Loose Ends

By Buffyfire

Disclaimer: As always, the characters aren't mine, but the situation is

Loose Ends

Part 1

"Hey the pot!"

Willow and Cordelia looked to the stove where Buffy was pointing. The pot had boiled over and scolding hot water was spilling onto the floor. Buffy quickly turned down the heat. The three of them cleaned up the mess, then returned to what they had been doing.

This cooking project had been nothing but a disaster. They had already burned the bread, covered the salad with expired dressing, and now this. Cordelia suggested that they call a take-out place. She even offered to go get it, but her friends said no. Angel, Oz and Xander had cooked for them the week before. It wouldn't be fair to cheat them out of a home-cooked meal.

"Do you girls need help?"

They looked up and saw Joyce, standing in the doorway.

"No thanks, mom. I think we finally got it under control," said Buffy. She turned back to the stove and began to stir the sauce.

"Help!" Willow squeaked, standing at the oven with a new loaf of bread, "How do you work this thing?"

Joyce helped her set the timer, then left the room saying, "Call me if you need anything."

A few minutes later, the bread was done. Willow took it from the oven and took a long whiff. She loved the smell of garlic bread.

"Mmm" she said.

Her "Mmm" was immediately followed by "Mmm"s from her friends.

The aroma filled the room and even brought Joyce back to the kitchen. By 6:45 the meal was done. It consisted of spaghetti with meat sauce, garlic bread, a Caesar salad and for dessert, a cherry pie that Willow had made at home. For drinks, they had an assortment of sodas and juices. When the table was set with cloth napkins and wineglasses, the girls hurried to the bathroom to mak themselves look presentable.

At 7:00, the doorbell rang. Willow left her friends to preen and answered the door. When Cordelia was done, she joined Willow in the living room. She kissed Xander "Hello" then led the guys to the table. When they were all seated, Buffy brought out the salad and bread. She sat down, then invited everyone to dig in. When everyone had had theirfill of salad, Cordelia brought out the main course. Finally, the pie was brought out and everyone moved to the living room to eat it.

The meal received nothing but praise. It couldn't compare to the Chinese chicken salad that the guys had made the week before, but they insisted that it was fit for a king, which pleased the girls enough.

When the pie plates were empty, Willow began to pick them up. When she got to Oz, he noticed some crumbs on her lips. He playfully, kissed them away, then allowed her to continue with her clean up.

"How long are you guys staying?" she asked as she collected the last of the dishes.

"That depends," said Xander, "how long are we allowed?"

"My mom want's guy clearage by nine," said Buffy.

Xander looked at his watch, "Whoa! Then we better clear, like we should have ten minutes ago."

As they prepared to leave, Buffy suddenly remembered something, "By the way, has anyone talked to Kayla lately?"

"She woke me up at 3:00, yesterday," said Angel sounding slightly annoyed, "I never did get back to sleep. Anyway, why?"

"I think I may have a place for her to stay. Amy told me that she's trying to move out, but her dad won't let her leave unless she gets a roommate."

"No, bad idea," said Xander, "Something tells me that they won't mesh."

"How do you know? They might be perfectly meshable."

"I doubt it," said Angel, "They could try it. I'm just afraid that if for any reason, they start fighting, they may end up killing each other."

"Well, next time anyone sees Kayla, tell her I need to talk to her."

Everyone gave a sign of affirmation. The guys each kissed their girlfriend, then headed out the door. Buffy watched them as they piled into Oz's van and thought about what they would do. She guessed it would be the same as usual. They would drive around for about an hour, trying to find something to do. Eventually, they would realize that they were in Sunnydale, where there was practically nothing to do on a school night and they would go home.

Oh well, she thought, it could be worse. They could be fighting.

When they drove off, she shut the door and went inside. She returned to the kitchen and found her friends washing dishes. When they were done, they divided up the rest of the food , then Willow and Cordelia left. Buffy walked them to the door, then went upstairs to kiss her mom goodnight. She went to her room to change her clothes, then snuck out the window, hoping to get in a good hour of patrol.

"Nite Wil," Cordelia called from her car as Willow walked to the door. Cordelia drove off, loudly singing the latest song from the
Wallflowers, which was blasting on her radio. By the end of the song, she pulled up to her house. It was dark, which was usual for a Sunday night. Her parents always went out on Sundays and rarely came back before 10:00.

