Ghost Knight
Chapter 11
by Anne Khushrenada
Disclaimers: I don't own any of the canon Gundam
characters. To steal a line from Ashura, I think they
own /me/ by now. I'm quite sure Dorothy and Lady Une
do, and sometimes they're not nice people. Alice
McKenzie, Terra, Lucian, Elena, Caro, and the rest of
the kids are mine. Linnea and her friends belong to
themselves because I don't want them anymore.
Warnings: implied yuri (DxC), yaoi (3x4). More like
shounen ai and shoujo ai, really.
Pairings of note: 13x11, 6x9, the aforementioned DxC,
3x4. Also 5xSP, 1xR, 2xH, but these have hardly been
mentioned yet. Too many characters, too little time.
Catherine Catalonia-Bloom twirled a pair of knives in
her hands, and the look in her blue-grey eyes was a
dangerous one. She was often thought of by her
friends and their children alike as the kindest, and
the gentlest of the 'aunts', but there was steel to
Catherine, a thing within her that could make her
every bit as strong, every bit as dangerous, as any
of the others. Fiercely protective of those she
loved, the kidnapping of her middle child and the
harm done her eldest, had brought that steel core to
the surface.
Metal sang as Catherine's knives cut through air, and
with a sharp cry she spun for the opposite wall. She
hardly felt it as the first knife left her hand, only
saw it flying through air and fixed her eyes upon it,
listening for the sound as it struck home.
/Thunk./
"Catherine," Dorothy said. She stood in the room's
doorway, arms crossed, eyeing the fencing foil upon
the wall in a way that suggested she wanted nothing
so much as to draw it and hack something to pieces
with it.
"Jessica's sleeping," Catherine said quietly. "She's
had a long day."
"How's she doing?" Dorothy asked.
"A couple more days, and I think she'll be through
the worst of the cold. I gave her some soup
earlier..."
"Good," Dorothy said. She crossed the room, stood at
Catherine's back. She placed slim hands upon her
lover's shoulders. "Good. Oh, Catherine-"
/Thunk./
The second knife sank hilt-deep into the plaster of
the far wall. Numerous marks surrounded Catherine's
two knives, evidence that she'd been at this quite a
while. Probably, Dorothy thought, since she'd called
to tell her about Carolyn and Sarah.
"How the hell could they?" Catherine exclaimed
suddenly, her soft voice almost harsh. "How /could/
they?"
"I don't know, Catherine," said Dorothy. "I honestly
don't know. But we're going to get them back- I swear
to you we're going to get them back."
"And when we do," Catherine said, "when we do, I
want- I want-" Unable to go on, she sank to her
knees, tears streaming down her face. Dorothy knelt
beside her, and took the other woman in her arms,
holding her close and smoothing back the curly red
hair.
"I know, Cath," she said. "I know. Damnit, they hurt
our /children/, and somebody's going to have to
answer for it."
Catherine nodded slowly. "I- knew you'd understand,
Dorothy."
Dorothy chuckled softly. "Of course I understand,
Cath. So do Lucrezia and Milliardo- they got to the
office as I was leaving to come home, and I tell you,
it's going to be a toss-up who gets there first when
we catch those bastards."
"I'm sorry about that," Catherine said. "You didn't
have to come home. They probably need you there-"
Dorothy shook her head. "Not really, no. The
Peacecrafts can handle things, and half the office is
out in the field anyway, between one thing and
another. Half the Preventer corps is camped out at
the hospital watching the kids, and two of those
Preventers are Trowa and Quatre."
Catherine seemed to be more than a little reassured
by that. Nichol's betrayal had showed them how little
they could trust some elements of the Preventers, but
her brother and his lover would allow no more harm to
come to any of the children. There was no one she'd
trust more to look out for them now.
Dorothy nodded, as if sensing the other woman's
thoughts. "Yeah." She dropped a kiss onto Catherine's
forehead. "This made it personal, Cath. When they
involved the kids, they changed everything. And we,
all of us, have to look out for family now. I thought
of you and Jess, here alone, and-" She shook her
head. "/Never/, ever think my work is more important
than any of you."
"You're right," Catherine said after a moment. "I
just thought-"
"I know. They need me; they need everybody. But we
also need to take care of each other. That's
important, too."
Catherine took Dorothy's hands in her and squeezed
them. "Thank you. Now, tell me everything you know-
Everything that's been going on."
* * *
John Ling snatched up the telephone as soon as it
rang. His son and Mariemaia had been gone several
hours now, and he hadn't heard a word from them,
which was unusual. "Ling here," he said into the
phone.
"Sir," came the voice of Officer O'Brien, "I've got
Lady Une of the Preventers here, and she says she
needs to talk to you right away-"
"Put her on, please."
Lady Une spoke quickly once the phone had been passed
to her. "John. Lady Une here."
"How's my file fire?" Ling asked wryly.
Une laughed softly, but quickly turned serious.
"John, the files are gone."
"Burned? All of them? Damn."
"No," Une corrected. "Not burned, John- /gone./
Someone took them before they set the fire, and, we
think, then set the fire-"
"To make us believe that the files had been
destroyed, not stolen," Ling finished for her. His
heart began to beat faster as he looked to his
briefcase, still on the kitchen table, and thought of
the file he'd given Mariemaia. "Lady Une, I think I
know why-"
"I'm taking Mariemaia and Terra to wait things out at
Catherine and Dorothy's. Do you mind if we stop by on
our way there? I'd rather discuss this face-to-face."
Ling nodded. It was, he decided, a very good idea,
given the circumstances. "Of course. By the way- is
David with you? He left right after Mariemaia did,
when she got your call-"
"That was hours ago, John," Une said, sounding more
troubled now, "and I haven't seen him, but Mariemaia
may have. You might ask her when we get there."
"Alright," Ling said. "See you shortly, then."
He hung up the phone with a sigh, and scratched his
chin. /Where is David?/ he wondered. /This is so
unlike him... but with everything that's happened
lately, things /are/ a bit hard to keep track of.
He's probably just running errands for someone, or-/
There were any number of reasons, good ones, that
David might not have been in touch, but the fact that
Une hadn't seen him, /that/ was troubling, and John
Ling could not shake the thought that something was
wrong.
* * *
Alice frowned at her cards, then lay them face down
on the coffee table in the hospital waiting room.
"You kids are getting too rich for my blood," she
said. "I fold."
"I," said Lewis Chang, "am going to raise you ten,
Terra." He tossed a scrap of paper with '10' scrawled
on it into the center of the table.
"See your ten and raise you twenty," said Terra as
she pushed her own markers into the 'pot'. "Gabriel?"
The sandy-haired Preventer who was Alice's cousin
grinned at her and shook his head. "I can do thirty,
lass," he said, before leaning over to help Jeff and
Alex Barton-Winner decide weather to place their bets
or not.
"McKenzie," someone called from the room's doorway,
and both Alice and Gabriel looked up.
"Sorry," the Preventer said. "Gabe."
Gabriel stood. "Sorry, kids. I've gotta spell Chin
there."
The Chinese man approached the table with a grin.
"But I can spell you, too, pal. How 'bout it?"
"Gabe says I should stay," Jeff announced. "What do
you think?"
Chin looked over the boy's cards, then his own. "I
think Gabe's right," he whispered.
Jeff nodded sagely. "Okay."
Gabriel McKenzie stepped out into the hall and
saluted Quatre. "Chin's in with the little ones," he
said.
Quatre nodded. "You've all been very good with them.
Thank you."
Gabe smiled. "Seems the least we can do, sir.
Everything still quiet?"
"So far," Quatre said. "You might want to check in on
Lucian, I think he's getting a little lonely."
"Sure thing," Gabe said.
