Chapter One - Square One (1997)
Jesse walked out of the back entrance of Sunnydale High School, glancing nervously around - in this town, it payed to know whether somebody was watching you. He didn't know why he felt so paranoid sometimes, especially at night, but a lot of the time it simply felt like he wasn't alone. Normally he wouldn't think about going anywhere without a couple of buds at his side, but this afternoon he had had to stay behind for some help in math (yeah, Ms. Jenkins was hot, but that didn't change the fact that Algebra II was a total bitch), and he had hardly been aware that time had slipped on as much as it had, and the sun had set. He was supposed to meet Willow and Xander at the Bronze at 7:00, but damned if part of him didn't want to go home, crawl in between the sheets like he was a fucking six-year-old or something.
He often found himself wondering just what in the hell it was that made this town so jumpy - what made the day seem shorter and the night just a bit darker around here? It wasn't just the multiple cemeteries (though he had to admit that was a helluva coincidence) - it just seemed like this town attracted a bad element. It wasn't a literal thing, not like monsters or evil spacemen or something (at least he didn't think so), Sunnydale just put out a bad...vibe, or something.
Ahead of him the Bronze sign glared harshly against the darkness around it, beckoning him closer, promising peace and protection, if he could manage the last few steps from here to there safely. As he moved closer, he straightened, unconciously shrugging off some the nervousness and anxiety that he felt, wanting to loosen up some. His current goal in life was to sashay into the company of one Cordelia Chase, the forbidden fruit, a goal for which he was repeatedly razzed by one Xander Harris, purporting himself to be Jesse's best friend. Of course, Xand would say, Cordy is hot, she's the epitome of hot, but it's like the apple in Snow White - one bite and you're dead meat, man. Yeah, Jesse would invariably answer back, but that would be one goddamned sweet bite. So wrapped in thoughts of Cordy Chase and impending Bronze-age was Jesse that he nearly missed the blonde woman who leaned against the wall to his left, watching him as he walked. She moved toward him, so silently and quickly that for a moment he thought his eyes were playing tricks on him in the semi-darkness. It was only after she was leaning into him, damn near touching him, before he stopped and realized that she must be real.
"Evening," she said breathily, the word flowing icily over his face.
"Uh...evening," he said hoarsely, throat for no reason suddenly devoid of all moisture. "Is there, uh, something I can help you with?"
She laughed, a tinkling little laugh that sent shivers up his spine. "Depends. Maybe I can help you."
His face grew suspicious. "Help me with what?"
She didn't answer, but instead brought her pale hands up to massage his chest. For a moment, he was speechless - this was the kind of thing you read about in Penthouse, the kind of thing you dreamed about. Yet... now that it was happening, happening to him, he felt unnacountably nervous again. Sex just seemed to radiate off of the woman in front of him - but she was cold, her hands like ice that chilled him even through the fabric of his t-shirt. Though as he stared into her eyes, it seemed not to matter much - those eyes told you that it was cool, that she was hungry, for his body, for his soul. He was the only one that could make it better, could quench that powerful thirst, and he would be grinning for every moment of it...
"Hey, Jess, you gonna come inside or play tongue tag with that chick all night?"
The voice came from very far away, from the fucking moon, and Jesse wanted to tell it to go away, just get the fuck outta here and let the business be done, but suddenly the girl was scrambling off of him, chagrined. Jesse lingered for a moment in dreamland, eyes closed and lips parted slightly, before staring furiously at the door to the Bronze and the source of the interruption.
Xander stood in the doorway expectantly. For a moment Jesse wanted nothing more in life then to wrap his hands right around that scrawny white neck and just squeeze, just squeeze the life right out of him, squeeze until his eyes fell out.
Instead Jesse forced a smile onto his face, and waved Xander back inside, "Yeah, we'll be inside in a minute, just hold your goddamned horses."
He turned back to the girl without waiting for a reply from Xander.
"Look, I don't know who in the hell you are, but I've got to say, I like your style. Wanna come inside for a drink?"
She smiled kittenishly. "You must be psychic. A drink was exactly what I came out for."
Willow and Xander sat in their customary couch in the center of the Bronze, chatting busily as was the nightly ritual. Presently they deliberated as to the possible nature of the girl who Xander had found climbing all over Jesse - Xander advanced the theory that she was a hooker, while Willow was inclined to give Jesse the benefit of the doubt, proposing that the girl was simply mentally impaired.
Jesse walked past the couch over to the bar, deliberately ignoring them, the strange girl in tow. She smiled devilishly at him as he ordered their drinks.
"I'll have a scotch on the rocks," Jesse said swankily. "And for the lady?"
"Bloody Mary," she said, almost automatically, her eyes still on Jesse.
The bartender looked at them blandly. "You got some I.D., children?"
Jesse reddened slightly, reached for his wallet, and brought out his fake.
"N.G., buddy row," the older man said, stifling a laugh. "Why don't you take your pretty little friend here and swim back to the kiddie pool."
Still smiling shyly, she reached into her pocket, and pulled out a driver's license.
"Twenty-two. Welcome to the real world." He poured her the drink, and she started to sip it slowly.
Jesse stared at her. "T-T-Twenty-two? Damn, you don't look twenty- two."
"You'd be surprised," she said softly around her straw.
Xander sidled up to the bar. "Barkeep. Couple of brewskies down this way."
"Look, man, for the third and final time, no I.D. means no booze."
Xander tried to look insulted. "But like I said before, my wallet's in the other -"
"Nope."
"Other pants?" he suggested hopefully.
"That one didn't work last week. I think you're running out of fresh material."
Xander scowled. "Alright, how about, my dog ate my I.D.?"
The bartender started to refill the peanut container. "I think that one's for your English teacher, numb nuts."
Xander shrugged. "Fair enough. Couple of Cokes down this way?"
The bartender snorted, and slid the bottles down the table.
Xander glanced over at Jesse, who looked eight seconds from throwing his date down on the bar right then. She was blonde, small, quiet - everything that Xander thought Jesse didn't look for in a girl (the exact opposite of Cordy Chase, for that matter). Xander looked more closely at the girl, and tried to remember if he had ever seen her around Sunnydale before. Sure, it wasn't Mayberry, but live around here for a while and eventually you had to see most of the sights and sounds the town had to offer. The Bronze was the one and only hotspot of social activity for the still-living-at-home crowd in town, and he, Jesse, and Willow, as well most of the Sunnydale High student body, were regular patrons, but he couldn't remember ever seeing the girl around. Or at school, for that matter.
He tapped his friend on the shoulder. For a moment, Jesse ignored him, and when he did turn around, it was with a glare of annoyance that was both unfamiliar and unwelcome on his face.
"What do you want, Xand?"
"Just wanted to see if you and your ladyfriend wanted to join me and Wills at the Scoob couch. Don't trip over yourself on the way over, though."
"Oh," the girl said excitedly, "Come on, Jess. You've told me so much about your friends, I'm just dying to meet them."
For a moment, Jesse looked totally perplexed. Then he seemed to catch the drift, and nodded slowly. "Yeah...told you so much about them, sure. Where're you sitting?"
Xander walked them to the couch, where Willow had begun to get impatient by herself.
"Sorry about that, Will. This is Jesse's new friend...uhm, I'm not sure I caught the name -"
"Darla," the girl said quickly. "Darla Sheppard. I'm at UC- Sunnydale, living on campus."
Willow smiled shyly, waved politely.
Xander, for his part, was nearly speechless. How Jesse had managed to snag a girl without his knowing it, much less a college student, much less a hot college student, was completely beyond Xander's ability to comprehended. Frantically, he motioned for the other boy to join him away from the table.
Darla sat down on the couch beside Willow.
"So...." Willow began earnestly.
"....so," the other girl replied, after a moment of silence.
Willow nodded to the guys, who appeared to be arguing, albeit whispering. "Guy stuff. Pretty complicated, that."
Darla shrugged. "Not so complicated. You've just gotta practice."
"Maybe so. Not having a steady, I guess I wouldn't know." Willow said, rather frostily.
Darla frowned. "You mean you and Xander -"
Before the girl could even finish the sentence, Willow was waving it off. "Nope, no way, not a chance. Just friends, best friends since first grade, just doing the buddy thing -"
Darla smiled again. "Got it," she nodded, but there was a wink in her voice that Willow didn't appreciate much. Before she could come up with the proper response, however, Jesse and Xander returned to the couch.
"So, Darla," Xander began, with the same kind of ice in his tone that Willow had used with the girl earlier. "What's your major?"
"Pre-med. I'm actually only a part-time student right now. Riding my dad's pocket, I guess you could say."
"So how did you and Jesse meet?" Willow asked.
"Tutoring program at the University," Jesse answered quickly. "Darla's helping me with the Algebra."
Willow glared at him angrily. "Jesse, you know, you could have come to me if you're having that much -"
"I didn't want to bother you," Jesse said crossly. "Ms. Jenkins suggested I get some help outside of the school anyway."
Willow looked ready to say something back, then thought better of it, and shrugged. "Suit yourself."
"So what's my Jess like in school?" Darla asked.
"Oh, you know, pretty qui-" Xander started to say, then caught the evil eye Jesse was sending his way. "Qui -, uh, Quick with the compliments. For the ladies. 'Cause they're all over him, you know? Will, wanna join me for a drink at the bar?"
"But I'm not -" she started, then caught Xander's come-over-here-now gestures. "Not...uh, not not thirsty. Double negative, see, one cancels the other out. I'm parched. We'll be at the bar."
Darla smiled as she watched them go. "I like your friends. They're...odd, which is good. Interesting."
Jesse smiled, though it looked more like a grimace. "I'm glad. You wanna skip?"
"But we just got here -"
"Yeah, we made the standard appearance, but I want to get back to what was happening earlier," he smiled devilishly at her, a little greedily, "Pick up where we left off."
For a moment, Darla's smile faltered, and Jesse thought that...for an instant...he saw something like anger in her radiant blue eyes. But only for an instant.
"Sure," she said, her voice a few degrees colder then it had been a moment ago. "It's kinda dead in here anyway."
She picked up her purse, and they left without a word. Willow and Xander watched them go from the bar.
"Not a word to the rest of the Scoobs," Xander said, shaking his head. "I thought he might get a little distant when he found a girl that could stand him. Just not like this."
"Don't worry," Willow said reassuringly, patting him on the hand. "When you get somebody, you can start acting like a jerk, too."
"Thanks, Will, you always know how to cheer a guy up."
Darla led Jesse away from the Bronze, back roughly in the direction of the downtown. She no longer cared whether anyone saw them - from any kind of distance, draining him would look like just a rather intense makeout session. And by the time the average passerby did notice something was wrong - perhaps when the boy started to scream - it would be far, far too late.
