Alfur was at his main job at the somewhat wretched files of the constabulary. Even though he's a redcoat, he loved working on the files, even if it didn't pay him well. He just found it so satisfactory messing with the paperwork and its inner workings.
As he was digging through the files out of curiosity, he came across a weird, old file… it was stated under "CLASSIFIED", with a large stamp on it saying "VACANT"... which wouldn't usually call attention to him… except that they don't have any vacant cabinets around, they are either just left unlabeled or locked until needed.
He tried to open the file but as he attempted to pull open the paperback folder of it, it almost ripped under his control and he concluded that the thing is glued...for some reason.
He decided for a different approach. He went over to the constabulary desk to fetch a pair of scissors before walking back to the file and then proceeded to insert one of the blades inside of the file and lift it up to the glued top and began to cut the dried glue away.
Then after doing so, he then unfolded the folder to see an interesting file case with a surname he has never heard of around the city.
Foulkstone.
As he took a peek in, he rapidly got consumed by it and its case. Between the birth certificates, last wills and words, the burials and all the marriages, it felt like he was reading a crime novel.. a novel that ended with Hilda. As he read further, he noticed that she didn't have any registered property, she had sold her last one a few years ago before ending up missing.
Not only that but she had no recent registrations either… she was reported to have gone away, ran away, missing but she's also seen on train stations? Her whole file is confusing, almost cryptic, but although she wasn't confirmed dead or missing, she surely wasn't gone from the city either.
The paintings of her plastered into the files were also odd… it says that she gained a scar somewhere between 7-12 years old at the same date an investigation started around the arson attack on the local church, and later around multiple properties of another family just a few blocks next to the church.
This seems all confusing and as he continued reading further down the line, just more stuff kept propping up. Until something awful called him…. Erik.
He was no exception to the new management he had established and as he would soon learn… stuff had gotten dark really fast.
An anonymous person dumped a body near the station. He wasn't identified but the body was… it was the girl who had been reported missing a few weeks ago.
As one of the constables wandered around the 1 PM afternoon with a cigar in their mouths, they only heard the subtle 'thud' of the body hitting the ground.
The constable looked back to see what fell. Knowing what things fall with a thud, he left his post to investigate the matter. As he passes through the narrow alleyways, he encountered the stables and as the horses neighed at his presence, he looks over to their dens.
He checked the dens first to see if one of the horses had somehow escaped but thankfully all of them are inside and none of them are missing. Having assumed in his head that it must be horse shit, he then walked right back where he came from and back to his post in a minute's notice. All the while missing a few steps forward to see a hand sticking out at the other side of the den.
Until he eventually found the dumped body, mushy and wasted from the decomposition. He wasn't sure if it was left behind or giver but regardless, he took it in, and then after he complained to Erik about how the stables smelled horribly than horse shit, now Erik is examining it.
After finding the body through a thorough investigation of uim alone, he started disposing of the clothes she was killed on, leaving the body with just the undies as the chest needed to be examined, even though this act was shameful in the eyes of gentlemen worldwide.
He then called on Gerda whilst pulling out his own tools that he had in his pocket. Then he shamelessly incising the scalpel right through her chest, going right in between her breasts, and then carefully opening it for all to see.
As everyone gathered up on the spot, everyone quickly concluded that the aforementioned killer and the dead man from earlier had a very close relation either to the killer, or to each other. Both were killed with a gaping wound in their chest, and both were taken down with what looks like wounds that came from a shovel.
Gerda snapped her fingers, "We have a pattern already and this is not going good."
"We'll send over requests to the funerary homes for an autopsy quickly!" Said one of the constables.
"No…" Erik said, turning his head towards the constables with a serious face.
Gerda rolled her eyes. "What?" She asked, crossing her arms out of doubt.
"It will only alert the killer. I have seen them before, they act like animals… try and catch one on sight and you will only scare them off. Remember, this man still has the benefit of being anonymous, which means he can disappear before we get to him, and since we are using hunting metaphors, you don't wanna find yourself trying to outrun a deer."
Seeing as Erik go off into his long and meaningless speeches, Gerda can't do anything but turn around and cover her ears in frustration that he, is a dumbass.
