Devlin seduces Harmony with his gradiose plans. Elektra leaves LA and makes an attempt on Debbie's life. Plus, Jeta begins her private war with the Nazis, and comes across a lonely Spike along the way.
Harmony arrives home at half past two in the morning to discover Devlin leaning back on her bed, reading the dirty poems of Catullus. "Devlin? What a surprise."
"Sorry. It was comfy. I took my shoes off, so I hope you don't mind," he says as he stands up and puts them back on.
"What brings you here at this late, late hour? Shouldn't you be in bed with your Slayer?"
"She's sleeping. I decided to take a drive and think. Pretty soon, I found myself in your pretty neck of the woods and elected to stop by for a progress report. How goes the espionage?"
"Good. Really good. When are ya gonna kill my new friends? Now that they're real friends. Some of them are kinda gross. And a few think they can get in my pants, which is so not happening."
"Thursday. Friday at the latest. Be sure to meet new vampires every night. I'd like to eliminate as many autonomous nests as possible."
"And I'm still getting paid by the staked vampire?"
"Money is not an issue. At a thousand dollars a head, I have enough to purchase the deaths of every vampire west of the Rockies," he boasts as he slowly walks over to her. "But there are things money can't buy. Like prestige, and reputation. You want those things don't you? You want other vampires to think highly of you?"
"Don't they?"
"I'm talking about being able to enter any crypt, any catacomb, anywhere in the world and have other vampires rush up to you, eager to kiss your ass. Which, I imagine, is exquisitely firm yet delightfully supple," he adds with an impish grin.
"Do you mean do that literally?," she asks nervously. "Cause that's kinda gross." Devlin chuckles and stands to her left, whispering into her ear.
"I'm a student of history. Always have been. You know why? Because it helps me avoid the sort of grandiose fuck-ups that did in Spike. There are movements, waves that sweep away everything that opposes them. The trick is to catch the wave and ride it for all it's worth. Like surfing. Did you surf?"
"No."
"Neither did I," he responds with a shrug, moving over to her right ear. "Our wave is coming. Last year, the Slayers were nearly eliminated. But they hung on, and now the survivors are more powerful than ever. This year, it's the vampires who are being eliminated. But those of us who survive — if we survive — will have power and privileges beyond our current dreams. A new world is about to be created. The question is, which of us are strong enough to be a part of it."
"Me, hopefully," she offers.
"I hope so too. See Harmony, there are two kinds of vampires: those who deserve to die, and those who deserve to rule. The Slayers are doing us a favor by getting rid of the worthless riff raff. That makes our lives so much easier."
"How? Pretty soon the Slayers won't have anyone to kill but us."
"Have you ever been to Paris?"
"No."
"Would you like to go?"
"Yes," she responds with a big smile.
"Imagine being the only vampire in Paris. You could feed off whoever you want, without fear. No one would notice a few corpses in a city of five million. Slayers wouldn't bother to patrol it. They need nightly kills. Spending weeks hunting a lone vampire, that's tedious. They'll have better things to do. This is why your work in San Diego is so important. When they are only a handful of vampires in Southern California, Slayers won't waste their time coming here, and Buffy won't waste her money sending them. I'm creating a safe haven for the likes of you."
"But, but I don't hunt. Not anymore."
"Because of Angel and his well-meaning policies. Guess what? He's not going to be head of Wolfram & Hart forever. The smart money says there's a fifty percent chance he'll be gone by the end of May. Either the Senior Partners will force him out, or he'll destroy the LA branch, or die trying, or succeed in becoming human. After which I hope he'll get polio and spend his remaining days in a wheelchair since he doesn't have any vaccinations. Not because I dislike him, but for irony's sake."
"Where are you getting this from?"
"People on the inside. People in other branches. This is why he can't punish my sources. The place is seething. Ninety percent of the employees want to eat him alive. Fifteen percent of them literally. They follow his orders and pretend to be loyal, waiting for the signal from on high. Truth is, they won't get it. The Senior Partners think Angel's corruptible, which is why they've kept him alive all this time. But Angel's not my concern. Buffy is. Do you know what Wolfram & Hart thinks of her?"
"They hate her? Please tell me they hate her."
"They liked her so long as she was keeping the world from ending. But they disapprove of her current endeavors. I mean, the name of the game for them is demon protection. Hundreds of Slayers roaming the earth causes them a fair amount of anxiety."
"Are they working with you? To hurt her?," she adds with a hopeful smile.
