***

Xander found a new definition for hell during the drive to the school. A part of this involved the girls demand that the radio be tuned to a top forty station. The station then decided to do a song sweep that Xander could only describe as the Boy-Band Marathon from hell. The squealing had been bad enough but Dawn's off-key rendition of a song about unrequited teen lust had Xander slowly spinning into a circle of hell from whence escape would be possible only by the loss of his hearing. He was desperately tuning the girls out and so was surprised when they had to start whacking him in the head. "Ok Important safety rule, no hitting the guy at the wheel."

"What is the deal Xander we said stop up ahead." The only thing ahead was an empty suburban street and a lone figure walking disconsolately along the roadway. Dawn screamed out "Celeste" and the girl looked up as if she had been in a daze. The sight of the screaming waving teen seemed to alarm her. "Need a ride?" Dawn asked

The girl seemed about to say No but then shrugged her shoulders and walked slowly over to the car climbing into the already crowded backseat. Dawn shot a look at her friend Val who reading that the two of them needed a moment crawled brazenly into the front seat of the car.

"Mr. Harris, Dawn says you have the coolest taste in music what kind do you like to listen to." She asked the man sweetly making good use of her pout-y lips and full lashes.

Dawn and Celeste settled back in the car seat. Dawn turned to her friend and fixed her with a searching gaze. "Well, what did your parents say when you asked them."

"They said the same thing everyone else says. Plastic surgery is dangerous and extreme. There is nothing wrong with me that good diet and hard exercise won't solve. More like there is nothing it can do to fix what's wrong. They say its my self esteem but that's not a problem its not like when my mom was in school they don't know how hard it is for me…. For us"

"Maybe you should hold off. I mean its not like we are going to be stuck in Sunnydale forever just grin and bare it."

"Easy for you to say Dawn you have a hot sister and you are very good looking. I look like a troll doll."

"Well I'm sorry but you're stuck with things as they are unless you can find someone who will work on you without parental consent."

"Well as a matter of fact. The last time I was at a doctors office trying to convince him, one of the ladies said that she had heard of someone who worked cheap. Came highly recommended too…"

"Ah well go see him then."

"I don't know. He might just say the same thing that the rest of them do; That I'm too young to know what I want. Or he will be scared my parents will sue his ass and he won't touch me."

The car pulled in front of the school. The three girls hopped out of the car with Val promising Xander that she would indeed try to find that Sex Pistols CD that he was saying redefined music as they had known it. The girls waked to class with Celeste updating Val on her ongoing quest to improve on natures gross screw over.

***

The topic was ancient civilizations and the class was history. Dawn hated the topic. Growing up in a home, surrounded by books on all aspects of ancient history would do that to you. But Patrick Miller the teacher made the class interesting, and if the reason he made it interesting was because he seemed to like the students and especially Dawn …well that was all to the good.

Dawn and Celeste were whispering about her situation during a lull in the class. The clearing of Mr. Miller's throat brought them back to the harsh realities of the moment.

"Miss Summers, I'm assuming that your lack of attention means that you already have an example of the civilization that we were just discussing." His sharp good looks and wavy hair made him look handsome in the eyes of the girls in the classroom. Dawn paled but Miller was not done. "You must be carrying it in that bag of yours. Is that why you are gabbing away with Celeste instead of paying attention in my class." He started forward and held out his hand. Dawn reached reluctantly into her bag to withdraw the notes that She and Celeste had been passing and her hand closed around something bulky. Surprised she withdrew the object, which the teacher snatched from her.

"Well, well what have we here…? Interesting…Sorry to disappoint you Summers but this is not Chinese."

"It isn't." She asked. She wondered just how miserable Buffy would make her life if the teacher called and asked about the Box. She figured that Buffy would wait maybe three seconds tops and then jump to the conclusion that she had stolen it. She had no clue how the danm thing had gotten there into he first place.

It's French, the construction was done by someone who has studied Chinese influence extensively but the wood and design accents clearly mark it as French. Nice try Summers. You can pick it up at the end of the day."

"But Mr. Miller" she whined

"At the end of the day…and I might consider not telling your sister why you weren't listening in class today."

"Yes Mr. Miller."

***

The rest of the day flew by. Not that Celeste would notice If it had not. After Miller's class the trio had gone through the rest of the day with Dawn fretting about the box Miller had taken. At the end of the day, she had gone off to see the man. Celeste had headed across town. As much as she liked Dawn and wanted to spend time with her she wanted to do this on her own. Her steps took her a dilapidated part of town. She was following the directions that she had gotten second hand from the lady in the doctors office. A puffy faced woman whose obvious wealth explained why she was able to pay for the best plastic surgery Sunnydale had to offer.

Her trip took her to an abandoned part of town. Had she brought Dawn with her The younger Summers would have recognized this as prime real estate for vampires. They loved areas like this, filled with emanations of despair and hopelessness. Even the hobos and transient steered clear of this block and the building she was in front of most especially.

