As the ground continued to shake, the hideous creatures paused in their menacing advance, startled by the tremors.

"What's causing that rumbling?!" Willow yelled.

"Hello! California! Earthquake state!" Cordelia yelled back.

"More like Sunnydale: Hellmouth town!" Hera snapped at Cordelia. She gestured at the intensifying light under the library table, which started to grow upward. The light literally blasted through the table, smashing it to pieces, as it slowly started to progress in the direction of the roof.

That was enough for the monsters. They turned and ran (or skittered or oozed or undulated and so on, but that's beside the point, right?).

Athena and Faith and Diana emerged swiftly from the back room, startling the others. Diana was now sporting a nasty gash on her big arm.

"What the fuck is going o-? " Faith's question was cut short when she caught sight of the terrifying crimson light being emitted from the floor.

"Save the questions for later." Lilith replied. She jumped up, caught ahold of the window sill of the small window that led to the outside above the right staircase, and smashed the window with her fist. She jumped through the window, poked her head back through it, and ordered:

"Let's go. Hand me the unconscious first, then the wounded, then everyone else."

As they evacuated, the building began to shake even more violently. Lilith kept a careful watch on her surroundings as she pulled people through, but she needn't have worried. The disgusting critters were long gone, obviously frightened out of their wits. Once they were all through (Neil's friends literally forcing their way through), the roof of the school exploded outward and upward. They had escaped just in the nick of time.

As they ran from the school, another explosion caused them to turn and look.

Before their amazed eyes, the red light had formed into a beam which projected hundreds of feet into the sky, and stopped at that point, and then a wave of energy spread from it covering the sky in its wake with a pulsating barrier of power.

"What the hell is that?" Buffy breathed.

"The bitch is cutting us off." Athena snarled.

"A force field." Xander said in disbelief.

"If that's true, it has to be covering the whole town!" Helen said, daunted despite herself for a moment.

"She never displayed this kind of power before!" Neptune yelled.

"How the fuck is she pulling it off?!" Hera growled.

"Neil." Diana answered simply, as she gazed up at the sky.

They looked at Diana in incredulity, then back at the awe-inspiring phenomenon.

Buffy abruptly looked down at the unconscious Giles, who was now bleeding quite profusely from his injured forehead.

"We need to get Giles to a hospital." Buffy announced firmly.

"We might want to get a helicopter first." Willow commented somberly.

"Huh?" Buffy said.

Willow nodded at something behind her, and everyone turned to look.

The streets of Sunnydale had become a battleground.


Demona gazed down at the chaos as various sirens and alarms went off.

And chortled, her satanic voice carrying over the winds.


Angel barely dodged a blow from the scabby monstrosity he was battling and retaliated with a one-two combo to the jaw, sending it staggering back. It snarled angrily and tried to take his head off with its razor-sharp claws. He jumped back, and as it advanced, he sprang forward and broke its burly neck with one sharp twist.

"One down, ten billion to go." Angel said wearily.


The frightened man ran as fast as he could and dodged around a corner, only to confront a dead end. He quickly spun on his heels only to come face to bumpy face with his pursuer: a vampire.

The vampire grabbed his victim and prepared to feast when they heard rumbling and hissing above them. They looked up.

Above them in the alley, moving down the walls leisurely, were several of Demona's creations. They regarded both of them hungrily.

"Make you a deal." The would-be victim said to the vampire.

"What's that?" the vampire asked.

"I run one way, you run the other, and we pick this up another night. I'll run slower next time, promise. Deal?"

The vampire thought about it quickly, and then said:

"Deal."

The vampire released his prey, they both shook hands on it, and then they both darted out of the alley and fled in opposite directions.

Furious at their prey escaping, the monsters surged out of the alley and split up to chase them down.


"See anything?" Willow whispered to Xander who was kneeling and peering around the corner of the alley they were sneaking down.

Xander was about to reply when he heard frantic screaming. Willow peeked around the corner herself when she heard the terrified cries.

And they both witnessed a frightened vamp run past, about 30 to 40 feet away, with three of Demona's creatures in ravenous pursuit.

As they watched, the chase continued out of their view. They kept staring until someone clutched their shoulders and they jumped like guilty schoolchildren.

"What was that screaming?" Helen asked, looking down at them questioningly.

"Oh, nothing important." Willow replied, a bit too straight-faced.

"Just someone's TV up too loud." Xander added, also absurdly deadpan.

Helen seemed doubtful at their responses, but went back down to the other end of the alley.

Willow and Xander looked at each other.

