Willow and Tara were in the kitchen shaking white powder into a huge steel
bowl when Gunn burst in.
"Morning, ladies," he said cheerily. He looked quizzically at the bowl. "What kinda magic is that?"
"Just the magic we call breakfast," Willow said. "We're making pancakes. Want to help?"
"I would," Gunn said, "but they tell me my pancakes taste like used tiles from the Space Shuttle. Besides, I've got something for y'all." He waved a piece of paper. "I tracked down those fancy getaway cars from the Déjà Vu to a custom manufacturer here in L.A. They all require IDs and background checks before they'll sell cars like those. Of course, all the customer's online credit and Motor Vehicles records disappeared as soon as the cars were out of the showroom."
"So how does that help?" Tara asked.
"I think I recognize the workmanship on the IDs," Gunn explained. "Looks like Wally Deevers, a local punk. Got his start making fake IDs for college kids."
"And, um," Willow said, "how do you know this guy?"
"'Cause I used to bounce those same college kids out of a bar in Westwood, whenever I needed crossbow-string money. Anyhow, I'm gonna go shake this guy down, and I thought Buffy might want to come along. I could use the extra arms," he added, holding up his cast-encased left wrist. "She awake?"
"Probably," Willow said. "She doesn't need as much sleep as the rest of us."
"Cool," Gunn said. "See you later."
Once Gunn left, Tara said, "I hope Gunn knows what he's doing."
"What do you mean?" Willow asked.
"He wants to shake somebody down, but.I don't think he knows how hard Buffy can shake."
***
Dawn had slept for nearly eleven hours before it even occurred to her to open her eyes. When she did, she found herself back in her room at Lucas Hayden's house. Someone had put her into her most comfortable nightgown and tucked her into bed, even leaving a glass of water by her bedside. Feeling parched, she drank it greedily.
She tried to get up. Her legs were wobbly, however, reminding her of a newborn giraffe she had once seen on Animal Planet. She leaned on her bed for support, but the moment she stepped away from it, she fell in a heap on the deep-pile carpet.
The door opened, and Mrs. Abbey, Hayden's maid or servant or whatever she was, entered. "Did you fall?" she asked neutrally.
"No, I'm looking for Stuart Little," Dawn said caustically. "Of course I fell!"
"Now, now, Dawn," Hayden said, emerging from behind his housekeeper, "I'm certain Mrs. Abbey only wants to help you. Come, let me help you back into bed, and then we'll see about bringing you up some breakfast."
"Don't treat me like I'm sick! I don't have a cold, or the flu, or a bad period! YOU DID THIS TO ME!"
"Yes," Hayden said, voice suddenly hard. "This is the one aspect of our relationship that is immutable, Dawn. You are here to power my machine, willingly or otherwise. I would prefer to be your friend, and to make your stay here a comfortable one, but if you make it necessary, I am quite willing to have you kept in a straitjacket and fed strained peas through a straw."
"Do whatever you want," Dawn said, eyes narrowing with rage. "It won't help you. Sooner or later, my sister is going to come for me. And then she's going to come for you."
"Your sister," Hayden replied, "is a very powerful girl, but she is no match for Nicole. Ms. D'Armand has already defeated Buffy once. If your sister dares challenge her again, I think the results are likely to be fatal. That is, if Buffy is able to find this place at all, which is quite improbable."
Dawn had no reply to that. She had seen the extent of Nicole's powers, and it didn't seem unreasonable that she might be able to take Buffy in a fight.
"Now then," Hayden said, lifting Dawn up from the floor and placing her back onto the bed, "get some rest. Mrs. Abbey will bring you some breakfast shortly. And please avoid wasting your energy on more emotional outbursts. We will be running the machine again tonight." With that, Hayden left, Mrs. Abbey following behind.
***
Gianni Cassio knocked gently on Dawn's door. "Dawn? Bella?" he called. There was no answer from inside. He was concerned enough that he used his code to unlock the door and open it.
Dawn was lying on the bed, staring out the window, with Diogenes in her lap. She didn't look at Cassio as he entered. The cryptologist could see tear tracks on her face.
"I just wanted to see how you were doing, bambina," he said. "Are you-"
"Get out." Dawn's voice was low, deadly.
