Chapter Sixteen:
the Cards You're Dealt
by Angie, Emiko, Jen, Jenny~Pie, and Woodknot
Acacia surveyed the streetlights below her. She was standing on the top of a deserted seven-story parking garage, her presence made even more unusual by the fact she was in her senshi form. There was, of course, a good reason for this. Somehow, Acacia felt closer to the realm of the dead when she was Sailor Hades, and closer to her mother.
Hades ran her finger along her tarot deck, which she had brought with her on this beautiful, clear evening because it seemed like the right thing to do. She tore her gaze away from the city lights to look at the deck, and turned over the top card. It was the Hermit. Introspection, focusing inward, she remembered. She crouched down and placed the card on the ground beside her in the beginning of the traditional Celtic Cross reading. The next card she drew was the Moon. Feeling fear, aimlessly wandering. Curious. In this Celtic Cross layout, the first card was supposed to represent the self, and the second clarified this in some way. The clarification here seemed obvious.
Curious as to what the card would hold for her tonight, Hades turned over the next card, which supposedly represented the source of the situation of the deeper meaning. It was the Two of Swords. Hades paused a moment as she remembered the card’s meaning.
Avoiding truth.
The next card she drew represented the past and what needed to be discarded. Three of Cups - friendship and community. Perturbed, Hades’s brow furrowed into a knot and she drew the next card, her goal. The Lovers card appeared in her hand, a representation of kinship and love. Mother.
Hades spent a long time considering the card and its meaning. It was true that her reason for being on the top of the parking lot was very much connected to her mother. As she continued to stare at the card, she drew the next: the card of the future. As she placed it on the dirty ground she froze.
Death.
Of course, the Death card did not necessarily represent death; it was also transition. Perhaps this referred to something in her powers as Sailor Hades. Rather than decide on the card’s meaning, Hades moved along to the next. It was another card meant to represent her self, and she drew the Three of Swords, a sign of loneliness and heartbreak.
Hades gave a sigh. So far, she had drawn nothing but melancholy cards, with the exception of the Three of Cups and the Lovers, and those were in the “past” and “goal” positions respectively. It did seem fitting. Next came the Five of Cups: defeat and sorrow. It was ironically positioned as the atmosphere - her current setting. There were only two cards left now.
The Ten of Wands - burden, struggle - took its place as her hopes and fears. Seeing as how she had drawn so many sad cards, Hades was certain the final card would be something happy. It was the final result of the entire reading, the outcome. Rather than draw the card immediately, Hades ran her finger along the edge of the cards, trying to guess at what the card might be.
At the sudden caw of a crow, Hades jumped, causing her deck to drop onto the ground. She looked around for someone in the area, but saw no one, and returned to the cards.
When the deck had fallen, four cards had flipped up. Hades stared at them, her eyes widening.
Tower. Sudden change, crisis.
Ten of Swords. Being a victim. Martyrdom.
Hanged Man. Another sign of martyrdom.
Justice. Absolution. The day of reckoning.
Individually, all of these cards could have positive meanings, but somehow Hades doubted there was anything positive here.
Just then, the door leading to the stairwell burst open.
"He's being obnoxious again and that's why I left him at home," Rayya explained to Gwyn as the two strolled down the sidewalk. She sipped at her iced coffee and then shrugged. "Julius is always after me to train and practice and hunt down other senshi but it's just not me. No offense, of course," she added quickly. "Meeting you has been one of the best things about this whole rigmarole."
The blonde smiled appreciatively, tossed her empty espresso cup in a nearby trash can, and nimbly sidestepped around a pedestrian. For a moment the two walked silently as she held her response until the passerby was out of earshot.
"Ray, you're taking all this Senshi stuff too hard," Gwyn finally chided. "Look how easily I deal. For me, it's this simple: beat the bad guys. That's all we have to do. You let Sgt. Swine's ramblings stress you out, when it's not a terribly complicated thing. Just go with your gut, girl!" She flashed her a little espresso fueled grin, and a confident wink. "It all comes down to luck in the end anyway, right?"
"Of which, you have plenty and some to spare," Rayya laughed, her violet eyes twinkling. "No, seriously, though. You say go with my gut but my gut says talk it out." She shrugged and dropped her empty cup neatly into a trash can as they walked past. "Which I know if pretty silly since all it will do is lead to me getting whacked harder if the other person isn't willing to listen."
Gwyn stopped and crossed her arms, disliking her friends dismay. " Well it's obvious enough that I can't appeal to your Senshi sensibilities today, so I give, who cares? This is not Senshi time, this is fun time, and I am more than ready to forget about that pig and his constant criticism!" She smiled brightly and looked over her shoulder at the sound of a group of people who had hurried across the street laughing. She peered down the avenue, trying to figure out their destination. Her blue eyes gleamed with mischief when she looked back to Rayya.
"Do I smell a party?" She asked her friend conspiratorially, then gleefully rushed down the street ahead.
Rayya hop-skipped into a gentle sprint after the blonde, finding her ensuing giggles didn't help the pace at all. Neither did the two-inch platform shoes she had chosen for the night. Determinedly, though, she caught up to Gwyn and tugged on her arm. "You smell the hot dog shop that we just passed," she snickered. Dramatically, she inhaled deeply, throwing her head back until she was looking completely skywards. "That, however, is a definite party smell now." She returned her gaze to the street ahead of her and pointed towards another group of people. "And there go some partiers. You up?"
Theresa yawned.
She had plans to meet her boyfriend, Rob, at the small park across the way for a concert, but that was half an hour away. Darkness had gathered in the meantime, and she stood on the sidewalk, leaning against one of the giant concrete supports of a parking garage. She didn't have her car with her - she'd taken a cab rather than do that or have Rob pick her up.
All because the bat had said so.
