The Widow's Spiders

Chapter 3

"I think we need to do what's best for Sophie." Prophet said calmly. I sighed.

"Fine, but we need to keep a close eye on him."

"Agreed."

"Are you talking about me?" Pickpocket asked innocently, fiddling with my wallet. I snatched it from him, gave Luka a look, and stormed off in the direction of Sophie's room. I was acutely aware of him skipping behind me, over-joyfully. As I led him to Sophie's room, I made sure to stop him before he entered. "What?" He asked innocently.

"If you betray her like you did to me-"

"Betray you?" He asked, looking genuinely confused.

"Did you really just ask me that?" I said in a dangerously low voice. He took a step back. "Because if you did-"

"I've only heard about you from Soph! I've never met you." There was a thick silence, as I saw Luka come up from behind me.

"What's going on?" He asked. From the look on his face, he already knew what we were talking about.

"What. Does. That. Mean?" I growled, struggling to reign in my anger. He looked even more confused at my anger.

"I've never met you before today!"

"You almost got me kil-" Luka interrupted me.

"He's telling the truth." That stopped me in my tracks, Luka was never wrong when it came to reading people.

"See!" Pickpocket said, giving an annoyingly innocent look in my direction. "I told you I've never met you before today!" That made no sense.

"Let's just help Sophie." I muttered, leading the way into her room. My eyes flicked around warily as I moved inside. You could never be too careful after all.

"Soph! You're ok!" Pick exclaimed happily, before he rushed forward and grabbed her into a tight hug, which she happily returned. Luka was looking confused.

"Wait, that doesn't make any sense."

"What doesn't make any sense?" I asked him.

"His body language just...changed. It's like he's a completely different person. It makes no sense."

"He can't be two people at once." I said.

"What if he can?" I thought about it for a moment. Him betraying me, his constant memory gaps, mood swings. There was a very high possibility of him having DID. I sucked in a breath and rubbed my eyes.

"Silverstar, are you aware of this?" I asked, gesturing at Pickpocket, hoping she knew what I meant.

"I've been aware for the past few months, and I've been trying to help him." She said coolly.

"Aware of what?" Pickpocket asked, looking less innocent then he did a few moments ago. Sophie shook her head.

"Oh great."

"Aware of what?" He pressed, stepping closer to me, almost like he was shielding Sophie.

"You have DID, probably due to some tragic event that happened when you were younger, and I'm so stupid as to not realizing it before you betrayed me."

"Excuse me as I look up DID." He said, bending over a nearby computer for a few minutes. "I do forget a lot of things, I've never had any trauma, I do have plenty of dreams." At that he shuddered. "I have had at least twenty-six of out-of-body experiences, and I caught myself wearing a polo shirt yesterday, even though I've never worn one, or had one." His face fell as he came to the realization. "Oh." I almost felt sorry for him.

"Who are your other personalities?" I asked.

"That's not the way it works." Sophie said. "Right now, this is Magnus. That's all you need to know."

"Do you remember me?"

"Kinda." He said. "I remember working with you a little, and then I never saw you again." He looked confused. "I don't remember a whole lot after that. Actually, the next thing I remember is meeting Sophie."

"You betrayed me." I said coldly.

"I don't remember that. I'm sorry if I did, but I had no control over that. I don't even remember doing so." He sounded annoyingly sincere.

"So you're saying that your current anchor is Sophie, and I was your last one?"

"Well when you put it that way..."

"Never mind. I'm just surprised you never noticed before. I mean, wouldn't someone close to you realize that you were acting differently?" He stared at me blankly, as I remembered the night he finally told me about his past.

(A/N PLEASE NOTE THAT THIS NEXT PART IS EXTREMELY VIOLENT AND MAY TRIGGER SOME PEOPLE if you wish to skip this, skip until the line "I hugged him, finally, finally getting his past out of him.")

"I lived in an orphanage a while back, with a few other children. It was more of a monastery of sorts. Anyway, we were expected to be perfect all the time." His voice cracked a little, and it was so different from his usual carefree attitude. "It was more annoying, really. I had a friend, Teri, and she and I would hangout all the time. We would ditch classes together, and steal food from the kitchen. It was fun, but the end of the month was drawing to a close." He closed his eyes painfully at this, and I put a hand on his shoulder. "I got a scratch on my back, that got infected and left a scar. It was an imperfection. I managed to hide it the first month, but not this time. This time, I was selected to be this month's sacrifice. They cut out my scar," He said, shuddering. "And they were about to burn me, before, before, before." He stopped, a tear slipping down his face. "Teri came out. She had a rash all over her face. I could tell it was fake, but they couldn't." He paused, taking a deep breath, thinking about his next words.

"They cut out her entire face, and burned her at the stake. I had to watch it all."

"I'm so sorry." I said. I didn't know what else to say. I felt sick to my stomach.

"The worst part is," He said, curling his arms around his legs. His face looked pale and his eyes were lost in the horrors of his past. "The worst part is that we were planning to run away that night. But I ran away, by myself. I made sure to bury her before I left. But I adopted her name. I had my middle name be Teri, after her. I couldn't bear for the last of her to be buried in the hard ground by a cultist monastery." He started openly crying at that, and I hugged him, finally, finally getting his past out of him.