Cassio was a bit taken aback. "Listen, Dawn-"
"I said get out." Dawn turned her face toward him. She was pale and fragile-looking and thoroughly furious. "I don't want to talk to any of you."
The young man swallowed, hurt and ashamed. "I didn't think it would be like that. You must believe me. I didn't know-"
"That they'd be using me?" Dawn demanded. "Sure, you didn't know that. You knew all along they'd be using me and my blood to power that-that thing! You're just upset because they're not making gold with it. Well, don't worry; I'm sure you'll be getting a lot of money when Osama bin Laden wants to build nuclear weapons!"
"I'm sorry," said Cassio, and he was. "I'm very sorry about all of this, Dawn."
Her eyes remained cold. "Glad to hear it. Now leave. Me. Alone." Cassio hesitated. "Leave me alone!"
Reluctantly, he retreated, drawing the door shut as he did. Outside, he paused, his brain working through the previous day piece by piece and coming to the firm conclusion that the whole thing smelled worse than Kogue's breath.
Cassio kept a very well-organized mind. It quickly weighed the options in front of him, as well as potential risks and rewards, and decided that it was time to cut loose before everything got completely out of hand. In fact, he decided that he needed to put an end to this whole thing before discount plutonium showed up on the overseas market. And what better way to guarantee that than by removing the Key to the whole operation?
Satisfied with his decision, Cassio tucked away all the information he had, resolved to keep an eye out for opportunities, and then occupied his brain with something else. In a moment, his resolution wasn't so much as a ripple on the surface of his mind.
***
It took nearly ten hours to track down Wally Deevers, the fake ID artist. The man no longer hung around his old haunts. Success had carried him out of South Central L.A. and into a nice little neighborhood where it was not automatically assumed that a relatively young black man with a Mercedes must be a criminal. In fact, he had established a reputation among the locals as a clever Internet entrepreneur.
This cover story was not terribly far from the truth. Deevers had realized years ago that, while making fake IDs was more both more profitable and more interesting than working at Burger King, it was really just the first stepping stone out of the ghetto. Where the money and the challenge really lay was in creating not merely IDs, but identities. To this end, Deevers had educated himself on a variety of topics - how birth certificates were completed in various states and time periods, the workings of the Social Security system, the appearance and contents of passports from many nations, how to perform a credit check, and, of course, how all manner of credentials could be created from scratch with the right software and a certain amount of Internet savvy.
Therefore, having worked so hard to shed every trace of his impoverished background, it was with a certain amount of surprise that Deevers (now going by Wallace Delacroix) answered the door to find an acquaintance from the old neighborhood standing on the front stoop of Deevers' townhouse apartment.
"S'up, Wally?" Gunn said with a big smile that did not give the slightest hint as to whether it was genuine or ironic. Even more inscrutable was the stony look on the face of Gunn's companion, a blonde girl whom Deevers did not know.
"Oh." Deevers said, "uh, hey, Gunn. Been a long time."
Gunn looked past Deevers into his apartment. The Raiders game was playing on a large-screen television set.
Suddenly, the blonde woman stepped up to Deevers, grabbed him by the lapels of his partly-unbuttoned dress shirt, and pushed him backwards into his apartment. Gunn closed the door behind them.
"You sold a fake ID to the person who kidnapped my sister," the woman hissed as she shoved Deevers against a wall. "I want to know where I can find her."
Deevers grabbed the woman's wrists and tried to pull her hands off his collar. They wouldn't budge.
"She used the ID to buy a couple of bulletproof Cadillacs," Gunn elaborated as he watched Deevers struggle. He pulled a sheet of paper out of his jacket and held it up in front of Deevers' face. It was a color copy of a passport with a woman's face on it. Deevers' eyes widened.
"I-I don't know her," Deevers said.
Buffy lifted Deevers up off the ground by his throat. It was only a few inches, since Deevers was half a foot taller than Buffy, but it seemed to get the point across. "For someone who makes stuff up for a living," she growled, "you're a lousy liar."
"Okay!" Deevers rasped. Buffy put him down and reduced the pressure on his neck just enough that he could speak intelligibly. "She was French or something -- wanted the passport, a driver's license, a military ID, and enough fake background to pass a credit check."
