Chapter 4 – Incoming Guests
I just keep chugging out these chapters…a lot of them being written during my "vacation" to the beach in Florida. And Mom telling Dad how fast my fingers are typing and Dad asking if I'm typing properly and I am incidentally. Lets see how fast did I go? 76 words per minute with 97 accuracy? It's gone up since then, of course, mwahahaha. That was back in 9th or 10th grade I can't remember…oh yeah I'm entering my first year of college at the end of August T-T;;; So yeah, better churn out as many chapters as I can before I start losing steam again xD;
Oh, on the actual upcoming chapter…um…well originally I was going to have the contest start in this chapter but as it got kinna long at the point I decided it would better to just start the next chapter with the contest. So what happens in this chapter then? Well, the three judges have arrived to Nadil's lair and Sabel is not happy. Why? Well read to find out xD This chapter is guaranteed to get a good few chuckles out of you teehee –evilcackle- Anyways, READ ON!
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The following morning Sabel was sitting on his couch with a stony look on his face. And he had every right to look that way. Khetti had plastered mud all over his face while he had been sleeping that previous night and it had hardened. She was now down below at the lake playing with his giant fish, and upon this discovery his face flushed in anger. The heat from his face caused the mud to harden and it soon started to crack, the newly dried mud slowly crumbling from his face. If he had a mirror he would have noticed that his face actually looked a lot better now.
He glared at the cow costumed little girl's back with seething thoughts only to freeze when he suddenly felt someone staring at him. Slowly turning around he saw one of the other girls just staring. Guessing she was around fifteen or sixteen years old, he knew he could take her down easily, but it was that stare that just sent such paralyzing fear. He inched away from her as to his horror he saw her slowly coming towards him, the black chii ears that blended in with her black hair twitching. "C-Can I help you?" he asked, his voice cracking.
She just continued to inch toward him, her eyes wide. "…Are you really Sabel…?" she finally asked after a few heart-wrenching moments. Well, they were heart-wrenching moments for Sabel since she kept coming closer to him.
"Er…yes…" he said too late as he realized he could have lied and faked his identity. But he had a feeling that would have been in vain.
Again she kept moving toward him, her eyes just growing bigger. "Reeeaaallllyyy?"
At this she closed the gap by quite a few more inches and caused Sabel to give a small shriek as he scrambled over the back of the couch and quickly scooted back, only to find himself quickly trapped by the wall. She was now, to his greatest of horrors, right in front of him. He winced when she gave a small squeal and proceeded, to his greatest of terrors, to glomp him.
She completely ignored his terrified screams.
However, two other people could not. Until they put on earmuffs. Then they could.
"So what do you think of this scene, La—er I mean Alena?" Nadil shouted over to the older girl leaning over him.
The girl took a moment to yell, "Don't hurt him, Rellie!" before taking the sheets and started to read through them. After a moment she gave a nod and grinned at him, handing him the sheets back. "Just maybe tweak a line here and there and I think you've got gold, Nadil."
He let out a sigh. "You think so?"
"Really. So anything new happen during my brief absence?"
"Nothing really…"
She raised a brow. "Oh? Your voice says one thing but your face says something else."
They cringed when they heard a loud crash and then a small voice crying. Instantly Alena disappeared in a whirl of black and white winds and was at the poor, little, cow costumed girl's side. Galaba was hovering over both of them frantically. He had shrunk a bit and was flying in circles.
The little girl clung to the older girl's waist and continued to cry. "Waaaaaahhh!"
Alena gently patted her cow-hooded head. "There, there, Khetti, tell Mommy what happened."
By this time Relle had come down the stairs and was watching the two, much to Sabel's great relief. He staggered up to Nadil, his hair and clothes tussled, but he was not in too bad of shape having experienced his first fangirl attack. Nadil had only risen a brow at that before coming down to join the group below.
