Episode 89: Dark Heart

Another Mystery

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by 3D Master (3dmaster@telfort.nl)

Disclaimer: see Episode 79.

Previously, on Buffy Z:

On a time table, the demon wasted no more time.  It jumped over to the circle, and slammed its fist into the middle.  Instantly a column of fire rose up, consuming the dead bodies, and then shot several hundred meters up in the air.  There it instantly formed a small vortex, black clouds of fiery smoke formed at its edges, and then from the vortex and the clouds, drops of fire started falling.  Soon a gentle rain of fire came falling down to the earth; setting things flammable ablaze, but otherwise snuffing out quite soon.  Again the beast wasted no time, jumping away from where he had sent Faith, the same direction as the Angel Team had come from, and then flew off, burst sharply down and away.

*****

The Cordelia-clone was lying on a bed in the apartment she had gotten; an abandoned, and condemned place.  The bed was a makeshift one, some blankets for her to lie on.  She was masturbating, moaning and rubbing her vagina.  Close to her orgasm she brought her other hand over; the one in which she was holding Connor’s hair.  She pushed her fingers holding the hair inside of her, and she climaxed.  Shuddering with pleasure she extended a little of her energy in the hair, and a moment later a pink light formed in her womb, bright enough to pierce her skin and be visible on the outside.  It coiled around her, melting with her eggs, and the circling tendrils than contracted into a small crooked form; a small fetus.  Then the light dimmed, and the self-proclaimed goddess started laughing heartily.  Then she laughed harder, and in the laughter an eery wrongness entered.

*****

And now, the continuation:

Defeated.

That was the only way the feeling that hung inside the Hyperion could be described. Defeated.  The rain of fire had ended by now, the next day, the sun shining down tranquilly.   Sadly, the rest wasn’t so tranquil.  The team form Angel investigations was sitting in a various degrees of being wounded in the main office, with the exception of Fred, who was lying in bed upstairs to heal.  Outside, in the lobby, were Faith’s friends, looking in on the scene inside silently.  A few hours earlier, they had helped with the bandaging, now they just watched with silent concern at the silence inside the office.  It was already the next day, a week day, but school had been canceled after the rain of fire; indeed, not many people went in to work either.   The concept was too alien and scary for most people to simply go on like nothing had happened, so most of them stayed home for various reasons: protect it, put out any fires, contemplate existence, relaxation for handling the stress, whatever it was, they stayed home.

The Team sat silently around Wesley’s desk, on the couch or in chairs, with Wesley himself behind it in his own chair.  Faith alone was without bandages; as she was the least wounded, and her Slayer healing had already take care of the wounds.  Angel’s wounds were healed as well, but the bandages were still on him.  Most were looking down at the ground, digesting their monumental failure.  Others looked straight ahead, sunk in their respective seats.

Their failure felt all encompassing.  One only had to look outside; where fires and plumes of smoke, coming from buildings that had been set ablaze by the rain of fire, were visible everywhere one looked.  The fire brigades were working of course, but there were simply too many.  The rock-and-lava monster had succeeded; its master’s intentions come to fruition.  The only thing it seemed they got lucky at; was that the rain of fire was but a first part of a larger plan, and not the end right away.

Oddly, or perhaps fittingly, the office’s shadows seemed to augment the mood perfectly. They played across the office, the books, the desk, and the faces of its occupants, as if to highlight their defeat at the hands of darkness.

“We got our asses handed to us,” Cordelia muttered darkly, not even bothering to look up.

“I think the bandages and pain are enough of a reminder,” Fred answered bitterly; she had been the worst hurt, and wouldn’t be fighting any time soon.  It would take a week, they figured, at least before she’d be doing any fighting.  In fact, pure determination on the diminutive genius part, was the only reason she was even sitting here, and not lying in bed.

“Hey, hey, retract claws, kittens,” Lorne interjected quickly, and then groping his painful jaw, before continuing, “We were beaten, let’s save the aggression for payback, and not for cutting ourselves to pieces.  That okay with you, pumpkins?”

Fred and Cordelia looked at the green-skinned, red-horned alien for a moment, and then dropped their heads down.  Angel decided this place needed a moral pick-me-up, so he started speaking, “We may have lost this battle, but the war is far from over.  We must strike back, and we must strike back hard.  We need to find out where that rock face and his master are hiding, what exactly they are up to and kick their asses to where they came from.  And sitting here feeling sorry for ourselves, is not how to do that.”

