silverandarsenic-hcs - Tumblr blog

silverandarsenic-hcs · 4 days ago

Text

Skeletal, Chapter Seventeen: Umbra, Part Two

AO3 Chapter One Chapter Two Chapter Three Chapter Four Chapter Five Chapter Six Chapter Seven Chapter Eight Chapter Nine Chapter Ten Chapter Eleven Chapter Twelve Chapter Thirteen Chapter Fourteen Chapter Fifteen Chapter Sixteen

Lamentations 3:32 "Though he brings grief, he will show compassion, so great is his unfailing love."

“Why?” V asked, wishing he could get a good look at what Sister, Copia, and Terzo were all doing on the other side of the room. Why would Secondo, the man who V heard was so full of hatred and rage, ask him not to kill Copia? Why would he not want to be avenged? V expected that if he had anyone on his side, it would be him.

“We can’t speak here.” Secondo turned his head to speak to V but made it look like he was stretching his neck. “Do not trust Paolo. Whatever you know is not the truth-”

“Did you say something?” Sister asked loudly.

“He was just saying how he thinks that, if Copia wants to be here with all of us so badly, he should kill himself and let that good looking new guy take care of everything. Weren’t you, Two?”

“Don’t explain me.” Secondo bit back.

“I will not kill myself- wait, how do you know what he looks like? You’ve seen V?” Copia asked with a certain pathetic hope in his voice.

“No, just an assumption. Hopefully he takes more after father than mother, like you do, C.”

“Boys.” Sister snapped her fingers loudly. “You are too old for this. Don’t make me-”

“What, be a mother?” Everything Terzo said was played off like it was a joke to him, no matter how spiteful his words were, but V knew better. “Yes, you wanted to birth an army of leaders like mother Mary, not raise a family, that’s right.”

“I know it’s Primo.” V whispered behind Secondo’s head. “I know what he did.”

“No. You. Don’t.” Secondo whispered. “See through me.”

“Pardon?”

“If I wanted to talk to you I would, kid.” Completely hidden and with no way to escape, V rolled back to sit on his butt, crunched into a tiny ball behind the sofa, and made himself comfortable. See through me? What are you talking about? This entire plan has gone to shit. V covered his right eye with his hand and did his best to peek around with what little his left could see - usually only flowing shapes and colors - but to his surprise, went right through Secondo and the couch, and upwards. He could see Sister, Copia, and Terzo as clear as day, but he was looking through his brother's eyes.

“Well, are you taking care of yourself?”

“Yes-”

“Liar. Go on, take off those gloves and show mommy your red little knuckles. Pants not fitting like they used to, eh, Flip? I’d venture to say you gained a pound or two now that you’re sitting on your ass all day, and you’re gonna end up right where you started.” Copia shifted uncomfortably in his seat, squeezing his hands tightly in his lap and folding himself inwards.

“Oh, my little Cardi…” Sister sighed disappointedly and shook her head

“Little is an overstatement.” Terzo snorted. Copia wound his fists so tightly they began to shake and Terzo eyed him curiously, tauntingly, waiting for him to blow up at last. He began to go red in the face. Rather than stand up for her son or up to the other, Sister sat as silently as Secondo, watching dust particles float by in the air, waiting for it all to settle.

“Stop it.” He choked. “I didn’t- I’m not… I came here to speak with Sister.”

“Before or after your nightly purge-wank session?”

“Fuck you!” Copia jumped up with the same force that he used to snap his favorite record. “Fuck you you stupid fucking ghost! Why are you even here!” He shook his fist at Terzo, painfully shorter than him.

“Mommy, are you gonna let him talk to me like that?” Terzo threw his hand over his heart and gasped like a cartoon princess.

“I told you, Cardi…” Sister patted the space beside her solemnly. “Don’t let him wind you up like that.”

“Go to Hell!” Copia shouted. No one reacted to any of his movements, volume, or tone.

“I’m trying. If we can all carry on, please, I have places to be.” Terzo scanned Secondo out of the corner of his eye so critically that V was sure he knew he was in his brother’s head. When Sister beckoned again, Copia sat like a good boy. “There you go.” A smug smirk tugged at the corner of Terzo’s mouth, but he quickly quelled it. “Bury us.”

