Woo! Another chapter! Flashback time!
"Big brother!" called a young girl, about fourteen years old as she ran up to two slightly older people.
"What is it, Natalia?" asked a tall boy. He had beige-blond hair, a large nose and violet eyes.
"I want to walk next to you, Ivan! Not Katyusha!" cried the girl, her long platinum blond hair covering her dark blue eyes even with a white ribbon as a headband.
"You can both walk next to me, da?" said Ivan, gesturing at the empty space beside him.
Natalia wiped off her eyes and fell in step with her two siblings. Her breath frosted in the cold air, but she was used to the cold.
"I would like to go to America one day," said Katyusha out of the blue.
"Da, it would be nice to go someplace new," agreed Ivan, nodding.
Suddenly he stopped short, gazing sadly at two small children playing happily in the snow.
"What's wrong big brother?" asked Natalia, concerned for Ivan.
"It just makes me sad when I see two people happy and having fun together," replied Ivan, walking again.
For the next few moments, the three were silent; the only sound the crunching of snow underfoot. Their breath frosted in the cold air; smoky clouds billowing in front of them.
"Look big brother! A sunflower in the middle of winter!" exclaimed Natalia, trotting over to the edge of the sidewalk, where a small sunflower was struggling against the cold. Both Ivan and Katyusha stopped, curious.
Just as Natalia turned around with the sunflower in hand, a car swerved, out of control towards her two siblings.
"Look out!" screeched Natalia as the car swerved towards them.
But the warning was too late. Both Ivan and Katyusha were thrown through the air and slammed into the wall of an empty building.
The sunflower fell into the snow.
"BIG BROTHER! BIG SISTER!" screamed Natalia as she raced over to where her siblings were.
She shook Katyusha, hoping to get her to open her eyes. "Katyusha, Katyusha! Wake up, Katyusha!" sobbed Natalia, hovering over her sister.
A small trickle of blood ran down her forehead.
"No. No, no, NO!" screamed Natalia as she stumbled away from the corpse.
She turned around and stumbled over to where Ivan was. "Ivan . . ." whispered Natalia, afraid that her brother was already gone.
At the sound of his sister's voice, Ivan's eyes flickered open. "N-natalia . . ." whispered Ivan, his violet eyes finding Natalia's blue ones.
"Big brother, don't speak! Save your energy!" cried Natalia, gripping one of Ivan's hands.
"S-sun . . ." Ivan managed. He was struggling to say something else, but nothing came out.
"Here," said Natalia, handing Ivan the sunflower that she had just raced back to get.
" . . . h-happy . . . America . . ." said Ivan, his eyes drifting back to the two small children playing in the snow.
"Big brother!" cried Natalia, holding onto her brother with all of her strength. "Don't leave me!"
"N-nyet . . . not . . ." said Ivan, but the rest of the words trailing off. He stilled, his violet eyes gazing up at the sunless sky, unblinking.
"BIG BROTHER!" screamed Natalia, sobbing into her brother's corpse.
The sound of sirens soon came to her ears, and she staggered to her feet. She needed to get to America. That was what Big brother had wanted. Natalia reached down and took the scarf from her brother's neck.
"Big brother, you'll live on within me, da?" said Natalia, wrapping the scarf around her own neck.
Natalia raced home and burst through the door. She grabbed one duffel bag and shoved everything into it. As she passed the door to her brother's room, she went inside and took the spare set of clothes that was on the bed.
Out into the darkening night ran a lone figure, away from the tragedy that had just struck. Like a thief Natalia stole between houses and in alleyways until she reached the port.
Without hesitating, she raced up onto the closest ship.
It had been several years since Natalia had ran away from her homeland. She had finally made her way over to the East Coast. New York, to be exact.
She had worked many different jobs over the years, but now she was a landscape artist. The job paid well, and she made enough to live comfortably. But she never forgot.
Every night she dreamed about that awful day so many years ago. She remembered her big brother dying in her arms. She kept her brother alive inside herself though. They were one in the same, or so she believed.
Natalia watched those around her very closely. Whenever she saw two people together, she remembered the unhappiness it had caused her brother.
She decided it was time to make her brother happy once again. She began planning and watching, looking for a target. The first to be killed were some blond siblings. They had been much too happy together.
How Natalia had enjoyed torturing them, making one watch while the other was in pain, unable to do anything. How it made her happy when the screams of pain told her they were no longer happy together. How it would have made her brother happy to see that he no longer had to be unhappy. How screams of pain turned into silence at the last stroke of midnight.
After that first killing she had kept on going. Eight were dead now, but that wasn't nearly enough to make her brother happy. Not even close.
Natalia stood outside of the door and listened. She was dressed in her big brother's clothes. She missed him so much.
"You jerk! I though you had left me!" said one voice, upset.
"It's alright, love. We'll be all right," replied a different voice, though it seemed bleak and hopeless to Natalia despite the encouraging words.
"Where's Dad?" asked the first voice, his voice shaking.
"I'm not sure love. But I know he'll come and save us," replied the other voice.
There was a pause and some sniffling; one of them was crying.
"I don't want to die," cried the first person, his voice cracking in the middle of the sentence.
"We're not going to die. Not here!" replied the other person savagely, as if someone had activated a mother's protective instinct on the man.
