The Mandred Chronicles:

Power and Pain

by zapenstap





Relena barely comprehended what happened when Coran leaped out from nowhere and tore her away from the terrible eyes of Teleb. She could not get those eyes out of her head, boring with their white hot fury into her mind. Pure rage and hatred pulsed out of their depths, fire and darkness, and all their malice bent over her. The crystals felt hot in her hands, but she clutched them tightly.

Something exploded behind her. Teleb was following.

Now she was running, running with the fuel of terror, breathing raggedly, pain lancing through every muscle. If she faltered, Coran gripped her about the forearm and pulled her ever onward. So she kept up, though all the world was hazy. She had long since lost her heeled shoes and ran barefoot on the cold white tiles, brown-blonde hair flying in tangled wisps before her face.

"We have to get back to the others," Coran said hoarsely. "We will be hunted down and slaughtered this way."

"And all the world will weep for me," Relena gasped through tears from anxiety and hot wind. "He called me casadrat," she said. "What does it mean?"

"This is hardly a time for lore learning, princess," Coran huffed, but he answered her. "Casadrat were what the concubines of the Lord of Solaroth called themselves in secret. It means "poison rose" in the old Alfarian language. The leader of the concubines took that name for herself and through her manipulations brought down a great empire. Her followers named their inner organization after her when she fell. You might take it as a compliment."

"I have never heard of the Solaroth Empire," Relena said. She wanted to distract herself, and it seemed to be working.

"It doesn't exist here, princess," Coran said, and threw her into another passageway.

"I wish everyone would stop calling me that," Relena said as he followed her and they began to run again, vaguely back the way they had just come. "How do we get back to the others? Where is Teleb?"

"Hot on our heels," Coran said. "For all I know, he could be invisible, or meet us while we're rounding a corner. We're going to have to find the other way into the room, or make our own way. I've got some explosives if it comes to that. Now conserve your breath and run."

They picked up the pace in a way Relena did not think possible. Fire roared in her lungs and she felt as if pincers were cutting the muscles in her sides. Tears leaked from her eyes, but she kept on, still clutching the crystals.

Abruptly, a sheet of fire rose before them, a fiery wall of burning heat in her face, blocking their path. Her face felt the warmth, her hair crackled. This was no light show.

"Whoa!" Coran shouted, and halted inches before the flames. Relena he jerked back slammed into the stone wall of the cooridor, protectively behind him. Teleb appeared on the other side of fire wall, still surrounded by a white aura.

"Those are mine," Teleb said through his teeth, and his eyes flashed like lightning as he stared at the crystals in Relena's fist.

Coran popped a cufflink from his sleeve and threw it hard against the tiled floor. Relena raised an arm to shield her face as it exploded in a burst of light and fire. As smoke filled the hallway, Relena tried desperately not to cough. Coran grabbed her shoulder and pulled her back down the hallway. She made to run swiftly, but Coran halted suddenly. There was a popping sound Relena recognized as a pin being pulled from a gernade, but she could see nothing in the smoke.

"Such tricks won't avail you, children!" Teleb shouted, almost sounding amused, but that unmistakeable malice coated his tone. "These games are entertaining, but my crystals are not a wager."

The gernade exploded and Relena ducked and covered her head. A large chunk of the wall burst asunder, bits of debris flying in all directions, white paint and dust showering them from the ceiling. In the choas, Relena rose without Coran's assistance and leapt through the hole in the wall. Coran followed after her, one hand pressed against her back and the other over her head to protect her from the bits of ceiling crashing downward.

They were again in the hallway they had escaped to from the main room, running back the way they had come. Relena's heart beat like a bird's, fluttering at speeds that she thought for sure must soon kill her, but she fled with all her strength, back to Heero. A second wind came to her and she ran harder, almost outdistancing Coran.

*****

Heero leaped to both feet and an explosion rocked the building a second time. Moments later, Relena and Coran burst back into the room, dust darkening their faces, hair and eyes wild. Heero looked up and Relena rushed to him, throwing her arms about his neck as if he were her last salvation, almost knocking him over. She trembled in his arms, her breathing shallow and ragged. He thought she might shatter if he held her too tightly.

Kyra rose tottering to her feet, and though she and Coran shared a look full of deep meaning, they did not approach each other, for at that moment something odd appeared in the air by the doorway. Coran moved back by Duo. Kyra hovered over Falora, shaking her and pleading for her to wake with a tone more of command than desperation.

The something odd was a circle of blue light that expanded steadily into a large oval opening in midair. As it expanded, it was filled with blue light, and though the oval was two dimenstional like a doorway, the light seemed three dimentional. In only seconds it was large enough for a man to walk through, and through it a man came. Teleb stepped lightly into the room from nowhere and the blue portal closed. His eyes swung straight to Relena and the crystals she clasped.

"Heero," Relena breathed warningly, moving to his side, her hands wrapped around his arm.

Heero shielded her as best he could, right hand gripping his gun. But Teleb was not daunted.

