Chapter 8(Behind enemy lines)

Xander was worried. He could see the lines enemy trenches stretching out barring the route between them and the line of ally troops in the distance. They were cut off from their own side and the fortification of the enemy line was getting stronger by the minute. More worryingly were the enemy sentries guarding their lines from attacks from within the Sunnydale side of the fortifications. Which meant they knew ally forces had infiltrated them. He should have guessed they would spot the dead demons and move to cut off the bottleneck entry into Sunnydale. Would they send troops to search for ally troops? Most probably. Although to call them troops was a misnomer. Dawn. He couldn't get the image of little Dawnie out of his head for all the fact that she was now 21. Then there were the two vampires who'd be forced to remain in the hut if the enemy came in daytime. He scooted backwards along the dirt trying to avoid the prying eyes of any sentry. Soon he was back at the shack where Dawn was still fruitlessly trying to get the radio to work.

"Yep they know we are here. They've blocked us off all communications."

He said as he poured himself a cup of black coffee. They all digested the news realising that meant they'd be searching for them soon enough if they hadn't started already.

It was dark now, finally. Stelios had waited till now wanting to use the vampires for their noses for scents. He'd been pacing the compound waiting as the sun moved slowly lower in the sky. Now he marched them out, his own skin missing the familiar tingle of the sun on his rough skin. His people had come out of their Sahara homeland and he felt most uncomfortable in this land of earth rather than sand. And now his dear brother was dead and he would lay the first blow that would signal the eradication of humanity. He let his mind focus on the rhythmical beating of feet on earth and waited.

The demons rounded the hill catching sight of the hut. Stelios shouted for them to charge and the horde spilled towards the tin structure. The door gave way to the force of a Fyarl demon's shoulder with minimal resistance and the wall to it fell away as sheer demon weight bombarded it. The horde ripped the fixtures off the wall in frustration at the lack of humans to rip apart. The vampires though were already pointing up the hill where their nostrils were telling them their prey had fled.

Xander trained his rifle on the target, where the path suddenly opened up leaving little protection for requiring it. At least this was one thing he didn't nee two eyes for as he panned the crosshairs across the area using the infrared sight.

"How long's Xander been super soldier?"

Spike asked Dawn in a low voice. She shrugged before replying.

"Every time I've seen him he's been goofy Xander except less goofy ever since Anya."

Just then the first vampire crept into the target area. Xander kept aim waiting for a demon he could actually kill with his rifle.

Lubyius crept forward scared out of his wits. His mind kept on playing tricks on his in this murky light. He'd heard how the last bunch who'd meet these humans had died and didn't want to follow them. He was more of a necro demon whose kind fed on the dead. He had come here to scavenge desperately looking forward to feeding on the dead humans on the battlefield. He didn't want to get dead himself though because somebody else would get to feed on his corpse or even worse it would be left to waste. There was a whizz and a plunk. His chest felt suddenly odd. He looked down to see his green blood oozing out. As his mind registered he'd been shot a second plunk took out his head and his life. The demons scattered desperately throwing themselves to the floor to avoid the flying projectiles. Demons being picked off as they ran around like headless chickens getting in each other's way. Finally Stelios got the remaining demons under shelter and sent the vampires up to deal with the gunman. Spike and Angel sensed them early. The essence of undead plainly evident to their delicate nostrils.

"Vampires they both whispered so that Xander and damn could get their crossbows out. Spike and Angel moved in front of the others knowing that their enhanced strength would finally come into play. These vampires weren't even trying to be subtle. They obviously had no clue that Spike and Angel were among their prey or else they would have tried to be a little bit subtler or you had to hope so. As he got older the more he despaired at vampires. Where were the Angelus', Darlas' and Spikes' of the next generation? He may be on the side of right and goodness but that didn't mean he liked watching the species' rep go down the toilet. They didn't even attempt to surround them, instead favouring a frontal attack. Spike and Angel rose up from hiding and clobbered them. At least a few of them had the good graces to realise who they were facing. One of them even shouting.

