WORK IN PROGRESS
        Rated - R
        Author's Notes - This story has been in the works for several years (yes, years) and while I do have plans for the rest of the story, I still don't know when it will be finished. I'm very proud of this fic. It's been a labor of love for a long, long time.
        Dedication – This is for Nicole, who never fails to give me a kick in the ass when I most need it and to tear apart my work even when I don’t want to hear it. Without her this story would have remained unfinished and uninspired. Thanks.
 

    Watching him with nostalgic eyes, Willow couldn’t help but think he looked amazingly like his namesake. Strange considering they were in no way related. He had the same deep soulful eyes, chiseled features, and unruly hair. Someone who didn’t know any better might have assumed them to be related. Willow knew better; vampires couldn’t have children.
    “Aunt Willow,” the teenager smiled, “got a minute?”
    Willow smirked lightly, for all the boy’s resemblance to Angel, deep within his eyes he seemed to have Buffy’s spirit. She loved the boy like one of her own children, but he had his mother’s uncanny ability to find trouble, no matter what the occasion.
    Assuming the worst, Willow sighed, “Sure, what’s up Angel?”
    He paused a moment and shook his head, “Never mind, I gotta get to the Bronze. Everyone else is probably already there. I’ll ask you later. It’s not important.”
    Willow looked to him confused, “Alright, then. Be home by curfew.”
    “Don’t worry, Aunt Will,” he smiled, “I will be.”
    Willow smiled in return as she watched him leave the house. Lost in thought, she didn’t even notice her husband’s presence until his arms had wrapped themselves securely around her waist. As he kissed her graying hair, Willow grinned in delight. “I’m so lucky,” she thought.
    “What’s up, Will?” He asked.
    “I think he’s wondering, Xander,” she replied, turning to face her husband, “We really do owe him an explanation.”
    Xander sighed and looked his wife directly in the eye, “We aren’t the ones who owe him an explanation. Even if we did, we don’t have much of one to tell him.”
    Willow swallowed and acknowledged the truth behind his statement, “But Buffy’s not here to give him the explanation he deserves and one of these days, we’re going to have to tell him something.”
 

    Angel smirked from his table as he watched his adoptive brother make a fool out of himself dancing smack in the middle of the Bronze, his scrawny frame waving around not quite in time with the music. Alex didn’t care. He seemed to have a knack for exhibiting foolishness. Goofiness, it seemed, was an inherited trait.
    “Do you think he realizes how amazingly insane he looks?” Rianna asked Angel amusedly as she sipped her Café Mocha.
    Angel shook his head, “Nope.”
    “Think we should tell him?” Mina chimed in.
    Angel chuckled and shook his head again, “Nope.”
    “Know what?” Rianna asked, her blue eyes twinkling as she gulped down her last bit of coffee, “Insanity is fun!” With that she jumped up and joined Alex on the dance floor.
    Angel shook his head and laughed, “She’s crazy!”
    “Yup,” Mina agreed, studying Angel closely, “and you wouldn’t want her any other way.”
    Angel grinned, his eyes never leaving Rianna, “No, no I wouldn’t.”
    “Sorry I’m late, guys,” a voice called out as a familiar girl approached the table, “got a flat up on route 13.”
    “No problem,” Mina replied, “we saved you a seat!”
    The girl laughed, “Look around, Min, that’s kinda a non-issue, but a sweet gesture anyhow.” Just the same, she plopped down into the seat Mina had saved and promptly began examining her long, stringy curls for split ends.
    ”Kaylan,” Angel spoke up looking at the newcomer, “anyone ever tell you you’re weird?”
    She laughed and tossed her dyed-black curls behind her, “You, all the time, Angel.”
    As the song ended, Alex and Rianna made their way back to the table. Grabbing a glass of water and wiping the sweat from her brow, Rianna laughed.
    “Kaylan, I cannot believe that Mom let you out of the house wearing that!” Rianna said, staring at her sister’s all black decor.
    Kaylan raised an eyebrow, “If she knew, she might have a problem with it, but what she doesn’t know can’t hurt me. Besides, you think she’d approve of your outfit?”
    Rianna looked hurt and stared down at her ensemble, “What’s wrong with my outfit?”
    “The words tight and short come to mind!” Kaylan told her as she peered over her ever-present sunglasses.
