Castlevania: Aria of the Ascending Soul

Written By: Lady Lunar Phoenix

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"Uh, hi mommy. The Pope sent us..." Xavier announced, while his fellow choir mates piled into the small entryway of their home. Mrs. Conti was taken aback and highly alarmed as she watched all these boys. Messily dressed, with many holding badly folded white fabric that made her think of the choir robes her son would get washed. Two boys were carrying stuffed teddy bears while their sacks bulged with something stuffed in them. Two others carried bags, yes, but clearly it wasn't full to bursting.

"Tony, you might what to explain..." was whispered out by various boys to one of the older kids. Giving that strong vibe of 'we're being quiet' only, not being quiest.

Her son walked over and grabbed her hand, his smaller hand squeezing at her fingers. "Mommy can they stay?"

"Uh, Hi Mrs. Conti... this is going to be a bit of a story..." 'Tony' confessed as he walked over, the boy looked nervous, and she couldn't fault him. Everyone just defaulted to letting him to speak and well...

Expressions stretched from apprehension and fear to curiosity and excitement, while their hair looked tossed about by the wind. Where had the boys come in front?

"Hello Tony, I have no idea how you all came to be here all at once. But why not come and you can settle in our family room for a bit before you start. Instead of standing in the entry way like this?" She offered, presenting a comforting smile to the children who obeyed like the little gentle flock they were taught to be.

"Yes ma'am," Tony replied and turned to the other boys. They didn't need much encouragement, the older boys began scraping their shoes against the welcome mat before they walked further in. While the younger, seeing this, paused and went back to the mat and emulated the older boys.

The house was nice to the kid, kinda like his home, though his mom was big on sculpting and the house almost always had a fine layer of dust from the dried clay. Somehow it felt more packed in now with all the other boys behind him being funneled through the passages to the family room. A family room that didn't really stand out as all too different. Tony had seen similar rooms from his friends, but he also knew there wasn't enough places for all the boys to sit down either.

It was at that moment the reality of what happened began to sink down into him. Running, walking under the sky, it had been easy to 'be in charge', talk about getting the grown ups... But...

"Mrs. Conti... We think something bad has happened in the Vatican..." Tony began.

All the other boys were a mix bag, the younger ones were looking at the various objects placed around the room. While their elder 'brothers' began having to keep them from trying to play around, Elmo had been keeping a large space between himself and the two bags holding Mr. Juste and Mr. Richter. With Elmo being friends with Xavier, Tony suspected the boy had gone to the other boys' room for some space. But...

Mrs. Conti, for her part, refocused her attention on the boy before kneeling down in growing concern. "What happened at the Vatican today."

"Oh, I'm Tony. Well 'Anthony De Luca', and well Elmo came and told us we had to leave. It was strange, then it got scary... He told us that there were new priests standing guard at His Holiness' office. And Elmo knows 'all' the priests who serve His Holiness so not knowing was a big problem..."

Mrs. Contis' alarm bells went off as she heard that, maybe Tony didn't realize it, but she quickly began wiping away the tears that began to slip down the childs' eyes. "Our Father was missing too, this strange man we never met before was in the choir room... He said he was our new teacher. But that's a lie! We'd be told if they were replacing Father Greco! Some of the Nuns who used to give us our lunch snacks were suddenly 'sick'. Not one or two, that happens all the time, but it was nearly all of them! One Sister was crying in the garden!"

Around the room the children began to tear up in growing fear...

"But they know where we live! What if they come after our parents? Who were those people... I'm sorry, I'm trying to be brave but..." Tony began as he rubbed at his own eyes.

Mrs. Conti knelt there utterly lost as she forced a confident expression on her face. 'They... what is this story?' A weight formed in the pit of her stomach as she realized what was being asked of her. 'The story sounds insane... but...'

But it validated Nicos' discomfort.

And then the bear moved.

It had been still the whole time.

Now it moved...

"The statue followed me! Like it turned its head to stare directly at me! And you know that picture of Jesus and the Disciples? They all pointed to the door one minute and next minute they looked the normal!"

"Nico that's enough, you shouldn't lie about the Lords' House."

"I'm not lying dad! It really happened!"

"I believe Nico... Elmo and all us in the choir have seen things lately..."

"Xavier not you too.."

'But here they are, a good number of the Cherub Choir and they're all supporting the same story...' she thought as she looked among them.