Khetti sniffled and looked up at Alena with big, tearful eyes. "I-I was widing Gawaba and and we were having fun and and it wasn't Gawaba's fauwt so don't punish him!"
Alena sweatdropped a little. "I won't, I won't, but what happened? We heard a loud crash."
The little girl sniffled. "I…I twied to stand on him like Sabewu had done and slipped and fell…"
Sabel blinked and then immediately wished he had stayed back upstairs when he saw the icy look Alena had shot him.
She turned her attention back to Khetti and hugged her close. "There, there, you're okay now," she smiled and patted her head. "Galaba is fretting for you so why don't you tell him that you're okay?"
The little girl nodded and proceeded to hug the fish close. Though this was much to Sabel's disgust, he kept his mouth shut, knowing it was not worth the risk. He glanced at Nadil who just shrugged. Sabel sighed, wondering what he had done to deserve such hatred when Relle suddenly latched onto him. Like Nadil had predicted just the night before, he wished the girls were gone from the place. And the sooner, the better.
"Too bad you have to put up with us for the next week," the Alena said wickedly. Sabel just inwardly groaned.
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Fortunately for Sabel, Alena had decided to visit the two new managers and requested the contest to be bumped up. Something about having to meet some person and making a deadline or something. The two had just looked at each other and shrugged. If the contestants were ready, then they did not see why not. And Shyrendora was more than ready. When Alena later told them they would be holding the contest the following day, Sabel actually fell to his knees with both Relle and Khetti now clinging to him and looked up to the high ceiling and exclaiming, "There is a God!"
All three girls had found that amusing and while the two younger girls continued to torment the poor youkai, Alena went over to Nadil's desk to find him working furiously, as usual.
"Don't you ever do anything else?" she asked after watching him for a few minutes. "Other than going to visit Cesia that is," she snickered.
Nadil was glad he was wearing his mask so the girl would not see his blush. "Well, no, there really is no time for such things."
"Not even to take a trip to your home?" she said idly.
At that Nadil suddenly jumped up, knocking the chair back in the process, and yelled at her, "I HAVE NO HOME!"
Alena just raised a brow and when he realized that everyone was staring at him, he blinked and slowly bent over to pick up the chair, only to find that Alena had beat him to it and said softly, "Well you got that part wrong…you do have a home. It's just waiting for you."
He just looked at her for a moment, his face expressionless, before slowly sitting back down and resumed to work. The other three watched her walk down the small set of steps and upon seeing their questioning looks she just grinned and tossed her long black hair back. "S'alright, just a bad memory." She looked at Sabel. "Have you ever asked him about his past?"
Sabel opened his mouth to answer only to close it. "…I…well no…"
"You've been working for him for how long and you never asked?" Relle said puzzled.
"Er…well…" Sabel stammered. In fact it had never crossed his mind to. He had found no need. And the Demon Lord had never asked him any personal questions either. They had just…gone on and started living at that point. Before he could continue going down memory lane, Khetti started to tug insistently on his shirt and after a few moments he hissed, "What?"
"Kafuuki!" Khetti said with a cute smile on her face.
Sabel just stared at her. "…What?"
"Kafuuki!" she repeated.
"What the hell is a "kafuuki"?"
"She wants a cookie," Alena said as she produced a cookie out of thin air and gave it to her. The little cow costumed girl nibbled on it happily.
Relle poked Sabel then. "Have you ever worn girl's clothing?"
Sabel just stared at her. "WHAT?"
"Well…you do look like a girl."
"I do not!" he yelled angrily.
Relle just shrugged. "Well I only asked because I saw some interesting outfits in your wardrobe. Your room also looked interesting."
Sabel stared. "What?"
Khetti just whistled innocently as he charged to his room. There was a moment of silence, exactly like the silence and calm one feels before a monstrous storm comes through.
Alena sighed as she held up three fingers and started the count down. "3. 2. 1…"
"AAAAAAARRRRRRRGGGGGGGHHHHHHHH!"
