Finding out your girlfriend is a dangerous demon is bad ...finding out she is a dangerous demon and that she still wants to date you ... well that is just weird. Cassie didn't want to kill me out of any spite. it was just a function of her biology she was driven to mate and wanted to mate with the most desirable male ... in a weird way it was compliment. I might even have been less stressed about the whole thing except that morlun are territorial demons, and Cassie made it clear that she would take any attempt to frustrate the mating process once it had begun as a challenge ...which she would respond to with lethal force. I found out just how much force when I tried stopping her. She just gave ne a backhand that felt like I was being punched by the The Hulk. Important little hinterland factoid Joyce, never attack a morlun just after it has fed. As powerful as they presumably are they are even stronger right after a meal.
Seeing as Cassie was willing to take a raincheck on the killing Spider-man thing, fate saw fit to force us to pay attention to someone who's need to see us dead was a much more pressing concern.
ADAM approached Octavius from behind. The deformed scientist was watching casually as his four tentacles set up and positioned larger versions of the projectors he had been using for his D-beam. One of his arms seemed to look at ADAM before returning to its work.
ADAM was hardly surprised when the Otto remarked, "What do you want ADAM, I'm at a critical juncture in the projector adjustments and I still need replacements for the crystals I use to focus and power the beams."
"I have found you your replacements. A news item, has appeared that should interest you." One of the arms darted over to the bank of computers and formed digits which rapidly typed at the keyboard bringing up a TV screen.
"… An excellent opportunity for those in LA." A pretty talking head gushed.
"Absolutely Patti..." an off screen voice agreed "Now what kind of security arrangements are in place for the Jewels trip back to their homeland?"
"Well I was informed that the Jewelry Collection will be under the protection of the world famous Wild Pack lead by Mercenary and Bounty Huntress, Silver Sable once the Jewels arrive in LA. "
"Have you seen the jewels yourself
"I was allowed a supervised glimpse of the collection and I have to say it is quite amazing. The centerpiece of the collection is easily the four Elements. Four Perfect diamonds whose natural colors echo the themes of Earth Wind Fire and Water."
"Well there you have it folks, a recently unearthed glimpse of our Mayor Richard Wilkins, who's private collection yielded an extraordinary discovery recently as investigators continue their search for the missing and presumed…" the monitor screen clicked off.
"Interesting." the Doctor mused
"Father, mother often spoke of such stones, she said that the songs they sing make stronger any attempt o summon great powers. No doubt this Wilkins used them for some grand scheme."
"I'm not some common thief," Octavious snapped.
"But you are in a hurry, the time needed to produce jewels of the size and shape you require is prohibitive. Here there are four jewels ripe for the taking and we know that the security until Los Angeles will be easily dealt with."
"You know about this Wild Pack?"
"I have access to files and believe me doctor, if we can obtain the diamonds before Silver Sable and The Wild Pack have them, then we should."
"Which means stealing them from the vault at the Sunnydale Police Department."
"Sunnydale Federal Reserve, actually. It seems the insurance company was reluctant to entrust a collection of this value to the local yokel police." ADAM smiled, "Locked doors do not an obstacle make dear Doctor."
Joyce was pressing her argument in Xander's mind. She had known the risks and hardly blamed either him or her daughter for their outcome.
"Fine Joyce you want to say that what happened to you wasn't my fault, then explain to me what on earth made you think that you should stand up to Doctor Octopus."
"So tell me again why I'm here?" Xander whispered to Willow as they walked behind mother and daughter Summers.
"...Because Buffy and I don't want you sitting around moping about the whole Cassandra thing."
"Willis, a beautiful and attractive woman wants to have a child, my child."
"In the process of which, you die, then she'll die I'm not really seeing any kind of a win-win there."
"Well I have no idea how to stop her from killing me and since she seems content with putting that whole discussion on hold until her body is ready for the old-mating-dance thing, I don't see the point in worrying about it."
"Xander she's powerful maybe even more powerful then you are now."
"You forgot that she hits harder then anyone has ever hit me before. ...And she has also been clear that if You or Buffy interfere. She'll take it as a challenge and slaughter you both without a second thought. How I'm going to stop her I don't know but until she decides to kill me - I'm fine."
Joyce was for her part complaining about the lack of Mommy - Daughter time "I haven't spent much time with you since you started school again."
"For good reason, Mom I'm trying to be a better student now."
