Chapter 25

"We took separate vehicles; Randy followed me to the cemetery." Brooklynn immediately came to Randy's defense, though her heart soared because Beth was truly worried about her. She loved both of them like family, nodding as Beth slowly lowered the shears. "He didn't abandon me, he talked with me, we went for a drive and then I told him I'd see him back here. I just wanted to spend a little time at my sister's grave to try to sort things out. So you see, Randy's innocent, no harm done." Twirling around, Brooklynn showed Beth she was completely unscathed.

"Told you." Randy muttered sullenly, fiddling with his black leather gloves. Beth had already told him to take them off and touch her so she could see firsthand just what she would do to him, if he had left Brooklynn to fend for herself, which he had declined as he didn't need the nightmares.

"Are we having a group moment?"

Too late.

Though it was amusing to see Beth jump and drop the shears.

Brooklynn turned her gaze toward the door, staring over at Taker, before looking back at Beth and Randy. "I'm fine, I promise." She smiled at them as Beth grabbed Randy's hand, dragging him from the room past Taker, leaving the shears on the floor. Brooklynn waited until they were completely gone and out of earshot before turning her focus on Taker fully. "I don't want to fight with you anymore." Her voice was soft and low and she sat down on the bed.

"Good." Taker said bluntly, stooping swiftly to pick up the shears, wondering just what in the hell Beth had been doing with them, arching a black eyebrow at Brooklynn. "Did you..." He stopped, realizing he was about to say something very cruel pertaining to her and Randy, knowing that would just be pointless. "Recharge?" He finished, feeling a bit lame.

"Yeah, I guess you could call it that." Brooklynn moved to lean back against the headboard, her knees drawn up, staring straight ahead. "I went to visit Julia's grave and-" She stopped, shaking her head, knowing he wouldn't want to hear any of that. It wasn't his business what she did when it came to her personal life. "I want this to be done as much as you do so we can both get on with our lives. So do you have any ideas on how to end this with Nemesis?" She refused to succumb to the pain in her heart.

"I weaken him with my...talents." His magic made everyone flinch, to put it mildly; her dislike went deeper than that as the situation between them was so much more personal, so complex. "You cross him -it- whatever Nemesis is, over."

"Y-You expect me to cross him over into the light?" She blinked when he nodded, wondering if he'd lost whatever was left of his mind. Brooklynn had to take several deep breaths to calm down, closing her eyes and felt the bed dip, trying to wrap her mind around actually doing that with Nemesis. "We need to vanquish him, Taker. There is a difference between crossing spirits over into the light and vanquishing the dark spirits. We have to VANQUISH him; there is no crossing him over."

"Explain to me... Lynn," His voice took on its usual dark, patronizing and still deadly tone he usually reserved for everyone else, when he was annoyed, with their ridiculous antics. Which was...all the time, actually. "How do you vanquish something that doesn't physically exist? There is no core to destroy, no body...how do you intend on vanquishing it when you could just cross the damn thing into the light and let the powers that be sort out what to do with him?"

"We vanquish him how you've vanquished the others. With your dark powers...as much as I despise them. He's a dark spirit, he will not go into the light willingly and, if he doesn't physically exist and there is no core to destroy, then there's no way for you to weaken him without completely destroying him, right?" Brooklynn knew she was right as she sat up, sitting Indian style in front of him. "So you tell me, how do you expect me to force a spirit into the light who refuses to go?"

He had to wonder if she actually graduated high school. "My pet, while there is no physical matter for me to weaken; there is the kinetic energy I can attack, which means...I can weaken it. In fact, I have a little force draining spell I could alter a bit to use on Nemesis. Usually, I reserve it for annoying humans, but..." He stroked his chin thoughtfully, wondering if Julia could be recalled so he could test it on her. "Are you SURE your sister crossed over?"

