Your whole body shivers at that thought, frissons of fear stretching the small hairs on your neck away from your body. Xanadu has since become such an ironic naming--far more so than you originally intended. Writ large upon this stage of your folly; that you dared to love again, and in loving lost all you thought your self to be.

Vast tracts of stone surround you now, you three. Under the blue sky you stand; you, your lover, and this new-sprung nemesis; held motionless beneath the passing seconds, a pregnant tableau. Torn threads of glittering light fall softly over you, and you have never before felt such a lack of hope as assails you now as he falls feather-light before your feet and she swings the muzzle of her gun to follow.

Such pain inside you now, where hope had so briefly resided. Reaping what you sow.... Quicksilver talons scratch their insidious way deep inside you to close about your heart, leaving in their wake the faintly metallic taste of ashen fear. Pulsing through your body, adrenaline beats in your ears and cries urgent through your brain, demanding movement, demanding action, demanding impossibilities. Only a miracle can save the both of you now, and you are fresh out of stock.

Naught can save you now; you know, in the furtherest reaches of your being, that you cannot reach neither her nor him in time, no matter how you try; she will shoot and you will watch the greedy energy slink toward him, and know that nothing, nothing at all, no effort on your part will stretch your self far enough to intercept the deadly stream before it reaches him. Minutes have passed, hours even, since the knowledge of doom -- his, and thereby yours -- wormed its torturous way inside the pathways of your brain; or is it merely that time plays his endless tricks upon you once again and you have stood here mere seconds? Light plays dreadful rays over the valley you stand in, clearly illuminating this nightmare you cannot deny, and as your body at last begins to move you cannot help but challenge this one remaining sliver of hope inside you now.

Keening wails fill the air, and you cannot tell if it is she or you that makes them. Just let you reach him, you pray, and the desperation behind your rusty prayer catches you off-guard and lends speed to your straining body. Inside you now, your lungs gulp bursts of air and push you forward, legs pumping, arms reaching, blood pulsing through you as you expend all your energy in a futile attempt to halt the inevitable. Hope wells up, one last burst as you near his huddled form, and the snarl stretching your face is feral as you had not known you could be.

Grim thoughts invade your mind as he writhes before you, and the insane smile on her face ignites a slow-burning anger far inside your soul. Feral snarls escape from between your lips, and she lifts her gaze to you for one burning second, surprise clear beneath the hatred in her eyes. Easily you read the thoughts behind her movements; shock, annoyance, a little fear. Driven by a hatred beyond your ken, she trains the zat now on you, and if you could somehow cross the few feet left between you and your lover before she shoots, at least then you will die together, and maybe, just maybe, you could block her aim and buy your beloved the time he needs to recover from his wounding and take her down.

Clearly luck is not with you now. Bitter pain races along your nerves, and the utter waste of this death impresses deep upon you; that you should die here, you and he, cut down by this threat you had neither of you recognised until she sent one well-placed shot into Jack's unprotected back.

And now--now he is lying at your feet, and this child-woman before you both is levelling her weapon at him, her finger tightening on the trigger, and you cannot do anything more than watch, helpless, as she takes from you the one thing you cannot any longer bear to lose....