Chapter Sixteen: Visitors from Hell
It had all begun to sink in for Faith. It was over, it wasn't her fault. She wasn't a cold blooded killer. She didn't have to spend the rest of her life atoning for what she had done and hiding from the police.
The trouble was she didn't believe it. She had killed the professor. She remembered doing it and she remembered much else besides. Faith remembered the resentment she had felt against Buffy, a resentment that still jumped out from time to time if she didn't keep control of it.
Faith still felt she had been in control of what she had been doing. Could magic really make all that much difference? Was it a case of pushing on an open door? Would things have been all that different even without the magic? The trouble was she didn't know and nobody would ever know. All she knew was she'd have no excuse for anything that happened from now on.
One of the main things Faith had discovered in prison was that she liked being the slayer. She'd had a lot of bad dreams and bad memories in prison with so much time on her hands. The best times had been remembering when she'd made a difference, remembering that there were people alive, alive and still living their lives, because of her.
When the bad memories had begun to get on top of her she had deliberately tried to remember the faces of people she had saved. She had found this very difficult. The face that she would never forget was the face of the dead professor.
Since leaving prison she had a few more faces, a few more good memories and a few more friends to think about. She realised that all she could do was to continue doing what she was doing, continue be a slayer...no The Slayer, The Chosen One, continuing doing what she was born to do.
The members of the old gang now had guilt of their own. Buffy and Giles in particular felt that they had in some way let Faith down. Faith noticed this and had a word with Willow and Tara about it before they went off to San Francisco to see the Halliwells about doing a clean up spell.
Neither Faith, nor Willow and Tara thought it a good idea that everything be wiped from everybody's memories. Although they wanted everybody inside the gang to remember what had happened they did want the criminal events to be stricken from the record and they did want the police to forget about looking for Faith.
"But you've got to make sure nobody thinks what happened was their fault," explained Faith. "Buffy and Giles and the others aren't to blame for what happened. You've got to take care of that."
"Magic's not like that Faith," said Tara. "The more complicated it is the easier it is to go wrong. A simple but strong forget spell aimed at the forces of law and order is all we can really expect."
"But the monks' spell that made Dawn. That must have been pretty complicated," suggested Faith.
"Yes, in was, in a way. But it didn't contain a lot of exceptions. It applied to everybody, everybody in the world, exactly the same," said Tara.
"Except the monks themselves," added Willow, "and probably only the monks who did the spell."
"Creating a false history for everybody is complicated enough," said Willow. "Making different histories for different people is way more than just complicated."
"As it is we may have to settle for everybody, including us being made to forget if the Halliwells think it too complicated or too risky to let some of us remember," said Tara.
"We all have guilt about something," said Willow remembering her own history. "It's what helps us avoid making the same mistakes again."
After making arrangements to meet the Halliwell sisters Willow and Tara orbed off to San Francisco. Meanwhile Giles received a message about a potential in Australia and Cordelia found time to telephone Angel and Wesley to put them in the picture about what had happened and what was now planned.
Cordelia was glad to hear that a lot had improved in LA following the darkness. Currently Angel and the gang were trying to hunt down something that was causing groups of people to disappear.
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Buffy, Xander, Cordelia, Kennedy and Anya arrived at the rendezvous well before the time set. It was the usual deserted warehouse. On arrival they proceeded to search the building and the surrounding area, that is Anya teleported around outside and the others searched inside.
"So why didn't you want Faith, Gwen and Amy to come?" asked Kennedy. "If the vampires have something planned we might need them."
"I've been caught that way before," said Buffy. "Invite me to a meeting and then attack while I'm away. That's how Drusilla killed Kendra, the slayer before Faith. I had to leave a strong team at the house. Fred can handle the equipment, Amy can do the magic, Faith and Gwen can lead the potentials if there's any fighting.
"They nearly killed me Willow and Cordy the last time," said Xander. "Angel captured Giles and tortured him for hours."
"Angelus, not Angel, Angelus!" said Buffy glaring at Xander. Just like him not to miss a chance to bring that up again she thought.
