Testing their new pact, Liz let Buffy drive once more

Testing their new trust pact, Liz let Buffy drive once more. She tried not to let the Slayer see how tight she was gripping her seat as they took turns on practically two wheels. She wanted something to take her mind off her terror so she broached something that had been bugging her.

"Have you see aliens before?" Liz asked. "Because you didn't seem very surprised when I told you about Max."

"Once," Buffy said. "But it wasn't like Max. It was slimy."

"Oh," Liz said, suppressing a shiver.

"It's just that I see a lot of things that most people don't want to believe exist, so it's hard to stun me."

"Things like vampires."

Buffy nodded. She had been in combat mode when she confronted Angel in the alley. She had been angry to find they were on separate sides of the fence. At the time, she hadn't given much thought to the last time they'd seen each other; at her mother's funeral. Everyone had left the gravesite except for Buffy. Darkness fell but she still couldn't move. She sensed him walk up behind her. She didn't have to say a word; she just opened her hand and his hand slipped into it. There had been no question that he would be there; he would always be there for her. Always.

"So how does a vampire slayer fall in love with a vampire?" Liz asked.

"Well Angel's not like most vampires, he has—"

"A soul, he told me." Liz finished. Buffy tensed up a bit. The fact that Angel confided in this girl, for some reason, felt like a slight stab in her gut. Liz didn't seem to notice, instead she leaped on a question that she hadn't had time to ask Angel. "But if a demon takes over his body when he becomes a vampire then what happens to his soul? I mean it can't go far if he can get it back. And does it physically leave his body or is it just buried beneath the demon? Is the soul a tangible thing?"

She stopped when she noticed Buffy was looking at her strangely.

"I'm sorry, I want to be a scientist and I analyze everything," she explained. "Sometimes I have weird thoughts."

"It's OK, I've wondered about some of that stuff too but not in such depth. I don't know exactly how it works, I only know what Angel was to me." She drifted off into thought again but she shook her head clear. "So how does a normal teenage girl fall in love with an alien?"

Liz smiled shyly.

"Well that's easy when the alien is Max." Buffy nodded like she knew what Liz meant and that made Liz's heart skip for a second. She had forgotten that Buffy and Max had spent some time together. For some reason she didn't like the idea at all. But she cleared her throat and continued. "But it started when he saved my life. I was shot and I was dying, I think I may have died for a second or two, but then he healed me."

"He brought you back to life?"

"Yes, he—" Liz stopped when she saw the weird expression on Buffy's face. "What?"

"I—I'm sorry, it's just that I was recently brought back to life."

"What?"

"I died," Buffy said. "Well I've died twice, actually, but the first time it was only for a minute. The last time I was gone for—a lot longer."

"How--?"

"It's a long story," Buffy said, wishing she hadn't mentioned it. Liz seemed to sense that and she just nodded. They drove in silence for a little while longer. Then Buffy took a sharp turn and nearly took out a mailbox.

"You didn't die in a car accident did you?" Liz asked.

* * * * * *

Max's wrists were beginning to bleed. Still he couldn't stop trying to break free.

"You're going to bleed to death," 'Ripper' remarked.

"It seems like a better way to go then if I wait a while," Max said.

"You're probably right." He said. "You're Max Evans aren't you? Liz Parker's boyfriend."

Max looked up at him startled.

"Ethan said that if Buffy killed Liz you would come after her. So I assumed you were the boyfriend that Buffy had met."

"Buffy is the slayer that that guy was talking about?

"She's the vampire slayer and Darla's primary target, I suspect. Why does Ethan think that you were responsible for Darla's great, great—this Topolski woman's death?"

"I—I don't know." Max stammered. "Why does she want you, Ripper?"

"Ripper" cringed.

"Rupert, not Ripper. Most people just call me Giles. And Ethan Rayne doesn't need an excuse to reign down terror. It's his hobby. But Darla is the one to worry about. She is a vampire and she hates Angel and anyone associated with him because he killed her a few years back and she was in love with him."

"Killed her?" Max said slowly.

"Yes, some lawyers resurrected her."

"Of course," Max said, wondering if Giles was sane or not. "Do you think that Buffy has hurt Liz?"

Giles shook his head.

"No, she was uneasy about it from the start. I should have trusted her instincts."

"You're her father?"

Giles hesitated then shook his head.

"No, I'm her Watcher."

Max nodded like he knew what that meant.

