taxonomites | [Location: Holo Taxon]

Briar might not be able to find Rosethorn's magic at that moment, but he would, if he kept going, find himself faced with Willow's. Her eyes were pitch black and she had a barrier up around herself, between her and the hellgod in front of her. She was chanting something in Latin, but as soon as she became aware that someone was approaching, she turned around.

"No! Don't come here! She'll-"

But the distraction was enough for Glory to gain control, pushing past Willow's barrier and sending the witch flying through the air towards Briar. Willow scrambled up, breathing hard.

"She's too strong!"

Briar only spared a second to glance down the hallway past Willow and Glory, hoping to see Rosethorn and Evvy. Then he tucked the thorn balls and burn salve into a belt pouch for easy access. Briar used a tiny tendril of magic to release the hemp ties holding his knives in their wrist sheaths so that the weapons could drop into his hands. "That seems like all the more reason for me to stay," he informed Willow matter-of-factly. "I can help fight, and I can probably reinforce that barrier, or at least come up with a secondary one."

"You can?" She was confused, but hey, who was she to deny help when she needed it? Thinking quickly, she pulled out a pouch from her pocket. A small bag was pulled from that and thrust into the boy's hands. "One pinch of that, one of this." Another was handed over as she took out two as well. "I'm gonna let the barrier down. When I throw mine on her, you do the same. It'll take a minute to work, but hopefully... it will."

She had a plan. A teleportation plan. If it worked, Glory would be far gone from them in a matter of seconds. And Willow would likely end up with a nosebleed again, but she didn't care. It would be worth the trouble.

Briar used his own power to test what was in the bags. Crushed dried plants. Well then, perhaps he would be more use than he'd expected in what the unfamiliar mage attempted. "Give me just a minute."

He wrapped his magic around the contents of each bag, strengthening the ingredients. They regained the power that fresher plants would have, reminded of what they had once been. Briar took pains to do so in equal measure for each in order to maintain the balance necessary for whatever use she intended to put them to. He might not be much help for the actual spell, but he could make it easier for her to cast. "Alright, whenever you're ready."

Willow didn't have time to ask what he was doing. Her attention was on Glory and her barrier. Once he said he was ready, she nodded. "Okay! Letting it go now!" And she dropped the barrier.

Glory started walking towards them, all catty bitchiness, complaining about how the barrier had ruined her hair and pissed her off. Willow stood her ground, knowing how to fight this enemy. Once Glory was close enough, Willow yelled, "Now!" and tossed her components forward, showering the hell-god in a mess of glitter.

She didn't even stop to breathe, chanting softly in Latin for a few seconds as Glory looked around.

"Oh come, on glitter? Really? That's so-"

Willow cut her off mid-sentence with a clap of her hands. Glory disappeared in a flash of glitter and Willow fell to the ground, now nursing a bloody nose.

"...It worked."

He flung the powders forward at Willow's request, eyes widening upon seeing their results. He wasn't had no idea what language she had been chanting, but Glory's disappearance spoke volumes. Willow seemed a little surprised by this development too.

Briar knelt down next to her, suppressing his bigger question for the more important one. "Are you alright?" He offered an arm for help to sit up if she wanted it. Since he had the supplies with him, Briar pulled a handkerchief from his kit and handed it to Willow.

The plant mage managed to contain his curiosity only long enough to make sure that Willow wasn't suffering any more severe aftereffects than the nosebleed. "How did you do that? I wasn't sure what you were trying, so I couldn't do anything other than strengthen the plants used in those powders." Even if he'd known, Briar would have been of no further assistance. Briar had never heard of anyone with power quite like this, and he certainly didn't possess it himself.

Willow managed to sit up, pressing the handkerchief to her nose. "I'm fine. Thanks." At least it wouldn't be a week-long nosebleed this time. She was far more powerful than the last time she'd attempted something like that. "It's probably not going to be a permanent fix, but it'll at least give us some time." She just didn't know how much. One of the kinks in that spell had always been exactly where the target got teleported. For all she knew, Glory would be right behind them.

She looked around carefully to be sure that wasn't the case before she answered the other questions.

"It's part of my witchy magic. I don't use it much since there's still a few kinks to work out a-and it's a really powerful teleportation spell. But for something like this? Definitely worth trying."