“I can’t…” Copia cried out and buried his face in his hands. “If I bury you, that means you’ll be gone, and- then I’ll be alone.” His voice cracked painfully.

“Don’t be a baby, Copia. Keep dear ma and pa with you, let me and Two go. It is not hard. The holes are still dug out there in the forest. Let us two go.”

“No, you can’t.” Sister pushed across the sofa towards Copia and wrapped her arms around him, pulling him into her chest warmly. “I won’t be here without my sons. All of us are together, finally.”

“Not Primo.” Terzo pointed brazenly at the glass coffin beside Nihil’s. “He’s not in there.” Sister stroked Copia’s cheek with her thumb.

“Yes he is. We’re all here together now.”

“Some mother you are, you can’t even recognize your own son. How many times do I have to tell you people? That is not him! Haven’t you ever wondered why he’s the only one of us who hasn’t come out here? I am sure he would have much to say about all of this. It’s because he is not here. You know that, Copia. I told you there was an imposter all those years ago and instead of killing him, you killed me! It’s not him.”

“Son…”

“Don’t you think I’d recognize him? Me of all people?” Terzo threw his hands up.

“Brother.” Said Secondo.

“No one ever fucking listens to me…” Terzo dug his fingers into his mess of black hair and tugged on it from the root. “You make me feel crazy, and I’m not fucking crazy. You people are. I know my own brothers. That is not fucking Tomaso. The only reason that corpse hasn’t rotted like the others do is because he’s in his box. That doesn’t mean it’s him. He would come out here just to whip you like a rented mule, Flip, you know it. Why don’t we get dear old dad to check, eh? Oh wait. He doesn’t come. At least we all know why he won’t come to these sweet little family therapy sessions. But that’s him alright. And if he did come, he would be able to tell you that is not fucking Primo-”

“Brother.” Secondo said again, harsher. Terzo turned to face the outside of the room and screamed at the top of his lungs until it rasped and crackled in his throat in a way that made V’s twinge. Still on his feet he crouched into a tiny ball and wrapped his arms around his knees, visibly heaving. No one cared that he was so upset either, just like Copia. He popped up like a rocket and spun with both his arms out at his sides, as welcoming as the ring master at a circus.

“Fine. We’re fine. I am alright. Anyways…” He slid ever so cooly towards the sofa and slipped into next to Copia, nuzzling into his shoulder like a cat. Copia turned away into Sister with disgust. “Dear little brother of mine, whom I love and adore, be a lamb and bury our corpses, will you?”

“Why should he have to?” Sister put her hand on Terzo’s face and pushed him away. “So what if he isn’t ready to let go of his family yet? He is going through a lot right now. He doesn’t have the luxury of rest between jobs like you three did. He needs his family.” In a blink V was back in his own body, looking through his own eyes. Secondo cleared his throat.

“Three is going to cry now. There is a door behind the podium you were at when you came in. Meet me at the gates.”

“As a distraction?” V tilted his head to the side. Secondo pulled a breath in and held it there for far too long.

“Yes.” And right on cue, V used the sound of Terzo’s loud, hoarse sobs to cover up the sound of his crouching steps as he stalked back to his first hiding place. Secondo stood and followed horizontally, always staying between him and Copia’s sight line. Sure enough, there was a small handle only a foot off of the floor. The second V touched it he was spat out of the mausoleum and into the swamp. Stinking murky water splashed up at the grey stone walls and tree roots, where no door was. The roots were so close together V wouldn’t have been able to get through them even if there really were a door, and why would there be a tiny little portal hidden there- more important things to worry about. V scrambled to his feet, sopping wet from head to toe, to reassess. The desire to murder his twin was still insurmountable, but suddenly, less motivated by revenge and rage, but by pity. The only person in that room who cared for him at all was Secondo, who did nothing more than ask for him not to be killed - Terzo and Sister were both so cruel to him but in such different ways. At least Terzo was not lying to him. Copia was clearly distraught and came to his family, the family that he wanted so dearly he could not even let them pass from this world, for guidance, and only to be belittled and berated. It was a wonder to V why Copia had not killed himself; clearly he had lost everything, his entire known family, his ghouls, his title, and he hated himself already. If V were still V, who he used to be, that weak frail thing made of bones and ribbon, he and Copia may have gotten along well. But as Perpetua, the recovered, the recently renowned, the renewed, he thought the best thing that could possibly happen was to put that sad little creature out of its misery.

