Disclaimer: Joss, WB, UPN et al. own Buffy. George Lucas, LucasFilm, LucasArts et al. own Star Wars. Timothy Zahn owns Grand Admiral Thrawn. Squaresoft own Final Fantasy. No, this isn't a FF fic.

Title: For the Good of the Empire.

Author: Paradigm Shifter

Feedback: Yes! YES! Please?! Love to know what you think.

Rating: I'll go with PG for now. Be prepared for it to go up, though.

Grateful Thanks: go to Trevelyan (Matt) and Bobby Cox. Your input and suggestions were both invaluable for this.

I'd also like to thank my readers on ff.net: Harry2, Layce74, Mountain King, ms8309, Teri, John Tarstano, Invincible Sword Goddess, poet freak, rickW22, Saintsaucey, Beth, ArealMoonchild and Bolo.

Individual Notes:

I.S.G: Squall and Seifer are characters from Squaresoft's 'Final Fantasy VIII'. Squall is the protagonist, and Seifer is his rival. Sorry I didn't answer before. You can find more info out on www.gamefaqs.com, under PlaystationFinal Fantasy VIII.

Mountain King: Could you tell me the author of this other Star Wars cross? Thanks. :)

Harry2: Ultimecia was the 'big bad' of Final Fantasy 8. And yes, FF is in there. :) I think you'll be surprised by this chapter. Ethan isn't in quite as much trouble as you think. ;D

Notes: A bit shorter, but I couldn't resist the ending. :)



"I recognise him!" Mara pointed to a car as it went past, indicating the occupant. The trio were standing in shadows by the side of the road, and apparently hadn't been seen. Buffy the noblewoman had fallen apart as the car went past, screaming something about 'demons', which Mara had quickly ended by reinstating her Force induced silence. Now she was half-heartedly fending off Buffy's attempts to beat her with her fists. It mattered little whether she did or didn't, they didn't hurt a great deal as she plainly didn't know how to hit. Each blow was an ineffectual tap. Fortunately, because the noblewoman thought she was physically weak, she did not use her Slayer strength: which would have hurt a lot. She was unaware of the ability, and so it didn't work properly. The 'slayer senses' however, were completely a function of her subconscious and still worked. Which was why Angel had freaked her out so badly.

Thrawn nodded, willing to accept Mara's announcement until he had proof otherwise. "So follow him."

Mara nodded, and took off after the car, using the Force to enhance her speed to the point where she could keep up with it comfortably. Thrawn grabbed Buffy, and followed more slowly.



Spike screamed in pain as the spirit entered his mind. It was worse than anything he had ever put the Slayers he had tortured through: it was rape of the most brutal kind, occurring completely within his own mind. Finally he stopped screaming, and merely lay on the ground panting in fear and horror at what had just happened.

He couldn't believe it: he, the great Spike – William the Bloody – had been turned into the willing puppet of an evil more calculating, more vile than he could ever be.

He was almost jealous. Almost. But if you had to be that to be that evil, he'd give up on the spot and become a monk. Some things just weren't done. Not even by vampires.

Seifer sneered down at him, his eyes radiating disgust and loathing. "Now you learn what it is to be a puppet. I have my dreams, but yours: your dreams matter little to me. I don't care for what you wish... I care only that my mistress gains the power she deserves!"

Spike whimpered as he stared up at the cause of his torment.

He could think of only one thing at this moment: he wished he was dead.



Drusilla moaned as something primal tore through the stars.

"Oh... my little Spikey has all gone. Now dancing to the tune of a different mistress, by a painful and sadistic master..." she hugged Miss Edith tightly, causing the doll to bulge from the pressure. "I've lost my precious boy! I've lost him!"

She broke down into tears, and one of the two vampires that Spike had ordered to guard her nudged, and then whispered to the other, "She's finally cracked, man."

His companion remained silent. He had seen Drusilla's fits of sanity and insanity. He had no desire to give her any reason to attack him.

Drusilla continued to wail, rocking backwards and forwards. Her eyes were open wide: fixed on a point only she could see. "The stars... the stars call to me... the Corrupt Knight has taken my Spike... my Spike... my Spike..." she flung Miss Edith at her vampire guardians in a fit of rage. "And there is nothing that the Blue Leader can do about it! The Slayer! The Slayer! She will meet her doom at the hands of the Mistress!"

The two guards watched in awestruck terror and fascination as the Vampire Seer writhed around. They couldn't tell whether it was agony or ecstasy or a combination of the two... with Drusilla, it could have been anything.

