

DISCLAIMER: We do not own Buffy or Angel (ooh, what a thought) or any of the rest of Buffy the Vampire Slayer. Joss Whedon, WB and Mutant Enemy do.
RATING: PG-13
CONTENT WARNING: Some violence, some smooching. Nothing serious -- about the same as the show, with slightly strongly language. But what really gives it the PG-13 rating is -- horror of all horrors -- the hyena jokes. (Not.)
SPOILERS: Everything, we guess. This story takes place in the Fall of '98. Maybe 'The Pack'?
SUMMARY: Buffy and the Slayerettes spend Friday the Thirteenth fighting a new demon, only this time there's a complication, and as a result, Spike frenches Cordelia at last... Willow finally makes with Xander... Angel socks Giles... and a new demon has come to play. No, wait, it's not what you think... but you'll never know what we're talking about unless you read it!!!

Part Four: How DO You Let Me Talk You Into These Things?
Angel and Xander, in unspoken accord, were busily barricading the library doors, properly for a change. Giles had vanished back among the stacks, though if Xander concentrated he could pick him out by his constant string of swearing. After some argument, Buffy and Willow had refused their presence on the mission, and Xander suggested that he and Angel stay behind to draw the "sucky squad's" fire. Angel could only hope that the girls would be able to remain undetected; if the unusual strength of the vampires they had faced earlier that evening was any indication, then Buffy would hardly be a match for a pack of them under any circumstances, much less while crippled.
Which no doubt was their opponent's plan.
"Any crosses stashed, say, in Giles' office?" Angel asked, surveying the barricaded doors critically. It would hold, but for how long?
Xander looked a bit sheepish. "As a matter of fact, yes. I forgot." He ducked into the office, Angel following behind. Even with vampire's limitations upon him, Xander had no trouble entering the private office, Angel observed. Something to meditate on, though heavy siege had never been considered a good time for deliberate speculation even by the most contemplative masters of Zen. Angel followed behind.
Xander tossed him a couple stakes. "Here," he said. "Keep these handy." Before Angel could warn him, Xander reached down and scooped up several crosses.
"*($&%)#*!" he yelped, spasming and tossing crosses in all directions. Angel could not help but snicker. Xander glared bloody murder at him, blowing on his singed hands to cool them.
"I could have warned you," Angel said, sobering. Wonderful. The best fighter remaining had just somewhat crippled himself. All they needed now was an earthquake, or maybe another Hellmouth-creature ripping open the library floor... he quashed that line of thought. No sense in jinxing them all unnecessarily.
Xander growled. "Yeah, well, I notice you didn't." He groaned and sat on the desk, momentarily overwhelmed. "How do you let me talk you into these things?"
Angel shrugged helplessly. Not without some misgivings, he bent and gathered up the strewn crosses. He heading over to the copy machine, debating whether or not it was worth adding it to the barricade, when a sound caught his ear.
"What's that?" he hissed to Xander, who had come up behind him.
Xander, listening, frowned. "I dunno."
A few seconds later, the sound of running footsteps was clearly audible. Whoever it was was alone, and headed fast in their direction. Xander moved out of the line of sight, and Angel hunkered down to watch the new arrival's approach.
Soon enough, they saw Drusilla running down the hallway, looking fearfully over her shoulder at every turn. She was carrying a pair of red high-heeled shoes, presumably so she could run better, and she was alone. She sighed in obvious relief when she saw the library. "Guys? Anyone there?"
Angel looked at Xander. Xander looked at Angel. "Well?" said Xander after a moment.
Dru hovered near the door, pushing at it, trying to see in. "Guys? Come on, you've got to be in there. Xander? Let me in!" She sounded almost desperate.
Angel hesitated for another moment. "I think she's Cordelia, actually, in which case we should really let her in..."
"I hear you in there!" Dru snapped. "Come on, Xander, it's me! Cordy!"
"Right," Xander agreed, and the two pushed aside the blockade long enough to let Dru -- or Cordy, whatever -- through.
Cordy pushed her hair aside, trembling. Her voice, when she spoke, was a peculiar mix of southern-Californian and the United Kingdom somewhere. "Guys, we're in trouble. Where's Giles?" She moved further into the library and among the stacks, out of sight.
Rapid footsteps sounded in the hall. Too late to replace the barricade, Angel and Xander turned to face Spike. "Theah you are," Spike said with great satisfaction.
Snarling, Angel leapt forward and swung at the white-haired vampire with all his strength. Spike ducked barely in time. "Xander, what are you --!?"
Angel swung again, and this timed connected. Spike reeled back, then skillfully caught Angel's arms and pinioned him. Enraged, Angel found that Xander's human strength was not enough to break free of the vampire grip. "Let go of me!" he snarled. Hmm, that seemed to be developing into a theme...
"Guys, wait!" This was Cordelia, reappearing behind them from the stacks, hands fluttering nervously.
