TEASER
NEVADA COUNTY, CALIFORNIA - NIGHT
Soon after where we left off, there were a dozen wolf-like monsters outside Summerland Academy, circling the school. After the initial attacks and capture, everyone had congregated in the library, which was now protected by magick. Holding their book bags and flickering candles, the Slayers In Training were panicking and whispering to each other; Buffy had gotten a roster from Willow and waved Dawn over, who left Giles reluctantly and crept over to her big sister.
"Dawn," Buffy started importantly, "we need a head count of all the girls and everybody else while you're at it. I've got this weird feeling that we're missing someone."
Dawn pursed her lips in annoyance. "We're having a monster crisis and I'm doing inventory? Fine, whatever. But if I miss monster maul-age, it'll be on your head." She turned back to the SITs and started taking names. To take their minds off the situation, Xander and Faith had been peering into the book cage, both of them tilting their heads and trying to decide on something about their restless, tranqued-out monster.
"How about...Scout?" Xander muttered.
"Dude, you named the last one," Faith snarled. "This time Harley if it's a boy, and Pizz'one if it's a girl."
"It's a boy," Xander insisted. The beast rolled onto it's back. "Whoa, okay, super a girl."
"Or a ragin' eunuch."
"Who's a pretty puppy?" Xander taunted. "Who's my special lady?" He poked his finger through the cage, teasing, and the monster swiped at him with a weak growl.
Xander leapt back in horrified comeuppance and Faith shook her head in disgust. "You are such a punk."
Meanwhile, Buffy was pulling a chair up beside Willow, who'd been flipping through the best of Giles' occult book stash, trying to read by flashlight.
"This is buffalo-pucky," Willow groaned at the book in frustration.
"No luck?" Buffy asked glumly.
"The only demon that fits the description of our wolven guy is the werewolf. But we know werewolf -- werewolf is a very good friend of mine -- and this guy is no werewolf."
"Keep looking. Giles bought the family size value book set from La Boca, maybe there's something in those. I just know we're missing something...."
"Um, hey?" asked the skatery girl who was sitting in the pentagon with Rona. She was timidly raising her hand. "Can I say something?"
"What?" Buffy asked a bit distracted.
"Well, I was sittin' in the back row when the lights went out, and I heard the screaming start behind me. I was the last out to the hall -- maybe one of the others got taken."
"Dawn's doing roll call," Willow said cajolingly. "Whoever's missing, we'll find her." Buffy put her hand up to stop Willow and gave her a knowing look. "What is it?"
"She said she heard the screaming start behind her," Buffy noted.
"We all heard screaming."
"But she was sitting in the back row. I had a good look at the auditorium before the lights went down and I didn't see anybody against the wall.... This might sound crazy, but what if whoever got the lights started the screaming?"
"Why would the bad guy scream like a girl?"
"I'm thinking to incite panic?"
"Right," Xander chimed in. "They hear a girl screaming in the dark, they all start screaming and nobody knows what to do. Easy pickin's. Lucky for us, the girls got out alright." He looked disdainfully at the monster. Stirring awake now, it looked back at him sleepily. "Okay, the people-eyes on that thing are startin' to freak me out."
"Maybe we should put crazy 'n' crazy t'gether?" Faith suggested. "This thing has workin' human parts. The lights go out, a girl starts screamin'.... I dunno, maybe I did too much junk as a kid, but I think Pizz'one is a person. Or a thing-thinger."
"Shape-shifter?" Xander offered.
"That seems a little far-fetched," said Willow, closing volume U through W of the Encyclopedia of Giant, Cursed Evil.
"Dunno about that," Faith went on. "There was this chick back in Boston. Some cheerleader. She got a leather jacket from her granddad that had this shifty mojo, and she'd freak out like a some monster bear or somethin' and rob the Quickstop; shred people to get her rocks off, but her eyes didn't change. Maybe this thing's got a jacket." Buffy was just about to roll her eyes at Faith when the lights came back on.
"Looks like it's google time." Buffy asked Willow. "Maybe they have some accounts of this thing online."
"I'm on it," Willow responded, sounding a bit too pleased with herself. She tucked into a computer table and got started. "Maybe a cross reference with shape-shifters?"
"You really don't think-." Buffy stopped herself when she saw the interest in Faith's eyes. "Um...shape-shifters, right. Better safe than sorry."
Dawn came back to Buffy with a marked up roster. "Well, everybody on the list is accounted for," she sighed. "And we're all here, so we should be safe."
Just then, Andrew's voice came over the P.A.
"Alright, we're back on the air, again. No worries, everybody, I fell on my keys when the power went down in the lodge, but I found a Snoopy band-aid, I'm alright now, and I'll be playing you the hits of the eighties, nineties, and today until lights-out." Buffy looked up at the speaker, something of dread in her eyes. "Andrew...."
SUMMERLAND SCHOOL LIBRARY - NIGHT
They stood around silently for a moment, as "Tainted Love" came over the sound system.
"Wow," Dawn mused to herself. "I-I can't believe we didn't notice that he wasn't here."
"I told you to get a headcount," Buffy reminded her while crossing the room to the weapons cabinet, searching. "Remember, when I said I thought someone was missing?"
"Oh, sure, blame me for not remembering. It's not my fault you didn't think of him-."
