The two remaining vampires scampered back across the parking lot, twelve bikers in hot pursuit. Buffy and Xander remained flopped on top of Cordelia's BMW, watching them go.
"Damn." Xander swept vampire dust off the hood of the car and rubbed at the dent in the red paint with the hem of his shirt, as if that would make it go away. "I'm hamburger now," he said sadly.
Buffy hopped down. "It's just cosmetic damage -- did you hear somebody calling my name earlier?"
A horn blared out across the lot and a car engine revved up, followed by two more. After a squealing exchange of wheels and thumps, a black Thunderbird jumped across the lot divide onto the road, followed closely by another black Thunderbird.
"Oh, no!" Xander yelled as the car streaked past. "They've got Willow!"
"You sure?" But Buffy was already hauling her car door open.
"That red hair of hers stands out from anywhere," Xander said desperately. He jumped into the driver's seat and started the car. "We've got to stop them!"
"All right, just catch up with them. I'll make 'em sorry they grabbed her!" Buffy said.
"You bet I will." Xander steered the BMW out onto the highway and floored the accelerator.
Giles managed to edge Spike's Thunderbird slowly but surely away from its twin in pursuit. Trust the vampire in charge to give his own vehicle an edge in horsepower, he thought with grim satisfaction.
Willow was staring back over the seat. "We're gaining, but how are we going to get back to the others?"
He glanced nervously at the fuel gauge. Angel hadn't been the only one tonight not paying close enough attention to the status of his fuel tank. "Let's focus on one thing at a time, shall we? Would you check the floor under the back seat and see if they left us anything in the way of weapons?"
"Okay." Willow scrambled over and began to poke around. She popped up again with a disgusted look on her face. "Uh -- no weapons."
He glanced back. The headlights behind them were gradually growing smaller. "What then?"
She climbed back over the seat. "Just don't get pulled over by a police car, okay?" She opened the glove compartment and poked through the contents. Wads of money fell out into her lap. She pulled out a paperback book, a porcelain doll, and several rental video tapes. "Ooh," she said and placed the book on the opened glove compartment door to read it by the bulb light.
"What?" He looked over at her, but had to return his eyes to the road ahead.
"Uh, nothing," Willow said innocently. She stuffed the paperback into her purse, then after a hesitation started stuffing money in on top of the book. At Giles' corner-of- the-eye look, she defiantly continued to accumulate the cash. "For whatever they did to Cordelia's car," she said. "Otherwise Xander will never hear the end of it."
"Give me six twenties," Giles said.
Willow looked at him wide-eyed.
"They slashed the tires of my Citroen."
"Oh, right." Willow tucked some twenties into his coat pocket.
"And forty for the briefcase Spike trashed."
"And twenty for me for the ticket to the Nazgul concert, since I didn't get to see it. Lesee, better get sixty for the others too. Oh, and ten for gasoline." Willow frowned at the pile of twenties still on her lap. "You figure they did a lot of damage to Cordelia's car?"
"Best take it all. To be on the safe side."
"Right." Willow barely managed to cram all of the bills into her purse. "I'll mail them whatever's left over." She stuffed the doll back into the glove compartment and shuffled curiously through the video tapes. "'Beach Blanket Bingo'?" she said incredulously. "And -- ooh. I wonder who the Ranma fan is."
"Willow --" Giles caught sight of the growing reflections of headlights in his rear view mirror. "Damn," he said under his breath and pressed down on the accelerator. The car behind them continued to gain. "Better take the cross out of my pocket, Willow. We may need it."
"Drive faster!" Willow said, peering back.
"Thank you, I hadn't thought of that," Giles said.
The car behind them relentlessly closed in and rammed their rear bumper. Giles fought to retain control of the car, but it skidded into the far lane and then over. "Seat belt!" he yelled at Willow. Headlights loomed ahead. He slammed on the brakes and steered off the road.
Willow screamed.
"Owww," Willow said, rubbing at the bump on her head. The Thunderbird sat on its nose in a ditch. It actually hadn't been the worst crash she'd ever been in, whatever was coming up notwithstanding. "Giles, are you okay?"
