Summary: America has been lured to a dangerous place and following after him Canada, Japan, and England are now caught in a deadly game. The objective: Find America before it's too late. The consequence for failure? Death.
Disclaimer: I think I've been forgetting to put up disclaimers but it ought to be pretty obvious that I don't own anything.
Warning: Yaoi, horror, gore, angst, sadistic behavior, cursing, human names, and just some stupid shit.
Chapter Two: Riddle Me This
Matthew finally made his way out of the building he was in and turned around, curious to see what kind of building had cells in it. It was a small building labeled 'Sheriff's Station' and Matthew felt a little foolish for questioning it. He walked forward into the thick fog, pondering the clue that the dead woman had given him.
"'The place children once laughed'..." He quoted out loud to himself thinking deeply. "Okay where are there lots of kids..." Matthew paused in the road, contemplating this question. "School? The park? Daycare? Where would any of those places be here anyway?" Matthew groaned in despair, looking around himself and seeing nothing but fog and dark shadows on the edges of buildings that seemed to barely exist. A loud and horrible screech sounded suddenly, causing Matthew to clasp his hands over his ears quickly in fear and surprise. "What the hell was that? !" Matthew whispered to himself shakily. The shriek sounded again and in a split second decision, he ran toward where he last heard the sound come from. As he ran, he had to change course multiple times after almost colliding with a few blood-spattered buildings.
Matthew was running down an alleyway when he was hit with the thick, familiar stench of blood and rotting meat. Matthew staggered, pausing for a moment before strengthening his resolve and continuing forward- at an admittedly slower pace. Once he reached the end of the alleyway, he almost dropped to his knees at the sight that greeted him. It was a fountain of blood and body parts. Matthew fought the urge to vomit because of the horrible stench, and just the scene itself. Matthew was about to turn around when he heard heavy footsteps in front of him. He snapped his eyes forward, looking for the source of it, and saw nothing even though the footsteps continued in a slow, steady rhythm. Noticing something out of the corner of his eye, Matthew's eyes were drawn to the cobblestone street.
Matthew's eyes widened when he saw bloody boot prints forming as though someone were walking, even though he could see no one there. Matthew took a staggering step back, completely terrified and ran in the opposite direction. He ran for such a long time that he was very much out of breath when he finally stopped. Looking around himself, he saw that he was in a large childrens park. There was a merry-go-round, a see-saw, a set of swings, and a slide. Matthew relaxed, seeing that no one was around... Until he heard soft giggling. Taking in the park again, he noticed that... though no wind was blowing, and there was no one in the park, the merry-go-round was spinning slowly and a few of the swings were swaying back and forth while others were at a dead stop.
Matthew swallowed hard, shaking a little as the giggling became louder and the merry-go-round began to spin faster. Matthew recalled the clue that the woman had left him with and stepped forward into the park. Everything came to a sudden, dead, stop and Matthew froze as well. Suddenly a loud wail sounded. This wail was a mix of many voices of children. A huge gust of wind kicked up and Matthew was suddenly able to see many young children screaming and running around in fear. Matthew was at a loss as to what to do and took another step forward.
Once again everything stopped; all the children in the park froze where they were for a few moments before turning to face him so suddenly he almost fell over in surprise. When Matthew took in the sight of all the children, he began to shake harder. All of the children were missing their eyes; blood seeped from their empty sockets. Matthew once again felt like he was going to be sick, though he dared not take his eyes off the children. Matthew took a careful step forward, trying not to make any noise. He was unsuccessful, as even though his step was very quiet, the children heard him anyway and wailed loudly. The children continued to wail as they floated over to the center of the park, swirling together and combining into one large gelatinous grayish barely-there mass with many bleeding faces caught in wails of agony. The giant mass sprouted arms and legs, standing up and facing him threateningly.
"Shit." Matthew cursed; the sound caused the thing to scream in a combination of all the childrens' voices, throwing and bending it's arms at its sides to scream more fully. Matthew turned around to run, only to be halted by the sight of a massive metal barricade. "No! No, no, no!" Matthew pleaded with the barrier, running his hands along in denile that it was even really there. He heard the creature's screams getting closer and turned around to see that the creature was now directly in front of him. He was so shocked he almost did not move in time to avoid the giant arm that came down to crush him. He ended up diving to the side, hitting the ground with a soft whump; his heart jumped at the sound of breaking rock and bending metal. He turned and saw that the creature had left a massive dent in both the ground... And metal he had just been standing in front of.
