Author's Note: Holy cripes, look at those reviews! Thanks so much! I now have a partner in crime with this story and my new co-writer is Crystalight33! Go check out her story "Slayers Lost in the Big City". Thanks for waiting.

Chapter 3

Lina knocked Amelia in the shoulder. "Look! It's the Chimera! He'll get us out of here!" Zelgadis didn't waste time, he shot off the other direction carrying his dirty laundry with him.

The two girls chased the poor boy to the end of the church. "Please! We just want to talk with you!" Amelia yelled. The archdeacon walked out from behind a column, stopping them by raising a hand.

"You are in a church. If you're going to scream and yell, do it outside." The archdecon said calmly, pointing a finger at them.

Lina hissed softly. "Very sorry 'bout that. But we can't scream and yell outside 'cause we'd get arrested if we went outside."

"I see. Well, carry on then…" He turned away from them to walk down the hall. "But do it quietly."

Lina and Amelia continued their chase and did it quietly. Shuffling their feet as they followed Zel doing one mile an hour. Zelgadis was doing the same, quietly jogging with his feet hardly lifting. "Let us talk to you." Amelia whispered to him, the sound of their feet scuffing against the polished floor.

"No!" Zelgadis hissed softly at her. "Leave me alone." *scuff scuff* He skidded further away from them with his laundry basket.

"Don't make come over there drop kick your ass!" *scuff scuff* Lina shuffled after him as he started to pick up the pace up some winding staircase.

Once Zel stepped onto the stairs he ran upwards calling down at her. "I'd really like to see you try!" Amelia and Lina started to run up the stairs after him.

Hugo, Victor and Lavern were in the middle of playing strip poker gargoyle style. Victor spotted Zelgadis being chased by two girls. "Look at that. He's only gone out once and he's already pimpin' it out! Go Zegladis!"

Hugo had lost his hand at poker……literally. They didn't have any clothes, so they chisel off limbs. He was in the process of removing a hoof when he too saw Zelgadis. "Zelgadis' is finally gonna get some tail!"

Lavern just shook her head and hopped down the ledge. "Hey Zelgadis!"

Zelgadis dove into the small belltower. "Need to hide need to hide!"

Lina appeared from the stairs followed by Amelia. "We got you now! Tell how we can get out of here or I'll go medieval on your ass!"

Amelia huffed as she reached the top step. "What is with you and the word 'ass' today?"

Hugo clapped his hooves together. "I rather like the word 'ass'. Ass, ass, ass!"

"Lets make a point to say that word in every sentence." Victor said sarcastically.

"Okay. Can I 'ass' you a question?" Hugo got his snout smacked. "Hey! You could've chipped it!"

Lina turned her head to look at the three statues, looking at the now frozen gargoyles. "Wait. Were those here when we got here?"

Amelia shrugged, then got slapped on the butt by Hugo. "Hey! What did that!"

Zelgadis peeked out from a corner of the tower. "Perverts…"

"There you are!" Lina smiled evilly and bounded up another small set of steps to the very top of the tower. "We're gonna get ya n…..whoa."

Amelia too was in awe. In the small, upper ledge of the tower was a wooden replica of Paris, everything from the buildings to land sights and even the people. Zelgadis walked out from the corner nervously.

"You….you made of this?" Amelia ran her hand over the finely crafted church. "Oooh! Look at the people!"

Lina stooped down to eye the wooden figures. The people were in action poses, running away from something. Some were lying on the ground with red paint over them and a small wooden figure of Zelgadis standing in the belltower shooting at them with an M16.

Amelia squealed. "It's so cute! Eeeee!"

Lina stepped away from her and gave a disturbed look.

Zelgadis looked curiously at Amelia's enthusiasm. "You like it?"

"Yeah! Look all the morose faces of the townspeople! It's so…..moving!"

Lina tapped Amelia. "We really need to get you out more." She picked up the figure of Minister Rezo with a knife in his back. "This adds a nice touch. If I could do this, I'd seriously need to channel my inner child."

Lina wandered up to the belltower as Zelgadis was showing Amelia that if you pulled a string on the Zelgadis figure's back, you could hear a little "pop" and one of the townspeople would fall over.

As Lina wandered around the huge bells, she found the bell pull ropes.  With an evil grin, she made sure Zelgadis and Amelia were still playing with his dolls.  With a big leap, she grabbed one of the ropes and rung the bell.

*DONG*

Both Zelgadis and Amelia fell to the floor in surprise as the sound of the bell thundered through the small tower.

*DONG*

Lina laughed hysterically as she bounced up and down on the rope.  Then, she realized that she couldn't stop and the bell was ringing out of control.

*DONG*

"Do something!!!" Amelia cried, covering her ears.

*DONG*

Zelgadis got up and rushed towards Lina.

*DONG*

Zelgadis reached Lina and grabbed the rope, halting it immediately and causing Lina to fall on the floor.  The tower was still ringing from the noise of the bell.

