Slayer, Vampire, Hunter, Hunted

by Mixer

Kennedy has left the Newly Formed Council, and what does she find but confusion, pain and the love of a beautiful vampire. BTVS/Supernatural Cross

1. Chapter 1

Rating: Violence, Rape, Harsh Language, Homosexual Relationships Rating: Violence, Rape, Harsh Language, Homosexual Relationships

Disclaimer: Unfortunately I own nothing... Buffy Post Season Seven Supernatural Post Season Two, Episode Three But possible spoilers for the rest of season 2

Etens, Oklahoma

She was so hungry, her blood boiled in her veins as it screamed out, if she didn't feed soon she was going to die…of course if she stopped to feed she was going to die as well. Screwed either way, so she ran. Feet thumping against mud and stone as a shimmer of rain descended on her, the brush that she was racing through stung as it cut at her exposed flesh and tore her clothes. Time seemed to slow as she lost her balance and slid across the mud, toppling down a slight hill. She vaguely felt something break as she struck the ground hard, with all of that nice soft mud she had smacked straight into a rock, and there she lay dazed for a moment. A moment that she didn't have to spare, but she couldn't move anymore, she couldn't run, she was so very tired. Physically her body had been pushed beyond its limits so that every muscle was strained and burning, and mentally she was too exhausted to think.

She just wanted to curl up and die. As that thought crossed her mind she began to cry, soft tears that slid across her cheeks to mingle with the rain that was soaking through her, the hunger was worse then she had ever felt it. Like a gnawing ache in her gut, it burned and wrenched at her, but more agonising then the hunger was the void inside of her, the emptiness, the utter desolation where her thriving spirit had once existed.

The slow schloomp of boots being sucked into the mud and pulled free signalled the hunter's arrival. The noise was maybe the worse thing she had ever heard, so slow and meticulous as it approached. Pace never faltering across mud or stone. With only a light rain shedding upon them she could smell his aftershave, a putrid mix of saffron and trillion. She could practically taste the leather of his boots in the air as he drew ever nearer until finally a blur appeared over her. She had to blink to clear the rain from her eyes enough to see him, but there he was. Standing at six foot two, lean, mean black muscle, his name was Gordan Walker and he was a psychotic vampire hunter who had just killed everyone she loved.

Now he had her in his sights, rain dripping down off his coat and sliding along the dull glint of his machete, a blade coated in a thick red substance that was slowly sliding along it. She would've spoken, tried to say something, but her stomach chose that moment to cramp horrifically, forcing her to curl into a ball. Not the most dignified way to meet her executioner, but since she didn't seem to have a choice it would have to do. "I've waited a long time for this vampire"; Gordan Walkers voice was low and grating, tightly controlling a seething mass of rage. Maybe his appearance of control fooled most people, but she was a creature intimately familiar with hate and loathing, too familiar to miss it in someone else.

"Sam and Dean bought you some time, but we both knew this was coming," he announced, "Vampires can't change, sooner or later you'll start craving the human variety again. I'm just ending the threat". She watched from the corner of her vision as he adjusted his grip on the weapon and drew it back, it took her a moment to realise he was planning to stab her first. The only way to kill her was decapitation; he was just too much of a sadistic bastard to end it quickly. And as she thought that her mind drifted back to the first time he had tortured her, small cuts with Dead Man's Blood, over and over again to watch her squirm. To watch the poison seep through her veins, almost as agonising as the hunger.

It was then she scented the blood. Like her the brush had cut him up as he stalked her, and now with him so close and the hunger so fierce she could smell it, metallic, almost like copper, her mouth began to water with the scent of it. She had denied herself so long, so very long, but at least before she had had something to take the edge off. Cow's blood may not have been appetising, but it was enough to survive on, She felt the slight pricks in her gums as her teeth descended and she unfurled, her pupils dilated and Walker must have seen it too.

For the second time that night, time seemed to slow as the hunter tried to drive the blade down and pin her to the ground. It was a sharp, sudden, pain as the blade pierced her chest but it was too late, with a speed born of lightning she had uncoiled and rode him to the ground. He smacked into the mud with a squelching sound and she watched as horror filled his eyes as she lunged forward, her teeth shredding through his throat in an act of pure savagery. And then there was the reward, steaming hot blood gushed from what had once been his throat, her mouth convulsed rapidly as she struggled around him and bit deeper. Trying to lap it all up.

His blood was such sweet ecstasy to her; she was like an alcoholic who had just fallen off the wagon. She had denied her thirst for so many years, all for the sake of survival, so that she and her kind wouldn't be hunted. But what had it really achieved? The hunter had stalked them, killed them anyway, the sudden clarity that suffused her with the hunters blood warred with who she was and what she had become. More then a year ago she had told one of her people, Eli, that if vampire could change, then so could people.

Tearing herself from his body she let out a scream of sheer rage, pain, and anguish. A scream that pierced through the fading night. She was not a monster, not anymore! At first she had stopped drinking human blood for the sake of survival, but somewhere along the line it had become more then that, she and her kind didn't need to kill humans to survive, they didn't need to be monsters! Screaming again she dropped back to her knees and wrenched the machete from her chest with a sickening schloomp, much like the hunters boots had made in the mud. She was alone, but she would not be a monster, she would not be a killer.

Clasping her head in her hands she keeled over into the thickening mud and began to cry again, heavy tears flowing out of her. And she began to whisper to herself, the same words over and over again, "I'm not a killer, I'm not a killer," and finally, "I'm not a killer…"

Dalsville, Colorado

More then a week passed from that fateful night and Lenore found herself in a grungy excuse for a bar somewhere in Colorado. The night was whipping up a cacophony of thunder and rain with the occasional pelting of hail. Ever since she had drunk from the hunter her senses had been soaring, not so much more powerful then normal, she was just feeling them anew. Almost like a rebirth.

A rebirth which she was going to be forced to fight, sighing wistfully she choked back a whisky and enjoyed the burning sensations as it slid down her throat, it was a momentary distraction from the gnawing that had taken a hold of her inside. It seemed that it was going to be harder to give up human blood the second time then it had been the first.

Lenore couldn't remember the cravings being so vicious the first time, but then again the first time she had been surrounded by her blood. By men and women she had made vampires, men and women who were suffering through the same withdrawals that she was. Shuddering she took a hold of herself and focused on keeping her hands from trembling, she was disgusted by herself, feeling like a junkie in need of her fix.

A fix that she could not, and would not have. Animal blood just didn't seem to be taking the edge off and she knew she was becoming increasingly…hostile…snappish and irritable. It was probably a good thing she didn't have any friends…unfortunately that thought conjured memories of her friends lying bleeding and broken, poisoned or beheaded, not a sight anyone would wish to come home to. For a moment she wished that bastard hunter was still alive so she could kill him more slowly, but that quickly passed, the only feeling she could hold onto for any period of time was her anguish, her grief. How she wished she could drown them out like humans did, it wasn't that she couldn't become intoxicated, but it was likely she would wake up surrounded by a pool of blood and a room of corpses.

A luxury that would bare too high a price.

While contemplating her self-loathing Lenore caught a scent, at the very edge of her awareness, it was illusive, almost slippery, if a scent could be such a thing. But finally as her attention shifted she was able to take it in, it was the scent of death, an almost snakelike muster.

It had been so very long since she had smelt anything like it that for a moment Lenore was confused, but the moment passed and the scent came into crystal clarity. Vampire. But not like her, it was something else, laced with an almost sulphuric taste, a demonic taste.

It wasn't a widely known fact, but there were two breeds of vampire, perhaps more that even she wasn't aware of. The demonic kinds were the most common, and Lenore's kind had worked very hard to be the lesser-known breed, of course that had backfired. Staying in the shadows her breed of vampire had kept their numbers low, numbers that were ever dwindling until they had become an endangered species…

Lenore shook her head to clear the scent from her nostrils as she glanced around the bar, a thin layer of smoky haze hid the edges of the room, and the broken flickering lights served to hinder her enhanced vision more then aid it. The constantly changing levels of lighting forced her pupils to continue to contract and expand. Pushing out of her wooden seat Lenore moved with a predatory grace as she finally spotted the creature. He looked like a man, with wavy dark black hair and intense blue eyes, a Mediterranean tint to his skin, he was quite simply gorgeous, as if he had been chiselled from stone and brought to life by the gods.

Of course there's a simple reason for that, she thought. Demonic Vampires were attracted to bright, shiny and pretty things, more then that, when they rose from their graves they brought with them their human failings. Vanity, lust, being two of the more powerful. A vampire would prefer to drink the blood of someone beautiful, a stroke to their ego, despite the fact that the blood of a leper would quench their thirst just as easily.

In that tradition Lenore noticed his companion was also a beautiful young woman, so fresh, so full of vitality that she could taste it from across the room. Smooth dark skin, dark eyes and wavy black hair as well that reached to her waist, her necklace and wristbands cried out she was Native American.

As they slipped out the door Lenore followed, stalking them from the shadows, across a dusty parking lot and into a tree line. It was sheer human stupidity to build their dwellings so close to woodland, a great many things can hide in the woods. Nonetheless Lenore continued to stalk the two of them, driven on by that sulphuric scent. It wasn't until she saw the two of them pressed against an old oak tree that she realised why she had followed them. The hunger. She could smell the girl's blood permeating the woods, so sweet, so tempting, Lenore's mouth was watering at the prospect and she hated herself for it.

In desperation she breathed deeply, taking in as much of that musty vampiric odour as she could, the tinge of sulphur burned her nostrils and for that she was thankful. Now all she could smell was the other vampire, the other monster, and it was his blood that she was hungering for.

Not to feed, but as something to hate, something to loathe other then herself. He was the true monster, not her, he revelled in blood and death, and he was part demon. With a feral roar she darted from her concealed position and dug her hands into the monsters shoulders, Lenore wrenched him from the girl with all of her own supernaturally induced strength. He smacked back into a tree with a sickening crunch and as quickly as that turned to ash, a shattered tree limb having perforated his chest, the look of shock on his face was almost amusing. For the big bad monster he hadn't known he too was being stalked, that something more dangerous then him walked the woods and that soon death would be coming for him.

But now that he was gone all Lenore could smell was the blood gushing from the girl, her own teeth had descended and her face contorted as she fought her body. She was dragging herself towards the girl despite herself, the unconscious bleeding girl. Sight, sound, smell, her senses were attuned to the blood and everything else faded away, the forest, the darkness, the wet mulch beneath her.

And for the second time that night a vampire was gripped by the shoulders and wrenched through the air. The impact with something hard shuddered through Lenore and she slumped to her knees, pain coursing through her as twigs and rocks cut into her palms. She growled monstrously as she flicked her hair back to see her assailant…and she paused. A young woman with short edgy brown hair was looking down at Lenore, dark black fishnet laced over a black bra and trailed over a dark skirt, her arms were crossed, poised, and she wore black gauntlets studded with silver over her wrists. She screamed predator, and in an instant she washed away everything that had been overcoming Lenore. Her hunger, her rage, all of it was simply gone, replaced with a sense of puzzlement.

She cautiously scented the air as she stood, taking a less aggressive but mirror image stance with her arms crossed. The woman smelled of sweet death, rain and ozone and life, the force of her aura radiated out in almost corporeal ripples through the air.

What was she?

Lenore had never come across anyone like her before. "You just going to stand there vampire?" The woman queried, a quirky forceful tone to her voice.

When Lenore made no effort to move or respond the girl simply shrugged and something in the air changed, a new spike of danger and exhilaration. The temperature seemed to drop a few degrees as a cool wind washed over them both, and then the girl moved. Like a predator, a graceful, stalking lioness the girl leapt into action.

A foot crashed into the spot where Lenore had been a heartbeat before, with her own swift response Lenore latched onto a wrist and swivelled beneath the girls arm as it became twisted behind her back. Her other hand reached towards the girls throat to pull her back, restrain her, suppress her ability to respond.

But with a startlingly degree of strength the Hispanic looking woman reversed Lenore's grip and used it to flip her, vampiric speed was all that prevented her from hitting the ground. She reared back and smashed a side kick through the Hispanic woman's stomach, to Lenore's astonishment the girl stumbled back a few steps and clasped her stomach for the briefest of moments before executing a flury of strikes.

It was all Lenore could do to maintain her defence; she had no chance to strike back after that. With an impressive arching back flip the Hispanic woman was suddenly behind Lenore and sweeping aside a hasty back fist. Lenore watched with her acute perception and clarity in that moment as the girl ducked and swung around to drive a stake through her heart.

The pain was immediate and Lenore gasped collapsing against the mulch of the ground, the soft mix of leaves and dirt comforting her as she fell against them grasping at the piece of wood sticking out of her chest.

An unconscious tear of pain slipped from her eye as she tried to pull the stake free, pain was lancing through her as the weapon splintered and broke. The Hispanic woman was looking…confused…her eyes glancing between Lenore and the now dead woman lying a few feet from them. A new glint of intelligence slipped across the woman's face as she focused on the now dead Native American and then back on Lenore, her eyes slowly coming to a halt on Lenore's utterly bloodless lips and then back to the savaged throat of the dead girl.

Again her eyes moved to take in the shattered stake protruding from Lenore's chest.

"Well this is odd," she stated before Lenore succumbed to darkness.

Lenore wasn't expecting to ever wake up again, so when she did that was shock enough. But to add to that she was still in the woods, still where she had fallen the night before. The only difference being someone had taken the time and care to remove the stake and all of its accompanying splinters and carefully bandage her chest.

Raising herself onto her elbows Lenore's eyes stung viciously and watered as a ray of light fell across her face. The shock of it made her slump back down again, and to her shame she even whimpered a little.

Tightly shutting her eyes Lenore lay back into the mulch again and unconsciously ran a hand across the ruins of her shirt and her unblemished chest. The skin was smooth and finely healed, she had been a vampire so long, and she knew with certainty that only decapitation would deliver her to her final death, yet she was still surprised when a supposedly mortal wound did more damage to her clothes then to her flesh.