“Angel’s right,” Wesley said with newfound purpose, rising to his feet to lend more credence to his words; and promptly sat back down with a groan as a sharp pain pulled at his sides.  He rose once again, this time with some more care, and continued, “It’s time we stand up.  I already told Xander on the phone this was something we’ll handle, we’re not going to do that by sitting here and feeling bloody well sorry for ourselves.  We’ll research that rock demon, and any shape shifters who can also shift their life force essence, and look for any of the latter who employ the former.  Then we’ve got our culprit, and we know who and what we’re dealing with, we’ll probably be able to find them as well.  After all, when we faced the First things weren’t going smoothly from the start either; this is nothing but a temporary setback.”

“That’s what I was going to say,” Angel gave his enthusiastic support to the plan, moving his fist in proactive, all but ‘by golly’ manner, before extending the index finger of the same hand, and pointing at Wesley.  “Time to kick some butt; in the written department, of course.”  Pike, Fred, Cordelia and Lorne looked at the souled vampire dryly.  “What?” Angel asked.

Pike let out a audible breath, and said, “Please; go back to brooding,”

“Yeah, you really don’t pull the happy-guy-routine off very well,” Cordelia added for good measure.

“Brooding suits you much better.  You’ve got the face for it, Angel-cakes,” Lorne completed the threefold observation.

It caused Angel to raise the tips of his eyebrows, giving them all a pathetic look, and saying, “I thought you all thought I should be less broody.”

“That was until you’re ‘less broody’ turned out to be scary,” Cordelia answered him annoyed.  She figured she probably wouldn’t mind so much if they weren’t up to their neck in shit, but she really couldn’t take Angel being ‘less broody’ right now.

“I’m going out patrolling,” Faith decided quickly, and getting up.  Before everyone could protest, she clarified, “I may not be able to detect Rocky, but I can still see him if he shows his ugly mug.”

“Good idea, actually,” Wesley answered in his usual British stiff upper lip, but then gave his girlfriend a quick smile.  Faith nodded, and was off.

*****

Faith flew over the greater Los Angeles metropolitan area; covering it all.  As she flew around though, houses down below, she saw no rock/lava demon anywhere.  She was frustrated as all hell, and worse, she felt guilty.  They had the damn thing; if only instead of not expecting anything, she had expected the worst and transformed before the damn demon had the opportunity to put her out of the fight long enough for it to finish what it came for; it would be over now.  Of course, its master, Cordelia’s doppelganger, would still be around; but a critical part of its plans would have been ruined, and they’d have time.  And it was all her fault.

Moving toward the down town area, she suddenly screamed with frustration, and burst upward into the air.  Her chi flame blasting around her, and she couldn’t care less whether anyone saw her.  High in the air, the sun bathing over her, she hovered, screaming out her frustration and guilt.  She momentarily transformed, then fell down again, and felt tears stream from her eyes.  Her chi flame died down at nearly the same time.  For a moment she thought of fighting her tears, but then figured that nobody would be seeing her, and let them go.  She put her hands in front of her face, and automatically went into a sitting position. “Why does everything that I touch fall to shit?” she whimpered to herself, hiccuping for breath as the cried to herself.

In her mind she went over all of them; her first watcher, distrusting everyone in Sunnydale from the start, not asking for them to help her get a better place for her than that rag motel, being gone for long periods of time and acting like she was fine, going evil, getting Connor kidnapped, getting Gunn killed, getting Pike crippled, and now this.  Maybe her father and mother were right about her.  She shook her head violently at that thought; she wasn’t.   She had done things, good things, things that weren’t the actions of a worthless whore.

“I should be able to get a triumph once without screwing up first, shouldn’t I?” she muttered to herself, as she felt her despair and sadness slowly ebb away.  “Stop whining,” she told herself resolutely, wiping away her tears with the back of her sleeves.  “Time to go find rock boy.”

Having calmed herself down, she blasted off again, toward the tall buildings of the Down Town area and its Financial District.  Faith extended her senses as she zipped along the mostly empty buildings and empty streets.  Normally the place would absolutely crawling with cars and people during the day, and the buildings filled with employees working; but after the rain of fire last night, most people had wisely opted to stay home for now.  So she found herself patrolling what felt very much like a ghost city.  It was like an eery premonition of what the world would be like if she - they - failed to protect it.  Faith shook of the scary thought and flew back out of down town, towards LAX.

It didn’t take long before she noticed some demon presences; but nothing that would indicated rock face.  Decided to interrogate them, and blow of some steam she rapidly descended down to a rundown building in a bad neighborhood.  She landed and attempted to open the steel door which she found to be unlocked and actually opening.  The building opened in a narrow hallway with multiple side doors, a staircase upward, and beyond it the beginnings of what seemed like a wider room - a living room.  There were several demons there, and Faith marched toward it with purpose.  Two steps in she triggered a trap and a large axe swung down.  Without even looking away Faith caught the deadly implement, crushed the metal with her hand, deforming it, and ripped it from where it was attached to the ceiling.  A moment later the offending item landed behind her on the hard floor with a clang.

