A/N; A link to France's Clouded Skies has been posted on my profile. I've only sang what's been written in the last chapter, so no spoilers there. My voice is derpy. You have been warned. Hope you guys enjoy anyways~ I'll include the link in the closing A/N as well.

I feel like I'm playing favorites and sucking up here, but I feel really honored to know that Akiru-chan is reading this story~ (insertlittlefangirlsqueelhere,) Being a total fantard of The Devil's Canvas and What May Come, I feel like….I dunno, David Gilmour just complimented my band's CD.

OKAY STORY WHAT HAVE YOU.

….do you think I should get a beta, guys? My sentence structure could probably use it..

A Phantom's Canon

Written By Freedom To Rhyme

Track Three; Ostinato

Anne frowned when Ciel emerged from his vocal teacher's apartment. She was certainly not oblivious to the red-tinted eyes and uncharacteristically down-turned eyebrows. Ciel never looked sad in his short -yet long- twelve-year life. Anne had never seen the boy cry, even as a child; he was always smiling brightly at anything that spoke. As of recent, the boy hardly showed any other emotion than extremely miffed. It would be a lie to say she wasn't surprised when the boy climbed into the passenger's seat in a state of forlornness.

"Ciel? Is something the matter? You look frightful…" Anne asked carefully. Whenever Anne ever asked Ciel's state of being, he had always shot her a cold glare, and told her prying was beyond rude. Today, however, the small child looked out the window to his left, avoiding his Aunt's gaze.

"I'm fine," he said flatly. With the tone the boy spoke with, and the obviously distraught facial expression, Ciel might as well have said, "No, actually, I'm dreadful. But I don't want your help, so leave me be,"

Anne sighed. She found it to be a growing trend; Ciel would much rather stay miserable than ask for anyone's help.

The ride was silent. At some point, Anne had turned on the radio. At some other point, Ciel has switched it off in irritation, mumbling something about poor music taste. And thus, the red Bentley remained void of sound. It was not until pulling into the driveway did Anne say,

"Oh, yes. I forgot to mention, but Lizzy phoned while you were at your lesson. She said to tell you she'd be dropping by tomorrow afternoon," Ciel's trademark scowl returned, his eyebrows shifting to their usual arched positions.

"You did tell her no, and that'd I'd be busy, yes?" Anne looked at her nephew.

"Ciel, you are never busy. You lock yourself up in your room doing god knows what," She unlocked the door to the house. "Would it kill you to spend a little time with your cousin? You know how much she adores you,"
"I'm quite aware, and that's what disturbs me…" Ciel said beneath his breath. The affection Lizzy displayed towards him was almost above platonic. Before his aunt could retort, Ciel had already locked himself in the confines of his bedroom.

To any normal onlooker, Ciel's room was relatively normal. A small bed was pushed into a corner without much thought; it seemed to say the occupant of the room did not care for sleep much. A large oak desk sat in front of a window, desk chair facing the door. A desktop computer sat beneath the desk, laptop of the same brand directly in front of the monitor. Several stacks of paper were organized neatly and laid to the sides. Pens, pencils, and other miscellaneous office materials were tucked away neatly into the desk drawers. Bookshelves were the only remaining pieces of furniture. The room smelled of aging paper, which was one of the very few things Ciel found pleasant.

There was nothing in Ciel's room that made it seem out of place. It was a very, standard room.

However, there was absolutely nothing in the room that said it belonged to a twelve-year-old boy. No sport's equipment, no CDs or DVDs. It was also disturbingly tidy.

Ciel situated himself at the desk, the only place that ever felt like his home. The bed in his room was seldom used, for the boy slept at his desk majority of nights. Ciel booted up his desktop computer, and laid his head down against the cool oak. He closed his eyes, only then realizing how much they stung.

From crying, he thought bitterly. The boy bit his lip hard. He felt a familiar metallic taste fill his mouth, and he was satisfied. Ciel began to absently drum his fingers on the surface of his desk. Abruptly, he stopped and glared at his hands. The boy had found himself tapping his fingers to the oddly swung beat of Sebastian's song. Angrily, Ciel pulled his keyboard and mouse closer to him, occupying his hands to prevent the idiotic action from reoccurring. He fired up his Internet browser and placed his hands on his keyboard. He hesitated. …It wasn't like he was curious about him, or interested in him; god no, that would be ridiculous. He was doing this as a precaution…

Ciel frowned. This time, his fingers clicked away at the keyboard, typing out "Sebastian Michaelis" into his internet browser's search bar.

