CHAPTER 30 - "A CLEVER OUTCOME"
"THAT BASTARD!"
The words echoed the quiet night, and everyone looked towards the mansion from the cemetery plot. The plot was a distance away, but loud sounds could travel long distances if carried acoustically, and as the plot was only a kilometer away from the mansion and the distance here from there was mainly flat, albeit a few rolling small hills, whoever's voice it was, seemingly traveled that distance.
"Who's voice was that?" Lukas said.
"Someone is at the mansion," Ciel replied straightly. But there were no way to be sure. "It sounds like someone has arrived in the front courtyard, but who could be visiting now?"
"I'll go see, Master," Finny offered.
Finny was the fastest of them and he could probably run the kilometer to the mansion in less than a minute, but Ciel suspected a sinister development. If Mathu Kelvin returned from Hell, whom had be brought back with him? Friends with sinister and malicious, even playful, intent?
He looked at Mathu Kelvin. "A friend of yours?" Ciel said, halting Finny with a hand.
Mathu Kelvin shrugged his shoulders. "I have no idea," he said. "But I do feel a supernatural power."
Ciel looked towards Salem, the Undertaker, and Grell Sutcliffe - both Reapers. "What do you feel?"
"It's a Reaper," Grell answered, "and I recognize his power level. It's Ronald Knox."
"Knox?" Salem said. "Why would he visiting here? Ah, perhaps he was assigned to retrieve the young man's soul, Trent Banes…" He gave Mathu Kelvin a scornful look. "You didn't have to murder him."
"I did what was necessary at the time," Mathu Kelvin replied. "And it did get your attention."
"But why would he scream like that?" Abberline wondered, chiming in. "Someone who screams an obscenity like that may have been wronged or has found something of a great disliking."
"Grell, go check it out," Salem ordered.
And he did.
Grell Sutcliffe 'winked in' on the front courtyard, appearing right next to Knox. His sudden appearance resulted in Knox jumping back suddenly, jumpy.
Grell's blood red attire and hair looked for a moment like a sinister demon, that Knox thought Decco had sent after him when he, Thann and Spencer, escaped the Von Strauss Manor. But he was relieved to learn it was one of his fellow - or after William filed that report on him - on of his former colleagues.
"Grell," Knox said. "What in Reaperdem are you doing here?"
Grell looked him, Knox knew he appeared a little scatterbrained at the moment, then at the others.
"I was about to ask you that very same question. Who are these people?" Knox quickly introduced them. "I take it, you're not here to retrieve this young man's soul?" he said, gesturing to the remains of Trent Banes.
Knox shook his head. "Boy, do we have a story to tell you and it involves our traitorous boss," he said.
Knox went through the whole story that included Decco, Thann and Spencer and others…all the way up to William's traitorous decision to help the demon. Grell, in turn, revealed Mathu Kelvin was back, and at present was holding the entire household hostage in the family cemetery plot, a kilometer away. And who had murdered Trent Banes in a demonstration of power, blowing up him and his vehicle, soon after he had brought First Inspector Frederick Abberline to the mansion for sanctuary.
"Not him again! How did he escape from…" Knox began to say about Mathu Kelvin.
"We don't know yet, he hasn't told us exactly," Grell said. "He's being elusive."
He turned and saw Spencer Von Strauss clutching tightly to a gold chain in his hands that had a crucifix with his face folded in a mean-looking scowl.
"Where is he? Get me a gun!" Spencer's voice was grisly.
"Bullets won't hurt him, boy," Grell explained. "He's not human, he's something else entirely."
"Take me to him now! I want to see the murdering bastard!"
"I take it that that it was you screaming a moment ago?"
Knox nodded. "After I told him what my suppositions were, that Mathu Kevin had killed his friend with all the evidence I found - the supernatural residue and static electricity charge on the metallic parts...the pieces fit." Knox turned to Spencer. "I'm sorry for your friend, Spencer. But there's nothing that can done."
"Can you bring him back to life like Decco did with Thann?" Spencer asked.
"I'm sorry, we Reapers can't do that. That was a rare happenstance. And there's not enough of him regardless." Knox knew that last part was a bit insensitive, but the truth had to be told. "I want you two to wait in the Phantomhive mansion until all of this is over."
Thann nodded, but Spencer didn't want to go. He was too angry to let the death of his friend just slide. Thann put his hands on Spencer's shoulders to help guide him to the mansion, knowing he didn't want to leave but it was necessary to get to a safe place.
He said, "We'll wait in the mansion, Reaper Knox, but if you can, kill the bastard for the both of us."
Knox nodded, but knowing that would not be possible due to Mathu Kelvin's supernatural powers. The Von Strauss brothers left the scene and entered the mansion, the door had been left unlocked.
When they were gone, Grell said, "Salem is here as well."
"Good," Knox said flatly. "Once I tell him about William, the pig shit will fly."
"So how do you wish to handle this new partnership, Reaper?" Decco said. His hands clamped on his hips, as he stood in the Dining Hall of the Von Strauss Manor, his new lair.