"Fine, it's nobody's fault. We just need to get him back now. If those things figure out where he is-."
"Need any help?" Robin asked. "Just one of those things seemed like enough for two slayers."
"Which is why I'm not feeding my friends to them," Buffy snapped.
"Hey!" Xander groused. "What keeps happening to the anti-evil faction?"
"Yeah," Willow chimed in, sounding thoroughly annoyed. "We're supposed to be this unit, but whenever things start getting a little dangerous, you get all martyr-y and Simone de Beauvoir on us. We get it, go girl power, whoopty-freakin'-doo!"
"Look," Buffy said, "this isn't just 'a little dangerous,' and we can't have the same argument every time I need to go it alone! I'm fast and I can get it done if I'm careful; the whole preternatural violence thing, not gonna do us any good this time. And sitting around and fighting about it sure as hell won't help Andrew."
Practically all of Buffy's friends were glaring at her until Willow shook her head and went back to her search engines. "Alright," she sulked. "I'm a good friend, I won't rag on your out-moded, Utilitarian slayer needs. Which are still out-moded, by the way...."
"Thanks," Buffy snorted sarcastically, pulling a hurling ax from the weapons cabinet. She turned to Faith and arched her brows expectantly.
"Am I coming?" Faith asked casually.
"I guess it's your call." Faith looked back a Giles with concern. "He'll be okay." Buffy assured her. "This place is protected, and he's kinda surrounded by super people."
"Yeah, super people that don't know their ass from their elbow," Faith said. "Look, if it gets wild here -- if that thing wakes up and starts tearin' into us-."
"So stay." They exchanged stolid looks. Buffy's expression softened. "Take care of them." After taking up her ax, Buffy turned and stormed out the door, many of the other's watching as she went down the hallway and out of fire exit.
It was bleak out on the grounds that night; there was a fierce electrical storm and the wind blew as though hell was coming on the horizon. Usual weather for fall in Nevada County. Their was the distant sound of effort -- fighting -- and Buffy followed, hoping Andrew hadn't met one of the monsters.
Back in the library, Dawn turned back to all the slayers. "Okay," she started. "Willow helped us all make the big cookie for cabin warming, this'd be a good time to eat if you're hungry-."
The beast in the cage suddenly began struggling to its feet. It let out a fearsome howl, causing Giles to practically bolt upright. He clutched at the stitch in his chest groggily as Faith crossed the room to him, trying to keep him from getting up too soon.
"Hey, you okay?" she asked softly. "I dunno how bad a header you took; maybe you shouldn't be movin'." He looked about the room and patted himself down for his glasses. Faith pulled them from his breast pocket and let him slip them on.
"Is everyone here?" he asked back, sounding winded and confused. "Was anyone hurt? The spell -- did Willow do the spell?"
"Yeah, it's fine."
The wolf monster let out another howl.
Giles looked to the book cage, then looked to Willow, Robin, and Xander. "You brought that thing here!?" he spat, sounding scandalized.
"We have to find out what it is!" Willow argued. "We don't know how to kill it-. And, we think it might be a person."
"My idea," Faith piped up, raising her hand smugly.
Giles looked at them all as if they were insane. "Good lord -- you all don't do this every time I get knocked out, do you?" The beast let out another howl, but this time it was met with a chorus of others from outside the school, some much closer than others. "What was that?" he asked Faith timorously.
"It's got some homies out back." One of the monsters outside put it's wet, dog-nose on the window, streaking and fogging up the glass around his nostrils.
Giles moved back a bit in quiet horror. "How many?"
"'Bout twelve."
"And Buffy?"
"She went to get Andrew from the lodge."
"Well, this is priceless, isn't it?" Giles muttered to himself, his voice cracking into a high, nervous twitter. "I'm out for a few bloody hours and the whole world sinks to sodding hell, perfect...." OUTSIDE SUMMERLAND ACADEMY - NIGHT
Meanwhile, Buffy stalked about the dark campus grounds toward the lodge, weaving through a small patch of trees by the nature trail. She raised her axe up cautiously, trying to pick up on the sound of struggle she heard earlier. But in a moment, frightening to behold, one of the monsters crept up behind her, silently and menacingly trailing her movement. She turned back to look toward the school, but saw nothing. The monster tackled her from behind, slamming her to the ground, the ax knocked from her grip. Being a bit small to pin, Buffy rolled herself out from under the monster and onto her feet, grabbed her ax, and took a swing. The blade landed itself deep in the monster's shoulder. It let out a roar at its bloody wound and started rearing back on its hind legs like a spooked horse. Buffy tried to pull her ax out of its flesh and was lifted up off the ground with the creature as it leapt. Not knowing what else to do, she put her feet up on the beast for leverage and pulled back, but was thrown to the ground for her efforts.
Buffy's struggle with the monster was drawing attention on the grounds. Two of the other monsters came charging at them from the school. Buffy started at full-run to the lodge, only to find the source of the early sounds of struggle ahead. She hardly believed her eyes at first, but the flashing lightening illuminated something brawling with a monster. In his classic, two-fisted style, Angel grappled with a large wolven beast. Buffy caught up to him, the wolvens were catching up to her as well.
Buffy's foot made contact with a monster's jaw, sending it stumbling back only a few feet. "What are you doing here?" she didn't have to shout over the howling winds or thunder on the trail between the school and the lodge because of the shelter provided by the trail's canopy of trees.