"So why are we here meeting Nutty and Bimbo," asked Cordelia who had bad memories of both vampires. "You know they both hate you. It's gotta be a trap."
"We've got enough firepower to deal with two vampires," said Kennedy, "even if they bring along their friends."
"Are you sure about that?" asked Glory walking out of the darkness towards them.
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"Why does Angel think we'll find anything here anyway?" asked Connor, giving his usual accurate impression of a whiny teenager. He had received a call telling him to come to the alley outside Lorne's old club. Currently he was waiting, hidden in darkness at one end of the alley with Gunn.
"Information received," said Gunn. "Some mage told him something's going down here, something about those people who've disappeared. Whatever it is we should find out more about it tonight."
This time for a change Connor kept to himself his low opinion of anything connected to magic and simply grunted. For this Gunn was grateful. Not for the first time Gunn thought that somebody who had vampires for parents and grew up in a demon dimension should have more belief in or at least respect for magic.
At the other end of the ally Wesley waited with Lorne. He was fretting about what Cordelia had revealed about Faith. I should have known he thought, or at least suspected. With the benefit of hindsight he kept going over all the things he now thought were clues that everything then was not as it seemed. We knew the mayor used magic he thought, we...I should have called in the coven that works with the Council. Willow was only a learner then. I shouldn't have just left the magic to her and Giles.
A movement in front of him attracted his attention. Angel had moved out of the shadows towards him. "Stop beating yourself up Wes," said Angel quietly. "It wasn't your fault. I was there and so was Giles. We didn't know what was really going on either and we had way more experience that you. It was your first assignment. Your first time in the field."
"But you weren't in charge," muttered Wesley mainly to himself.
"Heads up kiddies," said Lorne. "We have a live one. Well we have one, alive or not." As the other two looked up they saw that somebody had emerged from the ruined club into the alley.
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"What do you want?" asked Buffy although she thought she already had a good idea of what the newly revived Hellgod actually wanted.
"You know what I want," said Glory. "It's what I've always wanted...Euww!" Glory had been hit by a stone. The stone had been lightly tossed by Xander but had left a small blemish on her red dress which she quickly rubbed down.
"At least she's not the First," said Xander attracting Glory's attention to him.
"If you think I'll let you ruin my dress..." Glory began and then she moved towards Xander impossibly fast and with every intention of causing him some serious, if not fatal, damage. Nobody human could move fast enough to stop her. However just as Glory was about to put her hands on Xander's throat she was knocked aside by Anya and propelled clear across the room onto her back.
Glory picked herself up furious and ready for payback but pulled herself up short as she saw that the slayer and her friends were ready for a serious fight. Belatedly she recalled that she was not there for a fight. "Hey, calm down," she said. "I'm here to talk, not to fight."
"I heard about you," said Cordelia. "I heard you were not too smart. Anybody who'd start a fight over that dress..." she continued shaking her head.
"You just see how smart you'd be if somebody else was using half your brain," protested Glory. "Anyway if you won't listen..."
"So talk," said Buffy aggressively. "If you just want to talk we'll listen, but if you want a fight we're ready for that. As I recall you didn't do too well the last time we met." As Buffy confronted the Hellgod Kennedy hung back, her eyes searching around them to ensure that they were not taken by surprise by a sneak attack from another quarter.
"I'm here to give you a choice," said Glory. "A choice whether to help me or to suffer the consequences because hey, we both want the same thing."
"That'll be a first," said Buffy sceptically.
"As I recall you wanted me gone and I wanted to go," said Glory. "I think that's exactly where we are now."
"You're not having Dawn," said Buffy who received a strange look from Kennedy who did not understand what Dawn has to do with this. "You're not even going to see Dawn." Suddenly Buffy had a very bad thought and stepped back pulling out her cellphone.
As Buffy punched the number of the new house Glory realised what Buffy was doing. "She's all right. I'm not after Dawn. That was a once only deal. That won't work for me again, well not for hundreds and hundreds of years anyway."
