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Blackwake Manor
Part One
A Weiss Kreuz Halloween Fic
By Deena (deena_arashi@hotmail.com)
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Yohji and I really didn't want to do this mission and we probably would
have stayed home if Manx hadn't insisted that this was a job for the
four of us. Damn her. Her glare was almost as cold as Aya's and it
effortlessly put a stop to all our complains. Instead, Yohji and I just
grumbled to ourselves.
If anything, I thought Omi would protest but he happily agreed,
darting off to do research on his computer. Well I suppose it shouldn't
have surprised me. The kid was surprisingly rational and had a head for
logic. Aya, of course, voiced no objection. I don't think that anything
could scare that guy.
So that's the scenario. Yohji and I scared shitless and trying
desperately to hide it, Aya and Omi cool as ever and scoffing at us. We
knew that they knew we were scared and they knew that we knew that
they knew. Confusing right? Well I wasn't going to admit for the world
that I was scared and neither was Yohji. A man's gotta keep his pride
afterall.
Yohji covered his fear up by lamenting loudly about the hot date he
was missing. I peppered the cold night up with rants of how many bad
guys I was gonna kill and how justice would be served. It pretty much
fit my image since I was, as Aya had once put it, 'a hot-tempered,
impulsive idiot.' Well *excuse* me, icicle of the Arctic tundra. As if he
was such a paragon of human virtue.
I mean just 'cause a guy is attractive, all pale and cool and mysterious,
doesn't mean he can treat the rest of us, we who are *not* pale and
cool and mysterious, like a sack of shit. Friggin' arrogant bastard.
I glared at the back of his head and then at Omi's too. If both of
them were so damn fearless, why didn't they just do the stupid mission
by themselves? It wasn't fair!
Suddenly Aya and Omi stopped.
"This is the place," Aya said blandly.
We were standing before a huge, iron gate, the words 'BLACKWAKE
MANOR' scribbled out in sprawling letters. The iron name was rusted,
giving the words a bloody appearance. Behind the gate lay an enormous
mansion, all black and dark. It was sort of spooky house that every
third-rate horror film portrayed. About three stories high with thick
tendrils of ivy clinging to the rotting walls, windows dirty and broken.
A gust of wind chose that moment to shriek and the gate flew open,
it's creaky hinges wailing. Misty gray clouds parted to reveal a full
moon and in the distance some sort of nocturnal animal howled.
Screw pride.
I was running back towards the car in a nanosecond, Yohji hot on my
heels, our yelps of terror drowning out the wind and the rusty gate and
the crying animals.
Omi hurled himself on Yohji, the lanky blond falling flat on his face,
with the kid straddling him.
"GET OFFA ME YOU DAMN BRAT!!!"
Aya grabbed me by the shoulders.
"Ahhhh! Lemmegolemmegolemmego!!!!"
"Stop screaming!" Omi yelled. "You two are acting like babies!"
I struggled furiously. "I'm telling you, I'm not going in there!"
"Me either!" Yohji spit up dirt. "My face is getting muddy! Get off me
now Omi!"
I didn't mean to hurt Aya. Really I didn't. Sure the guy can be a moody
dork at times but I do like him. Kinda. Well that's to say, I couldn't
hurt him on purpose. But in all the thrashing I was doing, frantically
trying to get him to let go of me, I forgot I was wearing my claw. I
accidentally scratched his face a good one.
"OWWWW~!!!!!!!!"
By far, that was the loudest cry of the night.
"Uh...oops."
"Aya kun!" Omi rushed to his side. "Are you okay?"
He was holding his cheek with one hand, bloody dripping out from
between his fingers. "You clumsy ass!" Violet eyes glared daggers at
me.
I flinched as I sheathed my claws. "It was an accident." I felt sorry,
really I did, but at least he wasn't trying to restrain me anymore.
What was that saying about every grey cloud having a silver lining?
Yohji slid up to me. "You injured him, good one! Now let's make our
getaway!"
I looked over at the other two members of Weiss. Omi was standing on
his tiptoes, pressing a hankie to Aya's face. Guilt washed over me. "We
can't just leave them here! I scratched Aya!"
Yohji snorted and gestured to the house. It stood there in all its
sinister glory, waiting to devour our innocent flesh like the evil demon
it was. Sometimes a vivid picture was more than enough to overcome
the guilty dispositions of the mind.
"I'm with ya, Yotan."
