When the phone rang, Buffy momentarily was overjoyed, hoping it would be someone who'd talk to her for hours and thus keep her busy; Dawn still was at school, and she had cleaned the house as much as she had been able to in her still weakened state, having spent the hours since then on the couch watching TV, commenting the events on the screen and lamenting to herself about how much the programme sucked.
When she saw on the display that the caller was Willow, her joy grew even further, even though she briefly wondered why the redhead would call her now, at a time when she was supposed to be at college; then, she shrugged it off and took the call, her happiness about it clearly showing through her voice when she greeted her best friend.
"Hello Willow, I'm so glad you're calling", she started to talk right after taking the call, not even giving her friend the tiniest chance to say something, "I'm bored out of my mind here, Dawn's still at school and the TV programme sucks! I tried cleaning but…"
The sniffle which finally came through the line made her fall silent, and momentarily, her eyes went wide; then, mentally scolding herself for being so inconsiderate and just talking Willow into the ground when clearly, the witch was upset about something, she asked what was wrong, her eyes widening again at the redhead's answer.
"I had a fight with Pat, and now she left", Willow sniffled, sounding as if she either was already crying or was very close to tears, "it all went wrong Buffy…"
"Tell me what happened", the Slayer replied, giving her best to sound soothing; in response, Willow let out another sniffle, then started talking, starting at the beginning with the murder of Jane and mentioning everything which had been on her mind since then, from the button to the smell of smoke and the hair that had been at the place where the last victim had been killed.
"That doesn't look all too good for her", Buffy thoughtfully gave back, not liking the thought that maybe, her friend was the one responsible for those gruesome murders, but having to admit that Willow had presented a lot of evidence which couldn't just be ignored.
"I know", the witch gave back, now sounding a bit calmer, to Buffy's relief, "but she got so mad when I tried to talk to her about it… And I'm quite sure that she lied to me when I asked her if anything strange happened to her during patrol since those killings started…"
"Did she say where she's going when she left?" the Slayer wanted to know in reply, frowning at Willow's answer, the redhead sounded worried again when she told her best friend that Pat had gone out to find the one who was behind the murders.
"That might end badly", she muttered as soon as Willow had finished talking, "if it's not her, but some other demon with similar or even the same powers, it might be hard for her to take him on alone…"
"Yeah", Willow sighed her agreement, "that's why I'm worried… What if she gets hurt, or something worse…?"
"Can't you do a spell to find out where she is?" Buffy wanted to know in reply, then jumped back from the phone in shock as a slapping sound came through the line, only to giggle as she realized a second later what had happened.
"I can't believe I didn't think of that", Willow's voice drifted through the line again a second later, prompting the Slayer to hold the receiver to her ear again, "how stupid!"
Momentarily, she felt like slapping her forehead again when Buffy giggled, then tried to calm her down by telling her that she was upset and that thus, it was understandable that she hadn't been able to come up with that thought; afterwards, the blonde offered her best friend to come over, smiling slightly when immediately, Willow expressed concern for her well-being and asked her if she was sure that this was a good idea.
"Come on", she then gave her best to convince the redhead that it was okay, "your place is not that far from mine, and even if I'm still weakened from that stupid poison, there's no way I'll let you go and look for your girlfriend alone, especially not if she's right and already found the one who's responsible for this. I'll be there in twenty, okay?"
"Alright", the witch agreed after a moment, still not sure if this was a good idea; then, she figured that Buffy had made a point though and that, if there really was an unknown third party responsible for the murders, it would be dangerous to go and find them alone, no matter how good she was with spells by now – if something should have happened to Pat by the time they'd find her, she knew that there was a great chance that she'd be too distracted by concern and worry to focus on her magic properly.
"See you in a few then", she thus added, making Buffy agree before she said her goodbye and ended the call; sighing to herself, Willow did the same, putting the phone down on the table before she made herself as comfortable as she could in the current situation, counting the minutes as she waited for Buffy to arrive.
At the same time, Pat took the time to finish her cigarette before she entered the bar where she was sure she'd get the information she wanted; she knew that it wasn't exactly smart to go there, not with her reputation in this town, but this was the only place she'd been able to think of.