She walked to her door, still humming that song from the radio. It would be awhile before it got out of her head. She had just pulled out her keys to unlock the door, when she heard a footstep behind her. As she turned to see what it was, a sharp pain shot through her head. Her knees buckled and she fell to the ground. The last thing she saw was a blurred figure with shockingly white hair.

Part 2

"Bye, guys," yelled Xander as he practically fell out of Oz's van. His legs had been cramped in there for the past hour.

Oh, great, he thought upon seeing his house dark. This was a bad sign; he was locked out. He rang the doorbell and waited...and waited and waited. When no one answered, he rang again. He noticed something sticking out of the mailbox. It was an envelope with his name on it. He opened it and pulled out a paper that read,

11:00. 1675 Jamina Street. Come alone or else.

A hole was punched at the bottom of the paper. A small chain, like one from a necklace, was fastened through it. He pulled it from the envelope. At the end of the chain was Cordelia's locket.

"Oh God, Cordy," he said aloud.

The door opened a second later. His mom stood on the other side.

Xander entered the house and went straight to his room. He waited for his mother to return to her room, then quickly snuck out his bedroom window.


1675 Jamina Street was not the most inviting place in Sunnydale, but Xander went in anyway. There was no door, only a long, dark cloth covering a doorway. He pushed it aside and entered a large room. The building must have been some kind of warehouse or factory because heavy machinery sat in the corners collecting dust. Sitting high atop one of these machines was Spike. When Xander entered, Spike said to the vampire, which sat at his right, "Alright, pay up." The vampire reluctantly reached into his pocket and pulled out a $10 bill. Spike snatched it from his hand then jumped down from the machine.

"Ah, Xander. Congratulations, you just won me ten bucks" said Spike as he walked towards the boy who obviously was in no mood for chitchat, "Well your probably standing there, waiting for me to get to the bloody point, no pun intended."

"What did you do with Cordelia?" Xander in a voice that told Spike that he determined to get her back.

"I'll get to that, eventually. First we're gonna play a little game called, 'I Ask You a Question and You Bloody-Well Better Answer it'. I'll go first. What exactly did you people do to Angel?"

"Nothing."

"HA! Nothing? Then tell me, why has he suddenly gotten soft on us? Hmm? What made him change to your side?"

"Don't ask me," Xander lied, "He came to us on his own. For all I know he's been lying to us."

Spike smiled "Are you sure? I know someone who seems to have a different story."

A door opened to the right. Two vampires dragged the struggling Cordelia into the room, with Drusilla following close behind. The vampires threw Cordelia into the center of the room with Xander. She tried to run to him, but Spike grabbed her arm, throwing her back.

"Xander, I'm sorry I-" she began, but was interrupted.

"You two seem to be telling us two different stories. So, I think we should ask Angel himself. I want you to bring him here so we can get this whole damn thing straightened out. You have one hour to get him here, or..." Spike ran a hand along Cordelia's cheek, then her neck. She screamed with fright.

"Don't touch her!" Xander yelled, "Alright. I'll see what I can do." He turned to leave.

"Oh, and Xander," said Spike, "Don't tell him about this. You'll ruin the surprise."

Xander left the room quickly.

Great! Now what do I do? he thought.

He was stuck. He didn't seem to have a choice, but to give Angel to them.

He walked down the road, deep in thought. For one thing: how could he convince Angel to go with him and if he did, then what? He knew that this was a death trap and he couldn't just let Angel die like that, no matter how mucht the idea appealed to him, but unfortunately, Xander saw no other options.

Before he knew it, he was at Angel's door. He knocked, still unsure of what he would say. When the door opened suddenly, Angel looked at Xander a little strangely.

"What are you doing here," he asked.

"Uh..." Xander was lost. He struggled quickly to find an answer and eventually spit out, "Buffy wants you to meet her. I-I'm supposed to take you there."

"Now?"

"Uh, yeah. I don't know what she wants but she said to get you," Xander shrugged innocently.

"OK. Uh, come on in. I just need to-"

"Now," Xander insisted.

"What's wrong?" Angel asked, concerned with Xander's tone.

"Nothing, but you need to come with me."

"Alright," said Angel, almost reluctantly. He locked his front door, then he and Xander left the building.

They arrived with fifteen minutes to spare. Xander couldn't hear anything inside and guessed that they were all in another part of the building. The vampires wouldn't be expecting them for another fifteen minutes.

"In there?" Angel asked.

