---------------
Why me? Was the first thought that ran through Ryan's head after brakes finally dragged the detective's small car to a halt. Family reflexes were fast enough to dodge most idiots on the road, but whoever this joker from Cheyenne was, he'd cut across three lanes of traffic with no warning. Chi senses that should have picked up hostility or drugs or plain mental flip-out hadn't sensed anything but an odd, confused blur-
Mel!
"Ugh... call in the plate number...."
"Keep your eyes closed." Ryan undid his seat belt, leaned over to brush bits of safety glass out of Detective Melle Cameron's short mahogany hair. His nostrils flared; caught scents of spilled oil, burnt rubber, blood. But not from inside this car. "You okay?"
"Bleh." Sea-blue eyes blinked at him, narrowed in wry amusement. "That'll teach me to help you check out hunches on Air Force guys looking up your uncle."
Ryan glanced toward the crunched mid-size with the Air Force stickers. "He's bleeding. Could be bad."
Mel frowned, peering at what was visible of the other driver. "How the hell do you... never mind. Go." She picked up the radio. "Dispatch, 11-80..."
Damn, I miss Joss sometimes, Ryan thought, heading for the other vehicle with gun in hand. Detective Joseph White wasn't the keenest blade in the drawer - that's why he was still Narcotics, while Ryan had gotten snatched into Homicide - but he'd at least taken his partner's ability to pick information out of thin air at face value.
Mel was different. Mel watched him. Closely enough that she'd started to see a pattern to his monthly absences, even if she had no clue what caused them.
One night of the moon, a hanyou's power drains away....
And Mel didn't think the streetlight incident was just a martial arts trick.
Maybe Uncle Kenshin's right, I should tell her something... yeah, right. Where the hell would I start? "Mel? I'd like you to meet my grandpa, the wolf-hanyou...."
Oh gods, that wasn't even funny. Saitou Hajime could be downright vicious when looking over potential new pack-mates.
Pack-mates? Where the hell did that come from? She's my partner... right, you work with her, and blood-smell stirs up the protective instincts. Mind on the job, cub. "Sir?" Ryan approached with caution; that trickle of blood through close-cropped blond hair was a scalp wound, probably made by flying glass, but who knew how hard the head behind it had been hit? Way too many of the service personnel in the Cheyenne area had combat reflexes. "Sir, I'm Detective O'Connell. Are you all right?"
The Air Force sergeant giggled.
Not good. Ryan held his ground, frowning. Something was off. Something just didn't feel right....
White smoke spilled from the sergeant's nose and mouth.
Holy-! Ryan leapt backwards, not caring who saw, just trying to put distance between himself and whatever the hell that was.
Not fast enough. A creamy tendril grabbed his left arm, snaked up his shoulder-
Let go! Snarling, Ryan summoned up his own youki, shoving at the interloper.
White smoke screeched and pulled back, shaking. Hissed at him.
"Ryan?"
White smoke coiled. Moved side to side, as if considering how to go past him. His arm itched and burned, sure sign of foreign energies trying to take hold of his own. Eat, possess, hitch a ride - any way you slice it, this thing is bad news. "Mel, get back!"
"Why?" Leather shoes tapped across asphalt behind him. "What's wrong?"
"Just get back!" Damn! She can't see it. Ryan holstered his gun, flipping out one of the thin, silvery knives 'Jiisan had sworn even an honest cop would need someday. Slashed white smoke.
Metal sizzled away.
"Che!"
"Ryan?" Mel's voice sounded shaky.
"Yeah?" He flipped out another knife, watching creamy energy writhe back. Intangible; a Hornet's Flight is out, unless I want to fry all my knives in one go. So two more after this... did I hurt it at all?
"Your knife just melted."
"Yeah." Think, think! "Mel! Leather package in the back. Get it!"
Metal thumped. "O'Connell! Why the hell do you have a sword in your trunk?"
"Later!" Hope there is a later....
But creamy smoke snaked back and away, flinching from the glint of silvered steel. Curled on itself, and dove into the traffic still tearing past.
"K'so!"
Compact sedan, dark blue, Colorado plates WX9-G67. Ryan noted the details with a sinking feeling; by the time he could get the vehicle's description onto a B.O.L.O., that thing could have jumped bodies a dozen times.
Heck, even if we found it, it could take the cops!
Only one thing to do, then.
Taking out his cell, Ryan hit speed-dial. "Uncle Kenshin? We've got a big, big problem...."
A safety clicked off. "Sir?" The tone was polite, but the MP's eyes were hard. "Please turn the phone off."
A quick intake of breath drew Ryan's gaze back to his battered car, where two uniforms had just gotten a good grip on his partner. Mel's hands were on his katana's hilt, sea-blue eyes were all but spitting fire, and coral-tinged lips were curled in a snarl to match 'Kaa-san Mika Saitou O'Connell's best.
How dare they put their hands on her....
Creaking plastic brought the detective back to reality. He couldn't afford to crush the phone. Not now. Hope Kenshin's ears are as good as mine. "Gaki," Ryan said under his breath. "Heading into town. From the Mountain."
