"Let's switch butlers for a day. Whoever causes the other's butler the most pain wins.

Love,

Alois Trancy"

Ciel looks up from the white card he'd just read from to stare Sebastian straight in the eyes. The butler's crimson irises watch his Young Master with an amused look, lips tightly curled into a smile. Placing his right hand above his heart, Sebastian kneels before Ciel, head bowed so that raven black hair conceals his face.

"Understood, bocchan," Sebastian says. Standing back up, he turns to leave the room with tray in hand.

Over his shoulder, Sebastian can hear Ciel call to him, "Don't disappoint me."

Bou-chan and his pride . . . Sebastian thinks, closing the door behind him to seclude the young earl in his office.

"Neh, Claude," Alois mumbles lazily, prying open an egg at the dining room table with his fork and knife, "you think Ciel will accept?"

"Yes, Your Highness," Claude answers from beside him, standing at attention. Silently Claude glares at the blonde, the hatred emanating from the butler practically visible.

"You're just saying that, Claude!" Alois turns to the demon. Standing up, Alois's heels give the boy enough height to stare Claude right in the face, peering at those spiteful crimson eyes through Claude's spectacles. "Yes . . . Those eyes! Claude, don't disappoint me or you'll end up like Hannah! Oh, how I don't want to mar that gaze of yours . . ."

Alois, smiling down at his bowing butler, listens intently as Claude says in threatening monotone, "Yes, Your Highness."

Sebastian walks up the main entrance as he had done before, this time not a stranger, and this time not clad in a suspicious trench coat carrying a huge suitcase stuffed with a young boy's body. No, this time Sebastian has come to the Trancy household with a different objective, his only possession apart from his pocket watch and clothing being that same silver serving tray.

Claude sensed Sebastian's presence and immediately 'greeted' their most esteemed guest. The two demons stare each other down for a while, weighing their options: fight to the death and the winner sustain their master's wrath or do as their masters had commanded. To Claude, both options were rather enticing; anything to get rid of the Trancy-whore.

"Don't touch bocchan with your filthy hands," Sebastian hisses as he walks past the other butler.

"Do touch mine, Michaelis," Claude echoes tauntingly. Sebastian narrows his eyes at this, and Claude pushes his glasses up the bridge of his nose with a sneer curling his lips.

"My bocchan will win," Sebastian calls over his shoulder as he shut the front door behind him, leaving Clause to his own devices outside.

Under his breath, Claude exhales, "I wouldn't be so sure."

Sebastian combs his way through the hallways quickly, having already been in the estate on a previous occasion.

This place is much smaller than the Phantomhive mansion, he thinks. And it's so . . .-

"Ciel's butler~!" Alois calls down from the top of the main staircase.

"Young Master," Sebastian answers, kneeling down into a bow of allegiance, "My name is Sebastian Michaelis. I am your butler, Young Master."

Alois slides down the railing, landing with a slight jump of 'glee'. Placing two fingers under Sebastian's chin, Alois lifts Sebastian's face to look up at him. Taking out a butter knife from his breakfast that had just been interrupted, Alois lightly traces Sebastian's cheek with the blade. A cruel, sensual expression dominating Alois's features, he murmurs, "Your Highness. That is the proper way to address me."

"Yes," Sebastian corrects himself, "Your Highness."

Ciel, bored and lonely due to Sebastian's absence, is playing darts. Just as a dart hits the center, the door clatters open to reveal the Trancy butler.

"Your Highness," Claude says, bowing with his legs locked straight, "I, Claude Faustus, am now at your service."

Annoyed, Ciel throws a dart just above Claude's head, taking a few strands of hair with it as the dart lodges itself in the hallway wall. Standing before the butler with both fists on his hips, Ciel glares at Claude, their height being the same (Ciel has a complex about his height, even with the heels). Kicking Claude's left shin and, pressing his head down with one of his tiny hands, Ciel forces Claude into a kneeling position.

"A dog should always be lower than his master, and the name of 'Your Highness' is reserved for the Queen and only the Queen," Ciel says in a dead monotone, "Refer to me as Young Master or My Lord, or leave my sight until I say otherwise."

"Yes," Claude revises himself, "Young Master."

Both Alois and Ciel, as if timed despite the distance, mutter to 'their' butlers, "Absolutely preposterous!"

The butlers on the other hand, have quite different thoughts.

Ciel Phantomhive . . . is quite interesting . . . No- he's perfect . . . Claude thinks.

Sebastian reasons, This Trancy boy is nowhere near bocchan's level . . .

Yet both butlers are smiling as they wait for what's in store for them throughout the course of the day.