"Hi," said Buffy into her phone. "Is Dawn there...Good, keep her safe. Be ready for an attack, any sort of attack...Just tell her Glory's back... She'll explain...Yeah, we're all fine. We'll be back soon...bye."
"Why don't you just go then?" Anya asked Glory. "You're not having Dawn and you're not hurting Xander. If you stick around it's you who'll be hurting."
"That's just it I can't go," said Glory. "I can't go where I want to go and that's home. That's where you come in. You help me to go home and we're all happy. If I have to stay here I'll turn this world into a copy of my own Hell World. I don't want to do that, it'll be like, hard work but make no mistake sweetie, that's exactly what I'll do if I have to."
"How do you expect us to find a way to send you home," asked Xander. "What do you think we are, the Masters of the Universe?"
"I hear some of the Slayer's friends know something about moving between worlds," said Glory. "I'm sure you can come up with something, now you have a good reason to try really hard."
"And in the meantime you go back to sucking out brains, no thank you," said Buffy.
"You're out of date Slayer," said Glory. "Now I'm no longer sharing with Benji I don't have to do that any more. Although I could go back to it for old time's sake if you don't play ball."
"So you got rid of Ben," said Buffy.
"It wasn't me who got rid of Ben," replied Glory. "Anyway don't spare any tears for old Ben. He wasn't the nice guy you thought he was. He was the one who called in the Queller demon. In the end Ben was just like me. The most important person for Ben was Ben."
Kennedy stepped forward aggressively. "We can take her," she said. "Between us we're plenty strong enough. We don't need to do any deals."
Glory laughed. "Ooh, you do like having feisty little ones around you don't you Slayer," said Glory. "Does she know you died last time as well as me?"
"We'll think about this," said Buffy. "We'll meet again, same time, same place, next week to let you have our reply. But if we hear about a sudden outbreak of madness in the population all bets are off. We'll hunt you down."
Glory turned away but then turned back. "Just to make you think twice before you threaten me again..." Glory suddenly threw something hard and fast at the surprised Anya. Anya screamed and fell to the ground. Glory left the building before anybody could move.
Xander caught Anya as she fell. She had a long knife in her abdomen and seemed to be struggling for breath. Blood poured out of her. Xander let Anya down onto the ground and tried to stem the flow of blood. "We've got to stop the bleeding, oh god!" Buffy pulled off her shirt and knelt down trying to do just that. Kennedy decided she would be best employed staying back and keeping guard in case of another attack.
Cordelia stood quietly thinking. Suddenly she called. "Tara! Tara we need you." Abruptly Tara orbed in and stood beside Cordelia. Wordlessly Cordelia pointed at Anya and Tara knelt down beside her.
For a few seconds Tara tried to heal Anya but nothing happened. "Something's blocking me," she said.
"She's a demon. Does that make a difference?" asked Buffy.
"It's not that, it's something else," replied Tara.
"Her amulets!" said Xander. "We need to get them off her."
Buffy opened up Anya's clothes and tore off the amulets that Anya was wearing, immediately dropping them to the ground nearby. She stood up to give Tara more room and stood back, at the same time keeping an eye on the amulets.
Tara took the knife in one hand and pulled it out of Anya, at the same time applying her healing power with her other hand. As Tara tossed the knife away Anya gasped with the shock but the healing cushioned her and continued to work. At last Anya was herself again. Tara and Xander gently helped her to her feet.
Buffy picked up her bloodied shirt and ruefully examined it before tossing it aside. Xander took off his jacket and offered it to her. She put it on.
"I thought your amulets protected you from that sort of thing," Xander asked Anya remembering how they had been unable to hurt Halfrek.
Kennedy knelt down to examine the bloody knife. "Don't touch it!" ordered Tara. "It's enchanted."
"Does that answer your question?" said Anya.
Tara picked up the knife with Buffy's now useless shirt. "I'll get rid of this," she said. "This is becoming a habit."
Buffy and the rest explained to Tara what had happened and about their meeting with Glory. Tara explained that she and Willow were working out the details of the forget spell with the Halliwell sisters and would probably be away for a few days.
