Nobody bumped his head against the next car and let himself cry a bit about the flower situation, and than took a deep breath after and nodded his head. "Neato." He wiped away some tears and opened up the door to reveal a graveyard that ran for miles with a giant spooky mansion off in the distance. The sky was cloudy, though he could see the moon poking through every now and again.
He pouted as he looked inside and than back to the train cars outside. "I... this has to be a dream..." He walked forward and as soon as he did the door shut and he was hit with a torrential rain that drenched his clothes and washed away the blood and tears from the last car. "No." he turned back to try and open up the door, but after a brief futile struggle he kicked the door in frustration. "Fine! Onwards!" he crossed his arms and began his travel through the graveyard. "Maybe this is Hell..."
He looked up to the moon that somehow still shined down on him, illuminating the graveyard just enough so that he wouldn't bump into anything. He held out his left hand to see the green numbers, eclipsing the moon with it. It was still at -1298. Tilting his head, he traced his fingers around the number. "My mind is all over the place with this junk." He shut his eyes and remembered back to when the number went up. "They... were pressuring me to eat, but something felt wrong. I told them no though... and it went down?" he looked back to his number and glared at it. "What does that even mean?! What are you?!" he scoffed and put his hand down.
There was a jolt of lightning that lit up the graveyard and Nobody suddenly saw shadows just shuffling about amongst the old weathered tombstones. When it darkened again he couldn't see them anymore, but he had frozen and anxiously looked around. He than proceeded to quickly make his way through the graveyard, trying to notice if anything was moving in front of him.
When he made it to a metal gate at the end of the graveyard, he saw thorny hedges lining a gravel path that led up to the spooky mansion. He wrapped his hands around the gate and stared up at a light that suddenly illuminated the top of the mansion. While his attention focused on the top of the mansion, he leaned into the gate causing it to swing with a loud creak. Losing his balance slightly, Nobody held tightly to the gate as he was dragged across the gravel path.
Recovering, he looked back up to see the light had gone out which made him grimace. Shrugging he sighed and walked onward. There was no other direction to go but the mansion, the hedges blocking any other path. There was a giant ornate door with a lion shaped knocker, which Nobody promptly lifted up and let it drop, which strangely created a knock that reverberated throughout the whole area.
Nobody stepped back from the mansion door, his eyes shut tightly in anticipation. After a few moments, he slowly opened one eye to see nothing else happening to the door. He looked over his shoulder, which was followed by another lightning strike which let him see the shadow figures staring at him from behind the gates. It was a strangely morose image of them sadly looking at the mansion, which swiftly faded back to darkness.
He took a deep breath and turned back to the door,. His hand posed to knock again, but he paused noticing the knocker was now looking up at him with an incredulous glare. "Oh! I... you're alive..." he backed up a bit. "I didn't mean to-"
"The master of the house is not seeing visitors." the lion spoke in a dignified tone, he looked Nobody up and down and gave a disgusted wince. "You're so... unkempt..." Shaking his head he scoffed. "The master most definitely would not want such an unappealing guest in her home... I assume." he trailed off at the end, glancing towards the mansion behind him. "Honestly, she could stop by to chat a bit."
Nobody looked down at his ripped up clothes, and glared up at the lion knocker. "I was literally almost killed by a field of flowers!" the knocker looked away from Nobody with a crinkled nose like he had smelled something sour. Nobody grew softer and knelt before the lion knocker. "I'm sorry... Please, its raining so hard out here, and there are... things out here."
The lion looked down to Nobody and smirked. "Well... that is certainly a start. But truly, near death is no excuse to look so improper. Most dead people are rather well dressed. Why just the other night Marjorie had came through with a lovely ball gown she was buried with. Wasn't quite to our high standards, but it was far from ghastly like you."
Nobody felt his eye twitch to which the lion began to laugh. "I'm sorry but no. No. No. Now off with you, little commoner." he yawned and shut his eyes. "Its time for me to rest once more."
Nobody opened his mouth to speak again, but he stepped back and scoffed. "Fine." Walking back to the gate frustrated, his number began flashing again and Nobody glanced down to see it had gone to -1313. He groaned at that and kicked the gate. A lightning strike thunder through again, showing the shadows quickly moving away as the gate swayed towards them. Nobody's face softened as the light went down. "You guys... are you the dead people the lion was talking about?"
There was no response, just the rain continuing on with its downpour. Another lightning strike crackled through the sky and he saw them looking down to the ground mournfully wringing their hands.
