Warnings: Shounen-ai, a light peppering of fluff, evil Treize, raised tempers, language and just a little Relena bashing.

Disclaimer: I don't own any of the GW characters, but I do own Shiakara, Eli'iarkin, the Head Mage, Liraya, Kiranuy and their little group of mages. All of them. Except Lockei. He belongs to Misty Yuy, so blame her for his dirtiness and go read her stuff. ^_^ And don't take 'em.

Author's notes: Yay! Another chapter! :D And it's up before 12 at night too. O_o Shock horror. *grins* Have fun!

~ ~ ~

"Tomorrow? Mr. Treize, you're asking the impossible!" Une had to force the words out as she handed Treize a bar of soap, having never even considered saying to no to him, let alone actually doing so.

Treize thanked her softly, then began to wash himself, only half his mind on what he was saying to Une, the other half floating somewhere between Gerette and Milliardo.

"Nothing's impossible, Lady. I need you to organise those mages and get them rested and ready – we go tomorrow."

"But, Mr. Treize, these are all untrained younglings! You would have the younger ones that don't know a mage-bolt from a lightning bolt. I've done my best, but-"

"I don't appreciate your tone, Lady. Are you telling me what to do…?"

Sapphire eyes lifted to meet her glass-covered eyes and the blue was stormy and threatening. Mr. Treize may be a gentleman, but there was a deep-seated anger there and she was going to bear the brunt of it if she didn't say something to smooth things over. Since Peacecraft had left, Mr. Treize had been increasingly short and agitated. He had nothing to distract him from his thoughts.

"No sir, Mr. Treize… I just… No, sir."

Une bowed from the waist to him, turned on her heel and left.

Treize closed his eyes with a long sigh, still absently soaping himself with one hand as he rested his head back on the edge of the baths. His free hand lifted to pinch the bridge of his nose and he sighed yet again.

Milliardo was gone and, as such, there was nothing Treize could do about his death at the hands of the spell-sphere. The only possibility was that he go to get him before he triggered the spell, or at least not too long after it. He didn't want Milliardo to suffer too long before he got the antidote.

Treize nodded a little to himself. He would have to get Milliardo back, then kill the others. They deserved it. All of them.

How dare they.

* * *

Quatre shifted uncomfortably under the baleful looks he and his friends kept receiving whilst they were discussed by the mages. It wasn't all that nice, he thought to himself, to be talked about as though he wasn't there, or as though he couldn't understand what they were saying about him. To them, he was 'a faery' or 'the faery'. He wasn't Quatre. He wasn't Duo's friend or Iria's brother. He wasn't the person Trowa loved or the person Wu Fei had begun to respect. He was 'a faery'. Trowa and Tia'ara were 'the pantherin', if they were lucky, or 'the cat-things' when conversation became heated. Likewise, Wu Fei and Noin were 'the centaurs' or 'the horse-things'. Even Duo had begun to become 'the elf' or, when Relena got really agitated 'Heero's elf'.

It sucked.

"They aren't part of the University! They aren't even part of the human race! They can't stay here while we discuss the problem. Who knows who they're working for?!" one angry voice rose above all the others, triggering muttered agreement and a barrage of several other complaints before the Head Mage could quiet them.

"It was bad enough letting the elf stay, now there's faeries and centaurs and… and… cat-things!"

"Pantherin," Trowa corrected softly, and received a glare fit to freeze the ocean for his troubles to which he only replied with a calm half-smile.

"Eli'iarkin's got a point. They might be working for Khushrenada."

"Oh come on!" Duo cried. "They're not working for anyone! They're my friends!"

"There! There! You see?! I told you! None of this started happening until he got here! Milliardo was kidnapped and now we find out we're all going to be killed and it all started when he came! I said that from the start, but because he's Heero's elf, no one listened to me!" Relena cried, her voice rising in pitch and volume until, by the end of her tirade, everyone was wincing with every word.

"Relena…" Milliardo moaned, rubbing his temples with two long fingers.

