Ancient Rome (Or Thereabouts), Sunday Fandom Time
It was touching, really, that Amarice and Joxer had risked so much to retrieve their bodies with the intention of returning them to Greece for burial, and nothing short of impossible that Eli had managed to bring them back, but none of that really seemed to matter right now. Gabrielle and Xena were still too shellshocked from the trauma of their deaths and resurrections to be able to feel any of that yet.
Xena seemed more out of it than Gabrielle did, so Gabrielle was grateful for the hot soup that Joxer brought them, and to see that Amarice had managed to retrieve the broken pieces of Xena's chakram, but even more grateful when Eli got the two of them to stop asking questions and just give her and Xena some time.
"We're back," Gabrielle murmured, still in that vague, detached way. "Together?"
Xena leaned into her slightly. "Always."
Yeah, that felt just about right. "Are you okay?"
"Yeah, just a little stiff," Xena replied, hopping down from the slab (some kind of altar, she guessed) and that was the point at which Gabrielle finally realized that whatever power had brought them back from the dead had healed their wounds, too. That was strange; that brought some of the detachment back. The feel of the iron spikes being driven through her hands and feet had been too vivid for all evidence of those wounds to just be gone. "I feel like I've misplaced something."
"Your clothes? Yeah, I think we'll need to find a market," Gabrielle suggested lightly, reaching for the old humor that used to characterize their conversations, but faltering when she saw Xena attempt to put the two halves of the chakram together like puzzle pieces. "Xena, I don't know how we're going to repair that. It's not like you can just take it to a blacksmith."
She didn't know what kind of history was behind the chakram, but she knew it was unique, and possibly mystical in origin, a gift from Ares back in Xena's warlord days. It was impossible for anyone but Xena to wield (although Gabrielle suspected someone like Jaina Solo could probably manage), and as much a part of her as --
"What, this old thing Amarice gave me? What is this, anyway?"
. . . uh oh.
***
As if it wasn't concerning enough that Xena couldn't remember her chakram, things got worse once they made the trek to the nearest village market with Amarice and Joxer in search of new clothes and weapons.
Gabrielle, for her part, had picked out something leather, with intricate braided craftwork that reminded her of her Amazons, and a pair of sturdy boots. It felt right, more so than the outfit she'd picked up in India, and she'd need to find some kind of weapon to go with it, but while she was perusing the blacksmith's stalls she came across a pair of matched daggers that she thought Xena might like. She recognized them as sai; one of Shunsui's classes a few terms ago had piqued her interest in defensive use of weaponry, and she'd done a little reading. In theory, she suspected, she might know how to use these herself.
But she bought them, and went over to find Xena to see what she thought -- and found the Warrior Princess in a pair of thoroughly impractical sandals and a delicate, flowing gown. She didn't even seem interested in the sai, which had Gabrielle exchanging concerned looks with Amarice.
"They're not for her," Amarice said slowly. "They're for you."
"Me? Why?" Was that supposed to be a joke? Had Xena gotten a thousand times more subtle about humor in between dying and coming back this time?
"Well," Joxer tried, "what's a warrior without a weapon?"
"Oooh! Is that a riddle? I love riddles," Xena said brightly, chewing on a fingernail in thought. "Lemme see."
Definitely something wrong here; Joxer joined in on the worried-look-exchanging now.
"What is a warrior without a weapon?" Xena went on out loud, apparently unaware that they were in any way serious.
"Easy pickings," came a rough, cocky voice.
Oh. A dozen armed soldiers, including one wearing some kind of grotesque breastplate and helmet that were probably meant to be intimidating. Actually, it was working.
Well, never mind giving the sai to Xena now. And never mind any previous misgivings about fighting; Gabrielle jumped right into it, and realized she'd really missed this. What was more, the sai felt right in her hands, as did the flow of combat. Had it always been instinctive to her? And why had it never been this effortless before now? Maybe now that she'd finally embraced that part of herself . . .
