If you really need to read the disclaimer again, then refer back to the first ten chapters.
Ch.18
"SEEEEEEEEEETH!" Yami cried at the sight of her boyfriend. Both he and Christian were chained to the far wall. The tattered remains of their close clung to their body, but it did nothing to hide the bloody injuries that littered their bodies. Both of them seemed to be unconscious.
"Wha…how could…why" Jamie was at a loss for what to say, as was everyone else as the scene before them burned into their eyes.
"Well, I figured if you were going to come here to save them then I should give you some more incentive. Nothing brings out power like anger." Korran answered from his spot lounging in the corner. "And it seems to have brought out some traitors too." Shaylan and Erik took a step back as his eyes locked directly on to them. "Not that I'm surprised," he laughed. "I figured you would eventually try to rebel against me, and if these kids escaped it would do nothing but encourage you."
"It's high time we refused to bend to your whim," Erik softly spoke.
"But none of that matters to me right now." He sighed. "I'll deal with the traitors once everything else is settled."
Yusuke was at his limit of patients with this demon. "I've had just about enough of your shit," he yelled before charging. He slammed into Korran pinned the demon to the wall by his throat.
"I don't think you want to hurt me," Korran gasped between his teeth.
"Well I think I do," Yusuke spat.
"No," Korran struggled around his restricted windpipe. Using one of his hands he reached into a pocket and pulled out a remote. Mike had been right; he had had more than one. "Unless you really want me to kill those two." Yusuke hesitated and slackened his grip. After coughing a couple of times to clear his abused throat Korran continued.
"I literally hold those two's lives in my hand. Unless you want them to die then release me." Yusuke grudgingly did as he was instructed. However as he stepped away from the other man he failed to see Korran's hand flinch until it was too late to react. The end of the remote turned into something of a phasor except this seemed to lock onto spirit energy and electrify it, similar to the pulses in the collars he had used to keep the humans in line, except it was at a much higher voltage. Yusuke could not help it, he screamed as the electric waves pulsed through him. At the same time that Korran slammed the phasor-remote into Yusuke's side, a couple of humanoid looking robots appeared at the demon's side. Korran did not let up until Yusuke was on his knees.
"Now that he's been taken care of, capture the rest of them." The last part of Korran's statement was meant as a command to the robots at his side, but they did not respond. "What's wrong I gave you an order!" he shouted. At this the robots did move, not towards the group as they had been instructed but instead rounded on him, two of them each grabbing one of his arms and holding him in place. "What the-," but it did not take long for him to figure out what had happened. "You!" his eyes locked right on Jessica. The whole group turned to the girl.
"Jessica?"
"You know, those robots have a mind set pretty close to the ones you were using to train me," she answered. "It took almost no effort to lock on and control them." Korran was shocked. He had not realized that she had become so versatile with her power. To improvise and adapt her power to a situation that she had not been exposed to was beyond where he had speculated her to be. This could turn out badly if he had miscalculated on every one.
"And this is where I step in," Jordan stated. She moved so that she was standing next to the restrained demon and placed a hand over his heart before turning to the rest of her friends. "How far should I go?" she asked.
"Make him so weak that he can barely breathe," Stephanie responded in a cheery voice. She got nothing but whole hearted consents from the rest of the group. Well, except the Reiki Tantei who really had no idea what any of them meant.
"You want to explain what you all are talking about?" Yusuke asked the nearest person next to him, Erika.
"Well, let see, how should I put this? Jessica has the power to manipulate minds so at the moment she has control aver Korran's robot minions sense, in essence, they have minds." At this point it was mandatory for Erika to take a breath before continuing. Jordan has the energy to gather energy from her opponents, or in other words suck it out of other people and store it within herself. I'm assuming that with training she could eventually learn to give that energy to others, but at the moment she can't do that." Yusuke, and the rest of the Reiki Tantei had, up till this point been listening to her explanation in awe, and were only now remembering that it was polite to close their mouths.
"Your powers are just getting more and more impressive!" Botan exclaimed.
"I agree," Yusuke nodded. "I have to see I'd like to the capabilities of the rest of you."
"Yes, so would I," Kurama agreed half heartedly as he cast a worried glance at his lover.
"I'm finished!" Jordan called out, snapping the group out of their conversation. They looked to see one sorry sight huddled on the ground. The robots had released Korran and the demon was crumpled on the ground, and just as she had been instructed, even the simple task of breathing seemed a strenuous task.
"It definitely serves him right," Mike commented in a surprisingly quiet voice.
