See previous part for Disclaimer, etc.
January 6, 1997
6:50 PM
A block from the Bronze
Great, a stalker. My day just can't get any weirder Buffy thought as she darted into a alleyway and looked around for a hiding place. She'd noticed a tall figure dressed in black following her, as she made her way to the Bronze to meet with Xander, about a block back. Idly, Buffy wondered how long he had been following her. Her mind hadn't exactly been on focusing her enhanced Slayer senses like it should have been in a town supposedly swarming with vamps. No, she'd been thinking about all the crazy and unbelievable crap that had happened at her first day of school. A time traveler who knows all about me, a new Watcher, and the end of the world. Just another day in the life of Buffy Summers she mused.
Looking around the narrow alley, Buffy tried not to breath through her nose and inhale the less than savory scent common to dirty alleys everywhere. There was a grating of metal on metal as her appearance frightened a stray cat from its perch on a not-quite-closed garbage can, but otherwise, silence reigned. Looking up, Buffy spotted a sturdy looking metal bar about nine feet above the ground connected to the buildings on either side of the alley. She smirked as she decided to use a little of her Slayer agility to surprise her stalker. Taking a few steps back, Buffy took a running jump at the bar, and grabbing it, let her momentum carry herself around it. When she had spun 180 degrees around, she straightened herself out fully, slowing herself into a wobbly handstand on the bar. Buffy quickly righted herself and waited for her tail to show himself.
The sound of quiet footfalls alerted Buffy to the fact that her stalker was approaching, and she saw him scan the alley before walking into it. The man was dressed entirely in black, from the trenchcoat down to his shoes. His hair was dark and slicked into spikiness and he had dreary dark eyes sunk into his skull. Not bad to look at, if he weren't a creepy stalker and probably a vampire He didn't notice her as he walked under her perch, and Buffy pushed herself forward, spinning around the bar behind the stranger's back until she connected with a solid kick that sent him sprawling. He managed to roll onto his back before Buffy was on him, pushing him back to the ground with a foot on his chest. The stalker let out a loud sigh when he saw her, and spoke in a deep voice.
"Ah, heh. Is there a problem ma'am?" he asked with a slight smile.
Rolling her eyes, Buffy responded, "Yeah, there's a problem. Why are you following me?"
Putting his hands over his head in mock surrender, her second mystery man of the day said, "I know what you're thinking. Don't worry, I don't bite," smirking with the last phrase.
Buffy sighed long-sufferingly. Great. More inside jokes. This is getting old real fast "Was there a press release I missed, or something? Does everyone in this town know I'm the Slayer?" Deciding to hear what dark mysterious stranger #2 had to say, Buffy stepped off his chest, and took a couple steps back, staying in her fighting stance.
He slowly got to his feet, rubbing the back of his neck. "Truth is, I thought you'd be taller, bigger muscles and all that. You're pretty spry though."
Spry? Who says 'spry?' "What do you want?" Buffy asked, a suspicious frown on her face.
"The same thing you want," he said.
Not relaxing her stance one iota, Buffy humored him. "And, what do I want?"
Taking a step toward her, the man answered, "To kill them. To kill them all."
Oooh, menacing "Is that right?" Buffy inquired acidly. "Well, that's nice to know. Unfortunately, I work alone, so, buh-bye," she said, and turned to walk away.
He wasn't finished yet, apparently. "Do you really think that's an option anymore? You're standing at the Mouth of Hell. And its about to open."
Getting an annoying sense of deja vu, Buffy spun around and spoke to her stalker/informant. "Look, I already talked to your buddy about it. Harvest, blah, blah, Master rising, yadda yadda, end of the world! I've got it covered, so please, go stalk someone else."
The stranger seemed a little shocked at her rant, and was tongue-tied for a moment. It was all the time she needed to turn and walk out of the alley, turning the corner just as he opened his mouth again and reached into his coat pocket for something. Dismayed at her hasty departure, he turned and walked out the other end of the alley, his coat billowing behind him.
