38. Who Are You?

O ctavius frowned, eyeing Scarlett. “What did you do?”

Aurelius blustered, “I-I wasn’t finished!”

“Shut up! I asked her, not you, you twit!” he hissed, not even bothering to look up at the man.

Scarlett shrugged. “He decided to go all murder-suicide on Lilliana, and I informed him nicely that it was not going to happen.”

Octavius’ eyes widened, his anger rising to the surface as his gaze slowly slipped to Aurelius. “He. Was. What?” he ground out.

“NICELY?! You broke both of my hands!” Aurelius squealed, with way too much audacity. “And I’ll have you know, I was NOT going to kill myself!”

The female zombie scoffed. “I don’t really care. And that was me being nice. I should have just killed you. But…”

“You—” the male started, but Octavius cut him off, because really, the man was just rambling at this point.

“Ah,” he gasped. “Right, it was around 1605, I think… You were on your best behavior at the time because… Well, really, one too many dead bodies in the same century tends to bring up questions, so…”

Feeling someone’s eyes on him, Octavius looked over, his head tilting at the odd expression on Turney’s face. He wasn’t quite sure how to describe it… Horrified? Confused? Disturbed? Hmm… It was something.

“What?”

“I really feel like talking about killing people shouldn’t be so…normalized,” the zombie finished with a sigh.

“Stop—” Aurelius tried again, but Octavius cut him off once more.

“Well, Turney, we are old. Death is just a fact of life, and sometimes it’s easier to just put someone in the ground than deal with them.” Someone like Aurelius… Octavius planned to put him in the ground… Maybe not today, but soon enough…

Turney stared blankly, before saying slowly, “I’m…going to pretend I didn’t hear that.”

“That may be for the best, for now.” Scarlett snorted. “Until time eats away at that small, ridiculous bit of morality.”

Turney let out a heavy sigh. “Comforting.”

“Indeed!” Octavius giggled.

“LET ME FINISH!” Aurelius roared.

Octavius sarcastically waved his hand for him to go on.

The man just glared for a moment, before clearing his throat. “Dejected and betrayed, I went back to planning and healing… But as I was trying to put away my gun, which was hard to do with my injuries…it went off, the bullet piercing me in the skull. The world went dark, but…for some reason…I woke up. After I dug myself out of the hole they had tossed me in…I knew then, I had been brought back for one purpose, to punish those who had wronged me!”

“A phantom!” Octavius let out an incredulous laugh. “That’s what you are. I have to say, it's about damn time you got to the point. No wonder we didn’t smell or sense anything.”

Min-ji sighed. “A phantom who has no clue of his family history.”

“I'm not sure if the lack of knowledge explains his incompetencies though.” Scarlett made a snorting noise, before bursting into a fit of laughter. He eyed her, knowing full well that based on the sound, she’d be laughing for a bit.

“INSOLENT WENCH! STOP LAUGHING!” Aurelius screamed.

Scarlett started to laugh harder, before finally coughing, the fit coming to an end as she cleared her throat. Wiping tears from her eyes, she said, “I can’t understand how you didn’t realize we weren’t human. It’s been over four hundred years!? Though, I’m curious, do you even know what a phantom is?”

“I…” The man frowned, clearly thinking it over, before he must have decided to ignore it. “How… HOW dare you speak to me this way?! How dare any of you talk back at all, when all of this is your fault!

“Octavius, if you had just stayed out of my life! Or at least died as you should have, all of this wouldn’t have happened! I wouldn’t have had to change my name and my identity to hide! Those people wouldn’t be dead now if it wasn’t for you! THIS IS ALL YOUR FAULT! ALL OF IT!” Aurelius raged as his human skin peeled away, disappearing as he rose up off the stage in his phantom form.

Turney stared up with wide eyes at the ghostly form, and…couldn’t keep the frown off his face. While the whole of Aurelius’ existence was the same translucent white-blue as the wraths, he had to say…phantoms were not even close to being as scary. No billowing rags, no hideously twisted, screaming faces, or claws. Just, well…Aurelius looked like a ghost.

His form came together into an almost comically…cute, little tail wisp from the waist down. And while white-blue, he could see the man’s tux still, and his facial features were the same, even though they were also the same white-blue.

Really, beyond the coloring and the tail, the only thing different from the man’s human form and this one was…the bullet hole in his forehead. Though, Aurelius did look furious. He wasn’t sure it was possible for the phantom to get any angrier…

Octavius tsked. “All this blaming me. I mean, it’s not my fault you’re an idiot. Like, you literally shot yourself by accident, after a failed attempt to kill some innocent woman, just because she didn’t want to marry you?! Also, why exactly should I have left my friend to marry such a horrible, conniving, manipulative, control freak, like you…” The vampire frowned, trailing off, his lips pursed. “You know…I don’t actually remember your real name. Or…remember you really at all. Besides remembering the incident that is.”

Yep…that would do it. That would certainly add fuel to the already burning fire of hatred. Though, Aurelius looked…pretty stunned by the revelation… The phantom stared down at the vampire with wide eyes, his jaw slack.

“What…” Aurelius rasped, the word almost a whisper.

“I have to admit…I’m in the same predicament… His face just doesn’t come to mind,” Scarlett drawled, with little to no emotion.

And…yep, there went Scarlett, just adding to the damage.

Theo made a choking noise. “Neither of you remember him?!”

Min-ji sighed. “I figured as much.”

“You… You don’t… YOU DON’T REMEMBER?!” Aurelius bellowed.

Octavius snorted. “I did just say that, didn’t I?”

“You… YOUUU!!!!!” The phantom started to screech, the sound very reminiscent of the wraths.

Turney’s eyes widened, and he flinched when the rattling started.

That was when knives of all shapes and sizes began to float up from the stage. None had been visible before from where they were standing.