"Oh, that makes so much sense, general," the constables cheered, to the detriment of Gerda and her patience. "So what now? Are we gonna use people as bait!?"
"It seems to be all that attracts him."
"Oh just BRILLIANT! Just brilliant, sir." One applauded.
"Quit the sarcasm and man up." Gerda yelled, slamming her hand at the den's wooden pillars.
She then just left the area just to save her patience from arguing with Erik in order to stay above the usual and keep her job.
In the cemetery, Hilda was looking at the hole… right where she had hidden that last body. And even if it was the ultimate nightmare… She seemed calm, like she's going to win.
But she was smiling also because she now knew who dug it up… thet being whoever those followers were a few hours ago.
Some constables were at the place, asking her for a witness testimony but all she said was that she heard someone break in and then they would continue on to the next witness, but by the time the place was open, they were gone.
Their employer knew this wasn't true; she always had the keys to the plot but if he said so, the whole place might get shut down for investigations.
So with the constables gone, Hilda went back home with little to show for. As she entered the house, she glanced over at the decently metal roof, the still smooth, Hindu-themed Indian carpet on the plywood cracked floor. She sat down on the couch feeling tired from being interviewed all the time.
Dagger happily appeared from under and greeted her at the couch and after he jumped up, they both snuggled under a blanket through the afternoon.
Stephen meanwhile was again at his workshop, this time with some fellow employees who were helping him open his machinery up. 'Course kaisa was still trying to force him to declare the marriage decision null and void, following him in order to get him to declare it himself.
However the bigger concerns were on Frida's back. It wasn't long till someone overheard what was inside the outpost, and so the news of another murderer with a shovel to the chest were already around. She's too busy taking care of the house and of her parent's shed to have heard of any of this until now.
Henrie dropped in a newspaper on the desk with the headline out. "It's amazing how fast they can print the bad news" He commented as the newspaper still had the smell of fresh ink from the colporteur.
As the others in the shed looked at the headline, they were surprised at what is happening on the outside as they never really mind the outside. Looking at the newspaper, she borrowed it from her mother's hands and then rushed to her room to begin cutting snippets of the newspaper.
As each sentence and image of the newspaper filled up her already messy wall full of snippets, she took a breath and looked back at the entire wall and realized how far she had gone into Hilda.
Sleeping wasn't helping… her mind had plagued her with nightmares of the most grusome murders she can think of, dreaming of how that poor women would've almost had her chest impaled by the spade of a shovel.
As she tried to sleep it off, there now exists a voice that rung like a bell a ross her dreams as she huddled her blankets closer and closer.
"Helltaker…...Helltaker…..Helltaker….."
As this voice grew ever more louder and ethereal, she had to force herself awake in order to get rid of it. As she tossed the sheets over at the side, she then looked at the pinned wall with the voice quietly repeating in her mind.
"The Helltaker". That's what each of the newspaper say about the killer.
As she sat back down to her bed with an eyebag, she kept her eyes focused to the wall. "That's their way of scaring them off, I see."
Meanwhile, Gerda was back at the cemetery. The place was closed off for investigations amidst a request from an anonymous source, and since it was midday, only her and Erik were crazy enough to go out from their mid-lunch break which left them both alone.
As they strolled around the cemetery looking for a spot to eat. While Gerda was careful of her steps and avoided the gravestones, Erik is plainly reckless in his path, not minding scraping off a few pieces of dirt from a grave or kicking down a gravestone instead of going around it.
He then took a look at the big patch of used and unmarked spot in the cemetery near the fence and decided to sit on it and prepare his lunch. As Gerda took a good look at the dirt, she noticed that the soil was younger than the surrounding earth which assumes that it was dug up.
She sat herself down on the grass, resting her back. "Erik, I believe that you may not have the capacity to solve this one."
Erik giggled. "Oh please, woman, I have the skills."
"No i'm serious, you are a fucking jackass. You think you are so smart but in general, I'd say you're a moron!."
"I am smart, maybe smarter than your idiocy at Tyne not far from here! And if you think you're any better, shut your lips."
