The city had always been alive with people, surging from dawn until dusk. And while late Sunday nights in the suburbs were normally relatively free of people traversing the darkened streets what with the work week about to start, it was decidedly unusual for there to be a total lack of life. No people wandering home, no cats slinking amongst the shadows. It was strangely silent too, barely even the distant whoosh of car tyres on the main roads. It was creepy. Like the city was abandoned and Buffy didn't like it one bit. It reminded her too much of apocalypses past, when people seemed to sense something bad was unfolding and fled, leaving behind an empty town. As far as she knew there were no scheduled apocalypses due any time soon. Though maybe she should check that with Giles in the morning…
It was past midnight and well into the early hours of Monday morning. The slayer was patrolling with Cat, currently in a residential area. Tall white-washed houses stood on one side of the street, a large park on the other hidden from view by trees and hedges and wooden fencing. Parked cars lined both sides of the street, coloured chrome blurred into varying shades of orange by the street lights overhead.
"It's the cops talking about escaped wild animals and melonhead stories coming back." Cat attempted to explain away the emptiness as the slayer mentioned, not for the first time, the eerie silence giving her a bad case of the wiggins.
Buffy did a double take.
"Melonwhat?"
"Melonheads." Cat repeated simply, looking sideways at Buffy and gesturing vaguely to her head. "It's a story…Nevermind. Ask Giles."
"Right…" Buffy said slowly, watching Cat a moment longer as the reaper turned her gaze ahead once more. They were patrolling together, though there was no need. They had seen just one vampire that night, and dusted her easily. Dawn was only a few hours off and the night had most definitely been unsuccessful. Though at least that meant the streets were fairly safe. Silver linings…
"You know, you didn't need to come out tonight." She said after a while. Cat flashed a mischievous grin her way.
"Worried I'll show you up?" She teased. Buffy raised one eyebrow.
"Yes, what with the hordes of undead throwing themselves at us." She replied drily. Cat shrugged.
"I know things have been slow lately. Vamps hiding normally means there's a new hunter on the scene, right?" She said, and Buffy nodded.
"Right."
"So maybe you could use an extra pair of eyes, and hands, while out. Just in case whatever's spooking the spooks shows up."
"That definitely makes sense." Buffy agreed, crossing the road to enter the large park opposite via a natural gateway between the tall hedges that bordered the area. Cat followed her, hazy eyes adjusting almost instantly to the gloom of the wide open area as they left the glow of the streetlights behind. Only a handful of the lights illuminating the pathways through the grass were turned on at this time of day and the trees enclosing the park had soon swallowed the light of the sleeping city.
A cold wind blew through the trees, rustling through the dying leaves and causing the branches to creak and sway. Buffy shivered in the resultant chill and stuffed her hands into her coat pockets as they wandered through the middle of the park, out onto the open field.
"It's getting cold." She remarked idly. Cat adopted a solemn look.
"Winter is coming." She said gruffly.
Buffy merely blinked at her and Cat sighed.
"Dawn would understand."
Buffy opened her mouth and took a breath to respond, but instead found herself choking as another gust of wind swept across the park towards them, this time bringing with it some vile smell. Cat swiftly clamped her mouth shut and pulled her black cotton scarf out of her jacket collar and up over her nose, looking like she was about to be sick.
"Oh sweet Jesus…" She mumbled.
"Smells like something died." Buffy wrinkled her nose in disgust. She felt a tingling at the base of her skull and stopped walking, recognising her slayer senses throwing out a warning. A second later Cat had halted beside her and summoned her sword, evidently feeling the same thing.
They had almost fully crossed the park, and stood near a line of tall trees illuminated by one of the pathway lights glowing bright white a few meters away. It made them blind to the shadows within the bushes marking the fence across the path. Cat had narrowed her grey eyes and was peering intently in that direction, reaching out, Buffy suspected, with her reaper senses to locate the danger.
A leaf drifted by Buffy's face from above and she snapped her head back, staring upwards. Her heartrate skyrocketed as she came face to face with luminous silver eyes and a mouthful of razor sharp fangs just a few meters away.
She jumped up and slammed both feet into Cat's lower back, sending them both sprawling in opposite directions as some hideous…demon thing dropped out of the tree right into the spot they had just vacated. It landed on all fours as they leaped instantly to their feet, and hissed a warning at Cat as she drew her sword with the whisper of steel on wood.