"Poetic justice?"

"Yes, ma'am."


Several alleys later…

"How are we going to get past this?" Helen gestured at the raging battle going all around them, from one end of Market Street to the other.

The others were pondering the same thing.

"Raging battle" was probably too mild of a description. Citizens, police, soldiers, and monsters of every breed by the dozens were battling the loathsome invaders that had suddenly appeared in their midst. A blob-like monster slimed and devoured its way through several soldiers and residents before being obliterated by a volley of Molotov cocktails. It died screaming. An Apache attack copter flew overhead and was obliterated by two indescribable airborne monstrosities emitting energy rays from their singular eyes. As they flew by the alley, one was struck by a shoulder-launched SAM and blew up messily, spraying protoplasmic matter far and wide while the other was shot down by heavy machine gun fire. Everyone ducked back into the alley fully to avoid the splatter.

"Oh my god." Buffy whispered, disbelieving the growing carnage unfolding before her green eyes.

"Why did we move here? I didn't want to move here!" Dawn whined.

"I don't know. We'll almost certainly get wasted if we try to run through this." Ares answered thoughtfully in response to Helen's query.

"Maybe if we whined our way through?" Hera muttered.

"Let's pull back." Bellona ordered.

No one argued as they pulled back into the previous street.

"Maybe if we tried-"Buffy started.

"Hold that thought." Zeus suggested.

"We're about to be attacked."


On the other side of the beleaguered city, the terrified couple with the wailing infant ran as hard as they could.

Until the husband tripped and fell on his face, knocking himself unconscious, and his wife ran to him, shaking him frantically with her free hand.

"Sam, you've got to get u-"

A delighted snarl made her look up.

Two spider-like… things…were converging on her and her family. Each one had several human faces on top of tentacles, extending from their front. The "faces" hissed gleefully as they approached.

"God…please…no." the mother murmured fearfully.

They were a few steps away when a man in black suddenly landed in front of them, a fire axe in hand. The creatures skittered back, startled.

But they weren't allowed the chance to recover. With a few vicious swings of his axe, they lay in twitching pieces, which soon ceased.

"How can I ever repay you?!" the grateful mother asked the dashing stranger.

He turned to her, bloody axe in hand.

"You can die, luv." Spike replied ominously.


"Holy shit…" Faith said.

There was literally a squadron of those flying things from earlier heading in their direction, their cyclopean eyes glowing malevolently.

"They're going to strafe us. Run. Now." Athena urged.

Athena didn't need to tell them twice (or even once). They high-tailed it as the swiftly moving entities started taking potshots at them with their beams, blowing holes in the road, making small explosions which rained dust on them.

"Great! I'm never going to get this out of my hair!" Cordelia yelled.

"Will you shut up?!" Hera screamed at her.

Athena ran as fast as she could, but her injured leg was slowing her down. Faith noticed.

"Athena!" Faith yelled. She halted and ran back for her girlfriend, but she didn't need to bother. Hera was closer and grabbed Athena around her waist and put her over her heavily muscled shoulder.

"Oh, I didn't know you cared, Harry." Athena purred.

"Shut up, girl." Hera said calmly.

As they raced down the road, dodging wildly, it soon became apparent that they were missing a member of their group.

"Where's Willow?!" Xander cried, looking around.

Oz spotted her, fading fast and dropping behind the rest of the pack, she nearly tripped but fortunately regained her balance. To Oz's horror, three of their disgusting pursuers were focusing on her. Their bolts of pinkish energy came closer and closer to the nearly exhausted hacker. For Oz, the world narrowed. Nothing existed except her frightened face.

Oz ran as fast as he could. As he approached, Willow fell to her knees. Oz reached her and helped her up.

"Running. Too much running for Willow." The redhead gasped.

Hearing a blood-chilling shriek, they witnessed Willow's hunters swoop towards them, their eyes shimmering with barely controlled power.

They froze.

And suddenly a manhole cover flew over their heads and lodged itself in the lead creature's eye. It howled in astonished agony as it jetted backwards and smacked against its wingmates, sending them into a spinning crash (ouch).

"Bullseye." Bellona smiled grimly.

Oz and Willow didn't get a chance to react to Bellona's supreme accuracy because Neptune ran up to them, slung them over his massive shoulders, and took off with them.

Cordelia was cursing her high heels when she found herself suddenly being cradle-carried. She relaxed when she saw who it was.

"Thanks." Cordelia said, surprised.

"No problem." Zeus replied.

