-
Sunnydale
It was all happening again. The First had started another attack on the Slayer. And again it had used a vampire with a soul. No points for originality, but then it didn’t need to be original, as long as the plan worked.
The first time hadn’t worked, but it had been close. This time, it had been even closer. Perhaps it had worked. Spike had been under The First’s complete control, not even aware of it. But before they could work together to get him out from under that control, the First had taken him away. By taking Spike The First had taken the one person who might be strong enough to stand with her against it, no matter how tenuous his sanity was at the moment. Buffy had to stand alone. She didn’t even have Giles to counsel her.
Instead, she had another one of the First’s dupes, and he was talking. Too much, even. It was impossible to shut him up with anything short of gagging. But Andrew had shown her the place he had killed his own best friend, and what a sight it had been. Someone was tortured there. Spike? If he had been, he was gone now.
The whole group had returned to Revello drive afterwards. Willow was now trying to do a locator spell. She’d sounded confident, but as she poured the sand to do the spell, The First struck. Something blew up, and Willow was taken over by a giant demon that started firing lightning at Buffy. Buffy was knocked down. Only because Xander acted quickly and destroyed the focus of the spell nothing worse than that happened. But the damage was done. Willow was crying, upset because she had let The First take her over. She only calmed down a little when Buffy promised her she wouldn’t have to do magic again.
This was too much. To attack the Slayer was one thing. She was destined to oppose things like The First. But her friends had never had that destiny, they were just caught in the crossfire, and that wasn’t right. The First was going to pay. Despite Xander's pleas to let him come, she was preparing to go out alone. Buffy pulled open the door to leave.
And almost bumped into the last person she had expected to see. Giles.
-
Paris
Joe went to join Methos, who was again glued to his computer. He’d stayed awake this time, though, probably partly because Marie had claimed the piano in the bar and was frantically trying to play every piece of music she knew. She was having mixed success, so quite well played phrases were alternated with false notes and sometimes even a few very unladylike curses. It didn’t seem to bother the Old Man much. He was absorbed in whatever was on his screen, although he did flinch when Marie missed a chord by a particularly wide margin. He only looked up when Joe was standing directly behind him.
“Any luck, Old Man?” “Some. Google is a lot more helpful if you have specific keywords to put in. I must say that Sunnydale does not appear to be as pleasant a place as the name makes it seem.”
Methos clicked on a tab in the window and brought up a page with news articles. He quickly scrolled through them. Marie inadvertently set the mood by starting the Danse Macabre.
“Lots of unexplained deaths and disappearances, a high school that was blown up during the graduation ceremony, invasions by biker gangs and last but not least, an insanity epidemic. I’m not sure I’d like to go there. On the other hand, if our friends are there, they would probably fit right in. It’s also close to LA, so it could be connected to whatever is going on there.”
Joe pulled a barstool closer and settled down for a long conversation. “What about the ‘Slayer’?”
“Nothing on the news sites unless Marie has to go find one of several serial killers. None of which are currently based in Sunnydale. I don’t know what to think about the sources that do mention a Slayer in other contexts. Those sites are all dedicated to demonology, prophecies, conspiracy theories and that sort of thing. Especially vampires crop up a lot.”
The missed chord came exactly on cue for the Old Man’s mention of vampires. Joe couldn’t tell whether the flinch was because of the music or the improbability of the stories he’d been investigating. “Great, we’re down to nonexistent myths and rumors.”
That brought on the ghost of a smirk. “You just said that to a supposedly nonexistent myth, Joe.”
There was something in the Old Man’s tone of voice. “What, you’re telling me that vampires exist? The man who absolutely refused to even contemplate the existence of a demon like Ahriman?”
“I have never seen a demon. I did see vampires. But that was a very long time ago. I’d have thought they were extinct. The modern world isn’t really suited to beings that are at their best in complete darkness.”
Methos sounded contemplative, not entirely convinced that there were still vampires around, but definitely willing to consider the possibility. Joe wasn’t so inclined, but actually that was beside the point, as long as they could get some information. “Okay, so do we at least get some information about the Slayer from these sites?”
“Only that it’s supposed to be a woman.”
“That’s it?” “That’s it. Not much, but it’ll have to do. I don’t think we can afford to wait much longer. As soon as you can track down Amanda or Macleod so you have some protection, I’ll take Marie to Sunnydale.”
“Already done. Amanda called me this morning. She found her Watcher. He’d been dead for at least a week. I told her to come here. She’s on her way.”
“No Highlander?” “Mac is still nowhere to be found, at least not with the resources I currently have at my disposal. I’ve got a few survivors coming here as well. Maybe we can figure something out together.”
“Macleod would be a better protector. But Amanda should be able to protect you well enough in here.”
