Buffy stood, not even bothering to keep a hold of Spike. Spike stood as well, brushing himself off and trying to look indignant, but managing to look no less rattled than the humans around him. Each was taking a mental inventory of their weaponry and coming up with the same dismal result. They had nothing. The weapons they would have brought were discarded in the disarray of the school library. Buffy wasn't sure that a twig and shear anger were going to be enough to get them through the next fight. What was equally clear, however, was that they didn't have time to go back to the library to retrieve the weapons.

"Okay, Spike. You want to save the world?" Buffy said. "Here's your chance. Do you have weapons nearby? Anything? Swords? Axes?" Buffy tried to wrack her mind for what else was in the library. "Crossbows?" Spike rolled his eyes and it looked for a moment like he was not going to help them. Spike was pondering how he ended up in this situation, aiding a group of teenage humans save the world from demons. At last he shrugged his shoulder.

"Yeah. I got a stash a little way from here. You lot stay here. I don't need you all knowing where everything is." Spike started to walk off, but Buffy caught his arm.

"Not a chance." Spike looked about to resist, but the look in her eye gave him pause. It was a look that tolerated no argument. Nevermind, Spike thought. It was easy enough to move the stash to another location. Besides, he couldn't care weapons enough for them all without help.

"Fine," he said. He started off again, this time with Buffy in tow. "You know I'm just doing this so I can eat you lot later."

"Whatever."

While the others stayed concealed near the cave entrance, Spike and Buffy made their way back through the woods toward one of Sunnydale's cemeteries. Spike led Buff y to one of the crypts and pushed the door open with the toe of his boot. The inside was dirty and the air smelled stale. Somehow the smell of putrefying flesh was comforting to Buffy. That thought was somehow more disturbing to Buffy than the fact that she was crawling around a graveyard in the dark with a vampire collecting medieval weapons to kill an army of demons intent on destroying the human race.

"Original." She commented.

"Don't get cheeky, Slayer." Spike said. "When this is over you and I are going to have a very different meeting." Early in the week that thought would have been almost paralyzing to Buffy, but now all of this was starting to seem normal to her. Spike lifted the top of a large crate. Buffy could see it contained a stash of weapons. Spike began handing Buffy weapons. She took a mental inventory of what they had and assigned each person a weapon. She picked out swords 

for Giles and Willow and an axe for Xander. She couldn't really imagine what Cordelia could use. Finally she decided on a sword. There should be enough demons she can just swing and should be able to hit something, Buffy thought somewhat morosely. For herself she chose a well-balanced shortsword. She tucked the twig she had broken off the tree earlier into the sleeve of her jacket. Spike grabbed a battle axe and a couple of smaller knives which he stuck in his belt. They balanced their arsenal as best as they could and ran.

When they returned to the spot near the cave, they found the group waiting in the shadows of the trees. "What took you so long?" Xander asked. Buffy showed him the weapons with a wry expression. Mentally, Xander smacked himself. "Right." He said.

"OK." Buffy said, "This is the plan. Spike and I go in first. You guys follow after." The Scoobies nodded, frightened, but committed.

"Then we start hitting things." Spike said with satisfaction. Buffy ignored him and handed out the weapons to the others. Only Giles seemed comfortable with his weapon. He swung the heavy sword deftly with his hand feeling the weight of it and the way it moved as an extension of his arm. Xander, Willow, and Cordelia all looked significantly less comfortable with their weapons. Yet, somehow they didn't look entirely unnatural. It was a feeling Buffy had become all too familiar with, the feeling that the abnormal was normal.

"Right," Spike said once everyone was armed. "Let the violence ensue."