There wasn't much on the man. Ciel wasn't surprised; judging by the amounts of Styrofoam instant noodles cups in his teacher's trashcan, Sebastian was not a popular musician. A few personal sites were yielded, obligatory social networking sites, and a personal webpage. Ciel browsed the personal page, finding little of interest. There were a few samples of original compositions, which Ciel took a brief listen to. He had to admit Sebastian had a very, very soothing tenor voice. However, every composition seemed to be about the same thing, some sort of traumatic, dark event. Ciel found that curious, and committed the piece of information to memory.

Ciel sifted through the man's Facebook. There was not much of interest there either. Sebastian, despite his (Ciel admitted bitterly) unnaturally handsome features, did not have a girlfriend, or many friends in general. Communication on the Facebook page seemed sparse. Perhaps Sebastian was too devoted to the job he really didn't have? Ciel scoffed.

There was not much more the internet could offer. There was one post on Craigslist that contained Sebastian's name. Ciel knew of the many things Craigslist offered, and opted to avoid the link. More than likely, it was an advertisement for vocal instruction. But had it be some other source of income for the man….Ciel did not wish to know.

Clicking through Google's results, Ciel found more useless sites containing other Sebastian Michaelises. Near the end of the search results, buried between some article on Victorian butler attire (Ciel did not even bother questioning Google's search criteria) was a scanned image of a yellowed newspaper clipping. The small, faded text was nearly illegible, but Ciel managed to make out;

13th, January 1996- Missing Person's report. Sebastian Michaelis; aged ten. 157.5cm tall, 39kil. Black hair, pale skin. Peculiar eye color; dark maroon. Last seen in a black sweatshirt and dark blue jeans. Missing since 14th, December 1995.

Ciel blinked. He right-clicked the article, printing the page out. His eye narrowed; it really was a small world, the boy thought.

Thursday afternoon, Ciel refused to board his bus. At home awaited a blonde, pink-clad girl who had an undying need to smother him until breathing was impossible. He vaguely remembered being very close to his cousin as child. In the back of his mind, he somewhat remembered playing house with the girl, and that Lizzie was his wife. Ciel shuddered.

He let his bus home pass, and boarded the next arrival. Ciel was familiar with the route of the 52-B. In the past, he had ridden this bus after school every day. Three stops, just three stops. He was going somewhere familiar, safe, and well known to him. Yet, Ciel could not keep his hands from shaking.

It was just like he remembered; two identical oak trees stood erect at the park's entrance. A few steps in, Ciel saw the familiar bench his where his mother usually sat, waiting for him. There was the open field, where Ciel often played fetch his dog, Sebastian. The scent of freshly-cut grass wafted through the air; Ciel inhaled deeply, allowing a brief smile to play across his lips. It was peaceful. It was calm. It was almost like home.

And then he heard the singing.

A small choir was assembled in the center plaza of the park. There were six or seven boys, all around ten years of age. Several adults were gathered around, enjoying the soothing performance.

Ciel found himself walking in the direction of the singing. He found himself repeating, over and over "It isn't you singing up there….you aren't in that choir anymore...you have nothing to worry about,"

The song of the choir grew louder and Ciel drew closer. He recognized the song; he had sung it before as well. Though the title eluded him, he was sure he could sing along if he chose to. Ciel would not take that chance.

For such a small group, the choir sounded surprisingly complete. They had full, seamless three-part harmonies, and Ciel found himself nodding in approval.

As the piece drew to a close, the audience began a soft applause. The choirmaster turned, bowed, and scanned the crowd happily. Ciel noted that the man was still young, no older than thirty. Yet, he had a full head of white hair. Ciel found this peculiar, and assumed it to be dyed.

It was then that the choirmaster locked Ciel's gaze. His eyes were a frightening shade of violet, and looked at Ciel with the intensity that could only be recognition.

The choir swarmed their master happily, smiles plastered on their faces with glee.

"Master Landers! We did good today, didn't we?" The man's gaze was reluctantly averted from Ciel to look at the other boy clinging to his side. Ciel took the moment to run.

Ciel ran out of the park, and in an unknown direction. He could not go back to the bus stop; his bus home would not arrive for another seventeen minutes. The boy turned left, and ran straight. He did not know what he was running from, or if he was even running from anything. Ciel just ran.