A voice chimed in, "No dear." Nobody flinched and quickly looked around the graveyard. It wasn't till more lightning lit up the sky that he saw a stone angel looking at him from atop her gravestone. "They are our lingering regrets." Nobody stared curiously at the stone angel, crossing his arms instinctively as he approached her.
"Who are you?" Nobody looked down to the tombstone the angel was part of and read her epitaph. Matilda Marcus. 1830-1900. Loving Aunt and Seamstress.
"It's as the tombstone says..." The angel looked away from Nobody and stared listlessly forward. "This is quite a sad place ..."
"I can imagine..." Nobody looked back to the castle, another lightning strike, and he saw the light at the top of the mansion was once again illuminated. "Who... owns that mansion?"
"Hmm? I've never been in it since the incident. Couldn't really tell you." The angel smirked and motioned to her tombstone. "I don't move from here much since we got bound here. The mansion used to belong to Pierre Jumeau though... I saw him leave it after a wizard cast a curse on the place. I think he's down in section J down further that way."
Nobody followed the stone angel's finger and nodded. "If you think he can help..." Nobody smiled and held his hands to his chest. "Thank you."
"No problem. Say hello to Sally if you see her on your way." She gently rested her hand on her chest. "I'd help you but I'm still attached to me tomb. Someday I might be lucky enough it erodes enough I can get off." she laughed and shook her head. "I'm so glad I didn't have a drawing etched on my tombstone. Than it'd be so much harder to do anything."
Nobody gave her one last thanks, and continued on through. Going further, with his eyes growing more yessed to the dark, he began to notice the tombstones all mostly had little stone figures atop them. Some stuck like Matilda, and a few just casually talking to some of the etchings nearby, having fallen loose of their tombstones. Many missing feet, but still moving around freely.
On the ground there were letters after a certain amount of tombs, and once he got to the J's he could see some blue flames flickering to life as if to greet him. As Nobody passed through, the statues and etchings all silently stared at him as if they weren't as alive as the ones he had seen earlier. Once he got to a tombstone labeled Pierre Jumeau, he was met with another lightning strike which showed a shadow sitting on the stone staring off to the mansion. There was also a face etched into the stone that looked grumpily to the ground.
"Mr. Jumeau?" Nobody looked down at the etching which glanced up at him and smiled.
"Oh?" Jumeau quickly looked up and his demeanor completely changed to joy. "A visitor~ Hello young man. Come to mourn for the lord of this place." he smugly smiled and looked to the side where there was a statue of a woman adorned in a real dress who giggled at his gaze. "Good evening Marjorie~" he winked at her, which got another giggle from her and the other stone figures around her all suddenly became animated and chatted excitedly about the goings on this dark night.
" Didn't really notice you guys could move... or talk for a good while." Nobody rubbed the back of his head and weakly laughed. "But um... I was told you could help me get inside the mansion?"
"Inside? Why yes! Of course. Clive, my door man you see, is quite particular with who can come in." he laughed a bit before giving a groan as he looked around his tomb. "Yes... well... I... am sorry to say that I can't go over there to let you in. Kind of stuck... oh! But perhaps this will help!" Suddenly the earth began to shake and Nobody had to jump back a bit as a coffin came from the ground and swung open to reveal a desiccated corpse smiling ghoulishly at him.
"Ugh!" Nobody screamed as the wind caused the corpses arms to sway about a bit.
"Hey now! That's rude!" the coffin slammed shut and Jumeau sighed. "Its not that bad..." the dirt somehow flipped the coffin around and Jumeau gave his own startled cry before swerving the coffin back to Nobody. "Ok, so its been a few decades... the clothes are still in good condition though!"
Nobody stared at the body's clothes, and although they were beautifully crafted he gave a disgusted gag. "You want me to strip your body?"
"Well, I can't very well use them anymore. I don't have the body for it... but... before you do. Would you mind doing me a favor?" Nobody tilted his head and looked to Jumeau. The night sky was again illuminated with a thunderous rumble showing the shadow still sitting atop the tomb, staring at the mansion.
"That curse that was placed on my home... it also keeps us all buried here. stuck in material items, our regrets are the only ghostly form we are allowed and as you can see they don't do much." Jumeau glanced up as if he could still see his lingering regret. "Remove that curse... and we can be free to truly haunt this graveyard in peace." he shifted the coffin a bit so his corpse's hand dangled to Nobody. "Do we have a deal, young man?"
Nobody looked at the body with disgust but sheepishly shook its hands. "Sure."
