Zechs held the sword in his hands, carefully turning it over in the sunlight. As he held it under the water, the water flowed up and skipped around the shining metal, twisting and sculpting the light in Zechs’ eyes. He looked over the curved form of the crosshilt and the perfectly crafted blade. The "sister blade of the Epyon," he had heard it called. He knew it by the name Zero, for that many had escaped its fatal sting once they were set as tis victim. He only wished that Treize ahd gotten it to him sooner.

"Sir," he heard behind him, and turned around. Quinze was waiting there.

"Yes, Quinze?" he asked. The darkness of the entrance to the caves gaped behind him.

"The men have prepared," Quinze replied. He drew a dark rock from a pouch on his belt and showed it to Zechs. "And the Spell Stone is adequately strengthened."

"Good," said Zechs, rising and sheathing the Zero. "Have them assemble."

He followed Quinze to where the other three members of their force were waiting. At a wave from Quinze, they assembled into a circle, with their palms touching. They began to chant quietly, and as the force o fthe magic gathered, Zechs looked around at their faces. His three most loyal, and strongest, apprentices: Walker, Otto, and Trant, young, strong, and ready to follow him to their graves. If that’s what it takes, thought Zechs.

Zechs realized that Quinze was talking to him. "…no match for it," he was saying. "They’re old, burned out, and don’t have have the strength they used to."

"Of course," said Zechs. "The Five will fall easily. Just be sure to get back quickly as soon as you’re finished with them."

"Sure," said Quinze, and ducked into the center of the circle. He closed his eyes and joined in the chanting. In a few seconds a shining darkness in the air, that could almost have been one’s imagination, surrounded him, and he vanished.

As soon as he was gone, the three dark apprentices separated and turned to their master. "Can we go now?" asked Trant. "We are wasting time."

"Patience," said Zechs, "is an important virtue. There is one thing we must do first, to weaken their forces."

"What do we need to weaken them for?" asked Otto.

"They are strong," said Zechs. "We must take all precautions against letting them have an advantage." He put his hands together and began muttering a chant. It was a familiar chant, one they all knew: a Puppet Spell.

"There," said Zechs when he was finished. He looked ar them. "Now we may enter. Find the apprentices as quickly as possible and destroy them. But," he said, and his gaze grew strong and his eyes narrow, "if you find the one with the Epyon of Ironblood, leave him for me."

The apprentices nodded, and followed him into the dark mouth of the caves.

Quatre fought his way up out of a deep sleep and opened his eyes to see Dorothy standing over him. "They’re here," she said.

Quatre sat up and stood, looking around. The others were already strapping on there swords, and Duo was heading for the door, his eyes alight with the fire of battle but his face grim. Heero joined him, and they disappeared into the passageway. Quatre grabbed his bow and arrows and started after them, but a low, cold voice behind him said, "Quatre."

A shiver of terrified realization gripped him, and he turned slowly, to see Dorothy standing, a sword in each of her hands, with a sinister black light shining from her eyes.

Quinze was standing between two large trees in the middle of a birch forest. The white, scarred trunks rose to a dappled, light green canopy as far as he could see. He reached out with all the magician’s senses he had, but could not detect the presence of the Five.

Had the transportation spell not worked? It was supposed to take him straight to them–

"It seems you have underestimated us," came the perpetually amused voice from behind him. Quinze jumped and spun around to see them standing together, twenty feet away among the trees. Master J bowed slightly, mockingly. "Hello again to you, Quinze. It seems that you have not grown much since you began your training under Zechs; you still can’t see through a cloaking spell."

Quinze growled and hunched his head between his shoulders. "If I wanted to remain weak I would have stayed in training under you." He spat on the ground. "I have come to do a deed in Zechs’ name."

"We know," said Duo’s Master G. "Zechs couldn’t be bothered to come attend to us himself, I suppose. Too busy dealing with our apprentices – they’re quite a handful, aren’t they?" He chuckled.

Quinze’s eyes narrowed. "Enough," he shouted. "I’m here to finish you once and for all!" As he spoke, he lifted the Spell Stone before him. Even as he began to shout the incantation, the five magicians raised they’re arms and called in unison a counterattack.

Light shone in great beams from the Spell Stone, and birds and creatures fled in terror as the ground began to shake. Quinze paused in the spell, and finally cried out the final word of it. A great blast of sweeping white energy flowed forth from the stone; it barrelled forward, shredding the thick trunks of the trees. As it neared the magicians, however, it slowed, and the end of it hung suspended, rolling and boiling as it tried to get nearer to them. Great rumbling cracks sounded through the forest, and the very air seemed to be crackling and burning away from the blast.

Quinze dug his feet into the dirt and pushed his arms forward. "Be gone from this world!" he cried, and the white energy surged forward over the magicians, and enveloped them. As it did, the stream of the blast stopped, suspended, and after a hanging second, rolled outward in a catastrophic explosion. It swept over Quinze; his last scream was drowned out by the deafening roar of the energy burning through the forest. The two great trees on either side of him were ripped from their very roots with a sickening crack and thrown forward, incinerated in a few seconds.

The blast’s energy sank, humming dully as the white flaming air cooled and thinned, and in as much time as it formed, disipated into the air and was gone.

It left nothing. Within three hundred yards of where Quinze had stood was bare, scorched ground, the trees gone and what remained of them merely scorched logs. Complete and utter silence seared the air.

Quinze, and the Five Great Magicians, were gone.