Chapter 7: Strange Things Are Happening To Me

Buzz and Jessie had been combat training for over a month now. Well, if you could call "Balance perfecting through dance," combat training. She was a good but ruthless teacher; not that he had expected anything less than torture from her considering who she was, and who she worked for. She had told him that he was making some progress, but not nearly enough to have the perfect balance she knew he needed to survive an attack from Zurg and his army of robots and agents.

She frustrated Buzz to the point of making his blood boil; he was used to perfecting everything he tried with relative ease and in very little time too. But every time he thought he knew that his moves were perfectly executed, she would be sitting behind him, head in her hands complaining for the billionth time that he hadn't got the smallest detail right.

"No, no, NO! You're doing it all wrong! How am I supposed to teach you to defend yourself against Zurg if you can't even get the basics?" Jessie exclaimed, exasperated.

Buzz was bending down with hands resting on his knees, exhausted and out of breath from the hours of training. Upon hearing her criticising him, yet again, he tried with all his might to control his anger, but that didn't stop it from bubbling to the surface.

"I don't know what more you want from me, Temptress!" he snarled, "I am doing exactly as you instructed, and yet you are so stupidly critical that I am convinced that you simply have impossible standards, or just want to make me suffer. This is ridiculous; I am NOT doing it wrong!" Buzz knew he could be stubborn but this really was all just becoming a little bit ridiculous for him.

Jessie's eyes widened in disbelief of his arrogance, "Oh really? Ridiculous you say? Well when you get captured and tortured by Zurg, DON'T come crying to me!"

She had come much closer to him in the heat of her anger, so much so that her own body was mere centre meters from touching his. Buzz looked uncomfortable with their proximity, and it was only then that she realised how close she was to him. She could smell his intoxicating musty scent emitting from him, causing her head to swim a little. He was even more handsome up close, his skin and muscles glistening with sweat from his exertion, his dark blonde hair unkempt, his cheeks flushed. Anger, confusion, and some other emotion she couldn't identify were all mixed into the piercing yet serene pools that were his eyes.

She backed away from him quickly so as to refrain herself from getting caught up in his eyes, and barked orders at him.

"Sit down! I'm going to show you again."

Buzz clenched his jaw to refrain from retaliating and obediently, but angrily, he sat down on the wooden bench behind them with a loud 'thud.'

Jessie placed herself in the starting position, telling Buzz to press play on the CD player. Once the music started she began to move.

Buzz's eyes softened and his anger completely melted away as he became transfixed on Jessie. She twisted and swayed her body, soaring high into the air, and gliding across the room to the fast beat of pulsating music that seemed to flow through her entire body as she danced. She was an incredible dancer; not a foot or movement out of place. She flowed so easily and effortlessly through the music; like water running from the river into the ocean. He had seen her dodge bullets this way before, and he imagined them screeching past her as she elegantly spun her graceful body away from them in front of his very eyes, making him catch his breath in awe and his heart race at the suspense he felt every time she narrowly missed each one.

As Buzz watched he couldn't help but think, "How can something as excruciatingly beautiful as this cause so much hell and destruction?" It was beyond him… to infinity and beyond.

He almost felt like he was intruding on something that was private to her. She was so focused and seemingly unaware of him, her features were a picture of joy and concentration; so passionate. It made him wonder if he should allow himself to continue watching. But it was only a fleeting thought as he knew it would have been impossible to look away from her, even if he wanted to. It was no wonder that so many had fallen for the dark charms of The Temptress and been stripped of all sanity and reason.

He shivered when he remembered the cases he had read about The Temptress back when all this madness had begun; dripping with the innocent blood of those she had lured into her deadly grasp. He found it hard to keep remembering that this was the very same woman, those very same hands… her small, feminine, slender hands…that had caused so much bloodshed. It didn't seem right, and the more he thought about it, and the more he was around her, the harder it became to wrap his head around the cold, hard facts.

