A/N: Okay, I need to quickly address something because I've been getting a lot of PM's lately about whether or not I plan to write a third instalment to my Brothers At Arms & Band of Brothers series of fanfics. The answer is yes, I have been working on it but no, I'm nowhere near ready to start publishing. I don't like publishing work in progresses because I like letting my stories kind of grow organically and something I write in chapter twenty-three might make me go back and change something back in chapter two which builds into something substantial. Take my OC Seleena for example; she evolved out of me just liking the chorus' costumes for one of the songs in Wicked, and then that became a whole thread about her being black & white, Annabelle representing colour and Chucky being a shade of grey in between. However once I wrote the final chapter and the epilogue I saw potential to shape a particular imagery for Seleena which meant I had to go back to earlier chapters so I could weave those threads in to get the pay off I wanted . . .

The point is I write in a kinda of nonlinear way, which unfortunately kinda sucks for you guys. Also it doesn't help that I either write like wildfire where it completely consumes me or like a glazier where nothing really happens for a long time. Sorry.

Anyway, back to this story where we get some insight into the interrelations of the Trix, see Seleena go up against Icy and see something that been slowly building for a while now come into fruition.

Chapter Twenty-One

Icy had had enough.

Ever since the age of thirteen, when she had first obtained the Whisperian Crystals and learned of the legendary Dragon Fire, she had been planning for this day. She and her sisters had thrown themselves into research and had chased down every lead – no matter how faint – in order to find the ancient power. She had been in constant training to ensure that her physical, mental and magical state was at peak condition for the day she and her Army of Decay waged its attack on the Magical Universe. She had forced her sisters to do the same, and although there were areas where she felt her sisters fell short of the standard Icy demanded (such as Stormy's hotheadedness and Darcy's overcautiousness) she had thought that they'd still be able to do what was necessary. She had thought that they could have managed the individual tasks she had assigned them. She had thought she could have trusted them.

Clearly, she was wrong.

Initially Icy had believed that the blame had rested solely on Stormy. After all, she had been given the responsibility of hunting down and incarcerating any rogue students. She was supposed to prevent any kind of organised retaliation like what was currently happening at Alfea but she had screwed that up, just like she always did. Icy should have been expecting that. She should have never given so much responsibility to such an unreliable witch. Icy's gut had been screaming at her ever since that hero (or whatever he was) had managed to infiltrate Stormy's defences and rescue that Flora loser, and now she was furious with herself that she hadn't listened to it. She should have stepped in and handled it right then and there but instead she had trusted it to Darcy.

That was her second mistake.

Icy had always trusted Darcy a little bit more than she did Stormy. In a fight Icy preferred to have Stormy by her side since they both shared a love for utter chaos but she still respected that Darcy was a different creature. The Dark Witch enjoyed chaos and mayhem as much as her sisters but she worked best when there was some kind of organisation about it. That was why Icy trusted her to work unsupervised because she knew Darcy would eventually get results. Unfortunately her perfectionist natured tended to result in her dragging her ass about some things, such as getting those heroes under control. Yes, Icy understood that it wasn't an easy task but it shouldn't have taken this long. Also Darcy should have listened when Icy ordered her to send out scouts but for some reason the psychic witch had developed a chip on her shoulder and hadn't taken her orders seriously. Not to mention that she had allowed herself to become too attached to that wannabe Riven despite Icy's objections and these rebels had used that to their advantage.

Now Darcy was lying unconscious with blood dripping for her ears while the control she had spent days constructing around her heroes evaporated, denying Stormy the reinforcements she desperately needed to stop Alfea from being reclaimed. So once again it was up to Icy to clean up after her sisters and fix her own mistake of ever trusting them in the first place.

If you want something done right, do it yourself.

