Ironically, it was Sally who first noticed when they started losing weight, over three months after they started fighting. It was absolutely beyond Quatre how she'd done it, since he hadn't even noticed it himself, and he saw Trowa with very few clothes on a hell of a lot more often then she did! He thought about what he'd seen the night before, and was disturbed. How could he have not noticed how thin Trowa had gotten! He was practically skin and bones!
Well, skin, muscle, and bones, Quatre amended. Who would have thought that someone as tall and thin as Trowa would have so many muscles? Quatre smiled to himself as he pictured Trowa. He was absolutely delicious... but he was getting off track. The point was that he should have noticed before Sally. When he did ask, she told him it was something having to do with their wrists, and started feeding them more. She also examined the other mages, and found that they were starting to lose weight as well, although not as obviously as the five of them. She started feeding them more, too.
The fighting continued, and sometimes he felt like it was never going to end. That thought was even more depressing, because it was very close to the truth. Quatre worked very hard to keep from revealing his thoughts to those around him. They had enough to worry about without him burdening them. He was only too aware of that fact as despite all their (and his) efforts, their dreams and nightmares continued to intrude upon his. He spent some time searching through the memories Gente had left him, and determined that Gente hadn't had the same problem, at least not to the extent that Quatre did. He thought it was because his group was very close, and he was closer to the other four than Gente had been, but that didn't help him get rid of the problem.
One of the Manguanacs died. Then another.
When the third died, they started having to worry about more than just the emotional trauma involved in losing their own people - there weren't that many of them to begin with, so every person they lost was a hard blow. When that fact was brought up during a meeting, Sally didn't say anything, but at the next attack, she was with the Manguanacs when the gates opened, a sword in hand. She'd timed it so well that there was no time to argue with her and ban her from the fighting.
She proved that the weapons she'd kept in her office weren't just for show, killing her share of the Oz soldiers in that battle. That didn't stop Duo, of all people, from yelling at her about risking herself when the battle was over. Her response was short and to the point and one that couldn't be repeated in polite company. Wufei watched the entire exchange with a fierce glower on his face and then stalked off without saying a word to anyone, although Quatre had caught him watching her when he thought no one was paying attention. Sally had given Wufei a thoughtful look after that exchange, but still didn't approach him.
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:Wow, they really have it in for us, don't they?: Duo commented as they stood on the top of the wall, looking at the horde of Oz soldiers coming at them.
Horde was the proper word, because there didn't seem to be any pattern or organization to their movements, just *a lot* of soldiers running towards the fortress.
No one seemed to have an answer for that, and they remained silent for a minute. Then Duo commented, :Explain to me again why we can't just let them throw themselves against the shield for a while? They're dumb enough to do that.:
:At first, but eventually they'll figure out they can't get in, and they'll bring in more troops to encircle the fortress,: Quatre replied. :Then they'll start bringing in their mages, and once they've got a full Circle around us, they can do some real damage.:
:Yeah, I was kinda guessing it was something like that,: Duo replied. :But it would be fun to watch them throw themselves against the shield for a while, don't ya think?:
:It would help us conserve resources,: Heero commented.
Quatre stared at him for a second, then looked into his mind and saw what he was thinking. :You're right,: he said after a few seconds. :We'll let them kill themselves that way for a while. But we have to attack them as soon as they start to circle around us.:
No one had any arguments with that plan, and Quatre quickly informed their fighters. He looked back down just in time to see the first of the Oz soldiers throw themselves at the walls of the fort. They hit the shield just feet short of the walls themselves, and were instantly vaporized. Despite himself, Quatre winced. He could barely stand to see humans throwing their lives away like that, even if they weren't controlling their own bodies. It was obvious, just looking at them, the way that none of them even hesitated for a second before throwing themselves against the shield in a futile attempt to get through.
His eye caught on a young man with reddish hair who held a sword in his hand, and he had just enough time to get a good look at him before the man also flung himself against the shield. Quatre closed his eyes and turned his head away, although he knew that denying the reality of what was happening wouldn't do him any good.
It was nearly fifteen minutes before the demons figured out that they weren't going to get through the shields by throwing human fighters at it, and started to encircle the fortress. That couldn't be allowed.
:All right, they're moving,: he told the others. He wasn't sure quite how he had ended up in charge of the tactics in the battles, he just kept track of his men and told them where he thought they would do the most good, it didn't seem like anything too special.
He pushed the thought out of his mind as he spread his wings and jumped down from the top of the wall into the main courtyard, where the men (plus Sally) were gathering. They knew better than to try to fly into the battle. Trowa had tried that once, and nearly had his wings shredded by the number of arrows that had been fired at him. Quatre didn't know if the same thing would happen with his wings, since they were more magical in nature (if such a thing could be said about wings that were completely magical anyway) but he didn't want to experiment.
He landed, absorbed his wings, then drew his curved blade out of it's sheath at his waist. He wore it all the time, now, ever since he'd almost been caught off guard by an attack while he was in dinner. No one had ever said anything even mildly accusatory about his carelessness, although Heero had shot him a couple of hard looks before Duo pulled him away, but that just seemed to make it worse, and Quatre had promised himself he'd never disappoint the others like that again.
The gates swung open, just enough to allow them to slip outside into the fray, and then he was in the middle of one of the largest battles they'd seen yet. Literally hundreds of soldiers had died in that first useless attack on the shields, and they had been only a small fraction of the force here.
Quatre drew all of his power inward, directing it into his muscles and senses, allowing him to move faster than any normal human, even the demon-controlled ones, could possibly hope to move. Then he threw himself into the battle with the same desperate determination that had carried him through the others.
Once the battle actually started, he fell into a kind of haze, where most of his attention was directed out of his body, to the other fighters and to the battle as a whole. He generally only paid enough attention to what he was doing to keep himself alive. He knew that he wasn't their best fighter, not by a long shot, he could do them a lot more good by directing the battle then by focusing all of his attention on fighting. Heero, Duo... all of the others were much stronger fighters than he was - he could hold his own in a normal battle, but in these situations, he mostly took care of anything that came near him and let the others plow ahead.
That was probably why he didn't notice the attack until it was too late. There was an especially vicious set of soldiers on the other side of the fort. He started to direct people there, and suddenly felt a flash of danger from somewhere very close to him. He snapped his attention back to his immediate surroundings, and saw a woman working her way through the carnage. She was dressed in armor, which might have explained how she'd managed to make it this far without getting killed. A better explanation might be the aura of magic that hung around her like a cloud.
Quatre was so surprised that the demons would actually send one of their mages into the field that he didn't react to protect himself until it was almost too late. He threw a mage-bolt at her, then ducked under a sword and stabbed someone in the side. By the time he brought his eyes back to where he'd last seen her, she was gone.
Where'd she go?! he thought wildly, slashing at a couple more soldiers to drive them back. She'd looked so familiar...
Suddenly something hit him hard from the right side, but he knew instinctively that the threat was coming from the left, that the blow on the right was just to distract him. He turned his head just in time to see a flash of pale blonde hair and glowing eyes before he heard mocking laugher and felt a stab of pain in his side.
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Trowa suddenly felt a sharp pain in his left side, and an instant later identified the source. :Quatre!: His panic increased when he realized that Quatre hadn't responded. He conjured himself to Quatre's position, and found Rashid desperately trying to fight through the Oz soldiers gathered there. His target immediately became clear - a small, blond-haired figure slumped on the ground near the fort walls. Quatre... Trowa immediately began killing everything between him and his love. Even from here he could see the blood staining Quatre's shirt.
By some unimaginable stroke of luck, Quatre had been right next to the shield when he was struck, and fell within it's boundaries. Otherwise the Oz soldiers would have killed him instantly. As it was, they'd restarted their futile attempts at getting through the shield, throwing themselves at it in droves, and all dying.
Trowa reached Quatre's body at the same time as Rashid. Trowa immediately reached for the wound, pulling his shirt back to reveal the deep stab in his side, just above his left hip. Why hasn't it healed? He was dimly aware of Rashid covering his back in the midst of the battle, but all of his attention was focused on the body in front of him.
:Trowa! What happened to Quatre?!: Duo shouted in his mind, then grunted with some physical effort.
Trowa realized that he had no idea what had actually happened. "Rashid?" he shouted through the chaos.
"A witch! One of their mages got through and stabbed him!" Rashid shouted in response as he continued to methodically kill the Oz soldiers who ran at them.
:He was stabbed by one of their mages,: Trowa told the others. :He won't wake up, and the wound isn't healing.:
:She might have cast some sort of spell on him to keep the wound from healing,: Wufei responded. :It should lose power once you're in the fortress, in an hour or so.:
:I'll take him inside,: Trowa immediately said, reaching to pick up Quatre.
:No,: Heero told him, and Trowa frowned.
