"What do you mean he knows?!" Giles demanded. I'd told him on the way to school what we'd found out last night. I hadn't told him about what we'd discovered about Ford, but first things first. I wasn't technically breaking the rules by telling Giles, after all. It was Buffy we couldn't tell.

I shrugged helplessly at him.

"I suppose he must have figured it out after she came here. Why he didn't try and get in contact with her when he found out isn't really clear to me." I said. We were moving through the halls, so we were having to keep our voices low and being on the move is hardly the right setting for an in-depth discussion.

"Well what is he doing about it?" Giles asked.

"Nothing, so far. He just let her know that he knows. And now we know. There's a lot of knowing going on." Just not quite enough.

Giles shook his head, frowning deeply. He'd be frowning even more once I told him what had happened last night. As if we didn't have enough to worry about, now this. I'm seriously starting to think life never can be truly simple around here.

"Oh!" Giles exclaimed. He reached into his breast pocket and pulled out a scrap of paper, "I need to give this to Buffy."

"What is it?"

"The number for Miss Calendar's beeper…thing." He explained.

"Her pager?" I offered. He nodded.

"Yes, uh, here, memorize the number," he handed the paper to me, "when we're out tonight you can call if you need." He was blushing furiously now. I smirked, read the number, committed it to memory, and nodded for him to take it back.

"Uh, Margery," he started, and I almost groaned. Not this again.

"I can't help but notice your attitude towards Miss Calendar has been somewhat…" he broke off in a low grumble as he tried to think of the right word.

"Tempestuous?" I smirked.

"Precisely." He nodded. "And I wanted to ask you why that is? She's been helpful, perhaps a little condescending at times but overall she's been quite an asset. And she is trying to be a bit more friendly, but…do you not like her?"

I shrugged.

"I don't exactly think fond thoughts of her when I think of her at all." I answered honestly, "But I don't wish her harm, either."

"But why?" he asked, "I mean, why don't you think fond thoughts of her?"

"She and I just aren't compatible," I told him, "we have very different personalities, and sometimes people just don't get along with such differing outlooks and habits. She's too much like a child for me to take her seriously, and I look too much like a child for her to take me seriously. I don't much care for her attitude, but it's tolerable, and she has her merits, of course. I won't deny she's been incredibly helpful on occasion. But that doesn't mean we're naturally going to like each other even if we're on the same side. Like Montgomery and Patton."

Giles almost snorted in laughter.

"Well," he said, "I do wish you'd both try to be civil to each other."

"I would if she'd stop acting like she knows more than I do." I sniffed.

"Perhaps you just need to spend some time together?"

"That's your job." I pointed out. "I wouldn't know what to do with that woman. I'd beat her at arcade games so it still wouldn't go well."

Giles sighed in defeat, but also relief. At least now he knew I wasn't jealous. She just wasn't the woman I would have picked for him. Though he was right, she had been helpful. I just had to keep telling myself to keep from cringing when I thought of her.

"Buffy's this way." I told him, pointing towards the student lounge. She wasn't wearing as much perfume now, so it was remarkably easier to scent her, now.

"Ford's with her."

Giles frowned at me.

"Be nice?" I shrugged.

Giles hurried in the direction I pointed, with me almost literally on his heels. He swept up to Buffy, glanced suspiciously at Ford, and handed her the paper with Ms. Calendar's pager number on it.

"Buffy," he said, after explaining what the number was, "may I speak to you for a moment?" he forced a polite smile at Ford and led Buffy a little to one side, where I was standing, waiting for them.

Why yes, I did feel guilty that I wasn't telling her Ford was a liar, how'd you guess?

"Before you ask," Buffy said preemptively, "I didn't tell him. He knew."

"No, it's just…" he glanced at Ford, "be…careful, all right?"

"Don't worry about me," Buffy said, "you go experience this thing called 'fun'. I'll try not to have a crisis. For your sake. Okay?"

Giles frowned uncertainly, but let Buffy go back to Ford, and the two of them walked towards their class. Or rather, Buffy's class, since Ford was technically not even supposed to be here. Well, neither was I, but that was different.

"So what's the plan?" Giles asked once we were back in the library. That was when I told him about Ford's lie.

"The plan is for you to go on your date," I told him, "Angel, Xander, Willow and I are going to keep investigating our infiltrator, and try to figure out what it is he's here for and what it is he wants from us. If he wants anything."

And then kill him

'No.'

"I'd feel better if I were going with you." Giles frowned.

"I'm sure you would, but a vampire and a half should be able to handle an intel-gathering mission. You try and have a good time, and I'll call you if anything happens, all right?"

Giles didn't look exactly pleased, but I poked him playfully in the shoulder.

"Cheer up, child," I told him, "it'll be all right. Now, I wanted to ask you: Fowler's Monster Journal, do you think the really fought a chupacabra, or do you think it was a very small werewolf? Possibly a lesser demon possessing a dog or a coyote?"

Giles perked right up.

"Well, that has been a matter of some debate for half a century," he began, and soon he was rattling away about theories and evidence and hypothesis and demonology.

I can be good at distractions when I need to be.

That night, the four of us met up at Willow's house. Xander was ecstatic about the development with Ford, no surprise there. Angel was a little less so.

Willow said she'd managed to find out little, but she did have something. She led us to a rather seedy looking area, very dark, very dreary, very broody, and while I couldn't smell any vampires aside from Angel, this was seemed very stereotypical of them.

A little too stereotypical of them.

Vampires can be a predictable lot sometimes, but even we have our limits sometimes.