Besides, the whelp was starting to seriously get on her nerves. In the bar, in the company of his equally annoying friends, he was the perfect pig, playing as though he had made the first move. It was not the first time that she had encountered one so arrogant and stupid as he, and she had no doubts that it would not be the last. Perhaps as a vampire, as her childe, he could learn to be more respectful of his elders. The Master would say she was being careless, mingling with this generation, pretending she was as empty-headed as she was so often mistaken to be. But a thousand years of isolated existence had apparently not improved his sense of taste...
"You always did like to play with your food," came a voice from the shadows of an alley as they passed. Darla froze, in the utter shock of recognition - beside her, she felt the boy tense in a different kind of fright.
The voice stepped out of the darkness, became a man of substance, tall, covered nearly from head to toe in black, as if he had stepped out of a funeral procession.
For a moment, she could not find the breath to speak. The boy at her side did, however, and what he said sent her already low opinion through the floor.
"Look," Jesse started hoarsely, then cleared his throat, trying to speak firmly, "I don't know who you are, but if its money you want -"
The dark man vamped out, sneering down at the youth distastefully. "Get out of here."
"Oh, shit," the boy whispered, backing away. "Jesus, what the hell's wrong with you, man?"
He grabbed Darla's arm, and was surprised to find her as still as stone. "Come on, Darla, we've got to get out -"
She vamped out and grabbed the boy's arm. Before he could pull himself away, she twisted his arm back, forcing him around and into her arms. She threw his head back, pausing with her fangs glistening a few inches above his neck. Jesse started to cry, mumbling to himself in the darkness.
Darla smiled cruelly at the shadow-man.
"What will you give me for this boy, Angel?"
Angel's features slid back to normalcy. He held up his arms placatingly. "Just let him go, and we'll talk."
She seemed to consider for a moment. "I'm your sire, so by natural law, you can't harm a hair on my sweet little head. And even if you could, you'd never reach me before I drained half the blood out of his puny body. I could be wrong, but it looks as if I'm holding all the cards, Angelus."
Angel grimaced slightly at the name. "Alright, but if you kill him, I kill ten of yours. You know what I'm capable of."
She smirked. "Well, they didn't call you the Scourge of Europe for nothing. But I think your information is a little off. The vampires in this happy little burg are no more mine then they are yours."
That bit of news seem to catch Angel by surprise. "You mean, you're not the master that they all keep referring to?"
She shook her head. "Not a master. The Master."
The other's mouth opened slightly in dismay. "You're working for him? What the hell do you hope to accomplish with that derelict?"
"Oh, come on, Angel. You can't tell me you don't feel it like the rest of us. The mouth of Hell."
"What do you mean?" Angel whispered, though the terrible idea had already begun to take shape in his head as soon as he had arrived in Sunnydale. Darla watched it progress with bemusement on her demonic face.
"He's going to open it. The night of the Harvest. Let loose the forces of evil on the face of earth, just like old times. Fun would be the understatement of the year." Beneath her, Jesse moaned, though it was hard to say whether he was listening to the conversation at all.
"That was why she was coming here..." Angel whispered to himself, but with her sharpened senses, Darla picked up, and frowned.
"Who? Who's coming here?"
Angel shook his head, lost in thought. "Nobody of importance. You realize I'll try to stop you -"
She laughed at that. "You can try..."
With that, she threw the boy into his arms and disappeared into the night.
The boy was still trembling, muttering something to himself. It sounded suspiciously like a muddled version of the Lord's Prayer. Angel vamped out, and sank his fangs into the boy's neck, taking enough blood to ensure that the youth would remember nothing about the past few minutes. Then Angel dropped the boy on a park bench, and walked silently back into the night, brooding.
Sometime later, Xander and Willow walked by him on their way home. They were so busy chatting that they that they almost didn't notice Jesse asleep on the bench, but Xander finally saw him, and shouted out.
"Jess," he said as they ran to the bench. "Damn, Jess, what the hell happened?"
Jesse sat up, shaking his head, trying to get rid of the cobwebs. He felt as if he had been asleep for hours...
"I don't know," he said softly, "I was talking to you guys, and then I left..."
"With Darla," Willow filled in for him when he paused.
For a moment, Jesse looked confused, then nodded slowly. "Yeah, with Darla. We walked for a minute -"
Suddenly he looked fearfully at the alley across the street, his hand pointed shakily at it. Xander looked, but saw nothing but darkness.
"Then....I don't remember anything else."
Xander stared at his neck. "Well it looks like she left you with a parting gift. That's one goddamned nasty hicky."
Jesse reached up to touch it gingerly. A bruise was forming.
"Did your drink taste funny?" Willow asked him anxiously.
Jesse and Xander stared at her uncomprehendingly, and Jesse shrugged. "I don't think so. Why?"
"Because that's what they taught us in self-defense class. If your drink tastes weird on a date, it might be because your date put some drug in there, to, you know," she trailed off, gesturing with her hands, but the boys still seemed perplexed. "You know! You know that you know!"
Xander shook his head. "I don't think she was going to rape him. I think most guys would be flattered if a woman wanted to take advantage on the first date. She makes the first move, and its like, fire up the word processor and take every detail down for Penthouse."
"Then what did happen?" Willow said frustratedly.
Jesse shrugged complacently. "Just my luck. She probably did make a move, and I went into cardiac arrest or something."
"You feel alright to walk home?"
Jesse nodded, rubbing his eyes and yawning. "Yeah, I think so. I feel like I could sleep a week."
True to his word, it was nearly 10 AM by the time the alarm penetrated the haze of sleep and roused Jesse from unconciousness. He scrambled out of bed, dressed and inhaled a quick breakfast before hurrying to school.
But by the time he arrived at school, it was midway through second period, and rather than trying to catch the tail end of English III, he decided to hang out and wait for lunch period.
He still couldn't remember much from the night before, at least the period from the time he and Darla had left the bar to the time he had woken up on the park bench with Willow and Xander standing over him. What had come back to him came in the form of some really fucked up dreams, and even then, the images he saw were muddled and dark.
One word did surface in the fog repeatedly, dredged from the blackness, etched in red like a strange sort of stoplight. The word was Vampire.
After a while, he began to theorize what must have happened. He and Darla had been strolling along, perhaps too close to one of the countless dark alleys in that part of town, when they had been assaulted. Perhaps by muggers (though he had found nothing missing when he had checked his pockets at home last night). Maybe one of them had knocked him out, left him to sit on the bench, and scared Darla away. His unconcious mind, mucked up by the blow that had knocked him out, had just found a convenient label to apply to the crooks - they had been vampires. Of course it was nonsense to think that they had actually been attacked by demons, storybook creatures that had as much basis in reality as Santa Claus...
But it wasn't for information on Old Saint Nick that he went to the library.
When he got there, the library was deserted, as it very often was this time of day. Mrs. Gumbrecht, the ancient librarian that had been rumored to see 138 classes graduate, had finally found the gumption to hand the reigns over to new blood, a Mr. Styles or Miles or something.
Jesse set his bookbag down on one of the tables... and paused. As if by some divine intervention, set out on the table, was a book, worn and corroded by age. On the cover, written in some stylish old handwriting, was a single word - Vampyre. Jesse sat down, and opened the tattered book gingerly.
Most of it was stuff he already knew from the movies - crosses, holy water, garlic, sunlight, whatever. Scattered throughout the tattered pages were images, pictures of one ghastly torture or another, scenes of bloodshed from hundreds of years past.
One picture leapt up at him, and he stopped flipping. It was another one of the nasties, face ridged, teeth bared, menacing another random victim. And Jesse had the strangest feeling of deja vu -
The caption below read: He hath the face of an Angel, but he is the Devil's Own. Now and forevermore to be named the Scourge of Europe, hunter and hunted through eternity.
Jesse found he was shaking, and took a deep breath, eyes focused on the picture. Scourge of Europe, why did it sound so familiar? And why did the picture make him so suddenly afraid? It had to be two hundred years old, and for that matter not real, so why did it feel as if he had seen the face before?
There was a soft harumph behind him, and Jesse almost screamed at the sound. He turned, pale and shaking.
A tall man stood a few paces behind him, dressed entirely from head to toe in tweed, wiping the glasses in his hand clean, looking vaguely uncomfortable.
"Can I help -" the man started, in a British accent, before noticing the book in Jesse's hand. He reached over quickly to snatch it out. "Uhm, I'm sorry, this one's off-limits. Part of my private collection. Don't know what I was thinking, leaving it out like this."
Jesse sighed, tension slowly easing out of his body.
The older man looked askance at the boy. "Are you alright? I, uhm, didn't mean to startle you -"
"Nah, it's alright," Jesse said, "I was just in here to...uh, to browse."
The man seemed to ponder this for a moment, and Jesse wasn't sure he was buying it, but then the man nodded. "Very well. I'll be in the office if you need anything else."
The older man turned to go -
"Wait a sec," Jesse said. "Maybe there is something you could tell me - What do you know about vampires?"
The librarian stiffened noticeably, reaching up automatically to take his glasses off and clean them again. "Well...uhm, my s-specialty isn't mythology -"
Jesse looked down at his hands. "So...so they're not, uh, real, right?"
The man smiled, chuckled artificially. "No, they're not."
Jesse nodded, and picked up his books to leave.
"Just for curosity's sake, uhm, what makes you ask?"
Jesse shrugged. "Nightmares, mostly. Just wanted to see what made 'em tick."
He left the library. Rupert Giles watched him go, an anxious look on his face, and then hurried back into his office.
Sometime later, Giles cradled the telephone in one hand, flipping through an ancient text with the other.
"Yes, yes, I am aware of the transient nature of the -" he paused, allowing the other to speak. "No, I don't think I'm overreacting. You've no idea of the kind of activity....No, Sunnydale isn't overwhelmed, not yet. But matters are coming to a head -" Giles sighed in frustration. "Very shortly. And I simply cannot believe that the activity in Cleveland would deserve the kind of attention....Convenience? Since when does convenience matter in our business?"
Giles stopped flipping for a moment to stare out the window. "So that's the Council's final deliberation? Yes....yes, I'm sorry too," he finished this last with sarcasm, and slammed the phone down angrily. "Bloody fools. Bloody bureacratic popinjays."
His mind wandered again to the boy whom Giles had found reading the volume of watcher's journals, and cursed himself again for leaving it out. But the boy's fright was easy enough to read - he had been terrified. Obviously he had been attacked by one of the demons. Giles didn't know why the boy was even alive - he had never heard of a vampire leaving its victim alive for any reason, but perhaps it was a sign of just how extraordinary the situation was becoming.
The Slayer. He should have gone back to England, to the Council, to plead his case in person, the moment he realized she was late. But like the dutiful little Watcher, he had stayed here, waited, apparently in vain. And now he was alone. On the Hellmouth. The chain of command in the Watcher's Council dictated that he, in the field, have absolutely the least amount of decision-making power, and they categorically refused to credit his claims that the Master was here, intent on rising, the Harvest perhaps a month away.
"Bloody fools," he whispered again, and sank his head into his hands. He hadn't slept well the last few weeks - strategy after useless strategy flashed endlessly in his mind, him without the weapon to wield. It was a maddeningly frustrating position, made all the more difficult by his daily encounters as a high school librarian with the youth of the town.
