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Chapter 17

“May I see the vampire?” Maggie Walsh asked without greeting the sanitarium doctor.

“Right away, Professor Walsh.” The doctor saluted his former commander. “This one is in better shape then the last one. He’s actually alert and feisty.”

“Excellent.” Maggie Walsh followed the doctor down a long corridor to a security room. When they got into the room, a bank of television sets covered one wall. “Which one is he?”

The doctor pointed to a screen where a dark-haired specimen was rolling around the floor fighting against the straightjacket that encircled his body.

Walsh took a seat to study her newest acquisition for awhile before she presented herself to him. She noted that he was shouting something as he rolled around. She looked at the doctor. “What is he saying?”

“He is insisting that he’s the Champion of the Powers that Be. He’s quite adamant that we let him go, and that he needs to get home to Sunnydale to his child.” The doctor tilted his head. “Can a vampire have children?”

“Not possible. Their seed is quite dead.” Walsh tapped her chin. “Sunnydale. That’s quite interesting. I tried to set up a base in Sunnydale, but I was vetoed with no explanation given. This could be my opportunity to find out more about that town.”

“Will you request to be assigned there again?”

Maggie shook her head. “No, some group in England has banned any military interference in Sunnydale. I just wish to know about the town for my files.”

“Do you wish for us to prep him for travel, Professor?”

“Yes, please do.” Walsh looked at her former subordinate. “While you’re at it, can you prep him for Demon Truth?”

“Of course, Professor.” The doctor left the room. He almost felt sorry for the monster in the other room. Demon Truth was a serum discovered by the Initiative while on a mission in Belize. No secret could be hidden from the drug. The demon was forced to bare all of its secrets no matter how trivial.

Maggie went back to watching the screen. She saw the big, husky orderlies enter the room, followed by the doctor. The orderlies held the vampire down, careful of the creature’s fangs, while the doctor plunged a syringe into its neck.

Angel fought the humans that held him down, but the straightjacket hindered him. He screamed obscenities at the man that held a needle. He fell into darkness as soon as the hypodermic entered his skin.

Angel had no idea how much time had passed when he woke up. It could have been minutes or days for all he knew. When he tried to move, he realized that he couldn’t move. He was strapped in the upright position.

“Tell me what your name was before you were turned,” a disembodied voice demanded.

Angel opened his mouth to tell the voice to fuck off, but instead he found himself telling his entire life history.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

“Buffy, can I talk to you for a minute?” Anne said softly to her vampiric counterpart. She nodded her head towards the basement stairs. “I have some news for you.”

“Okay.” Buffy nodded. She followed the older Slayer to the basement. “What’s the what?”

“The Angel who did all this to you isn’t coming back with my mate, but the one from our dimension is.” Anne sighed. “I understand that you don’t want to see him. So, he’ll be going to the apartment to hang out, but I wanted to warn you that he’s here in town.”

“Will he hurt me?” Buffy gulped nervously.

“Nah, he’s okay. Darla didn’t curse him like she did here.” Anne shrugged. “Now, if he gets all happy, that’s a different story. His soul has a happiness curse on it. One happy, and he’s Angelus.”

“When will they be here?” Buffy looked concerned.

“In about a half hour, I think.” Anne grinned. She really missed William, and she was glad that they’d be together again. “We’ll have our meeting about the Master. I think we’ll be out of your hair really soon. We need to move on to keep away from our Willow.”

Upstairs the doorbell rang to herald the arrival of the first of the guests that planned on attending the ‘Eliminate the Master’ Scooby meeting.

“We better get upstairs.” Anne smirked. “Don’t want any of them to kill each other before dinner. Besides, I need to introduce Clem to Spike. They’re gonna be great buddies.” She pulled her counterpart towards the stairs.

Spike opened the front door to find Xander, Anya, Giles, and Serina on the other side. He ushered them inside, sending the women to the kitchen with the goodies that they had brought for dinner. Xander and Anya had been there earlier until they realized they needed go out to find something for the potluck dinner.

Anne and Buffy ascended into the kitchen to find Serina and Anya placing two big square dishes, and a big round foil covered bowl on the counter. They looked at the identical Slayers, and they both smiled in greeting.

“I made two lasagnas,” Serina said. “My specialty from my Italian grandmother. One is vegetable lasagna, and the other is traditional.”

“Serina helped me make a fruit salad.” Anya pointed at the bowl. “Should I put it in the fridge?”

“Sure go ahead.” Anne waved towards the appliance in question. “I’m just glad you didn’t bring anything like what was served at the Wedding-that-didn’t. I don’t think this crowd is ready for some of the more exotic demon foods.”

“There’re demon foods?” Willow entered the kitchen carrying several loaves of bread and a tub of garlic butter. When the other women looked at her in surprise, she shrugged. “Yeah, we’re back from Vegas. The gang is dropping Liam off at the apartment right now.”

“Oh, yeah.” Anne giggled while she answered Willow’s question. “We had to keep Xander’s family all distracted from the moving food on the plates at the rehearsal dinner.”

“How did you explain everything to the Harris’?” Willow went to the counter where she started to prepare the garlic bread.

