Title: The First Seconded

Author: Falcon-Rider falcon_rider@hotmail.com

Rating: PG-13 for Angst and ect. And CD

Disclaimer: I own nothing 'cept the plot and Nich. Anyway, Kris and Echo are mine as well.. but they aren't in this chappy… as for previous chap Faiths friends belong to me as well!

Authors note:  I got no sleep last night and I'm hoping for tons tonight, yippie! Anyway I have a story to tell because I'm all hyper and YAY! Anyway on Halloween my friends and I decided to go tick or treating and one was dressed as a gothic angel, one was a vamp, one was dead, one was well some evil thingie, I was a blonde-blue eyed faith cause my mom wouldn't let me dye my hair, and one was a guitar playing skater… anyway we ended up going to one of our teachers house, Mr B. hehehe we had him, or rather I only had him part time cause he taught at one school and I went to the school he didn't teach at but our classes went on a lot of trips where we all haung out… anyway Mr B is British and when we went to the door my friend dressed as the gothic angel said 'candy or DOOM' and he answered in his nifty accent, Doom please. Then he gave us candy. Did I mention Mr. B. looks a lot like Giles (ASH?) he does! Its scary…we played TorD on a bus ride back from some thing late at night, there was about 30+ of us on the bus and they dared him to table dance… he did only he only removed his tie. I'm gonna shut up now… my insomnia (due to paint fumes and envisioning paint brushes after 10+ hours of straight painting) has caused my mind to short circuit.

As for where this is going: Just Ask and I'll check ur site out…and for those ppl who I've said I would email them the parts w/o my author notes so they can post them… their coming soon!

It is the story that never ends…. Yes it goes on and on my friends… I started wr-

***

Part Twenty-Six

No Baloney

42 days

"Nope, seats empty." Xander told the young brunette as she sat down.

"Good, I didn't want to intrude on anyone." She smiled brightly at him.

"Well you're definitely not intruding," Xander smiled. "I'm Xander."

"Nice to meet you, I'm Nancy." She smiled then turned to order a drink for the bartender. "One beer please."

*

Justine swam around the dark cold metal object that held her nemesis and swore as an internal battle waged within her. She didn't want to let the monster inside the coffin go, but she had no doubt in the blonde man going through with his threat. Eventual she wrapped the metal chain around the coffin and made sure it was secure before carefully making the accent to the surface.

*

"Are you ever going to tell us exactly who, and what you are?" Gunn asked as the three men stood on the deck of the fishing boat.

Spike glanced his way and nodded slightly, "Eventually." He turned his head. "I like a little mystery. I also don't like telling a story more than once, so you'll have to wait till peaches is strong enough to chit-chat."

"Peaches would be Angel?" Wesley asked causing Spike and Gunn to both turn towards the ex-watcher.

"Yep," Spike nodded smirking. "Peaches, Poofter, nancy boy. He's a man of many insulting names. Most of them I came up with myself."

"So you've known him for a while than?"

"Not only am I older than I look, I'm also a tad smarter," Spike turned back toward the back of the boat and turned his flashlight on the water once more. He was inwardly laughing at Gunn's attempt to get him to let some info on who/what he was slide out. "There she is, we better collect her and start pulling up whatever it is she hooked up to, careful on that though… never know if she decided to double cross us."

*

The darkness was everlasting. His hunger once ferocious had dimmed his mind with panic and fear, taken over completely with the urge to find food till without finding any he had completely shut down. First his mind, corner by corner, nerve by nerve had fallen into a deep silence, a coma. Then his motor functions and blood had stopped till all that was left was a meticulously slow movement of the blood through his veins.

His human face had long since been abandoned, replaced by bumps and crags and sharp pointy blood stained teeth that badly needed some whitening strips that crest sold to be used on them. The fangs them self had somehow managed to pierce his lower lip as his skin had grown taught across his bones and muscle was eaten away.

Spike once told Giles that a vampire who handed eaten became a living skeleton, like those pictures of the starving children in third world countries only worse. He was right.

*

Her hands gently massaged Willows shoulders helping to ease away the stress and worries of the day. Tara smiled as her lover moaned slightly letting her know that she was feeling a lot better. The witches were sitting on Tara's bed in the flat that Tara, Nich and Spike had purchased when they had first arrived in England. Those were times Tara missed, but she knew she'd see them in a few days when she arrived in the states.

Nich and Spike had become her family over the last few months, a brother and a sister that she had never had. Of course she had had a brother but Spike was the one she wished she had had. The three had gotten really close and she missed Spike, even though he had been quiet and plagued by nightmares of the past the majority of the time and she missed Nich's out spoken remarks.

She missed her family. Willow was her girlfriend, her lover. Someone she cared about and adored but it just wasn't the same, as just a friend, or just someone to hang out with and love like a sister or a brother.

As she thought back Tara realized that Spike had been the first guy she had ever gotten close to at all, she had just been to shy and then when she realized she was a lesbian she didn't have any real reason to talk long with them. Not that she didn't have guy friends before Spike, no that definitely was not the case, but Xander was really Willow's friend and she hadn't known Giles that long. She was glad she had someone that could help her understand the male half of the species, even if she wasn't really interested in doing anything but being friends with the male half.