"If you had a pair of shades, I'd really appreciate them," she called out, she could smell the young woman from the night before somewhere close by. Lenore could almost feel her eyes pressing down on her.

"The light stings your eyes," a sweet, melodic, but somehow bratty, voice called back

"Which is why I was asking for the shades," Lenore replied as she remained lying in the mulch, even with her eyes closed she could see red swarming through her vision rather then black. No doubt the result of the bright morning light that was shining over her.

"If you want to kill me I'll tell you how." Lenore said quietly, a normal human wouldn't have heard her but from the subtle shift of position that she could hear the other woman make it was obvious Hispanic girl wasn't entirely normal.

"But if not," she continued "shades would be very much appreciated. I don't particularly like having a conversation where I'm blind."

Leaves twisted and twigs broke as the other woman made no attempt to hide her approach, and suddenly a cool pair of frames slipped over her face and she let her eyes flicker open. Lenore's face was a little damp from the tears that the sun had evoked, but now that the world was tinted black, a very dark shade of black, she felt considerable better.

With a liquid grace she rolled to a standing position and swirled to face the Hispanic woman. She was even more beautiful in the daylight, her soft brown skin was almost luminescent under the sun, more then enough to take Lenore's breath away.

"Hi," Lenore said, in a clipped cool tone, "I'm Lenore, I'm a vampire and as promised decapitation is my primary weakness…and you are?" It was cavalier, even for her, but the other woman must have been standing watch over her for the better part of the night, something about that bugged Lenore.

"My names Kennedy, I'm a vampire slayer and usually any kind of mortal wound will kill me," her response was bratty, immature. Yet it swept through the vampire with a breath of serenity.

A vampire slayer. Lenore rolled her head as she took in Kennedy's scent once more, breathing it deeply until it was embedded in her memory. Lenore had only ever heard vague legends of the vampire slayer, a girl with a destiny, the bogey woman of the supernatural world. Until that moment that was exactly what Lenore had thought a slayer was, just some myth, a non-existent entity used to scare the supernaturals.

"I didn't think the slayer truly existed," Lenore said, it was strange how peaceful she felt, staring at what amounted to death.

Kennedy laughed at that, a rich, deep laugh that echoed through Lenore. "You claim to be a vampire, and yet you didn't know that slayers exist -" she continued with "Well I suppose THE slayer doesn't exist anymore…"

While at the same time Lenore spoke defensively, "What do you mean claim to be a vampire?"

The girl, the slayer, was laughing at Lenore as if she were an ignorant child. "For a 'vampire'," she actually went as far as creating quotation marks in the air "you don't do a very good job, for one a stake through the heart did zilch to you, sunlight just stings your eyes and as far as I can tell you didn't kill that girl last night."

She growled then, low and deep in her throat, she hadn't meant to. But she didn't enjoy being mocked…on the other hand she was quite happy to still be alive, maybe a little mocking wasn't so bad.

A grin spread across her face, she could mock as well. In an exaggerated manner she looked directly into Kennedy's eyes and sighed, "I suppose I shouldn't hold your ignorance against, I mean how is an itsy bitsy little girl meant to understand the vast and complex supernatural world."

Suddenly the slayer didn't seem to find it quite so amusing, her arms crossed into a more aggressive stance and she flicked the hair from her eyes violently, "And what's that supposed to mean wannabe?"

"It's supposed to mean that more creatures walk the earth then heaven and hell combined, the earthly plains are a crossroads for other worlds, that being said there are more then one breed of vampire on this earth."

"Don't stop now," Kennedy threw back, "You almost sound interesting."

"The vampires you know are true monsters, soulless, demonically possessed evil bastards…tend to turn to ash when they die…sound about right."

Kennedy just gave a curt nod, so Lenore continued "But vampires like me? We're not demons, we're not possessed, we're not soulless and we're not all evil."

"Even if that's true, your still a bloodsucker."

Lenore would have protested but her body chose that moment to cramp painfully, forcing her to her knees, making the point that she needed to feed.

Through clenched teeth she hissed, "I don't have to hurt people to feed."

"Your still a vampire," Kennedy's voice was soft now, and there was no humour in it. Glancing up at her Lenore saw an unsheathed blade in her hand, a blade that hadn't been there a moment ago and she had a frightful moment of clarity. The Slayer had just been playing with her, she had known from before Lenore woke what she was and how to stop her.

Looking intently at the shining silver blade Lenore grunted, "If you already-" she was panting with the exertion "-knew what I was. Why. Not. Kill me. While. I slept?" She lost the little strength she had then and screamed with the gut wrenching pain.

Gods! She had never felt the hunger quite like it and in another moment of clarity she realised Walker must have tainted his blood somehow, it was the only explanation for all the pain she had been feeling. She had just thought it the hunger and the withdrawals, but it couldn't have been just that!

"Curiosity," Kennedy replied as she slowly began to walk forward, "Something I picked up from my last girlfriend, an almost insatiable desire for knowledge…when I realised you weren't like a normal vampire I called a friend to get the full scoop on what you are…I just wanted to talk to you first…"

Clenching at her stomach Lenore felt the pain beginning to lance deeper within her, "I have a right to survive, just like you," she said as she descended into the agony, those would probably be the last coherent words she ever spoke.

Kennedy's voice was even softer now, as she drew back the sword, "Survival of the fittest."

Once again Lenore never expected to awake, but once again she was wrong as she felt the nauseating hunger ripple through her…but strangely not as bad as when she had last past out…which didn't make any sense, but she wasn't exactly going to question a blessing.

With her eyes still closed she could feel the shades that the Slayer had slipped over her face. She could also feel the warmth and comfort of a bed that she was tied to.

It wasn't the first time she had been tied to a bed…but she supposed this was a less kinky situation then that time, too bad really, the slayer. Kennedy. She had said her name was Kennedy, she stirred something within Lenore, desire, lust, something primal and emotive.

In the long, sometimes excruciatingly painful centuries she had existed she had taken a variety of lovers, men and women with minds and personalities so diverse an outside observer could never have imagined what attracted her to them.

But in all that time she had never taken a mate, a true mate, because her kind of vampire was fundamentally different from the demonic breed. Her kind mated for life, an irrevocable and irreversible bond that could only be severed in death. A kind of enduring love and camaraderie that mortals could only dream of…there had to be some perks to vampirism after all.

But she was digressing, this wasn't the fun kinky kind of tied to the bed. Her bonds were soft, flexible and comfortable, more like the kind used on mental patients rather then prisoners. But even as she flexed her strength against them Lenore could feel the sturdiness, the strength that would more then hold her.

And as she made that effort of movement something new came to her senses, a slight prick on the back of her hand, the possibility of what it could be shocked her into opening her eyes and craning her head up to see the IV leading from her hand back to a bag of blood that was slowly being fed down into her body.

It was startling to say the least. Though it did explain the reduced hunger.

As her pupils dilated to take in her environment she saw the room was sparsely decorated, a single painting of daisies hanging against the wall over what looked like a mini fridge. Add in the poorly carpeted floor, and the single bed identical to the one she was strapped to across from her and Lenore would have to say she was in a motel room, a very cheap one at that.

Odd.

"You can come out of there, I can hear you moving, the rustle of your clothes, even the soft breaths you take and the beat of your heart," Lenore spoke into the apparently empty room, though a moment later the door furthest from her creaked open to reveal the one and only Kennedy, still dressed the way she had been when they first met, which judging by the lack of light making its way through the blinds, must have been the night before.

"Your senses are very acute," the Slayer responded in a controlled but appreciative tone.

"Thanks."

Then they just stared at one another, as each waited for the other to speak. And finally Lenore broke the silence.

"I appreciate being alive," she said softly, "but why am I alive? And why am I not only alive but being fed?" she couldn't help but have the slightest bit of distaste enter the last word. iFed/i as if she were a child or invalid.

"I don't know," Kennedy responded, just as softly

"I really don't know, maybe because you didn't kill that girl last night? Maybe because I want to interrogate you further? Or maybe because you bare a disturbing resemblance to my exes dead girlfriend." She tried to make the second idea seem the reason, but from the hesitation in her voice Lenore was guessing she really didn't know why she hadn't killed the vampire. The ex's dead girlfriend part was just…odd.

"I know not all demons are bad," she continued, "Hell not even all demonic vampires are nasty, Right now I can think of two who wouldn't hurt an innocent person."

That was a little shocking, Lenore thought, not one but two demonic vampires who didn't kill? More then likely they were just playing nice, gaining trust before they made their move. The slayer must have been mentally impaired not to see it, and she didn't know why she cared about that. Why a twinge went through her heart as the prospect of those two anonymous vampires killing Kennedy filled her mind.

"And I don't think you're the bad kind," she continued, "but then I'm also not an idiot, that's why the restraints."

"And the blood?" Lenore asked

"You seemed to need it, can't question a dead or starving vampire…believe me I've tried," the hint of coldness, of malice directed towards memories that haunted her excited Lenore, her breathing quickened ever so slightly as she visualised Kennedy interrogating, a.k.a. torturing vampires.

"Well then my darling, interrogate away," she said in a somewhat provocative manner, "Unless you'd like to continue staring at my somewhat naked body," Lenore almost physically felt Kennedy flinch at that, "I mean you must have changed these bandages," she said, nodding towards her chest, "At least twice while I was unconscious because they're all sparkly clean right now."

The comment was mostly designed to make Kennedy uncomfortable; A shrink had once told Lenore that she could be somewhat antagonistic at times, of course that was back when she still fed on human blood… and was taking considerable delight in cutting that particular shrink to ribbons. So she was surprised to feel interest radiating from the girl at her comment, she could even smell the faint blush as blood rose to the slayers cheeks.

Very interesting.

"Hey if you want to try something a little more…ifun/i…then talking I'm all for it," she wiggled her somewhat restrained but modestly covered hips for emphasis, "You don't even have to untie me or anything."

Kennedy opened and closed her mouth somewhat like a fish but whatever she might have been about to say was lost in the sudden splintering crash of the door, faint light streamed in as chunks of cheap wood were shot across the room and a hulking figure of a man emerged. Closely followed by two other slimmer, but equally as repugnant men.

They reeked of demonic residue, and were an assault against her senses as their game faces slid into play. The first creature roared through the room and smashed into the slayer, carrying her into and through the thin walls of the motel.

Lenore felt a little guilty about Kennedy's delayed reaction to the demonic vampire, she had been more then a little distracted by Lenore's proposal and even as the door was obliterated her attention had been riveted on the restrained vampire.

But now she was in the other room, and from what her own acute vampiric senses could hear Kennedy was holding her own against the hulking brute…which left her tied to a bed with two of her more demonic brethren wracking their eyes over her.

"Hey baby," The closer one said, his features so badly distorted that she wouldn't have been able to recognise him anytime he wasn't wearing his game face. "Don't go anywhere," he continued, his voice oozing sleaze, "After we're finished with the main course, we'll be back for dessert," and with that appallingly unoriginal line he shot through the demolished wall and into the fight against the slayer.

The third and final vampire made like he was about to follow the other two, which could have been bad. From what she had seen Kennedy was good, but three to one were never nice odds. And once they were done with her Lenore would be at their mercy.

True she was a vampire herself…but she was a different breed, and she was also in her opinion a fairly hot young woman tied to a bed. Demons were hedonistic by nature, they would fight, feed and then that only left fuck. They were also suckers for easy meat, worse then ghouls that way.

"Wait," She called out in what she hoped was a distressed, damsel like tone, "Those other two boys look fairly tough…" she even let a faint southern drawl cling to her voice. Guys, dead or alive, could never resist a good ol' southern accent. "Do ya'll really want to go fight the slayer only to have to take seconds?" She paused for effect, "or would that be thirds, on the real prize?" And once against she wiggled her hips suggestively.

The bastard didn't even have to think about it, he gave the raging fight in the other room a quick glance before hurling himself at her.

Sinking further into the bed the beast straddled her, the rank stench of his breath made her want to gag as his hands tried to molest her, leaving an oily trail over her skin.

"Woah boy, slow it down a little, enjoy yourself," she said cautiously

He just smiled savagely and started to fiddle with his zipper. She was loath to even think it, but as long as she was still tied down she was helpless. Fortunately men of all species could be manipulated more easily then a hungry puppy.

With a saucy smile she suggested, "Wouldn't you prefer to put it somewhere…a little less travelled?" and to reinforce the idea she ground her hips up so that he would glance down.

For a moment he looked puzzled, but eventually the cogs began turning and he got the idea. "Baby you keep being this helpful and maybe I'll turn ya before I'm done." Or at least that's what she thought he said, it was more like a guttural snarl of words as he tried to turn her over.

He wrenched her so hard that it felt like her arms would snap off before he noticed she was tied down. "Ya'll have to untie me first honey bunch," laying the southern on as thickly as she could "The slayer and I like to get a little kinky". A quirk of her eyebrow was all it took.

His buddy vamps were fighting for their lives in the room opposite them as he was trying to rape her, and the suggestion of kink and girl on girl action had gotten him so ready to go that he couldn't think clearly. That's if he ever could have to begin with.

With an effortless ease he snapped the restraints binding her to the bed and as he again reached out to forcefully turn her over she drew back her knee and smashed a crunching foot into his groin. The force of the kick propelled him across the room where he crashed against the mini fridge.

Thoroughly pissed off now Lenore jerked herself off the bed, her own version of a game face sliding into effect. The moron of a vampire was still too busy whimpering from where she had kicked him to notice, that was until she hauled him to his feet by his hair and executed a powerful uppercut to his chest, followed by a barrage of vicious punches, several of which cracked bone and sent spurts of blood across the walls.

"I really should say thank you," she whispered as she drew back her fist for the final blow, "Who knows how long I might have been tied up if you hadn't come along."

Then she struck, like a viper her fist crashed into his chest with all of the preternatural speed and strength she could draw upon. Her nails pierced his skin and broke his rib cage as her palm closed around his heart and she wrenched it from his chest.

