Sunnydale, California
"Oh come on Buff, I know you, what's wrong?" Willow looked at her friend worriedly; it was unusual for Buffy to be so quiet on patrol.
There had been hardly any quips while dusting those pesky vamps. Of course, Willow knew what was wrong. The problem came in a dark, hunky, mysterious shape with brooding dark brown eyes and countless leather jackets.
"What? Oh its nothing, I'm fine." Buffy looked at Willow, she knew that the red headed Witch wouldn't fall for it.
"Oh don't give me that! I know what's wrong and it begins with 5 letters. Now come on lets go to the Bronze, The Dingoes are playing tonight, I promised I'd be there for Oz." Willow noted Buffy's even further downcast expression; Willow mentally slapped herself, Angel is usually at the Bronze and that was exactly who Buffy didn't want to see.
"I'll buy you a double chocolate Mocha, with extra whipped cream." Buffy's face lightened. Willow chuckled, chocolate was always a quick way to the Slayers heart.
At the Bronze, Willow thought, is when I will tell them about Maria. They are going to be wary at first but she knew they would all get along great. Willow was stoked; she had been talking to this girl for about 3 years now and in a few days, she's going to see her!!!
The walk to the Bronze wasn't that far; all in all Sunnydale is an incredibly small town. Just as they were turning a corner, something jumped out at them; it was a vampire, a very strong one at that. Buffy fought hard but he seemed to be better.
Willow rushed at him with a stake but he just swatted her like a fly right into a brick wall. Somehow, the vampire, which Willow decided to nickname Beefy, had knocked out Buffy and ran off with her over his shoulder.
"Buffy!!" She screamed. There was no answer.
- - - - - -
Willow ran the rest of the way to the Bronze, frantic; she pushed her way through the swarming masses of lust filled teenagers to a small table near the coffee bar.
There she could see Xander doing something very stupid with Cordelia's whipped cream from her mocha. It looked like he was doing an impression of a pervy Santa Claus, making a beard with the cream and trying to sit her on his lap. Oz was just in deep thought, his head moving to the music of the new band.
Willow ran to them, they obviously could see how distressed she was because they stood up as she arrived and had on 'worry' faces.
"It's Buffy." Willow managed to gasp out. Fear had crawled up her body and was filling up her lungs, choking her to death. "She's gone. A vamp knocked her out and ran off with her over his shoulder." Oz, always knowing what to do, gave willow a huge sip of his mocha. It really did help, like water extinguishing the fire. Willow smiled lovingly at Oz and then returned to the pressing matters at hand.
"I reckon we should speak to the G-Man, he always knows what to do. Maybe there's some kind of prophecy or ritual with the Buffster as the main ingredient." Xander said, unaware of the cream still on his face.
"I agree, but I can't come, my mother made an appointment with our manicurist. Plus I gotta pick up my grandmother later." Xander whispered something into Cordy's ear; her face broke into a little smile. "Fine! Fine! I'll go help. But you owe me on this Xander. Do you know how long it takes to reschedule a manicure appointment?"
"Oz, are you in? We need all the help we can get with this one. I'm getting some seriously bad vibes from this." Xander glanced over at the teenage werewolf, obviously in a world of his own. "Yo Oz, you coming?"
Oz stared at Xander, "yeah, I go where Will goes, plus this place is a bit jammed for me. Xander, before you go to Giles you better wipe your face. Not cool man." Willow smirked as Xander turned bright red and hastily wiped his face in embarrassment.
The Slayerettes opted to go separately, Cordelia and Xander in her car, Willow and Oz in Oz's van.
"Giles is doing some workouts with Faith. Man am I so glad that Faith is here, especially now, with Buffy MIA." Willow glanced at Oz, his face in deep concentration. She wished she could crawl right into that head of his; he was always so deep in thought.
"Yeah, I hope she doesn't batter him up too much if we have some fighting to do." Oz looked over at the self proclaimed Computer Geek. She looked beautiful with her long red hair sweeping down her back.
"Oz! We have to get Angel. He'll want to know as well, plus hopefully he can help."
"Okay, Angel's first, and then Giles." Oz swerved his van to a quiet and desolate street.
This was where Angel lived; his mansion was at the bottom of the street. It's huge, it also seriously needs a paint job. The paint on the mansion was peeling and crumbling off, the shutters were on their last hinges and the gate was rusted through.