We made a break for it.
Two minutes, one jumping and five bruises later, Yohji and I slogged
back towards the gate with Omi leading the way. Aya was behind us,
katana drawn.
Let it not be said that Yohji and I didn't fight for what we believed in.
I mean, is it our fault if Aya's katana is stronger than our will?
The gate was still swinging wildly, the bottom of it scraping loudly
against the asphalt. Omi marched up to it and shoved it open, holding it
back for us. "Come on."
Yohji looked at me. "You first," he graciously invited.
"Oh no, I wouldn't dream of it," I quickly replied. "You first."
"No, no, little ones first."
"Don't be absurd. You first. I insist."
"No you first. *I* insist!"
"Dammit I said that I insist!"
"Well I said that I insist too!"
The sharp point of Aya's katana nudged my back. "You go first Ken,"
the redhead growled.
I cursed him in my mind. He hated me, I knew it. Just because I
punched him in the face that one time...
"Come on Ken kun," Omi coaxed, hanging off the gate. "We've faced
much more dangerous things then this silly, old house."
"But it's a *haunted* house!"
That's right. If you hadn't already figured it out, our mission was to go
poking through this old English mansion. People had been complaining
about it and so Persia had shoved the task to us. Stupid Persia. Why
the hell didn't he do this mission himself? Where was the justice in
making us do it? I'll bet the guy was at home, reclining in his easy chair
with Manx fawning all over him. It's at times like this that I realize
life stinks.
"GO!" Aya's voice was ice-laden, punctuated by a sharp jab of his
katana.
I hurried forward, my knees shaking.
The driveway was made of cobblestone that was broken and crumbling.
It snaked up to the house, edged with trees and shrubbery lining
either side. The lawn that lay on either side of the driveway was an
absolute mess, overrun with knee high weeds and grass. In the middle
of the right side, I could see a fractured fountain of a lady holding a
vase, grass springing out from the numerous cracks. The left lawn was
covered with eerie looking trees and a mushy, overgrown pond.
I stumbled over a bit of uneven pavement. It was a sign. A sign of the
doom that was to come. Oh Lord, I was really getting freaked now!
Behind us, the gate smashed shut with a loud groan.
"We're stuck in here!" I howled, jumping a mile.
"I'm too young to die!" Yohji moaned, joining in. "There are still too
many beautiful girls who want to date me!"
Omi looked annoyed. He hated when Yohji talked about girls and
dating, mostly because he had a crush on the older blond. My keen
sense of in-depth personality evaluation had led me to deduce that
*ages* ago. Well that and the fact that I'd accidentally found an old
delivery receipt with Omi + Yohji scribbled all over it. It rather cute
actually.
"The faster we search through this house, the faster we can go home,"
Aya put in.
Well that was exactly the sort of logic I appreciated. Yohji too, for as
I darted forward, he was right beside me.
"A quick look around and then we can blow this dump," he muttered to
me.
I nodded. "We're Weiss. Of course we can handle a dumb mission like
this."
And that's when the unthinkable happened. A slimy, bony hand reached
out and grabbed me!
"Aahhhhhhhh!!!! Help!!! A monster's got me!!!!!"
"Oh God no!!! Save Ken!!!!!!!"
"That's a tree branch moron," Aya informed me calmly, unhooking the
said branch from my jacket.
Oh.
Omi started to laugh. "You guys are so lame!"
Aya threw me a disgusted look, not condescending to say anything. He
merely strode off, Omi following close behind, still laughing.
"It was an easy mistake to make," Yohji assured me supportively.
"It was a false alarm this time but it won't be next time." I shivered,
pulling my jacket tighter around me.
As quietly as we could, we tiptoed after Aya and Omi, keeping our eyes
open for any unwanted visitors from the supernatural realm. With the
moon as our only light source, it was hard to be on top of things.
Especially since we were surrounded by so many skeletal trees and
droopy bushes that cast shadows on everything.
We slinked forward, inch after deteriorating asphalt inch, and when a
sudden rustling noise in a nearby bush cleaved through the night air,
we grabbed at each other.
A rat scurried out, narrowing missing our feet and disappeared into
the grass.
I looked at Yohji. He looked at me. Simultaneously, we broke into a full
run, speeding down the remainder of the ruined driveway and up the
broken stairs where Aya and Omi were casually lounging.