"I came to see your big opening." Angel and Buffy glanced at each other for a moment, and Angel abandoned his monster to retrieve Buffy's ax. "I know there's a better way of saying that."
Buffy kicked his previous attacker across the jaw. "You came all this way to see a school assembly?" she asked, breaking the limb off of a nearby tree and swatting at the beast between her and Angel. She sighed, tossing the branch onto the ground as she watched the monster she'd been fighting make a speedy getaway into the woods.
"Can we discuss this later!?" Angel yelled, being yanked off the ground as the wolven reared back. He used the height to kick one of the other creatures over onto another, sending them back. Buffy plowed her monster back and got a hold of Angel, their strength combined finally pulling the ax free. The wolven howled in pain and backed away.
Buffy took the ax from him and gave one of the things a good slice across its eyes, sending it into an enthusiastic retreat as well. "Fine, we won't talk about it. I mean, I kinda think you're too old for the cryptic-secret-baby act but if you don't wanna talk about it, we won't talk about it."
"You're talking about it." Angel threw a left hook at one of them, then a killer, Batman-worthy uppercut that sent it flipping back -- it would've been more impressive if the monster hadn't landed on it's feet to advance again. Angel stood for a moment, flinching a bit. "Come on." he grabbed Buffy's shoulder arm and pulled her after him, breaking his grip only when they were both in a dead run for a fork in the trail.
Angel turned down the left path and took off toward the lodge and Buffy sprinted after him. The weather had turned fierce, now. "What are you doing out here, anyway!?" Angel called back, trying to be heard over the crashing thunder.
"Andrew's at the lodge!" Buffy shouted.
"Who!?"
"Andrew -- you don't know him!"
"Is he another boyfriend!?"
"Oh, I get it," Buffy grumbled to herself, "this you doing that thing where you come to see me to be a big whiner."
INT. SUMMERLAND SCHOOL LIBRARY - NIGHT
Back at the Library: Willow shifted in her seat at the computer, searching the results page for anything about the wolf-like monsters.
"Well, this is just getting pointless," she groaned to herself. "I keep turning up stuff we've seen before, like hellhounds and werewolves."
"Thing-thinger," Faith reiterated, turning the watcher's diary she was reading sideways and letting the page unfold. "Nice...."
"Perhaps you should be searching for local events," Giles suggested, moving on to another book. "They probably have a history of this sort of thing."
"Think our sleepy, little burg has some secrets?" Willow asked. "What do they call the local town?"
"Meadowbrook," he answered thoughtlessly. "Predominately Christian, white bread, xenophobic-."
"I'll be sure to put that in my search," she added sardonically. "Let's see, Meadowbrook...oh. They've got a pretty colorful history, here. Abductions,...disappearances... and a butt-load of tourist sightings. And, hey, civic pride. No confirmed deaths, though."
"Well, that a mercy."
"Not even. I'm searching the news archives for murders and maulings, but none -- ever. Just strokes, heart attacks, run-aways, teen drug overdoses, and accidents."
"Does sound rather dodgy."
"The dodgiest! Whatever's going on, the local government's gotta be in on it."
Giles looked through a pile of diaries then handed a few back to Rona, who sat with her friends at the edge of the pentagon. "See if you can find any accounts in those," he asked them.
Rona handed out some of them and buckled down to read. The other two noticed some of the slayers around them having panic attacks. "You'd think they didn't know they had super powers," Rona mumbled with disdain. "My name's Rona, by the way."
"I'm Grace," said the younger girl.
"Reagan," the skatery girl said. "I've been watching these kids all day. Most of 'em ready to piss themselves. Strength or no strength, their gonna get clobbered, like, El Kabong style."
"Welcome to the jungle," Rona snorted to herself, returning to her book. "Just so long as none of 'em bleed on me, I could care less."
On the other side of the campus, Angel and Buffy reached the lodge and raced in. They shut the reinforced double doors in time to hear the wolvens slam against them, growling. They left ugly dents in the metal. "...Andrew?" Buffy called out uncertainly. "Andrew!?" She looked around the dingy, old lodge that had acted as an activity center in the Summerland's sleep-away camp days. It was a rather large, out of date room filled with long tables and benches, the windows boarded up.
There was a plain, wooden doorway at the other end of the room. One of the wolvens burst through it, getting caught in the doorframe at its shoulders. It pushed through the drywall until it was standing in the room, wearing the frame like a collar. Angel and Buffy went to another small door and ran out. The wolven followed, leaving a wake of thrashed furniture. Already wearing the frame of the other door, the wolven couldn't push through. It backed away, trying furiously to shake the frame.
"Andrew's still in there," Buffy panted, as she and Angel circled the lodge.
"Doesn't seem like it." Angel said, his voice drowned out by the wind.
"What!?" Buffy shouted.
"I don't think anybody's in there!"
"We need to go back in for a better look!"
"Okay!" Sneaking around the back, they found a back exit and crept inside, surprised the other monsters hadn't followed them.
"Those things can be stealthy when the want to," Buffy said quietly. "Andrew? If you're in here, you need to tell us.... God, I'm actually afraid to yell. Can't you use your spidey senses to find out if he's in here?"
