"Can you believe that that guy is a secret soldier?" Buffy asked, after she
and Willow got their daily dose of Professor Walsh's psychology course.
"Well, he doesn't look like one," Willow agreed."At least he seemed kinda nice."
"Way more nice that Professor Walsh," Buffy muttered. "I don't get it. It makes no difference if I'm awake or not. She's always the same dragon."
They walked along the hallway, when Buffy's cellphone suddenly began ringing.
"Hello?" she answered the phone.
"Hi Buffy it's me," came Xander's voice over the speaker.
"Xander," Buffy said and smile. "What's up? Something wrong?"
"Yeah," Xander responded a bit uneasily."Look I have to cancel our meeting for lunch. I doing a little errand for your mother in LA."
"Oh," Buffy said disappointed.
"Yeah, bad luck, I know. Well, what have you guys planned for tonight," he asked.
"Just the Bronze," Buffy said.
"Okay meet you there. Eight?" he asked.
"Eight is it."
---------------------------------------------------------------------------- -----------------
"Hey guys," Xander greeted the Scoobs when he finally reached their table, thirty minutes too late.
"Hi Xander," Willow greeted back.
"What took you so long?" Buffy asked a bit annoyed.
"Visited Cordy and Faith. Those two in one apartment, not a nice picture. I was tempted to lay a minefield in the middle of the room to separate them," Xander told her with a smile and waved for the nearby waitress. "Whisky," he ordered.
She wrote his order down and walked in the direction of the counter.
"And I thought me and Faith had a tendency for getting on each others nerves," Willow mused and played with the straw in her glass.
"You and Faith?" Xander snorted. "You two were like two tame small kittens. Faith and Cordy are like two grown up lionesses," he explained and the three scoobies grimaced at the image.
The waitress returned with Xander's drink an placed the glass on the table
"So," Buffy asked expectedly." How did your meeting with Finn go."
"Not so bad, if you consider this whole conspiracy crap," Xander told her and took a sip from his glass. "I asked him questions, he asked me questions. I told him ways of killing vampires and he told a bit about their operation."
"And? Something interesting?" Willow asked interested.
"Nothing really new. But one thing is interesting. He told me that their researchers would probably like to get werewolves, witches or other civillians that have certain abilities into their hands," Xander explained.
That statement caused a bit of uneasiness especially for Oz and Willow.
"You told him about us?" Oz asked a bit worried.
"No, I didn't tell the anything about you guys," Xander reassured them. "I just asked him a few theoretical questions."
"So, what do we do with the soldiers?" Buffy asked after everyone had the opportunity to absorb the information.
"I think we should do the same as before. I told him we would leave them alone and they leave us alone," Xander explained the situation.
"That isn't really a solution. We can't do our work here if we have to tip toe around them," Buffy said.
"I know Buff," Xander tried to calm her down. "But in the current situation we have to take what there is to take. Maybe we can make some deal with their higher ups once they have learned more about the hellmouth. But for the moment we should keep a low profile."
Buffy's expression suddenly shifted from relaxed to alarmed when three men passed their table. Xander immediately noticed this change.
"Trouble?" he asked worried.
Buffy nodded. "Yeah," she said and motioned for three men that now were walking to another table in the other end of the room. "Those spanish looking guys over there? Vamps."
Xander sighed, but still stood up. He gulped the last drops from his glass and slammed it down on the table. "Those guys really know how to ruin an evening," he said and pulled one of his stakes out of his pockets. On the other side of the table Willow and Oz had done the same. And Buffy had of course always her favourite stake with her.
"Okay, let's clean the Bronze out," she said and the three slayerettes followed her to the place where the three vamps were still standing.
When they came nearer they could hear the argument that took place between the three guys that sat at the table and the vampires that were standing in front of them.
"Austin, I tell it you only one more time. Join up or you and your guys will die," the vampire leader threatened the guy sitting at the head of the table.
"I told it you once and I'm telling it you twice. I'm not working for Sanchez. So you can tell your boss he can fuck himself for all I care," the Austin spat back and turned his back on the vamps.
"Your choice," the leader said and nodded for his two men.