:What did you just say?: he asked quietly, slicing off the hand of an Oz soldier who got too close. The man didn't even flinch, just picked up his sword with his other hand and attacked again. Trowa ran him through, then kicked the body off of his sword.
:You're needed here,: Heero said simply, and Trowa's frown deepened.
:I'm not just leaving him there for the rest of the fight,: he responded, raising his left hand to elbow someone who had tried to grab his arm. He got his arm free, turned, pulled a knife from his belt and used it to slit the throat of the guy who'd grabbed him. He got a fierce satisfaction out of seeing the body slump to the ground.
:Trowa, he's right,: Duo said, sounding regretful. :We really need you in the fight right now. With the Q-man out for the rest of the battle, we're in deep shit.:
Trowa growled intelligibly at him and rammed the knife into the gut of another soldier. He immediately scolded himself for his carelessness as he put too much force into it and the hilt became tangled in some entrails. He shoved the dying soldier away from him and grabbed a knife from the body of one of the soldiers he'd killed earlier. A quick glance around the battlefield told him that Heero and Duo were right - the loss of one of their best fighters could be devastating to his side right now. Already he could see some of the Manguanacs faltering, allowing themselves to get isolated now that Quatre wasn't coordinating the battle.
:Get those four to pull back together,: he instructed coolly, always keeping an eye on Quatre. He couldn't just leave him there, but he couldn't leave the battle, either. If he left now, they would lose, and he'd do Quatre no good.
"Rashid," he said out loud. He knew that the big man heard him, although there was no faltering in his fighting and he didn't turn. "I need you to take Quatre inside. Keep him safe, and then watch him until he recovers from the shock and heals himself."
Now Rashid did glance at him, just for a second, before nodding his head sharply. He let out a loud cry in a language that Trowa didn't recognize, then with a flurry of strikes, somehow managed to clear a small area around Quatre's body. In the brief respite he'd gained, he scooped Quatre up in his arms, then threw him over one shoulder.
Trowa grimaced. That probably wasn't the best way to carry a person with a deep wound, but Rashid had to be able to defend himself, and it wasn't worse than leaving him on the ground. Besides, he could heal up any extra damage that was done along with the actual wound.
He watched as Rashid started to move along the wall, keeping his back to the shield and keeping a sword between Quatre and the Oz soldiers who rushed at them. He was far too big to fit between the trees that made up the shield and the wall of the fortress, but he still made good use of the shield, ducking into it whenever the fighting got too bad. In a few minutes he was out of sight.
Then there was nothing left to do but fight.
--------------------------------
The fight lasted several more hours, and Quatre never reappeared. He didn't contact them, either, which meant that he hadn't woken up yet.
They really could have used his help, too.
Duo had long since given up swearing and muttering about the idiot Ozzies - he was still pissed as all hell, but it was too much effort and required too much of his breath to do that, breath that he couldn't spare right now. He continued to mutter curses silently, but saved his breath for the fighting. He hadn't realized how much Quatre was doing when he organized all of them. His fighting skills might have been weaker than the rest of them, but the chaos that the battle quickly disintegrated into was not pretty.
More than once Duo saw a creepy-looking girl, about their age, dressed in black armor, drifting in and out of the carnage, a cloud of magic so thick he could practically smell it hovering around her. A mage, he thought with the part of his mind that wasn't dedicated to slaughtering Oz soldiers. She's got to be the one who got Quatre. He might not be a tactical genius, but he couldn't see Treize endangering more than one of mages on his side at a time. He redoubled his efforts to get at her, but by the time he got near her, she'd already turned and started to flee, the soldiers closing around her to guard her escape.
Duo caught a fleeting glimpse of something in the eddies of power that surrounded her. It took him a second to figure out what he was sensing - damn it, where was Wufei when he needed him! Then it became clear - he didn't know how the hell she was doing it, but the girl with the freaky eyebrows was somehow acting as a sort of power sink, drawing in energy from all around her. It was probably making her a hell of a lot stronger, but it was also drawing energy from the Oz soldiers around her. It could be enough...
He stuffed one of the two knives he used back into his belt and held out his right hand, concentrating on his power. He drew it in, picturing Thanatos in his mind, just the way she'd appeared in the dreamscape, instructing him as to some of the harder disciplines, holding that scythe...
Suddenly he felt cool wood appear out of nowhere in his right hand. Duo blinked as he stared at the scythe in his hand - he hadn't expected an actual physical weapon, he'd expected an image in his mind, but he wasn't about to complain. He stabbed someone - he didn't really care who - with his left hand, then stuck that knife back into his belt and grasped the scythe in both hands.
He spared a quick glance at the large curved blade - a blade that should have been sharpened metal but was not, was something infinitely more dangerous. He didn't know exactly what it was made of, only that is was shiny and obsidian, and that it pulsed with power. His power.
With an almost negligent gesture, he swept the scythe through the air in front of him. Suddenly a wave of blackness shot out in front of him, originating at the line in the air he'd designated with the blade of the scythe. It struck the soldiers around him in an ever-widening arc. Those closest to him barely stumbled, but as the line got close to the power-sink the girl was creating, it started having a real effect. At first the soldiers were only knocked to the ground, then they were knocked unconscious by the force of his spell, and by the time the wave got within fifteen feet of her, every soldier around her dropped dead.
She spun around, and his magic impacted on the shield she hastily threw up. The result of the clashing magic was a massive explosion that killed even more Oz soldiers. Duo did a quick mental check and was relieved that none of their people had been caught up in the fireball. He'd never seen anything like that before.
:What was that?!: Wufei demanded.
:Damned if I know. There was a ripple in the protective shield, and I attacked it. And I hit that damn girl's shields. Then... kablooey!: That probably wasn't the best description he could have come up with, but it was all that he could provide on such short notice.
:It might be the two opposing forces meeting directly...: Wufei mused out loud. Well, not really out loud, but it was the same thing, sorta. Wufei sounded pretty distracted, but Duo knew better. Wufei was still slicing away with the economical strokes he favored (and man, was he good with that weird sword of his), this other thing was just a passing interest. :We should be careful using our power directly against their mages, it could be... destructive.:
:Attack now!: Heero suddenly commanded, and Duo realized that between the number of people he'd killed with his magic and the confusion caused by the explosion, they had a temporary advantage over the Ozzies. He attacked.
Heero's timing had been excellent. When everyone on their side rallied at once, the Ozzies were caught off guard, and fell quickly. Within a half-hour, the battle was over. After Sally and the Manguanacs went inside, Duo quickly performed the by-now habitual burning of the corpses and sent the scythe back to wherever he got it, and Wufei checked to make sure that there was no residual magic left behind.
Trowa was the first of them inside, and once the gates closed behind them, all four of them immediately conjured themselves to the room that Trowa and Quatre shared.
A female mage was sitting in a chair next to Quatre's bed, a damp cloth in her hands. She was wiping Quatre's forehead with it, but when the arrived, she immediately set it aside and walked over. "Oh, thank the gods you're here!" she exclaimed as Trowa hurried to Quatre's side. "I didn't know what to do... he's feverish, he won't wake up, and he's not healing..." she trailed off as Quatre began to toss his head back and forth on the bed as Trowa knelt beside him. Quatre's face was very pale, almost translucent. The last time he looked this bad was when he lost his magic, Duo found himself thinking.
"What's going on, woman?!" Wufei demanded angrily.
"That's the most he's moved in hours," she reported, wringing her hands. "Is that a good sign?"
Duo suddenly realized that she was talking to *them*, that she expected them to know exactly what was going on? What the fuck did she think they were, gods? He opened his mouth to tell her exactly what he thought of the situation and to vent a little when Trowa finally reached out and gently touched Quatre's hand. Quatre suddenly moaned loudly, and Duo felt a stab of alarm from Wufei.
:Get away from him!: Wufei shouted, and used his power to haul Trowa away from the bed, throwing him halfway across the room. :Don't touch him!:
Trowa spun to look at Wufei, and Duo took an involuntary step back. He'd thought that Trowa's expressionless, blank gaze was unnerving at the best of times, frightening at the worst. That was absolutely nothing compared to Trowa, his eyes practically glowing with anger, his power gathered inside of him, ready to be used. He made a sound that was more of an animalistic growl than a sound a human would make. His body was actually trembling, he was so angry, as Wufei stepped between him and the bed where Quatre lay. Duo immediately decided that Wufei was just about the bravest person he'd ever seen.
:Get out of my way,: Trowa ordered.
"If you continue to touch him, you'll kill him," Wufei replied quietly, subtly motioning for Heero and Duo to move behind Trowa, to restrain him if necessary. In his state, Trowa didn't notice.
"What?!"
"It's a spell. It took me a few minutes to recognize it, but she cast a spell on him and the wound. That's why it won't heal, and why our presence is hurting him."
Trowa didn't respond, and he still didn't look happy, but the emotion was fading from his eyes as he regained control, and Duo realized that Trowa had been dangerously near to going the route that Quatre had taken - letting his power take control of him. That would spell the end for them right now.