"It is not a partnership, demon," William replied. "It is an association between two interested parties for mutual benefit." Next to them stood Wilhelm Lazarus and his son Johnny. "I will help you eliminate Sebastian Michaelis, and in turn, you will aid me in capturing a Fallen Reaper that has eluded my watch ever since I became the Head of Reaper Affairs."
"You scratch my back and I scratch yours. A equitable arrangement."
William adjusted his spectacles to settle them on the bridge of his nose. "A crude analogy, but nonetheless accurate. But this Fallen Reaper is very powerful. You will need all your tricks to defeat him."
"I have no tricks, William. I'm a very powerful demon."
"Indeed."
William turned his attention to Lazarus and his son. The man seemed a bit stand-off'ish, but the boy had a confident glare in his eyes.
William was a man of facts, but this time he had to wager a guess because of a lack of facts. And he hated that. But it was an educated guess that Wilhelm Lazarus, former head of the religious cult known as the Illuminati, a world-wide organization dealing in every aspect of the human world's political and economic standing, didn't want to be here. His only intention, despite his declaration a few minutes earlier, was to be with his son. William didn't need facts to know that Wilhelm was indeed a family man.
And the boy, well, the boy was a different story. There was a darkness inside him. He was not Johnny Lazarus despite outward appearances. Inside, he was something else entirely. A body can not live without a soul, except if it is controlled by a supernatural being. Johnny was human, but his "emptiness" was not.
Johnny Lazarus had been brought back from the dead, but he was essentially a hollow shell inside, although he appeared to express no ill-affects of what Sebastian Michaelis had done to him two and half years prior when Johnny was slaughtered by Michaelis, along with other children, and the Inner Circle members present. It was to hide Ciel Phantomhive's escape. It was only later learned when Ciel Phantomhive came out of hiding, did the truth begin to unravel itself of what really happened.
However, due to a supernatural spell placed upon the amphitheatre at the time, the souls of Inner Circle members and the children could not be retrieved until after Mathu Kelvin and others returned to that place to open it once more, but possessed by Fallen Reapers. Albeit the spell did not work on humans and in the amphitheatre they murdered the remaining five members of the Inner Circle who had gathered in a failed attempted to reestablish the order. Grell Sutcliffe then had an encounter with the FR's, whereas Ronald Konx had to rescue him. A report was filed, whereas William began to become intrigued of the event.
"And their usefulness in all this is…"
"They are merely pawns, pay no attention to them," Decco said, waving them off. William knew Decco spoke the truth about Lazarus, but the demon was lying about the boy.
William observed Wilhelm Lazarus's brow furrow as if offended that he meant nothing to Decco, but the boy remained cool and collected as if he had already knew the fact and accepted it.
"In fact…" Decco waved a hand and suddenly the covenant on Lazarus's forehead vanished. "I don't need them anymore. You two are free to go. Willy's all I need now."
"That's William, not Willy," he corrected Decco.
Lazarus felt his forehead and then pulled back Johnny's hair. The covenant was also gone.
For the sake of appearances, William abided the lie, but he knew probably as soon as he stepped out of this house, Decco would kill Lazarus with a mere thought. "Go home, Mr. Lazarus," he said. "Carpe diem."
Lazarus smiled, probably with the believe that he had just been granted a second chance at life like Thann Von Strauss. He nodded. "Seize the day. Come Johnny, we'll start our lives anew."
The boy gave Decco a sideways glance and then followed Lazarus out the front door, out of sight.
"It's just you and me now, Reaper," Decco said.
William folded his arms across his chest. "You can stop with the lies. The boy is not alive, he has no soul."
Decco smiled.
There was a short, but loud scream. William looked towards the hallway. Almost immediately, the boy returned with a bloody human heart in one hand.
"The heart of a loving father," Decco said, extending a hand out. Johnny gave to him, still beating. Decco held it in his hand until it stopped beating. "It is said a human heart still beats a few minutes after the host is dead. It would appear the old man's heart had less heart than I thought." He laughed as he squeezed it in his hand. Blood and fluid oozed out of its arteries and other orifices, dripping to the floor.
"There is no need for theatrics, demon. It does not surprise that you would do something like that."
"You disappoint me, Reaper. What would life be without theatrics? I believe Shakespeare said it best: All the world's a stage, and all the men and women merely players: they have their exits and their entrances; and one man in his time plays many parts, his acts being seven ages."
"Indeed," William agreed, then said,
"All the world's a stage,
And all the men and women merely players,
They have their exits and entrances,
And one man in his time plays many parts,
His acts being seven ages. At first the infant,
Mewling and puking in the nurse's arms.
