Greetings to all readers out there! Welcome to my first Kuroshitsuji fic!
Disclaimer: I do not own Kuroshitsuji, nor do I claim rights to H.P. Lovecraft's Herbert West-Reanimator
Some can gaze and not be sick,
But I could never learn the trick.
There's this to say for blood and breath,
It gives a man a taste for death.
-A.E. Housman
To the vanished Herbert West and to me the disgust and horror were supreme. I shudder tonight as I think of it; shudder even more than I did that morning when West muttered through his bandages, "Damn it, it wasn't quite fresh enough!"
-H.P. Lovecraft, 'Herbert West-Reanimator
Perched atop one of the many gleaming black coffins within his shop, Undertaker stared out a window, and into the shadows surrounding his shop, contemplating the day's events. It had been a slow, boring day, as days in May often were. The whole spring season in fact, was rather boring. Not many people tended to die when Nature's full glory swung around. Of course, this was not to say he hated spring; the lovely sunshine, the mild weather, the crisp breezes, the beautiful flowers were all wonderful. However, as far as business went, he preferred winter. So many deaths, so many mutilated bodies, oh such fun! Unfortunately, he'd only had a total of four customers come in today. A slow day indeed.
A jingling sound brought him out of his reverie. Standing in the doorway, peering in with timid eyes was a young man with hair as dark and unkempt as raven feathers. When his eyes settled on the Undertaker, he cleared his throat a bit and stepped into the shop. In his arms he held the limp, lifeless body of a young woman. Her skin was marble white, and her lips had long ago lost their vibrant pink hue. Undertaker smiled. Now this was interesting. Smiling, he hopped off the coffin to greet the escort of his newest customer.
"Yes? You have need of my services I take it?" He asked, pointing to the corpse in the young man's arms. The man nodded.
"Y-Yes. P-Please, forgive me for coming at such a late hour, but we ran into various problems along the road. I'm sorry sir"
"Hm, various problems you say? Well, I'll admit, I'm honored that you came such a long way just to come to my little shop. Thank you kindly."
The dark robed mortician took the corpse from the young man, and placed her in the back room, where she would sit for the time being until the living occupant departed. He laid her down on her back, smoothing her dress down, and brushing a few stray hairs out of her face. Such a pretty girl. Shame that she wasn't torn up beyond recognition. Her arm rolled off the table and the Undertaker reset it beside her body. He wondered how long she had been dead if she was still rag-doll limp.
Meanwhile, a nervous toe attempted to grind itself into the floor. The young man looked around the shop. This place was creepy. Honestly, why had his friend told him to come here of all places? There were plenty of funeral parlors in Chelmsford. Naturally though, they had wanted the arrangements for the body to take place somewhere were they wouldn't be recognized.
The sound of joyous humming caught the young man's attention as the Undertaker re-entered the room, smiling. He was really starting to wish he'd gone against his friend's wishes and went to a funeral parlor in Chelmsford. This guy was just plain freaky.
Hidden eyes scrutinized the human male before him. Just out of the adolescent stage, this poor lad was having a hard time keeping his cool standing in Undertaker's humble little shop. Undertaker's usual smile widened into a sardonic grin. Humans were quite entertaining!
"Alright lad, she's all set up in the back. Now, how would you like to go about getting her buried? Something extravagant or not so much?" He asked, inwardly enjoying watching the kid squirm.
The young man jumped, almost as if he had not been expecting the question.
"Oh, y-yes. Erm…just a simple coffin is fine, nothing fancy. A pinewood coffin should do."
"Oh, I don't know about that. Pine rots awful easy you know."
"Then cedar shall be fine sir."
A long black claw jabbed up at the ceiling. "Ah! Now that's a good choice lad! Alright then, one cedar coffin for a pretty young miss coming up! Say, by the way…"
His grin widened even more. "This woman, she isn't related to you is she?"
Like symmetrical inkblots dabbed onto a dry piece of paper, his pupils grew rapidly in size, leaving only a ring of iris in each eye. He stared at Undertaker, mouth agape. Once he realized what implications his actions may have, he shut his mouth and uttered a hasty response.
"N-No sir, she was one of our patients at the hospital in Chelmsford. She was a foreigner, and had no family to claim her body. My colleague thought it a disgrace to our town, lumping in a nobody with the good people of Chelmsford, so he ordered me to bring her here, to have her buried in London."
