Hellboy dragged me out of the Troll Market and into the meat locker which disguised the entrance. There he kept that stupid Right Hand of Doom wrapped around my arm while the talking suit interrogated Princess Nuala, who had acknowledged my presence with a glance but offered no word on my behalf.

"Vhy exactly vas zat troll after you?" the suit inquired.

"Why don't we ask Jinxed, here?" Hellboy suggested, hefting me up like a sock monkey again. "How 'bout it, Jinxie?"

All eyes turned to me, but I kept my mouth stubbornly shut. At least, I would've kept it shut if Hellboy hadn't started to apply more pressure to his grip. I had to either spill the beans or suffer a broken arm.

"That!" I blurted out, twisting in the stone vice and pointing to the crown piece on Princess Nuala's belt. "It was for that, now let go! Ow, ow, ow!"

The attention of the group slid away from me, and the Right Hand of Doom relaxed its grip, to my relief.

"To wage his war," Princess Nuala said, removing the crownpiece from her belt, "my brother needs this: the final piece to the Crown of Bethmoora. And this map to the location of the Golden Army." She gestured to the cylinder Abraham, the fish-man, held.

"Zhe Golden Army!" the talking suit gasped in wonderment. "Zhe harbingers of death! Zhe unstoppable tide!"

During this little outburst, Hellboy wandered aside for a moment and stared into space, looking a little weirded out. "Howdy Doody…" he murmured, and his grip slackened on me—though not enough for me to break away.

"Your Highness," the talking suit went on, "if you hand zhe crownpiece over to us—"

The Princess interrupted. "No. Where it goes, I go." She replaced the crownpiece on her belt. "My father died to uphold the truce between our worlds. You must honor his noble intentions."

Seeing my chance, I raised my free hand and declared, "With Mister Wink gone now, I have nowhere else to go. I…hate to admit it, but the once-prince scares me a little. After what he did…after what I helped him do in the council chamber…I don't think I can trust him at all. Therefore, where Princess Nuala goes, I go!" I somehow managed to cross my arms and nodded firmly.

To my surprise, the first one to speak up was Abraham, and he wasn't protesting! He became my instant favorite as he turned to the talking suit, who was obviously the leader of their little team, and implored, "These ladies are in dire need..."

"I take it you're vouching for zhem, Agent Sapien," the suit replied coldly.

"Most emphatically. Yes, I am." He and the Princess exchanged a long look, and all of a sudden I pictured the fish-man with a cherub's arrow wedged firmly in his gills. Ah, young love!

But the talking suit was intent on being a cold-hearted gasbag. "Even so," he said, almost sounding apologetic, "I am sorry, but we simply cannot assume such responsibility on our own!" He began to walk out of the meat locker, but soon realized that all four of us were refusing to follow him.

Hellboy did not seem happy, and his grip began to tighten on my arm again. I was definitely sensing some hostility between him and the suit. "The lady just lost her father," he said. "What more do you want?"

At this the suit stopped short. Turning on his heel, he thrust his fog-filled globe into Hellboy's face and began to rant. "You may not care, but zhere are procedures, rules, and little handbooks zhat—"

Hellboy leaned in close and exhaled a cloud of cigar smoke into the suit's glass face. "They're coming with us," he growled. "You got that, Gas Bag?"

"Wh-what! What did you call me!"

I smelled him before I saw him. The once-prince Nuada had arrived, and I suddenly found myself overcome by a guilty blush. I hoped to the nearest divinity that he hadn't heard what I'd said about not trusting him, because if he ever did get his hands on the third crownpiece I would be treated as a traitor. I would be, in short, so damn screwed.

But I didn't appear to be the object of interest in this confrontation. Instead of calling me to his side, the once-prince barked, "You! You will pay for what happened to my friend down there."

Hellboy immediately dropped his cigar, ground it under his boot and pulled his massive handgun out of its holster. "Yeah?" He replied cheekily, "Ya take checks?"

Nuada scoffed. "Demon…" Wait, was he talking to me or to Hellboy? I assumed the former and wasn't sure whether to cringe behind the motley crew or pretend to be elated. I decided to go with something subdued, something neutral so that I didn't offend whichever party was going to be winning the battle I knew was about to ensue.

"Prince Nuada," I said, taking a half-step forward so as not to appear too eager to be by his side again.

The once-prince ignored me. He'd been talking to Hellboy, apparently, because his full statement was, "Demon, born from a womb of shadows sent to destroy their world, and you still believe you belong?"

That was a little harsh, in my opinion. Hellboy didn't seem fazed, however. He retorted with, "Are we gonna talk all night? 'Cuz I'm really sleepy."