"And you would stand up for him!" she screeched, pointing at Milliardo. "You fucked him!" She actually looked shocked at herself for using that word, but not so shocked as Milliardo himself and not so shocked as Heero and Duo were angry.

"I never-" Milliardo started, but Heero cut him off.

"How dare you, Relena? You seem to forget you still only hold the status of apprentice. What Milliardo does with his personal time is none of your business, and what I do with mine is even less. I'm dropping you a level. You'll have to go through your previous level of training over again before you can finish the one you were on. Eli'iarkin, your apprentice still lacks discipline."

Relena glared at Duo as though this was his fault too and the elf just stuck his tongue out at her then smiled sweetly. He'd moved up through the levels so quickly that, now Relena had been dropped one, they were on the same level, but he was half way through his where she had to do the lot of hers again. To put it simply, Duo was technically on a higher level.

Eli'iarkin bowed his head a little in acknowledgement of Heero's decision, wondering where he'd gone wrong with Relena. He'd never been soft on her at all… And her brother wasn't constantly whining. He sighed and shook his head before turning his mind back to the conversation at hand.

There was a moment of silence following Heero's reprimand, then another voice rose up.

"They can't stay!"

"Of course they can't! Nor can the elf!"

"The elf should have never been allowed to enter in the first place. We should have made him leave the moment we saw him!"

"Aye! It doesna matter tha' there would be one less because o' 'is powers! Th' less o' 'em th' better!"

"Excuse me…" Shiakara spoke softly and no one heard her.

"An elf we can probably deal with – the only difference is his ears after all – but the others…"

"No! No, they should all leave! Even the elf! Especially the elf!"

"Excuse me!" The OtherKin was a little louder this time, but still, only a few around her heard and the rest kept arguing.

"What harm could it do…?" wondered one very daring voice.

"What harm? What harm?! A damn lot of harm, for your information!"

"EXCUSE ME!" Shiakara bellowed at the top of her voice, silencing everyone almost instantly as they turned to blink at her.

"Sh… Shiakara?" someone murmured into the silence.

Shiakara coughed politely and smiled a little as though she'd never shouted, then began to speak in a calm, matter-of-fact voice.

"You all seem to have forgotten about me. It's not exactly easy to miss the fact that I'm not human. It's easier to mistake any of these six for human than it is me. Duo's only difference is that he's got pointed ears. If Quatre tied his wings down and put a loose tunic over them, you'd never know he isn't human. Okay, it's a little harder to hide Trowa and Tia'ara's ears and the fact that their eyes are different, but they still look essentially human. And if you saw Wu Fei or Noin in the water, with their horse halves submerged, you'd think they were human too. Me, I'm a wolf with wings and funny coloured fur, not to mention the lack of pupils in white eyes. But you know me. You all like me and trust me. You all laugh when I make a joke and talk to me like I am another person. It took a while, that's true, but you've accepted me. Why won't you ever give other races a chance? What is it you think they're going to do? Why is it you think they'll be trouble or unable to master control? What makes you fear them? What?"

The entire room full of mages stared at her for a long, long time, then a soft murmuring began among them. Why did they fear the other races? Why did the rule stand that they wouldn't let them in?

"You're wrong," one soft voice spoke into the murmuring and cut it short. They all turned to look at the Head Mage. He was looking straight at Shiakara, something frightening moving behind his eyes.

"Wrong?" she wondered, frowning at him.

He nodded and smiled, if it could be called that. It was merely a peeling back of his lips from his teeth, almost a snarl.

Shiakara's hackles rose and her ears flicked back.

"Yes. Wrong. I don't like you. I don't trust you. I don't accept you and I never will."

A gasp rippled around the room at the Head Mage's words and it suddenly made sense why each and every mage there seemed to have an innate sense of xenophobia. He had hated so much, it had rubbed off on them without them even noticing. Insidious whispers and rules that weren't questioned because he was their leader and he knew best. If he said they weren't to allow non-humans, then it must be the right thing to do.

