I still do not own Buffy the Vampire Slayer or any mythology.
I'd also like to take a moment to thank Tammin for all his hard work.
Slayerfest 98
Miller's Wood
"Hello, ladies. Welcome to Slayerfest '98," the man on the recording enthused. He looked familiar to Buffy, but she couldn't quite place him. 'Hey, wait a minute. Where's this thing getting its power from? Don't tell me these trees got electrical sockets!'
Next to her, Faith had no problem identifying the person. "Trick," she hissed and the venom in her voice finally made the memory click. 'Right, he was with Kakistos. I knocked him over the side. And I don't remember seeing him afterwards, he must have sneaked off the moment things got serious.'
The recording, unfazed by their confusion and hate respectively, went on. "What is Slayerfest, you ask? Well, as in most of life, there are the hunters and the hunted. Can you guess where you two fall?"
"The vampire obviously has no idea who he is dealing with," Mjöllnir commented.
"From the beginning of this tape, you have exactly thirty seconds," Trick paused to look at his watch, "no, that's seventeen now, to run for your lives. Faith, Buffy," Trick's smile changed into a full-blown grin, "have a nice death." The screen faded to black and the word "SlayerFest" appeared with the first part in red while the latter letters were white.
"He actually made a freaking logo for this?" Buffy shook her head.
"Goddamn coward," Faith spit. Her words were punctuated by the boom of a gunshot causing them both to jump as a bullet punched through the TV.
"Cowards with guns," Buffy concluded. Meeting Faith's eyes she didn't have to say what they should do. They ran into the woods even as another bullet splintered the bark of a tree.
The Bronze
"I hope the mix-up won't delay Buffy and Faith too long," Willow worried as the limo rode away.
Xander shrugged as he led Cordelia into the Bronze followed by Willow and Oz. "Don't worry, they'll be here in half-an-hour tops, you heard the driver. Odd though that they thought Buffy had canceled their pick-up."
"It's the first time I heard about them making a mistake," Cordelia agreed. "But they won't miss anything, my coronation is still an hour away."
"Isn't this a secret ballot?" Oz remarked.
Cordelia rolled her eyes. "Please, Willow's database clearly shows Holly has been snatching votes away from Michelle leaving my voting block intact." She sniffed. "While they've been fighting like two dogs over the same bone, I've been working to actually get the biggest. That tiara is mine," she said with finality.
Miller's Wood
"This is the last time I wear anything with a heel," Faith cursed as they jogged through the woods at a steady pace.
Buffy took her eyes of the trail for a moment to look at Faith. "Boots just don't go with that dress, Faith. And if you throw them right you can take an eye out," she added cheerily.
Faith opened her mouth to retort, then made a sudden stop barring Buffy's path with an arm at the same time. "Look out!"
Buffy put her foot down as she looked down to see what had startled the brunette when she felt her shoe land on something hard and flat. She was already retracting the leg when the sound of a metal spring releasing reached her ears followed swiftly by the snap of the trap's metal jaws.
"Thanks, that would have hurt," Buffy commented as she looked back up at Faith. And that motion brought some movement in her peripheral vision to her attention. Looking behind her she finally got her first glimpse of the person shooting at them. 'He's human,' Buffy noted surprised even as the man lined up his shot.
'There's not enough cover here,' she fretted when it hit her. The reason she hadn't taken the fight to them earlier was because she couldn't find whoever was shooting at them. Jungle Bob there had just solved that problem for her. "Down," Buffy cried out pushing Faith out of the way even as she hopped in the opposite direction.
The move had the desired reaction, for a few precious heartbeats Jungle Bob was busy deciding who to shoot and that was enough time to bring Mjöllnir into the game. One moment her hand was empty, the next she was pointing the war hammer at the hunter as the blonde guided her power carefully down the weapon and straight at Jungle Bob.
Not wanting to kill the man, Buffy had only put a trickle of energy in the strike. So instead of a lightning bolt slamming into Jungle Bob, there was only a stretched out spark connecting him and Mjöllnir for the blink of an eye. He yelped as his rifle fell out his nerveless fingers, then he tried to take a step back but tripped.
