Chapter 8: Music, Lost and Camping

The room is decorated by dead flowers and dead animals. The scent is poisonous and what scares the female more is the lifeless bodies she finds in the floor.

Blood coming down the floor, Alice watches with frightened eyes as a figure comes into sight. She screams sharp fangs try to bite her skin.

Closer, closer, closer...the fangs are—

~.X.~

"Eeek!" Alice wakes up in fear and she looks at her surrounding, noting that she is already moving to the kitchen. She has one heck of a nightmare about the other masters she has yet to seen. With no knowledge of the other masters, she has been thinking of the worse—a cannibal.

Considering the masters and mistress she meets, it is not impossible to think that one of the masters will have crazy fetish. It won't surprise her anymore if they have some degraded prince in the place.

Alice cooks the current meal for the day and sighs in relief when nothing bad seems to be happening as of yet. Almost immediately, she tenses up at the thought.

It is suspiciously too quiet to be true. Something very bad is going to happen she can just feel though in any case, her maid costume doesn't stop and just keep moving.

Her body moves toward the place where she has first met Blood, Nightmare and Gowland and narrows her eyes at the dark and silent atmosphere. She doesn't even see even one of her master and she is pretty sure Black will have complied by now.

"Hello? Is anyone there?!" she calls out, not able to take the stillness of the situation. She brings the first meal she had to make, a Swedish dish of knäckebrödknäckebröd and filmjölk to Gowland's room.

She knocks on the door and receives nothing in respond, not even some slight noise. But then, the door suddenly opens by itself, making the female deadpans.

"That's one cliché move. Where am I? In some horror movie?"

Alice walks inside the room and looks around the room, noting that it is simply too dark and no life is there. It is weird to experience this silence. She has been used to the noise and damages that the others do that this kind of calm makes her anxious.

A hand suddenly touches her, causing her to scream and run—or she tries to. Her maid costume makes her stay in the spot. She can't even scream in terror since her outfit controls her body if it annoys her master so meaning...

'That hand was Gowland, right?' she manages to calm herself at the realization but then, she scowls. 'But why in the world did he surprise me like that?'

"Oh, there you are, Alice!" Gowland drags the female to a room where there is a large stage and let her sit into one of the empty chairs. "You'll be my audience!"

"Audience?" slight sadness in his eyes, the male averts his look and stares at the stage. He nods at the question, "No one likes my inventions that much so I'm the only one, who watches them perform..."

Alice says nothing at that and looks at stage as well. The inventions in the stage are all robots carrying different kind of instruments. They must be having a musical performance.

"That's why I'm glad that Alice is an audience as well."

Said girl sighs, not moving from her spot. She isn't practically ordered to remain and watch the performance so she can just leave. She watches the other feeling excited at the play and she smiles slightly. It won't hurt to try and watch it.

"HGUFUVBHJH~"

She stands corrected. "Ugh, my ears!" she puts her hand in her poor ears and feels dizzy at the horrible sounds coming from the inventions. Her mind goes to why she should have refused to watch the performance. 'This is the worst! Now, I understand why I saw no one before...they were hiding from this!'

"STOP THE MUSIC!"

Gowland seems really unaffected. "What? Louder?" he asks and orders the robots to up the loudness. "There? Better, Alice?"

"NOO! My ears, my poor ears!" Alice cries poorly. She is glad that she doesn't have cat ears anymore or God help her, she will experience a lot more pain. She stands up and runs for it.

Forget slightly feeling bad for the guy, she wants to live longer. She doesn't want to go deaf as well!

Running blindly, she bumps into someone before she can't take the dizziness anymore. She faints to the arms of the person she bumps into.

~.X.~

"—lice! Are you okay, Alice?" the familiar voice causes Alice to open her eyes and see the person holding her.

"Ace?" she mutters slowly and blinks. "Why are you carrying me?"

"You faint on me again," Ace chuckles loudly and sets her down. "Am I really too angelic that you faint every time you see me?"

Alice twitches visibly at that and sighs, finding the situation too similar to their first meeting though this time, she is running from Gowland, not some bear.

Speaking of which...

"Did you see Gowland pass by or something?" she asks, pointedly ignoring the previous question. She would rather not answer that.