"Ducky," Giles said. He sounded somewhat groggy, so Willow unlatched her seat belt and crawled over to check on him. He blinked and peered at her in the dim dashboard lights. ". . . and you?"
"Okay for the moment." She looked up fearfully at the sound of crackling vegetation as their pursuers came down into the ditch after them. "Now would be a good time for something new to happen, though."
"Get behind me." Giles grabbed the cross from her hands and faced the driver's side door. "We'll make a break for it, if we can."
The door was yanked open, the locking mechanism stressed beyond bearing.
"Hah! Die! Again!"
Giles bumped into Willow in his scramble backwards. "Buffy!" Willow yelped. "No contest! We're not gonna resist!"
Buffy stared at them, stake still brandished kamikaze style. "No vampires?" she said.
"Sorry to disappoint you," Giles muttered. He pulled himself out of Willow's lap and grabbed the door frame to lever himself out of the car. "And how -- ow! -- many times must I tell you to stop expending effort in those comic book exclamations?" He reached back to give Willow a hand out.
Xander was hanging out on the slope of the ditch, looking contrite. "Boy, are we embarrassed," he said.
"It's not our fault," Buffy said. "What were you guys doing driving Spike's car?"
"We heisted it," Giles said matter-of-factly. "Who is that parked behind our BMW up there?"
"Maybe that car you guys almost took out?" Xander said hopefully.
"Or vampires." Still clutching the stake, Buffy scrambled back up the slope,
Giles, Willow, and Xander stood at the bottom of the ditch for a minute, listening. When the sounds of battle failed to materialize, they followed her on up.
Buffy was standing by the BMW, peering suspiciously at two older men who'd been walking over from the other parked car. They were backed up against the BMW, their hands raised.
"Rudy!" one of the men hailed Giles. "Tell your young friend that we're not punks, hey?"
"It's all right, Buffy," Giles said. "They're not vampires."
"You sure?" Buffy said, not ready to give up on a potential fight just yet.
"They're college professors."
"Tenured," Professor Wilson cackled, letting his hands down. He'd developed a definite tilt during the night. "Whole other kind of blood sucker."
Doctor Szell wobbled on past Buffy to peer over the lip of the ditch. "Christ, Rudy, you really totalled that sucker. Hey! it's the car that punk student of yours was driving, Wilson."
"Really?" Wilson wobbled over. "Damn, you're right!" He giggled. "Good goin', Rudy! Teach those punks to dig up Andy's paint job." He turned to wave his arms at the parked red Jaguar. "Hey, com'on over here and look at this, Andy! You'll get a kick outta it."
Professors Anderson and Scopes strolled on over. Only the elder Scopes seemed relatively sober.
"Sight for sore eyes, all right," Anderson slurred, grinning idiotically. "How'd you get a hold of it, Rudy?"
"We heisted it," Willow said. "But then we crashed."
Scopes lit a cigar and was peering down at the car with some regret. "Pity," he said. "Classic Thunderbird in mint condition. Good thing it wasn't yours. Shouldn't have been hot-rodding in something like that."
"We weren't offered an alternative mode of transportation," Giles said.
The sounds of more engines broke through the crickety night, and several motorcycles glided up. "Hey, Rupert," Lucy yelled. "You okay?"
"Fine, fine," Giles yelled back.
"Crap," Szell said.
"May I remind you, sir, that there are ladies present?" Scopes told Szell sternly.
"Where?" Xander said, peering about. Buffy stomped on his toe.
Lucy, Zuzu, and Rio left their Harleys by the roadside to join the group by the ditch. "Wow, you ditched that fucker!" Lucy commented, peering down at the smashed Thunderbird. "And come down in the world to boot. Oh, hello Szell. Heard any fresh anecdotes lately?"
"Go to hell, Koppel," Professor Szell snarled.
"Really original, that," Zuzu remarked, hitching herself up to sit on the bonnet of Cordelia's BMW. "No wonder Sunny U lavishes such largesse on your pet projects."