She gripped her teeth at her sandwich, feeling fury from that extremely striking statement and boiling anger at his attitude these days. She bit off a piece and then immediately unsheathes a knife and pulls it up to Erik's chin.
The sudden unsheathing of her knife and her quick moves surprised Erik and as the tip now made contact with the edge of his jaw, he trembled in fear of getting slit.
"Any further statements?" She asked, turning the knife 90 degrees to the left.
He nodded with desperation in his eyes, fearing what she might do to him with the shank. At last, she sheathed it back into her sheath and resumed eating her lunch and Erik followed suit minutes later.
But that didn't mean he would accept defeat, and so once they were done, they both went to the morgue, looking for any other co-relations, which was hard to do since. The victims inside were drastically different in their ages, and appearances.
Although they expected something with the weird local cult around the city, surprisingly no organs were taken out, which was expected given the reputation their cult had outside of their walls.
There were no witchcraft engravings and most importantly, nothing was taken out or stolen in each and every one of them.
She rubs her chin with her hand. "I feel like we can presume anyone else that the killing is gonna have something to do with shoveling, given the wounds of the earlier victim," Correlating the bodies in the morgue against the body at the house concludes for Gerda that the killer uses a different weapon.
Agreeing with the conclusion, Erik made a decision. "Well then, if this involves a shovel, better start 'digging into' this case!" He jokes, making a pun out of the conclusion. That didn't really help ease the mood.
It was clear to the rest of the constables that no one but Erik and her had dealt with how gruesome some killers can be, so as she wandered the station, she easily noticed how distressed some of the officers looked, but were too afraid to ask for permission to leave or change stations.
Some were stuttering or stammering their words out when they requested suggestions among them, some refused to take a look at any of the cases both were showing to show an example for them, with some of them deeming the crimes "a work of a devil than a man". Some even tried to look productive by cleaning the entire station and even tending to the stables, good work by Erik's standards but Gerda can sense their distress.
Gerda took a breath only to cough out the putrid smell of rotting carcasses that can be found amongst the morgue.
However, as she left the place to get fresh air, she saw something on the corner of her eye at the far end of the cemetery.
A group of what seems to be men in extravagant coats, all of them with matching hats and shoes… feminine shoes. Not only that, but they all seemed to look at another man, with a matching hat, only missing the color.
The man however was different from their flock, his coat was thicker and he was surprisingly taller than the others, and the fact that he was walking his dog under an umbrella, stopping here and there at the markets to buy stuff.
Seeing how a group is looking at this peculiar man, it intrigued Gerda to stay outside, pretending to be patrolling, but she always keeps a watch from the corner of her eye just in case something happens.
As she observes, it was all well until finally, the man and his dog started to run, both of them leaping over a small fence, which prompts the followers to dissipate immediately. All but one, who leapt over the fence too to chase this man down..
Although she knew that she might not catch that killer, she knew that something fishy was going on with this person, and that man and his dog were the biggest abnormality she saw in the city… aside from the killings, of course.
As she observed back to the quiet cemetery, she begins to think about what could this person be? A local conspirator? A foreign spy? A French infiltration? Jesus, so many things that I don't know.
Unfortunately, the man disappeared from sight as she glanced back at the street.
Meanwhile, the marra was following faster, by a lot. Even with her training, she could barely keep up the distance, while the guy seemed to be unfazed.
Eventually he made a turn, way too sharp to follow for a normal man, but at least for now, she was much more satisfied.
She had a brand new case, and this time… she knew where she went.…
Hilda, meanwhile, was just starting her hunt. These people were greatly delaying her, and it was about time she sent a message out… she's not the victim here.
As she waited in an alleyway, she finally caught a glimpse of one of them, via the matching hats. Seeing her chance, she got out of her hiding spot and then followed one of them into an alley where she held her, both hands above her head, back against a wall.
However the victim wouldn't stop squirming, she kept trying to escape and scream, even kicking her in the legs and even her groin, thinking that she's a man.
She pushed her back forward at her to get out, to no avail. "The fuck do you want with me, pervert!?"
This doesn't faze Hilda, instead she simply pulled her old feminine voice she reserved. "Mind your language, madam."