Heero gasped as pain shot through him, a feeling like electricity shocking through his whole body. Unprepared to face an enemy he could not fight, he breathed raggedly and shouted as a second wave jolted through him. He could not stop shaking after that, and the pain did not stop. He muffled his cries, eyes tearing involuntarily as he battled the pain desparately. But it was too much, and it grew. The world lost its focus, growing hazy and indinstinct among the pain. He felt himself falling, but he could not very well hear his own cries.

"Heero!" Relena voice reached him in concern. He felt her arms encircle his chest as he faltered and fell, collapsing limply. "What are you doing to him?" he thought she said, fighting to remain conscious. If he had known Teleb was keeping him awake, he would not have bothered. "Stop it!" Relena cried again, and he wondered how he could hear her so clearly. "You're hurting him! Heero!"

The pain suddenly vanished.

"Give me my crystals," Teleb said softly.

Heero opened his eyes hazily. He found he was lying on the ground with his head in Relena's lap. His body still shook, but no new pain racked it. Still, he could not rise, or move, and his perception of the world was like watching a dream.

No, Relena, Heero thought. She stroked his face and said nothing, but he could see her eyes, blue now like a lagoon, shimmering with her tears. He could not speak, but he tried to communicate with his eyes what she should do.

"I won't give in, Heero," Relena said softly just to him, as if reading his mind. "I wouldn't do anything you would not. I've patterned everything I do after you. You have to believe in me now." Heero closed his eyes.

"Very well," Teleb said to Relena, and Heero's eyes snapped back open at the tone in his voice, the threat. "You I would break for your treachery alone, and I promised you pain, but the crystals are mine. Give them to me now."

Relena rested Heero's head lightly on the ground and stood. He watched, still shaking, as she stepped away from him and stood proudly with the crystals in the fist clenched at her side. The air around her seemed to grow still. "You are an outlaw and a coward," she said forcefully, mustering the strength and command of a queen from her throne. "You can humble your enemies only through pain and fear, yet you accuse me of treachery. These crystals mean nothing to me, but I would never willingly give them to you, you who have no doubt destroyed many things lovely and beautiful without thought or care or cause other than your own selfish and unsatisfyable ambition. I would retailiate against you if I could, but having no such power, I will settle to defy you. When you depart from this place I hope you do so in shame and loathing. I do not count it treachery to betray the treacherous, nor do I account myself a liar for being coerced into a promise by threat of pain. If I am weak, at least I am honest, and if I am a fool, at least I am brave. These crystals you may take from me, but I will never willingly surrender them. You..."

Teleb strode over the space between them and wrapped a hand about Relena's throat in a crushing grip. He lifted Relena into the air as if she weighed nothing and shook her even as she struggled to breath, kicking her legs feebly. "Now is not the time for speeches, my dear," he said through clenched teeth. "You know nothing about me, but you perceive much. Take your reward."

The first of Relena's screams rent Heero's heart and he awoke from his comatose in a jolt. Ignoring the shakiness in his limbs, he leaped to his feet and threw himself at Teleb with all the enegy and skill he could muster, but he struck a wall of air and was thrown back to the ground. There he lay only for a moment, winded, and Relena screamed on, shierking in agony. Heero felt worse than useless, and the sound of her cries stabbed his heart.

Coran made to come to Relena's aid, passing by Teleb unnoticed, but though his attention was focused on Relena, Tebel somehow caught him and Coran froze in place. Duo simultaneously rounded on the other side, but he too was unsuccessful. Duo was not caught like Coran, but Teleb's eyes held him and he simply collapsed unconscious where he stood and did not rise again.

"Duo!" Heero shouted in alarm.

Moments later, Coran collapsed too and Heero fell silent, amazed and horrified.

"That for Coran Domared," Teleb said, peering sidewise at Kyra. "And you, Kyra, I will finish shortly." Teleb's gaze swung to Heero. "You I will teach to respect my power. Know that you can do nothing here. All would have gone easier on you if you had done what I asked and simply given me my crystals!"

Relena was no longer screaming, but tears leaked from her eyes and her body seemed to quiver and spasm out of her control. Then, to Heero's growing horror, her skin began to smoke and peel and the smell of burned flesh filled the room. So much pain enveloped her, that she did not appear to notice her own flesh burning, but only whimpered pitifully, her eyes glassy and dull.

"Stop it!" Heero cried hoarsely, and did not wonder at the tears in his own eyes. "You monster! Nobody deserves that! Stop it! Oh, God..." And he folded over, clutching at his jacket, shutting his eyes and ears to the sound.

His hand felt something in the pocket of his jacket and he clutched in to remind him that real, solid things existed outside the horror around him. And then he suddenly remembered what it was. He'd forgotten all about it. Reaching into his pocket he withdrew the small alarm device Mandred had given in case of emergencies and stared at it stupidly.

He looked up to see Relena, wilted now like a dying flower, her skin scared and blackened in places, her eyes shut. She looked lifeless. Teleb dropped her like an old rag and turned to Kyra and Falora, looking unpleasant and unsatisfied. "You are growing strong again, I see," he said in wicked tones to Falora. "But not fast enough."

With shaking hands, Heero pushed the button.

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