"No. I'm not crazy about demons myself, and they're not ready to back an unproven asset. But it's nice to know I can fall back on their generous resources in the future, if need be."
"And where does Little Debbie fit into this? I haven't heard one word about her."
"Debbie and I have a splendid fifteen months left, until she graduates high school and goes on to college. After that, if anyone hurts her, I will exact painful reprisal upon them and anyone they care about. In the meantime, I have an organization to build. Even the strongest among us is powerless by themselves against a Slayer horde. We have to work together if we want to survive. Once we do, the Slayers will figure out which vampires are dangerous and which ones are dustable, and they'll leave us alone out of self-preservation. It's amazing what organized, disciplined vampires can achieve. Have you ever heard a dozen Slayers moaning and crying? Of course not. You've never even seen one helpless, desperate Slayer. But you can imagine it. Now multiply by twelve, and you'll understand what we can achieve. You want in?"
"Yes. Please. I mean, I'm working for you, aren't I?" She's amazed how charismatic the normal-looking Devlin can be when she's just listening to him and not looking at him.
"You and I, Harmony, we don't get to go to Heaven. But I believe that if we do the right things, we can each make our own little Paradise right here on Earth." That's what he has done in Laguna Hills with Debbie. "Don't you?"
"Who doesn't?," she weakly replies, having never conceived of her vampire life in such exalted terms. Devlin was so much more convincing that Spike or that Pyramid Scheme guy. Plus, he had one dead Slayer and twelve maimed Slayers to his credit.
"Keep up the good work." He leaves. No one had ever said that to her. Not even Angel, who she actually works for. Harmony realizes nerds are good for something: coming up with plans for world domination. She lies on her bed, and can smell Devlin. She smiles. He smells like success.
After incinerating Ivan, Jeta makes her way back to Auschwitz. It had been less than a month since he had taken her away from here. A guard in a watchtower sees someone approaching, and fires his gun to scare them away. Jeta leaps up into the tower and chokes the man to death, watching the life slowly leave his face. She takes his rifle, puts on his hat and coat leaps down inside the camp. It takes Jeta a little while to get her bearings and figure out which one of hundreds of identical sheds her family was in. This gives the other guards time to notice the intruder. She clubs to death the first guard who approaches her, and drives the rifle butt through the skulls of the next two. The guards may be elite SS, but they're not used to people breaking INTO a concentration camp, and take a little while to react. Meanwhile, Jeta finds her old quarters by the identifying numbers on the building. The Gypsies are startled to see one of their own armed and dressed like a Nazi. And a woman, no less. These are different people. Her family's already gone. She has this sinking feeling as it sets in that she will never again see anyone she has ever known in the past. All that scheming against Ivan and his minions distracted her from the fact that her life had been completely and utterly obliterated. If she went home, she'd be hunted down, and not just for being a vampire. Her world was gone. Sure, that's the case for any vampire. But at least Spike still had London. Angelus still had Ireland. And they each had Drusilla and Darla, respectively. Jeta detested her sire. She was a stranger in a strange, war-ravaged land.
All this introspection distracted her from the vital task of making a clean getaway. The sound of boots approaching reminds her of this necessity. She runs out, holds the gun at her hip and shoots down five soldiers to her left. To her right, a soldier barks in German for her to put down her weapon. She turns and sees eight men with eight guns, all pointed at her. She drops the rifle — which was out of ammo, anyway — and puts her hands up. "Surely, it doesn't take eight big, strong men to overpower a lone, frail, young woman?," she asks coquettishly. The men open fire simultaneously, putting eight bullets in her chest and sending Jeta flying backward. They stand over the corpse. Then an officer takes out his pistol to put two bullets in her brain, just to make sure. Jeta kicks the gun out of his hand and bounds to her feet, stunning the soldiers. "Those things really burn." She takes advantage of their utter shock to leap twenty feet away and make a run for it. But the soldiers aim and opening fire, pouring lead in her direction, hitting Jeta six more times before she falls down. Jeta crawls under a shed, hiding in the six inches between the floor and the earth. The soldiers inspect the area carefully, but can't find any signs of life. They leave, puzzled by what they saw and fearful about what they will tell theirs superior concerning the nine fatalities.
Two thing Jeta had never felt before as a vampire were fear and pain. She hated it. She hated the helplessness. She hated the loneliness. During the two hours she spent wedged under there, Jeta resolved to have her revenge, but in a less reckless manner. When she had not heard the sound of boots for a good while, Jeta decided it was safe to crawl out and sneak back over the fence. She limps, in great pain, to the nearest railroad tracks and heads west, jumping on the first supply train that passes by. She sits in an empty boxcar, painfully pulling out bullets and planning her next attacks. No vampire could take on an army. She would have to hit them where they were weakest.
