DISCLAIMER: I do not own anything to do with Buffy the Vampire Slayer - it all belongs to Joss Whedon.

AUTHOR'S NOTE: Just a couple of chapters to go. . .watch this space! Review!

Chapter 10

As she arrived at the familiar steps, descended them, and reached the door like last night, she knocked. The slot slid open, and she could hear the man breathe in on the other side, ready to speak. But before he could say anything, she flashed the card at him, and he simply opened the door, asking no questions.

Buffy walked into the wrestling arena, glancing around, seeing the crowd. It seemed that everybody had heard of Kate's defeat the previous night, because all the banners supporting her were gone. Instead, all banners carried slogans supporting her own name. Apparently, word had gotten around Buffy was going to fight again tonight.

She made her way to the back, the way she had been shown last night, trying to remain unnoticed, and sure enough ended up in the changing rooms. It was quite funny to parallel the two experiences at this place, especially at this point; yesterday, at that moment, Buffy had been laughed at by the other wrestlers. But today, the women were cowering away from her, or looking up in awe.

Buffy tried to ignore it, frowning, turning away from anybody that looked at her, but couldn't. Suddenly, someone stood, blocking her way, and she stopped walking abruptly.

It was her boss, Mr. Cooper.

'Buffy!' he yelled, so that anybody that hadn't been looking at her before now was. 'Glad you could make it. Ready for the ring?'

She nodded reluctantly. She felt so deflated - the night before she'd had more energy, why was it that now all she wanted to do was crawl into bed?

Mr. Cooper led her to a different separate changing room than the one she'd been to before. 'Here you are. Feeling confident?'

She smiled politely. 'Hmm. . .ish.'

'Ish?!' he gave her a disbelieving look. 'Buffy, you're the talk of this place! The new champion! Everybody loves you - of course you're confident! Now, go in there and get changed. Somebody will be back here to fetch you in 10 minutes.'

She nodded grimly. Ugh, why was she so miserable? She tried to think of all the things that uplifted her. . .but the first things she thought of were her friends, and that just made her feel even worse.

She opened the wardrobe, and this time had a different costume. It was just as tight as the other one, except this was horrible bright purple with a yellow lightning bolt across the front.

'Oh God, I'm gonna look like goddamn Harry Potter,' she muttered to herself.

She put it on, and glanced at herself in the mirror. For some reason, she couldn't bear to stare at her own reflection, and turned away.

'Hey, champion girl!' A greasy man with a toothpick in his mouth popped his head into the changing room. 'You ready?'

Was it possible it had already been 10 minutes? 'Yeah, I am,' she replied, as he led her to the ring to once again confront what had probably become known as her arch-nemesis - Kate the Great.

'And now. . .' the same voice that had boomed the other night was doing it again. 'The fight I'm sure you've all been waiting for. . .' the crowd cheering got louder as Buffy reached the very edge of the ring.

'A re-match in some eyes - in others, just a repeat of a great fight. In the red corner, our former champion, Kate the Great!'

Buffy saw her enemy from the night before. She looked even fiercer. . .even more monstrous. . .it was too hard to believe. She looked ready to fight a huge animal, not just a puny Slayer.

'And in the blue corner. . .a girl who blew us all away last night. Our new champion. . . Buffy!'

The crowd roared with whistles, cheers, and any other loud noise to show their support. Buffy took a quick glance at Kate's face, and could see it was one of great envy. This was the support Kate used to have, and it had been stolen from her in just one night. By some little puny tramp. . .

The two girls stared at each other in the ring, awaiting the signal to fight.

'I think you ladies know the rules,' called out the referee. '3, 2, 1. . .fight!'

He stepped out of the ring, and even though that barrier wasn't there anymore, neither of them seemed to want to approach each other.

'Well, little girl. . .' Kate began, trying to maintain confidence. 'You're back for more. You think you can beat me again - but I can tell you right now that yesterday was a total fluke.'

'Look, whatever, OK?' Buffy didn't want to beat around the bush. She'd win this fight, get the money, and have it over and done with. She could get back to her friends without them suspecting anything, and get back to work the next day, with all this behind her. 'Talking is a pathetic way of stalling. You're just too afraid to fight me.'

Kate made a face. 'You think so, blondie?' She punched one fist into her palm. 'Then let's get it on, and see who's afraid.'

Buffy rolled her eyes at the cliché.

Kate had been slowly approaching Buffy, and all of a sudden grabbed her left arm. She twisted it around, and Buffy wanted to cry out with the immense pain, but managed to hold it in. Kate didn't let go, but held the arm in place. 'It hurts, doesn't it?' she whispered. Buffy was wincing, as she tried to collect up enough strength to do something.

But she didn't need to. Before she knew what was going on, Kate let go of Buffy's arm, grabbing her own head, and crouching down. Buffy looked down at the figure, confused - what was going on?

