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Desert Storm

DESERT STORM

by: SwordnQuill

SwordnQuil@aol.com

Part 1

Disclaimers: The characters of Xena, Gabrielle, Lao Ma, Alti, Borias, and everyone else who sounds familiar belong to Pac Ren and Universal Studios. I am not making money off of this story.

Genre Disclaimer: Ok. Bear with me, please, because this is kinda tough to explain. Sometime last year, I read a story on the internet that moved me so much, I was inspired to write a sort of companion piece to it. That story was “Lost Soul Walking” by DJWP. In her words, “This is NOT UberXena fiction. It just starts out like it is.” The same can be said for this piece. While not directly related to “Lost Soul Walking”, “Desert Storm” can be considered a sort of prequel to it. It is a story, if you will, about the lifetime before the one depicted in that fabulous, outstanding story. (Can you tell I loved it?) In addition, this is somewhat of an ambitious piece of fiction, in that I am attempting (don’t know if I’ve succeeded, but I’ve attempted) to take the entire X:WP universe and modernize it. We start, in updated terms, with my version of Xena’s betrayal by Caesar (seen in “Destiny”), and continue up through the X:WP episode known as “Remember Nothing”. The plot will be very recognizable to you. It’s meant to be that way.

Special note: Because of this, Gabrielle does not appear, except in offhand mention, in a great deal of the first half of this story. Do not look for her, because you won’t find her. After all, she was not a part of ‘evil Xena’s’ life. If she were, things might have turned out differently, but because this is based on the premise of “Lost Soul Walking” it cannot happen differently. Gabrielle will, however, make her presence known, and that quite strongly, in the second half of the story. If you can hang on till then, I believe that you will not be disappointed.

Sexuality and Violence Disclaimers: We’re dealing with an updated dark Xena through much of the first half, and an updated redeemed Xena through the second. There’s gonna be violence. There are gonna be naughty words. There are also descriptions of sexual activity in this work. There are allusions to heterosexual sex, but nothing graphic. There are some graphic (though I hope tasteful) scenes of sexual expression between women as well. That is how I see the relationship between Xena and Gabrielle, and that is how I will continue to write it.

And, finally, thanks: To, as always, the incomparable Mike. A better beta and a better friend one could never hope for. Thank you also, as always, to Mary D, who rescued this story from the refuse heap and begged me to keep going on it. If you hate it, blame her. <w> Grateful and heartfelt appreciation goes out to DJWP, for continuing to write stories that grab me somewhere above the liver and giving her kind permission to mention her story in these disclaimers. If you haven’t read her stories, please, do yourself a favor and do so. Finally, this story is dedicated to a group of people without whom I would most probably be living on the streets. Elizabeth, Rachel, Sulli, and the rest of the “Get Sue to Atlanta” crew, this one’s for you!

Feedback: As always is gratefully appreciated. If you wrote to me regarding “Redemption” during the month of September to early October and I haven’t responded, please allow me the honor of apologizing in public. It was then that I was at my lowest point and making ready to move to my new home. Your words of praise and encouragement for my writing kept me firmly out of the pit of depression I was falling into and I shall be forever grateful to each and every one of you who took the time out to feed this bard. And for those of you patiently (or not so patiently) waiting for Redemption’s sequel, fear not, for with the conclusion of this piece, that piece will be started. Any and all who wish to may write me at SwordnQuil@aol.com . I’ll continue to do my best to answer each and every email. An exploding mailbox is a good thing to have. Thanks again!

DESERT STORM

by: Sword’n’Quill (Susanne Beck)

PART ONE: In The Beginning

“A new Xena is born tonight. With a new purpose in life. Death.” Xena: Destiny

22 July 1990: Al Kut, Iraq

It was hot. And dry. And bright. Very bright. The sun’s rays shimmered in a maddening dance, reflecting off of the heavily tinted windows of the tall building, deflecting back to joyfully lance into squinting blue eyes. A long fingered hand rose once again to shield sensitive eyes inadequately shielded behind a turban and protective face veil. “Are you sure this is the right address?”

“Positive, Gunny. I’ve got the orders right here.”

“Looks like an apartment building to me,” a third figure observed, squinting at the figures of heavily robed and veiled women as they led young children into and out of the massive structure.

“Check the address on the building one more time,” the first figure ordered.

“Aw, Gunny. C’mon. We’ve done this three times already. This is the place!”

Piercing pale eyes narrowed. “Do it.”

With a sigh, one figure detached itself from the group of six, striding across the wide, poorly maintained street.

“We’re wasting time here, Gunny,” came the voice of a fourth man, First Sergeant Timothy Epps. “This is the place. We all know it. Checking the address a dozen more times ain’t gonna change that fact. Let’s just do the deed and get the hell outta here. This heat is driving me bugshit.”

The blue eyed figure’s retort was cut off as the sixth member of the group returned, shrugging. “It checks out. The address is the same one as what we’ve got on the orders. Can we just do it already?”

“The only thing we’re doing is leaving here.”

“But Gunny! Our orders?”

“I don’t care if Bush himself sent those orders on a gem encrusted platter. There’s no way in hell I’m gonna blow up a building filled with women and children. Now let’s just get the hell outta here.” The figure stooped to retrieve some of the gear strewn on the sand swept sidewalk and was stopped by the distinctive sound of an MEU(SOC) pistol cocked and ready.

“Drop that gear, Gunny. We’ve got our orders and we’re gonna follow through on ‘em.”

“You’re forgetting your place, Epps.”

“No I’m not. You’re the one who’s choosing to disobey orders. I’m relieving you of duty, Gunny. Now drop that gear and back away slowly. I don’t wanna hurt you, but I swear to God I will if you don’t do what I say.”

“What the hell are you doing, Epps?” the sixth man interjected, stepping up to the pair. “Christ! Let’s just get outta here, huh? We can come back and try again tomorrow if we have to.”

“Come on, Epps,” another pleaded. “Put the gun away, ok?”

“Fuck you, Reingold,” came the sneering retort. “You always were Gunny’s little pet, weren’t ya.”

Reingold stepped closer to Epps, providing the needed distraction. The squatting figure stood quickly, gripping the wrist which held the lethal pistol and pushing upwards harshly. Breaking bones sounded like a rifle shot through the still air. The sound was compounded by a balled fist which shattered the man’s nose, crumpling his knees and dumping him, unconscious, onto the heat blasted ground.

Reingold completed his stride toward the pair, squatting down, his eyes wide. “Holy shit, Gunny. You killed him!”

“I didn’t kill him, Shooter. He’ll just wish I did when he wakes up. You and Reg gather up this horse’s ass and let’s bug out.” A loud sigh gusted out from the face veil. “What a balls up this turned out to be.”

“Uh, Gunny?” came the slightly tremoring voice of Reg.

“What now.”

“Uh, I don’t think we’re goin’ anywhere in a hurry. Except, maybe, with them.”

Turning, the group’s leader spied a squad of Republican Guards, resplendent in their scarlet uniforms, looking interestedly at the small party, their weapons held at the ready. “Aww, shit.”

One of the Iraqis stepped forward, speaking in rapid Arabic and gesturing with his weapon.

“What’s he saying, Gunny?”

“Nothing I’d care to repeat in polite company, Reg.”

“Fuckin’ A, man. We’re royally screwed here.”

“Looks that way. Just take it easy, ok?” Taking a deep breath, the leader stepped up to the guards, giving them an unseen smile. “Hello, boys. Something we can help you with today?” More rapid-fire Arabic and menacing weapons gesturing answered that statement. Gunny sighed. “Take off the hats, boys. Time to pay the fiddler.”

So saying, the squad’s leader reached up to remove the tightly wound turban, revealing a head of long raven hair and the beautiful face of one Master Gunnery Sergeant Kael Evan Androstos, leader of the USMC counter terrorism squad.

Following their leader’s command, the rest of the men removed their turbans, revealing close cropped heads of brown and blonde hair. Americans to a man.

The sound of Iraqi submachine guns being readied and drawn to high port filled the square as the squad’s identity was revealed.

“Aww shit,” Reingold swore softly. “I think I just pissed myself.”

“Be glad for the moisture and keep your mouth shut,” Kael replied, following the rapid Arabic speech with ease. “I think we’re goin’ on a little trip.”

“Ya sure know how to make a guy feel comfortable, Gunny,” Reingold muttered under his breath as he was herded with the others into a tight group surrounded by Republican Guardsmen.

The leader of the Guard walked over to the still unconscious form of Epps, prodding the body with his toe. He turned to Kael, his eyes questioning.

“Had a little accident,” she replied in Arabic.

The leader sneered and raised his weapon. A rapid fire of ammunition and Master Sergeant Epps was no more.

“Holy Christ!” Reg shouted, struggling with his captors. “What did ya have to go and kill him for!” He was answered by the stock of a gun to his jaw and he went down in a heap.

“Reg!” Kael shouted, easily shrugging free of the guard’s grip but remaining where she was. “You alright?”

Reg slowly came back to his feet, rubbing his jaw. “Yeah. I’m ok. Fucking bastards.” He spat blood and a tooth onto the ground.

“We gotta do something, Gunny,” Reingold said. “We can’t let em take us.”

“We don’t have a choice right now.” She looked around at the crowd which was attracted by the sound of gunfire. “We try escaping and a bunch of civilians are going to get killed. We need to just take it easy and see what they’ve got planned for us, alright?”

Reingold scowled. “I’m not too sure I like that idea, Gunny. You can bet that whatever they’ve got planned for us, it ain’t gonna be pretty.”

Kael favored him with a small half smile. “That’s why they pay us the big bucks, Shooter.”

That broke the mood and the four men chuckled, bucking up and preparing to face whatever would come their way. Kael’s heart swelled with pride for her men and noted that this was quite probably the last taste of freedom they’d ever have. Pushing those dangerous thoughts down deep, she nodded to her crew. “Let’s go.”

*******

The group was ushered to a large, canvas covered truck bearing the bright golden eagle symbol of the Republican Guards on its door panels. One by one they were bound with their hands behind their backs and shoved up into the large truck after hoods were jerked down over their heads. When the last Marine was aboard, the canvas flap was closed, leaving the group in total darkness.

“Get your hand off my ass, Reingold,” Lance Corporal Paul Andrews muttered.

“Take this hood off and I’ll find your dick, Andrews,” Reingold retorted, shifting about in the tightly packed truck.

“Shut up, both of you,” Kael replied, working at the bindings at her wrists. “Let’s just all calm down and enjoy the ride, shall we?”

“Easy for you to say, Gunny,” Andrews retorted. “You don’t have a hairy behemoth sweating all over you.”

“Sure I do. I’m sitting next to you, aren’t I?”

“Oh. Well then, if those are your hands, Gunny, feel free to keep copping a feel.”

“Bite me, Corporal.”

The squad’s laughter was cut short as the truck started up, shooting off a loud backfire as plumes of oily diesel smoke filled the cramped compartment. The soldiers groaned as a group.

“Well, look at it this way,” Reg, always the optimist, commented. “At least there’ll be a breeze.”

The men groaned again as the truck started off along the bumpy, poorly maintained streets of the Iraqi city, wincing as the hard edges of the interior cut into tender body parts with each foot the vehicle traveled.

Same Day. Underground Bunker of the Republican Guard. Ar Rutbah, Iraq

The military truck finally came to a rattling stop after several hours of driving, giving off one more loud blast as the engine settled. The flap was opened almost immediately, to the immense relief of the group of sweating, air-starved soldiers trapped within it’s stifling confines. Rough hands hauled the human cargo from the back of the truck, forcing each member of the group face down into the scorching, sandy ground, hoods and bindings still securely in place.

Iraqi soldiers argued among themselves as Kael tried to follow the rapid conversation. Her body ached from the enforced confinement. Years of Marine training urged her to get up and crack some heads, if only to get the circulation going again. She resisted the temptation mightily, aware that her men were probably going through the same things. Being captured without a fight was not in the Marine Code. However, they had stopped being Marines as soon as they were captured. Had, in fact, stopped even being U.S. citizens. They were officially persona non grata to the U.S. government. Her orders were clear. “You get captured, we don’t know you.” Easy enough to remember, she supposed. After all, it wouldn’t do for it to come out that the United States of America sent in armed squads to blow up buildings of third world countries at taxpayer’s expense.

Kael smirked under her hood. They were officially on their own now. No black suited U.S. Embassy official would come knocking on the door of wherever they were, demanding their immediate release. ‘Well, Gunny. You got em into this mess. It’s up to you to get em out. Right?’ Right. Turning her stiff neck so she faced the rest of her group, Kael cleared her throat, speaking softly in a voice that did not carry up from ground level. “Ok, guys, you know the drill. We’re not at war, so the Geneva Convention’s out the window. Name, rank and serial number is just movie stuff. As far as these goons are concerned, we’re just a bunch of mercenaries from Outer Nonamia out blowing up buildings for kicks. Got me?”

Grunts of assent came from the rest of the group as they resisted their training and awaited their fate.

The rough hands came again, hauling the soldiers up from the ground and dragging them into some type of building. Kael concentrated on counting the steps from the entrance to wherever they were going to be held, noting that the floor curved steadily downward and the air became noticeably cooler and more humid with each step.

Their hoods were removed one by one and each soldier received only a glimpse of their surroundings before a rifle butt to the back of the skull sent each into darkness. Their unconscious bodies were dragged, still bound at the wrists, and dumped into two tiny, dank cells. Steel doors clanged shut with finality and retreating bootsteps went unheard by the group.

*******

Kael was the first to return to consciousness, pain pounding sickly in her temples. Her bound hands prevented her from rubbing the stinging knot on the back of her skull, and as she tried to sit up, a wave of dizziness convinced her that movement was not the best course of action at the present. Instead, she laid back down, her head pillowed on someone’s well muscled thigh. Staring up at a water-stained, crumbling ceiling, her eyes traced the path of several silken webs that ran from the corners of the small cell to the caged light which hung down from the ceiling on a rusty chain.

Movement from beneath her head caused her to sit up once again, rolling with the waves of dizziness as they washed over her. Blinking her eyes to clear her vision, she moved away from the figure beneath her, her back pressing against a chilled, damp wall. “Andrews, you ok?”

“Will be as soon as you give me the plate of the truck that mowed me down,” the young man mumbled, struggling to come to a seated position. Like Kael before him, he gave up the effort, crumpling back to the sodden ground and moaning. “Where the fuck are we anyway?”

“Holding cell of some sort,” Kael replied, looking around for the first time. The cell was a rough square, approximately ten feet by ten feet, barely large enough for its three occupants to sit without becoming tangled up in one another. The walls were made of crumbling cement, liberally smattered with mostly illegible graffiti. Water ran in continuous streams down the walls, pooling on the cement floor and running down into a large drain in the center. There were no beds, chairs or toilet facilities. The place stank of excrement, death and despair.

Andrews finally made it up to a seated position, looking around as well. “Reminds me of P.S. 62 in the Bronx,” he sneered. “What about Sleeping Ugly over there?” He gestured with his head toward the still unconscious Reingold, then groaned and leaned his aching skull back against the damp wall. “Fuck.”

As if hearing his name mentioned, Reingold struggled into awareness, the stench of the fetid water flowing into the drain beneath his head causing him to screw up his face in disgust. As he lifted his head from the floor, the others noticed a green slime had liberally coated his close cropped reddish blonde hair.

“Nice look for ya, Goldy,” Andrews sneered. “Green is definitely your color.”

“What the hell are you talking about, asshole?” Reingold asked, propelling his body out of the pool of water and scrabbling up to lean against the wall, rubbing his head against the crumbling cement to rid himself of the slimy mass clinging to his skull.

“Shut up. Both of you.” Lifting her head, Kael looked around the cramped quarters again. “Reg, Kelly, you guys alright?”

Soft moans came from the west end of the tiny cell. “Yeah Gunny, we’re alright in here,” PFC Bryon Kelly answered, his voice muffled behind the feet of thick cement separating the two cells. “How about you?”

“We’re ok,” Kael answered. Her piercing eyes lanced into the men sharing the cell with her and when she next spoke, her voice was raised just enough to capture the attention of her other two men in the adjoining cell. “Alright, guys. This isn’t gonna be fun, but we’ve been trained for this eventuality. Just remember to keep your heads on straight, don’t give ‘em any information, and try your best to hold on till we figure a way out of this. Understood?”

All the men voiced their consent bravely, promising they wouldn’t break under whatever tortures were going to be inflicted on them. Kael fixed Reingold and Andrews with a significant look. “I’m proud of you guys. Just trust in yourselves and each other and we’ll get out of here.”

Reingold cracked a grin that lit up his whole face. “Don’t worry about us, Gunny. We’ll take whatever they can dish out and then some.”

“Good,” Kael grunted, trying to find a more comfortable position for her aching body. “Now let’s just stay calm and wait to see what they’ve got in store for us.”

Several hours later, the steel door to Kael’s cell blew open and two heavily armed guards stepped partially inside, looking menacingly around for a moment before reaching down and pulling Andrews up from the floor.

The brash young soldier’s eyes widened in fear and his dark skin paled for a moment before the customary smirk reappeared over his broad features. “Give it your best shot, coppers,” he said in his best James Cagney accent. “You’ll never get me to rat.”

The smart remark earned him a hard shot across the jaw, but Andrews refused to let his knees buckle. Turning his head toward his companions, he flashed them a brief, confident smile before he was dragged from the cell, leaving his two squad mates to stare at one another in silence.

The poke to the jaw did nothing to ease the pounding in his head, Andrews observed as he was dragged along through the twisting corridors of the underground structure. Adapt and overcome was one of the mottoes of the Corps and he tried to do both. He really did. It was, however, a bit difficult trying to adapt when one saw everything in quintuplicate. Overcoming was damn near impossible.

Instead, he just went along for the ride, spying everything through a fog of pain and nausea which clenched sickly at his belly as if it had grown roots and planned staying on awhile. He was thankful to whichever gods might have had pity on poor Marines when he was finally dragged through one last doorway and thrown into a hard, high-backed wooden chair. His cuffs were released, then his arms were bound in back of the chair, stretching the muscles in his shoulders to the point of protestation.

His pain calmed some as his vision eased back into sharp focus. Taking advantage of what was sure to be an all too brief respite, the soldier looked around at his new accommodations. It appeared he was in an office of some sort, quite Spartanly decorated. A desk filled much of the space and a large picture of Saddam Hussein hung behind it, bordered by the Iraqi flag on one side and the banner of the Republican Guard on the other. The floor was cheaply tiled and barren of any coverings. Andrews smirked internally. ‘It’s gotta be a bitch to get the blood out of Berber.’

Seated behind the desk, resplendent in his Guard uniform, was obviously the Commandant of this little pleasure camp, his black, close cropped hair gleaming in the mellow light. A luxuriant mustache sprouted beneath his nose and the man stroked it reflexively as he attended his paperwork, giving off the calculated air of a man much too busy to have time to deal with ruffians such as the one now seated before him.

After a long moment of silence, the man’s dark, cunning eyes lifted from the desktop, scanning the seated form of Andrews with as much fascination as one would spy a particularly interesting insect on the sidewalk. He looked at the guards bracketing Andrews like bookends, speaking rapidly to them. Both men nodded and grabbed their weapons to their chests, standing like statues.

Finally, the man looked back at Andrews, smiling slightly and stroking his moustache again. He fired off another rapid sentence, then sat back in the chair awaiting a response.

Unfortunately for the Marine, Andrews was a last minute addition to the squad, having been called up from a cushy job stateside when the original explosives expert came down with the flu. As such, his training in the local flora and fauna of Iraq left much to be desired. He neither spoke nor understood a word of Arabic.

Never one to allow such a minute detail disrupt his work, Andrews met the patiently waiting look from the Commandant with a challenging stare of his own. His effort was rewarded by a rifle butt to the stomach and he hunched over, gasping for air, suddenly thankful that he’d skipped breakfast that morning. Looking back up, Andrews shot another challenging glare toward his tormenter and was again rewarded with a blow to the stomach, leaving him breathless and coughing.

Getting his breathing back under control, the Marine gathered his wits and straightened slowly, trying to adopt a casual posture against the snakes of pain in his guts. “Listen, Colonel Klink,” he said in the strongest voice he could muster, “it should be obvious to you by now that I don’t understand a word you’re saying. You could jabber at me like a monkey on the rag till the next millennium and I still wouldn’t understand ya. So why don’t you just cut to the chase, beat the crap outta me like a good little thug and take me back to my buddies, huh?”

His breath came out in a gush and he swore he could feel the weapon’s stock against his spine as the next blow to his stomach came full force. The world around him greyed out for a moment, and when he came to, the Commandant was slowly getting up from behind his desk, meticulously straightening the creases in his uniform. He favored Andrews with a toothy smile. “You Americans are so predictable,” the man said in English so lightly accented that Andrews knew he had spent quite some time in the States. “All bluster and bravado, yet when it comes right down to it, softer than the belly of a pig.”

“You’re barkin’ up the wrong tree, m’man,” Andrews retorted. “I’m about as American as Mao T’se Tung.” Two rifle stocks jammed into the nerves of his shoulders, slamming the Marine back against the hard wood of the chair, a hiss of pain escaping through tightly pursed lips.

“You take me for a fool,” the man observed, coming around to the front of the desk and perching against it with one hip, casually studying his fingernails. “No matter. What you lack in bravery, you in no way make up for in civility. I, however, am a man of good breeding. I can be polite, even if my guests don’t understand the meaning of the word.” He pressed down the fabric of his uniform jacket, then braced his palms against the desk, leaning forward slightly. “My name is Kamran Al-Hassein and I am the commander of this Unit. And you, my American friend, were caught trespassing on my land. I would like to talk with you about this. Civilly. Why don’t we start with your name?” Al-Hassein smiled again, spreading his hands. “After all, you know mine.”

Andrews smirked. “John Fuckin’ Doe. Next question?”

At the Commander’s nod, two rifle stocks came down on the long muscles of the soldier’s thigh. Andrews cried out in pain, slumping in the chair once again, beads of sweat popping out on his forehead and under his nose. “Your name, American.”

“Benito Mussolini from Bum Fuck, Egypt,” Andrews gasped out. A thundering blow to his jaw snapped the Marine’s head back against the chair and the world spun crazily on its axis for long seconds.

“Your name.”

“Dom Perignone, 1936,” the soldier moaned. A blow to his right collarbone, the bone snapping like a rifle shot, the sound echoing throughout the sterile room.

Al-Hassein walked over to the semi-conscious man, lifting the sopping hair and peering into the soldier’s pain glazed eyes. “Why do you have to make things so hard on yourself, my friend?” False compassion rang through his voice. “The pain will end if you just tell me your name.”

Andrews gathered what little bilious spit was left in his mouth and shot it at the Commander’s face, hitting him directly between bushy black eyebrows.

Al-Hassein stepped back, wiping the spittle from his brow and nodding to one of the guards. Andrews screamed as the butt of the man’s rifle came directly down between his spread thighs, squashing his genitals like a ripe melon. The Marine’s arms and legs drew inward as he hunched over, vomiting squarely into his abused lap. Then he passed out cold.

Sighing and shaking his head, Al-Hassein cleaned his wet fingers on an immaculate white handkerchief. “Take him down to his friends,” he ordered the guards in Arabic. “Unbind the others and let them live with his pain tonight. We’ll start up again tomorrow.”

“Yes, my Commander,” one of the guards intoned. “Will there be anything else, sir?”

“No food or water for any of them. Oh, and make sure none of them gets a wink of sleep tonight. That will be all.”

“Yes, Commander.” Unbinding the unconscious soldier from the chair, the guards removed him from the room.

Pressing his handkerchief back into his pocket, Al-Hassein returned to his seat behind his desk, sighing again. “Americans,” he mused sadly as he picked up his pen. “Such pitiful representatives of humanity. The world will be much better off without them.”

Only the walls of the office heard his thoughts as the Commander returned to work.

The slamming open of the steel door scared Reingold out of a year’s worth of growth and he jumped up from his place by the drain, barely avoiding the body of Andrews as it was thrown into the cell. The guards laughed and retreated from the cell, slamming the door tightly shut behind them.

Kael gathered the young man up in her arms and gently turned him over so his face could be seen. Dried blood crusted around his nostrils and mouth. One side of his jaw sported massive swelling and the first hints of horrid bruising that seemed to take shape before their eyes, competing with a day’s growth of beard for space on his face.

“Aww shit, Gunny,” Reingold whispered, taking stock of his companion. “What did they do to him?”

“A little manual persuasion,” Kael replied shortly, noting the fractured collarbone by the odd angle of the Marine’s right arm. Laying the unconscious body gently down on the wet ground, she lifted the front of his thin robes, baring Andrews’ swollen abdomen.

“Aww bloody fuck,” Reingold whispered again, taking in the injuries. “Think he’s got something busted inside?”

Kael gently probed the muscled abdomen, feeling for warmth or involuntary guarding. “No. These guys know what they’re doing. They want us around for awhile yet.” Her eyes tracking down to the massively swollen bulge hidden beneath Andrews’ Marine issue Jockeys, Kael took a deep breath and gently tugged them down by the waistband.

Reingold’s gasp echoed through the tiny chamber, his eyes wide, his face pale, his hands involuntarily cupping his own groin in sympathy for the sight that greeted his eyes.

“Don’t go passing out on me now, Shooter,” Kael warned, gathering up her own robes and ripping off a large swath of cloth from the hem. “I’m gonna need your help here, so buck the hell up.”

“I …I don’t think I can take this, Gunny,” he replied in a tremulous voice.

“Step to, Marine!” Kael’s low voice rang out. A sharp sound followed as her callused palm connected with the panicked man’s cheek.

As if in a trance, Reingold reached a hand up to caress his cheek, looking at his commanding officer with wide eyes. “Why’d ya hit me, Gunny?”

“Because you were acting like a horse’s ass, Shooter,” Kael commented, tearing the cloth in two and dipping both parts into the chilled fetid water that pooled on the floor of their cell. Folding both cloths into neat squares, she pressed one over Andrews’ groin and the other over his abdomen. “Not worthy of Johns Hopkins, but it’ll do for now.” Her eyes lanced up at Reingold who seemed to have regained some of his coloring. “I’ll need your help for this next part,” she said softly, pulling up the Marine’s undershorts and pulling down his gown.

“W-what do you want me to do?”

“Rip off a piece of your robe about this big,” she said, indicating the length by the spread of her hands.

Doing as he was ordered, Reingold handed the cloth to Kael. “What do you need it for?”

“His collarbone’s fractured and mis-aligned. I’m gonna need your help to set it properly, then we’re gonna bind his arm to his chest. We’ll have to take it off before the guards come back, but it’ll lessen his pain for now. You ready?”

“I …I think so.”

Kael looked at him, her eyes warming. “You’re a good man, Shooter. C’mon. Help me lift him up.” When the soldier was leaning against her chest, Kael gestured to her companion. “Ok, hold his arm straight out. Yeah, just like that. Now keep holding and don’t let go, alright?” At the Marine’s nod, Gunny took a deep breath, clenching and releasing the fingers of her numbed right hand. “This is gonna hurt like a bitch. Thank the gods he’s unconscious. Ready? One. Two. Three. Now.” With a sharp jab, Kael drove the heel of her hand into Andrews’ collar bone. The two ends of the bone aligned with a sharp snap.

Reingold gulped convulsively. “I think I’m gonna puke,” he groaned, his face pale once again.

“Steady, Shooter. Almost done. Now bring his arm across his body gently so his hand’s against his other shoulder. Perfect. Now hold his arm there nice and tight while I push him up so I can bind it to his chest.”

Within moments, the job was done and the still unconscious Andrews rested more comfortably, his head and shoulders pillowed in Kael’s lap. She looked up at the still pale Reingold and smiled slightly. “Good job, Shooter,” she commented warmly. “Ya might never make it as a Medic, but I think I’ll keep ya around anyway.”

Reingold smiled sickly at her in response.

Making herself more comfortable against the crumbling wall, Kael reached down and gently stroked Andrews’ sweat soaked hair. She raised her voice slightly. “Reg and Kelly. You guys still with us over there?”

“Yeah, we’re here, Gunny. We heard what you were doin’ in there. Andrews’ alright now?”

“He’ll live. Now listen up. I’ve been through this drill before. It’s a sure bet that sleep’s the last thing we’re gonna get tonight, but that’s ok because we’re Marines, right?”

“Right!” came the shouted, proud response.

“Good. I want us all working every minute of the night. Study your cells. Look for any weaknesses. Study the guards’ patterns very carefully. Watch the way they open the doors. Watch the way they close ‘em. Look ‘em in the eye and let ‘em know you’re not afraid. If we work together, we can find a way out of this, alright?”

Yells of assent echoed through the cells.

Reingold sat with his back hunched up against the cell wall, dripping wet from the impromptu shower the group had received to make sure no one was sleeping. The fat nozzles of high pressure hoses had protruded through the small slit in the steel door, water blasting from their mouths with dangerous force. Andrews had screamed shrilly at the blast, then slipped into merciful unconsciousness yet again, Kael’s body wrapped protectively around the wounded soldier.

Running a dripping hand through his hair, the young Marine studied Kael’s huddled form, watching as the glittering blue eyes darted around the room, resting on nothing for more than a second before moving on. ‘What’s going through that mind of yours, Gunny?’ he thought. In his own way, Reingold loved Kael. She was almost like that tired cliché of the sister he never had. They’d met in basic and had pretty much been together ever since, their interests and talents meshing well; their goals meshing equally well. He felt no sense of jealousy when the woman quickly surpassed him in rank. Chose to follow her willingly into hell and back, seeing the excellent leadership abilities even back when they were young and green as spring branches. His nickname came from the fact that he was an expert marksman, but she was his better in even that. In fact, in his considered opinion, and one which he never minded sharing loudly and often, especially while on a bender, he couldn’t think of a single Marine who was her better at anything. ‘What went wrong this time, Kael? We were supposed to just go in, do the deed and get out. It’s not like we’ve never done this sort of thing before. When did you finally find your conscience?’

He opened his mouth to ask the questions his mind was speaking, then shut it quickly, catching Kael’s eye as she perused the room yet again. The gaze that dropped back down to the injury riddled form in her lap was filled with guilt and self-loathing. He remembered that look well. It always came over her face when she talked about the death of her beloved brother Kevin.

Reingold slumped back against the wall as he remembered the story of Kevin’s death in a hazing mishap at VMI. Kael and her brother had been as close as two peas in a pod; sharing everything. Their mutual goal was to follow their much honored father into the prestigious halls of the Academy, to honor the memory of the man whom each worshipped.

Unfortunately, at that time, the gender rules were strictly enforced and though she could have passed every entrance exam easily, Kael was denied admission. She fought hard for the right to enter the school, but to no avail. Loathe to talk her brother out of his dream of attending, Kael said goodbye to Kevin one late summer morning and never saw him again. She blamed herself for his death, rationalizing that if she had only fought harder to change the archaic rules, her brother would never have died. No one could talk her out of the feeling; she carried it with her still. She vowed on his grave to spend her life proving to the powers that be that a woman had as much right in the military as a man. ‘And damn if you didn’t do it, Kael. I know that somewhere, Kevin’s looking down at his big sister, proud as hell. I only wish you believed it.’

He sighed and turned his gaze away from the two figures, not really surprised when the nozzles entered again, blasting them all with their icy jets. Mercifully, Andrews remained deeply asleep, the brunt of the blast borne by the brave woman protecting his battered body with her own.

The night passed slowly and quickly at the same time. At regular intervals, icy water drenched the group, preventing sleep, preventing thought as their bodies shivered and trembled in the cold, still air of the cells.

After several tense hours, Andrews finally came fully awake to find himself propped in Kael’s lap, a pair of concerned blue eyes looking down at him. “How are you feeling?” Kael asked, continuing to stroke the wet hair from his forehead.

He tried to crack a smile, though his face felt like he was holding a pool ball in his cheek. “Alright,” he rasped, then looked around as if only now fully aware of his position. A leer curved the undamaged side of his face. “Hot damn, Gunny. If I’d have known that the way to get between your legs was to get the shit beaten outta me, I’d ‘a had Goldielocks over there rough me up a long time ago.”

At her arched eyebrow, Andrews laughed, coughing and gasping as pain tore through his abused gut. “Aww shit,” he groaned after getting his breath back. “This just hasn’t been my day.”

“You’ve had a time of it,” Kael agreed, shifting slightly beneath his head. “C’mon. We need to get you sitting up. The guards should be back soon.”

Andrews cried out as Kael shifted his position, grabbing her arm with feeble strength. “Can’t sit, Gunny. Gotta lie down. Lying down is good. Real good.” His breath came out in whistling gasps as sweat came again to bathe his temples.

Kael held out determinedly against the weak thrashing of the Marine. “Sorry, my friend. Up is where you need to be right now. Can’t have those guards coming in and thinking we’re giving you special treatment, can we?”

“Sure we can!” Andrews grasped, still struggling as the torn muscles in his abdomen screamed in time with his suddenly racing heart. The pain between his legs throbbed more sickly than a rotted tooth. “Gunny! Gunny, c’mon. Please. Oh fuck.” Now seated, he collapsed back against Kael’s chest, wheezing loudly as the room spun around him. He felt chilled hands at the back of his neck and stiffened.

“Hold your arm tight against your chest. I need to take the bindings off.”

“You …ya don’t have to do that, Gunny. They’re not very observant guys. Maybe they won’t even notice, huh?” He gasped again as his C.O. ignored his protestations, gently removing the bindings holding his collarbone together. He roared in pain, struggling to move up and away from the body trapping his own in a strong embrace of agony. “Damnit, Gunny! Do you have to be such a fuckin’ Sadist? First you get us thrown in jail and then ya about kill me! What next??”

The body behind him stiffened. Her hands dropped away as if his skin were suddenly made of molten steel. “You’re right,” the strangled voice sounded in his ear.

“Aww, Christ,” Andrews muttered, struggling to turn his head slightly. “I’m sorry, Gunny. I got a big mouth, ya know. Sometimes I just don’t know when ta close it. Don’t take nothin’ I said personal, Gunny, ok?”

“No. You’re right. It’s my fault that we’re in here.”

Struggling against his body’s betrayal, Andrews managed to wrench himself around, reaching out a hand and laying it on the muscled forearm of his commander. “This isn’t how any of us pictured it turning out, Gunny,” he said. “But them’s the breaks, right? To tell ya the truth, I wasn’t too fond of seeing those little tykes in pieces either.” Taking a chance, he removed his hand and gently grasped Kael’s chin, forcing her dull blue eyes to fix on his. “We’re not all like Epps, Gunny,” he said softly, willing her to believe. “I haven’t known you all that long, that’s true. But I can see you’re a good leader and a damn fine Marine. When we get outta this, I’ll be happy to cover your ass anytime alright?”

Forcing out a small smile, Kael nodded her dark head, reaching up and gently clasping his uninjured hand with her own.

The doors blew back open and two guards stepped in, eyeing the three drenched captives, sneering, before they reached down as a unit and grabbed Andrews away from Kael. The Marine’s scream was high and breathless as his arms were wrenched behind his back, the previously set bone bulging, straining against his skin like a malignant growth. Marshalling his strength against the blackness encroaching on his vision, Andrews struggled to get his legs beneath his spasming body, determined to walk out of the cell like a man.

After he was thrown into the chair, trying with all his might not to black out as his hands were again forced behind his back, Andrews’ eyes widened with shock as, with a nod, Al-Hassein dismissed the guards from the room.

Taking in Andrews’ look of mild surprise, the commander smiled, displaying a row of brilliant white teeth. “I thought that today, our meeting might be better served by just having us chat, man to man as it were,” the Iraqi explained, standing in front of the bound captive, his hands loosely clasped behind his back. “My guards sometimes get a little too …shall we say …possessive of my rank in our society. They don’t like to see me slandered.” He shrugged. “I am sure you know how it is.” Reaching out, he ran a fingertip along the Marine’s swollen jawline, smirking as the man pulled his head defiantly away from the gentle touch.

Wiping the sweat from his hand off on Andrews’ tattered robe, Al-Hassein straightened and stepped back slightly, his eyes sparkling with false compassion. “Where’s your sharp tongue, my American friend?”

Andrews’, acknowledging that discretion was the better part of valor, decided against telling the Iraqi interrogator exactly where he could shove his compassion and remained silent.

Al-Hassein smiled and nodded as if Andrews had spoken aloud. “It’s good to see that you Americans have some manners after all.” Shifting his weight, the commander casually crossed his arms over his broad chest, looking down at his captive with interest. “Perhaps that civility can continue into today’s discussion, no?” He smiled again. “Perhaps your telling your name was just too hard a task for you yesterday. I’ve decided to start with something a bit more simple. Which branch of the American military are you assigned to, my friend?”

When his captive failed to answer, the commander reached out his arm again, grasping the man’s jaw in one hand and squeezing slightly, warning. Andrews winced and bit back a moan. “Please talk to me. You needn’t feel any more pain, you know.”

Andrews remained silent, and the hand became like a vice. He hissed out a pained breath.

Al-Hassein sighed and released his grip. “I really would rather not hurt you anymore, my friend. It pains me to see you like this. It pains me deeply. Just tell me which branch you’re from and I’ll send you back to your friends. I’ll even arrange to have some food and water sent in. Maybe let you get some sleep tonight? Hmmm?”

“Go to hell, you Iraqi pig.”

Shaking his head, the commander thrust out an arm, the heel of his hand striking the broken collarbone dead on. Andrews’ scream was breathless as he slumped in his chair, unconscious.

The commander stepped back, blowing out a breath of disgust. “Allah be my strength,” he whispered to the walls in his own language before turning and summoning his guards back into the room.

“Get him out of here and bring me another,” Al-Hassein ordered when the guards arrived.

Nodding, the two guards released Andrews’ wrists and dragged his limp body up from the chair, holding him suspended between them. “There’s a man and a woman in the cell with him, my Commander,” one of the guards said, “and two other men in the adjoining cell.”

The commander’s eyes widened. “A woman?!”

“Yes, Commander. Should we bring her in to you?”

Al-Hassein cupped his chin in thought. Perhaps he was mistaken? He fancied himself quite a scholar of the U.S. military, and knew of no women who were trusted enough to belong to an elite terrorist squad. Perhaps these weren’t Americans after all?

He sighed, the beginnings of a headache pounding at his temples. Orders had come from on high this morning to break these American bastards. His leader was gearing up to cross into Kuwait and the Americans were rattling their sabers, warning against such action. If Al-Hassein could prove that these people were really American terrorists, sent into the country to kill innocent civilians, the United States could well be forced to stay out of Arabian affairs. He smiled inwardly. The glory of Allah would be his.

So, the question remained. Were these truly American soldiers? His instincts told him yes, even if the presence of a woman among them stirred the pot a little. Would he be able to get anything important from her? That was doubtful. If she were here with the rest, it must be in some minor support role. Her mind wouldn’t contain anything of importance to his mission. Women’s minds rarely did. “Bring the other man from the cell. We’ll try him first.”

“As you wish, my Commander.”

Al-Hassein took time to study the new prisoner as he was strapped to his chair. This new man was almost a total opposite from his previous captive, with his light colored hair and pale skin. Where the previous man was stocky, this prisoner was long and lanky, thin almost to the point of emaciation. The commander clucked his tongue softly, mildly disgusted. Summoning up his rapidly depleting reserves of polite civility, Al-Hassein smiled and stepped around his desk to face his prey. “My name is Kamran Al-Hassein. Welcome to my home.” He spread his arms wide in a friendly welcoming gesture. “I realize you are probably thinking that you’re about to receive the same treatment as your friend. Let me put your fears to rest, my friend. He talked. Told me everything I needed to know. All I need from you is a few loose ends tied up and you’re free to go.”

At the expression on Reingold’s face, the commander’s bushy eyebrows rose in mock surprise. “I’m hurt that you don’t believe me. Deeply wounded. You are my guest here. Why would I lie to you?”

Reingold smiled slightly and shook his head. “If my ‘friend’ had told you everything, sir, you wouldn’t have thrown him back in the cell still alive. He would have served his purpose and damn sure wouldn’t look good as an example of a misguided young man shown the error of his heathen ways by a benevolent mentor, now would he. I don’t think even your own people would believe he had made some trumped up confession of his own free will.”

Al-Hassein’s brows contracted. Out-maneuvered. By an American, no less. The thought left a bitter taste in his mouth. He willed his face to remain relaxed as his mind sorted through various plans in an attempt to save face. He smiled broadly, falsely. “You watch too much television, American. Your friend is alive simply because I have no need to see him otherwise. He put up a brave fight, but in the end, he was persuaded to tell the truth.” He took a step closer to the bound captive. “You seem a bit too intelligent to have need of the same persuasive tactics, am I right?”

Reingold pretended to give the question serious thought. “If you mean that I’m too smart to need you to beat your version of the truth out of me, then you’re right,” he agreed. The sneer which bloomed looked very much out of place on his open, friendly face. “I wouldn’t tell you the time if I were standing in front of Big Ben with a gun to my head.”

His chair tilted crazily back on two legs as the blow to his face thundered into his head, shattering his nose and several front teeth. Coughing harshly on inhaled blood, the young man jerked forward, righting the chair as he spat blood and teeth shards from his furrowed lips. “There goes another candidate for TV Confessions with Saddam,” he rasped. The second blow ended his torment and Reingold sagged against his bonds, his breathing shallow and rapid.

Al-Hassein stepped back, snarling as he viewed the blood dotting his immaculate uniform. “Get him out of my sight. Bring the other one back here, conscious or not. I want answers and I want them now!” With a disgusted sigh, the commander looked at the clock. He had promised his superiors answers by the end of the day. Time was rapidly slipping away from him and that put him in the foulest of moods. If Hussein got wind of these failures, the captives would look like poster children for the Good Health Society compared to how he was sure to look after a session with his leader’s master interrogators.

Reingold was holding a compress tight to his nose as Kael tended to what was left of his mouth. The cell door opened and Andrews was thrown in. Dropping her rags, Kael caught the Marine’s slumping body before it hit the ground, staring up at the guards as they sneered at the captives. After a long moment, they turned and left.

Kael gathered Andrews close to her, examining what was left of his face. His eyes were horribly swollen and blackened, his nose crushed, his mouth a bloody hole. “They didn’t break me, Gunny,” Andrews slurred through a mouthful of broken teeth. “The bastards tried, but I didn’t tell ‘em anything.”

“Ya did great, Andrews,” Kael said gruffly, ripping another swatch from her robe and tending to his heavily bleeding facial wounds. “Rest now and let me take care of your face, alright?”

Andrews struggled against her, straining to open his swollen eyes. “No, Gunny. Don’t waste your time. Please. I …I did it this time …but not next time. Next time, I’m gonna crack, Gunny. I can’t hold out anymore. You don’t know what it’s like in there. You don’t … .” The young soldier began to choke on his own blood.

“Shhhh, Paul. Shhh. Relax now. I won’t let them hurt you anymore. I promise.”

“No! It’s too late. Too late …for me, Gunny. Please …please fix it so I’m still a hero, ok?”

Kael’s blue eyes widened. “What are you saying, Paul?”

Andrews’ tortured eyes met her own. “Please, Gunny. End it. Here and now. Please. Don’t make me sell out.” He struggled weakly again. “Please, Gunny. I’m beggin’ ya. Don’t let me die a traitor.”

Kael tore her gaze away from the pleading, anguished soldier, looking over at Reingold who was staring at the scene with wide, frightened eyes. She looked back down at Andrews who met her gaze unflinchingly. “Are you sure you want this, Paul?” She tenderly stroked his swollen face, needing desperately to know the answer. “Absolutely sure?”

“I’m positive,” he gasped. “Help me. Please.” The last word came out in a tortured whisper.

Taking in a deep breath of stale air, Kael nodded, reaching over with her free hand and gently cupping his face on either side. “Anything you …want to tell your family?” she asked uncomfortably, her throat suddenly dry at the duty she had been given.

Andrews closed his swollen eyes for a long moment. “Tell them …tell them I died well, Gunny,” he whispered. A small smile crossed over his face. “Good luck,” he added softly.

Kael’s eyes, pale orbs which could freeze the heart of any mortal, warmed with compassion, pride, and the quiet strength which always characterized her. “Good rest, my friend.”

“Thank you,” he whispered.

A quick twist and it was over.

