It is a Nightmarish Circus
Rin holds Len's hand, tightly, a smile on her face as they walk down the street. They are out grocery shopping for their mother and since the crowds are large, Len suggested they hold hands to not be separated.
"Mmm, I love the feeling of autumn, don't you?" Rin asks, watching as a leaf falls from one of the trees nearby.
"Uh-huh," Len replies, a bit distracted as he stares at the shopping list. "Why can't Mom just go shopping herself?" he groans, fussing with the messenger cap on his head.
"Why can't you dress like a boy more than one day out of the week?" Rin teases, earning a glare from her older brother. "I know it's a free country and all, but hello? How are you going to get a wife if you're the one acting like the wife?"
"I don't plan on ever getting married," Len replies, looking over as a boy shouts about the newspaper in his hand. "There's no point in it. I want to live my life without chains."
"But you're already sixteen! You should be thinking more about your future," Rin scolds, swishing around her long skirts with her free hand.
"I am thinking about my future, and dressing in women's clothes actually opens more doors than it closes."
Rin rolls her eyes, playing with the little flip of hair from Len's pony-tail. "You're just so silly," she says, leading him to the town square.
"Rin, where are we going? The market street is the other way."
Rin nods. "I know. This is a short cut, okay? A short cut. We'll get there faster."
Len rolls his eyes. "You just want to use all the money up on jewelry that the street-side venders sell," he snips, even though he, himself, wants to use the money for the exact same thing. He just knows their mother will yell at them if they do.
Rin pulls Len along at a faster pace. "There's nothing wrong with just looking!"
But, when they reach the town square, there's a large crowd circling something, people's 'oohs' and 'aws' reaching their ears. "What's going on?" Rin asks, as if her brother knows.
"I don't know," Len replies as they walk closer to the crowd.
"C'mon; lets get closer to the front!"
Being a bit rude, Rin pushes her way passed people with Len in tow, apologizing for his sister. Once they get to the front, they understand why the people are so fascinated.
A tall man, seemingly on stilts, dances around for the crowd's amusement as one man walks around, a candle in his hands. His fiery red hair matches his eyes and he grins, widely. "As you can see, there is no flame upon the wick,"
[/i] he says, his voice lower than what Len guessed.
"But, watch."[/i]
Suddenly, the candle begins to melt, as if heated to a high temperature. The blond twins find themselves in awe, clapping and gasping with the rest of the audience.
Purple hair catches the blond boy's eye and Len looks over, seeing a sleek, refined man standing off to the side, leaning on a shiny black cane. He's wearing a suit that matches the cane, white pinstripes the only other color on the suit. Violet eyes sweep across the crowd and catch Len's blue eyes and everything seems to freeze.
That is, until the purplet starts walking over to him and Len's heart leaps into his throat. When they're within inches of each other, they just stare into each other's eyes and the boy has a fleeting thought of,
'Why is no one staring, or are they? Rin should be saying something right about now, but she's silent…'Then, suddenly, he's up against the wall, his lips meshed together with the mysterious purple haired man's, his breaths coming to him in gasps. He allows the man to part his lips with his tongue, both of their pink muscles locked in a steamy tango. Vaguely, Len is aware of a pain in his wrists, which are above his head, shackled by one of the purplet's hands. The other hand of the stranger is dipping beneath the boy's pants.
The purplet's mouth leaves a trail of kisses leading to Len's neck, his tongue running thickly over the blond's jugular as his hand works the organ beneath the blond's clothes. Leaving a very soft kiss, the man whispers one thing, his lips brushing against the skin.
"Len…"[/i]
He then bites down, through the flesh.
And that's when the blond twin snaps his head up. He's not up against a wall, but where he was moments ago, standing next to his sister at the front of the crowd. There is no man assaulting him up against a wall, but still staring at him from across the circle, a smirk now spreading his lips, his eyelids drooping just slightly.
Len presses his hands to his flushed cheeks, more than just confused.
'What… What in the world was that?' What in the world made him have such a realistic fantasy?
"Len, are you okay?" Rin asks, a hand on her brother's shoulder, worried.
The boy looks to her and nods, swallowing hard, trying to catch his breath.
"Y-Yeah…"Rin nods, though doesn't quite believe the other.
"We are all part of the Dark Woods Circus,"[/i] the man that Len had fantasized about says then, walking forward and stealing the show. It's quite obvious that all the women are attracted, for the crowd surges forward, just a little. Maybe that means that the men are just as attracted. Len is.
