See Part One for disclaimer and details. Hello again, everyone, welcome to the latest chapter of the story! Thanks again for all the reviews and feedback, wow - it really was kind of unexpected. Well, anyway, here is the Dead Man's Party episode, or at least my evil and twisted version of it. Trust me, things are only going to get complicated from here...
Part Three: Awakening
Sunnydale High School Library, Sunnydale
September 16th, 1998
Xander looked at the cat which Giles had collected earlier from Buffy's house, and which was moving around in its cage on one of the library's tables. "That thing is dead, right?"
"It looks dead. It smells dead," Oz proclaimed, as Xander nodded in full agreement. "And yet, it's still movin' around. That's interesting."
"Interesting? Try way creepy," Cordelia said, dragging Xander away to the main table as Oz followed them and sat down next to Willow. "Seriously, Giles, don't you like doing anything normal in your life? Golf, collecting stamps, something?"
Giles looked irritated, as he came down from the mezzanine level with a book in his hand. "I'm trying to find out how and why that creature rose from its grave, as should all of you. It's not as if I'm going to take it home and offer it a saucer of warm milk!"
"Fine, no need to be such a big grouch about it," Cordelia replied as she grabbed a book.
Cordy then noticed Xander staring at her – he had been doing that a lot ever since the other night – and the young woman quickly looked away with a smile. ( Yes! Finally, my boyfriend is paying attention to ME instead of his precious Buffy or Willow. God, I probably should have had sex with him ages ago! Well, as long as he doesn't start acting like that lovesick puppy Jesse, of course – may he rest in peace. )
Willow noticed the by-play between them, and looked away with a grossed-out expression. ( I can't believe Xander actually had sex with HER! What, did Cordelia lose a bet or something? ) The Rosenberg girl then said, "So, what about Buffy's welcome home dinner tonight? I told her mom we'd help out. Y'know, bring stuff."
Giles scratched the back of his neck. His meeting with Buffy the previous evening, not long after she'd arrived home and hugged Joyce on her doorstep, had convinced him that the Chosen One wasn't completely back to normal after her summer sojourn. ( Buffy was definitely far too jittery in my flat last night, even taking into account nervousness after such a long time away. )
Still, the situation with this dead tabby was something Giles knew he couldn't simply ignore, either. So he said to his teenage companions, "Well, you all go ahead and do that – I'll be along later in time for the festive occasion, I'm sure. A-as soon as I figure out what's happening with that dead cat, I mean."
"Something occurring," Oz spoke up in his typically laid-back sort of way. "We should figure out what kinda deal this is gonna be tonight, right? I mean, is it a gathering, a shindig or a hootenanny?"
"What's the difference?" Willow asked, momentarily glancing at Xander in exasperation – she knew him well enough to tell when her best guy friend was distracted playing footsie with Cordelia under the table.
"Well, a gathering is y'know, brie, mellow song stylings, maybe a little alcohol. Shindig – that's dip, less mellow song stylings, usually a large amount of malt beverage. And hootenanny, that's chock full of hoot, just a little bit of nanny," Oz replied sagely.
"Well, I'm not sure that either a, um, shindig o-or hootenanny, i-i-is really appropriate here. Uh, it should be something a little more – intimate. I mean, Buffy has just arrived home, I-I'm sure she's still feeling a little disoriented," Giles replied.
In response to their looks, the British man said to Willow and Oz, "Don't tell me I was the only one who noticed it last night?"
"Huh? What?" Xander suddenly woke up and decided to join the conversation. Well, that was before Cordelia's shoe-less foot reaching up to massage his groin caused his eyes to widen and his mouth to start watering. Not surprisingly, Harris quickly returned his attention to his smiling girlfriend.
"Buffy was disoriented?" Willow replied to Giles, paying Xander no heed. "Well, then, that's all the more reason to make her feel welcome, a-and a big party definitely says, 'Welcome back, Buffy'!"
