* * *
Okay, much with the weirdness on Principal Wood, as Willow searched for data on him, Kennedy, Dawn, and Amanda looking on.
“I’ve Googled till I just can’t Google no more,” she asserted.
Then Anya and Giles stomped into the room, Anya with a stack of papers. Anya handed them to Willow and said, “Giles made these for Chao-Ahn, and now she’s locked herself in the bathroom.”
“Those are flashcards,” Giles said. “I—I made them to facilitate her training. Chao-Ahn never had a Watcher.”
Crude black-and-white stick figures were swathed in blood as they were menaced by various knife-wielding evildoers labeled VAMPIRE and BRINGER. TUROK-HAN was especially hideous, looming over a girl who had been ripped in two. They reminded Willow of the pictures Giles had drawn when the Gentlemen had glided into town and stolen everyone’s voices.
“Perhaps I’ll rethink the approach,” Giles conceded.
Then Willow invited him to get researchy, and that was The First Giles heard about Buffy’s . . . event.
“Buffy has a date?” he asked, blinking.
Anya grimaced. “Didn’t you hear? Everybody has a date. Buffy has a date. Willow’s been completely making out with this girl—” She pointed to Kennedy, who said, “Hey!”
“Xander’s out with some hardware-store-whore,” she continued. “It’s Date Fest 2003.”
With that, she sat down.
“Buffy’s actually investigating Principal Wood,” Willow allowed. “It’s not a date.”
“Really?” Giles asked, somewhat mollified.
“It might be a date,” Willow said guiltily.
“For God’s sake!” Giles cried. “How can anyone think about their social life? We’re about to fight the original, primal evil. These girls are in mortal danger. Didn’t you see the flashcards? This isn’t right!”
Neither is what I’m doing, Andrew thought, as he spied on them.
* * *
“This isn’t right,” Buffy said, hesitating as Principal Wood—let’s call him Robin—led her down a small dark alley.
“I know it doesn’t look promising,” he said, “but I swear this place is great. The best-kept secret in town. It’s just down this way.”
They headed into the alley, and then . . . vamps attacked!
They came at them from the shadows, surrounding them, and Buffy got into melee mode. She vaulted over one to land on the back of another, staking him through the back, and landing on the ground while he dusted under her. Then she kicked out with her feet from that position to work on the other two; she was dusting another one and then doing a flip and shouting at her date, “You set me up!”
And then she had the chance to observe him in action and he dusted two vamps in quick succession, pffft pffft,—yeeeea! just like that.
He held out a hand to help her up.
“The restaurant’s right there,” he said.
And so it was.
* * *
Lissa was not only hot, but she was a great listener, too, so Xander poured his heart out about Anya. After all, they had just had their not-anniversary, so, ouch. But she said, “It turned out good for me, and that’s what really matters, right?”
He laughed and nodded, and said, “I should have taken you on a nicer date than this.”
Her answering smile was sexy. “Well, I can think of something fun to do. . . .”
* * *
The restaurant was intimate and romantic, just the place for good food and true confessions, as Robin opened up to Buffy about the battle they’d just won.
“I’ve had a little practice,” he allowed. “Never took on two at once before, but I’ve taken out a vamp here or there. And some demons.”
“So, you’re . . . freelance?” she asked.
“Freelance.” He considered that. “Yes, I guess that would be a good way to put it.”
“And you know who I am?” she asked him.
“You’re the Slayer.”
“Right.” She took that in. “So . . . I’m guessing that you don’t work in an office about fifteen feet over a Hell-mouth because you love educational administration.”
He grinned at her. “I actually do enjoy the work, but you’re right, I maneuvered myself into that school, that office, just like I maneuvered you there. The Hell-mouth draws the bad things in close, and now we’re headed for something big, Buffy. Really big.” His demeanor lost all traces of amusement. “Really big, and I need to be here where it happens. I want to help.”
“So, you didn’t want me for my counseling skills?” she asked obliquely.
