Author's Note: To whomever it may concern: I'm back. My God, it feels like forever since I've uploaded anything... Hope there are people still willing to read my fics. If so, thank you very much! Well, anyway.
The quick sound of a match striking could be heard echoing through a sanctuary. The man holding the match held it against a long, white candle. A conniving smile crept along the man's face, giving way to cunning hazel eyes. The man, named Vincent Smith, slowly blew on the match, extinguishing it. He closed his eyes and inhaled slowly the smell of musky old books. Vincent always loved the smell of books, even when he was a child. Sometimes, it was the only thing that got him through his tumultuous childhood. But he didn't like to dwell. Vincent opened a book on religious law. Rubbish. He threw the book onto a stand situated against the pulpit of the sanctuary, completely uncaring of its condition. He scoffed at his religion's law. It didn't apply to him like it did to its mindless followers. He was above God's law.
That's not to say I'm holier than thou, Lord, he thought as he smirked, But I'm not exactly like them, am I?
His smile fell when he realized he'd recited exactly what his father would say when he thought he was alone with God, standing at that very pulpit.
Alone...
Vincent let the word melt in his mind.
And now you're dead, aren't you?
Vincent wore a grimace as he exited the church to make time for his guest.
"Damn it, Vincent. Why can't you give adequate directions to this godforsaken town?" Otacon drummed his fingers against the steering wheel of his car impatiently. This wasn't the first time he visited this odd and out-of-way town. His relationship with his estranged brother wasn't exactly peachy, to say the least; and, like all of their meetings, this wasn't going to be pleasant.
Otacon reflected on his brother, Vincent. His mother and father had Vincent a year before himself, but, his mother, fearing his father would do something to him, gave Vincent up to his great-grandmother, a choice that weighed heavily on her. Vincent ended up in the Silent Hill Orphanage after his great-grandmother declared the child too heavy a burden to care for. "Evil in his eyes!" she declared to her husband, and left the year-old baby on the doorstep, cold and freezing and too helpless to choose his own destination.
Otacon sighed and started the car up again. This fog wasn't getting any thinner, and he didn't want to have to stay in this town longer than he had to.
As he drove slowly down the road, he noted the slightly decrepit state of the town. It seemed worse than last he came. He could see something moving in the distance, but ignored it, figuring it to be a local. Slowly, a large steeple shown in the distance. Fog hid the cracks along the church's walls and the eerie nature it gave off. He pulled into the church parking lot and stepped out of his car. Somehow, he made it, despite Vincent's directions. He looked up at the church's beautiful exterior. Truly, it was a quite a sight. But he knew exactly the evil it held. As he finished that observation, just a small portion of that evil came to greet him outside.
"Brother!" Vincent greeted, arms held open, smirk on his face.
"Vincent," Otacon greeted back. His face, on the other hand, held no pleasant expression, fake or not.
"Don't be so cold, Hal." Vincent's smirk fell, but he wasn't disheartened. He pushed his glasses up.
"Come in," Vincent said as he opened the door to the church to allow Otacon entry.
"In there? Can't we talk somewhere else?" Otacon asked in unease.
Vincent felt himself growing impatient.
"I find conversation pleasant here," he pushed, then walked in.
Otacon rolled his eyes and made his way inside.
Otacon slowly looked around the church. Although seemingly massive on the outside, the inside left little to be desired.
"Beautiful, isn't She? I built her with my own hands," Vincent boasted, that static smirk on his face.
"You mean with your own money and someone else's hands?" Otacon asked rhetorically. He was getting tired of Vincent's games.
"What's the difference?" Vincent's once-raised hands fell slowly to his sides. He was done with pleasantries.
"Now..." he started, running a hand against a pew and walking up to a painting of his God. But Otacon spoke before he could continue.
"What do you want? What's so important that you have to leave a cryptic message on my own desk?" Despite his obvious dislike of his estranged brother, he felt a need to keep in touch with him, albeit very rarely.
