A Fulfilled Threat

[Shakira]

Shakira was coming back to her lair after her speech for the reconstruction of the orphanage. Foolish mortals will believe anything as long as she looks hurt and makes the right promises. She walks through dark tunnels smiling to herself as she thinks of more ways to implicate Max as the culprit of the tragedy.

As she reaches a door at the end of the tunnel, she stops to listen to the screams of agony from her victim. She stops and closes her eyes as if listening to a symphony. She finally pushes the door open and slides in to see two of her demons torturing the foolish woman. They know not to stop the process when she walks into the room. Jenia is tied to a table while one of the demons slowly skins her using only a small knife and claws. The other one is there to regenerate the victim and keep her alive so the torture is neverending.

Shakira moves closer, and Jenia's eyes open wide as she notices her presence. She tries to talk but new pain prevents her from doing so. Shakira's eyes never leave her victim as she screams. She leans closer to Jenia, motioning to her demon to stop for a moment. Jenia pants and cries. "Please...no more. I can't take this any longer."

Shakira runs her fingers through Jenia's sweat drenched hair and whispers, "Oh, but you can and you will. I told you that you would pay for your insolence. You will be mine for as long as I want you to be."

Jenia's eyes open wide as the meaning of those words sink in. She gathers whatever strength is left in her to pull on the ropes that keep her from moving. "You will die for this!" She says through gritted teeth.

Shakira dips her fingertips in a pool of blood. Jenia's blood. She brings the fingers to her lips and tastes the blood, then smears the rest on Jenia's parched lips. "No, I won't," is Shakira's reply. The screaming resumes.

[Shakira]

Jenia lays awake on the table. The torture has stopped but she knows something new will start soon enough. It is always that way. She is kept alive for the pleasure of Shakira and her demons. Just when she's at the end of her strength, when she feels life slipping away from her, they would stop long enough for one of them to heal her. They don't take the pain away, but her body is healed again--while they come up with new, perverse tortures.

How long has she been here? Days? Weeks? She cannot remember. She can no longer remember life without pain. She remembers Shakira's orders as if she was saying the words right now: 'break her but do not kill her.' Then the pain started, sometimes they didn't even touch her to make her feel pain. Sometimes they did, and when they did they tore her skin and broke her bones. Her teeth hurt from gritting them so hard--until they started ripping them out. She has become their plaything. She lives for their amusement. And she is completely helpless. Her cries for help go unheard, her pleas for mercy go unheeded, her prayers unanswered. Tears roll down her cheeks as she screams and writhes in agony, but that doesn't stop them. She tried to resist, but that only increased the punishment.

She hears the door open and her heart sinks as she knows what's coming next. To her surprise a little girl enters the room with Shakira and two demon-torturers. The mere glimpse of the demons make tears well up in her eyes. They stop near the table, and Shakira reaches for the girl and places her before Jenia.

"Jenia, I want you to meet Lily. This beautiful girl is my protege. Both her parents are dead, and I decided to raise her as my own. You might have heard of her father. His name was Athlstan." Shakira pauses after that bit of information.

"You and Lily will be the main guests in tonight's ritual. She as my priestess, you as the offering." Shakira's expression blank of emotion as she explains.

"Please, don't do this. Don't let her do this. She's only a child," Jenia pleads as best she can, her voice hoarse from screaming.

"Correction. She is 'my' child," Shakira smiles.

In the blink of an eye, Jenia notices they are no longer in the dark dungeon. It takes her only a few minutes to realize she's in the Duel of Swords Arena. Shakira, holding a curved dagger, moves closer to the table. She takes Jenia's ring hand and with a swift flick of her wrist, she cuts off the finger that bears her Baronial Ring. Shakira smiles as she removes the ring from the severed finger and places it upon one of her own fingers. "You won't be needing this."

Jenia's eyes bulge at the sudden pain. Two demons then untie Jenia and move her to one of the dueling rings. They hold her on the floor by her ankles and wrists. Thirteen catdemons walk out of the shadows to form a circle around the ring and begin chanting. Shakira gives Lily the curved dagger, and the girl cradles it in her small hands.

Shakira and Lily walk into the ring and stand on either side of Jenia. Shakira lifts her arms and announces, "The time has come to open the portal that will bring forth the World of the Dead and make it one with the living. We bring an offering of flesh and blood to the creatures beyond."

The chanting grows louder as Lily kneels next to Jenia. She brings the knife up above her head and chants along with the other creatures. Lily looks into Jenia's eyes, but what Jenia sees there no one will never know. With frightening skill, Lily slices open Jenia's chest. Jenia's screams fill the room as Lily deftly removes her still-beating heart. The Ward starts doing its work of healing Jenia as best it can. Lily lifts the heart above her head with her small, bloody hands. The chanting reaches a crescendo.