* * * * *
7:00 PM
The Bronze
Xander sat his usual (or what would become his usual) table in the Bronze, about mid way between the front entrance and the bar. The night was still relatively young, so half the tables in the popular night club were empty, and the dance floor was almost bereft of teenagers. Xander was absentmindedly twirling the ice in his Pepsi with a straw, and concentrating on scanning the Bronze for any familiar faces. Familiar dead faces. Specifically, Xander was searching for the deceptively angelic face of Darla.
From what he remembered of the events surrounding the Harvest, which was a lot considering they introduced him to the world of the supernatural, the four hundred year old vampiress was the one most responsible for the death and unholy resurrection of Jesse. She had seduced him into following her to his death, and she had been the one who abducted him during Buffy's first fight with Luke in the cemetery. For all Xander knew she might even have been the one to turn him.
For that, Xander hated her with a passion normally reserved for Angelus, which, he realized suddenly, was another reason to hate her. Darla was responsible for bringing that most sadistic and depraved of vampires into the world. Directly or indirectly through her demented childe, Darla was the cause of much of the pain in Xander's life. Jesse's death. Angel's existence in Sunnydale and Buffy's subsequent love for the vampire, ruining any chance Xander had with the woman he loved. Angelus' crimes against his loved ones. Jenny Calendar's murder. The list went on and on. And for her crimes, Xander vowed Darla wouldn't survive the night.
Pushing his vengeful thoughts aside, Xander glanced at his watch. 7:10. Buffy should have been here by now. Maybe I didn't do a good enough job of convincing her he thought worriedly. He had picked seven o'clock to met at the Bronze because Willow and Jesse wouldn't be there until at least quarter to eight. Willow had always done her homework before going out with her friends, and he and Jesse were always patient and tolerant of her bookish-ness. That usually meant that the three friends wouldn't arrive at the Bronze until eight or later. Xander was counting on that tonight in order to keep them out of harm's way.
Xander spotted a flash of blonde hair at the Bronze's entrance and smiled when he saw Buffy surveying Sunnydale's one and only club. Xander sat back in his seat and waved his hand to beckon her over. She saw him and flashed him a smile, and then made her way across the sparse dance floor to his table. Looking her over as she approached, Xander was reminded of a fact he had almost forgotten over the past couple years he'd spent getting over Buffy - no one wears short skirts like Buffy wears short skirts. She'd grown out of that phase by the time she entered college, and she still looked great in whatever she wore, but the sixteen-year-old in Xander was drooling over her now.
Outwardly, Xander was not drooling, just smiling appreciatively. "Hey, Buffy! Took my advice, I see," he said, visibly scanning her with his eyes.
The corners of her mouth twitched up in a smile as she looked down at herself. "What, this old thing?" she asked innocently before pulling a chair out and sitting opposite Xander.
Hey! That was ... yeah, that was a definite flirt there! Woo hoo! ... I mean ... Woo hoo! Xand-man one, Deadboy nada His internal rejoicing was cut short when he noticed Buffy staring at him strangely.
"Earth to Xander," she said, snapping her fingers in front of his face. "You kinda zoned out there. Is that, like, a side-effect of time travel?"
Note to self: less internal monologue
"Huh? No! I just, y'know, space out sometimes when I'm thinking," Xander replied quickly.
Buffy nodded at that, then leaned back in her chair, folding her arms in front of her chest. A moment of silence fell over the duo, which surprised Xander a bit. Buffy didn't know him very well, so her silence was understandable. He, on the other hand, was rarely speechless around his friends. It's because you're freaked that you'll screw up your first shot with Buffy, again his mind told him, which made sense, he thought.
"So," Buffy finally broke the silence. "did you check the winning lottery numbers before you went all 'Back to the Future'?"