Trajan could be cryptic - hell, he personified cryptic - but that afternoon, he'd outdone himself. The bat knew how to push her buttons. Still, they had a longstanding association, and he'd never outright lied to her. All the years she'd known him, he'd been telling her to wait for a day when everything he said would come to pass. He hadn't said this was the day; not in so many words. But she knew the bat well enough to be nervous.
*I'm too old for this,* she thought, digging in her jacket pocket for her cigarettes. She shook one out and lit it, watching small groups of laughing, excited people head for the park.
There was no warning; one moment she was playing fashion police, and the next something struck her in the back of the head and stayed in her hair.
Rather than shriek and slap her hands at it to try and get it off like any sane, normal person would, she said, "I hate it when you do that."
"I hate the disgusting habit you're engaging in at the moment," a scratchy, wisp-thin voice said from her hair, "but we all have crosses to bear."
Theresa sighed out a lungful of smoke, snapping off the lit end of the cigarette and tucking the rest back in her jacket. The bat on her head crawled left, situating himself on her shouder instead of one of her lavendar braids. There, nestled flat against her leather jacket, his dark silver-tipped fur wasn't as noticible.
"Trajan," Theresa said, "just tell me flat out, this once. What the hell's going on?"
"I'll do nothing," the bat snapped. "You'll make your own decisions. You'll react to whatever comes of your own volition, not due to how you're prompted."
"Whatever it is needs to happen before Rob gets here," she said evenly, shrugging her shoulders a little and forcing the bat to dig his claws in. "I really don't think I need him to find out about this supposed senshi stuff until I know more about it."
"Not every decision is yours," the bat replied softly. "What's above and below you will decide."
Theresa sighed again and watched the gathering people. Two in particular caught her attention..
"Look," Trajan whispered suddenly. "Look, Theresa."
But it hadn't sounded like he'd said Theresa. It had sounded like he said Tisiphone. She felt the world tilt a little, staring at two young women who were running by, just down the hill from her. Laughing. A girl in heels, with waist-length chestnut hair, trying to catch up with a blonde.
"Above, and below," Trajan said, tucking himself down into the collar of her jacket, at the back of her neck.
Rayya paused mid-giggle and sent her gaze skittering over the surrounding area. That buzz, that same blasted thing that hit her everytime she was near another senshi. This time, she knew it wasn't Gwyn, though. Suddenly, however, her shoe skidded on some gravel, a fitting reaction to her lack of attention, and her fingers closed convulsively on Gwyn's jacket sleeve. "Whoops," she muttered as she struggled to right herself.
The blonde snickered, placing her hand on the other girl's shoulder to help steady her clumsy friend. "And you ask me if I'm up?" she snorted, amused.
Rayya grinned, abashed at her lack of dexterity, but shook it off quickly as she straightened again. "Don't you feel it, Gwyn? Someone else is here. You know," she muttered.
Gwyn tightened her lips and started walking again as if she hadn't heard her. "C'mon, Ray, don't be so slow." She remarked coldly, keeping her eyes on the block ahead.
Rayya froze dead in her tracks and stared after her quickly retreating friend in complete bafflement. What the hell? Quickly, she looked around, searching the area for a plausible reason for Gwyn's sudden change in mood. Nothing remarkable caught her rapidly wandering attention; laughing passersby ran in the direction of the party ahead, loiters stared at large, carefully decorated shop windows. A flash of a glowing cigarette end snagged her eye temporarily and she registered the young woman smoking it vaguely. Yet nothing seemed enough to explain Gwyn's behavior. With a short jog, she sped after Gwyn and tapped her shoulder, whispering, "What's wrong, hon?"
The air seemed dangerously thin, paranoia filling the atmosphere in the darkening city. The ex-New Yorker felt horribly exposed, scanning faces that walked past, fighting back the urge to scream. She'd felt it. The presence of another soldier's energy, only it wasn't like when she met Rayya. This was cold and foreboding, tying her stomach in knots. Someone was out there, and if they felt us the way we sensed them... She shivered at the thought of it, their cover might have already been blown. They were defenseless.
Gwyn shifted her head just a bit to see Rayya out of the corner of her eye. "Don't look around, but I think..." She whispered, sounding more scared than she'd hoped. "... I think someone's watching us. They might know our identity, and if that's the case..." She trailed off, knowing that Rayya would hate what she'd say next.
Rayya frowned. She knew what Gwyn was implying. It was one of the few things she and her friend didn't see eye to eye on. While she was slowly coming to understand the necessity of fighting (the bruises from her last fight still ached slightly when she thought of them), it didn't mean she wanted to go looking for trouble. Sighing, Rayya scanned the area covertly. A few interesting sorts but no one to frighten Gwyn this much. Gently, she rested her hand on Gwyn's forearm. "Then we figure it out," she murmured. "Let's just stay awake and go on, okay?" A touch of pleading entered her voice. "I'd rather not, well, you know, unless we have to." Forcefully, she lightened her tone and added, "And, anyway, who could hope to take out us, the dynamic duo?"
A laugh escaped from Gwyn's tense face, and she shook off some of her fear thankfully. "Ha! Too true, I forgot to pity the poor fool. How silly of me!" She chuckled for a moment as she and Rayya looked around somewhat casually. Her eyes drew across the marquee of her favorite Italian restaurant, Luigi's. Damn, she really wished she could just go eat a big fat bowl of pasta right now. Then an idea hit her so fast that a lightbulb over her head would've popped with enlightenment. A big grin spread across her face.
"Alright Ray, I got an idea that I think you'll like," she gloated, dragging her friend into the restaurant, laughing all the way.
Rayya's face lit up at the sight of the Italian restaurant and she cooed, "Ooo, Italian!" Her adoration of a good plate of canollis quickly eclipsed the nervousness about whoever was lurking nearby. Willingly, she went with her friend. "I'll treat," she giggled.