* * *
Wufei Chang was seated in the chair beside her bed
when Carolyn next came to. She raised a hand and
waved.
"You know," she said. "This is really starting to
suck. Sally give you any idea when I can go home?"
"The last time I was trapped in one of these little
rooms and I asked her that, do you know what she said
to me?" Wufei scowled. "Never. She said 'never'." He
muttered something that sounded like a complaint
about women and things they thought were funny.
Caro laughed. "It /is/ funny, and she told me the
same thing. But I feel useless here. Weak, stupid,
and useless."
"You are none of the above," Wufei said gruffly. "You
are the child of Dorothy, who scares even me at
times, and a woman who made her living throwing
knives at people. You are not weak, and you're
certainly not stupid. The information on the drug you
got from that technician- Lucrezia's digging into
that back at HQ, looking into the old OZ files and
such..."
Caro nodded. "Okay. So I've helped with one silly
little thing. But- aren't you angry at me? If they
had wanted Lewis, they could have taken him. I
failed."
"No," Wufei said. "You tried to fight. You defended
the little ones, and if Nichol were not dishonorable,
you could have bested him."
"I should have been more suspicious," Caro said. "We
know he's trouble."
"We knew he was an idiot," Gabe McKenzie said from
the doorway. "We did /not/ know he was a traitor. And
that's /our/ fault for not taking a closer look at
him when he was just annoying and hadn't progressed
to obnoxious and dangerous. Not yours." He gave Wufei
a sketchy salute. "I'm on rounds; just spelled Chin,
who's with Alice and the kids in the waiting room."
"Thank you," Wufei said.
They had developed a system whereby the Preventers
going about their 'rounds' at the hospital checked in
with each other, and checked up on each of the
children, wherever they were. They always stopped at
Carolyn's and Lucian's rooms, and checked in with the
Preventer stationed there. The Preventers watching
Lucian and Carolyn, respectively, rotated on the
hour, and these were by far the best of Lady Une's
inner circle.
No one really thought they would see any more trouble
from Nichol so soon, not in this area, but with two
children gone and one nearly taken, they weren't
taking any more chances.
Gabe ducked out of the room again with a wave. "See
you, Caro."
"So," Carolyn said, "what've I missed?"
"Chin on rounds, Alice before him, Ishisaka before
her-"
"Nothing else?" Caro interrupted. Wufei shook his
head. "Where's Mariemaia?"
"With Lady Une, last I saw. They're making plans to
move the young ones to your home. They don't all need
to be here."
"And Mom needs something to do besides put more holes
in the walls," Caro said with a nod.
* * *
Mariemaia knelt in the hospital's small chapel. She
had never been incredibly religious, but there was
something calming about the chapel, something
peaceful about being there. The Preventers needed to
be here, needed to be looking out for the kids and
for further trouble, but it was good to get away from
them for a bit, she thought.
Besides, few of them would have understood what she
was doing, in any case. Only Lucian, Terra, and her
mother really knew- those three, and probably
Milliardo. No others.
"Sometimes I think it's just us now, Father," she
said softly. "Mom, the twins, and I- and the rest of
the family. But there are things we know that they
don't, and-" She sighed. "Nichol betrayed us, and now
Sarah and Elena are gone. Lucian's taking it pretty
hard..."
She trailed off quickly, feeling guilty as if caught
in a lie, at the sound of approaching footsteps. She
looked up, spotted the black garments and the
clerical collar, and quickly relaxed. It was only the
priest, and priests didn't see anything wrong with
talking to dead people- did they?
"I'm sorry if I startled you, my child," the man
said. He stepped into the candlelight from the alter,
and Mariemaia saw that he was middle aged, his hair
steely grey with faint streaks of dark brown. His
eyes were blue, soft and kind.
"It's okay," she said quietly. "I can go-"
"Only if you wish to," he said. When she didn't make
any move to leave, he smiled down at her. "My name is
Thomas Gideon. Might I have the pleasure of knowing
yours?"
"Mariemaia Khushrenada," she said.
"I'm pleased to meet you, Mariemaia," Father Thomas
said. "What brings you here?"
She sighed. "My younger brother has pneumonia. He'll
be alright, we know that, but- That's not the worst
thing that happened today. Two children I know have
been- taken, by a man we know."
"Good heavens," the priest said. "What are their
names, child? I will pray for them."
"Elena, Elena Peacecraft. She's ten, like my brother.
And Sarah Catalonia-Bloom. She's only eight."
"Lord have mercy!" he gasped softly. "And you know
the one who took them?"
"Yeah. He- hurt Sarah's older sister, my friend,
Carolyn, to get at them." Mariemaia's voice shook.
She hadn't realized how much Caro's injury had upset
her until she'd started to tell the priest about it.
"I was talking to my father when you came in. He died
a long time ago. But they all fought in the war
together- well, some of them on different sides- my
father, my mother, Elena's parents, Caro and Sarah's-
We're family, all of us..."
Father Thomas was nodding. "I sometimes speak to my
father as well. He died when I was a boy, but
sometimes I can look up there and I know that he
hears me. There are those who think that's crazy, but
I understand. I am sure your father hears you,
Mariemaia, and that he looks after you."
"I hope so, Father," Mariemaia said. "Because right
now I think we could use all the help we can get."
Father Thomas knelt and turned his kindly gaze upon
Mariemaia. "Would you like me to pray with you for
your family, child?" he asked.
"I'm not sure I even believe in God," she said. "I'm
not sure I believe in anything. Few of us do. Uncle
Quatre's Moslem, but sometimes all that seems to mean
is that he curses Allah instead of God."
"Were you raised with any particular religion?" he
asked.
"Yeah," said Mariemaia dryly. "The Church of Dekim
Barton, till I was six. After that- not much."
"I see," the priest said.
"No, you don't," Mariemaia said, angry now. "You
don't see at all. Nobody does." She climbed to her
feet. "You pray for whoever you want to, Father. Me,
personally, I learned a long time ago that God
doesn't give a damn about what happens to me, or my
friends. If we're going to get through this, we'll do
it on our own."
* * *
Lucrezia squinted at the screen before her and swore.
"Somebody's been messing with these files," she said
over her shoulder as her fingers hit the keyboard to
try something else. She'd been able to access
Nichol's personnel records from OZ, and though they
hadn't told her much, she'd relayed everything she
had found to the others through Milliardo, who sat at
Dorothy's desk, working the radio and the
switchboards. But it was the old OZ files on the
hypnotic drug that seemed- odd was the only word she
could really use to describe it. There were large
gaps in the data.
"How so?" asked her husband when he'd finished
issuing his latest orders over the radio.
"Look here. See these gaps? I'm no expert, but I know
there should be stuff there." Lucrezia sighed. "Can
you make any sense of this?"
Milliardo shook his head. "Not really, no. I see what
you see- gaps where the data we need should be." He
sighed and snatched up a ringing telephone.
"Preventers, Lady Une's office."
"Milliardo, it's Une." He sighed again, this time
with relief when he recognized Une's voice. "How are
you two holding up over there?"
"We've both been better, Lady. Let's just leave it at
that. What's up?"
"Frustratingly little." She paused. "Milliardo, we're
moving the children out to Catherine and Dorothy's. I
think we'll all feel better if we know they're safe,
and somewhere where they can't get into trouble. They
all want to help, of course..."
Milliardo smiled at that. "Any of them any good with
computers?" he asked. "Lu and I aren't having much
luck cracking those old OZ files. Which in and of
itself is weird. We shouldn't have to /crack/ them at
all."
"Did you try Treize's access codes?"
Milliardo laughed softly. "I never knew them, Lady."
"I know several, but-"
"Not over the phone, I shouldn't think," Milliardo
finished for her. "Nichol's specialty was
communications, wasn't it?"
