Frank Holt was in trouble. There was a very familiar Impala parked in front of the store he had gone into for his candy. If the Winchesters were in town, they would not be happy that he was trying to catch a girl to hand her over for who knows what. He had only seen what John Winchester had done to a rapist once. Once was enough. He had no wish to find out what John would do to them should he find out what they were up to. He prayed that John just had a simple job here in Sunnydale.
Of course, that wasn't to be. Before he had taken another step after spotting the car, he was surrounded by all three Winchesters. "John! What are you and your boys doing here?"
"Hey, Frank. I see you've sunk low." John smirked at his friend. "Are you really going to try and take Faith back to those bastards in England? Do you know what they want to do to her?"
Frank held up his hands. "Sorry, John, all I know is that she's killed some people while she worked for the Brits and they want to take care of the mess. She was working for the other side, man. I know you don't like the idea of jobs on women, but she's made her bed. Besides I'm just here to make sure she goes back to England."
"She's done her time for that!" Dean snapped. "She turned herself in. If it wasn't for Travers she'd still be there, talking with a head shrink and starving herself half to death just to pay for what she did when she went off the deep end." Frank looked at the kid's eyes and shuddered. There was more going on here than just defending a woman.
John saw the shudder and knew that Frank had realized this wasn't a simple job. "Frank, you're not an idiot. Faith made some mistakes. She's paying for them. But, that really doesn't matter now does it? Because even if she hadn't volunteered to put herself through hell to pay for those mistakes, you would never touch my son's girl, now would you?"
Frank froze all the way down to his toes. One of John's boys was dating a slayer? It had to be Dean. He was always picking up wild girls. On the other hand, Sammy was the one more likely to settle down, slayer or not. "Sammy's got himself a girl now? Damn, I'm getting old. I remember when he was just toddling around and we had to make sure he didn't eat the bullet casings."
"Faith isn't my girl." Sam said shortly. "She's Dean's."
Frank hadn't realized that the silent one was Sammy. "Relax boys. Your dad is right, I'd never touch family; especially not for the little prick running this job." Frank swung around and looked up at Sam. "Damn boy, you've gotten big!" Frank meant what he said. There was no way he'd turn a member of his adopted family over to Travers. And John's boys had stolen his heart years ago. "Dean, are you sure you know what you're getting into with this girl? I ain't asking because of the job you know. I don't want to see you get your heart broke the same way your old man's was. Sorry John." He added in apology.
"That's ok, Frank. I know you're just worried about my boy." John smiled, and Sam was amazed at how quickly the situation was turned around. It never failed. The bonds created by serving together were strong, but not as strong as those created by serving under fire, and hunting the things that went bump in the night created even stronger bonds than that. Frank had joined Pastor Jim's special flock nearly twenty years ago after John had saved him from a group of ghouls in the cemetery where his family was buried. "I'd appreciate it if you would explain to whoever is in charge that there is no way any of us are going to let Faith be taken by Travers. He wants to take her powers away from her and lock her up with a vampire without any weapons. She'll be completely helpless."
Frank nodded. "So you and your boys are going to defend her. What does the little shit want to do that for?"
"If he kills Faith, he can control the next slayer to be called. He can't control either Faith or Buffy."
"That makes a lot more sense than what the jackass was trying to feed us. So what's new besides Dean finding a steady girl?"
Sam smirked. It was time to tease, just a little. "Oh, not much, we've got a new half sister and Dad's dating her sister."
Frank stopped dead in his tracks. "There is no way I heard that right, Sammy. Did you say John was dating your sister's sister?"
Dean burst into laughter. "It gets better! I'm dating her sister!" He dissolved into giggles at the look on Frank's face.
"Don't mind the comedy duo, Frank. It gets rather involved but here it is." John led the way back to the Impala. "I got drunk one night and had a one night stand. It produced a little girl, but I can't even tell you what the mother's name was. All I know is that she put the baby girl up for adoption and she named me the father. A wonderful lady named Joyce Summers adopted the baby. She named the baby Dawn. She had a health scare a while back, cancer. That's why she had the paperwork checked out. It turns out the adoption was never finalized. She tracked me down because Dawn's birth mother is dead. She wanted to know if I'd take Dawn if she died. Well, you know how I am about family." Frank nodded. It was one of the things he admired about John. The man was loyal to his family. "I was worried about that damned demon of course. I took Dawn for a couple of weeks and we moved here. It turned out that Dawn's older sister is a slayer. Her name is Buffy Summers. I'm dating Buffy and Dean's seeing Faith of course."
