YoungEarlCain -- 01-00

Truth Serum Chronicles

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

The wide stone streets were victims to hooves and wood carriage wheels once again. The day life of the city is always moving. A deep colored oak carriage played host to a young girl with long and wavy blond hair and blue eyes. Her lips were colored a gentle pink to accent her red and white lace gown and white accessories. This little girl has been looking to the streets with a bold amount of caution. Where most see pease, she sees the illusion behind it all. The smiles and laughter of the world hold a mysterious hidden factor. What it is, the girl cannot say, but it draws her curiosity anyway.

It's been one year now sense she lost her only family to the pain of falling glass. Two men were together in their last moments, but she refuses to accept that it's truly over. She was able to find one. His body crumbled to dust after the glass fell. However, the other disappeared, never to be seen again. Despite his absence, the young Earl left his mark upon the world. The wealthy would talk about his reckless reputation, saying that the reason for his death was more than likely due to his own collection of poisons. The poor talk about his mysterious influence, saying that the murders would probably end now that he was gone. The men seemed grateful that he was gone while the women continue to talk about his charm and untouchable will to real them in. The same applied to the young blond in the carriage but her care for him was on a different level.

'Dear brother...I wish I could have been your songbird just a little while longer...' she thought as her pink painted lips curled into a soft smile. Suddenly the carriage came to a stop. The motion was so furious that it nearly bumped her off of her seat. She strained to keep her balance, resting her hand on a large stuffed bear sitting next to her. When the carriage was still she stood up and opened the door to look out. "What happ--" her voice halted in her throat when she spotted a man with silvery hair pass behind the carriage and step into the crowd. Looking closely, she saw a small ear ring in his right ear. "GASP" She couldn't mistake the ear ring. It looked identical to the one she saw a year ago. Desperate to find answers, she jumped to the stone road and picked up her skirt, fixing her sight on the man before running off toward him.

"Lady Hargreaves. Please come back!" the carriage driver cried before he made to circle the block for her.

The girl was more than determined. She's had nothing but the events of last year on her mind all this time. She hated the last year due to the true feelings she learned the people had for her brother. After claims of love and devotion through out his life barely anyone went to his funeral. After the funeral a few family members came to see what money they could get from him, only to find that the Hargreaves name would go to her instead. The money he had was the only thing anyone cared about. If this man was who she thought it was then she would have to take in many impossible possibilities.

"Riff!" she called out and the man flinched before he stopped. He stood turned away from her for the longest time, the people around him brushing past his long blue cloak. When she came up close to him the man turned to look down at her. He had the same pale skin she remembered him to have, his eyes naturally hollowed in color. "Riff...I thought you were....But how! If you're here then--"

"Please, Miss Merryweather. Not here. Someone is bound to hear you." The man extended a hand gently toward her. Always his left hand as usual. When she placed her hand in his he looked around before stepping into the alleyway with her. "A lot of things have happened sense last year. A lot of it is very hard to understand--"

"Tell me anyway! You have no idea how much I've thought of both of you. Seeing you makes me think about him in ways I shouldn't be. If you're alive then--"

"That's right...I've been searching for him through out the year." Riff knelt down, looking into Merryweather's concerned eyes with his own soft gaze. He was silent for a moment, unsure how to explain what he needed to. His main concern was weather or not se could understand it all. "For right now, just know that he's alive. I know he is. The same people who brought me back also kept him alive. We were separated because I didn't turn out the way they had hoped. They need him, Miss Merryweather and so they won't kill him."

Merryweather sighed and tilted her head slightly. She was happy to hear that her brother was alive but she still didn't understand. The fact that Riff was being so secretive didn't help. She wanted to help in any way she could, by any means. "Don't baby me this time, Riff. After everything I've seen, I want to help. I don't care, as long as he's safe again." She then casually wrapped her arms around her torso and gave a deep frown as she tried to study the man in front of him. He didn't seem to be lifting his defenses for her in the slightest. "At least let me help you plot. I haven't stopped practicing with the tarot cards and it helped us before. I might be able to help you find clues."

"My main concern is that the shock of knowing he's alive might provoke you to do something rash. Lord Cain wouldn't want you to give anything for his return if it would put you in danger."

"I know...Let me help, please!" she beckoned and Riff let out a light sigh.

"Alright. You can help."

With in the hour Riff found himself in the new mansion Merryweather had built. It was the same as the one she once lived in with her brother Cain, brick for brick. He walked through the courtyard to find that the trees were the only thing the girl couldn't replicate. No tree truly grows the same way and so he had to get use to the curvature of the new trees al over again.

As he walked he couldn't help but to think of being separated from the young Earl Cain. He couldn't stand the feeling for many reasons. The first was the simple fact that he was separated from his only willful link to life. Without Cain, he felt like he wasn't whole. His will to protect the young earl drove him even as the glass fell. The second was the gap of memory loss that signified the time lost and then the events that played out before the separation.

-----------------------

-----------------------

"Riff!"

The two may have agreed to spend their last moment together but the butler couldn't stand the thought of the young earl's death. In a last effort to ensure his personal purpose, Riff pulled the teen under his form and wrapped his arms around to hold him tight. Tucking Cain's young frame under his own, he stopped the earl from struggling as the glass struck. Cain could only shout in protest, his voice instantly frozen at the sight of the man's blood. His green eyes widened through his deep brown locks and he struggled only to be held tighter by shaking arms.

"Lord Cain...Please...know that my feelings are real. No matter how dead my body was...my heart was...a-always alive..." Riff couldn't bring himself to speak anymore. He felt a terrible strain in his chest and had a sickening taste in his mouth.

