Shorter than the last one but there wasn't as much to write. The next chapter should be longer. Also, I have to say, I write this story for you people, my lovely readers, so please could you take just a minute or two to review after you have read so I know what you think? I seem to be getting less and less reviews, I'm worried people are getting bored. I know it's quite long, is it dragging? Please tell me if it is. Enjoy.

Chapter 29

Overnight

The Xiaolin monks were up all night caring for those who were traumatised by the battle, reassuring those who had lost loved ones, trying to reunite children- who Dojo had returned to the Temple- with their parents and making any repairs they could on the Temple. They were so busy they took no notice at all t the world outside as it shifted and changed around them. Borders to every country on Earth closed overnight, thousands were slaughtered and everywhere figures in strange black cloaks appeared, like guards. There were cries for help over radios as families were torn apart, as people went out and never came back, as a new entity took control.

And still the work went on inside the Xiaolin Temple. Raimundo worked harder than the rest, cleaning away rubble, helping builders repair the damage, taking care of their guests. He did not even stop t rest even though he was exhausted. He was pushing himself because as long as there was work to be done, he could stop his mind from straying back to his brothers. He had sworn to save them and they had died anyways. He felt like he had failed them.

He had not spoken to Bethania either; who he knew had only stayed at the Temple after the offer of a ride home because she did not want to take the news of Reynaldo and Carlos to the rest of the family. Selfishly, he had allowed her parents do this for her.

It was not until a red headed girl in ragged clothes that hung off her malnourished figure approached him that he finally stopped to rest. He faced the girl who he recognised immediately even though he had only met her once, a long, long time ago; Virginia.

"Raimundo," Virginia said. Her voice was weak but her eyes were gentle. She wore the expression of a woman who had fell from a great height and had accepted her doom, only to land on an immense bed of pillows, completely unharmed. "I want to thank you, all of you, for saving us."

"It was Clay that got you out," Raimundo shrugged.

"I know I've already spoken to him. But if it wasn't for all of you we'd probably have died in there. People were starting to give in to Wuya. There was less resistance. I thought she'd never be stopped," she paused. "Is she really gone? ...You really killed her?"

"She's gone," Raimundo nodded.

The corners of Virginia's mouth twitched into what was probably her first smile in years and she said, "You're so brave. Fighting her like you did. I don't think anyone else could have done it."

"Yeah, well...someone had to," Raimundo shrugged modestly. Virginia flashed him one more small smile and retreated, allowing him to continue his work.

Almost as soon as Virginia had left, Omi entered the room. He held the Ruby of Ramsies in one hand; he had been using it to transport piles of rubble out of the Temple into a corner of the grounds. Something occurred to Raimundo then and he addressed Omi.

"Chase was sneaking around the palace during the battle you know," he said.

"Yes, I saw him too," Omi nodded.

"Any idea what he was up to?" Raimundo questioned.

"I do not know," Omi said. "I wonder if he got out in time."

"Yeah, I'd never thought of that," Raimundo said. "Victoria said he was in dungeons with her and he used her to escape. Why would Wuya lock him up?"

"I expect she was afraid of more competition," Omi said wisely.

"I suppose," Raimundo agreed. He sat down on the floor and stretched his acing legs out in front of him. "What do you reckon is going to happen now?"

"With the Dark Queen?"

Raimundo nodded.

"We shall just have to wait and see," Omi shrugged. Then he looked at Raimundo rather sheepishly. "Raimundo, I would like to say something to you."

"...Oh?" was all Raimundo could think of to say. He was slightly surprised by this sudden change in Omi.

"...When you first came to the Temple, I never thought much of you. Especially not after you joined Wuya. But not even I knew then how strong you were going to become. You killed Wuya. That is something I am not sure even I could have accomplished. So I am sorry for the way I have treated you. I should never have doubted Master Fung's decision to make you Shoku Warrior," Omi said, his eyes were fixed on Raimundo as if he was trying to show his sincerity by gazing into Raimundo's eyes as he spoke, but his hands fiddled with the hem of his robes, as if he was nervous- and slightly ashamed- of what he was saying.