"If he is, he's hidden pretty good," Angel said, "'cause I'm only gettin' one human from the room. I could be wrong, though. I still can't get the mangy fur smell out of my sinuses. Is some one playing 'Hungry Like the Wolf'?"
"...That's funny."
"Well, yeah, when ya think about it. A little off-color maybe, but-."
"Not the song. Andrew was broadcasting from this building during the attack."
Angel couldn't help but split into a silly grin. "Hey, wouldn't it be kinda funny if those things attacked when he put it on-."
"It's not the song, Jug head, drop it."
Angel fidgeted self-consciously. "Yes, ma'am. God, if I'd have known this was gonna be the thanks I'd get for setting you guys up, I wouldn't have bothered. Is a little respect and gratitude too much to ask for these days?"
"That's a guy for ya," Buffy muttered to herself as she walked along the wall. "They buy ya one little university, and they think they own you."
"You always do that. You always compare me to the other guys you've been with."
"It was a quip -- I'm quipping. You're the only man I've ever gotten a school from."
"Okay,... sorry."
"But now that we're fighting, why did you have to come back here? And don't say for the assembly, because we both know that's bull."
"Excuse me? Why is me wanting to see your speech bull?"
"If it was a one time thing, you wouldn't have pushed for that Necco-Waffered glass."
"Necro-tempered, and I just thought, since I'm funding the thing myself. Which you have yet to thank me for-."
"You did it because you couldn't help yourself," she said. The two of them were arguing so vehemently that neither noticed the wolven crouched in the corner behind them, still wearing the doorframe. Buffy continued the fight under her breath: "You wanted to swoop in and save me, so I'd be all melty and wouldn't call you on it when you're being a big, creepy guy. Faith told me about your evil ad agency. What's the deal with having them buy us prime real estate in Satan's wild life preserve?"
"Do you really think I'm creepy?" Angel asked with a pitiful voice, his brow raised as he suddenly looking ever so slightly mussed by the comment.
Buffy sighed and shook her head, tucking a lock of blond hair behind her ear, "No, well...maybe if I didn't know you really well? No, you're not creepy."
"Look, if it's the locale that's making you moody, I can always have the slayers relocated. Go upscale. And it's an evil law firm, you're so smart."
The wolven in the corner crept up behind them.
"Go ahead, throw money at the problem," Buffy snipped. "That's what you do best...."
"When do I ever throw money and anything!? I mean, until very recently-." Angel's eyes darted around the room when he heard the click of a claw on the wooden floor. "Did you hear that?" They turned in time to see the wolven take a swipe at them, sending them crashing into the tables on top of each other. Angel threw Buffy a timid look.
Buffy winced and mumbled Andrew's name under her breath before casting a mournful side glance at Angel, "On three, make a break for the timber...."
Angel nodded and the two silently counted down the numbers. On 'three' both circled the room back over to the broken door and ran out together, tearing off toward woods.
SUMMERLAND SCHOOL LIBRARY - NIGHT
Robin peered out the picture windows. "It looks like they're not window-shopping anymore," he noted. "When demons disappear like that, it usually means they're hiding, or they found something better to chase after."
"This shouldn't be taking so long," Xander said to Willow. He paced around behind her chair. "I can't believe she made us stay here. This Manudo-Secludo act is getting really tired."
"She's just trying to keep us safe," Willow recited, as though they'd gone over it a million times. "Buffy depends on us to take care of things here so she can fight evil without worrying about us or any of the girls."
"Hey, these 'girls' are sla-yers. They can take care of themselves." Xander gestured back to the SITs to punctuate his point, only to show Willow a blonde girl with braces, who was crying as she attempted to pull her pigtail out of her jacket zipper. Willow tried to suppress a chuckle.
"Like I was saying," Xander went on, "since when are we automatically the ones to watch these kids? Buffy doesn't teach a single class, the rest of us are doubled up, and now she just expects us to take the home front. We're the Scooby gang, Will, not the Babysitters Club."
Willow went back to her monitor with a sheepish expression. "...I liked the Babysitters Club," she mumbled. "Look, you don't have to help us take care of these girls, but getting all worked up and stomping out for a booty-kicking and possibly early grave isn't useful to anyone." She put her hand up. "So, simmer."
"Will-."
"When the hand goes up, the mouth goes shut."
Xander shook his head and started sulking away toward the far end of the pentagon. "She paid way too much attention in kindergarten." He settled down on one of steps and tried to feign brooding.
Kennedy -- who had been griping with Rona -- noticed the little drama and crept over to Xander's end of the seating area and sat next to him. "Did you get a simmer, too?" she asked. "We've been fighting so much lately, and at first I just thought it was the pressure, but she's turned into such a fascist, I'm starting to think Buffy rubbed off on Willow...." She frowned a moment. "Starting to also wonder where that saying comes from."
"Can you just save the self-righteous, dissention riff for someone who can actually stand you?" Xander sighed.
"Sure. And besides, you're the one in charge of the inappropriate humor nuance. Look, what it comes down to is that you're just as sick of having to fall in line as I am. Tattle if you want, but I'm going out to help." She got back to her feet and started for the front exit, casually taking a sword from the cabinet on her way.
Xander hesitated for a moment, then caught up with her, grabbing her arm. "Wait a sec," he whispered.
"What? I said I was going. You wanna try and stop me?"
