Chapter 3

SAN QUENTIN PRISON VISITORS ROOM

"I didn't know it was ladies' night from Angel Investigations."

Cordelia couldn't help but roll her eyes. "I see spending time here has not improved your sense of humor."

"And I see your time with Angel hasn't taught you tact," Faith countered. "And I've guessing you're the genius who Angel helped save from the monsters a few months back."

"Pleased to, I mean, thanks for making the time, I mean, I know that you're very busy,"

Faith looked amused. "She scared of me or is she still dealing with five years in a hell dimension?"

"A little of each." Fred had now steadied herself. "I'm sure you realize this is awkward for everybody."

"I'm kind of surprised," Faith admitted. "Ever since I turned myself in, it's pretty clear what most of you have thought. I assume you heard the stories, Fred."

"I have. But I know that are two sides to all of them, and none of them involved you," Fred told her.

"She has a point," Cordelia added. "Look, I know you never knew when to keep your mouth shut, but I'd appreciate it if you let me get through this."

"No one ever had to tell you to stop talking, Queen C, but go on."

Cordelia took a deep breath. "I judge people. I've been doing it since nursery school and I kept doing all the way to graduation. I'm not going to apologize for it, it's who I am." She paused. "Doesn't mean I was right about all of them or that I never had feelings. I just did a very good job of hiding them."

She looked at Faith. "First time I saw you, I thought you were little more than a white trash whore. The fact that you were a Slayer didn't raise you in my estimation because I didn't exactly think much of the resident one. And because I made that snap judgment, I spent pretty much your entire tenure in Sunnydale ignoring some pretty glaring signs that you were having problems."

Faith looked at Cordelia. "What was your first clue?"

"When Buffy told me where you were living." Cordelia said bluntly. "Vampires and demons wouldn't go near that part of town; what did it say about us that we knew you were living there and didn't say or do anything?"

Faith's expression changed subtly. "Thought you didn't apologize."

"It doesn't excuse what you did, you made your own decisions." Cordelia hesitated. "But it doesn't let us off the hook either."

Faith blinked. "You didn't make me kill anybody."

"No, but we didn't exactly give you emotional support that you would have turned us the first time." Cordelia reminded her.

"And I have to say that when you turned yourself in, you kind of overcorrected on that one," Fred added.

"I killed two people."

"I'm not arguing the second murder. But in the case of Allan Finch, a pretty bad DA would have been fine with calling it involuntary manslaughter." Fred said.

Faith raised an eyebrow. "Angel told me you were smart."

"I watch a lot of courtroom dramas," Fred waved it off.

"The fact I covered it up?" Faith said curiously.

"I've seen my share of crime films, that isn't that much different," Cordelia said. "Besides, it's not like it worked that well. Even the Sunnydale PD figured it out, and I know first-hand how lousy they are at their jobs."

"I always missed how much you sucked at defending people," Faith said wryly.

"I'm not very good at it, remember?" Cordelia reminded her. "The point is, you were in a crappy emotional place and nobody except Buffy was even making the effort to reach out to you. There were at least half a dozen times when you came to Sunnydale that we really could have used your help and I don't think any of us even brought it up. I mean, it was basic math. Two slayers is always better than one, especially on a Hellmouth. And I think all of us basically just said, Buffy's here, why bother even asking what's her name?"

"That did become clear pretty quickly," Faith admitted.

"And clearly you picked up on it," Cordelia said. "I mean, yes, we could judge you for not reaching out but it's not like there was any evidence that we would have listened."

"Doesn't excuse me going to the Mayor," Faith said.

Fred spoke up. "All I know about Slayers is what Angel and everyone else has told me. But even just from hearing about it, I can't begin to imagine the kind of stress people like you are dealing with every hour of every day. I'm guessing it's a very extreme version of how soldiers have to deal with being on the front lines."

Faith nodded. "B and I clashed a lot over that. I kept telling her to have more fun with it. She kept telling me to take it more seriously."

"I also don't think Slayers have gotten the kind of support they need from the Watchers," Fred said carefully. "A lot of that does seem to come from the top down based on Wesley told me."

Faith raised an eyebrow. "He admitted he screwed up?"

"He had two Slayers in his charge and they both ended up quitting. That has to be unprecedented back in England," Cordelia reminded him.