Before the occupants of the table knew what was going on the two vamps had drawn two stakes from their jackets and plunged them into the chests of the two men that accompanied Austin.
The two immediately dissolved into dust, which caused a panic among the teens that stood around the table.
The vampire leader in the meantime had Austin pinned on the table, holding him firmly in place.
"I'll give my boss your regards," the leader told him with an evil smile a placed his own stake over the Austin's heart.
"Hey," came a voice from behind him. "Why don't you mess with someone you own size?"
The leader turned around confused and before he could react the blonde girl had already kicked the staked out of his hand. Not waiting for him to regain his balance Buffy slammed her own stake into his heart and watched with satisfaction as the vampire turned into dust.
The two remaining vampires looked confused at the small girl.
"Seems like you two are new in town," Buffy told them. "Well, I'm the slayer. You can no either die or run."
Clearly not accustomed to a situation like that vamp number 1 decide to fight the girl whereas vamp 2 decide to seek his luck by fleeing.
But his run was cut short. He impaled himself by running directly onto Xander's stake, who looked at the shocked face of the vampire with an evil smirk.
"And if you run, you die tired," he continued Buffy's sentence and watched as the vampires features turned into dust.
Buffy meanwhile had made short work with the remaining vampire and was currently beating the hell out of Austin. She was just about to stake him when Xander grabbed her wrist and stopped her this way.
"Buffy wait," Xander said.
"What?" she asked confused. "You know, it's my job to kill vampires."
Xander rolled his eyes a bit at that. "Yeah, I know that. But I think it would be useful to know why the vamps are fighting under each other, don't you think?"
Buffy pouted, but finally agreed and placed her stake back into her waistband. She took the vampire's left arm whereas Xander took his right one. Together they carried the unconscious undead out of the now empty nightclub, Willow and Oz following them.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------- -----------------
"Do you really think this is a good idea?" Giles asked. The Scoobies had carried the vampire to Giles' apartment, because it was the nearest one. The apartment still was filled with the books they rescued from the high school.
"Yep," Xander said and applied the last layer of ductape and finished tying the vampire up to one of Giles' chairs.
"Giles, it was really weird," Buffy explained." Those vamps were fighting and killing each other. Something is going on. And that vamp might know what that is."
"I didn't mean that," Giles said. "Do you thing there will be no damage to my chair? It had been in the possession of my family for the last 70 years."
"You are telling me this now," Xander quipped. "Well, unless he is not too much into struggling, then your chair will be fine."
"And how do we wake him?" Willow asked. "Buffy gave his head quite a pounding."
"Well, I would suggest blood," Giles proposed.
"Great idea," Buffy said sarcastically. "Has anyone a blood bag lying around."
"Eh, no," Giles said.
"Oh you wimps," Xander said and took a knife from his boot. He cut with the blade over his open palm and waited for the blood to spill.
"Ouch," Buffy stated and looked with a bit of concern at Xander's blooody hand. "So, who is going to interrogate him?"
"Since it was yours and Xander's bright idea to bring him to my apartment you can also do the dirty work," Giles said and lead Willow and Oz out of the room.
"Hey, wakey up," Xander said as he waved his bloody hand under the vampire's nose.
Slowly the vampire came to his senses, the smell of the blood waking his hunger.
"What happened," Austin asked confused "Where am I?"
"That are two excellent questions," Xander stated and withdrew his hand from the vampire. "But were are the ones asking here."
"He is right," Buffy asked. "See, it not exactly normal for vampires to fight under each other. We would to know a bit more about that."
"Look," the vampire started. "We want no trouble with you guys. We have enough of that already."
"Why don't you tell me about it?" Buffy asked with a fake smile.
"Why should I?" the vamp spat back.
"Because if you don't you'll have through a very slow and painful death." Xander asked rhetorically.
The vampire sighed, but decided that the only chance of survival was cooperating.
"Okay, what do you want to know?" he finally asked.
"Who were those vamps that attacked you?" Xander asked.
"Sanchez's men." The vampire told him, nearly spitting the name out.
"Sanchez?" Buffy asked confused.
