CHAPTER FOUR

I All in a day, she saw the face in the mirror lie
To her dismay, she saw the child that was in her die
And she cried... overnight
'Cos what she sees... she doesn't like
b The Corrs - All in a Day /b /I

Buffy slumped in the courtyard of the practically ancient house she lived in, now down one member of the Slayer family. She heard footsteps behind her but barely looked up. Willow sat on the steps with her while Connor and Giles edged past to stand in the grass.

"I should have been there." She tried not to look at Connor. She knew he felt just as guilty as she did that Alcina was dead.

"Buffy, it's not your fault. Even if you had been on patrol, you might not have been with Alcina. It could have just as easily been you and Concetta out there," Willow said, sympathy woven into her face.

"She was the youngest of us." Buffy caught herself before she punched the stone step. "I should have been with her."

"Buffy, Willow's right. Alcina was no younger than you when you started with Merrick." Giles shoved his glasses up. "Given Concetta's account of what happened, I doubt that there would have been anything you could have done to prevent this. You wouldn't have been any closer to Alcina than Concetta was. You can only move so fast."

Buffy sighed. "I know. I just wanted one day of fun. It's been way too long. And we had fun, too, and then this happens. I can't help but feel a little guilty."

"Understandable." Giles took a few steps closer to her. He looked like he was going to say something more comforting but Buffy froze him with a warning look. She didn't want to be comforted just yet. He changed tactics. "Would you like me to contact Alcina's parents?"

"Please. You're so much more eloquent than I am." She looked up into his soft blue eyes, seeing the fatherly concern there.

He smiled just a ghost of a smile. "Thank you. I'll do that straight away." He slipped past her and Willow, going back into the house.

Willow stood, patting Buffy on the shoulder. "If you need to talk, just come find me."

"Thanks, Will. I'll be okay. I'm just kinda being self-indulgent." Buffy wrinkled her nose. "I don't think I've done that since Sunnydale turned into a smoldering pit."

"Sometimes we're allowed. You've been training so many girls since the whole big bad ugliness." Willow smiled wryly.

"I think I'm getting a little old to be selfish," Buffy muttered under her breath. She saw Connor's head jerk up at that as if he heard. Willow's eyes dimmed.

"It's not selfish to ask the person with the most experience to handle the call home, Buffy. Giles is looking for something to do with himself, too. It's make the call or do book work," Willow said.

"He'll do both," Buffy replied.

Willow nodded. "You okay? I'd like to go cast a seeker spell."

Buffy waved her on. No one knew what her ploy to stop the First was going to do to the longevity of the Slayer line. Every time they got a report of a Slayer death, Willow tried to use a seeker spell to see if a new Slayer was chosen or if the magical pool was now dry. The only problem was they didn't know where all the activated Slayers were yet, and they couldn't be sure if she did get a hit, if it was a previously undetected Slayer from the fall of Sunnydale or if it was someone totally new. She just prayed she hadn't doomed the Slayers to die out in one generation.

"I'm sorry," Connor said, softly.

She glanced up at him, wondering if he meant for Alcina's death or for inviting her on a date that ran over into patrol time. She decided it was both. She patted the steps next to her and he sat. "It's not your fault any more than it is mine. We had to eat, right? We were just about to go out on patrol. I keep telling myself that, but it's not helping."

"I know." A rueful look tugged down his whole face.

She leaned against his bony shoulder. He had sharp angles, even sharper than Spike's. She knew people worried she was too thin. Buffy worried that Connor was. Her mind flashed back to something that happened earlier in the evening. "You went off on your own at the scene like you were following something. What did you see?"

"Nothing." He shifted nervously.

She saw a shadow falling over his face. "It sure looked like you did."

"If I had seen something, Buffy, I'd have told you." Connor got up, his eyes evasive. "I have class tomorrow morning. I should try to get some sleep."

