---------------- Kyuuketsuki Duo Episode XXVI The Road to Hell ---------------- Duo may not have been the one sending his senses out into the ether that night, but if there was one thing he could always sense, it was Heero, and Heero was sensing something out there. 'What's up?' he thought, not really speaking directly to his partner so much as putting his thoughts where he knew Heero could read them. ::It's not what we're looking for,:: the hunter answered, routing the thought through their link and down to a level beneath the guardian's headache. 'But...?' The dull ache stretching down the back of his head apparently did not dull his powers of observation, at least when it came to Heero. There had been a slight hesitation before his words. ::It's not what we're looking for,:: he repeated, pointedly turning his search away that sector. 'But?' Duo reached a finger up and poked it into Heero's side, a message that the soothing way he was running his slender fingers over the hair on the head in his lap was not serving as a distraction. Quite the contrary, really. It was only making Duo feel better. The fingers stilled, and settled down to become a light, steady warmth against Duo's forehead. ::It's not Shinma.:: 'And it's not Quatre. So? It's still gotta be more than a little sprite to give you pause.' ::....:: 'Lemme see?' With only a tiny sigh, Heero filtered out all of the miscellaneous information from the stream and fed it carefully to his partner for his inspection. 'Hmmm.' ::You want to go check it out, don't you?:: Duo released his hold on the information and opened his eyes to see Heero watching him carefully. "You know I don't like funny things running around my territory, Heero." "We could put it off." It was a testament to his concern that he proposed procrastinating. "We could," Duo agreed amiably. "But something tells me we shouldn't." "What about Quatre?" "He'll keep. Trowa wasn't being all that urgent about it." "Would Trowa be urgent about anything?" "Alright, true," Duo conceded. "But still. Maybe we can just drop by and see what's going on." "That's it?" Duo smiled. Heero could be so cute when he was worried. "That's it." ************ "Where are we going, Wufei?" she asked as they paused at an intersection. Meiran thought to herself that it was quite fortunate that her father was out of town so often. It would be difficult to explain these nighttime forays. "We'll know when we get there." He turned left and kept on going, heading away from the center of the city's night life. It was fortunate that it was a quiet night since they were just wandering around, following Wufei's instincts. He had sensed some suspicious overtones in the air when he had searched area, and now they were playing a game of hot and cold. They reached another intersection. Wufei fingered the hilt of the sword beneath his long coat, silently asking for a hint. It warmed only briefly for him in recognition of his presence, but that was all. ************ Quatre tried not to fidget in his seat. That was hardly professional. Nevertheless, it made him nervous to be taken for a ride into a probably dangerous situation. Penny assured him that he could change his mind and leave, although how that would work when they were currently in a car traveling away from the places he was familiar with was beyond him. He had a passing ridiculous vision of himself jumping out of the moving vehicle as always happened in the movies. The time for indecision was long since past. He had made a choice, and now he had to stick with it. Recent trends proved that he had to learn to follow his own course. Duo's absences only pointed out that Quatre couldn't rely on him forever; he had his own duty and responsibilities to take care of that superceded by far any responsibility he may have felt for teaching a lost little spiritualist in need of direction. The car stopped before he realized where they were. He looked around and realized that they although he had never been here, he could easily recognize it. There were high stone walls surrounding the block that kept the interior hidden from the outside, but the statuary gave it away. "The cemetery?" Penny made a sound of acknowledgement as she parked the car and got out, Quatre hastily following as she made her way inside. "I tracked it down here earlier. It's hiding its precise location with the proximity of the dead." "Is it... undead or something?" he whispered, as if he could disturb the dead lying beneath the ground. His own mother could have been one of the bodies buried here, but she had chosen to be cremated instead. "No. Just a demon masking its scent. It doesn't have to be dead to blend in with the dead." She walked as if she knew exactly where she was going. Their destination seemed to be an area of medium-sized crypts. Quatre shuddered. Being in a cemetery at night was not his idea of a good time. At least the graves were well-kept, the walls clean. No broken angels lying in weed-infested dirt. He didn't get the feeling that zombies would be clawing their way out of the ground any time soon. It also made him feel a little better when he looked up to the heavens and saw that the moon wasn't quite full yet. Strange things always happened when the moon was either full or new. He tried to laugh at himself. He obviously watched too many movies. There was a path that they were following that led to this area. Penny stopped, looked around her as if judging her position, and nodded in satisfaction. "This is it," she declared. "This is the best we'll be able to do." "Best for what?" Quatre asked before he could stop himself, forgetting for a moment that he didn't want to impose too much upon his teacher. "We'll have enough space