Here came another of them, now, as the school bell rang. She was slight, red hair pulled back in a rather unflattering pigtail arrangement, glancing here and there with a shy, slightly confused expression on her delicate face. Oh, yes, he thought savagely, the demons would have fun corrupting such a one. And all like her. He closed his eyes for a moment, unable to look at the girl - fun indeed.
There was a knock on the office door. He opened it to find the red- haired girl looking up at him meekly.
"I hope I'm not bothering -"
"No, no," he said quickly, "No interruption. Uhm, is there something I can do for you, Ms....Ms -?"
"Rosenberg," the girl said, "Willow. You're M-Mr. Giles, right?"
"Yes," he smiled slightly, though it was a forced and distracted motion. "Rupert Giles."
She smiled slightly, too. "You posted something on the door last week, a-about an opening? For an assistant?"
For a moment, still wrapped up in thoughts of the Slayer and the encroaching Harvest, he had no idea what she was referring to - then it came to him. "Yes, yes, of course. You must forgive me, I'm still acclimating myself to the, uhm, American schedule."
She giggled at that.
He grinned again, and this time the expression felt more natural. "Something amusing, Ms. Rosenberg?"
"No, no," she said, trying to keep a straight face, "It's nothing important."
"Uhm, yes," he said, though he was still perplexed. "Please, have a seat, Ms. Rosenberg."
She nodded gratefully. "Call me Willow."
"Then you can call me...uhm, no I take that back, I suppose you can't. Call me Giles."
"Giles," she rolled it around experimently in her mouth. "Giles it is."
"So how's the new librarian?"
Xander sat down heavily on the sofa next to Willow, handing her a coke while taking a swig out of his own.
"Fine," she said, "Kinda British, though. He said shedule. How weird is that?"
Xander shrugged. "Did you get the job?"
"Yeah, I think so. Didn't sound like there were a whole lot of kids scrambling for the position. Most of 'em have lives, I guess. Their loss."
"Oh, come on, Will," Xander said. "You've got a life. It just happens to revolve around musty old books and musty old librarians."
"Well, I don't know if I'd call him musty, exactly," Willow, and smiled a little teasingly, "I thought he was kinda cute. Just... a bit eccentric."
Her expression dampened a bit. "Did you ever talk to Jesse?"
He shook his head. "He never showed for first period. Sandy said he was in third period, but kinda out of it, like he was strung out or something. I hope whatever the hell it was that Darla chick spiked him with wasn't permanent."
Willow was thoughtful. "He didn't look strung out last night. Just kinda....sleepy. And anyway, aren't we kinda jumping on the old conclusion bandwagon with the whole Darla-poisoned-Jesse thing? Did you actually see her put anything in his drink last night? Or discuss her evil plans alone in a deserted corner of the Bronze and then laugh maniacally?"
Xander shrugged. "Well, its not like he fell asleep on that bench 'cause he needed a power nap."
"Maybe he was, like, attacked or something. Mugged."
"In Sunnydale?" Xander snorted derisively. "Anyway, he said himself nothing was missing. If somebody did rob him, they've got some concept problems with the whole stealing thing. Like how you're supposed to actually take something."
Willow would not be put off of the scent. "Well, what about those weird marks on his neck?"
Xander glanced down at her worriedly. "Yeah, that was a little scary. Looked like a bug bite or something. But have you ever heard of a bug that sucks out your memories?"
Before she could answer, someone stumbled into Xander, causing him to fall into the couch. Xander got ready to yell something at the guy, until he saw who it was - his jaw dropped.
"Jess?"
The other boy grinned lopsidedly at both of them. "Xand-man? Howz tricks?"
Xander grimaced. "Jeez, Jess, what the hell are you into?"
Jesse held up the half-empty bottle of Jim Beam and lurched unsteadily around the table. "Nuthin' but the best, man, top-grade shit. Anybody seen that Darva bitch around?"
He leaned into Xander, waved the other boy in closer as though he were about to whisper to him, then spoke almost loud enough for the rest of the Bronze to hear. "Really shiftin' the throttle last night," he winked broadly. "Roundin' home and headed to fourth base."
The bartender strolled over to the table. "Look, I don't want to seem impolite here, but if the cops see this dude in here trashed, it won't look good on my transcript. If you catch my drift."
"Drift caught," Xander acknowledged grimly, and the bartender nodded gravely. "Jess, man, you gotta sleep this off."
Jesse seemed hurt. "You're gonna let that dude run us out? Who died and made him boss?"
"Well," Willow said, trying to help salvage the situation. "Him being the owner kinda makes him the boss."
Jesse frowned, then shrugged. "Whatever." He started out, weaving through the crowd, drawing angry looks from the people he nearly tackled. Xander and Willow rushed up to support him, one taking each arm. As they walked out, Jesse began to belt out an off-key rendition of "Lean on Me" in between mouthfuls of whiskey.
"Jesus, Jess, where did you get that stuff?"
"Old man's private collection. Hope he won't miss it."
They staggered slowly on. As they walked farther and farther away from the Bronze, Jesse seemed to sober up quickly. In fact, Xander thought, it almost seemed as if he was getting scared.
They started past the Park, near the bench where they had found Jesse asleep the night before.
"Wait a sec," Jesse said waveringly. "Let's go back to the Bronze." He threw the whiskey bottle into the trash. "Come on, guys, I promise I'll be good."
"No dice, Jess," Xander grunted, trying to force the boy back toward home.
"But...but..." the boy slurred, glancing anxiously toward an alley across the street. "But somebody might be...followin' us."
"What?" Xander stopped, and looked at the boy angrily. "What do you mean, 'following us'?"
Jesse opened his mouth, but couldn't speak. His bloodshot eyes were wide and unblinking, darting here and there like a lizard's.
"Jesse," Xander said seriously, shaking the boy. "What the hell happened to you last night?"
"She..." he started hoarsely. "She wasn't..."
"Who wasn't what?" Willow said, frightened now. "Darla? Darla wasn't what, Jesse?"
"Human," said a calm, feminine voice behind them. Jesse moaned faintly. "Human might be the word he's grasping for." Xander and Willow whirled around.
Darla was standing a few paces away. Two men were standing at her side, flanking her protectively like bodyguards. They were all three of them grinning ferally, fangs instead of teeth shining brightly in the moonlight, foreheads misshapen like a mountain ridge on a relief map. But the worst, Xander thought clinically, the worst were the eyes - an animal yellow, unblinking, staring not at you but through you, in you, tasting your blood, liking what they tasted.
Darla started to move forward, her henchmen moving stride for stride with her. "Jess, you didn't call. I'm crushed."
"So," Xander said, and he was surprised at the steadiness of his tone. He felt Willow tense beside him to run, and wanted to tell her that somehow he knew it wouldn't matter if they tried to run or not. "This is the part where you kill us, I gather?"
Darla's smile widened appreciatively. "You're not as dumb as you look."
And then the vampire to her left very suddenly and smoothly vanished into a cloud of dust. Xander hadn't seen the source of the creature's destruction, but Darla and the other vampire were hissing angrily at the shadows to Xander's left. He risked a glance in that direction.
Another man was walking calmly out of the alley, with what appeared to be a crossbow fitted with wooden arrows in his hand.
Darla didn't seem surprised to see the other. She raised her hand and pointed at him, speaking with no emotion in her voice. "Kill him."
The other vampire leapt toward the man, almost too fast for Xander to track, but the shadow-man patiently tossed the crossbow aside, reaching into his black coat to retrieve a long knife - no, not a knife. It was a plain wooden stake.
The vampire led with a roundhouse kick so fast and hard that Xander thought it would have taken the Karate Kid's head off. The shadow-man sidestepped it easily, swinging his own foot into the creature's back, sending it flailing to the pavement. Before it could recover, the shadow- man brought his hand down in a smooth and lightning fast motion, plunging the stake into the vampire's back. It dissolved to dust, and was born away in the breeze.
Darla started to clap, though her expression was a bit less cheery then it had been a moment before. "Well done, Angel. I'm glad to see you're just as efficient in the kill as you used to be."
The shadow-man...Angel, Xander thought wonderingly... said nothing, only started to walk purposefully toward her, pulling another stake out of his pocket.
Darla crouched into a fighting stance. "You can't hurt me, Angel -"
"No," Angel said evenly, and pointed at Xander. "But he can. All I have to do is hold you."
Darla stared at him for a moment, a look of betrayal on her demonic face, and then she fled into the night.
Angel watched her until she was out of sight, and then looked at the teenagers. "You alright?"
Xander gaped at him. "Ah...what I mean is...ah..."
"We're fine," Willow finally said. "Thank you."
The stranger smirked. "You're welcome." He turned to leave.
"Wait!" Willow ran after him. "You're not leaving us alone again out here, are you?"
Angel shrugged. "Thought you said you were alright -"
"Yeah, but what if she comes back?"
He shook his head. "She won't. Trust me."
"But...." Willow swallowed hard. "Does that mean she's going to....you know..."
"Feed on someone else?" Angel's expression seemed to grow even more grim. "Yes, she probably is."
Willow's eyes glistened, and she turned away. "That's awful -"
"Would you rather it be you?"
She shook her head quickly. "No, no, that's not what I meant -"
"I know what you meant."
Willow looked up at him. "But you could fight her. You're some kind of superhero or something."
He laughed bitterly, harshly. "Not quite a superhero. But I'd kill her if I could."
"Why can't you?"
He glanced down as if in shame. "She's my sire."
"What's that, something like a restraining order?" she said, confused. "Is she your ex-wife?"
He shook his head, and then his face shifted, became ridged. Once again, Willow found herself looking into the eyes of a vampire. His voice was slightly garbled by the sharp teeth in his mouth. "No, I mean she made me."
Willow jumped back, heart beating a mile a minute, but she surprised herself by not running, or screaming. Angel stared at her for a long moment, evidently as surprised as she was, and then his face shifted back to normal. When he spoke again, his voice was awed and quiet. "This is usually the part where you run away screaming."
"But you saved our lives. So obviously you're not going to eat us now. I hope you're not going to eat us now -"
"No, no," he said quickly. "I'm not going to hurt you."
"Good," Willow said, relieved. "So...why aren't you going to eat us now?"
"Would you believe it's because you don't look very tasty?"
"No," she said softly, strangely offended, and then smiled. "Oh. Late picking up on the joke."
He smiled thinly. "I'm not exactly your run-of-the-mill-vampire -"
"Obviously," said Xander flatly, walking slowly up to stand at Willow's back. Jesse stood a few paces behind, unable to look directly at Angel. "So what's your non-biting deal?"
"I used to be...not so nice a guy," Angel started hesitantly. "Evil, you might say. Kinda like her," he paused to indicate Darla, "Except worse. Anyway, I killed the wrong girl, a member of a gypsy tribe. By way of revenge, they cursed me. They gave me my soul back."