"The only thing he was any good at, besides being an
ass," Lucrezia muttered.
"Yes," Une said, and Milliardo couldn't tell if she
were agreeing with him or his wife. "I'm sending
Alice by the office to pick up a few things; I'll
have her bring you the codes."
"Can we hang onto her?" Milliardo asked. Alice wasn't
their best computer tech, but she knew the OZ systems
better than they did, and just might be able to help
them.
"I can spare her for a while, but I may need to steal
her back," Une said.
Milliardo heard Mariemaia's voice in the background
then, arguing with her mother. "You need Alice here,
Mom. I'll follow you to the Lings' in my car, then go
help out Aunt Lucrezia and Uncle Milliardo."
Une sighed. "Mariemaia, I wanted you to stay with
Dorothy and Cath-"
"I don't need a babysitter, Mama, and I'm too
restless to /be/ one. I've been messing around in
Daddy's files since I was a little kid. Let me /do/
something."
"Alright," Une said. "Milliardo? Did you catch any of
that?"
"The relevant parts, yes," he said.
"I don't like this," Une said quietly. "I'd rather
not have any of the children be a part of this,
frankly."
"Mariemaia is twenty-one, Une," Milliardo said. "She
does what she pleases; she always has. And the fact
of the matter is that we need her."
"Of course you're right," Une said. "I just- oh,
damn. What a fool I am. Complaining of Mariemaia's
involvement when your daughter-"
Milliardo cut her off. "Is missing, perhaps drugged,
but I doubt, in any immediate danger. It's just a
feeling I have, really, but they want her for
something; they wouldn't hurt her. And until we get
her back, well- she's my little girl, but she's also
her mother's daughter, and I suspect she'll be- how
would Duo phrase it? Raising hell and kicking ass."
Une laughed softly. "As you say, Milliardo. Keep in
touch."
"Will do," he said. Then, after she'd hung up, "Just
don't be surprised if you can't get through right
away." He snatched up another telephone. "Preventer
HQ, can you hold, please?" A pause. "Yes, you /can./"
He slammed his hand down on the hold button. "This is
unreal. You'd think the city was in chaos..."
"It's only the reporters," Lucrezia said, scowling at
her screen once again. She'd been reduced to guessing
at Treize's passwords, without any success. "Tell our
people to use the private lines or the radios, and
then you'll only have to answer half of those."
"Point," he said, and started making radio calls.
Between these he made suggestions to his wife on
passwords. "Roses?"
She turned and rolled her eyes at him. "Please. Been
there, tried that. Anything else?"
"I could keep guessing," Milliardo said, "but why
don't we just wait until Mariemaia gets here? The
info's not going anywhere without us being aware of
it-"
Lucrezia nodded; one of the first things she'd done
after calling up the files was to slap a tracer on
them. If anyone else accessed them, let alone tried
to change or delete anything, they would know about
it, and maybe even be able to trace that action to
its source. She halfway hoped someone, /anyone/,
would try, perhaps giving them a place to strike at.
Her daughter had been kidnapped, her friends'
children injured, and Lucrezia Noin-Peacecraft wanted
somebody to /pay./
Through her thoughts she heard another phone start to
ring.
* * *
The Place Between Worlds
Walker shuffled through the snow, slouched and half-
hidden inside the coat of his OZ uniform. For a
moment he thought he could still feel the cold, a
freezing chill so icy that it nearly burned. Then he
shook his head and sighed. /Great. Now I'm
hallucinating./
Of course, this whole day, if one wanted to call it a
day, had been the stuff of nightmares anyway. Too
damned many dead people packed sardine-style into a
realm that should have been nearly empty, all of them
trying to figure out what the hell was going on, and
at least half of them panicked because they couldn't.
It was insane, and frustrating to everybody, but
perhaps few more so than Walker. He knew that he and
Treize were the key to setting things right again,
but like most everything he knew of lates, Walker
didn't know /how/ he knew it.
He sighed as he continued to winde his way through
the crowds. About the only place one could find any
peace anymore was at the River, but the thought of
being there, alone near that thing that had made him
forget everything once, then made him do it again
when he came back from beyond it, troubled Walker far
more than hanging out with the masses did.
"There's gotta be something we're missing here,"
Walker said quietly to himself. "This just isn't
adding up right-"
He fell silent as he approached one particular group,
unremarkable except for their clothing, which was of
a style he knew hadn't been fashionable in several
hundred years. These were old souls, far older than
him, and he stopped to listen, unobtrusively, to what
they were saying.
"They say the dark lady's been about," one of the men
said, his voice a thick Irish brogue. The Irish
accent brought Alice McKenzie quickly to mind, and
Walker felt a pang in his heart that he'd not felt in
a very long time.
"The Dark Knight is not a thing to be spoken of
lightly," a woman said, and her soft voice was so
very like Alice's that Walker nearly fell to his
knees and wept.
/What is wrong with me?/ he thought. /I've seen
hundreds of ghosts, some of them even Irish ones. But
none of them have ever effected me the way these do./
"Aye," the first man agreed, "but her lurking
hereabouts isn't something I /take/ lightly, either."
"He speaketh truly, does my brother," said a second
man. "An' it troubles me greatly, it does."
"Aye, as it does the lot of us, I think," the first
man said.
"I'd thought she was naught but a rumor," the woman
whose voice sounded so like Alice's said. She turned
then as if sensing Walker's presence, and looked him
over. Her eyes were green, like Alice's, and seemed
very kind. "Lad? Are you ill?"
"Of course he's not ill, Deirdre, he's dead," said
the first man.
"You needn't say it so rudely," Deirdre replied,
still looking at Walker. "Well, lad? Are you mute,
too?"
"No, I'm not." Walker sighed. "I'm- troubled, that's
all. You remind me of someone I knew once."
The Irishwoman nodded. "I do hate to say it, lad, but
you looked as if you'd seen a ghost."
The second man rolled his eyes. "Deirdre-"
She shook a finger at him. "Don't you start with me,
Michael- I've had more than enough of your lip today
already."
"Ye shouldn't be makin' jokes like that, Deirdre,"
the man she called Michael said. "It ein't funny."
"'Course it is, you bloody fool," said the other man.
Deirdre rapped them both across the shoulders with a
short switch she carried. "Enough, both of you. We
were discussing the dark lady, and /I/ was asking
after the lad's health."
Walker smiled despite himself. "Oh yes, you remind me
a great /deal/ of someone I knew."
"Thank ye," she said. "My name's Deirdre. The shorter
one there is Michael, the one who called him a fool
is his elder brother, Caleb. McKenzies all, and proud
of it."
Walker shivered. "Pleased to meet you all," he said.
"I'm Ethan Walker." It was the first time in ages he
had used or spoken his given name, and to say it felt
strange. Of those he'd known while alive, only Alice
had ever used it. "I knew a McKenzie when I was
alive- you have a right to be proud of that name."
Deirdre smiled. "I'm glad you think so, lad. You must
tell us some time of the McKenzie you knew."
"I will," Walker promised. "Later. You were talking
about a woman when I got here-"
"Aye," said Caleb, "the Dark Knight. Not just any
woman, or so I'm told."
"Who is she?" Walker asked.
"'Tain't so much /who/ she is, as /what/ she is,"
said Michael. "An' that's a thing we donna know, for
certes. Uncanny, that one is- lass in armor dark as
night. When we see her, we steer well clear, an you'd
be wise ta do the same."
"Is she real, though?" Walker asked. "She sounds more
like a legend than anything else."
"Oh, she's real, alright," Caleb told him. "A bit too
real, if you ask me."