"If you do not know of this circus, allow me to explain,"[/i] the man says with a wide grin.
"But first, an introduction. This lovely, daring, handsome man standing before you now is known as Kamui Gakupo,"[/i] he says, taking a low bow, holding out the top hat he had been wearing. Placing back atop his head, Gakupo continues,
"and I am a creature of your greatest nightmares."[/i] His grin spreads wider.
"The Dark Woods Circus is a show of monstrous proportions, meant to simply show you what happens when God has turned His back on His people. We are what happens when you sin.
"To educate you, to keep you on the righteous path, we ask you come to our 'circus', to fully understand the power God has over each and every one of you. And we ask that only the strong of heart come, for what is behind closed doors is some times better left unseen."[/i]
It's then that the other circus members throw the flyers into the air, people shouting in their joy as the papers rain down upon them.
The performers aren't done yet, though.
With a loud, animalistic cry from each of them, excluding the one known as Gakupo, they all throw some sort of small ball onto the ground, each exploding and releasing a thick cloud of deep red smoke. And when that smoke clears, each of the circus members is gone.
"Uwah!" Rin exclaims, clapping her hands together in excitement.
"Len, Len, we have to go! If we don't go, I'll cry! I'll throw a fit! You'd better take me!"Still a bit mesmerized by the fantasy he'd had so randomly, Len nods, laughing softly at his sister's antics.
"Alright, Rin, I'll take you, I'll take you. Don't shout."The night is cold, so Rin pulls her coat around her just a little tighter.
"Len, are we going the right way?" she asks, the dark so thick and inky that she can barely see.
Len holds up the lantern he'd grabbed before they left and peers down at the flyer, his eyes squinting to better see the text on the paper.
"Yeah, we are. It says that it's far back in the forest, so to not get too disheartened if it takes a while," he responds, looking back at the road.
Rin sighs.
"My feet are going to be sore before we make it even halfway there."
"We are halfway there."
"Oh. Then excuse the exaggeration."Len rolls his eyes with a chuckle and reaches out, grabbing his sister's hand, reassuringly.
"Don't worry, Rin. We'll make it in time to see the show."It isn't long after that that they make it to a large crowd, which is gathering in front of an even larger, deep red tent. The man from before, the one on the stilts, is dancing around, shouting to the anxious crowd.
"Come one, come all, to the Dark Woods Circus! See the horrific beasts with your own eyes! From deformities to monsters; your eyes will show you the truth, no lies, no lies! The unreal will become real; the abnormal now normal! Let your imaginations run wild!"[/i]
Rin squeals with excitement, clapping her hands together. She then grabs Len's wrist.
"Come on! I want to be the first inside!"The man on the stilts laughs, overhearing Rin in her excitement.
"So eager to see the price of sins, little lady?"[/i] he asks, his accent thick, as if he was straight out of years before hers and Len's, even though the speech is only slightly different.
"I'm excited to see what's inside," Rin replies.
"I don't care if it's sin or grace; I want to see!"Again, the man laughs.
"So eager to lose the innocence in her heart. Step right in, fair lady, and see what awaits you in the dark."[/i]
The crowd shuffles into the tent, Len and Rin at the front, the excitement buzzing in the air. They all walk to the first room in anticipation and stare in awe at what had waited for them.
A boy with green hair sits on the floor, his head down. Large black angel-like wings hang from his back and his claw-like fingernails dig into the earth as if he is hanging onto reality by just his fingertips.
Slowly, he looks up at the crowd, a deep sadness in his eyes and he stretches out his wings in one swift movement, a few loose feathers floating to the ground around him. The skin on the right side of his face looks as if it is decaying, some skin hanging loose from his face.
"Beautiful," Rin whispers, her eyes wide with wonder. The sight simply takes her breath away.
Len nods in agreement, unable to put into words the amazement he feels. Although, he doesn't know what to think of the rotting flesh.
In the next room is the redhead from earlier, who melted a candle with just his hands. A woman is strapped to an upright table next to him, struggling against her bindings, eyes wild and frantic.
"Help me!" she cries, tears streaking her reddened cheeks.
"Please, help me!"Of course, no one does anything for her, though a feeling of unease sets over the crowd.
With a wicked grin and an insane glint in his eye, the redhead reaches over to the girl, his eyes following his own movement. The woman screams and he hasn't even touched her yet. But, when he does, her eyes practically pop from her skull and she screams so loudly that no sounds comes out.
