Author's Note: This chapter continues the same themes and settings as presented in the previous Chapter 54 'The Master Is Gone' also presented here.

Squatting on her heels in front of the swaying man absolutely reeking of alcohol, Faith muttered under her breath to Xander while waving a stubby metal cylinder over his soaked shoes, "I can think of more helluva fun ways for both of us to wind up like this. But no, you gotta spoil all a gal's dreams, dontcha?"

Hiccuping a few times, Xander then glared down at the top of Faith's head. "Will you get your damn mind out of the gutter- Gungh!"

That pained grunt, followed by Xander abruptly doubling over in agony, was the result of Faith straightening up and at the same time maybe-accidentally clipping him a good one in the crotch with the tip of the lifted Geiger counter probe.

"Oops! Sorry 'bout that," Faith apologized with the most insincere smile seen this side of a multiple-term politician.

Gingerly reascending to vertical, Xander sent Faith a supreme stinkeye. She just innocently smirked at him in return while dumping the Geiger counter onto the Cleveland Slayers House anteroom table. "'Kay, this thing says you're clean, which proves Andrew wasn't a total idiot getting it for the house. You better not tell him that, though, or he'll never quit saying 'I told you so, Xander!'"

This same man opened his mouth in an attempted rejoinder, only to be interrupted by Faith overriding him, "Now, are you finally gonna tell me why you're stinking up the whole place like a Jap brewery? I didn't know you even liked sake so much that you hadda take a bath in it!"

"It was a complete accident!" Xander protested. "I couldn't dodge fast enough when the guest of honor at Biers spilled a little of their toast during Mr. Nakajima's wake."

Faith looked blank. "Who's he—"

Frantically waving her hands after cutting herself short, Faith instead instructed Xander with grim intensity, "Nah, never mind! I don't wanna know! Every time you go to that weird Creature Features bar, you come back with some goofy story that don't do nothing but make my head hurt! Just tell me it's over and done with, all right?"

"Yes," Xander muttered. He glowered at Faith breathing a sigh of relief. His irritation suddenly changed to actual worry at then seeing the Slayer's slow evil smile, along with her next statement.

"Fine. Betcha you're ready now to learn about alla the flak you're gonna get for the whole big screwup you announced right before you left."

Xander regarded Faith with genuine puzzlement. "What's so wrong with declaring a Girls' Night In for the other Slayers?"

"Oh, is that what it was?" Faith sarcastically countered. "Back in prison, we called it a full lockdown. You set the building wards to keep everybody inside the whole night!"

Instantly finding something of great interest over Faith's left shoulder on the anteroom's opposite wall, Xander said in a hurt voice, "I just thought you and the other girls deserved a night off!"

Faith bestowed a pitying look upon Xander. "A night off? I spent the whole time in my apartment binge-watching Game of Thrones and keeping the door barred shut while ignoring anything I heard from outside there! As long as either smoke or blood didn't flow from under the door's bottom edge I didn't give any kind of damn what the kiddies got up to on their own."

Xander closed his remaining eye in despair. "What's the damage?"

"Oh, you'll find out," Faith snickered. She beamed at where Xander had opened his eye again to testily view her. "For one, the dryer's wrecked now."

"What? That machine's the heavy-duty industrial type made for laundromats! How can even a bunch of Slayers possibly break it drying their clothes?"

Shrugging, Faith answered, "Gee, alla them I cornered, they got seriously vague about how it happened. There's one big clue, though. Somehow, lotsa footprints are now inside it, kinda like a dozen bored superhuman babes dared each other to see who could ride the longest through the permanent press cycle."

Rubbing his forehead which was now throbbing in anticipation of the tremendous hangover to come from all the booze he'd absorbed through his skin, Xander sighed. "Okay, you win. I'll take care of everything. Um…you can go back to bed now, Faith. Thanks for staying up."

"No prob," Faith nodded. She still waited with superb timing until Xander was almost out of the anteroom to call after him, "Oh, there's something else."

Xander halted in his tracks, refusing to look behind at where Faith was sure to be grinning with malicious glee after him.

"What?" this former Sunnydale native managed not to snarl.

"You know Suzanne here? The one whose hobby is listening to the local police scanner? Well, she heard one really unusual call tonight. Seems a Ford auto dealer had the whole place – at least a hundred cars and pickup trucks – bulldozed flat. They all got turned into ruined metal no more'n a few inches thick now. Nobody got hurt, but neither did anyone see anything ever. Strangest part is, the Toyota dealer right next door didn't have even the slightest scratch on any of its own inventory."

"Imagine that," Xander replied, all while fixedly staring straight ahead.

Behind him, Faith wrapped her arms around herself to prevent a stray giggle from messing up her revenge against Xander. *Let's see if this'll do it…*

"Yeah, sounds almost like something in our line of business, dontcha think? Too bad you were at that stupid Biers saloon swilling down brewskis with alla those demons right outta the Movie Chiller channel. Whatever happened at the car dealer, it musta been in the exact same neighborhood."

By now maintaining an excellent poker face, Xander finished marching out of the anteroom, calling over his shoulder just before disappearing from the Slayer's sight, "Didn't see anything like that, Faith. Probably just a stray vandal making trouble, I bet. Well, good night, Faith."

"'Night, Xan," Faith sent back. Only then did she allow herself to start laughing like a loon. Best of all, she was positive the guy running away was hearing every bit of her vengeful mirth.

Further Author's Note: Haruo Nakajima, who portrayed Godzilla the radioactive monster in the original 1954 classic sci-fi/horror film with marvelous acting skills despite wearing an extremely heavy rubber suit, recently passed away at the age of 88 on August 7, 2017.