But Kate recovered and stood up, attempting to grab at Buffy's arm again. But the Slayer was too quick, grabbing her opponent's arm this time, and doing a powerful side-kick into her stomach.

This was like a way serving in badminton. You hold the shuttlecock until the last second, then you let go just as your racket hits it, and it goes flying. In this case, Kate had been the shuttlecock and Buffy had been the racket, letting go of Kate's arm as soon as she'd felt an impact with her foot on her enemy's stomach. Kate flew backwards in pain, and ended up sitting on the floor of the ring.

'You having fun?' Buffy said roughly, looking down on the wrestling demon. 'You want more?' Buffy was being as vicious and cruel as Kate had been herself the other night. But she wasn't aware what this fight was doing to her.

Kate's face seemed to be getting ready for a comeback, but her face just contorted, and something happened to her eyes. They went. . .soft.

'I surrender!' Kate managed to cry out. And her voice seemed to be changing. Where was that deep throated confidence?

Kate crawled out the ring, a man leading her to the changing rooms, as the crowd cheered for Buffy, waving their banners and placards at her.

"What was that about?" Buffy thought. It didn't seem like Kate to give up like that (admittedly, Buffy had only fought Kate once, but it didn't seem like someone who was an ultimate champion to surrender so easily). Buffy could hear some voices in the crowd, she could hear the referee shouting her name, but she didn't care.

She jumped out of the ring, over the ropes. Something had just happened to the supposed demon, and she was going to find out what, whatever it took.

She made her way to Kate's changing room.

**********

Meanwhile, back at the house, Willow and Faith were sharing the fact that they had basketball tickets to the rest of the gang around a bowl of chips.

'Hey, not bad. . .' Xander said, taking a look at what seats they'd bought. 'This'll be great, right sweetie?' He showed them to Anya.

'I never understood the need of watching a bunch of men get sweaty around a ball. I mean, in my years as a vengeance demon, there were SO many women who looked for vengeance on their husbands or boyfriends because,' she imitated the women, '"he loves baseball more than me", or "he'd rather go to the soccer game than spend time with me" or blah blah blah. You simply get fed up!'

The rest of them sat staring at her, as she grabbed a chip proudly. 'But, yeah, it'll be great!' she said, tapping Xander gently on the cheek.

Faith had a bemused expression on her face. She leaned over and whispered to Willow: 'Man, she's got issues. And coming from me - that's saying something.' Willow nodded.

'So where'd Buffy go?' Kennedy asked the group in general to see if anyone knew.

'Uh, she had a work thing.' Spike explained.

'What kind of work thing?' Willow asked concerned.

'I dunno. . .she said she had to meet up with some of her colleagues or something. . .' he took a chip from the bowl.

'Already? After her first day of work?' Dawn asked, interested. Spike shrugged.

'I guess. . .'

Faith's eyes widened. 'I don't think so.' They all looked at her quizzically.

'Going out at night to meet up with colleagues after one day? Don't you think that's slightly bizarre?'

'Well. . .maybe her job's difficult,' said Xander. 'Y'know, she needs more explained to her and that. . .'

'No,' Spike suddenly said.

Xander bent over, looking at Spike. '"No"?'

'Her job's not difficult, she told me herself. She said it was surprisingly easy.'

'Then why else would she go out with work people?' Kennedy asked, noticing they were about to uncover something.

'She didn't.' Spike said simply. 'She lied to us.'

'She can't have!' Dawn cried. 'We're her family. . .her friends. She wouldn't do that. . .' 'Except she would,' said Willow eventually. 'The way we were telling her to "stay away from danger". . .of course she'd go right to it.'

'We were being way too over-protective,' Kennedy agreed. 'She thought if she told us where she was really going, we'd stop her.'

'Which means it's somewhere dangerous,' Xander concluded.

'Did she take her cell?' Willow asked eagerly.

'Yeah,' Spike answered grimly. Willow picked up the phone and started dialling the number.

How could Buffy lie to him? He loved her so much, he couldn't lose her. . .he felt tears well up in his eyes at the thought of her not trusting him, but built up enough strength to hold them back, even though he felt heartbroken.

'No answer. . .' Willow said. She put the phone down. 'What now?'

'You guys realise you could be fussing over nothing,' Anya reminded them.

'Anya, we all know Buffy well enough to know she's somewhere else,' Xander explained to his wife. 'We've gotta find her. Any suggestions?' He looked around at the group hopefully, clasping his hands together.

'I say the wrestling place from last night,' Faith said. 'Perhaps her boss asked her to fight again tonight.'

'Good idea, Faith,' Willow stood up. 'Everybody, arm yourselves,' she sighed. 'We're going to watch some wrestling.'

**********

A/N: Next up. . .the secret behind Kate comes out, but will Buffy be able to defeat what's behind all this on her own?