Chapter 7: Phone's Incertus Orbis

"Ah! THAT room!" Ciel suddenly exclaimed and clapped while he was walking up the stairs to the porch. "That red door!" Then he continued his way up to his room. As soon as he entered the door, he saw a man fiddling with the TV on top of the customized credenza. Ciel froze and thought to flee as quiet as possible; the man had white hair and that attribute alone was enough for the boy to be alert of his pursuer. "Uh-oh… Pluto…"

Sebastien began to growl and this brought the man's attention to them. Ciel frowned a bit at Pluto's appearance; his hair was curly and well-groomed; his eyes were calm and relaxed and they were lavender in color; his face was smooth and angelic; his clothes were all white starting from his shirt down to his shoes, though the vest underneath the coat was a light purple; there was also a silver chain trailing from his pants pocket up to the lowest pocket of his vest. All in all, this new Pluto looked more attractive and civilized. But Ciel knew better than to be deceived by appearance. He broke into a run to escape but the man had quickly seized his hand. "Help!" He yelled.

But the man did not say "dolly" or giggle in a demented manner. Instead, he talked in a silky and civilized voice. "Is something troubling you, young master?"

Ciel's heart raced and started panicking. "Let go of me!"

But the man did not let go of him. Instead, he pulled the boy close to him as if in embrace and placed his free arm on the boy's back. "Don't you remember me?"

Ciel stared at the man's face and blushed. Mainly because he had recognized the man who had saved him twice from injury; also his blush deepened because of the way the man had held him close and how their bodies were too close to each other. But still, the boy found it hard to pull away since he felt comfortable and safe. "N-no… I don't t-think so…" Ciel stuttered.

"I understand since you were slipping out of consciousness on both circumstances." The man chuckled lightly. "Let me introduce myself once again, I am Ash, the castle's keeper."

"Keeper?" Ciel whispered. "Oh! I remember now! I-it's you!… I'm sorry!"

"Why should the young master say sorry, I wonder?" Ash chuckled softly. Ciel blushed harder and mentally kicked himself in shame. "I… I thought you were Pluto." He answered.

"I understand, since we may have a resemblance when we are viewed from behind." Said Ash and released the boy from his hold. "And about Pluto; forgive me, young master but I could not seem to find him around the place. He might come after you unawares and I'm getting worried."

"Ermm… that's alright." Ciel said. Thankfully, his blush was starting to fade and he was now comfortable with talking to the man. But when Ash's eyes scanned him from head to foot, his blush returned once more.

"You're quite a mess, young master."

Ciel consciously looked at his already stained clothes and started to pat and wipe away the dirt on the clothes. "Ermm… sorry…"

Ash sighed a bit and brought out a lavender scented white handkerchief. "It's not recommended for you to get stained by unnecessary filth." He said as he began to wipe the boy's face gently. Ciel blushed harder now that Ash's face was much closer to him. Sebastien kept his eyes grudgingly locked on the man.

"There. Now you're much better to look at." Ash said as he finished wiping away the grime from the boy's face. Then, he held Ciel's hand and placed the handkerchief neatly on his palm. "Just in case you might need this, please take it and use it to satisfy your needs."

"Ah, but…" Ciel protested but was silenced when Ash knelt before him on one knee. "I am your servant, young master and I only wish your good well-being. So please accept my offer, I humbly ask of you."

"Th-thanks…" The boy mumbled. He wasn't used to be treated highly like this but he felt contently better that he was well-cared of. "I'll take care of it! But…please stand up…"

Ash noticed the boy's behavior. "Did I put you in unnecessary unease?"

"A-a… a bit…" Ciel put the handkerchief inside his shorts pocket. "You don't have to do that…"

"But this is customary, young master." Said Ash as he stood up. "As you servant, I must pay you due respect."

"But a simple bow is enough. That's all, I ask… please…"

"If that's what you wish." Ash bowed along with a charming smile directed at the boy. "A bow, then."

What intrigued Ciel was the fact that he seemed to have been captivated by the man through his charms and actions. This was the first time that somebody had him stirred up and conscious of appearance and flustered in sight… although, the feeling was quite familiar. But nevertheless, the infatuation bothered him. Homosexuality wasn't quite accepted in society… or maybe by the world at most. But maybe he was just thinking too far ahead or even exaggerating or implicitly assuming…

"What were you doing with that TV anyway?" Ciel asked all of a sudden to interrupt himself in his pondering session.