He burst into a flurry of laughter much like Willow’s, the caught himself and assured her, quite seriously, “They’re valuable, too.”
“Why didn’t you tell me about you?” she asked, cocking her head.
“I wasn’t sure about things yet. Not sure I was ready yet. Now the fight is starting and I don’t have time to worry anymore. I have to do something.”
“So, you knew who I was before you even came here,” she said. “How do you know about Slayers?”
He nodded, as if they were getting down to brass tacks. “See, when I was a little boy, my mother was one. The one, actually. The Slayer.”
“Your moth . . .” She caught her breath, shaken. “Wow. I didn’t know that any Slayers had children.”
“Well, I don’t know of any others,” he conceded. “She was killed when I was four. I still remember her, but it’s a little . . .” He searched for a word. “Fuzzy? You know?”
She had to ask, although she didn’t really want to: “Um, something got her . . . a demon?”
“A vampire.” He got a faraway look in his eyes. “I went through this whole ‘avenging son’ phase in my twenties, but I never found him. So now I just dust as many of them as I can find. I figure eventually I’ll get him. That’s probably why we got jumped outside. I’m not very popular with the bumpy-forehead crowd. I bet you aren’t, either.”
She shook her head. “No. Not most of them. Um, so, do you have any Slayer powers?” She laugh self-consciously. “I’m sorry, I—I’m just so floored. I—I have no idea what to ask.”
“No, I don’t have powers,” he told her. “No super-strength or mythic responsibilities. I’m just a guy with a few skills ’cause her Watcher took me in and raised me.”
“So you decided to tell me . . . in a darkened, little romantic French restaurant?”
He gazed at her, and it was a man-to-woman kind of gaze. “Yeah. I’m not really sure how that happened, but yeah.”
* * *
Still mired in the wrongness, Andrew parlayed with Jonathan/The First in the living room. Andrew had a paper bag and Jonathan had a question:
“Did you find the gun?”
“Yes. It was in Buffy’s underwear drawer. She has nice things,” Andrew reported.
“Show me,” Jonathan ordered.
“Well, I didn’t take ’em,” Andrew allowed, “but there were thongs and regular underpants . . .”
Irritated, Jonathan said, “Show me the gun.”
“Oh.” Andrew opened the paper bag to show him the gun. “Willow tried shooting Kennedy with that.”
“Great.” Jonathan got down to business. “There’s going to be panic and fleeing when you start firing, so you’re going to have to get them trapped someplace like the basement.”
Andrew said, “Uh-huh. And we’re killing them because . . . ?”
“Because they’re the future of the Slayer line. When they’re gone, the line is gone.”
“Mmhmm, uh-huh. So why not have Spike do it?” Andrew asked. “He’s the one with the trigger.”
“It’s not time for him yet. You can wait for the next time they’re training in the basement, but don’t rely on a locked door.”
“Okay.” Then Andrew asked, with as much casualness as he could muster, “Say, um, do you have any weaknesses I should know about if I’m gonna work for you, like, uh, kryptonite or allergies? Ah,
are you made out of the evil impulses of humans, so if everyone was unconscious at the same time, you would fade away?”
Jonathan looked at him suspiciously. “You’re asking a lot of questions.”
“Yes, well, I . . . because I’m evil.” Andrew was nervously playing with desk accessories. “And I want to do the best I can at that, so I want to . . . know stuff . . . like when—when do we kill Buffy?”
“Are you wearing a wire?”
Uh-oh. ’Cause he was.
“Do you think you can trick The First?” Jonathan demanded. “I told you, Andrew. I made you do this . . .”
He pressed his hands against his sweater. They came back wet with blood.
“Jonathan suffered,” The First murmured. “He was your friend, and he trusted you, and now he spends eternity in pain because of what you did.”
“No,” Andrew gasped. “What’s happening to you?”
Like a time-delay special effects in an old horror movie, Jonathan’s face began to decay, all white and green and shiny with decomposition.
“This is what you did to him. You started down a road with that action. You have to keep going.”
“Stop looking like Jonathan,” Andrew protested in a tight, frightened voice. “You’re not him. You’re The First, and you’re trying to get me to shoot innocent girls, but I won’t do it. I’m good now. When the fight is over, I’m going to pay for killing Jonathan.”
The First shook his head. “You’re going to pay for more than that. Do you know why? Because the biggest, baddest First Evil in the world is angry with you.”
* * *
And Willow, listening in on Andrew’s wire at the dining room table, finally thought she heard something.
“You think you can trick me, women?” Jonathan’s voice boomed.
Beside her, Kennedy bolted out of her chair and took off Willow’s headphones.
“You hear only what I want you to hear,” The First proclaimed. “You see only what I want you to see.”
Then Jonathan appeared behind Amanda, who screamed and backed away with the others.
He was gross, purple-black; one eye milky. His flesh was opening, putrefying, and it was terrifying to see those dead lips open and say, “So many dead girls. There’ll be so many.”
* * *
“See, I knew it,” Xander said, resigned.
He and Lissa were in the Sunnydale High School basement. His date had tied him on the wheel Spike had been bounded to in order to be tortured, also for bleeding all over the Seal of Danthalzar, once more uncovered.
Lissa had changed into something more comfortable, a slinky High Priestess outfit all black and shiny like her hair—not unlike another wacky evil love interest of hers, the Inca mummy princess, Ampata.
“Thanks for your help selecting the ropes,” she said. “The one I picked wasn’t strong enough.”
“Yeah, that would’ve been bad,” he said. “Listen, is this because I’m a friends with Buffy?”
“Who’s Buffy?”
“The Slayer,” he answered miserably.
“You know the Slayer?” She was impressed.
She started winching up the rope, and the cross-works wheel started rising into the air. “This can’t just happen,” Xander groaned. “It just can’t keep happening that demon women find me attractive. There’s gotta be a reason.”
“You just seem like a nice guy. That’s all,” Lissa replied. “And I wanted to get to know you.”
“And kill me?” Xander asked shrilly.
Sure,” she said pleasantly. “Do the ropes hurt?”
“Yes,” Xander told her.
She smiled. “Good.”
* * *
In the living room, Willow and her contingent of eavesdroppers briefed Anya, Spike, and Giles on what had just happened with The First. Dawn was trying to peel the tape off Andrew’s chest that held the wire in place.
“So, we’re thinking,” Willow said in summation, “it didn’t go too well.”
As Dawn worked on the tape, she said to Andrew, “You should let me do this fast.”
“No. No, no. I hate that. Ow!”
Spike couldn’t believe what he was hearing. “You tried to record the ultimate evil? Why? In a complex effort to royally piss it off?”
Kennedy leaned over Willow’s shoulder. “Guess we succeeded pretty good, huh?”
“God, I never should have gone in wired.” He made his whiny Andrew moan. “Redemption is hard.”
Giles frowned. “Getting back to Spike’s question, why did you try to record it?”
“To study it,” Willow told him, over more of Andrew’s mewling. “To see if we could figure something out from what it was saying. Because, guys, we have to face it. We know nothing about The First.”
“Well, we know not to record it,” Anya ventured. “That’s something.”
“Why did it appear to this one, then?” Spike persisted, waving a hand at Andrew. “I thought it was supposed to be pulling my strings.”
“It said it wasn’t time for you yet,” Andrew said. Spike reacted to that with a very concerned frown.
Then Andrew said, “Ow,” as Dawn pulled off the last piece of tape. “Ow. I’m frightened. And my chest hurts where the tape was.” Petulantly he said down.
“It’s okay, Andrew. You did good. You stood up to it. That’s really amazing.”
Andrew smiled at her. “Thank you. You’re a peach.”
Anya said, “Yeah. What did it want you to do, anyway?”
“Shoot all the girls,” Andrew told her.
“Shoot girls?” Dawn asked nervously.
“Not you,” Andrew assured her. “Just the Potentials.”
Dawn was relieved. “Oh, well, that’s something anyway,” she said. Then, catching herself, she said soberly, “Something tragic.”