Buffy followed him inside to where everyone was in the living room. Between Giles, Riley, Spike, and Angel trying to protect her or keep things from her, not exactly lying but not exactly telling the whole truth, she had finally developed an eye for when men were doing that to her. "So, what is it you're not telling me?"

"Nothing." Connor paused, seeing all eyes on him. Andrew, Kennedy, and Concetta were working the books. Giles was just putting the phone down, a heaviness in his eyes. Willow glanced up from the sparkly grid floating magically in mid-air.

"There's something." Buffy grabbed Connor's arm and his eyes slotted. For the first time, Buffy got a glimpse of the danger that lurked below his surface. "You wanted to play on the team, Connor. There are no secrets here." What a joke, she thought. That's all she and her friends had always been, a bundle of secrets. If they had just practiced open communication, so much pain could have been avoided.

"I don't know anything, Buffy." He pulled a long face. "Not for certain."

"Guesses are entertained here," Giles said, gently.

Buffy saw Connor take stock of all the eyes on him, a hostile little family who had just lost a sister and saw him as withholding help. His shoulders slumped, and he dragged a hand roughly through his hair.

"It reminds me of something I came up against once," Connor said, reluctantly. "A soul eater."

Giles' eyes opened wide, an excited look on his face. "Which kind?"

"Uh, there're kinds?" Connor grimaced. "Look, I can't say this is a soul eater. I don't know if they kill like this. I don't know if they even kill."

"So you did see something," Buffy said, feeling overly irritated at him. "Why didn't you just say so?"

"Because I didn't see it. It's like a hint of something, you know." He swung his fist against his thigh. "I didn't want to focus the investigation on the wrong thing if my impressions were off."

"If you didn't see anything, then why do you think it's a soul eater?" Willow went back to looking at her grid.

Buffy saw that evasive look touch Connor's eyes again. She put a hand on his shoulder and tried to look encouraging rather than accusatory. He smiled up at her then turned incredibly melancholy like he was being forced to tell a deep dark secret.

"I caught a familiar scent," Connor replied, tension tightening his voice.

Buffy shook her head. "There were no smells in the alley."

"Yes, there were," he argued, obvious anxiety in his eyes. "only you can't smell it."

"So how can you?" Andrew shot him a disbelieving look.

"My senses are...superior, I guess. I know what you smell like. I'm not saying that to be gross or anything. You all could disperse into the city and I could find each and every one of you, track you to another city if I had to." Connor paused and his cheeks colored as he surveyed the uncomfortable looks on everyone's faces. "Today, earlier while I was working on my paper and you ladies came out of the work out room, I could tell Giles had sparred with all of you but Andrew only with Alcina and Concetta."

"You could smell them on us?" Buffy felt a twist forming in her stomach. "Like a vampire."

As some of her friends shifted nervously, Connor's face went dark. She saw that glint of fury again. "The reason I didn't want to say anything, beyond the fact I'm not sure about what I smelled out there, is the way you're all looking at me right now, like I'm a freak."

"It's not exactly normal," Concetta said, clutching a book to her chest like a shield.

"I can't help it. This is me." Connor's fists balled. "This is what I can do."

"You said senses, as in all of them?" Willow's eyes burned bright with the curiosity Buffy had long ago come to associate with her friend.

"All of them."

"You mean you can hear us?" Kennedy had a horrified look on her face. "Even when we're...you know...in the other room."

"It's why I sleep with the radio on, to cut down on the noise." Connor seemed to shrink before Buffy's eyes. She suddenly felt bad for doing this to him in front of everyone. She had no idea this was what he was hiding. If she had known, she would have spoken to him privately; more damn secrets. "Besides you and Willow aren't that interesting to listen to, no offense," Connor continued and Kennedy's glare could have smelted iron. "Not even when you're fighting."

"We don't fight," Willow said with an oddly desperate edge. Her eyes flicked over to Buffy.