"I'll second that," said Deirdre. "She's nothing like
the Ghost Knight, I can say that for certain. There
are stories, legends if you want to call them that,
about /him/, too. But that's about the only thing
they have in common, save that the stories tie them
together in one thing- they're mortal enemies."
/Bingo,/ thought Walker. /And about damned time,
too./ "You don't say," he said. "Is she strong then,
the Dark Knight? Like the Ghost Knight is?"
"Aye," said Caleb, "strong, and not so choosy about
how and when she uses her power, or so I'm told." He
shrugged. "We don't know much, really, only enough to
be glad we've only seen her time or two, and at a
distance too."
"She doesn't- live here?" Walker asked cautiously.
"No," Caleb replied. "She comes and goes. From and to
where I don't know, but she's no part of /this/
world, that's for sure."
"Really," Walker said. "I haven't been here more than
a decade or two, you see, and I spend most of my time
with men I knew while I was alive- men I fought
with." Which, in a manner of speaking, was true. He
/had/ spent some time listening in on his fellow OZ
soldiers, and he did keep company now with Treize,
who he had known /of/, but hardly known personally,
in life...
"Were ye a soldier, then?" Michael asked.
"Yes," said Walker. "I fought with OZ. Died for what
maybe is a stupid reason now, but I thought it was
important then." He shrugged, and the men nodded.
"War's like that," said Caleb. "Sometimes all the
meaning in the world, but in the aftermath, never
seems like enough."
"You steer clear of the dark lady, now, Ethan
Walker," Deirdre said. "You've got enough problems as
is, being dead and stuck here like the rest of us,
without stirring up more trouble."
"Good advice," Walker said. /Unfortunately, I just
have this feeling that I'm not going to be able to
take it./
* * *
Treize sat perched on the branch of a tree that
wasn't really there, his back against its trunk,
knees tucked up near his chest, gloved hands laced
over his calves. His eyes were closed, and his
thoughts followed Mariemaia through the realm of the
living. He knew that Terra and Lucian were safe, for
now, but Treize worried for his eldest daughter.
Without the Well of Souls, he could not truly see
her, but he could sense her presence, her living
spirit as it moved through the world, and could sense
those around her. She was moving now, away from the
gathering that included her sister and mother, making
her way towards the familiar pair of gentle souls
with their edges of steel that he knew as Milliardo
and Lucrezia.
Treize knew that Mariemaia was troubled, her thoughts
swirling around names, faces, /feelings/ he knew all
too well. David's image, with a questioning feel
beside it, a sense that something was wrong.
Mariemaia had always been sensitive; she had known
when he was there, even in part, when the twins and
Une did not. She knew something was wrong now in the
same way, knew it when the others had only started to
grasp it.
Closer to the surface of Mariemaia's thoughts was
concern for her best friend. Carolyn's injury had
effected her more profoundly than even she was aware
of, and Treize winced as he sensed that deeply
troubled part of his daughter, reeling now with a new
pain, sharp and stabbing, an agony that screamed
/Caro!/
"And where are you, David Ling," he asked aloud,
"that you aren't there for my daughter as she has all
too often been there for you?"
Death could answer that question, of course, were the
specter of a mind to, but Treize doubted that he was,
and he had greater worries in any case. With a sigh
he reminded himself, yet again, that Mariemaia could
take care of herself. She was going to have to, it
would seem.
Treize allowed Mariemaia's presence to fade to the
back of his mind, and turned his thoughts to the
others. He followed Lady Une to Catherine and
Dorothy's home, where she settled many of the
children. He was glad to see the young ones safe in
the care of his cousin and her lover, but couldn't
help shaking his head at the way Une hugged them all
goodbye and then dashed out the door once again.
/You work far too hard, my dear,/ he thought, though
the thought was a familiar one to him now, and he
tried to be more amused than troubled by this
particular habit of hers. She had been much the same
during her days with OZ, still hard at work long
hours after everyone else had gone home.
He knew why she did it, though, and that was the
reason it troubled him. The more she worked, and the
more exhausted she was at the end of any given day,
the less she had to think. Treize understood it all
too well, and wished he could allow himself the same
illusions now.
As if to underline the fact that he could not, Treize
sensed Walker approaching quickly. The other man's
spirit broke through the trees near the River at a
run, and he didn't stop until he'd reached the tree
in which Treize sat.
"You don't really need to do that," Treize reminded
him.
"I know," Walker said. "Sometimes I forget. And
sometimes I like to give you a little warning I'm
coming, just because nobody else ever does."
Treize nodded. "Thank you, Walker."
At Treize's nod, Walker rose to float beside the
Ghost Knight's branch. He crossed his legs and sat
upon the air as if it were solid ground. Treize
hardly noticed it, though there was a time he'd have
found it disturbing indeed.
"Just out of curiosity, did you climb up there?"
Walker asked.
"No." Treize paused. "I presume, by your rushed
entrance, that you've got something for me?"
"Yeah," Walker said. "I don't like it very much,
though, tell you the truth."
"Oh?"
"Does the term 'Dark Knight' mean anything to you?"
Treize shook his head. "It sounds vaguely familiar,
but-" He cut himself off. "What is it, Walker?"
"I'm not sure," he said. "I heard about her from a
trio of Irish ghosts I met. They didn't know much
more than rumors and legend, but that's better than
what we had, which was nothing, so I asked them about
her. And here's what I've got. The Dark Knight is, in
legend at least, the sworn enemy of the Ghost Knight.
She's at least as dangerous as you are, my friend, if
not more so. And it's her sworn duty to try and
destroy you."
"Let her try," Treize said, his voice cold.
* * *
John Ling paced before his kitchen table, where Lady
Une, Mariemaia, and Terra were seated. They had only
just arrived, and Mariemaia had retrieved her laptop,
which she'd left in her haste to reach the hospital
as soon as she got word of the kidnappings.
She held the file Ling had given her, and about it
they had all reached the same conclusion: The police
file room had been destroyed to prevent them from
getting at this very file. And Mariemaia, having read
through it, knew why.
"It's a tenuous connection," Ling said. "Leia Barton
to Linnea Khushrenada, or vice versa, but it /is/
there, and there was definitely something in that
room they didn't want us to get at. I can't think
what other file might arouse such interest- we only
kept the old ones there, cases going back ten years.
The rest were closed, as far as I know, or had been
open a lot longer than this woman or her friends
could /possibly/ have been alive."
"What's it mean, though?" Terra asked. "If she'd
wanted that file, she could have just taken it-
unless she didn't want us to know /what/ she was
after."
Lady Une nodded. "They stole all the files, then set
fire to the building. If we didn't already have this
one in hand- I'd like to think we'd have figured it
out, but it could have cost us a couple days."
"Days we might not have," Mariemaia said. "What it
also means, Ter, is that dear cousin Linnea may have
more people working for her than just Nichol.
Somebody had to get into the file room to plant the
device, and it had to be somebody the cops wouldn't
suspect. Someone who had a reason for being there."
Une turned to Ling. "John, I hate to ask this, but
we're going to need access to your personnel files.
All of them."
"I think I'm supposed to argue with you at length,"
Ling said, "but under the circumstances, I don't see
a problem. Others might, but you let me worry about
them. I'll get you the files, and some people I'd
trust with my own life to help go through them."
"Thank you," Une said. She skimmed the first page of
the file again, and sighed. "If you've got anything
else of this nature laying around, even if it doesn't
seem at all related to any of this, you might want to
consider storing it someplace safe."
"And someplace fire-retardant," Mariemaia added as
she stuffed the file and her laptop into her bag.
"Next stupid question: Where the hell is my
boyfriend?"
"That," Terra said, "sounds like one of those
questions you're not supposed to have to ask."
"You said it, little sister," Mariemaia replied.
