15-Aug-2002
Pet Shop of Horrors: Earthsong
by bonnejeanne and cassiopeia
Title: Earthsong
Author: bonnejeanne (bonnejeanne@yahoo.com) and Cassiopeia (cassiopeia@gundamwing.net)
Archive: http://www.no-assumptions.com/gundamwing/
Category: yaoi, AU
Rating: NC-17
Spoilers: Series
WARNINGS: Lemon/Limey stuff, AU
Disclaimer: Pet Shop of Horrors characters and universe are the property of the copyright owners. Our stuff is ours. No money being made here. As with all our fics, while our goal is to stay as in character as possible, any discrepancies are our mistakes.
Feedback: Any and all comments welcome, be they short or long.
NOTES: This is a sequel to our first fic, "Blood". See Part One for full Notes.
Extra Note: "Lui Yat Siu" - the Laughing Guy, i.e. head baddie, was borrowed from one of my fav Hong Kong movies - Jet Li's 'Last Hero In China' (which is a send up of his other Wong Fei Hung movies)
Earthsong: Part Thirteen
Leon's first glimpse of the room beyond the swiftly opening door gave an impression of a peek onto a movie set from some low-budget historical film. The room was big, the ceiling vaulted, and of all things torches were being used for illumination. The smell of them mingled with the heavy incense that trailed through the air in visible coils like an airborne colony of vipers. It wasn't like the incense he was familiar with from the pet shop. It seemed to crawl over his skin unpleasantly and his senses informed him that it was *wrong* somehow. Dangerous.
They saw figures standing in the room, but no one rushed at them. None of the people there looked like the other thugs they'd been dealing with on the upper floors. There were five men in the room, four of them dressed in robes that suggested priests of some Asian religion. The fifth was Lui. He had changed from street garb into an outfit that looked like it would have suited a historical prince. Red traditional tunic trimmed in gold, a sash around his waist... and a gun firmly gripped in one hand.
The men stood in what resembled a kind of circle, facing inwards, or perhaps the points of a five-pointed star. The four 'priests' were all chanting something and there again, though Leon could not make out the words or understand the language, the sound of them on his ears felt *wrong*.
But the thing that drew the eyes of all three intruders to the scene was not on the ground - it was the large gold cage, suspended by a chain from the high ceiling, inside of which could clearly be seen a small blond boy and a strange lizard.
Leon held back from rushing immediately into the room, held back in the doorway, the sights in front of him keeping him there. Even though it was pretty similar to what he had imagined he would find here, pretty close to what he had thought China would be like, it was hard to think of it as real. Hard to believe it was *not* a movie set.
He moved into the room, and his eyes could not leave the big bird cage holding his brother and Ti-lung. Leon couldn't clearly make out the chain holding up the cage, through the distance and fog of thick incense, but if it were to snap or bend, and they were to fall... it was a long way to the floor.
Leon's eyes finally left the cage, and centered on the man who had put his brother in it in the first place. The man who was in his way, and he got to beat the crap out of anyone who got in his way. No killing was just fine...
The only one not chanting, Lui took the opportunity to address his guests.
"Chang Wu... or should I say Chang Fei Hong?" he said, somehow combining mirth with a sneer. "So you've decided to attempt heroism, and finally try to follow in the footsteps of your illustrious ancestor... how inadequate! Might as well go back to your grannies and tell them to find deep holes to hide in... a new day is here for Hong Kong. A day of order. A day of prosperity... mine." Without waiting for an answer, he snapped something, it sounded like, "Sun!", and one of the four priests stepped away from the circle and confronted Chang, taking on the fighting stance of a kung fu master.
"And our American tourist! Or was that hero? Such an honor to entertain you," Lui called with a laugh.
Chang muttered a curse as the priest engaged with him, another set of sounds adding to the chanting and Lui's laughing... the sounds of two men in earnest and serious battle.
