Disclaimer: Blah blah. Not mine!
Chapter Twelve: The Dark Side
3:20 pm
Bianca felt the chill up her spine before she felt the claws.
She threw herself forward without thinking, hearing the spined claws snag ever so slightly on the leather of her uniform before she tucked into a roll. A metallic clang sounded to her left, the displaced air around the blade ruffling the edges of her hair, staying only long enough for Bianca to registered it as a flash of dark silver before she conjured up two athame and attempted to staple her assailant's feet to the floor. She wasn't quite successful but it had a desirable effect, the man jumped back, giving her enough room to breath and survey the situation.
She whipped around to see Rubiec standing back, a dark blade in his hand, satisfied smile on his jagged, twisted face, looking happy to start the fight again. Bianca gathered herself for another attack, flipping an athame over in her palm, the demon reciprocated the challenge with a twist of his own blade... and then her line of sight was broken.
"What," Wyatt stood between them, back to Bianca, the set of his shoulders screaming rage, "are you doing?"
Bianca almost dropped her stance for a moment, amazed at the dark emphasis in Wyatt's words. Every demon in the room had frozen in their spots, the lucky ones who were close enough to doors, had slunk out as soon as the fight had started. In that moment, she almost forgot Wyatt wasn't some kind of paragon of all evil, and it scared her.
"This was the deal," Rubiec's voice was raw grit, like someone had rolled burning coals in there and never quite allowed it to heal, "I join you, I get to do whatever I want with the Phoenixes when they defect."
Cold seeped into her gut, mind flashing back through everything she'd said and done in the past half hour, trying to find where she'd given herself away or if she even had.
"She hasn't defected." Wyatt shot back, hand wordlessly placed on Excalibur's hilt. Bianca pushed back and off to his side, eyes shouting dares at Rubiec. The demon looked at her in disgust.
"You really believe that?" He deadpanned, "I warned you, it's in their nature. Phoenixes are incapable of loyalty, I've experienced it personally." He gestured shortly at his own scarred face and suddenly Bianca felt very fond of her family. Then he kept talking. The demon's clawed finger pointed at her, "That whore is sleeping with Christopher. She's turned to his side, been hiding all his work against you these past years, all the while feeding him information. She's the one that helped him steal The Book yesterday. That's why she couldn't kill him."
'Oh crap...' Bianca thought, grip tightening reflexively on her athame. The room was utter silence, Wyatt's shoulders still a tense square. Bianca could feel eyes on her from all over, could feel the intent. The silence continued for several devastating moments, until the clear ring of Excalibur coming to life broke it. In the next second Bianca felt the sharp scratch of Excalibur's blade at her throat, she didn't even try to dodge.
"Leave," Wyatt growled at everyone and no one, looking around only when he didn't hear that they were following orders, "now!"
Nearly the entire room shimmered out, leaving only Bianca and Rubiec standing on either side of him. If Rubiec looked murderous before, he now looked genocidal.
"We had a deal, Halliwell."
"I've altered the deal," Wyatt turned a dark look on the demon, "Do you want to make it worse?"
Rubiec's shimmers were the color of his anger: red, black, and exuding a feeling of unease Bianca could feel in her bones. Only when the room had cleared, Wyatt's eyes casting around like they did when he was sensing, and then another good few seconds for good measure did Wyatt sag where he stood, bending over to put his hands on his knees and suck in several breaths.
Bianca let her athame disappear and gave him an encouraging pat on the shoulder.
Wyatt looked up at her, relieved grin on his face, "I was this close to full on quoting Darth Vader. This close!"
"That was what you were doing? You were channeling Darth Vader?" Bianca pressed a hand to her temple.
"Hey, a little appreciation please?" Wyatt stood up, restashing Excalibur into the side of his belt, "It worked, didn't it? Nothing beats the classics."
Bianca just returned that with a roll of her eyes, "So... now what? We're blown, they're expecting me dead or worse and there's no way they'd believe that I got away from you."