"You idiot!!!  Do you realize what you've just done??  People are going to start closing their shops and going home because they think it's 5pm when it's really only noon!!!"

Lina just looked at him and yelled, "WHAT??  I CAN'T HEAR YOU!"

Zelgadis covered his ears again and said, "You don't have to yell!"

"I'M SLOW AS A SNAIL??  YOU BASTARD!!" she replied and started to attack him, but she remembered he was made of stone and thought better of it.

Zelgadis glared at her. "Don't....yell... "I'm going to get some fresh air." He growled to himself as he walked out one of the belltower windows.

Amelia shot Lina in the bum with the Zelgadis figure. "Lina! Look what you did to Zelgadis."

Lina picked out a small little pellet from her dress. "What? He deserved it." She mumbled. "He's a jerk anyway. Those bells were asking for it!"

"Lets go cheer Zelgadis up, Lina." Amelia tugged on Lina's arm and dragged her to the belltower window.

"How about we not." Lina hissed under throat.

"You wanna get out of the church doncha?"

Lina sighed and agreed with a nod of her head. They saw Zelgadis leaning his upper body on his forearms on a part of the balcony. "Hey, Chimera of Notre Dame!"

Amelia pinched Lina. "Not like that!" She smiled and walked up to Zelgadis and sat on the ledge where he was resting his arms. "Hey Zelgadis. Why don't you want to talk to us?"

Zelgadis gave her a snotty look. "I don't like people."

"Oh come one, we're not all bad."

"You'd be surprised. My own mother turned me into a Chimera. At least, that's what I heard." He said with a hurt expression in his eyes. Amelia made a small squeak.

"Your own mother!? How terrible!"

Zelgadis nodded. "And…" He sneered at his next words. "Minister Rezo took me in when no one else would. I can't say I'm very grateful, cause he treats me like I'm idiot and loves to remind me every single day that I'm a monster." He turned to lean his back on the ledge and acted out Rezo his squinting his eyes closed. "Everyday it's 'Oh hi Zelgadis how is my ugly, unattractive adopted drone?' 'Have you grown any mold under your arms like the rest of the gargoyles?' 'You're so disgusting even the ugly stick wouldn't beat you.' 'Hey with a hair-cut like that, you could join the cast of "Cats".'

Amelia looked pathetically at Zelgadis. "That's terrible!"

"Yeah, and he's blind too. I don't understand why he'd be able to describe my appearance but still trap himself in a corner, banging into the same wall repeatedly. That's kinda fun to watch though."

Lina was hanging around the other side of the balcony hoping Amelia would ask him how to get out of the church. She looked over the side for second and then felt something right behind her. "Hey!" She almost tripped over a pig with bat wings gargoyle. "How'd that thing get under my dress? This place is creepy."

Amelia scooted closer to Zelgadis. "I don't think you're a monster."

"You're just saying that so I won't push you over the edge."

Amelia scooted away.

"No…." She stammered and scooted a little distance from him. "I'm just saying it. You have a lot of un monster-like qualities."

He rolled his eyes and looked out over the hozion. "Like what?" Not really caring.

"Well, um, you're nice…..sometimes." Amelia was trying very hard to think up some nice things. "And you have a nice shade of blue…."

Zelgadis glared her. Amelia stuttered, "….in you're eyes!"

Zelgadis blinked. "Really?"

"I think so." Amelia blushed.

Lina called from the other side of the balcony. "Tell him how hard he is!"

Amelia nodded her head. "And you're hard…" Her eyes grew with realization. "NO! I didn't mean that! LINA!" Lina snickered.

Zelgadis looked disgusted at the two girls. "See. This is why I hate people."

"Please Zelgadis!" Amelia pleaded. "You have some great qualities! Like….him….hey Lina?"

Lina walked up to them. "What?"

"You can read palms right?"

"A little. Why?"

Amelia took out Zelgadis' hand out of his own freewill and shoved it in Lina's face. "Read his palm!"

Lina pushed Zel's hand away from her face and sat down next to him with her his palm at a more comfortable distance. "Lets see her…..oh, see this here?"

Zelgadis tried to free his hand. "Just hurry and give me back my hand!"

Lina twisted it and he yelped. "Shut up or I'll break it off." Zel was surprised at her grip actually hurt his stone hand, so he stayed quiet. "Okay. You have a long life line….and this little bit here means you're a real jerk."

Amelia scolded. "Lina!"

"Okay okay. Um….this means you're shy…and…oh!" Lina genuinely looked perplexed at a marking in his hand.

Zelgadis found himself becoming very curious. "What?"

"This little crease here means you'll be rich one day. You'll build your house somewhere in France, put in a garden and….." Lina spit in his hand. "A swimming pool."

Zelgadis cursed and jerked his hand away and brush off Lina's saliva. "That's sick!"

Lina giggled. "I love doing that! Works every time!"

Zelgadis stood up and pointed at them. "I want the both of you out!"

Lina smiled and grabbed onto Amelia. "Perfect! But you have to tell us how?"