The now familiar sound of metal jaws closing followed by a noise like a tree-branch snapping came to Buffy and she flinched as Jungle Bob left out a pained grunt.
"Ha, we got him trapped now!" Mjöllnir crowed.
It all happened in a flash so Faith was still getting up when Buffy stalked over to Jungle Bob but the Slayer didn't waste any time hastening to her side. "That's gotta smart," she commented as they observed the man trying to pry the trap's jaws open with his one functioning arm. That trap was firmly closed around his right upper arm guaranteeing he wouldn't be shooting anybody for quite a while. Not with a rifle anyway.
"Good," Buffy retorted as she placed her weapon on the guy's chest and pushed him down flat on the ground interrupting his futile attempts at escape. "Now, I could let you out of that, or I could give you a good up-close image of Mjöllnir. How many are there in this little game, and what are they packing?"
He took one look at her eyes, and Buffy figured they must be quite frightening with her power flowing freely through them, because they slid right off and he didn't try to meet her gaze again as the words started to tumble out of his mouth.
"There's me, two Germans with AR-15's and a grenade launcher," a grimace interrupted him but he started up again before Buffy could prod him on, "yellow-skinned demon with long knives and some French vampire. I think he knows Trick."
Buffy didn't know what AR-15's were, but she figured they were some kind of guns. The grenade launcher part hinted at that too. "That's everybody?"
"Everybody who's out there. Germans are wired. Their boss is tracking them on computer. Now please get me out of this!"
Before Buffy has the chance to respond two serrated, bone knives hit a trunk less than a yard from Faith. Looking in the direction where they came from Buffy saw the yellow-skinned demon Jungle Bob mentioned running towards them. Feeling no need to restrain herself with this one, Buffy was already raising Mjöllnir to give him a full-powered blast.
This time, however, Faith was the one to react the fastest. Kicking up Jungle Bob's rifle she caught it and pumped a new round into the chamber in the same move. Not even bothering to put the rifle to her shoulder Faith took the shot. So close to the gun, the gunshot was quite deafening to Buffy's sensitive hearing and the surprise was enough to stop her in her tracks.
The yellow-skinned demon was stopped too, but for him it was the slug punching itself a way through his chest that did it. He looked down at the tattered hole in his vest for a moment as if he couldn't understand what had happened then collapsed like a puppet who's strings had been cut.
"Lesson of the day: Don't bring a knife to a gun fight!" Faith taunted before looking challengingly at Buffy. "And just 'cause you're freaking Thor don't go thinking I'm some damsel-in-distress."
"I won't," the blonde assured her. "But that doesn't mean I can't watch your back eith-" The Aesir broke off as her ears caught a weird plopping sound. Before she could ask herself what that was, the answer landed between her and Faith. 'Grenade!'
There was no time. No time to think, no time to set Jungle Bob free, no time to warn Faith. There was barely enough time to act as Buffy took a desperate gamble. Grabbing as much power as she could, Buffy leaped over the grenade and hugged Faith somewhat awkwardly as she had to keep a hold of Mjöllnir at the same time.
Slamming as much energy as her power of flight could handle and then some, Buffy willed herself to shoot up into the sky taking Faith with her. Leaves and twigs slapped against her skin and the blonde saw the rifle getting snagged out of Faith's hand from the corner of her eye but she pressed on. Then they reached the clear sky but Buffy wasn't taking any chances.
They were already a hundred yards above the trees when an explosion tore through the vegetation beneath them.
Trick's house
"And that is why Daniel Boone and that idiot demon are creatures of the past," Abercrombie explained to Trick as one of the blips on the computer screen vanished. "And why I am the future." His satisfied look dissolved in a frown though and he began to type rapidly on his keyboard.
"Something wrong?" Trick asked casually.
"Hmmm? Oh no," the old human assured him. "The remaining target is moving west now, back towards town, but for some reason the positional locator is malfunctioning along the z-axis. According to this, she's actually flying, which is impossible."