Leon's eyes stayed with Lui, and though he wanted to take him out immediately, when he advanced, it was on another of the priests, not Lui. He figured an unconscious priest could not chant, and that seemed like a good way to call a halt to the ceremony. Leon trusted D to either stay out of dodge or help, though he kept track of the dark-haired man, even when he was not in his direct line of sight.
The man Leon advanced upon seemed to accept his approach as an appropriate move, and stepped out of the circle to face him. He also took on a martial arts stance as if ready and able to accept anything Leon desired to dish out.
Leon didn't adopt any stances. He was in a hurry. He moved forward and aimed any blows that he threw at the priest's head, trying to knock him out. Leon couldn't find it within himself to be annoyed that he couldn't use his gun, but the thought did cross his mind that it would have been much easier... ping, ping, ping. End of story.
The other was quick and knocked Leon back a few times, but when the priest went down, he went down hard. With a quick look, Leon glanced over to see how Chang was doing.
He'd missed the better part of a fight that would have gotten a standing ovation from audiences of any big action film, and only managed to see the third priest taking advantage of Chang's attention being on the opponent in front of him to approach from the rear by stealth, some kind of bladed weapon lifted in his hand to stab the boy in the back.
Leon shouted, "Behind you!" and reached for his gun to take out the assailant, then dropped his hands, remembering the deal. He took a few steps forward, in case the boy didn't react quickly enough to his warning.
Chang dodged but it cost him with the priest in front of him. He managed to curl around the blow to his solar plexus, absorbing some of the force, but it brought him to one knee.
The near-stumble only seemed to make the boy angry and he exploded in what looked like two directions, flying kicks taking out one then the other priest in seconds.
At the same moment, Leon sensed something behind him that jerked his attention as if someone had inaudibly yelled.
Spinning, he saw the fourth priest, chant still pouring from his lips, confronting D. Q-chan, whom Leon could not remember seeing since they left the plane, had appeared from somewhere and was flying around the priest screaming in his high little voice, but the priest ignored him as he faced down the Count.
What D appeared not to realize was that in confronting the man, D had somehow gotten himself between the last priest and Lui himself.
Leon rushed forward, angry for the first time since entering the place. He'd been doing a good job of keeping track of the Count while he fought, but the threat to Chang had distracted him, and he had lost D for moment. And now...
As the priest continued to move, Leon struck him hard, in the back, to get his attention.
He certainly had that, though somehow the man continued to chant even as he staggered and turned to face Leon.
The next sound that Leon heard clawed at his nerves - Lui laughing heartily.
"Have you ever heard of 'shooting fish in a barrel', Detective Orcot?" the villain called, followed by the sound of a cocking pistol. "Or we could coin a new saying... such as shooting birds in a cage..."
The sound of the opening door grabbed the blonde boy's attention, and he braved moving a little closer to the edge of the cage, to get a better look at what was going on below, keeping Ti-lung close to himself the entire time. He watched Count D, the man who wanted to take Ti-lung home, and his brother, sometimes holding his breath, other times letting it out in relief.
Then someone mentioned a cage, and he felt the attention in the room shift upwards, to himself and Ti-lung, and he retreated from the edge once again. Of course, he knew it was really no safer in the center, but there wasn't anything else he could do.
Chris felt a powerful kind of fear, the kind that blocked everything else out of existence, and he could only think of getting away. /Ti-lung... get us out of here./ There was almost a sob in his voice, then he shook his head. The fear was also strong enough to have made him brave. /No... you can get away, though./
The little dragon in his lap had also become aware of what was going on below in his own way. For one, he sensed D's presence the moment the man stepped into the room. The incense and other things had prevented him from feeling it before but once in the room, he knew the Count was there. The chanting made his head hurt, pulled him, made him feel heavy and slow. But the fear in Chris's thoughts penetrated the unnatural lethargy. With a greater effort than anything he had ever tried to do before in his short life, Ti-lung lifted his head. There was danger... to Chris... and to Count D... and even to the big blond man who had been kind to him. He was not some helpless worm. He was the last Earth Dragon of Hong Kong. His ancestors were Powers of the Earth. He would not allow his friends to be hurt by this merely evil human.
