A Buffy the Vampire Slayer/CSI crossover. This story is a sequel to "Should Have Gone To Vegas..." and "Manhunters." which involve Angel, Riley Finn, and other characters from BtVS and Angel. It is set between Buffy Seasons 6 and 7.

All characters are the intellectual property of their respective creators, film companies, etc.; this story may not be sold or distributed on a profit-making basis.

I'm British, so's my spelling. Live with it.

WORK IN PROGRESS - Feedback is greatly appreciated, especially on anything that looks like a continuity or factual error.


Slayer, Las Vegas

By Marcus L. Rowland

IX

"Do you want to tell me what that was about?" asked Brass as he drove Dawn back to headquarters.

"I don't know. It sounded like a spell, something protective. Something to stop... oh."

"Yes?"

"There was a spell.. a couple of years ago now, some monks used a spell to hide me from someone who wanted to kill me."

"They wanted to kill you? Not your sister?"

"Uhuh. She wouldn't have gone near Buffy if she hadn't been protecting me. It's kind of complicated."

"Okay. So, can these monks cancel the spell?"

"No. They're all dead. She killed them, and drove a whole bunch of people in Sunnydale insane."

"Okay, scratch that idea. Sounds like we're going to have to do this the hard way."

* * * * *

Brass and Dawn got back to headquarters as Warrick left the studio, and were in the control room as the cars following him began to report in.

"Target on Washington Avenue heading West. Passing Bruce Street."

"Sounds like he might be headed towards Lorenz Park," said Brass.

"That's where Clem said the vampires are based", said Dawn. "Look out for old warehouses, factories, that sort of thing. Places that don't have a lot of windows."

"Passing Highland Avenue."

"Brown's making a call from his cellphone!" said one of the technicians. "Same number as before."

"Put it on speaker," said Brass.

"This is Warrick Brown. I think I'm being followed, I'm going to lose them before I come in."

"Damn," said Brass. "See if you can pin down the location of the phone he's calling."

A familiar rasping voice said "Stay away, Brown. The Brides wish you to draw off your pursuit. When the ritual is complete and the Master has risen you will be summoned for your reward." The call ended.

"North side of the park, or close to that side inside the park."

Brass said "There's a lot of small streets in that area. Could be difficult to pin it down precisely. I think we've learned all we can by letting him run free, have them bring him in."

* * * * *

"Let's see..." said Catherine, pressing the vampire's hand to a fingerprint form, "your name is Harold Croft, you used to live on Niblick Drive near the golf course, and you've been a vampire how long?"

"About a week."

"And you're already in trouble with the police and the Slayer. Hmm... get the feeling you're in the wrong line of business?"

"It's not like I asked to be a vampire," Harold said sulkily. "They haven't even let me kill anyone yet."

"I guess not. Must be a big disappointment to you. Your other hand please. Onto the ink-pad first, then one finger at a time onto the paper like the other hand." She noticed its face start to shift a little, and said "Don't even think about doing anything else, it's still daylight outside and officer Reilley here would really like to play with his TASER again. Now, we need samples of your skin cells and saliva. Here's a swab, put the end in your mouth and rub it on the inside of your cheek, then put it into this jar."

"Why are you making me do all the work?"

"If you think I'm dumb enough to put my hands anywhere near a vampire's mouth think again. Oh, I forgot, vampires don't seem to be able to do that very well."

"This is racism."

"Sue me. Oh, the courts are only open in the daytime, how sad."

"She's enjoying this," said Grissom, watching the examination through the closed circuit cameras.

"It's a good way to get vampires to talk," said Dawn. "Buffy can threaten them, but they aren't really frightened of anyone else, except maybe Faith. Insults and flattery work better for everyone else, provided you can stop them from tearing your throat out."

"Who's Faith?" asked Brass.

"Another Slayer."

"How can there be..." began Grissom, then realised. "Oh, when your sister was killed?"

"Sort of. The first time Buffy died Kendra was activated, but she only lasted a year or so. Drusilla killed her. Faith was her replacement."

"Does she work with Buffy?"

"No. They don't really get on too well. She's... kind of quit."

Back in the cell the vampire was saying something, a threat. Grissom tuned it out until he heard the words "..when our Master arises tonight."

"Tonight?" asked Catherine.