'Maybe we can help him when this whole slayer napping was done, by painting his house and ooh, some house warming presents.' Willow looked at her watch; it was 6:45pm, just 15 minutes after Buffy had been taken.
Confidently Willow walked up to Angel's door and pounded on it. The gorgeous and wet looking vampire opened his door. Willow's jaw nearly dropped open. It was a good thing Oz was waiting in the van because he would've been a bit miffed at the drool coming off Willow. Angel had opened his door in a precariously low hanging towel. His wet hair was spiking everywhere from running his hands through it, his abs and very muscled chest was glistening from the shower.
"Willow! What are you doing here? What's wrong?" Angel looked at the Witch curiously.
Oh, yes Willow mentally scolded herself. Angel is Buffy's, think of Oz, Oz is yours and Angel is Buffy's. She repeated it in her head as some sort of chant. "Angel we need your help. Buffy got knocked out during patrol. Some vamp knocked her out and carried her off." Angel growled and his face changed out of anger. Willow didn't blink an eye, she just continued on talking. "I did think about following him, but I though it would be safer for me and for Buffy if I just came to you and the guys."
Angel stared at her. Why isn't she screaming, or cringing or doing something? For gods sakes I killed her fish, I nearly killed her, I did kill Jenny! She should be running away instead of just babbling to me like I'm Xander or something. He thought to himself suddenly, trying to calm himself back down. "Willow, what did this vamp look like?"
Angel looked ready to spring up and leave right away. "Um…Angel? Shouldn't you get dressed? I'll tell you the rest at the library. That's where Cordelia and Xander are, get dressed and then Oz and me can give you a lift there. We don't really have much time to spare." Angel blinked at Willow. He had totally forgotten about his state of undress. Willow saw a very faint bit of colouring creep across Angel's cheeks. If he wasn't 242 years old and a vampire, she could've sworn he was blushing.
The Airport, New Mexico
Isabel was irritated; she had been waiting for half an hour now, her perfectly manicured nails tapped against the table, playing the whole Ice Queen thing to a T. Max was infuriatingly calm as usual, staring holes into Liz. Liz was also being annoying by fiddling with something in her hands, sighing a lot. Kyle and Tess were off in their own world; blatantly flirting with each other, occasionally she caught the phrase 'lamp trimming' and 'Buddha boy', Isabel thought best that she didn't know what that meant.
Maria was reading something about witchcraft, trying to swot up before she met Willow and whenever she thought no-one was looking, she would glance at Michael then look back to her book for the next 5 minutes. Michael in his usual cave man like way just grunted a few times when anyone asked him anything, he was also stealing glances at Maria and every time their eyes met he looked away.
Isabel looked at Alex; he had his headphones on, his head nodding to the music. How much she wished she could be with Alex but there was always something stopping her. She just couldn't show him the real her, the scared, vulnerable side. Besides, she agreed with Michael, what if something happened to him all because if her and her alien-ness. She didn't think she would be able to have that in her conscience.
Isabel looked at times for the planes. She sighed in annoyance; the plane won't be here for another half an hour.
"Hey, can we get something to eat?" Kyle piped up.
"Yeah, I'm starving." That was the most Michael had said in the past 48 hours.
"You're always starving." Maria smirked at Michael, Isabel didn't want to think if that had a double meaning or not, that would just be too gross.
"Lets get some KFC, McDonald's and Burger King suck." Kyle said, a look at pure disgust crossed over his face.
"Too true man!" Alex said, shaking his head, somehow he had managed to hear the whole conversation through his headphones.
"Okay you guys go and get us some food while us girls will stay here and look after the bags, get 2 super buckets that serve like 8 people so we can all eat." Maria said, batting her eyelashes and smiling at the hungry guys.
"Fine." Michael muttered and walked off in front. As soon as the boys were gone the 3 other girls crowded around Maria.
"So Maria, your friend Willow is a witch right?" Tess started off, "You know if you learn all about his magic and stuff then it would help in our group. Against any FBI or any new dangers." Maria smiled her 100-watt smile.
"That's the plan."
"Okay, there's going to be a problem on this trip and I think everyone else knows what I'm talking about." Liz said, her face as stern as usual.
"The cabin." Isabel breathed out.
"Yep. There are only 4 bedrooms. I know we could go girl- girl, boy-boy, but I want to get Michael back. Staying in the same room with me for a few weeks will hopefully do that." Maria said. Yeah, that or we'll end up murdering each other. She thought to herself.