He shook his head, realising that he was treading on very dangerous ground. This was exactly how she confused her enemies, how she contorted reasoning and logical thought. She would confuse her enemies' minds, make them lose sight of their convictions and strong beliefs of what they knew and thought about her, and the mind was the most powerful thing. If she weakened the mind, she weakened the man, making him vulnerable.

Buzz knew he would have to fight more than he had ever fought in the past to keep his mind in check. He knew something odd happened to him whenever she was around him, but he could never understand what it was, or why it happened. If he was honest with himself, he was beginning to feel almost comfortable around her. Like she was someone he could be relaxed with; someone he could trust. That terrified him. Because his head knew that she was the complete opposite, everything in her past that he had experienced himself or read from previous cases had been solid proof of that fact. And yet here he was, longing to trust her, to be in her presence on a daily basis, going so far as to not even use her criminal name when he simply though about her...Which was becoming a regular occurrence.

Jessie startled him when she called out to him; he had been so caught up in watching her that it made him forget about the real world.

"Buzz, I'm gonna attempt somethin'. Come towards me as if you are going to attack me, and I'll try to do the same to you." She said this as she continued to spin and float, making her body rise and fall with each steady beat.

"I don't understand. What are you trying to do?" he queried her warily, not quite sure what she meant to achieve.

"I think I've been going at this the wrong way. You seem to be overthinking your movements. And I've known you long enough to know that you're at your best under pressure, and I don't think I've put you under the right kind of pressure." Buzz stood up, walking slightly towards her and looked at her still a little apprehensively, but he let her continue.

Jessie saw the slightly confused and guarded expression on his face and continued to explain.

"If I attempted to attack you, as if you were really in a situation where you must apply the techniques I've taught you, then maybe it would stop you over thinking what steps and movements you are trying to remember and perfect, allowing you to act and move more instinctively; more naturally. If you try to attack me first I can show you what it's like to take on another agent of Zurg's that has similar fighting techniques. But trust me, NO one is as good as me" she winked at him playfully with a hint of something darker in her eyes.

Buzz tried to ignore the strange feelings that induced and focussed on what she had asked him to do, but he wasn't entirely sure how to proceed.

"Okay, that makes logical sense. Erm… How exactly do you want me to do this, just come running at you?"

"Well… for a lack of anything better, yes. Maybe try and swing a punch at me or something." She said this so matter-of-factly that it made Buzz just stare at her incredulously.

"You seriously expect me to just come up to a woman and hit her? Are you crazy?!" Just because she was The Temptress, didn't mean that Buzz felt at all comfortable with the idea of striking a woman.

Jessie's heart was so touched by his need to remain a gentleman that she stopped her dancing abruptly; that didn't exactly happen with Zurg and his male agents around, none of them could be considered a gentleman, even remotely. She shook her head and tried to make light of her sudden shock.

"Well, to be fair Buzz, you have shot me before so swinging a punch shouldn't be all that bad." She laughed. "Plus this is just training and I'm asking you to do it. So it's fine."

Buzz grimaced when she reminded him of that. Just over month ago he would not have batted an eyelid at the statement, knowing that he would have thought it fully justified. But now, he was ashamed to remember it, to remember how awful and disturbed he had felt when her blood ran freely from her previously unscathed figure.

His mind would tell him that there had been no other way, and that in doing what he did finally made for the successful capture of one so dangerous, and rid the town of so much terror. But part of him still panged with guilt, especially now he knew her to be not half as evil as he had once conceded.

Bringing himself back to the present he took a deep breath and nodded, giving in, and walked over to her. He waited for her to restart the music. They faced one another, slipping into the first position, mirroring one another. "You swing at me on the second movement," she instructed.

Buzz prepared himself by closing his eyes and tried to remember how The Temptress had made his blood burn with rage and made him long to inflict pain on her. He remembered how she had destroyed his previously happy marriage to Mira, the single most painful experience of his life. He remembered the haunting laugh she left behind every time she eluded him, making him wake at night in cold sweats with hate gushing from the broken lump of meat he used to call a heart. He remembered nearly losing his mind and making himself so ill with the obsession over The Temptress case and the grief over the loss of his love that he had considered ending it all… He remembered how all those memories had made him feel, and it possessed him.