"Yes," Jordan agreed with a smile on her face. She had her back turned to her previous victim so she did not notice him move until he was upon her. Korran lunged to wrap one hand around her throat and the other to pin her hands behind her back.
"What?" Jordan gasped. "You shouldn't even be able to move." A quiet, menacing laugh issued from Korans throat that turned them selves into words.
"You forget I created you, which means I have some amount of immunity to your powers. It's true you did weaken me, but as you can see, it did not have quite the intended response. I can recover from any injury you inflict on me rather quickly." Once his monologue was finished Korran wasted no time to, out of seemingly nowhere, produce a threatening looking syringe and inject it into the girl's neck. Jordan immediately crumpled, she had fainted dead away. Once she landed on the floor Korran kicked her like a soccer ball and sent her skidding across the floor to come to a halt at her friends' feet.
"Jordan!" they coursed in unison.
"Don't even try to wake her up," Korran sneered as he watched one of the girls shake her. "She won't be waking up for a good five hours."
"Bastard!" Mike shouted as he stood up.
"Aw, your mad," Korran cooed. "Lets bring in something to keep you occupied," and at his command an entire horde of low class demons appeared in the room. Just like the seen at the field and latter in the valley.
"Doesn't this guy have any new ideas," Yusuke wined. He was getting sick of being faced by the same problem. "Travis, can you take care of them?" Yusuke asked the boy.
"There's no need," Mike growled as his body began to glow. When the light vanished he was left standing there only this time with blue tipped spikes, and demon markings. "This guy has pissed me off way too much. I'll take care of this," and in a blur that looked strangely like the Tasmanian Devil, Mike took off into the thick of the demons, tearing into them like they were paper.
"Um…" was as far as Yusuke managed to get in his question while vaguely motioning in Mike's direction.
"Berserker," Sam answered simply.
"Oh," Yusuke breathed before going back to watching Mike's performance. In the short time it had taken him to ask a question Mike had decimated more than two thirds of the opposing demons.
"And that's that," Mike exclaimed a moment latter, when all of his enemies were destroyed. "Thank god for misguided anger. 'Cause it kicks ass!" He was getting a little too excited about such a small victory.
"Hey Mike," Travis called. "Watch out, your head is swelling."
"Shut up!" Mike shot back. "You just hate me 'cause I'm beautiful," he swooned with an over exaggerated hair flip.
"Yeah Mike, the blue really brings out your eyes," Aryn called.
"Hn?" Mike looked down at himself and noticed the demon marking. "Oh," he rubbed his head sheepishly as he returned to the group. "Thought I'd start a new fashion statement."
"Yeah, yeah Mike," Elizabeth scoffed. "Why don't you put that spiky head of yours to use and help us find a way to rescue those two?"
"You still believe you can save your friends," Korran called. In the chaos of Mike's battle, the demon had slunk to the safest, and furthest away, spot on the opposite wall. Yet still his banter was threatening. "You forget that in the end I'm still your master."
He was panicked. No, not panicked, concerned. He hadn't realized the full extent to which his subjects had developed. By his calculations there bodies should still be under the stress of trying to adapt to their new power. For some reason they seemed to have completely, physically accepted it, and there was no way they could have managed to accomplish that so quickly. At this point there minds should almost have shut down with the stress of trying to cope. So what was giving them so much power, so much…confidence. That was it that was the answer to the question.
"Oh, I see we're a bunch of sneaky little rats, aren't we Sam. I will say that I'm impresses." Through his whole speech Korran had kept his eyes on the ground. Now he raised them to savor the baffled expressions of the group before him. All except Sam that is.
"I had to do something," she shrugged. At this point it did not seem physically possible for the rest of the groups confusion to get any worse, and sense no answers were forthcoming it was driving Yusuke crazy.
"Would someone please tell me what is going on! I've spent most of this mission wondering around blindly and I can't take it anymore! I think we all deserve some answers here!" Yusuke shouted, the confusion finally getting to him.
Korran sighed before giving the boy an answer. "Why must the thrill of suspension always be ruined? Alright here's the deal. By my calculations all of you should have collapsed by now from the strain on your bodies from trying to adapt to your new powers. However as you can see that is not the case. At first this baffled me, but I seem to have finally figured out this annoying little quirk. This girl," he pointed to Sam, "Has been feeding you all a constant flow of confidence and power. You're lucky that her own powers are not as much of a strain on her or she would have fallen unconscious a long time ago."
"Is what he's saying the truth?" Erika asked Sam. The girl nodded in response.