For a moment all he could do was look shocked as she held his lifeless heart in her grasp, with a second thought she dropped the withered heart and lashed out as he began to collapse. Her hands taking up parallel positions on his head as she twisted it from his body. Still with that shocked look on his face.

And then it was over; a vibrant orange skeleton burned its way through his flesh and his lifeless corpse dissolved in a shower of ash.

"You said it was survival of the fittest," Lenore said as she turned, Kennedy stood in the person shaped hole in the wall, a small trail of blood working its way from her nose down across her lips. Accentuating them in the bold redness of her blood.

Her senses were flooded with the slayer, her human heart pounding in excitement, the smell of adrenalin and a fine gleam of perspiration marring her skin. She couldn't help but stand as a statue in her stillness, Lenore could fight when she had to…but even just the brief fight had revealed that Kennedy was a goddess of battle, she gloried in it. She was a creature of it.

"Where you just messing with me?" she demanded

"What?" Lenore exclaimed in surprised confusion, but she was rapidly cut off as Kennedy launched towards her. She didn't have even a heart beat to react as the slayer clutched at her face, but then their lips met and all Lenore could taste was the sweetness of Kennedy.

The slayers blood mingling with the taste of Kennedy's lips, and the feel of her tongue. With a violent passion Lenore was lifted bodily from the ground and thrown into the bed with enough force to break it, but that didn't matter as Kennedy rode her body into the mattress.

Resuming the fervent passionate chaos that ate at the two of them. It was as if there was a merging of their very essences, because all Lenore could think was Kennedy. There was nothing else.

Kennedy's POV

"Police!" The booming authoritative voice called out a moment before either of the two heartily satisfied women realised he was there.

Still basking in the afterglow Kennedy reacted first sliding from the ruins of the bed while she pulled the rather stained sheets across her body.

"Put your hands on your head and get down on the ground," he boomed out as a second and third officer appeared through the doorway, each with their gun drawn and pointed.

"What the…" But Kennedy trailed off before she got to the obscenity as she glanced around the devastated room and the splatters of blood coating one of the walls and the two girls as well…it looked kind of bad, but most of the blood was from the IV bag, which had ruptured at some point during the ifestivities/i. Though she was probably going to have a tough time explaining that.

Of course what did that matter…she had just had sex with a ivampire/i!

She knew she'd been lonely and aching for a little bit of physical affection, it had been nearly a year and a half since she and Willow had called it quits, and nearly a year and half since she had touched another woman…But a ivampire/i?!

"I said you're under arrest, now get on your knees," the first officer boomed yet again. As Kennedy glanced over him she nodded to herself in approvement, the guy was basically Arnold before the steroids, buff, powerful and ready to kick ass.

But as she appraised the cops she also had to push down the instinct to fight, she was a force of nature, she was embarrassed and a little bit pissed off, but three guns pointed at her with fingers on the triggers were still a little more then she could handle…not to mention the cops weren't bad guys, they were just doing their jobs.

As she sunk to her knees she wondered aloud "Interesting how it took the police a couple of hours to get here," it had taken them a very long time…long enough for Kennedy to have completely forgotten that she had just trashed a public motel room very loudly as she dispatched her would be foes.

Sighing she glanced over at the vampire, at Lenore who was smiling as steel cuffs were clasped over her wrists.

She wasn't on good terms with the Council to begin with…now she really didn't look forward to making her report…

"You could quit smiling so much," Kennedy, outfitted in a pair of sweats that the officers had allowed her to take before she was carted off, growled in frustration as she paced the small cell she and Lenore were sharing.

Unfortunately Lenore was stuck in a vibrant orange jumpsuit that community workers usually had to wear.

"Couldn't," Lenore replied sweetly, "Not even if I wanted to."

Kennedy just growled again and continued to pace. Lenore didn't see what was so bad, admittedly they had both just been arrested but the charges wouldn't stick. After all how could two itty bitty little girls like them have trashed that room so thoroughly, and she had heard one of the cops taking a statement from a witness in one of the other rooms who had claimed to have seen three guys breaking through the door.

The blood all over the place would be a little trickier, but the medical bag that it had come in was still in the room and once it was checked out the police really didn't have anything to hold them on. They'd be out in twenty-four hours, tops. Sooner if someone could bail them out.

Of course everyone Lenore knew was now dead and buried…so not much chance of that happening from anyone she knew. But maybe Kennedy had friends in the area. She had made a phone call to someone after all.

"Do you want to tell me who you called now?" she asked,

"No," the slayer bit back.

"Oh come on, relax a little its not that bad," Lenore offered

"Says you."

"Well your right this seat isn't very comfortable, kind of hard and cold…want to warm me up a little?" She couldn't help but laugh as Kennedy glowered at her, which just pissed the slayer off more.

"Its been awhile, but I'm sure sex is meant to be a bonding experience," from outside of the cell Lenore heard a cop sputtering into his coffee, isome people/i, she thought.

And finally Kennedy stopped pacing, "You're a vampire," she said like it meant something.

"Your point being?"

"Gah!" Kennedy hissed in a low hushed voice, obviously aware of the guard who was out of sight but trying to listen to what they were saying, "You vampire. Me vampire slayer"

"Your point being?" Lenore asked again

"I'm suppose to kill you, not sleep with you!" she cried out in frustration. Somehow Lenore had a feeling there was more running through the slayers mind then she was saying.

"And I'm suppose to be the monstrous bitch of the west who sneaks into peoples home and eats their children." Stereotypes could be such a bitch, "Instead I've spent the last eighty years drinking cows blood and trying not to gag on it."

Kennedy paused with a thoughtful expression, "So you really didn't kill that girl the other night?"

"No," she said, "But then you already knew that or I'd currently be headless…you know if you don't want that guard hearing us you should really sit down," and she patted the cement slab beside her as she changed the subject.

"Promise I won't bite," crossing her fingers like a girl scout

The slayer just looked askance at both Lenore and the spot she had patted, "I- no"

"Well ok, but when we start yelling about vampires and killing people a little more loudly I get the feeling we won't be getting out of here so easily," once more she patted the slab beside her.

Kennedy snarled at her but reluctantly took the seat, her body brushing against Lenore as she collapsed into it. And where she touched the vampire, Lenore tingled, and she knew that Kennedy felt it as well.

"If you didn't kill the girl then who did?" She was going back to a safer subject, trying to steer clear of what had happened between them. Lenore sighed, but if it made the slayer feel more comfortable she could play along for a little while.

"One of the demonic vampires," she replied, "I followed the two of them out of the bar on the edge of the woods but I was too late to help her. I did kill him," she confirmed, "Probably just moments before you got there."

"Hmmm," Kennedy murmured, "then the vamps in the motel, were they after me…or after you?"

"Does it really matter? They're ash now."

"Good point."

But now that they had played through that little conversation Lenore could feel something was wrong. Kennedy had wrapped her arms around her knees and was rocking back and forth. And she could smell the salt in the slayers tears…she was crying? Softly, but yes she was definitely crying.

"Oh come on, I know its been a while but I still know the basics. I couldn't have been so awful you have to cry over it," Lenore exclaimed with an exasperated tone, trying to bring a little humour into the situation. Apparently she wasn't very good at it because Kennedy just started to cry harder, and Lenore was strongly of the opinion that very few people were privy to such displays of emotion from the slayer.

"No you, I, I mean, y-just hold me?" She asked softly, turning to look into Lenore's eyes, and as she did the vampire felt a pang of some shared pain. Eventually everyone succumbed to a time of turmoil and vulnerability, it looked like she had met the slayer at that point in her life.

As she wrapped her arms around Kennedy she felt the younger girl lean into her, letting herself be absorbed into Lenore's embrace. Trying to find some measure of comfort in the touch of another. And so they sat there, Kennedy letting the tears roll down her cheeks as Lenore breathed in her scent and relished in holding the slayer.

They must have sat like that for what was left of the night and into the next day as she watched the sun dawn, the light stinging her eyes until they watered as it reached through the barred window at the top of their cell.

Food was brought to them and she felt the presence of new people walking through the building, the sounds and smells of them filling her as they went to work for the day.

She first became aware of someone new, of someone who didn't belong when she heard his heart beating. Rhythmically, powerfully, it echoed through her senses in time to his steps as he was brought into the lock up itself. From the pulsing strength she could feel, Lenore was surprised to see the man it belonged to.

He was young, no more then 25, if that. Shy of six feet he had dark wavy black hair and an aura of intensity surrounding him. Broken by what could have been a serious smile if the patch across his eye hadn't made him seem so comical, in the end that smile was more of a goofy grin. But the intensity, the strength of will wasn't at all diminished by it.

He was dressed casually in a pair of faded blue jeans and a loose plaid shirt with a denim jacket hanging to his waist. And he moved like a predator. The police officer beside him paled in comparison, he was bulging against his uniform from being overly muscled either from a macho complex or steroids and at six three he towered over the one eyed man. But it was still the one eyed guy who drew her attention, and apparently he noticed her too.

"Sweet Jesus," he breathed, but whatever it was that had shocked him vanished from his face in the next instant.

Lenore was stroking Kennedy's hair as she watched the officer and the other man unlock the cell, but Kennedy was breathing softly in her lap, in a light but restful sleep.

"We have company," She whispered quietly and in an instant the slayer awoke and sat up, the last of her tears having long dried.

Glancing towards the two men she exclaimed "Xander!" in a pleased and relieved tone as she darted towards him to be embraced in a fervent hug.

"Good to see you again Kennedy" he spoke as he returned the hug, and his voice wasn't deep, but it was strong, almost as if whatever he said was meaningful.

Pulling back from him the slayer gave him an inquisitive look, "Not that I'm not happy to see you… but why are you here? And so soon?"

Xander glanced towards the police officer, and Lenore, who was still calmly seated on the cement slab before he carefully responded. "I wasn't far away when you called Giles, I was…working…"

"Ah," she replied.

"So then," he said more cheerfully, "Shall we get out of here? The charges have already been taken care of and you're free to go," looking towards Lenore he added, "You friend as well."

This time it was Kennedy's turn to look towards Lenore, searching her face, her eyes…and as she looked into Lenore's eyes a wealth of emotion was passed between them.

Sighing, almost as if in resignation she said "Come on Lenore, we have ithings/i," emphasis on things, "to talk about."

Xander, exercising a wisdom he had been accused of lacking once or twice chose not to say anything and just shifted his body so they could get out of the cell.

"Ok, we don't have a lot of time before Xander gets back," Kennedy whispered quickly, after dropping the two of them off at a hotel, a hotel of much better quality then the motel they had been in before, he had gone off to find some clothes for Lenore and food for the three of them.

"Why are we whispering?" Lenore whispered back mockingly as she stretched out across the king sized bed,

"I-" Kennedy whispered "Don't know," she finished in a normal tone of voice.

"Look, Xander will be back soon," she repeated as she began to rummage through a bag of her own clothes

"And that matters…?"

"He can't know about us, what happened between us I mean," she insisted urgently

"Ashamed?" Lenore taunted back, and Kennedy faintly blushed

"That's not it, putting aside the fact I'm a slayer and you're a vampire Xander doesn't have a good past when it comes to vampires and slayers having"… she struggled for a word and Lenore didn't feel any particular compulsion to help her "Relations," she finally settled on. "Different situations I know," she rambled, "but Xander also reports back to the same people I do, hell he sits on the board of directors for the new Watchers Council and while they can be pretty open minded my ex girlfriend, a mega bad ass witch is also on the council and she's his best friend and things will just get really screwed up."

Watchers Council? She wondered, but chose to ignore for the moment

"Your relationship didn't end well?" Lenore asked softly, the pain evident in Kennedy's voice.

"I broke her heart, and in the process pissed off most of the Council because they are all the ibestest/i of friends," she explained, though she didn't elaborate on why she had broken the witches heart.

"Please, please don't say anything to Xander," she begged, "He won't stick around for long and then we can talk about, well about everything," about whatever it was the two of them were feeling for one another.

During the course of Kennedy's ramblings Lenore had perched on the edge of the bed and now the slayer was kneeling in front of her, holding tightly to the vampire's hands as she begged.

"Please?"

"Kiss me," Lenore responded

"What?"

"Kiss me," she repeated, "One kiss, right now, no adrenalin clouding our judgements. Just kiss me and I promise you he won't hear anything from me."

Kennedy looked so relieved as she pushed up from the floor and took hold of Lenore's face, pressing the warmth of her red lips against the pinkish flesh of Lenore's. Warmth, energy, it was as if life itself coursed through the intensity of that kiss. As if they should have been burned by it, and it was only very reluctantly that they both pulled away.

Lenore knew with absolute assurance then that there was something between them, something intangible, indescribable. She could wait until Xander was gone to revel in that.

Think of the devil and he shalt appear, both the slayer and the vampire heard the faint click of a key sliding into a lock, they both heard the tumblers clicking into place as the knob was twisted and with a burst of speed Lenore watched Kennedy clutch at the bag of her clothes and vanish into the bathroom.

Lenore herself lay back against the bed and let her eyes drift closed, as if that was how she had been the entire time.

Only as the door swung open did she look towards it, Xander was back.

Kennedy's POV

Lenore was down the hall in another room, far enough away that Kennedy couldn't hear her, which probably meant Lenore couldn't hear Kennedy and Xander either.

The slayer had slipt into a pair of tight denim black jeans and a plain black Singlet; her hair was still wet from the shower and looked like someone had just run there hands through it…which she had.

No makeup, no jewellery. She wasn't really in the mood for any trappings, she just wanted to get her conversation with Xander over with, and fast. Except for periodic reports to the council, mostly in the form of emails Kennedy hadn't had any actual contact with anyone from the new Watchers Council in nearly eighteen months.

Which was mostly her choice. She had broken Willow's heart when she left her, and after doing that she couldn't bare to face her again. And despite their best intentions the core of the new council had been formed by the survivors of Sunnydale, people who loved and cared for Willow deeply, breaking her heart had pushed Kennedy to the outskirts with everyone.

She remembered the day everything went to hell like it was yesterday…

"Willow I have to get out of here," Kennedy exclaimed loudly, and not for the first time. For two years the scoobies and various survivors of the first council had been trying to put everything back together, well more then put it back together, trying to create it anew to withstand the onslaught of the newly chosen.