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The next day could not have come sooner for Sabel. When Alena had told the two youkai that they would be leaving the underground labyrinth so they could enter through the front doors and enter normally rather than suddenly appearing within the opera house itself, he almost danced for joy. He had spent most of the previous day and night refurnishing his room. Khetti had turned it completely into a girlie girl's room, complete with pink frills, ribbons, and various stuffed animals. One could imagine Sabel's distress.
He was not the only one in distress that morning either. Alfeegi was on the verge of tearing his hair out. It was still hours until Shyrendora and Cesia would be performing for the judges, but there were already stacks of complaints by pretty much everyone who inhabited the opera house. And they were the most ludicrous, too.
"Listen to this, Ruwalk!" Alfeegi half yelled at his partner who was just sitting calmly at his desk, his legs propped up on it as usual.
"I'm listening, Feeg," Ruwalk sighed and picked up a book.
"They heard screams, screams, or rather more like angry yelling the past night and morning! Also they heard child-like laughter! Can you believe this?"
"Well, maybe it was the Demon Lord and he has kids," Ruwalk shrugged.
Alfeegi pondered upon that idea before he gave Ruwalk a stony look. "I highly doubt that, Ruwalk," he said in a dry voice. He was not amused when Ruwalk offered him water. "But they think this place is haunted for real! With real ghosts!"
"Well this is a pretty old opera house."
"RUWALK!"
The long, dual-colored haired manager cringed and pulled away from his desk. "Sorry, sorry, but it is. So no one has blamed the Demon Lord?"
"On the contrary, they haven't even made so much as a peep about him! Except for the few who said they would prefer him over ghosts!"
"Well then just call a ghost exterminator."
"RUWALK!"
"Okay, ask the Demon Lord to check out the ghost problem for us."
Ruwalk winced when he saw Alfeegi's face and barely ducked the chair he had thrown at him. "Well there goes two hundred dollars…"
"AAAAAAAAAARRRRRRRGGGGHHH! OUT!" Alfeegi screamed and Ruwalk was immediately gone.
Ruwalk winced when he heard the door slam firmly shut behind him and sighed. "I guess that wasn't the smartest thing to do…"
"A lover's spat?"
The manager felt chills go through him as he turned to find Kitchel just giving him a sly look. He coughed. "Alfeegi and I are not lovers," he said, heavily stressing the "not". "We just work together. We have our own different apartments as well." At Kitchel's dubious looks, he continued. "We live separately."
Dubious stare.
"Different room numbers!"
More doubtful staring.
"WE LIVE IN TWO SEPARATE APARTMENTS AND ON DIFFERENT FLOORS!" he shouted in an exasperated voice.
"Riiight," Kitchel said airily before looking at the door. Amazingly there were no cracks in it. "So what happened?"
"Just complaints from the cast who live in the opera house. People claim to have heard "ghosts" during the night."
She raised a brow. "Ghosts you say?"
Ruwalk nodded. "Least, that's what the claims said. I, uh, kind of provoked him a little too much, eh-heh…"
"Smart," Kitchel said with blatant sarcasm. "But I didn't hear anything during the night."
"Really?"
She nodded. "Nope."
"Hm…maybe you're a heavy sleeper."
Kitchel just shrugged. "I won't deny that. But I am a little more attuned to the spirit world than most."
At this Ruwalk raised a brow and looked at her skeptically. "This coming from a former thief."
"Hey, thieves, treasure hunter, whatever it is, if it involves something that's worth millions, I'll go through anything. And that includes haunted tombs, crypts, ancient ruins, etc., etc."
Ruwalk just stared at her. "…Desperate, huh?"
"I think of it as going to the soul of treasure hunting," she said with starry eyes. Ruwalk just sweatdropped and shook his head.
