A/N: Hello again! I'm so sorry I've been so long in getting this one up, but you know how it goes… and anyway, I've been having a massive huge great big load of coursework and homework, and I am sleep deprived. Not that I'm making excuses or anything… ;) but we finish school on Wednesday, so then I can write my little twisted, deluded heart out. *sighs happily* oh, the pure joy…

Anyway, hope you enjoy the chapter, and if I don't update before the 20th, * sings* happy birthday to me, happy birthday to me, happy birthday dear me-e, happy birthday to me! *clears throat* Ahem, and if I don't update by the 25th, HAPPY CHRISTMAS! And to those who don't celebrate it, HAPPY HOLIDAYS! Can I stop already??????

TO MY REVIEWERS: Thank you again to every one who reviewed! Thanks to EMerald QUeen, Rosie the Rubix Cube, seambowler (or are you in fact my elusive second or so cousin???), The Oracle, Sinadaaraniel, Italiangur31 and Kelti. I love you all. Thank you.

The story…

*****

Holly skidded about half a metre on the slippery floor as she dashed round the corner of the pool. Goblin projectiles hissed through the air around her, bouncing off the smooth surfaces. It hit her all at once that she would never make it through the door. She'd get gunned down before she even touched the handle. But all she could do was keep running.

She veered towards the water, dodging the laser bursts that were getting more and more accurate. One of the shots went askew, smashing into the tile under her left foot, sending it spinning out of place. She stumbled as her balance was thrown to the right, slipped on the floor, and with a small shriek, crashed through the surface of the pool with a large splash.

It took her a few precious seconds to get her bearings; namely which way was up. In a tangle of hair, dress, and limbs, that wasn't exactly easy. She floundered for a moment, trying to get her legs and arms free. Finally, after what seemed like an eternity, she was able to propel herself to the surface, and broke through it, gasping desperately for air. Her head whipped round, causing her wet, and now loose tresses to fly into her eyes. 'This is why I don't have long hair!' she thought irritably as she shook it out of her face, continuing her scan of the goblins' position and status.

For the moment, they had stopped shooting. Stunned by her sudden taking to the water, they weren't quite sure what to do next. Holly decided that it might be a good idea to take advantage of their temporary confusion, and get the hell out of there. There were steps out of the pool at the far end, where her destination lay. All she had to do was swim, then it wouldn't be too hard to get out the door with all her body parts present and intact.

Holly gritted her teeth, and smirked grimly. All she had to do was swim… that was the thing about electro-charged weapons – if you shot at a body of water, and the power weakened slightly and spread across the whole thing. The shocks wouldn't kill her, just give her a painful jolt. They would hardly have to even aim.

She ducked under the water again, pushing off from the side. The chlorine made her eyes sting but she kept them open. That was one of the advantages of being a fairy – they could see clearly under water, not like the blurred mish-mash humans were limited to. This was because they had descended from water spirits, and their cousins were the Merfolk. It didn't stop chemicals from making their eyeballs tingle though.

Holly swam along the bottom of the pool, her hair floating in clouds around her head. D'Arvit, she had known that eazy-grow stuff of Carmen's had been a bad idea. She felt the first of the shocks as the goblins finally got their act together, and started shooting into the water. Her face twisted in pain as the electricity raked through her body. She swam faster, feeling her air beginning to run out. There was only about ten more metres left, but it felt like a million miles…

Then, things took a rather drastic turn for the worse. One of the goblins had a different type of gun. It was much, much nastier than the lasers. And its bullets were as solid as rocks. Unfortunately for Holly, the goblin in possession of the weapon was also the best marks-man in the entire squad.

She felt a sharp, agonising pain in her side as the missile sank into her midriff, and she jerked back out of her stroke as the pang caused her stomach muscles to convulse, making it impossible for her to swim. She sank slowly to the bottom, curled up as the pain tore through her middle. Slowly, she felt something being sucked away from her. At first she didn't know what it was, but then she realised. It was her magic! Something was draining the power right out of her.