She reached the living room; a concrete wall, a table, several chairs and two couches, a tv and a lamp on the ceiling. The tv was on, and five demons were watching it. More correctly, had been watching it, now they all looked with varying decrees of fear and surprise at the new arrival.  One demon was a classical red with horns, a green scaley demon that had a face like a snake, a vampire, and finally three yellow demons with green eyes, and red frills were present.

“Uh, hey, Slayer . . . right?” the snake-faced demon stammered out nervously.

Faith turned her gaze toward the demon; frighteningly cold, and she said, “Rain of fire. Rock demon. What do you know?”

“Nothing, we’re as clueless as you,” the snake-faced demon said.

A moment later the demon had a smoking hole in its chest, and then it’s body rapidly fell to pieces, splattering open until only a pool of blood and mush flesh was left.  “Shit!” one of the yellow demons explained in shock.  He turned to Faith, and said, “We don’t know squat. You don’t have to threaten us with death; we just don’t know, okay?”

Faith turned her head toward the demon, narrowed her eyes, and said, “Death shouldn’t be your concern, it’s how that death will come about that you should be concerned with.” Faith instantly turned her right index finger at the demon that had spoken, and fired rapid beam of energy.  The demon screamed in pain a moment later, and grabbed his right upper leg.  The leg now sported a finger-sized hole on the upper light, just next to the knee.  Holding on tight to the leg to reduce the pain, the demon gritted his teeth moaned his pain out loud.   The remaining demons looked in shock at the event.  Angry now, Faith said, “Rain of fire. Rock demon.”

The devil-demon quickly spoke, obviously afraid, saying, “Lady, we don’t know squat, for real! We’re not holding anything back you can beat out of us; we just don’t know!  And trust me, if we’d did, we’d happily spill our guts right now.”

“That’s too bad . . . of course, I can arrange that,” Faith said with a growl in her voice, and she turned around and started walking away.  She glowed, and four balls of energy formed around her, and a moment later they shot forward and ripped open the demons’ torsos with a small explosion, spilling out their guts.  Once outside the building, Faith blasted off again, hoping against hope she could find the rock demon, with her eyes, and ears - because it sure as hell had managed to cloak its chi.

*****

The Hyperion was deathly quiet; apart from the occasional page turning.  Everyone was deeply into the books, researching the beast and who or what could be its mistress - or master seeing as it could obviously take different shapes.  Even Tiffany, Zoey, and Archie were helping; not that it helped any, there didn’t seem to be anything about either the beast or any shape shifter powerful enough to be its mistress/master.

With Wesley in his office doing his part of the research, that left the others strewn around the lobby.  Faith’s three friends were next to each other at the lobby-side of the counter, while Cordelia was sitting on the opposite side, left from them in the corner.  Angel, Pike, and Lorne were further on in the open office, reading through books themselves.

Archie flipped another page, listlessly.  He looked around nervously and debated with himself.  The silence was driving hm crazy.  He wished Faith would return already; she would almost certainly be lively and that would mean no more maddening silence.  It felt to him, like they had already lost, this silence.  He rested his head on his left hand, the arm resting with the elbow on the counter.  He turned his head and turned to look right.  Zoey was studiously busy reading through a book, and past her, he could see Angel, Pike, and the alien Lorne.  The thought that popped in his head about how he wasn’t even amazed at the concept of aliens, magic and demons anymore, didn’t even phase him from his melancholy.  He switched arms, and peered to his left along the blonde Tiffany, and Cordelia beyond it.  Two sets of fantastic racks, further hot bodies, and eyes and brains to die for.  Not so amazing, more amazing were interesting personalities to boot.  Weird; the thought that Tiffany could have an interesting personality was more of a bump in his thoughts than magic, aliens, demons, and Slayers; not that it was enough to dispel the silence of doom surrounding him.

“Are you checking out my breasts?”

Archie blinked and refocused, realizing that the soft whisper had come from Tiffany.  He shook his head.  Tiffany narrowed her eyes for a moment, then shrugged and went back to her book; apparently decided that whether he was lying or not, wasn’t important.  Apparently his friend didn’t mind that he, Archibald Butterworth, super nerd checked out her cheerleader breasts.  There was no tirade, no comments that he was a nerd who shouldn’t have the right to check out her breasts, there wasn’t even a simple: you male pig.  He didn’t know whether to be happy she had made such progress, flattered, or insulted.

