***** Sita crouched in the darkness beside the plane and clutched her gun close to her chest. The others looked on, terrified. They were all armed, some more than others. “Ok, I’m going to cause a distraction. Oz, you, Willow, Scully and Mulder take point. I want Angel and Buffy to stick together, Xander make sure you keep an eye on everyone. Cordelia, Giles and Jenny, watch Joyce and for God’s sake, don’t shoot anything unless you’re sure it’ll hit the mark. Yaksha, Seymour, Kali, bring up the rear. If we get separated, everyone head for that mountain, just beyond it is a valley with a shit load of caves, duck down there and wait until you get picked up by someone. If you get split up, stay in pairs, three or fours if possible but no less than two.” Everyone nodded and set off, sadly gazing at each other and the sky where they knew death waited in black helicopters.
Yaksha stayed, watching Sita as she walked to the Apache. “Sita, be careful.”
“I will be.” Yaksha walked over to her and touched her face gently. “Did I ever say how sorry I was for changing you?”
“I can’t remember, Yaks, go! Look after them.”
“Sita, let me get this out, I am so sorry. I, I only did it because I could never get you out of my mind.”
“Yaksha! Go!”
“Sita, I,” Sita decided to silence Yaksha and did so by pressing her lips to his and his breath was taken away. She pulled back and looked at his darkened face. She turned and ran into the chopper. Yaksha stood and watched her go, totally shocked. He turned and ran after the others just as the planes came into human view. He caught up with the shaken group and could tell that Oz, Willow and Co were about a hundred metres ahead of everyone else, guns raised and torches shining. Angel gripped Buffy’s hand and she gasped in exhaustion, it was taxing. Xander peered around, gun tight to his chest and in the correct position. Cordelia had a glock and she held it in both her hands, glancing around nervously. Giles helped Joyce along and Jenny chanted a prayer to Hectate, Goddess of all witches. Kalika and Seymour skulked through the shadows noiselessly alongside him and they all had a full view of the people in front of them.
Back at the base, Sita jumped into the helicopter and started the engine. It whined to life and the rotars spun, getting faster and faster until she lifted up off the ground and over the tree tops. She saw around her evergreen forests that stretched for ever. Two Apaches came to greet her. She noticed that there were two fighter jets about a kilometre overhead. The jeeps were still a fair bit away but they were coming quickly, they’d be there soon.
“Playtime buddies.” She banked sharply and swung right into their paths. She could hear the pilots swear and separate. She turned again and swung to the helicopter on her left. She raised her gun and grimaced. She could hollow a dime at two hundred yards with the right gun, this was the right gun. She took careful aim and shot the pilot once in the head, sending the Apache swirling out of control. It crashed into the ground, blew into a million pieces and blazed with intense heat. She swung back to the other and buzzed them, getting as near as she could. She hovered, waiting, waiting for the right moment. She uncovered the switch for the twin missiles and stared and looked out the window to the gunner in the other helicopter, she could hear their conversation.
“We’ve got orders to take them alive, as many as we can but to kill anyone that stands in our way, let them go.”
“Are you sure?”
“Fire soldier!” She could sense his fingers move over the instrument panel and she took a breath. At the same instant that he hit his button, she hit hers and in a move too quick to follow, she jumped out of the helicopter. It blew up behind her as did the other one and the double force sent her flying to the ground. Now, time to improvise. A piece of wing came flying by her and she grabbed it, holding it perpendicular to the ground. In a move that was more copying TV than anything, she shoved the board into a position under her feet so it slowed her rapid descent, a bit. She clutched the board and steered it clumsily. It gave her the friction she needed and her speed slowed, she skimmed an air current and it sent her reeling off away from the road, towards the mountains. The ground was getting closer and closer and when she was little more than a hundred feet away from the trees with their pointy, stake like tops, she brought the makeshift board over her head and the lightweight aluminium alloy gave her a little more deceleration. She brought her knees up to her chest and closed her eyes. She fell through the trees and slammed to the ground with such force she could feel most of the bones in her body shatter. Blood seeped from many cuts and she closed her eyes, praying that the others would be safe.