It was an emaciated thing, all grubby grey skin and bones threatening to burst free. Veins and tendons bulged like steel cords. Long stringy black hair framed angry eyes that burned silver in the darkness. It stood hunched on strangely elongated wiry legs, it's limbs spiderlike and deceptively frail-looking. While it was vaguely humanoid in shape there was no mistaking it for the Hellish creature it was. This was definitely the thing Buffy had glimpsed briefly a few nights previous.
Cat coughed loudly, drawing the demon's attention once again.
"Mate, you stink." She informed him, pressing her scarf back over her nose. "What is that? Eau de corpse?" The demon roared and pounced at her with a frightening speed. Bony palms slapped into Cat's shoulders and bowled her backwards. Unable to dodge, she tried to roll backwards with the beast to gain the upper hand, but was instead pinned to the ground, having been caught off guard and not anticipating the immense strength of her enemy. She had kept her grasp on the sword and saya but hadn't the leverage to attack.
Buffy sprang into action, dashing forward with the intention of planting her boot in the side of the demon's face. Instead, in a blur of motion, the demon twisted to face her, seized her leg mid-kick and threw her easily into the trunk of the tree it had jumped out of a moment ago. Her head struck bark and stars exploded behind her eyelids. She gave an 'oof' as she hit the ground and the air was driven from her lungs.
In the distraction, and before the demon could get back to pinning Cat, the reaper dealt a stunning right hook to the demon's jaw that sent him spinning sideways, leaving her free to climb to her feet. He recovered fast and regained his balance. Cat was waiting, sword in hand, and lunged forwards, driving the sword point through his heart with all of her weight behind it. This brought her uncomfortably close to his face and those rotten fangs. She stared up at him, waiting for the light to die in his eyes. Instead the demon stared angrily down at her.
"Uh…" Cat looked from the sword buried up to the hilt in his chest, to the furious burning eyes above her. The demon grabbed her by the throat and lifted her with one hand, a growl rumbling in its throat as cracked and blackened lips pulled back from stained brown fangs in a snarl. Cat's fingers scrabbled over the wiry wrist, clawing at grey skin marked by faded black ink. An old tattoo, her oxygen starved brain informed her. A strange thing for a demon to have. Spots danced before her eyes as her vision blurred and began to darken at the edges, her heart hammered erratically against her ribs. She brought up her dangling legs and pressed the balls of her feet against the demon's narrow chest, summoning all of her magic into her hands. Finally she let go of the creature's arm and thrust her palms forwards, hurling a blast of energy into the demon's face that forced him to stagger backwards while propelling her in the opposite direction. Her shoulders slammed into the ground and she rolled backwards and crashed into Buffy, who had just climbed to her feet. The slayer stumbled and grabbed at the tree trunk behind her to steady herself.
"Why is he not dead?" Cat asked nervously, allowing herself to be hauled back up onto her feet.
"I don't know." Buffy replied, still looking dazed from her collision with the tree. As they watched, the demon grasped the handle of Cat's sword with both hands and tugged it free of his chest. The blade emerged with a coating of frost. The tip slid free of his heart with a small puff of ice crystals. The wound sealed almost immediately.
"Plan?" Cat asked as the demon turned his gaze back to them.
"Run." Buffy announced and turned and sprinted for the boundary hedges.
"Agreed." Cat dashed after her.
Slayer and reaper leaped the fence and landed running on the other side down a street almost identical to the one on the opposite side of the park. They heard the demon racing along after them, gaining ground despite their supernatural speed.
Cat dropped into a crouch as she sensed an incoming attack from behind, and the demon sailed overhead, claws outstretched. Buffy skidded to a halt beside her, instantly adopting a fighting stance.
"Houston, we have a problem…." Cat said without taking her eyes from the snarling monster crouched just a few meters from them. It launched itself forwards, arms outstretched, eager to bury its claws in Cat's chest. She threw herself sideways as the demon landed, summoning her sword back to her. It swiped at Buffy, who pivoted on one foot to dodge, then whirled back and drove her knee up into the underside of its jaw during the downward arc of its attack. Its head snapped back, stunning it long enough for her to follow up with a devastating roundhouse that spun the demon round to face Cat and her trusty blade. Cat swung her sword in a horizontal slash, ready to take the demon's head off at the shoulders, but the demon recovered fast and whipped out a hand at the blade, halting it in its tracks as its fingers closed around cold steel. Cat gaped at the demon.
