(Continued for Sebastian shortly after All is well that ends.)

Without Garrett as a guide, King Pharmaceuticals seemed more like a horrifying fun house than a drug research and development company. The healer tried to go back the same way they had come in the first place, but instantly got turned around. What's more, there were strange sights and impassable obstacles that were not there before. In some places doors lay slumped sadly in the hallways where someone had blown them right off their hinges. A macabre wall forged completely out of bone blocked a pathway that he thought he was supposed to go down. An explosion rocked the building, causing debris of all sizes, from dust to ducts, to rain down from above. In one place an entire water line had been disrupted, causing a small flood all the way down a staircase toward who-knew-what in the lower levels.

Despite the evidence that they had been occupied, and vandalized, rather recently, the hallways were now empty. The scene had changed so much since he'd gone into the lab with Seizure. It only could have been a few minutes, yet the whole world had changed around him. So much destruction had happened so quickly.

The unicorn shifter found a staircase that lead down, and another that led up to where he thought he was supposed to go. He was mistaken. When he opened the door at the top of the stairs, it didn't open upon the front desk as he had expected, but rather upon open sky. Just as he realized he had ended up on the roof, the building below him gave a shudder as if someone was pulling it apart at the seams and Sebastian was knocked to his hands and knees.

He was rushing the building way to late, there was already a war zone here, and he hadn’t been here for the beginning of it, he wondered how many of his comrades would be in better shape if he had been there at the start… the important ones looked ok, alive at least. It wasn’t until Isabel had said one sentence that changed his mind about what him and the four with him were going to do.

Apparently their healer and new lead member had decided it was a good Idea to hurt his little sister. Is only had a chance to answer two questions after she said Syn was hurt. Who? and Where? They had been in the building and it was two very trusted males….it was also unforgivable.

“circle the building and watch for the rats to leave, don’t get distracted. Watch the exits like a hawk. Jupiter put me up top.” And with that the first male was flung by the second to the top of the building.

His landing punctuated with a solid thud, his mass raised from the ground and a practiced crouch, as luck would have it one of the two stood before him. He opened his mouth to speak but the only thing that came was inaugurated anger. A bellow rang out across the battlefield and to the man that stood before him, there could be no mistake in the fact that they were now foes. His bloodshot crimson eyes glared at the man before him.

He then began to set a sure and steady pace toward Sebastian and what Abyss believed was going to be the end of a long and prosperous life. Such a shame he threw it all away on hurting his little Aelly.

The unicorn shifter used the door frame to pull him self back up to his feet. The building, he thought to himself, is not very stable. Another shudder reverberated through the roof, but this time he kept his feet. It was a bit like being on a ship in the choppy seas, or live feeling the tremors of an earthquake.

An agonized and infuriated roar indicated that the source of this tremor was not within the building, but on top of it. Sebastian looked up to see a large red hulking man glaring at him. One of the Abyss brothers, he wasn't certain which one, but whomever it was he was not as friendly looking as when the unicorn man had first met him, that first day at the Sanctuary. Now anger clouded his eyes as the large red man began a slow but steady march toward where Sebastian was standing.

“Abyss, my friend,” Sebastian made his voice as soothing as possible, “What is it that troubles you?” Could he have heard of the destruction of haywire already, or was even an attempt enough to make him lose his temper so quickly? Perhaps he was simply defending his territory from the backup Sebastian had unwisely requested. He was regretting that request now that he had seen what his back up had done to the building; they'd turned it into a war zone. Could Abyss know that it was Sebastian's fault that all these people showed up to provide a distraction at his request? If so, it made sense that the mutant would be seeing red right now.

~~“Abyss, my friend,”, “What is it that troubles you?”

What treachery is this that the white unicorn stands before a demon and calls him friend. It is the devil that should be the betrayer not the white unicorn…yet here he stands calling him friend after causing pain to his beloved little sister. He had better hope that the pain dealt would be repairable, Sebastian worked miracles before he had better hope for one now.

"You." He struggled to speak over the deep well of anger in him. "Have hurt what you are supposed to heal." His menacing pace was closing on the horned man. "Where is Syn?" a growl rumbled an interruption in his thoughts. " You are going to heal her."

His face involuntarily twitched as he closed the distance, It said volumes about Sebastian that he was standing his ground, the first would be called ‘overconfident in immortality’, the last would be called ‘when I should have ran’.