here to bind it." Bind? Well, yes, he supposed that that was what they would have to do to the demon, although he hadn't really given it any thought beyond the fact that they were going to confront it. She had tried to fight it before, and lost. Binding it, though no easy task, could possibly be easier than trying to destroy it, at least for those of the spiritualist bent. But it had been bound before, Penny said, and if she thought that she could do it again, then she probably could. From what he could see, she didn't have a lot of pure strength behind her power, but she knew how to use it. But where was the demon now? He tried to figure that out for himself rather than asking again. The shadows suddenly looked a lot more threatening with the realization that a demon could be hiding in one of them. If it had been hiding among the dead, then perhaps it wasn't looking for a confrontation just now. Maybe if this was its haunt, then maybe it would just show up, angered that they were intruding on its territory. That wasn't a pleasant idea. "I did some research on the initial binding done on the demon," Penny explained as she went about her preparations. "I've improved upon the original design. It should work the way it was meant to, now." He watched quietly as she pulled out a bag of salt from a pocket in her jacket and sprinkled it in a circle, muttering as she went. That would be for the warding and binding. But how would they get the demon into the circle to begin with? If there was going to be a fight, he would have appreciated a little advanced warning. And maybe Wufei to back him up. The motions she went through reminded him of something. He was familiar with the general way she was drawing in the air with her power. It was almost the path he was accustomed to following when he summoned an elemental, only this had a few foreign shadings to it. The tints weren't something he had personally dealt with, but from hints and process of elimination, he thought it was 'demon'. "We're going to summon it?" he asked incredulously. "How else are we going to get it here?" He shrugged helplessly. "I don't know. I thought it would already be here. We came here for a reason, after all." "And it is here, Quatre. It just isn't where we want it yet." ************ Fortunately, the sword decided to be a little more helpful and eventually led them before a set of forbidding looking stone walls. It would have looked like the fortifications of a prison, if not for the light stonework of angels and other religious figures smiling beneficently down from their friezes. He supposed the walls were supposed to give privacy to those inside. He could appreciate that, just as he had appreciated the privacy his family had received only a couple of days ago. "Great, a cemetery," Meiran muttered to herself. "It's always a cemetery, isn't it?" "What always is?" "Ugly, scary things at night. Nothing good ever comes out of a cemetery, I'm telling you." "Nothing comes out of a cemetery," Wufei replied mildly. "They only go in." "Do you have to say things like that when we're right about to go in?" His lips quirked up briefly in something a little less than a smile as he turned to find a way in. The main gate was closed to visitors at night, and the walls discouraged hooligans from trying to climb over. There was a small gate next to the main entrance that looked like it would allow foot traffic for late visitors. It wasn't latched completely shut. Meiran glared suspiciously at it before nudging it open with a knuckle. It swung wide without complaint. "After you," she said graciously to her companion. Wufei grunted and entered first. She followed shortly, pushing the gate back to an almost-shut position behind her. Nothing out of the ordinary made itself immediately apparent. Wufei looked around, trying to get a sense of where within these walls the disturbance was coming from, but there was too much interference from their surroundings. "Meiran. Can you tell where we need to be?" She blinked, startled that he had actually requested her assistance. Rather than make an issue of it, however, she turned her attention to the matter at hand. She could see why the energies bouncing around in here could obfuscate the issue for Wufei, but she settled down to sort it out. Eventually, she produced an answer, and pointed in proper direction. "Over there." He nodded, and headed off in that direction, Meiran trailing him and feeling gratified that he hadn't questioned her. Once in a while, she murmured some course corrections, but after a short time it became unnecessary. A clear signal went up as something got started that stopped them both in their tracks. "Is that...?" Meiran asked tentatively. "Someone summoning a demon? Fools," Wufei spat impatiently, and together they picked up their pace. ************ Wait a minute, Quatre thought. What was going to happen after they bound the creature? They couldn't very well leave it in the middle of the cemetery for the groundskeepers to find the next morning. Perhaps he should have questioned his mentor for more information before coming out here, but he had assumed that she would tell him what he needed to know before it became necessary to know it. He tried to put away his worries and just trust her, but it was hard in coming. Perhaps after the initial binding, they would lock the demon away into something else, a vessel of sorts. It would have to be something that Penny had brought with her, however, and she hadn't come carrying anything extraordinary. Her knife, perhaps? But she used that knife, and wouldn't be able to anymore if there were a demon locked away in it. Well, more accurately, he supposed, she could, but why would she want to? It