"What the Hell is wrong with you?!" She demanded. In response the demon tore her weapon out of her grasp and raked the claws of its free hand across her stomach. Cat yelped at the fiery burn of triple sharp slashes opening across her gut and leaped backwards to avoid the follow up swipe that was sure to disembowel her. The demon rose to its full height then and managed to take one single step towards the reaper before Buffy slammed into him from the side with a flying kick that sent him soaring across the road and into the front garden of one of the houses. He crashed onto the perfectly manicured front lawn and rolled several times. The movement triggered a security light that filled the street with a blinding white light. The demon glanced back and immediately recoiled with a shriek, covering its face with its hands. It took off down the street without a backwards glance at the slayer and the reaper, leaping parked cars in single bounds. It rounded the corner and disappeared into the night.
"Ooookay…" Buffy commented.
"Who the Hell has a light like that?!" Cat demanded, squinting in the sudden brightness. "It's like a collapsed sun!"
Buffy leaned back against a street light to catch her breath, grinning at her friend's indignant raving. She knew they should be chasing the demon. Knew they would never catch him.
"I take it you're okay, then?" She asked. Cat turned back to the slayer, confused a moment, then looked down at her bleeding midriff and shrugged.
"'S just a flesh wound." She said, then looked back up at Buffy, yet again indignant. "Unlike what I gave him! I stabbed him." She cried, gesturing wildly. "Clean through the heart!"
"Maybe his heart's in a different place." Buffy said, pushing off from the lamp post and heading off in the direction of home.
"I don't care! You don't just carry on after you've been stabbed. It's not natural."
"He does." Buffy replied. "But he's clearly not natural."
"And who the hell has a chest full of ice anyway?!"
"Definitely one for Giles."
Buffy carefully slid her front door key into the lock and slowly turned it until she felt the lock give. She pushed open the door while keeping one hand on the edge to stop it swinging back and banging into the wall. Willow, Tara and Dawn would be fast asleep and she didn't want to wake them. She crept over the fresh hold and turned to Cat, needlessly pressing a finger to her lips. Cat rolled her eyes and stepped inside. She held her scarf bunched up against her stomach, wary of spilling blood on the floor.
"First aid kit's upstairs in the bathroom." Buffy whispered while closing the door softly. "I'll find you something to wear while you clean up."
"Thanks." Cat muttered, one handedly unlacing her boots and taking them off. She heard Buffy creep up the stairs, socks rustling softly against the carpet. She didn't turn on any of the lights in the house.
Cat left her boots beside Buffy's shoes, shrugged off her leather jacket and hung it up on the coat rack by the door, then made her way further into the dark house. Orange light crept around the edges of the blinds at the front windows from the street outside and penetrated the gloom as far as the bottom three stairs. She could see the outlines of the furniture in the living room, the glowing green numbers on the DVD player beneath the TV telling her the sun would be rising soon and she should get some sleep for her graveyard shift at the hospital that night. She could hear the humming of the fridge in the kitchen, the creak of bedsprings from upstairs as someone rolled over in their sleep. Buffy was moving around upstairs in stealth mode, conscious of waking her friends and family.
Cat put her foot down on the bottom step and started up the stairs. It creaked loudly beneath her weight and she froze.
"Bugger…" She hissed, pausing to make sure she hadn't woken anyone up. Hearing no movement from above she dashed up the stairs on light feet, thankfully without any more incidents, and made her way into the bathroom. She closed the door behind herself and pulled on the cord by the door to turn on the light. Her eyes adjusted swiftly, and she crossed the room to the mirrored medicine cabinet above the sink. She opened the door quietly, and took down the plastic green first aid box from the bottom shelf (the most used item in the cabinet), setting it on the back of the sink to use in a moment. She closed the cabinet door softly, then chucked her bloody scarf and ruined T-shirt into the bath tub. Red splattered the white tub, but it would be easy to clean. Looking down at her stomach she saw three deep gashes still oozing blood. The wounds were already healing, she knew, and would be nothing but pale scars by the end of the week due to some handy supernatural accelerated healing. She washed her hands with soap and set about cleaning up the cuts and dressing them.