    “Nah,” Angel said studying Rianna’s tiny silver skirt and skin-tight top as closely as he could while still retaining a front of an innocent bystander, “I don’t think it’s too short or too tight.”
    Mina laughed so hard she squirted cola out her nose, “You’d probably say the same of a string bikini,” she accused her adoptive brother.
    “You kidding?” Alex asked, “Angel’s about as likely to admit to that as he is to get down and dance like the master!” He said, gesturing to himself.
    Rianna rolled her eyes, “It’s name-brand, so Mom could care less. I could probably get away with wearing a paper bag if it said Gucci on it.”
    Kaylan shrugged, her way of acknowledging the truth in her sister’s statement.
    As a slow song started, an evil look took over Rianna’s face, “We, are dancing,” she announced as she grabbed Angel’s hand.
    “But…” he started.
    “No, buts!” she demanded putting a finger to his lips, “Come on before I decide to dance with Alex again!”
    “Huh? What? Ok!” Alex piped up, his voice squeaking as he knocked over his chair, jumping to his feet.
    Angel smirked, “Sit down, Alex.” And followed Rianna to the dance floor.
    The three friends watched on with curiosity as Angel and Rianna danced. “Think he’ll ever admit to liking her?” Kaylan asked curiously.
    “Angel?” Mina asked, “No way. You know how he is. He’d never make himself that vulnerable. He’s got to keep his distance.” As she stated that Mina looked almost sorry for him.
    “Well,” Alex piped up, “Rianna needs someone more open, more outgoing, more willing to be squashed.”
    “She doesn’t like you, Alex,” Kaylan said, “She likes Angel.”
    “Sure, maybe she’s attracted to him, but does she really like him? I don’t think so. I think that she…”
    “Alex, face the facts,” Mina told her brother, “she likes him. Get over it.”
    “But…”
    “No buts about it, man,” Kaylan said, “she’s hooked on him. Just look at her.”
    Alex, reluctantly, glanced over to where Rianna and Angel were dancing. Her bright blue eyes were glued to his face and her mouth seemed to be frozen in a smile.
    “She’s trying to let him down easy,” Alex announced, “just wait. Time will tell.”
    The two girls groaned, deciding it was hopeless and dropped the subject.
    “Mina, Alex, can I ask you something that will never leave this table?” Kaylan asked as she leaned forward seriously.
    “Yeah, sure, Kaylan, what is it?” Mina asked.
    “What do you know about Angel?” she asked them.
    “In what sense?” Mina returned, “I mean, you know him almost as well as the rest of us. We kinda all grew up together.”
    “That’s not what I meant,” Kaylan told her, “I mean, about his real parents and his childhood and all.”
    Alex and Mina looked to each other, “I don’t think even he knows much about it, Kaylan.” Alex said, “His Mom’s name was Buffy Summers. She was real close with our parents. She was a really successful author. She wrote some horror stories about vampires or something; I never read ‘em. She died when he was six years old and my parents adopted him. That’s all I know. Why’d you wanna know?” He asked.
    “I just was wondering. After all, my sister likes him. Call it a background check,” Kaylan told them.
    Mina raised an eyebrow, “Kaylan, you’ve known him since elementary school! You had to check him out?”
    Kaylan shrugged, “Ria’s way too trusting. I’m cynical, so sue me.”
    As the words left Kaylan’s lips, a huge crash echoed through the Bronze followed by frenzied screams emanating from the other side of the club.
    “What the Hell?” Kaylan asked.
    Most of the patrons of the Bronze ran hysterical from the club, but through the wake of delirious teenagers a group of deformed looking people could be seen wrecking havoc on the club. One of the strange looking ones grabbed a girl and bit into her neck.
    “Shit! Let’s get out of here!” Alex cried as he jumped up, knocking the chair over again in the process. No one disagreed. Four of the teenagers ran as fast as they could for the nearest one of their houses, seeking shelter. It was only after they reached the Harris residence that they realized Rianna was not with them.
 

    “You so ruined my day, I finally got like my lifelong crush to dance with me and what do you do, you have to decide it’s dinner time!” Rianna seethed more than a little annoyed, at what she knew to be vampires.
    “Sorry, Slayer,” one of them said, changing back to his human façade, “we just wanted to let you know we were back in town.”
