Faith's eyes snapped open and her right hand shot out, catching the vampire
by the throat. She raised her left and saw the bear. "B? Stake?" She
croaked out.
Buffy punched her vamp again and then tossed the stake toward Faith. Faith dropped the bear, caught the stake without looking, and then drove it home while Buffy grabbed her spare and finished her opponent.
"Faith, are you okay?"
"I think so." She looked around the room. "You sure do know how to throw a welcome back party." She gave Buffy a brilliant smile. "I need some clothes." She wrinkled her nose. "And a bath."
"I think they threw your clothes out, but I'm pretty sure I have some you can wear at home. Come on; let's get you out of here. I guess I should ask if you are able to walk. You've been in bed for months. I spent part of the time with you each night moving your arms and legs, trying to make sure you'd be able to use them when you woke up."
"Good thing." Faith flashed the smile again, then swung her legs off the bed and set her feet on the floor. "Whoa that's cold." She stood up and wobbled a little. "Walking may be a bit of a trick."
"Here, lean on me. We'll get you home." Buffy helped Faith out through the door and then headed for the side entrance.
The door was obviously battered from the outside and couldn't be pushed open from the inside.
"Looks like the front door is the only way out. If they didn't have bars on all the windows to prevent jumping, we'd just go out that way." Only in Sunnydale could they get away with bars on hospital windows that would prevent escape in case of emergency.
When they reached the lobby, Buffy felt a pang of sadness. The nice deskman who'd always let her in the side door was dead, his throat ripped out. Fortunately for him, that would be the end. The two of them stumbled a little as they got outside and then Faith seemed to right herself.
"That's better. The legs are remembering which way forward is. By the way, thanks for the bear." Faith held it out and looked at it. "It's the first time I've ever had a stuffed animal."
"You're welcome. I just saw it and thought of you." Buffy hadn't even seen Faith pick it up. "I think I better give a yell and see if the FBI agents are still around." She felt Faith stiffen and try to pull away.
"No. It's okay. They're not here for you and I wouldn't let them take you." She felt Faith relax a little bit, but not completely. "They'll give us a ride. It's a long walk home." They walked on a little further and then she shouted "agent Mulder? Are you out here? Agent Scully?"
"We're around by the side entrance and in one piece for the most part."
"I'll be there in a moment. I'm going to need a ride home. I've got Faith with me and she's a little unsteady on her feet."
"That might be a problem."
"Why is that?" Buffy stopped moving.
"We have a vampire pinned between the car and the building. If I move it, the vampire will get loose. It's none to happy right now."
They continued around the corner and nearly ran into Xander. He fixed them both with a look that caused Faith to stop and start back the other way.
"No, Faith. It's okay. Xander, don't say a word, not a word. And if you're going to look at us like that, just look somewhere else."
"But I." His eyes were pleading, but his face was a mask of revulsion.
Buffy cut him off. "I said not a word. I mean it." She stared at him until he backed down and turned away. "I'll talk to you about this later, but not now."
"Buffy, I don't want to cause problems for you with your friends."
"Faith, you're not a problem. He doesn't know what I do. When he does, he'll see you in a very different light. Until then, cut him some slack and we'll work on the re-education process. Now, let's find you a seat in the car." She opened the back door and motioned Faith inside.
"Umm. B? Red's sacked out in there."
"Did you guys just run around picking up everyone I know? Is my mother going to pop up next? Or Giles?" She had a perplexed look on her face that caused Faith to let out a small laugh.
"Who?" Mulder looked confused.
"It's not funny!"
"Actually it is, if you think about it. I mean. You obviously come here by yourself, only to find that the FBI, Xander and Willow are all here too. Not to mention you have Nosferatu over there," she jerked a thumb toward the vampire, "stuck between the car and the wall."
"Xander, could you move Willow over so she can share the back seat with Faith?"
Xander got in the back seat and moved Willow into a sitting position, made sure the driver side door was locked and then leaned her up against it. He peered back at Faith and saw her clutching the stuffed bear. That was very unlike Faith. It was also very unlike Faith to have not made some cutting comment by now. "The seat is now yours." He motioned Faith toward the car.
"Thanks." She gave him a tentative smile and sat down.
"Okay, so let me get this straight. There were three vampires. You all pinned one against the building and we dusted the other two?"
"No, that's not right and what do you mean when you say 'we,'" Scully asked.
"The first vamp into the room practically bowled me over. I was tangled up with him when the second came in. I couldn't get free and thought he had Faith when up shoots her arm, like a snake striking, and catches him by the throat. I tossed her a stake and she dusted him. Sleeping to slaying in under ten seconds." She flashed a smile at Faith. "Now what did you mean that that wasn't right? Were there more? Did they get away?"