He stood up from his chair, leaning his weight on his hands, which rested before him on the table. The look on his face was one of pure disgust as his eyes met Shiakara's and his voice fairly dripped with the same disgust.

"You're… you're… unnatural! Every single one of you is. Look at you. Wings… tails… pointed ears…" He shuddered. "And who knows what sorts of habits… out there in the wild. It's horrible. So uncultured and… and… unhygienic!"

Shiakara stared at him.

"I think I take offence to that," Wu Fei said calmly, one ebony eyebrow lifting.

"I know I do!" Duo snarled, and it was only reflex that saved him.

A ball of fire came screaming the length of the table and he was barely in time to snap a shield into place. As it was, he staggered back two steps at the impact, the shield only barely there.

Another collective gasp sped through the room, wide eyes and stunned mages surrounding a fuming Duo, who quickly extended his shield over his friends and his lover, not trusting the Head Mage as far as he could throw him.

The mage was indeed rallying another shot, the power building above his palm and solidifying into another ball of fire. Duo lifted his own hand, his friends watching wide-eyed as a bolt of lightning formed there. A slight half-smile formed on his lips.

"Silly man," the elf murmured, and the bolt vanished as Duo closed his hand around it, his eyes shutting as well. Quatre opened his mouth to speak, not understanding what his friend was doing, afraid. Heero reached out and covered his mouth with a hand.

~He knows what he's doing. Have faith,~ the mage sent as the Head's fireball exploded against Duo's shield.

"Silly, silly man… Anger makes one rash and he can't think straight enough to use the right spells…"

Duo opened one eye and lifted the closed hand, opening it before his mouth and blowing gently as though getting rid of a little dust. Eyes widened as the Head's shield crackled with energy, then collapsed upon it's creator, doing just enough damage to knock him senseless without killing him.

"Take him away. Keep him bound. Don't let him free." It was Milliardo who gave the orders to two other mages, who nodded and complied. Duo carefully wove the energy of his shielding back into himself and smirked at Quatre, Wu Fei and Trowa, who were literally staring.

"Pretty cool, huh?"

* * *

Une pinched the bridge of her nose and prayed for patience. The nine mages lined up before her were young. Very young. She'd thought there was time, when Treize first presented her with them, to let them mature, teach them everything they needed to know. The fact of the matter was, however, that she was only one mage. They didn't get one-on-one attention like they should. She couldn't be there every second to supervise and iron out the kinks in their spell-casting.

Why had he insisted on young, untrained mages?

Liraya, Lockei, Ura'a, Kiranuy, Jeren, Hikaara, Nika, O'yan and Be'ki. It had taken her a month just to remember all their names and she was supposed to have turned them into full-fledged mages by herself in four months? Treize was asking miracles from her and she couldn't deliver. No matter that she wished she could, that she would do anything for his approval, this, she couldn't do.

At best, she had a row of half-trained younglings before her.

"Fire. The easiest of the Elements. Let me see," she said with a sigh, hoping the results of this test would be better than the ones on air. Thankfully, a stable fireball appeared above each hand. She closed her eyes in thanks and when she opened them, found Kiranuy, ever the joker, was now juggling three fireballs. His friend, Liraya, was giving him significant looks; ones that said something like "stop that, you idiot!" while Lockei, on the other side of Kiranuy to Liraya, was giggling, his fireball flickering as his concentration wavered.

"Kiranuy! I get the feeling you enjoy making me angry," Une growled as she stalked along the line until she was standing in front of said mage. He smiled sheepishly, wincing, and vanished the fire, then shifted from foot to foot, embarrassed.

"Er… I be sorry, Ma'am. I were just… lightening the mood…?"

Liraya groaned and covered her eyes with her free hand while Lockei kept giggling away to himself, the rest of the small group all hiding smirks or choking back laughter.

"Lightening the mood…?" Une repeated dangerously before grabbing a fistful of his shirtfront and literally shaking him. When she stopped, he tried smiling at her, hoping he was going to get off with just that.