"Yes, but you were using plants. I'm a plant mage, a strong one, and I couldn't sense what you were doing." The chants made it seem more like academic magic than ambient, but even so, Briar couldn't name a single mage he'd heard of who could make people truly vanish to suddenly appear in another location.

Briar heard a dull thump from the direction of the gates and winced. The emperor's war mages had entered the fight for real. That was the crack of a projectile hitting the wall. The temple mages were starting to slip. After another worried look down the hallway toward the gates, Briar turned back to Willow. "Can you move?" he asked, voice soft and serious. "This isn't a safe place to be anymore. The gates won't hold long." He remembered just how little time there was, the pulse throbbing in his ears serving as a countdown. If Briar didn't move quickly, he would lose his chance to find Rosethorn and Evvy, to escape from the temple.

"The powder stuff's just something to help the spell. It's not what actually does it."

But she nodded anyway, glancing around. She couldn't quite hear what had him worried, but she'd trust him after he just helped her deal with Glory. Or whatever vision of the hell-god that had been. She pushed herself to her feet and nodded again.

"Where should we go?"

She'd follow him if he had any ideas. Otherwise, she would just run off in a random direction and how they got to safety. Sooner rather than later.

That did make sense. If plants were inherently capable of such a thing, Briar's magic would be able to access that. Willow's power was still very impressive, even if Briar couldn't hope to replicate a bit of it.

"You," he told her, just the slightest emphasis on that first word, "should go that way, second left, first right after that, and out the side gate. Quick, before the emperor's troops cut off that escape route." He looked stubborn enough that arguing with him would obviously not do much good. "I've got someone to find before I leave," Briar informed Willow grimly.

Just because he looked stubborn about her leaving didn't mean she would actually obey him. Willow wasn't in any mood to leave him alone, not now when they both clearly needed the help. She shook her head.

"Not alone. I'll follow you, but I-I'm not leaving without you."

While electricity flew from her arms into the hearts of her enemies, a blur of brown and green flew past her. She did a quick double-take and broke off the energy, calling out to him. "Hey, kid! You okay?"

"Not a kid, and I'll be fine as soon as I find my my family." Family was the quickest word for what Rosethorn was. Teacher, foster mother, the biggest influence in Briar's life. And Evvy was his student, his responsibility until he got her home and into the hands of a stone mage he trusted to take over her training. They had to be here somewhere.

Briar nodded toward her opponents, releasing his knives from their wrist sheaths. He settled easily into a strong stance, ready to act as needed. "Are you alright?" he asked right back. Weather magic might have more battle potential than most other types, but magic was always draining and war magic added an emotional toll on top of the cost in energy. Gwen was also not wearing temple robes, but she could be temple trained without being a dedicate. He was, after all. Her concern for him told Briar that she was on the right side here.

Family. Everyone had something they were trying to find, here. Or running from. For Gwen, it was the good guys--Angel, Connor, even Spike--who she sold out a year ago in L.A, and the bad guys too.

She flexed her fingers and balled them into a fist, feeling electricity crawl up and down her arms like a million little vines. The smile she flashed the boy was confident--like it hadn't been so long ago that she'd done this very thing. "Sure. I got this," she answered, sending a bolt of electricity at one of the various creepy-crawlies in her view. When that was taken care of, she looked back at Briar.

"You look like you're not having the best day either," she remarked. But really, who was?

Lightning. Electricity. Gwen. Taxon. He'd escaped Gyongxe once. Gyongxe didn't even exist anymore, just another part of the Yanxing empire now. This had happened already; it was just another nightmare now. He hoped it was, at least. "I've had better," Briar admitted with a strained attempt at nonchalance, adding bitterly, "Welcome to Gyongxe. Watch out for the invading army."

Briar turned and lunged, stabbing an enemy who was trying to sneak closer to the pair from his side. Apparently he had assumed that at least Gwen would not electrocute her own companion. "Using me as a shield is only effective if I won't attack you," Briar remarked dryly. He wasn't a weak point.