"I see. Well, if someone's looking for anonymity, then London certainly is the place to come! But, don't go thinking that I'll take any random Jack off the street, I'm not that desperate for coin after all." He remarked, chuckling in that eerie, snake-like way. The young man suppressed a powerful shiver. Outside, the bell tolled the tenth hour, and the Undertaker just had to snicker when the poor fellow about jumped out of his skin. When his heart-rate was back under control, the young man wiped his brow, and nodded his head to the Undertaker.
"Once again, I would like to thank you for taking care of this for us. My colleague wished me to give you his utmost thanks."
"Yes, you keep bringing him up. There a specific reason he couldn't make it?"
"Erm…well, my colleague runs the hospital in Chelmsford, and therefore is incredibly busy all of the time, so I am the one who gets stuck with things like this. Plus, I'm the only one he would trust with such a daring task."
The two men stood in silence for a moment, then the man turned on his heel.
"Well, I suppose I should be going, the hour is late after all."
Wasn't this guy forgetting a little something called, le Bill? Although his eyes were not visible the Undertaker dropped his smile the tiniest margin. Sensing the mortician's disapproval, the other man turned back around, a sad attempt at a sheepish smile haphazardly slopped onto his face.
"That's right, I do believe I'm forgetting something. I…I have the payment for you," He began rummaging through various coat pockets until he came to one sewn on the inside. A tiny bit of pride bled into his frame, for he puffed up the slightest bit, "My friend is always chastising me on my overly cautious nature, but when those bandits attacked the carriage and attempted to steal something of monetary value, they never bothered to check the inside of my coat. Heh, guess it pays to be careful."
Undertaker let his grin return in full, "Literally.
Later, the man stepped back out into the alleyway and shut the door behind him, leaning against it, lest his knees betrayed him. That had been an ordeal. He sighed. At least the body was out of his hands and soiling someone else's grip now. It turned out that his friend had been right for a change. Of course it made sense; the big city of London had many things to hide, among them strange occurrences, and who was that creepy mortician going to tell anyway? What could he possibly gain? No, they had covered their tracks.
"Well? How did it go?"
For the second time that night, the poor man nearly had a heart attack. After taking a few deep breaths to calm himself, he rounded on his friend.
"Honestly West, don't scare me like that!" He hissed at the intruder a few feet to his left. Now that he was out of the shop, he dropped his fake British accent.
"Don't call me that!" West replied, glancing around for any random passerby. "I told you, while we are here in England, I am known as Dr. Richard Fielding, do you understand?"
Worn out from the frightening momentary stay in the Undertaker's parlor, and not wanting to get into an argument with his dear friend, the man nodded. Above the wide brim of the upturned jacket collar, West smiled.
"Good, we've gotten that body out of our hands," West sighed and kicked the ground, "why does nearly every thing I do have to end in failure? Not once has anything I've done so far yielded the proper results!"
A reassuring hand laid itself on West's shoulder. West turned to see his friend giving him an endearing smile.
"Well, it's like you've always said yourself, the only thing you can do now is keep trying. You never give up, even in the face of total defeat. It's one of your redeeming qualities my friend." He said West smiled back at his friend.
"Thank you, very much. You have no idea how much your compliment pleases me. Now," West shrugged off the hand and walked out of the alley, "the carriage is located near the pub that is just up the street from this alleyway entrance. Come, let's make our way back to Chelmsford.
The man nodded, but hung back a bit, watching West as he strode away. Yes, West never gave up, not even if all hope seemed lost. A redeeming quality indeed, but this time, it would bring the bright, young doctor absolute ruin.
Normally he never left his shop much, but there was just something about a peaceful spring night that just begged to be wandered around in. The streets were quiet, undisturbed, and the moon hung in the sky, bright and full. Glimmering full of the night's wonder and promise. Stars twinkled with their usual mirth as they winked at the semi-sleeping city below. A cool breeze stirred the leaves on the trees fringing the city shrouded in fog. Oh yes, what a perfect night. So very quiet, so very tranquil.