"Yeah, if Joyce wasn't dating Giles, all we'd have to do is set up her with Sammy and then we'd really be in a tangle."
"Shut up, Jerk!" Sam said and tackled his brother to the ground.
"Ow! Knock it off bitch!" Dean yelled back. The brothers were soon fighting and tussling.
Frank turned back to watch the boys fighting styles. "They've gotten better from the last time I saw them." He said to John.
Preacher wasn't happy with this job, and he had been very vocal with Sampsom about it. There was something wrong about this whole thing. He just knew that they were missing something. He knew that the shit head hadn't given them the information they needed for this job. Sampsom had told him that he knew Rupert Giles and there was no way in hell was this guy to be messed with. Preacher hadn't found all the information he wanted because he couldn't get into the files the Watcher's Council had on Rupert Giles. No matter how hard he worked at it, he couldn't get through. It made his skin itch. Why would a former run away street brat, who had gone back home and shaped up, quit his prestigious job at the museum and travel to the United States to be a high school librarian? It didn't make sense. It had to be something to do with his job with the Watcher's Council, but the man had been fired and had chosen to stay. Why? What held the man here? It wasn't a woman; the only dating the man had done was with a teacher who had died several years ago. No former street brat would be that sentimental.
He walked along the streets heading for the local library. The shit head had actually thought that the girl had only been in the prison for a few weeks at most. Shit, she'd been there for more than a year. Idiot. He could have gotten her at any time if he'd done his homework. How many times did he have to say it? Preparation is the key to success! But even he wasn't prepared for what happened next. A woman with a scarf wrapped around her head stopped him in the street. She was a cancer patient, he automatically thought. No threat, but she was pissed about something. "Are you one of the men working for that idiot, Travers?"
Shit, if even a woman like this knew they were in town, Sampsom's hope that they could escape Giles' notice was shot to hell. "Yes, ma'am, I'm afraid I am."
"Well then." She backed him up against the wall of a nearby house. "You should be ashamed of yourself. That poor girl had a break down and Travers is the one who wouldn't let her get any help. We all tried, but thanks to his interference she completely lost it, and eventually ended up going to that prison to get the help she needed. She is my daughter's sister slayer and you will not be allowed to turn her over to a man who is going to execute her for his own mistakes." Joyce waved her hand, signaling the rest of her team. They had done their own preparation for this moment. Spike picked up the merc from behind and Xander tied his hands together. Between the two of them they quickly had him hog tied and gagged. "Faith has a lot of friends in this town who are very proud that she has done so much to get herself back on the right track. We aren't going to allow anyone to interfere with that; especially not Travers!"
Spike slung the merc over his shoulder and carried him over to Joyce's SUV. Once there he carefully laid him in the back of the vehicle. He patted the man on the face. "Don't worry, mate, where you're going you won't need much."
They quickly drove to one of the cemeteries and dragged him out of the back. Joyce held open the door to one of the crypts and Spike carried the merc inside. Once there Spike went out to play guard while Xander and Joyce placed Preacher into an empty stone coffin. "Are you claustrophobic?" Joyce asked gently. "Because if you are we can leave the lid off. Not that it will matter much, the crypt is well sealed. But at least you won't be sealed into a tiny box."
Preacher nodded his head frantically. He definitely did not want to be sealed into a stone coffin. "Alright." Xander said and produced a set of chains. "These are just to make sure you don't go anywhere." He quickly chained Preacher down and then he and Joyce left the crypt together. Willow was waiting outside and she sealed the crypt with her magic. "He won't be getting out until we say so, now, on to the rest of them."
Jose just wanted to get as far away from both his team mates and his employer. This was small town USA, there had to be a coffee shop around here somewhere. Just as he turned a corner, he was hit from behind. When he came to, he found himself tied to a chair in a room somewhere. It was dusty and had been long abandoned by the looks of things. "Hello!" Chirped an incredibly young voice. He looked around and saw three girls, one of whom couldn't be more than fifteen at most.
"You are one of the men who work for Travers. I know it's just a job for you, so we've got a deal for you." The little blond was the one speaking. "The chair you are tied to is wired with a bomb. If you don't move, you'll be fine. Move, and well, you won't like the results. We are going to go take care of your employer, so if you are good and don't move, we'll untie you when we're done. Do you understand?" Jose nodded. He didn't give a crap about Travers, but he really didn't want the rest of his team to know that he'd been taken out by three little girls. What was worse was none of them were the slayer they were supposed to be tracking. "Good. Bye then." All three girls waved as they left the office. Dawn and Buffy stopped to watch Tara seal the room with her magic.