The voice shocked the marra but this doesn't stop her squirming. As her screams continued and her cries of murder gotten out, a garden shovel from Hilda's coat appeared from her hand and at that time, the marra knew it wasn't the time to play the heroine act.
As the shadow of the shovel grew narrower, her entire body shook, her arms trembling in desperation and her legs stuck to the wall, she could only watch as her last moments were being documented.
The shovel struck her back like a knife cutting through steak. In such a strong stab, her body, which was squirming in all directions, finally froze in position as the brain couldn't reach its desperate calls to the rest of the body and soon the marra rested itself against the wall.
Kaisa was meanwhile, trying to confront Stephen about the blasphemous declaration.
"You have to void the declaration now! I'm not marrying David, he's still not a legal adult yet."
Stephen, busy overlooking his workers on his balcony, turned to his head. "Why not?"
Kaisa scoffed at the question. "Because I'm much older than him? I came here when he was 16 or so, and that doesn't mean you have the right!"
Stephen snapped his fingers twice before releasing his breath. "God, Kaisa, you act like it's a big deal. It's just a little wedding, what's the problem?"
"Well… IT IS A BIG DEAL! I HAVE THE AGE TO BE HIS PARENT AT THIS POINT!"
Stephen nearly broke out of laughter. "Really? you don't look that old to me." He dismisses, even though Kaisa clearly looks young.
"If you forgot to read my application for hiring, you would KNOW that I was 28 by the time of hiring! But I'd say you forgot all of it in your drunken brainstorming!"
He ignored her rant and went back to overlooking his workers, counting his fingers while mumbling about when Kaisa joined the party.
"I mean how old is he, 21? 22? So when he was 16, you were 42?..." His mumbling thoughts dissolved into incoherent rambles as he tried to explain the age gap.
He turns around to Kaisa once again, this time with his back against the edge. "I mean, you look a lot younger and no one will notice. Look at you, you still have that fine skin, I'm sure David won't even notice."
Kaisa was actually stunned, his mumblings were noticeably loud for her to hear and not only did he care so little for HER age, he barely remembered it, but also by the fact he couldn't grasp his son's age.
In a fit of anger, she stomped off to her room, slamming the balcony doors on the way, and after nearly knocking down 4 vases in the hallway, she jumped onto her bed and pulling the covers over her head as she let out her rant, then as she was about to lose her voice, she heard a knock on the door.
"Are you okay Kaisa? You seem mad."
That was David, he overheard her rampaging feet upstairs. He felt concerned of what is going on and went up.
"y-yeah yeah, i'm fine. it's all good, it's not like, y'know, we are years apart and your dad wants to marry us- OH WAIT! NO IT'S NOT FINE!" Suddenly, her tone changed.
David carefully opened the door, finding Kaisa under a lot of blankets whilst coughing lightly from screaming underneath it.
David pulled out one of them out of the way. "...are you okay?" He pulled his hand back, letting her pull the rest of it out by herself.
As the sheets moved towards the ends of the bed, Kaisa moved aside her hair and held back a cough from a sore voice.
"I'm fine, I just need a glass."
Then suddenly, David hugged her in consolation instead of fetching her a glass. "Hey hey, don't you worry, I'm sure whatever you're going through will dis-" As he was about to finish his consolation, the bells rung for the first time since the fire, surprising them both.
"Wait, they got it fixed?" Both of them jinxed right before they immediately went downstairs and outside to see the church.
As they were rushing downstairs, they saw Frida coming in from the hallway next to it in a rush and when they got down, she's already outside screaming.
"Those fucking bells!"
David went outside first while Kaisa and then Stephen stayed inside as he approached Frida.
"Uhh, frida?" asked David reluctantly, "Why are you screaming?"
Frida turned around, her eyes were sunken deep and her pupils seemed to dilate and contract rapidly, trying to adjust to the light. "Your head-fucked dad asked me to play the organ and host the church….for you marrige…. I would like to express how pissed I am to you, but I have been without a bathroom break so long I might be pissed if I stand up to quickly."
