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Chapter Two

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If Buffy had been smart, she would have called for backup. Not with conscious Drusilla but with unconscious Drusilla because Drusilla in every form was extremely heavy when your arm is out of socket. Buffy needed a vertical wall to throw herself against to put her arm back, which was not provided in a sewer. The walls were round and Drusilla was still very heavy.

She was taking the very stinky route to avoid questioning eyes and nosy glances. Buffy felt that dragging a dead bleeding body through the middle of a circus would arouse some suspicion if not trauma. So she half floated half dragged the vampire back to the cages.

Undoing the handcuffs provided some difficulty, but once mastered, Buffy realized that it was not the difficult part. She flung Drusilla’s body over her shoulder and with one arm, Buffy climbed up the steps to where the other vampires play.

All three vamps were out of their ropes. The blond girl wasn’t surprised. They weren’t magical ropes and they would have used pure strength in getting out. But it would make this more difficult. Buffy wasn’t in the mood to fend off all three vampires.

“Tsk tsk tsk. Drusilla seems to have given our little slayer a little trouble.” The oldest vampire said while pacing across the entrance of the cage. She was heartbreakingly beautiful and the complete opposite of the mad vampire Buffy had on the floor. Darla was tall, blond, statuesque, cruel, and ruthless. Out of all the four vampires, she hated Buffy the most. She had sired Angelus us, the dark haired handsome vampire, who liked to flirt around with Drusilla, much to the disgust of his sire. He was everything Darla was and more. He had the pleasure seeking drive that his sire did not possess yet he had none of her focus. The two made a deadly team.

Spike and Drusilla were hardly the same pair that their sires and grandsires were. Angelus sired Drusilla after torturing her and making her insane. She now spoke of nothing except drabble. Buffy suspected she was living in a completely different world, in another time even. Spike was sired from Drusilla’s boredom and had nothing his grand and great-grand-sire possessed. He was intensely possessive of Drusilla, especially when she flirted with Angelus, and yearned to prove himself constantly. But where Darla had focus on the big picture, he had none. Spike only thought of the now, today, and nothing of tomorrow. He was immensely cocky and pretty in a lean, blond way versus Angelus' dark and muscular one. She admired them like she admired a rabid purebred dog, the amazement that they looked as good as they did while foam dripped from their mouths.

Buffy thought of how she could possibly get the three of them to back away from the entry of the door. Darla was pacing in front of the entry, Spike was aching to get his hands on his lover, and Angelus was watching calmly from the back of the cage with his eyes half lidded, but fully conscious.

Buffy watched them pace back and forth in the cage. Then she pressed her hand against the lock. As the computer confirmed her prints, she took the two empty tranquilizer darts and threw them. The jagged one hit Darla in the shin while the other hit Spike in the neck. Both paused for only half a second, giving Buffy the time to throw Drusilla into the cage and slam the door shut.

Darla ripped the dart out of her shin, and then went to where Drusilla lay. She looked down at the vampire, in Spike’s arms. She sniffed, then sat down on her cot and began to re-read The Historian.

Buffy walked over to the speaker.

“Jonathon. How much time do I have?”

“Willow! Remember when Darth Vader tried to tempt Luke to the dark side by using Leia and Han as bait? If you don’t, it was the last thirty minutes of The Empire Strikes Back.”

His voice was shaky and there was loud talking in the background. It only meant one thing; that Ben Wilkinson was there. Buffy shuddered. Everyone knew how much she disliked him, so everyone constantly covered for her by muffling his voice and calling her whoever was out at the moment.

“Right Jonathon. I will be there in thirty. And can we keep this between the two of us?”

“Sure Willow! Any time.”

“Thanks.”

“She needs a bandage.” Buffy heard from behind her. She turned around and took a look at the cage. Spike was at the edge, standing completely still. “Give me gauze you bleeding bitch.”

“Your bitch is bleeding more than I am.” Buffy snapped and threw him the roll of gauze, “And doesn’t your kind get turned on by this sort of thing?”

“No more than your boyfriend, Milkingcow.”

“Ben Wilkinson isn’t a masochist, nor is he a vampire, nor is he my boyfriend.” She replied. She reached forward and slammed her body against the wall. With a sickening pop, she felt her arm slide back into the socket. She suddenly felt very tired. “When you get done with the gauze, can you hang yourself?”

“My pleasure, Slayer.”

It was hard to look aloof when you are bleeding and have just come from the sewers. It was even harder when you knew you were going back into the sewers to avoid the wealthiest yuppie you have ever known. Yup. Her day stunk as much as she was going to.


* * * * * *

Buffy arose from the sewer system to confront Jonathon. She had confirmed with him before she got to fresh air, that Ben Wilkinson was bashing Giles for his ‘poor’ performance tonight. This just reminded the girl of how much she loved Giles.

Jonathon’s room was the equivalent of a secretary’s office. Every line needed to be switched to another line if there needed to be any person to person contact. He was the hub of everything, and this was a concept that only he could understand. So when Jonathon said that he would do anything for Buffy, it was quite a statement. Not that he would really do anything for her. There were limits.

Her stinkiness apparently bordered one of them.

“Buffy, you really need to take a shower.”

“In a moment, what is going on?”

He put on his earphones and started to switch wires around... listening into different conversations. Buffy also liked the fact that Jonathon knew just about everything and would tell her everything he knew.

