Chapter Eighteen: The Master Plan
(Sorry 'bout the wait. It's all coming together in my brain now. Don't worry, more shall come.)
Spike had been falling for a good while now. He'd given up screaming about fifteen minutes ago. Now, he was just letting gravity run it's course until he landed, preferably on something soft.
~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~
Buffy was pissed. It was the only way to describe what she was feeling. Once again, her friends had managed to kick her out of the loop. Bastards. The whole lot of them. She stewed in her contempt. She was pretty sure that Faith didn't know anything, she would've blurted it out. She thought about going over and talking to Faith, but she was with Robin, and she didn't want to interrupt them. She grabbed a couple of stakes and headed out. The group wasn't in the library, that was the first place she checked for them. She was prepared to give them a good chuck of her mind, but instead found all their notes and books about a prophecy and junk. That's all she needed now, more shit to deal with.
Buffy tracked them all the way to the sewers. There she found ashy vampire remains and blood splatter. Just then, she heard a noise and whirled around, almost staking her Watcher.
"Giles!" She exclaimed. "What are you doing here?"
"What am I doing here? What are you doing here?" He asked.
Her eyes narrowed and she pushed him. "I followed you guys. Look like I missed a pretty good fight." She said noting the blood and piles of dust.
Giles sat on a beat-up chair, he lifted his shirt, exposing a nasty purple bruise under his ribs, flinching in discomfort as he did. "Ha, you did. Stop it."
"Stop what?"
"Glaring at me."
"You know why, right?"
"Yes."
Buffy rolled her eyes. "Then why didn't you tell me what was going on? Instead, I have to hear it from Lilah."
"Lilah?"
"That weird woman, Angel and Wesley are always talking about," she told him. "Why didn't you tell me, Giles?"
"Didn't want to worry you," he replied, fibbing. "You've been through enough." She crossed her arms and gave him a Look. "What? That's all you're getting out of me."
"And?"
"And you should feel lucky I'm too hurt to really tell you what's on my mind." He said.
"Giles!" She whined.
He sighed, it hurt. "Oh, all right. And next time something is going on we'll tell you. Happy?"
"No."
"Good Lord, Buffy. You could at least accept that. It's not that big a deal," He said taking his glasses off.
"No, Giles..." she walked over to a spot on the floor. She touched it, it was red. "Is Dawn here?"
"Yes, Buffy it wasn't my idea. Dawn wanted to come." He said.
"Giles, you could've said no or tied her up. Which way did she go?" She demanded.
Giles pointed to a tunnel to Buffy's left. "Her and Willow went that way."
Buffy wiped the blood on her pant leg. "Okay. Do you need me to take you back to Angel's?"
Giles stood up, "No, I can manage."
Buffy nodded and ran down the dark tunnel.
"I'm sorry," he whispered after her.
~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~
Buffy stopped running after a few yards. The filthy water was splashing up with every step she took, and it smelled really bad. "Dawn, I'm gonna kill you," she muttered when she saw a dead rat float by, it's legs up in the air. She rounded a corner and decided where to go next.
"Hello." Buffy gave a little yelp when she felt a tug at the back of her jacket. She turned around and saw the pair of Twins the vamps were after earlier.
"Hello," she said. "You shouldn't be down here. There are bad things down here."
"Are you looking for us?" The little girl asked.
Buffy shook her head. "I'm looking for my sister and my friends. Have you seen them?"
The little boy whispered something into the little girl's ear. "We haven't seen them. But can you take us with you?"
"I'm sorry," Buffy smiled.
The little boy whispered into the little girl's ear again. "Please?" She took hold of Buffy hand.
Buffy relented, "Okay. But if we see anything bad, you have to run away." The little boy whispered in the little girl's ear yet again an the little girl smiled. "Okay."
~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~
They trudged along for a good while now. "Xander, can we stop?" Andrew asked whiningly.
"No," Xander replied. "Sooner we find those twins, faster we get out of here."
Andrew leaned against the dirty wall. "I'm so tired though."
"Well so am I."
They continued walking until Xander tripped and fell face first into the sewage. "Oh gross!" Xander screamed. He got to his feet. "What was that?" Andrew felt around in the water, and pulled up the top half of a rotting, water logged, corpse. "Gah!" Xander jumped back and fell again in the water. "Put that down!" He ordered Andrew.
"What? It's just a dead body," Andrew said.
"Half a dead body. It's disgusting," Xander said. They heard distant splashing and Willow and Dawn came up behind Andrew.
"We heard screaming," Dawn said.
"What's wrong?" Willow added.
"Oh, Xander's just afraid of this dead body," Andrew said turning around showing them the decomposing corpse. They girls jumped back and screamed. Dawn buried her face in Willow's shoulder.
