(LA Night)The testing

[Jessy Jackson]

The darkness surrounded me. I clung to something, a table. It toppled, slowly and something spilt. A liquid. What? My thoughts were slow and lazy. Then a growl. It grew in volume. A roar. A word. "Beer" Now the words came quicker. Too quickly. Only a few made sense. "My....spilt...worthless....dare."

The words stopped. Out of the darkness came a ball. No, not a ball. A hand. Fist. I cried out. Pain. Again came the fist. Wimper. Pain. Aching. Again fist. Pain. Then nothing.

[Joshua]

The moment the voice rang out, I was alone in the blackness. Which surprised me for all of half a second. Then, about ten feet away, right in front of me, a bright glow began to shine.

It was red in color, and as I took a good look at it, I realized that there were cracks forming in the black ground allowing the red, a familiar red glow to shine forth.

"I've got a bad feeling about this," I mumbled, checking on my weapons, and pleased to find I had the minimum amount on my person. And considering I was being trained by the Perfect Warrior, fought demons and vampires in LA of all places, the minimum is a lot more than you would think.

I turned around and started running away from the red glow, and just in time too as a horrible cracking and tearing sound complimented with an explosion came from the cracks. Increasing my speed, I took a small glance behind me to see what was happening, and what I saw urged me to move even faster!

That crack in the ground was turning into a volcano!

More red glowing cracks were expanding in all directions from it, and lava was spewing forth like red hot acid.

Sooner than I expected, I came to what must have been the wall of this place, and without hesitation, leaped up onto it, drawing a couple daggers to use to drive into the wall and use as hand holds. It worked just in time too as portions of the laval filled floor began to fall away between cracks, revealing a maddening sight of a massive ocean of lava right beneath the floor.

"JOSH!!" Mai's voice screamed out, and instantly I saw her, trapped on an 'island' in the ocean of lava, obviously scared and with no way out. Either this was another test, which didn't matter either way, or her powers were still on the fritz and she couldn't teleport or leap off of it.

There was however, a very small chain of footholds leading from my position to Mais, but they would not last long, and once there, both of us could be trapped.

"I hate tests," I muttered as I leaped to the first stone and didn't hesitate in leaping to the second until I was on my way to my Mai.

[belledraco]

(((Kinda wish I could join this, but I don't think I can... Really good so far! Very exciting. I'm afraid of volcanos. )))

[Maya]

I was in... the dojo? this cant be good, i thought. I crept through the front room to the door- it was locked. So i held up my hand to magicakly open it- and the damned thing flew off its hinges. This is DEFINITELY not good. I verified. I stepped out... and i was back in the dojo, down near the vaults.
"ok..." I murmured. I continued through, calling out,
"Josh? Doc? ANyone!?"
Suddenly i heard scuffling, and then a figure raushed out of the next passage, "Doc?" I cried. He turned, eyes wide, but kept backing up... until he froze.
"Mai?" He said with a frown, "You... are you... back?"
It was now that i noticed his blood stained clothes, and that his arm was held oddly,
"What?" I said, "Goddess, Doc, what happened?"
"You dont remember?"
"Remember what? I just got here!"
His frown deepened, and he led me back to the room he had bolted from. As i passed the threshold i felt a surge of energy... some sort of barrier? I gasped- Chained to the walls were several of my friends- Charlie, Del, Jessy... and Josh- he looked barely conscious,
"Oh goddess!" I cried, rushing to him. He flinched. "Josh?" I said. "Oh goddess... who did this?"
Josh looked up at me through one eye, as the other was swollen closed- still i could see his frown.
"Of course she could be pretending..." Doc said, "But... i dont think she remembers."
"Remember what!?" I cried, "Please, tell me! WHo did this!?"
"You." Came Josh's pained reply.

[Jackson ''Doc'' Ellison]

"You look surprised," the other me said.

"More impressed," I said. "I didn't expect them to go to these lengths, whoever 'they' are. So, I presume you're Francois?"

"Oui," he said, dropping Charlottes limp form. that's when I saw the blood. "She was so much fun before she died. Just thought you'd want to know."

"I'll be sure to write that on your tombe stone," I growled, dropping into a fighting stance. "I'm not afraid of you."

"But you are, mon brave," Francoi said. "You're afraid of what I could do," lights came on revealing a pile of bodies and dust behind him.

