"Come on girl, get up," a gruff voice commanded. Before I could do anything more than open my eyes, a hand gripped the nape of my neck and pulled me backwards. I slid across the cold, hard floor. My vision cleared, showing me that I was out of my cage, and the lights were on.

I stumbled to my feet, and obediently followed my escort. Something looked different about him, but I couldn't put my finger on it. There was no time to ponder it further. I was shoved roughly out of my cage room and into the hall.

Once more, we wound through the dark halls until we reached the ceremony room. That's when I realized why my escort had looked different tonight, and it stopped me dead in my tracks: everyone in this room, save for myself, was wearing garments that were entirely blood red. Momentarily, I wondered if they had used real blood to dye their clothes; it would certainly explain the stench. Maybe it was better not to know, actually.

"Hurry up, we 'aven't got all night," my escort snapped, prodding me in the back with the metal bar he carried for protection. I tripped forward, caught my balance, then proceeded into the ceremony at a slower pace than usual.

The size of the audience appeared to have nearly doubled since the other night. As I moved through their ranks, one figure stood out to me more so than the others. The red it wore was a little brighter; more like the red of someone's lips than the macabre shade the other figures donned. I received another poke in the small of my back. Surely it was just a trick of the light. Everyone here was the same.

Once again I found myself trapped in the cruel embrace of the upside down oak. The audience began to chant, prompting another realization of mine: they'd been silent so far. A cold stone seemed to settle in the pit of my stomach. Tonight was going to be distinctly different from its predecessors.

Suddenly, two lines of people entered the pentagram on the floor from behind me, one line on each side. It was then I saw that they were children. What do they want with children? They already have me. Unless…

Unless they're planning to sacrifice me tonight.

The world snapped into high definition. I did not intend to die; not here, not now, not for these fools' idiot plans.

My heart was thundering in my chest, matching the pace of the crowd's chanting. I snuck a glance at my escort, figuring that if I was nothing more than a pig to be slaughtered tonight, he would move me to where my death would be a little more dramatic. But he was still, eyes closed as he chanted along with the group.

Returning my sights to the pentagram, I noticed that a few audience members had stepped forward and were lining the children up in front of the potted trees. My eyes widened and I averted my gaze when I realized the children were naked and blindfolded.

What the… Oh. They're going to die, not me. A ripple of relief washed through me, but it was quickly replaced with guilt, followed by anger. Why all these sacrifices? Why us, children? I'm glad it's not me they're killing, but that doesn't make it right for these children to die!

The chanting changed to something fast and low and almost hungry sounding. The audience members who'd been lining up the children now stood, one in front of each victim. Each one produced a long, curved, white knife from their robes. My stomach churned uncomfortably.

A few of the children screamed as the knives plunged into their stomachs. I turned away and was sick. My escort glared at me. If he didn't want me to be sick, he should've warned me.

When I gathered the courage to look back to where there were now eleven fresh corpses, I was startled to see someone who clearly did not belong at the ceremony stooped over one of the children. It was the figure I thought I'd seen earlier: a man with long scarlet hair and a matching coat. He carried a chainsaw in one hand, which caused me to wonder what on Earth he was doing here and why none of the ceremony's attendants had chased him off by now.

"Dear me, it's truly a shame but I'm going to have to let you go," the man said. I stared at him in confusion. A flicker of movement caught my eye, and I realized a long string of pictures- moving pictures, at that- was sprouting from the child he stood over like water from a fountain.

A rough hand on my arm pulled me out of my position in the upside down tree. It was my escort, tugging me out to begin my portion of the ritual. When I glanced back, the man in red was no longer visible.

The ground was slick with the children's blood as I made my rounds. Their corpses still lay behind me. I refused to look at them, fearing that if I did, I would never be able to get the image out of my head. I would already be hearing their tortured screams every time I closed my eyes for the rest of my life.

I was silent for the rest of the ceremony, and paid no attention to what the others were doing. When my escort tugged on my arm so that he could return me to my cage, I began to follow him numbly. Before we plunged back into the dark maze of hallways, I noticed the children's corpses had been cleared away. Their screams and the memory of those knives burying themselves in the children played in my head, and I was violently sick again.