Nuada's lips twitched in the phantom of a smile and he reached into a black velvet pouch at his waist, drawing out from it…

I couldn't believe it!

"No, Brother, no!" Princess Nuala cried desperately, backing away.

It was a God's Cradle! It was in the shape of a gilded egg, but as soon as Nuada held it aloft it began to open with the tinkering sounds of clockwork. Within was a large green seed, filled with the essence of what I knew to be one of the last elemental gods in existence—I knew it was one of the last because I had previously thought they were all extinct!

I began to renew my escape attempts, and finally Hellboy let me go. He probably figured that Nuada didn't exactly care for me, and I didn't exactly care for Nuada, so his plans to use me as leverage were pointless. I backpedaled until I hit the curb, where heavy traffic prevented me from going any further. I stared with a building sense of horror as Nuada took the seed, raised it slowly to his lips, and then my sensitive hearing caught his whispered order: "Kill him."

He tossed the seed forward and I scrambled after it. It had landed on the damp ground, but it needed to immerse itself in water to rekindle the life within its shell. "Oh no," I said through gritted teeth. "No, no, no!" The seed was headed for a storm drain.

"It's just a jumping bean!" Hellboy scoffed, blissfully ignorant of the terrible things that were about to occur.

"It's going for water!" Princess Nuala gasped. She turned to Abraham. "Hurry!"

I could've gotten that seed if the fish-man had just stayed out of my way! I almost had it within my grasp—telekinesis wouldn't work on the vessel of a god, unfortunately—when he came clumsily dancing after it, knocking me out of the way!

Sprawled out on the pavement, my heart began to hammer as I watched Abraham fall to his hands and knees, shouting helplessly after the seed as it plummeted down into the drain.

"You idiot!" I screeched, every alarm bell in my head going off at maximum speed and volume. The sound of my own panic was deafening. "You moron! You stupid, stupid…" I failed to come up with a foul enough word, so I used the first one that came to mind. "You stupid FISH!"

Suddenly the entire block shook, and cars honked their horns as they momentarily swerved out of control. Every vehicle on the road hit its brakes and confused and angry people climbed out to experience the earthquake. A crowd began to approach Hellboy as he walked out into the middle of the street, but men in black suits ushered them away, telling them to stand back.

Never had I claimed to be a brave demon, and though my sense of self-preservation wasn't as fine-tuned as I'd liked it to be I knew it was time to run. I got to my feet and sprinted as fast as demonically possible from that city block before the god awoke.

I didn't get very far before the pavement in front of the Troll Market entrance heaved upward, cars flying everywhere, people panicking, broken glass pricking the pads of my feet. With a sonorous groan the god wove its grassy tendrils up, up, up until it was tall enough to reach out and bat the news team helicopters from the sky. Leaves and vines sprouted from the body, coating it like skin, and a bud formed around its glowing green energy center like a head. I didn't stay turned around long enough to see any more because it was a little difficult to run for my life when I was hitting a car every few feet.

The tide of people was beginning to follow my lead, which wasn't good because that meant that the god was coming our way. From somewhere nearby, I could hear a woman screaming for help—something about her baby—but I couldn't bring myself to halt in order to assist her. There didn't seem to be any point in it—we were probably all gonna die anyway.

I leapt onto the hood of a car and went on from there to avoid the onrush of screaming humans, bounding from vehicle to vehicle and not even trying to prevent my feet from denting them.

I heard what sounded like a car being turned to scrap metal, most likely by a giant leafy tendril, and a woman's voice screeched, "My baby! My baby's still in there!" I paused to catch my breath and to turn around and look as the god hurled a crumpled tin can that'd once been a minivan at a news helicopter that had strayed too close. The resulting fireball momentarily entranced me—we demons kind of have a thing for fire—but then the god picked up its roots and began to swagger down the street, bashing cars and people out of the way, tearing at the buildings on either side of it.

Hellboy was there. Hellboy, with a bundle of blankets tucked close to his chest and an even bigger gun than the last strapped to his back. He was jumping onto and over cars as he ran to avoid the extremely pissed-off deity, and that's when I realized that I should probably be doing the same thing.

"Agent Hellboy!" the familiar, German-accented voice screamed above the sounds of chaos. "Reach higher ground and shoot zhe weapon! Shoot zhe weapon!"

I looked down beside the truck I was perched on and saw the suit pointing at the god as though it'd been overlooked. I opened my mouth to tell him he should probably keep running, but then thought better of it. Screw him; I hope he deflates like a whoopee-cushion.