"First off, you're not going to," Wyatt shrugged and gestured at the floor, where a disturbingly perfect copy of Bianca faded into existence, all accurate other than the fact that this version didn't move and looked like she'd taken Excalibur straight through the heart.
"Oh that's weird..." Bianca stared down at her dead self before shrugging it off, "But appropriate."
"Yeah," Wyatt agreed, though he didn't seem to like it. "Second...You need to go find Chris. The way he and Mom were talking before, he knew something about all this. Maybe he'll know how to fix it."
As much as Bianca really wanted to just run and leave the more obnoxious half of the Halliwell brothers to his own devices, she was surprised to find she was genuinely worried for Wyatt. She didn't say as much, wouldn't want it to go to the boy's head of course, so she just pinched her lips together and stalled. Wyatt too, seemed mildly surprised she hadn't shimmered out as soon as he'd offered the escape, but he had enough tact not to bring it up.
"And what will you do?" Bianca asked cautiously.
Wyatt shrugged, "Continue channeling the dark side?" He tossed a look over at the incomplete sigil on the floor, "and do as much as I can to keep the giant death laser from becoming fully functional."
"I seriously doubt it's a laser..." Bianca mumbled.
"Hey. Lay off my metaphor," Wyatt puffed out his chest, "It's my evil triquetra, I can call it whatever I want."
"If I hear something that sounds like millions of voices crying out in terror and getting suddenly silenced, I'll know we're doomed." Bianca drawled out the words in thick sarcasm, but they didn't have her usual bite. She allowed herself a half smile, arms crossed around her rib cage, before she looked up at Wyatt again, attempting to be serious for a moment, "Those demon powers. Remember what I said about them. Try not to let them get the better of you..."
Wyatt returned the smile, feeling like it was some kind of peace treaty. "There is no try, only d-"
"Oh shut up." Bianca punched him in the arm and shimmered out, out of range of Wyatt's senses in less than a second. Abruptly he was standing in the giant room, the silence encroaching in on him, and he felt very, very, alone.
3:30 pm
It turns out that, when looking down the business end of a Russian rifle held by a Valkyrie, people don't try to stop you from leaving. It was one thing Chris couldn't complain about, though the constant burn of eyes on his back and a still bleeding head wound did dull the achievement somewhat. He swiped again at the thin trail of blood, mostly harmless, but highly irritating as it kept creeping down the side of his face.
When he'd been in that... dream... pocket dimension... or some corner of the overworld, he'd just assumed that it had worked like a vision and he'd just wake back up where he stood in the tunnels. He hadn't expected to lose any time or he would have cut that meeting far shorter, but evidently, she'd needed him to be unconscious. It sure seemed like she was just waiting for it to happen... if she didn't orchestrate it herself.
It didn't matter, the plan hadn't changed. If the Source wanted a hand in this game, she'd have to wait in line until he'd exhausted every trick in his book.
The four of them, Chris, Leo, Freja, and another Valkyrie Chris thought was named Katarjyna, rounded the last corner before the straight shoot to the surface, passing another side hallway where a dozen faces peeked out at them. Chris kept his eyes strictly forward, not wanting to see anything more than the shadowy detail they were in now. Not wanting to see their angry expressions...
Even with all the memories he'd sorted through so far, it was amazing how many kept filtering in, wrapped in all sorts of dangerous, distracting emotions. Guilt, mostly. Despite popular opinion, he didn't like lying, especially to people he cared for, and the people in these tunnels, he had liked at one point, even with the peripheral memories he had at the moment, he knew that. If he let himself look at them, it would get so much worse.
So Chris dug back into his mind for an old mantra, the one that had kept him going for so long. 'You had no choice.' It covered the guilt like a dusty moth eaten blanket, not really all that effective but it dulled the sensation nonetheless.
"You alright?" Leo asked in a low voice, coming up as far next to him as he could without bumping into the side of the narrow hallway. Chris looked over at him cautiously, the presence of the Valkyrie seeming all the more sharp at that moment. It was something they'd never really ironed out back then, after his identity was out in the open, the whole... Valhalla thing was the one topic Chris pointedly kept off the discussion table hoping it would just... go away. He'd never anticipated a face to face meeting like this.