Looking up, the one direction he disliked the most when he wasn't on solid ground, he peered at the chain that suspended the cage. His red jewel eyes followed it up to the ceiling, then along the loop to the next pulley, and saw that it eventually led to the ground. It was a nightmare idea.
'Lift me up to the cage, as high as you can,' he told Chris with some effort. 'I will get down there and bite that man. And then they will rescue you.'
Chris followed Ti-lung's gaze with his head, and it took him a minute to figure out what his friend was planning on doing. He still gasped a little when Ti-lung actually said it. /No! You... you didn't like it on the plane, you don't like it up here... that's even worse!/ He held the small dragon closer, tighter, and hung his head, defeated by something. /I don't want to be rescued if you get hurt./
The dragonet nuzzled under Chris's arm. 'I won't be hurt. I can do it. But you have to help, I can't climb all the way up the side of the cage. Hurry!' The urgency in the little dragon's voice throbbed intensely. 'That voice.... is tying me down. Hurry!'
Standing up, Chris walked a little closer to the edge of the cage. He understood that he needed to be fast, but he still paused a second before lifting Ti-lung in the air. He wished he could smile, for his friend, but all he could get out was a piece of his small heart. /You're my friend. That's important./ With that, he lifted Ti-lung high, as high as his short arms would go, and released him to the edge of the golden cage.
As he passed Chris's face, the dragonet feathered a dry, soft forked tongue along his cheek. As Chris held him up against the side of the cage, his feet reached out and closed around the wires, and he leaned close and opened his small jaws as wide as they would go, which was wider than one might guess. *Snap!* and *snap!* - he bit through the side of the cage, pushing a hole in it, and began to scramble up, not graceful but using the strength of talons that could crack granite even now and would be able to form mountain ranges someday. Fighting vertigo and the leaded pull on his limbs, he crawled up the outside of the top of the cage and then, pausing only for a moment to gather himself, began to climb the chain.
Leon stopped what he was doing, as if a switch had been thrown, and while he didn't take his eyes off of the last priest, he made no further moves toward the man.
In an even voice, he asked Lui, "What do you want?" Leon knew how to reason with a man holding a gun. Unfortunately, he'd seldom been successful at the practice.
"Just a little more time," Lui said with a horrible smile, as the last priest continued the chant.
"No," D said, stepping in front of the man. Lui smirked and sighted the gun on the cage. Then before anyone could blink, he shifted his aim to Leon's chest and pulled the trigger.
The *BANG!* of the shot echoed in the room, but was almost drowned by a clap of thunder so close and so confined that it momentarily deafened everyone in the room. Leon saw the flash of the gun, and then saw something move faster than his eyes should have been able to track.
There was a moment of frozen stillness in the room - Leon found his eyes fixed on Count D, who held one hand up, fisted, between the muzzle of the gun and Leon.
Lui stared. D opened his hand. The flesh was darkened as if bruised but on his palm both men on either side of him could clearly see the small pellet of lead.
"Make this stop, Leon," D said quietly.
Leon tried to blink, to clear his eyesight, but he could not. Everything was surreal. And even as he grabbed the final chanting priest by the shoulder and knocked the man out with a single blow, he did not feel like it was him, Leon, doing any of it. It was all too slow, too sharp, and everyone around him looked different. Even D.
Facing Lui, Leon cocked his head a little, as if he were looking at something the other man could not see. Then he spoke, and his voice was grave. "Go away," he said, giving the man a chance.
The villain snarled, and backed up, continued backing up, the muzzle of the gun now fixed on D's chest.
"Can you do that five more times?" the man hissed, no longer smiling or laughing, and proceeded to fire the remaining rounds in quick succession.