Chapter 11
by Anne Khushrenada
Disclaimers: I don't own any of the canon Gundam
characters. To steal a line from Ashura, I think they
own /me/ by now. I'm quite sure Dorothy and Lady Une
do, and sometimes they're not nice people. Alice
McKenzie, Terra, Lucian, Elena, Caro, and the rest of
the kids are mine. Linnea and her friends belong to
themselves because I don't want them anymore.
Warnings: implied yuri (DxC), yaoi (3x4). More like
shounen ai and shoujo ai, really.
Pairings of note: 13x11, 6x9, the aforementioned DxC,
3x4. Also 5xSP, 1xR, 2xH, but these have hardly been
mentioned yet. Too many characters, too little time.
Catherine Catalonia-Bloom twirled a pair of knives in
her hands, and the look in her blue-grey eyes was a
dangerous one. She was often thought of by her
friends and their children alike as the kindest, and
the gentlest of the 'aunts', but there was steel to
Catherine, a thing within her that could make her
every bit as strong, every bit as dangerous, as any
of the others. Fiercely protective of those she
loved, the kidnapping of her middle child and the
harm done her eldest, had brought that steel core to
the surface.
Metal sang as Catherine's knives cut through air, and
with a sharp cry she spun for the opposite wall. She
hardly felt it as the first knife left her hand, only
saw it flying through air and fixed her eyes upon it,
listening for the sound as it struck home.
/Thunk./
"Catherine," Dorothy said. She stood in the room's
doorway, arms crossed, eyeing the fencing foil upon
the wall in a way that suggested she wanted nothing
so much as to draw it and hack something to pieces
with it.
"Jessica's sleeping," Catherine said quietly. "She's
had a long day."
"How's she doing?" Dorothy asked.
"A couple more days, and I think she'll be through
the worst of the cold. I gave her some soup
earlier..."
"Good," Dorothy said. She crossed the room, stood at
Catherine's back. She placed slim hands upon her
lover's shoulders. "Good. Oh, Catherine-"
/Thunk./
The second knife sank hilt-deep into the plaster of
the far wall. Numerous marks surrounded Catherine's
two knives, evidence that she'd been at this quite a
while. Probably, Dorothy thought, since she'd called
to tell her about Carolyn and Sarah.
"How the hell could they?" Catherine exclaimed
suddenly, her soft voice almost harsh. "How /could/
they?"
"I don't know, Catherine," said Dorothy. "I honestly
don't know. But we're going to get them back- I swear
to you we're going to get them back."
"And when we do," Catherine said, "when we do, I
want- I want-" Unable to go on, she sank to her
knees, tears streaming down her face. Dorothy knelt
beside her, and took the other woman in her arms,
holding her close and smoothing back the curly red
hair.
"I know, Cath," she said. "I know. Damnit, they hurt
our /children/, and somebody's going to have to
answer for it."
Catherine nodded slowly. "I- knew you'd understand,
Dorothy."
Dorothy chuckled softly. "Of course I understand,
Cath. So do Lucrezia and Milliardo- they got to the
office as I was leaving to come home, and I tell you,
it's going to be a toss-up who gets there first when
we catch those bastards."
"I'm sorry about that," Catherine said. "You didn't
have to come home. They probably need you there-"
Dorothy shook her head. "Not really, no. The
Peacecrafts can handle things, and half the office is
out in the field anyway, between one thing and
another. Half the Preventer corps is camped out at
the hospital watching the kids, and two of those
Preventers are Trowa and Quatre."
Catherine seemed to be more than a little reassured
by that. Nichol's betrayal had showed them how little
they could trust some elements of the Preventers, but
her brother and his lover would allow no more harm to
come to any of the children. There was no one she'd
trust more to look out for them now.
Dorothy nodded, as if sensing the other woman's
thoughts. "Yeah." She dropped a kiss onto Catherine's
forehead. "This made it personal, Cath. When they
involved the kids, they changed everything. And we,
all of us, have to look out for family now. I thought
of you and Jess, here alone, and-" She shook her
head. "/Never/, ever think my work is more important
than any of you."
"You're right," Catherine said after a moment. "I
just thought-"
"I know. They need me; they need everybody. But we
also need to take care of each other. That's
important, too."
Catherine took Dorothy's hands in her and squeezed
them. "Thank you. Now, tell me everything you know-
Everything that's been going on."
* * *
John Ling snatched up the telephone as soon as it
rang. His son and Mariemaia had been gone several
hours now, and he hadn't heard a word from them,
which was unusual. "Ling here," he said into the
phone.
"Sir," came the voice of Officer O'Brien, "I've got
Lady Une of the Preventers here, and she says she
needs to talk to you right away-"
"Put her on, please."
Lady Une spoke quickly once the phone had been passed
to her. "John. Lady Une here."
"How's my file fire?" Ling asked wryly.
Une laughed softly, but quickly turned serious.
"John, the files are gone."
"Burned? All of them? Damn."
"No," Une corrected. "Not burned, John- /gone./
Someone took them before they set the fire, and, we
think, then set the fire-"
"To make us believe that the files had been
destroyed, not stolen," Ling finished for her. His
heart began to beat faster as he looked to his
briefcase, still on the kitchen table, and thought of
the file he'd given Mariemaia. "Lady Une, I think I
know why-"
"I'm taking Mariemaia and Terra to wait things out at
Catherine and Dorothy's. Do you mind if we stop by on
our way there? I'd rather discuss this face-to-face."
Ling nodded. It was, he decided, a very good idea,
given the circumstances. "Of course. By the way- is
David with you? He left right after Mariemaia did,
when she got your call-"
"That was hours ago, John," Une said, sounding more
troubled now, "and I haven't seen him, but Mariemaia
may have. You might ask her when we get there."
"Alright," Ling said. "See you shortly, then."
He hung up the phone with a sigh, and scratched his
chin. /Where is David?/ he wondered. /This is so
unlike him... but with everything that's happened
lately, things /are/ a bit hard to keep track of.
He's probably just running errands for someone, or-/
There were any number of reasons, good ones, that
David might not have been in touch, but the fact that
Une hadn't seen him, /that/ was troubling, and John
Ling could not shake the thought that something was
wrong.
* * *
Alice frowned at her cards, then lay them face down
on the coffee table in the hospital waiting room.
"You kids are getting too rich for my blood," she
said. "I fold."
"I," said Lewis Chang, "am going to raise you ten,
Terra." He tossed a scrap of paper with '10' scrawled
on it into the center of the table.
"See your ten and raise you twenty," said Terra as
she pushed her own markers into the 'pot'. "Gabriel?"
The sandy-haired Preventer who was Alice's cousin
grinned at her and shook his head. "I can do thirty,
lass," he said, before leaning over to help Jeff and
Alex Barton-Winner decide weather to place their bets
or not.
"McKenzie," someone called from the room's doorway,
and both Alice and Gabriel looked up.
"Sorry," the Preventer said. "Gabe."
Gabriel stood. "Sorry, kids. I've gotta spell Chin
there."
The Chinese man approached the table with a grin.
"But I can spell you, too, pal. How 'bout it?"
"Gabe says I should stay," Jeff announced. "What do
you think?"
Chin looked over the boy's cards, then his own. "I
think Gabe's right," he whispered.
Jeff nodded sagely. "Okay."
Gabriel McKenzie stepped out into the hall and
saluted Quatre. "Chin's in with the little ones," he
said.
Quatre nodded. "You've all been very good with them.
Thank you."
Gabe smiled. "Seems the least we can do, sir.
Everything still quiet?"
"So far," Quatre said. "You might want to check in on
Lucian, I think he's getting a little lonely."
"Sure thing," Gabe said.
