That Butler, Shaken

I own nothing but my OC.

≤speech in Indian language≥

'thoughts'

"speech"

{setting/stage directions?}

SOUND EFFECTS

An entire sentence like this, without quotes, is narration for dreams or stuff like written letters.

=†=†=†=†= scene shift/time shift

—^—^—^— change of perspective/area of action within one specific time frame/location

Previously:

"The blade of my death scythe won't cut through…!?" Grell said, furrowing his brow and gritting his teeth. Undertaker repelled Grell's attack and sent him flying. Undertaker's grey scarf fell away and his chain of mourning lockets came loose. Undertaker opened his robe wide, revealing more sotobas. In one hand, he held the original sotoba. In the other he clutched the lockets. Undertaker smirked.

"!!" Grell said, glaring down at him. Undertaker grinned. He whipped his robe around, flinging sotobas up at Grell while he was still in the air. Grell held his death scythe in front of him as a shield. The Sotobas speared the glass dome above him, sending down a shower of sharp shards.

"Guuh…!" Grell grunted as he was cut.

"Young Master!!" Sebastian said, quickly shielding Ciel, kneeling down so he could cover him better. Lacey swung her scythe and scattered the shards directly above them.

"Aah. How sad it iiis..." Undertaker said, holding his head. He pushed his bangs up, revealing phosphorescent green eyes. "… That laughter should vanish from this place."

Ciel's eye widened at the scene he saw peeking over Sebastian's shoulder. His brow furrowed slightly in confusion. He didn't believe what he was seeing.

"Undertaker…!?" Ciel said. Undertaker looked at him with Reaper eyes.

CRAAASH!

The glass finished hitting the floor. Sebastian straightened up and took stock of the situation. Grell was kneeling on the floor with five sotobas embedded in the floor around him. And Undertaker had finally revealed his true nature.

"Well, what do you know?" Lacey said.

"He masked his presence most skillfully," Sebastian said. "His 'eyes' have always been hidden as well, so it escaped even my notice." He spared a side glance at Lacey, the only other Reaper he knew of to have done this.

"Same here. He fooled me good," Grell said, wiping the blood from the cut above his eye. Ronald hopped down to join him.

"Mister Sutcliff, sir!" Ronald said. "Those eyes..."

"Yes," Grell said, standing up. "That chartreuse phosphorescence, without a doubt, can only belong to… a Grim Reaper!"

"Hee! Hee! How nostalgiiic!" Undertaker said. "It's been at least half a century since I was last called that."

"Undertaker… is a Grim Reaper—!?" Ciel said, still finding it hard to believe.

"Wow, his face really is just like my Undertaker's!" Lacey said.

"Is your Undertaker a Reaper as well?" Sebastian asked. Lacey smirked slyly.

"What do you think?" she said.

"Is he or isn't he!?" Ciel asked.

"I think I'll keep that a secret~!" Lacey said with a wink.

"Just forget it!" Ciel said, annoyed. What did it take to get a straight answer out of that woman?

"Explain yourself, Undertaker!!" Rian yelled, rushing past them on his way down the stairs. "You said you control those corpses with this device!"

"Did IIII now, truly?" Undertaker asked.

"!!" Rian gasped. "So you tricked me… Was it all a lie!? Even the part about sailing to America to popularize absolute salvation… everything!!?"

"Well, you seeee… I found it comical that you were earnestly attempting to resurrect the dead via medical science..." Undertaker said, shrugging. "You were just the man of talent for my purposes."

"And what of our singular desire to bring the whole world into health and wellbeing through medicine…!?" Rian asked.

"That was your desire, riiight?" Undertaker said. "Besides! You are not capable of bringing the dead back to life by the power of the medical knowledge in your grasp. And it all ceased to be medicine in the first place the moment you began to depend on my techniques. One who conducts procedures upon his patients that he himself does not understand can no longer call himself a physician." Rian was stunned. He fell to his knees.

"H-How could this be…?" he said shakily.

"You were a good lad, naively buying all I said without question," Undertaker said, patting him on the head.

"So you're saying that you masterminded the Aurora Society's experiments to resurrect the dead? Undertaker!" Ciel asked furrowing his brow.

"That's a secret. " Undertaker said, holding a finger to his lips. "—Is what I'd like to say, but you have paid for information innumerable times over that phoenix pose of yours, Earl. So tell you, I shall! Hee! Hee…" His quiet laughter was almost lost in the zombie moans. " 'Twas indeed I who produced these reanimated corpses."

"To what end!?" Ciel asked.

"Well, let's seeee," Undertaker said, tapping a sotoba against the floor. "… Simple curiosity toward humans."

"Curiosity killed the cat," Lacey said.