"What was her name?" Buffy demanded.
"I didn't ask," Deevers replied desperately, "and she paid in cash."
"Oooh, wrong answer," Gunn said, shaking his head. As Buffy lifted Deevers back up off the ground, Gunn walked over and leaned against the wall where Deevers was pinned. "You don't want to be the weakest link here, man."
"I have her license plate number," Deevers croaked.
"Tell me," Buffy said.
"I'll show you," Deevers gasped. "Just put me down."
Buffy lowered the man to the floor but kept her grip on his throat. "Where?" she demanded.
"There," Deevers said, pointing to a far corner of the room. "In the desk. I took a Polaroid of the back of her car."
"Why?"
"If ever get busted, I can give the cops a bigger fish than me to fry."
Gunn walked over to the desk and opened a large drawer at the bottom. Inside were several hanging file folders, one containing several Polaroid photos, some of people, some of cars.
"Hers is the green Lotus," Deevers said.
"Hmm," said Gunn. "Girl's evil, but she's got taste. And cash."
"Then I guess we're done here," Buffy said. She tossed Deevers in a heap on the couch.
"See you, Wally," Gunn said as he headed for the door. Then he stopped and held up the copy of the ID Wally had made for the blonde woman. "You know, you may be all hip with the computers and everything, but you're still a lousy photographer. Everybody in your ID pictures looks dead. And I should know."
***
Giovanni Cassio typed furiously. Music from a local alternative radio station was blasting on his headphones, occupying much of Gianni's conscious mind. That, he hoped, would be enough to keep Nicole out of his head, should her mental searchlight happen to sweep over him. Besides, he did his best work when he let his intuition guide his fingers.
It wasn't unusual for the young code-cracker to bang out 120 words a minute or more, but only while under the influence of a heavy dose of caffeine. Today, however, he was powered by nothing but his own anger, both at his employer and at himself.
He had to get Dawn out. Hayden had said the machine wouldn't harm her, but it was clear now that Hayden hadn't known or cared either way. Dawn had clearly been damaged in some way during the machine's first run - what if the second one killed her? Or the third? Or the hundredth? Even if she survived, what sort of existence was that, spending every day in bed, too feeble to stand, recovering her strength only to be drained again? Gianni remembered his aunt Luisa, who had struggled with cancer for years, enduring round after round of chemotherapy that sapped her strength until her eyes and mind were cloudy and dull. She had been almost glad to die.
No. This would not happen to Dawn. He would stop it, somehow.
And so Gianni sat in his office with the door locked and the lights low, banging away at the keyboard of his computer. There wasn't much time. The next run of the machine would take place in three hours. He had to rescue Dawn before then.
But in order to do that, he would first have to bring down the house's vast security network - the cameras, the motion detectors, the alarms, all of it. Only Hayden had the passcode to shut it down. That was why Gianni was racing to write a program that would uncover it.
If you had to mess with someone, Signore Hayden, Gianni thought, you should not have picked a cryptologist.
***
"Got her!" Cordelia cried as she ran out into the Hyperion's lobby. "Nicole D'Armand, resident alien."
"More alien than most," Buffy commented. She and most of the others were gathered there, waiting to see if Buffy and Gunn had finally found a clue that led somewhere other than another dead end.
"I've got her address," Cordelia continued. "And, even better, I know who she's shacked up with."
"What are you talking about?" Wesley asked.
"MapQuest.com has this feature where you can see an aerial photo of whatever address you just looked up. See this big, oval swimming pool in the back of the house?" she said, holding up a printout of the picture. "I've seen it in PEOPLE. That's Lucas Hayden's house."
Everyone looked blankly at Cordelia. She rolled her eyes.
"He's only one of the most eligible bachelors in L.A.," she explained. "Huge international industrialist. Plus, pretty easy on the eyes for a forty-something." Giles gave her the subtlest glance of annoyance.
"That makes sense," Willow said. "Whoever took Dawn obviously has a lot of money to hire hit men and, um, hit monsters."
"And a sorcerer clever enough to turn Angel and Spike back into their former selves," Wesley added.
"Then what are we waiting for?" Buffy said. "Let's go get him."