The music started and Jessie saw Buzz's eyes open to reveal the wild, crazed anger that she had so many times seen in him and had started to forget… it scared her… what would he do to her now?

The second movement in their routine came and Jessie was barely able to block his fist as it came hurtling towards her as a ferocious speed. That made her angry, and it didn't take long until both of them we're attempting to seriously strike one another.

An observer would have thought it both terrifying and beautiful had they been able to see it. They came so close to contact and then moved away in a split second, swooping under high kicks, dodging and spinning from hard punches, skin kissing skin almost delicately as they moved in perfect synchronicity of each other's movements, blocking and attacking in equal measure, moving as one.

The music came to a sudden stop, as did they, tightly clutching their hands together above their heads. Their faces were a couple of inches apart, breathing heavily and looking at each other unwaveringly and straight in the eyes. The tension between them was impenetrable.

Buzz was still seeing red with anger and hurt. But he visibly relaxed all of a sudden as he saw the woman in front of him as the young girl who had her life and loved ones taken from her by fire and corrupted by Zurg.

Jessie noticed him relax and again realised with a blush how close they were. They still remained in that same position; not daring to move from fear of not knowing what would happen if they did.

Buzz continued to search her face with his eyes, and suddenly frowned… This had been a long time coming, and he hadn't realised it until now.

"You. Ruined. My. Life." he spoke barely above a whisper with utter contempt in his voice. He released her hands, turning his back to her.

Jessie just stood there dumbfounded at what had just passed between them. It took her a few seconds to register what he had said to her and it confused her slightly, "What?"

Buzz spun back to her with a watery sheen to his eyes, shouting, "I said, you ruined my life! Have you any idea of what hell you have caused me and countless people over the past few years? I have lost everything that meant anything to me because of you… I was so happy with her, my wife, the only one that meant more to me than anything in this universe… and she walked out on me, into the arms of another man…All because of you! There had been many, many times that I told myself that it was my entire fault for her leaving me, for making my own life a living hell, but it all comes back to you torturing me and my soul with your evil, poisonous trickery and terrorisation…If there is anything left of the girl you used to be before Zurg, then maybe you could redeem yourself by at least feeling a flicker of remorse and compassion; something human!" Buzz's entire body was shaking with emotion as his accusations came to an end.

Jessie stood there in silent shock, staring at him. She knew exactly what had happened to him, after all she was the second half of this sick charade, but she had never seen the physical and emotional effects it had on him.

She had only heard the report from Mira's mission of her successfully breaking his heart. It had all sounded so cliché and matter-of-fact that she had never really thought about how much grief and misery a person could go through over losing someone you really loved. But it had never mattered to her before; He had never mattered to her before.

She did feel remorse, most acutely, in equal measures for what she and the rest of Zurg's agents had done to him and for what had become of the 16 year old happy, lively and kind girl that had been buried so deep into her core that she no longer thought that part of her existed. Not for a long time. It was only now she realised that it was starting to rekindle ever so slightly within her.

"I'm sorry," she whispered, so gently that if there had been any other noise in the room but their breathing it would have gone unheard.

Buzz inclined his head sharply as he looked up at her in surprise, and then he laughed mirthlessly, "Don't… Just, don't."

She moved towards him until their bodies were almost touching again. She reached a hand up to cup his strong jaw, making him look at her, "I mean it," she breathed heavily, "I really…really am very sorry, Buzz."

His eyebrows raised slightly in surprise. He looked down at her soft pink lips and back up to her bright emerald eyes. There was absolute truth in those eyes.