As they ran, Cordelia saw Xander being carried by Artemis and Joyce and Dawn being carried by Taryn. Obviously, the "normal people" were slowing down the desperate flight.

Even with three of their number dispatched, they were still too many monster energy blasts for comfort, zinging over their heads and impacting around them, nearer and nearer, until several blasted the ground in front of them, sending them sprawling.

"Fuck." Apollo groaned.

With their doom bearing down on them, their assailants suddenly exploded.

"What in the world?!" Helen exclaimed.

"Cavalry arrived blowing their bugles." Buffy responded, pointing at their saviors.

A squadron of Apaches flew by, cannons blazing, the high velocity rounds downing the last monster as they ripped through its nauseating form. It fell to the road with a splat, quivered, and lay still.

Their job done, the Apaches flew off to another part of the escalating conflict.

"It's too dangerous out here, we need to find shelter. And the duh award of the year goes to…" Xander pointed at himself, still being carried by Artemis.

"Yes." Diana stated matter of factly, "But none of these structures along this road are appropriate. They are only houses, and in this sort of conflict will be ruined promptly."

"You're not wrong." Bellona observed, evaluating their laughable potential shelters with a critical eye.

"We can't go far in town to find it, especially after everything we've seen. Nearly every street is like the one we just saw, a war zone." Apollo added.

"From the clamor, this street will turn out to be indistinguishable from the others we have observed very shortly. The conflict is imminently forthcoming onto this lane." Lilith cautioned.

"I know a place." Athena said suddenly.

"Where?" Willow asked.

"Neil's house. It's like a fucking fortress, and on the very edge of town. It's really remote." Athena responded.

"Not to mention an assload of weapons and supplies, like medical, it's seriously stocked." Faith supplemented.

"Neil has a house?" Buffy asked in disbelief.

"Does he have a swimming pool too? I guess that's not really important." Willow laughed nervously.

"If he has a stash of 1960's and 1970's rock records, I'm moving in." Oz said calmly.

"Hello? Paging clueless people? Safety first, questions and surprise later?" Cordelia snapped.

"Going to have to go with the bratty cheerleader here." Hera commented.

"I'm going to ignore you!" Cordelia hissed.

"Would you screech a little louder?" Bellona said sourly.

Everyone got to their feet, and Taryn asked, "Which way?"

"Just follow the Slayer hotter than the other Slayer." Faith replied.

As they melted into the shadows, Buffy retorted:

"So we're supposed to be following me?"

"Keep tellin' yourself that B."


"Now where could you be, my lovelies? Hmm?" Demona mused, as she stared into her energy ball.

"I know you're there, but you seem to be not in attendance at school, at home, or anywhere. Now how ever could that be, I wonder?"

Scowling, she focused harder and was troubled when the vibrant ball of light suddenly vanished without her permission.

Demona cocked her head and an almost slithering smile crossed her lips. She looked at the hand that had held the orb.

"Are you endeavoring to intervene?"

Sniggering, she sat on her throne, a throne that pulsed with unholy vitality.

"There is nowhere for them to depart, my love. I have all the time in my world to locate them."

An unexpected roar startled Demona and her sentinels. They looked around and saw…nothing.

Nothing…


The glowing light from Sunnydale High throbbed and hummed with malevolent energy, its sinister and incessant sound the only one in the area. The nearby battle had ceased. From the amount of bodies and destruction, it was difficult to say who achieved any degree of victory.

Then a new sound emerged, that of stumbling feet.

Angel emerged into the light cast by the energy barrier's beam and sank by one of the trees in the yard. His pale skin covered with bruises and deep lacerations, which made him grit his teeth as he sat. His dark eyes followed the beam stabbing upwards into the darkened heavens.

Can't just sit here. Must find Buffy. The vampire thought.

As he arose and shuffled towards the school, he began to realize through the pained haze of his wounds the sad state of the school building. The school literally had cracks running up and down the walls, and the entire roof was gone. It appeared as though it would crumble at not even a moment's notice.

Undaunted, he entered the building and searched it from top to bottom. Empty. He found nothing except the source of the beam, which was emerging from the Hellmouth. The energies it was radiating made it too dangerous to enter the library, as they occasionally crackled and arced around the room with unpredictable frequency.

Angel went through one of the side doors and smelled a familiar scent.

He followed Buffy's distinctive smell to the broken library window and knelt down, picking up a shard of glass.

You got away, but then where did you go?

Angel followed his nose north, but then paused. For some reason, she had doubled back. And now he smelled blood. Giles's blood.

Angel hurried as fast as he was able in his battered condition.