Chapter Two – "A Great Big Bloody Mess"
"Dammit!" Dare hissed as his leg became ensnared by a barbed wire fence. "Goddammit!" He had been running along at a perfectly good clip in the cool California moonlight when he forgot where he was – there was really no other excuse – and caught himself on the low barbed wire he had seen there so many times. Dare crashed to the ground, sliding every so slightly on the wet grass, the silver moon above mocking him for his foolishness.
Normally, in an intense foot race for survival, one didn't have time to reflect, so it puzzled and concerned Dare that he was doing just that. Perhaps this was that whole life flashing before your eyes thing he had heard people talk about. Idly, he wondered if his own victim's lives flashed before their eyes and that bothered him even more.
No doubt about it… he was about to die.
Quickly he banished that horrible thought of mortality from his mind and untangled the rusty length of razor sharp iron from around his calve and knee. The cuts went deep… very deep. He could feel the wire bite into his bone as he tore it loose. Severing a muscle was definitely going to slow him down to nothing unless he learned to walk on his hands.
Dare got to his feet and, hopping on his good leg, leaped over the short mossy stone wall that had guarded the cemetery for over one hundred years.
He remembered the one who sired him talk about the day they put it up, musing, "Now what good is that going to do? Do they honestly think we can't get over the wall or at least find a gate?"
Not that the residents of Sunnydale were that observant. A giant snake could rampage through the High School and the next morning, the only thing that would be on the citizens minds would be when the next trash pick up would be.
Actually, didn't a giant snake already rampage through the school already? The weirdness was getting somewhat confusing.
Dare quieted his breathing as he sank behind a large tombstone and then he stopped it all together to avoid making any noise at all. With no breathing and the eternal stillness of his already dead heart, it was the very quiet that had so shocked him when he was first turned and resulted in one of the most restful nights of his life. The nightmares he had since then were interesting, but he was learning to forget them.
Well, all but one. All but the slayer.
The funny thing about it was that he had spent an entire brain-killing semester of algebra sitting next to her. She was cute and everything, but never in a million years did he even consider that she was a one-woman evil destroyer. When he was informed of this shortly after his transformation into a child of the night, he laughed so hard that he literally peed himself.
Not from the laughing, but because of his bladder involuntarily emptying on account of his being dead. His sire told him not to think about it… that it happened to the best of them after they were turned. Dare couldn't imagine someone like Dracula pissing all over himself and had his doubts that it really happened. Perhaps the old man was just trying to make him feel a little better? Who knows… it was just something he didn't like to think about except for the fact that he thought he might pee himself again on this frantic night.
He could hear the footfalls coming and then the sound of two feet landing gracefully on the graveyard side of the increasingly ineffective stone wall. There was a small step and then another and then another; he could picture those skinny chicken legs that the other football players always laughed about behind her back gently creeping through the low-lying fog, he delicate little feet becoming wet with dew and stained with the freshly cut grass. A wooden stake in one hand and a compact mirror in the other, checking her face as she went.
Dare was no fool, though, and knew that the slayer was anything but small and frail, beneath that smallish figure lurked the heart of a warrior – a barely contained beast who would kill him without a second thought or one iota of mercy. It's what she did… she was a vampire slayer. She was THE vampire slayer.
And he, being a vampire himself, wasn't a fan.
Despite the fact that he was a large brutish man, - a former member of the football, rugby, and soccer teams - Dare knew that he couldn't overpower her, but he also knew that she was fond of keeping several pet vampires around. He was fairly handsome as his looks had gotten him quite a bit of post-game entertainment and, since becoming a vampire, more than an occasional meal from an unwitting person of the opposite sex. Perhaps he could charm his way out of this.
After all, his leg was almost severed… there was no where to run.
So he stood and plastered on the most debonair smile he could, making sure he wasn't showing his true vampire face. "All right, Buffy," he said, playfully raising his hands and looking as sheepish as possible, "I surrender!"
The smile disappeared from his face when he realized it wasn't the slayer at all. It was a man… a large black man with sunglasses and a very large sword. What in the world was someone wearing sunglasses at this time of night?
The man in shades drew his weapon and took a defensive position that was both beautiful and dangerous, his dark muscles flexed in this moonlight as he flexed his arms. His face never betrayed a single emotion.
"You're not Buffy!" Dare the vampire said, his shoulders slumping.
The mystery man thrust upwards with his sword in a move almost too fast to see and, before Dare knew what had happened he felt a sharp pain in his neck; almost like a paper cut.
"You must be psychic," he heard the black man say.
Dare started to say something, but never got a chance because that was when his head fell off.
His body stood for a moment, a daft headless thing with a blood geyser for a neck. One hand actually felt where his head used to be as if it was shocked it wasn't there anymore, before it fell over and burst into dust filling the air with the scent of ash, earth, and a faint aroma of brimstone.
Blade returned his sword to his holster and smiled a wicked toothy grin.
"My kind of town," he said.
--
"Buffy, would you be so kind as to tell me just what the hell is going through your brain?"
Buffy blinked through heavy eyes at Giles who had not only met her at the door of the library, but practically leaped over a table to greet her with a stern reprimand for something she had done. Problem was, she wasn't sure what it was she had done so the best thing she was able to come up with for a reply was, "Huh?"
He showed her a yellowed sheet of paper with writing – some demon writing, she wasn't sure – written in… She looked. Yep, written in blood.
"Don't demons have pens?" she yawned, "Just regular ink pens? What does it say?"