"Don't leave me here alone...I won't--" The earl's green eyes veered off a bit as he heard footsteps coming down the hallway. He then began to shift to stand. He gathered up the strength to free himself from Riff but he couldn't get up completely. A sharp pain ripped through his right leg and he winced sharply.

"Take him, doctor. He is the key factor in all of this."

The man's voice seemed emotionless and cold. The intensity of the moment shifted from sadly safe to hostile. Out of the corner of Riff's eye he saw a very tall and large figured man approach. Cain forced himself to move despite the pain in his leg only to be gripped at the arm and pulled out of the glass. Riff wanted to get up but the nerves through out his body have already wilted. His heart ached with a deep need to protect as he heard his earl fight desperately only tobe beaten to the floor. Every strike and scream echoed in Riff's ears...even as his vision began to blur...

'No...I was supposed to...save you...By some... miracle...let me live. Let me...Let me...'

How long was it that the silver haired butler wandered in the darkness. He didn't have any means to watch over the one person he loved the most. His pained spirit was unable to rest, dredding the possibilities. Was his young Lord being put through the same torture as he endured in his young life? He couldn't stand the thought of Cain being bound in any way, let alone have to endure the same pain again.

Despite his lack of physical form, Riff spent his entire afterlife screaming until he finally saw a small light. Passing through it, he found himself awakening in a sore state, laying upon a cold floor. He stayed there for a moment before he finally turned to sit up on his hands and knees. Looking to his features, he found that he had the same physical structure he always remembered. Silver hair and pale skin. The only difference was that he wasn't slowly decaying due to the secret fact of being dead. He was a perfectly living middle aged man once again...but how was that possible?

His focus was torn away when he looked around the room. He seemed to be in some kind of holding cell. The cell was directly beside a second cell with a small line of bars and stone separating them. Riff's focus was upon the bed in the second cell. A teen lie upon his back, his head turned away slightly. His deep brown locks of hair lightly crowded over his closed eyes, accenting his pale skin. His black suit was torn a bit, his jacket and dress shirt left open due to broken buttons and tearing. While one hand rested upon his exposed stomach the other lie beside him, his hand and wrist hanging off of the bed in a tired fashion.

"...Lord Cain..." Moving toward the bars, the revived butler reached across the corner of the second cell. He was just inches away, his fingertips shaking in desperation. Just a little further and he could have touched the teen's head. With a harsh sigh he lowered his hand and leaned his forehead upon the bars. "Please, wake up...Lord Cain!" The boy's fingers twitched slightly as they hung off of the bed. He gave a light yet painful moan, but he only seemed to move just a little bit, turning his head from one side to the other.

"I wouldn't bother," came the voice of an elderly man from the hallway. Riff quickly looked back to see a tall man with short grey hair and a mustache. He wore dark glasses to match his black lab jacket. "More than likely, he won't be able to hear you. You'd have better luck talking to a doll."

"What did you do to him?!" Riff asked as he shifted to stand and the man shrugged, not finding much interest in the butler's concerns.

"What was necessary to get information out of him. He was quite stubborn, I'm sure you know how that is, but we still managed. He gave us the information we needed to clone you, but the results weren't quite what we were hoping for."

"What do you mean? What does Lord Cain have to do with your need to clone me?"

The old man gave a light smile and shifted to cross his arms over his chest. "Alexis was a smart man when he created Delilah. He actually had a partner in his cause. Both of us had people we hated and so we created soldiers to do our dirty work." As the man spoke he turned to take light steps toward the second cell. His gaze then became fixed upon the sleeping earl. "When Cain managed to defeat Alexis all of his soldiers became my property. That includes you Riff. I cloned you with the intentions of harnessing your second personality. Unfortunately, you proved to be stronger that Riffael."

"What do you intend to do with Lord Cain now that you know how to clone people?"

"What we do with him shouldn't matter to the world. To them, Cain Hargreaves is dead. Considering the failure you've become, we'll have to move on with plan 'B'." The man then pressed a button upon the wall and the floor under Riff began to crumble. Riff quickly clung to the bars of the cell, hanging on as tight as he could. With a light sigh, the doctor knelt to be at Riff's eye level. "Think of it this way, Riff. If you live you may be able to see your master again. The only promise I can give you is that if you spread the word of his liveliness then we may have to bring his loved ones into this."

"I'll rip your heart out if you hurt him in any way. I swear it!" Riff said, his heart filled with a deep rooted anger toward the doctor. He desperately tried to pull himself up only to be harshly kicked in the face. The impact was enough to knock him back into a dark haze and hurl him downward.

The butler could never forget the frustration of not knowing what building he was in. He could only remember awakening in a sewer and working to find his way back up to the surface. He has been searching endlessly for clues that could point him in the right direction, but none seemed to surface. Now that he has met with young Merryweather again he may have a chance...

'I will free you...I don't care what has to be done.'

While Riff was taking in his memories of the life he lived, the young Lady Hargreaves spent her time sorting through her closet. Where did she put her deck of tarot cards? It had to be somewhere in the boxes of the top storage shelf. Standing on her red stool, her little fingers plucked at the various boxes along the right side. She's already gone through two boxes, all while hearing the protests of the head butler, urging her to let him do the work. She was so protective over these cards that she could never let anyone touch them.

"Ah!" Finally! In the center box was a white rectangular box with a red binding tie on it. She took it down with a smile on her face. "With this...I can finally find you, dear brother."