"Buffy… hanging out with me for one day isn't going to tank your grades - unless there is something I should know?"
"Professor Walsh is always talking about how much she looks forward to seeing Buffy's work " Willow said quickly
Xander for his part was wondering why his spider-sense was going off the charts. The bank was filled with normal daily traffic including some guy in a trench coat and dark hat…ah that was it, no doubt some robber about to do robbery type stuff. Well, just his bad luck that Spidey is in the house.
Xander tapped Willow "Get them out of here, big bad is going down."
Willow scanned the bank. "Is it Cassie?"
"No I think is a good old fashioned bank robbery just like mom used to make." Xander answered as he pulled open his shirt to reveal his uniform. he then ducked out of sight.
Suddenly a rent a cop with instincts too good for his own safety decided that the guy in the dark coat needing a talking to. He approached him "sir if I could ask you to hold on a second."
"Actually son I'm in kind of a hurry." Otto snapped and one of his arms streaked out from under the coat and bashed into the guard sending him to the floor.
The arms lifted Otto over the counter and he shoved desks out of his way as he marched to the vault.
Willow squeaked out a scream "Uncle Otto "
Otto reached out with the tentacles which fastened on the vault door, tearing it from its hinges. Otto thoughtlessly tossed the door causally to the side narrowly missing Willow.
He walked into the vault his arms opening drawers at random searching them and closing them finally one opened a drawer to find the briefcase with the four Elements inside.
"Yes my children bring the diamonds to me." Then one of the arms turned to "see" Spider-man lowering himself on a web line.
"You " Otto growled with venom in his voice.
Spider-man was surprised to see Otto standing there apparently knocking over a bank. "Hey Doc, I know bank lies can be a bitch but isn't this a bit over the top?"
"No THIS is... " the deranged doctor snapped as two arms ripped drawers out of the wall hurling them at the wall crawler who dodged the first and pulled the second out of the air with a well placed webline. His Spider Sense barely signaled to warn him of the oncoming moneybags as the devious Doctor used several he grabbed at random to batter and bash at the web-slinger.
"You are out of control..." Xander yelled at Otto who laughed at his words.
"On the contrary my web-slinging friend, I'm in total control watch " Doc reached out with several arms snagging guns from the unconscious guard and wielding them to great effect Spider-man found himself dodging gunfire that came from every direction.
Finally he landed on a desk, using it as an anchor to pull the guns from Otto's wildly swinging tentacles. The remaining arms dropped their weapons and pulled on the weblines slamming Spider-man around the room.
The dazed spider was helpless as tentacles grabbed him, slamming to the ceiling. Otto's remaining arms raised The doctor up to look more closely at his foe. "Because of your interference my precious is gone, what can I take from you I wonder that would balance that scale, maybe your life?"
"Definitely not those diamonds." Spidey grunted and kicked out at Otto's hand, causing him to drop the briefcase that slid across the floor.
Otto released the web head with one arm and reached down for the case, Spider-man fired webbing at Otto's face, blinding him.
The Scientist screamed in frustration while his tentacles quested across the floor for the case. A well-placed web shot pushed the case into the Willow's waiting hand. Otto looked up and saw Buffy running toward him with Axe in hand. Strangely his niece was at her side.
"Why must everyone interfere in my business? " he shrieked, tossing chairs and anything else his arms could grab at the slayer who hopped over some, ducked around others, and used her axe to bat the rest our of her way. Willow wasn't so lucky as one of the chairs knocked her down causing her to lose her grip on the briefcase.
Slipping out of the grasping arms of his captor, Spider man dodged across the ceiling to fire webs trying to snag the case, "we are trying to keep you from making a mistake."
"Me trying to kill you is not an error you cretin." grabbing Buffy and then the axe in her hands. He threw her to the side with contempt. " I'll take this young lady."
Wielding the axe he took swipes at Spidey who dodged them but since Otto could quickly toss the axe from one arm to another as well as use the arms to harass and chase him around the room, he was having trouble.
At one point Willow saw Xander slam his head into the ceiling post and then shout at no one in particular. "I know I'm in danger thank you." Then he saw the axe streaking toward his head and dropped to the ground as it lodged in the ceiling post he had been clinging to.
Otto looked around for his case and found it was gone. He looked around the room both with his own eyes and with the arms and saw Joyce Summers scrambling for the exit, the briefcase clutched in her grasp. With a roar of rage, he went after her, Spider-man and Buffy hot on his heels.