Once dressed in the beautiful outfit, Nobody carried his original clothes under his arm and than made his way to the mansion. He glared down at the lion before he grabbed the knocker and let it echo once more. Clive snorted as he awoke and stared up at Nobody. "Wha- what's this?" he blinked away the blur in his sleepy eyes, and suddenly gasped as seeing the outfit. "Lord... Jumeau?"
"Huh?" before Nobody could continue the door swung open.
"Oh sir~! You have to come in! The new master of the house does not nearly have the taste to keep everything in proper order! Its a sty in here. I can't have strangers just roaming into here. It'd bring such shame to you. I've had to turn away even the best dressed!"
Nobody walked in and nodded his head to Clive and smiled. "I'll, get this all fixed Clive."
"Thank you sir. I love the new look. I was wondering what was taking you so long." Clive kept talking as the door shut and was now muffled. "Did lady Belton create that for you?"
Nobody rolled his eyes and glared forward to see a very dusty broken down hall, with a stairway next to it. He put his clothes on a dresser nearby that had a fallen painting on it. Now out of the rain he began to squeeze his new clothes out, leaving puddles as he walked towards the dark stairs. As he leaned against them, he saw an eerie glow coming from up at the top of the stairs. "Wer ist da?" came a firm voice. Nobody felt himself quiver a bit and step back.
"I-I uh... I'm sorry. I don't speak..." before he could finish there was a scoff.
"Ugh... another American. I presume..." The light came down further from the stairs and Nobody saw it was a porcelain doll, dressed in a fancy white dress with a large hat. Her hair was a light purple, and in one hand she held a little candle. She looked him up and down and gave a puzzled stare. "What... are you wearing? Were you larping before you came on this train, or do you just like 18th century fashion."
Nobody looked down to his clothes than back to the doll. "That's a little hypocritical, isn't it?"
She sighed and shrugged. "Fair enough... it is a wonderful style." She turned about and began to climb back up the stairs, which she had to scale like she was hopping a fence with each step. "Mph... come along. You want the car's door yes?"
Nobody quickly grabbed his original clothes and followed close behind her. Once they got to the next floor, Nobody cleared his throat. "I, um, promised Mr. Jumeau to remove the curse from this house... do you happen to know much about that curse?"
"Quite a bit, though if that is what you wish to work on we should get to know each other a bit first." she glance back at him and smirked. "What is your name imposter Jumeau?"
Nobody sighed and paused his walking. The doll looked back to him, waiting for his response. "Nobody... just call me Nobody."
She sighed and shrugged. "Very well. I suppose this is related to why you're on this train." she began to walk further down, than illuminated another set of stairs. "The guest rooms are up here. Choose which ever you want. Do not go into the west wing though."
"Why is that?" Nobody began to peek inside some of the bedrooms, only to find in one of them an eerie owl painting leering at him. He slowly shut the door and stared back at her. "Have something you want to hide?"
Her face pursed before she looked down with an embarrassed frown. "That's uh... under construction." The house shook, and the sound of breaking wood echoed down the hall as if in response. She shut her eyes tightly and cringed as the sound continued for a few more moments.
After it finished, Nobody looked down to the doll and smiled a bit. "Hard to maintain a mansion when your all by yourself?"
She sighed and averted her gaze from him. "Its is. Especially when by nature you make things worse..." she motioned towards the rooms. "Go on and choose."
Nobody nodded and opened the nearest door that showed a much nicer room than the flowers had given him, though it was still dusty and covered with cobwebs. There was canopy bed with rich red curtain around it, he pulled it back to reveal a soft looking bed with sheets and pillows. Suddenly a fire was lit in the fire place across from the bed, causing Nobody to quickly look around to see the doll was next to it, lighting it with her candle. After she was done she bowed her head to him. "You may call me Louise Beltane. Dry your clothes by the fire. If you wish to speak with me, I'll be three floor up in my library." She curtsied to Nobody and walked off leaving him alone for the moment.
Alone for the first time in days, Nobody sat in front of the fire watching as the wood crackled and burned away what looked like a broken chairs. He raised an eyebrow as he looked more into the fire and saw some torn garments and other wooden items. "So... I take it she's not good with fixing anything in this house... at least its not human bones." His eyes glanced up to the mantle above the fireplace and saw a painting hanging above it with a dusty hammer just resting on the mantle itself. The portrait was that of a horse who wore a mask and carried a bag of gold pouring out of it.