Briar wasn't really surprised that Gwen handled battle magic more easily than Tris did. He was still amazed that she'd made it to adulthood without breaking, considering she had never learned to control her power. If Gwen could at least use it to defend herself, Briar wasn't about to hold it against her. Tris couldn't stand killing with magic, and Briar certainly got no enjoyment from it, but every one of the four siblings had gotten their power tangled up in death at some point.

She had a quip on the tip of her tongue--really, she did--but then he turned around and did something that caught even her off-guard, and she gave herself a moment to be impressed. Kid definitely had a few tricks up his sleeve. And if those tricks happened to serve her--so be it. She wouldn't turn him away.

"Not bad," she remarked, regarding him with acceptance and a little bit of intrigue. She remembered something from a long time ago--what seemed like a long time ago--something about magic. Unfortunately, it was a day Gwen had chosen to let grow hazy in her mind, until she met with Long again. "Gyongxe, huh? Never heard of it. But...that explains a lot. Hey, you wouldn't happen to know the way out of here, would you?" She shrugs, pulls away and unleashes a surge of electricity to a nearby foe. When she faced him, her face was twisted in the grimace brought by some memory. "Because last time I had to throw down like this? Wasn't pretty."

Briar caught the look Gwen shot him after he moved. With only a twitch of his mouth to hint at a smile, he informed her seriously, "I always have a couple tricks up my sleeves. That's where I keep my knives." He also had tricks in his belt pouch, and in the kit on his back.

Banter was good. Banter would keep Briar from panicking. Maybe. Of all the places from his own world he could be, why Gyongxe, and why now? Hadn't he returned enough times already while he slept?

He shook his head. "I can't leave yet. If my foster mother and my student are here... I can't leave them here." He looked down the hallway in the direction he'd been heading. "There's flames one way and the other... won't be pretty either."

"So I see," she replied with appraising eyes. He was good, if not young and cocky. That part of him she knows well, having recognized it in herself--especially when she was a kid. Looking to prove herself, show off her special skills to the big shots who had presidents' faces spilling out of their suit pockets. She wouldn't have gotten half as far as she did without that fire--but she made a lot of mistakes along the way, too.

One thing she didn't have was family. She had the luxury of looking out for herself and only herself. So to Briar's objection, she gives him a stern, frustrated look. "No one's here, kid. Not really. Time to look out for yourself. Hate to say it, but Taxon's a whole lot better than...whatever this is."

Gwen hadn't seen most of what Briar could do yet. He wasn't showing off; if he were, he'd have done something flashier. He was trying to save his magic until absolutely necessary. Briar wouldn't consider himself cocky, especially not here. It was bravado rather than anything genuine, with the temple's alarm bells echoing in his ears. The flashbacks had started, and a few tolls of the bell were accompanied by views of things he knew would happen soon.

He didn't want to leave Gwen to fend for herself, but she was doing it well enough that Briar hoped she'd be fine. "I'm sorry," Briar told her, mouth set in a stubborn line , "but I can't take that chance. I'd never forgive myself if something happened to Rosethorn or Evvy and I could've prevented it." If Gwen left, she was doing so without him. He indicated the direction from which he came. "If you want to go now, go. The side gate might still be accessible. Down that hallway, take your third left, then the first right after that, and go straight till you get to a door."

The first whiff of smoke reached him. This wasn't good. He didn't have much time. "I'm going that way," he told her, pointing the opposite direction. "If you can't get out the side gate, you'll have to also. Crawling will be your best bet once you get to the fire or," Briar's throat tightened and his voice hitched just a little as he finished, "the bodies. I can give you something to help with burns and smoke inhalation, in case you need it."

She shook her head, wanting to argue but knowing it would do nothing but waste time. The kid was stubborn, and if he wanted to go off and be the hero, she wasn't going to stop him. She knew someone like that, once, and when it came to his family, Gwen would have had to pull him away kicking and screaming.

The air smelled like fire and ash, and Gwen thought of doing just that. Maybe because he reminded her so much of Connor, or maybe because she'd already killed one of Taxon's finest, she didn't want to be responsible for another biting the dust. Maybe helping the kid out would put a couple more checks in the Plus column, write off some of the bad.