"Uncle Gowland? Naah," the smile on the brunet's face falters slightly. "But I'd rather not see him today. I don't really want to listen to his inventions' music."

Alice can understand, really. She just wants to cry for her poor ears at the mention of it.

"That happens all the time?" she asks nervously, fearing another experience of such horror.

Ace smiles in reassurance. "Not really!" he answers cheerfully. "Just once a month or so. You can always ignore it or stay in your room."

The dark blonde wants to sulk. That will definitely work on others but she has a maid costume that controls her body. If Gowland wants to, she'll be the audience every time. She just wants to cry at the unfairness.

"But why are you not hiding, Ace?" that is actually a curious question. She blinks in confusion when her eyes catch a bag in his back. "Are you going somewhere?"

"I'm using a shortcut to get back to my room," he shrugs and waves his hands in the air carelessly. "But I always end up not being in my room as the sun set so I camp out instead."

"Camping...indoors?" she want to slam herself to the wall or something. This is totally not normal and for some time, she thinks that maybe Ace will be normal but she stands corrected again. "And aren't you just being lost?"

Ace blinks at that. "No way. My shortcuts are always right," he says in conviction and Alice is 100% sure that is not the case. Those shortcuts are most likely being lost and are definitely long-cuts, not short. "Ah, how about I show you?"

"Ah well, I don't really—" she is dragged before she can finish the protest.

"Let's go to my room~"

~.X.~

It's official. Ace is not normal. Alice finds her thoughts being like this as she is carried bridal style by Ace while the male is jumping high and low from branches of very tall trees in a jungle. She doesn't really remember how they arrive at where they are.

She remembers being dragged to some cliffs and dangerous animals but she can't remember when they arrive at a jungle. She can't even remember ever stepping out of the house.

'This guy is totally not human,' the maid thinks as she watches the brunet defends and attacks some aggressive tigers that tries to bite them. 'And I thought it was strange that a bear was scared of Ace. It has every right to be afraid!'

"This is fun, isn't it, Alice?" Ace asks, dodging another attack from the wild animals and he jumps down the tree.

Alice closes her eyes in fright, noticing that the animals are gaining on them. She screams frantically, "What is?! Oh God, I don't want to die yet!"

"Who says anything about dying?"

The maid feels her feet touching the ground and she slowly opens her eyes. They are in the hallway again but somehow, she doesn't really recognize the place.

"Where are we?" she asks the male besides and watches as the guy makes a tent indoors. "And what are you doing?"

"It's getting a little late so let's camp for the night," he says with a big grin. "Sorry, I only have one tent so we'll be sharing."

"...huh?" Alice is tempted to kick the other. Does the male have no consideration? He is a male and Alice is a female. They can't just share a tent! That's totally wrong.

But in the situation where her maid outfit is not moving then she has no choice but to comply.

She positions herself as far away from the other, causing Ace to blink.

"What's wrong, Alice?" he asks in confusion and moves towards the girl. "Why are you so far away? There's plenty of spaces left!"

"Don't you have no shame?!" Alice fails to force down her blush from the embarrassment. "I need to stay as far away if we're staying in the same tent!"

'Oh God, this is worse than the music of Gowland's inventions!' she screams in her mind. 'There's no way I'll go with Ace and his shortcuts again.'

Ace blinks in confusion and tilts his head, "Why?"

'And he's even asking why!' the female can't help but continue the frantic thoughts in her mind. 'This guy is dangerous, the most dangerous of all!'

"Y-you can't be seriously asking me why!" her voice goes up in half high pitch and the blush deepens. "You're a man and I'm a woman so we can't possibly sleep together! Only lovers and married couples do that!"

"Haha, you're really funny, Alice!" the brunet chuckles loudly and drags the female closer easily despite the maid's attempts to struggle. "But it's fine. Let's use this opportunity to bond~!"

"HUH?!" she tries to get away. "This is sexual harassment, you know! Let go!"

~.X.~

"So how exactly did it end up like this?" Alice mutters and by this, she means exactly this. How can she be trying to sleep together with a male near her age, only an inch apart from each other?

"You can't sleep, Alice?" said male asks clueless to her thoughts.