“Anya is on stage. Spike is talking to Drusilla. Apparently he is quite put out with you. Be careful today.”

“He’ll get over it.”

“Wilkinson is with Giles. Giles is trying to make excuses for your absence and Ben is chewing him out.”

“I’ll remember to cook him dinner.”

A beat. “You don’t cook.”

“Maybe I’ll take him out to breakfast.”

“Good idea.”

Silence.

“Ummm. Hold on a second.” Silence for a moment, then Buffy unplugged Jonathon’s wire.

“Just because Tara and Willow forget that there is a speaker in the dressing room, does not mean that you get to listen to their conversations.”

Jonathon blushed five shades of red.

“And don’t you dare think of jerking off.”

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“Ever since the entrapment of all demons, there are few organizations that show you their faces. We are one of the rarest. You have seen Polgaras, Fyarls, Gnarls, Tsuvolti, and Hellhounds, Pixies, Trolls, but you have never seen a demon so devious and close to our kind. Ladies and Gentlemen, I present to you the three of the most vicious vampires in history, and the only woman in the world who can control them; Darla, Angelus, Spike, and Buffy their Vampire Slayer!”

The light disappeared, then shone again on a tiny blond. Her hair was pulled back in a slick ponytail, her outfit was a black jeans that hung to her body like a possessive boyfriend and a black long sleeve tee-shirt. In one hand, a whip, the other held a knife, on her belt, there were vials of blood. She was ready.

Buffy slowly turned to show her accessories and then the lights hit a cage, descending ropelessly. Buffy jumped and back flipped onto the top of the cage and the crowd watched as the vampires snarled menacingly at the people around them.

Then, in an unexpected move, the walls of the cage collapsed while the top remained stable. The mob gasped and screamed, holding onto their friends and lovers. The vampires reached the edge of the ring, and growled at the spectators in their vampiric faces. There were some who were skeptical about the lack of the fourth vampire; those who looked in their brochures would see that the second female was missing. But very few were that skeptical, because most were in front of the beast, with their growls and teeth.

The three walls of the cage closed up while the excluding wall rose above them all, creating an apparent opening. Buffy leapt down from the ceiling in a cat like move. She cracked her whip and the vampires came towards her slowly. Darla and Angelus came in a pair, hoping to steal some blood from her belt, or even better, from herself. But unusually, Spike stalked forward slowly and cautiously, unlike his normal reckless abandon.

Angelus moved first, kicking and baring his teeth. They fought for minutes, neither letting the other gain an upper hand. The male vampire grabbed a few vials of blood and each time, the masses of surrounding people booed and hissed whenever he drank it with glee. It was a game where the house always won.

The rule today was to attack one at a time, a rule set down before they went out on stage by their trainer and feeder. Buffy could fight them off and escape with her life but she knew that today, if they fought better than normal, she would die. Willow was in charge of their movements and kept Darla and Spike in an invisible outer ring. Tara ruled over the wireless special effects, and would back up Willow if she was too tired.

Buffy circled, then in a blur she kicked twice and threw Angelus into the cage. Tara blocked it so he couldn’t get out. Buffy felt her energy seeping away. She then reached into her pocket and pulled out a flask. Taped to the cap were two adrenaline pills. She downed the pills with a pick pocket’s practice while the spectators only saw her drink a clear liquid from her flask. No one saw her intake, but the ringmaster in the background suspected what she had done.

Darla was a completely different fighter. She moved with stealth and cunning, circling twice before making her final move. Out of all the demons, she tended to be the hardest to battle. Angelus depended on brute strength and Drusilla would sway, but Darla had speed and grace. Buffy cracked her whip a few times, and Darla moved cautiously away. Then she ran and hit Buffy in her wounded arm, grabbing a few vials. Buffy cried out and her knife hit the ground but not before her whip lashed out and grabbed Darla by the waist. Buffy then rolled and as her whip wrapped around her, Darla inched closer and closer until they were nose to nose. Darla lunged for Buffy but the blond in black had the upper hand. A burst of adrenaline and Buffy propelled the vampire into the cage with her mate, which left only one. Spike.

Spike was unpredictable. Sometimes he would be the easiest out of the four, hitting and kicking without any passion. But other times, he would leave Buffy breathless. Always, he had a smirk on his face and a wicked gleam in his eye. However, today, something was different. He didn’t seem to be in his normal frame of mind, nor was he gleaming. Spike looked like he was out for vengeance. When Jonathon said she should be careful, Buffy had prepared a fight, but she wondered if she was over her head this time.

Buffy felt the adrenaline working by the time he had walked into the center of the ring. Her body was itching for a fight and it was painless from the pills. Spike circled dangerously, never letting her out of her sight. She jumped back and forth, waiting for the moment to come, but it never did. Impatient, she lunged first, and it was cue for him to react. He grabbed her arm and swung her around. Buffy punched him with her bad arm, Spike let go and threw her onto her bruised back. They were fighting dirty, punching where it hurt, where it would count the most. Finally, when Spike was bleeding from his arm and Buffy looked like a plum, Buffy took her whip and swung, knocking Spike and herself into the cage. It was the most dangerous place she could possibly be but Willow had her back. Buffy threw the rest of her vials at the vampires and ran out battered and bloody but alive.

The spectators roared.

The lights went out.

It was over.