A/N: I need to give a huge thanks to my beta reader isugirl. She noticed that I had completely lost my mind and switched everything to present tense, which totally clashes with the other chapters. I think it was because I had just finished reading the Hunger Games trilogy. I was so freakin into it. If you haven't read it, definitely check it out. Anyway, I digress. The point is that those novels are all written entirely in present tense. Add that to the fact that I've had horrible migraines this week and you get a crazy person who entirely forgets their own style of writing. Anyway, isugirl did an enormous amount of work in pointing out all the inconsistencies. I hope I've cleared it all up, but like I said – crazy person. I do apologize for being so behind on writing responses to my reviews. It's been difficult for me to spend as much time in front of my computer due to the headaches (insert shameless pity mongering). I assure you I haven't forgotten. I am enormously grateful for each and every review. Anyway, I'll stop rambling.

The chapter title is an Aerosmith song from the album Aerosmith (1973)

XXXXXXXXXX

Sam was awakened by the sound of someone knocking on the door to his motel room. Without thinking, he automatically reached out for the knife that was lying on the bedside table. He noticed that the clock was reading 4:32 A.M. and decided he was likely just dealing with some guy who'd been out drinking all night and was now too wasted to remember his own room number. He still kept a tight grip on the blade though, life as a hunter tended to make a person paranoid. Without flipping on a light, he crept silently to the window and peered through the opening in the curtains, hoping to get an idea of what he was dealing with. He was shocked to see that it was Faith. She was pretty much the last person he expected. He watched her raise her fist to knock again, but then she appeared to change her mind and turned to go. Her unexpected appearance had definitely made him curious, so he opened the door enough to pop his head out and called her by name. She had already made it halfway to the stairs, but turned back at the sound of his voice. Sam was struck by how sexy she looked with her hair all messy and a large tear in the tight t-shirt she was wearing.

"Hey you," she greeted with a sultry smile. "I gave up. Thought you were dead to the world in there."

"Is something wrong?" he asked.

"Nah, I was just coming off patrol when I saw your car parked here. That thing's pretty damn obvious, but guess you already know that. Anyways, I decided to pop in and see what you were up to. Guess your brother's at Buffy's place?" she asked hopefully.

"Yeah," he answered, sounding a little confused by her friendly tone. "Give me a second," he said while holding up a finger.

Sam closed the door and quickly pulled a clean pair of jeans over his boxers. He caught his reflection in the dresser mirror and realized that his hair was sticking straight out on the left side of his head. He tried to flatten it with his hand, but wasn't having any luck. He decided that there wasn't much hope for it. Besides, Faith shouldn't expect him to be perfectly groomed this early in the morning. He couldn't imagine what had brought her here. If there was an emergency, Dean would've called and this seemed like a very odd time to talk about whatever he'd done to piss her off.

"Come on in," he offered, holding the door open for her to pass.

She strolled in and immediately flopped down on the unoccupied bed that would normally have been claimed by his brother. She made herself completely at home by propping her booted feet up on the bedspread.

"Man, it's been a long night," she said as she slowly stretched and then rolled onto her side, providing Sam with a very deliberate and very excellent view of her curves. "It's friggin crazy out there."

Sam remained standing by the doorway, appearing very unsure of the situation. "Yeah," he agreed haltingly, "long night. We spent at least five hours looking for that dragon in the sewer tunnels. Unfortunately, I've gotta feeling we haven't even scratched the surface. This town has miles and miles of sewers."

"Fascinating," she remarked, her tone indicating that she had little interest in the subject. "Are you just gonna stand there?" she asked. She slid over a little and patted the mattress beside her in a clear invitation.

Instead of joining her, Sam paused for a moment, his brows drawn together in confusion. "Sorry," he finally said, "maybe it's the whole one hour of sleep I've gotten, but I'm not sure I get what's going on here."

A hurt expression crossed Faith's features, but she hid it quickly. "What's to get?" she asked, a hint of uncertainty creeping into her voice. "I figured we could both use a good toss in the sack before we turned in for the day. It'll help us sleep. Ya know," she added, licking her lips sensuously, "pick up where we left off? There's definitely some stuff on the menu we haven't tried yet."

Sam let out a surprised laugh. "Wow," he said, "you're serious. I really don't know what to say. I thought you hated my guts."

"Why would you think that?"