Jenia cannot stop screaming, the effects of the Ward still keeping her alive. Suddenly, Jenia's body stiffens and shakes as a light comes out of her chest and expands above her. The demons move away from the body as the light becomes blinding. A portal opens at the ceiling above Jenia; movement can be seen on the other side of it.

"Come forth! I command you!" Shakira calls.

Ghostly forms slowly come out of the portal and swirl around the room as if testing their freedom. A large form makes its way out of the portal. This ghostly warrior floats triumphantly under the portal. He extends his arms and twin swords appear in his hands, then he crosses his arms before him and bows to Shakira. The portal closes and disappears back into Jenia's body.

The wraith stands and turns to look at Jenia, still in the spell's grip. He points a blade at Jenia, her body starts to shake violently as it floats above the ground. The creature raises his blade and brings it down severing Jenia's head.

Silence. In an instant, all that is left as evidence of the gruesome ritual is Jenia's mangled body in a pool of blood.

[Chris Graziano]

"Yeah, lemme just stop in and pick up some paper work first, Tone,” Chris yelled out to his brother as he stepped back into the Arena that night to sign a letter Rory was sending to the Baron's council concerning the Ward and a particular substance. As he jumped over the third step to the ground, he could already feel something was amiss.

A flick of the lights and a quick scan later revealed the scope of the damage.

"Yo Tone! Come 'ere and look at this."

Tone stepped through the door and glanced over to where Chris was pointing. "Daaaaaayum. I bettah go get our crap"

Chris nodded as Tony made his way back out. He then moved over to survey just who the unfortunate victim of this mess was. When he realized it was Jenia, his problems doubled.

"Shoot, couldn't a been some stupid warlord." His first thought went to the Twelfth ring, and after seeing it missing from her hand, his problems tripled.

Chris scratched the back of his head, trying to think of what to do.

"Better keep this quiet 'till I find that ring," he muttered as Tony came back with the necessary supplies to help Chris clean the mess up.

[Guy Savage]

Guy was sitting at his desk, reviewing news coming off the wire, when the phone rang. He grabbed it up, and dropped it onto his shoulder, holding it there with his head to the side as his hand returned to the keyboard where he was taking notes. "Dueling Zone News, editor's desk."

A muffled voice on the other end said something he was unable to make out. "What? I'm sorry, you will need to speak up."

The voice repeated its message. Guy stopped typing and turned away from the newsfeed. "Would you repeat that..."

Guy scrambled for a pencil and began scribbling notes onto the blotter in the middle of his desk. "It was found this morning you say?" More scribbling.

"Can I get your name and number..." but the voice on the other end vanished as the connection was broken. Guy checked the caller ID. Blocked.

There was no hesitation as Guy tapped the hook and dialed a number. "Get me the bullpen. I need someone sent to the Arena, now!"

[Rory Laurent]

"You stored the body in your sister's office?" Rory asked Chris incredulously, standing just outside Maria Graziano's office in the locker room of the Kitsune Stadium.

"Wha'? It's not like she's even in town," Chris protested innocently as he easily picked the lock on Maria's office door. "This part of the buildin' is practically shut down when TDL's over. Tone and I'll move her to some sort of walk-in fridge tomorrow."

"You could always tell your sister some type of animal died in there," Sartan piped in helpfully.

Rory shook her head at the two, attempting to push from her mind the trouble that would erupt in the Arena if the body of a dead and mutilated Baroness was found in the office of one of the Wrecking Crew. With a heavy sigh, Rory reached a hand out toward the door. Her clammy palm twisted the doorknob, pulling the door open. "Lorelai, be careful," Sartan interrupted somberly. Rory offered a small smile and nod before stepping inward, closing the door behind herself.

After flipping on a light, Rory began to make out the details of the small office. A long desk and expensive leather office chair sat abandoned. Black and white action shots of the Crew dueling were framed along the wall and a framed sonogram sat on the desk. Rory made her way towards the closet behind the desk.
Gathering her courage, she opened the closet door. A crumpled lump was wrapped in heavy burlap lying on the floor of the deep closet. She dropped to a crouch, laying a hand on the rough burlap. She was thankful for the layers of material that covered the body. Chris' description of the mutilated corpse had been enough to make her stomach turn.

Rory let out a slow deep breath, focusing on her last memory of the Baroness. Drawing on a vision did not take a lot of focus. The power was always there in the back of her mind. A wall kept it from being used. When she wished to use it, she simply relaxed the wall and invited the power out of the dark recess of her mind. It was an easy process. The difficulty came afterward. The intense headache, the overwhelming exhaustion, and the lingering wounds would keep her pretty much confined to bed for several days.

All at once the vision overtook her mind. Her fingers tightened around the burlap, gripping the corpse's arm. Her light blue eyes grew wide and then bloodshot. She was no longer seeing the corpse. Instead, she was witnessing Jenia's last moments.