    “Like your stench hadn’t already given it away? Please!” she countered.
    He threw back his platinum blond head in laughter, “Oh, this is so reminiscent! I was worried you’d be boring like the last few slayers. That Kendra one was so stiff, left a bad taste in your mouth, didn’t she pet?” he asked his companion.
    “Mummy didn’t like the boring one. She kept spoiling my fun!” the dark-haired beauty responded with a deep pout on her face, “But this one, she reminds me of the one who gave us back our Angel.”
    Rianna looked up at the name ‘Angel,’ “If you’re trying to intimidate me, it’s so not working. If you’re here to fight, let’s get started, otherwise, get the Hell out of here so I can go home!”
    “We’re not going to fight you now,” a man called from the back. “We were here to size you up and give you a warning. Now that we’ve done both, I say we leave,” he declared, stepping into the light.
    Rianna tried not to gasp, but the vampire looked more like Angel, the teenager she’d known her nearly her whole life, than she would have thought possible. Mistaking her look of surprise for something else, the blond one laughed, “What is it with you and slayers anyhow, Angelus?”
    Rianna stared viciously at him. Having already decided she didn’t have the weapons or skill yet to defeat all the vampires there, she took another approach.
    “Well, it’s been real nice meeting you all, but I gotta jet,” she declared.
    “Not so fast, Slayer,” the one called Angelus smirked, “we have a message for your watcher. Tell him that Spike, Dru, and Angel are back and we aren’t leaving this time.”
    With that, all of the vampires turned and left the same way they had come, mysteriously, leaving Rianna completely and totally confused.
 

    “Ma?” Mina called out, receiving no response, “I guess no one is home.”
    “That was so wacky!” Alex declared sitting down.
    Kaylan looked up to her three friends, “Where’s Ria?”
    Angel looked around frantically, “She’s not here?”
    “She was with us when we got out of the Bronze,” Mina assured him.
    “But she’s not here now,” Angel said pointedly, “I’m going back to find her.”
    “Angel,” Mina pleaded, “it’s really dangerous, we shouldn’t go back out there!”
    “All the more reason to go out there and get her!” Angel insisted, “You don’t have to go. I’ll be careful, Min,” he promised his adoptive sister as he hurried out the door.
    “Come on, guys,” Kaylan declared, “we’ve got to help. That’s my sister out there. Besides, there’s power in numbers.” Mina and Alex nodded and moved to follow the way Angel had gone.
    “I hope we know what we’re doing,” Mina muttered worriedly as they ran out the door.
 

    As Rianna finally turned to leave, Angel entered the Bronze in a hurry. “Are you alright?” he asked her worriedly.
    “Yeah, yeah I’m fine,” Rianna replied.
    Angel gathered her into a huge hug, “Damn, don’t do that, you scared me to death! Why didn’t you leave?”
    “I…” she stuttered, searching for an answer he’d buy, “I tripped and… and fell. And then I saw them, the strange people, run out the back way, so I came back in to see if anyone needed help or anything.”
    “I could have sworn…” he started.
    “Ria! You’re ok!” Mina called from the doorway, Angel allowed his arms to drop from around her when he realized how it might look to the trio.
    “Yeah, I’m fine,” she smiled, “why is everyone so shocked at that?”
    “I think my cynicism is wearing off on them,” Kaylan told her.
    Ria smirked at her twin, “Let’s get outta here before the cops show up and think we’re the wackos who started all this.” She smiled as she headed for the door.
 

    “What happened?” Willow asked approaching the exhausted teenagers as they returned back to the Harris residence.
    “It was so weird, Ma,” Alex said, “we were all just sitting there in the Bronze when there was this huge crash and a lot of screams and everyone started running. Then, we saw the group of freaked-out weird looking guys wrecking the place. Then one of them, this dude with a really bad blond hair dye, grabbed some girl and bit her! It was so wacky!”
    Willow’s face paled horribly and she sat down, looking sick to her stomach.
    “Ma, what is it?” Mina asked concerned.
    “Nothing, it’s nothing darling. I’m just, a bit tired,” She lied.
    “We came back earlier, but no one was here and then we realized Ria wasn’t with us, so we had to go back and make sure she was ok,” Alex told his mother.