Xander looked confused - what the hell kind of a roundabout punishment was that? But Willow's mouth was open, her eyes glistening again. "So you remembered all the bad things you did before, and could be ashamed for it."
Angel nodded. "I haven't fed off of a human being since then."
"Are there any more vampires out there like you? I mean, w-with souls?" Willow asked.
Angel shook his head. "No, at least not that I know of. Must not have occurred to any other vengeful gypsy tribes."
"So you're the only one... fighting against all of them?" Xander said respectfully. "Which segues nicely into my next question - Just how many of those damned things are there?"
"Hundreds," Angel replied gravely.
"In the world? I guess that's not too bad -"
"No. Hundreds in Sunnydale."
Xander paled and reached for Willow's hand in the darkness. It was cold and trembling in his. "So how come we just found out about it? Are we the only humans who know?"
"No. The majority of humanity is kept in the dark, pardon the pun," Angel smirked humorlessly. "But there are...a few that do know. And do fight. One of them..." he trailed off, as if the rest of his thoughts were too painful to put into words.
"What?" Willow asked him anxiously. "One of them what?"
"One of them...was supposed to be here. To help me fight. And she's not."
"Why Sunnydale? Why the mass infestation in our sleepy little burg?"
Angel frowned. "It's...it's hard to explain. I'm not sure I know all the details. It's got something to do with the Master. The head vampire," he said as he saw their confusion at the reference. "Over five hundred years old. Very powerful. He was...an acquaintance of mine, pre-soul. We're not each other's biggest fans nowadays. Darla works for him now, apparently."
"Why haven't we seen him around? Or any of them, for that matter?"
"I'm not exactly sure. The vampires have been laying low for a while in this town. And I haven't even seen the Master yet. Something tells me that he's not here of his own volition. Or at least he hasn't stuck around because he appreciated the high property values," he paused for a moment, waiting for a laugh, at least a smile, but the other two were stone-faced and grim. "He's stuck here, for some reason. For a while. Anyway, there is something, something about this place, that attracts the demons. I can feel it. I just can't...I can't place it," he finished, and looked down at the ground. "Except that it's underground."
"So without this girl here, the one that was gonna help you, how are you going to stop this head-vampire-guy?" Xander mused. "Apparently the direct attack isn't an option. Though by all outward appearances your ass- kicking abilities leave little to be desired."
"You're right," Angel said seriously, then saw the other two's slight grins, "I mean about the fact that I can't take the Master down by myself. I'm gonna need help -"
"We can help." Willow said.
Xander and Angel both gaped at her.
"Will," Xander said increduously, "Not to burst your little volunteer- bubble there, but we can help this guy about as much as Jimmy Olsen helped Superman," Angel stared at him strangely. "That means we wouldn't be much help."
Angel turned back to Willow. "I hate to agree with your friend's weird little comic-book analogy, but you can only get in the way. I don't mean to be insulting, but the Master would swat you like flies."
"Well, I don't mean we jump in and do the -" she paused and made little chopping motions with her hands, "-the karate thing like you do, but we could be sideline-guys. You know, root, root, root for the home team. We could help you research the Master. You know, somebody once said, to defeat your enemy, you must first know him -"
"It was Tse-tsu." Angel said patiently.
"What?"
"Tse-tsu. That was his quote."
Xander looked at him cock-eyed. "Is this the part of the conversation where you tell us you knew him, that you were sitting on the porch sipping tea when he leaned over and said 'Angel, I was sitting over here sipping my tea when the thought occured to me, to defeat your enemy, you must first -'"
"No."
Xander started to say something sarcastic in reply, but Willow elbowed him in the stomach.
Angel turned away from them for a moment, staring into space. "If you did try to help - your lives would never be the same. I mean you wouldn't be able to just leave this alone -"
"Trust me, the whole life-changing moment thing, already past it," Willow tried to joke, but it came out too slow and serious. "If it means the difference between everybody being safe and...not, then I'll do what I can do."
"Aw," Xander said reluctantly. "Wellllll...I guess...I just can't let Will go out there all alone -"
"Don't do it because of me, Xander. Do it because you want to."
Xander swallowed hard, but stared Angel resolutely in the eyes. "Count me in, Soul-man."
Angel glanced over their shoulders, in Jesse's direction. The boy was still was sitting on the ground behind them, swaying and staring palely at the concrete below, nearly oblivious to his surroundings. "What about him?"
"He's drunk," Xander said, though the tone of his voice told them that he thought his best friend would need more than a cup of coffee and a few hours rest to recover. "Give him some time. I think he'll help, too."
Angel just nodded.
"So that's it?" Willow said expectantly. "No secret club handshake? No complimentary t-shirt?"
This time, she drew a chuckle from the vampire. "'Fraid not. Though we do offer a generous retirement package," he paused, and looked at them somberly. "You aren't the only ones we'll need. To defeat the Master, we'll need a coordinated effort from more then just a handful."
"Oh, Jeez," Willow said, feeling inexplicably embarassed. "I don't think I could ask anybody I know to do something like this -"
"No, no, that's not quite what I meant. I already know of a few who would be ready and willing to join our side. I think you already met one of them."
"Who?" Willow said, perplexed.
"Giles," the librarian said, reaching forward to shake Xander's hand. "Rupert Giles. You can call me -"
"Giles, Giles, got it," Xander acknowledged quickly, returning the handshake.
The librarian nodded. "Alright, then. Uhm, Willow, you wanted to have a word with me?"
Willow nodded. "Yeah. I hope this doesn't sound too strange. Last night...me and Xander were walking home from the Bronze, w-when, we were...attacked. By a....a vampire."
For a moment, Giles simply stared at her, eyes widened, mouth slightly open, muscles tense and stiff. Then he tried to melt into a reassuring smile, which didn't fool either of the teenagers for a moment. "Perhaps I'm not accustomed yet to the, uhm, American nomenclature. By vampire, you mean -?"
"Bloodsucker. Dracula-type. With the I-never-drink-wine?"
Giles nodded slowly. "I'm afraid you must be mistaken. There is no room in science for such a creature -"
"Look, we can move past the secrecy thing, already," Xander said impatiently. "We know what we saw. And we know that you know what we saw. Or something like that."
Giles took a step back, pulling his glasses off to clean them. When he put them back on, his face was more natural, less phonily cheery. "Alright. How did you know I knew?"
Xander opened his mouth, but Willow beat him to the chase. "From a very reliable, and presently anonymous, source."
Giles looked at them askance. "How anonymous?"
"Very anonymous. John Doe-anonymous."
"Alright," Giles replied, drawing the word carefully. "What am I supposed to do about these vampires?"
Willow and Xander looked at each other. "We were hoping you would tell us."
"Uhm-hmm," Giles said, unconvinced. "And this...Mr. Doe, he is an ally?"
"Oh, yeah. Friendly. Gets his kicks staking vampires. Definitely of the ally variety."
Giles turned away, rubbing the bridge of his nose. "How much do you and Mr. Doe know?"
"We know...something about the Master," Giles started at that. "But we don't know where he is. Or why he hasn't shown his...uhm, fangy face."
"I know why," Giles said quietly. They gazed at him expectantly. "He's stuck here."
"That's what...uh, John thought. Why is he stuck?"
"Fifty years ago," Giles explained. "The Master attempted to o-open a...hole, to Hell, to set loose on the world the same demons and creatures which ruled the Earth billions of years ago. Fortunately, a f-freak earthquake disrupted the ritual, closing the hole and trapping the Master in the caverns beneath Sunnydale."
"So why the large unhappiness now? If he's stuck -"
"The Master will not stay stuck for long," he paled slightly. "The...H-Harvest is coming."
"The Harvest?" Xander asked. "I'm gonna take a leap here and guess that it's not a harvest of the good, agricultural kind that we're talking about here."
Giles paused only a moment to give the boy a strange look. "Y-yes, well, you're quite correct. On the night of the Harvest, the Master can appoint one, uhm, representative to leave the caverns. To go out and...feed for him. If this...v-vessel feeds on enough victims, the Master will be set free."
"Jesus," Xander said seriously. "This is..." he couldn't quite finish the thought.
Willow spoke up softly. "And...and how do you k-know about all of this?"
"I..." Giles started hoarsely, and swallowed. "I...used to be... someone. In a position to understand such things as these, which most people do not."
Xander was puzzled. "But now -"
"Now I'm a librarian," Giles said quickly, bitterly, "Who happens to know that one of the most infamous demons in history is about to be set loose on the world again. And I can do nothing about it."
"But we've got to do something. We c-can't just...I mean..." but Willow didn't know how to finish the thought.
Giles started to reshelve some books, slamming them into their places as hard as he could. "We can do what? All Jane and John Does aside, the Master would swat us like flies."
"That's the same thing Ang-... John said," Willow said in a small voice. Giles whirled around to look at her, then turned more slowly back to his books.
"Yes...well," Giles said sadly. "My best advice to you both, since you do know and there's nothing that will change that, is to take your families and leave Sunnydale. Immediately. And don't come back."
"That's it?" Willow asked increduously, "That's your best advice? To just...abandon our town? We grew up here, this is our home."
Giles spoke without turning around. "I might remind you that this was his home long before it was yours -"
"That's not the point, and you know it," she said angrily. Xander was watching her as if he had never seen her before. "You want us to leave without a fight? That means he wins! Is that what you want?"
"Of course not," Giles meant to say it firmly, but it sounded weak and troubled even to his own ears. "I meant that -"
"I know what you meant," she interrupted, more calmly, "And it amounts to the same thing. Holding up the little white flag."
Giles said nothing. He stopped shelving books, simply stood silently on the level above them, hunched over, as if in pain.
"What about everyone else in Sunnydale, Giles?" Willow's voice was starting to tremble, but she spoke through the tears. "What happens to the people who don't know? How can you leave with the knowledge that the people you're leaving behind will have nothing between them and the darkness when the Master rises?"
Giles mumbled something too soft for the two of them to hear.
"What?"
"I said I'm not leaving," Giles repeated gruffly. His voice was many years older then his age. "I'm staying. To fight."
"By yourself?" Willow asked incredulously. "You can't do that -"
"I can, and I will," Giles said sadly. "It's the least I can do -"
"Then it's the least we can do," Xander said firmly. Willow looked at him proudly, and he shrugged. "Hey, I couldn't let you two take all the hero lines."
Giles finally turned to look at them, pleadingly. "I can't ask you...I won't let you risk your lives -"
"You don't have to," Willow said. "We're going to fight the Master anyway. With or without your help."
Giles shook his head, and smiled sadly. "You have no idea what you're getting yourselves into -"
"That's where you and Will come in. You're the Research Duo, while me and John are out kicking undead ass, taking undead names," Willow gave him glare, and he wilted slightly. "Well, mostly John....90% John. Maybe 95%," Willow continued to stare. "Hey, I can act as a tasty bait. That's got to be worth something, right? Gimme the 5 percentage points!"