It had been hard work, but it was finally all coming together and now that Kennedy wasn't needed for all the emergency training, now that a number of new slayers were coming to a point where the oh so mighty Buffy decreed they were ready to start fighting the forces of darkness and not just training. Now Kennedy wanted that opportunity for herself.

Even back in Sunnydale when she was just a potential she had felt restricted, confined, with the one 'real' slayer always looking over her shoulder. And now that she had the power, now that she was a slayer, powerful, strong and one bad ass fighter in her own opinion she wanted to get out from Buffy's shadow.

Wanted to carve out a territory somewhere to begin fighting on her own, or not entirely on her own. She wanted to go somewhere with Willow, somewhere they could have more control; somewhere they would be calling the shots.

And with every day that passed that feeling was growing inside of Kennedy, she was becoming more restless. And something Faith had once said kept coming back to mind; slayers didn't get along well because they were never meant to exist together. There was only ever supposed to be one. And with dozens or even hundreds crammed into the Councils training centres that malice within her was growing, her temper fraying faster and faster each time any of the other slayers even began to get on her nerves.

Buffy said it was because Kennedy was a brat, an only child who wasn't use to sharing. Of course she hadn't intended for Kennedy to hear that, but she had. And she was positive that wasn't the reason, Faith and Buffy couldn't stand to be around each other for more then a few weeks at a time, normally not even a few days. Willow said it was just because the two of them had history, but Kennedy was seeing it everywhere, the moment a slayer reached a certain point in her training, in her development she became more aggressive with the other slayers, pushing and picking at them.

And when they hit that point the Council, or more precisely Buffy, would have them assigned somewhere else in the world. While never acknowledging the phenomenon, never admitting it, and all the while keeping Kennedy reigned in, close to home. All because of Willow.

"I can't take it anymore!" Kennedy screamed at the love of her life, and this time it was in a very public forum. Dozens of slayers and would be Watchers were perusing the shelves of the library, but Kennedy just didn't care any more.

"I have to leave Willow, I don't care what Buffy or Faith or anyone else in the Council says, every minute I spend here is like having a tooth drilled and it just keeps getting worse!! There's no outlet for me, no demons, no vampires to slay," and with such a heavy slayer population in the centre of England of course there was nothing for her to hunt.

"Kennedy…" Willow said, trying to break through her rant

"No Willow, don't say anything. There is nothing here for me, except you," and she felt such pain ring through her heart as she said that, she could see her expression mirrored in Willows face as she realised where this was going

"You and Xander and Buffy, you never want to be apart, the best of friends, and since my being gone would hurt you I'm stuck here, they won't ever assign me somewhere else."

Goddess, Kennedy couldn't have imagined anything in the world hurting as badly as it did right then. She was going to break Willow's heart, but it was either that or be slowly driven insane. She was a slayer; she needed to move, to fight, to fight for her life even, without death the slayer was nothing. Demons death, her death, it didn't matter, death and killing was what the slayer breathed, it was what animated them, made them who they were. Without it they were worthless.

"Convince them to let me go, or come with me," she begged her lover. One word from Willow was all it would have taken for the Council to assign Kennedy somewhere, just one word…but she was so happy in England, friends, magic, learning, teaching. It was the essence of who she was as much as death was the essence of the slayer.

"Don't do this baby," Willow said, tears welling in her eyes as her skin went all red and blotchy.

Goddess, it hurt so badly.

"Please don't do this," And Kennedy hated seeing the loss, the desperation searing through Willows soul, but she had no choice.

"I'm leaving you," Kennedy said quietly, but all of those slayers and watchers who were trying hard to pretend they weren't listening heard exactly what she said, and if they hadn't watching Willow sink to her knees and begin babbling tears would have told them.

Her sorrow cut through Kennedy worse then any blade; her despair, her anguish and she wanted to kill herself for being the cause of it. And she wasn't even done yet.

"I don't love you anymore," she lied, and then she walked out of the library. Leaving Willow to her agony as Kennedy descended into her own abyss, curled her own pain and despair around her like a blanket, to fortify her against what she was going to do next.

Goddess she didn't want to, she wanted to go back into that room and beg for forgiveness. But if she was going to survive, if she was ever going to cut the leash that was strapped to her throat she had to do something more. Something so devastating the Council, the scoobies would send her so far away she would never have to deal with what she had done.

She stalked through stark, empty hallways until she came to the living quarter and to René. René was a slayer, one that Kennedy had brought back to the Watchers Council in the early days when she had still been allowed to travel, to be useful. René had made no secret that she was interested in Kennedy, and when she couldn't worm her way between her and Willow she began to earn a reputation among the young slayers as somewhat of a player. Taking pleasure in destroying other relationships, and she had never exactly been subtle to Kennedy that she was just waiting for the day she got tired of Willow…like that would ever happen.

The door to René's room was solid oak, and it splintered violently under the enraged kick Kennedy directed towards it. In an instant she took in the room and the young man and woman on the bed. Fraternisation between slayers and watchers wasn't exactly prohibited, but everyone was encouraged to be discrete.

"Out," Kennedy decreed, her voice oozing with malice and the young man paled violently before taking off, too scared to remember little things like his pants.

René was less disturbed, she lazily rose to her feet and began to ask "And what is it I have done this time?" in her little French accent.

Kennedy responded by roughly grabbing the younger slayer by the hair and dragging her down to meet Kennedy's lips. At first she was shocked, but she got over that quickly. Melting into Kennedy and hurriedly dragging at her clothes.

Kennedy was repulsed by herself; she wanted to take a mace to her wrists because an axe would end it to quickly, too painlessly. And sometime later when René was in the throws of ecstasy Willow caught up to them…

The Council had shipped Kennedy off to the middle of nowhere Mexico the next day.

Xander snapped her back to reality, but she hadn't heard a thing he said… "Sorry, can you repeat that…my attention was wandering."

"Lenore looks uncomfortably like an old friend," he repeated

"Tara," she said, Willow's second lover and the first woman she had given her heart to.

"In fact she looks identical to Tara, except for the longer hair and paler skin," he continued

"Its not her," Kennedy said simply

"I know that," Xander snapped, his unflappable cool cracking, "But I read the incident report, when the police found the two of you, you were in bed. Together." Kennedy just shrugged in response.

"Is this some new way to try and torture Willow?" he snarled, "find someone who looks like her dead girlfriend? What were you going to do, take pictures and send them to her?" and as he ranted he drew into striking distance.

"What the fuck are you talking about, I would never do anything like that to Willow-" she had to bite her lip to keep from saying she loved her.

"Right. You'd never do anything like break her heart in a nice public setting and then start effing another girl where you knew she'd find you," then he did something very unXander like, he hit her. Hard.

The blow rocked her head back, and she felt the blood beginning to dribble from a split lip as she looked back at him.

"Do you really want to go there Xander? You know what the slayer is, what I can do," she said quietly

"Your not a slayer," he snarled back, "A slayer protects people, she doesn't hurt them."

"Actually no," she snapped back, "A slayer kills. That is what the slayer does, she hunts, and she fights and she kills, the fact that killing helps people is just a happy coincidence."

He punched her again, she could have stopped him. She was fast enough, but she let it come, something deep inside hated herself for what she had done to Willow, and that part of herself was glad to take the punishment. She hated what she had done, but it was that or let herself die piece by piece, her soul withering.

Xander looked at her then, and his eyes flicked down to the blood welling up across his knuckles and he took two big steps back from her and began to shake his head in disgust.

"You make me sick Kennedy, and the fact you had the nerve to call the Council after what you did-"

"Ok your turn to shut up you big arrogant, self righteous prick. I am a slayer. First and foremost, my relationship with you, with Willow, with any member of the Council is irrelevant. Something you all forgot!" She screamed at him "If any of you bastards had just let me go occasionally, given me a little leeway to be what I am meant to be I wouldn't have had to break Willows heart!"

"You're trying to blame us?" He cried back indignantly

"No," She said, calmly, strongly. "What I did was my decision and mine alone, all of the blame rests with me, just like the repercussions. But maybe you and the others should try thinking a little more, I mean hell you and Buffy and Willow loved being together so much the three of you were permanently in England, and because none of you wanted Willow to be upset or distressed I wasn't allowed to leave. Ever. Not even to patrol because Willow might worry. It was killing me to be so boxed in, it really felt like parts of me were dying."

"Buffy was there as much as you were, she didn't seem to have any problems," Xander argued back, but she could feel something had changed, something in his tone of voice showed that he was finally starting to think.

"Buffy, the oh so grand matriarch of the slayers came and went as she pleased, every other week she was making quick visits to some demonically populated area so she could vent, so she could be what she was made to be…But I was never allowed to do that!" She growled back

"I had to leave, and the only way any of you would let me was if I broke Willows heart, I knew the Council would arbitrarily boot me out of England after that," She watched the shock cross his face as he realised she was absolutely right.

"You almost destroyed Willow so you could turn us against you?"

"It was the only way," Kennedy insisted, "I begged Willow to come with me, to let us leave together. But she was so happy there with all of you, with the coven and with everything else. So happy she couldn't even begin to see how miserable I was."

She was crying now, and she was so sick and tired of crying, of being vulnerable and letting other people see how vulnerable she was.

Xander saw her pain and with some effort he managed to drag himself off the topic of Willow as he tried to put himself in a more professional frame of mind. "When," he paused for a second to clear his throat, "When you called the Council I was collecting a newly called Slayer to take back to England, they also asked me to investigate a series of mutilated bodies in Dallas. But seeing as you are a senior slayer I'm assigning Dallas to you," he said in a matter of fact way.

He might have sounded distant, but it was an olive branch…and she knew how hard it was for Xander to offer it. Guess something she had said got through to him.

"There's a preliminary file of what I know in the case," he nodded towards a metallic brief case on the hotel rooms desk, a case that she hadn't even noticed was there until that moment. What an observant slayer she was.

"And I think I should go now," he said, "we both have a lot to think about," and he sounded like he meant it "And I'd prefer not to start yelling again," he tried to add a goofy grin to it. "After all you might hit back next time."

Then he left and Kennedy slumped down across the bed, emotionally exhausted after having relived that awful day and the ever so polite discussion she and Xander had just had.

"Dallas?" Lenore repeated "As in Texas. Now see I'm sure you said something about talking…"

Kennedy just gave her an exasperated look, "I'm fairly sure you heard everything Xander and I said."

"Said implies a quiet civilised conversation," Lenore shot back, not bothering to deny the fact she had more or less eaves dropped on the conversation after the two had started screaming at each other.

The vampire had also very pointedly not said anything about Kennedy's split lip, though she felt the sudden urge for a little blood letting in that bastards direction. Kennedy was a chance for Lenore, a precarious hold on life and love again, and that made Xander enemy number one for having hit the slayer.

While the council member and Kennedy had been 'talking', Lenore had taken the opportunity to shower and change into some actual clothes rather then the embarrassingly bright orange jumpsuit she had been wearing.

Next time the police arrested her after having sex and destroying a motel room, she planned to have her clothes with her…or maybe just not get arrested again. Yeah, that could work, she thought.

But back on the subject of clothes, the bastard Xander had actually had the sense to stick with something simple, not too baggy dark brown cargos; a loose fitting full arm dark green shirt and her jacket was army fatigue style, ankle high brown boots finished the image off. Not pretty, but simple and more or less her size.

And in a slightly out of character move for her Lenore had pulled her hair back with a band, a few loose strands of uncooperative hair trailing over her face.

She stalked across the room until she was a breath away from Kennedy; "You still said something about talking, but wait," she added before the slayer could say anything "Let me get you started. I'm a vampire, you're a slayer…whatever happened before you didn't really mean, it was a fluke, an accident, a mistake. Now I should get out of here before you decide the only good vampire is a dead vampire."

It was meant to be controlled, a hard and fast summary but she could hear the quiet desperation in her own voice…it still hadn't been that long since she had lost everyone she loved, and as if she needed the additional reminder she could feel the faint stirrings of her hunger rearing its ugly head.

Then Kennedy kissed her again, and it was most definitely hard and fast, just a lightning quick lean into Lenore with her head tilted up so that their lips could meet.

"We're going to have to work on those insecurity issues of yours," Kennedy quipped in a sassy tone as she smiled provocatively

"There's something here," she said in a more serious way, "something between us, and yeah I'm not totally with the whole vampire thing…that's just a little creepy still…but you don't seem to be a bad person and I want to know you, I want to be with you against everything my brain is telling me…so I guess its really down to you now to see if we could have something. I'm the slayer, I'm going to be on the move constantly, more often then not I'm going to be fighting for my life and if you're with me you'll probably be fighting for yours too."

Lenore just smiled at her then, she'd practically summed up a vampires existence.

"I want you too," she replied quietly, slipping her hands into Kennedy's and as she did so she could feel the steady rhythm of the slayers heart beat quickening with each hopeful word Lenore spoke, "For the rest, my breed of vampire are nomadic, constantly moving to stay a head of the hunters and I already have to fight for my life more often then not," she flashed back to Gordon Walker then, the bastard who had murdered her family.

"Not to mention I'll be an asset in your work," As the slayer quirked her head, Lenore elaborated, "I'm as fast as you."

"I'm as strong as you."

"My senses are more acute then yours," each sentence being punctuated with the adamant strength of her conviction

"And last but not least there's only one way I can die…but," and there always had to be a but, what was life without one. "I'll also be a liability to you," she didn't want to drive any more wedges between her and the slayer, but it was better to say it now then wait.

"There was a reason you didn't want the Council Member to know what I was, and in the places your going to be going, the circles you'll be travelling there will be hunters. Men and women who will recognise me for what I am and they won't like it."

"And then," Kennedy interrupted her, "If they push us we'll show them what a vampire and a slayer can really do when they're motivated," and as she said that there was a sinister, almost anticipatory gleam in her eyes.