* * *
Wufei Chang was seated in the chair beside her bed
when Carolyn next came to. She raised a hand and
waved.
"You know," she said. "This is really starting to
suck. Sally give you any idea when I can go home?"
"The last time I was trapped in one of these little
rooms and I asked her that, do you know what she said
to me?" Wufei scowled. "Never. She said 'never'." He
muttered something that sounded like a complaint
about women and things they thought were funny.
Caro laughed. "It /is/ funny, and she told me the
same thing. But I feel useless here. Weak, stupid,
and useless."
"You are none of the above," Wufei said gruffly. "You
are the child of Dorothy, who scares even me at
times, and a woman who made her living throwing
knives at people. You are not weak, and you're
certainly not stupid. The information on the drug you
got from that technician- Lucrezia's digging into
that back at HQ, looking into the old OZ files and
such..."
Caro nodded. "Okay. So I've helped with one silly
little thing. But- aren't you angry at me? If they
had wanted Lewis, they could have taken him. I
failed."
"No," Wufei said. "You tried to fight. You defended
the little ones, and if Nichol were not dishonorable,
you could have bested him."
"I should have been more suspicious," Caro said. "We
know he's trouble."
"We knew he was an idiot," Gabe McKenzie said from
the doorway. "We did /not/ know he was a traitor. And
that's /our/ fault for not taking a closer look at
him when he was just annoying and hadn't progressed
to obnoxious and dangerous. Not yours." He gave Wufei
a sketchy salute. "I'm on rounds; just spelled Chin,
who's with Alice and the kids in the waiting room."
"Thank you," Wufei said.
They had developed a system whereby the Preventers
going about their 'rounds' at the hospital checked in
with each other, and checked up on each of the
children, wherever they were. They always stopped at
Carolyn's and Lucian's rooms, and checked in with the
Preventer stationed there. The Preventers watching
Lucian and Carolyn, respectively, rotated on the
hour, and these were by far the best of Lady Une's
inner circle.
No one really thought they would see any more trouble
from Nichol so soon, not in this area, but with two
children gone and one nearly taken, they weren't
taking any more chances.
Gabe ducked out of the room again with a wave. "See
you, Caro."
"So," Carolyn said, "what've I missed?"
"Chin on rounds, Alice before him, Ishisaka before
her-"
"Nothing else?" Caro interrupted. Wufei shook his
head. "Where's Mariemaia?"
"With Lady Une, last I saw. They're making plans to
move the young ones to your home. They don't all need
to be here."
"And Mom needs something to do besides put more holes
in the walls," Caro said with a nod.
* * *
Mariemaia knelt in the hospital's small chapel. She
had never been incredibly religious, but there was
something calming about the chapel, something
peaceful about being there. The Preventers needed to
be here, needed to be looking out for the kids and
for further trouble, but it was good to get away from
them for a bit, she thought.
Besides, few of them would have understood what she
was doing, in any case. Only Lucian, Terra, and her
mother really knew- those three, and probably
Milliardo. No others.
"Sometimes I think it's just us now, Father," she
said softly. "Mom, the twins, and I- and the rest of
the family. But there are things we know that they
don't, and-" She sighed. "Nichol betrayed us, and now
Sarah and Elena are gone. Lucian's taking it pretty
hard..."
She trailed off quickly, feeling guilty as if caught
in a lie, at the sound of approaching footsteps. She
looked up, spotted the black garments and the
clerical collar, and quickly relaxed. It was only the
priest, and priests didn't see anything wrong with
talking to dead people- did they?
"I'm sorry if I startled you, my child," the man
said. He stepped into the candlelight from the alter,
and Mariemaia saw that he was middle aged, his hair
steely grey with faint streaks of dark brown. His
eyes were blue, soft and kind.
"It's okay," she said quietly. "I can go-"
"Only if you wish to," he said. When she didn't make
any move to leave, he smiled down at her. "My name is
Thomas Gideon. Might I have the pleasure of knowing
yours?"
"Mariemaia Khushrenada," she said.
"I'm pleased to meet you, Mariemaia," Father Thomas
said. "What brings you here?"
She sighed. "My younger brother has pneumonia. He'll
be alright, we know that, but- That's not the worst
thing that happened today. Two children I know have
been- taken, by a man we know."
"Good heavens," the priest said. "What are their
names, child? I will pray for them."
"Elena, Elena Peacecraft. She's ten, like my brother.
And Sarah Catalonia-Bloom. She's only eight."
"Lord have mercy!" he gasped softly. "And you know
the one who took them?"
"Yeah. He- hurt Sarah's older sister, my friend,
Carolyn, to get at them." Mariemaia's voice shook.
She hadn't realized how much Caro's injury had upset
her until she'd started to tell the priest about it.
"I was talking to my father when you came in. He died
a long time ago. But they all fought in the war
together- well, some of them on different sides- my
father, my mother, Elena's parents, Caro and Sarah's-
We're family, all of us..."
Father Thomas was nodding. "I sometimes speak to my
father as well. He died when I was a boy, but
sometimes I can look up there and I know that he
hears me. There are those who think that's crazy, but
I understand. I am sure your father hears you,
Mariemaia, and that he looks after you."
"I hope so, Father," Mariemaia said. "Because right
now I think we could use all the help we can get."
Father Thomas knelt and turned his kindly gaze upon
Mariemaia. "Would you like me to pray with you for
your family, child?" he asked.
"I'm not sure I even believe in God," she said. "I'm
not sure I believe in anything. Few of us do. Uncle
Quatre's Moslem, but sometimes all that seems to mean
is that he curses Allah instead of God."
"Were you raised with any particular religion?" he
asked.
"Yeah," said Mariemaia dryly. "The Church of Dekim
Barton, till I was six. After that- not much."
"I see," the priest said.
"No, you don't," Mariemaia said, angry now. "You
don't see at all. Nobody does." She climbed to her
feet. "You pray for whoever you want to, Father. Me,
personally, I learned a long time ago that God
doesn't give a damn about what happens to me, or my
friends. If we're going to get through this, we'll do
it on our own."
* * *
Lucrezia squinted at the screen before her and swore.
"Somebody's been messing with these files," she said
over her shoulder as her fingers hit the keyboard to
try something else. She'd been able to access
Nichol's personnel records from OZ, and though they
hadn't told her much, she'd relayed everything she
had found to the others through Milliardo, who sat at
Dorothy's desk, working the radio and the
switchboards. But it was the old OZ files on the
hypnotic drug that seemed- odd was the only word she
could really use to describe it. There were large
gaps in the data.
"How so?" asked her husband when he'd finished
issuing his latest orders over the radio.
"Look here. See these gaps? I'm no expert, but I know
there should be stuff there." Lucrezia sighed. "Can
you make any sense of this?"
Milliardo shook his head. "Not really, no. I see what
you see- gaps where the data we need should be." He
sighed and snatched up a ringing telephone.
"Preventers, Lady Une's office."
"Milliardo, it's Une." He sighed again, this time
with relief when he recognized Une's voice. "How are
you two holding up over there?"
"We've both been better, Lady. Let's just leave it at
that. What's up?"
"Frustratingly little." She paused. "Milliardo, we're
moving the children out to Catherine and Dorothy's. I
think we'll all feel better if we know they're safe,
and somewhere where they can't get into trouble. They
all want to help, of course..."
Milliardo smiled at that. "Any of them any good with
computers?" he asked. "Lu and I aren't having much
luck cracking those old OZ files. Which in and of
itself is weird. We shouldn't have to /crack/ them at
all."
"Did you try Treize's access codes?"
Milliardo laughed softly. "I never knew them, Lady."
"I know several, but-"
"Not over the phone, I shouldn't think," Milliardo
finished for her. "Nichol's specialty was
communications, wasn't it?"