Horrified, Matthew scrambled to get up and find a way out of the park and away from the creature. Matthew ran, desperately trying to find a way out, but he was only met with more buildings or metal barricades. He could hear the creature wailing, screaming, and crushing things behind him and tried to run faster. He was forced to run into the middle of the park again and looked around for anything he could use to help himself. As he looked around for something, he saw that there was one child sitting alone on the swings. She had dark brown hair held in pig tails and a bloody stab wound on her chest; this girl was not missing her eyes and watched him closely, Matthew had no idea what to make of it. The little girl smiled at him and pointed to a spot in front of her. Matthew looked over to where she pointed, surprised to see a sword laying on the ground. Matthew turned his head back to the girl, only to discover that she was gone.
Matthew was so busy paying attention to the girl that he had completely lost track of the creature that was chasing him and so was shocked when he felt something heavy smash into him, throwing him forward hard. Matthew rolled in the dirt and gasped in pain as the momentum from the force of the hit finally stopped. Matthew lay gasping in pain for a minute, trying to see through the haze of pain he was in. Matthew tried to get up and blinked back tears of pain. The moment his vision cleared, he saw that the sword was laying not an inch away from him and sighed in relief. The sword was a rather old-looking saber and Matthew could only hope that it would work against this horrible creature. Hearing the creature screech again, Matthew's hand shot forward and he snatched up the sword before standing up quickly and falling into a familiar stance. He faced the creature with more confidence than he felt.
The creature stepped forward towards him quickly and Matthew ducked a large, but clumsy swipe at him, and thrust the blade up and into the creature, stabbing into one of the faces that adorned its body. The creature stumbled back, its screaming louder than before. The face began to fall off, forming back into a child; the child stood up quickly and ran away sobbing. Matthew was so surprised by this, he gaped for a moment before cursing and ducking another swipe that the creature took at him. Matthew tried to stab at the creature again, but the creature jumped back when it missed, just barely avoiding getting stabbed again. Matthew did not let up, however, and continued forward, slashing at the creature. This time, slicing through three faces at once and causing three more children to run with loud sobbing.
The creature became slower and more clumsy as it lost children to Matthew's swordsmanship until the creature had begun to try and run away from Matthew all together. Matthew chased after the creature, determined to defeat it. Then when only two faces were left in the giant mass, the creature began to sob and try to kill him again. Matthew was easily able to dodge the creatures clumsy and slow attacks and managed to slice at both faces at once. The creature wailed in agony and began to melt until only two small sobbing children were left sitting on the ground. Matthew stepped forward, close to the children, feeling a little guilty for making them cry and one of the children stood quickly and ran away abandoning the other child who tried to crawl away.
"No! Please don't hurt me anymore!" The little boy begged, crying hard. Matthew really felt guilty then.
"It's okay, I won't hurt you! Please don't cry!" Matthew replied gently. The child stopped trying to crawl away and sniffled, turning his little bloodstained face towards Matthew.
"Y-you promise you won't hurt me anymore?" The boy asked, sniffling miserably.
"I promise. I'm sorry I hurt you but I'm just trying to find my brother." Matthew told him. The little boy scrunched his face thoughtfully and stopped crying.
"Your brother?" The little boy asked curiously.
"Yes. This strange woman took him away from me. She took my friends away too and I want to find them so we can go home." Matthew explained. The little boy frowned at him.
"Nobody but you has come here in a very long time. There was only one person who came here before you and she played a game with us. She even taught us a fun riddle." The boy told him excitedly.
"A riddle?" Matthew asked hopefully.
"Yes," The boy replied nodding quickly. "She said that if anyone ever lost something they should know this riddle; Ever-wet and always moving. Made to grind and turn to flowers. I have no beast that is always turning. All with wood that gives me my powers...But I dunno what it means or how it would help. None of us can figure out the answer." The boy informed him, shrugging helplessly. "Sorry."
"No, you did a good job. That really does help me. Thank you so much for telling me." Matthew thanked profusely. The little boy beamed at him and ran off to the merry-go-round, giggling. Matthew heard more giggling and saw the other children reappearing and going back to playing as they were before he had ever stepped into the park. Matthew smiled at the scene and turned around to try and figure out how to get out of the park and blinked as he noticed that the barricades were gone. Matthew shook his head and repeated the riddle to himself thoughtfully. "Ever-wet and always moving...So part of it is always in water I guess...Made to grind and turn to flowers...turn to flowers? Flour? So...it makes flour? I have no beast that is always turning...All with wood that gives me my powers...Animals don't turn it, it's made of wood, and it makes flour...Is it...a watermill?" Matthew mused to himself. Matthew began to walk down the street again, hoping to be able to find the watermill. Frowning thoughtfully, Matthew looked back into the park and noticed that he could not see the children again.
"Who was that little girl and why did she help me?" Matthew wondered out loud. Shaking his head Matthew turned back to the empty street and continued on his way down it. "To the watermill then..." Matthew tightened his hold on the saber in his hand and took more confident strides forward, feeling just a little more confident than he had before. "I'm coming Al..."
TBC...
Yami Ryo: Special thanks to my beta akuoni! And dedicated to my bff esyas123!