would be dangerous and foolhardy, and probably wouldn't make the creature very cooperative either. And why would anyone want a demon in their pocket anyway? So what else was there that was strong enough for the task? "Here." Penny shoved a silver necklace in his direction. "Put this on." He took it reflexively and examined it. "What's this for?" It looked something like a celtic knot -- all loops and no beginning or end -- and it thrummed with power. "It will protect you from the demon." He slipped it over his head with only a moment's hesitation. She directed him where to stand and told him firmly to stay there. "You said you would help me with this." Quatre nodded. "Of course. You don't have to ask twice." "Then I may need to borrow some of your power. Can you leave yourself open to me?" "Uh, yeah, sure." The thought of doing that made him a little nervous, especially since a demon was going to be coming onto the scene soon. But he knew now how to prevent others from intruding on him when he didn't want them there, so he felt reasonably confident that nothing was going to happen. And it explained why Penny had allowed him to come as well. Would she have gotten herself hurt trying to do it herself if Quatre hadn't volunteered? He was glad he came. The summoning really happened faster than Quatre had expected it to, but if it had already been lurking in the area, then perhaps it wasn't too surprising, although he had to wonder why it hadn't attacked them yet. Power was sucked out of him as the binding circle went up with enough speed to give him the feeling of a bloodrush, but through it he could see and sense the sudden appearance of a wraith-like creature within the circle, and it grew more substantial with each passing moment. It cried its rage to the skies above, lashed out against the ring of power around it, but was repelled. It was held successfully; now it needed to be tied to something. "Quit your whining, demon," Penny hissed at it, fighting its attempts at resistance. She was holding her knife out in front of her with one hand on the hilt, one hand along the flat of the blade. The inscriptions on the metal glowed faintly with power. "You belong to me, now." Quatre blinked. Wait a minute. That wasn't supposed to happen. "Penny? What are you talking about?" She ignored him in her struggle against the creature's will. He tried again. "Why aren't you finishing this?" She flexed their combined power, and the runes on the blade flared, the creature howling in counterpoint. It appeared that, despite Quatre's earlier reasoning, she was indeed attempting to bind it somehow to her long knife. "Quatre!" He turned. "What are you doing?" Funny. He had been just about to ask them that very same question. Wufei grabbed him by the arm and pulled him back, his sword drawn in his other hand. He was quickly passed off to Meiran's competent hands and Wufei took up a defensive stance between them and the demon with its summoner. "What's going on here?" He directed the question both to Quatre and the woman. "Friends of yours?" Penny gritted out, her concentration still on maintaining the demon. It would belong to her. She used her knife as a power boost. It would be in the knife. People once derived power from its imprisonment. There was an unpleasant pattern emerging here. "Penny, tell me you're going to finish this. Tell me you're not going to keep it for yourself!" "Tough luck, kid. Can't do that." "But-- But you're supposed to help put a stop to this sort of thing, not be a part of it!" She spared a bit of her attention to glance his way. "I *am* helping to put a stop to this. I'm putting this thing away where no one will ever abuse its power again." "And you, Penny?" he shouted at her, pulling out of Meiran's grasp to approach her, but Wufei kept him back. "You're just going to put it away and never look at it again?" "Of course not, Quatre. Don't be silly." "Then you're going to use it, just like the bad guys." "It's not all just 'good guys' and 'bad guys', Quatre. But whatever you're fighting against, you need power to do it. If I'm going to be putting this thing away, I see no reason to waste its power. Isn't it even better if I can turn its power towards our side instead of theirs?" Wufei cut in at this point. "Thinking like that will inevitably lead down the path of destruction. Either release the demon, or destroy it. Otherwise, I will be forced to take steps." "What the hell are you people?" she asked, outrage beginning to gather. "Some sort of supernatural conscience patrol? I *need* this power." "You will lose to it," Wufei answered coolly. "And I cannot let that happen." "I will *not* lose to it! I'm stronger than he was!" Before they had time to ponder to whom she referred, she struck out with her power, creating another binding field that sprang to vivid life around the two Chinese teens and kept them caged. "Wufei! Meiran!" Quatre cried out, unable to help them. The bindings had been formed of Penny's own energies, and she consequently borrowed more of Quatre's to keep the creature penned. It made him lightheaded again. ************ ::Tell me I don't see that. Tell me I'm imagining this, Heero.:: ::No such luck.:: ::Sigh. How do these things happen?:: Shrug. ::Any supernatural event in this city is likely to involve at least one of this set of people, and where one goes, others follow.:: ::Is that Trowa hiding behind a tombstone?:: ::Seems like it.:: ::Great. The whole gang, together again.:: ************ Wufei slashed at the bindings with his sword, but it passed harmlessly through it. He cursed. "Stop her, Quatre!" he shouted at the boy, unable to do anything more at the moment. Meiran took a moment to study the field, then