"No,... I wanna come with you." He took a cautious look back. Everyone was busy and turned away. Only a few SITs were looking, but the didn't question anything.
While Xander and Kennedy slipped out the door, Giles sat at a workstation, calmly going through one of his newer volumes. Faith sat beside him with one foot up on a nearby chair, looking at Giles with quiet interest. Every so often his eyes would wander back to her, and that went on until he couldn't ignore her any longer.
"Are you watching me?" Giles asked.
"Yep," Faith answered simply.
"Is there any reason in particular why?"
"Maybe I'm givin' you a douse of your own medicine, watcher-boy."
He turned to her with a good-natured smile. "I am alright, you realize. It was just a tranquillizer. That's happened before, actually."
"Wow. You just get tore up, doncha?"
"Assuming your choice of vernacular is referring to collateral damage, then yes, I get tore up."
"See that? Little words get it done, Rupes."
It took a moment for Giles to absorb her meaning. "Oh, uh, yes," he agreed. "They do at that. One of the things I've always admired about you is ability to meet your fellow man on a level plain. It won you a lot of friends in the onset, if I recall."
"Yeah, Remember when. Everyone was all for hangin' out and hearin' stories when it was the fun, new thing, but when it counted, everybody turned on me. Ya know, everybody,...except you."
"Well, there was a lot of emotional entanglement. Willow from your encounter with Xander, and Buffy...from the beginning, to be honest. Being a slayer, and a feminist with a sort of, um, ribald mystic, she found your presence in the field and social group as an encroachment on her niche."
Faith froze for a moment, slightly startled. "I grabbed her boob once, but I didn't think anybody saw us." She caught Giles look of alienation and grimaced. "What's a niche?"
"Sorry. What I meant was, Buffy felt as though she identified with you in particular, and held you to her personal standard. In you, she saw all the character flaws of her own self that caused her misery the year before -- impulsiveness; sensuality; a tendency to avoid your emotions and become aggressive. She projected her shadow self on to you, never realizing how many assets she truly had over you: a loving mother; a beautiful home; loyal friends; healthy relationships, wealth. She didn't trust you enough to share any of her inner turmoil, but expected you to be straightforward with her at a time when you felt you had nowhere to turn."
"You been thinking a lot about this?"
"I had to write a dissertation for the diaries," he admitted sheepishly. "...A small one."
"Yeah, well, I'm glad that somebody understands it. You could've been like everybody else, but you never changed your story, never ganged-up on me.... So, thanks."
"You're quite welcome."
Faith rubbed her hands together anxiously. "Can I get you somethin', are ya hungry? I bet I could make it to the teacher's lounge 'n' back."
"Don't trouble yourself," Giles said with a shrug.
"Come on, you gotta let me go do somethin', I'm goin' batcrap in here!"
"Well,...there is a Cup-of-Noodles and a Microwave in my office."
Faith beamed eagerly. "You get a Microwave? Wicked 'A'."
Giles smirked, arching a brow. "Well, I am the librarian."
"So, you want me to encroach you up some soup?"
"I'd like that very much."
"'Kay, be right back...." She got up and strutted over to the adjacent office door. Robin noticed her leaving and followed her, and Giles went over to the weapons cabinet, looking through an old medicine bag. Just missing the shadows of Kennedy and Xander through the door window, Faith slipped into Giles' office and, taking a minute to be impressed with the kitchenette -- "Sweet ass!" -- got the noodle soup, and shut it in the little black Microwave, trying to guess the time and temperature, rather than check the package. Robin came in, lurking behind her.
"Maybe I should tell you how this works," he started.
"Nah, Angel showed me. It's power level, time, start." She pushed the right buttons in succession and started the Microwave.
"No, I -- I mean the whole relationship thing. It's about trust. For me to trust you, you have to trust me, in order for us to have-."
"Trust? Look, I gotta get this soup to Giles. He's all hungry and bitchin' for food, and whatever."
"I think he can wait a minute-." Robin was cut off by the sound of a pea whistle, coming from the library.
"See? I don't got time to twist a nipple with you about trust games and whatever else gets you off."
"But you know I'd catch you if you fell."
"Can we not go there? I'm kinda busy."
"Watching noodles is more important than talking about us?"
"Well, I haven't seen this one, yet. Shrimp flavored. Don't know what's gonna happen. You, on the other hand, I've seen. You get all cute 'n' kissy, and, swoon, I give you whatever you want."
"Can I get that in writing?" he asked playfully and stepped up to her.
"What am I, J.K. Rowling?" she joked, groping her hands over his chest and shoulders. She gave him a smile and leaned in for a kiss, but they were stopped by another insistent whistle. Faith groaned in frustration. "He's got the radar, man, I swear t'God." She turned back to the Microwave and popped the door open, then carefully took out the cup of soup. "Walk me back?" she asked in a flirty tone.
"To play it safe. Those wolf things might want some of Rupert's noodle soup."
"And if he doesn't get fed, I'll have to hear that damned whistle whenever we start gettin' down." Faith hissed as she pulled a clear blue plastic spoon from a box on the kitchenette's grey marble counter. The couple exchanged looks and headed cautiously back to the library to see Giles sitting back in his chair with a new, turquoise whistle.
"I've found another one," Giles told them flatly. "Shiny, lovely color. Aqua, I think."
