A blessing in disguise was the fact that Keith hadn’t been settled in his gifted building long enough to install cameras outside. She didn’t need to worry about him knowing in advance that Eli was dead. It was even more of a blessing that she had thought to snag his phone off of his still-warm body before fleeing. As she rolled up on the front door where the buzzer was, she opened his phone and sent another text.

’i’m here.

It was the second text she’d sent along the way back. 10 minutes prior she’d sent along one letting him know that ‘Eli’ was on his way back. She kept it simple, like all of the other messages she’d seen in Eli’s history. Keith had responded back with a ‘Good’ and that had been that.

She tapped the buzzer as she prepped the pistol in the pocket of her blazer, which she had been given to wear in place of her hoodie.

A moment later the lock clicked and she headed in. She could immediately hear James talking, loudly, from the back.

”... Bet she struggled… looked like a struggler to me. Good thing she didn’t have any of those fake claws all the girls wear these days.”
She paused in the doorway, listening.

”Would have loved to have been there to see it, though. That moment as the light leaves the eyes is just-” He made a sound like kissing the air, and she couldn’t see the accompanying gesture that went along with it.

Keith chuckled, but it was an empty laugh. He didn’t seem to enjoy actually killing people as much as his companions did. Threw people away like broken tools, yes, but she hadn’t seen anything from him that led her to believe he was sick in the same ways.

… Still sick enough to warrant death though, that was for sure.

”You and Eli… man, you two really are cut from the same stone aren’t ya?’”

She stood there as a soft argument broke out, with James adamantly trying to prove he was ‘less sick’ than Eli was because he didn’t enjoy taking people apart. He just enjoyed the feeling of overpowering someone and dominating them, and if his B*tch of an ex hadn’t been so weak she wouldn’t have died from him roughing her up and…. blah blah blah. If she hadn’t been so focused on pumping herself up, she might have rolled her eyes. Sounded like someone trying to split hairs, to her.

Their gross conversation faded into background noise as she stood there and prepped the gun in her hands. Didn’t want it jamming or anything or all of this was in vain.

It was a small gun, so she had 5 shots. Technically six, since there was a round already chambered. All she needed to go was not panic and miss… and this was all over.

Juniper tried to ignore the fact that her whole body felt slick with a sheen of sweat, and a chill had settled over her.

...This was it. Once she crossed that threshold there was no going back.

”....Ay, Eli… what’re you doin in there?”

Her uncle's voice snapped her out of her spiraling thoughts, and her grip tightened on the gun.

Now or never.

A few quick strides brought her to the door separating them. She grabbed the knob, twisted it, and pushed it open. As soon as she rounded the flaking, white painted door she lifted the pistol and aimed it dead center on Keith’s chest.

He took too long to react, eyes widening in shock at seeing her instead of Eli.

She pulled the trigger three times, and the gun jerked in her grip.

He was hit twice in the chest, once slightly left of the sternum and in the ribs, and a second time three inches higher toward his armpit. Her last bullet hit him in the left arm as he was jerking away, and James hopped in her line of sight.

Without flinching, she re-aligned her sights and emptied the last three bullets in his direction.

The older man crossed his thick arms in front of his chest and face and took the bullets without even flinching.

Juniper knew she was in trouble when she saw the holes they had left in him, but no blood.

“@#$%.”

”@#$%ING KILL HER!”

Keith was shouting. He’d absolutely lost his practiced cool as he limped off to the side and covered his chest wounds with his hands.

James sprinted right for her, and on reflex, she hurled the empty metal gun at his head. It hit and bounced off harmlessly.

He closed in quicker than she thought he could have and dove at her in an attempt to get his arms around her and take her to the floor.

Her power listened to her for once and she was able to phase herself through him off to the side.

”Yes! I love the cat and mouse game!

Panic clouded her mind and all she could think to do was make a run for it. She didn’t have any weapons and her power was unreliable right now. She made a dash for the door-

...only to find it suddenly blocked by James. The older man was grinning from ear to ear. Once neatly combed hair disheveled from the sudden action, but he didn’t seem to mind.

Keith managed to collect himself enough to sit back down in his now blood-spattered chair, and he was furious.

”I don’t know how the @#$% you managed to get away from Eli with that collar still on-” He gasped and winced, applying more pressure to the wound in his ribs. ”....But i’m going to make sure you die here, you little @#$%^.”