reached out a hand tentatively to touch it. "Ow!" she squeaked as it bit her fingers. Nevertheless, she had gotten a better sense of it when she had come into contact with it. She formulated a plan, and thrust her hand back into the glowing power again, gritting her teeth against the pain. "What are you doing!?" Wufei screeched at her. She shrugged his hand off, concentrating instead on the energy field. "It's giving, Wufei. If I can just--" She gasped at the sensation of the barrier yielding just a little bit more. "If I can just manage to keep pushing...." Wufei's impulse was to pull her away from the barrier and slap her silly, but he restrained himself, noticing that she seemed to be making progress. The energies around her hand glowed a bright ruby in the middle of the lavender field. The sword in his hand pulsed a sharp emerald. Sometimes Wufei wondered just what sort of power resided in the sword, because he got the distinct impression that it was irritated by the barrier. He absorbed that feeling, and got an idea. He grabbed Meiran's free hand with his own and placed them upon the pommel of the sword, resting the blade's tip against the ground. The gem set in the pommel flared again, and it was as if a circuit was completed as the sword took it upon itself to siphon away the painful energies that were running through Meiran's body. A sharp intake of breath at the sudden relief was the only audible indication she gave of the assistance. The rest of her was concentrating on pushing harder. ************ Penny spun more energy out of Quatre as she attempted to draw the creature's essence into the blade itself. The runes on the blade glowed incandescently as it attempted to absorb the power. Quatre tried to shut off the flow of power between them, but it wouldn't close down despite his efforts. He shook his head to clear it and refocused on the woman before him. He was fairly certain that it was too late to talk Penny out of the error of her ways, so he tried another tack. "Why are you doing this, Penny? Who do you have to be stronger than?" "Stupid," she muttered under her breath. It was more as if she were talking to herself rather than answering Quatre's question. "Fell prey to these vile things. But I'll do it right, you'll see, and then I'll have the power to stop them from ever harming anyone else again, just like I said." "This really isn't the way, Penny," he tried, buying himself some time to think. "Like you said, people have tried this before. The story only ends with their destruction." Tackling the woman was out of the question, because with her out of the picture, there wouldn't be much left holding the bindings on the demon, and he really didn't want to fight that demon unless there was no other option. Demon-fighting was a Wufei thing, but he was being held, and those wards would not go down with Penny. He tried one last time to keep her from accessing his power, but once again, was denied by some force he couldn't find the source of. With a final triumphant cry, there was a bright flash of light and the binding circle on the demon went down, for there was nothing left for it to ward within its confines. Some of the power that Penny had borrowed from Quatre came rushing back into him, sending him reeling once more. When his vision cleared, Penny's knife was pulsing with a cyan glow that he averted his eyes from. He felt the rest of his power had gotten sucked up into the wards still responsible for binding the demon's essence in its new home. Off to the side, there was a flash of lavender as the wards holding Wufei and Meiran finally collapsed, and they stumbled through them. It was a little late, however. Penny had control over the demon's power, and with a grim smile she tossed a ball of pure power at them. Wufei managed to dodge it, pulling Meiran with him by their still connected hands. "Sorry, kids. Finder's keepers, you know." "I wouldn't quite say you found this guy." She spun towards the sound of a new voice, and saw two figures separate themselves from the shadows. "You know, I'm not as into the whole morals thing as the rest of these guys are, but I'm afraid that doesn't mean I can just let your actions go, either." Penny gasped in recognition. "You're one of *them*," she whispered harshly, prompting a raised eyebrow from Duo. "This has nothing to do with you. But since you're here--" She reached out to the new power within her again, only to encounter resistance. "Wha--? Quatre, what are you doing?" The boy had a weak smile on his face as he put some distance between them. "You forget, Penny. This isn't just your power you've tied up into this whole mess." His power was in there, too, still helping to contain the demon's energy under her direction. If he couldn't remove his power, then all he could do was throw a little more of his own power into the mix and tighten the wards even more, making it more difficult for Penny to access it. While he couldn't dispel the wards altogether, he decided that he had better make the best of a bad situation and at least prevent Penny from using it against his friends as well as he could. "Quatre, stop arguing with me. Your two friends over there--" she jerked her chin in the direction of the boy with the sword and his companion, "--I'll let go. But these guys," she indicated the newcomers. "These guys die." "I don't think so," Quatre replied with as much calm as he could muster. "They're the bad guys, Quatre," she yelled at him, keeping a wary eye on the two mostly Shinma. So far, they were just standing there. "They feed on humans! Isn't that what you wanted to do with your power? Get rid of the bad guys?" "Like you said, Penny. There aren't always clear-cut good guys and bad