"Hey, watch how you're twisting those arms!" Xander cried, leaping forward into the breach. Taking Spike by surprise, he struck twice in rapid succession; Angel broke free of the imprisoning grip. Together, Xander and Angel closed in on their enemy.
"STOP!" a voice bellowed. It was Giles, standing behind the rail in the upper portion of the library. "DON'T TOUCH HIM!"
Spike moved forward, between Xander and Angel as if he had forgotten they were threats; surprised, they fell back. The vampire and the librarian glared at each other.
"Until we've got this bloody mess sorted out, ducks," Giles, who was not Giles, growled, "I suggest we leave off the hitting...?"
Angel looked from Giles to Spike, and then at Xander. A possible solution began to dawn on him. He swung around to face Cordelia. "You mean..."
Cordelia walked over to Spike, who was bending over, stanching the bloody nose they had given him and swearing under his breath. "That's... what I was trying to tell you," she said a bit nervously. "Whatever weird demon thingie or whatever that got us scrambled? Worked on Spike and Dru, too."
Giles -- er, Spike, damn but this was confusing -- was glaring at Xander. "Try it," he snarled.
The Watcher looked up from his bloodstained handkerchief. "If anyone tries anything, we'll never get this tangle of spells sorted out! Any one demon with enough power to implement castings of this magnitude will certainly be able to defeat us if we do not join forces!"
"Uh," said Xander. "Ditto."
"He's right," Angel pointed out.
"I'll hafta go with Giles on this one," said Cordy. All four transformed Slayerettes looked at Spike.
Spike shrugged uneasily, but acknowledged that he didn't really have a choice. "All right," he said. "Truce."
Xander and Angel glanced at each other, shrugged, and began reassembling the barricade.
"Good," Giles said. "Where's Buffy?" He looked around at all assembled. "For that matter, where's Willow?"
"She's with Buffy," Angel hedged, straining to drag the copy machine over to the door. Xander stepped over to help him, and kindly took the job away from him. Angel barely refrained from grumbling over the loss of his vampire-strength.
"But where is she?" Giles asked more forcefully. "If the vampires are, indeed, headed for the library, then the Slayer should be here."
"Well," Xander began, and stopped. "Buffy thought it would be better if we stayed here, as bait, while she went off to hunt the head. And remove it," he added after a moment's thought.
"With Willow?" Giles demanded. "How does Buffy plan to fight her best while protecting her?"
"Well, actually, it would be more like Willow protecting Buffy," Angel offered. The words conjured a thought-image he found it hard to deal with.
The same image had apparently occurred to Giles. "Explain," he said tersely.
"Well, when Will tried to reverse the black mojo the demon used on Dead-boy and me, the spell went wacky and Buffy's a redhead," Xander summarized briefly. "Is it just me or is our track record for casting spells not something we could win a school letter for?"
"Tell me about it, matey," growled Spike.
Giles sank down into the nearest chair and dropped his platinum-blond head into his hands, an interesting sight. He muttered something under his breath, including the words 'children' and 'suicidal'.
"Your roots are showing," Cordy observed, noting the black underlayer in Giles' hair.
Spike, who had noticed the same thing, glared at her. "Itıs not like I can look in a mirror to check!"
"I was just trying to help," Cordelia sniffed, tossing Dru's black hair over her shoulder.
"All I can say is, if I don't get my own body back soon, I'm going to take a railroad spike, find the witch, and do something that will change my name to 'Brainsurgeon' for good!"
"With a railroad spike?" Xander said, taken aback. "Now that's a mental picture I could have lived without!"
"Don't underestimate him," Angel said softly.
Spike grinned. "I had a good teacher."
Angel winced.
"That's enough," Giles said, pulling himself together. "We have to find Buffy and Willow."
"Buffy said to stay here!" protested Xander.
"Buffy has been known to make errors in judgment in the past," Giles said reasonably. Spike choked, but nobody paid any attention. "If she and Willow are out there alone, both crippled, then they stand no chance against these magically strengthened vampires, much less the demon controlling them!"
"They won't have to fight the supervamps," Cordy said, cocking her head to listen to the feet tramping in the hall. "We will."
"Not if I can help it," Giles said grimly. "Now, I've got an idea for dealing with this mess that might work if we can just --"
From inside Giles' office, the ancient clock struck twelve. The lighting of the library interior brightened almost unbearably, and vamp and human alike covered their eyes. Reality twisted. Even the tape deck must have hit a glitch, because the tireless 'Exosquad' theme fizzed to static.
On the east balcony, Buffy froze as a peculiar roaring sound filled the air around her. Apparently the whole sound system was non-magic compatible. Her ears popped.
"The demon's casting her spell!" she whispered urgently.
Willow nodded, and braced herself: but for whatever reason, the spell didn't seem to be affecting her or her ex-self.
"An impatient demon," Buffy muttered.
"Why?" Willow asked.