And yet, her flight or fight response was kicking in and flight was winning by a long shot. "Damn it," she muttered. Her instincts won, and she took a few steps toward the side gate. "You're on your own, kid. And hey, listen to me." It was no more than a small consolation, but it was the least she could do and it didn't make her feel any better. "If you run into trouble and you need a little lightning on your side, call me on the tablet, alright? Don't let this place eat you alive."

"Wait," Briar said as she turned to go, reaching into his pack. "In case you can't get out the side gate, take these. The salve's for burns, and the packet will make a tea that'll get whatever you inhale out of your lungs. Coughing that stuff up is... unpleasant, but it's better than more permanent smoke damage." He tossed them lightly to Gwen one at a time. It was that or put them on the floor, since he'd thought quickly enough to remember he couldn't touch her. Briar wanted to avoid making her think about that any more often than she already had to. "Medicine's my most useful contribution in a crisis. Knives are third on the list." Briar didn't elaborate on what came second. Gwen wasn't the only one with combat abilities that went beyond physical strength.

"Thanks for the offer," he told her, "I promise I'll keep it in mind." Grimly, Briar added a reassurance. "I've survived this once already. What's one more time?" One more time was a whole new round of nightmares, but at least Briar knew what was coming. His chances of making it out were higher this time around.

She caught the stuff with her one gloved hand. "Thanks," she said, inspecting them. Medicine's my most useful contribution in a crisis. Knives are third... She couldn't help wondering what nifty little skill was tucked between the medicine and knives, but now wasn't the time for that conversation.

With these and the glass figurine she'd tucked safely away in a crevice a few blocks down, she'd have to find some kind of a pack or purse. Wouldn't be too hard, she figured. If what Briar said is true, there'd be plenty of bodies to lift one off of.

That idea didn't exactly made her feel the warm and fuzzies, but she couldn't run around in this death trap without her hands free. She made a mental note to find the dragon and a pack, and start looking for the nearest door out of here.

"That makes one of us," she answered with a mysterious smile. Maybe he made it through a hell like this twice, but she didn't exactly survive the first one. "See you on the other side, kid. Don't do anything stupid." And with that, she was off.

Briar isn't the only one running towards the fire; in Bagoas' home land, fire is sacred. It is divine, and for a moment he hopes in vain that it is a ritual fire seen to by the Magus; another moment passes and he sees before him the pyre at Persepolis.

To be there and live it alongside his dead King would be a blessing, even in a place such as this.

In the end, when reason claims his mind and turns it once more onto the path of sanity, he drops to his knees and cries to the heavens. This is not Persepolis of old; this is not a dream of Alexander, but a nightmare without end.

Let the fire claim me, he thinks to himself, And let my bones find their peace among the ashes of long lost dreams.

Briar wonders if the figure ahead of him is heading toward the fire for the same reasons as he is. Their speeds approximately equal, Briar does not close much of the gap between them until Bagoas stops and lets himself fall. The mournful cry doesn't bode well, and Briar sprints the remaining distance. Can the man sense something that Briar can't?

He lays a gentle hand on Bagoas' shoulder, just barely touching him and ready to leap back should the other man take any contact as a threat. It would be easy enough to do, with emotions running high and an army at the gates. Better safe than sorry.

"Were you looking for someone?" Briar asks softly.

Martha, disheveled and tired but alive, wasn't sure when she'd managed to escape from the ruined cities of the year that never was. She wasn't even sure how she'd managed to escape. All she knew was that there were no more toclafane in the sky and the vast network of sound systems that had broad casted the Master's voice across the planet were gone.

She rested against the wall of an ornate and unfamiliar stone building, allowing herself the brief luxury of closing her eyes for a moment. The peace didn't last for long. Martha could smell spoke on the air.

The toclafane might not have been to blame, but this city was burning just as surely as Japan had burned.

Bells ringing around her, Martha headed out into the open, trying to get away from the flames and work out exactly where she was. In her haste, she almost crashed into Briar.

Briar pivoted to the side as Martha narrowly avoided knocking him flat. He reached for a wall with one hand to steady himself and Martha with the other to do the same for her. "I guess I was running the wrong way," he quipped, his usual charm worn thin by worry, "So I can't blame you for the near-collision. Are you alright?"