Abyss squeezed his fists and his knuckles let out a loud crackle, the unicorn had mere moments to say something, anything to placate him. His value was in the fact that he could heal. If he refused, well he hoped for his sake he wasn’t truly immortal it would be hellish to live an immortal life in the shape Abyss was prepared to leave him in.

For a brief moment, confusion left its traces on Sebastian's white face. He was unsure, for that brief instant what Abyss could have meant by accusing him of hurting someone, and that he needed to heal Syn now. Had she been hurt again since he had left her in the laboratory with Isabel? If so, the big man was probably right to accuse the unicorn shifter of being the cause of her injury, indirectly at least. It was his fault, after all, that all these people were here.

“Last I saw her, she was with Isabel,” he answered the large mutant's question as promptly as he could. “I tried healing her, but I couldn't. She was...” He was going to say she was perfectly healthy, but as the large red man stepped closer and formed a fist that could probably blast a hole through a mountain, the unicorn decided it would be wiser to step out of his way first (and hastily) and finish his sentence second.

Sebastian didn't give the other man a chance to swing his fist at him, at least not yet. He darted around the man's left side toward the opposite edge of the building. He had worked on honing his reflexes for quite a long time, which was probably a good thing. He wasn't going to be out muscling Abyss any time soon, but if he could keep light on his feet he might survive what was escalating quickly into a fight without a broken neck or something equally unpleasant.

His movement brought him close to the front of the building, and he could see what had become the battlefield below. What he saw sickened him. He had not intended this to escalate into a brawl. He hated violence, and had inadvertently caused so much of it. There were people and mutants lying dead or unconscious, and all around them fights continued to rage. Perhaps the flashiest part was the girl riding the construction vehicle and swinging a stop sign at her foes. Such destruction.

His right hand opened and swiped as he read Sebastian’s move, The lithe man dodged left and kept on going Abyss turned and his teeth bared into a Maniacal grin. "She Was, what?!" his mind leapt at the negative, She was too far gone? He lunged forward. Long strands of saliva connecting his lower teeth to his top, his mouth was dry and yet it looked as if he was frothing at the mouth. Somewhere in his mind, logic counseled him to calm down, would the old man be so callous about causing pain? He didn’t think so. The position left him still out of direct reach of the man. His tail whipped into the floor behind him causing bits of rooftop to explode from behind him.


“You have ten seconds.” He hated wondering if she was going to be ok and his failure to defend what was truly important to him against calm collected logic was barely holding the flood gates shut, apparently Sebastian had ten seconds to try to keep them shut before Abyss opened them freely and let the insanity burst through the damn and drown those that stood before him. All in and all he felt generous.

>>>"She Was, what?!"

Abyss didn't give him time to answer that question before lunging at him, mouth hanging open, saliva flying. It was almost as if the man was going to bite him. Sebastian had no doubt that his jaw was every bit as powerful as the rest of him. The unicorn man dodged again, following the ledge on the edge of the building. It was almost as if Abyss had turned into an animal, letting his rage and his instincts control what would otherwise be a rational mind. Sebastian had seen people who were devoted entirely to their leaders before this, but this was ridiculous. Perhaps he and Syn were lovers or something, that he would get so upset when all that happened was she had been knocked out.

“...healthy,” the unicorn shifter responded over his shoulder. As he dodged the thrashing tail as well and cut back toward the doorway where he had come up. This was all some crazy misunderstanding, and things had spiraled way out of control.

>>>“You have ten seconds.”

Ten. That wasn't a very long time...

Nine.“Look, I didn't intend for anyone to get hurt.”

Eight. ...in the scheme of things.

Seven. “I was only trying to prevent people from getting hurt in the future.”

Six. Did he mean Sebastian had...

Five. “I had no idea...”

Four. ...ten seconds to explain himself...

Three. “...that Garrett would start shooting at people.”

Two. ...or ten seconds left to live?

One.

>>“...healthy,”

A sigh of relief echoed threw him, but if he was innocent why was he running like the guilty?

>>“Look, I didn't intend for anyone to get hurt.”

Which was it, the cool breeze that trickled in with the good news evaporated along with the remnants of his logic. As the crackling campfire set the whole forest a blaze. apparently the man only had three seconds to explain. And seven to make things worse.

