Narrator's POV

Identical hands grasped at each other's as the elder twin was pulled out of the cage by the monstrous cultist.

Their bodies, weak from their month in a living Hell, couldn't hold on to each other.

Ciel was dragged away and tossed onto the marble alter like a slab of meat.

"Ciel!" Astre screamed out, desperately trying to get to his brother from behind the cage's bars

"Let me go!" The older blunette screamed, trying to get out from the cultists arms

"Now, let us offer our prayers to the Devil!" The head cultist told the crowd as Ciel was restrained, "Come forth ye who don the flames of Hell, ruler of the night, sworn ally of darkness, the nefarious beast that sups on spilled blood."

"Help m-" Ciel cried out, one of cultist's clamping a hand over his mouth

His cries were ignored as the head cultist continued his 'prayer', "Beneath the protection of the moon with its thousand faces enter into a covenant with me!"

Astre Phantomhive was frozen in shock as he watched the cultists stab his big brother —his perfect and strong big brother— in his tummy.

With one final tearful shout of pain, Ciel Phantomhive was dead.

The younger twin's eyes —one of which blinded by a kidnapper's careless treatment— filled and spilled over in tears: he was just as helpless as he had always been and could do nothing to save his sibling.

No shadows filled the room, no voice questioned the cultists, no demon arrived to make a deal.

This poor boy, now an only child, was so lost in his grief and shock that he barely processed the cultists throwing his brother's corpse carelessly to the ground like a bag of flour and walk towards his cage.

His tear-filled sapphire eyes were wide open, not even blinking, as the masked men opened the little cage once more and pulled him out just as they had Ciel.

Astre was limp in the horrible man's rough hands, like a kitten held by the scruff, as he was placed on the bloody alter.

The last Phantomhive, a mere ten year old boy, stared at his brother's forgotten corpse as the head cultist held the bloody dagger above his stomach just as he had less than a minute ago.

The blood on the dagger —his brother's blood— dripped onto his bare stomach as if it were marking the blade's target.

But the blunette didn't notice, he didn't become re-aware of the world around him until the sharp ceremonial dagger was impaling his stomach.

The sickly boy tried to scream, but by then it was too late.

And then the Phantomhive line was gone.

***

Less than an hour later, behind the abandoned church used by the cultists, the corpses of the sacrificial lambs laid unceremoniously in an overgrown flower bed filled with red poppies.

From afar, the bodies of the two children looked as if they had fallen asleep playing in the flowerbed, but as the white haired man walked closer the horrific sight unfurled itself.

Both boys had giant stab wounds on their stomachs, leaving a hole big enough that the other side could be seen.

Blood was dried around their mouths, showing that it once had dribbled out of it.

Undertaker swallowed the bile threatening to rise up his throat: he needed to remain calm or he couldn't help.

Gathering the two cooling corpses in his arms, he gently placed them side-by-side in his hearse-carriage and began to return to his shop.

As the grey horse pulled the wagon away, beginning the two hour trip back to London, the mortician finally allowed himself to weep.

***

Two hours later, as the sun began to rise to greet a cold January morning, Undertaker parked his carriage in the alley behind his shop and went inside.

Since he had entered through the back door of his shop, he didn't have to maneuver around the display coffins as he was already in the work room.

As a mortician, he always had a few coffins available of various sizes, so he selected two of the appropriate size and laid them on a large table side-by-side.

Removing the lids, he placed them aside and grabbed the biggest jars of formaldehyde he had, pouring an equal amount in each coffin.

With that done, the reaper then returned to the alley.

Opening the hearse's doors, the man took the dead boys back into his arms and carried them inside.

After stripping them of their soiled and bloody clothes, the heavily stitched man placed each boy in a cherry wood coffin.

Ciel and Astre's corpses were half covered with the chemical to prevent further decomposition.

Getting out his surgical tools, he started with Ciel.

***

Days passed, sunrise bled into sunset and all over again, people walking by the shop wondered why the sign on the front door hadn't flipped to 'open' in days but most didn't question it.

No one knew of the cocktail of science and magic occurring in the building, no one but the one performing it who, at last, sighed with relief as he sat down on a creaky old chair.

Undertaker was a disheveled mess: his hands and forearms were caked in blood and chemicals of various dryness, his long white hair was tied up into a poofy messy bun, his white dress shirt —which he usually kept hidden under his normal black robe— was drenched in blood and chemicals as well.

But it was well worth it as he watched the chests of the twin Phantomhives gently rise and fall.

The retired reaper had no idea how long they would sleep or if they'd ever wake up again but that was tomorrow's problem, today he had successfully brought them mostly back to life.

He spent the following few minutes watching them just breathe with the help of their oxygen tanks, watching as their lungs expanded and deflated under their stitched skin.

Placing the coffin lids back over them, Undertaker walked up the stairs and into his flat.

He took several showers, the first of which fully clothed and then with each of the following ones lost an article of clothing until finally nude.

Exhausted from days of performing surgeries as well as working the manual pump to his shower, the white haired man barely got dressed and plopped into bed, taking a well deserved rest...