A few more hours passed, hours bringing the time of the contest closer, and soon the time for the arrival of the judges was at hand. By this time Alfeegi had cooled down – much to Ruwalk's relief – and the two of them were waiting by the entrance of the opera house. As they steeped out, they shivered from the cold blast of air that greeted them.
Ruwalk pulled up the collar of his trench coat while Alfeegi wrapped his own coat tighter to him. "Looks like winter is quickly coming," he said while Alfeegi scoured the cobbled stoned streets before them. There were many carriages passing by despite the chilly weather and he was keeping a look out for the one that would be bearing the four judges.
"It's almost the end of autumn," Alfeegi said a little bitterly. He hated the cold.
"Actually we're only three quarters through," Ruwalk said matter-of-factly. At Alfeegi's cold glare he quickly shut his mouth and refrained from saying more.
They waited a few more minutes outside the grand double doors leading to the opera house before retreating back inside to warm up a bit, but just as they started to turn around, they heard the sound of hooves come toward them and Alfeegi, much to Ruwalk's relief, brightened instantly and eagerly went up to door as the carriage stopped. Ruwalk found it a little interesting that it was drawn by four black horses and the carriage itself was completely black, but he just shrugged and joined Alfeegi as the door opened to reveal the judges of the contest.
They were caught completely by surprise.
Well, it was actually Alfeegi who did the catching.
As soon as the door open, a little girl in a cow costume suddenly leaped from the carriage doorway and latched onto Alfeegi, the surprised manager staggering backwards. "Wh-What the!"
"Khetti, get off Alfeegi," a girl dressed completely in black said as she stepped out of the carriage with the help of Ruwalk.
"You know she can't help it, Rellie," an older girl dressed in more earthy tones consisting of browns and darker greens said with a grin as she jumped out and headed to the horses.
Ruwalk stared at the three girls. The two older ones had masks on, the one who was addressed as Rellie wearing a sort of black anubis mask. She also had cat ears on her head. The other one, the one whom he presumed to be Alena, wore a mask that resembled a tiger. Sort of. It had the stripes. The third, smaller one did not need a mask. Her cow costume was complete with a cow hood so she had that drawn over her. Her little cow bell clanged every time she moved, but luckily for them, it was not an annoying clang.
"It's padded inside," Alena whispered to him when he asked why it sounded muted. "She wouldn't stop clanging the bell on the way over so Relle took some action."
Realizing that he was only seeing three of the judges (well, Alfeegi was really still holding one of them. Khetti had managed her way to sit on his shoulders. But he did not seem to mind so much though it would probably be best if he did not since the cow costumed little girl had a hold of his ponytail.), Alfeegi looked into the carriage. "Erm…where's judge…uh…Nadil?"
"Here."
The two managers whirled around at the deep voice behind them, much to Khetti's delight. Before them they saw a tall (What? Nadil's kinna tall…taller than Rath –snickers-), handsome (-droool- Iun care what you Nadil haters think, he's YUMMY), young (okay, so he's actually a few centuries old, but he is SO not middle-aged! And I can have literary freedom…) gentleman dressed in a black suit and, much to their surprise, a cape. His mask was actually quite simple. Completely white, it covered three-quarters of his face, only the left side of his face completely covered. The right side was only covered around his eye. However, his appearance and stature appeared to Ruwalk as more of a nobleman or some person of higher power. There was also a darker aura about him but before Ruwalk could try to sort it out, he was caught completely by surprise when he suddenly found himself face to face with the mint green haired youkai who had given them the applications.
Sabel grinned as he stepped back and with a black-gloved hand, he held it out in front of the older, tiger-masked girl and began the introductions. "Announcing the volunteer judges, Lady Alena." He turned and held out his hand to the black anubis-masked girl and said, "Lady Relle." He then moved to the cow-costumed girl who had jumped off of Alfeegi's shoulders by now and said, "Lady Khetti." It seemed his voice and manner were a little forced and restrained when introducing the last two girls, but once again, before Ruwalk could ponder more about this, Sabel turned to face his master and with a lot more grandeur than he had given the girls, he said, "And last, but not in the very least, the great Lord Nadil."