The Slayer understood. Willow and Kennedy's relationship had been born out of the fear of dying and its sister, the need for closeness in dark times. Buffy understood that intimately. She just didn't know it that was any more solid of a foundation than any of the relationship she herself had ever had.

"Fine. Your discussions then." Connor's lips thinned. "I try not to listen. I don't like eavesdropping. It's why I'm glad you offered me this room. The dorm...I can barely shut it all out. If I stay in the other house, Andrew's computer games keep me awake; that's why I like to bivouac here. I wouldn't feel right about asking Andrew to turn off the computer being a guest and all."

"So, you think you scented this soul eater," Giles steered them back on track, and for that Buffy was grateful.

Connor's expression said he was as well. "I was going to tell you after you made your calls, before I turned in. I just didn't want to put us on the wrong track if I'm mistaken. I didn't see or hear anything. Scent's trickier than sight, and I only came up against one once. But if it is a soul eater, you need to change your attack strategies."

"Now you're going to teach Slayers how to fight." Kennedy sniffed. "Did you overhear us whispering our weaknesses?"

"Kennedy!" Buffy snapped, feeling an urge to bitch-slap her. Ever since the day Kennedy showed up, she had done nothing but challenge everyone. Her brattiness was trying Buffy's patience. "Connor, most of us would be very thankful for any suggestions you have."

"They're fast," Connor replied.

"What isn't?" Kennedy waved him off.

Connor was out of his chair and across the room before Kennedy could move. He pressed his finger tips to her chest just above the swell of her breasts. "That's all it has to do, Kennedy. Touch you, and you're done for. It's not like a vampire that you can beat off of you once it latches on." Connor dropped his hand, stepping back.

"You got too close, didn't you?" Buffy saw something in his eyes she had never seen before, fear.

Connor tore a hand through his fine hair. "I couldn't move after it touched me, couldn't breathe, couldn't do anything. I felt it stripping out my soul, hollowing me out, and there was nothing I could do to stop it. I can't describe that kind of pain. If I had been alone in that fight, I'd be...well, I'm not sure, dead with my soul gobbled up or alive but a mere soulless husk."

Concetta unconsciously started reaching for her forehead to make the sign of the cross before she caught herself. Buffy could understand the reaction. If it was the same creature that killed Alcina and the civilians, they suffered a more horrible fate than she could imagine. Buffy remembered heaven and how welcome her soul had been, how comforted. What did nothingness feel like?

"So you're suggesting we go out with crossbows and the like," Buffy said.

"Yes. You don't want to touch them if you don't have to. We beheaded the one we were fighting with a sword. Giles, do you want me to help you, see if I can find the thing in your books?" Connor turned his gaze to the older man.

"Connor, didn't you say that you have class tomorrow morning?" Buffy reminded him.

"Yeah."

"You go to bed. If we find anything, we'll wake you up," Buffy said, and to her surprise, he didn't argue. She expected him to fuss but he seemed to be just as happy to escape the room.

"Okay. Just call my name to wake me. I don't like to be touched when I'm sleeping." A pained look fluttered over his face. He had a face made for pain, Buffy thought suddenly. "Sometimes I hit if you shake me awake."

Buffy's eyes widened. "Good to know...do I want to know why?"

"Bad things happened," was all he said before going to the guest room.

"Guess we should get cracking at those books," Willow said, still looking embarrassed.

Buffy nodded without enthusiasm. "Giles, could you and I take a minute." Her eyes canted over to the door to the courtyard.

Giles seemed somehow startled but he nodded, following her outside. Buffy walked to the other house before looking back. Was she out of earshot for Connor? How much had Angel and Spike overhead over the years, keeping inside any pain, joy, or betrayal so not to feel even more ostracized by their abilities?

Giles clasped her elbow. "Buffy, are you all right?"