It wasn't Otacon who found out about Vincent; Vincent was the one to contact him. Vincent had contacted him wanting to "connect" and "get to know each other." In reality, Vincent was looking for familial grounds within the church. After Vincent's father died and left him the robe, he found it fit to try to rope Otacon into his crazy cult. How he ever made it to Priesthood, Otacon would never know. Now, Otacon felt his family ties wearing thin, and didn't want to feel a loneliness he needn't feel. Not that Vincent provided any comfort, but he did offer blood he no longer had. That reason alone was enough for him to visit very, very sparingly.
So, after confirming his bloodline ties with Vincent through his own testing, he met up with him the first time, and, for him, the rest is history. How Vincent ever knew who he was and where to find him, he felt he'd never know.
Vincent turned to look at Otacon.
"If you'd let me finish, you'd know," he said calmly as he picked up a book on customary law.
"So... I've just recently learned that our father is dead. He died... six years ago, was it?" Vincent said, putting the book down and looking up briefly in contemplation.
"Seven," Otacon corrected grimly.
"And why wasn't I informed, dear brother?" Vincent asked bitterly.
"Perhaps, when we first met, I should have been told, at the very least, of his passing?"
"It was no concern of yours, and still isn't. Why do you care?" Otacon asked, genuinely curious.
Vincent pushed his glasses up again and smiled.
"I'll be forward. Was there a will?"
Otacon crossed his arms in disbelief.
"I might've guessed! No, there wasn't a will, and, if there were a will, you wouldn't have been in it," Otacon shot at him.
"Neither would you have been!" Vincent shot back, finding himself to be more offended than he felt necessary.
Otacon felt an odd mix of irritation and guilt.
"...You had your father, I had mine." Otacon looked away as he said this. He fiddled with the hem of his sweater. Why did it suddenly feel colder?
Vincent closed his eyes and breathed in.
"...True." Vincent smiled at him.
"Will that be all, then?" Otacon asked, eager to leave this creepy atmosphere.
"Well, haha, actually..."
Just as Vincent said that, the candles around the sanctuary blew out, leaving the place in see-through darkness. What little light that shown through the windows went dark. A sudden high-pitched noise floated through the air, making Otacon plug his ears and cringe. He noted how calm Vincent was. The noise eventually faded, then, looking around, Vincent nodded once, then relit the candles. Otacon removed his hands.
"What the hell was that?" he asked, feeling slightly nauseated.
"You don't want to know, Hal, nor do you want to leave right now. Let's just say, it's not the quaintest of towns outside right now," Vincent explained.
"What-" Before Otacon could finish the question, a loud banging could be heard outside. He rushed to the doors of the church and opened them.
"I wouldn't go out there if I were you," Vincent half-heartedly warned.
As soon as Otacon opened the doors, a heavy weight in the air made him feel suffocated. He looked around to see darkness engulfing the streets and buildings. Every building and sign went back fifty years in age, and was even more decrepit than before. He saw odd creatures roaming the streets, let out a yelp, then quickly shut the doors.
"Lock the damn doors!" he screamed to Vincent.
Vincent walked up to him and put up a hand defensively.
"All right, all right, calm down." Vincent then locked the doors with a key he pulled from his front pocket.
"W-w-what the hell were those things?!" he screamed into Vincent's ear.
"Quiet, Hal. Don't you know it's impolite to yell in a church without conviction?" He smirked.
"'Without conviction'?! There are... monsters out there, Vincent!"
"Monsters. Hm." Vincent put a hand on his chin.
"Are...Aren't they m-monsters...?" Otacon asked, out of breath.
"They're whatever you want them to be, Hal. I won't judge, God won't judge..." He smiled at him.
Otacon felt a chill run down his spine as Vincent said this.
Why does he keep smiling? he thought to himself as his eyes followed him up to the pulpit.
"What are you doing, Vincent?" Otacon asked, eyebrows furrowed, confused.
"God won't answer an obedient prayer if it's not asked, will She?"
Vincent proceeded to whisper to himself.
Otacon was thoroughly freaked out. He wanted to know what was going on. He waited a few minutes, trying to calm himself down.
"What's going on, Vincent?" he asked just as Vincent stopped praying.
Vincent kept his eyes closed, then opened them, head still bowed.
"Unfortunately for you," he started, then walked out from the pulpit and approached Otacon, "God chose now for a cleansing of sinners. Better be in Her good graces, Brother," Vincent explained.