Professor Wilson grabbed onto Szell's arm. "Evan, we're above them. Remember that."
Szell was making a visible effort to rein in his temper.
"You guys are the acme. Really," Lucy said magnanimously. She hopped up to join Zuzu on the car. "You're obviously above all those departmental politics."
"He's certainly proved that. He ain't got no funding." Rio wandered over to take a look at the Thunderbird. "Boy, you cracked that sumuvbitch something hard."
"Should we put up a post?" Giles wondered. "Roadside attraction and all that?"
"Guys, can we go now?" Xander tried to interject.
"I've seen enough," Dr. Szell muttered. "Andy, are we going to stand here all night gawking like a bunch of acned yokels at a car wreck?"
"Ask Scopes," Professor Anderson said. "He's th' self- 'lected designate driver."
Scopes had moved to sit up on the BMW beside Lucy. "Why not?" he said mildly. "The show's easily better than anything else in town."
"We're going now. Okay guys?" Xander said.
"Might as well stick around, Szell," Lucy said with a smirk. "This show is free. About all you can afford right now."
"You back-stabbing, brown-nosing bitch," Szell erupted. "You just wait. Dean MacAfee is out next year, and you bet your skinny ass that Tennyson has your number. I'll get the Budapest project back where it belongs then."
"Szell, Szell!" Anderson and Wilson both had him by the arms. "Damnit man, remember you dignity," Wilson said.
"Oh, I remember Professor Szell's dignity," Lucy mocked. "Upstanding, despite that plate of hors d'oeuvres he tossed across the room at the Alumni 'Good Old Summertime' Reception."
"You provoked me into that on purpose, you harpy!" Szell screeched at her.
"I'm starting the car now, okay guys?" Xander pleaded.
"Let Doctor Szell go, boys," Zuzu said. "I'd like to see him and Lucy go a round."
"Hell, yes!" Rio enthused, his attention finally captured from the car wreck. "Serve the bastard right."
"Not right to hit a woman, Doctor," Scopes said. "Even if she can beat you in a fair scrap. I'd avoid the situation, if I were you."
"Oh, let him, Tom," Zuzu growled. "Sure as hell'd be more honest than his usual tactics."
"You got what was coming to you, McLaren," Szell snapped at Zuzu. "I was there laughing when they decided to kick you out of the school. And everyone knew that it was for brawling."
"Wow," said Buffy. "You got expelled for fighting?"
"Uh no, I was fired -- I was on faculty at the time," Zuzu said, looking only slightly embarrassed.
"Right in the middle of an inter-departmental meeting," Wilson chortled. "Wish I'd had a camcorder at the time. You wrapped Tennyson's attitude around his head several times. Bet he wished he'd had a camcorder too. Nobody would back him up in court. Had to pay for that broken nose himself."
"Tennyson's a pissant," Szell admitted. "If it had been anybody else, I would have testified."
"I love you too, Evan." Zuzu blew him a kiss. "Hell, you got me out of that dogpatch of a Department."
"You would say that, after you got kicked out."
"It's a dogpatch, Evan," Scopes said evenly. "You know it. I know it. Wilson over there the heck knows it. Zuzu's well out of the carnival. You did her a favor, old man."
A black Cadillac glided up and perpendicular parked in front of Cordelia's BMW.
"Hey!" Mitch the vampire was climbing out the Cadillac's rear window even before the car came to a stop. "What the fuck did you do with Spike's Thunderbird?"
Giles and Willow moved closer together. "Uh, we parked it down in that ditch," Willow said.
"Hi, Buffy," Sheila said cheerfully from inside the Cadillac. "How's tricks? Made any cool banners lately?"
A stream of expletives erupted from Mitch at the edge of the ditch.
"Guess you guys didn't do such a good job parking the Thunderbird," Sheila continued to Giles.
"You wait right there, Sheila," Buffy said. "I've got something for you." She strode over to the BMW and hauled the door open.