"She couldn't wait for Friday the Thirteenth? It's still Thursday night!"
"I think it's past midnight, Buffy," Willow replied. "It is Friday the Thirteenth. Just, very early in the morning."
Buffy clapped a hand over her forehead. "Boy, do I feel dumb," she muttered. "Here I was psyching myself up for a big vampire suckfest tomorrow night, and they turn around and take me by surprise with a technicality!"
"We've got to find that demon soon," Willow said grimly.
"Where is the spellcasting?" Buffy asked, looking around as if expecting a demon and a legion of vampires to come swarming up over the ledge. "Can you tell?"
Willow shook her blonde head in frustration. "I don't know!" she almost wailed.
Buffy put her hands on her friend's shoulders, and Willow calmed down. "Well, you've got Slayer-senses now, right?" Buffy asked. "Hone!"
Back at the library, the world slowly returned to normal as the disordered Slayer Squad attempted to readjust their senses.
"Oh, gross!" exclaimed Dru, staring down at her black empire dress in horror. "I thought being a hyena was bad -- I thought being Dead Boy was bad -- but this absolutely redefines my standards for 'living hell'!"
"Bloody hell," Xander's body agreed. "This time that wanker has gone too far! You think that threat with the railroad spikes was a joke?"
"Sick sense of humor much?" Spike cried, distressed. "You think I wanted to spend my evening as a Billy Idol wannabe? And that my children will end up as laboratory testees!"
Giles looked around at his companions-in-disarray. "Which one of you is Giles?" he demanded. "And who's in possession of my body now?" He pointed to Angel.
Angel was staring at the barricade by the entrance. "The demon has been a very, very, bad girl," he muttered. "She shall have no tea tonight..."
Something slammed against the library doors.
Everyone jumped. Xander ran towards the blockade and tripped flat on the trailing skirt. "Ow," he remarked from the floor. "How do you manage these things?" he -- or is it she? -- demanded of Angel.
"It would have to be you in Drusilla's body, wouldn't it?" Angel groaned. "If it had been Spike or me..." He trailed off into grumbling as he reached down to give Xander-Dru a hand up. They joined Spike-in-Xander and Cordelia-in-Spike at the doors.
A vampire's hand snaked through a chink and started to pull on the copy machine lid. "Someone give me a cross," Xander ordered, holding out his hand, long red-polished fingernails tipped with white.
"No," Spike said flatly.
Abruptly, Xander remembered his mishap with Giles' stash of crosses and his burned hands. "Right. Forgot. Dammit!" There were several more slams on the barricade, and the flailing hand pulled the copy machine lid half off. Angel checked to make sure he was not currently a vampire, picked up a cross, and smashed it against the vampire hand. There was a howl of pain, and the hand withdrew. From the commotion outside, Angel guessed that his attack had stung.
The noise quieted. "It sounds like they're giving up," Cordelia said hopefully.
"Impossible," Angel-Giles snorted. "It's too easy. Dammit, where is Giles with his brilliant idea?"
Through this scene, Dru-in-Angel was staring at the stacks. Now she -- he? -- turned to the foursome. "Spike?" she asked vaguely. It was unclear which Spike she was addressing. Cordelia, however, forgetting which body she was in, did not even turn around.
"What is it now, pet?" the real Spike asked, turning to face her.
Drusilla pointed to the stacks. "The doors are open," she remarked.
Cut off in mid-sentence, Giles found himself in a new body, but still in the school -- in fact, in one of the girl's bathrooms. He had no idea what the last possessor of the body had been doing; he knew only that he had come to himself stuck halfway through the bathroom window, with no way of knowing whether the body had been dropping in or climbing out. Hastily, he squirmed backwards, landed on the floor, and darted out of the room. Still, he could not help catching a glimpse of his new face in the mirror: Cordelia.
"What a nightmare," Giles groaned to himself, though to be precise this was not, thank heavens, an occurrence he had ever dreamed about. Who had had this body before him -- ? If Cordelia had simply switched, the most recent owner was the vampire Drusilla. Just as the Watcher's Journals that described her had suggested, she was very careless with her possessions. Or was that possessees?
He had to get back to the library, to help them fight the vampires, or supervamps as Cordelia had dubbed them. Unless -- perhaps he should he try and find the Slayer and the Slayer's body?
He paused for a moment, considering; then vague echoes of shouts, thumps, and screams hit his ears. The so-called "supervamps" were attacking the library. His library. That decided him. Giles set off, stopping only to grab a fire extinguisher. It was the one he and Father Samuel, the history teacher's career day speaker, had had a fascinating discussion over. Giles had a hunch he was going to need it.
The vampires attacked from behind, silently, eerie in their silence. Angel-in-Giles was the first to react, leaping forward into the breach cross in hand, probably not the best of ideas given that at the moment, he was the weakest. As if to underscore this point, the point vampire merely swung at him once, Angel couldn't duck fast enough, and he found himself flying across the room and landing -- you'll never guess this one -- on a bookshelf. Luckily, the boombox was still on the fritz.
