Bite Me

Chapter 26: The End

AC 201. 24. June

0400 hours [4:00 am]

Space - Colony L5-A0207

The five comrades were running down a corridor faster than they imagined their feet could take them. The near constant explosions reminded them all too much of the war, of the destruction, of the fear, of that incessant feeling that with one more step the world might crumble beneath them. But somehow it was comforting to know that the ex-pilots were at least all together again.

Treize Kushrenada had made a quick escape as another explosion rocked the colony, causing Ray's transmission to cut out before he could fully explain what was happening. He'd taken advantage of the distraction as any of them might have done in the same situation. But now, as the group scrambled to get out of the crumbling castle, the only thing on their minds was escape.

"This way!" Wufei yelled over his shoulder as they skirted around a corner, more vibrations rocking under their feet.

Duo was taking up the rear, but a presence to his right caused him to pause for a single heartbeat before the powerful frame of Raymond Noin was colliding into his shoulder.

Knocked so off balance, Duo began to stumble, but a hand caught his arm and pulled him back upward. "Shit, my bad man!" Ray shouted over the intermittent rumbles. Duo would have been less shocked to have crashed into Kushrenada. He hadn't realized that Ray might actually be on the colony when he'd seen him moments before through a communicator.

"Ray? What the hell is going on?" Duo's voice was both angry and concerned. He could still feel the grudge he held towards the vampire's earlier cowardice, but now the tides had so drastically changed all he could wonder is why the man had come back to play the hero.

Ray looked up to be met with several sets of confused eyes. "You really thought I would leave you to die?" he countered in disbelief, eyes wide and childlike. Duo was hard pressed to realize it was almost like looking in a mirror.

The braided shifter gave him a pointed look. "Yes," he grumbled.

"Have a little faith," Ray spat out. Eyes darkened behind his glasses. "You may be too proud to call for backup, but I'm not."

Another explosion hit. Duo nearly fell backwards into Heero, Wufei balanced himself with outstretched arms, while Trowa and Quatre found themselves leaning against the wall their bodies had been jerked against.

"These are just distractions," Ray explained, gesturing around him widely. "The real fun is in here." He pulled out a small, black device from within the duffel bag full of guns Duo had been desiring earlier.

They all eyed the device, but Trowa was the first to speak. "It's a bomb. The bomb to end all bombs?" The appreciation in his voice efficiently startled Duo; it seemed he had been listening in on their earlier conversation aboard the shuttle after all.

Ray cocked an eyebrow, but grinned maliciously. "You got it, slim. The one and only, my prized possession."

Duo frowned. "But you said-"

"I said it was never financed by the E.A.," Ray interrupted with his best evil genius impersenation. "I never said it wasn't manufactured."

In all his life Duo never thought he'd be worried about the innovation of an explosive device, but he couldn't help but feel a slight bit of nervous bubbling in his gut in accordance with this one.

A soft voice broke through the next detonation. "You're not going to do this all on your own. Let us help." Quatre, who had not ever met the mysterious vampire, already held gratitude and compassion for him. Duo managed a smile. Maybe the world wouldn't be such a bad place if there were more people like Quatre Winner floating around in it.

"Thanks but no thanks, blondie. Got plenty of help already!" Ray shouted out, his tactless knack for nicknames still abounding. "I called up the Preventers and my cousin, because you know she's engaged to the second most powerful man in the universe, and batta-bing batta-boom, things are happening!" He nearly sang out the last word, the explosions still erupting throughout the colony.

"The Preventers are here?" Trowa asked, his eyes wider than normal beneath frantic bangs. He pushed off the wall and steadied himself, waiting for more of an explanation.

"That's what I said, isn't it?" Ray laughed out, tossing a Preventer issue radio into the tall man's hands. "Here, they're your problem now."

Duo leaned towards him, wrapping fingers around the vampire's forearm. There was an unsteady glint in his eyes that Duo knew all too well from his own personal repertoire. He all but growled, trying desperately to reign the man in. "Ray..."

"Don't worry about me. I'm going to set up this bad boy and find one Dorothy Catalonia." His eyes flicked to Heero. "I've learned how to deal with evil-doing makers from the best," he said in his direction, only a small amount of humor lacing the surprisingly genuine words.

