"Here goes," Faith said. She popped the valve. Liquid helium spurted out, spraying the molten moonsilver as it waited in the mold.

"Should you be doing that by hand?" Angel wondered.

"I got gloves on," Faith said dismissively. Sure, if the stuff touched her it'd freeze her as solid as the liquid-metal Terminator and a lot deader, but that wasn't happening and wasn't gonna. The protective gloves went past her elbow, and really, that was a concession to Fred. The absent-minded professor type was worried about her.

"Wasn't that crown thing you melted into the metal s'posed t' be part of you?" Spike wanted to know.

Faith nodded. "My 'intemperate heart'," she agreed. "It still is, so I'll be leavin' part of me behind when I go. Happens all the time with Graces, Dawn says." She didn't need an eyepatch anyway now.

"Transtator core is complete," Towers of Azure informed her. "It can now be inserted into the computing matrix for programming. When that is complete, place it in the proper setting in the medical cocoon device."

"You guys plannin' on coming back with me?" The vampires had complained of feeling useless here, out of their league. Apparently some baddie had managed to wreck suits of power armor right off their backs. "Portal's nice an' roomy. TARA's coming with."

Spike glanced at Angel. Angel glared at Spike. "We meant to rescue Buffy," Angel said.

"But it sure looks as if she's not needin' a rescue," Spike concluded.

"I'm willing to head back to Earth," Angel said reluctantly. "Did you really cut a deal with Lilah?"

Faith groaned. "Seemed like a good idea at the time. She already had the election in her pocket, and...she managed to put some kind of whammy on all of us. Amy snapped out of it first." She walked around and pried open the mold, removing a moonsilver egg with rods protruding at various odd angles. "Better go pop this in. Sooner it's programmed, the sooner I stop looking like an ass."

Spike chortled and smacked her on the rump. "Your arse was definitely better the way it was. Be good to see it again."

Faith punched him on the shoulder. "You two better be coming back with me then. I've been gone for days now. Who knows what Lilah's been up to?"

Chapter 69-Out of Spiritus Mundi

"Aggh!" Amy rushed across the hall as Harmony let out with a godawful screech. All she saw, though, was the ex-vampire hauling something bloody out of her mouth on a hook. Painful but clearly voluntary.

"Harm, what're you-?" The dull red fluid flowed into Harmony's shadow, thickening it. The darkness gained form, gained substance, gained color. And then a second Harmony stood by the first, wearing vamp face.

"New minion!" Harmony chirped, finishing with a cough. "This one's-hack!-better!"

"I am not a minion," the vampire Harmony said. "I'm a part of you. Now what'd you want me to do? I'm hungry."

"First," Harmony said sternly, "no killing unless I tell you to."

"Ohhhh, why not? Well have you got any blood?" The creature whined and sniffled until Harmony pulled out a blood bag and handed it to her.

"Is that actually a vampire you?" Amy wondered.

"Not exactly," Harmony said, "but I gotta wonder if vampires were made from things like it somehow. It's a hungry ghost, and it's made out of me! It does what I say and I can even take it over!"

"Harm, are you really sure this is a good idea?" Amy looked the creature up and down; it certainly resembled Harmony exactly. "Controlling vampires is one thing, but making new ones? Or something like them at least."

"I'm not a vampire," it said. "I'm much better than a vampire."

"I'm good at it," Harmony said firmly. "It's a tool. I can use it to fight the bad guys. I might be able to fix the universe with it. It's worth knowing this stuff!"

"Can I kill someone now?" the other Harm asked.

Amy splashed water over her face. She didn't use her hands. She didn't use the plumbing. Water appeared, splashed over her face, and vanished. She wasn't sure why she did it this way, except practice; she wasn't limited by Kate's water bill any more. Hadn't been for months, since just after Faith left.

She walked to the window, went out onto the balcony, and looked down at the city from the tower that had belonged to Wolfram and Hart. The firm had been dissolved by act of Congress, its assets seized by the government for numerous crimes. Meet the new boss; same as the old boss: Lilah had made it their new headquarters and superhuman training facility.

"Having fun?" Amy didn't look around. The dark man behind her sounded like whispers in the shadows.

"I don't have any interest in talking to you." Amy considered stabbing him, then thought better of it. She didn't yet know how to make spirits stay dead. "You've betrayed us again and again."

