New Scotland Yard, Westminster, London
Thursday, the 4th July
4:16 p.m.
*

"Did anyone leave the room during the time you waited for Mr. Lewis?"

Slowly Keith grew tired of the questions of the detective. He understood that the man was only doing his job, but Keith couldn't help him. He was the last person, who knew what happened. Miss Jones was the person to interview, if he wanted the truth, which he probably already did. Keith's testimony only was a stupid formality.

"Everyone did at some point to go to the toilet or to fetch a new drink. The only people that stayed in the living room were Charlie, me and Miss Jones."

A nod. At least for once the police believed him, Keith thought bitterly. He would have perhaps laughed at the irony if he had been in a better mood. 

"Did anyone go upstairs to look after Mr Lewis?"

"Miss Jones did at 8.30 I think, when he didn't turn up. Before you ask, no I have no idea, if anyone went upstairs to see Mr Lewis investigation results, while we waited. It doesn't matter anymore anyway, does it? " Keith countered annoyed. "I can't tell you anything new."

The detective wasn't impressed, instead he nearly seemed amused at Keith's obvious lack of patience... Maybe Keith had nothing to do with the murder that had taken place a few days ago, but he was sure he surely would be guilty of one if they didn't let him leave soon. 

"What happened after Miss Jones came back?"

Keith sighed this was going to be a long day and hopefully one without any further deaths. 

*

Cotchford farm, Hartfield, East Sussex.
Tuesday, the 2nd July
8.20 p.m
*

"So where is our ominous host?" Mick broke the silence that had settled after the grandfather clock had announced 8 o'clock. The only sounds that could be heard for 20 minutes were Miss Jones, announcing that it could only take a few minutes longer until Mr. Lewis arrived and the storm that was raging outside. Keith definitely didn't want to trade with Anita anymore. This dinner probably was the last place on earth he wanted to be, but at least it was dry and he had something to drink.  

"I-I don't know..." Miss Jones mumbled and bit her fingernails. The girl definitely was younger than she looked like and inexperienced too. When she had confronted Anita and Keith earlier, she had seemed professional, but now she was hardly more than a bundle of nerves. Keith nearly felt pity with her. None of this was her fault, she probably only was doing for what she was hired, but it was her that would suffer the consequences no matter what this evening would bring. "I'll go upstairs and look for Mr. Lewis. In the meantime everyone else can take a seat in the dinning room. A buffet is already waiting for you there. Name cards are on the table. I'm deeply sorry for this minor inconvenience, I try to sort everything out as quick as I can." She even bowed and Keith wondered how she could switch from the unsure girl to serious business woman in a matter of seconds. Miss Jones certainly had something about her that made her hard to figure out or maybe he only started to get paranoid. 

Miss Jones translated her speech into Swedish, before she left without another word. Nobody moved at first, until Charlie got up from his seat next to Keith.

"You're not seriously going to listen to her," Mick confronted the drummer, who only shrugged.

"I don't see what other choices we have."

"We-"

"Mick shut it," interrupted Keith the singer. "Charlie is right. We can't leave so we might as well make the most of our time here and food definitely sounds like a good idea."

Without waiting for the others Keith left the room with Charlie. They actually had no idea where the dinning room was supposed to be, and neither had Miss Jones it precised, but finding it was surprisingly easy. Keith hadn't noticed earlier, but beside the living room, the kitchen and another room, which turned out to be the dinning room had locked doors. They hadn't checked up stairs, but he doubted it was any different. Mr Lewis whoever he was, didn't want them to run around the house. Another thing to add to his list of ominous things, Keith thought as he sat down on a seat, not caring about the name cards and he doubted Anna would mind if he sat on her seat. 

Keith wasn't hungry anyway, but the wine bottle on the table was very welcome and Anna's had been the closest to it. Charlie on the other hand examined everything first until he sat down, naturally on the seat where he was supposed to sit. 

Charlie sometimes really was too polite and Keith had wondered more than once why he had never thought about leaving the band and still dealt with his and Mick's shit- especially Mick's shit- daily. Not that Keith wanted the drummer to leave, he loved him dearly, even just sitting with him here in silence felt peaceful.