David felt shocked. "Jesus Christ, you need a break from all the investigations… a-and maybe a new set of clothes too, that rag doesn't look good on you."
While David rushed back to the house, Kaisa meanwhile took notice of the stank from sweat and condiments on Frida's clothes as she stared at them with slowly blinking eyes.
Frida's reaction time was extremely slow, her eyes blinked slowly as she barely moved, tired from the fact that the church got rebuilt and it'll be hosted there.
Kaisa and David both took frida upstairs, they were met with no resistance from Stephen who was just watching this from the gallows even if they had stumbled her shoulders on the walls multiple times.
Then as they were at the hallway towards the bathroom, David asked her about what she said outside. "Frida...what do you mean by "host the church?"
She panted. "Your dad planned to host it here but then he got news that the church got rebuilt." Then they were right at the bathroom door. "God the organ practice sucks."
Having heard of updates on the wedding situation, David felt too mad to continue it towards the bathroom so he stayed outside while Kaisa took her in, as a gesture of chivalry and out of respect.
Now inside, Kaisa first forced Frida to take a bath and a bathroom break, as the stench was simply unbearable for anyone, even the dirt poor workers handling coal.
As Frida wore the bathroom robe on her own, she then let out a faucet of hot water coming in from the springs before closing it to let her bathe in it. As she dips her toes and eventually her legs inside, Frida then began to sink herself a little bit deeper to the water for its heat and comfort.
As the smell of sweat began to dissipate from her, Kaisa begins asking questions. "Why were you practicing an organ for a wedding?"
Broken from her comfort with a question, Frida took a breath and sighed. "Look, he made me do it because he thinks that an organ would play well with a wedding." Then she sinks herself back into the water.
This almost made Kaisa laugh, though she tried to prevent it, she snickered at the thought of an organ being played at a wedding.
Then after she's done, Kaisa then accompanied her to her room and helped her put on her sleeping attire and finally, she then put her to bed. As she stayed for a few minutes, Kaisa noticed something from her, she wouldn't sleep.
As sunken as her eyes were and as tired as she was, both of her eyelids remained open, giving her almost a sort of corpse aesthetic even as she tries to fall asleep.
Then a knock was heard at her door. David walked in after the knock and went over to Frida to see if she's okay.
He walked over to the other side of the bed. "Frida, how are you doing so far?"
Frida opened her eyes. "David, I'm fine." Then she held a cough which both noticed. "Yeah, I'm fine."
"Frida, you're not fine. What is happening with you?" He then caressed his hand on her cheeks to see if she had a fever.
After he pulls it out, being sure that she's fine, he then lets her speak for herself.
Frida looked at him. "David...to be honest I'm not feeling okay. That damn organ practice made me tired….." She said in a hoarse voice due to all that screaming. "Also David, may I whisper something to you?"
He agreed, going close to Frida where she can get up to her body's allowance and request something in his ear.
She whispered softly. "Bring Kaisa to my room at the shed, I've been thinking about Hilda for too long."
He doesn't like that, he knows about her overthinking of Hilda the previous days but he didn't know it would result in this. He nodded at her request and then moved back to the edge.
Kaisa turned to David. "What did she say?" She asked with her hand at the bedframe, looking at him with a curious face.
David looked at her with a worried face. "She said that she's been thinking of Hilda too much."
She felt bewildered, it's been years since they've heard of her again and yet here she is, getting herself tired off of a memory.
Eventually she understood what she meant.
Then as Kaisa and David arrived at the shed with their permission and entered her room, they couldn't help but start to look at her data that she had amassed over this week.
As creeped out as they were of this conspiratorial-like plotting of snippets, David and Kaisa had to recognize the effort Frida had taken into it, unfortunately, that effort was tiring her.
"Jesus, it almost reached the ceiling."
As the day went by, to the point even the long-lasting rain that began to fall started to calm her down and the sun then began to set. But she still wouldn't shut her eyes, not even when she's blind-folded, given calming tea, having both nostrils filled up with grinded calm herbes, she would barely relax her eyes.
As she laid there in her bed, she felt liquid about to pop into her. "Oh lord, I need to use the bathroom." Frida said in a low tone.
