Alliance's Untitled Story - Indefinitely Suspended

[AllianceSJR]

Chapter One

"Damnit!"

Allison looked up from her computer to see her roommate enter the apartment, slamming the door behind her. She raised an intrigued eyebrow at the outburst. "Problem, Mory?" she asked.

Moryera glowered at her flame-haired friend. She blew an auburn lock of hair from her face and crossed her arms huffily. "I'm going to kill that girl," she replied. "I'm going to kill her, and revive her, and kill her again." She stormed over to the couch and plopped herself down on it.

Allison turned in her chair to face her. "Lunch didn't go so well?"

"Hah!" was her reply. Mory grabbed a pillow and lay down on the couch she was sitting on. "Oh, lunch was fine, Ally. Lunch was absolutely fabulous." She reached under the couch and pulled out a honey bottle. Allison promptly got up from her chair and grabbed the bear from her. "Hey--!"

"Stop leaving these around the place," Allison responded, placing the bottle on the table. "What do you do, sleep with these?"

"I'll have you know I bought that one with my own money and can therefore do what I will with it," Mory snapped, grabbing back the bottle.

The brown-haired girl calmed down. "Lunch with Kyraa was fine," she said. "Up until the point where she started badgering me again. 'When are you going to get a boyfriend, Mory?' 'Did you get a boyfriend yet, Mory?' 'How about Weston? He's cute.' " She made a disgusted face. "And when I got fed up with it, she pulled out the big guns."

Allison sat down next to her. "She didn't set you up on another blind date, did she?"

Mory nodded. "Yeah. I'm supposed to meet him tonight, at Le Petit Fou. I think that's downtown a bit."

"The Little Idiot?"

"Hey, don't ask me. She says it's her favorite restaurant. Probably because of the name." Mory giggled. "It's no better than you hanging around that cybercafe all the time."

Allison raised her hand defiantly. "Hey, the 'Ware House is a perfectly reasonable place to hang out. A lot of my friends are always there, and I know the owner." She winked. "Besides, I'm in training to become a cage fighter."

Mory burst out laughing. "Yeah, whatever, Napoleon."

She turned on the TV, only to be assaulted by news reports on nearly every channel.

In the other room, the phone rang. "I'll get it!" Mory cried as she bounced off to answer it. "Hello? Oh, hi, Mom. Yes, we're doing fine. I'll tell her you said hi. Ally, Mom says hi."

"Hi, Mrs. Thorne!"

"She says hi. Yes, I'm eating fine, we have enough money. Yeah, Weston's doing good, he just got a new job."

Mory blushed furiously at something her mother must have said. "Mother!"

Allison giggled, and turned her attention back on the television. There had been another bombing downtown. Or at least, the police said it was a bombing. But the reporters were baffled by this statement, as the wreckage looked more as if the buildings were torn apart rather than blown apart.

"It's starting," she mumbled.

"What was that?" asked Mory, coming back into the room.

"Oh," Allison replied. "Nothing. Just commenting on the bombings downtown. That last one wasn't too far from that Idiot restaurant you're going to tonight."

"Good, maybe they'll target me this time and put me out of my blind date misery."

That's exactly what I'm afraid of, Allison thought.

* * *

In the darkness of a faraway cave, in the forest close to the city, two hapless campers were having trouble building a fire. Every time they managed to start one, it would die out within seconds.

"Give me the matches," said one of the campers.

"No, I can do it," replied the other camper. "You didn't want to."

"You're not making it right. You tried five times already."

Continuing their bickering, the campers didn't notice a darkness creeping up on them until it had completely surrounded them, choking them with a shadowy mist. They fell to the ground, struggling to breathe, until their motions ceased. Something appeared out of the darkness, and dragged them down slowly deeper into the cave.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Chapter Two

Moryera stepped out of the apartment complex and started walking. She didn't know quite where she was headed; all she knew was that she wanted some time to herself before the whole "blind date" ordeal she was suckered into.

She let out a rueful chuckle. Oh, was she suckered into it.

* * *

"Well, what about Weston?" Kyraa had asked. "He's cute."

"Cute, yes," Mory replied. "But he never really noticed me before. Sure, he always makes time to talk to me, and he's always checking up on how I'm doing, but he's just a friendly person......what are you looking at me like that for?"

Kyraa had rolled her eyes at that. "Nothing, nothing. Well, regardless of how Weston might feel about you, I've been having a...problem...of sorts that maybe you could help take off my hands."

"What kind of 'problem'?" Mory asked, warily. She was familiar with her friend's difficulties with would-be suitors, and Kyraa amused herself by foisting them off on her female friends.

Sure enough, such was the case then. "Well, there's a guy that's been bugging me..."

"Hold it," Mory interrupted. "Why do you do this? Can't you just tell these guys that you're already involved? That should turn most of them away, and you won't be bothered by this. And then you won't have to annoy your friends with it."

"Sweetie," Kyraa responded, with an evil glint in her eye. "These are just the guys that aren't turned away by that."

Mory was stunned. "Wait, so you mean that you then shove them towards us so that we could totally destroy them?"

"Serves them right for coming on to a happily attached girl."

"Honey," Mory said, smiling devilishly, "you are one diabolical woman."

They clinked their glasses together, laughing.

Kyraa smiled. "So does this mean you'll help me?"

"Not on your life."

Kyraa's face fell. "But I thought you..."

"Oh, I agree that guys like that should be tortured horribly," Mory replied. "But I want nothing to do with it. Just because I know the reasons for it now doesn't mean my answer will change from the last few times you tried to get me to do this. Go ask Ally or Danti."

"I would," Kyraa said, sheepishly, "but Danti refuses to do it, and the last guy I shoved off on Ally left the restaurant crying."

Mory choked on the tea she was drinking. "Really? I knew she enjoyed the date, but I didn't know it was because she was tormenting the guy."

"Oh, Allison is fairly vengeful when she wants to be. She doesn't let her inner b***h out as often as she should, so those rare occasions are ones to treasure. I just wish I was there to watch her do it."

"I hear that."

Kyraa finished her pasta. "The fact of the matter, Mory, is that you need to get out more." She held up a hand to forestall the familiar denial. "Why not take this opportunity to just relax and have fun?"

"Well....."

"Besides," the redhead finished, "he already has reservations at an expensive French bistro. And he's paying for the whole thing."

There it was, then. Her trump card. Mory knew that her friend had planned on the conversation turning out this way, leaving the petite brunette royally flushed.

"I hate you, you know."

"I know you do, lovie," Kyraa said, beaming. "Just wait until after the date before you take your revenge."

* * *

Mory shook her head. It really was amazing how well her friends knew her. Well enough to know exactly which buttons to push, no matter the situation.

She was so lost in her recollection of earlier that day that she wasn't quite noticing where she was walking. She forced herself out of her reverie and noticed she was walking past the coffee shop she liked. She turned back and looked inside. There, setting up some band equipment, was a familiar face.

"Hey, Weston!" she cried as she entered the coffee shop.

Weston looked up at the sound of her voice, and smiled. His beard was a bit shaggier than she remembered, and she noticed how his fingers disappeared into his hair as he ran them through it. "Mory!" he exclaimed. "You're just in time to help me set up."

Mory went over to the small stage, and picked up a guitar. "I knew you were learning how to play, but I didn't know you were in a band."

"Nah, it's nothing big," he said. "Just me and three other guys. We just started, and figured we'd do some PR." He looked around. "I haven't seen DV or Gendou around, though."

Mory thought for a second. She knew DV, of course, but she had never heard the other name before. "Who's Gendou?"

"You wouldn't know him," he answered. "He just came into town recently. Keeps to himself a lot. He doesn't talk much, but man can he shred some mean riffs."

He finished setting up the drums near the back of the stage, and waved to a tall man on the other side of the room. "You're all good, man!" he called. The man nodded, and turned back to the book he was reading.

"Anyway," Weston continued, "we're going to be playing in an hour. Want to stick around?"

"I'd love to," said Mory, dejected. "But I have plans."

"Oh." Weston looked disappointed for a moment. He cheered up quickly. "That's okay. We'll be back here tomorrow night. Want to stop by then?"

"I'd love to," she said, smiling. "I'll bring a lighter."

Saying goodbye, she exited the coffee shop with a bit of a bounce in her step. It was turning out to be a very good day after all.

* * *

The tall man in the back of the coffee shop looked up from his book, and stared after the girl.

He would have to keep an eye on that one.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Chapter Three

Weston sat in a chair in the coffee shop, idly picking out a few chords on his guitar. The band was due to play in ten minutes, but still the only other member present was Ananel, still reading his book off in the corner. DV had popped in half an hour previously to check on things; he said he'd be back before the gig was scheduled to start. And there was no sign at all from the enigmatic Gendou.

Weston sighed. This new band was certainly a piece of work.

He scanned the growing crowd for a familiar flash of brown. Even though Moryera had said she was busy tonight, he still was hopeful to catch a glimpse of her as the shop filled. She had seemed genuinely sorry that she wasn't able to make it tonight.

He hoped that Kyraa hadn't tried to set her up on another one of those blind dates.

* * *

Mory sat at a table in the little French restaurant. She had arrived early, to give herself some time to compose herself, and make the best of the evening with whatever creep it would be. She spent most of that time devising bigger and more painful traps for Kyraa for when she would be able to get her revenge.

She had more time than she thought to dwell on this, though, for the guy was ten minutes late.

The door chimed as it opened, and someone walked in. Mory's head snapped up to see a man with dark hair and an expensive-looking suit making his way to her table. He was holding a bouquet of flowers in his hands.

"Hello," he said as he reached the table. "I'm Andrew." He handed Mory the flowers.

"I'm Moryera," she responded, taking the bouquet.

She held out her hand to shake his, but he turned it slightly and brought it up to his lips. She snatched it back rather quickly.

Unfazed, he sat down across from her, and his eyes slowly panned downwards and back up, taking her in. "Moryera," he crooned. "That's an unusual name. Whereabouts would this name come from?"

"It's Danish," she answered. She was beginning to feel fairly uncomfortable around him.

"Danish?" Andrew seemed confused. "It certainly doesn't sound like any Danish name I'm familiar with."

Mory frowned. "My mom found it in an old book. It's fairly unique."

"It's every bit as special as the woman it belongs to, my dear."

Oh, great, Mory thought. The one time I humor Kyraa and I get the wanna-be Casanova.

Moryera was going to kill Kyraa. And it was going to be painful.

* * *

Deep in the cave outside the city, the shadow-creature prepared a ritual. The bodies of the two unfortunate men were propped up side-by-side inside a circle of bones. Around the circle were situated seven torches, each of them burning with a peculiar black flame.

In front of the shadow-creature was a sword. Its blade was black as the night, and the hilt was encrusted with diamonds. It was embedded, blade-first, into a stone altar, which was decorated with ornate runes and curious lettering.

To the sides of the being were bowls filled with blood, drained from the men inside the circle. The shadow-being coalesced into a solid, human-like form, and dipped its hands into the bowls, covering them with gore. It placed its scarlet hands upon the hilt of the sword, and slowly withdrew it from the altar.

The ground began to tremble. Loose rocks fell from the ceiling of the cave, and dust began to swirl in a vortex around the circle of bones. The ground underneath the bodies opened up, swallowing them.

The sword glowed an eerie silver. The shadow-creature dropped it upon the ground, and the sword burst into flames. A haunting sound emanated from the weapon, and the swirling cloud of dust abated.

Inside the circle, a black pool had appeared. At first, nothing happened, but after a short period of time, the surface rippled, and broke apart, as creatures arose from the pool.

The shadow-creature smiled. "The seal has broken," it said in a deep, echoing voice. "The seal is broken, and the mortal world will once again be ours."

* * *

High up on a rooftop on the outskirts of the city, Allison stood, watching the sun set. Her hair was loose and flowing in the wind. Her face almost seemed to glow in the waning sunlight.

She closed her eyes in sadness. "The seal is broken," she said. "The seal is broken, and the mortal world is doomed."

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Chapter Four

The night was anything but quiet. As soon as the last fingers of sunlight disappeared beyond the horizon, the mouth of the cave spewed forth a multitude of demons. Horrendous beasts that humans have only seen in their nightmares were set loose upon the world.

All of them were headed towards the city.

* * *

Allison rushed into her room in her apartment, digging under her bed for the key she kept taped to the underside of the frame. She pulled it loose and went into her closet, pushing back her clothes to reveal a blank section of wall. She passed her hand over it, and a small keyhole appeared.

She hadn't felt anything like it before. She had been told about it, of course. Her family was very involved with the entire situation. Her mother had chosen her as the new guardian long ago, and shared with her the secrets of her line.

Shaking her head, Allison used the key to open the hidden compartment, revealing equipment she had hoped to never use. Grabbing a few specific items, she closed the compartment back up and raced out of the apartment building as fast as possible.

If she hurried, there still could be time to stop it.

* * *

Ananel closed his book, and raised his eyes towards the window of the coffee shop. The band was supposed to start playing half an hour ago, but this didn't matter to him. It didn't matter to him that DV was making frantic calls to his friends, trying to find the final musician. It didn't matter to him that Weston was being scolded by the manager of the establishment for not being able to keep to a contract. He didn't care about any of that.

The seal was opened, and the war was about to begin again. This time, he was going to do it the right way, and finish it once and for all. Even if he had to take out all of humanity in the process.

He stood up, and placed his book back into his coat pocket. Ignoring the cries of confusion from Weston and DV, he walked calmly and determinedly out into the night.

* * *

The shadows swirled in a dark alley near the theatre district, and once again took on a solid form. Stretching his muscles, the human-shaped demon looked around, and saw that his appearance was unnoticed.

Unnoticed by all save one.

A young human woman with long red hair dropped down from a nearby fire escape, directly into his path. She was wearing a sleeveless black shirt and faded and torn jeans. Across her back was strapped a sword, her right hand on the hilt, ready to draw it. She was unknown to the shadow man - yet when he brought his other senses to bear on her, he found that he recognized her after all.

"So you are the current Guardian," he said, his deep voice rattling in his throat. It was not a question.

Not waiting for a response, he took a few steps toward her. "It has been some time since I encountered one of your line," he said. "Your ancestors put up quite the fight during the war. It was rather surprising that they managed to create the seal. But even their power has diminished with the generations."

He stopped directly in front of her and stared into her rage-filled eyes. "You're not worth my time, girl," he taunted, and stepped past her.

The metallic shriek of a sword being drawn from its sheath caught his attention. He turned to find the woman in a battle-ready stance.

"I will stop you," she said.

"You will not stop me," he replied. "All you can do is delay me slightly."

"I can hold you long enough. Until the ritual is complete."

The shadow man laughed. "The ritual? The ritual will not stop me. I have guarded myself against it long ago. The priest will fail, and take my enemies with him."

The woman's eyes widened. "But that means..."

The shadow man turned back. "The descendant is the one I am after. She will be the key to power." A shadow blade extended itself from his hand. "But if you're so eager to fight me..."

Calling on his speed, he whirled around and launched himself at the woman.

* * *

"....and these are just some of the benefits of my all-cheese diet."