V changed outfits when he got back to his bag, thankful he had brought a second outfit of his second favorite clothes. Skin tight leather pants, a black shirt, and the purple velvet blazer. With so much new information swelling in his brain and circling like a thunderstorm, he could not wait to get his mask back on. And what was the point of taking it off? He wanted his twin to see every exact detail of his bare face while he was dying, but instead had his entire world shaken like a snowglobe without even the safety of a piece of silver. Though he was hidden for the entirety of his family’s exchange, he felt as though he’d been laid bare and prodded like a science experiment, more exposed than on Cirice’s table. And he was starving. The thirst that once felt like swallowing a length of barbed wire felt like having his esophagus pulled inside out by that ghoul’s phantom fist.

Secondo caught V on his knees at the ministry gates with the wrist of Sister Lamia in his mouth, suckling at her torn pale flesh and emitting satisfied moans and whimpers every time he could be bothered to take a breath. Sister Lamia was a crumpled mess against the fence, knees bent askew and the most animated, doll-like expression of ecstasy across her face. Lurking in the shadows, Secondo watched until V broke from Lamia with a gasp, slinking backwards onto his butt, and then slowly lying flat in the dewy grass. He looked rather like he had just had an orgasm. He did not hear Secondo approach but jumped up slightly when he saw him hold a hand out to Lamia without bending forward at all. Dazed, she threw her hand into his palm. He hoisted her up quickly and brought her wrist to his mouth, but rather than drink what was left of her, he licked her wound closed.

“Go to bed.” He demanded, and straightened her robes before sending her back through the gate.

“Later, Papa.” She winked over her shoulder at V. It was just his luck that he happened to find someone so willing, because willing or not, he was going to take what he needed. Half of him was falling through time and space, and the other half was doing his darndest to readdress the severity of the situation. Secondo stared down at him disapprovingly until he managed to roll onto his knees and climb upright using the fence for balance. V held his hand out excitedly. “We meet at last. I am V. Or Papa. Or Perpetua, they call me that now.”

“I know.” Secondo glared at his hand until he put it away. “We don’t have much time. Follow me.” Both men walked silently through the forest for so long that V believed wholeheartedly that he was about to be ambushed. He freed his wings but kept them tight at his back, and Secondo released a sound that one may have called a chuckle.

“Special.”

“Pardon?” Secondo stopped abruptly and stood in front of V.

“You are the only one of us with wings like that. That is special. I felt it in you.”

“Like how I saw through your eyes?”

“No.” Secondo turned back around, making a few paces forward. He stopped in front of a giant hole in the ground, full of dead yellow leaves. “I went looking for you.” He turned back quickly. “I looked for you. I was going to bring you home but father- you don’t know?” His expression never changed and he was as still as a statue, but his tone was rushed

“Paolo said he chose Copia when we were born and then gave me away. All he ever said about you was that… you threw a party at the estate once, and left a note with the act of contrition written on it on his dinner plate. You wanted to study God but you weren’t allowed.”

“Yes, that’s true. But I did not only want to find God, I went to find you. That was what it was all for. I wanted to bring you home.”

“Why?” To groom me like Terzo and Copia? Keep me in the tombs for longer? Let me join in on this beautiful, happy family affair?

“Family should be together.”

“Is that why you don’t want me to kill Copia?”

“No. It was our father who ended our lives, not Copia. Even if he were the one who pulled the trigger, it still would have been father. You are lucky you did not know him. He was worse.”

“Than what?”

“Anything.” Secondo snapped. “If you kill Copia, you will be doing it to serve the rule of a dead man. If he were still alive when you arrived here at the ministry, you would be in one of those boxes too. He would have done anything to keep Copia on the throne. Do not ask me why. Primo wants you to kill him because he lives for a vendetta and sees you as a way to end it. Nothing more.”

