The vampire went for Buffy, who sidestepped him and shoved him into a truck parked in the alley. He tried to kick her, but she blocked it and returned with a more powerful kick of her own, which knocked him flat on the ground. She dove at him, stake raised and ready, but he held her off and they struggled violently.
This had all happened very fast, and Faith hadn't gotten more than a couple of steps towards helping Buffy when they were joined by a second vampire. The newcomer bore down on her as she struggled to draw the bow in the limited space, but it was no good. "Screw it!" she growled to herself, dropping the bow and raising the arrow to use as a stake.
The two Slayers managed to dispatch their opponents within a couple of seconds of each other, but it wasn't over yet. They had barely started moving again when a third Eliminatus appeared. Even with his sword, however, he was no match for two Slayers, and he had soon joined his fellows as dust. But now Buffy and Faith were really on edge. Every shadow might conceal another enemy; every sound might herald an approaching foe. When a hand suddenly reached out of nowhere and grabbed Buffy by the shoulder, therefore, Faith reacted instinctively. As she threw the owner of the hand against the dumpster and he crumpled to the ground, Buffy realized with a jolt of recognition that it was only Allan Finch, the deputy mayor—the human deputy mayor.
"Faith, no!" she shouted, but her cry came too late. Faith had already plunged her stake into the man's chest—into his heart. Buffy rushed to his side, her own heart pounding frantically. Faith stepped back, wide-eyed.
"Don't move!" Buffy told him, her voice coming out slightly squeaky with hysteria. He couldn't die. He wouldn't. He wasn't a demon. They only killed demons.
"I didn't—I didn't know," Faith stammered in protest, both mind and body frozen with shock. "I didn't know."
"We need to call nine-one-one," said Buffy urgently. "Now!" But Faith didn't move. She couldn't. This couldn't be real. Blood was pouring thick and fast from the wound in Allan's chest, staining his crisp white shirt crimson. The color was rapidly leaving his terrified face, and he was shaking. "Don't move," Buffy told him again, "i-it's okay." She pressed her hands to the wound, but the blood kept coming. "I-I need—I need something to stop the…." Her voice trailed away when Allan began to convulse, his eyes widening in fear and blood trickling from his mouth. There was nothing Buffy could do but watch, horror and panic drowning out any coherent thought, as Allan lifted his arm, trying to reach out to her. He never make it. His arm dropped limply to his side and his body wilted and was still. Something dimmed behind his eyes, which remained wide open.
[o]
The silence was as absolute as death, and seemed to last an eternity. Buffy couldn't move; couldn't think—she could only look into the empty eyes of the dead man before her.
Eventually, the terrible trance was shattered by a noise in the distance, and Faith jerked back to alertness. "We've gotta go," she said, grabbing Buffy's shoulder. Buffy barely felt her hand. She was still trying to understand what had happened. "Come on! We've gotta go!" Faith said, much more loudly this time, tugging Buffy's arm so hard that she had no choice but to follow.
They ran. When they reached the corner, Buffy made to look back, but Faith grabbed her again. "Come on!" she said, forcing her back around, but she didn't wait for her to follow this time, and ran ahead and hopped a stack of crates and over a low wall. Buffy looked around and saw a chain-link fence, which she vaulted over and kept running. Finally, when several streets were between her and Allan's body, she slowed to a walk, but she had no sooner done so than a figure emerged from the shadows to her left.
"Angel!" she said, startled.
"Buffy," he replied, looking preoccupied, tense, and angry. "I've been looking for you." He couldn't say anything else before she had launched herself, trembling, into his arms. "What's wrong?" he asked, automatically pulling her close and momentarily forgetting his reason for seeking her, but she shook her head against his chest and didn't reply.
Angel suddenly became aware that he could smell blood, and he gently pulled her loose and turned her wrists so that he could see her palms, which both gleamed with the source of the smell. He let go of her hands and looked up at her face, but she wouldn't meet his eyes. Something was very wrong. But hopefully not so wrong that it couldn't be dealt with later—and, in any case, she looked like she needed something to distract her. He only wished it was something less upsetting. "I've just been to the warehouse," he said, his hands clenching into fists. "I was waiting for you. They got Wes and Giles, but there are too many of them for me to take out alone."
Buffy looked up at him, alarmed. "Let's go," she said.
[o]
Wesley was quite certain that he'd never seen anything as repugnant in his entire life as the demon in front of him. If he ever met the man who wrote the book stating that Balthazar was dead, he was going to beat him over the head with it. Repeatedly. Assuming, of course, that he even made it out of this alive, and the chances of that didn't look particularly good from where he was standing. He and Mr. Giles were surrounded by vampires, their hands were bound rather painfully tightly with ropes, and, he suspected, the only reason they weren't already dead was that Balthazar knew they knew where his amulet was.
As he watched one of the vampires pour water over Balthazar's many folds of blubbery flesh, Wesley didn't know whether he was going to faint or vomit first, but both seemed inevitable. Astonishingly, Mr. Giles, though also revolted, seemed rather bored by the proceedings. Was this what the daily life of a Watcher in the field was like, then? Why on Earth had he ever signed up for this?
"Oh, God!" he said, so tensed up that he thought he'd probably remain upright if he actually did faint. "Oh, God!"
"Doesn't seem too promising, does it?" said Mr. Giles.