The god raised a tendril and pancaked the front end of a car Hellboy had been clambering onto, sending him flying through the air as though he'd been launched from a catapult. He rose towards the night sky like some kind of demon in denial of the loss of its wings, and just as gravity began to assert its authority he switched the giggling bundle of blankets to his stone arm and yanked on an overhanging power line. Sparks flew as he sailed across the street, landing upon a neon HOTEL sign.

"What the hell is he doing?" I asked nobody in particular.

"I'm sure ve know just as much as he," the gasbag replied, still standing beside my truck. He shook his globe exasperatedly.

Hellboy crouched on the sign and carefully transferred the blankets—which, from the cheerful burbling they emitted, belonged to an extremely well-tempered baby—into the care of his scarlet tail. Above everything I heard him say, "Your first piece of tail, kid…" and I couldn't help but grin.

Seeing as the god seemed more interested on killing the Infernal Prince than rampaging through the city, I deemed it safe enough to remain crouched on the cab of my truck and watching who would win. A god versus a rebellious demon—now where have I heard that story before?

Hellboy began to scale the sign letter-by-letter as the god reduced it to HOTE, HOT, and finally just a single H clinging to the side of the building. The other letters were discarded in the intersection below, almost too close for comfort, but still I decided to remain.

"You must shoot it in zhe energy ganglion!" the suit shouted upwards. Hellboy made a face that clearly conveyed his doubt that 'ganglion' was a word, and even if it was it probably wouldn't kill the god to shoot it right in the—

"The energy ganglion!" Gasbag repeated.

"The head!" I yelled at him, intent on having a bit of fun egging this fight on. "Shoot it in the head!"

Hellboy looked from me to the suit and opened his mouth to say something, but the neon H he was standing on was having a bit of trouble hanging onto its building, and one of its two supports came unbolted from the brick. Hellboy cried out and windmilled his arms to keep his balance, the baby giggling behind him at the rocking motion. Suddenly remembering the baby, he transferred it back into his arms just as the god let out a guttural roar and swatted at him, only to miss as he jumped over the tendril and landed awkwardly but unscathed.

He looked from the baby to the god and back again, then turned to the bundle of blankets and said, "Ya gotta trust me little buddy, okay?" The baby didn't make a peep of protest as the Infernal Prince flung him toward the starless sky, shrugged the gun off of his back and into his grasp, readied it, and then caught the plummeting bundle in his stone hand without a moment to spare.

"Damn," was all I could muster in response.

Perhaps the end of its gravity-defying fun had upset it, or maybe it had realized that this bright red, gun-toting man was not its mommy, but the baby began to whimper and cry, squirming in the Right Hand of Doom. Hellboy glared at the god and said sternly, "You woke up the baby."

He pointed his weapon at the approaching god and I winced at the sound it made. Gigantic bullets appeared out of a blinding muzzle flash and struck the god in the chest, causing it to roar in agony and fall back against a building. Its thick green blood spattered the pavement, turning it to lush moss and grass on contact. It was its flowing blood which began to bind it to the building it leaned upon, vines and lichens sprouting from its body and pooling onto the concrete, turning it soft and green.

Though I much prefer seeing things burn than seeing them grow, I couldn't help but think that it was kind of a cool effect.

People took the god's incapacitation as an opportunity to escape from behind cars or wherever they'd been hiding from the swinging tendrils. The god yanked at the vines tethering it to the building, but the more it struggled the more it bled, and the more it bled the more vines sprouted to bind it.

The suit craned its metal neck upwards and ordered, "Agent Hellboy! Take zhe shot! Right now! Take it!" Fog hissed from a couple of valves beneath his globe, and I wondered if that meant he had the talking suit equivalent of high blood pressure. I looked up to see what the Infernal Prince would do, if he chose to preserve the lives of humans rather than spare the life of one of his own, an ancient creature of magick.

"Zat's an order!" the suit continued to blather even as Hellboy raised his gun, aiming for the god's head. "Take zhe shot, zat's an order, Agent Hellboy!"

But rather than pull the trigger, the Prince was hesitating. The god let out a piteous moan and its giant head lolled on its shoulders. It lifted a tendril as if to take a swipe but then lowered it and made a groaning sigh.

"Demon."

The voice of the once-prince made me start, and in my momentary panic I couldn't pinpoint Nuada's location. But then I spotted Hellboy, looking up at a figure perched on the roof of his building. A spotlight slid across the pale countenance of the king-killer as he gestured towards the god and asked ironically, "What are you waiting for? This is what you wanted, isn't it?" Hellboy did not point his gun at the once-prince—instead, he lowered it and listened.