The top of the stairs were flanked by two imposing, ugly gargoyle
statues. Two more gargoyles peered down at us from their position
atop the door.
"We didn't think you were going to make it," Omi remarked, barely
containing his laughter.
Yohji glared at him while raking a shaky hand through his hair. "Shut
up brat!"
I turned to Aya with the newfound knowledge that I *loathed*
gargoyles. "Please, please, pleeeeese can we go home?" I implored
desperately. At this point, I was not above begging.
Aya stared at me. "What happened to all the bad guys you were going
to kill and all the evil you were going to dispel?" he asked in a flat tone.
What a jerk he was, bringing that up at a time like this! "Bad guys are
a whole different story from supernatural forces of evil!" I retorted.
Some smart leader Aya was. Anyone knew that!
Suddenly Yohji seized hold of my hand. "That gargoyle just blinked at
me!"
"Oh jeeze," Omi moaned, rubbing at his forehead. "Gimme a break."
I clung to Yohji, wishing he was fatter. The more mass he had, the
more I could cling to. There was safety in blubber, wasn't there? I
tried vainly not to look at any of the gargoyle statues. I didn't want to
see those vile creature of the night blink at me.
"Oh come on!" Aya snapped, impatiently. "Let's get inside!"
I looked at the door. It was utterly gigantic, made of solid wood and
carved with intricately freaky designs like skulls and ugly monster
heads and flames. It did nothing to reassure me. There was no
doorbell, which naturally I'd expected. Instead there was a heavy
metal knocker.
"Guess we'll have to knock," Omi said as he reached out to grab the
knocker.
His assistance wasn't required because the door opened BY ITSELF!!!!
Now let me tell you that when you're in the safety of your home,
sitting on the sofa, eating popcorn and watching a movie where a door
to a haunted house opens by itself, it's easy to say, 'Oh that was
dumb' or 'How unoriginal' or 'That's lame'. In reality however, it's as
scary as fuck! Even Aya and Omi looked surprised.
Both Yohji and I yelped and held onto each other for dear life. I was
taking no chances!!!
"It was obviously the wind," Omi explained, casting us a pitying look.
"How the frig does the wind blow open a heavy oak door?" Yohji
demanded, hugging me tightly.
"Who the hell cares about that!!!" Aya snarled furiously. "Come on!" He
scowled at us and entered the house with Omi.
Yohji and I meekly followed, still clinging to each other.
The smell of mold and rotting wood and evil and death greeted us. Omi
pulled out a flashlight and shone it around. Sprawled out before us was
a huge staircase, covered with thick, red carpet. Portraits of sinister
looking people lined the walls on either side of the staircase. At the
top of the stairs was a small landing, before the stairs turned to go up.
Above the landing was a large, broken window, a suit of armor standing
before it.
To the left and to the right of us were sizeable rooms, white sheets
covering the furniture. Dust blanketed all uncovered furniture and
cobwebs liberally decorated corners and doors and various other
surfaces.
"It's not too late to go!" I whispered, anxiously looking around for signs
of the devil. "This place reeks of pure evil!"
"Stop being so melodramatic," Aya ordered, annoyed. "We're not
leaving and that's final!"
"Hey, what's that noise?" Omi suddenly asked.
Yohji and I froze. "What noise?" we gasped in unison.
Aya rolled his eyes. "It's their teeth chattering."
Omi giggled. "Are you guys really so scared of this stupid, old house?"
I clenched my teeth together and didn't bother to dignify that absurd
question with an answer.
I wondered who I wanted to strangle more, Aya or Omi. No, Persia. I
definitely wanted to kill Persia first. This was all his fault, that lazy
arse! I could be at home watching a soccer game right now. It was
Italy vs. Argentina, dammit!
Suddenly the heavy door behind us banged shut. There was a tense
moment of silence.
"We're doomed!" Yohji hollered, his voice echoing off the filthy
chandeliers above us, around the many once-elegant tables and mirrors
and off the grimy marble floor.
"That was definitely the wind," Omi muttered to no one in particular.
Yohji and I shared a look. It most certainly was *not*!!!
"We're wasting time standing around," Aya barked, gracing us all with a
steamy glare.
Omi nodded in agreement. "This place will take a while to search out.
Why don't we split up and look around?"
Now anyone with any brains who's ever watched a horror film knows
*never* to split up. Someone *always* gets killed that way!!!
"No way!" Yohji and I cried together, again.