Austin nodded. "Big time vampire leader. Rules the business in south california and in north Mexico."
"Okay, so what are his guys doing here." Buffy asked.
"Man, for a slayer you are really dumb. Must have something to do with your hair colour," he told her with a evil smirk. That remark earned him a hard punch from Buffy, which broke his nose. "Ouch! Okay, okay. I'll stay to the story. Well, since the Mayor is out of business, Sunnydale's vampire are in a kind of civil war," the vamp explained. "We are fighting under each other to determine the next master vampire of the town."
"And Sanchez?" Xander asked.
"He and his men moved into town at the beginning of the summer. But the whole summer gap delayed his activities. Vampires don't fight much during the summer, because we are weaker than normal and all that stuff."
"Go on," Xander urged him
"Well, Sanchez' men basically want to take over the hellmouth. They are forcing all the vamps to either work with them or die."
"And you choose the last one." Buffy stated. She turned to Xander "I think it's clear. We kill this Sanchez and everything is fine."
That statement caused a burst of giggles from the tied up vampire.
"What?" she asked annoyed.
"Not only Sanchez is in Sunnyhell," Austin told her, tears rolling down his cheeks.
"And who else?" Xander asked.
"Another big time gangster. Dean Carver. Vampire leader. Controls LA and most of northern California." the vamp explained.
"And why are these two coming to Sunnydale now?"
"You see, before the Mayor died Sunnydale was kind of neutral territory. It separated Sanchez area from Carvers empire. With the Mayor gone this blocker is gone and those two are clashing against each other."
It took a few seconds for Buffy and Xander to let the information sink in.
"Open war between two vampire groups. That doesn't sound good." Xander muttered.
"So, I told you all about it." the vamp stated. "I have done my part. Now let me leave."
But instead of cutting him loose Buffy took the stake from her waistband and was ready to stake the vampire. But for the second time this evening she was stopped by Xander.
"Buffy wait," he said and took the stake from her hand. He took his knife again and freed the vampire from his restraints.
"Go," Xander told him. "Tell all the independent vampires to keep a low profile. We are gonna take care of the problem."
The vamp looked warily at the two, but finally made carefully his way out of Giles' apartment.
"Did we really have to let him live," Buffy finally asked when the vamp had closed the door behind him.
"Don't know. I just hope that this will keep the number those two gangster recruit their vampires from a litle lower."
"So how did it go?" Giles asked as he and the two other Scobies came back into the living room.
"We have a problem," Buffy stated.
"What happened?" Willow asked. "Where is the vampire?"
"We let him go," Buffy said.
"You what?" Willow shrieked. "You let a vampire leave? Why?"
"Okay, why don't we all sit down before the big yelling starts," Xander proposed and motioned to the couches and chairs. Finally each of the the Scoobies took a place and sat down.
"Yes, we let this vampire leave. Why? Cause Sunnydale's vampires are our smallest problem at the moment."
"What do you mean?" Giles asked confused.
"The guy told us about two vampire groups fighting for supremacy on the hellmouth," Buffy filled the rest in.
"Oh dear god," Giles muttered.
"My thoughts exactly," Xander threw in. "That is one hell of a problem for us. Now we not only have to deal with those soldiers but also with two groups of vampires that want to make the hellmouth their new home."
"What do we do now?" Willow asked.
"The same as always. Gathering information," Xander stated and stood up. "Maybe Giles' books have something on one of those vamps. The one was called Dean Carver the other one Sanchez," he told the ex-librarian and took his jacket.
"And what do you think you are doing?" Buffy asked him.
"Oh, I'm paying Willy's a little visit," he told her with a smirk.
"And you want to leave me stuck here," Buffy yelled with fake outrage. "No way, I'm coming with you."
"Buffy how do you get information out of Willy?" Xander asked rhetorically
"I beat him till he talks," she said.
"See? I'm paying him for information. And if you enter his bar all the vamps and demons leave the place. Maybe I'll get a hold on one of Sanchez or Carver's men," Xander explained and opened the door.