She felt Jenia's pain. It was unlike anything she had ever experienced. It seemed to come from everywhere and nowhere at the same time. The messages of pain being shot to her brain overwhelmed it, causing little else to be processed. Everything was a foggy haze. Nothing was in focus.

Then, suddenly, there was a face. The angelic face of a young beautiful little girl flashed into Rory's vision. She heard Jenia's voice protest to a young child being present in the midst of such violence. A voice answered. Rory could not make out the reply nor even identify if the voice was that of a man or a woman. Her mind was swimming in an intense sea of pain.

The angelic face was flashed before her again. The child plunged a knife into the chest of the young Baroness. Rory felt a sudden surge in the pain as if her chest was being ripped apart. A scream was choked off in her throat by blood, allowing only a strangled gurgle to come forth. The voice was there again. Rory attempted to push past the pain, knowing that she must identify that voice.

Rory was pulled away from the vision and the pain in a brief violent moment. Her body was tossed backwards, her grip on the body lost, as if pushed by some unseen force. She landed hard on the floor. Uncontrollable sobs racked her body.

Blood escaped from a new wound across her neck. A wound that appeared as if someone had tried, yet failed, to remove her head from her shoulders. Blood also dropped from her ring finger -- the same finger that had been removed from Jenia's body. Rory's blood began to pool on the tile of the office floor.

The sound of the thud of her body against the floor had been all that Sartan needed to react. Within a moment, he had thrown open the door and was crouched down beside her. A bewildered Chris had followed.

"It was a little girl. A little girl killed Jenia," Rory managed in a hushed whisper.

[Kitsune]

Despite efforts, the Foundation had never been able to plant bugs in the Arena... Some technicians claimed it was this mysterious 'Ward' that interfered with them, while others expressed the opinion that the Arena and Annex were entirely too well maintained given a staff of two teenage boys and the young man who sometimes cooked in the kitchen.

Monitoring the Twilight Island had proven equally fruitless, as the transmittion of data across dimensional barriers was beyond the Foundation's current technology.

However, the Outback had been a simple matter... after all the Foundation had been instrumental in rebuilding it twice now.

And Kitsune Stadium, "The Home of the Wrecking Crew"? It went without saying that nothing could go on there without someone in the Foundation seeing it on a monitor eventually.

When the body was stashed in the Team Captain's office, it was Mr. Nekkenwande who was notified. At first, he dismissed the situation. Ms. Stone had promised non-interference in the Team's lives. He gave orders that the tape was to be shunted to the secure storage, for possible blackmail use later, and that both security and maintenance would be ordered not to go near that office.

Then came the second report... This time Nekkenwande watched the tape himself. When the woman identified the corpse as well as a clue to the corpse's killer, he knew there would be a problem.

The first tape was recovered from storage and both were sent to Ms. Stone's private storage queue along with an "eyes only" tag. Nekkenwande couldn't put anything more in... he'd been bribed too well. But he couldn't hide this either... too many people knew. Now he had to slip a message out to inform Shakira of the death of the Baroness and the Officials' hiding of the fact.

There was no way he could know that Shakira already knew of Jenia's death, because she was the architect of it.

[Guy Savage]

Guy sat at his desk reviewing the response to his inquiry. Ms. Laurent denied that anything of consequence had happened in the Arena. This was in contradiction to the tip that had been called in the night before.

The reporter sent to investigate the scene came back reporting there was nothing in evidence to support the tip. No mutiliated bodies. No dead Barons.

That was unless the officials had elected to hide the event...

Guy kicked his feet up onto his desk and leaned back in his chair. As clasped his hands behind his head and stared up at the ceiling he considered the odds of a crank tip against the possibility of a cover-up. What was there to hide? Was there something more to this alleged murder?

Guy grabbed his mug and sipped at coffee that had long since gone cold.

His investigative reporter would stay out, checking with other possible sources. Maybe something would turn up to confirm the story one way or the other.

"Chief! Package for ya!"

Guy glanced over at the door, his reverie broken. An intern ambled in and set a medium-sized box on his desk. "Who's it from?"

"Don't know, it doesn't say."

"There's no sender listed?" Guy's interest was piqued. He slid his feet off the desk and sat up.

A quick knife slice opened the box, which held a small ice-cooler. "Now, who would be sending me an ice-cooler?" Guy mused to himself. His reporter's instincts were starting to itch.

Guy lifted the lid off of the cooler and peered inside. The intern gasped, and after a moment turned green and ran from the room. The noises of muffled gagging followed, but Guy didn't hear them. His attention was held by the contents of the cooler.

Inside rested a finger, and what appeared to be a human heart.

[Guy Savage]

Guy walked through the city room reviewing the results of the forensic examination. He shook his head, the news confirmed the anonymous tip.

Guy folded the report and returned to his office. Without waiting to walk around to his chair, he grabbed up the handset of his phone. A quickly dialed extension and he was connected to the print room.

"Start the presses. It looks like we've got a story."