"I are sorry, Ma'am. I aint never meant to make you angry. It's… well… I just are that way," he said, still smiling charmingly at her from under red bangs.

"I am sorry, Ma'am. I haven't ever meant to make you angry. It's… well… I just am that way," Une corrected the entirety of his words then dropped him. "I don't have time to worry about you."

~You're not just a dipshit, you're a damn lucky dipshit!~ Liraya hissed into his mind and he only grinned at her before they turned their attention back to Une and her lessons.

They'd been smart enough to figure out that something was going on. This slap-dash crash course was because the pressure was on. The Master must be leaning on Une to get her to better their skills. Something was going to happen, and soon. Liraya just hoped they'd all live through it.

Lockei's concentration was only half on what he was doing. The other half of his mind was counting the days since he last got laid and deciding it had been too long. Lockei was just like that. He always had been and he always would be. His entire drive lay around sex and the having of it. It was his opinion that he'd inherited the trait from his mother – he did, after all, have twelve brothers and sisters.

He had some work to do… if Une ever decided to let them go.

* * *

She never did. Before any of the nine young mages knew what was happening, they were atop horses, Treize leading them off to who knew where. He said something about Peacecraft, or so O'yan told Lockei, after Be'ki had told him. Lockei hated horses with a passion, and he was glad enough when they stopped and climbed off.

Treize spoke to the nine of them plus Lady Une, concerning the resistance they would encounter.

"Only one mage. No more. No less. There are ten of you and I trust you will deal with this mage swiftly and cleanly. I expect no less from you. And I will be grateful to the one who kills him. It shouldn't be too long now and he'll be here, then we have more work. Prepare yourselves. He will arrive."

They all looked incredulously at one another, all but Une of course, who had eyes only for Treize as usual. Ten mages against one? What was so special about him…?

Nonetheless the nine of them were nothing if not obedient and they stood in two rows of four and five, eyes closed as they tapped into the earth and its energy, preparing and readying themselves for the battle to come.

Come to think of it, Lockei thought idly to himself, they didn't even know how Treize knew this one mage was coming…

* * *

Talk circled around and around itself, with no conclusions drawn. Tempers rose and Milliardo even snapped at a few people, evidently very afraid. They didn't have much longer before Treize Khushrenada began the process of sending them all to their graves and all they could do, all they could do, was argue.

Shiakara did her best to calm tempers and restore peace and she was usually very good at it, but the mages were on the edge of hysteria. They were all so frightened and unsure of what to do that they attacked one another when they could come up with no solutions.

To make matters worse, word had somehow got out and there were now four different languages buzzing around the Great Hall as delegations had come from other countries to be here for the argument.

And they largely blamed the Nyriad mages for the fact that this had happened.

One mage in ornately decorated robes, his hair pulled into thousands of tiny plaits, spat something in a foreign language at Milliardo and as it was translated, assenting cries had come from the other foreigners.

"He says we should have kept a better eye on the people of our continent. He says we should have known of Khushrenada and stopped this long before it ever happened," the translator had informed Milliardo, who'd somehow become the unofficial Head Mage for the time being.

"He's right. You should have known," came the translation of words from a mage in a short tunic with a small dragon on his shoulder, which kept breathing fire and singing hair, which didn't impress anyone and certainly wasn't helping with tempers.

"How could we have known? Do you keep stock of every person in every corner of your continent?" wondered one voice, and three translators relayed that to their respective mages.

"Na!"

"Ki'a!"

"Sike!"

The replies came all at once, their translations following suit.

"Yes."

"Yes."

"Of course."

Milliardo muttered something under his breath and got questioning looks from the delegates.

"I said that's bullshit," he repeated delicately, which only started another round of insults and screaming matches after the translations.

Duo, standing off to one side while Heero put in his thoughts and insults along with the rest, shook his head and looked at Quatre, who seemed to be practically glued to his side.

"This is useless, Quat. It's not helping anyone and that guy is getting closer to killing us all… I have to do something…"

"You have to do something?" Quatre asked. "Why you? You don't owe them anything. Not long ago they were calling you 'the elf'. You don't need to do a thing!"