Otacon felt speechless, but knew he definitely wasn't.
"God? Cleansing? Sinners? What are you, crazy? You believe all that?" Otacon's mind was running a mile a minute.
"You have your beliefs... I have mine." He smirked, yet again, and sat on a pew. He crossed his right leg over his left and opened a bible.
Otacon rolled his eyes, then walked up to the paintings on the walls. One by one, he looked at them and read the captions under them.
"This stuff is crazy. How do you legitimately believe this stuff?" Otacon asked absentmindedly.
"You're not of faith, Hal?" Vincent responded, eyes still on the bible.
"I'm not without my beliefs... But they're not half as crazy as this stuff," he answered.
"God is merciful, but I'm sure She wouldn't take kindly to being called crazy," Vincent said.
"...Sorry." Otacon moved from the paintings and sat in the pew across from Vincent.
"So... How long have you been going to this church?" Otacon asked, feeling ever colder, despite his sweater. Vincent seemed fine.
"All my life," Vincent answered.
"Why? I mean, why this church? This... belief system?"
Vincent closed the bible.
"I don't see any other churches around, do you? Besides, I couldn't just abandon a church I built from scratch, a clergy so devoted to me, could I? As for my beliefs, well... I'd rather not get into that."
Vincent got up and sat next to Otacon.
"Even though you're the priest of this church?" It was Otacon's turn to smirk. Vincent laughed.
"Well, you'd be surprised at how little you need to say to get people to follow you..." Vincent laid his arms across the back of the pew, leaning his head back and closing his eyes, legs once again crossed.
Otacon scoffed, arms folded, and shook his head. He wasn't about to get into that with him. Vincent started slowly bouncing the leg crossed over the other.
"So, how did dear ol' Dad treat you? Well?" Vincent looked at his watch absentmindedly.
"I'd rather not say... I'm afraid to ask about yours- Wait, did you even have a father? Or mother? Parents at all?" Otacon cursed his thirst for knowledge sometimes.
"Damn it, sorry. I shouldn't have asked," he said, hand over mouth.
Vincent smirked. Otacon was starting to think it was habit for him. His followers probably thought it was reassuring, a smile. How wrong they were.
Vincent got up and started sifting through the books he placed next to the pulpit a few days ago. He was getting bored of reading the same material over and over.
"Terrible," he answered nonchalantly.
"Abusive," he added.
"Just as, if not more, conniving than I am," he continued.
"...I'm sorry," Otacon offered.
"Don't be. I've seen worse," he said, thinking of a certain silver-haired woman.
"...He was a priest here?" Otacon knew the answer, but felt the need to ask anyway.
"Of course. Who else would it have been? But, of course, that was before I tore his church down... and built my own," he explained.
"How..." Otacon started, trying to tread lightly, "...How did he die, if you don't mind me asking?"
Vincent paused for a little bit, then turned around to face Otacon.
"I killed him. How else?" No smirk or smile adorned his face.
Otacon's heart stopped for a second. He felt the urgent need to leave. His body went rigid.
Then, suddenly, Vincent started laughing loudly, apparently disregarding his own rule about being loud in a church.
"Don't look so scared, Hal. I'm only kidding! You should see your face... So scared. Ha." Vincent looked as his watch again.
Otacon let out a breath he didn't know he was holding.
"God!" he exclaimed. As if whatever he saw outside wasn't enough to scare him straight.
Then, as quick as a heartbeat, light started flooding the sanctuary again. Otacon shot his head towards Vincent, who was, predictably, smiling. Otacon ran to the doors and turned the knob. The door clicked open. He looked to Vincent quickly, disbelief on his face.
"They're weren't locked? We could've been killed!" Otacon exclaimed.
"God wouldn't allow death to come to Her most loyal servant... and his brother," he explained, arms spread.
Otacon looked down, then back to Vincent.
"Until next time, Brother..." said Vincent, waving once with his hand.
Otacon nodded, then walked out into the bright, fog-blanketed town, leaving Vincent to his church. Otacon felt something else in the air, something he couldn't explain. He got into his car and drove away.
He was sure he'd see him again someday soon.
THE END