"The Round Killing Thing"

By Phantom Bard  (J. Nakamura)

Disclaimers:

This is a work of fan fiction, and is offered for non-profit entertainment.  It may be downloaded for personal use only, and must contain this statement.  The characters and concepts from the TV series Xena: Warrior Princess, including Xena, Xena's ghost, Gabrielle, Livia/Eve, Eli, Ares, etc. are the creations and property of MCA/Universal, and Renaissance Pictures.  No malice is intended to these characters or concepts.  I would like to express my thanks to the creators of this outstanding production for sharing them with us for six short years.

Love/Sex/Violence Warning: Minimal violence and suspiciously close hugging and kissing between star characters alerts.  Nothing explicit is depicted…maybe next time, but this story didn't demand it.  I suppose there should also be a warning about air quality.

Violence Warning: t's got some action, but no graphic violence.

Spoiler: In addition to references to Friend In Need I & II, events are alluded to that derive from the episodes: In Sickness And In Hell, Chakram, Ides Of March, The Debt I & II, Is There A Doctor In The House, When Fates Collide, The Last Of The Centaurs, The Price, Between The Lines, Path Of Vengeance, and Fallen Angel.

Bard's Comments: Gabrielle seeks a lesson about the chakram from Xena, the one who knows it best.  She's already used it successfully as a weapon, and throwing the chakram isn't a problem.  However, Gabrielle is a bard as well as a warrior, and there are things she wants to know. Beta?  What beta?  I've got spell check!  (Just like turn signals, it's paid for but not always used.

Comments, feedback, and constructive criticism may be sent to jn401160@aol.com. Thank you.

☼

The sun was down and Gabrielle was fussing over a stew pot.  She crouched over her campfire, where the pot was simmering, savoring the delicious aroma that had set her stomach growling.  Clouds of scented steam curled up, accompanying the swirling wood smoke, wreathing her head and tormenting her hunger.  The compact blond warrior, once bard, poked at the gently bubbling mixture with a comically large spoon.  In the last year she'd traded her cookware for smaller versions more suitable to cooking for one, but the spoon was a left over from her days with Xena.

"Needs rosemary and thyme," Gabrielle muttered, fumbling through her pouch of spices and identifying the correct packets by feel.  

She added pinches of crumbled herbs to the thickening gravy, while inhaling deeply. Her stomach grumbled in complaint, impatient for her to give in and ladle the stew into the bowl that sat next to her feet.  The spices floated over the chunks of chicken, onions, mushrooms, carrots, and potatoes.  Gabrielle shoved the spoon into the mix and submerged the herbs in the gravy.  She stirred for a moment and then lifted the spoon, blowing on it and slurping up the oversized sample.  The taste test caused her to close her eyes with a blissful moan of anticipation, followed by a smacking of her lips.

"Xena, you'd love this," she said to the figure reclining on her bedroll, "I've definitely gotten better with chicken.  This is to die for…uhhh, sorry, Xena."

"Very funny, Warrior Cook," Xena's ghost deadpanned, "I can see you have many skills.  Could come in handy if you had to do battle with Joxer's ghost."

"Oh yeah?"  Gabrielle retorted, unable to keep a straight face, "And you two could share the ghost of his radish stew and contract a spiritual diarrhea."

"Gods, he almost killed us both with that concoction once," Xena remembered with a grin, "I doubt I'd survive it a second time.  Think I could die of food poisoning if I'm already dead?"

"Wouldn’t put it past you, after all, you have all those sick Scythians to atone for."  Gabrielle replied accusingly, filling her bowl from the pot and sitting down next to her soulmate.

"Gabrielle!  Why, I never felt guilty about them."  

"Gotcha," the Warrior Comic crowed as she happily dug into her supper.

"Oh, very funny."  Xena groused, knowing Gabrielle would never see her mischievous grin while bolting down her food.  "I don't poke fun at you for gaining that weight."

The bard's head popped up from her bowl of stew and she stared at her companion in disbelief.  Xena was appraising her body, looking pointedly at her belly, hips and thighs.