Outside people scrambled to get out of the way of the mad scientist as he picked up pedestrians hurling them out of his way as his arms carried him down the street after the fleeing mother. Joyce fled down the street to where she'd parked the car diving inside; she revved the engine to life.
"Give me back my diamonds woman." Otto screamed at her. Joyce had no idea who this maniac was, but if Buffy was trying to keep him away from the case then she was going to do what she could to help. Of course, she reflected as she watched said maniac come down the street tossing things out of his way to get to her, that idea had worked a lot better in her head then it did right then.
She threw the car into reverse and expected it to start moving but it wasn't the engine raced and grinded but the car didn't move forward or backwards, instead it went up…and up.
"You, my little miss, are trying my patience. " Otto said casually.
"Let her go Otto." Spidey shouted as he and Buffy caught up with the fleeing doctor
"If you hurt that woman…" Buffy growled.
"…Then stay right where you are the both of you. I don't know how strong I am, but I'm willing to bet that dropping the car from this height won't do her much good."
With both Buffy and Spidey holding back, Otto's arms balanced the car, smashing through the driver's side window to grab for the case when Joyce latched on the case, the arm ripped the door off its hinges causing the suburban mom to scream.
Buffy could hold back no longer and raced forward, Otto catching sight of her movement, instinctively lashed out with the arm holding the case, forgetting perhaps that Joyce was still clutching to it.
Joyce cried out in terror as Otto used her body to bash at The Slayer, sending both women thudding to the ground. Xander darted forward to stand over top of the fallen women. Otto brought the bulk of the small car crashing down on the Wall Crawler, the weight and momentum of the blow causing his feet to stab into the street.
Otto laughed cruelly and brought the car around again in a second blow that sent Xander crashing into a boutique display window followed by the car, which landed on top of him.
Spidey fought passing out "Can't pass out, Buffy needs me …Joyce needs me." he groaned at himself as he fought his way back to his feet stumbling out to the street where Buffy was trying to wake Joyce who was lying still …very, very still.
The emergency room doctor came out in the hall and smiled sadly at Buffy.
"The good news is your mother is out of danger for now. Her injuries were serious but not too severe. There was bleeding which we stopped. At this point, it is up to her body, we've done all we can."
Buffy nodded, Willow embraced her. "I'm sorry, hun if there is anything I can do."
Buffy snapped "yes there is, Xander are you good to go yet?"
"I'll need a night of rest, after that…"
"Good, tomorrow we start the hunt for Doctor Octopus."
"Wait a minute Buffy." Willow asked nervously seeing an all too familiar gleam in Buffy's eye. "I thought we were trying to cure him. Its not his fault, its those arms it has to be "
"My mother is in the hospital Willow, Doc Ock put her there. I want his ass and I want it bad."
Willow startled but spoke her mind "He needs our help, if we could get the arms off him then he would be fine again…"
"I don't care." Buffy snapped.
"Why? Cause its not Angel," Willow argued coldly, "if this was because of Angelus, you'd be falling all over yourself to make excuses for him."
"Not after he put you in the hospital and killed Jenny, Then I was gunning for him, just like I want Doc Ock now."
"His name is Otto Octavius, and before his accident…"
"So my mother's life means nothing." Buffy asked angrily.
"I didn't say that it's just that …Xander help me."
"I can't Willis, not this time. Doc oc…Uncle Otto isn't the man we knew anymore, he's become obsessed and dangerous and in case the battle passed you by unnoticed he wants Spider-man dead in the worst way."
"I'd… we can find a way..."
"…To heal him yeah, honey, do you have a spell that will work right now. If he showed up here right now, could you get those things off him? Because, if he was here right now, our lives would be in danger, and I'm sorry, I'm not holding back not anymore."
"He treated you like family…"
"You are family and he threw a vault door at you. More people then Joyce could be hurt if we don't stop him and soon."
"We can find a way to do that without hurting him I'm sure of it…"
"…Are you really that confident, because I'm not. Not before it's too late."
"What do you mean?"
"Basic hero detective work 101 Will, the diamonds he took from the vault. Combined together they would power that machine of his, he has found a place to rebuild the D-beam. That means he's planning on cutting another hole in space-time and from the size of the stones that were in the vault it will be a much bigger hole this time."
"Aunt Rosie, Someone has talked him into trying again."
