Crowley swore as the man reeled back to throw the bottle. "This would be a good time for some magic boyo," he said, turning their horse and raising his sword as if planning to swat it away if all else failed.<br/><br/>Kosuke was torn with an extremely painful indecision.<span style="font-style: italic">If I bounce it back,</span>he found himself thinking,<span style="font-style: italic">they'll die.</span><br/><br/><span style="font-style: italic">Think!</span>he shouted at himself.<span style="font-style: italic">There has to be a way to avoid injury on both sides. Water! No, that only makes alcohol fires worse. Oh, think darn you, think!</span>He saw Crowley readying himself to swing at the bottle and he found himself with an idea.<br/><br/>"I'll put a barrier around it," he said to Crowley. "Hit it as high as you can."<br/><br/>"You got it," the soldier replied, bracing himself to swing. Kosuke muttered a short incantation under his breath and a sort of shimmering could be seen in the air immediately surrounding the bottle. Crowley pulled back and swung his sword as hard as he could. The impact bounced off the barrier and forced the bottle away. All eyes were on the small bomb as it carried further into the sky, wondering which side it would land on.<br/><br/>It didn't matter. The bottle caught fire and exploded while still in mid air, the blast was still able to force through the barrier, but not far enough to do any real damage. That wouldn't have been the case if Crowley hadn't gotten such a good hit on it.<br/><br/>Most of the alcohol was used up in the original explosion, and the fire basically died there in the air. It was a wonderful sight that they couldn't enjoy long. "Move, move, move!" Crowley shouted and they took off with their horses, driving them at top speed away from the kidnappers.