Alfeegi raised a brow at the introduction but he shrugged it off and bowed to the foursome, yanking at the ends of Ruwalk's long hair and pulled the unsuspecting co-manager down with him when he did not follow suit quickly enough. "It is a great honor to have you here to judge this little contest. Your decisions will greatly reflect upon the whole of this upcoming opera as well as perhaps the whole opera house. Please make yourself as comfortable as you wish and if you need any help, just ask any of the cast and crew and they will be more than happy to oblige." He then jabbed Ruwalk hard in the ribs.
Taking the painful hint, Ruwalk straightened back up and ignoring the streams of pain he was still feeling from his head he said, "I am Ruwalk and this is Alfeegi. If there is any dissatisfaction during your brief stay, just come to either of us and we will take care of it right away. There are refreshments within the main auditorium. Now, I'm sure all of you are tired from the ride and probably want to get in from the cold. Shall we step inside then?"
After Alfeegi instructed Sabel of where to take to the carriage and horses, they quickly went inside and much to Alfeegi's dismay, Khetti started to run around and came dangerously close to some rather expensive items. But before he could take action, Alena was already there and had settled the cow-costumed girl onto Ruwalk's shoulders. The black and brown haired manager glanced up at his passenger in surprise but laughed and carried her into the main auditorium where she mooed in awe. Relle slowly spun on the heel of her high-heeled boot, admiring the artwork above and taking in everything that was within the walls and columns of the huge opera house. Only Nadil and Alena seemed unimpressed, or rather passive, about the whole grandeur.
A little disconcerted, Alfeegi went up to them and asked, "Well, what do you think?"
Alena blinked from her daze and smiled at the manager. "It looks like you two have been keeping up with this place rather well," she said, and by the content tone in her voice and Nadil's nod Alfeegi suddenly felt his worries dissipate.
"So when do we start judging?" Relle asked after she had finished inspecting the area.
"And when do we get to eat some cookies?" Khetti asked, her voice muffled from the cow hood.
Ruwalk laughed at the little cow-costumed girl's question and moved down the steps to the stage. The judges table was placed on the platform right above the first ten rows of seats. "There will be cookies down at the judging table. And I think you all came just in time, actually," he added when he saw Kitchel waving and grinning up at them from the edge of the stage. Nohiro, Delte, Ringleys, and Zoma were with her as well, and they seemed to be in deep discussion behind her back. As they continued their descent, Ruwalk noticed that members of the cast and crew occupied some of the front row seats. The young mint green haired youkai was also sitting in one of the seats near the judges table. He was sitting near the aisle on the twelfth row right behind the judges and had his feet propped up on the seat in front of him. It was also near the seat where Nadil would be sitting. …I don't even know his name, he realized thoughtfully. Alfeegi's going to yell at him for having his feet up like that.
"Well, here's the last stop for the Ruwalk Express!" he said laughing as he stopped right in front of Khetti's seat.
"Yay! That was fun!" she said happily as she hopped off his shoulders and plopped into her seat. She then nabbed a cookie and started to nibble on it happily as the other three filed in and took their seats.
Ruwalk saw Alfeegi's raised brow and just said, "What?" before taking his own seat.
When the lights started to dim, the group on the stage immediately hopped down and took their seats, Ringleys flying over to the small orchestra surrounding the stage. Despite Ruwalk's earlier beliefs, though the whole orchestra consisted completely of water lights, the instruments were fitted for their smaller size. The music was just amplified through various speakers located throughout the auditorium.
"So who's first?" Relle asked Alfeegi when he sat down. His seat was a little behind hers since she was on the other end of the table and he was closer to her.
Alfeegi leaned back in his seat and sighed. "I think it's Shyrendora. Well, no, I don't think. I know. She would never let anyone go before her."