Theresa watched both girls pause and discuss something, then one drag the other into a nearby restaurant. It was one she knew well, one she and Rob had been to several times.
She felt a prickling along the hairs on her back and neck and knew it had nothing to do with the bat lodged in the collar of her jacket. She turned a little and glanced up, higher into the parking garage, and she could have sworn she saw a face looking down at her briefly in the gathering dark. It was gone almost too quickly to register, too many stories up.
She shrugged a little and debated following the girls. The bridge of her nose felt a little like a tuning fork someone had just lightly struck. Something was happening, and she hoped it wouldn't happen too quickly for her to react to.
She glanced at her watch. She had maybe 20 minutes before Rob showed. A little more, if he was fashionably late as usual. "Are they friendly, or not?" she said.
"Do they look evil to you?" came Trajan's muffled, snappish reply.
Theresa began humming the theme from the original 'Batman' series, then segued into 'Mission: Impossible' while she thought. She heard the bat make a frustrated squeaking sound of disapproval. Then she jogged across the street and walked along the storefronts as if window shopping. She got a strong whiff of both the hot dog shop and Luigi's, and her stomach growled. It had been awhile since she'd eaten, and things would get ugly soon if she didn't grab something.
She paused outside the restaurant, glancing through the plate glass windows into the main dining area. Cheerful couples and small families were seated at varying levels, but it was only moderately busy. She let her eyes travel over the tables and the bustling staff, looking for the two girls. The bat wouldn't have snuggled out of sight if he hadn't thought it was necessary. He meant for her to chase after those two.
She wanted to think they'd run in to use the bathroom, or to eat. She didn't want to believe the whole thing was a trap.
"Trajan," she said. When he didn't answer, she watched the people passing her on the sidewalk for a moment, then glanced back into the restaurant. The girls should have returned, should have been visible. Luigi's didn't have a back dining area or a bar. They'd either fallen in, or...
"The way out is through," Trajan whisper-hissed.
Theresa found herself digging her hands into her pockets, felt her right hand close around the battered shape of an ancient Roman coin that she had been carrying for years. Then she turned abruptly and walked back down the sidewalk, turning a sharp corner around the brick veneer building. She dragged a hand along the side of it as she went, steadying herself, gathering her courage as she reached the back of the building. The face of an alleyway between the loading area of Luigi's and the fence that sealed off an AM/PM loomed before her. She paused at the mouth of it only briefly, then took a breath and stepped quickly around the final corner.
She didn't know what she'd expected; the girl with the long, chestnut-brown hair stood several yards ahead at the back entrance to Luigi's, up on tiptoe, peering through the window into the kitchen. The mercury-vapor safety lights picked up a startling array of the girl's red highlights and made her seem paler than she had on the street. The other girl - the blonde - was nowhere in sight.
Theresa must have made some sound that she wasn't aware of, because before she could speak, the spying girl whirled on her, the blue-white light reflecting off violet eyes and turning them nearly ultraviolet.
"Oh, hi," Rayya giggled, offering a small, friendly wave. Determinedly, she avoided squinting at the young woman. Making this feat doubly hard, though, is the fact that her head is buzzing faster, a tingling more intense than the slight alert that she had received earlier on the street. Guess this was the other senshi I was sensing, she decided. What's the protocol here again? Are you a good witch or a bad witch? She grinned infectiously to herself and tucked a stray piece of her rich hair behind her ear. Okay, this lady is about as tall as me, she observed. Comparative weight, the coolest hair I've ever seen, and a squirming jacket. She did a double-take at that last observation. A squirming jacket? Oh, great. She's got a passenger. Rayya frowned. This stranger was so familiar. A quick scan of her short term memory rewarded her with a correlating image at long last. The girl in the shadows, smoking that cigarette. Aha. Well, best foot forwards... Rayya took a step forward and extended a slim hand. "Hello, there."
Taken aback, Theresa only stared for a moment as the girl kept advancing. She wished she had something to say. She wished Trajan would keep still. She wished she had a bagel...well, wishing was getting her nothing, so with a lifetime of social politeness behind her, she took a step forward and extended a hand as well.
One polite but firm handshake later, Theresa was positive of two things: this girl wasn't like anyone else she'd ever met - and, she'd set herself up by following her intuition into the alley.
"I'm Theresa," she said, unwilling to give her last name quite yet. "So, who the hell are you and why are we suddenly so interested in each other?" She offset the bluntness with a disarming grin.
Rayya returned the grin brightly. Oh, good, she thought. She's not gonna try to kick my butt. Then she realized that she had yet to answer the other girl's question. "Oh, my name's Rayya," she replied. "And I guess the best way to answer that second part is..." She paused, suddenly unsure that there -was- a best way to answer it. Somehow, she doubted that "Hi, I'm a senshi and you must be one, too, so which team are you on?" was an appropriate opener. Neither did "Please don't kill me." Rayya sighed. "Okay, well, the best way here is that I think I know you from somewhere if that makes any sense." She shrugged and pointed at the other girl's jacket. "By the way, I think whatever's in there is about to suffocate."
For one long, hypoglycemic moment, Theresa was too focused on where Rayya might know her from to understand what she was talking about. So she stared blankly and said, "I think it's a lot more than that, but this is no place to talk. And where's your -"
She paused when an outraged squeak augmented a scuffling at her neck. Remembering Trajan, she shrugged her jacket down off her shoulders, effectively releasing the bat and trapping her own arms. Trajan clambered up her braids in a shot and unmantled his wings, making it look as though Theresa had just sprouted them out of her own head.
The bat opened his mouth to make some sort of declaration. But he lost his chance when Rayya screamed - and something dropped on them from above.
