Sneak Peak | Black Butler Fanfiction: Break Through Time

NOTE: I'm still in two minds of what to name this story. I'm stuck between 'Lex Talionis' and 'Break Through Time'. But at the moment, I think I am leaning more towards 'Break Through Time'.

The long walk down the seldom used country road brought on a wave of mixed feelings. Nostalgia gently caressed over her mind before a tidal wave of bad memories soon followed, crashing over her. The lone walker continued on despite these feelings; she had been prepared for them. 

Suppressing them, she clutched at her camera that dangled in its bag from her right shoulder, occasionally brushing against her thigh as she pressed on. The afternoon air was filled with drizzle, obscuring the horizon. Not that there was much to see. This place had fallen apart years ago. What were once large, majestic fields were now overgrown with unkempt grass and weeds. Moss oozed out of the cracks in the road, making wet sounds beneath the walker's black ankle boots. 

Ordinarily, this would be enough to make anyone turn around and not bother. But this was actually perfect. It created the perfect atmosphere, just what the young woman needed for inspiration. The dreary mist hung low in the air, reminding her very much of a horror movie. Despite the annoyance of being back here after all these years, she couldn't help the smile that tugged at the corner of her shell-pink lips. 

That smile soon disappeared though as the large manor finally emerged like a monster from the depths of the mist. Though having fallen into disrepair, it was still a beautiful sight. Ever since the fire ten years ago, she had been forbidden from coming back here by her mother. In fact, the fire seemed to have been just the excuse her mother needed in order to leave. Her grandfather had always been very strict. The family should stay together. The land was theirs and had been for many generations. To even contemplate leaving was unthinkable. It was a duty to stay. But to her mother, that duty had been nothing more than a prison sentence. 

“I refuse to be stuck here all my life, dad!”

“To run this estate is an honour!”

“Yeah, well not for me! I've got better things to do with my life than babysit this stupid old place. I refuse to have Jem stuck here for the rest of her life too! I want better for her!”

“Don't play the doting mother act on me, young lady! We both know that Jem will soon be under your feet, except you'll be on your own! You'll no longer have me as a babysitter on demand!”

“Good! She's already turning into a grumpy little bitch just like you!”

Smack!

Jem had listened to the whole argument through the crack in the door. She was supposed to have been in bed, but all of the shouting had kept her awake. Not to mention she had been going through a phase of being terrified of her closet. 

That had been the night of the fire. Not long after that argument, her grandfather had suffered a stroke while smoking his cigar in his favourite chair. They had all been lucky to get out of there alive. But the stroke combined with being starved of oxygen due to the smoke had led to permanent damage to her grandfather. He remained in a home until this very day; of course there was no way her mother would look after him. Because of all of this, no one had lived in their family manor since. The place had fallen into complete disrepair. The fire hadn't destroyed too much, but nature had soon staked its claim on the place. 

The gardens were overgrown. Flowers were replaced with weeds. Large hedges that had once been beautifully shaped now grew out of control, their branches contorting in random directions. Weeds also grew from the gaps in the stone pathways. The white stone the manor was built from was now a dirty grey in colour, appearing mostly black in the areas that the fire had reached. Luckily there wasn't any graffiti as little to no people knew of this place. Jem had always been lonely while growing up as a result of this. But it made the perfect setting for her latest college project. 

As Jem was about to approach to get a closer look, bright headlights soon blinded her, preventing her from moving further. The sound of tires against gravel echoed all around her, and the headlights soon turned along with the car that slowed down to pull up alongside her. The silver paintwork almost blended in with the foggy air around them. Loud music blasted from inside before shutting off along with the engine. Then finally, the occupant stepped out and gave the manor an unsure look. 

“Oh... well... ummm... I'm not gonna lie, Jem, but when you said we were going to your family's old estate, I expected something a lot more fancy than this,” the other woman proclaimed while still eyeing the manor wearily. 

Jem rolled her eyes. “What did you expect, Megan? It has been abandoned for over ten years.”

“I don't know about this... What if someone sees us?”

“Like who? The cows?”

As if to emphasise her point, one of the cows grazing in a distant field mooed loudly. 

Megan giggled and shook her head.

“Plus, it's not trespassing if its your own property,” Jem added with a smug grin.

“Fair enough.” Megan gave the manor one last once over before turning to look at her friend. “So, this is the Phantomhive manor?”

“Yep,” Jem replied as she began pulled out her camera ready to begin.

“This is where you grew up?”

“Yep.”

“That certainly explains a lot.”