"Xeeeena, I am not getting fat…my clothes still fit just like they did when we left Japa."

"Gabrielle," Xena said, reassuringly, "it's not that much yet, and you know that outfit doesn't cover the trouble spots."

Gabrielle set her bowl down and looked herself over, pinching her flesh and even trying to look behind herself at her bottom.  "I am not getting fat!  Xena, you're kidding, right?"

"Look, Gabrielle, don't worry about it, ok?  You're still beautiful to me…."

"Aaaaaarrrrrrrgh!  I'm dying of hunger here and you have to tell me this?"

"Uhhh, sorry.  Look," Xena said in a reasonable tone, "I think all you really need to do is take it easy on those third servings right before bedtime, and maybe cut back on the nutbread and baklava."

"Xena, I haven't eaten desert in weeks…but maybe you're right about eating so much right before going to sleep."

Gabrielle had gotten up to refill her bowl, and she critically looked herself over again.  Xena could barely keep from snickering as her soulmate leaned over and twisted around, trying to see herself from different angles.  Finally she sighed and refilled her bowl, two-thirds of the way instead of full.

"I just can't believe it…" she muttered, turning to look at Xena with a pitiful expression.

The once Destroyer of Nations just couldn't maintain her warrior's mask, and a giggle escaped, which she desperately tried to cover with a cough.

Gabrielle's eyes widened.

"Ghosts don't cough!  Xeeeena!  Why I oughta…"

The rest was lost as she launched the bowl of stew at the spirit who had collapsed in hysterics on the bedroll.  The bowl and its contents passed right through her and landed in the bushes several yards away.  As the furious bard advanced on her, the once Lion of Amphipolis recalled the better part of valor, and vanished.

☼

  Morning found a sleeping bard, who had eaten three bowls of stew for dinner, wrapped in her blankets and softly snoring, while a contrite ghost stood guard over the campsite.  In the watches of the night, Xena had heard no real danger, and her protective duties had amounted to waking Gabrielle once when a skunk that had come to sample the spilled stew.  The bard had not been happy to see her, yet, and had groaned at being awakened.  Through bleary eyes she had regarded the skunk, finally ignoring its feasting, and rolling back up in her blankets.  As if by mutual agreement, the skunk had finished its supper and trundled noisily off into the undergrowth, never entering the campsite.

  The morning sun had cleared the horizon, sprinkling dappled highlights through the breeze tossed leaves.  Xena enjoyed the smell of the dew-moistened woodland.  The delicate traces of perfume from night flowers overlying rich humus under the trees.  The scents mingled with those of the campsite, smoke, leather, and leftover herbed stew.  She inhaled deeply to indulge her senses, for as a ghost she had no need of air.  Her second lung full brought her the strong odor of someone's insides, announced by the expected flatulent sound effect, and a puffing of the bard's blanket.  A moment later, Gabrielle struggled out of her bedroll.  She rubbed her eyes, and gave Xena an accusatory glare.  Her hair was flattened on one side, and a few leaf fragments were stuck in the cowlicks.  Xena got the momentary impression of a disgruntled marmot, rousted from its hibernation.

  "Of all the vulgar ways to wake a person up, Xena.  Honestly, is this what I get now that you can't lift a bucket to douse me with water?"

  Gabrielle was still groggy, if incensed, and her reasoning was sluggish and impaired by her sleepiness.  In answer, Xena could only burst out laughing.  It took a few moments for her to compose herself enough to answer.

  "Ghosts don't fart, my bard," she uttered, on the verge of cracking up again, "woke yourself up, did you?"

  "Aaaaarrrgh!  Is this any way to start a day?"  Gabrielle asked, rhetorically to the sky.  She was rolling her eyes and flapping her blankets to air out her bedroll.  Finally she shook her head, her native good nature allowing her to grin at herself.  She cast a glance at Xena, who choked back a giggle, and she offered an apology of sorts.

  "Sorry, Xena, I guess you're right about ghosts…I mean, you're the expert now and all.  Gods, I really did wake myself up.  Coulda wakened the dead too, huh?"