"Ah, one moment," Giles said. "There is still the question of the Sch'sek demon and the mind-reader, plus whatever other surprises this Hayden fellow may have on hand. I'm not entirely certain we are a match for them without." He glanced towards Liam and William, who had been sitting quietly and watching the others up until then. Liam looked at Buffy.
"You say these people took your younger sister?" he asked.
"Yes," Buffy said.
"Then I'll help you." Liam walked over to the weapons cabinet and pulled out a Danish axe.
"How?" Buffy asked. "Do you even know how to use that thing?"
"I probably do," Liam replied. "Besides, I'm strong as an ox. You can't afford NOT to let me come."
"He does have a point," Wesley said. "We'll need every able hand."
"Even if the mind ain't so hot," Xander muttered.
"I heard that," Liam said sharply. "William, what about you?"
"I should be most happy to help save the girl, but it's clear that I'm useless in a fight," William replied, hanging his head. "I would only get in the way."
"That's not true," Anya said. "You're a great fighter. I mean, you've killed lots and lots of people, including two Slayers like Buffy."
William looked at her with a mix of incredulity and horror.
"Ignore her," Cordelia said rapidly. "She has a, a brain disease."
Anya's mouth hung open in indignation. "I do NOT have-"
"An, honey," Xander cut in desperately, "please please please let's talk about this later, OK?"
Anya fumed but said nothing further.
"We could really use you, William," Buffy said.
"We?" William asked, looking around at the women in the room. "Surely you ladies will remain here?"
Tara suddenly perked up. "Oh, no, William," she said. "We'll all be putting ourselves in mortal danger. It will be hard, with so few men to help us, but.I'm sure at least some of us will survive."
William leaped to his feet. "You shall not go into the breach, dear lady," he cried. "I will go in your place. And if you will not be dissuaded, then I shall come and be your protector."
Looking at William, Tara tilted her head and sighed appreciatively.
"I am suddenly inspired!" William cried. "I shall return shortly." He yanked his pad and paper from his pocket and ran upstairs.
When he was gone, Willow took hold of Tara's face and gave her a big kiss on the forehead, then looked at the others. "I love this girl's brain," she explained.
"All right," Buffy said loudly. "Everybody arm up. We're leaving in five."
END CHAPTER 10
"Morning, ladies," he said cheerily. He looked quizzically at the bowl. "What kinda magic is that?"
"Just the magic we call breakfast," Willow said. "We're making pancakes. Want to help?"
"I would," Gunn said, "but they tell me my pancakes taste like used tiles from the Space Shuttle. Besides, I've got something for y'all." He waved a piece of paper. "I tracked down those fancy getaway cars from the Déjà Vu to a custom manufacturer here in L.A. They all require IDs and background checks before they'll sell cars like those. Of course, all the customer's online credit and Motor Vehicles records disappeared as soon as the cars were out of the showroom."
"So how does that help?" Tara asked.
"I think I recognize the workmanship on the IDs," Gunn explained. "Looks like Wally Deevers, a local punk. Got his start making fake IDs for college kids."
"And, um," Willow said, "how do you know this guy?"
"'Cause I used to bounce those same college kids out of a bar in Westwood, whenever I needed crossbow-string money. Anyhow, I'm gonna go shake this guy down, and I thought Buffy might want to come along. I could use the extra arms," he added, holding up his cast-encased left wrist. "She awake?"
"Probably," Willow said. "She doesn't need as much sleep as the rest of us."
"Cool," Gunn said. "See you later."
Once Gunn left, Tara said, "I hope Gunn knows what he's doing."
"What do you mean?" Willow asked.
"He wants to shake somebody down, but.I don't think he knows how hard Buffy can shake."
***
Dawn had slept for nearly eleven hours before it even occurred to her to open her eyes. When she did, she found herself back in her room at Lucas Hayden's house. Someone had put her into her most comfortable nightgown and tucked her into bed, even leaving a glass of water by her bedside. Feeling parched, she drank it greedily.
She tried to get up. Her legs were wobbly, however, reminding her of a newborn giraffe she had once seen on Animal Planet. She leaned on her bed for support, but the moment she stepped away from it, she fell in a heap on the deep-pile carpet.
The door opened, and Mrs. Abbey, Hayden's maid or servant or whatever she was, entered. "Did you fall?" she asked neutrally.