And the bear just kept watching her.

"Tony about that bear..." She began causing him to look down at the toy as well.

"Oh this is Simon," with that Tony put the bear down. "He's a good person! His family is too, they're just trapped in these toy bodies."

"What?" Mrs. Conti blurted out in disbelief while the bear in question nodded, his static stitched on face didn't emote much. But the children seemed to rally to this point.

"Yeah!"

"Yes, Xaviers' Mommy! This is Simon, but we always called him 'SnuggyWuggy' because that's what Ms. Yoko called him!"

Just the name 'SnuggyWuggy' caused the ears on the bear to start wiggling and the bear seemed to freeze up in possible annoyance...

"That's Mr. Christopher, and the two dogs are Mr. Juste, he's the husky, and Mr. Richter, he's the badly colored German Shepard." Another boy, who looked to be about Tony's age answered.

"AND he turns into a real dog if we sing!"

That... was alarming, and the boys seemed to have started to rally themselves to start singing...

But the bear, the 'Mr. Christopher', broke free of the child holding him and scrambled to the center of the room. He planted himself in front of her and began waving desperately against it as the boys..

"Wait, if they turn into 'real' animals when you sing you really shouldn't." Mrs. Conti announced in concern, but mostly mounting alarm. Desiring to call the children liars was growing... but she was starting to suspend disbelief especially given that the bear 'moved'.

"But Mrs. Conti, it would prove what we're saying..." The other boy pointed out and she forced a reassuring smile on her face.

"I'm sure you're telling the truth, but these are 'bears' and if they change into full bears, we could all be in danger of being smooshed by their weight." She pointed out.

The boys all stopped at that and studied the room around them. There were pictures on the wall of family and things. Furniture with those pillows that parents bought but didn't want the kids to play with, the telly, a sound system set up as well...

"Are bears... big? In real life? Like how much bigger could Snuggy grow?" One small red headed boy asked, easily older than Xavier but younger than Tony.

"Oh well, he could possibly stand up and bump his head on the ceiling, and we couldn't get him through the door if that was the case." She pointed out gently, while both bears nodded fervently.

"Oooooooo..." the light bulb went off over the little ones' heads leaving her with one less possible issue to spring up.

"Well this is understandable, but how do we get a phone, access it, and call Kazu?" Christopher asked now that the children weren't preparing to break into song.

"Oh that might help," Richter noted as his ears perked up. There was a table near the couch and a variety of objects resting upon it. He trotted over it and jumped up on the table, which got him the attention of several of the small children.

"Mr. Richter?" Robert, a downy haired boy, walked over.

"Ahh good." The hunter sat down, his tail wagging as he looked about the table. There was a center piece resting on it, a small vase but sticking out of the bowl it was resting in appeared to be a pen. Getting up he went to take the pen into his mouth.

"Oh, Mr. Richter wants to write something!" Robert announced, getting the attention of the other boys.

"He can't write, his paw looks funny when he tries. Let Mr. Simon do it," several other boys replied.

"Oh 'now' I'm 'Mr. Simon'..." Simon fairly growled.

Mrs. Conti stood there alarmed as the toy dog 'walked' to the table, jumped up it and located the pen. It felt surreal, she knew of the 'Stuffy Patrol', Nico had enjoyed seeing them during the Christmas events at the Vatican. Though Xavier was too young to attend before he was accepted as a Cherub. But they were simple toys, everyone knew they were simple toys.

But the dog was bringing the bear the pen, it was very clear they were aware, making that rock at the pit of her stomach get heavier. It was still early, her husband wouldn't be home for hours yet, and Nico was off with his friends. But he would be home sooner than his father at this rate.

"Mrs. Conti, not all the Cherubs got away, they're still in the Vatican, and we've been worried. They yelled at us, they are strangers that we don't know and worse yet they know where we live. We don't want our mommys and daddys to get in trouble because we ran. But the Pope told us to leave, that has to mean something right?" Tony asked, the words pulled Mrs. Conti's attention down to him.

It was incredibly heart felt and it pulled at her heart to see the kids, looking at so many children who's eyes were wet with unshed tears. Others gave in and were crying while their elders tried to comfort them. But they were young boys, and awkward with their effort not that she would judge them harshly. It brought to mind Nico trying to comfort Xavier when his little brother had begun bawling after that first day of being a Cherub.