Faith took this in. "I wasn't very helpful. I also got the feeling they threw him in the deep end and he hadn't even learned to dog paddle."

"We all picked up on that," Cordelia said. "I was crushing on him at the time, and I even knew he was clueless at his job." She paused. "Maybe I should have been blunter about it."

"From what I remember you were distancing yourself at the time," Faith said. "And it's not like they took you that seriously then."

"Maybe you saw yourself in Wesley," Fred said. "He was an outsider in the Sunnydale group and from what I've been told, nobody made much of an effort to get to know him and he did everything he could to isolate himself."

Both Faith and Cordelia took this in. "I never thought of it that way," Faith admitted. "But… Angel tell you about my history with Watchers?"

"I got the Cliff Notes' version," Fred told her. "I'd say you kept getting bad apples, but based on what Wesley has told me, Giles may have been one of the few good ones."

"And they fired him for caring too much," Cordelia reminded her. "Based on what I heard, even before you went rogue most of them barely saw Slayers as little more than their instruments. I'm kind of shocked something like this never happened before."

"Giles said that there had been. If Wes' approach was how they handled it, I'm guessing it didn't turn out much better," Faith said.

"All of this is to say you had a lot going against it before you showed up in Sunnydale and we did nothing to lighten the load," Cordelia said. "You kept drifting and we kept throwing lead weights on you. I'm amazed you survived, much less came out the other side."

"It took seven months in a coma and me trying to destroy Buffy to get there," Faith reminded her.

"That's more rehabilitation than most people in this place get," Fred said. "As I'm sure you know by now."

"Cordelia, I do appreciate the apology, but I'm still not sure why you came now," Faith said.

"Because for obvious reasons circumstances have changed," Cordelia paused. "More than when Angel visited you last, in fact." She hesitated. "There's no easy way to tell you this-"

"Buffy's alive." Cordelia looked at Fred, who shrugged. "I figured this would be one case blurting something out would help."

Faith looked very puzzled, with a sense of anger appearing. "How long have you known?"

"About four hours," Cordelia said. "But I'd hold on to that rage your feeling because I'm still trying to work through it myself."

Faith began to put it together. "They didn't tell you."

"Had to get an explosive migraine to learn that the Scoobies brought Buffy from the dead two months ago without even a heads-up," Now Cordelia was starting to go full Queen C.

An expression that Cordelia had not been familiar with was appearance on Faith's face. She looked worried. "How's B doing?"

"Judging from how badly she handled coming back after being dead just a couple of minutes, I'm guessing not great," Cordelia said. "That's assuming she came back completely herself free of whatever dark magic that idiot redhead used."

Faith was struggling. "Buffy was buried. They put her in the ground."

"And I hope at the very least they bother to dig the coffin up before did whatever voodoo they did," Cordelia said. "The worst part is, I don't even have the time to properly rage about this because we've got two other crises going on."

Faith was all-business. "What's going on in Sunnydale?"

"Nothing. That's the problem." Fred paused. "You know Dawn?"

"I get why you're asking, Freddy," Faith said. "I remember Dawn. I remember having dinner at the Summers house with them, opening Christmas presents with her…and putting a knife to her throat." Faith paused. "I also known none of those things actually happened. You got a scientific explanation for that?"

Fred hesitated. "I do. And I have to tell you it's troubling to me. Part of that may even be why Dawn got taken in the first place."

Fred hadn't shared that part with Angel and the others. "Were you planning to share with the rest of the class?" Cordelia asked.

"I can, but I think we have to deal with the other crisis first," Fred said. "Now that Buffy's alive, you know that as far as the Watchers are concerned, you're expendable."

"I've been sleeping with one eye open ever since Angel told me," Faith admitted. "Kind of shocked that they haven't made a move before."

"Well, they're definitely going to now," Cordelia said simply. "We may have a way to get you out of here legally, but…"

Faith was shaking her head. "You do know these guys. Someone was watching my hospital bed for nearly a year waiting to see if I'd wake up. My guess is they've had someone camped outside this prison for the last year or so, just waiting to find the time."

This didn't truly shock Cordelia. She imagined Angel had done his own kind of surveillance every time he came here but given how long the Council had existed there was a good chance they could hide in plain sight.

"There are ways we can do things." Fred said slowly.

