Author's Beginning Note Thingy: So this chapter is completely un-canon... then again, they don't tell you much about what happens pre-game, so it could be true, whoooooo! No, this certainly never occurred, but does that stop me? Noooo... It's a little awkward, I think, and kinda long, but it serves it's purpose, I hope, in setting up yet another long-winded, and hopefully artfully slashy fic ahead!
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Sleeping wasn't the only thing he did. Yes, there were times when weeks went by without him knowing, when he was trapped within his own mind, in those terrible, terrible dreams. Nightmares. At the same time, there were weeks where he just couldn't find sleep. It was in those weeks he got up, got out, wandered around...
...his exploration area was small. He didn't, obviously, just take a stroll around town, but he couldn't remain in that accursed little box the whole time. To be honest, it sometimes gave him claustrophobia. He'd walk the creaky halls of the mansion, look out of its dusty windows.
It was through these dusty windows that he once watched a little boy grow up. He'd never imagined then what kind of man that boy would grow up to be, or that he would ever know him for more than just an angelic little face.
The town had changed in the years where there weren't such interesting spectacles to watch. It had flourished almost into a small city, but never got quite there. Still, the children liked to fancy themselves city children, and as children often do, they picked up bad city-habits. No small towns had gangs, it just wasn't heard of, but this one did... sort of.
At first, it had been something to smirk, and shake his head at. The relatively innocent comings and goings of the little people in short skirts or baggy shirts, thinking they were 'all grown up' and 'totally badass'. Things he'd heard from snatches of their conversation if they'd ever drifted to close to his home.
At first, he thought nothing of it, the things they did... but as they aged, and a new group of young ones came about, the real fun began. As always, the older harassing the younger. Most of the younger were lucky enough, though, to have a brother or sister in the little cliques, which got them an automatic placement, with little to no trouble about it.
One such boy was not so lucky. The victim of several unfortunate circumstances: he had only a mother, no father was known, or had ever been seen by those watchful eyes... he obviously had a crush on what the children regarded as the 'prettiest girl in town', he had big dreams, and a small stature, as well as the most beautiful, innocent face a boy could ever dread to inherit. These qualities made him the local punching-bag.
There was a time, when he was still very young, that he'd been observed wandering, it seemed, aimlessly throughout the streets. Sometimes he would disappear behind a block of buildings, and reappear at the other side... at once, he did find a roundabout route to the mansion, but by then, the poor little thing was dragging himself along, and there were tears on his face. He was lost.
Other kids were about, but he either hadn't the will to ask them how he could get home, or already had and was turned down because of their cruel lack of sympathy. So he'd wandered here. He was looking fearfully up at the mansion, renewed sobs shaking his small frame, and not looking where he was going that caused him to trip, and fall into the dirt path outside the front gate to the building. There he stayed for a long time...
For the first time in... who knew how long, must've been more than twenty years, he ventured out of the mansion, and into the dimming sunlight. A shadow-clad figure bent over the fallen boy. Curiosity had driven him to the boy's side, and now pity drove him to do what he did next.
With the utmost care, he lifted the limp figure into his arms...
Half-asleep, the boy became vaguely aware of what was going on around him... he heard something that sounded like very soft footsteps. A shadow. Something picked him up, and began to carry him somewhere. Dimly, in the back of his mind, he realized this might be a very bad thing, but... the little boy didn't have the energy to bother trying to get away, or find out who it was.
He was put back down on something hard, and the shadow and the warmth it brought him went away with the fading footsteps. Then he forced his blue eyes open, and tried to look at it, but there was nothing to see... He looked down and beheld the familiar door mat of his own house. How did he get here? Hadn't he just been... he looked over towards the mansion. Had something just moved inside that window? No, couldn't have been... or maybe…
The startled boy gasped, and sidled up to the door, reaching up for the bell, and hoping mom would be home to answer. Who had...? What had happened? How did he get back home from all the way up the road, when he was sure he passed out at the mansion? His mother came. He went inside.
It was not the last time that happened. Similar things occurred. Once, years later, someone had stolen his backpack, with all his schoolbooks and everything in it. He'd torn his room apart looking for it, as well as all the horrible places of town where he imagined it might have been someone's cruel decision to hide it... still nothing.
He'd given up at late evening when it was too dark to do anything anymore, when he heard a strange thump on the ground outside. He glanced out his window, and glimpsed a dark shape retreating into the night. He rushed down the stairs, and to the front door to pursue it, when he fell flat on his face on the ground... having tripped over his backpack.
A door slammed up the road near the mansion. He looked around. The shadow was gone.
He didn't know why he did it. Didn't know why he seemed to care so much for this strange boy he didn't even know the name of. But nevertheless, he watched him grow up. And watched out for him as he did so.
The most interesting of events occurred. The blonde followed that girl he liked out into the mountains one day, and on a simple gut instinct, he did too. He saw the bridge collapse, the girl fall, the boy fall...
His heart skipped a beat, he wouldn't let that happen. He couldn't save them both, but thank the Ancients he'd been there for one. He caught the boy's hand, and broke his fall with his own body. The poor thing was still knocked unconscious, giving him the chance to get the hell out of there before anyone woke up.
Time passed. All three of those involved had eventually recovered from their injuries during the bridge incident... the girl had taken the longest to heal up, and that took a toll on the boy. He never told anyone what he thought had saved him... he hadn't seen much anyway, the only sensible description he could ever come up with was a 'bloody ghost', but not only did that sound crazy, it didn't sound like something that would have saved him anyway. However, none of that stopped him from being persistent. For some time now, he'd been trying to join up with the little group that she was a part of. They alone knew the truth, for she had told them, that he had tried to save her from the fall, and was not in fact the cause of it.
