Standard Disclaimer Applies
As always big thanks to Wolf.
Chapter 21
For as long as there had been a fight there had always been backup. Always someone standing with him, there in the dark to watch his back. To yell a warning for surprise attacks, to pull the nasties off his neck. To chant a spell or incantation. To provide, always needed, comic relief from the tense situations. He could count on one hand the number of times that he'd faced evil himself, alone all by himself. But the fights where he had support outnumbered them maybe a hundred to one. The fights where he'd stood side by side with a Slayer. With a Witch. With a vampire. With friends.
That feeling of company as you face the unknown was what he perhaps now missed the most. The ability to bounce plans and ideas off another person, a more rational person. The I can do attitude of the Scooby's, their inability to give-up their refusal to let the evil win. How he wished he could have that support now.
But he was alone, well and truly and by choice. If he picked up the phone and called in Slayer support he was opening his best friend up to the possibility of discovery by the NSA, by the Air force. No. He wouldn't be the person responsible for Buffy getting turned into the governments most lethal human weapon. Wouldn't risk harm to the world's most valuable asset. Wouldn't and couldn't risk any of his family, not even Faith. Then again he wasn't really alone. Not really. Cause if he allowed them to, there was a soldier and a hyena ready to come out and play too.
The explosion rocks the building suddenly and completely without warning. Two SUV's shoot sky high as their gas tanks disintegrate into fiery deadly balls of orange heat. Men in an odd mixture of black BDU's and civilian clothing burst from the old mill carrying a dizzying array of weapons. Orders are barked down radios and the men form a very organised sweep of the old compound. Weapons held up and ready. The men sprang into action, the adrenalin running on high.
" The perimeter is secure Sir." The Man hears down his earpiece and he knocks a coffee mug off the control table in disgust.
" They're here. Find them!" He barks down the microphone before him. His eyes scan the video monitors in front of him slowly and methodically.
" It's been my experience that parked cars rarely just explode." He mutters to the other two men standing besides him in the fortified room.
" You think this is the boy?" One asks the other and The Man turns to face him.
" I think this is the Father. The boy has no military background. No training. Nothing at all to suggest that he'd be any more of a threat then an angry golden retriever."
" I need not remind you the importance of keeping our little secret here secure." The second states quietly and The Man glares at him.
" You can be assured. This is not a problem." he replies calmly and the other two men in the room nod at each other before disappearing in a bright flash of light.
" Find him!" The man roars down the microphone, disregarding the calm demeanour he had adopted a moment before, and allowing a tincture of panic to creep into his tone. If the situation wasn't remedied than it would certainly start to become a problem.
The men in the compound sweep the surrounding area thoroughly. The compound now illuminated by strong floodlights. Some patrol by strolling through the night sniffing occasionally at the breeze that turned and blew the black smoke skyward. Others used sophisticated night vision technology to inspect the area beyond the fence surrounding the mill. Together they find a grand total of nothing. A very confusing nothing.
Deep within the building structures of the Mill, two extra guards were added to the outside the quarters of two prisoners. Fire extinguishers were used to smother the burning remains of the vehicles and apart from that absolutely nothing happened.
" Get the old man." The Man orders down the microphone as he stands and moves away from the cameras and strides out into the dark night. Coming to a stop under the wash of one of the huge flood lights. He stands surrounded by his 'army' for a moment in silence.
" Get your hands off me!" Mike commands as he is dragged roughly and easily across the dirt terrain by a vampire roughly three hundred pounds of pure undead muscle. Mike is unaware of the origin of his captor as he writhes like a child beneath the grip of the man. To silence his captive the vampire quickly wraps a strip of leather around Mike's face and head. Gagging him.
" Jack?" The Man calls out into the night. He is certain that the General is out there watching him. Waiting.
" Jack. I'm going to count to ten and then I'm going to put a bullet into the back of old Pop's head here." The Man yells. His threat is met with silence and The Man turns and looks at the Vampire.
" Wait for the count." The Man orders and the vampire pulls a forty four magnum pistol from a holster on his belt with one hand. Easily forcing Mike down onto his knees with the other. Mike's cries can still be heard muffled through the gag, and though not discernible they are audible.
" One!" The Man yells and he looks at his troops. " Watch the fence," He orders quietly.
" Two!" He waits a beat, watching the area keenly. " Three! You want to save him? All you have to do is to stop hiding. Jack! Stop hiding and you can save him. Four!"
" Five!" He yells and the vampire brings the gun up in front of Mike's face and cocks the pistol. Mike tries to look away from the opposing weapon. Starts to tremble in fear.
" The old man for the young man! Five!" The Man bellows and the only answer is his own echo, radiating off the old metal machinery of the mill.
" Six! You think that I'm playing Jack!" He screams now, becoming increasingly angry. Increasingly irate.