"Ouch," he muttered, and shook his head to clear it. By the time Angel fought his way clear of the kindling, (hmm, ready made stakes!) his allies-by-default were engaged in free-for-all combat, all except for Dru-in-Angel, who calmly sat in one place and simply knocked the crap out of any vampire who came near her.
Angel shook his head in near despair; Dru was the only one who was not at a considerable disadvantage. Spike-in-Xander found that most of his usual moves were not particularly effective without his vampire strength, and was taking a severe pummeling; Angel, who had most recently occupied that body, knew how sore and weary it had been to start with, and almost managed to feel sorry for Spike. Almost. Xander-in-Dru was doing his best, but while his usual moves had more strength behind them than he was accustomed to, he was having a great deal of trouble dealing with Drusilla's female body and outrageous attire. But Cordelia was definitely the worst off: even in Spike's strong skilled body, she simply did not know how to fight.
Angel himself was not in great shape. There were nearly... fifteen vampires that he could count so far, and all of them were unnaturally enhanced somehow. There was no way Giles' body could hope to go hand-to-hand against even one. Angel abandoned the idea of reentering the melee and looked around for a projectile weapon.
He spotted one -- several even -- right away, and sighed. "Giles is NEVER going to forgive me," Angel muttered as he hefted Volume Five of Dramius' writings and hurled it with all the accuracy of a vengeful child flinging tennis balls at one of those soak-the-teacher fund-raisers. Giles would probably have preferred that Angel damage his borrowed librarian body than one of the precious books, but it turned out to be a fairly effective weapon. The heavy tome slammed into the head of a vampire closing on Spike. Dazed and enraged, the supervamp turned and searched for the thrower.
"Hey!" Angel shouted. Well, if it worked for Xander it could work for him. "Over here, you oversized leech!"
Xander, who had just figured out the biggest advantage of wearing high heels, kicked his current opponent where he felt it most. As Angel shouted, Xander glanced towards him and flashed him a pained smile, shaking his head. On Dru the expression looked most disapproving. Then he went back to fighting.
However unoriginal the taunt was, it proved effective; two vampires left the fight and headed towards Angel purposefully. Having distracted them, he was now unsure what to do with them. Spotting a half-emptied bookcase, he made a dash for it, paused a minute to send a quick prayer to She Who Watches Over Tightrope Walkers and Librarians, and scrambled to the top. There he sat, temporarily out of danger if also out of balance, and contentedly rained 30-lb books upon his attackers.
Spike and Xander were working together to protect Cordelia. The three of them made a surprisingly good team: as Angel knocked one vampire off balance with the particularly vicious Holander Codex, Xander-in-Dru kicked the point vampire -- the one who had made Angel airborne -- under the chin. Blood flowed. The vampire spun around, directly into Spike's cross-fire, or rather cross-punches. Once he was sufficiently off balance, Xander and Spike each grabbed an arm. The "supervamp" shook off Spike's weaker grip with relative ease, but it was too late: Cordelia raised her arms and plunged a broken chair leg into his heart with new vampire strength. With one last howl, vampire exploded into dust. The newly repaired stereo, predictably enough, burst into an enthusiastic rendition of "Another One Bites the Dust".
"I staked somebody!" Cordelia cried with delight, in Spike's voice but with unmistakably Cordeliesque inflection.
"Congratulations," Spike began in his dryest, most cutting tone, but whatever witticism he intended to make next was cut off as a vampire behind him lowered the boom. His eyes rolled back in Xander's head, and he collapsed, dazed, though not yet unconscious. The vampire grabbed his head and yanked it to the side, exposing the neck. Spike looked terrified, but could not force his leaden limbs to move.
Xander and Cordelia were moving towards him, but Angel saw three vampires behind them, attacking. He shouted a warning, hurled his second-to-last tome with deadly accuracy at one vampire's head, and leapt down from the shelf, landing square on the second attacker's shoulders. They both tumbled to the floor, and Angel discovered that falling down hurt. A lot. Meanwhile the third vampire, who was far too smart for any of their goods, grabbed a hapless Cordy-in-Spike's arm, swung her around full circle, and let go. She slammed into Xander with a great deal of force, and they both went down.
Spike-in-Xander flailed weakly in the vamp's grip, seeing death coming -- no demon ever shared turf, and the attacking vampire would drive Spike out of Xander's blood and shiver him into nothing. But, as the demon bent over for the bite, Angel's vengeful silhouette rose up behind him, a metal wastebasket poised for the kill. Dru clanged the wastebasket down over the vampire's head and gave it a huge WHACK with a heavy board. The vampire made no sound (other than the deep, echoing "doonnnggg"), but simply keeled over, wastebasket and all.
"Nobody messes with my Spike," Drusilla-in-Angel growled, showing that she was not quite as confused as they had thought. She/he picked Spike up and set him on his feet. "Are you hurt?" she asked, making fussy-noises.