“I hate Paolo, but I don’t think that’s true.”

“Did you read the diary?”

“Everything he did to Terzo, yes-”

“That is the same man you’re dealing with. No different. I don’t know what is written there, but Terzo said he kept a detailed account. Primo tried to destroy it, but he put some kind of spell on it. None of us understand his magic, least of all him. Primo wants you to kill Copia because he can’t do it himself, because everyone would discover his true identity, and because the ghouls would stop him. He thinks that you being Papa would make them stand down. I will tell you now, it won’t. The ghouls are loyal to whoever summons them. Dew still comes here to visit Terzo, because that is his Papa. None of that matters right now. If you kill him, he will never bury our bodies.” Secondo turned again, and V realized where they were, and why. Seven holes in the ground. Six feet deep. “We can’t move on if we aren’t. I have tried to figure it out for so long now, but I keep getting the same answer. It is why you drink blood. Why you have wings. Why our corpses don’t rot. Because we are not in control. Copia has to be the one to put us in the grave himself. He takes our bodies with us everywhere he goes because he cannot let go. Sister is not ready either. But Terzo and I…” Secondo exhaled a weary sigh. “We are ready to go. There is one thing you should know about being part of this family, that is in our blood and inescapable. We always get what we want, but never how we want it. The monkey’s paw.”

“He spoke highly of you.”

“Primo?”

“No, Terzo. In the diary. Even when you were there torturing him, or- in charge of the torturing. He wrote about how much he missed you at first.” Secondo tilted his head to the side then closed his eyes softly.

“I was never there.”

“But he said you were, when Primo was off being Papa. That you used to stare at him without talking, that you begged him to give in. He said you brought him a violin.” If there were any light in that black forest, V would have been able to see the glisten in his brother’s eyes.

“I was never there, V.” He muttered. “I wanted to get him, the same way I wanted to get you. I couldn’t do it.” Their two hearts broke. Terzo imagined it all.

“Because of your father?”

“If I could blame it on him I would.”

“Tell me about Angel.”

“No.”

“For the same reason you couldn’t go back to the tombs?”

“Yes.”

“Primo said that leaving halfway through your transformation made you brutal and bitter. That you could have been great but all you ever were was angry.”

“Primo pretends to be someone else. Terzo is stuck between worlds, not quite alive but not quite dead, and uses his delusions to cope with his sadness. Even if he is buried he’ll keep wandering. Mass every morning, the grave every night. He is ready to let go, but what has him is not. That is why he is so erratic. It is not only him in there, in that body. Copia is timid to cover up his anger. Aren’t you hiding something too?” V sat down and hung his feet in one of the graves, imagining that he was sitting over his own un-rotting corpse. When V imagined his death before coming to the ministry, he imagined people would be either very sad, or very indifferent. Sad because they could no longer take from him what they wanted, or because they should have seen it coming - the story here was always that it was at his own hand or another’s - or indifferent because he really did not matter all that much in the grand scheme of things and would be ascending to Heaven, which was always thought to be the better place. V slipped down into the hole and lay flat on his back in the crunching leaves and turned early with his arms crossed over his chest, and stared up at the starry sky through the treetops. If he were to die now, right there in that hole, people would be sad because they liked him, and because he could not fulfil his duties, which would be quite the inconvenience. His family, however, who he gave up everything in the world to find, would be indifferent. Not because he did not matter, and not because they knew he was going somewhere he could be happier, but because it was the expected thing for him to do. At his own hand or another’s. It is not only the curse of misgiven wishes that runs through their bloodline, but the kind of solemn sadness that calls them to the grave as Sister’s letter called him home. The only question that remained was whether or not that was because they should not have been born at all, as in they deserve to be put to death, or because they were born in the wrong world to begin with. Was it the rotten womb that engendered them which made them so evil, or the spirit of the man whose seed they emerged from, or was it that the thing inside of them that made such devilish mutations possible only trying to bring them back?