Jesse walked out of the back entrance of Sunnydale High School, glancing nervously around - in this town, it payed to know whether somebody was watching you. He didn't know why he felt so paranoid sometimes, especially at night, but a lot of the time it simply felt like he wasn't alone. Normally he wouldn't think about going anywhere without a couple of buds at his side, but this afternoon he had had to stay behind for some help in math (yeah, Ms. Jenkins was hot, but that didn't change the fact that Algebra II was a total bitch), and he had hardly been aware that time had slipped on as much as it had, and the sun had set. He was supposed to meet Willow and Xander at the Bronze at 7:00, but damned if part of him didn't want to go home, crawl in between the sheets like he was a fucking six-year-old or something.
He often found himself wondering just what in the hell it was that made this town so jumpy - what made the day seem shorter and the night just a bit darker around here? It wasn't just the multiple cemeteries (though he had to admit that was a helluva coincidence) - it just seemed like this town attracted a bad element. It wasn't a literal thing, not like monsters or evil spacemen or something (at least he didn't think so), Sunnydale just put out a bad...vibe, or something.
Ahead of him the Bronze sign glared harshly against the darkness around it, beckoning him closer, promising peace and protection, if he could manage the last few steps from here to there safely. As he moved closer, he straightened, unconciously shrugging off some the nervousness and anxiety that he felt, wanting to loosen up some. His current goal in life was to sashay into the company of one Cordelia Chase, the forbidden fruit, a goal for which he was repeatedly razzed by one Xander Harris, purporting himself to be Jesse's best friend. Of course, Xand would say, Cordy is hot, she's the epitome of hot, but it's like the apple in Snow White - one bite and you're dead meat, man. Yeah, Jesse would invariably answer back, but that would be one goddamned sweet bite. So wrapped in thoughts of Cordy Chase and impending Bronze-age was Jesse that he nearly missed the blonde woman who leaned against the wall to his left, watching him as he walked. She moved toward him, so silently and quickly that for a moment he thought his eyes were playing tricks on him in the semi-darkness. It was only after she was leaning into him, damn near touching him, before he stopped and realized that she must be real.
"Evening," she said breathily, the word flowing icily over his face.
"Uh...evening," he said hoarsely, throat for no reason suddenly devoid of all moisture. "Is there, uh, something I can help you with?"
She laughed, a tinkling little laugh that sent shivers up his spine. "Depends. Maybe I can help you."
His face grew suspicious. "Help me with what?"
She didn't answer, but instead brought her pale hands up to massage his chest. For a moment, he was speechless - this was the kind of thing you read about in Penthouse, the kind of thing you dreamed about. Yet... now that it was happening, happening to him, he felt unnacountably nervous again. Sex just seemed to radiate off of the woman in front of him - but she was cold, her hands like ice that chilled him even through the fabric of his t-shirt. Though as he stared into her eyes, it seemed not to matter much - those eyes told you that it was cool, that she was hungry, for his body, for his soul. He was the only one that could make it better, could quench that powerful thirst, and he would be grinning for every moment of it...
"Hey, Jess, you gonna come inside or play tongue tag with that chick all night?"
The voice came from very far away, from the fucking moon, and Jesse wanted to tell it to go away, just get the fuck outta here and let the business be done, but suddenly the girl was scrambling off of him, chagrined. Jesse lingered for a moment in dreamland, eyes closed and lips parted slightly, before staring furiously at the door to the Bronze and the source of the interruption.
Xander stood in the doorway expectantly. For a moment Jesse wanted nothing more in life then to wrap his hands right around that scrawny white neck and just squeeze, just squeeze the life right out of him, squeeze until his eyes fell out.
Instead Jesse forced a smile onto his face, and waved Xander back inside, "Yeah, we'll be inside in a minute, just hold your goddamned horses."
He turned back to the girl without waiting for a reply from Xander.
"Look, I don't know who in the hell you are, but I've got to say, I like your style. Wanna come inside for a drink?"
She smiled kittenishly. "You must be psychic. A drink was exactly what I came out for."
Willow and Xander sat in their customary couch in the center of the Bronze, chatting busily as was the nightly ritual. Presently they deliberated as to the possible nature of the girl who Xander had found climbing all over Jesse - Xander advanced the theory that she was a hooker, while Willow was inclined to give Jesse the benefit of the doubt, proposing that the girl was simply mentally impaired.
Jesse walked past the couch over to the bar, deliberately ignoring them, the strange girl in tow. She smiled devilishly at him as he ordered their drinks.
"I'll have a scotch on the rocks," Jesse said swankily. "And for the lady?"
"Bloody Mary," she said, almost automatically, her eyes still on Jesse.
The bartender looked at them blandly. "You got some I.D., children?"
Jesse reddened slightly, reached for his wallet, and brought out his fake.
"N.G., buddy row," the older man said, stifling a laugh. "Why don't you take your pretty little friend here and swim back to the kiddie pool."
Still smiling shyly, she reached into her pocket, and pulled out a driver's license.
"Twenty-two. Welcome to the real world." He poured her the drink, and she started to sip it slowly.
Jesse stared at her. "T-T-Twenty-two? Damn, you don't look twenty- two."
"You'd be surprised," she said softly around her straw.
Xander sidled up to the bar. "Barkeep. Couple of brewskies down this way."
"Look, man, for the third and final time, no I.D. means no booze."
Xander tried to look insulted. "But like I said before, my wallet's in the other -"
"Nope."
"Other pants?" he suggested hopefully.
"That one didn't work last week. I think you're running out of fresh material."
Xander scowled. "Alright, how about, my dog ate my I.D.?"
The bartender started to refill the peanut container. "I think that one's for your English teacher, numb nuts."
Xander shrugged. "Fair enough. Couple of Cokes down this way?"
The bartender snorted, and slid the bottles down the table.
Xander glanced over at Jesse, who looked eight seconds from throwing his date down on the bar right then. She was blonde, small, quiet - everything that Xander thought Jesse didn't look for in a girl (the exact opposite of Cordy Chase, for that matter). Xander looked more closely at the girl, and tried to remember if he had ever seen her around Sunnydale before. Sure, it wasn't Mayberry, but live around here for a while and eventually you had to see most of the sights and sounds the town had to offer. The Bronze was the one and only hotspot of social activity for the still-living-at-home crowd in town, and he, Jesse, and Willow, as well most of the Sunnydale High student body, were regular patrons, but he couldn't remember ever seeing the girl around. Or at school, for that matter.
He tapped his friend on the shoulder. For a moment, Jesse ignored him, and when he did turn around, it was with a glare of annoyance that was both unfamiliar and unwelcome on his face.
"What do you want, Xand?"
"Just wanted to see if you and your ladyfriend wanted to join me and Wills at the Scoob couch. Don't trip over yourself on the way over, though."
"Oh," the girl said excitedly, "Come on, Jess. You've told me so much about your friends, I'm just dying to meet them."
For a moment, Jesse looked totally perplexed. Then he seemed to catch the drift, and nodded slowly. "Yeah...told you so much about them, sure. Where're you sitting?"
Xander walked them to the couch, where Willow had begun to get impatient by herself.
"Sorry about that, Will. This is Jesse's new friend...uhm, I'm not sure I caught the name -"
"Darla," the girl said quickly. "Darla Sheppard. I'm at UC- Sunnydale, living on campus."
Willow smiled shyly, waved politely.
Xander, for his part, was nearly speechless. How Jesse had managed to snag a girl without his knowing it, much less a college student, much less a hot college student, was completely beyond Xander's ability to comprehended. Frantically, he motioned for the other boy to join him away from the table.
Darla sat down on the couch beside Willow.
"So...." Willow began earnestly.
"....so," the other girl replied, after a moment of silence.
Willow nodded to the guys, who appeared to be arguing, albeit whispering. "Guy stuff. Pretty complicated, that."
Darla shrugged. "Not so complicated. You've just gotta practice."
"Maybe so. Not having a steady, I guess I wouldn't know." Willow said, rather frostily.
Darla frowned. "You mean you and Xander -"
Before the girl could even finish the sentence, Willow was waving it off. "Nope, no way, not a chance. Just friends, best friends since first grade, just doing the buddy thing -"
Darla smiled again. "Got it," she nodded, but there was a wink in her voice that Willow didn't appreciate much. Before she could come up with the proper response, however, Jesse and Xander returned to the couch.
"So, Darla," Xander began, with the same kind of ice in his tone that Willow had used with the girl earlier. "What's your major?"
"Pre-med. I'm actually only a part-time student right now. Riding my dad's pocket, I guess you could say."
"So how did you and Jesse meet?" Willow asked.
"Tutoring program at the University," Jesse answered quickly. "Darla's helping me with the Algebra."
Willow glared at him angrily. "Jesse, you know, you could have come to me if you're having that much -"
"I didn't want to bother you," Jesse said crossly. "Ms. Jenkins suggested I get some help outside of the school anyway."
Willow looked ready to say something back, then thought better of it, and shrugged. "Suit yourself."
"So what's my Jess like in school?" Darla asked.
"Oh, you know, pretty qui-" Xander started to say, then caught the evil eye Jesse was sending his way. "Qui -, uh, Quick with the compliments. For the ladies. 'Cause they're all over him, you know? Will, wanna join me for a drink at the bar?"
"But I'm not -" she started, then caught Xander's come-over-here-now gestures. "Not...uh, not not thirsty. Double negative, see, one cancels the other out. I'm parched. We'll be at the bar."
Darla smiled as she watched them go. "I like your friends. They're...odd, which is good. Interesting."
Jesse smiled, though it looked more like a grimace. "I'm glad. You wanna skip?"
"But we just got here -"
"Yeah, we made the standard appearance, but I want to get back to what was happening earlier," he smiled devilishly at her, a little greedily, "Pick up where we left off."
For a moment, Darla's smile faltered, and Jesse thought that...for an instant...he saw something like anger in her radiant blue eyes. But only for an instant.
"Sure," she said, her voice a few degrees colder then it had been a moment ago. "It's kinda dead in here anyway."
She picked up her purse, and they left without a word. Willow and Xander watched them go from the bar.
"Not a word to the rest of the Scoobs," Xander said, shaking his head. "I thought he might get a little distant when he found a girl that could stand him. Just not like this."
"Don't worry," Willow said reassuringly, patting him on the hand. "When you get somebody, you can start acting like a jerk, too."
"Thanks, Will, you always know how to cheer a guy up."
Darla led Jesse away from the Bronze, back roughly in the direction of the downtown. She no longer cared whether anyone saw them - from any kind of distance, draining him would look like just a rather intense makeout session. And by the time the average passerby did notice something was wrong - perhaps when the boy started to scream - it would be far, far too late.