The wrong way? Briar would run that way again in a heartbeat if he could find his teacher and his student. He sent his magic branching out like roots, looking for Rosethorn. He knew her power so well by now that he should be able to find her even among other temple mages.

Gyongxe didn't stand a chance against Yanjing; what the emperor wanted, he could usually get, all wishful thinking aside. Now that the army was here, Briar wanted Rosethorn and Evvy away and safe. They'd escaped once. How was he back here again? "I was looking for a woman and a girl," he fights to keep desperation from his voice as he asks Martha for help without much real hope she'll have the information he needs. "The woman's short and sharp-tongued with cropped auburn hair, works with plants, and the girl has stone magic." If they were together, Rosethorn would take less risks, and Evvy would be safer than she would on her own. Briar prayed they were together.

The fire was spreading. Briar felt more plants die and knew it was coming for him.

"Oh my god, Briar! It's so good to see you. And I'm sorry you're here too."

Finding herself face to face with someone real after an indeterminable about of time with nothing but ghosts for company was a pleasant surprise, for the most part. He caught her to stop her from falling and, impulsively, Martha wrapped her arms around him to hug him in response.

"I'm sorry, I haven't seen them. I haven't seen anyone. The whole place is an illusion. There might not be anyone to find."

"No, I'm sorry you're here. This is--" not home, though it was of his own world at least. The strange city was preferable to being back in Gyongxe. 'My nightmare' was more revealing a description than Briar was willing to share, however resoundingly accurate it might be. Eventually he settled for, "somewhere I've been before," just to keep the pause from stretching out indefinitely.

Briar stiffened for a moment in Martha's embrace, the shock of finding another familiar face here delaying his reaction. Then he hugged her back, almost tight enough to hurt, desperation seeping into the gesture against Briar's will. The city and his own world were mixing together. Bad enough he was back in Gyongxe, but for other people to be here too? People who never should have been.

The mage shook his head, pressing his hands to the sides of his face and trying to focus on finding Rosethorn. If something happened to her because he was too inept to concentrate? That was a failing he couldn't even think about. "I don't know how much is real, and I can't leave them," he said quietly, the same stubbornness in his voice that had convinced Gwen earlier. He was running out of time now, though. "It's my mother and my student." Briar managed to keep his voice from breaking on the word 'mother,' but use of the word without 'foster' in front of it was rare enough that if Martha knew him just a little better, it would be every bit as obvious. Briar, Rosethorn, and Evvy had helped each other escape once. They'd gotten out of this. He couldn't leave without them now.

He didn't need to tell Martha that this burning city was his nightmare. Even if she hadn't come directly from the ashen remains of London and her own dark memories of the Master's reign, his expression would have told her everything that she needed to know.

"Ok," said Martha, staying relatively calm despite the circumstances. If the positions had been reversed, and her family had been missing, nothing would have stopped her from searching for them. "If they're here, we'll find them. Together. I'm not letting you do this on your own."

Briar frowned, forehead creasing between his eyebrows. He didn't want to ask Martha to follow him into trouble. At the same time, he'd be lying if he pretended it wasn't a comfort. Having someone he knew by his side provided reassurance in a measure to more than equal the additional worry it caused.

In the end, there wasn't anything Briar could say other than a very sincere, "Thank you."

He frowned and looked in the direction Martha had come from. "This way, I think, until it gets too dangerous," he decided.

He didn't need to ask her. She'd followed the Doctor into trouble on more than one occasion and she wouldn't hesitate to do the same for Briar. It wasn't difficult to see that he needed her at the moment and that he would continue to need her regardless of what they did or didn't find.

"That's what friends are for," she said simply, offering him her hand and turning in the direction that he'd indicated. "Let's go."

Briar managed a grateful smile even in Gyongxe, for the word friend and for Martha's willingness to stay. He nodded decisively, teeth gritted and chin jutting out in stubborn determination. The hand in his caught him off-guard, but Briar gave it a light squeeze.

When he started moving, he didn't run, but he didn't exactly amble along at a leisurely pace either. As they traveled along the corridor, the smell of smoke grew stronger. Briar tried hard not to feel like a tree about to be caught in the worst sort of forest fire.

Shouts began to echo down the hall, and Briar flinched slightly. Not enough that most would notice, but the hands linked between them gave the involuntary movement a channel.