Another glare, this one hotter than the last. "We're splitting up and
that's final!"
Our gracious leader had spoken. If that was final than that was final. I
let go of Yohji and leeched onto Aya's arm. "I'm going with Aya!"
Yohji grabbed the redhead's other arm. "No I am!"
Apparently both of us had the same idea. I mean if you had a choice
between the moody guy with the sword or the genki kid with the darts,
who would you choose?
"LET GO OF ME!!!!!!"
Whoa.
We let go of him in a flash.
Omi hastily jumped between us and a decidedly pissed off Aya. They
were right, redheads really *do* have the worst tempers. "Come on
Yohji kun, I'll protect you," Omi wheedled in a sweet voice.
"Fine, Ken comes with me then!" Aya grate out, his temper on the
verge of breaking.
YES!!! I was gonna live!
I hid behind Aya and gloated.
"We'll meet back here in an hour," Aya stated, snapping into
'commanding leader' mode.
"Unless we're dead," Yohji muttered.
"No one is gonna die!" Omi burst out, exasperated. "Stop being so
pessimistic!"
"Ken and I will take the top two floors," Aya continued, ignoring the
byplay between Omi and Yohji. "You two search this floor and the
basement."
"Why do we have to do the basement?" Yohji cried in horror.
"Everyone knows that the labs where mad scientists concoct foul
concoctions and resurrect evil demons are hidden in the basement!"
Omi sighed deeply. "Let's just get this over with, okay?" He snatched
Yohji's wrist and dragged him away, the older blond protesting loudly
all the while.
Aya turned and stalked up the stairs, his boots making prints in the
thick dust.
I scrambled after him, struggling not to look around. I did *not* want
to look into the face of pure evil.
Aya took the steps two at a time, confidence marking his stance, his
trench coat swishing coolly around him, katana firmly clasped in one
hand. No one would dare mess with him, that's for sure.
I, on the other hand, was an obvious choice for evildoers to wreak
havoc upon. I trudged warily up the stairs, clinging to the banister,
struggling not to trip over the stairs in fear. Against my will, because
let's face it, innocents are always made to do things against their will
in spooky, haunted houses, I found myself looking at the portraits that
hung on the wall.
A row of pale, gaunt faces glared down at me. All the people were all
dressed in somber colors like blacks and grays, sitting stiffly upon
what appeared to be a throne. The kind of throne that a devil would sit
upon while ordering the slaughter of innocents. I came to the
conclusion that they were all wicked.
One painting in particular caught my eye and I froze. It was of a man,
with black hair that fell roguishly over his forehead. He was younger
than the rest, perhaps in his early twenties. It was his eyes that really
got to me, they were a pale yellow color and shone in the dark, almost
as if they were glowing.
I swallowed thickly and they moved. Honest to fucking goodness, those
yellow eyes *moved*. They turned and looked at me, smoldering
ominously.
Well I wasn't going to hang around and see if the rest of the guy
moved too. I bounded up the remaining steps and hurled myself onto
Aya, who was standing on the landing beside the suit of armor, waiting
for me.
"What now?" he snarled, trying to pull my arms off his neck.
I was shaking violently. "That guy in the painting moved! He fucking
looked at me Aya!!!!" I buried my face into Aya's shoulder and
whimpered.
"It's all in your imagination," he barked, vexed. "Now get off me!"
I was unprepared for the force of his shove. Afterall, Aya is a pretty
thin guy. He looks anorexic to me most of the time. Who knew he could
push so hard?
And of course, since the God of Fate have conspired to make me the
ultimate clumsy killers, I promptly careened into the suit of armor
that graced the landing. I crashed to the gritty carpet in a heap of
Knight clothing, my legs entangled in the heavy lance, my left arm
stuffed into the helmet and one thigh piece stuck to my head. It was a
true Hidaka Ken moment.
I didn't stop screeching, even when Aya fished me out from the metal
parts and blasted his glare of doom at me. I didn't care. I had just
seen a painting look at me and now my ass hurt! This sucked shit!
"Why can't you be more careful?" Aya demanded, yanking me to my
feet.
"Well maybe you shouldn't have pushed me!" I retorted, angrily.
"Well maybe you shouldn't have hurled yourself on me!"
"Well maybe that painting shouldn't have rolled his eyes around and
looked at me!"
Aya scowled as he turned and headed up the next flight of stairs.