"They don't like Angel, but they're afraid of him," Faith said simply. "Best case scenario they have the resources to keep you guys in red tape long enough so that they can get to me. Worst case, this prison might have a suspicious gas leak or an electrical fire."

These were the ravings of the hopelessly paranoid – or anyone who spent even a few months on the Hellmouth.

Cordelia had an idea something like this was coming. Perhaps she had suspected it when they'd come here in the first place. "You do this, you'll have a whole new set of enemies."

Faith nodded. "Based on what you just said, I might also have a whole new set of friends."

Fred took this in. "Could you give us a moment, please?" She hung up the phone, thought for a moment and then took Cordelia's hand.

"Ok, if I've done the math correctly, " she said, "this should be a safe enough distance."

She turned around and looked at Faith. Faith had hung up the phone and had taken a few steps back.

"If I'd known this was coming I wouldn't have worn heels." Cordelia said.

Three seconds later, Faith had charged through the shatterproof glass and the sirens were blaring.

It was a credit to Cordelia and Faith that neither froze during this; they had already started to run by the time Faith had managed to catch up to them.

"I really need to plan these things better!" Cordelia shouted. "We're in the visitor's lot!"

"Good thing I know this place so well!" Faith shouted. "Follow me, ladies!"

Fred had gotten used to running in Pylea so she was more than able to keep up with the two of them. In less than twenty seconds Faith – who no surprise had taken the lead away from both of them – had led them to a window.

"If I rip these pants going through this window!" Cordelia yelled,

"You stupid bastard. The fall will probably kill you!" Was it possible that the frail Fred Burkle had a stupid grin on her face right now?

"On three!" Faith said. "One…two…"

And with that, she hauled the two of them through the window and they fell nearly twenty feet.

Into a dumpster.

"Do you know how much this skirt cost?" Cordelia said, as she very delicately yanked a banana peel off.

"I missed you too, Cor," Faith said with a smile. "Now we'd better hurry. You know what a bitch it is parking at this hour."

SIMI VALLEY

"We've been at this for an hour," Gunn said. "I've reached the limit of what human senses can tell me. How about supernatural?"

They had moved to the upstairs or what there was of it. If the previous tenants had barely touched the ground floor, they had done nothing to the second floor. In this case, it meant that they hadn't even bothered to repair it.

"I don't see anything out of the ordinary," Angel said.

"How about that famous sense of smell?" Gunn was still kind of creeped out by Angel's gift with this, but any port in a storm.

"They definitely kept someone up here for a while," Angel said. "But I can't tell much more except everybody involved was either nervous or terrified."

Wesley figured Angel was picking up residual of perspiration. "Anything more you can tell us?" he asked.

"Only that the people who were holding Dawn were definitely human," Angel said. "Beyond that, I can't tell much, not even how many of them were here."

"I think there might be a reason for that," Gunn had stopped by the bathroom. "Take a look in here."

The three men looked at the bathroom. "It's practically pristine," Wesley said. "Which is completely out of context with the rest of the house."

"And even I can smell bleach," Gunn said. "They left the rest of this place a shithole, but the bathroom looks like it was cleaned today. I can only think of one reason why that would happen."

Angel couldn't argue. He could pick up the smell of blood, however faint. Someone had been murdered in this room.

"Wesley, you got your black-light?" he asked casually.

Wes nodded and took it out. He flicked it on. He had an idea what they'd find and where they'd find it even before he did and he was proven correct.

There were a few splatters of blood on the wall, but the area around the bathtub, walls and floor was practically shining. Angel knelt down by it. "Whoever they killed was unconscious when they brought him here. They slit his throat and let it wash down the drain."

"They must have been holding him upright," Gunn said. "Otherwise there wouldn't be anything on the wall."

"They probably brought a shower curtain," Wesley pointed to the pipes above the wall.

"Norman Bates clean-up," Gunn agreed. "I'm guessing there was only one victim brought here."

Angel nodded. "Probably whoever bought the house for them."

"Killed the bastard in his own bathroom," Gunn said. "Even by the standards of the creatures we hunt, that's cold."

"Just a theory but I think a human killed our victim," Angel said. "Most vamps wouldn't be this elaborate in their murders and there's no way anyone would have cleaned up this way."

"They might have use a demon to get rid of the remains though," Wesley said. "Whoever did this clearly didn't want loose ends and that's the easiest way to make sure of it."

"Still leaves us searching for the who or what," Gunn said. "Before Mama went on her road trip with Cor, I asked her if she could run down who the most recent owner was."

"She have any luck?" Angel was still looking at the tub.

"The name was Dwight Renfield, which has to be a fake," Gunn said. "I figured whoever did this was showing off."

"The whole Dracula thing?" Angel asked.

"More than that," Wesley said. "Dwight Renfield is the nom de plume of the title character in a Stephen King short story called 'The Night Flyer.' Tabloid journalist uses his pilot's license to chase down a serial killer who seems to be killing in the method of a vampire."

"And the final twist is that he is." Angel said.

"I read the story which is why I know this guy is showing off," Gunn said. "His last previous address is listed as Bangor, Maine. End of the day I think somebody knew that we'd be coming here, and you specifically."

Angel got up. "Did Wolfram and Hart have anything to do with the closing?"

"That would be too obvious for them," Wesley reminded them. "That doesn't mean they didn't broker the deal. But it is pretty clear whoever took Dawn is very aware of what Buffy Summers does for a living."

A queasy expression was coming over Gunn's face. "You think these people want to get caught or want to make sure they get away with us?"

Wesley thought for a second. "You're thinking this isn't the only clue they left?"

'I think these guys are smart. They could have signed it something like Van Helsing or Bela Lugosi if they wanted to really tease us, but they chose a reference to a vampire that's pretty obscure even by the standards of horror. They picked Dwight Renfield for a specific reason."

Angel looked at Charles. "You think there's a clue in the name."

Wesley got it. "The story ends with the reporter ending up in an airport bathroom and he looks up into the mirror. He hears the sound of someone urinating but no one's there. But there's a stream of bloody urine that just seems to go on forever."

"Does the reporter get killed?" Angel asked.

"No, but he ends up handing over his camera with all the evidence to the vampire and just standing there until he hears the door open." Gunn said slowly.

Wesley looked around. "There's no blood around the toilet."

"Doesn't mean there isn't a clue there." Gunn said.

Angel headed towards the toilet. "These are the times you really regret having a sense of smell this good," he said.

"Check the tank first," Wesley said.

Angel slowly lifted it up. All three of them saw what was there. Next to the wire was a small black cylinder that had no business being in a toilet, certainly not taped to the tank.

"You do know this whatever we find here, they'll already be gone before we leave," he reminded them.

"Maybe we should think positively," Wesley said. "You told us everyone here was extremely nervous. Maybe one of them was because they weren't entirely devoted to the cause."

"They have just taken a thirteen-year old girl from her family," Gunn said. "There might even be some demons who have problems with that."

Angel hesitated, then unscrewed the cylinder. He saw there was a lid to it and he unscrewed that too.

There was a small piece of paper inside. He looked at it for a moment, and then handed it to Wesley. "Any idea what this means?"

There was writing on it, a group of numbers that didn't immediately add up to anything.

Wesley took a closer look. "I don't know what the writing means but I think I have an idea who the kidnappers are working for."

He pointed to a watermark in the corner of the paper. "I recognize the insignia. It's a crest that the Council uses."

Angel's voice got cold in a way they were very familiar with. "You're sure?"

"My father had a set of stationary just like this," Wesley's voice was even colder. "Charles and I speculated that this was a possibility before you arrived. This would appear to be confirmation."

'Why would they take Dawn?" Angel asked. "To try and get Buffy under their thumb? Another test?"

"Or for their own devices." Wesley said. "I know these people. I could easily see them saying that Buffy is to irresponsible to control something as potentially powerful as the Key."

"Giles is going to be pissed when he hears this," Angel said.

"I'm all for burning the Watchers the ground, but first things first," Gunn said. "The Watchers wouldn't make this a cat and mouse hunt, at least not in the way that we found it right?"

Wesley thought for a moment. "The kidnapping structure falls under the plan of what the Council might do. The murder, that's outside their usual level of wetworks."

"And they would never leave a hint this big." Angel sounded a little more civil now. "Whoever's doing this isn't on board with what's happening. They're hoping we catch up with them."

Gunn turned to Wes. "There any ciphers that the Watchers use for this kind of work?"

"Several, but most of them are in languages and texts so obscure you'd need a lifetime of training to learn it." Wesley looked at it. "This is a far more basic cipher, something they could create without much thought and that they know one of us could break."