'How can I possibly sleep in this kind of situation?!' her thoughts are really wild and rude but for Pete's fake, she will try to be polite, even if she wants nothing more than to slap the other.

She replies with a slight smile, "No, I can't. I'm a little uncomfortable with sleeping here."

Actually, she's too uncomfortable with the whole situation, really.

"Want to talk about something?" he suggests nicely and i brings guilt to Alice for thinking badly of the man. "Have you met Little Mouse yet?"

"'Little Mouse'...who's that?" she raises an eyebrow at the nickname.

Ace smiles in a highly different way from his usual smile. "He's the most hated resident by everyone...," he thinks for a minute. "Except maybe, Bloody."

"Why's that?" Alice asks curiously, slightly forgetting her dilemma and finding Blood's nickname funny. 'Really? Bloody? That guy with God complex lets someone call him that? That's so funny!'

"He did something unforgivable," Alice doesn't know why but she shivers at his tone. "But everything's okay now. He already got his punishment."

Silence falls at that statement and Alice tenses up when Ace moves near again.

"You're pretty warm, Alice," the brunet hugs her tightly and moves his head to her neck, his breathe tickling her ears. "Hey, want to come to my room? i'll show you something really good..."

'Okay, okay! This is getting out of hand!' Alice thinks with a big blush and she tries to escape again.

She is saved when someone suddenly appears and knock Ace out cold. She blinks at the unfamiliar face.

"You should go now or the idiot will wake up again."

No sooner do those words is said, Alice is quick to run but she does thank the male, who saves her.

The boy sighs before crossing his arms. "Just what are you doing, Ace?" he asks in annoyance. "You do know that the new maid is off limits, right?"

A dangerous smirk playing in his angelic face, Ace sits up with no injuries.

"You're no fun, Gray," he chuckled darkly. "I was just giving a warm welcome to our maid."

Gray glares at the older male, "Just keep it that way. We can't have you damaging another maid again."

"And since when did I damage anyone, Gray?" Ace truly has a cruel smirk. "I was only playing with them. It's not my fault they can't take my games."

Back the oblivious heroine, Alice smiles.

"That guy is a master, huh?" she thinks aloud. "Finally, someone nice and he's not some cannibal, too!"

Ah, she should really know now that first appearances are useless to the people in the house.

Omake: Frozen JnKnA Style! (Practice)

"You know, you're suppose to be singing 'Let It Go' in that part, Julius," Alice comments dryly as the play is once again paused because of some characters. "If you keep this up, we can't finish this in schedule."

"I know but why do I have Elsa's role?" Julius scowls darkly, wearing a blue dress with matching accessories. "Do I look like a girl to the readers?"

"With long hair, you sure do," Alice fixes a strand of hair that gets in the way of the male's face. "I think the dress even suits you."

The young man looks at the female by his side and sighs, "You're enjoying this way too much."

"What give you that expression?" the dark blonde asks with fake innocence and shouts at the Jokers. "Did you memorize your lines as Hans, White, Black?!"

"Will you reward me if I say yes?" White says, leering at the only female sensually while his twin glares. "Of course, I did. Who the fuck do you think I am?!"

She ignores that and goes to the other character. "How about you, Ace?" she asks the guy who gets the role to be Olaf. It is seriously not fitting to Ace's sadistic moments but she won't complain much...though she crosses the lines when the guy does pervert stuffs to her.

"I'm done. Let's go to the part where we kiss!" Ace grins cheerfully.

"Ace, you do know that your role is Olaf, right?" the female asks slowly, wondering where the heck the guy gets the idea of kissing.

The brunet blinks and says in confusion, "I'm Olaf? Eh, but didn't Pierce gave me the role of being Kristoff?"

'Oh God! Don't tell me, he...!' Alice looks for Pierce, who is suppose to be Kristoff, the partner to her role as Anna. Her eyes catches sight of Pierce's scared mumbles in a locked room.

'He did! He really did it! He just threatened and scared Pierce to death for the role!'

This is Cat...and before you guys say anything about the long update, don't blame Bee! I'm the one, who was super slow but I blame to my school really. Anyway, Ace seems to be popular to be Olaf in the previous question...though I prefer Pierce XD

Anyway, next question... Bee and I actually are curious about this:

Is Ace asexual or not?