guys. These guys aren't bad guys." He looked up after that, startled to find Trowa's hand on his elbow, steadying him and leading him back a few more steps. Now when had he showed up? Oh, never mind. There were more important things to deal with right now. He turned his attention back to the woman in front of him. "Where do you people keep coming from?" she demanded exasperatedly. Then she took a closer look at Trowa, or more specifically, his aura, and her eyes widened again. "He's touched." Her eyes darted back to the shadowclad two. "And you, Quatre? Do those things have their hooks into your soul as well?" He shook his head. "I could ask the same of you as well, Penny. Especially considering what you now have inside of you. Are you sure it's not affecting your judgment?" ************ They calmly surveyed the drama unfolding before them. ::Hn. Who knew spiritualists could do this sort of thing.:: ::It's just a variation on a binding,:: Heero pointed out. ::And a sort of crude version of what Dr. J used to do to acquire the essences of supernatural creatures. It's allowing her to use power that isn't hers. As I've always said, creative use of power will--:: ::--allow one to accomplish almost anything. Yeah, I know. Just our luck the creative one had to be a bad one, too. Well, no. She's not completely bad. Just misguided. Luckily, Quatre's a hell of a talker. I didn't like the looks of that power she was tossing around.:: ::I take it that means we are to try to avoid killing her?:: ::Bloodthirsty, aren't we?:: Duo smirked. ::But yeah, probably. She's not trying to hurt anyone right now. Well, besides us, but what else is new? Anyway, the guys probably wouldn't like that.:: ::Even less than you would, no doubt. Despite your claims to the contrary, you do hold to your own set of morals.:: ::If we can get that demon's power out of the picture, we should be able to take care of her pretty easily. I feel kinda bad for that thing, being tossed around and used like that. It's not gonna be happy when it gets out, is it?:: ::Probably not. Is your power cooperating yet?:: He tested himself. ::Not really. But hey, on the plus side, I can stand on my own two feet!:: ::Hn. That is very little to be proud of.:: ::Hey, given my last day or two, I'll take what I can get.:: ::I'll cover for you.:: ::Don't try too hard. If they find out, they find out. No big deal.:: ************ "No, Quatre," Penny asserted, wresting a good amount of control back from him. "You're the one who's wrong here. I don't know what sort of false impressions you're under, but I'll put a stop to them." An unnatural wind stirred the dry leaves on the ground into a rustling dance, and with an oddly gentle whooshing sound, the air attacked the two least human of them all. They were able to dodge easily. Nevertheless, Duo looked down and saw that the bottom corner of the front panel of his long tunic had been torn by the attack. He held it out. ::Fix that for me, would you, Heero?:: ::Isn't that rather inconsequential, Duo?:: he asked, fixing it anyway. If that was what the guardian would do, then that was what he would do, for now. ::Image, my dear. It's all about image. Besides, what if she had nicked my braid or something? I wouldn't let her get away with something like that!:: He painted a small smirk on his face. "Now why do I get the feeling that we aren't welcome here?" ::Is mocking her also part of the image?:: ::Yes. Now hush.:: Penny's eyes narrowed. "Are you mocking me, demonspawn?" "Now, demonspawn is really a rather inaccurate appellation." She responded with a paper ward thrown swiftly through the air. It ignited with blue flame as it flew towards them, but the coldfire was put out with a thought from Heero, and Duo managed to scrape together enough fire of his own to turn the ward to ashes before it closed on them. "Penny, stop this." Quatre leapt back into the fray, taking a few steps back towards her. "Take a good look at yourself. Yes, you have power now, but at what cost? You thought you could control it, but you were wrong." Penny sighed impatiently and turned to face him. "I'm still in control. The cost to myself is negligible, Quatre, so long as I put an end to these 'bad guys' of yours. I would think that you, with all of your high-minded ideas, would appreciate that." "Well, maybe I can't argue with nobility, but I would ask you how close are you getting to being one of the 'bad guys' yourself? He looked her directly in the eyes, eyes that had gone from hazel to pitch black. "There are other ways of defeating them, ways that don't involve--" "It doesn't matter!" she grated at him, the power flaring darkly around her. She flung out an arm at him, the one still holding her knife, and he was hit by some force that rippled through the air and shoved him back, where he stumbled messily into Trowa, standing next to Wufei and Meiran. "Give it up," Wufei hissed in his ear, grabbing him by the arms and hauling him upright. "It's too late for her." When Quatre looked like he was about to protest, Wufei cut him off. "Look at her. It's just as you said. The power has consumed her, claimed her for its own. She is beyond reason now." Duo smiled again in that utterly innocent, irritating way as she turned her attention back to them. ::Do you suppose it would help if we just left?:: ::No. She would find other targets soon enough.:: ::Well, at least we can buy some time for the others to figure something out. Shall we try some harmless offense?:: Heero responded with what they had tried once before against another opponent, a cage of shadows leaping up from the darkness pooling at the woman's feet to ensnare her, but as happened before, the shadows slid off of her with a mere