At 2:45, Debbie walks through the halls of Laguna Hills High School towards the front door, along with hundreds of other students who are relieved the school week is over and looking forward to the weekend. Her hair, more frizzy than curly today, is pulled back. She wears blue overalls, black boots and a red long-sleeved t-shirt, and carries her books in a satchel slung over her right shoulder. Amidst the hustle and bustle, she is overshadowed by her larger, faster-moving classmates. No one seeing her now for the first time would guess that she's a super hero. When she gets outside, she looks up at the clear blue sky and the bright sun. It actually makes her slightly depressed because it reminds her of the limitations of her relationship with Devlin. She knows there's something sick and inhuman about that. At the same time, she knows there's also something natural about missing someone you love and wishing they could be with you more often. By now, Deb was used to the inner conflict, accustomed to the passionate, boundless affection she felt when she was with him and to the loneliness and self-loathing she felt when they were apart.
Then there was the one big fear that was always in the back of her mind. Debbie knew that Devlin was a massive aberration. She had no illusions about the true nature of vampires. They were monstrous killers. Maybe her love had changed Devlin. But for how long? And if he returned to his prior, natural behavior, would she have the strength, the will, to kill him? Being a Slayer had really screwed-up her life. At the same time, it left her life less screwed-up than it had been before. That's what separated Debbie from Buffy: she had so much less to lose. And, she had no one to control her. No one to stop her from abusing her powers in an irresponsible manner. Deb walks through the parking lot. Two jocks in their varsity jackets lean against a Saab. In front of the driver's door is Ryan, who is six foot seven and white. To his left is Shawn, who is six foot five and black. Surrounding them are four girls who talk and flirt with the handsome athletes. Deb stops ten feet behind the girls and drops her heavy, book-filled bag. The girls hear the crash and turn around. "I just need a minute, tops," Debbie tells them. They turn up their noses, glance at each other with disgust and revulsion, and walk away from Debbie as if she has the plague. Naturally, the guys aren't happy.
"Whatchya do that for?," Shawn asks.
"Relax, boys. Your groupies will be back. Especially if you win tonight against El Toro."
"If?," Shawn scoffs. "They lost to Viejo by ten. We beat Viejo by twenty. We're number one in the coaches' poll for a reason."
"Because El Toro always wins, and nobody likes a winner. Especially the folks they beat. And they've beaten us for eleven straight years."
"Since when were you a fan, Debbie?," Ryan asks. She walks to within three feet of him.
"Does it matter?," she asks. Shawn can tell this girl's trying to intimidate Ryan, which he thinks is utterly ridiculous.
"Yo Ry, this female got a beef with you?"
"Please. I barely know her." She glances to her right towards Shawn.
"He's right. Nothing personal." She puts her left hand to Ryan's throat and slams his back into the door and the back of his head into the roof.
"Damn girl! Why you trippin'?," Shawn exclaims. She reaches out her right hand, grabs his right wrist and twists it.
"Is that your shooting hand?"
"What the hell is your problem?" Deb sticks her right foot out and, sweeps his left leg outward and causes Shawn to fall on his face.
"The bigger they are . . . " Shawn gets up.
"That does it."
". . . the more they complain," she jokes. Shawn balls his left hand into a fist.
"I never hit girls. But wit you, I think I'll make an exception." Deb squeezes harder on Ryan's throat.
"Just go," he wheezes.
"Aw come on, Ry! You just gonna let some girl push you around?" Deb lets go of his throat, and a red-face Ryan stands up, gasping and coughing.
"I said go." Debbie turns around and looks up at Shawn.
"I think you should listen to your friend and fellow ringer who transferred here a couple months before you did." Shawn takes Ryan aside.
"Whassup with lil' miss psycho?," Shawn whispers.
"Dunno. But something is. Let it go. Catch up with the honeys. Tell 'em I'll be right there." Shawn shakes his head in bewilderment before walking away.
"Alone at last," Debbie says as she walks up to Ryan. He looks desperate to end this little meeting.
"What do you want?"
"Nice car. You parents buy it for you?"
"No. It was my dad's. He gave it to me when he bought his Jag."
"So he won't mind if I borrow it for a few hours?"
