Well, here we are again. After a nearly three year absence, I decided I owe it to all the reviewers who read this story to finish it. This chapter and one more. Then we're done!

I haven't ever stopped writing, but I did stop with Speed for a while in pursuit of more academic endeavours. I am working on a novel that should hopefully be finished within a year, and that takes up a lot of my free time! Due to this, I feel my writing has improved somewhat since the beginning of this story. I may redo the entire thing to make it better, who knows? At any rate, please enjoy the final chapters. Please Review!

Chapter 10: Bullets Fired

Trixie sat in the cockpit of her helicopter, knowing perfectly well that she should have already entered the building, knowing that every moment she wasted here was another moment Speed was in danger, knowing every second she sat still was another moment that madman was loose, and yet, she had to use all her willpower to bring her white-knuckled hands to rest in her lap, and let go of the two-way radio, her only lifeline. Daring a glance out the side window of her helicopter, she noted immediately the door that the Inspector had told her about. She ticked off her instructions in her head. Go down the stairs, to the right there's a hallway, second door on the left, second door on the left, second door… With a sudden burst of determination, she shoved the door open and slid out of the seat, securing her radio to her belt and then creeping slowly to the door.

It was narrower than she had expected, rising from the roof like a long, colorless finger, with a long, silver handle that gleamed at her like a barrel of a gun. Poetic, she thought bitterly as she reached for it. It was cold and locked. She cursed, an unusual behavior she must have picked up somewhere. She snatched a pin from her hair and rammed it into the key lock. If Speed could teach her how to hotwire a car, she could certainly figure out how to get through this one obstacle. It did not bode well for her if she could not make it through the preliminary round of this cat-and-mouse chase that Jarrett had set for her, however unknowingly. With a protesting squeak, the lock clicked, and Trixie found herself looking down a long and extremely dark stairway. She paused a moment, but one heartbeat later, an image of Speed smiling at her made her set her shoulders and plunge downward.

It was cold, so cold that it almost matched the feeling in her heart. Almost. She considered taking her shoes off; against the steep cement stairs they thudded and the sound echoed all around her until it died away in the abyss before her, but decided against it. If push came to shove with Jarrett, she'd rather not be incapable of flight. She had to feel the step in front of her, since these stairs obviously hadn't been used in quite some time. Dead people obviously had no need to see the sunlight on the roof, and she couldn't imagine any of the morgue caretakers having any uses for it.

She took one more step, prepared to take one more step, and stumbled a bit when her other foot stayed on the same plane, signaling a definite end to the stairs. Turning her head to the right, she noted light coming from what appeared to be a closed door…the second door on the left…

Speed couldn't open his eyes. Comprehension was nill, and there was a strange taste in his mouth. He ran his tongue over his lips and groaned with the effort as he tried to open his eyes again, to no avail. A hand on his forehead swept away the loose strands of hair that brushed his eyelashes annoyingly. He lay quiet for a while, content to stay in this half-dreaming state. A voice murmured to him, but he ignored it for the most part, and quietly slipped back into his slumber.

The next time he came into wakefulness, his eyes snapped open immediately, and there was a sense of panic so thick it almost made him choke. He couldn't move, however, only enough to turn his head weakly to stare at the person whose presence had become suddenly apparent. His memory returned immediately.

"Good morning!" Jarrett smiled cheerfully. His hand caressed a gun, tracing the trigger in a lethal manner that belied his current expression.

"Get away from me." Speed demanded, infuriated that his voice carried less power than he had hoped. It sounded weak to his ears.

"Oh, don't be like that, baby." Jarrett smiled and rose to his feet, stuffing the gun in his back pocket casually, before turning to look down on his biological son with a tenderly maniacal grin. He watched Speed struggle for a while, rise to his elbows then fall, then rise and fall again before he added, "It will be easier if you just lay still. Better yet if you just go back to sleep."

"Forget it, freak." Speed growled, pleased that his strength seemed to be returning, albeit bit by bit. "You can just forget it."

"Now, now, that's no way to talk to someone who has risked so much to bring you home, now is it?" Jarrett, not daunted in the least by his son's protestations, knelt back down, tracing one finger beneath Speed's jaw, before slipping one arm about his shoulders, lifting him half to his feet. Speed's first inclination was to push the man away, but knew that if he did so, he would be in the same position as before, flat on his back on the floor, helpless to move. No, he would bide his time. Jarrett gently set him down in a small, cold chair, and stepped back to watch him with a bemused expression. Speed sunk downward, exhausted.