Besides, the whelp was starting to seriously get on her nerves. In the bar, in the company of his equally annoying friends, he was the perfect pig, playing as though he had made the first move. It was not the first time that she had encountered one so arrogant and stupid as he, and she had no doubts that it would not be the last. Perhaps as a vampire, as her childe, he could learn to be more respectful of his elders. The Master would say she was being careless, mingling with this generation, pretending she was as empty-headed as she was so often mistaken to be. But a thousand years of isolated existence had apparently not improved his sense of taste...
"You always did like to play with your food," came a voice from the shadows of an alley as they passed. Darla froze, in the utter shock of recognition - beside her, she felt the boy tense in a different kind of fright.
The voice stepped out of the darkness, became a man of substance, tall, covered nearly from head to toe in black, as if he had stepped out of a funeral procession.
For a moment, she could not find the breath to speak. The boy at her side did, however, and what he said sent her already low opinion through the floor.
"Look," Jesse started hoarsely, then cleared his throat, trying to speak firmly, "I don't know who you are, but if its money you want -"
The dark man vamped out, sneering down at the youth distastefully. "Get out of here."
"Oh, shit," the boy whispered, backing away. "Jesus, what the hell's wrong with you, man?"
He grabbed Darla's arm, and was surprised to find her as still as stone. "Come on, Darla, we've got to get out -"
She vamped out and grabbed the boy's arm. Before he could pull himself away, she twisted his arm back, forcing him around and into her arms. She threw his head back, pausing with her fangs glistening a few inches above his neck. Jesse started to cry, mumbling to himself in the darkness.
Darla smiled cruelly at the shadow-man.
"What will you give me for this boy, Angel?"
Angel's features slid back to normalcy. He held up his arms placatingly. "Just let him go, and we'll talk."
She seemed to consider for a moment. "I'm your sire, so by natural law, you can't harm a hair on my sweet little head. And even if you could, you'd never reach me before I drained half the blood out of his puny body. I could be wrong, but it looks as if I'm holding all the cards, Angelus."
Angel grimaced slightly at the name. "Alright, but if you kill him, I kill ten of yours. You know what I'm capable of."
She smirked. "Well, they didn't call you the Scourge of Europe for nothing. But I think your information is a little off. The vampires in this happy little burg are no more mine then they are yours."
That bit of news seem to catch Angel by surprise. "You mean, you're not the master that they all keep referring to?"
She shook her head. "Not a master. The Master."
The other's mouth opened slightly in dismay. "You're working for him? What the hell do you hope to accomplish with that derelict?"
"Oh, come on, Angel. You can't tell me you don't feel it like the rest of us. The mouth of Hell."
"What do you mean?" Angel whispered, though the terrible idea had already begun to take shape in his head as soon as he had arrived in Sunnydale. Darla watched it progress with bemusement on her demonic face.
"He's going to open it. The night of the Harvest. Let loose the forces of evil on the face of earth, just like old times. Fun would be the understatement of the year." Beneath her, Jesse moaned, though it was hard to say whether he was listening to the conversation at all.
"That was why she was coming here..." Angel whispered to himself, but with her sharpened senses, Darla picked up, and frowned.
"Who? Who's coming here?"
Angel shook his head, lost in thought. "Nobody of importance. You realize I'll try to stop you -"
She laughed at that. "You can try..."
With that, she threw the boy into his arms and disappeared into the night.
The boy was still trembling, muttering something to himself. It sounded suspiciously like a muddled version of the Lord's Prayer. Angel vamped out, and sank his fangs into the boy's neck, taking enough blood to ensure that the youth would remember nothing about the past few minutes. Then Angel dropped the boy on a park bench, and walked silently back into the night, brooding.
Sometime later, Xander and Willow walked by him on their way home. They were so busy chatting that they that they almost didn't notice Jesse asleep on the bench, but Xander finally saw him, and shouted out.
"Jess," he said as they ran to the bench. "Damn, Jess, what the hell happened?"
Jesse sat up, shaking his head, trying to get rid of the cobwebs. He felt as if he had been asleep for hours...
"I don't know," he said softly, "I was talking to you guys, and then I left..."
"With Darla," Willow filled in for him when he paused.
For a moment, Jesse looked confused, then nodded slowly. "Yeah, with Darla. We walked for a minute -"
Suddenly he looked fearfully at the alley across the street, his hand pointed shakily at it. Xander looked, but saw nothing but darkness.
"Then....I don't remember anything else."
Xander stared at his neck. "Well it looks like she left you with a parting gift. That's one goddamned nasty hicky."
Jesse reached up to touch it gingerly. A bruise was forming.
"Did your drink taste funny?" Willow asked him anxiously.
Jesse and Xander stared at her uncomprehendingly, and Jesse shrugged. "I don't think so. Why?"
"Because that's what they taught us in self-defense class. If your drink tastes weird on a date, it might be because your date put some drug in there, to, you know," she trailed off, gesturing with her hands, but the boys still seemed perplexed. "You know! You know that you know!"
Xander shook his head. "I don't think she was going to rape him. I think most guys would be flattered if a woman wanted to take advantage on the first date. She makes the first move, and its like, fire up the word processor and take every detail down for Penthouse."
"Then what did happen?" Willow said frustratedly.
Jesse shrugged complacently. "Just my luck. She probably did make a move, and I went into cardiac arrest or something."
"You feel alright to walk home?"
Jesse nodded, rubbing his eyes and yawning. "Yeah, I think so. I feel like I could sleep a week."
True to his word, it was nearly 10 AM by the time the alarm penetrated the haze of sleep and roused Jesse from unconciousness. He scrambled out of bed, dressed and inhaled a quick breakfast before hurrying to school.
But by the time he arrived at school, it was midway through second period, and rather than trying to catch the tail end of English III, he decided to hang out and wait for lunch period.
He still couldn't remember much from the night before, at least the period from the time he and Darla had left the bar to the time he had woken up on the park bench with Willow and Xander standing over him. What had come back to him came in the form of some really fucked up dreams, and even then, the images he saw were muddled and dark.
One word did surface in the fog repeatedly, dredged from the blackness, etched in red like a strange sort of stoplight. The word was Vampire.
After a while, he began to theorize what must have happened. He and Darla had been strolling along, perhaps too close to one of the countless dark alleys in that part of town, when they had been assaulted. Perhaps by muggers (though he had found nothing missing when he had checked his pockets at home last night). Maybe one of them had knocked him out, left him to sit on the bench, and scared Darla away. His unconcious mind, mucked up by the blow that had knocked him out, had just found a convenient label to apply to the crooks - they had been vampires. Of course it was nonsense to think that they had actually been attacked by demons, storybook creatures that had as much basis in reality as Santa Claus...
But it wasn't for information on Old Saint Nick that he went to the library.
When he got there, the library was deserted, as it very often was this time of day. Mrs. Gumbrecht, the ancient librarian that had been rumored to see 138 classes graduate, had finally found the gumption to hand the reigns over to new blood, a Mr. Styles or Miles or something.
Jesse set his bookbag down on one of the tables... and paused. As if by some divine intervention, set out on the table, was a book, worn and corroded by age. On the cover, written in some stylish old handwriting, was a single word - Vampyre. Jesse sat down, and opened the tattered book gingerly.
Most of it was stuff he already knew from the movies - crosses, holy water, garlic, sunlight, whatever. Scattered throughout the tattered pages were images, pictures of one ghastly torture or another, scenes of bloodshed from hundreds of years past.
One picture leapt up at him, and he stopped flipping. It was another one of the nasties, face ridged, teeth bared, menacing another random victim. And Jesse had the strangest feeling of deja vu -
The caption below read: He hath the face of an Angel, but he is the Devil's Own. Now and forevermore to be named the Scourge of Europe, hunter and hunted through eternity.
Jesse found he was shaking, and took a deep breath, eyes focused on the picture. Scourge of Europe, why did it sound so familiar? And why did the picture make him so suddenly afraid? It had to be two hundred years old, and for that matter not real, so why did it feel as if he had seen the face before?
There was a soft harumph behind him, and Jesse almost screamed at the sound. He turned, pale and shaking.
A tall man stood a few paces behind him, dressed entirely from head to toe in tweed, wiping the glasses in his hand clean, looking vaguely uncomfortable.
"Can I help -" the man started, in a British accent, before noticing the book in Jesse's hand. He reached over quickly to snatch it out. "Uhm, I'm sorry, this one's off-limits. Part of my private collection. Don't know what I was thinking, leaving it out like this."
Jesse sighed, tension slowly easing out of his body.
The older man looked askance at the boy. "Are you alright? I, uhm, didn't mean to startle you -"
"Nah, it's alright," Jesse said, "I was just in here to...uh, to browse."
The man seemed to ponder this for a moment, and Jesse wasn't sure he was buying it, but then the man nodded. "Very well. I'll be in the office if you need anything else."
The older man turned to go -
"Wait a sec," Jesse said. "Maybe there is something you could tell me - What do you know about vampires?"
The librarian stiffened noticeably, reaching up automatically to take his glasses off and clean them again. "Well...uhm, my s-specialty isn't mythology -"
Jesse looked down at his hands. "So...so they're not, uh, real, right?"
The man smiled, chuckled artificially. "No, they're not."
Jesse nodded, and picked up his books to leave.
"Just for curosity's sake, uhm, what makes you ask?"
Jesse shrugged. "Nightmares, mostly. Just wanted to see what made 'em tick."
He left the library. Rupert Giles watched him go, an anxious look on his face, and then hurried back into his office.
Sometime later, Giles cradled the telephone in one hand, flipping through an ancient text with the other.
"Yes, yes, I am aware of the transient nature of the -" he paused, allowing the other to speak. "No, I don't think I'm overreacting. You've no idea of the kind of activity....No, Sunnydale isn't overwhelmed, not yet. But matters are coming to a head -" Giles sighed in frustration. "Very shortly. And I simply cannot believe that the activity in Cleveland would deserve the kind of attention....Convenience? Since when does convenience matter in our business?"
Giles stopped flipping for a moment to stare out the window. "So that's the Council's final deliberation? Yes....yes, I'm sorry too," he finished this last with sarcasm, and slammed the phone down angrily. "Bloody fools. Bloody bureacratic popinjays."
His mind wandered again to the boy whom Giles had found reading the volume of watcher's journals, and cursed himself again for leaving it out. But the boy's fright was easy enough to read - he had been terrified. Obviously he had been attacked by one of the demons. Giles didn't know why the boy was even alive - he had never heard of a vampire leaving its victim alive for any reason, but perhaps it was a sign of just how extraordinary the situation was becoming.
The Slayer. He should have gone back to England, to the Council, to plead his case in person, the moment he realized she was late. But like the dutiful little Watcher, he had stayed here, waited, apparently in vain. And now he was alone. On the Hellmouth. The chain of command in the Watcher's Council dictated that he, in the field, have absolutely the least amount of decision-making power, and they categorically refused to credit his claims that the Master was here, intent on rising, the Harvest perhaps a month away.
"Bloody fools," he whispered again, and sank his head into his hands. He hadn't slept well the last few weeks - strategy after useless strategy flashed endlessly in his mind, him without the weapon to wield. It was a maddeningly frustrating position, made all the more difficult by his daily encounters as a high school librarian with the youth of the town.