Xander broke out in a wide grin. "That does sound like something I'd do. Unfortunately, I was too busy getting the blood sucked out of me at the time." Buffy cringed and opened her mouth to apologize, but Xander cut her off. "Don't apologize Buff. I make bad jokes about stuff like that all the time. I was the comic relief when things were looking bleak back in the good old days."
"Oh. So what was that like? I mean, will be like. Er- you know this is really confusing. And not fair! You can read me like a book but I know next to nothing about you!" Buffy exclaimed in frustration.
"Okay, Buff. How about for now we just talk about the present, and leave getting to know one another for a non-fight night?" Xander asked, trying to steer their conversation in a useful direction.
Calming down, Buffy nodded. "All right," she sighed. "So, what about these vamps here tonight? Where are they?"
After looking around to make sure they hadn't arrived in the last few minutes, Xander turned back to Buffy and responded. "Not here yet. Neither are their original victims. One of them was a guy in a leather jacket who looked like he stepped out of the '80s, and the other was a girl, Darla," he spat out her name.
Hearing the venom in his voice, Buffy asked. "What's her deal?"
"It's personal," Xander said, uncharacteristically terse.
Mulling that over for a bit, Buffy stated, "So, it's something she's going to do, right?"
Might as well, tell her. It'll help clear up any trust issues between us. I just know she's thinking in the back of her mind that I may be working against her. Can't say I'd blame her. This whole situation seems too crazy to believe
"Her victim is going to be Jesse," Xander spoke matter-of-factly. Buffy's mouth opened in surprise. "Which is why I had us meet before he and Will arrived and which is why I am going to stake her personally."
His cold tone told Buffy that there wasn't to be any argument on that score, and Xander hoped she wouldn't play the 'I'm the Slayer, you're not' card. Luckily she didn't, and merely changed the subject.
"You didn't bring any friends with you from the future, did you?" she asked.
Xander raised an eyebrow at her question. "What do you mean?"
"Well, just before I got here, I had to beat up this stalker guy who wanted to warn me about your Harvest-thingy. Dark, gorgeous in an annoying sort of way. Seems like you two would be buds."
When Xander realized she was talking about beating up Angel, he had to bite down the laughter he felt coming on. However, he couldn't hold it in any longer when she said she thought they were buds. After a few moments of snickering, he answered the question written all over Buffy's partly confused, partly amused face.
"Oh, Buff!" he said, still trying to swallow his giggles. "Buds, we are not. Angel and I are barely on speaking terms."
"Angel?"
"Uh huh. I'll tell you why that's ironic in a minute. First of all, Angel is on our side, annoying and mysterious though he may be. Second-" Xander trailed off as he spotted something behind Buffy. Someone, actually. His face lost all its humor in an instant.
A blond beauty had just entered the Bronze, walking in and looking around like she owned the place. Several male heads turned as she made her way to the bar, but she ignored them as she ordered something from the bartender. A few moments after the blond entered, a dark haired boy in a leather jacket walked in, sleeves rolled up like some Miami Vice reject.
Xander quickly got over his need to glare a hole in Darla's head and turned his attention back to his glass, taking a sip. Buffy had followed his glare, and also noticed fashion-victim-guy walk in, and came to the obvious conclusion. "That them?"
Xander nodded. "Don't stare at them," he said, and Buffy turned her eyes away from the pair of vamps. Xander looked at his watch. 7:25. Better get this done soon "All right. Here's what we're gonna do..."
Darla was used to attention from the opposite sex. Though she hadn't seen her own reflection in nearly four hundred years, and her memories of her human life had faded, the turned heads of nearly every male she encountered was proof enough of her exquisite looks. This power she held over men she had learned to use to devastating effect over the centuries. It had come almost naturally to the vampiress, who had used seduction as a human to attract the attention of wealthy gentlemen seeking to have their sexual desires fulfilled. As a member of the undead, her seduction attracted meals and prospective childer.