"Let's see," he began, shaking his head in amazement, "first you bail on me - no goodbye, not even a screw you. Then when I see you later, you don't even bother to say 'hi'. Maybe I'm weird,but that doesn't exactly scream 'I like you'. So, sorry… I'm just not itching to jump back into bed with you." The last part was a huge lie and it had also come out sounding a lot harsher than he'd intended, but the way she'd ditched him earlier had seriously stung.

Faith sat up and stared at Sam for a moment, clearly shocked by his rejection. "What's your deal? Did you think we were engaged or somethin'?" she asked as she hopped fluidly to her feet. "Newsflash dude - I don't owe you crap. So, excuse the hell outta me if I thought you were man enough to handle a little 'friends with benefits' action. Your loss," she added with an indifferent shrug, although her tone betrayed her anger.

"Friends with benefits?" he echoed back at her incredulously. This girl was really starting to piss him off. "I'm not sure you know what the word 'friend' means. Maybe you should look it up."

Faith stalked toward Sam, not stopping until there was less than an inch of space between them. She looked up at him with her most intimidating expression firmly in place. "You should watch that smart mouth with me," she stated coldly as she pointed a finger at him. "I've got no problem kickin' your ass and you better believe I can do it. Won't even break a sweat."

Sam returned her glare, showing no indication of backing down. "Go for it," he replied simply. "I've had my ass kicked plenty of times. I'm sure you'll enjoy it since that sorta thing gets you off."

Faith placed her hands on his shoulders and gave him a shove, causing him to stumble into the wall behind him. "Go to hell!" she practically yelled as she snatched open the door to leave. "That whole nice guy act you've got goin' - Trust me, I'm onto you now. You're just as big an asshole as the rest of 'em."

She punctuated her words by slamming the door so hard behind her that Sam wondered if he'd end up paying to have it replaced. He had to force himself not to open it up again just so he could yell back and tell her what a royal bitch she was, but he decided they'd probably already woken up half the guests and besides he wouldn't give her the satisfaction.

After waiting a few minutes, he tested the door to see if she'd broken anything. It seemed to be in working order, so he closed it back and gave it an angry kick before sitting down on the foot of his bed. He could practically hear Dean's voice telling him what a dumbass he was. His brother would say he should never let his pride come between him and a hot piece of ass. Of course, Dean was completely full of shit more than half the time. Even so, he decided not to mention this little episode to him. He wouldn't get it or if he did, he'd claim the conversation was way too chick-flick oriented. The fact that Dean was the current reigning king of chick-flick moments would obviously be completely irrelevant. Besides, maybe imaginary-Dean was right, it's not like he was looking for a relationship right now. There were way too many unresolved issues regarding what happened over that missing year and what might happen if the wall in his head didn't stay put. He probably should've just played along with Faith's game and refused to let her indifference get to him. He realized that he'd always been way too stubborn for his own good. So instead of enjoying a nice, mindless post-sex coma, he got to sit here all pissed off, listening to traffic go by on the freeway. But who was he kidding anyway? He could never take that bargain. It was one thing when he thought he'd inadvertently done something to offend her. Then he found out that she was just a cold bitch who expected him to perform like a trained dog, even though she couldn't be bothered to acknowledge his existence in the morning. To hell with her, he decided and to hell with imaginary-Dean too. He'd keep his pride. They could both kiss his ass.

XXXXXXXXXX

Buffy found herself standing in the auditorium of the original Sunnydale High. She looked down and noticed that she was wearing a gauzy dress in a beautiful deep-orange shade. She liked it; it reminded her of the color of the leaves in fall. As she took in her surroundings, she saw that the back row of the audience was filled with china dolls. This immediately brought up a mental picture of that homicidal nutcase Drusilla. The dolls were creepy enough by themselves, but when she looked closer, she saw that all of their eyes had been painted a solid black. With a shiver, she turned away from the sight and made a mental note to stake Drusilla at the first opportunity. She didn't care if Angel and Spike felt sorry for her, she was dangerous and those dolls were way too freaky for her to go on living (or unliving).

She walked up the center aisle toward the stage where she spotted at least a dozen of the young Slayers, several of them on ladders, busily hanging decorations. They appeared to be creating a night sky, but instead of one moon there were three, each in different phases. All of the girls were barefoot and wore simple, white dresses that fell just below their knees. One figure stood out in the group because she alone was wearing black. As she climbed onto the stage, Buffy realized that the lone figure was Willow and that she was dressed in a cheaply made witch's costume, similar to one a child would wear on Halloween. Her black dress had a ragged hem and she wore a pointy hat. The look was completed with a fake hooked-nose.

