The sun shone bright, high up in the Timbuktu sky. A hunched over butler burst out of a beaten-up trunk, gulping in breaths of fresh air.
Blinking an eye wearily, Edgar stretched out and stood up, brushing off the dust on his fancy suit from Paris, his hometown.
In the distance, a truck roared back to life, splaying dust behind it as it zoomed off into the distance.
Edgar coughed, staring at the vehicle. At first he wondered why he was in the deserts of Africa, and why he had been in a box.
Then his memories scurried back home to papa, and he remembered everything.
He remembered the old lady geezer, Madame, that he had served faithfully for years. He snorted. The old lady had gone bonkers.
He remembered the cats. They were always on Madame's mind, and she loved the darn creatures like they were humans. Tch.
He remembered Madame's will. Goshdangit, the will. The bat-crazy woman had decided to give all of her possessions and fortunes to the cats when she died! The cats of all people! Er, living things!
She should have given her things to her loyal, faithful butler who had served her for years without a word. Not that he had had words in his mind. He just didn't say them, like a good butler.
But that's beside the point. The felines- something like Tuhlose, Bearleeoz, Mary, and Ditchess, he thought- were lazy and good for nothing. They even hated him before he had kidnapped them and shooed them away, and he had done nothing to them before the 'incident' as he called it in his mind.
And then, they came back to the manor! What an outrage! Of course, Edgar had attempted to kidnap them again, but then he got shipped straight to Timbuktu instead of the cats!
And now he was stuck here in the lonely desert of Timbuktu, with no place to go.
Sighing disdainfully, Edgar scowled and slumped back onto a rock, figuring it was his best option. Slowly, he closed one eye, and then the other, and drifted off to sleep.
"Uncle Waldo, are you sure this is England? I don't believe Sebastian mentioned any deserts when he gave us directions."
"Of course, Abigail! That butler probably just left something out in his directions."
In the distance, three geese waddled through Timbuktu, their bickering getting closer and closer to Edgar, arousing him sharply from his sleep.
The first thing he thought when he opened his eyes was that one of the geese had a shaved tail.
Blinking fast, he refocused his vision, and sure enough, there were the three geese. The older one, presumably Uncle Waldo, waddled drunkenly around, and the two females supported him up while talking.
"Amelia, will you check on the travel brochure? Because this sin't the route we normally take to get back home to England from Paris," asked one of the girls, who he assumed was Abigail, to the other female goose, who was likely to be Amelia.
Amelia pulled out a folded piece of paper from underneath her fur coat, and squinted at the tiny letters. "Says here that we were supposed to travel across the English Channel."
Abigail groaned with a british accent, and snatched the brochure from her sister. Reading furiously, she looked up for a moment, excitement in her eyes.
"It says here on this page though that there's a bus going from London to Timbuktu and back and forth, and it's arriving in five minutes!"
At this, Edgar sat up straight, ecstatic about what he had heard. Quietly, he creeped up behind the geese, dodged a wobbling Uncle Waldo, and snatched the brochure.
Flicking it open, he read the adress of the bus stop, and sprinted away before the geese could catch him.
Almost threateningly, Edgar's top hat tilted slightly in the breeze from running. A memory flooded through the gate of when he had lost his hat. Protectively, the balding butler put up a hand to stabilize it.
Stopping at the designated place, Edgar quickly checked the signpost to make sure he was in the right location.
Sure enough, a bus pulled to screeching halt in front of the butler and the sign. The doors creaked open, and Edgar climbed on cautiously, deposited his fee in the bin, and took a seat in the way-back.
"Next stop: Phantomhive Manor of London."
Groggily, Edgar stretched out on the near empty bus after opening his eyes. Staring out the window, he noticed lavish mansions, most likely inhabited by wealthy people, and not the endless expanse of desert he had traveled in Timbuktu.
I'm in London! Edgar thought as he stepped off the bus and onto the road, grinning for the first time since he captured Madame's cats.
Wait... why did he need to be in London? He should be going back to Paris to get revenge on the cats.
He tried to recall what the geese had said back in Timbuktu and things said on the bus, but came up with only scraps of information.
Sebastian... butler... Phantomhive Manor...
A butler would be nice; he could lead Edgar back home to Paris.
Oh! He should look for the butler Sebastian at Phantomhive Manor!
Strolling off through the elegant streets of London, Edgar peered around each corner to find the long-awaited mansion, but had no luck.
Finally, Edgar turned a corner, and walked straight into a burnt garden. A short, strawberry-blond gardener held a bottle of pesticide in his hand, looking guiltily at the dead plants.
Sighing, he thought to himself that this was the end of the journey. No way this is the manor!
Approaching quickly were two figures, whispering to each other frantically. One was clad in black, the other, a fancy gown and an eye-patch.
Edgar bowed politely to the strangers, who jumped in surprise, not having seen him before.
The jet-black suit guy whipped out a pistol lightning-fast, and aimed it at Edgar's heart.
"Who are you and what do you want?" 'Black', as Edgar called him in his mind because of his dark suit and hair, said quickly and angrily, steadying the pistol, even though his grip hadn't quavered. No, not one tiny bit.