"I meant just that. It was not three vampires. Yes, there were more and no, they didn't get away. I counted a dozen of them when your friend Willow created her light show."
"Oh, so that's what that was. Not lightning. So what happened to the rest?"
"Willow burned one, Xander staked one and we knocked two down that Willow finished off with the stake. Two went inside and six were taking turns beating on the door. Willow burned up another and then passed out. Xander staked one more then we kept shooting the others to knock them down while Xander staked them until the last one when we ran out of ammunition. We all tangled with it and Mulder ended up staking it. That leaves this one."
"Wow, you guys did some amazing work there. But this is bad. Vampires don't usually work together in numbers like this. They're not real big on the planning and organizing." She walked over closer to the vampire and asked him, "So, what were you all doing here? Couldn't you have caught me at a better place than this?"
He laughed. "You weren't the target at all. We heard there was a slayer in a coma. We figured on taking her and keeping her alive, then feeding off her when we wanted to. Slayer blood. That alone could make us strong, but selling slayer blood could also make us rich and powerful. Granted, fourteen was a bit much for sharing. Two apparently got careless and didn't come back from going to get a midnight snack last night. I'm guessing they ran across you and had a little accident. They weren't very bright."
"So you're trying to tell me you came up with this plan on your own and weren't working for someone else? I find that hard to believe, but I suppose it's possible. Obviously if you weren't expecting to find me, you didn't do much research." She turned and looked at Faith and held up her stake. "Do you want do it, or do you want me to?"
"I'm up for it." She pulled out the stake she'd had since Buffy tossed it to her earlier and climbed out of the car, still holding the bear in her left hand.
"I'm not even going to ask where you were keeping that inside a hospital gown." Xander smirked at Faith.
Faith rolled her eyes at Xander, then flipped the stake up in the air, caught it, and threw it at the vampire, striking him point first and turning him to dust. "I've still got the touch." She smiled brightly, winked at the stunned FBI agents, and then retrieved the stake from where it had fallen on the hood of the car.
Xander noticed the difference in the smile. It wasn't the halfhearted or forced smile he used to see. This one seemed genuine. He also noticed the weariness creep into her face as she sat down in the back seat and closed her eyes.
Scully stood, mouth open again, unsure what to think or say. A young woman, who'd been in a coma, wakes up after months of being bedridden and can walk and still has the fine motor skill control to throw a pointed object into a target accurately and with enough force to penetrate it. She decided it just wasn't worth the ridicule she'd take for publishing the findings. Not to mention that there were any number of people out there who would seek Faith out in hopes of running untold numbers of tests on her. And, there were the ones who would rather just take her for studying against her will. "Mulder, I think we need to get out of here." Sirens began to wail in the distance.
"That's not like you, Scully, wanting to leave the scene of a crime."
"Trust me, it's for the best."
"We still have brass to pick up. If we don't the police are sure to link it to us. How will we explain it?"
Buffy spoke up. "I have an idea." She walked over to the car. "Wil, wake up. I need your help."
Willow opened her eyes, saw Faith and jerked to the side, hitting her head on the window. "Ow, okay, not a nice way to wake up." She rubbed her head and made a face. "And what's she doing here?"
"Hi to you to, Red." Faith gave her a little smile. "What, no welcome back hugs?"
Willow just glared at Faith.
"Wil, look at me? Faith is here with me, okay? Now concentrate on what I'm saying. I need you to try to do a spell, if you can. We need to find all the shell casings from the bullets that Mulder and Scully fired and we need to do it pretty quickly."
"Oh, well, that's not so hard. It's kind of like a locator spell. If I don't have to actually make something or destroy something, I think I can probably do it. I just need an example of what I'm looking for."
"Here, Mulder reached across Faith and handed a shell casing to Willow."
"Okay, just give me a second here. If it works, you'll be able to see them all and collect them easily. If not." She shrugged. She concentrated on the item said a few words and then turned to Mulder. "Okay, here you go. Any moment now it's going to work or not work." She collapsed back against the seat again.
"Hey, look, all sorts of little glowing spots all around." Xander eyed them, and then took off toward where they'd killed the first four vampires. "I'll get these out here."
Mulder and Scully were already picking up the ones near them. Scully looked at her watch. "What is wrong with the police here? It's been twenty minutes since we started shooting and they still haven't shown up."
"You can rest assured that the headline tomorrow will be something like 'Drug related attack on hospital,' but they'll leave off the fact that the nice guy on night shift was killed. It will probably be in the last paragraph, almost like a footnote."