"I wish I knew, Giles. I feel so selfish for having these thoughts right now." Buffy turned from him, not ready to look into those fatherly blue eyes. "Alcina is dead, and I'm busy being wigged out over Clark Kent in there. I just wanted to have something normal in my life, and now he says all the stuff he just did." Buffy kicked a stone. "Who am I kidding? I've always known he wasn't normal but I didn't know he was this weird."

"And why is this a problem, Buffy?"

Buffy looked at Giles, checking to see if he had head damage that kept him from understanding the problem. Didn't he understand she no longer trusted her judgment in men? Just look at her track record. "We don't know why Connor's different."

"Buffy, it seems to me you're looking for me to disagree or give permission for you to see him," Giles said. " I have always kept out of your love life as much as I could, for better or worse. All I'm going to say on this is you've known from the moment you met Connor he wasn't an ordinary boy, and yet you felt comfortable enough to befriend him and invite him to stay. He's told you he was born this way, and we've all accepted that. I think you should trust your own instincts. For my part, I think he's a decent young man, however odd. If you think you're going too fast or if he makes you nervous, you know what to do. You have to make up your own mind about Connor."

"Guess everything has risks." Buffy tore a hand through her long hair. "I'm wasting time. Let's go and do the research thing."

Giles caught her shoulder as she moved past. "I know you've had bad luck with men, no worse than that. I can understand your concerns."

"But I'm the only one who can make a decision. I know...maybe this should just end before it begins. I don't need the complications, especially with someone I know won't be here long." Her shoulders slumped and she saw a flare of concern in Giles' eyes.

"We may not be here long ourselves, Buffy, just until Concetta's ready to be on her own and I select an appropriate Watcher for her," Giles said, and Buffy stared. She hadn't even thought about leaving Italy. She wasn't sure she wanted to, no matter the exorbitant expense of Rome and the fact she did not have Dawn's gift for languages. "And I also remember being your age and the thrill of a fling, enjoying it for what it was." He shot her a cheeky grin made all the more devilish by the moonlight.

She eyed him sourly. "You used to be so bad."

"Occasionally, I still am."

Her hand shot up. "That's all I want to know about that. Let's get back to work."

Buffy felt guilty about taking the time to worry about her personal life when a young girl had been slain. She couldn't say why Connor's revelation had been the straw that broke the camel's back but it had been. Maybe she needed a vacation, a real one, no demons, no slaying.

The looks her friends gave her made it clearer why she had been so upset. They had been made uncomfortable by knowing what Connor could do and it struck Buffy as odd. They had been at equal risk of being eavesdropped on when Angel and Spike had been part of the group, and it never bothered them. Maybe they hadn't realized, or maybe they were all subtly on guard around the vampires because of what they were and hadn't known to do so with Connor.

Buffy regretted forcing the confession out of Connor. It had been the wrong way to go about it but looking back, she didn't know how else she would have handled it. She needed all the facts and now she had them. She hadn't known he had super senses to go with his strength. If she had had an inkling, she wouldn't have pushed it.

She settled down with a book and the research began in silence. They slowly relaxed into a more normal session. Buffy couldn't keep track of the hours spent looking for soul eaters. Andrew and Kennedy were asleep on the books. Giles and Willow looked ready to follow. Buffy had already sent Concetta off to bed. The youngest slayer had been hardest hit. Death was still new to her.

"I think this is the best we're going to do with what we know," Giles said, lining up some books.

"Three possibilities is pretty good," Willow said, rubbing her tired eyes.

"I'll go wake up Connor." Buffy headed to the bedroom. She almost didn't want to bother him. She knew Connor slept poorly as it was, not that she had spent any time sleeping beside him, but living in the same house it was obvious he did not lay about in bed long. She knocked softly on the door. "Connor." She heard him shuffling around. When he opened the door, his lank hair was sticking up at odd angle. Standing there in jogging pants, his eyes puffy, Connor looked suddenly old.

"Find something?"

"A few things." She took his hand. "Thanks for doing this."

"No big. If it's what I think it is, I want it killed." He stretched, his shoulders popping.