"Okay," Buffy said and sat down. "But the next time I'm going to Willy's and you can do the boring research," she called after Xander's retreating back.
"Well, he doesn't look like one," Willow agreed."At least he seemed kinda nice."
"Way more nice that Professor Walsh," Buffy muttered. "I don't get it. It makes no difference if I'm awake or not. She's always the same dragon."
They walked along the hallway, when Buffy's cellphone suddenly began ringing.
"Hello?" she answered the phone.
"Hi Buffy it's me," came Xander's voice over the speaker.
"Xander," Buffy said and smile. "What's up? Something wrong?"
"Yeah," Xander responded a bit uneasily."Look I have to cancel our meeting for lunch. I doing a little errand for your mother in LA."
"Oh," Buffy said disappointed.
"Yeah, bad luck, I know. Well, what have you guys planned for tonight," he asked.
"Just the Bronze," Buffy said.
"Okay meet you there. Eight?" he asked.
"Eight is it."
---------------------------------------------------------------------------- -----------------
"Hey guys," Xander greeted the Scoobs when he finally reached their table, thirty minutes too late.
"Hi Xander," Willow greeted back.
"What took you so long?" Buffy asked a bit annoyed.
"Visited Cordy and Faith. Those two in one apartment, not a nice picture. I was tempted to lay a minefield in the middle of the room to separate them," Xander told her with a smile and waved for the nearby waitress. "Whisky," he ordered.
She wrote his order down and walked in the direction of the counter.
"And I thought me and Faith had a tendency for getting on each others nerves," Willow mused and played with the straw in her glass.
"You and Faith?" Xander snorted. "You two were like two tame small kittens. Faith and Cordy are like two grown up lionesses," he explained and the three scoobies grimaced at the image.
The waitress returned with Xander's drink an placed the glass on the table
"So," Buffy asked expectedly." How did your meeting with Finn go."
"Not so bad, if you consider this whole conspiracy crap," Xander told her and took a sip from his glass. "I asked him questions, he asked me questions. I told him ways of killing vampires and he told a bit about their operation."
"And? Something interesting?" Willow asked interested.
"Nothing really new. But one thing is interesting. He told me that their researchers would probably like to get werewolves, witches or other civillians that have certain abilities into their hands," Xander explained.
That statement caused a bit of uneasiness especially for Oz and Willow.
"You told him about us?" Oz asked a bit worried.
"No, I didn't tell the anything about you guys," Xander reassured them. "I just asked him a few theoretical questions."
"So, what do we do with the soldiers?" Buffy asked after everyone had the opportunity to absorb the information.
"I think we should do the same as before. I told him we would leave them alone and they leave us alone," Xander explained the situation.
"That isn't really a solution. We can't do our work here if we have to tip toe around them," Buffy said.
"I know Buff," Xander tried to calm her down. "But in the current situation we have to take what there is to take. Maybe we can make some deal with their higher ups once they have learned more about the hellmouth. But for the moment we should keep a low profile."
Buffy's expression suddenly shifted from relaxed to alarmed when three men passed their table. Xander immediately noticed this change.
"Trouble?" he asked worried.
Buffy nodded. "Yeah," she said and motioned for three men that now were walking to another table in the other end of the room. "Those spanish looking guys over there? Vamps."
Xander sighed, but still stood up. He gulped the last drops from his glass and slammed it down on the table. "Those guys really know how to ruin an evening," he said and pulled one of his stakes out of his pockets. On the other side of the table Willow and Oz had done the same. And Buffy had of course always her favourite stake with her.
"Okay, let's clean the Bronze out," she said and the three slayerettes followed her to the place where the three vamps were still standing.
When they came nearer they could hear the argument that took place between the three guys that sat at the table and the vampires that were standing in front of them.
"Austin, I tell it you only one more time. Join up or you and your guys will die," the vampire leader threatened the guy sitting at the head of the table.
"I told it you once and I'm telling it you twice. I'm not working for Sanchez. So you can tell your boss he can fuck himself for all I care," the Austin spat back and turned his back on the vamps.
"Your choice," the leader said and nodded for his two men.
