Adult-FanFiction.org : Anime

Annals of Fear II	By : DeathNoteFangirl Category: Death Note > Yaoi-Male/Male > Mello/Matt Views: 5803 -:- Recommendations : 0 -:- Currently Reading : 0
Disclaimer: I do not own Death Note and I do not make any money from these writings

Chapter List
- 36
- 37
- 38
The manor house felt colder than it ever had, yet Century was sweating, as he followed Fenian up the stairs.    The Irishman's breath could be seen as steam as he talked.    He seemed confident, so confident, but Fenian hadn't been here before.   Century felt the terror growing inside, just as it had before.   He plodded on in the certainty that he was going to die.   Yet dismissed the same as paranoia.   He had been just as sure before.

At the top of the stairs, Century's heart was pounding so much that he had to stop.   "Fenian, wait on."   He slunk down the wall and sat there, panting.    Fenian gave him an impatient look, wrapped around with climbing apparatus and a restless gait.   "This doesn't feel right.   Not enough is happening."

"Sure it won't, if you're sitting there."   Fenian took the bag that Century had been carrying.   "I've got ten minutes to check this out.   Any longer and Kiana will have my balls."   He strode off into the empty room, leaving Century alone, looking up and down the landing.

Century swallowed.    Nothing should be happening at all.   The bottle was back beneath the tree.   All phenomena should be corked.   Which meant that Mello was probably on his way with a gun.    Yet the house felt alive around him.   The foxes still howled.   The atmosphere was laden, tingling on his skin, like it was full of static electricity.    There was the sensation of being watched.   Century took deep breaths, wondering if that was helping or hindering his speeding heart-rate.   An aura of doom was a symptom of a heart-attack.   He was going to have another one.

"Century, are you fucking coming or what?"   Fenian yelled.

Century slowly stood, his hand pressed against his chest.    He peered up and down the landing again to see what he was missing.   The fact that nothing was there felt worse than if there had been ghosts peering from every crevice.   He was left with the feeling that something would move the second he turned his back.   He hurried into the room, where Fenian's arm snaked out of the hole in the floorboards, pulling his bag after him.   Century glanced up at the cameras and checked his communicator.   "Are you reading us, Dee?"    There was no response.   "Dee?"

"Century, are you not coming down?"   Fenian called from the priest hole.

Century sat down over the edge, then gradually eased himself down.    The strain was intense and he saw stars before he fully reached the bottom.   Clinging to the ladder, gasping for breath, fear pumping through his veins.   "Fian!"

Fenian was suddenly behind him, steadying him.   "You're working yourself up, man."   Fenian helped Century sit, on the wooden boards of the floor.   "What is it exactly you're worried about?   This house?   Mello?   Chrissie and Salvo not letting you go home?   Failing?"

All of them, Century wanted to scream, but he'd been raised better than that.   "Just let me get my breath.   I'll be good."

"Fine."   Fenian gave him a searching look of such compassion, that Century wanted to cry.    "Ok, you sit there.   Have a sip of water.   I'm going to see where I can anchor."    Fenian took a torch and shone it into the open altar.   A great slab of weathered quartz filled most of the space, but there was a narrow gap beside it.   He could make out brickwork, which Century had already identified as 18th century, but the void then sloped away, beneath the quartz.   It was just wide enough to take a man and they had both assumed that they were looking at some sort of mausoleum.   However, a pebble, from Fenian's pocket, dropped into it, had taken a long time to stop crashing against the sides.   Fenian frowned, then stepped back to inspect the ladder against the far wall.    "I'll be anchoring to this.   It looks sturdy enough."

Kiana's voice floated down, fiercely demanding.   "Liam, where the fuck are you?"

Fenian closed his eyes.   "Fuck."

Century did not want to be left down here, when Fenian went to find Kiana.   Visions of Matt being trapped here flooded back.   He scrambled to his feet. "I'll get her."