Gwyn Kelly squinted in the dark almost twenty feet above the misty alleyway. Her body stiffened against the rusty fire escape, the smell of led paint chips stinging her nostrils with every minuscule breath. She strained her ears against the wind, trying to hear something that was going on below. Grinding her teeth, she pondered her friends odd course of action thus far. When she had said they'd try it Rayya's way, she had no idea it meant going up to a possible enemy and shaking their friggin' hand. She was amazed at Rayya's kindness, astounded that nothing bad had happened yet. Still, the night air was full of a foreboding energy, and Gwyn's blood turned anxiously with every passing second. If only she could hear something.
Suddenly the girl made a move, and Rayya's scream soared up the alley. Before she knew it, Gwyn had pushed off the fire escape and leapt out of the shadows. She felt the air rust past her finger tips as they rolled into fists. Watched with contempt as the girl's upturned face came into focus. Her knee came past her hip, and kicked out like a lightning bolt as she released an angry yell. The girl was quick though, and leaned forward just enough to evade the scuffed boot aimed at her head. Gwyn felt her foot connect with something else, maybe a hat or something the girl was wearing she'd failed to notice earlier.
There wasn't time to investigate though. She met the ground with a heavy thud, remembering almost to late to roll off her feet. The blonde half rolled, half slid across the alley, and crashed unceremoniously into bunch of garbage cans.
Theresa watched the figure roll, and heard the resulting crash above Rayya's scream. She came out of the crouch she'd settled into to avoid the leap from above, and realized immediately that Trajan was gone. There was no way he'd had time to fly off, not in that commotion, not when she'd felt a foot just miss her head.
Rayya's scream had cut off, and the figure by the garbage cans - the blonde, it so happened - was trying to extricate herself and get back on her feet. Theresa took a quick glance around, and with no sign of Trajan, she focused on the blonde with snarling rage. The blonde had done something with her bat.
She found herself digging in a pocket without realizing she was doing it; found herself withdrawing the coin and holding it level with her own forehead, and saying words she'd been told to keep to herself.
"Tisiphone Dirae Power, MAKE UP!"
Theresa dropped her hands as the coin began to spin, never seeing the look of shock and recognition on Rayya's face. Theresa's form became indistinct, a mirror of smoke, and she stepped through the illusion in a blood-brown dress that pooled on the ground around her feet. A copper-colored sash whipped around her in the breeze that was suddenly blowing in the alleyway, and as the spinning coin settled into a choker at her throat, Theresa - Tisiphone - pointed a finger that was gloved in blood-red at the blonde.
"Whatever you've done," she hissed, "you'll receive, and then some."
She took a step toward the blonde, one hand raised as if to strike.
Then Rayya jumped in front of her and shouted, "Wait!" She recognized this new senshi. Or thought she did. Ah, hell, even if she didn't, she wasn't in the mood for a fight. Inanely, she waved her hands at both would-be combatants. "Hold up one second there, okay? This is way too familiar for me." She sighed and dropped her hands. Then she glanced at Fortuna out of the corner of her eye, fighting back an accompanying grin. "And you call me graceful, Fortuna," she snickered. "Nice landing there." An impatient noise from Tisiphone drew her attention back to the new senshi. "Oh, sorry," Rayya said quickly. "Anyway, you're Tisiphone, you said?" A curt nod was all the answer she got and she scratched her head thoughtfully. Finally, it hit her. Thank heavens that Julius had made her go through all of those mythology books. Thank heavens some of it stuck. "That's Romanus," she announced. "It's cool, Fortuna."
Proudly, like a small child showing off a brand new toy to a favored relative, Rayya displayed the ring on her middle finger for Tisiphone. "Watch this." With a huge grin, she pulled it off and tossed it into the air, shouting, "Bacchus Deus Power Make-up!" A whirl of mad laughter and purple lights later, Bacchus stood between the other two. "See?" she asked. "I'm Bacchus." Suddenly, a new thought occurred to her. "Oh, your whatever it was! Where did it go?"
Tisiphone stared at Bacchus, anger draining marginally in favor of surprise. She'd actually transformed, after years of wondering if the whole thing was true. Another senshi was standing in front of her. "Romanus," she echoed. "You're a Romanus." Then Bacchus' question got through and she said, "My 'whatever it was' is a bat. My guardian, Trajan." She turned and looked into the shadows of the alleyway, never realizing that the dress melted away as she did so, vanishing with her anger. She was standing back in her street clothes and searching along the back of the building for movement.
"Bat? What bat? And if you're gonna be on our team, don't de-morph like that, its dangerous, and dumb, and... creepy," the blonde rambled frustily at the strange girl, kicking a garbage can off her foot with the last word.
Theresa gave her a dismissive glance that said more than any epithet could have, and went on casting around for Trajan.
Fortuna rubbed the back of her head and felt a sizable lump coming in. Her eyes bounced back and forth between the two, confused, until she caught sight of a banana peel on her shoulder. Sneering over-dramatically, she used her staff to prod it off, then looked at Rayya, and lightly flung the banana peel at her.
Bacchus dodged the banana peel with a giggle. "Oh, yuck, Fortuna," she replied. "Just because you landed head first in the night's trash doesn't mean that you have to share the wealth, you know." She frowned. "And be nicer to our new teammate."
"You know, you're damn lucky that once again you managed to find a friendly senshi. If she'd been a Graikos your little 'Mr. Rogers' routine would've gotten you killed." Trying to calm down, she wiped some dirt off her face and smiled warily. "Look, next time we try it my way, alright?"
Bacchus stuck out her tongue childishly. "Fine, whatever you say. I'm glad we didn't do it that way this time." She folded her arms obstinately and added, "I thought I knew her anyway." Then she turned back to Theresa. "So let's find your bat then. Maybe he knows something else. My guardian is almost useless at times. Bless him," she finished with a sweet smile.
