It was around 7 pm when the guests arrived. They had called earlier, wondering if they should wait for calmer weather, but the drive isn't far and Valt insisted against rescheduling. Through the maelstrom of sleet and pouring rain their car jumped onto the driveway. He watched from the door as they threw up an umbrella and made a dash for the house.

"What's up, Valt?" Rantaro shouted, hardly letting him open the door. Valt called them in as cheerfully as he could.

"Honcho! You guys! How are ya?" Valt asked cheerfully. He looked at a peach haired boy. "Hey. I never seen you before. I'm Valt Aoi." He offered a hand shake.

"Antonio Rairakkushiro." A boy accepted a hand shake.

"He's my cousin." Kamiyu added. "Come on, you have to tell us everything. What have you been doing all this time?"

"I'll get to it, I'll get to it," Valt replied, playfully surviving Unmei's cuddly hug. "Now get in here, before it starts hailing or something."

While the night's dinner baked in the oven, Valt and his friends went about sharing all the things they'd missed getting to be a part of in each other's lives. A flood warning had been issued, and the guests were going to have to stay the night. Diran got cozy laying on the sofa, resting his head on Rotto's lap, a lime haired boy blushed. Valt found a seat from where he could face them and the doorway.

At one point, Antonio went to find the bathroom. Daigo waited for him to leave, then he and Unmei leaned in to interrogate Valt.

"Alright," he began. "When did you and Shu go out? You're going to be trapped in this house with me and you're not getting away until I know."

"You know what," Valt answered with a sigh, "fine. It happened over the weeks, just after the Nationals."

"What? Why didn't you tell us?" Unmei asked.

"I mean, I guess I hadn't thought about it? I don't know." He scratched his eye while trying to remember. "It still doesn't feel like it really happened."

"How long were you together for?"

"Um... four months? Yeah, four I think."

"Only four?"

"We weren't exactly a match made in heaven, I guess."

It was almost 8 pm at this point, and Antonio returned from the bathroom.

"Holy hell," Wakiya started.

"What?" Kamiyu asked. "What is it?"

"Okay... Wow! That guy really scared me in the hallway!"

"Sorry for what happened you in all your freaking life!" Antonio sarcastically apologised. "Scaredy cat."

"You're worse than him!"

"Don't blame me!" Rantaro pissed off.

Unmei, Rotto and Diran laughed. Daigo, Kamiyu and Isan sweat dropped. Valt laughed as well, even though he was nervous. He tried to form some sort of an explanation, but got interrupted when the first bang shook the walls.

https://youtu.be/uQNIGtOsqAc

"Woah," Rotto stammered. "What was that?" The room fell silent for a moment.

"It wasn't a gunshot, was it?" Valt interjected.

"Was it?" Unmei worried. "It sounded close–" She'd barely finished her thought when a second shot boomed out, then a third. Another two went off in quick, shocking succession, as if whoever fired them was in a panic. Then, silence, save for the substantial rain battering the walls and windows; as if on cue, the storm was starting to really hit.

"Guys?" Daigo broke into the ambience. Diran started to get up, but he gestured for him to stay put. "Diran! You should stay away from the window."

"Why?" Diran asked.

"What if there's something going on, like a shooting?"

"I think Daigo's right," Rantaro noted, "it could be serious."

They sat still, listening. After what felt like a lifetime, their senses on full alert, they weren't able to hear anymore gunfire. Valt got on his feet to peer out the window; Daigo didn't stop him this time. It seemed as though time itself held still while he opened the blind, trying to catch a glimpse of whatever awaited them in the rain. He couldn't see anything through the downpour, and he was about to close the blinds when he noticed a shape lying on the driveway.

They leapt out of their skin when a knock came at the door from across the house. it came suddenly, without warning. He looked at Rantaro, then Daigo, then Rotto, then Wakiya who was watching towards the entrance.

"Is it your mom?" Rotto wondered aloud. No one answered as Valt made his way around the couch. Taking hold of the wall, he would lean into the hall through one of the doorways to see who was knocking; he feared it was whoever had been shooting, but some part of him was more afraid of what might have caused it.

Before Valt identified their guest, his checked one more time on the group behind him. Diran, Kamiyu and Unmei hadn't moved from the couch; Rantaro, Daigo, Rotto and Wakiya was standing next to him, where their was when the shots went off. Another deep breath, and Valt was ready to find out who was at the door. He wasn't sure what he was so afraid of. What if they were just overreacting?

It was clear we weren't overreacting when he discovered the front door was open. Whoever'd been knocking was now in the house.

"Who is it?" Rantaro whispered from beside him. He tried to formulate a reply.

"...I'm not sure..." became his response. As he watched the door, something caught his eye. "Honcho, did you leave the light on upstairs?"

"The light?" Rantaro repeated, unravelling. Walking over to see what Valt meant, he noticed the open door as well. It became clear he was getting nervous. At last, Valt decided he'd had enough, and went off towards the stairs. Daigo called to him from the doorway, hardly at a whisper.

"Valt, where are you going?"