Fenian yelled, "Up the stairs.   Turn right.   Unfurnished room.   Hole in the floor.   Down there."     But she was already up there.   They heard her footsteps crossing the boards.    "You've got us."   Fenian turned away from the ladder, looking worried.   He hissed.   "She's not going to be happy about me going down there."    He snatched up his harness and started to put it on.

"Liam?"   Kiana snapped.   She sounded far away.

Century and Fenian exchanged glances.    Fenian had to ask, "Who just walked up to the edge there?"

Century knew that his eyes were wide.   He wiped his mouth and stared upwards.    He half hoped, in some perverse way, that it was Mello, because at least he was worldly.    He wrapped his arms around himself and waited.    Kiana shrieked out, "Liam!"

Fenian raced to the foot of the ladder and climbed up it.   "Kiana!"   He bellowed, half in the priest hole.    They heard her come running, but it was still a relief, when she burst into the room.    "Sorry, I thought...."

"Holy Mother!"   Kiana gasped, shakily.   "Liam, leave.   Fucking leave here now."

"I've a job to do."   Fenian returned down into the priest hole.   "Come on down. It'll be a tight squeeze, but you can see what we found."

She didn't follow.   They heard her, a couple of seconds later, speaking as if it took all of her will to do so.   The words were teased out, tightly, through gritted teeth. "I don't want to go down there.   I don't want you, or Century, down there."

Century took several deep breaths.   Fear begot fear here.   Fear brought hallucinations and more fear.   Fear could kill.   He had to remember that.   Nothing was real.   Probably. All of it was hallucination, brought about by a higher than average electro-magnetic field.   They were just going to find out what was causing that.    Fenian was silently fitting his harness, clamping ropes to the ladder and throwing the length into the altar's hole.   It took an unsettling amount of time for the end to reach the bottom.   That made no sense. They were inside a house.   How far down could it possibly go?   Only to ground level, surely.    Century stared at Fenian.   Fenian just looked white and said nothing at all.

Kiana gave a shuddering breath and sounded like she was at the limit of her self-control.    "Liam, come out now and I'll give in. I will marry you."

Fenian's head shot up, his expression stunned.   "What?"

"It's what you've wanted. I'll marry you."    Kiana sniffed. "Please, just come out of there."

Fenian took a staggering step backwards.   His hand came out to steady himself against the wall. Century watched, with eyebrows raised, trying to work out if Fenian was acting like this for comic effect.   But the Irishman's other hand covered his mouth.   His eyes filled up, but he blinked the tears away.   He nodded once, then bowed his head.   "Thanks."   He whispered, so quietly that Century guessed that Kiana didn't even hear him.   "Thanks a million."   Then he propelled himself the two steps back to the altar and eased his feet and legs into the gap.    He called out, more loudly, trying to keep the emotion from his tone. "I'll be five minutes, if that.    I'd love to marry you, Kiana." He wriggled down, beneath the level of the quartz slab, unable to see what was there until his whole body was beneath.

Century hurriedly unwrapped another lollipop and moved to the edge of the altar.   Ropes ran taut, bisecting most of the available space.   "What can you see?"

Kiana gasped, "Has he gone down there?"    She rushed to climb down the ladder, carefully negotiating her way over the ropes.   Century wished she hadn't.   As well as it being really cramped in here now, he was also left with the feeling that the boards could be replaced, trapping them in.   It had happened to Matt.   "Oh fuck. Oh fuck. Oh fuck." Kiana looked wildly around. "Oh my God."

Fenian's voice sailed up to them.   "It's really narrow, all the way.   Same as above, brickwork on three sides and quartz on the other.   I think I know what it is."   There was a pause.   "And a fucking bad smell.    And..." There was a pause, then a panicked, "Fuck shit!"

"Liam!"   Kiana screamed.

There was a scrambling down, then an almighty crack and the rope went slack.    Century waited for a stricken moment, before calling out, "Fenian?"    Beside him, Kiana's expression was a mask of terror.   "Fenian?"     They both waited, but there was no sound at all.   "Shit."