"What the hell are you talking about?"
"Incentives. You'll get it back. After you win tonight."
"Say what?"
"You heard me."
"Deb, this is pretty low. Even by your standards."
"Did I just hear you insult me?" Deb gets some satisfaction out of making a guy more than twice her size quake in his boots. "I'll let that one slide. Wouldn't want to hurt our star center on the day of the big game."
"Deb, what I said, that was no insult. It's advice. You've lost it. You were living on the edge, but now you've fallen right over it."
"You're trying to help me. That's sweet. And guess what? I'm trying to help you. I'm giving you a reason to work harder, play better, get a few more highlights on the local news, catch the eyes of a few more scouts. Everybody wins."
"Why are you doing this to me?"
"Same reason you've dated half the cheerleaders. Because you can."
"You're sick. You know that?"
"I prefer to think of myself as a highly creative motivational therapist."
"And if we don't win? Then what?"
"Let's hope we don't have to find out. Relax Ry. I'm probably bluffing."
"If you're willing to do this, I'm not so sure."
"I may be crazy, but I'm not stupid. And I'm not eager to go to prison. The question is, what can I get away with? What will get you in trouble with mom and dad without getting me in trouble with the cops? You'd be amazed with how much a helpless-looking little girl can get away with." Ryan can't believe what he's hearing. And no one likes to be bullied.
"Why me? What did I ever do to you?"
"Why you? Cause you're lucky."
"Lucky? How does this possibly make me lucky?"
"I meant it the other way around, Ry. Now be a good boy." She holds out her right hand, palm facing up.
"Jesus Christ. I don't freakin' believe this."
"There are a lot of things in Southern California that you wouldn't believe. And all of them are a lot scarier than me." Ryan takes his keys out of his pocket and drops them in Deb's hand. "Don't need your house key. Or this one. Or this one."
"Actually, that's for the trunk," he tells her. Ryan's beginning to fall prey to the Stockholm Syndrome.
"You think I'm taking this thing grocery shopping?" She hands the three keys back to him. "Drive home, drive back. Four miles tops. If you don't believe me, check the odometer when you get it back."
"At least you can get home. And what am I supposed to do? Walk?"
"Take Shawn's ride. Or go with one of your fan club. A lucky guy like you always has options." She opens the driver's door.
"Stop calling me that while you're stealing my car. It's, it's sick." She sits down inside.
"I'd call it ironic. And true. Good luck, Ryan. I'll be rooting for you." She shuts the door, starts up the engine and drives away while Ryan catches up with Shawn and makes up excuses to hide the fact that he's just been victimized. Ryan may have felt angry, as well as a little sorry for himself. But he felt far sorrier for Debbie.
Lorne and Angel walk out of Angel's office. Angel gets his messages from Harmony. "Looking forward to your first big on-location assignment?," Lorne asks.
"Playing a high school student everyone wants to talk to and hang out with shouldn't be much of a stretch for me. But I have one small problem."
"What's that?," Angel asks.
"After lunch, I checked my calendar, and I realized that I'm supposed to meet Paris and Nicky for drinks at eleven."
"Drinks," Angel asks with trepidation. "Are they vampires?"
"Depends who you ask," Lorne jokes. "Don't sweat it. I'm meeting them for brunch in half-an-hour. I'll let them know you may be a little late."
"Brunch? Lorne, it's 4:15 in the afternoon," Angel points out.
"Granted, it's a little early for them. But they're always willing to lose a few winks in exchange for a free reading. Which, considering their vocal abilities, is no picnic. But their father pays this firm on a hefty retainer, and you can't say no to clients."
"Is their father a demon? Or a wizard of some sort?," a clueless Angel inquires, causing both Lorne and Harmony to laugh.
"You know Angel, you're no longer living in a hole in the ground. Start acting like it," Harmony jokes.
"I had no idea you knew them," Lorne confesses to Harmony.
"We met last month. I thought I saw someone attacking them, so I knocked him unconscious. Turned out he was a photographer. That pretty much scared the rest of the paparazzi away. Next thing I know, I'm their best friend. We hit a few clubs. I take care of a few jealous ex-girlfriends of the guys they've slept with. By the way, Shannon Doherty scratches. And bites. Bitch is lucky that I didn't bite her back."