There'd be time to wonder about it later. Now they had to deal with getting Xena to safety, because she didn't even raise a hand to defend herself when one of the soldiers knocked her down with the pommel of his sword. Even stranger, it was Gabrielle who had to leap in to rescue her.
They finally managed to escape, thanks to a timely if clumsy tackle from Joxer that sent half a dozen soldiers falling down like dominoes and gave Gabrielle and Amarice enough time to dispatch the rest, and hurried back up to the abandoned temple on the mountain where they'd been hiding out.
Once there they filled Eli in on the fight, and their concerns that something was wrong with Xena. That got fairly obvious fairly fast: when they reminded her that she usually pulverized guys like that, she wanted to know why they even thought she would. She didn't even remember fighting Alti, or Callisto. Upon hearing that the soldiers had mentioned a Kal who was after Xena, Eli got even more concerned.
"Kal's the god of war in these parts," he said, and that was odd. Gabrielle had never heard of a god of war named Kal, not even in any of the texts she'd read in Fandom. "If there's a bigger picture, you can bet he's part of it."
He had a friend named Caleb, he said, a scholar who might be able to help them.
"How's a guy who studies old scrolls supposed to help us fight a god?" Amarice grumbled in typical fashion.
Gabrielle left Eli to try to explain the value of knowledge to her; they'd need to pick up the pace, they still ran the risk of running into Roman soldiers, and out of everyone here she was the most suited to take point.
How had that happened?
***
They did have to stop and make camp eventually, and Gabrielle tried to fill the time by telling Xena stories about her past battles in hopes that something might jog her memory. So far nothing had worked; Xena didn't remember any of it, and couldn't understand why she had to fight all those battles instead of pursuing a more peaceful solution.
. . . it was really strange being on this side of the question now. Not just strange; it felt wrong, and Gabrielle felt bad for anyone who'd had to deal with her answers in class for the last several months.
It was ironic, as she told Eli after he'd sent Xena to accompany Amarice on a hunting expedition, telling her she was an excellent tracker. (Amarice was less than pleased; seeing Xena like this was upsetting her so much that she was more petulant and touchy than usual.) She'd always wanted to see Xena rid of her dark side, but now, without it, she seemed off balance.
And, as they discovered several hours later when the hunters didn't return and Gabrielle had to go after them to find Amarice unconscious and alone, in deep trouble.
"Kal got her," Amarice admitted sullenly, with a look on her face like a child who knew she'd disappointed her parents immensely. "Him and his main muscle threatened to kill me unless she went with them, and . . ."
And the way Xena was acting now, she'd probably gone along willingly, and Amarice had gotten knocked out trying to stop her.
Joxer looked around helplessly. "Went where?"
Gabrielle glanced down, saw the faint impressions of boot treads in the bent blades of grass, followed the trail the way Xena had taught her. "This way. Come on."
Wasn't it usually Gabrielle who got kidnapped, and Xena who had to do the rescuing? This was going to be new.
***
Amarice insisted they had to hurry, Kal's men were probably killing Xena right now, and Eli kept reassuring her that they needed Xena alive for something.
Gabrielle ignored them all; she was too busy putting together a plan to get into Kal's stronghold.
Not that they needed it -- Xena popped out of the bushes at them, unharmed but still "not normal," as Amarice kept muttering, and Gabrielle might smack her for that choice of words soon. Someone had freed her, apparently, which -- well. That was interesting. Most likely a god, if it had been that effortless, and two gods working at cross purposes? This was definitely not going to be easy.
By the time they got to Eli's friend Caleb's place -- a rather luxurious cliffside dwelling equipped with a full library and a hot tub, which made Gabrielle wonder about monks -- there was no sign of Caleb himself.
"Something's wrong. Caleb's always here," Eli said, sounding a touch frantic.
"Maybe there's a cook, or . . . ?" Gabrielle began to suggest, but trailed off when he shook his head.