It was a reasonable pace - even now, she couldn't help but note that the Doctor would have been running - and Martha kept up without difficulty. When Briar flinched, she squeezed his hand in a gesture of comfortable that would have been just as imperceptible to anyone else.

"They're not real," she said, firmly. "The aliens made them. They made all of this."

Briar barely heard Martha, however firm her voice. It should be something to latch onto, but right then Briar was too busy sorting out memories from current situation. Flashbacks every so often really weren't helping him. He sent his magic snaking farther out in front of them, weaving through corridors like spreading roots. "Ouch," he murmured as it picked up just a few too many plants withering and dying. "I can't feel her. Just plants, and they're all suffocating, burning up." As what she said finally reached him, Briar looked at Martha and added, "The plants are real. There's no proof the people aren't."

Briar sped up. Where was Rosethorn? She should be keeping Evvy safe, so if he could find one of them, he'd have them both. He rounded one corner. Magic still extended in front of him, Briar felt the death of every plant, but none of what he was looking for. The air grew hotter, and he coughed as the first wave of smoke entered his lungs. It wasn't right that he was dragging Martha further into this. Rosethorn. He couldn't leave.

Briar stopped for a moment, crouching down below the worst of the smoke and gesturing for Martha to do the same. He began pulling medicines out of his pack. He handed one jar of burn salve to Martha, tucking the other into the pouch at his waist instead of the larger kit. Glad the kit was perfectly stocked, he pulled out two small waterskins. He dumped a packet of tea into each. "If you inhale too much smoke, drink some. You'll cough a lot but it'll get the stuff out of your lungs." They couldn't go too much further, and Briar should be able to feel Rosethorn by now. He was just shy of panic. When he started moving again, it wasn't upright. He crouched, down where the smoke wasn't as bad. He would shift to crawling in a minute, and then they would hit a dead end, too many flames. Briar's mind screamed at him not to think about that.

Martha wanted to tell him that plants and people were very different things, but, even if Briar had been listening to her, it wouldn't have made a difference. She didn't understand his magic and she certainly didn't understand the sort of bond that he had with plants. All she could do was stay close and hope to keep him out of trouble.

She dropped down immediately, accepting the tea with gratitude.

"If she's here, we're going to find her," she promised, forced to release his hand in order to crawl but remaining as close as she could.

Once they started moving, he gave in and asked Martha for help. "I can't... tell me when you see flames, not just smoke, alright?" Briar was already seeing them, and he couldn't tell what was real and what wasn't anymore. Even in a jumbled mixup of memory and reality, though, Briar still had faith that he'd know Rosethorn the second he felt her.

"Yes," Briar breathed, coughing after he'd gotten out the word. Martha's promise replaced the desperate chorus of Find them, find them, find them in Briar's head with a slightly calmer mantra of Going to find them.

He withdrew his magic. There were no plants to run it through anymore. Briar would have to find them the old-fashioned way.

She nodded, stifling a cough and tearing off a strip of her shirt to use as a makeshift face mask. It wasn't much, but it would at least keep her from breathing in some of the particles of dust. She handed a second strip to Briar a moment later.

"Here," she said, "Put this over your mouth and nose."

They still had a long way to go.

"Thanks," he repeated, sounding a lot more grateful than he would for just a strip of cloth.

He crawled forward, the floor growing hotter beneath his hands and the smoke searing his eyes. "Rosethorn!" he manages to get out, but he knows that at this point she's elsewhere or she's gone. Nothing looks any different, he's been seeing flames all along, but something in the air tells Briar that this time they might be real. They spread so quickly last time. Nothing has changed, just another night in his nightmares. This time, though, without Rosethorn, and with Martha dragged along.

He waits for confirmation from Martha that the orange light flickering through the smoke in the hall isn't imaginary and tries not to have a breakdown here in the smoke-filled corridor. Rosethorn has to be elsewhere in the temple, then. She'll be headed for the exit he sent Gwen and the other mage toward. He'll meet her there.

[Location: Holo Taxon]

location;

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

[location]

[location]

[location]

[location]

[location]

[location]

[location]

[location]

[location]

[location]

[location]

[location]

[location]

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject