Thanks for the reviews. And to answer your question BAKAMAN wolfblades are hybrid werewolves. Instead of a human being cursed with becoming a werewolf, they are just pure demon. If you want to know how they look, think about the werewolves in the movie Underworld. Also I'm working on some new chapters for problems with the soul, so hopefully I can get those posted soon.

Also check out my new fic, Son of Sparda.

Chapter 9

Last Moments

"Spike! What the hell are you doing here?" Angel asked.

"Captain Forehead..." Spike started.

"Spike who the hell are you... Angel." Buffy said shocked as she saw her once former lover.

"Buffy..." Angel said as he looked at her hard and then sniffed the air. "Why do I smell Spike on you?" he finally said after a moment. Buffy nearly dropped her scythe as she looked at him wide eyed. But she was saved from questioning as Willow climbed into the limo.

Buffy then gave Angel a look, that said 'We'll talk about this later.'

"Hi Angel!" Willow said as she hugged the vampire. Ripping his glare away from Spike, he managed a smile.

"O.k., you must be Buffy's little sister, Dawn?" Fred asked the brunette in front of her. At her nod she continued.

"We'll then you'll be coming with me and Lorne. Since there's no traffic, we should make it to L.A. in about an hour."

"What!" Dawn shouted. "I'm not leaving. I'm staying to fight." Dawn wanted her to know.

"Dawn..." Jesse called out her name as she touched her on the shoulder. "did Buffy teach you how to fight?"

"Not really but..."

"Dawn we need experienced fighters. We can't afford to have anybody in the way."

Dawn turned all shades of red as she shot Jesse dirty looks.

"Look Dawnie, Jesse's right." Xander said as he looked down at her. "Buffy want be able to concentrate on the fight if she has to worry about you."

Dawn then shot Xander a dirty look, until finally she nodded. "O.k., but you better protect her Xander!" Dawn said as she hugged the man she had a crush on for years.

"Alway's." Xander said as they broke their hug.

"Ok, are there anymore non-combatants?" Lorne asked the group.

"Yeah those two." Xander said pointing at Anya and Andrew.

"What!" both of them shouted at the same time.

"But I have to seek redemption for what I did. Much like on..."

"Oh shut up Andrew!" Anya shouted. "Xander I'm not leaving you."

"Aun please! Just leave and be safe, Ok. I promise after all of this is over, we'll meet up in L.A." Xander promised.

"Alright I'll leave. But you better not die on me Xander Harris." Anya said as she grabbed Andrew by the arm. No one saw Jesse frown at these turn of events. 'Damn, if she lives I might not ever be born,' she thought bitterly to herself.

"Come on monkey boy." Anya said as Lorne led the way to their car.

"Hey that hurts!" Andrew shouted as Anya tighted her grip on his arm.

"Alright, everybody else come with me." Wes said walking ahead of the group. "I've acquired a mode of transportation for us." he said as he led them to a school bus.

Thirty minutes later, the entire group met up at the warehouse Jesse came into this time at.

"Alright, everyone arm yourself as you like. In about six hours were going to go after The First." Buffy called out to everyone in the room. It was a good thing that the Fang Gang brought tons of weapons with them. Or Buffy and Co. would have been screwed.

"Buffy we need to talk." Angel said as he grabbed her roughly by the arm.

"What the hell about?" she asked as she wrenched her arm free.

'Is she really this dense?' Angel thought to himself. "About Captain Peroxcide over there." Angel said as he pointed at Spike. Who was about to walk up to the two, before Rona and Principal Wood stopped him.

"You're not telling me something and his scent… I remember it pretty well."

"You vampires. Didn't anybody ever tell you the whole "smelling people" thing's a little gross?" Buffy asked starting to get a little pissed.

"Is he your boyfriend?"

"Is that your business?" Buffy snapped totally pissed.

"Are you in love with him? (beat) Okay, maybe I'm out of line but this is kind of a curve ball for me. I mean, we are talking about Spike here."

"It's different. He's different. He has a soul now."

"Oh!" Angel said taken aback. "Well. Buffy, What?" Angel said now totally confused. "That's great. Everyone's got a soul now.

"He'll make a difference." Buffy reasoned.

"You know, I started it. The whole having a soul. Before it was all the cool new thing." Angel said not hearing what Buffy just said.

"Oh, my god, are you twelve?"

"I'm getting the brush-off for Captain Peroxide. It doesn't necessarily bring out the champion in me."

"You're not getting the brush-off. And besides you're the one that left me remember." Angel flinched a little at that last part.

"Ok, Ok." Angel said as he held his hands up in mock surrender. "What you do is none of my business. All I'm saying is be careful. And before I forget I brought something else as well." He removes a silver amulet with a multi-faceted crystal at its center from his pocket.

"I can already tell you, I have nothing that goes with that." Buffy joked.

"It's not for you."

"Splainy?"

"I don't know everything." Angel admitted. "It's very powerful and probably very dangerous. It has a purifying power… cleansing power… possibly scrubbing bubbles. The translation is… anyway, it bestows strength to the right person who wears it."

"And the right person is?"

"Someone ensouled but stronger than human. A champion. As in me."

"Or me."

"No. I don't know nearly enough about this to risk you wearing it. Besides, you've got that real cool axe-thing going for you."

"Angel, this time the bad guy is killing off the potentials. Trying to destroy the Slayer line. So I'm taking that real personal. And honestly I need anything that'll hurt The First." she said as she held her hand out.

Angel looked at her hand for a long moment. After what seemed like an eternity he handed over the the amulet.

Spike saw Angel grab Buffy. Not liking what he saw, he started on his way over. Until Rona and Principal Wood stepped in his path.

"No time to talk, luv." Spike said stepping aside as he heard Buffy and Angel talking about a dangerous Amulet. "I have some business to take care of." he said as he continued walking. But he stopped dead in his tracks as he heard Rona's voice.

"So you don't have time to talk to an old friend?" Nikki asked with a grin, that quickly turned into a scowl as Spike turned around.

"Nikki?" Spike asked wide eyed.

"Yes it's me, Vampire." she answered looking at Spike with utter disgust.

"Nikki...I...I..."

"Is this the part where you tell me you're sorry or that you have a soul?" Nikki asked. "Well guess what Spike I don't care." she said stepping up to him. "All I want you to know is that when this is all over, I'm coming after you." she threatened.

"And if she doesn't get to you, I will." Principal Wood said as the two walked off. Leaving a stunned Spike in there wake.

"Damn does anybody ever stay dead in this town?" Spike muttered as he walked off.

"Good move getting Dawn and the others out of here." Willow complemented Jesse as she sat down beside her. On the ride over Angel told her all about Jesse's little plan.

"Thanks." Jesse said with a smile.

"Listen." Willow started as she began to fidget. "I just thought that since this might be our last day together, that we should get to know each other better."

"Sure what do you want to know?" Jesse asked.

"Well I already know that you're from L.A. and a Slayer. So why don't you tell me about your parents. Well your mom at least, I mean I already know your father..." Willow began to babble but caught herself. She really didn't know that Jesse was enjoying that though.

"I'm sorry for babbling so much." Willow apologized.

"It's Ok." Jesse said with a lopsided grin.

'There it is again.' Willow thought to herself. 'Everytime that girl smiles, it just reminds me so much of Xander.'

"Well let's see." Jesse started. "About my mom. Well she was very pretty and she had firey red hair like your's. Oh and she was a very powerful Wicca." she stated proudly. That last part seemed to perk Willow up.

"Your mom was a Wicca?" Willow asked. At Jesse's nod she continued. "Is she the one who got you started doing magicks?" Willow asked.

"Actually my Grandpa..." she cast a look over at Giles who was having a heated discussion with Wes, Xander, and Faith. "was the one who got me started in spells. But after he died my mom taught me some more advanced stuff."

Willow laid a sympathetic hand on her shoulder and pulled her into a hug. After that they sat and talked about a few things and what they wanted to do after this was all over.

"I'm sorry to disturb you two." Buffy said as Angel and Giles stood behind her. "But we need to talk strategy, if were going to beat The First."

Everyone sat in a circle planning strategies and shooting down others. That was until Jesse stood up and formulated a plan.

"Me, Xander, and Angel did a recon mission last night." Jesse stated.

"What!" Buffy exploded. "Damnit Xander you could have been killed!" Buffy said as she started to stand, only for Angel to restrain her.

"Buffy just hear her out." Angel advised. Buffy shot Xander a glare but then sat back down.

"As I was saying we did a little recon and we found out that The First is going to split it's forces. Since it's doing that we need to do likewise."

Then Jesse went on to explain her plan to the others. There assignments given out some got rest, while others talked about the times to come.

Slight Intermission

30 minutes before the big battle

Nightfall

Wesley sat in a corner by himself loading his shotgun. The cool feel of the metal strangely soothing him.