***** Buffy cried out as she stumbled over a root in the total darkness and Angel caught her as she fell. “Buffy, are you ok?” he asked, eyes and voice smouldering with concern, husky and breathless in the pitch darkness of the woods. In answer, she laid her head on his chest and listened to the immortal heart that beat under it. She breathed heavily and her hands fell to her belly, hoping that nothing she did would hurt her child. Angel’s brows knit and he shouldered his AK 47 and swept her up into his arms. She wanted to say no, to let him keep his strength but she was so tired, too tired. She buried her head in his shoulder and held onto him.
Yaksha glanced around and tested the night for Sita’s scent or her sounds but her heard none. He had seen the three explosions along with the others and he hadn’t seen anyone jump out or the furls of a parachute. They continued slogging through the woods and around the base of the mountain, arms carrying each other and not guns, hands holding each other and breaths taken shallowly, in fear. Finally, as the first threads of dawn appeared in the eastern sky, they reached the valley. Oz found an old fox hole that led into the underground caverns. They opened it up and walked through the inky darkness, following the vampires. Kalika looked around and finally decided on a small cave off to the side. They crawled in and were delighted to discover that it was dry and warm.
“Buffy, are you ok?”
“Yeah, tired.” Angel stroked her hair and she lay on his chest, his heart lulling her to sleep.
Willow and Oz lay in a corner beside Cordelia and Xander, all four lumping together for warmth. Giles, Jenny and Joyce sat speaking among themselves quietly and Kalika and Seymour indulged in some gentle kisses. Yaksha guarded the entrance and sat, staring into nothing. Mulder grimaced as his ankle burned in pain.
Scully took off his boot and treated his ankle as gently as she could. “You really did yourself in this time Mulder, what the Hell were you doing?”
“Nothing, walking, running, tripping.” Scully smiled and tenderly brushed the hair out of his eyes and pulled him onto her lap, stroking his face.
“Scully? You gonna start singing again?” Scully laughed softly and it helped, a little.
Angel looked over at Yaksha. “What are we going to do? No one’s able to move again yet or do anything.”
Yaksha’s eyes took on a hard glint, an impassable coldness and seemed to loose all their humanity, all their hope. He sat still and was like a statue. “We wait, move off at dusk. With or without her.”
Buffy looked up from Angel’s chest and lowered her eyes in sadness. “She’s not dead, she can’t be.”
Kalika nodded vigorously. “She won’t die, she has to be alive.” Seymour took her hand and squeezed it, his thoughts were the same. No one spoke for the rest of the day, they just slept, cold miserable and hungry. Yaksha alone stayed awake, waiting for her and praying that she’d come. She had to, he loved her with an immortal fury. His creator, his creation, his lover, his greatest weakness, his Sita.
***** At dusk, Angel woke with the night that had hidden him for so long. Yaksha was standing, inspecting his rifle and trying not to let his worry show. “We should go soon, wake up your girlfriend there. We need to get going.”
“Where are we going?”
“A place I know, a friend’s house.”
“Where?”
“About a hundred miles from here. We’ll hike to the road and grab a couple of cars.” Angel nodded and woke Buffy up gently. She smiled at him and kissed him, just wanting to lie in his arms, not to have to see the darkness in life or walk the dark streets or worry, just to feel his breath on her throat and the tiny life within her. She took one of his hands and guided it to a patch on her slightly swollen stomach. She pressed his palm gently onto her flesh and he smiled as he felt the tiny movement of their baby. They stayed that way as everyone else woke up and got ready to go, Mulder’s ankle bandaged carefully with the little bandage that had been in Scully’s pocket.
“Right, we have to move.” Angel nodded at Yaksha and stood, bringing Buffy with him and he helped her out of the hole into the bright night. The new moon shone over the hills and vales, giving it an otherworldly appearance and the small group set off. As they walked, they were all getting more and more nervous.
At one stage, Kalika stopped altogether and fell to the ground. She pulled everyone else with her and motioned for them to fan out along a small crest. She shoved anyone who wasn’t immortal or adept with guns down into the sparse grass and took careful aim. She let off a single shot and the scent of fresh, human blood came on the breeze. Suddenly, the valley exploded in light as all along the edges, at the very periphery of vampiric senses, about two hundred soldiers sat poised with guns and sodium arc lights. Seymour swore and Yaksha took out a hunting knife. He started digging furiously, clawing away the dirt with fingers and the blade. A lump of clay fell away to reveal the same tunnels and caverns they had just left.