Here came another of them, now, as the school bell rang. She was slight, red hair pulled back in a rather unflattering pigtail arrangement, glancing here and there with a shy, slightly confused expression on her delicate face. Oh, yes, he thought savagely, the demons would have fun corrupting such a one. And all like her. He closed his eyes for a moment, unable to look at the girl - fun indeed.
There was a knock on the office door. He opened it to find the red- haired girl looking up at him meekly.
"I hope I'm not bothering -"
"No, no," he said quickly, "No interruption. Uhm, is there something I can do for you, Ms....Ms -?"
"Rosenberg," the girl said, "Willow. You're M-Mr. Giles, right?"
"Yes," he smiled slightly, though it was a forced and distracted motion. "Rupert Giles."
She smiled slightly, too. "You posted something on the door last week, a-about an opening? For an assistant?"
For a moment, still wrapped up in thoughts of the Slayer and the encroaching Harvest, he had no idea what she was referring to - then it came to him. "Yes, yes, of course. You must forgive me, I'm still acclimating myself to the, uhm, American schedule."
She giggled at that.
He grinned again, and this time the expression felt more natural. "Something amusing, Ms. Rosenberg?"
"No, no," she said, trying to keep a straight face, "It's nothing important."
"Uhm, yes," he said, though he was still perplexed. "Please, have a seat, Ms. Rosenberg."
She nodded gratefully. "Call me Willow."
"Then you can call me...uhm, no I take that back, I suppose you can't. Call me Giles."
"Giles," she rolled it around experimently in her mouth. "Giles it is."
"So how's the new librarian?"
Xander sat down heavily on the sofa next to Willow, handing her a coke while taking a swig out of his own.
"Fine," she said, "Kinda British, though. He said shedule. How weird is that?"
Xander shrugged. "Did you get the job?"
"Yeah, I think so. Didn't sound like there were a whole lot of kids scrambling for the position. Most of 'em have lives, I guess. Their loss."
"Oh, come on, Will," Xander said. "You've got a life. It just happens to revolve around musty old books and musty old librarians."
"Well, I don't know if I'd call him musty, exactly," Willow, and smiled a little teasingly, "I thought he was kinda cute. Just... a bit eccentric."
Her expression dampened a bit. "Did you ever talk to Jesse?"
He shook his head. "He never showed for first period. Sandy said he was in third period, but kinda out of it, like he was strung out or something. I hope whatever the hell it was that Darla chick spiked him with wasn't permanent."
Willow was thoughtful. "He didn't look strung out last night. Just kinda....sleepy. And anyway, aren't we kinda jumping on the old conclusion bandwagon with the whole Darla-poisoned-Jesse thing? Did you actually see her put anything in his drink last night? Or discuss her evil plans alone in a deserted corner of the Bronze and then laugh maniacally?"
Xander shrugged. "Well, its not like he fell asleep on that bench 'cause he needed a power nap."
"Maybe he was, like, attacked or something. Mugged."
"In Sunnydale?" Xander snorted derisively. "Anyway, he said himself nothing was missing. If somebody did rob him, they've got some concept problems with the whole stealing thing. Like how you're supposed to actually take something."
Willow would not be put off of the scent. "Well, what about those weird marks on his neck?"
Xander glanced down at her worriedly. "Yeah, that was a little scary. Looked like a bug bite or something. But have you ever heard of a bug that sucks out your memories?"
Before she could answer, someone stumbled into Xander, causing him to fall into the couch. Xander got ready to yell something at the guy, until he saw who it was - his jaw dropped.
"Jess?"
The other boy grinned lopsidedly at both of them. "Xand-man? Howz tricks?"
Xander grimaced. "Jeez, Jess, what the hell are you into?"
Jesse held up the half-empty bottle of Jim Beam and lurched unsteadily around the table. "Nuthin' but the best, man, top-grade shit. Anybody seen that Darva bitch around?"
He leaned into Xander, waved the other boy in closer as though he were about to whisper to him, then spoke almost loud enough for the rest of the Bronze to hear. "Really shiftin' the throttle last night," he winked broadly. "Roundin' home and headed to fourth base."
The bartender strolled over to the table. "Look, I don't want to seem impolite here, but if the cops see this dude in here trashed, it won't look good on my transcript. If you catch my drift."
"Drift caught," Xander acknowledged grimly, and the bartender nodded gravely. "Jess, man, you gotta sleep this off."
Jesse seemed hurt. "You're gonna let that dude run us out? Who died and made him boss?"
"Well," Willow said, trying to help salvage the situation. "Him being the owner kinda makes him the boss."
Jesse frowned, then shrugged. "Whatever." He started out, weaving through the crowd, drawing angry looks from the people he nearly tackled. Xander and Willow rushed up to support him, one taking each arm. As they walked out, Jesse began to belt out an off-key rendition of "Lean on Me" in between mouthfuls of whiskey.
"Jesus, Jess, where did you get that stuff?"
"Old man's private collection. Hope he won't miss it."
They staggered slowly on. As they walked farther and farther away from the Bronze, Jesse seemed to sober up quickly. In fact, Xander thought, it almost seemed as if he was getting scared.
They started past the Park, near the bench where they had found Jesse asleep the night before.
"Wait a sec," Jesse said waveringly. "Let's go back to the Bronze." He threw the whiskey bottle into the trash. "Come on, guys, I promise I'll be good."
"No dice, Jess," Xander grunted, trying to force the boy back toward home.
"But...but..." the boy slurred, glancing anxiously toward an alley across the street. "But somebody might be...followin' us."
"What?" Xander stopped, and looked at the boy angrily. "What do you mean, 'following us'?"
Jesse opened his mouth, but couldn't speak. His bloodshot eyes were wide and unblinking, darting here and there like a lizard's.
"Jesse," Xander said seriously, shaking the boy. "What the hell happened to you last night?"
"She..." he started hoarsely. "She wasn't..."
"Who wasn't what?" Willow said, frightened now. "Darla? Darla wasn't what, Jesse?"
"Human," said a calm, feminine voice behind them. Jesse moaned faintly. "Human might be the word he's grasping for." Xander and Willow whirled around.
Darla was standing a few paces away. Two men were standing at her side, flanking her protectively like bodyguards. They were all three of them grinning ferally, fangs instead of teeth shining brightly in the moonlight, foreheads misshapen like a mountain ridge on a relief map. But the worst, Xander thought clinically, the worst were the eyes - an animal yellow, unblinking, staring not at you but through you, in you, tasting your blood, liking what they tasted.
Darla started to move forward, her henchmen moving stride for stride with her. "Jess, you didn't call. I'm crushed."
"So," Xander said, and he was surprised at the steadiness of his tone. He felt Willow tense beside him to run, and wanted to tell her that somehow he knew it wouldn't matter if they tried to run or not. "This is the part where you kill us, I gather?"
Darla's smile widened appreciatively. "You're not as dumb as you look."
And then the vampire to her left very suddenly and smoothly vanished into a cloud of dust. Xander hadn't seen the source of the creature's destruction, but Darla and the other vampire were hissing angrily at the shadows to Xander's left. He risked a glance in that direction.
Another man was walking calmly out of the alley, with what appeared to be a crossbow fitted with wooden arrows in his hand.
Darla didn't seem surprised to see the other. She raised her hand and pointed at him, speaking with no emotion in her voice. "Kill him."
The other vampire leapt toward the man, almost too fast for Xander to track, but the shadow-man patiently tossed the crossbow aside, reaching into his black coat to retrieve a long knife - no, not a knife. It was a plain wooden stake.
The vampire led with a roundhouse kick so fast and hard that Xander thought it would have taken the Karate Kid's head off. The shadow-man sidestepped it easily, swinging his own foot into the creature's back, sending it flailing to the pavement. Before it could recover, the shadow- man brought his hand down in a smooth and lightning fast motion, plunging the stake into the vampire's back. It dissolved to dust, and was born away in the breeze.
Darla started to clap, though her expression was a bit less cheery then it had been a moment before. "Well done, Angel. I'm glad to see you're just as efficient in the kill as you used to be."
The shadow-man...Angel, Xander thought wonderingly... said nothing, only started to walk purposefully toward her, pulling another stake out of his pocket.
Darla crouched into a fighting stance. "You can't hurt me, Angel -"
"No," Angel said evenly, and pointed at Xander. "But he can. All I have to do is hold you."
Darla stared at him for a moment, a look of betrayal on her demonic face, and then she fled into the night.
Angel watched her until she was out of sight, and then looked at the teenagers. "You alright?"
Xander gaped at him. "Ah...what I mean is...ah..."
"We're fine," Willow finally said. "Thank you."
The stranger smirked. "You're welcome." He turned to leave.
"Wait!" Willow ran after him. "You're not leaving us alone again out here, are you?"
Angel shrugged. "Thought you said you were alright -"
"Yeah, but what if she comes back?"
He shook his head. "She won't. Trust me."
"But...." Willow swallowed hard. "Does that mean she's going to....you know..."
"Feed on someone else?" Angel's expression seemed to grow even more grim. "Yes, she probably is."
Willow's eyes glistened, and she turned away. "That's awful -"
"Would you rather it be you?"
She shook her head quickly. "No, no, that's not what I meant -"
"I know what you meant."
Willow looked up at him. "But you could fight her. You're some kind of superhero or something."
He laughed bitterly, harshly. "Not quite a superhero. But I'd kill her if I could."
"Why can't you?"
He glanced down as if in shame. "She's my sire."
"What's that, something like a restraining order?" she said, confused. "Is she your ex-wife?"
He shook his head, and then his face shifted, became ridged. Once again, Willow found herself looking into the eyes of a vampire. His voice was slightly garbled by the sharp teeth in his mouth. "No, I mean she made me."
Willow jumped back, heart beating a mile a minute, but she surprised herself by not running, or screaming. Angel stared at her for a long moment, evidently as surprised as she was, and then his face shifted back to normal. When he spoke again, his voice was awed and quiet. "This is usually the part where you run away screaming."
"But you saved our lives. So obviously you're not going to eat us now. I hope you're not going to eat us now -"
"No, no," he said quickly. "I'm not going to hurt you."
"Good," Willow said, relieved. "So...why aren't you going to eat us now?"
"Would you believe it's because you don't look very tasty?"
"No," she said softly, strangely offended, and then smiled. "Oh. Late picking up on the joke."
He smiled thinly. "I'm not exactly your run-of-the-mill-vampire -"
"Obviously," said Xander flatly, walking slowly up to stand at Willow's back. Jesse stood a few paces behind, unable to look directly at Angel. "So what's your non-biting deal?"
"I used to be...not so nice a guy," Angel started hesitantly. "Evil, you might say. Kinda like her," he paused to indicate Darla, "Except worse. Anyway, I killed the wrong girl, a member of a gypsy tribe. By way of revenge, they cursed me. They gave me my soul back."