Then, the whining schoolboy with his satchel
And shining morning face, creeping like snail
Unwillingly to school. And then the lover,
Sighing like furnace, with a woeful ballad
Made to his mistress' eyebrow. Then a soldier,
Full of strange oaths, and bearded like the pard,
Jealous in honour, sudden, and quick in quarrel,
Seeking the bubble reputation
Even in the cannon's mouth. And then the justice
In fair round belly, with good capon lin'd,
With eyes severe, and beard of formal cut,
Full of wise saws, and modern instances,
And so he plays his part. The sixth age shifts
Into the lean and slippered pantaloon,
With spectacles on nose, and pouch on side,
His youthful hose well saved, a world too wide,
For his shrunk shank, and his big manly voice,
Turning again towards childish treble, pipes
And whistles in his sound. Last scene of all,
That ends this strange eventful history,
Is second childishness and mere oblivion,
Sans teeth, sans eyes, sans taste, sans everything."
"From infancy…to death," William said, after reciting the full Shakespearean poem. "The Seven Stages of Man. William Shakespeare, one of England's foremost playwrights of the 14th and 15th century."
William evaluated which of the seven stages this demon appeared to be in at the moment. He chose: Soldier, as the demon wanted revenge for the transgressions Sebastian Michaelis had committed towards him over the years. But he was too blinded to the true reality that faced him, and he was a stupid soldier who has not learned the true meaning of "justice". In truth, the man was envious of Sebastian Michaelis, his rival; jealous that their master choose Michaelis to teach the secrets of the universe to instead.
Decco had abandoned his master's teachers believing he was a foolish old man with nothing left to teach him. The fact was Michaelis had done nothing to him to deem such vengeance. So that would also make Decco a child and a whining schoolboy. This demon was mere jealous childish schoolboy, indeed.
He was in the worse of Shakespeare's seven stages and a man who has a child sense of reasoning.
"You are indeed a very well educated man, William," Decco said.
"I pride myself on facts and truth," William said. "But let us dispense with such things and get down to the direct issue at hand."
Decco's face took on a serious expression. "And that is?"
"Your rival Sebastian Michaelis. There is something you must know, which may be quite beneficial to your plight to kill him. A ghostly entity has put Michaelis under a sleep induced unconsciousness and he is currently dreaming. At this moment, he is currently laying in state in the Phantomhive family cemetery plot, with I may add, the Fallen Reaper Mathu Kelvin is also present, keeping the others at bay from helping him. Mathu Kelvin also has a beef, if I have used the word correctly, with Michaelis as well. Michaelis defeated him and sent him to Hell. But the Fallen Reaper has returned."
"Why is Michaelis asleep?"
"As punishment. The ghost, Renfrew Phantomhive, a distant relative of the family, did so to protect a secret inside Lukas Phantomhive's mind, a secret you might also be interested to know involving your old master. Apparently, some time back, Lukas Phantomhive was approached by another demon who gave him this knowledge to keep secret, but locked it away - believing that someday with skills the boy possesses, Lukas Phantomhive, with his brother, Ciel, will be able to open it. The ghost was asked to protect it at all costs by both this demon and Lukas Phantomhive, who then asked that his memory of it be erased of it at that time."
"What does this have to do with my old master?"
"It seems a way has been found to open the void you placed Belial inside."
Decco's eyes widened with utter alarm. "No, that can't happen! I won't allow it!"
"Then there is an urgency here. It is Mathu Kelvin who holds a piece of a dark gem called the Hope Diamond, which, with the boys, will unlock this void. But only Sebastian Michaelis, by his connection with Belial, will be able to open it."
"Then the Phantomhive boys must die to prevent this!"
"That is one option," William said. "A simpler option is to defeat Mathu Kelvin and take the diamond chip. Without it, the void can not be opened."
"So, are you saying, Mathu Kelvin is the true enemy here, and not Michaelis?"
"Indeed, I am. Defeat him, allow me to capture the Fallen Reaper's soul that is possessing Mathu Kelvin, and then you can, if you wish, crush Sebastian Michaelis at your leisure as he sleeps."
Decco nodded. "You are correct, that would be the most prudent and effective way to handle things." He then chuckled, and pointed a finger. "Very nice, William. You have made things much simpler for me. You are a credit to your profession."
William adjusted his spectacles. "Indeed."
"And you may want to do something about that tell."
"Tell?"
"You have adjusted your glasses every time your mind racers with intrigue. I'm not stupid. This is way for me to do all the work. The most cost effective way for a Reaper, so no overtime is incurred, is for him to get someone else to do all the work as he observes the outcome. So you did not in fact betray you employee at all, but you did make him believe you had, so I would release all those souls here, and make him leave in quick succession with the others. All except my son here."
Johnny smiled.
"That is so pedestrian, you are over-analyzing things," William said. "If you do not wish my help, then I will return to my regular duties. I am a very busy man to get caught up in affairs such as these."
"And you claim we demons are the tricksters," Decco said, almost admirably. "Go, if you wish. But your information about Sebastian Michaelis has proved useful. And once I defeat your pathetic and weak Fallen Reaper, I will kill Sebastian Michaelis. So, you have done me a great service in revealing certain things. I wondered why Sebastian Michaelis did not confront me before. I know he would have sensed my power level. Now that I know he is unconscious, there will be nothing to stop a surefire victory."
William eyed him with a thin, witty smirk. "I will be watching," he said, and then 'winked out'.