Authors Notes: This is my first attempt at writing a fanfiction and I'm not the fastest writer in the world, so subsequent chapters may be a little slow in appearing. Please bear with me and have patience. This prologue is pretty much just setting the scene, but future chapters will include femslash romance, so if this is illegal for you to read, or just not to your taste, you have been warned.
PrologueBuffy was bored. The bright full moon shone down upon the still loneliness of the empty graveyard. The cold clear light clearly delineated row after row of grave stones undisturbed by any newly arising vampires. No demons lurked amongst the shadows behind the scattered mausoleums. Everything was perfectly peaceful.
Buffy sighed. Three nights patrol with absolutely nothing to fight. She could feel the frustrations building up inside her with nothing to release them on. Of course it didn't help that Angel seemed to have pulled another disappearing act. She had thought that everything was going so well. After he confessed his jealousy for the act she had put on dancing with Xander at the Bronze, she was sure they'd resolved the awkwardness between them, but now he'd vanished and she wasn't so sure any longer.
So she was trudging through the graveyards searching for something evil, and preferably not too slimy, to beat up in the hope of taking her mind off her pathetic love life. But as so often happened when she actually wanted something to fight all the evil creatures of the world were nowhere to be found.
No new supernatural threat had raised its ugly head in Sunnydale since she and her friends had put a stop to Chris and Eric's little build-your-own-girl scheme last week. 'Oh, and wasn't that a big success!' she thought to herself. 'Another burnt down school building to add to my record. Guess I should be grateful that at least this time the fire was an accident and the building was abandoned rather than in regular use.'
At first Buffy had been a bit worried that the fire investigators might start asking some awkward questions once Daryl's remains were discovered and had asked Willow to keep an eye on what reports and evidence were being filed in the Fire Department's and Sunnydale Police Department's computer systems. So far, they weren't reporting anything other than "medical wired together skeletons" and the missing remains of the exhumed cheerleaders. They even seemed to be treating the fire as accidental rather than arson, with one report rambling on at length about lack of maintenance, faulty wiring, the improper storage of highly flammable chemicals and for some strange reason, mice.
She had been amused the next day by Willow's recounting of Cordelia's big thank you speech to Xander. Which he had blown off in a completely self-absorbed and clueless rambling on his dateless status. Perhaps there was hope for Cordelia yet. After all if she could unbend enough to thank Xander of all people for saving her life then maybe she wouldn't feel compelled to make snippy comments to Buffy or her friends whenever their paths crossed. 'Yeah, and wasn't that a flying pig I saw earlier!' Buffy thought with a snort. 'She did look kind of cute with those smudges on her nose and forehead though. And getting t ride on top of her like that would sure have been more fun that getting pounded on by the NFL's answer to Frankenstein junior.'
'Whoa, I did not just think…' Buffy shook her head vigorously as though to dislodge the unwanted thoughts. 'Nah! It must be the boredom. No way am I imagining what it would be like to feel my body pressed up against her firm…'
"Arghh!" Buffy exclaimed aloud in disgust. "I so need a good slay! Where are the vampires when I really need them?"
"Why right behind ya darlin'," a new voice said in an exaggerated Western drawl.
Buffy whirled around to face the newcomer and couldn't help laughing out loud. "You have no idea how ridiculous that cowboy hat looks on top of your game face do you?" she asked cocking her head to one side. Watching as the vampire turned a bright red with rage, she answered her own question. "No, of course not. What with you being reflectionally challenged and everything."
The cowboy charged furiously, growling low in his throat, out-stretched hands and curled talons grasping for her throat. Buffy merely side-stepped and gave him a hearty kick in the back side as he stumbled past, sending him crashing face first into a nearby grave stone. "Oh, come on. You can do better than that surely. How am I meant to work off my frustrations if you make it this easy for me?"
The vampire staggered to his feet and brought his hand up to wipe at the slow trickle of blood seeping from a shallow cut above his right eyebrow. Looking at the red stain on his fingers he snarled at the Slayer and swung with all his might towards the Slayer's smirking face. With a snort, Buffy simply leaned back slightly letting the fist swish past her before shoving the seriously off balance vampire with her foot sending him sprawling across another grave.
Pulling a stake from the waistband of her pants and twirling it lightly in her fingers, Buffy put her left hand on her hip and looked down at the fallen vampire in disgust. "I can't believe I'm going to say this," she told him. "But you're making this way too easy."