"What's going to happen to us if we don't get out of here?"

"Nothing pleasant, I can assure you."

* * * * * *

Liz picked up the cup with the Crashdown logo on it. She looked around the warehouse where Angel had tried to keep her safe. The entrance was blackened by fire but was otherwise the same. She and Buffy hadn't expected to find anyone there but maybe a clue as to where they'd gone. So far, they'd turned up nothing.

Buffy hadn't found anything in the alley and she didn't really expect to find anything in the warehouse but she had to be sure. She was standing near one of the windows when she heard a car pull up outside. She peeled some of the paper off and peeked out. A sheriff's patrol car had just pulled up. Police and Buffy never mixed. They never believed in any of the supernatural phenomenon that Buffy saw everyday and because they usually found her in the thick of things suspicion would always fall on her.

"It looks like it's time to leave," Buffy called out to Liz.

Liz set the Crashdown cup down and followed Buffy toward the side entrance without question. They were both almost out the door when someone called out to her. Liz turned and saw the sheriff and a big smile broke out on her face. She ran over to him and threw her arms around him. Behind her Buffy hesitated. She thought since Liz was harboring an alien than she'd have the same opinion of law enforcement. Obviously not.

"Liz, what are you doing here?" The sheriff asked. He looked over her head and saw Buffy. "And who is this?"

"Oh," Liz bubbled, overjoyed to see someone she knew and cared about. "This is Buffy, she's a vampire slayer."

"A what?"

"Liz?!"

She looked over the sheriff's shoulder and saw Maria, Isabel and Kyle walk in behind him and she ran to them with arms wide open. Buffy walked up to the sheriff and gave him a nervous smile.

"Uh, hi."

"My god," Maria cried, "Liz, where have you been?"

"It's a long story," she replied.

"Liz," Isabel said. "Do you know where Max and Michael are?"

"No," Liz said, "We're here looking for them."

"Well you found one of us."

Everyone turned and found Michael, standing in the doorway, dirty, smoke stained and looking like he wanted to fall down. Maria ran to him and threw her arms around him, nearly knocking him over.

"Michael, my God, what happened to you?"

Everyone rushed to his side. When Maria let him go, he had to bend over and catch his breath.

"You OK, man?" Kyle asked.

Michael nodded, caught his breath and stood up again.

"Max and I found Liz here a couple of hours ago and then the fire started coming from the sky. I saw Max get blind sided by that vampire and I followed them into the sewer. They had him tied to a chair and I was about to crash the party when someone else showed up. They did something that knocked everyone out and then they had a whole army of vampires come in and took them to the soap factory. There were too many for me to handle by myself so I came back here to get the Jeep and find reinforcements."

"That was a good idea," the Sheriff said, mildly surprised that Michael hadn't taken on the army himself. Although he wanted to get back to the whole vampire subject.

"Did you see who was in charge?" Buffy asked.

Michael looked at her, realizing for the first time that she was there.

"You," he said lunging at her. "You're involved with this whole thing."

"Michael, no!" Liz shouted, jumping between Buffy and her alien friend. "She's not the enemy. She's here to help."

"Liz, she was out to kill you."

"Yeah, well we worked that out."

"I don't know who she is, but she's not a part of this," Isabel said. "We don't trust outsiders, and we're going to handle this ourselves."

"Listen," Liz said. "We don't know exactly what is going on here but Buffy is involved in this too. And her boyfriend, Angel, was trying to help me when he kidnapped me. He and his friends saved my life. This whole thing involves all of us and we all have to work together if we want to save Max."

"The last person we trusted was Tess and see how that worked out." Isabel said, knowing playing the Tess card would bring Liz to her senses.

"I trust, Buffy." Liz said. "And she is a vampire slayer and Michael said there was an army of vampires. She is the only one in this room that knows what we're up against. She can help. And Michael, you said that a vampire grabbed Max at the fire?"

"Yeah, the guy you were taking off with—the vampire, the Coppertone girl and two other guys."

"The vampires took them to the soap factory too?"

He nodded.

"So they have Angel, too." Liz said. "Buffy has just at much at stake as we do. So much has happened to me that would explain why I feel the way I do and when we have time I will explain it but in the meantime, we have to work together. Please."

Everyone was silent until Buffy looked at Michael again and asked: "Did you see who was in charge of this vampire army?"

Michael looked at Liz, whose eyes begged him to tell her. "Some English guy," he said, and then he looked at all of his friends. "And agent Topolski."