"Hey You're Spik…."

Just as Spike staked him. It made him feel all macho that he was still a name in vampire society. A couple tried to flee after their comrades were cut down but Xander and Dawn had moved into position and cut them down with crossbow bolts.

Down Below Stelios howled in anger as he finally realised his vampires had been eradicated.

Above, the crew had come up with a new and dangerous plan. There was no point in staying out and trying to fight whatever remained of the enemy force. They had to try an evade them. The fact two of them were vampires limited the choice to a suicide run across no mans land between enemy and ally lines assuming they even got through enemy lines. The other option was to head for the shelter of the newly constructed Sunnydale. Not a brilliant option but at least they might find out what was going on there and why the demons were building it.

Below Stelios had called for reinforcements to surround the enemy position and was now waiting to daytime to pull to the noose and kill them. His own neck constricted as the boss' presence entered his head. If he failed his won head would be in the noose it said to him. The presence slowly faded but its fiery embers still burned deep inside his skull.

They scurried down the hillside in the dark, skidding down shale slopes and trying to do so quietly. Xander had learnt to do stealth operation. Knew now instinctively where to place his feet to make least noise. He'd started out doing this but now he was just moving with speed. There was no point doing stealthy with Dawn tripping over her feet every couple of minutes. The other two weren't exactly brilliant either for that matter but Dawn hadn't seemed to have grown out of her clumsiness. It was nice knowing she was still Dawn, he half wished he was still Xander trailing behind trying not to screw up. The natural Shaggy of the group, but now he was taking the lead. Maybe he should have got himself a dog instead of going into black ops. Maybe he could have accepted his Shaggy existence if he'd had a Scooby Doo at his side. Then again Scooby was cool because he could talk and Fido or Rover wasn't because they couldn't.

They reached the first building, crouching beside it maintaining a deathly silence. The sound of feet marching to a beat got closer. Demons marched past wheeling away from them and towards where they'd come from. They'd just missed being the jam in a demon jammy dodger. Xander left the door to Spike to pick as he checked out the building itself. The buildings had been hurriedly put up. They didn't even have windows and there were gaping holes where the brickwork didn't meet. The construction worker in Xander was appalled by the shoddy workmanship. Why build houses anyway and then when you do why make such a bad job of it? There had to be something they were missing. It didn't make any sense at all. The door opened with a click as Spike triggered the lock. They sneaked inside looking out for sentries all they found was emptiness. The only things inside were the odd roof support buried into the mud floor. No they were wrong. There was a hatch in the middle of the room. There was no lock on it but it wouldn't come free no matter how much force they applied. It was a circular bronze construct with runes raced all around it in a concentric circular pattern.

"We've seen this pattern before."

Angel said, a low whisper but traces of frustrated anger clearly present.

"Yeah when we escaped our prison we escaped through a hatch like this."

Spike explained, running his hand across the bobbly metal surface. It was warm to the touch with a chilly aftertaste. Not that something warm having a cold aftertaste made any sense but then magic and mystical things rarely followed the rules of nature. Several more houses later and they were sitting in an identical looking house with an exactly similar portal.

"Suppose you need some sort of key."

Angel said more to himself than to anyone else giving it one last hopeless tug.

They all tensed at the sound of feet heard passing by. Through a hall between the bricks they saw lines of vampires passing by into a nearby hut. Flashes of amber flared at regular intervals till it all went quiet. They all crept across to the building the vampires had disappeared and entered cautiously. It was empty just like the others. Spike walked across to the portal and gave it a half hearted tug. He turned to say something sarcy but found himself underground. Above everyone stood in shock at Spike's disappearance. Xander gave the portal a tentative tug waiting for something to happen but nothing did. Angel walked up saying.

"Maybe it's a vampire thing."

As he laid his hand on the hatch handle and found himself next to Spike.

"Yep, definite vampire thing."

He said to a bemused Spike and strode ahead to study their surroundings.