169
Spike and Angel raced through halls, expecting to meet a mad rush of demons, but there was only a trickle of them. They started hacking their way through such as there were, heading for the source of the influx, and to see why it was so slow.
They turned a corner to see two young girls duking it out with five demons and a vampire. When they saw armed reinforcements, one of them threw the vamp at Spike.
"What's the world coming to?" Spike tssked. "I had bigger wrinklies when I was first fledged." He tossed the vampire back to the Slayer, who neatly staked him. "Sorry, luv," he apologized. "But I had to throw that one back. He was too small."
"Will you quit grandstanding and actually do something?" Angel groused. Another vamp came at him from out of nowhere, and he passed him on to Spike. "Stop trying to impress the girls. Try impressing me for a change."
Spike decapitated the vampire with a flourish of the claymore. "If neither that nor my amazing good looks don't impress you," he remarked, heading for a demon. "Then I don't want to know what will. Sure as hell don't want to impress you bad enough to listen to Barry Manilow."
"Who's that?" asked one of the Slayers.
&&&&&&&&
"While we're waiting," Rose gasped, trying to ignore the pain. "I would like to say that I find your lack of trust in your friends to be deplorable and unbecoming."
"And what precisely puts you in a position to be able to judge?" Giles asked snappishly. "You're far too young a woman to have any idea of all the ins and outs..,"
"Did your copy of the prophecy say where I came from?" Rose asked. She'd been getting quite a few insights from the rest of The Powers almost ever since she went into labor.
"No," Giles admitted. "That part of the prophecy was obscured, I fear. Is it really that pertinent?"
"Do you think that The Powers That Be leave details like that unsupervised?" Rose queried. She shifted a bit in the cot, but couldn't find a way to get comfortable.
"I'm not sure what The Powers do and don't do," Giles mumbled. "Although for an event of this magnitude, I would imagine that they would want to keep a rather close eye..," He trailed off, eyes widening.
"A very close eye," Rose agreed, gritting her teeth. "Personal supervision, you might say, although I wasn't allowed to remember it when I first came here."
"Rose Powers," Giles said musingly. He seemed to be in a state of shock.
"The name wasn't very good camouflage, was it?" Rose remarked. "Please don't look at me like that, Rupert. I'm an ordinary human being now, just like you." A contraction hit her, and terminated thought processes for a few moments. "Okay, maybe not just like you."
"Not entirely," he agreed. He took his glasses off and rubbed the bridge of his nose. This day had had more surprises than he really wanted to deal with. But there was one thing that was both important and immediate, and he didn't see any way out of dealing with it. He put his glasses back on and looked at the manual again. "I suppose that you should really remove, um, uh, your undergarments."
&&&&&&&
The main lobby looked like a battlefield, which indeed it was. Vampires and demons against the Slayers and those members of Wolfram and Hart that had the training. But the flood of demons kept pouring in from the darkness.
A slavering demon with enormous claws slashed at Spike, raking a furrow across his chest.
"Shit!" Spike swore. "That was a new shirt. Rose will have a fit." He disemboweled the demon, which slowed it down, but didn't stop it.
Gunn came up from behind the demon with an axe, which he buried in its head. It stopped moving and slowly slumped to the floor, and he wrestled his weapon back out. "Couldn't let you hog all the fun."
&&&&&&&
Angel was fighting almost mindlessly. A new target, take it out, and on to the next. He had reached a point where he scarcely noticed his allies, only the relentless onslaught of demons. Until suddenly there was someone fighting side by side with him, moving in such coordination with him that he had to look. He almost dropped his sword.
"Cordelia?" His brain abruptly disconnected.
"Concentrate, Angel," Cordelia scolded. She finished off the demon he'd been fighting. "I woke up when that black whatever it is settled over the building and I decided to see what was going on."
The conversation was halted for a few minutes while they took out a few more demons.
"Is it just me, or does this place look an awful lot like Wolfram and Hart?" Cordelia asked.
"It does, and it is," Angel replied, cutting down a reptilian-looking demon. "It's a long story, Cordy, too long to go into right now." But there were other things on his mind now. "I don't understand how you can be up and fighting. You've been in a coma for over a year now. Your muscles should have atrophied."
Cordelia shrugged. "Beats me," she replied. "I just woke up and got out of bed before anyone realized what was going on. Maybe because you needed me."
"I always have," Angel said softly.
&&&&&&&&
"I'm not saying that a flamethrower isn't an effective weapon, Fred," Wesley remarked. "I was merely asking that you try for a little more precision. You almost took my eyebrows off."
"That demon was about to jump you," Fred pointed out. "Eyebrows are a small price to pay."
"Conceded," Wesley agreed. "But try not to burn the building down, will you?"
"I hadn't planned on it," Fred replied. She turned to roast another advancing demon. "Are we still on for tomorrow night then?"
"If there is a tomorrow night," he answered.
&&&&&&&&
Giles clicked the button on the stop watch, and referred to the manual again. He was starting to feel he owed Wesley an apology for a great many of the things he'd said about him since their first acquaintance. "According to the manual," he said. "The contractions are close enough together that you should start pushing on the next one, Rose."
"All right," Rose agreed weakly. Her hair was plastered to her face with sweat, even though the room was air-conditioned. "Could I ask you a small favor, Rupert?"
"Certainly." He wiped the sweat from her brow. One of The Powers or not, he felt for this delicate little woman and what she was going through.