Keith and Charlie weren't long alone though until first Mick, Janet and Anna entered then a bit later Tom and Frank. Nobody touched the food as they sat down. Anna didn't say anything about Keith sitting on her seat and just sat down on his instead and Keith nearly regretted switching places. He sat next to Mick and opposite of Tom, and his own seat had been next to Mick and opposite to Charlie.  

Both seats at the end of the table were empty and he suspected that one belonged to Mr. Lewis and the other one to Miss Jones, which he hoped appeared soon. As peaceful the mood had been with just Charlie in the room, it was just as tense now, but still as silent. You could have heard a pin drop, though they heard something far different.

A shrieking scream from upstairs ended the silence as a loud thunder echoed from outside, followed by a bright flash and then darkness. The tree candle lights that stood on the table were the only light left. 

"It's fine. The lights only went out... probably because of the storm," Mick stated.

Keith rolled his eyes, leave it to Mick to point out the most obvious and least important detail. 

"The scream?" Anna asked, voicing exactly what Keith had wondered about too. It could only have been Miss Jones. It had clearly been a woman and beside her there only was Mr. Lewis who wasn't with them in the room. 

"The electricity is more important. One of us should go down to the cellar and try to get it to work again," Tom retorted. 

"How about we split up? We have three candles, so 2 people go downstairs, 3 stay here and another 2 go upstairs to check on Miss Jones?" Charlie offered and Keith was glad they had decided to invite him and leave Bill out and not the other way around.

"Fine," everyone mumbled. 

" So who-" Mick started off, but got caught off by a flash and Anna. 

"No...No...No... Omöjlig... det kan inte vara!" She exclaimed loudly, trembling from head to toe. Her face even in the sparse light white as a sheet. Whatever she had seen, had scared her.

"What?" Tom asked without much pity.

"Brian! He... He was outside- outside the window!" She exclaimed, still trembling and pointing at the window. Even if it would have been possible that she could have seen a man that had been dead for 20 years, it was too dark outside to make out anything. Granted with the lightening, she maybe could have made out certain shapes, but Brian outside? No, that was impossible, Keith thought and suspected it only had been a trick of the light. Nothing more. 

"Rubbish," Frank mumbled, which was one of the first things the man had said tonight. "He's dead! It was just a trick of the lightening or something..."

"Let's just stick to our plan," Tom agreed.

At least Janet took pity on Anna and tried to calm her down, while the other argued over splitting up. Well Keith should have expected, that it wouldn't be that easy considering they didn't exactly all like each other... At least some splitting was easy, Frank had the most knowledge about electricity and well he knew the house rather good too. Anna was still shacking and didn't want to go anywhere and Janet wanted to stay with her.

In the end they draw by lot. Mick went with Frank, Keith stayed with Anna and Janet, and Charlie and Tom went looking for Miss Jones. It wasn't the best solution, but at least one that worked. Keith didn't mind staying anyway. The others weren't as happy, but wandered off anyway as Keith opened a new bottle of wine.

"I knew what I saw...." Anna mumbled quietly, making Keith sigh. He didn't want to have that discussion. "It was Brian... I would recognise him everywhere."

"He's dead," Keith said soberly and filled another glass of wine. "Drink that," he said as he held the glass out for her. "It will calm you down."

Janet glared at him, but Keith ignored her. Anna didn't take the glass anyway, she didn't even look up at Keith, instead she glanced at her hands in her lap. "What if he wants revenge?"

"Revenge?" Keith snorted. "Anna, Brian is dead. He can't do anything and even if he could why would he get revenge on you? You didn't kill him, did you?"

"No... but I couldn't save him... He was still breathing... maybe..." she mumbled and Keith feared she would start to cry soon. 

"Listen, you-" he started off, slightly annoyed, but was interrupted by thunder and another bright flash that flooded the room.

"No..." Keith whispered. The glass of wine slowly gliding out of his hands, until it shattered with a clinking sound on the hard floor and the liquid wet his shoes, but Keith momentarily didn't care. 

Right outside the window stood a man with light hair and a bright smile, clad in a long coat with a hat upon his head. 

"Brian.."

Thanks for reading, voting and commenting. <33