Thinking she saw movement in the shadows, Theresa turned away without another word, wondering what the hell she'd gotten herself into. "Traj," she said aloud, and there was a muffled squeaking to answer her further down the alley.
She found him, caught in a bit of chain link fence at face height. One wing was piteously bent, and he was holding on for dear life by his feet. Theresa gently gathered his barely conscious form into her hands, trying not to injure him any further. "You need a vet?" she said.
"No," he said. "I need to change sides."
Theresa turned and glared at Fortuna again. "Is this your idea of 'teamwork'? Shooting first and asking questions later?"
"Bite me!" the blonde shot back lamely. "In this team you watch out for your friends. Rayya screamed and I reacted. What would you rather I do? I wasn't about to jump down and try to get you to shake my friggin' hand!"
"Yeah, well," Theresa said, "don't tell me how to be a senshi, and I won't tell you how to throw yourself off fire escapes."
Fortuna rolled her eyes and saluted. "Okay then, Batgirl."
Theresa opened her mouth to add something else, but Trajan said, "Above.
They looked at him. "You said that before," Theresa said. "Now I know what the below is, but you're gonna need to be a little more forthcoming."
"Are you all dense!" Trajan shouted. "There's a Graikos on the goddamn parking garage!"
Retrieving her weapon from her back, Fortuna threw a glance at seemingly miserable Bacchus. She looked at the bat mistrustfully for a moment, then nodded finally and crossed her arms as she addressed Tisiphone.
"Well, I don't wanna -tell you- how to be Batgirl or anything," She chimed flippantly. "But why don't you hurry up and transform again so we can actually fight the enemy and not each other for a little while?"
Bacchus sighed and shrugged. "It's what we do, right?" she asked hypothetically. Then she started reluctantly for the fire escape. "I'm still battle-ready, oh my mighty protector," she added with a somewhat forced giggle. Okay, this is it then, she thought. No more fooling around. I don't want to get hurt like I did last time. With that other Graikos. Two rungs up the ladder, she paused and bit her lip. But I won't be too rough, she promised herself. She glanced over her shoulder, down at her teammates, and smiled grimly. "You all coming? If not, I'm going to go see if whoever it is would rather go get drunk instead of fighting." With those final words, she began her slow ascent again. Hand over hand, praying that the Graikos would be gone by the time she got up there.
"Shyeah, right. Whoever gets bruised buys the brews!" Fortuna laughed cheesily for a moment. Then she narrowed her eyes at the fire escape.
Nuh-uh.
"I'm -uh-... gonna head around the other way, and -um- meet whoever it is head on!" she lied, badly. "You guys go that way and flank 'em from behind and stuff."
Quickly, she changed the subject. "And that beer bet..." She said, turned and pointed a finger seriously at Tri. "That goes for you too, Batgirl!" And with that, the Senshi of Fate disappeared into the shadows.
Leaping lightly over the low wall to the roof, Bacchus crouched low and scanned the area. Gawd, I hate this, she thought. She glanced up at the sky and frowned. Heavy, shifting clouds had drifted in on the light wind, scutting across the sky like foreboding phantoms. The bright moon's light faded in and out with their movement, casting shadows that made it almost impossible to see clearly over the uneven rooftops. Lousy night. Edging towards the other side of the restaurant's roof, Bacchus squinted into the night. It looked like there was a figure on the next roof. Just one, lone, solitary figure. Great, I have to attack one person. Bacchus smiled grimly. Better odds than last time, though.
Calculatingly, she gazed at the distance separating the two roofs. Not bad, she thought. I can make it. I think. Taking a deep breath, she readied herself. Then, with a last, rushed prayer, she sprang for the opposite roof.
She landed harder than she had planned and stumbled into her defensive stance. "Okay," she called out. "Who are you and, uh, what do you want?"
At the sudden appearance of an unfamiliar senshi, Sailor Hades panicked and grabbed at her tarot cards; her fingers clawed at them uselessly a moment before she regained her senses and stood, remembering that she had been addressed. “I am Sailor Hades.” The words seemed natural to her; she was afraid she might slip up and say “Acacia” instead, but she hadn’t.
Another figure stepped out from behind Bacchus, out of the shadows. One with flowing brown robes - that no one had seen her transform back into - and a calculating glare. "Hades," Tisiphone said, her voice soft in contrast to her hard gaze. "Any reason why a Graikos is watching the street? One we just happen to be on?"
“I--” Hades began, then stopped and narrowed her eyes. This was not the time for her to be nervous. These unfamiliar senshi clearly meant business.
Bacchus stared at the girl for a second. Yeah, Hades, Greek. Oh, damn. Finally, she shook herself out of the sudden sinking feeling in her stomach and replied, "Well, I'm Bacchus if that means anything to you." Determinedly but still somewhat hesitantly, she brought a hand up in preparation for a possible mess.
"And I'm Tisiphone," the latter said. "Usually when someone's this outnumbered, they run or attack. So how many of you are there?"
Almost shrugging this challenge off, Hades said, “Just one.” Mentally, she was wondering how much damage her Soul Blade would be able to do. Hopefully it would knock the Romanus Senshi unconscious, as it had done before, and give her a chance to escape.
One, right, great. Bacchus shifted from one foot to the other, hand still raised defensively. She glanced at Tisiphone and shrugged minutely as if to say "Now what?"
True to form, displaying cosmically bad timing, Trajan floated up between the pillars of the open garage. He was a fluttering apparition in the fading light, startling all three Senshi. In the end, it came down to a reaction.
Hades raised her hands, which filled with a rapid, smoky haze even darker than the descending evening. She clasped her hands quickly and drew them to her chest, her eyes on the fluttering bat.