"Why ya lil' bitch! Wait till I get my hands on you. I'll rip your head off and…" he yelled, leaping up to attack once more, only to stop with a stunned look on his face as he ran right into the business end of Buffy's stake. "Sh…" he started to say, before bursting into a cloud of ash.
"And another one bites the dust." Buffy smiled with satisfaction. 'Now why does that phrase sound familiar?' She shrugged dismissing both the thought and her recent foe. 'Well I guess that's my duty done for the night. What little there was of it. Time to hit The Bronze'
With her friends gathered around the table in the library the next day, Buffy was recounting her encounter with a certain amount of relish.
"I know that vamps often have really dated fashion senses, but this one really took the biscuit. I swear he even had snake skin boots. It was just so ridiculous, a style critique from Cordelia would've made him run away in shame, I tell you!"
"He didn't sound like the sensitive type to me, Buff" said Willow. Bright highlights catching in her long red hair as she shook her head emphatically. "He'd more likely try to skin her to make himself a matching belt."
"Eww! That is one visual I really didn't need." Buffy complained screwing up her nose. "Speaking of the annoying one, has anyone seen her since that Weird Science business the other night?"
Giles looked up from the book he had been studying with a frown. "Now that you mention it, I don't think she showed up at school today."
"That's odd," Willow said. "She didn't seem to be hurt or anything. You don't suppose anything's happened to her do you?"
Xander snorted from the other end of the table. "Hah! It's probably nothing. After all what could possibly have happened to her on her way home?"
"You're kidding right!" Buffy demanded in surprise. Her short blonde hair swirling about her shoulders as she turned to confront him. "I spend more time rescuing Cordelia than the rest of you put together! Something is always happening to her. Plus you know what she's like. She'd accept a lift from the Devil himself if he was driving an expensive enough car."
Xander looked away from her glare hanging his head. "Sorry, that was stupid alright, but Queen C just gets under my skin. It's not like I really want anything bad to happen to her." He paused a moment with a thoughtful look on his face. "At least not unless I get to watch."
"Xander!" Willow exclaimed thumping him on the arm.
"Oww!"
"Enough, children" Giles said wearily. "I think we should at least check to see if anyone has heard anything before we assume the worst."
"Good idea. I've got History next. If Cordelia isn't in class I'll ask the teacher if she's heard anything," volunteered Buffy. Then with a slightly malicious smile she turned to Xander. "Why don't you find Harmony and ask her if she knows where Cordy is?"
"What! No. No. And I say again, no." Xander jumped up waving his arms in agitation. "Why don't you ask me to do something safer? Like run naked through the graveyard at night with a sign marked 'Food' around my neck."
"I'd pay to see that," Willow muttered too quietly for anyone to hear. Or so she thought until she saw Buffy staring at her with her mouth hanging open.
"Ah, um, well…" Giles said taking his glasses off and polishing them intently for a moment. Pointedly ignoring Xander's outburst he continued, "I'll check with the school office and see if Cordelia called in sick today."
"Quit the dramatics Xander. It's just Harmony. She's a pain but she's not dangerous."
"Fine," Xander moaned. "But you are all going to owe me for this. And don't say I didn't warn you if I end up with my brains dribbling out my ears from having to listen to her mindless yammering!" And with a last glare around the room he stormed out.
Buffy and Willow shared an amused look at their friends antics, before getting up as well. "See you later Giles, but first the dreadful fate that is history class awaits us."
The gang had questioned everyone they could think of who might know anything about Cordelia's whereabouts, but nobody had seen her for days. And strangely nobody seemed to be worried much either.
Harmony had told Xander that Cordy's parents had left for a vacation and that perhaps she had gone with them to "… like, get over the shock of almost getting cooked in that fire, you know?"
Aura told him Cordy had failed to show up for a shopping trip they and a couple of their other friends had arranged for Saturday and then not appeared for their arranged date at The Bronze that evening either. They had heard a version of what had happened at the game and knew Cordelia wasn't always the most conscientious person when it came to keeping appointments, so the girls weren't really too surprised.
The school secretary had told Giles that there were no notes or messages asking for Cordelia to be excused from school but that "those rich bitches often disappeared for days when the fancy took them."
