Ripping a dagger off the wall he held it to his side and waited on a corner for someone to walk past. After a few moments, someone did, and Hyde leapt at them like a feral cat. Putting the knife to their throat, they shook slightly, a line of crimson blood seeping from the place it cut. Smiling, Hyde growled, the taste of metallic blood in his mouth.

"Scream; I cut your windpipe open", he snarled. "And would you be so kind as to direct me towards a boat?" The man nodded, his blonde hair straying into his eyes.

"O-over on the west dock. There's one there", he quivered. "Please, p-please don't hurt me". Hyde pondered it for a while, whether to let this Tenebrae agent, this monster, go, but he had a change of heart. It was probably Jekyll tugging on his heart strings. He dropped the knife on the floor so it clattered on the tiles, making the man jump.

"Run", Hyde murmured. "Before I catch you first". The man nodded again and ran as fast as his legs could carry him down one of the corridors. A Vetala came around the corner, but didn't notice him skulking in the darkness. And whenever they were near, Dance had to be too. However much Hyde hated his guts, somewhat literally in the case of the Moroii, he had somewhere better to be. "Why not give him a day off today?" Hyde thought, taking off down the corridor that the supposed boat was.

:/:

Olalla had hunted for her brother for hours, accompanied by Lottie, but hadn't gotten far with their search. The rest had stayed home awaiting his return, but everyone had the horrible thought that something terrible had happened. Night was already upon them and, however much Olalla disliked being Jekyll, she knew her brother would want her to embrace that side. They had been pretty much everywhere in town, asked every drunkard on every corner on every street, but nothing. Lottie was now approaching a place which could only be described as dodgy. She really did hope she wouldn't find her brother, rolled up at some tenth-rate tavern on the edge of the city, but then again, after him being gone this much time, she wouldn't really care.

"Robert?" she asked quietly, looking rather reluctant to walk the pavements, where God knows what could have happened there. She could have been stepping on a buried body for all she knew. No, no, this was for her brother, she had to. Cautiously she wandered into one of the alleyways, picking up a knife off the floor just in case something was going to jump out at her. It didn't surprise her to find random weapons just lying on the street, especially in a neighbourhood like this. "Robert?" she asked again. No answer. Nothing at all. "Turn back now, or carry on?" she pondered. One half of her said to go back, see if he turned up at home, but the other half just had visions of Robert curled up, sobbing, just around the corner. She carried on.

:/:

"This is a dead end", Olalla kept saying to herself. "This is a complete dead end. He's gone and -". She was going to finish, but then she realised that what she was about to say would horrify herself. The only place left that they hadn't checked was the very edge of London, at the dockland. But why the Hell would he be there? It was the only place, she had to check. And besides, she wasn't that far away from it anyway. Swiftly she ran down the winding streets, seeing the water in the distance. The sky above was dark, and soon enough it had started to rain, heavily. "Well, this is...brilliant", she muttered, noticing how much she sounded like Garson. Olalla sighed, it was very late and she really didn't know if she could hold off her Hyde side for much longer. The monocane that Garson had told her to use 'sparingly' was now running out. But there, just on the horizon, amongst the darkness and clouds, was a familiar silhouette against the water. Could it be? Could it be that four hours of searching had actually resulted in something? She ran towards whoever it was, hoping that it was her brother and not some random stranger, but then again, who would be boating at this time of the night? Yes, yes it was him. His curly hair hung, half clung to his face by the rain, and his coat had slumped down his shoulders. Water droplets ran down his cheeks, and his eyes were bloodshot.

"Jekyll or Hyde?" Olalla asked him.

"Jekyll", he answered, and a silence then swallowed up any other conversation they could have had.

"So we going to go inside?" she enquired finally. "Because I'm soaked through to the bone".

"Suppose so".

:/:

Turning a corner, her heart skipped when her shoes cracked some broken glass beneath her feet. It was so dark down here, and there was someone here, Lottie could sense it. There was a mind she could read, but it was graphically confusing, hundreds of lines intersected with each other.

"Who's there?" she called out. "Robert, is that you?"

"I know you're afraid", a voice said back, not Robert, but someone else, someone she... knew? "Don't be. We're not here to hurt you". Now she knew where the voice was coming from, she could see a shadow where he or she stood.

"We?" she whispered. "Come into the light". The person came forward as told, and she inhaled sharply when she saw who it was.

"Father?" she gasped. He smiled slightly, but his eyes were just great pools of darkness. Lottie's expression changed from utter delight to concern when she saw them, knowing some element of the supernatural was involved. "What happened to you?"

"He-" he started, but his voice jumped. "I'm lo-"

"What? What is it? What are you trying to say?" she asked frantically, stepping forward to take a closer look at his eyes. Past the blackness, there were faint lines, like the ones she had seen in his mind when she tried to read it.

"He is...currently unavailable, I'm sorry", another voice said from behind her. She spun around to see Dance, smirking, with a creature beside him, one unlike any other she had seen. It was like a woman, very beautiful, but with twisted horns protruding through her golden hair.

"What have you done to my father?" she demanded, and a maleficent smile crept across the woman's face.

"He is currently residing in the Puzzlebox".

"Th-the Puzzlebox?"

"I'm soon you'll get to grips with it. This...", he replied, and his assistant stepped forward. "...is Semira. Think of her as a replacement".

"Getting rid of me so soon, darling. And there's me thinking you loved me so".

"Oh, I do", he lilted, reaching forward to put his hand on her face. "And I love this face, so...trustworthy".

"Glad you think so".

"Anyway, enough chit-chat. I understand you are familiar with this". Semira held up a long, golden chain with a circular disk hanging on it. A line went across it and around the edges was a scalloped edge.

"That's the Jezequel Amulet. Where did you get that?"

"Turns out Brant Jezequel will give anything if you promise him a way out of a lifetime watching a portal".

"Wait, is that what you've done to him? You've used the amulet on him to... control him?" She asked, gesturing towards Louis standing behind her.

"Of course. Well, we couldn't keep him here otherwise", he answered, and the woman next to him seemed to merge into someone, something else. What the Hell was she? She then transformed into a perfect replica of Brant, snarling loudly. "Ah, yes. Forgot to mention; she can become anyone".

"A changeling?"

"No, a tokhiruulagchiin".

"Bit of a mouthful".

"Yes, but much more civil, and much more... pretty", he exclaimed, his words slightly contradicted by the fact that the 'pretty' one he was talking about was now a growling man-wolf. Semira held up the amulet higher in front of Lottie and she inhaled again, slightly terrified. The gold circle split open and beneath it was an eye, human in appearance, but positively not mortal. Her sight started to wither, and it almost felt like half of her was somewhere else. "Welcome to my plan, Fedora, hope you enjoy your stay"...