Chapter 15: Death Takes a Halliwell Part 1

March 25, 2002

"Buffy…Buffy…"

Buffy groaned and swatted at the hand that was disturbing her rest. Undaunted, Faith kept up with her self-appointed task, nudging her girlfriend until Buffy finally opened her eyes and glared at her.

"What?" Buffy growled, still half-asleep.

"It's nearly noon."

Blearily, Buffy glanced at the clock. It was, indeed, quarter till noon. But that didn't explain why Faith was so insistent she wake up. Their lives were usually so hectic, a few extra minutes of sleep when time allowed were usually not frowned upon.

"So?" Buffy muttered, closing her eyes again.

"So, we're supposed to meet Prue, Phoebe and Dawn in an hour."

This time, Buffy's eyes flew open with no further prompting.

0 – 0 – 0 – 0 – 0

Two hours later, Buffy and Faith sat on the beach watching as Phoebe built a sand castle which, as Prue pointed out, would be washed away 'in about five seconds flat.' Buffy had debated using the setting as a place to finally propose to Faith, but now that she was here, she was getting a case of the nerves. It didn't help that Prue didn't seem to be in good frame of mind.

"What's with the ba-hum castle attitude there?" Phoebe said having noticed something was going on with Prue as well.

Prue looked slightly distracted. "What?"

"The whole point of today was to relax and have fun," Phoebe reminded her sister.

"Aunt Phoebe is right," agreed Dawn.

"See, and I thought the point was to give Piper and Leo some alone married people time since they decided to wait on their honeymoon," Prue quipped.

"Okay," Phoebe hedged. "So, you're sure nothing's wrong?"

Busted. Prue looked a little bit like a deer in the headlights, and she looked away as she admitted, "The beach isn't exactly my idea of a good time."

"Why not, mom?" asked Buffy.

Prue sighed. "This is where Grams brought Piper, Phoebe and I after Mom's funeral to try and cheer us up."

'Oh," thought Buffy with a sigh. Maybe she shouldn't have suggested they come here.

"Wow," Phoebe breathed.

"Yeah. You know, but I didn't want to ruin it for the two of you," Prue said looking at her daughters, "but something about the sand and the ocean makes me feel angry." She gestured to their surroundings.

"Why does it make you angry?" Phoebe had a degree in psychology; maybe she could help.

"Doesn't Mom's death make you angry?" Prue asked, perplexed, looking at her sister.

Phoebe shook her head. "It makes me sad."

Prue snorted. "Well, I don't do 'sad' that well, you know. I didn't even cry at her funeral."

"So, seeing Grandma Patty at Aunt Piper's wedding and now the beach…" Dawn theorized.

"Yeah. So, I'm sorry if I've been a little cranky," Prue apologized.

"Say no more. Princess Prue has spoken!" Phoebe yelled, returning to her previously-playful attitude, and earned a smile from her nieces, Faith and Prue. "By the order of the Queen, that's me…"

"Oh, we got that part," Faith rolled her eyes.

"Phoebeville, and all of its glory, will be abandoned for greater pastures and five lattes," Phoebe declared.

"Oh, all hail the Queen," Buffy, Dawn and Prue readily agreed as Faith laughed.

They turned to make their way back up to the parking lot, and that was when Prue spotted her. There was a woman standing at the top, snapping photos of either them or the scenery. She stopped once Prue spotted her, and the two stared at each other. Or rather, the woman stared at Prue, while Prue stared at the figure behind her. It wasn't really a figure, so much as a big, dark shadow, and it was definitely not a trick of the imagination. Not knowing what else to do, Prue snapped a picture of it for future reference. The woman took off.

"Hey! No, no, no, wait!" shouted Prue.

"You okay?" Phoebe asked, alarmed.

Prue pointed at the place where the woman and the shadow had just been standing. "There was this woman and there was a shadow next to her. It had to be demonic."

"A shadow?" Phoebe's breath caught, her mind flashing back to her recently-rediscovered childhood nightmare. "Like, what do you mean? Like a Woogy?"

"No, spookier, way spookier," admitted Prue. "I think I got pictures, though."