"And yet I have an interest in you, Amy Madison," Five Days' Darkness said patiently. "You in particular. I'm sorry you mistake that interest for betrayal."

"What else would you call it? You pretended you were on our side. You fed us lies. You let Lilah and then Drusilla get Exalted and then helped them attack us." Amy went ahead and stabbed him in the chest with a shard of ice. So what if it didn't kill him? "What do you call all that?"

"Education."

Amy curled her lip at him. "Even if you really wanted to teach me, I can't trust you."

"No," Five agreed. "Nor can I trust you. You're no monster of malice, Amy, but you lack ethics and you sell cheap. Fortunately for the universe."

Amy snickered. "First time I've heard that. How do you figure?"

"Simple," Five said. "Come with me. I need to show you some things." He led her out the door, and she followed reluctantly. "Amy, the Infernal Exaltations were intended to screw over their recipients. It didn't work out as intended. There are some issues that need resolving, but you have the potential to ascend beyond the beings you know as demons and gods. And we want you to."

"Why?" Amy stopped in the middle of the hallway. "If it's too good to be true..."

"It isn't." Five beckoned her onwards, then grunted irritably when she didn't move. "We need you to ascend in order to save the universe. The perks are worth it. I guarantee it. Come on and let me show you." He stepped into the elevator, and Amy followed with a scowl on her face.

Five tapped out a series of buttons, and another, glowing white, appeared on the pad. He tapped that one as well, and the world faded into white light.

A moment of blinding brilliance passed, leaving a barely visible floor and ceiling, though no walls. "This is the White Room. Traditionally, it serves as a means of communication with the Senior Partners, but since we're on this side..." He shook his head, smiling wryly. "Mesektet's around here somewhere. Don't worry about her. She's my daughter by Erembour. She can take anything you can dish out so far."

"What is she?" Amy wondered. "A demon or a god?" She peered about in the blank sheet of a room but saw nothing.

"None of the above," Five said. "I suppose one could call her a behemoth, but that's just a name we give to entities we don't have another word for. Creations of the Primordials or of Unshaped, offspring of beings of power who fit no one category, even a few creatures designed by Exalts. Mesektet is my daughter. What else matters? Now. Reach out with your mind. Feel the essence of this place. Take it to yourself, and shape it."

"We need guns," Amy said. "Lots and lots of guns." Distant specks appeared on the horizon, rushing towards her.

"Not really," Five warned. "But make them if you like. What I really want from you is a place, a practice place. One day soon you will build worlds. One day further on, you will be one. That is the destiny of the Infernals, Amy, the destiny never meant for you but that you must find anyway." Racks shot past them-revolvers, shotguns, rifles, pistols-and out into the distance again before Amy could touch anything. "It will take some time to solidify the environment you want. I suggest you try something more elaborate and more suited to you personally than a movie reference."

Amy nodded, grunted, and set her jaw. This was real power. "So I'm like a god or something?"

"By the traditional usages of Creation-far greater than a god." He inclined his head to her. "However, if you wish to imagine an Abrahamic God in embryo, you are perhaps not far from a description of yourself. You need to grow in power, and to define your self-concept. Then you will become like the Primordials. This creation is only the beginning-Solars could do it, and in limited ways other Exalts. But it is a beginning."

Amy grinned from ear to ear. "Awesome."

Kate studied herself in the mirror. Herself...himself? No, herself. Too confusing otherwise. At least the back hair looked like it matched now. She flexed substantial but very flat pecs. "Interesting. Don't see the big deal." Her voice rumbled in the upper range of bass.

"Five Days' Darkness said Lunar Exaltations try to pick people who won't be bothered by their bodies changing," Shoat said. "It's not the first priority, but it matters." She plucked at Kate's chest hair.

"Ouch!" Kate frowned briefly at the girl, who backed off a step. "Just my luck I look like a rug as a man. But...yeah, I could use some manscaping, but I'm not disgusted or creeped out. And hey, I'd have been taken seriously by the force if I looked like this." She felt carefully around. "I see how it works. If you can't handle shapeshifting, being a Lunar's not for you. And if you can, I guess for most people what kind doesn't matter too much."

"You're taller," Shoat observed.

"And bigger around," Kate agreed. "But I'm not that different. Men usually are bigger than women." She was about six inches taller like this, which she had to admit was a lot, and the hard work she'd done to get fit for the police had had a lot more visible an effect on these muscles. She poked at her six-pack. "I'm pretty ripped. I can run with this."