"Look at it—the last of its kind," the once-prince told him, confirming my own suspicions. The god began to renew its struggles against its bonds, and this time managed to make some progress. It let out a monstrous roar as it strained toward Hellboy and Nuada. "Like you and I, if you destroy it, the world will never see its life again." Shoots and vines were snapping, chunks of brick tumbling to the pavement, and I wondered if Nuada was merely distracting Hellboy until the god freed itself.

"You have more in common with us than with them," Nuada urged, surprising me by including me in his gesture meant for 'us'. "You could be a king!"

The suit was screaming orders again, but it was just an irritating background noise that I didn't care to decipher. The thought of Hell on Earth was certainly an appealing one, at least to me, and I was straining to hear what the Infernal Prince might say next.

"If you cannot command," the once-prince pointed out, glancing down at the suit, "then you must obey."

Hellboy shook his head, brow furrowed in thought. "Damn," was all he said. It was all he had time to say, anyway, for the H's final support began to fail under his weight, and as he stumbled the god lunged for him and roared like a beast sensing weakness in its prey. Its limbs struggled to heave its body forward and a single tendril rose to strike Hellboy from the face of the Earth, and he fired a single shot into its open maw.

The god's head popped like a grape, spilling green juice everywhere, even on me. My skin tingled as moss burst into life upon it, pale green vines draping themselves around my arms like bangles. Flowers sprouted up and down my body, and I couldn't help but grin at the feeling of being covered in new, god-given life. It was ironic, yes, but it was really a nice feeling.

Blood dribbled onto the sidewalk and grass flooded the intersection, saplings sprouted beside traffic lights, and the broken metal bodies of cars were transformed into flower patches. The god's body became encased in a thick blanket of soft green, and it truly was something to marvel at.

The humans who'd stayed, like me, to watch the battle began to creep from their hiding places, staring at the forest clearing in the middle of Brooklyn. A few of them took pictures, and I climbed down from my truck to avoid being caught in the flash of a camera.

We all watched as the casing of the god's head revealed itself to be a collection of petals, which unfurled and spilled billions of little seedlings into the night air like snowflakes. The impossibly gigantic flower filled the streets with a sweet, clean scent—one that chased away the stink of car exhaust and garbage dumpsters.

I stooped to run my fingers over a collection of ferns that'd gathered at my feet, and then realized that they were actually growing on my feet. It was impossible to name the reason why I didn't simply slough off my leafy second skin, but I did find myself walking gingerly so as not to disturb my new covering.

The suit, Abraham, Princess Nuala, and a dark-haired woman I assumed was also part of their team were the only ones beside me who walked upon the god's blood. They took a moment to look at me with similarly odd expressions—though I did have to make one up for the suit—and all I could do in response was grin my devilish grin, spread my arms and state, "This is amazing. I wonder if I'll turn into anything this cool when I die." I didn't plan on dying soon, but I didn't harbor any delusions that I was going to live forever—because forever is a very, very long time.

"It's…beautiful," Abraham agreed. Beside him, Princess Nuala reached towards me and touched a fluffy white seedling that had alighted on my shoulder. It allowed her fingertips to gently kiss it before floating off in search of a more permanent resting place. Its brethren floated all around us, filling the sky with what could be imagined to be stars.

I decided it was time to shed my green pelt and began to carefully disengage the grips of the various floras coating me. It peeled off in strips that, when dropped back to the ground, merely took root there instead as though nothing had happened. I looked up above to see what Nuada was making of all of this, only to find Hellboy gazing at the spot the once-prince had once occupied.

This beautiful peace didn't last long, however. It was broken by the sound of police sirens, and blue-and-red lights flashing atop police cars. I planted myself with the suit's team firmly in place between me and the authorities on the off-chance an officer recognized me from my time-to-time escapades in the human world. No, I'd never actually been arrested, but I had been the quarry of a few pursuits now and again.

Cops swarmed the green, forming a barricade that blocked the citizens from getting through to touch the god's corpse or take samples of the foreign plant life. Press shot photos like crazy and, as Hellboy dropped down from the flickering neon H, voices began to rise in anger.

"Hey, give the baby back!" I heard a man shout, and the mob seemed to agree with him. As he strode past the cops a woman forced her way through the barricade, face tear-stained and voice hysterical. She screeched and ran at Hellboy, snatching the sleeping baby from his arms with a cry of, "What've you done to my baby!"