"So much for the lattes," Dawn sighed. "Looks like there's a new demon in town."

0 – 0 – 0 – 0 – 0

They were sorely disappointed when they got back to the manor. Prue's photos, as they turned out, showed nothing except the woman. No shadow, not even a distortion. Even worse, there was nothing in the book. The only thing they could do was contact Darryl to see if he could track down the mysterious woman. Buffy and Faith were heading to do just that when the doorbell rang. Phoebe answered it. Their visitor was Inspector Reese Davidson, DA Bureau of Investigations, and he didn't look happy.

"Inspector, how can I help you?"

"You can tell me where to find Cole Turner," Davidson ordered. "I know he's alive and I know he's in town."

Phoebe's breath caught, and she was sure he didn't miss it. How did Davidson know Cole was back? "Really?" she feigned surprise.

Unsurprisingly, Davidson didn't buy it. "Yeah, really. You wanna know how?" he hissed, taking a step closer. Phoebe leaned back, but didn't allow him entry into the manor. "Because his former landlady was found brutally murdered at this address." He showed it to her. It was Cole's old apartment.

"Mrs. Owens," Phoebe breathed, thinking back to the nosy but kind older woman she had met. "That's awful."

"Awful like you can't imagine," Davidson sneered.

"Uh, Cole didn't do this," Phoebe tried to convince him. "The Cole Turner I know…"

Davidson pounced on her, figuratively if not literally. "The Cole Turner you know. See, now that just doesn't sound like the words of a woman who claims her boyfriend left her without a word four months ago."

She continued trying, "I know what you're thinking, and I know what this looks like, and I am so sorry for what happened to…"

The inspector cared little for words he felt were insincere, and didn't let her finish. Aghast, he hissed, "You're sorry?" Phoebe stepped back a little at his venom; he was really, truly angry and he proved it by giving her a description of the crime scene. "Her eyes were frozen open in terror, her skull punctured in two places, and by the time the police got there, most of her brain had spilled out onto the floor. Be sick, be horrified, but don't stand there lying to me and say you're sorry."

Phoebe noticed that Faith and Buffy glanced at each other at the mention of twin puncture marks. She knew instantly what they were thinking, it sounded like vampires or something similar. And that whether it was vampires or demons they were after Cole and had found his landlady instead.

"Alright, wait a second," Buffy cut in. "You're talking to Aunt Phoebe like she did it."

Davidson glared at her. "If she's lying to protect Turner, then she might as well have." He turned back to Phoebe, getting right in her face. "Now, for the last time, where is he?" Phoebe said nothing; there was nothing she could say. Davidson shook his head disgustedly. He threatened, "I'm going to find him, Miss Halliwell, and then I'm going to bust his ass, and then I'm going to bust yours."

They watched him leave in a fury.

"You okay?" Faith asked.

Phoebe looked at Faith remembering the story she, Dawn, Prue and Buffy had told her and Piper about where she had been and why for two years. Out of all of them she knew Faith knew what it was like to be accused of murder, even though the first death was accidental. "He didn't do it," she said, in earnest. "I know he didn't do it."

"We believe you," said Buffy. "That said though it's not us, Dawn, mom or Piper you have to convince."

"Prue!" said Faith as she looked out the window. Davidson was with the woman from the beach. "The woman from the beach."

Prue came from the living room and Faith motioned toward the window. She looked and saw Davidson talking to the woman, and the shadow was following them. "Oh my God," she pointed, and Buffy, Faith and Phoebe looked. "Alright, look, do any of you see it?"

Buffy, Faith and Phoebe saw nothing but Davidson, the woman, and a car. "No. All I see is Inspector Davidson and a woman," said Phoebe.

"Same," said Buffy and Faith.

"What does this mean? Is he having her follow us?" asked Phoebe.

"I'm more concerned about what's following her," Prue told her. "I don't understand why you three can't see it."

"That doesn't matter, Mom, you can." Buffy said they watched the two get into the car.

"Do you think this has anything to do with the landlady's death?" Phoebe looking at Buffy and Faith.

"It would be a pretty big coincidence if it didn't," Buffy pointed out.