Not because of what he learned, not because of what he was made into by Cirice, not because abandoning his post made him feel like a failure, but because lying there in that cold grave gave V the same feeling as wearily pushing his key into the front door after a long drive home, he knew that his entire life thus far had been a waste. A waste of oxygen others more deserving should have inhaled, a waste of food that could have gone to hungrier bellies, a waste of tailored clothes that could have covered those with only rags, a waste of homes that could have sheltered the downtrodden. He could have taken his own life as a boy and spared his mind and body the pain of living and searching, and gone straight home through more than flimsy katabasis. Fall through the earth for one final time without a drink or an orgasm, and find his throne among six others.

Until he began his work for Ghost, V would not see that any of their lives ever had a point, aside from being used as pawns to torture each other. Perhaps they were even too rotten for Hell, and cast out as Lucifer was cast down from Heaven, and their punishment was each other. Maybe the best thing for all of them to do was wash their hands of the others and go in separate directions, and try to forget, if forgetting was ever possible.

“Primo thinks that healing is brutality, and that silence is indifference. He chose Copia because the others chose you. I looked for you, brother. Please don’t hurt anyone.”

#this is another long one #skeletal fic #ghost bc #ghost #the band ghost #ghost band #papa iii #cardinal copia #papa ii #secondo #terzo #papa v perpetua #perpetua #perp

3 notes · View notes

silverandarsenic-hcs · 5 days ago

Text

Skeletal, Chapter Sixteen: Umbra, Part One.

Psalm 109:10 Let his children wander about and beg; And let them seek sustenance far from their ruined homes.

Umbra, Part One

Copia was V’s favorite television show. He watched him go about his entire day without leaving that room once, observing his every action and forgetting his own precarious hiding spot. After cleaning up the record debacle, Copia read two entire books and then brought out a suitcase from the wardrobe, which was still packed from his move two weeks ago. He read through several mismatched colored pieces of paper, giving an “awh, how sweet�� or an “oh, isn’t that nice” to each, before collecting them in a neat stack and pinning them on the mirror, tucked underneath the frame. He then spent over an hour deciding where four framed photographs should go.

The only one that V could get a good look at was a photo of Copia and the ghouls outside of the ministry, set right in the middle of the mantel between one of him holding an Employee Of The Month plaque, and one of himself and Nihil. In the group photo, Copia was still wearing his cassock, so he assumed it was from before he was Papa, when they sent him off to work like one anyways. All that was left in the little suitcase were a few articles of clothing, and a miniature stuffed creature resembling Copia and wearing one of his outfits. He set that thing nicely in its own chair, and V immediately wanted to tear it to shreds. The desire to see its stuffing strewn across the room while he picked out bits of its felt skin from between his teeth was so strong he almost leapt through the window for it.

I went to Hell and back. I turned my back on the God I spent my entire life worshipping, and left my home to become some kind of demon. I have read graphic accounts of torture, been tortured myself, learned every grim tale there is to know about my disgusting family. My life has become so extremely morbid. And you, Copia, have a fucking plushie of yourself. At least Primo changed his name and pretends that he’s dead to hide from the shame of what he did. You murdered two of our brothers, three as far as you know, and you get to say “isn’t that comfortable?” while giving a fluffy miniature of yourself its own goddamn chair. I came in here as one big ugly scar because of the life that I was forced to have away from all of this. I just murdered people to make myself feel better like an infant sucking their thumb. I drink the blood of other human beings for sustenance now. And you, Copia, get to read cute little letters and organize sweet memories.

That happy family home V conjured up was gone. When he pictured it then it was an empty, overgrown, dilapidated husk of an estate, with a pool full of algae and food on the grill so rotted that it was beginning to turn into dust. The estate is gone. Mother is dead. Father is dead. Primo is a wolf in the clothing of a sheep, in the clothing of a wolf. Secondo had everything he ever cared for ripped away from him. Terzo was victimized and mangled for nothing. I was burned, battered, and raped. And you, my malefic twin, just asked a servant to bring you a smaller spoon, because the one you were given with dinner feels weird in your mouth. V had never wanted to kill anyone more in his entire life, not only to spare his own life in the future but because he thought he deserved it. Copia deserved to die, and why not at the hands of the man who stole his life? It should have been V raised at home with his family. It should have been V cooing at pieces of paper and organizing happy pictures and having a stupid, ugly doll of himself. He wouldn’t say Copia should have been in what was his place, but he should have not been born at all. V was going to correct the mistake he made by not absorbing him in the womb.