It took a second for the jibe to register, to which Jem turned to punch Megan in the arm. “What're you trying to say?”

Megan laughed. “Just that your weird old house matches your weird personality.”

Jem huffed, but refused to retort. If she ended up getting into a banter match with Megan, then she would never be able to get her work done. She was already worried about how far behind she was with this project. She'd had a severe creative block for a few weeks, and now she only had one week left to get all of this work done. She could ask her tutor for an extension, but she didn't dare try that one after what happened last time. It wasn't Jem's fault that she didn't have time to organised herself. Okay, maybe that was only half true. But juggling college and work was a difficult task. Especially since her mum had pissed off to Spain to be with her new fella. Now the bills all fell down to her. Not that her mum ever paid them herself anyway...

“Let's go,” Jem announced, shaking herself out of her thoughts. If she thought about her mother any more, then it was likely to sour her whole mood completely. 

“Wait, what?” Megan froze. “You mean... inside?”

“Yeah?”

Megan's eyes remained locked on the manor, and she pulled her pink waterproof jacket tighter around herself. Her brown eyes betrayed her unease. Jem honestly never thought her best friend would be so bothered by the place. Did it really look that intimidating to outsiders? 

Jem's sapphire blue eyes glanced back to look at her old home. To her, she just saw a pile of old rubbish and bad memories. But perhaps to those who weren't used to the place, it would look rather... spooky. After all, the manor was built during the Georgian era, though rumour had it that it had burnt completely down in the late 1800s. Her mother had always joked that their family was cursed. Apparently her great-grandfather, Ciel Phantomhive had re-built the place, increased the family fortune, and practically brought their family back from near extinction. Her grandfather had always held great admiration towards his own grandfather, Ciel. He used to tell her so many stories about his achievements. 

“You're not scared are you?” Jem began smirking again, turning away from her friend to continue heading towards the dilapidated building. 

“What? No!” Megan's frantic footsteps sounded from behind as she rushed to catch up. “It's just, you don't know what could be lurking in there, that's all. There could be squatters! They could be waiting in there high on coke right now, ready to stab us as soon as we enter!”

“You have a very vivid imagination, Megan,” Jem sighed as she began searching the windows for a way in. Most of the windows had been boarded up. The front door was locked, and only her grandfather had the key. Jem had tried rummaging through his personal belongings during her last visit she paid him, but to no avail. All she found was a bunch of old family photos and keepsakes. When she had tried asking her grandfather about it, he had only gotten confused and upset. 

“I'm just trying to be realistic!”

Jem sighed again. “I promise you, there's no squatters. Hardly anybody knows about this place. We're in the middle of nowhere. Nobody ever comes out here. Now can we please get on with this film? I want to finish before it gets dark, and I'll have so much editing to do.”

Story Extras | The Tribal Curse: Story Video Review by GummyGal

 

YouTube Channel: https://www.youtube.com/@TheGummyGal

Concept Art | Reflection: Flora's Dream

Pencil sketch of Flora's dream in chapter 3: His Lordship and His Butler.

Character Profile | Reflection: Flora Byrne

⚠ MAY CONTAIN SPOILERS ⚠

Full name: Flora Niamh Byrne

Birthday: 13 January 1870

Age: 18

Species: Human

Gender: Female

Height: 152cm (5'0'') 

Aliases: 

• Flower
• Miss Byrne 

Affiliation:

• St Bartholomew Toy Shop
• Phantomhive
• Funtom Corporation 
• Sebastian Michaelis

Occupation: 

• Apprentice designer of the Bartholomew Toy Shop
• Apprentice designer of the Funtom Corporation

Family:

• Katherine Byrne (mother)
• Johnathon Swindon (foster-father and master)

Appearance:

Flora is a teenage girl with very light, dirty blonde hair that often resembles the colour of wheat or straw, and striking ice blue eyes. She is short, skinny, and rather delicately built due to stunted growth as a result of malnutrition. Her hair is often wild and messy despite attempts to keep it tidy by wearing it in twin braids. Her skin is also very pale and sickly looking due to living in poverty for most of her life, however, after a few weeks living on the Phantomhive estate, her body does fill out a little bit more, and she gains some healthy colour in her cheeks. Her nails have also always been a dull grey colour, a sign of her once being a part of a demon. 

While living in poverty in London, Flora wears a dark green tattered dress that falls to her ankles, with a dirty white apron over the top of her dress. Her clothes are often covered in dirt, charcoal and paint from her work. She also wears black stockings and black leather boots. She also occasionally wears a brown woollen cloak when outside in colder weather. When living in the Phantomhive manor, she wears a long black dress with a white apron, black stockings, and black boots. She also often wears a small silver cross necklace that belonged to her mother. 