  "Sure got my attention.  I'd just been sampling the smells of nature.  Guess I had to uhhh, experience the full variety."  She smiled at her soulmate and jested.  "I must still have something to atone for, huh?"

  For a few moments the two warriors gazed fondly at each other, and then, drawn by the strength of their eternal bond, they moved towards each other and met in a hug.  They stood together in each other's arms, grateful that death hadn't separated them completely, and thankful that they could still touch.  Finally they parted enough to gaze into each other's eyes.  Much as she would have liked to maintain their embrace forever, Gabrielle's bladder was suggesting that she head for the bushes.  Her irreverence broke the moment.

  "Xena, you don't really think I'm getting fat, do you?"

☼

  Midday found Xena and Gabrielle walking down a dirt road at a relaxed pace.  As usual, Xena was scouring the landscape for danger.  Gabrielle was woolgathering, gnawing on a strip of horse jerky.  The candlemarks spent trudging along the roads that crisscrossed the known world had often been a time of reflection for her.  The bard had worked through some of her best stories as she paced away the miles with her warrior.  Often she'd decided on the wording that became preserved at the end of the day in her scrolls.  At other times, Gabrielle would ponder bits of legends or history that interested her.  

  For a long time she'd wondered about the chakram.  It had been Xena's signature weapon for years before they'd met.  At least the dark half of it had.  Since inheriting it, following Xena's death several months before, Gabrielle's interest in it had been growing.    

  The first time she'd used it, to kill the samurai who had beheaded her soulmate, she'd flung it without a second thought, and it had returned to her waiting hand.  Since then, it had seemed to obey her, though she flung it only rarely.  On those occasions, she had acted on instinct, often in desperation, and without consciously calculating the weapon's flight.  She had been gaining confidence in her accuracy, and in the chakram's return.  So far it had never let her down.  What Gabrielle pondered that day wasn't the practical use of the chakram as a weapon, it was its history, its origins, and what rules governed its existence.

  They had stopped for an afternoon rest in the shade of a large oak, which stood by itself on a rise overlooking the road.  Gabrielle sipped from her water skin and nibbled at a hard cheese.  She decided to add an apple to her menu, savoring the crunchy sweetness and the burst of juice as she bit into the fruit.

  Xena had made herself comfortable on a large root and watched her soulmate eat.  Even after all their years together, Xena still felt the same joyful warmth when she knew Gabrielle was finding enjoyment.  Seeing how she could revel in something as simple as the taste of an apple, or the comfort of a bath, or a good joke, made her aware of how vital and alive her companion was.  Even after all the heartbreak and sorrow and hardship of their adventures, Gabrielle had never lost her honest love of the world around her.  Her joy in being alive, her basic decency, her optimism, and her loyalty had long ago won Xena's heart.  To the warrior, who had hardened her own heart and encased it in cold blue ice when she needed to, Gabrielle's friendship was like a revelation, a shock from a world she'd left behind. It hadn't taken her long to realize that Gabrielle was simply extraordinary.  Her moral code, to which some could ascend once or twice in a lifetime, was a way of life for the bard.  She had attracted Xena like a moth to a flame.  Before the light of her soul, the greatest warrior of her time had found herself helpless.  Sometimes as she watched over her soulmate, alone in the dark of night, Xena found herself overcome with the love she felt for this village girl who had audaciously joined her so long ago.  In those night watches she had found that a ghost could cry.

  "Xena," Gabrielle asked the daydreaming warrior, "what do you know about the origin of the chakram?"

  "Huh?"  Xena asked, momentarily disoriented, "Umm, I got it from Ares, back when I first became his Chosen…why?"  

  "Well, now that I've got it, I've started wondering about it, ya know?  I mean, I've never really come across any references to it other than as your weapon.  I know Eli had found a scroll in Kalib's library, after he brought us back to life, but I never got to read it."

  "Ok, I can understand being curious about it.  I was.  I thought I should know about anything that had the power to kill a god.  I think it's one of the few things left around that can, other than the dagger of Helios, and Hind's blood, of course."