"No, I'm looking for Stuart Little," Dawn said caustically. "Of course I fell!"
"Now, now, Dawn," Hayden said, emerging from behind his housekeeper, "I'm certain Mrs. Abbey only wants to help you. Come, let me help you back into bed, and then we'll see about bringing you up some breakfast."
"Don't treat me like I'm sick! I don't have a cold, or the flu, or a bad period! YOU DID THIS TO ME!"
"Yes," Hayden said, voice suddenly hard. "This is the one aspect of our relationship that is immutable, Dawn. You are here to power my machine, willingly or otherwise. I would prefer to be your friend, and to make your stay here a comfortable one, but if you make it necessary, I am quite willing to have you kept in a straitjacket and fed strained peas through a straw."
"Do whatever you want," Dawn said, eyes narrowing with rage. "It won't help you. Sooner or later, my sister is going to come for me. And then she's going to come for you."
"Your sister," Hayden replied, "is a very powerful girl, but she is no match for Nicole. Ms. D'Armand has already defeated Buffy once. If your sister dares challenge her again, I think the results are likely to be fatal. That is, if Buffy is able to find this place at all, which is quite improbable."
Dawn had no reply to that. She had seen the extent of Nicole's powers, and it didn't seem unreasonable that she might be able to take Buffy in a fight.
"Now then," Hayden said, lifting Dawn up from the floor and placing her back onto the bed, "get some rest. Mrs. Abbey will bring you some breakfast shortly. And please avoid wasting your energy on more emotional outbursts. We will be running the machine again tonight." With that, Hayden left, Mrs. Abbey following behind.
***
Gianni Cassio knocked gently on Dawn's door. "Dawn? Bella?" he called. There was no answer from inside. He was concerned enough that he used his code to unlock the door and open it.
Dawn was lying on the bed, staring out the window, with Diogenes in her lap. She didn't look at Cassio as he entered. The cryptologist could see tear tracks on her face.
"I just wanted to see how you were doing, bambina," he said. "Are you-"
"Get out." Dawn's voice was low, deadly.
Cassio was a bit taken aback. "Listen, Dawn-"
"I said get out." Dawn turned her face toward him. She was pale and fragile-looking and thoroughly furious. "I don't want to talk to any of you."
The young man swallowed, hurt and ashamed. "I didn't think it would be like that. You must believe me. I didn't know-"
"That they'd be using me?" Dawn demanded. "Sure, you didn't know that. You knew all along they'd be using me and my blood to power that-that thing! You're just upset because they're not making gold with it. Well, don't worry; I'm sure you'll be getting a lot of money when Osama bin Laden wants to build nuclear weapons!"
"I'm sorry," said Cassio, and he was. "I'm very sorry about all of this, Dawn."
Her eyes remained cold. "Glad to hear it. Now leave. Me. Alone." Cassio hesitated. "Leave me alone!"
Reluctantly, he retreated, drawing the door shut as he did. Outside, he paused, his brain working through the previous day piece by piece and coming to the firm conclusion that the whole thing smelled worse than Kogue's breath.
Cassio kept a very well-organized mind. It quickly weighed the options in front of him, as well as potential risks and rewards, and decided that it was time to cut loose before everything got completely out of hand. In fact, he decided that he needed to put an end to this whole thing before discount plutonium showed up on the overseas market. And what better way to guarantee that than by removing the Key to the whole operation?
Satisfied with his decision, Cassio tucked away all the information he had, resolved to keep an eye out for opportunities, and then occupied his brain with something else. In a moment, his resolution wasn't so much as a ripple on the surface of his mind.
***
It took nearly ten hours to track down Wally Deevers, the fake ID artist. The man no longer hung around his old haunts. Success had carried him out of South Central L.A. and into a nice little neighborhood where it was not automatically assumed that a relatively young black man with a Mercedes must be a criminal. In fact, he had established a reputation among the locals as a clever Internet entrepreneur.
This cover story was not terribly far from the truth. Deevers had realized years ago that, while making fake IDs was more both more profitable and more interesting than working at Burger King, it was really just the first stepping stone out of the ghetto. Where the money and the challenge really lay was in creating not merely IDs, but identities. To this end, Deevers had educated himself on a variety of topics - how birth certificates were completed in various states and time periods, the workings of the Social Security system, the appearance and contents of passports from many nations, how to perform a credit check, and, of course, how all manner of credentials could be created from scratch with the right software and a certain amount of Internet savvy.