>>“I was only trying to prevent people from getting hurt in the future.”

Abyss tail grappled a large piece of rock that his tail had just broken out of the roof.

>>“I had no idea...”

It rolled around the piece of rock,

>>“...that Garrett would start shooting at people.”

And flung it hard toward the right of the door frame that Csendes was encompassed in, the rest of Abyss waited a second and then barreled to his left of where Csendes was standing a moment before. He just wanted to hit him once…it should be enough. He hadn’t been the one to cause true harm to Syn…it Was Garret! Seizure! He gained their trust, access to KP and then did this at the first chance he got, now that man would pay.

The red bull’s left arm rocked forward in a hook, looking to connect with the last unicorn. He hadn’t even bothered to wait to see if his ploy would work, he wasn’t at his best when his temper was out of control. Perhaps sometimes that was a blessing.

Even the innocent run when someone is throwing large pieces of concrete at them. Especially when the person throwing it had just dug the concrete chuck out of the building with his tail. Sebastian's tail hung limp, giving only the smallest twitch of foreboding; it was feeling a little inadequate right now.

He saw the rock coming, but with the incredible force behind it the concrete flew faster than he could dodge. Fortunately Abyss missed, and only a smallish piece of concrete shrapnel flew his way, cutting a long gash down his cheek as the unicorn dodged through the doorway to duck behind the frame. It almost seemed like the red bull was herding him, trying to get him to go somewhere.

Even as the blood dripped down his face, the cut knit itself back together. It was redemption for his part in destroying Haywire, for Syn's strange malady, and for the damage that was being done to King Pharmaceuticals because of the battle he had brought to its doorstep. He had been over zealous, perhaps, and probably deserved whatever Abyss could throw his way, including the punch that came flying through the wall to the right of the door frame only a half a second after he had ducked behind it. The punch landed square on his tail, which was pinned and crushed between the giant's red fist and the metal railing that protected people from falling down the stairs. The railing succumbed to the force of the fist and the largest portion of it clattered down the stairs leaving only a broken pipe or two in it's place. Rubble from what was formerly a wall and now resembled a window hit him as well, leaving bruises he could only feel starting to form under his clothing.

Sebastian was reeling from the pain in his fifth and favorite extremity. Now that, my friend, was uncalled for. You can punish a man for his crimes, but you should always leave his tail out of it.

It was probably stupid, but it was necessary for their friendship that they settle this like men. His tail did not want to hold a grudge forever against the monumental red hulk, but it did want what little revenge it could get before he would be forgiven. Even if he could not possibly in a million years* win a fight against Abyss, he was going to teach him not to mess with his tail. The metal pipe might help.

The unicorn shifter steadied himself as the dust cleared and grasped the metal pipe between his hands. The smell of the iron was strong, and red rust flaked off onto is his hands. He waited just a moment to catch his breath, then charged out swinging his metal weapon at where he thought Abyss' tail must be, hopefully before Abyss had a chance to be surprised that he was still alive. Take that, your prehensile red monkey tail. Take that.


--

*A figure of speech using hyperbole commonly used by Americans to emphasize the impossibility of a situation. If a million years were actually to pass, there would of course be no contest, as Abyss' lifespan most certainly would have ended by then. Sebastian's lifespan... we'll not go there.

Of course the rabbit dodged toward the hole and not the left where he wanted him to go, but his muscles already set a course and he was leaning into it just right, might as well follow through for effect. perhaps he could simply scare the man until he fainted... his fist carried through the wall sending bits of cement towards him self and an eruption of sheet rock on the other side, he heard a yelp and some pipes burst. He unballed his fist and then pulled it back through the hole, there was a distinct lack of crushing a body. It was an odd sensation to know you would recognize breaking a man, but it was in him to know. He pulled his fist out and began to turn to head down the stair way, he briefly wondered how far he had ran. He was about to take the half step he would need to get to the doorway when surprisingly the Unicorn moved with his fluid grace out the door and behind him swing a pipe like a paddle toward his tail. He was stunned the Sebastian intended on taking him head...or tail on rather.

The pipe swung true sending the odd sensation of pain all the way up his spin, attacking his tail wasn't normally what a foe would do but he supposed, that a tailed foe would know that attacking a tail was effective. The strike rocked through his body like and caused a interesting type of pain comparable to biting your own tongue. But it was something he could survive.