Further down the hallways, Xander and Kennedy skulked around school. They heard echoes of banging somewhere in the building and Kennedy raised her sword.
"I'm starting to wonder if this was such a good idea," said Kennedy.
INT. SUMMERLAND SCHOOL LIBRARY - NIGHT
"Now?" Xander yelped at her. "We all get this way, and you're thinking it through now? I thought lesbians were supposed to be really smart."
"Remind me to kick your ass if we live through this."
"Little chance of that. When Willow finds our mangled corpses lying stretched out to dry on the roof like unusually ugly, homemade fruit-roll'em-ups, she'll kill us."
"One -- ew, and two -- she can't kill us if we're corpses."
Xander smiled glibly. "You've never seen Willow mad then."
"I think I've seen enough of it."
"So I'm guessin' this wasn't the search and rescue mission I signed on for."
"Really? Enlighten me."
"Well...I think you're having some kinda cat-fighty rebellion with Will, and all your dramatic, bitchy, rich-girl faculties tell you this is the way to get even."
"Fine," said Kennedy, "I'll kick your ass, then we'll live through this. So where do we go now?"
"You're asking me? I thought I was feet-first guy and you were the one with the strategy!" There was a rumbling clatter echoing indistinctively through the building and Xander turned from her to search for the source of the noise.
"I've got a strategy for you. Scatter."
"Scatter?" He spun around to see Kennedy gone and heard her footfall down the hall. "Kennedy! Leave the sword!" He took off after her, turning two lefts down an un-forking hallway. He ended up at an intersection of hallways that split three ways, no clue where she'd gone to. "Okay...I'm getting Will."
In another part of the school, Kennedy continued to follow the noise with a tentative expression, sensing the action might be coming from outside. She pushed through a door and stole around, eyes searching through the dark. As she turned a corner, the light from the door window sharply faded, the only remaining light coming from the random flashes of the electrical storm. She stepped carefully over the cold, dewy crabgrass, wincing as it crunched. As she took a few paces along the wall, she felt her foot crunch on something different. The air was suddenly muggy and stale on her face.
"Ohhhh, crap," she whispered to herself, a girlish, wavering quality in her voice. She picked her foot up carefully and stepped back, but felt something cold and wet between her shoulder blades. Quickly as she could, Kennedy swung the sword as she turned, hitting something solid as stone. It roared and tossed her away from the wall, clawing her arm. She scrambled to her feet and made for the other side of the school where she'd last seen an entrance. Turning the corner, she got her shoulder bitten down on deeply, the wolven attempting to put a front leg around her. She let out a yell and sliced the wolven's face with her sword -- it yowled and released her.
Her face was pinched with pain as she stumbled quickly toward the nearest exit, but was pounced on from behind by the wolven that was dogging her. It started mauling her, and was joined in it by two others, but the one that went in for the kill stopped. Its ears pricked and it twisted it's head around, like a dog being called in the park, to look at the source of a inaudible noise. The other wolvens looked in the same direction for a moment then all started bounding toward it, leaving Kennedy badly bloodied and barely conscious. The wolvens were congregating in the woods, where Buffy and Angel had fled, both of them bleeding from multiple wounds. They were taking the wolvens one at a time, kicking off from the trees, climbing them for leverage, and running the monsters into them, but it wasn't long before they were too far out-numbered. Cutting their losses, they headed out for the main trail, where they were coming upon a massive, blue-eyed wolven, right in their path.
"You can probably take it with a flying kick!" Angel advised.
"Are you telling me how to slay!?" Buffy yelled back as they charged toward it. "Or did something happen to your inner monologue!?"
"My what!?"
"Inner monologue!!!"
"Fine! What do you usually do with a monster that big!?
"Sleep with him!!!"
"What!? ...HEY!!!" Buffy built up momentum running, jumped, and landed both feet square on the wolven's chest. When she fell to the ground in traction, looking as though she were silently screaming, the wolven was seemingly unaffected. It began to growl. Buffy looked up at the towering beast with a diffident expression, crawling back from it.
"Good doggy," she cooed, "nice doggy?" It plunged it's face down, nose to nose with Buffy, and roared in her face, giving her a good look at it's tonsils. "Okay, big doggy!" She swung her leg up and gave the beast a good drop kick to the jaw, letting out a little grunt of exertion. She rolled backward until she was on her feet again, and she and Angel made a b-line for the school. "Thanks for the help, Conan!"
"I was building my chi!"
"You're a vampire, you don't have chi!!!"
"Chi is the vital force believed to be inherent in all things! I exist, therefore, Taoism applies!"
"Fine, you get chi! Happy!?"
"Oh, thrilled! Thank you so much for allowing me to exist!"
"Any time!"
"And it's an evil law firm, you're so smart!"
"What!?"
"Wolfram & Hart! Law firm!!!"
"Oh, sorry! Got you confused with Derwood!"
"Darren! And Mac Mann & Tate wasn't evil, it was just corrupt!"
"Oh, whatever!" They put some distance between them and the wolvens and circled around the building to the library as a clap of thunder sounded, followed by an instant downpour. On the way, Angel stopped dead, looking around in the dark.
"Wait, I smell blood! Somebody's hurt here!" Buffy ran back to him, pushing wet hair out of her face.
