Book I-
Chapter III-

The Tiny Black Creatures with the Blood-Red Eyes

Kento trudged down the stairwell of Mia's mansion. Rowen was in a very bad mood.
He hated it when people were in back moods. He figured it wasted to much "Life-
energy" as Sage put it. Kento knew he had to cheer Rowen up. He had to, somehow. Then he
thought of Sage.
Rowen's best friend. His comrade. His companion. His brother. His equal.
'Whoa, dude. That's deep.'
Kento rounded the last corner to the kitchen. Sai stood in the doorway, frying pan
in hand, demanding what took him so long.
"Well, ya see, umm, Rowen's in a bad mood and everything so he won't be having
breakfast with us." Kento blurted out in one breath.
Ryo looked up from the morning paper. "Why is he in a bad mood?"
Sai whirled around, his robe whirling with him. "It's because he misses Sage, that's
why, you dolt! If I were missing, or if Kento or Rowen or even Yuli were missing and you
had no idea where to start looking for them, wouldn't you miss them, too?!"
Everyone was silent. For the first time in god knows how long, Sai just blew up. Ryo
stared and Kento backed up.
Sai huffed and calmed himself. He sat down at the kitchen table with his arms
around his face as he rested his head on it. "I'm sorry, love, I'm just worried too."
"Yeah, we noticed." Kento stated so matter-of-factly. "Now, about breakfast..."

It swam in the rivers of decay. The street lights twisted backwards at its
presence. All new in the world had reason to be frightened.
The Reaper was angry.

Yuli stared out his open bedroom window, listening to the rhythmic tapping of
Rowen's fingers on the keyboard. Yuli sighed and sat up, casting a long and heavy gaze
across his room. There was nothing to do. The guys were depressed and angry, and it was
all Sage's fault. He ruined all the fun.
The child walked across the clean carpet of his room only momentarily, deciding
now was not the best of times to bother Rowen. He heard Kento say that Rowen was not in
a good mood.
Yuli shook his head and returned to the window. He stared out and almost missed
the blond passerby. It was Sage.
He nearly toppled over in delight. He rushed into Rowen's bedroom to tell him the
good news. He jumped up and down to grab Rowen's attention.
"Rowen! Rowen! I saw Sage! He's coming home!!"
Rowen's gaze shot from the computer to Yuli like lightning.
"Are you serious?" he demanded.
Yuli grabbed Rowen's hand and forcibly dragged him to the front door, where
everyone in the living room heard the faint jingling of keys. They heard the lock turn. They
saw the front door open.
And there stood Sage.
Rowen nearly gushed at his best friend's reappearance. He rushed over to him as
fast as his legs could carry him. Rowen hugged Sage as if to test the fact that he was real.
He was real, as he soon found out. Rowen noticed in time that his hug made Sage wince
from some sort of pain. He released Sage.
"Where in the world have you been?" everyone in the living room demanded.
Sage blinked. "Out." he breathed, and turned to walk up the staircase.
And he disappeared again.

The trees calmed themselves as Death flew on by, passing them up. It wasn't their
time yet. The breeze through the leaves made a sort of whistling sound; but the trees
knew they didn't whistle.
They sighed.

A tiny head peeked around a corner, winced, and pulled itself back into the gloom
of the forest surrounding the Koji residence. The sun was still up, and there was no time to
lose. Only three days left before the coming. They had to wait until nightfall.
They could see their Master in the window of the dwelling. It was on the second-
story of it, and they knew no heights, no matter how tall, could keep them from their
Master.

The Sun felt like it shouldn't be going so soon, but the Moon had insisted that it
was time to rest. The Sun agreed, pulling itself down under the mountains, helping the
Moon rise to greet the world the Sun kept so warm and bright.
Silver rays spread across the land, and glittering stars shined fully in the sky,
showing off their radiance. The creatures of the day slipped quietly into sleep, while the
sleeping creatures that roamed the night were just about to awaken.
This is the time of transition.