"Oh," Raimundo said again. "Well...thanks Omi."

.:.:.:.

It was not until Clay turned on the radio and heard the pleas for help that they realised what was happening in the rest of the world.

"The Dark Queen is taking over! Her forces are everywhere! There are bodies in the streets, people are being dragged from their homes, families are being torn apart and friends are going missing! Everywhere is in ruins, everything is being destroyed! Someone please help us!"

[A crash in the background]

"Oh no, they're here. Someone, please, you've got to save us!"

[Another crash, a scream, a thud and then silence]

.:.:.:.

It felt strange to be lying in a bed again, even if the bed was just a mattress on the floor. The once familiar surrounding felt surreal to Raimundo, who had never expected to find himself lying in his room in the Xiaolin Temple, listening to Clay's thunderous snores, ever again. There was one difference this time however, he now shared his mattress with Abi, who was almost as exhausted as him as she had rushed around all day caring for the bereaved and the shell-shocked.

After they'd heard the radio broadcast, the Xiaolin monks had gathered in the vault, the only part of the Temple that did not seem to have suffered any damage seeing as it was empty anyways, and discussed what they had to do.

"We have to do something," Raimundo stated.

"What though?" Kimiko asked. "We don't know anything about the Dark Queen. No one's ever seen her, all we know is what you told us of when she captured you," she inclined her head to Raimundo. "We don't even know what are soldiers are. All we know for sure is they're definitely not fucking human. You saw what they did to Sampson when he tried to fight one in England when we went for his family. How are we supposed to fight an enemy we don't even know?"

"I don't know," Raimundo sighed. "But we've got to do something."

"Why did you let your parents go back to Brazil?" Sampson asked suddenly. "Why didn't you ask them to stay here where you knew they would be okay?"

"I asked them to but they wanted to check on the rest of the family," Raimundo said. "I told them we could bring them here but they weren't having it. They wanted to go home."

"I don't even know if my papa is alive," Kimiko said quietly.

"Neither do I," Clay said. They stood for a while in silence.

Now Raimundo lay in bed, staring out of the window across the dark grounds and up at the velvet sky studded with diamonds. It was a beautiful view and looking at it, he found it hard to believe such horror could be happening all around. He wondered what had happened to the man they had heard on the radio. Had they killed him? Or had he been dragged off to the Dark Queen's strange palace made of black diamond.

"You're the only one with a little knowledge of the Dark Queen," Abi said, as if she had been reading his thoughts. "Do you think she's stronger than Wuya?"

"Yes," Raimundo asked after a short pause. "I've fought against plenty of her soldiers too and they're impossible to defeat. I don't know how we're going to do this and now everyone is looking to me for answers."

"You'll do it, Rai," Abi said. "And I'm not just saying that. I've seen what you're capable of. And you never give up. You don't allow innocent people to suffer. I know you're going to do everything you can to beat this Dark Queen, whoever she is."

Raimundo said nothing, absorbing Abi's words and wishing they filled him with confidence like they were meant to. What he felt instead was dread. He thought of how he felt when he had head the Dark Queen speak. Even just the memory made him shudder. He had never believed before now that just the sound of someone's voice could make anyone feel like that. The pain. The pain that seemed to embed itself in him rather than tear through him like true physical pain. The way it made him feel like he would simply like to end his life, to end his suffering. He didn't know how they were going to fight the Dark Queen.

"I'm sorry about your brothers, Raimundo," Abi said after a few minutes of silence.

"Yeah," Raimundo whispered. The last thing he wanted was to think of his brothers. He had seen Bethania before he turned in for the night. "Don't blame yourself Rai, it wasn't your fault," she had told him. But he couldn't help but blame himself. His mother and father had barely spoken to him before they left and he had a feeling they blamed him too.

"You killed her Rai," Abi said. "Don't let yourself forget that; you killed Wuya. Think how many more people could have died if you hadn't? You've saved so many lives."