Personality:

Flora is a very shy and quiet girl. She suffers from acute social anxiety, and tends to be very awkward and unsure around other people. She also suffers from a mild case of selective mutism, meaning she is only able to talk to and around people she is most comfortable with. Due to her background in poverty, Flora is largely uneducated. When first arriving at the Phantomhive estate, she was unable to read, write, and complete even basic arithmetic. However, Flora does possess some artistic talent, being mostly self-taught in the skill as she copied her neighbour, John. She is able to copy and draw things from memory, sometimes even after just a single glance. 

She also shares her mother's love and knowledge of flowers.

Flora also adores any and all animals to a smothering degree, often much to the animals' displeasure, and usually attempts to keep any and all animals she comes across, regardless of safety and hygiene issues. 

Flora is also very simple and humble, finding luxury uncomfortable and overwhelming. Though glad to be rescued from the slums, she finds the Phantomhive wealth to be excessive, and she struggles to learn the strict manners and etiquette of high Victorian society. Due to this, Flora is often not considered highly intelligent. She often has a hard time paying attention, though when she is actually paying attention, she can be highly observant and tends to have a more 'outside the box' way of thinking, such as when she caught Ciel off guard during a game of chess. However, Ciel often continues to describe her as a '"simple-minded fool."' Despite all of this, Flora is overall very kind and caring, though at first, she is always very closed off and untrusting.   

History:

Flora's history technically begins with Sebastian and whenever he was created/born. She was once a part of his soul, both of them effectively being the same entity. However, this changed when Sebastian became a demon, consequently causing part of his soul (Flora) to be ripped away from him as punishment for consuming human souls. It is not known what happened to Flora during this time, but it can be assumed that she was floating around in limbo until she could be born within a human body as the demon curse foretold. When this happened, Flora would have no memory of being a part of Sebastian, developing her own consciousness when she was re-born, and becoming her own unique person.  

Flora was born on 13 January 1870 in the slums of Whitechapel on the east end of London. Her mother, Katherine Byrne, an Irish immigrant, would often work from one job to another, even resorting to prostitution in order to get by, though she appears to have the training and knowledge of a skilled gardener. Flora's father is unknown and is believed to be one of her mother's previous clients. Despite their circumstances, Katherine loved her daughter very much, and did everything she could to shield her from the harsh world around her. However, it didn't take very long for Flora to figure out the things that her mother got up to just to make ends meet. While Flora was young, the two of them shared a run-down house with a few other female friends of Katherine's (usually other prostitutes). Next door to them live Jonathon Swindon, who fell in love with Katherine at first sight. However, she never wanted to escalate their relationship to anything further than friendship.

Jonathon would often help out Katherine and Flora by supplying them with extra food and pieces of coal, especially if it would help keep Katherine from resorting to prostituting herself. He would help raise Flora to a point where she came to the view the man as a father figure, and she would frequently sit in his shop and watch him work. This is where she picked up her skill of drawing since she would watch him design furnishings for clients. After seeing richer children with toys, Flora began to design her own, and this is what created the side-business of the two of them designing and creating toys to earn some extra money. These creations became quite popular with the neighbouring middle class children. 

During her childhood, Flora would often have reoccurring nightmares, though they became less frequent as she got older. These nightmares would often be her personal experience and interpretation of being separated from Sebastian all of those millennia ago. 

From a young age, Flora was forced to work for a living due to her poor background. Her mother tried to shelter her as much as possible, but during tougher times, the young Flora would result to begging on the street which would frequently cause her to be mistreated by people passing by, and get into trouble with the police. One of her biggest fears was her and her mother having to resort to the workhouse. But Flora and Katherine always managed to stay out of it, no matter how bad things got for them. As a poor child, Flora received no formal education as school would have been too expensive for her mother. She did not learn to read and write, but instead, became more street-wise, and occasionally her mother would teach her about flowers and their symbolism. For the most part, Flora had to teach herself many of the skills that she acquired over the years. 

Tragedy struck Flora when she was around 8-years-old. An outbreak of cholera hit their neighbourhood, and Katherine contracted the disease due to the consumption of contaminated water (something which was unknown at the time). Katherine's deterioration was rapid, barely living past two days after her symptoms first appeared. Flora witnessed the entire thing and the event would scar her for the rest of her life. She tried to help nurse her mother, but it took only hours for Katherine to fall into a state of delirium. Sadly, she passed away, giving Flora a long lasting fear of loss and disease. When authorities arrived, Flora fled in fear that she would be placed in a workhouse. Jonathon tried to find her for many years, but Flora had believed that nobody would want her, and so did her best to evade capture.

