Well, second update of the day. Hope you like it!

Thanks to all the people who're reading this right now! You are amazing! :D


Chapter Twenty-Four

For Better or for Worse


"Humpty Dumpty?" My voice was nothing higher than a whisper when I repeated the name of the Chain they had sensed in the manor. "There's no such Chain within the squadron sent in by Pandora." If anything it was those who could pass as Oz's friends and some Pandora agents.

"Not from Pandora."

"Then from where?"

"Just—trust us. This Chain's been active for plenty of time. It's causing an interference with the magnetic field in these grounds."

"Stop with the cryptic bullshit and just tell—" Before I could finish my tirade at him, I felt the yank on my chest that brought me quickly to a knee.

"Claire?!"

"This feeling..."

"This is impossible. No Chain's supposed to be able to break my strings!"

It was my suspicion; one of the Magnetic Strings had been cut. Quickly checking for the others I gathered as much information on their whereabouts as I could. Oz was still where he had been a few minutes ago. Break, Sharon, and Alice were still all in the parlor where we had left them. That just left one person left.

"It's Reim." Without a second to hesitate, I started going down the stairs once more trying to reach the floor below were the party was still ongoing, oblivious.

I tried pushing people that were just getting in the way. Screw them if they were cussing and cursing me but I needed to reach Sharon. I wasn't even a few steps when I noticed that Break was no longer among them and that only Sharon and Alice where there.

"Sharon!" I called ignoring the looks everybody around gave me. At hearing my call, she turned with a worried expression. We came together with Alice tagging along. "Something happened—"

"I know. Oz-sama just found a headless corpse." Those words floored me. Although those weren't the news I was talking about, they shocked me all the same. Sharon pulled us away to where nobody would see us and turned to Alice. "I'll send you to him right this inst—"

"Wait!" Alice had startled us when she so suddenly burst out and launched at a kid in a red cloak. The boy yelped and it took me a couple of seconds to recognize from where I had seen him before.

"There's no time for that Miss Alice!"

"Sharon, wait!" But it fell upon deaf ears. She had already conjured Eques without a second thought and transported the two to where Oz was.

"We can't keep second-guessing ourselves." And before I had any say in the matter, I was taken by Eques' shadow and landed somewhere in the mansion. Looking, I took a mental note of my surroundings and noticed that neither Alice nor Oz were anywhere near me. But I thought that Sharon—

"Something interfered with Eques."

"W-What do you mean?"

"We're not sure. But something caused the way to Oz to break and you ended halfway there."

Standing back up, I recognized this as one of the upper floors. Second floor, maybe. If Alice was already with Oz there wasn't much I could do. And since Gilbert would be looking for him with Sharon's help the only thing I could do would be look for him. But that would take too long. And even with all this in my mind, the most important one to me was finding Leo and Elliot.

I had no idea where to start looking though.

Suddenly, a jingling took my mind away from that and made me turn up the stair case. There, menacingly standing, was a man in a red cloak.

"Baskervilles? Here?!"

"They're not Baskervilles," I said through gritted teeth and glared at the medallion that hung from the robe. It was a gold medallion with a picture of a snake coiled around a stake. "They're Yura's men." Hearing more from downstairs, I noted how another was quickly coming up from the main floor towards me. Digging into my skirts, I managed to draw out my dagger.

"This is ludicrous! You can't fight them!"

"I have to try!" Ignoring the tiredness of my body, I feinted towards the first then roundhouse kicked him to gain an opening to stab him. Once he was down, I kicked him down towards the one that was quickly gaining on me. Running down before he could get a hold of his bearings, I went and lunged my dagger to his throat. The other tried scrambling out of my way but didn't get far before I reached for my dagger and quickly plunged it down on hid throat too. With my breathing heavy, I tried gathering myself before Lacrimosa spoke to me.

"You're not well. You can't be recklessly fighting like that!"