“Everyone, get down! Now!” Cordelia hopped down the hole and helped Buffy as Angel passed her down. As soon as the Slayer was down, the night was ripped apart by gunfire from a hundred odd guns. Xander, Seymour, Kalika and the FBI agents took up positions along a bluff, firing into the middle of the knots of soldiers, hitting fuel tanks and mortar launchers and sending people hurtling to the ground as bullets bit through them.
“Angel!” Buffy yelled as he flattened himself along the ground. He pulled Joyce to himself and pushed her down the hole to her daughter. Yaksha brought his hand up, a grenade in it and threw it. Just as it landed, an insanely lucky shot hit him it the wrist and he fell back in pain. He stumbled down into the hole and landed in a heap at Cordelia’s feet.
She helped him up and looked up at the others with fearful eyes. “Angel! Get the others down here! Now!” Angel obeyed and crawled over to Oz and Willow.
Just as he reached them, a canister of gas was fired and landed dangerously near him. “Come on! Move!” Just as they started to crawl, the canister leaked a white gas and Angel coughed, trying not to inhale it. He was dismayed when Willow and Oz and Xander and everyone else above ground swooned and fell into untidy heaps. Kalika and Seymour looked around incredulously. Seymour wiped a bead of sweat of his eyes and fell to the ground, panting. A second later, Kalika was beside him, fighting to stay awake. Angel pulled himself to the hole and shouted down. “Gas! They,” he gasped, “get out now! Run!” Yaksha grimaced and nodded. He pulled Cordelia, who was in hysterics over Xander and the others, away from the hole but Buffy wouldn’t move. “Angel! Get down here! Come on, hurry!”
Angel tried to pull himself over to the edge but his arms failed him and he sank to the ground in defeat. He could hear her screaming his name and Joyce and Yaksha pulling her away. He let one arm fall down and he touched her fingers. “Run, the baby, I’ll be ok.” Just as the white gas started to spill into the passage, Buffy brought her hand down and coughed. “I love you Angel.”
“Love you too, go.” Buffy ran, with tears in her eyes and a pain in her gut and Cordelia cried as she ran beside her, ghosts below the earth. Angel could feel his consciousness slip away and he closed his eyes, letting the darkness in.
***** Part 2
Sita mumbled and shook her head. She smelled the antiseptic long before she opened her eyes and she groaned. She sat up in a small army issue bed and took a breath. She was in a room, a small bedroom with a bed and a desk with a small folding metal chair. She stood and coughed, still tasting the foul taste of dead blood in her mouth and some drug that she couldn’t quite place. She stretched like a cat, letting her vertebrae crack and resettle into their right places. She ran a hand along one wall, it was the same unbreakable material that she had seen in the other military base. She walked to the door and opened it easily. Surprised, she walked into a large sitting room or something. All along the side of the walls were other doors the same as hers, ten in all. On one wall, there was a huge, closed partition that looked as impregnable as the rest of the cage she was in. She walked to the nearest door to her and pushed it open. Sprawled on a bed much like hers was Rupert Giles. Relieved, she ran over and slapped his face a few times, waking him up.
“Um, Sita?”
“Hey Giles, where are we?”
“I have no idea. The army, gas, I can’t remember much else.”
“It’s ok. Who else is here?”
“I have no idea.” Sita pulled Giles up and suggested they go find out. They walked into each room, waking up vampires and humans alike. After a while, they all sat or stood in the living room, the entire group except Buffy, Cordelia, Joyce and Yaksha.
“Well, we’ve got a situation here don’t we?” Sita sat on a couch beside Angel and he glared at her. The TV in one corner flicked to life and everyone crowded around it. A huge, insanely muscled general sat beside a scared looking grunt who seemed to be controlling the link up. “I am General Callan and I’m the overseer of this project here.”
“What project?” Giles asked hotly.
“The study and analysis of DNA from the beings in the room next to you.”
“Vampires asshole. At least give us the right name.” Callan glared at Seymour but went on.
“You will not escape from here, the mistakes made in the previous operation will not be made again. You may as well all get used to it.”
“Why bother? You know that no cage built by man can hold us.” Sita smiled at Kalika, like mother, like daughter.
“I think you’ll find that this one will.”
Mulder stepped up. “Why the Hell are we here then? Why bring us here?”