"Yes, I suppose so, but still – I know my Slayer, Willow. I-if Buffy had wanted a big party, she would have hinted as such during your, um, shopping trip yesterday, wouldn't she?" the Watcher asked the redhead.
"Well, I don't know – I-I sorta couldn't make it to the whole shoe-hunting expedition thing," Willow said, looking embarrassed.
"Then in that case, I think we should play it safe a-and just have a nice, quiet family dinner at Buffy's house," Giles said firmly. "What does everyone else think?"
"Sounds cool," Oz said, leaning back into his seat.
"I'll bring the brie," Cordelia said, finally withdrawing her foot from Xander's pelvic region.
"Oh yeah," Xander nodded, still in la-la land and not paying any attention to the actual conversation.
"Excellent, then that's settled." Giles looked over towards the dead cat, which had started meowing. "Now, let's get on with solving the mystery associated with this, um, feline, shall we?"
It was too bad for Giles how, after getting distracted by the zombie cat, he missed out on seeing a picture of a Nigerian mask in his book; the same mask that he had seen hanging on the wall within the Summers residence not long ago.
The mask which held the power of the evil demon named Ovu Mobani within it.
Outside 1630 Revello Drive, Sunnydale
Later that night
Xander got out of his girlfriend's car, as he and Cordelia headed for Buffy's house. He stared at the statuesque beauty and whistled, "You look incredible, sweetheart."
Cordy gave him her classic megawatt smile. "Thanks, you don't look too bad yourself. Oh, how's my hair?"
"You even have to ask?" Harris quipped, and then he grinned as she gave him a light shove. "Hey, I'm wearing that new aftershave you gave me tonight. How does it smell to you?"
Cordelia took a big sniff, and nodded in approval. "Perfect. Y'know, I still don't get how that happened, how I ended up grabbing two bottles of cologne! It's the last time I ever buy stuff like that at a lousy airport store, though, I tell you – to think, one of them was a useless dud!" Miss Chase said in annoyance, not knowing just how wrong her supposition was.
"Eh, never mind – no harm, no foul. Think happy thoughts, Cor – we're gonna have a nice, normal, fun evening tonight, right?" Xander asked optimistically.
"Okay, now I'm sure you've just jinxed us completely," Cordelia snorted as she rang the front doorbell, before Buffy let them into the house.
Cordelia was, unfortunately, more right than she knew.
Later that night, a lot of angst and hard feelings quickly rose to the surface after Buffy and Willow started talking alone in the Slayer's bedroom – and it was discovered that something had happened back in May which neither of the girls had known about.
That is to say, Xander's big lie concerning Buffy's former boyfriend, the vampire known as Angel.
It had all started during Buffy's 17th birthday nine months ago, when the soul curse had been broken due to Angel having a moment of perfect happiness. When the demon statue Acathla had been found towards the end of junior year, Angelus – Angel's evil soulless alter ego – had decided to destroy the world using the great big ugly piece of rock. Willow had been trying to do the curse on Angelus again during the bottom of the ninth, and she'd sent Xander to tell Buffy the situation.
And yet Xander had lied to the Chosen One outside Angelus' mansion that day, saying that Willow had said for Buffy to 'kick his ass' instead.
"XANDER, HOW DARE YOU-!" Buffy screamed at the male teenager, as she and Willow stormed down the stairs.
"Huh? What?" Xander and all the other dinner guests got up from the chairs and sofa.
"Buffy, what's going on?" Joyce looked confused.
"This ASSHOLE lied to me!" Buffy glared at Harris with the fury of an exploding supernova. "Willow sent you to tell me that she was going to do the soul curse again, and you told me she said to kick Angel's ass? You fucking liar!"
"BUFFY!" Joyce looked scandalized at her daughter's use of the f-word. Then she turned towards Xander, who everybody was now staring at. "Uh, is, is that true?"
"Yep," Xander nodded once, looking the Slayer straight in the eyes.