And as if on cue, the curtain was suddenly blown open as cold blasts of air filled the large room. The stage was completely encased in ice and snow was falling from the ceiling. At first Ruwalk thought it was all fake but to his great surprise he found that the snow was real and when he looked at the stage he could see that the ice and everything else was real as well. In shock he looked at Alfeegi only to find that his partner was just as shocked as he was. This set was completely different than the one they had seen before.
Then came the prima donna herself. Dressed completely in white and blue, and as her style, her dress had many open patches to reveal her pale white skin. Ruwalk wondered how the hell she got into the laced and chained thing she called a dress but was once again cut from his thoughts when she stepped up to the edge, the mike in her hands, and a rather smug look on her face.
"…She looks like a freaking whacked out pop singer," Relle muttered and Alfeegi could not agree more.
"…That's a lot of glitter…" Khetti added.
"…And her song is "Ice Queen"…" Alena said after she glanced at the sheet in front of her.
"…How fitting," Nadil commented. "Though I do not believe she needs that getup to get that point across."
"Wait a second, "Ice Queen" is a song by Within Temptation!" Alena exclaimed indignantly. "And she claims this to be her own song! Negative one hundred points…"
While Relle rolled her eyes as Alena scribbled furiously, Shyrendora smiled at the judges, oblivious to all that had transpired. "Good afternoon, judges!" she said cheerily. So cheerily it made everyone's stomach flip. "I hope you had a safe and easy trip on the way over to this humble theatre."
"Humble my ass, the witch is such a suck-up," Sabel muttered in a voice loud enough only for Nadil to hear. Whether or not the Demon Lord heard it Sabel did not know since he gave no indication.
"Thank you, Shyrendora," Alena said in a slightly cold voice. "Less talking and more performing, please?"
There was a bit of applause and "oohs" from the audience as Shyrendora gritted her teeth and turned around to walk back to the center of the stage. When she reached the exact center, Ringleys took his cue and the music started.
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Doom da doo, well first off, who are Khetti and Relle? They're close online friends of mine and Khetti helps proof my chapters n-n
Khetti: And it's a good thing I do, otherwise you'd have a big mess!
-coughs- Well anyway, can anyone tell me who Alena is? Nadil did a little slip at the beginning and her name should actually help you. I'll give you another hint: When it comes to making up names or words, I tend to scramble already existing words and names -wink-
But those three are only in the fic for just the judging. They might return again at some point later in the story, but they are just guest characters/people so don't expect to seem them often. They might be referred to at some point, but yeah. Anyways, onto the reviews!
Kavic: -coughs- Easy girl, there's enough Ruwalk for everyone…well maybe xD;
FireyFlames: Glad you like the story and I hope you keep reading it n-n
Yokai no Miko: Yeah, sorry about the Nadil rant u-u;; I didn't mean to blow up like that, it just that it happens a lot in other fics and I just kinna snapped x-x;;; Sorry x----X But I understand your view point so I'm in no way objecting to how you think! I had also thought of that at the beginning too actually o-o And on the SabelxKitchel thing…well you'll just have to wait and see, mwahaha.
bananaluvie-rc: Crazy cool? XD First time I heard that one, lol. And you think they are fitting with the original character oO? Weird…I think Erik in Pot(at)O is a lot more aggressive than how I have Nadil…lol.
Shorea Tashinnaku: The relationship with Kitchel is up in the air officially. Personally I see three possibilities: Thatz being the number 1, then Tetheus, then Sabel. But as this is a fan based world, anything can really go xD And you keep any doubts of me updating at bay cos at the moment I'm really working quite quickly on this fic. I'm like having part of a chapter already done before I even upload the next chapter xD I don't want to upload them too quick ya know.
dark-birdie: Hey! Glad you found the fic! And yes I ADORE Sabel n-n And I think you've found out who two of the judges are, but if you didn't figure out the other one, then I shall be sad and disappointed (another hint)