Then as Kaisa returned to the room alone, she heard her plea for a bathroom break.
"Well at least now you acknowledge it." Then she helped her get up from the bed.
"Well thanks but I can do it myself, you know."
Then as she walked towards the hallway to the bathroom, she then suddenly contemplated joining her as she felt her cape stick to her back.
She took the cape off. "Maybe i should take a shower myself." Kaisa commented as the outfit she was in was starting to adhere to the stank in her sweat from the heat.
David nodded and they both went back to her business.
Stephen meanwhile was putting in his max effort today. The contraptions were starting to mount onto the gears so he had to take the locomotive outside into the yard to finish the job. As the train was being built, David looked out from his bedroom window to see his dad taking out the screws on the engine amongst his workers.
As much of a knucklehead Stephen could be, there was something frightening about him. He couldn't quite pin it down, but this blindly focused attitude wasn't recent. According to his family, the richer families in the city came from a single house, which were originally named the Pearson House. They were once a united family with a single surname and they served as one of the first settlers of the city.
The house itself later broke apart into the main lineages and went on in life with their new surnames from their middle names or their second names to male them distinct families.
Part of these include, but not limited to, the Foulkestone's, the Haustad's and the Fergusons, and a couple others that fell out of status overtime.
The legend goes onward to say the the man of said house had his last documented words be :
"This city had grown away from the values and laws of its founders, the bums have arrived from both the sea and on land and they had degraded our great city. Once we got our funds, we will flee from this godless city and make our own."
Mind you that he wrote this to his aunt, who had reportedly beaten over his pet deerfox with a chair.
The man did go on to live his promise, leaving Trolberg and founding Tøfoten up river to the west and having his death be an accident on the construction of the town hall.
Even though he created his independent city, Tøfoten is still dependent on Trolberg for its growth and sustainability as most of the resources came through there first.
He wasn't fond of this but he died before he could find a way to fix it. He had in his will that his body molded into a bronze statue and had its engraving go as: "May them bums from the sea and the island die from the illnesses they brought over, and I hope they must rot."
The king noticed the engraving after the governor complained, he then had the next mayor change the engraving to a more positive one.
The Pearson family had a lot of fights with the royal family before their eventual breakup, starting with a scandal going down hundreds of years ago after one of the kings had a second wife. Even if he was dishonored, the other family still receives the royalties as the brother was kind enough to provide for them.
After many interventions by subsequent kings and governors, the power of the Pearsons weakened and the city fell back to a normal city on the outskirts of the north.
Of course, Trolberg took the toll as the train and its accompanying railroad would be built for the sole purpose of being as far away from London as the terrain would allow.
David's current house was the closest descendant from the original, and Stephen took the saying very literally, not giving up on his goals, even when they utterly result in loss. Sometimes his perseverance ended up with losses but it did bring success.
He went as far as to attempt to buy the original engraving for the statue, and have it framed in his office. He never got the chance now that Tøfoten grew further away from its sister city.
Still, he thought having it in his office was hilarious.
Trolberg as a whole was somewhat misshapen in its history and its name, and there were multiple origin stories for its name.
The most reliable one was that the same guy who had died, named the city after getting his last drink and while intoxicated, talked about how he saw trolls in his visions before dying from liver failure, naming the city the day after.
The walls were only finished by the time the Jacobites and Scots attacked, however in the older parts around the west, it then shows another plate entailed on the stones, which reads:
"To my dear aunt, Astrid, may her soul be trapped on this ground so she may never rest in peace."
Probably the most crazy story found was that the sole reason Trolberg had the Hulder River going through it was that, in the founder's quotes "This river tastes like troll spit." It was then believed that after he tasted the river, he found that its aftertaste tastes better than what it seems.
Then a few hundred years later during the hectic English occupation of the north, the Trolberg Siege was an event armed by the Foulkstones side of the family, after they all got drunk and brought multiple men and children on the streets around the walls, sieging the city for 2 months using a baby as a human shield and a pet crocodile as an offensive weapon.
The siege didn't last and the Foulkestones were seen as fools by its besieged, and after a little scuffle amongst the family, they broke apart.