---------------
"Ryan?" Kenshin gripped the phone, listening hard.
Walking into the dojo with the second-to-last bag of groceries, Daniel watched the swordsman's knuckles pale, and wondered if maybe he'd have been better off sticking to his apartment after all. Granted, he hadn't wanted to stay inside all day, and once Kaoru knew he had a mostly-bare fridge and a card for the library near the dojo, she'd all but hit him over the head and dragged him along with them....
Still, watching a lethal redhead count down to ignition was not on Daniel's list of things to do with an unexpected day off.
Quiet as a breeze, Kenshin set the phone down.
Daniel fought the urge to close his eyes and duck into cover. Three, two, one-
"Aoshi's fears have come to pass."
Um - fizzle? Daniel took a second look at Himura's still face, the pale hand not quite touching his sword-hilt. Uh... no. Slow boil. Very slow boil.
Kaoru breezed back inside, tote bag in hand, shinai over her shoulder, and list tucked into a pocket. "Okay! Garden looks good, the herbs are drying, if we can just get that order in for a few more bokkens... Kenshin?"
"I fear our call to the woodwright must wait." Kenshin studied Daniel. "Before our young cousin was taken into custody, one suspects by your O'Neill's military police, he mentioned a gaki."
Kaoru gasped. "They took Ryan?"
"A hungry ghost?" Daniel hazarded. "Japanese mythology isn't my area of expertise." I should have looked it up, though; we've met a Chinese Goa'uld, there's probably some Japanese ones as well. Why can't the Tok'ra give us a list?
Kenshin's gaze didn't flicker. "But what comes from the Mountain is."
Daniel shook his head. "I can't talk about that." And you can stare until Doomsday; I've faced down System Lords, I'm not going to break my word now-
Kaoru thumped him on the arm, a few careful inches away from the bruise. "Cut it out! Both of you!"
"Ow!"
"Oro?"
"You," Kaoru glared at Kenshin, "Get the map. Let's see if whatever it is shows up."
A whisper of cloth, and Kenshin was gone. "Scarier than Jin-e," floated back on the breeze.
"I heard that!" The same azure glare turned on Daniel. "Now, you are going to help me get my supplies together. And think about what you can tell us."
---------------
And the day just keeps getting better, Jack thought wryly, tapping his fingers on the SGC interrogation room table, staring down the lean, dark-haired man across from him. Six foot even, loose-sleeved plainclothes suit and tie, collar-length black hair with a half-dozen chin-length bangs in the front, hard features that melded Japan and Europe - he'd never have guessed the man's name if he hadn't seen it plastered all over the guy's ID. "Detective O'Connell."
"Colonel O'Neill." Hazel eyes stared back, fearless as a wolf's. "Taking some time off from deep-space radar?"
I'm going to hurt whoever came up with that cover story. Oh yeah. Jack gestured to the three and a half slender knives spread on the table between them. The neat leather armlet they'd been sheathed in was currently in Teal'c's very interested hands, in another room. Set up for quick release and throw. Nifty little assassin's trick. Made for a lefty, no less. "Want to tell me how this happened?"
"Ryan Saitou O'Connell. Detective, Carson Springs PD, Homicide. I want a lawyer. A civilian lawyer." The detective crossed his arms, not so casually putting a hand over the right elbow Janet had tapped for her blood sample. "And I'm not saying anything else 'til I get one."
Uh-huh. Easy to say. Hard to do. "Most cops I know wouldn't carry these," Jack said thoughtfully, waving a hand over slim steel. "Kind of gives the wrong impression." He raised a brow. "Saved your neck today, though."
Silence.
"Speaking of impressions... kind of funny, you carrying a katana in your trunk. Right next to the shotgun. Either way, you're not the kind of guy to keep something you can't use." Jack shrugged. "I just can't believe a guy like you would watch another swordsman cut down a streetlight and not try to figure out how he did it."
More silence. Ryan didn't even twitch.
"Your partner's talking, you know. Well... was talking," Colonel O'Neill gave him a worried, sympathetic frown. "Our doc's with her now. Anything you could tell us that would help?"
Lean nostrils flared. Hazel eyes looked through him, ice over fury.
Tough kid, Jack reflected. But you've got a soft spot for Cameron a mile wide. Not just partners, huh?
He could use that. If he had enough time. If any of them had enough time.
Someone rapped on the door. "'Scuse me." Jack scooped up the knives, keeping an ear out as he turned his back on the younger man. The chairs in here made a vicious scrape over the floor; no matter how many ninja tricks the detective knew, he ought to hear the kid coming.
But Ryan didn't move as Jack left the room. Just sat, and waited, and seethed in furious silence.
Tough. We've got an alien predator out there, and you want to play "I'm a civilian"? Jack frowned at his team, looked down at Janet. "What?"
"Blood type O-positive, immune response within acceptable limits, histamine levels normal," the doctor reported. "He's clean. So is Detective Cameron."
"But before she clammed up, she said it looked like there was a heat-wave around him," Jack pointed out. "And we checked everybody else at the scene. Why the heck would it bug out with all those fresh targets around?"