"Not now, kitten," Spike muttered, unable to bear these affectionate touches from Angel, possessed by Drusilla or not. Angel himself felt slightly ill, watching his own body attempting to caress -- well, whether Xander or Spike, it was nasty either way.
Angel scrambled to his feet, rocking slightly on the balls of his feet in fighting stance. He had to tell Giles to get some better fighting shoes. The vampires he had temporarily downed were also back up on their feet, as were Xander and Cordelia. There was a brief pause in the fight as the enemies sized each other up, and each waited for the others to make the first move. Angel noticed that three -- no, four more vampires had appeared from the stacks to back up their friends. Not only was the fight far from over, it looked like they had no chance of winning. The "Jaws" background seemed only to support the idea.
The vampires obviously knew it too. They were grinning, taking their time now.
Angel backed slowly towards the now-useless barricade, intending to pick up the more aerodynamic components and hurl them at their enemies, but as he drew close, he heard Cordelia's voice from the other side -- by process of elimination, Cordy's body was almost certainly possessed by Giles. "Whoever you are in my body," her, no, his voice came lowly, "get the others into the office, and get this card catalog out of my way."
Not daring to question, Angel motioned to the others, who approached him and listened as he quickly repeated the terse instruction. The vampires, seeing their inexplicable motions, were moving to attack as Angel and Drusilla grabbed the wheeled card catalog and sent it rolling towards them; they dodged easily, but Angel and the others seized the moment to duck into the office/cage behind the reference desk.
"What was the point of this? Now we're trapped like rats in a hole!" Spike protested.
"Shut up," Angel growled. "Let Giles do his stuff."
Even as he spoke, the library doors burst inwards and Giles, resplendent in Cordelia's designer outfit, marched in toting a fire extinguisher.
The allies in the office blinked in disbelief as the vampires began to laugh hysterically. Giles only smiled as he pulled the lever and opened fire. A jet of chemical foam shot out at high velocity. Angel's brow crinkled in disbelief and disappointment -- until the vampires began to scream.
"It burns," Drusilla murmured, eyes wide. The only vampire left still in a vampire body, only she could identify from afar the deadly weapon that Giles had turned upon their enemies. "It's blessed..."
Xander stared in amazement at the spectacle of his girlfriend taking out eighteen vampires. "It's holy..." he groped for the proper word, "...holy fire extinguishing stuff!"
"How did he do that?" Angel breathed. The vampires were turning, running, escaping from the painful gunk. It was obviously not as effective as holy water, for none had died, but the supervamps were definitely in pain. "I didn't know you could bless anything besides water!"
"I did," Spike murmured. He was clearly recovering. "Congregation pubbing party, 1926. Can still taste it. But while vampire turncoat you may be, Angel love, I'd appreciate it if you didn't go spreadin' it around!"
Giles, triumphant, dropped the spent vampire extinguisher and joined them in the office. "What'd'you think of that?"
Cordy smiled uneasily. "It was great," she said, "but, you know, as long as the vampires are gone... this time can we barricade the back door, too?"
Willow and Buffy sneaked down the corridor, arguing fiercely, if quietly. "But, Willow, Giles strictly forbade you from even thinking about black magic again!" Buffy insisted.
Willow shook her head. "What I'll be doing isn't black magic, it's just witchcraft. There's a big difference, you know."
"Oh yeah?" Buffy challenged. "What?"
Willow groped for a way to phrase her meaning. "It's hard to explain, sort of -- "
Alerted by a sound from further down the corridor, Buffy waved a hand at her in a frantic shushing movement. Ahead of them glowed a greenish light. The two girls peeked around the corner and through the small glass window of the science lab. They saw two uninvited guests conversing. One figure they couldn't quite make out, but the other was clearly a vampire. Both voices were quite audible to the flies-on-the-wall.
"What do you mean, you can't destroy them?" demanded a female voice.
"I mean just that," said the vampire. "I don't know how it happened, but your spell wasn't all it cracked up to be. I mean, I didn't see the Slayer anywhere, but I saw Spike and some of the Slayer's boys, not to mention that brace of hellcats, their girls I guess, and they were putting up pretty stiff resistance. They've barricaded themselves in the library."
"I need the Slayer dead to get the power!"
"You don't even know which body she's in right now!"
"Then you have to kill them all," the unseen demon snarled. "What's your problem with this? Until she's dead, I don't get the power core and you don't keep your super powers."
"I'm not so convinced these special spells of power are so great after all," the vampire sneered. "Mitch got dusted. A whole bunch got holy water burns, some bad. Most of us are okay, I guess, but I got to tell you, this is really going too far. I mean, you flat out promised that we'd have no trouble, that your spells would take care of the Slayerettes. Well, they didn't. What's your next bright idea... bug-girl?"
There was an endless moment of silence.