"Yeah," He answered slowly, even as he swiped at the trickle of blood again, "What about you?"
Leo gave him a look that was one of his rare bouts of annoyance, "Yeah, I'm good. They seemed to be to concentrated on you than me..."
"They're doing what they think's best." Chris defended automatically, before shrugging, "They're wrong, of course, but it's their choice."
"That's really... diplomatic of you." Leo said, eyebrows raised. Chris kept from rolling his eyes at that. Diplomatic was Leo's keyword for 'Sounding like a Whitelighter' a phrase Chris had been railing against his whole life. Though now that he thought about it with his old memories available again, it made a lot more sense why he'd always done his dire best to keep himself as far removed from the Elders as possible. Something like that couldn't be scrubbed from your instincts by just getting rid of memories.
"Chris?" Leo prodded, a little worried at the lack of annoyed comeback.
"Hm? Oh. Sorry, just... with these old memories, things are making more sense now. Like why I think Elders are all assholes."
Leo's eyebrows shot up, restraining himself from chiding his son for disrespect. Chris caught it anyway.
"They can't hear us anyway. They bunkered down years ago. Locked up and left us all to fend for ourselves." Chris shrugged, used to the feeling now. Leo frowned sadly, eyes unfocused.
"Yeah, I noticed that..." Leo said lowly. Chris watched him, guarded, not quite knowing how his father would deal with all this. Leo's faith in the elders had been rattled over the years, but over all, he still trusted that they knew what was best. The idea that they would close up shop likely wouldn't sit well with him. Chris expected a knee jerk defense for the elders, like the one he'd given for the people who lived in the dead zones, but he didn't get it.
"Chris," He asked seriously, eyes intense, "Did I... Was I one of the Elders who ordered that?"
'Yes' Chris's thoughts answered automatically, but he held them back, "...That wasn't you, Dad."
Leo gave him a sharp smile, showing he appreciated the effort but didn't quite believe it. He shook his head, "No wonder you tossed me into Valhalla the first chance you got."
And there it was, Chris winced on reflex, "Yeah, Uh- sorry about that."
"Don't look so nervous," Leo couldn't help but laugh, "It's not like I can ground you for something you did before you were born... well, at least I wouldn't... we probably shouldn't tell your mother."
Chris silently held up a hand in absolute agreement.
The hallways got wider as they walked, the frequency of the oil lamps spacing out drastically so you could only see a foot or two around at a time, and that was optimistic. Chris reached out to run a hand along the wall, letting his fingers count the carefully carved notches in the wall, measuring the ratio of long lines to short ones. It was their own special code to tell a member of the tunnels how to get around, not quite Morse, but similar enough. Chris consulted his mental map... they had a little time. He just needed a little privacy.
"Katarjyna," Chris looked over his shoulder at the dark haired Valkyrie. She titled her head in answer. She was listening. Kat had never been the chatty type. "Could you fall back and make sure no one is following us?"
Without hesitation, the Valkyrie bowed her head in agreement and let the shadows overtake her, checking the halls behind them on silent feet. Chris had no doubt she already knew if people where following them or not, but she also knew that the request was for a reason, and gave him the space. He saw a flicker of a knowing gaze from Freja and nodded to her. She wordlessly shrugged and turned back to the front.
When Chris finally looked back to Leo, his father's jaw was hanging open.
"How..." Leo look back and forth at the now missing Valkyrie, "Did you just order her?"
"Order is such a strong word..." Chris couldn't help but be amused and shrugged, not exactly at the point of figuring out the relationship himself, "We have an understanding."
Leo didn't accept that as a full answer and Chris sighed and shrugged again.