GAH!  He should have answered her out loud!  Perhaps even make a joke out of it; something to break this ever more oppressing silence!  Something like, ‘Why?  Would you like me to check out your breasts?’  He was an idiot!  Why was it, that he always thought of the perfect thing to say, two minutes /after/ the moment to say it had past.  Hey!  He had an idea . . . and remained seated.  He slowly looked right, to the open office, and the cupboards that held the subject of his new idea.  Dang it; all the confidence building his friends, especially Faith, had done, and he didn’t have the guts to do it.  He remained seated longer, and went back to research.  Now why didn’t he just go and do it?  What happened to enough confidence to ask girls out on dates?  Well, his mind supplied him, asking out a girl you don’t know and just getting turned down at worst, was something else than this plan wasn’t it?   Here were his /friends/, all studiously researching to prevent the end of the world, and he was going to disturb them, he felt like it would plunge the world into Armageddon - not to mention get himself killed by those friends.

Thirty seconds later he couldn’t take it anymore, and got up, not bothering to be extra careful.  Multiple pairs of eyes looked up from their research and followed his - compared to the silence before, deafening - trek through the room.  He reached the office, passed the vampire, human and alien - congratulating himself on his suicidal level of courage - and reached the cupboards hanging above the counter holding the sink and coffee machine.  He opened the cupboard and pulled out a bag of chips.  With everyone looking incredulous, he started on his trek back, and noisily opened the squeaky plastic bag.  He pulled out a chip, and happily started to eat it; crunchily.  Soon he reached his place, having eaten another chip in the process, placed the bag on the table, and took another chip, before continuing his research.   He flipped a page, swallowed the chip, and got another, which he crunched between his teeth.   Six pairs of eyes looked at him with various emotions.

“Are you trying to get yourself fat again?” Tiffany bluntly asked him after a few moments, in which time he finished getting another chip.

Archie turned to look at the blonde, and for a moment a smile quirked on his face.  For some weird reason it was good to know that the old bitchy Tiffany wasn’t entirely gone.   “No,” he decided to answer truthfully, for some reason the smile returning uncontrollably, even though it was now there for a very different reason.  “The moping silence was driving me crazy, I needed some sound to be able to continue, even if it’s crunchy chips.”

The silence was even worse than before; now there wasn’t even a page turning.  He turned his head to the other side nervously, checking out to see if Angel was ready to drain him dry, and then looked to Zoey, wonder what his other friend would say.  Suddenly Zoey’s face broke in a wide smile, and her left hand moved out, to reach into the bag of chips, pulled one out, and went to eat it herself, extra loudly, and returned to her book.  Archie’s worried face, couldn’t keep itself from smiling.  A moment later a hand came from the other side, and pulled out a handful of chips to be placed closer by on the counter.  Archie followed the arm, and looked into the face of a glaring Tiffany, who then smiled light.  It seemed she was angry for not thinking of this herself.  Cordelia stood up, walked over and got a handful of chips herself before returning to her spot.  In the open corner office, Lorne audibly got up, and went over to the cupboard to get another bag for Angel and himself.

“Angel-cakes, catch,” Lorne said, and Angel caught the bag of chips.  “I’ll make some coffee and blood for Angel.”  There were approving nods all around, and the research continued . . . now with less defeated looks on people’s faces, even a smile or two, and just enough sound to not drive anyone up the wall.

*****

Upstairs in her room, on her bed lay Fred.  The girl wasn’t so happy though; in fact she was a lot less happy than the others.  Worse yet, she was even more /un/happy than the others.  Not the least of her troubles was her flaming right shoulder; the pain killers the hospital had prescribed her had half worn off, and she was not in the mood to take more.  After the fight with the rock demon, they had rushed her to hospital, and they had actually had to reopen the shoulder to work with it.  She was lucky the demon had not bothered to aim better, or she’d be dead, and that bothered her to no end.  The only reason she was already out of the hospital, was because the attack had fried her wound closed the same way it opened it.  The shoulder was stiff as less flesh was stretched close together; and in Fred’s opinion the bandage didn’t help any at all.  With a fried-closed wound, the doctors only had to reopen the small round wound, cut away fried flesh, make sure the nerves were lined up correctly and put everything together.  If the wound had been open, and she’d been brought bleeding to the hospital, or if the wound had been shredded and uneven, she’d still be there.  Now though, when the doctor said he had rather keep her longer for observation, she had checked herself out; going against doctor’s advice, and her friends’ pleas to heed that advice.

In front of her was book on the lore of devils, and gargoyles - a gargoyle was a stone devil, and the rock monster seemed an awful lot like a stone or rock devil - goat horns, goat hooves, but all rock, not the conveniently pierce-able red skin the average devil had.  Fred however was long past seeing the book.  She stared down, but instead of at the book, she was looking through it, and through the bed.  Not literally, but her eyes were focused on eternity.