Nobody took off his damp clothes and placed them next to the fire. He than went to the bed where he pulled back the curtains and hid under the covers. His mind drifting off to before all strange train. His eyes shut tightly he began to quickly escape to sleep. He dreamt of himself at work at a grocery store. Nobody quickly walked about, helping customers at the self-service center, progressively looking more aggravated as customers kept coming in a torrent. Constant complaints of prices, not listening to what the self-service computers told them to do and just demanding he do the scanning for them. His superiors from the service center kept walking off talking with friends or finding some other thing to do leaving him to deal with angry customers. Over and over he had to explain to customers he didn't have the power to change prices without permission, and despite his attempts to get his superiors they kept refusing claiming what they were doing was more important. He groaned as it finally began to slow down to a trickle and his superiors returned back to the service center. Than the phone rang.
The ringing echoed through his mind, everything blacked out as his dream became more distorted as he reach towards the phone. It seemed the phone kept getting farther away, and its ringing continued to echo in his mind even when he woke up and popped out from under the covers. "I don't want to remember..." he said with a shaky voice. His eyes began to fill with tears as he got out of the bed and began to pace the room. "Calm down... calm down..."
After a little whiles more of trying to keep from ruminating on the dream, he checked his clothes and found they had dried. With his own clothes back on he noticed that he didn't actually have shoes. Wiggling his toes, he looked over to Mr. Jumeau's fancy shoes and sock and shrugged as he put them on. Now fully clothed from feet to shoulder, he turned his attention to the window of his room. Peering outside, he saw the rain was still pouring heavily and as lightning flashed he could see the regrets that wandered the cemetery. It was a bit more difficult to see the souls that possessed the stone tombstones, though right as the light faded he saw something moving about.
Leaving his room he began to wander the mansion, though much of it was far too ruined for him to safely trek through. He came near the west wing where he saw the hall had given way leaving a gigantic hole with sharp wood jutting out. Grimacing he chose to go up some stairs that were nearby and followed the none ruined path to the library.
Once in the library he found Lady Beltane was hidden behind a book which she was intently reading by her candle light. "So... Ms Beltane?" Nobody waved down at the porcelain doll. "About that curse I mentioned... are you involved with that wizard that placed it or did you just happen to take over after everyone was kicked out."
"I am involved." She shut her book with enough force it echoed through the library and caused the candle to flicker.
Nobody looked down to his hands which tightly hugged each other, and took a deep breath. "Are you the wizard?"
"No. I'm the curse." she curtsied once more but gave a tired expression. "I've lived here a long time as no passenger has been willing to help me yet. I would love to go, but I can't just up and leave." She looked at her porcelain hands and sighed.
"What do you need help with? I can't make any promises, but I hopefully can help you out." Nobody smiled at her, but slowly frowned anxiously as she glared at him.
"Unless you can commit, I don't want your help." she said curtly, turning her back on him. "You might as well just leave like the rest."
Nobody now was glaring at Beltane. "I'm not making a promise for something I don't know! Its ridiculous for people to expect a definitive answer when there isn't enough information." his attention shifted to his hand which was flashing and he saw it went up to -1080."
Beltane looked back at him as he stared at his hand. "What did it do?"
"It went up..." he tilted his head flipped his hand to her.
She didn't look at it right away and scoffed. "Up? Than I guess this is a bad move on your part." she grew silent when she saw his number. "Is that negative?"
"Yes, and I'd kindly ask you to not be so rude to me. I know this may be some hellish dream purgatory or whatever..." he sighed and shook his head. "I'm sorry. You're probably frustrated too. I just want to know what you need help with."
Her face softened and looked away from him, rubbing her chin. "I suppose it won't do any harm... come with me if you would." She grabbed her candle and led Nobody to a room filled wall to wall with other porcelain dolls but none of them moving like her. Turning to Nobody she saw him staring in aw at the dolls. "I... I was created to destroy this house and cast everyone out permanently. The wizard snuck me in as a present for Mr. Jumeau. A vase if I recall..." she shut her eyes and crossed her arms, the candle wax dripping to the floor. "When one Jumeau's guest got overly rambunctious and knocked into my vessel it broke open and I began to wreak havoc on the mansion."
She opened her eyes and gently stroked the face of one of the dolls that were on her level. "I was just wildly tearing everything apart, and than I found this room."
Nobody glanced near the entrance where he saw some smashed dolls, but after the first few broken ones they were all pristine. "You liked this room I take it?"