"Our presence is hurting him," Wufei repeated, more gently than Duo could ever remember him speaking. "We have to get out of here. The longer we stay close to him, the less time he has, the less time I have to figure out how to counteract the spell."
That got Trowa's attention. "You don't know how to counteract it?"
"Outside," Wufei repeated. "And don't use any magic. Tone it down as much as you can." As he said this, he glanced at Heero and Duo, who immediately followed his instructions. After a few seconds, Trowa did the same, and allowed himself to be escorted out.
The woman mage, who'd fled as soon as Wufei shouted, was waiting outside, and stared at them with wide eyes. They ignored her.
"What's wrong with him? And how can we fix it?" Trowa asked immediately.
Wufei frowned, closing his eyes and pressing one hand against his temple. Duo sensed the deep concentration that meant he was digging through his predecessor's memories. "It's an assassin's tool, especially designed to kill mages," he said slowly.
Duo started to sort through his own predecessor's memories, but couldn't think of any assassin spells that he knew of that would make them have to stay away. "What's it doing?"
"It's centered on the crystal," Wufei said, still frowning and rubbing his brow.
"What crystal?" Trowa asked sharply.
"There was... there must have been a fragment... a shard of crystal on the edge of the blade," Wufei said, finally lowering his hand. "It's not trapped in the wound. It's drawing out his power, his magic, and feeding it to the mage who cast the spell. His body, automatically trying to use magic to heal itself, is feeding the crystal. Having magic used nearby accelerates the process," he finished, his eyes gazing into space. "We are magic," he continued. "It's worse with us in the room, and worse than that with us touching him. If you'd carried him in from the battlefield, it probably would have killed him. Trying to heal him at this point would only end in our power being drawn away as well, and speed up his death. As it is, the spell will continue to drain his power until there is nothing left."
"What can we do?" Trowa asked immediately, worry showing plainly in his eyes as he glanced at the closed door.
For a long moment Wufei didn't answer, and Duo was afraid that he didn't have an answer for Trowa, but finally he turned to the woman, who still stood there, staring at him. "Get Sally Poe," he said to her.
Her eyes widened. "You mean... the woman fighter? She's..."
"I am quite aware of that, onna!" he snapped. "Do it!"
The woman paled slightly, then bobbed her head and ran off down the hall.
Duo looked at Wufei. "Sally? Why do you want her?"
Wufei stared into space for several seconds, then sighed softly, and it was like something, some tension, maybe, just drained out of him. "Sally once mentioned that she was something of a healer, one who used herbs."
"Hey, you're right, I forgot that," Duo remarked after a few seconds of thought. "How'd you remember that?"
Wufei shot him a scornful look. "When your mouth is closed, you have a better chance of hearing something," he said with a pointed look, and Duo grimaced. Well, I guess I walked into that one.
"So why do you want her here?"
"The crystal has to be retrieved and destroyed. None of us can safely touch it. Sally has no magic."
"You mean you want her to go and dig that thing out of Quatre?" Duo exclaimed, then immediately regretted his choice in words when all the blood drained out of Trowa's face. Duo took a step back and decided now was a good time to try that quiet thing of Wufei's.
"It has to come out," Wufei said without looking at Trowa. "Once it's out, he can heal himself, and we can help him. And I've heard of such techniques before - some of my Clan studied them, as a matter of fact."
"Your Clan practiced cutting people open?" Duo asked before he could stop himself. Oh well, there went that attempt at quiet.
"They practiced medicine," Wufei said sharply.
"Will Quatre be all right?" Trowa asked suddenly, his tone vaguely pleading.
Wufei still refused to meet his gaze. "If he survives the initial procedure, he will be fine."
Sally came running down the hall. It was obvious she'd just come in from the battle - she was still dressed in her blood-stained pants and had a sword swinging from her left hip, but at least she'd cleaned the blood off her hands and lower arms. "What's the emergency?" she asked, an amount of urgency in her voice.
Without any prodding, Wufei quickly explained the situation to her. When he got to the part about what she had to do, she cut in. "I'm sorry, but I have only minimal training, from a few books, about that sort of thing. I can't in good conscience..."
"Woman, he will die if you don't," Wufei told her. His tone softened slightly, and he actually looked directly at her, for the first time that Duo could remember. "Please. This has to be done."
Sally stared at Wufei, an odd expression on her face, then she nodded slightly. "What do I have to do?"
"There is a sliver of crystal, mage crystal, imbedded in the wound. You need to find it and get it out of him. Once you have it out, crush it and throw what remains into the fire. Do you understand?"
Sally nodded nervously. "Can I have someone to help me? To hold him down?"
Trowa's head snapped up and Duo quickly said, :That's just normal medicine, Tro. I've seen it with broken legs and arms before. You don't want them squirming around too much and upsetting something else.:
Trowa turned his head away, but stifled his objections.
Wufei nodded in response to Sally's question. "So long as it isn't a mage," he responded.
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Ten minutes later, Trowa stared at the closed door. Rashid had arrived a few minutes ago and went into the room with Sally, and after that there had been no word from them. Trowa could still feel Quatre on the other side, but Wufei had cast some sort of ward on the room so no magic seeped into it, and if he opened the door he'd break the ward and possibly hurt Quatre.
Quatre. Just the mention of his name brought forth emotions that Trowa had never even experienced previous to meeting Quatre. He didn't know how to deal with all of this... feeling. He'd been dead inside for so long, for as long as he could remember, and Quatre managed to shatter all of that. It was a good thing... he couldn't remember every feeling this alive, but it also made him feel... vulnerable. He didn't like that, and the thought of losing Quatre was enough to cause almost physical pain.
Physical pain he could deal with - he'd experienced enough of it so that it didn't affect him anymore - but the feelings that one blond mage evoked in him - they were not so easy to deal with.
I can't lose him, he thought, his throat tightening up.
:It's all right, Tro,: Duo told him. :He's going to be fine.:
Trowa stared at him, not having anything to say. There was no way that Duo could know for certain that Quatre would be all right. Instead, he turned to Wufei. "Are you certain that that will help him?"
Wufei nodded his head sharply. "That is the spell she used. The difficulty is in extracting the shard. It will be quite small."
Trowa swallowed. "If he dies..."
Wufei raised his head with a sharp motion. "Then what? What will you do? Will you kill yourself, and doom all of your people, all of Quatre's people, to slavery under the demons?" He took several steps closer until his nose was mere inches from Trowa's. "Well?"
"You can't," Heero said flatly. "You're needed to defeat them. Especially if he doesn't survive."
Trowa turned just in time to see Duo dig his elbow into Heero's side, and to hear him hiss, :Heero!:, but Heero's expression didn't change.
Heero's unsympathetic bluntness managed to reach Trowa, though, and he managed a curt nod to them. "If he..." he couldn't quite bring himself to say the words. :If something goes wrong,: he continued in his mental voice, :I will help you defeat the demons.: He would, for no other reason than Quatre would want him to. Also, he wanted vengeance. Fighting the demons would provide both. And after every single one of the demons was dead...
Quatre had brought him to life, more literally than anyone suspected, including Quatre himself. After the demons were dead, if Quatre wasn't in this world, what remained for Trowa? After he avenged Quatre and protected his love's people, he would kill himself.
:Trowa, that isn't a solution,: Duo said quietly. :Trust me, I know something about this.: But even as he spoke, Duo unconsciously reached out and snaked an arm around Heero's waist, and Heero reciprocated the gesture by grabbing onto Duo's trailing braid and giving it a gentle tug. Even when he was lost in bad memories, as Trowa knew he must be, even at the worst of times, Duo had Heero.
Duo noticed him staring at their loose embrace, and blushed and looked away. :Look, he's going to be OK, and if he was here, you know he'd give you hell for even thinking about it, so just don't, OK? He's going to be fine.:
Trowa resumed staring at the door.
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Five minutes passed. Then ten. Then twenty. Even Trowa could tell that the silence was becoming oppressive, but he couldn't think of anything to say.
Suddenly he felt something stirring at the edge of his consciousness, pushing at the wards Wufei had erected. "Wufei!" he said urgently. "I felt something!"
"Yes, I know. Wait a moment, the danger remains until the crystal is destroyed," Wufei said, pressing his hand against the door, his brow furrowed in concentration.
They all heard a sound like breaking glass, and Wufei abruptly dropped the ward, pushing the door open. Despite the fact that Wufei was right in front of the doorway, Trowa managed to beat him through it. His eyes took in the room in a glance - Sally standing by the fire, staring intently into it, Rashid, standing by the bed, trying unsuccessfully to convince Quatre to lie still... Quatre, who was still pale, but struggling to sit up and argue with Rashid at the same time.
He broke off as soon as Trowa entered the room, his head automatically swiveling around to face the door, a brilliant smile lighting up his face. "Trowa!"