"Maybe it didn't like O'Connell's knife." Sam pointed at her laptop monitor. "Don't ask me how the smith did it, but there's traces of silver in this alloy."
"The draoch, whom Daniel called shaman, was wearing silver charms," Teal'c pointed out. "As was the bola-thrower."
Jack raised a skeptical brow. "T. Do not tell me this thing's related to the Wolfman."
"What is a Wolfman?"
"A myth," Jack said absently. Where was Daniel when you needed him? Right, concussed and at home. Meaning their monster hadn't latched onto him. Good. "Usually made into cheesy horror movies where the good guy - or gal, sometimes - ends up taking a silver bullet to the heart." He pointed at Sam. "Don't even think about Lone Ranger jokes."
"Sir, we have reason to believe this is an energy-based life-form," Sam said practically. "And silver is a conductor."
Swell. "Just so you know? I'm not hauling out Grandma O'Neill's cutlery so we can go monster-hunting."
"It would limit our range to hand-to-hand," Teal'c said thoughtfully. "I would advise water pistols loaded with silver nitrate."
"I keep plenty in the infirmary for a last-ditch antiseptic," Janet nodded. "Sometimes I have no idea what kind of infectious organisms a team's brought back. Hard to beat the basics."
Lunatics. He was running a team full of lunatics. At least they're my lunatics. "So we have a plan to stop this thing."
"If we can locate it," Teal'c agreed.
"It might be easier to let it find us." Sam shrugged under the sudden weight of three stares. "Well, on Aindrias, it's associated with the pader-paebi, so...."
"Bait," Jack said tersely. "Good idea."
"We still have to get close enough for it to know we're there," Sam fretted. "By the time we can follow up on a report of weird behavior it'll be long gone."
"And we can't just lock down the whole city and take blood samples," Janet frowned.
"We could," Jack said bluntly. "And we will, if we have to." The general already had a plan to do just that, if worst came to worst.
"Colonel." Janet's scowl deepened. "Those people aren't in the military. They have rights. Do you know how many laws we'd be breaking-"
"Major Fraiser. If we weren't pretty damn sure this thing is an isolated creature, and not some kind of spreading infection, we'd have done it already." Colonel O'Neill glanced at his second in command. "Carter. Who'd O'Connell call before we snatched him?"
---------------
"Kamiya dojo. Instructor Himura speaking." Kenshin watched Daniel help Kaoru prepare her inks and papers, senses alert in case the creature they sought came seeking them too soon. His own preparations had been swift and simple; plain gi and hakama changed for ones of patterned silk, a glass-beaded blue ribbon to catch back red hair in a high ponytail, calm breaths to draw his mind into the stillness needed for the fight....
And Battousai whispering close to the surface.
My territory. My people. My kin.
This creature will not escape me.
"Now, why am I not surprised?" Colonel O'Neill's voice drawled.
Nor I. "It would be wise if you released Ryan. And his partner."
"What makes you think we have him?"
"Do not," Battousai said evenly, "Play the fool with me, O'Neill."
"Likewise." The Air Force officer's voice held a level chill the rurouni recognized all too well... and the hitokiri knew in his bones.
The ice-cold blood of war. Battousai took firmer control, gently setting the rurouni aside. This one has lost part of himself, as Aoshi did so long ago. Reason will not sway him. Only deeds.
"So. Now that we're not playing, here." A thump; possibly a boot from desk to floor. "O'Connell's not talking. What do you know?"
"You hunt a gaki," Battousai said plainly. Daniel stiffened; the swordsman held up a hand, motioned him back to Kaoru's preparations. "And it hunts the people of this city."
"A what?"
"A gaki," Battousai repeated, drawing on some of Himura's patience. Ryuu Mei San might not work over all phone lines... and stunning the man would not obtain Ryan's release any more quickly. "Or something like unto one. A hungry ghost, a cloud of smoke that feeds on human energies. It is swift, most humans cannot easily see it, and silver hurts it, but will not slay."
O'Neill was silent a moment. "So what will?"
I will. "I would advise you to find a houshi," Battousai said evenly. "A warrior monk, who has the skills and chants to cast the gaki out of an unwilling host."
Another beat of silence. "You're saying we need an exorcist?"
"Yes."
"Now, come on...."
"And soon," Battousai cut across his words. "Before it nests in a human host, and spawns."
O'Neill paused. "You think it can do that."
"If it chooses to nest rather than simply feed, its host will be weak, listless. Perhaps delirious. Fires will start about it, without explanation. There will be fever, convulsions, and shortly after that, death. And more gaki. Perhaps three or four. And the cycle will begin again."
A longer pause. "How much time do we have?"
"There is no way to know." The rurouni took hold for a moment. "These are the numbers I know of...."
Hanging up on yet another protest, Kenshin took a calming breath.
"He's not going to be fooled for long," Daniel pointed out. "He walked in here. He saw you. Even if he didn't see everything, Jack knows you're not going to just say it's not your problem and walk away-" The archaeologist drew in a sharp breath. "Your eyes."