She had just stuck a gauze pad over the wounds when Buffy knocked quietly on the door. Cat opened it and took the T-shirt she was offered. An oversized Snoopy one. She twitched an eyebrow and looked up at Buffy.
"What? It's comfy for sleeping in." Buffy insisted in a whisper.
"Didn't know I was staying." Cat said, pulling on the T-shirt. The sleeves came to her elbows and the hem hung almost to her knees.
"No point in going home now." Buffy said, coming in to pick up Cat's ruined clothes from the bath. "Besides, I want to fill in Giles in the morning. He'll want to speak with you too, probably. What do you want me to do with these?" She lifted up the clothes and Cat heaved a sigh.
"Might as well chuck 'em." She said. "How's your head, by the way?"
Buffy reached back and gingerly touched the sizeable lump at the back of her skull from where her head had hit the tree. She pulled a face.
"I think I grew a dinosaur egg." She grumbled.
"Cool, if it hatches maybe it can eat the stupid demon thing."
Buffy raised her eyebrows slowly at Cat who grinned sheepishly.
"I think maybe I should get some sleep…" She said apologetically.
"Sofa okay?" Buffy asked with a smile, and Cat nodded.
"Sofa good." She said. "Thanks."
"Go down and I'll bring you some blankets and pillows."
Cat left the bathroom like a ninja as Buffy bundled up the bloody clothes and turned out the light. She made her way into her bedroom and grabbed one of her pillows and the blanket folded at the foot of her bed. Spares were kept in Willow and Tara's room and she didn't want to barrel in there and risk waking them up. So she would just have to suffer cold feet for what remained of the night.
She carried the blanket and pillow downstairs to the living room where Cat was perched on the edge of the sofa waiting for her bedding with a glass of water in one hand. She stood as Buffy approached, putting her glass on the coffee table and reaching for the pillow and blanket with a smile.
"Cheers." She tossed the pillow down at one end of the sofa and shook out the blanket. Buffy nodded.
"Sleep well. I'm going to call Giles later, tell him to come over early so we can talk."
Cat lay down on the sofa, spreading the blanket over herself.
"I'll probably go after that. I want a proper sleep before work. And a shower. And, like, a full hog roast or something."
"If you're hungry you can grab something." Buffy jerked a thumb over one shoulder.
"I'll wait until breakfast." Cat said.
"Okay. Thanks for tonight."
"Any time." Cat smirked at her. "I don't mind being gutted for you guys."
"Try not to do it again." Buffy couldn't help a smile at the mischievous look on Cat's face. "Anyway. Good night."
"Night."
Buffy turned and made her way for the back door to put Cat's ruined clothes in the bin.
"What's this? No goodnight kiss?!"
The slayer rolled her eyes and continued out the door, shaking her head in despair. She dumped Cat's clothes in the bin, then headed back inside, locking the door after herself. She returned to the bathroom upstairs and cleaned blood from the tub to save potential awkward questions in the morning, then went into her own room and flopped down onto the bed fully clothed.
Buffy awoke with a pounding headache after grabbing just a couple of hours' sleep. She groaned and buried her face further into her pillow, but knew she couldn't drift off again. She needed to call Giles for a Scooby meeting. She heaved a sigh and pulled herself upright into a sitting position, rubbing sleep from her eyes with one hand as she groped blindly for the mobile phone on her bedside cabinet with the other. She then remembered that she hadn't changed for bed before going to sleep and that her phone was still in her trouser pocket. She sighed and pulled it out, thumbed the power button and cracked one eye open to squint at the seemingly blindingly bright phone screen. She scrolled her contacts list for Giles' home number and hit dial, then held the phone to her ear. While waiting for Giles to answer she tentatively probed the back of her head for the lump left by her collision with the tree, wincing as her fingers found the knot. The swelling seemed to have gone down a little, but it still hurt like Hell.
"Stupid demon." She grumbled.
"Hello?" Giles answered the phone and Buffy was glad to hear a little early morning gravel in his voice. Even Giles was unable to wake up chipper.
