Chapter 4: Sensitives

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Hello again! It's been a little while, but I'm back again! My computer died a few weeks ago, so I was without internet or typing. It was horrible, I'll tell you. I'll get right onto the reviews, and then you can read the story!

Cube Fangirl: I like the part with Griffin and David's mother too. Don't worry, it gets even better! Keep reading and reviewing!

Lovebuggy: I'm sorry it seemed a bit off. I was getting tired and I was so close to finishing that I rushed a little bit. I think I did pretty well under the circumstances though. ;)

Nothing is What it Seems: Thank you so much! I liked that part too. I was so proud of myself because I made that up under interesting circumstances. Lovebuggy seems to think it was a little stiff, and you can look at the reply right above this one for reference or whatever. Lol. The battle does get pretty epic.

Buieruwen: Thanks! Griffin is awesome. And he will get his revenge… one way or another. I don't know how badly he's going to get David back, but I really dislike David sometimes, so it really depends on my mood when I finally get around to writing it. Lol. I don't think that they're ever going to team up though. I can't picture it at all. Griffin seems like the kind of person to hold a grudge he'd never get over it, though David might.

ShadowWolfDagger: Thanks for the review! I'll be looking forward to more!

Now, onto the story!

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Griffin watched her warily, wondering wryly what he had gotten himself into. He was normally more careful than that, but in his haste and natural impatience to exact his revenge on David, he hadn't taken his usual precautions. Now he had to watch her carefully. See what kind of a fighter she was.

She took a few steps forward and he adjusted himself accordingly, his feet crunching in the snow as he sidestepped and then backed up two paces. Her eyes narrowed and she took a few more steps forward, though a smile played on her features. He took a few more steps back, into a tree.

Brilliant.

As soon as he backed into the tree, her finger pulled back on the trigger. Maybe he had been more in range that he had thought. Maybe she had been tricking him. Herding him. The cables were definitely losing altitude, but they would still hit him if he didn't move. So he jumped. Griffin didn't have too much time to think, so he just moved forward, the cables passing behind him and wrapping around the trunk of the tree. He didn't expect what came next.

Mary had reloaded immediately, and then fired again, right as he jumped. Now that he was closer to her, the cables were going to hit him square in the chest. Luckily, he reacted quickly enough to jump directly behind her.

Now I know where he got it from…

"Almost." Griffin said tauntingly, as she spun around, pulling out another cartridge and reloading. He had to hand it to her. She was much faster at this than most Paladins.

"I try." She replied, her words icy.

He jumped again, close to her, and she instinctively fired, though she missed as Griffin jumped away. It went on like this for a few minutes, with Griffin jumping close and then safely away, over and over again. As a result, she became more and more careful about firing off her weapon. She was using up all of her ammo, and the backup Paladins still hadn't arrived.

"Last bullet, eh? Better hope it hits. Then it's my turn…" Griffin said, advancing a few steps with a grin. When he was a few yards away, her finger tightened on the trigger and he jumped away. He appeared a few meters to the left, looking vaguely confused.

"Getting a little jumpy there, Griffin?" Mary asked all-too-sweetly, tapping her gun suggestively. She hadn't fired off her last available ammunition.

Griffin's eyes narrowed. "Just a bit. Getting a little more desperate?"

"Possibly." She sidestepped a few paces, and then advanced toward him. Griffin got the impression that she was herding him somewhere again, for a specific reason that might give her the advantage. His eyes narrowed as he took a hesitant step back. She took three more. He took one more tentative step back as she gained a few more paces on him, and then he couldn't resist any longer. He glanced backwards to make sure that he wasn't going to run into anything that could slow him down. Mary pulled the trigger.

In a way, it was the moment they had both been waiting for. For Griffin, she had fired her last shot, and he could now come closer and still be relatively safe. For Mary, he had made a fatal mistake that would give her that advantage she had been waiting for.

Griffin had been ready for the shot to go off, and he jumped. This time, he wasn't keeping his distance, since she had no more ammo, and he jumped right behind her. She had been expecting this, and in one swift movement, she had spun around and her fist connected with his side. Gripped in her hand was a small black tube, and he wouldn't have needed what happened next to be able to tell what it was.

10,000 volts of electricity coursed out of the black stick and through him, and he fell back, tripping over his own feet and writhing in pain. It was bearable, but as he twitched backwards and tried to jump, he knew that she had the upper hand. He flickered in and out of vision as Mary pulled out a dagger and looked down at him, a smirk on her face.

"I'm not new at this you know. What did you expect?" She then lunged for him, the dagger going for his throat, and he rolled to the side, staggering to his feet. He jumped away as soon as he could, only having to stumble a few feet away before he was able to. He didn't try to go any one place at all, which was why he ended up in the Empty Quarter.