He's melting her chest. The liquefied skin runs down her stomach, followed by boiling blood and melting muscle. He touches her ribcage and the bones melt, too. Finally, he grabs onto her heart, the muscle spastic in his grip until it begins to melt as well, the woman thrashing so much it's like she's having a seizure, until she just goes completely still, her eyes wide and staring at the audience.
All the while, the redhead is laughing.
A greater case of unease settles over the crowd, so close to terror at this point. They all somewhat rushed to the other room, Len pressing a hand over his mouth as if he's going to be sick.
Adding more to his panic is the fact that Rin is still smiling.
They pass a few more rooms in which Len refuses to look at, just from the gasps of terror from the group (though he heard Rin mumble something about a rotting woman in the room in which off-key music came from). He decides to somewhat 'suck it up' and look at the next room they come to.
The lights are even dimmer in here than the other rooms and it unnerves Len a little. When his eyes land on a familiar purple haired man, his unease seems to clear up a little, though, and he has the sensation of being intoxicated when that man looks his way and their eyes meet.
The smirk on Gakupo's face make's Len's knees shake and an odd feeling makes its home in the pit of his stomach.
All the while staring at Len, Gakupo moves around his room, to a boy just sitting in a chair, facing the audience, a dopey smile on his face (looking about the same as Len feels). In a slow, sultry movement, Gakupo moves the boy's hair from his neck and leans over him, eyes still locked with Len's.
He then bites down, hard enough to sink his teeth through the soft flesh.
As some blood slides down the boy's throat and shoulder, Len realizes that Gakupo is drinking the red liquid, all the while staring at the blond with a wanting look that sends chills right down his spine and to some place unmentionable, though he isn't sure why; the sight should sicken him, not arouse him.
Still staring at the blond twin, Gakupo rakes his nails down the still-smiling-boy's arm, ripping open the flesh and exposing what lies beneath; the shredded muscle and blood-streaked bones. His hand then snakes around to the boy's chest and his nails dig into the flesh, ripping it off like he's opening packaging to a present. Gakupo crushes the bones of the boy's ribcage into a fine powder in his hand and rips out the heart, which continues to beat for a little while.
Finally, he pulls back from the smiling corpse and holds up the heart, taking a bite as if it's an apple. Slowly, he licks his lips, eyes never leaving Len, who's red in the face.
Len manages to look away, his breath slightly quicker than before, even though he knows he's disgusted by what just went on. He just can't shake that overpowering feeling. Is this the power of a vampire?
Rin pushes on Len's back, leading him to another room, the smile on her face holding the cruelty of a child squishing ants on the sidewalk, or that of a serial killer who's just ripped open her latest victim.
"I'm so glad we came."In this next room is a blue haired man sitting at a table, staring at an empty plate. Len blinks, noticing the straightjacket the man is strapped up into. He watches as the man begins to smile, like he knows that something good is going to be brought to him.
"Eh…"[/i]
With that soft sound, the man looks up, his piercing blue eyes as cold as a cruel winter night. The smile widens, his eyes locked with the boy's, and he begins to speak.
"It's time…"[/i]
"…Time?" Len asks, his voice naught but a whisper.
"Time for… for what?""Feasting."[/i]
It's then that a woman, all skin and bones, walks into the room from somewhere behind the man, a tray in her hand. On that tray are two arms, frozen so badly that not only are they blue, but they are burned as well. She, with a glove on her hand, grabs one of the arms and holds it out to the bluenet, once she's close enough.
The man throws his head back with a cry sounding like a deranged laugh, his grin spreading much too wide, and chomps down on the arm, biting through flesh and bone. He eats the meat like it's the greatest delicacy the world has even known, licking his lips after he swallows. He then takes another bite and looks up at Len, the sounds of the bones against his teeth loud and cracking. He swallows.
"See? Feasting."[/i]
The group goes on to the next room, which is much larger than all the rest. The first thing that the people notice is a large, white cage with golden detailing, styled much like a bird cage. The next thing they notice is the girl with green hair that pools around her, much like her torn dress. Her hands grip the metal bars of her cage; her head hangs as if in misery.
What is quite visible, right away, is the deformity of her legs. The thighs are large, unnaturally so, to the point where they look almost swollen ten times over. Then, at the knee, her legs thin so much so that it seems there is no muscle, just bone. Her knees also bend the wrong way.