However, along with the pain, came the irresistible urge to let go of her now weak grip on consciousness. Tendrils of numbness were eating away at her mind, and Holly knew she wouldn't last much longer. She hit the bottom gently, and her eyes closed as her consciousness slipped away from her. Her body relaxed, and unclenched as her auburn locks floated gently back and forth, partially hiding her now still face.

~

The goblin grinned smugly. As usual he had hit his mark perfectly. Well, almost. He'd actually been aiming for the elf's neck, but he hadn't taken the refractional properties of the water into consideration, mainly because he didn't even know they existed, and the shot had hit her in the side. The thug shrugged. Who cared? It had the same effect. And from what he could see through the rippling water, it had done all that it had been designed to do…

"Sir," crowed the goblin into his mike. "We got 'er."

From the control room, the All-Seeing-Eye growled menacingly. "You mean you just killed her?" he snapped. "After I ordered you not to unless it involved maximum suffering?" He sounded, and was, incensed. "You idiots! You're going to wish -"

"But sir –"

"Don't you dare interrupt me, you -"

"WE DIDN'T KILL HER!" a particularly brave goblin managed to shout over the Eye's tirade of furious threats.

"Excuse me?" he hissed, his voice filled with deadly venom. "What do you mean, you didn't kill her?"

The particularly brave one seemed to have forgotten how to speak. Another took over the explanation. "Well… Craaben hit her with the MS when she was under the water, and now she's not moving any more. But she isn't dead." he added hurriedly. "Just knocked out."

The Eye gave an exasperate sigh. "Well then get her out of the water!" he said. "Before she drowns! Where's the fun in that?"

The goblins promptly did as they were told. It was the most sensible thing to do. The Eye's lips curved into a sly smile. He had a plan for Holly…

"When you have her, go through the door by the steps, towards the kitchen." The goblins couldn't help but notice he sounded a lot more cheerful. "I have a little idea…" His voice hardened again, his customary bad temper returning. "And be quick, before the narcotics wear off. You don't want her to wake up, do you?"

Although the goblins said nothing, they agreed unanimously. They certainly did not.

*

The commander took point as he and Foaly sneaked up behind the goblins in the passage. There had to be at least fifteen of them in total – though being that there was a variation in the states of consciousness among the thugs, only about ten of these were still 'operational'. The rest were evidence of Holly's struggle to gain the upper hand. Root was quite impressed despite himself. She had done well to take down five considering the circumstances.

Luckily for the elf and the centaur, the goblins were far too busy enjoying the spectacle going on in the room beyond the door, and were all crammed together in the opening, with their backs to the two. How stupid could you get? They'd even heard Holly calling for reinforcements, for heaven's sake.

Silently, they positioned themselves squarely in the middle of the corridor, raising their weapons to aim at the backs of the idiots before them. Root gave Foaly the signal, and half of them were down before they even turned around. They saw the remaining five's eyes widen, show a flicker of recognition ('oh look, it's the two guys, not the girl'), then panic slightly as they fumbled with the settings of their lasers, bumping the power level up from enough to stun, to enough to kill. Yet another big mistake. They were all knocked out before you could say 'Atlantean stink balloons'.

Their friends on the other side of the door, it seemed, weren't particularly keen to get involved. Instead, they hauled the unconscious elf from the water and dragged her through the very door she had been aiming for as fast as they could.

By the time Root and Foaly had managed to get across the space, and had peered through the opening, there was no one in sight. Caution, however, could not be abandoned. The two crept into the room, lasers cocked and ready to go at the slightest sign of trouble. They edged around the perimeter of the pool, each scanning the water for any sign of Holly. This would explain the splash they had heard earlier. They reached the steps at the far side of the pool, when Foaly gave a small shout of exclamation, and darted towards the steps.

"Julius!" he called, forgetting the correct form of address for his boss. "Look, there, floating in the shallow bit!"

Root sprinted over, then slowed down when he saw what Foaly was pointing at. Floating by the handrail was the purple imitation rhododendron flower Holly had used to hold back her hair. The commander reached into the water, and lifted it up.