To her relief, the bar was as empty as she had expected it to be so early in the afternoon; she briefly looked around, seeing just one guy in a booth at the far end who didn't pay attention to her at all, then moved up to the counter where Willy was cleaning classes, looking up as she approached him, his eyes briefly widening in surprise.
"Quite brave of you to come here", he then greeted, displaying a surprising amount of guts – the last time she had been here, she had beaten him up to get the information she had wanted, and by the time she had been done, he almost had been willing to kiss her feet. "You're lucky the place is so empty. What'cha want?"
"Answers", Pat gave back, stopping at the counter, not sitting down though, frowning at the barkeeper's reply. "No answers without an order. So what'cha want?"
"Give me a beer", the demon sighed out after a moment; she knew that technically, she already could start beating him up, but on the other hand, he also might give her the information she wanted without a need for violence, the black haired woman figuring that he still remembered the beating he had gotten the last time quite well.
Smirking, Willy bent down to one of the fridges and got out a beer bottle, removing the cap before he put it down in front of her, then went back to cleaning the glasses, looking at her with a raised eyebrow as he waited for her to ask him what she wanted to know. Before she did so though, Pat lit up a cigarette and took a large gulp of the beer; she briefly grimaced at the taste, wondering how long it had been in that fridge already, then shrugged it off and looked at the barkeep again, keeping her voice down as she asked what she had come here for, not wanting the guy in the corner booth to hear her. "You heard anything 'bout a new guy in town? Flamey, like me?"
"Maybe I did", Willy gave back, smiling a toothy grin at her, her good eye narrowing as she realized what would come next. "Maybe I did after you… helped my memory along, if you know what I mean."
"Maybe I'll just beat you up again until you talk", Pat snarled, not willing to take this any further – her mood was sour enough after that fight she'd had with Willow, and she wasn't eager to play Willy's idiotic little games.
"Oh, but that would be tiring for you, and painful for me", Willy now gave back, putting the glass he had been cleaning down on the counter with surprising force, "it'd be much easier if you'd just give me… Hmm… Let's see…"
"Just tell me how much you want", Pat snapped, putting out her cigarette while she waited for him to answer; to her dismay, he didn't do so, but just kept cleaning another glass, taking his sweet time with doing so before he put it down just as forcefully as the previous one, finally speaking up while he reached for the third one.
"Hmmm", he made again, "let me think… Maybe a twenty will help a tiny bit, but a fifty would be even more convincing… You know, with Buffy and you going around and killing all my customers, business has been kinda slow lately, so…"
His gaze flickered from her face to a point over her left shoulder, and all at once, the demon realized what he had been doing – he had been keeping her busy and distracted, giving someone the chance to sneak up on her, something made considerably easier by her blind side.
Snarling a curse, she spun around, too slow and too late though; she still had a moment to see the beer bottle come down, then it shattered against her head, glass flying everywhere. Stumbling back against the bar, she grasped for the wood for some support, fighting hard to stay on her feet and to stay conscious; the man who had attacked her let out a low growl, clearly angered about the fact that he hadn't managed to knock her out with the first hit.
Behind her, she could hear how Willy ducked behind the counter, snapping at her attacker to get done quickly; with a snarl, she brought her fists up, glad that at least, he had smashed the bottle against the left side of her head and that thus, no blood was getting into her eye and blinding her.
Unlike most other opponents she had fought, this guy didn't bother to say anything, not even letting out the tiniest sound as he blocked her first two punches, then stopped the third one by catching her fist; his foot shot forward, painfully connecting with her knee, the demon letting out a low grunt of pain as the kick landed.
Once more fighting to stay on her feet, she somehow managed to duck the punch that followed the kick, only to realize that this had been a mistake when a second later, his knee came up, crashing right into her face and sending her to the ground.
Groaning, Pat rolled over as fast as she could, coming up on her hands and knees, fighting hard once more to stay conscious, her sight blurring; then, the barstool came down on her back, then on her head, finally knocking her out, the last thing she heard before darkness engulfed her being the slight chuckle Willy let out from behind the counter.