"Oh, well let's see," Giles dramatically adjusted his glasses and took a deep breath. "Dear Buffy, thank you so much for killing the heads of the Toraga Clan last night. They had ever so much fun getting disemboweled and do so love the gapping holes you put in their chests. Oh, by the by, we're going to kill you now. No hard feelings." He tossed the paper on the circulation desk.
"Huh?" was, yet again, all Buffy could muster.
"The Toraga Clan," Giles said stabbing the paper with his finger.
"This will be the third 'huh?'."
"This is serious, Buffy. I cannot believe that you slew an entire clan without at least telling me what you were doing. Do you have any idea of how much trouble this could stir up in the underworld?"
Buffy was staring at him with a partially open mouth.
"You- You have absolutely no idea what I'm talking about, do you?" he finally said, looking a little sheepish.
"Don't they have the word 'huh?' in England?" Buffy replied.
Giles made a quick nod of apology and fumbled with his glasses. He smiled nervously, "I should have realized that you wouldn't have been so foolish or mindless. After all-"
"Giles," Buffy said.
"Y-Yes?"
"I had a late night," she continued, "Would you mind filling me in? Cliff notes, please, I had to skip Starbucks on the way here."
"Running late? So you were out last night?"
"Not slaying Tovarlala demons," Buffy said wearily making her way to a chair, "Some slimy little monsters. It was weird… they multiplied when they got wet. Hundreds of them after that rain shower last night."
"Never heard of that before," Giles replied searching his mental rolodex, "Did you…" He made a stabbing motion with is hand.
Buffy wrinkled her nose and shook her head, "Once the sun came up they kind of… melted. Incidentally, Giles… stop doing that. There are children present."
Giles immediately stopped making the stabbing motion. "Let me get you some coffee," he pulled a chair from the table for her to sit, obviously taking great pains to be courteous since he had started the day biting her head off for something she didn't do.
Xander and Willow walked in laughing about something as Giles slipped behind the desk to the percolating pot of java. Oz and Cordellia walked in a few steps behind them; Oz in his usual aura of unceasing calm and tranquility as if even the greatest hurricane couldn't phase him and Cordellia already rolling her eyes at something that had deeply offended her delicate sensibilities.
They gathered around the table, "We miss it?" Xander asked as Giles returned with a hot cup of coffee for his precious slayer.
"Missed what?" replied Giles handing the cup to Buffy.
"Oh, just the usual gloom and doom of how the world is going to end this morning," Willow said as she exchanged a look with Oz. Oz, for his part, smiled. Willow seemed to be the only one to get him to do that particularly since his curse.
"It's how I love to start my day," Xander continued. "Bowl of Cheerios, glass of OJ, and oh yeah… this is how we're all going to die this week."
"We're just getting to that," Buffy said taking a drink of the bitter treasure.
"Neat," Xander said turning a chair around so he could use the back as a hand-rest. "Hit us with it, Big Poppa!"
Giles flustered a little wondering if Xander had just insulted him, but continued anyway. "The Toraga Clan of demons was wiped out last night."
Xander threw his hands in the air, "Go Buffy! C'mon, fist bump me!"
"And what would be a bad thing," Giles chided him.
"Since when is a fist bump a bad thing? What are you, un-American?"
"No, the deaths of the The Toraga Clan!" Giles was starting to loose his cool again.
"Am I missing something here," Cordellia said with a sigh checking her makeup in a mirror, "when was a dead demon a bad thing unless it, like, blows up or something and showers you with goo?"
"Like you getting showered with goo would be that unusual," Xander mumbled beneath his breath. Willow slapped him on the arm for his remark, unsure why she was even making the effort defending Cordellia's honor.
"It's a bad thing when they are the masters of an underworld kingdom and benevolent masters at worst," Giles informed them. "They were practically clergy!"
"Buffy killed clergy!?" Willow squeaked.
"I didn't kill clergy. I didn't even kill demons last night… it was some army of tiny horny monsters" Buffy said scratching her chin and wondering idly if all of the guts from the exploding creatures had come off during her abbreviated shower this morning.
"Wait, what? I'm confused," Xander said.
"Oo," Cordeilla said, "Stop the presses! Xander's confused!"
"Remind me again why we invited her," Xander said pointing idly at Cordie who rolled her eyes for what must have been the eighth time.
"My point is, the Toraga Clan was the lynchpin in a very complicated underground empire that made peace with the human race over a thousand years ago and with them gone, there's nothing to keep their subjects from crawling out of every hole in the Hellmouth to take their revenge on every human being they see," Giles said, happy to finally explain everything and dreading having to explain it again when someone else didn't get it.
"See?" Cordellia said motioning to Giles who stood there panting in frustration. "Nothing confusing about that."
"What can we do?" Buffy said, taking an interest in what Giles was saying, "Who do I have to kill?"
"Killing may not be the best option."
Buffy whined, "But it's what I'm best at!"
"Diplomacy," Giles said with a raised finger, "is the easiest way to allay fears. If we let them know that it wasn't the slayer…," he stopped. "We need an intermediary."
"Why don't we send Spike?" Willow said bubbly.
Everyone looked at her. Willow seemed to shrink a little.
"Spike?" Xander parroted. "Are you insane?"
"What? Who said Spike?" Willow stammered.
"You did," Cordellia said. "Just now."
Willow plastered on an awkward smile, "Oh, oops… Sorry. I meant to say Angel. I could have sworn I said Angel. Sorry. Was that racist? I don't mean that all vampires look alike."