"No, Caleb always liked doing things for himself. He was a real ascetic." With a hot tub in his house, apparently. Eli smiled slightly. "We always called him the purest monk in his order."
Xena inhaled sharply. "Oh, no."
Well, that got Gabrielle's attention immediately. "What?"
"Something Kal said," she replied, her gaze flicking toward Eli. "Eli, I'm so sorry."
It was the most vehement Gabrielle had ever seen him: he immediately started pulling books and scrolls down off the shelves, insisting that there had to be something there that they could use. (It was a little reminiscent of Fandom invasions, yes.) The rest of them should get some rest, he insisted, since they'd been on the run for days. Really, they were too exhausted and sore to argue.
***
Things got more complex -- and irritating -- yet when Gabrielle went looking for Xena and found her in the hot tub. With Ares lurking just outside, talking to her.
. . . that was not a flare of jealousy. Just indignation. Really.
"Ares," she spat, glaring at him.
Xena looked at her curiously. "Oh, you know each other?" she asked as Ares smirked at Gabrielle.
"Your hair's shorter, but you're still the same --" Gabrielle bit down on the selection of choice invective she wanted to use. "Only you would take advantage of Xena when she's like this."
"Like this? What do you mean?" Ares asked coolly. "Because she can't remember things that make her mad? Things that fill her with hate? Well -- when did you become so hard?"
Gabrielle had no answer for that beyond a stunned, speechless look. Ares spread his hands, gave her one last deliberate smirk, and vanished.
***
Ares's involvement became a lot more clear once Gabrielle informed Eli about his visit. According to what Eli had found in Caleb's scrolls, Kal was after something called the chakram of light: Ares had stolen its counterpart years ago, and that was the one Xena had used for so long until it broke in the prison courtyard.
Where the chakram of light was so unique was that it had the power to kill gods. No wonder both Kal and Ares were after it.
No wonder they were after Xena, too, and no wonder Caleb was dead -- only the purest soul could hope to remove it from the altar and live.
Xena wanted to know why they couldn't just leave the gods to their warring and walk away, and Gabrielle still felt very, very strange trying to convince her that they needed to go into this fight and stop them, or they'd never stop. It didn't feel wrong; she actually genuinely believed it. It was just that explaining it to Xena was bizarre.
***
Good thing Gabrielle had come up with that plan; it looked like they were going to need it after all. Also a good thing: Amarice was about a thousand times more likely to listen to her now, and didn't even argue when she laid out what she wanted to do.
The entire plan -- drawn from the tactics Xena had taught her -- hinged on her and Amarice infiltrating Kal's stronghold from above. They'd string up a couple of ropes to the parapets, climb up, take out the guards, then drop into the courtyard, counting on the element of surprise to give them the upper hand.
In practice, that plan worked out even better than anticipated: Kal's soldiers had a stock of Greek fire stashed in plain sight in the courtyard, so when Amarice pulled off her part of the distraction perfectly by "falling" from her rope right into the middle of a cluster of guards, it gave Gabrielle the perfect opportunity to grab a torch and one of the bombs.
"Hey, guys," she called, and waited for them to turn her way before grinning ferally, touching the wick to the flame, and watching them panic.
She took a particular glee in hurling one after another, she and Amarice causing as much chaos as they could before they flung the gates open to let Xena, Eli, and Joxer in. Then, it was up to them to hold off the soldiers until Xena could run into the temple, grab the chakram of light, and -- assuming it didn't torch her too -- take out Kal and Ares.
Except for the part where Xena came rushing back out of the temple with the chakram of light in hand, Kal and Ares started to back off, and Xena dropped the chakram, claiming she couldn't kill.
That had not been in the plan.
***
Well, being barricaded into a temple with soldiers trying to knock down the doors was familiar enough, too, and once again it was Gabrielle who had to step up to take Xena's usual role of directing people to bar the doors, block off all potential entrances, and then try desperately to think of a new plan.