"I can't help it. If I hadn't done it they would've shortened my already small lifespan." Going towards the man, I dislodged the dagger from his body and cleaned it on his cloak. It was when I turned to go upward when I noticed something out of the norm. The bodies on the floor reminded me of something that flashed through my eyes. The images changed rapidly through my head and made it hurt but the flashback kept coming. And it wasn't even a full one. They were just mindless scenes of the tragedy that overlapped with this one. Soon the whole image changed to a burning building with dead bodies everywhere. One I recognized well. What the hell was happening?!

Ignoring it as best I could, I went ahead and headed towards the stairs to climb them. The more I ran though, the more dread I felt. Something was really wrong here.

"Over here..."

At first, I thought it had been Lacrimosa but when I turned about to face it something had disappeared around the corner. The glimpse I caught of it told me it was a small child. Before I could stop myself, I chased after her. Taking me around the building she took me to the next staircase that would lead up. Halfway up, she stood there with the rest of the stairs to her right and a wall to her left while she faced me were the bottom stairs were.

Her eyes were a blood red until she blinked and they changed to a dark cobalt. I recognized her; she was me. She stretched out her little hand and tilted her head towards me.

"Don't lose him."

What...? Mindlessly, I reached towards her and barely touched her fingers. When I did the delusion I had broke and instead of having reached for a little girl's hand, I had touched the gloved hand of another woman. A headless corpse.

It wasn't until I saw the head hit and heard the loud thud from it's fall that I knew who it had been.

"Va...nessa...?"

My lungs lost their air. My eyes stung. My heart pounding in my ears. And all was silent.

"Elliot!" Gilbert's voice saying his name brought me out of my stupor and made me turn up towards where the rest of the stairs led. Stepping aside and carefully, I reached the top just enough to see Break handling Elliot roughly by his wrist while the latter was kneeling before the top of the staircase.

"You'd better not resist—" Break called in a cold, demanding voice. He seemed frightening, like what he looked like back at Barma's. "Elliot Nightray. Or should I say...Head-Hunter?"

"What...?" I mumbled completely aghast by his allegations.

"Me...the head-hunter?" Elliot whispered just as perplexed as all of us. "Cut—the crap! Would I have killed my own sister, Vanessa!?"

"Well then, it seems we have no choice." Break suddenly went down and pinned Elliot's arms behind his back, restricting his movement.

"Break, stop this!"

But my bellows were completely ignored. "Gilbert-kun, please, with your own eyes, look—To see whether there is an Illegal Contractor's seal on his chest."

"Break..." Gilbert whispered in shock.

He began explaining about how with Elliot restrained, no contractor of Humpty Dumpty's would be able to funtion. Just then a thought occurred to me. "Humpty—"

"You knew about it?" Break inquired apparently having heard my mindless mumble.

I shook my head before I answered still a bit at a loss. "Lacrimosa and Chronos mentioned that they had felt the presence of a particular Chain that didn't belong to us or Pandora. They mentioned the name of Humpty Dumpty but—" My head shook vigorously at the mere thought. "You have to be wrong!"

"I admit I made a mistake." His confession of failure to something shocked me somewhat. "I had no idea that the children of the House of Fianna would gather here. If I had known, I would have told Oz-kun right away."

"W-What the hell are you talking about!" Elliot called still floored by the information that had been fed to him. I couldn't blame him. It was hard for me too. That was my home they were talking about. "The children of the House of Fianna—illegal contractors!? Then...what about Leo?! What about—" His gaze turn upward towards me. When his eyes landed on mine a memory I had repressed voluntarily surfaced.

"Drink this and you'll forget—"

"No! Leave me alone!"

"They tried it...on me too," my voice went on to ramble by itself. The memory was blurry but I remembered the men that had come, Yura's men, and then—that man. "But they couldn't contract me to another Chain. Not while I was conjoined to another. It was—"

"I interfered."

"I know of that. But, right as of this moment, we have no time to waste. Hurry now, Gilbert-kun. If you don't, the seal will disappear." Elliot suddenly started yelling at them which Break quickly quieted with another of his own. "There's no use on buying yourself time. You—"

"Break!" Gilbert's sudden outburst caught me by surprise and made me turn to him. "Let go of him!"

"Were you even listening to what I said!?" Break inquired a bit hysterically. With that the whole verbal fight broke out. Then when Gilbert mentioned Break's concern with Reim, I remembered something important. But before I could voice my own concerns Elliot won me to the plate.