"Down Willow," Buffy said with a smile. "I'll go talk to Angel. I've got TA duty during this period, thank God. Hopefully, we can get this whole Tornado demon clan thing sorted out before lunch."
"It won't be sorted out," Giles cautioned, "until the real killers are found. Until then, we're sitting on a powder keg."
"This is bad."
Everyone turned their heads and looked at Oz who was sitting in a near meditative state at the other table, away from others were he could wallow in his serenity as his body wallowed in his sheepskin jacket. For Oz to comment on anything was rare and for him to say that a situation was bad meant that it had to be practically catastrophic.
"I'm sure it's nothing the Scoobies can't handle," Xander said with a shrug.
"What? No, I'm not talking about that thing you were talking about," Oz said. "It's something else."
"What?" Willow asked.
"I think I smell another werewolf in the school."
--
"This is awesome," Murton Dingle said as he and his friend, Tommy Dawkins, walked down the corridors of Sunnydale High School. "Do you have any idea of where we are?"
Murton was excited and, as so, he was making exaggerated hand movements, his black overspiked hair wobbling on top of his head as if it was getting ready to shake off.
"I think I got the general idea when you kept talking about it in the car ride over here," Tommy replied with growing annoyance. The two of them were on a roadtrip to San Diego, but Murton insisted on making a stop much to Tommy's chagrin for all he wanted was a normal roadtrip with his semi-normal friend without any werewolf business or weirdness intruding on his life as it had so many times.
"Sunnydale, California," Murton continued, "Home of-"
"A paranormal hotspot known as a Hellmouth," Tommy finished, brushing his fingers through his brown curly hair. "Why do I let you talk me into these kinds of things?"
"My charm and tenacity?"
"I will give you tenacious," Tommy responded. "What are we doing in a high school? When I graduated, I thought I'd never have to look at the inside of one of these buildings again."
"This Hellmouth has many openings into our world. Back home in Pleasantville, Philadelphia… and the great granddaddy of them all, most famously, is located in the library of this very building," Murton said apparently feeling very proud of himself.
"And I suppose that's why you want to stop at Disneyland too."
Murton went quiet. Tommy glared at him.
"No way," Tommy said.
"It's under It's a Small World,"
"No way," Tommy said again.
"How else do you explain The Black Cauldron?" Murton told him, "There was evil in that movie, Tommy! Dark evil!"
"Hellmouths," Tommy said shaking his head still not buying it. The Disneyland Hellmouth didn't help matters, either. "Murton, how do you find out about this crazy stuff?"
"I have my sources."
Tommy rubbed this bridge of his nose, "You got it off the internet, didn't you?"
"AND second hand information!"
"I'll be out in the car."
Tommy turned around, but Murton grabbed him by the arm. "C'mon, Tommy! I need you!"
"You just think you'll need me to save your butt just like I had to do in Roswell!"
Murton shrugged, "How I was I supposed to know that was a real alien!?"
"He had three heads!"
The school bell rang and Murton and Tommy watched as throngs of students emptied out of classrooms and into the hall. Being teenagers and having little or no regard for manners, they bumped into the two visitors quite regularly.
It was moments like this that Tommy secretly treasured for even though he longed to be normal, watching people pass him unaware of his amazing secret life made him feel more special than anything in the world. He cracked a half grin, watching the students breeze and push by and shook his head, "They all look young, don't they? Seems like only yesterday it was you and me and Lori and Stacy doing just what they're doing now."
Murton nodded his head and then sarcastically added, "Fighting evil, demons, aliens, vampires… Yeah, they're totally into that here. Why, I'd wager that blonde over there probably has wooden stakes in her purse."
Tommy rolled his eyes and shook his head. "You don't have to be sarcastic," he said.
--
Tommy and Murton entered the library and looked around. Murton squealed with delight as he skipped to the center of the empty room. "Circular design! I knew it!"
Tommy shook his head. "Huh?"
"Circular design!" Murton said again, "This room wasn't just accidentally built over the Hellmouth, it's a cork on the wine bottle of evil! "It was put here for a freakin' purpose!"
"Yeah, to hold books," Tommy said looking at a stack of books on the circulation table. His hand brushed over one… a book about mythical creatures that had an ancient etching of a werewolf on the cover. Tommy bristled at the picture of a sharp-toothed beast with blood dripping out of its mouth. His eyes drifted to another book that bore the title Vampyre and a piece of yellowed paper with red ink… No… The smell. That's…
"Blood," he whispered.
Murton, in the meantime, was inspecting the library and had just emerged from the stacks. "They've got some weird books in here," Murton said thumbing back to the bookshelves. "And from me, that's a compliment. Old books… like, hundreds of years old. They're priceless!"
"Look at this," Tommy said, calling his friend to him. When Murton arrived, Tommy indicated the books he had found and handed him the note written in blood.
"Someone's an avid fan of the paranormal," Murton said, "or they're just used to this kind of thing. There was a rumor in that supernaturals would be attracted to a Hellmouth, but it was in a post by a noob with no post count so I didn't think it was that accurate."
"It feels…," Tommy searched for the word, "comfortable here. Like I'm not so abnormal after all. It feels like… home."
Murton stared at Tommy, a little creeped out by his friend's apparent confirmation of the rumors when the office door slammed open causing the two of them to jump in fright. Giles entered with a stack of books balanced in his arms. "I'll be with you in a minute," he stammered as he sat the books on the desk. Murton quickly stuffed the blood note in his back pocket.
