Dear old Dad…

"How sure of this are we?" Giles asked as he pushed open the double doors leading into the Councils war room, a vast chamber built into an abandoned underground station. The room was filled with Watchers and other support staff clustered around computers, maps and bookcases.

"Lorne wouldn't contact me unless this was the real thing." Faith looked worried, "It looks like Angel and the Fang-Gang are going to try and take out this Circle of the Black Thorn."

"I have heard of them, and I have my doubts that they will succeed." Giles walked over to an electronic map of North America: coloured dots showed the location of every known Slayer and Watcher, along with other beings of interest, "The Circle of the Black Thorn is an immensely powerful organisation. Attacking them is tantamount to suicide."

"Sounds like Angel."

"Have you told Buffy?"

"First thing I did: she told me to put together a strike-force to go and back up the Fang-Gang. Willow's teleporting a number of Slavers over from Cleveland to add to what we have in London. We called Riley, but his team is somewhere in South America, and we don't know if they'll be back in time."

"Who do we have that's ready for this sort of thing?"

"Well, there's the usual suspects: you, me, Buffy, Willow and Xander. Kennedy, Robin and some of the other Sunnydale veterans are in the armoury getting set right now. Thor, Spitfire and Union Jack are up for a fight, and Doc Pym has offered to help-out."

"What did Buffy say about that?"

"She's less than thrilled, but the guys got experience from his time in the Ultimates."

"Has he selected a new codename?"

"Yeah; he said something about 'Yellowjacket'."

"Wonders never case. Where's Buffy?"

"She said she had to go make a phone call."

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"Sir, we have a Miss Summers from London on line two for you." The intercom on General Fury's desk interrupted him while he was in the middle of some rather tedious paperwork, and he was somewhat welcome for the distraction.

"Put her through." Fury picked up the phone, "Miss Summers, I take it this isn't a social call?"

"No, this is very much business: we've received word of a possibly apocalyptic event in Los Angeles tonight. We're going to be putting as many people into the field as we can, but we can't guaranty that we'll be able to stop this one."

"Just who are your 'friends' going to piss off?"

"All you need to know is that they are very old, very powerful, and can not be negotiated with. An old friend has been trying to take them down from the inside for over a year, and it all comes down tonight."

"How certain of this are you?"

"Do you think Thor or Dr Pym would be willing to travel to America right now if it wasn't the real deal?"

"I can have a small army in L.A. in four hours…"

"No: this has to stay on the QT. We can't risk the opposition finding out about what's planed for tonight. Put your people on stand by, in case we don't succeed, but stay out of this: none of you're media darlings, with the possible exception of Black Widow or Captain America, have any experience dealing with this sort of threat."

"These friends of yours, they wouldn't be connected to all that wired stuff that happened in LA last year, would they?"

"I can not tell a lie General. But trust me when I say that they did their best to minimise civilian casualties."

"That is something I'm going to have to take on faith. I'll have the Ultimates and the Reserves on standby, just to be sure."

"I'd recommend calling up anyone who can fight."

"A full mobilisation? Surely you can't be serious?"

"I am serious... and don't call me Shirley." Buffy chuckled slightly, "Sorry: apocalypse humour. Live through as many as I have and it starts to get to you. Look, unless they've been trained, normal humans are all but useless against demons. Sending in the Marines will just get a lot of people killed unnecessarily. We need people who are trained to deal with non-human threats."

"I'll make some alls, see who I can talk, coheres or downright threaten into helping, but so help me god, if this is some kind of trick…"

"General, if this is a trick, then we could all be in even more danger than we are at the moment. See you in L.A." The line went dead.

"This just keeps getting better and better…" Fury pressed the button to connect him to his sectary; "I want all members of the Ultimates and the Reserves in the briefing room in one half an hour. And get me the Baxter Building: we're going to need all the help we can get on this one…"

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"How we doing?" Buffy walked into the armoury, dressed in a black leather cat suit, her scythe slung across her back, "And do I really have to ware this?"

"It's for your own protection." Faith chuckled, standing in her armor, helmet held under one arm, "We're all as ready as we're ever be."

"Says the woman with the billion-dollar battle armor."

"I've already spoken to Dad: he says we can have more suits as and when they become available, and only at cost."

"That's still a lot."

"I'm sure something can be arranged. Maybe have them on layaway or something?"

"How'd you feel?"

"About the same as you look."

"That bad, huh?" Buffy nodded, "Ok, let's go see if Thor can do his magic-hammer thing…"

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"I don't know about you guys," Angel gripped his sword, looking at the approaching demon army, "But I ant to kill the dragon."

"Sorry to tell you this, Dead Boy, Xander stepped out of the shadows, a huge war-axe across his shoulder, "But Thor already called dibs."

A titanic bolt of lightning crossed the sky, striking the dragon in the chest. It exploded, consumed by its own fire. What little remained fell to earth in burning chunks. The lightning contended to dance about the sky, illuminating the alleyway suddenly full of Slayer, Scooby's, Mutants and Thunder gods.

"Hope you don't mind us crashing your party." Buffy stepped forward, followed by the others, "But a little green birdie told me you guys might need some help…"

TBC…

Sorry for the hiatus: my father recently underwent a quadruple heart bypass, and my mother managed to break her right leg just above the ankle. This has, as I'm sure you can understand, left me with very little time for writing something as complex as this story.