"I'm repairing the whole thing." Ash answered. "Its whole mechanism inside had malfunctioned many years ago and I left it unattended. I thought you might need this to occupy your spare time."

"Ah, no. That's alright. I don't watch TV that much anyway. And besides, the entire castle is interesting enough for me to be occupied."

Ash withdrew the tools that were placed around the TV. "If that is so, then."

Ciel noticed that Sebastien continued to growl at the man while they were speaking. "Sebastien!" The boy scolded in a firm voice and a slight glare. The wolf's response was immediate however, his ears remained laid-back and his tail was hanging straight, parallel to the floor; meaning that his suspicion remained at the man.

"Ah." Ash looked at the hound. "I see you've acquainted yourself with that beast, young master."

Ciel blushed once more. Why was he reacting like this? WHY?!!

"And it appears that you have done well in domesticating him." Ash continued as he looked at the wolf. "Wolves are proud and stubborn creatures and would prefer assertive dominance than a kind and gentle assurance. And from what I have learned, wolves are very difficult to tame since they originated from the wild…"

"Wait…" Ciel's eyes widened in shock and looked at Sebastien. "A wolf?! Are you saying that I have tamed a wolf?!"

"Of course." Ash nodded. "See his eyes and his mane? They are different from the common canine, indeed."

"Come here." Ciel called Sebastien to his side and knelt down to him until they were both leveled eye-to-eye. "So, you're a wolf then? No wonder you're so hard-headed."

Sebastien snorted in disappointment. "And you just noticed that? You're a bit slow, aren't you?"

"The young master must be a talented tamer, I wonder." Ash hinted. "Despite me having ownership of that hound, you, on the other hand, were able to domesticate him."

"He is yours?"

"Yes. But since he now obeys your command, you have just won his trust in you." Ash said. "I resign my ownership of him; he is now yours."

"But…"

"My own pet doesn't trust me, so why should I still have him? Trust is the most important thing that forges a bond. You are the one he trusts most. So you should definitely have ownership of him."

"Well…" Ciel demurely looked at Sebastien. "Would you mind?"

Ash remained silent for a while. "No. I assure you I won't."

Ciel embraced the wolf tightly. Then, another round of silence prevailed.

"I'm interested at how you had domesticated that beast." Ash said. "I had acquired him a few months ago and he simply refuses to obey every command I issue. He is a very wild creature as you can see and prefers to follow his own will."

"He definitely is." Ciel said. "Well, to be honest I kind of threatened him into obeying my commands…"

"Would you specify how?" Ash curiously asked. Ciel blushed a deeper shade of red.

"I…I would glare at him… and let my temper get the best of me." The boy rubbed his arm demurely. "You might not want to see that…"

"Really?" Ash laughed. "The young master seems to be a gentle natured sort, it seems. Now, I wonder what the young master looks like when he displays his rage…" He brought his hand to his chin and made a thoughtful face. "I have tried displaying my anger to the hound many times, but still he refuses to obey me."

Ciel's face was very red.

"Perhaps your face fascinates the hound more than anything."

"Of course, since his face is more pleasing to look at, compared to you." Sebastien commented.

"Ah… uhmm…" Ciel stammered. The conversation was becoming awkward. All the more, his heart raced as if he was panicking.

"Well that must be true. Since…" Ash approached the boy and ran his hand through the hair that framed the boy's face. "The young master has such a beautiful face. All the more is that beauty intensified when he displays his expressions."

"Mmmn… S-stop…" Ciel gently pried away the hand that had started caressing his face. "Do I… r-really…?"

Ash bent closer and whispered to his ear. "Most definitely."

Sebastien grew annoyed and tugged hard at Ciel's coat-tail. That action caused Ciel to be dragged away by the wolf quite rudely. "Sebastien!" The boy protested but the wolf continued to drag him away from Ash. "We have something to attend to besides flirting to one another. Now move it, Ciel!" The wolf thought as he continued to drag the boy up to the bedroom door; he didn't care if he was already dragging the boy on the floor.

"Sebastien, stop!" Ciel scolded and pried his coat tail away from the wolf's teeth. "What's gotten into you, boy? Excited to go?"