"Wait! All right. I-I'll do it myself..." Elliot sounded odd as he spoke. I couldn't discern whether he was afraid or just not in his right mind. "So please—At a moment like this...you shouldn't..."

Just then Break's voice yelled out when some footsteps came our way from the balcony above us. "P-Please help me! He's going to kill me! That man...he suddenly—started cutting off h-heads!"

"W-What?!" But when Gilbert spoke the man had already been decapitated, his head rolling down the stairs. It was so close to me that I had to jump back to avoid it tripping myself in the process and falling on all fours on my back.

I covered my mouth as vomit started rising in my throat. What the hell? Why was all this bringing up the memories of that night at Sablier!? All I saw through my eyes were dead bodies of red cloaked men lying on the floor while the manor burned in the night. It was the same...all the same!

"Break! What are you doing?! The murderer is upstairs!" Gilbert called, alerting Break who then threw Elliot a few feet away from me against the railings. He went on ahead without waiting for Gilbert. The latter turned towards us and spoke, "Elliot! Claire! You two stay right!"

Only after they were gone did I began hearing my heavy sobbing over Elliot's ragged breathing. "What the hell's going on!?" His sudden shout made me cringe and jump at the same time.

My thoughts were going rampant with all the overwhelming feelings I was getting. I scrambled backwards, bumping onto Elliot's side just before I tucked myself into a small ball. Voices and screams kept repeating in my head and the sound and smell of burning flesh wouldn't leave me. My hands went to my head trying to minimize the screeches as much as possible but to no avail.

"Jack..." I whispered not knowing what else to do. "Glen-sama—please...don't kill him...—Jack—stop him."

My little mental wreckage was interrupted when I heard rummaging of clothes behind me. Gazing over my shoulder, I saw as Elliot began to unbutton his shirt beyond his undone coat. Crawling over to him, I tried prying his hands off from his clothes. "W-What do you think you're doing?!"

"I have to see, Claire!" He pierced me with his gaze and then spoke more softly this time at me. "Please, Claire...Let me." And no matter what I said he would still do it. Giving up on starting a useless fight, I sat back on my legs and sat there between his spread legs with my stained dress pooling around me.

My gaze remained down while he did that. My hands kept coming to my head as a louder ringing noise kept knocking on it. Shut up. Just be quiet and let me hope that it's not what Break said. It's not true. Elliot—he isn't the headhunter!

When I heard him pull away his shirt, I gazed up still afraid of what I would see. My eyes widened a second before I took in the scene. It was Elliot's chest...and it was bare. There was nothing there. No illegal contractor's seal.

He panted and then sighed in relief. My emotions won over me this time and I launched to embrace him as the tears poured down my face. "I knew he was wrong!" I cried out holding him tighter with my arms around his neck. "I knew you couldn't—you would have never done something like that!" Soon he embraced me back, his hands shaking vigorously while they grasped tightly around me. It hurt how tight he was holding me but that just made this that much more real. This was real. He wasn't the headhunter.

After a few minutes, his grip loosened and he drew back a bit after my crying had subsided as well. He glanced sideways and then a grimace appeared on his face. "What's wrong...?" The moment I asked that I regretted it. Glancing down, I tired not to say anything else that would be stupid and hurtful. "S-Sorry."

"Don't be." His head plunged down and landed on my shoulder with force. His hands rested on my waist. And that instant I felt something warm drip on and down my shoulders. "I-I'm not like you. I can't hold it in. I can't just let it out with words either. S-So please—" His hands traveled up my waist onto my back as he pressed himself, or me, closer. "J-Just stay like this for a while. I-I...don't want to be seen like this by anybody!" Just then he burst into tears making my own resurface as well.

Wrapping my arms around his neck, my hands reached for his back and head and soothingly rubbed them. "It's okay. Let it all out. You'll always have a shoulder to cry on with me." My head turned a bit to the side before I planted a soft kiss on his head, "I'll always be here. Always."

He cried as much as he needed and after what felt like hours, he lifted his head from my shoulder and came to face me. And with that one look I knew something that I had denied all this time.