Xander looked confused - what the hell kind of a roundabout punishment was that? But Willow's mouth was open, her eyes glistening again. "So you remembered all the bad things you did before, and could be ashamed for it."
Angel nodded. "I haven't fed off of a human being since then."
"Are there any more vampires out there like you? I mean, w-with souls?" Willow asked.
Angel shook his head. "No, at least not that I know of. Must not have occurred to any other vengeful gypsy tribes."
"So you're the only one... fighting against all of them?" Xander said respectfully. "Which segues nicely into my next question - Just how many of those damned things are there?"
"Hundreds," Angel replied gravely.
"In the world? I guess that's not too bad -"
"No. Hundreds in Sunnydale."
Xander paled and reached for Willow's hand in the darkness. It was cold and trembling in his. "So how come we just found out about it? Are we the only humans who know?"
"No. The majority of humanity is kept in the dark, pardon the pun," Angel smirked humorlessly. "But there are...a few that do know. And do fight. One of them..." he trailed off, as if the rest of his thoughts were too painful to put into words.
"What?" Willow asked him anxiously. "One of them what?"
"One of them...was supposed to be here. To help me fight. And she's not."
"Why Sunnydale? Why the mass infestation in our sleepy little burg?"
Angel frowned. "It's...it's hard to explain. I'm not sure I know all the details. It's got something to do with the Master. The head vampire," he said as he saw their confusion at the reference. "Over five hundred years old. Very powerful. He was...an acquaintance of mine, pre-soul. We're not each other's biggest fans nowadays. Darla works for him now, apparently."
"Why haven't we seen him around? Or any of them, for that matter?"
"I'm not exactly sure. The vampires have been laying low for a while in this town. And I haven't even seen the Master yet. Something tells me that he's not here of his own volition. Or at least he hasn't stuck around because he appreciated the high property values," he paused for a moment, waiting for a laugh, at least a smile, but the other two were stone-faced and grim. "He's stuck here, for some reason. For a while. Anyway, there is something, something about this place, that attracts the demons. I can feel it. I just can't...I can't place it," he finished, and looked down at the ground. "Except that it's underground."
"So without this girl here, the one that was gonna help you, how are you going to stop this head-vampire-guy?" Xander mused. "Apparently the direct attack isn't an option. Though by all outward appearances your ass- kicking abilities leave little to be desired."
"You're right," Angel said seriously, then saw the other two's slight grins, "I mean about the fact that I can't take the Master down by myself. I'm gonna need help -"
"We can help." Willow said.
Xander and Angel both gaped at her.
"Will," Xander said increduously, "Not to burst your little volunteer- bubble there, but we can help this guy about as much as Jimmy Olsen helped Superman," Angel stared at him strangely. "That means we wouldn't be much help."
Angel turned back to Willow. "I hate to agree with your friend's weird little comic-book analogy, but you can only get in the way. I don't mean to be insulting, but the Master would swat you like flies."
"Well, I don't mean we jump in and do the -" she paused and made little chopping motions with her hands, "-the karate thing like you do, but we could be sideline-guys. You know, root, root, root for the home team. We could help you research the Master. You know, somebody once said, to defeat your enemy, you must first know him -"
"It was Tse-tsu." Angel said patiently.
"What?"
"Tse-tsu. That was his quote."
Xander looked at him cock-eyed. "Is this the part of the conversation where you tell us you knew him, that you were sitting on the porch sipping tea when he leaned over and said 'Angel, I was sitting over here sipping my tea when the thought occured to me, to defeat your enemy, you must first -'"
"No."
Xander started to say something sarcastic in reply, but Willow elbowed him in the stomach.
Angel turned away from them for a moment, staring into space. "If you did try to help - your lives would never be the same. I mean you wouldn't be able to just leave this alone -"
"Trust me, the whole life-changing moment thing, already past it," Willow tried to joke, but it came out too slow and serious. "If it means the difference between everybody being safe and...not, then I'll do what I can do."
"Aw," Xander said reluctantly. "Wellllll...I guess...I just can't let Will go out there all alone -"
"Don't do it because of me, Xander. Do it because you want to."
Xander swallowed hard, but stared Angel resolutely in the eyes. "Count me in, Soul-man."
Angel glanced over their shoulders, in Jesse's direction. The boy was still was sitting on the ground behind them, swaying and staring palely at the concrete below, nearly oblivious to his surroundings. "What about him?"
"He's drunk," Xander said, though the tone of his voice told them that he thought his best friend would need more than a cup of coffee and a few hours rest to recover. "Give him some time. I think he'll help, too."
Angel just nodded.
"So that's it?" Willow said expectantly. "No secret club handshake? No complimentary t-shirt?"
This time, she drew a chuckle from the vampire. "'Fraid not. Though we do offer a generous retirement package," he paused, and looked at them somberly. "You aren't the only ones we'll need. To defeat the Master, we'll need a coordinated effort from more then just a handful."
"Oh, Jeez," Willow said, feeling inexplicably embarassed. "I don't think I could ask anybody I know to do something like this -"
"No, no, that's not quite what I meant. I already know of a few who would be ready and willing to join our side. I think you already met one of them."
"Who?" Willow said, perplexed.
"Giles," the librarian said, reaching forward to shake Xander's hand. "Rupert Giles. You can call me -"
"Giles, Giles, got it," Xander acknowledged quickly, returning the handshake.
The librarian nodded. "Alright, then. Uhm, Willow, you wanted to have a word with me?"
Willow nodded. "Yeah. I hope this doesn't sound too strange. Last night...me and Xander were walking home from the Bronze, w-when, we were...attacked. By a....a vampire."
For a moment, Giles simply stared at her, eyes widened, mouth slightly open, muscles tense and stiff. Then he tried to melt into a reassuring smile, which didn't fool either of the teenagers for a moment. "Perhaps I'm not accustomed yet to the, uhm, American nomenclature. By vampire, you mean -?"
"Bloodsucker. Dracula-type. With the I-never-drink-wine?"
Giles nodded slowly. "I'm afraid you must be mistaken. There is no room in science for such a creature -"
"Look, we can move past the secrecy thing, already," Xander said impatiently. "We know what we saw. And we know that you know what we saw. Or something like that."
Giles took a step back, pulling his glasses off to clean them. When he put them back on, his face was more natural, less phonily cheery. "Alright. How did you know I knew?"
Xander opened his mouth, but Willow beat him to the chase. "From a very reliable, and presently anonymous, source."
Giles looked at them askance. "How anonymous?"
"Very anonymous. John Doe-anonymous."
"Alright," Giles replied, drawing the word carefully. "What am I supposed to do about these vampires?"
Willow and Xander looked at each other. "We were hoping you would tell us."
"Uhm-hmm," Giles said, unconvinced. "And this...Mr. Doe, he is an ally?"
"Oh, yeah. Friendly. Gets his kicks staking vampires. Definitely of the ally variety."
Giles turned away, rubbing the bridge of his nose. "How much do you and Mr. Doe know?"
"We know...something about the Master," Giles started at that. "But we don't know where he is. Or why he hasn't shown his...uhm, fangy face."
"I know why," Giles said quietly. They gazed at him expectantly. "He's stuck here."
"That's what...uh, John thought. Why is he stuck?"
"Fifty years ago," Giles explained. "The Master attempted to o-open a...hole, to Hell, to set loose on the world the same demons and creatures which ruled the Earth billions of years ago. Fortunately, a f-freak earthquake disrupted the ritual, closing the hole and trapping the Master in the caverns beneath Sunnydale."
"So why the large unhappiness now? If he's stuck -"
"The Master will not stay stuck for long," he paled slightly. "The...H-Harvest is coming."
"The Harvest?" Xander asked. "I'm gonna take a leap here and guess that it's not a harvest of the good, agricultural kind that we're talking about here."
Giles paused only a moment to give the boy a strange look. "Y-yes, well, you're quite correct. On the night of the Harvest, the Master can appoint one, uhm, representative to leave the caverns. To go out and...feed for him. If this...v-vessel feeds on enough victims, the Master will be set free."
"Jesus," Xander said seriously. "This is..." he couldn't quite finish the thought.
Willow spoke up softly. "And...and how do you k-know about all of this?"
"I..." Giles started hoarsely, and swallowed. "I...used to be... someone. In a position to understand such things as these, which most people do not."
Xander was puzzled. "But now -"
"Now I'm a librarian," Giles said quickly, bitterly, "Who happens to know that one of the most infamous demons in history is about to be set loose on the world again. And I can do nothing about it."
"But we've got to do something. We c-can't just...I mean..." but Willow didn't know how to finish the thought.
Giles started to reshelve some books, slamming them into their places as hard as he could. "We can do what? All Jane and John Does aside, the Master would swat us like flies."
"That's the same thing Ang-... John said," Willow said in a small voice. Giles whirled around to look at her, then turned more slowly back to his books.
"Yes...well," Giles said sadly. "My best advice to you both, since you do know and there's nothing that will change that, is to take your families and leave Sunnydale. Immediately. And don't come back."
"That's it?" Willow asked increduously, "That's your best advice? To just...abandon our town? We grew up here, this is our home."
Giles spoke without turning around. "I might remind you that this was his home long before it was yours -"
"That's not the point, and you know it," she said angrily. Xander was watching her as if he had never seen her before. "You want us to leave without a fight? That means he wins! Is that what you want?"
"Of course not," Giles meant to say it firmly, but it sounded weak and troubled even to his own ears. "I meant that -"
"I know what you meant," she interrupted, more calmly, "And it amounts to the same thing. Holding up the little white flag."
Giles said nothing. He stopped shelving books, simply stood silently on the level above them, hunched over, as if in pain.
"What about everyone else in Sunnydale, Giles?" Willow's voice was starting to tremble, but she spoke through the tears. "What happens to the people who don't know? How can you leave with the knowledge that the people you're leaving behind will have nothing between them and the darkness when the Master rises?"
Giles mumbled something too soft for the two of them to hear.
"What?"
"I said I'm not leaving," Giles repeated gruffly. His voice was many years older then his age. "I'm staying. To fight."
"By yourself?" Willow asked incredulously. "You can't do that -"
"I can, and I will," Giles said sadly. "It's the least I can do -"
"Then it's the least we can do," Xander said firmly. Willow looked at him proudly, and he shrugged. "Hey, I couldn't let you two take all the hero lines."
Giles finally turned to look at them, pleadingly. "I can't ask you...I won't let you risk your lives -"
"You don't have to," Willow said. "We're going to fight the Master anyway. With or without your help."
Giles shook his head, and smiled sadly. "You have no idea what you're getting yourselves into -"
"That's where you and Will come in. You're the Research Duo, while me and John are out kicking undead ass, taking undead names," Willow gave him glare, and he wilted slightly. "Well, mostly John....90% John. Maybe 95%," Willow continued to stare. "Hey, I can act as a tasty bait. That's got to be worth something, right? Gimme the 5 percentage points!"