"Stay calm, Mr. Giles," he said, though he himself was already the farthest from calm that he could get. "We have to stay calm."
"Well, thank God you're here," said Mr. Giles sarcastically, "I was beginning to panic."
Wesley glared reproachfully at him. Was he this irritable with everyone, or was it just special treatment he reserved for him? But then again, he supposed, he had taken the man's job. Perhaps that did merit irritability even though they were on the same side.
"Bring them closer," said Balthazar, jolting Wesley out of his mental segue and back into the very unpleasant here and now. The two vampires holding them shoved them forward until they were mere feet away from the tank in which Balthazar sat.
"You know what I want," he said.
"If it's for me to scrub those hard-to-reach areas," said Mr. Giles, "I'd like to request you kill me now." The vampire behind him growled at his insolence and dealt a powerful blow to his shoulder, making him stumble. "Ow," he said.
"Are you out of your mind?" asked Wesley, his voice slightly higher than usual. "This is hardly the time for games!"
"Why not?" asked Mr. Giles, still, incredibly, sounding bored. "They're going to torture us to death anyway."
"You're not wrong about that," Balthazar snickered happily.
Mustering every ounce of courage he possessed, though he was still paralyzed by fear, Wesley jutted out his chin and glared at the morbidly obese demon. "You and your minions are no match for our friends. They won't be terribly happy with you if we're killed."
"Would these be the friends who have my amulet?" asked Balthazar shrewdly. Giles groaned.
"You'll never get it back if you kill us," said Wesley, his voice climbing still higher in spite of his efforts to sound forceful and intimidating.
"I suppose that's true," said Balthazar, but the relief Wesley felt from these words was short-lived. "Pull off his kneecaps!"
"NO!" cried Wesley, his brave front completely evaporating as two vampires closed in on him.
"Then tell me who has my amulet!" said Balthazar, flailing his flabby arms in agitation.
"You don't stand a chance against him!" said Wesley.
"Be quiet, you twerp!" hissed Mr. Giles. "You think threats will stop them from killing us? The second they find out what they want to know, we're dead!"
"You will tell us everything!" roared Balthazar. Wesley looked at him apprehensively. "What is this friend's name?"
Wesley remained defiantly silent, though he felt his knees quaking beneath him.
"Look, erm," said Mr. Giles, "tell you what. Let Captain Courageous here go, and I'll tell you what you need to know. How's that deal?"
"THERE IS ONE DEAL! YOU WILL DIE QUICKLY, OR YOU WILL DIE SLOWLY! THE MAN WHO HAS MY AMULET! WHAT IS HIS NAME?"
"His name is Angel."
Wesley actually smiled at the sound of the familiar voice, and turned to see Angel striding into the midst of their captors, his demonic features contorted in fury. He seized the vampires holding Wesley and Mr. Giles and sent one hurtling into the wall and the other into a set of metal shelves.
It was only then, as he watched Angel fight, that it occurred to Wesley that the ensouled vampire might not have been giving one hundred percent when he fought in the tournament. Then, he had only been fighting to protect himself—and the audience, in the case of his fight against Erebus—, but now he was fighting because the man who had done so much for him had been threatened. The result was that he had become a juggernaut against which the Eliminati had no hope of prevailing.
Wesley was so transfixed by Angel's battle that he was only barely aware of the fact that Buffy had joined the fray, that Balthazar had completely given himself over to a tantrum, or that Mr. Giles, whose bonds had been cut by Buffy, had untied the ropes binding his hands. It was only when Balthazar, by then one of very few enemies in the warehouse who hadn't fled or been killed, raised his hands and telekinetically pulled Angel towards him, that Wesley did more than stare. "Angel!" he shouted, running towards the enormous demon without the slightest idea of how he was supposed to fight him.
Fortunately, he didn't have to. His shout had alerted Buffy to the danger, and she yanked the chords supporting the buzzing light fixture, sending it crashing into Balthazar's tank. As electricity surged through the demon's bloated body, Angel was able to break free of his grip. He, Wesley, Buffy, and Giles all watched as electric sparks danced across Balthazar's skin, which smoked and turned red.
Buffy ran to Angel to make sure he was okay, and they hugged tightly.
"Well, I must say," said Wesley in an admirable attempt at his usual pompous manner, "that was quite an advent—" But the end of his sentence was cut off by Balthazar jerking back to life, and the young Englishman jumped so violently that he almost fell over.
"Slayer!" wheezed Balthazar. "You think you've won. When he rises, you'll wish I'd killed you all." On that ominous note, he died, and the Watchers, vampire, and Slayer all exchanged uneasy glances.
Okay, I realize that this one was yet another chapter with very little deviation from canon, but there was really no way I could cut Allan's death scene. Besides, it was a very intriguing scene to go at from within the characters' minds. And then we've got Buffy reacting a little more emotionally when she runs into Angel than in canon, which I think makes sense given how he still hasn't been back for very long and she's not going to pass up an opportunity to be comforted by him even if he doesn't exactly seem prepared to offer comfort at the moment. Also, I hope it was clear that Angel wasn't angry at her; he was angry at the vamps who had taken Wesley and frustrated that he probably couldn't handle them all by himself. Okay, at this point, I think they're more like brothers than friends, which is just awesome. And Wesley! Gah. Once again, he was ridiculously fun to write. I think I'm actually having more fun writing him than Buffy and Angel. Odd. Aaand...I think I'm done now.
