It was shortly before midnight when Willow and Xander arrived at the crypt. Spike was casually perched on the sarcophagus smoking a cigarette while Buffy checked over her supplies and weapons. They had arrived at the crypt well over an hour earlier after Buffy had changed into appropriate 'skulking attire' as she called it. He had hoped that they might make love before the others arrived, but Buffy had been too tense. Spike hadn't tried to force the issue. He just hoped it wasn't a foreshadowing of things to come.

Once Buffy was sure that they had everything they needed she nodded to Spike to lead the way into the tunnels. Bringing up the rear, she deliberately put everything but the mission out of her mind. She would think about Spike and her friends and her Watcher later. And, dear God, her mother would have to be told, and how that> revelation was going to fly she just didn't want to even think about. She knew that if she just broke up with Spike, she could leave off the whole 'mom has to be told' bit, but she didn't think that was an option yet.

It didn't take long to reach the passageway and once again Willow opened the door into the crawlspace using the command from her laptop. And as before, Buffy led the way. They had decided that they would enter from a storage or office area past the prison compound. They wanted to be as far away from the control center as possible even though it also meant that they would be farther away from the door to the tunnels. It also made sense to investigate as much as they could from the crawlspace before they committed themselves to entering.

The main room did indeed seem less crowded with soldiers and personnel than it had the previous week. Disturbingly, although Buffy couldn't say why it disturbed her, the demon's prison compound was also less crowded.

At last, they came to what seemed a well maintained office, perhaps one used by whoever was in charge or a second in command. Willow came forward at that point, laid out a few stones and pieces of colored glass and poured some sand in a sacred circle. Taking a small wire from her bag she waved it over the spell ingredients and started chanting. Spike's vampire senses could pick up the sharp smell of ozone and an odd buzzing filtered through his brain followed by a sharp pain. Gasping quietly, he grabbed his head wincing as the pain stabbed through his skull.

Buffy looked at him sharply, worried that something was wrong with him, but he looked up after a second and nodded to her that he was all right. For some reason, the witch's spell had apparently set off whatever it was they had put in his cranium but it was okay now. With a final flourish and a soft pop, the spell was completed.

"It should be okay now Buffy," Willow whispered. "The security system will appear to be still online, but it won't register us. We have about three hours until the spell wears off."

"Good, let's go then." Buffy nodded to Xander and he took his place at the grating and began to unfasten it. One screw didn't want to give, but Spike reached forward and with a quick twist loosened it. Xander bobbed his head in thanks and then quickly removed the rest of the screws. Buffy reached forward and quietly removed the grating from the wall. Handing a rope to Spike, she threw the end down the wall and slid down it quickly as Spike acted as anchor. Xander followed and then Willow. Spike jumped down with the stealth of a cat, landing silently beside the others. Despite themselves, Xander and Willow were impressed. Spike just winked at them.

Willow went over to the office's computer, booted it up and once again took spell ingredients from her bag. She positioned them on the shelf in front of the computer's tower and then taking a cable attached to her laptop, she linked the two computers. Once everything was in readiness, she began her spell. Data streamed over the desktop's monitor and Willow's laptop downloaded the information. Willow sat back and watched the computers' activities carefully explaining what was happening. "I set the spell's perimeters to what we discussed in our planning sessions. With luck we'll get most of what we need and not too much unnecessary info. I put a new hard drive in my computer with only the barest programming needed to make it operate so that there was plenty of room to download this information." Frowning at the data stream she continued, "This is all encrypted of course so it may take me awhile to break the code and be able to read what we've gathered, but Jasper also gave me a spell I can adapt to help with that." Willow flashed a smile at Buffy. "Those guys are pretty neat. I think they wanted to come to Sunnydale and help, but I told them we had to keep our strike force small."

Buffy forced a smile, but she was starting to get itchy. Her spidey-sense was screaming at her that they needed to get out of there as soon as possible. Unfortunately, the data download was going to take time even with the magic enhancement.

Spike was picking up on Buffy's tension which made him tense too. His natural restlessness was causing him to want to pace, but he was aware of the need to remain as calm and quiet as possible. This was so against his nature that he was having difficulty keeping his demon suppressed.

After what seemed an eternity, Willow finally shut off her laptop, disconnected the cable, removed her spell ingredients and put everything back the way it had been. When they were sure everything was property restored, Spike leaped up to the grate opening and pulled himself back into the crawlspace.

Lowering the rope he pulled Willow up and then Xander. Buffy climbed the rope monkey-like and quickly joined her friends. Resetting the grate in place, Xander replaced the screws and the four headed back towards the tunnels as rapidly as the need for stealth allowed them. They all heaved a sigh of relief once they had exited the crawlspace and resealed the door. As an added precaution, Willow added a spell which made the door impossible to open from the inside.

***

Willow spent the next week working on the data they had pirated and finally broke part of the code with exciting results. She was able to ascertain that the organization in charge of the commandos was called "The Initiative". The information was still sketchy at best, but there was no doubt that experiments and research were being conducted on "Hostile Sub-Terrestrials" or "HSTs". What the experiments consisted of and what was the goal was unfortunately still part of the encrypted data. However, it did mention that the main laboratory where the most serious experiments were conducted was listed as "Room 314".

As well as the information regarding "The Initiative" Willow was also able to break the code that contained a schematic of the facility's floorplan. And Buffy noticed that part of the blueprint behind the section marked "314" appeared to be missing. Now that was interesting.

***

Once again nervous subordinates brought bad news to Maggie Walsh. Looking coldly at the technicians she inquired, "You're sure there was a security breach in the computer?"

"Yes ma'am. It was quite expertly done. It was only by accident that Robinson noticed a small glitch in the data stream. We think that a computer terminal in one of the offices was accessed. We still don't know exactly how it was done."

Robinson quickly added, "We're doing a complete diagnostic on the security system for the past two months, but so far we've found nothing to indicate that any unauthorized personnel have gained entry into the compound."

"Keep checking gentlemen and let me know immediately when you find out what happened." With a deadly glare Maggie added, "And you will find out what happened."

Nodding in nervous agreement the two computer technicians rapidly returned to the safety of their terminals. To be honest, Maggie Walsh scared them more than all of the HSTs combined.

Maggie sat back in her chair thinking about what she had just been told. She had a definite idea as to who was behind the break in. Miss Buffy Summers and her vampire lover were no doubt the culprits. Maggie wasn't sure how they had evaded security, but she would find out, take countermeasures and then lead Miss Summers into the end game. She had plans for Buffy. Big plans.