"I'm going to find out what the hell is going on," Valt answered brashly, not stopping to face him. Instead, he rounded the corner and took to the stairs. Dashing up, he was ready to get some answers he halted at the landing, realizing he might be running into danger with reckless abandon. The hallway, including the doors to his mom's room and his own room, was just visible around the corner.

The bathroom door was ajar, and an orange ray poured into the unlit hall. Ah, ominous, Valt contemplated. Why not? Taking the final step onto the second floor, the doorway was now in full sight. He'd been hoping this whole thing was a strange coincidence, but his hopes were suspended when a shape in the cracked opening caught his chocolate eye. After everything that'd happened that night, he was a little unsettled; it was when he opened the door that he really became concerned.

https://youtu.be/uDJwB3grRa0

"...Shu?" The words escaped his mouth as though they weren't mine. Leaning against the sink, staring at his reflection in the mirror, Shu had appeared for the first time in almost twenty-four hours. At his exclamation, he turned to face me–there was a look in his red eye he couldn't quite place. They stood in a long beat of silence, until he broke from his trance to start getting some answers.

"Were you knocking on the front door?" Valt asked.

"Yeah," Shu responded. "I was hoping you were home, but no one answered, so I came in to make sure you were okay." Something about Shu was different, but he couldn't figure out what it was.

"Why are you in the bathroom?"

"I came upstairs to see if you were–"

"Why are you in the bathroom?"

"Alright, I know this seems weird Valt, but the only reason I have–" he stopped him again with more questions, no longer able to contain his curiosity.

"What happened last night? Where did you go?"

"Valt, if you'd give me a second to explain..."

The Valtryek blader hadn't interrupted him, but he trailed off anyway. It took him a moment to realize he wasn't looking at him. 

You know that feeling you get when even though you can't see it, you know something's behind you? 

However you describe it...

That's what hit him just before the bathroom light went off.

The next few seconds were a blur. There was a scream, he assume The Spryzen blader and he saw him holding something in the dark. On impulse Valt ran, and before he knew it his feet had carried him to the stairs; he practically tumbled to the bottom as he scurried towards the living room. At some point during his flight a series of ear-splitting booms shook the house, and he hadn't even noticed the flashing light before he got back to the others.

"Holy crap!" Rotto called down the hall as Valt fell through the living room doorway.

"Oh my god," Unmei cried while helping him to his feet. 

Daigo ran to them. "What the hell just happened?"

"Someone attacked us," Valt gasped, hardly believing his own words.

"What?" Wakiya shouted. "What do you mean someone–"

"I don't know, the lights went–"

"Was that a gun?" Antonio cried.

"That was a gun, Ant," Rantaro started yelling. "Did you–?"

It was chaos. Unmei, Diran, Rotto, Rantaro, Kamiyu, Wakiya and Antonio were almost screaming, Daigo and Isan were panicking, and Valt couldn't finish a sentence, and someone walked past the room, and the rain was getting heavier; there was no calm in sight when them heard footsteps charging down the stairs. Shu halted at the top of the staircase, he brandished a handgun, pointed right at his. The panic got worse.

"Everyone shut up!" Shu exploded. They froze, encased in fear. "Nobody move!"

"Shu?" Valt dared a question. He watched him, letting him speak, but he was definitely on edge. He got the feeling he wouldn't hesitate to gun him down the moment he made a wrong move. "Shu, what the hell is happening?"

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https://youtu.be/TWLw80tX8Zg

They managed to calm everyone down enough to come together in the living room. Shu was still eyeing them, his gun at the ready; they all eyed him back, and he began to speak.

"Now," Shu started, "I don't know what's going on, but no one is leaving this room until we've figured something out."

"Shu," Rotto interjected, "you're hysterical."

"Quiet!" He kept the barrel leveled right with his head.

"Shu," Daigo spoke up. "Were you the one firing those shots earlier?"

"Outside?" Shu elaborated. Daigo nodded. "Yeah... Yes, that was me."

"Why?" Diran asked. He looked shaken, but he was holding together.

"...It was trying to escape."

There was an uncomfortable pause at the word. For a moment, looks of terror turned to looks of bewilderment; they all exchanged glances, and he asked for clarity.

"It?" Valt repeated.

"Yeah," Rantaro added in, "what is-, what is 'it?'"

"I don't know what it is," Shu began to answer, "but it–"

"This is ridiculous," Wakiya interrupted. "Do you realize how–"

"Wakiya, I swear to God!" His grip on the weapon tightened. "Look, I'm telling you. Whatever got to Lui, it's probably trying to–"

"Lui?" Unmei stopped him. Suddenly, Shu's nervous fury melted a bit, and he was lost in thought; his grip loosened on the pistol.

"Shu," Daigo questioned, "Who were you shooting at outside?"

"It was my demon self," Shu admitted after a moment. Valt looked utterly confused. "We're not the same, but it looked like me and it was walking towards your house–"

"Shu?" Kamiyu stopped him too. "What's going on?"