The moment his skin made contact with the liquid, his vision blacked out, to be replaced by an image of Holly. Root found he couldn't move, and watched helplessly as in slow motion, he saw her legs going like pistons as she ran hell-for-leather round the edge of the pool. He saw the tile smash, and his officer crash through the surface of the water. His vision plunged with her, following her movement, and rushed up to give a close-up of her face. He began to feel sick. This was worse than a pod ride…

He saw the panic in her eyes, then time speeded up, and in a blur of motion, she writhed about, shot through the surface, and tore off under the water again. Root was dragged along with her. Somehow, he felt the electric shocks, and saw Holly flinch whenever one hit her. Suddenly, he shot closer, so that he seem to be right next to her, and time slowed to a crawl again. He saw the strangely shaped bullet plough steadily through the water, heading straight for Holly's side, and saw it plunge into her body. He tried to do something, but he was paralysed, unable to help her. He saw the pain, then the confusion, then the lethargy as she sank into blackness. His own vision darkened, and with a sickening jerk, he was hauled back to reality.

"Commander?" Foaly whinnied worriedly. "Julius! What is it?"

Root groaned, and slumped forward from where he had been forced to his knees, his head resting on the cool tiles in an attempt to soothe the splitting pain in his cranium. He had one blinder of a headache already.

"Just give me a sec, Foaly…" he managed to mutter, trying to calm his racing pulse. The centaur folded his four legs awkwardly as he sank down to the other fairy's level.

"What the hell happened, Julius?" he asked, concerned.

"I don't know, D'Arvit!" Root growled, giving Foaly a look that clearly added 'you idiot' to the previous statement. "It's not everyday that you suddenly start seeing your officers dying on the bottom of swimming pools whilst wearing dresses!"

Foaly looked confused. "I didn't know you had visions…"

Root glared at him. "I don't" he snapped.

Foaly was about to open his mouth to voice another of his crackpot theories, no doubt, when the full implication of what the elf had said hit him. He paled, and dread tainted his eyes. "You had a vision of Holly dying?" he breathed, his voice coming out in an uneasy stutter. "Are you… I mean… how…" He had to stop, for fear his shock and potential grief would burst out.

Root sat up again, rubbing his eyes. "No… not dying. I think she was knocked out, or something. She got shot in the waist, she stopped swimming, she sank to the bottom and then I had the pleasure of hearing your lovely voice."

Foaly couldn't help but sigh with relief, and a smile touched his mouth. Then his techie-side kicked in. "Type of gun?"

Root shook his head. "Classification; unknown. All I saw was the bullet… and I've never seen bullets like that before…"

The centaur looked like he was on the verge of a mental break-through. "Describe it…" he said vaguely, thinking hard.

The commander screwed up his face, trying to remember clearly. "It was very strangely shaped – not cylindrical like the standard solid projectile. It was spherical – with a slightly pointed end at the back. It had tiny 'fins' on the sides, as if to guide it in a certain way… But the strangest thing was that when it was about 30cm away from impact with Holly's body, three little…" He struggled for a way to describe it. "…prongs pushed their way out from the blunt end. It may just have been me, or the vision messing with my head, but when it was about 10cm from impact, a spark of blue light broke away from Holly, and was caught between the prongs. Then, when it was about 5cm away, it…" Again, he had difficulty expressing what had happened. "… parted the material of her dress. It was as though the thread in that particular area just unravelled to let the bullet through. It sealed up almost immediately, but before it did I saw the thing slow down, and push its way through the skin. Basically, there wouldn't have been enough momentum to propel it out the other side."

"So…" continued Foaly. "Its still in her."

Root nodded. "Basically, yeah."

The techie put his head on one side, and looked thoughtfully at his boss, confused. "And how come you could see all this, if it was a bullet being shot from a gun?" He grinned. "Those things move pretty damn fast."