With the rush of a potential fight stirring their adrenalin ever so slightly the two embraced one another with a violent passion, but before they lost all sense of reason Kennedy got in one final line.

"No biting," she whispered, her breath coming warm as she dug her teeth into Lenore's ear.

On the Road

Splat. Bug after bug met their end upon Kennedy's windshield, and Lenore faintly wondered if she too was going to meet her end on account of Kennedy.

Vampires were rowdy. They were loud. They liked to drink and let loose. In short most of them were thrill seekers, but Kennedy's driving took that to a whole new level.

In some kind of sleek silver Porsche they were doing nearly a hundred and eighty miles an hour along highways and back roads. It was insane. It was reckless. And it was turning Lenore on.

"You know a Porsche isn't exactly an inconspicuous car," Lenore said smoothly, Kennedy just smiled and kept her eyes pasted to the road.

"Do you mind cranking up the AC? Steams coming off the road, and its pretty damn hot in here as well."

Lenore obliged, cool air blasting out towards her.

"Nothing to say about the car?" Lenore asked

Again the slayer just grinned without taking her eyes from the road, "We can pick up something a little more low key in Dallas."

"Thank you."

"Though I notice your not complaining about the sunnies," Kennedy shot back and Lenore grimaced a little and sat up straighter, pulling out of her slouched position as she adjusted the 'sunnies'.

No matter what breed you were, vampires and sunlight still didn't go well together, but since there were time constraints on getting to Dallas the two of them couldn't exactly wait till nightfall. Which had created a problem when Lenore had stepped out of the hotel lobby and into the bright morning light, an instant migraine had sliced its way through her skull and the slayer had to support her as she hobbled towards the car. More then a little embarrassing.

But if she was going to be useful she had to be able to move around in daylight, and blindingly painful headaches accompanied with fiercely stinging and watering eyes was going to make that difficult.

Lenore hadn't even noticed when Kennedy slipped away and returned a half hour later with a pair of illegally dark shaded sunnies. They were so dark that for a human to wear them would have been like being in a pitch-black room, but with Lenore's heightened visual acuity they were perfect. Not enough sunlight was filtering in to be uncomfortable but she could still see perfectly.

They were also ungodly expensive. More then a grand for a pair of very dark, face fitting shades with some kind of designer name on the frames…Kennedy was also right that Lenore wasn't complaining about them.

"The shades are a necessity," Lenore piped back, and again Kennedy just smiled without looking at her.

"And at the moment, so is the car. A girl's gotta have an image you know, and there's nothing wrong with going a little fast."

"Fast and suicidal are two different things… but new topic. Except for the way I feel I barely know anything about you," Lenore was very aware of the tension that sprang through Kennedy, it was subtle, just the slightest shift in posture and a more rigid grip on the wheel, but it was definitely there.

"Want do you want know?" Kennedy asked cautiously

"I want to know you," Lenore replied, "I want to know what you like, what you don't like, what kind of a family you have."

Kennedy was quiet for a few minutes as she thought, the road and surroundings blurring around them.

"I like girls, I like pizza, I like Gone with the Wind. I don't like anime or break ups or family get togethers. I'm an only child, my parents are both alive and my family is rich." There was a definitive silence around the family parts, but then Lenore wasn't too eager to start talking about her family either, hers were all dead.

"And what about you Lenore, What do you like, what don't you like? What's you family like?" and there was more then a tinge of bitterness in her voice

"My family is all dead," she replied softly, "And I like girls too, and guys, I like to drink sometimes, to dull the pain of life and as far as eating goes, I don't need to eat so I don't. I don't like people who think they know everything and that their way is the only way."

They were quiet for a long time after that, mile after mile rushing by before Kennedy hesitantly asked, "Where do you get your blood from? I mean you have to drink."

Lenore quirked her head and really looked towards Kennedy who was carefully keeping her eyes forward and not glancing anywhere else.

"I told you, I drink cow's blood most of them."

"Yeah but from where? Do you like stock up at the butchers or do you tap a cow in a field somewhere or what? Because I know a couple of vamps who usually just get a couple pints from the butchers, one of them even crunched up weetbix in his blood, said it gave it texture."

Lenore couldn't help but laugh, hysterical, crazed laughter. Eighty years she had been drinking the blood of cattle, and never once had she thought of getting it from the Butchers, it was so simple, so easy and so much harder to trace then numerous cattle mutilations. Gods sometimes she felt like a simpleton.

"Are you ok?" Kennedy asked hesitantly,

"Y-yes," Lenore stuttered back through a barrage of laughter-induced tears.

"Its just in eighty years I never even thought of stocking up at the butchers, as you put it. So simple and it would make life so much easier, maybe I'll even try the whole weetbix thing," Kennedy looked a little green at the thought of that but the effect of Lenore's enthusiasm was contagious eventually she laughed a little as well.

Define Hell.

The absence of hope, utter despair consuming you. If you went with that definition then the toad shaped demon that was getting its ass handed to it by Kennedy was in hell, because there was no chance it was surviving the night.

Lenore was a hunter, instinctual, powerful, a deadly predator when the situation required it. But as for tracking some random unknown killer monster down, she was out of her depth. And since it was Kennedy's assignment Lenore was just riding shotgun as the slayer ploughed her way through cemeteries and parks, pulverising anything of the supernatural variety that even blinked in her direction.

Once more Lenore was seeing the ferocious slaughter that the slayer was capable of, the slaughter which revealed the death in which she thrived. And it was exhilarating.

Apparently Kennedy was done with the toad demon, she slipped past a flailing limb and took the slimy creatures head between her hands and snapped the neck. The sound was surprisingly quiet, usually a broken neck resounded through Lenore's mind. The extinction of a life in one audible strike.

Strange.

"Not that I don't appreciate your methods, but shouldn't you have questioned it?" Lenore asked as Kennedy wiped the beast's blood on her jeans.

"Tonight isn't about questions, that's tomorrow night," Kennedy replied knowingly

"So what's the point of tonight?"

Kennedy sighed in a dramatic, over the top fashion, even going as far as placing the back of her hand against her forehead in a fainting motion. "Tonight my pretty, is about making a reputation."

Lenore just looked at her quizzically.

"This city," waving her arms in a general circle around her, "hasn't seen the likes of a hunter, or slayer in awhile. So the resident demons are getting cocky, thinking they are worth more then they are. The point of tonight is to cut a path of blood and entrails, and remind them that nastier, deadlier things stalk the night then them."

"Tonight I scare the shit out of them. So tomorrow night the run of the mill beasties will be shaking in their beds. And only the guys who think they are real bad asses will be running around."

"So we find the monster you're hunting for by process of elimination."

"Exactly," Kennedy replied, beaming a smile at Lenore.

"I guess that makes sense."

Kennedy was about to quip back when they were interrupted by a short stifled laugh. A laugh that soon became a booming echo which reverberated around the two of them.

And as the two predators glanced around trying to find the source of the laughter they came together, back to back. The wet grass squeaked a little under their feet, but their search produced nothing. Someone who they couldn't see, hear or smell was laughing at them.

"I liked your plan," A voice echoed around them, coming from all directions, yet none. The voice was cool, controlled, and very masculine, edged with a condescending tone

"But I just couldn't help but come out and play tonight. As some runt of a human once said, Why put off till tomorrow what you can do today?" and that was the end of the conversation.

The air shimmered in front of Lenore, almost like heat rising from the ground, only it was a chilly night. And from that shimmer protruded a humanoid arm, bulging with over emphasised muscle, and a claw like hand that gleamed under the pale moonlight.

Lenore saw this in the fraction of a second before the creatures claw sliced down across her chest, cutting deeply as the blood sluggishly tried to flow to the surface. She let out a small gasp of surprise before he struck again, this time with the opposite hand.

The claw once again sliced through her flesh with ease, only this time he latched on, his claw digging a hold into her chest as he lifted and hurled her across the small space of the park. With a clear smashing sound she crashed against a thick tree and slid to the ground.

Oh sweet Jesus, how that had hurt.

From her supine position Lenore watched that shimmering figure slice towards Kennedy, but she was no longer there. With a rough pivot the slayer twisted away from the bladed claws and in a series of humanly impossible gymnastic feats she dodged a barrage of attacks. Lenore couldn't even see the creature, aside from the shimmers and she was willing to bet Kennedy couldn't see it either. Yet she avoided it as if the thing was clear as day and moving in slow motion.

Finally the slayer stopped dodging, in a sudden and obviously unexpected movement she threw herself forward and landed a front kick deep into the things gut, and as it bent over in pain it was clearly visible for one brief moment.

The creature was nearly seven foot tall and had a glowing, almost silvery sheen to its skin. Muscles bulged across its entire body, but ignoring the claws, the only other thing that really screamed out how human it wasn't were its eyes. They were too large for the otherwise handsome face, and they were completely filled with a deep vibrant red which was pulsating, no pupil, no iris, just red.

And then it was gone again, but too slowly. With each blow Kennedy rained down on the creature its shimmers became more and more substantial until he was almost entirely visible.

He was kneeling, or more accurately he had collapsed to his knees, blood streaming from its mouth and nose, gashes covering his exposed flesh where blunt force trauma had burst his silvery skin. Skin that was fast taking on a crimson sheen. As she watched the creature's defeat Lenore felt her own body healing, the gashes over her chest had already stopped bleeding and were growing shallower as the skin knitted together. With a small amount of effort and even less pain she was able to stand.

The damage to her shirt being the only reminder of the wounds that would have proven fatal to any human.

With a speed akin to lightning a small blade appeared in Kennedy's hand and she lunged, the knife darting into the beasts throat with a thick, wet, meaty sound, and with a psychotic glee the slayer wrenched the blade across with a spurt of blood which splattered across Kennedy's mouth and neck, half severing the creatures neck and leaving his spine exposed.

Before its body could even begin to droop the slayer spun and as if she were still fighting for her life she drove that same blade through the creature's heart, gazing into his eyes as the light flickered out. His vibrant red eyes dimming until they were black as coal. She didn't bother to remove the blade, just pivoted until she was facing Lenore.

And with the beasts blood on her hands and face she kissed the vampire, a smooth but excited kiss as she pressed into her lover.

Lenore couldn't help but respond in more ways then one; she reacted to the kiss and the blood, both exciting her. The blood was sweet and ever so potent, just the spurt on Kennedy's lips was seeping into her system and she couldn't begin to describe how that felt, the raw coursing strength that flowed through her, that drove her. She could feel her face changing, the blood lust pouring through her, the pricks of her teeth elongating, the better vision as her eyes darkened, the pupils dilating.

Liquid lust swept through her like molten lava, it burned her fiercely, but she needed more, she wanted more.

With a violence bred of hunger she bodily lifted the slayer and slammed her against a tree, Kennedy's legs closed around her with a crushing strength and it only felt good as they mashed their mouths together harder.

God she could taste the slayers blood then, her teeth cutting into Kennedy's lips and tongue, slicing through them like butter as she fed from the slayers mouth, sucking down the blood to draw it out faster.

If the demons blood had been molten lava, then Kennedy was a super nova of heat and passion, and she wanted everything, she needed everything. With a savage snarl Lenore wrenched herself away from the slayer, but the blood lust was riding her too hard.

Even trying to pull away from her, Lenore couldn't bring herself to see the slayers pale complexion, the glazed almost drugged expression. All she could see, all she could feel was the pulse of the slayers body, the blood just beneath the surface, the rhythmic throbbing of the artery in her neck. Lenore's hand wrested lightly on that pulse and she fought, fought hard to stay away. But she could feel herself loosing and Kennedy was too far-gone to stop her.

With the weakness of blood loss Kennedy's legs finally fell away from Lenore's waste and the vampire knew she was about to kill her new lover, she knew it with that gut certainty that people rarely have. But she and Kennedy were both creatures of death, they lived and breathed it and they both knew when it was coming.

Lenore still fought the need, if it had just been the need for blood she might have won, but she needed Kennedy in everyway it was possible to need someone…how could she have fallen so hard and so fast?

But the thoughts didn't really matter as she bit into Kennedy's throat, she despised herself while she loved and relished that first hot spurt of blood as it coated her mouth and slid down her throat, warming her inside as she slipped her tongue into the wound she had made, wiggling it inside the warm muscle while she willed herself to die.

She was in Hell then, with a capital H. No hope, only all consuming despair…and that glorious rush of blood.

Kennedy's POV

She was blacking in and out of consciousness, blissfully dampened to most of the pain, she had been out of it since the park, unconscious as the ambulance arrived and she had just started to become aware again, her eyes flickering open as she reached the hospital.

"We have a Hispanic woman, early twenties with wounds to the face and throat and severe blood loss," One of the Interns cried out as the gurney was pushed through a set of double doors.

She heard the doors snap closed behind them as a young female Resident took the interns place, of course she didn't know the woman was a Resident at the time.

"Pulse is slow, but constant," someone called from her peripheral vision

"Christ," a second intern said, "This is one tough chick," he announced as he took the EMT's place holding a bandage against the woman's sluggishly bleeding neck.

"Prep an OR for immediate surgery," The Resident called out, and glancing towards a chart she continued, "She's going to need an immediate blood transfusion as well."

Before they could make it to the Operating Room Kennedy's breathing became raspy as she struggled for air, her lungs hurt more with each breath

"Shit, her throats swelling, we need to intubate now," her vision was darkening again, but she felt something being shoved down her throat and she gasped around it.

But then everything was gone and darkness reigned supreme.

During the surgery the slayer slipped into a coma as her weakened body tried to accelerate the healing process. She was alive, but was breathing, peeing and being fed through tubes. All the while a suicidally depressed vampire was alternating between stalking the hallways of the hospital and clutching at Kennedy's hand in desperation.

England; Three Days Since Kennedy entered her Coma.

"She's in a coma?" Willow asked quietly

"Yes," Xander said just as softly as he took a seat beside the witch, letting himself sink into the warm leather as the heat of the open fire filled the room.

He had just returned to England when he got the call, he hadn't even made it back to the Council's main residence, and he hated to be the one to tell Willow but both Buffy and Giles were out of contact in Africa, and being her oldest friend that dubious responsibility had fallen to him.