  "You mean you read the scroll?"  Gabrielle asked hopefully, her curiosity exploding.

  "Not exactly, Gabrielle, it wasn't in any language I'd ever seen.  Eli called it Enochian script, and told me as much as he could, based on what he'd read.  I guess he and Kalib were the only ones who could have read it."

  "Ohhh…." Gabrielle sighed, momentarily dejected.  Both Eli and Kalib were long dead.  Then, predictably, she asked, "So what did it say?"

  "Well, I thought a lot of it was myth.  Otherwise it's pretty hard to believe, if you take it literally."

  "What, like it was made by Hephaestus to be a god's weapon, or something?"

  "Actually, it was more incredible than that, Gabrielle.  From what it sounded like, the claim was that it was made by Eli's One God."

  "You have got to be kidding.  Xena, am I supposed to believe that the God of Love created a weapon that could kill gods?"

  "Gabrielle, it wasn't even supposed to be a weapon…"

  In the end, they set up their camp for the night in the woods, less than a hundred paces from the oak tree, near a spring they found among some boulders.  Xena's explanation, and the following inevitable discussion, took several candlemarks.  Afterwards, Gabrielle immediately had to write it all down.  The bard was so engrossed in the tale that she never even bothered to cook a supper.  Instead she munched on dried meat, cheese, hardened bread, and fruit.  She barely budged from the rock she'd chosen as a seat.

  "In the beginning," Xena recited from memory, "God created the heavens and the earth.  The earth was without form, and darkness was upon the face of the deep.  Then God said, 'let there be light', and there was light.  And God saw the light, and found that it was good.  And God divided the light from the darkness."

  "So what's that got to do with the chakram, Xena?"  Gabrielle asked impatiently.  "This sounds pretty much like a standard creation myth to me."

  "Hold your horses, Gabrielle.  It gets better.  Those were just the first principles, but you can see how it starts…with the separation of dark and light.  Just as the chakram was once two separate rings, one dark and one light.  The light was good and the dark was evil.  To take a chakram from its altar, you had to be either very bad, or purely good.  Of course, the chakram of light was the one that could kill a god, though all the gods it could kill were kinda like bad guys to the One God.  That's how Ares could steal the dark chakram…and how I could use it all those years."

  "Ok, so that makes sense so far, I guess," Gabrielle nodded.  "But, Xena, you used the dark chakram long after you had reformed."

  "Remember, Gabrielle, once the chakram was off the altar, anyone could use it.  Callisto used the dark chakram several times, and both you and Livia have used the combined chakram."

  "You're right, Xena, that's why the chakram of light was so dangerous after you removed it from the altar.  Ares or Kal could have taken it."

  "Exactly.  Anyway, the One God created the chakrams as symbols of the division of power into opposing forces.  They were sort of like teaching aids.  More than that, they symbolized the extremes of unbalanced force. Because they represented the extremes, only a person who personified the extremes of good or evil could remove them from the altar."

  "Well, if that's so, Xena, how come you could take the dark chakram from the altar after it was repaired, even though you were completely good at the time?"

  "Hmmmmm, you know, I never really thought about that.  I shouldn't have been able to remove it any more than Kalib could remove the chakram of light.  Maybe repairs are a special case, or maybe I'd had it for so long that it knew me."

  "Xena, maybe the One God wanted you to have the chance to balance the chakrams?  Maybe he sent you the sign you prayed for after all.  The dark chakram was only broken because Callisto threw it at you, and she wasn't supposed to act."

  "Maybe, Gabrielle.  I guess we'll never know."

  "I hate holes in the plots of my stories, Xena.  Every so often a listener in a tavern will nit pick at them when I perform.  It's embarrassing."

  "And I hate being manipulated by unseen forces, Gabrielle, even when things turn out for the better.  I just get resentful.  You know how I feel about gods and fate and destiny."

  "Yeah, and they were all still around back then.  I guess it's like you said though, Xena, 'everything happened precisely as it should', the good and the bad.  I was so happy to have you back to your, 'rotten old self', all because you combined the chakrams."