Except -- how had Amarice managed to get hold of the chakram of light? If only the purest person could touch it --
"Wait a second," Eli blurted out, from where he was bent over a scroll spread out on the altar. "It says here that once it's off the altar anyone can touch it."
Gabrielle yelped, "You couldn't have read that part before?"
That seemed like a minor concern, though, compared to oh, say, being barricaded in a temple while two gods were after them.
"Bring that here," Eli instructed Amarice, gesturing to the chakram. "There's gotta be something I'm missing."
There was: fusing the two chakrams would neutralize the power to kill gods, and render it useless to Kal and Ares.
It just would have been nice if they'd gotten a chance to do that before Kal's guards broke down the door. So once again it meant Gabrielle and Amarice (and Joxer, such as it was) had to fight, and buy Xena and Eli the time they needed.
Not before Kal made the mistake of threatening Xena, though, and Xena reacted instinctively by slicing him open with the chakram of light.
Well. That explained why he didn't show up in any of the texts Gabrielle had read.
Gabrielle had lost track of how long she'd been at this -- not even flinching when she used her sai to disarm one soldier and fling his sword point-first into another's chest -- when she heard the familiar whistling sound of the chakram ricocheting overhead from . . . two directions?
And there was Xena's war cry, and the familiar and welcome old maelstrom of blows that wiped the floor with whatever soldiers were left standing in no time flat; Gabrielle wheeled just in time to see Xena standing in front of Ares, the chakram a bare inch from his face.
It looked different: the blade was smooth now, no jeweled pattern around its edges, and there was a handle bisecting the center -- it looked like the yin-yang symbol she'd seen in some of the books she'd read, Gabrielle realized. And that was fitting, somehow: for the chakram, and for Xena.
And for herself, she supposed.
"Neutralizing the chakram. Why'd you do it?" Ares asked. "You had the power to kill us all.
"No one deserves that power, Ares," Xena replied, sounding like herself again, which was an immense relief. "Least of all me."
"Smart move," he conceded, grudgingly. "Brought you back."
She curled one side of her mouth up in a fierce grin that Gabrielle had really, really missed the past few days. "With a vengeance."
Ares started to back off, but -- typically -- couldn't leave without some kind of swagger to cover up the fact that he hadn't gotten what he was after. "I'll catch you around the Acropolis," he drawled just before vanishing.
***
Eli chose to stay behind; with Caleb gone, he felt that someone should carry on that work, and besides, he felt like Caleb's scrolls would teach him a lot. Gabrielle was used to leaving friends behind, but as always she refused to call it goodbye.
She and Xena trailed behind, letting Amarice and Joxer lead the way (or really, just bicker out of earshot), as they set out back for Greece.
"It feels good to be going home," Gabrielle remarked.
"Going home in more ways than one. Back to Fandom for you?" Xena asked, and Gabrielle nodded. "Think I'll stop in and see Mom. After all this, a little down time seems like just the thing, huh?"
Gabrielle chuckled. "It really does."
"You're going to have a lot to explain to your friends, you know," Xena said, indicating Gabrielle's clothes and the sai tucked into her boot laces.
"Yeah. I know." She'd probably get a lot of grief for her sudden about-face, she knew, but Gabrielle would just deal with that when it happened.
Xena put a hand on her shoulder and squeezed. "Thanks, by the way."
"For what?"
"For pointing the way back to my rotten old self."
Gabrielle laughed and slung an arm around her waist. "Yeah, well, it's a pleasure. Does it make me a bad friend to tell you I wouldn't have you any other way?"
"Well, you might get a few points off for --"
"Hey!"
[OOC: NFI/NFB, OOC-okay. Post 2 of 2, and thus concludes this bit of canon catchup. Adapted from X:WP 5x02, "Chakram." Oh, S5, you started out so promising and went downhill so fast, sigh. But I forgive you somewhat for lots of Gabrielle.
