Chapter Three

"Again Callie, I'm dreadfully sorry," Giles apologized for the fifth time.

"Rupert, it's all right. You must help your Slayer." She was wearing bellbottom, dark jeans with a three-inch heel, black boot. Her upper body held a dusty jean jacket buttoned up and a thick red and orange scarf wrapped around her slender neck. Her hair was a light brown with natural blonde high lights. "Thank you for a pleasant evening. And I'm sorry about your pants."

Giles looked down at the wet spot that engulfed his crotch. The football strayed from the field, twenty minutes into the game, and slammed into his cup of warm water. "It's not your fault. It's number fifteen's."

Callie smiled and leaned in for a kiss. Giles quickly accepted. She placed her right hand on his chest as she went deeper into it. Their mouths parted. "Good night Rupert."

"Goodnight." He watched her enter her house and shut the white door.

Giles walked to his shiny new Rolls Royce and pulled away.

Back at the new, twelve-story building the Watcher's Council resided in, Giles was searching through some texts. There were twenty opened books lying on his desk and ten around it.

There was a knock on his door. He walked towards it, holding an aged text in his right hand. Giles turned the knob and saw Kennedy holding a guy by the collar of his brown, eighties shirt. "I found'im." She tossed inside.

"Thank you Kennedy."

"No problem." She walked into his office, allowing him to shut his door.

"What do you want?" he asked.

"Information about a new power in Rome."

"I don't know anything more than what I told you."

"Really?" Giles asked. "I assume you'll tell me the same thing after Kennedy removes a couple of your fingers."

Kennedy smiled and mimicked the motion she would use to break them. His eyes widened at the sight.

"So, Gavin, would you care to retract your previous statement?" Giles asked.

"It's a vampire. I'm not sure who. From what I hear he's about eighty years younger than Dracula."

"We already knew this," Kennedy stated.

"What is he planning on doing?" Giles asked.

"I don't know. All I know is he has a party coming up tonight and so far he has one person captive. Supposedly someone close to the Slayer. Ya know, the real one."

Giles wore a pensive face. "Who?"

"I don't know his name," Gavin answered. He was trembling, thinking of the bodily harm that could be done to him if he lied.

"It's a male," Giles discovered.

"Xander?" Kennedy asked.

"Can't be, I just spoke with him." Giles thought for a minute. "It can't be Angel. He's the one that informed her."

Kennedy walked towards Gavin and grabbed his shirt. She put him against the wall and lifted him off his feet. "What else do you have?"

"Nothing."

Kennedy slammed him against the wall. "What else?!" she demanded.

"Okay, okay." Kennedy lowered him, keeping a tight grip on his shirt. "From what I hear, he and the Slayer were quite intimate. He has some sort of weird name too."

Giles reflected for a moment on the new information he received. It kept leading him to one conclusion. "Spike."