Without thinking, Leon moved, white-hot anger pushing him from behind like a hand. The world broke into pieces around him, like colored glass, and he easily honed in on the one he wanted.
He was beside D and pushing him before he could quite believe it, and it was easy to imagine that his footsteps had been nonexistent, so brief they had seemed. Somehow, he had beaten the bullets... mostly. The only sign that his effort had not been completely successful was now lodged in his left arm.
Leon sat down, or fell down (it wasn't clear which) on the cold floor, near D, and his breath was a little labored. When he looked at the other man, it was only to see if he was all right.
D fell around him like a flock of butterflies settling on his body, even as Chang dived from somewhere, knocking Lui to the ground. And no one saw the small shape that scuttled down the long chain with suddenly lighter limbs and dashed across the room, not until Lui, grappling with Chang, suddenly screamed as a pair of sharp, envenomed fangs sank into his calf.
Leon looked up from D at the scream, though the only thing that showed on his face was weariness. He tried to put his arms around D, but his left arm didn't want to, so he stayed still except to swivel his head in the direction of the bird cage. He wondered... if Ti-lung had gotten loose, then... had Chris?
The dragon backed off from the man who now writhed, his body twisting as the venom ripped through it, contorting his face and bringing incoherent sounds from his throat. Turning to Leon, Ti-lung saw the gunshot wound and smelled the blood. It brought a huff from him. Then he turned and snapped, and Leon clearly heard, "Use the chain to bring my friend down!" The order was issued imperiously to Chang, who seemed to understand it, if it left him somewhat bemused. The boy obediently ran to the chain and pulley and began bringing the bird cage slowly down to the floor.
Gentle fingers brushed the skin around Leon's gunshot wound, and then the man holding him bent down and, covered by the fall of his hair, gave the wound one lick.
Within seconds, the pain seemed to dull slightly. D began folding the shawl pulled from his shoulders to use as a bandage.
Watching the Count's actions, Leon colored slightly. He appreciated the reduction in pain, though he'd only began to feel any a few minutes prior, his high pain tolerance born from necessity, most recently fueled by adrenaline. With his other arm, he tried his best to help with the bandage, not so much because he was any good at dressing wounds, but because he didn't want to keep sitting still.
His attention shifted to the lowering bird cage, and he could see Chris inside, pressed against the edge as close as possible to the door. The boy's face was a mixture of emotions. Fear (that was probably closer to terror) in the background, something else in the foreground that Leon could not determine. But the small blue eyes shone, and the detective could tell that the boy had been strong, had been brave.
And Leon was proud and angry at once. It should not have happened, but the boy had not crumbled, the boy could still stand at the edge of the cage, waiting to be let out.
This was his brother... *his*. Leon felt something fall away as the thought came into his mind, and breathing got a little easier.
Leon heard D murmur something in his ear, if not exactly what, and a pair of slender hands with a great deal more strength than they should have had pulled him to his feet.
As Chang opened the cage, the little dragon actually tread on his feet to be there when Chris came out.
Chris burst through the door as soon as it was starting to be opened, so glad to be out of the cage that it almost made him cry. But he wasn't going to be sad, not when Ti-lung's plan had worked! Not when his brother looked at him... like he was... important.
The blonde boy moved down on his knees, down to the floor to grab hold of Ti-lung, and his voice was as bright as he could make it. /It worked!/ He didn't know why his eyes kept blurring. He wasn't sad at all...
'Of course!' the dragon growled, his natural cockiness fully returned by the cessation of that awful chanting, the feeling of Mother back under him, the nearness of D and the smug pleasure of finally getting to Bite That Man. He even let Chris lift him from the ground because the ground was *there* and it was under Chris, so it was all okay.
Chris held tightly to the small dragon, refusing to let any of the liquid spill from his eyes and blinking any that did manage to leak out quickly away. He couldn't quite get his heart to stop beating so fast and even though the bad men were all out of the way, he still felt like they were watching him, ready to jump out from behind something at any minute.