"Alright, I'm going to follow her to protect her from it. If I'm the only one who can see it, that must mean I'm meant to fight it," said Prue.

"I'll go with you," offered Buffy as Prue nodded.

Phoebe looked at her niece. "Alright, but by the way the Inspector was describing the murder…" she trailed off, knowing Buffy would know what she meant.

Buffy did. "I know, we'll be careful. Have Dawn portal you to Cole, tell him what happened."

"And see if he knows anything about this shadow thing," added Prue.

Buffy and Prue left, driving off in Prue's car.

"Dawn!" called Phoebe as Dawn came down the stairs. "I need you to take me to Cole."

"I'll come with you two, just in case," said Faith. "If something is after Cole…"

"Thanks, Faith," said Phoebe.

0 – 0 – 0 – 0 – 0

Prue pulled her car up behind Reese's car. She and Buffy watched as Reese and the woman talked. The woman eventually got out and walked into the building alone. Prue and Buffy got out and followed her in.

0 – 0 – 0 – 0 – 0

Cole was doing what he now spent most of his time doing—moving through different planes to dodge bounty hunters—when he felt it. Although he couldn't sense witches nearly as well as demons, he could sense Phoebe. More specifically, he was getting good enough to where he could sense if when she wanted him. Right now, he was feeling that distinctive pull. He willingly followed it.

Unsurprisingly, it led him straight to their preferred meeting place—the mausoleum. Phoebe came up to him, greeting him a, "Hey, baby," and a kiss. Again, Cole returned willingly returned both greetings, but he quickly pulled away. He noticed Faith and Dawn standing behind her. He instantly knew whatever had caused Phoebe to summon him to the mausoleum was urgent or she would have come alone.

"What's wrong?" he asked.

"Your landlady was murdered," Phoebe told him. She described the shadow figure, the murder of his former landlady and Davidson's accusations against them both. If Davidson continued his investigation…

"I better get out of here," Cole immediately decided.

"What? Why?" Phoebe demanded.

"Because it's getting too dangerous," Cole explained. He didn't want to leave, but this was his battle. He knew that Faith and the Halliwell's, both those by blood and adoption, could hold their own against supernatural foes, but he wasn't sure they could handle that and a mortal one. There was too much at stake here.

"So, you're just going to disappear again?" Phoebe was getting angry. If this was Cole's response every time there was danger, their newfound relationship was in trouble.

"If that's what it takes to keep you safe," Cole stated simply.

"What about keeping me sane, Cole?" Phoebe asked, exasperatedly. She was never going to be safe, and the sooner he got over that, the better. Sane was all they could hope for. "I'm not going to lose you again."

"Some demon obviously knows I'm alive or at least suspects that. Why else would they have killed my landlady?" Cole ran his hand through his hair. "And if they killed her, they'll kill anyone they have to, to get to me."

"That is exactly why you cannot leave." Phoebe reminded herself that Cole was used to fending for himself, to working alone. Well, that wasn't how it would work with them. "We have to stop them before they hurt anybody else. Before they hurt you."

"Cole," said Dawn. "You are a part of this family, even if you aren't married to Aunt Phoebe."

Cole looked at Dawn and Faith. "They're after me, this is my battle. I'll handle it." He started to walk away.

Phoebe wasn't letting him leave that easily. "Cole," she called, and he stopped, turning back around to look at her. "I love you, and if holding onto that means I have to fight a couple of extra demons along the way, then bring 'em on."

"The same goes for me," agreed Dawn.

"And me as well," said Faith. "You mean a lot to Phoebe, which means you mean a lot to Buffy. Which means you mean a lot to me."

Cole looked at the three women and nodded.

0 – 0 – 0 – 0 – 0

The woman walked into Reese's office and found a man there.

"Oh my God," the woman said frightened to find anyone there. "Oh, you startled me. Uh, are you waiting for Inspector Davidson?"

"Are you expecting him?" the man asked.

"Uh, not tonight, he's in the field."

"Where?" the man asked.

"I'm sorry," she said as she noticed another man behind her. "I don't know."