"Hi Buffy," her best friend said, "I look ridiculous don't I? I'm the crone," she stated with an eye-roll. "It's a stupid stereotype, but somebody has to do it. Besides, it's actually not a bad thing. They've just made it seem that way. They're scared."

"What's going on here Will?" she asked.

"We're getting ready for the curtains to open," she stated, her tone implying this should be obvious. "But I think we need more shiny stars," she commented thoughtfully as she looked up at the cardboard, glitter-covered stars hanging from the ceiling.

"Definitely," Dawn's voice agreed. Buffy turned to see her sister sitting in the front row of the audience. Although she was blindfolded, she appeared to be reading a freshman humanities text titled The Ancient World. "The stars represent the souls," she continued with an air of authority, "it's all about the souls. You should put up as many as you can. They're the stars of the show you know," she said as she raised her head from the book and smiled brightly. "Get it?" she asked. "The stars of the show."

"Good one Dawnie," Willow replied with a giggle before returning her attention to Buffy. "I think we have some extras in the basement. Will you go get them?" she asked hopefully.

Buffy was now in a damp, seemingly abandoned basement that smelled strongly of death. She watched in morbid fascination as blood dripped slowly into a drain in the middle of the concrete floor. The room was dark, illuminated only by one filthy, yellow florescent light which buzzed and flickered constantly overhead. In a shadowy corner, she saw the silhouette of a man sitting in a plain wooden chair, a large blade dangling loosely from one hand. As she moved cautiously forward, she was shocked to see Dean's features coming into focus in the flickering light. He was covered in blood and staring at the blade in his hand with a blank expression. Her heart constricted painfully in her chest as she came to a stop in front of him. She didn't want to see this. It was all wrong. Everything was wrong. A feeling of darkness and hopelessness like she hadn't felt in years began to wash over her.

"They shouldn't be here," he said, shocking her with the rough, pained sound of his voice. He didn't meet her eyes, but continued staring at the blade as he spoke. "I never meant for them to come. None of this should be happening… not here." He finally looked up at her and she was struck by how intensely green his eyes looked in contrast to the blood that almost completely covered his face. "I'm sorry," he nearly whispered. "There used to be a natural order and we broke it. Don't you see?" he implored, his voice taking on a desperate edge, "I'm a killer. I break things. It doesn't matter what I want, it's all I can do."

Buffy reached out, wanting to touch him, to tell him everything was okay, that it didn't matter to her. However, the room in front of her faded and became her bedroom. She found that instead of Dean, she was reaching out toward Faith, who was holding three small kittens in her arms (one black, one orange, and one white). They mewed constantly and squirmed around, trying to climb up her shirt.

"Cute as hell, aren't they?" she asked.

"Yeah, but how did they get here?" Buffy asked curiously.

Faith laughed. "Come on B, you know how it works. You don't need me to draw a picture," she said, shaking her head.

"I think you might have to," she replied, completely perplexed by the entire situation.

Faith didn't respond, but instead looked up toward the ceiling. "Have you seen the moon tonight?" she asked. "It's wicked cool."

She followed the other Slayer's gaze and instead of her bedroom ceiling, she saw the night sky above her and there were three moons.

"You wanna hold one?" Faith asked, drawing her attention away from the sky. She started to reply, but Faith was no longer standing in front of her. Xander's girlfriend, Allie, had taken her place. She is very obviously pregnant and holding one kitten that appeared to be a perfect combination of the three Faith had been holding the moment before. Buffy noticed that its eyes were the same intense shade of green that Dean's had been.

"It's a calico," Allie explained, happily rubbing her nose in its fur. "They're always girls. Here, you can hold her," she said, placing the tiny kitten in Buffy's hands. "Just watch out for the mother. You don't want to make her angry. It throws off the balance. Nothing's more dangerous."

Buffy followed Allie's gaze to see a large, powerful lioness standing several feet away. She seemed to look through them as if she was indifferent to their presence.

"It's almost reaping time," Allie continued nonchalantly, seemingly unconcerned by the appearance of the large cat. "I grew up on a farm you know. Years ago, they used to sacrifice virgins to ensure a good harvest," she added conversationally.

"Sounds like a good time," Buffy replied dryly.