Heero, taken aback, obviously didn't know how to respond, but when Ray disappeared into the rising smoke and dust he realized he thankfully didn't have to.

Duo seemed so preoccupied with the idea of going after the man that he barely registered the iron grip on his arm. "Come on," Heero said, tugging his entire body forward. He turned to the rest of the group. "Let's get to the shuttle hanger."

But by the time they had reached their destination, it was dangerously clear that the brunt of the attack was taking place in the large hanger as several Preventer shuttles were parked haphazardly, littered in bullet holes and some torn completely apart by unruly explosives.

Wufei, Heero, and Duo ducked behind a shell of what once was a cockpit, while Trowa and Quatre took refuge behind a huge steel beam that had fallen from the ceiling. There was a barrage of bullets and as Duo peeked from their hiding spot he watched as several Preventers fell to the ground, while a vampire wielding the deadly automatic weapon was taken by surprise with a stake through the heart.

His tense gaze was broken by Trowa's strong voice yelling at him over the top of the noise created by the steel encased war zone. "Whatever you do, Duo, do not shift! It will only make you a more vulnerable target in this style of combat!"

Style of combat? Duo thought wryly. It seemed like a deadly free-for-all to him, but there was a faint memory of heavy fire-role combat and a boy piloting a walking arsenal during the war that made him smirk in understanding of the fighting taking place around them.

He nodded firmly, taking Trowa's point to heart. Besides, he'd rather have his wits about him; it was true that he was still admittedly new to the idea of shifting anyways.

"We need weaponry!" Wufei shouted, brandishing the pistol he'd retrieved back from Duo before they'd made their hasty exit earlier. He eyed it with near disgust, perhaps wishing it would morph into a more preferred machete. "It's abundantly clear that this isn't going to get us anywhere!"

"In there!" Heero pointed to the shuttle nearest them. Its door had been blown off and inside they could see several gun wracks toting semi-automatics.

"Any volunteers? Maybe the L5-C's?" Duo yelled back with a roguish grin, loud enough so Quatre could also hear. "I'd say you're a bit more durable than me 'n Trowa right now!" It was quite possibly one of the most sensible things he'd ever said.

Heero stared at him with wide eyes. The sounds of burning explosions and gunfire cascading into numb silence until their mouths were crushing together in a gesture that might've been more passionate than even that of a final farewell kiss. For a moment it seemed like they were back on Earth, wrapped in each other's arms; wet, warm, safe. But another blast brought them both quickly back to reality. The vampire pulled away and the shifter smiled, almost intoxicated by the moment, and then Heero was following Quatre and Wufei's lightning quick movements, heading directly towards the shuttle.

Duo took a deep breath, steadying himself, before crawling on his stomach to where Trowa was still kneeling, keeping his head as low as possible without taking his eyes off of Quatre's incredibly fast form.

"This isn't good," Duo said to him, keeping the grin plastered on his face. If he was going to go down, at least he was going to go down laughing in the face of death like he'd always done during the war. The God of Death was back and ready for action and in this moment it felt surprisingly good.

Trowa finally took his eyes off Quatre to look down at his comrade, his hair creating its familiar curtain across the left side of his face. "You're optimism astounds me."

Duo might have laughed through the hand now rubbing at his grimy face, but his mind was momentarily distracted by a shadow figure of what looked like a lean, four legged animal darting through the destruction twenty-or-so yards from their position.

He was going to voice the oddity, but the impact of an Uzi submachine gun landing against his leg brought him out of the reverie he was almost certain had to be a mirage, his mind just playing tricks.

The two shifters wrapped their hands about the new weapons, feeling the weight of something they'd since grown detached to from their stint with simpler Preventer issued pistols. Trowa actually smiled and Duo could feel the impending need for battle and destruction flittering across his skin with a shiver. He just hoped it wasn't an impending need to shift, still trying to heed to his mentor's earlier warning.

They watched as their vampire counterparts flashed past them, toting similar guns, hearing the static emitting radios attached to their hips as they moved inward towards a group of unsteady looking L5-C newborns.

Duo was on his knees getting ready to follow suit when a crackling voice from Trowa's own radio startled them both.

"This is Preventer Schbeiker." Her voice sounded stressed as it came through the device. "Come in, Ray?"

Trowa brought the radio to his lips. "This is Preventer Barton. Come in Preventer Schbeiker."