Without really knowing how he covered the distance between them, Trowa suddenly found himself crouching on the bed, with Quatre in his arms. He was dimly aware of Wufei calling the others for something, them making some sort of magical effort, but all of his attention was focused on the man in his arms. After a few seconds he heard Quatre's magical laugher in his mind. :Trowa, I need to breathe.:
He immediately relaxed his arms fractionally, and Quatre leaned back in his arms to look at his face. "I'm sorry," he whispered softly. "I didn't mean to worry you so much. I would never, ever leave you."
Trowa shook his head silently, and Quatre embraced him. :I told you already, I almost lost you once, I won't let it happen again. And if I ever catch you thinking about killing yourself over me again, you'll regret it!: he said fiercely, and Trowa stifled a chuckle of his own. It was amazing, just being with Quatre seemed to make everything else inconsequential.
"Are you all right?" he asked anxiously, checking over Quatre with his eyes. He looked all right, but there was an awful lot of clothing in the way...
"I'm fine!" Quatre said, sounding frustrated. "Will you please explain to Rashid that I can heal myself perfectly well, and that I don't have to spend the rest of the day in bed?"
"I think Rashid has the right idea," Trowa responded, looking at the red stain that covered all of the bed and a good deal of the floor, too. It took a lot of blood to make a stain that big. "You lost a lot of energy to that bitch, and then you had to heal yourself. That takes a lot out of you. I thought we already had a discussion about this," he added sternly.
"Guys, what are they doing?" Sally asked as she walked over, trying in vain to get some of the blood off her hands by wiping them on her pants. Her eyes were fixed on the other three, who were frozen in place, staring into space.
"They're going after her!" Quatre gasped. "We have to help them! Give me your hands!" Trowa grasped Quatre's hands, then suddenly they both leaped out of their bodies and into the merge the other three were performing. They joined it with an ease that was startling, and found themselves hovering over the Oz camp.
:Hey Quatre! Glad you could join the party!: Duo exclaimed happily. :You OK?:
:I'm fine. What's going on?:
:Wufei says that the bitch who stabbed you is hiding in that tent there,: Duo said, directing their consciousness in the correct direction. :There's a shield over it, but he says that she did something when she created a line of power to you that will allow us to get at her.:
:Found it!: Wufei exclaimed with some relish. Suddenly they were inside.
There were a number of unfamiliar people with glowing gold eyes rushing around a single still figure in the center of the room.
:That's her,: Trowa growled, identifying her by the blond hair he'd seen through Quatre's eyes.
:Yeah, I'd recognize those freaky eyebrows anywhere,: Duo muttered. :What's wrong with her?: It didn't take a genius to see that something was wrong - she was absolutely unmoving, staring into space, a lax expression on her face.
:All of her attention and power was tied up in the spell,: Wufei said with a definitely satisfied edge to his voice. :Her personal shields are down as well, and they haven't realized that she left us an avenue to get in. She's helpless.: He didn't sound particularly comfortable as he said this last thing. Trowa had a pretty good idea why - striking someone who was not only female but helpless as well had to go against everything Wufei had been taught.
Trowa had no such reservations. :Kill her,: he growled.
:Hn,: Heero said in agreement.
:Sounds good to me,: Duo said grimly. :Lets do this.:
It was remarkably easy. She was helpless, as Wufei had said. It took only a moment of concentration to draw in their vast power, and then a single spell stopped her heart. It was far more painless than Trowa would have preferred, but there was no mistaking what happened when her body suddenly dropped to the ground. With her death, they lost their access and found themselves outside the camp again.
There was a moment of silence, then they were suddenly back in their own bodies, back at the fort. Trowa blinked several times and realized Quatre was still sitting in front of him, and embraced him again.
"Aw, that's cute," Duo said from across the room. He was grinning like an idiot, then yelped when Heero gave his braid a firm tug. "Heero!" he complained, but Heero didn't seem to be paying much attention to him.
"Inefficient," Heero commented, sounding displeased.
"Huh?" Duo stopped complaining to stare at his lover.
"There has to be a better way," Heero said unhelpfully with a deep frown as Wufei turned and strode out of the room, which was empty of other people. Trowa suspected that Sally and Rashid had gone to find a mage to tell them what was going on.
"He's talking about Dorothy," Quatre said quietly. Everyone turned to stare at him.
"Who's Dorothy?" Duo asked with a frown.
"The mage who stabbed me. She's Treize's cousin, I should have known that she would be a mage as well. I met her several times when I was younger." Quatre's gaze was distant, and he bit his lip.
"Quatre, you better not tell me that you're sorry we killed her, after how worried we were about you," Duo said warningly.
"I'm sorry that we had to kill her," Quatre said in response, "but she had to die, you're right. That's what Heero's talking about, too."
"What?"
"It's inefficient - we have to come up with a better way of killing their mages." Quatre smiled wryly. "We finally got one."
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It took Wufei several minutes to find Sally. Rashid found him almost immediately, demanding to know what had happened. Wufei told him to go ask the others, and continued the search. When he finally found her, she was standing on top of the wall, gazing out at the setting sun and the dark splotches on the ground where blood had stained the desert sand. She glanced at him when he stepped off the stairs, then went back to her study of the scene without even acknowledging him.
Wufei did his best to quell the irritation that instantly rose up at her actions. He hadn't come here looking for a fight. Besides, he had ignored her often enough, and she never seemed to take offense.
For a long moment neither spoke. Then Sally suddenly said, "How long do you think it will take?"
Her question caught him by surprise, and he tried, without success, to determine what she was talking about. What did she think he was, a mindreader? Well, actually he was, but that was besides the point. He wasn't about to use his powers in such a frivolous manner. "How long will what take?" he asked crossly, sounding more like an angry child than he liked.
Sally didn't seem to notice his temper. She never did - it was one of the most interesting and irritating things about her. "The sand. How long do you think it will be before the bloodstains from the fighting are gone?"
Wufei looked down at the sands. How much of the blood there was he responsible for? How much had he spilled personally? How much of it was his own?
"It depends," he said finally. "This is the desert, if one of those big storms comes up, there won't be much of anything left. But if there isn't one... stains like that can last for a very long time. Years, even. In my..." he swallowed. "In my homeland, there was a war several hundred years ago. The bloodstains are gone, but you can still go to the final battlefield and see the scars on the land." He fell silent, remembering the trip with his family. He'd been a child then, trying to reign in his excitement at seeing the famous battlefield. His excitement had faded quickly as he used his fledgling powers to sense the aura of the place, a stench that hung over it like a cloud. Images of the battle had flown through his mind, and he immediately had pulled away and demanded to leave. They'd humored him, but he could still hear the screams of the men as they died, still see the limp bodies lying all over the ground, for as far as his eyes could see...
Sally let out a soft sigh that brought him out of his memories. "That's what I thought," she said, turning away from the blood. She leaned back against the outer wall, resting a hand on the sword she still wore. Finally she turned to look at him. "Did you want something?" she asked.
"What?"
"You came looking for me," she pointed out, raising an eyebrow.
Wufei suddenly realized that he didn't know why he'd been looking for her. "We killed the mage, the one who attacked Quatre," he said uncomfortably.
"Good," she said, her voice echoing some of the satisfaction Duo had showed when they killed the woman.
"And Quatre will be fine," Wufei finished. He expected her to show relief, joy, and was surprised - again - when she clenched her fists and dropped her head slightly. "What?" he asked, wondering again what he was doing here.
"He almost died," Sally said softly.
"You saved him," Wufei said with a frown.
"You... you don't understand how close it was. His heart stopped beating for a few seconds, because of the blood loss. My hand... it brushed against the crystal and I pulled it out, and his heart started again." She took another deep breath and let it out slowly. "It was too close. He could have died, if I'd been a second later, if my hand had been an inch to the side... All of our hopes rest with you guys. If one of you falls..."
"We will not die," Wufei said sharply. "And we will not fail."
Sally shot him a worried look. "But they came so close this time... what if next time... you..." she abruptly cut herself off.
Wufei's eyes widened as he caught her slight slip, but he decided not to mention it now. "He did survive, and we killed the one responsible. They lost a mage today - it was a bad blow for them."
"I know. Congratulations."
Wufei nodded his head slightly in response to her comment. "I sent for you when we found out what the problem was, and you saved Quatre. That's why I came up here, to thank you."
Her eyes widened at his statement, and she stared at him. "You did?"
Wufei inclined his head slightly. "Thank you, Sally."
Well, there's the next section. Sorry about the long delay, it's been a long couple of... (counting on toes and fingers and running out of digits) wow, it's been a very long time! Anyway, I hope I didn't get too out of character for Wufei and Trowa in that section - I have the hardest time with them under the best of circumstances. I had an easier time with Trowa this time than ever before, possibly because I wrote most of his part when I was absolutely exhausted and mostly numb. Not sure what that says about either of us.