Then the demon asked, "Do you know what 'large-force dark phenomena' are to a spellcaster, little one?"
"Do you know what 'broken promises' are to a vampire, you pathetic Tolkein-arachnid ripoff?"
The demon ignored the interruption and went on. "Every once in a while, in a place of power, there is a large amount of energy available for a dark one's use. But unless you can get the power core, it is a limited amount. So the fewer spells I cast, the more effective each one is."
"I don't see -- "
"Hush. Did I ask you to speak? No. It just so happens that as long as I have all this power at my command, it doesn't really weaken my forces to be down by a few trivial onions. And you, friend, just seriously ticked me off. You think my spells are useless? Let me just show you a little trick I found in the manuscripts of the Alshe'ann Oarbb awhile back. You remember, the spider-people?"
As Buffy and Willow watched, the demon extended one misshapen hand towards the frozen vampire. It spoke a few quick phrases, some quite beyond the human vocal range. From its outstretched hand hundreds of tiny black missiles began to pour, the black mass on the floor heading towards the vampire.
Buffy and Willow jumped away, but one of the little black creatures bounced through the crack in the door and scurried past them. It vanished quickly, but Willow caught a glimpse of eight hairy black legs, let out a muffled whimper, and made a pretty good attempt to melt through the wall. It was spiders -- hundreds of spiders. Only one had gotten through the door, but there was an entire swarm in the lab, crawling everywhere.
Buffy craned her neck and continued to watch through the little round window. It didn't take long for her to doubt the prudence of this tactic. One spider alone was a pretty harmless thing; even a poisonous spider, if it bothered to bite, would have no effect on a vampire. Three hundred spiders, however, were quite another matter. The vampire found himself instantly overwhelmed by an assault he could not combat as the horde swarmed over him. The venom had no effect on his undead flesh, but their silken webs covered his mouth and muffled his agonized screams as he was sucked dry of all fluids. Buffy would never have though she could feel compassion for a vampire (other than Angel) but this act of utter maliciousness made her feel ill.
She was not the only one. Her noise drowned out by the vampire's screams and that damned tape deck, Willow had moved a few feet farther down the corridor, where she was valiantly trying not to be sick. Buffy sneaked as quickly as she could over to her, clapped a hand over her mouth and together they staggered back the way they had come.
Willow clenched her teeth and swallowed several times. "That," she finally managed, "was black magic."
Buffy didn't argue this time. "I think it's safe to say we've found the witch."
"Say," Willow said abruptly. "What were we just watching?"
Buffy grimaced. "Demon politics. They always kill the messenger."
Willow shook Buffy's head. "Not that. Didn't you hear what that vampire said? They were up against Spike and the Slayer's boys -- fighting together!"
Buffy began to speak, stopped, and closed her mouth again. "Uh," she supplied intelligently. She knew that while such a thing was not impossible, it did not bode at all well. It meant that Spike was scared enough of this demon that he was willing to dine with, instead of on, his enemy -- again.
"What's going on around here?" Willow wailed.
Buffy thought. It hurt. "It must be Xander's fault, somehow," she muttered.
"What?" said Willow sharply.
Buffy shrugged. "Big spider. I mean, we've had Bug-man, Mantis-lady and now Spider-girl. Damn," she paused, "but that sounds waaay too much like a Marvel comic. It must be Xander's fault," she concluded.
Willow glared at Buffy. "We'll place blame later," she reminded her. "Right now, we need to think about this calmly and rationally. And, oh, I even have a plan."
"What plan? Spill!" Buffy ordered.
"We panic," Willow said calmly.
"Good plan," Buffy gulped, then regained control. "Aagh! Willow, you're the Slayer now -- you can't just give up!"
"I'm not the Slayer!" Willow was beginning to get hysterical. "Dammit, Buffy -- what was the first thing you slayed? An ordinary vampire, right? A newbie even -- not an old powerful vampire. Not a giant spider-demon with black magic and large dark-force phenomena at her disposal, whatever the heck that is!"
"Willow, calm down!" Buffy shushed frantically.
"I'm the thinker -- not the Slayer."
Buffy paused mid-shush. "Hey! Are you saying I can't think?"
"No, of course not."
"Willow, you can do this. You've just got to calm down and, and, work yourself up to this!"
"To what? How are we supposed to fight her?" Willow's panicking was getting out of hand; she was nearly screaming. "If I go in fists blazing, I'll get eaten alive by spiders and -- and you'll just get killed!"
Not pausing to examine that last statement, Buffy slapped Willow across the face. Without thinking, Willow hit back, and Buffy didn't jerk away fast enough: the fist grazed her jaw, and stumbled backwards into the wall, hand flying to her face. That hurt. She had been hurt worse, of course, but she hadn't realized just how much being the Slayer protected her from pain.
"Oh, Buffy, I'm so sorry!" Willow gasped, rushing over to her friend.