"Any ideas?" Angel said.

Wesley thought for a moment. "Did either of you see a book or magazine anywhere around this place?"

"The trash can." Gunn said. "There were a bunch of magazines there. "

"Get them out of there," Wesley said. "I think I know what kind of code they used. It'll be a matter of trial and error and we'll know where to look."

As Gunn left the room, Wesley's cell phone rang. "Cordelia, thank goodness you called."

"You may not be that grateful when you hear why I'm calling."

Wesley paused for a second. "Oh no." He heaved a very Giles-like sigh. "Please tell me that there are only two of you in the car right now."

"I haven't told you a lie in two years Wes. You think I'm going to start now?"

Wes hesitated, then handed Angel the phone. "It's moments like this I really wish you were still in charge."

Angel knew exactly what Wes was talking about. "Look on the bright side. At least we won't have to deal with Wolfram and Hart in the courtroom."

Wesley badly wanted to polish his glasses but resisted the urge. "Get Charles. We're going to need to take the next step back at the hotel."

HYPERION

"Glad to see you've moved up in the world," Faith said, checking the lobby out. "I'd raid the minibar, but I have a feeling that it's not in my best interest to stay that long."

"It's not that we don't appreciate your company, Faith," Wesley was trying to maintain a certain level of dignity which he knew wouldn't fit.

"Wes, last time I laid eyes on you, I tortured you," Faith said. "This is as awkward for me as it for you."

"I was hoping that your time away had helped you manage some impulse control."

"I get it. Short term and long term it was a bad idea," Faith said simply. "But now that Buffy's back, I'm expendable. I'm kind of shocked your old bosses hadn't made a move over the last few months."

Wes considered this. "So am I, frankly. The moment Buffy returned; the Old Guard would have eliminated you as quickly as possible."

"I could yell at you for not giving me the heads up, but you learned about that, what six hours ago?"

"Five hours and thirty two minutes, but who's counting?" Cordelia asked.

"The Council wasn't exactly subtle when you were working for them. Now that you and Giles are gone. I can't imagine it's much better."

"That's a pretty safe assumption," Angel said.

"And they'd never use a slingshot when an atom bomb would do. Even if they didn't, we all know they have no problem with collateral damage." Faith said. "And a lot of the guards and inmates aren't bad people. I wasn't going to let them get hurt because of me."

This was a long way from the Faith who had come out of her coma and told Buffy that there was no such thing as an innocent person. Wesley had to admit that she had clearly reformed.

"You realize this will create another form of a mess?" he reminded her.

"When this is over, I'm willing to turn myself back over to the authorities if that's what you want," Faith said. "Right now, we've gotta deal with the current problem, which is who the fuck would be stupid enough to take Dawn?"

"We're still working on that," Angel said. "But right now, it's looking like at least someone with it is connected with the Council."

Faith threw her hands in the air. "Wes, I take back everything I said to you the last time we were in the same place. If this was the brain trust that was training you, you clearly never had the right idea as to how to handle a Slayer."

"I didn't realize it was time for an apocalypse because I'm in complete agreement with Faith," Cordelia said. "Are your ex-bosses so thick that they seriously thought it was a good idea to do this?"

"We don't know if there doing this on their own or if they're in partnership with someone else," Wesley said. "All we know for certain is someone involved has enough doubts that they're trying to leave a hint."

Faith became all business – by her standards. "Someone left you a bread crumb?"

"We dug up around the time you called us," Angel said. "The problem is trying to break the code."

Gunn brought them out. "Well, whoever was holding Dawn was well read. We got New Yorker, Esquire, The Economist, The Atlantic, The Guardian, New York Review of Books and Playboy. Should we just throw this one out?"

"This might actually be the one occasion someone did use it for the articles," Wesley said.

Fred looked at the paper. "I think I know the code they're trying to use. This is, what, Arthur Conan Doyle cipher?"

"The Valley of Fear," Wesley agreed.

"I don't think I read that one. Care to translate for the rest of the class?" Gunn asked.

"In the first chapter of the book, Holmes is given a cipher which is basically a group of numbers that don't seem to mark a substitution cipher," Wesley said. "He figures out the code refers to a specific publication – I believe it's an almanac – and that the numbers refer to a specific page and words on that same page."

Gunn followed. "And you think our helpful friend left a message by using one of these magazines."