His tail lashed out trying to entangle the unicorn’s arm, once he got a hold on the foolish man, he would finish the rest. It popped as it went stretching out to its full length. He had decided on changing tactics as a bit of the rage lifted and allowed him to focus, slightly more, his hands opened and he focused on catching Csendes.

…the logical words of the unicorn were begin to find there mark as he calmed even slightly. He had tried to heal her, not out of guilt but because he wanted to…then Seizure started shooting; Seizure was who he should be chasing right now. But there was still the fact that Sebastian was here to hinder the sanctuary and had been on the side of the one that was truly doing damage, hadn’t he overheard the man speak of healing limbs…he wondered momentarily if Sebastian could do that trick on himself… He would just have to find out.

“Here uni uni uni.” Abyss called mockingly.

Abyss' tail was angry and lashed out at him as he danced away again. Rightly so, since Sebastian had just smashed it with a metal pipe. Somehow it made his own tail feel just a little bit better: his own tail was flattened like a tank had run over it and trailing sadly behind him on the ground like a dead thing, but its thirst for revenge had been satisfied. His bruises were already fading, but the bones in his tail were going to take awhile to regenerate from their current pulp-like state.

The unicorn shifter was surprised that his blow had any effect at all on the red giant. He didn't really want to hurt the man who had first shown him around the sanctuary and made him feel at home, or one of the brothers to that man. He did not, however, see any way at the moment that this little scuffle could end without one of them being knocked into next week. Or killed. He wasn't sure if either of them could kill the other, and he was certain that he didn't want to be either the killer or the corpse.

Sebastian skirted around the edge of the building, holding his pipe like a sword. The balance was off, but it was approximately the right length and weight to approximate a broad sword. It had been ages (literally) since he'd used one and already his arm muscles were protesting at the unaccustomed weight. When had he let himself become so out of shape?

The battle continued to rage down below, as chaotic as mutant battles always were. Unlike the predictable movements of chess pieces or human armies no two troops functioned the same in a mutant brawl, making strategies nearly impossible to plan and even more impossible to decipher. Abyss called to him, mocking. The building trembled again beneath his feet, not enough to make him lose his balance, but enough to make him consider backing off from the edge of the building. Or jumping over it.

He supposed that going over the edge of the building could afford him an escape route, albeit a desperate one. It would get him out of the pan and into the fire and would probably earn him a pair of broken legs if he didn't land correctly. That would make continuing to run away more difficult. His speed was the only advantage he had over Abyss and he didn't relish giving that up just yet.

He could try apologizing. One of these days his words might actually sink in and calm the raging beast that lived within Abyss' heart.

“Abyss,” he called as he dodged behind a gigantic machine with fans whirring inside a vent; it was an air conditioning unit, but he didn't recognize its functionality other than its usefulness as a shield. “I am sorry for my involvement in this mess. Is there anything I can do to make amends?” Aside from dying, that is. He peered around the opposite side of the conditioning unit, pipe at the ready just in case. “Let's end this.”

He was prepared to lay down his weapon if Abyss could cool his temper. He was also ready to swing it at the man's head in hopes of knocking him unconscious. He would greatly prefer the former outcome over the latter.

~~“Abyss,” “I am sorry for my involvement in this mess. Is there anything I can do to make amends?”

Abyss stared at the white haired man as he put the air conditioner between the two of them and tried, tried hard to hear words over the demands for violence in his heart and in his head. He grinned at Sebastian straitened his Pasteur from hunched. He then motioned him out from behind the unit.

~~ “Let's end this.”

“Shake my hand, and take a message to Garret for me, if you find him before I do that is. If you can do those two things then we are good.” He showed no true hint of friendliness to the man, but if he was truly so humbled to apologize and if he honestly had less to do with all this than he thought, then could leave the elder in peace. “If I find out that you have deceived me about my sister, this will go for you too. Tell him he better run and not stop, because once I talk to Syn, If I find out that either of you have done anything harmful or permanent to her. I will chase you to the ends of the earth and I will repay the debt of pain a thousand fold.”

He knew it wasn’t the most assuring thing to tell someone when offering them your hand but, if the unicorn wouldn’t shake his hand now he would simply assume that he had done terrible things and destroy him on principle. He looked to the offered hand momentarily wondering if he was going to close his hand on the unicorns and beat him to death if he was trusting enough to take it….at the moment he wasn’t quite sure.