" Seven! It's the boy's fault Jack. That damned son of yours should have just played dead. We weren't hurting anyone! " He screams turning to face Mike dramatically.
" Eight." He calls softer staring into the frightened eyes of Mike, with a look of false compassion. Of false empathy. He moves to stand beside his hostage and he crouches besides him.
" He can save you but he won't. What kind of a man would do that?" The man asks Mike. " Nine." He whispers into Mike's ear.
" Last chance!" The Man yells making Mike jump at the loud noise so close to his ear. Sweat runs down the brow of the old man and he stops trying to be heard through the gag and closes his eyes. Preparing himself as best as his terrified mind will allow for what is about to happen. He is okay with this, he tells himself. Sara will be saved. He tells himself. Jack will save her. Jack will save them both. The mantra rings in his mind.
" Ten!" The Man screams in disgust and the retort by the big gun is like another explosion. Then the night falls silent. The Vampire looks up at The Man and shrugs.
" There is no one out there." He says amused and The Man turns and storms back into the building in disgust.
" Kinda funny when you think about it. " The Vampire chuckled looking around for someone to agree with him. " Like an actor performing to an empty theatre." He adds poetically before grabbing the hand of a limp Mike, who had fainted when the gun was fired behind his head into the dust.
" All the world's a stage." The Vampire mutters as he drags Mike along the ground back to the building. Around him some of the men return to the building as well. Some take up their posts around the compound. They like The Man are convinced. There is nothing out there. Whoever was there has gone.
Four hundred yards from the fence. Up wind and crouched behind a boulder, Xander throws up. He sits frozen in the night while his thumping heart quietens. Until the sweat that has broken out on his brow dries and until his breath comes to him again naturally. He tells himself that he's done well. That he knows now the weakest point in the compound's defence. How he saw the men race to the site of the explosion and leave the right side of the compound exposed. He tells himself it was important to test the responses of his enemy. Tells himself that he knew The Man's threats were a bluff. That last part he repeats for awhile, and then he is ready to move.
This time when he breaches the perimeter of the compound he does so by cutting the wire in the fence. Not as he did last time by climbing over it. Like before he loiters in one of the security cameras blind spot until the two vampires on a roving patrol come past. He knows that although they wear radio equipment they do not routinely call in as they move around the compound. He knows know that it will be a good fifteen minutes until they are missed. If at all.
Killing the vampire patrol must be done in complete silence and Xander pulls the machete off his belt well before the vamps approach. Just in case they are alerted by the rustle it makes as it is pulled from it's sheath. He waits not moving, holding his breath as the vampires pass. The are close together sharing a quiet joke as they pass the boring night. Creatures of the night, such as themselves they believed, were below being used as hired body guards.
Xander waits for them to get past him before he explodes from the shadows, his stake sliding powerfully through the back of the vampire closest to him. The vamp explodes and as his partner turns toward the threat, Xander takes his head off with a machete. Ten seconds, no noise and two dead vampires. Xander allows himself a small smile of pride as he kicks dust away into the breeze.
After pouring a trail of gas from two more vehicles a small voice inside his head tells Xander that it's time to go loud.
The Man can hardly believe it as another explosion rocks the compound and he stares at the monitors before him in disbelief as two more of his black SUV's are destroyed in flames.
" I want his head on a platter!" He screams down the Microphone. " Get out there and find him!" He orders snatching an MP5 off the table in his surveillance room and running from the building. He is furious at his men and himself for not checking the other vehicles for more explosive devices. He has underestimated Jack and Jack would be the one that paid.
The men swarm the compound again, fanning out in the same formation they had used in the earlier attack. But this time they pull open the gates and several heavily armed men accompany Vampires in rushing out into the area around the mill.
Xander slips through a small window, broken long ago by teenage pranksters, and drops quietly to the ground inside the building. He sniffs the air and moves to the doorway of the room he has arrived in. Once out in the hallway he nearly crashes into an extremely surprised man in a jet black uniform.
The man moves to yell a warning to his comrades, trying to bring up his weapon at the same time from where it was hanging off a strap wrapped around his body. Xander strikes the man in the face with the heel of his palm, smashing the soldier's nose. He follows the move up with a strike to the throat as the soldier's hands fly to his injured nose. A final blow to the side of the soldier's head and he is unconscious.
Xander catches his victim as he falls and pulls him into the empty room he has just emerged from. He souvenirs the man's high powered weapons with a grin. Allowing instinct to take over as he checks the weapon and moves back out into the hallway.
There is yelling from the compound. And Xander crosses a large cavernous space inside the old Mill quickly and quietly. At the end of the space, a group of four soldiers are waiting, weapons ready, guarding two doors.
Outside a secondary explosion from the cars sounds deafening and Xander uses the cover to open fire on the men. Holding back a disgusted sigh at himself for cutting down four humans. The men, their bodies destroyed by the quick bursts from Xander's weapon fall to the ground. Offering no resistance and Xander bolts towards the doors.