Shoat flexed her fingers, and bone blades slid from her knuckles. "Everyone changes," she said wryly. "You get old, you die. Or you stop changing and that's a different way to die. Weird, isn't it?"

"You look like little-girl Wolverine," Kate said with a small chuckle. "And morbid, but I guess it goes with the territory."

"You should've talked to me before I found out I was going to live forever," Shoat said, laughing in return. "At least now I see the funny side of it."

Kate patted her on the head. "The world is getting funnier and funnier these days."

"I just got back!" Gwen Raiden protested. "I mean, I'll be more effective with my powers under control, but I could use a little rest."

"You won't be going alone," Harmony said. "Take any of us you want. This isn't going to be easy."

"You're sending me off after a myth," Gwen protested. "Into the underworld at that. If it were easy I'd wonder where all the monsters went. You're the necromancer; you come with, you and Shoat."

Harmony checked the map. "This is totally going to be an exciting trip," she insisted. "But I don't blame you for wanting help. If you want me along, I'll come."

Robin Wood sank to the mat, breathing heavily. He was bloody, he was bruised, and he felt as if he'd gone ten rounds with the Hulk. But the fact was, he didn't seem that badly hurt. No broken bones, no major lacerations, just scrapes and bruises.

"I didn't go easy on you," Riley said. "You're not quite up on my power level, but you're close. You just mostly channeled it into making yourself tougher. I think I could stab you in the chest and you'd pass out for a few minutes, then wake up fine."

"Let's not try the experiment right now," Robin wheezed, and struggled to his feet. "So...they say I can't ever be anything but an Infernal. And there are what, forty-five Exaltations left for that? Call me modest, but I don't think I'm badass enough to get one."

Riley shrugged. "Work at it. In the meanwhile, there's a lot more you can learn." He set the warhammer back on its rack. He looked like he meant to make some suggestions, but just then three women strolled in, looking excessively casual. One was Marie Santangelo; the other two had deep red skin like smoldering coals and hair black as soot.

"Andreia, Susana...Santangelo," Riley stammered out. The Brazilian natives-the Amazons, the squad had come to call them-didn't have last names, and their real names were nigh-unpronounceable. "You ladies are on training rotation. I know you get the pregnancy cravings, but-"

"We are here for training," one of the two Robin didn't know said in a thick accent. "You will teach us how to not get so much tired."

"We've got to get Lilah to release more Exaltations," Santangelo said. "We're wearing you out even with your abilities, we have trouble learning important techniques, and we're elementally-unbalanced. But Andreia is absolutely right; we need your powers of not wearing out too. And you need more acrobatics in your life." She blushed faintly beneath her unnatural pallor. "Robin, you're welcome to stay."

Robin started to say he'd go, then halted. What did he have to lose? He wasn't a married man; he'd spent his younger years crusading against the undead. And the women knew by now how far they could go with mortals without hurting them; they could do more with him. "Don't mind if I do. Take a little of the stress off you, Riley?"

"Just don't expect me to kiss him," Riley joked at the girls, who snickered.

Santangelo gave him a considering look, then a wink. "If I were asking you to take one for the team, I'd suggest you go after Lilah. Someone'sgot to persuade her."

"Something bad is coming," Susana agreed. "We need our whole strength to fight it, but your president only wants her own power."

Riley began to pull his shirt off. From beneath the fabric came his response: "I guess I could try that. Only turnoff is the horrific evil, after all."

"Hello," the little girl said, and sat down in one of the crystal chairs. "You must be Amy Madison."

"You must be Mesektet," Amy responded. She and Five Days Darkness were sitting across the table from one another sipping conjured Pepsis and eating conjured ice cream. The table was a delicate filigree of crystal that stood in a castle composed of a shimmering maze, its walls shaped from diamond and emerald and ruby and sapphire.

One other item sat on the table, a little domed birdcage. Instead of a bird it contained a tiny copy of her mother, who screamed without any sound and beat at the bars. It wasn't the real Catherine Madison-at least Amy didn't think so-but it was the closest copy of her mind Amy could imagine. She'd thought she'd want to zap her mom over and over, but holding her like this was more than enough satisfaction.

"I like what you've done with the place," Mesektet said, smiling. "I might let you leave it this way. Can I hurt her?"

