TITLE: THE PRIZE 5

TITLE: THE PRIZE 5

AUTHOR: STEPHEN HOWE

E-MAIL: sh01@bigpond.com.au

FEEDBACK: Sure.

DISTRIBUTION: Ask and ye shall receive!

DISCLAIMER: All characters belong to Joss! He created everything! Rated R for violence and adult themes. Set in season 6.B/X pairing Giles is Buffy's watcher who now works for the Council once more. Anya gave her life to save Buffy in the fight against Glory. Dawn is still here and Willow is with Tara. SECRETS REVEALED AND TRUTHS UNEARTHED. Buffy grabs him by the shirt. " Then what?" Frank tells her. " That's all I know! I swear to god! He did something later that night and all hell broke loose James, Vince and some of his deputies went out searching for him then James drove his Viper back to the garage and told me to shut up about it." Giles clicks his fingers. " The curator at the museum was telling someone they were trigger happy and they should have found out where he hid it before..." Just then his cell phone rang and Giles took it out. " God damn piece of... I wish I'd never bought the blessed thing... Hello?" Mr. Giles? It's Quinten Travers here I've been trying to contact you for days! .." I'm sorry but we have a situation here and.." The boy.. Harris is still with your group? " Xander? Yes he is why?" Well it appears he's not as useless as we first believed. According to our resources he's a vessel and the last of his kind. Are you still there Rupert? Do you understand what this means? ..." Yes Travers I fully understand what it means but it appears we maybe too late." He moves away from the others." I believe he has been murdered and we are in the process of bringing his murderers to justice." Listen Rupert you and your 'group ' are not the police you will cease your actions and return to your... Giles thumbed the off switch and threw the phone into the car. "I suggest we go back to town and try to find out what's going on then take Frank here to the State authorities." They agreed and Giles drove them back into town, but before they arrived Buffy tied Frank up and told Willow to watch him. They parked out of the centre and walked into town. THE MUSEUM Giles and Buffy walk in like big city visitors and wait till they can see the Curator enter his office. Buffy opens the door and walks in followed by Giles. " I'm sorry this is a private area you'll have to..." Giles shuts and locks the door behind him. " Hey do you know the penalty for this?" Buffy stalks up to him and pushes him back into the chair. " No, but my guess is it's a lot less than kidnapping and slavery!" She lifts his nametag and tells him. " So, John, tell me what you did with Xander and maybe I'll let you give yourself up to the police." He snorts. " What makes you think I did anything?" " Oh, the way your heart sped up when I mentioned the police and the fact you're sweating like a pig when it's almost winter." She grabbed the back of his head and slammed it into the table. " Now I'm through playing nice! Where is Xander?" He finally broke. " I had nothing to do with it I swear to god!" She relaxed her grip and he told her." I don't know what they did with him but the man you want to talk to is Sheriff Jones and his deputies." " And they are where?" Buffy asks. John shrugs. " They got a report that someone grabbed Frank from the gas station and they're looking for the car." Buffy looks at Giles." Willow!" Frank is still shaking as the Sheriff cuts through the bonds. " You were lucky we saw the car Frank. What the hell did they want and where are the other three?" Frank looks over at the two deputies as they stand over Willow as she struggles against her handcuffs and gag. Frank looks towards the town centre and tells him. " They went to see John in the museum but Vince something's got James! We went his place and it looks like a tornado had hit it. Then the weird lookin guy took off into the woods to follow it." "Bill, Jim why don't you take the little lady and go look for this guy." He grins at them and they leer at Willow. " Oh we'll search Vince we'll search REAL hard!" The two deputies pick Willow up and throw her in the back off the patrol car and drive off. As they get near the Woods Bill turns to face Willow." While we're out here we might as well show her the sights eh Jim." They both laugh as Jim drives deep into the woods then pull up in a clearing. Jim removes her gag after he takes out his gun." One word out of place and you end up like him!" She glares at him as they drag her to the centre of the clearing. " What have you done with Xander? Take me to him NOW!" Jim laughs. " Okay honey.. Look down at your feet." Willow looks down, realises what she's standing on and screams. Buffy and Giles are walking the curator to the car when they see the sheriff driving it towards the museum." Buffy drags John into an alley and warns him not to do anything stupid. She turns to Giles." I hope Spike made it undercover before the sun came up!" She looks to John." Do you know you have some beast roaming around your forest?" John looked at her and sneered until he saw she wasn't joking." They used the stone to call Kattadhin!" Giles moved closer to him. " Kattadhin? What is that?" " To some a legend created by drunken Indians. To those that know, it may just be the beginning of the end of European domination of the America's!" He looks at Giles." The first ones that created life also created Kattadhin forming it from every animal in creation. Legend has it that during the ghost dances of the 1900's the core of tribal shaman gathered and fore told of the coming of the Kattadhin. And with it's coming the rivers would run red with white man's blood till they were driven from the First Peoples land!" " Why did they call it?" Giles asks. He looked down. " You have to understand I only arrived here last year as part of my studies on the First Peoples. I first found out about what the towns people were doing when a car struck down my daughter and the doctors said she would never recover from the coma. But after a visit from one of the natives she was up and running around like nothing had ever happened." He looks at Giles. " You know about their healing powers? Well we controlled them, held them as virtual slaves, by keeping their most revered icon under lock and key. But that damned young idiot broke in and stole it, I still can't figure out how he did it, they chased him all the way to the reservation and we thought he still had it but when the Sheriff caught up with him this Xander must have hidden it. But know I guess he must have given it to the Indians." Buffy thinks she knows what happened next but she has to know dreading the answer she asks. " And what happened then?" " From what I can gather he pissed Vince off so much he lost it and ... Emptied his gun into him." John shrinks back as Buffy losses it. She starts to run towards the front of the alley. " Buffy! " Giles calls out." Remember he's not a demon and if you kill him you'll be worse than Faith!" Buffy stops and he can see her body shake as he walks up to her. She turns and he sees her cry." But I loved him! He waited for me for so long and now I can finally say the words he can never hear me!" Giles hugs her and whispers." Yes he can Buffy. If he has crossed over I can't help but think he's looking down on us with love in his heart." END OF 5