"Are you sure about that?" he asked just as the second man grabbed her from behind and sunk his teeth into her skull. She managed to let out a startled scream before she crumpled in his arms. He let her fall to the floor. "What did she know?"

"Nothing," the second man said. "She told me nothing."

"Which means he definitely knows something," the man said as the door flew open as Prue and Buffy burst into the room. They watch him and the second man disappear.

"Buffy," Prue said as she noticed the shadow floating above the woman's body. She raised her hands and telekinetically moved a vase instead of the shadow.

The shadow solidified into human form. "I'm beyond your powers," he said. He looked down at the woman's body. "It's time."

"Where is he?" Buffy asked as the woman's spirit rose out of her body.

"Who are you?" Prue asked ignoring her daughter's question.

"I'm Death," Death said. "And I'll be back."

0 – 0 – 0 – 0 – 0

Not too long after their meeting in the mausoleum, Dawn, Faith, Phoebe and Cole stepped out of a portal inside his apartment.

Phoebe saw the blood stain. "Oh, God."

"You okay?" Cole asked. "Try not to touch anything, you don't want to leave your finger prints."

"What if I want to get a premonition?" Phoebe asked.

"Use the back of your hand," he told her.

Phoebe followed his advice, touching various objects while Faith, Dawn and Cole looked around the apartment. He went into the bedroom, Faith into the kitchen and Dawn the bathroom.

"Did you find something?" Phoebe asked, coming into the bedroom.

"Just this place. It's strange to be back here," Cole commented as he looked around the room.

Phoebe leaned her head against his shoulder. "I know. It's strange to be back here too."

"This was the first taste I had of a normal life," Cole explained. "There were mornings I'd wake up next to you and I didn't feel evil. I was just a guy in love with a beautiful girl. I wanted it so much. I started to believe that lie."

"That's not a lie anymore," Phoebe told him, smiling. "We can have that. We can have a life together."

"Aunt Phoebe's right." They turned and saw Dawn standing in the doorway. "Look at what happened to Buffy and what she has now."

Cole smiled.

As she slowly moved away from him, Phoebe's hand brushed against a lamp. She gasped as her mind was violently ripped from the room they were in and into a place that was dark and gray. A mausoleum. Inspector Reese Davidson was there, only long enough to be killed by what she would swear looked like a vampire. Prue, too, was nearby. She watched as the man was killed. She did nothing.

The air exploded out of her lungs and Phoebe stumbled as she came out of the vision. Cole and Dawn were right there. They were concerned.

"What did you see?" Cole asked.

"Prue, she turned her back," Phoebe cried. Desperately, she asked, "Why didn't she do anything to stop them?"

"Stop who?" Dawn asked.

"They looked like vampires," Phoebe thought back over her vision, cringing away from its viciousness. "But they were floating. They were killing Davidson."

"Dracula is the only one to have powers and he got them from a Romani," said Dawn. "So, it's likely not a vampire but a demon."

Cole recognized her description. They weren't vampires—right now, as far as he was concerned, they were worse. "They're seekers. They have ways of gathering information fast." By ripping it directly out of their chosen victim's brain. "Really fast."

"Do you know how to vanquish them?" Phoebe asked anxiously.

"No," Cole admitted. He had never dealt with a seeker before.

"Then let's hope the Book of Shadows does," Faith suggested.

Now that they had what they had come for—knowledge of who and what had killed Mrs. Owens—Dawn portaled them the Manor. Once there, Phoebe brought the Book of Shadows down to the much comfier living room and began flipping through it. The seekers were easy to find. She pointed to the page.

"Here it is. The seekers. They gather information by feeding on their victims' brain stem cells. Lovely," she remarked sarcastically.

"Which means that my landlady must have talked to Inspector Davidson about me, that's why they're after him," Cole said. "Does it say anything about demons taking on shadow form?"

"No, but it does have a vanquish. Want to see it?" Phoebe held the Book up to him.

Cole quickly got up and moved away, wanting to put as much distance between himself and the Book of Shadows as possible without actually leaving the room. "Oh, no, no, no," he shook his head. "Last time I touched that book, it electrocuted me."

