Disclaimer: I don't own anything, and most obviously not Grimm or its characters. Some story concepts may have been borrowed and adapted unintentionally or intentionally from other fictions, books, tv shows, movies, religions, geography, history, theology, etc. This is what happened when I ran out of Nadalind stories to read.
WARNING! THIS IS MY FIRST FANFICTION (no beta)
Author's Note:
I am very unsure about this whole -ness! This writing business 'n stuffs! Please tell me if its crap or too slow or boring etc.
PLEASE REVIEW! I need to know if it's crap! I can't tell!
- - This is a single chapter posting - -
I need to edit / write the rest
More reviews please! I'm not a writer! Need helps…. I'm an engineer….
BTW: I intend to post on AO3 as well, because in case of later PRONs I need to be able to NOT edit myself. Such story aspects will be entirely truncated from my FFnet version. But not until much later. Baby first.
General Notes:
Hexenbiest and Zauberbiest are used as both singular and plural nouns. (I don't speak German)
Italics – thoughts or memories
Bold – quotes from TV series
"separated dialogue" – telephone conversations
Chapter 10
May 3rd – Around 12:50 PM
"Good. That's what we're hoping for."
Renard realized, belatedly, that by running in to rescue Juliette from Nick, he'd entrenched himself in the oncoming fight. I can't believe I just hopped a bunch of fences… He hadn't intended to be present, feeling that he could be more useful as a Police Captain and by mitigating potential fallout. Regardless, he was here now. He turned to where Nick stood sentinel, behind Adalind's seat.
"Ok, so how do you want to do this?"
"We… didn't get that far yet." Nick admitted. "Any ideas?"
"Seriously?" Renard was flummoxed. What the hell did they do all morning?! "Juliette just said we don't have any time!" Agitated, he stood and began pacing the room.
"We couldn't figure out how to take them out, in the MIDDLE OF THE DAY, while minimizing casualties, while keeping this publicly undetected, without implicating ourselves for mass murder." Nick defended, he'd been thinking over this all morning, but the primary focus had been on Juliette. She'd been the larger threat.
"We knew this was as problem before I left. God…" He took a deep breath to clear his thoughts. "Well, just how powerful IS Adalind right now?" His mind brushed vaguely against possible solutions.
Everyone turned to the witch in question.
"I don't actually know…" Adalind appeared to shrink into her seat at the attention. She clutched the hand Nick had resting on her shoulder with one of hers, like a security blanket. "I've never HAD this much power before! It's not like we ever really KNOW. That's why we all get sent to Henrietta."
"I don't think it would be wise to risk testing you. I already had permanent damage to my home from testing Juliette. I'm just lucky it didn't hit any of my books…" Henrietta commented. "Besides the test takes too long. BUT, I do think Sean's on to something."
"I agree," Nick gave his bond-mate a reassuring smile and her hand a quick squeeze. "The only way for us to get ourselves out of this is by magic."
"Well… if you think of something, I'll see if I can do it." Adalind smiled in return, warmed by his presence. She could probably do anything with Nick there beside her. And aren't I full of cheese…
Sean ignored the couple's interaction. "Let's just think. It's the middle of the day, but THEY have to deal with that too. The Verrat is careful to leave only unsolvable mayhem. They don't want to cause international incident, ESPECIALLY with my father in town. Can she ward?"
"Definitely." Henrietta noted.
"Uh…What am I warding exactly?"
"The neighbors." Nick answered, catching on. "We need to keep the Verrat out of where they don't belong. And funnel them exactly where we want them." Adalind's eyes grew large at the prospect, she hoped she wouldn't have to pee.
"Don't worry, I'll help you focus." Henrietta laughingly consoled, but Adalind didn't look consoled.
"It's not that…" The majority of the room looked perplexed, not understanding what the problem could be.
"I have something that can help."
May 3rd – Around 1:35 PM
Kenneth was not pleased. Teams drove in towards the intersection of Prescott and 8th, from multiple directions. They would move in hard and fast as planned, but it was apparent they'd lost the element of surprise. Not only that, Juliette was MIA, up in the air as a wildcard. A very dangerous wildcard.
They'd had to build a separate team just to take down the house. Kenneth was joining that team. He intended to express his displeasure in a VERY physical manner.
They had to be very careful about this mission. They had to take down the Grimm and his friends but leave the house intact. Kelly Burkhardt would never believe the house was safe if it was obviously destroyed.
His van pulled up outside of the neighborhood to wait on standby, as the other vehicles moved into position.
"Rispoli. Update."
"There's been a complication."
"Well spit it out!"
"It appears, sir, that we can't approach any of the properties."
"What's that supposed to mean?"
"None of my men are able to step foot beyond any of the property lines. They can step out onto the street, but not onto any of the properties surrounding the Grimm's residence. It appears to be a Hexenbiest ward of some sort, and a powerful one too."