Disclaimery thing: This post contains a fair amount of violence, mention of character death, random made-up gods, and your standard amount of Xenaverse WTF.
Finally, for your visual reference, this is what Gabs looks like now. So kind of different than before she left, yep.]
Xena seemed more out of it than Gabrielle did, so Gabrielle was grateful for the hot soup that Joxer brought them, and to see that Amarice had managed to retrieve the broken pieces of Xena's chakram, but even more grateful when Eli got the two of them to stop asking questions and just give her and Xena some time.
"We're back," Gabrielle murmured, still in that vague, detached way. "Together?"
Xena leaned into her slightly. "Always."
Yeah, that felt just about right. "Are you okay?"
"Yeah, just a little stiff," Xena replied, hopping down from the slab (some kind of altar, she guessed) and that was the point at which Gabrielle finally realized that whatever power had brought them back from the dead had healed their wounds, too. That was strange; that brought some of the detachment back. The feel of the iron spikes being driven through her hands and feet had been too vivid for all evidence of those wounds to just be gone. "I feel like I've misplaced something."
"Your clothes? Yeah, I think we'll need to find a market," Gabrielle suggested lightly, reaching for the old humor that used to characterize their conversations, but faltering when she saw Xena attempt to put the two halves of the chakram together like puzzle pieces. "Xena, I don't know how we're going to repair that. It's not like you can just take it to a blacksmith."
She didn't know what kind of history was behind the chakram, but she knew it was unique, and possibly mystical in origin, a gift from Ares back in Xena's warlord days. It was impossible for anyone but Xena to wield (although Gabrielle suspected someone like Jaina Solo could probably manage), and as much a part of her as --
"What, this old thing Amarice gave me? What is this, anyway?"
. . . uh oh.
***
As if it wasn't concerning enough that Xena couldn't remember her chakram, things got worse once they made the trek to the nearest village market with Amarice and Joxer in search of new clothes and weapons.
Gabrielle, for her part, had picked out something leather, with intricate braided craftwork that reminded her of her Amazons, and a pair of sturdy boots. It felt right, more so than the outfit she'd picked up in India, and she'd need to find some kind of weapon to go with it, but while she was perusing the blacksmith's stalls she came across a pair of matched daggers that she thought Xena might like. She recognized them as sai; one of Shunsui's classes a few terms ago had piqued her interest in defensive use of weaponry, and she'd done a little reading. In theory, she suspected, she might know how to use these herself.
But she bought them, and went over to find Xena to see what she thought -- and found the Warrior Princess in a pair of thoroughly impractical sandals and a delicate, flowing gown. She didn't even seem interested in the sai, which had Gabrielle exchanging concerned looks with Amarice.
"They're not for her," Amarice said slowly. "They're for you."
"Me? Why?" Was that supposed to be a joke? Had Xena gotten a thousand times more subtle about humor in between dying and coming back this time?
"Well," Joxer tried, "what's a warrior without a weapon?"
"Oooh! Is that a riddle? I love riddles," Xena said brightly, chewing on a fingernail in thought. "Lemme see."
Definitely something wrong here; Joxer joined in on the worried-look-exchanging now.
"What is a warrior without a weapon?" Xena went on out loud, apparently unaware that they were in any way serious.
"Easy pickings," came a rough, cocky voice.
Oh. A dozen armed soldiers, including one wearing some kind of grotesque breastplate and helmet that were probably meant to be intimidating. Actually, it was working.
Well, never mind giving the sai to Xena now. And never mind any previous misgivings about fighting; Gabrielle jumped right into it, and realized she'd really missed this. What was more, the sai felt right in her hands, as did the flow of combat. Had it always been instinctive to her? And why had it never been this effortless before now? Maybe now that she'd finally embraced that part of herself . . .
There'd be time to wonder about it later. Now they had to deal with getting Xena to safety, because she didn't even raise a hand to defend herself when one of the soldiers knocked her down with the pommel of his sword. Even stranger, it was Gabrielle who had to leap in to rescue her.