Soon, I was locked away again in my cage, enveloped by darkness and silence. I leaned my head back against the metal bars and tried to block out the horrible memory. It was harder to hold back tears; too hard, it would seem, as a single, fat drop fell into my lap. This was just so unfair. What had I done to deserve this? I had almost no memories of before my captivity, and those that I did have were fuzzy and vague. What had those children done to deserve being murdered? But most of all, what I wished I knew was why. Why all these rituals and sacrifices and blood? Who was in charge of this operation, and what did they want to accomplish?

"You saw me, didn't you?" A voice asked from somewhere outside my cage. It sounded familiar, but I couldn't put a finger on why.

"Who are you?" I asked, wincing at how timid and scared I sounded.

"I was collecting souls, and you saw me. I'm a Shinigami; my name's Grell."

The man with the long red hair and the chainsaw. Right! When I did not reply, Grell went on, "You must have been able to see me because you're close to death yourself."

"You don't have to tell me I'm going to die soon," I retorted. I hugged my knees tightly to my chest. I suppose death isn't so bad to him, I thought bitterly.

"Given up hope, have you? That's pathetic," Grell replied, his tone almost bored-sounding.

My self-control slipped and my thoughts and emotions came pouring out. "What hope do I have? I'm locked in a cage, probably in someone's basement, and I keep watering trees with my blood and I'll probably never see the sun again. I'm only alive so that they can kill me prettily and you expect me to have hope?"

I could hear the frown in Grell's voice. "I suppose when you put it that way it does sound a little depressing…"

A little hum of agreement passed my lips. In the quiet, I could hear every movement he made, no matter how small.

"Well, if you're just going to sit there with your misery, then I'll get back to work before Will comes to yell at me or confiscate my chainsaw. I thought you'd be at least somewhat interesting," Grell sighed. I could hear him stand up (what had he been sitting on? His chainsaw?) and take a few steps. Maybe he had better night vision than humans, because I could feel him staring at me.

His footsteps began to get closer to where I knew the door to be, and before I could think I heard myself blurt out, "What's it like? Out- or up- there?"

Grell stopped walking. He was silent for a minute, seeming to choose his words carefully before he said, "Do you remember London?"

London. I could hardly remember anything before my life now. I didn't know how long I'd been down here for; I had nothing with which to make marks on the bars of my cage. But when Grell said it, I remembered small scraps of London. I'd been very young, and my memories were hazy; children running through an alleyway, a big, grimy river, and a shop called Gordon and Burch.

"A bit," I replied.

Grell seemed suddenly thrilled to have been asked, his tone shifting rapidly to excitement as he exclaimed, "Oh, London never gets any less exciting! It gets dirtier and bigger and the people get louder and maybe a little more intelligent, but the only thing you'll find different is the fashion, darling."

I tried to conjure up images of what Grell described, piecing them together from my scarce memories. Nothing came of my efforts.

"Speaking of London, I have more souls to reap tonight, so I really must go now. I think we'll be seeing each other again very soon, Miss…" Grell trailed off as if mentally reaching for something.

"Hey!" He protested. "I never learned your name."

It was no small miracle that, after so long in the dark and silence with any reprieve from my cage being only brief and worse than the cage itself, I still remembered my own name. To be fair, I only remembered my first name, but it sure as hell was better than nothing.

"Aline," I said. "My name is Aline."

Grell muttered something about my name being unique. I wouldn't have heard it without the lack of other noise in the room. It sparked a rare feeling of pride, or possibly just happiness, in me; an event so startling and special that Grell instantly claimed a small, special place in my heart. I hadn't had a human conversation like this in… I didn't even know how long.

"Well Miss Aline, this won't be the last time we see each other, I'm sure," Grell said. With that, his footsteps trailed away, leaving me alone in the dark and silence again. I wondered if the next time I'd be seeing him would be at my death.

It was as I replayed our conversation in my head that something occurred to me. Grell had said "the only thing you'll find different is the fashion," as if he thought I might get to see London again. A soft little smile stretched across my face, working out muscles so rarely used nowadays that smiling almost hurt a little bit. It was nice that he cared. And somehow, it comforted me to know who would be there to end my life.

A/N: Wow, it's been forever since I updated this! And, as I reread earlier chapters, I realized that this story isn't really going how I want it to, so I'm going to edit the chapters I've posted already, and moving forward I'm going to scrap the outline I had for this story (it involved Lizzie and my OC dying, something I do not want to have happen) so that this story aligns to what I want it to be a little better. You won't see another chapter posted to this story until I've edited the earlier chapters, so please be patient with me! Thanks!