"Last mont. Photographer," Lorne says as he thinks about this. "Wait. You're the smart blonde chick they mentioned to me."
"Wow! No one's ever called me smart before."
"Everything's relative," Lorne quips. "Compared to them, you're Albert Einstein."
"I, for one, think you're very intelligent," Angel assures her, thinking that Harmony fishing for a compliment.
"Boy, was that genuine," she comments.
"Oh deary," Lorne cautions, looking worried. "Paris asked me if I knew your old boyfriend. I'm praying that she wasn't referring to - "
"Who are these girls?," Angel asks again.
"Right now, I think it's best that you don't know," Lorne suggests. Angel goes back into his office. Lorne looks at Harmony. "Now, if you'll excuse me, I'm going down to neurology to get a few memories erased."
When Deb gets home, she heads straight for her room. The shades are drawn, the lights off, and Devlin sits in front of her computer wearing only a pair of sweatpants. "What do we got here? Porn? Vampire chat room?," she jokes before putting her arms around him from behind, rubbing her hands against washboard abs, kissing him on the right cheek and resting her chin on his shoulder.
"Something just as graphic, if you use your imagination. Police blotters."
"Are you always this dull when I'm not around?"
"Of course. I don't like leaving you out of the fun. I spotted two suspicious killings from last night. One's is Chula Vista. "
"That's all the way down in San Diego," Deb complains.
"The more vampires you kill, the further they run away to feed."
"That's ninety minutes each way. Plus two or three hours waiting for the vampire to rise. Our evening's shot."
"Burial's tomorrow."
"There goes Saturday night. And how do you know they turned this one?"
"Simple. I'll hack into the coroner's office. Get a look at the pdf's of the autopsy report."
"All that'll say is neck trauma' and blood loss.' We already know that."
"I'm looking for the photos. If he's drained, the chest will be sunken. The blood loss is a lot less when a guy gets vamped. Plus, he gets part of that back from his sire. The ones who've been turned look normal. That's the giveaway."
"At least I don't have to break into the funeral home and open the casket."
"You're too old for that Nancy Drew crap."
"Where's the other one?"
"Corona."
"I miss when we could patrol graveyards in this county."
"It's only thirty miles east."
"And in the middle of nowhere. Even if the vamp made it out of the cemetery, he wouldn't be able to find anyone to bite."
"Could be worse. I've talked to guys who rose in the middle of North Dakota, or western Nebraska. In this country, it doesn't get much worse than rising in the prairie. Nothing but farms for miles. Everyone's inside their homes and out of reach. You can't steal a car cause they're all going seventy. If you're lucky, you get to a bar before closing time. Otherwise, you have to find a barn to hide out in until the the sun goes down again."
"I didn't know a vampire's life could be so precarious," Debbie jokes. "I mean, when they don't have me too worry about." Dev smiles and puts his right hand on top of her head, nudging her left cheek next to his right cheek. She puts her left hand on the left side of his face.
"We need an urban environment to provide shelter and food. Why do you think so many vamps come to South Cali despite the endless sunny weather? They love the sprawl. Thousands of miles of sewer lines to take you anywhere, anytime. Demon fighters run a gang out of a city, or even a whole county, and there's still an endless suburban frontier for them to hide out in. It's guerrilla paradise for the bloodsuckers."
"Nice use of the third person," she notes before sitting on his lap. "They? And what are you?"
"I've always liked people better than vampires. Even before I met you. Most of my kind are dreadfully dull."
"And why would that be? What do they lack that humans have? Oh, I know. A soul," she answers ironically.
"That's only part of it."
"So you admit that it makes a difference."
"Of course. But it's only half of the equation. If you lose the soul, and all you think about is feeding, then you've devolved into an animal. Lacking a soul is a necessary, but not a sufficient, condition."
"Are you stuck forever with all that college boy geek-speak?"
"Wasn't college. I already talked like that when I was your age."
"You really were a nerd."
"Still am. I've always been multifaceted."
"A regular renaissance vampire," Deb says as she stands up. He laughs at her joke. "Let's go watch tv."