"Yes she did, she and Kyle are gone." Brooklynn had to fight back the sadness in her voice, hating the fact she would never get to know her sister because of her ruthless parents. "Taker, I'm going to say this so that you can understand clearly: I cannot cross a spirit, no matter the stature, into the light without them WANTING to go. The light is all I know of; though I'm sure there are other spiritual realms out there. In that case, YOU would have to do it because I have no unearthly clue how to go about crossing a spirit over into anything but the light. Do you understand what I'm saying?"

Taker pinched the bridge of his nose, exhaling through his mouth. "There are...other realms." He admitted grudgingly, having spent a limbo in one of them during his little in-between period as Mark/Taker. "But I can't force a spirit into one, you'll need to go through the motions of crossing it over after I weaken it and then, together, we can force it into this realm." Conjuring that up was going to be damn near deadly as a frown creased his brow. "We're going to have to use our...talents, together."

"I don't have any powers." She whispered, keeping her eyes on her clasped hands, trying not to show any emotion whatsoever. "I'm not you, I can only see and hear the spirits, I can't force them to do anything and Nemesis is far more powerful than any spirit I've ever encountered. The most I can do is communicate with him and tell you what he's doing, warn you ahead of time if possible..." Brooklynn suddenly looked toward the door, a single tear slipping down her cheek. "What about the others?" She asked suddenly, looking back at him with focused amber eyes. "What if all 10 of us put our gifts together? There's no way Nemesis can fight all of us off..."

She had to be the most idiotic woman on the face of the planet and, sadly, he was irrevocably in love with her, which in turn made him the most idiotic man on the planet. They were well-matched. She had no power...she had talked how many spirits into crossing over? Her power was the way she made connections with the dead, which essentially, was what Nemesis was when one got right down to it. A dead man or woman who had lingered on and turned into something much worse, she emphasized with them and that was perhaps the most powerful talent out of all of them.

"This is true." He conceded reluctantly. "Though, I would advise leaving Glenn behind as his migraines will undoubtedly leave him useless."

"I can be a distraction to help you and the others push him into one of these realms. I can goad him on or something until you have the clear shot to do what you do best."

Brooklynn didn't want to argue with him; she wanted this to end, so they could both leave this place and go back to the way things were. Mark wasn't coming back; Brooklynn accepted that, which is why she wasn't touching him or barely looking his way. It hurt too much, but she knew she had to be near him until this was done and over with.

"He's not the only one we'll need to push into this realm...my parents are going down along with him."

Taker nodded absentmindedly, sitting down in his usual chair in the corner, staring at her without actually seeing her. He was already planning strategy. Randy touched things. Trish had visions. They had migraine boy, an automatic writer, miss water girl...

"How are we going to apply their talents to this?" He asked finally, wondering if there was any chance he could convince Mickie to help him concoct some kind of spell to project their powers, maybe make them actually useful.

"Hopefully, Trish can see what's to come and John will end up writing things down... hopefully not in his skin either. Randy touches things to project images, so I don't see how that would work unless we found an object surrounding Nemesis or my parents..." She suddenly felt her eyes widen, looking over at Taker and stood up from the bed. "The locket... Taker, where is the locket?"

"You gave it to me, remember?" He arched an eyebrow, wondering if she was losing her mind as this was not the time for her to start going off the deep end. He reached beneath the black thermal shirt he wore and pulled the locket out, having been wearing it around his neck for safekeeping.

"I know, but this locket also links to my parents. I'm wondering if Randy touches it, if there's anything he can see from them, besides what happened to Julia." She reached out and fingered the locket, her heart pounding being this close to him. Closing her eyes momentarily, Brooklynn pulled her hand away. "I agree with you about Glenn, I don't know about Steve. Mickie can be very useful because her powers are light... Maybe Melina can cook up something to use against dark spirits..."

Taker considered all that, knowing he and the Wiccan were going to be working very closely for a while and smirked at the thought, then scowled. Mickie tended to get sick around him, due to his darker energies overloading her nervous system. They were going to have to sort that one out.

