Chapter 19: Paeniteo

"NO, Sebastien!" Ciel scolded for the nineteenth time. It was amazing how long his patience held out despite his urgency to find his servant. "You have already given me this ring and that's enough hunting for shiny things. NOW."

Sebastien deposited the twentieth antique disk he had uncovered from the floor in front of his master. They were scouting the castle and they were in the Mars Exhibit and no sign or a whiff of Ash's scent anywhere. Actually, the wolf wasn't making any effort to follow the boy's objective. Instead, he continued his scavenger hunting but this time, inside the castle. Ciel obviously mistook him following his orders but apparently, the wolf wasn't. "I never thought this place has more shiny things around than outside!" The wolf thought as he continued sniffing around.

Ciel sighed and shook his head. "Sebastien's acting strange lately." He thought as he picked up the disk from the floor and dusted it. He didn't understand why the wolf was suddenly searching for intricate pieces of metal. He looked at the disk… well not exactly circular. It was octagonal in shape and it had a disk filling its middle. The frame was red and had runes all around it. The disk was gold and had a rune-like symbol on it; much like a central design. Whatever the disk or medallion was, it must be for something useful. So, he stuffed the disk inside the knapsack he had thought of carrying. They had twenty disks so far; each disk differed in color: blue, silver, green, plain bronze, and every color metallic.

Sebastien uncovered another plain bronze disk again. "This place has a lot of shiny stuff!" He said as he wagged his tail; half-teasing and half-amusing the boy in his achievement and disobedience. Ciel was not amused as he picked up the disk and stashed it in his bag.

"Okay, Sebastien." He sighed and knelt down to go down to the wolf's eye level. "Sit. I told you to look for Ash, didn't I?"

Sebastien snorted. "Yeah right…"

"Let's find him first." The boy stared into the animal's eyes. "Please?"

"No. Way." The wolf averted his eyes away from the boy. But Ciel held his face and turned his gaze back into his pleading blue eyes. This was something Sebastien could not resist from gaining a second thought. He could see the intense urgency of the boy to find the pervert and he did not like seeing Ciel upset.

"Please?"

"Oh, alright…" Sebastien responded with a bark; submitting immediately to those eyes. "Darn it…"

Ciel smiled and kissed his forehead. "Thanks, Sebastien." He giggled and embraced him. "Gee, have I told you that you're really warm and cuddly?"

Sebastien snuggled into the embrace. "Flattery will get you nowhere."

"Hey Sebastien, you know Ash's scent don't you?"

"No." The wolf laid his ears back and pretended not to hear him; quite forgetting his submission almost immediately. He pretended to go back to scavenger hunting and sniffed along the floor. "That annoying lavender scent… Grr!"

"Good! Sniff him for me, boy!" Ciel said encouragingly and followed him along. "Now if you're actually searching for shiny things again, you won't get a kiss or a hug from me next time."

"Ah… darn it!"

"I wonder why I said that?" Ciel thought but shrugged the thought off as soon as the wolf started moving.

"D-do you think he's actually here?" Ciel trembled and swallowed. The wolf had led him to Pluto's hut and he could remember very well what happened down the chapel last time. For sure, Pluto will come out and chase their heels all over again. "Are you sure, Sebastien?"

Sebastien sniffed the air. "Positive." He reared up to the plank of wood boarded up on the entrance of the hut; supposedly a door. "I smell that annoying lavender here." He pawed the door and barked at him. "Let me check it out for you?"

Ciel approached the door cautiously; half-hesitant to venture inside it. He could smell the strong scent of the moldy straw and something rotten he refused to figure out what. He gave a glance at Sebastien before pushing the plank to give way to them.

"I'm right behind you. Don't worry."

He didn't go inside immediately. He waited for something to come out but after a minute or so, nothing came bounding out or running whatsoever. But still, he refused to assume that everything was safe. He took a light and noiseless step; sort of sneaking in. He also gestured to the wolf to keep silent.

"Careful. Pluto is here…!" Sebastien missed the habit of biting at his tail-coat as a fair warning to the boy of an approaching danger. But he kept silent and kept himself close to the boy's heels.

Ciel looked around the hut's interior. It looked nothing more like an over-sized garden shed since there were picks, shovels and rakes propped on the walls; and shelves with cans and clippers and all sorts of hand-sized equipment for gardening. Also, a wheelbarrow and a scarecrow were in that huge open space of a… bedroom?

"So this is Pluto's home?" He sounded quite upset and disturbed and a bit pitiful. "Maybe if only he wasn't so… broken… He could've had his own room in the castle?" He walked in to the open space. There was a broken bed on the corner and some kind of dusty and cobwebbed broiler or a heater near the edge of the bed. On the opposite side of the bed, there was a huge altar-like structure. He squinted and approached that altar. It was only composed of a table with an intricately woven tablecloth. On top of the table, there were scattered feathers, lit candles and of course, dolls of all kinds. They were similar to the kind of dolls that he saw in the nursery but the big difference was, the dolls have wings. He swallowed and inspected the dolls closer. The wings were from an actual live origin and they appeared to be ripped off of that origin and badly stitched together on the backs of the dolls. However, one doll stood out most among the collection of dolls in the table. This doll was the largest; made of velvet; fine, black string-hair tied into a ponytail; blue glass eyes; and eagle's wings. Its dress was a white silk sheet trimmed with lace and crystal beads on the hem-lines and a silver ribbon was wound around its waist like a belt. Apparently, the doll was well-kept since it was the only one that didn't appear sooty and patchy. The doll was hung above all the collection of dolls on the table; like a goddess above the lesser ones.