"Oh God," I breathed, Maya's cold eyes staring at me. "You son of a BITCH!" I charged, no longer caring, one thought on my mind.

He would suffer.

(((Obviously not the real gang.)))

[Cervil]

I woke up to the red earth under my face. I got up, looked around and was shocked at what I saw.

I was in the city, everything was burning. I looked around, noticing all the dead people around, burnt cars, and collapsed building and infestructure.

[glow=red,2,300]We've gone so far, look at what we've achieved! Let us continue, we only have another half of the world left![/glow] Said a voice in my head, a very familiar voice.

"NO!" I said out loud, "It can't be you!"

[glow=red,2,300]What is wrong Yier-Vill? This is what you wanted is it not? Ultimate power? You now have it! Look at the mangled bodies of the worthless humans and other beings that you so easily slayed![/glow]

'What?' I thought, looking around. When I looked harder, I saw, over by a nearby car, the burnt corpse of TPot, hanging off a lamp post was a burnt corpse of Doc, and next to a ruined building, with a pole straight through her heart, and also burnt, was the Jessy's corpse.

[glow=red,2,300]Oh, and what fun it was to hear their pained screams! Come on, we only have a few to go, they cannot run forever, we can find them! Together, we will defeat everything and everyone! Nothing will stand in our way![/glow]

"NO!" I screamed, "I won't let you kill any others! I won't!"

[glow=red,2,300]What do you mean me? This was all your doing, testing your new strength.[/glow]

'I couldn't 'ave, no way could this be my doing!' I thought.

"But it is! And you will pay!" I turned to see Zeroc, anger in his eyes, dark magic surrounded him.

Standing beside him was Maya, she also had a vengeful look on her face. Joshua was standing nearby, critically injured. Blood was pouring freely out of his mouth, he was close to death.

"You won't get away with this Cervil! You won't" Came the hateful voice of Maya.

[glow=red,2,300]Come on, you can defeat them, It will be easy! You cannot loose, look at what you did to Josh, in one blast too! They do not stand a chance![/glow]

[Maya]

"Me?" I gasped. The word had hurt like a slap to my face. I shook my head, "No... no! I wouldn't... why? No..."
"Yes." Del said weakly. "You... power..."
"What?" I stood again, looking at all of them, shaking my head, "No... No, i'm getting you out of here." I went to Josh again, rasing my hand to the lock to magickally brake it.
"NO!" Doc cried, but i had already done it. The magic felt wierd, pulsating- strong. I frowned. The lock was broken and Josh was free. He frowned at me.
"What, Doc?" I asked, "I dont understand."
[Sure you do.] said a voice in my mind... my voice? [you have more power than them. you dont need them]
"Of course i do!" I snapped. They all looked at me, startled. Doc shoom his head,
"Fight it." He said.
"FIght... what?" I gasped.
"Dont let it control you! The power is yours, you can control it!"
[Dont listen to that whelp- he is nothing compared to you- prove it!]
"What?"
[Do it. GO on! Do it!]
"Do what?"
[Kill him!]
"What!?"
[you know you can! DO it!]
I was holding my head in my hands. I cried,
"NO!" ANd felt the frustrated energy flow from me. I heard a cry, and a sickening slam. I raised my head, to see that Joshua was now unconscious, and Doc- Doc had been thrown against the wall, blood trickling down his face. "No!" I gasped. I ran to him, desperately feeling for a pulse, "Oh goddess no!" I wailed, "No, no..."
[Told you] Said the voice.
I shook my head. My eyes wide, i ran back to Josh, gasping his name as i checked his vitals. A faint pulse beat in his neck, "Josh talk to me- please!" I sobbed. His eyes flickered open and he managed to look up at my tear-stained face.
"Fight it, Mai..." he managed, "Please, please fight it..."
Then his eyes rolled up and the pulsing stopped.

[Pepper]

Where was I. I was still in the blackness but where was everyone. Then I remembered. They had gone on without me. Knowing what was going to follow I decided to skip the test. I opened a portal to the finishing room. " Penelty" I heard the voice boom and I was standing in a room with evryone else.....only thing was they were all trying to kill me.

[Azoth (Kyler)]

(((This might be a little wierd... but, I can't come up with anything)))

I was standing at the Spot... as usual there were people dancing, the group were all there, drinking, talking... but there was something wrong.