The other stayed inside the city while the other went to Cornwall, sailed to Spain, defected and moved to what you would call Florida today, shortly after.
Then a few hours has passed and David later woke up in the middle of the night, surprised to see that it was still raining. He also heard the sound of clinking bottles from the living room, and suspecting that his father invited some investors, went down to see who he might be dealing with.
As he walked down, he then found both his mother and Kaisa aside with a tired frida, all around a table with a lot of red and white wine. They all seemed pretty intoxicated, with Frida being clearly about to puke as her hands kept holding her lower torso.
As he arrived downstairs, he noticed that they were all laughing from a joke that David couldn't hear, but the laughter eventually led to Frida suddenly falling off her chair and vomiting what she drank, which prompted everyone, including frida herself, to laugh harder.
He was somewhat shocked to see that Kaisa seemed to be perfectly fine, at least outside, despite the seriously concerning scene but then again she always listed drinking as her strong point since she has told him before of that time with Jared.
Mary noticed him from the dark. "Oh, sweetheart, I'm sorry for the occasion…" She kept a drunken blush and smile while trying to looking sober in front of her son.
"I'm not!" exclaimed kaisa while standing on the table, making a couple empty bottles fall to the carpet as she drunk up a liter of wine without reflex.
David was somewhat horrified by the sight, especially with Frida, who was still laughing from whatever happened in sight, twitching on the ground as she was too tired to get up or puke it out.
Before David tried to get a lantern and go to his father's workshop, Kaisa then walked all the way to the end of the table, rushing to the end and surprising him a hug, which he had no option but to retribute, despite how sickend he was by the smell of alcohol is in her face and breath.
He tried to push her away but instead it pushed them both to the floor, tightening her hug and finally letting go while smashing the bottle on the floor.
He struggled. "Kaisa, stop! Come on, you know someone will have to-" He tried pulling out of her grip but he only managed one arm out.
And as he was about to finish his sentence, she gripped him tighter and shamelessly gave him a kiss on the cheek, suggesting she may be immensely drunker than he expected.
She looked him in the eye. "I'm- hic- your bride according to your old man… so hic- this house is mine as much as it is yours…" she said while grabbing another bottle from the floor and suddenly tossing it out of the hallway.
He was starting to get scared. This isn't the hardworking, anti-marriage and modest secretary he knew. He tried kicking away her legs and her legs came to pass, then as he crawled his way out of her, he discovered that she fell asleep quick.
He tiptoed his way away from her to give her some space before looking at the dinner table. He first took his concerns for Frida who had also fallen asleep along with his mother, Mary.
He then carefully carried Frida upstairs. Her heavy body and twitches from her intoxication made it even harder and even more due to the fact that there's only darkness in the stairs and most of the lights are in the rooms.
Smelling her, he first gave her a bath but kept her in the bathtub and didn't open the tap hoping she would stop twitching.
He then went downstairs to try and clean up the mess while waiting for Frida. After placing all the remaining unscathed bottles under the sink, he went back up to see if Frida's doing okay.
He went up with a few pockets of lantern fuel for the bathroom and as he arrived, he then refueled the lantern and as it shines more brightly, it showed that she's still twitching.
Concerned, he decided to call his dad… only to hear nothing amidst the darkness even as his office is just a hallway away.
Sighing at this recurring occurrence, he had to leave Frida alone in order to go and see what he was doing only to see he had joined the girls, and Frida's parents.
The house had some sort a weird equality, where everyone was so drunk they couldn't be racist or sexist to each other. After finally waking him up, he finally got Stephen awake and then had him first visit the bathroom and he seemed equally horrified at frida twitching on the tub.
"Holy fuck, she looks like she just slammed a door to her head!" He backed away.
David looked at him with pippy eyes. "Can you help-" Suddenly he pressed his two fists into her stomach.
"Dad, what the fuck!?" He objects. "That isn't helping her!"
Stephen didn't listen and continued. After more than 10 compressions into her stomach, she finally stopped twitching but she accidentally made a projectile vomit towards the lantern, covering it in a pile of bile.