"Would you please sing to us?" Rose asked. "It might make it seem less frightening. And the children are used to being sung to. By me, by Spike, by Lorne." Another contraction hit, and she bit off a small shriek and concentrated on pushing.
Giles was a little taken aback by the request, but complied. He pulled on the rubber gloves that Wesley had included in his baby-delivering kit, feeling that the rest of The Powers wouldn't let her go through much more of this. And so he prepared to bring Rose's children into the world, singing.
&&&&&&&&
Three demons of varying descriptions were pressing Spike back, though he fought on gamely. He backed into someone, who started helping him fight. "I just about had 'em where I wanted 'em," he pretended to growl, though in fact, he'd been starting to feel just a bit alarmed. He looked at his new ally, expecting another Slayer. "Cordelia? I thought you were playing Rip Van Winkle."
"Spike?" She was as stunned as he was. "What are you doing here?"
"Long story, legs," he replied, twisting the claymore as he thrust it into a demon. He yanked it back out, and most of the demon's insides came out with it. "The short version is, my poncey grandsire doesn't have a monopoly on the whole soul-having deal anymore."
"You have a soul?" Cordelia was having trouble accepting that. But everything she'd seen since she'd woken up had been weird. And she was someone who knew weird. After all, she was from Sunnydale.
"Duck," Spike ordered. Cordelia complied automatically, and Spike beheaded another demon, splashing her with gore.
"You're paying for the dry-cleaning," she warned.
"What can I say?" Spike remarked. "This job can be a little hard on the wardrobe."
&&&&&&&&&
Lorne was in one of the safe rooms with about half a dozen other people. Very, very scared people. He took a swig from the bottle of water he had and wished for something stronger, although from the looks of this crew, he'd probably have to fight for it. Pipes sufficiently lubricated, he started singing again, he'd been doing so almost non-stop, just to help chase away the jitters. Theirs and his.
&&&&&&&&&
Rose's hands gripped the sides of the cot, straining with effort. A stifled scream escaped her lips.
"Got.., him," Giles said. He started tying off the umbilical cord. Baby supplies weren't on tap here, so he'd purloined some towels from the washroom, and once the infant was cleaned off, wrapped him up in it. He bit his lip, wondering what to do with the child. He and Rose both knew there was another one on the way, and she was going to be unable to hold her infant son until after his sister was born. With a sigh, he laid another towel on the floor and placed the baby on it. It didn't seem right, but it would have to do. "Sorry about this little fellow," he apologized, and wondered that he thought it necessary to do so with a newborn.
"He understands, Rupert," Rose panted. "He knows you're busy right now. All he really wants is to have his sister with him. They've never been apart before."
"I know they're special children, Rose," Giles replied. "But I can't imagine that they have that much of a grip on reality yet."
"They've been talking for about six months now," Rose informed him. "You wouldn't believe some of the things they say. I really must speak to Spike about his language again."
"They speak?" If his hands hadn't been such a mess from delivering a baby, Giles would have been polishing his glasses as was his habit when he didn't know what to say next.
"I think they're actually telepaths," Rose responded. "But only Spike and I and Lorne have heard them." Her knuckles went white again, as she clenched the sides of the cot, and a fresh coating of sweat broke out on her face.
Giles waited patiently while the pain washed over her. "Who is this Lorne person you keep mentioning?"
"He's from Pylea," Rose replied. "He's an empath. I suppose that's why he can hear them."
"A demon has been singing to your children?" This day was turning Giles' world upside-down. "Good grief. I suppose that the next thing you're going to tell me is that he's going to be one of the godparents."
"As a matter of fact..," Rose's answer was cut off by another contraction.
&&&&&&&&
By now, all the Angel Investigations team, plus the Slayers were concentrated in the main lobby. They were standing in a loose circle, surrounded by vampires and demons, and it wasn't looking good. Fred had had to give up on her flame-thrower, it had run out of fuel. She was now using a handgun, but she didn't have much ammunition left. Gunn, Wesley and Cordelia were starting to look extremely fatigued, and even the Slayers and the two vampires were starting to show the wear.
Then, all the attackers started melting away like the morning mist, and the darkness that had heralded their arrival began to abate. Soon, the defenders found themselves alone, save for the dead and wounded.
"Where'd they go?" Spike wondered aloud. "They could have had us in a few minutes. So why did they just give up?"
"I think I know." Wesley leaned on his sword to keep from falling over in exhaustion. "They were here to try to prevent the birth of the new race. I'd say the fact that they've left means..," He found himself talking to an empty hole where Spike had been.
"I am so out of the loop," Cordelia remarked. "Could someone fill me in on this new race? And what has Spike got to do with it?"
&&&&&&&&&
Giles had set up another of the cots, and put it beside the one Rose was on. He laid the infants on it so that they could be close to their mother.
"Rupert?" Rose asked wearily. "I hate to ask, but could you do me one more small favor?"
"I think your day's work deserves a few favors," Giles replied, wiping off her face again. "What do you want, Rose?"
"Please don't tell Spike that I was screaming," she pleaded. "I really wanted him to be proud of me."
"He will be proud of you, Rose," the Watcher assured her. He looked down at the children, laying there quietly next to their mother, and contrary to normal practice, their little eyes, one pair, blue, the other, gray, seemed to focus. "He will be."