He lurched over to the rock that had once adorned red paint splatters from days when he had played with his father. He sat down heavily on it with a groan.

"Good goin' Griff. You went and messed up again!" He scowled, looking around the barren ravine before sighing and shaking his head. A thought suddenly dawned on him, and he immediately jumped to his lair.

He walked over to his plywood wall of Paladins, still rubbing the spot where her shock stick had made contact with his skin, scanning the pictures. Roland dominated most of the area, but there were a few other important Paladins that he had up there as well. Sure enough, he saw her. He had only one picture of her, of the one time his cheap security cameras had picked her up when he had been doing some "fishing", and he hadn't bothered to sketch her yet. There was no questioning how he hadn't recognized her. The picture was fuzzy, black and white, and outdated. She had gotten a haircut since then. She had never been a priority of his anyway. He'd always been obsessed with Roland.

Sighing again and admitting defeat for the day, he jumped to London. It was late… early actually, as he found out when he entered the bar where he had first seen David. By the clock they had inside, it was roughly three in the morning. Around seven o'clock pm back in San Diego and… well, he didn't exactly know which time zone his newest lair fell in, and he was too lazy to try and try and figure it out. Instead, he walked over to the bar and ordered himself a beer while he tried to contemplate what to do next.

Griffin had found David's mother only to find that she was a Paladin. One messed up family, right? He hadn't gotten any closer to finding David. He had only confirmed that Roland hadn't returned from his mission, which meant that David was indeed alive… but it didn't necessarily mean that Roland was dead. He might still have work to do there.

No matter how much he tried to tell himself to grow up, Griffin still felt an odd sense of hope when he thought of the possibility that Roland might still be alive. It wasn't that he wanted the bastard to live, definitely not; just that he had been hunting him for ten years, so he hoped that he got a chance to dispatch of him himself. As he mulled through all of this over a beer, he still found no solution to his problem of finding David. The only reason he had been able to keep track of him before was because he had been such a reckless Jumper. Now that he had had a taste of the Paladins he would be more careful with his jumps.

After his second beer, he was done thinking it over. He was bound to meet up with David one way or the other. There was no use beating himself up about it because he couldn't think of a way to find him immediately. With a brooding expression adorning his features, he paid for the drinks and then walked out of the bar.

Griffin was just searching for an alley in which to jump home from when he heard it. It was the unmistakable pop of a Paladin's electrified cable shooting gun. In the moment he realized that it wasn't being shot at him, he thought that he might need a shorter abbreviation for the thing. It was tedious just to try and think the words "electrified cable shooting gun" all in a row. He resolved this problem by shortening it to ECG, for "electrified cable gun". Now that his mind was done thinking about random trifle things, it was time to move onto bigger problems.

Like who a Paladin would be shooting at at this hour in the middle of London. David? He didn't know. Wouldn't let himself hope for that much. But it had to be a Jumper. They didn't shoot ECG's at random passerby on the street. They didn't even shoot them at relatives or friends of Jumpers. Only Jumpers themselves.

There was another pop of an ECG and a cry of pain from the alley directly across the street from him. He silently stalked over and peered in.

It was dark, and he could barely see. As his eyes slowly adjusted to the dimmer lighting, he found that he could make out the dead end alley in front of him. Two Paladins with their backs to him were advancing on someone who was pinned to the brick by the cable stretched across their torso. The captive struggled feebly, twitching and writhing as the electric current coursed through them.

Griffin couldn't tell if the Jumper pinned to the wall was David or not. If it was, he was saving the Jumper so he could kill him himself… or at least beat him up and teach him a lesson. And if it wasn't? Then he was saving a Jumper from Paladins. No big deal. He didn't do it all the time, but he didn't meet up with Jumpers in distress all the time either.

He jumped to his lair, snatched the metal baseball bat that was propped up against the wall of the cave, and then jumped back to the alley, whistling sharply to catch their attention.

He hadn't needed to. The two Paladin's heads wrenched around and their gazes locked onto him as soon as he jumped there. Sensitives, eh? This'll be fun. They switched targets as he twirled the bat with one hand. It whistled through the air with a metallic whir as he smirked. "'Ello boys. Lookin' for someone to play with?" He took a step forward as one of them lifted their gun.

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There you go! Another chapter! And, now that it's summertime, I'll be updating a lot more often! Big bonus for you guys, and I hope you enjoy.

BTW: Jumper came out on DVD on the tenth if you didn't already know that. I was uber-inspired to write after I watched it again! Lol, anyways, see you next update!

-Wolfie