Xander only nodded. Angel grabbed the side of the curtain and was about to pull it back, when he himself was pulled back and shoved against the wall. He wanted to yell at Xander for grabbing him like that, but instead, Xander yelled at him.

"Shut up and listen," It was more of a loud whisper, "Buffy isn't even here."

He let Angel go and stepped away from him.

"What is this?" Angel asked, stepping away from the wall.

Xander sighed deeply, "Spike's in there. He has Cordelia I had to bring you here, he said he'd kill her if I didn't."

"I knew something was wrong. Alright, we need to figure out how to get her out."

"We have to work fast, we only have about fifteen minutes."

"Alright, I have an idea. Stay here. If I'm not back in time, stall them," with that, Angel ran off, leaving Xander alone outside the
building.

A few minutes later, he returned with what looked like bottled water. He gave it to Xander with a stake.

"Here's what you do," he said, "Take this in with you, tell them that I'll be in, in a second. Say that I've gone somewhere, I don't know, make something up. As soon as you get the chance, douse Spike witht this. It's Holy Water, so it should do some damage. Grab Cordelia and get the hell out."

"What are you gonna do?"

"I'm gonna make sure you two have a clean getaway. Now, go before they get suspiscoius."

Xander took a deep breath and pulled back the curtain. He walked in just as Spike and his friends returned to the room. Spike had a strong arm around Cordelia. Drusilla watched from a distance with an unhappy look on her face. She seemed jealous.

Spike looked at his watch, "You havea knack for cutting it close, don't you? Where is he?"

"He's coming. I gave him the address. He shouldn't be long."

"Where'd that come from?" Spike asked, taking note of the water bottle in Xander's hand.

"Oh, well, I had some time and I was thirsty. I stopped at home."

Cordelia saw it and mouthed the word "Holy?" Xander gave a slight nod.

"What was that nod for?" asked Spike.

"Well, uh, she was just asking me if she could have some. Can she?"

Spike gestured to a female vampire who was the closest to Xander. He handed her the bottle. She took it to Cordelia, who took a long swig then returned it to Xander. Before she could walk away, he pulled up the pop-top on the bottle and squirted Holy Water all over her. She shrieked in pain. Before Spike could react, he met the same fate. Cordelia had stored the water in her mouth and in a quick motion had spit it all out onto him.

Xander grabbed her hand and ran for the doorway. Before he reached it, a vampire grabbed the curtain and shut it. He stood against the curtain, blocking their only means of escape. He smiled at them cruelly. A second later, his smile changed to surprise as pain shot through his back. He turned to dust where he stood. The end of a stake was sticking through the cloth. The curtain was thrown back and Angel stepped quickly through inside armed and ready for action. Xander and Cordelia ran out of the room.

There were only three other vampires that were in any form of fighting condition. They ran at Angel full charge. He ran out through the doorway. Only one of them made it to him. The other two were stopped dead in their tracks. Xander and Cordelia stood armed with stakes at either side of the doorway. All that they saw of Angel's fight was the vampire falling helplessly to the ground and turning to a small pile of dust.

They looked inside. Drusilla had picked up Spike, who had fallen unconscious from pain, and was carrying him out through a back entrance. She was mumbling something about Ms. Edith washing his hair in green water. They watched her leave, then turned to leave, themselves.


"Are you sure you're OK?" Xander asked Cordelia.

"How many times are you gonna ask me that? I told you, I'm fine," She gave Xander a long kiss, then entered her house.

Xander walked down the walkway and found Angel waiting for him in the street.

"Is she gonna be OK?" he asked.

"She seems to think so." They began to walk. "Look Angel, as hard as this is to say, I'm sorry. I nearly got us all killed. What are the chances Spike actually keeping his word?"

"Don't worry about it. To be honest, if it had been Buffy in there, I probably would have done the same thing."

"C'mon, it's not like you would have had to. Buffy can fight her way out of a situation like that."

"You're probably right."

"You worry about her a lot?"

Angel was a little reluctant to answer. "Yeah, I probably shouldn't. You're right, she could fight her way out, but something- I don't know. She still- it's hard to explain. I'm well aware of her capabilities but-"

"But you feel better when you're there to protect her. I know exactly what you mean. I mean, Cordelia...well, she's tough, but she's not that tough."

"Do you worry about her?"

"Sometimes. By the way, are we cooking for the girls next week?"

"I think so. What do you think, Mexican?"

"I know a great place."

The End