When she looks up, the audience sees that she has a blindfold on, soaked through with tears that also run down her cheeks, and the left half of her face is rotted through, though no bone or muscle is visible, only the skin is decaying.
"Kill me,"[/i] she sobs so very softly that only those who are at the front hear her (which includes Rin and Len).
"Please… Please kill me…"[/i]
Len shakes his head, his eyebrows pinching together in sorrow. In her own way, he finds the girl beautiful, even with the deformities. Certainly not cursed enough to wish for her own death. Slowly, he makes his way to the bars of the cage and looks down at her, in pity.
"You're beautiful," he whispers very softly.
"Don't let anyone tell you any different."The girl in the cage freezes, surprised, and her hands grip tighter to the iron bars. More tears slip down her cheeks as she just barely manages,
"Thank you."[/i]
When Len turns around, the only person he sees is Rin, whose smile has lost its cruelty.
"Come on, Len, the show's over.""Did everyone leave already?""Yes. They pretty much ran out of here."Len sighs and starts walking over to his sister. That is, until arms wrap around him from behind and lift him into the air. He screams, but a hand clamps down over his mouth, silencing his cries.
"Be quiet,"[/i] a voice hushes, though in a softer, kinder tone than what one would expect from an assailant.
Len recognizes the voice right away as Kamui Gakupo. He tries to scream louder and struggles against the man.
"Len!" Rin cries, running forward, only to be grabbed, herself, and lifted off her own feet by the greenet boy with the black wings.
"Let me go!" she shouts, struggling against him.
"Let me go, right now! Len! Len!"Tears spill from Len's eyes as he thrashes against Gakupo. His eyes widen in fear as a figure in a black cloak comes into the room, seemingly floating instead of walking. The figure's smile is all the twins can see, the teeth unnaturally white.
"Ah, twins. A golden haired boy and a golden haired girl,"[/i] the figure says in his too deep of voice, the sound almost guttural.
"Just what I need for my collection."[/i]
"Collection?"[/i] Rin gasps.
"What do you think we are? Toys? We're human beings! Let us go, right now! If anything happens to us, our parents'll call the police!"The man laughs.
"That will pose no issue, child,"[/i] he says, almost threateningly.
Len moves his head this way and that until he finally gets Gakupo's hand off of his mouth.
"Wh-what are you going to do with us?" he gasps, his voice shaking.
"Why, I'm going to make you into performers,"[/i] the man replies, as if it's so obvious.
"You will be my cute Little Devil and you," he turns to Rin, "will be my Mistress of Destruction."Rin bares her teeth, anger welling up in her.
"You leave Len alone! You touch one hair on my brother and I'll kill you!""But you loved it all, didn't you?" the cloaked man asks, tone teasing.
"Little Kagamine Rin, who enjoyed all of the blood, the gore, the insanity."Rin freezes, her heart leaping into her throat.
"Wh…What?" she gasps.
"How do you…?"He turns to Len.
"And Innocent Kagamine Len, who found interest where he should have been sickened," he says with a chuckle in his voice.
Len's own heart leaps into his throat. He knows of those secret feelings; those in which Len is ashamed of?
The man laughs as if winning a great game.
"You are mine." He looks to Gakupo nodding his head.
With a silent nod and a solemn expression, Gakupo carries Len off to a back room, who's struggling his hardest against the purplet.
"Let me go!" he cries.
"Rin! RIN!""LEN!" Rin screams, watching as Gakupo quickly closes the curtain to the brightly lit room behind.
"What are you going to do to him? Let him go! Let him go or I swear to God I will kill every last one of you!"The cloaked man's smile spreads just that much wider.
"I'm making him into a Superior Being. My Little Devil."Upon hearing a bone chilling scream that Rin knows is Len, the blonde girl fights even harder against the boy holding her, who seems unfazed by her attempts at getting free.
"Len! Len! LEN!"Inside of the brightly lit room, Len fights against the bindings keeping him strapped to a cold, metal table. A woman he has no name for slices into his back once again, pulling the flesh apart. Over his screams from the sheer white-hot pain, Len can hear the muscles being pulled apart; the tendons snapping and the blood squelching.
Again, he feels the woman place something in the wound in his back, the pain even greater as certain muscles and things are touched that are never meant to be touched.
The woman sociopath stitches up the wounds, having placed two, over sized bat wings into Len's back. They are not big enough for the boy to use them to fly, but they were much bigger than that of the animal's their origin is from. She nods to Gakupo, who's standing by the table with no sympathy and he holds onto the boy as she undoes the bindings.