From the compressions, Frida awaken and she placed her hands at her stomach because she felt like a hammer beated her to death.
Seeing his job done, Stephen then went down again to his office, leaving David to clean the puke up and help her go to bed.
After helping her get up and let her go to her own room, David then had to get a napkin from the cabinet to rub away the vomit which cost him 6 minutes and 8 napkins.
After he's done, he then decides to return to his room because he wants a break from this hectic day but then as he enters, he is suddenly hit with the breeze of the open coming in from his open windows. The dancing curtains curtailed any fresh scents and let in the smell of the streets.
He covered himself with a robe and went out, he is not going to sleep with that stench. Checking the other bathrooms, including the one the maids used, he checked for any water to keep him awake… but… nothing came out of the tap.
He then walked outside, only to found out that despite being night and the rain just starting to ease, they were all at one of the outside pools Stephen made to appear better, but not only that, they were also using what could only be described as primitive water slide, which due to Stephen's creative engineering, and used all the water that goes into the house.
He rolled his eyes at the complete waste of water and just sat down on a chair outside, waiting so he could take a shower.
It didn't happen, he waited, and as midnight strikes, he slept the night away on the chair while basically the whole family drunk away and he even heard someone taking a dive.
Eventually, he woke up first out of everyone. He went back inside and sees everyone hungover on the hallways and on the poolside. Sleeping on the hallway next to the stairs is Kaisa and Mary with barely anything on, and his dad sleeping on the poor, wooden waterslide, getting stuck on the way down due to the lack of running water.
He went over to Kaisa and his mum first, pulling them both out of the floor and bringing them to their respective beds, fearing that this might leave them to miasma. But for once, he was happy to see a sunrise after so much rain.
Back inside, Frida was awake and sober, making coffee and breakfast among the stumbled bottles and broken glass that was already being cleaned by the servants.
The messy household would've been a problem for Frida but, not for now.
Meanwhile, Alfur was back in the archives and the library, reading deeply into the Foulkstones, and finding they were actually pretty messed up since way back.
For starters, he has read about the Trollberg Siege, an event that's largely considered treason on their part though some consider it to be a fictional event due to its ridiculousness. Then their house split, some went to the south of the new world while others stayed in Great Britain while the Haustads went with the Hanoverians.
Those who stayed were by far the most chaotic, they had a long range history of having weird pets, ranging from a frog, to deerfoxes and just recently wolves, to going as far as investing a lot of money in finding a selkie.
They also had the largest range of inbred traits and some say that one of the house's leaders would annually challenge the king of Britain to hand to hand combat to claim the throne but none of these letters actually received the word of the king.
Sometimes one of their letters would be heard and the king would accept, sending an alibi to make sure… not only did the challenger beat said alibi, but he also argued that because he bet the throne of Britain, he had to give it regardless of who the man is.
Then there was that one time when the man reigned for two days thinking he had won, and shortly after the actual king defeated him and exiled him to a small island near Trollberg, similar to how King James II or VII's fate became after the Glorious Revolution.
The only issue was that said challenger swam back to the shore and went on to declare independence to the British Empire that went unnoticed due to how miniscule his efforts were
Then the king found out about this little city declaring independence and declared it back as british territory after two years of its short independence. Due to this, the citizens and also its guards, magistrate and mayors weren't getting British supplies due to their embargoes.
Alfur was actually stunned by all of these histories, most families had their fair share of weird tales, but the Foulkstones seemed to be hellspawn to their oldest records, with actual stories of the first wives being scottish prisoners during the Wars of Scottish Independence.
During the early 18th century, they were a weird mix between drunkenly stupid and terrifingly morbid people who exists in the streets of Trolberg.
As he dove himself further into the books, obituaries and newspapers about them, suddenly a colleague bursted the door and dragged Alfur out of the library and into the morgue… they found another body and oh boy… this was absolutely horrendous. the face was broken on itself, the face bones were comforted and the skin was stretched and lumped. It looked more like the work of a devil than man.
A single sentence was encarved this time.
"Justice takes no sides."
And seeing that, for both the marras watching with a telescope through a window across the street and for the guards… It means a time of trouble.