"A variation of it." Wesley put the piece of paper on the magazine. "You see how every heading has either a C1 or a C2 before it?"

"What's that mean, chapter?" Faith asked.

"Perfectly logical reasoning if it were a book," Fred told them. "I think in this it means column."

"That would make more sense." Faith admitted. "And I'm guessing whoever it was didn't want us leafing through every magazine, so these two numbers on top are the pages."

"Promising powers of deduction, my dear Faith," Everyone looked at Cordelia. "What? I watched PBS too."

"All right we're looking for pages 86 and 87." Gunn said. "We can toss the Review of Books, that stops at 55."

"Toss the Guardian too." Wesley said. "All right. Everyone else, take a magazine. We'll cover more ground." He handed them each a piece of paper. "Faith, read out the words. We'll each try and see if we get something coherent."

Faith nodded. "All right. First one is C2 123."

There was a long pause as everybody looked through their publications and counted.

"Go on."

"Next is C1 89."

There was another pause. "Unless they're hiding Dawn in agriculture pork bellies, I think we can rule out the Economist," Wesley said.

"My combination is unprintable, but I'm not ruling it out yet," Gunn said.

"Ok. C1 23."

"Got it." Cordelia said. "They are going."

Everybody moved towards Cordelia "God bless Esquire." Gunn said.

"What's next?"

Faith kept reading.

"To…Meeting…Morning….Cardiac." Cordelia paused. "Maybe I spoke too soon."

Wesley shook his head. "In the original story, when Watson told him the message was garbled, Holmes reminded him that it is very hard to come up with the exact words for what you need to say in so short a form. Our informant is clearly following the same path.

"They're going to a morning meeting with…cardiac," Gunn thought for a moment. "They're taking Dawn to some kind of doctor."

"To a lawyer." Cordelia nearly dropped the paper. "Think about it? What do we associate with a cardiac surgeon?"

The penny dropped.

"I knew your bosses were willing to make deals with the devil," Faith said. "I just didn't think they were that literal about it."

Wesley shook his head. "There's something we're not seeing. Travers and his ilk are barely human, but the last thing they would do is collaborate with representatives of evil incarnate."

"You think we're being led into a trap?" Angel asked.

"Doesn't matter." Gunn said. "This is the only lead we have right now. It's our only hope in finding whoever took Dawn. Besides, we all know at some point we were going to have to look under this rock."

"I didn't come here to look under any rock."

Everyone looked up. Except Angel who had already known who was here.

"Last time I was here, I walked away before dealing with Wolfram and Hart," Buffy said quietly. "Clearly I made a major miscalculation."

"You were a little distracted at the time," Faith walked over to Buffy. "We just keep meeting like this, B."

Buffy had gotten used to Faith appearing in places she shouldn't. "Heard you reformed."

"Heard you were dead." Faith countered. "I'm glad to know I was misinformed."

"You weren't." Buffy said. "Was I?"

"Believe it or not, I'm here to help." Faith said. "If it makes you feel better to finish what we never quite did the last time we met, go ahead." She dropped to her feet. "But I'm not gonna put up a fight this time."

Buffy had a slightly glazed look on her face that cleared a bit when she looked at her. "Pretty sure you wanted me to kill you then too," she told Faith. "But I don't think I'm in the best emotional place to be making any decisions right now."

"Because they took Dawnie or because of the fact that you're not dead anymore?" Cordelia asked.

Buffy smiled lightly. "I don't know what it says about where I am right now that I actually missed your lack of tact," she said slowly.

"Maybe you shouldn't be," Cordelia said. "Are your friends here?"

"They're looking for a place to park," Buffy said.

"It's downtown LA; that might take an hour or two," Gunn said.

"Then I'll be blunt. If I'd been in Sunnydale when whichever of your genius friends decided to bring you back, I would have asked them if they knew what the tern 'rest in peace' meant and if you hadn't earned some after the last five years," Cordelia could barely hold in her rage.

"You wouldn't have missed me," Buffy said.

"Of course I would have missed you!" Cordelia said. "You're a pain in the ass, Buffy and you have terrible fashion sense, but you're a great human being. But I lived on the same hellmouth you did. When you bring someone back from the dead, there are consequences for that person. Clearly the brain trust I left back in Sunnydale didn't evolve in the last two years or they would have remembered that basic fact!"