    “You went back out there with those demons running lose?” Willow asked her son incredulously.
    “Uh, I would have gone with hoodlums, but demons works,” Alex said, as usual trying to use humor to lessen the tension.
    “Ria, honey, don’t take this the wrong way, but you all should have never gone back out there! What did you think you were going to do? Getting yourselves hurt too wouldn’t have helped Ria any!” Willow chastised the group.
    “She’s right, guys,” Rianna said, “what could you have done?”
    “I could have bashed their heads in!” Angel muttered defensively.
    “Somehow, I don’t think that would have helped much,” Ria told him gently placing her hand on his shoulder, “I mean, what if they had had a gun or something?”
    Angel searched his thoughts for an answer but found none, “All I can tell you is that I’m not willing to let one of my best friends be hurt and suffer while I sit back and do nothing,” he vowed.
    “You’re too much like you’re mother,” Willow murmured, too low for him to hear.
    “Don’t ever do that again, do you understand?” Willow told her children. Alex and Mina nodded their heads in unison, Angel followed, reluctantly, a moment later. “That goes for all of you, not just my kids,” she told the other three. “Now, why don’t you all make some popcorn and watch a movie. I don’t want you going anywhere with deformed biting vandals running around, ok? Call your parents, you can all stay here tonight.” A huge grin spread across Alex’s face, “Boys, in your rooms and girls in Mina’s room,” Willow told them, disappointing her son to no end, “And I will check on you!”
    Alex sighed, “My dreams are crushed.”
 

    As soon as Willow reached her room, she collapsed behind the door, shaking uncontrollably.
    “Will,” Xander called, rushing to her side, “hon, what is it?”
    Through punctured sobs, Willow gazed up at him, “They’re back. Spike’s back. The kids… they, at the Bronze, saw vampires.”
    Xander’s knees gave way and he sat next to his wife on the floor, stroking her hair, “What are we going to do Xander?”
    “What can we do?” He asked in return.
    “We, we have to find out who the slayer is, we have to help her,” Willow said, determined.
    “Will, we aren’t sixteen anymore. We can’t go running off trying to destroy demons every night. We have jobs, a family, responsibilities…”
    “One of those responsibilities is to help the Slayer!” Willow demanded. “I… I promised Buffy, long ago, that I would always be there to help when I was needed. Well, damn it Xander! I’m needed and whether it’s convenient or not, I have an obligation to her!”
    “Honey,” Xander said calmly, “I love you, you know that, but you have to understand that this new slayer, she isn’t Buffy. You… you feel like you have an obligation to Buffy and…”
    “Xander, I do have an obligation to her! If I hadn’t been out that night, if I hadn’t been so stupid, she’d be alive today! I owe her my life. I know this new slayer isn’t Buffy, but I have to make peace somehow. I owe her so much. I have to do something!” Willow insisted hysterically.
    “Shhh, ok, ok, Will, tomorrow we’ll go see Giles and find out what he knows. Maybe, maybe there’s something we can do to help,” Xander relented.
    Willow sobbed with relief in the arms of her husband.
 

    Everyone watched on as Alex tossed up a piece of popcorn and, in attempting to catch it in his mouth, failed miserably as it hit his eye. Angel grinned and tried the same thing, only he was successful.
    “Argh!” Alex yelled, “Best two out of three!” he demanded.
    “Why bother, Alex,” Mina asked, “You never get it!”
    “Hush, oh sister of mine, you’ll make me lose my concentration!”
     Mina sighed and sat back and watched as he missed yet another two times. He even managed to get one stuck up his nose. Angel on the other hand, made all of his.
    “It’s your fault,” Alex insisted pointing to his sister, “there was a concentration drain!”
    Rianna rolled her eyes, “Give it up, Alex, or at least practice some other time so that we don’t have to sit here for the next two or three hours watching you in anticipation of you finally catching a piece of popcorn in your mouth. It lacks a certain amount of entertainment value.”
    “Damn,” Alex muttered, “and here I was hoping I could make it my career.”
    “Guys, we haven’t really talked much about what happened at the Bronze,” Angel said.
    “What’s there to talk about?” Rianna asked.
    “Oh, I don’t know, what planet those guys were from!” Alex retorted.
    “They were probably some whacked-out gang high on something,” Ria responded.
