Rainbow Over Sunnydale Chapter 18

by Joe Black

Disclaimer: Red Storm and Tom Clancy own Rainbow and Characters. Joss Whedon owns Buffy and Characters. Anyone else belongs to me. I make no profit of the following except to have a little fun.

Spoilers: Buffy to present. Rainbow to Bear and the Dragon.

Authors note 1: I am adjusting the Buffy time line slightly, moving things back about a month. This fic starts right after 'Never Leave Me'.

Authors note 2: I can't seem to get Fanfic to accept any special formatting so anytime that you see '*' it means that the speaker is speaking a foreign language. If you see '[*]' it is the persons thoughts.

Notes to Reviewers: Thanks for reviewing LMiC2001. I was shocked by the number of fics that came in after I posted. I was on page two almost instantly. Thanks for looking for it.

Thanks to all that reviewed. Constructive criticisms always welcomed. Flames cheerfully ignored.

Below Campsite 22

Mesa Alto National Park

Near Sunnydale CA

26Oct2003

0940 hours

Buffy stalked carefully through the woods. About ten yards behind her Ding came, and ten more behind Ding, Ranger Broadman came. Buffy scanned the woods in a one hundred and eighty-degree arc in front of them, Ding covered the sides, and Broadman was responsible for the rear. Between everyone they managed to keep the area around them covered as they moved. Ding had been surprised initially at how skilled Buffy was in the woods. Though he ruefully admitted to himself that he was still letting some of his chauvinism color his thinking. He was going to have to beat that out of his system, before Buffy did it for him. He took a moment to watch Buffy move. Ordinarily Buffy moved like a big cat, smooth and powerful. Now moving through the woods it was much more pronounced she stalked rather than walked. Her crossbow tracked where she looked, he noticed that she had the safety off and her finger rested not on the trigger, but rather on the trigger guard.

Buffy suddenly stopped, the other two closed up on her. In front of them was a pair of small hills with a gap between them. Buffy motioned to the hills and whispered, "They are on the other side of the hills." She then turned and started to go around the right hill. Ding was about to ask why go that way, when he realized that they where walking down wind of whatever was over there. He wondered if Buffy had consciously chosen that way?

When they got halfway around the hill Buffy started to climb. Ding and Broadman followed her. He was amazed at the kind of brush she could move through silently with the crossbow in front of her. She just seemed to flow through it. He and Broadman were nowhere near as successful. After glaring at them and the noise of their confrontation with the first set of bushes she altered her climb so that the brush wasn't as thick.

When they reached the top she went down on her stomach and peered over the crest of the hill. A couple of moments later Ding and Broadman also reached the top. "There they are," Buffy said softly, "by the big rock."

Ding looked and didn't see anything, "I'm not seeing them," he whispered back.

"Look at how the leaves and stuff are moving, it's not the wind," Buffy replied in a low tone.

Ding looked again, and then noticed what she was talking about. Above each of these disturbances was something that looked like a heat shimmer, "Okay now I got them. Can you take the shot?" He asked.

Buffy shook her head once. I could get one definitely; maybe two, but the other two would scatter. They might try and follow us and I would be able to get them then, but the could just melt back into the forest and still be a threat," she whispered.

Broadman grunted that he had them too, so they then worked their way back down the hill quietly. Once at the bottom of the hill they gathered in a circle, "How do you want to do this?" Broadman asked.

"How bout a skirmish line?" Ding suggested. "We form a line across the gully at the base of the hills and let them come to us."

Buffy thought about it for a second and said, "Okay that works for me." Broadman nodded.

Ding went on, "I think Robert should move into the center with the '14, Buffy you are in first so you would have the right, I would be in last and have the left."

Buffy and Broadman nodded. Broadman pulled out his cellphone and said, "I'll call the Doc, and let her know we are here."

Buffy and Ding waited as Broadman did that, then all three moved to the mouth of the gully. They quickly stepped through with Buffy leading. As they made their way between the hills a loud growl from around the bolder area indicated that they had been spotted. Ding stared up the hill and spotted a ripple that he hoped was a hound coming straight at him. Broadman began squeezing off shots immediately, "[Must be nice to have a thirty-round clip]", he thought. He put his own rifle to his shoulder and tracked the ripple. At fifty-yards he squeezed the trigger for the first time. The floor of the forest erupted behind the ripple, "[Too high]", he thought to himself. Ding worked the action of the Marlin and fired again when the ripple crossed forty-yards. This time the ground in front of the ripple exploded. The ripple reared up in surprise giving Ding his first clear target. He aimed at the center of mass worked the action and squeezed the trigger a third time. Red exploded and the hound was blown backward by the big slug. Ding swung around to see if he could help either of his companions. He got around just in time to see the head of Broadman's hound explode in a spray of gray and pink. Ding then tried to pick up anything else when he realized that two of the hounds must be heading for Buffy, but he couldn't pick them out of the clutter!

Dr. Sanchez found herself becoming more, not less tense when Ranger Broadman had called her. She waited for the shot that would end her or one of her kids lives. She was mildly surprised when three people came quickly into the campsite area forming a line at the bottom of the hill, facing uphill. One of the figures she saw was a young woman. She seemed to be armed with a crossbow instead of a rifle. As the men started shooting she just stood there aiming up the hill. Probably because she had been tracking whatever these things were, she could pick out the two that picked the slight figure as a target. Still the blond just stood there. She wanted to scream at her to shoot, or duck, or do something but found herself mute in terror.

Buffy for her part was perfectly calm. Neither the CRACK, CRACK, CRACK, of Broadman's rifle, or the deeper BOOM of Ding's made any impact on her. She stood there watching both hounds coming at her. Their tactics were plain, the lead hound would knock her over, and then the second one would savage her. Why they had choose her, as a target didn't matter, whether it was because she was the smallest, or they somehow perceived her as the most dangerous was immaterial. She knew which one she would shoot, when she would shoot, and what she would shoot, and what she would do after she shot, so all she had to do was wait. When the lead hound crossed the twenty-yard mark she stroked the trigger of the crossbow. The lever that held back the string went forward and the arms snapped forward carrying the string with them. The string struck the back of the quarrel and started propelling it forward. The bolt had barely cleared the front of the bow when Buffy dropped it. She then started shifting to her left; the hound left the ground with the intent to knock The Slayer over. Buffy shifted her hip and wasn't in the path of the hound anymore. As it sailed past her it's angry growl changed to one of confusion. Buffy's hand streaked out and grabbed one of the hound's fore legs and she pulled down hard causing the hound to flip through the air. The shadow hound came down back first across a boulder, there was a loud crack as its spine broke, and its yelp of surprise became a shriek of agony. Buffy leaped after the hound and landed next to it. It's rear half was already losing its transparent appearance. She gripped the lower jaw of the animal with her left hand and cupped the back of its head with her right. A sharp wrench and another cracking sound and the whimpering stopped.

Ding carefully approached the hound he had shot. He noticed that it was still barely alive, but with the wound in its chest he doubted that it would live for long. So he took his gun and shot it once in the head to put it out of its misery. As soon as it died it lost the transparent appearance and it's fur took on a splotched gray appearance. There was no doubt that Broadman's hound was dead so he went over to Buffy's first victim. He found it laying there on its back, already splotchy gray, a neat hole in the center of its chest, with an exit wound in the center of its back side. He glanced down the hill where Buffy was already up and scanning the woods with the machete in her hand. "Anything?" He called.

Buffy did one further circuit but then put the knife away and said, "Were clear."