The ease with which that rock beast had put her aside ate at her very being.  She had been tossed aside like a rag doll, like some inconsequential piece of trash to be discarded.  It ate at her constantly.  The words that Gunn, First Evil Gunn, had spoken to her.  ‘You didn’t think you’re ridiculous training made any difference, did you?’  She didn’t do enough, she couldn’t do enough, she’d waited too long, she still was no help.  She had doubt about herself and her decision before First Gunn had dropped the bomb, they had plagued her more afterward . . . but now . . . It had come true.  She hadn’t made a difference, all her hard work and determination for nothing - discarded like a useless piece of trash.

Suddenly her stomach felt hollow, and the hollow seemed to consume her from the inside out.  She squeezed her eyes shut.  She was not going to cry, and make this worse.   There was a little pop, and for some reason Fred opened her eyes at it; seeing a small wet round on the paper.  Another pop and a new wet spot later proved that the pops were tears landing on the paper.  A sudden sob wracked her body, and she couldn’t keep it back anymore.  As she leaned back, and shrank into a ball, she moved the book to her left and let it drop of her bed.  Then she turned right, as she could no longer keep it back.  Heavy sobs wracked her body, as she audibly started to cry, tears streaming from her eyes.  To add injury to injury, the tears stung painfully on her still healing face.  Her cheeks, where they weren’t already blistered from the fiery, demonic knee, quickly became red and puffy as the empty feeling of uselessness and loss overwhelmed her.

*****

A little ways further down the hall, in Angel’s room, the souled vampire was performing one of duties, one that took precedent over researching - partially because hungry crying baby would quickly render research impossible anywhere in the hotel.  Connor was happily grasping the twisting part of the bottle cap, while sucking on the nipple section of the cap.   The milk disappeared into Connor’s mouth and down his throat as he sucked and swallowed eagerly of the tasty food.

“He’s grown a lot, huh?” Angel asked the other occupant of the room.

Cordelia was smiling and bent over father and son, her cleavage rather in the babies face. “Yeah, like weed,” she said with a wide grin, studying the baby’s happy look.  Connor was looking past the bottle, and let go of it with his right hand, and grasped what peaked his interest.

“Hey,” Cordelia said not unhappily surprised, looking down as the little hand grasped the breast in his face, the light bump in the fabric that Cordelia’s nipple made in her shirt.

“That’s right, Connor, that’s where the yummy milk originally comes from,” Angel said with some amusement.

“You men are all alike, even as babies,” Cordelia said with mock scorn, gently pulling Connor’s hand away.  “Now, Connor, it’s bad manners grabbing women’s breasts.”

“Don’t listen to her, son, when a woman pushes them in your face like that, you grab ‘em all you like,” Angel joked with a smirk.

“Oh!” Cordelia exclaimed and stood up.  “So that’s how you men turn out like that, taught from father to son when you’re still in diapers!  I oughta . . .”  Cordelia’s banter stopped as she turned her head to look right.  There was clearly a complaining sound coming from beyond the room.  She looked back down at Angel, who mouthed, ‘Fred.’  Of course he would have heard much better and identified the owner already; although Cordelia had made a good guess earlier in her head.  For a moment they communicated silent through their eyes, and then Angel stood up, careful with the still drinking Connor.  After checking though, it seemed the bottle was nearly empty, and Angel waited a few moments.

After those moments were up, Cordelia, and Angel carrying Connor, sans bottle, exited their room.  “Ah, I may have . . .” Wesley’s cultured British voice sounded as he had just finished climbing the stairs.  Angel and Cordelia looked over to him, the injuries in his face the beast gave him bandaged, slowly healing, or both - and he was now looking at Fred’s room now too, having easily positively identified the source of the relatively new sound.

The three of them moved toward each other, and toward Fred’s room.  When they joined at the door, Wesley asked a little uncomfortably, “Do you think she needs more pain killers?”

“This is not a physical pain crying, Wesley,” Cordelia answered softly, and very annoyed.

“I knew that, was just hoping I was mistaken,” Wesley returned a little uncomfortable and slightly disappointed.  He would much prefer a problem that could be solved with a pill.   The three looked at each other for a moment, and then Cordelia stepped a final step to the door of Fred’s room.

She knocked gently, and asked just as gently, “Fred, you okay?  Can we help?”

“No, I’m fine,” Fred’s strangled voice came from inside.  Cordelia looked at the two men, and then opened the door anyway.  Wesley and Angel followed at a respectful distance. The bed on the left side of the room held the curled up Fred, while a desk was too the right.   The closet was left against the wall, which felt like an additional barrier to Cordelia for the moment.  Fred’s despair came off of her in waves, and the entire room seemed to be filled with it.  Fred turned to the intruders, her face was twisted in misery, covered in injuries, the worst bandaged, and wet with tears.  She said with an attempt at anger, “I said I was fine.”   Her heart obviously wasn’t in it.