Tonight, however, Darla's feminine wiles were to be used to serve her Master, her sire, her unholy salvation. After over half a century of imprisonment, he had finally arisen, ready to reenter the world and usher in the end of the age of humanity. For now, however, he was hungry. She would bring him an offering of young blood, perhaps even a new soldier for the coming war against mankind.
Right now, she sat on a stool by the Bronze's bar, scouring the club for an appropriate candidate to join the Order of Aurelius. One of her lesser childer, Thomas, was doing the same on the dance floor. She saw a short blond girl in a proportionally short skirt approaching him. Darla saw Thomas size up the girl and came away with a satisfied smirk. It appeared as though he'd found his offering for the night. So typical of our pathetic minions. Picking up the first piece of meat that comes along
While watching Thomas in his lackluster attempts at enticing the girl, which nevertheless seemed to be working, Darla spied out of the corner of her eye a dark-haired youth take a seat in the stool next to her. He ordered a drink which the bartender went to fetch, and turned his head fractionally, smirking as he appraised Darla with his eyes. His drink arrived, and he took a sip before turning in his stool to face her completely.
"Hey there, beautiful," he said with a grin. "What's a pretty lady like you doing in a dump like this?"
As far as pick-up lines went, Darla had heard a lot worse, but also a lot better. What intrigued her was his delivery. Living for hundreds of years allows one to pick up on subtle nuances in speech and body language that can show the measure of a man. And the young man before her was oozing confidence. Not the brash, arrogant confidence of, say, a star high school quarterback, but the quiet, assured confidence of someone who had lived beyond their years.
Flashing a seductive smile, Darla turned herself to face him as well. "There aren't many places in Sunnydale to have fun. I'm Darla."
"Alexander Harris."
Darla felt like turning him on the sheer irony of his name alone. Alexander meant 'protector of humanity,' and making him into the destroyer of it would be quite humorous, even if that little inside joke went over the heads of most humans.
Alexander continued to make small talk, but Darla was already getting impatient. As far as she was concerned, he was the perfect offering for the Master. She hoped her sire would bless this young man with eternal life; she hadn't been this anxious over a new vampire since - she thought with a twinge of sadness - Angelus.
As always, thoughts of her most brutal and beloved childe brought with it mixed feelings of anger and longing. Anger at the cursed Gypsies who had de-fanged her poor boy, and at the spineless rodent he had become with his soul. Longing for the days they had ravaged the cities of Europe, and hoping the same would come to pass again in twenty-first century America.
Darla mentally shook herself out of her reverie when she saw Thomas guiding his 'date' out the Bronze's back exit. She decided it was time to for her and Alexander to go, and was about to invite herself back to his place when he beat her to it. "Y'know, it's kind of loud in here, Darla. You wanna go someplace a little more ... private?" he said with a mischievous grin.
Needing no second invitation, Darla replied. "Sure. I know just the place." She stood and took his hand, leading him to the back of the Bronze, following the route Thomas took.
I'll bet, bitch Xander thought as Darla took his hand and led him toward the back exit he'd seen Buffy and her vamp just leave through. He didn't think it would take the Slayer long to finish off one little minion vamp, and he didn't want to keep her waiting.
However, as he and Darla entered the unlit alley behind the Bronze and wound their way through it to the street opposite the club, Xander found that he'd overestimated Buffy, or underestimated the vamp. As they walked around a corner in the alley, they came upon the tail end of Buffy's fight. Her stake had just entered the vamp's chest, and he burst into ashes a second later.
Darla was no fool, Xander realized a moment later. She knew about Slayers, and she could see a trap when confronted with one. Apparently, it took all of half a second for this to process in her mind. After that, her right hand squeezed his painfully, and her left had grabbed him by the throat. Before Xander could react, he was thrown toward the brick wall on his left, just getting his right arm up in time for it to absorb some of the impact.