Anyway, I'll start writing the next section as soon as possible, but no promises as to when it will be out.
Marika 6/25/01
Well, skin, muscle, and bones, Quatre amended. Who would have thought that someone as tall and thin as Trowa would have so many muscles? Quatre smiled to himself as he pictured Trowa. He was absolutely delicious... but he was getting off track. The point was that he should have noticed before Sally. When he did ask, she told him it was something having to do with their wrists, and started feeding them more. She also examined the other mages, and found that they were starting to lose weight as well, although not as obviously as the five of them. She started feeding them more, too.
The fighting continued, and sometimes he felt like it was never going to end. That thought was even more depressing, because it was very close to the truth. Quatre worked very hard to keep from revealing his thoughts to those around him. They had enough to worry about without him burdening them. He was only too aware of that fact as despite all their (and his) efforts, their dreams and nightmares continued to intrude upon his. He spent some time searching through the memories Gente had left him, and determined that Gente hadn't had the same problem, at least not to the extent that Quatre did. He thought it was because his group was very close, and he was closer to the other four than Gente had been, but that didn't help him get rid of the problem.
One of the Manguanacs died. Then another.
When the third died, they started having to worry about more than just the emotional trauma involved in losing their own people - there weren't that many of them to begin with, so every person they lost was a hard blow. When that fact was brought up during a meeting, Sally didn't say anything, but at the next attack, she was with the Manguanacs when the gates opened, a sword in hand. She'd timed it so well that there was no time to argue with her and ban her from the fighting.
She proved that the weapons she'd kept in her office weren't just for show, killing her share of the Oz soldiers in that battle. That didn't stop Duo, of all people, from yelling at her about risking herself when the battle was over. Her response was short and to the point and one that couldn't be repeated in polite company. Wufei watched the entire exchange with a fierce glower on his face and then stalked off without saying a word to anyone, although Quatre had caught him watching her when he thought no one was paying attention. Sally had given Wufei a thoughtful look after that exchange, but still didn't approach him.
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:Wow, they really have it in for us, don't they?: Duo commented as they stood on the top of the wall, looking at the horde of Oz soldiers coming at them.
Horde was the proper word, because there didn't seem to be any pattern or organization to their movements, just *a lot* of soldiers running towards the fortress.
No one seemed to have an answer for that, and they remained silent for a minute. Then Duo commented, :Explain to me again why we can't just let them throw themselves against the shield for a while? They're dumb enough to do that.:
:At first, but eventually they'll figure out they can't get in, and they'll bring in more troops to encircle the fortress,: Quatre replied. :Then they'll start bringing in their mages, and once they've got a full Circle around us, they can do some real damage.:
:Yeah, I was kinda guessing it was something like that,: Duo replied. :But it would be fun to watch them throw themselves against the shield for a while, don't ya think?:
:It would help us conserve resources,: Heero commented.
Quatre stared at him for a second, then looked into his mind and saw what he was thinking. :You're right,: he said after a few seconds. :We'll let them kill themselves that way for a while. But we have to attack them as soon as they start to circle around us.:
No one had any arguments with that plan, and Quatre quickly informed their fighters. He looked back down just in time to see the first of the Oz soldiers throw themselves at the walls of the fort. They hit the shield just feet short of the walls themselves, and were instantly vaporized. Despite himself, Quatre winced. He could barely stand to see humans throwing their lives away like that, even if they weren't controlling their own bodies. It was obvious, just looking at them, the way that none of them even hesitated for a second before throwing themselves against the shield in a futile attempt to get through.
His eye caught on a young man with reddish hair who held a sword in his hand, and he had just enough time to get a good look at him before the man also flung himself against the shield. Quatre closed his eyes and turned his head away, although he knew that denying the reality of what was happening wouldn't do him any good.
It was nearly fifteen minutes before the demons figured out that they weren't going to get through the shields by throwing human fighters at it, and started to encircle the fortress. That couldn't be allowed.
:All right, they're moving,: he told the others. He wasn't sure quite how he had ended up in charge of the tactics in the battles, he just kept track of his men and told them where he thought they would do the most good, it didn't seem like anything too special.
He pushed the thought out of his mind as he spread his wings and jumped down from the top of the wall into the main courtyard, where the men (plus Sally) were gathering. They knew better than to try to fly into the battle. Trowa had tried that once, and nearly had his wings shredded by the number of arrows that had been fired at him. Quatre didn't know if the same thing would happen with his wings, since they were more magical in nature (if such a thing could be said about wings that were completely magical anyway) but he didn't want to experiment.
He landed, absorbed his wings, then drew his curved blade out of it's sheath at his waist. He wore it all the time, now, ever since he'd almost been caught off guard by an attack while he was in dinner. No one had ever said anything even mildly accusatory about his carelessness, although Heero had shot him a couple of hard looks before Duo pulled him away, but that just seemed to make it worse, and Quatre had promised himself he'd never disappoint the others like that again.
The gates swung open, just enough to allow them to slip outside into the fray, and then he was in the middle of one of the largest battles they'd seen yet. Literally hundreds of soldiers had died in that first useless attack on the shields, and they had been only a small fraction of the force here.
Quatre drew all of his power inward, directing it into his muscles and senses, allowing him to move faster than any normal human, even the demon-controlled ones, could possibly hope to move. Then he threw himself into the battle with the same desperate determination that had carried him through the others.
Once the battle actually started, he fell into a kind of haze, where most of his attention was directed out of his body, to the other fighters and to the battle as a whole. He generally only paid enough attention to what he was doing to keep himself alive. He knew that he wasn't their best fighter, not by a long shot, he could do them a lot more good by directing the battle then by focusing all of his attention on fighting. Heero, Duo... all of the others were much stronger fighters than he was - he could hold his own in a normal battle, but in these situations, he mostly took care of anything that came near him and let the others plow ahead.
That was probably why he didn't notice the attack until it was too late. There was an especially vicious set of soldiers on the other side of the fort. He started to direct people there, and suddenly felt a flash of danger from somewhere very close to him. He snapped his attention back to his immediate surroundings, and saw a woman working her way through the carnage. She was dressed in armor, which might have explained how she'd managed to make it this far without getting killed. A better explanation might be the aura of magic that hung around her like a cloud.
Quatre was so surprised that the demons would actually send one of their mages into the field that he didn't react to protect himself until it was almost too late. He threw a mage-bolt at her, then ducked under a sword and stabbed someone in the side. By the time he brought his eyes back to where he'd last seen her, she was gone.
Where'd she go?! he thought wildly, slashing at a couple more soldiers to drive them back. She'd looked so familiar...
Suddenly something hit him hard from the right side, but he knew instinctively that the threat was coming from the left, that the blow on the right was just to distract him. He turned his head just in time to see a flash of pale blonde hair and glowing eyes before he heard mocking laugher and felt a stab of pain in his side.
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Trowa suddenly felt a sharp pain in his left side, and an instant later identified the source. :Quatre!: His panic increased when he realized that Quatre hadn't responded. He conjured himself to Quatre's position, and found Rashid desperately trying to fight through the Oz soldiers gathered there. His target immediately became clear - a small, blond-haired figure slumped on the ground near the fort walls. Quatre... Trowa immediately began killing everything between him and his love. Even from here he could see the blood staining Quatre's shirt.
By some unimaginable stroke of luck, Quatre had been right next to the shield when he was struck, and fell within it's boundaries. Otherwise the Oz soldiers would have killed him instantly. As it was, they'd restarted their futile attempts at getting through the shield, throwing themselves at it in droves, and all dying.
Trowa reached Quatre's body at the same time as Rashid. Trowa immediately reached for the wound, pulling his shirt back to reveal the deep stab in his side, just above his left hip. Why hasn't it healed? He was dimly aware of Rashid covering his back in the midst of the battle, but all of his attention was focused on the body in front of him.
:Trowa! What happened to Quatre?!: Duo shouted in his mind, then grunted with some physical effort.
Trowa realized that he had no idea what had actually happened. "Rashid?" he shouted through the chaos.
"A witch! One of their mages got through and stabbed him!" Rashid shouted in response as he continued to methodically kill the Oz soldiers who ran at them.
:He was stabbed by one of their mages,: Trowa told the others. :He won't wake up, and the wound isn't healing.:
:She might have cast some sort of spell on him to keep the wound from healing,: Wufei responded. :It should lose power once you're in the fortress, in an hour or so.:
:I'll take him inside,: Trowa immediately said, reaching to pick up Quatre.
:No,: Heero told him, and Trowa frowned.
:What did you just say?: he asked quietly, slicing off the hand of an Oz soldier who got too close. The man didn't even flinch, just picked up his sword with his other hand and attacked again. Trowa ran him through, then kicked the body off of his sword.
:You're needed here,: Heero said simply, and Trowa's frown deepened.
