Emperor Xander
by Chaoseternus
It was a very bemused Gerard that slowly placed the phone back in its cradle and glanced across at his teammates, who were looking at him with more then a little curiosity in their expressions.
He shook his head, leaning backwards in his seat, "well, it seems that our enquires into the agent from the keys incident has drawn some high level interest..."
"How high?" Cosmo asked, curious but not really paying attention, his face once more buried in the laptop screen in front of him.
"That was President Ryan on the phone"
The pencil fell from Cosmos mouth, "President Ryan, Jack Ryan?"
"He says he would greatly appreciate it if we left Mr Tasker alone," Gerard shrugged, amused, "well, we got a name now at least"
"I'll get right onto it" Cosmo promised.
Gerard nodded, "We also have to find out why Ryan is willing to break the law and try and interfere in an ongoing investigation"
"Great," Cooper commented wryly, "this investigation just gets more and more fun all the time"
Riley felt sick, almost physically so.
He was a soldier, he had joined to serve his country, to do what he felt was right and whilst he had heard a lot of horror stories about what the government could be like he had never given them any credit, till now.
He hadn't raised an eyebrow when General West was relived of command and replaced with a researcher because it didn't take a genius to figure out that actually researcher the monsters and not just killing them would pay off better in the long run. In the end, wars were won and lost on the basis of who knew the most, who had the best intelligence and he had thought the Demons had them beat by quite a margin, that they would need to learn as much as they could as fast as they could but to find out that all they needed to know was already out there, that Walsh was placed in command to carry out grossly illegal and immoral experimentation not just on the demons but on the soldiers working for her too
He had thought the only problem with a researcher being in command was there tendency to care only for their work, a tendency to lose sight of the road, a tendency indeed not to know how military operations actually worked and more often then not, not even care, how wrong he was!
To find out that the NID had carefully seized control of the project, an agency that was in theory merely an external watchdog for black ops had gotten rotten to the core and was planning to create a supersoldier for their own uses from demons, humans and machinery
It was disgusting, abominable.
He wished he could say he didn't believe, but strangely enough he did.
The computer records from Willows hacks could have been faked off course, that device they showed him was in his shoulder they might have placed there themselves whilst he was asleep, but he didn't think so, he believed them.
He didn't want to, the part of him that had made him join up in the first place truly wanted to believe that their government, the government of the United States of America was better then that, but still he believed.
Riley shook his head, and turned, catching the eyes of his team. They nodded slightly, imperceptibly.
"Fine," Riley replied, his tone screaming Danger, vengeful soldier at large' "if the NID have managed to seize control and pervert the purpose of the Sub-Human Initiative, then by God we are going to take the project back, one way or the other"
"So," Gibbs commented, his eyes leaving the door to the library just long enough to sweep across the corridor once, checking for potential threats, "how do you suppose we do this? Just go in and say Hi, we heard you slayed vampires and want in?'"
"I don't want in," Helen replied, a firm but disgusted, angry note in her voice, "I want to know why the only people fighting in this town have to do so between homework assignments"
Gibbs nodded, "okay, then we get the librarian alone and torture him till he tells us what the hell is going on?"
The windows on the double doors to the library shattered abruptly, an arm reaching out, grabbing Gibbs and pulling him swiftly through the hole left by the still falling glass.
Shocked by the abruptness of the move, it took Harry a record full second to react, his pistol clearing his holster as he slammed through the doors, low and fast.
He stopped abruptly; jaw dropping slightly as he caught the scene in front of him. A young lady, Miss Summers according to the card file in his head, was holding the taller and certainly heavier Gibbs up, his feet kicking at her ankles.
"Touch one hair, just one hair on our Giles head and they will bury you in Alaska... and Washington, and London and about twenty other places, get me?"
Harry shuddered involuntary, he had heard that growl just three times from his wife, it promised pain and worse for whoever was on the wrong side of it. He really didn't want to be in Gibbs place right now.
"Really Buffy," the tone was bemused and a little embarrassed and it didn't take a leap of imagination to figure that it was Giles, the librarian who was speaking, just out of his sight, "was that really necessary?"
Buffy growled, "He threatened family, of course it was necessary"
"Watch it Buffy, you'll embarrass him," a youthful, boyish voice sounded from behind him, "you know he can't afford to wear away another set of glasses with all the cleaning you're making him do"
Wait
Behind him.
He spun around, pistol raised and stopped abruptly.