"But satisfaction brought it back," Undertaker said with a grin. "Why don't you explain how 'life' and 'death' work? You look like a clever girl."

"Humans possess 'bodies of flesh and souls'… If the two are present, humans, as living beings, exist in this world and continue to log their 'cinematic records', the memories of their lives," Lacey said, deciding she may as well help move things along. "And when the bodies of the flesh decay and Grim Reapers retrieve their souls, their cinematic records come to an end at that moment, and the living become the dead."

"Yes. Grim Reapers, going by their lists, extract souls from bodies and bring cinematic records to their ends," Undertaker said. "Day after day. Indifferently. Matter-of-factly. However, one day, after I'd spent a long time as a Grim Reaper doing just that, day in and day out, something occurred to me. What would happen if there was a sequel after those endings?"

"!?" Lacey, Grell, and Ronald gasped.

"What would happen to bodies of flesh that had lost their souls and whose memories had come to an end if I added a continuation to those very memories?" Undertaker continued. "Souls alone are all Grim Reapers hunt, after all. The 'bodies' and the 'memories' in their brains still remain in this world."

"Come on… You're telling me you edited their cinematic records?" Grell said.

"Hee! Hee! Well now! Why not use your powers and have a look-see at their records for yourself?" Undertaker asked, pointing at the zombies. Grell leaped towards two zombies and cut them with his scythe. Their cinematic records rolled forth, each showing a clear 'end'. But then they continued to roll and the Undertaker's face popped up, wearing a big grin, a toothbrush mustache, and a bowler hat. He was dancing around dressed like Charlie Chaplin.

"!? Hey what is this!?" Grell demanded.

"This is…!!" Sebastian said.

"Charlie Chaplin!?" Lacey said.

"!? What's going on!?" Ciel asked.

" 'The end' title of a cinematic record, which arrives arm in arm with death… never appears because I attached counterfeit memories to the records, like so," Undertaker explained. And to my surprise… the flesh, under the mistaken notion that 'my life continues on'… began moving again without its soul!"

"!" Sebastian said with a furrowed brow.

"All living beings instinctively attempt to make up for what they lack. If their bodies are wounded, they try to close their wounds. If their spirits feel isolated, they seek others to alleviate their loneliness. So they also instinctively desire what they lack..." Undertaker explained, making a heart with his hands.

"I see. And in seeking out their 'souls' they attempt to rip open the bodies of living humans," Lacey said.

"In order to even out the balance of their never-ending cinematic records, you see?" Undertaker finished.

"!" Ciel said. "So that's why they came after our souls when they couldn't see or hear us…!?"

"But it doesn't work that way, which is why they keep killing," Lacey said.

"Even though it's impossible to make another's soul one's own… I can tamper with cinematic records, but I cannot create souls," Undertaker said. "I experimented plenty, but most of them became no more than dolls of flesh without an ego. And so I call them thus—neither living… nor dead… they are 'bizarre dolls,' warped flesh puppets."

"Even bad taste has its limits," Ciel said, disgusted.

"Hee! Hee! If you cannot understand their beauty, you have quiiiite a ways to go, my lord!" Undertaker said, approaching one of his 'dolls'. He pulled her into a gentle embrace, holding her so one hand was holding one of hers, with his hand around her waist, so she couldn't turn and bite him. He rested his head on hers. "White waxen skin that has been sewn together prettily in semblance of their living selves. Mouths that no longer clamor loudly or spit out lies. Are they not more beautiful now than when they drew breath?"

"I'm going to be sick!" Ciel said, glaring at him.

"Oh, I can understand why they might appeal to some… But any man who thinks that's an ideal woman, because she can't think or speak for herself… is my enemy," Lacey said with a frown and furrowed brow. "No matter who they are."

"That may be how you feel, but… there are humans who desire these bizarre dolls, you know?" Undertaker said.

"!?" Ciel and Sebastian said.

"These children don't feel any pain or fear. They single-mindedly desire souls and devour the living," Undertaker said. He gave them a Cheshire cat grin. "What say you? Do they not make the best military animals?"

"Wha—!?" Ciel exclaimed, appalled.

"…!?" Ronald and Grell gasped, alarmed. Even Sebastian was disturbed. Only Lacey's expression remained unchanged.

"Let me guess… This ship is the testing ground?" Lacey said jadedly. Undertaker's grin widened.

"Those eccentric fellows said they wanted to see how useful these could be… so I decided to experiment by tossing the same number of 'bizarre dolls' as live humans into this luxury vessel," Undertaker said. "Who and how many will be left standing when the killing ends?"

"… You really have lost your mind," Sebastian said, the crease in his brow deepening a little.

