Strange Body

"We found out Tobias' background information during our recent investigation," Edgar informed Alexander upon his arrival with Olivia.

"Hmm, is that so."

"Tobias Keppel was his full name. His family were middle tier merchants, nothing suspicious there. Not long ago, business wasn't doing well for the Keppel household causing them to become a bit more frugal than usual. As we asked around his neighbourhood, people commented that Tobias didn't take his family's economic circumstances to heart, instead he continued to curry favour and hang out with the lower class nobility. Except, during one ball party, witnesses disclosed that Tobias had approached a young lady, pestering her for a dance. The young lady could no longer take it, before mocking Tobias' financial status in front of everyone, turning him into the joke of the night," Edgar sighed shaking his head.

"And so?" Alexander asked.

"And so Tobias' close acquaintances, when interrogated, recalled that Tobias had disappeared after the ball party debacle. Here's the full report," Edgar passed over a black notebook.

"I suppose that's when he turned into a homicidal vampire," Alexander commented, flipping through the pages.

"Pathetic," Olivia mumbled under her breath. All because of one negative event, he went and took multiple innocent lives.

Edgar looked over at Olivia after hearing her comment. He had seen this young girl following after the vampire over the last two weeks. He had observed and ended up finding nothing special about her. She was neither a vampire nor did she resemble a typical looking Giver. He wondered why Alexander kept her by his side.

Once he had finished reading the report, Alexander stood up from his seat.

"Where are you off to now?" Edgar inquired.

"I'm going to pay Silas a visit."

"Yes, it's best you do. He's been very busy lately, especially with the one that came last night. He's been in there all day not even stepping out for a second."

Alexander promptly walked off, striding off deeper into the inner rooms of the building. Olivia hurriedly chased after him, trying to catch up. It was quite a humorous sight.

"Who's Silas?" She asked. She was currently replaying Alexander's earlier conversation with Edgar. What did Edgar mean when he said 'The one that came last night'?

Alexander stopped in front of a pristine white coloured door. Just as he went to open the door he replied in a low voice, "He's a coroner."

Once inside the room, Olivia looked around. The walls were an ash grey. On the wooden tables, placed around the corners of the room, stray pieces of paper and spilt, messy ink, lay on top. Other tables held metal tools, some that Olivia had never seen before and others that she was particularly familiar. Glancing upon them, Olivia gave a shiver before retracting her gaze elsewhere, feeling slightly ill at the sight. She didn't want to be reminded of what she had been through in the past. Before she ended up becoming fully unwell, her eyes finally caught a lanky figure, hunched over a metal table.

Alexander didn't bother making his presence known as he sauntered across the room. Olivia also walked behind him and finally saw what the man was occupied with. On top of the table was a grim and hair-raising sight. A body lay bare, with multiple huge chunks of flesh missing. It looked as if someone ripped them out without mercy, allowing the viewer to see all the gory details.

"Oh, Alexander! When did you come in? I haven't seen you for a while," Silas greeted with a smile.

"I was busy," Alexander replied, looking over the corpse.

"This came in late last night," Silas looked back at the body.

He then looked back up at Alexander before his sight shifted to the person next to him.

"I didn't notice there was someone else present," Silas looked over at Olivia, openly observing her. Olivia, of course, did the same.

She noted that Silas was in his 30s. He had an average appearance, wearing normal clothes except the white, long coat draped over him. He had short black hair with dark brown eyes. An average human.

"Hello, my name is Silas," He greeted after a while.

"Nice to meet you, my name is Olivia," She greeted back with a polite smile.

"What do you think happened here?" He probed Olivia.

Alexander finally looked up at Silas thinking the question was intended for him, but was taken aback seeing Silas' eyes trained on her.

Olivia gave an awkward laugh, "How on earth would I know?" She replied honestly.

Alexander glanced at Olivia before looking back at the corpse, Silas doing the same.

"If you look carefully, you'll see that the body had endured prolonged torture," Silas briefed, pointing over to the multiple lashes, sharp slices from what seemed like a knife or dagger and other unknown wounds on the surface of the little, left over skin.

Olivia looked down, this time properly observing the corpse while Alexander and Silas continued their conversation.

Her eyes roamed around before landing on the corpses head. Except, what greeted Olivia weren't eyes but empty eye sockets. It seemed the victim had their eyes dug out during their torture. Looking into them, Olivia felt eerie and cold yet she couldn't find it in herself to look away for some reason.

The dark, black eye sockets seemed to look like an empty void, sucking her in. Olivia felt her body get even hotter than she had ever felt in the past days. She didn't understand what was going on but something was preventing her from moving her sight away.

Before long, Olivia felt her vision go black. A few seconds later, she woke up feeling disorientated and confused. She looked around, looking for Alexander and Silas but soon her face drained of colour.

She tried to close her eyes, thinking of this as merely one of her hallucinations due to the overwhelming heat she felt seconds before, but she quickly found that she had absolutely no control over her body. She observed the room she was currently in, only to see that she wasn't in the familiar ash-grey coloured room she was in earlier, but a dark chamber. One that she didn't recognise. She tried to move her limbs once again but to no avail, nothing was working.

Olivia soon started hyperventilating, not knowing what was going on. Had the witches caught her again? Was she going to spend time in another chamber once again? She then started to think even darker thoughts. Was escaping from Miran and Glenn a dream? Did she make up a story of meeting Alexander, going to the De Vere household, Eli and Ivan?

As the seconds ticked by Olivia started to descend deeper and deeper into despair.

Suddenly, the door to Olivia's chamber, opened.

Olivia wanted to put her arms up to shield her eyes from the light but before she could do so, her body had already moved, slinking closer to the door.

A burly man walked in from the entrance. Olivia couldn't make out his features as his face was covered with a black, long nosed mask, leaving only his mouth open for view.

"Enjoying yourself there?" The burly man spoke, looking down at Olivia.

Olivia was still confused about the whole situation. She wanted to ask questions but her mouth was refusing to speak.

"Well it doesn't matter if you aren't. Tonight's going to be your last," The man chuckled as he moved closer.

Before Olivia could make head or tails of the situation she suddenly heard a foreign voice, "No! Release me! I beg of you!"

Olivia was stunned with both shock and horror. The voice she thought to be foreign, was in fact, coming out of her own mouth. Olivia could no longer fathom what was happening to her. She felt as if her body was no longer hers. Or perhaps she was in a body other than the one she knew.

As the man grabbed hold of Olivia's arm wanting to drag Olivia out of the room, she started to become increasingly petrified and fearful. She wanted to scream but could not do so. The foreign voice kept continuously screaming for mercy and release but the burly man would pay no mind, harshly dragging her across the floor with him. Soon, Olivia felt the burning heat come again, hotter and hotter before once again, her vision became black.

Like earlier, a few seconds later, she opened her eyes. She looked around to thankfully recognise the same ash-grey walls she was previously in. Olivia's galloping heart started to calm down upon recognising her familiar surroundings.

So it wasn't a dream. She really had escaped. She then looked up to see Alexander standing close in front of her, with a frown on his face.

Olivia was confused as to why Alexander looked that way. Was he angry? Had he called for her while in that state and she didn't reply?

"Master Alex…ander?" Olivia managed to breathe out before collapsing in his arms.