Len fights hard to get away, but finds himself flipped onto his back, which hurts more than words can describe, and re-bound.
The woman looms over Len's face as he sobs in pain and panic. She then forces his mouth open and keeps it open with a device much like the ones found at dentists' offices made to keep the sleeping patient's mouth open.
Again, the blond boy cries out, loudly.
Still with no sympathy for the boy, the woman grabs what looks like a pair of pliers and uses them to grip onto one of Len's canine teeth.
Knowing what's coming, Len sobs even more, fighting against his restraints, screaming when she finally rips his tooth out. He screams even louder when she rips the other canine out.
"So noisy," he hears the woman mutter under her breath as he sobs, pitifully, as she moves away from the table.
Gakupo looks down at Len, who looks up at him, pleadingly, and he frowns, the pity for the boy showing on his face, finally.
"This is the last thing that I wanted to happen," Gakupo whispers, softly.
The woman returns with two, bright white fangs in her hand. With the gentleness of a rabid grizzly bear, she thrusts a fang into one of the open, still bleeding spots in Len's gums, causing him to choke on his sobs. She does the same with the other fang and open spot.
"Good, now that the preparations are complete," she hums, grabbing a needle filled with some liquid or another. She jabs it into the inside of Len's elbow and injects the dark liquid into him.
Immediately, the blond feels the liquid running through his veins like fire and he writhes. The pain he feels is so great that not a sound passes through his lips.
But, as quickly as it came, the pain is gone, completely, from his mouth and back, as well. His eyelids droop as the woman removes the bindings and Gakupo places a blanket around him, before picking him up.
"I'm sorry," the purple haired man sighs, holding Len close as he leaves the room, pulling the blanket up over the boy's head.
"I'm so sorry."Rin fights even more against the boy holding her once she sees Gakupo leave the room, Len in his arms, wrapped up in a blanket. Tears spill from her eyes and stain her cheeks as she shrieks,
"What the hell did you bastards do to him?"With a nod from the man in black, the greenet begins to take Rin over to the brightly lit room. She screams and thrashes in a panic; whatever made Len scream so horribly is in there and she wants no part of it.
She doesn't have a choice.
Immediately, she's thrown onto the table and strapped to it, the woman already at work. She has a large surgical knife in her hand, which throws Rin into more of a panic.
"GET AWAY FROM ME!" Rin cries, throwing her full weight against her bindings, but finds her struggles futile.
The woman grabs one of Rin's hand and cuts off her pinky finger at the second joint, effortlessly cutting through the bone.
Rin screams so loudly her throat is immediately sore and paining her.
Next, the woman cuts of the remainder of the fingers on that hand, then moves on to the other hand, repeating the process. She puts down the knife only to pick up five others without handles, the same size as the one she'd just used. Yet, instead of cutting the blonde girl, she jams them into the bloodied stumps of Rin's fingers, pushing down so hard that the bones crack and brake. Ignoring her 'patient's' screaming, she does the same to the other hand.
After that, the woman grabs a syringe filled with the same dark liquid she used on Len.
"Like brother like sister," the woman sighs, shaking her head.
"Teenagers these days. They have no idea how to keep quiet."She stabs the needle into the inside of Rin's elbow and injects the contents into the girl's arm. And, just like Len felt, Rin has the same white-hot fire flowing through her veins, causing her body to react so violently that she actually manages to snap the restraints on her wrists.
In horror, that pain still flowing through her, the blonde twin holds up her hands to her face, the blood dripping from her fingers onto her cheeks, and watches as the skin moves.
It crawls onto the knives and seems to fuse with the metal, giving her feeling all the way to the tips of the blades, as if they'd always been her fingers and had never been anything different.
When that pain fades away as fast as it had come, Rin finds herself exhausted. Her hands fall to her sides on the table and she takes deep, slow breaths, her eyes half-lidded.
"Perfect,"[/i] the woman says with a cruel smile.
"Just like her brother. No side-effects what so ever.""None that we can see," the boy with the wings mumbles.
"We can't see if she'll go insane or not. Not like Kaito, or Akaito."The woman shrugs.
"Even if she does, it'll just make for a better show."Rin's eyes slowly slide closed and, even though she really isn't too aware of it, a smile pulls at her lips. A thought rings out in her mind and she wonders how she could have never not known it, previously.
'This feeling… It's pure… elation.'[/size][/center]