Mory held her forehead. She had given up pretending to listen to Andrew's nonsense a half hour ago, but he didn't seem to care. As a matter of fact, he seemed to enjoy the opportunity to keep talking about himself the entire time.

"Anyway," Andrew was saying, "I was recently able to purchase a replacement engine for my Porsche. Have you ever driven one of those?"

Mory shook her head. "Can't say that I have," she responded. She grabbed a wine glass from the tray of a passing waiter, and set herself to draining it. After all, if she was going to endure this, why do it sober?

* * *

Allison parried the shadow blade, and shot her foot out at the demon's abdomen. Her foot sank into the dark cloth of his overcoat, but couldn't seem to connect with his body. She lost her balance and fell to the ground, narrowly missing a second shadow blade aiming for her neck. She rolled off to the side, and brought herself back to her feet in time to stop the blade coming for her face.

The two combatants exchanged strikes for a bit; neither one managing a direct hit, neither one managing to draw blood. Eventually, Allison leaped up onto the fire escape and looked down upon the shadow man.

"Why are you toying with me?" she asked.

"You haven't figured it out by now?" he taunted. "Search your feelings, Gabriel."

Confused, Allison closed her eyes and stretched out her senses. She didn't see what good it would do; she had tracked the demonic force to this alley. Stretching out wider, she brushed up against the familiar auras of her friends, until....

Her eyes flew open. "No! It was a diversion!" She climbed up to the rooftop and jumped off to the next building, towards the French restaurant where Mory was eating.

* * *

Mory grimaced. She hadn't been able to snag another glass of wine after the first one, and Andrew didn't seem like he would slow down anytime soon. She chewed on her baguette angrily.

"But it didn't seem like they were dogs at all, more like ponies. Hey, what's that?"

Startled by the sudden pause in his voice, she looked around. "I don't see any---"

Her sentence was lost as the wall exploded towards her.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Chapter Five

Mory ducked under the table as chunks of concrete and metal sailed towards her. Among the screams and the sounds of the wall caving in was a sickening wet crunch. She curled up in a ball and waited for it to be over.

The screaming didn't stop when the other sounds stopped, however. She pulled herself out from under the table, and glanced at her date.

Or rather, what was left of him.

A length of pipe that had been launched from the wall in the explosion had flown directly at their table. Andrew hadn't been able to move out of the way, and the pipe lodged itself just below his neck, severing his spine. His face was contorted with fear, but there was no pain evident in his features.

Mory's stomach turned, and she fought to keep from retching. Her mind whirled, trying to grasp what had happened. She tried to rationalize the situation. Walls don't just explode. Walls are happy. Walls like holding up the ceiling. Walls don't try to kill people.

She managed to calm herself down enough to look over at the wall in question. There was a big hole, and dust, a monster in the middle heading right for her, and ragged chunks of stone strewn about.

...wait a minute.

Mory screamed as she ducked under a massive claw, and scrambled to her feet. She backed up, keeping an eye on the thing. It was a large wolf-like being, with six arms and razor-sharp teeth. It slowly advanced on her, snarling.

She hit something behind her. Another wall. Were these damn things everywhere? Why couldn't this one have exploded, too? She turned to run, but a massive fist slammed into the wall beside her, stopping her. Another fist shot out and hit the wall on the other side. She looked up directly into the ugliest, most terrifying face she had ever seen.

Mory did the only thing she could do in this situation. She fainted.

* * *

Racing across the rooftops, leaping across the great gaps between them, Allison prayed. She prayed that she would arrive at Le Petit Fou in time. She could already sense the fear and destruction from that direction; it was crashing over her senses like a tidal wave.

Damn that shadow demon who delayed her. Damn herself for not realizing it was a trap. Damn it all!

She arrived at the block where her friend was in danger, and looked down on the street below.

The wall of the restaurant had been completely torn down. There were two wolf-like demons, each with more arms than should be necessary. They were standing just outside the hole, watching what was going on inside. She grabbed her sword, and prepared herself to jump down and draw it quickly.

Something stopped her. A feeling; something that touched an embedded memory inside her. Grimacing, she crouched down and watched.

* * *

On another rooftop nearby, Ananel also stood overlooking the devastation. His book was out, opened, in front of him, and he chanted in an unknown language. Arcane symbols flashed around his head, and the wind swirled around him endlessly.

He switched suddenly to English. "And now, with the death of the Descendant, the portal shall be sealed. The Earth shall be cleansed once more."

The wind around him died, and the book snapped shut on its own. The flashing symbols likewise vanished. "What?" he cried. "Who has interrupted me? The ritual must be completed!"

A deep, grating voice behind him spoke. "That is not the ritual."

Ananel whirled around to face a swirling mass of shadows. Before his eyes, the darkness pulled inward and assumed a solid form. It was the form of a man in a dark overcoat, with his ebony hair covering one side of his face. His one visible eye burned a deep red.

"Gend---"

His shout of recognition was silenced as the man's arm stretched out into a dark claw and closed around his throat.

"How foolish you have been, priest," he taunted, lifting Ananel off the rooftop to leave him dangling in the air. "You have spent all these years hunting me, and I have been within your reach the entire time."

He threw the man into an air-conditioning unit. "Your faith has left you blind. You perform arcane rituals without even knowing their true origin or purpose."

Ananel struggled to his feet. "H...how? How do you exist?"

The man enshrouded in shadows laughed. "Oh, come now, Ananel. I can't tell you that this early in the game." He picked up the fallen book and placed it in his coat pocket.

"You won't win, Gendou." Ananel growled.

The shadows swirled around Gendou once more. "I already have," he replied as he faded away into the night. "I already have."

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Chapter Six

Mory felt something licking her hand. It was soft and tickled slightly. She opened her eyes and tried to sit up, which startled whatever was near her hands. A feline screech pierced her ears, and something dark and blurred ran off outside her vision.

She took a look at her surroundings. Everything was incredibly blurry, but she could tell she was still in the restaurant. She took her glasses off and rubbed her eyes, hoping to clear them. Putting her glasses back on, she tried to take another look around.

Still blurry.

She took her glasses off again, and tried wiping them off on her shirt. She brought them back up and saw that there were now dark red smears all over the lenses. She looked down at her shirt. It was covered in crimson streaks. She started to panic, when something hit her.

Her glasses were still in her hands, yet she could see clearly. Even more clearly than she ever had before when she needed her glasses.

She focused her newly-corrected vision on her hand. It, too, was covered in blood, but that wasn't what attracted her attention to it. It was slimmer, slightly, and looked stronger. Her nails were also longer than she remembered them being.

Shaking her head, she stood up. This had to be a dream of some sort. Hands don't simply change. And neither....do.....

She took a good look at her surroundings once more. Only this time, she could actually see the carnage. Blood was everywhere. Splattered across the floor. Splashed on the walls. There was even some dripping from the ceiling. And the parts....the parts. There were arms and legs and torsos all over, though not any kind that she could recognize. They all had coarse, dark fur, matted with bodily fluid. There were a few heads lying around, as well.

Mory let out a nervous giggle. Oh, this was the monsters all over the place.

She shook her head again. What the hell was wrong with her? She wakes up to gore and she immediately makes Wizard of Oz humor?

A faint mewling snapped her out of her reverie. A black cat was sitting on a table nearby, watching her closely. It was this cat, Mory realized, that had been licking her hand when she woke up.

She stepped closer to the cat, arms outstretched in a friendly manner. The cat arched its back and hissed, but calmed down quickly, eventually letting Mory pet its head.

Mory saw that the cat had an old scar running down its face, through its right eye, which seemed permanently closed.

She's a stray, she thought. She didn't know how she knew it was female from this angle, but she didn't dwell on that. The cat jumped into her arms, and purred contently.

Mory stroked the cat's head absent-mindedly as she viewed the destruction around her. It was odd how detached she felt about it all, when before she nearly lost her lunch at the sight of Andrew....

Andrew's body was still slumped over their table. The sight of him once again churned her stomach, and she turned away from the scene. Why don't I feel sick around these monster parts, when I can't even look at Andrew?

"Because you have a human's heart."

Mory whirled around to see a familiar face. "Ally, what are you....why do you have a sword? Why are you pointing it at me?"

Allison looked back at her with fear all over her face. She returned her sword to the sheath on her back, however, and took a shaky step forward. "Do you remember what happened, Mory?"

Mory shook her head. "No, there was a...thing coming at me, and I blacked out. I woke up to all this."

Allison nodded, a strange expression on her face. "Let's go home, we can get you all cleaned up. The demons will be back shortly."

"What demons? What the hell is going on, Ally? What did all this?"

Allison closed her eyes and sighed.

"You did, Mory."  

[AllianceSJR]

Chapter Seven

Moryera walked in silence as her roommate led the way to their apartment. A million questions ran through her mind, but only one pushed its way to the front.

"Who are you?"

Allison looked back. "I'm the same person I always was, Mory."

"Bull," Mory huffed. "You never had a sword, or powers, or anything like that. Why would you keep something like that from me?"

Allison stopped walking. She was silent for a moment. "I didn't want to have to tell you this," she said, not turning around to face Mory. "I didn't want to have to."

Mory stomped her foot in agitation. "Tell me what?"

"That the world as we know it may end soon."

* * *

Allison hated this. She didn't want to be the one to tell the girl about the war, or the prophecy. She wouldn't believe it, anyway. Hell, Allison didn't want to believe it, and she grew up with it.

She started walking again. "The world as we know it is a lie. Humans were never the reigning species; they just like to think they were. Most of the history of civilization was made up in some guy's basement, with a typesetting press and an active, optimistic imagination. Anything before the Renaissance never happened, although some of the mythology is based on what actually happened."

"What do you mean, made up?"

"I mean just that; made up. Before this time, humans were not very powerful."

Allison stopped again, and turned to face Mory. "Humans have forgotten about magic."

"Magic?"

"Magic." Allison waved her hand at the grass next to them. The grass grew six inches, and pink flowers started dotting the green. "Magic, and everything that is associated with it, falls into four main alignments. Earth, Air, Fire, and Water."

"The four elements!" Mory exclaimed. "Everyone said that they weren't real!"

Allison shook her head. "That's the thing. To most people, they aren't. Magic will only work for those who believe in it. When humans became the rulers of the planet, they forgot about magic. And for a long time, aside from a couple exceptions, it has faded to a mere memory. My family has always been aligned with the Earth, which is why I could do that trick you saw just there."

"What does this have to do with me, though?" Mory asked.

"I'm getting there." She started walking again. "These four elements form a type of wheel. Kind of like a color wheel. You remember color wheels?"

"Yeah, red and orange are similar, and blue and orange are on opposite sides."

Allison nodded. "It's like that with mortal magic. Fire is opposed to water, but it's complemented by Earth. But there are two realms of magic outside the mortal scope, that of Shadow and Light."

"Shadow and Light...Ally, when you said that humans weren't the reigning forces..."

"The immortals were. They were of the Outer Two."

Mory was quiet for a moment. "And you said that the mythology of some cultures was based in fact, right? So that means that angels and demons..."

"You're only partly right," Allison responded. "The immortals were of Shadow, and of Light. And they were at war with each other constantly. Humans, with their limited grasp of understanding, mistakenly labeled them angels and demons. You can use those terms to refer to them, but angels and demons have more alike than they have differences. Sure, there are the physical differences, but they're both immortal, and they both have great power. And they each hate the other."

Mory frowned. "So what happened?"

"Well, they were always at war. And humankind kept getting caught in the crossfire. Finally, the humans had had enough. So the four most powerful mages - one of each element - banded together, and together they were able to seal away the immortals inside of a cave. This spell was the most powerful ever created, and it not only required the casters to sacrifice their own lives, but also the lives of a set number of other humans."

Mory gasped.

"But that seal has been broken, Mory. And you are a part of the upcoming war."

* * *

Mory shook her head. This was all too much to take in at once. "It all sounds pretty, Ally," she said. "But it can't be true. I mean, sure, there were monsters coming after me, and then they...weren't..."

She shook her head again, trying to clear it. "How do I know that you're telling the truth about all this?"

Allison stopped. They had arrived at their apartment building. "You mean aside from me performing more magic?"

"Yeah."

The redhead nodded her head towards the building. "I'll show you."

They walked up the stairs to their apartment in silence. Millions of questions were racing through Mory's head again, but she couldn't pick one out of the din.

They entered the apartment, and Mory went to the bathroom to clean the blood off of her. She washed her hands and face, and looked back up into the mirror.

"ALLY~!"

Allison rushed into the bathroom. "Yes? Oh, you finally noticed."

Mory stared, slack-jawed at her reflection. Or rather, not her reflection, as the person looking back at her was someone she certainly didn't recognize.

Her eyes were no longer the warm brown she remembered; instead, icy blue orbs stared back at her, even more conspicuous by her lack of glasses. Her features were a bit sharper, more pronounced. Her teeth were a dazzling white that would make any dentist jealous, and they also appeared to be sharper than normal.

Her hair, however, was the most noticeable difference of her features. It had, for some unexplained reason, turned from its usual dark brown to a soft, bright violet. Almost even a lilac shade. It was also much shorter than it was, and a lot more feathery-light.

Overall, the changes gave her a somewhat avian appearance.

"What the hell is this?" she wailed.

"That," Allison said, crossing her arms and smiling, "is your proof."

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Chapter Eight

"All right," Moryera said. "Explain it again."

Allison sighed, and shifted her position on the couch. The scarred cat had followed them home, and Allison was absent-mindedly stroking it as she talked. "The mages created a ritual. They would sacrifice their own lives, and bind the immortals to a separate plane of existence. But they couldn't contain all of the immortals, for some of them were too powerful to be banished. So the mages selected other sacrifices: Children who were unlucky enough to be chosen to help bind the immortals."

She ran a hand through her hair. "The mages took the essences of these higher-order immortals, and bound them to the sacrifices, changing them forever. But there were two humans that didn't change, which was odd, since they received the two most powerful souls of all the immortals. They were also the youngest of the group of sacrifices. They were only five."

"b*****d mages, condemning little kids like that," Mory muttered. "So why did the mages need children?"

"No one knows," admitted Allison. "The mages wrote everything down in a journal, which was handed down through the families of the Order of the Wind. The last time the journal was seen was a thousand years ago, before the descendants of the Wind Mage disappeared. So I only know what happened, but not why."

* * *

"These children will house the souls of the leaders of the Armies of the Light and Shadow Wars."

Ananel read aloud in the back room of the Ancient Library. His voice was hoarse, and his throat still bore the marks of the dark-taloned hand.

"Within the body of the young boy will reside the soul of the Lichlord Nazushette, king of the Undead and the Dark. Within the girl will reside the soul of the Valkyrie Queen Xalenthia, holy warrior of the Light."

As he continued to read, his grip tightened on the book. His expression became darker and darker.

* * *

"Like I said, though, the boy and girl were unchanged by the soul-binding. The other children were unrecognizable after the ritual, becoming werewolves and vampires and other such creatures. Halflings, they called themselves."

Mory shook her head. "So these....halflings, they're real, too?"

Allison nodded. "Very real. Though most of them keep to themselves. The Shadow Halflings tend to split off of their groups and terrorize small towns, but even then it's a rare occurance."

"So what came after me today was a halfling? A werewolf?"