When Chris had told Buffy that he had seen Cordelia heading back towards the locker rooms after speaking with Xander and Willow by the fire trucks, probably to clean up and change out of her cheerleader's uniform. So Buffy had gone in search of Joy, finally cornering the older cheerleader in the locker room hoping she might know or have heard something / anything that might give some clue to where Cordelia had gone after that. But Joy hadn't seen or heard from her either. And more worryingly still, Joy reported that Cordelia's sports bag and clothes were still where she'd left them that night.
After hearing all the negative reports, Giles had quietly phoned around the local hospitals to see if she might have been admitted. Then with a sinking feeling in his heart he had asked Willow to hack into the Coroners Office's files to check who had turned up in the morgues recently.
When Willow reported that not only was there nobody matching Cordelia's description but that there had only been one other death in the last few days and that was of an overweight middle aged man who suffered a massive coronary while in the queue at the local burger bar, everyone breathed a sigh of relief.
The relief quickly turned to concern again as it struck them just how unusual the lack of deaths was for Sunnydale. They had all dove into research mode then to look for anything in the books that might explain the sudden lull in supernatural activity and maybe give a hint of just what might have happened to Cordelia.
Several hours later and with no further clue as to what might be happening, Xander and Willow had reluctantly left to go home. Buffy was all for doing the same herself but Giles had cautioned her that just because things looked quiet was no reason for her to slack off on her duties. After all they had no idea what new evil might be quietly brewing away beneath Sunnydale just waiting for the perfect opportunity to burst forth upon an unsuspecting world.
Buffy had reluctantly agreed and so here she was on yet another eventless patrol through some of Sunnydale's many cemeteries and even more frustrated than ever.
'All this tension and worry can't be good for me,' she thought as she trudged through her third cemetery of the night. 'And I'm not even getting the catharsis of a good fight.' She stopped suddenly in her tracks as she realised what she'd just thought. 'Giles is such a bad influence on me. I can't believe I knew a word like that, but I'm certainly not letting Giles or the guys know. I'd never live it down. Besides life's much easier when they expect to do the heavy thinking and leave the muscle work to me.' Smiling to herself at her complicity (another Giles word), Buffy started forward again.
As she peered cautiously at the moonlit graves to either side of her, she pulled a stake from her jacket and began tossing it back and forward swirling it around her fingers in a casual display of skill that didn't even register on her conscious mind. Her hands thus occupied her mind drifted back to musing on the current situation in the town.
'I really wish I could relax and enjoy the peace and quiet,' she thought with a sigh. 'But it's kind of difficult when I keep thinking of this as the lull before a storm. Then add in the worry that Cordelia might have been kidnapped as part of some evil world threatening plot, which Giles will no doubt find out about with only moments to spare, and which I will have to stop and well relaxing just isn't on the cards tonight now is it and am I babbling in my head now? I am aren't I? And it's not half as cute as when Willow does it.'
"Arghh! This is getting me nowhere fast. Face it Buffy you're not going to find the big brewing evil this way so why not call it a night and go home to bed?" she muttered to herself. Stuffing her stake back inside her jacket and turning towards the street.
But the Slayer had only gone a few strides before she felt something stirring behind her. Whirling around, Buffy came face to face with one of the largest vampires she'd ever encountered. 'God, this guy must be six and a half feet and he's built like a bull as well. How the hell did he creep up on me? I wasn't that distracted surely?'
The massive vampire let out a deep belly laugh on seeing her surprised expression. "Oh, I might be evil little girl, but I've always preferred to think of myself as dashing or mysterious. Brewing just sounds so," he paused waving his massive hands in front of him as he searched for the appropriate word. Then his lips curled back in a twisted smile as the answer came to him, "alcoholic. And I much prefer to keep my wits about me."
"Oh great," Buffy moaned. "A comedian. Isn't that just the perfect end to the day. I mean, how could this get any worse?"
As soon as the words left her mouth, Buffy felt it had been exactly the wrong thing to say, a feeling that was quickly borne out when a new voice spoke up from her left.
"You just think you've got it bad. We have to put up with his attempts at humour all the time." The whining voice was a perfect match for the tall, weasel like character that Buffy's quick glance showed her before she refocused most of her attention on the much more dangerous looking giant in front of her.
"Watch your mouth Nigel," the first vamp growled. "This tiny little girl is barely enough to share as it is. Much more of your lip and you'll be going hungry tonight."