With the ministry asleep for the night and Copia’s heavy curtains drawn, V stood up proudly on that overhang and spread his wings to their fullest arrogant extent. Every muscle fiber in his body was screaming for him to break through those fragile windows and kill the wretched little man right there on the carpet. Slowly, too. He wanted to wrap his hands around Copia’s throat hard enough to crush it, and watch the light leave his ugly green eyes. He wanted him to know that it was V killing him, that the man who took his place was taking his life too, and he wanted him to know why - vengeance immaculate. Instead, V flapped his wings with a loud whoosh, and that one gesture was enough to get his feet off the ground. He had nothing guiding him but blind confidence when he jumped off of that overhang, and with a few more quick flutters he began to soar. Over the garden, over the fountain, over the trees, and over the ministry fences. The cool evening air and the new power surging through him only revved him up even more. He would have flown straight to the moon if not for the thirst that felt like swallowing a mile of barbed wire inch by inch over the last two hours. He landed hard on his feet between the trees, right where he ditched his bag in the morning, and sunk his teeth into one of two blood bags he bought. He did not expect that he would be gone for long when he was packing, and figured that if need be he could find someone to drain on his way home, but no need. V wouldn’t strangle Copia, he decided, he would drink every last drop of his blood. It wasn’t enough that he die slowly at the hands of his successor, he had to know that every last bit of power he had in his life and his body was being used to make him more powerful.

V sucked down both bags quickly and threw them to the forest floor. Such a momentous occasion requires an outfit change, he thought. But what, of V’s favorite articles of clothing, would be best for the job. The cloak, while beautiful, would get in the way, but V did want Copia to see his magnificent color. The silver mask placed on him in his hour of darkness was his safety blanket, but he wanted his brother to see his face as clear as day. The spurs tickled him with every step, but were loud enough to give away his position before he was ready to strike. Decisions, decisions. With his thirst temporarily sated and his attire chosen, he turned back towards the ministry fences just in time to hear the gate open through the trees, far to his right. Eager to get a good look at the face of the man who he had not seen leaving the mausoleum, the skeletal man with black hair, V restrained his wings and crept through the trees on his hands and feet like an animal. Each snapping twig and ruffling leaf threatened to give him away. He followed the scent of lamp oil to the garden pathway where a man in all black with a wide black hat on was holding a hellish red lantern out in front of himself, and humming.

His back was turned again, and V couldn’t tell if it were the same man who had snuck back inside while V was so engrossed in stalking his brother, or if it were some other stranger from the ministry. Slinking around cypress trees V followed this figure all the way down the stoned path to where the dry forest became a marsh. The scent of stale water and algae forced itself upon V, overwhelming his senses and making it impossible to use his second sight. The lack of trees in the swampy clearing forced V to hang back so far that he would lose his subject if not for the lantern. Fog as thick and white as smoke wet him from the neck down as he crawled from slippery rock to slimy stone. There in the center of this wetland was the mausoleum, and sitting right on top of it, clearly crushing it by the way the edges of the roof were cracking, was a massive bald cypress tree, with thick, tentacle-like roots growing down the building in every direction like a cage. It looked like it was being reclaimed by nature.

“Here we go…” The man with the lantern sang with a sigh, and knocked on the stone door six times hard. Breaking the pressured silence was the sound of stone grinding against stone so loud that V was half convinced the earth itself was splitting in two, and the door opened. It was a perfect chance for him. If it was the black haired man or anyone else he would have them cornered and be able to question them about… he would come up with some questions. If it was his atrocious twin, then V had already won. Once the man was inside he circled the mausoleum to be sure there were no other exits, and managed to slip inside through the door just before it was beginning to close. He had the good sense to lunge behind a gigantic black podium just in time to keep himself hidden when the man he was looking for turned back to be sure the door had closed, and that he was alone. It was Copia - without the white contact he wore in his eye to pretend that he had the family marking. V thought he was even uglier up close, that the window he was looking through must have obscured his vision.