"No," Allison replied. "Those were Wendigoes. Those were full demons, the purest variety."

"So they were going to kill me?" Mory asked.

Allison nodded.

"But then I....I...." Mory trailed off as she tried to remember. "What did I do? And how?"

Allison sighed. "The little boy and girl grew up as normal human beings. There were no apparent traces of the Immortal souls within them, and they went about their lives as though nothing ever happened. The families of the mages looked after these two, because they were ordered to by the mages before the ritual. The little boy went under the care of the families of Fire and Water, and the little girl was taken in by the families of Earth and Wind.

"Over time, the children grew up, and started families of their own. Their children likewise had no traces of the immortal souls, and their children were normal, and so were their children. Over the generations, the descendants of the boy and girl separated from the descendants of the mages. The story was passed down as much as possible through the mages' families, but the history became garbled and lost."

Allison grabbed a nearby glass of water, and took a sip. "The boy's line became completely estranged from his guardians around World War I. The Fire and Water families, having forgotten their past, let it happen, and nothing was heard from any of them again. The Wind family separated itself from the girl's descendants, and it too disappeared."

"And the Earth family?" Mory asked.

"The Earth family stayed close to the line," Allison said proudly. "We've been the sole guardians of the knowledge of the War for three generations, and we've always stayed close by. My mother was always encouraging me to play with you when we were younger, though your mother never suspected the true reasons."

"My mother...?"

Allison nodded. "You, Mory, are the descendant of the girl. You have within you the soul and the power of Xalenthia. And right now, you also have her physical appearance."

"But why did it happen? Why did I change?"

"Because of the Prophecy."

Mory stared. "Prophecy? What prophecy?"

"About five hundred years after the Sealing," Allison replied, "one of the descendants of the girl went into a coma. It was unexplained, there was no medical reason for it. This descendant, a man named Smithson, started speaking in his coma, in a voice that sounded like a man and a woman speaking in unison. We've since decided that it was the man's own voice, with the voice of Xalenthia included."

"What did he say?"

"Word for word?" Allison asked. "We don't know. It wasn't written down at the time, and passing it down orally made it somewhat garbled."

* * *

On the roof of the apartment complex, Gendou stood.

"The Four shall be Divided, and the Two shall come into their Inheritance. The Dark King will Rise once more, and loose His Armies upon the World once again."

He chuckled. "Tell the girl everything, Gabriel. It won't change a thing."

As the sun began to rise in the East, Gendou dissolved into shadows, which swirled around the rooftop. "Enjoy the day, Gabriel, for tomorrow night shall be painted black."

By the time the first rays of light reached the rooftop, the shadows were gone.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Chapter Nine

Weston sat on a park bench in the early morning, absent-mindedly strumming his guitar. His attention was not on how well he was sounding, or who might be listening. He didn't pay attention to the people walking by. His mind was on one thing.

Last night was horrible.

The manager of the coffee shop had spent hours screaming at Weston, about holding contracts and paying for customers lost. DV had been frantic when Ananel had simply walked out. And Gendou....

Gendou had shown up a couple hours after the band had gotten kicked out. He didn't seem to care that the gig was busted; rather, he had kept asking Weston questions about his friends. What they looked like, what they do; minor things like that. He left soon afterwards, making a cryptic comment that things weren't "as they readily appeared to be".

Whatever that meant.

He was startled out of his thoughts as a black cat jumped into his lap. "Well, hey there, Kia," he said, stroking the cat's fur.

The cat purred and nuzzled his hand.

A voice called out from in front of him. "Oh, there you went, kitty. We were wondering where you....Weston!"

Weston looked up to see a flash of red. "Hey, Allison," he said. He looked over to the other girl that was with her. "Hey, Mory. I like your hat."

Mory reached up and touched the large straw hat she was wearing. "Thanks. I haven't gotten a chance to wear it lately, and it's gorgeous today." She looked somewhat nervous about something, but Weston couldn't put his finger on it. She certainly was fidgeting more than she normally did.

Weston started scratching the back of the cat's head. "So you're already familiar with Kia, then?"

Allison smiled. "Is that her name? She followed us home last night."

Weston nodded. "She tends to do that. She's a stray, but she loves following people home. She doesn't normally stay, but she always remembers the people who were nice to her, and visits them occasionally."

"She likes you a lot," Mory said. "And you know a lot about her."

Weston grinned. "She likes coming here to the park every day, and I generally make it a point to say hello. Sometimes I bring her food."

The cat mewed.

"No," Weston said to her. "I don't have anything for you today. I'm sorry."

Allison shifted the large duffel bag she was carrying. "We should get going, Mory."

Mory snapped her head up. "Right," she said, dejectedly. "We need to get going."

"I'll see you later, then, Mory," Weston said, causing the girl to blush.

"I...yes. I'll see you later."

* * *

Mory followed Allison into an empty warehouse a few blocks from the park. It was dark, gloomy, with boarded-up windows and what looked like lots of exposed insulation.

"All right," Allison said, tossing her duffel bag on the floor. "This is a good place to finish answering your questions."

Mory took her hat off, letting her lilac hair fall down against her shoulders. "I can't see why we couldn't finish this in the apartment," she muttered. "Weston almost saw what had happened to me."

Allison gave her an appreciative once-over as she knelt down to open the bag. "Something tells me he probably would have liked it." She ducked under the hat that was flying towards her head.

She pulled out a set of boxing gloves, and put them on. "All right, to understand what happened in the restaurant, I need to show you how to release your power." She strapped padding onto her arms and legs.

"Don't I get padding?" Mory asked.

Allison raised an eyebrow. "This is to protect me from you," she said. "Besides, all your responses and reactions should be quickened considerably."

The redhead closed her eyes, made a subtle hand gesture, and picked up a loose beam from the floor. "We're going to test your dodging skills. Are you ready?"

"What are you going to do with that?"

Allison smirked. "Make you dodge it."

* * *

"Here, let me see it now."

"You hit me in the face with a girder!" shrieked Mory. She clutched a large towel to her nose, which had been bleeding profusely.

Allison sighed. Training the girl was going to be harder than she thought. "You were supposed to dodge it." She reached for the towel again.

Mory slapped her hand away. "You hit me. In the face. With a girder."

"It was not a girder. It was a beam."

"I don't care what it was!"

Allison finally grabbed the towel and pulled it away from Mory. "See, look. It's already healed." She took a second, damp towel and moved to clean the dried blood from the girl's face.

"No, don't touch me!" With that scream of defiance, the lilac-haired girl backhanded Allison with all her strength, knocking her clear across the room.

Mory looked at her hand with amazement. "Did I just.....Ally! Are you okay?"

Allison got to her feet. "I'm just fine," she said, wincing. Man, she thought, that's going to be a gigantic bruise in the morning.

"What did I just do?"

The redhead smiled. "You just proved my decision wrong."

"What decision?"

"I thought I didn't need head protection today."

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Chapter Ten

The creature overheard the noises of training coming from the empty warehouse. Climbing up to a broken window, it made its way inside and hid itself under a pile of cardboard boxes.

It watched the two women as they performed super-human feats. The red-maned one was throwing large metal objects at the one with the light blue-violet hair, who was jumping out of the way faster than should be possible.

* * *

"Good," Allison said, smiling. "You're learning to control your new reflexes."

"I still don't see how this is necessary," muttered Mory. She rubbed her shoulder; a car door had grazed it half an hour ago. "If you're this strong, you should be able to handle anything coming my way."

Allison shook her head. "This is a spell I'm using, and it takes a lot of concentration to do this. Without casting this spell, my muscles are nothing more than a normal human's."

She walked up to Mory. "But you don't need a spell for any of this. Your body is much stronger and faster than mine. You just need to learn how to control your new abilities."

"How do I do that, though?" Mory asked. "You said yourself that you've had all sorts of special weapons and fighting and magical training since you were a kid." She slumped her shoulders. "I just got this body yesterday, and I don't even want it."

Allison sighed. "Deep down, you know how to control your abilities. And you know how to fight."

"No I don't!" Mory screamed. "I don't know how any of this works, and I want my body back! I can't fight, I can't do anything special, I just can't!" She turned away, clenching her fists in anger.

She fully expected Allison to blow up at her. She expected her to be angry, to walk up and smack her in the head.

She was unprepared for the soft, almost sad tone that was in her friend's voice.

"Then what happened to that Wendigo?"

"I don't know," Mory said. She was surprised at how calm her voice was. "You keep saying it was me, but I don't know how it's possible."

"Because you don't believe you're special." It was not a question.

Mory turned back to face Allison, but kept her head down. "I know I'm not. I'm nothing special. I'm not this Queen Xanadu or whatever. I'm just me. I'm just Moryera Thorne."

"Then you have already lost."

Mory jerked her head up, surprised at her tone. Allison had said that last with...contempt?

Sure enough, the redhead had a hard expression on her face. "You've already lost, and the shadow-man never had to lift a finger. He's already walked all over you, and he's never even met you."

"Shadow-man?" Mory asked.

Allison ignored her, and took a menacing step closer. "So you're right," she said, raising her voice. "You're nothing special. You're not even normal. You're nothing at all." She continued to make slow advances to the girl. "You're filth. You're trash. You don't deserve your heritage. You don't even deserve your normal life."

Mory flinched at every shout. "But I?"

"And furthermore," Allison interrupted, "you don't even deserve Weston."

Something snapped inside Mory at that last remark. "Don't. You. DARE." She swung a fist at Allison's face, but the redhead ducked underneath. "Don't you dare speak to me about him."

She shot her foot into Allison's midsection, sending her flying back into the far wall. Not content with this, Mory leaped after her, clearing the distance with a single jump.

Allison was ready for her. She tucked her legs under her as she landed, and rolled away. Mory's hand slammed into the wall right where her head had been a second ago. She wasn't fast enough to dodge the next blow, however, and Mory's elongated nails plunged into her shoulder. Allison grabbed her wrist, yanked the girl's fingers out of her flesh, and spun her around.

Try as she might, though, Allison couldn't escape the wrath of the smaller girl, only barely stopping her from doing lethal damage with every blow.

Mory pushed the attack. Blow after blow, she wouldn't rest until her enemy was lying on the floor in a bloody heap. Every time her fist or foot or elbow or knee made contact, something inside her howled with delight. Her fist struck the woman in the chest, and she was pleased to feel something give underneath. This was simple, this was prey...

No!

She forced herself to stop. This was wrong. This was wrong. She shook her head to come back to her senses.

And trembled at what she saw.

Allison was leaning against a pillar, breathing heavily. She was bleeding from the nose, mouth, and various clawmarks - clawmarks on her body. Her face was bruised beyond recognition, and her left eye was swollen shut.

"Ally...I....no!"

She rushed to her friend, and moved her grabbed her shoulders in an effort to steady her. Her hands were red, stained with blood. Blood that she had drawn from her friend. From her friend. "Ally, I'm so sorry, I didn't?"

Allison chuckled weakly. "No. Don't be sorry. I did this intentionally. I provoked you into attacking me."

"Why? Why did you do that?"

"So you could?" Allison coughed. "So you could see for yourself that you do have power. You do have the ability. But it's raw, unfocused. You need to train it, to learn how to use it without losing yourself."

"But I almost killed you!"

Allison smiled. "Yeah. You almost did. I'm proud of you."

She eased herself down into a sitting position. "I...I need to borrow some of your strength for a moment," she said. "I'm not strong enough right now to heal myself."

Mory knelt down next to her. "Anything."

"Put your hand on my shoulder...yes, like that. And just open your mind to me."

Mory opened her mind as best she could. She felt something slowly drain out of her, as Allison sat up straighter.

And what happened next was something that Mory had never seen before.

Allison's wounds closed up seamlessly. The swelling on her face went down, though the discoloration persisted. There was a loud crack from within her chest, and Allison's face contorted in brief - yet obviously intense - pain.

Allison opened her eyes. "Thank you."

Mory shivered. Everything was changing around her. And she didn't know if she could handle it.

She didn't know if she could handle it at all.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Chapter Eleven

Weston grimaced as he applied disinfectant to his fingers. He ignored the bloodspots on his shirt; he was going to change when he got home anyway.

He wondered briefly what had happened to Mory. She had seemed....odd when he saw her that morning. Almost as if she was hiding something. She seemed a little different, as well. Taller, perhaps?

Nah, he thought, dismissing it as a trick of the sunlight. It was early in the morning, and he had been facing east to begin with.

Something bothered him, though, about the way she and Ally felt to him. Like there was something underneath the underneath, as it were. They had headed off towards the warehouse district after the brief encounter, and he had not heard from them for the rest of the day.

There was something familiar about the way Ally was dressed, as well. He hadn't seen her in those clothes since.....

He pushed that line of thought away, as well. The clothing she wore was simply similar to that which she had worn as a child; nothing else.

But the embroidery on the bag she carried...it was too familiar. The significance of it was lost on him, but he knew that it was indeed important. The thought of it nagged at the back of his mind for the rest of the day, until just recently.

He finished wrapping up his fingers; they should heal by morning. They always did.

The tree symbol on the side of Ally's bag, that was important somehow. He knew it was. He'd ask her the next time he saw her.

He returned the small first-aid kit to its regular spot in the trunk of his car, and reached back to pull the shaft of wood out of the chest of the Wendigo that was slumped against the side of a nearby building.

"I hope you're happy," he told the still-warm body of the demon. "I spent two paychecks on that guitar." He shoved the corpse further into the alley and got back into his car.

And I just got this thing washed....

* * *

Off in the back of a library somewhere, a section of a scroll darkened. Ananel peered over at the changed writing, and frowned.

"So the descendant of Wind has retained the lessons of his training," he mused. "Perhaps all is not yet lost..."

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Chapter Twelve

Swords flashed in the air, coming together with a resounding clank. Flashes of color whirled through the room, red and violet. Each strike was met by the opposite blade - a dance of steel.

"I think I'm getting the hang of this," Mory said, smiling. "I really think I could - OW!"

"Don't speak to your opponent unless you're sure you can efficiently divide your concentration."

Mory's hand went to the new gash in her shoulder, wiping away the blood. The wound healed immediately. "It's not my fault that you delight in causing me pain."

Allison huffed. "I do not enjoy causing you pain." She paused for a second. "Much."

"Thanks a lot." Mory took a step forward - or tried to, as her feet caught against something. She looked down to see a pair of vines wrapped around her ankles; the vegetation had apparently sprung up through the concrete floor of the warehouse. "Oh, very funny."

Allison stifled a giggle as her friends struggled against her new bonds. "Just reminding you of the First Law of Combat."

Mory swiped her free hand at the vines. Her nails elongated and sharpened into claws, easily slicing through her organic restraints. " 'Never trust a redhead with a sword?' "

" 'Always be aware of your surroundings.' It's easy to forget where you are in the heat of battle, and you never want to be backed up into a corner or trip on something you could have avoided." The redhead reached back to place her sword back in its scabbard on her back. "There's usually always something around that you can use for cover, as well, or even a makeshift weapon."

Mory shook her head. "Why do I need to bother with that? I've got these weird new powers, and right now I've got this sword. Which, by the way, do you want back?"

Allison grimaced. "Hold onto that for right now. But you should never rely on your powers alone. Sometimes you need to know how to improvise at inconvenient times." She closed her eyes, as if concentrating.