Kennedy had broken Willow's heart so badly that the witch was still grieving, but she also still loved Kennedy so deeply that Xander could read the new pain as it crossed her face.

"I'm sorry Willow," he said as he wrapped an arm around her, giving her what little comfort he could.

For a time they just sat together, with Willow's quiet sobs soaking into his shirt.

"Slayers have come out of comas before," Willow suddenly said, "I mean Faith did, and Kennedy's not hurt that badly."

"She could come out of it soon," he offered, "She is pretty strong for a brat," he didn't want to tell her not to get her hopes up.

Secretly, deep down he almost wished Kennedy would just die. Because nothing short of death was going to let Willow move on from her. And Willow needed to move, Kennedy obviously had, or ihad she/i?

He thought to back to the rather loud conversation they had had before he left, how Kennedy had accused the New Council of killing her bit by bit, denying her want it meant to be a slayer. How she had begged Willow to leave with.

A gentle sigh escaped his lips; nothing in life was ever easy.

"What are we going to do now?" Willow asked, turning her tear stained face, and still watering eyes to look at Xander.

"Someone needs to be with her until she wakes up, or we could have her brought her?" she suggested hopefully while Xander internally recoiled at the idea, with Kennedy's Tara look alike for a new girlfriend it would be suicidal to have Kennedy brought to England.

"I'll send-"

"No." Willow said quietly, but with a resolved voice, "No, I'll go."

"Willow," he protested

"No Xander. I'm a member of this Council as well, and I am going to go, maybe there's something I can do to help her, but I need to be there."

"Willow," he tried again

"Xander I've been walled up with my pain and misery for too long, I've been ignoring everything else, I've practically shunned you and Buffy and Giles. Its time I start acting like the witch I am."

"Willow," he tried a final time

"Resolve face," She said stubbornly while putting on a poor imitation of what had once been the infamous Willow resolve face. The face that no man, woman, nor beast had dared to defy once upon a time, and suddenly presented with that particular Willow gesture he was confronted with the fact that he was attempting to deny the most powerful witch in the world what she wanted.

Not a healthy move for anyone, not even her best friend.

Even if she did stay in England she would sulk, and after Kennedy had left the first time her sulking had turned into raging thunderstorms as she lost some of unconscious control over her magic's. He shuddered to think of that happening again.

"Book me the earliest flight," She ordered as she stood up.

"Alright," he agreed, "But your not going alone."

"Xander, one of the senior council has to be in residence at all times."

"I know that," he said gruffly, the rule had seemed like a good idea at the time. "But that doesn't mean your not taking some backup, one of the more experienced slayers and one of the coven," he said thoughtfully

"Xander-"

This time he cut her off, "No Willow. You want to go? Fine. But your taking a slayer and another witch with you, you can be stubborn about it and I'll pick them or you can pick them yourself. Your choice."

"Not much of a choice," she grumbled half-heartedly

"Live with it," he replied, but his voice was light, more of jesting tone then the serious tone the rest of their conversation had been in.

As he stalked out of the room he had the vague nagging feeling that there was something he'd forgotten. But it wasn't until Willow was already gone that it suddenly hit him.

"Shit!" He muttered, "I forgot to tell her about Kennedy's girlfriend…"

Dallas Central Hospital

Lenore clutched at Kennedy's hand as if it were a lifeline, she was painfully aware of her lover lying limp on the white hospital sheets. The soft sounds of her breathing through a tube. The slayer resonated inside of her, for a time they were sharing the same blood.

It flowed through both of their veins, bonding them, heightening their connection to an entirely new level. And serving only to remind Lenore of what she had done, she had been weak, unable to control her hunger, her need for the slayer. And that weakness may have just killed Kennedy.

Through teary eyes Lenore focused on the cotton bandages hiding the slayers ravaged throat, even if she did wake up she was going to be scarred for a very long time. Her beautiful skin ruined.

The vampire held Kennedy's hand to her mouth and kissed it, and once more she was pained. This time by the clammy coolness of her lovers hand, always before it had been unusually warm, as alive as the rest of her. But now she was fading, her flesh growing cold, dark rings embedding themselves beneath eyes that were slowly sinking back into her skull.

As she gazed down at her comatose lover Lenore's mind drifted back to a conversation the two of them had had on their way to Dallas.

After the butcher conversation, Lenore had set herself to enjoying the breeze as it rushed across her face and played havoc with her hair. The insane speeds that Kennedy drove were actually kind of relaxing once she got past thinking she was about to be obliterated in one blaze of glory as the Porsche ripped up the road.

For a while she just stared across at the slayer, taking in the warmth of her eyes, the flush of her skin, the beaming exuberance of her life. Lenore was no walking corpse, but she wasn't truly as vivaciously alive as Kennedy was.

Perhaps it was just the weariness of time, or maybe just the draining qualities of the sunlight beating down upon her. With the sun down, and the moon high, with her pale skin reflecting the light of night, that was when Lenore felt alive, when she felt more a part of the world. Daylight just plain sucked.

And maybe it was that depressing quality of sunlight, which allowed the question to slip from her lips…

"Have you ever wondered what it might be like to live forever?" she asked softly

She felt the tension rise, saw from her peripheral vision the way Kennedy suddenly sat rigid, tense, the muscles in her arms straining with her death grip on the wheel.

"I don't want to be a vampire," she replied, almost as softly, but the tension ringing through her voice was abundantly clear.

"I didn't ask if you wanted to be a vampire, just if you ever wondered what it might be like to live forever, to measure time in decades rather then hours…to see the world change."

Kennedy was silent for a long time then, long silences seemed to be the theme of the car ride.

"When," she coughed, "When I was a little girl, I use to think it would be so cool to have super powers and to live forever. Even after the old Council told me what I might one day become, what really went bump in the night, I still thought it would be cool."

"What changed your mind?" Lenore asked quietly, she heard the soft sigh in Kennedy's voice as the slayer let the tension go and spoke again

"I got super powers," she paused "And it was cool. But they changed me, becoming the slayer changed who I was; made me more, but it also made me less, less human, before I was the slayer I liked to fight, but now? Now I love to kill. After that I stopped seeing just the benefits, don't get me wrong I'm still a fun loving girl at heart, but now I look at all the demons and monsters out there who don't age in any normal way, and how time has twisted them. Destroyed what they once enjoyed, made them sadistic, brutal, because it was the only way for them to survive so long, to maintain a measure of sanity."

She had felt an overwhelming sadness then, she was an immortal after all, was that to be her fate?

And as if Lenore couldn't feel any worse then she already did, one of the Nurses had left the morning paper where's it headline could catch her eye.

Three More Dead. Mutilations Continue!

She barely had to glance over the article to see it was the same pattern Kennedy had been sent to investigate. Either they'd killed the wrong demon, or they hadn't killed the demon at all. Which wasn't actually that much of a stretch, Kennedy pummelled the creature and broke its neck, a broken neck wouldn't have killed Lenore so it would be a little egotistical to think that only her breed of vampire could recover from that kind of injury…

…But what did it mean? What should she do? That thing had tossed her around like a rag doll, she didn't know what it was, and she didn't know how to kill it…she was scared. She was scared of it. She was scared for Kennedy. She was scared of herself.

And she was damn tired of being scared, tired of being an emotional wreck. Tired of being so weak. She wanted to be her old self again…but her old self had had a family, friends, her old self had run with a pack, her pack. God how she missed them sometimes, Eli especially.

He could be so forceful sometimes, insisting that it was kill or be killed. That they had to do more then survive. Sometimes it had made him seem cold, distant. But he had been the heart of her pack, the strength from which she had taken her own strength.

His death had hurt her more then any other, and she faintly found herself imagining killing Walker. Slowly. Painfully. No quick, frenzied, hurried feeding for survival.

"I barely know you Kennedy," she whispered, again kissing her lovers hand, "Hell I don't even know if you're officially my girlfriend or whether we're just sleeping together…but I think I know what you'd want right now. You'd want that monster put in the ground for good. You'd want all of this to mean something. And that I can do for you, when you wake up. And you will wake up, I'm not giving you a choice on that, you can rest assured that its dead."

She slowly stood up; reluctantly releasing the slayers hand, taking comfort in being able to touch her still, because when she woke up it might all be over. Lenore was a vampire; she had bitten Kennedy, taken her blood in a moment of giddy uncontrollable lust, and she believed she was going to have to pay for that lack of control. But for the time being, she was going to make something else pay.

Demon Bar

In full vampiric fashion Lenore roared her fury, a mouth full of elongated needle point teeth snapped open and closed, her eyes a reflective black as she flipped a demonic vampire by the throat and brought his body crashing down onto the bar.

It shuddered under the impact and a faint layer of grime rose from it, the other vampire grunting in pain as its body had smashed down over several glasses. Shattering them and impaling its back.

Growling in a feral fashion Lenore felt the spittle flinging from her teeth as she bent over the mans upside down face, he might have been an attractive man under normal circumstances, but in the face of a bitchy, pissed off vampire beating the shit out of it…he was less then charming, his own vampiric game face horribly contorting his features.

Despite her own inner fury she found herself studying the differences between them, his entire upper face was morphed inwards, as if someone had added skin coloured putty and pushed it together. His eyes were tinged with a yellow, almost vibrant demonic light and his teeth were jagged, more serrated then her own.

While she was studying him she was also aware of the bar that had rapidly cleared out around her, except for the bartender huddling in a corner and a few stray beasts still trying to make it out of the dingy little room, with a half seconds thought she pivoted, throwing a chest high round house kick squarely into a second vampires ribs, the cracks were distinctly audible, as was the meaty sound of the broken bones perforating the creatures lungs, it was a good thing demonic vampires didn't really need to breathe, otherwise he might have been in trouble, as it was he was just in a great deal of pain.

Lenore just vaguely tracked him through the corner of her eye as he hit a bar stool and rolled to the ground. All the while she had kept a choking death grip on her first victim, he was snarling and struggling, but compared to her he was still young, not more then two or three years dead, making her far more powerful.

"The red eyed beast," she snarled into his face, "Where is he?"

"What?" he tried to say, but it came out more as a hacking burst of breath, very rancid breath, breath that was stained with both very old and very recent blood.

"The red eyed beast that has been mutilating women here in Dallas," she elaborated, "he can shimmer into nothingness, be unseen. And I will only ask once more vampire, where is he?"

"I don't know what your talki-" she cut him off as she dug her slightly claw like hands through the soft flesh of his throat, the next moment wrenching that chunk of throat from his body. The bloody mess sat in her hand as the creature gargled for breath.

The saddest thing was he wouldn't even die, he would want to, choking on his own blood, in unimaginable agony until his flesh could heal. But not needing oxygen to live, he would just flail around in a puddle of his own growing blood

He deserved the pain. But she would be merciful, in a rising axe kick she raised her leg to her face, and in the next instant dropped it down with such force that the vampires head, which was lying just off the edge of the bar, was torn from the rest of its body. Instant decapitation thanks to the lack of a throat to absorb some of the impact.

She watched with a degree of pleasure as a flaming orange glow radiated out from the vampire's skeleton, burning free from its prison of dead flesh until all that remained were ashes.

Sighing wistfully Lenore exerted a measure of control over herself and forced her teeth to shrink back into the gums, her eyes loosing their reflective black, before she turned to look towards the second vampire she had knocked back.

"Howdy," she said politely, almost perkily, "Unless you're an idiot, which I wouldn't put past you, you already know my question."

It nodded emphatically, so scared that it couldn't even hold onto its game face, reverting to a more human state.

"I don't know," it muttered, "I swear I don't know where he is," he was shaking in his metaphorical boots as she stalked towards him.

"Then how about what is he?" again he was just shaking his head, quivering. Somehow she didn't think she was going to get the answers she wanted, which was really too bad for the little baby vampire, she needed to hurt something, needed to kill. And he was drawing the short straw.

"Ya'll should probably get the hell away from him," a new, distinctly Texan voice called from the doorway as Lenore approached the fledgling vamp.

She turned her head just enough to quirk an eyebrow at the new arrival, "I'll be with you in a moment."

"Sorry doll, but anything you've got to say to him, has got to go through me first."

Lenore finally turned to face the Texan vampire, she was pretty in a school girl kind of way, and she couldn't have been more then five foot four with a slightly delicate frame and dark brown hair that fell in ringlets around her shoulders. She had the kind of pale complexion that took vampires years to achieve, a smooth girlish nose and she was dressed the way you would have expected a Texan Vampire to dress, big brown boot with small spurs, short raggedly cut off blue jeans and a red tank top that showed more then it hid, with a small light brown tasselled jacket hanging over it all. To cap it off she had on a big old-fashioned western hat.

She cut an attractive figure, and radiated decades of undead life. She was also backed by three other male vampires, dressed in the good old Western fashion as well. Now that she thought about it the vamp she had already ashed was sporting a western look…and so was the one on the floor. A themed vampire pack? It was certainly different, a little lame, but different.

"You see that little runt you were about to obliterate is one of mine, I chose him, I made him, he's mine," Lenore's interest in the new vampire dropped a little, she didn't care about the fledgling, all she cared about was that something belonging to her was about to be damaged.

It made her sick to think of it like that, her pack had been her allies, her friends, her family.

"Do you have a name?" Lenore asked, mirroring the standoffish posture of the Texans

"Isobella, but ya'll can just called me Mistress."

Lenore just quirked her eyebrow again as she folded her arms, silence could be such a useful tool.

"Ya see, in about 2 minutes you'll be on your knees begging for ya life, and I figure ya'll serve a much better deterrent to other disrespectful youngsters as a minion," Lenore couldn't help but let out a snort of laughter

"Really? How old could you possibly be to be calling me a youngster? In my experience it's the babies who have to try and act older then they are." Texan girl snarled at that, but kept her face carefully composed and Lenore suddenly realised they didn't know she was a vampire.

They hadn't seen her version of a game face, and she didn't have that sulphuric demonic scent to give her away, she had once heard it said that the enemies ignorance was your gift and should be wielded as if it were a sword, seemed like good advice to her.