Still, they were wary to let this particular outsider in.
"Give me your worst!" he said loudly one day, standing at the well just down the street. The quiet summer day carried the echoes up to a cracked window on the second story of the shadowy building.
"Anything, anything you want, I promise I'll do it." he said again.
"The worst thing we can think of?" some of the people glanced between one another.
"Whatever it is." he confirmed.
There was silence. The group drew together to consult... and finally came up with the verdict:
"Stay a night in the mansion!"
Those eyes in the second story window perked up a little bit. Oho, this could be fun... but closer inspection showed that it was the blonde boy they were talking to. Ah, his sense of humor would have to wait for another day, and another child to scare out of his wits. Still, though, the urge to maybe… meet this person face-to-face for once was strong…
"Hah!" he scoffed haughtily, "That's the best you can do? Grow up, all the legends about that place are fake."
"We'll see..." said a wary voice. "Anyways, you're still not supposed to go there, so..."
"You're going easy on me." he protested.
"Is that a bad thing?"
Truth be told, ever since the backpack incident, and certainly after some of the other strange events that had followed, he'd always wanted to check the place out... this was the best excuse.
He went up there after nightfall, flashlight, and pocketknife in hand. At the front door, he'd already found his doubts again... but the whole group was watching... he at least had to go in until they went away, to make it look good. So he did, passing through the creaky door, strangely free of cobwebs... he looked on the ground, and saw paths through the dust... footsteps leading over to a room on the right, which included an open door and stairs leading to the basement. That was where the footstep-path ended.
The boy swallowed down a lump in his throat, and decided to go in the other direction. He'd had the luck to find a nice bedroom on the first story, where he could camp out in. He didn't particularly want to go onto the second story, he wasn't sure how stable it was.
Looking around the room, he found it fairly average: two beds, a shared nightstand, a mirror, a closet. Flashlight in hand, he moved toward one of the beds, and lightly sat down.
"This isn't so bad." he whispered to himself, "This place was originally meant for living in, after all..." he reasoned with himself, allowing the necessary relaxation to lye back on the pillow.
"Yes, indeed. Not bad at all." said a deep voice from... everywhere? Nowhere?
With a yelp, he fumbled, and dropped the light. It clattered on the wood floor, rolled, and went out. His breathing quickened as he reached for the knife in his pocket.
"Please don't be alarmed..." said the voice, coming closer. With a click the blade was out, and the boy gasped.
"Ow...!"
"That's dangerous. You're a little young to be playing with a thing like that." the voice said again.
"No! I'm... I'm... who are you?" he asked. This wasn't a voice he'd recognized...
"That doesn't matter. Here, let me see your hand."
The boy's wide blue eyes darted around in the darkness. There was nothing to see... nothing at all. The room was an overwhelming pitch dark. There was no starlight, no flashlight, no moon... the only thing...
...drawing closer after he had held his arm out blindly, two small red glints. They paused in midair not far in front of him, and he felt a warmth on his hand, other than the blood. He gasped.
"I said don't be afraid." said the voice again. A tear of fabric... something soft was being wrapped around the cut.
The boy swallowed, "If you won't tell me who you are... then what are you doing here?"
"Right now, I am bandaging your hand... but I could easily ask the same of you..." the red... red eyes... the red eyes stared down at him pointedly, and he felt sweat drip down the side of his face under their stern glare.
"I... I... my friends dared me."
"I see..." the eyes turned back down as the hands of the body they belonged to tied a firm knot in the fabric around the cut, "Well... that was quite stupid of you to come in here. What if I was anyone other than who I am?"
"Who are you?" he asked again.
"I already said, it doesn't matter." was the reply.
The blue eyes looked down at his hand, not actually seeing it. A finger ran over the dampening fabric, then the eyes looked back up. "Thank you." he said.
"Don't worry about it."
A silence lapsed... he couldn't be sure, but he thought he heard footsteps fading... the eyes went away.
"Hey, wait, don't go."
"I'm not leaving... I intend to stay with you until morning. Make sure none of your... 'friends' tries anything."
He nodded. Then stopped. "Wait, why? How do you know them? Or me, for that matter?"
"I see things." he replied cryptically. There was no response from the boy to that, so the man continued, unsure why he was now willing to reveal his little secret. Probably because of the slim chances of ever seeing this boy again, "Haven't you ever wondered... about some of those strange, coincidental things that happened to you?" there was an almost desperate note in his voice... desperate for thanks, for recognition... for the ability to be able to help someone.
After a moment, the boy smiled. "Yes..." he began, unsurely, then confirmed in a stronger voice, "Yes. That was you?"
The eyes bobbed up and down slightly, as the figure nodded.
"Who are you?" he asked again.
There was no reply.
Sometime after that conversation, he must've fallen asleep, because the next thing he remembered was opening his eyes, and seeing the sun shining through a window, lighting from behind a dead rose in a vase on the nightstand. He sat up. His knife and his flashlight were on the pillow next to him, and he'd been tucked into bed. There was no-one anywhere near him...
He smiled vaguely, looking down at his hand, which was wrapped in a very unique-looking crimson fabric, but then, it might have been that color because of the blood. He headed out. So there was someone in this mansion, looking out for him. He hadn't dreamed it... had he? He couldn't have dreamed it... but he still wouldn't tell anyone. In a way, whether he knew him or not, he'd always regarded this enigmatic person as his guardian angel.