Edgar dipped his head again, now very nervous. "I-I'm sorry for intruding, but I appear to be a bit lost. My name is Edgar, and I am a butler from Paris. Would you happen to know where Phantomhive Manor is? I would like to meet their butler, Sebastian."
'Black' smiled a certain grin- how would you describe it?
"Oh, I'm sorry. You're looking straught at the manor and straight at me: Sebastian Michaelis, butler of Ciel Phantomhive."
Now Edgar realized how he would classify Sebastian's grin.
It was a devilish grin.
Edgar nodded and smiled at the things his fellow butler said.
"I apologize for the mess. I did not realize that I would be expecting a guest. Please, enjoy yourself here at the manor. A storm is approaching on the horizon, and I would hate for you to get miserably soggy on your travels back home."
At that remark, Ciel looked up curiously. The two of them shared a look, almost as if they had been through an interesting experience during a storm.
Not speaking, Edgar's eyebrows raised quizzically at their tensed shoulders. With a shooken head from Sebastian, it was clear that it was no big deal and none of his business.
Quickly changing the subject, Ciel spoke up. "Shall my butler bring you some tea, Sir, I mean Monsieur Edgar?"
"Yes please, Earl Phantomhive," Edgar responded, tipping his hat.
Ciel scurried off to tell Sebastian, his long blue bangs fluttering.
Already intrigued, Edgar tippy-toed up to the door, and used his large elephantine ears to eavesdrop on the pair.
"Sebastian, Monsieur Edgar looks very suspicious. I suggest investigating him."
"Young master, you have no evidence for this theory. He could just be a lost traveler."
"You are my butler, and you must follow my every command. Remember the covenant?"
"Yes, as you wish, young master."
"And about the no evidence part- you devils never work from evidence."
At the word devils, Edgar crashed to the ground, suddenly weak in his knees.
The door creaked open slowly as Ciel and Sebastian re-entered, both shaking furiously.
"How much of it did you hear?" demanded Sebastian, glaring at Edgar.
"A-all o-of i-it," whimpered the Parisian, sprawled out on the floor.
Sebastian clap his hands together, not pleased, but looking slightly amused. "Well then, I suppose we can't hide it from you. I am a devil butler, bound by a covenant to the young master."
Edgar's eyes blinked sleepily, and he rubbed them rapidly to make sure he wasn't hallucinating.
Ciel jumped in. "It is true, Monsieur. Now, don't just sit there like a limp tuna, entertain me with your story!"
But Edgar did not comply, his head still filled with wonder.
"Yes? What is it?"
Edgar began to stutter slightly the beginnings of a question, yet eyes filled with hatred for the cats he left behind. This would clinch his race for revenge, and give him endless riches and wealth when Madame passed away.
This was it. If Sebastian said yes, Edgar would walk away a king of the heavens, able to get rid of the kitties. But if he said no...
There was only a sliver of certainty about the answer.
Edgar was certain that this was the only way to do it.
"Get on with it!" Ciel yelled quietly, getting impatient while tapping his metal shoe sole against the wooden floor.
Edgar took a deep breath in, and exhaled it slowly, gazing at his frozen breath hanging in the air. His ambition for revenge was hanging in the air, teetering and tottering, one way and then the other.
Ah, the random chance of life. Just a roll of the die decides who is born. Just a toss of the coin determines who dies. Just a pull of the cards tells you who's rich and who's beneath the line of poverty.
The dice, the coins, the cards.
Maybe Sebastian was life, rolling a die, tossing a coin, pulling a card. Gambling. Choosing Edgar's future.
After all, he was a devil.
And devils represent life, don't they? The evilness, the cruelness, the heartlessness. They stand for the antagonists.
Sebastian seemed like a pretty nice guy, but he was bound by a covenant. Who knew what he was really like?
He was evil. Cruel. Heartless.
Like all other devils.
Sebastian was no different.
All of them were the same. And maybe Edgar was like him too.
Evil. Cruel. Heartless. He had wanted to murder a bunch of kittens after all.
But that didn't matter.
Right now, his future was at stake. A tipping of the scale could lead his life one way or the other.
Sebastian was a devil, but it was still a game of luck and chance.
Sebastian could do whatever he wanted, and it wouldn't affect Sebastian's life.
It all depended on this very moment.
Ciel scowled at the foreigner, and made a gesture almost as to shoo him out.
Edgar sent a prayer up above, and opened his mouth to speak.
"I was wondering... could you teach me to become a demon butler?"
There it was. The question.
Edgar almost didn't hear Sebastian's monotone answer as blood roared in his ears, pounding away with an anvil. The answer.
One word.
But only two letters.
"No."
The whole world shattered into a million shards. Like broken glass, it hurts if you step on it.
A wolf howled. A grim reaper passed judgment on a soul.
A devil butler said one simple word.
A regular, unimportant, useless butler trod on a shard of reality.
As Sebastian turned away to leave and walk off with Ciel, he flashed another grin at Edgar, leaving chills on his skin.
It was the same grin as before.
It was a devilish grin.