Something Stolen

Thanks to XBoneX, Xiaolin Fan and TheXGrayXLady for reviewing. You're all beyond sweet! And to TheXGrayXLady, yes, that is Chuya. They're probably my OTP for the fandom. Here's where the Heylin are introduced, and where we find out that Inque might not be on the side of good.

Chase Young sat at the head of a conference table, surveying and listening with a steely gaze. The man looked young, not a day over 25, but his sheer presence commanded respect and attention. Night-black hair that ran to his back, cruel gold eyes and a smile that could make a crocodile shudder. He was always dressed sharply, and only rarely was he seen in something other than a suit and tie. His right-hand woman, Wuya, was equally cunning and less honorable. Red hair that ran untamed, eyes like chips of jade and strange markings under her eyes. No one ever asked about them because, rumor had it, the last person to do so had never been heard from again. She dressed in blazers and pencil skirts, always black, and heels. Not only was she Chase's personal secretary, she was also his bodyguard, though it was only for public purposes. In reality, Chase was more than capable of ridding himself of attackers, but he knew that dark sorcery just didn't get the popularity votes it used to.

The man who had been speaking finished, and Chase stood. "Very good. Now that we've heard Mr. Silver's plans for our offworld enemies, we can focus on this dimensional plane. Mr. Blake?" he asked, glancing at a young brunette man. The man stood and looked at a stack of papers in his hands.

"Ahem. We're under our quota for water filters and damages in Eastern Africa will halt any delivery. The penicillin shipments will also be delayed, perhaps for weeks."

Chase nodded. "Excellent. Go on."

"Also, we've gotten another oil pocket in Alaska, under a nature reserve. Some finagling with memory charms should get us access, if you'll just sign off on some paperwork."

"I'll have Wuya look over it. Good job, everyone, for another productive quarter. If you have any questions, submit them to Wuya and she'll filter the important ones to me," he said, his smile as icy as his voice. "Anything I've forgotten?"

"Monsieur?" a blonde man in the back said, raising his hand tentatively. "Zee Heylin Corporation eez s-supposed to be a humanitarian company, eez eet not?" Chase stared holes in the man for a second, before glancing around the table.

"He's new," explained Mr. Silver.

"I can see that. Someone please explain to me why I shouldn't just rip him limb from limb as an example?" he asked calmly, as though he was simply asking about the weather. The blonde man's eyes widened, and he shrank back.

"Mr. Valliere is our ambassador to France," said a dark-skinned woman near the front of the table. "He is in the unique position of having a direct familial relationship to two of the members of the French Parliament. He will prove useful should we have any trouble with the reserves in Europe."

"I see." Chase turned back to the man, who was scared, confused and very eager to get out of the room. "Well, Mr. Valliere, the Heylin Corporation does have mankind's best interest at heart, I assure you. But sometimes, to make a new, strong building, you must tear down the old one first. Many people blame the world's troubles on the government of one or two countries alone, not the countries as a collective. The true problem lies there, amongst the diverse principles and ideas of the world leaders. With all the conflicting ideas, the border disputes, the poverty in one nation next to a rich one, it is nearly impossible for the world to function. But if one man, one woman, one group of people ran the world, then the world could have peace. Religion and race would no longer matter, for everyone would be equal. Borders would disappear, we would all speak one language and have one big melting pot of history. If the world was one big country, there would be no more war, no more poverty, and everyone would get the same opportunities. Do you understand what I'm getting at, Mr. Valliere?"

"Um… oui?" he said weakly, giving a smile that was more like a grimace.

"You see, we work to raise the stakes, rather than lower them," said a Chinese man across from him. "No pain, no gain, after all."

"Our purpose is to heighten tensions until everyone collapses of weariness," continued Mr. Blake.

"And then they will have no choice but to hand over their countries to us," Wuya finished, smiling darkly. "We have been in operation for longer than you would think, Mr. Valliere. We have sleeper agents in places you wouldn't believe. If you do not wish to cooperate with our plan to help the world, you might end up regretting it."

"I suggest you think wisely," Chase said, sitting back down again. "We would hate to lose such a helpful connection."

Valliere gulped. "O-of course not, monsieur. I would be honored to 'elp your noble cause."

"Yes, I thought so. In that case, now that everything has been sorted out, you are all dismissed. I'll see you at next month's meeting. " Everyone stood, gathered their things, and walked out the doors. Once they closed for a final time, Chase glanced at Wuya, who was looking over a clipboard. "And of our agenda?"

"I'd say everything is proceeding accordingly, except…" she pulled out what appeared to be a newspaper clipping and handed it to him. "Someone got to the egg before us. And that someone could be anyone."

"Or it could be Inque." Chase glanced at the doors and narrowed his eyes. "She's on her way up now."

"I could take care of her," Wuya offered. "It would be simple to get the information from that child."

"Unfortunately, she is a wildcard, but we need her. We don't know she stole it, and her defenses are too great for a psychic probe. Besides, she has too much invested this to take it from us. No, we'll let her play her part, and see what comes from it. Other than the theft of our talisman, is everything else coming together?"