"The only thing he was any good at, besides being an
ass," Lucrezia muttered.
"Yes," Une said, and Milliardo couldn't tell if she
were agreeing with him or his wife. "I'm sending
Alice by the office to pick up a few things; I'll
have her bring you the codes."
"Can we hang onto her?" Milliardo asked. Alice wasn't
their best computer tech, but she knew the OZ systems
better than they did, and just might be able to help
them.
"I can spare her for a while, but I may need to steal
her back," Une said.
Milliardo heard Mariemaia's voice in the background
then, arguing with her mother. "You need Alice here,
Mom. I'll follow you to the Lings' in my car, then go
help out Aunt Lucrezia and Uncle Milliardo."
Une sighed. "Mariemaia, I wanted you to stay with
Dorothy and Cath-"
"I don't need a babysitter, Mama, and I'm too
restless to /be/ one. I've been messing around in
Daddy's files since I was a little kid. Let me /do/
something."
"Alright," Une said. "Milliardo? Did you catch any of
that?"
"The relevant parts, yes," he said.
"I don't like this," Une said quietly. "I'd rather
not have any of the children be a part of this,
frankly."
"Mariemaia is twenty-one, Une," Milliardo said. "She
does what she pleases; she always has. And the fact
of the matter is that we need her."
"Of course you're right," Une said. "I just- oh,
damn. What a fool I am. Complaining of Mariemaia's
involvement when your daughter-"
Milliardo cut her off. "Is missing, perhaps drugged,
but I doubt, in any immediate danger. It's just a
feeling I have, really, but they want her for
something; they wouldn't hurt her. And until we get
her back, well- she's my little girl, but she's also
her mother's daughter, and I suspect she'll be- how
would Duo phrase it? Raising hell and kicking ass."
Une laughed softly. "As you say, Milliardo. Keep in
touch."
"Will do," he said. Then, after she'd hung up, "Just
don't be surprised if you can't get through right
away." He snatched up another telephone. "Preventer
HQ, can you hold, please?" A pause. "Yes, you /can./"
He slammed his hand down on the hold button. "This is
unreal. You'd think the city was in chaos..."
"It's only the reporters," Lucrezia said, scowling at
her screen once again. She'd been reduced to guessing
at Treize's passwords, without any success. "Tell our
people to use the private lines or the radios, and
then you'll only have to answer half of those."
"Point," he said, and started making radio calls.
Between these he made suggestions to his wife on
passwords. "Roses?"
She turned and rolled her eyes at him. "Please. Been
there, tried that. Anything else?"
"I could keep guessing," Milliardo said, "but why
don't we just wait until Mariemaia gets here? The
info's not going anywhere without us being aware of
it-"
Lucrezia nodded; one of the first things she'd done
after calling up the files was to slap a tracer on
them. If anyone else accessed them, let alone tried
to change or delete anything, they would know about
it, and maybe even be able to trace that action to
its source. She halfway hoped someone, /anyone/,
would try, perhaps giving them a place to strike at.
Her daughter had been kidnapped, her friends'
children injured, and Lucrezia Noin-Peacecraft wanted
somebody to /pay./
Through her thoughts she heard another phone start to
ring.
* * *
The Place Between Worlds
Walker shuffled through the snow, slouched and half-
hidden inside the coat of his OZ uniform. For a
moment he thought he could still feel the cold, a
freezing chill so icy that it nearly burned. Then he
shook his head and sighed. /Great. Now I'm
hallucinating./
Of course, this whole day, if one wanted to call it a
day, had been the stuff of nightmares anyway. Too
damned many dead people packed sardine-style into a
realm that should have been nearly empty, all of them
trying to figure out what the hell was going on, and
at least half of them panicked because they couldn't.
It was insane, and frustrating to everybody, but
perhaps few more so than Walker. He knew that he and
Treize were the key to setting things right again,
but like most everything he knew of lates, Walker
didn't know /how/ he knew it.
He sighed as he continued to winde his way through
the crowds. About the only place one could find any
peace anymore was at the River, but the thought of
being there, alone near that thing that had made him
forget everything once, then made him do it again
when he came back from beyond it, troubled Walker far
more than hanging out with the masses did.
"There's gotta be something we're missing here,"
Walker said quietly to himself. "This just isn't
adding up right-"
He fell silent as he approached one particular group,
unremarkable except for their clothing, which was of
a style he knew hadn't been fashionable in several
hundred years. These were old souls, far older than
him, and he stopped to listen, unobtrusively, to what
they were saying.
"They say the dark lady's been about," one of the men
said, his voice a thick Irish brogue. The Irish
accent brought Alice McKenzie quickly to mind, and
Walker felt a pang in his heart that he'd not felt in
a very long time.
"The Dark Knight is not a thing to be spoken of
lightly," a woman said, and her soft voice was so
very like Alice's that Walker nearly fell to his
knees and wept.
/What is wrong with me?/ he thought. /I've seen
hundreds of ghosts, some of them even Irish ones. But
none of them have ever effected me the way these do./
"Aye," the first man agreed, "but her lurking
hereabouts isn't something I /take/ lightly, either."
"He speaketh truly, does my brother," said a second
man. "An' it troubles me greatly, it does."
"Aye, as it does the lot of us, I think," the first
man said.
"I'd thought she was naught but a rumor," the woman
whose voice sounded so like Alice's said. She turned
then as if sensing Walker's presence, and looked him
over. Her eyes were green, like Alice's, and seemed
very kind. "Lad? Are you ill?"
"Of course he's not ill, Deirdre, he's dead," said
the first man.
"You needn't say it so rudely," Deirdre replied,
still looking at Walker. "Well, lad? Are you mute,
too?"
"No, I'm not." Walker sighed. "I'm- troubled, that's
all. You remind me of someone I knew once."
The Irishwoman nodded. "I do hate to say it, lad, but
you looked as if you'd seen a ghost."
The second man rolled his eyes. "Deirdre-"
She shook a finger at him. "Don't you start with me,
Michael- I've had more than enough of your lip today
already."
"Ye shouldn't be makin' jokes like that, Deirdre,"
the man she called Michael said. "It ein't funny."
"'Course it is, you bloody fool," said the other man.
Deirdre rapped them both across the shoulders with a
short switch she carried. "Enough, both of you. We
were discussing the dark lady, and /I/ was asking
after the lad's health."
Walker smiled despite himself. "Oh yes, you remind me
a great /deal/ of someone I knew."
"Thank ye," she said. "My name's Deirdre. The shorter
one there is Michael, the one who called him a fool
is his elder brother, Caleb. McKenzies all, and proud
of it."
Walker shivered. "Pleased to meet you all," he said.
"I'm Ethan Walker." It was the first time in ages he
had used or spoken his given name, and to say it felt
strange. Of those he'd known while alive, only Alice
had ever used it. "I knew a McKenzie when I was
alive- you have a right to be proud of that name."
Deirdre smiled. "I'm glad you think so, lad. You must
tell us some time of the McKenzie you knew."
"I will," Walker promised. "Later. You were talking
about a woman when I got here-"
"Aye," said Caleb, "the Dark Knight. Not just any
woman, or so I'm told."
"Who is she?" Walker asked.
"'Tain't so much /who/ she is, as /what/ she is,"
said Michael. "An' that's a thing we donna know, for
certes. Uncanny, that one is- lass in armor dark as
night. When we see her, we steer well clear, an you'd
be wise ta do the same."
"Is she real, though?" Walker asked. "She sounds more
like a legend than anything else."
"Oh, she's real, alright," Caleb told him. "A bit too
real, if you ask me."