At some point, Ciel had turned to look behind him. Panic arose when he saw a white-clad figure disappear into an alleyway. Ciel was torn between running even faster, or slowing to a walk to make him appear oblivious to his follower. The child took in his surroundings. To assure he was indeed being followed, Ciel took unorthodox turns into narrow alleys, and looped around buildings in circles. Each time he turned, the white clad figure was not very far behind.

Not very good at stalking…Ciel thought to himself humorlessly. He sped up his pace to an accelerated walk. Memories swam in Ciel's eyes, and he carelessly tried to push them away. He would NOT let that happen again.

Ciel remained alert of his surroundings, looking for any sort of store that was open. Stupidly, Ciel had run into a deserted area of town, perhaps a storage district. He was coming close to breaking down in panic. But Ciel would not allow himself to stoop so low.

Around a few more alleys, and past a few more streets, Ciel saw a lit shop window. The child checked behind him; the man seemed to still be behind a few corners. Breaking into a sprint, Ciel burst through the shops doors. There was one person in the shop; a dark head was ducked behind the register. Breathing a sigh of relief, Ciel sunk to his knees. He was safe. No matter how dumb his pursuer may have been, no one was stupid enough to attempt anything in public.

It took Ciel a moment to register that he had stepped inside a music store. He rolled his eyes; of all the stores he could have ended up in…

Ciel approached the counter, determined to tell the shopkeeper of his potential pursuer.

"Can I help you?" Ciel stopped. He frowned. The voice was unmistakable.

"It really is a small world, isn't it, Sebastian?"

Sebastian blinked at the small, slate-haired boy standing behind the opposite side of the counter. Of all the people that could have walked into this store…Sebastian almost found the incident too coincidental to be real coincidence.

"What are you doing here?" He stated flatly.

"Someone's following me," Sebastian could almost see the cliché dripping from the ceiling; he was almost tempted to look up and check for leaks. He pulled the boy behind the counter.

"Who?" Ciel shook his head.

"I don't know. I went to the park, and there was a boy's choir performing. Their choirmaster gave me a strange look, and he followed me here. I didn't know him," Ciel hesitated. "Well, I don't think I did. Something about his eyes seemed familiar, though,"

"…uh huh," Sebastian looked at the boy skeptically. He glanced briefly toward the storefront. Suddenly, the man pulled the younger boy to the ground.

"What the hell?" Ciel shrieked.

"Shush!" Sebastian hissed, gloved finger pressed to his lip. "Stay down. I think I see your stalker,"

Sebastian hovered briefly over the boy, a position that would be considered indecent out of context. Before standing, the man slipped a pair of dark sunglasses over his eyes. Ciel did not say anything, though he could not help thinking that wearing sunglasses indoors was even more suspicious than not wearing them at all. Ciel did not think as to why Sebastian would also have to hide his face from the white-clad man.

Sebastian narrowed his eyes at the figure passing back and forth on the street outside the store. More than once, he stopped to peer inside. Sebastian clenched a fist, nails scraping against his palms. He prayed the sunglasses and distance between them would leave him unrecognized.

It would be so much easier, Sebastian thought to himself, just to have killed him before, like everyone else. He clawed the counter. If he took one step inside that door, Sebastian could not promise he'd stay law-abiding.

The man stood outside the shop, facing the street. He seemed to be contemplating something. It seemed days had gone by before he finally crossed to the other side and walked out into the distance.

Sebastian visibly deflated, hunching over the counter. He peeled the sunglasses off his face and tossed them to the side.

"You can get up now. He's gone,"

"You're sure?"
"Positive,"
Ciel stood up and stretched. Like a cat arching its back, Sebastian noted. He watched contently, biting his tongue all the while.

Ciel looked to his teacher.

"You seemed to know him. Any idea why he followed me all this way?"

Sebastian looked to his student, a grim look etched into his face.

"I can think of a few good reasons…"

AN; Yeah. I made fun of my own cliché so you don't have to waste effort doing it yourself. Honestly, I think making fun of myself was the best part of this chapter xD I don't really like this one that much, it's more a transitional chapter than anything else, I had some trouble actually writing it, since I couldn't think of anything good….

Anyways, here's the link to the song again. Just replace the (dot) and (underscore) stuff.

http(colon)(slash)(slash)(slash)hotlink(slash)c6mu6w481x(slash)france(underscore)s(underscore)clouded(underscore)skies(dot)mp3

Also the link is on my profile. You have to copy and paste it, I couldn't get it to work ay other way…So if you don't want to fill in all the shit from above, just head to my profile and copy it from there.

Ostinato; a repeat of a section of a musical composition