Releasing her hold on his face, Kael gathered the body up to her chest, supporting the lolling head with one hand as she supported the limp form with the other. A sad, haunting melody sprung forth from her lips of its own accord, filling the chamber with its somber beauty as she rocked the unfeeling body of her comrade in her strong arms.

The last note hung in the air for a long moment before it faded out and Kael lowered her head to rest her brow atop the dark hair of Andrews. “Goodbye, my friend,” she whispered.

Reingold cleared his throat to break the silence. “That was beautiful,” he said in a strangled voice. “I’ve never heard you sing it before.”

Kael lifted her head away from Andrews, her brow furrowing. “I don’t know where it came from,” she said, puzzled. “I’ve never heard that song before in my life. It was just …there.” Shaking her head to clear her confusion, the C.O. gently laid Andrews’ body on the cold damp floor of the cell, crossing his arms over his chest and brushing an errant lock of hair from his face. Shifting her position slightly, she moved to sit next to Reingold, who slipped an arm around her shoulders in an awkward hug. Kael sighed. “Let’s try and get some sleep before the hoses come again.”

Within moments, all was quiet save for the steady dripping of water into the cell.

It was nighttime. And warm, at least when compared to the damp chill of her prison cell. The freshening breeze caressed her clammy skin delicately. The air smelled clean, with just a hint of woodsmoke which came up from the bonfire in front of her, being born off by the wind in the other direction before it could sting at her eyes. She noticed trees in the periphery of her vision and wanted to look around, take them in, but her eyes were focussed squarely on the bright burning pyre that grew as she walked closer to it. The haunting melody continued to spring forth from her soul, borne, like the smoke from the pyre, up in the wind’s gentle embrace.

Her heart was heavy and sad as she stared into the fire, the last note of her tribute fading in the night breeze. Off to her left, very nearby, came a voice which touched deep chords in her soul, though she had never before heard it. The words were foreign, but she understood them, as she suddenly understood the words to the song which had borne Andrews to his death, the song she had just now sung again, though to whom, she wasn’t sure.

“I wish I could have met him,” the unseen figure at her side said, her voice full of warm compassion. “I’m sorry.”

“He was my friend,” she replied in the same unknown language, but speaking it like a native born.

“To be remembered like that is a good thing.”

She wanted to turn her head; to look at the person who thought to offer her comfort through this un-understood grief, but her feet carried her closer to the fire before she could force her head around. “My friend,” she found herself saying, stopping a short distance away from what she now realized to be a funeral pyre. “My friend.”

The sharp sound of a door slamming off concrete walls as well as the sudden convulsive stiffening of an arm around her shoulders woke Kael from her dream. Still half unaware, she jumped into a fighting crouch, flinging off the arm pinning her against the wall and clenching her fists.

Two guards burst into the cell, both eyeing her closely, their hands tightening on their weapons. Kael stared back, then relaxed against the wall, taking a deep breath to calm her racing heart. The dream, which seconds ago had seemed so real, scattered and dissipated like fog in the morning sun.

Fully entering the dank cell, the guards grunted as they bent down to grab Andrews by the arms. The Marine’s head, unsupported by his broken neck, lolled backwards, the close cropped hair fuzzing the back of his skull pressing close against his shoulder blades. One of the guards eyes’ widened and he dropped the arm he was holding as if the chilled skin had burnt the tender flesh of his palms. His companion, taken by surprise by the action, dropped the other arm, allowing Andrews’ body to fall back to the water-pooled floor, his neck cocked at an unlikely, grotesque angle.

The first guard grunted and squatted, reaching out a hand to rest on the captive’s marble-like neck. Cocking his head, he felt around some more, before raising his gaze, his eyes taking in first his companion, then the two prisoners who sat against the wall opposite him. “This man is dead.”

Kael allowed a smirk to form on her lips. “What tipped ya off, Einstein?” she replied in flawless Arabic.

The second guard snarled, lifting his weapon and stepping toward the seated captive before he was stopped by his comrade who stood and dusted his hands off on his immaculately pressed trousers. “We don’t have the time,” he informed his companion, releasing the guard’s arm to force him to the cell door. “The Commander needs to know of this.”

Grunting, the second guard allowed himself to be guided out of the cell, turning back only once to imprint the face of the woman into his memory.

Al-Hassein turned his head to look at the clock for the third time in as many minutes. Time, once a cherished friend, had turned into a deadly enemy over the course of one day. His evening prayers, once a bastion of peace in his otherwise chaotic world, had seemed to drag interminably. For the first time in his life, he found himself rushing through the rituals, needing to get them over with so he could attend to his duties.

He looked at the clock again, growling under his breath and slamming his clenched fist down on his desk, causing the myriad of scattered papers to shuffle in protest. He had an hour at the most before his superiors would call demanding answers.

Closing his eyes and rubbing at his temples, the commander forced himself to relax, contenting himself with the vision of the battered soldier when he had last seen him. The man would break quickly now, he knew. He had been a hairsbreadth from cracking during the last session before his pain carried him away, and with his consciousness, his secrets also retreated.

‘Not this time, my American friend,’ Al-Hassein promised himself. ‘This time I’ll have you begging me to reveal all your dirty little secrets.’ A malicious smile bloomed on his face as he pictured his new, opulent office in the Presidential palace and the “Friend of Saddam” ribbon that was sure to adorn his chest. His name would be spoken of in reverent whispers as the man who single-handedly prevented the loathsome United States from entering a war that was sure to begin just as soon as the first Iraqi tank entered the boarder into Kuwait.

His blissful reverie was interrupted when the empty-handed guards stepped diffidently into the room. “Where’s the prisoner?” he barked, his vision shattered in pieces and laying on the ground at his feet. Time suddenly sped up again and a nervousness totally foreign to him planted its seeds into his gut.

“He’s dead, my Commander,” one of the guards replied.

“Wha-at?” Al-Hassein demanded, rising slowly from behind his desk. “What do you mean ‘dead’?”

“He lives no more, Commander. His neck was broken.”

Al-Hassein flew around the desk, his teeth bared in rage. Stalking up to one of the guards, he planted a knee squarely between the man’s legs, causing the guard to gasp, hunch over, and loose his weapon. “You ignorant pig!” he screamed, spittle flying from dry lips. “I told you to take care with him!”

“It …it wasn’t us, Commander,” the other guard stated strongly. “The woman caught him when he was placed into the cell. He was alive when we left. I swear it!”

The Commander turned to the second guard, his eyes glittering with feral intensity. The guard’s eyes were round and wide but the truth of his words came through clearly. Al-Hassein felt the anger at his own men leave him with the words. His mind spun. The circumstances of the man’s death became clear to him and he felt a hint of pride at the unsuspected bravery of the American prisoners. He never expected them to choose death over dishonor. Further never expected a comrade to end the existence of another. Life was just too precious to them. His mind’s eye pictured the skinny blonde man snapping his companion’s neck. The picture seemed wrong somehow, but he suspected that perhaps the Americans had some hidden strengths after all. “Go back into that cell and bring me the skinny one.”

The guards nodded and were just about at the door when their commander’s voice pulled them up short. “No, wait.” He looked at the clock again, thoughts running rapidly through his head. Surely the woman would be easier to break. She might not know all the answers, but even a woman would know her own name and the name of the military branch to which she was attached. This information was sure to be enough to appease his superiors for the time being. After he broke the woman, he could work on the remaining men at his leisure.

Time again became his ally as Al-Hassein smiled, stroking the corners of his luxuriant moustache. “Bring me the woman instead.”

“Yes, Commander,” one of the guards replied as both stepped out of the office, closing the door softly behind them.

Al-Hassein smiled and rocked back on his heels. Life was suddenly quite good again.

The Commander smiled to himself as he heard his office door open once again, not even bothering to look up from his paperwork as the guards stepped into the room. His good mood had grown in the few minutes he was forced to wait; grown as he realized that he wouldn’t even have to get his hands dirty during this particular session. Al-Hassein could be a very charming man when he had to be. He knew American woman liked that; their own men being too boorish to master the fine art of civility. He would just walk over to the woman, turn on the charm, let her know that her information would keep the others in her group from getting hurt, and in ten minutes, be on the phone to his superiors, basking in their accolades.

It was only when he heard the small group cross over to the chair sitting before his desk did the officer deign to look up from his work. His smile froze on his face as he took in the form of the figure being held between his two guards. Whatever he might have expected, it was surely not this. The top of her lush raven head came equal to the taller of the two guards. Her strange, pale, utterly fearless eyes lanced into his own, causing his heartbeat pause as the seeds of nervousness previously planted began to grow roots in his belly. The woman exuded strength, focus, and an utter darkness the likes of which the commander, who was well used to strong, dangerous, dark men, had never seen.

After a long moment, his own darkness rose to the fore again, dismissing the look he had been given from those strange eyes as a mere trick of the light. With a nod of his dark head, the guards forced the woman down into the chair. He stopped them from binding her arms behind her back however, as he chanced a look at her hands. Suddenly, he knew without a doubt who had ended the soldier’s life in the cell. Those hands were large and strong and Al-Hassein thought that if he just looked at them for long enough, he would see inches of dried blood coating them. A tendril of fear snaked through his body as his gaze trailed up the lean, yet voluptuous, form of the now seated prisoner, stopping to take in the proud jaw and high arched cheekbones of what even he would admit was a beautiful American woman.

Pushing the senseless fear down yet again, the commander affixed a welcoming smile to his face as he rose from behind the desk and crossed to stand before this new prisoner. “Welcome, young woman,” he said in his most charming voice. “A pity that my friends didn’t remark on your ravishing beauty. I would have offered you only the finest hospitality had I known.”

“Then I’m glad they didn’t,” Kael responded in Al-Hassein’s own tongue, spoken without a trace of an accent. Again, the commander was left wondering, uncertain. Could these truly be Americans? Nodding again to his guards, Al-Hassein watched as they laid the woman’s arms on the arms of the chair, reaching down to secure her to the seat with thick leather straps. Her lean, tapered fingers curled around the edge of the chair arms, relaxed.

The commander allowed his countenance to darken as he looked up from his study of the woman’s hands to again peer into her glittering eyes. “Your friend was just about to bare his soul to me,” he said, finding comfort in the speaking of his own tongue. “You prevented that from happening. Why?”

Kael’s lips curved into a sneer as she refused to look away from his direct gaze.

The two engaged in a silent battle of wills for long moments before Al-Hassein found himself unbelievably having to look away from the deadly glare of his prisoner. Clearing his throat against his discomfort, the commander gestured to his men, who raised their weapons. “Unfortunately, you did a very bad thing and must receive the proper punishment. It’s not something I want to do, believe me. But even I have my orders.” He tried to make his voice sound sad, but failed miserably, so off balance was he by this strange woman sitting in his office as if she, not he, were the interrogator. He nodded again, a savage shake of his head, and watched interestedly as the rifle butts came down upon her unprotected hands, crushing the bones beneath the smooth, silken flesh, his ears awaiting the wonderful sounds of her screams of agony.

There was only silence. He forced himself to look up, knowing the woman had passed out just as her compatriots had before her, and irrationally disappointed because of it. Looked up to find those eyes still staring at him, the sneer still curled about the full lips of his captive.

“Is that the best you can do?” the low, melodious voice asked without a hint of the agony she must surely be feeling.

Al-Hassein forced himself not to gasp. Surely this woman was not human. “Who are you?” he breathed, barely aware that he was speaking aloud.

Kael chose not to answer him Instead, she leaned back against the chair, actually crossing her legs as the smirk on her face became a half smile of amusement. She was holding all the cards and she knew it. Worse, she knew he knew it as well. Her deceptively casual posture was deliberately designed to prod him into making a mistake.

Closing the distance between them, Al-Hassein’s wonder was evident on his face as he pushed a large thumb down onto the warm flesh of her crushed left hand. He stared at her face, determined to see some sort of reaction to this. There was none. Not even the involuntary tensing of her jaw muscles or the contraction of her pupils betrayed her pain. The amused smile remained. Her eyes seemed to laugh at his discomfort.

The commander removed his thumb and moved slightly away, trying to regroup. He was totally non-plused and reeling off balance. Al-Hassein was a competent military commander with many skirmish victories under his belt. None of his experience, however, had prepared him for this. His mind whirled. His broad shoulders raised, then settled as he wiped his hands down his uniform, huffing out a soft sigh of air.

The look of false compassion returned again to his eyes. “It doesn’t have to be like this, you know,” he said finally, gesturing to her hands. “You understand my position. It was only business. You took something of mine so I had to take something of yours. Now that we are again on an even field, as it were, we can begin anew.” Reaching outward, he used a fingertip to gently caress Kael’s square jaw. “All you need do is answer my simple questions and I can promise you that this interview can proceed most …pleasantly.”

Kael’s smile of amusement turned to one of outright seduction. Her glittering silver-blue eyes darkened and narrowed wantonly, causing the Iraqi’s entire body to respond quite against his conscious will. “Perhaps,” she replied softly, her own eyes blazing a path down Al-Hassein’s uniformed body, coming to rest on the area between his legs. An ebony eyebrow curved. “If you’re sure you have the stamina for it, that is.”

His jaw opening in shock, Al-Hassein stepped back again. Reaching into the breast pocket of his uniform, he pulled out his ever-present handkerchief, wiping his fingers furiously as he stared at the prisoner still wantonly eyeing him. “You Americans are amazing,” he choked out, stuffing the rumpled, damp cloth back into his pristine uniform coat. Used to the covered deference of Muslim women, the commander was out of his element and he knew it. The line of seduction he had just laid on the American would have been an affront of the most horrid to one of his own, yet she accepted it as if it were her due and even had the utter gall to chastise his manhood.

Black blooms of rage flared up behind his eyes as he stared at his prisoner, grinding his perfect teeth in rhythm to the clenching of his fists. Well groomed nails dug divots into the warm flesh of his palms causing dots of blood to well up and surface.

Keal kept up the act, knowing she had the Iraqi on the ropes. One more blow and he’d go down in a heap. In a deep, throaty voice, she purred, “Are you sure you’re man enough to take me on?”

Bellowing in rage, Al-Hassein threw up his right arm, intending to strike the impudent woman’s face with all his strength, determined to mar the beauty she was so effortlessly using against him. The blow never landed. Instead, it was easily deflected off a rock hard forearm as Kael ripped from her bindings with ease, blocking the thundering blow and the one that followed it. Standing, she drew back her head and butted the frozen commander while at the same time urgine a sharp knee into the manhood she had just mocked. Al-Hassein went to his knees, wheezing and retching as his stunned guards looked on with wide eyes.

“Guess not,” she sneered, landing an elbow to the muscled mid-section of the guard to her left, causing the weapon to fly from his tight grip. In her zeal, Kael had forgotten about her injured hands and the weapon fell from her grasp to clatter onto the tiled floor of the office. Turning quickly, she threw a sweeping round kick at the second guard, connecting with his upper chest and sending him to the ground beside his commander.

The first guard regained his footing, clamping a huge hand on one broad shoulder, intending to spin the prisoner around to face a right cross he was readying. Instead, his nose met with a backfist and he released the woman, howling and clutching at his face as streams of blood sprayed through his clenched fingers.

Tears of pain stung at Kael’s eyes as her crushed hand made forceful contact with the guard’s face. She blinked them back savagely, a feral grin blooming on her face. The second guard scrabbled for his gun, only to be stopped as the heel of Kael’s combat boot crushed his hand. “Paybacks are a bitch, boys,” she taunted, swinging around and leveling the still keening Al-Hassein with a front kick to his face.

The guard whose hand she crushed managed to grab for her long robes, pulling her off balance. As she struggled to right herself against the desk, her bracing hands screamed out their torment, refusing to bear her weight as she tried to kick her captor off. Snarling in rage, she gathered herself and kicked out and back, grinning wildly as she heard a howl and a satisfying thud. The guard flew halfway across the room, a large swatch of her tattered gown still fluttering in his uninjured hand.

Dodging to her left to avoid the screaming Al-Hassein, Kael gathered up the remnants of her robes, making for the door. The first guard managed to pick up his submachine gun, trying desperately to aim at the retreating figure through the haze of blood filling his eyes. His shots went low, splintering Kael’s shins. She went down, her weight landing on her injured hands and the world greyed out around her momentarily.

Seeing the demon woman go down, Al-Hassein struggled to his feet again, holding together his badly torn chin and gagging at the blood that pooled in his mouth. Stumbling over to the prisoner laying on her side, he watched as she continued to weakly struggle toward the door and freedom. A flush of rage suffused his features as he lashed a booted foot into her abdomen and chest again and again until she finally stop moving. With a final kick which felt as if it had ruptured something internally in the woman, the commander dropped to his knees, panting, his blood streaming from his face to land on the once white robe of his prisoner.

Five heavily armed soldiers burst into the office, their weapons held at the ready.

Saliva frothed from Al-Hassein’s mouth, so complete was his insane rage. A woman had nearly defeated him. A woman! A stupid, useless American woman. Rising, he took out his rage on the squad of guards who stood blinking stupidly at the bloody scene before them.

“What were you waiting for?!” he screamed, his eyes bulging from their sockets. “Allah?!?” Up and down the line he went, raining down blows on each of his men until he was too tired to lift his arms. He looked down at the huddled form of the prisoner at his feet, kicking the body again once more just for the sheer pleasure of it.

“Get this carcass down to the cells and bring me back the skinny pig. Five corpses will decorate my prison by the time this night is over. Do it! Now!!”

Two of the soldiers bent over and grabbed Kael under the arms, a third leading the way out of the office. Kael’s shattered legs trailed limply behind her, a trail of blood marking her passage through the bunker.

Reingold was ready for action as he heard the guards troop down the hallway. He had heard the sounds of gunfire above his head and knew something had gone horribly wrong. At first, he had entertained the notion that Kael had gotten free and taken care of business, but the sounds of many booted feet dashed that fantasy, leaving his muscles coiled and ready for anything.

The door pounded open and his commander was thrown in, the front of her robes painted red with blood. Black power burns told him who had borne the brunt of the weapons fire he had heart. His heart constricted sharply and his vision trebled as a snarl twisted his face.

“You fucking bastards!” he screamed as the first of the guards reached out to grab him. Carefully laying Kael’s body on the ground, he pistoned upward with his legs, giving his blow the strength it needed to release the gun from the guard’s suddenly nerveless fingers. “What the fuck did you do to her, huh?” Reversing his grip on the gun, he clouted the guard under the chin, flipping him into the man behind him. Flipping the gun in his hands once again, he raised it to high port, taking a split second to aim. Bullets sprayed out from the weapon’s muzzle, cutting into the two fallen men. He looked up into the barrel of a weapon pointed directly at his head.

Tongues of fire leapt from both weapons at once. American and Iraqi alike went down, dead before they hit the ground.

All was silent for a long moment until desperate knocking was heard from the adjoining cell. “Gunny? Shooter? What’s going on in there?”

Only a cold silence answered the two Marines.

Continued..Part 2

Return to The Desert Storm Main Page

DESERT STORM

Part 2

by: SwordnQuill

SwordnQuil@aol.com

Disclaimers: The characters of Xena, Gabrielle, Lao Ma, Alti, Borias, and everyone else who sounds familiar belong to Pac Ren and Universal Studios. I am not making money off of this story.

Genre Disclaimer: Ok. Bear with me, please, because this is kinda tough to explain. Sometime last year, I read a story on the internet that moved me so much, I was inspired to write a sort of companion piece to it. That story was “Lost Soul Walking” by DJWP. In her words, “This is NOT UberXena fiction. It just starts out like it is.” The same can be said for this piece. While not directly related to “Lost Soul Walking”, “Desert Storm” can be considered a sort of prequel to it. It is a story, if you will, about the lifetime before the one depicted in that fabulous, outstanding story. (Can you tell I loved it?) In addition, this is somewhat of an ambitious piece of fiction, in that I am attempting (don’t know if I’ve succeeded, but I’ve attempted) to take the entire X:WP universe and modernize it. We start, in updated terms, with my version of Xena’s betrayal by Caesar (seen in “Destiny”), and continue up through the X:WP episode known as “Remember Nothing”. The plot will be very recognizable to you. It’s meant to be that way.

Special note: Because of this, Gabrielle does not appear, except in offhand mention, in a great deal of the first half of this story. Do not look for her, because you won’t find her. After all, she was not a part of ‘evil Xena’s’ life. If she were, things might have turned out differently, but because this is based on the premise of “Lost Soul Walking” it cannot happen differently. Gabrielle will, however, make her presence known, and that quite strongly, in the second half of the story. If you can hang on till then, I believe that you will not be disappointed.

Sexuality and Violence Disclaimers: We’re dealing with an updated dark Xena through much of the first half, and an updated redeemed Xena through the second. There’s gonna be violence. There are gonna be naughty words. There are also descriptions of sexual activity in this work. There are allusions to heterosexual sex, but nothing graphic. There are some graphic (though I hope tasteful) scenes of sexual expression between women as well. That is how I see the relationship between Xena and Gabrielle, and that is how I will continue to write it.

And, finally, thanks: To, as always, the incomparable Mike. A better beta and a better friend one could never hope for. Thank you also, as always, to Mary D, who rescued this story from the refuse heap and begged me to keep going on it. If you hate it, blame her. <w> Grateful and heartfelt appreciation goes out to DJWP, for continuing to write stories that grab me somewhere above the liver and giving her kind permission to mention her story in these disclaimers. If you haven’t read her stories, please, do yourself a favor and do so. Finally, this story is dedicated to a group of people without whom I would most probably be living on the streets. Elizabeth, Rachel, Sulli, and the rest of the “Get Sue to Atlanta” crew, this one’s for you!

Feedback: As always is gratefully appreciated. If you wrote to me regarding “Redemption” during the month of September to early October and I haven’t responded, please allow me the honor of apologizing in public. It was then that I was at my lowest point and making ready to move to my new home. Your words of praise and encouragement for my writing kept me firmly out of the pit of depression I was falling into and I shall be forever grateful to each and every one of you who took the time out to feed this bard. And for those of you patiently (or not so patiently) waiting for Redemption’s sequel, fear not, for with the conclusion of this piece, that piece will be started. Any and all who wish to may write me at SwordnQuil@aol.com . I’ll continue to do my best to answer each and every email. An exploding mailbox is a good thing to have. Thanks again!

DESERT STORM

by: Sword’n’Quill (Susanne Beck)

24 July, 1990. Very Early Morning. Temporary Israeli Military Camp. ~100 miles West of Tadmur, Syria.

A hot gusty wind blew through the open flap of the command tent, causing the papers on the large table set in the center to rustle, much to the consternation of the small figure who was trying to read a map in the near darkness of the enclosure. Commander Tovah Rybak raked a hand through the cinnamon curls on her head in frustration. “Damn it,” she hissed, trying futilely to prevent the map from rolling up once again.

Lt. Commander Benjamin Adellich, Tovah’s second in command and field medic, grinned at his friend, coming to her aid and flattening the paper down onto the table. “You’ll ruin your eyes if you keep trying to read in the dark,” he quipped.

Tovah rolled her eyes. “Thanks, dad.” Sighing, one small finger traced a route from where they were currently stationed into Iraq and the bunker hidden beneath the ever shifting sands.

“You’re sure they’re there.”

“At this point, Ben, I’m not sure of anything anymore. All I know is that we received a report of five captives being brought to that location two days ago. No one’s seen them since.”

“Any descriptions?”

Tovah shrugged, tracing the route again, calculating the dangers. “Only that they were dressed in robes and had hoods over their heads.”

“They could be ours then. Those are the clothes they were wearing when we lost track of ‘em. Minus the hoods, of course.” He gusted out a sigh, blowing black hair away from his forehead. “Of course, it’s just as likely not to be them. Things being the way they are, the Iraqis are seeing a spy in every pot these days.”

“Our people or not, Ben, they’re obviously enemies of Hussein. Which makes them friends of ours.”

“Friends perhaps,” Adellich countered, “but is friendship worth crossing hundreds of miles of open enemy desert? There’s a good chance we’ll go all that way just to rescue a bunch of corpses who don’t even belong to us.”

Tovah stepped away from the map, stalking to the other end of the tent, her tiny, compact body vibrating with tension. “I’m well aware of that, Ben,” she snapped. “But if there’s one thing I’ve learned, it’s that you don’t turn your back to someone who needs your help. And if there’s anyone still alive in that place, they’re going to need our help. Kin or not.”

Adellich smiled warmly at his friend. “That’s my Tovah,” he said, grinning. “All fire and no fear.”

Tovah returned the warm grin, returning to the table one last time. Memorizing the route, she rolled the recalcitrant map back up and placed it in the case with the others. “Everything ready?”

“We’ll leave the moment you give the word.”

“Let’s go then. I want to be back here by sundown tonight.”

24 July 1990. Early Morning. Just Outside the Underground Bunker of the Republican Guard. Ar Rutbah, Iraq.

Adjusting the dials on his binoculars, Adellich squinted into the bright sunlight. “Something’s going on in there,” he remarked to his silent commander. “They’re running around like birds without heads.”

“Let me see,” Tovah replied, grabbing the glasses away from her friend, adjusting them and peering into the heavily guarded compound. Scarlet clad Iraqi soldiers ran back in forth across the flat cleared space where the squat bunker and its outbuildings sat. None seemed to be moving with any purpose. “Alright then. Let’s add to their distraction. ‘A’ unit ready?”

“And waiting,” her second replied, holding a radio to his lips. “Is it a go?”

“Yeah. Everyone ready here?”

Adellich nodded, clicking a button on his communications device. “’A’ unit. Set up a distraction on my mark. Ready. Now.”

‘B’ unit waited as the first sounds of mortar fire were heard around the periphery of the compound. The shots were designed to draw the soldiers away from the main target and they were working to perfection, compounding the distraction of the Iraqis. Drawing up their weapons, the Republican Guardsmen returned fire on their unseen tormentors, their attentions drawn totally away from the bunker proper.

With a wave of her hand, Tovah beckoned her fifteen member squad to follow her on a zig zag path up to and behind the outbuildings. “Tell ‘A’ squad to put their fire down further to the west. We need more of a clear shot to the building.” They were moving in from the east and the blinding cover of the rising sun. The bunker’s door was to the north. A few guards hovered around the entrance, their weapons at the ready. The others were still close enough to be a danger if Tovah and her people were spotted before they had a chance to silence the guards.

As Adellich complied with her order, Tovah and her squad made it to another outbuilding, the last piece of cover before the bunker itself. “Ok, everyone. This is it.” She pointed out ten of her men. “You stay topside and take out the commander and his guards. The rest of you down into the cells with me. Shoot anything that moves and wears scarlet. We’re not out here to make friends, understand?”

The men and women of her squad nodded at her, adjusting their weaponry and clothing, brave beyond measure. Tovah’s heart filled with pride for her people and she let that pride show in her eyes. “For the glory of God and our homeland,” she whispered. “Let’s go.”

The sixteen members of ‘B’ squad paired up and ducked from the cover of the last outbuilding. Their camouflage uniforms blended easily with the desert as they made their way to the front of the compound and the four guards who were standing uncertainly by the doors, their attentions off to the west. Tovah kept her weapon strapped to her back as, instead, she simply extended the first two fingers of both hands and drove them into the nerve centers of first one, then two guards, stepping past them as they slumped to their knees, paralyzed. Her partner took care of the other two with a knife across the throat and the pair stepped aside as two more Israeli soldiers stormed forth to blast open the door to the barracks.

Once inside, the group split up. Tovah’s smaller group made off to the left, down the slowly descending hallway that led to the cells. The rest of the squad moved off to the right and into the command center of the building. Weapons fire started up immediately.

The way to the cells was sparsely guarded, and the Commander found out why as she rounded the last curve and stepped through the door and into the prison proper. Throwing up a hand to cover her nose as the stench of death and decay hit her full force, Tovah led her group into the prison. Thick steel cell doors lined the long, dark corridor, ten to a side. Using hand gestures, the commander directed her men to begin searching the cells.

The sounds of steel hitting concrete soon filled the cramped corridor as Israeli soldiers searched the prison for any signs of life. Tovah raced down the narrow hallway, blowing into the last cell on the right. The stench inside made her step back outside for a second to clear her sinuses. With a deep breath of less fetid air, the commander ducked back into the cell. Two men lay curled in the cell, their bodies awash with dried blood. Sewer roaches crawled into and over open mouths and eyes as the two deceased Marines stared blankly into eternity.

Stepping further into the charnel house, Tovah got a good look at both men, matching up what she could see of their features with the memories of her own captured kinsmen. Neither was a match and her heart grew sad and hopeful at the same time. Maybe her cohorts were having better luck.

“Tovah, in here!” came the voice of Adellich from the adjoining cell. “We’ve got a live one!”

Finishing her quick prayer over the two dead men, Tovah quickly retreated from the cell, entering the next one down the line at a dead run. The stench in the new cell was worse and the commander could tell by the condition of one of the bodies that death had claimed one of the prisoners some time ago.

The second body was that of a young, thin man who had most of his face blown away. The back of his bloodied head was pillowed upon the chest of the third figure, next to whom Adellich was currently squatting.

Tovah edged further into the cell, intent on examining the third member of the cell. Her eyes widened as she took in the deathly pale face of the prisoner. “It’s a woman!”

“Yeah. And she’s nearly dead. With these wounds, it’s a miracle that she’s managed to stay alive this long.”

“Can she be moved?”

Shouts and screams sounded near to the entrance to the prison. The fighting was getting closer. “I don’t think we have much choice,” Adellich replied, gathering the long body of the woman and hefting her easily into his strong, stout arms. “Hang on for a little longer,” he whispered to the woman in his arms. “Just a little longer. We’ll get you out of here.”

Tovah squatted down, retrieving her friend’s weapon while looking closely at the other two. Like their compatriots in the other cell, their faces were almost unrecognizable, but they didn’t match with any of her missing kin. “These aren’t ours either.”

“No,” Adellich agreed. “At first I thought they were Americans, but when I saw her … .” The big man shrugged.

“I guess we’ll just have to wait till she wakes up.”

“If she lives that long.”

Tovah looked into the woman’s face once again, seeing the strength there even near death. “She will,” she said with confidence. “Come on. Let’s get the hell out of here.”

Stepping back into the hall, Tovah and Adellich met up with the rest of their small party. All the other members were empty handed. “No one in the other cells,” one young soldier remarked sadly. “I guess we’ll never find them now.”

Smiling sadly, Tovah walked over to the young man, putting a warm hand on his shoulder. “Don’t give up hope, Itzak. They’re not here, so there’s always a chance, alright?”

Itzak returned his commander’s smile. “Yes, Ma’am,” he replied.

Giving the shoulder beneath her hand a fond squeeze, Tovah turned to the rest of her troops. “Even though we didn’t find our kin, our mission was a success. We’ve managed to save one soul from the arms of the Reaper. Now let’s get outta here and blow this place off the face of the earth.”

Raising their weapons, the squad let out a shout, turning to follow their brave leader back into the fighting.

The increased numbers evened the odds and the firefight quickly turned into a rout. Al-Hassein had been found much earlier in the battle, seated behind his desk, his life ended from a self inflicted gunshot wound to the right temple. He had died before the bunker was even stormed as in his killing rage he had managed to execute the last two people who could possibly tell him anything. Overcome with fear at the thought of what his superiors would do to him, the Iraqi Guard Commander ended his own life rather than face the tortures of the very regime he so gladly tortured others in the name of.

The Israelis fought with redoubled fury and soon not a Republican Guard within the bunker was left breathing. The commotion outside the barracks had prevented other soldiers from coming to the Iraqis’ aid, the sporadic gunfire inside the bunker seeming less important than the violent explosions outside.

Lifting the radio to her lips, Tovah pressed a button. “C’ team. All clear?”

“Ready and waiting, Commander,” came a static-filled voice.

“We’re ready in here.”

“Stand away from the walls then. We’ll have you out in a jiffy.”

The group stepped away from the south wall of the bunker, most milling around Adellich and the unconscious woman he still carried in his arms. “All clear,” Tovah announced.

Seconds later, a large area of the south wall disintegrated soundlessly. As soon as the dust settled, the group ran from the building, allowing the C team to enter and place explosive charges around the facility.

Five trucks, emblazoned with the Republican Guard symbol on their canvas flaps and door panels, stood ready for the group. Adellich and Tovah ran to the nearest one. Adellich laid Kael’s body on the floorboards in the back of the truck, then hauled his big body inside, lifting the soldier once again and gently placing her in a stretcher strapped to a long plank.

The driver of the truck, clothed in an appropriated Republican Guard uniform, stepped to the rear, striding over to his leader. “We’ve got problems, Commander.”

“What sort of problems,” Tovah asked, turning her attention from the silent figure being strapped to the gurney and searching the young man’s face with dark, almond eyes.

“The Iraqis are shoring up their boarders with Syria. Our escape route is pretty much cut off. The secondary route is still passable, but it’s at least a twelve hour trek through some pretty rough country.” He looked significantly into the back of the truck where Adellich was squatting next to the secured woman, checking her vitals.

“Shit.” Tovah looked inside the truck as well, waiting until her second had finished his work before clearing her throat. “You heard?”

“Yeah.”

“Think she’ll make it if we take the long way home?”

“I doubt it. I don’t know how she’s managing to hang on now. Any more jostling and we’ll probably lose her.”

Tovah crossed her arms and slapped one palm against her bicep as she searched her memory, working at her lower lip with sharp white teeth. “We’ve got a safe-house in Karbala. That’s closer to Baghdad than I want to be right now, but I don’t think we’ve got a choice.”

“I don’t think that’s such a wise idea, Commander,” the young soldier stated. “The roads between here and there are going to be crawling with the enemy with this massive troop buildup. And when the war starts, you can bet that Baghdad is gonna get bombed. You’ll be in a lot of danger.”

“I realize that, Martin. But this woman is going to die if we don’t get her some immediate aid. And I’m not willing to let that happen.”

The young man took a deep breath. “Commander, forgive me for speaking out of turn, Ma’am, but you’re taking a big risk. The chances are good that none of you will survive once the bombing starts. I know you want to save this woman, but what’s the point if she’s only going to die in Karbala along with the rest of you? I think it’s better to chance the longer route.”

Tovah looked back into the truck, meeting Adellich’s intent gaze. The older man shook his head slightly. The commander looked back at her young compatriot. “It’s a risk I’m going to have to take, my friend,” she said gently. “Only this truck will go to Karbala. The rest of the squad can take the route to the north and safety. If you want to go with the others, do so. I won’t fault you. Just leave your uniform so we can make use of it.”

“Begging your pardon, Ma’am. But if you’re going into danger, I’m going with you,” the young man responded, his chest stuck out with pride.

Tovah smiled and clapped the young man on the shoulder. “You’re a good man, Martin.” She beckoned another soldier to approach. “Relay my orders to the others. B and C squads get in those trucks and head north to meet with A squad at the rendezvous point. Take the secondary route out of here. Benjamin, Martin and I will go to Karbala with our injured friend. Good luck and God’s blessings on all of you. You did a great job today. I’m proud of you.”

The young woman beamed, snapping off a stiff salute. “God grant you safety in your journey, Commander.” Turning, the officer gathered the rest of the soldiers and the group entered the remaining trucks, escaping the bunker under cover from their compatriots still pinning the Iraqi forces down.

Adellich reached down a hand and aided Tovah into the back of the truck. Once there, the commander found a cache of purloined uniforms and took one out for herself, groaning at the gigantic size compared to her tiny form. She also threw one to Adellich and the two began to hurriedly dress as the truck lurched away from the scene of slaughter.

Scant moments later, the small truck rocked on its springs as a titanic explosion sounded behind them. Tovah looked out the flap and saw the remains of the bunker litter the sky in a field of fire. “May God have mercy on your souls,” she whispered before turning and coming to sit beside her friend. “How’s she doing?”

“No change,” Adellich replied, dragging a hand through his sweaty hair. “She has an incredibly strong will to live. I just hope it’ll be enough. There’s nothing more I can do for her here.”

“The safe-house has a pretty good medical facility,” Tovah informed him, leaning over to brush a lock of dirty raven hair from the face of the injured woman and gently caressing her noble brow. She cocked her head to the side, studying the woman’s features intently. “Who are you, Jafit?” she whispered. “Where are you from? Do you have kin to mourn your fate or tell your stories?”

The silent battered woman gave no answer as the truck lurched along through the desert.

24 July 1990. Israeli Safe-House. Karbala, Iraq

The journey to the safe-house was easier than any of them expected. They arrived quickly and without incident, having only been stopped twice on the road. The scarlet of their uniforms and the expertly forged documents allowed the group through the established blockades with nary a passing glance from the quickly growing ranks of Iraqi soldiers filling the streets.

With a rattling cough, the truck stopped outside of a non-descript two story building that had seen better days. The whole neighborhood had, in fact, seen better times. With its close proximity to Baghdad and the continuous shelling that was doubtless going to start up soon, Karbala might just be gasping out its last breath of existence in these watchful weeks of summer.

The rear flaps blew back as Tovah jumped from the truck, followed quickly by Adellich who bore Kael’s heavy body easily in his arms. A knock to the door, an exchange of passwords, and the group was allowed entrance into the home.

With one look at the unconscious figure slumped in Adellich’s arms, the soldier guarding the door sent the group up the narrow stairs and onto the second floor of the house where the medical facilities were housed. The rooms were filled with young men and women industriously going about their assigned duties. Quick glances of curiosity were spared the newcomers before attentions were returned to the important work being done.

A door at the far end of one hallway opened and a tall, striking woman with cropped dark hair stepped out, taking in the sight of the three visitors and beckoning them closer to her. “Bring her in here,” the young woman said, stepping aside to allow Adellich and Tovah to enter a large, sterile room filled with medical instruments. “We’ve been ready since we received your call.”

Adellich strode to the single bed set in the center of the room and gently laid his charge out on the crisp white sheets. He turned to the woman, running a hand through his disordered hair. “Show me to your washing facilities. Then get her prepared for surgery.”

With a crisp nod, the woman did as ordered, leading the medic back to the bathroom and the stack of clean gowns laying on a rack just inside the small room. Conditions were hardly sterile, but Adellich was used to operating in the middle of battle and so would make due with what he had, filling the woman with potent antibiotics to stave off whatever infection the lack of sterility would cause. Of course, lying about in fetid, filth infested water for days with open wounds would pose far more of a danger to the woman’s fragile health.

Finished washing and gowning up, Adellich gently ushered Tovah from the room as the nurse finished preparing her unmoving patient for surgery. “It’ll be a few hours at the very least, so why don’t you get out of that uniform and take care of business. I’ll come down and let you know how things went once I’m through here, alright?”

With a last long look at the woman she’d helped rescue, Tovah nodded. “Good luck,” she said, squeezing his arm briefly before turning from the room and closing the door firmly behind her.

“I’ll need it,” Adellich remarked softly, walking over to his patient to begin the lengthy process of trying to save her life.

Tovah traversed the long hallway and entered the command center of the house. Her compatriots greeted the soldier warmly, ushering her into a shower and giving her clean clothing to replace the detested and blood spattered Iraqi uniform she had been forced to don.

Rolling up the sleeves and pant legs of the too-large garments, Tovah walked back into the large second floor room, coming to stand next to an earnest young man who was busily tapping codes into a massive computer terminal housed along the back side of the room. The young man looked up at her, smiling and removing his glasses, which he proceeded to clean on the tail of his shirt. “I’ve sent your information to Command, Ma’am. We’ve just been given orders to bug out in a week. Maybe less if the Iraqis cross into Kuwait sooner than expected.”

Rising, the young officer led his superior over to one of the large windows and pulled back the heavy curtain. Both looked down onto the bustling city streets. Off into the distance, Tovah could see Iraqi soldiers pulling heavy camouflage tarps over huge nests of armaments and military equipment. Tovah smirked as she noted that the soldiers weren’t half as interested in protecting the city and its attendant civilians from the threat of military reprisals. “I’ll bet you’re looking forward to getting out of here,” she remarked softly to the young man at her side.

“Home has never looked so good,” he agreed, closing the curtain and walking back to his post. “I haven’t seen my wife and daughter in almost a year.”

“You realize it’s likely to be just as dangerous there,” Tovah warned, looking over the man’s shoulder at the military strategy mapped out on the large computer monitor.

“Yes. Probably moreso. But I’d rather be with my family when war comes.” He blushed slightly. “There’s just something about looking into my daughter’s eyes that makes me want to fight harder for the freedom of our homeland.”

Tovah smiled warmly and clapped her compatriot on the shoulder. “I understand perfectly.”

Turning away from the young officer, Tovah found an unoccupied desk away from the middle of the action and sat gratefully down in the padded chair, staring into the blank computer monitor, lost in thought. She wondered if she’d ever see her homeland again. She was stuck about as far behind enemy lines as one could get, right on the brink of an all out war. Her thoughts traveled back to when she was a young girl, the only child of a marriage between an Israeli mother and an Egyptian father. Her father had been a soldier in the Egyptian army and his wife and daughter had been his biggest secrets. Growing up, the young girl had revered the impossibly tall man with the thick black hair and laughing brown eyes. She listened to his impressive tales of battles won, her young mind not even comprehending that the enemy her father spoke so proudly of defeating encompassed fully one half of her own heritage. Until she was much older, she never thought to question the fact that her mother seemed so impossibly sad during the telling of these particular tales of glory.

All the young Tovah knew was that she wanted to be a soldier like her father. It mattered not that women were not allowed in the Egyptian military. She’d change those rules when she was old enough. The day that the news came telling his family that her father died during a particularly bloody battle was the saddest of the young girl’s short life. She remembered being woken up in the middle of the night by her mother. She remembered being bundled into heavy clothing and taken down seemingly endless twisted alleyways that comprised the city where she had lived. She remembered her terror as large men with rough hands and rougher voices hurried her into the back of a hot, smelly truck without a word of kindness or explanation. But most of all, she remembered the totally empty look on her mother’s face and how her arms seemed stiff and cold as she wrapped her young, heartbroken daughter into a maternal embrace.

Mother and daughter had barely escaped with their lives to Israel. When her father had died, Egyptian officials had found on his person letters from his wife, a wife they now knew to be the enemy. The Egyptian army officer, hero of the battle, was given the burial of a traitor that day and his family was hunted down like dogs. Friends of the family had risked their own lives to ensure the safety of Tovah and her mother, sending them on a secret, desperate journey to Israel and freedom.

Tovah was jerked out of her reverie by a strong hand on her shoulder. She started slightly, swiveling her chair around to meet the warm eyes of her second. “How’d it go?” she asked softly.

“Better than it had any right to,” Adellich answered truthfully. “You want the rundown?”

“Yeah.”

The medic ticked off the injuries on his thick fingers. “Her hands were a mess. Totally crushed. Probably by rifle butts if I’m not mistaken. I was able to save ‘em both, though. She should regain full use of them, God willing. Her shin bones were pretty much shattered by the shots her legs took. It was the weirdest thing, though. When I got in there to clean them out, they had already started reknitting! I’ve never seen anything like that before.” He chuckled ruefully. “She’s an interesting case, alright. Anyway, I went into her belly to take a look around. Her gut was fine. Her spleen was pretty much ruined, so I took it out and took care of a laceration on her liver. She has few cracked ribs, but she must have been able to protect herself pretty well despite her injuries, cause none of them penetrated a lung. She was really lucky.” Adellich shook his dark head. “She lost a lot of blood, but we’re replacing that right now. Some of her wounds were pretty badly infected, so we’re pumping her system full of antibiotics to take care of that. She’s really dehydrated, so we’ve also got fluids running into her.”

“Will she live?”

“Well, I can’t guarantee anything, but given what I’ve seen so far, I think that’s a pretty safe bet.”

Tovah blew out a breath of relief. “Thank God for that.” She smiled at her friend. “At least something good came out of this mission, huh?”

The medic returned his friend’s smile. “Yeah.”

“Can I see her?”

“She’ll be out of it for awhile. She just came out of surgery and we’ve got her on some pretty intense pain killers.”

“That’s ok. I don’t need to talk to her. I just want to see her. To reassure myself that she’ll be alright.”

Adellich looked at his commander intently. After a moment, he shrugged. “Sure. I can’t see the harm in it.” Helping her up out of the chair, the medic steered his friend down the long hallway and into the bedroom they were using as a recovery room.

Their patient was laying comfortably in the large hospital bed, a faint bloom of color already returning to her cheeks, courtesy of the blood being infused into her system via a pump located next to the bed. A soft chime sounded from the cardiac monitor seated on a shelf over her dark head, keeping time with the slow beat of the woman’s powerful heart. IV poles and tubing competed for space in the cramped quarters.

