Michael was standing on a precipice in Heaven that plunged downwards to the very depths of Hell. He could smell the evil long before his old comrade made his appearance. "I've been expecting you." Michael commented in a matter-of-fact manner.

A low, unnatural growl found its way out from the depths of the fallen angel. "I knew it," he bellowed and lunged for the archangel. Michael drew his sword and stepped back.

"Enough!" Michael's voice sent the rocks beneath them quaking. "This is neither the time nor place for this to play out."

Lucifer backed off, but his voice was quivering with rage as he spat out, "Where have you stashed her, that treacherous, deceitful, double-crossing bitch? I'll have that soul to persecute for eternity. I deserve to wring every bit of pain and agony out of it that I can."

"You deserve no such thing, Lucifer." Michael stated lowering his sword. "And she certainly does not deserve to be handed over to the likes of you….or Hades minions. You should know that I am prepared to fight to the last to prevent you from doing so."

"Your loyalties are perverted and misplaced Michael. That woman soiled Heaven with her lies and trickery and I should think you would welcome the chance to see her punished."

Michael stepped up to Lucifer so that he was eye to eye with the King of Demons. "Now, let's set one thing straight here. While I do not condone Xena's methods, she did not force you to do anything. I believe she was wrong, very wrong for doing what she did, but you allowed yourself to fall victim to it. YOU should have been the stronger of the two of you, Lucifer. If anyone brought shame down on the realm of Heaven, it was you."

The Demon King said not a word, but dropped head first back into his pit. Out of the acrid winds that blew up from the fiery depths, Michael heard Lucifer's faithful chanting, "Vengeance, vengeance, vengeance!"

"Master," Euryale spat out the words, "the Hag Meredith has located the Warrior Woman through a vision. She is in a land known as 'Limbo'."

"Limbo?" Lucifer repeated stroking his leathery chin. "Yes, I am aware of such a place. It is a large void …a chasm really. And of course the perfect place to hide a soul that you don't want to be found. I fear it will be an arduous task finding her there. Supposedly it is vast, vaster than Heaven or Hell and full of smoke and mirrors. I have never had cause to visit there myself. Michael is not going to make this easy for us, so we will just have to outsmart him. Euryale, I want you to grab every extra ghoul and phantom that is not readying for physical battle and meet me here as soon as possible. Make it known to them that I will take you all to the outskirts of this Limbo and send you in to hunt and seek that which is my enemy. I want this done as secretly and quietly as possible. Do not approach her or make your whereabouts known to her. Then, when she is located, you, Euryale, shall come to me post haste and take me to her. If I can possess her while she is defenseless with no one or nothing to back her, I should be able to drag her to Hell quite easily and no battle will be needed. Remember, you must not arouse suspicion within the ranks of Heaven. There shall be special privileges given to the one that finds her. Now, go….oh, and Euryale….do not fail me!"

Michael knew that they must now act quickly. He appeared again to Gabrielle to disclose the next phase of his plan. He found the bard dining with Hercules and Takis in a private room she was renting in a local boarding house in the town of Stagira. It was near a newly constructed temple of Eli where Eve and several of her followers were staying.

"The Greek Amazons have set up camp just outside of town; there ended up being about fifty of them. The others should be here by nightfall." Gabrielle told the archangel.

The door opened and in walked Virgil, brandishing an impressive looking sword and whetstone.

"Michael," the man said as he bowed in acknowledgement of the Heavenly creatures' presence.

"So, you have been asked to join in this venture I see," the archangel said, responding to Virgil's greeting.

"Actually, I had a dream of my Father. He told me the girls were in trouble. I knew that Xena was... err…dead so I wasn't certain if it was real or just…well…a dream. But I couldn't shake the feeling of dread that had been plaguing me so…here I am. I can't say that my Mother was overly excited to see me off, but I know she understands."