Her true intent - defense or offense - was never settled among the two Romanus. Tisiphone raised a hand just an instant behind the release of the power in Hades' hands. Rays of darkness lashed out toward Trajan, who was still oblivious. There was a bare heartbeat of space, and then Tisiphone was shouting a word by rote that had seemed like nonsense until that moment.
"Aftermath!"
Nothing happened. Trajan could have told her nothing would, that she had misused the power by trying to invoke it before it would be of any use. But by then, the bat had been hurled into the nearest pillar, and Bacchus was shouting while Tisiphone ran towards the small, crumpled form.
Distressed at the sudden, violent reaction of the dark-haired girl, Bacchus took a few rushed steps towards her. "Check him," she called over her shoulder to Tisiphone. Then she raised her hand and drew it back, a glowing ball of white light materializing in it. With a quick flick of her wrist and a shouted, "The Morning After!" she launched the attack square at Hades' stomach. Then Bacchus spun on her heel and moved back a few steps, towards the frantic Tisiphone, awaiting the impact of the almighty hangover on the enemy.
Hades instantly threw her hands to her head. "Ooh," she moaned. An intense, throbbing pain resounded through her temples, as if a thousand hammers were drumming out the William Tell overture in a bizarre symphony only she could hear.
Azrael looked over the scene from the shadows of a column. One Graikos fighting some Romanus. At the moment the fight looked somewhat even and both of the teams were her enemies. If she joined the battle fighting all of them would be pure stupidity. The thought of allying herself with another team made her sick.
"You know what you should do. Fight alone but against the Graikos," her black rat told her.
She nodded and knew that was the best thing to do. Azrael walked out of the shadows and into the open. "DEATH IS COMING!" She pointed at the Graikos and whispered, "soon."
Hades opened her eyes, able to see her own heartbeat in them from the intensity of the headache Bacchus had given her. Where on earth were they all coming from? What had set this off?
In her peripheral vision - what there was of it - Hades could see the one robed Romanus scooping up the fluttering thing that had startled them all moments earlier. She opened her mouth to say something, anything, to try and clear her head. But a finger was already being pointed at her, and a dispassionate voice intoned, "Aftermath."
What hadn't worked earlier did now; the impetus was in place, and vengeance for the injured fluttering-thing came in the form of Hades' own power. She felt, to her shock, a version of Soulblade strike her. Coupled with the headache, it sent her stumbling back toward the retaining wall. She felt her back hit the waist-high barrier.
No sense, now, asking what all the fighting was for.
And it never occurred to her to run.
Feeling it was her only choice, knowing she had to finish what had begun, she summoned her strength. She raised a hand, and a sphere of purple light began to glow within.
Oh, shit. That doesn't look good. Bacchus stepped sideways, covering Tisiphone more as the other girl checked the bat again. "She's doing something," she hissed over her shoulder urgently. She raised her own hand, bringing a matching purple light to life.
A cold glint ran over Hades' eyes when she saw the energy Bacchus had summoned. With a hard flick of her wrist, the ball of energy flashed violently and shot forth at the Romanus, white tendrils of energy spinning around a purple core.
Bacchus moved into a protective position, more than ready to take the hit for both herself and Tisiphone.
Suddenly someone yelled, "I got it!" and in a second, Fortuna was standing in front of her. Immediately, the blonde held out her weapon and it began to spin before her outstretched hand.
The blast from Hades hit the enchanted rod, a terrible heat pulsating from it. With a surprised gasp Fortuna pushed back, causing the energy to spray above and past them. She smiled smugly as the energy dissipated, lessening her concentration to wonder if the others behind her were all right. But when the white light was finally all taken care of, the purple energy tried a last desperate push through her defenses. The spinning of Sors still sprayed the energy apart, but a final particle shot through.
Fortuna watched the glowing dot speed towards the spot between her eyes, and instinctively dodged her head to the left. The energy shot past her, slicing through the right side of her neck and disappearing into the night. With a dismal clank, the Sors fell, and she dropped to her knees, clutching the side of her neck with a startled cry.
"Gw... Fortuna!" Bacchus screamed, catching herself a bare instant before she used her friend's real name. Moving in a blur, she released the purple energy in her hand, letting it dissipate, unused, as she fell into a kneeling position beside the other girl. "What the hell have you done to her?" she hissed. Another ball of purple light materialized in her hand.
Azrael looked at the fallen girl and her friend who was about to issue another attack. No way, it was her turn now. She looked at Hades. "Blood Letting!"
Hades looked at the pale senshi as a red mist surrounded her from all sides and slowly covered her. She waved her hand and the mist dissipated. "What was that suppose to do?" she said to herself in disgust.
Hades held out her hands and let them fill with black smoke. Her nose started to throb lightly and she felt something warm run down her upper lip. She let go of the attack and put up a hand to wipe whatever it was off. She stopped. She looked at the crimson stains on the fingertips of her lavender gloves. "What in the world--" She tasted something hot and acidic in her mouth, but it only took her a few seconds to figure out what it was. Blood. Hades tried to stop her bleeding nose but only succeeded in making her face a bloody mess.
It gave her an instant to catch her breath, to realize that by throwing Darkness Descending she had accomplished nothing; she'd wounded a Romanus and weakened herself dangerously. She had, now, a fourth angered personality aimed at her as well.
Maybe, this once, I should have reached out rather than pushing back, she thought dimly. But it's not how I'm made. It was all for nothing; all for nothing. They had come looking for a fight, and she had done nothing but give them one. She saw the threads of portent gathering around her, and remembered the cards she'd drawn - been dealt? - just prior to the confrontation. It made sense in a way so few things had in her life, as if everything had drawn to this final realiziation.
Unfortunately, the cost was dear.