"But then how can you be certain you got one of them? If one locator got damaged, then couldn't that be the case for the other one?"
"Perhaps," Abercrombie admitted as his fingers went still. "That's why I'm having my men inspect the area before resuming the hunt for the remaining Slayer. I should be receiving their report any moment now."
Trick's response was preempted by a knock on the door. The sound immediately sets off alarm bells, but not answering it while it's pretty clear someone is home would be even more suspicious. And when it came right down to it, Trick was confident he could talk himself out of any problem. 'At least long enough to wrap this whole thing up.'
"I'll take care of it," he said out loud to a distracted Abercrombie. Opening the door, Trick let off some mental curses at the sight of the uniformed police officers; but on the outside he was all smiles. 'Nothing to see here, officers. Everything's peachy and keen. Yessir! Walk right along.'
"Evening, gentlemen. How may I help you?" There were several responses he'd been expecting; apologetic explanations, naked suspicion, or plain surprise. What he got instead was stony silence as they simply grabbed him and cuffed him as they lead him away.
"Excuse me! Anybody got a warrant here?" he yelled only to get the same silent treatment. 'Oh, this is not good.'
Sunnydale, the sky above the town
Faith's enjoyment of her first time flying was unfortunately spoiled by the position she was in. "Do you have to hold me like this?" she asked as she looked down their bodies. Which wasn't actually down because she was lying on top of Buffy who was flying with her back pointed at the ground. "We look ridiculous!" And being pressed up all tightly against the blonde was doing some very uncomfortable things to her libido.
"Yes, we kind of do," was Buffy's irritated answer. "I'm still new to this whole flying deal and I've never taken anybody with me."
"Are you telling me I'm your first?"
"Must you make everything about sex?" Buffy asked back as her face reddened.
Faith had to fight hard not to blush herself. "Hey, that's not how I meant it Twinkie. So who's thinking about sex here, huh?" Unfortunately, now that Buffy had brought it up Faith became intensely aware of their position again.
She tried to move and create at least some distance between them but Buffy responded by tightening her hold. "And stop wriggling around before you fall off," she snapped.
The Slayer went stock-still. She almost commented how Superman never had this problem, but the brunette did not want to compare herself to Lois Lane so she said something else instead. "We could walk the rest of the way if you want to. You bought us a head-start."
"Hmmm," Buffy responded distracted who wasn't looking at her anymore. Instead, she was looking intently at the corsage on her wrist and didn't seem to have really heard Faith; something that was confirmed with her next words. "You know, with this all being a big trap I'm suddenly thinking we should look a gift corsage in the mouth."
"What?"
Buffy looked away from her wrist and met Faith's confused look. "Our corsages. Remember Jungle Bob saying those Germans were hooked up to a computer?"
"And you're thinking they've been using that to tell where we are. That they didn't aim that grenade by just guessing where we were," Faith finished for her now looking at her orchid intensely. It only took a few seconds to spot something. "I think I see something metal, could be some tracking device. Shit, that means they're still following us."
That was bad. Vampires she could handle, but the Slayer-package didn't come with any nifty powers that neutralized the effectiveness of guns. On the other hand, there was an easy solution. "Better get rid of them now before we reach the library." They'd thought about going to the Bronze to get Buffy's friends but if the hunters caught up with them there, things could get messy for all those innocent bystanders. So they were going to get a weapon for Faith at the library and handle this on their own.
"No, wait," Buffy ordered before Faith could even begin removing the betraying decoration.
One look at the blonde Aesir's intense expression told her why she did that. "You got a plan," Faith concluded.
Buffy nodded. "I was thinking about this nest we were going to clear up tomorrow over at Nylund Cemetery."
It took a moment for Faith to follow the blonde's meaning. "Whoa, that's harsh B. Didn't know you had it in you."
"I figure they got guns, that should be enough to at least keep the vampires from actually getting them while they waste all their bullets just staying alive."
"What if they don't get away." Faith hated to point it out, but felt that the former Slayer would never forgive herself if they hadn't considered that.
"If they can't deal with vampires, they shouldn't be out hunting Vampire Slayers," Buffy said with steel in her voice.