"Bloody Harry Potter gets thicker every book," Giles muttered. He looked up at Tommy and Murton, "Can I help you lads?"
"You're the librarian?" Murton asked, slightly raising an eyebrow.
"I am."
"Good, I was wondering what you could tell us about…," he scratched his chin in an exaggerated way as he was prone to do when he was trying to be suave. "…odd occurrences in or around this area."
"My dear boy," Giles said, "This is a High School. It is little more than an exceedingly elongated succession of anomalous occurrences instigated by hormones and supplementary teenage inanity."
"That has to be the most complicated sentence I've ever heard in my life," Murton said in awe.
Tommy sighed, "We're here because of the Hellmouth."
Giles stood like a statue, glaring at the two boys.
"See? Are you happy?" Tommy said, "Now I look like an idiot and this poor guy probably thinks we're going to shank him or something."
Giles stammered, "I-I'm sorry, what?"
"Shank," Tommy said, "You know… stab." He made the motion with his hand for added effect, but then realized that was probably not the best idea. "Not-Not that we are going to do that, sir. We just came in to see the library and its circular design and now we've seen it and we're going to go." Tommy took Murton by the hand and practically started to drag him to the door.
Giles nervously smiled. "Y-You're from out of town?" he said, stopping the two from retreating any farther.
"Pleasantville," Murton said, his ego balloon already burst.
Giles nodded, "You know…" he said trying to buy time for Buffy or one of her friends to come in the door, "I've heard of Pleasantville. Interesting… stories about that place. I read about them online. Some chap named Dark Wolf Keeper posts some interesting works of fiction in a paranormal blog one of my students keeps track of."
"That's me!" Murton squeaked.
Tommy looked at him. "Dark Wolf Keeper?" he said with such disgust and anger that his eyes actually turned yellow and a low growl erupted from his throat. Quickly, however, Tommy got his wolfly manifestations under control and cleared his throat with an exaggerated cough. "Sorry," he said, "sore throat."
"Oh, you're him?" Giles said pointing at Murton. "Obviously, I'm somewhat of a supernatural buff, so to speak," he said waving a hand over the collection of books on the circulation desk. He noticed a Harry Potter book and swiped it into the floor.
"I am he," Murton said, his pride making a miraculous recovery, "I am the Dark Wolf Keeper."
Tommy kicked the back of Murton's leg, causing him to stumble. "Oh, sorry Dork Wolf Keeper!" he said, taking little effort to hide his irritation.
"How fascinating!" Giles said, rubbing his hands together, "I would be so interested in hearing about some of these occurrences first hand."
"Oh!" Murton jumped at the chance, "I'd love to. And, if you have any, I'd love to hear about the supernatural happenings of Sunnydale!"
Giles motioned to the chairs in the center of the room. "I would be delighted."
As Murton began to regale him with tales of the unbelievable, Giles was careful not to let his two guests see him checking his watch since, one, it would be rude and, two, he wasn't sure if these two strange visitors who knew about the Hellmouth would have him killed if they knew that he was slowly biding his time (and wasting theirs) waiting for the return of his prized pupil… or at least Xander who could listen to these asinine stories of living statues and Sorority house covens in his stead.
--
Angel leaped into the air, barely dodging a bullet that passed so close to him that he could feel the heat of the projectile across his face. He jabbed a leg up against the wall and launched himself into a dive, striking his attacker with two clenched fists. The gun slid across the floor and under a couch.
The black man in sunglasses flew backwards into a wall, cracking the stone behind him in a move that would have shattered the spine of a normal human. Angel's attacker simply pulled himself free of the man-shaped impression in what used to be fine marble and cracked his neck by turning it slightly.
"Who are you?" Angel demanded. It was only a few moments ago that Angel was enjoying a quiet morning in his home reading a book when this maniac crashed through the window and started to fight him for no sane reason.
The black man snarled, "You know who I am."
"Pretty sure I don't," Angel replied. He took a decorative sword from the wall and took a defensive posture. "How about we talk about this, huh?"
Blade took his sword from his holster and sliced the air a couple of times, making a metallic whipping sound. Angel could tell that the blade of the weapon was extraordinarily sharp to make that type of a sound.
"All I want to know is where the eggs are," Blade shouted at him.
"What eggs?"
"Your little patsy told me all about you 'fore I dusted him," Blade said. "Now, are you gonna start talking or am I gonna have to start cutting?"
"I'm fairly certain I don't have a patsy," Angel said.
Blade leaped at Angel who deflected the sword with a tight turn. Unfortunately, Blade's sword lopped Angel's in two, causing the severed blade to clatter on the stone floor. Angel looked up at Blade who smiled.
"Nice sword," Angel said.
"Take a closer look."
Blade came at him again, but Angel was ready this time. Recognizing that his foe was overly dependent on his weapon, Angel contorted his body around the metal and delivered a jaw-crushing elbow punch to the left side of Blade's face. He grabbed Blade's arm and brought his knee up into Blade's elbows.
Blade merely grunted as that was apparently the extent to which he was willing to show pain, but the shock to his limbs was sufficient to cause him to release his weapon which clattered to the ground.
Angel allowed himself a small inner victory, but it was to come with a price as Blade swung his leg around Angel's and the two of them thudded to the ground. Landing on his back and with Blade crushing his front, the air burst from Angel's chest and he saw stars. Blade smashed his forehead against Angel's, sending him into a stupor.