I know. "It is part of my nature," Kenshin said levelly. He'd called it, after all. Felt youki rise to the surface, bleeding red hair to scarlet, turning violet eyes amber as flame.
Hitokiri Battousai.
The demon who brought the bloody rain. The assassin who killed like an ogre and vanished, elusive as wind.
The heritage he had finally accepted so many years ago, for Kaoru's sake and his own.
Karyuu-hanyou.
Daniel faced it and did not quail, though sweat glimmered against golden hair. "He's trying to do the right thing."
"You trust him." Kenshin held his gaze, level as a blade. "Even to stand aside from a danger he cannot see, and cannot fight."
Daniel swallowed. "I hope so."
Kaoru touched the back of his hand. "He must be a very good friend."
"One of the best." Daniel shook his head. "We just can't seem to reach each other. I don't know why."
"War," Kenshin stated. "It freezes the heart of the strongest souls."
"But we can't stop fighting." Despair ached in Daniel's voice. "There isn't anyone else. We have to do this."
Kenshin smiled sadly. "So I, too, said once."
Blue blinked behind glass, dragged out of misery by the seeming contradiction. "Japan hasn't been in a war since 1945."
Not as you might think of one; though some of our folk have meddled in Asia, as have yours. Kenshin chuckled at the note of accusation. "And I was not in that one, that I was not." Save peripherally, in frantic efforts to haul kin and friends out of the madness that had swept Europe and his homeland. For once his red hair had been Kaoru's protection; no Allied soldier saw that and believed him one of the loathed Japanese.
Although being called a "carrot-topped Injun" had been a shock.
One last preparation to make. One last measure, against a creature that would laugh at any thoughts of surrender to human hands.
Kneeling beside a black lacquered chest, Kenshin untied his sakabatou's sheath. Laid it aside.
Opened the lid, and took out his paired swords.
---------------
"Just so you know?" Mel pointed out to her grim-faced partner as they walked through fading daylight, past Herbert's Garage, Clips and Snips Hairstylists, and other struggling middle-class shops that formed a major part of their beat. "We're being followed."
"I know."
Probably before I did, Mel thought wryly. How do you do that? "O'Neill?"
"Three others. One of them's...." Ryan drew in a breath, almost as if he were tasting the air. "Not human," he finished in a whisper.
Mel glanced at him askance. "You're starting to freak me out here."
"Go home, Mel."
"Oh, right. Leave you out here with Colonel Klink and his buddies, one of whom you say isn't human, so you can go meet up with your weird uncle and chase down something else that's not human and eats people." Mel snorted. "Not a chance."
"I didn't say I was going to...."
Mel gave him a Look. "You didn't head in to press charges on O'Neill. You've got that look, that the-universe-is-screwy-and-what-else-is-new look, that you only get around Kenshin. Or on the phone with your grandparents. And you're carrying that sword. Which you still haven't explained, by the way."
"Family heirloom?" he tried.
"That you keep in your trunk. Weak, Ryan. Real weak."
"Point," he admitted.
"I am," Mel said archly, "A detective."
"And you detect...?"
"I saw you slice a heat-wave. I saw it melt the knife." She stopped dead in the center of the sidewalk, temper rising despite her best efforts to squash it. "I don't know what to think, but I do not like being kept in the dark, partner."
His wolfish face bent in an unaccustomed grin. "You are so beautiful when you're angry."
Say what?
Quick as thought, Ryan had an arm around her, leaning close enough to nuzzle her neck. "Don't hit me yet," he breathed by her ear. "They're watching."
"This better be good," she hissed through a smile.
He pressed a kiss against the collar of her shirt, angling his body so an observer would think skin had touched skin. "We're decoys."
"Uh?" Ryan's arms were strong, and warm - and ready to lift off in an instant if she flinched. So she wouldn't flinch. If her partner needed an act for their would-be jailers, he'd get one.
Besides, this was kind of nice. Ryan had been a gentleman ever since he'd been paired up with her; quite a change from the usual Homicide newbie trying to outdo one of the few women in the field. She'd even considered asking him out once or twice on one of his free days... which was when she'd finally realized Ryan had a pattern of hiding in his apartment one night a month.
One of these days, I'm going to get that out of him, too. "Talk, O'Connell."
"O'Neill let us go."
"Right...." Hard to concentrate with his breath feathering her ear. Think, Mel. Grabbed us, questioned us, dropped us off, following us.... "Phone. GPS."
"I heard O'Neill call Uncle." Left-handed, Ryan stroked her hair. "I asked around the other day. I'm not the only guy in the department O'Neill called. And if he's smart, and he is smart, he figured out some of what Kenshin didn't tell him."
Which was that for the past year or so, when the department had reports of the freaky, Kenshin usually ended up there to handle it. "So if they're trying to find this gaki, why not follow him?"
Ryan snickered; it tickled the fine hairs at the nape of her neck. "You ever tried following Kenshin?"
"No...."
"Like tracking a hawk on a cloudy day." Ryan buried his nose in mahogany strands. "Trust me. Just doesn't work." He breathed in with a blissful sigh. "Kirei na kaori...."
