The Baron of Castle Frankenstein

He awoke suddenly, slowly rising from his bed as he looked around. He was in an
unfamiliar room with grey stone walls and little else decorating it, the bed he
was lying on was a simple square metallic bed with an serviceable mattress,
white blanket and a white pillow. He saw a wooden door nearby and began to walk
towards it, and as he opened it he was startled and flinched back, greeted by
the sight of a slightly portly, grey haired older man wearing a black suit and
tie, looking like some sort of butler.

“Ah, you are awake.” The older man said, his voice calm, collected and somehow welcoming
even though he didn’t smile, his expression remaining in a neutral frown. “I
have some clothes for you, if you are ready, the Baron would like to speak with
you properly.”

The younger man blinked, frowning in confusion. “Baron...? who are you...? Wh...where AM
I?”

The older man placed a hand over his chest as he bowed slightly. “I am called Dogsbody,
and I serve as the Baron’s chief manservant. You and your fellow traveller had
gotten yourselves in a nasty accident, and my master had brought you both to
his castle to help you.”

He frowned, growing more confused, but something was clicking on the edge of his mind.
“Accident...you mean...something happened with...me and my sister...?”

“My sister and I.” Dogsbody corrected. “It was quite a close thing, very traumatic, so it
may take you a while for you to fully remember what had occurred, just know
that if it wasn’t for my master neither you or your sister would be standing
now.”

Dogsbody handed him some clothing, the younger man nodding slowly. “Where IS my
sister...?”

“In another room, recovering, I shall see to her shortly. Now come, get dressed.”

He nodded and unfurled the clothing given to him to look at it properly...eyes widening
as he saw it was some sort of maid’s uniform.

“I’m afraid we did not have anything prepared for you, so hopefully one of the spare uniforms
we have on the premises will suffice for now.”

He stared at the older man in disbelief. “W-wha...are you serious!? Is this some kind of
joke, I can’t be wearing this!”

Dogsbody looked the younger man over, face still neutral and stoic. “I’m afraid you don’t
quite understand the situation you are in, madam...”

“What are you saying...!?” He snapped. “I’m not...”

Dogsbody pointed at the younger man, who looked down over his body, clad in a green
patient’s gown...and saw curves that shouldn’t be there, and in fact overall
the body shape and his own height seemed...wrong.

‘My master did their best, of course, but they didn’t have enough time to worry about
getting it exact...your heads WERE quite separated from your bodies and your
bodies had lost a lot of blood...and it WAS quite dark....”

He could barely hear Dogsbody’s words, colour draining from his face as he saw that
below his neck wasn’t his own body...but that of someone else. His sister’s.

------------------------

His name was Lucien. His sister was Karla. The pair had been backpacking through the
European countryside, wanting to see me of the world outside the city they used
to live in, and had soon found themselves walking through a dark wood,
hopelessly lost. Neither was sure how it happened or where they were, and that
soon mattered very little when Lucian tried to find some way to check.

Karla was the first to hear it. A noise nearby, in the woods. When she looked towards it,
she saw...SOMETHING, she wasn’t sure what, but it seemed fairly large and
dangerous. It dashed from the shadows, running towards Lucien. Karla dove in
quickly as Lucian looked up at the attacker too late, Karla pushing him out of
the way of the thing...but causing the pair of them to fall over a cliff
neither had seen in the darkness of the moonless night, and the pair of them
fell together, tumbling, bones breaking, skin bruising and when they had fallen
to the bottom their heads were torn from their bodies, blood pooling around
them.

Lucien looked up, his sight fading as death closed in, and the last thing he saw was
someone rushing towards them, sounding panicked, a hand reaching towards him.

And that was the last he remembered before he awoke in his bizarre new surroundings and
situation.

------------------------------

Karla grumbled, fiddling with the suit she had been forced to wear as she walked down the well
kept, red carpeted hallway.

She woke up in a strange place, alone, and then that weird old guy came to her and shoved
some clothes at her and said a bunch of nonsense to her, and then she found out
that the ‘baron’, whoever they were, had somehow messed up her body and now on
top of it all she had to wear this stupid suit that served to only accentuate
her bizarre new body.

Or rather, her brother’s body.

She pushed the huge wooden double doors, greeted by the sight of a large dinner table in a
large room, her body, now wearing what appeared to be a maid’s uniform, sitting
on a seat by the table, a large feast of various foods prepared on the table.
Karla walked over, sitting beside her brother as she looked him over.

He gave her an embarrassed smile, his blonde hair cut fairly short and neatly, Karla’s own
brown hair hanging in long curls.

“Are you...okay?” Karla asked.

Her brother nodded. “Yeah...I’ll be fine it’s just....unbelievable...” He reached a hand up
to his neck, grazing the faint scar marring the flesh.