It took Shu a few moments before he'd adequately come out of his trance. He spoke slowly, as if choosing his words carefully.

"Over the past few weeks," he began, "I noticed something... was wrong with Reo." Daigo and Isan looked at each other, then at Valt as though expecting some kind of explanation, he had no words. Shu continued. "Soon enough, Lui was furious before he started his rampage. I locked myself in my room and avoided them, and it might be the only reason I'm okay."

"How do we know you're okay?" Isan asked, sitting up in the chair. it seemed that Shu had no idea how to respond; the longer he waited, the more the rest of the BeyClub began to shift around. Finally, he thought of a reply.

"Would I want to kill it, whatever it is, if I wasn't?" This seemed to satisfy the all of them.

"What happened to Lui?" Kamiyu inquired, not handling the suspense very well. Shu took an uncomfortably long time to answer.

https://youtu.be/CoQoGTmkoU0

"I... I killed him."

Kamiyu's pink eyes widened. Valt collapsed to the floor with his chocolate eyes widened and Diran fainted. Isan jumped to his feet, not happy at all about his current situation.

"What do you mean you killed them?!" Isan bellowed. Shu snapped to attention, readying his weapon.

"Man," Daigo remarked. As quickly as he'd gone out, Diran started coming to; Isan calmed as Rotto grabbed a cloth and making a cool wind on his greenette friend.

"Listen to me!" Shu tried to reason. "He wasn't human anymore!"

Any sane person would have thought Shu had lost his mind; they must have been crazy themselves, because they started to listen intently. "After I killed him... I took the body outside to bury him. That's when I grabbed the gun." Unmei wasn't sure what Shu had used before the gun, but the thought bothered her and she kept listening. "As I was taking them around the house, Helena showed up."

"Last night?" Unmei asked.

"Yeah. She was the first to act out so I knew she wasn't herself anymore. I couldn't trust her–so I shot her. After that I buried her body with the others."

Valt wasn't taking the story very well, and he was shaking all over; Shu didn't take his eyes off of him.

"So why don't you trust us?" Unmei remarked. "I mean, if it was just Lui, why would we–"

"Because after I killed her–before I got the body–something... something came out of her corpse." Shu looked as though he no longer believed himself, as though the uncanny nature of his testimony was just starting to hit him. "I... I didn't see it, but I heard it break through your window."

All at once, everything added up.

"Oh my god," Unmei stammered. He was trying to process this, but it wasn't long before Shu explained it to all of them.

"Valt, either it's in your house, or it's already inside one of you." Daigo sat up; so did Valt; so did Unmei.

"Well..." Rantaro pondered aloud, "...Well then it can't be me or any of us. I mean, we just got here tonight. I–" He noticed Daigo, who was watching Valt cautiously. Shu saw this too, and suddenly four pairs of eyes were locked on him.

"W-W-Whatever it is," Valt stuttered quickly, "you and I were just attacked by it upstairs. It's still on the loose!"

"If it's been here since last night," Shu calculated, "it could have gotten to anyone in this house. Has anyone been away from the group tonight?" The eyes all shifted to Antonio, who had been in the bathroom.

"What?" Antonio protested. "I was just peeing, okay? I was gone for like, three minutes, tops! But–" he turned to Daigo. "–you were alone with them! Until that spoiled prince appears!" He pointed to Valt with his exclamation. Wakiya, pissed, defended himself.

"Well, something attacked Shu and Valt!" Wakiya retaliated. "What if whatever it was got you while you were in the bathroom?" The two were farther apart, physically speaking, than he'd seen them in years. While the group threw accusations left and right, a shadow caught the corner of Valt's eye; It looked behind him, but didn't notice anything out of the ordinary.

"I was gone for three! Minutes! What could have happened?" Antonio railed on.

"That could have been enough time for it to copy you," Valt noted.

"Copy?" Shu halted the witch trial to take notice of Valt's comment.

"Yeah," Valt explained. "You said it looked like you, right?"

"...Yes?" Shu confirmed.

"Did you bury Lui before you saw yourself near my house?"

"That's correct."

"Then I think whatever you shot wasn't Lui." he only saw Shu's puzzled stare for a moment before the whole room went dark. Something turned the lights off.

https://youtu.be/ex7VpCrIsjM

Unmei and Kamiyu screamed as Shu fumbled for a source of light. He yanked out his phone and flipped the flashlight on, just in time to illuminate an unusual figure making its way out of the room.

"There it is!" He called, alerting the rest of us. "Don't lose it!" The chase was on as Shu bolted into the dark. The BeyClub went after him, and Valt followed. Shu flew up the stairs after the intruder, but our adrenaline ran out in the second floor hallway–as if by magic, the figure had disappeared.

"Gaaah!" Shu gasped. "Hey Valt, did you see where it went?"

"Huh?" Valt replied.

"You were right behind me."

"No, I didn't see it."

Shu sighed as he pushed his hair back, then began peeking into the rooms with his light. He checked Valt's mom's room: nothing. He checked Valt's room: empty. He checked the bathroom: vacant. "Well... it looks like we lost it."