Before the occupants of the table knew what was going on the two vamps had drawn two stakes from their jackets and plunged them into the chests of the two men that accompanied Austin.
The two immediately dissolved into dust, which caused a panic among the teens that stood around the table.
The vampire leader in the meantime had Austin pinned on the table, holding him firmly in place.
"I'll give my boss your regards," the leader told him with an evil smile a placed his own stake over the Austin's heart.
"Hey," came a voice from behind him. "Why don't you mess with someone you own size?"
The leader turned around confused and before he could react the blonde girl had already kicked the staked out of his hand. Not waiting for him to regain his balance Buffy slammed her own stake into his heart and watched with satisfaction as the vampire turned into dust.
The two remaining vampires looked confused at the small girl.
"Seems like you two are new in town," Buffy told them. "Well, I'm the slayer. You can no either die or run."
Clearly not accustomed to a situation like that vamp number 1 decide to fight the girl whereas vamp 2 decide to seek his luck by fleeing.
But his run was cut short. He impaled himself by running directly onto Xander's stake, who looked at the shocked face of the vampire with an evil smirk.
"And if you run, you die tired," he continued Buffy's sentence and watched as the vampires features turned into dust.
Buffy meanwhile had made short work with the remaining vampire and was currently beating the hell out of Austin. She was just about to stake him when Xander grabbed her wrist and stopped her this way.
"Buffy wait," Xander said.
"What?" she asked confused. "You know, it's my job to kill vampires."
Xander rolled his eyes a bit at that. "Yeah, I know that. But I think it would be useful to know why the vamps are fighting under each other, don't you think?"
Buffy pouted, but finally agreed and placed her stake back into her waistband. She took the vampire's left arm whereas Xander took his right one. Together they carried the unconscious undead out of the now empty nightclub, Willow and Oz following them.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------- -----------------
"Do you really think this is a good idea?" Giles asked. The Scoobies had carried the vampire to Giles' apartment, because it was the nearest one. The apartment still was filled with the books they rescued from the high school.
"Yep," Xander said and applied the last layer of ductape and finished tying the vampire up to one of Giles' chairs.
"Giles, it was really weird," Buffy explained." Those vamps were fighting and killing each other. Something is going on. And that vamp might know what that is."
"I didn't mean that," Giles said. "Do you thing there will be no damage to my chair? It had been in the possession of my family for the last 70 years."
"You are telling me this now," Xander quipped. "Well, unless he is not too much into struggling, then your chair will be fine."
"And how do we wake him?" Willow asked. "Buffy gave his head quite a pounding."
"Well, I would suggest blood," Giles proposed.
"Great idea," Buffy said sarcastically. "Has anyone a blood bag lying around."
"Eh, no," Giles said.
"Oh you wimps," Xander said and took a knife from his boot. He cut with the blade over his open palm and waited for the blood to spill.
"Ouch," Buffy stated and looked with a bit of concern at Xander's blooody hand. "So, who is going to interrogate him?"
"Since it was yours and Xander's bright idea to bring him to my apartment you can also do the dirty work," Giles said and lead Willow and Oz out of the room.
"Hey, wakey up," Xander said as he waved his bloody hand under the vampire's nose.
Slowly the vampire came to his senses, the smell of the blood waking his hunger.
"What happened," Austin asked confused "Where am I?"
"That are two excellent questions," Xander stated and withdrew his hand from the vampire. "But were are the ones asking here."
"He is right," Buffy asked. "See, it not exactly normal for vampires to fight under each other. We would to know a bit more about that."
"Look," the vampire started. "We want no trouble with you guys. We have enough of that already."
"Why don't you tell me about it?" Buffy asked with a fake smile.
"Why should I?" the vamp spat back.
"Because if you don't you'll have through a very slow and painful death." Xander asked rhetorically.
The vampire sighed, but decided that the only chance of survival was cooperating.
"Okay, what do you want to know?" he finally asked.
"Who were those vamps that attacked you?" Xander asked.
"Sanchez's men." The vampire told him, nearly spitting the name out.
"Sanchez?" Buffy asked confused.
Austin nodded. "Big time vampire leader. Rules the business in south california and in north Mexico."
