Watch the World Die:
Chapter Seven
by GylzGirl

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Giles and Buffy picked up Xander and Willow on their way back to the Summers' house. They filled them in on the morning's events. When they arrived at Buffy's house, Faith was awake and awaiting a plan. They assembled in the living room. Giles stood, all expectant eyes upon him. "The remainder of the renegade Watcher faction may or may not know by now that Buffy and Faith defeated their colleagues. We don't know what kind of a schedule they were to keep with each other. They will undoubtedly move under cover of darkness, hoping to use the Hellmouth's demonic activity as a distraction for either Slayer should they have survived. It's nearing sundown now. My father will have moved the children to a hotel in town by now. The renegades won't want to draw attention to themselves so even if they discover the switch, they probably won't risk an attack in the city limits. The children should be safe, and Father will have lookouts posted just in case."

"So what are the numbers and what's the plan?" Xander asked.

"14 and capture and disable."

"Right." Faith rose to her feet and stood at Giles' side. "So let's go kick some moldy, cowardly, flat, tweed-wearing butt!"

"Faith," Giles began.

"What? You're no coward. You're not moldy. And as for butts?" She drew her hand back and swatted him hard on the tush. Giles jumped. Buffy hopped protectively to her feet, fists clenched, and then sat back down. Xander grinned from ear to ear. Willow blushed and lowered her eyes. Faith grinned and strode confidently out the door.

Giles cleared his throat. "Y-yes. Well, shall we?" Giles followed Faith, Xander trailing the Watcher.

Buffy and Willow brought up the rear. "How come she gets to do that? We've known him longer and we don't get to d..."

"Will!"

"Well...not that I wa... oh forget it!" She scrambled out the door, Buffy giggling as she followed her out.



******


Buffy knelt in the bushes surrounding the now darkened small house she had visited earlier that day. Giles smiled and nodded at her from his position about 30 feet away. Further along the perimeter, Faith held her position near the back door. Xander and Willow had been paired off and given lookout duty near the road. All of them were armed with tranq pistols, while Giles carried the tranquilizer rifle. A large barn and tall trees completed the perimeter, forming an almost natural enclosure.

Buffy sat her gun at her feet for a minute and rubbed her hand on her jeans. She was anxious, just wanting this over with, wanting the future Slayers safe and home. She had sensed the same feeling in her friends and now it hung in the air over this place as a nearly physical presence. The flash of headlights on the main road signaled the renegade's arrival. As they turned onto the side road for the house, they switched their lights and motors off, coasting in. Buffy caught sight of Xander and Willow inching back along the tree line, taking up position behind one of the large trunks.

The sound of branches snapping brought Buffy's attention back to the road. As she spotted four of the renegades moving into the clearing, Buffy reclaimed her gun. She turned her head to catch sight of three more moving around the perimeter, toward her position. She signaled to Giles, who acknowledged her and then began backing into the bushes to take care of the two he saw coming his way. Buffy turned into the darkened foliage and silently made her way through.

She crept up behind the three men, not resisting a smile as she drew her gun. She took aim at the man bringing up the rear and shot him in the behind. His "oof" and the sound of him hitting the ground caused the other two to turn. Buffy barely had time to register that they were holding much more lethal firearms than her own when she had shot the one on her right in the chest and delivered a spin-kick to the face of the one on the left. Soon the three men were all unconscious, hog-tied, gagged and tucked nicely into the bushes. Buffy reloaded her pistol and moved to back-up Giles' position.



******


Giles stepped out of the shrubs in front of the two coming his way. He fired off a shot directly into the man's thigh. He dropped, revealing a dark haired, smiling woman behind him. "Hello Rupert."

"Marilyn, why?"

She leveled her pistol at his chest. "Drop the rifle." He did. "We could use the Ripper if you'd be interested. Some of the others might have a problem, you having been assigned a Slayer and all. There's a little bitterness about that. Still, I could put in a good word."

Giles' eyes narrowed. "I'd rather die."

She cocked her gun. "Then you shall." Giles heard the sound of a shot and winced in anticipation. To his surprise, he saw Marilyn's eyes widen as she sank to the ground, a tranq dart in her back. His eyes moved up from Marilyn's body to Buffy's smiling face.

"Well that's two down. How many did you take out."

"Three."

"Good." He bent and began to tie Marilyn, probably tighter than necessary. Buffy started to do the same to the man. "That's five down, five heading to the house. That's four unaccounted for. Let's uh, let's head over and help the others." The Watcher and Slayer drug the bodies into the shrubs and made their way through the cover of shadows.