The inside was nothing like the outside, V felt like he was inside a circus tent. Instead of a tiny room with stone coffins or porcelain vases full of ashes all piled on top of each other, stinking like corpses and the same deafening smell as the muck outside, they were in a massive room the size of the atrium at the tombs, but decorated like a mansion. Red damask wallpaper covered the walls, broken by dark wooden wainscotting. The hardwood floors were clean and dust free, and several very comfortable looking couches, loveseats, and chairs were scattered around the edges of the gigantic open room. At the head, directly across from the door, was a fantastical fireplace tall enough to walk into with a stone-faced chimney carved with different symbols and writings he could not see from his vantage point. And in the center of the room in a large circle, were five class caskets, each with a perfectly preserved corpse resting inside. Four men, one woman.

“Oh, mama…” Copia placed his lantern on the floor and walked right over to the woman, leaning on the casket with his head on his fist and staring down at her. An even better stage, V thought. Our entire family will be here to witness me usurping the throne. “I wish you would have told me…” Copia sighed dreamily. He half expected the body of his mother to answer Copia, after hearing about how their ghosts were wandering around, but nothing happened. Making himself comfortable, Copia dragged an armchair over from the edge of the room and sat right between her and the oldest man. “And dear old dad…” He snorted. He pulled a golden flask out of the breast pocket in his jacket and took a big swig. “Had to go and die before you could tell me anything. That’s just like you two, you know. No straight answers…” In an act of bravery, V slipped around the podium to hide behind one of the sofas, much closer. “Come on then, I don’t have all night.” He sighed. It was so silent that V thought he was talking to him, and would be looking directly at him when he finally stood up. Instead, an earthshattering rush of air blew through the mausoleum, sniffing every candle except for Copia’s lantern that illuminated the entire room into one monochromatic nightmare. When Copia stood a monstrous shadow grew behind him, seemingly slower than his own movements. V’s mind immediately went back to what Allegra had told him only days ago: The ghouls are loyal. They would intervene. Neither of you would be able to kill each other. No one else with that evil white eye of yours is going to die. That ghouls were near, V did not doubt, but Allegra’s prophecy did not account for Copia’s lie. He did not have the evil white eye, meaning the only two people left alive with the feature were V, and possibly Paolo if he could prove he was hiding it with contacts. In V’s mind, that meant he was safe.

“Mama- oh!” Copia jumped and threw his hand over his head. V craned his neck in every direction to see who his twin was concealing, but could only see the top of his black hair. “I thought Sister would come… anyways…”

“Just little old me.” His voice was deep and raspy. Copia sat down again and as he was about to take another pull from his flask, the man snatched it for himself. He crossed his arms and leaned against Sister’s casket carelessly. “Why, do you need some motherly comfort?” He taunted.

“It couldn’t hurt.” Copia widened his eyes. The other man sighed, emptied the flask into his mouth, and tossed it into Copia’s lap. V took off his gloves very slowly so he could pick at his nails, hoping the sensation would help lighten the burden that was his absolute carnal need for answers and blood.

“And you don’t stand when a woman enters a room? What a gentleman. Go on, I’ll wait for her. She has something to say to you and I want to be here for this.” Dragging his feet, Copia crossed the room to a small cabinet by the dampened fireplace. In the darkness V couldn’t see what he retrieved, but he carried his haul back to the center circle and sat down on his knees. The other man began to pace like he was bored of it all and had been impatiently waiting for Copia for many many long hours, and then found a place in front of a different casket, directly across from V. He crouched as small as he could, praying that he hadn’t been caught. Copia placed a black candle on top of each of the caskets, lighting them each with their own match and throwing the spent match into the fireplace. “I still think it’s odd that you call her mama.” V took one stabilising breath before peering up again to check if the coast was clear. With his arms crossed loosely over his chest, leaning back on one foot, Terzo was staring right at him. He looked much younger than V, perhaps only in his early twenties, and wearing the same skull paint as in his portrait in the tombs.