"You know, since I'm going to be all aquiver soon, would you mind telling me about the Red Eyed Beast?"

"Sorry doll, never heard of him. So you gonna do this the easy way, or the fun way?"

Lenore's interest peaked once more, "I like the sounds of the fun way," and that was the end of the conversation, two of the flanking vampires surged forward.

It wasn't the most uncoordinated attack she had ever seen, but it was close, the two of them just lunged for her. Expecting brute force and speed to win out, guess she was going to have to disappoint them. Darting beneath the first brutes outstretched hands she took his wrist in hand and swivelled, unfortunately for him he was going one way and she was going the other way.

The tremendous force against his wrist shattered the arm in a thick wet meaty sound as he began to scream, plummeting towards the hard wood floor. It was relatively easy to give him a soft back kick to help him on his way into a broken chair leg. Before he could even begin to ash she slipt a fist through the second vampires pathetic defences, impacting against his jaw with a satisfactory cracking sound.

As he gasped and his head flicked backwards she latched onto his arm and jerked him forwards, using a snap kick to the back of his knee to drop his legs out from under him.

And as he staggered to his knees, looking towards his mistress in despair, Lenore released a now flailing arm and coolly placed a hand to either side of his face as she wrenched his head from his body, allowing a shower of ash to explode across the room. It hadn't taken her five seconds to dispose of the two thugs.

The third minion took a half step away from his Mistress and calmly and collectedly drew a bright, shiny revolver. Just as calmly and collectedly Lenore flipped a small wooden blade into the palm of her hand and using an under arm throw, flung it towards the minion who looked shocked at the fact his shot had gone wide, not to mention seeing the hilt of the weapon sticking out of his chest, however it had apparently missed the heart.

"Damn," she muttered loud enough to be heard, "I borrowed the knife from a friend, never really was much good at hitting what I aim for."

Isobella gave Lenore a faint smile at the same time she gave her thug a disgusted look, in a rapid motion that Lenore failed to see the Vampiric Mistress pulled the knife from her minions chest and drove it back in, this time piercing his heart and rendering him to ash as she allowed both the knife and the gun to fall to the ground.

"Sorry about that, these younglings just don't know anything about decorum. Honestly, a gun?" She shook her head in astonishment; "I thought I taught him better then that."

Then she sprang forward, Lenore had thought she was fast, but she couldn't even track the blur as two open palms shoved her back against the bar, and in the next instant she was pinned as a barrage of open palm and closed fist strikes rained down on her. And they hurt, god how they hurt, she could feel her bones breaking, vessels rupturing, muscles being torn, but she plain and simply wasn't fast enough to even try and block the blows.

When Isobella did finally step back Lenore collapsed to the ground, the only thought streaming through her mind was that it had in fact been less then two minutes since Isobella had said Lenore would be on the ground.

Crouching down over the beaten girl, Isobella stroked her hair, leaning down to whisper "The first lesson is always the hardest, gotta break you to the bit before I can start training you up, after all I am out four minions because of you," The demonic vampire was so damn cocky she still hadn't let her game face slide into view, maybe that was just vanity…Lenore could smell mint on the vampires breath rather then blood, breath mints and a preference for human appearance added up to vanity as far as she was concerned. Of course what did it matter, Lenore was loosing.

The Texan Vampire leaned closer to whisper into Lenore's ear, "Soon you will be one of us…"

Lenore turned her face into Mistress Vampires throat as she whispered back, "I already am," before the words could register Lenore's own needle point teeth descended and she sunk them deep into the bitches throat.

The cool vampiric blood ran sluggish and lumpy, tainted with sulphur, it was disgusting, but Lenore dug in with everything she had left and eventually Isobella's own attempts to pull free resulted in her own throat being torn out.

She was down and gurgling in her own blood as Lenore tried weakly to stand, she couldn't wait to see what she would feel like in the morning since she already felt like shit.

Cautiously scenting the air Lenore stumbled away from the alcohol soaked bar and headed towards the door, her feeble, bruised body aching with every movement. Glancing over the room she saw broken tables, broken chairs, and most importantly, copious amounts of broken bottles which had released a beautiful, gloriously flammable substance to soak into the very essence of the demon bar.

"Goodnight sweet Mistress," she called out in a singsong tone of voice as she retrieved a pocketbook of matches. "Don't get too close to the fire now."

And she lit them, a blindingly bright white flare filled her vision, quickly replaced by a smaller but more sombre yellow-orange flame, the two weakened Texan vampires just looked at her in horror as she dropped the matches, flames quickly spreading from them to engulf the room.

There was still a good portion of the night left, but her little adventure had left Lenore emotionally and physically drained, she was going to go back to Kennedy and resume the hunt the next evening.

Sometime the Next Day

The sting of sunlight woke Lenore from the depths of an almost catatonic healing sleep; she had never made it back to the hospital the night before. She had barely made it back to the motel room she and Kennedy had gotten there first night in Dallas.

She knew she had been hurt by the Texan vampire, but until she had stopped moving, taken a moment to really feel the wounds, she had had no idea how extensive they were.

With her strength rapidly fading she had ripped into some bagged blood that Kennedy had graciously picked up from the butcher and popped into the fridge, obviously before the coma…it was gritty, and cold, but nourishing, and as the new blood began to mix with her system a lethargic state begun to crawl over her.

Starting in her stomach it had quickly spread through her limbs, her legs falling out from under her before she could even begin to move towards the cheap motel bed.

Curling herself into a foetal position on the grungy floor she had stopped trying to fight it, her body needed to heal and fast, and the most efficient way was to shut itself down.

But now shafts of sunlight were beaming through the partially closed curtains, and if that was enough to stir her from such a deep sleep, then it was past time she was up and about. Of course like most things that was easier said then done, her body still ached, her muscles burned and as she glanced into a mirror she saw the unusual gauntness of her face, her stringy, greasy hair, the ugly green and yellow bruises.

Shit! She thought vehemently. She hadn't just been out for a few hours, she'd been out for a day at least, the sun had risen, set and risen again.

She was feeling better, but that was kind of irrelevant. Kennedy had been alone for two nights now, anything could have happened to her! Lenore knew she wasn't thinking rationally, it was a little absurd to think Kennedy couldn't survive without her, but still she was a defenceless slayer in a public hospital. Any body could get in, and it would take less then a heartbeat for some things to kill her.

She was beginning to hyperventilate as she rapidly paced, trying to think. She needed to shower, change into something a little less bloody…glancing around the room she contemplated cleaning up the bloodied carpet, or maybe the empty bloody packs…but then again that took time.

Lenore raced through an icy cold, prickly shower, scratching at the scabbed blood until her skin was raw, she applied a similar method to her hair, trying to grind out the worst of the grease before she flung herself back into the other room letting the warm air dry her as little as it could before she hurriedly dressed in black jeans, a black long sleeved turtle neck sweater and dark leather boots.

The pure black ensemble had a devastating affect in revealing her pale complexion, but that couldn't be helped since they did effectively hide most of the bruising. Never a good idea to walk into a hospital looking all beaten up, the doctors tended to get worried. However there wasn't much she could do about the dark ugly bruises tracing their way up her jaw and swelling part of her cheek.

Stuffing a cheap gym back with extra clothes Lenore slung the bag strap over her shoulder and took the keys to Kennedy's Porsche in one hand and a fresh bag of all American pigs blood in the other, it had a little straw sticking out of it and everything.

The vampire slipped on the shades Kennedy has provided on the road trip to Dallas, and with that final addition to her wardrobe she stalked out into the stifling hot air and the harsh light of day.

By the time Lenore reached the hospital and edged her way past concerned nurses and doctors it was late afternoon, but even then she couldn't catch a break.

The afternoon sunlight poured through the windows into the slayers room…or at least it should have…it had the first day Lenore was there.

But this time the blinds were drawn and a pale young woman in a candy stripper's outfit stood beside Kennedy. A candy stripper that reeked of sulphur.

"Hey," Lenore called out gently, "How's she doing?"

The candy stripper looked up startled, her hands dropping away from the bed

"Oh ah, she's doing fine," she claimed, as she glanced around at the monitors. Even Lenore could tell she had no idea what she was supposed to be doing or even looking at.

"That's great," Lenore replied as she stepped closer, unfortunately the young vampire was edgy, nervous and she reacted the way any nervous little vampire would. Violently.

She snarled, her face changing form as her nostrils flared, taking in the aroma of a different kind of vampire. She awkwardly lunged towards Lenore, but it was a simple matter for the older vampire to catch one of those hands, her other hand snaking around the candy strippers throat and spinning her into the wall.

A muffled grunt was emitted as the demonic vampire hung suspended by her throat and shoved against a wall as she gasped in imitation of being human. "Tut tut little one, you shouldn't snarl at your elders."

Leaning in until she could feel the warmth of the monsters breath she asked, "What's a little vamp like you doing up and about during daylight hours…wait, no don't rush to answer," it was kind of cruel to mock the vampire while she tightened her hold just in the off chance that the vampire could still speak.

"Let me guess, you heard about a comatose slayer, someone weak and defenceless, someone with blood so potent it could make your eyes boil, and you just couldn't help but try and take a slice of her home with you. Of course being the baby that you are you couldn't possibly have come for her at night, not when other more powerful beasties would be trying for her, you had to try something a little more risky, something a little more daring, such as a daylight strike."

Lenore smiled savagely as she slowly let the vampire's feet down to the ground; releasing her hold just enough for the girl to gasp as Lenore stroked her hair and whispered, "Its too bad, you're kind of cute in the candy stripper outfit."

The girl's eyes widened, but before she could gasp or scream, or even begin to fight back Lenore dropped the hand and gripped the girls shirt with both hands, lifting her entire body in a sweeping, powerful throw. Her face was so surprised, so startled as she punched through the curtains and crashed through the glass.

It was at least a three-story drop, but the moment she entered that awful stream of sunlight her body began to smoulder, flames licking across her cheeks as she was engulfed. A fast and hard method of execution, but relatively painless and it left so little trace.

Of course there was going to be the matter of the security, she could already hear, rushing down the hall. As she turned to face the music Lenore took a half step back.

Shocked to see a young woman had already entered the room, a woman with vibrant red hair and extraordinarily sad eyes. A woman dressed in unconventional, but upbeat, happy, looking clothes.

"Demon," She whispered, as an unearthly wind began to move the woman's hair and energy crackled along her closed fists,

"Wait," Lenore exclaimed, raising her arm in a peaceful, pacifying gesture, the witch didn't even pause. A stream of raw, painful energy surged through her, lifting her bodily and hurling her across the room, and wouldn't you know it? Right through the same smashed windows she had just thrown the other vampire through.

Life was such a bitch sometimes. But that was all the thought she had time for as the asphalt rushed to meet her in a painful encounter akin to dying. She was already hurt, and the fall didn't help matters in the slightest.

But that didn't matter, her pain was nothing. Awkwardly she pushed herself to her feet, remarkably she was still more or less in tact, nothing was broken that was going to slow her down too much, and she needed to get back to Kennedy and fast. Who knew what the hell the witch was going to do to her?

Turns out all the pain of standing up wasn't necessary, the Witch was floating a half foot above the ground with her pointy little shoes dangling as that same unearthly air stirred around the red haired woman. Seemed she was more interested in Lenore then Kennedy, only for an unprovoked and very violent attacker the Witch seemed confused.

Her eyes darting over Lenore's face in puzzlement, as if her mind was trying to reconcile what she saw with what she knew…it was as if she recognised the vampire, only she didn't at the same time.

"Tara?" She suddenly whispered, her voice hopeful as her eyes brimmed with tears and it suddenly hit Lenore that the Witch must be a member of the Council, like Xander, the guy Kennedy had met with before. If she recognised Lenore, like he had, thinking she looked like that other person, then she must be a member of the Council.

Her mind was slowly piecing together what she had been told and what she overheard…oh shit, she thought. The kind of hope, kindled with the kind of confusion that was sweeping across the Witches face could only mean that she was Kennedy's ex, the ex whose heart had been broken. It might have seemed like a leap in logic, but it made sense, she had come to see a wounded Kennedy and had defended her viciously against even a possible danger, and she was also looking at Lenore like she was her dead lover brought back to life.

"I'm not Tara," Lenore said simply, but with some measure of pain in her voice. Hadn't that Xander guy told the rest of them that Kennedy's new lover bore a resemblance to Willow's old one?

"My name is Lenore, and I guess Xander didn't tell you anything about me," At that moment a second young woman appeared beside Willow, a short African American woman moving with all the grace and deadly prowess that Lenore associated with Kennedy.

Another slayer.

The Witches eyes hardened, "Of course you're not Tara. Tara is dead. Your some kind of demon, looking like her, trying to make me lower my guard!" Her hands began to lift in a striking motion and the dark magical energies coalesced, darkening, intensifying.

"Wait," Lenore cried out, "I'm not a demon!"

The Witch just looked from Lenore to the three-story drop, "I can also sense energies demon, when I want to, and you, you're not human."

"Before you do anything rash, talk to Xander, I met him, he saw me with Kennedy, he knows I'm not a bad guy," she blurted out, trying to reason with an increasingly irrational witch.

"He didn't say anything to me," She replied as a jolt of energy leapt from her hand and towards Lenore.

The blast ripped through her and she flew into the side of a car with a tremendous thumping sound, the metal indenting around her as she sunk to her knees. God how she hated magic.

A faint trickle of blood built at the top of her mouth before the small well overflowed, coating her lips in the sweet taste of herself. And she could smell the ozone building in the air as a second wave of energy became charged.

"She begged you to leave with her," Lenore breathed out, her eyes frantically searching the Witches for a hint of something, of mercy, of understanding, and there was the slightest hesitation there. But the currents of energy were still crackling around her arms in ever growing volume.

"She had to break your heart," Lenore kept trying, "She thought it was the only way the Council would ever let her leave."