"Okay, so what are his guys doing here." Buffy asked.
"Man, for a slayer you are really dumb. Must have something to do with your hair colour," he told her with a evil smirk. That remark earned him a hard punch from Buffy, which broke his nose. "Ouch! Okay, okay. I'll stay to the story. Well, since the Mayor is out of business, Sunnydale's vampire are in a kind of civil war," the vamp explained. "We are fighting under each other to determine the next master vampire of the town."
"And Sanchez?" Xander asked.
"He and his men moved into town at the beginning of the summer. But the whole summer gap delayed his activities. Vampires don't fight much during the summer, because we are weaker than normal and all that stuff."
"Go on," Xander urged him
"Well, Sanchez' men basically want to take over the hellmouth. They are forcing all the vamps to either work with them or die."
"And you choose the last one." Buffy stated. She turned to Xander "I think it's clear. We kill this Sanchez and everything is fine."
That statement caused a burst of giggles from the tied up vampire.
"What?" she asked annoyed.
"Not only Sanchez is in Sunnyhell," Austin told her, tears rolling down his cheeks.
"And who else?" Xander asked.
"Another big time gangster. Dean Carver. Vampire leader. Controls LA and most of northern California." the vamp explained.
"And why are these two coming to Sunnydale now?"
"You see, before the Mayor died Sunnydale was kind of neutral territory. It separated Sanchez area from Carvers empire. With the Mayor gone this blocker is gone and those two are clashing against each other."
It took a few seconds for Buffy and Xander to let the information sink in.
"Open war between two vampire groups. That doesn't sound good." Xander muttered.
"So, I told you all about it." the vamp stated. "I have done my part. Now let me leave."
But instead of cutting him loose Buffy took the stake from her waistband and was ready to stake the vampire. But for the second time this evening she was stopped by Xander.
"Buffy wait," he said and took the stake from her hand. He took his knife again and freed the vampire from his restraints.
"Go," Xander told him. "Tell all the independent vampires to keep a low profile. We are gonna take care of the problem."
The vamp looked warily at the two, but finally made carefully his way out of Giles' apartment.
"Did we really have to let him live," Buffy finally asked when the vamp had closed the door behind him.
"Don't know. I just hope that this will keep the number those two gangster recruit their vampires from a litle lower."
"So how did it go?" Giles asked as he and the two other Scobies came back into the living room.
"We have a problem," Buffy stated.
"What happened?" Willow asked. "Where is the vampire?"
"We let him go," Buffy said.
"You what?" Willow shrieked. "You let a vampire leave? Why?"
"Okay, why don't we all sit down before the big yelling starts," Xander proposed and motioned to the couches and chairs. Finally each of the the Scoobies took a place and sat down.
"Yes, we let this vampire leave. Why? Cause Sunnydale's vampires are our smallest problem at the moment."
"What do you mean?" Giles asked confused.
"The guy told us about two vampire groups fighting for supremacy on the hellmouth," Buffy filled the rest in.
"Oh dear god," Giles muttered.
"My thoughts exactly," Xander threw in. "That is one hell of a problem for us. Now we not only have to deal with those soldiers but also with two groups of vampires that want to make the hellmouth their new home."
"What do we do now?" Willow asked.
"The same as always. Gathering information," Xander stated and stood up. "Maybe Giles' books have something on one of those vamps. The one was called Dean Carver the other one Sanchez," he told the ex-librarian and took his jacket.
"And what do you think you are doing?" Buffy asked him.
"Oh, I'm paying Willy's a little visit," he told her with a smirk.
"And you want to leave me stuck here," Buffy yelled with fake outrage. "No way, I'm coming with you."
"Buffy how do you get information out of Willy?" Xander asked rhetorically
"I beat him till he talks," she said.
"See? I'm paying him for information. And if you enter his bar all the vamps and demons leave the place. Maybe I'll get a hold on one of Sanchez or Carver's men," Xander explained and opened the door.
"Okay," Buffy said and sat down. "But the next time I'm going to Willy's and you can do the boring research," she called after Xander's retreating back.