"That better have been a compliment, partner."
Ryan didn't speak, just made a sort of rumbling growl, and nuzzled in deeper.
Okay, this was little too close to not acting. "Ryan?" Mel tapped his chest. "Ryan... O'Connell! Snap out of it!"
Wide-eyed, he jerked back. "Anou?" Looked at her face, red tingeing his cheekbones. "Oh god. Um, I can explain. Sort of. Later...."
Watching her usually cool, calm, and collected partner go from pale to tomato in under sixty seconds, Mel shook her head. "You'd better."
---------------
"Wow."
"Let me guess." Kaoru let the jade dragon pendant dangle over their white-and-gray city map, feeling the tug of distortion following red-inked dragon lines. "You've never seen anything like it."
"Um, actually, I think...." Daniel gripped the edge of the folding table as he traced the pattern around Cheyenne Mountain. Frowned. "Not this map. But something like it. Tiamat. The mother of dragons. 'She walked among men by day, but at night she would retreat to the Great Sea to sleep, and the paths of her feet would linger quiet until the dawn, a blessing on those who followed her.' Fault lines? The whole area around Babylon's always been at risk of earthquakes. If Tiamat - or Omoroca - really could quiet the quakes, that'd be enough to get people following her...." The archaeologist blinked, suddenly aware of where he was. "Ah - could you forget I said that?"
Northward tug, with just a quiver of something off about it. "You're sure it's not important?" Kaoru asked.
"Pretty sure." Daniel gave her a shy smile. "It was something else. Someone else, really, but... there wasn't anything like your gaki involved."
"If, in truth, it is a gaki." Silk rustled as Kenshin tied a red ribbon around her stack of ofuda. A plain bandage wrapped the side of his left forefinger, where her dagger had drawn the blood that dotted the tip of each talisman. "Its course has not changed?"
"It's wavered a little. But it's still following this line." Kaoru touched the map, feeling that echo of sticky energies, as if a slug had crawled over bright paper. Odd, to think that her grandfather's talent for ink painting had led her to a view of their enemies Kenshin could not see. And yet not so odd, from what they'd learned about magic ever since that frantic chase to save Tokyo's Circle of Eternity a second time. From the moment Hiko Seijuro had taken him in, Kenshin's training had led him down the path of the lone warrior, the swordsman who struck at the enemy where and when he would. Like an assassin. Like a dragon.
Maps were a human concern.
"And it staying on track is not a good thing?" Daniel asked warily.
"A true gaki is near as intelligent as a human, when it is not driven by hunger." Amber eyes studied the map. "If it has encountered Ryan, it knows it will be hunted. A true gaki would have left the lines, here. Or here. Or perhaps turned off along this thinner thread of power, to break its trail. It has not."
"So if it's not a gaki, will those still work?" Daniel nodded toward the talismans. "How do those work?"
"They're kind of like mirrors," Kaoru said hesitantly. For all the study she'd done over the years since Tokyo, she was a swordswoman, not a miko. She could mix the ink, paint it with the proper strokes, mind as calm and prepared as it would be in the midst of a sword form. With Kenshin's help, she could even power it. Explaining it was something else. "They take in energy that shouldn't be there, and reflect it back, so it can't get through."
"In answer, yes." Kenshin stepped back from the table. "So long as this creature infests a human chi, our measures will work, gaki or no."
Daniel rubbed the side of his head. "But if it's not a gaki, maybe it's not going to spawn...."
"Yes, it is." Kaoru shivered. "It's going from person to person. It doesn't need to do that just to get enough chi to live. The distortion in the lines keeps getting worse. It's storing energy."
Rrring-
Kenshin seized the phone before the ring finished. "Himura." Frowned. "Sanji. Slow down."
"Sanji?" Kaoru laid her pendant down.
"Friend of yours?" Daniel asked.
"No, not really," she admitted. "Officer John Sanji. He's Sergeant Williams' new trainee. You missed him last night, he was busy hauling off idiots... his parents came over from India, and he's got an awful accent when he's upset." Which he had to be right now, given the way amber had narrowed into deadly slits.
"Did he harm you?" Kenshin said abruptly. "No. No, Sanji. Taking him by force would have meant two options; either it seized you as well, or it eluded you and did your partner great harm. Which way did it take him?"
---------------
Black wool cap pulled over his golden brand, Teal'c frowned as Cameron stepped out of O'Connell's arms and headed down the street. "I believe they have 'made' us, O'Neill."
"Darn," Sam sighed. "And here I thought someone was having better luck than I am."
Stuffed into the back seat of Jack's F250 across from Sam, Janet considered her options. Bad, worse, worst, the doctor thought dryly. I should have known it wasn't just a drug reaction, I should have checked....
Well, she didn't, and she hadn't. And now the city, and possibly the planet, had to deal with the consequences.
But there's got to be a better way than this. There just has to be.
"Heck with it." Jack pulled in to the curb and got out. "Come on, kids. Might as well just ask the guy."