I felt the bar counter, then picked up my drink, and drank some... the bitter taste hit my tongue.

Hang on! I could *feel* the bar? I could *taste* the drink? This wasn't right!

I looked down at myelf, I had skin... but there was something else, something that I hadn't noticed until now, someone was sitting next to me, and had her arm around me... and mine around her...

AREDHEL! I looked up, and was shocked! I fell to the floor, and hit my head, and it hurt! But I was more shocked than anything...

Everyone in the group laughed at me, like it was a joke, or something...

"You're so funny!" Doc laughed out.

"You ALWAYS cheer us up!" Jessy exclaimed.

"Yep!" Aredhel said cheerfully, "that's my boy!"

'What? What is going onn here?' I thought, confused and shocked.

[Jackson ''Doc'' Ellison]

He blocked every shot, countered every move, but I kept going, kept fighting. I couldn't give up, not after hed done.

"It keeps goin' through you're mind, don' it, mon ami?" He taunted. "'Ow it's ''im', 'what 'e did'. I remember dat."

"What the hell are you talking about?" I demanded. Francois grinned at me evilly.

"I'm not an image, mon ami," he said, stepping back. "I am you're future."

"What?"

(((Twisty!)))

[Pepper]

"Whoa, back off guys" I said hurridly when they started coming towards me.
"Why, so you can kill someone else I care about?" Taunted Maya. "What" I said in confusion. Then I saw who wasn't there...Jessy "Oh Goddess" I whispered, suddenly realising what was happening. Touching my forhead I felt wrinkles and sure enough when I ran my tounge around my mouth I felt two sharp pointy.....fangs. I was a vampire.
"I'll never forget what you did to her" snarled Doc as he lunged at me.

[Jessy Jackson]

"Did you really think you could escape me, Jessica? You thought your friends would protect you?" The words made more sense now. "No, they handed you straight over. You were useless, a child. It wasn't as if you were unique. No, they had other freaks like you. Better freaks. So, now you are with me. You're friends, Ha! Freinds. They don't care, to them you are just a fading memory. Now, you're mine. But you're gonna work hard. No more school, you stuck up cow. Work.

[Maya]

"Josh?" I gasped, "Josh no! No..." tears flowed freely as i shook him, "Oh goddess, Josh please wake up! I cant lose you! Not again... no! Please, oh goddess, no..." As i broke down, i felt the anger at myself and at the world creeping in- i felt the power rising.
"He told you to fight it..." I heard Del's weak voice. I looked over at her,
"Why is this happening?"
"Because you werent strong enough." She said harshly.
"But i didn't know..." I began
"His last wish..." Del gasped. I nodded, still feeling the power welling up- it was crackling through my finger tips. I looked at Del with scared eyes,
"Fight it!" She ordered with all the strength she could muster. I was shivering with it, feeling it fill every part of me- it made me feel so strong...
"I cant!" I gasped in terror. "I cant! oh goddess its too strong!"
"Fight...." Del breathed.
"Del?" I cried, "Oh goddess...."

[Joshua]

It was literal childs play to get to the 'island' where Mai, if it really was Mai or not, again didn't matter, was. That is if a child could leap over twenty feet through the air and land with pinpoint accuracy on a one foot by half a foot stone in an ocean of molten lava and then leap off of it before their mere weight caused the stone to sink beneath the lava and melt away.

I was with Mai on the ever-shrinking 'island' within a minute and that's when my primary dilemma reared it's ugly head.

"Great, much as I appreciate the effort," Mai was saying, "how the freaking Hellmouth are we supposed to get out of here? Unless you've got some kind of spell . . ."

"Not a Time Wizard anymore Mai," I explained, looking all around us as our land continued to shrink. There were no footholds within sight, however, the cliff which I had been on when the lava ocean appeared was still there, and easily visible.

"Avalon taught me a trick," I told Mai as I took off my shoes, "which unfortunately is just not going to work in this case, but I think I can do something similar."

"What?" she asked, nervous and hopeful at the same time.

"Give me your shoes, and please don't argue, we are running out of time!" we had less than ten feet of land left around us, and the shrinking was going faster than ever.

Immediately she took off her boots and handed them to me. Taking out the shoe strings, I physically tied one pair to each of my feet, then I grabbed Mai and put her on my back. When our land was on the verge of becoming less than the stepping stones, I looked back at her over my shoulder and whispered with a cocky grin on my face, "Hold on tight."