Karla growled testily, looking at the head of the table. “Who the hell did this to
us...what gave them right...?”

Several wooden double doors marked each wall of the room, flanked by empty portrait
frames. One of the doors, nearest the head of the table, opened wide, a girl
with long messy black hair tied into a pair of messy pigtails stepping forward.
Her skin was pale, her beautiful face marred by several stitched scars, an
eyepatch over one of her eyes, her other eye looking extremely bizarre as it
was pitch black with a white cross where her iris and pupil would be. Her hands
were covered in stitches and sported black fingernails, and her outfit was a
pitchblack  gothic Lolita dress sporting
red stitching in the torso of the dress as well as the hem of the skirt. She
curtsied before taking her spot on a large red velvet chair at the head of the
dining table, a young teen girl with wild pink hair and wearing a maid uniform
soon stepping into view and standing at the girl’s side.

“Good evening, I’m glad to see you are both recovering.” She gave a small smile, a
sad look in her eye. “I am the lord of this castle; you may call me Baron
Frankenstein.”

Lucien looked at the girl in surprise. “You’re...you’re the Baron? I...I was
expecting...someone else.”

Karla meanwhile was not going to let an unexpected reveal deter her as she rose from
her seat and slammed her hands on the table. “You’re the lunatic who brought us
here!? Look what you did to us! Fix it NOW!”

Lucien flinched, startled from the shouting as he looked at his sister, Baron
Frankenstein meanwhile simply gazed over the siblings with a sigh. “I’m very
sorry...I just didn’t have enough time to work before you died and I didn’t
notice the mistake I made until it was too late...”

“Mistake!? MISTAKE!?” Karla shouted. “You turned us into a pair of FREAKS!”

Thee Baron looked down at her plate. “And I do apologise, really I am very sorry, but it’s
not something I can easily fix. It will take time...in the meantime, I promise
you that you’re both welcome to stay here until I make amends and rectify my
mistake, and anything you want I will try to give to you, within reason. You
can also call upon the other residents that work here at my castle as well.”
She gestured to the pink haired at her side. “Dogsbody here will see to it,
just ask her.”

Lucien blinked in puzzlement. “That’s the name of the butler I saw...are you related
to him miss?”

The teen girl grinned widely, almost manically as she spoke in a fairly thick cockney
accent. “I reckon I could be, yeah. Don’t worry, the Baron’s a deft hand she
is, you two will be fixed up an’ back home before ya know it. Meanwhiles, you
really should have dinner, our chef did a bang up job making all this grub and
it’d be a waste to let it go cold!”

Karla glared at the Baron as she set to her plate, find it plated with several vegetables,
buttered bread rolls, roast pork, chicken and other foods, her brother also
having a similar plate in front him.

“You said there were other people here, right?” Lucien ventured. “But I’ve only seen you,
that maid and the butler.”

The Baron gave a small smile. “They are not quite ready to meet you just yet. Once you
become more accustomed to being here then you’ll likely see them. But I’ll give
you a proper tour of the castle the neighbouring town later, for now you should
focus on eating and resting for tonight, build up the strength in your bodies.”

Karla grumbled under her breath. “Ordering us around...”

Lucien looked at the Baron, frowning in thought and indecision for a moment before
speaking up. “I...I admit this is really weird and I do want us to be fixed
but...thank you for saving us. Really, thank you.”

The Baron smiled warmly while Karla gaped at her brother in disbelief. The pink haired
Dogsbody curtsied to the Baron before turning to walk out of sight.

“Where is she going...?” Lucien asked.

“While they are not dining with us the other residents do still need food of their own, and
delivering their meals to them is part of Dogsbody’s many duties here. Dogsbody
has a lot of jobs here.”

Lucien nodded slowly as he got back to his meal. “I see.”

------------------

Dogsbody hummed to herself as she walked to the kitchen, her eyes glancing to a window
she passed, seeing a dark shadow run past and continued on her way into the
kitchen to see a woman wearing a chef’s hat and apron. Of course, she was only
clearly woman due to the large pink dress she wore, as her face, arms and legs
were covered in thick, heavy bandages.

“’Ey Justine!” Dosgbody greeted. “Got Liz’s grub?”

The chef nodded and pointed to a heavy plate piled with 9 pieces of raw bloody hunks of meat,
the motion causing some bandages to loosen and reveal a skeletal hand,
flinching it back to hide it while Dogsbody simply walked over and easily
lifted the plate with one hand as if it was light as feather and whistled as
she strode off.

Down at the depths of the castle in a large, formerly forgotten dungeon, the elderly
Dogsbody walked down the dank, musty hallway, carrying a large plate of bloody,
raw meat and placed it down in front of a large steel door. An square opening revealed
itself at the bottom of the door as a set of wicked looking, razor sharp
serrated claws reached forward and pulled the plate in, horns visibly shaking
from behind a small window on the door as the creature inside ate like a
ravenous beast, the small opening at the bottom closing shut with a metallic
clank.