Both of the woman’s long arms were laying stiffly on the bed, bound up in the thick plaster of casts which came up to her fingertips. Likewise, her legs were heavily casted from toes to mid thigh. The crisp white gown hid the bulky bandage covering the large wound on her abdomen. And with all that, Tovah was still enraptured with the sight of the woman whose newly cleaned raven hair shone almost blue in the stark lighting of the room.

“She’s a beauty alright,” Adellich teased gently, easily reading Tovah’s thoughts. “I’d give anything to know her story.”

“So would I,” Tovah responded, coming to stand beside the bed. She stared intently down at the motionless figure. “Who are you, Jafit?” she asked again, whispering. “Wake up soon, alright?”

Adellich cleared his throat from his position by the doorway. “It’ll be at least a couple more hours before she wakes up,” he said. “Since it’s getting late, why don’t you go get some rest? I’ll have the nurse get you when she wakes up.”

Not taking her eyes away from the study of the woman on the bed, Tovah answered. “No. I think I’ll stay here awhile. She’s doubtless going to be disoriented when she wakes up. I don’t want her reopening her wounds.”

“Suit yourself,” the medic said, grinning to himself. “I’m going down to get something to eat. I’ll be back up later to check on her, alright?”

Pulling up a small stool beside the bed, Tovah nodded absently.

Softly clucking his tongue, Adellich left the room, closing the door softly behind him.

With a start, Tovah raised her curly head from the bed, beyond chagrined that she just spent some unknown amount of time sleeping, her head on the bed of the very person she had promised to watch over. Yawning and wiping her chin, the commander sat up, putting her hands on her hips and stretching out cramped back muscles.

She paused in mid stretch as a strange tingle traveled up her spine. Opening her eyes slightly, she was shocked to meet a pair of intense pale blue irises looking back at her, very much aware and sparkling with faint amusement. Tovah’s dark skin colored in a furious blush and she cleared her throat against the sudden dryness in her mouth. “Um, good …morning, I think. It’s good to see you awake. You’ve had a very rough time of it.” The commander stopped her babbling when she realized that the stranger probably didn’t understand a word she was saying. Clearing her throat again, Tovah’s gaze traveled down the relaxed form and up to the steadily beating cardiac monitor before again meeting the mesmerizing blues of her patient. “I really don’t know if you can understand me … .” Her voice trailed off. The stranger’s intent expression didn’t change, nor did she speak. “Um, well, my name,” she said, pointing to her chest and feeling faintly foolish, “is Tovah. Tovah Rybak. And somehow I’ve got to make you understand that you’re safe.” She looked around the room, scratching her neck behind the fall of her thick cinnamon colored hair. “And I’m not really sure how I’m gonna do that,” she said in an undertone. “Hmm. Well, ok. Just in case you do understand what I’m saying, you’re not in the bunker anymore. My friends and I rescued you from the Iraqis and brought you here to Karbala. You’re in a safe-house. Obviously, we’ve treated your wounds and I’ve just been waiting for you to wake up so we could talk.” She laughed a little. “And so here we are. You’re awake and I’m the one doing all the talking.” She thought she saw the eyes of the woman twinkle a bit at that last statement, but when she blinked, the expression was gone, replaced by that mesmerizingly intense stare that made her uncomfortable and giddy at the same time.

The gaze left hers as the woman’s eyes traveled around the room, taking in everything, missing nothing. The woman projected the air of a professional assessing the situation for hidden dangers and potential escape opportunities. Her examination complete, the patient turned her head and her gaze back to Tovah.

The Israeli was determined to say something, anything, to spark some type of reaction in the woman. She had to know if she were being understood. “About the men in the cells with you,” she said finally. “They didn’t make it. I’m sorry. They were dead when we got there. I’m sorry,” she said again, softly. Then it happened again. The woman’s eyes changed, a look of profound sadness and guilt darkening the pristine blue before they were hidden behind lids bearing thick, dark lashes.

“Thank you for trying,” came a whisper in Tovah’s own language; a whisper so soft the commander wasn’t sure if she had heard or merely imagined it.

“You’re welcome,” she answered, but the woman was asleep and didn’t hear.

Continued..Part 3

DESERT STORM

Part 3

by: SwordnQuill

SwordnQuil@aol.com

Disclaimers: The characters of Xena, Gabrielle, Lao Ma, Alti, Borias, and everyone else who sounds familiar belong to Pac Ren and Universal Studios. I am not making money off of this story.

Genre Disclaimer: Ok. Bear with me, please, because this is kinda tough to explain. Sometime last year, I read a story on the internet that moved me so much, I was inspired to write a sort of companion piece to it. That story was “Lost Soul Walking” by DJWP. In her words, “This is NOT UberXena fiction. It just starts out like it is.” The same can be said for this piece. While not directly related to “Lost Soul Walking”, “Desert Storm” can be considered a sort of prequel to it. It is a story, if you will, about the lifetime before the one depicted in that fabulous, outstanding story. (Can you tell I loved it?) In addition, this is somewhat of an ambitious piece of fiction, in that I am attempting (don’t know if I’ve succeeded, but I’ve attempted) to take the entire X:WP universe and modernize it. We start, in updated terms, with my version of Xena’s betrayal by Caesar (seen in “Destiny”), and continue up through the X:WP episode known as “Remember Nothing”. The plot will be very recognizable to you. It’s meant to be that way.

Special note: Because of this, Gabrielle does not appear, except in offhand mention, in a great deal of the first half of this story. Do not look for her, because you won’t find her. After all, she was not a part of ‘evil Xena’s’ life. If she were, things might have turned out differently, but because this is based on the premise of “Lost Soul Walking” it cannot happen differently. Gabrielle will, however, make her presence known, and that quite strongly, in the second half of the story. If you can hang on till then, I believe that you will not be disappointed.

Sexuality and Violence Disclaimers: We’re dealing with an updated dark Xena through much of the first half, and an updated redeemed Xena through the second. There’s gonna be violence. There are gonna be naughty words. There are also descriptions of sexual activity in this work. There are allusions to heterosexual sex, but nothing graphic. There are some graphic (though I hope tasteful) scenes of sexual expression between women as well. That is how I see the relationship between Xena and Gabrielle, and that is how I will continue to write it.

And, finally, thanks: To, as always, the incomparable Mike. A better beta and a better friend one could never hope for. Thank you also, as always, to Mary D, who rescued this story from the refuse heap and begged me to keep going on it. If you hate it, blame her. <w> Grateful and heartfelt appreciation goes out to DJWP, for continuing to write stories that grab me somewhere above the liver and giving her kind permission to mention her story in these disclaimers. If you haven’t read her stories, please, do yourself a favor and do so. Finally, this story is dedicated to a group of people without whom I would most probably be living on the streets. Elizabeth, Rachel, Sulli, and the rest of the “Get Sue to Atlanta” crew, this one’s for you!

Feedback: As always is gratefully appreciated. If you wrote to me regarding “Redemption” during the month of September to early October and I haven’t responded, please allow me the honor of apologizing in public. It was then that I was at my lowest point and making ready to move to my new home. Your words of praise and encouragement for my writing kept me firmly out of the pit of depression I was falling into and I shall be forever grateful to each and every one of you who took the time out to feed this bard. And for those of you patiently (or not so patiently) waiting for Redemption’s sequel, fear not, for with the conclusion of this piece, that piece will be started. Any and all who wish to may write me at SwordnQuil@aol.com . I’ll continue to do my best to answer each and every email. An exploding mailbox is a good thing to have. Thanks again!

DESERT STORM

by: Sword’n’Quill (Susanne Beck)

When Kael next awoke, it was to the vision of a nurse leaning over her adjusting her IV lines. The young woman broke into a smile when she saw her patient had awakened. “Welcome back to the land of the living. How do you feel?”

“I’ll live,” Kael rasped. “I think.”

The nurse’s grin widened as she chuckled and smoothed the last of the wrinkles from the bed linens. “Oh, you’re well on the road to recovery. Are you in pain?”

“Not much,” she lied. The pain was intense, but Kael, being Kael, was determined to show no weakness, even in front of a medical professional who certainly knew better.

The nurse narrowed her eyes, though her grin didn’t falter. “Nevertheless, I think I’ll give you a little Morphine bolus. Just in case you feel like being in pain later, ok?”

Kael mustered up a smile for the young woman.

“That’s better,” the nurse responded, patting Kael’s arm above her cast. After she injected the pain-killer into the IV tubing, she discarded the syringe and needle and turned back to her patient. “Is there anything I can get for you?”

Despite the volumes of fluids being pumped into her, Kael’s mouth was dry as the desert. “Water?”

“Coming right up.”

Kael struggled to sit up when the nurse returned with a cup and was kept down by a strong hand to her shoulder. “Best keep still for now. You’ve got a nasty belly wound and it wouldn’t do to open up your stitches.” Kael relaxed against the restraining hand and allowed the nurse to help tilt her head up so she could reach the cup. The Marine drank greedily; her first water in days.

“More?” she asked plaintively.

Smiling, the nurse refilled the cup and gave it to her patient. Sated, Kael fell back into the pillows. “Thank you,” she said, her eyes again fluttering closed as the potent narcotic washed through her system, dulling the raging pain to a more manageable level.

Replacing the cup on the night stand, the nurse brushed an errant lock of hair from Kael’s forehead before quietly leaving the room to find Adellich and inform him that his patient was beginning to come around.

Kael opened her eyes to see the broad, stocky figure of Adellich hovering over her, his dark head close to her own as he listened intently to the sounds her heart and lungs were making through the bell and tubing of his stethoscope. After prodding around her chest for a few more seconds, he straightened, pulling the ‘scope out of his ears with a snap and looping it around his neck. His seamed face creased into a smile. “Good afternoon. I won’t bother asking how you feel, ‘cause I know it’s gotta be pretty crappy, right?”

“It’s not that bad,” Kael replied, shifting slightly on the bed to ease the numbness of her back and buttocks.

“Well, the good thing is that it only goes uphill from here.” Pulling back the light cover, the medic exposed Kael’s tanned legs and grasped at the bottom of her hospital gown. “I’m gonna have to pull this up to check on my handiwork, alright?” At the woman’s calm nod, he continued, lifting the gown and exposing the bulky bandage he’d placed over the row of sutures adorning her belly like a macabre tattoo. Pulling away the bandage, he examined the wound, eyes widening slightly at the level of healing already occurring the new incision. “Anyone ever tell you you have amazing recuperative powers, young lady?”

Kael smiled faintly and shrugged one shoulder as the medic continued his examination.

After carefully cleansing the area, Adellich placed a fresh dressing on the wound, then pulled down and straightened Kael’s gown, pulling up the coverlet to the tall woman’s mid chest. “You’re healing beautifully,” he said finally, writing some notes on a chart next to the bed. “Wanna hear the damage?”

“Please.”

“Ok. Obviously, we were able to save your hands and legs. The damage was pretty severe, but it doesn’t look like anything that’ll give you anything more than a pain in damp weather given proper time and exercise after the casts come off. I had to take your spleen and stitch up a cut in your liver, but you’re healing well from that. And I’m sure you can feel the broken ribs, but they’ll also heal in time. Our main worry right now is infection, but you seem to be handling that pretty well. We’ll get some more blood cultures and keep you on the antibiotics till we’re sure you’re out of the woods.”

“Thank you.”

Adellich grinned again. “No need for that. Just glad I could help. Anything else I can do for you?”

“I’d like to try to sit up, if that’s possible.”

The medic’s brow furrowed in thought. “Well, it’s bound to hurt like hell, but I don’t see the harm in it. Your belly wound’s healing well and sitting up would help you not to contract something nasty, like pneumonia.” He nodded, reaching a decision. “Alright, we’ll crank the bed up a little. But you be sure and tell me when enough’s enough, alright?” When Kael’s dark head nodded again, Adellich bent down and grasped the hand crank at the bottom of the bed. With slow movements, he steadily raised the head of the bed, keeping a steady eye on both his patient and the ever present cardiac monitor resting on a shelf above her head. When the heartrate jumped suddenly, he stopped cranking, straightening and coming once again to stand beside her. “You alright?”

After a moment of calm, steady breathing, Kael nodded again. “Yeah. Just trying to get used to a new perspective.”

Adellich laughed, squeezing her shoulder fondly. He checked the wall clock beside the bed, then the chart’s medication sheet. “You’ve got another hour before your next Morphine dose, but I can give you a little something to tide you over if you need it.”

“No. That’s alright. I’d like to stay awake for awhile.”

The medic checked his patient’s coloring and the cardiac monitor again, pleased that both were returning to normal quickly. “Alright then. Just don’t be afraid to ask for something if the pain gets too bad, alright?” He looked down at her and smiled again before releasing her warm shoulder from his grip. “If you’re in the mood for visitors, Tovah would like to talk with you some more.” His tone indicated that all she had to do was shake her head and she’d be left alone.

“I don’t mind,” Kael replied, reassuring him. “Send her in.”

With a final smile, accompanied by a friendly wink, Adellich turned and left the room.

The door reopened bare moments later to admit Tovah, who stepped gingerly into the room, her face lighting up into a smile when she saw the woman awake and sitting somewhat up in the bed. “Hello again,” she said, coming to stand beside the bed. “How’re you feeling?”

Sighing inwardly, Kael wondered if she should just write up a sign saying ‘I’m fine’ and tack it up on the headboard of her bed. Looking down at her casted hands, her smirk showed on her lips as she realized the absurdity of that thought. “I’m alright,” she said softly, her gaze meeting the warm brown eyes looking compassionately down at her. “The medic said you wanted to talk to me.”

Nodding, Tovah pulled up the rolling stool and sat down beside the woman, her hands clasped in her lap. “Well, I know that this is really none of my business, but I …we …were kinda wondering who you are and how you ended up in a Republican Guard prison bunker. You didn’t have any identification on you when we found you, and your description doesn’t match any of the MIA files we were able to locate. You speak my language like a native, but something tells me you’re not kin.”

Kael looked away from the open gaze of the woman seated beside her, scanning the room again. “I don’t know if I’m comfortable sharing that information with you,” she said softly, in a tone of regret.

“I understand, of course, given everything that you’ve been through already. You’re not required to tell us anything.” She shrugged slightly. “More just curiosity, I suppose.” Shifting slightly in the stool, she smiled. “How about if I tell you a little about us and how we came to get you out of that hell hole?” Sharing secret information may not have been the wisest course of action, but, for some reason, Tovah felt that she had nothing to fear from this quiet stranger she’d rescued. At the woman’s nod, Tovah began. “Well, you already know my name, Tovah Rybak. I’m a Commander in the Israeli army, stationed just inside Syria. A few days ago, we got word that one of our planes was shot down in Iraqi airspace. There were eight survivors, as far as we know. Our people have been keeping an eye out at all the potential holding areas, and when word came that five people were seen dragged from a truck at the bunker in Ar Rutbah, we thought that maybe we’d found our missing people.” She sighed sadly. “Obviously, we were wrong. But, of course, we didn’t know that then, so we stormed the bunker and found you and your friends. We got out and exploded the bunker, then found out that our primary escape route was blockaded. So I sent the others along the secondary route and took you here, to a safe house in Karbala. We patched you up and, well, here you are.”

Kael looked at Tovah intently. Then she sighed, turning her head away. “You should have left me to die with the others,” she said in a low voice.

Swallowing, Tovah stood and reached out a hand, cupping Kael’s jaw and gently bringing her face back around. “I couldn’t do that,” she said. “We found you, horribly injured, but with enough strength of will to cling to life amidst all that dirt and depravity. I couldn’t just leave you there to breathe your last in that den of hell.”

“It would have been better if you did,” Kael ground out, her voice filled with self-loathing.

Tovah felt a tendril of fear snake through her belly at the woman’s words, but reminded herself that this woman was not her enemy. “I couldn’t do that,” she repeated forcefully.

Kael closed her eyes for a long moment, before forcing herself out of the gutter of self-recrimination. No matter how much she wished it, the fact of the matter is that she was not dead. She was alive thanks to some very brave, very good souls and she’d better make the most of it. “Kael,” she rasped finally, before clearing her throat and trying again. “My name is Kael Evan Androstos.” Taking a deep breath, she gave a short mental shrug, giving in to the need to tell this stranger the information her men had died trying to preserve. “I’m a Master Gunnery Sergeant in the United States Marine Corps.” She laughed almost silently. “Or at least I was.”

Tovah’s eyes widened in shock. “You’re an American?”

“Born and bred,” Kael replied in English.

“I didn’t know the Americans let women go behind enemy lines,” Tovah remarked, also in English. Her accent was light, her words easily understood.

“They don’t. Normally. I’m one of the few exceptions.” An internal pain having nothing to do with her wounds shuttered Kael’s expressive eyes once again. “Apparently, they made a mistake with me.”

Looking up, Tovah could see the heart rate on the monitor increase dramatically. She looked back down at Kael. “Are you in pain?”

The blue eyes which met her own could have been those of a corpse, so empty were their depths. “No,” came the response before those eyes closed once again, signaling the end of the conversation.

Tovah rose from her place by the bedside, reaching out, intending to lay a comforting hand on the American’s broad shoulder. Her hand hovered for a moment, short of its goal as the Israeli took in the closed off expression on Kael’s beautiful face. After a moment that seemed to span eternity, Tovah dropped her hand back to her side and spun on her heel, leaving Kael alone with her thoughts once more.

25 July 1990 – 14 August 1990 Israeli Safe-House. Karbala, Iraq

The days passed quickly for the people inside the house now behind enemy lines in the biggest war in decades. Heads were clustered around monitors as Iraqi tanks crossed the boarder into Kuwait. Concerned Israelis watched as American President Bush declared war on Iraq. Via encrypted satellite feeds, the group was able to watch CNN as the first bombs landed on Baghdad.

Slowly, in pairs and small groups, the house was evacuated under cover of night. Others remained behind, supplying allied forces with accurate bombing targets, well aware of the fact that their lives were at risk by enemy and friendly forces alike.

On the second floor of the house, Kael continued her convalescence. Her mind and body raged against her immobilization; itching to be out among the combatants winning the war. She damned herself in a million different ways for failing her duty to herself, her squad and her country. Damned the injuries that kept her pinned down to a soft bed while her countrymen were dying for a cause she needed to be a part of.

The only thing which brightened her dark mood were the visits from Tovah. The two women developed a surprisingly deep bond in the space of a few short weeks. The two normally reticent women found many things to talk about during those first days of war as bombs shuddered the foundation of their safe house and lit the night sky ablaze.

One night, when suffering a painful hamstring cramp, Kael was surprised when her companion simply jabbed at the nerve center of her groin, deadening all feeling in her leg, as strong fingers worked out the cramp. Fascinated, Kael asked to learn more about the technique, and many hours were spent in the study of the ancient procedure. Though her hands were casted and she couldn’t practice the art, Kael was sure that, should the time ever come when she would need to use it, she would have no trouble imitating what she had learned from the tiny Israeli soldier.

At night, her dreams were filled with smoke and fire. With the screams of dying men and women. Aided by the concussions of bombs going off in the near distance. The shelling was getting dangerously close to the city proper. It would soon be time to abandon the safe house completely or risk being killed in the nightly air raids.

15 August 1990. Israeli Safe House. Karbala, Iraq.

She was propped up on her elbows on a hay filled cot in a room which smelled strongly of bitter herbs. Long needles sprung forth from her legs which were broken and twisted, aching and throbbing. A young woman sat next to her on the cot, speaking in a language she knew she should understand, but didn’t. Behind her, a tall man stood, translating the young woman’s words.

There was a loud crash, and the door blew open. Heavily armed men, dressed in the armor of Roman soldiers, burst into the room, shouting. Her companion sprung from the bed, fighting the soldiers in a fury as she looked on, helpless. A Roman raised a crossbow, it’s bolt aimed at her heart. She watched as his finger tightened on the trigger. She could hear the whistle as the bolt left its housing, speeding toward her. Her eyes widened, then narrowed as a brown shape flew in front of the bolt, preventing it from killing her. The figure landed her arms, a bolt through its back. She pulled away, pulling the figure with her, lifting the head, turning it to the light. It was the young woman. Her friend. ‘M’Lila’, her mind supplied. With kind, loving eyes M’Lila looked at her, trying to impart a final message in that final glance. Then they closed forever as the woman rolled from her grasp.

She looked up, a feral rage far beyond anything she had ever felt, filled her body until there was nothing but hatred. She could feel her mouth stretch and curl into the snarl of a wild beast as her broken body coiled. The soldiers came up from their places on the floor, running toward her, intent on the kill. Her nostrils flared. Blood scented the air. Her grin widened.

Flipping off the bed, she landed on her undamaged arms, using her shattered legs to level two of the soldiers with thundering kicks to the head. She sprawled back on the bed, her legs incapable of holding her upright. Another soldier came, and with a vicious side kick, she sent him across the room and into the blazing fireplace. The smell of charred flesh perfumed the room as his face burst into flames.

And still they came, yelling like savages. She grabbed one, broke his knee, and drew a sword across his neck, a feeling of almost sexual ecstasy coursing through her body. She threw back her head, reveling in it, letting it wash through her soul. She impaled another soldier through the guts with the same sword.

Still another came. She headbutted him, then grabbed his falling body, pulling it between her screaming legs. She felt herself using the technique Tovah …’M’Lila, her mind supplied again …had taught her. The soldier gurgled at her feet, paralyzed

“You’ll be dead in thirty seconds,” she found herself saying. “But know this. You won’t be the last. Tell Hades to prepare himself. A new Xena is born tonight. With a new purpose in life. Death.”

Her dream was fractured as Kael felt someone shaking her. Her eyes popped open. “M’Lila?” she whispered hoarsely to the woman standing above her.

Tovah cocked her head. “It’s Tovah,” she replied. “We need to go now. We just got word. The Americans are getting ready to bomb the military targets right outside of the city. We need to be out of the area before the bombs fall.”

The doors opened again, admitting Adellich who sported tousled hair and a three day growth of beard. He flashed a smile at Tovah and Kael. “Ah good. You’re up. I’ll have the men bring in the stretcher and we’ll stow you aboard the truck.”

“Wait,” Kael ordered as he turned back to the door.

“Yes?”

“Get these casts off me.”

Adellich turned completely around, his eyes wide with shock. He shot a glance to an equally alarmed Tovah before switching back to the reclining woman. “Say that again, please?”

“You heard me. Get these casts off me now.” Though she didn’t remember more than scattered threads of her dream, Kael was filled with a strong sense of foreboding.

“Are you crazy?” the medic asked, coming to stand beside the bed. “Your wounds are just starting to heal. You could cripple yourself permanently if I take these casts off now.”

“I realize that. I also realize that we’re about to go out into a war zone. There’s no way I’m going to ride in the back of a truck unable to defend myself and you. I’m a soldier. Now get these damn casts off of me or I swear by any god you name I’ll smash them apart.” The very air around her snapped with command.

Adellich looked at Tovah, who was looking intently at Kael. After a long moment, the commander nodded. “Do as she says.”

“Are you crazy too?”

“Do it. She knows what the dangers are.”

Throwing up his hands in disgust, the medic went into one of the back rooms, returning with several boxes of splints and the cast cutter. “I want to go down on record that I’m only doing this under the strongest protest.”

“So noted,” Tovah replied. “Now get to work. Please. We don’t have much time.”

Grumbling under his breath, Adellich set to work. Within a very few moments, all the casts had been removed. The medic noted with some shock that Kael’s wounds had healed abnormally fast. The swelling was gone completely and only residual bruising could be seen. An untrained eye would take her limbs for sound. He knew better.

Kael looked down at her freed hands, breathing deeply and straining to close them into fists. The pain was sharp but the gratification sharper. Grinning in triumph, she relaxed her tight muscles, allowing the medic to put both arms in molded plastic splints.

After Adellich had splinted her legs, Kael eagerly swung them off of the bed, only to be stopped by a strong hand to her shoulder. “Not so fast,” the medic said sharply. “Making a fist is one thing. Trying to stand on those shattered legs is quite another. Leave me some dignity as your physician and let the men carry you down to the truck, alright?”

After a moment, Kael relaxed against his grip and nodded. Grunting in satisfaction, Adellich ushered in the two litter-bearers, then helped Kael onto the stretcher. Retrieving a large pack filled with medical supplies, he nodded, encircling Tovah with one arm. “Alright then. Let’s get out of here.”

A short time later, Kael was stowed aboard the truck, her stretcher secured to one of the long benches by thick leather straps. Tovah and Adellich sat opposite the American on the other bench, clothed again in their accursed Republican Guard uniforms. Two submachine guns were stowed safely beneath the benches, out of direct sight but easily retrieved if needed. One of the litter bearers sat in the driver’s seat while the other went with his compatriots in a second purloined Iraqi truck.

The truck coughed loudly as it was started up, and with a rattle, the group made their way across the bomb blasted desert to a far off safe zone, each trapped within the dark well of their own thoughts.

16 August 1990. ~50 miles west of the boarder between Iraq and Saudi Arabia

The flight to freedom had been excruciating for the soldiers, especially those sitting in the back of the truck. Avoiding main thoroughfares and constantly streaming patrols of soldiers, Iraqi and allied alike, caused a merciless pounding on tender bodies.

Kael had finally fallen into a troubled, sweat-stained sleep about seven hours into the journey. Noting this, Adellich reached under the bench and removed his medical bag. Peering inside, he brought out a pre-filled syringe of Morphine.

“What are you doing?” Tovah asked.

“This has gotta be agony on her,” Adellich replied in a whisper. “She’d never ask for help while awake, so I figure I’ll give it to her when she’s asleep.”

Tovah snickered. “You always were known for your bravery, Ben.”

Pulling a face, the medic stood, supporting himself against the bench as the truck hit yet another deep rut in the desert. Straightening, he made his way across the truck bed, then lifted the light coverlet he’d placed over Kael’s reclining body. A quick swipe with an alcohol pad to her hip and the injection was administered.

Kael’s eyes shot open, her left hand moving in a blur and knocking the now empty syringe from the medic’s hand. “What are you doing?” she growled.

Adellich looked slightly sheepish as he rubbed his now bruised wrist. “Just giving you something for the pain.”

A sable eyebrow rose. “Did I say I was in pain?”

“You didn’t have to.”

Opening her mouth to say more, the American yawned instead. “You son of a bitch,” she mumbled as her eyelids betrayed her body’s signals to keep awake and aware.

“Relax,” the medic said, laying a gentle hand on Kael’s broad shoulder. “We’re almost there.”

” …kill you … .” was all Kael could say before her body gave in to the seductive call of the drug.

Tovah laughed as Adellich, still rubbing his wrist, rejoined her on the bench. “Can’t wait to see how you’re gonna get yourself out of this one,” she teased, patting the medic’s shoulder in mock sympathy.

“Don’t tease an injured man,” he grumbled, holding up his arm and asking for sympathy with his eyes.

“It was your own fault. You … .” Tovah cut off her words, stiffening her posture and cocking her head.

“What is it? Tovah?”

Tovah threw up a hand for silence, her hearing strained against the loud rumbling of the truck. The distinctive sound of semi-automatic weapons fire sounded uncomfortably close. Straining still further, she could pick up muffled shouts. More fire, and the truck came to a lurching halt.

“Shit,” Tovah whispered, reaching down for her concealed weapon.

“What is it? What’s wrong? Why are we stopping?”

“I’m not sure. Either the Iraqis found us out, or the allies think we’re the enemy. Either way, we need to be ready.” She nodded to him, then cut her eyes to the floor beneath the bench.

Taking a deep breath, Adellich bent over and retrieved his weapon, checking all the clips to be sure it was loaded and in proper working condition. He returned her nod, hefting the weapon. “What now?”

“Stay quiet and let me do the talking. Just get ready to fight if we need to. Keep an eye on Kael.”

“I can do that.”

The back flap of the truck was lifted by the long nose of a weapon. A masked figure, dressed in desert camouflage ducked underneath the flap, pointing his weapon at the occupants. “Put down your weapons and raise your hands above your heads!” the figure commanded in Arabic, gesturing at them with his gun to make sure his statements were understood.

Laying her weapon on the floor, Tovah straightened and lifted her hands above her head. “We have an injured soldier,” she replied in Arabic.

“I can see that,” the soldier returned. “Now get up slowly and come towards me. No funny stuff or I’ll blow your head off. You understand me?”

Tovah did as she was commanded, rising slowly and peering closely at the man’s uniform. She took a chance. “We’re not Iraqi,” she said, slowly walking toward the heavily armed soldier. “We’re allies.”

A harsh chuckle sounded from behind the mask. “Yeah, and my mother’s dining with the Queen next Sunday. Now shut up and move!”

“I’m totally serious. It should be obvious to you that I’m a woman. How many women do you think the Iraqis let in their army?”

“I don’t give a shit if you’re a fucking gorilla. You’re wearing an Iraqi uniform. That makes you the enemy. Now get your ass outta the truck before I cut you in two!”

As Tovah ducked beneath the tent flap, the soldier noticed Adellich, and his gun, for the first time. There was a short, sharp report, and the medic flew against the truck’s bulkhead, his weapon flying from his grasp. Blood spurted from a hole in his throat.

“Ben!” Tovah shouted, whirling.

The soldier clouted her across the back with a blow from his weapon. The Israeli slumped to the ground, stunned.

Weapon fire cutting through the drug induced haze of her sleep, Kael struggled back into consciousness. She came awake quickly, bringing her body up, leaning on her elbows for support. With a sweep of her eyes, she noted the now dead Adellich, his weapon near her cot, the slumped form of Tovah, and the soldier gripping his weapon tightly.

Raising her right arm to her mouth, Kael ripped the velcro closure to the splint open with her teeth, then reached down to grab the medic’s weapon as the soldier busied himself with trying to remove a struggling Tovah from the truck. “You son of a bitch!” Kael screamed, bringing her weapon up.

The soldier dropped Tovah to bring his own weapon up. The Israeli grabbed the gun by the barrel and shoved, causing the wild shots to fly over her head, missing Kael completely. Adellich’s thick body danced as more ammunition entered it.

Pushing the soldier away, Tovah scrambled back to her feet, heading toward Kael and her weapon. “Don’t, Kael. Please. They’re allies.”

Kael shook her off, weapon raised again as the soldier’s head popped back up under the canvas flap, this time joined by two of his comrades. Kael squeezed the trigger, sending one of the men flying away from the truck. The second lifted his weapon and fired toward Kael.

As if seeing it in slow motion, Tovah felt her body spring over the short distance that separated herself from her American friend. With a yell, she covered Kael’s body with her own. Three bullets tore into her back. She felt the sudden urge to cough, spraying Kael’s white hospital gown with blood. She watched the patterns interestedly, wondering if this was how it felt to die.

Lifting a head which felt like it now weighed a ton, she looked into Kael’s ice blue eyes for a moment that seemed to span eternity. The look of cold death in those eyes was her companion in her journey to oblivion.

Kael broke the gaze and shifted her hips to buck Tovah’s dead body from her. The corners of her mouth turned up in a snarl of utter rage. “Pray to whatever gods you believe in, cause I’m sendin’ you to meet ‘em.” Depressing the trigger, Kael mowed down the two soldiers staring at her from the back of the truck. Lurching to her feet, biting back a shout of pain as her legs tried their best to bear her heavy weight, the American steadied herself against the bench, then turned. Shuffling steps, each a study in agony, brought her to the back of the truck. Without even looking outside to aim, she depressed the trigger of her weapon again, shredding the canvas flap and sending screaming missiles into the desert heat. Screams of the dying men played an orchestra in her ears.

Shooting until she ran out of ammunition, Kael picked up Tovah’s weapon. Standing behind one steel support strut, she eased the canvas flap away with the muzzle of the gun. The desert was littered with bodies. She counted ten in all from her vantage point. Freezing in place, she listened carefully. There was no sound but the howling of the desert wind.

Grunting in satisfaction, the soldier lowered herself to a sitting position in the bed of the truck, then gingerly slipped down to the ground. Her knees gave way immediately, dumping her to the desert sands. Raising up a bloody hand, she gripped the truck bed and pulled herself back onto her feet. The hard packed sand conspired against her, threatening to take her feet out from under her.

Gritting her teeth against the pain, she slowly made her way around the truck. There, hiding behind a wheel and looking in the opposite direction, was the last of the patrol. “Nighty night,” she whispered, pulling on the trigger and killing the hiding soldier.

Going to the front of the truck, she pulled the door open, not surprised when the dead body of the Israeli driver fell out into her arms. The weight of his body bore her to the ground again and this time she could not stop the scream of pain as it tore its way out of her throat.

Rolling the body off of her, Kael stood again, looking down at the soldier she had murdered. On his breast was a small emblem. The American flag.

Taking a quick look at the corpses littering the desert, Kael noted the similar flag on each. She tipped her head to the sky, a howl sounding from an opened mouth.

Grimacing, she pulled herself up into the now empty truck and started off, fleeing into an unknown future and escaping the torturous past.

To Be Continued…

DESERT STORM

Part 4

by: SwordnQuill

SwordnQuil@aol.com

Disclaimers: The characters of Xena, Gabrielle, Lao Ma, Alti, Borias, and everyone else who sounds familiar belong to Pac Ren and Universal Studios. I am not making money off of this story.

Genre Disclaimer: Ok. Bear with me, please, because this is kinda tough to explain. Sometime last year, I read a story on the internet that moved me so much, I was inspired to write a sort of companion piece to it. That story was “Lost Soul Walking” by DJWP. In her words, “This is NOT UberXena fiction. It just starts out like it is.” The same can be said for this piece. While not directly related to “Lost Soul Walking”, “Desert Storm” can be considered a sort of prequel to it. It is a story, if you will, about the lifetime before the one depicted in that fabulous, outstanding story. (Can you tell I loved it?) In addition, this is somewhat of an ambitious piece of fiction, in that I am attempting (don’t know if I’ve succeeded, but I’ve attempted) to take the entire X:WP universe and modernize it. We start, in updated terms, with my version of Xena’s betrayal by Caesar (seen in “Destiny”), and continue up through the X:WP episode known as “Remember Nothing”. The plot will be very recognizable to you. It’s meant to be that way.

Special note: Because of this, Gabrielle does not appear, except in offhand mention, in a great deal of the first half of this story. Do not look for her, because you won’t find her. After all, she was not a part of ‘evil Xena’s’ life. If she were, things might have turned out differently, but because this is based on the premise of “Lost Soul Walking” it cannot happen differently. Gabrielle will, however, make her presence known, and that quite strongly, in the second half of the story. If you can hang on till then, I believe that you will not be disappointed.

Sexuality and Violence Disclaimers: We’re dealing with an updated dark Xena through much of the first half, and an updated redeemed Xena through the second. There’s gonna be violence. There are gonna be naughty words. There are also descriptions of sexual activity in this work. There are allusions to heterosexual sex, but nothing graphic. There are some graphic (though I hope tasteful) scenes of sexual expression between women as well. That is how I see the relationship between Xena and Gabrielle, and that is how I will continue to write it.

And, finally, thanks: To, as always, the incomparable Mike. A better beta and a better friend one could never hope for. Thank you also, as always, to Mary D, who rescued this story from the refuse heap and begged me to keep going on it. If you hate it, blame her. <w> Grateful and heartfelt appreciation goes out to DJWP, for continuing to write stories that grab me somewhere above the liver and giving her kind permission to mention her story in these disclaimers. If you haven’t read her stories, please, do yourself a favor and do so. Finally, this story is dedicated to a group of people without whom I would most probably be living on the streets. Elizabeth, Rachel, Sulli, and the rest of the “Get Sue to Atlanta” crew, this one’s for you!

Feedback: As always is gratefully appreciated. If you wrote to me regarding “Redemption” during the month of September to early October and I haven’t responded, please allow me the honor of apologizing in public. It was then that I was at my lowest point and making ready to move to my new home. Your words of praise and encouragement for my writing kept me firmly out of the pit of depression I was falling into and I shall be forever grateful to each and every one of you who took the time out to feed this bard. And for those of you patiently (or not so patiently) waiting for Redemption’s sequel, fear not, for with the conclusion of this piece, that piece will be started. Any and all who wish to may write me at SwordnQuil@aol.com . I’ll continue to do my best to answer each and every email. An exploding mailbox is a good thing to have. Thanks again!

DESERT STORM

by: Sword’n’Quill (Susanne Beck)

PART 4: Sins of the Present

“With shattered legs and crippled soul, I went east. To lose myself in vengeance. Not against Caesar. But the entire human race.” Xena. The Debt 1: Betrayal

24 April 1991. A Secluded Airstrip Outside Medellin, Colombia.

“Where are they?” Geraldo asked for perhaps the hundredth time, pacing along the front of a flattened area clear-cut from the surrounding jungles and running a hand through his thick black hair.

“They should be here shortly, sir,” Varguez, the chauffeur, replied from his place by the long black Lincoln. “The pilot did say they ran into trouble in customs, remember.”

“That was six hours ago!” Geraldo replied, coming to the end of the dirt strip and reversing to begin the track all over again. The grass was plastered flat under his boots. “They should be here by now.”

Geraldo Nunez Rodriguez, known as el Toro by his compatriots, was a man unused to waiting. As the eldest son and sole leader of one of Colombia’s largest drug cartels, he was used to being waited on hand and foot. When his mouth opened, people jumped. Or they died. His life was simple and cruel and he liked it that way.

Or at least it was simple until she came along. The plains of his handsome face creased into a smile as a picture came to his anxious mind unbidden. A picture of how she had looked when they first met, her face and form almost invisible under the crust of dirt she wore like a cloak, the pupils of her dazzling eyes pinpricks as his cocaine jolted through her system.

His self appointed job as public relations manager for his business kept Geraldo away from the streets of his home for long months. When one of the new pups had been inducted into his family had been given a task to complete, a simple money retrieval, Geraldo jumped at the chance to go back to the streets and alleys where his customers lived. He tagged along as the young man’s mentor and guide, content to simply sit back and watch as the cruelties he had ordered were carried out first hand.

Geraldo smirked as his compatriot pointed out the intended target. It was a woman with long, matted black hair. She sat in a tiny alley, her head propped back against a stucco building, her hands shaking as the drug worked its way through her system. Her long legs, visible beneath the tattered robe she wore, were bent, twisted and scabbed over. A gnarled stick which the drug lord supposed was a walking cane of some type, lay discarded next to her body.

Geraldo watched as his associate smiled arrogantly, thinking this job would be the easiest one he would ever have, and stalked over to where the young woman sat unaware. It would be the last mistake the young man ever made.

In a move almost too quick for the drug lord to see, his employee found himself sprawled between the woman’s twisted legs, a long dirty arm tight across his throat. His face slowly flushed to the color of old brick and his eyes bulged slightly in their sockets. His mouth opened wide in a rictus of pain from which only the slightest of wheezes emerged.

Another quick move, and the man’s gun was removed from its hiding place. The barrel was raised, not to point at the unfortunate man’s trapped head, but at Geraldo himself. The drug lord smiled at the temerity of the dirty woman. As she turned her gaze his way, Geraldo was struck dumb by the dazzling beauty of her sapphire eyes. “You had something you wanted to say to me?” she asked in clear, non-accented Spanish.

Locked in the mesmerizing gaze, Geraldo cleared his throat softly. “You have something that belongs to me,” he said finally.

The woman sneered and tightened her lock on the young thug’s throat. “Not for long,” she drawled.

“I was speaking of my money.”

The woman’s gaze narrowed. “Who are you?”

Geraldo smiled charmingly. “My name is Geraldo Nunez Rodriguez.”

“And I’m supposed to be impressed?”

The drug lord’s smile turned into a bark of laughter. In his life, no one had ever had the guts to speak to him this way. He found that he liked it. In small doses, of course. “Perhaps not,” he replied. “But you’ve been dealing with some of my associates for quite awhile now. And it appears that you haven’t been compensating them fairly for the services they’ve been providing for you.”

The corner of the woman’s mouth turned up in a smirk. “Perhaps if you hired better ‘associates’, fair compensation, or lack thereof, wouldn’t be a problem, now would it.”

Geraldo laughed again, surprised and charmed by the woman’s audacity. “You may have a point, Miss … .”

The woman didn’t rise to the bait. “I’ll make you a deal, Rodriguez. You and your cronies leave me alone and in return, I return your little puppy here back to you only slightly damaged and promise to find another place to procure my …services.”

Folding his arms across his broad chest, Geraldo appeared to give the proposition serious thought. “I have a counter offer,” he said after a long moment.

“Which is … .”

“Join me.”

“I work for no one.”

Uncrossing his arms, Geraldo made a sweeping gesture that encompassed the dirty alley and the tattered denizens therein. “If you’ll pardon me for saying so, a person like you does not belong in a place like this. I can offer you so much more.”

The woman laughed dryly. “Thanks, but I think I’ll pass on your generous offer.”

“I do wish you’d reconsider, Senorita. You could have a place to live, new clothes, a chance to use your obvious talents on more than a group of untrained thugs whose only desire is to steal what is yours.” He took a step closer to the woman, pleased to note that the gun didn’t waver an inch. “I could give this to you, if you’d let me.”

“At the cost of my freedom,” the woman snarled at him.

The drug lord snorted. “Freedom? You call this being free? Forgive me for laughing, my dear, but my ‘product’ binds you closer to me than slavery ever could. Not an hour goes by when you don’t think of me and how to get what I offer. I’m allowing you a chance to break free from all of this.” He took another step closer, his hands empty and held out before his body. “Join me.”

After a long tense moment of silence between the two, the woman lowered the gun. “Fine. What do I have to do.”

The charming grin returned. “Kill him.”

The gun came back up. “What?”

Geraldo shrugged. “You were right, of course. This was his first test. He failed. Kill him.”

The woman narrowed her eyes again, searching deep into Geraldo’s own. Then, with a shrug of one broad shoulder, she drew her arm back, gripped the side of the young man’s jaw, and yanked hard. The sound of bones snapping filled the narrow alley. Gun still raised, the woman pushed the dead thug from her lap. “Now what.”

The drug lord closed the distance between the two, holding one hand out. The woman drew back the gun still pointed at his heart. He smiled. “You may keep that. It’s yours. I am only offering you a hand up.”

“I can take care of myself.” Shrugging off his aid, the woman struggled to her feet, grabbing the walking stick and planting it on the ground between her feet. She wobbled slightly as her ruined legs attempted to balance her weight. “Are you sure you want …this?” she asked, gesturing at her own crippled body.

“It’s your spirit I want, Senorita. Your legs can be fixed. Come. We have much to discuss.”

The droning of a nearby plane broke Geraldo from his musings and he looked up, a smile breaking across his face as he recognized the markings of the craft. “About time,” he muttered, walking to stand well away from the crude airstrip just in case the pilot had problems with the landing. Within a very few moments, the plane landed safely and taxied to the end of the runway. Shutting down the engines, the pilot opened the door and rushed to the side of the plane, opening that door and pulling down the steps nestled inside.

The first person out was one of his young associates, grim-faced and carrying a large briefcase. Geraldo’s grin widened as the man’s companion exited next, negotiating the steps with negligent grace despite the slight limp she still bore even after several rounds of surgeries. Rather than detracting from her charm, the drug lord felt the slight imperfection only added to it. “Kael!” he cried out, waving one hand as she exited.

The smile she gave him doubled the drug lord’s heart rate. He realized he was probably in love with his partner some time before this and his body’s response seemed to confirm this fact nicely. The contrast between the dirty woman sitting in an alley and this vision of female beauty stunned him as it always did.

Geraldo cut his gaze from the vision descending from the plane and brought it to the young man stepping diffidently toward him, briefcase in hand. The man’s hair was mussed and the corners of his long moustache drooped down, disconsolately. He had the air of a whipped puppy and the drug lord smirked openly, knowing exactly who had caused this normally brash man such distress. “Any trouble?”

The young man affixed a false smile on his face. “None, senor,” he said, thinking himself safe. A small pop was heard and the man’s eyes rolled back in his head. His hand reflexively opened and the briefcase flew into the surprised hands of Geraldo as the courier collapsed to the ground, dead, blood streaming out from the wound behind his ear.

“Liar,” Kael snapped, re-holstering her small gun at the small of her back.