Darla had already turned to confront Buffy, and stalked cautiously toward the Slayer. Buffy held her stake at the ready while the two blondes circled one another. Darla lunged with a right cross at Buffy's head, which the Slayer blocked. Buffy took the opportunity to plunge her stake into the vampiress' heart, but Darla grabbed her wrist in an iron grip. Squeezing tightly, the stake fell uselessly out of Buffy's suddenly slack grip. She followed with a quick kick to the Slayer's midsection and an uppercut which sent her flying across the alley.
Buffy landed hard on the pavement, a few feet short of the alley's street entrance, wincing momentarily before flipping herself back to her feet. Just in time to be tackled back to the ground by a charging and growling Darla. The impact knocked the wind out of Buffy, and the vampiress took advantage to land a couple vicious punches to the Slayer's head. Buffy dodged her head out of the way of the third shot, and Darla's fist hit the pavement, and an audible crunch was heard as a couple of fingers broke. Darla's temporary impairment allowed Buffy time to swing her legs up from behind Darla, wrapping them around her neck and flinging her back, off the Slayer.
The two combatants regained their feet at the same time. Buffy tried a snap kick to Darla's left side, but, using inhuman speed and agility, she dodged inside the kick and landed her own on the Slayer's exposed back, sending her off balance into the wall. Buffy's hands shot forward to steady herself against the wall, then delivered a back left elbow to Darla's head when she sensed the vampiress behind her. She then spun into a hard right backhand, which staggered her opponent onto the sidewalk.
Spying a shard of wood on the ground, Buffy deftly scooped it up and advanced out of the alley onto a sidewalk bathed in streetlights. Darla threw a right jab, her fingers already healed, which Buffy blocked, and responded with her own to Darla's chin, snapping her head back. The Slayer followed up with a roundhouse kick to her head, sending her back-first to the pavement. Buffy pounced beside the prone vampire and in one fluid motion brought her makeshift stake over her head and down to Darla's chest. But again her stake-arm was caught mid-jab, and Darla used her other arm to sweep Buffy's legs from under her, sprawling the Slayer on her back.
Darla then pounced on the prostrate Slayer, pinning her arms to the pavement. "It's been sooo long since I've had Slayer's blood," the vampiress said as her face shifted to its demonic visage. "And once you've had that, you can never go back." With that, Darla descended to Buffy's neck, fangs bared.
Unfortunately for her, Darla had forgotten all about her former 'date.' She was reminded when a steel-toed kick landed in her side, cracking a couple ribs. She grunted in pain and looked up at her attacker in time to see a boot connect with her head, hard. The vampiress was knocked back, off of Buffy.
When Darla was knocked prone, Xander put his ad hoc plan into motion. He'd liberated a bottle of holy water from Buffy's jacket, which she'd probably shrugged off during her first fight. Then, he'd stood back to see if Buffy could handle Darla on her own, awaiting his chance if things went sour. Once Buffy had been pinned down, he took his opportunity.
Before she could get to her feet, Xander splashed the holy water onto Darla's face. She screamed out in pain, instinctively clutching her hands to her smoking face before she figured out that was what Xander wanted. Realization came too late.
Xander dropped to his knees and without further ado slammed his stake home, piercing her unbeating heart. "Sorry, Darla. You're not my type," he said just before she shrieked and burst into ashes. The four hundred year old vampiress' wail reverberated through the still night air like a death knell for a few more seconds before the street fell silent again.
Xander got to his feet again, deliberately stepping on Darla's ashes, which gave him an odd sense of satisfaction. He'd avenged Jesse's death by saving Jesse's life. Anything's possible on the Hellmouth he thought wryly. He was about to help Buffy up when he saw her looking at something behind him, and heard a familiar voice from the same direction.
"Xander!?"
Turning, Xander saw the incredulous expressions on the faces of Willow Rosenberg and Jesse McCormick, who seemed riveted to the sidewalk.
Getting over his surprise at seeing his friends, Xander grinned sheepishly. "Uh. Hey guys," he paused. "What's up?" he asked cheerily.
End IV