"I know."

"I've made everyone uncomfortable. I'm sorry," he said lowly. "Do you want me to go back to sleeping at the dorm? I'll understand."

Buffy looked into his big, blue eyes and saw his hurt. This was her chance to make a clean break, get out before she was all the way in. It would sting him but he'd get over it. "No, I want you to stay," her heart said, totally out of synch with her brain.

He nodded and went into the living room. Giles waved a hand at the three books on the table. Connor stabbed a finger on the right hand one, even as Giles was asking if any of them looked right. "That's what I'm talking about. I won't swear that's what killed Alcina, but if I had to guess, yeah it is."

"Thank you, Connor." Giles scowled.

"That's not a happy face," Buffy said, a sinking feeling forming in her gut.

"It's the hardest soul eater type to kill. This one you could kill with holy oil." Giles tapped the one in the middle. "And sea water for this one. The one Connor selected is far more resistant. It takes decapitation or removal of the heart."

"We can do that," Kennedy said, still half asleep.

"So long as you remember Connor's admonishment to not let it touch you. He was quite right in that. It only takes a moment for it to take your soul that way," Giles said.

"Nothing's ever easy." Buffy sighed. "Why don't we all call it a night since there's not much left of it?"

"No arguments," Kennedy said, getting up. She held out her hand to Willow.

Willow shook her head. "Go on, I'll be there in a minute."

Kennedy gave her a strained look, spared a hostile one for Connor, then headed back to her bedroom.

"Buffy, can we talk?" Willow asked.

"Sure," Buffy said, suspecting what about.

"Is there anything you need me to do?" Connor asked, as Giles gathered up the book with the right soul eater in it. If he planned on reading more before sleeping, Buffy considered kicking her Watcher's butt.

"No, just get some sleep Connor. If we need anything more, it can wait until after your class. It'll take us that long to come up with some sort of plan," Buffy said.

He seemed unconvinced but he headed off anyhow. Buffy sat on the couch with Willow.

"What's up, Wills?"

Willow looked at her hands. "I didn't want you to think I'm not happy."

"Why would I?" Buffy didn't wait for an answer since she already knew it. "Willow, everyone fights from time to time. This is why Connor didn't want to say anything about what he can do. Guess he knew how freaked out people can get."

"I'm not freaked," Willow protested.

"That's why we're sitting here talking about it at three in the morning, Willow. Your relationship's not my business. I'll listen to whatever you want to tell me about it, but I'm not going to pry." Buffy tried to look comforting but she doubted she looked anything but tired. "Connor doesn't want to either. He tries very hard not to hear things, I guess. Imagine how hard it has to be with him."

"But it makes you wonder, doesn't it? What he is." Willow's wide eyes seemed oddly nervous. Buffy felt it had more to do with Willow being concerned over butting into Buffy's relationship, than any fear of Connor.

"Do you think he's dangerous?" Buffy was curious if Willow had any feelings on the matter. She was learning to trust her friend again after all the unpleasantness of last year.

Willow mulled it over for a moment. "I think I should say yes since there's so much we don't know about him, but no, I don't think he's some big bad hiding in plain sight."

"He's one of the good guys, don't ask me how I know..." Buffy said, wishing she felt more confident of it. Part of her had no doubt; the other part, the part that kept getting burned, was less sure.

Willow smiled. "Isn't a Slayer supposed to sense that sort of thing?"

Buffy scowled. "Yeah, but my radar gets jammed a lot. Damn, ever wish we were just normal girls?"

"Not any more. It'll make you nuts thinking about it."

Buffy got up, stifling a yawn. "Truer words never spoken. I need to get some sleep."

"Good night, Buffy."

"You, too, Wills." Buffy wished her brain would stop flip-flopping on how she felt about Connor. She wished she could concentrate on the more immediate problem of the soul eater. She wished for sleep. She got none of her wishes.