"Actually, I think they did make a big party out of it," she shrugged, "but that was way before my time. Anyway, there's a really good crop this year. You should see the fields," she said brightly, pointing to a field of wheat which had mysteriously appeared around them.

Buffy was now alone, walking slowly between endless towering rows of wheat, which stretched in every direction as far as the eye could see. Dean appeared a few yards ahead of her. He was no longer covered in blood, but appeared to be extremely frustrated. He stomped around, turning in circles and craning his neck in an attempt to see past the grain.

"This blows," he said to her through gritted teeth. "You can't see a damn thing in here. I think they're trying to hide something from us. It's a freakin' shell game."

"Who cares?" she replied, slipping her arms around his neck and pressing her body against his. "We don't need to see. We can always feel our way around."

His angry expression softened and he smiled as he wrapped his arms around her. "I can work with that," he agreed.

Suddenly, they were making love in Buffy's bed, which now sat in the middle of the wheat field. Everything was in slow motion, allowing her to concentrate on each detail, every feeling. For a long moment she focused on the slightly scratchy feel of his stubble when he kissed her. She ran her hands across his back and down his arms, feeling the muscles working beneath his warm skin. She traced the deep scar on his shoulder and pressed a kiss against it, knowing without being told that this was the key, the secret to truly understanding him.

The world seemed right for the first time in what felt like forever. Out of the corner of her eye, she could see the lioness. It blended in almost perfectly with the golden stalks of wheat as it moved gracefully in rhythm with the softly swaying grain. She knew that the beautiful animal was a predator. She meant death, but the fact didn't alarm her, because she meant other things too. She belonged here. She was part of the cycle.

In the background, a very intrusive wailing noise began to invade the balance of the world, as the sound grew louder and closer it started to melt away. As the scene slipped away from her, Buffy was relieved that she could still sense Dean's presence beside her. At least that much had been real. She could feel him lying on his side behind her, one arm draped across her waist. She opened her eyes to see the wall of her bedroom and immediately recognized the sound of an emergency siren that was already beginning to fade as the vehicle moved up the road. The sound didn't seem to disturb Dean. He was still sleeping. She could tell by the steady, even sound of his breathing. She lay still, not wishing to disturb him. A bad dream had caused him to lie awake for much of the night. He didn't admit to it, instead he claimed that their late dinner of greasy, delivery pizza had given him indigestion. Buffy didn't buy his excuse, because she was intimately familiar with the signs of a nightmare. She'd had enough of her own to be an expert on the subject. He'd displayed at least three of the classic symptoms - disorientation, a cold sweat, and pupils dilated with fear. Still, she didn't challenge him. Whatever the dream had contained, it had shaken him and she had an instinctual feeling that she shouldn't push. Not yet anyway, not while things were still so new between them.

She tried to remember the details of her dream. It hadn't been a nightmare, at least the end of it wasn't, but it did seem that there was something ominous about parts of it. However, the more she tried to recall it, the faster it seemed to slip away from her. Her gut told her that the dream was an omen, but her head said that she was only being paranoid, reasoning that she'd be able to remember it if it was really that important. She had always been able to recall a prophetic Slayer-dream in almost perfect detail. Only regular, meaningless dreams seemed to fade this quickly. It made sense. After all, what good was a prophetic dream that couldn't be remembered? It would defeat the entire purpose. She decided that she was only concerned about it because of Dean's nightmare. Empathy was making her anxious, causing her to see meaning where there was none. Since it was still early, she curled her fingers into his hand and allowed herself to drift back to sleep.

XXXXXXXXXX

Buffy struggled to keep a straight face as she watched Dean spit out another piece of egg shell. She wondered how long he would keep pretending that his omelet was edible. She'd definitely botched breakfast. Actually, she didn't consider herself a bad cook. After the move to Cleveland, she suddenly found herself chiefly responsible for ensuring that Dawn was fed. Before that, there had always been someone around to take up the slack. Once all of her friends had gotten their own apartments, she quickly learned that take-out gets old fast. Normally, omelets were one of her specialties, but she did have issues with the egg cracking thing. There was a very fine line between a perfectly cracked egg and one that had been shattered into a million tiny bits by her Slayer strength. Unfortunately, this morning she crossed that line and obviously she was mistaken in believing that she'd managed to retrieve all the pieces. It was a tragedy - with orange juice and toast. At least she hadn't burned the toast.