"I can't believe the police and the press would both be party to that."
"It's what you get when you live on a Hellmouth. Lots of bad things happen and there's lots of ignorance and denial."
"What would we tell them? We helped kill vampires? They'd call Skinner and we'd be hung out to dry." He looked around. "Okay, that's all from around here."
Xander jogged back to them, pockets bulging. "I think we've got all of them."
"Get in and we'll get out of here." Mulder slid across the front seat and started the car. "Scully, you and Xander get in the front and Buffy get in the back." He waited while everyone got situated.
"Hey Faith, are you hungry?" Buffy gave her a knowing grin.
"Oh yeah! Just like always." At the sound of the words, Xander shifted uncomfortably in his seat and Faith couldn't resist baiting him. "Don't worry Xander, I'm not going to jump you right here. Maybe when we get home, though." She giggled a little and Buffy joined her.
Mulder wasn't sure what the laughter was about, but he waited for it to settle down. "All set?" He backed the car away from the hospital and turned it around, following a very subdued Xander's instruction as to how to get to Buffy's house.
Mulder pulled away from the curb after the door closed and the kids were all inside Buffy's house. "Well Scully, do you believe in vampires now?"
"I never thought I'd say this, but yes, Mulder, I do believe in vampires. It won't make a difference, though."
"What do you mean? We've seen proof. We have to tell the world."
"Mulder, I hate to say this, but it doesn't matter what I believe. It doesn't matter what we've seen." She shook her head. "If we tell people what we know, what do you think is going to happen to this town, those kids? We'd be sentencing them to become lab rats or worse. I think the only thing we can do is help with the cover-up that's obviously been going on for years."
"Scully, this is a once in a lifetime opportunity for us to show that the X- Files actually means something, that we're not just chasing imaginary fairies or little green men. Now you're talking about burying the truth." He stopped speaking and shook his head. "It bothers me that we've found tangible evidence that would be hard for anyone to refute and we can't use it. This could move us from laughing stock kooks who chase aliens to serious investigators who find proof of the unbelievable. It would assure funding of future projects. And now, the world can't know." He sounded dejected.
"I think the place to start is at the hospital and we'd better start now. Don't look at me like that. If we don't, we're going to have to include ourselves as subjects under a microscope."
"I suppose you're right." He hit the steering wheel with the heel of his hand. I can't believe I'm going to help hide the truth. He exhaled slowly. "How do we want to work this?"
Buffy punched her vamp again and then tossed the stake toward Faith. Faith dropped the bear, caught the stake without looking, and then drove it home while Buffy grabbed her spare and finished her opponent.
"Faith, are you okay?"
"I think so." She looked around the room. "You sure do know how to throw a welcome back party." She gave Buffy a brilliant smile. "I need some clothes." She wrinkled her nose. "And a bath."
"I think they threw your clothes out, but I'm pretty sure I have some you can wear at home. Come on; let's get you out of here. I guess I should ask if you are able to walk. You've been in bed for months. I spent part of the time with you each night moving your arms and legs, trying to make sure you'd be able to use them when you woke up."
"Good thing." Faith flashed the smile again, then swung her legs off the bed and set her feet on the floor. "Whoa that's cold." She stood up and wobbled a little. "Walking may be a bit of a trick."
"Here, lean on me. We'll get you home." Buffy helped Faith out through the door and then headed for the side entrance.
The door was obviously battered from the outside and couldn't be pushed open from the inside.
"Looks like the front door is the only way out. If they didn't have bars on all the windows to prevent jumping, we'd just go out that way." Only in Sunnydale could they get away with bars on hospital windows that would prevent escape in case of emergency.
When they reached the lobby, Buffy felt a pang of sadness. The nice deskman who'd always let her in the side door was dead, his throat ripped out. Fortunately for him, that would be the end. The two of them stumbled a little as they got outside and then Faith seemed to right herself.
"That's better. The legs are remembering which way forward is. By the way, thanks for the bear." Faith held it out and looked at it. "It's the first time I've ever had a stuffed animal."
"You're welcome. I just saw it and thought of you." Buffy hadn't even seen Faith pick it up. "I think I better give a yell and see if the FBI agents are still around." She felt Faith stiffen and try to pull away.
"No. It's okay. They're not here for you and I wouldn't let them take you." She felt Faith relax a little bit, but not completely. "They'll give us a ride. It's a long walk home." They walked on a little further and then she shouted "agent Mulder? Are you out here? Agent Scully?"
"We're around by the side entrance and in one piece for the most part."
"I'll be there in a moment. I'm going to need a ride home. I've got Faith with me and she's a little unsteady on her feet."
"That might be a problem."