“Congratulations, Anya, you now belong to the circus.” Anne laughed at the surprised look on her face.

“Buffy, can you come in here for a minute,” Giles called out. “There’s someone who wants to see you.”

Buffy left the kitchen, and in a few seconds the ladies still in the kitchen heard the turned Slayer cry out, “Mom!”

“I didn’t know Mom was coming tonight,” Anne said. She peered out the kitchen door like she was trying to catch a glimpse of the older woman.

“Giles thought it would be a nice surprise.” Serina moved to touch Anne on the shoulder. “He warned Joyce about you, if you want to go in and say hello.”

“I don’t know.” Anne bit her lip. “I mean, she just found out her real daughter is not completely dead. She doesn’t need another one buggering up the reunion.”

“How long have you been hanging out with Spike?” Willow asked. “I have to say ‘buggered’ isn’t really a Buffy word.”

“We’ve been together for a few years now.” Anne got a little smile on her face.

“We sure have, luv.” William sauntered into the kitchen. He stumbled backwards a bit when Anne leapt onto his body, surrounding him with her legs and arms. Their mouths met in a scorching welcome.

Willow’s cheeks turned a bright red with embarrassment, and she turned to her task of buttering the bread. Serina gave a serene smile as she read the Immortal Guardians’ happy auras.

In the living room, the others watched as Buffy got reacquainted with her mother. Clem had shown up with his new girlfriend, a very nice human woman named Jack who worked as a bartender at the Bronze. They brought along another demon that looked completely human by the name of Richard Jones. Richard was an Uxia demon that owned and operated a tattoo parlor in town. He was the representative for the demonic population. The deputy mayor Alan Finch brought along Willy from the Alibi Room as a representative from the human businessmen in the town. Hassib and his lovely wives were the last to arrive, bringing a salad and some news from about the other dimensions.

After a nice dinner of lasagna with all the trimmings followed by key lime cheesecake, the group got down to business.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Buffy patrolled alone that night. Angel was off doing what ever it was he did when he wasn’t being Mr. Cryptic-I’m-too-old-for-you guy, Giles and Willow were shelving books at the school library, and Xander had a date. Buffy just hoped she didn’t have to kill this one. Killing her friend’s dates was getting to be a bit boring.

“Maybe we need a Scooby dating quiz,” Buffy muttered to herself. She twirled the stake she was carrying.

“Slayer, we meet again,” Spike snarled.

Buffy whirled around to find the bleached blond vampire standing a few feet away. “Spike! Just who I was looking for. The fledges have been damned boring tonight. Dusting without a fight, let me tell you.”

“So, you wanna dance, Slayer?” Spike cocked his head to one side.

“You betcha!”

The fight was on. The Slayer and the vampire circled each other for a few seconds before one of them threw the first punch. Buffy was just getting into the fight when a cold shiver went down her spine, and she stopped suddenly as she looked around wildly.

“Spike, I’m scared,” Buffy said in a little girl voice.

Spike stopped fighting the same time that Buffy did. He extended his senses trying to catch a glimpse of what had so cleverly brushed up against himself and the Slayer. He stepped towards the girl, who was now hugging her body and shivering. “Me too, luv,” the vampire replied.

Buffy felt an overwhelming need to step closer to Spike, and when he opened his arms to her, she gratefully stepped into them. “If you’re scared, and I’m scared, it must be something really bad.”

“Yeah, it’s something bad.” Spike continued to scan the graveyard for something out of the ordinary. He noticed a blue light out of the corner of one eye. When he turned to catch a better glimpse, he realized it was a vortex of some kind. Turning to give the swirling light a better look, he noticed a black phantom sliding through the currents that made up the vortex. “There it is.”

Buffy turned to look at the creature. “I don’t like the feeling of this. I’m feeling pretty wonky now.”

“I agree. Let’s go find the Watcher.” Spike grabbed Buffy’s sleeve, and they ran at full speed towards the school and Giles.

Giles, Willow, and Xander looked up in surprise when Buffy and Spike slammed into the library, breathless from running.

“What’s he doing here?” Xander demanded. He didn’t like the way Buffy stayed snuggled up against the notorious vampire.

“There’s something out there,” Buffy panted. “It came through a vortex thingie.”

Angel stepped out of the stacks at that moment. He could smell the fear rolling off both Spike and Buffy, and he knew if Spike was scared then it was something really bad. The Spike he knew wasn’t scared of anything. In fact none of the Spikes he had ever met had been this scared except under one certain condition. “Tell me what happened.”

Spike and Buffy looked at the older vampire, and then at each other. Buffy spoke for the two of them. “I got really cold first. Then, I was scared like nothing I’ve ever been before. Spike noticed some kind of vortex.”

“A dark shadow creature came out of it,” Spike continued.

Angel gave a sigh. “I was afraid of this. The Shades have finally come to this dimension.”

“Angel, what are you talking about?” Giles gave the dark haired vampire a curious look.

“Let me tell you a story.” Angel descended the stairs. “A story about a vampire with a soul who did a really, really bad thing. As Spike will tell you, magic has consequences. It always has consequences.”





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