They finally managed to escape, thanks to a timely if clumsy tackle from Joxer that sent half a dozen soldiers falling down like dominoes and gave Gabrielle and Amarice enough time to dispatch the rest, and hurried back up to the abandoned temple on the mountain where they'd been hiding out.
Once there they filled Eli in on the fight, and their concerns that something was wrong with Xena. That got fairly obvious fairly fast: when they reminded her that she usually pulverized guys like that, she wanted to know why they even thought she would. She didn't even remember fighting Alti, or Callisto. Upon hearing that the soldiers had mentioned a Kal who was after Xena, Eli got even more concerned.
"Kal's the god of war in these parts," he said, and that was odd. Gabrielle had never heard of a god of war named Kal, not even in any of the texts she'd read in Fandom. "If there's a bigger picture, you can bet he's part of it."
He had a friend named Caleb, he said, a scholar who might be able to help them.
"How's a guy who studies old scrolls supposed to help us fight a god?" Amarice grumbled in typical fashion.
Gabrielle left Eli to try to explain the value of knowledge to her; they'd need to pick up the pace, they still ran the risk of running into Roman soldiers, and out of everyone here she was the most suited to take point.
How had that happened?
***
They did have to stop and make camp eventually, and Gabrielle tried to fill the time by telling Xena stories about her past battles in hopes that something might jog her memory. So far nothing had worked; Xena didn't remember any of it, and couldn't understand why she had to fight all those battles instead of pursuing a more peaceful solution.
. . . it was really strange being on this side of the question now. Not just strange; it felt wrong, and Gabrielle felt bad for anyone who'd had to deal with her answers in class for the last several months.
It was ironic, as she told Eli after he'd sent Xena to accompany Amarice on a hunting expedition, telling her she was an excellent tracker. (Amarice was less than pleased; seeing Xena like this was upsetting her so much that she was more petulant and touchy than usual.) She'd always wanted to see Xena rid of her dark side, but now, without it, she seemed off balance.
And, as they discovered several hours later when the hunters didn't return and Gabrielle had to go after them to find Amarice unconscious and alone, in deep trouble.
"Kal got her," Amarice admitted sullenly, with a look on her face like a child who knew she'd disappointed her parents immensely. "Him and his main muscle threatened to kill me unless she went with them, and . . ."
And the way Xena was acting now, she'd probably gone along willingly, and Amarice had gotten knocked out trying to stop her.
Joxer looked around helplessly. "Went where?"
Gabrielle glanced down, saw the faint impressions of boot treads in the bent blades of grass, followed the trail the way Xena had taught her. "This way. Come on."
Wasn't it usually Gabrielle who got kidnapped, and Xena who had to do the rescuing? This was going to be new.
***
Amarice insisted they had to hurry, Kal's men were probably killing Xena right now, and Eli kept reassuring her that they needed Xena alive for something.
Gabrielle ignored them all; she was too busy putting together a plan to get into Kal's stronghold.
Not that they needed it -- Xena popped out of the bushes at them, unharmed but still "not normal," as Amarice kept muttering, and Gabrielle might smack her for that choice of words soon. Someone had freed her, apparently, which -- well. That was interesting. Most likely a god, if it had been that effortless, and two gods working at cross purposes? This was definitely not going to be easy.
By the time they got to Eli's friend Caleb's place -- a rather luxurious cliffside dwelling equipped with a full library and a hot tub, which made Gabrielle wonder about monks -- there was no sign of Caleb himself.
"Something's wrong. Caleb's always here," Eli said, sounding a touch frantic.
"Maybe there's a cook, or . . . ?" Gabrielle began to suggest, but trailed off when he shook his head.
"No, Caleb always liked doing things for himself. He was a real ascetic." With a hot tub in his house, apparently. Eli smiled slightly. "We always called him the purest monk in his order."
Xena inhaled sharply. "Oh, no."