The commander glared at him. "I know that. I forgot to mention that that part of the vision was in slow motion. There was a variation with the time speed… ordinary, fast-forward and slow motion were all in there. It seemed to be skipping the less-important bits, and slowing down the most."

Foaly was nodding, understanding shining in his eyes. "I think I know what our mystery firearm is… and I don't think you're gonna like it at all… I'm pretty sure Holly was hit with a 'Magic Stealer', or an MS as its known in the trade."

The commander failed to produce the mortified reaction Foaly had anticipated. "What the hell is that?"

The centaur decided to let it drop this one time. "An MS is a solid-missile firearm-"

"How about you tell me what I don't already know?"

Foaly glared at him. "I was getting to that… Anyway, an MS is a solid missile firearm, that is designed to rob a fairy of his, or her magic. Very useful when your opponent has a warlock who's interferrin' with what you're trying to do. Now, they do this by parting any material, living or non-living that stands between them and the magic source. It can get really messy when you have non-magical, or drained beings in the way… they just part the actual flesh, like you saw that one doing to Holly's dress to get through. That's why they are still being tested and developed. Anyway, next, the three prongs that you saw proceed to attract and collect all the power the fairy posses at that given moment, and collect it, locking it away in the sphere. This means that it is no longer accessible, and the fairy can't use it to heal, or anything like that."

The centaur paused for breath, and to give the elf a chance to get his head round the whole thing, before he continued. "The storage device, called the chamber, remains in the body of the fairy, under the skin. It stays there until another fairy, usually from the opposite side, touches that fairy's skin, and the magic is transferred into them. They then use an electro-magi device to extract the chamber. If you get the chamber out within half an hour, it does no damage, but longer, and the internal chemical balance is shot. Can take months to get over. We need to get it out of Holly A.S.A.P."

Root nodded slowly. "Right… got all that…"

Foaly breathed a secret sigh of relief. Hopefully he'd stay un-dismembered for a little longer then. The commander tended to get angry when you confused him. "So… that's the function. Now, there are also the extras… Fairies with magic sometimes experience flash backs or visions of what happens, caused by residual charges. As you, I'm sure, noticed, Holly lost consciousness pretty quickly. This is because there are strong, but very temporary narcotics that get released when the chamber starts suckin'. These are mainly to stop the fairy from fighting the pull on their magic, but also so the person after their power can get close enough to get it. It only lasts about five minutes though, so Holly should be coming round any minute now."

Root was silent for about a minute. "And I haven't heard about this mean-magic-stealin'-machine before because…"

"Well sir… it's still in the implementation and testing stage at the weapons labs, so only us few privileged and respected techies get told about them. I just didn't think you'd be interested in all that 'crap' as you would no doubt, so elegantly put it."

He nodded grudgingly. "Well… I suppose you have a point… Anyway, we need to find Holly as quickly as possible. Who knows what those goblins are doing to her…"

The pair stood up, both wincing slightly at the stiffness in their legs. On closer examination of the area around the steps, they saw a faint and quickly drying smear of wetness that seemed to be heading for the door behind them. Drawing their weapons warily, they proceeded towards it. This was getting really repetitive – going through doors, weapons out, to try and rescue Holly…

Cautiously, they sneaked up to the door, and finding it slightly ajar, edged through it. The space beyond it was completely empty. The commander cursed, and he and Foaly began to look for clues. Again.

Suddenly, they heard a door slam up ahead, and the sound of footsteps running away. The two fairies shot a glance at each other, before sprinting towards the source of the noise.

*****

I know, I know… cliffy. And they are all very similar… the chapters all seem to end with them charging down some corridor or other, or bursting through some door or other… hopefully I will be able to think of better endings next time. It isn't really that hard…

Anyway, the next chapter should be up soon, seeing as I finish school in three days, as previously stated, and I shall see you all (well, not see you…) then. Bye!

Luv slime xxx

P.S.: oh yeah… and if the bot gets my other fic, the AFNS, I may have to put the bulletins at the end of Strictly Ballroom chapters. Just so ya know. Bye.