"Yeah, I do. That wasn't their fault and… and Heero's important to me. Important enough that I want to help his friends… no, they're more like his family. He grew up here, you know. He was left on the doorstep as a baby and never knew his mother or father." Duo's eyes traced the line of Heero's back, watched his body move as he pointed at someone to emphasize his point.

"But he… he's…"

"A human? You're no better than them if you say that, you know. I love him. I really do. I know it's different and it's really kinda weird, but I do. I love him and I want to help him."

Duo turned to look down at Quatre who was smiling a little at him.

"It's not weird, really. Different, maybe. I'm… well… I guess I'm glad for you…"

"Hey… Quat, there's something you're not telling me, isn't there?" Duo said with certainty, putting a hand on each of Quatre's shoulders and looking into his eyes, ignoring the arguing mages.

"Uh… Well… it's…" Quatre blushed and dropped his eyes from Duo's. "Trowa kissed me. He said he loves me."

"He did?" Duo blinked. "What did you say?"

"That I'm not gay."

"Are you?"

"Duo!"

"Well are you?"

"Duo, I… I…"

"It's a simple enough question. Are you gay?"

Quatre closed his eyes and shook his golden head.

"No. No, I'm not."

"You sure?"

"Duo! Yes, I'm sure! Just because I look… Just because I am like I am doesn't mean I'm… like you."

Duo laughed a bit at that, amused no end.

"Alright, settle down. I'm not accusing you of being 'like me'. I was just asking. So… what did Trowa say when you said you weren't gay?"

Quatre shrugged.

"Tried to convince me I didn't need to pretend, that there was nothing wrong with it. It took a couple of repetitions for him to realise I meant it when I said I wasn't. He… he was upset… I… didn't mean to hurt him, Duo…"

"Of course you didn't. Don't tell me you've been beating yourself up over this? You have, haven't you? Geez! It's not your fault Trowa's fallen in love with the wrong guy. Really it isn't. Don't worry. He'll find someone."

"That's what I keep telling myself…" Quatre said, but he didn't sound convinced.

"Well start believing it, okay? I have to go now. I can feel them, Treize's little group. They're pulling power from the earth… I can feel the shift. The others are too busy arguing to notice it. I have to go."

"I'm coming too!" Quatre said, fingers tightening around his wand.

"No, you're not."

"I am!"

"No, Quatre," Duo murmured, putting a hand on Quatre's shoulder again. "You're not." He flexed his fingers on Quatre's shoulder and the faery found himself unable to move, unable, even, to send a thought to Trowa, to tell him what was happening.

"Sorry, Quat, but I don't want you killed or something."

That said, Duo turned on his heel and strode out of the room. He walked purposefully down the corridors, snapping his fingers to change his clothes. They remained black, but changed into leggings and a knee-length tunic, a belt around the middle. His hair remained the same, the gold chain chiming softly every so often, and his shoes changed to soft ones, for the purpose of sneaking.

He slipped into the stables and put the stable-master to sleep with a whispered word, because he knew if the man was still awake, he'd be able to tell what Duo had taken and which way he'd gone. He apologised softly, then carefully led Milliardo's prize stallion out of his stall and hopped onto his back after bridling him. He didn't ride with a saddle, elves never did. The horse was a dappled grey-black, a beautiful animal. He was sleek and, more importantly, fast.

Duo kicked him into a gallop as soon as he was out of the stable, setting a charm over both of them to hide them from the eyes as they left the grounds of the University, then dropping it when it wasn't needed anymore.

The stars watched the brave elf and wept.

~ ~ ~

Author's notes: O_o Duo's gone off on his own to face Treize Khushrenada! Will he be in time? Will he be able to face up to all those mages? Will anyone realise he's gone before it's too late? Does anyone know the answers to these questions? Heh… I do!

Oh! I hereby relinquish ownership of the Head Mage. He's a big meanie. You're welcome to him. *grins* ~_^