    “Ria, dear, have you ever seen anyone who looked like that before?” Kaylan asked her sister.
    “Well… no,” she lied.
    “If you ask me, I don’t think they even looked… well… human,” Alex said.
    The group was silent for a moment and then laughed nervously, “What, you think they were vampires or something, Alex?” Angel asked grinning at his brother.
    “Nah, never mind, I’ve seen one too many sci-fi movies,” Alex laughed.
    “Hey, what do you all say we tell some horror stories?” Kaylan asked grinning in anticipation.
    “Huh? Oh, no, cause horror stories, they bring… well, uh, fear, and horror and…” Mina’s voice trailed off.
    “Mina, don’t be such a baby! You’ve got two big strong guys here to protect you!” Alex declared, “Well, one big strong guy and his sidekick,” he grinned.
    “Well, you know, I was gonna be nice and not say anything, but if you want to designate yourself sidekick, that’s fine with me,” Angel grinned.
    “But, I…” Alex began.
    “Isn’t that so nice of him, willing to give up the spotlight and all?” Ria asked grinning.
    “Well, hey, you know, it’s not in my nature to try to be the center of attention or anything,” Alex smiled, “I’m a Clark Kent kinda guy, silent yet strong. Compassionate, yet humble. Giving, yet….”
    “Dorky?” Mina asked.
    “That was not the image I was going for,” Alex told his sister.
    “One small issue I hate to point out about us telling horror stories,” Ria said. “We all spend time with each other and have like our whole lives. Any horror stories we’ve heard all of us will already know!”
    “Oh, yeah, that’s true…” Kaylan said, biting her lip in thought.
    “Oh, darn, no horror story, well, we all have to make sacrifices in life, this shall be mine,” Mina declared solemnly.
    “I have an idea,” Kaylan smirked, “Angel, didn’t your mother write horror stories?”
    Angel raised an eyebrow and sat back in his seat, “Yeah, she did.”
    “Ever read em?” She grinned.
    “No, actually. When I was younger and wanted to, Aunt Will said I was too young for that sort of thing. I have to admit that recently it’s not something that occurred to me to do,” He smiled sadly.
    “Wanna read em now?” Kaylan asked with an evil grin.
    He shrugged in an attempt to look nonchalant, “Why not?”
    “Alex, your parents have to have a copy of her stuff around here,” Kaylan said excitedly.
    “If they do, it’d be on the bookshelf in the family room,” he replied.
    “So, go get it!” Kaylan urged.
    Mina groaned and flopped back onto the sofa, “Why? Why do we always have to do scary things! I’m still not over the time you guys made me help you with that séance in the graveyard. I think I suppressed some of that night.”
    Ria laughed, “You’re so exaggerating, Min!”
    “No I’m not,” she pouted wounded.
    “Here they are,” Alex said as he returned to the den, “there’s a huge series of them, so I brought the first three.”
    “Coolness!” Ria exclaimed, “Lemme see!”
    Taking the first of the books from Alex, she flipped to the back cover to the about the author section.
    “Buffy Summers is a 21 year old resident of Sunnydale California where she lives with her infant son, Angel,” Ria read as Angel looked over her shoulder.
    “Oh my gosh, Angel, she was gorgeous!” Ria exclaimed.
    “Yeah, she was wasn’t she?” he asked sadly.
    “Angel, if this is too difficult for you, we don’t have to read this. It was just an idea,” Ria told him.
    “No, I want to read it,” He said, attempting to sound sure of himself, “I do remember her, but I was only six years old when she died. Mostly I remember the idea of her and I want to know more about who she was. This is a good way to do that.”
    “Alright,” Ria said, “shall I start?”
    The group quickly found that the books were excellent and though they were primarily about vampires, they were really comedies as much as they were horror. Angel, Mina, Alex and Kaylan decided that Buffy Summers had been a very gifted writer with a great imagination. Ria, however, was worried.
    “Did she read about the Slayer somewhere?” Ria asked herself silently, “How did she know?”
    After her friends had fallen asleep, Ria continued to read the series of books. What she saw caused her to gasp and drop the book in shock. She had to get some rest and talk to her watcher first thing in the morning.