"Go on," Janet waved Sam off as her phone vibrated. "I might have to take this."
The astrophysicist nodded and slipped out behind her teammates, closing the dark green door with a gentle thump.
Quiet. At last. Not that SG-1 had been talkative while stalking the detectives, but the brooding tension might as well have been a circular saw running full blast. "Hello?"
"Janet?"
"Daniel!" The world felt better already. "How are you?"
"Okay, my head feels a lot better, and - wait. I was calling about you. Are you all right? I tried the Mountain first, they said you left with Jack...."
"Tired," Janet admitted to that honest concern. "Cranky. Did the colonel tell you we had a problem?"
"Sort of."
Sort of? Janet eyed the phone suspiciously.
"But you're okay?" Daniel went on. "No delirium, no fever, no weird fires...."
"None of the above." And why did that sound familiar?
"Good. That's good, I was worried...." Daniel blew out a breath. "Is Jack in a listening mood?"
"Not as much as I'd like," Janet admitted, watching Jack gesticulate and O'Connell cross stubborn arms. Was it her imagination, or was the tall detective looking very carefully at Teal'c? "He's trying to track down-"
And her mind put together Daniel, trouble magnet, list of symptoms, and Kenshin Himura. "Oh no."
"Um... yeah."
This is just not my day. "Where are you?"
"Did Jack find a houshi?"
Janet rolled her eyes. "Daniel. Are you asking me if Colonel O'Neill, USAF, went looking for an exorcist to handle one of our problems?"
"Damn. Probably too late to bring one in anyway, but I was hoping...." A sigh. "So what was his plan?"
"Silver nitrate and some fungus to bait it. We hope. What do you mean, too late?" Janet felt a chill jitterbug its way down her spine.
"I'll call you back."
"Daniel! Don't you-"
Click.
He'll call you back. He promised. And Daniel wouldn't lie to her. Not deliberately.
Shoving Teal'c's seat forward, Janet stuck her head out the window. "Colonel!"
In the middle of a gesture that evoked attempted friendliness and imminent neck-wringing in one efficient move, Jack stopped. Craned his head her way. "Doc?"
"Daniel just called," Janet said bluntly. "He's with Himura."
"Say what?"
---------------
"It's a bad idea!" Kaoru huffed, laying out ofuda in a wide, subtle circle.
"Perhaps." Kenshin paced grass and weeds like a ghost, studying the lay of the ground, the way one particular alley led into this fenced lot.
"No maybe about it," Kaoru said bluntly. "He didn't even look? He didn't even listen, when you told him it was a gaki?" She shook back dark hair, blue eyes all but snapping sparks. "Why should we let him anywhere near here?"
"He needs to see it," Daniel insisted. It felt like Kenshin was listening, and yet....
Those eyes.
Molten amber, waiting to drown the unwary in flames.
Been there, done that, a wry part of his mind spoke up. Jack's counting on you. Everybody is.
"The Mountain's Jack's responsibility," Daniel said plainly. "He needs to know we caught it. That it's over. Or he won't have any choice but to turn the city upside-down."
Amber weighed him. "You trust him."
With my soul. "Yes."
Scarlet inclined; one subtle nod. "Then the choice is yours."
---------------
"For the last time, Colonel, we have no clue where Himura is," Detective Cameron insisted, obviously fighting the urge to drum her fingers on the green pickup's hood. "He's a private citizen, he's more than a little odd, which I'm sure you've noticed - heck, he could be halfway across the country by now."
Phone clenched in her hand, Janet resisted the urge to applaud. Nice performance. But Himura's not nearly as eccentric as you're trying to make us think he is, is he? And you're worried.
"Assume he's not, and work backwards," Jack said sourly. "He thinks he's chasing a ghost. He's got one of my people with him-"
"He knew silver would hurt it," Sam said thoughtfully. "How?" The astrophysicist studied O'Connell like an unexpected pulsar in the middle of an otherwise sane planetary system. "How did you know?"
The detective let out a slow breath. Shrugged. "My family has a history of dealing with things. Like gaki."
Silence.
"You're a cop," Jack pointed out.
Hazel narrowed, wolf-bright. "You know, Colonel, youkai and oni don't look at your job description before they try to eat you." O'Connell turned an apologetic glance on his stunned partner. "I was trying to think of a good way to tell you...."
Ring.
Janet opened her phone with a sigh of relief. "Fraiser."
"Promise me you won't let Jack jump into the middle of this."
"Daniel-"
"Daniel?" Jack grabbed for the phone. Janet dodged, giving him her best pulling-medical-rank glare.
"Janet, please," Daniel went on, oblivious to the battle of wills. "We think it's following the dragon lines, the... energy paths in the city. And if it is, we know where it's going. I hope."
Janet's hand clenched on black plastic, all too aware of SG-1's eyes boring into her. Teal'c wasn't about to help Jack corner her, but the set of his impassive face told her he was not on her side. Not when it came to an unknown dragging Daniel into his plans. "Keep talking."
"Himura has a plan, but it's risky. Promise me you'll grab Jack before he runs over one of Kaoru's ofuda."