"Lovely day we're having," Spike says to Angel Tuesday afternoon. "Makes you feel like standing up and jumping for joy. Oh. Sorry," he impishly adds about Angel's badly injured knee.
"That's strange. I thought you wanted her dead, on account of her being evil?"
"I also know she wants you and me to track her down. Just as she'd love you to send a few commando teams her way. Which, from wut I'm hearing, is just what you did."
"They're combing possible hideouts, trying to take her by surprise. The girl does sleep during the day."
"She's been known to pull an all-dayer. If you're lucky, you're just wasting everyone's time, and she's already moved on. If you're not, you'll be down a couple more bodies."
Debbie walks into her house at ten past seven at night, carrying a brown shopping bag. Devlin sits on the couch, watching the Jim Lehrer News Hour. "You're late."
"You were late coming home last night. I got your blood. Two half-gallons. Plus some nutmeg and cloves. I think by now the butchers just accept that I'm some freak." She puts the two bottles on the kitchen counter. Devlin walks in. There's some awkwardness when they meet in the narrow corridor between the refrigerator and the stove. "Room's all yours," Deb finally says, walking back into the living room.
"How did your chemistry test go today?"
"Fine."
"Do you need any help with that paper on the similarities and differences between the Populist and Progressive Movements?"
"I think I can handle it on my own." Suddenly the tedium is shattered as Debbie's front door comes crashing down off its hinges. Standing on the porch is Elektra. "What the fuck?"
"So this is Little Debbie." She has two inches on the Slayer. Debbie smiles and walks of to the vampire.
"You must be Devlin's kid sis." By now, Devlin has raced into the living room and tries to hold Debbie back.
"Hello brother. I'm confused. See, I searched and searched the good neighborhoods, only to find you living on the white trash side of the O.C. How beneath you." Debbie pulls back her right fist. Dev grabs her harm and drags her a few steps further away from the door.
"Let's not do anything stupid," he cautions to both ladies.
"Like kill a vampire? It's my job." She reaches into the weapons chest behind the couch and takes out a stake and crossbow.
"Gawd, this is so freaking ordinary," Elektra says as she looks into the house. "I thought the love nest of a sexy Slayer and her rebel vampire boy-toy would look a little more Anne Rice-y. Where's the hotness?"
"You're looking at her," Devlin says as he stands behind Debbie. She points the crossbow in her right hand at Elektra, who stands fifteen feet away. The vampire puts both hands behind her back.
"Oh, heavens to Betsy, she has a crossbow," Leks responds with mock fear. "You're not the first Slayer to try and kill me. Not even close."
"Did any of the others have backup?," Debbie asks. She puts her stake in her belt, pulls her left hand back and runs it down Dev's left cheek. He smiles and puts his right arm around her waist. It's the first time she's touched him since the nightmare. Devlin goes bumpy and leans his head a little to the left, putting the shadow of his fangs across Debbie's neck, tormenting Elektra by reminding her what the siblings could do if they worked together. He's glad to see it's upsetting his little sis. After all, he's always been her protector, from her very first night all the way up to yesterday evening.
"You're going to end up just like dad. You know that, right?"
"And who will you end up like? Mom? Or grandmom?" Leks is a little freaked by the reference to dead Darla. But she holds her ground, and the tense stand-off continues.
"Get off my property. Get out of my town. Leave my state," Debbie demands.
"Or what?," Leks asks with a wicked laugh. "You'll kill me?" Deb pulls the trigger on her crossbow.
"No!," Devlin screams, throwing Debbie to the ground and stepping in front of her. Leks parries the arrow with a two-inch star that she then tosses for the Slayer. Dev takes it in the ribs, and it bounces painfully around his insides. As Deb stands up, Leks fires two one-and-a-half inch stars designed for speed and penetration. The first one heads for Dev's throat or Debbie's face. Dev puts up both his arms to form an X, and the star slices a chunk off the top of his left forearm, spins through one left forearm bone and lodges itself in the other. The second star goes through the left side of his stomach, comes out his lower back, breaks Debbie's skin and bounces off her lowest rib. Elektra looks at her mangled brother on the ground, shakes her head in disappointment, and takes off. Debbie gives chase, her stake in her left hand like a relay runner's baton. She's caught every vampire she's chased, but she can't catch Elektra, who actually builds a hundred yard lead over the mile they run. Leks stops in a parking lot just off the highway, gets in, starts up as Debbie closes in on her, gives the Slayer the finger out her window, cuts off traffic on the on-ramp, nearly causing a four car pile-up, and gets onto the interstate. Debbie catches her breath and heads home. She looks inside the doorway and sees Devlin. Given the speed of the fight, she hadn't notice how badly he was hurt.