 

    Finally asleep, Rianna looked more at rest and peaceful than usual. Unbeknownst to the dozing slayer, her Angel stood in the doorway, staring at her. He had been there for some time. Not even he knew how long. Enraptured by the rhythmic sound of her breath, he found himself unable to move away. Slowly, cautiously, he moved towards her. As he sat down on the floor next to her makeshift bed, he brushed an errant strand of hair away from her face. Spotting a book that had fallen to her side, he picked it up and, out of curiosity, glanced at it. It was his mother’s book.
    He looked to the page she had left off on and murmured the words under his breath, “Spike laughed tauntingly from his wheelchair and cocked his platinum blond head to the side slightly as he raised his hand, ‘Uh, you’re not clear on the concept mate. There is no instead, just first and second.’ ‘And if you go first, you don’t get to watch the slayer die,’ Spike’s lover, Dru finished. As the Judge drew closer to the slayer, Angel, the slayer’s love, searched frantically for a way to free them from their fate.” Angel closed the book and stared at the cover. There lay a drawing of the vampire he had seen earlier that night at the Bronze. “What the Hell is going on?” he asked himself.
    “Hell is the right word,” Ria said, startling him.
    “Oh, I, uh, I didn’t know you were awake,” he stumbled over the words.
    “Just checking to make sure we were alright?” she asked, sitting up to face him.
    “Um, yeah,” he agreed, grasping her explanation, “I was just worried after everything that happened last night, you know.”
    “That’s so sweet!” she murmured, drawing closer to him.
    He cleared his throat and backed away slightly, “What did you mean when you said Hell was the right word?” he asked.
    She sighed and bit her lip, fishing for an explanation. “You read it, yes?” she asked.
    “About the vampire we saw last night? Yeah,” he confirmed, “Do you know what’s going on?”
    Rianna sighed, “I haven’t told anyone this. I’m not allowed to, so you have to keep quiet about it, ok?”
    He nodded.
    “Your mother’s stories aren’t fiction. They are the story of her life. She was the vampire slayer, the one of her generation,” Ria told him, watching him carefully to see how he took it.
    “How do you know that?” he asked her.
    “Because, I am the slayer, now,” she whispered.
 

    Angel blinked at her in surprise, “I’m sorry, could you repeat that?”
    “I’m the slayer, Angel,” Ria told him softly as she laid her hand on his arm.
    “And that’s really why you didn’t run off with the rest of us at the Bronze?”
    Ria nodded.
    “How long… how long have you known?” He asked.
    “Known I was the slayer, or known your mother had been one?” she asked.
    “Both,” he replied.
    “I’ve known I was the slayer for about a year. My watcher, Cora McKevern, she’s the Eastern European Mythology teacher at Sunnydale Community College, told me and started training me. I’ve only known your mother was a slayer since I read this. Ms. McK’s been sketchy to me about prior slayers, probably because she knows we are friends and didn’t want me to know about your Mom. Personal involvement on any level as a slayer is a no-no and I have the distinct feeling that knowing your best friend’s Mom was a slayer who was killed by vampires eleven years ago would fall under the category of ‘don’t-tell-the-teen.’ Ms. McK worries a lot.”
    He blinked at her incredulously, “So… you go out and slay vampires every night?”
    She sighed, “That’s the tricky part. About a year before your Mom died, the Hellmouth returned and she defeated it, again. It was prophesied to return to Hell for thirteen years and gather it’s energy before returning to Sunnydale. When that happened, the vampires all weakened, a lot of the already weak ones even died. With that mystical power source gone, they had no reason to stay in Sunnydale, so most of them spread out all over the world. But it’s been thirteen years, and with the showing the vampires gave last night, I think the Hellmouth is about to resurface.”
    “Ok, so the Hellmouth is returning to Sunnydale and I assume with it comes the vampire community?” he asked.
    She nodded soberly, “I think so but, I have to talk to Ms. McK.”
    “What are we going to do?” he asked her.
    “We?” she raised her eyebrows, “Not we, me. I am going to perform my sacred duty and kill vampires. It’s what I was born to do. You are going to go to school, graduate, party, and live a normal life.”
    “No,” he protested defiantly. “I’m not going to abandon you to some blood-sucking demons. I wouldn’t do it last night and I won’t do it now!”
    “Angel,” she whispered, staring deeply into his hazel eyes, “your loyalty is touching, but this is something I have to do alone. Something I’m supposed to do alone!”