Thankfully, though, Angel had the presence of mind to push Blade off of him with his legs. Blade fell onto his back as Angel scrambled to his feet, still seeing flashes of light in his eyes and so dizzy he thought he would fall to his knees. It was only through sheer will he was able to stand at all.
Through the haze, Angel realized that Blade had retrieved his sword and was coming at him again. There was no other choice. Angel twisted his body again and clenched his teeth in pain as Blade's sword plunged into his chest. He could feel the blade slice into his lung and bite into a rib. Blade must have realized that his blow missed his opponent's heart because he tried to shove upwards and cut Angel like a roast.
Angel, drawn out of shock by the influx of tremendous pain, socked Blade in the nose causing a small geyser of blood to splatter in all directions. Angel couldn't help but smile that he had finally, at least, broken those damn sunglasses as well.
Not that he used it much, but Angel could feel his left lung filling with fluid. He grabbed the sword by the hilt and painfully pulled it from his chest. Angel realized that the handle contained some sort of mechanism and let go just as a deadly series of blades erupted from it, something that would have cost him a hand had he not noticed it.
Blade, in the meantime, was growling in fury holding his face. His nose had been shattered almost as much as his pride. "You broke by goddamn shades!" he yelled.
Angel indicated the sword still poking out of him, "You stabbed me!"
"You got a point."
"I got a point all right," Angel muttered. "Listen, you want to at least tell me who you are before we kill each other? I mean, this is awfully pointless; no pun intended."
Blade regarded him.
"You're a vampire, but you're out in the sun," Angel said. "You wanna tell me what's up with that?"
"Daywalker," Blade said.
Angel blinked, "I thought you guys were mythical."
"I ain't no myth," he answered.
"Obviously," Angel said as he pulled the sword completely out of his chest. "Myths don't hurt this bad."
Blade narrowed his eyes and peered at Angel. "I'll be goddamned," he said with no small measure of facination. "You've got a soul, don't you?"
"You couldn't notice that before turning me into a pincushion?"
"That sonuvabitch told me you were in on the…" He stopped and then Blade smiled in recognition, "Angel…"
Angel looked at him, "You know my name?"
"I had a friend a while back," he said, "Vampire hunter by the name of Whistler. Mentioned your name a couple of times. Apparently, he was keeping tabs on you. Thought you were in New York."
"I haven't been in New York for a couple of decades," Angel replied, letting himself to sink into a chair and hoping that he wouldn't bleed on the leather too much. "I heard the Daywalker was supposed to be a good guy."
Blade picked up his sword and holstered it, taking note of the fact that Angel allowed him to have a very devastating advantage should he choose to attack. This guy was either a good judge of character or very stupid. "I was following a lead," Blade told him.
"This lead have a name?"
"Some suckhead named Frank had dealings with the people I'm after," he said, "said you were the head honcho vampire of the area and that you was in on it."
"Frank told you I was a head honcho vampire?" Angel blinked, "What a jackass. What, did he tell you this after you promised to let him go?"
Blade pressed his lips together, "Yeah, but if it makes you feel any better, I didn't keep my promise."
"It does, actually."
"Sorry about…," he pointed at the hole in Angel's chest.
"What? This?" Angel waved him off, "barely feel it."
"Name's Blade," the daywalker told him, "I'm passing through looking for a cult."
"Got plenty of those here," Angel said. "What kind of a cult is it?"
"They worship someone called The Master," Blade answered.
Angel sat back. Even in death, The Master still seemed to inspire nothing but evil. Blade apparently saw it in Angel's face. "I see you heard of him."
"Sunnydale was his last home base," Angel told him. "We killed him here."
"That's the problem," Blade said.
Before Angel could ask what he meant, Blade was almost out the door.
"Blade," Angel called to him.
Blade stopped at the door, but didn't turn around.
"If this involves The Master, you're going to need help," Angel said.
Blade crossed his arms and didn't say anything.
Angel sighed, "All right, so your not much into getting help… I'm fine with that, but there are a few rules you have to follow while you're in Sunnydale because there is a higher authority here you may have to answer to."
"Oh my God, Angel!" Buffy's shrill voice echoed through the room. She ran to Angel and grabbed him for dear life.
"And that's her," Angel said tilting his head towards Buffy.
"Angel, who did this to you?" Buffy asked.
Blade raised his hand, apparently amused by the arrival of the 'higher authority' in the form of a teenage girl. "My bad," he smiled.
Buffy had made sure that Angel was okay and turned to face his attacker, "So help me, God, if you hurt him again…"
Blade bent down so he could look her in the eye and smiled, "You'll do what, baby?"
Angel could have warned Blade what was going to happen next, but he chose to delay that warning by a half a second allowing Buffy to ram the base of her palm into his already broken nose and swing her foot around catching him in the gut and propelling him into a butt-skid and a bone-jarring crash against a wall.
"I'll do that," Buffy snarled.
"Buffy," Angel said hobbling between the two, "This is Blade and… he's a good guy."
Buffy bit her bottom lip as Blade picked himself up. "Sorry," she said, waving to him ever so slightly. She looked at Angel, "You could have said something."
"Buffy," Angel replied, "He stabbed me with a sword."
--
It was the end of the school day and the final bell had just tolled on campus. Giles was resting his head on his hand and, despite trying not to look extraordinarily bored, he wasn't succeeding very well. In fact, the boy with the brown hair, Tommy, had already told Murton several times, "Murton, you're boring the guy. Let's just go." To which Giles would laugh and say, "Nonsense! This is fascinating!"