"Why do I have to?"

Her complaint was cut off by a low rumble near her feet. She jumped to the side, right as a stone spire shot out of the ground right beneath where she was standing.

"Because you never know what the enemy is capable of," Allison said, opening her eyes. "If you're not careful, you could find yourself impaled on a stalagmite."

Mory stared at the spire for a moment. "I...didn't know you could..."

"That's the thing about us mortals," Allison said, smirking. "Everyone underestimates what we can do. They assume that Earth-type magic is the weakest of the four elements. Those aligned with Water can also work with ice and steam, Wind-aligned mages can call upon lightning bolts as well as tornadoes and gales, and fire is freakin' fire. 'Oh, you're aligned with the Earth? The ground is shaking, I'm scared! What are you going to do, grow flowers at me?' " She shook her head. "Second Law of Combat: Never underestimate your opponent." She waved a hand and the spire sank back into the ground; the concrete sealed itself back up.

"I don't even know what I'm capable of, let alone whatever I'm fighting against!"

"It'll come to you in time, when you need it," Allison responded. "Look at it this way: have you ever touched a sword in your life?"

Mory looked flustered. "No..."

"And yet when I gave you that one, and then attacked you with my own, you fended me off very well, even getting a few attacks in of your own. You even scored a hit on someone who has been training with a sword since she was three." Allison indicated a slowly-healing cut on her wrist. "Not only that, but you used your claws intentionally, without having practiced how."

The lilac-haired girl looked at her hands. "I did..."

"You're using the knowledge of the soul sealed inside you," Allison continued. "And you're using it on your terms, not in a blind rage. This is wonderful progress for you."

The women smiled at each other.

* * *

Hidden in a pile of boxes off in the corner, the creature watched the exchange. He hadn't been aware of how quickly the Light Descendant would come into her powers; but then again, the Dark Descendant had fully embraced his upon finding out about them.

It was no matter. The Phoenix Blade was in the hands of the Dark One, and unless that changed, the Seal would remain open. If the girl failed, the creature would just have to go back into hiding.

He shivered, accidentally knocking away a nearby box, sending it clattering to the ground.

Oh, crap.

* * *

Allison's gaze shot over to the dark corner of the warehouse. A box had fallen from the pile, but there was no real reason for it to have just?

Of course. She should have realized it before.

She recited a short phrase in her head, twitching a hand in the direction of the sound. Vines shot out of the ground and plunged into the pile, thrashing about, until one coiled up as if it caught something. She felt a tug at her power, so with a flick of a finger the vine sprouted thorns.

"Keeeeeeeeeeeeee!"

Allison sighed. She knew that scream. Of all the times.....ugh.

She retracted the thorns, and whipped the vine towards where she and Mory were standing. She dangled her quarry upside-down in front of her.

"Don't hurt the cute foxie!" Mory squealed. "Let it go! Don't hurt it!" She reached up to grab hold of the small fox and untie the vines from around it.

Allison didn't loosen her grip. "Leave him alone, Mory," she said. "He knew what he was doing."

Mory clutched the dangling animal to her chest. "It's scared! Look, it's shivering."

Indeed, the fox was quivering, but not from fear. Mory didn't see the expression on its face when she pressed it to her, but Allison caught it. The vine wrenched away from Mory's grip and swung the fox over to the fuming redhead. "That's quite enough, pervert," she snapped, pounding it on the head with her fist. "I don't have time for your shenanigans today."

The fox, understandably, remained quiet. Mory, however, did not.

"What the hell are you doing to that poor thing? It's just a fox, that's no reason to hit it!"

Allison gave a small, dark chuckle. "Just a fox? I don't think so. This is William, an old....friend of mine. William, say hello to Mory."

The fox looked reproachfully at Allison before turning its head to the violet-haired girl.

"Hello, Mory."  

[AllianceSJR]

Chapter Thirteen

Mory shrieked and jumped back a couple feet. "What...what the hell is it?"

"Gee, thanks," William said. "Nice to meet you, too." He twitched his tail angrily. "Bigoted Immortals, think they're so much better than us...hey, Ally, can you let me down now, please? All my blood's been rushing to my head."

"Well, good," Allison responded, arms crossed. "Maybe that'll spur your brain to start working again." She released the vines holding the fox, which crashed to the ground none too gently.

Grumbling, the fox closed its eyes and disappeared in a burst of blue flames. The fire cleared to reveal a short teenage boy with large fox-like ears and a tail. He ran his hand through his silver hair and smiled. "Ah, that's much better. No thanks to Nature b***h over here."

Allison pounded him on the head again. "What the hell are you doing here, coward? I don't appreciate people spying on me."

William held his hands up. "Whoa, whoa, whoa. Chill out, sister. Let's not get irrational about this." He reached around and rubbed his backside. "Speaking of rashes, are you sure that wasn't a poison ivy vine?"

"Get to the point."

"Right, the point. The point." William's face became serious. "The point is that the Halflings are scared. The seal has been opened, and the Phoenix Blade is in the hands of the Dark One. And there's talk that the world might go back to the way it used to be, now that the Immortals are coming back. I was sent to find out what was happening with the Descendants and help in any way I can."

"Great," Allison said, smiling. "I'm glad to have you with us!"

William looked up at the redhead with confusion. "You....you are?"

"Oh, of course!" she beamed. "There's just one thing we need to take care of first."

William looked hopeful. "Yes?"

Allison smiled widely, punched the fox-boy in the face as hard as she could. "Don't you ever spy on me again. Is that clear?"

"Crystal." William stood back up, wiping the blood off his face. "Ungrateful tree-hugger," he muttered. "Get a boy's hopes up like that, only to crash them down. It's a terrible thing, what the world's coming to..."

"Oh, save your drama."

* * *

Mory looked from the fox-boy to her friend, and back again. "Okay," she said. "Now can someone please tell me what's going on?"

William stared at her. "What, she doesn't know?"

"I only had time for the basics," Allison responded. "Who she is, who I am, essentially what happened, and roughly what you are."

"All right, then." He walked up to where Mory was standing. "Well, kid, it's like this. I'm a Halfling. I come from a long line of proud kitsune demons, although we're not exactly demons, you see."

"I know what Halflings are," Mory said. "You had Immortal souls bonded to you a long time ago. Are you a Light Halfling or a Dark one?"

"For the most part, I'm Dark," he said. He shook his head when Mory took a tighter grip on her sword. "No, no, no. You don't understand. Light and Dark ain't Good and Evil, kid. They're just two sides of the same coin. The Immortals were more alike than they were different. The Great War that they had going? It wasn't a whole Divine deal like everyone assumed it was. It was just that the Light beings and the Shadow beings didn't like each other, and there was a lot of bigotry and boasting going on in both sides. But the thing is, kid, is that you need both. You can't have righteousness without passion. You can't have death without rebirth. You can't have eggs without bacon."

He stretched. "And I'm not entirely Dark. Kitsunes were born from a union of two lines of Halflings; the were-foxes and the shapeshifters. The parent lines have since died out, but we're still here."

Mory frowned. "Eggs and bacon?"

"Focus, kid," William growled. "I'm only tellin' you this once."

"All right, all right," she apologized. "If Darkness isn't the same as Evil, then why did the humans seal it away?"

"Because they were destroying the world with their war," Allison explained. "The War was as much about ruling the mortal world as it was about proving a point to the other side. And there were a lot more human casualties than there were Immortal ones."

"Neither side was evil, kid," William continued, "but neither side was wholly good. Beings like them, they had enough power as it is, they didn't need to rule the world with it. The Seal was for their own good, so they could learn humility and co-exist. And the Descendant theory was a failsafe."

"The Mages knew the Seal would be broken eventually," Mory realized.

"Smart girl." William nudged Allison. "I like her already."

"The thing is, though, Mory," Allison continued, ignoring the fox-boy, "is that the Seal wasn't supposed to have been broken from the outside. It would have opened itself when the world was ready for it, when the humans could hold their own against the Shadow and Light. But something went wrong."

"What went wrong?" Mory asked. "What happened?"

Neither the kitsune nor the redhead answered this question, however. The voice that responded was one that chilled Mory to the bones.

"Me."

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Chapter Fourteen

"Me."

The word came from nowhere in particular, yet everywhere at once. The voice was deep and gravely, and seemed to sound in Allison's head as well as in the air.

His.....his power....I can't stand up to that....

She looked back at the other two. William was hiding behind Mory, who was frozen in fear.

No, Allison thought. I won't let him take you.

The light fixtures overhead exploded, sending a shower of sparks over the inhabitants of the room. The windows burst inwards, letting in the cool night air. A dark mist started swirling around the top of the warehouse.

Allison reached up and unsheathed her sword. "Are you a coward?" she cried. "Do you have nothing but cheap tricks?"

"Of course not, Gabriel," the voice answered. "But I must amuse myself somehow. Did you not like it? I thought the windows were a nice touch."

Allison grimaced, and tightened her grip on her sword. "Show yourself."

The presence seemed to sigh, and the dark mist disappeared. "Very well," it said.

Her eyes narrowed. The voice hadn't spoken in her mind, it came from....

Behind!

She whirled around, swinging her sword at chest level, where it struck a dark, misty blade with a muffled clang. The shadow-man was looking at her with idle amusement.

"Why so hostile, Gabriel?" he asked, soothingly. "I'm not here for you." Almost as an afterthought, he moved his shadow-blade to intercept another strike from the redhead. He morphed his hand into a large, armored claw, and swung it in a backhand, connecting with her temple.

Allison was sent flying backwards from the blow. She slammed into the far wall, and the world turned dark.

* * *

Gendou allowed himself to smile as he turned away from the unconscious Guardian. "Now, my sister," he said, rounding on the girl and the fox, "you will come with me."

The Descendant shuddered as she looked at him. "I...I'm not your sister," she whispered.

"You are the Descendant of the Light, are you not? You are my soul-sister, and together we can rule this mortal world."

The girl flinched. "I....I won't come with you!"

The fox recovered his spine. "You won't touch her," he growled, moving to stand in front of the girl.

Gendou glared at the silver kitsune. "I will do what I must. And she will be coming with me. I can teach her how to use her powers. I can show her who she is."

The girl seemed confused. "But, Ally already told me who I am. She explained all that to me."

Gendou chuckled. "Did she really? Tell me, whose soul did she say was inside you? Did she tell you that Queen Xalenthia was a benevolent ruler of the Light?" He took a step forward. "Or did she tell you the truth?"

"The....the truth?"

"Xalenthia was no champion, sister. She had a terrible temper, and ruled her lands with an iron fist. She punished the weak and favored the strong."

"No, I....but...."

"Did you wonder why you enjoyed killing my pets so much? Did you ever consider why you felt joy when attacking Gabriel?" Gendou took another step. "You and I, we are the same. We can learn from each other. Come with me." He reached out to her.

"Garer!"

A wall of thorns rose up from the ground, between Gendou and the Descendant. It continued to grow until it reached the ceiling. He struck the wall with his shadow-blade, but the edge bounced off without leaving any mark at all on the vegetation. "What....who dares?"

"Second Law of Combat, b*****d," said a voice from behind him.

He turned around to see the Guardian, mischievous glint in her eye, as she held her sword in a ready stance. She spat a glob of blood to the side, and gave him a cold smile.

"Never underestimate your opponent."

* * *

Mory watched through the holes in the thorn barrier, and sighed in relief. Allison was alive. Allison was alive, and she had saved her.

As she watched, the redhead charged the dark man. Her sword flashed high in a carefully-calculated opening strike. The dark man countered, and moved for a counter-strike.

"Fighting with swords," Ally had explained to her, "is a lot like chess. Each combatant is not only aware of her current move, but also three moves down the line. Every attack has a counter, and every counter has its own counter. Each attack opens up many different pathways to other attacks and counters. But what you cannot forget is what your opponent is capable of, and what attacks and counters he can make based on your moves."

If a sword fight was a game of chess, then there was a World Champion-class tournament unfolding itself before Mory's eyes. Allison's one blade was met with the dark man's two, and every motion was fluid. Every attack led to another, and another.

They did not fight. They danced.

The dark man grinned suddenly, as a shadowy tendril reached out and ensnared Allison's sword. He moved in to strike while she was defenseless, but Allison's eyes flicked upwards, and a large chunk of concrete fell down to where the dark man stood. He jumped out of the way, inadvertently releasing his opponent from his grasp. And the dance continued.

Allison struck low, in a sweeping strike that would have cut the dark man's knees out from under him. He jumped back, and grabbed a fallen light fixture with a tendril. He threw it at the redhead, but a stone wall rose from the ground to intercept it. Glass and sparks flew everywhere.

The dark man gestured, and wind started swirling around the warehouse, picking up the glass and debris. It swirled around Allison, slicing into her. She threw up an arm to keep from being blinded; staggering back. A second, smaller thorn wall started to rise around her, but the dark man crashed through it. His arm shot out and grabbed the woman by the throat.

The dark man laughed as he lifted Allison up into the air. "It's a pity, Gabriel," he said. "This was the most fun I've had in a long time."

Mory's eyes went wide. "Put her down! Put her down right now!"

Allison glanced over to where Mory was. She shook her head noticeably, and her gaze drifted over to William. She gave him as much of a nod as she could.

William grabbed Mory by the shoulders. "Turn away. We have to get out of here."

"No!" Mory shouted. "I'm not going to leave her."

She pounded on the thorn wall from the inside.

* * *

Gendou watched as the Descendant pounded futilely at the barrier. "Look at that, Gabriel," he taunted. "Look at how much she cares about you."

The Guardian glared at him, her purpling face having just as much to do with rage as it did with asphyxiation. "She....will kill you," she choked out.

"Perhaps," Gendou replied. "But if she is to try, she'll have good reason to do so." He tightened his grip.

A wet snap echoed through the warehouse, and he tossed the woman limply to the floor.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Chapter Fifteen

"The one thing you need to realize," Allison said, rummaging around in her duffel bag, "is that there is no such thing as destiny."

"But what about the prophecy you told me about?" Mory asked, stretching her sore muscles. "Isn't that a form of destiny?"

Allison stood up with two swords in her hands. "Here, catch." She tossed one of the swords to Mory. "Prophecies are tricky things. The deal with most of them is that they are self-fulfilling."

Mory passed her new sword around in her hands, getting a feel for the weight. "Self-fulfilling?"

"Yeah. Self-fulfilling." Allison thought for a second. "I'll give you an example. Say you always walk one way to get to work. You pass a dollar store on the street, but you never go in. Then one day you read a fortune cookie, or a horoscope, or something like that, and it says something like, 'To deviate from a path well-worn will bring you riches of a trivial sort, but you will overindulge and see that such a path is not wise.' You think to yourself, 'Hey, that means I should go in the dollar store and play one of those lottery scratch-cards.' So you go in, play a scratch card, and win fifty dollars."

"Well, go me," Mory said. "That's fifty dollars I wouldn't have had."

"I'm not finished," Allison said. "So you cash it in, and get your fifty dollars. Then you see a special on your favorite cookies, so you buy a couple boxes, and eat them all on the way to work. But the cookies were past the expiration date, and you get sick."

