Mort set up some targets along the side of the barn, while Faith found Lorrie and a couple crossbows. Lorrie had been all too eager to help Pyro learn to use a crossbow, blushing as she scampered outside. Faith had trailed after, carrying several bundles of bolts, so they'd actually have something to shoot.
Pyro wanted to help them. Maybe it would be more accurate to say that he wanted to help Lorrie and that he didn't want to go back to the school of smile and look harmless for the normal people, but that was close enough for Faith. Considering the opposition, she was sure that they could use all the help they could get.
"I've got bolts so you can actually shoot," Faith called, smirking at the way Lorrie was showing Pyro exactly how to grip the crossbow.
"Good," Pyro mumbled, his cheeks pink as Lorrie snuggled against him, her hand overlapping his.
The basics of loading and holding it were soon explained, and Faith made sure to stand back as Lorrie, Pyro and Mort faced the targets. She knew that Lorrie and Mort were decent shots, but Pyro was a complete unknown, and she was sure that it would hurt to be shot. Probably worse than being stabbed, but not as much as falling backwards off a building onto a truck. Best not to find out at all. Looking at them and checking one last time to be sure all the points were aimed towards the barn, Faith called, "Fire!"
Lorrie's bolt hit the middle of the paper plate. Mort's caught the edge, not good enough to get the eye or the heart but enough to make the baddie hurt. As for Pyro, his bolt missed the plate by an inch, both down and to the left of the target.
"There's not as much recoil as a gun, try it again," Mort offered.
"I don't have much experience with guns either. Fire's always been enough for me," Pyro grumbled, awkwardly reloading the crossbow.
"It's always a good idea to be able to use a weapon," Lorrie stated. "If you know how, you don't have to use it, but if you can't use it, it's nothing more than a really expensive and not so effective club. Besides, if you can set the bolts on fire after you launch them, it won't matter where you hit a vamp, they'll burn up."
"And that's a good thing. The movies have the blood-drinking part right, and they're a damn predatory bunch. I'd rather keep my blood inside my veins, and I think that you'll agree to that statement regarding yours. The best way to ensure that is to eliminate the vampires before they get to you," Mort continued.
"If it makes you feel better, you can wait until they make with the lame threats," Faith offered. "Once they start calling you dinner and threatening to crack open your bones to suck out the marrow, that whole reluctance to kill thing goes right out the window."
"Crack open your bones… who talks like that anymore?" Pyro demanded, eyes wide and face pale.
"Well, the one I heard making that threat was pretty old. You have to remember that vamps don't get old, wrinkled and fragile like regular people, they just get stronger as time goes by. And the older ones tend to be meaner and smarter than the young and stupid vamps you're more likely to run into," Faith replied.
"That's because the stupid ones get killed off when they're young, not because people were smarter before. The idiots get killed, leaving only the criminal masterminds and the professional cowards," Mort added.
Glancing at Faith, he insisted, "I can pay attention to your vampire lessons."
"Good, because sometimes what you don't know can kill you," Faith leaned over and kissed him. "I want you to be around for a long time, and I want to spend that long time with you. As much as I can, at least."
"Can we get back to the target practice instead of the sappy stuff?" Lorrie called.
"Sure. You might want to help Pyro learn to reload faster, and he definitely needs to work on his aim," Faith decided. Perhaps tomorrow she'd draw a person-shape on the side of the barn for them to practice with. Something where she could mark the heart. "And if he can practice… next time we get a burn pile built up, he should practice lighting the bolts before they hit the target. It could be very useful against vampires."
"This is definitely not the way I expected life to turn out. Hunting vampires and demons… I thought those were just stories," Pyro lifted the crossbow again, releasing the bolt. It hit the edge of the plate where it was all scalloped and ruffly. "And now they're as real as mutants."
"Yeah, welcome to my world," Faith patted him on the shoulder. "Don't forget that you get to learn the hand-to-hand stuff too, just in case they get past your crossbow."
"So, what can you tell us about that Wesley guy who was at breakfast? He's definitely not local," Lorrie asked.
"No, he's English, and he's a Watcher. Sort of. Again. Wait, let me start over. When I got to Sunnydale in California, the Council sent me Wesley. He was supposed to take over and be my Watcher, since Mellie had been killed in Boston. Of course, Mellie was about ten years older and had quite a bit more field experience than Wes. All he had was theory, a bit of weapons instruction indoors, and a couple controlled exposures. By now, I'm sure that all of you know that the one thing you can be sure not to run into out patrolling is a controlled circumstance. When he faced the reality of being out there, he wasn't ready. And he had no idea how to deal with a Slayer who thought for herself instead of letting the Watcher do it all for her. It went badly… very badly. The short, short version is that I ignored him, he got fired, and both of us left town, not at the same time. And somehow, here he is. In the past nine months, he's picked up a lot about the real world, relaxed, and figured out how to think for himself instead of quoting the Council. He's here to read all the old Watcher books, some of which are German, and I know there's French and Latin. Maybe some Sumerian or other weird old languages that haven't had a city in centuries. That's part of what Watchers do, they read the old books full of demons and magic rituals and objects, and tell us what the mystic whats-it is and how to stop the big evil ritual," Faith explained. She just hoped that Wesley had really improved as much as she was claiming, for all their sakes.
"I'm sorry about your first Watcher," Lorrie offered.
"It wasn't your fault, Lorrie. The responsible party was a vamp named Kakistos, and he's dead now. Run through with a railroad tie, and the bones crushed, torched, and the ashes dumped over fresh cement," Faith couldn't manage a smile. Somehow, the slight good mood about the target shooting had been crushed.
"Okay, back to practice. I want to be prepared when the scary lady sends more minions after me… us," Lorrie said, turning to face the barn.