Murton was recounting a story about some kind of a ghost or demon who lived in old educational movies when the doors to the library opened and Cordellia entered. Despite the fact that it was potential help, Giles cringed on the inside. "Cordellia!"
"I'm just here looking for the back of my earring I dropped this morning," she said giving Giles the hand, the universal teenage symbol not to talk to her. Giles was rather taken aback that she would give him, an adult, the hand but chose not to deal with it.
"Cordellia," he said, "I was wondering if you knew were Buffy was."
"I would have to care first," she sighed.
"That's a shame," Giles said, his voice getting harder, "because these two boys here have the most fascinating supernatural stories that I'm sure she would have to hear." Giles nodded at her as if to ask her if she understood.
Being Cordellia, of course she didn't. Instead, she found herself drawn to Tommy who looked almost as bored as Giles did. "Hello salty goodness," she said walking past Giles and up to him. "Hi," she extended her hand, "Cordellia Chase."
"Tommy Dawkins," he replied taking her hand and shaking it. Dear God, he was dreamy.
Murton waved, "I'm Murton!"
"Don't care!" Cordellia said, still smiling at what she assumed was her future ex-boyfriend.
"Cordellia, will you please be a dear and please find Buffy and tell her that a need her?" Giles said again.
"God, Giles," Cordie said throwing her hands in the air, "if you need any help with these two, you could ask me first!"
Giles buried his face in one hand.
"I mean, seriously, why does it always have to Buffy? Buffy this and Buffy that! You know what? Buffy may be A-1 head honcho super-chick around here, but Cordellia Chase can deal with anything that you can throw at me!" Cordellia took a deep breath and, her eyes going wide, she wrinkled her nose in disgust. "Did one of you guys fart?"
Suddenly, she found herself yanked backwards by an invisible hand. A very large knife appeared out of nowhere and pressed itself against her throat. She tried to scream, but a hand covered in scales and smelling of excrement covered her face and cut that cry for help off. The smell was so horrid that she thought she was throw up.
Tommy and Murton ran to her, but Giles stopped them. "No!" he screamed. "It's a Toraga!"
"A Toyota?" Tommy said tilting his head.
Murton was beside himself in excitement, "A Toraga! A chameleon-like demon known for living in the underworld and emitting the smell of feces!"
Tommy was shocked, "How did you…?"
"," Murton replied, "those internet sources you were so pithy about earlier."
Cordellia was turning several shades of green. Her attacker was still invisible, save for his arms. She moaned and heaved as though she were about to vomit from the smell.
The pitiful moan was all it took for that look to cross Tommy's face; that look that said that he was through playing on the sidelines. His eyes furrowed and a deep growl escaped from his throat. He flashed his teeth which elongated and grew sharp. Murton was always awed by Tommy's protective streak more than anything. His friend might be a werewolf with all of the great power that came with it, but at the end of the day all Tommy cared about was his fellow human beings and that made him the greatest hero of them all.
Giles didn't even notice the change at first and only turned when Tommy roared, his transformation complete. It wasn't the drastic transformation that afflicted poor Oz, but rather a werewolf compliment to the human form. Tommy still remained upright, but sported wolf ears, fur, and yellow eyes – eyes that looked like they belonged to a demon but still managed to communicate his heart and humanity. On each furry hand, black claws were poised and ready to attack.
"So," a disembodied voice said. It was deep and didn't come from the being that held Cordellia. "You are well protected, Watcher." Obviously, there were more Toragas in the library, keeping hidden in their camouflage and blending perfectly into the background.
Murton's eyes went wide and be mouthed the word, looking across at Giles. Obviously, the term used to describe the librarian meant something to him.
"Just let her go," Tommy said, flashing his teeth. Giles noted that Tommy still held his intelligence, another advantage over Oz.
"Please," Giles said, "there's no reason for this."
A female voice joined in the conversation, "Your slayer murdered the heads of our clan."
"It wasn't her!" Giles protested.
"No one else has that kind of power. It could be no other," a new voice boomed. How many of them were here?
"You have my word as a man and a watcher," Giles cried, "Buffy was not involved."
Something socked Tommy in his back and he lost his balance, taking a few awkward steps foreword.
"And what of this one?" the female hissed.
Tommy growled, "Lady, I just got here and have no idea what's going on."
"Know this, Watcher," the baritone rumbled, "the Toraga will have our pound of flesh."
Whack! There was a meaty slapping sound from the back of the library as Buffy entered in her usual dramatic fashion. She had leaped in from the back door, somersaulted over the upper level, and smashed her heels into the head of one of the invisible Toranga's. As it fell unconscious, it dropped its camouflage and thudded to the floor, a red and black striped reptilian with protruding incisors and frills around its neck.
"Why settle for a pound when you can have a hundred and ten?" Buffy asked.
"A hundred and twenty is more like it," Cordellia said struggling, her mouth working loose from the grip of her captor just long enough to deliver a cutting comment. "Now will someone please get this nasty thing off of me before I hurl?"
No sooner had Cordellia made her request; Tommy leaped the distance between himself and the demon holding her hostage and landed a clawed fist right where he assumed the monster's head was. He was correct and he felt the creature's jaw snap at the impact.