Only to find out it was because the boy got to meet the Pope and been given a blessing...

"I understand, I'll see what I can do though I'm just one woman... Let me make sure Xavier and Elmo are ok. Keep them out of trouble if you could?" She asked which was answered by Tony and the others nodding.

How was the dining room and kitchen normal?

She walked past the furniture in this surreal situation that she wished would help ground her to reality. She had to fight the urge to just make herself a sandwich and pretend the world was normal.

'Xavier isn't good at lying, if anyone is going to tell me the truth its going to be him,' she decided as she took the stairs to the next floor. On the left was Xaviers' room, his name displayed with a hanging sign in the shape of a plank. The door was cracked open and she could hear the soft murmuring of the boys in the room.

"It looks neat..." It was the first thing she heard Xavier say clearly.

"Thanks."

"I'm sure His Holiness is ok! God will protect him and the other grown ups!" The words brought a smile to her face. Xaviers' eternal faith, only that faith ripped the smile from her face, he wouldn't know she was listening... He 'was' worried about the Pope!

'Something seriously happened in the Vatican? What are we supposed to do? Tony is right after all! I don't even know how to get in contact with all the...'

Bile rumbled its way up from her stomach. The weight that had been pulling her insides down started to churn its way up as she realized what the boys said. Not all of the choir was here, and Father Greco is missing as well! She slumped against the wall, her hand pressed against her head.

"It was so scary, when I saw the priests their eyes looked weird!" Elmo whimpered, "They were just round like those little black dots aren't supposed to be 'that' big..."

"Yeah, and remember how Jesus pointed for us to get out of the Vatican too? That was weird but he's still looking out for us!"

While down stairs Simon had finished scrawling out the message, his ears wiggling that the woman had the nerve to leave. The children were mostly behaving, Robert was holding, what appeared to be the grocery list mid construction, still so Simon could painstakingly write the message out on the back.

"I suppose I'll bring it to that Conti woman." Simon announced as he put down the pen and grabbed the sheet of paper. "Keep the kids from breaking anything," he instructed walking to the edge of the table and dropping down.

"Who died and made you leader?" Christopher good naturedly asked, carried as he was with arms wrapped around his torso.

"So long as Elmo manages to not see us and run screaming out of the house," Richter confessed as he scrambled himself up the shelf that held a number of pictures. Two of the young boys were trying to pull down pictures to exam them. But as young as they were Richter wasn't feeling very confident they wouldn't break it or leave it on the floor where it would get stepped on. So he kept moving and lightly bopping their hands.

Now the pair thought this was a game and were gleefully now 'playing' at trying to get the pictures.

Simon took stock of this and inwardly sighed before he left the room, the last thing to catch his sight was Juste riding Tony's shoulder.

With the sheet of paper in his arms he began running down the hallway. 'I need to get that woman to let us borrow a phone. Stealing won't do us any good if we can't figure out whatever stupid lock she has on it.'

Imagining the phone taking a picture of a teddy bear for trying to break into the phone was not lost on the man. 'If I was here I would go check on Xavier wouldn't I? He's her kid and she's bound to want to make sure he's ok.'

Thus Simon rushed through the kitchen and found the stairs that lead up to the second floor. Better yet, he saw just the tip of head coupled with the softest of murmurs, so she 'had' gone to see her kid. There were already eight kids left in the Vatican that didn't escape with the boys. So their alarm was understandable for their level.

Only the living didn't understand that there was a vampire in the Vatican, who had once been a Pope. 'Those boys could very well be rounded up in a room at this point being prepped to being turned. Soma being restrained ensures there's no way to stop this group either. So we 'really' need you to get it together woman.' Simon thought to himself as he reached halfway up the wooden stairs.

Thankfully though, the noise of the sheet being dragged along the wooden stairs caught Raena's attention. She turned back to the stairs and found that bear determinedly walking up the stairs, a sheet of paper clutched to his chest. At the same moment he saw that she had moved to the top of the stairs and was looking down at him.

'This would be faster if you helped,' he thought irritably as he tried to slide the paper up higher for her to see.

"...Is that for me?" she asked before taking her first worried steps down the stairs to help the bear.

Simon nodded as he resumed until she lifted him up by the unsightly shoulder.

Damn woman.