“Fred,” Cordelia said with sympathy and rushed over.  She set down on the bed and carefully, mindful of the hurt shoulder and face, embraced the smaller girl in a hug.  To make matters worse for Fred, it only meant she started crying harder, wishing she wasn’t so pitiful.   “Hey, what’s wrong?”

Fred didn’t want to answer right away, staying silent, and Angel and Wesley looked at each other, silently deciding between the two who would go first.  Wesley took a step forward, and said, “We are friends, family and a team, Fred.  We help each other, and you don’t have to be embarrassed about anything with us - I’m certain you know just as many mortifying things about any of us.”

Fred sniffled, and averted her eyes.  Angel came forward and set down on the bed on the other side of Fred as opposed to Cordelia.  “You can tell us everything, and if you can’t, can you really say no to this cute little face?” Angel said with a cut baby voice, lifting Connor a little straighter to show Fred.  Connor giggled and smiled.

The small smile that broke through Fred’s sobbing face hurt - and not just physically, it felt like a betrayal of the way she felt inside.  “I was useless,” Fred said with a broken voice.

“You were not useless,” Cordelia corrected immediately.

“He tossed me aside with no more effort required for a dish rag,” Fred said heatedly, not liking being contradicted on the obvious, and feeling the despair rise once more as she said, her voice breaking mid-sentence to degenerate in a pitiful wail.

“So was Faith, or any of us for that matter,” Wesley said gently, squatting down to be eye-level with Fred.

“Faith’s a thousand times more powerful than me,” Fred replied with a choking sob and annoyance.

“She’s a thousand times more powerful than any of us.  You can’t measure yourself with a Slayer, Fred,” Cordelia said with a concerned frown, “They’re really annoying like that.  Just like a certain Saiyan who’s even worse.”

“But you are all more powerful than me, too,” Fred said defeated.

“We started earlier, and we started with an advantage.  You’ll catch up, Fred,” Angel said gently, while Connor looked around cluelessly from person to person.

“Exactly!” Fred spat angrily, jerking her whole body forward with the emotion, and was surprised at her own outburst.  It was obvious to three of the four occupants that the anger was not aimed at any of them, and the fourth was a baby.

“What’s this really about, Fred?” Wesley asked her.

Fred fidgeted, looking around, not wanting answer.  Finally she gave, “I should have been there for Gunn; and I know we’ve been over this often enough, but . . . he ha . . . he told . . .”  Fred trailed off, and buried her face in Cordelia’s shoulder, not caring about the pain flaming up again, she just wanted to be seen.

Her three friends, frowned, thought about what she said.  “The First,” Angel said softly, and Cordelia and Wesley cocked their heads at Angel’s conclusion.  “He came to you, didn’t he?  As Gunn.”  Fred nodded with a whimper in Cordelia’s shoulder, shortly followed by a hiss as the motion was particular painful to her banged up face.  “It lies, Fred, you knows.”

“It told the truth, it said I’m useless, and I’m useless,” Fred said muffled from Cordelia’s shoulder.

“Hey,” Cordelia said forcefully, bringing Fred’s face up, “even if that were true, which it isn’t, Gunn would never hate you, he loved you too much for that.”

“In addition, you are not useless.  You have more to offer than muscle, Fred, you are brilliant, you have intelligence and mental skills that have helped us many times over.  You are far from useless,” Wesley told her with a certainty that made Fred smile.

The smile didn’t last though, because she answered, “Isn’t doing us any good now, is it? There’s nothing on this monster anywhere, let alone its mistress.”

“You know, cry,” Cordelia said suddenly, shaking Fred, who looked up a little surprised as did the two men.  “Not because you’re useless, or because Gunn said he hates you, because he didn’t and doesn’t, but so you get all these emotions and stress out, and then get some sense.  I’ll get you something to drink and some ice cream, and then you trust us when we’re saying that we need you badly, and at the best of your abilities - all of them, got it?”  Fred nodded slowly.  “Good, then we’ll leave you alone for a bit, unless you say otherwise . . .”   When no answer to the agreement came from the shorter brunette, Cordelia finished, “That’s settled then, we’ll let you have some privacy, but no more of this useless nonsense, understood?”

“Yeah,” Fred said weakly.

“Good,” Cordelia replied, getting up, and ushering the two men and baby out the door.

Fred remained behind, lying back down and took a deep breath.  To her surprise, she did feel better, not a hundred percent, but better still . . . and she was looking forward to that ice cream.

*****

Somewhere in LA

The run down house was dirty, covered with spider webs, broken furniture and an even dirtier mattress and pillow.  It wasn’t something than one would think could be the home of a goddess, but in this case, it indeed was.