"That's one hell of a fortune cookie to predict all that."

"That's not the point, Mory," Allison admonished. "The point is that if you hadn't read that, you wouldn't have had any reason to go in the dollar store in the first place."

"Oh. OH. A self-fulfilling prophecy."

"Now you get it." Allison swung her sword in a tight circle, warming herself up. "People will always tell you things. They'll tell you what they think you should do, what they want you to hear. But you are always the master of your own life. You decide what you want to do, and why you want to do it. Don't let anyone tell you what you have to do. You don't have to do anything. You do what you feel is right."

"That makes sense," Mory said, frowning. "I think."

"There will come a time when all hope will seem to be lost. Where you see that something is inevitable. You may be in a situation that will probably kill you. But you shouldn't give up. Even if it doesn't look like you'll win, like you'll even survive, you should do everything in your power to keep fighting. If you've done everything you can, and still lose, then you've not lost after all; you've won something for someone else. But if you believe in something enough, you should always keep fighting for it.

"Keep fighting, Mory. Even if it kills you."

* * *

Mory stood, clutching the thorn wall in horror. She paid no attention to the thorns digging into her palms. She paid no attention to the blood running down her arms. She paid no attention to the fox-boy pulling at her shirt, trying to get her away from the scene.

She stared through the holes in the thorn wall. She stared at the remains of her best friend, and roommate.

Keep fighting, Mory. Even if it kills you.

Something resonated in the back of her mind. Something warm, and powerful. She reached for it, embracing it. She pulled at it as hard as she could, trying to bring the power to the forefront.

"You b*****d."

The tugging at her shirt stopped. She didn't care.

"You goddamn b*****d."

All emotion was drained from her voice. All that was left was coldness. All that was left was numb.

"I'll kill you."

"Hey....uh.....kid?"

Mory grimaced. "Back off, William." She started pounding on the thorn wall, like she had earlier. It didn't budge.

"No, you listen, girlie," he snapped. "We need to get out of here. She's giving us enough time for that, but the wall's going to come down eventually. We can't be here when that happens."

"Do you think I care?" William flinched at the hatred in her voice. "I'm going to kill him. You had better not be in my way when I do."

She kept pounding on the thorn wall.

* * *

Gendou stood over the still-warm body of the Guardian. He ignored the pounding coming from the barrier that she had put up. It didn't matter to him. Her magic was dissipating rapidly; the wall would be fragile enough to slice through soon enough.

"You fought well," he said. "It was an honor to face such a worthy opponent. But I should let you know, you died in vain. You did nothing but prolong the inevitable."

He gave a humorless chuckle. "Foolish even in death."

He turned to the wall. The Descendant was still pounding on the barrier from the inside; already, it was starting to pull away from the ceiling. He formed a shadow-blade and sliced easily through the dying vegetation.

Two more quick slashes, and he had a doorway.

"Now, sister, you will come with--"

He paused. Something wasn't right. The girl was still pounding away on the barrier, paying no attention to the fact that her quarry was already inside. Upon closer inspection, it appeared that the wall itself wasn't giving any to the girl's strikes - it should at least vibrate a little at this stage.

Blast. Of course.

Gendou formed his hands into a simple gesture in front of his body. "Kai."

The scene flickered for a bit before dissolving into nothingness, revealing what was actually there.

Or rather, what wasn't there.

The girl and the fox were gone, as was a section of the stone wall behind them. There was not even any trace of which direction they had taken off in.

Gendou gestured; the shadows around him congealed into two puddles on the ground, which formed into a pair of large black wolves.

"Find them," he commanded. "Destroy anyone in your path, but find them, and bring them to me."

The wolves nodded once, and silently leaped out into the night.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Chapter Sixteen

Pain.

Was it?

On her hands. On her palms. On her knuckles.

No. It didn't matter.

Pain.

In her heart.

Pain.

The halfling says something as he pulls her along. She doesn't pay attention to what he's saying. She doesn't care.

Emptiness.

Loneliness.

She stumbles on something. The halfling pulls her back to her feet, and drags her along again.

She continues on, numbly.

Anger.

Betrayal.

Why did she have to leave? Why did she have to go away? Why did she leave her all alone?

Pain.

They've stopped moving. She doesn't know where they are. She doesn't care.

Keep fighting, Mory. Even if it kills you.

Even if it kills you.

Kills you.

Kills you...

An anguished, inhuman howl pierced the night. It took her a few seconds to realize that it came from her.

Pain.

* * *

Weston slammed on the brakes, ignoring the subsequent honks and cursing from the cars behind him.

Something was wrong. Something had just torn at him from the inside, and he didn't know what.

Without understanding why, he turned his car around and went back the way he came, heading towards a destination that he wouldn't know until he got there.

* * *

William stood nearby where the girl had slumped down. He had no idea how to handle this situation.

"Kid...."

No response. Damnit, Grass Girl, why'd you have to stick me with this job?

"Kid," he repeated. "We have to keep moving. We have to get to the safe house."

Mory mumbled something that he couldn't quite catch.

"Kid, come on. The b*****d's probably right behind us, we have to keep moving--"

"I don't care."

William grabbed her arm and tried to pull her back up. "You can not care all you want when we're safe, girlie, now come on--"

"I said I'm not GOING!" Mory's eyes flashed and she swung her arm at the fox in a vicious backhanded strike.

He dodged the blow and jumped back a step. "What do you mean, you're not going? Do you just want the shadow-man to just find you here?"

"Why not?" Mory asked, not looking at him.

"Because he'll kill you," William said. "And most likely me."

"Let him."

William was silent for a moment. Oh, you really owe me now, Nature b***h. "Where's that anger I saw five minutes ago, kid? Where's the homicidal rage? Where is Moryera the Avenger?"

"Ally's dead..." Mory put her head in her hands and rocked back and forth on her heels. "She's dead, she's dead, she's dead, she's dead...."

"Oh, enough of that s**t," William snapped. He stepped back closer to the girl and slapped her as hard as he could. Mory looked up at him in shock, her eyes snapping back into focus. "Wake up. Yes, she's dead. And there's nothing we can do about it. So you can either wallow around in your disgusting self-pity, like you've currently set yourself to doing, or you can get up and take your life back into your own hands."

Mory stayed silent, but William could see that she was processing his words.

"Look, kid," he said, more gently. "I miss her too. But she gave her life to protect you, and you're not doing her any favors by throwing that gift back in her face. So get up, and let's get going."

* * *

Mory sat for a few more seconds. Allison was dead. Allison was dead.

Something clicked in her mind; something that the fox had said...

She stood up. "What did you mean before, about a safehouse?"

William smiled, an unfamiliar expression flickering through his eyes. "Yeah, a safehouse. I gotta hide somewhere, you know?" He motioned for her to follow, and she set herself to running after him - this time, under her own power. "The hippie girl wasn't entirely unprepared for this happening. She's got one final gift for you waiting back at my place."

They continued running in silence for a bit, before William stopped again. He tilted his head back and forth, sniffing the air.

"Oh, great," he said. "You got your strength back, kid?"

"Yeah," Mory responded, extending her fingernails into sharpened claws. "Why?"

"We've got company."

As if on cue, two creatures leapt at the from the shadows. Mory only got a quick glimpse of them before she ducked out of their way; they appeared to be wolves, but they were black as the night, and much larger than she figured wolves would be.

William disappeared in a flash of blue fire, and reappeared next to a nearby trashcan. He grabbed the metal lid and threw it at one of the wolves; it dodged and leapt at him, fangs glistening in the moonlight.

Mory raked her claws at the second beast, leaving deep gashes in its shoulder. It growled and glared at her. She jumped at the wolf, grappling with its muzzle. It slashed at her arms with its claws, tearing at her shirt and leaving large bloody tears in her skin. She rolled onto her back and brought her feet under its body, kicking it away into a wall. William jumped at her, transforming himself with another flash of blue flames into a long metal pole with a wickedly-curved blade at the end. She twirled her new weapon with a flourish and beckoned at the wolves.

In unison, the beasts rushed forward. She stabbed the bladed end of her weapon into the head of the first wolf, and used its body to bat the second out into the street. She tossed the lifeless body off to the side, and readied herself to strike at the remaining creature.

The wolf kept its distance, snarling at her.

"Come on," she taunted. "Afraid to meet the same fate as your brother?"

The wolf's eyes narrowed in hatred, and it tensed itself up to strike.

"Is that all you've got, then? Give me everything you can, puppy."

As if giving her its reply, the wolf grew to twice its normal size.

Well, s**t. Mory tensed up and prepared herself for a brutal attack.

An attack that never came. A car rounded the corner and slammed itself into the wolf's side, sending it sprawling down the street. A man got out and walked towards the beast, silently.

The wolf got to its feet and lunged at the man. The man stepped casually to the side, reached over to grab the wolf as it soared past, and calmly snapped its neck. He turned back to his car, muttered something under his breath, and then looked up at where Mory was staring at him.

"Are you all right?" he asked.

She nodded silently. His voice...it was so familiar...

The man walked into the light, and Mory got a good look at his face.

"Are you sure?" asked Weston. "You've got blood all over you."

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Chapter Seventeen

"Well, mes amis," William said as he unlocked the door to his apartment, "welcome to my humble s**t-hole of an abode. Don't bother to wipe your feet; whatever you track in will match some other stain."

Mory and Weston followed him into the tiny room. "Very, uh, nice place you've got here," Weston commented. "I...erm, like what you've done with it." He lifted a towel off a nearby lampshade, then quickly placed it back over the bloodstain underneath it.

William glared. "Smartass. Go make yourself useful and clear off that sofa."

As Weston went to make a clean place to sit, Mory made her way to the bathroom to clean herself up. They had been attacked a couple more times on the way to William's safehouse, each time by a small group of demonic creatures. Each time, she fought them off with increasing skill, and each time, Weston had been fighting right beside her. She had been shocked, but decided not to say anything until they arrived at their destination.

Likewise, he hadn't commented on her new appearance or superhuman speed and strength. He had recognized her right away, of course. And he hadn't acted like he was afraid of her. Mory didn't quite know how to take that. Was it a good thing? Did it mean that he accepted her as who she was, rather than how she looked? Or did he just not care enough about her for it to make a difference to him?

She wiped the last of the blood off her face and went back out to the main room. Weston was sitting on the couch. She sat on the chair across from him, carefully placing the dead squirrel to the side.

They stared at each other. Neither one spoke.

Millions of questions raced through Mory's mind, but she couldn't choose one. She stayed silent, as she studied the face across from her.

Weston's eyes were focused intently on her own. They too held questions she couldn't pick out, but they also showed calm restraint and concern.

She wished she knew what he was thinking. She wished she knew what to say. She wished--

"Hey, sweet cheeks, I found what I wanted to give you."

Mory jerked her head towards the sound, startled. "What? Bring it--" She coughed and cleared her throat. "Bring it in here."

She looked back at Weston. "I...uh...guess you want to know what happened out there."

Weston didn't move. "Demons attacked. We fought them off."

She blinked. "Erm...right. You probably want to know why I look different..."

"You're the Descendant."

"Um...yes. Okay..." Mory glanced around nervously. "How...how do you know? And I really didn't know you could fight like that."

Weston leaned back. "Well, that's the thing. I usually can't. My uncle had trained me in martial arts since I was really little. Sometimes he took me over to Allison's house, and her mom would train me with weapons and stuff. But I never had a need to use any of it until just recently."

Mory slumped down and stared at the stained carpet. "Did...did Ally's mom tell you why, then?"

"No," Weston said. "I had no idea about any of it until earlier today, when I went to go visit my uncle."

William came into the room, carrying a long, apparently heavy box. "No, don't get up. Please, sit back down. I'm fine, really." He dragged it over to the pile of clothes and small animals between Mory and Weston. His tail swept around and pushed the top layer of filth off the pile, revealing it to be a fairly dirty coffee table.

Mory crossed her arms. "Listen, I know that guys can be horrible at cleaning up their messes, but this is ridiculous."

William glared at her. "It's not mine, girlie. This place belongs to the matriarch of my clan. She owed me a favor, and I'm collecting on it."

"Must not have been a huge favor," Weston quipped. Mory giggled.

"Yeah, whatever, laugh it up. Just be glad that she's not here to hear you make comments about her den. It may not look like much, but the pissyfox is fiercely protective of the dump." William picked up the box and set it on top of the table. "Aside from the mess, this place has more wards on it than the Pentagon has security cameras. That's why I asked for it as a safehouse." He jumped onto the couch next to Weston, and nodded at the box. "Go ahead, kid. Open it up."

Mory opened the box and gasped. "It...it's beautiful..."

Inside the box was a sword. It was nestled securely inside a scabbard, which was covered on the outside with gorgeous tan leather, which was carved and molded to look like wood. The curve of the "rings" gave it an asymmetrical appearance, and it looked to have been recently polished until it shone. Mory touched it; it was the softest leather she had ever felt.

She lifted it out of the box and pulled the sword out of the sheath. The blade, too, appeared recently polished, and it gleamed in the soft light of the apartment. The crossguard was painted a dark green, and seemed to have a life of its own. The grip was also of a soft leather, this time dyed a light green and molded to look like tightly-wrapped vines. The end of the hilt was decorated with a large, round emerald, which shined with its own inner light.

"It's absolutely gorgeous," Mory whispered.

William beamed. "That there is the sword of the High Earth Mage. It was passed down from generation to generation since the Sealing. Each Guardian was trained in the art with that sword, before they went on to make their own, individual swords. Allison left that with me when she had her own weapon forged, and she told me to give it to you if something...happened..."

Weston's gaze left the blade. "What do you mean, if something happened? What happened? Where is Allison?"

Mory felt tears welling up in her eyes. "She...Weston, she's dead. She was...she..." She couldn't bring herself to finish the sentence.

"She was killed by the Dark One," William finished.

The color drained from Weston's face. "The Dark One? The other Descendant?"

William gave the man an appraising look. "What do you know about the Descendants?"

Weston reached into his coat pocket and pulled out a small leather-bound book. "When I went to see my uncle today, I found this near his body."

The fox-boy jerked backwards. "That's the journal of the Sealing!" he cried. "That was lost when the Wind family disappeared! Your uncle had it?"

"Yeah," said Weston. "He wrote something on the inside cover. Addressed it to me. He said that he was the last surviving Wind Guardian, and his time was nearing an end. Something about a Dark One going after the surviving Guardians."

"Then it has come full circle," William said. "Halfling spies have reported in that the Fire and Water Guardians were attacked last week; a ninja and a samurai. They had put up a fight, but the Dark One killed them. He apparently found the Wind Guardian today, so he was saving Allison for last."

Mory slid the sword back in its sheath. "Does this thing have a name?"

"Name? What is it with you humans? Always gotta name your swords. The Phoenix Blade. Excalibur. The Sword of Truth. The Blade of Babybane. Can't a weapon just be a weapon? It's almost like those guys were naming their--"

"William."

The fox sighed. "It has been known as the Herald. The Earth Mage was weird like that, naming his stuff to fit in with his name. He also decreed that all the Guardians after him would be named Gabriel, after him. If you ask me, kid, he had a huge head."