"All I could find was this address," Willow explained, "the Sunset Club. Still didn't find anything really incriminating, though."

"He leaves no records, no paper-trail," Angel pointed out, "that's incriminating enough."

"People only become invisible when they have something to hide," I agreed, "and erasing their past only points to something unsavory they're running from. At the very least, it's highly unusual for a young boy to be so determined to wipe his history away."

"Something tells me you've done that a lot." Xander smirked, "Still, I'll have to agree with Dead Boy and Girl on this one."

"Could you not call me that?" Angel frowned.

"Well he's not wrong." I said, not quite managing to suppress a smirk.

We walked up to a heavy steel door. There was odd music coming from behind it, though I doubted Xander or Willow could hear it.

Angel knocked on the door. A panel in the door slid back so a pair of eyes could peer out.

"We're friends of Ford's." Angel said. The eyes looked at Angel, flicked to me, and then the panel slid shut and the door opened for us.

Inside was…very theatrical.

Everything was done up with vampire-themed aesthetics. And everyone was dressed as their idea of a vampire, as well. Powdered white skin, black lipstick, fake fangs, and lots of velvet. Which I never really understood. Sure we wore velvet back in the day. When it was winter. It didn't make any sense to wear velvet all the time. That fabric is incredibly difficult to clean. And I'm very lazy when it comes to that sort of thing, so I always gave velvet a pass.

Also, many people were wearing capes.

Again, not really a smart idea. Those things are difficult to work with when fighting.

"Boy, we blend right in." Willow commented.

"In no way do we stick out like a sore thumb." Xander agreed.

"Let's look around," Angel said, which made me wonder if he'd been watching Scooby-Doo, "you guys check out downstairs."

There was no way I was leaving the children alone, here. Not even with fake vampires.

"Sure thing, Bossy the Cow." Xander snorted, starting for downstairs with Willow at his side and me right behind.

"Okay, but do they really stick out?" Willow asked suddenly.

"What?" Xander responded.

"Sore thumbs. Do they really stick out? I mean have you ever seen a thumb and gone 'Wow, that baby is sore'?"

Xander just looked at her.

"You have too many thoughts." He told her.

For fake vampires, they were really rather friendly. A man in a coffin waved at us, and a few nodded in approval at me. That was very disconcerting.

"You guys are newbies," a young lady said from behind us, we turned and she smiled brightly at us, "I can tell." She was dressed as her idea of a vampire as well.

"Oh, no, we come here all the time." Willow tried to claim.

"Don't be ashamed," the girl smiled, "it's cool that you're open to it. We welcome anyone that's interested in the Lonely Ones."

Well, that had been applicable to me once upon a time, but it wasn't really a fair description of vampires. Most had little groups of their own. They were hardly lonely. In fact they'd laugh at the idea of being called 'lonely'. Angle was an exception, perhaps, but even he had friends now.

Vampires don't stay alone for long.

And I was a half-vampire so I don't really count.

"Vampires." I frowned at the girl. She seemed so nice to be so interested in demon-possessed corpses.

"Oh," Xander said, "we normally call them the Nasty-Pointy-Bitey-Ones."

Angel came down to join us, finally.

"So many people have the misconception," the girl said, and God help me but she really believed what she was saying, "but They Who Walk with the Night are not interested in harming anyone." She smiled brightly.

"I'm going to hazard a guess, child," I said, "and wager that you haven't actually met one?"

She blinked at me.

"They are creatures above us," she said, "exalted! Of course I haven't met one."

"You're a fool." Angel growled.

I agreed with him, but I wouldn't have put it quite that way. She was deceived. She believed what she was saying, as foolish as it was. She didn't mean to harm anyone with her words. I glanced back at him and gave him a warning glare.

"You…don't have to be so confrontational about it." She stammered. "Other viewpoints than yours may be valid, you know."

"Of course," I said, hastily turning back to her, and tried to return the kind smile. After all, she was being very sweet.

"It's just," I tried to think of how to warn her, what to tell her without giving us away, "what you think about the…Lonely Ones…there's a reason violent stories follow their kind. The only reason they could be above humans is because they're greater predators." She frowned, looking as though she wanted to protest.

"Trust. Me." I said, locking eyes with her.

She gazed at me a moment, and looked startled. She went a little pale, and took a step back.

"I-I see." She stammered. "Th-Thank you. Miss." She dropped into half a curtesy, half a bow, and then quickly moved away.

"Nice meeting you!" Willow called after her.

Now it was Xander's turn to turn and glare at Angel.

"Boy, you are a real people person." He said sarcastically.

"Now no one will talk to us!" Willow fretted.

"I've seen enough," Angel shrugged, "I've seen this before. They're just children making up bed-time stories of friendly vampires to comfort themselves in the dark."

"They're children," I agreed, but emphasized the word, "of course they'd make up stories. Especially at this stage. They want to relate to something that's misunderstood so they make up their own ideas of what monsters might be."

"These people don't even know what a vampire is," Angel argued, "what they are, how they live, how they dress-"

A young man suddenly stumbled into Angel. He was dressed just like him.

I stifled a laugh and cleared my throat as the young man moved away.

"Then they could be taught," I pointed out, "will you take on the task?"

Angel frowned at me.

"Didn't think so."

"All right, good talk," Xander said, heading back up the stairs, "but I'm still confused as to why Ford, the bestest friend of the Slayer, is hanging around with a bunch of vampire wannabes."

"That is odd." I agreed.

This certainly wasn't how Ford had presented himself.

"The plot thickens. As always." I sighed. "Like a very confusing pea soup."