"Yes. All we need are our conduits, which we'll lure out easily enough, and then I'll finish tying up the spell. All I need for that are three things for each conduit- friend, foe and foundation."

"Easy enough. I'll dispatch a few of the outside agents to take care of that." Wuya nodded and wrote something down on the clipboard as the doors burst open. In strode a young woman, just over 21, with brown hair cropped boy-short and gelled to spike up in the front. She wore thin, copper-framed glasses over hazel eyes that were narrowed in annoyance. She also had a black leather jacket, under which she wore a black shirt with the Batman logo on it. Blue jeans and black boots completed the punkish look, as did the expression on her face. A flustered woman burst in behind her, looking too scared to stop her and too scared to just let her walk in.

"Mr. Young, I'm sorry, but she wouldn't take no for an answer-" Chase raised his hand and silenced the woman. "It's perfectly fine, Mrs. Haynes," he said. "She's on the list."

"Oh, yes, well. I, ah, I'll just go, then," she said, leaving the room in a flurry of embarrassment.

"What exactly are you tryin' to pull, Young?" the girl snarled, halting a foot away from Chance. He raised an eyebrow, but she was undaunted. "I go in to get that egg thing for you guys, and it's gone when I get there! Do you just not want me on your payroll, is that it? 'Cause if so, tell me and I'm gone. I could hack it in Gotham easy as I could here, so-"

"Miss O'Reiley, please, calm down," Chase said, gesturing to a chair. "Have a seat." The woman sat down with no small degree of irritation. "I didn't order anyone else to steal the talisman. I was assured you could do it."

"Yeah, well, I-" the woman paused and blinked. "Oh. Well, then… I won't get paid?"

"You'll get paid. But in the meantime, I need you to complete another assignment, along with Spicer, Katnappé, and Tubbimura." The woman's eyes grew dark and she glanced at Wuya, who didn't look up from her clipboard.

"You know I hate the human litterbox. I don't have to actually talk to her, do I?" she asked, crossing her arms. Chase rolled his eyes, but replied, "No, Miss O'Reiley. You don't. Just give the information I'm about to give you to Spicer and tell him to pass it on to the other two." Wuya placed an envelope on the table and Chase slid it over to the woman, who eyed it in a mixture of curiosity and distrust. "We have held back some- well, most- of the details of our plan. But if the Heylin Corporation is to wrest control of the world, we'll need you four to fully understand our plan if you're going to help us."

"… Yeah, okay. As long as I get a cut. Ireland, right?" Chase nodded and the woman grinned. "Swank. I'll get this to Jack. Oh, and will ya stop with the Miss O'Reiley? I prefer Inque." She headed back to the double doors, and had a hand on the handle before pausing and turning back around. "Then that means neither of you can see them, either."

"See who?" Wuya asked, her tone like that of someone addressing a two-year-old. The woman just grinned, the light glinting off her glasses to hide her eyes. "If you have to ask, there's no reason for me to tell you. I mean, really…" she sang as she left, her words floating through before the doors closed. "… Where's the fun in that?"

"This is so gross!" Raimundo wailed. He was making his way through a tunnel under an old abandoned hotel, and was currently disgusted. It was pitch-black, and though it had gotten tall enough for him to stand up in, but it was going down, which was not where he wanted to go. As Dragon of Wind, he didn't like small, dark spaces or being underground. So he was pretty sure that Inque was having a good laugh at his expense. "This was a bad idea," he whimpered when he heard something move to his right. "This was a bad, bad, bad idea."

"Actually, you're almost out of the tunnel," DOJO piped up. Raimundo reached into his pocket and pulled out the handheld device. "According to my readings, there's an open space just up ahead." Raimundo walked forward, and found that Dojo was right. When he felt the dirt under him change to concrete, he heard a click and lights flipped on. Unaccustomed to the brightness after being in the dark for so long, he cried out in pain as the light seared his eyes. His hands flew to his eyes, and DOJO clattered to the ground.

"Aagh! Give a guy a warning next time, huh?" he said, rubbing his eyes with his palms. "Ow, ow, ow, ow, ow. I am going to kill-" his train of thought crashed to a halt as he opened his eyes and took in his surroundings. He was in a bunker, not too big, but large enough to house about five or six people. The floor and walls were concrete, and there was a trapdoor in the ceiling. The walls were lines with filing cabinets, except for where there was a door. After picking up DOJO, he tried to open the nearest filing cabinet, but found that it was locked. After trying several others, he found that they all were. Then he noticed something tacked to the door, and went to get a better look. The door itself was metal, and a small magnet kept a picture attached to it. On the picture were sixteen keys, all similar but none identical. Each one had a number, too, and then Raimundo realized what they were for. Inque must have drawn keys that matched the ones that unlocked the cabinets, then destroyed the originals. That way, only she could open them up by using her powers to bring the keys into the physical world. So, since he couldn't open them anyway, Raimundo decided to try his luck with the door.