He knew that the offer to shake his hand could be a trap. Thus far it was only because he was faster than the red giant that he hadn't been broken into a thousand pieces by now. Taking the man's hand would be like putting his head in the lion's mouth and waiting to see if he bit it off. Sebastian was an honorable man, though. After he sought to end the fight, it would feel wrong to refuse Abyss' request of a handshake. He had to show that he trusted the man before he would be given trust.

The other problem about this arrangement was that he basically had to agree to let Abyss go after Garrett and exact the same kind of revenge he had tried against Sebastian. He couldn't let him do that. Whether or not he was a good man, whether or not he had made the correct choices, Garrett was his friend. He couldn't agree to those terms.

The unicorn man stepped out from behind his shelter and lowered his pipe to the ground with his left hand. His right, he extended, offering it to Abyss from about three Abyss sized strides away.

“I will shake your hand, but I can't stand by and let you kill someone else. An eye for an eye blinds us all. Garrett was your friend, too. Show him some mercy, please.”

Abyss walked the three strides required as he considered the man's statement, he took Unicorn's hand and shook it, he squeezed only slightly and for a moment ensuring that he knew that he wasn't in more pain because he had decided it wasn't necessary., his tail could attest that he could crush or remove it all together.

~~“I will shake your hand, but I can't stand by and let you kill someone else. An eye for an eye blinds us all. Garrett was your friend, too. Show him some mercy, please.”


"what will you do instead of standing by? You've lived a long life Sebastian, You've had family pass along your trek through eternity, I assume somewhere along the way you've been betrayed, worse your family has suffered within your sight." he took a breathe seeming very much the kind beast that he met so long ago. "You have the opportunity to have another family over and over again, you must watch them pass, or get to love them as they do. You seem like a man with the capacity to love in spite of all that. I get one chance at this, one lifetime. My parents are already dead, The only family that I have left is possibly dead." Yes, there was Deathstar, but she loathed him, how could you count that as family. His poor alley was possibly dead. “He could have been family,You know what you call a friend that betrays your family?”

The unicorn could run all day long to save his tail...or not as the case may be, but could he run fast enough that someone else could get away? not until he turned into a baby or an old many he couldn't.

He still hadn’t released Sebastian’s hand and wasn’t sure at the moment if he could let one horn off as easily as he thought he could. He stared the man in the eyes and realized that he couldn't let him off free and destroy Seizure and hadn't Sebastian been here betraying his family as well?

"An Enemy." his red hand compacted the smaller pale hand in his own, his tail wrapped around the pipe to stop any struggling and his free hand scooped under Sebastian's arm. "what would you call A unicorn that could fly? A Pegasus...Good bye Pegasus!" Abyss launched the man into the air away from KP in Grim satisfaction now to hunt Seize... He felt a little bad for those that got in his way....He was in the mind set to hurt those he cared for if need be, enemies need not leave with their lives this night.

Abyss grasped his hand, and icy energy leaped through their grip to make its way to Abyss' tail. Not healing it wasn't an option; as soon as their skin touched it happened automatically. The immortal healer listened to Abyss' rant without speaking. He just watched his face. There was a kind of pain there that he couldn't touch, couldn't heal away. Violence and vengeance wouldn't heal it away either, but he doubted that the big man would listen if he told him that, not when he felt like this.

Sebastian recognized the pain Abyss was feeling. He had felt it dozens of times himself. No matter how many people one grew to love, it never ever got easier to say goodbye to them and to know that even if there was an afterlife it was impossible to join them there. Loved ones can't be replaced. There is always room left in the heart for new loves, but where love has been lost nothing can fill the hole that is left there.

Sebastian wasn't surprised when Abyss crushed his small white hand in his massive red one. He flinched, slightly, but remained standing tall and looked the man in the eye. It was a very brief moment that he was able to maintain this eye contact, not because he felt the need to look away, but because Abyss felt the need to throw him off the roof.

It was a very short flight between the roof of the Sanctuary and the window of the next building over. Sebastian didn't even have time to look down before he slammed shoulder first through the window and into the opposite wall. He left there a sizable impression of where his body hit, not quite a perfect gingerbread cut out, but as close as one could come to it in real life. Sebastian, being unconscious at this point, didn't notice.