It reached into the sky like a dying clutching hand. From the outside boards could be seen blocking all sunlight access into the building. Celeste walked fearfully up the steps to the huge metal front door. She knocked. The echo could be heard bouncing off hallways aged with dust and decay. She pushed on the door, which screeched open allowing daylight to stab at the dank hallway. Rats and other unmentionable vermin scattered down the hall. She walked down the hallway toward an open alcove at its debris-strewn end.

An elevator old fashioned and being maintained by someone. There was only one place to go besides the ground floor. That was Up. she pressed on the button and the doors clanged shut. Grinding & clanking of gears signaled that the cage was raising upward. it finally pulled to a halt with a jerk and the doors slid open revealing a spectacle almost as depressing as the downstairs area.

She stepped through the door and the elevator clanged shut behind her. The room was vast but low with the ceiling being only a foot or so above her head. Sunlight streamed through the slates that had been placed over the windows but instead of cutting the gloom they created more and stranger shadows from which things might appear at any second.

She looked around the room and was sure that there was nobody here. Then she saw a flicker, and flash of movement so small and precise that she was sure that it had been her imagination. She looked at the point in the room where she had seen it but there was nothing just the rising cloud of dust from a floor. This didn't look like any Doctor's office she had ever seen. Had she been screwed over?

"Is anybody home." she called into the gloom

"Home is where the heart is, where is your heart little one so that we can cut it out and see for ourselves." The voice was scratchy. It came from a pallid figure that glided out of the gloom. He was dress head to toe in black including a long coat that dusted the ground beneath him. As he moved. Celeste cried out and backed away as the man moved forward. "Show us your pumper dearie, show us the dark soft places on the inside. We love the dark and the soft." his hands held a long ornate blade. Celeste could tell that this blade had been crafted to look good and kill people in an ugly fashion.

"I'm sorry if I bothered you …I'm in the wrong place …please just let me leave."

"Leaving she is. Going before she has come. Wants what we can give but gives nothing in return for this we could just prune you." He was stalking relentlessly forward.

A voice cut through the gloom. It had low cultured sound to it yet commanding. " Mr. Keene, my instructions were to find and guide not to find and harass."

Keene shrank in on himself glancing nervously behind him "Keene plays, he plays games with the miss, not serious is Keene, never and no. Only at masters bidding does Keene move, does he speak, does he draw breath and keep breathing and such luxuries as master gives."

Celeste watched as formerly menacing figure transformed into a fawning lapdog of a man. Genuflecting as large double door opened. Keene turned and gestured to the girl quickly as though eager to prove his loyalty. "Step quickly girly-girl Master has plans and schemes and dreams. Precious is his time not to be wasted it is."

"Your attention to my time is admirable Keene, see to the girls refreshment and then leave us be." The man speaking was tall very tall. He stood in front of a bay window surrounded by flora of all types. Soft music played in the background in this room apparently a garden for all the plants that filled the room from floor to ceiling. Amidst the plants were statues. Figures locked in every conceivable pose. "My art, I hope that you are impressed."

"I've never seen anything like it." said Celeste her voice trembled as she watched Keene flit about the room always wondering when he would slip his leash and attack her.

"I capture a moment of human existence and make it last."

Celeste looked at the figures. At first, she thought the faces were frozen in orgasmic pleasure but she realized some were in pain. "The images are shocking? Terrifying? You ask did he imagine this…. Hold it in his mind and carve, chip, and break the surface till the what was in the mind was in the stone."

"This has got to be some of the best work I've seen."

"But you are also wondering did he work from still life. Force some model to wear that face till he was done carving."

"I can't imagine anyone could do that."

"You would be surprised at what a man can endure for his art."

Keene stopped in front of her and silently pushed a cup of steaming tea into her hands. He did the same for the tall man and then he retreated from the room.

"Now that we are alone, We can speak honestly, you and I speak of what brought you to me."

"I heard that you can do things, make a person beautiful. That's what I want. I want to be beautiful."

"You want beauty but beauty comes from within. Surely, you know this. If you lack belief in yourself, you will never know true beauty and I can not give you belief in yourself.

'"That's a crock…about beauty I mean. Everyone says that it comes from inside but even if I feel better about who I am that doesn't change that I still look the same way. I want to be different."

"You want to be better then you could ever be on your own." The tall man said wistfully

"Yes. And I will do whatever I have to."

"Well then, perhaps we can help each other. What you seek is a thing not easily found and even more difficult to keep once obtained. Nevertheless, if you have the will. Then I can do much for you. Celeste allow me to introduce myself." The tall man stepped toward her and for the first time, she could see the man who spoke to her. His face was a warped and twisted affair including a wide gash that was his mouth and eyes that were totally irregular. "I am Vincent Clotho I am a maker of art and a crafter of form."

***