flexing of her power. ::Demon and spiritualist power together are a strong combination,:: he remarked. ::Perhaps a more direct approach?:: He pulled his scythe from the shadows and sprang forth to do battle. ::Hey, whatever happened to non-lethal?:: Duo reminded him, taking advantage of the distraction to check in with the others. Wufei quickly jogged over to him, dragging Quatre along with him. "Why aren't you doing anything?" he demanded. Trowa and Meiran soon followed. Duo put his hands up placatingly. "Hey, you might recall that you were pleased to hear that I can't do much against humans or spiritualists, remember? Only physical stuff, which will probably get her hurt." "Don't hurt her," Quatre said immediately. "That's what I said. This one's yours." Wufei frowned at the guardian's response and looked over to where the combatants were dancing between the tombstones. Heero wasn't fighting to kill. He might have joined the battle right away, had Duo not spoken his next words. "Quatre. Where did you get that necklace?" "Necklace?" Quatre blinked, then remembered the piece of jewelry that Penny had handed him before this whole thing began. He touched it with his fingers, and it was warm, and sent a jolt of revelation through him. "Shoot! Necklace!" His hand closed around it and he quickly tore it off, throwing it to the ground. As he thought, he tested his power and it came flying back to him, the channel between him and Penny no longer stuck in an open position. "Um, Quatre--" Duo started, but it was drowned out by the screech that came forth from the woman's lips. Heero leapt away from her as the basis for the bindings on the demon's power unraveled without Quatre's power to hold it in place. "Great." The knife flared again, and the pale blue light surged outwards to encompass her whole body. Her back arched rather painfully as the light invaded her flesh, the blade dropping from her limp fingers. Dr. J had made a life's study of the power extraction process before he became quite the expert on the matter -- Penny had no such experience. At least the scientist had had innocent test subjects to experiment on; Penny was finding out first-hand that the power of the demon still retained some of its demonic will, and now that it was deprived of its own flesh on this plane, it desired another vessel. She screamed as it poured through her and merged them into one. ::Did I sound that bad when I was being remade, Heero?:: ::Well. No. You were too far gone to scream by then.:: ::Huh. Lucky me, I guess.:: He looked mildly at Quatre's horrified face. "Well. Now it's really too late for her." Meiran whapped him on the arm. "Duo!" she reprimanded in a whisper, sounding positively scandalized. He glanced unrepentantly back at her as the spiritualist stilled, then straightened. Her short hair stood on end, floating in its own cloud of static electricity generated by the power that rolled off of her. Her fingers seemed to be longer, thinner, sharper than before. Where before only her irises had turned black, now those ebony pools had engulfed all signs of white in her eyes. "Nice try, Quatre," she rasped. "But as you can see, I got all the power I wanted in the end." ::Now can I use lethal force?:: Heero asked. ::You can take her, right?:: Confirmation. ::Then let's follow their lead for now.:: Wufei stepped forth to the front of the crowd of teens, his sword, as always, at the ready. "Are you still going to try to reform her, Quatre?" he shot over his shoulder. He shook his head. "This can't be what she wanted," he murmured to himself. Wufei took that as enough permission to engage her. "You may have power now, woman, but you are still weak," he declared, and then he rushed her. She knocked aside his first blow with a flip of her hand, but Wufei fought on undeterred. Quatre, in the meantime, was muttering to himself. "This is too much. I can't believe this. I thought she was one of the good guys. I trusted her. And she used me! I walked right into this one with my eyes wide open. I can't believe this. That's it! I am never trusting another human being again." Meiran, never one to shy away from knocking sense into people, grabbed him by the arm and shook him. "Why the hell are you just standing here mumbling? Wufei's out there risking his ass trying to deal with her, and you're not doing a thing! So get out there and redeem your sorry self!" She pushed him towards the fight. "Huh?" Meiran's short tirade was certainly enough to throw him out of his stunned loop. "Oh!" His eyes focused on the fight, and when he saw Wufei's rhythm being thrown off by the headstones, he hustled towards them. ************ ::I'm following his lead here,:: Heero sent to his partner, scrutinizing Wufei's actions with a critical eye. He watched as the boy angled his swing to avoid wounding the woman deeply. ::But he's holding back.:: ::He doesn't want to kill her.:: ::She's trying to kill him.:: He almost made a sound of disgust as he was forced to not take advantage of an opening. ::Doesn't that make her his enemy?:: ::Perhaps. He knows this. He said as much earlier. But his heart and his mind don't always make it a habit of working in unison. I doubt he even realizes-- Heero--:: ::Got it,:: he answered, deflecting with his scythe a swipe of her powerfully charged fingers that could have injured the boy as he hesitated. ::We can't just keep doing this all night. Someone has to do lose. I would prefer it to be her.:: ************ The pale lightning that flew forth from Penny's fingers was blocked by an exertion of will on Quatre's part. If there was one thing he, as a spiritualist, was good at, it was shielding. It gave him a grim satisfaction that he could apply what he had