Therefore, having worked so hard to shed every trace of his impoverished background, it was with a certain amount of surprise that Deevers (now going by Wallace Delacroix) answered the door to find an acquaintance from the old neighborhood standing on the front stoop of Deevers' townhouse apartment.
"S'up, Wally?" Gunn said with a big smile that did not give the slightest hint as to whether it was genuine or ironic. Even more inscrutable was the stony look on the face of Gunn's companion, a blonde girl whom Deevers did not know.
"Oh." Deevers said, "uh, hey, Gunn. Been a long time."
Gunn looked past Deevers into his apartment. The Raiders game was playing on a large-screen television set.
Suddenly, the blonde woman stepped up to Deevers, grabbed him by the lapels of his partly-unbuttoned dress shirt, and pushed him backwards into his apartment. Gunn closed the door behind them.
"You sold a fake ID to the person who kidnapped my sister," the woman hissed as she shoved Deevers against a wall. "I want to know where I can find her."
Deevers grabbed the woman's wrists and tried to pull her hands off his collar. They wouldn't budge.
"She used the ID to buy a couple of bulletproof Cadillacs," Gunn elaborated as he watched Deevers struggle. He pulled a sheet of paper out of his jacket and held it up in front of Deevers' face. It was a color copy of a passport with a woman's face on it. Deevers' eyes widened.
"I-I don't know her," Deevers said.
Buffy lifted Deevers up off the ground by his throat. It was only a few inches, since Deevers was half a foot taller than Buffy, but it seemed to get the point across. "For someone who makes stuff up for a living," she growled, "you're a lousy liar."
"Okay!" Deevers rasped. Buffy put him down and reduced the pressure on his neck just enough that he could speak intelligibly. "She was French or something -- wanted the passport, a driver's license, a military ID, and enough fake background to pass a credit check."
"What was her name?" Buffy demanded.
"I didn't ask," Deevers replied desperately, "and she paid in cash."
"Oooh, wrong answer," Gunn said, shaking his head. As Buffy lifted Deevers back up off the ground, Gunn walked over and leaned against the wall where Deevers was pinned. "You don't want to be the weakest link here, man."
"I have her license plate number," Deevers croaked.
"Tell me," Buffy said.
"I'll show you," Deevers gasped. "Just put me down."
Buffy lowered the man to the floor but kept her grip on his throat. "Where?" she demanded.
"There," Deevers said, pointing to a far corner of the room. "In the desk. I took a Polaroid of the back of her car."
"Why?"
"If ever get busted, I can give the cops a bigger fish than me to fry."
Gunn walked over to the desk and opened a large drawer at the bottom. Inside were several hanging file folders, one containing several Polaroid photos, some of people, some of cars.
"Hers is the green Lotus," Deevers said.
"Hmm," said Gunn. "Girl's evil, but she's got taste. And cash."
"Then I guess we're done here," Buffy said. She tossed Deevers in a heap on the couch.
"See you, Wally," Gunn said as he headed for the door. Then he stopped and held up the copy of the ID Wally had made for the blonde woman. "You know, you may be all hip with the computers and everything, but you're still a lousy photographer. Everybody in your ID pictures looks dead. And I should know."
***
Giovanni Cassio typed furiously. Music from a local alternative radio station was blasting on his headphones, occupying much of Gianni's conscious mind. That, he hoped, would be enough to keep Nicole out of his head, should her mental searchlight happen to sweep over him. Besides, he did his best work when he let his intuition guide his fingers.
It wasn't unusual for the young code-cracker to bang out 120 words a minute or more, but only while under the influence of a heavy dose of caffeine. Today, however, he was powered by nothing but his own anger, both at his employer and at himself.
He had to get Dawn out. Hayden had said the machine wouldn't harm her, but it was clear now that Hayden hadn't known or cared either way. Dawn had clearly been damaged in some way during the machine's first run - what if the second one killed her? Or the third? Or the hundredth? Even if she survived, what sort of existence was that, spending every day in bed, too feeble to stand, recovering her strength only to be drained again? Gianni remembered his aunt Luisa, who had struggled with cancer for years, enduring round after round of chemotherapy that sapped her strength until her eyes and mind were cloudy and dull. She had been almost glad to die.