“To study the phycology of these, vampires with humans. To see if instinct will overrule logic.”
Xander shuddered and glanced at Angel. “What does he mean?”
“He’s going to starve us and see how long before we kill you.”
“Oh, that’s, not good.”
Sita shook her head. “You don’t get it, do you Callen? We can’t die, and these people are our,” she didn’t want to say friends, “allies. We won’t kill them, might kill you and your GIs though. Been such a long fucking time since I’ve eaten soldier, God, it’s a wonderful blood. You’ll be my first Callan.”
As Sita spoke, Callen shivered and his fear was like a magnet to her. She zoned in on his mind, it was further than they had been in the last place but she knew that she’d get him. “I doubt that miss. You’ll all comply with our requests or you’ll see what you love dead.”
“Like what? Vampires don’t have souls or feelings. What we love is blood, gore and violence. How can you take that away? You never know, maybe we will kill them. It really doesn’t matter. They’re mortal. They’ll all die sooner or later. So will you, sooner rather than later though. I can’t wait to taste your blood Callen, your fear makes it very, very alluring.”
“I’m not scared of you.”
“Maybe you should be.” She grinned, showing her long fangs and he turned off the link. She could feel his fear, the power and magnetism of her voice deep in her gut and she knew that she’d get out.
“Well, let us all hope that it doesn’t come down to cannibalism.”
“Won’t Giles. They won’t starve you guys, trust me.”
“But they may starve you and Kalika and Seymour and Angel.”
Sita looked at him with cold eyes. “If you think I’d ever do that then you’re wrong. I’d let them drain me before I’d touch any of you guys.”
Willow touched her arm. “We believe you Sita. Besides, if you were going to kill us, you’d have done it by now.”
“Good point.” Sita smiled.
“There’s eleven here and only ten rooms, who’s sharing?”
Seymour put his hand up and started bouncing. “Me and Kalika!”
Kalika sneered and poked him in the ribs. “Dream on nerdy.”
Giles put his arm around Jenny and she leaned into him. Willow was sitting on Oz’s knee with Xander’s head in her lap, trying to comfort him. Mulder and Scully sat together and Scully checked his ankle tenderly, hating the government more than anything at the moment. Seymour and Kalika explored the little pseudo house with a vampire’s detachment and Angel sat on the floor heavily, stroking his ring and remembering her soft touch, her innocent eyes and her fiery spirit.
He missed her, he missed her so much it hurt him. He closed his eyes and recalled the feeling of their child under her skin, that one and only night together and the way she made him feel so much more than he was. He prayed to a long forgotten God that she’d be safe, that they’d all be safe. That he’d live to see his child. That she’d live to bring it into the world.
***** Two weeks later, Buffy sat in her bedroom and stared at the wall. Her hands moved over her stomach and she could feel her daughter- she was sure it was a girl- under her stretched skin.
Coming back, they had stayed in Yaksha’s friend’s house using it as a base of operations. They had discovered that Buffy’s house was under surveillance and wisely, Joyce had sold it. Of course, as soon as she was off the phone, a man rang up asking if there was a house in Sunnydale in which he, his two sisters and his mother could move into. To avoid losing any valuables, they’d bought the furniture in the house and Mrs Summers, the ex occupant, had been only too happy to avoid removal costs.
Soon enough, after the casting of very powerful glamours by Yaksha, they returned to Sunnydale, looking the same to each other but Hank Summers wouldn’t have recognised his old wife or expectant daughter.
Cordelia had decided to move in, being too miserable to do much else and the house was sombre, to say the least.
Buffy looked at the butterflies on her wall and thought about the times Angel had fallen asleep with her on the soft duvet. She remembered her birthday and all the times that they had wanted to repeat it, stopped by misplaced mothers, watchers or Xander’s. She missed them all so much, being able to talk to Willow and the stuffiness of her Watcher, his befuddlement and love for Jenny. She missed the total apathy for rules and regulations and the strange empathy of the vampires and Xander and Cordelia’s little bickering matches. More than anything, she missed him, her Angel. She could barely open her eyes or shut them without thinking about him and the way he made her feel. He should have been by her side, holding her and she wanted nothing more than his touch, his kisses.
Cordelia walked into her room after a tentative knock. “Hey.”