"No, it's my fault," Buffy mumbled. "Should know better than to hit a Slayer having hysterics. If anyone should know, it's me..."
"But I --"
"Hey, Will, if you're really feeling a guilty, remember that you'll be feeling this when you get your body back." Buffy smiled unevenly. "Anyway, if it cured your hysterics, it was worth it."
Willow paused. "I do feel better. I'm thinking clearer. What is a large dark-force phenomena?"
Buffy shrugged. "Some kind of evil power vortex thing that opens up on all Fridays the Thirteenth, I guess."
"Oh. Oh. Oh my gosh." Willow's eyes got big. She bounced up from her sitting position and pulled Buffy to her feet. "I got it! Buffy, I read about this in a book -- after last Friday the Thirteenth. Giles said that those vampires were trying to tap into this power to bring the Master back... but you stopped them?"
"And we'll stop them again," Buffy assured her, but Willow made a negating motion.
"Buffy! That demon said she needed the Slayer dead to get the power core... why?"
"You're research-girl," Buffy said helplessly. "I give up. Why?"
"Because you stopped that power last time -- you fried the vampire that was calling it. And now that power's locked on you!"
"What!" Buffy looked horrified. "Are you saying that I have some kind of black magic... stuck on me?"
Willow nodded. "Only for tonight. But, yeah."
"How can I tell?"
"Well, if there is some kind of power fixed on you, you'd have been feeling it rise for about a day beforehand..."
Buffy nodded, confirming it. "Well... I've been feeling really weird all day."
"And you'd be immune to black magic spells by a caster who's drawing on that same source."
Buffy grimaced. "That is obviously not true, or I wouldn't be you right now!"
"But it is," Willow insisted. "The spell worked before because it was only Thursday the twelfth... once it was after midnight, the spell didn't work on you or me, though you felt her spellcasting."
Buffy looked a little frightened. "I've always been on the receiving end of black magic before... this is scary!" Probably not quite as scary as being on the receiving end, but certainly unnerving as hell.
"Don't worry," Willow assured her wryly, "you've got an expert guide. Me."
Buffy gave her a Look.
"Just kidding." Willow focused. "I might be immune too, because I'm in your body. But I could be wrong about that. I don't know exactly if this kind of fixation is purely spiritual, or also physical."
"We have to risk it." Buffy shook back her chin-length red hair. "We need some kind of beheading-type weapon."
Willow grinned. "Got it covered. I brought your slaying bag." She deposited it triumphantly in Buffy's arms. "Are there any, like, daggers in here?"
"A couple." Buffy pulled them out. "Ready?"
Willow grabbed the second dagger. "No no, that's not all. Buffy, what do you use to lure a really big spider?"
"A really big fly?"
"Exactly." Willow nodded gravely. "She's going to think I'm the Slayer. She wants me dead. So I'll be the bait. We know you're immune to her magic, so you sneak up while I distract her, and behead her."
"But Willow, what if you aren't immune?"
Willow shrugged. "Then she'll kill me -- but meanwhile, she'll be really distracted?"
"I'm not lovin' this plan."
"Do you want Angel to spend the rest of his life in Xander's body?"
Buffy brandished her dagger. "Okay, I like it."
The demon -- let's call her Spider-girl, shall we? -- paced around the science lab, muttering to herself. "Tolkein ripoff, is it? I'll show them. Ha!" Glancing out the window, she ascertained that the library roof, distinctive in that it was the only lit building on campus, was within visible range. Good. "It's just like I've always said," she commented as she assembled various spell components for her next casting. "If you want something done right, you gotta do it yourself. Or was that Shakespeare? Not important. If the vamps are fast enough to get out of the building when the library goes up in flames, then they deserve to live. If not, well, they can just fry along with the Slayer."
"I don't think so," came a new voice from the doorway. The demoness whirled.
Armed with knife, holy water, and several stakes stuck in her belt, stood a small human girl. Blond. A hiss escaped Spider-girl's mouth at recognition. "Slayer!" she snarled. Abstractedly, she started coming up with a list of anatomically impossible places she would shove that radio if she ever caught up with the owner.
"Do you guys ever come up with new lines?" complained the Slayer as she strode, apparently casually, into the laboratory. She glanced around at the wrecked tables, the horrid black stains and various other stains in the carpet, and the thick spiderwebs everywhere. "Love what you've done with the decor, though."
Spider-girl could not believe her own luck. Here was the prize she had been searching for all night, just walking into her net. Literally -- net. The 'webs' that were strewn in the door area stirred and began to move, weaving themselves across the entryway.
"Step into my parlor, Miss Fly?" purred the demon. "So kind of you to attend. I've been looking for you." She took a slight step towards the Slayer, confident of her own unnatural speed and reflexes to defend her should the Slayer attack. She paused, a frown creasing her misshapen features. She could feel the power she had been looking for, in this very room, but it did not seem to be emanating from the Slayer...