No. This would not happen to Dawn. He would stop it, somehow.
And so Gianni sat in his office with the door locked and the lights low, banging away at the keyboard of his computer. There wasn't much time. The next run of the machine would take place in three hours. He had to rescue Dawn before then.
But in order to do that, he would first have to bring down the house's vast security network - the cameras, the motion detectors, the alarms, all of it. Only Hayden had the passcode to shut it down. That was why Gianni was racing to write a program that would uncover it.
If you had to mess with someone, Signore Hayden, Gianni thought, you should not have picked a cryptologist.
***
"Got her!" Cordelia cried as she ran out into the Hyperion's lobby. "Nicole D'Armand, resident alien."
"More alien than most," Buffy commented. She and most of the others were gathered there, waiting to see if Buffy and Gunn had finally found a clue that led somewhere other than another dead end.
"I've got her address," Cordelia continued. "And, even better, I know who she's shacked up with."
"What are you talking about?" Wesley asked.
"MapQuest.com has this feature where you can see an aerial photo of whatever address you just looked up. See this big, oval swimming pool in the back of the house?" she said, holding up a printout of the picture. "I've seen it in PEOPLE. That's Lucas Hayden's house."
Everyone looked blankly at Cordelia. She rolled her eyes.
"He's only one of the most eligible bachelors in L.A.," she explained. "Huge international industrialist. Plus, pretty easy on the eyes for a forty-something." Giles gave her the subtlest glance of annoyance.
"That makes sense," Willow said. "Whoever took Dawn obviously has a lot of money to hire hit men and, um, hit monsters."
"And a sorcerer clever enough to turn Angel and Spike back into their former selves," Wesley added.
"Then what are we waiting for?" Buffy said. "Let's go get him."
"Ah, one moment," Giles said. "There is still the question of the Sch'sek demon and the mind-reader, plus whatever other surprises this Hayden fellow may have on hand. I'm not entirely certain we are a match for them without." He glanced towards Liam and William, who had been sitting quietly and watching the others up until then. Liam looked at Buffy.
"You say these people took your younger sister?" he asked.
"Yes," Buffy said.
"Then I'll help you." Liam walked over to the weapons cabinet and pulled out a Danish axe.
"How?" Buffy asked. "Do you even know how to use that thing?"
"I probably do," Liam replied. "Besides, I'm strong as an ox. You can't afford NOT to let me come."
"He does have a point," Wesley said. "We'll need every able hand."
"Even if the mind ain't so hot," Xander muttered.
"I heard that," Liam said sharply. "William, what about you?"
"I should be most happy to help save the girl, but it's clear that I'm useless in a fight," William replied, hanging his head. "I would only get in the way."
"That's not true," Anya said. "You're a great fighter. I mean, you've killed lots and lots of people, including two Slayers like Buffy."
William looked at her with a mix of incredulity and horror.
"Ignore her," Cordelia said rapidly. "She has a, a brain disease."
Anya's mouth hung open in indignation. "I do NOT have-"
"An, honey," Xander cut in desperately, "please please please let's talk about this later, OK?"
Anya fumed but said nothing further.
"We could really use you, William," Buffy said.
"We?" William asked, looking around at the women in the room. "Surely you ladies will remain here?"
Tara suddenly perked up. "Oh, no, William," she said. "We'll all be putting ourselves in mortal danger. It will be hard, with so few men to help us, but.I'm sure at least some of us will survive."
William leaped to his feet. "You shall not go into the breach, dear lady," he cried. "I will go in your place. And if you will not be dissuaded, then I shall come and be your protector."
Looking at William, Tara tilted her head and sighed appreciatively.
"I am suddenly inspired!" William cried. "I shall return shortly." He yanked his pad and paper from his pocket and ran upstairs.
When he was gone, Willow took hold of Tara's face and gave her a big kiss on the forehead, then looked at the others. "I love this girl's brain," she explained.
"All right," Buffy said loudly. "Everybody arm up. We're leaving in five."
END CHAPTER 10