"Is it a little guy!? Maybe Andrew tried to get back!"
"No, it's a girl!" He picked a body up from the grass and bought it with them as they ran.
INT. SUMMERLAND SCHOOL LIBRARY - NIGHT
Back at the library, Xander sat at one of the tables, looking at his hands.
"Do you know how tremendously stupid that was?" Willow asked as she sat staring at him, furious.
"I'm aware of the stupid," he agreed quietly. "But she would've gone without me, anyway. She was pretty ticked-."
Faith's calling cut him off. "Harris!" she shouted, waving Xander over to the book cage.
"I have to go work on something with Giles, anyway," Willow said.
The two friends pushed out from the computer tables and went their separate ways -- Xander to Faith, and Willow to the workstation where Giles was going through one of his volumes and setting up something magickal. Among many other items he's assembled, there was a circle of twelve painted stones on a round, wooden plate, and one decorated with an Egyptian eye glyph sitting beside a burner, atop which was a large beaker, filled with simmering silvery liquid.
"So," Willow began to Giles, "anything new on the wolf men-. Women-. Wolf persons?"
"Nothing on them," Giles admitted, sipping his soup, "but I've been simultaneously researching sanctuary spells, and I think I've found a genetically specific representation of a Pictish banishment wall. It's a spirit shield against nondescript intruders, and if we can get a specimen from the demon, we can remove it from the property."
He gestured to Xander, who stood in front of the book cage with Faith. Xander was taunting the captive beast again. "The Wolven will come for you with his razor," he said sarcastically, throwing in a maniacal laugh. "Yeah, that's right, Droopy, what are ya gonna do about it? Huh? Bring it!" The monster leapt at Xander, trying to kill him through the cage.
Faith swept in with a pocket knife, reached though the book-return slot, and cut off a tuft of fur from it's front leg. She took a step back from the cage with Xander, who looked a little shaken. "You're a stud," she told him, in an overly patronizing tone. She brought the fur over to the workstation and held it over the beaker, throwing Giles a questioning look. He nodded reassuring and she dropped it in the liquid, making the bursting surface spark for a moment.
"Very good, Faith," Giles said distantly, turning back toward Willow. "If the spell goes as planned, then in a moment or two, these...things, will be thrown bodily off the premises."
Willow's face lifted. "We can really do that? That's perfect!"
"No, not entirely. On a greater scale, this is a very dangerous spell, and as so, not very commonly used since the sixth century. In order to widen the wall, we'd have to stretch it outward, like an elastic band. It could only take the pressure from a small number of threats and would be libel to break or snap back on us at any time, which -- according to these accounts of Connacht -- is a rather gruesome picture." He stepped next to her, showing her a two pages-long engraving of a decimated village, strewn with maimed bodies.
"Why would they draw that?" she asked herself, clearly nauseated.
Just then, a dripping wet, battle-trashed Buffy broke though the picture window and landed crouching on the floor beside the book cage, scaring the hell out of everyone. She straightened up, shaking the glass fragments out of the front of her shirt with a contorted look of pain on her face. "Sorry," she grunted. "They blocked the exits.... The next time I decide to crash through a window, I'm doing it in one of those metal, Xena bras." Buffy's friends looked quizzically back at her and she met their gazes sadly. "We didn't find Andrew," she told them.
As she did, Angel came charging up to the library window from outside, carrying Kennedy. He leapt at the window, but smacked into an invisible barrier and fell back.
"Angel?" Dawn asked critically. "What are you doing out there?"
"Oh!" Willow said to Giles. "He's 'overtly evil'. We might wanna get on that."
"Ha, he's evil again!" Xander yelled, pointing vindictively at Angel. "I knew it -- nobody sane cares that much about tempered glass!"
"I'm not evil!" Angel growled, getting to his feet with Kennedy. "And, hey, not crazy!"
"Nice try," Xander snapped, "I can see it in your eyes and your evil drool!"
"I'm not drooling!"
Willow spotted Kennedy from inside. "Oh, God!" she gasped. "What happened, is she alive?"
"It's raining outside," Angel continued retroactively, "I don't droll."
"Excuse me!?" Willow shouted at Angel. "Concerned girlfriend!"
"Oh, she is," Angel answered. "But she's lost a lotta blood-. Girlfriend?"
Robin stepped through the shattered glass and Angel handed Kennedy off to him behind the barrier. "I'll take care of her," Robin told Willow.
"Look, there's something up with those things," Angel told them. "I can't get heart or heartbeat off any of 'em. If it wasn't for the authentic, wet-dog smell, I'd think they weren't alive. Did you have to break my windows?" he asked Buffy. "I mean, I go to all the trouble of setting you guys up, and this is my 'thank you'?"
"That's enough," Willow began uneasily, following Robin with her eyes as he laid Kennedy on a table. "We need to get Angel in. There's a spell we're working on, but we'll have to take the ring of protection down-."
Without warning, Angel was slammed headfirst into the wall beside the windows. He fell back into the shadows, making visible the larger wolven that had been blocking the trail outside. It threw itself repeatedly against the barrier, trying to push its way through with an unnatural amount of strength. Finally, the barrier broke, and the wolven leapt into the room, sending everyone to the other side of it. Robin gathered Kennedy up again and moved her as far from the beast as he could. The rest of the faculty moved in front to shield the young slayers.