"Valkyrie are supposed to fight at the end of the world. Ragnarok. This is it." He gestured vaguely at the tunnels and all the chaos above it. "They left Valhalla to fight, looking for an army to join, but at that point the Elders had sealed themselves away, Wyatt was evil, and most of the other witches were dead or turned. I was all that was left, so they found me."
Of course Leo was aware of the protocol for the Valkyrie, but it had never occurred to him that there might be a time when the Elders wouldn't be around for them to report to. They needed a General. Someone to coordinate with, to understand the battle and what was required. Of course, they still had free will, they were allowed to reject the options they were given as the choice was extremely important. Once they'd chosen an outside force to swear allegiance to, they tended to stick with that person until the bitter end.
"Imagine our surprise, Elder," Freja spoke without turning around, "To wait so long for a battle to find you've arrived too late. It was... " She struggled to find the word, turning partially, "horrible. Then we found that, small as it was at the time, there was still a defending force."
Leo took a long second to nod, "I apologize on behalf of the Elders that we could not be here to help you..."
Freja waved a hand, "We do not regret how things have gone. It took us time to find out place, but now that we have, none of us want it any different."
Chris's gaze was distant, once again trying to turn aside stray fragments of memories. When Freja said took Time, it was a massive understatement. None of them respected a thing he had to say and most were outright enraged that they were denied their final battle, but he won them over, one by one. Really, it was just a good thing that Valkyries tended to like abrasive, manipulative, bastards who didn't even try to win them over with diplomacy. He'd also never really claimed to have any leadership over them, he just told them what he'd like to be done and they decided if they trusted him enough to do it.
"Without them, I wouldn't have gotten as far as I did." Chris shook his head.
"And still far to go..." Freja nodded, "You have information."
Chris would never understand how she always knew that, he rolled with it anyway and got back to what he'd originally wanted to talk about. He framed a look at Leo, trying to figure out how to say this in the least pie in the sky, sunday school kind of way... he couldn't find any. "Screw it- Dad, is there a Source of All Good?"
Leo was getting a little tired of having his jaw drop. When this was all over he was going to sit in the Manor and refuse to be surprised by anything for a good week. In the meantime though, Leo narrowed his eyes, "There hasn't been one in a long long time but, technically yes. Though I've never seen him."
"Her." Freja supplied.
"Excuse me?" Leo returned.
"The Source of All Good is a Her." Freja repeated, "You are a young Elder so you would not have met her. She is rather odd..."
"That's an understatement," Chris mumbled, drawing the attention back to him. He sighed. There was some corner of his brain that was hoping she was just some demon trying to trick him. A shapeshifter or something. At least he'd know how to deal with that. But now... He clenched his hand in his pocket, feeling the cord of the triquetra necklace twining around his fingers. "Okay, let me just explain this real quick or I'm never going to get through this..."
3:20 pm
That had gone better than he'd expected. All he'd had to do was tattle tale on the little Phoenix to the scarred demon and all was done. Rubiec was so steeped in his own hatred that the barest hint of indiscretion on the girl's part made him shimmer across the room and attempt to drive a sword through her heart. All he needed was the girl to die and the time line would balance itself out. Those with the wrong set of memories would be replaced with the correct ones, the world would topple into the apocalypse and he'd finally be free.
Of course the Pale Man hadn't been expecting the girl to be competent.
She survived with the help of that damnable boy. The Man had allowed himself a minute to seethe before he realized the plan was still in order. She was going to leave and be all alone... undefended. She may be a good fighter, but The Pale Man knew that she was far from immune to his powers. So he waited for them to be done, watched the shimmers fade away... and followed.
AN:
Hahgeeze the quarter is insane. To all the people who have not gotten replies to the reviews. I VERY much want to still do that, and I will be, it will just be delayed somewhat. Whenever I get a spare moment it's a choice between answer reviews or write more of the fic. I do adore every single one of them though, and each review spurs me to write this a little faster. So, as always tell me what you think, lines you liked, predictions if you feel like gambling, and I will see you as soon as I can. :D
...PS Is the plural of Athame, Athame or Athames... I was totally guessing based on which sounded less dumb.