"Oh God. Oh God. Dev, I'm so sorry," she says as she rushes to his aide. "I'll take you right to the hospital." He chuckles.
"Vampires don't go to hospitals, love. Just get some bandages."
"Your arm is about to fall off! It's hanging on by a thread."
"I'll be okay. I just have to wrap and immobilize it."
"You're bleeding. Really badly."
"Yeah, I've ruined your carpet," he jokes.
"Don't move." She rushes off to grab her first aid kit.
"It's nothing personal, Deb. My sister's never liked any of my human friends." Debbie comes back and wraps gauze around his badly-bleeding left arm. "Put that chunk of my severed flesh in the trash, would you love?" She looks over his right arm.
"What do I do? What do I do?"
"Get some tweezers, pull out the star."
"Couldn't that make it worse?"
"Not as bad as having a sharp chunk of metal in my arm forever. Just pull it out the way it came in." Debbie thinks tweezers will be too weak, and fetches tongs. "Are those sterilized? No matter. Not like I'm going to get an infection."
"Hold still." She puts her left hand on the far side of his arm to hold it together, reaches the tongs in, struggles for a few seconds, then pulls them out.
"Ow!"
"Dammit! It slipped off."
"What?" She reaches her fingers in and pulls the star out by had. "So, how do I feel on the inside?," he jokes.
"Cold, and mushy," she responds while wiping her fingers clean.
"Umm, there's still the matter of bandaging my arm together." He puts his left hand to his right wrist and adjusts the forearm while grunting. "There. That's about where the bone should set. Now put them on lightly. Otherwise it could squeeze the bone apart."
"You sure are fussy."
"How would you be in my situation?"
"Possibly passed out from the shock."
"And the blood loss. Which would make my job that much easier." She slowly and carefully wraps his forearm.
"How's that?"
"It should hold."
"Can you walk?"
"Can you carry me?"
"Okay, I guess you've earned it," she concedes with a small smile. Debbie props the front door back up, picks up Devlin and takes him to her bedroom.
"I meant the couch."
"No, no. You're staying in here tonight. So I can watch over you."
"Where will you sleep?"
"Well, you know, I got that paper to write. If I finish, I'll just lie on the floor."
"Of course. I am kind of fragile, now. And if we were in the bed together, and you rolled over on my arm."
"Right." Talk of being in bed together makes nervous.
"Deb, wait," he cautions as she gets to her door. "I'm still bleeding." She sees the trail of blood that's followed him.
"Damn! How'm I gonna get that out?," she jokes about the carpet as she ducks into the bathroom to bandage the entry and exit wounds from the last projectile. "There you go. All plugged up."
"One problem." He rolls on his stomach. "Do you see anything on my back?" Debbie looks close and is alarmed to see the first star lodged next to his spine.
"Oh my God."
"Can you cut it out?"
"Yeah. I think so. Eww. And, wait. It's kind of near your spinal cord."
"Figures. That's where it hurts. So take a knife, cut it out and bandage me up. Then, wash all the blood out of the tub, or else the next time you take a shower, it'll be pretty gross."
"What would have happened if it went through your spine?," Debbie asks nervously.
"I'd be paralyzed. Temporarily, of course. Spike had that happen once. But I think he also had a couple broken vertebrae, so this wouldn't be as bad."
"You sure you wouldn't die? Cause like twelve inches further up, and that kills a vampire." There's a few second's pause.
"I told you I'd die for you, Deb."
"I'd prefer it if you didn't." Dev smiles.
"That's sweet, Deb. Now be a dear and stab me in the back."