Nobody argued. After all, she had a very good point – the vampire would try again.
End part 47.
Faith couldn't make up her mind if time was crawling past or rushing. They'd been training, and she was starting to hope that Pyro could turn into a tolerable shot with the crossbow. Failing that, if he hit them at all, he could then light it on fire, if he had his lighter or something was burning. They'd been working on hand to hand combat, and making certain that there were weapons scattered through the house. Wesley kept searching through books, looking for what the Door might be used for, and anything that might help identify the vampire. Faith's description had been more helpful than the fact that the other vampires had called her 'the Lady', with an audible capital.
She'd sent an email to Dick's lawyer, saying that an acquaintance had mentioned that he was looking for her, and that Dick had said he was indeed his lawyer. There hadn't been a response yet, but she figured it wasn't a big rush. If they couldn't stop this vampire and her plans, Faith would be too dead to look into an inheritance anyhow.
Pyro was becoming a better shot with the crossbow, and he and Lorrie were definitely together. Not just the sappy grins when they looked at each other, but the noises from their room late at night made their involvement clear. Of course everyone had their own idea why they seemed to be good for each other. He'd ducked through the Door to grab some things from his old school, and left a note for his friends there.
Wesley still hadn't figured out what the evil vampire-lady wanted the Door for, but trial and error had determined that if you had a clear picture in your mind and tried to open the door at night, it would open to that somewhere. More efforts had determined that it would only work once a night, but distance didn't seem to limit the Door, and Wesley had determined that it didn't need to be night on the other side after a quick trip to London. Mort had tested and discovered that it only did the magic door to elsewhere trick from the inside, opening it from outside only led to the hallway. They had no way to tell if it would bypass a vampire's need for an invitation, but the idea was unsettling.
Faith sighed, and decided to go to the computer and see if she had anything interesting, either from Sunnydale or Dick's lawyer. Maybe it would help not to think about their problems. Later, she and Mort would do a patrol, and see if they could get rid of any other minions, or get some information of this vampire. Even if they couldn't, they'd at least feel like they were trying. She'd leave the books to Tanya and Wesley, who seemed to be getting along pretty well. Well enough that Faith was wondering if someday, this house might belong to Tanya Wyndham-Price.
Opening her email, she shook her head, deleting the garbage emails about cheap prescription drugs, porn of various flavors, penis enlarging drugs, and one claiming to have an inheritance worth millions that was stuck back in Nigeria, and if she'd only help, they'd split it with her. The daily news update was there, and another email from Willow, with the subject line 'Current Problems'. Somehow, Faith didn't get a happy feeling about that email. Opening it, she could only shake her head.
To BackFromtheDark5x5...
From RedRose99...
Subject: Current Problems
Faith,
…and I just wondered, what IS your last name? Do you even use one, or is it just Faith, like just Madonna or just Angel?
Sunnydale is being awful, which is probably all because of the stupid Hellmouth. You missed the freaky floating demons that stole everyone's voices – the news called it a sudden massive outbreak of viral laryngitis. Better than gang members on PCP or people falling on barbeque forks. Maybe.
Remember I said there was an effort to make an army of demon-cyborg soldiers? Turns out that it's a military project (it's going to go awry in a truly horrible fashion. Didn't any of them read Frankenstein?). You didn't say where you are, but considering this and that Slayers NEVER EVER get to have safe & boring lives, you might want to look into any strange military projects wherever you are. There's a group of soldiers hunting demons out here. Sounds good, right?
Except the demons either vanish entirely so that not even Willy has any idea (Buffy even beat him up twice and Giles offered money. Still no info.) or they show up acting like puppets – and we don't know who's pulling the strings. The soldiers hunt in groups from three to six, in camouflage and masks. We don't know if it's the same soldiers spotted at the docks as the ones spotted near the old High school.
Buffy thinks her boyfriend's cheating on her, not that you're probably too worried. I have to agree that Riley is hiding something. Granted, there could be a lot of thing's to hide, but… He's probably cheating. Like Oz did. Men are jerks.
One of the books had something about a Door of Spirits – no idea if that's anything like your funky magic door or not. It's supposed to allow ghosts or any other dead soul to 'move on to the Realm of the Dead'. The text suggested that this moving on might not need to be voluntary, and would work from either side. Nifty, but nothing to say an evil vamp would want one. Of course, if you can send someone away, can you call them back? And if so (which would be bad) then how?
Anyhow, Sunnydale sucks. I hope you're doing better wherever you are. Don't go evil again.
Willow
Faith blinked, slowly letting out the air in her lungs. She wasn't sure what had happened to get Buffy away from Angel, but this Riley – whoever that was – didn't sound like Angel. And while she didn't care too much if Buffy got cheated on… She did care. She just didn't know why. The whole idea of Oz cheating on Willow was strange though – Oz hadn't reacted once to her and her charms. If that wasn't being utterly stuck on Willow, nothing was. What had changed that? Not that it mattered much to her out here.
Soldiers grabbing demons though… that could matter. It could matter a lot if it was an official project, especially if it was something going on in more than one location. And demons under some sort of control… what would they be used for? Hunting criminals? Hunting other demons? Hunting mutants? Shuddering, Faith decided that if they survived this vampire and her plans, she'd have to figure out a way to check into the possibility of local military, both for being here at all and having scary projects.
And she'd have to let Wesley know about the Door Willow had found. Could something like that call up the dead? Would that be an army of ghosts, or zombies? Demonic hordes out for blood? Slime covered things with glowing eyes? None of those options sounded good. Standing up, Faith wondered why magic had to be so complicated.
She was looking forward to a nice, simple patrol.
End part 48.