"Of course! I'm excited to get you away from that man with all costs! He's seducing you for Pete's sake!!!" Sebastien tugged his coat-tail once again.

"Ok, ok!" Ciel said in resign. "See you, Sir Ash!" He said with one last glance at the castle keeper and then, let himself get dragged by the irritated wolf.

Ash couldn't resist a chuckle. "Ah, how adorable you are, Ciel…" He said to himself.

Ciel returned to the strange red door after passing through the fairy park. He examined the strange cavity again and compared it to the marionette he retrieved outside the castle earlier. The marionette's control handle and the cavity on the door matched perfectly. "Perhaps this is the key to this door?" He examined the door further and noticed the picture of a black stick figure below the odd-shaped cavity. The black stick figure matched the marionette's shape although in miniscule size. "Definitely..." He inserted the marionette's handle into the cavity like a key. The handle sagged into the cavity until it dragged the marionette to the picture's level. Then, Ciel heard a click and the door mechanically swung open.

"What an odd way to make a door open with a marionette don't you think, Sebastien?" Ciel said. "You know what? Sometimes this castle has a lot of nonsensical things around. But that's what makes this place interesting…!"

"Hey, hey…"

Ciel entered the room but he didn't feel comfortable with the way the room was decorated and lighted. The room was bathed in dim red light and the feel was quite hellish and demented. Also, the most disturbing thing of all were the numerous figures of dolls and marionettes hung up around the walls; wooden puppets, stuffed dolls, china dolls, antique dolls, bisque dolls, metallic puppets and just every kind of dolls and puppets that Ciel haven't seen before. Some of the dolls were in perfect condition and others were, disturbingly, stabbed with knives, daggers and nails as if they were there for target practice. Also, some of the puppets were also dismantled and most of their parts were connected in the wrong places; like, the neck should be connected with the head and not the leg and the like.

"I don't like this place. Maybe this is Pluto's exhibit of sorts…" Ciel said as he ran his hand at a nearby antique doll hanging on the wall. He took a look at the wooden gate of sorts in front of him and wondered why that was there. There was a corridor leading to the other side of the room, though. So why is there a need of a gate to be able to see the other side of the room? "Sebastien, let's go!"

The pair followed the corridor until Ciel noticed the red rug inconveniently placed on the floor. "What's this doing here?"

And then, Sebastien started to growl; his leering red eyes glared hard at the wall without any dolls or puppets hanging on it. Instead, the wall adorned what seemed to be a set of closed, bulging, silver eyeballs in varying sizes. The eyeballs looked so real that it could open any second. "What's wrong?" Ciel asked. But he shook his head a while later upon realizing that the wolf could not talk.

"Don't go there!!! It's DANGEROUS!!!" Sebastien began to bark furiously when Ciel stepped his foot on the red rug. The wolf began to pull at the boy's tail coat again for good measure to show his definite disagreement with Ciel's actions. Ciel grew irritated at the wolf's habitual pulling. "Now that's enough pulling there, Se- !"

Ciel stopped speaking abruptly when a couple of darts went whizzing across his face. He froze in shock as he saw the darts stick dangerously on the exhibit of dolls opposite the eyeballs. "A trap?!" He immediately backed away from the rug's range. If he had crossed the carpeted area just like that, the eyeballs would send darts raining on his body and he didn't want that to happen.

…Maybe if he crossed fast enough for the eyeballs not to sense his presence. He decided to test his theory by throwing a doll across the red rug. So, he picked off a wooden doll from the walls and threw it across the rug. But shockingly, the eyeballs were as quick as lightning to sense the object and shot a rain of darts at the doll before it had crossed the other side. Well in fact, the doll didn't even manage to cross the carpeted area; instead, the doll had been pinned mercilessly to the wall, thus joining it with the exhibit of strange dolls.

"Perhaps this rug is hiding a sensor underneath." Ciel thought. "But isn't there any other…"

Then the wooden gate came to mind. Perhaps it was there as an alternative route to avoid the trap. He ran back to the gate and anticipated a handle for it to be opened. But unfortunately, there wasn't any. The gate seemed to act like a barrier from getting across the room safely.

"Now what?" He leaned his face through the wooden bars to get a view of something at the other side of the gate. The object seemed to be a circuit breaker of some sorts, but he wasn't sure judging by his limited point of view.