Dogsbody bowed gentlemanly. “Enjoy your meal Madame Elizabeth. I would keep you company,
but sadly I must deal with a foolish creature that has decided to intrude on
the premises. Goodnight, Madame Elizabeth.” He started walking away; leaving whatever
creature Elizabeth was to enjoy her meal.

-------------------------

Lucien and Karla had been sent off to sleep in their new rooms for the night to rest up.
Lucien had been sent to a rather sizeable bedroom with a massive queen sized
bed with a polished, wooden frame with little columns framing it, the blankets
and pillows thick and fluffy. He once more looked at himself, wearing a
nightgown now over his ‘new’ body.

“It’s only temporary...” He reassured himself as he stepped forward and crawled into his
bed.

Unbeknownst to him something peered through the large window overlooking his bed. The
massive, squat figure dragged razor sharp claws against the glass as it gazed
down on Lucien’s now sleeping form with cruel, cold eyes. Drool and slime oozed
from its mouth as it opened wide to reveal sharp teeth.

Suddenly something grabbed it and pulled it far from the window, slamming it hard
against a large fountain styled after a mermaid. The creature, a massive
frog-like creature with a very wide mouth, sharp teeth and brown flesh that
continuously melted and oozed down from its body, leapt to the ground
hurriedly, its sharp, metallic claws glinting in the full moon light, four
pairs of eyes looking around for its attacker.

“I’m right here.” The voice of the elderly Dogsbody spoke, firing a shot from an antique
rifle that tore a hole in the muckman’s hide, serving only to draw the creature’s
attention and ire. “Now see here, we do not take kindly to creatures like
thinking they can walk around our abode unmolested and endanger the lives of
the Baron’s honoured guests.”

The Mudman roared, a large portion of its head being shot off as Dogsbody fired again and
stepped forward and the moment he stepped into shadow he was suddenly gone, in
his place was the pink haired younger female Dogsbody instead.

“Those two ain’t quite ready fer the REAL darkness in these lands, not yet, so we’re
handlin’ this discreetly, without alarmin’ those two.” She stepped forward, firing
several more times, pushing the creature back with the force of each shot, the
wounds melting away to be replaced by the constantly melting flesh. Once more
as she stepped through shadow she was replaced by the elderly Dogsbody, the
pair constantly switching back and forth as they moved towards the Mudman.

The Mudman roared reared a claw back, snarling in rage.

The elderly Dogsbody gave a cold, cruel smirk at the monster. “I have no idea what your
interest in those two are, but it matters not. You’re in the perfect position
for our gardener to deal with you. Let it be a lesson to you for thinking you
can just harm anyone who wanders near our master’s home.”

The Mudman tried to lunge forward to gut the arrogant old man scolding it like a
child...only to suddenly fall as eight long arms reached out from beneath the
flower patch it stood upon, a massive, angry spider hiding underneath. The
Mudman struggled and screamed helplessly as dirt piled around and buried it
deep, leaving a patch of empty earth that soon began to sprout with colourful
flowers where the Mudman had once stood.

“Beautiful as always, Denny.” The voice of Baron Frankenstein spoke up as she walked over
to stand at the side of Dogsbody. “I’m sorry you had to trouble yourselves like
this...”

“It is our duty as your servants.” Dogsbody said, turning to his master, the shadow of a
cloud passing past him and causing the younger Dogsbody to appear in his place.
“But...ya all this secrecy is the right plan?”

The Baron looked down. “No, one day they’ll have to find out...everything. But not now.
Once we’ve fully gained their trust, once they know we’re truly on their
side...then they can judge us for what we are.”

Dogsbody looked her master over carefully. “Ya think one of them’s a candidate to become
a successor?”

“I....I do not wish to place that burden on them.” Baron Frankenstein said, clenching her
hand. “For now, I want to focus on making up for what happened to them...”

“And yer fine with them thinkin’ yer the one who mixed up their bodies like that?”

“Yes...better they think that than know the truth of what’s out there...”

“Who do ya think did it?” Dogsbody asked. “You think...?”

“No. No we saw what happened. We ended HIS madness long ago, and its best we leave him
forgotten. But...these creatures...maybe they’re remnants of his madness. In
which case we need to be even more vigilant.”

“Well we’re always at yer service, Milord.” Dogsbody grinned. “Now, let’s get inside. We
all need some shuteye too, I reckon.”

The Baron nodded, smiling. “Thank you, Dogsbody.”

The pair turned walked back into the castle under the pale moonlight, paying no mind to
the many eyes glowing in the black forest surrounding the castle, the hidden
watchers gazing at the castle and its residents hungrily, impatiently.

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