"Why is that?" Buffy stopped moving.
"We have a vampire pinned between the car and the building. If I move it, the vampire will get loose. It's none to happy right now."
They continued around the corner and nearly ran into Xander. He fixed them both with a look that caused Faith to stop and start back the other way.
"No, Faith. It's okay. Xander, don't say a word, not a word. And if you're going to look at us like that, just look somewhere else."
"But I." His eyes were pleading, but his face was a mask of revulsion.
Buffy cut him off. "I said not a word. I mean it." She stared at him until he backed down and turned away. "I'll talk to you about this later, but not now."
"Buffy, I don't want to cause problems for you with your friends."
"Faith, you're not a problem. He doesn't know what I do. When he does, he'll see you in a very different light. Until then, cut him some slack and we'll work on the re-education process. Now, let's find you a seat in the car." She opened the back door and motioned Faith inside.
"Umm. B? Red's sacked out in there."
"Did you guys just run around picking up everyone I know? Is my mother going to pop up next? Or Giles?" She had a perplexed look on her face that caused Faith to let out a small laugh.
"Who?" Mulder looked confused.
"It's not funny!"
"Actually it is, if you think about it. I mean. You obviously come here by yourself, only to find that the FBI, Xander and Willow are all here too. Not to mention you have Nosferatu over there," she jerked a thumb toward the vampire, "stuck between the car and the wall."
"Xander, could you move Willow over so she can share the back seat with Faith?"
Xander got in the back seat and moved Willow into a sitting position, made sure the driver side door was locked and then leaned her up against it. He peered back at Faith and saw her clutching the stuffed bear. That was very unlike Faith. It was also very unlike Faith to have not made some cutting comment by now. "The seat is now yours." He motioned Faith toward the car.
"Thanks." She gave him a tentative smile and sat down.
"Okay, so let me get this straight. There were three vampires. You all pinned one against the building and we dusted the other two?"
"No, that's not right and what do you mean when you say 'we,'" Scully asked.
"The first vamp into the room practically bowled me over. I was tangled up with him when the second came in. I couldn't get free and thought he had Faith when up shoots her arm, like a snake striking, and catches him by the throat. I tossed her a stake and she dusted him. Sleeping to slaying in under ten seconds." She flashed a smile at Faith. "Now what did you mean that that wasn't right? Were there more? Did they get away?"
"I meant just that. It was not three vampires. Yes, there were more and no, they didn't get away. I counted a dozen of them when your friend Willow created her light show."
"Oh, so that's what that was. Not lightning. So what happened to the rest?"
"Willow burned one, Xander staked one and we knocked two down that Willow finished off with the stake. Two went inside and six were taking turns beating on the door. Willow burned up another and then passed out. Xander staked one more then we kept shooting the others to knock them down while Xander staked them until the last one when we ran out of ammunition. We all tangled with it and Mulder ended up staking it. That leaves this one."
"Wow, you guys did some amazing work there. But this is bad. Vampires don't usually work together in numbers like this. They're not real big on the planning and organizing." She walked over closer to the vampire and asked him, "So, what were you all doing here? Couldn't you have caught me at a better place than this?"
He laughed. "You weren't the target at all. We heard there was a slayer in a coma. We figured on taking her and keeping her alive, then feeding off her when we wanted to. Slayer blood. That alone could make us strong, but selling slayer blood could also make us rich and powerful. Granted, fourteen was a bit much for sharing. Two apparently got careless and didn't come back from going to get a midnight snack last night. I'm guessing they ran across you and had a little accident. They weren't very bright."
"So you're trying to tell me you came up with this plan on your own and weren't working for someone else? I find that hard to believe, but I suppose it's possible. Obviously if you weren't expecting to find me, you didn't do much research." She turned and looked at Faith and held up her stake. "Do you want do it, or do you want me to?"
"I'm up for it." She pulled out the stake she'd had since Buffy tossed it to her earlier and climbed out of the car, still holding the bear in her left hand.
"I'm not even going to ask where you were keeping that inside a hospital gown." Xander smirked at Faith.
Faith rolled her eyes at Xander, then flipped the stake up in the air, caught it, and threw it at the vampire, striking him point first and turning him to dust. "I've still got the touch." She smiled brightly, winked at the stunned FBI agents, and then retrieved the stake from where it had fallen on the hood of the car.
Xander noticed the difference in the smile. It wasn't the halfhearted or forced smile he used to see. This one seemed genuine. He also noticed the weariness creep into her face as she sat down in the back seat and closed her eyes.