With his other hand, Tommy grabbed the demon hand with the knife and pulled it away from Cordellia's neck, freeing her and allowing her to fall out of the way as Tommy twisted the demon's arm around, sending him into a backwards flip. The impact against the floor broke the demon's concentration and rendered him visible.
No sooner had this happened, Tommy was again struck from behind by one of the demon's friends. He flew off of the demon he had just defeated and slid across the polished floor, ramming up against a steel cage that was against one of the walls. He tried to stand, but was hit yet again and thrown into the cage. An invisible hand locked it before he could recover and sealed him away from the fight.
Murton had taken the opportunity to pull Cordellia under the table where the two cowered together,
Buffy, in the meantime, was fighting two… possibly three of the invisible Toragas at once. She had managed to get a bead on the first creature after listening in for a few minutes, but now it was a completely different situation and she didn't have the first clue where they were or when they might strike next.
She finally managed to hit one in what she assumed was its shoulder to pay it back for the dozens of hits she had already received. Two of the Toragas were down – one by her and one by the new guy, whoever he was – but there could be three, four, maybe even five left in the library.
Giles stood on top of the table with his hands raised, "Please," he said, "there's been an awful mistake! Can we just talk about this!?"
A heavy blow rocked Buffy off of her feet. She scrambled backwards finally realizing that she had gotten in over her head. "You are lost, Slayer, ten of you could not defeat us."
Buffy grinned a wicked grin, "Well… Where am I ever going to find ten of me?"
The double doors of the library burst open. Angel and Blade marched in, both wielding swords. They held them up on their shoulders, ready to join the fray.
"Toragas," Angel said, "stand down and let's talk about this."
"The time for talk has ended," he was told by the female.
"Murton!" Tommy yelled out banging on the cage door.
Tommy's friend nodded and started to scramble over, but something knocked him backwards. A child's voice rang out, "Stay down, little human."
"Great, the whole family's here," Murton grumbled.
"One last chance," Angel warned. "Stand down."
"Blood for blood!" the baritone declared.
"Don't say we didn't warn you," Angel said. He looked at Blade. Blade nodded and the two of them put on a pair of goggles. Once switched on, it gave the two warriors military grade infrared vision and revealed seven demons in brilliant and colorful hues.
"Blade," Angel said, "you are officially my new best friend."
"You're just lucky we got Toragas where I come from," Blade replied.
The two of them charged the demons in front of them who, stripped of their camouflage, instantly lost all of their bravery and started to run. It was almost comical the way that they threw their hands in the air and ran as though they were overgrown cartoon characters.
Buffy blocked their retreat. Now she was armed with goggles and the nastiest mace that she could find on such short notice. "Oh, wait. I thought you wanted to talk to me."
The demons stopped and sank to their knees in submission. "Make our deaths quick, slayer, as you did our brethren," the female wailed. It was such a pitiful wail that Buffy felt pressure behind her eyes as they teared up.
Buffy brought up the mace but then let it drop to the floor with a clang. She walked over to the largest, the one she assumed was the leader, and offered him a hand. "I didn't kill your brethren and I don't want to kill you," she said, "and I won't."
The demon took her hand and rose to its feet. Slowly, it and the rest of its kind dropped its camouflage revealing themselves to the naked eye. Buffy, Angel, and Blade removed there goggles.
Giles rushed over, his face flushed and wet with perspiration. "All right, good. Good," he said. "Now, shall we speak?"
"First thing's first," Buffy said pointing in Tommy's direction, "who's that in Oz's cage?"
"I'm Tommy," he said, grinning a gigantic fanged grin and waving.
"He's nobody," Giles sighed with a wave.
Tommy swelled at the insult. "You're nobody!" he said.
Murton helped Cordellia out from under the table. Cordie fanned the air and coughed, "Can we open a window or something?"
Willow, Xander, and Oz ran inside. They practically fell over each other when they saw the Toragas and the visitors in their library. "Whoa," Xander exclaimed.
"We heard the fight!." Willow looked at the demons, Blade, and everyone with worried eyes. "Should we be running?"
"No, Will," Buffy reassured her, "I think everything's okay now."
"Why is there another werewolf in my cage?" Oz asked, sounding a little offended as though he were afraid of being replaced.
Tommy crossed his arms, "Don't mind me. I'm nobody."
"You chose to spare us, Slayer," the head demon said. "We apologize for this incursion into your domain and absolve you of guilt. Shall we over you a gift in atonement?"
"Air freshener would be nice," Xander said, taking note of the smell.
"No, no thank you," Buffy said to the demons, but then shook her head, "actually… if you continue to uphold the treaty and I'll consider us even."
She looked at Giles who smiled and nodded in approval. Murton was releasing Tommy from the cage who quickly reverted back to his human form to greet Buffy's friends.
"But what of the murderer?" the demon asked. "We cannot return to the underground until he is brought to justice."
"Let me guess," Blade said, "disemboweled with a gaping wound in the chest?"
The demons looked at Blade, "How do you know this?"
Blade looked like he had received the worst news possible. "Sounds a lot like some things I've encountered lately. Somehow, it lays an egg inside your body and its babies explode out of your chest."
"Ew," Cordellia exclaimed.
"It's pretty gross," Murton replied.
"No, the guys who smell like poop are still here," she said fanning the air.