learned from her, against her. Her head slowly turned in his direction, and he readied himself, but then she laughed. It was a short, ugly thing. "Very well. I said I would leave this one alone. My quarrel is with these others." Duo knew a threat when he heard it, and he hastily made his way towards Heero and away from Meiran and Trowa. He was prepared when she threw the lightning his way, managing to summon the power to block it himself even without Heero's additional help. She next put together a wall of air that forced him up against one of the headstones and threatened to crush him there until Heero hurled a black shard of the darkness at her and her concentration broke as it cut her in the shoulder. Duo fell to his knees, his back complaining from where it impacted the edge of the stone. It probably looked worse than it actually was, though, and he almost laughed when Quatre stepped between him and the rampaging spiritualist. ::Sweet kid, ain't he? Think she'll burn out?:: ::Maybe. Difficult to tell, with the mixing of energies.:: "Why are you helping them?" Penny demanded of Quatre. "Why can't you see how wrong this is?" he answered evenly. "You don't even know them. They're not--" "Know them? Why would I need to know them? Their kind is evil, Quatre, and they must be destroyed." "You don't even know what kind they are!" They faced off silently for a moment. "Get out of my way, Quatre." She backed up the statement with a shot of flame, but it stopped short of hitting him and spilled harmlessly around his shield. Through the flames flew a ward, and it hit her squarely on the forehead, but failed to stick. She was protected against it by what was left of her own spiritualist magic. "If you're not my ally, Quatre," she said in a low tone. "You're my enemy. You all are." She turned towards her previous opponent, Wufei, and arrows of fire were thrown at him. He knocked them aside with his sword. Her next target was Quatre. His shield was still up, but she knew the spiritualist's power inside and out and knew how to get through it. He might have gotten toasted if Heero hadn't thrown up a second barrier behind the first to protect him. It was close, though, and Quatre got knocked back and stunned against yet another in the endless row of headstones. Perceiving Heero to be a problem, she surrounded him in a tall circle of flames that blocked him out for long enough for her to turn to the others. She regarded Duo curiously. "You're not really as powerful as you seem, are you?" Damn. It was only inevitable that she notice Heero was doing most of the work. She laughed, and her hand reached out towards the last two, her eyes never leaving his as if daring him to do something. Duo realized that Heero wasn't going to break out of his trap quickly enough, Meiran and Trowa were pretty vulnerable, and Wufei was too far away. In the race between himself and the twisted spiritualist, time seemed to move in slow motion for him as he watched her raise her hands again while he frantically pleaded with his power to just cooperate with him. 'Come on, dammit!' he screamed at it. The sphere was growing in the palm of her hand, and Meiran and Trowa were preparing to jump out of its way, but that wouldn't help them. 'What the hell do you have against me? You're mine, do you hear me? Mine! So work, dammit, WORK!' And it was suddenly as if it decided that he was worthy of its power again, and it answered his call. 'Yes!' he cried, and as the sphere was released from the woman's hand, his own translucent ball of flame intercepted it and swallowed it whole before it hit the two defenseless teens that were jumping to the side anyway. He chuckled darkly, watching them roll to their feet unharmed. Meiran gathered herself and ran to Wufei's side; Trowa took off in the other direction. "Try me now," he challenged her, the thrill of having the power running through him again making him brash. The flames surrounding his partner vanished. ::Back in business, I see.:: Heero remarked mildly, blinking out and reappearing by his side. ::You better believe it, baby.:: Duo flexed his power, trying to get his groove back, and reveled in the joy of it sliding over his skin. "Hmpf," Penny responded to the challenge. "I believe I will." Dark energy sparkles were gathering around her, and as they prepared themselves to meet the final strike, the black glimmering vanished with something of a poof, and she looked down in surprise at the tip of the knife protruding from her belly. She stumbled forward a few steps, revealing Trowa behind her, his face as expressionless as ever as he backed away. The energy around her dissipated and returned her look to mostly normal, before the blade flashed, its inscriptions running red with the lifeblood of its master. ::Ow. That's gonna hurt.:: Indeed, Duo's assessment proved itself correct as the power that had been kept within the focus was released into her. There was power in the crimson bathing the metal, and it bled back out of her and into the blade and was let loose once more within her in a terrible loop that was too much for the human body to bear, and it burst into an otherworldly flame too bright to look at with mortal eyes. When the glow faded along with the echoes of her strangled cries, there was nothing left of her but ashes. There was a long silence as everyone caught their breath. "She's dead," Quatre whispered. Duo raised an eyebrow at him, and tried to be gentle as he welcomed Quatre to the real world. "How else did you think this was going to end? She wasn't about to just admit she was wrong, shake hands with us, and then leave us alone." He listened numbly to the guardian's words before turning to another of his companions. "You