The Cordelia look-a-like turned reverently around, leaving the only things worth anything at her back.  The small altar, made from a wooden crate, a towel as cover, and having candles, chandeliers, a small silver platter, a mirror framed in gold and several magical ingredients even now glowed with an unearthly light - a few silver sparkles fluttered about.

The fake held out her hands to a kneeling Beast.  On her hands lay a jewel, flat at the bottom and sprout out several structures in various angles upward, somewhat like a rose, but instead of rounded edges it was made of sharp protruding column aiming upward.  It was white on the outside, but inside was something that was orange - the entire thing looked dully cold.

“Take this, my sweet,” the goddess said with breathlessness coming from awe at the object.  The rock demon gently extended its hands, and she placed the gem in his hands. “Guard it well,” she said with a smile.  He slowly took it toward himself, and then the jewel disappeared into his chest, which warbled for a moment as if a stone had splashed down into water.  “Go the hotel, and wait for the Slayer return.  Sneak up on her, and use that gem.  It will take the Slayer’s Dark Heart, and render her no longer a threat.”

“And then I shall kill all those who oppose you, my mistress,” the demon intoned with a deep, rocky voice.

“No!” the fake Cordelia hissed sharply, “Guard that jewel, return it here, immediately.”

“But surely without the Slayer . . .”

“No!” the Cordelia-clone ordered sharply once more, this time more than a whisper, and angry but no loud voice.  “Apart they are nothing to you, together they are strong.  Now that they know what to expect, they will not let you get to them one by one.”

“Yes, mistress, as you command.”

“Yes,” the woman said lowly, then moved forward and pulled the horned, rock head, with glowing lava in its crevices to her face.  There was a sizzling from the heat, but goddess did not seem to care.  “You are magnificent, my love, do not think I think less of you.  Return quickly after you’ve eliminated the Slayer from our troubles.”

“I go as ordered,” the monster answered and then got up.  The goddess took a step back, and looked up for a moment.  Then the monster turned and left to do as bidden.

*****

Outside the Hyperion

The Beast had found a good place to hide.  Deep into the shadows of a nearby building, it patiently waited for the return of the Slayer.  Oh, indeed, the Beast and its mistress knew where the Slayer was looking for them, flying around, but going after her was too great a risk.   The jewel’s power was strictly close range, and the Slayer as especially the True Slayer, the Super Slayer most certainly did not.  They need surprise, they needed an ambush; and the hotel was the only place where they knew for certain she was going to be.  The drawback, of course, was that the others would be present.  The combination was not good.  The jewel wasn’t instantaneous, and while it did its thing, his mistress had explained, he could move away, not avoid anything, he would have to take whatever they threw at him, and survive.  He didn’t know to be worried at his mistress’ dire thoughts on the subject, or if he should dare question his mistress’, his goddess’ judgement on the subject.  They did not seem that strong.   He would do as ordered though.

As the twilight of falling night approached, so did the Slayer.  The dark-haired beauty did nothing to the Beast, its preferences in women were more . . . rocky.  The girl touched down lightly and turned toward the hotel, and started walking toward the entrance.  Slowly, and stealthily, much more stealthily than you would give a giant rock demon credit for, the Beast emerged from its hiding place, to advance on the unknowing Slayer.  Good, the masking of his life force still held, and he gripped the jewel in his right hand in anticipation.  The Slayer continued walking forward to the entrance of the hotel, and he rapidly came closer.

Suddenly, as he had gotten rather close, the Slayer smoothly turned around.  As expected really, he couldn’t possibly be able to fool her other senses with his bulk and hooves on stone tiles.  The moment she did, he surged forward, and her power jumped with a scream, and her eyes turned to black holes.  For a moment the Beast knew fear, but he would not be deterred; the mistress had ordered, he would succeed in carrying them out.  His hand holding the jewel reached her chest, and the jewel touched.  He uttered the short activation phrase, and the change was instant.  Instead of the face eager and focused on destroying him rock by rock, turned to shocked pain, and her now blue flame of power flickered and swirled around.  Then from her mouth, nose, eyes, and ears and inky black mist poured forth, and was sucked into the jewel.  The jewel started to glow faintly as the mist entered it, and then the mist started pouring from the Slayer’s entire body.

Faith sudden cry of surprise and then murder, along with her power increase had not gone unnoticed inside the Hyperion.  And everyone able to fight, that was everyone minus Faith’s friends, Connor, Lorne, and Fred, came rushing out the building.  The first out the door, didn’t even bother to waste the time on opening it, meaning that the Hyperion’s front entrance was splintered in pieces.  Angel and Wesley were up front, shortly followed by Pike and Cordelia.  A moment later four powerful energy beams converged on the Beast, careful to miss the Slayer in between - a Slayer who was very much to those four’s consternation not doing anything - except with a jerk detransforming that is.