Stunned, Geraldo looked from the briefcase in his hands, down to the dead man and back up to meet Kael’s disgusted gaze. “You can’t keep killing the help like that, my dear,” he said in a soft voice.

“That man was a liar and a fool, Geraldo,” Kael replied, crossing her arms. “Maybe when you learn to start hiring real men instead of the inbred bastards of your family members, this organization will have a chance to flourish.” An ebony brow raised over one sapphire eye. “Until then,” she snarled, toeing the dead man over onto his back, “you get what ya pay for.”

Geraldo looked down at his dead associate, sighing. With a simple hand gesture, the chauffeur was beckoned to take the body into the jungle where the animals would take care of its disposal. Soon, all that was left of the young man’s life and deeds was a blood stain on the runway and a case filled with millions of dollars in the hands of the drug lord. “What happened?” he asked finally, looking up at the woman who had captured his heart, even though it appeared she herself didn’t own one.

“He froze like a kid caught with his pants down. Right in front of customs, no less.” She sighed disgustedly. “I wound up having to convince the agent to give us a free pass.”

Varguez returned from his chore and escorted the two into the waiting limousine. As soon as the two were safely ensconced within, he got in the car and started the engine, pulling away from the airstrip and back to Medellin.

Laying the briefcase on the floor between his feet, Geraldo turned to his partner and lover. “So, how did you manage to ‘convince’ the customs agent to let you go?”

Kael smiled lasciviously, turning her body and straddling the drug lord’s hips. “Let me show you,” she said, giving the drug lord a kiss that set his hair on fire. Pressing her warmth against his now powerless body, he gave in to the wild, feral feelings only this frightening woman could bring out in him.

Same Day. Rodriguez Compound. Medellin, Colombia.

The massive room was shadow-cloaked, lit as it was by only the fire cheerily burning in the stone fireplace. The scent of wood smoke wafted gently through the room and Geraldo sniffed at it appreciatively as he gazed down at Kael lying naked on her side, dozing lightly. The light from the fire stroked the burnished skin of her body, highlighting the sweat sheen that coated her skin like another lover. He smiled tenderly as he ran blunt fingers gently through her tousled raven hair. He thanked God for sending her to him, his dark Angel. In the months they had been together, she’d proven her worth admirably. Her mind was as sharp as any he’d ever seen and her physical abilities, especially in areas of combat, were unparalleled. With her aid, he’d quickly moved up the ranks from just another middle-of-the-road cartel to one of the biggest in Medellin. If things continued on their present course, and he had no doubt but that they would, they would eventually control all of Colombia.

His gentle touch woke Kael and she opened her eyes, the firelight dancing in their depths creating a shimmering miasma that the drug lord couldn’t help but be drawn into. “What,” she stated, wiping a tendril of hair stuck to her lips and watching him watch her.

“Just glad to have you back,” he hedged. Her response to him the last time he tried to tell her how he felt shrank his male ego enough for him not to want to push the issue further. For now, it was enough that she shared his business and his bed. There would be time enough to convince her to share his heart in the future.

She didn’t answer. Instead, Kael pulled away from his gentle touches, running a long fingered hand through her hair to settle it somewhat. Then she pushed her long body upwards to settle her back against the ornate oaken headboard, turning her head to gaze into the blazing fire, her thoughts her own and far away.

Geraldo studied her strong profile for long moments before he reached over to the nightstand and pulled a long white envelope from it. “I have something for you,” he said softly, handing it to her.

Kael drew her gaze from the fire, staring down at the envelope in her hands. Her eyes narrowed, and when she looked over at Geraldo, her gaze was cold. “Tell me this is a joke,” she said, her voice low and ominous.

“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” he said truthfully, a tendril of fear snaking through his guts.

“This,” she said, gesturing at him with the envelope. “Payment for services rendered?” Her eyebrow arched to hide behind her bangs.

His eyes went wide as the implication struck him. “No!” he said, laying a hand on her arm, which she promptly shrugged off. “Nothing like that!” Shifting on the bed, Geraldo ran his hands through his own hair. “Kael, do you know how many men I’ve had killed for even thinking that about you?”

“Then what’s this?”

“A gift.” At her angry glare, he hastened to explain. “For both of us. Please. Open it and you’ll understand.”

Looking at him in warning for another long span of moments, Kael finally shifted her gaze downward to where the envelope was cradled in one large hand. After another moment, she gave an internal shrug and tore it open, shaking out the contents. “Plane tickets?” She brought the tickets up closer to her face so that the light from the fire could decipher the words. A malicious smile bared her perfect teeth when she read their destination. “You finally did it.”

“No, my dear. You did it. Apparently, Ming Dao was quite impressed with the way you decimated the members of Chao Lin’s tong who visited us last month.”

“That was fun,” Kael sneered, remembering the screams of the dying men.

“A little barbaric,” he said, grinning slightly. “But creative,” he hastened to reassure.

“Dead’s dead. I always did like a good kill.”

“Quite true. On both counts. While you were away, Ming Dao contacted me and offered us both a chance to sit with him and talk. The opportunity to bring heroin and opium into the business is one we’ve been waiting for for a long time,” he explained unnecessarily.

“So, it’s all set?”

“We leave in the morning.”

“Wonderful.” Her grin was that of a predatory cat on the trail of a particularly tempting morsel.

Geraldo smiled, moving close to her, happy when she let him. “Yes,” he murmured, covering her responsive mouth with his own, “it is, isn’t it.”

To Be Continued…

DESERT STORM

Part 5

by: SwordnQuill

SwordnQuil@aol.com

Disclaimers: The characters of Xena, Gabrielle, Lao Ma, Alti, Borias, and everyone else who sounds familiar belong to Pac Ren and Universal Studios. I am not making money off of this story.

Genre Disclaimer: Ok. Bear with me, please, because this is kinda tough to explain. Sometime last year, I read a story on the internet that moved me so much, I was inspired to write a sort of companion piece to it. That story was “Lost Soul Walking” by DJWP. In her words, “This is NOT UberXena fiction. It just starts out like it is.” The same can be said for this piece. While not directly related to “Lost Soul Walking”, “Desert Storm” can be considered a sort of prequel to it. It is a story, if you will, about the lifetime before the one depicted in that fabulous, outstanding story. (Can you tell I loved it?) In addition, this is somewhat of an ambitious piece of fiction, in that I am attempting (don’t know if I’ve succeeded, but I’ve attempted) to take the entire X:WP universe and modernize it. We start, in updated terms, with my version of Xena’s betrayal by Caesar (seen in “Destiny”), and continue up through the X:WP episode known as “Remember Nothing”. The plot will be very recognizable to you. It’s meant to be that way.

Special note: Because of this, Gabrielle does not appear, except in offhand mention, in a great deal of the first half of this story. Do not look for her, because you won’t find her. After all, she was not a part of ‘evil Xena’s’ life. If she were, things might have turned out differently, but because this is based on the premise of “Lost Soul Walking” it cannot happen differently. Gabrielle will, however, make her presence known, and that quite strongly, in the second half of the story. If you can hang on till then, I believe that you will not be disappointed.

Sexuality and Violence Disclaimers: We’re dealing with an updated dark Xena through much of the first half, and an updated redeemed Xena through the second. There’s gonna be violence. There are gonna be naughty words. There are also descriptions of sexual activity in this work. There are allusions to heterosexual sex, but nothing graphic. There are some graphic (though I hope tasteful) scenes of sexual expression between women as well. That is how I see the relationship between Xena and Gabrielle, and that is how I will continue to write it.

And, finally, thanks: To, as always, the incomparable Mike. A better beta and a better friend one could never hope for. Thank you also, as always, to Mary D, who rescued this story from the refuse heap and begged me to keep going on it. If you hate it, blame her. <w> Grateful and heartfelt appreciation goes out to DJWP, for continuing to write stories that grab me somewhere above the liver and giving her kind permission to mention her story in these disclaimers. If you haven’t read her stories, please, do yourself a favor and do so. Finally, this story is dedicated to a group of people without whom I would most probably be living on the streets. Elizabeth, Rachel, Sulli, and the rest of the “Get Sue to Atlanta” crew, this one’s for you!

Feedback: As always is gratefully appreciated. If you wrote to me regarding “Redemption” during the month of September to early October and I haven’t responded, please allow me the honor of apologizing in public. It was then that I was at my lowest point and making ready to move to my new home. Your words of praise and encouragement for my writing kept me firmly out of the pit of depression I was falling into and I shall be forever grateful to each and every one of you who took the time out to feed this bard. And for those of you patiently (or not so patiently) waiting for Redemption’s sequel, fear not, for with the conclusion of this piece, that piece will be started. Any and all who wish to may write me at SwordnQuil@aol.com . I’ll continue to do my best to answer each and every email. An exploding mailbox is a good thing to have. Thanks again!

DESERT STORM

by: Sword’n’Quill (Susanne Beck)

25 April 1991. Ming Dao’s Estate. Chengdu, China.

After the bodyguards had finished giving them a thorough pat-down, managing to miss the three throwing knives concealed on Kael’s body, the men left them alone to wait. Kael took this as an opportunity for exploration and did so with abandon, her eyes raking over every square inch of the massive ante-room where they were temporarily housed.

Impossibly expensive antiques vied for space in every nook and cranny of the room. Priceless vases kept company with stunning statues of ivory and jade. Bejeweled weapons of all types hung on walls covered with skins of big cats. Massive windows gave view to the lush greenery of the estate’s acreage. “Nice setup,” Kael remarked, snickering.

“Behave,” Geraldo chided. “We don’t want to upset the man before we even get a chance to see him.”

The grin turned into a full sneer as Kael took her attention off her partner, turning to run light fingers over the weaponry. An ornately carved heavy wooden door opened soundlessly and a short, slight man wearing western clothing stepped out to greet them. “Ming Dao will see you now. Please, follow me.”

Tearing her gaze away from the weapons, Kael quickly fell into step beside Geraldo as they crossed the marble floor, their footsteps echoing mournfully in the cavernous room.

They were ushered into a large office modeled in the typical western style. A huge teak desk sat imposingly near one wall. A fireplace, its mantel holding more priceless pieces of antiquity, housed a cheerily blazing fire. Thick burgundy carpeting covered the floor.

The man sitting behind the desk was broad of face and form. Thick glasses magnified his almond eyes to the size of small eggs. His hair was short and slicked back with the first hints of silver slashing through. He kept his attention glued to the desk top until his two visitors were standing in front of two chairs positioned in front of the desk. Only then did he deign to look up, a falsely convivial smile on his thick, rubbery lips. “My name is Ming Dao. Welcome to my home.”

“We are honored by your welcome, Ming Dao,” Geraldo replied, bowing. Kael managed to keep the smirk off her face as she inclined her head slightly. “I am Geraldo Nunez Rodriguez and this is my partner, Kael Evan Antrostos.”

Ming Dao eyed them both, his gaze staying longer on the beautiful American. His smile turned into a leer. A coated tongue protruded from his mouth, licking his lips. “Please,” he said, gesturing. “Sit.” He gestured to a young boy of no more than five dressed in an absurd imitation of a British schoolboy, flannel Bermudas, beanie cap and all. “Allow me to introduce my son, Ming Lao. I hope you’ll excuse his presence at this meeting, but a boy needs to learn to deal with all sorts of people.”

“We are honored to be in his presence,” Geraldo replied, bowing his head to the boy whose expressionless eyes were set in the cold mask of his face.

Kael covered her sneer with one hand as she cut her eyes to the fireplace in an attempt not to laugh at the absurdity of the whole thing.

“Does something here amuse you, Ms. Androstos?” Ming Dao asked primly.

“No. Please. Continue,” she answered, ignoring Geraldo’s warning glance.

Ming Dao folded his hands on the desk top. “Very well. The reason I asked you to this meeting is that I had heard of the job you did on a competitor’s associates. I was most impressed with what I heard.”

“Every word of it is true,” Kael boasted, her eyes filled with pride.

The Chinese drug lord looked at the American, non-plused for a moment. “Ah. Yes. Based on that information, I decided that perhaps your company is in a position to aid mine in distributing our product beyond the boundaries of this country. I was given to understand that this is something you might wish as well?”

“A partnership is something we desire very much, Ming Dao,” Geraldo said humbly. “We are prepared to give you whatever assistance you may require to bring this to fruition.”

“My requests are simple ones. Your business associates come into this country, armed with proper documentation of course, retrieve my product and return it to your own country. From there, you distribute it as you wish. For this, you get thirty percent of the receipts, minus whatever shipping and labor charges you might accrue, of course.”

“Wha-at?” Kael asked, her head snapping up from her study of the carpeting.

“Is there something in my explanation you did not understand, Ms. Androstos?” Ming Dao asked, scowling.

“Oh no. I understood ya perfectly. It’s belief that I’m havin’ trouble with at the moment.”

“Kael,” Geraldo hissed half under his breath. “Behave!”

Kael shot a glare to her partner before returning her attention to Ming Dao. “Let me be sure I got this right. We send men in here, taking the risk of being stopped by governmental officials or blown to bits by your rivals, bring your shit home with us, distribute it, again running the risk of dealing with the government and rivals, and for that you offer us the magnanimous gesture of thirty percent?” She turned to her partner, a bold sneer splitting her full lips. “And you thought I was crazy.”

“Kael!” Geraldo repeated, shouting this time.

Again, Kael ignored him. “No dice, Ming. I’m not gonna risk my people just so your fat ass can sit in that chair getting fatter. No offense, little Ming,” she sneered at the silent, wide-eyed child.

Ming Dao pushed his chair away from the desk, rising to his diminutive height. “I believe this conversation is ended, Mr. Rodriguez. I had thought that you spoke for your people. Apparently I was mistaken.”

Geraldo shot up from his chair. “No! Wait! Please, Ming Dao. This is just a simple misunderstanding, I assure you.” He put on his most charming smile. “She tends to open her mouth without thinking sometimes. I can assure you that this will not happen again.” He shot another warning glare at his partner.

Kael took a deep breath, then let it out. “Fine,” she spat. “Your funeral.” Rising from the chair, she pinned a glare on Ming Dao. “Please, continue this conversation without my interference. I know my place now. If it pleases you,” she said, sarcasm dripping from every word, “I’d like to be taken back to my hotel room.”

Kael watched as Ming Dao stared up at her, disgust, lust and a small inkling of respect warring for space in his magnified eyes. “Very well,” he said, finally breaking eye contact and pressing a hidden button on his desk.

In response, the door swung open and two burly guards stepped through, bowing formally at the waist. “Please take Ms. Androstos back to her quarters,” the drug lord ordered imperiously.

Nodding and bowing again, the silent guards fell into step behind the tall American’s shoulders, escorting her from the estate.

Same evening. Hotel Room. Chengdu, China.

Geraldo was seeing red as he almost knocked the flimsy door off its squealing hinges. Stomping into the room and throwing his keys on the battle-scarred table, he strode to the bed where Kael was sitting. Swinging his hand up to his opposite shoulder, the Colombian lashed out at the seated woman, intending to make sharp contact with the high cheekbones of her face.

His blow never landed, caught as it was in a grip of solid steel. Eyes the color of that steel peered murderously into his own, a smile blooming on perfect features instead of the handprint he’d expected there.

“What the hell were you hoping to accomplish back there?” he demanded, jerking his arm free and pacing the length of the tiny room. “You made me look like a total idiot in front of that man!”

Kael laughed dryly. “Didn’t need my help for that,” she said, clapping her hands together in front of her face and sketching a mock bow in her irate lover’s direction.

Snarling in rage, Geraldo whirled, arm up once again. He quickly lost his legs from a sweeping kick and bounced onto and off of the bed, to land hard on the floor, the heel of Kael’s boot firm between his nipples. “You’re pathetic,” she snapped, pushing down on his sternum until he winced in pain.

Released from the grinding pressure of her boot, the drug lord scrambled back up to his feet, leaning against the wall and rubbing his chest. “You don’t understand anything.”

Kael raised one eyebrow. “Oh, I understand plenty alright. I understand that that bastard’s giving you a good screwing and you’re just grabbin’ your ankles and beggin’ for more.”

“You don’t get it, do you?” Geraldo retorted. “I’ve got to earn that man’s respect so … .”

“Respect?!” Kael stated, whirling, her long hair fanning out from her shoulders. “Is that what you think you need? He’ll never respect you, Geraldo. To him, you’re nothing more than a common street thug. Look around you, Geraldo!” she shouted, flinging her arms wide to encompass the tiny room they were given. “Look at this place! I wouldn’t make my dog live here!” Dropping her arms, Kael cocked her head, affixing her partner with a genuine look of sympathy. “And you know what the worst part is? The worst part is that tomorrow you’ll go back to that bastard and act like he put us up in the fucking Ritz Carlton!”

“Kael, this isn’t some street war, you know. It’s the fine art of negotiation… .” his words ended in a gasp as long fingers melded themselves to his throat.

“Don’t you presume to tell me anything about negotiations, you bastard,” Kael snarled in his face. Releasing the man, she pushed him hard back onto the bed. “You make me sick.” She stared down at his reclining figure for long moments before her face split into a feral grin. “However, there’s more than one way to skin a cat.”

Geraldo’s eyes narrowed. “Don’t do this, Kael. Don’t ruin our plans here.”

“Take your ‘plans’ and shove ‘em up your ass, Geraldo. Assuming they’ll fit with Ming’s dick up there already.” Whirling away from him, she picked up her leather jacket and thrust it on.

The drug lord struggled to sit up. “Where are you going?”

“Out,” she snarled. And did just that, the door slamming loudly behind her.

The bathroom mirror rattled, then fell from its brackets, shattering into the sink. “Dios mio,” Geraldo moaned, burying his head into his hands.

*******

Kael picked up a tail as soon as she left the seedy hotel. At first, she left the man alone, enjoying the simple feral pleasure the chase gave her. Leading the guard further and further down into the squalid areas of the city, she ducked in and out of dank alleyways, doubling back and covering her tracks. The man was very good and managed to keep up with her until Kael hid in a narrow alley, deep within the shadows of a towering building. As he took a step past her concealment, she rose an arm to grab him around the neck, changing in mid-stride to instead jab at his unprotected neck with the stiffened fingers of both hands.

Her eyes opened in shock as the man slumped to his knees, gasping. “Well, whadda ya know. It really works.” Squatting down on her haunches, a sneer curling her lips, Kael patted the hapless man’s cheek. “Well Chang, or whatever the fuck your name is, I’ve just cut off the flow of blood to your brain.” She cocked her head, her features assuming a mockingly sympathetic cast. “And to tell ya the truth, I’m not too sure I know how to undo it.” She grinned. “So how ‘bout if we do this. You take a message back to your master for me, and I use the remaining time trying to figure out how to undo this thing before you join your ancestors right here in this alley. Huh? Sound good to you?”

The man’s head bobbed and nodded as if it were on a spring. A thick line of blood flowed slowly from one nostril.

Kael put one finger up to the man’s nose, trailing through the blood and rubbing it between her fingers. Her sneer widened. “Now that’s a pretty sight.” She came in closer to the man, her lips almost touching his ear. “Now, here’s what I want you to do. You tell your master that I don’t need anyone following me around his city. Tell him the next idiot he sends won’t get off near as lucky as you. Got it?”

The man nodded again, gasping and moaning, his eyes pleading with her.

“Good.” Bringing both hands up to her face, Kael extended the first two fingers of each, stared at them, then shrugged. “Well, here goes nothin’.” In a lightning fast move, she jabbed at his pressure points. The hold broke and the man slumped to the concrete pavement, groaning aloud and panting for the breath he’d lost.

Rising to her feet, Kael smiled down at him. “Sleep tight,” she intoned as she delivered a sharp kick to his exposed head. The man’s body flew against the opposite wall and fell limp to the ground. Mouing her lips in mock sympathy, Kael blew on her still extended fingers, twirled them like she was twirling a gun and jammed them down by her sides. “Score one for the bad guys.”

Stepping out of the alley, Kael sauntered deeper into the bowels of the city, led on by the sweet scent of opium as it wafted gently into the still night air. The three months that she spent in horrid withdrawal from cocaine and other drugs she had started taking to distract her mind from the gnawing pain of her shattered legs were among the worst she’d ever known. Geraldo had stuck with her throughout, bathing her sweating body with cool, clean water, changing her fouled clothes, enduring her beatings and raving shouts as she demanded just one hit, just one line, anything to subdue the agony roaring through her body and mind.

If she hadn’t been so ill, the true irony of the situation would have amused Kael no end. That she would be lying on a bed brought with money from the very drugs she was unable now to consume. That she was being comforted by the very man who made his living pulling others into his net of fast highs and faster deaths. The irony escaped her at the time, however, so great was her need.

Now she was going back into that seductive trap with her eyes open, knowing full well what might lay in wait for her at the end of the line. This time it was her craving for power and not the overwhelming need to forget that led her here, to the deepest, darkest part of the city where her kindred spirits dwelled.

Passing several drug houses, she finally stopped at one that seemed to meet her needs for the evening. At first, her way was barred by two thick-set men who stared at her and her foreign features as if she had come from another solar system entirely. With a flash of her smile and a ruffling of cash, the way cleared before her as if she were Moses and her cash the staff which parted the sea of suspicion. She walked through the place as if she owned it, and if truth will out, she would one day, stalking up to the bar and laying a slim bundle of currency on the stained surface. “A clean pipe and an ounce of your best,” she ordered imperiously, smirking as the proprietor stared at the money with wide, almond eyes.

The requested items appeared magically before her and Kael grinned as she swept them into her hands, leaving a generous tip for the man before making her way to a relatively unoccupied corner of the dark room. It took mere minutes to set things up to her liking and soon the stem of the pipe was between her full lips and she was dragging the sweet, pungent taste of oblivion deep into her lungs.

The drugs hit her cleaned-out system powerfully, a muted buzz humming from her heart outward, tingling through her limbs and swaddling her in a cocoon of warmth and bliss. “Woah,” she said softly, blowing the smoke out into the room, “that’s more like it.”

A few more hits and she was ready to look around and so she did, taking in the looks of casual disinterest emitted from glazed eyes. She kept her own expression carefully non-committal, inviting no one, yet spurning none. Her cool façade seemed to calm them and the patrons went back to their own oblivions-in-the-making, none the worse for wear. Kael knew that there would soon come a time where she would use both her cash and the allure of her western body like a siren, drawing the men into her web and seducing information from their small minds. But for now, she was content to simply let both the drug and the muted conversation wash over her like a warm wave, picking up small bits of information and storing them in that part of her mind that remained very much awake and aware. Time enough to put plans in motion later. Now was for laying subtle groundwork and ingratiating herself, by her very aloofness, into a society she soon hoped to possess.

Thoroughly satisfied with her lot in life at the moment, Kael stood to her full height, stuffing the remainder of the drug into the front pocket of her jeans for later consumption. The world tilted oddly for a moment and she braced herself against the head-rush as casually as she was able. Once she was sure she could navigate without difficulty, the tall American walked through the small room, stopping only once to slip a generous tip into the hands of the surprised doormen. Then, with a spring in her step and a jaunty whistle on her lips, Kael made her way back through the city to where her tiny bed awaited.

*******

Sitting straddled in a high-backed, thoroughly uncomfortable, wooden chair, Geraldo checked the luminous numbers on the bedside clock yet again. His anger had long ago given way to fear, paranoia, and finally a sense of the inevitable. Kael was out there, somewhere, doing God knew what with God knew whom. In his younger days, he doubtless would have let his anger spur him into a building by building search of his wayward lover and, upon finding her, let his sharp tongue and sharper fists do his talking for him.

He sighed, putting his head in his hands. All those previously used tactics went nowhere with the thoroughly beautiful, thoroughly charming, thoroughly exasperating woman who captured and held his heart effortlessly. Trying to tame Kael was like trying to rope the wind: impossible. Just when you thought you had a handle on it, it would change direction and dance laughingly just out of your reach. He sighed once more, looking again at the clock which seemed to taut him from its place on the scarred nightstand. With an arching fist and a guttural yell, he smashed the timepiece into tiny bits of protesting plastic and circuitry, then batted it against the far wall with a sweep of his strong arm. “Damn it, Kael!” he shouted into the silent room. “Where are you?”

The door chose that moment to slam open and Kael sauntered in, a faintly amused grin on her full lips. “Why Geraldo,” she said, eyes wide in mocking sympathy, “I’m right here!” The smile bloomed fully on her face as she brushed past her dark-haired lover and dropped her rangy frame down onto the lumpy bed, bouncing a few times for effect.

Geraldo shot to his feet, his anger slamming down onto him like an iron bar dropped from on high. “Where the fuck have you been all this time!” he shouted. “I’ve been worried sick! You don’t just … .” His diatribe trailed off as he noticed the condition of his lover for the first time. The smile remained firmly in place on her face and her striking eyes were glazed over, slightly reddened. “You’re stoned!”

“Sure am,” Kael replied happily. “Right out of my fucking gourd. And ya know what, Geraldo? It feels goooood.” Leaning back on her elbows, she eyed him coquettishly from beneath half-lowered lids. Freeing one hand, she dug it into the pocket of her jeans, producing the baggie filled with opium and holding it up between her thumb and forefinger. “Want some?”

“Why you … .” One hand shot out to grab the stash while the other one attempted a blindside hit to Kael’s sneering face. Neither tactic was successful and the drug lord quickly found himself flat on his back, a widely grinning Kael straddling his waist, the drug still safely in her possession.

“I’m in a very good mood right now, Geraldo,” Kael explained to her pinned captive. “But that could change in an instant.” She looked down at him, one ebony eyebrow raised. “You wouldn’t want to make me angry now, would you?”

Repocketing her stash, Kael shifted her hips lower, leaning forward and grinding against him wantonly. She grinned ferally at the look of complete surrender on Geraldo’s face as she felt him harden beneath her. “I’m feelin’ really good at the moment,” she repeated, her voice a seductive purr, her eyes smoky in the dim lighting. “Let’s see if I can’t make us both feel that way, hmm?”

With a low, keening groan, Geraldo did the only thing he could. He capitulated without a fight.

*******

It was, she supposed, a pretty ordinary dream for someone who’d been clean of drugs for three months and had enough opium now running through her system to fell a moose. Smells, sounds and sights snapped at her with hyper-vivid clarity, imbuing her senses with a sort of other-worldly surrealism.

She was sitting in some sort of a … tent was the best word that came to mind. She could feel the thick luxurity of the furs beneath her semi reclining body, a body which was clad in some sort of cloth and metal which felt heavy enough to be armor. A strange, haunting melody sounded from behind her while in front, Geraldo sat, his long black hair done up in some sort of top-knot. Next to him sat a beautiful Asian woman clad in a traditional red silk robe which brought out the highlights of her raven hair and eyes to exquisite perfection. Kael brought the thin stem of an opium pipe up to her lips and inhaled, looking through the smoky haze as a seduction played itself out right in front of her.

She watched through narrowed eyes as Geraldo enchanted the beautiful woman, serving her food as if she were a princess and he, a lowly valet. His hands were gentle upon her body and his face soft as he bent to whisper whimsical nonsense into one delicate ear. She felt a rage flow through her on the wings of the drug she took into her lungs. She saw the woman look at her deeply, before looking away and smiling at something Geraldo whispered to her.

Kael tried to interpret the look through her drug-filled haze. Was it desire? For her? For him? Her rage built as the answer eluded her. The woman smiled coyly once more as she began to reach a slim, perfectly manicured hand across the table. Kael reached down and liberated a knife at her waist, snarling and throwing it so that it landed, point first and hilt thrumming, just inches away from the woman’s reaching hand. “That’s my piece of meat you’re reaching for,” she heard herself growl.

“You’re wrong,” the woman responded, her voice as graceful as her form and movements. “I don’t eat meat.”

The sense of Geraldo shifting under her woke Kael and scattered her dream to the four winds. Groaning softly, she rolled off her lover’s recumbent body, forcing herself to her feet as a hangover thudded sickly in her temples. An ugly grin twisted her features as the half-clad man mumbled in his sleep, turning over and grabbing a pillow, snuggling it against his chest. “You’ve gone soft, Geraldo,” she sneered, running a hand through her sleep-tangled hair. “Soft as a pig’s belly.”

*******

The next two weeks saw the lovers drifting further and further apart. Geraldo continued on in his negotiations with Ming Dao, going over and over the million tiny sticking points that prevented a successful business arrangement between the two parties.

Of course, being the man he was, he was also attempting to forge alliances with some of the other drug lords dotting the Chinese landscape, but Ming Dao didn’t need to know that. It was more than enough for now that the man continued to negotiate, given the horrible first step that had been made with Kael.

For her part, the tall American was every bit as busy as her bed partner. Her days were spent putting her long years of military training to good use as she staked out Ming’s estate, greedily gathering up as much information about the man’s living habits as she could without being noticed. Ming Dao was a creature of habit and if Kael had anything to say about it, those habits would be his undoing. She watched in gleeful satisfaction as he and his retinue of guards and beautiful women took their morning constitutional on the lush grounds of the estate at the exact same time each day. She had the little jaunt timed down to the second, watching them return just as the black sedan bearing her dark lover pulled onto the grounds.

Her nights were spent in the myriad of opium dens lining the city streets which promised oblivion to those passing by, luring them in with exotic scents and sounds and ensnaring them into a world of decadence and depravity. Kael learned many interesting things during her underworld tours, chief among them the fact that Ming Dao doted on his young son to the exclusion of all else save his priceless antiques and the millions of dollars he made trafficking in illegal drugs. The young boy was never out of his father’s sight except for the times Ming Dao and his followers would walk the grounds each morning.

Ming Dao had several wives and more concubines than an Arabian sheik, yet the story was that only one of the beautiful women he courted was able to bear him a son who lived past infancy. For her troubles, the drug lord had her killed so that his son would not have to split his loyalties or his love.

Gotta give him points for that one, Kael thought when she heard the story, the viciousness of the act planting a tiny kernel of respect for the man in her mind. She sneered in satisfaction when she realized that she’d discovered probably the only weakness of the feared drug lord, the love he had for his son. It was a weakness she planned to exploit to the fullest. Paybacks are a real bitch, Ming.

Now that she had the means to an end, all that remained was the planning. For this she used her most potent three weapons; her drugs, her money and her long, beautiful body. Men were the most amenable to this type of persuasion. A little cash, a little dope and a promise of ‘later’ would have them giving her the numbers to their secret bank accounts if she’d wanted them. Which she didn’t. The women were harder to get a handle on, well used to having drugs and money shoved in their faces as payment for services soon to be rendered.

Rising to the challenge, as always, Kael chose to forgo the drugs and money, skipping instead to the third weapon in her arsenal. A surprising number of women took the American beauty up on her offer for reasons undisclosed even to their seducer. Kael didn’t much care what the reasons were as she took the women to a small hotel room she’d rented for this purpose. The words trembled from their lips as the tall American delved into the secret recesses of their passions, her senses tingling with the tantalizing taste of eastern spices on her western tongue.

Sooner than even she’d hoped, the plans were finalized. She’d even managed to gather up a goon squad of sorts; heavily muscled men, their bone with Ming Dao well gnawed, who were more than willing to provide whatever assistance was necessary, provided, of course, she keep them well steeped in drugs and petty cash. That wouldn’t be a problem.

11 May 1991. Ming Dao’s Estate. Chengdu, China.

Smiling in satisfaction, Kael lowered the night vision glasses from her eyes and tucked them into the pouch at her waist as she steadied her black-clad body against the thick trunk of the tree she was tucked into. Still well before the first light of dawn, the estate was dark and quiet. Groups of guards, muzzled dogs tethered to their wrists, strolled the vast grounds near the main house in exact, repeating patterns. Kael had been watching the arrangement for the past hour and was well pleased. Spying a weakness in their surveillance net, she figured she had about thirty seconds to cross the approximately one hundred yards from her place of concealment to the house before the guards would come around again.

Peering through the moon-shrouded darkness, the American spied the faint white of the balcony encircling the doorway through which she planned to make entrance. One of the women she’d bedded had, coincidentally, been a maid-servant of Ming Dao’s and was only too happy to provide a rough layout of the house’s interior, a vision which was supported by a few other people she’d talked to. The particular balcony she was spying led to an upper floor room that went mostly unused; an extra office of sorts which was currently being used for storage.

As she watched, the guards came around the house again, talking in low tones which whispered to her over the passing gentle breeze. She tensed her body, adrenaline coursing through her, engorging her muscles and forcing her heart to pound strongly, steadily. As the guards passed beyond the perimeter, Kael took a deep breath, then leapt from the tree, landing noiselessly upon the immaculately manicured lawn. She was running even as her feet hit the earth, her long legs exploding, thigh muscles coiling and relaxing as she flew across the grounds, silent as a stalking cat.

Lengthening her stride just before the balcony, Kael squatted slightly, then jumped, catching her hands on the balcony rail and pressing herself over, to land silently on the deck, freezing in place within the shadows of the building.

The guards came very close to her and she remained still and silent, unsurprised when they didn’t even bother to look upwards, where they would have surely seen her there, waiting. When they disappeared around the corner, the tall American relaxed, silently letting out the breath she’d been holding and reaching into her pouch to retrieve a slim lock-pick, slipping it into the door with gloved hands. After a few seconds of jiggling, the lock clicked. Placing the tool back into her pouch, Kael opened the door hardly more than a crack and slipped her long body inside, closing the door quietly behind her, a smug smile of satisfaction adorning her features.

She looked around the small room, noting its fully western flavor, idly tracing the moon’s wavering patterns on the navy and silver bedspread that covered the large king sized bed. Large boxes stood sentinel against the room’s four walls, piled haphazardly and dusty from disuse. A computer and monitor, its screen also covered with a healthy smattering of dust, stared blindly in her direction. Shaking her head, a wry smile hidden behind the black ski mask she was wearing, Kael crossed the room to slip behind several tall boxes, settling in to wait for morning.

*******

A shaft of sunlight slanted into the room, highlighting the dust moats suspended in the air. The low murmur of voices could be heard throughout the newly wakening house. Kael opened her eyes, fresh from her bout of meditation, slowly stretching and contracting her relaxed limbs, pumping the blood through her rested body. The sound of a heavy door opening and closing was heard and the American woman looked on in satisfaction as Ming Dao and his cronies stepped out into the strong sunlight of the new summer day.

The house became quiet again as Kael stood up from her place of concealment, stalking silently to the door and pressing an ear against it. Hearing nothing, she opened the door a crack, one blue eye peering down the length of the darkened hallway. Satisfied with the silence, she opened the door still further and stepped into the hallway, her steps silent in the plush carpeting.

Keeping fast to the walls, she traversed the entire length of the long hallway, meticulously avoiding the myriad of doors which lined the area. Peering around the corner, her body in shadow, she saw two guards standing sentinel outside one of the rooms. Opening her pouch, the tall American retrieved a small throwing star and, winding up, she threw it down the length of the second hallway to land, imbedded in the far wall. Startled, both guards looked in that direction, and Kael used the distraction to take a running leap down the hall, tackling the first bulky guard and tumbling him into his heavier partner. Both men went down hard, the breath driven from their bodies. A knife glittered in Kael’s hand as she slit the throats of first one, and then both of the guards before they had the chance to recover.

Leaving their bodies in the hallway, the woman quickly opened the door they had been guarding and stepped inside. An old woman was kneeling beside young Ming Lao, her gnarled hands tugging on his wool blazer as his eyes stayed glued to the television broadcasting western cartoons. Hearing the intruder’s entrance, the old woman gasped and fell to the floor, holding her charge in a protective embrace. “Don’t hurt him,” she begged, her wizened eyes wide and pleading. “Take what you want, but please don’t hurt the boy.”

“Oh, I don’t plan on hurting him,” Kael replied, her smile hidden behind the black fabric of her mask. “Or you either, for that matter. As long as you both stay quiet, you don’t have a thing to fear from me.”

Keeping the boy close to her body, the old woman nodded.

“Good. Now get up and step away from the boy. Nice and easy.” The woman continued to cower next to the child, her lips moving silently. “I said step away from the boy, old woman. You really don’t wanna make me angry, now.”

Looking into the fierce, glittering eyes of the intruder, the woman swallowed against the dryness in her throat and nodded, coming slowly, painfully to her feet and stepping away from her young ward.

For his part, the young boy stood silent, his almond eyes wide but unafraid as he took in the tall, menacing form of the intruder.

Reaching back into her pouch, Kael took out a small roll of duct tape, quickly ripping off a piece as she strode up to the grey-haired woman. Steadying her with one hand on her shoulder, Kael eased the tape over the other woman’s mouth, taking care to make sure her nostrils were kept free. Her grip was almost gentle as she led the woman over to the large, silk covered bed and laid her down on her stomach, grasping both wrists and bringing them behind the woman’s back and taping them together. Moving quickly down the bed, she did the same with the woman’s ankles, then stepped away, satisfied with her work. “I have a message for you to give to your master, old woman,” she said in a conversational tone. At the woman’s nod, she continued. “Tell him I have his boy. If he ever wants to see him alive again, he needs to follow my instructions to the letter. He’ll find those instructions pinned to one of the goons outside this room. Do you understand me?”

The old woman nodded again, breathing deeply through her nose and trying not to move against the aching restriction of her bound limbs.

Kael’s smile, though unseen, was terrifying in its malevolence. “Good.” Turning her fierce gaze to the still staring boy, she held out one hand. “Come with me, little Ming. We’re gonna take a little trip together. Sound like fun to you?”

After a long moment, Ming Lao reached out and grasped Kael’s hand. With a quick tug, the American pulled the boy to her and tucked him up under her arm, pulling out a hastily scrawled note and a knife from her pouch with the other. Easing the door open with her foot, Kael kept the young boy secure as she knelt down and laid the scrap of paper on one of the guard’s chest, then rammed her knife deep into his ribcage, pinning the note to his body.

Slinging Ming Lao securely across her hip, Kael quickly made her way down the deserted hallways, stepping silently back into the room through which she’d made entrance into the house. A quick look through the large French doors showed her all was clear and she stepped through them, onto the large balcony. “Hold on tight and don’t make a sound,” she warned the boy as she slipped up and over the balcony railing. Listening again for any sounds, she nodded once, to herself, and jumped off the ledge, landing softly on the thick carpeting of grass.

A quick look around, and she was off, sprinting across the estate grounds back into the covering of trees which sheltered her the night before. “Well, that was easy,” she snickered to her charge as she walked through the small wooded land that separated Ming Dao’s estate from the heavily traveled streets of the Asian city.

To Be Continued…

DESERT STORM

Part 6

by: SwordnQuill

SwordnQuil@aol.com

Disclaimers: The characters of Xena, Gabrielle, Lao Ma, Alti, Borias, and everyone else who sounds familiar belong to Pac Ren and Universal Studios. I am not making money off of this story.

Genre Disclaimer: Ok. Bear with me, please, because this is kinda tough to explain. Sometime last year, I read a story on the internet that moved me so much, I was inspired to write a sort of companion piece to it. That story was “Lost Soul Walking” by DJWP. In her words, “This is NOT UberXena fiction. It just starts out like it is.” The same can be said for this piece. While not directly related to “Lost Soul Walking”, “Desert Storm” can be considered a sort of prequel to it. It is a story, if you will, about the lifetime before the one depicted in that fabulous, outstanding story. (Can you tell I loved it?) In addition, this is somewhat of an ambitious piece of fiction, in that I am attempting (don’t know if I’ve succeeded, but I’ve attempted) to take the entire X:WP universe and modernize it. We start, in updated terms, with my version of Xena’s betrayal by Caesar (seen in “Destiny”), and continue up through the X:WP episode known as “Remember Nothing”. The plot will be very recognizable to you. It’s meant to be that way.

Special note: Because of this, Gabrielle does not appear, except in offhand mention, in a great deal of the first half of this story. Do not look for her, because you won’t find her. After all, she was not a part of ‘evil Xena’s’ life. If she were, things might have turned out differently, but because this is based on the premise of “Lost Soul Walking” it cannot happen differently. Gabrielle will, however, make her presence known, and that quite strongly, in the second half of the story. If you can hang on till then, I believe that you will not be disappointed.

Sexuality and Violence Disclaimers: We’re dealing with an updated dark Xena through much of the first half, and an updated redeemed Xena through the second. There’s gonna be violence. There are gonna be naughty words. There are also descriptions of sexual activity in this work. There are allusions to heterosexual sex, but nothing graphic. There are some graphic (though I hope tasteful) scenes of sexual expression between women as well. That is how I see the relationship between Xena and Gabrielle, and that is how I will continue to write it.

And, finally, thanks: To, as always, the incomparable Mike. A better beta and a better friend one could never hope for. Thank you also, as always, to Mary D, who rescued this story from the refuse heap and begged me to keep going on it. If you hate it, blame her. <w> Grateful and heartfelt appreciation goes out to DJWP, for continuing to write stories that grab me somewhere above the liver and giving her kind permission to mention her story in these disclaimers. If you haven’t read her stories, please, do yourself a favor and do so. Finally, this story is dedicated to a group of people without whom I would most probably be living on the streets. Elizabeth, Rachel, Sulli, and the rest of the “Get Sue to Atlanta” crew, this one’s for you!

Feedback: As always is gratefully appreciated. If you wrote to me regarding “Redemption” during the month of September to early October and I haven’t responded, please allow me the honor of apologizing in public. It was then that I was at my lowest point and making ready to move to my new home. Your words of praise and encouragement for my writing kept me firmly out of the pit of depression I was falling into and I shall be forever grateful to each and every one of you who took the time out to feed this bard. And for those of you patiently (or not so patiently) waiting for Redemption’s sequel, fear not, for with the conclusion of this piece, that piece will be started. Any and all who wish to may write me at SwordnQuil@aol.com . I’ll continue to do my best to answer each and every email. An exploding mailbox is a good thing to have. Thanks again!

DESERT STORM

by: Sword’n’Quill (Susanne Beck)

Same Day. Hidden Room Deep in the Inner City. Chengdu, China.

Kael sat on a tattered sofa, eating from a slimy cardboard carton and trying to pay attention to the governmental drivel being spouted from the snowy television. Ming Dao remained silent through the whole ordeal, never taking his eyes off the tall woman who had taken him from his home. It was starting to get on the American’s nerves.

“You mute or something?” she growled, flicking a few pieces of rice at him with her chopsticks.

Though he made no move to remove the rice from his face and hair, Ming Dao shook his head slowly.

“Just not one for talkin’, huh?” Kael said around a mouthful of food. “I can relate.”

The boy continued to stare, unblinking, at her.

“Ya know, I could put your eyes out with these, if I wanted.” She jabbed the utensils toward the boy, snickering when she saw him flinch away from her. “That’s better.” She slumped back into the couch, patting her stomach, then folding her hands over it. “Your daddy’s a really mean guy, Ming Dao. But he has one weakness. Ya know what that is?”

Solemnly, the boy shook his head ‘no’.

Kael grinned. “You. Yup. Your old man loves ya. So much that he had your mother killed just so she couldn’t love ya too.” She laughed at Ming Lao’s wide-eyed expression of shock. “Didn’t know that, didja. It’s true, you know.” She drew a finger across her throat. “Just like that. Dead.” Her voice took on a sing-song quality. “He wanted you all to himself.” Her grin widened, becoming malicious. “It’s gonna be his undoing.”

She stretched luxuriously, then let out a contented belch. “When you grow up, assuming you ever do, remember one thing, little Ming. Love makes you weak. It gives your enemies a tool to use against you. And believe me, they’ll use it.” Her grin was self-satisfied. “Just like I did. Remember that.”

Ming Dao’s eyes were deadly serious as he nodded at her, absorbing the information deep into his soul.

*******

A short while later, a polite knock came to the door and Kael flew off the couch, peering through the peep-hole. Smiling, she swung the door open, allowing her visitors entrance. Two stocky, heavily armed men stepped into the room, followed by a petite woman in a flowing silk gown. Ushering her guests inside, Kael returned to the couch, sprawling her rangy body down over the lumpy cushions. “Well?”

One of the guards stepped closer, a smile on his face. “He received your message and accepts your terms.” His smile turned mocking as he set his gaze on Ming Lao. “His only concern is for his poor, dear boy.”

Kael returned the smile. “I’m sure it is.” She turned her attention to the other man. “You have the stuff.”

Nodding, the man handed a large bag over to the American, standing silent while she pawed through the contents. “Perfect,” she said finally, zipping up the duffel and laying it beside the couch. “Are we all set otherwise?”

The second man nodded. “Everything is in order.”

