Slit

Autumn was teary-eyed at the end of the story. "T-t-that's... Slit, I-I never knew. That's so sad."

"It's a story I'd rather forget."

"Is that why you're edgy now?" Locke asked with a rather disappointed look. "I thought you were tougher now, but you still break down upon me mentioning Daddy. Pathetic." I growled and opened one of the thermoses on my belt, raising my hand near the mouthpiece to pull out a stream of blood that straightened into five spike shapes and solidified. Locke's spider legs emerged, and he aimed his crossbow at me, the spider motif's front legs stretching out to form the frame, and a string extending between them.

"Go ahead. It's an even fight. I'll let you have the first attack." My words reached him, but Autumn's green eyes darted behind me, and Locke's bolt wasn't aimed at me when it fired. I heard it bounce off of something, and I saw a man with a jet black shield behind us. He drew an axe and smirked. It was his axe!

"You!" I raised a spike and threw it, but the man swung the weapon, and the glowing, golden blade fired a wave of light that cleaved the spike in half.

"You know, you're not supposed to greet someone with weapons." He grinned.

"Where the hell did you get that axe?" I snarled.

"A friend gave it to me. Said it's of great importance." His accent made me think of Aaron and how obnoxious he was.

"Thief..."

"Oh? Is this yours?"

"Thief! You took it!" I snapped.

Autumn's POV

I watched a dark aura around Slit grow bigger and bigger as he got angrier and angrier, like a maelstrom of darkness swirling inside him was breaking free. It grew and grew until

It stopped.
------------------------------------------------------

???

I watched as the young man fell into a chair, moaning drunkenly under something's influence.

"Why did I wake up?" He began yet another monologue. "I love her so, but she can never be mine. Why must she be a sacrifice?! I love her like how Romeo fell for Juliet. And I wish to give her a taste of me as I taste her! Be still, my beating heart. Don't escape my chest!" He rolled onto the floor. "Brother, do you know love?" I shook my head.

"I don't know what kind of love you've been exposed to," I growled. "But to me, it's only for tricking foolish girls into becoming sacrifices."

"You cannot understand. This feeling has no match!" He took a deep sniff of a handkerchief, getting even more love-drunk in the process.

"Good grief. Is this what I left London for?!" I lamented.
------------------------------------------------------

???

"Lyra, you can't be serious!" I persisted. I knew what that Faust character does. He had drawn some of my female classmates in with charm and good looks, then used all of them for sacrifices! I wasn't fooled, but my friend Lyra was another story. "You know what he did to our friends!" She took her headband off and let her brown pixie cut down, sighing.

"Mira, you're such a killjoy. That man is a hunk and a half."

"That's how they all feel," I replied. "And weren't you supposed to be the mature one and Autumn the ditz?"

"I'm mature!" she squeaked. I rolled my eyes. "He's just so tall and strong."

"Oh my God."

Virgil

I watched him bring down the axe, sending a wave of power along the ground and forcing Locke to jump away from the explosion.

"Slit, we're enemies, but someone needs to teach this bastard not to steal from our family." Locke teleported in a burst of energy, and I nodded before being knocked down. The skeleton mask flew off my face, and the man grinned as he flipped off his hood.

"It is you," I muttered.