"Anything on?"
"I was thinking of putting in one of our tapes. Something romantic."
Dev stands up. "Taxi Driver?"
"I'm serious."
"So am I. Love drives the whole plot. Okay, it's obsession. But he gets the girl in the end."
"How bout Casablanca?"
"Good pic. But Double Indemnity. Now that's romance."
"Guy gets seduced into killing a woman's husband?"
"Exactly! He risks everything. His career, his conscience, his life. It's like a Greek tragedy, with much better clothing and locations."
"Doesn't sound like the movie I saw. May it'll look different the second time around." Dev smiles. "Now put some clothes on." He frowns.
"Four words I dread hearing," he replies.
"You're getting too used to getting your way." She snaps a towel into his chest."
"Ow!" He puts on a Sonic Youth "Daydream Nation" t-shirt and follows her out of the room. "Deb, I got no problem being whipped. Long as you don't take it literally." She chuckles and walks up to him, putting her hands on his chest and pushes his back into the wall.
"I thought you liked it when I hurt you."
"Up to a point."
"Tell me when we reach it."
Spike walks into Angel's office around six. "I need wheels."
"You totaled another one?"
"No. Just got bored with it." He tosses Angel the keys.
"Which one would you like?," Angel forces himself to say politely, despite how annoyed he is with Spike's presence over a quibbling matter such as this.
"Yours."
"How typical."
"That a yes?"
"No."
"Fight you to the death for it?"
Angel laughs. "You're joking."
"What if I'm not?"
"Then you need to get a life. Why are you so content with my office, my friends, my vehicles? Doesn't living in my shadow bother you?" He's hoping this makes Spike fly off the handle so they can have a breakthrough which leads to Spike spending less time around Angel.
"Not possible. It's too bloody small." Angel's disappointed that Spike responded with humor. He opens a drawer, pulls out a set of keys and tosses them over.
"Corvette."
"That must be the '57." Angel picked the keys at random. "Perfect for a guy in a mid-life crisis. Or a, post-life crisis, as the case may be." Spike leaves and passes by Harmony's desk in the lobby.
"Spikey. I mean, Spike. Can I ask you something? It's about Devlin."
"You plan on chatting up the bloke?"
"No! What kind of an idiot do you think I am?"
"A very fetching one." Harmony tosses a pencil at Spike, the point entering his chest two inches to the left of his heart.
"Bloody hell! That was close. Someone can't take a joke."
"I know. I thought the pencil gag was really funny. Why didn't you like it?" Spike likes the attitude, and sits on the edge of her desk after pulling out the pencil and tossing it on the floor. "I wanted to know what to expect. What's he like?"
"Not me."
"How? He's totally following in your footsteps."
"Dev's low-key."
"You mean laid back? Cool as a cucumber?"
"And joined at the something to this Debbie girl."
"Nothing like a vampire becoming a slave to his mortal enemy. No offense."
He walks away from her, smiling away the insult. "I see you've still got some bite, Harm." Spike takes the elevator down to the garage and drives home, where he finds Devlin sitting on his couch. Deb's at her friend Cynthia's house for dinner, so he had some time to kill before the big game.
1,800 people are on their feet, about two-thirds cheering for the hometown Laguna Hills Cougars, and one-third cheering for the visiting El Toro Cowboys. 52.9 seconds remain on the clock. Cougars 70, Cowboys 75. When the time-out ends, the Cowboys prepare to take the ball out from under their own basket. Ryan looks to his right and sees Debbie in the crowd, dangling his car keys. He wipes the sweat from his forehead. Twenty nine points, twelve rebounds, four blocks. And still they had their backs to the wall. The Cougars try a full-court press. After some initial difficulty the Cowboys break the press and find their power forward streaking towards the basket all alone. Having stepped up to try to force a mid-court trap, Ryan races back as he sees the ball floating towards the open man. The forward takes the ball on the left side of the basket and tries a right handed lay-up to ice the game. But Ryan comes from out of nowhere and whacks the ball off into the backboard. The crowd roars at this spectacular rejection. A Laguna Hills guard races the other way and stops at the top of the key as if about to try a three. Instead, he sets up Shawn for powerful alley-oop jam from the right side of the basket. The crowd's on its feet, cheering them on. Forty seconds to go. Down by three. While trying to break the press and cross the half-court line, the Cowboys' guard steps his left foot on the sideline. The Cougars work to get the open three, but their best shooter misses. Ryan hustles to get the rebound, does a drop step to pivot around his defender and slams it home to pull the team to within one point with 15.2 seconds left. Cowboys call time-out. Their lead is rapidly slipping away. Laguna Hills just might pull off a miracle.