"Either he thinks he can rescue her or else …" Buffy realized
"...Our enemy, someone has been pulling strings from the shadows, the government guys, Walsh's disappearance, the demon vigilantes, Now Otto rebuilding his machine."
"Someone is messing with us and if I get my hands on them." Buffy snarled "Nobody messes with my family and my town and gets back a working set of limbs."
"For once, I'm starting to think you've got the right idea." Xander said grimly.
We were being played Joyce but we all just assumed it was this year's model of big bad. Once we had a handle on the big plan, whatever it was, we'd make with the busting of the bad guys. I forgot that long before weird demons and monsters hatched evil plots that made my high school a literal hell, fate had set the high bar for screwing us around. No matter how dangerous the demons and vampires and monster and mayors got - fate could still hurt us way worse then anything unnatural ever could.
Tara had just left Stevenson Hall , she had heard about Buffy's mother and was hoping there was something she could do for her new friends. She was going to meet Willow. when a shadow moved to halt her progress. "Tara, what are you doing here, why are you helping those…people." the masked woman said
Tara recognized the voice beneath the ornate golden mask, "I'm going to school here, trying to make a life for myself, what are you doing here?"
The Masked Woman hissed, "I warned you about Sunnydale, about the things that people say about it."
"It's a place a town, there is good and there is bad like everywhere else."
"What are you doing with …those people." The masked woman barely hid her disgust "they know too much, are too involved."
"Willow is …my friend and the rest, they try and protect people when they can."
"Really, I saw one of them, the girl, The Slayer, do you know what a Slayer is."
"Buffy tries and helps"
"The Slayer is a girl chosen and empowered with magic. Magic Tara, magic just like the kind that destroyed our family "
"Magic didn't destroy us Becca, Mom died, Father and his fanatical beliefs destroyed our family."
"Mother destroyed us. And you abandoned us. You think becoming more like her will bring her back. Her and all her filthy kind are a blight on the world, they make the world black and sick. They give the darkness the power to harm the truly innocent."
"What happened to you wasn't mom's fault." Tara tried to explain. "She tried to stop…"
The masked woman cut her off harshly. "But she didn't stop it did she, and because she didn't stop our family was punished for harboring that evil in our home and our lives." she stepped forward tearing the mask from her face. "They mutilated me, Tara." She snarled. Her features were perfectly ... almost hideously smooth, free of any of the contours, flaws or shapes that made a normal human face.
Tara remembered the face that had been taken from her sister. A pretty face, the face of a model. That was all gone now, no plump of cheeks, no delicate eye lashes over her oddly yellow colored eyes, and no full lips to fill out the straight line that was her mouth.
"Mom would have helped you if she could have…" Tara said pleadingly
Her sister gave a harsh bark of laughter, "You can't see how much the dark magic has already warped you, changed you, made you …twisted." She sneered, "But I'll fix that. Believe me Tara What I do for the Scourge is as much for you as it is the free the world of the curse of magic."
"I had to get away from that town, I've learned so much since then."
"So have I Tara, I've learned that magic is an infection, a sickness that poisons a world that belongs to human beings."
"Please, Rebecca listen to me."
"Don't call me that," Becca snapped, "you barely acknowledge your family anymore but if I have to accpet what you've done to yourself the least you can do is accept who i've become. Rebecca Maclay is gone, they call me Lady Scourge now.
"Why did you have to take the mask Becca, the Scourge, what they do is wrong, they hunt and kill indiscriminately and without mercy."
"We …protect the humans that inherited this world. It's ours Tara, it belongs to us. Not demons or monsters or mages it belongs to human beings. We should protect it, not a whining Barbie doll and her loser friends. Did you know that Slayers are infected with the darkness they are meant to be fighting how can that be right?"
Tara saw there would be no reasoning with her sibling. "So, are you going to kill me. That's what the Scourge do to witches."
"Eventually Tara, you are going to see as I have. You've been tricked. All magic is bad, all demons are evil and all you are doing is putting innocents in harms way. Tell your friend, If she gets in our way again, I'll take her down in the name of justice and humanity."
"So your just going to keep killing, You know one of them saved me, Spider-man."
"I've heard conflicting stories and reports about this Spider-man. I don't trust him either but know this Tara, enemies of humanity will not be tolerated, tell your friends to distance themselves from the Spider-man. He isn't human and anything inhuman is evil and evil will be dealt with, am I making myself clear." She spun on her heel and marched away vanishing eventually into the shadows
"Yes sister, crystal clear." Tara whispered miserably