Kael nodded, crossing her arms over her chest and smiling. “Good. Go on back to the estate and keep your eyes open. Anything looks strange, notify me immediately, understand?”

“It shall be as you wish,” the man said, bowing deeply and turning to leave the room.

The American turned her icy gaze to the second man. “Take up a position outside. Contact me if anyone suspicious comes sniffing around.”

“As you wish,” the second man replied, bowing, then hefting his weapon as he let himself out of the rooms.

That left only the petite woman and the young boy. Looking at the woman, Kael’s smile deepened into one of seduction. Which, unfortunately, was ruined by a jaw-cracking yawn, reminding her that her last shot at sleep had been more than forty eight hours prior. She looked at the silken vision before her regretfully, pleased by the woman’s charming blush and downcast eyes. Kael sighed, then bent down and retrieved a semi-automatic weapon from the duffel she’d been given earlier. “Keep an eye on this little monster while I go in the back. If anyone knocks, come and get me. Don’t answer the door under any circumstances. Understand?”

The woman nodded silently, eyes still downcast as the tall woman moved to stand before her.

Kael hefted her weapon, pointing its lethal muzzle squarely between the staring almond eyes of Ming Lao. “Behave, little Ming,” she growled.

The boy nodded solemnly, never taking his eyes off hers.

Grinning, she lowered her weapon and made for the back room, slamming the door behind her and sinking blissfully into the soft down of the mattress, her weapon at her side.

*******

Kael woke from her deep sleep quickly, in the space between one heartbeat and the next, her senses fully extended, her being silent, even her breathing halted. The muffled sound of quiet voices was heard through the thin boundary of the room’s wall. It was difficult to pick up the words, but the tones were unmistakable. One speaker was her female companion, the other was …she strained still further …one of her guards, the one she had sent over to watch Ming Dao’s estate. Kael’s hand gripped convulsively around the gun at her side as her eyes narrowed, straining to hear the quietly murmured words, her body shouting out warnings of immediate danger.

Her eyes darted about the small, dark room, assessing her chances for escape, were one needed. They were very slim. Only a small, reinforced window sitting well above her bed gave her any hope. The sound of an almost silent knocking to the main door, and the further sound of that door quietly opening and closing, spurred the tall American into action. Quickly, soundlessly, she rolled from the bed, her weapon poised and ready in her hands. Almost without thought, she leapt on top of the tall, rickety dresser, knowing that if her betrayers burst in, they would aim for the bed first.

There she stayed, silent, waiting, her body pumping adrenaline through her system, infusing her musculature, readying it for action. A dark smile creased her shadowed features, despite the danger about to face her. Only at times like this, her death a very real possibility, did Kael feel fully, impossibly, alive. One long finger caressed the trigger of her weapon like the tender skin of a lover.

In the brief eternity of waiting, her mind had time to contemplate and chastise her for her stupidity in trusting people so easily bought with drugs and money. Further self-flagellating thoughts of that nature were mercifully silenced by the sound of confident footsteps leading to the door to her room. Her nostrils flared and she could fairly smell the scent of betrayal as it oozed its way under the crack at the bottom of the door.

From her place in the veiled shadows of the night, Kael watched intently as the moon-bathed doorknob twisted slowly, once, twice. Her fierce eyes glinted briefly in amusement she heard a muffled curse directed to the locked door. The footsteps backed away a pace and she readied herself for action.

The door blew open with a resounding crack, arcing gracefully toward the wall, its now impotent knob breaking through the wall’s weak plaster and sending puffs of white up and out to be caught by the moon’s light as it mimicked snow.

A large bull of a man burst through the open doorway, his weapon hefted and ready. The rapid sound of gunfire sounded loud in the tiny confines. Bits of shredded betting and wall plaster scattered throughout the room, drifting on the stained and colorless rug. As the man stepped in further, confident his goal had been met, Kael drew a bead on his bald, shining head and squeezed the trigger ever so gently. The man’s head disappeared in a fountain of blood and gore. His body bounced off the bed, then rolled to lay beneath her.

Two more heavily muscled men burst into the room, firing blindly. Kael picked them off easily, the grin of her bared and growling teeth a specter in the moonlight.

The fourth man to enter was a bit calmer, and was able to crease her shin with a bullet before his firing went awry, doing Kael’s job for her by splintering the room’s only avenue of escape. She finished him off as well, trying to keep her weight off her injured leg while still maintaining balance on the wobbling dresser.

Shouting in the other room told Kael her time had well and truly run out. Wincing at the pain of her wound, the American squatted slightly against the wall, then flung her body up and to the left, bracing for impact with the lethal shards of glass left behind.

Hot breath hissed through her teeth as razor sharp glass tore through her thin cotton shirt, imbedding itself into the warm skin below her shoulders. A brief instant of weightlessness and she was falling free, her long body propelled into the chill air by the strength of her legs. She maintained enough presence of mind to compact her body into a tight tuck and roll and sped toward the onrushing ground feet first. Her wounded leg gave out and Kael sprawled onto the broken pavement, glass shards showering over her bloodied form.

Quickly, she broke herself out of her mild daze, pulling herself up to her feet and grabbing her weapon securely against her. A quick look up at the broken window and the weapon muzzles suddenly protruding from it and she was off, limping and running down the midnight-deserted inner city streets, leaving several trails of blood behind to mark her passing.

Running steps and weapons fire came inexorably closer as Kael stumbled her way down the damp city streets, scraping her palms raw against the crumbling cement as her leg intermittently gave way, dumping her onto the pavement.

“C’mon, Kael, run,” she whispered to herself, beads of sweat popping out over her eyes and lips. “You’ve been through worse before and came out just fine on the other end.”

The gray haze of too many sleepless nights, too much opium, and blood loss threatened to take her under with it as she stumbled to the ground once again. Jumping back to her feet, she reached down and jabbed a finger directly into the bullet hole in her shin.

Agony sliced through her like razor wire, jerking her back from the precipice of semi-consciousness she had been about to fall into. Her eyes darted back and forth along the narrow street, looking for escape routes as she ran, just barely keeping ahead of the quickly approaching armed mob.

A tiny alley off to the left caught her vision and she darted into it, almost slipping in the accumulated water and debris littering the pavement. The alley stank of rotting food and the slimy mess squelched around her bare feet, turning her already nauseated stomach.

“Adapt and overcome,” she muttered to herself, trying to make herself as invisible and silent as possible. The water and sodden garbage would serve to hide her blood trail, giving her just a bit more breathing room.

Easing back against one dirty, wet and crumbling brick wall, she peered carefully around the corner, ducking back quickly as she caught a glimpse of the onrushing men. She pulled back completely into the shadows as they flew past and watched as a sputtering streetlamp gilded their features in gold.

Her blood froze in her veins.

“Geraldo, you stinking son of a whore. You betrayed me.” Her lips peeled back in a death’s head smile. “You’d better light a few more candles to the Virgin tonight, my friend. Cause you’re gonna need her help where you’re goin’.”

Turning as quickly as she was able, Kael darted out the other end of the alleyway, making a complete circle so as to briefly confuse her pursuers.

Then she made another circle through intersecting alleys and headed back down the main thoroughfare, listening closely for any hint that the enemy was getting closer.

A loud shout echoed off the dank walls looming over the streets, causing Kael to shoot a quick look over her left shoulder, trying to pinpoint the sound. As a consequence, her next step was halted, unannounced, when she came into contact with a slight, warm body.

Her body stiffened as if galvanized and she brought her bloodied hands up in a defensive posture as she whipped her head around, stringy tendrils of her hair plastering themselves to her face.

Realizing that only a slight, if beautiful, Asian woman was the only thing impeding her path, she pressed her open hands against the woman’s narrow shoulders and pushed.

The woman didn’t move. Not the slightest inch.

Kael shoved harder, with the same result. It was like trying to push a boulder socketed into the earth.

“Come with me,” the woman said serenely, her English barely accented.

“Get outta my way!” Kael snarled, pushing away.

Her eyes widened in shock as she found herself helplessly restrained by a woman half her size.

“You will die like a dog in an alley if you do not come with me now,” the woman said, her intense stare cutting through Kael’s drug and adrenaline-induced haze. Her voice was calming, serene.

“Who are you?”

The woman didn’t answer. Instead, she looked past Kael’s shoulder. “You must make your choice now. I have no wish to lose my life with yours.”

A short second later, Kael heard the shouting of the men trailing her. She looked back at the strange woman still holding her. It was like looking into the surface of an utterly still pool of water. She felt all resistance leave her.

The woman smiled, the expression lighting up her face and making it radiant.

Shifting her grip to Kael’s elbow, the woman gently ushered the tall American into the building from which she’d appeared. The door closed almost silently behind them.

Kael stiffened as she heard the sound of feminine giggling from above. Immediately in front of her was a long set of steps ascending into an unknown part of the building in which she now found herself. At the top of those steps, young, painted Asian women giggled behind the hems of their colorful robes.

The American turned to the smaller woman, her eyes again wide. “A whorehouse? You took me into a whorehouse?”

If the Asian was perturbed by Kael’s question, she certainly didn’t show it. “Safety is often found in the last place one would think to look,” she replied.

Kael shook her head in amazement as the women above giggled once again. “Who are you?” she asked again.

“I am Mistress of this place. Welcome to my home, Kael Androstos.”

Pulling the woman up from her formal bow, Kael bared her teeth. “How do you know my name,” she demanded, her grip like iron about the thin, almost frail, woman’s upper arm. “How!?!”

“I know many things about you, your name the least significant among them,” the woman replied serenely, not showing a hint of pain from the American’s tight grip. “Please follow me.”

Shrugging off Kael’s hand as if it were but a minor annoyance, the woman gathered up her robe and began to walk up the steps, leaving the American to follow, bewildered, behind her.

When they got to the top of the stairs, the woman issued a terse set of orders to her employees in a dialect Kael, an expert on many foreign languages, didn’t understand. A moment later, several of the women scampered back down the steps, bearing towels and water which they used to wipe away any traces of the American’s passage.

The woman led Kael through a myriad of rooms which the drug lord guessed were part of the living quarters of the massive pleasure house. Everywhere they walked, groups of smiling, giggling women would follow their passage with sparkling almond eyes.

As they were just about to enter the largest of the rooms, which looked to Kael to be a formal sitting room, a loud pounding was heard from the downstairs door, the rear exit which Kael had been ushered through just moments before.

Her savior quickly grasped Kael by the elbow and urged her into the sitting room. The floor was made of highly polished wood and a simple white rug lay beneath a low, long table. The two women walked quickly to the northwest corner of the room, where the older woman released Kael’s arm and bent down, somehow grasping some hidden lip and pulling up a section of the flooring, exposing a dark space below. “Hurry inside. It is damp and small, but it will keep you safe. Go. Now.”

“I’m not … .” Kael protested.

She was interrupted by a louder pounding and yelled obscenities from the other side of the door.

“Now. Please.”

Nodding, the American jumped down into the hole, her feet hitting the ground quickly. Half of her body was still above the flooring, and she carefully, and painfully, shimmied into the space.

Tight, indeed.

She sat there, knees pulled up to her chin, her head bowed, as the flooring was lowered over her, encasing her in total darkness.

“Great,” she muttered, her breathing loud in the tiny confines of the crawlspace.

Once the American was sufficiently hidden, the woman dusted off her hands and made her way back through the house and down the stairs. Taking a moment to make sure her appearance was nothing short of perfect, she opened the door, smiling serenely.

At the sight of her late night visitor, she bowed deeply. “I am honored that you have chosen to visit my unworthy home, Ming Dao. What might I do to assist you this evening?”

“I want the bitch. I know you have her.”

“I’m afraid I don’t understand you, Ming Dao. If you are looking for a woman, I have many that might please you, Most Honored One.”

Ming Dao lifted his hand to slap the woman, then appeared to think better of the action. “You know damn well who I’m talking about. The blue-eyed American bitch. I know she’s in here. Her trail leads right to your door.”

“I assure you, Honored Guest, I have not seen the person of whom you speak. You may, of course, feel free to search my home, if it pleases you.” So saying, she stepped away from the door, one robe covered arm bidding entrance to the Chinese drug lord and his men.

With a grunt, Ming Dao gestured to his men, and all pushed past the tiny woman and into the vast home.

When everyone had reached the top of the stairs, the drug lord motioned his men off in different directions while he remained behind. “If it pleases you,” the woman said, bowing again, “allow me the honor of serving you while your men carry out their work.”

“That …would be acceptable,” Ming Dao replied, allowing his ‘host’ to lead him into the formal sitting room, where pots of tea, mugs, and Chinese delicacies already awaited the pair.

As the two seated themselves, another woman entered the room, clothed in formal robes, and began serving the two, pouring tea and arranging the finger foods as the sounds of a room to room search echoed through the cavernous building.

From her spot beneath it all, Kael struggled against the cramps that were threatening her contorted body. The bullet wound throbbed and stung. She gritted her teeth against the pain. With her sensitive hearing, she struggled to pick up the conversation taking place almost directly over her head, but the trap door had been seated so perfectly that only the tiniest of unintelligible sounds floated down to her from above.

She sighed softly in frustration before almost blowing her cover when something soft and twitchy brushed against the skin of her hand. In a lighting move, she lashed out and caught her visitor, knowing what it was by the shape of its body, even in the total darkness. Her lip curled in revulsion. God, do I hate rats.

A quick twist of her fingers and the rat was no more.

Dropping the corpse next to her body, she wiped her hand on her dirty, tattered pants and willed that none of the deceased’s family would come investigate the homicide.

Totally oblivious to the object of his search hiding almost below his ample posterior, Ming Dao finished the last of his tea and placed the mug down with an impudent clatter. Just as he was about to speak, one of his men came into the room and bowed. “The search is complete, sir. We have not found the woman.”

Ming Dao slammed his hand down on the table, rattling the plates and cups. “What do you mean you haven’t found her? She is here! Search again!”

“But sir … .”

“Search again!!! Keep searching until you find her! Is that clear? Do you understand me?!?”

The man bowed again. “As you wish, sir.”

12 May 1991. Very early morning. Chinese Pleasure House. Chengdu, China.

It was well into the hours of the early morning when Ming Dao was finally persuaded to give up the search. His men had searched the whorehouse from top to bottom, bottom to top, and hadn’t found anything. All the women had been questioned, several times each, without any leads.

Ming Dao’s face was flushed brick with rage.

He stood nose to nose with the petite Asian woman, his entire body trembling with barely suppressed anger. “That …woman …was …here!” he enunciated clearly from between clenched teeth.

The woman remained supremely unfazed. “If she was, she is here no longer. Your men have searched every inch of my home, Ming Dao. There is no one here.”

“You know she was here! That door can only be opened from the inside. Tell me where you sent her or I will burn this place to the ground and you and all your whores with it!”

The woman smiled, then bowed her head. “This home, these women and, of course, myself are yours to do with as you will, Honorable Ming Dao. If it pleases you to burn all that we are, it is not my place to stop you. But, I assure you, I cannot tell you what I do not know.”

Ming Dao looked deep into the eyes of the woman, someone he had known for years upon years. He could detect no sign of malfeasance in her calm stare. But, then again, he never could.

His fists balled in frustration, but, in the end, he was forced to go with the inevitable. Gathering up his men, the drug lord shooed them down the stairs and out the door. “My men will be watching this place very carefully,” he warned. “If that whore is found within a mile of here, I’ll follow through on my threat. Do not be so complacent as to think that I won’t.”

“I would never presume to believe such a thing, Ming Dao,” the woman replied, bowing deeply. “Thank you for honoring my humble dwelling with your presence. It is my hope that we shall meet again, under more pleasant circumstances.”

Damn the woman! Ming Dao thought as he threw one last warning glare at her before finally turning and leaving the establishment. I know she knows more than she is telling me. I can smell her treachery. I just can’t prove it. And I can’t afford to be wrong. Not with her.

With a last, frustrated glare, Ming Dao turned and left the building. The war is not lost, he told himself as the door closed behind him. If revenge is indeed a dish best served cold, I will wait until the very sun freezes into a ball of ice. I will have that woman. If it takes my last breath to do so, I will have her.

*******

After seeing her guests safely from her home, the petite Asian woman returned to the sitting room after issuing orders to some of the women who rejoined her. Walking over to the area housing the underground crawlspace, she pulled at the nearly invisible joins at the flooring and, as if by magic, the opening beneath was revealed.

Kael, trapped within her enforced misery for several hours, threw her hands up and squinted into the sudden, blinding light, blinking rapidly. Her cramped body was coiled and tense, ready for action, if such would be required.

The woman simply smiled down at her, lowering an outstretched hand. “The danger has passed. It is safe now.”

Ignoring the offer of help, Kael carefully braced her hands on the floorboards and hauled her long body out of the tiny hole, determined not to show any weakness to this strange woman. Her injured leg threatened to give way beneath her, but she managed to maintain a steady pose, eyeing the other woman expectantly, eyebrow raised.

“Please, come with me, Kael Androstos,” the woman said. “It has been a long and no-doubt trying evening. A bath, clean clothes, and a bed have all been prepared for you. Allow me to take you to them.”

Kael, who could easily smell the waves of stink radiating up from her filthy body, swallowed any objections she might have voiced, and instead nodded to the woman, opting to follow her through the house once again.

The woman led Kael into an enormous bathing chamber. The huge tub was filled with steaming water upon which lotus blossoms floated. “I will take your clothes and you may bathe at your leisure.”

Looking down at the smaller woman, Kael was again struck by her delicate beauty. A cocky snicker curled her lips and she reached up slowly to begin unbuttoning her tattered, stained shirt. “I normally don’t get naked in front of a beautiful woman who’s name I don’t know,” she purred, slowly revealing and displaying her body to its greatest advantage in the dim, humid light.

“You seem to have a strange fascination with names. Are they truly that important to you?”

Kael shrugged. “Sometimes. And since you seem to know mine … .” Naked, she spread her long arms out, her grin a mixture of cocky surety and outright sultriness.

“You’re a very interesting woman.”

“So they say.”

The woman was silent a moment, thinking. Then she gave the slightest of sighs. “I am known as Lao Ma.”

Kael’s eyebrow ascended. “A very …historic …name. For a whorehouse madam, especially.”

“One of my ancestors was wife to Lao T’su.”

The American’s grin widened. “She must be spinning in her grave over what became of her line.”

Lao Ma’s eyes narrowed. “As must yours be.”

Kael dropped her arms, her aura fairly bristling with malicious intent. “What do you mean.”

Lao Ma sighed again. “It is nothing. Please forgive my rudeness. You are a guest in my home. You would honor me greatly by accepting my hospitality.”

Kael remained motionless, trying to read the woman before her. It was trying to look through a mirror. Her jaw tightened in frustration. Then her body signaled its fervent desire to give in to its insidious craving for relief. The bath called, its siren’s voice too seductive for even Kael to ignore. Shooting Lao Ma a glare that would have felled a lesser person in their tracks, she stepped over the lip and into the tub, pausing only as the hot water lapped stingingly at her open wound.

Fortunately, the wound, though painful, was less severe than she had first thought, being merely a crease to the muscled part of her shin and calf and managing to miss the bones entirely; a fact for which she was profoundly grateful.

The pause was but a brief one, and before a second had passed, Kael had immersed her long frame into water up to her chin. She bit back a groan of utter bliss as the water immediately started to work its magic on her abused body, loosening knots even she hadn’t known she had.

“I’m going soft,” she hissed into a now empty room, Lao Ma having left silently as soon as Kael was fully immersed herself. Grabbing some pleasantly scented soap, she slapped her hand down into the water. “I can’t believe I let those bastards get the drop on me. Trusting a bunch of drugged out half-wits. What was I thinking?!? Since when have I ever trusted anyone but myself?”

Washing her skin so harshly that her flesh turned red from the abuse, Kael tried to think of the answer to her own question. When had she ever trusted anyone but herself? Iraq? Perhaps, to some extent. She needed to trust in her team in order to complete her missions. But that trust always went so far and no further.

She winced internally, trying to push that train of thought off the tracks before she would be forced to re-examine the steaming trash heap her life had become.

Some things just didn’t bear too close an inspection.

Placing the soap back into its holder, she leaned back, stretched out, and allowed herself to fall into a light, healing doze, confident that her senses would warn her if danger came lurking about.

And so it was with a nasty surprise that she jerked awake from her peaceful sleep to a soft voice whispering in her ear. “Keep your eyes closed,” the voice advised.

Kael struggled to sit up, but the hand on her shoulder exerted more force than she was capable of resisting. Shock ran through her nerve endings as her languid muscles jumped to attention.

“Please, you are in no danger. I have merely come to ask if you should wish help in washing your hair.”

The identity of the voice filtered through her panicked senses and Kael relaxed minutely, grunting out her assent, not trusting herself to do anything more than that.

Soon, warm water cascaded down over her head. Then a sweet-scented shampoo was massaged into her hair by fingers that were far stronger than they appeared at first glance. Against her better judgement, the American felt herself relaxing once again, calmed by a force she didn’t understand. That alone set her internal alarm jangling discordantly, but she didn’t seem to have the will to fight against it.

All too soon, the wonderful massage was completed, and her hair rinsed of its burden. As if in a dream, Kael allowed Lao Ma to help her from the tub and found herself standing silently and complacently as the tiny Asian woman gently toweled her skin dry.

Almost as serene as her much-venerated ancestor, this Lao Ma was also just as human. Like the woman many years dead, she found herself powerfully drawn to the tall, powerful and supremely willful person she had saved from Ming Dao and his thugs. Her body responded just as powerfully to the beautiful woman’s nakedness and she allowed that attraction to flow through her naturally. For it was the natural order of things upon which her whole philosophy rested.

Still, she kept her response from being detected outwardly. Lao Ma was a woman of great vision, and she knew that if she was to complete the task which her worthy ancestor had failed, she must step as carefully as one would upon entering an adder’s den.

After Kael was sufficiently dry, Lao Ma led her over to a simple chair on one side of the bathing chamber. “Please, sit and I will attend to your wound.”

Kael did as she was bade, laying her injured leg on a footstool Lao Ma provided. The petite Asian’s hands were gentle, her touch soothing. Before the American knew it, her wound was cleansed and bandaged and she was back on her feet, accepting a simple, unadorned blue silk robe which Lao Ma slipped over her shoulders, tying the sash off and smiling at the taller woman.

“If it pleases you, I will show you to your room. The bed is prepared and you may sleep as long as you wish.”

Still in an almost trance-like state, Kael merely nodded and once again followed Lao Ma through the cavernous building until they reached a small, sparsely furnished room. A narrow pallet, covered in silk sheets, took up most of the floor space. Untying the robe, Kael allowed it to fall to the floor before slipping between the sheets of the bed awaiting her.

She was asleep as soon as her head hit the pillow.

Lao Ma stared down at the sleeping American for a long moment. A smile crossed her face briefly, then was gone. Desires move the mind to activity. Stillness is the Way of all things. Sleep well in your stillness, Kael Androstos.

Then, like a shadow among shadows, she was gone.

To Be Continued…

DESERT STORM

Part 7

by: SwordnQuill

SwordnQuil@aol.com

Disclaimers: The characters of Xena, Gabrielle, Lao Ma, Alti, Borias, and everyone else who sounds familiar belong to Pac Ren and Universal Studios. I am not making money off of this story.

Genre Disclaimer: Ok. Bear with me, please, because this is kinda tough to explain. Sometime last year, I read a story on the internet that moved me so much, I was inspired to write a sort of companion piece to it. That story was “Lost Soul Walking” by DJWP. In her words, “This is NOT UberXena fiction. It just starts out like it is.” The same can be said for this piece. While not directly related to “Lost Soul Walking”, “Desert Storm” can be considered a sort of prequel to it. It is a story, if you will, about the lifetime before the one depicted in that fabulous, outstanding story. (Can you tell I loved it?) In addition, this is somewhat of an ambitious piece of fiction, in that I am attempting (don’t know if I’ve succeeded, but I’ve attempted) to take the entire X:WP universe and modernize it. We start, in updated terms, with my version of Xena’s betrayal by Caesar (seen in “Destiny”), and continue up through the X:WP episode known as “Remember Nothing”. The plot will be very recognizable to you. It’s meant to be that way.

Special note: Because of this, Gabrielle does not appear, except in offhand mention, in a great deal of the first half of this story. Do not look for her, because you won’t find her. After all, she was not a part of ‘evil Xena’s’ life. If she were, things might have turned out differently, but because this is based on the premise of “Lost Soul Walking” it cannot happen differently. Gabrielle will, however, make her presence known, and that quite strongly, in the second half of the story. If you can hang on till then, I believe that you will not be disappointed.

Sexuality and Violence Disclaimers: We’re dealing with an updated dark Xena through much of the first half, and an updated redeemed Xena through the second. There’s gonna be violence. There are gonna be naughty words. There are also descriptions of sexual activity in this work. There are allusions to heterosexual sex, but nothing graphic. There are some graphic (though I hope tasteful) scenes of sexual expression between women as well. That is how I see the relationship between Xena and Gabrielle, and that is how I will continue to write it.

And, finally, thanks: To, as always, the incomparable Mike. A better beta and a better friend one could never hope for. Thank you also, as always, to Mary D, who rescued this story from the refuse heap and begged me to keep going on it. If you hate it, blame her. <w> Grateful and heartfelt appreciation goes out to DJWP, for continuing to write stories that grab me somewhere above the liver and giving her kind permission to mention her story in these disclaimers. If you haven’t read her stories, please, do yourself a favor and do so. Finally, this story is dedicated to a group of people without whom I would most probably be living on the streets. Elizabeth, Rachel, Sulli, and the rest of the “Get Sue to Atlanta” crew, this one’s for you!

Feedback: As always is gratefully appreciated. If you wrote to me regarding “Redemption” during the month of September to early October and I haven’t responded, please allow me the honor of apologizing in public. It was then that I was at my lowest point and making ready to move to my new home. Your words of praise and encouragement for my writing kept me firmly out of the pit of depression I was falling into and I shall be forever grateful to each and every one of you who took the time out to feed this bard. And for those of you patiently (or not so patiently) waiting for Redemption’s sequel, fear not, for with the conclusion of this piece, that piece will be started. Any and all who wish to may write me at SwordnQuil@aol.com . I’ll continue to do my best to answer each and every email. An exploding mailbox is a good thing to have. Thanks again!

DESERT STORM

by: Sword’n’Quill (Susanne Beck)

Same Day. Mid-Morning. Lao Ma’s Home. Chengdu, China.

Kael awoke shortly after dawn, as was her habit no matter how little sleep she managed to get the night before. Long years of military service had managed to survive the drug and crime induced haze of her new life, forcing her body into a state of awareness that came with the sun’s rising.

Regardless of its brevity, her sleep had been the most refreshing she could ever remember having. It was free of the nightmares usually plaguing her attempts at rest and seemed, because of that, much longer and more restful than was usual for the troubled criminal.

Slipping from the bed, the American found herself pleasantly surprised when her body offered up only the most minimal of protests. Curious, she checked beneath the bandage on her leg, pleased to see the wound had been well tended and, in fact, seemed well on its way to recovery without further intervention.

She paused as her rapidly awakening mind replayed the events of the night before. Her mind slowed as memories of the bath and what came after played behind her eyes. That woman has great power. I want that power. And I’m gonna get that power.

Snickering inwardly, she pulled on the robe and belted the sash before walking barefoot out of the small bedroom and following sensitive hearing to a place where women were heard to be talking. Eventually, she came upon a formal dining room, its long, low table surrounded by young women sitting on pillows and eating breakfast.

Lao Ma looked up, smiling and coming to her feet as she saw her guest enter into the room. “Welcome, Kael. Please, sit and break your fast with us.”

Kael allowed herself to be escorted to a space near the head of the table. Sitting crosslegged in front of a feast of Chinese delicacies, she took a sip of the bracing green tea set before her and dug right in, more famished than she could remember being in a long time.

Conversation muted since Kael’s entrance, and every so often she’d look up to catch one or more of the young women looking her way. She noted with appreciation that the women were much more beautiful without their traditional facepaint exaggerating their features. When she met their eyes, each woman would look shyly down after the briefest of seconds. Ordinarily, this overt staring would have aggravated the volatile American. That morning, however, she was in such a good mood that she didn’t let it bother her.

Instead, she spent her meal flirting outrageously, if non-verbally, with the women at the table, inordinately pleased with her self when she managed to get a blush or a girlish giggle from each and every one, save for the serene woman sitting at the head of the table, who pointedly ignored the goings on.

To say that Kael was fascinated by Lao Ma would have been an understatement of the most grandiose proportions. She was more enigmatic than Kael, a woman who buried her emotions hard and deep, could ever hope to be. She seemed to carry the secrets of the world within her heart. She could tell just by looking that the Asian had power beyond reckoning. Kael’s quick mind began to plot and plan on how to get that power and make it her own.

All in all, though not one word was spoken, it was a very interesting meal.

*******

Breakfast complete, Lao Ma rose gracefully from her position at the head of the table. “If it pleases you, Kael, would you join me in my sitting room? We have some things which require discussion.”

Jumping easily to her feet, Kael simply nodded, determined not to fall into the trap of complacency that had so effortlessly snared her the evening before. Lao Ma had something she wanted, and she was determined to do whatever it took to get it.

The two women walked down several long, narrow halls before coming to an open, airy space. Light streamed into the room from various unshaded windows, casting colorful patterns on the floor and walls. There was a simple desk at one end of the room, and several comfortable-looking chairs filled out the rest of the furniture requirements.

Kael took an offered seat, looking around curiously at the soothing tapestries which covered the walls. The whole room seemed to be given to quiet contemplation and the American found herself quite liking it.

Lao Ma took a seat in another of the chairs, facing Kael at an oblique angle. “Was your sleep restful?” she asked after a long pause.

“It was.”

Lao Ma smiled. “It pleases me to hear that. Is your wound troubling you?”

“No. It’s just fine.”

Nodding, the smaller woman relaxed into her chair, her posture, as always, one of dignity and grace. Kael could easily feel the seductive pull of the Lao Ma’s natural power, but was determined not to give in to it.

Slow minutes passed by as the women stared into each other’s eyes, neither showing any signs of breaking the stalemate.

Finally, Lao Ma cleared her throat and smiled, very slightly. “You are a woman of strong will, Kael Androstos.”

The corner of Kael’s mouth curled upward. “What clued ya in?”

Lao Ma refused to be drawn. “If you continue to serve your will like a slave to his Master, it will be your undoing. To depend solely upon your will is to upset the delicate balance of your true nature. It will get you nowhere.”

“Ya don’t say.”

“Did your will allow you to sell Ming Dao’s son back to him for ransom? Did your will keep those thugs and whores you bought off with money and sex loyal to you?”

With the first of Lao Ma’s polite questions, Kael began to slowly rise from her seat, her face set into stony planes of anger. “How do you know these things?” she asked from between clenched teeth.

“I know many things about you, Kael Androstos.”

Coming fully out of the chair, Kael stepped toward Lao Ma, her fists clenched at her sides, her body rigid with feral intensity. “You goddamned son of a … .”

Before Kael could finish the epithet, Lao Ma raised her hands and the American found herself blown back into her seat, stunned and out of breath. She felt as if she had just been touched with a cattle prod. She tried to lift her arms, but they didn’t seem to want to work anymore. Likewise, her legs appeared to have given up the ghost.

“The effect is only temporary,” Lao Ma advised.

“How did you do that?” Kael asked, surprised that she had the voice for it.

“You desired to cause harm. That desire was turned back upon you.”

“Bullshit.” The tingling feelings were beginning to abate. Kael found herself able to move her arms and legs more normally. She shook both hands vigorously.

“I have no reason to lie. If one fills oneself with desire, one sees only illusion. Empty oneself of desire and one can see the great mystery of things.”

“Like the mystery of how to force someone away from you without even touching them, huh?”

Lao Ma smiled. “Among other things, yes. Will and desire are concepts that have no place in the natural order of things. Yet you bandy them about like they are priceless objects. You feel like you can bend anyone you desire under your will. And you are just finding out now how false a theory that is.” Turning her head a little, Lao Ma gazed upon one of the tapestries that hung on the wall. “My wise ancestor was known by a particular saying.”

“And what was that.”

“Soft as water, yet who can withstand the raging flood?”

Kael smirked again. “Oh yeah. That’s a keeper alright.”

“Water can heal or harm with equal force, Kael. Yet it desires to do neither. It has no will. It simply acts according to its nature. Yet it is more powerful that you or I will ever be. And that is one of the great mysteries. That which acts according to its nature will always be more powerful than that which attempts to impose its will upon that nature.”

The American shook her head. “I drop one bomb on your house, and nature pretty much pisses itself all to hell.” Her grin was white with bared teeth.

Lao Ma chose to maintain her serene silence.

Kael shifted uncomfortably in her chair. “Why are you telling me these things?”

Lao Ma closed her eyes for a long moment. “Because I sense the seeds of greatness inside you, Kael Androstos. If you continue to impose your will on all you see, those seeds will never be allowed to germinate and will die, unborn. And that will be a great loss to everyone.”

The American snickered. “I think you need to pick up a little more wisdom from your venerable ancestor, Lao Ma. The only thing ‘great’ about me is my capacity to do ‘great’ evil. And I happen to like it that way.”

“Do you.”

“Yup. Wouldn’t have it any other way.”

“If I am wrong, it will be revealed soon enough. Until then, I would be honored for the chance to continue speaking with you about these things.”

Kael shrugged. “Why not? I’ve gotta lay low till things with Ming Dao cool down anyway.”

“Wonderful.” Lao Ma rose gracefully from her chair. “My business is set to open for the day soon. If you should wish it, would you like to assist in the preparations?”

“Sure. Sounds like fun.”

*******

Late that evening, Kael found herself back in Lao Ma’s personal sitting room, wiping sweat dampened hair back from her forehead. The silk overblouse and loose pants Lao Ma had given her were, likewise, soaked through with sweat in places. “I didn’t realize running a den of iniquity would be quite so tiring.”

Indeed, Kael had been on her feet for over twelve hours, assisting in any way she could. She found herself fascinated by the business of pleasure, but kept herself carefully out of the line of sight of the many customers, never knowing if Ming Dao would try to send a spy inside. The night had, fortunately, been without incident. Kael found herself physically exhausted, a state rare in the trained soldier.

“A garden may grow without aid, but there is more to reaping the harvest than waiting for the rain to fall,” Lao Ma advised.

“Do you always speak in riddles?”

Lao Ma laughed. The sound reminded Kael of the wind-blown tinkle of the tiny chimes which hung outside of many houses in China. It warmed her. She looked upon the smiling woman, her own face softening. “You’re a beautiful woman, Lao Ma.”

To the American’s utter shock, Lao Ma dropped her eyes and blushed, like a schoolgirl.

“It’s good to know you’re human after all,” Kael gently teased.

“I have never claimed to be otherwise,” Lao Ma replied, though she smiled as she spoke the words.

“True. But watching you, you take everything in stride. Nothing seems to faze you.”

“The same could be said of you.”

A dark, knowing smile spread Kael’s lips. “Oh, plenty of things faze me,” she purred, seeing if she could get another shy blush from the normally imperturbable woman.

Lao Ma didn’t rise to the bait. Instead, she settled herself comfortably in her own chair, seeming to take in everything and nothing as she glanced around the now silent room. After a long moment, her eyes shifted back to Kael and she smiled slightly. “Would it please you to hear a story?”

Biting back a retort about what would please her more, the American settled for a nod. “Sure. Why not.”

“A long time ago, my ancestor, Lao Ma, attended a fateful meeting in the place of her ailing husband. There, she met an intriguing woman, a warrior from Greece. The woman, who was known as Xena, had become crippled at the hands of someone she thought she loved.”

Kael snorted. “A crippled warrior. Not much call for those.”

“Perhaps, though she learned to fight on horseback and became one of the best warriors, if not the best, of her time. She fled to China after being betrayed by the man and gathered an army there, together with another man she took as her lover.”

“Got around, didn’t she.”

“She was very confused about love,” Lao Ma said softly. “The softer things had no place for her in her heart, or so she told herself. She was consumed by rage and hatred and the need for revenge against anyone who would oppose her.”

“Smart woman,” Kael replied, smirking.

“Was she?”

“Oh yeah.” Kael’s smile grew dark as vivid images of her planned revenge against Geraldo played through her mind. “Very smart.”

Finally noticing the continuing silence, Kael shook herself from her reverie and met Lao Ma’s patient, if saddened, gaze. “Please, continue.”

“Xena was very jealous of her warlord-lover’s attentions to my ancestor and attacked her after dinner that evening. Though crippled to the point of needing to use a cane to walk, Xena was still a formidable foe …as Lao Ma said, she was a dangerous woman.”

“So, Xena beats the crap out of your ancestor and starts a war in China,” Kael deduced.

Lao Ma smiled. “Not exactly.”

“Well don’t leave me hanging, woman! What happened?”

The Asian woman laughed good-naturedly.

Kael scowled. “If you tell me patience is a virtue, I’m gonna scream.”

“I don’t think my windows could survive that,” Lao Ma replied in mock horror.

“Did you just make a joke?”

“I believe I did.”

Grinning, Kael shook her head, suddenly liking the small, quiet and supremely confident woman very much. “Please, will you continue your story?” Dear God, did I just say ‘please’??

“As it pleases you. Lao Ma defended herself much the same way I repelled your attack earlier today. Xena was knocked unconscious and Lao Ma took the opportunity to leave, after speaking with her attacker briefly.”

“What did she say?”

“’Fill yourself with desire and see only illusion. Free yourself of desire and see … .”

“The great mystery of things,” Kael concluded, nodding. “Sounds familiar.”

“It pleases me to know that you heard my words.”

Kael snorted again. “Like I had any choice in the matter? I couldn’t have moved even if I’d wanted to.” She shifted a bit on her chair, pulling the fabric away from her heated skin. “What happened next?” Despite herself, she was becoming quite interested in the story, especially as this Xena person seemed to mirror her life so well. Kael had no doubt that this was Lao Ma’s intent in telling the story.

“Some time passed. And in that time, Lao Ma learned that Xena had made a terrible mistake, causing a powerful head of one of the largest families in China to turn against her. With the help of her warlord-lover, she was captured and handed over to the man, who sent her into the forest and set his hunting dogs after her.”

“Guess she wasn’t so smart after all.”

“No. She was young and full of hate. She thought she could bend the world to her will. She found out just how wrong her philosophy was.”

Kael resisted the urge to shift uncomfortably in her chair, very much aware of the mirror being held up to her eyes. “Did …ah …did the dogs get to her?”

Though she did not say so, Lao Ma could easily detect Kael’s increasing discomfort with the subject matter. Perhaps a breakthrough would come this evening. “Fortunately, they did not. Lao Ma happened to be in the right place at the right time and was able to offer assistance to Xena, who accepted it.”

“Fortunate indeed,” Kael replied. Smiling to herself, the young American steepled her fingers. “It occurs to me that this …tale …is sounding more and more familiar as time goes on.”

Lao Ma nodded sagely. “Left unchecked, history does tend to repeat itself.”

Kael’s eyes narrowed. “Care to explain that?”

“I think the explanation will reveal itself in time.”

Huffing out a frustrated breath, Kael flicked her hand. “Continue then.”

“In time, Xena came to love Lao Ma, becoming my ancestor’s most passionate student. She had an amazing capacity for learning. She soaked up Lao Ma’s teachings as a sponge soaks up seawater. In time, she learned to let go of her hatred and subdue her ravenous will.”

“Did Lao Ma love Xena?”

The Asian woman’s face softened. “Very much so. It is said that Xena was her greatest love. And because of that, some believe, she failed in her mission.”

“What was her mission?”

“To unify all the families in China.”

Kael whistled. “Your ancestor sure didn’t dream small, did she.”

“Indeed not. But while her intentions were pure, her desire for peace throughout the land took her away from her philosophy. And, some believe, it all started with her desire for the Warrior Princess.”

“The ‘Warrior Princess’?”

“Yes. That was the title my ancestor bestowed upon Xena. Through the use of her strong sword arm, coupled with the powers Lao Ma’s teachings had given her, Xena would have been the peace-keeper of a united China.”

“Doesn’t seem like a bad job for a warrior to have. What happened?”

“It became apparent that although Xena sublimated her hatred and need for revenge, she hadn’t cleansed them from her spirit.”

“Ahhh,” Kael said, nodding wisely. “She had fooled Lao Ma.”

“And herself as well. I believe that she really wanted to be what Lao Ma saw in her. The knowledge would not have come to her if she were consciously evading Lao Ma. But when she saw the men who she felt had wronged her, my ancestor’s teachings were buried under a tide of hatred. Lao Ma tried to stop her, but in the end, she failed. Xena left and the houses of China remained separate entities.”

“Damn. That’s tough. What happened to them?”

“Xena went through many more years of revenge and hatred before turning her life around. She never forgot Lao Ma, nor what my ancestor taught her. She spent much of the rest of her life regretting the decisions she had made. But, she eventually became a great force for good and, with the mate to her soul, went on to bring hope back into the world in which she lived.”

“And Lao Ma?”

“She was eventually executed by her son, the emperor of China.”

“Holy shit! Her son?”

“Yes. He was a brutal tyrant. Given her philosophy, and the fact that he was her son, Lao Ma could not divert his course. She sent a message to Xena for help, but it came too late to save her own life.”

“Did Xena get the message?”

“Yes. She returned to China and assassinated the emperor.”

Kael chuckled. “Gotta hand it to her. The woman had balls.”

“Indeed. Though she did feel it was her duty. She helped to create Ming Tien, after all.”

“Wha-at?”

Lao Ma smiled sadly. “That is another story for another day. It is late. Perhaps sleep is in order.”

Standing and stretching her tired muscles, Kael nodded. “I’ll hold you to that. Thanks for the story, Lao Ma.”

“Thank you for listening, Kael. May you have a pleasant evening.”

“And you as well. Goodnight.”

8 June 1991. Lao Ma’s Home. Chengdu, China.

Kael stepped from the bathing chamber, her skin still warm and tingling slightly from the vigorous scrubbing she’d given herself.

It was Saturday, the Pleasure House’s one day of rest for the women who had stayed up into the wee hours of the morning, pleasuring the men and women who had come to work off a hard week’s labors. The house was quiet in the golden minutes just after dawn. Kael padded silently through the massive structure on bare feet, the fine silk of her robes brushing softly against the floor to mark her passing.

She was heading toward Lao Ma’s private sitting room; the one place in the entire house where she felt most comfortable. As she moved, Kael thought back on the three weeks already spent in the remarkable woman’s gentle company.

The two women spent many evenings together after the business was closed down for the night. Lao Ma spoke candidly about her total devotion to the Tao and its principles. She spoke very little about herself, yet was warm, caring and compassionate, with a serenity about her that helped draw out a tiny sliver of peace lodged deep within Kael’s dark and shadowed soul.

The story of the original Lao Ma and her warrior-student was never spoken of again after that first night. Instead, the small Asian woman took up the mantel of mentor once again, gently opening Kael’s eyes to a new philosophy of the world.

Lao Ma taught Kael forms of meditation that the former soldier, well versed in such arts, had never considered. The techniques were welcomed, for they helped her ease her way out of the opium addiction she’d fallen back into. They also helped to impart some sense of stillness to the American’s always active mind, and for that, Kael was grateful.

Though the teachings of the Tao, with their emphasis on stillness and serenity, were as foreign to the American as anything could ever be, when seen through the eyes of a true devotee like Lao Ma, Kael couldn’t help but feel the smallest bit jealous over the woman’s seeming comfort with the world and her place in it.

For Kael, every day of life was a war, a struggle which pitted her unbending will against any foes who had the audacity to face her. She was born a soldier and likely would die one. She felt it her destiny, if such a thing could even be contemplated.

To accept, then, life on life’s terms was a concept she couldn’t begin to understand, except at the most basic of intellectual levels. How could it be possible to live life without expressing her will, her desire for things she wanted? It could simply not be done, not even with the bright promise of a world the Tao envisioned hanging over her head like a reward.

Still, Kael had, at some deep and unspoken level, come to treasure her evenings with the gentle woman who had taken her in, though she would probably never admit it to anyone but herself. If spending time with Lao Ma was like looking into the window of a world she could only dream of, then look she would, and be content with the view.

“I really am going soft,” she chuckled to herself as she rounded the last corner to her destination. She rounded the corner, and then stopped, her vision captured by one of the most beautiful sights she had ever seen.