The one kneeling by the fallen Romanus was already lashing back out at her again, a sphere of purple energy held in front of an angry, grieving face. Words were shouted that Hades didn't really hear; she was drawing Darkness Descending to full power again, knowing that unleashing it would kill her and probably take one of the others with her. But she had to play this bit of fate out; she would do this well, would fall into the hands of it fighting with everything she had. There would be no half-truths, no lying comatose in a hospital bed, no halfhearted intentions.
All or nothing. And she'd had enough of nothing.
She glanced again at the blood on her glove. Blood on her hands, yes. That was the way it had to be, for all of them.
Her own sphere of purple light waited in her hand now, her own death and that of another balanced in her palm. She didn't see or hear the retaliation for striking the blond Romanus until it was already enveloping her.
Tisiphone watched Fortuna fall, heard Bacchus scream, and knew there was no going back. They'd been skirmishing until then, and it had seemed a dream. But not after injuries like this, not after purposeful malice. It no longer mattered what had started it, or if it had a purpose, or if they should simply have talked things out before the first blow was dealt. All that mattered was ending it, now, before the toll got any higher.
The robed senshi ran for Fortuna and Bacchus, knowing she had to make contact with a victim before the power could return to its source.
There was another there with them, a presence she was only peripherally aware of, someone that caused Hades to pause a moment as a red mist enveloped and bloodied her face. They would deal with the other when they were safe, if they had to, but it seemed they all had a common cause that night.
Even Hades.
A purple sphere of light was gathering in Hades' hand again when Tisiphone knelt behind Bacchus and laid a gloved hand on Fortuna's shoulder. She shouted for Aftermath a second time, pointing at Hades over Bacchus' shoulder, drawing off the portion of Darkness Descending that had done the damage.
"The Morning After!" Oblivious to Tisiphone's actions, free hand still touching Fortuna's motionless shoulder protectively, she flicked the ball of energy in her cupped hand fiercely towards Hades.
It was only a second before the two energy patterns hit the dark-haired girl, twining about each other as they spun over her form. She stumbled backwards with a ragged gasp which quickly escalated to a pained scream, her hands dropping as the ball in her hands seemed to crackle and break apart. Sparks of purple light flew everywhere, connecting with concrete and air and brushing past loose clothing and hair. A few gasps from her attackers sounded harsh in her ears, overloud in a growing silence. Sounds of pain? Had she connected? Why had..? Then her world went fuzzy and the wind past her increased.
Bacchus barely paused to watch the dual attack connect before she was in motion again. Shaking Fortuna harshly, she managed to return her friend to a semblance of consciousness and hauled her upright by main force. Then she muttered over her shoulder, "I'm getting her to help, okay?" She didn't wait for an answer but stood up, dragging the half-aware Fortuna with her. Suddenly, she winced as something brushed by her ear like a stinging insect. Vision fogged, she glanced up and was shocked to not see Hades. She ran. Must have. Pushing all further thoughts of their opponent aside, she began pulling Fortuna towards the elevator. "I'll be in touch," she yelled harshly in Tisiphone's direction. "Run like hell, girl." With that, she had punched the button, stepped through the doors with her friend, and began their descent.
Tisiphone did not reply. She had watched Hades pinwheel her arms in a struggle to free herself of the aftereffects of the attacks, waist slamming into the retaining wall. Hades hit it hard enough to propel herself over, in the end, and she seemed to not realize she was falling.
Then the Graikos had vanished, toward the street below, without a sound.
For a moment, the world had hung suspended on the silence that descended after Tisiphone heard herself and another gasp in surprise. Bacchus and Fortuna never heard the shrieking of tires that followed or the horrific *thud*. The sounds were final and required no visual accompaniment; the story was told.
Tisiphone stood frozen for an instant, then spun to see if the stranger was still there. If she was, she chose to hide herself among the pillars and parked vehicles. Had that been another senshi? If so, who?
She walked to the retaining wall, placing her gloved hands on the edge and steeling herself to look down - seven stories down - on the street. She had helped bring things to that point; the least she could do was face the result.
Three cars were in haphazard positions in two lanes, the result of a near collision. On the hood of a dark four-door sedan lay a girl with short dark hair that fanned out about her now-misshapen head, slender limbs splayed. One arm was bent at an impossible angle, thrust through the sedan's windshield. Glass sparkled her form, picking up the sodium vapor glow of the streetlights.
She wore plain streetclothes. There was nothing magical about her now. She was nothing more than a broken doll that had been tossed away, her dull, glassy eyes staring up into an eternity of night.
People were gathering, coming out of the park and the surrounding shops. Someone was screaming, probably the driver of the sedan.
Tisiphone felt a breeze pick up and trail her robes out behind her, and knew she had to be visible. Faces were turning up to see where the poor doll had fallen from, asking why. Something was fluttering on that breeze toward the street, a handful of light and tumbling objects. They looked like cards.
She turned away, taking her hands off the wall as if it burned them. When she did, her robes fell away, leaving her in her plainclothes again. It made her think about Gwyn's admonishment, how she shouldn't detransform like that. Gwyn, for whom she'd struck a blow that had ended in death. They had only *reacted*. Hadn't they?
She walked quickly toward the other side of the garage, feeling Trajan tucked into her jacket, hearing the first sirens begin in the distance. She found another stairway and ran down the stairs two at a time, ending up on a street that intersected the first.
She turned the corner quickly, joining the gathering crowd, knowing Rob would be looking for her. He was supposed to have met her ten minutes earlier. That all seemed so far away, so normal and sane.
Something fluttered past her face, and she reached out by reflex to grab it.
It was a Tarot card. The Two of Swords.
Rayya sighed as the doctor walked away to help others in the emergency room. "Thank heavens," she murmured. Then she picked up Gwyn's jacket and handed it over, pausing to touch the small gauze bandage on her friend's neck lightly. "No stitches, no worries, eh?"