:I'm not just leaving him there for the rest of the fight,: he responded, raising his left hand to elbow someone who had tried to grab his arm. He got his arm free, turned, pulled a knife from his belt and used it to slit the throat of the guy who'd grabbed him. He got a fierce satisfaction out of seeing the body slump to the ground.
:Trowa, he's right,: Duo said, sounding regretful. :We really need you in the fight right now. With the Q-man out for the rest of the battle, we're in deep shit.:
Trowa growled intelligibly at him and rammed the knife into the gut of another soldier. He immediately scolded himself for his carelessness as he put too much force into it and the hilt became tangled in some entrails. He shoved the dying soldier away from him and grabbed a knife from the body of one of the soldiers he'd killed earlier. A quick glance around the battlefield told him that Heero and Duo were right - the loss of one of their best fighters could be devastating to his side right now. Already he could see some of the Manguanacs faltering, allowing themselves to get isolated now that Quatre wasn't coordinating the battle.
:Get those four to pull back together,: he instructed coolly, always keeping an eye on Quatre. He couldn't just leave him there, but he couldn't leave the battle, either. If he left now, they would lose, and he'd do Quatre no good.
"Rashid," he said out loud. He knew that the big man heard him, although there was no faltering in his fighting and he didn't turn. "I need you to take Quatre inside. Keep him safe, and then watch him until he recovers from the shock and heals himself."
Now Rashid did glance at him, just for a second, before nodding his head sharply. He let out a loud cry in a language that Trowa didn't recognize, then with a flurry of strikes, somehow managed to clear a small area around Quatre's body. In the brief respite he'd gained, he scooped Quatre up in his arms, then threw him over one shoulder.
Trowa grimaced. That probably wasn't the best way to carry a person with a deep wound, but Rashid had to be able to defend himself, and it wasn't worse than leaving him on the ground. Besides, he could heal up any extra damage that was done along with the actual wound.
He watched as Rashid started to move along the wall, keeping his back to the shield and keeping a sword between Quatre and the Oz soldiers who rushed at them. He was far too big to fit between the trees that made up the shield and the wall of the fortress, but he still made good use of the shield, ducking into it whenever the fighting got too bad. In a few minutes he was out of sight.
Then there was nothing left to do but fight.
--------------------------------
The fight lasted several more hours, and Quatre never reappeared. He didn't contact them, either, which meant that he hadn't woken up yet.
They really could have used his help, too.
Duo had long since given up swearing and muttering about the idiot Ozzies - he was still pissed as all hell, but it was too much effort and required too much of his breath to do that, breath that he couldn't spare right now. He continued to mutter curses silently, but saved his breath for the fighting. He hadn't realized how much Quatre was doing when he organized all of them. His fighting skills might have been weaker than the rest of them, but the chaos that the battle quickly disintegrated into was not pretty.
More than once Duo saw a creepy-looking girl, about their age, dressed in black armor, drifting in and out of the carnage, a cloud of magic so thick he could practically smell it hovering around her. A mage, he thought with the part of his mind that wasn't dedicated to slaughtering Oz soldiers. She's got to be the one who got Quatre. He might not be a tactical genius, but he couldn't see Treize endangering more than one of mages on his side at a time. He redoubled his efforts to get at her, but by the time he got near her, she'd already turned and started to flee, the soldiers closing around her to guard her escape.
Duo caught a fleeting glimpse of something in the eddies of power that surrounded her. It took him a second to figure out what he was sensing - damn it, where was Wufei when he needed him! Then it became clear - he didn't know how the hell she was doing it, but the girl with the freaky eyebrows was somehow acting as a sort of power sink, drawing in energy from all around her. It was probably making her a hell of a lot stronger, but it was also drawing energy from the Oz soldiers around her. It could be enough...
He stuffed one of the two knives he used back into his belt and held out his right hand, concentrating on his power. He drew it in, picturing Thanatos in his mind, just the way she'd appeared in the dreamscape, instructing him as to some of the harder disciplines, holding that scythe...
Suddenly he felt cool wood appear out of nowhere in his right hand. Duo blinked as he stared at the scythe in his hand - he hadn't expected an actual physical weapon, he'd expected an image in his mind, but he wasn't about to complain. He stabbed someone - he didn't really care who - with his left hand, then stuck that knife back into his belt and grasped the scythe in both hands.
He spared a quick glance at the large curved blade - a blade that should have been sharpened metal but was not, was something infinitely more dangerous. He didn't know exactly what it was made of, only that is was shiny and obsidian, and that it pulsed with power. His power.
With an almost negligent gesture, he swept the scythe through the air in front of him. Suddenly a wave of blackness shot out in front of him, originating at the line in the air he'd designated with the blade of the scythe. It struck the soldiers around him in an ever-widening arc. Those closest to him barely stumbled, but as the line got close to the power-sink the girl was creating, it started having a real effect. At first the soldiers were only knocked to the ground, then they were knocked unconscious by the force of his spell, and by the time the wave got within fifteen feet of her, every soldier around her dropped dead.
She spun around, and his magic impacted on the shield she hastily threw up. The result of the clashing magic was a massive explosion that killed even more Oz soldiers. Duo did a quick mental check and was relieved that none of their people had been caught up in the fireball. He'd never seen anything like that before.
:What was that?!: Wufei demanded.
:Damned if I know. There was a ripple in the protective shield, and I attacked it. And I hit that damn girl's shields. Then... kablooey!: That probably wasn't the best description he could have come up with, but it was all that he could provide on such short notice.
:It might be the two opposing forces meeting directly...: Wufei mused out loud. Well, not really out loud, but it was the same thing, sorta. Wufei sounded pretty distracted, but Duo knew better. Wufei was still slicing away with the economical strokes he favored (and man, was he good with that weird sword of his), this other thing was just a passing interest. :We should be careful using our power directly against their mages, it could be... destructive.:
:Attack now!: Heero suddenly commanded, and Duo realized that between the number of people he'd killed with his magic and the confusion caused by the explosion, they had a temporary advantage over the Ozzies. He attacked.
Heero's timing had been excellent. When everyone on their side rallied at once, the Ozzies were caught off guard, and fell quickly. Within a half-hour, the battle was over. After Sally and the Manguanacs went inside, Duo quickly performed the by-now habitual burning of the corpses and sent the scythe back to wherever he got it, and Wufei checked to make sure that there was no residual magic left behind.
Trowa was the first of them inside, and once the gates closed behind them, all four of them immediately conjured themselves to the room that Trowa and Quatre shared.
A female mage was sitting in a chair next to Quatre's bed, a damp cloth in her hands. She was wiping Quatre's forehead with it, but when the arrived, she immediately set it aside and walked over. "Oh, thank the gods you're here!" she exclaimed as Trowa hurried to Quatre's side. "I didn't know what to do... he's feverish, he won't wake up, and he's not healing..." she trailed off as Quatre began to toss his head back and forth on the bed as Trowa knelt beside him. Quatre's face was very pale, almost translucent. The last time he looked this bad was when he lost his magic, Duo found himself thinking.
"What's going on, woman?!" Wufei demanded angrily.
"That's the most he's moved in hours," she reported, wringing her hands. "Is that a good sign?"
Duo suddenly realized that she was talking to *them*, that she expected them to know exactly what was going on? What the fuck did she think they were, gods? He opened his mouth to tell her exactly what he thought of the situation and to vent a little when Trowa finally reached out and gently touched Quatre's hand. Quatre suddenly moaned loudly, and Duo felt a stab of alarm from Wufei.
:Get away from him!: Wufei shouted, and used his power to haul Trowa away from the bed, throwing him halfway across the room. :Don't touch him!:
Trowa spun to look at Wufei, and Duo took an involuntary step back. He'd thought that Trowa's expressionless, blank gaze was unnerving at the best of times, frightening at the worst. That was absolutely nothing compared to Trowa, his eyes practically glowing with anger, his power gathered inside of him, ready to be used. He made a sound that was more of an animalistic growl than a sound a human would make. His body was actually trembling, he was so angry, as Wufei stepped between him and the bed where Quatre lay. Duo immediately decided that Wufei was just about the bravest person he'd ever seen.
:Get out of my way,: Trowa ordered.
"If you continue to touch him, you'll kill him," Wufei replied quietly, subtly motioning for Heero and Duo to move behind Trowa, to restrain him if necessary. In his state, Trowa didn't notice.
"What?!"
"It's a spell. It took me a few minutes to recognize it, but she cast a spell on him and the wound. That's why it won't heal, and why our presence is hurting him."
Trowa didn't respond, and he still didn't look happy, but the emotion was fading from his eyes as he regained control, and Duo realized that Trowa had been dangerously near to going the route that Quatre had taken - letting his power take control of him. That would spell the end for them right now.