"I've seen a lot of shit in my life, but this takes the cake!" Lacey agreed. She enjoyed a good zombie fight as much as the next girl, but really? Even she wouldn't throw living children into something like that.

"Hee! Hee! I never imagined we'd run into an iceberg, though," Undertaker said, dumping the doll and descending the steps to the landing again. "Having quit being a Grim Reaper, I don't have my list anymore and all… Well! I've been saved the trouble of making this ship sink, so it's a matter of killing two birds with one stone!"

"I see," Sebastian said. "So… this passenger liner was never meant to sail to America from the beginning."

"Because of you all, more humans survived than I'd expected," Undertaker said, tapping his lip with his long fingernail. "Will I get a scolding for that?"

"Did you know Chêne was a 'code 42'?" Lacey asked him sternly.

"Hee! Hee! No. But I always thought she possessed a unique quality..." Undertaker said with a glance at Sebastian.

"Your 'dolls' targeted her far more than anyone else I've seen on this ship. They went out of their way to get at her. You could've killed her," Lacey said, narrowing her eyes dangerously at him.

"I am sorry she got caught up in this," Undertaker said. "I've always like Missus Maid."

"Hmph. The more I hear, the more we can't overlook this," Grell said.

"No doubt. It'd be mind-blowing to allow a Grim Reaper to warp 'death'," Ronald agreed. "All the same, he ain't wearin' specs. Is he one of those 'deserters' we get once every blue moon?"

"I don't care what he is," Grell said. "Anyway, a Grim Reaper interfering with life and death in the human world is against the rules."

"To hear you of all people say that, sir..." Ronald said wryly.

"Tying him up and turning him over to the higher-ups would also seem to be the most efficient way to get him to reveal the workings of the moving corpses, hmm…?" Grell continued as if he hadn't spoken. "And… on top of your breach of conduct, I shan't forgive your sin of harming a girl's face!" he roared with multiple veins throbbing on his head. "I shan't forgive you, even if you are a total dish!!"

VREEEE!

Grell charged at Undertaker, but his death scythe was blocked again.

"Oopsie," Undertaker said. Ronald slid up to attack from behind.

"I got your ba—daah!" Ronald said, shocked when Sebastian kicked him away. While he was still in the air, Sebastian delivered another swift kick to the Undertaker, but he dodged. Ronald slid across the landing until he smacked into the stairs.

"Hey! Sebas-chan, what do you think you're doing!?" Grell demanded.

"We cannot allow you to haul him away," Sebastian replied coolly, adjusting his gloves.

"Hunh!?" Grell said.

"We ourselves are tasked with presenting the truth before Her Majesty the Queen," Ciel said. "We mustn't let him escape!"

"And so… we shall take him into our custody," Sebastian said.

"This is a Grim Reaper concern! Outsiders should stay out of it!" Grell said with his brow furrowed and eyes narrowed.

"This is my duty as a butler," Sebastian said coldly with slitted pupils, showing a little fang. "I humbly ask that outsiders refrain from interfering."

"Ha! Stoic as usual, Sebas-chan! You do know how to get my blood rushing! Fine, then!" Grell said. "If you're raring to go, we won't hold back either!"

"That the phrase 'hold back' even appears in your dictionary comes as the greatest of all the day's shocks," Sebastian stated.

"Then it's simple. The first one to get him wins," Ronald said, swaying a little as he stood up. He glared at Sebastian with multiple veins throbbing on his head. "And I don't have any intention of losing to an old man like you!!"

"Ooh, this is getting good now!" Lacey said. "Makes me wish I had some popcorn!"

"Aren't you going to join in!?" Grell asked a little incredulously. "You're a Reaper, aren't you!? You should be on our side!!"

"My official assignment is to protect Chêne. There was no mention made of 'dolls' or zombies or whether I should do anything to stop them. I'm only here to keep an eye on these two in Chêne's place," Lacey explained, gesturing to Sebastian and Ciel. "Part of protecting someone is making sure they're happy, and she won't be happy if anything happens to them. But I won't be joining Sebastian either, because it won't look good if I aid a demon in fighting my fellow Reapers. So I'm just gonna fight these zombies to make sure they don't get too close to Ciel." She revved up her death scythe and turned to face the zombies that had begun to creep a little too close for comfort.

"I'm obliged to you for looking after the Young Master," Sebastian said.

"Like I said, it's for Chêne," Lacey said, shrugging. Sebastian, Grell, and Ronald all turned their attention back to Undertaker.

"Hee! Hee! This is juuust like rabbit hunting," Undertaker said. "… Now, then." He smiled. "Who will be the hunted rabbit?" All three of his opponents charged at once.