  "That's the lesson they teach.  It wasn't just the chakrams that were balanced…it was my nature too.  What happened within me was a reflection of what happened with the chakrams.  It's what happens in the world all around us, Gabrielle.  The light and the dark have to be balanced to be truly good.  Either one alone is a force out of balance.  Pure dark and pure light can both turn to evil."

  "Right.  When you were a warlord, the light seldom tempered your darkness.  After Eli brought us back, well, it was like I said. The best in you was helpless without your balance of darkness and light inside."

  "There's another thing, Gabrielle.  The combined chakram can still be separated into halves.  It's a reminder that good isn't a thing unto itself.  It really is a balance of opposing extremes.  Almost any virtue you can think of can be taken too far…then it winds up causing trouble."

  Gabrielle fell silent, remembering an example of her own conduct.  She had believed that killing in cold blood was wrong.  It wasn't something she had thought was questionable.  In her willingness to save Xena from committing premeditated murder, she had betrayed her soulmate to the Green Dragon, a man so evil he had personally tortured his own mother to death.  Even as unassailable a belief as the sanctity of life could become a trap of blind dogma.  She had nearly cost Xena her life, and consigned Chin to the rule of a despot.  In the end, Xena had murdered Ming Tien.  She had been convinced of the necessity, and she had owed her mentor a debt.  She had also been forced to agonize over the need to lie to her partner, knowing Gabrielle wouldn't understand the necessity of her action.  Gabrielle gulped as she looked back at Xena.

  "Gods, Xena.  I can see how a virtue carried to excess becomes a vice.  Just look at how I nearly got you killed in Chin…or how Lord Belach's love for his wife and daughter got twisted until he slaughtered the centaurs."

  "Or how my fear of the horde carried me back to my darkness.  I wanted to kill them all and I was willing to become a monster to defeat them.  I was completely blind, but at least I had you to show me the way back, Gabrielle."

  "Yeah, it was a lot like when the Mitoan General Marmax let his war of defense turn into cold blooded slaughter of the Thessalians.  But he had you to show him how he'd let himself become blinded by hatred."

  "Gabrielle, you had a big hand in teaching him, just like you did with me a year later.  You have balanced my darkness so many times, my love, I never would have made it without you."

  For a while they were lost in the memories of their adventures and neither spoke.  The sun had fallen below the horizon and dusk graced the woods.  The crackle of Gabrielle's small fire, and the rustling of animals in the underbrush as they settled for the night were the only sounds.  Finally Xena took a deep breath and broke their silence.

  "I guess you can see why I'm so worried about Eve?  She's gone from the extremes of her darkness as Livia to the pacifism of Eli's Way of Love.  Now she's wandering around Indus and Chin, and she's still got so many enemies.  And she won't even raise a hand to defend herself."  Xena looked beseechingly at her soulmate, worry and sadness etched on her face.  "I can't help her now, Gabrielle.  If you ever see her again, please try to show her the need for a balance of darkness and light?"

  "Of course I will, Xena," Gabrielle promised, as she wrapped her arms around her warrior, "I love her like my own daughter, and I'll do anything to keep her from getting hurt."

  "I know you will," Xena whispered, before they lapsed into silence again.  She remembered the fight Gabrielle had lost to Varia, trying to save Eve from the Amazons' wrath.  It was fully dark before their conversation resumed.

  "Gabrielle, there are a couple more things I learned from Eli.  The chakrams have been around practically forever, and we're not the first people to have held them.  According to Kalib's scroll, every so often, what we've been through is repeated, more or less."  

  "Huh?"  Gabrielle's head came up as she registered what Xena was saying.

  "Someone claims one of them," Xena continued, "and then the need for the other to be claimed grows, until they are combined and their forces become balanced.  Eventually though, the balance fails, the rings are separated, and they are returned to their altar."

  "So the whole chain of events flows in a circle, just like the chakrams?"  Gabrielle asked.

  "That's what it said, Gabrielle.  They are God's symbols of the ongoing struggle between dark and light, and they illustrate the nature of good and evil.  It has always been, and it will never end."