Then I leaped as absolutely high and as far as I possibly could with my retrained muscles. That was half the distance right there. But that first leap was against solid ground.

We were hurtling straight for the lava and Mai screamed in terror, and I certainly didn't blame her. Even a Slayer was allowed to scream when falling uncontrolled and with little help of rescue towards an ocean of lava.

Then, the moment before we would have fallen in, I leaped again, and from the surface tension of the molten rock, my feet protected by a double layer of boots, for a few moments at least, it was enough to get me a few more feet along through the air, and then I did it again, leaping with my other leg, getting us another few feet.

I managed to half our distance from the cliff again before I relized my feet were becoming maybe too warm and realized that on the next jump, no matter what, the protection would be gone, and there was very little I could do about it.

So I did what I could, and the very next leap, jumped with all the power of both my feet, sending us high into the air again. Instantly I realized that we were not going to make it. If only one of us had been doing it, if I had left Mai, I probably could have made it. Oh well.

You know, I do this enough that I think eventually this girl is going to kill me herself, and everybody else is going to start calling me 'Buffy' or something.

Grabbing Mai's arms from around my neck, I started flipping us end over in in mid-air, and she was shouting at me, "Joshua! What do you think you're doing?!"

"Saving your life. I . . . I'm sorry, again, my Mai," I told her, and then on the next rotation, used every bit of my strength to send her flying towards the top of my cliff.

Newton's 2nd Law, opposite reaction. Mai would now make it to the cliff, propelled by the energy of my throwing her. But as a result, I was sort of forced in the opposite direction. Not enough to send me flying out back to the middle of the lava, but certainly enough to keep me from even getting close to the cliff.

"NOOOOO!" she screamed as she made it to the cliff and skidded a little when she landed.

I closed my eyes and reached out through that special connection I seemed to have with my Mai, one that could breech dimensions, time, and an entire continent even.

<I love you Mai. Live. Live for me . . . and for . . .> I trailed off as I was struck by inspiration.

My eyes snapped open and I began rotating my body very quickly around my axis. Then I spread my legs out like a helicopter and angled down towards the cliff.

Something of a minor miracle actually gave me the strength suddenly, like an infusion of energy that I could have sworn came from Mai herself, but I was too distracted to confirm, to pull what I was trying off. I managed to 'hover' my way further along through the air, but there was no way I would make the top of the cliff.

But maybe the bottom of it . . .

TBC!!!! (((Dunh-dunh-DDUUUUUUUNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNN!)))

(((Oh, PS to Maya: that's a subtle hint to make that mental message part of your own test.)))

[Jackson ''Doc'' Ellison]

"No," I whispered. My rage was gone, replaced by shock. "It couldn't... I'd never..."

"But it is, mon brave," Francois sneered. "Karen and Grace, dey pushed you too far. Grace's idea, she'd planned it for Maya, but Karen adjusted. She organised Jessy's death."

"Jessy...?"

"After dat, well, I don't think I need to tell you," he chuckled. "I t'ink you can guess. You went after dem, killed Karen, den de others got in de way. No one gets in my way."

"So you killed them," I said listlessly. Francois looked at me.

"Looks like I got de wrong Doc," he said. "Oh well. I'll just...

(Third person)
The test ended, mysterious figures standing over Doc's form.

"This is unexpected."

"We knew this was possible."

"But we thought he was stronger than this."

"No. You thought that. I knew this was dangerous. I told you the problems he had after his first loves death, that led him to becoming Francois in the first place. I warned you you could break him."

"So what now?"

"We need to show him his friends still live, and that they need him."

"But how?"

"You used the wrong fear. That's the rod to break him. What you need is a cattle prod."

(Doc's POV)
It was quiet at first, dark. Had I failed? Probably, but I didn't care. At least they were safe. Charlotte, my sweet girl, I'm so sorry.

Then it began. A whimper in the darkness.

"Jessy?"

Then more, each one with a name, crying for help. My friends, my family, they still lived.

They lived!

"Guys," it was like my entire body energised. I looked around the dark space. No, room. A small room, like the container.

"Not again," I whipsered, searching for an exit as I recognised once more that blasted container. Only this time, it wasn't sis. It was Jessy. "I will not fail again!"

(((Okay, that was weird. That is okay, right, T?)))