"Gabriel...that's what the shadow man called Ally." Mory frowned. "But her middle name was Gabrielle. Is that why?"

William gave her a sad smile. "She was right about you, you know. She said you were a lot smarter than you gave yourself credit for."

Mory ran her hand over the leather covering of the scabbard. "Then you know what I'm going to say next."

"Mory," William said, placing a hand on her arm. She looked up, startled. It was the first time he had used her name without a mocking nickname or comment.

"You can't stop me."

He smiled. "I wasn't going to. But you need to realize that she didn't want you to do this out of revenge."

"Revenge?" Mory stood up and strapped the sword to her back, just the way she had seen Allison do it earlier. "This isn't revenge." She drew the sword and twirled it around once in a tight circle, testing its weight.

"This is justice."

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Chapter Eighteen

"Could you stop knocking over the lamp?"

Mory glared at the fox-boy. "It looks better like that," she said. "Look, the hole in its side matches the one in your head."

"Very funny," William snapped. "Go exercise your wit outside, as long as you're going to be swinging that thing around. There's a small training field on the rooftop."

"All right," she said, sheathing her sword. She left the apartment, muttering to herself.

"Ungrateful little..." William grumbled, pacing the floor. He stopped in front of Weston, who was still sitting on the couch. "Hey, you're the last of the Wind now, right? You got any powers?"

"Powers?" Weston asked, blinking. "No, not that I know of. My uncle never told me I had any powers. He just taught me how to fight; said I'd need it later on." He glanced down at the floor. "So Allison's really...?"

"Yup."

"And she was the Earth Guardian, then?"

William nodded. "Yeah. b***h was always on my case, too. 'Don't underestimate your opponent,' she'd say." He grinned. "She got real pissed at me when I made some crack about her powers, once. Held me upside-down by a vine for three hours. I thought I was gonna pass out. And all I said was, 'What're you gonna do, hippie? Grow flowers at me?'"

"You don't seem like you were that close to her," Weston remarked.

"What, are you shittin' me?" William sputtered. "She and I were the best of friends! I always looked out for her. Saved her life a couple times."

Weston stared.

"Well, all right, she was the one who saved my life. But just because we were always arguing doesn't mean we weren't close." The fox twitched his ears. "We...we had an understanding, really. I'd watch her back, and she'd always bring me food. To see her just...tossed aside like that...I..." He trailed off, suddenly unable to continue.

Weston stood up suddenly. "Well, I think I'd better go check up on Mory. We'll be down later."

William blinked a couple times. "Huh? Oh, sure. I'll just...clean up." He picked up the box and made a show of closing it up and dragging it off as Weston left.

"Thanks, kid," the fox whispered as the door closed.

* * *

Mory thrust the sword at an imaginary opponent, and twirled it around in a complicated defense. She put herself and her weapon through a series of practice maneuvers, all flowing into a seamless dance.

...keep fighting, Mory...

She swung high, where a normal man's head would be, following through with a kick to her imaginary opponent's midsection.

...a lot more human casualties than there were immortal ones...

She thrust her elbow into a dark, shadowy face, and raked her blade upwards through the midsection, opening the imaginary body up.

...underestimates what we can do. They assume that Earth-type magic is the weakest of the four elements...

She swung the sword with enough force to decapitate a full-grown man; it struck a nearby wooden post and lodged itself tight. She left it there and punched the wall as hard as she could.

...it's raw, unfocused. You need to train it, to learn how to use it without losing yourself...

She kept punching the wall, over, and over again, tears streaming down her face. Pain flared in her hand; she ignored it.

Not a sound escaped her as she attacked the wall. Not a sound as she wept.

It's the silent tears that hurt the most.

* * *

Weston stood in the doorway to the stairwell, silently watching the scene on the rooftop. He watched as the lilac-haired girl threw the last, earth-shattering punch, leaving a large crack in the brick wall. He watched as she slumped down to the ground.

He wanted to go comfort her. To put his arm around her shoulders, to whisper the soothing cliches that everyone found themselves listening to in times of sadness.

He held back, however. He knew, more than anyone, that sometimes it was best to be left alone. She was working through her grief on her own terms, and she'd come out stronger for it. It was why he had left the kitsune alone in the apartment - Weston had seen that the fox-boy was grieving in his own way, but was too self-conscious to shed tears around strangers.

Mory was kneeling next to the wall, facing away from Weston. Her shoulders stopped heaving, and she drew an arm across her face. "Hi, Weston," she said softly, not turning around.

Weston left the doorway and walked up to where she was kneeling. He didn't ask how she knew he was there; she was probably learning how to use her newly heightened senses to recognize people from a distance.

"It's...strange."

Weston blinked. "What's strange?"

"I've never even touched a sword in my life before today," she said. "But I can use that one perfectly, as if I had used it all my life." She turned to him. Her face was red and puffy, and still fairly wet with tears. Her eyes were focused and glinted in the moonlight. "Ally said I was taking all this from the soul inside me. That I'd automatically know how to do certain things, without being taught." She shook her head and gave him a beautiful, sad smile. "Everything's different now. Everything's changed."

Weston put his hand on her shoulder. "You know what they say. The more things change--"

"The more ******** up they stay?"

He chuckled. "Something like that."

She stood up and walked to where she had left her sword. It had sunk fairly deep into the wood, and it looked to be wedged too tight for any normal person to remove it. Mory pulled it free with a grunt, wiped it off, and put it back into the sheath on her back.

She turned back to him. "I need your help," she said. "I...I can't do this alone."

He stepped up to her and placed his hands on her shoulders. "You won't. I'll be with you every step of the way."

"I have to stop him. I have to keep fighting." Tears started welling up in her eyes again. "Even if it kills me."

"It won't." He pulled her into a tight embrace, and felt her arms wrap warmly around him.

She turned her face up to look deeply into his eyes. "You...won't leave me?"

"Never."

Slowly, she leaned forward until her lips were touching his. And in that moment, everything was swept away; all the sadness, all the fear, all of it was lost in that instant, leaving only bliss.

The world existed for nothing but them.  

[AllianceSJR]

[ Message temporarily off-line ]  

[AllianceSJR]

Chapter Twenty-Five

William shifted slightly in his hiding spot, trying to get comfortable. Or as comfortable as he could in a tree. His kind didn't belong up high, they belonged on the ground. Preferably in a cave-like den of some sort.

Besides, he had never trusted trees since that failed prank on Nature b***h.

He shifted again. Sitting up here was starting to get painful, even in full-fox form. He had been up in the tree for three and a half hours - he could tell because he could easily see the glowing clock on a bank sign - waiting for the Guardian to show up. It was nearly two in the morning, and he was tired. And hungry. And in a mood to kill something.

Clan Mother LeMoru had pulled him aside earlier that day, and told him that she had received word that someone claiming to be the Shadow Descendant had contacted one of the Guardians, supposedly in an attempt to reconcile an ancestral disagreement. From what the Den knew, the Dark lineage had been lost when the Fire clan and the Water clan apparently disbanded, for reasons that have never been all that clear to the kitsunes.

Allison had appeared worried when William had asked her about it. She hadn't heard anything about any of the other clans, nor about the Descendant's sudden re-emergence. She was especially troubled - as LeMoru had been - at the idea that the Descendant knew of his past. Especially since the other Descendant hadn't shown any signs at all of recovering powers or memories. She promised to keep a closer watch on the Light Descendant.

A movement across the way startled him out of his thoughts. He watched as a black mist started to pool next to a park bench. The mist rose to form a darkly-clothed man, who stood silently, waiting for something.

What the...

Something was very definitely wrong. This was the Descendant, no doubt about that, but he shouldn't have had this much control over his powers. And he definitely shouldn't have figured out that particular one.

"Come out from hiding," the figure said. "I can see you."

William choked. No way could he have been spotted from there.

He gave a sigh of relief as another voice rang out.

"Why did you send for me?" The voice seemed to come from everywhere at once.

The dark figure seemed to sigh. "Please, it is insulting to put your illusions against me. I would rather speak to you face to face."

Silence.

"Very well," the second voice said. The air shimmered in front of William, and a black-suited woman appeared where there had previously been a trash can.

"Thank you," said the dark man.

The woman stretched her neck, and moved her hand behind her, ready to draw the short sword she had strapped to her back. "Why did you send for me?" she repeated. "Our families parted ways about sixty years ago." She took a wary step forwards. "And furthermore, how can you have access to that much of your powers?"

The Descendant chuckled. "My apologies, Rokubungi-san. I should not have assumed that you would know."

"My name isn't Rokubungi."

"No?" The dark man waved a hand nonchalantly. "Pity. I rather liked that name. Brings back memories of your ancestor. You positively shine with his essence."

The woman took an involuntary step backwards. "M..memories? What do you--no, you couldn't have!"

The dark man started walking towards her. "I'm sorry? Couldn't have what?"

"That should have been impossible," she said, fearfully. "The power, it should have killed you!"

"And it nearly did." He stopped directly in front of her, and casually lifted his hair away from the left side of his face. The woman gasped, seeing the painful-looking scars and the solid-white eye. "I was...careless, in thinking I could easily handle the Lichlord's power. It was a lesson I learned, of sacrifice."

He lowered his hair over his ravaged face. "But enough about that. As for why I called you here. I suppose you know the truth about the Seal?"

The woman's hand gripped the blade, still sheathed. "The Seal was meant to keep you and your filthy kind away from the mortal world." The woman visibly calmed, and slid the blade free of its scabbard. "If you are planning on telling me that you intend to break the Seal, I will have no choice but to stop you."

Almost faster than William could see, the woman rushed at the dark man, and swept the blade upwards, cleaving him in two. She ran past and twirled to face him, watching as he crumpled to the ground.

She stepped backwards as the body dissipated into a thin mist, which melted away.

"Pity."

She whirled around, searching for the source of the voice. "No!"

The dark man stepped out from behind a nearby tree, unharmed. "Did your ancestors teach you nothing? You come from a powerful ninja clan, and you cannot tell the difference between a physical body and a kage bunshin?"

He shook his head sadly. "Though I cannot put you at blame; my shadow clone was much more...convincing than your sorcery and smoke. But it appears that I have your answer. I am sorry that you cannot see the reason for my plea to you."

Twin blades formed in his hands. "But I cannot let you stand against me." Closing his visible eye with an almost sad expression on his face, he sighed.

The woman had no time to blink as he swiftly recovered and rushed at her.

* * *

"That's when I left the tree to find some higher ground."

Mory glowered at him. "You left her there to fight him?"

"Are you kidding?" William protested. "He moved too fast for me to even follow. I could tell the fight was going to be huge, so I decided to get out of harm's way and watch from a less risky position."

The Guardian narrowed her eyes. "I don't remember that much, fox. But it is just like your kind to tell deceitful lies and slander against the Master."

"Quiet, firegirl," Mory snapped.

"I will not be silenced! Once I escape from these bonds, I will kill you where you stand!"

"Was she always like this?" Weston mused from behind him.

William turned. "No, she was a nice girl. She was caring, and loving, but dedicated to whatever her current goal was. She sees us as her enemies, so I'm not surprised to see her reaction." He looked down at his feet. "But I saw her killed. She shouldn't be..."

Mory frowned at the pause. "She shouldn't be what?"

William groaned, smacking his forehead with his palm. "Oh, Clan Mother. I forgot."

He turned back to face the violet-haired girl. "The Descendant, he merged with the soul of Lord Nazushette, gaining his memories and his more powerful abilities. He seems to have figured out his power over death."

"But that means...!"

"Yes." William looked at the Guardian with new eyes. "She's still dead. She just hasn't gotten around to the 'not moving' part yet."

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Chapter Twenty-Six

"Las, honey, you really shouldn't have bothered those humans."

Las bowed her head. "But momma," she said, plaintively, "they were nice to me, and they had big smiles!"

Her mother sighed. "Las, they're humans. Humans are mean and nasty and they don't understand."

"Not these humans." Las shook her head emphatically. "No, they were nice to me."

"I don't want you going near any more humans, do you understand me?"

"Momma," Las said, "I'm twenty years old. I'm not a little cub anymore!"

"Yes you are," her mother snapped. "And you'll do as I say!"

"You're wrong about the humans!" Las said, sobbing. "You're just being a...a...racist bigot!"

Her mother stretched a hand out to the kit. "Las, honey..."

Las batted the hand away with her tail and scampered out of the house.

She stifled her sniffles as she put as much distance between her and her mother as she could on her short legs. Her mother was wrong about the humans. She was just misguided, with the same prejudices and fear that she was raised with.

It was sickening. Las had been taught all her life that humans were evil ones who burned anything that they didn't understand. And then there were two of them, right in the Den, and they seemed...nice, for lack of a better word. They were normal.

They were just like she was, she figured. Only taller, and with much less fur. They had seemed delighted when she had talked to them, and shown them her progress in her transformation. And then they had said...

...they had said to listen to her momma.

Humans were nice. But listen to momma. Momma says that humans are bad.

Las stopped and shook her head, trying to clear it. It was all so confusing.

She ran off in the direction of the Meeting Hall. The Clan Mother would help her straighten this all out.

* * *

"For a dead person, she moves pretty fast," Mory commented, wiping the blood off her hand. The gash from the sword had already healed, though the blood drips had left a stain on her clothing.

The Guardian glared at her from across the cavern, struggling at her bonds. William had transformed the kodachi into a length of rope, and had expertly bound the woman's hands and feet.

Weston frowned. "You said this happened a week ago?"

William nodded. "Yeah. Roughly. They fought for a bit, but he grabbed her at the end, and picked her up..." He trailed off, horror flashing through his face. "Guys...I left before I saw what happened to the body. He must have taken it back here and...revived her."

Mory felt like she was going to be sick. "Ugh. How the hell could he have the power to do that?"

"He said it himself," William responded. "Or rather, he hinted at it. But he must have bonded to the soul within him, giving him all of the Lichlord's powers and memories. And we were hoping that his talent for necromancy would have been left...well, buried."

"How can he have bonded to the soul? I haven't heard a peep from my tenant since I found out about her."

William shrugged. "I don't know. But he seems to have done so. Which means that you can't possibly face him down, unless you find a way to unlock all your powers and memories, as well."

Weston jerked his thumb at the Guardian. "What do we do with her?"

The fox-boy sighed. "We...we have to dispel his influence over her."

"Which means killing her again," Mory spat. "Hasn't she been through enough?"

"You mean being murdered, only to be raised as a servant?" William countered. "I'm talking about mercy, here. Would you want to have s**t like that done to you?"

Mory's face flushed. "Well...no!"

"Glad we're in agreement, kid. So get to it."

The lavender-haired girl started. "Me? Why can't you do it?"

William glared. "Only Xalenthia was powerful enough to dispel a summoning by Nazushette himself. I don't have a purely Light alignment, and even if I did, I'm nowhere near as powerful enough to do something like that."

"I have no idea how to do that!" she cried.

"You'd best figure it out, girlie," William snorted. "Look deep inside yourself. Stretch out with your feelings. Lower the blast shield on that helmet."

Mory shot him a Look of Death, and stepped up to where the Guardian was bound. She closed her eyes, trying to think of how the hell she was supposed to do this.

She felt something dark in front of her. It felt cold, damp, and sticky; like a surface that had tape on it that was removed suddenly. She opened her eyes.

