the catacombs where all this had begun. Baba Yaga brought her hands together and sent them back to Maddie and Kitty's dorm room. The two wonderlanders were not present, having been instructed by Grimm to stay out until told otherwise.

"Let's go to your office now," Raven said as she began walking and was not joined by the two adults. "What's going on?"

"Do it now," Grimm ordered. Baba Yaga brought her hands together and cast an aura over Raven just like the one she cast on Toralei.

"What did you do?" Raven asked worryingly.

"Baba Yaga just cast a spell that will prevent you from going back to Monster High," Grimm explained. "Just in case you had any plans of duplicating the accident that sent you there."

"Why would I do that?" Raven asked. "You're about to give me what I wan... oh." Raven's eyes widened in realization as she just put together what Grimm was up to. "You never had any intention of making a deal with me."

"That's right," Grimm said smugly. "Legacy Day is in two days. You are going to pledge your destiny and do hexactly what you're supposed to. And don't even bother telling anyone about how I brought you back here: if you do, I'll deny it and no one will take your word over mine. Do I make myself clear?"

"Yes," Raven glared at him.

Asshole, Raven thought as he and Baba Yaga left. Having been deceived by Grimm and deprived the option of going back to Monster High, Raven was more determined than ever not to follow her destiny. You've won this battle Grimm, but the war has only just begun.

Raven grabbed her mirror walked out of Maddie and Kitty's dorm room and was amazed at how many people were standing in the hallway. Maddie, Cerise, Cupid, Hunter, Cedar, Meiling (dressed as Michigo), Finelope, Dexter, Apple and Briar were there, most likely awaiting her return to EA High. Raven lowered the mirror to the floor as Apple went up to her.

"You're back," Apple said as she grabbed Apple in a big, hug. "I was so worried about you. Are you all right?"

"I'm fine, Apple," Raven said as she returned the hug and then looked at all the people who were happy to see her back, pleasantly surprised that the number was higher then she had expected.

Maybe not staying at Monster High won't be so bad after all.

...

The next day at around 8:50 P.M., Raven was focusing on pissed she was at Grimm as she channeled her magic into her mirror. As she did this, an image came into focus on the mirror. A few seconds later, the image focused into that of Cleo's face.

"It worked!" Raven cheered with raised arms. She had left her mirrorphone behind at Monster High with Cleo, hoping that she could use her magic mirror to connect with it and talk to her ghoulfriends. She had been able to tap into greater reserves of her magic by thinking of how angry she was at Grimm for attempting to keep from seeing them again which had helped in establishing the connection.

"Yes Raven, it worked," Cleo responded dryly. Draculara and Frankie went in front of the screen and said hi as well.

"And I'm here too," Toralei said as she brought the screen to her face. "We've never met before but I think you know who I am."

"I do, Toralei," Raven said. She had heard about the werecat from Kitty and Maddie and got a description from them along with a recounting of what she'd done at EA High. "And I thank you from the bottom of my soul for trying to change people's minds about things work here."

"You are fairy welcome," Toralei replied with a grin. "How did it go with getting your concessions from Grimm?"

"It didn't," Raven responded with a sad look.

"He f *ked you in the back, didn't he?" Toralei asked.

"Yeah," Raven answered with an angry glare and then explained how Grimm had barred her from ever going back to Monster High, then revealing that he never had any intention of negotiating with Raven.

"That guy's an even bigger dick than I thought!" Toralei yelled.

"That was pretty much my first thought too," Raven admitted.

"What are you going to do now?" Draculara asked.

"I'm going to continue trying to forge my own path in life instead of following the destiny people like Grimm have chosen for me," Raven declared. "And now I have a new reason for wanting to do that: being a pain in Grimm's ass."

"Sounds good," Toralei grinned back.

"But enough about me: let's talk about what's going on there," Raven said. They all small talked for the next several minutes. Raven was overjoyed beyond words that Grimm's attempt to keep her from physically going to Monster High had not resulted in all contact being completely severed with her new friends.

….

Author's notes: there will be a follow-up to this based solely on the Ever After side that will come out sometime in the future. Be on the lookout for that if interested.