"Feel free," Amy said, and gave her a thumbs up. "I can't think of anything too bad to do to my mother. She deserves it."

"But you're leaving her alone," Mesektet said with a frown. "Why is that?"

Amy shrugged and took a bite of ice cream. "She's under my power here. I can do whatever I want to her whenever I want. There's no rush."

"Do you really think of this as your mother?" Five studied Amy's expression. "Her souls are elsewhere; this is a construct."

"If she died and went to Lethe," Amy said, "then her soul's in some random baby, right? Who doesn't remember a thing? Thinks she's a completely new person?"

Five nodded. "If that's what happened to her, yes. But I don't see why you'd presume that. She might not even be dead." He reached out and ran a hand over the cage.

"If she's not that baby, and I can't see how she would be," Amy explained, "then her identity's not with her soul. It's with her mind-and her mind is here even if it's somewhere else too. This is my mother. Sure, it's a paradox. Magic is like that."

Five scratched his head. "I suppose I can see that. Traditionally we thought of a human identity as following her hun soul-but then we said the same of the Exaltation, even called it the Third Soul, since it also carried the person's memories. So I suppose by our own standards a person can be in more than one life at a time. I...it still seems odd to suppose that you could create infinite copies of your mother to imprison."

"Odd?" Mesektet laughed. "I would call it amusing myself." She knocked the cage over and rolled it around on the table, forcing Catherine to struggle and flail. "Of course, they do say I'm evil." Five Days' Darkness made a sort of coughing laugh and ruffled her hair.

"I don't need infinite copies," Amy said. "One's plenty." She picked up the cage and studied the little copy of her mother.

You have my approval, Halfrek said.

Thanks, Amy answered, and slammed the cage into the wall.

"They worry," Drusilla said. "Not I. The Loom is my plaything and mine alone."

Lilah leaned back into the big chair, smiling. "And we like it that way, so long as you don't mess around with my bureaucracy too much." Drusilla had just sat through a meeting in the Oval Office, stark naked, and all anyone else had seen was the White House Chief of Staff. Lilah hadn't asked for such a view, but she appreciated the gesture.

Drusilla waved a dismissive hand. "You needn't worry, Grandmum. I have all the amusements I need. The farmer boy. He fancies you. Thinks you'll listen to him if he offers his body."

"Depends on what he has to say," Lilah mused. "What's he want out of me?" She glanced out the window. Gardeners roved about here and there.

"Thinks you're not getting ready. The dead are rising, the Last Trump sounding, and Ms. Antichrist doesn't have her army about her." She didn't sound as unconcerned as she claimed. "Open the bottle, he says. Let the genies out, he says. Doesn't he know what tricksters and hucksters and monsters the djinn are? Yes, yes, Miss Edith. I'll grant your wishes."

"This bottle is staying as tightly closed as I can keep it," Lilah said firmly. "No more fooling around, Drusilla. You nearly died, and there are far more Exaltations loose than I'd prefer. If I could have gotten them to serve willingly, gotten their trust...Ah well." If she could work out how the Prison functioned, she'd recall all the Exaltations save hers. Well, and Dru's. Probably not Dru's.

"You're ready for the great dark, then?" Drusilla smiled and tweaked Lilah's nose.

"Drusilla, you don't seem to comprehend. I am the great dark. And that's what's going to save the world." Dru tilted her head and frowned uncertainly at her, then got up and strode over to the window. "Everything's going to be fine, Dru."

The response came in the delicate voice of a small, frightened child. "Are you sure?"

Harmony doodled diagrams as she sang along to N Sync. "I wanna see you out that door, baby bye bye bye..." Hmm, no. "If Oblivion is metaphorically a black hole then we can model death as gravity-no,the event horizon. But...just another player in your game for two...from your own perspective you never actually cross the horizon...maybe quantum tunneling takes you through Lethe?"

She glanced down at the rubber-sheet gravity diagram festooned with unicorns and sparkly stars. "Life sacrifices life to the maw to maintain its own low-entropy state above the horizon...bye bye bye..." She scribbled some equations and Greek letters above the sheet. "Epsilon chi theta...no...if they want to end their existence they're going about it all wrong. The Neverborn...maybe worship Oblivion themselves? Sacrifice to it?"

Shoat poked her head in. "Harmony?"

"Oh hi! Just working something out in my head. Come on in!" She scrawled another equation on the paper and set the pencil down.