Faith took the Book from Phoebe and laughed. "If doing evil gets you electrocuted it should hate me. But it doesn't."

Cole held his hands up. "Better safe than sorry."

At that moment, Buffy and Prue walked in. They looked…defeated.

"Alright, I need the Book," Prue declared. Then she noticed Cole. Feeling slightly outraged, she demanded, "Wait a second, what is he doing here next to it?"

"Keeping my distance, don't worry," Cole reassured her.

Prue looked like she was about to say something else, but Phoebe interrupted her. "Uh, pardon the potential understatement of a cliché, but you two looks like you've seen a ghost."

"We lost mom's innocent," said Buffy.

"Davidson?" Cole asked.

"No, his partner. She was out of our sight for two seconds and then they got her," Prue sank down at the coffee table.

Faith moved over to Buffy and showed her lover the Book. "Is that them?"

Buffy looked at the page, the demons on it certainly looked familiar. "Yeah, I think so."

Faith looked at Phoebe and nodded as she handed the Book back to Phoebe.

"They're demonic lie detectors," Phoebe explained. "Only no one survives their test."

"They killed Mrs. Owens and now they're after Davidson," Cole added.

Prue gave him a hard, chilling look. "To get to you?" she asked pointedly.

"Yes, to get to me," Cole admitted. Prue's unspoken accusation that he was to blame for this hung heavy in the air, and everyone was silent for a moment. Finally, Cole turned back to Phoebe and said, "Maybe I should deal with this on my own."

Phoebe shook her head. "No, you can't. You said it yourself. You don't know how to vanquish them."

"Unfortunately, this isn't the only evil we're up against either," Prue remembered. She grudging accepted that they might still need Cole's help.

"You mean the shadow?" Dawn asked.

"Yeah." Prue turned back towards the empty entryway, calling, "Leo! Leo!"

Leo and Piper appeared in a swirl of bright, white orbs. Brighter still was the… lamp? ...that Leo carried in his hand.

"What's with the lamp?" Faith asked.

"Bright, isn't it?" Piper commented. It was obvious that she didn't like it.

"Uh, yeah." Prue brushed it off, and moved on to the real reason she had called her sister and brother-in-law back down to Earth. "Leo, is there such a thing as Death? I mean, the Angel of Death?"

"Yeah, sure. Why?" Leo asked.

"Because I met him," Prue stated.

"You mean you and Buffy met him," said Dawn.

"No, I couldn't see him," said Buffy.

"That's how the shadow introduced himself to me when he took Davidson's partner," Prue explained quickly. "And then he said he would be back, too, Buffy and I are assuming for Davidson."

If that was true…Cole sighed inwardly. "He's not working with the demons," he informed them matter-of-factly.

"No, he can't be," Leo agreed. "The Angel of Death isn't evil."

Prue snorted. "The hell he isn't. And if I can see him, that must mean I'm supposed to stop him."

"Prue, you can't stop him," Leo put in. "The Angel of Death always gets what he comes for."

Prue brushed him off. "Yeah, well, not this time. Alright, I need to get a hold of Davidson. If I can get him here, I can protect him better."

Piper, however, stopped her. "Hold it. Davidson? As in, Reese Davidson, the DA investigator? He's the innocent?"

"Yeah, is that a problem?" Buffy asked.

"One great big giant one. We can't protect him without telling him we're witches or that you and Faith are Slayers, Buffy," Piper exclaimed.

"Yeah, we know that, Piper, but I don't care, okay?" Prue took a deep breath. "I cannot stand by and watch death take that man."

"But that's what you do," Phoebe interjected quietly. She explained, "At least, according to my premonition. You turn your back when the demons attack."

"That makes no sense," said Buffy. "Why would mom turn her back on a demon."

"I'm not going to let Death take any more of my innocents," Prue added. "I'm tired of losing people. So, Phoebe, do you have Davidson's card?"

Phoebe left the room to get it. Cole quietly excused himself, wandering out into the hallway. He needed to get to Davidson first so the man couldn't expose them all. Once he was sure no one was looking, Cole shimmered.