"Yes. Tonight, two years to the very second since our Master was killed."

Dawn turned white, pulled out her notebook, and looked for the section on Dracula. "Tomorrow night, not tonight!"

"Are you sure?" asked Grissom.

"Here... tomorrow's date, 'Buffy killed...' oh crap."

"What?"

"It was late when Buffy got home, I was in bed. She told me the next morning."

* * * * *

Something roused Buffy from her meditation. She looked around, expecting to see the door open, but nothing seemed to have changed. Through the bars of the cell she could see the vampire guard working on a crossword - she briefly thought of asking for water, but decided not to risk being drugged again - but otherwise things outside were also unchanged. Inside the cell... there was something growing in the corner by the door, a tiny green plant she couldn't remember noticing before. If that was there... she went over to the corner and examined the floor around the plant, tracing a network of fine cracks. She needed some sort of tool, but there was nothing inside the cell. Just the bucket and the mattress.

"Good thing I have Slayer-strong nails," thought Buffy, quietly ripping the mattress open. Inside she found what she was hoping for; a layer of padding, then a mesh of steel springs. Breaking a length of wire loose without alerting the guard wasn't easy, but she managed it. Then she pushed the wire into the most promising-looking crack and started to dig.

* * * * *

"About half past nine?" said Dawn.

"Near as I can remember it," said Xander over the speaker-phone. "I was in thrall the first part of the evening, then punched out. Giles might have a better idea, I guess."

"I've tried calling him but all I'm getting is his answering machine. I think he said he was taking Willow to a retreat in the country, he must have decided not to have calls forwarded."

"What about Riley? He was there."

"He's on a mission somewhere with Sam, the police here have tried calling him but he isn't picking up his voicemail much."

"Well, it's more or less right. Buffy dusted him for the first time around nine-fifteen, then she got us out of the castle, then she went back to finish him off about fifteen or twenty minutes later. So some time between nine-thirty and nine-forty, I guess."

"How did you break the thrall?" asked Grissom.

"It kinda went away once Dracula was dusted. Wait a second... no, it was gone when I woke up, and Buffy had only just staked Dracula when I got back to the main hall of the castle. Being punched out must have done the trick."

"It could work," said Grissom. "Pain and shock might snap him out of it."

"A little hard on him though," said Brass. "Maybe there's other things we can try first."

* * * * *

"So let me get this straight, these dresses were stolen from your shop four months ago?"

It was Sergeant Porter's eighth dress shop of the day, on Vegas Drive a few hundred yards from Lorenz Park. She'd almost given up on finding anything, but now the manager was giving her everything she needed in one weird package. A few minutes later she called it in to Brass.

"The store's been losing stock for the past year. Eventually they realised that it was mostly happening on Thursday and Friday evenings when they open late, but none of the staff admitted to seeing anything. They put in some hidden cameras and found these three women coming in, trying on clothing, and simply walking out without paying. The counter clerks were even taking the security tabs off for them. So the manager showed the tape to the clerks and they acted like they had no idea what was going on. He fired them, and a couple of weeks later it happened again. At least four times so far, twice when the manager was actually there, and nobody remembers a thing about it. But he says the faces of the women on the tape match our composites."

"Any theft report filed?"

"Yes, after the initial loss a year ago. Nothing since, the manager has been writing it off to stop the owners realising that he can't stop the shop from being robbed."

"Pull the security tapes if they still have them and get them back to CSI."

"On it."

* * * * *

Two Internal Affairs lieutenants bought Warrick to Grissom's office. He didn't struggle or protest, just asked "What's this about?"

"The disappearance of Miss Summers. We have positive identification of you picking her up outside Sara's home, and we've been monitoring your calls today. You might as well tell us all about it."

"I haven't done anything!"

Grissom pressed 'play' on a recorder: "It's Warrick Brown, I don't have much time. Tell them that the Slayer's sister has called someone called Willow. She says she's a witch. She'll arrive in Las Vegas some time tonight."

"We have much more," said Grissom. "Tell us about it."

"He can't," said Dawn. "Maybe he wants to, but until the spell is broken he won't be able to say or do anything to harm the Brides. But I just realised what the cure must be. He just needs to drink some holy water."

"Holy water?" asked Grissom, oddly troubled by the idea. "Do you think it will work?"