"Giles, hi!" She answered, clearing her throat and sitting up straighter in an attempt to pretend she was more awake than she actually felt.
"Buffy?" He already sounded worried. "Is everything all right?" He knew she had been patrolling and obviously feared the worst.
"Dandy." Buffy said, removing her fingers from her scalp. The lump continued to throb. "Any chance you could come over early? I'd like to fill you in on a new demon friend I made last night."
"Of course. I'll be over as soon as I can."
Buffy heard a rustling noise over the phone and smirked.
"Still in bed at this hour?" She teased.
"I know you've only just woken up." Giles replied and Buffy cracked a grin.
"See you in a bit." She said and they hung up. She paused a moment to gather her thoughts, then tossed her phone onto her bedside table and crawled out of bed. She stretched her arms above her head and arched her back to work out some of the stiffness, then trudged out of her bedroom to the bathroom in the hope that a shower might impart some energy. Slayer or no, two hours sleep was not enough to function properly on.
When the doorbell rang half an hour later Buffy was dried and dressed and just heading down the stairs intent on grabbing a caffeine fix. Cat reached the door before her and opened it. Giles blinked in surprise, having not expected to see her.
"Oh, hello, Cat…What are you doing here?" He asked.
"I got a boo-boo." She told him by way of explanation. Giles paused, clearly not knowing what to say. By this time, Buffy had appeared behind her guest.
"She was patrolling with me last night." She told him, as Cat stepped aside for Giles to come in. He wiped his feet on the door mat before entering.
"Where you met this new demon?" He asked. Cat closed the door behind him and stood back with her arms folded over her chest.
"Yeah, and he's a right bugger." He said with a scowl.
"Giles, you're here early!"
The trio turned to see Willow and Tara stood at the bottom of the stairs still in pyjamas. Willow hastily tied up the belt of her dressing gown, feeling underdressed in front of visitors.
"And Cat." She added, looking confused.
"Is there a party you forgot to tell us about?" Tara asked Buffy with a playful grin, smoothing down Willow's wild bed hair with both hands.
"Scoobies assemble!" Cat said, bounding into the living room with a lot more energy than the others had. She stopped by the sofa and turned to look back at the others with a frown on her face. "Can I say that if I'm not really a Scooby?"
"You're a Scooby." Willow told her. "The Scoobiest Scoob and I'm gonna go make some coffee…" The redhead did an about turn and headed for the kitchen to get a pot of strong coffee brewing.
"Good idea." Buffy said, sitting down on the sofa beside Cat, who always seemed to get excited about these meetings.
"I'm sensing a story." Tara said, settling on the floor at one end of the coffee table so she would be within easy reach of the morning mug of fuel.
"Only a little one." Cat said, holding up one hand with her forefinger and thumb indicating a small distance.
Willow returned then with a tray on which was clustered five steaming mismatched mugs of coffee and a plate of toast for Tara and herself. She put down the tray on the table and sat on the floor beside Tara, picking up a slice of toast and a mug of coffee and looking expectantly up at Buffy as she nibbled at strawberry jam.
"What happened last night?" Giles asked, leaning forwards and choosing a mug. He looked down at the coffee as he sat back with the drink. Tea would have been preferred, but he wasn't one to decline an offered drink when he was a guest and so he had a sip of the bitter liquid.
Buffy and Cat exchanged a look. Cat gestured to the blonde, allowing her to take the narrative lead, and so Buffy explained all that had unfolded that night out on patrol, with Cat chipping in occasionally. They described the demon, and Cat went into great detail over the way she had clearly dealt a mortal wound that hadn't fussed the creature. Buffy added that he had fled when the light came on.
"Well," Giles said as they finished, "That doesn't sound like any demon I've ever heard of."
Willow and Tara shook their heads, looking nonplussed.
"We can look in the books later. That's a lot of information you got us." Tara said, licking jam from the ball of her thumb.
"And we have a good description to go off." Willow added. "That should help narrow it down."
"Sure." Buffy said. "How many tall, starving demons that want to kill people could there be?"
"Do you think it's the thing that's been going round chomping on people?" Cat asked.
"I'd say chances are quite high that he's the culprit." Giles nodded.
Cat flashed a grin.
"Scooby research mode activated."