"So, you admit it!" Buffy said vindictively, not seeing Cordelia staring at her boyfriend in horror. Upon witnessing Xander's stony features the Chosen One then demanded, "What, you aren't even going to try to weasel your way out of this?"
"What's the point, Buffy? I knew what would happen right from the start if you and Willow ever compared notes, but I still did what I did anyway," Harris replied. "I'd like to ask you something, though – what would you have done if I had told you the truth that morning?"
"I would have done – I don't know, something! Something different, so that Angel wouldn't have had to end up in Hell after his soul was restored at the last second!" Buffy screamed.
"The curse actually worked?" Willow said in amazement.
"Whoa. Heavy," Oz commented, but displaying no sign of untoward emotion.
"Okay, can I say something? Buffy, why don't you give Xander a chance to fully explain himself – before you start whaling on him like he deserves?" Cordelia spoke up, sending her boyfriend an angry glare.
"Fine. Well?" Buffy growled at Xander, who was staring at Cordelia like he was saying farewell to something he'd lost forever; but then Harris straightened up and focused back on the Slayer.
"Buffy, I'm not gonna deny that I wanted Angel dead that day, because I did – everyone that guy killed ever since he lost his soul, they all deserved some sorta justice. Especially Ms. Calendar," Xander said as calmly as he could, noticing both Willow and Buffy flinch at the mention of the dead computer teacher's name. "But believe it or not, that wasn't the real reason why I lied to you."
"Then what was it? Wait, lemme guess. It couldn't be, oh, say, the fact that I chose ANGEL as my boyfriend instead of your jealous, pathetic ass?" Buffy shouted furiously.
"No-" Xander started to say, before a louder female voice cut him off.
"HEY! Xander's girlfriend, standing right here!" Cordelia huffed at the Chosen One. Pissed as she was at Harris right now, Miss Chase was still naturally defensive of her territory.
"Shut up, Cordelia, this has got nothing to do with you!" Buffy yelled at the high society princess, the Slayer being in no mood to deal with her attitude right now.
"Well, that's rich coming from you, you self-centred freak!" Cordelia shouted furiously.
"Okay, I, I think we all need to just calm down here..." Joyce said uncertainly, even though no one was paying any attention to her.
"So why did you do it, Xander? If it wasn't because you hated Angel that much, and it wasn't because of the jealousy factor, then WHY?" Willow demanded of her oldest friend.
"Honestly, Will? Because I thought you'd fail to pin Angel's soul back on the donkey, what with you being straight out of that coma and all. I mean, let's not forget how you tried it the first time and failed, and Kendra ended up dead as well. The second time around, I figured that if Buffy thought there was even a one in a billion chance that she'd get her undead boyfriend back, then she wouldn't go all out in the fight – in other words, Overbite would finally quit playing games and kill her, and we'd have had Hell on Earth for the past four months now," Xander told Willow.
"What?" Joyce demanded, staring at her daughter in horror. "Buffy, you-you never told me any of this!"
"Xander, I can't believe that you had so little confidence in me," Willow started to complain, even as Buffy avoided her mother's look. The redhead then added, "Because I DID do it, head injury or otherwise!"
"It doesn't matter now. Because as far as I'm concerned, Xander, our friendship is officially over," Buffy spat out. "So get out of my house, and don't ever come back!"
"Buffy!" Joyce exclaimed, looking at her daughter in shock.
"No, no, it's okay, I'll leave. Like I said, I knew what the consequences would be right from the start," Xander shook his head as he headed towards the door. "G'night, Mrs. Summers, and thanks for the meal."
Willow stared at Oz, but the werewolf musician made no attempt to stop Xander from leaving, and so the fledgling witch decided not to do anything either. She was still hurt over what she considered to be Xander's ultimate act of betrayal, and so Miss Rosenberg just gravitated over to her boyfriend and held him tightly.