"What's all the screaming?" Wesley and Gunn ran up to them.
"Dude, drop that thing, you're gonna get maggots," Gunn told Andrew.
Wesley peered at it. "Must be one of the vampire's victims," he announced.
"Where's the rest of him?" Dawn asked, her voice muffled.
"The rats, I assume," Wesley said.
"It's coming from over here," they Angel's voice say. Angel and Fred joined the rest of the group. "Hey, what's up? Oh, he's dead," Angel said looking at Andrew's friend.
"Been dead. He's all poofy, and he doesn't have eyes, his entrails are hanging out..." Andrew described much to everyone's chagrin.
"Yes, yes. We've all seen the dead body." Xander gulped. "Now, can someone help me up before I lose everything I've ever eaten?"
Angel lent Xander a hand. "Better?"
His knees wobbled, and he tasted puke in the back of his throat. "No," Xander said and he turned and threw up .
"Ew!" Everyone exclaimed and backed away from Xander.
"What's with the Geneva Convention?" Buffy asked coming up behind them. "Oh, he's dead," she said looking at Andrew, who was still holding the body.
"We've all established that," Xander commented weakly. He was still a nice shade of pale green.
"What are you doing here?" Angel asked Buffy.
"Oh, I dunno. I like taking late-night walks through rat-infested sewers," she replied sarcastically. "Especially to look for my sister and my friends, who don't let me in on anything any more." She put her hands on her hips.
"We didn't want..."
"To worry me?" Buffy interrupted Willow. "Good job with the no worrying me when Dawn's out here playing hide and seek with a corpse."
"Buffy..." Willow tried to apologize.
"No, Will. I wanna know what's going on. Since no one wants to tell me what goes on anymore, who can have kids and such," she said looking at Angel.
Angel cleared his throat, "We were looking for these twins..."
"Twins. Like babies? Like tiny little, Angel-faced babies?" She said still looking at a very uncomfortable Angel. Then a light bulb went off. "Oh!" Buffy looked around, "Twins, I found them. A boy and a girl. They were right here."
The group looked at each other. "We'd better head back to the firm," Angel said.
~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*
"Okay, so what's the Master Plan?" Buffy asked after the group was finished telling her what they had been hiding from her.
"We, uh, actually don't have one," Giles confessed. "We're playing by ear."
"But we're getting there," Dawn handed her a book. "See, we've translated almost everything. Except for some of the stuff Andrew and I found in Lilah's office."
"What were you doing in Lilah's office?" Angel turned to Dawn.
"We uh... we were..." Dawn trailed off. She looked at Andrew, "Andrew!" She pointed her finger at Andrew who was trying to make himself as small as possible. "H-He wanted to go there and look for something."
"Look for what?" Angel now turned to Andrew.
"Uh... er.." Andrew wanted to hide. "I was looking..."
"For me," Wesley spoke up. "I asked him to get something."
Angel looked at Wes, making a mental note to talk to him later. He smacked his lips together, "Okay. But stay away from Lilah. She's bad news. Buffy?"
"What? Huh?" Buffy looked up.
"Dawn should stay away from Lilah, she's bad news?" Angel said.
"Oh yeah. Dawn, don't go there again. But, she's not that bad," Buffy said to Angel.
"Yes she is. She always has her own agenda. She's evil."
"Whatever. She just didn't seem that evil," she muttered under her breath. "So, this prophecy. New Big Bad." She read from the book. " 'After the defeat of the First Evil by the Chosen One and her allies, and the return of a Champion, a great evil will follow.' " She sighed. "Why is there always consequences? 'Five signs will signal it's return. 'The Conception, The Twins, and The Rise and Fall of a Champion, and The Death of True Love' I don't like the sound of that last one."
"What do you wanna do?" Angel asked.
"Oh yeah, when it's time for Buffy to come up with a game plan, tell her everything at once," she said sarcastically. "I don't have any idea what this all means."
"Maybe we should just play this one by ear," Willow offered. "I mean, it's worked so far."
"What about those Twins?" Fred asked. "Buffy said she found them, then they disappeared."
"Well, Cordelia to me something..."
"Cordelia?" Angel head snapped up. "Cordy's awake?"
Willow shook her head. "No, I tried to wake her up, but I couldn't. Anyway, she told me to 'find them'. I didn't know what she was talking about, but what if that's all we had to do?"
"Wait, so you mean these things are literal?" Xander asked. "Well, color me obvious."
"If the signs have a literal meaning that means..." Giles started.
"They can be prevented," Angel finished.
"Then we prevent them," Buffy said.
"We just have to find out where, when and who, and be there first," Willow said.
"Right," Xander clapped his hands together, "That's the Master Plan."
"Are they always this disorganized?" Fred asked Wesley.
"Worse," he replied. "But they seem to get the job done."