"Well yeah, it burns vampires like acid, it ought to burn away their influence."

"I'll send someone to the church."

"No need, I've got a couple of bottles with me." She poured part of a bottle into a plastic tumbler, and gave it to Warrick. "Drink up."

Warrick held the glass in his hand and started to move it towards his mouth, then his muscles seemed to lock.

"Okay, let me help you." said Dawn, and stood in front of him to guide the tumbler to his mouth. Without any warning she kneed him in the groin.

Warrick collapsed to the floor, gasping, and Dawn pushed the neck of the bottle into his mouth and tilted it back, then pinched his nostrils closed. One of the lieutenants moved to pull her off him, but Brass waved him back. She held on to him until all of the bottle was gone.

Coughing and spluttering, Warrick struggled back onto his knees then threw up on the floor. Grissom noticed the remains of several insects in the mess, and decided to make sure that Warrick was given a thorough medical check. "Sorry," said Dawn, "I don't have Slayer strength to force you to drink and there isn't time to play games."

"Damn it," gasped Warrick, "you know how stupid that felt, doing everything those bitches wanted, and eating bugs and all. Thanks for that, if it didn't hurt so much I'd be kissing you."

"Ewww... you're a bit old for me, you know. D'ya want to get up now and help us rescue Buffy?"

"Just give me a minute to start breathing properly again, and let me wash my mouth out, and I'm all yours."

* * * * *

"So what have we got?" asked Brass, when everyone was back in the conference room.

"All I can really tell you," said Warrick, "is that they had me drug her and bring her to the junction of Orange Avenue and Riverside Drive. They loaded her into another car, a black Volvo. Didn't get the licence. Last I saw they were heading down Riverside Drive towards Baker Avenue, but I don't know if they turned off before they reached it, there were too many vehicles in the way."

"What drug did you use?" asked Grissom.

"Pentathol. She'd have been out for two, maybe three hours."

"Assuming that they didn't drug her again, of course."

"Usually for sacrifices and things they don't do that," said Dawn. "Drugs mess up the magic."

Sara said "I'm not sure what bothers me most, the fact that you know that or the fact that I believe that you know what you're talking about."

Dawn silently lifted the hem of her shirt, revealing faint scars. "The time someone tried to sacrifice me, they wanted me awake and dying as slowly as possible. Drugs would have interfered." There was an awkward silence. "Hey, no big deal. I'm still alive. Buffy took the fall for me."

"Okay," said Grissom, "That gives us a point on the map. She was taken here. Did the vampires give you any indication of their base's location, when you were driving there today?"

"No, I was supposed to go there and wait for someone who would drive me the rest of the way there. I guess he would have torn my throat out first."

"Can't be a vampire, it's only just gone noon. They must have other people under their control. Catherine, Greg, you learn anything from our prisoner?"

"He claims not to have killed anyone," said Catherine, "but he was present at the original crime scene, we have footprints that match his shoes and he left fingerprints on one of the lighting stands."

"I thought vampires didn't leave fingerprints," said Dawn.

"Normally no, but there was blood from one of the victims splashed on the stand, he must have dipped a finger in to take a taste. That means he was at a minimum an accessory to murder, probably one of the murderers. We know that he lived on Niblick Drive near the park, which gives us another dot on the map. He's refusing to answer questions concerning the exact location of their base."

"We could always threaten him with crosses, or holy water..." said Dawn.

"Sorry, that would be unlawful interrogation," said Brass. Dawn snorted, but said nothing.

"There are some tapes coming in that show the Brides 'shopping'", said Brass. "Looks like they were using that thrall trick on the counter clerks to avoid paying. We might learn something from that."

"All right," said Grissom. "I think it's safe to assume that we know roughly where the brides are based. What we're looking for now is the exact location. Nick, when the tapes come in I want you and Sara to work on them, see if you can spot anything that gives a clue to their location. Greg, Catherine, review the forensics and see if anything else shakes loose. Jim, I'd appreciate it if you could pull some strings with the military and the phone company, see if we can do anything to locate that cell phone more precisely. Warrick, I want you checked over by a doctor, make sure you didn't pick up any infections or parasites with those bugs. Dawn, you look hungry. Join me for lunch, then we'll sit down together and see if we can come up with sort of plan."

TO BE CONCLUDED