Buffy glared at him, pulling herself up as tall as she could, although that only seemed to emphasise the difference in their heights. "Oh, I am so going to hurt you for that," she snarled. "Have you never heard the phrase 'The bigger they come the harder they…"
"Hit?" asked the giant. Lashing out against her chin with a lightning fast pile driver of a punch that Buffy saw almost too late. Despite managing to ride the blow, Buffy's jaw felt like it had been hit by a wrecking ball and she could taste blood in her mouth as she moved cautiously around the two vampires.
"Nice one Brian," Nigel shouted encouragingly. "That'll teach her to watch her smart lip."
Brian however, looked less sure of himself. The girl had taken his punch and although it had knocked her off her over as he had expected, she had turned the fall into a roll and was now back on her feet and looked as ready to fight as ever. That worried him. Brian hadn't lived as long as he had, which was a very long time indeed, by underestimating his opponents, and this girl was not acting the way a human should when faced by a couple of large vampires.
Seeing the larger vampires hesitation, Buffy rushed forward and launched a quick combination of punches and kicks that would have left any other opponent a broken wreck on the ground. But although Brian staggered and grunted from the pain of the strikes, he didn't look like he was going down anytime soon, and Buffy's limbs felt like she'd been hitting a tree rather than a mere vampire. A tensing of his massive shoulder muscles warned her that another punch was coming and she quickly dived out of the way, putting some space between her and her much larger opponent.
A darting glance to check what the other vampire was up to, made Buffy's heart leap into her throat in fear as she saw that he had now been joined by another three tough looking vamps. 'Oh boy!' she thought. 'I really need to be more careful what I wish for. I'm going to be really lucky to get out of this in one piece, unless Angel shows up soon. Preferably, with the US Cavalry for backup.'
Fortunately they seemed content to watch the fight for now, and even seemed to be making bets on how long she'd last.
Buffy feinted a kick towards Brian's groin, before dropping to the ground and trying to sweep his feet out from under him, but he read her intention and neatly jumped over her leg. She ducked and rolled out from under the slashing side kick he tried to direct at her head as a follow up and suddenly found herself in the perfect position to drive her fist up between his legs.
"Yeow!" she screamed, shaking her hand in pain. 'Damn giant must be wearing some sort of protector round his balls. That felt like hitting a brick.' In her distraction the vampire caught her a solid kick to the ribs sending her crashing into the wall of a nearby mausoleum. He charged after her, trying to follow up on his advantage. Buffy evaded his lunge, putting a couple of gravestones between them as she held one hand to her aching chest, wincing slightly as she felt a broken rib shift beneath her touch. 'Think Buffy! You can't keep this up much longer!' she silently admonished herself.
The other vampires were now spread out in a loose semi-circle blocking her most likely paths of escape and watching her with all the intensity of cats playing with a mouse.
Brian charged in again, trying to grab her and Buffy once again stepped aside avoiding him. But this time her foot slipped on a patch of grass still damp from the light rain shower that had passed over Sunnydale in the afternoon. Stumbling and off balance, Buffy dropped clumsily to one knee. Brian roared in triumph as his hands closed around her shoulders, lifting her to her feet and pushing her back up against the mausoleum once more.
"Say goodnight Slayer," he gloated. His fangs starting their decent towards her unprotected neck. "You just ran out of luck."
Buffy strained against his grip but was unable to move. She could feel his hair brushing her cheek and knew she didn't have much longer. Just as she was resigning herself to dying again, the night was suddenly rent by a line of bright light appearing out of nowhere between two rows of tombstones, directly behind Brian.
As quickly as the light appeared, it was gone. Leaving behind a widening gap in the very air of the graveyard, the edges glowing a lurid purple, so dark as to be almost beyond the range of human vision, even a Slayer's. When the portal reached about a metre in width, a slender, black clad woman dived through, rolling quickly to her feet and drawing a bright, lethal looking sword from the sheath strapped across her back in a single smooth motion. Barely pausing to look around, she continued the drawing motion in a flat, clean sweep that separated Brian's head from his shoulders before he could begin to react to the newcomers presence.
Staring at the brunette through the falling dust of the vampire that had just come so close to killing her, the Slayer felt her mouth drop open in amazement.
"Hi, Buffy!" the swordswoman said cheerily. "Mind if I cut in?"
Buffy's mouth worked silently for a few moments before she managed to squeeze the word out past her disbelief.
"Cordelia?"
TBC