She finally lost it at the expression on Dean's face when he cringed as he bit down on another piece of shell. She had to spit a mouthful of coffee back into her cup to keep from choking on it.

"I'm sorry," she said through her giggles. "You really don't have to eat that."

"Oh well," he shrugged good naturedly, "It doesn't matter. Anything we eat is just gonna come back up the minute we step into the sewer."

"Ugh," Buffy replied as she shoved her coffee away from her in disgust. "You had to bring that up, didn't you? It's too bad I can't assign smelly sewer duty to some of the younger girls. I'd try to push it off on Faith, but she'd never buy into it. She's way too street smart. I don't want to be head Slayer anymore," she added with a pout.

"Sorry babe, maybe we'll hit it lucky out there today."

"Have you ever hit it lucky?" she asked. "If so, it's all on you, because luck and Buffy are very non-mixy things."

"We're screwed then," he replied with a laugh. "Cause, I'm fairly sure that me and Sam are cursed."

"Yay," she sighed, "more sewers for us. So, do you wanna hit the shower first? We should be squeaky clean when we walk through all that crap."

"You sure? It doesn't matter to me. I don't need three hours to get ready," he teased.

"It doesn't take me three hours," she replied with an eye-roll. "And yeah, I'll go after you. I need to suck it up and call Giles. It's time to find out what the damage is. I'm sure Willow's already worked some sort of spell to figure out which of the girls we have to keep under wraps. Personally, I'm keeping my fingers crossed and hoping that the abstinence movement was a complete failure."

"I never saw the appeal," Dean joked lightly. He started to leave the room, but paused and turned around like he wanted to say something.

"What is it?" she questioned curiously.

"So, you think the witch will really work a spell?" he asked.

"Yeah," Buffy replied, shaking her head fondly at the memory of Willow's meltdown. "She'll do it. She won't like it, but she knows it has to be done. Heck, none of us like it. It's kind of a… I don't know… it just feels like a taboo subject. It seems majorly creepy that a bunch of adults are so obsessed with underage girls' sex lives."

"Tell me about it. I keep expecting Chris Hanson to pop out from around a corner and stick a microphone in my face."

Buffy could tell that Dean still had something on his mind, but he seemed reluctant to come out with it. "Why do you ask?" she questioned.

He massaged the back of his neck with one hand and regarded her seriously for a moment before speaking. "Do you really think it's a good idea to let her work spells on a bunch of kids?"

"You don't trust Willow," she concluded with some surprise. "This is about more than her interrupting us that night. Isn't it?"

"It's nothin' personal. Truth is, she seems pretty harmless, but I don't trust witches. Never have. I've never met one that didn't try to bend me over."

"Well that's too bad," Buffy stated simply, "because I trust her completely. She's family. Besides, do you really think I have no concern for those girls?" she asked, a note of indignation seeping into her voice.

"Of course not," he replied with a sigh. "I just… I had to put it out there. Okay? I'm not good at pretending when it comes to crap like that. So, now you know how I feel."

"Fine," she replied flatly. "Now I know."

Dean took a couple of steps forward. "Look Buffy," he began.

"No," she said, holding up her hand. "I don't wanna hear it. I can't force you to like her and you can't convince me not to trust her." She paused for a moment and then added, "But if you care anything about the way I feel, you'll try to treat her with respect."

"I'll give it my best shot," he offered. "I'll try not to be a bigger dick than I usually am," he added with a smile.

Buffy gave him a small smile in return. "Well, I guess that's the best anyone can hope for," she stated with a smirk.

XXXXXXXXXX

Dean came down the stairs wearing only his boxers. He was freshly showered and shaved, and had a damp towel draped across his shoulders.

"I'm done in there," he announced as he poked his head into the living room.

"Okay," Buffy murmured absently without looking up. She was sitting on the couch, her hands wrapped tightly around a cold cup of coffee.

The tone of her voice convinced Dean that she was still angry about the thing with the witch. He sat down beside her and kneaded his forehead as he tried to think of something to say that would smooth things over. Angry women always baffled him; he was never sure how to deal with them. It was one of the few situations where he felt completely helpless.

"I'm sorry," he began awkwardly. "It's like I said before, I just don't trust witches. But, I promise I'll try my best to get along with her. Besides, if I piss her off, she might turn me into a toad," he added jokingly in the hope that a little humor might lighten the mood.