"Why? Just go downstairs and go out the doors." Zelgadis still kept his finger pointed.

They shook their heads. "We can't." Lina started. "We got in some serious trouble helping you out at the festival and Rezo almost had us arrested for it. Once we set foot outside the church we're dead meat."

Amelia whimpered a little. "Please Zelgadis. Can you tell us how we can get out of here so they won't see us?"

Zelgadis sighed and motioned with his eyes at the balcony. "Well, you can just jump off and climb down."

"Yeah!" Amelia said happily. "We can just jump off and……Jump off the balcony????"

Lina growled. "And climb down?? We'll get killed!"

"That's the whole point. They can't arrest you if you're already dead." Zelgadis shrugged and began to walk back inside the bell tower, but Lina jumped on his back and knocked him down.

Forgetting how heavy Zelgadis was, Lina ended up knocking him and herself into Amelia and subsequently off the balcony.  Zelgadis managed to grab onto a gargoyle head and Lina grabbed his legs and Amelia dangled precariously off of Lina's ankle. 

"DO SOMETHING!!" Lina and Amelia shouted. Zelgadis was about to reply, but the gargoyle head broke off, sending all three of them hurtling towards the ground.  Fortunately, a metal roof was in their way.  They all breathed a sigh of relief, but then the metal slab they had landed on dislodged itself from the rest of the roof.

 Sparks went flying everywhere as their makeshift sled slid down the roof.  They were about to slide off the roof when Zelgadis pushed Lina and Amelia off of it.  They rolled to the side as the metal slab crashed into a nearby alley causing the guards in the near vicinity to get a closer look.  Amelia looked at Zelgadis with big sparkly eyes.

"You saved us!" she said, to which Zelgadis sweatdropped and Lina rolled her eyes.  Amelia took off one of her bracelets and gave it to Zelgadis saying, "I want you to have this.  Remember, when you wear this woven band, you hold the city in your hand."

Zelgadis looked at it and said, "It's only a star….. how is this the city?" However, Amelia could only look at him with her big sparkly eyes.  He was about to shake her out of it when Lina got him in a headlock.

"When we get done with this story, I'm so gonna Dragon Slave your ass!" and with that, she grabbed Amelia and left a confused Zelgadis standing out in the alley.

He had just gotten back in his tower when he heard what sounded like a muffled squawk followed by footsteps coming up the steps leading to his room.

"Ugh, what now??" Zelgadis exclaimed.  He went to go investigate.  As he was going down the stairs, a chicken ran up between his legs followed by Gourry, except that Gourry didn't actually go between Zelgadis' legs.

"Hey man, let me by!  I want that chicken!"  Zelgadis just restrained Gourry as he said, "Look, I've already been bothered enough, so just go away and you won't get hurt."  Gourry wasn't paying him any attention.  Zelgadis sighed and said, "Hey, you know, there's another chicken downstairs.  A really big, fat, juicy one."  Before he even finished, Gourry was at the

foot of the stairs.  Zelgadis rolled his eyes and went up to his tower to think.

Unfortunately, thinking was out of the question.

"Hey Zel! Buddy!" Hugo hopped on his stump up and down as Zelgadis climbed up to his room.

"Hugo just go away, I don't want to talk to you." Zelgadis growled and passed him.

The gargoyle followed him. "I'll go away IF you tell me what you were doing down there." He nudged him and wiggled an eyebrow.

"I got rid of the girls, that's it."

Victor and Lavern joined their friend. "You mean you helped the girls." Lavern grinned.

Zelgadis shook his head. "They wouldn't leave me alone."

Victor pointed at him. "I see you're blushing. You liked that Amelia girl." He hid the bracelet behind his back and blushed harder.

"Ya stud." Lavern giggled. Hugo and Victor looked strangely at her. "What?"

The chimera climbed up to his bed and layed down. "I don't know what you're talking about. I don't like either of them, especially that Lina girl…"

Hugo held up his hoof. "Then I can I have her? I've always had a thing for redheads."

Victor rolled his eyes. "You've always had a thing for limestone too…..in the worst way. But we won't get into that."

"Thank you."  Was Zelgadis' muffled reply as he covered his head with a pillow.

"Oh 'ass' if I really cared."

"Hugo! Will you stop that!"

- - - - - - -

Meanwhile at the Palace of Justice Minister Rezo was in his chamber, listening to the echoes of the Latin chanting filtering up to his room. Everyone knows that Latin chanting is wonderful to hear, but if you've listened to the chanting for more than forty years it gets very annoying. So Rezo had to figure how to give it a beat.

Rezo was dancing by his fireplace. "I'm too sexy for my robe! Too sexy for my robe! Too sexy it……what rhymes with robe?! Soge? Foge?….er….um…..I'm too sexy for my hat! Too sexy for my…."

"Sir!" A guard called from his door. Rezo nearly squeaked and and adjusted his clothes.

"Yes?"

"The gypsy girls, they've escaped!"



to be continued……