“What with all we’ve done with it over the past weeks, this place is a fortress. It should hold, yes.” Joe worked his way back onto his feet. “I’ll go tell Marie to stop playing and start packing.”
-
Sunnydale
Seeing Giles again was great. But the news and the people he brought were not. The Watcher’s Council was gone. Okay, maybe that wasn’t the worst news in the world. But the First wasn’t just trying to kill the current Slayer and her Watcher support, it was going after all potential Slayers as well. Giles had rounded up three of them whose Watchers had already been killed and brought them to Sunnydale. According to him, more were on their way.
So in addition to her old advisor Buffy got three more people to protect. At least two of them weren’t in any sort of state to protect themselves, acting like good schoolgirls and taking notes of whatever was said to them, but probably unable to stake a vampire if their lives depended on it. Which, let’s face it, it did. The third seemed a bit better prepared, but she hadn’t really endeared herself with her behavior.
Time to keep an eye on the bright side. Giles was back, and he’d brought some information on The First. That was something. He was helping her find Spike. That was another thing. He didn’t especially know that she was looking for Spike, but hey, you couldn’t have everything.
The bright side was hard to see in this darkness. She had gone down into the pit where she had found The First previously, and she could almost touch the blackness.
What was that? Something slid past behind her back. Buffy turned around. Nothing. She turned back to continue onward into the maze of caves.
The hiss was more of a surprise than the fang-face. But the punch beat both. And the one after, and the one after that. It took a long time before Buffy could pull herself together enough to fight back properly, and even then the vampire was scarily efficient in avoiding or blocking her moves. When she finally managed to put a stake through his chest...
The vampire took it right out again and tried to stab her with it. Time to start running, but where to? Big, strong and scary was impossible to avoid. He got in several more punches and managed to break her hand before Buffy could escape into the dawn.
Coming home was no joy after that. To make matters worse, the new arrivals were already up and chattering, just when she needed a few moments of peace and quiet. Maybe she’d get it at school.
-
Sunnydale
“It doesn’t look like a place where you could find vampires, if they really do exist. It’s far too, well, sunny.”
Marie was basking in the light of the evening sun. She was right, too. It didn’t look at all like a place vampires might favor. Long daylight hours made for short hunting times and modern buildings didn’t leave enough nooks and crannies where they could hide their traditional accessories.
If there were any vampires at all. The last vampire sighting Methos trusted had been well over a thousand years ago. Oh, he had heard of more in the years after, but most of those could be traced to either some disease or an Immortal mistaken for a vampire. He had been the victim of such a mistake himself once, forced to lie in a grave for fifty years while the stake rotted enough to allow his heart to heal. Thankfully they didn’t use the decapitation method of vampire disposal in that particular area. But even that was three hundred years in the past. By the time Bram Stoker appeared on scene, vampires had been long gone. Or were they?
“So close to Los Angeles, too. I suppose that could explain all those vampire movies.”
Apparently jet lag was not something that affected the girl’s sense of humor. It didn’t seem to have affected her much at all, in fact. She certainly looked a lot fresher than Methos felt as they walked to their rental car. “I doubt Tom Cruise or Brad Pitt are vampires.”
“It would be a shame if they were.” Her expression seemed to imply otherwise. “So why are we even believing this vampire nonsense?”
“We’re not. But we can still be careful. Catch.” He tossed the car keys to Marie. She caught them, but then looked up at him incredulously.
“What am I supposed to do with these?” “You’re driving. That car is the best protection you can get. You stay in it until we find this ‘Slayer’. If we run into trouble, you run over the trouble. “I can’t drive! I’m only sixteen!” “Sure you can.” But they didn’t allow sixteen-year-olds to drive in Europe. The things one forgot when forging papers, instead of going about it the official way. Oh well. Methos shrugged mentally, then smiled at Marie, who was still looking shocked. “Come on, it’s not that difficult. I’ll talk you through it.”
-
Sunnydale
School had not brought much in the way of peace and quiet. Just some more disturbing dreams when she dozed off during a conversation. And there was the scarily handsome and mysterious principal, who seemed to be keeping an overly close eye on her.
All in all, Buffy had not been refreshed by the respite the day had brought her from fighting the incredibly strong proto-vampire. And now that day was almost over, so she would have to prepare for the night. The new arrivals weren’t helping. At first, the two meek ones were just about screaming for protection, while the other –Kennedy?- kept demanding weapons. Well, if she wanted them, she could have them. Buffy had Giles open the weapons chest, then dismissed the potential Slayers from her mind to deal with Andrew, and then finally a little quiet time, with only Giles standing by with good advice.
That ended when Kennedy came in with the news that Annabelle, the most frightened of the potentials, had decided that outside would be safer. Just before sunset with a Turok-Han out there. Maybe it was for the best. This way Buffy could lure the vampire away from her house, and at least the others would be safe. Everyone but Annabelle.