But as was typical of things in Sunnydale, the supernatural made itself known when the front door was suddenly blasted off its hinges, and buried Harris underneath it as a horde of zombies came swarming into the house.
"XANDER!" Cordelia screamed as Buffy dragged her backwards, and then rushed to seize some sort of weapon.
"Are, are those vampires?" Joyce looked terrified, as her daughter grabbed an andiron from the fireplace and starting swinging at the zombies.
"I don't think so," Willow said fearfully as Cordelia grabbed a vase and smashed one of the zombies over the head with it.
"Everybody, upstairs!" Oz called out, as the group ran up to the second floor of the house whilst Buffy continued to vent her anger on the zombies. Strangely, the walking dead mostly just ignored her as they all headed up the stairs as well.
"Buffy! Are you all right?" Giles said as he finally showed up for the evening.
"Yeah, I – Xander!" Buffy shoved the front door off of him, and was relieved to find that he was still alive. Then she turned back to her Watcher, "Giles, WHAT is going on here?"
"It's the mask in your mother's bedroom, that's what they're after," Giles said rapidly, looking rather the worse for wear after his adventures with the zombies tonight. "The mask of Ovu Mobani, the Evil Eye. Buffy, that's what's been resurrecting the dead lately – and if one of the zombies should put the mask on, it'll become the demon incarnate. You have to stop it from happening!"
"And if I can't?" Buffy said hurriedly, heading for the stairs.
"Mobani's power lies in his eyes. You have to go for the eyes, in order to defeat him!" Giles called out as Buffy left. Then he tried to rouse Xander from the depths of unconsciousness. "Xander? Xander! Wake up!"
Harris eventually did so, just as one of the zombies succeeded in putting the mask on, but Buffy tackled the demon and they crashed out of her bedroom window – while the rest of her friends and her mother continued to fight for their lives against the walking dead.
Outside, the Slayer and the demon tumbled down off the roof and onto the front lawn. A moment later, Xander showed up and grabbed a shovel off the ground. Immediately after Ovu Mobani had paralysed Buffy with its stare, he jammed the shovel into the demon's eyes, embedding the digging tool deep inside its head.
In a flash of brilliant white light, Ovu Mobani disappeared. The zombies did too, as all the supernatural energy present was released in an uncontrolled burst.
And to Xander's great misfortune, what with the Wolfram & Hart virus having infected his body three days ago – that was just the sort of magical 'trigger' needed for the virus to become self-aware within its host.
( What is happening? ) the now-sentient virus asked itself, as it stopped its normal activities and tried to figure things out. ( Where am I? WHO am I? Where did I come from? )
All good questions, to be sure. And all of which would eventually be answered in the fullness of time.
The Espresso Pump, Sunnydale
September 17th, 1998
Whilst Giles was attempting to convince Principal Snyder to let Buffy back into the school, Willow and the Slayer were talking within the coffee shop – before they laughingly indulged in a bit of name-calling.
Willow said with a grin, "Bailer."
"Harpy," Buffy responded glibly.
"Delinquent."
"Tramp."
Willow yelped, taking mock offense, "Bad seed!"
"Witch," Buffy riposted in kind.
"Freak," Willow laughed, before she suddenly sobered up.
"What is it, Will?" Buffy asked, seeing her best friend's change in expression.
"I'm sorry, Buffy, I-I shouldn't have said that one. Y'know, since that's what Cordy called you last night," Miss Rosenberg said apologetically.
"Eh, don't worry about it. A lot of things were said last night, most of 'em not good," Buffy shrugged. "Did you talk to Cordelia at school today?"
"Yeah," Willow nodded glumly. "She said that she and Xander had a fight about whether or not he was still interested in you – even though he, like, promised Cordy that that ship had totally sailed. She also mentioned how they're now officially on a break. Not a break-up, just a break – and not so much for the lie way back when, but the fact that Xander didn't trust Cordelia enough to confide the big secret to her."