Lao Ma, her hair unbound and luxurious, gently brushing against the curvature of her buttocks, stood at one of the long, narrow windows in her sitting room. A shaft of early morning sunlight lanced through the window, gilding the Asian woman in tones of purest gold. Her simple white robe took on a luminescent quality, and the sun brought out the bluish highlights in her night-black hair.

To Kael, Lao Ma didn’t look prosaic as a mere angel, but rather a goddess, bathed in the hues of her majesty. The American suddenly found herself physically aching with the need to become a part of that light, that majesty. She felt pulled to the vision as a magnet to a core of iron. Her feet carried her across the room, her eyes never wavering from what was before them.

If utter goodness had a physical form, surely this was it.

Stopping less than an arm’s length away, Kael reached out a slightly termoring hand and brushed the tips of her fingers against the shining radiance of Lao Ma’s flowing hair. Her hand tingled as if she were touching some great, but controlled, power source.

Lao Ma, who had known Kael was present from the moment the other woman had stopped before the threshold, felt the gentle, almost reverent, touch to her hair and turned, closing the distance between them to almost nothing.

Kael, too, was standing in the light. Her eyes fairly glowed from an internal heat Lao Ma couldn’t even begin to contemplate. The Asian tilted her chin up slightly, taking in the sun-gilded features of the striking woman standing so close to her. She is truly beauty incarnate.

Quite of its own volition, Lao Ma’s arm went up, the backs of her fingers gently brushing away a strand of hair that had laid itself across Kael’s marble-cut cheekbone. She smiled at the unconscious gasp of air which came from the lips of the taller woman.

“You are so beautiful,” Kael whispered, her eyes drawn to the pink-bow lips of her teacher. Still drawn, she lowered her head slowly, her hand sinking into the thick fall of Lao Ma’s hair to cup the skull beneath.

Their lips brushed lightly against one another, then melded seamlessly, tasting, touching, taunting.

Kael felt as if she had swallowed the sun. A riot of colors exploded behind her closed eyes, washing through her as if giving benediction for her sins.

For one brief and shining moment, she felt …clean.

Then her body caught up to her mind and she deepened the kiss, drawing her tongue against Lao Ma’s lips, which opened in invitation and drew her in to the warmth beyond.

Lao Ma responded primally to the kiss of the beautiful woman, tasting the heady flavor of her lips, taking the warm, exotic and thoroughly female scent of her deep into her lungs.

Desire arrowed through Lao Ma on eagle’s wings.

When she recognized it for what it was, she gently pulled away, gathering up Kael’s hands and kissing them softly, her face shining.

Stunned, Kael’s ice-blue eyes popped open and she stared dumbly down at Lao Ma.

“It is not yet time,” the other woman said, smiling.

Kael blinked. “But I …you … .” She sighed, shaking her head. Then she cleared her throat. “Did …did I do something wrong?”

“No, not at all.” Lao Ma’s smile broadened, her almond eyes twinkling. “It was wonderful. What I’d dreamed it would be.”

“You …thought about kissing me?”

“I have. But …not like this. It’s not time yet. We have much more to go through.”

“I’m afraid I don’t understand.”

“As with all things, Kael,” Lao Ma replied gently, brushing their joined hands against her own cheek, “understanding will come to you when you are ready for it.” Then she smiled again. “But, it seems as if you’ve taken at least one of my lessons to heart.”

An eyebrow rose over one impossibly blue eye. “And which one was that?”

“When I pulled away, you did not attempt to follow. For that one brief moment, you did not try to bend something to your will. This is a good thing.”

For the American, standing in a puddle of her own raging hormones, it didn’t feel like a very good thing at all.

As if reading her mind, Lao Ma threw back her head and laughed gaily, enjoying the perplexed look on the beautiful woman’s face. “Come, my friend. Let us sit and talk awhile. I think we could both use some cooling off.”

Totally dumbfounded, Kael followed meekly behind her teacher, absently wondering where the real Kael Androstos had gone off to and if she was planning on coming back anytime soon.

To Be Continued…

DESERT STORM

Part 8

by: SwordnQuill

SwordnQuil@aol.com

Disclaimers: The characters of Xena, Gabrielle, Lao Ma, Alti, Borias, and everyone else who sounds familiar belong to Pac Ren and Universal Studios. I am not making money off of this story.

Genre Disclaimer: Ok. Bear with me, please, because this is kinda tough to explain. Sometime last year, I read a story on the internet that moved me so much, I was inspired to write a sort of companion piece to it. That story was “Lost Soul Walking” by DJWP. In her words, “This is NOT UberXena fiction. It just starts out like it is.” The same can be said for this piece. While not directly related to “Lost Soul Walking”, “Desert Storm” can be considered a sort of prequel to it. It is a story, if you will, about the lifetime before the one depicted in that fabulous, outstanding story. (Can you tell I loved it?) In addition, this is somewhat of an ambitious piece of fiction, in that I am attempting (don’t know if I’ve succeeded, but I’ve attempted) to take the entire X:WP universe and modernize it. We start, in updated terms, with my version of Xena’s betrayal by Caesar (seen in “Destiny”), and continue up through the X:WP episode known as “Remember Nothing”. The plot will be very recognizable to you. It’s meant to be that way.

Special note: Because of this, Gabrielle does not appear, except in offhand mention, in a great deal of the first half of this story. Do not look for her, because you won’t find her. After all, she was not a part of ‘evil Xena’s’ life. If she were, things might have turned out differently, but because this is based on the premise of “Lost Soul Walking” it cannot happen differently. Gabrielle will, however, make her presence known, and that quite strongly, in the second half of the story. If you can hang on till then, I believe that you will not be disappointed.

Sexuality and Violence Disclaimers: We’re dealing with an updated dark Xena through much of the first half, and an updated redeemed Xena through the second. There’s gonna be violence. There are gonna be naughty words. There are also descriptions of sexual activity in this work. There are allusions to heterosexual sex, but nothing graphic. There are some graphic (though I hope tasteful) scenes of sexual expression between women as well. That is how I see the relationship between Xena and Gabrielle, and that is how I will continue to write it.

And, finally, thanks: To, as always, the incomparable Mike. A better beta and a better friend one could never hope for. Thank you also, as always, to Mary D, who rescued this story from the refuse heap and begged me to keep going on it. If you hate it, blame her. <w> Grateful and heartfelt appreciation goes out to DJWP, for continuing to write stories that grab me somewhere above the liver and giving her kind permission to mention her story in these disclaimers. If you haven’t read her stories, please, do yourself a favor and do so. Finally, this story is dedicated to a group of people without whom I would most probably be living on the streets. Elizabeth, Rachel, Sulli, and the rest of the “Get Sue to Atlanta” crew, this one’s for you!

Feedback: As always is gratefully appreciated. If you wrote to me regarding “Redemption” during the month of September to early October and I haven’t responded, please allow me the honor of apologizing in public. It was then that I was at my lowest point and making ready to move to my new home. Your words of praise and encouragement for my writing kept me firmly out of the pit of depression I was falling into and I shall be forever grateful to each and every one of you who took the time out to feed this bard. And for those of you patiently (or not so patiently) waiting for Redemption’s sequel, fear not, for with the conclusion of this piece, that piece will be started. Any and all who wish to may write me at SwordnQuil@aol.com . I’ll continue to do my best to answer each and every email. An exploding mailbox is a good thing to have. Thanks again!

DESERT STORM

by: Sword’n’Quill (Susanne Beck)

Lao Ma led the taller woman over to one of the chairs and eased her down into it. She pulled a second chair up close, and sat so that their knees were just brushing against one another. She smiled at the somewhat dazed expression of her companion, waiting for the sharp intelligence, accompanied by wary reserve, to shadow those remarkable features once again.

She wasn’t disappointed.

When Kael’s eyes sharpened and lasered into hers, Lao Ma smiled.

“For the last three weeks, you have been very patient with me. You have listened as I have talked on and on about subjects which I am sure held very little interest to you. For that, I thank you.” The small woman bowed her head briefly in appreciation, continuing to smile. “It occurs to me that you have not felt the need to ask very many questions of me. Do you have anything you would wish to ask?”

Kael was silent for several moments, pondering. She fingered her lower lip as she thought. Then she looked back up at Lao Ma, a slight, almost challenging, smile of her own on her face. “You seem to know, or presume you do, a good deal about me. Yet I find myself knowing very little about you.”

“What is it that you would like to know?” the Asian asked, shifting slightly on her chair to make herself more comfortable.

Lifting one long arm, Kael swept it the length and breadth of the room, encompassing everything. “It seems to me that a woman of your …special …talents is somewhat out of place in this type of venue.” Crossing her arms, she slouched back in her chair, eyeing Lao Ma with a look of cocky confidence. “So tell me, Lao Ma. What’s a woman like you doing in a place like this, hmmm?”

“That answer is a simple one. I belong to Ming Dao.”

Kael was out of her chair before she realized her feet had hit the floor, her motion nearly toppling Lao Ma from her own chair. The smaller woman made no attempt to defend herself, even as Kael grabbed the front of her robes and pulled Lao Ma up until just a breath of air separated their faces. Kael’s eyes were wild with feral intensity. Anger radiated from her in waves of dark energy. Lao Ma remained calm and serene, showing no fear whatsoever. The contrast between the two woman was intense.

“Bitch!” Kael snarled, shaking the smaller woman. “You betrayed me! You set me up! Pulling me in here and teaching me all that garbage about peace and serenity and freeing yourself of desire. You wanted me weak! You wanted me helpless so that your Master could take me without a fight. Well, you failed.”

Growling, the American pushed Lao Ma back into her chair. “You failed big time. If you think I’m gonna let myself get cornered like a rat in a maze, you and your Master have another thing coming.”

Spinning quickly, Kael stalked to the long window, peering out onto the sun-dappled grounds, her hand shading her eyes. A spy hid in every shadowed nook. Every moving branch from the surrounding trees was the barrel of an assassin’s rifle.

Taking several deep breaths, she calmed herself. Trees and shadows became harmless once again. Whirling from the window, she paced the length of the room, shooting glares at Lao Ma as she passed.

The other woman remained as imperturbable as ever.

Kael’s thoughts were a jumble of violent emotions and she struggled to get a fix on them as she paced.

Her body was on such a hair-trigger that she nearly sent Lao Ma through the wall when the later laid a gentle hand on Kael’s shoulder. “Kael,” Lao Ma said softly, “listen to me.”

Flinging the hand from her shoulder, the American spun quickly, pinning Lao Ma’s arms to her sides. “I’ve listened quite enough, thank you. In fact, that’s all I’ve been doing for the past twenty one days. Listening. Going soft while my enemies sat right under my nose. Laughing!” Releasing the smaller woman, she again spun away. “There’s gonna be laughter alright. But you won’t be the ones laughing when I get through with you.”

When the touch came again, it was anything but soft. Lao Ma used her implacable strength to grab Kael’s arm and hold on, not letting the struggling woman free. “If I wanted you dead,” she began, in that same calm voice, “I would have let Ming Dao and his dogs finish the job they’d started. I would have let you die on the street. I would never have brought you into my home, endangering the lives of the women who share it with me. If you believe nothing else, I ask that you believe this. I do not want you dead nor in the hands of Ming Dao and his thugs. Just because he owns my body does not mean he owns my spirit. Please allow me to explain this to you so that you may understand.”

Kael ceased her struggles, but her anger was still in high gear. “Start talkin’.”

“My father was addicted to heroin. Every bit of money he ever had went to Ming Dao’s brown powder. Soon, he had amassed quite a debt to the man. When I was thirteen, I was sold into indentured servitude for thirty years as partial payment for that debt. I had no choice in the matter. It was just the way of things.”

Kael said nothing, but Lao Ma could feel the American’s muscles begin to soften beneath her grip. She felt slightly encouraged, and so continued her tale, never loosening her grip.

“Six years ago, I became pregnant by Ming Dao. Nine months later, I gave birth to a son, who was named Ming Lao.”

The American stiffened again. “Ming Lao is your son? They said his mother was killed.”

“And, to all intents and purposes she was.”

“So, someone is lying. Cause you’re not dead.”

The other woman remained as imperturbable as ever.

Kael’s thoughts were a jumble of violent emotions and she struggled to get a fix on them as she paced.

Her body was on such a hair-trigger that she nearly sent Lao Ma through the wall when the later laid a gentle hand on Kael’s shoulder. “Kael,” Lao Ma said softly, “listen to me.”

Flinging the hand from her shoulder, the American spun quickly, pinning Lao Ma’s arms to her sides. “I’ve listened quite enough, thank you. In fact, that’s all I’ve been doing for the past twenty one days. Listening. Going soft while my enemies sat right under my nose. Laughing!” Releasing the smaller woman, she again spun away. “There’s gonna be laughter alright. But you won’t be the ones laughing when I get through with you.”

When the touch came again, it was anything but soft. Lao Ma used her implacable strength to grab Kael’s arm and hold on, not letting the struggling woman free. “If I wanted you dead,” she began, in that same calm voice, “I would have let Ming Dao and his dogs finish the job they’d started. I would have let you die on the street. I would never have brought you into my home, endangering the lives of the women who share it with me. If you believe nothing else, I ask that you believe this. I do not want you dead nor in the hands of Ming Dao and his thugs. Just because he owns my body does not mean he owns my spirit. Please allow me to explain this to you so that you may understand.”

Kael ceased her struggles, but her anger was still in high gear. “Start talkin’.”

“My father was addicted to heroin. Every bit of money he ever had went to Ming Dao’s brown powder. Soon, he had amassed quite a debt to the man. When I was thirteen, I was sold into indentured servitude for thirty years as partial payment for that debt. I had no choice in the matter. It was just the way of things.”

Kael said nothing, but Lao Ma could feel the American’s muscles begin to soften beneath her hand. She felt slightly encouraged, and so continued her tale, never loosening her grip.

“Six years ago, I became pregnant by Ming Dao. Nine months later, I gave birth to a son, who was named Ming Lao.”

The American stiffened again. “Ming Lao is your son? They said his mother was killed.”

“And, to all intents and purposes she was.”

“So, someone is lying. Cause you’re not dead.”

“Indeed I am not. Another young girl named Ling Li was sold into servitude at the same time as I. We became friends. We also became pregnant within a month of one another, and gave birth within hours. I, to Ming Lao, and Ling Li to a daughter she never got to name.”

“And why was that.” Kael’s voice was flat, without inflection, yet Lao Ma knew she was keenly listening.

“Girl children are not seen as gifts by Ming Dao. The infant was murdered within seconds of her birth. Ling Li lost her life shortly after that.”

“Why?”

“Female offspring hold no interest for Ming Dao. Every one of them has been killed after birth. I was the only one to produce a male heir. He dares not rid himself of me.”

“I’m afraid I still don’t understand. From what I can remember of biology, it’s the man, and not the woman, who produces the chromosomes that determine the sex of the child.”

“Ming Dao is a very superstitious man. He tried for many years to produce a son, but failed. Because of his success with me, he must keep me alive and healthy. If Ming Lao should die before he reaches maturity, Ming Dao will come back to me, demanding I produce another son for him.”

Kael snorted. “Just like that, huh.”

“Yes. Just like that.”

“And why did your friend have to die? Does Ming Dao murder all concubines who displease him by giving birth to daughters?”

Lao Ma laughed lightly. “I don’t think there would be two women left standing in all of China if that were so. No, Ming Dao employed a skill with which he is quite accomplished: deception. He killed Ling Li, telling everyone it was she who had given birth to his son and had died in childbirth. Myself, he kept alive and sent away so I would not be a ‘softening’ influence on his son.”

“’His son’?”

“Yes. I gave birth to the boy, and there will always be that bond, but he is being raised to be as monstrous as his father. Ming Lao is his father’s son.”

“And so he sent you here?”

“Yes. The Mistress of this house died suddenly and he sent me in to fill her place. It is his way of keeping me in his service while removing my influence over Ming Lao. And here I shall stay.”

“What happens if Ming Lao manages to live to take over his father’s position?”

“I will likely be executed.”

“You don’t sound as if that frightens you in the least, having a death sentence over your head.”

Lao Ma shrugged. “My life matters little in the Universe’s plan. After all, we all live beneath the sentence of death from the moment we draw our first breath.”

Kael relaxed. “Yeah, I suppose we do.”

The Asian woman released her grip on Kael’s arm. “So, as you can see, I have very little vested in the affairs of Ming Dao and his empire. I helped you escape from him and his men not to hand you back to him, but rather to free you from yourself. You are destined for greatness, Kael Androstos. You must simply find those seeds within yourself and allow them to blossom. I can only offer so much aid to you. It is something you must, ultimately, do for yourself.”

Kael turned slowly, looking deeply into the eyes of the woman before her. “How do I know I can trust you?”

“You don’t. Not with one hundred percent certainty. You must listen to what your heart says.”

The American laughed. “I don’t have a heart, Lao Ma.”

Reaching up, Lao Ma laid a tender hand on Kael’s cheek. “Yes you do. And it is bigger by far than you can imagine.”

Disbelieving, Kael shook her head.

“You have within you an immense capacity for hatred and anger. You are filled to the brim with it. Love and hate are two sides of the same coin. Where the capacity exists for one, the capacity exists for the other. Drain your hatred, subdue your will, and the understanding will come.”

“And you really believe this.”

“Yes.”

Kael dropped her eyes, looking down at the ground as she swallowed hard. “I only wish I could,” she said, a trace of hoarseness in her vibrant voice.

15 June 1991. Lao Ma’s Home. Chengdu, China

It was early morning when Lao Ma made her silent way to her sitting room to begin her daily meditations. She smiled as she crossed the threshold, seeing Kael sitting crosslegged on one of the mats, a copy of her ancestor’s Book of Wisdom laying open on her lap. Her mesmerizing blue eyes were closed and she appeared deep in meditation.

Those eyes opened as Lao Ma took a step back, intending to leave the other woman to her peace. Kael’s smile was open and beautiful, pulling Lao Ma back to the threshold. “Please,” she said softly, responding to the smile with one of her own, “continue with your reading. I did not mean to intrude.”

“You weren’t intruding at all. In fact, I’d welcome your presence. I have a few questions about what I’ve been reading.”

Gracefully accepting the invitation, Lao Ma let her feet carry her into the room, where she joined Kael on the mat, sitting and crossing her own legs beneath the silken fabric of her gown. “How might I be of assistance to you?”

Kael looked back down at the Book, pointing out a passage with one long, tapered finger. “Your ancestor was indeed a wise woman. I just wish she wrote in a way that could be easily understood by mere mortals like myself.” Her eyes twinkled.

“What about the passage troubles you?”

“It says here ‘To conquer others is to have power. To conquer yourself is to know the Way.’ What ‘Way’ is she talking about?”

“The Way of Serenity. Of Wisdom. Of being one with the Universe.”

“And how does someone conquer themselves? I’m not sure what she’s getting at here.”

“Humanity is driven by a will. To conquer yourself is to rise above that will. To let it no longer have an impact on your life.” Lao Ma smiled at Kael’s still slightly confused look. “A will is like a bolder that is loosed from the top of a mountain. It rolls down the slope, destroying all in its path. It does not stop until it either runs into something that is stronger than itself, more often than not destroying itself in the process, or until it no longer has the energy to destroy. If the bolder is simply removed at its source, the mountain’s summit, it cannot destroy, and life beneath it continues as it was meant to be.”

“So, it all goes back to getting rid of your will.”

“Exactly.”

“You make it sound so easy.”

“The philosophy is easy. The practice is not.”

“Not even for you?”

Lao Ma’s face shone with compassion. “Not even for me.”

Kael sighed. “Well …I suppose it might be a little easier if I could see a practical application of this philosophy. You know, to make it more real to me.”

The older woman’s dark, almond eyes narrowed. “It occurs to me that you are mainly interested in whatever powers may come with this philosophy.”

The corner of Kael’s mouth curved upward. “I’d be lying if I said that your …special …powers don’t intrigue me. But, if what I’m hearing you say is true, I won’t be able to use them unless I follow your teachings. So, based on this, what harm can my knowledge cause?” Kael looked deceptively innocent, reminding Lao Ma again never to underestimate the powerful woman.

She thought quickly, carefully weighing the pros and cons, then sighed, coming to a decision. “Come with me.”

She didn’t miss the triumphant spark that lit Kael’s pale eyes as she jumped to her feet, all to willing to follow her mentor into this new stage of learning.

Same Day. Ming Dao’s Estate. Chengdu, China.

Geraldo stood in the waiting room of Ming Dao’s mansion, nervously pacing before the antiques that garishly decorated the place. He had been waiting for two hours for an audience with the drug lord, his heart beating more quickly with each passing moment until he was sure it would explode from his chest.

Finally, the door opened and a large bodyguard gestured for the Colombian to enter Ming Dao’s office. Geraldo found himself before the older man’s desk in short order, wiping his sweaty palms on his perfectly pressed slacks.

After a long moment, Ming Dao looked up from his work on the desk, his eyes magnified behind the thick lenses of his glasses. “You asked for a month, Mr. Rodriguez. I have given you that, and more. And yet that worthless whore continues to elude you. That is not what you promised me, Mr. Rodriguez. Not what you promised me at all.”

“She is here, Ming Dao,” Geraldo countered. “And I’m quite sure I know where she is hiding.”

The Asian’s eyebrows rose, giving him an almost comical appearance. “Then why is she not here, in this room? What games are you playing with me?”

“No games, Ming Dao,” Geraldo hastened to explain. “I assure you. It’s just that …she’s in the one place you won’t allow me to look.”

“And where might that be?”

“The whorehouse run by that woman you call Lao Ma. I don’t trust her. She’s hiding something, and I bet my empire that it’s Kael.”

Ming Dao smiled. “You must be very sure of yourself to make a bet like that, Mr. Rodriguez.”

“I am very sure.”

“Very well. I will give you another week. You may search the pleasure house at your leisure. If you can find your whore among all the others, I will honor my arrangement with you and you may sell my product in your country. If not,” Ming Dao’s smile became a shark’s leer, “your empire, and your life, become mine to do with as I wish. Do we have a deal, Mr. Rodriguez?”

“What will happen to Kael?”

“For kidnapping my son, her life is already forfeit. She belongs to me and is not part of the arrangement.”

After a moment, Geraldo nodded. “Alright, you’ve got a deal.”

“Very good. I will see you in exactly one week. Leave now.”

Bowing his head respectfully, Geraldo turned from the desk and was escorted from the mansion. As he slipped into the car and keyed the engine, he thought briefly of just going over to the whorehouse and grabbing Kael. But then he hesitated. Ming Dao had given him a week. He would make the old man sweat it out. Then he would retrieve what was his. Ming Dao would never have Kael. But he would find that out the hard way. Later.

A dark smile bloomed on his face as he pulled away from the walled estate. “This is going to be fun.”

Same Day. Lao Ma’s House. Chengdu, China.

Lao Ma led Kael to a large room that looked somewhat like a gymnasium. The walls and floors were padded, their coverings vivid with Chinese characters so that the entire room looked like one gigantic mural.

Off in one corner, a group of shelves stood, each bearing an assortment of clay pots, glass bottles, small carved figurines, rocks and other sundries. A small round table sat in front of a wide window which showed the vista of the sun-drenched city several stories below.

“Please choose an object from the shelves and place it on the table,” Lao Ma requested, coming to stand, relaxed, before said piece of furniture.

Kael did as she was asked, selecting a blown glass green fish and setting it on the table, before backing off a few paces, watching the older woman avidly.

Standing relaxed, her hands loosely by her sides, Lao Ma took in a deep, cleansing breath, then let it out slowly. She allowed that core of serenity always within her, a gift from her ancestor, to break its bounds and flow through her, filling everything within her. She focussed her eyes on the glass figurine.

It shattered.

“Holy shit!” Kael shouted, a wide, disbelieving grin on her face. “That was fantastic! Show me how you did that!”

Lao Ma laughed, taking in Kael’s child-like excitement and glowing eyes. At that moment, she sensed no malicious intent in the woman before her, but that wasn’t to say those feelings wouldn’t change in a heartbeat’s time. Some of your wisdom would be appreciated right now, Honored Ancestor. I can only hope that I am doing the right thing, teaching her these powers. Did you feel this way when you gave them to your Warrior Princess?

Swallowing her misgivings, Lao Ma gestured to the shelf. “Choose another object, then.”

Kael returned to the shelf and chose a delicate glass vase, flowers painstakingly painted around the barrel. She returned to the table, and after clearing the top of the glass fragments, set the vase carefully in the middle. “Ok. What’s next?”

Despite herself, the smaller woman couldn’t help smiling. “Next? Try to break it.”

Kael scowled. Then she stepped away from the table and relaxed her body in conscious imitation of her mentor. She stared at the vase, concentrating her mental effort, willing the glass to shatter as it had for Lao Ma.

It sat there, staring impudently at her, refusing to so much as tremble.

If vases could laugh, this one would be doing so.

Lao Ma, under no such constraints, laughed lightly, the sound muffled by her hand over her mouth.

Kael scowled again, gritting her teeth and clenching her fists. “What’s so funny,” she ground out.

“This exercise is about losing your will, Kael, not about using it as a battering ram.”

“Well what in the hell else am I supposed to do? Try a sneak attack??”

“Exactly!” Lao Ma exclaimed.

“Huh?”

“Kael, breaking the vase is not the goal for you.”

“It isn’t?”

“No. That is merely a side effect of sublimating your will and purifying your thoughts. It is the energy you need, not what it can destroy. The vase is just an object to let you know the energy is there.”

Kael rubbed her forehead, trying to take it all in. “So, in other words, the end point is the reception of the energy, not the destruction of the vase.”

The smaller woman’s smile broadened. “Perfectly stated.”

“And how do I get this energy? If the world is driven by a will, how do I lose mine?”

Walking over to join the tall American, Lao Ma laid a gentle hand on her arm. “Don’t try so hard. Here. Close your eyes.”

Kael closed her eyes, feeling the warm touch of Lao Ma’s small hand on her arm and smiling a bit. “What next?”

“Bring a vision into your mind, one, preferably non-violent, that makes you feel at peace with yourself. Do you have one of those?”

Kael frowned, but, surprisingly, the requested vision came easily. It was the beginning of her kiss with Lao Ma. At the moment when their lips touched and she felt energized …cleansed. It was, in her mind, the perfect moment. A slow smile spread her lips. “Yeah. I got one.”

“Good. Now, let that vision, and the feelings it evokes within, fill you, pushing everything else away. Become its vessel. Feel as it starts from the tips of your toes and travels through your body, filling you with that sense of peace. Can you do this?”

Nodding slightly, Kael concentrated on doing as she was asked, allowing the memory of that perfect kiss filter throughout her body, soothing her hurts, blunting her dark desires, curbing her will. It felt, almost, like a cocaine high, but without the chemical hangover. The energy she felt filling her up was intense, yet utterly pure and peaceful. “Yes,” she whispered, becoming a willing vessel to it.

“Open your eyes.”

Arctic blue eyes opened, gaze pinned, unconsciously, to the table.

The glass didn’t just shatter.

It exploded.

Billions of tiny fragments, the majority too small to be seen with the naked eye, blew outward from their source, only by some miracle missing the two women who where standing, utterly shocked, not three feet from the table.

“Did I just do that?” Kael asked, her voice full of wonder.

“Indeed you did,” Lao Ma returned, awed beyond belief. In all her years of studying and teaching, she had never seen a demonstration that even came close to the one she just witnessed. “What sort of vision would cause that much power?” she mused, hardly aware she was speaking aloud.

The American, however, with her highly sensitized hearing, caught every softly uttered word. “This,” she said simply, turning and tilting Lao Ma’s chin up, then lowering her own dark head until their lips once again met and merged.

The energy each woman had summoned was still within them both. It joined together through the power of their kiss, arcing back and forth in a never-ending loop, feeding in upon itself and growing stronger until it was all that existed.

The kiss deepened, each woman drawing within themselves the power of the other until it seemed one perfect being stood where two had been before.

Kael’s legs, which had pained her from the day they were shot out from under her in Iraq, straightened and grew strong again. Old hurts, swollen like abscesses in her soul, seemed to shrink and shrivel away to nothing. Things she’d done wrong, people she’d failed, people who’d failed her. All lost their importance when compared to this vast well of utter purity which was consuming her, cleansing her, healing her.

She opened her eyes and looked down into the surreal glow that was the face of the woman she realized she loved. Reaching slowly down, she untied the belt of Lao Ma’s robes, slipping warm hands inside to touch the silk of her skin.

And was lost; taken up in rapture the likes of which she’d never known.

To Be Continued…

DESERT STORM

Part 9

by: SwordnQuill

SwordnQuil@aol.com

Disclaimers: The characters of Xena, Gabrielle, Lao Ma, Alti, Borias, and everyone else who sounds familiar belong to Pac Ren and Universal Studios. I am not making money off of this story.

Genre Disclaimer: Ok. Bear with me, please, because this is kinda tough to explain. Sometime last year, I read a story on the internet that moved me so much, I was inspired to write a sort of companion piece to it. That story was “Lost Soul Walking” by DJWP. In her words, “This is NOT UberXena fiction. It just starts out like it is.” The same can be said for this piece. While not directly related to “Lost Soul Walking”, “Desert Storm” can be considered a sort of prequel to it. It is a story, if you will, about the lifetime before the one depicted in that fabulous, outstanding story. (Can you tell I loved it?) In addition, this is somewhat of an ambitious piece of fiction, in that I am attempting (don’t know if I’ve succeeded, but I’ve attempted) to take the entire X:WP universe and modernize it. We start, in updated terms, with my version of Xena’s betrayal by Caesar (seen in “Destiny”), and continue up through the X:WP episode known as “Remember Nothing”. The plot will be very recognizable to you. It’s meant to be that way.

Special note: Because of this, Gabrielle does not appear, except in offhand mention, in a great deal of the first half of this story. Do not look for her, because you won’t find her. After all, she was not a part of ‘evil Xena’s’ life. If she were, things might have turned out differently, but because this is based on the premise of “Lost Soul Walking” it cannot happen differently. Gabrielle will, however, make her presence known, and that quite strongly, in the second half of the story. If you can hang on till then, I believe that you will not be disappointed.

Sexuality and Violence Disclaimers: We’re dealing with an updated dark Xena through much of the first half, and an updated redeemed Xena through the second. There’s gonna be violence. There are gonna be naughty words. There are also descriptions of sexual activity in this work. There are allusions to heterosexual sex, but nothing graphic. There are some graphic (though I hope tasteful) scenes of sexual expression between women as well. That is how I see the relationship between Xena and Gabrielle, and that is how I will continue to write it.

And, finally, thanks: To, as always, the incomparable Mike. A better beta and a better friend one could never hope for. Thank you also, as always, to Mary D, who rescued this story from the refuse heap and begged me to keep going on it. If you hate it, blame her. <w> Grateful and heartfelt appreciation goes out to DJWP, for continuing to write stories that grab me somewhere above the liver and giving her kind permission to mention her story in these disclaimers. If you haven’t read her stories, please, do yourself a favor and do so. Finally, this story is dedicated to a group of people without whom I would most probably be living on the streets. Elizabeth, Rachel, Sulli, and the rest of the “Get Sue to Atlanta” crew, this one’s for you!

Feedback: As always is gratefully appreciated. If you wrote to me regarding “Redemption” during the month of September to early October and I haven’t responded, please allow me the honor of apologizing in public. It was then that I was at my lowest point and making ready to move to my new home. Your words of praise and encouragement for my writing kept me firmly out of the pit of depression I was falling into and I shall be forever grateful to each and every one of you who took the time out to feed this bard. And for those of you patiently (or not so patiently) waiting for Redemption’s sequel, fear not, for with the conclusion of this piece, that piece will be started. Any and all who wish to may write me at SwordnQuil@aol.com . I’ll continue to do my best to answer each and every email. An exploding mailbox is a good thing to have. Thanks again!

DESERT STORM

by: Sword’n’Quill (Susanne Beck)

20 June 1991. Just before midnight. Lao Ma’s House. Chengdu, China.

Standing outside the red and gold painted door to the Pleasure House, Geraldo ran a nervous hand through his thick hair before straightening his tie. He groaned inwardly at his nervousness, feeling more like a teenager with his first woman than a fully grown man coming to get what was rightfully his.

That’s probably not the best way to think about this, he thought to himself, wiping sweaty palms on his dark pants. You’ll be lucky enough if she doesn’t kill you on sight. You betrayed her. She’ll never forgive that.

Because she acted foolishly! another part of him insisted. She almost ruined the deal. Would have, if you hadn’t turned her in.

Ruined deal or not, you found out, this last month, exactly what is more important to you. Face it, Geraldo, she’s right. You have gone soft. You are so in love with the woman that you almost went crazy not having her around all this time. The minute you see her, you’ll be down on your knees, begging for forgiveness.

Yeah, if she doesn’t kill you first.

That’s a very definite possibility.

His internal conversation, over for the moment, Geraldo took one last deep breath, feeling the surety of being between a rock and a hard place, and raised his hand to knock on the door before him, winging a quick prayer heavenward as he did so.

*******

Gasping for air and covered with a fine patina of sweat, Kael slumped back against the twisted silk sheets, one arm flung up and draped over her eyes. “That was,” she croaked out, ” …inspired.”

“And inspiring,” Lao Ma agreed, coming up to lay beside the beautiful woman who shared her bed. Pillowing her head on one broad shoulder, the smaller woman gently grazed her fingertips over the sweat-sheened skin as she breathed in the scent of their lovemaking with an almost primal pleasure.

“This ‘freeing yourself of desire’ stuff has got some merit,” Kael said, rolling over and enveloping Lao Ma in a warm embrace.

Lao Ma laughed softly, returning the embrace and nuzzling into Kael’s sweet smelling hair. “Not the usual way a true Master teaches this lesson, however.”

Kael’s eyes, still passion-dark, opened slowly. A rakish grin came over her face. “Don’t see why not. It’d pretty much guarantee your students came back for more.”

Any reply Lao Ma might have made was lost as a light tapping came to the door frame.

“Enter.”

A young woman, dressed and painted for the evening, entered the room, keeping her head bowed and her gaze on the floor. “Many pardons for the intrusion, Lao Ma, but there is a man downstairs asking to speak with you. He says that it is very important.”

Lao Ma could feel Kael’s body stiffen behind her. “Was he alone?”

“Yes, Ma’am.”

“Did he give his name?”

“Yes, Ma’am. He said his name was Geraldo Rodriguez.”

The young woman drew back in fear as Kael launched herself from the bed, a soundless snarl on her lips.

“Kael! No!” Lao Ma shouted, also quickly standing.

“Stay out of this, Lao Ma. That bastard’s mine.” Not even bothering to slip a robe on over her naked body, Kael strode toward the door.

“Stop it, Kael! Stop desiring! Stop hating!”

The American whirled, her lips split in a shark’s sneer. “Pretty words, Lao Ma. But that miserable excuse for a scum-sucking pig betrayed me. There isn’t enough philosophy in the world that’s gonna stop me from paying him back.”

“And what will your revenge accomplish, Kael?”

“I’ll make me feel better,” Kael smirked, turning once again.

Her face white beneath the paint, the young messenger jumped out of the enraged American’s way.

Kael had gotten no more than two steps from the room when she was brought down by what felt like a cattle-prod to her spine. Her legs crumpled beneath her, refusing to bear her weight. She fell to the floor in a heap, quickly twisting to glare murderously at Lao Ma, who was standing very calmly beside her.

“You must stop this casting out for revenge, Kael. It will grant you nothing, save, perhaps, a very temporary respite. Or an ugly death.”

“Maybe that’s all I’m lookin’ for,” the American ground out, sitting up and rubbing at her tingling legs.

“If it is, then we have both wasted our time.”

Looking up, Kael caught the brief expression of disappointment as it darkened her mentor’s eyes. That look drained much of the anger from the taller woman’s body, replacing it with a sort of shame that made her shift uncomfortably on the floor at Lao Ma’s feet. “He betrayed me, Lao Ma!” she repeated, as if saying it yet again would convince the other woman of that simple fact.

Lao Ma nodded. “Of that, I am well aware. However, perhaps this time apart has given him a chance to think on his actions. Perhaps he has come here, hoping for a chance to apologize to you.”

Kael snorted. “Geraldo? Lao Ma, that man wouldn’t apologize to his own mother if someone was pulling his fingernails out by the roots.”

“People change,” the Asian replied simply.

“Not Geraldo.”

“Some would say that it would be easier for a mountain to shed tears of sadness than for Kael Androstos to feel anything other than anger. Is that also true?”

Kael looked at Lao Ma for a long moment, before dropping her eyes back to her still numb legs. “Not anymore,” she mumbled.

“Then perhaps others have it within themselves to change as well.”

“Damnit, Lao Ma! He’s not here to beg forgiveness! It’s a setup! Are you so blind to evil that you can’t see that? He’s nothing more than Ming’s puppy, sent in to do the dirty work. If he finds me here, all our lives are forfeit!”

“I am not nearly as blind to evil as you think, Kael. I am asking you to trust me to handle this. You trusted me to hide you from Ming Dao.”

“I didn’t have a choice then.”

“You have a choice now.” She looked down into the mesmerizing blue eyes. “Will you trust me?”

Kael looked up into the eyes of her teacher. Do I have it within me to trust again? Can it really be so easy as saying ‘yes’? Do I dare run the risk of being betrayed yet again? Can it really end here?

Pushing out all doubts and fears, half astounded at herself for doing so, she took in a deep breath and let it out slowly. “Yes,” she said finally. “I’ll trust you.”

Lao Ma’s smile lit up more than her face as she reached down to help Kael from her place on the floor. “Thank you, Kael.”

The American shrugged off her grip. “Yeah, well just don’t take too long down there. I might get a little nervous, and you wouldn’t like me when I’m nervous.”

“I’ll keep that in mind,” Lao Ma replied as she reached for, slipped on, and belted her robe.

*******

Standing just inside the ornate entrance to the Pleasure Palace, Geraldo soothed his nerves by preening slightly before the gaggle of painted beauties who flirted shamelessly with him from their places inside the large sitting room just to the right of the entrance.

That the women were beauties there was no doubt. Exactly the type of nubile, young flesh he had feasted upon before a certain black haired, blue eyed she demon had come into his life, crippled and hooked through the nose on the fruits of his labors.

Geraldo, once, had prided himself on being his father’s son; a man who, it was said from within the shadowed depths of roadside cantinas, had more women than Colombia had cocoa plants. How he could have allowed one woman to capture him so completely—and so effortlessly—was beyond his capacity to guess.

The drug lord was snapped out of his thoughts by the sudden quiet in the house. His gaze was directed to the stairs, where the young messenger was gracefully returning, followed by a truly stunning woman, dressed in formal robes of rose and pink silk.

Reaching the bottom of the stairs, the woman walked toward him with such dignity and grace that Geraldo found himself straightening his spine until it fairly crackled with ramrod straightness. He bowed his head in respect before he even realized he was doing so.

The woman smiled. “Welcome to my humble home. My name is Lao Ma. You wished to speak with me?”

“I am sorry for the intrusion, Lao Ma, but I must speak with you. It is very urgent,” Geraldo managed to get out. He could feel the woman’s eyes on him, calmly assessing, and he felt his nervousness return once again, full force, drying up all the moisture in his mouth.

“Very well,” she said after a moment. “Come with me.”

Breathing out a silent, but heartfelt, sigh of relief, Geraldo silently followed behind the woman as she led the way deeper into the building.

Lao Ma ushered Geraldo into her office, gently closing the door behind her. Gesturing to a chair, she continued around to the rear of her large desk and seated herself behind it, folding her hands on the pristine surface. “How may I be of assistance to you?”

“I am looking for a woman, an American, by the name of Kael Androstos. I have reason to believe that she is here, with you, in this place. I must see her.”

Placing her hands flat on the desk, Lao Ma made as if to stand up. “Than I am sorry, Mr. Rodriguez. You have wasted your time.”

Geraldo jumped to his feet. “Please! Wait! I must speak to her! It’s urgent!”

“And what is this urgency, that you must come here in the middle of the night?”

“It’s …difficult to explain,” Geraldo hedged.

“Then, again, you have wasted your time. I can be of no help to you.”

“Please, hear me out. I said it was difficult to explain, not that I wouldn’t explain it.”

Lao Ma looked at him, waiting.

Running a hand through his thick hair, Geraldo sighed. “I …made a deal with Ming Dao. Kael, in exchange for the chance to sell his ‘product’ overseas.” He dropped his eyes. “But I couldn’t go through with it. He gave me a month to find her, and tonight, my time is up.” Raising his eyes again, he looked beseechingly into the serene face of the woman sitting across from him. “Please, I must speak to her. I’ve managed to secure a way out of this country. For the both of us. If she doesn’t leave with me tonight, Ming Dao will surely find her and kill her.”

“And why don’t you just go through with your deal?” Lao Ma asked. “Surely it would be safer for you in the long run. More profitable, as well.”

“I … .” Geraldo’s voice trailed off as his machismo tried one last valiant stand against his heart. He took in a deep breath, his heart winning out. “Because I love her. Because my greed and my anger made me betray her. And because I want to make it right with her.”

Lao Ma looked carefully at Geraldo. His sincerity was rolling off of him in waves. It was obvious that he did love Kael, enough to risk his own life getting her to safety. But I love her as well, she thought, a small twinge of unaccustomed jealousy worming its way into her heart. She fought it down ruthlessly. Kael was not safe in China.

As Geraldo opened his own heart, Lao Ma shut hers down. “Come with me,” she said, simply.

The Latin walked behind the small woman, following her deeper into the voluminous confines of her home. Stepping through a narrow doorway, he stopped, frozen, as Lao Ma stepped aside and the vision of a naked Kael was presented him. His jaw dropped as his eyes took in the strong lines and supple curves of the woman he loved. Lust consumed him, once again drying his mouth.

“Hello, Geraldo,” Kael said, her aura oozing blatant sexuality. The corner of her mouth crooked up in a half-grin as she closed the distance between them, seeming to glide more than walk across the open space. “Didja miss me?”

Geraldo found that his voice had gone wherever his spit had disappeared to. Dumbly, he nodded.

Then the air rushed out of his lungs through the pinhole that had suddenly replaced his throat as a muscled thigh interposed itself between his slightly spread legs and pushed. Hard.

A half-breathed whimper and he was down on his knees, hands cupped—too late—over his genitals.

Coughing out a smirking laugh, Kael lifted her knee again, just as Geraldo was folding forward, connecting with his forehead and sending him sprawling on his back, wheezing.

Lao Ma stepped forward. “Kael … .”

“Stay out of this, Lao Ma,” Kael snarled, reaching down and pulling Geraldo up by the lapels of his suit jacket. “This is between me and the little puppy here.” She grinned into the man’s face. “Isn’t it, Geraldo.”

“Stop this, Kael,” Lao Ma ordered.

“Not a chance,” the tall woman said, grinning evilly. “It’s payback time.”

Releasing one of the lapels, Kael slapped Geraldo across the face, open handed. Then she slapped the other cheek, harder. The Latin’s eyes rolled back in his head as he slumped backward, only Kael’s strong grip keeping him on his feet.

“Pussy,” she spat, releasing him and watching as he dropped bonelessly to the floor. “Worthless piece of shit.”

“Kael, stop!!”

The American rounded on Lao Ma before a scream halted her in her tracks.

Gunfire echoed through the building.

More screams followed.

Completing her turn, Kael threw Lao Ma to the floor before squatting down and grabbing Geraldo’s Sig from its place at his back. “Now the real fun starts,” she purred, grinning darkly, wildly.

More screams, followed by the sound of quickly running footsteps, coming closer.

“Don’t do this, Kael,” Lao Ma warned.

“Just stay outta my way.”

Lao Ma stood her ground as the footsteps came ever closer. Kael raised the weapon, aiming for the doorway. Two men came into view, their faces blank tableaus, upon which murder was ready to be written in blood.

Kael squeezed the trigger and the men fell to the floor, to be replaced quickly by two more. One of the men managed to get off a shot before his head exploded in a fountain of blood.

His partner was smarter, using the dead body as a shield. Pushing the corpse into the room, he waited until the American woman ducked out of the way, then fired.

Kael felt the sting of a bullet as it whizzed by her ear, missing her by a hairsbreadth, at most. Her grin widened. “You couldn’t hit the Great Wall, four eyes,” she taunted, before ending his life with a perfect shot to the heart. The man fell soundlessly, his weapon clattering to the floor.