“And what should I call her?”

“Mother, like a grown man. Or her title. Or her first name. Not mama. She breastfed you for too long.” Terzo shrugged. V swallowed his fear and did not back down again.

“Don’t be vulgar.” Copia scoffed. When all of the candles were lit, doing hardly anything to illuminate the red room, he stood in the center of the circle, held both hands out, and snapped in his leather gloves. Thunder cracked outside. Sister Imperator appeared with a flash, standing right between her sons with her hands clasped in front of her. She looked just as severe as V imagined she would, after all he’d heard from the others. The only difference was that she did not appear as solid as the two men at her sides. Not quite transparent, not how V expected a ghost might look, just not quite all there.

“Boys…” Every candle in the room lit up once more, bright enough to see clearly but dim enough to be intimate, and the red lamp extinguished. Her thin lips curled into a crooked smile.

“Mama.” Copia sighed in relief and wrapped his arms around her. Every part of her that he touched seemed almost smoky. He looked very obviously proud of himself for how he’d been able to conjure her, wiggling his hands around.

“Hello, Cardi.” She put one hand on his shoulder and patted his head with the other, turning her face away from him uncomfortably. Nobody likes him, even better, V thought. Terzo watched V curiously until Copia and Sister separated.

“Mother.” Terzo said flatly.

“Hello.” She was entirely apathetic. They did not embrace. “Now, C, how is everything going as Frater- can’t you bring your mother a seat? These bones are not what they used to be.”

“They aren’t real.” Terzo muttered and began to examine his fingernails.

“Oh, uh- of, yes, of course. Apologies.” Copia held both his hands out and twisted slightly like he was torn between directions, and eventually pulled over a loveseat from the other side of the room. V thought he would feel much more upon seeing his mother for the first time, even as only a loosely concocted collection of molecules, but he felt no connection to her. In his heart, his mother was the woman in the yellow kitchen who cleaned his wounds, and she died a long time ago. What he could not tear himself away from was Terzo, and not only because he was the only thing keeping him from being found out. He had so much more to say to him than anyone else. Firstly, an apology for everything that happened in his life. Second, ask for a much more detailed recount of everything Primo did to him so that V may know better how and why to hate him. And third, cursed third, advice on what was going to happen to him next. V felt that he and Terzo were so similar, having been ruined and then made fantastic, and would trust his word on the future more so than anyone else’s.

“Being Frater is… good. That is to say, well… it’s all fine, it is, but- I’m here, aren’t I?” Copia sat beside Sister and when she crossed her leg politely, he did too. Terzo scoffed again.

“I can’t think with you looming like that.” Just behind them in the corner something moved in the shadows. V rolled forward slightly to sit on his knees when his legs began to cramp from crouching. A severe man in skeletal paint and long black robes emerged from the shadows. Copia was very obviously startled by him, and V ducked down again. “Sit. Over there.” V clenched every muscle in his body to stop himself from crying out some sort of prayer that he would not be found out. Copia’s death could not happen that night, not in front of the ghosts like that when V had no idea just how tangible they were, but there was no way for him to escape unnoticed. Heavy footsteps approached like earthquakes, and when Secondo sat the entire old sofa creaked loudly. He blocked V entirely from the rest of the room like a shield, even covering the last bit of light from underneath the sofa with his long robes.

“Is anyone else here?” Copia asked loudly.

“No, no one else came to see you whine.”

“Oh, Terzo …” Sister huffed. “Be easy on him. He has had a difficult go of it lately…”

“Et tu brute? When have I ever not been easy on him?” Secondo took a slow, deep inhale while the other three continued their bickering. “Are you going to kill him?” He asked quietly. His voice was a low rumble from deep within his chest. What if the others hear him speak? What if Copia discovers him then? What if this is all a ruse to get him to come out so they can kill him? V cleared his throat, and just as he was parting his dry lips to speak: “Don’t do it. Please.”

#this ones a lot #skeletal fic #ghost bc #the band ghost #ghost band #ghost #cardinal copia #copia #papa v perpetua #perpetua #perp #papa iii #papa ii #sister imperator

3 notes · View notes