Buffy shrugged again. "Well, I guess that's Cordelia Chase logic for you. Still, good for her – she can do better than that guy, I'm sure."
Willow hesitated for a moment. "About Xander, Buff-"
"I don't want him around me, Willow," Buffy interrupted at once. "Despite what happened with that zombie demon on my front lawn last night, things are not okay between me and him. What Xander did that day outside the mansion – look, I can understand his reasons, even if I don't agree with 'em at all. Still, the fact that he lied and he made no apologies for it just totally pisses me off right now, and until I'm calm enough to deal with it? Xander may as well not exist, as far as I'm concerned," Buffy said to Willow with an air of grim finality.
"Do you think there's any chance you two'll get past this, and be friends again one day?" Willow asked without much hope, hating the fact that she now had to choose between her two best friends.
"I don't know. Maybe, but Xander needs to grow up a bit first and apologize for what he did," Buffy said.
( Oh boy, ) Willow thought to herself miserably, she knew better than anyone just how stubborn Xander Harris could be – and thus, what the odds were of THAT ever happening.
City Hall, Sunnydale
The same time
Holland Manners sat in the visitor's chair, and gazed at the Mayor of Sunnydale calmly.
For his part, Richard Wilkins eyed the lawyer from Wolfram & Hart a lot more intently. He had had an agreement with the Senior Partners ever since the previous century and, up until now, it had been a profitable arrangement for both sides. The Mayor paid his tribute to them and kept the Hellmouth under control, and the Wolf, Ram and Hart assisted in making Sunnydale a virtual paradise for the vampires and demons he allowed to stay, as well as warning him of any unfavourable elements heading his way.
But the appearance of their flunky here and now made Wilkins wonder whether the firm had discovered his plans for Ascension next year. ( Golly, I certainly hope not. That would be no good at all! )
"Well, now, Mr. Manners, what can I do for you and your law firm today?" Wilkins suddenly asked with a toothy politician's smile.
"Mayor Wilkins, I'm afraid I have a bit of a problem. According to the firm's seers, some valuable commercial property of Wolfram & Hart has fallen into the hands of one of Sunnydale's residents," Holland replied smoothly, his eyes never leaving the Mayor's.
Richard frowned. "Well, I certainly hope that none of my constituents have gotten up to any sort of illegal tomfoolery?"
"No – or at least, not intentionally," Manners replied. "However, the situation is a bit tricky, and your co-operation would be appreciated in retrieving our missing virus."
"A virus? Eww, germs! I can't abide them. Tell me, Mr. Manners, what can I do to help?" Wilkins had a distasteful look on his face.
Holland just smiled like a reptile as he heard the Mayor say that.
"I'm glad you asked. Now, the situation is such that a certain Miss Cordelia Chase inadvertently brought the virus here from Los Angeles, but it's no longer in her possession – she gave it away, due to its disguise as a bottle of aftershave. According to my information, she gifted the virus to her boyfriend, a young man named Alexander Harris-"
"The Slayer's little friend? Or former friend, anyway," Wilkins interrupted. He had eyes and ears everywhere in this town, and thus already knew the current situation with the members of the so-called Scooby Gang.
"Yes, Miss Buffy Summers. I've heard how she was in Los Angeles for quite a few months recently, but kept completely underneath the radar – no vampire or demon kills at all. I couldn't help wondering why." Holland then shook his head in dismissal of that question. "Still, that doesn't matter right now. My problem is Mr. Harris, and that virus he's been infected with."
Richard Wilkins the Third (and the Second, and the First) cocked his head slightly, before he smiled. ( Well, what's one less student to feed on in roughly nine months' time? He'd probably just give me an upset stomach after what's happened to him, anyway. )
"Feel free to retrieve that virus, Mr. Manners. Whichever way you like," the Mayor quickly gave his blessing to the evil lawyer's scheme.
Even though if he'd known what was good for him, Wilkins really, really shouldn't have done that.
To Be Continued...