"If anybody has a suggestion," said Buffy to her friends, "don't be shy."
The wolven advanced on them slowly, sniffing the air. It shook its rain-soaked coat out, splattering everyone, and seemed to start scanning the crowd, until the monster in the book cage let out a small growl. The larger wolven left the crowd of humans and leapt on the book cage, beating through the cage door with one paw, warping the metal and breaking easily through the lock. A few of the pack outside made whimpering noises, and the two wolvens inside went out to meet them. They sniffed at each other and grunted. One of them poked curiously at Angel's unconscious body with its paw, wagging its tail and growling playfully.
"What are they doing," Robin said to himself.
"I dunno," Dawn said, leaning over to get a better look, "but when the raptors in Jurassic Park III acted like that, they were planning something."
"You think they're talking?" Buffy asked fearfully. "Okay, maxi-wig. Will, whatever you guys are working on, this would be the time."
"It's very dangerous," Giles warned her, as the wolvens eyed them through the window. "There could be dire consequences-."
"Do it, do it, do it!" Buffy whispered, panicked.
Giles snorted in dissention, muttering all manner of curse words as he returned to the table and held the eye rune over the circle. He read aloud from the "Liber Magorum":
"Ones savage," he recited quickly as another wolven crept in, "ones of the fur and flesh, we forge against thee. Terrible ones, born of the fibers burned, these runes banish thee." It roared at the crowd and started walking toward Willow. Giles went on, "The Eye shall bind, till houses blind, Spiritualis Scutum contra Titanos!" Giles slammed the eye rune down heavily onto the center of the circle. A wave of distortion rippled out forcefully from the rune circle. For a moment an almost blinding light lighted the library and the visible distortion physically tossed the approaching monsters backward, out of the light of the room. Buffy went swiftly to the window.
"This may be the wrong time," Xander said weakly, "but I kinda wish it was lighter out, so I could see those things go flying." Everyone gave him a searing look. "Okay, wrong time."
"I only hope the shield holds," said Giles. "I suppose we should put a fence up."
"I could get a crew out here tomorrow," Xander told him. "I don't know that it'll hold those things off, though."
"Oooh," Willow piped up, "we could lay a Torques Titanorum along the fence line, that'll strengthen it. I mean, now that we got time to put a fence up. There were only a dozen out there, right Buffy?"
Buffy was outside now, kneeling over Angel in the rain. She ran her fingertips gently along side the gash on his forehead.
EXT. SUMMERLAND GROUP CABINS - EARLY MORNING
A few hours later, still a long way from sunrise, the last groups of slayers were filing out of the school toward their cabins, Robin passing out flashlights to them and Dawn taking careful roll of them as they left. Giles and Faith stood under an umbrella with an electric lantern, directing the girls and seeing them off in the waning storm.
"What do you think happened t'Andy?" Faith asked, hugging herself to keep the cold out.
"Hard to say," Giles answered, waving the slayers straight. "If he didn't leave the school, then...I doubt he survived."
"God. What a way t'go, huh?"
"I only wish we'd realized sooner that he wasn't with us. Unfortunate...." Giles broke off.
Back at the lodge, there was a stirring sound and Andrew's voice quietly singing from the water-heater closet.
"...Take one down, pass it around, no more bottles of beer on the wall.... Ninety-nine bottles of beer on the wall, ninety-nine bottles of beer...."
Meanwhile, Buffy and Willow walked across the lawns toward the school, hazily eyeing a parked, silver car ahead. Buffy was bandaged up under her coat.
"I think Kennedy'll be alright," Willow said, frowning sadly. "Being a slayer, she'll heal pretty quick. I wanted to take her to the hospital, but there'd be questions about what happened. I just feel awful, though. The last time we talked, I was so mean to her. I told her to simmer."
"I think when she's better, she'll realize it was to protect her," Buffy said, sounding exhausted.
"But it wasn't just that. We've been fighting so much lately, I can't remember when we last talked -- ya know, without being pissy."
"Well, there's a lotta that going around-." Buffy winced as she heard Giles' pea whistle sound and groaned. "I'm so gonna kill him."
"I think I need to go help," said Willow. "Get my guilties out."
"'Kay."
Willow turned back and headed for the line of slayers as the last girls left the building. Buffy trudged to the muddy trail, where Angel stood in front of the school, waiting to see her before he went back to his BMW. There was now a closed, bruised up cut on his forehead.
"You guys really outta put up a fence," Angel told her.
"We can handle it," Buffy said.
"...How're you feeling?" he asked after an awkward moment.
"Green," Buffy answered, rolling her eyes in spite of herself. "It's not easy, y'know."
"Yeah, I've been there. I just wanted to see if you needed anything. Make sure you're alright."
"I am," she said. "Thanks...." Angel turned and started walking to his car, as Buffy went on. "For everything," she added.
Angel turned back, shifting his arms uncomfortably. "You don't have to say that."
"I know. I thought I should, though. Before you go. Thank you."
Angel smiled weakly and started back on the long walk for his car. Buffy watched him quietly, folding her arms in front of her.
Leaving the slayers, Dawn walked up beside her sister. "What are we looking at?" she asked Buffy. "Angel's leaving?"
"Yeah...."
"Oh.... Should we be quiet?"
"Yes, this would be a quiet moment."