Sai sat puzzled in the kitchen, along with everyone else, except Yuli.
"Why did he evade a question like that?" Kento asked.
Everyone was situated around the kitchen table, discussing Sage's strange
behavior. Rowen knew his best friend quite well, and he knew him enough to say that Sage
never evaded such a question.
"I don't know," Rowen sighed. He wasn't sure that was the best answer.
"Why don't we ask him?"
Rowen looked up at Kento. He was right. Why not outright ask him why he was
acting so strangely. First, he disappears without a trace, then he shows up miraculously at
their front door. What was going on?
"I'll go."
Everyone turned to Sai.
"Don't worry, I'll be fine." he insisted.
The rest of the group nodded, in unison, and Sai prepared to creep up the stairs.

Yuli sat on his bed, wondering vaguely why Sage had ruined all his fun. Now
everyone was downstairs, and they weren't watching the television or playing video games
like they used to. They were discussing something.
But he could care less of what that was.
The way he figured it, if no one was having fun, then the whole house got boring.
White Blaze was sleeping soundly by his feet, but even he was too tired, or just too lazy,
to have any fun with him.
Yuli huffed and crossed his arms.
"You're bored, I see." A voice seeped from the doorway to his room.
Yuli gasped and whirled around, seeing Sage loom in from the hallway. Yuli smiled
and calmed his heart rate. Maybe Sage wasn't so bad after all.
"Would you like something to do?" Sage asked.
Yuli's smile widened into a full-fledged grin. He nodded profusely, and followed
Sage out of his room and down the darkened hallway. As Sage spoke to him, Yuli thought
his voice was a bit...strange. But his interest in fun was more important than Sage's
peculiar voice.
He should have known better.

Sai crept around corners. He knew something was wrong here; something was very
wrong here. He should have been able to hear Sage's mind as he walked through the door.
But, all he heard was thousands upon thousands of voices. None of which he recognized.
That in itself was weird.
He heard a soft moan of neither pain nor sleep. It sounded like nothing he had ever
heard before. It sounded...
Empty.
Sai's heart raced as he dashed around the corner of hallways and up staircases.
The moan he heard was not emitted again, to his dismay. He search all of the third floor,
but turned up nothing. He decided it was all in his mind, and preceded down the last flight
of stairs. But, he heard it again.
Sai turned with a start. He wanted accompaniment. He raced into the kitchen, face
pale, body cold and clammy.
"Sai!! What happened?" Ryo was at his side in an instant.
"S-S-Something's up there..." Sai stammered.
Kento held his best friend's shoulders in an effort to calm him. It had no effect.
Sai still shook violently. Sai pointed upstairs.
"I need...your help...please..."
Ryo nodded to Kento and Rowen. "C'mon, guys. Let's go."

Yuli's gaze was transfixed on the bedpost. Just the bedpost. Nothing else seemed
of interest to his eyes. His nerves, however, were a completely different story.
Yuli seemed almost lifeless as his head rested upon Sage's shoulder. His breathing
was slow, very slow. His eyes were mere glass balls rendered useless by forces unknown.
They were in Sage's room, not secluded from view. In plain sight, at around eleven o'clock
at night. The grandfather clock struck twelve midnight.
So much for time-telling.
The Master held his little soul still, listening to the heavy breathing being emitted
by the boy in his arms. He sat in a corner, facing the open door, and peering into the
blackened hallway.
Yuli blinked slowly, he breathed slowly. Everything about him was slow. This is the
way Death worked. Of course, wasting such energy on a worthless life such as this? Never!
He would only be a mannequin. A perfect little porcelain doll. A puppet.
He liked this idea.