Well, that got Gabrielle's attention immediately. "What?"
"Something Kal said," she replied, her gaze flicking toward Eli. "Eli, I'm so sorry."
It was the most vehement Gabrielle had ever seen him: he immediately started pulling books and scrolls down off the shelves, insisting that there had to be something there that they could use. (It was a little reminiscent of Fandom invasions, yes.) The rest of them should get some rest, he insisted, since they'd been on the run for days. Really, they were too exhausted and sore to argue.
***
Things got more complex -- and irritating -- yet when Gabrielle went looking for Xena and found her in the hot tub. With Ares lurking just outside, talking to her.
. . . that was not a flare of jealousy. Just indignation. Really.
"Ares," she spat, glaring at him.
Xena looked at her curiously. "Oh, you know each other?" she asked as Ares smirked at Gabrielle.
"Your hair's shorter, but you're still the same --" Gabrielle bit down on the selection of choice invective she wanted to use. "Only you would take advantage of Xena when she's like this."
"Like this? What do you mean?" Ares asked coolly. "Because she can't remember things that make her mad? Things that fill her with hate? Well -- when did you become so hard?"
Gabrielle had no answer for that beyond a stunned, speechless look. Ares spread his hands, gave her one last deliberate smirk, and vanished.
***
Ares's involvement became a lot more clear once Gabrielle informed Eli about his visit. According to what Eli had found in Caleb's scrolls, Kal was after something called the chakram of light: Ares had stolen its counterpart years ago, and that was the one Xena had used for so long until it broke in the prison courtyard.
Where the chakram of light was so unique was that it had the power to kill gods. No wonder both Kal and Ares were after it.
No wonder they were after Xena, too, and no wonder Caleb was dead -- only the purest soul could hope to remove it from the altar and live.
Xena wanted to know why they couldn't just leave the gods to their warring and walk away, and Gabrielle still felt very, very strange trying to convince her that they needed to go into this fight and stop them, or they'd never stop. It didn't feel wrong; she actually genuinely believed it. It was just that explaining it to Xena was bizarre.
***
Good thing Gabrielle had come up with that plan; it looked like they were going to need it after all. Also a good thing: Amarice was about a thousand times more likely to listen to her now, and didn't even argue when she laid out what she wanted to do.
The entire plan -- drawn from the tactics Xena had taught her -- hinged on her and Amarice infiltrating Kal's stronghold from above. They'd string up a couple of ropes to the parapets, climb up, take out the guards, then drop into the courtyard, counting on the element of surprise to give them the upper hand.
In practice, that plan worked out even better than anticipated: Kal's soldiers had a stock of Greek fire stashed in plain sight in the courtyard, so when Amarice pulled off her part of the distraction perfectly by "falling" from her rope right into the middle of a cluster of guards, it gave Gabrielle the perfect opportunity to grab a torch and one of the bombs.
"Hey, guys," she called, and waited for them to turn her way before grinning ferally, touching the wick to the flame, and watching them panic.
She took a particular glee in hurling one after another, she and Amarice causing as much chaos as they could before they flung the gates open to let Xena, Eli, and Joxer in. Then, it was up to them to hold off the soldiers until Xena could run into the temple, grab the chakram of light, and -- assuming it didn't torch her too -- take out Kal and Ares.
Except for the part where Xena came rushing back out of the temple with the chakram of light in hand, Kal and Ares started to back off, and Xena dropped the chakram, claiming she couldn't kill.
That had not been in the plan.
***
Well, being barricaded into a temple with soldiers trying to knock down the doors was familiar enough, too, and once again it was Gabrielle who had to step up to take Xena's usual role of directing people to bar the doors, block off all potential entrances, and then try desperately to think of a new plan.
Except -- how had Amarice managed to get hold of the chakram of light? If only the purest person could touch it --
"Wait a second," Eli blurted out, from where he was bent over a scroll spread out on the altar. "It says here that once it's off the altar anyone can touch it."