killed her." He looked at Trowa with uncomprehending eyes. Trowa met his gaze steadily, obviously standing by his decision. Not that he had really expected her to spontaneously combust like that. Nevertheless, she had been a threat to them all, and the answer had been clear to him. That was Duo's gift to him. "She was trying to kill us, Quatre," Wufei pointed out. "All of us. She gave herself over to dark powers, and betrayed us." "But... she...." He shook his head in frustration. "She was... was being controlled, or something, right? I mean, maybe, maybe she was... I don't know! Maybe a Shinma was telling her to do those things, or...." Duo looked at him with no sympathy. "There are no cheap excuses here, Quatre. You can't blame this on any Shinma, or demon, or anything. Just humanity, plain and simple. The root of all evil lies not with the supernatural. It's thinking like that that leads to situations like these." "I know that," he answered helplessly. He looked imploringly at Wufei, thinking that perhaps the demon hunter would have some different insight into the matter. Wufei refused to meet his gaze. Not too long ago, he, too, had seen the supernatural in such monochromatic light. Wufei had corrected his ways before something terrible had happened, but he had had a glimpse of the possibilities this night. How far might he have gone, how far might he yet go, to obtain the power he needed to defeat his enemy? It was a noble cause. But from there, how far was he really from his cousin, who also had sold his soul and his family for power? And even without the issue of power, there were more questions without answers. He stated so confidently to Quatre that Penny was one of the enemy, that she had sold them out, yet would he really have killed her? She had been a threat, and needed to be neutralized, that much was indisputable. But she was human. However, if she performed the same deeds that despicable non-humans did, why should he kill one without second thoughts and not the other? What was the difference? Or was it all the difference in the world? And was he less of a human being for feeling relieved that she had gotten herself killed through her own devices and not forced the deed upon him? Quatre met the loss of Wufei's support uneasily. Although Wufei had been firmly advocating the woman's defeat, it had seemed to Quatre that the driven boy would have had something to say about the evils of supernatural influence upon mankind, although whether that would have worked to Quatre's advantage or not would remain unseen. "But... she..." He made one last crack at her defense, not really knowing why he was. He could see why things had ended the way they had, but that didn't mean that he had to like it. Everyone had valid points, of course, and Duo was quite right. It was unrealistic to believe that everyone could have walked off that battlefield unscathed. Nevertheless, he felt as if Penny's humanity, her underlying goodness, was being overlooked. Her cause had not been malicious. On the other hand, wasn't it her very humanity that was, at this point, darkening her behavior past forgiveness? Yes, she had every right to live as a human being, but she also had the right to make her own decisions, and somewhere along the way, she had chosen unwisely. "She was just trying to..." "The road to hell is paved with good intentions," Duo quoted dryly. ::I know you just got control over your power back, but aren't you supposed to be more sympathetic or something right now?:: Oh, yes. Control over his power. The power that was deciding that after so long without being exercised, it was tired and was going to take a nap for the night. Oh crap. His knees weakened, and Heero caught him before he fell. Luckily, everyone was focusing on Quatre right now. "She's right, you know. Where *do* you people all keep coming from, anyway?" Everyone blinked. It seemed as if Quatre was getting over the shock, at least for now. No doubt he'd be dwelling on the situation for weeks on end, trying to figure out if he could have done something differently. Hopefully, he would come to the right conclusion, and let it go. Penny, for whatever her reasons, and despite her intentions, had followed the wrong path, and paid the price. "We sensed something suspicious in the wind this afternoon, and decided to check it out," Meiran offered tentatively. "Uh, same here," Duo echoed, deciding that Quatre didn't really need to know that Trowa had fairly demanded that he check up on him. Quatre looked at the remaining friend. Trowa shrugged. Duo smiled wearily. "I guess in retrospect, six against one was kinda unfair, huh?" Trowa surprised them all by laughing. ----- uh, yeah. i keep thinking that there should be an epilogue of some sort for this, or even a better ending, something deeper and philosophical and touching, but oh well. do let me know if you find this unsatisfactory, but really. penny's dead. q's going to go home and agonize about it for a while. that's it. no one else really has a problem with it. i do think it would be rather amusing if they all stole penny's car for a ride home, though, since it's parked outside the cemetery and all. =) thanks for sticking around. that's it for the tv series. hopefully, i'll see you all for the movie, coming sometime to a website near me! _________________________________________ This piece of fiction is the intellectual property of the little turnip that could. The basis for this fic, i.e. Gundam Wing, Kyuuketsuki Miyu, et al., is the property of someone else. The author can be con- tacted at jchew@myrealbox.com. This has been an entirely automated message. http://www.cs.hmc.edu/~jchew/misc/gw.html last modified : 6/5/2002 00:54:14 PST