A pillar of shimmer descended from the ceiling to the floor and Aphrodite materialized. She walked over to Gabrielle and gave her a little squeeze. "I'm ready whenever you are and Ares and his army are camped by the creek. I must say he did a pretty good job getting those men whipped into shape….considering what he had to work with."

Gabrielle could not stop the tears that had found their way down her cheeks. "I….I am overwhelmed with all this help. It's really been beneficial in bringing me back to good, restored a lot of the faith I guess I lost when Xena died. Thank you, thank you all so much...for me and Xena."

"I appreciate the confidence, Gabrielle," Hercules stated, "but we haven't won yet."

"Regardless," answered the bard, "it's good to know that the family and friends that Xena, and I, loved...love… so much are still there beside us."

"I'll drink to that," said Takis raising his tankard. "Although I never had the pleasure of meeting the Warrior Princess, I know how much she meant to my Father…and Uncle Herc here. I am honored to be at your service."

"Yes, this is more assistance than even I imagined," Michael remarked. "Ares has managed to round up close to five hundred troops, Persephone has nearly eight hundred, and I have at least that myself. Even if Lucifer's horde has us outnumbered, those ghouls of his are not seasoned fighters. I might add that a vast majority of them are not very smart either. They have no need for intelligence in that realm and I rather think Lucifer prefers them dumbed-down as they give him less trouble that way. They do, however, resort to other nasty tactics and we will need to be on our guard for that and use a few tricks of our own. And speaking of which…"

Here Michael produced Persephone's satchel with all the other worldly arsenal that it contained. "A present from the god's. I guess you are aware of some of its contents Hercules."

"My pleasure," the demi-god said with a nod.

"What's all this then?" Gabrielle and Aphrodite said, almost in unison.

Aphrodite grabbed the satchel and pulled out the smooth marble flask. "Whatever is in this pretty little thing?" she cooed.

Michael looked her square in the face and answered. "Hinds blood."

"Ewwww," the Goddess squawked, forcing the bottle into Gabrielle's hands. "Here, sweet pea," she cried, putting the satchel down on the bench beside Gabrielle. "You can check the rest of it out!"

"That flask can only be opened by mortal hands and will not crack or break." Michael relayed.

"Whatever!" Aphrodite cried. "It still kills gods. I don't want to touch the thing!"

Hercules reached across the table and pulled the leather pouch out of the satchel and laid it on the table. "The ribs of my Grandfather, Kronos." His voice faltered a bit. "I had hoped to never touch another one of these again, but…..well I gathered them all up and gave them to Persephone. I….I imagine they could come in handy at some point."

Gabrielle retrieved the purple velvet bag and Michael commenced to tell her and the others how to utilize the enchanted clay wheels and the oil in the crystal vial.

"Well, no time like the present to start dipping," Virgil exclaimed and they all did so, immersing or pouring the vials magic slickness onto swords, daggers, and the tips of arrows.

"It's bottomless too." Michael explained. "The vial will not go dry as long as the battle is being waged."

Gabrielle looked at Michael. "I should get this out to the Amazons."

Michael smiled and gave a little nod. "Do that, and I am going to remove Xena from her hiding place. Lucifer has figured out where she is now and has sent many of his ghouls in to find her as I knew he would."

"Part of the plan I suppose?" Aphrodite questioned.

"Exactly." Michael answered. They know it's going to be a tough task, so it should take them a day or two before they figure out they've been duped, or just give up. Either way, it should keep that lot nicely tied up and out of the way for a while. The more of Lucifer's gang we can dispose of before we even set to fighting the better."

Gabrielle felt a lump rise up in her throat. "Michael, if Xena's a…spirit, will anyone be able to see her? And where are you taking her?"