"You're being foolish."
I clambered after him, not wanting to fall victim to anymore paintings
who wanted to do me in. "Persia was foolish to give us this dumb
mission," I grumbled.
Aya halted at the top of the stairs. I seized his hand and looked
around in all directions. "We're safe for the time being," I assured
him.
He rolled his eyes but thankfully didn't pull his hand away. "Baka."
The hallway was long and dark and seemed to stretch out endlessly.
"Tell me you have a flashlight," I whispered nervously.
"I don't," he replied curtly.
"Oh great," I moaned. "After all this time of killing bad guys and
surviving, we end up at death's door in this damn house. Isn't there
some kind of irony in all this?"
"Just shut up!"
Aya started to move forward and I followed him, because afterall I
had a death-grip on his hand. He may have been a jerk but I did feel
safe with him. And he had excellent vision in the dark.
"Look, there's a candle on that table," he murmured, gesturing to a
small table that stood beside the door to the first room on the left.
I squinted. A red candle sitting in a brass candleholder. "Aya no," I
cried frantically. "We can't use their demonic implements!"
"Would you rather go gallivanting all around this house in the dark?"
I thought about it, for one second. Hell no!!! And besides, Aya was
wearing gloves. That would offer some protection, right? Unless the
candle was acid dipped...
He grabbed the candle before I could warn him. He dug out a book of
matched from his pocket and lit the candle. A soft, eerie glow
illuminated the corridor.
Absently I happened to glance into the mirror that hung on the wall
behind the table that the candle had been resting upon.
"ARGH~!!!!!!"
"Oh what now?!!" Aya erupted, whirling around and glowering furiously
at me.
With a shaky finger, I pointed at the mirror. "I have no reflection!
I've been turned into a vampire!!!"
"You damned idiot!" He bit out scathingly. In one fluid movement, he
strode up to the mirror and slid a slender, gloved-finger across the
surface. "It's dust! You can't see your reflection because the mirror is
dusty!!! You're not a damn vampire and there is no evil in this stupid
house!!! Now shut the hell up before I kill you!!!!"
Jeeze. Temper, temper. I opened my mouth to tell him that he should
watch his temper because it could lead to early heart troubles but
after seeing the look on his face, I decided against it.
Well exCUse me Aya-fucking-stick-shoved-up-the-ass-Fujimiya. Was it
my fault if this junky moth-hole set my nerves on edge?
"Come on!!!"
I didn't care if he was upset or not, I still stuck to him like those rabid
schoolgirls at the shop stuck to me as we entered the first room. It
was some kind of child's playroom, filled with chests of toys. But not
modern toys like Barbie dolls and Spiderman action figures but instead
things like rocking horses and rag dolls and wooden soldiers. There was
a table stacked with books, old, yellowed books with titles like 'Peter
and Jane Go' and 'Mary Beth makes a cake' and 'Author's pet dog'.
Real old stuff that no kid would learn from today.
Aya lifted the candle and it shone upon a painting of two little blond
girls. They were both clad in white, lacy dresses, pink ribbons adorning
their curls. Fear was painted their faces, their saddened eyes
captured for all eternity. Behind them loomed a threatening shadow.
"You can't tell me this isn't creepy," I muttered, tearing my eyes away
from the picture.
"Hn."
I took another look around when something caught my eye. "Aya, over
there," I managed to croak, my voice suddenly hoarse.
He led me to a rocking chair in the corner where two yellowed, lacy
dresses sat. They were easily recognized as the frocks the little girls
in the painting were wearing. Only these dresses were tarnished with
huge, rust-colored stains that covered both bodices.
Aya took a step closer. "Stabbed," he whispered, softly. "See the little
rents in the fabric? They were stabbed."
"And then someone laid their dresses out..." I covered my mouth,
utterly horrified.
"Ken..." He looked at me and gently took my hand.
I shuddered. "How could...why would..."
"Don't think about it." He pulled me close to him.
"Now...now d-do you believe me?" I stammered, still staring at the
bloody dresses. "There is something evil going on here!"
At that moment, as if to mark my words, music began to play. Aya and
I both whirled around. There, on the table beside the stacks of
withered books, sat a porcelin Merry-go-around. The hollow-sounding
carnival music filled the room as the pink and blue and white horses
bobbed up and down.
I felt a shiver run through Aya's body. Tight-lipped, he dragged me
from the room.