Anya knelt down to pick up her amulets. "You can't put them back on you know," said Cordelia. "Not anymore."
"Why?" asked Anya. "They're what keeps me safe, what let me stop Glory from killing Xander."
"They nearly got you killed," said Xander.
"Cordy's right Anya," said Tara. "You've resisted those amulets so far but if you wear them much longer you'll be fighting on the other side."
Anya stood up. She knew Cordelia and Tara were right but she hated it. Without the amulets she would be powerless, she'd be unable to defend herself and she'd be unable to help anybody else.
Tara walked over to Anya and took her hand. "I can help you know," she said. "It's my job to help. You have your own witch power. I can help you to develop your power as a white witch."
Anya turned away. "Take them away," she said. "Take them away now before I change my mind."
Tara quietly picked up the amulets and added them to her bundle, all except one. She walked back to Anya. "You can keep this one," she said smiling. "This one was made by Willow. It'll still give you some protection." As Anya put Willow's amulet around her neck Tara orbed away.
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Gunn and Connor watched as the figure walked away from them towards the group at the other end of the alley. Connor made to move forward but Gunn put a hand on his shoulder. "Our job's still here," he said. "It's only one person, Angel and the others can handle whoever it is. We need to keep watching."
At the other end of the alley Angel, Wesley and Lorne watched the figure approach. It soon became obvious that it was a woman. And what a woman! The woman was the most beautiful they had ever seen, a literal goddess. As she approached the three of them they fell to their knees. "Hello," the woman said. "My name's Jasmine, would you like to work for me?"
"What the hell!" said Gunn watching from the other end of the alley and starting forward.
"No!" said Connor this being his turn to return the favour in restraining his partner. "We've got to get out of here now!" With that he grabbed Gunn and pulled him away from the alley.
"I've seen demons like this before," he said. "They're very strong, very dangerous. Just getting near them lets them take you over body and soul."
"What about Angel, Wesley..." protested Gunn.
"They're working for the demon now. Run!" answered Connor.
At the other end of the alley Jasmine turned and saw Gunn and Connor leave. She smiled and turned to Angel."Your first job for me will be to bring those two back here to meet me," she said.
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Buffy called a meeting the next day to discuss what Glory had said. Giles had left for Australia and Willow and Tara were still in San Francisco. As everybody else gathered Cordelia's phone rang. It was Gunn. He explained that Angel, Wesley and Lorne were now working for a very powerful demon known as Jasmine who appeared to be taking over the loyalty of just about anybody who came close to her. Of Angel's gang only Gunn and Connor were still unaffected because they'd managed to avoid getting too close to Jasmine. Cordelia determined she had to go to LA to help.
In the discussion that followed Fred also expressed a wish to go back to LA but in view of her knowledge and experience of travelling to other worlds she was persuaded to stay in Sunnydale and work on finding a way to send Glory home.
It was determined that Faith, Gwen and Amy would go back to LA with Cordelia. The plan was to see if Amy and Cordelia could use magic to protect everybody from the power of this demon and hopefully destroy her.
"So how many times do we have to rescue Angel?" asked Xander.
"As often as we need to," replied Buffy firmly. "He's always been there for us when we needed him."
Xander looked around and found that Buffy, Cordelia, Fred and Faith were all glaring at him.
"Hey Xander," said Gwen. "No hassle. We're used to rescuing you guys. It's what we do."
The discussion continued about what to do about Glory. Anya and Dawn were in favour of killing her as quickly as possible but they both agreed that it would be very difficult. There was no real dissent to Buffy's view that they should see if they could send Glory back to where she came from.
"Does anybody know where she came from?" asked Fred. "I know how to go back to Pylea and I might be able to open a portal to Quortoth but otherwise what I know only leads to random places."
"Quortoth might be a good place to send her," said Cordelia.
"We'll keep that in reserve," said Buffy. "We don't want to send her to the wrong place and then have her plotting to come back again. We want to get her to a place where she's gonna stay."