"Looks like this guy is obsessed with that goddess." Sebastien thought as he reared up to look at the table along with Ciel. "Does that doll look familiar to you too?"

"Iustitia…" The boy breathed. "He worships her intently. Maybe he's the one attending to that chapel…"

"RAAAAARGGHHH!"

Ciel gasped and spun around at the snarl and he found himself face to face with Pluto. The deranged man seemed to be glaring at him; perhaps angry and looking for vengeance for the huge scratches and bruises that resulted from their fight in the chapel. The boy could smell the blood and the pus emanating from that swelling and infecting wounds. He backed up and looked fearfully at him, for the man was staring at him with his teeth bared and claw-like hands outstretching to him. Sebastien growled and prepared himself to spring if ever the man made another move. "Hurt him again and I'll kill you!"

However, Pluto didn't grab or snatch the boy as expected. Instead, his vengeful expression changed into horror and awe. He fell to his knees and put his hands together, as if in prayer. Furthermore, he was howling and moaning like an injured dog as he bowed down to Ciel's feet as if asking for mercy.

"What the…?"

Ciel was shocked was quite relieved that Pluto wasn't terrorizing him any longer. But he was puzzled as to why the man had suddenly shown this submissive behavior. Pluto crawled up to him and pulled at his ankles. "Forgiveness…! Forgiveness!" The man cried and latched on to his ankles which prevented Ciel from going away.

"F-for what?" Ciel trembled in tension. "Now this is odd…"

"Hurt you! Hurt you!" Pluto answered and continued to cry and held his feet tighter. "I hurt 'Ustitia! Hurt "Ustitia!"

Ciel thought it over. Maybe he'll stay safe as long as he answered Pluto correctly. "Why did you hurt her?"

Pluto howled even more. "Mistook her for Dolly!... Mistook Dolly as 'Ustitia!"

"I'm sure you didn't mean it?"

"Meant it! Meant it!"

Ciel didn't know what to answer next. He guessed he must speak kindly to him even more. "I know you're not bad Pluto. I know you're not."

Pluto raised his eyes to him. Ciel could see genuine tears and his wanting for mercy and pardon. "Everyone is innately good in their own way. It's just… you are… misunderstood." He swallowed; quite guilty from the words coming out of his lips. "It's really unkind that everybody fears you because of who… what you are."

Pluto smiled. From a destructive looking madman, he looked like an innocent freak deprived of understanding. Ciel sighed and almost cried. He was guilty of being among those who had misunderstood him too. "Maybe deep inside, he needs a friend." He thought.

Sebastien stopped growling and sensed that everything was going alright. Pluto seemed to have calmed down and lost that hunter look from his eyes. The wolf sat down and watched them.

"Stand up, Pluto." Ciel held up his face gently and stared into his eyes. "You've done nothing wrong." He said as he helped the man rise up.

"H… hail you, 'Ustitia…!" Pluto said through his struggle of vocabulary. "H…hail you 'Ustitia!" He bowed again and again in worship.

"Hail him indeed!" Sebastien thought as he went close to the boy and stood there like his steward.

Pluto's wounds bothered Ciel completely. "I wish I could do something more than alleviate his guilt."

Suddenly the man pulled out something familiar from his clothes. It was one of those disks that Sebastien had wasted time over instead of looking for Ash. Pluto happily showed it to Ciel before limping towards the broiler like machine at the end of the bed. He swatted away the heavy looking cobwebs and blew away the dust-balls that had accumulated all over the machine. Ciel had a glimpse of the machine; it looked nothing of a broiler but still it was quite familiar and unfamiliar at the same time. The machine had some kind of board that displayed ten small black spheres in some kind of formation. Under the board, there was a slot and this is where Pluto suddenly pushed in the disk. Also, he pulled a lever just beside the board that caused the machine to vibrate and hum and the spheres on the board started to flash different colors: gold, white, red, blue, green and black. He turned and looked at Ciel happily. "Machina! Machina!" He said loudly and happily clapped in amusement at the flashing colors.

"So that's what those things are for!" Ciel said in amazement and pulled out the collection of disks that they had accumulated. "I've got more! See?"

Pluto jumped up and down and clapped happily. Then he pulled the lever again and all of the spheres stopped at the color white. "Machina! Machina!"

"It's a matching game!" Ciel cried happily and joined Pluto. He pushed in a red disk and pulled the lever. "My turn!"

Sebastien rolled his eyes. "Oh here we go…" The scene was quite… anticlimactic. At the beginning they were all scared out of their wits and the next second, everybody eagerly joined the game of roulette. The wolf watched boringly at the two childish creatures in front of him.

"Haha. He didn't notice that I lied to him." Sebastien decided to ignore the two and continued trailing that lavender scent. He reached under Pluto's worn-out bed to see whatever thing the annoying scent linked to. Instead of an item belonging to the servant's property, he saw a pitiful amount of lavender flowers growing out on the ground. "Heh… wrong item."

A/n: Urgh... I'm not doing so well with my writing. One chapter took me a month to write because I fail at writing... scenes... *shot*

Anyway, I'm 5 chapters ahead. I'm really not doing well. Let's see each other again on March 11!

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