It wasn't locked, and when Raimundo saw what was behind it, he thought it should be. Behind the door appeared to be a small vault, containing more filing cabinets. There was a small whiteboard on a wall above the cabinets, and when and in the back, a single, lit display case. Raimundo walked up to it, eyes widening when he realized what it was. "DOJO," he whispered, his breath fogging up the glass, "is that the talisman Inque stole?" The egg was more like an oval than a sphere, tapered on both ends. It wasn't smooth, either, but with a rocky golden shell.

"Yes," DOJO replied. "I've been running some analysis and searching for more information."

"I wondered why you were being so quiet. Well, what have you found out?" Raimundo asked, pulling out the device again.

"The talisman has no roots in Celtic folklore. The museum website Kimiko used to find that out had been given false information, but I can't trace where it was. Apparently, the egg isn't in any folklore at all. In fact, the museum wasn't even supposed to have it. It was supposed to go to the JLA." Raimundo paled. "It's actually a containment chamber, of sorts."

"What's it contain, then?" Raimundo asked, half afraid to find out.

"A being called Krona." He frowned and glanced around the room, eyes falling on the whiteboard. He walked over, trying to make sense of the scribbles. On the far left, there was a list of seemingly random things. Helmet of Nabu, Norman McCay, circus gunman, conduits (check sources), and splicers. Helmet of Nabu and circus gunman had been crossed out. Conduits had an arrow pointing from it to another list, but this one had their names. Under each name were the words friend, foe and foundation. She had starred Earthshaker, and written under Raimundo's name Jack. Under Blaze was Katnappé and under Aqueous was Tubbimura. On the far right, she had underlined the word Deadman and written under it Boston Brand, Spectre, Phantom Stranger, Black Lantern/White Lantern, Hanged Man (tarot) and innocent? The Brazilian was only getting more confused.

"DOJO, what is all this?" he asked. "I can't make any sense of it."

"Neither can I. Hold me up and I'll take some pictures to analyze back at base." Raimundo held up DOJO and the machine snapped several pictures. Raimundo headed back towards the case, when DOJO stopped him. "Hey, wait just a minute, there! What exactly do you think you're doing?"

"I'm stealing back Krona's egg, duh," Raimundo said, kneeling down to find a weak spot in the case. "I can't just leave it here."

"But if you take it, Inque will know that you were here and she'll come after you," DOJO cried. "It would be better if you just left it."

"No way. Sorry, DOJO, but this is for the greater good. If it was supposed to go to the JLA, then I'll bet Chase Young got it to the museum instead so Inque could steal it for him." He paused. "Wait. Then… why would she keep it?"

"My sensors are picking up a human aboveground heading this way! Hurry up and get out of here!" DOJO cried. Raimundo glanced at the door, then at the case, and rolled his eyes. "Oh, forget it." Then he grabbed DOJO and smashed him into the case, shattering the glass but leaving the egg unscathed. He shoved DOJO into his pocket, ignoring his complaints about being used as a blunt weapon, and let the air in the room cocoon around the egg so he wouldn't have to touch it. For all he knew, it could be radioactive. Then he bolted out of the bunker, keeping the egg right in front of him. He burst out of the tunnel and flew through the broken glass. He didn't stop until he was several bocks away, landing on a roof that was considerably nicer than the one he had been on previously. He still didn't touch the egg, but examined it in the light of the rising sun.

"Okay. Let's get you someplace safer." With that, he flew back to the Citadel, thoroughly tired but victorious.

"NO!" Inque's scream resonated through the bunker, making Scrawl wince. The woman tore through the room in a frenzy, looking for all the world like she was about to throttle someone. "They took it! They took Krona!" she screeched, kicking a filing cabinet. "How- how did they even find him? I took steps to make sure that this place was protected, I thought that they couldn't even find-"

"Inque, calm down!" Inque whirled around, glaring daggers at Scrawl.

"Never tell a woman to calm down!" she screamed, grabbing the front of his shirt and hauling him down to her eye level. "Do you know what they'll do to me? I'm dead! D-E-A-D! Dead!"

Scrawl gently removed her hands and stood straight again, keeping a firm grip on her wrists. "Inque, think it through. If the Heylin had found it, then they would have already attacked you, right?" Inque's breathing slowed down, and slowly, she nodded. "Right. So it must have been one of the Xiaolin that did it." Inque nodded again and Scrawl let her go. She glanced around the room, then back at Scrawl.

"Okay. Yeah. You're right. Of course you're right. It wouldn't be Earthshaker, because he's a man of his word, and he wouldn't have broken it unless he knew I was lying. And Aqueous wouldn't, because he's too honorable or whatever, and Blaze wouldn't, because she's too smart, so it must have been Vento." She punched her hand, eyes narrowing. "That figures." She turned to Scrawl, holding up the envelope Chase had given her. "Okay. Here's what we're gonna do…"

So there is no honor among thieves after all. Either Inque's lying to Earthshaker or to the Heylin Corporation, but she's certainly telling no one the full truth. And now that you know her identity, (congrats, Xiaolin Fan!) her powers might make more sense. Or less so, depending. Please review!