“This proves my point,” Giles said. “This is a crucial time. We need to circle our wagons and stop doing things like going out on dates when gunplay is imminent. Willow, call Buffy. Get her back here. We need to dispose of the gun and figure out our next move.”
“I’ll go get her,” Spike said.
Willow’s cell phone chirped and Amanda said, “Bet that’s her. Sometimes you’re thinking about calling someone—”
Willow checked the phone. “No, it’s a text message. From Xander. It’s one of our signals. The system we set up awhile back. Like codes.” She frowned thoughtfully. “Uh, this one’s either ‘I just got lucky, don’t call me for a while’ or ‘my date’s a demon who’s trying to kill me.’ ”
“You don’t remember which?” Kennedy asked incredulously.
Willow shrugged, made a face. “It was a long time ago.”
Dawn ventured, “Well, if we play the percentages . . .”
“Something’s eating Xander’s head,” Giles finished.
“Buffy will know what to do,” Andrew piped up.
“I’ll go get her,” Spike offered. “I can probably still track her scent. She’ll be worried about the boy.”
He was out like a shot.
* * *
And he made it to the French restaurant just in time to hear Buffy say to her date . . . very much a date, thank you very much . . . “Oh, my God, that might be the best thing I’ve ever had in my mouth.”
And then he was feeding her, for God’s sake . . . and then both looked up and saw Spike glowering there, and he said, “It’s Xander.”
* * *
I saw this movie, Xander thought as he hung kayak-style over the Seal of Dental Floss. Lair of the White Worm, Ken Russell director, starring that chick from L.A. Law . . .
“The end is coming,” Lissa said, channeling the same movie. “The final fight, and everyone is hearing the drumbeat. It’s telling us to pick our partners, align ourselves with the good or the evil.”
She’d gone all lizard eyes, and she reached forward with a long, thin knife and stabbed him in the stomach.
His blood dripped down onto the seal as he screamed
in agony, and the Seal began to glow. Appreciatively, the demon woman said, “Couldn’t have done it without you, Xander. Thanks for the great date.”
* * *
Buffy was not loving the cavalry car ride to save Xander. She was in the front next to Robin and Spike glowered some more in the back seat.
“You’re sure he’s in the high school?” she asked Spike.
“Willow did a locator spell. Usual stuff,” he bit off.
Robin was equally uncomfortable as he asked, “So, how do you two know each other?”
“He works with me,” Buffy blurted. “In the struggle against evil.”
“Cool,” Robin said.
* * *
But it was not cool. Ever so not cool.
Because as they burst into the school basement and the fight began, Buffy’s coworker turned into a vampire.
But time for that then, as Buffy and Spike fought Lissa and Robin moved to free Xander. As he eased him down, one of the triangles on the Seal cracked open and the taloned hand of some hideous creature shot through. It grabbed Robin’s leg.
Robin managed to throw Xander away from the Seal, cutting off the steady supply of blood. The triangle slammed shut, severing the arm.
From beneath the Seal, there was a scream.
Meanwhile, Spike launched himself at Lissa, hitting her high and knocking her back. Buffy was ready. When the demon flipped to her feet, Buffy swung with a sword she’d wrenched away from her and whacked off her head.
The headless body morphed into a pinkish humanoid shape with hairy shoulders, shark teeth, and black stitches.
Robin checked on the young man . . . Xander, while Buffy crossed to the vampire. Silently, they regarded each other and she checking him for injuries. They were . . . intimate. That was the only word Robin could find for what he was seeing.
Then Buffy came to Xander’s side. Tersely he said to Buffy, “I think your friend’s gonna be okay.”
Xander grimaced and said to Robin, “So, how’s your date going?”
Robin could only stare at the vampire . . . with hatred in his gaze.
* * *
At the Summers residence, those who were dateless awaited the arrival of those who were not.
“Where are they?” Anya said angrily. “I can’t believe Buffy hasn’t brought him home yet. His slut ate him up.”