Xena couldn't sleep, her blood boiling. She sat up, unable to think any complete, coherent thoughts because of her rage, and cast her eyes to the near-death fire beside her. Even it irritated her, and finally the warrior woman got to her feet, grabbing her sword tightly in the process. She stormed into the forest then in silence, but not before snatching her chakram from the ground, completely unaware of the waking pair of eyes that followed her.
The warrior found a tree, the blank air everywhere else not satisfying enough for her sudden fury, and made war with it as if it were her worst enemy. She struck blows that would kill any foe instantly, and found a small pleasure in the fact that the tree would allow her to attack continuously until either she cut it down or wore herself out. The gashes in the bark were remarkable, visible even in the weak light of the night. The cloudy sky allowed for the moon only to light the world below it with a fragile glow, but it didn't matter much to the sapphire-eyed woman. Xena could see enough to know that damage she was doing, and the anger in her heart lapped up the fact greedily, growing stronger. In this growth Xena's movements grew swifter, more agile, and with much more force behind them, enabling her sword to get itself stuck in the trunk of the tree. The raven-haired woman recovered quickly, however, ripping the blade from the wood. She took a few steps back and then charged the tree, up at her highest speed immediately.
"Aiy-aiy-aiy-aiy-aiy-aiy! Sheeee!" She ran up the tree's height and flipped backwards, landing squarely on her feet. Xena then threw out her chakram and grinned devilishly when she heard the sound of splitting wood and a deep thunk as the weapon removed some branches and then halted cold, lodged deep beyond the bark. Immediately after the triumph, though, she became motionless, sensing a presence somewhere behind her. The anger in her still had not been quelled, even after drilling for as long as she had been, and so the fact that she now had an uninvited audience made the woman scowl. She carefully reached beneath the top of her battle dress, between her breasts, pinching the handle of her breast dagger and pulling it out, before twisting and hurling it behind her in less time than her heart could beat again. She never heard the blade make any contact, but whoever had been behind her was now down in the grass, almost out of sight. Xena took a few long strides towards the intruder, her eyes narrow and piercing, and her face hard. "If you're alive, tell me who you are and I might let you stay that way," she said. The figure didn't move.
"Xena, it's me." The blue-eyed warrior paused.
"Gabrielle?" Xena came forward, kneeling down by the woman on the ground. It was Gabrielle. "Gabrielle, what in Tartarus are you doing? Why are you out here?"
"I could ask you the same thing," Gabrielle quipped. "And you have no right to talk to me that way. I didn't almost kill you." Xena's face softened, but only by a fraction, her anger still prominent.
"Are you alright?" she asked. Gabrielle gave her a look.
"Yes, I'm fine… I'm alive. What's gotten into you, Xena?" Xena was silent for a moment, unmoving.
"I don't know," she said. "But there's a rage in me that I don't know how to deal with. It woke me up and refused to let me sleep, so I came out here to try and drain it."
"…And?" Gabrielle asked, her eyes trained on her companion's face.
"It's not working," the warrior snapped, her tone very harsh. Gabrielle recoiled, but held a brave face, trying not to be affected by Xena's anger.
"You want to talk to me about?" she asked. Xena closed her eyes and her jaw clenched and she did her best to breathe deeply. She didn't want to lash out at Gabrielle, it wouldn't be fair. The bard had nothing to do with her anger. That was one of the main reasons she kept herself so guarded at times- she didn't want to pull her friend into the darkness, no matter how desperate the circumstances got. Slowly, her eyes re-opened, but did not meet her friend's immediately. She sighed.
"Gabrielle, there is a part of me that I know you are aware of, but that you do not know well. That part of me is very dark and hard, and without much love. It isn't a part of me I treasure nor is it my main component, but it is a part of me nonetheless. That is why I close myself off to you at times. I can't allow myself to bring you into my-"
"Xena," Gabrielle interrupted," the darkness in your heart does not scare me." Xena was surprised by the statement, and her face expressed as much when she finally looked into Gabrielle's. "I know who you really are, and that's the woman I love. There is nothing in this world that can change that." Gabrielle smiled at her friend gently, warmly, the love in her eyes illuminated by the weak moonlight. The strawberry-blonde shifted to her knees, folding her legs beneath her. She took one of Xena's hands and held it to her chest. Xena could feel that Amazon's heartbeat, and she smiled subtly. "I mean that." Before she let go of Xena's hand, Gabrielle squeezed it affectionately and then rose to her feet, grabbing the breast dagger that had been throw at her earlier from the grass on the way up. The warrior princess followed suit, taking the dagger when it was handed to her, and turned to retrieve her other two weapons from the tree behind her. When she returned, she found Gabrielle with a look on her face that struck a sudden tranquility in the warrior woman's heart. "Think you can sleep now?" the bard asked. Xena hesitated in responding, sitting on the fence about her answer. After a moment, however, she was decided.
"Yes," she said simply, and she wrapped an arm loosely around Gabrielle's shoulders. "Come on."