"The baby's fine," he replied with an attempt at a smile, but she hurried off without listening to a word. I whipped my head around and glared at the mob as she disappeared into it, though I really shouldn't have been surprised. If there were two things humanity was really, really good at, they were panicking uncontrollably and fighting pointlessly. Mostly the latter—if it wasn't true, then how would you explain all those wars, hm?

"Freak!" a man snarled, brandishing a baseball bat.

"Kidnapper!"

"Baby-snatcher!"

Hellboy looked around in confusion and started forward towards the grim-faced police. I came up beside him and said helpfully, "The baby's fine, or couldn't you tell? Who else do you know that can rock a kid to sleep while shooting a rampaging elemental in the head, huh? He'll be peachy—your human infants don't even start forming memories until they're—"

"Don't move!" a cop shouted, aiming his pistol at us. "Hands in the air!"

I could feel my glamour beginning to slip out of anger and took a bold couple of steps forward, raising my hand to display my claws, but before I could start defending us Hellboy grabbed me by the collar and yanked me back. His right hand was in the air in a harmless gesture, but a stupid policeman barked, "He's got a weapon in his hand!"

The dark-haired woman looked at him like he'd just said the most moronic thing humanly possible and called out, "That is his hand!" She walked past the cops and shielded Hellboy with her own body as a look of bitter realization spread across his face. He released me and lowered his hands, and a cop ordered, "Miss! Stay away from him, for your own safety!"

"He was trying to help, don't you see!" she shouted back at him, pale face flushed in anger. "He was just trying to help!"

"You morons, he saved your lives! Don't you get it? He just took down a god for you thankless, gutless, brainless—"

I found the muzzle of a gun pointed my way, and soon realized why. I'd gotten a little too heated during my speech, and my glamour was pretty much entirely gone, basically leaving me a seething scarlet beastie. Aw, what did I care! Let them see me, I decided. It's about time anyhow, and it feels good to not have to have my tail curled up in my pants leg anymore.

The girl looked at me strangely for a moment before crying out, "That's all we do, that's all we've done all these years! We just try to help you! You!"

"You're just a freak!" someone roared in response, and a stone pelted Hellboy in the face before he had time to move. It left only a small cut on his cheek, but from the look in his eyes it stung more than just physical pain.

I thrashed my tail and looked for the stone-thrower, but whoever it was must've been smart enough to duck back into the crowd. "You're the freaks!" was my clever retort. "Who in the hell do you think you are!"

The woman glared in the same direction as me and took a deep breath, her skin beginning to glow. Within moments flames had flared to life over her entire body, heating the cross around her neck until it turned red-hot, but oddly enough not burning her clothes. "Pyrokinesis," I remarked, flashing a fanged smirk. "Nice. Gonna toast 'em or what?"

The cops had lowered their guns, and the mob had fallen relatively silent. Everyone looked on in horror, probably wondering why the woman wasn't screaming in agony or why the stench of burning flesh didn't fill the air, but all I could smell was fear. Human fear.

There was nothing for me to worry about if she decided to go nuclear—I was fire-proof, and so was the Prince. I waited eagerly for something to happen, but all there was was a sizzling noise as the Right Hand of Doom rested gently on the flaming woman's shoulder. "Liz," he said quietly, looking at the terror-filled faces before him, "let's go home."

She took another couple of deep breaths before fizzling out, the cross still glowing with heat around her throat, and followed him through the mob, which parted before them. The police made way for the suit, Abraham and the Princess, and I trailed along behind them, not really knowing what else to do. As I walked among them I wanted so, so badly to claw just one or two of the humans, or even just gnash my teeth at them, but I figured that the last thing we needed was a riot on our hands.

As we neared a van parked just a little ways away from the god's corpse I thought about my usage of 'we'. Was I really a part of this little gang of misfits now? Or was I technically still on once-prince Nuada's side? Was I a guest, like the Princess, or a prisoner? Where lay the line between 'us' and 'them'?

A/N

Haven't touched this in a while, huh? The person you can thank for the existence of this chapter is OceanFire9, who left me the most lovely review today—well, considering the fact that it's 1:30AM here I'd say they left the review yesterday.

Ahem, so there you have it, the forest god scene on display. As always, reviews are encouraged. Particular points of interest include Jinx's participation in this chapter—I don't feel like she did a lot, but I also feel like there wasn't an awful lot for her to do.

Also, I feel like I'm not making her demonic enough. It's okay that she likes having god blood on her, right?

Anyway, I don't suppose next chapter will be jumping straight into BPRD HQ. After all, we need Manning's reaction after learning another demon's gonna be waltzing around his organization.

Question for consideration: Is Jinx a guest or a captive? Seriously, because I haven't the foggiest at this point.

Review!