"Our presence is hurting him," Wufei repeated, more gently than Duo could ever remember him speaking. "We have to get out of here. The longer we stay close to him, the less time he has, the less time I have to figure out how to counteract the spell."
That got Trowa's attention. "You don't know how to counteract it?"
"Outside," Wufei repeated. "And don't use any magic. Tone it down as much as you can." As he said this, he glanced at Heero and Duo, who immediately followed his instructions. After a few seconds, Trowa did the same, and allowed himself to be escorted out.
The woman mage, who'd fled as soon as Wufei shouted, was waiting outside, and stared at them with wide eyes. They ignored her.
"What's wrong with him? And how can we fix it?" Trowa asked immediately.
Wufei frowned, closing his eyes and pressing one hand against his temple. Duo sensed the deep concentration that meant he was digging through his predecessor's memories. "It's an assassin's tool, especially designed to kill mages," he said slowly.
Duo started to sort through his own predecessor's memories, but couldn't think of any assassin spells that he knew of that would make them have to stay away. "What's it doing?"
"It's centered on the crystal," Wufei said, still frowning and rubbing his brow.
"What crystal?" Trowa asked sharply.
"There was... there must have been a fragment... a shard of crystal on the edge of the blade," Wufei said, finally lowering his hand. "It's not trapped in the wound. It's drawing out his power, his magic, and feeding it to the mage who cast the spell. His body, automatically trying to use magic to heal itself, is feeding the crystal. Having magic used nearby accelerates the process," he finished, his eyes gazing into space. "We are magic," he continued. "It's worse with us in the room, and worse than that with us touching him. If you'd carried him in from the battlefield, it probably would have killed him. Trying to heal him at this point would only end in our power being drawn away as well, and speed up his death. As it is, the spell will continue to drain his power until there is nothing left."
"What can we do?" Trowa asked immediately, worry showing plainly in his eyes as he glanced at the closed door.
For a long moment Wufei didn't answer, and Duo was afraid that he didn't have an answer for Trowa, but finally he turned to the woman, who still stood there, staring at him. "Get Sally Poe," he said to her.
Her eyes widened. "You mean... the woman fighter? She's..."
"I am quite aware of that, onna!" he snapped. "Do it!"
The woman paled slightly, then bobbed her head and ran off down the hall.
Duo looked at Wufei. "Sally? Why do you want her?"
Wufei stared into space for several seconds, then sighed softly, and it was like something, some tension, maybe, just drained out of him. "Sally once mentioned that she was something of a healer, one who used herbs."
"Hey, you're right, I forgot that," Duo remarked after a few seconds of thought. "How'd you remember that?"
Wufei shot him a scornful look. "When your mouth is closed, you have a better chance of hearing something," he said with a pointed look, and Duo grimaced. Well, I guess I walked into that one.
"So why do you want her here?"
"The crystal has to be retrieved and destroyed. None of us can safely touch it. Sally has no magic."
"You mean you want her to go and dig that thing out of Quatre?" Duo exclaimed, then immediately regretted his choice in words when all the blood drained out of Trowa's face. Duo took a step back and decided now was a good time to try that quiet thing of Wufei's.
"It has to come out," Wufei said without looking at Trowa. "Once it's out, he can heal himself, and we can help him. And I've heard of such techniques before - some of my Clan studied them, as a matter of fact."
"Your Clan practiced cutting people open?" Duo asked before he could stop himself. Oh well, there went that attempt at quiet.
"They practiced medicine," Wufei said sharply.
"Will Quatre be all right?" Trowa asked suddenly, his tone vaguely pleading.
Wufei still refused to meet his gaze. "If he survives the initial procedure, he will be fine."
Sally came running down the hall. It was obvious she'd just come in from the battle - she was still dressed in her blood-stained pants and had a sword swinging from her left hip, but at least she'd cleaned the blood off her hands and lower arms. "What's the emergency?" she asked, an amount of urgency in her voice.
Without any prodding, Wufei quickly explained the situation to her. When he got to the part about what she had to do, she cut in. "I'm sorry, but I have only minimal training, from a few books, about that sort of thing. I can't in good conscience..."
"Woman, he will die if you don't," Wufei told her. His tone softened slightly, and he actually looked directly at her, for the first time that Duo could remember. "Please. This has to be done."
Sally stared at Wufei, an odd expression on her face, then she nodded slightly. "What do I have to do?"
"There is a sliver of crystal, mage crystal, imbedded in the wound. You need to find it and get it out of him. Once you have it out, crush it and throw what remains into the fire. Do you understand?"
Sally nodded nervously. "Can I have someone to help me? To hold him down?"
Trowa's head snapped up and Duo quickly said, :That's just normal medicine, Tro. I've seen it with broken legs and arms before. You don't want them squirming around too much and upsetting something else.:
Trowa turned his head away, but stifled his objections.
Wufei nodded in response to Sally's question. "So long as it isn't a mage," he responded.
------------------------------
Ten minutes later, Trowa stared at the closed door. Rashid had arrived a few minutes ago and went into the room with Sally, and after that there had been no word from them. Trowa could still feel Quatre on the other side, but Wufei had cast some sort of ward on the room so no magic seeped into it, and if he opened the door he'd break the ward and possibly hurt Quatre.
Quatre. Just the mention of his name brought forth emotions that Trowa had never even experienced previous to meeting Quatre. He didn't know how to deal with all of this... feeling. He'd been dead inside for so long, for as long as he could remember, and Quatre managed to shatter all of that. It was a good thing... he couldn't remember every feeling this alive, but it also made him feel... vulnerable. He didn't like that, and the thought of losing Quatre was enough to cause almost physical pain.
Physical pain he could deal with - he'd experienced enough of it so that it didn't affect him anymore - but the feelings that one blond mage evoked in him - they were not so easy to deal with.
I can't lose him, he thought, his throat tightening up.
:It's all right, Tro,: Duo told him. :He's going to be fine.:
Trowa stared at him, not having anything to say. There was no way that Duo could know for certain that Quatre would be all right. Instead, he turned to Wufei. "Are you certain that that will help him?"
Wufei nodded his head sharply. "That is the spell she used. The difficulty is in extracting the shard. It will be quite small."
Trowa swallowed. "If he dies..."
Wufei raised his head with a sharp motion. "Then what? What will you do? Will you kill yourself, and doom all of your people, all of Quatre's people, to slavery under the demons?" He took several steps closer until his nose was mere inches from Trowa's. "Well?"
"You can't," Heero said flatly. "You're needed to defeat them. Especially if he doesn't survive."
Trowa turned just in time to see Duo dig his elbow into Heero's side, and to hear him hiss, :Heero!:, but Heero's expression didn't change.
Heero's unsympathetic bluntness managed to reach Trowa, though, and he managed a curt nod to them. "If he..." he couldn't quite bring himself to say the words. :If something goes wrong,: he continued in his mental voice, :I will help you defeat the demons.: He would, for no other reason than Quatre would want him to. Also, he wanted vengeance. Fighting the demons would provide both. And after every single one of the demons was dead...
Quatre had brought him to life, more literally than anyone suspected, including Quatre himself. After the demons were dead, if Quatre wasn't in this world, what remained for Trowa? After he avenged Quatre and protected his love's people, he would kill himself.
:Trowa, that isn't a solution,: Duo said quietly. :Trust me, I know something about this.: But even as he spoke, Duo unconsciously reached out and snaked an arm around Heero's waist, and Heero reciprocated the gesture by grabbing onto Duo's trailing braid and giving it a gentle tug. Even when he was lost in bad memories, as Trowa knew he must be, even at the worst of times, Duo had Heero.
Duo noticed him staring at their loose embrace, and blushed and looked away. :Look, he's going to be OK, and if he was here, you know he'd give you hell for even thinking about it, so just don't, OK? He's going to be fine.:
Trowa resumed staring at the door.
------------------------------
Five minutes passed. Then ten. Then twenty. Even Trowa could tell that the silence was becoming oppressive, but he couldn't think of anything to say.
Suddenly he felt something stirring at the edge of his consciousness, pushing at the wards Wufei had erected. "Wufei!" he said urgently. "I felt something!"
"Yes, I know. Wait a moment, the danger remains until the crystal is destroyed," Wufei said, pressing his hand against the door, his brow furrowed in concentration.
They all heard a sound like breaking glass, and Wufei abruptly dropped the ward, pushing the door open. Despite the fact that Wufei was right in front of the doorway, Trowa managed to beat him through it. His eyes took in the room in a glance - Sally standing by the fire, staring intently into it, Rashid, standing by the bed, trying unsuccessfully to convince Quatre to lie still... Quatre, who was still pale, but struggling to sit up and argue with Rashid at the same time.
He broke off as soon as Trowa entered the room, his head automatically swiveling around to face the door, a brilliant smile lighting up his face. "Trowa!"