"Some vampire doomsday cult have been spreading its eggs all over the west coast trying to get the species to spread and wipe out all life on Earth. Seems without their precious Master, they don't think that anything deserves to live. Don't ask me where they got them, but the point is these things make nests and birth hundreds of others,"
Giles and the Scoobies stiffened at the mention of The Master. The atmosphere of the library became deathly still, so much so that even Tommy and Murton who knew nothing of the situation felt a layer of serious dread blanket the room.
Blade stuck his tongue in the side of his mouth and cocked his head, "You ready for the bad news?"
"I love bad news," Buffy said.
"You won't love this," he warned. "This creature the cult is spreading around takes on the characteristics of whatever it grows inside. It grows inside a human; it's got two legs and two arms. It grows inside a dog; it's got four legs and runs like a dog. If it grows inside a demon…"
Giles' eyes went wide, "You mean to tell me that this… lifeform… it has created a nest in the very pits of the Hellmouth and is taking on the characteristics of demons?"
"Demons, vampires, werewolves… you name it," he said, "This thing was deadlier than anything I've ever seen before and if it's here…" he stopped. "We can't handle this alone."
"We'll help anyway we can," Angel told him.
"Us too," Murton said, speaking for Tommy.
"Dude," Tommy protested.
"Oh, like you weren't going to volunteer," Murton said.
"Well, yeah," Tommy said, "but you stole my thunder!"
"No," Blade said, "I didn't say I couldn't handle it, I said we can't handle it."
"You've been handling it alone all this time," Buffy stated.
Blade shook his head as he took out a cell phone, "Who said I was working alone, sweetheart?"
--
The vampire's name was Chip and, by astonishing coincidence, he had been one of Dare's linemen on the football team. The two never really associated beyond the playing field and, truthfully, they didn't even know each other's name and referred to each other as only "Number Ten" and "Number Fifty-Three."
Now, only a few hours after Dare had been relieved of his immortal coil, Chip found himself in a different situation that appeared to have much the same ending; that being a fairly nasty death.
Chip himself wasn't even sure how he got to where he was, namely firmly affixed to a wall and encased in some sort of black hard crusty shell that looked like it had been shat onto the stone walls of the cave.
The vampire coughed a little and idly wondered why his throat was so sore. In front of him, a large gray orb sat open like a morbid flower and there was also the smell… a thick and strangling smell of rotting flesh. Chip could hear hissing somewhere deep in the cave and knew that whatever it was possessed death itself as a companion.
Chip struggled against his prison, but was soon overcome with a wracking pain inside his chest as though something pushed against his ribcage from the inside with tremendous force. The vampire cried out in pain as tiny crawls scratched against his organs attempting to find traction for another push.
The hissing grew closer as Chip screamed. Around the corner came a large creature on two long legs, a serpentine tail whipping with a dangerous madness behind it. Slime dripped off of its black exoskeleton and elongated head. The animal bared a set of teeth in what appeared to be an awful grin that made the vampire fearful.
The vampire screamed again as ever rib along his sternum cracked and separated. His chest heaved outward.
The creature opened wide and, though its mouth there came a tongue and on that tongue was another mouth lined with teeth. That smaller mouth opened and a hiss escaped from it.
Chip's chest exploded and he felt something claw its way out. Chip barely heard the newborn squeal a birth squeal before his body burst into ash and disintegrated ending his brief immortal existence.
The new creature picked itself up off the ground and gazed up at the larger. It opened its mouth and showed off a pair of vampire fangs.
Poor Chip never learned that the creature wasn't from Earth at all, but actually originated in deep space. Its true origin and name had been long lost to history, but it had been called by many names in many languages. It was called a dragon, a xenomorph, a serpent, a beastie, and a bitch but one name stuck more than any others.
Alien.
But the alien was not the only one who was busy that night. For one thing, there was the matter of a small army who had assembled in the circularly designed library of Sunnydale High School: A vampire slayer, a vampire with a soul, a daywalker, and a big wolf on campus.
There was also the matter of a very large being with sawed off horns and red skin who was happily petting a stray alley cat on one of his outdoor escapades when his cell phone suddenly started to play The Theme from Shaft. The large brute stood, inadvertently frightening his new friend and causing him to run down the alley. A large red thumb pressed the speaker button on the phone. "What have you found out?" the red man asked.
"Sunnydale, California," Blade's voice answered. "This is the eye of the storm, baby."
"We're on our way."
The man's large hand shut the cell phone and placed it into his vest pocket where he retrieved a single cigar. He placed the cigar in his mouth and promptly lit it. Hellboy nodded as he took a long nicotine drag.
"I always wanted to go to California."
It turned out that the same phrase was about to be used by another agent. Not an agent of The United States Bureau for Paranormal Research and Defense, but an agent of Hell itself.
It wasn't that he wanted to be an agent of Hell, it just sort of happened that way through an extremely bad decision by his parents before he was born. Sam's soul had been promised to the Devil and, when the slacker who had never done anything substantial in his life and still worked in a bulk hardware store turned 21, the Devil collected by forcing him to become a bounty hunter; Chasing down, capturing, and delivering escaped souls back to hell.
This was done by using a mystical vessel which took a number of odd shapes for each adventure. Once it was a camera, once times it was a dustbuster, and once it was a lighter.
This time, by another astonishing coincidence, it was a cigar and, as usual, came with no instructions.
Sam sighed, a little bummed at the prospect of a mission so far away from home. "Well," he said to his two best friends, "I've always wanted to go to California."
"Man," Sock, his portly and somewhat unhygienic pal, said patting Sam on the shoulder as a show of support, "I'm sorry the devil is such a dick."
To be continued…