I love him. This blockheaded, short-tempered, and beautifully kind-hearted man. I love Elliot Nightray. This boy was the one thing that mattered the most in this world to me. And that he felt the same way only gave me such joy to be alive for this. To accept these feelings and finally convey them.

"Claire, I—" I touched his lips with my index finger, silencing him and shaking my head twice.

"You don't have to say anything."

He took my hand in his and brought it up to his face as if savoring the sensation it gave him. "No, I want to. Claire, I love you. With everything I've got and everything I am. You can't even begin to imaging."

"Maybe I can." His eyes came to mine just before I finished my sentence. "...because I love you to—" But my sentence ended short when his lips suddenly touched mine. His hands were warm and huge as they palmed the back of my neck and brought me closer to him. The touch surprised me and made me yelp giving him the entrance we both had seemed to yearn. The softness and warmth consumed me instantly while I tasted the sweetness that he was.

This was overwhelming in such extreme levels. The taste of him and the mere thought of him drove all nightmares away and quieted all voices. In that instant, all I could think of was the boy that I had before me. He wasn't a noble. He wasn't my master. He was only and simply...the one I loved.

In that moment I could have sworn I lost my mind because I began hearing a faint sound. One that I hadn't heard since Cloude's death. One that filled my chest with the same joy and giddiness that the mere thought of Elliot brought to me.

Sadly, it ended with us having to breath some much needed air. But his scorching gaze never left mine while he cupped my cheek. Without meaning to, the words slipped from my lips before I could stop them. "I love you..."

"And I, you." He didn't hesitate to answer. He gave a soft and gently kiss to my forehead before placing his own upon mine. "Always."

"Elliot! Claire! Are you guys all right?" The blissful silence we had was broken when Gilbert came calling for us. We both pulled back and began to get up. Elliot, once up himself, helped me stand and kept our hands together just when Gilbert got there.

"Gilbert...there's no seal on my chest. No seal." Gil then did something he only reserved for his 'big brother' moments. He ruffled Elliot's hair and it strangely reminded me of how his brothers would do it too.

They began accounting for everybody's well being. When it came to Oz though, it seemed that Sharon had lost touch through Eques. Maybe they were somewhere they couldn't be reached. But then—

"Maybe mine can reach." The two turned at my little outburst. "My Magnetic Strings are a little more powerful than Eques so maybe—"

"Can you try?" Gilbert asked, already knowing about my failing condition.

"Yeah," I assure him with a nod and start heading away while letting go of Elliot. "It's this wa—" My body suddenly failed me and dropped me to all fours.

Reaching me first, Elliot kneeled down beside me. "Claire? What's wrong?"

"I can't..."

"What?!" Gilbert called perplexed.

"Something just—something cut the string I had on Oz and Alice. Not just that, they don't appear in my radar." But that wasn't possible. Even if the place wouldn't allow a Chain's power and ended up cutting my strings, I would still be able to sense their magnetic fields in contrast to everybody else's. "I can't pinpoint Oz's location anymore. What's the matter?! Lacrimosa! Chronos?!"

"It's not me! It's not us!"

"Something just drained our power. Cut the strings. Now!"

"Release!" I cried out letting the rest of the strings break voluntarily. The heaviness lifted somewhat leaving me able to stand with Elliot's help.

"It's all right. We'll just have to go looking for them ourselves." As much as I hated the idea too, this was really the only option we had. But as we began descending the stairs towards the main floor, something I had forgotten caught my attention again.

"Gil. I lost contact with Reim."

He turned to me perplexed before saying, "You just cut contact with all."

I shook my head while holding it as another bad feeling crept on me. "No. This was before that. It cut off by itself. Gil, something happened to Reim. And if Break finds him and something bad has happened to him then—" Now I knew why I hadn't told Break about Reim. It wasn't because I couldn't. I wasn't able to. The fear of how he might've reacted kept me from saying anything. But now I regretted even that. What if something...really bad had actually happened?

"We have to find Oz before something else happens."


A bit longer than the last but still short for my standards. Well this will be the last upload of the night! Hope you liked it and stayed tuned for the next chapter! :D