Willow, terrified, took another step towards the demon, clutching the dagger nervously. For all that this had been her plan, nearly to the letter, she wanted nothing more than to turn and run. She glanced around in irritation, looking for that annoying boom box which was now playing the 'Mission Impossible' theme. She could hear Buffy-in-Willow crawling above them in the ceiling, slowly making her way towards a suitable position for decapitation. The tiny thumps and scratches were so loud to Willow, she could not believe that the demon had not heard it.
Willow gulped; the demoness, with an undeniable look of suspicion, had moved several steps closer. "What new trick is this?" it growled, wholly focused on the transformed Hacker.
Willow took a step backwards, as she tried to come up with a suitably perky comment to keep the conversation going. "W-we were getting along so well," she stammered. From the sound of it, Buffy was almost in the right place -- just ten more seconds...
"What's this 'we'?" demanded the demon. Without giving her opponent time to reply, she began casting the spell that the Slayer's arrival had interrupted. The room burst into chaos.
Willow's theory had been right; the demon's spells didn't affect her in Buffy's form. But under cover of the explosion of fire that she had conjured, the giant spider sprang towards the hacker, a tower of horn and sinew*. At the same moment, in a shower of annoying little fake plaster bits, Buffy dropped from the ceiling and landed squarely on the demoness' back.The enemies wrestled as Buffy tried to get into a good position to put the knife to its proper and accustomed use.
Willow shrieked and covered her head in her arms, seeing impending death bearing down on her in the form of a really really ugly spider-thing. After a moment or two in which she was not decapitated, eviscerated or disemboweled, she straightened up with a puzzled frown and glanced around the merrily burning room.
Buffy had managed to get in several extremely painful, though sadly not fatal, hits with the knife, and was now riding the spider -- demon -- witch -- (for the love of God, somebody give me a pronoun!) -- thing -- around like a fresh Bronco horse. "Hold still!" Buffy yelled, frustrated.
The demon did not deign to comply. Giving up her attempt to slam her back against the wall and thus squash Buffy like a bug, Spider-Girl whirled again and rushed at Willow, determined to take down at least one of the confounding duo.
Willow, without really understanding what her body was doing, because her conscious mind was still babbling like a flooded brook and searching for some shadowy corner of her brain to hide in, aligned herself for a blow and punched the demoness in the mandibles with all her Slayer strength. On an unstable combination reflexes and adrenaline, Willow leapt into the fray with dagger in hand. By the time she stopped to think about WHAT THE BLOODY HELL SHE WAS DOING, she and Buffy had the demon unconscious, helpless and half-decapitated on the ground.
"Hey," she panted, wiping the sweat off her forehead as she and her friend paused to rest before completing the job. "That was cool--I've always wished I could be strong..."
Buffy raised one eyebrow. "You want it?"
Although it was meant as a joke, they both fell silent in the instant, their smiles fading. If they did nothing, and let the spellcaster die without being fully beheaded, then Buffy could have the normal life and idyllic family she'd always dreamed of -- Willow could be strong, and beautiful, and all the abilities of Buffy's she'd always envied -- perhaps Xander would start lusting after her at last -- surely the boys would understand...
Green eyes met blue-green as the inner debate raged.
Then -- "Naaaahh," they said in unison. Without another word spoken, both knives dived down, and finished the gruesome work.
When they could see again, the fire was almost out, and they were looking at each other from their own eyes.
"Well, that was certainly interesting," was the comment that popped out of Willow's mouth. She promptly covered it with her hand and winced.
Luckily Buffy, dirty, exhausted and covered in greenish slime, was not in the mood to fight. Rather, she shrugged, tossed her (blond!) hair over her shoulders, grinned, and said, "I don't know why I was steeling myself up for this whole Friday the Thirteenth gig. It's just been another day on the Hellmouth."
"The day's not over," Willow pointed out. At Buffy's alarmed look, she hastened to clarify. "You still have to explain to the principal exactly what that..." a vague gesture encompassed not only the demonic carcass but the entire science lab, including the broken window where the demoness had climbed in, "is."
Buffy's gaze locked on something over Willow's shoulder; her eyes widened. "I may not have to worry about that," she said, pointing. Willow whirled around to see the flames, left over from the witch's fireball, slowly expanding to encompass the room behind her.
"Time to make our exit?" Willow offered.
"Excellent idea," the Slayer agreed. The demon-fighters hastened out the door, and left the Hellmouth's most recent rising (evil) star to her pyre.
And she could hope, Buffy mentally added as they set off for the library, the damned stereo would be incinerated along with the mess.
*How many people got that reference? Think classic fantasy series which featured very dangerous overgrown spiders... the originals. No, not Lovecraft.
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The Brotherhood ][ Last Man Out ][ Blacklight
Behind the Scenes ][ What's Mine Is Yours ][ 3 Thru The Merry-O
Swing Set ][ The Healer ][ Black & White
The Meek Shall Inherit ][ Rosemary For Remembrance
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