After washing up on the New Jersey Shore, Spike took the train to New York City and caught a British merchant carrying supplies for the invasion of Sicily. In Casablanca, he was able to board a boat for Cadiz in southern Spain. From there, he went up to Seville and began searching for Drusilla. Given how easily Dru stood out, she shouldn't be too hard to find. Spike sets himself down with a bottle of wine in a dingy tavern, where three male guitarists strum away while an attractive woman dances the flamenco. About a dozen onlookers clap with the beat and cheer her on. A dark-skinned woman stands up and starts dancing next to her. Then, to the shock of everyone, the stranger starts dancing with the woman, as a man would. Spike's intrigued. The woman seems helpless to resist Jeta's advances as they whirl around. Spike leans forward as things get increasingly heated. Soon he's on the edge of his chair. They get closer and closer, until they're doing something Spike's pretty sure isn't the flamenco. The woman tries to resist, but Jeta's grip is too tight. She spins the helpless woman around in a demented waltz. After all that time at sea, Spike's missed the fairer sex. Especially such pleasing examples as these two. The music gets faster and faster. The dancers twirl around as if glued together. Then they stop on a dime. Jeta tries to kiss the Spaniard on the lips. When she is rebuffed by the horrified woman, Jeta goes bumpy and bites the left side of her neck. The music stops at once and people scream and evacuate. Spike smiles ear-to-ear, stands up, goes bumpy and starts to slowly clap.
"Bravo. Bravo! Now that's a bloody show-stopper." When Jeta is finished lustily draining the unfortunately attractive woman, she looks her fellow vampire over. He wears a long dark brown leather coat, like many of the Nazis. But he speaks English. Perhaps he's working as a German spy.
"I kill all National Socialists, even the vampires," she says in German. "Join me, or face my vengeance." Spike recognizes "nach-zehrer" as a German word for vampire, but that's about it.
"The name's Spike. William the Bloody. Perhaps you've heard of me. I've never heard of you. Which is a bloody shame." Jeta begins to sense that this gentleman isn't German.
"Vil-helm."
"Yep," Spike replies with a chuckle. "I Vil-helm, you Jane."
"Vil-helm," she says again pointing at him. "Yetta," she adds, pointing at herself. Each of them assumes the other's an idiot.
"Yetta. That's a funny name. You know, you don't look German." She puts her face within a few inches of his and carefully surveys Spike's head. Wow, this woman was beautiful. And strange. Plus a little bit scary. All of which Spike liked. She runs her right hand through his hair and pulls a strand out by the roots. "Ow! What the bloody hell?"
Jeta holds the dark brown hair in front of Spike. She shakes her head. "No. Wrong. Hair wrong." She's knows more English than Spike knows German, which is not a lot. "Hair wrong," she repeats. Spike's used to women who don't quite make sense, and quickly figures out what she's getting at.
"You're right. I dyed my hair to make myself a little less conspicuous. The Krauts want to use me as a secret weapon against the Yanks. I'm very much in demand," he brags. Then he wonders how she knew this. Jeta grabs his shoulders, pulls him close and bites the left side of his neck. "Ow! Oww!!" This wasn't a playful bite. She stuck her fangs way in there and drank deep. He growls and pushes her away. Jeta falls down and looks up at Spike. She had such captivating eyes. Then, suddenly, those eyes turned blank for about ten seconds as she stood up and seemed to go into a trance. When she came out of it, she slowly walked over to Spike.
"Drusilla, Angelus, Das Boot, Kaldarash, armán." She then starts giggling uncontrollably and falls to her knees. The last word is Romani for curse.
"You're a Gypsy," Spike guesses. She stops laughing and looks up at him.
"Sinti."
"Whatever. Anyway, Yetta, if that's your name, I'm looking for a woman about your height. Goes by the name of Drusilla." She stands up and smiles.
"Drusilla? Frau!" Spike begins to suspect this German-Gypsy-vampire is also a lesbian, and quite possibly some sort of witch. Jeta's getting annoyed with Spike not understanding her, but thinks he can be of some use, especially now that she knows the Nazis kidnapped him. Jeta draws a swastika on the floor with the dead woman's blood. "Hast," she says, pointing at the symbol. "Hast."
"Okay," Spike replies, unable to comprehend her reference to their shared hatred. Frustrated, Jeta makes an X across the swastika. "Oh. Kill Nazis. I can get behind that. I'm sure we'll run into a few on my way to Dru."
Until she can find a translator, Jeta decides to communicate with Spike in the one language all men understand. She kisses him on the lips and puts her right hand in his pants. Spike's eyes bug out. Maybe she wasn't a vicious, man-hating lesbian. For her part, Jeta wasn't seducing Spike because she found him attractive. She was trying to enslave him so he'd do her bidding, just like Ivan. After a few seconds, she stops kissing and fondling Spike.
"Sure. If that's the direction you want to take things," he says with a smile. She takes his left hand in her right hand and leads him back to her place.