"What's she doin'?" Boyce craned over towards the passenger side window to watch Buffy's ass.
Sheila shrugged and grinned at Giles. "Hey, Rupert," she said. "How're ya? I, like, really enjoyed our backseat tumble back there. Bet Willow enjoyed hers too."
Buffy straightened suddenly and whacked her head against the doorframe. "Owww!"
"You been having fun tonight, Rudy?" Wilson said with a cocked eyebrow.
"I never --!" Giles protested.
"Ingrate," Anderson said. "Scampering off to party without a by-your-leave, and you didn't even invite us."
Buffy came stomping back. "Let's get one thing straight," she snarled at Sheila. "Nobody calls Giles by his first name but me. Except that I don't."
"Ms. Calendar does," Xander offered helpfully.
Viola hung out the window by Sheila. "He's gonna walk the Wild Side tonight," she said to Buffy. "Aren't you, Rupert sweetie?"
"Go away," Giles said. "I've had quite enough of the whole lot of you."
Zuzu dropped from her perch on the BMW and took a step towards the Cadillac.
"Now dear," Lucy cautioned her. "Don't get involved in other people's domestic disputes."
"Rupert!" Sheila said with a grin. "Come be our love- bunny!"
"Buffy, she's just trying to get you mad," Willow said. "Not that that's really bright of her --"
"Congratulations, Sheila," Buffy said. "You've succeeded!" She groped towards her bag for a stake, only to discover that she'd left the bag in the car again.
"Buffy!" Xander said. "Ixnay on the ayage-slay." He jerked his head to both sides to cover their civilian audience.
"Ooh, Cowboy, you look yummy," Viola said, grinning at Xander. "Wanna go out for a bite?"
"You just stop that right now," Willow said angrily.
Xander backed off to put the bulk of the BMW between himself and the Cadillac. "Okay, anybody ready to go now?"
"Sheila and friends are," Buffy said.
Mitch trailed back from the ditch. "I can't believe you wrecked Spike's car!" he whined. "What am I going to tell him?" He glared at Giles and Willow.
"Might be a good time to check out the nightlife in Vegas, Mitch," Sheila said with a smirk.
"You were in on this too, you know!" Mitch screamed at her. "When Spike finds out it was all you fault --"
"Me?" Sheila said with wide, innocent eyes. "When he left 'Top Gun Mitch, The Chickie Chomper' in charge?"
"Better start runnin', Mitch," Viola said.
"You females always hang together," Mitch snarled. "Boyce, dude, back me up on this."
Viola thumped the back of Boyce's head.
"Uh, love to help you out, man, but I didn't see nothin'," Boyce said.
Viola shoved the car door open and bounced out to the edge of the ditch. "Cool! Gotta see this, Boyce. Spike's car got smashed up real good."
Mitch covered his head with his hands and whimpered.
Boyce scrambled to join her. "Far out! Was anybody like smushed inside?"
"I scraped up my hand climbing out of the ditch," Willow said, holding up her arm. Giles shoved it down before the vampires could get a good look at it.
Viola folded her arms across her chest and moved into the BMW's headlights, "At least you guys are having fun," she pouted at Willow. "We are having a real super-bummer of a night."
"Viola?" Doctor Szell suddenly said. He stepped forward, squinting into the headlights. "Viola Harbringer?"
She looked at him. "Uh, yeah?"
"We used to date? Remember? Woodstock? You went to score some hash? Never came back?"
"Oh, right! Wiggy Szell! Wow man!"
"'Wiggy'?" Professor Wilson said with a look at Szell.
"I waited for three days, Viola," Szell said.
"Like, I met this dude," she said. "Wow, Wiggy, like long time no see --"
"And you haven't changed. At all." Szell stared at her. "Well, some of the clothing looks new. Relatively speaking."
"Hey man, you were really at Woodstock?" Rio said.
"I told you that," Szell said irritably.
"Yeah, but you don't think anybody really believed you, do you?"