Scully stood, mouth open again, unsure what to think or say. A young woman, who'd been in a coma, wakes up after months of being bedridden and can walk and still has the fine motor skill control to throw a pointed object into a target accurately and with enough force to penetrate it. She decided it just wasn't worth the ridicule she'd take for publishing the findings. Not to mention that there were any number of people out there who would seek Faith out in hopes of running untold numbers of tests on her. And, there were the ones who would rather just take her for studying against her will. "Mulder, I think we need to get out of here." Sirens began to wail in the distance.
"That's not like you, Scully, wanting to leave the scene of a crime."
"Trust me, it's for the best."
"We still have brass to pick up. If we don't the police are sure to link it to us. How will we explain it?"
Buffy spoke up. "I have an idea." She walked over to the car. "Wil, wake up. I need your help."
Willow opened her eyes, saw Faith and jerked to the side, hitting her head on the window. "Ow, okay, not a nice way to wake up." She rubbed her head and made a face. "And what's she doing here?"
"Hi to you to, Red." Faith gave her a little smile. "What, no welcome back hugs?"
Willow just glared at Faith.
"Wil, look at me? Faith is here with me, okay? Now concentrate on what I'm saying. I need you to try to do a spell, if you can. We need to find all the shell casings from the bullets that Mulder and Scully fired and we need to do it pretty quickly."
"Oh, well, that's not so hard. It's kind of like a locator spell. If I don't have to actually make something or destroy something, I think I can probably do it. I just need an example of what I'm looking for."
"Here, Mulder reached across Faith and handed a shell casing to Willow."
"Okay, just give me a second here. If it works, you'll be able to see them all and collect them easily. If not." She shrugged. She concentrated on the item said a few words and then turned to Mulder. "Okay, here you go. Any moment now it's going to work or not work." She collapsed back against the seat again.
"Hey, look, all sorts of little glowing spots all around." Xander eyed them, and then took off toward where they'd killed the first four vampires. "I'll get these out here."
Mulder and Scully were already picking up the ones near them. Scully looked at her watch. "What is wrong with the police here? It's been twenty minutes since we started shooting and they still haven't shown up."
"You can rest assured that the headline tomorrow will be something like 'Drug related attack on hospital,' but they'll leave off the fact that the nice guy on night shift was killed. It will probably be in the last paragraph, almost like a footnote."
"I can't believe the police and the press would both be party to that."
"It's what you get when you live on a Hellmouth. Lots of bad things happen and there's lots of ignorance and denial."
"What would we tell them? We helped kill vampires? They'd call Skinner and we'd be hung out to dry." He looked around. "Okay, that's all from around here."
Xander jogged back to them, pockets bulging. "I think we've got all of them."
"Get in and we'll get out of here." Mulder slid across the front seat and started the car. "Scully, you and Xander get in the front and Buffy get in the back." He waited while everyone got situated.
"Hey Faith, are you hungry?" Buffy gave her a knowing grin.
"Oh yeah! Just like always." At the sound of the words, Xander shifted uncomfortably in his seat and Faith couldn't resist baiting him. "Don't worry Xander, I'm not going to jump you right here. Maybe when we get home, though." She giggled a little and Buffy joined her.
Mulder wasn't sure what the laughter was about, but he waited for it to settle down. "All set?" He backed the car away from the hospital and turned it around, following a very subdued Xander's instruction as to how to get to Buffy's house.
Mulder pulled away from the curb after the door closed and the kids were all inside Buffy's house. "Well Scully, do you believe in vampires now?"
"I never thought I'd say this, but yes, Mulder, I do believe in vampires. It won't make a difference, though."
"What do you mean? We've seen proof. We have to tell the world."
"Mulder, I hate to say this, but it doesn't matter what I believe. It doesn't matter what we've seen." She shook her head. "If we tell people what we know, what do you think is going to happen to this town, those kids? We'd be sentencing them to become lab rats or worse. I think the only thing we can do is help with the cover-up that's obviously been going on for years."
"Scully, this is a once in a lifetime opportunity for us to show that the X- Files actually means something, that we're not just chasing imaginary fairies or little green men. Now you're talking about burying the truth." He stopped speaking and shook his head. "It bothers me that we've found tangible evidence that would be hard for anyone to refute and we can't use it. This could move us from laughing stock kooks who chase aliens to serious investigators who find proof of the unbelievable. It would assure funding of future projects. And now, the world can't know." He sounded dejected.
"I think the place to start is at the hospital and we'd better start now. Don't look at me like that. If we don't, we're going to have to include ourselves as subjects under a microscope."
"I suppose you're right." He hit the steering wheel with the heel of his hand. I can't believe I'm going to help hide the truth. He exhaled slowly. "How do we want to work this?"