Three more men advanced, spraying automatic weapons’ fire into the room, chewing through the walls and artwork that had stood in the once pristine room.

Kael managed to get the first two and was drawing a bead on the third, when her wrist was creased by a bullet, causing her arm to go numb. Her next shots went wide of their mark, allowing the third man, followed by a forth, and a fifth, to enter the room, their expressions grim.

The American tried to fire her weapon, but her hand wouldn’t work. She backed up slowly, eyes frantically searching for an escape.

Ming Dao entered at the end of the parade of armed muscle, his seamed face further creased in a mocking smile. “So, Ms. Androstos, we meet again. I had hoped to make your death a little more …painful …but you’ve cost me too many of my men already. The hunt has been fun, but I’m afraid it is time to say goodbye to the prey. Do you have any last words?”

Kael bared her teeth. “Eat shit.”

The drug lord threw back his head and laughed, gesturing for one of his men to finish the job.

He was dead before he’d even stopped laughing. The bodies of his remaining guards quickly joined him on the blood-pooled floor.

Her eyes wide with shock, Kael whirled to face a barely standing Geraldo, his weapon clasped loosely in one limp hand.

“I couldn’t let them kill you,” he gasped, slowly straightening as some color came back to his cheeks.

Kael looked at him for a moment, before turning her head to track down Lao Ma. “You can come out now,” she called. “The bad guys are all gone.”

When there was no answer, Kael dropped her gun and ran behind the bed where Lao Ma was sprawled, face down. Gasping, the tall woman squatted, turning the body over. “No,” she half-sobbed, taking in the shredded and blood soaked gown. “No! Lao Ma! No!!”

Panic stricken, she shook Lao Ma’s unresponsive body, then blindly reached for a pulse.

There was none. Lao Ma’s flesh was already growing chill.

“NO!” Kael screamed, gathering the dead woman into a tight embrace, burying her face in her mentor’s thick hair. “No!!!”

Sirens pierced the now-still air.

Geraldo limped painfully over to where Kael sat rocking Lao Ma in a fevered grip. “Help her,” his lover begged, her eyes sparkling with tears. “Please. I can’t lose her.”

“We need to go,” he said tightly, laying a gentle hand on her shoulder. “The police are coming. We’ll be stuck here forever if they find us.”

“Help her, damn you!!”

“It’s too late! Kael, please! We have to go! Now!!”

“No! I won’t leave her!”

“You have to! I’ve gotten us passage out of the country. We must leave, Kael! We must!!”

“No. I won’t leave.” Looking down, Kael gently wiped a strand of hair clinging to Lao Ma’s full lips. “I’m so sorry,” she whispered, sobbing. “Lao Ma, I’m so, so sorry. Please, come back to me. Please.”

The sirens came closer. Squealing tires were heard as the cars skid to a stop on the wet pavement outside the establishment.

“There’s no more time, Kael,” Geraldo warned, grasping her arm and trying to pull her to her feet.

“Leave me alone, damnit!”

“I can’t! I won’t! Lao Ma is dead, Kael. There’s nothing more you can do for her. “We need to get away. Now!”

Kael looked from the dark man to the dead woman, listening as the sounds of car doors slamming and men yelling penetrated the thick walls of Lao Ma’s home. She bowed her head, placing a last, tender kiss on the woman’s soft brow. “You’ll always be a part of me, Lao Ma,” she whispered, stroking the long, jet hair for the last time.

Slowly, her eyes hardened to arctic ice. She released Lao Ma, then stood.

“Let’s get the fuck outta here.”

END OF SECTION TWO

DESERT STORM

Part 10

by: SwordnQuill

Disclaimers: The characters of Xena, Gabrielle, Lao Ma, Alti, Borias, and everyone else who sounds familiar belong to Pac Ren and Universal Studios. I am not making money off of this story.

Genre Disclaimer: Ok. Bear with me, please, because this is kinda tough to explain. Sometime last year, I read a story on the internet that moved me so much, I was inspired to write a sort of companion piece to it. That story was “Lost Soul Walking” by DJWP. In her words, “This is NOT UberXena fiction. It just starts out like it is.” The same can be said for this piece. While not directly related to “Lost Soul Walking”, “Desert Storm” can be considered a sort of prequel to it. It is a story, if you will, about the lifetime before the one depicted in that fabulous, outstanding story. (Can you tell I loved it?) In addition, this is somewhat of an ambitious piece of fiction, in that I am attempting (don’t know if I’ve succeeded, but I’ve attempted) to take the entire X:WP universe and modernize it. We start, in updated terms, with my version of Xena’s betrayal by Caesar (seen in “Destiny”), and continue up through the X:WP episode known as “Remember Nothing”. The plot will be very recognizable to you. It’s meant to be that way.

Special note: Because of this, Gabrielle does not appear, except in offhand mention, in a great deal of the first half of this story. Do not look for her, because you won’t find her. After all, she was not a part of ‘evil Xena’s’ life. If she were, things might have turned out differently, but because this is based on the premise of “Lost Soul Walking” it cannot happen differently. Gabrielle will, however, make her presence known, and that quite strongly, in the second half of the story. If you can hang on till then, I believe that you will not be disappointed.

Sexuality and Violence Disclaimers: We’re dealing with an updated dark Xena through much of the first half, and an updated redeemed Xena through the second. There’s gonna be violence. There are gonna be naughty words. There are also descriptions of sexual activity in this work. There are allusions to heterosexual sex, but nothing graphic. There are some graphic (though I hope tasteful) scenes of sexual expression between women as well. That is how I see the relationship between Xena and Gabrielle, and that is how I will continue to write it.

And, finally, thanks: To, as always, the incomparable Mike. A better beta and a better friend one could never hope for. Thank you also, as always, to Mary D, who rescued this story from the refuse heap and begged me to keep going on it. If you hate it, blame her. <w> Grateful and heartfelt appreciation goes out to DJWP, for continuing to write stories that grab me somewhere above the liver and giving her kind permission to mention her story in these disclaimers. If you haven’t read her stories, please, do yourself a favor and do so. Finally, this story is dedicated to a group of people without whom I would most probably be living on the streets. Elizabeth, Rachel, Sulli, and the rest of the “Get Sue to Atlanta” crew, this one’s for you!

Feedback: As always is gratefully appreciated. If you wrote to me regarding “Redemption” during the month of September to early October and I haven’t responded, please allow me the honor of apologizing in public. It was then that I was at my lowest point and making ready to move to my new home. Your words of praise and encouragement for my writing kept me firmly out of the pit of depression I was falling into and I shall be forever grateful to each and every one of you who took the time out to feed this bard. And for those of you patiently (or not so patiently) waiting for Redemption’s sequel, fear not, for with the conclusion of this piece, that piece will be started. Any and all who wish to may write me at SwordnQuil@aol.com. I’ll continue to do my best to answer each and every email. An exploding mailbox is a good thing to have. Thanks again!

DESERT STORM

by: Sword’n’Quill (Susanne Beck)

PART THREE: Adventures in the Death Trade

“Help me. And I will make you Destroyer of Nations.” Alti: Adventures in the Sin Trade

23 December 1991 Rodriguez Compound Medellin, Colombia

With only two days to go before Christmas, Medellin was ablaze in the colors of the season. Churches, storefronts and houses all displayed their finery in preparation for the holiday’s celebration.

Within the heavily walled confines of the Rodriguez compound, however, the air was more funerary than festive. The bedroom, in particular, had taken on the look of a dismal cavern. Heavy curtains masked the large windows, blocking out the bright Colombian sun. In the fireplace, a cheerless fire blazed, the flames’ light reaching out and turning a glass of Cabernet sitting on the table the color of freshly spilled blood.

Kael sat slumped in a chair facing the fireplace, staring blindly into the flames as if trying to divine the meaning of her existence from the shifting patterns of light and shadow.

Just outside the doorway, Geraldo stood, watching Kael watch the fire, uneasy down to his very soul. She had been like this for months, now; ever since the harrowing escape from China. Lao Ma’s death seemed to have extinguished whatever tiny bit of light had dared to live within her. This new Kael was more cruel, more ruthless, more utterly heartless than ever before. It was as if causing pain, anguish and death was the only thing keeping her own demons at bay.

When she wasn’t on some killing spree, Kael sequestered herself in the bedroom, staring blindly at nothing for long hours. She hardly spoke at all anymore, except for a few tersely voiced commands which she issued to friends and enemies alike.

Her soul seemed a dead and rotting thing.

But still, for all that, Geraldo found himself still desperately in love with the woman. His heart was a traitorous thing, not even his own anymore.

“Stop staring at me before I take your eyes out with this poker,” Kael spat out without ever turning her head from the fire.

Biting back a sigh, Geraldo stepped fully into the room, closing the distance between them in several long strides. Careful to stay out of touching distance, something the woman, of late, detested except for those times when the lust of killing led her to take him to their bed and wear out his mind and body with the heat of her blazing passion, Geraldo looked down at Kael’s bowed head. “I’m due at a meeting shortly. I would like it if you would join me,” he said quietly.

Kael slowly turned her cold, dead eyes toward him. Her lip curled slightly. “Does this ‘meeting’ involve bloodshed?”

“No.”

“Then get the fuck outta here. I’m not interested.” She turned back to the fire.

“You’re never interested in anything anymore! Except killing.”

Kael snorted. “Smart boy you are, Einstein. It took you this long to figure that out?”

“Kael, please. Diego Cordova has asked to meet with us. I think it would be interesting to see what he has to say.”

“The only thing interesting about Diego Cordova is how high he’ll scream when I pull his balls out by the roots.”

“He has important connections in Indonesia. It might be valuable to us to form an alliance with him.”

The dark head shook. “That’s all you’re good for anymore, Geraldo. Talk. Where’s the man who used to have the jewels to rip the hearts out of assholes like Cordova, huh? That useless piece of shit is so far beneath you that he’d have to look up to see the soles of your shoes, and yet you want to talk to him. Form an alliance with him.” She threw up her hands in disgust, still staring into the fire. “You’re a weak, pathetic excuse for a man, Geraldo. A spineless jellyfish is what you’ve become. You make me sick.”

“Kael … .” Anything further Geraldo might have said was interrupted by the chiming of the door. The jaunty tune trailed off to silence, only to start up again, bare seconds later. And then again.

Kael snapped her head around, her eyes narrow and murderous. “Where the fuck is the hired help, Geraldo? Packed off to their little families to spread some Christmas cheer?”

The look on Geraldo’s face was all the answer she needed. She blew out a disgusted breath and rose from her chair as the door chime rang yet again.

“I’ll get it,” Geraldo offered.

Kael smirked, patting his face as she passed by. “No, that’s alright. I wouldn’t want you to strain yourself, little man. Just relax and rest up for that great meeting of the minds you’re gonna have.”

Leaving Geraldo to stand impotently in the darkened bedroom, Kael made her way down the winding staircase, her ire ratcheting up another notch each time the doorbell rang. She found herself wishing the caller was a religious fundamentalist hoping to teach her the error of her heathen ways. She would have fun teaching them the true meaning of the word ‘righteous’.

Coming to the bottom of the stairs, she crossed the floor quickly, then grasped the door handle, yanking the door open savagely, rage painting her face in harsh tones.

Kael, whose unusual height made it rare for her to have to look up into the eyes of anyone, especially another woman, found herself doing just that as she froze in mid snarl. The woman facing her topped her by a good two inches and was, to put it simply, gorgeous. She was tall and sleek, her curves absolutely dangerous. Her hair was a gentle brown, long, and soft-looking as it was drawn away from the striking features of her face. Her lips were a bit too misshapen, her cheeks a little too sharp to give her a classic beauty, but her deep caramel eyes, accented by heavy eyeliner, more than made up for it, in Kael’s book. And that body … . “What do you want?” she asked finally, in a tone far less harsh than she had at first intended.

The woman cocked her head, her entire essence rippling with barely repressed sensuality. She smiled. “You.” Her voice was low and whispery, with a whiskey and cigarettes hoarseness that made Kael’s already surging hormones stand up and take gleeful notice.

“Me, huh?” Kael made a show of eyeing the entire package, slowly, lewdly.

The grin broadened. One long, slender finger drew itself down the middle of Kael’s broad chest. “Oh, yes,” the woman purred. “We’ll have a lot of fun together, you and I.” The finger dipped into the waistband of Kael’s slacks, tugging slightly. “More fun than you ever dreamed.”

Kael’s eyes narrowed as a dark smile bloomed on her face. “So, you know what’s in my dreams, do you?”

“Oh yes,” the woman said again, her finger now trailing along Kael’s strong jawbone. “Full of such delicious imagery. Rage. Death. Fear. A veritable feeding ground for the senses.”

Cobra-quick, Kael reached up and snatched the stranger’s hand away from her face. Their eyes met and locked, each soul feeding off the palpable darkness in the other.

They might have stood that way forever, locked in an unending feedback loop of mutual rage, had Geraldo not chosen just that moment to make his presence felt behind Kael.

“You’re beginning to irritate me, Geraldo,” the American growled, still looking at the strange woman who had captured her interest. “And I really don’t think you wanna go there right now.”

Taking a chance, Geraldo put his hand on Kael’s shoulder and squeezed. “I need to talk with you,” he whispered in her ear.

“So talk,” Kael replied, managing only by the smallest of margins to keep from turning and ripping his face off.

“Not here. Inside. Alone.”

The other woman smiled, gently disengaging her grip from the beautiful American’s. “Talk to your friend. I’ll wait right here.”

“You do that.” Grabbing Geraldo’s hand, she flung it off her shoulder and turned, pushing him back into the house and closing the door behind her. “Spit it out,” she demanded.

“Do you know that woman?”

A corner of Kael’s mouth crooked up. “No. We haven’t been properly introduced. Yet.”

“If you know what’s good for you, you’ll keep it that way. She is nothing but trouble.”

Kael’s grin broadened. “Well, you know how much I like trouble.”

“Not her kind. She’s a Santeria priestess. A very dark and dangerous one. She is responsible for the destruction of the Villa family. She made them believe that they were invisible to the police and that bullets couldn’t hurt them. The police came and killed them in their beds.”

Kael snorted. “They deserved it for being such idiots, then.”

“She is evil, Kael. Her words are all lies, but she has the power to make you believe them. I forbid you to let her come into this house.”

Ice blue eyes narrowed dangerously. “You …forbid… me?”

Geraldo stood his ground. “Yes. I will not have that woman in this house, corrupting it. Corrupting you. I love you, Kael. Shouldn’t that count for something?”

“Not with me, it doesn’t. Love makes you weak. It makes you soft. Just like you’ve become, Geraldo. Worthless. So just go to your stupid meetings and hash out your stupid deals and let me take care of my own business, hmmm?”

Frustrated beyond all good sense, the Latin man lifted his arm, his eyes flashing his anger at the impudent American.

“Lay one finger on me, and I’ll make sure you never touch another living thing again, Geraldo.”

His teeth clenched, Geraldo curled his hand into a fist and stood there, his entire body trembling with the need to lash out at something …anything, just to release the building frustration. The woman who had gone to China with him had died somewhere along the way. In her place, a stranger stood. A stranger who Geraldo both loved and loathed. That he feared her was beyond question. That he was scared for her was likewise true. He felt lost in a way that was foreign to him, and that made him angry, bitter, and frustrated beyond all good sense.

Angered past the ability to make a rational decision, Geraldo allowed his fist to swing down, intending to, if nothing else, get in one good blow before Kael could think to block and retaliate.

Kael saw it coming, and backed her head out of the way, allowing Geraldo’s arm to move past her before using the opening his wild swing left to lift her own arms and, fingers extended, jab at the pulse-points in his neck.

Geraldo collapsed to his knees as the fight left his body.

Kael squatted down in front of her dark lover, sneering. “I’ve just cut off the flow of blood to that thing you call a brain. Any last requests?”

The Latin felt a warm trickle as a thin stream of blood left one nostril to pool at his upper lip. “Please,” he gasped.

“Please what?”

He gasped, choking on the blood seeping into his mouth.

“Speak up, Geraldo. Can’t hear you when you mumble, ya know.”

“Please,” he whispered again. “Don’t … .”

“Don’t what? Don’t defend myself when you go after me like a rabid dog? Don’t demand my right to have anyone in this house that I please? What? Help me out here.” She grinned darkly. “And I’d suggest you do it quickly. Your time’s just about up.”

“Don’t …kill me … .”

“Don’t kill ya, huh? Well, that might be arranged.” She cocked her head, smiling coyly. “What’s in it for me? I like to know what my options are before making a decision of such magnitude, ya know.”

“Anything!!”

Lashing out, Kael reversed the nerve block, her teeth bared in an obscene parody of a genuine smile. “See? I knew there was a reason I kept ya around.”

She grabbed him by the lapels of his dark suit and pulled him to his feet, reaching out and snatching the pristine white handkerchief from his breast pocket as she did so. She put the handkerchief up against his nose, then reached down and grabbed his hand, replacing it on the bloody square of cloth. “Keep the pressure on for a minute or two. We’ll talk about the terms of your surrender later.” Brushing his jacket of imaginary lint, she turned and headed back toward the front door and her date with the intriguing stranger waiting just outside.

Opening the door, Kael leaned casually against the doorjamb, crossing her arms, and legs at the ankles. “You’re still here.”

“As promised,” the woman replied, inclining her head slightly.

“Please. Come in.”

Smiling seductively, the stranger oozed her long body past Kael, trailing a finger across the other woman’s abdomen as she did so.

Breathing deep and grinning to herself, Kael pushed herself off the jamb and followed her guest inside, closing the door softly behind her. “Make yourself comfortable,” she said, one long arm gesturing to the over-stuffed chairs occupying the huge living room. “Would you like something to drink?”

The woman’s grin deepened into a frank leer. “What are you offering?” she purred.

Kael’s eyebrow rose to hide beneath her bangs. “Cocktails. For now.”

The stranger matched her expression. “Then I’ll pass. For now.”

The American poured herself a scotch, neat, and swirled the liquid around in the crystal glass absently before taking a sip and feeling the pleasant burn of the alcohol as it washed down her throat. Walking across the room, she gracefully lowered herself onto the couch next to the other woman and took another sip. “Kael. Androstos,” she said finally, drinking in the woman’s beauty.

“I know. A powerful name for a powerful woman.”

Kael waited in silence.

“My name is Ianna.”

“Very beautiful.”

“Thank you.”

“I hear you’re a practitioner of Santeria.”

Ianna’s smile broadened. “Oh yes. Such wonderful power in the religion.”

Kael smirked. “Power, huh? Seems to me that you’ve got to be a bit of a charlatan to make people believe they’re invisible. And invincible.”

“No more so than having people believe that you can shatter a bottle with the strength of your mind.” There was a mad, knowing sparkle in Ianna’s dark eyes.

Kael jumped from her chair, her teeth bared. “How do you know … .”

“About your …mentor …Lao Ma?” Ianna asked, unperturbed. “Do you really think she is—or was—the only person on the planet with the power to see into the hearts of others?”

“Don’t you ever speak her name to me again,” Kael growled, grabbing Ianna by the neck and squeezing off her air.

The other woman seemed totally unaffected by the violent display. “And why not? The woman is dead, Kael. But her power, that incredible, wonderful, delicious power, lives on in you. It’s just a matter of using it the right way.” Incredibly, the strangling woman curved her hand around Kael’s taut waist, pulling her dark captor ever closer. “Tap into the darkness in your soul, Kael. Tap into the blackness that fuels your dreams. Feed on it like a starving man at a banquet. Use that anger and hatred that lays claim to you. Use it and feel your true power.”

Ianna’s words were hypnotic, their lulling tone calling to the beast coiled within Kael; summoning it out to play. Her eyes darkened to a deep indigo as a feral smile spread wide her full lips, her teeth gleaming in the firelit shadows. Her hand still wrapped, white knuckled, around Ianna’s neck, she brought her head down and kissed the woman with crushing force, drawing blood with the first blow.

Ianna growled deep in her throat. Kael matched it, shifting her hand from the other woman’s neck to her jaw and prying her mouth open. Her tongue entered strongly, harshly conquering unmapped territory as her other hand went downward, kneading Ianna’s firm breast through the soft cotton of her T-shirt.

With a final bite to kiss-swollen lips, Kael pulled away and downed the last of her scotch in one gulp, leaving Ianna panting and slightly dazed. “That powerful enough for ya?” she asked, wiping her mouth with the back of her hand.

Ianna swallowed hard, slowly regaining her equilibrium after the devastating attack on her senses. “Oh yes. It was perfect.”

“Good. Then get out.”

Smiling, Ianna slowly came to her feet, reaching into the back pocket of her jeans and retrieving a business card. “I’m sure we’ll be seeing one another again,” she said, laying the card face down on the glass table fronting the couch. “Soon.”

“Don’t count on it.”

“Oh, but I am. Our darkness draws us to one another, Kael. Alone, we’re formidable. Together … together, we’ll be destroyers.”

Fingers of a long, elegant hand flicked, a casting off. “Whatever,” came the dark voice. “Just get out of here. Now.”

“Very well,” Ianna purred, smiling as she crossed the floor. “Until we meet again.” The smirk still on her lips, she opened the door and slipped from the home.

DESERT STORM

Part 11

by: SwordnQuill

SwordnQuil@aol.com

Disclaimers: The characters of Xena, Gabrielle, Lao Ma, Alti, Borias, and everyone else who sounds familiar belong to Pac Ren and Universal Studios. I am not making money off of this story.

Genre Disclaimer: Ok. Bear with me, please, because this is kinda tough to explain. Sometime last year, I read a story on the internet that moved me so much, I was inspired to write a sort of companion piece to it. That story was “Lost Soul Walking” by DJWP. In her words, “This is NOT UberXena fiction. It just starts out like it is.” The same can be said for this piece. While not directly related to “Lost Soul Walking”, “Desert Storm” can be considered a sort of prequel to it. It is a story, if you will, about the lifetime before the one depicted in that fabulous, outstanding story. (Can you tell I loved it?) In addition, this is somewhat of an ambitious piece of fiction, in that I am attempting (don’t know if I’ve succeeded, but I’ve attempted) to take the entire X:WP universe and modernize it. We start, in updated terms, with my version of Xena’s betrayal by Caesar (seen in “Destiny”), and continue up through the X:WP episode known as “Remember Nothing”. The plot will be very recognizable to you. It’s meant to be that way.

Special note: Because of this, Gabrielle does not appear, except in offhand mention, in a great deal of the first half of this story. Do not look for her, because you won’t find her. After all, she was not a part of ‘evil Xena’s’ life. If she were, things might have turned out differently, but because this is based on the premise of “Lost Soul Walking” it cannot happen differently. Gabrielle will, however, make her presence known, and that quite strongly, in the second half of the story. If you can hang on till then, I believe that you will not be disappointed.

Sexuality and Violence Disclaimers: We’re dealing with an updated dark Xena through much of the first half, and an updated redeemed Xena through the second. There’s gonna be violence. There are gonna be naughty words. There are also descriptions of sexual activity in this work. There are allusions to heterosexual sex, but nothing graphic. There are some graphic (though I hope tasteful) scenes of sexual expression between women as well. That is how I see the relationship between Xena and Gabrielle, and that is how I will continue to write it.

And, finally, thanks: To, as always, the incomparable Mike. A better beta and a better friend one could never hope for. Thank you also, as always, to Mary D, who rescued this story from the refuse heap and begged me to keep going on it. If you hate it, blame her. <w> Grateful and heartfelt appreciation goes out to DJWP, for continuing to write stories that grab me somewhere above the liver and giving her kind permission to mention her story in these disclaimers. If you haven’t read her stories, please, do yourself a favor and do so. Finally, this story is dedicated to a group of people without whom I would most probably be living on the streets. Elizabeth, Rachel, Sulli, and the rest of the “Get Sue to Atlanta” crew, this one’s for you!

Feedback: As always is gratefully appreciated. If you wrote to me regarding “Redemption” during the month of September to early October and I haven’t responded, please allow me the honor of apologizing in public. It was then that I was at my lowest point and making ready to move to my new home. Your words of praise and encouragement for my writing kept me firmly out of the pit of depression I was falling into and I shall be forever grateful to each and every one of you who took the time out to feed this bard. And for those of you patiently (or not so patiently) waiting for Redemption’s sequel, fear not, for with the conclusion of this piece, that piece will be started. Any and all who wish to may write me at SwordnQuil@aol.com . I’ll continue to do my best to answer each and every email. An exploding mailbox is a good thing to have. Thanks again!

DESERT STORM

by: Sword’n’Quill (Susanne Beck)

21 January 1992 Rodriguez Compound Medellin, Colombia

What the winter holidays lacked gaiety, they more than made up for in brutality. Back from Indonesia, Geraldo walked in on a Kael that seemed but one step away from utter madness. This time, alcohol had become her drug of choice, and empty bottles littered the house. The staff had long since abandoned the crazed woman, too frightened to set foot in the huge house without Geraldo there to act as somewhat of a buffer.

Following the trail of discarded clothes and empty bottles, Geraldo had walked up to the master bedroom, where his senses were almost overwhelmed with the scent of alcohol and stale sweat. Kael sat before the fireplace, guzzling yet another bottle of liquor, rocking back and forth as she did so.

She had been totally unkempt, this shadow of his lover, her hair greasy and matted, her clothes stained and wrinkled, as if she’d slept in them for many nights running.

Dead drunk she might have been, but Geraldo had to perform an almost balletic move to evade the bottle thrown at his head with deadly accuracy. “Leave me the fuck alone,” she had snarled.

Jetlagged from the trip and heart-sore from the vision before him, Geraldo did what he did best, these days. He capitulated. Again.

*******

Kael stood in the middle of her room—and it was her room now, Geraldo having taken up residence in another of the bedrooms after his return from his Indonesia trip—half drunk, yet clean, staring down at an empty liquor bottle sitting somewhere near the middle of the teak cocktail table near the fireplace.

Rubbing her hands together, she took in a deep breath and let it out, then rolled her head around, cracking the vertebrae and relieving some of the stress in her neck. “C’mon, Kael,” she whispered, her breathed words unheard above the crackle and hiss of the fire as it burned, “you can do this. You’re an empty vessel, remember? An empty vessel.”

Clearing her drunken thoughts was a process doomed from the start, but Kael was nothing if not mule-stubborn. She tried to fill her mind with the image of the kiss she and Lao Ma had shared in that long ago time, but Ianna’s face and form seemed to always interfere, despite Kael’s best efforts to erase the dark witch from her thoughts.

She opened her eyes, but the damned bottle refused to budge from its spot on the table.

She tried harder.

And harder.

But it was useless.

Her face screwing up in a predator’s snarl, she lashed out with her foot, sending the glass bottle to shatter against the stone of the fireplace, the shards glittering like misplaced diamonds as they landed on the hearthrug.

“God damned mother-fucking son of a goddamn bitch!” The table was the next to fall, splintered into kindling by a well placed kick.

More bottles flew, smashing against the floor and walls, testifying to Kael’s rage with musical tinkles of shattering glass. “Lao Ma! How could you leave me?!? How could you do this to me?”

The mattress and bedding weren’t spared their own share of their owner’s anger, nor were the works of priceless, and not so priceless, art that adorned the walls of the large room.

Spitting obscenities and saliva in equal measures, Kael became a whirlwind of destruction, using her fists, head and feet to punch plate-sized holes through the room’s drywall. Plaster dust settled over the floor and destroyed furniture in drifts like a cocaine addict’s greatest fantasy come to life in white powder.

From his place in the study a floor below, Geraldo heard the tantrum from its inception. As they had become more and more frequent in the passing weeks, he ignored the noises from above as best he could until the sounds of breaking walls caused him to jump up from his chair and bolt from the room, his feet pounding into the thick carpeting as he navigated the stairs, four at a time.

What he saw, this scene from a poorly-made horror flick, wasn’t human. Kael’s clear blue eyes were dead as a corpse’s, lacking even the spark of rage that her body held as its very own.

Swallowing back his fright, he launched himself into the fray, sending up a quick prayer to the Blessed Virgin as he did so.

Kael heard him enter and stopped her deconstruction of the walls. She turned, her long fingers hooked into eagle’s talons and flexing …flexing …waiting to sink into his flesh and feast on it in an orgy of blood and death. Her face was a grinning death’s head mask, full lips pulled back from gleaming teeth in a wordless snarl, gums glistening and pink against the whiteness of her canines. “C’mere, little puppy,” she taunted, seeming not even to recognize him. “Let’s play.”

“Stop this, Kael. Now.”

Cocking her head to the side, Kael allowed her lips to curl into an exaggerated pout. “What’s the matter, Geraldo? Don’t wanna play with me anymore? You used to love to play with me. Remember?” Her hands relaxed, then came up, caressing her own breasts, pulling at her nipples and jutting out her hips in wanton seduction.

“Enough! Damn it, Kael, that’s enough!”

“Can’t get it up anymore, little man? Pity.”

“Stop it! You need help, Kael. And you’re going to get it. Starting now. I’ve been much too lax with you, but that ends here. I’ll give you a choice. You can come with me willingly, or I’ll drag you to a hospital myself.”

Kael sneered, dropping her hands from her breasts. “I don’t like either of your choices, Geraldo. Pick another,” she purred, beginning to stalk him. “One we’ll both enjoy.”

Geraldo retreated with each step Kael advanced, until his back his hit a desiccated wall. “No. I won’t fall into your trap anymore. I love you and I’m going to do right by you. You need help and I’m going to make sure you get it, willingly or not.”

“A eunuch can’t grow back his balls, my dear. You lost yours the day I met ya.”

Seeing his chance, he lunged at her. Kael twisted away at the last second, retreating back toward the center of the room, grinning wildly. “Ohhhh, so you do wanna play. I like this game.”

Geraldo made another attempt, but Kael dodged his advance, giggling in a high-pitched, almost girlish voice.

“Come and get me, little man.”

In an attempt filled with desperation, Geraldo managed to snare one of Kael’s thick wrists, a stroke of blind luck allowing him to twist it up behind her back, disabling her temporarily. Kael shrieked like a trapped cat, hissing and twisting as she tried to buck him away.

“Listen to me, Kael,” he said soothingly, his lips brushing against the softness of her ear, “you don’t have to live like this. Whatever’s going on can be fixed. Let me help you. I love you. Let me help you.”

Trapped within his strong grasp, Kael allowed her body to relax slightly, lulling him, making him believe she was actually listening to his pathetic drivel. When she felt his hold loosen minutely, she quickly reached out toward the remains of the couch, snagging one of the few unbroken whiskey bottles and shattering it on the chair’s arm, holding the jagged remainder by the neck.

Before Geraldo could even think to react, she brought the bottle to her side, slicing the arm that held her.

Hissing in pain, Geraldo drew away, clasping the bleeding wound, his eyes shooting daggers at the now-free woman. “You don’t want to do this, Kael. Give me the bottle.”

“Like hell I will,” she replied, slashing at the air just inches from his face. His hands flew up to protect the delicate skin as he backed away quickly. “You just made a very big mistake, Geraldo. A very big mistake.”

Fear curling deep in the pit of his belly, Geraldo fought to keep his breathing under control as his wide eyes followed Kael’s every movement. Her twisting, slashing form was hypnotic as a cobra’s and he prepared himself for her deadly strike. “Put the bottle down, Kael,” he tried again. “Let’s talk about this.”

“The time for talking’s over, little man. It’s been over for quite awhile now. Now’s the time for action.”

With blinding speed, the cobra struck.

Geraldo screamed as he felt the jagged glass plow a furrow into his cheek, narrowly missing his eye and continuing down until his jaw shunted the weapon away from his face. Blood sheeted from the gaping wound, covering both man and woman as Geraldo’s hands instinctively went up to clamp down on the tear in his face.

Kael grinned in satisfaction, but managed to quell the almost overwhelming impulse she had to stick the shattered bottle into his unprotected middle and twist until she could feel his spine stop her forward momentum.

Most of her wanted to just finish the job, but the tiny part that still held the last tattered shreds of her sanity was the stronger of the two, and so Kael pulled away, turning and stalking from the room, the remains of the bottle still clamped in one blood-slick hand.

She strode down the stairs and into the kitchen, leaving a trail of gore to mark her passage through the house. The maid, only recently talked into resuming her duties—albeit with a significant financial incentive thrown in to sweeten the pot—took one look at the blood-covered, armed and half crazy Mistress of the house, screamed, and promptly fainted onto the cool terracotta tiles of the kitchen floor.

Her blue eyes wild, Kael laughed at the sight and threw her makeshift weapon down on the floor, the remaining glass shattering and providing a grizzly halo to the downed woman as it sparkled across the tiles around her fallen head.

Walking out of the front door, she cut left and stalked over to the huge garage housing their myriad of vehicles slipping quietly inside its cool, darkened confines. Closing the door behind her, she leaned against one wall for a moment, allowing her heartrate to slow as she inhaled a mixture of motor oil and car wax. The scents helped soothe her. A little.

Sighing, she pushed away from the wall, somewhat irked by the blood that was slowly drying to a sticky crust on her bare arms. Walking over to one of the recessed cabinets, she quickly tapped in the security code, opened the door and pulled out a set of keys.

Then she padded over to the sleek, shiny little speed demon with an engine bigger than the interior, and slipped inside the leathered comfort, cranking up the engine in a satisfying howl of horses and filling the garage with the stink of smoking tires as she backed out of the open garage.

Shoving the car into gear, she executed a precise one-hundred-eighty-degree turn and headed toward the barred gate of the compound, baring her teeth at the frightened looks the heavily armed guards were throwing her way.

Trying to hold his face together, Geraldo ran out into the yard, followed closely behind by the now recovered and screaming housekeeper who was waving a blood-stained towel in her hand and running as quickly as her thick legs could carry her.

“Open the gates!” the drug lord screamed at his guards, well knowing that Kael would simply ram them down if given half a chance. “Then someone follow her! Don’t let lose her or I’ll have your heads! Do you understand me?!?”

Something, either the sight of their gore-covered boss screaming obscenities at them, or the sight of a shiny black demon-car bearing down on them, made the guards’ decisions for them and one ran to open the gate while the other jumped into the Range Rover parked by the guard-shack just outside the fence.

Kael shot out through the ever widening gap in the fence, more than a bit disappointed that she didn’t get the chance to ram the damn gate down, even more so with the fact that in her hurry she’d managed to miss the little pissant who was cranking the damn thing open while looking at her through white eyes half the size of dinner plates.

She jarred the wheel sharply to the left and the car took the turn on two wheels, shooting onto the street and missing a broadside collision with an oncoming bread truck by the width of a hair. The bread truck then did what Kael wished she could have done, taking out both gate and guard in one fell swoop of screeching brakes, squealing metal, and screaming human. The Range Rover finished the job, plowing headlong into the bread truck and smashing the guard flat against the gate post.

The screams mercifully stopped.

Cackling in triumph, Kael downshifted and sped out toward the milling city, a gore-coated specter whose sanity, what there was of it, cowered in a corner of her dark and empty soul.

*******

Forty five minutes later, she found herself on the very outskirts of Medellin, driving along a twisting road she’d never been on before, having no idea how she’d gotten there, and gripping the twisted remains of a blood-sodden business card tightly in one hand.

Too puzzled over her apparent blackout to be frightened, she pulled off to the side of the empty road and looked down at the card again, trying to decipher the fine script through the coating of damp blood obscuring it.

Ianna Velasquez de la Cruz

Seer

The address was a bit harder to read, but by placing it within the map she carried inside her head, Kael figured she was pretty close to the ‘seer’s’ home, even though she honestly couldn’t remember having made the conscious decision to drive out that way.

“Alright, witch,” she whispered. “Time to find out what’s going on here.”

She eased the car back onto the street, the sound of her tires crunching over gravel the only thing that could be heard this far out into the country. A short while later, a white, adobe-style house loomed over the cresting hill, sitting on land that was almost entirely barren; a definite rarity for an area where jungle was a fact of life. A smaller building, also white, sat off to one side, its doors and windows tightly shuttered against the strong sunlight. Unlike the house, which seemed, from the road at least, more open and airy, the lone outbuilding had a vaguely menacing air around it, as if, by its closed-tight look, it promised dark secrets hidden within.

As Kael drove closer, she noted that there wasn’t a number on, or near, the house, but since there weren’t any other habitable buildings anywhere else along the road for as far as the eye could see, the dwelling must have been the right one.

Pulling up into the semi-circular driveway, she turned off the ignition and sat in the car for a moment, listening to the tick of the slowly cooling engine and thinking. On her wild drive to nowhere, her anger leaked out of her slowly, leaving her empty once more. She was well aware how deep of a pit of depression she was in.

She was empty.

Completely and without purpose.

Emptier even than when she had first set foot in Colombia, the only reason for her existence being to live until the next fix could end the screaming pain of her shattered legs.

She didn’t even have that pain to spark her anymore.

Instead, she felt …numb.

Anger and hatred seemed the only things capable of filling her enough to erase the swaddled-cotton feelings she experienced each and every day since Lao Ma’s death. Utter rage was the only thing that got her out of the bed in the mornings.

She knew she was falling. Knew it in the marrow of her bones. So she tried. Oh yes, she tried. Tried again to be that vessel for purity that Lao Ma had so wished for her. Tried to picture in her mind that one perfect moment when anything seemed possible.

And failed. Miserably.

Well, if darkness was what it took to get her living again, she could handle that. Relish it, even. It seemed all she was destined for anyway.

Why not have fun with it?

And she had the feeling that this ‘seer’ could be very fun, indeed.

Feeling a little better about life in general, Kael pushed open the door and slipped her long frame out of the cramped car, raising to her full height gracefully, stretching out her muscles as she did so, and frowning, once again, at the caked blood liberally coating her flesh. “Motherfucker bleeds like the stuck pig he is,” she muttered, scratching flakes of blood off her arm.

The closing of her car door seemed deliberately timed to coincide with the opening of another. Dressed in dark jeans and a bright green shirt, her hair hanging loose and blowing in the slight breeze, a smile firmly affixed to her beautiful face, Ianna seemed the very picture of peace and clean living.

That and a good, healthy dose of primal, blatant sensuality thrown in for good measure.

“Welcome,” Ianna purred, leaning against the doorjamb in an exact imitation of Kael’s casually seductive pose when they had first met. “I knew we’d see one another again.”

“Yeah. You’re a real fortune teller, alright.”

Ianna’s smile broadened. “It pays the bills. Won’t you come inside?”

Instead of answering, Kael brushed past the standing figure and walked down the dimly lit hallway toward what she sensed was a large open room, lured on by the sight of candlelight as it flickered off one wall in the near distance.

The hallway opened out and Kael stepped into the room, then stopped, stunned at the sight before her.

The room was filled with candles. Seemingly hundreds of them littered every flat surface within, their flames dancing merrily and casting eerie shadows on walls and objects stuffed into the largish space. Taking up most of the remaining space were garishly dressed and painted life-sized plaster representations of what Kael, a Catholic girl back when religion actually meant something to her—as in when she was five and her parents, both long dead, forced her into a Church kicking and screaming—recognized to be saints. She looked, over her shoulder, at Ianna, who had followed her into the room. A perfectly arched eyebrow raised over one impossibly blue eye in question.

“As I said, it pays the bills,” Ianna said unapologetically. “The locals like a bang for their buck and I, of course, am happy to provide it for them. I am, after all, a Santeria priestess.” Her smile was mocking.

The connection clicked home. “Santeria. Saints.”

Ianna grinned. “Beauty and brains. An intoxicating package.”

“Yeah. Whatever.” Kael looked around. “You really believe in all this mumbo-jumbo? I took you more for a woman of …substance.”

The other woman laughed, somehow a harsh and grating sound, like two sandstone blocks rubbing against one another. “The spirit world has more substance than you could ever imagine. This is just my parlor. My pretty trappings, if you will. There are other, much more glorious things to be seen here. For those with the courage to look.” Her glance was a challenging one.

Kael snorted. “Like your ‘friends’ in the Villa family?”

“Ahh, you heard about them, did you?”

“Enough.”

“One of my proudest achievements.”

“If you consider that an achievement, I don’t think I’d like to see any of your failures.”

Ianna tilted her head coyly. “That’s just because you don’t know the whole story. It was a wonderful success.”

“Ya don’t say.”

“Oh, but I do. I most definitely do. You see, if they had only listened to me, did what I told them to do, they’d have been alive right now.”

“I was under the impression that listening to you was what got them murdered in their beds.”

Ianna laughed again. “Who do you think set that up in the first place?”

Kael bit back a smirk, cocking her eyebrow at the other woman.

“I’d be happy to share the whole tale with you, but first, why don’t why don’t we slip you into something a little more …comfortable.”

The raven eyebrow rose higher.

“Fetching as the blood-stained look is on you, my dear, I don’t want to have to spend the rest of the day washing it out of the furniture. We’re about the same size. I’m sure I have something to compliment that marvelous body of yours.”

*******

A half hour later, Kael was stepping out of the shower and feeling, physically at least, totally clean for the first time in what seemed to be months. Her long, lean body dripping, she reached out for a towel, only to open her eyes to find it dangling from one of Ianna’s fingers, a devious, totally wanton smile playing on the other woman’s full lips. “Looking for something?” she purred.

Shooting Ianna a withering glance, Kael snatched the towel and began drying herself off, putting a subtle play of eroticism in the act just for fun. As she put one leg up on the commode to begin drying the long, tanned expanse of skin, she saw the other woman, eyes glued to the sight, unconsciously lick her lips. Kael smirked and took her time, giving her audience a view she wouldn’t soon forget.

“If I ever had an ounce of doubt in my mind as to why that little bastard who calls himself a drug lord rolls belly up for you like a horse-whipped puppy, you’ve erased it quite nicely,” Ianna said, her normally husky voice even more burred as she struggled against the urges Kael engendered in her body.

After having dried off every square centimeter of flesh on her body, Kael straightened to her full height and simply stared at Ianna, a half grin teasing at the corners of her mouth. “Are you just gonna stand there staring at me all day, or are clothes an option?”

“Decisions, decisions,” Ianna returned, grinning wickedly. “Though I suppose clothing would make our little chat a bit less …distracting.”

“Then just give me the damn things and let’s get on with this already.”

Ianna laughed, but handed over the clothing and left the room, not bothering to close the door behind her.

Ten minutes later, as Kael walked into the living area clad in Ianna’s tight maroon tanktop—sans bra—and faded denim jeans, her hair still wet from the shower and clinging lovingly to her broad, tanned shoulders, Ianna realized she was wrong.

Clothed or not, the woman was distracting as hell.

Part 12

by: SwordnQuill

Disclaimers: The characters of Xena, Gabrielle, Lao Ma, Alti, Borias, and everyone else who sounds familiar belong to Pac Ren and Universal Studios. I am not making money off of this story.

Genre Disclaimer: Ok. Bear with me, please, because this is kinda tough to explain. Sometime last year, I read a story on the internet that moved me so much, I was inspired to write a sort of companion piece to it. That story was “Lost Soul Walking” by DJWP. In her words, “This is NOT UberXena fiction. It just starts out like it is.” The same can be said for this piece. While not directly related to “Lost Soul Walking”, “Desert Storm” can be considered a sort of prequel to it. It is a story, if you will, about the lifetime before the one depicted in that fabulous, outstanding story. (Can you tell I loved it?) In addition, this is somewhat of an ambitious piece of fiction, in that I am attempting (don’t know if I’ve succeeded, but I’ve attempted) to take the entire X:WP universe and modernize it. We start, in updated terms, with my version of Xena’s betrayal by Caesar (seen in “Destiny”), and continue up through the X:WP episode known as “Remember Nothing”. The plot will be very recognizable to you. It’s meant to be that way.

Special note: Because of this, Gabrielle does not appear, except in offhand mention, in a great deal of the first half of this story. Do not look for her, because you won’t find her. After all, she was not a part of ‘evil Xena’s’ life. If she were, things might have turned out differently, but because this is based on the premise of “Lost Soul Walking” it cannot happen differently. Gabrielle will, however, make her presence known, and that quite strongly, in the second half of the story. If you can hang on till then, I believe that you will not be disappointed.

