A/N Credit SamonIllmantrim for how the Scoobies defeat the Mayor in this story. 😁
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"Deputy Mayor Finch?" Buffy smiled at the nervous little man who answered the door. He flinched as he realized who was standing at his door.
"Buffy Summers?"
"Oh, neato, a politician knows who I am!" Buffy continued smiling. "Do you know anything else about me?"
"How-how did you find me?" He was actually shaking as he stared at the bottle blond teenager and the others arrayed behind her.
"I looked up the address for the Deputy Mayor." Willow piped up. "Wasn't hard."
"Sla-slayer." He stuttered.
"You do know what I am." Buffy stopped smiling. "Can we come in? We need to talk."
Deputy Mayor Finch blinked rapidly and hesitantly stepped to the side and motioned them in.
"You know, Buffy," Xander commented. "technically he's the acting Mayor, since Mayor Wilkins has been having health issues, according to the newspaper, since last Halloween."
"I remember reading about that." Buffy said, mock sympathetically. "Interesting that he'd start having health issues on that particular date."
"What-what do you want to know?" Finch asked. "I'll tell you whatever you want, I just want it over."
"Want what over?" Amy asked softly. "You don't seem to be one of those fanatical followers we were told about."
"I'm not, but my parents were." Finch shuddered. "I could never understood why, he's terrifying!"
"What is he, exactly?" Xander asked.
"A sorcerer, black Magic sorcerer." Finch answered. "One that's been around for a long time."
"How long?" Buffy asked.
"Over a century." Finch answered. "He's been Sunnydale's Mayor from the beginning, he built it on purpose."
"Why?" Xander was considering the...coincidences. The Mayor's 'illness' starting on Halloween, when the Hellmouth shut down. A black Magic sorcerer could have been feeding it, it's shut down could have backlashed along that connection...damaging him. But why feed it in the first place? What did he get out of it?
"As a haven for demons and vampires." Finch explained. "The negative emotions of their victims would help fuel the Hellmouth and he needed it to be really strong."
"Might explain why it was the largest ever known." Amy surmised. "Did he do all this for the demons or was he getting something out of it?"
"Oh, he got immortality but that was just to buy him the time he needed to achieve his own goal."
"Which was?" Buffy probed, a little frustrated, the guy was willing to talk, but he was piece mealing it and that was frustrating Buffy.
"He wanted to be an Old One, a pure blood demon and he needed a century of sacrifices and Tributes to various demons to have the power to be able to transform."
Xander and Amy both shuddered, they understood better then the others just what that meant and Xander understood it from two perspectives since the comics had battles against Elder Beings, a term that meant the same thing as Old One. Monstrously huge creatures, near godlike in power.
"And to finish it," Finch continued. "he needed to pull power from the Hellmouth."
"And with it shut down he was SOL." Xander muttered, glancing at a so far silent Cordelia who was examining the Deputy Mayor like a bug under a microscope, equal parts disgust and interest. "How close was he?" Xander inquired.
"At the time the Hellmouth shut down, a year and a half away, the final transformation would have come at your graduation ceremony next year. He has one more Tribute and one more ritual, one that will make him impervious to harm, to get through."
"But the Hellmouth is shut down, he can't do anything now." Buffy pointed out.
"Which is where the demon statue comes in, doesn't it?" Cordelia asked, acidly. "It can open a vortex big enough to swallow the Earth itself and it leads to a Hell dimension of its own. Just as much, if not more, dark power than the Hellmouth."
Xander nodded. "And he'll be powerful enough once the transformation completes to shut it down without the reverse ritual. Never mind how many people die in the process, their deaths will feed him anyway, just like all the deaths over the last century fed the Hellmouth."
"Before it was shut down and the vampires wiped out." Finch nodded. "Something no one has an answer to."
"Hmm, an eternal mystery." Buffy grinned. "So, he's a year away from doing this final transformation dealio, right? That gives us time to stop him."
"You have to help me get away from him." Finch insisted. "I only stayed because I was so afraid of him. Now that I've talked I can't stay here, I stay and he could find out and kill me. But not before he tortures me for a very long time."
"How's another reality sound?" Xander asked, thinking of the Stargate reality, where there was no Sunnydale and no century old Richard Wilkins, they might be able to give Finch a fresh start or if necessary, find him another reality. If they were willing to help, that is. It wouldn't hurt to ask, would it?
"If there's no Sunnydale, then there's no him -." Finch realized. "You can do that?"
"Yeah, we can. And if they can't help, we can find somewhere else that you can go." Buffy decided. "Provided you're telling the truth."
"I'll take any test you want." Finch offered.
"Alrighty." Xander nodded. "Let's get some testing out of the way and then see about finding you a new home. After which, I have an idea how to deal with the Mayor. Considering he's a politician and they tend to be full of hot air, it seems very fitting."