For the next few years, Flora lived on the streets, begging and scavenging for food in order to survive. She would sleep in alleyways or in abandoned buildings. During this time, she became known to the police as a prominent vagrant, beggar and pick-pocketer. However, Flora always managed to evade capture due to her intimate knowledge of the labyrinth of streets that made up the slums of London. Flora would sometimes try to find work, but she would often always be scared away. She spent some time working at a variety of factories and mills, though she would often be thrown out after being late to shifts. At one point, she tried to find employment in an asbestos factory, something which would damage her lungs and contribute to her breathing difficulties over the next few years. However, Flora ran away on her first day after witnessing another child become crushed in one of the factory's machines. 

After this, Flora grew weaker and weaker and almost succumbed to starvation. Luckily, Jonathon had been walking by the exact same street Flora had curled up on and recognised her almost instantly. Flora had barely grown or changed in the years she had been missing, although she was now even skinnier than she previously had been. The two were finally reunited and Jonathon took Flora in without any hesitation, seeing it as his responsibility to take care of Flora now that Katherine was no longer around. 

From then on, Flora lived with Jonathon in his small shop and earned her keep by becoming his apprentice. However, during difficult times, Flora would still result to begging, stealing and scavenging in order to obtain food and other supplies. She felt happier and safer now that she was back with Jonathon, and had planned on helping him in the shop for as long as possible. Apart from this, Flora maintained little to no plans or hopes for the future. She refused to settle down and get married, like many girls would have done by the age of 16, and was especially terrified of the idea of having children after watching many of the women around her die in childbirth. 

For that moment, Flora was content with the way that her life currently was. 

Abilities:

• Drawing/designing 

Trivia:

• Flora was originally going to be working as maid, but I decided that idea had been done to death by other writers, so I turned her into an apprentice instead.
• There were other names I debated before I ultimately decided on Flora. These names included other popular Victorian girls' names at the time including: Wilhelmina, Clara, Pearl, Josephine, Charlotte, Evelyn, Genevieve, Jemima, and Violet. I decided Flora matched her personality a lot more. Plus, it matched with the backstory idea that I had for her mother.
• I decided on her being the daughter of an Irish immigrant as Irish immigrants were very common in England at the time. Many of them fled from the potato famine in order to start a new life. This included my own personal ancestors. Irish people faced astonishing levels of discrimination. 
• Flora's middle name 'Niamh', meaning 'bright' or 'radiant', reflects her Irish roots, as well as her surname 'Byrne', which originates from 'O'Broin', which means 'raven'; a reference to Sebastian.
• Flora suffers from selective mutism, a disorder in which sufferers are unable to speak in certain social situations. It is a type of anxiety disorder that literally renders people unable to speak, and can cause anxiety-like symptoms. 
• The ways in which Flora is often seen scavenging in the story were all real scavenging methods used by poor people during Victorian times.
• At the beginning of the story in which Flora often coughs and struggles to breathe is caused not only by the London smog and damp, dirty conditions, but is also the result of exposure to the material asbestos, of which use became common during the nineteenth century. 
• Cholera, the disease which Flora fears the most, was a real disease that ravaged the slums of England during the 1800s. It was caused by contaminated water, and death was usually assured within 24 hours. Due to her fear of sickness and disease, Flora could technically be classed as a hypochondriac, despite arguably her fears being well placed.   
• Flora's love for animals was inspired by the fact that she often doesn't communicate well with people, so she it made sense that she would seek social interactions with animals instead. 
• Flora's hair was originally going to be black. 
• The slang that Flora uses is all real, genuine Victorian street slang.
• The neighbourhood in which Flora lives in London was a real place. The location of buildings are all accurate, and the street in which she lives was a real street during the nineteenth century. The street still exists to this day, though the slums were cleared many decades ago now. You can find it on Google Maps and everything.
• In chapter 4, Flora was not exactly pleased to receive brown bread. This is because in Victorian times (and during most of English history) white bread was believed to be better for you. The whiter the bread, the more posh you appeared. To take advantage of this, a lot of bakers would add chalk and other nasty substances to their bread in order to make it appear whiter and sell it at inflated prices. This is why Flora only trusts a select few bakeries as she became wise to this trick.  

Fan Art | Madness Within: Defeated Ladybug by lanelin

 Artist: lanelin