The blonde cringed reflexively at the touch, even though it hadn't hurt. "Yeah, no sweat." She replied with a forced smile, slowly pulling on the first sleeve of her jacket. After it was on, she worked her hair over with her fingers, using the reflection in the darkened window next to them for a minute. Her face looked pale and drawn, the window's inert transparency caused it to seem so ghostly that it sent a chill through her entire body. She took a deep breath and shook her head to dispel the whole feeling.
"Y'know, this turned out to be -no- fun." She muttered to the other girl. "I mean, If I have to end up in the ER at the end of the night, could I at least get a cute doctor? Where the hell is George Clooney?"
Rayya offered a thin smile as she pushed open the curtain protecting them from prying eyes and led Gwyn towards the door. "Isn't he usually shtupping some relatively attractive nurse?" she replied lightly. "Might wanna check a janitor's closet."
"Elch, how tacky!" Gwyn yawned, following after Rayya drowsily and continuing to converse automatically. "If I was with a doctor, I'd definitely be hitting up the OR... or an ambulance."
Hitting the automatic doors that opened onto the parking lot, Rayya paused when she reached the fresh air and ran a hand through her hair nervously. "Uh, Gwyn?" she finally muttered. "Ever feel like something in the world just slipped?"
The blonde looked at her for a minute. She looks about as tired and un-nerved as I feel, she thought to herself morosely. More actually. Placing a light hand on the other girl's shoulder, she nodded a bit. "More like the world -itself- is slipping. Right out from under my feet. And today," she said tiredly, "it's been tilting with an exceptional effort."
Rayya nodded, touching Gwyn's shoulder in a reciprocating gesture of support. "Then let's get you home before it decides to buck us both off," she answered softly. Then she pointed. "My car," she announced. Quickly but carefully, she guided Gwyn towards the little car, placed her in the passenger side, and got herself situated in the driver's seat. "Remind me where you live, okay?"
Dozing a bit as the street lamps flew by, Gwyn fidgeted lightly with the bandage on her neck. The seatbelt was touching it every now and then, and she was debating on whether or not to just take the damn thing off. She decided she was way too tired to be trying something as expeditious as that.
"Uh, Rayya?" She half mumbled in her sleepy state. "What happened back there? Why am sitting here all busted up, and where's Tisiphone?"
Rayya chewed on her lower lip for a second, only half-concentrating on the road ahead of her. "Well," she said slowly. "You got hit with something that Hades girl threw. Then there was another one who showed up, not like us or Hades. She attacked Hades, too, for some reason. Made her start bleeding somehow... Then Tisiphone and I spooked Hades off, I guess, with what we threw at her. I grabbed you and got you to the hospital. Tisi..." Rayya managed to shrug and reached up to pull her hair away from her face, momentarily driving with her raised knee. Placing a hand back on the wheel, she finished, "I think she stayed behind to meet someone. A boyfriend?"
"Oh." Gwyn shook her head a little, and muttered to herself, "Well, she's gone without a trace then, isn't she?" Leaning back in her seat and pointed vaguely to the right. "This is the street, dude." She said through a yawn, the medicine from the hospital throwing a curtain of drowsiness over her eyes.
Rayya obediently turned the wheel, directing her little car down the indicated street. "Doubt it," she replied. "We always seem to be able to find each other without even trying. We'll see her. Soon I bet." She shrugged. "Anyway, I remember her last name so there's always the phone book, right?.. This place?"
"Yes, and double yes." Gwyn replied goofily.
Nodding, Rayya put the car in park. Then she slid out of the car and moved around to help Gwyn out. "Here we go, hon," she murmured.
"I got it. I'm okay." Gwyn politely shrugged the help off and started up the stairs to her apartment building. Pulling her keys out of her back pocket, she gave Rayya a slight smile. "I didn't mess up that bad, now."
"No, of course not," Rayya replied softly. Unsure, she hesitated at the bottom of the steps and looked up at her friend. "Do you want me to stick around or anything?" she offered.
"Nah," Gwyn said, jamming her key into the lock of the outer door to the building. "Maybe, If you were the strong, handsome, Senshi of the ocean type I'd make you come tuck me into bed..." She teased mildly, pushing the door open. "But I think I'll just call you later, Ray. Go home and get some rest."
Sighing, Rayya dragged her hand through her hair roughly as she made her way through the common room of her dorm. Hell of a night, she thought, exhaustion so pervasive that it shaded even her thoughts. Meet new people, smack 'em around. Wasn't fair. Then Gwyn getting hit like that... She shook her head. Seeing her friend go down like that, she'd seen red for a moment and lashed out. Against all her own judgements... Dammit, it was too early to be thinking on that. It was past dawn. Time for bed.
Passing by a table and chair arrangement, Rayya spotted the day's newspaper. She hesitated over it for a second and then grabbed it. Maybe she could read herself to sleep. As she walked towards her room, she slowly brought the front page up to scan. In an instant, she felt a hand close around her heart and she stumbled into the wall, most of the paper falling from her numbed fingers. The only sheet that remained clutched in her white-knuckled grip was the front page with its jet-black headline and tiny type and picture of a young girl. "Oh, god," Rayya hissed, hand covering her mouth, ink of the paper staining her cheek. It was her. The girl. On the roof. Oh, god. Moving again, almost desparate in her motions, Rayya headed for her room. "Forgive me, oh, god... What have I... Oh, god..."
In a sudden, violent movement, she flung her door open. "Out," she hissed to a startled Julius. "Just... Get out... Don't come back until..." With a quick shove with her foot, she forced the pig outside of her room and slammed the door behind him. "Until I'm..." Falling against the door, she sobbed, a pained noise from deep in her chest. It was her... Dammit... I did...
That night, a sound never before heard on Hollins campus echoed through a quiet, sleeping dorm... The breaking of a heart and the end of an innocence all consolidated in one edged scream, torn from the raw throat of a trapped spirit...