"Like I said, I had to do something. I could feel you all getting weaker and weaker so I decided to try and do something about it. Apparently it worked."
"Right and what do you do?" Kuwabara asked in his regular rude strait to the point manor.
"I'm an Empath," she smiled at him.
"Wow those are rare," Botan gasped.
"Um could we stick to the problem at hand? Like the crazy demon scientist that could, possible kill us," Yusuke growled, although there was no menace in his voice.
"Yes, let's do stick to the problem at hand." The small laugh at the end of his sentence went unnoticed by all but himself. In the short time that the conversation had taken place Korran had thought up the best plan to get his test subjects back. True it was a bit extreme, but as they say, desperate times call for desperate measures.
Relying once more on his trusty remote Korran called numerous cylinders of what looked like gold glowing light to drop from the ceiling. They feel strategically so that each one captured one person, separating that person from the others. Each of them was captured this way until all were isolated. All except Jordan, that is. The girl's form stayed safe in its slouched over position by the wall right where she had been placed.
"The only way I can overcome you is individually it seems," Korran mused to himself. A keyboard appeared literally out of nowhere, seeming to form out of the wall, off to Korran's right and he walked to over to it to begin furiously typing on it. Whatever it was that he was preparing to do, only one thing was certain. It would not be good for any of them.
What can I do? Yami thought. There must be something. As she peered up at the dull gray ceiling above her the glimmer of a brilliant plan started to form. This left her with two options. Either wait and plan it out more, or act now and hope it works. Well, planning has never really been my strong point she thought as she pointed her index finger straight up.
No one felt the power charge, not even Korran, but the defining crash defiantly caught everyone's attention. Everyone looked towards the source of the sound just in time to see a mountain of grey stone topple on top of Yami. All of them were too shocked to speak.
She can't…she can't be…she just can't, Jamie's mind sputtered around incoherently until movement amongst the rubble caught her eye. Yami was managing to claw her way to the top of the pile. It took her a few moments to successfully remove herself, but once she did she sat top of the rubble like king of the mountain and started laughing.
"I knew something was going to go wrong," she yelled.
"You want to explain what just happened?" Aryn called to her.
"A half assed job at trying to escape," Yami answered. "Although it apparently wasn't all in vain," she added after looking up at the well sized hole in the ceiling. There was, unmistakably a two square foot gap between the edge of the barrier and the ceiling, just enough room for a person to squeeze through. "Now the question is how the hell do I get up there?"
There was a whooshing sound as something suddenly came careening from the sky. Yami managed to scurry out of the way just as it slammed into the ground and all could see a large pie sitting on the uneven ground.
"Sorry," Elizabeth called. "I don't really have that much control over it." Yami stared at the pie for a moment before looking back at her friend.
"Well don't stop. If you can get me out of here then keep going." Elizabeth nodded before her eyes glazed over. Another pie fell from no where followed by another and another. They kept coming; Yami was pushed to the far side of her enclosure as the pastries stacked themselves into a form that somewhat resembled a staircase. Pie after pie was stacked on top of each other leading all the way up to the opening at the top. "Umm…, that doesn't look all too safe." Yami commented as she eyed the escape rout wearily.
"Don't worry, it will work," Elizabeth coaxed. So, putting all faith in her friends abilities Yami began to climb. It was odd, to say the least. The pies under her feet jostled and shifted with each step, and they were squishy. Putting your foot through a pie is not a pleasant experience and this situation was no exception. She managed to scramble her way to the top but there she hit a problem. There was no way down from the top. The stack behind her started to wiggle and just as they had fallen into place they began to soar again and restack themselves on the other side of the barrier. Yami just barely managed to keep herself up by balancing on the top edge of the barrier and hold onto the crumbling remains of the ceiling that was in reach. Once there was a stable pile in front of her she began her decent in the same fashion as she had ascended. It only took a few more moments for her pie encrusted feet to be placed firmly on the ground.
"I can't believe that worked," Yami breathed in relief.
"I swear!" Yusuke shouted, gaining everyone's attention. "If I have to ask someone what's going on one more time I'm seriously going to kill myself."
Yami turned to him with sparkling eyes. "Ok, here I'll show you." She aimed her pointer finger at the top of Travis' enclosure. "Travis, duck and cover," she yelled. He did so and she fired. As expected the ceiling exploded and crumbled leaving a gap for escape. Travis, like Yami climbed out of the rubble unharmed.
"Whoa, she's got my spirit gun!" Yusuke exclaimed. Yami turned back to face him and blew on the top of her finger like the corny move in an old cowboy film.
