The voices in his head were shouting at him, they were begging him for help but he couldn't see them, he couldn't help them. Frustration boiling up in him, the only thing that kept him grounded was the grip the girl, Jen, was keeping on his hand. Without someone here he knew he'd be lost and the feral part of his brain tried to encourage him to let go, to lose himself. Somehow, in this place and in this time it was easier to listen to that part of him. He looked down at the small hand gripping his own and snarled, she was prey, she just didn't know it yet.




Jen felt his grip getting tighter and she looked up at him, his eyes were glowing with a creepy light and he had a teeth-filled sneer on his face. He was actually making the kind of noise she'd only ever heard the rabid dog her daddy had killed make. It was definitely a growl, but the menace in it sent ice-cold shivers up her spine. The fear was back but she knew she couldn't let go of his hand, she couldn't get through this without him and she had the strange feeling that the same was true in reverse.

So she froze; it was an innate instinct, if she didn't move then maybe he wouldn't either. Suddenly it felt as though they were falling, she braced herself, remembering the pain she'd felt when she'd fallen onto the road.




The floor seemed to drop away from beneath his feet and Xander suddenly felt as though they were plummeting towards the earth at an incredible rate. He tried to prepare himself to tuck and roll but he had no idea when they'd hit a solid surface.

Within the seconds the ground came rushing up to meet them; he landed painfully and the wind was knocked out of him. He kept hold of the girl's hand though; there was no way he was letting this prey get away from him now.

The ground beneath them felt cold and wet as he lay there trying to get his breath back. Rocks littered the area around him and he could tell from the pain in his side that he'd landed on at least one of them. Standing slowly, it still hurt to breathe - he thought it might be a broken rib, he looked around to get his bearings. Definitely a cave of some sort, underground from the chill but other than that he had no idea.

A noise from beside him, a whimper almost, and he spun around to see Jen cowering on the floor, her hand was locked in his like a death grip. The terror in her eyes coupled with the sharp pain from his side brought him back to himself. He had lost control, again.

Despite the pain, he forced a reassuring smile onto his face, hoping that she'd see the difference. She didn't move for a second and he panicked as he thought that maybe she'd injured herself in the fall; but then she stood, still a little wary and joined him in surveying their surroundings. A gasp escaped her as she recognised it, this was the place the freakazoid had kept her locked in a rusty cage. She spun round quickly, yes there were the cages. Xander followed her gaze and the shock was clear on his face. Stretching back as far as the eye could see and then further was cage after cage. Each of them holding at least one person, but there was something not right about them. Every single one of them had an eerie green glow in their eyes, and as they felt his gaze rest on them they grew agitated, rattling the bars of their confinement. They were strangely quiet otherwise, only adding to the eerieness of the situation.

In the centre of the makeshift jail stood an inordinately tall robed figure. Demon. Had to be. The thing had its back to them and seemed to be chanting the same phrase over and over again "Nyumba Ya Sanaa; Nyumba Ya Sanaa; Nyumba Ya Sanaa." The words echoed in Xander's head and he recognised the voice as being the one that had called him from the other side of the country.

Having a face, or rather a back, to put to the voice seemed to release something in Xander's mind. All this time he'd thought he was struggling with himself, when it turned out that he was fighting against a demon. That much he could handle. He dropped Jen's hand and moved into a fighting stance, this thing was clearly much bigger than he was but it couldn't know that Xander had been fighting alongside the Slayer for three years, could it?

A niggle of doubt began to work it's way into his mind and when Jen again cowered behind him for protection he cursed himself for bringing her along. Okay so maybe he wasn't going to get out of this alive but to risk someone else like this was unforgivable!

The demon still hadn't shown any signs that it was aware of their presence yet. It just stood chanting over and over again; he felt like the words should mean something to him, but they didn't. He couldn't explain it to himself but it was almost as though when he'd seen the demon standing there, part of himself that he'd fought against had drained out of him.

Enough stalling, he decided, it was time to take the fight to the demon. He signalled to Jen to start opening cages and, despite the terror in her eyes, she agreed meekly. He crept up behind the demon, trying to avoid making any noise at all when suddenly a shape came flying our at him from a darkened corner of the cave. Knocked to the floor again, the pain from his damaged ribs flared from a dull ache into a raging torrent of agony. He saw blackness at the edge of his vision and knew he was close to passing out.