“Hey Cordelia.” The former cheer leading, drama queen, bitch of the planet sat beside Buffy and sighed. Buffy felt close to her, she knew what she was going through.
“God, I hate all this waiting and worrying, all the not knowing.”
“I know.”
“They’ll be back, won’t they Buffy? I mean, Sita’s fifty centuries old, she’ll get them out. And Jenny and Willow know spells and stuff, they must be able to get out somehow.”
“They have to, they will Cordy. God, I, I just hope it’s soon.”
“The baby?” Buffy nodded sadly. Here they both were, trying to delude themselves into some semblance of peace, of stability.
“I haven’t even been able to pick her name yet.”
“It’s a girl?”
“Yeah.”
“Have you been to the doctor?”
“No, I just, I know it’s a girl.”
“Gut feeling?” Buffy smiled sadly and nodded.
Cordelia stood up and dragged the Slayer with her. “C’mon, Yaksha said he was getting pizza and movies.”
< “Ok, I’m coming.” As Buffy walked out of her room, she wished to whatever God would listen that Angel would be ok. She bowed her head and whispered to herself. “Where are you?”
***** “Oh fuck! Run!” Xander’s yell alerted everyone else and he ran out of Oz’s room. He slammed the door and braced his back to it. “He’s waking up, run, RUN!”
In the living room, everyone jumped up off the couches and ran into the nearest open room. Sita stayed behind and yanked Xander away from the door, throwing him into the room and shoving a sofa in front of it. Just as she turned, a very hairy, very pissed off Oz smashed through the door. He growled and ran right at Sita.
She stood and calmly punched his snout. He crumpled to the ground in and unconscious heap and she called the others out. “Well, at least tonight’s the last night.”
Willow walked over to her fallen boyfriend and stroked his fur. “Why didn’t it work tonight? I mean, it worked the other two nights.”
Jenny knelt beside the two and thought about it. “I have no idea, the spell should have kept him asleep whenever the full moon rose.”
Giles took off his glasses and rubbed the bridge of his nose. “Unless the herbs we used weren’t fresh, that could have done it.” Willow and Giles gently carried Oz into his room and closed the remains of the door behind themselves.
“At least no one got bitten or scratched. That would have complicated things.”
Mulder picked up a small lock of wolf hair and rubbed it between his fingers. “Say, can any of you vampires turn into a vapour and go out through the air vents? I know it’s not exactly a key hole but it might work.”
“Mulder!” Scully smacked him on the arm and Seymour grinned.
Sita went over to the partition and started working on her spot. In the place where the doors joined, there was a tiny gap that was probably full of locking mechanisms. She had been able to weaken the door a bit and she figured there was sweet fuck all that the army could to do stop her from kicking it until her ankles ached. Kalika’s tactic for escape was different, sit and meditate until she could control a soldier and get him down to the door with a rocket launcher and a few grenades. Seymour just took one of the microphones that they hadn’t wrecked and sang into it for hours at a stretch, it was working. He had already given four soldiers a nervous break down.
“Well,” Scully said over the din of Sita throwing herself against the door, “I think we’ve got problems, don’t you?”
Jenny nodded. “God, I hope the others got away.”
Angel’s head snapped up. “They did.”
Xander clenched his jaw and hoped they had. He missed Cordelia, it was weird. The first thing she’d do would be to kiss him, then to yell at him. He was looking forward to it. He missed Buffy, his Slayer. He still had a bit of a crush for her but hey, he had Cordelia, he was happy, well, he had been until she had to leave him. He hoped she was looking after Buffy and the baby.
Sita walloped the wall again and could smell the fear of the soldiers who monitored it. Unfortunately, they were too far away for mind control, even though Kalika was trying. She hit it again and her foot hurt from the impact of the blows.
Growling, she kicked it again, with her other foot and her thoughts wandered to Yaksha. He seemed to be regaining his humanity, more and more of it each day. He wasn’t the sadistic bastard or the eternally depressed vampire she had known, he was the boy she had caught glimpses of when she had been mortal. He was getting better, he was really trying to improve, for her. Maybe he wanted something more than what they had. Addmitantly, that wouldn’t have been the worst thing, not by any standards. Maybe, if she ever got out, she’d give it another chance. Banishing all memories of when they had first run, the lust and the long nights and the rivers of blood, she concentrated on the door.
Continue to final chapter