"Randy won't lose his mind and get sucked into something again, will he?"

"I don't know, there's only one way to find out, but I think for tonight we should let everyone rest. We'll have to track Nemesis down again because he won't be sticking around here." Brooklynn knew that for a fact because they'd been tracking him for years, and now her parents were involved… parents who killed their own child to keep her in the dark. "I'll do whatever you think is best, Taker."

"I think a good meal, some after dinner light planning and a good night's rest would do us all good." Taker agreed, knowing they had a short time frame, maybe. One could just never tell with spirits, especially malevolent ones like Nemesis. "Besides he's a total prick, do we know anything about Nemesis?" He asked curiously.

"He's from the 1800's, hung by the neck after being accused of witchcraft. His real name is Derrick Mathers. He's been around for a very long time, Mark..." She winced when she said that name, clearing her throat awkwardly. "Sorry, Taker." Brooklynn corrected, knowing she had to acknowledge him properly and looked out the window since the balcony doors were closed, the rain pouring down in gallons outside as the lightning streaked the sky repeatedly. "His parents were burned to death in their home shortly after he was born and he was raised by two women who were later killed because of accusations."

Taker hadn't minded being called Mark, which was unusual. He chalked it up to being distracted by everything going on at the moment. He knew them working together and getting their battle plans drawn up was a bit more important than him copping a fit over being called by THAT name.

"So basically we have a dead spirit with an attitude because he got the short end of the stick. I think we can work with that." He rubbed his chin thoughtfully, smirking evilly.

If done right, they could seriously mind fuck a ghost, of all things.

"That's the gist of it, yes."

Brooklynn didn't want to know what was going through Taker's mind, deciding she needed to get out of these jeans. He'd seen her naked on numerous occasions, so she wasn't the least bit bothered by him watching her dress. She slipped her shirt and jeans off before slipping into a floor-length pale blue spaghetti strapped nightgown, brushing her hair out. Taker arched an eyebrow, feeling only a hint of lust, but his mind was otherwise occupied with Nemesis, wondering how did one get into a ghost's head? His thoughts then strayed to the other members of their little group, going over their own powers, debating on how best to use them.

"What would happen if Randy touched Nemesis?" He asked out of nowhere, knowing it wouldn't exactly be touching in the sense of something solid, but still doable.

"Randy can't see Nemesis, I'm the only one who can, so probably nothing. I don't know how far Randy's power exceeds...I don't know if he can touch spirits or if they have to be human." Brooklynn admitted, trying to figure this out along with Taker. "Why do you ask?"

"Randy doesn't have to see Nemesis." Taker remembered how Randy had touched Brooklynn when she had been...not mentally in this world, but physically, and then he had seen things then. "He can touch you."

Brooklynn raised a slow eyebrow, wondering what he meant by that, not saying anything for a while. She knew whatever she said would sound stupid to him because, in Taker's mind, he was always right so Brooklynn would let him think that way. Nemesis wouldn't visit Brooklynn's dreams; it was too risky, though Randy already knew everything she went through with Nemesis, even before she met everyone. So whatever Taker was planning would more than likely backfire, unless he knew something she didn't. Taker knew ultimately they were going to have to face Nemesis. If they could throw Nemesis off track, they had a better chance of doing whatever it was they were going to do. What he was thinking was potentially dangerous, for Randy, at any rate, remembering Randy suffered physical effects from contact with spirits through Brooklynn, no less.

As far as he was concerned, two birds with one stone.

It was as if a lightbulb clicked on in Brooklynn's mind as her head snapped up, amber eyes widening, knowing exactly what Taker had in mind. Nemesis would use Randy as soon as he touched her, while conversing with Nemesis, and that would give Taker the distraction he would need to open the realm to send Nemesis in. Brooklynn looked from Taker to the door, knowing there would be no other way and Randy was their only chance to truly ending this once and for all.

"You're truly sadistic." She stated finally, breaking the silence between them. "But it's also a brilliant idea."