There was a moment where they feared they'd lost connection with the woman, but then her voice came back, this time softer, forgoing protocol to get her words out as quickly as possible. "Trowa, I have a tracker on Ray's bomb, but it's been activated earlier than planned. Everyone needs to get out of there now."

All around them came shouting and orders in place of the gunfire that had rang through the air seconds before. News of the bomb's activation was traveling like wildfire through both the Preventer and vampire forces. There was a familiar sound of shuttle engines revving behind them and both shifters realized that they had to move now if they wanted to get out alive.

"Copy that," Trowa managed to get out before the sound of staccato bullets above their heads alerted them to their next and newest threat.

Angelo Catalonia, his body covered in a mixture of dirt and glistening blood, his uniform ripped and shredded appeared out of the dust in front of them. His lips formed a malevolent smile as he fired several more rounds into the air, an automatic weapon resting on his shoulder in a casual manner.

Both shifters aimed their guns at the vampire, vibrations of the spray to follow working its way through their bodies right down to the bone. But as they watched a barrage of bullets spread themselves across the vampire's skin, flicking off in every direction they realized all too quickly that these weapons were useless to them if not loaded with silver bullets.

Duo threw his Uzi down with disgust, adrenaline filtering to the forefront of his mind. Trowa's own gun hung down at his side from stiff fingers. They only had one option left, one other form of defense that could tear through a vampire's granite skin, but it was truly a last ditch option that Trowa did not want to resort to.

Angelo laughed, dark and unsettling. "You mongrels aren't getting away this time." His words were slurred with supremacy and the bubbling red blood of his enemies as it ran down his chin demonically. Perhaps Kushrenada was not their truest adversary on this colony; he was a negotiator more than a mercenary.

Duo watched in slow motion the events that took place next. Angelo had raised the SMG in the direct line of his heart, a finger hovering just over the trigger that would heave out twelve rounds in just over a second. Trowa's body arched forward as if he were getting ready to shift any instant. But it took Heero Yuy less than a heartbeat to crash into Angelo's unsuspecting body.

"Go!"

His voice ripped through the air as he screamed the command, Angelo's hands coming up to wrap around his neck in a bruising constriction, but Heero was ready with a solid punch to the side of the man's head, lessening the grip somewhat.

Trowa grabbed at Duo's arm, but the claws around Heero's neck were all the braided man could focus on. He felt his body spark and a twinge of discomfort ran down his spine before his body morphed mid-air towards the combatants.

The things that happened next were so blurry and shaded by the intensity of the instincts fueling his attack that Duo wasn't even able to find Heero's face, his voice shouting something he could not quite make out, before the bullet was searing into the flesh of his shoulder.

The pain was immense, burning and scalding as the object burrowed into the muscle and fur of the hound's recently shifted flesh. Duo felt his world begin to spin, animal and human thoughts swirling together in confusion, before suddenly he was above himself, watching everything play out in horrific detail.

He watched as Heero pulled the deadly weapon from Angelo's hands, desperately trying to subdue the vampire, his fangs glistening under the artificial light. He watched as Trowa, with all his remaining strength, wrapped arms around Duo's limp form and made his way towards a waiting shuttle. He watched as Wufei ran towards them, helping Trowa and taking the hand of an awaiting Quatre to pull their bodies to safety. Through the effort the shuttle had already begun its taxi away from the hanger, away from the destruction, away from Heero.

And then suddenly, Duo felt himself being sucked back into his own body and with a gasp of breath, sprung upwards and screamed through the now closed shuttle door.

"Heero!" He attempted to kneel, not registering the slightest bit of pain from his wound.

"Heero!" he yelled again, his voice already hoarse with emotion.

He wasn't sure when he'd made the change from hound back into human, in fact he wasn't sure of anything, nothing other than the sensation of his ears being clogged as if his body were floating under water in some sort of state of paralysis.

"Heero!"

The soft hand of Quatre Winner pushed him back down to the floor. "Duo, please stay still," he said, though Duo's ears were still un-hearing. "There are other shuttles. Heero is going to be fine. We are all going to be fine."

Trowa helped Duo into a plush leather seat in order to begin sterilizing his wound. Their shuttle had begun its journey out of the gate-lock and Duo's eyes stayed glued to the colony from the seat's window. He waited desperately for another shuttle to appear. It wasn't just Heero, Ray was in there too.