The Beast was still surprised, despite his mistress’ warning.  The four beams, which were thankfully far away from the jewel as they didn’t want to hurt their friend, were cutting into him.  Alone they weren’t much, combined together though, they became powerful.  The Beast grunted with the effort to keep the beams from pushing him away from the Slayer before the jewel could finish.  He fired an several blasts of energy with his free hand, even as the pressure caved in his chi field and started to do the same with his rocky hide which was already started to glow red from his own internal heat and the beams’ damage.  Piece of rock, big and small, one piece from his horn, tumbled on the floor with to the defenders satisfying kachunkachunks.  It was then that the older male ended his beam.  The reason was simple; he had come close enough to smash the most powerful kick he could muster into the beast’s face. Although the kick didn’t do that much damage, it was enough of a sudden change in forces working on the Beast, that he was launched away from the Slayer.  It looked at the Slayer with frustration and honor - if he failed . . .

He didn’t have time to contemplate consequences though, as the younger male had reached him, the beams gone, now a spinning ball of energy in his right hand.  The ball made contact with the Beast’s chest, and it roared in pain as it simply started chipping away at its hide, like a energy-based buzz saw.  With a roar he smashed the human aside, only to getting several exploding balls of energy against.  With them coming from two sides, and no way to move with the explosions, the Beast was tossed about and he felt his pain flaring through his right side and arm, seeing from the corner of his eyes lava-blood welling up from inside.

He looked over at the Slayer though, waiting for a moment.

“Faith!” Wesley exclaimed in shock an concern as Faith slumped backward, starting to fall.  He moved forward and went down to a kneed, and caught her, before she could smack unforgivingly onto the pavement.  The event distracted the defending team, looking in shock at the obviously defeated Slayer.  The Beast wasted no time in getting his severely wounded self away from their while they were distracted.

“Argh!” Pike exclaimed and flew forward quickly in the direction of the Beast, but found it had already disappeared.

The rest hurried over to Faith and a distraught Wesley.  “Is she . . .?” Angel asked with dread, as Wesley went about checking her vitals.

“She’s alive, but in some form of coma,” he said with pain, looking with hurt eyes at his down girlfriend, feeling guilty over her defeat.

“Faith!” three young voices sounded and Faith’s friends came rushing over to her downed friend.

“What the hell was that thing!?” Cordelia asked in shock, referring to the jewel the Beast had used.  ‘That it can do that to a Super Slayer,’ remained unsaid.

“This was a surgical strike,” Pike observed coldly.

“Take out, Faith, the biggest gun on the block,” Angel nodded in agreement.

Wesley slowly stood up, holding his comatose girlfriend, while her friends looked at her in shock.  None of them had ever considered seeing their super human friend in that condition.  Shutting down his emotions and running on logic alone, was the only way Wesley kept from falling apart, so he looked around the pavement leading up to the hotel, seeing some pieces of the beast lying there, and he said, “Cordelia, could bring some of the demon’s pieces it left behind, it might give us a clue as to what we’re dealing with and how best to fight it.” Cordelia blinked, and then silently nodded, going to do just that.

*****

The Beast stumbled into building.  He had been hurt worse than he thought.  A perfectly round hole was in his chest, from which cracks arched outward.  Glowing lava was visible in the cracks and was slowly oozing outward to refill the damage.  He could barely move the arm that still held the jewel, he was missing one horn and everything hurt.  The Cordelia-clone rushed to him, and support him with concern.  “Did you succeed?” she asked, as they walked further in.

“Yes,” he groaned out while nodding.  He lifted his right arm with some difficulty and opened his hand, presenting the jewel, it’s inner orange now glowing outward, pulsing almost with malevolent intensity.

His mistress took the artifact, and laughed with glee.  “Yes, my sweet!  You did it!” she exclaimed with happiness.  “We have already won.  From now on, you will never have face all of them at the same time, the Slayer is out of the picture.  You’ve deserved a rest.  Let’s lie you down, and once you’ve healed fully in about a week or so, we will complete my plans.”

“Thank you, mistress,” the Beast rumbled and his mistress slowly moved him to a relatively empty corner and put him down so he could lie and rest.

To Be Continued . . .

Next time on Buffy Z: Willow will plead with Tara to take her back, Dawn will separate herself from the group more as she seeks answer to her personal dilemmas, and Buffy is recovering in Episode 90: Healing Is All One’s Got - The Dilemma of Trust.  And in the episode after that, the Beast will unearth five more pieces of the mystery.