Buffy had no idea who agent Topolski was but the mention of her name sent shock waves through the whole group.

"What?" Maria asked.

"Kathleen Topolski?" The sheriff said.

"I thought she was dead." Kyle said.

"It was her," Michael stressed. "But they kept calling her by a different name. They kept calling her Darla."

"Darla?" Buffy said.

"Do you know her?" Liz asked.

"I don't know an agent Topolski but I know a Darla." She looked at Michael. "What did she look like?"

"Blond, blue eyes. She talked with this sing song voice, like she was a little girl or something—"

"Darla." Buffy whispered.

"Who is she?" Liz asked.

Buffy looked her in the eyes and said: "She's my Tess."

And in that moment they shared a single moment of shared clarity and an unbreakable bond was formed.

* * * * * *

While the others came back to consciousness slowly, Angel's eyes snapped open and his head popped up like he'd been awaken from a horrifying dream.

"Darla," he said.

"Why do I even bother with dry clean only clothes?" Cordelia muttered to no one in particular.

"Does anyone else's head feel like a two hundred pound demon just played basketball with it?" Gunn asked.

"A knockout spell," Wesley said matter of factly. "They don't usually have such a hangover effect. Ethan must have added that on his own. Sadistic bastard."

Max stared at them and wanted to shout: "Excuse me, you just woke up chained to a wall?! Am I the only one concerned?"

"Giles," Angel asked. "Where's Buffy?"

"I don't know, but Darla and Ethan are expecting her. They have an army of vampires awaiting her arrival."

"She'll come anyway," Angel said.

"So will Liz." Max said, regretfully. Despite the danger she would come.

"Liz can't defend herself like Buffy can." Angel said.

"I doesn't matter," Max said. He remembered how she'd stood up to both of their moms when they'd been caught in the eraser room, how she'd doggedly pursed Alex's killer, how she'd gone after him when he'd been captured by Agent Pierce. "She rescued me before. She's the bravest person I know. She'll come."

* * * * * *

Liz tilted her head back and closed her eyes.

She felt the warm desert wind caress her skin and she could hear the song on the radio even above the roar of the Jeep's engine.

*Look at the stars, look how they shine for you

And everything you do….*

Liz opened her eyes and stared at the twinkling stars above her head. She stretched her hand out to one of them, wanting to touch them. She heard Max make a strange noise and she turned and smiled at him.

"They remind me of you," she said. "Of how you make me feel."

He hit the brakes and pulled the Jeep over to the side of the road. In one fluid motion he'd unsnapped his seat belt and he'd slid over to her. She saw, with continued amazement, all the love he had for her in his beautiful brown eyes. He leaned down and kissed her and he took her to those stars.

"Liz?"

Liz looked away from the desert speeding by and she turned and looked at Buffy.

"Where were you?" She asked.

Liz shrugged sadly. "In a galaxy far, far away."

Maria reached out to her from the backseat and gave her shoulder a squeeze.

But Buffy stared at her a moment longer before she turned her eyes back to the road.

"That gives me an idea," she said.

* * * * * *

"This is insane," the sheriff mumbled twenty minutes later as they overlooked the soap factory. He put his binoculars to his eyes again and looked down at two vampires patrolling the grounds. He'd believed in aliens because his dad had convinced him that they existed. Even after his dad was committed to an institution, something in him had always believed. Even so, the first time he'd seen Michael use his powers he'd still been blown away. But vampires—that was just something he never thought could really exists.

Buffy, observing the same scene next to him, pushed herself up.

"Welcome to my world," she said.

"What now?" Isabel asked.

"How about something?" Michael said.

"We have to know what we're up against," Liz reasoned.

"We know. Let's move."

"No," Buffy said.

"Hey," Isabel said. "We said you could come along, but who exactly put you in charge?"

"We're going to go in as soon as—"

Then headlights suddenly pinned all of them to their spots. Two vehicles came rumbling to a stop in front of them. Michael clenched his fist and sheriff Valenti laid his hand on his gun. The doors of the cars opened and three women and two men emerged. They were silhouetted by the headlights at first, each carrying a weapon. Nothing as modern as guns, mind you, but crossbows and swords and stakes. Then they came closer and the small band of aliens and friends could see their faces. They were a gang of young people, not much older then they were, but with obvious more battle time.

"The Scooby gang is all here!" The dark haired guy said enthusiastically and Buffy smiled.