At her command the Army of Decay swarmed up until it was level with the balcony of Miss Griffin's former office, allowing Icy to step out onto the solid surface. The last time she had travelled to Alfea, she had arrived in the manner of a person who believed they had already won. The throne was meant to signify that she was there to rule and everyone else should have dropped to their knees and accepted that. This time she was going to suppress an uprising of rebels that hadn't accepted their fate, so she needed a stance that showed she was there to kick some ass. The rot insects merged together to create her a platform as tall as her throne had been and she stood on it with her feet shoulder-width apart, her arms by her sides with her hands clenched into fist, her cape and hair flying dramatically behind her and a scowl on her face that showed she meant business.

Even thought it wasn't as fast as flying or teleporting, her rot platform was able to cut through the distance between Cloud Tower and Alfea at a fairly decent rate. However it wasn't so fast as to not give her some time to think. She could sense that there were enough rot monsters at Alfea to put up a fight but not enough to make it a whitewash. The rest were on their way but Icy knew she'd have to get her hands dirty for a bit before they joined the party. Not that she minded. She was pissed and wanted to take it out on whatever cowboy threw together this retaliation.

As Alfea came into view, Icy could see these rebels game plan. They had teleported into the school (Icy knew of a sophomore at Cloud Tower that had a talent for that and of course there was Stella's sceptre) and now they had set up a magical shield over the school in an attempt to keep out the Army of Decay. The school looked like a giant snow-globe. She could see colourful flashes of magic being thrown around Ms. Faragonda's office so she knew where Stormy currently was. If she had to wager a bet she'd say that they were targeting the Weather Witch to try and bring down her cloudbank, allowing the forces waiting on the other side of it to get through.

Well, Icy wasn't about to let that happen any time soon.

"You losers don't seem to know when to quit," Icy announced, her voice booming unnaturally across the battlefield. A thrill shot through her body when a few fairies screamed at the sound of her voice. This was better than being a rock star.

Her rot platform wasted no time and brought her the edge of the Rebellions defences. Chucking maliciously, Icy outstretched her hand and placed it on the magical shield. With a surge of her magic, Icy began icing the shield and the combination of the sounds of ice cracking and people screaming was like music to her ears. In a matter of seconds the entire shield had been transformed into solid ice and when Icy clenched her fist the only defence the rebels had literally shattered around them. With nothing to stop them the Army of Decay swarmed and began pummelling the students who struggled to keep their feet.

Throwing back her head, Icy howled with laughter.

"Is this the best you can do?" she asked, her eyes flashing with undisguised glee as she surveyed the bedlam her rot monsters were inflicting on her enemies. "You pathetic weaklings! I bet that there's not one of you that has guts to try and stop me!"

And then, as if they had been waiting for the challenge, a pillar of light the colour of lightning through mist shot up from the quad and connected with the dark clouds above. It was a showy move and made for a perfect backdrop when Seleena levitated herself up to meet her opponent, her long black hair flowing and her silver white eyes shinning.

The grin Icy gave her classmate was feral. "Psychic Seleena. I should have suspected."

"Oh I think you did. You just didn't have the self-preservation to consider the possibility that anything would come of it," Seleena shot back confidently.

"I'm still not convinced anything's going to come of all this," Icy said, observing the battle beneath her with an amused expression. "Are you sure you really want to do this, Seleena? I'll admit you're good at what you do but you'll never be at the same level as me."

"I might surprise you."

Icy laughed out loud, the sound cruel and cold. Holding out her hand the witch slowly created an ice spear that was a metre and a half in length and as thick as a persons arm. "All right, surprise me."

With little more than a flick of her wrist, Icy sent the spear hurtling towards the other witch's chest. Seleena calmly stared the projectile down and just before it impacted she threw up a psychic shield strong enough to shatter the spear, sending tiny shards of ice fluttering down like snow.

"Hmm. Not bad," Icy admitted. "Think fast!"

Quick as a snake, Icy threw two-dozen sharp icicle darts at Seleena. Even though there were still rot monsters to contest with, the crowd below had been watching the standoff above them and there were several shouts of alarm when Seleena didn't even try to put up another psychic shield. Instead, she let the icicles hit but they flew through her like she was as thin of substance as mist.