"One apocolyspe down, one more to go." he muttered to himself. The whole time he didn't know that Jesse was standing behind him.

"That's not going to work you know." Jesse said startling him.

"Oh Jesse it's just you." Wes said calming down a bit. "What do you mean it want work?"

"I was talking about your shotgun. For your part of the mission you're going to need silver." she said as she handed him one of her silver bullets.

"There's a replicator spell on the bullet. That way, you don't have to worry about running low on ammo." Jesse explained.

"How does a little girl know such difficult spells?" A shocked Wes asked.

"What can I say. I learned from the best." Jesse said with a shrug as she sat down beside him. As they talked for awhile Jesse began to get up until she remembered to do something.

"Wes, will you promise me something?" Jesse asked.

"Of course. Anything." Wes said as he looked up at the girl.

"Just promise me that in May of 2004, that you will read what's on this CD." she said as she handed him the disk that was in her bag.

"What's so important about...?"

"Just promise me Wes!" Jesse said with alot of emotion in her voice.

"Alright." Wes promised as he put the CD into his pocket.

"So you're a Principal of a school now?" Nikki asked her son. At his nod Nikki continued.

"I'm so proud of you!" she squealed as she gave him a hug. "I knew you would make something of yourself." she said as she looked up at him. Only to see that he was sad.

"What's wrong honey?" she asked already knowing the answer.

"When you take that amulet off you're going to leave me again." Wood said as a tear rolled down his eye.

"Oh, honey." Nikki said sympatheticly as she squeezed his hand. "Remember what I told you when you were little?" she asked. When he didn't answer she continued. "Even if mommy has to go away, I'll..."

"Always be in your heart." Wood finished for her.

"That's my boy." she said as they hugged one final time.

"So you're Gunn right?" Xander asked the slightly older black man in front of him.

"That's right dawg. And that's with two N's, so don't forget it." Gunn said with a smile.

"I got it." Xander said with a grin of his own.

"Listen, I was talking to Deadboy..."

"Deadboy?" Gunn asked.

"Yeah... that's a little nickname I have for Angel." Xander replied with a sheepish grin.

"Deadboy..." Gunn said getting used to the name. "I think I like that."

"Well, We'll talk about that later. What I want to talk about now is Cordy." Xander stated. And to his surprise, Gunn shared the same look Angel did almost a day before.

"Listen man, you need to sit down for this." Gunn said as the two went into a corner and started talking.

"Alright guys get on the bus. Everybody else you know what your mission is." Buffy said to her troops. As one everyone stood and walked out.

When Buffy turned around though Spike was standing there watching her.

"What is it Spike..." Buffy started but was cut off when the vampire kissed her.

"What was that for?" Buffy asked as they broke their kiss.

"It was for good luck." Spike said simply as he put something in his pocket and walked out of the door.

Buffy turned back to the three who are left: Giles, Willow and Xander. One by one she looks at the best friends she's ever known, then smiles.

"So… what do you guys want to do tomorrow?" Buffy asked.

"Nothing strenuous." Willow replied happily.

"Well, mini-golf is always the first thing that comes to mind." Xander offered.

"I think we can do better than that." Giles said looking over at Xander.

"I was thinking about shopping- as per usual." Buffy said.

"There's an Agnes B in the new mall!" Willow said excitedly.

"Good. I could use a few items." Xander said already making a list in his head.

"Aren't we going to discuss this?" Giles asked. "Save the world and go to the mall?"

"I'm having a wicked shoe craving." Buffy said ignoring the comment.

"Aren't you on the patch?" Xander joked.

"Those never work." Willow joked back.

"And here I am, invisible to the eye, not having any say…" Giles said feeling left out. Xander, Buffy and Willow start to walk out the warehouse door.

"See, I need a new look. It's this whole eye patch thing." Xander said, already knowing they would make a joke about it.

"Oh! You could go with the full black secret agent look." Buffy said half teasingly.

"Or the puffy shirt, pirate-slash-poet feel. Sensitive yet manly…" Willow said picturing Xander in said outfit.

"Now you're getting a little renaissance fair on me."

"It's a fine line." Buffy puts in as Giles watches his children go with an ironic smile.

"The earth is definitely doomed." Giles says to himself as he heads off to the car to join Wood and Wes.

Buffy, Xander and Willow walk silently together side-by-side. Willow steels herself, then breaks off and heads to the bus. A little further along, Xander takes Buffy's hand and squeezes it, then he get's into Angel's limo. Alone once more, Buffy takes one last look at the night sky and gets on the bus with her friends.

TBC...

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