Debbie comes down from the bleachers and stands next to the doors under the Cougars' basket. Ryan can see her to his right. He is guarding the guy in-bounding the ball, putting his hands up and jumping up and down to try to block the passing lanes. Just before the officials were going to call the Cowboys for five seconds, he throws it in to Ryan's right. Ryan leaps over, grunts as he stretches out his right hand, and gets a piece of the ball. It misses its target and bounces towards the sideline. Shawn races up from midcourt and grabs it, leaping in the air as he goes out of bounds. Shawn saves the ball by passing it to Ryan, who's posted up fifteen feet from the basket on the right wing. The defense closes on Ryan. His small forward makes a back door cut towards the left side of the basket. Ryan hits him with a perfect no-look bounce pass. He leaps at the rim from head-on and reaches out his right hand to lay the ball in and give the Cougars the lead. But the ball bounces off the back iron. A giant "ohhh!!!" can be heard from the hometown side of the bleachers. Ryan cries out "NO!" as he lunges desperately for the rebound of what should have been a sure thing. He tips the ball, which ends up on the ground ten feet behind him. Two opposing guards struggle on the floor for possession. Jump ball. Arrow points in the Cougars' direction. 5.4 seconds left. Down by one. Coach calls time-out. Debbie heads out the door. She didn't even bother to see how it ended.
Outside, Devlin checks the bushes near the parking lot. "Fe, fi, fo, fum. Something wicked this way comes." Devlin is kicked in the back and goes down. When he gets up, he sees two vampires before him: the one who kicked him, and the one who had been hiding in the bushes. The one who kicked him is a beefy fellow who has four inches and sixty pounds on Devlin. The other vampire has two inches and thirty pounds on him. The bigger guy wears a studded leather jacket and dons a bandana atop his head. The vamp to his left wears a sleeveless leather jacket and has several tattoos on his well-developed arms. Both men wear brass knuckles on their right fist. "Cute look. Kind of a The Outsiders' meets Grease' theme. Am I supposed to feel intimidated?"
"No stupid. You're supposed to feel dead," the larger one says before throwing a right hook. Devlin steps to his left, watches the punch sail by and sweeps the vamp's legs, causing him to fall on his face. The second vampire steps up and throws a right cross. Devlin grabs his opponent's fist in his right hand and kicks him in the groin with his right foot. He follows that up with two left jabs and a right uppercut, putting the vamp on his back.
"Technically, when I'm dead, I'll feel nothing," Dev responds as the bigger vamp tackles him to the ground and pins his shoulders down. The vampire tries a right jab. Devlin moves his head to the left, and his opponent's bras knuckles slam into the pavement. Devlin pushes the vampire off of him and stands up. Just in time to get clotheslined by his other opponent's tattooed right arm. "Now that hurt," Dev says as he quickly gets to his feet and retreats before getting attacked from both sides at once. "It would have hurt more if I needed to, you know, breathe." They attack simultaneously. Dev circles left, keeping a step ahead. The vamp on Dev's right tries another haymaker right hook. Dev ducks and nails the guy's chin with a right uppercut. The vamp on Dev's left lands a left hook to Dev's face, knocking him back six feet. "Using the other hand. That I was not expecting. Would that make you the one with a brain?" He charges ahead of his partner. Dev ducks his left jab and blocks his right cross, pulling his right arm behind his back. "Apparently not." Devlin pushes the man in his back, sending him towards the bushes. A wooden stick shoots out of the shrubbery, impaling the stunned vampire. His partner knocks Devlin down with a left hook kick, only to get distracted by the sight of his buddy turning to dust. Devlin sweeps his legs out, putting the vampire on his ass as Devlin rises to his feet.