"Do you think we should have told him it was a magic bomb that would make all his clothes vanish?" Dawn asked.
"Nah, he'll find out all on his own if he misbehaves." Buffy reassured her.
Wolfgang was delighted that the music store at the very small mall had a good, although not great, selection of classical music. He noticed the young man going through the classical rock section next to him. The kid seemed to be typical of the young people here, leather jacket, necklace, and a bunch of leather strips around his wrist. Normally he would have dismissed the kid from his mind, but he was on a job, even if he had been given a little leave time. What he didn't know was that Dean was the distraction. Dean looked up at the tall German mercenary and made a face at his selection. "God, dude. Can you get any crappier stuff?"
"I'll have you know that this is some of the finest music to ever be performed, bar none." He said haughtily.
"No way, man." Dean shook his head, and got a little closer. "There is no way that crap can ever compare to this." He held up a cassette of Blue Oyster Cult. As Wolfgang was about to start defending his choice in music, Sam reached up and poked him with a small dart. Before Wolfgang could swing around and punch his, until now unnoticed assailant, Dean had grabbed him. The potion Tara had whipped up for them was quick acting and their target crumpled almost instantly. "Wait! I got an idea." Dean grinned. This one was going to be good. He passed the unconscious man to Sam and went over to pick out a CD. Then he picked up a player and went to pay for them.
"What are you doing?" Sam asked as they carried their burdens out to the Impala.
"Did you, or did you not see what that guy was picking out?" Dean asked his brother. Sam grimaced. He'd noticed all right.
Dean pulled the Impala up to the same office building that Tara, Buffy, and Dawn were walking out of. "Hey, ladies! How did your pick up go?" Dean asked pulling out his purchases from the back seat.
"Just fine. Do you need some help?" Buffy asked, looking at the man in the backseat.
"If you're offering, I won't say no. Slayer strength would be a plus in getting this guy up to the room." Sam hurriedly said before Dean could turn her down. Dean might be too stubborn to take help when he felt that he had the situation in hand, but Sam would take whatever help he could get right now. Lugging someone up a flight of stairs was never fun.
Buffy waited until Sam and Dean had dragged the man out of Dean's car and then swung him up in her arms. Her carrying the man made the trip a lot faster. They got to the room, Tara and Dawn following out of curiosity. Each target was being dealt with on an individual basis by those picking them up. The only common thread was that each was to be sealed into a small empty room until Travers was dealt with, which would mean that their jobs were over. Sam pulled a chair over to the center of the room and Buffy sat the man down on it. Quickly tying the man up, they then checked out what Dean was doing with the bag he'd carried up to the room. He was deep in discussion with Tara who was nodding. Then he set up the CD player so that it would play the CD he had bought on continuous repeat. Nothing he could do to it would stop the music thanks to Tara. Buffy was puzzled as to why Dean was playing what she would consider a workout CD, but shrugged. There were still more mercenaries to deal with.
Hound was checking out the local whore house. Even a small town like this had one. He was too busy checking out the working girls to notice that two men had followed him in. If he had, he would have seen that one was Rupert Giles, a man Sampsom had warned them all not to cross, and the other was Wesley Pryce, the man who had stolen their target right out from underneath their noses. Both men were angry, but they didn't want to take too much of their anger out on this man. He was only a mercenary; this was just a job to him, nothing more. No, it was Travers they both wanted.
"Mr. Giles, if this man was interested in a show, perhaps it would be best to give him one." Wesley whispered to the older man.
Giles frowned in confusion. "What are you talking about?"
"I seriously doubt he truly understands just what kind of establishment this is. If you would allow me?" Giles nodded and waved Wesley on ahead of him. Wesley went and talked to the Madam of the house. The arraignment was quickly settled on and the Madam quickly ushered the Watchers to one of the back rooms. A few minutes later two bouncers brought Hound in. They tied him to a chair and placed a magical mirror in front of him. "Sir, I believe that you are aware that magic is real, correct?" Hound nodded; internally he was cursing his luck. These were just the two men he really didn't want to see right now. "Good. Now, if you do not agree to forget about your pursuit of Faith, you will be forced to watch the activities of the others in this establishment until we deal with your employer. Will you agree to drop your pursuit?"
"No way! Travers is a jackass, but I took his money and he hasn't called off the job yet. Sorry, but I got a rep to maintain." Besides, he thought, watching wasn't all that bad.
"Very well; Madam Daisy, if you will?" Wesley gestured at the mirror. She smiled and waved her hand over the mirror. Hound stared at it in shock and horror as the Watchers left him. How in god's name had he managed to find a demon brothel?