"Have you eaten anything today?" Shoat asked. "The kitchen staff hasn't seen you."

"I totally had...I..." Her stomach did feel empty, now that she thought of it. There was no rush. "I forgot."

"You should go eat, Harm." Shoat sat down but made no move to offer her anything. Maybe she couldn't.

"I'm not hungry," Harmony said. She hadn't felt hungry since she pulled her shadow out. Maybe it was eating for her? Rho omicron sigma..."Necromancy as a sacrifice to the void...I burn energy to keep dead things a little bit alive..."

"Harm?" Shoat sounded worried. "Harm, come eat with me. Tell me about this stuff on the way."

Harm shrugged. "Sure, why not?" She picked up the notebook. "The Neverborn don't matter," she said, opening the door. "I mean, they do some damage, but they're just burning energy to hold position above the event horizon. The black hole's the problem. Life itself is totes a kind of sacrifice to death, has been since the Primordial War."

Shoat narrowed her eyes and nodded. "Go on. It sounds familiar somehow." She handed Harmony a water bottle.

Harm swallowed and immediately realized her throat was dry from the ouch. How long had she been working on the problem? "We sacrifice a little bit more to animate the dead, or control them. But-"

"I thought the Neverborn wanted death," Shoat queried. "That when the world was gone they could go too."

"Well...they will, when they run out of energy," Harm answered. "The Neverborn don't know what they want. It's like brain damage. They don't have the energy to think straight."

"What if we gave them more?" Shoat asked.

"Oh, that'd be way too much-"

"Harmony? I thought-"

"Don't," she told Oz, pinning him against the office wall. "I don't. Live a little. Let me live a little."

"But you're human now," Oz said, like an idiot. She bit his lip hard, drawing a trickle of blood. Not enough.

Harmony didn't know what it was like-no, that was wrong. Harmony knew what it was like to be dead and crave life. She just didn't care. She wouldn't let Harm kill. Harm ripped her shirt over her head and roughly shoved Oz's hands onto her tits. "I'm cold," she said. "Warm me up. C'mon Oz. Warm me up."

She could feel his crotch grow warm against hers. It was a start. "Harm, this isn't-" She kissed him again. God she was hungry. For him, for food, for blood, for everything.

Oz started to change beneath her. She either had him really turned on or really mad. Hair bristled down his cheeks, on his chest. "Yeah," she said. "Yeah. Let's get rough."

This was gonna be totally awesome.

"Lilah is going to clog the courts," Kate said. The unfamiliar rumble of her voice was at least ceasing to startle. She had a badge on again, even if it was Lilah's doing. "We're going to have to counter that. If we can't get sentences then we have to haul 'em in. Over and over if we have to. Fill the cells and keep 'em full."

"Won't that give her an excuse to attack police brutality?" a man in the front row asked.

"It will," Kate agreed. "We have to be cautious. Keep the use of force to a minimum, but arrest. Arrest over and over again. The fuller the jails are the more out of touch she looks."

This was a gamble. It ran dangerously close to the zombie cops on the streets not long ago. But if Lilah took one extreme, she'd have to take the other-not to make a point but to counter the leaks in the system. If Lilah had her way, real murderers and thieves would flood the streets, using genuine problems of discrimination, corruption, and excessive force as an excuse for her own political game.

Kate couldn't allow that. At the same time, she had to keep the police themselves looking squeaky clean and being as clean as possible.

She was going to have to kill. To prowl the streets using deadly force, as an animal who wouldn't be pegged as a cop. Any violent criminal she saw would die between her teeth.

It was a perversion of the system. She wasn't the good guy any more, and it was Lilah Morgan's fault.

One day the flesh in her mouth would be Lilah's heart.

"I don't like the trends I'm seeing," Buffybot said.

"You're telling me?" Lorne felt sick enough to turn green, if he hadn't been already. "Lilah's got our friends so obsessed with taking her down they're forgetting they're supposed to help the helpless. We've been down this road before with Angel, Synthia, and it almost ended on a very bad note."

"That too," Buffybot agreed, and pointed to the computer. Lorne squinted. His eyes weren't the best when it came to screens.

"Oh," he said. "Get the ball-gag, Synthie, cause we've got a fat lady to keep quiet."

Harmony and Shoat weren't the only ones with undead minions. The graveyards and the morgues were emptying out. When there was no more room in hell...

Yeah, there was no good last line to that old song.