"What Cordelia is trying to say, very badly," Wesley tried to take on his Watcher tone, "is that while your friends hearts may very well have been in the right place, it's very clear their brains weren't working at all!" He lost all semblance of his Watcher control. "Please tell me that Rupert didn't sanction this."

"I didn't." Giles had walked into the room while they had been focused on Buffy. "And as glad as I am to see Buffy back with us, I fully concur with your opinion Wesley."

Wesley managed to regain a modicum of control. "You'll forgive the unruly outburst, Rupert," Wesley said. "But we're clearly annoyed by many parts of this, not the least of which is this happened several months ago and we only found out today."

"I don't think there's a single individual you can lay that on," Giles said. "I take a measure of responsibility for not keeping any of you informed." He focused on Angel. "You in particular."

Angel had not said a word since Buffy had entered the lobby. He had been focused on seeing the woman he had thought was dead forever back near him. "I hadn't dared hope I'd ever see you again," he told Buffy.

Buffy looked a little more grounded than she had been in a while. "This is usually where I'd make a pun about not being able to keep a good Slayer down," she said. "Problem is, I should be."

Angel looked at her. "It takes a while to get through it," he reminded her.

It dawned on Cordelia that this was yet another reason why the Scoobies' failure to tell them Buffy was back was so reprehensible. Perhaps the only person in their entire circle who'd been through an experience remotely like this had been Angel after he'd been sent to Hell by Buffy and been sent back after who knew how long in a Hell dimension. Buffy had helped him get through that particular experience and gain a new sense of purpose.

"When we're done with this, I'll help you find your way back," Angel walked to Buffy. "It won't be easy, but I'll help."

There was a long pause as the two of them stared at each other.

"What a touching moment. I may vomit."

Angel hadn't bothered to look up. "Who invited him?"

"I don't need your permission, grandad," Spike said. "And this ain't about whatever business you and I might have. This is about finding the Niblet again."

"What does it say about where we are right now that of all the people in the room, he's the one I'm the most happy to see?"

The rest of the Scoobies were trailing behind Spike, perhaps hoping the vampire would provide protection against the death glare of Cordelia Chase.

All of them were clearly trembling but Xander looked petrified as he looked at the room and saw in the addition to everything else he was going to have to deal with, Faith was in the room.

"Spike if you ever hated me at all, do me a favor and rip out my throat right now," he pleaded with the blond vampire.

A small smile crossed Spike's face. "That ponce Sartre once said that hell was other people. This is the first time I've ever thought he had a point. Sorry Harris, you're on your own."

He walked over the other side of the hotel. "All right, ladies. Which of you wants the first shot?"

AUTHOR'S NOTES

I always thought the Scoobies' treatment of Faith throughout Season 3 was at least partially responsible for how she ended up working for The Mayor. Cordelia apologizing is the first step at that direction.

I had a plan that they were going to get Faith out of prison to legal way, but then I also didn't intend for Faith to be a factor in this story at all. Besides, let's not kid ourselves this is a lot more fun than a Law And Order: Slayer Unit episode.

I did think the Watchers were going to be involved in this story and I think I've worked out their motivation for being involved in Dawn's abduction. How deeply involved I'm still not sure. I thought that a mole in the kidnapping would make the story that much more interesting, though I'm not yet sure who it is (or if it'll be a familiar face)

The Stephen King theme continues. 'The Night Flier' can be found in King's short story collection Nightmares and Dreamscapes and it is pretty much what I described. (It was also made in a straight-to-video movie with Miguel Ferrer as the lead.)

The code is a variation on one of the best aspects of Arthur Conan Doyle's The Valley of Fear, the last Sherlock Holmes novel as well as the least highly regarded of the four. (I've read it; it's poor reputation is justified.) Still the cipher code is a good one and perhaps it may hint to whoever's involved.

Buffy and Faith are going to work through their issues too. The fact that they've both recently been dead is probably going to help them bond. (What else can a Slayer bond over?)

Yes Cordelia and Wes are glad to see Buffy back but they are infuriated by how it happened. Trust me, this will lead to more awkward.

Angel and Spike in the same room? Awkward. Xander in the same room with all his love interests, past and present? Don't tell me you weren't looking forward to this. I was. And this time, he doesn't have a miscast love spell to blame their wrath on them.

More to come, Read and Review and support the WGA!