But the war had taught him one thing: there is always a moment in situations like these when everything goes silent, when the air seems to be sucked out of the world, when time freezes over, when hope seems irrevocably lost. That's when the colony blew.

The explosion ripped easily through the steel walls of Colony L5-A0207, debris flying, shattering through the darkness, yellow flames licking at the stars that seemed to surround the incredible massacre. The bomb to end all bombs.

There was no sound as was true of space, but it didn't matter because the pounding of Duo's heart in his head was loud enough. He barely even recognized the faces that gravitated towards him.

They were soldiers, they'd seen death, they'd felt warm blood on their flesh, they were supposed to be immune to this grief.

But as Duo crumbled silently, his body going limp and numb nearly falling from his seat, Trowa was there to catch him, Wufei kneeling in front of him saying words that he could not hear, Quatre stroking the mussed bangs from his eyes, fighting back his own tears in order to be strong for him, for them all.

It was happening again. Heero was gone. And this time it was all his fault.

Amidst the chaos of the slowly collapsing colony that the vampire had called home for so long, Treize Kushrenada made his way towards the room he had nearly died in so many years ago.

Down a shadowy hallway, the chandelier that had previously lit the corridor, shattered on the ground, his eyes following a pool of red blood to a body nearly ripped in half. Treize gazed down at the woman, her blonde hair matted with dried scarlet, one side of her face was completely missing though it didn't make her any less beautiful. The silky black dress he was so accustomed to shredded, though its remaining fabric still managed to hide what was left of her body. Delicate skin that had always been so soothing to the touch was cracked and splintering where it was still attached to her sinewy muscles. Her killer had not made death easy on her.

It was a sad sight indeed, bringing a rare tear to his eyes. He'd always loved her in some form, in his own way, but he'd never indulged her like she'd wanted him to. Love was such a dangerous thing in the hands of someone as vulnerable as she. He wondered vaguely if her brother knew or if maybe he too had suffered a similar fate.

Stepping over her body, Kushrenada continued his journey towards a room that few knew of, even he himself had only been there a handful of times. The vampire grabbed ahold of the laboratory door's frame as another detonation reverberated through the floor beneath his booted feet. They were getting worse and he knew his time on the colony was quickly diminishing.

When the vibration had finished, he moved quickly into the sterile, white room. Many things had fallen, shifted, shattered on the tiled floor; it looked like a war zone already.

Kushrenada moved towards a nearly empty desk in the back of the lab. His hands swept across several files open on the desktop, but that was not what he was searching for. In a bout of frustration as he heard another explosion, this one slightly farther off, he pulled open the desk's first drawer roughly. It was empty. He moved to the next one down. Empty as well.

If he had had a breath to hold, he would have done so in that moment. His swift fingers pulled open the final drawer closest to the ground and his eyes lit up, a ring of light burning around his blue irises.

He reached for the vile with a careful hand, allowing the small glass tube to rest atop his white glove as he examined it. There was nothing special about it in any way; the liquid was clear and colorless and might as well have just been water. But Treize Kushrenada knew better than that.

The vampire turned the vile over with his fingertips, holding it up so his eyes could read the label in the flickering light of a partially working lamp above his head.

In scrawling handwriting that he recognized so well it read: Virus L5-A.

The End...

A/N: To those of you who have stuck through this story from the beginning, thank you. And to those that are new readers, thank you just as much. I cannot believe it's been nearly five years in the making.

So, seeing as how I started writing this story back in 2010 and my writing style/ability has certainly grown over the years, I have since decided to take another look at this story and revise some of the earlier chapters. That means minor revisions, no story changes and major plot reworks, I promise. I would just like to see this piece at its best and that means making some grammatical changes, rewriting some particularly awkward sentences, and just giving it a fresh polish as of its near five year anniversary.

If you're so inclined, go ahead and give it another read once I've uploaded the revised chapters. Give it a fresh look and don't hesitate to tell me if I've actually made it anymore of a worthwhile read with the new, minor edits. I humbly thank you for all of your support now and in the future, it's been a fun ride.

Oh and maybe, because yes I do realize there might be some unanswered questions and a cliff hanger or two, be on the lookout for a sequel in the upcoming months?

For now, over and out.