"The Mistress! The Lady of Darkness! The Sorceress! The Hyne incarnate! Noooooo!"

Finally, she lapsed into heartrending, terrible sobs.



"Ethan! Ethan!" Giles stalked through the doorway of the costume shop, his mild-mannered Watcher persona completely missing. This was Rippers time. "Ethan! I know you're here you bloody tosser! Come out and show me you aren't the rat bastard you were years ago!"

He walked through a doorway, and turned at the sound of movement.

"Ethan!"

His declaration was met by an evil smirk and a cricket bat. The wooden implement collided with his skull, and Giles folded to the floor as consciousness left him.

Ethan grinned down at the unconscious form of the Watcher. "Well, me old China... looks like inn't the same old Ethan you knew all those years ago..." He kicked him for good measure, and dropped the bat to the floor.

Bending down to grip Giles by the shoulders, he dragged him out of the doorway and deeper into the store. "Urgh! What have you been doing, old boy?" Ethan asked the unconscious figure, "I swear you must have put on about forty pounds!"

A collected female voice spoke from behind him. "I think you'll just leave him there, won't you?"

Ethan dropped Giles shoulders, causing his head to hit the floor again, and straightened slowly as he turned. The little redhead he had served with the Slayer: it was her.

"Hello, hon," Ethan greeted. "Not happy with the costume? Want a refund? Well, come back tomorrow, and I'll get it all sorted!"

"This isn't a costume." Mara stated. "I want to know what is going on. Who you are. Those are good questions. And you will be answering them. Through your own will, or through pain. Either is fine with me."

Mara looked at Ethan for a second. "Actually... resist! Please. I've been dying for a chance to try out a new trick the Emperor taught me."

Ethan backed up slowly. "I... I can explain... it's just a joke. Really! I wanted to..." he ground his teeth. "Aw... Hell." He turned and fled.

"Going somewhere?" Angel asked as he stepped into the doorway to the alley just before Ethan reached it.

"Vampire!" Ethan shouted, "you may not enter! And while you can't, you can't get me! See!" His fear at being trapped was quickly turning to terror.

Mara chuckled. "He doesn't need to come in. He just needs to keep you from getting out."

Angel nodded. "That's right." His solemn face turned into an angry glare. "Now... tell us how to break this spell."

Ethan backed up into the plinth that the statue of Janus was on, and it rocked as he knocked into it. "I... I have no idea what you're talking about."

Mara didn't turn from watching Ethan as Thrawn entered behind her, dragging the distraught Noble lady with him. "Sure you do: we want to know how we got here... and you seem too frightened to not know what is going on." He looked down at the unconscious form of Giles. "Get too much for you?" he asked Jade curiously.

Mara rolled her eyes, aware that her back was to the Admiral and that he wouldn't be able to see it. "He was like that when I arrived. Honest."

"Honest? You? Since when?" Thrawn sniped back.

Angel snarled, "are you two quite finished? We have a situation here!"

Both Mara and Thrawn looked at him. "Shut up."

Thrawn stepped forward, blaster drawn. "You will tell us what you have done. I have a vague memory of this place... it's faint, but its there. You were the cause of this."

Ethan eyes the blaster. "You shoot me, and you will never learn how to undo the spell."

Thrawn nodded. "Oh, that's right. I forgot. Jade?"

Mara fired. Her blaster was no longer on stun, and the blast tore into Ethan's leg with a whine and roasting smell of charred flesh. Buffy leapt backwards and cowered in the corner next to the body of Giles at the sudden unexpected noise. Her nose wrinkled at the smell, but she refrained from complaining, not wishing a similar fate.

Ethan screamed as he dropped to the floor clutching his leg.

Angel battered against the invisible field keeping him out of the building. "Stop the bleeding! If he dies we'll never break the spell!" he shouted, before realising that he couldn't smell blood. Only charred flesh.

Mara looked at the vampire. "Hello? Reality check? Cauterises on wounding?"

Thrawn kneeled next to the injured Ethan, and grabbed him by the throat, hauling him upright. "Now. Tell use how to get home."

Ethan was in too much pain to think about lying or acting innocent. "The... the bust." He whimpered, "Smash the bust."

Thrawn seemed to freeze for a second. "But... it's art..." he said with a strange tone. There was a subtext there that no one could read.

"So?" asked Mara nonchalantly, and shot the bust.

The next ten seconds, would be ones that Angel remembered for the rest of his days: living or dead.

Review? Thanks. :)