"But I couldn't save them," Raimundo said. Abi fell silent. No matter how exhausted he was, Raimundo knew he was not going to get any sleep that night.

.:.:.:.

Kimiko was also lying awake in bed, in the room beside Raimundo's. She had heard Raimundo and Abi talking and longed to be in Abi's position, lying in bed beside Raimundo, trying to comfort him. For one brief moment she regretted saving Abi, and then she felt a wave of guilt wash over her and felt a little sick and how horrid that thought was. Besides, Raimundo was happy with Abi. She should be happy for him. Shouldn't she? She certainly didn't feel happy.

Thinking of Raimundo's lost twin brothers made her think of her own family. Was her father still alive? If he was, for how long would he stay that way? The Dark Queen must know the Xiaolin monks were going to oppose her, to fight back and try to bring her down. Surely she'd want some sort of leverage, to deter the warriors from trying to fight her. For something like that, the obvious solution was obviously to go for the families. And all three families, Kimiko's, Raimundo's and Clay's, were unprotected, in a far away placed where the warriors could not even check up on them. For the first time, Kimiko realised how much they were sacrificing by fighting this war. And yet, they'd be sacrificing so much more if they didn't fight. It was lose-lose either way. All they could do was fight and hope for the best. But the thought of fighting an enemy they knew nothing about seemed ominous and virtually impossible. Fighting Wuya and her forces had been hard enough. The idea of fighting The Dark Queen, who was obviously so much more powerful, was daunting.

Kimiko rolled onto her side so she had a view of the open night sky through the window. Grey clouds now rolled across it, blotting out the scatter of twinkling stars. It seemed so strange that thing like this, the stars, the rain, could go on, oblivious of everything else around it.

Being an only child, Kimiko did not know what it was like to love a sibling. She didn't know what it was like to have a sibling. But she expected it was the same losing a parent and that was something she had experienced, though she had never spoken of it to her friends. Not once. She thought it was odd that after so many years no one had asked about her mother but supposed now, they had noticed she never spoke of her, and they had met her father and they must have also noticed her mother wasn't there, and they had simply followed her lead. She remembered the day her mother had died. She remembered the days before it too. Sometimes she dreamed about it. She thought about it less and less as she got older and that was the way she liked it but once every few months the memory would catch her off guard. She did not know how she would feel if she lost her father too.

Kimiko knew there was too much going on, too much on her mind, to sleep. She wanted to get up and go for a walk to clear her head but, although her mind was fully awake; her body was too tired and would not allow her to get out of bed. She needed rest.

.:.:.:.

The night was chilly, and Alexis had been wandering all day. By a sheer stroke of luck, she had escaped the palace before it collapsed. She found it difficult to believe Wuya was dead. She found it difficult to believe Ty was dead too. That fucking Japanese bitch had killed her brother and she was going to pay. Alexis swore it.

She did not know what she was going to do now. She did not know where to go. She supposed she could search for any Heylin survivors, but she wasn't even sure where to begin.

The clouds above threatened rain and Alexis knew she needed to get under cover but she had nowhere to go. It was a moment before she realised she was being followed. She turned around, hastily pushing silver hair out of her face so she could peer through the gloom. A cloaked figure was approaching her. She stood her ground and watched. The figure reached her and stood before her. The cloak swept the ground but she had a feeling the figure was floating, rather than standing. Then it spoke. "You are Alexis," it said. The voice was stranger than any voice she had ever heard. It was rather hoarse and raspy, as if it had a sore throat and found it difficult, perhaps painful, to speak. Yet there was something vaguely familiar about that voice that Alexis could not quite put her finger on.

"Yes," Alexis said. She was readying herself for a fight, for this figure gave off a feeling of hostility.

"You were a Heylin supporter," the figure stated. Alexis noted the use of the word were.

"Yes," she said again, somewhat defiantly.

"You will come with me," the figure said.

"Oh will I now?" Alexis said, rather shrilly. "And what makes you think that?"

Then the figure reached up and lowered its hood and Alexis realised then what the Dark Queen's soldiers were. Alexis screamed.

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