There was a dark aura around this woman. She wasn't sure how she could see it, but she could. She could see it, and feel it. She could smell it; it smelled musty and rotten.

It didn't belong.

She had no idea what it was, but she knew it didn't belong. It...offended her.

She clenched her right hand, and was surprised to see that she had drawn her sword. She didn't remember reaching back for it, but it was there, in her hand. She felt the sword, felt its presence and its shape with this new sense that she couldn't identify.

The sword, she realized, smelled.

It smelled like home, like family. It smelled old, but rightfully so.

And furthermore, it smelled normal. This sword had no power in it. It was not a mystical weapon; the only thing out of the ordinary about it was how old it was, and how well-loved it seemed to be. There was no power.

But it felt right to be in her hands at the moment. More than right. It felt like it was needed for the task at hand.

She found herself pushing her energy into the sword. Her power, her own essence and magic, was pouring out of her hand and into the blade.

And then she knew. She knew what needed to be done. She knew what was happening. Awareness flooded into her as she stared at the sword in her hand, watching it start to glow softly.

Five seconds after she had opened her eyes, she had come to a new understanding. She understood what she was. She understood what this power was.

And she hated it.

* * *

Weston stood watching as Mory stepped up to where the woman was. She drew her sword in one smooth, swift motion, and he watched in amazement as the blade started to glow.

She moved, he thought, as if she had done this many times before. She seemed sure of herself, and confident in what she was doing.

He watched as she brought the blade down through the ropes binding the Flame Guardian. The woman, now released, shot to her feet and rushed at Moryera.

It happened almost too fast for him to see. The woman leapt at Mory, arms in a deadly-looking martial-arts pose. Mory stepped to the side, used her free hand to spin the woman about, and almost effortlessly slid the sword through her chest. The blade's glow intensified, becoming blindingly bright for a moment.

The woman crumpled to the ground, lifeless.

Mory was facing away from Weston; he couldn't see her face. But her head was tilted downwards, and her shoulders were slumped. He heard her whisper in a soft, breathy whisper.

"I forgive you."

The blade's glow dissipated, leaving it a normal length of blood-stained steel.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Chapter Twenty-Seven

Darkness surrounded Mory. She could not see a thing about her; she held her hand out to summon the white flames, but they would not come. She couldn't feel their flickering warmth against her palm.

She couldn't feel much of anything, for that matter. No ground under her feet, no walls around her. She had a slight sensation of falling, but she couldn't tell where.

Suddenly her feet struck something solid. She took a cautious step forward, to make sure she didn't imagine it. She took another step. And another.

A light flared into existence ahead of her. There was a dimly-lit tunnel, leading...somewhere that she could not see.

She made her way down the path.

* * *

She stood still, almost a statue. Her bloodstained sword was still in her hands; aside from the occasional drip from the end of the blade, it too was unmoving.

"Mory?" called Weston. "Mory, please, say something."

William shook his head sadly. "It's no use, slick. She's been like that for ten minutes now."

Weston ignored him. "Mory, wake up, please." He reached out and shook her shoulder.

No response.

Worried, Weston ran around in front of her. He stopped short at what he saw.

Mory's face was rigid. Her frozen expression was one of shock and fear, and at the same time, sadness. Her eyes were wide open; also unmoving, save the tears, silently streaming down her face.

Weston's heart lurched as he looked into her eyes. The warm brown that he remembered was completely gone, as well as the more recently cool shade of blue that had been present the night before. Now, in its place was a dull, lifeless grey.

He grabbed her by the shoulders and shook her again, harder. "Look at me! Come on, say something!"

He felt a hand on his shoulder. "Leave her, kid," William said. "She has to wake up on her own."

Weston spun around to face the fox-boy. "What do you mean? What happened to her?"

William cast his eyes downward, and pressed his ears flat against his head. "It has to do with her powers, and awakening them." He walked to the torch, motioning for Weston to follow. The flames had shifted from the burning red to a softer, more natural yellow.

"Each of the Descendants had their powers locked away deep inside them. Whether the Mages intended it that way or not is something that's been debated for centuries, but the fact of the matter is that they never knew the power inside them." William shook his head. "And that was perfectly fine; frankly, we didn't want them to gain those kinds of powers. The rulers of the Immortals were too powerful for their own good, and when they decided to wage war on one another, they laid waste to much of the world as it was.

"And they didn't care about any humans getting in their way, either. Just plowed right through them, or used them to train their troops. You ever hear of the Black Plague?"

Weston nodded silently.

"That was no disease. That was a curse that the Shadow commanders were testing out." William sighed. "And the Light forces were no better. They frequently raided villages and towns and captured people to use as test subjects for spells and curses, or simply as bodies for their soldiers to train against. They were only mortal, what did they matter?

"The thing is, though, that all of these orders were coming from as high as possible. The rulers of the domains, Xalenthia and Nazushette. They often performed these tests themselves, and had hordes of human slaves that they used to keep themselves in fighting shape."

William shuddered. "If the Sealing had only worked on two beings, it would have done its job fine with Xalenthia and Nazushette."

Weston blinked. "How come? I mean, what about the rest of the Immortals? Weren't they doing the same?"

"The thing is, slick," William replied, "before those two took control of all the beings under their power, they were just fine by themselves. Sure, they attacked humans and each other if they were bothered or hungry or something, but the same with wild animals, and other humans. The leaders took command, and ruled over all those under their alignment."

"All right," Weston said. "But what does that all have to do with Mory?"

"I'm getting there, sparky. Be patient." William ran a hand through his shaggy silver hair. "My point is that no one really wanted the Descendants to gain access to that kind of power. I don't know about you, but I really don't want another war like that one. That happens, and you can kiss your a** goodbye.

"But the Shadow Lord has already returned, in whatever form he could. He had to sacrifice himself to merge with the Descendant, but they now share one mind and one body." William glanced nervously at the lavender-haired girl, still frozen near the remains of the Flame Guardian. "From what Allison told me, Mory started to gain access to her powers after a traumatic experience. She started to gain more control after Allison died.

"And now she's killed her first human. From what it looks like, her tenant decided that now was a good time to pull her in for a chat."

* * *

Mory reached the end of the tunnel, and blinked as she was hit with a bright light. She pulled her arm away as her eyes adjusted and took a tentative step forward.

She was in a wide open space, filled with white marble columns and fountains and gardens of colorful flowers. A wide walkway stretched out in front of her, leading to a rectangular pond. A throne stood at the end of the walkway, unattended.

She walked up to the pond, and knelt down beside it. She gasped at the image that stared back at her.

Her reflection was of her, before the ill-fated blind date. Before she had become...more. Long brown hair cascaded down past her shoulders, framing a face that was most definitely still hers. Her eyes had returned to their normal brown, and lacked the ferocity that had been in her expression at William's apartment.

"I'm...I'm me again," she said to no one in particular.

She leaned forward to get a better view of her reflection, and frowned. It was her, but definitely not her clothing. She was wearing a black sleeveless top that she recognized as the one Allison had been wearing. Around her neck was a silver necklace that she did not recognize; the pendant depicted a sunburst. And strapped across her back was a sword; not only a sword, but her sword, with the vine-wrapped hilt and the double-helix crossguard.

Another reflection appeared in the water, of a tall woman with long, shining white hair. She had ice-blue eyes, and an annoyed expression on her face. Most disconcerting of all, however, was the fact that she had simply appeared behind Mory's reflection.

Mory spun around, reaching for her sword, but there was no one behind her. She drew her sword, warily.

"Put that dreadful thing away, girl, before you hurt yourself."

She whirled around again, searching for the source of the voice, and took an involuntary step backwards.

The woman was sitting on the throne in front of her. The throne that had previously been empty.

"I said, put that thing away," the woman barked. "Don't make me tell you again."

Mory kept a grip on the weapon. "Tell me who you are, and where I am."

The woman narrowed her eyes. "Insolent mortal. You dare talk back to Xalenthia, Queen of the Light?"

Mory's eyes widened. "Xalenthia...you're who's inside me. You're the source of my powers, and the reason I look the way I do now." She brought her hand up to her dark hair. "Well, the way I did."

"Well done. It's amazing how you mortals tend to state the obvious." Xalenthia stood up and crossed her arms. "Yes, girl, I am she. Come closer, and I'll demonstrate those powers on you."

"No thanks. Where the hell am I?"

Xalenthia uncrossed her arms, and swept them to her sides in a regal gesture. "You are in my Great Hall. Or rather, a re-creation of my Great Hall. I could not transform it exactly as it was, however hard I tried." She glared down at Mory. "To be more specific, we are inside yourself. I brought you down to set some things straight."

Mory looked around. "Is that why I look different now?"

Xalenthia waved her hand dismissively. "Perhaps. Your mind has its own self image; your current appearance reflects that which you imagine yourself to be."

Mory started walking around the rectangular pond. "Why did you bring me here, then?"

"Because you and I are merging into one." Xalenthia frowned as Mory made her way around the pond and stopped in front of her. "You have been taking my power into yourself, and making it your own. This cannot continue."

"What?" Mory snapped, "I'm not stealing your power. If anything, you're forcing it onto me!"

"I am not."

"So what the hell is going on, then?"

Xalenthia pursed her lips. "Every time you encounter a situation you cannot handle alone, you have taken my power into yourself. Each time you have done that, a piece of myself is destroyed." She smiled wickedly. "And each time that happens, a piece of yourself is also destroyed. Whether you are aware of this or not, you and I are becoming unraveled. And we are being put back together as something...else."

Mory clenched her fist. "I don't want that to happen."

"It is no use arguing the fact, it has already begun." The woman closed her eyes in thought. "There is a solution, however."

Mory narrowed her eyes. "Why are you telling me this? Don't you hate me?"

"Indeed I do, mortal. That is not the issue." She opened her eyes once more, and glared down at the brown-haired girl. "I would like nothing more than to see you perish. However, as...enmeshed as the two of us have already become, that would lead to my own death."

"And that puts you in a very precarious position," Mory realized. "Which means...what, you'll give me your power when I ask?"

Xalenthia sniffed haughtily. "I'm afraid not. But the fact of the matter is that you and I are merging together already." She leaned forward. "I propose that we take control of this process and do this on our terms, instead of leaving it up to fate. We would join ourselves willingly, and become something greater. The resulting being would be neither of us, yet both of us at the same time. And I shall be reborn, as that fool Nazushette already has."

"This is still my body."

"And it will also become mine."

Mory thought for a while, before coming to her decision. "No."

"What?"

"I said no." Mory sheathed her sword. She glanced at the marble pillars nearest her; they crumbled and toppled. She gestured at the floral gardens surrounding the fountains; they withered and died.

"How are you doing this?!"

"You said it yourself," Mory said, smirking. "We're inside me. And the only one who will have control of me is me, do you understand that? You've been rooming in my body my entire life; I think it's time you paid rent."

She made another gesture, and two thick vines grew out of the ground and wrapped around Xalenthia. "Here's the deal; if I need my power, you'll let me know how to use it. You're going to teach me what my body can and cannot do, and you will not have any say on how I use my abilities."

"I refuse."

Mory smiled innocently. "Very well. But keep in mind that your Nazushette is after me. If he kills me, you die too."

"..."

"Think it over. I'll be waiting for your answer." Mory released the woman from the vines, turned around, and walked to the exit.

"Wait!"

Mory stopped. "Yes?" she asked, turning around.

Xalenthia's face was red, though Mory couldn't tell if it was rage or embarrassment. Probably a combination of the two, she thought. "Very well," she finally said. "When you return to your body, you will have access to my knowedge of everything regarding your powers and abilities."

Mory smiled sweetly at her. "Aw, thanks! That's so nice of you. See you around!"

She walked out the doorway, back into the darkness.

* * *

A noise sounded from behind Weston. He turned around to see Mory wiping her sword on a length of fabric.

"Mory!" he called.

William glanced up. "Kid, you're awake!"

Mory nodded, sheathing her sword. She ran her fingers through her violet hair. "Yeah, it's me."

William ran up to where she was standing, but stopped just out of arm's reach. "Is it...just you?"

Mory nodded. "It's just little ol' me. Same Moryera Thorne you know and love." She smiled, though William could see that the smile was not for him.

Weston wrapped her in a hug. She hesitated a moment, then wrapped her arms back around him. "I'm glad you're back," he whispered.

"Me too," she whispered back. "Me too."

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Chapter Twenty-Eight

Las opened the door to the Meeting Hall. "Clan Mother?" she called. "Are you there?

Something was wrong. She smelled something...off, but she couldn't place what it was, exactly.

"Clan Mother?" she repeated. There was no answer.

Las went into the darkened building, warily glancing about. There was nobody in the main room, but the doorway to the stairs to the second floor was ajar. She scampered up the steps.

The second floor was much more brightly-lit than the ground floor. Large windows covered the walls, providing a full view of the entire city.

"Are you lost, little cub?"

Las turned around to face the owner of the deep voice. It was a rather tall man, wearing all-black clothing. His dark hair obscured one side of his face; his visible red eye twinkled merrily at her.

"I...I didn't see you there," she said.

"Oh, people tend to pass by me all the time," remarked the man, cryptically. "Some people have told me that I tend to...sink into the shadows." He leaned forward.

"You know," Las commented, "I'm not really supposed to talk to strangers. Momma got really mad at me for talking to those two humans earlier today."

"Really?"

Las nodded emphatically. "Yeah."

The dark man pondered this for a moment. "Well, what's your name, little cub?"

"I'm Lasreaine, but people just call me Las, 'cause it's a long name."

The dark man chuckled. "Well, my name is Gendou. How do you do?"

Las smiled. "How do you do?"

Gendou bowed his head. "There, now we know each other. So we're not strangers anymore, are we?"

Las thought that over. "Well...I guess not."

"Good!" Gendou clapped his hands once. "Well, Las, can I ask you a tiny favor, now that we know each other so well?"

Las nodded. "Sure!"

Gendou knelt down and gently placed a gloved hand on her head. "Do you remember those two humans you said you saw earlier?"

She nodded again.

"I'm going to have you deliver a message to them for me."

* * *

"So are we going to encounter any more rooms like this?" Mory asked.

Weston flipped through the journal. "No, this should be a straight shot to the Final Altar."

"That's where the Phoenix Blade should be," William noted. "We'll need to grab it and bring it back to the Den."

"I don't know," Mory said. "I've got a bad feeling about this."

"Please don't say that," William pleaded. "It always gets worse when someone says that."

"Well," she countered, "think about it. We're trying to take the Phoenix Blade so that the shadow-guy can't have it, right?"

"Right."

The three exited the cavern and made their way down the short corridor towards the next room.

"Well, there are a few really big holes in this plan," Mory commented.

"What do you mean?"

Weston glanced up from the journal. "I see it too. We know that he used the Blade to unseal the Shadow, right?"

William nodded. "Yeah."

"So that means he's already had his hands on the sword." Weston motioned towards the doorway to the next chamber. "And who knows what traps he set for us in there?"

William frowned. "There's only one way to find out."

* * *

The following chamber was at least five times bigger than the last, and roughly hemispherical. Torches lined the wall, following the curve of the room all the way around. The walls themselves were covered in various carvings; images of great battles long ago, words written in languages long dead.