"I'll second that," said Deirdre. "She's nothing like
the Ghost Knight, I can say that for certain. There
are stories, legends if you want to call them that,
about /him/, too. But that's about the only thing
they have in common, save that the stories tie them
together in one thing- they're mortal enemies."
/Bingo,/ thought Walker. /And about damned time,
too./ "You don't say," he said. "Is she strong then,
the Dark Knight? Like the Ghost Knight is?"
"Aye," said Caleb, "strong, and not so choosy about
how and when she uses her power, or so I'm told." He
shrugged. "We don't know much, really, only enough to
be glad we've only seen her time or two, and at a
distance too."
"She doesn't- live here?" Walker asked cautiously.
"No," Caleb replied. "She comes and goes. From and to
where I don't know, but she's no part of /this/
world, that's for sure."
"Really," Walker said. "I haven't been here more than
a decade or two, you see, and I spend most of my time
with men I knew while I was alive- men I fought
with." Which, in a manner of speaking, was true. He
/had/ spent some time listening in on his fellow OZ
soldiers, and he did keep company now with Treize,
who he had known /of/, but hardly known personally,
in life...
"Were ye a soldier, then?" Michael asked.
"Yes," said Walker. "I fought with OZ. Died for what
maybe is a stupid reason now, but I thought it was
important then." He shrugged, and the men nodded.
"War's like that," said Caleb. "Sometimes all the
meaning in the world, but in the aftermath, never
seems like enough."
"You steer clear of the dark lady, now, Ethan
Walker," Deirdre said. "You've got enough problems as
is, being dead and stuck here like the rest of us,
without stirring up more trouble."
"Good advice," Walker said. /Unfortunately, I just
have this feeling that I'm not going to be able to
take it./
* * *
Treize sat perched on the branch of a tree that
wasn't really there, his back against its trunk,
knees tucked up near his chest, gloved hands laced
over his calves. His eyes were closed, and his
thoughts followed Mariemaia through the realm of the
living. He knew that Terra and Lucian were safe, for
now, but Treize worried for his eldest daughter.
Without the Well of Souls, he could not truly see
her, but he could sense her presence, her living
spirit as it moved through the world, and could sense
those around her. She was moving now, away from the
gathering that included her sister and mother, making
her way towards the familiar pair of gentle souls
with their edges of steel that he knew as Milliardo
and Lucrezia.
Treize knew that Mariemaia was troubled, her thoughts
swirling around names, faces, /feelings/ he knew all
too well. David's image, with a questioning feel
beside it, a sense that something was wrong.
Mariemaia had always been sensitive; she had known
when he was there, even in part, when the twins and
Une did not. She knew something was wrong now in the
same way, knew it when the others had only started to
grasp it.
Closer to the surface of Mariemaia's thoughts was
concern for her best friend. Carolyn's injury had
effected her more profoundly than even she was aware
of, and Treize winced as he sensed that deeply
troubled part of his daughter, reeling now with a new
pain, sharp and stabbing, an agony that screamed
/Caro!/
"And where are you, David Ling," he asked aloud,
"that you aren't there for my daughter as she has all
too often been there for you?"
Death could answer that question, of course, were the
specter of a mind to, but Treize doubted that he was,
and he had greater worries in any case. With a sigh
he reminded himself, yet again, that Mariemaia could
take care of herself. She was going to have to, it
would seem.
Treize allowed Mariemaia's presence to fade to the
back of his mind, and turned his thoughts to the
others. He followed Lady Une to Catherine and
Dorothy's home, where she settled many of the
children. He was glad to see the young ones safe in
the care of his cousin and her lover, but couldn't
help shaking his head at the way Une hugged them all
goodbye and then dashed out the door once again.
/You work far too hard, my dear,/ he thought, though
the thought was a familiar one to him now, and he
tried to be more amused than troubled by this
particular habit of hers. She had been much the same
during her days with OZ, still hard at work long
hours after everyone else had gone home.
He knew why she did it, though, and that was the
reason it troubled him. The more she worked, and the
more exhausted she was at the end of any given day,
the less she had to think. Treize understood it all
too well, and wished he could allow himself the same
illusions now.
As if to underline the fact that he could not, Treize
sensed Walker approaching quickly. The other man's
spirit broke through the trees near the River at a
run, and he didn't stop until he'd reached the tree
in which Treize sat.
"You don't really need to do that," Treize reminded
him.
"I know," Walker said. "Sometimes I forget. And
sometimes I like to give you a little warning I'm
coming, just because nobody else ever does."
Treize nodded. "Thank you, Walker."
At Treize's nod, Walker rose to float beside the
Ghost Knight's branch. He crossed his legs and sat
upon the air as if it were solid ground. Treize
hardly noticed it, though there was a time he'd have
found it disturbing indeed.
"Just out of curiosity, did you climb up there?"
Walker asked.
"No." Treize paused. "I presume, by your rushed
entrance, that you've got something for me?"
"Yeah," Walker said. "I don't like it very much,
though, tell you the truth."
"Oh?"
"Does the term 'Dark Knight' mean anything to you?"
Treize shook his head. "It sounds vaguely familiar,
but-" He cut himself off. "What is it, Walker?"
"I'm not sure," he said. "I heard about her from a
trio of Irish ghosts I met. They didn't know much
more than rumors and legend, but that's better than
what we had, which was nothing, so I asked them about
her. And here's what I've got. The Dark Knight is, in
legend at least, the sworn enemy of the Ghost Knight.
She's at least as dangerous as you are, my friend, if
not more so. And it's her sworn duty to try and
destroy you."
"Let her try," Treize said, his voice cold.
* * *
John Ling paced before his kitchen table, where Lady
Une, Mariemaia, and Terra were seated. They had only
just arrived, and Mariemaia had retrieved her laptop,
which she'd left in her haste to reach the hospital
as soon as she got word of the kidnappings.
She held the file Ling had given her, and about it
they had all reached the same conclusion: The police
file room had been destroyed to prevent them from
getting at this very file. And Mariemaia, having read
through it, knew why.
"It's a tenuous connection," Ling said. "Leia Barton
to Linnea Khushrenada, or vice versa, but it /is/
there, and there was definitely something in that
room they didn't want us to get at. I can't think
what other file might arouse such interest- we only
kept the old ones there, cases going back ten years.
The rest were closed, as far as I know, or had been
open a lot longer than this woman or her friends
could /possibly/ have been alive."
"What's it mean, though?" Terra asked. "If she'd
wanted that file, she could have just taken it-
unless she didn't want us to know /what/ she was
after."
Lady Une nodded. "They stole all the files, then set
fire to the building. If we didn't already have this
one in hand- I'd like to think we'd have figured it
out, but it could have cost us a couple days."
"Days we might not have," Mariemaia said. "What it
also means, Ter, is that dear cousin Linnea may have
more people working for her than just Nichol.
Somebody had to get into the file room to plant the
device, and it had to be somebody the cops wouldn't
suspect. Someone who had a reason for being there."
Une turned to Ling. "John, I hate to ask this, but
we're going to need access to your personnel files.
All of them."
"I think I'm supposed to argue with you at length,"
Ling said, "but under the circumstances, I don't see
a problem. Others might, but you let me worry about
them. I'll get you the files, and some people I'd
trust with my own life to help go through them."
"Thank you," Une said. She skimmed the first page of
the file again, and sighed. "If you've got anything
else of this nature laying around, even if it doesn't
seem at all related to any of this, you might want to
consider storing it someplace safe."
"And someplace fire-retardant," Mariemaia added as
she stuffed the file and her laptop into her bag.
"Next stupid question: Where the hell is my
boyfriend?"
"That," Terra said, "sounds like one of those
questions you're not supposed to have to ask."
"You said it, little sister," Mariemaia replied.