Gabrielle yelped, "You couldn't have read that part before?"
That seemed like a minor concern, though, compared to oh, say, being barricaded in a temple while two gods were after them.
"Bring that here," Eli instructed Amarice, gesturing to the chakram. "There's gotta be something I'm missing."
There was: fusing the two chakrams would neutralize the power to kill gods, and render it useless to Kal and Ares.
It just would have been nice if they'd gotten a chance to do that before Kal's guards broke down the door. So once again it meant Gabrielle and Amarice (and Joxer, such as it was) had to fight, and buy Xena and Eli the time they needed.
Not before Kal made the mistake of threatening Xena, though, and Xena reacted instinctively by slicing him open with the chakram of light.
Well. That explained why he didn't show up in any of the texts Gabrielle had read.
Gabrielle had lost track of how long she'd been at this -- not even flinching when she used her sai to disarm one soldier and fling his sword point-first into another's chest -- when she heard the familiar whistling sound of the chakram ricocheting overhead from . . . two directions?
And there was Xena's war cry, and the familiar and welcome old maelstrom of blows that wiped the floor with whatever soldiers were left standing in no time flat; Gabrielle wheeled just in time to see Xena standing in front of Ares, the chakram a bare inch from his face.
It looked different: the blade was smooth now, no jeweled pattern around its edges, and there was a handle bisecting the center -- it looked like the yin-yang symbol she'd seen in some of the books she'd read, Gabrielle realized. And that was fitting, somehow: for the chakram, and for Xena.
And for herself, she supposed.
"Neutralizing the chakram. Why'd you do it?" Ares asked. "You had the power to kill us all.
"No one deserves that power, Ares," Xena replied, sounding like herself again, which was an immense relief. "Least of all me."
"Smart move," he conceded, grudgingly. "Brought you back."
She curled one side of her mouth up in a fierce grin that Gabrielle had really, really missed the past few days. "With a vengeance."
Ares started to back off, but -- typically -- couldn't leave without some kind of swagger to cover up the fact that he hadn't gotten what he was after. "I'll catch you around the Acropolis," he drawled just before vanishing.
***
Eli chose to stay behind; with Caleb gone, he felt that someone should carry on that work, and besides, he felt like Caleb's scrolls would teach him a lot. Gabrielle was used to leaving friends behind, but as always she refused to call it goodbye.
She and Xena trailed behind, letting Amarice and Joxer lead the way (or really, just bicker out of earshot), as they set out back for Greece.
"It feels good to be going home," Gabrielle remarked.
"Going home in more ways than one. Back to Fandom for you?" Xena asked, and Gabrielle nodded. "Think I'll stop in and see Mom. After all this, a little down time seems like just the thing, huh?"
Gabrielle chuckled. "It really does."
"You're going to have a lot to explain to your friends, you know," Xena said, indicating Gabrielle's clothes and the sai tucked into her boot laces.
"Yeah. I know." She'd probably get a lot of grief for her sudden about-face, she knew, but Gabrielle would just deal with that when it happened.
Xena put a hand on her shoulder and squeezed. "Thanks, by the way."
"For what?"
"For pointing the way back to my rotten old self."
Gabrielle laughed and slung an arm around her waist. "Yeah, well, it's a pleasure. Does it make me a bad friend to tell you I wouldn't have you any other way?"
"Well, you might get a few points off for --"
"Hey!"
[OOC: NFI/NFB, OOC-okay. Post 2 of 2, and thus concludes this bit of canon catchup. Adapted from X:WP 5x02, "Chakram." Oh, S5, you started out so promising and went downhill so fast, sigh. But I forgive you somewhat for lots of Gabrielle.
Disclaimery thing: This post contains a fair amount of violence, mention of character death, random made-up gods, and your standard amount of Xenaverse WTF.
Finally, for your visual reference, this is what Gabs looks like now. So kind of different than before she left, yep.]