******


Willow leaned nervously against the tree trunk. Xander's eyes shifted left to right, trying to keep an eye out for any movement nearby. "So when does Oz get back from LA?" he whispered.

She arched her eyebrow his way. "He gets back tomorrow. You already know that. He told you himself before he left. I must have mentioned it a hundred times today."

"Pardon me for trying to fill up the quiet with some small talk."

"I think it's supposed to be quiet. Making a lot of unnecessary noise is probably not something we're supposed to be do..." Her sentence was cut short by the hand around her throat. Xander's eyes flashed to her direction. Out of instinct, he brought his pistol level to the smug face of Willow's captor.

"Oh no thank you, I brought my own." The man moved a silver .45 to the redhead's temple.

"Oh God." Xander licked his lips, his breath heavy with his helplessness.

Willow clenched her teeth and tried not to tremble or cry. She curled her hands around the man's wrist to try to alleviate some of the pressure on her throat. "Drop the water pistol Little Boy." He let go of the weapon. "Good." The man leveled the gun to Xander's face.

"Xander," Willow gasped. She stomped her foot down as hard as she could on her captor's toes, at the same time pulling desperately at the hand at her throat. The man pushed her hard to the ground, moving the gun to her. Xander kicked him in the stomach, causing him to drop his gun. This time it was Xander he grasped by the throat. He shoved the boy against the tree, pinning him as Xander clawed at his arm. Willow scrambled on the ground for Xander's discarded weapon. She stood and fired right into his back. The man released him as he lost consciousness. Xander slumped to the ground gasping for breath. Willow crawled up next to him and pulled him into a tight hug.



******


One bulky, tall man and two statuesque women neared Faith's position. She grinned and scrambled up the trunk of the nearest tree. She crept along it's branches until she was directly over their heads. Wordlessly, she dropped from the oak, right atop the threesome. With Slayer-agility, she was first on her feet. Followed by one of the female Watchers, who pulled a knife and smiled. "What is it with you British bitches and knives? Take a nap." Faith drew the tranq pistol from the waistband of her jeans and fired into the woman's chest. As that Watcher dropped, Faith fired into the back of the other woman before she could get up.

The tall man rolled the women off of him, stood looming over the brunette, and grinned. Faith returned the smile and squeezed the trigger. It simply clicked. Faith stared at it a moment. "Damn." The tall man's grin grew wider. Faith dropped the now useless weapon and looked up as he advanced. "Oh well big boy, guess I get to take you down the hard way." He pulled his hand back into a fist. She brought up her arms and arched an eyebrow. "Let's rock and roll." She turned quickly into a spin-kick.



******


The five renegade Watcher's who had headed straight for the darkened little house, reached the front door and kicked it open. As soon as they had all entered, the lights came on and they found themselves face to face with ten members of the Watcher's Council Enforcers, each armed with tranquilizer rifles. Before the renegades had a chance to react, they had each been tagged with a dart and sedated.



******


Buffy and Giles headed for the house as soon as they saw the lights come up. When they reached the threshold, they saw the Enforcers binding the renegades' sleeping bodies. Their leader caught Giles' eye. "Is that all of them?"

Before Giles had a chance to respond, the shrill piercing sound of a little girl's scream broke through the silence of the night. Watcher and Slayer froze and stared at each other.

"The children," Giles said.

Buffy's eyes widened. "The barn!"

They were out the door in a flash, running toward the barn.



******


Faith gave the tall man one last roundhouse to the face. He still wore that same smug grin, minus three more teeth, as he sunk to his knees on the dirt and collapsed. She kicked his sleeping body once more in the ribs for good measure, still pissed off that he had ruined a perfectly good shirt, and ran off into the night towards the sound of the scream.



******


As Buffy and Giles neared the imposing dark structure, Willow and Xander emerged from the bushes to one side of them, also running toward the scream. From the other side, Faith appeared at a full run.

"I don't get it, I thought the kids were outta here?" Faith breathed.

"They should have been," Giles answered.

"Did we not get all the Watchers?" Xander asked.

"We got all the ones we were told about," Buffy stated as they reached the locked double doors of the barn. Together, the Slayers kicked at them and they burst open almost explosively. As the barely lantern lit interior came into their view, the five figures froze at the entrance. Beth, Emmy and Chrissy each carried one of the three infants as they brought up the rear behind the rest of the children. They hurried up the ladder to the loft. Behind them, a group of ten vampires advanced.