The boy's body leapt a considerable amount when he felt something touch his arm, his shoulder, and he did not turn around immediately to see who or what it was.
"Chris," Leon said, standing behind the child, and it was as if he'd never said the name before. As if he'd just learned what the word meant. He held on to D for support, though he wasn't hurt badly enough to need to, and only let go so he could be at eye-level with his brother.
Using his one uninjured arm, Leon turned the boy firmly until they were facing. "Chris," he repeated, and though his speech was simple, his eyes told another story. 'You were brave, and I'm proud of you. You're my brother, and I love you. I won't let anyone hurt you again.'
The boy's blue eyes were wide and trembled a little, but he did not look away, and they even seemed to get wider as they examined Leon's. He set Ti-lung down for a minute, a reluctance in his arms, and when he reached forward to hug his older brother as hard as he could, the only indication he had that he should have taken a bit more care to avoid Leon's injury was a soft inhalation of breath.
The little dragon huffed silently but his grumpiness at being put down was more on principle than really being upset. He wound himself over Chris's ankles. Looking up at the two brothers, he huffed again but actually felt a bit pleased.
"Late," he growled softly at Leon, but it didn't seem to keep him from being glad to see the detective. Then he quietly went over and nuzzled Count D's ankle.
As Leon went to Chris, the door of the room opened and Blank and Nine both cautiously poked their heads in. Observing the chaos in the room, the grounded cage, the body of Lui on the floor, his eyes starting to blacken around the sockets, there were hastily exchanged words.
Standing next to the small group, Chang cleared his throat. "It's best we get out of here."
Leon smiled a little at that, slowly releasing Chris from his arms. "I was about to say the same thing," he said, rising, his eyes never quite leaving Chris's.
D crouched down and seemed to have a hurried, whispered conference with the little dragon. This involved slight disagreement, a resolution, and a few loving strokes of D's fingers along Ti-lung's back.
Then the dragonet scampered over and confronted Chang. In much the same imperious voice he'd used when ordering him to lower the cage, he growled, "Pick me up. You will take me from this place."
Chang blinked, looked up at D, his expression for once lacking a little confidence. D simply smiled back neutrally. It certainly wasn't feasible to refuse, so he did as ordered, picking the little dragon up carefully, and supporting him against his chest. He then glanced at Leon, his expression still a bit bemused. "Your little brother is okay?"
Leon looked up from where he'd still been staring at the boy, for some reason, unable to take his eyes away. He stared at Chang for a long time before answering. "Yeah," he finally said, a smile in his voice that faded quickly as he met the Chinese boy's eyes. "That's two I owe you."
Chang froze for a moment in surprise and a rather vulnerable look flickered across his features, almost instantly gone. "Come on, let's get out of here," he said instead of answering, and headed for the door where his two subordinates waited.
Leon herded Chris in front of him, then, thinking better of it, grabbed the boy's hand. Chris didn't seem to question the procedure, and prepared to quicken his steps to keep pace with his brother's strides. Before taking off, Leon grabbed hold of D's hand as well, and only then did he move.
The Count had his own ideas however. He gave Leon's hand a gentle squeeze, then stepped in front of him quickly and lifted Chris in his arms before either he or his brother could do anything. The result meant they would all move more quickly.
Ducking his head slightly as if expecting Leon to scold him, the pet shop keeper moved with grace, keeping just in front of the American detective, following Chang and the other two.
Leon had no thoughts of scolding D, watching the Count's actions, in fact, with an almost fond expression. The scene before his eyes changed for a minute, taking on a slightly grainy quality, and he saw another figure with long, dark hair holding a small - always smaller than he wanted - blonde boy.
He shook the memory away and followed, taking one last glance behind him, to make sure no one was following them or moving... those that were still capable of moving, that was.
TBC