"We have some very unusual flora in this community," Devlin jokes as his opponent gets up. It's the smaller one with the tattoos, though he's still large enough to make any observer predict that he could toss Devlin up and down the parking lot. When his opponent attacks, Devlin fires back, staggering him with a leaping right roundhouse kick. Dev takes a left jab to the face, ducks a right cross and knocks his opponent back with a left spin kick to the chest. "This is getting wicked predictable."
"Slayer slave," his opponent sneers before trying a right roundhouse kick that Dev backs away from.
"That reminds me – I'm conducting a survey. Did you come here to feed, or to kill me for betraying my own kind?" The vampire takes out a stake in his left hand. "Bit of both, then?" He blocks the vampire's right hook by grabbing the guy's right wrist with his left hand. But that was only a diversion for the left thrust for Dev's heart. He takes hold of the stake when it's a foot from his heart, head-butts his opponent in the nose, and lands a right roundhouse kick to his chest. He staggers backwards a few steps, then notices the piece of wood sticking out of his chest. Devlin had knocked him into another one of his helpers, who snuck behind the unwelcome out-of-towner. "Was that what you were trying to do?," Devlin asks, making light of his opponent's failed attempt at misdirection. He turns to dust. Devlin's other vampire helper emerges from behind the bushes. They screw apart their saw-off pool cues and put them away in the carrying cases slung over their shoulders. "Good work, Luiz. Sweet timing, Paulie. They never knew what hit 'em."
"You think they'd have given up by now," Paul comments.
"Moth to the flame," Devlin responds. "But even the ones who are scared of Debbie think we're a bunch of patsies who rely on the humans for protection."
Luiz chuckles. "They got it backwards."
"Count your blessings. If every vampire did his homework before going on the warpath, the world would be a very different place." Dev looks at his watch. "Shouldn't the game be over by now?"
Ryan takes the inbounds pass on the right wing, just outside the three point line. He drives right, pivots round, takes a left dribble as he enters the lane and goes for the left-handed layup. It won't fall. But the whistle is blown. His defender hacked him, preventing Ryan from making the go ahead basket. Now he has to win the game at the foul line. One second remains on the clock. When he gets the ball in his hands, the crowd quiets. You could hear a pin drop. Ryan glances to his right, and notices that Debbie is gone. That seemed odd.
Debbie was in the team locker rooms, checking for unwelcome intruders. In the visitor's room, she stops in front of one locker and opens it. A vampire leaps out and grabs her. She slams the vamp's forehead into the lockers behind her, then tosses him to her left. He crashes into the wall and falls down. The vampire rises to his feet and makes a dash for the door thirty feet away. But Deb saw this coming, leaped after him and tackles the vampire from behind after he traveled all of ten feet. She gets on top of him, lands two right jabs, puts her right hand to his throat to hold him down, and takes her stake in her left hand. "The boys' locker room. Someplace that would be off-limits to me. I'm impressed." She stakes him and stands up. "As piles of dust go, you're pretty clever." Deb hears the crowd roar. "That must mean we won," she concludes before walking towards the shower area that connects both locker rooms just a few seconds before the stunned losers enter. When the jubilant winners walk into their locker room, Ryan sees his car keys dangling from the mesh front of his locker. That was a lot quicker than he expected.
After stepping outside, Deb spends a few minutes hooking up with her human friends. About fifteen minutes after the final buzzer sounded, they join Devlin, Luiz, Matthew and Sidney. "I'm amazed how many people bet on high school athletics," Dev tells her.
"How much?" He pulls out a thick wad of cash.
"Twelve hundred bucks. Here's your half."
"Half? I'm the one who made it happen," Deb complains as she puts the money in her left jacket pocket. Then she reaches her right hand for the cash he holds in his left hand, which he pulls back.
"Relax, love. Ya know I'm gonna spend most of my share on you, anyway."
"You better believe it," Deb jokes as she grabs Devlin's t-shirt, pulls him towards her and kisses him. Harmony slowly circles round them from thirty feet away. With the thousands of people milling around, there's no way they'll notice her from this distance. The first thought that occurs to Harmony is that, for a Slayer, Debbie seems to have an awful lot of friends.