A gun was pointed right at Helens head, a big gun, with what looked like a clip full of... f''ing hell, shotgun shells feeding into it, held by what he assumed was the source of the young male voice. A second was in the hands of a giggling red head, pointed at Faisils head.
Dammit, Helen knew the escape move for when a gun was pointed at you from that close range and that angle, but Faisil sucked at it. If they tried, Helen would have a one in five chance of dieing, maybe more depending on how good the kid was, and Faisil one in two, easily higher.
Annoyed, Harry dropped his pistol, kicking it away. Best option was to give the impression of surrender for now, and escape at first choice
But hey, they were here to contact this group, of course he hadn't planned on being disadvantaged but they had contact, why not use it
In fact, the best option might just be for Helen to go into full-on overprotective mother mode and if they started discussing vampire hunting and their kills which he had little doubt they would at some point, that button would get pushed big time
Harry hid a smile, he almost felt sorry for the kids... almost.
Three more weeks
Just three more weeks of running security for Sunnydale Airport and he would be free to leave this hellhole. Free to forget about the things that disturbed his sleep, free to find a therapist who would help turn all this into a bad dream
And maybe free to do his job properly, he was security for Christ sakes, he was meant to make sure nothing or no-one unauthorised got on or off the planes, but here, here it was a daily occurrence. Yet whilst they all moved under their own steam, they were all... things, not people, things.
He had learned quick enough to turn his back, but he tried to have pride in his work and it hurt to have to turn his back all the time. Well, at least there wasn't anything coming off the Jamaica flight usually, should be safe to do his job properly.
A lithe, dark skinned figure dived from the aircraft with supernatural quickness, shooting him a startled; deer in the headlights look before running across to the perimeter fence and leaping over in one bound.
The man sighed, he hadn't even said it, yet he still managed to tempt Murphy. Dammit, this town was hell, he would be glad when he could get out.
"What manner of creatures are those Daniel Jackson? I have never seen the like before"
Daniel didn't even look up, though he did catch and agree with the disgusted and revolted edge to Teal'cs voice, an edge so hard even those who didn't know the warrior would be able to recognise, "yes, well, they seem to fit several of our old legends about vampires, they are certainly drinking blood, have fangs and a human form"
"Do the legends mention what they are and how they can be killed?"
"Well," Daniel tore his eyes reluctantly from the face of what had been an attractive young lady, "according to legend they are demonic but it's consistently reported as a possession in most cultures so it's possible we are looking at a lost Goa'uld off-shoot race. Decapitation, a wooden stake to the heart and sunlight kill them, garlic and an inability to cross running water is mentioned but only in more recent texts..."
Daniel smiled, embarrassed, "my first practise dissertation was on the vampire legends, I found it surprisingly interesting. I did not think there was any truth in the legends however"
"Understandable," Teal'c nodded, "and a fortuitous choice"
"Yes..." Daniel frowned, "wasn't my choice though..."
Bond took one step into the Library and stopped, an eyebrow swiftly rising as he saw a trio of obvious military types in close discussion with Giles, a discussion that any other time he would have loved to hear on the nature of evil and demons, a group whose manner just screamed feds locked up in the Library's cage, looking rather disgruntled and in the case of at least one member, more and more angry and indignant as the time wore on.
Bond winced, recognising her type, overprotective and worse, well trained mother, which was trouble of a kind even he tried to avoid. Or maybe watch . From the safety of a different continent.
"I see," he said slowly, "that you've been busy"
Xander shook his head, "turn outs been somewhat disappointing so far, only people in town have been sent by the government, or a government at least"
"Not entirely surprising," Giles rolled his eyes at Xander, "it does take a little more time for serving officers to arrange some leave, transport, accommodation"
"Guys," Willow called anxiously from the computer, "problem"
Exchanging of course there's a problem' looks, the group walked up behind Willow at the computer.
"What have you found on that infernal contraption?"
Bond shot Giles at incredulous look, which was joined by a bemused eye roll from Xander. Willow just shook her head, and started talking.
"One of the teams sent in response to that message has been declared MIA, SG-1 was ordered out of the town by the President but they never left and aren't responding to phone calls," Willow glanced back at Xander, "their bags were found packed in their rooms ready to leave along with most of their equipment ready to go"
Xander grimly nodded, "most likely they have become demon bait, but we need to search anyway, call Buffy in and let's brief Riley and co"
There was a screech behind them, and they spun around to see the cage door ripped off its hinges, a rather furious looking woman stalking towards them. Behind her, her companions, even the walking mountain, were looking rather agog at the hole where a door used to be.
"Oh..." Xander started.
"Shit" Bond finished.