Kento led the group around the corner until he reached the first flight of stairs
leading to the bedrooms. The hallway was so dark at this point. Not so pitch that one
couldn't see, just the kind of darkness that made one fell sick to their stomachs. A heavy,
sinking kind of darkness.
Misery? No, not quite. Maybe dreariness? Or gloom?
That felt good. So positive.
Kento shivered. He had never seen the hallway like this. It was always well lit and
spacious. He felt like a rat in a maze. One where inside it, his senses didn't function
properly. He felt trapped. And scared.
Now the hallway held its gloom, or misery, or whatever, in its hands like a heavy
liquid. It seeped from the ceiling and crawled up the walls, and any breath that was given
was quickly snatched up and stored for later use. No one dare live in such a gloom.
Such pity and misery hung in this one hallway. Why just this one hallway? Did
whatever it was that made the moans come from up there?
The darkness seemed to come from one place. Kento knew they had to find it.
Or get lost trying.
Ryo moved into the lead position as the trio ascended the stairs. It felt so cold up
here. He could even see his breath in front of his face. Ryo was glad Sai stayed downstairs
with Mia so he could calm down a bit. He didn't want to be up here himself.
They rounded yet another corner. Ryo was sure it didn't take them this long to get
to their bedrooms. Something was making this journey take forever, and Ryo was
determined to find and stop whatever it was.
He felt so slow, thick, and heavy.
Then, they heard something.
Not a moan, groan or sob. Not a sigh or a gasp. Just...something. That something
made Rowen sick. He didn't like how it sounded.
It sounded...like the wind through a hollow, dead tree, or the sound an old man
makes in his lungs before dying. It sounded...
Empty.
There. That emptiness again. Too painful to be bared, too horrifying to listen to.
Rowen pulled into the lead as the trio rounded the last corner. He thought he might as well
combat this darkness, this evil. But he had to know where it was coming from.
Rowen stared in disbelief. He stopped in the middle of the hallway, causing Ryo and
Kento behind him to stop. Rowen had found the origin of the gloom.
Why? Why from his room? Why from...Sage's room?
They both shared the room, so it made no difference as to who's name was
attributed to it. All Rowen knew was that whatever was causing the gloom was from that
room. How could he tell?
Well, from the occasional sickly feeling, to that awful feeling in the pit of your
stomach that tells you something's wrong, there were many ways to tell. Not to mention
that the darkness ended halfway up the hallway. No darkness lurked after their bedroom.
No gloom, no misery. Just night.
Rowen swallowed hard.
He and Ryo looked at each other before nodding. They were, in the words of GI
Joe, "goin' in". Kento brought up the rear as the two in front of him carefully pushed their
forms through the threshold.
There, they gasped. All three of them.
They saw nothing but the open window, with its pale green curtain softly floating in
the night air, enjoying its new-found freedom.

Yuli's hair was swept from his face as the air flew past him. He didn't care, though.
Even thinking felt like hard work. He decided to sleep.
"Go on. You may sleep, little one. Your job has yet to be performed."
"Yes...Master..." said the boy, drifting to sleep as Sage and a companion raced down
the street. The figures stopped in front of the church. They had business to attend to.

"Nothing's up there..." Rowen finally said after recovering from their trauma at the
threshold of the bedroom. Sai shivered, but helped to calm Rowen and Kento by fixing
some soup for them. They took three hours.
"Are you sure?" Mia asked as she seated herself next to Kento, who was on the
couch with his soup bowl in hand. The wind softly caressed the windows of the house as
they spoke, giving off an eerie sound.
Kento looked up from his soup suddenly. He put the bowl down onto the coffee-
table and sat up very straight.
"Guys," his voice was shaky, "Yuli wasn't up there like he should've been..."

Arthur drew his legs close to his chest. The candles he arranged in holy circles
sent shadows flying across the walls in a dance that impressed him. There were crosses
everywhere he looked. The Virgin Mary hung from a wall, her eyes dry as stone.
Arthur smiled to himself. How that demon got out, he didn't know, but it wasn't
coming in here. Or so he thought.
He sat atop an Oriental-style red rug, smiling at the Bible he held in his lap. Just in
case it came back. He was ready for it.
He cast one last glance at Mary.
"Oh, Mary. Don't cry. 'Tis only me..."
Arthur unleashed a bone-rattling wail as the Virgin Mary that hung on the wall
wept blood.