Sebastien began to bark at him. Ciel broke out of his trance. "It seems like I have to depend on you a lot, huh?" He said as he rewarded the wolf with another affectionate rub on the head. "Do you know another way out?"

"Follow me!" The wolf barked as if in response. Then the animal quickly ran out to the door where they had entered. Ciel followed him until they came upon a small alcove at the beginning of the hallway. "What about it?"

Sebastien entered the small alcove and sat on an embossed tile. The tile sank like a button upon the wolf's weight and from their position, they heard a sound of gears at work. "Stay!" Ciel commanded him and went off to investigate the sound's source. He went back to the doll exhibit room immediately and found that the wooden gate had been lifted off from its position before. Now that the gate was away, he could see the circuit breaker at the other side of the room. "If I switched the electricity off here, maybe that trap would not be able to work now!" Having thought that, he quickly crossed the room and lifted the lever on the circuit breaker. Immediately, the lights that illuminated the room went completely off thus, signaling that the electricity was now not surging through anything.

"Now this room's finally safe… I think?" Ciel summoned Sebastien to his side; the gate began to sink down back to its original place, but it didn't matter. And since Sebastien was able to cross safely from the eye-trap, that meant that the area was safe for good. "Good boy! But… was it me or, were you easier to command just now?"

Sebastien tilted his head; he didn't know either.

They came to another room with a carpet; but this time, there were no freaky dolls for show. Thankfully, the room was a sane one and it looked more like a lobby. There were wide paintings on the walls; plush sofas, coffee tables, some book cases and some ornamental plants decorating the room. Though for a lobby, the room sure looked strange since it appeared to be partly a walkway and a lobby.

Both followed the carpet's trail. But when they were just about to go through the door, a phone began to ring. Ciel turned his attention to the phone on one of the nearby tables. The phone seemed to be an antique because of its design compared to the modern telephone; the telephone had a candlestick-like cradle with the receiver and transmitter attached to its ends like buds; the transmitter had a horn like piece attached to it; the switchhook and the ringer box were attached together, which resembled the body of the modern telephone; the antique had silver engravings all over it and complemented well with the phone's black color. But unlike the modern phone, the antique didn't have any buttons or a rotating disc for dialing. Perhaps the phone was only meant for receiving calls?

The phone continued to ring. Now who would make a call at this place? This seems to be the only phone he had seen so far. He also wondered who would be able to answer the phone in the vastness of the castle. The castle was so huge for a phone like this to be noticed by the inhabitants of the castle.

"Might as well answer it then." Ciel decided finally and picked up the cradle. "Hello?"

Surprisingly, there seemed to be someone answering. Though, the sound was quite fuzzy. "C…c-ci…el…" A struggling voice sounded through the receiver.

"Hello?" Ciel answered loudly. "Who is this?"

"You…ave…to…-isten…carefully…Ci…el…"

Ciel brought the receiver closer to his ear.

"Be…ware…of…Ash……Y…your….A…-zoth…" Then the sound immediately cut off.

"Hello?!" Ciel said through the transmitter more loudly. "Are you still there?!" But no answer came through the phone but total silence. He placed the cradle back to its switchhook; he frowned in wonder. "Azoth? What could that voice have said if the conversation had not cut off? And… about Sir Ash…"

"MY DOLLY!!!"

"Oh, nevermind…" The chase was on again.

A/n: Character round-up! So far we have:

Fiona Belli - Ciel Phantomhive

Hewie - Sebastian (just call him Sebastien for now...)

Ayla Belli - Rachel Phantomhive

Ugo Belli - Vincent Phantomhive

Debilitas - Pluto

Riccardo - Ash

Daniella - Angela (Ok, I've spoiled it =D

Aureolus (is the spelling right?) Belli - ???

One more character to guess! Oh yeah, "italized dialogue" are Sebastien's comments, similar to the Hewie comments in Haunting Ground. But here, Sebastien reacts to what he sees and thinks about things in general. Oh yeah, a CielXAsh moment right there and it's necessary folks. Sorry to disappoint the CielXSeb fans out there, but the way I have written the story, it's mostly composed of CielXAsh! Oh noes! Don't worry, Sebastien/an would have his moment; I'll try to think of something...

My exams will start in 2 weeks or so, so this would be the final chapter I'd be submitting for the moment. But I'll be back! Definitely! I have post-its on my study-table to remind me of writing the story...

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