"Why the hell not?" Szell erupted. "Have you people so addled your brains with that gibberish you call modern poetry that you can no longer distinguish truth from fiction?"
"Ooh, them's fightin' words," Lucy said.
"Nope." Rio walked up to Szell. "Just that you're a simpering pompous prig."
Viola gave Rio a shove. "Hey man, that's my boyfriend you're calling a pig."
"Whomp his ass, Viola," Boyce said.
"Oh no, not again." Giles grabbed Willow by the elbow and steered her towards the BMW. "Xander?"
"Huh?" Xander blinked, then realized that Giles was talking to him. "Oh, great! Going we are! Now! Buffy!"
Sheila jumped out of the Cadillac and went to whisper something to Boyce. He hurried back into the driver's seat and backed the car up to sit at an angle to the BMW's front bumper, effectively boxing it in between Jaguar and Cadillac.
"Hey!" Xander said. "Move that thing!"
Boyce leaned out the window and leered at him. "Come make me, Mr. Marlborough Man."
"That does it." Xander took off the cowboy hat and crammed it on top of Buffy's blond head. "Buffster! Hello?" he said. "Are we going to leave now? 'Cause there's a snarky vampire double-parking us."
Buffy blinked. "Wha'?" She looked at the Cadillac. "Oh shit." She and Xander strode around towards the Cadillac,
"Viola!" Boyce yelped. "I could use some help?" He hurriedly cranked the window up.
"Minute, Boyce!" she yelled, still doing a nose-to-nose glare with Rio. "I'm gonna stomp this dude's fat ass first."
"Hah!" Szell mocked, latching an arm around his ex-girlfriend's waist. "You're in for it now, you prick."
"Oh, come on," Zuzu said in a bored tone. "The day this thing can take Rio is the day I trade in my cowboy boots for Birkenstocks. And what is that get-up anyway? Heroin chic meets Godspell? You going to show off your 'girlfriend' at the next faculty-alumni mixer, Szell? Bet Tennyson'll love her."
Szell bristled. "And what if I do!?"
Professor Scopes sighed audibly. "Evan," he called out. "I feel compelled to remind you that you're still in the middle of one extremely messy palimony suit. And that you've never demonstrated an iota of common sense where the fairer sex is concerned."
"Butt out, four eyes," Viola said, snuggling closer to Szell.
Scopes sighed again and slid off the BMW. He walked to the Jaguar, reached in and fiddled with the dashboard controls, then strolled back to the boot and pulled the lid open.
The loud sound of kicking erupted from the direction of the vampires' Cadillac.
"Hey!" Viola said, looking over. "Stop that! Boyce, kick her ass!"
Boyce rolled down the passenger side window. "You come back and kick her ass, Viola! I'm not getting out of this car."
"Move it, fang face!" Buffy was yelling as she darted around to that side of the car. Boyce tried to roll up the window again, but she grabbed it and forced it down. He yelped as she grabbed him by the coat and hauled him through the window.
"Better!" Now that the danger to the car was over, Viola turned back to ogle her long lost boyfriend, "Sheila, do you believe in soul mates?"
"Yeah," said Sheila unexpectedly at Giles' elbow. He jumped. She seized his arm and stood up on tip-toe to blow in his ear. "But 'play mates' is better."
Professor Scopes strolled back out from the Jaguar, a Super Soaker(TM) in his hands.
"Uh, what's that filled with?" Viola said uneasily.
Scopes smiled unpleasantly. "You have one guess, my dear."
"Owie," Sheila said.
Viola took several steps away from Szell. "Hey man, chill. We're all copacetic."
Rio placed his bulk between Viola and Scopes. "I don't need no protectin' from squirrels, particularly by old guys carryin' squirt guns."
Szell pulled Viola behind him. "Who are you calling a squirrel?"
Boyce and Buffy came rolling through the group. "Xander!" Buffy was yelling as she grabbed Boyce and bounced him off the fender of the BMW several times. "I need my bag, damn it!"
"Here! Here!" Xander shouted excitedly from within the BMW as he held the bag out the window on the wrong side of the car.