Kiana turned her tortured gaze onto him.   She spoke with unprecedented calm, "Go and get help, Century."   He felt frozen to the spot.   She barked out, "Now!"   And he rushed to the ladder, not even thinking what might be above.    His mind had gone numb.   He couldn't even think who to call nor what to tell them.   Watari was the obvious contact.   But most of Watari were here.   The potholer was the one in trouble.   Should they be pulling on the ropes?   But the way down was narrow and winding, they could be doing more damage.    He hadn't even checked if the slackened rope meant it no longer held Fenian's weight.   They'd heard a crack, not a fall.   Maybe the cameras had shown all.   Maybe Deontic already had someone en route to help.

Century was at the foot of the stairs before he remembered his communicator.    He could see Lauren in the kitchen, waiting pensively.    She stood to attention as he rushed in. Century was gasping out sounds and realising, only now, that his heart was pounding fit to burst from his ribcage.   He couldn't speak.   He leaned heavily on the central worktop and panted, breathlessly, painfully.   Dots filled his vision.   He couldn't breathe.

"Has something happened?"   Lauren asked, cautiously.

He had to breathe.   He spluttered his words, "Deontic! We're going to need emergency services here!   Crack, there was, and his rope's gone slack!"   He heard her start to reply, then the communicator went dead.   "Did she hear? Did she...?"   There was pain in his heart and Century crumpled against the worktop, down to the floor.   He was crying now and this kid, this fifth generation kid, was watching him.   It was humiliating. He was having a heart-attack for real and it was going to be the death of him.   The doctors had said he couldn't have another one.   The scar tissue needed time to heal.    He was only eighteen and it was all over.   He'd never had a chance to shine.   Never been enough in the Watari world.   Never had a fucking chance.

"I think they heard."   Lauren turned and poured him some water, then crouched down to hold it to his lips.   "I'm sure they heard.   Mello will come."

The lights went out.   The kitchen plunged into darkness, along with the dining room too.   The silence of appliances stopping sounds that they hadn't even registered hearing.    All was gone.   Century found that he and Lauren were clutching each other.   There was no sound, but his own laboured breathing and Kiana's panicked shriek from the depths of the house.   "Dewi!" Century gasped, jumping more, as cold water spilled down his neck.    Lauren had been holding a pint glass of water.   That was all.

"Century."   Lauren whispered.   "You were here before.   I haven't been briefed.   What do I need to know?"

Century held her tightly, trying to discern whether or not he really was having a heart-attack.    If he wasn't, then he was close.   He rasped out, "Divide and conquer."

"What?"

He recalled them piling the fire high, to sweat out the adrenaline, to stop the calcium ions building up in their hearts, to save their lives.    Mello roaring out at him, 'rage, rage, against the dying of the light'.    No Dylan Thomas now, was it?    He realised that Kiana had gone very quiet and that the foxes were no longer screaming in the woods.    "Lauren."   Century breathed. "Don't get scared.    Fear kills in this place.   Get scared and you die."

Lauren nodded.   Century felt, rather than saw her do it.   "Ok."   She stated, decisively.   "I won't get scared.   It's my opinion that the message got out and Mello will come."    She started to stand, but he pulled her back.   She said, quietly, "I'm going to find the other two."

"Don't wander off alone.   It will pick us off.   One by one."

"You speak as if it's sentient."

Century had had weeks to contemplate this, but it was the first time he had verbalised it. "Oh, but it is sentient.    And it's after killing us."    He sucked in a breath.   "You know what? It's going to succeed this time."

Author's Note: There is a discussion about this story going on here: http://mrsjeevas.joharrington.co.uk/forum/viewforum.php?f=11
- 36
- 37
- 38
You need to be logged in to leave a review for this story.You need to be logged in to leave a review for this story.
Report Story

Annals of Fear II