Willow sighed and turned to face Tara, "Thanks, I really needed that."

"No problem," Tara smiled and settled back on the bed. "I should have stuck up for you at the beginning, but Anya just surprised me. You know the whole teleporting thing and all."

"I know, and can you believe it?" Willow smiled her surprise clearly shown on her face. "Giles and Anya together in the together sort of way. I mean wow, who would ever have guessed."

"I think its good for them," Tara replied slowly. "Giles needed someone and so did Anya. And I think they kind of mesh together, you know what I mean?"

Willow bit her lip but nodded, "I think so. Plus they're kind of cute together."

"Aren't they?" Tara giggled. "I'm happy for them. They both deserve to be happy."

"Don't we all," Willow smiled and reaching out slipped her hand into one of Tara's.

Tara smiled back and squeezed gently, "We all do."

There was a moment of comfortable silence as blue eyes met with green in a loving glance.

Willow was the first to break the silence. "Xander isn't going to be happy is he?"

"Probably not."

*

The clang of steel against steel as the metal coffin that held the comatose master vampire fully awoke the make shift crew of the small fishing boat and sent them into action. Spike and Gunn quickly began to undo the chains from around the coffin as Wesley readied the blowtorch.

As soon as the metal lit had been removed from the coffin Justine carefully undid the tying's that remained. Within minutes Gunn and Spike managed to drag the massively under weight vampire to the hold. They managed to get him onto a table before Gunn spoke up.

"We forgot the Pigs Blood."

Spike glanced up at him as he removed a knife from his jacket, "We won't need any pigs blood. It wouldn't help him anyway." He stared down at his grand sire and pursed his lips. "It'll have to human blood."

Before Gunn could protest Spike had slit his wrist and held it out as the blood poured across his skin. "Open his mouth, now."

Gunn did as he asked.

*

"That's the complete, or nearly complete story." Fred said and bit her lip. "Or the parts I know anyway.

Connor glanced up at her his eyes a torrent of emotion, "So Angels good now." He spoke slowly in a statement rather than a question.

"Yes, he has been for quite some time." Fred smiled slightly glad that Connor was actually listening to the truth and perhaps even believing it.

"He trusted me," Connor looked back and forth between Nich and Fred. "And I broke it. I trapped him underwater in a coffin. I thought it would be punishment, I thought it was justified."

Nich just nodded as she stared at her hands. She didn't really know what to say, after all, she didn't really know any of these people. She was here to repay a debt that she owed. What could she say? She didn't even have the whole entire picture of what had been going on in the last few months.

"He's never going to forgive me."

Nich frowned and looked up, "Never is a long time."

"He'll live forever," Connor shook his head. "And I won't."

"So?" Nich rolled her eyes. "What is it with you people and depression? He. Will. Forgive. You. Eventually. Sides, it was a humongous misunderstanding, and you're his son. Worse he can say is 'you're grounded' or 'get out of my house.' He's not going to kill you."

"B-"

"She's right Connor." Fred nodded. "He might be mad, but Angel won't kill you. He loves you. No matter what."

'Let's just hope that's true,' Nich thought. 'I really don't want to meet Angel if he's willing to kill his own son.'

*

"Its just Ronny's been so- so mean lately," Nancy smiled weakly at Xander as she lifted her glass up to her pale pink lips.

Xander frowned, "How so? He hasn't, hit you has he?"

Nancy chocked on her drink and shook her head vehemently. "No! Not like that!"

"Then how so?"

"He's just been…" she bit her lip as she ran her finger across the rim of her glass, "Distant you know?"

Xander blinked and turned to stare into his fourth beer of the night. Mean while, Nancy tilted her head towards him and sniffed. Her eyes began to brim with unshed tears as she chocked out.

"I think he's going to dump me!"

*

Faith closed the hospital room door and smiled to herself as she walked through the sterile hallway of the Sunnydale hospital. She was a proud godmother of a teeny tiny, fragile, baby girl. The kid was even named after her, faith being her middle name.

Her boots clicked against the tile floor as she past the checkout/in desk and she yawned, perhaps today would be a good night to do a quick patrol since it was late enough that Buffy would probably have been done for a few hours.

She slipped her hand up and caught her hair in one hand and used the other to tie a band around it. As she exited the hospital her long blonde hair bounced in a ponytail behind her and her hand held a slim stake.

The fun was about to begin.

~

'The human body can be drained in 8.6 seconds with the right vacuum ability,' –River, firefly (approximate quote)

****

Author Note: -iting it not knowing what it was and it'll continue forever just because… RPT

Anyway, J/K it has an ending which may be subject to slight modifications over time but I have the basic plot planned out in my ahead and on a piece of paper taped to the wall right in front of me…also I now have a plan for Xander… that, sadly, does NOT include killing him off (BTW: Nancy was filler.)

To be continued in: Blood

Reviews are very nice! Thanks all of you who take the time to review! I'm so happy I have over 100; I never thought I would get that many, ever! ^_^ Thanks everyone!