Leaning his face down to hers, not thinking about what he was doing, he pressed lightly against her lips with his own. They both gasped slightly and a spark exploded between them, making Jessie wrap her slender arms around his neck tightly and pull him deeper into the kiss. Buzz snaked his heavily muscled arms around her tiny waist and crushed her to him, falling back against the wall as they desperately explored one another with their mouths. Hands tangled in hair, bodies pressed firmly together, tongues danced and moved passionately over each other, and hearts beat as if they had only mere minutes left to live. There was no thought, no rationale, no outside world, no Zurg, no Captain Lightyear or The Temptress; Just Buzz and Jessie, and feeling.

As quickly as this sudden madness of passion had begun it stopped when Buzz realised what they were doing and who he was doing this with. He rapidly but reluctantly pushed her away from him and vanished from the room, leaving Jessie completely alone in a mess of conflicted emotions and desire.

"What the hell are you doing, Jessie?!" she said tugging at her hair and mentally kicking herself, she was going to end up just like Mira if she wasn't careful.

The communications device in her ear bleeped gently, followed by Zurg demanding a status report. The micro-chip in her arm had signalled that she was alone and out of earshot, "Temptress! You have not provided me with an update for over a week and I am becoming impatient. What is the current status of your mission?"

Jessie became angry again. She felt traitorous and remorseful; Feelings which she should have been feeling towards Zurg considering what her purpose was at Star Command. She did not know who was her friend or foe anymore; she did not know who she was anymore.

She placed a finger to her ear to activate the communications device.

"Do not fret, Zurg. I had nothing to report until now; therefore I thought it redundant to waste your time, Sir. You will be pleased to hear that Lightyear is beginning to trust me far quicker than expected, he is emotionally vulnerable towards me but I need more time to continue building his trust. I will report again when I have something new to tell you."

She took her finger away, severing the contact between her and Zurg… "Perhaps in more ways than one," she thought, suddenly afraid.

The officers guarding the room she and Buzz had occupied came in and escorted her back to her prison cell. She made no fight to go, and crawled up into a ball on her bed thinking over everything that had happened that day. She fell into a fitful sleep dreaming of the loss of her previous life, of Zurg's scarlet eyes, and of Buzz kissing her.

Buzz paced outside Woody's office door waiting for him to return, clearly deeply troubled by the events of the day. He couldn't be around Jessie anymore, it was too dangerous. The same thoughts ran through his head in a continuous loop, "Maybe what happened with her was a good thing, maybe she was actually remorseful and is starting to be on our side? On my side?... No, that is how the Temptress gets to you; this is her evil way of tricking you. You fool; she is making you feel for her… But what if I am so prejudiced against her that I don't recognise genuine regret and concern in her when she shows it?...But I cannot let myself be drawn in by her or I shall be blinded to whatever she truly intends… I need to speak to Woody, he's the only one I can truly trust and talk to about this."

Woody came walking up the hallway with Bo on his arm, laughing and talking amicably with her. He saw Buzz and the distress he was in and his face dropped into a look of concern immediately. He paused and Bo looked up at him confused, "Bo, I think Buzz needs a little chat with me tonight if that's alright with you, darlin'? I'll get one o' the gals to drive you home. I'll be back as soon as I can, I promise."

Bo nodded and smiled up at him "O' course sugar, I'll see you at home," with that she reached up onto her tip toes to kiss his cheek and walked towards her own office, leaving Woody with a smitten grin on his face as he watched her go.

He then turned his attention to Buzz, walking over to him. He placed a hand on his shoulder and asked, "Buzz, what's eatin' ya? You look like somethin' awful has happened to you my friend."

Buzz looked at him with a small and troubled smile, "I think something awful has happened but I can't be sure. Sherriff… I really need to talk to you in private, I don't think you're going to believe or understand any of this." Woody sighed out of concern over his friend and motioned to Buzz to go into his office.

Once Woody closed the door he sat down to listen to Buzz's story, not realising what he was in store for, but oddly he would not be wholly surprised by what he would hear.

Sorry for the very long awaited update!

I'm afraid I can only update when I can, life gets in the way of fanfiction sadly XD haha

Thank you so much to everyone who gave me a review, I really appreciate your support of my story!

Thanks again, let me know what you think of this chapter

xxx