  "Just like us, Xena."  Gabrielle stated excitedly.  "We're destined to be together again and again.  We know we'll be fighting for the greater good in at least one future life, as Arminestra and Shakti.  Ummm, do you think we've been together in the past too?"

  "It wouldn't surprise me at all.  Not after all the things we've been through."  Xena said with a smile.  "And it wouldn't surprise me if the chakram turns up in our future lives as well.  Maybe not in all of them, but hey, considering our "mission", I'd guess we'll cross its path again."

  "I just hope we remember about it, when we do."

  "Me too, Gabrielle."

  "You know, Xena, our lives have been a lot like the chakrams, haven't they?  I mean, you started your adventures as an evil warlord, and I started as an innocent village girl.  We were about as opposite as anyone could be.  Then over the years, we both gained a balance.  I know I'm not the same as I was, and you certainly aren't."

  "Well, for starters, I'm dead, Gabrielle," Xena deadpanned, catching the bard by surprise for a moment, before laughing, "but I've been amazed at the changes too.  We started at the extremes.  Now, you're a warrior with a balance inside you.  Sorta like the best of both of us combined.  Maybe that's why you're alive and you inherited the chakram.  Maybe, like the balanced chakram, there can be only one of us at a time."

  "Don't say that, Xena.  You make it sound like if we ever both achieve this balance, one of us will have to die."

  "Think about it, Gabrielle," Xena responded, "It was after Eli brought us back that you really came into your own.  But it was only after I'd shown you the pinch and you used the chakram in battle that your training was complete.  Now you're what I could have been if I hadn't been crippled by my past."

  "But you did so much good."  Gabrielle protested.  

  "Gabrielle, I wouldn't let you die in Japa because I love you, but I also somehow knew your destiny was too important to end there with me.  Since I've been a spirit, I've been thinking a lot about how things were.  I think my purpose was to train you, and to join the chakrams.  I believe God wanted me to do that, and it explains why he sent me back without my dark side."

  "I think we were sent back so you could bring Eve into the world."  Gabrielle reasoned.  "We had to die and go through heaven and hell so you could redeem Callisto.  You redeemed yourself by becoming a demon, of all the ironic twists, and by redeeming Callisto, God could use her spirit for Eve."

  "So I had a couple purposes, huh?  Well, I like I always said, I have many skills."

  "You certainly do, my warrior, and the one I value most is your love."

  "Gabrielle, finding you, and becoming us, is what's made this whole crazy adventure worthwhile.  I really do believe things happened precisely as they should.  I have no regrets anymore."

  "That's something I've wished for during all the time that I've known you.  I've always hoped you'd let yourself feel at peace one day.  That's so good to hear, Xena."

  "Speaking of hearing…" the warrior whispered, raising an eyebrow.

  "Three on the left!"  Both the bard and the warrior declared in unison, and cracked up laughing.

  "They're fifteen yards away, and one just drew a sword."  Gabrielle observed.

  "Actually, they're thirteen yards away, and the other two already had their weapons drawn."  Xena chided.

  "Show off."  Gabrielle replied, unhooking the chakram.  "Just watch this."

  In the darkness, outside the light of the campfire, a silver blur sped towards the stealthy would be attackers.  It caromed off a tree trunk, rebounded off a helmet, struck a sword blade, slammed into an armored back, and returned to the bard's outstretched hand.  A yelp and a couple of groans carried back to the listening pair at the campsite.  Moments later the sound of two staggering as they dragged off a third could be heard moving away through the brush.

  "Nice shot," Xena complimented with pride, "I couldn't have done better myself."

  "Thanks, Xena," Gabrielle responded, basking in her soulmate's praise, "now where were we."

  "Well, since you don't have any trouble throwing the chakram, and I've pretty much finished my history lesson, I think we were right about here…."

  Xena had leaned down and quickly lifted the surprised and giggling bard.  She carried her to the bedroll spread out next to the fire.  The warrior gently pinned her down, and captured her lips with a kiss.