Sexuality and Violence Disclaimers: We’re dealing with an updated dark Xena through much of the first half, and an updated redeemed Xena through the second. There’s gonna be violence. There are gonna be naughty words. There are also descriptions of sexual activity in this work. There are allusions to heterosexual sex, but nothing graphic. There are some graphic (though I hope tasteful) scenes of sexual expression between women as well. That is how I see the relationship between Xena and Gabrielle, and that is how I will continue to write it.

And, finally, thanks: To, as always, the incomparable Mike. A better beta and a better friend one could never hope for. Thank you also, as always, to Mary D, who rescued this story from the refuse heap and begged me to keep going on it. If you hate it, blame her. <w> Grateful and heartfelt appreciation goes out to DJWP, for continuing to write stories that grab me somewhere above the liver and giving her kind permission to mention her story in these disclaimers. If you haven’t read her stories, please, do yourself a favor and do so. Finally, this story is dedicated to a group of people without whom I would most probably be living on the streets. Elizabeth, Rachel, Sulli, and the rest of the “Get Sue to Atlanta” crew, this one’s for you!

Last disclaimer: Hi all! Well, after a year or so, I’m baaaaack. <weg> I can’t promise any swift or timely updates on this piece because it’s still the bitch of a lifetime to write, but I am dedicated to getting it done, so just hang in there with me, ok? To all of you who have written asking when it would be continued, thank you, and here’s your answer!

Feedback: As always is gratefully appreciated. Swordnquil@aol.com

DESERT STORM

by: Sword’n’Quill (Susanne Beck)

A half hour later, Kael was stepping out of the shower and feeling, physically at least, totally clean for the first time in what seemed to be months. Her long, lean body dripping, she reached out for a towel, only to open her eyes to find it dangling from one of Ianna’s fingers, a devious, totally wanton smile playing on the other woman’s full lips. “Looking for something?” she purred.

Shooting Ianna a withering glance, Kael snatched the towel and began drying herself off, putting a subtle play of eroticism in the act just for fun. As she put one leg up on the commode to begin drying the long, tanned expanse of skin, she saw the other woman, eyes glued to the sight, unconsciously lick her lips. Kael smirked and took her time, giving her audience a view she wouldn’t soon forget.

“If I ever had an ounce of doubt in my mind as to why that little bastard who calls himself a drug lord rolls belly up for you like a horse-whipped puppy, you’ve erased it quite nicely,” Ianna said, her normally husky voice even more burred as she struggled against the urges Kael engendered in her body.

After having dried off every square centimeter of flesh on her body, Kael straightened to her full height and simply stared at Ianna, a half grin teasing at the corners of her mouth. “Are you just gonna stand there staring at me all day, or are clothes an option?”

“Decisions, decisions,” Ianna returned, grinning wickedly. “Though I suppose clothing would make our little chat a bit less …distracting.”

“Then just give me the damn things and let’s get on with this already.”

Ianna laughed, but handed over the clothing and left the room, not bothering to close the door behind her.

Ten minutes later, as Kael walked into the living area clad in Ianna’s tight maroon tanktop—sans bra—and faded denim jeans, Ianna realized she was wrong.

Clothed or not, the woman was distracting as hell. “Very nice.”

Kael threw a smirk Ianna’s way as she ran a hand through her still-wet hair, then lowered her rangy frame onto one of the couches, crossing one long leg beneath her, her arms thrown casually over the seat’s plush back. “You wanted to talk. So talk.”

“Straight and to the point. I like that.” Ianna smiled. “Have you ever been to an American movie studio lot?”

Unsure where the conversation was leading, Kael kept her response to a brief nod.

“Good. Then you’ll understand me when I say that I think of all of this,” she gestured around the garishly decorated room, “as false front.”

“With you in the lead role.”

Ianna smirked. “Perhaps. But I play my part very well. My mother was a Santeria priestess, as was hers before her.”

“Insanity runs in the family, does it?” Kael replied, returning the smirk measure for measure.

“Touché. Priests, whores, witches and actors, all thought insane at some point or other in history. I’m in good company, wouldn’t you agree?”

“If that’s what you like to call it … .”

Throwing her head back against the couch, Ianna laughed, her voice low and liquid, a single malt scotch that smoothed and burned as it went down. “I do so enjoy you, Kael.” Righting her head, she gazed at the American with frank appraisal. “And I hope that I shall enjoy a great deal more of you as time goes on.”

Kael smiled dangerously. “I suppose that depends on you.”

“It does indeed.” She rose gracefully to her feet, coming the hair back from her forehead as she did so. “Please, come with me. I think you’ll find the next part of our tour very interesting.”

*****

Exiting the house through a rear door accessed through the small kitchen, Ianna led her guest along the barren grounds to the small shed which Kael had first noticed when coming upon Ianna’s house. Reaching into her pocket, Ianna removed a key which she placed in the large padlock which secured the shed’s solid door.

Slipping the lock free from the hasp, she opened the door.

Kael resisted the almost overwhelming urge to take a step back as the stench of rotting flesh assaulted her sinuses. Well used to the sickly sweet odor of decaying flesh, her stomach remained steady, but even though she was used to it, it wasn’t a preferred perfume. “Sublime bouquet,” she replied to an avidly watching Ianna. “Chateau de’ Corpse, ’89?”

Offering up a quiet chuckle, Ianna stepped inside and hit a switch next to the door. Dim overhead lighting illuminated the interior of the small building, revealing an oiled dirt floor, four garishly painted walls, and a large iron cauldron sitting in the very center, gleaming malevolently. The rest of the space was completely barren.

Though the outside air was scorching, the interior air was cold enough to raise gooseflesh on Kael’s bronzed skin. Her breath emerged as wisps of fog which quickly dissipated as they rose to the ceiling.

The chill wasn’t manufactured by some cleverly hidden air conditioning units. She could tell that without looking. Rather, it had the feel of an empty grave; a dark and rotting thing that touched upon her own darkness and pulled it effortlessly forward. She wasn’t even aware of the feral smile which slowly parted her lips, though her watcher most definitely was, and brought forth a smile of her own as Kael walked, almost trance-like, toward the center of the room.

Reaching the cauldron, Kael stopped and looked down. Inside was a dark, gelatinous mass which fairly radiated an overpowering stench, a chill that threatened to freeze her skin to her bones, and an overwhelming sense of power, hatred and fear.

“What is this?” she murmured, barely aware that she had even spoken aloud.

“The heart of darkness itself,” the priestess purred, coming to a stop next to her guest. “Power. Hunger. Hatred. Yours for the taking.”

Kael’s gaze sharpened as she turned her head and pinned Ianna with her icy eyes. “Explain.”

Ianna laughed, a deep, throaty sound that Kael’s body responded to. Reaching up, she threaded strong fingers though the thick mass of the priestess’ hair and brought their lips together with crushing, brutal force as their bodies pressed and glided against one another roughly.

Darkness flowed strongly through the American, and she welcomed it, opening the deepest parts of her soul to its overwhelming seduction, becoming one with it. Her body jerked and writhed as passions unknown even to her exploded within, carrying her effortlessly along their dark, twisting currents.

The sounds she made were those of a rutting animal, and when her climax roared through her with a force more powerful than she’d ever known, her neck arched back and she screamed her release to the heavens, her lips and teeth stained and glistening with Ianna’s blood.

When sensibility returned once again, she found herself crouched on all fours above her willing victim, her chest heaving, her body still spasming with the power of her release.

Ianna was grinning wildly, still writhing beneath the weight of her captor. Her once pristine shirt was rent down the center, and both breasts were bleeding freely from the bites she’d received. “You’re all I have hoped for and more, Kael Androstos. Join me. Join me and I will make you invincible.”

Growling, Kael rolled off the priestess’ enchanting body and stood, straightening her rumpled clothing and dragging a hand through her sweat-drenched hair. Her eyes became shadowed and wary as she attempted to process what had just happened to her.

Ianna rose more slowly. Still smiling, she didn’t even bother to try and pull together the tatters of her clothing. She wore her bloodied nakedness like a brand. She reached out to touch Kael, but wasn’t surprised when the American jerked away, snarling. Her spell had fully unleashed the animal hiding inside the beautiful woman; an animal she knew would refuse to be tamed, and could turn on her without a second’s notice unless she was very, very careful.

Closing her eyes, she deliberately relaxed her muscles, and allowed the darkness to slip free of her, as if shedding a coat or a second skin.

“Come back into the house with me,” she said finally, in tones meant for soothing and gentling. “I’ll explain everything there.”

After a very long, dangerous moment, Kael finally nodded and led the way to the door. She left, but not without looking back at the darkness within, her eyes glittering with a light that fell just short of madness.

*******

Freshly showered and clad in a simple dress with enough buttons undone to show tantalizing glimpses of her generous cleavage with every indrawn breath, Ianna half reclined on one of her sofas, a long-stemmed glass of blood red wine resting easily in one perfectly manicured hand.

Opposite her, in a plush recliner, Kael perched, a dark and sultry energy rolling off of her in waves. Though the grip of whatever it was in the outbuilding had lessened its hold on her, she could still feel the dark passions it had engendered, and she reveled in them just as one might when under the spell of a particularly powerful drug.

Ianna smiled and chose her words with care. “There is one thing in all the world, one thing undiluted by time, which has the power to bring entire nations to their knees. It has existed since the very beginning of the world, and will go on existing, unchanged, until long after humanity ceases to be. It is the greatest force in the universe, yet only a chosen few can control it.”

“Fear.” Kael said into her glass of scotch.

The priestess’ smile grew. “Fear,” she echoed. “The ultimate power.” She swirled the wine around in her glass, then took a sip, enjoying the heady flavor as it slid smoothly down her throat. “What you felt today was just a small taste of what fear, properly controlled, can do. It can take you places you’ve never dreamed of going, and you can stay there for as long as you wish. It gives you power over the mightiest and the weakest of men.” Taking another sip of wine, she narrowed her dark, glittering eyes at the woman opposite her. “I have the ability to take fear and distill it into its most natural, most pristine state. I consume it, like a starving child consumes a crust of bread. And in consuming it, I become the face of fear itself.”

Kael snorted in derision. “All that, huh? From a few parlor tricks. You’re more insane than I thought.”

Ianna straightened, swinging her legs off the couch and to the floor, her eyes narrow and flashing. “Parlor tricks? You felt the darkness. You know it was there.”

“I felt somethin’ alright.”

The priestess felt anger, hot and bright, flare through her at the American’s taunting. Her fists clenched and her teeth ground as Kael’s bright eyes mocked her from across the room.

The realization came quickly to her that Kael was cleverly baiting a trap for her to fall into. “Very good,” she purred, releasing her anger and smiling to display a twin row of carnivore’s teeth. “Very, very good.”

Kael simply smirked and watched the ice in her scotch-rocks swirl slowly around.

Knowing she was a hairsbreadth away from losing her audience, Ianna silently

ran through a handful of scenarios before coming up with the only one that stood a chance of working. “If you’ve nothing else pressing for this evening, why not spend a night out on the town with me? A few drinks, a little fun, perhaps find a less than willing victim to terrorize? I can show you, if you like, exactly how I do what I do.”

Kael’s smirk became more pronounced as she raised her gaze from the amber fluid in her glass to the deep caramel eyes of the woman seated across from her. “And here I thought I a magician never revealed his secrets.”

Ianna returned the smirk with a sultry grin. “Given the right …incentive …a magician might be willing to share almost anything.”

The American tilted her head just slightly. “What’s in it for me?”

“Learning the secret to ultimate power isn’t good enough for you?”

Kael kept silent for a moment, taking a healthy sip of her drink and enjoying the pleasant burn as it made its way down to her belly. “No.”

The priestess could feel her anger surge again, but fought hard to keep it at bay. Explode now, and she’d loose this delicious woman forever. No questions asked. And with her would go the one chance she had to pay her family back for their betrayal of her. She had within her grasp a way to overcome that brutal humiliation which she had never lived down. And she was damned if she was going to let it go.

“What more can I offer?”

Kael smiled full out then. And to a casual onlooker, it might even have looked genuine. If they didn’t look into blue eyes which were colder than the arctic tundra. “When the time comes, you’ll know.”

It was then that Ianna realized that in trying to evade the American’s trap, she’d fallen neatly, even eagerly into it. Her awe of the woman before her rose another notch, and she bowed her dark head, gracefully conceding the round.

*******

Kael stepped out of the convertible and straightened the clingy fabric of her dress, inwardly cursing herself for allowing herself to be talked into wearing such an uncomfortable excuse for clothing. Not that she couldn’t, or wouldn’t, dress to the nines when the occasion warranted it, because she had, many times.

She was, after all, a woman who believed in using, to the fullest, every asset at her command. And she wasn’t disingenuous enough to overlook the blatant fact that her body was one of her most dangerous, and compelling, assets.

That didn’t mean, however, that she had to enjoy being packed into a dress half the size of a respectable cocktail napkin, but if it got her the results she wanted, the minor sacrifice of her comfort would be a small price to pay.

Gracefully stepping out of the driver’s side, Ianna rose to her full height and twitched the soft fabric of her spaghetti-strap dress into place. Brushing her hair back over her shoulders, she walked around the front of the car and came face to face with a vision in black. Her eyes took the full measure of the taut muscles and sumptuous curves before her, and her lips stretched into a full, awed smile.

“Mmm. That dress on you gives new meaning to the word ‘delicious’.”

Kael smirked. “Save the pick-up lines for someone who gives a shit.”

The priestess laughed. “The body of an angel and the tongue of Satan himself. You are a worthy prize.”

She felt her hand, which she’d raised in an attempt to brush off a stay piece of hair from Kael’s dress, captured in a grip strong enough to crush bone.

“I am no one’s prize,” Kael hissed through a smile dangerous enough to belong to a hunting shark.

“A figure of speech,” Ianna attempted to reassure, her voice and tone as strong as she could manage.

“Remember not to use it again in the future, witch,” the American responded, giving the hand she held one final, strong squeeze before thrusting it away from her.

Instead of answering, Ianna turned away, and rubbed the feeling back into her hand.

Kael started forward, sharp eyes missing nothing. The exterior of their destination resembled hundreds of similar mock-ups of American discotheques scattered liberally around the world, down to the bright neon sign and the long line of people waiting to be noticed. The only thing holding the crowd, beautiful and non, back was a thin velvet rope and a small, bespectacled doorman bookended by two mammoth bouncers who took scowling to an art form.

Smiling, Ianna bypassed the line, stopping before the doorman and bending down to achieve an eye-level conversation with him, showing generous cleavage as an added incentive. “May we pass?” she purred.

He froze in the act of waving her away, his eyes becoming glassy as he stared down the front of her dress.

Catching something in the periphery of his vision, the doorman turned his head slightly. His jaw dropped as he watched Kael stride toward him like a model fresh out of a magazine. The sounds his throat was making were completely unintelligible, but their meaning was crystal clear.

Ianna’s smirk turned into a grin of triumph, and she straightened to her full height, placing slim hands on her shapely hips. “I’ll take that as a ‘yes’, then?”

Still gobbling, the man reached out a less than steady hand and unlinked the velvet rope from its support post, allowing the two beautiful women to pass unhindered, to the great displeasure of most of the crowd who had been waiting for hours for just such an invitation.

Immediately upon entering the building, Kael’s ears were assaulted by the heavy bass thump of a disco tune which drilled down into the marrow of her bones and set up residence in the roots of her teeth. She followed the priestess down a short, dimly lit hallway as a gauntlet of men leered at them from along the walls. The men were dressed in nearly identical costumes, from polyester shirts opened almost to the navel, thick gold chains nestled in greater or lesser mats of chest hair, skin tight pants and matching jackets. Thick black hair was greased back in the latest “disco-pompadour” fashion, and crooked, nicotine stained teeth gleamed in the dim lighting. The stench of unwashed bodies beneath cheap cologne would have been enough to drop a team of lathered horses in their tracks.

The American came to an abrupt stop as she felt the rude caress of a hand up the back of her leg. Quicker than thought, she turned, grabbed the offending hand out of thin air, and bent the man’s wrist and fingers back, forcing him to his knees, gasping in pain. Her eyes were glittering diamonds; her smile cruel and cold.

The rest of the men shuffled in embarrassment at the ease with which their compatriot was taken down. The overblown machismo faded from their puffed up bodies like water through a sieve.

“Touch me again, boys,” she purred, voice low and soft and full of menace, “and you die.”

The threat was reinforced by the audible popping of bones as Kael drove the man’s wrist past its breaking point.

The man’s howl of pain was drowned out by the blaring music, but the American knew her point had been well made.

With a final smile, she pushed the panting man back away from her, then turned and started forward again, collecting the staring Ianna with a curt, yet somehow regal, nod.

The narrow hall opened out into a huge, multi-layered room. Directly in front of the two women, though against the opposite wall, was a very tall platform, atop which the DJ looked out like a ruler surveying his kingdom. Below him was the dance floor; a huge rectangular number lifted straight out of Saturday Night Fever, lighted floor tiles and all. The obligatory mirrored disco ball hung down from the high ceiling, reflecting the dancers below in hundreds of split-screen images.

Ignoring the insipid, crushing press of sweaty bodies, Kael made her way to the bar, which was on the third level of the discotheque. “Scotch. Neat.”

As the bartender nodded and bustled away to fix her drink, the American surveyed the rest of the bar. The top was mirrored, and reflected both the glasses hanging above, and the beams of light which shot through the disco in time to the beat of the music.

There were courtesy bowls every two feet or so, only instead of being filled with the usual pub fare of chips and pretzels, these bowls were filled with pills of every description and color of the rainbow. As she watched, hands dug into the myriad of pills like grandma’s Easter candy dish. Uppers and downers in dangerous mixes were all washed down with healthy swigs of alcohol.

Further down the bar, she saw lines of cocaine being cut and snorted through rolled bills or tiny silver spoons.

Nearby, the sweet smell of opium perfumed the air, and in an out of the way corner, a junkie was shooting heroin into an arm vein as her friends urged her on and laughed as she nodded off before she could undo the rigging.

“Oh, very nice,” Ianna murmured as she finally squeezed in beside Kael. After ordering her own drink, she handed Kael’s scotch to her, then turned and surveyed the crowd. “Very nice indeed.”

“What are we looking for?” Kael asked, sipping her drink.

“We’ll know him when we see him.” At the American’s questioning look, she continued. “Women’s fears are much closer to the surface. Easier to bring out. They’re good for a quick fix, as it were. But men … their fears are buried deep, hard to dig up. But the reward is well worth the effort.” Receiving her wine, she smiled and toasted her partner. “Besides, what is it you Americans say? Good things come to those who wait?”

Kael smiled into her drink. “Indeed.”

*******

“There he is,” Kael said softly, with surety, her eyes narrowed and pinned to the dance floor.

Ianna leaned closer, melding her body to the American’s delicious form and following her line of sight. A smile, dark, predatory, and extremely sensual, curved her full lips. “Oh yes,” she whispered, lips just touching the perfect shell of Kael’s ear. “Perfect.”

The man was tall, with a broad-shouldered, lean-hipped look that Kael favored in both men and women. With the expensive cut of his suit, so out of place here among the unwashed masses, and the thick, ebony fall of his hair tied back into a tight ponytail, Kael almost mistook him for Geraldo.

Until he turned and presented her with golden hazel eyes, full pouty lips, and a face pretty enough to belong to a woman. While on the surface those looks gave the man an air of almost innocent sensuality, it was the raw undercurrent of shimmering darkness that attracted the American’s notice.

Draining the last of her third glass of scotch in one easy mouthful, Kael set the glass down on the bar and stood. Her body was all fluid motion and feline grace as she left the bar area and began a slow, sure stalk of her intended victim.

Ianna was left behind without even a second glance, but she didn’t mind. She found herself to be a bit of a voyeur, after all, and there was no doubt in her mind that the woman she was watching was magnificence personified. It wouldn’t matter anyway, for by the end of the evening, the man would be so much rotting flesh, and Kael would be hers once again.

Grinning with an evil triumph which would have turned the heart of the bravest man to ice, she gracefully rose from her barstool and trailed after her American beauty, her mind already spinning with the evening’s possibilities.

Like a magnet which repelled as strongly as it attracted, Kael parted the hungry, writhing crowd before her and stepped easily up onto the dance floor.

Suddenly aware that he was being closely observed, the man finally lifted his head from the lips of one of the bevy of women adorning him like some living robe. Shaking the women from him like a dog shedding water, he placed his hands on his slim hips and leeringly appraised his new admirer.

Staring into pale, predatory eyes, his own widened, just slightly, before narrowing in speculation. The woman standing so casually before him possessed an exotic allure so unlike the common harlots who paraded around him, seeking even a split second of his attention as if he were an oasis in their parched and dusty lives.

Stepping up to the duo and standing more or less unobtrusively off to one side, Ianna watched the silent standoff with twinkling, amused eyes. She could feel the tension crackling around the pair, see the hunger as it rose from them, swirling over their still forms in a dark, iridescent glow only her gaze could detect.

The amusement in her eyes curved her lips, and she looked on, arms crossed over her breasts, as the man reached out toward Kael with a hand that was a hair less than steady.

Reaching up, Kael grasped his wrist and easily placed it on the curve of her hip, allowing the handsome stranger to pull her in close to his well-muscled body. Her lids were heavy and half lowered, and her lips parted, glistening in the whirling, frenetic lighting, as his head descended.

Their kiss was incendiary, rough, bordering on brutal. Kael felt the living heat of him blister through her body as she raised a hand teasingly up his abdomen and across his chest. She bit down with more than a hint of force on the tongue twisting within her mouth, darkly thrilled with the low moan sounding deep in his throat.

With a throaty, seductive laugh, she pulled away, nipping his bottom lip with sharp, white teeth.

His eyes were glassy, his stance unsteady, and he blinked rapidly, tongue running over his full lips.

Smirking, Ianna chose that moment to step forward and lay clasped hands over one of Kael’s broad shoulders. Sensitive nostrils flared as she scented the arousal coming off of both of them in waves. “Will he do?” she purred into the American’s ear.

Growling, Kael grasped Ianna around her trim waist, pulled the priestess in even closer against her, and turned her head, crushing the taller woman’s lips against hers for a timeless moment.

When she finally broke away, Ianna’s eyes were shining and her heart thundered forcefully in her chest. “I’ll take that as a yes.” Turning her head, she saw that the man’s unsteadiness had resolved, and he was gazing at them with frank, and aroused, speculation. Moving forward, she whispered a rather vulgar request in his ear, then straightened to watch as his chest expanded, then relaxed as he nodded his assent.

“Good,” she replied, a coy smile shaping her lips. “Shall we?”

*****

Ianna tried very hard to keep her eyes on the road, even as her body was strongly responding to the scene taking place scant inches away. The convertible’s top was down, allowing Kael to straddle the hips of their guest, who gave his name as Raphael. He’d pulled down the tight material of her dress and was feasting on her breasts, each in turn, as she tossed back her head and laughed in primal abandon, her hands strong on his broad, muscled shoulders.

Her nipples were so tight and so engorged with blood that every strong draw of his mouth gave as much pain as it did pleasure, and she relished it, mouth open wide as she drew sweet night air into her needy lungs.

Knowing well that the road ahead was flat, straight, and empty, Ianna took her eyes off that particular view and turned it to a much more pleasant one instead. She turned to look just as Kael’s strong, veined hands left Raphael’s shoulders to disappear between their bodies for a long moment.

Raphael groaned as he felt her deft hands unclasp his belt and unzip his trousers. His groan became a moan when he felt her cool fingers grasp him, firm and sure, and position him just so. Then he gasped as she lowered herself upon him and he felt the wet heat of her engulf him so wonderfully and so totally that he feared, for one brief moment, that he would spend himself right then and there.

Kael laughed as she caught the brief instant of panic in the man’s eyes. She leaned in to kiss him hard as her inner walls began an intimate caress, swallowing his breathless moans with delight. Feeling him begin to succumb to the primitive urge to thrust deep into her, she grinned and used the weight of her body to keep him still, passing along the wordless message that it was she, not he, who would lead this particular dance.

There ensued a long, tense, sexually charged battle of wills between them, neither giving ground, until, finally, Raphael bowed beneath the weight of her superior tactics, grasped her hips, and simply went along for the ride.

*******

Ianna had to grant Raphael one thing as she pulled into her driveway. The man certainly had staying power. After a full half hour or more of being ridden like a prized Thoroughbred by one of the most breathtaking women on the planet, he was still going strong.

She felt a flash of regret as she eased herself out of the car. Regret for the loss of what looked to be a marvelous plaything. Then she shrugged and walked around to the passenger’s side. Men of Raphael’s particular talents were easy enough to come by, if one knew where to look. And right now, he was worth so much more to her dead than alive. She only hoped Kael would see it that way.

“Oh honey,” she purred into the American’s flushed ear, “we’re home.”

Kael turned passion-dark eyes toward the priestess, her breath coming in rhythmic pants as she raised and lowered her hips in long, smooth, deep strokes. Reaching up, she grabbed a handful of Ianna’s dress, tearing the silken fabric as she pulled the grinning priestess down to her lips and almost swallowed her whole.

Unprepared for the blast of undiluted carnality, Ianna’s knees weakened and she staggered, leaning her weight against the sturdy car door. The power of Kael’s arousal stole the breath from her lungs and the strength from her muscles.

After a long, extremely intense moment, Kael pushed the priestess away from her, and with a small sigh, disengaged herself from the man beneath her.

Recovering her strength and wits somewhat, Ianna gathered herself, stepped back, and swung the car door open. Kael stepped out gracefully, and with a wicked little smirk, reached down and tucked Raphael back into his trousers. “Keep that warm and ready for me, hmm?” she asked, not even attempting the task of trying to zip him back up, knowing well that any attempt would be a futile one indeed.

Raphael didn’t move. He didn’t speak. His glassy eyes didn’t even blink as he sat slumped against the bucket seat.

“What did you do to him?” Ianna asked with some concern.

“A little thing I picked up from a friend.”

“Ahh. Lao Ma, your little Chinese whore.”

The priestess gasped as iron claws sunk themselves into the tender skin of her throat, cutting off her air.

“I told you never to speak her name,” Kael hissed, her eyes narrowed to dangerous slits.

“S-sorry,” Ianna ground out breathlessly. “I didn’t—”

“No, of course you didn’t. You never do, do you.” Releasing her captive, she turned back toward the car. “Help me get him outta here.”

*******

Kael blinked in surprise when Ianna led them away from the house and toward the little outbuilding on the side of the sprawling grounds. Dazed as their guest was, she knew that one whiff of the interior of that building would send him running as fast as his legs could carry him.

Sensing the American’s disquiet, Ianna smiled and leaned in close. “Trust me,” she murmured, before releasing her hold on Raphael and unlocking the door. “Keep Romeo here occupied for a moment, would you? I’ll be right back.”

Kael prepared herself for the blast of foul air as the priestess pulled open the door. To her amazement, the only scent her sensitive nostrils could detect was a faint hint of candle wax.

Ianna smirked at the raised eyebrow she received, and disappeared inside the building.

Raphael roused a little from his bliss-induced haze and tried to shake off Kael’s firm grip on his arm. Smiling, Kael leaned in and captured his lips once again as her hand slid down and pressed intimately against him. “Relax,” she murmured against his lips, “we’re just gonna have a little fun.”

“Fun?” he whimpered, arching helplessly into her expert hand.

“Ohhh yes,” she purred, sealing her lips to his and pressing him back against the rough wood of the outbuilding. “Wonderful fun.”

Ianna separated them by laying her hands on their shoulders. “Please,” she intoned, voice husky, “follow me.”

As she walked away, the priestess slipped the thin straps of her dress down her shoulders, and let the soft material fall to the ground, baring her silken flesh in all its majestic glory.

All around the room, dozens of candles flickered, casting a soft, dancing light over an otherwise black room. In the very center, where the cauldron had been, stood a low table covered with a deep red cloth. Reaching the table, Ianna stopped, then did a slow turn, displaying her fire-licked body to its greatest advantage. Her dark eyes were sparkling, her smile as welcoming and seductive as she could manage.

“Do you like what you see?” she asked, staring into two sets of eyes which raked over her naked flesh in undisguised want. “Come in. Don’t be shy.”

Placing a warm hand on Raphael’s broad back, Kael urged him forward and into the shadowed darkness.

Raphael shuffled forward until he was pressed against the naked body of the woman standing before him. His hands slid smoothly down around the curve of her hips, and he pulled her to him more strongly as his head bent to devour her glistening lips.

With a throaty laugh, she pressed his upper half away, the palms of her hands pressed flat against his muscled chest. “Not quite so fast, little man,” she husked, elegant fingers reaching for the lapels of his jacket and pushing it free of his broad shoulders. “We have all night.”

Kael drew the jacket off as Ianna ripped open Raphael’s silk shirt in a scattering of buttons. The priestess smiled as the points of her neatly polished nails scratched invitingly through the thick mat of dark hair on his chest.

He growled and tried to pull her in for a kiss, but she evaded his advances easily as she worked on divesting him of the rest of his clothing. Within moments, he stood naked to the world, and only then did Ianna allow him to grind roughly against her body and capture her lips in an urgent kiss.

Looking on with interest, Kael slipped slowly, gracefully out of her own garments, then padded silently into a position just to the right of the action, eyes narrowed and flickering between Ianna and Raphael as their moans of pleasure filled the still air of the building.

It was only when Raphael attempted to lift the priestess onto the low table that she broke away and, in a move that seemed effortless, especially given the difference in size of their bodies, spun the man so that his thighs were against the hard edge of the platform. With a little push, she eased him down. “Lay back and relax, my friend. I promise, you’re going to love what comes next.”

After a moment of silent contemplation, Raphael gave in to his body’s insistent urgings, and drew himself back until he was laying completely atop the table.

Eyes glittering, Ianna turned her smile toward the intently watching American. “He’s all yours.”

Kael’s return smile was absolutely predatory as she brushed against the priestess. Coming to stand at the foot of the table, she allowed her burning gaze to rake hot coals over the well-made and very aroused man below her.

Raphael did his best to remain absolutely motionless as the stunning woman towering over him flicked piercing, glittering eyes up and down his body. Everywhere her eyes set down it felt as if she were stroking him with hot, urgent hands. He willed his body not to shift or to tremble. His machismo snarled at him, ordering him to move, to take charge, to show that damned bitch who was running this show, but the rest of him succumbed to her lust like a newborn puppy.

Pressing her hands flat upon the firm, level surface, Kael gracefully climbed aboard the table and, cat-like, crawled slowly over Raphael’s prone body until she loomed above him on all fours, straddling his slim hips comfortably, and allowing him to feel the searing, wanton heat of her so very, very close.

Kneeling up just slightly, she reached out and brought his hands up to her engorged breasts, then leaned down and licked a trail around his lips with just the tip of her tongue, moaning in pleasure as his hands tightened reflexively, passionately, his blunt, strong fingers sinking deliciously into her needy, wanting flesh.

“Oh yes, lover,” she growled against his lips, “just like that.”

As she deepened the kiss, she lowered herself until once again she filled herself with him, sighing happily as he slid easily within. Steadying herself by placing her hands once again flat against the table, she began to rock her hips in a slow, sensual motion.

Off in the fire-flecked shadows, Ianna began to softly chant, her eyes riveted to the coupling going on just in front of her. Passion’s sweat shone on Kael’s muscled back, and the glorious length of her raven hair fanned out across the face of the man she was riding, providing a living, luxuriant curtain which shifted and glimmered with each thrust of her arching body.

The prayer fell easily from the priestess’ lips as she prepared the libations her particular gods required for the sacrifice. Rum was poured into the center of a circle made from red, white and black candles. Ashes from a pungent cigar came next. Three tiny shells, the color of the candles, followed.

The candles flared high in acceptance of their gift, highlighting the deep blackness of her eyes and the cruel, twisted smile curling her lips.

Bending down, she easily hefted a long, razor sharp dagger from its place just outside of the circle. Her chanting grew louder as she passed the blade of the knife through the candles’ flame three times in a counterclockwise fashion.

Hefting the rum bottle, she poured the liquid over the blade, coating both sides carefully. When she drew the dagger through the flames again, they leapt up, causing the metal to flare as if it had been forged by the sun itself.

Laughing in triumph, she once again rose to her full height and lifted her prize to the heavens, her chant winding down and becoming a low drone.

As her gaze returned to the pair on the table, she noticed that Kael had straightened and was thrusting in earnest. Her body was taut, every muscle exquisitely defined. Her hands were caressing her own breasts and torso. Raphael’s hands had a death grip on her thighs, fingers sunk deep into the tender flesh around corded, bulging muscle. His eyes were glazed, fevered and hot. His mouth hung wide open, his breath coming in tortured gasps.

Turning her head, Kael watched as Ianna stepped out of the shadows, dagger in hand. Grinning, the American took her proffered gift and spun it easily in her hand.

Faster than a striking snake, she had the point of the dagger pressed against the bounding pulse of the man beneath her.

“What …what are you doing?” he gasped out, eyes going wide.

Kael’s smile was evil incarnate as she rode him mercilessly. “Seeing what it feels like to fuck a dead man.”

Raphael’s struggle to escape became his undoing. As his hips bucked in a desperate attempt to lift Kael off of him, he unknowingly slid into her with just the right force, at just the right angle, to cause him to fall over the chasm into release. His body betraying him, he arched and bent back, his head slamming repeatedly against the hard wood of the platform as he groaned, flooding her.

Kael’s hand stayed rock steady on the dagger, drawing only a thin line of blood as the man thrashed helplessly beneath her, trapped by the power of his own desperate release. Her laugh was low and teasing and cruel, and she looked down with dispassionate eyes as Raphael spent himself totally within her.

“That’s a good boy,” she crooned as he finally relaxed and lay panting and dazed, weak as a kitten and scared out of his wits. “Such a very good boy.”

Her tongue played teasingly across the sharp edge of her teeth as she casually drew the dagger down the front of his body. “Aren’t we having fun?” she asked, her coy tone a blatant contrast to the dark mirth in her eyes.

Scenting Raphael’s fear the way sharks scented blood, Ianna stalked to the head of the table and grasped his face between the palms of her hands. She moaned in ecstasy when his terror assailed her senses. Her eyes rolled back in her head and her lashes fluttered. “Oh yes,” she murmured, her voice dark and husky, “give it to me. Give me your fear. Let me taste it.”

Staring up into the priestess’ lust-filled, demented eyes, Raphael began to feel a kernel of anger develop deep within. He nursed it carefully, and grunted with some satisfaction as it ran through his weak, spent limbs. Wrenching his head away, he brought both hands up and shoved Ianna back away from him.

She stumbled, then went down in a heap, scattering the circle of candles at her feet. Cursing, she jumped back up and began to right the fallen and scattered objects before the power of the spell she was laying seeped out into the dark emptiness beyond.

Raphael’s gaze tracked up to the blue-eyed she-demon still astride him and his lips pealed back in an ferocious snarl. “Get the fuck off me, you fucking whore!”

Kael laughed, riding out the wave of his bucking hips easily. When his futile struggles ceased, she leaned casually forward, her breasts brushing against his sweaty and heaving chest, the point of her dagger drawing a whimsical trail along one chiseled cheekbone. “Ya got the fucking part right, lover,” she purred, grinning. “But as for the whore …well, I suppose I’ll need to collect payment for… ” her hips rocked lewdly against him, “services rendered, no?”

“You bitch!” he screamed, throwing a muscled arm up in an attempt to beat her off of him.

Laughing again, Kael evaded the slap easily, but opened a gaping slice in his cheek in the process. Sparkling eyes went wide with mock innocence and shock. “Whoops!”

His left arm came up in reflex and managed to deal a heavy blow to the side of Kael’s face.

A lesser human would have tumbled off the table with a broken neck.

Kael barely flinched.

A snarl curled her full lips. “You’re gonna pay for that, lover boy.”

Looking into those soulless blue eyes, Raphael was sure he saw the depths of hell. Terror seeped into him again, and he began struggling with everything in him, cursing his weakened muscles and uttering the incoherent sounds of a trapped and snarling animal.

“No!” Ianna shouted, looking up from her task in time to see the glittering silver of the dagger held high over Kael’s head, ready to begin its downward plunge. “Not yet!”

Somehow, Kael managed to arrest the furious descent of the knife but not her burning desire to inflict pain on the man beneath her. Turning the dagger in her hand, she dealt a crashing blow with the hilt to the side of his skull.

Raphael went limp as his eyes glazed over. Dazed, yes, but still alive.

Grunting in satisfaction, Kael slid off of the table just as Ianna moved by.

“Did you have to do that?” the priestess hissed.

Kael shot her a narrow-eyed look but refrained from commenting.

“Help me,” Ianna continued, reaching up and pressing a button on the near wall. The thump-rattle of a heavy chain hitting the table was clearly heard in the silence of the room. “Strap those around his ankles and I’ll haul him up. Quickly, before he wakes up.”

The American’s pristine white teeth glowed in the flickering candlelight. “You know, the last asshole who tried to tell me what to do gave up trying to breathe through the extra holes I put in his skull.”

The priestess’ return smile was every bit as false. “Please,” she conceded, tilting her head in a way that could be construed as sarcastic, but wasn’t.

After a long, assessing moment, Kael turned away and bound the semi-conscious man’s ankles tightly with the thick cords attached to the chains.

When the American stepped away, Ianna pressed the button on the wall again. The hidden winch began to turn, drawing Raphael up toward the ceiling by his ankles. When his hips left the table, he became aware enough to renew his struggles, though weakly.

Those struggles trebled in intensity once his shoulders, and then his head, left the table and he found himself hanging upside down, suspended from the ceiling.

Twisting fruitlessly like a fish on a line, he tried to bend at the waist to free his ankles, but it was no use. His body simply betrayed him, the only thing left to him was a string of rabid curses which flew from his mouth in a spray of spittle and flecks of foam.

“Help me move the table. Please,” Ianna said, already coming to the head and gripping the plywood with fingers hooked to talons.

Nodding, Kael went to the foot of the platform and, on the count of three, easily lifted it up and to the side, revealing the gleaming black of the cauldron beneath.

Instantly, the scents of death, despair, pain and hunger assailed her, causing her to take an involuntary half-step backward while still holding the table.

Ianna yelped as splinters drove themselves into her palms, and she dropped her end of the platform, hissing in pain.

Raphael simply screamed.

Mindlessly, Kael simply tossed the plywood off to the side, and stepped forward again, stared into the cauldron, eyes wincing and watering as the icy chill seared through her skull. Those same eyes widened when she realized that the icy mass of …whatever it was in the kettle… was now coming to a full, violent boil without any type of heat source whatsoever.

She wanted to look up, wanted to demand the priestess’ explanation for this trick, but found her gaze unbreakably captured by the boiling, putrescent miasma beneath. She tried to set her formidable well against it, but the pull of the darkness was just too powerful, and as she felt it wash over her, her will crumbled to dust, and with it, her desire to fight.

The second she relaxed, it moved through her, filling every vessel, every cell, until she was part of the darkness, and it was part of her. Voices whispered to her, their sibilant tones teasing just below the level of her hearing. Raphael’s keening, terror-filled screams were just so much static as she attempted to chase down the elusive voices, if only to hear the messages they seemed to be imparting to her very soul.

With the darkness came a hunger. A hunger more powerful than any she had ever known. A hunger for fear, for rage, for death in all its bloody glory. She raised glittering, colorless eyes to Ianna, her brain not even registering surprise that she was now able to move.

The smile which pulled her lips back from her teeth was a deaths head mask as chilling as the boiling cauldron below.

Ianna met Kael’s gaze without flinching. Her lips moved to the rhythm of the chant she was softly singing. Her body swayed with sinuous, sensual grace, like a snake dancing to the pipes of his charmer.

In her hands was another knife, much larger than the first. Its hilt was made from a partial shaft of a human femur. The blade, blue-fired steel as dark as midnight, was bound to the hilt by human tendon, yellow and brittle with age.

Kael looked on, tongue darting out to moisten dry lips, her eyes following every movement of the priestess as she swayed and chanted.

Ianna stepped forward and handed the knife to Kael, pressing it into her hands and curling her fingers tightly around the handle. “You know what to do,” she whispered before resuming her melodious chanting once again.

The moment the dagger touched her hands, Kael knew exactly what to do. Long fingers caressed the haft as one would caress a lover; slowly, gently, lovingly.

The voices became more insistent, and though she still couldn’t hear the words, the message was loud and clear.

Kill.

Kill.

Kill.

Hefting the knife, she turned and approached her flailing victim. She easily sidestepped his desperate, sobbing attempts to keep her away. Reaching up, she latched an inhumanly strong hand just below his knee, clamping down hard to steady his helpless movements.

“No!” Raphael sobbed, his voice whispery and raw. “God, please, no.”

“Your god can’t help you now, my friend,” Kael replied in a surprisingly conversational tone.

He lifted his head as much as he was able. “Please,” he begged, tears rolling down his face, “please, don’t do this. I beg you, please.”

She actually appeared to consider his pleas for a moment, before a sneer distorted her face and she plunged the knife deep into his gut, just above his pubic bone.

The blade was razor sharp and slid in easily past skin, fat and glistening viscera. With a soft grunt of effort, she brought the blade slowly down, cutting a surgeon-straight line through his gut until the knife was stopped by his sternum. Hot blood glutted from the wound, bathing Kael in its essence, coating her hands and arms and spraying against her face and chest.

Raphael had long since stopped screaming, and hung limp and unconscious, his blood falling into the caldron below his head in a river of red.

Ianna’s chanting became louder, her dancing wilder. Her face and eyes glowed with dark power.

As if viewing herself from a distance, Kael saw her hand come up and plunge itself into the opening she’d made. Her long fingers slipped easily past the man’s ribcage, questing for his still beating heart. Once she found it, she wrapped her fingers around it and, steadying herself, she pulled.

It came free far easier than she imagined it would, and with a look just short of rapturous, she pulled it from Raphael’s body and held it high in the air, where it quivered, glistening in the wavering light of the candles.

Blood poured down her arms to coat her breasts like some grisly coat of armor, and she moaned in ecstasy as her neck lolled back and her eyes rolled up in her head, showing only the glittering whites. Her body writhed and jerked in time to Ianna’s chanting, as if she were a puppet given life by a master’s hand.

Obeying a silent command, she finally lowered her arms and dropped the heart into the boiling cauldron.

Everything stilled.

Even the sound of Raphael’s still draining blood made no sound.

Then, very like an erupting volcano, the cauldron came to life once again, spewing out brilliant beams of light every color of the rainbow.

Enraptured, Kael stayed rooted to the spot, staring downward as the light shafts pierced her torso and head, lancing through her body and continuing onward through the ceiling of the building and to the infinity beyond.

She felt a dark, malevolent power enter with the light, filling her as if she were nothing but an empty vessel created expressly for that purpose. The power of it was overwhelming, causing her to stumble a bit as her knees weakened. Her strength returned rapidly, however, as she felt a huge surge of vitality flow through her with the force of a tidal wave.

Her vision, already perfect, became even sharper. Scents previously undetectable now assailed her senses. Likewise, her hearing became almost uncomfortably acute, to the point where she could easily hear the sound of Ianna’s heart beating furiously in her chest.

This is how it feels to be a god, she thought, reveling in the dark power which consumed her. Nothing could hurt her. No one could stand against her. She was invincible.

Ianna waited in the proverbial wings, the same dark energy roiling through her own body; though in her case it was something she was well used to, and as such was not quite as intoxicating.

“Come to me,” she rasped, arms held out in a gesture of tender welcome, though the look in her eyes was the very antithesis of tender. “Join with me in the darkness. Let me welcome you home.”

Kael looked up slowly, seeing the naked priestess as if for the first time. A smile, slow, dark and incalculably evil, spread over her face.

With the fluid, muscular grace of a stalking lioness, Kael closed the distance between them. One blood covered hand reached up into the thick fall of Ianna’s hair and pulled back, hard, exposing the priestess’ elegant neck to her hungered eyes.

“Welcome this,” she purred, lowering her head and biting through tender skin to suckle the heated blood within.

Ianna struggled just enough to spark the American’s dark rage, then submitted willingly to her merciless attentions, her body an open, wet and willing vessel.

The furious coupling lasted until the first light of dawn turned the eastern sky to rose, and only ended as each woman finally gave into the exhaustion of their bodies and collapsed, still entangled, onto the cold dirt floor.

It was an experience neither one would forget.

*******

There ya go! I hope to have the next piece up in the next week or so. Swordnquil@aol.com

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Бэк Сюзанна Desert Storm