"UNCLE!" Boyce screeched. He scrambled to his feet and ran straight at Scopes and his Super Soaker. "Oh, FUCK!" he said, pulling up short. He turned to send a kick at Buffy's face.
She grabbed his leg and tossed him onto the back of the BMW. "Wait right there!" she yelled, racing around to the other side to get her bag.
"Violence is never the answer, Buffy!" Sheila yelled. She hooked an arm around Giles' neck to drag him down into a sloppy teenager'y kiss.
Buffy froze in her race around the car, then came running to Giles' rescue. "Get your slobbery hands off him!" As she passed by, Boyce pounced on her shoulders.
"Let go!" Willow tried to intervene in Buffy's place, but Mitch was suddenly back in the game, snatching at her hair. Willow shrieked at him.
Mitch howled as a hard pulse of Super Soaker water hit him, and he took to his heels. Willow seized the Super Soaker from Scopes' hands and darted off in pursuit of the hapless vampire.
Giles tried to pry Sheila off, but he only succeeded in getting further entangled in her. "Violence is lots of fun though, isn't it?" Sheila smirked at him.
"I'm sure having fun!" Zuzu said, grabbing the girl by the coat collar and pounding her on the ear to make her let go. She turned and pitched her into Viola's arms. The two vampiresses tumbled into the dirt. "Particularly when there are so many people about just asking to be smeared into the pavement."
"That's it!" Szell declared. "You're going down, McLaren." He took off his jacket, folded it up and handed it to Scopes, then took a boxing stance with his fists up. "For the honor of Viola and the Sunnydale U Department of History!"
Lucy hopped down off the car and removed her own jacket. "You just had to bring departmental politics into it, didn't you Szell?"
Rio cracked his knuckles and grinned.
"Crap, Evan," Professor Anderson said. "My back's acting up tonight. Can't we fight this out later?"
Szell set his jaw and raised his hands higher. "Com'on, sissy girl," he mocked Zuzu.
Zuzu smiled at Szell, coughed once into her hand, lifted her fists, then swung around and kicked him hard in the crotch. Szell collapsed whimpering to his knees in the dust.
"Oh, that's dirty fighting," Lucy said. "Good one, Zuzu!"
Viola scrambled up, landed a punch into Zuzu's stomach, then kicked her straight back into the ditch.
"Way to go, Viola!" Boyce hopped on top of the BMW again. Buffy grabbed his foot and hauled at it. Boyce held on to his perch, trying to kick her head with his other foot.
Back from her vendetta, Willow ran back to Giles. "Buffy!" she yelled out, "Catch!" She tossed the Super Soaker at the Slayer. It dropped on the roof of the car. Buffy dropped Boyce's foot to lunge up after the toy. Boyce desperately scrambled to beat her to it.
Viola ran at Zuzu as the other woman crawled out of the ditch, spinning a kick at her head. Zuzu jumped back out of range, barely saving herself from another plunge, then grabbed Viola's foot to send her tumbling on down. She turned to pursue her.
"Hell, any girlfriend of Evan's is a girlfriend of mine!" Professor Anderson declared, and ran to pull Zuzu back by the arms.
"You really don't want to do that, Andy --!" Scopes winced. "Zuzu, go easy on the man! He has a bad back!"
Sheila was at Giles' arm again. "Kind of noisy around here, isn't it?" she grinned at him. "Wanna go neck?"
Willow kicked her. "Let go," she said indignantly. "He doesn't want to go with you."
"Oh, and like what are you going to do about it?" Sheila snarled at her, shifting into game face.
Willow kicked her again.
"Oww!" Sheila let go of Giles and lunged at her. He backed quickly out of reach. She whirled to snatch at him, only to get a wallop on the leg from Willow again. "You guys are asking for it," she hissed at Willow, and lunged at the girl. "OWWW" she yelped as Giles clouted her hard in the back of the head.
A sudden brilliant light washed over all of them.
"All right, everybody. Like FREEZE!" an authoritative voice boomed out.