"What the . . ?" Icy blinked in surprised, staring at the unharmed witch opposite her, so she didn't see the attack coming from behind until it collided with her back. "Ah!"

"Surprised yet?" Seleena snarled viciously, letting the illusion in front of Icy dissolve. "Psychosomatic Strike!"

Icy screeched in agony as a pain that only existed in her mind ripped through her body. However, she quickly gritted her teeth and lashed out with another blast of ice magic at the telepath, who wasn't expecting Icy to throw off her attack so easily. Luckily for Seleena the throw was wild and the psychic witch managed to easily dodge the attack but the simple hex Icy followed up with hit her dead on.

"Your little mind tricks aren't going to work on me, Seleena," Icy hissed. "I had Darcy desensitise me to that kind of pain years ago."

"What a charming relationship you two must have," Seleena replied snarkily, shaking off the sting from the hex. The two witches had passed the stage of staring one another down and were now in constant motion, zigging this way and that to avoid the attacks each were throwing at each other.

"Just imagine what we do to our enemies," Icy grinned maliciously.

Seleena's face was a mask but her voice was heavy with disdain. "I'm not letting you win this."

"And what are willing to risk to prevent that from happening?" Icy asked.

Seleena didn't hesitate. "Everything."

In the past, the students of Alfea, Red Fountain and Cloud Tower had fought through the entire night to hold back the Army of Decay. Today they hadn't been fighting for an hour and yet somehow it seemed to be lasting twice as long as any pervious battle.

Despite Stella and the others best efforts to keep Stormy contained, the weather witch had managed to break through and had gotten outside where she was literally in her element. Her crimson lightning mixed with the ice blue and silver white flashes from Icy and Seleena's magic but so far Annabelle's task force had managed to prevent Stormy from joining her sister.

"I'm gonna make you losers suffer for this!" Stormy promised, a furious light in her eyes.

"Yeah, you say that but I'm not believing it," Annabelle shot back mockingly.

"I know right?" Stella agreed. "What I think's gonna happen is that we're going to beat the crud out of you and your psycho sisters and then the three of you are going to spend they rest of your lives rotting your asses off in jail."

"See that's where you're wrong," Stormy told her, throwing another attack that was then deflected. "Once the rest of the Army of Decay get here you guys won't have a chance and then payback's gonna be fun. Go ask your little friend, Flora. I made her scream and blubber like a baby."

At that Stella saw red. "You bitch! Supernova!"

On the ground the fight between human and rot monster waged on. Many of the heroes that had stormed the building had rejoined the fight (Chucky and Helia included) while a few others remained behind to watch over those too weak to be of any use out on the battlefield. The rot monsters kept coming and the exhausted teenagers fought desperately without respite.

"You're a pretty good shot," Chucky noted after watching Helia take down three flying stingrays in a row, one right after the other.

Helia had originally started off with his laser string gloves but it quickly become apparent that that kind of weapon had no affect on these particular monsters so he had been forced to trade for a more effective but less familiar weapon. After learning how to aim with a whip-like weapon, however, it was easy to work out the sights of a gun.

"I try," Helia replied modestly, shooting down another monster. "How many shots do these ammo canisters hold?"

"They're magically designed. They'll probably keep shooting long after you can no longer stand."

"I don't really wanna test that theory," Helia admitted, wiping the sweat from his brow.

As before, magic was proving to be the best weapon against the Army of Decay. Swords and guns merely broke the monster apart, only to have them rebuild themselves as quickly as they had fallen. Magic on the other hand managed to paralysis the monsters in their insect form for a few seconds before they were able to regenerate. It may not have seemed like much but to the Rebellion a few seconds of rest before they had to chop the monster down again was a blessing.

"Argh, is it halftime yet?" Musa panted, hurling another ball of sound magic at a monster. It connected with its neck, settled for a second and then exploded, sending tiny rot insects scattering.