"B-but the lady on the n-news s-said that no one e-ever lived past the t-twenty-fourth hour," sobbed the first voice.
Natalia slammed the door open.
"Time to begin, da?" said Natalia, though inside she was thinking, 'Big brother, do I kill them? There are three, just like it was back then. Three . . . with one left behind . . .'
Alfred sighed. He had been sitting in the police station for hours, being questioned thoroughly by the two brothers. Apparently, when they had been called, his family had already been gone for over an hour. The only thing they had found as evidence was a small bit of lead pipe, chipped off of something.
The piece of metal was in forensics now, being scanned for any trace of the killer. Every now and then a police officer would pass by and shoot him a sad look. They had all gone through this routine before.
Inspector Bondevik walked up to him saying, "Mr. Jones, please come with me. We have some information, though it's not much."
Alfred got up without saying a word and followed the man into a small room filled with science equipment.
Officer Bondevik looked up from a small computer screen as his brother walked in with Alfred.
"Inspector, Officer, what did you find out about my family?" asked Alfred, still feeling numb.
"We've traced the origin of the lead, and found that it was manufactured in Russia, about ten years ago," said Officer Bondevik, turning back to the screen.
"What does that have to-"
"Then we tracked the metal using trace elements found in certain areas of any given place," said Inspector Bondevik, cutting off Alfred mid-speech.
"Well where does it come from then?" asked Alfred, getting impatient.
The two brothers looked at each other, sharing something that Alfred couldn't really pick up on. They remained silent.
"Inspector? Off-"
"Call me Emil," said Officer Bondevik, cutting Alfred off.
"Well then, Inspector, Emil," said Alfred, putting strain on the officer's name. "Where. Is. My. Family?"
Both of the other men looked surprised at Alfred's vicious sounding demand.
"Well, the trace minerals pinpoint the location to here," said Emil, pointing at a map on the computer screen.
Alfred looked at where the officer was pointing and blanched. "What? B-but that's-"
"Ground Zero," said the Inspector, finishing Alfred's sentence for him.
"But how? There's nothing there! Not after-"
"Underground. That's the only explanation," said Emil, cutting Alfred off.
"So what are we still doing here? Shouldn't we be on our way?" asked Alfred, furious.
"We don't know where the entrance is. There's also a possibility that it's heavily guarded. We don't want to kill everyone here, now do we?" replied the Inspector coldly.
"Well . . . there's always-"
"No! We swore that we'd never go back to him! You know how he is!" snapped the Inspector, cutting his brother off.
"What is it? If it could help, then tell me!" said Alfred looking alternately between the two brothers, wondering what on Earth they could possibly be so worked up over.
"We might be able to find out the entrance location via a . . . contact," said Emil hesitantly.
"Then by all means find out!" yelled Alfred.
"You don't understand. The man's a double-crossing rat. He'll do anything for the right pay," snarled the Inspector, disgusted.
"JUST CALL HIM!" screamed Alfred, furious at both brothers.
Emil looked nervously at his brother as if asking permission.
"Fine. Call him. I just don't want to talk to the guy," said Inspector Bondevik, turning his back on the other men.
Emil pulled out his cell phone and hesitantly dialed a number. "Andersen Densen there?" asked Emil, waiting for an answer. "No, tell him he needs to answer this call," answered Emil in response to the other person's question. "No, no, not about that," said the officer quickly. "No, tell him . . . ah, what was it? Oh! 'It's springtime and I'm being invaded by unicorn fluff and glitter bugs,'" said Emil awkwardly after pausing to listen to the person on the other end of the phone, who seemed to be paranoid.
"What is he talking about?" asked Alfred, bewildered.
The Inspector just shook his head, indicating that it would be better to just not ask.
Emil sighed, "Finally! Densen, I need to call in a favor." He waited as a loud voice buzzed from the phone. "No, remember last time? I paid for all of your drinks," replied the officer, somewhat annoyed. "You can't threaten me with your axe over the phone!" Emil shouted indignantly. "I need a location. To a secret base," said Emil, calmer now. "Where? Well it's only under Ground Zero!" laughed the officer, venom lying beneath the mirth.
"You," breathed Arthur, pulling himself in front of Peter.
The killer tilted his head and said, "Nyet, I am not who they think I am."
"What do you mean?" asked Arthur over a sobbing Peter, though already suspecting whom it was.
In response, the killer just took off the soviet hat. A curtain of platinum blond hair fell down. A pair of dark blue eyes stared at Arthur.
"I am Natalia Arlovskaya," said Natalia, watching Arthur.
"You jerk! It doesn't matter who you are! You'll still be a jerk!" said Peter, who had stopped crying.
"Peter, stop that," commanded Arthur, fear in his voice.
"But mom, why?" whined Peter, struggling to turn around and look at Natalia.
"He fears for you, that is why," said Natalia, speaking before Arthur had the chance to.
"Why would he be more afraid for me?" asked Peter, confused.
"Because of what she is," said Arthur coldly. "Years ago, she arranged for the death of her two siblings, then fled to America when she feared capture."
For those of you who don't know, Andersen Densen=Denmark. And Lukas Bondevik=Norway and Emil Bondevik=Iceland. Please review!