"Why don't we ask her where she came from?" asked Dawn. "If she really wants to go back she should tell us everything she knows about the place."
"It's not like we agreed to find an exit for her immediately," said Kennedy. "It'll give us time to get Willow, Tara and Giles back. They probably know a lot about other worlds."
"There's something else we need to think about," said Faith. "You remember that guy Caleb we met on the way into town?"
"Yeah," said Kennedy. "That preacher guy on the road who hurt Shannon before we dealt with him."
"Well Shannon reminded me earlier that he said he had something belonging to the slayer," continued Faith.
"Didn't Tara say he was connected to the First Evil?" asked Gwen.
"Yeah, she did," said Faith. "I forgot all about what Shannon told us in the rush to get here. I suppose this guy might have had it in his car. We had a quick look inside but didn't search it."
"Or he might have had it wherever he was going," said Kennedy. "I bet he was going to join up with the Bringers. Shannon said they were his boys."
"So we need to find the headquarters of these Bringers and search it," said Buffy. "OK everybody be on the lookout for any sort of Bringer HQ. If you spot any Bringers see if you can follow them back to their base, if you can do it without taking too many chances."
"I'll ask Kate if the police found that guy's car when I get back," said Gwen.
"Did that Bringer we caught say anything before he died?" asked Xander.
"No eyes, no tongue," said Amy which provoked a chorus of disgust "but he had a few interesting things in his pockets from before he was a Bringer. He used to be a man called Silvio Cannesta and he was a farm worker."
"People like that move around a lot," said Xander. "But it might mean the Bringer HQ is somewhere out of town."
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Jasmine came out of her bedroom in the Hyperion Hotel well fed and very satisfied. Such nice people. She went downstairs where Wesley was waiting for her.
"The TV people will be here tomorrow," he said. "You'll be going out live."
"Good," said Jasmine. "Once I've made my broadcast the main networks should pick it up as a news item. That'll take everything past the point of no return."
"On the other hand you can put that off for the time being," said a woman's voice from behind them. Darla entered the foyer from the back of the hotel. As it was broad daylight outside she had presumably entered the building from the sewers.
"Hello Darla," said Wesley smiling. "I'm sure you're happy to meet Jasmine."
Jasmine smiled and walked towards Darla, her hands outstretched. Suddenly she was propelled backwards by an unseen force across to the other side of the foyer. Drusilla appeared from behind Darla holding a short stick with a bright red jewel secured to the end.
"Ooh goody," said Drusilla, "it worked."
Wesley rushed forward towards the two vampires angry that anybody should attack Jasmine. In his present state he had no interest in his own safety and was easy meat for Darla who dodged his lunge and knocked him unconscious.
Jasmine stood herself up glowering and started forward again. "If you think that pitiful magic will protect you..."
Darla held up her hand. "We know that won't stop you for long. We just want to stop you long enough for you to listen to us. We've got a message for you."
Jasmine stopped. "A message, why should I be interested in any message?" she asked.
"As you can see your devastating attraction is having no effect on us," said Darla. "In fact we can see what you really look like. Do you want to know how?"
"She doesn't want to share, oh no," said Drusilla. "She wants the whole cake. Naughty girl."
"You're not the only power in this world," said Darla. "We work for another, somebody who is visiting for a while."
"You work for Glory," said Jasmine. "I know she's back."
"That's right, Glory," said Darla. "But Glory's not your enemy. She just wants you to stop what you're doing for a while. She'll be leaving this world soon. She wants you to stay here quietly for a few weeks until she's left because what you're doing will mess up her plans. After she's left you can do what you like."
"I can already do just what I like," said Jasmine laughing. "Why should I do what she likes? What does she offer me?"
"Her friendship if you do as she asks," said Darla. "You really don't want her for an enemy."
Jasmine shook her head and started forward. "I have my own timetable...
Suddenly there was a loud bang and a bright flash. The room was temporarily plunged into darkness. As daylight returned Jasmine found herself alone in the foyer with the unconscious Wesley. Drusilla had been ready for another attack from Jasmine and had used another spell to cover the escape of the two vampires.