Janet blinked. "O-what?"
"Paper talismans. Sort of like what hit MacKenzie, only aimed at things, not people. Janet, promise me."
Might as well ask me to hold back a tornado. "If you're in the line of fire-"
"I'm not! I promise."
"Hang on." Janet took the phone away from her face. "Daniel says Himura has a plan."
---------------
Mmm, smack, yum....
The corpse-smoke nudged at its current host, almost full. This way... yes, this way had a good feel to it. There were energies under the ground. Forces too weak for it to feed on, but perfect for lifting its spawn on their way to nest in brood-fungus.
Just a little farther. Then it would spawn, burning its hapless host in one burst of agony that would breathe its young into life.
One odd fact nagged at the corpse-smoke. In all its wanderings through this other-human nest, it hadn't sensed a trace of brood fungus. Which meant its spawn might have to blow far in the wind to find rest and feeding after they hatched from the seared husk of this host.
But that wasn't its problem.
---------------
Colors - sounds - too bright-
Sergeant Williams staggered down the street, not sure where he was, or why. He'd pulled a cherry-red Escort over, watched a weaving woman lurch to the side of the road, and then-
My radio. Where's-
Clarity vanished in a swirl of fever. He had to walk this way. Had to find someplace to hide.
Someplace to burn....
God, somebody help me!
---------------
Almost there. It stalked through a ragged field - vacant lot, the host's mind whispered - toward a battered human-nest. On its host's right was a discarded pile of paper and brown, bark-like sheets, leaning up against the nest wall. One strip stood out against the rest, birch-pale, marked with angular black slashes and one red dot that felt of blood.
Perfect. No one would suspect a fire here.
It nudged its host again, and reached-
White light flashed up.
---------------
"What the heck?" Jack bunched his fingers in the chain link fence separating his team from the run-down construction shack. Damn Himura, gave us these directions on purpose. Not that a fence would keep him out. "Why'd it stop?"
"That light," Daniel whispered.
"What light?" He'd seen the hapless uniformed officer reel back, but from what?
"You see it?" Still standing like a Swiss Guard between his blinking partner and Teal'c, Ryan looked Daniel over more carefully. "Huh."
Something Daniel and Ryan could see, but the rest of his team couldn't. Jack did not like this. At all. "Fine, whatever, let's go-"
Metal sang across metal; the bone-chilling slide of a sword from its sheath. "You cannot pass, gaki."
Jack stopped, one foot still lodged in chain link. That, is no practice blade.
Red and white silk whispered out of the twilight, flowing around a small frame. Himura stood like a willow against the first breath of storm, patient and waiting. Slim arms held a katana, angled in front of his chest; the right just below the guard, the left gripping under it. Two sheaths were tied to his belt, one still holding a wakazashi. Red hair glowed scarlet as blood in the first dark of night, caught up in a high ponytail that seemed both ancient and oddly formal.
And his eyes were deadly, molten gold.
"I know you hear me, nestled within your unwilling host. I know you understand." All the courtesy had dropped from Kenshin's voice, though it was still light and soft as a wind through tall grass. "You cannot pass."
---------------
Ow! Ow ow ow ow ow!
Try left. Try around-
Ow!
More strips of paper, gleaming with the same painful light as the first. Filled with hurt, like home-humans' mean, nasty chants-
A trap. A trap!
---------------
Kenshin watched Sergeant Williams' face twist as his body crashed against the shimmering walls of Kaoru's ofuda. The gaki was in control; he could see it in the loose, faltering steps, the sickening dark pulse in the man's chi.
In control, and prepared to spawn.
You will not suffer that death, Williams. I swear it.
Hissing, the gaki turned toward him. Narrowed stolen eyes.
"Stolen flesh and soul can never pass those wards," Kenshin said levelly. His ears caught Kaoru's quick steps behind him, laying the last of her talismans to seal the circle about his enemy. "Your host may pass, or you may. Not both."
A cruel smile twisted Williams' lips. Arms spread, threatening.
"It takes many minutes for a man to burn alive. Many minutes, and a great deal of agony. That is what you feed on. What your spawn must have, to be cast upon the winds and grow." Kenshin set the peace in his soul aside, let memories of blood rise up and take him as he slipped his sheath from his belt. "You... will not kill him."
Arms hesitated. The shuffling step faltered.
The hitokiri sheathed his blade. "Come." Stepped back and left, knees bent; sheath gripped under his left arm, right hand by the hilt and waiting. "Learn the meaning of the name, Battousai."
---------------
"Ohmigod." Janet grabbed the fence, started to climb.
Jack grabbed her by the scruff of her white coat, hauled her down. "No."
"But he's going to-"
"Damn straight. No." Jack glanced at Teal'c, noted with approval that the Jaffa had already seized Sam's shoulder. Which leaves one more idealistic idiot to grab-
But Daniel wasn't moving. Only standing there, fingers laced into the fence, watching Kaoru stand fast outside her circle of inked papers. The kendo instructor had an origami box in her left hand, an ink brush in her right... and tears trickling down her cheeks.