Without really knowing how he covered the distance between them, Trowa suddenly found himself crouching on the bed, with Quatre in his arms. He was dimly aware of Wufei calling the others for something, them making some sort of magical effort, but all of his attention was focused on the man in his arms. After a few seconds he heard Quatre's magical laugher in his mind. :Trowa, I need to breathe.:
He immediately relaxed his arms fractionally, and Quatre leaned back in his arms to look at his face. "I'm sorry," he whispered softly. "I didn't mean to worry you so much. I would never, ever leave you."
Trowa shook his head silently, and Quatre embraced him. :I told you already, I almost lost you once, I won't let it happen again. And if I ever catch you thinking about killing yourself over me again, you'll regret it!: he said fiercely, and Trowa stifled a chuckle of his own. It was amazing, just being with Quatre seemed to make everything else inconsequential.
"Are you all right?" he asked anxiously, checking over Quatre with his eyes. He looked all right, but there was an awful lot of clothing in the way...
"I'm fine!" Quatre said, sounding frustrated. "Will you please explain to Rashid that I can heal myself perfectly well, and that I don't have to spend the rest of the day in bed?"
"I think Rashid has the right idea," Trowa responded, looking at the red stain that covered all of the bed and a good deal of the floor, too. It took a lot of blood to make a stain that big. "You lost a lot of energy to that bitch, and then you had to heal yourself. That takes a lot out of you. I thought we already had a discussion about this," he added sternly.
"Guys, what are they doing?" Sally asked as she walked over, trying in vain to get some of the blood off her hands by wiping them on her pants. Her eyes were fixed on the other three, who were frozen in place, staring into space.
"They're going after her!" Quatre gasped. "We have to help them! Give me your hands!" Trowa grasped Quatre's hands, then suddenly they both leaped out of their bodies and into the merge the other three were performing. They joined it with an ease that was startling, and found themselves hovering over the Oz camp.
:Hey Quatre! Glad you could join the party!: Duo exclaimed happily. :You OK?:
:I'm fine. What's going on?:
:Wufei says that the bitch who stabbed you is hiding in that tent there,: Duo said, directing their consciousness in the correct direction. :There's a shield over it, but he says that she did something when she created a line of power to you that will allow us to get at her.:
:Found it!: Wufei exclaimed with some relish. Suddenly they were inside.
There were a number of unfamiliar people with glowing gold eyes rushing around a single still figure in the center of the room.
:That's her,: Trowa growled, identifying her by the blond hair he'd seen through Quatre's eyes.
:Yeah, I'd recognize those freaky eyebrows anywhere,: Duo muttered. :What's wrong with her?: It didn't take a genius to see that something was wrong - she was absolutely unmoving, staring into space, a lax expression on her face.
:All of her attention and power was tied up in the spell,: Wufei said with a definitely satisfied edge to his voice. :Her personal shields are down as well, and they haven't realized that she left us an avenue to get in. She's helpless.: He didn't sound particularly comfortable as he said this last thing. Trowa had a pretty good idea why - striking someone who was not only female but helpless as well had to go against everything Wufei had been taught.
Trowa had no such reservations. :Kill her,: he growled.
:Hn,: Heero said in agreement.
:Sounds good to me,: Duo said grimly. :Lets do this.:
It was remarkably easy. She was helpless, as Wufei had said. It took only a moment of concentration to draw in their vast power, and then a single spell stopped her heart. It was far more painless than Trowa would have preferred, but there was no mistaking what happened when her body suddenly dropped to the ground. With her death, they lost their access and found themselves outside the camp again.
There was a moment of silence, then they were suddenly back in their own bodies, back at the fort. Trowa blinked several times and realized Quatre was still sitting in front of him, and embraced him again.
"Aw, that's cute," Duo said from across the room. He was grinning like an idiot, then yelped when Heero gave his braid a firm tug. "Heero!" he complained, but Heero didn't seem to be paying much attention to him.
"Inefficient," Heero commented, sounding displeased.
"Huh?" Duo stopped complaining to stare at his lover.
"There has to be a better way," Heero said unhelpfully with a deep frown as Wufei turned and strode out of the room, which was empty of other people. Trowa suspected that Sally and Rashid had gone to find a mage to tell them what was going on.
"He's talking about Dorothy," Quatre said quietly. Everyone turned to stare at him.
"Who's Dorothy?" Duo asked with a frown.
"The mage who stabbed me. She's Treize's cousin, I should have known that she would be a mage as well. I met her several times when I was younger." Quatre's gaze was distant, and he bit his lip.
"Quatre, you better not tell me that you're sorry we killed her, after how worried we were about you," Duo said warningly.
"I'm sorry that we had to kill her," Quatre said in response, "but she had to die, you're right. That's what Heero's talking about, too."
"What?"
"It's inefficient - we have to come up with a better way of killing their mages." Quatre smiled wryly. "We finally got one."
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It took Wufei several minutes to find Sally. Rashid found him almost immediately, demanding to know what had happened. Wufei told him to go ask the others, and continued the search. When he finally found her, she was standing on top of the wall, gazing out at the setting sun and the dark splotches on the ground where blood had stained the desert sand. She glanced at him when he stepped off the stairs, then went back to her study of the scene without even acknowledging him.
Wufei did his best to quell the irritation that instantly rose up at her actions. He hadn't come here looking for a fight. Besides, he had ignored her often enough, and she never seemed to take offense.
For a long moment neither spoke. Then Sally suddenly said, "How long do you think it will take?"
Her question caught him by surprise, and he tried, without success, to determine what she was talking about. What did she think he was, a mindreader? Well, actually he was, but that was besides the point. He wasn't about to use his powers in such a frivolous manner. "How long will what take?" he asked crossly, sounding more like an angry child than he liked.
Sally didn't seem to notice his temper. She never did - it was one of the most interesting and irritating things about her. "The sand. How long do you think it will be before the bloodstains from the fighting are gone?"
Wufei looked down at the sands. How much of the blood there was he responsible for? How much had he spilled personally? How much of it was his own?
"It depends," he said finally. "This is the desert, if one of those big storms comes up, there won't be much of anything left. But if there isn't one... stains like that can last for a very long time. Years, even. In my..." he swallowed. "In my homeland, there was a war several hundred years ago. The bloodstains are gone, but you can still go to the final battlefield and see the scars on the land." He fell silent, remembering the trip with his family. He'd been a child then, trying to reign in his excitement at seeing the famous battlefield. His excitement had faded quickly as he used his fledgling powers to sense the aura of the place, a stench that hung over it like a cloud. Images of the battle had flown through his mind, and he immediately had pulled away and demanded to leave. They'd humored him, but he could still hear the screams of the men as they died, still see the limp bodies lying all over the ground, for as far as his eyes could see...
Sally let out a soft sigh that brought him out of his memories. "That's what I thought," she said, turning away from the blood. She leaned back against the outer wall, resting a hand on the sword she still wore. Finally she turned to look at him. "Did you want something?" she asked.
"What?"
"You came looking for me," she pointed out, raising an eyebrow.
Wufei suddenly realized that he didn't know why he'd been looking for her. "We killed the mage, the one who attacked Quatre," he said uncomfortably.
"Good," she said, her voice echoing some of the satisfaction Duo had showed when they killed the woman.
"And Quatre will be fine," Wufei finished. He expected her to show relief, joy, and was surprised - again - when she clenched her fists and dropped her head slightly. "What?" he asked, wondering again what he was doing here.
"He almost died," Sally said softly.
"You saved him," Wufei said with a frown.
"You... you don't understand how close it was. His heart stopped beating for a few seconds, because of the blood loss. My hand... it brushed against the crystal and I pulled it out, and his heart started again." She took another deep breath and let it out slowly. "It was too close. He could have died, if I'd been a second later, if my hand had been an inch to the side... All of our hopes rest with you guys. If one of you falls..."
"We will not die," Wufei said sharply. "And we will not fail."
Sally shot him a worried look. "But they came so close this time... what if next time... you..." she abruptly cut herself off.
Wufei's eyes widened as he caught her slight slip, but he decided not to mention it now. "He did survive, and we killed the one responsible. They lost a mage today - it was a bad blow for them."
"I know. Congratulations."
Wufei nodded his head slightly in response to her comment. "I sent for you when we found out what the problem was, and you saved Quatre. That's why I came up here, to thank you."
Her eyes widened at his statement, and she stared at him. "You did?"
Wufei inclined his head slightly. "Thank you, Sally."
Well, there's the next section. Sorry about the long delay, it's been a long couple of... (counting on toes and fingers and running out of digits) wow, it's been a very long time! Anyway, I hope I didn't get too out of character for Wufei and Trowa in that section - I have the hardest time with them under the best of circumstances. I had an easier time with Trowa this time than ever before, possibly because I wrote most of his part when I was absolutely exhausted and mostly numb. Not sure what that says about either of us.
Anyway, I'll start writing the next section as soon as possible, but no promises as to when it will be out.
Marika 6/25/01