"… Juliette?"
"I believe so."
"No, someone has to be helping her. She wouldn't be capable of something so complicated."
"Adalind then."
"Fuck! I should've killed her when I had the chance."
"Sir?"
"What now?"
"We can still approach the Grimm's property."
"They're trying to funnel us. Have teams 1 and 2 pull back and report to the king. Have team 3 cover us."
"Even though it's a trap?"
"If Juliette cast these wards, she's a sitting duck. They've all just sacrificed themselves to save the neighbors. It would be rude to waste it."
"Move out!" Kenneth commanded his team leader.
May 3rd – Around 1:45 PM
Rispoli and his team were staged from inside their vans, guns trained on the house, as Kenneth's team pulled up. Team 1 was ready, so as soon as the vehicles stopped, Team 4 fully unloaded and rushed to the porch. Turned out they didn't need the coverage.
The door was unlocked, so after a beat Kenneth signaled his team in ahead of him, before following them inside. When they were all in, the door was shut behind them. Team 1 held their guns at the ready while they waited.
As the last member of Kenneth's team entered the house, Rosalee, Juliette and Henrietta watched and listened from the windows in Nick's room. Juliette was using binoculars to observe the vans through a small opening in the solid curtains of the large center window, using the sheer curtains and sunlight as camouflage. Rosalee was Woged, sitting on the floor near the right window, which they had cracked just enough on the bottom to listen.
They had moved the lamp and table out of the way from the windows, both arm chairs now facing outside.
"Okay, they're in." Rosalee retracted after hearing the front door close.
"Yeah that's Rispoli in the front over there." Juliette passed the binoculars to Henrietta, so she could get a better look ahead of time.
"Okay," Henrietta took a breath to clear her mind before Woging. She held up two hands near the windows. Quickly Juliette and Rosalee pulled back both layers of curtains in front of Henrietta.
As soon as she had a clear view, she acted. Concentrating on the four black vehicles outside, she quickly made a very slight but controlled gesture with her hands. They all shut off. A different gesture immediately followed the first, and all the doors and windows sealed up tight. She retracted with a satisfied look on her face.
The women opened all three sets of curtains wide, now that they'd taken care of the threat. Henrietta sat on the bed, no longer needing to see her targets.
Juliette and Rosalee sat down to watch as the trapped Verrat agents all began panicking inside their respective vehicles. Rosalee opened the window next to her chair wide and Woged for just a second to listen.
"I can't hear anything from them."
Juliette used the binoculars again. The agents were a flurry of activity, in their attempts to escape.
"They aren't moving the vans at all." She passed the binoculars to Rosalee.
"No and no. Inconspicuous remember?" Henrietta chided.
Juliette snorted. "With a bunch of black vans in front of the property?"
"At least they're quiet."
"Can they breathe?"
Henrietta had to pause and think about that one. "That's a good question…" She shrugged but didn't actually answer the question. Juliette and Rosalee shared a wide-eyed look before resuming their observation.
"Do I get to learn how to do that?"
"Among other things."
As Kenneth walked into the entryway, he heard one of his agents close the door behind him. They had fanned out against the walls, guns pointed in every direction as they prepared to swiftly and systematically clear each room on his command. About half of them had collected to the right, just past the entryway.
They waited for his instruction. Must be a welcome party…
His men moved to the side as he approached, what appeared to be, a living area. There, on a large green couch against the wall, all alone, sat none other than Adalind Schade.
Still heavily pregnant, looking about to burst, the little witch sat calmly with a blanket over her knees. She appeared to be fiddling with something in her hands, completely unperturbed by all the guns now aiming at her head. Kenneth was amused.
"Adalind, I didn't expect to see you alive." He greeted with a genial tone and a grin.
She returned with a bright smile of her own. "Kenneth… I think this is one of yours." She tossed the object in her hands to him.
He didn't allow himself to react as he caught, what appeared to be a human hand. He turned it over.
"Ah, that's what you warded against. I suppose that's what happened to my surveillance." He said as he waved the Verrat tattoo at her before passing the hand to one of his agents.
"Yup, pretty clever, huh? Your friend Juliette was nice enough to point him out for us… once we gave her the suppressant we made." She amended.
Impossible.
"I find it hard to believe she willingly took a potion YOU made."
"Oh! She didn't. We, kind of, had to trap her."
Kenneth realized that if Juliette really was useless, then Adalind must have cast the ward herself. He'd underestimated her. Time for a new tactic.
"So, where's Juliette's ex-beau I've heard so much about? The Grimm. You and your child can't be very important to him if he's using you as bait."
Adalind just smiled at him.
"Well, she's not bait…" came an unfamiliar male voice from the left.
Kenneth quickly drew his gun on the new arrival, only to have it suddenly ripped from his hand and stuck to the ceiling. He looked back and saw Adalind's eyes now glowing a bright blue
"She's the trap."