"I'm afraid I don't think there is a halftime," Flora smiled tragically, firing a flying stingray out of the sky.

"Well it doesn't matter because we're not giving up until this is done!" Tecna said passionately, her eyes determined.

"Right," her two friends agreed in unison.

While the Rebellion at least had some experience with the Army of Decay, they had little understanding of the rot monster-slash-animal hybrids that had been created while they were hiding out by the Tree. The hybrids could move faster across land than the rot monsters and they charged into the battle with horrific screams that were almost as terrifying as the sight of them. There were boars, foxes, magi-beavers, badgers, deer, rabbits, raccoons and even a bear and all of them had rot tentacle wiggling out from beneath their flesh. As horrifying as they were, however, they were easily taken care of. Once the animal was killed the rot insects inside it would focus on slowly absorbing the carcass instead of fighting.

"Timmy! Take them out!" Brandon ordered, watching as his geeky friend calmly shot beast after beast in their eye sockets like he had done to the boar they had encountered when they found Sky and Stella.

"Any reason why you couldn't handle them, Brandon?" Sky asked, decapitating a rot monster and booting its head as hard as he could. It sailed several meters away, the tentacles from its mouth fluttering like a banner behind it.

"Well to be honest I don't want to touch them with my broadsword," Brandon admitted, his nose scrunched up in disgust.

"You're kidding me, right?"

"Those things are foul!" Brandon said and seconds later a rot infected wild turkey came running at them. "Especially that one! Get it? Foul. Fowl."

"Oh, that was so lame," Timmy criticised, picking up on Brandon's wordplay while simultaneously taking aim at the bird. The turkey's eye sockets were so small that he had no choice but to blow its whole head off. The turkey then continued running like a headless chook directly towards one of the larger rot monsters.

"Everybody's a critic," Brandon sighed tragically, slicing a rot monster across its belly and causing small rot insects to spill out onto the ground.

"Brandon, we're battling an army made up of decay," Sky pointed out. "Where do you draw the line between – "

Sky's question was cut off by something slamming into his stomach so suddenly it caused him to double over and his vision swim. And when it cleared, something was very, very wrong.

~Flash~

It was like the world had been put into slow motion. After the frenzy of battle, the silence that greeted him gave the impression of being underwater and the slow, steady heartbeat he felt moving through him left him somewhat off balanced.

Opening his eyes, he saw he was hovering far above the ground and staring down at a pair of legs that weren't his own. However, the horizontally stripped black and white socks were very familiar. The black pleated skirt on his hips fluttered in the wind and long, dark hair fell into the edges of his sight. Sky's vision moved upwards, as if he was slowly straightening, to reveal a white blouse that was rapidly staining red and trembling, feminine hands pressed against his midsection.

And perturbing from his stomach was a thick dagger of solid, glittering ice.

Eyes continued to pan upwards and there was Icy levitating opposite him. Her hand was outstretched like she had just thrown something and there was a manic but victorious grin on her face as she started to laugh, the sound slight distorted by the swell of the life draining from him. Sky then felt his eyes roll backwards, followed by the sensation of falling. There was sky above him but his long, black hair kept flying in front of his eyes, twisting the image until the dark consumed him entirely and the thud of a sudden impact sounded in his ears.

~Flash~

With a gasp, Sky's blue eyes shot open. He was back on the ground, his sword in his hand and his cape fluttering against his calves. Opposite him, he saw the turkey that Timmy had decapitated run into to larger rot monster and fall to the ground, indicating that barely a second had passed. And yet his whole body was shaking like a leaf, his breathing was ragged and his arms were wrapped protectively around his middle. Glancing around him quickly, Sky saw that Brandon and Timmy were in an identical state as him and with one look at their wild, terrified eyes he knew that they had just experienced the same thing he had. He also knew one terrible and horrible truth.

Miss Seleena was dead.

And then, from somewhere behind him, there was an explosion of fire.

TBC.