"Why the hell not?" Cameron's fingers were itching to grab her gun.
"If we go in there, we'll breach the wards," Ryan bit out. "It'll get away. It'll have time to spawn." The detective swallowed dryly. "If Kenshin kills it first, it can't."
Mel blanched. "We can't-"
"Williams is dead already!" O'Connell's face was hard; hazel eyes were suspiciously wet. "Damn it, Mel, my family's met gaki before! If it's not out of him in the next few minutes, it will burn him to death. So it can breed, and fly, and kill more people. Is that what you want?" He kept his gaze on the blaze of scarlet hair. "That's battoujutsu stance. It'll be quick."
Jack watched the standoff like a hawk, wishing for an instant he had Daniel's eyes. There was something going on here he couldn't see, some clash of will or power that went beyond pure swordsman's bluff. "Daniel?"
"It - feels sick around him," the archaeologist said hesitantly, glancing at the cop. "Dark, and thick. Like swamp water."
Not what I meant. But-
Mary, mother of - no one's that fast!
It wasn't even a blur; just a heart-stopping sense of movement-
A subtle deflation of the cop's form, as heat shimmered away-
And the blade turned, flashing silver as it touched cloth-
"Now!"
Kaoru leapt into the circle, swooping her box through the center of the heat-shimmer. Firework-red sparks flashed across distorted air, turning it to a white, twisting cloud that stretched and strained-
And folded on itself, yanked into the box as Kaoru closed an ink-scribed lid on top of it. "Got you!"
---------------
"I apologize for the blade, Williams-san." Kenshin stood near the edge of the talisman circle, six feet from where his turned blow had slammed the cop through the shimmering force of inked paper. "Your captor had to believe the threat was real."
Coughing, Williams reached up just enough to touch dark cloth, revealing the upward slash across his chest that had left Kevlar untouched. "H-how...."
"One who has mastered everything of battoujutsu," Kenshin said softly, sheathing his blade. "That is the meaning of the name, Battousai." Walking over to the fallen man, he knelt. Behind him bodies were climbing and swearing their way over chain link; Kenshin trusted they would see the danger was over. He took one of Williams' wrists to check pulse and chi, then the other. "Stay still."
Williams shivered. "H-himura...?"
"Yes." Kenshin smiled, letting the hitokiri's fury settle back into the rurouni's calm. "You worried me, Sergeant."
"He worried you?" Dr. Fraiser went to one knee in a rustle of white cotton. "Stay with us, Sergeant, you're in shock. Not to mention your histamine levels are probably through the floor... just hang on, I'm going to get you help."
"St. Gwinifred's would be best," Kenshin informed her as she started to dial. "There are those on staff who will recognize such injuries."
"Air Force hospital would be better."
O'Neill. Such sharp, brittle edges to the man's chi. Hard to sense past them to the rough warmth Daniel trusted. "Not," Kenshin said evenly, "For Williams. Nor for the others the gaki fed on, who are even now scattered across this city, attempting to piece together what fragments of their selves they have lost." He rose, locking violet on hard brown. "This secret no longer dwells in your shadows, Colonel."
You have lost.
Kenshin felt the unspoken words echo between them. O'Neill's gaze dug at his, defiant, challenging, as so many warriors had challenged over the decades....
And violet eyes acknowledged that challenge, and let it flow away like running water.
You have lost.
O'Neill drew in a sharp breath. "You," he bit out. "You're coming with me."
Kenshin inclined his head. Accepted the snarling paper box Kaoru pressed into his hands, even as she brushed comforting fingers along his arm. "That I will."
---------------
A/N: Omoroca (sometimes thought to be another name for Tiamat) is mentioned in the Stargate episode "Fire and Water". Tiamat as queen of dragons was associated with earthquakes as well as the abyss of the sea.
11-80 - Accident, major injury.
B.O.L.O. - Be on the lookout.
Translations from Japanese:
Che - Damn.
K'so - Damn it. (Stronger version.)
Gaki - "Hungry ghost". Sometimes takes the form of a cloud of smoke or ball of flames.
'Kaa-san - Mother.
Shinai - bamboo practice sword.
Rurouni - "wanderer, vagabond". (Nobuhiro Watsuki made this word up. So it goes.)
Hitokiri - man-slicer, assassin.
Hitokiri Battousai - legendary assassin of the Ishin Shishi; a.k.a. Himura Kenshin.
Ryuu Mei San - (Screaming Dragon Flash or Scream of the Dragon that Deafens): Use enhanced speed to quickly sheathe the sword, causing a sound that distorts the hearing of those with enhanced senses.
Houshi - priest.
Karyuu - a very small red dragon (only 7' long, as opposed to the usual 40' or 100'), associated with flame.
Kirei na kaori - Beautiful fragrance.
Ofuda - paper talismans.
Miko - Shrine maiden.
Oni - Ogre.
Battoujutsu - a.k.a. "iai" or "nuki"; press blade's edge against the inside of the sheath, draw the sword quickly to increase the speed of the swing two to three times normal, striking before the opponent can react.