She grinned and proudly pointed to herself. "Its obvious perhaps... these vessels are so lovely... I wanted to look like them so much. " she did a twirl in her gown and smirked up at Nobody. "I chose the name Louise Beltane, I think she was the one who made these dolls." she looked sad now and became more reclusive, going further to the back of the room. "They are porcelain though. Easily destroyed if not properly taken care of. If my body were to break I'd have to posses some other object if I want to keep from destroying anything."
"So... you can actually leave whenever you want, you just don't want to leave without backup bodies?" Nobody picked up a blonde doll, gesturing towards it.
"Precisely, also I don't want to just randomly destroy everything. I'm too small in this body to carry even one of these. Passengers never take me up on my offer... not really. Some pretend to help and than throw my dolls back in here. Leaving me alone yet again." her eyes began to glow more intensely than her candle as she stared, with an eerie blue glow. "Tell me, Mr. Nobody. Do you intend to do the same to me? If you betray me like the others, I will tear your body and soul apart." a shadow aura began to form around her, wildly moving about like a flame.
As the room creaked, and Nobody heard something else collapse somewhere in the house, he stepped away from Beltane. He stopped himself and clenched his hands. "I promise you Beltane. I will help you carry your dolls out of here and help you leave the train car." he than glanced around at the over seventy dolls that stood in the room. "We... aren't taking them all are we?"
"Oh no... I need to keep spares here in case they all break for some reason." Lady Beltane returned to her normal visage walked into the back where she dragged out a duffle bag. "I already have a select few I'd like to bring."
Once Lady Beltane was happy with the dolls that were chosen, Nobody grunted as he picked up the duffle bag and the two made their way to the very top of the mansion. There was a portrait of the original Louise Beltane, though her last name was actually Belton. Beltane wistfully stared at the portrait as Nobody raised an eyebrow at the name plate. "Ok... so her name is Belton. I didn't want to completely copy her." she gently pushed the portrait aside and revealed the car door.
Nobody stepped forward and opened the door to reveal the desolate world outside of the train cars. He smiled down at Lady Beltane and motioned for her to go first. She smirked and took a confident stride out of the car. Once the two were out, the mansion suddenly lit up and all the dust and broken rubble began to fix itself. The car door shut before the could see much more, leaving the two quietly standing around. Lady Beltane just stood their, staring thoughtfully at the outside world.
"I..." she held her hands to her chest as she walked over the bridge that led to the next car. "I can finally walk free... without having to worry about breaking myself." she shut her eyes, crying painted tears which curled down her chin and disappeared. "Well than." she smirked and looked up to Nobody who was holding tightly to the duffle bag. "Shall we begin our adventures, Mr. Nobody?"
Nobody smiled down at her and readjusted the duffle bag. "Sure. I'll try to do my best."
Back on the flower field car, the entrance to it opened to reveal an eight foot tall werewolf. His fiery red eyes surveyed the car and sniffed the air. Crouching into the tall grass, he disappeared. Only the movement of the grass showed where he was. Once he got to the cottage he began to sniff around the area more intensely. He stopped around the back where he sniffed particularly long, and than he bounded off into the tall grass once more, stopped in the areas where dried up blood now covered the area, with young flowers chattering amongst themselves.
"Oh, hello Mr. Dog~" a tiny daisy sweetly said. "Looking for something?"
He gawked at them at first but quickly went back to what he was doing. He eventually came upon of the cut, now normal, flowers that covered the area. The tall grass already beginning to envelope the key symbol again. "He's been through here..." he said in a deep baritone. He moved to the exit but found he couldn't open the door. "Oh for the love of..." he took out a tablet and began to type on it, but he began to notice laughter.
"Silly doggy, you have to solve the puzzle first." The flowers all began to laugh at him as he continued typing. "Stupid doggy, the passenger that came through is probably long gone now. Too bad the others didn't keep him here... there'd be so many more of us~" they all cheered as they began tossing the cut flowers around. "Solve the puzzle stupid doggy~!" the cheered.
The werewolf glared at the flowers, who paid no mind to his growls. After one more 'Stupid Doggy' he spewed out a massive wave of flames from his mouth that set fire to the fields.
"No! Its going to take forever to fix this! You cheater!" the flowers yelled before they and the grass all turned to ash revealing the key in the ground once more.
The door opened up, and the werewolf let out one last snarl at the car before heading on to the next car. "I'm not stupid..." he grumbled as he entered into the next car and his tablet got covered in rain. His eye twitched and quickly shoved it into his pockets. "Damn it..."