... I'm back?


Chapter 14

By the time Angel had finished checking the upstairs, the entire gang had found their way to the lobby. Buffy looked up as he made his way down the stairs.

"Connor and Cordy are gone, too," he told her.

"Damn it," she muttered. "I knew we should have said something."

"Do we need the locator spell?" Willow asked.

Buffy nodded and the red-head began.

The rest of the group sat in silence as they watched Willow do the spell and Buffy and Angel paced.

"Found them!" Willow said a few seconds after she finished chanting and scourging her eyes over the map.

"Where are they?"

Willow grimaced. "About halfway to Sunnydale."

Buffy took a breath. "Okay. Angel, you're with me. Willow, call Spike and tell him to meet us at my house with weapons."

"You think you'll need weapons?"

"Better safe than sorry. The rest of you…" she trailed off.

"Research," Angel finished. He tossed Wesley the book he found in Cordelia's room. "Figure out what's going on."

'Everyone got it?" Buffy asked.

The group nodded.

"Good."

BtVS - A:tS - Sw9

'Cordelia' looked over the ritual one more time, glancing back at the paper she'd planned it on. It had taken longer than she would have liked to set up, but it was done.

"You," she said, pointing to Dawn, "Sit here. Connor, over there."

The teenagers nodded, hesitating slightly, but sitting down all the same.

'Cordelia' sat down in her spot and handed Dawn a knife.

"What… What is this for?"

"You need to put some of your blood in the bowl," she said, pointing to the bowl in the center of the ritual's lines.

Dawn hesitated. "Are you sure?"

'Cordelia' almost sighed in exasperation. "Dawn. I'm positive."

Dawn put the blade of the knife to her palm, took a deep breath, and sliced. She winced, but put her bleeding hand over the bowl.

Cordelia began the first part of the chant.

"Hoc est sacrificium sanguinis.

Hic sanguis est mater.

Sanguinis iste, volens, dimidium est."

"What's she speaking?" Connor whispered to Dawn.

"Latin, I think?"

"Hoc est sacrificium sanguinis.

Hic sanguis est mater.

Sanguinis iste, volens, dimidium est."

BtVS - A:tS - Sw9

Buffy was pretty sure she had never driven faster in her life. And considering how badly she had flunked drivers ed in high school, that was saying something.

She made a hard right, and could practically hear Angel biting his tongue to stop himself from telling her to be careful.

Hey, it wasn't her fault he had the better car.

She glanced at the road sign. Ten miles to Sunnydale. She pressed on the gas.

BtVS - A:tS - Sw9

"Hoc est sacrificium sanguinis.

Hic sanguis est pater.

Sanguisis iste, volens, dimidium est."

BtVS - A:tS - Sw9

Thankfully, Spike was all ready to go when Buffy pulled into the driveway of 1630 Revello Dr. The blonde vampire ran to the car under a blanket and crashed into the backseat next to Angel, whom he promptly glared at.

"Red gave me situation on the phone," he told her as she backed out of the driveway faster than the average Sunnydalin would call wise.

"Something about Cordelia, Dawn and this guy's kid?"

"That's the gist."

"So, where we off to, then?"

BtVS - A:tS - Sw9

The air grew stiff as Dawn could feel magic swirl around her.

"Sanguis corpus est. Sanguis spiritus est. Creo!"

The air still and a sense of dread washed over Dawn.

"Was this supposed to happen?" Dawn whispered, breaking the stillness.

Almost as a response, Cordelia suddenly fainted, and the blood from the bowl rose up, looking almost translucent. It circled above Cordelia and looked as if it were pulling something out of her.

She looked over at Connor, who looked as shocked as she did. The realization hit her like lightning.

"We were tricked, weren't we."

BtVS - A:tS - Sw9

Finally, the trio found Cordelia's car. It was parked outside of an abandoned factory in the center of Sunnydale. Buffy jumped out of the car, barely remembering to park it in the shade so the vampires could get out. She could hear some sort of wind coming from the inside, and she began to kick down the door.

"Dawn!" she yelled. "Dawn!"

"Buffy!" she heard called back, though she had to fight to be heard over the wind. She heard footsteps at a run and pounding on the door. "I don't know what happened, I swear!"

"Stand back, Nibblet!" Spike called.

"Spike!"

"Move!"

Without waiting for a response, he joined Buffy, and now, Angel, with the effort of kicking it down. Thankfully, with three people they soon got it open.

It was a mess.

The wind was blowing so hard they could barely move. Buffy's ponytail was struggling to stay together and out of her face, and she saw Connor apparently knocked-out after being slammed into a wall by the wind.

"How long?" Angel asked.

"Ten, fifteen minutes," Dawn answered.

"What's causing it?" Spike asked.

"That," Buffy answered in place of her sister, pointing to the translucent body that seemed to be forming over the unconscious form of Cordelia.

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Dawn watched as her sister ran towards the translucent blood figure and tried to hit it. Angel and Spike quickly joined in, and Dawn made her way over to Connor. He was still alive, thank goodness, but he had been knocked out cold after being slammed into the wall.

Dawn let out a shriek as an axe came flying in her direction. She ducked down, covering her head, and winced at the bang. She glanced up, and saw that there hadn't been any damage done to the figure above Cordelia. She glanced over at the axe that had landed by her. She looked up at her sister again, before looking back at the axe.

Well, she was probably already grounded anyway.

She grabbed the axe and fought her way through the wind. Pulling on any strength she had gathered from periodic monster fighting, she swung the axe towards the figure.

The wind stopped.

The figure suddenly let out a deafening scream, and Dawn was knocked backwards again. She covered her ears until the noise trailed off.

Cordelia blinked and sat up.

"What… just happened?"

Angel made his way over. "Are you alright?"

She nodded. "Fine. That was just… weird."

Buffy came over to Dawn.

"Are you hurt?"

"No," Dawn said. She looked down. "I was really dumb, wasn't I."

"It wasn't your fault you didn't notice she was possessed," Buffy said. Dawn looked up. "You're still grounded for the other stuff, though."

"Yeah, I thought so."


So... I went on temporary hiatus. I guess that's not too unexpected, though I was surprised. Anyway, I'm back with only the epilogue left.

I ended up learned some Latin in the months since I started this chapter (because when I took a break, I really took a break), and I can actually read some of the incantation without Google Translate, which is pretty cool.