Undertaker smiled as he strode through the streets. Nights like this were perfect for reflection, or just concentrating on the present. The white-haired ex-shinigami opted for the latter of the two, for truly, it was such a beautiful night, who would want to waste it all by dwelling on the past? The woman who had been brought in earlier was shut away nice and tight in a coffin in the back of his shop. No worries there. Naturally, there had been no need to lock up for what did he have that any would-be robber would want to steal? The famous body snatchers, Burke and Hare had been condemned to death around seventy years ago, and even if they had still been among the living, the two men were famous for murdering rather than grave-robbing. Nope, Undertaker had nothing either on him or in his shop worth pilfering.
Crows flew beneath the moon's iridescence, silhouetting themselves against the glow, calling to each other in the alien voice of nature's night. Somewhere, a cat could be heard singing a mournful song atop a fence. In the fuzzy light of the streetlamps, insects whirred about, head butting the glass again and again in a desperate attempt to reach the light within. Undertaker smiled; the night was indeed a gorgeous thing.
Just then, a simultaneous mixture of crashing and banging sounded from the way he had come. For a moment, he stood there, trying to figure out where the sound had come from. Hang on, didn't that sound like it was coming from…
"Oh hell."
Hastily, he beat it back to his shop. Talk about a sight.
The door had been flung open, but luckily none of the hinges appeared to be broken. Inside, the myriad of coffins that had been sitting on the floor had been torn apart, and many of them lay broken against the walls. In the back it was worse. The coffin, the very one he had placed his newest arrival in only an hour or so ago, was broken beyond all repair. The lid looked as if a wild animal had lain into it. As for the coffin itself, the sides were split and part of the bottom had just snapped off. Undertaker just stood there, surveying all the damage and trying to force down the anger that was steadily rising. Perhaps locking up would have been a good idea after all. After a minute or two, he sighed and resigned himself to cleaning up the mess, or rather making order out of the chaos that his shop had now become. While he picked up the broken pieces of coffin, he kept shaking his head and muttering;
"I can't believe that someone would have the nerve to come in here and steal one of my customers. Really now."
And as the night wore on, if someone living in the city happened to look out their window, they would have seen a shadowy figure with an unsteady gait shuffling down the street. Almost as if they carried a great burden with them as they walked.
"A mutilated corpse was found? Where?"
The question came from a young noble sitting behind a desk drinking a cup of Darjeeling. His butler placed a newspaper before him.
"Here, read this my lord," his butler responded, "I think it will tell you everything you want to know."
On the front of the paper, bold letters screamed out the title, beneath that, was the disturbing article. Interested, Ciel Phantomhive began to read.
Mutilated Body Found Near Westminster Abbey!
Could Jack the Ripper's Ghost have Come Back?
Earlier this morning, at approximately 5 a.m., a local Constable discovered the body of what could barely be described as a young man lying face up, dead and torn apart beneath the neck-line.
"It was horrible," the Constable remarked, "I've never seen anything this bad. The person who did this makes Jack the Ripper appear benign."
After the body was discovered, Scotland Yard was contacted. Unfortunately, Sir Arthur refused to be questioned until he had "further evidence that will lead us to the killer". The body was removed from the scene immediately, but has yet to be identified. Although his face is clear of any obvious signs of mutilation, it is covered with many long scratches. Police and Scotland Yard assume that since there is nothing to identify this man with, that he may have been a homeless beggar.
"That is what we think, but it's hard to tell underneath all that blood." Says investigator Fred Aberline, shaking his head at the sudden chaos birthed by moonlight.
No major evidence has been found. All the people of London can hope is that the body found is nothing more than the victim of some wild animal attack, although it seems unlikely.
Ciel put the newspaper down on his desk and sighed. There seemed to be no rest for the weary. Nearby, Sebastian smiled.
"Is there something troubling you, young master?"
"No, but I think that you and I will be making a little trip into town today."
The smile widened into the famous smirk as Sebastian produced an envelope, bearing an all too-familiar seal.
"I think someone is way ahead of you, my lord."
He stared at the envelope in his butler's hand. Of course he would be the one called upon by the queen. After all, Scotland Yard had so far been proving itself to be rather useless. Smirking, Ciel leaned back in his chair.
"It seems there really is no rest for the weary."
"No rest for the wicked either."
He had to admit a certain truth to that.
I'm sorry to leave it on such a short note. I normally never do that. At any rate, tell me what you think. Constructive criticism is indeed appreciated.