"Enough," Willow decreed, her voice echoing in an ominous way. As the energy built to blinding levels around the Witch Lenore could only stare up at her and watch, being oddly reminded of the idea that there was a light at the end of the tunnel. Because despite it being the middle of the day, the sun burning bright around them, all she could see was the blinding glare of Willow's energy.

"Tell her that I love her," she whispered, pleading with Willow, "And that I'm sorry."

As the witch drew back her arm the coalescing energy crawled along her skin, as if it were being syphoned from the rest of her and into the palm of her hand.

In the moment when Lenore thought she would finally meet her end, finally be with her family again the governor called. A stay of execution in the sweet dulcet tones of Kennedy's rasping voice.

"Willow stop," And the Witch did, instantly, the growing energies were extinguished

Kennedy stood, wide-awake, and coma free, resting heavily to one side in her white hospital gown with the wind wreaking havoc on her. She was so pale, the bandages only loosely covering her throat, and even from her dazed position smacked into the side of a car Lenore could see the not so faint tremors running through the slayer.

She could hear the difficulty that Kennedy had in pushing words through her raspy vocal cords and swollen lips, damage done by Lenore's lack of control.

"You should be in bed Kennedy," Lenore said quietly as she rose to her feet. The witch seemed incapable of words, her eyes brimming with tears as she gazed longingly at Kennedy. Such raw emotion coursing across the woman's face.

"And you shouldn't be here Lenore," Kennedy replied, "Not yet at least," she continued, cutting the vampire off before she could even try to argue.

"I need to think, and," she interrupted herself as she bent over and succumbed to a bout of a hacking cough, "and," she repeated, "I can't do that with you here."

Those words cut Lenore more deeply then any blade could have, but she regretfully understood. She had committed an unspeakable atrocity upon the slayer, she had destroyed any chance for their blossoming relationship and she was lucky to still be alive. She richly deserved the fate the Witch had been about to hand to her.

Lowering her head in shame she watched Kennedy through lowered eyes, watched the shaking as it begin to affect the slayer more. She was too weak to be moving around, and she was certainly too weak to have to deal with Lenore. The sooner she left, the sooner the slayer could rest, begin to recuperate.

"I understand," Lenore murmured, eyes still lowered, "Y-you need space," she stuttered.

"I do," And those two simple words conveyed more pain then Lenore had thought possible. She tried to be strong, tried to meet Kennedy's gaze. But she felt the blood rising through her cheeks, tears brimming in her eyes and so she turned away.

"Goodbye Kennedy," she whispered, unable to bear looking back at the slayer as she walked away. Fully aware of the three sets of eyes watching her go.

Hospital Room

Kennedy's POV

The three girls had been silent on the trek back to Kennedy's somewhat damaged hospital room, though much to her shame she had needed Avanda's help to get back there. Avanda being the African American slayer Willow had brought with her.

However once Kennedy was settled onto the hospital bed Avanda had skipped out, eager to avoid the growing tension between the former lovers.

"Not that I'm not happy to see you Willow…but why are you?" Kennedy asked, her voice still rasping painfully.

Willow just looked shocked at the question, "You were hurt," she said simply, as if that were all the explanation she need.

"Maybe you're not my girlfriend anymore, but you're still my friend and I care about you" she continued earnestly, wringing her hands a little.

Kennedy was honestly a little shocked by Willow's answer, she had hurt the Witch so deeply the emotional scars were still visible and yet she had flown half way around the world just to be at Kennedy's side. It made the slayer feel sick at herself.

"Ok. And the reason for trying to kill my new girlfriend?" Goddess, she could be such a bitch, she felt even worse as she watched her words crash through Willow, the slight hope being washed from her eyes, her posture slumping slightly in defeat.

"I-I'm s-sorry" she stammered, "I-I didn't know, she was just here with y-you, and the room was wrecked and she wasn't human and I just reacted" the witch babbled. "Hey" Willow said suddenly, interrupting her own babbling, "Wait a minute here, she's not human, I could feel it, that she's not human I mean"

Kennedy quirked an eyebrow, "And?"

"And, but…"

"But I'm a slayer, you're a witch, Oz is a werewolf, Dawn is a mystical key, Anya was a demon and Angel and Spike are vampires…being human doesn't really mean anything any more"

"Witches are human" she replied, fixating on that one part of Kennedy's speech

"Oh please Willow," she said in an exasperated tone, "Witches are as human as a slayer is"

"A Slayer is human!" the witch protested

"Not really" the slayer replied, "And there's no shame in it Willow, being humans not all its cracked up to be. We're not completely human any more, but we still have our souls and our humanity, we feel and we hate and we love"

Willow didn't have anything to say to that. So she just stood there for a time, eventually taking a seat beside Kennedy on the bed.

"I'm still in love with you" Willow whispered, hanging her head in defeat

"Oh baby I know" Kennedy replied, trying to be reassuring as she put her hand over Willow's, "But you and me? We're a thing of the past"

"I know" Willow replied sadly

bA Bar Somewhere outside of Dallas/b

In the spirit of sadness Lenore was drowning her sorrows in a triple shot of scotch in some grungy bar outside of Dallas, the floor boards creaked and were so sticky it felt like she was wearing suction caps when she walked in.

A low set ceiling fan and light dangled ominously and the flickering, swinging lights cast deep shadows through the room.

She could smell excrement, vomit and urine and things that no human body should be without. She could practically taste the demons in the room, demons that were seeking the dregs of society, the desperate and hopeless to feed upon.

And right then, she just couldn't bring herself to care. The scotch was dulling her senses slowly, but in a delightful manner as her ability to think and feel was becoming hazy, her sense of balance rapidly deteriorating and her vision blurring.

Slapping the glass down she waited for a refill, the barman served the customers indiscriminately, no limits of what you could shoot down except for your cash at hand. Lenore could have been a thirteen-year-old kid or a ninety-year-old grandma with liver disease and the barman wouldn't have cared.

"This seat taken?" a sleazy, and very male voice said as he slid onto the stool beside her, she just ignored him. Content in her misery.

"How about I buy the next round," He suggested as he dragged the stool a little closer, she simply continued to ignore him.

Ripping back another throat burningly horrific scotch, hell she wasn't even sure it was scotch, but as long as it kept pushing her deeper into an abyss of blissful unawareness, she didn't care if it was yak piss. She just didn't want to feel anything.

She especially didn't want to feel the hand sliding up her thigh, or smell the rank beer stained breath as the man leaned into her, "If you don't wanna talk, I'm good at a lot of other things", his inflection and his hand conveying what he wanted, especially as his hand began to wander into more tender areas.

"Remove the hand," she slurred, not being able to muster the effort to threaten him if he didn't.

"Look, your obviously upset, but me and little Ricky can fix that for you" she was disgusted as he patted his crotch. Little Ricky. It was pathetic.

Almost as pathetic as the slight prick of a blade piercing the skin at her ribs, "I asked nicely babe, now get moving. Don't even bother calling for help, in a place like this nobody gives a shit".

Without so much as blinking an eye she shunted the blade to the side and ripped into his throat, his flesh parting like water beneath her teeth as his blood rushed to fill her mouth in a glorious high. The alcohol in his blood was so potent it was better then a dozen shots of whatever she had been drinking.

Wrenching her teeth from him his corpse collapsed from the stool and smacked into the ground with a thud that raised a thin layer of dust.

"Don't bother calling for help," she mimicked at his corpse, "in a place like this nobody gives a shit."

And it was true, no one did, no one had batted as much as an eyebrow when he tried to coerce her from the bar, and no one had so much batted an eyebrow when she ripped into this throat and dumped his corpse on the floor.

"If you don't want him, I'll happily take him off your handsss misstresss" A wormy, pale looking brat hissed around his forked tongue, delicately scenting the air she caught the taste of decay, of rot beneath the boys otherwise human façade. A ghoul most likely. A scavenger.

"All yours," she said gesturing expansively

How far she had fallen, and so quickly. In mere months she had broken her eighty-year human free diet multiple times, and now she had killed, without a second thought. The man had been a pig, gross, disgusting, but he hadn't deserved to die. She barely made it outside before she began to vomit his blood back up.

With the bile in the back of her mouth, and the fresh vomit smell lingering on her, she had to admit that perhaps she was not going to be able to go back. That maybe it was already too late to escape the bloodlust; she simply didn't have the strength to abstain, to resist, anymore.

As her body finished its attempts at dry heaving she collapsed back against an outside wall of the bar and tried to breathe the clean air, but all she could smell was blood, and she was numbed sufficiently from her earlier exploits that she couldn't even feel the dirt under her, or the wooden walls behind her.

Despair was setting into her soul and she was ready to give up, it had been mere hours since she walked away from Kennedy, but she believed it didn't matter whether it was hours or years. Kennedy would not be able to forgive her for what she had done, or at least that was what Lenore believed.

Perhaps death was the answer, free from life and pain and despair, and love, oh yes, free from the wickedness of love. It still astounded her at how easily she had fallen in love with the young slayer, it had just felt so right, like coming home.

"Really now, don't you just feel pathetic?"

Lenore's eyes shot up towards the malevolent voice, holy shit…it was the big bad red-eyed shimmery demon and he looked terrifyingly happy, like a child in a candy store.

With one monstrously sized claw he reached out and took her by the throat, lifting her from her half crouched, half collapsed position until she was dangling above the ground. The finest trickles of blood worming their way from her body where his claws dug in.

"Not even a tiny bit of a struggle?" He asked, his voice booming with disappointment. "Such a pity, come now speak up, I have little interest in you. It was the other one who wounded me so."

Suddenly he had her attention, and from the way his lips curled into a grotesque version of a smile he knew she was all ears as well.

"Tell me where she is little one and I will not only release you, but grant you safe passage from this city, if you leave tonight."

In the next moment it was as if an eternity had passed, to live or die, to betray Kennedy or not, to end her own suffering or not? What could she possibly do, on the one hand she already betrayed Kennedy, how was betraying her again really that bad?

Taking a deep breath as he relaxed his group she spoke as quietly and demurely as she could, "Sit on it and rotate asshole."

The beast snarled and smashed her repeatedly into the side of the wall, tossing her about like a rag doll until finally he hurled her a good fifty feet across the rocky ground, as she skidded to a stop she felt the grazes and the blood sluggishly flowing out of her.

In the blink of an eye he crossed the distance, moving like some poorly animated cartoon, though in reality he was just moving too quickly for her eyes to track most of the time. He slashed his claw viciously down the side of her face, ripping through the flesh of her cheek and nose, cutting the soft jelly like tissue of her left eye. She barely gave him the satisfaction of a grunt.

And then he sliced her shirt to ribbons, three precise slices, none of which cut her flesh, but still managed to eviscerate her clothes. "You should have told me where she was," he whispered, as his claws mauled her, groping and slicing through her chest at the same time.

God help her be strong in her last moments of life. Funny how in all her years of being a vampire, even when she religiously fed on humans, she had never stopped believing in the One True God. Never stopped praying to him in her time of need, of course she had never truly believed he would aid her, but still she hoped for strength in her final hours. Let her not betray Kennedy again; let her leave the world with a little dignity.

The beast took a malicious pleasure in looking into her eyes as he spoke, "Your God can't help you now," her eyes reflected the shock as she suddenly felt the pressure within her mind, the invasion of the creature as he read her most intimate thoughts.

She wanted to fight that psychic invasion but what he did next destroyed her ability to do so, in the true fashion of a devil his body changed. The monstrosity that was his penis split like the head of a hydra, three tentacle like penises emerged from the one, a slick oily residue sliding over them as they elongated and widened. A delicate slice of his claw removed the slight obstacle of her jeans and she cried out as the thing rammed its way inside of her.

But as she gasped in pain, the second of them snaked its way into her mouth, forcing its way down her throat so that she gagged over it. The third pushing its way through her anus, all three of them stretching and expanding to fill her. To press inside and stretch her until she broke into tears at the pain and violation.

The beasts three tentacles lifted her bodily from the ground without any aid, and she dangled, thrashing in mid air as they continued to worm around inside of her. The bestial creature crying out in pleasure and amusement as she tried to scream.

"Keep fighting, it only makes it better," he snarled in excitement, and then she was under the assault of his mind. Not just as he ripped his way into her thoughts, searching and discarding, but she could see what he was and what he had done as well.

The psychic invasion was a double-edged blade; she just didn't know how to use it to her advantage as random memories from the creature found her.

She saw that she was the 31st woman he had done this to in the last century, that he came out to feed and sow chaos every 20 or so years, spending the rest of its time in the bowels of hell. She saw that those who survived his horrific attentions were never the same again, forever altered, and the truly unfortunate ones became impregnated with his demonic spawn. Spawn that would in time eat its way through the mother.

And she saw something more terrifying then any of that, she saw what it planned to do to Kennedy when it found her. In its mind she was a powerful being, worthy of its attentions. And what it wanted to do to her made what it was doing to Lenore look like a cakewalk.

With great disgust she felt a rush of something pouring into her from the creature, and then it was done, casually discarding her he flipped her another dozen feet. And there she lay, violated, broken and despairing in the knowledge that it had ransacked her mind and now knew exactly where to find Kennedy.

As she tried to move Lenore cramped horribly, curling into the foetal position as she let out a primal, unearthly agonised scream. She could feel something moving with in her, thrashing and growing. Every part of her was hurt or broken, but compared to what was thrusting through her the rest of her body wasn't even a blip on the radar.

It was growing so fast it was wrenching through her, biting into her organs, trying to rip its way free. She screamed again as the little monster bit its way out, its grotesque little head sticking out of her abdomen as it began to eat up her stomach, crawling its way out and closer to Lenore's face.

The vampire thought she had truly had it, that she was done, finished, when a figure flashed across her view, small and bratty looking the young man swept the monster into its hand and with a pair of razor sharp and somewhat serrated teeth bit the creatures head clean off.

"One good turn dessservess another" the young ghoul hissed, its forked tongue flicking out into the air as it cradled the now deceased baby monster. Lenore just looked at him, the simple pleasure he had just derived astonished her as he beamed a smile down at her. She began to laugh, as darkness enclosed her vision she just continued to laugh.