'Damn, I've really underestimated Buffy. I never figured her for the ruthless type.' And she should have. Hadn't she thought the blonde was dangerous on their first encounter? And now she'd forgotten that just 'cause Buffy looked so girly at the moment. Well, before she proposed to pit their enemies against each other. "Sounds like a plan. Let's drop these babies off."
Nylund Cemetery
Nail eyed the flower in his hand carefully, still unsure if it was real. Wreck was facing a similar problem apparently. "Dude, did the Slayers just come in here and throw corsages at us?"
"I think they did," Nail answered.
"Maybe they're explosive corsages," Crow piped in. "Like James Bond's pen."
Nail eyed the third member of their quartet carefully. Even by their own standards, Crow wasn't exactly smart. Or lucid. "Wouldn't they have exploded by now if they were?" He looked back at the fake flower. "Maybe it's a warning or something."
"I dunno," Wreck muttered. "Don't seem their style, right?"
Nail shrugged. Like most Sunnydale regulars he knew what the Slayers looked like, but not much more. He was just about to remind Wreck of that when the door to their crypt got busted open again. Looking over at the doorway Nail was just about to remind Shiv to go easy on the place when two guys in black commando gear stormed in with guns blazing.
Wreck and Nail reacted the fastest, diving to the sides even as the bullets started punching holes in their bodies. Crow didn't and caught the full fury of the lead rain. He howled as the first projectiles ripped into him, but was reduced to a collapsing, gurgling wreck a second later as the humans turned his head into Swiss cheese. It wouldn't kill Crow, but it was going to be days before he was capable of forming a thought again. A coherent one would take even longer.
With a growl, Nail rushed at their attackers with Wreck following his lead. Smoothly, the two humans both concentrated their fire on one attacker each. More pain blossomed in Nail's chest but not enough to stop him. Out of the corner of his eyes he saw Wreck stumble and fall as his legs got shot up, but it didn't matter because Nail had finally reached the humans.
Batting the firearm away, Nail jerked the human's head to the side and plunged his fangs into the man's neck. The other human was already raising his gun at Nail but he faltered when the vampire positioned the man he was feeding on between him and the armed human. "Hans!" he cried out as he finally showed some emotion.
With anguish still twisting his features the human tried to flank Nail to get a clear shot at him. He was just passing the short stairs leading to the outside when Shiv finally returned from wherever the hell he'd been. "Hey, guys. I heard all the rack-" Shiv broke off when he finally spotted the armed human who'd turned to face him at hearing his voice.
That left his back wide-open for a moment and Nail had every attention of taking that opportunity. Letting the corpse in his arms drop to the ground he jumped the distracted human. But there was apparently nothing wrong with his reflexes because even as he kept Shiv under shot with his gun in one hand the other one quickly pulled out a knife which he rammed back straight into Nail's left eye.
Though that stopped Nail dead in his tracks, it was also the signal for Shiv to leap into action. The human managed to get several shots off but that wasn't enough to stop Shiv from landing on him and dragging him to the floor. As Nail collapsed to the floor, he could just see Shiv tear out the man's throat before the world dissolved completely into pain.
Sunnydale High
"You think those Germans already reached the nest," the one Jean pegged as Faith asked. Debry couldn't help but smile at hearing the validation to his strategy. They had gotten rid of his competition, exactly as he had hoped, and they'd gone to their safe place as he knew they would.
'That's the difference between the others and me. They try to fit a strategy to the tools they got, if they even get that far. But me, I went the smart way. Come up with the strategy that fits the situation, then get the tools you need for it,' he gloated. It would be nice if he could actually tell anybody else about his brilliance, but that would just warn his future victims. He would just have to settle for a big, fat paycheck.
The click-click of heels on the floor came closer than the rhythm stalled, signaling they'd reached the library's doors. The moment he'd been waiting for. As he stepped away from his hiding place behind the lockers, Jean drew his piece and took aim at the Slayers' unsuspecting backs. 'Nighty-night.'
TO BE CONTINUED