"It's not that," she replied. She had to smile a little at Dean's lame attempt at a joke. She was completely convinced that he believed his frequent inappropriate remarks were helpful to his case.

"I talked to Giles," she continued, her expression once again serious. "It's not good."

"What's the story?"

"Well, over half of the girls failed the test… or is it they passed the test? I don't know," she groaned as she sat her cup on the coffee table and began rubbing at her temples. "I just know that it means that out of twenty-two girls, I now have seven that don't have to be kept under lock and key. It's not a surprise really. We have a lot of fifteen-year-olds right now. Two of them are only fourteen. I can't believe I'm saying this, but seven isn't enough. Twenty-two isn't enough! This place is a powder keg and it just keeps getting worse. I've never seen anything like it. Something is seriously rattling this Eve lady's cage. Get this. Last night, Faith took on some kind of demon that supposedly only hangs out in New Zealand. New Zealand. I never took geography, but I'm pretty sure that's about as far away as you can get and still be on earth. What the hell is going on?"

"I'm not sure," Dean replied somberly. "We've seen the same kinda crap. Things have been crawling out of the woodwork that I didn't even know existed. Fairies, of all things. I mean, God Damn that was freaky."

"I'm going to have to do it," Buffy continued. "I'm going to have to split the girls up and send them out on their own. This town's too big to send them out in groups. We can't cover enough ground. We have almost 400,000 people to protect. I've needed to do this for a long time… but it scares me," she admitted quietly, sounding like she was ashamed of herself. "It's just… I can risk my own life. That's a given. I'm really not afraid to die. But, risking theirs is a whole other story. Did you know I haven't lost one girl since we moved to Cleveland? Not one. I always send them out in groups. Make sure the newer ones are with the more experienced ones. Faith says I baby them. She says I'm not preparing them for the real world… and what if she's right? Now it's too late. The shit has hit the fan and they'll have to go right out in the middle of it. Their very first time on their own and they'll be working under circumstances that are way out of control, even for the Hellmouth. I just didn't want them to go through what I went through." She paused and shook her head sadly. "I had a false sense of security. I thought the fact that we have so many Slayers meant that the world was safer… that we didn't have to take as many risks. I'm some leader, aren't I?" she asked with a bitter laugh. "Guess you think I'm a big joke."

"God no," Dean stressed. "Being that responsible for that many people… hell, that many kids. I'd wonder about you if you weren't freaked. You just want to protect them, there's nothing wrong with that."

Dean felt sick to his stomach as he watched Buffy sitting beside him staring silently at her hands. She was obviously making a huge effort just to keep it together. He could hear Balthazar's snotty little voice saying, 'There's no more rules, boys'. No more rules - because he and his brother derailed the apocalypse. He still believed it was the right decision, but wondered when the fallout was going to end. If there would ever be a time when he didn't have to watch the aftereffects harm the people he cared about. To make things worse, he wasn't sure how to make Buffy feel better about the situation. He'd decided that he sucked when it came to dealing with anything that happened outside of the bedroom. He felt completely clueless. He wished he could tap into his brother's mind. Sam would know what to do, he'd always been better at the supportive/feeling thing. Sadly, Dean's idea of helping usually involved killing something. Of course, in this case, that just might apply.

He placed a hand on her shoulder in what he felt was a lousy attempt at being comforting, but hell he was trying. "We'll figure it out," he promised her, hoping desperately that he didn't end up disappointing her. "We'll find that lame-ass dragon and send its ass back to Middle Earth or wherever the hell the stupid thing comes from. Then we'll take on anything else Eve wants to send our way. She's toast," he added confidently. "Her kids'll have to ship her back to Purgatory in tiny little pieces."

Buffy couldn't help but smile, Dean really knew how to talk a good game. Although she knew it was mostly a bunch of macho bullshit, she still found it reassuring. Even if he couldn't manage to pull it all off, she knew he'd try. In that way, they were a lot alike. He wouldn't go down without a fight. She figured that out the first time she met him.

"You're getting ahead of yourself Rambo," she teased him. "We'll have to find her first. Then we can make with the tiny little pieces."

"Oh, we'll find her," he assured her with a cocky grin. "The bitch can't hide forever. She'll have to come out and fight sometime. The only reason she hasn't is because she's scared."

"I'm sure she is," Buffy agreed as she climbed onto his lap. She had just remembered that they hadn't tried out the couch yet and decided that the sewers could wait.