"Why don't you just shoot me and be done with it?" He said, glaring up at the man who could have passed for his older brother. Speed met his biological father's eyes for a moment, but something in them forced him to look away. He roved his eyes over the rest of the morgue, and the two new bodies that were strewn about the floor. He felt his heart freeze as he looked closely at the wide-eyed look of surprise that was frozen on the small boy's face.

"Regrettable, I know." Jarrett chirped, pausing as though he remembered something suddenly, then crossed to the older man that lay in a pool of crimson, reaching under the corpse and retrieving a second gun. He wiped it off on the corner of the man's jacket before stuffing that gun into his back pocket with the first. "But, that's a small price for any father to pay." He planted his arms across his chest casually, like an artist examining his masterpiece.

"You're not my father."

The corner of Jarrett's mouth twitched. "You're still tired, baby." Jarrett said firmly, after an undecided pause. Speed glared back at him. "And besides, if I'm not your father, then it would seem you don't have one, doesn't it?"

"I do have a father." Speed broke in, glad for the sudden rush of adrenaline that pushed aside whatever drug had been (or seemed to have been) invading every fiber of his being.

"I suppose you're referring to that idiot outside." Jarrett plopped himself down on the floor, resting on his palms, that infuriatingly innocent smile still plastered to his face. "I already told you. He's no more your father than that thing is." Jarrett indicated the corpse on the floor with a jerk of his head.

"And the man who I didn't even know existed, you think you're my father?" Speed scoffed, surprised at his own courage in the face of what was obviously a life or death situation.

"Biology can prove it. Science speaks in absolutes, and last time I checked, it said you were my son. And so you are. I would love to carry on this conversation with you, but I fear we must cut it short. It would seem we have a guest." As he spoke, he crossed to the silent doorframe. He put a finger to his lips and indicated the doorknob that twisted slowly, side to side, fighting against the lock. With a diabolical grin, that could have been playful had it come from more innocent lips, Jarrett released the clasp on the door and stepped back quickly. It was a moment before the knob twisted again, this time pushing open and revealing a very, very familiar form.

"No!" Speed cried, wrenching his eyes away from Trixie to watch Jarrett clench her wrist in his own, wrap one arm securely around her and force her against the wall. She cried out as her back slammed against the unforgiving brick.

"What do you think you're doing?" Jarrett barked in her ear. He wasn't keeping up his masquerade of a jovial father any longer. Trixie shuddered. He was so close she could feel his every exhaling breath warm against her neck. "I should kill you now and be done with it!"

"Get your hands off her!" Jarrett had just enough time to glance over his shoulder before he went down in a torrent of pain and blood. Sprawled across the floor, his nose pouring crimson and his mouth throbbing, Jarrett realized for the first time, that Aurin might really mean what he said about not being his son.

Trixie half-fell into Speed's outstretched arms, and he crushed her against him, burying his face in her hair. "That was quite the punch." She whispered after a moment, only to break the silence.

"Yeah." He sagged against her a little, his sudden burst of activity draining, but before she could ask any further, there was a noise behind them.

It was a dull, metallic click that snapped them back to reality. Jarrett stood with a pistol in each hand, his eyes now mad beyond recognition, lit from within with insanity. "You hit me." Anger flared in his gut, and the urge to pull the trigger was almost uncontrollable.

"Let her go." Speed ignored Trixie's protest. "Keep me, but let her go."

"I won't do that." The affectionate 'baby' suffix was gone now.

"You and me. We'll get a car from the police. You have me as a hostage, they'll give you what you want. You and me, we'll go. Out of town. Out of Japan, if you want to, I don't care. I'll be your son. I'll be whatever it is you want me to be. But let her go first."

Jarret tsked, raising both pistols up a little higher. "I know that's not what you really want. You don't want anything to do with me. If you don't want me to have you, I suppose I won't force the issue." He smiled, but it was emotionless, not angry, or sad, or joyful. "But if that's the case, I'll make sure that nobody else ever has you."

Two triggers were pulled.