"Yeah, I also want to explore what me and Kyle have." Tess looked over at Liz, took a deep breath and spilled her guts;
"I'm sorry Liz for trying to steal away the guy that you love. Please try to understand that all my life I have had no family, no friends and the only thing that kept me going in life was that soon I will be able to find my true family and they will accept me. Knowing about Max being my former husband sort of made me snap because then I thought that a person would love me unconditionally even though I'm a freak. If that makes sense." Tess squirmed uncomfortably, she wasn't used to pouring out her heart like this, but she really felt she needed to set things straight.
Liz did something very uncharacteristic with Tess and hugged her. "Its okay, I understand. I know you'll be happy with Kyle, he likes you a lot."
Maria turned to Isabel, "I watched you Is when you were going out with Alex and I have to say you were the happiest I had ever seen. Now since you have broken up you seem more depressed and Alex is depressed, he was deliriously happy when you two started hanging out together. I know there was this huge thing about the destiny and stuff but if you four…um…Czechs stay friends then I'm sure it really shouldn't matter." Maria was right and Isabel knew it.
"Okay, girls lets make a pact that over the holiday we try our dammed hardest to get our guys."
"Agreed." They all chorused.
"What's agreed?" Alex asked behind them. The girls jumped and whipped around, unsure of what to say they just stared at Alex for a while.
"O..o..h nothing, just that when we get to this Sunnydale we….um…" Liz was never good at making believable excuses.
"Just that we promise to share each others makeup and stuff, so there will be less fighting on our vacation." Tess carried on smoothly.
"Oh, o-kay....we got food, just like you wanted." Alex put a bucket on the bench next to them and walked over to the guys.
"What was that all about?" Kyle asked, clueless as ever.
"I think they're up to something." Alex said, eyeing the girls as they giggled to each other. Shaking his head he bit into his chicken leg.
"So Whitman, you hoping to score with Isabel?" Alex's eyes went wide and he started choking on the piece of his chicken.
"Excuse me?
"Come on guys, its time to go now!" Isabel yelled at the boys. Curiously she eyed Alex, wondering what exactly was making him choke and if he is choking why is Kyle grinning like a madman? This is not good. She decided, Not good at all
"Isabel, come here for a minute." Tess was also grinning but there was a mischievous glint in her eyes. When Isabel reached the huddled group of girls, Tess started to tell them her plan. "Okay, I have thought of a genius warm up. When we get our tickets we will somehow make sure that our significant partner will sit by us all the way through the flight. We will sucker the guys into carrying our bags for us, saying some mushy stuff like they are so strong and able…blah, blah, blah. Then we'll go get the tickets and each get our partners' tickets aswell. Easy as pie."
"Wow Tess you're evil!" Maria laughed, finding a new respect for the curly blonde. She seemed to know her stuff when it came to manipulating men. The girls stifled their giggles, flashed their sexiest smiles and swayed their hips ever so slightly as they made their way over to the unsuspecting teenage boys.
Since you guys were so great getting us all that food…" Isabel started.
"We thought that we will go get your tickets for you." Maria finished for her.
"Uh…what's the catch?" Kyle asked, nervously looking from one girl to another. Tess smiled (if possible) an even more glamorous smile at Kyle.
"Catch?" She asked innocently, looking quite like and angel with her halo of white blonde curls. "There is no catch, can't us girls do something nice for you guys without there being a catch? We just need you to carry our bags to the plane, 'cause you're so strong and all." Kyle melted into Tess' baby blue eyes and nodded dumbly.
"Alex? Are you going to help?" Isabel gave a slight pout of her lips and tossed her hair over her shoulders. Alex swallowed the offending chicken in one gulp and quickly grabbed a few bags.
Michael just smirked at those poor whipped fools. Max was as much as a goner as the other two. He wouldn't bend to Maria's will, nope, not even is she kissed him all over with those soft…sweet flavoured…shiny gorgeous lips. Nuh-uh, he won't do what she asks him to do, she can carry her own bags. He won't carry them for all the short silky skirts she can produce over her smooth milky white legs… Michael groaned, being on holiday with her is going to be hell on his pants.
As Kyle, Alex and Max walked past him carrying the girls' bags Michael made a light whipping sound.
"Yeah well Guerin, whipped or not at least over the holiday we'll be getting some." Kyle said, smirking smugly as Michael's smile dropped immediately.
tbc....