"Actually it's Ki," she corrected.
"Umm…." Yusuke sweatdropped. "Riiiight."
"It's the same basic concept as the spirit gun," Kurama explained. "Only it's weaker and more versatile."
"Alright well that explains one," Kuwabara called. "What about the other one."
"Uhhh…." The whole group of humans chorused.
"That one's rather hard to explain," Sam put in.
"I guess the best way to explain it is that I control the improbable," Elizabeth said. She figured she would need to go into a more detailed explanation from the incomprehensive looks she was receiving from the Reiki Tantei. "Well, the more unlikely something is to happen the easier I can make it happen. Like the pie. It's almost impossible for something like that to occur, so it was really easy for me."
Yusuke gawked at her. "You mean you can make anything happen. That can come in handy."
"Well yeah, but because it's random I don't really have much control over it. I can give basic commands like make an escape route, but I can't really tell what acctualy is going to ensue. It's actually kinda scary."
"But you can get us out of here right," Botan piped up. Elizabeth just nodded.
"Well, come on don't stop now," Mike called. So things continued in the same fashion. One by one Yami shot down the ceiling above the barriers, by some miracle no one was hurt, and Elizabeth would give them a way out. Travis was the next one out. He was given a mountain of rubber ducks to scale. It was a rather noise escape sense every time he stepped on a duck it squeaked. Jamie was given a tower of cheese, and made her way to the top by scampering through them like a maze.
"I feel like a mouse," she called as she waited at the top for the cheese to form on the other side. Once it was formed she slid down the holes like a tube slide, landing safely on the ground. Aryn was in no need help from Elizabeth once she was given an opening, she could just jump through it, as could all of the Reiki Tantei except Kuwabara who was given a staircase of marshmallows to climb, and Botan flew through on her ore. Erika climbed over a bunch of lunch room tables stacked on top of each other and Stephanie was similar except they were lay-z-boy couches. Giant sized logos were formed into a stair for Sam, and Jessica was given a way out by, oddly enough, a flock of purple flamingoes; each one positioning its feathered body in just the right way so that Jessica could easily walk up them. At first she had been scared that she would hurt the birds by stepping on them but found them to actually be quite stable. Once at the top all she had to do was wait for the purple cloud of birds to soar over her and reform themselves for her decent. Once she was out all that was left were Kuwabara and Elizabeth herself.
"Come on Kuwabara, climb up," Yusuke called. The tall carrot top was faced with long wriggling vines creeping down the side of the barrier that held him as his way out. He did not trust the plant and eyed it warily.
"Are you sure about this," Kuwabara called back.
"Kurama is here, what could those plants do to you?" Yusuke responded.
As Kuwabara began his struggle up the wall of vines Kurama leaned over and whispered to Yusuke. "Maybe this wouldn't be a good time to mention that I have no control over those plants." Yusuke just smirked at the news.
"Yeah, I figured as much," he whispered in response but if it'll get him going then I'm willing to lie to him.
Once Kuwabara was safely on the outside Elizabeth focused on making her own escape rout. It only took a moment of concentration, but so far she was only able to create one thing at a time. She was eventually given a pile of Kudoneko-sama plushies to scale. After a brief moment of struggling and climbing she found herself safely outside with the others. As soon as enough people had been freed they had begun to work on getting Seth and Cristian down. By the time Elizabeth joined them the two unconscious victims had been freed and propped against the wall next to Jordan.
"So can we, like, wake them up or something?" Kuwabara asked.
"Yes," Kurama answered him after standing up from checking over the three. "There symptoms should be easy enough to cure." He placed a seen on the hard floor and it instantly began to bloom. The dense floor was too hard for the roots to penetrate so they just writhed around uselessly on the surface. Once the plant finished sprouting it looked like a tall green straw was sticking up from the ground with something like an exploded white and yellow tulip at its tip. Kurama plucked a rather large pit from the flower and crushed it in his hand before blowing it over the unconscious humans. No more than five minuets latter the three were standing and completely unharmed, if not a little groggy and confused.
"Hey, what happened to Korran?" Aryn asked once she knew her friends were ok. In all the confusion no one had noticed his disappearance until now.
"Oh, that bastard ran off at the sound of Yami's first explosion," Yusuke answered her. "I think he's running out of ticks. Now I don't know about you but this is all starting to get really tiring. What do you say we wrap this up?" The rest of the group whole heartedly agreed with him. Now that the whole group was back together they confidently made their way to the only other exit in the room.
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