James made a grab for her again and she tried to phase but failed. His larger hand fisted in the fabric of her blazer in the crook of her neck. He jerked her up off her feet and supported the rest of her weight with a hand on her stomach.

”Well, Keith, what do we do with her? You got any ideas, or do I get to get creative.”[/i]

Keith swore and forced himself up a little more. ”Find out where the diamonds are first…. Where Eli and Simon are…”

She tried to phase out of his grip again, but still couldn’t connect fully with her power again. A shoe fell off as one foot randomly phased, but that was it.

James easily carted her small body over to the old pool table they had played many games on, and with mutation boosted strength he hurled her down straight on top of it.

The old wood and board gave in to the assault immediately, caving in with a loud crash and the creaking of splintering wood.

The impact knocked the air out of her lungs, which made trying to scramble out of the pile seem impossible. Her chest seized and it felt like she couldn’t get a breath in. Splinters stabbed into the exposed parts of her arms and a few errant nails newly poked out left scratches through her jeans.

”You heard him, Missy. Better start talking now, before I really get riled up.”[/color] James stood above, rolling his shoulders and cracking his knuckles.

Juniper grabbed one of the broken legs of the table and tried to swing it into the side of his knee. It hit but seemingly didn’t seem to do anything.

”Oh… girly, you are so sorely outmatched. You might as well stop while you’re ahead.”

He reached down and snagged one of her ankles. Standing back up without a care for how uncomfortable it might be for her, he started dragging her from within the large pieces of the broken pool table into a clear area of the floor.

”You know, you remind me a bit of my ex. She was short and had an attitude problem too.”

Being dragged at a weird angle like that made her realize how much her back and side hurt now.

She didn’t get to focus on it for long, though.

”You know I’ve won championships? I was on top of the world-” He dropped her ankle as soon as she was in an open stretch of floor, and the straddled her so that his feet were tucked neatly on either side of her ribs. ”...but then that #$%&@ had to go and croak on me, and I lost everything. Everything! If you think, for one second, that I am going to let you ruin this second chance for me…”

He squatted on top of her, looming over her with her trapped between his shoes. She was panic trying to phase the floor under him… but no dice again.

”...Where are the diamonds, Juniper?”

She didn’t respond immediately, so- just like her uncle was prone to doing- he reacted instantly. He slapped her, hard, with his full hand. The sound of it filled the room for a moment. It was hard enough that it cranked her head to the side and her vision glitched for a second.

”It’s gonna get worse the longer you drag this out.”[/color] With the same hand, he backhanded her with his knuckles on the way past. The ring on that hand left a long, even welt across her cheekbone and temple.

”Where are my @#$%ing diamonds, Juniper?!” Keith cut in, raging at the top of his lungs from his chair.

She clamped her jaw shut and curled in on herself as much as she could. Fear was telling her to spill what she knew… that maybe if she did this would all stop and they’d leave her alone… but she knew better deep inside. Keith had been planning on killing her from the very start more than likely, and snitching on Simon would do nothing to save her own skin. She’d just be putting someone else in harm's way.

James pried one of her arms away from her head far enough that he could get an actual punch in, and the force of it knocked all the sense and fight right out of her.

She could taste blood on her tongue and her vision kept fading in and out of black. She could barely hear Keith as he started rambling and stood, staggering over to them so that he could loom over her as well.

”@#$&. ...This was either Eli or Simon’s plan… goddamn two-timing son of a-”

“.. So what now then? We track them down? Who do you think has the diamonds?”

“..S’gotta be Eli. He texted just before this… he must have sent her here to off us so he could have the diamonds all to himself.”

They muttered a bit and tried to hash out what most likely happened, while Juniper slowly came back to her senses and resumed trying to phase herself out of danger. It was even harder trying to get a grip on her wiley power with her brain being rattled from the punch.

”-gotta get rid of her, still. I have some contacts that might be able to find the others.” He kept hissing through his teeth and muttered about needing to get to the hospital soon.

James turned back to Juniper, and she locked eyes with him. Hers were welling up with tears despite herself. His large hands wrapped around her throat and squeezed... just the same way he had done to his Ex all those years ago. He just needed to focus on keeping her from trying to scratch his eyes out, like the last one had done, which Juniper immediately started to do.