"I have my ways of making her visible. My first inclination was to put her amongst Ares' army, but those men are not really in it because of any loyalty for Xena, other than Ares that is, and I am not sure that I can wholly trust them. Persephone's ranks are too close to those we are trying to avoid. I think our best bet is to hide her among the Amazons for a short while. I would like to have her stay sheltered in one of their tents until I am ready for her to make herself seen, probably tomorrow. I believe if we can get the word out to our rivals that her spirit is here among the living, we can entice both Hades adversaries and Lucifer's troops to bring the battle above ground; it will give us a decided advantage."

"True," said Hercules, draining the last of his ale, "but you are right in saying that a lot of the beings in the underworld are rather, well….daft. I've battled dozens of them at a time by myself. And speaking of the underworld, we keep talking about Lucifer, what news is there of Hades loyalists?"

Michael chuckled. "Persephone planted a couple of moles among them. It seems they have decided to sit back and wait for the battle to start and then join in. I believe they are rather frightened of Lucifer and without Hades at the realm, they have no real leadership. And I think they are even more dim-witted than Lucifer's bunch. Persephone is going to try and dispose of some of them as soon as they emerge from their lair and then she will make sure Lucifer knows about it and hopefully he'll follow her and her army here. As of now, I'm not really expecting the Hades brigade to pose any significant problems, other than being extremely annoying. Now, I am going to leave you. I shall return with Xena before too long. And ah, could someone talk with Ares and let him know about this. I think I make him nervous." And with that the archangel was gone.

Virgil picked up the vial. "Right. Gabrielle, Takis, let's get this to the Amazons and then I'll take the oil out to Ares' army. We've been given these gifts, let's put them to use."

"Let's take a few of the bones and wheels also," Gabrielle stated. They can decide amongst themselves who should carry them. Aphrodite, why don't you hold on to one of the clay wheels….just in case."

"Um…Ok...right," the goddess replied hesitantly.

Hercules rose from the table. "And I shall go take my stand with Ares. I think we can manage to not battle each other for a couple of days. See you all later."

The crew said their goodbyes and Hercules set out for Ares's camp.

"Now...the Hinds blood…" Gabrielle stated.

Aphrodite threw her hands in the air. "Don't look at me Toots. I'm not going anywhere near that stuff!"

"Ah, yeah...probably not a good thing to go splattering all over the weapons of Ares' troops either. It might make our favorite war-god a little skittish." Takis offered.

"I guess it stays with me then." Gabrielle decided. "I'll dip the breast dagger in it...maybe the chakram. We'll just use it as we go and when needed I guess. All right, let's go. Aphrodite, thank you. Seriously, I cannot express how much this means to me...to know that you are willing to do this for me...for Xena."

"I'll expect some quality girl-time when this is over, sweet ums. See ya." And she vanished.

The trio left the building and started towards the Amazon camp. Gabrielle stopped suddenly and addressed them. "Umm…you know what, you two go ahead, I'm going to run into the temple and let Eve know what we are doing. I'll be along shortly."

Gabrielle found Eve sitting in front of a brightly lit altar, deep in prayer. The beautiful candles and the sweet smell of incense acted as a balm to Gabrielle's anxious mind. Eve sensed that she had entered the room and stood. She turned and smiled at the bard.

"I'm sorry if I've disturbed you…" Gabrielle started.

Eve smiled. "It's fine. I have been spending nearly all my free hours in supplication and prayer, requesting a short, swift victory from the oppressions of Hell. Eli has assured me that God is on our side."

"Well, that's good to know." Gabrielle responded. "Anyway, I just wanted to relay to you what the next phase of the plan is." She ran through all that had been discussed earlier in the tavern. "I also believe it would be fine for you to remain in the temple as it looks as though the battle will be waged here, outside the city. I can always send someone to get you if need be."

"I appreciate that," Eve replied, "although I was serious when I said I would fight if you need me."

Gabrielle hugged her warmly. "I know, and I love you for that Evey. I had better be going. I will see you soon." She turned to leave and then stopped, retraced her steps and handed Eve a weapon.

"What's this?" Eve questioned.

"Your mother's breast dagger….dipped in Hinds blood."