Kicking in the first door Xander discovers Sara huddled against the far wall in the room. Her hair is tangled but she appears unharmed. She stares up at her son in shock. For a moment she is frightened of the figure before her. Xander stands in the door way dressed from head to toe in black, holding a machine gun and barks an order at her.
" Move now!" Sara scurries to her feet quickly and runs towards her Son. She looks across the hallway.
" Dad!" She cries and Xander turns and ducks out of the room for a brief second before ploughing through the door opposite.
Mike is slumped on the floor, lying on his side and Sara rushes to him.
" Dad?" She asks tearing up shaking her Father's shoulders for a response. The old man doesn't react and she slaps the side of her fathers face and Mike's eyes open in surprise.
" Sara?" He asks struggling into a sitting position and Sara nods, crying now, at her Father.
" What's going on?" Mike demands turning around to catch a glimpse of Xander standing in the door way, gun ready.
" Jack?" Mike asks catching sight of the build and posture of the man before him, and Sara shakes her head as she hauls her Father to his feet.
" No Dad. It's Xander." She explains as the rush towards the door.
" We gotta move." Xander says quietly, " I'll explain later." He says and ducks his head out of the doorway.
" Ok let's go home." He calls from the hallway and Mike and Sara stick close to Xander as they move back across the cavernous space. The journey is less careful and not nearly as quiet as the first crossing. They make it about halfway before bullets start pinging into the machinery around them.
Sara and Mike dive to the ground in response, shielding their heads from the projectiles. They move when they hear Xander tell them.
" Get behind me."
" Run!" Xander shouts as he turns and opens fire at the direction the bullets came.
The Shooter, ducks behind an old saw and Xander moves backwards across the floor, firing as he shepards Mike and Sara across the open space. Dropping the gun as it runs out of ammo he pushes Sara and Mike into the room with the still unconscious soldier.
" Out the window!" Xander hisses shutting the door and turning back to the soldier, his hands flicking through the man's pockets and along his belt until he rips the whole belt off in frustration.
Sara and Mike climb awkwardly through the window and Xander follows more gracefully. Turning back sitting on the window sill as the door creaks open he pullsthe pin on a stolen hand grenade and flings the bomb inside the room as he flings himself outside. Falling nearly on top of Mike and Sara.
Xander pulls Mike and Sara down as a ball of flames follows him out the window. The three cower in the dirt for a moment, before Xander jumps to his feet ready to move again.
" This way!" He calls hoarsely leading his family back towards the cut fence.
They make it halfway, Sara and Mike hunched forward and running low and terrified before a vamp catches up with them.
" Hmm, midnight snack." The undead creature muses looking at Sara as Xander pulls the stake from his pocket and lunges at the vamp in an overhead strike.
" Go!" He yells to his family as he attacks. And he can see for a moment in his peripheral vision Sara and Mike rush past him.
The vamp catches Xander's arms as they crash towards it's chest and the force behind Xander causes the vamp to fall backwards, but it kicks out as it goes down. Catching Xander in the stomach with a boot and flipping him over it's head. The Vamp flips too. The fighting pair end up with Xander lying on the ground and the vampire straddling him. Pinning his arms with his thighs.
" It's like I'm the cheese on top." The vamp muses as Xander's arm scrabbles at his pockets desperately. He bucks his body up and down trying to dislodge the vampire.
" Top this." Xander retorts as he pulls the pin on a magnesium flare and holds it to the vamp's leg. The vamp ignores the pain for a moment before he screams and rolls away from the intense heat.
This time it was Xander that rolled with him and as he got the vampire on his back he punched the vampire in the chest. Impaling the flare in the vulnerable skin over the vampire's heart. The magnesium burns through the skin of the vampire and Xander turns his head in disgust as the vampire explodes.
Xander jumped up into a crouch and scanned the area around him, looking for new threats. But for the moment it seems like he's in the clear. Turning Xander starts running. Slipping through the fence and sprinting away into the night.
He catches up to Sara and Mike easily and grabs Sara by the arm. Pulling her in the direction he wants to go in.
" This way!" He yells jumping into a dry creek bed that ran beside the mill. Crouching low the trio speed down the rocky road.
From the other side of the Mill shots rang out again, but Xander ignores them and kept running. His enemy were disorientated and in disarray, they were more likely to be shooting at themselves then at the family that had slipped, nearly unnoticed away into the night.
His only thoughts now was of getting Sara and Mike to safety. And the safest place he could think of was the fortified base he'd just escaped from. Consequences to himself be damned. He was going back to Jack.
To Be Continued...
AN: Sorry for the huge gap in time between updates. Standard Disclaimer still applies. Hope you enjoyed the latest part. Read and Review people, it spurs me on.