In the center of the room was a stone altar. Much like the rest of the cavern, it was covered in mysterious carvings. Unknown symbols, strange lettering, and simple artwork - all of this was crammed into as much surface area as possible.

In the center of the altar was a sword, the blade halfway plunged into the stone, like some Arthurian legend. Mory felt herself drawn to it; she found that she had walked halfway to it without realizing she had taken the steps.

William and Weston had stayed back near the doorway. Mory didn't care - the sword had all of her attention.

She made her way right up to the altar, and stared. It was beautiful. The blade itself was black as night, yet somehow shone brighter than any black metal she had ever seen before. It was also not a straight blade; both edges curved in an almost feminine manner. The crossguard was a bright red, and was formed to mimic two feathery wings, swept forward towards the blade. At the intersection was set a large black jewel. The grip had long since decomposed, leaving a smooth orange shaft of metal that ended in a plain, rounded nub.

"This is it, then," she whispered. "I can feel it."

She turned to the guys. "We found--"

Her words were cut off when the ground gave a tremble. A wall of thorns rose up to block the passageway.

William jumped to the side. "s**t. Guys, I think things just got a bit more interesting."

Weston placed a hand on the wall next to him to steady himself. "Define 'interesting'."

" 'Oh God, oh God, we're all going to die'?"

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Chapter Twenty-Nine

Mory stared at the thorn wall, raising her hand to her weapon. She glanced around as her senses alerted her. There was danger here, which meant that it was time for some fun.

She frowned as she discarded that thought. Don't you start, she snapped at the other consciousness within her. There's something way too familiar about this all, though, she thought, as the ground started to shake.

Various senses and instincts were screaming at her - too many to keep track of. She closed her eyes and tried to shut it all out. She succeeded only in giving herself a headache.

Damnit, she thought. Yeah, you've given me awareness of all my senses and abilities. How am I supposed to use them, now?

She felt, rather than heard, haughty laughter from inside her. Well, you should have said so to begin with.

Ha. Ha ha ha ha. What the hell am I supposed to do?

She felt Xalenthia sigh. Calm your mind, and let everything wash over you. Only when you are at peace with yourself will you know how to use your new instincts.

"Great," muttered Mory. "I'm getting Jedi training." She closed her eyes again, and let her mind settle. The wash of feelings and warnings, now unrestricted by her attempts to control them, flowed past her consciousness, melding together and - she was pleased to note - settled themselves down, becoming less noticeable to her thoughts.

All save one. Above!

Without pausing to make sense of that warning, she threw herself to the side, rolling as she landed into a ready crouch. A smallish boulder dropped from the ceiling, crashing into the spot on the floor where she had just been previously.

"I don't think that this room is quite stable," Weston noted, dryly. "Maybe you shouldn't have touched anything."

"What," retorted William, "you think that was a load-bearing sword?"

"Looked important enough to me."

"Quiet!" Mory hissed at them. "We're not alone in here."

She forced her mind to calm itself again, and let her awareness focus on her enhanced senses.

She still wasn't used to her new abilities, especially since it had only been a couple days since the transformation. But she was finding it easier to accept that she not only could hear the heartbeats of everyone in the room, but that she could pick out who was who by the pattern of each beat.

She was coming to terms that she could pick apart various scents, and that she now associated these scents with people - Weston's scent, she had noted, kind of reminded her of sandalwood, and William smelled a bit like a familiar dog.

Her vision, though, was what astounded her the most. Having needed to wear glasses for longer than she could remember, the sudden clarity at which she now saw continued to stupefy her whenever she stopped to think about. Not only was her vision corrected, but it was sharper than it ever was with her glasses on. She could identify various objects and people at a ranger farther than she ever thought possible.

It scared her, at times.

This, however, was not one of those times.

She stilled her thoughts and allowed herself to process the information her senses were providing. There was an additional heartbeat in the chamber, one that she couldn't easily identify through the groundquakes. She could pick out an additional scent, though it was mostly masked by the dust that had been kicked up into the air.

But what Mory found the most useful was the fact that she could spot flashes of movement on the ceiling; something (or someone) was moving about in the darkened shadows, using the craggy surface to keep from falling. But even with her enhanced sight, she could only pick out the movement, not the actual form. There was the occasional flash of red, and a glint of gold...

Oh....oh no...

Praying that she wasn't guessing correctly, she withdrew her focus from all but her ears and eyes, letting herself return to a normal state of consciousness.

"William, give me something long-range."

"What?"

She kept her gaze on the ceiling of the chamber. "You can turn to weapons, right? Give me something I can use to hit the ceiling."

The movement paused momentarily, and then flashed off in a different direction, dislodging another chunk of stone as it passed over their heads. Mory leapt out of the way again, and sensed the others do the same. "You might want to hurry."

* * *

William tensed. His mind was frozen on a single memory - the memory of the last time he had seen this particular transformation.

There was a reason that William was the only kitsune with silver fur. This was not because of nobility (anyone who came in contact with the fox would have trouble even processing the concept), but of simple genetics. Those born with silver fur were especially gifted in illusions; a natural talent, if one was to consider it as such.

William was not only a master of illusions, but he also had considerable skill in transformation - a "lost art" of the kitsune. Most of the demon foxes were able to transform themselves to a certain extent; mainly to give themselves human features, for aid in everyday activities, or - if needed - infiltration into human society. This was the limitation of the transformation ability; it came from the dominant side of the heritage of the kitsune, the were-fox.

William, however, was a "freak birth", as it was called. The dominant genes for him were not of the were-fox, but from the changeling, a Light-aligned Halfling race that made up the other percentage of kitsune blood. He was able to transform himself (and with some limitations, other objects) into more than just a fox, or a human, or some combination of the two. And while he had a large selection of various subjects he had learned to change into, there was one realm in which he has more skill than any other.

When he was born, he was taken from his parents and placed under the care of a clan elder, one who, like William, had silver fur, and thus great skill in transformations. He trained the young fox in this art, teaching him many various forms that would aid him not only in individual settings, but also with groups of others. William soaked it all up, eager to see what he could do.

The elder focused his lessons on various weapon forms; to change into a form that an ally could take advantage of. He taught him the shapes and construction of swords and shields, of axes and maces, and various staves.

William could never pull off a complete transformation for these weapons.

But the elder did not give up. After five years of this training, he pulled from the back room a large wooden chest. This chest, the elder had explained, contained special weapons that had aided the Clan in battles long past. These weapons were crafted by trained kitsune weaponsmiths, and were blessed with the magics of Clan Leaders of old. Both of these weapons, however, had been damaged beyond repair, but their essence could be absorbed and made into a special henge.

With that, he opened the chest, showing William the weapons inside.

Several months later, the Den was terrorized by a loose werewolf, which had somehow gotten past the wards and was running rampant in the underground city, killing anything it could. Every adult fox was busy either fighting the lycanthrope, or evacuating the cubs. They were no match for the larger beast, and it tore through the defense lines, headed towards the Meeting Hall.

The elder took William to the red building, and explained to him that they were the last line of defense. The elder grabbed a large stone and transformed it into a heavy crossbow bolt.

"William," the elder had said, "I am going to demonstrate to you the power of the legendary Harkonnen crossbow, the one in the chest. I am going to need you to fire this weapon at the intruder before it gets to the Meeting Hall. The fate of the Den rests with you, boy."

With that, he erupted in a flash of blue fire, which dissipated to reveal an oversized - but incredibly lethal looking - crossbow. Shaking with fear, William picked the weapon up and prepared to fire it at the oncoming werewolf.

He froze.

William couldn't get his arms to work right, couldn't pull the lever back, couldn't move his fingers on the trigger.

The werewolf leapt at him, and he rolled out of the way at the last possible second. Clearing his head, he pulled back the lever, preparing the one bolt to be fired.

One bolt. He only had one shot at this. He hesitated.

The werewolf knocked the crossbow out of his hands and swept him aside with a powerful paw. William struck the cavern wall with a dull thud, and struggled to keep from losing consciousness.

The werewolf ignored him and started pounding on the door of the Meeting Hall. Large cracks appeared in the wood.

William didn't have much time. It was all up to him. He ran as fast as he could to the fallen weapon, scooped it up, and leveled it at the beast. "Hey, Fang. Why don't you chew on this for a bit?"

The werewolf turned, and William rushed at him. He shoved the crossbow in its face, knowing he only had one shot. Before he could pull the trigger, the werewolf took the weapon in its jaws and bit down. Metal squealed against razor-sharp teeth.

William fired.

William could remember every detail of what came next with exceptional clarity. Every time he recalled it, the memories surfaced in slow motion.

The back of the werewolf's head erupted in a shower of bone and mush, spattering the wall behind it in red and pink and grey. Its teeth clamped down reflexively, shattering the crossbow completely.

William had gathered all the pieces of what remained of the elder, trying to put them back together so that he could change them back from metal to flesh.

The metal remained metal. Shards of a broken weapon remained broken, never to return to their original form.

William cleared his head. He forced himself out of his memories and back into the present. He did have that form, yes. But he wouldn't end up like that.

"Long-range," he found himself saying, echoing Mory's request. "Sure thing, kid."

He steeled himself mentally, forcing his past out of his mind. The girl needed him. This time, he'd do things right.

* * *

Out of the corner of her eye, Mory saw William bend down and grab an armful of large, loose stones. He tossed them up in the air, waved his hand, and caught the newly-formed wooden shafts as they came back down.

She kept her gaze trained on the high ceiling of the cavern, keeping track of the flashes of movement. "Any time would be good, William," she said.

The fox-boy leapt in front of her, hands clenched around heavy bolts. "Let's rock." He jumped straight up, bursting into blue flames. The fire vanished almost as soon as it had appeared, revealing something that Mory couldn't identify at the edge of her vision. She took her eyes off the ceiling and grabbed the object as it fell. Two smaller objects clattered to the ground.

She examined the object in her hands. It was a rather large weapon that looked to be the cross between an assault rifle and a heavy crossbow. It was a dark steel-grey, with a black grip and trigger guard. There were no serial numbers stamped in the metal anywhere she could see, but the small white lettering on the right side of the crossbow spelled out the word Harkonnen.

She had once heard a term in a gaming session, "Heavy Repeating Crossbow". She supposed that if that classification didn't fit this weapon, nothing did.

She picked up the two fallen objects from the ground. They appeared to be magazines for the weapon; a glance inside showed five wooden bolts in each. She spun the crossbow about expertly and smoothly slammed a clip into the stock, feeling a comforting click as it made its way home. She slid back the small lever on the left side, feeling a stronger thunk as the first round cycled into the chamber.

"A hot chick with a big gun," Weston remarked, giving a low, appreciative whistle. "I think I'm in love."

Mory knelt on the ground, swinging the Harkonnen upwards to aim at the ceiling. "Sometimes a sword is just a sword, Weston," she quipped, scanning the darkness for another sign of movement.

"Freud said nothing about military-grade crossbows."

Mory pulled her attention back on the ceiling. "I think this falls under 'Weapons of Sexy Destruction', myself," she murmured absently.

There!

She squeezed the trigger, sending the first bolt rocketing towards the sudden flash of movement. It smashed into the rocks, embedding the metal tip in a crack. The wood shattered from the force of the impact.

"That's quite some power you're packing," Mory said, amazed. She stilled her thoughts, and let her awareness envelop her hands and the crossbow they held. She narrowed her eyes, filtering out all but her target.

The ceiling seemed to expand, and the flash of gold grew to an enormous size. She couldn't possibly miss something that large.

She fired.

The flash of gold snapped back to its original size as the second bolt rocketed towards it. Mory realized with a start that it hadn't grown to begin with; rather, she had been so focused on aiming that - probably with aid from her powers - it became the only thing in her mind, giving her complete control over her shot.

Before the bolt could reach its target, however, a wall of rock shot out of the ceiling, interposing itself between the bolt and its target. The bolt impacted harmlessly against the new outcropping. The force of it appeared to dislodge a rather large vine from the ceiling however, which fell towards Mory.

She frowned. I don't remember there being any....s**t!

Mory rolled away to the side; the vine whipped itself through the area she had just previously occupied. It swung back towards her, snaking itself around the crossbow - and the arm holding it. She hissed in pain as thorns dug into her flesh.

She extended the claws on her left hand and swiped them through the thick, organic cable. The severed part flopped to the ground, motionless, while the remainder coiled itself up and sank back upwards, into the darkness.

She stood up, not even paying attention to her wounds as they closed themselves up. Her fears had been confirmed - there was no denying the situation anymore. She knew who was attacking her. She'd feared it from the beginning, since finding out the situation with the Flame Guardian. She sighed, resigned to her fate.

"Get down here, dead girl," she called. "Neither of us can win like this."

Silence.

"Come on," Mory continued. "Get your a** down here. I know it's you now."

Weston looked confused. "You know it's who?"

Mory ignored him as she watched a second vine drop down from the darkness above. This one was smooth; there were no thorns or even leaves upon it. A figure soon appeared, sliding quickly down the vine. Mory handed her crossbow over to Weston, not taking her eyes off the approaching person.

The figure reached the ground and let go of the vine. The vine rose back up to the top of the chamber, coiling itself up as it went. The figure ran her hands through her long hair, smoothing it out. "I'm not going to ask how you knew it was me. You've obviously been gaining new control over your powers. I'm proud of you."

Mory clenched her fists. "You left us."

"I did what I needed to."

"Bullshit." Mory slapped the woman as hard as she could. The woman stood her ground. "You knew what was going to happen from the beginning, didn't you? And you didn't even tell me?"

The woman rubbed her stinging cheek. "There was no other choice. I had to get you out of there."

"You left us."

"Mory..."

The violet-haired girl said nothing. Instead, she moved her hand upwards, grasping the hilt of her sword. Recognition flared in the green eyes of the woman, but she made no other move.

Mory drew her sword. "How much of you is left in there?" she asked. "How much of you is him?"

The woman clutched a dark bruise around her neck for a second. "It's all me in here. But he controls me now." She shook her head and smiled weakly. "I can think and speak for myself. But I've been ordered to kill you. I've been fighting it, but I can't hold it back much longer."

Mory narrowed her eyes. "You were holding back when I was fighting you, weren't you?"

"Not the first time. Not when you attacked me." The woman clutched at her head. "I...I can't fight it anymore." She reached back and drew her own sword. "I'm not going to be able to hold anything back when I fight you now, either. But I want you to promise me something."

"What?"

"I want you to promise me that if you win, you'll...hear me out first before you do anything."

Mory hesitated for a moment before nodding.

The woman twirled her blade expertly. "I'm sorry, Mory."

Mory smiled, for the first time since the last fight began. "I'm sorry too, Ally."  

[AllianceSJR]

09: I'm sure this'll be for chapters, as well.  

[AllianceSJR]

10: *insert witty comment for chapters here*  

[AllianceSJR]

11: I'm not certain if I'll need quite this many posts for chapters, but best to be sure.  

[AllianceSJR]

12: Getting close to the end of the page. Chapters.  

[AllianceSJR]

13: Yeah.  

[AllianceSJR]

14: One more...  

[AllianceSJR]

15: And that should be it.