    “My Mom had help!” he protested, “In the books it said those three people, um, Lavell, Fern, and Reagan, they all helped her!”
    “Are you sure she didn’t make that part up?” Ria asked him sadly. “After all, did any of your Mom’s friends have those names?”
    “No,” Angel admitted, “but in the books her name was Anne,” he pointed out.
    Ria looked down pensively, “Did your Mom have a middle name?” she asked him.
    “I… I’m not sure,” he replied, “I could ask Aunt Will,” he offered. “Why?”
    “Just thinking,” she responded as she looked up at him and smiled. He smiled back and tried desperately to not allow his adoration of her show through his eyes. It was late and he was failing.
    Ria licked her lips tentatively and shifted closer to Angel, “Why haven’t we ever been… we?” she asked him staring into his eyes.
    “Uh… We?” he asked searching for a way to escape this particular conversation.
    Ria nodded and stared up at him with hope and fear in her eyes.
    Suddenly very aware of their proximity and Mina’s far too tight T-shirt Ria was wearing, Angel gulped and looked around frantically.
    “Ria, I…” he started.
    “Angel, what are you doing in here?” Willow asked from the doorway, “It’s way to late to be chatting. Get to bed,” she yawned.
    “Right, Aunt Will,” Angel smiled, relieved that someone had apparently heard his prayers, “Sorry, I didn’t realize it was so late. Ria, I’ll see you in the morning.” He announced as he got up.
    “Right, then we can finish this talk,” she said hopefully.
    “Sure,” he said slowly as he headed for the door.
 

    “Min,” Rianna called from inside her friend’s closet, “don’t you have anything bigger?” Ria was by no means large, in fact at just two inches over five feet she was the shortest of the group, but she was far shapelier than her slender friend.
    Mina sighed, “Sorry, Ria. Didn’t you leave your black skirt here last month?”
    “Bottom drawer on the left,” Kaylan informed them as she put her headphones on and immediately zoned out to the rest of the world.
    “Thank goodness!” Ria exclaimed as she held up the skirt in triumph, “I was beginning to wonder if I’d have to call Edward to bring something over!”
    Mina smiled at her friend enviously, “You’re so lucky! I mean, how many kids have maids and butlers and personal drivers and stuff?”
    Rianna laughed at Mina’s naivete, “Yeah, lucky me. I have so many people who care about me,” she said sarcastically.
    “Mina, don’t knock what you got! Sure, I have family money, so what? My father works constantly and his secretary has to even remind him when my birthday is. My mother is far more concerned with her social status and shopping ventures. My sister, don’t get me wrong, I adore her, is really weird!” She said glancing to her ever darkly dressed twin who was banging her head to the music. “You’ve got two parents who adore you and two brothers who would do anything for you. They love you, Min. All I have is you guys!”
    Mina looked to her shoes guiltily, “I didn’t mean like that. I just meant that having money would be nice.”
    “It’s a hell of a trade off,” Ria informed her as she examined herself in the mirror.
    “How do I look?” Ria asked nervously.
    Mina laughed, “Like you ever look bad?”
    “Seriously!” Ria insisted worriedly.
    “You look great! Not that it’ll make a heck of a lot of difference! Angel already likes you a lot, but nothing you do will ever get him to tell you that. He doesn’t do well with personal involvement. Even with his family,” Mina said sadly.
    “Why?” Ria whined plopping onto the bed next to her friend.
    Mina looked to Kaylan to make sure she was still engulfed in her music, seeing she was Mina whispered to Ria, “You can’t tell anyone this, ok?”
    “Yeah, sure,” Ria agreed seriously.
    Mina sighed, “Angel was there when his Grandmother was murdered. He was like five years old or something and he doesn’t remember any of it, but he was there, in the room, when it happened. First he lost his only Grandparent and saw it happen. Then, his only other living relative, his mother, was murdered too! Since then he’s never let himself get close to anyone, except for Mom, but he was already close with her before his Mom died. I think he’s scared that anyone he gets close to will die.”
    Ria sighed and leaned back, hitting her head on the headboard, “I won’t die on him,” she murmured in promise.
 

    A little past noon, Willow and Xander ventured out to see Giles. None of the old group, save of course for Willow and Xander, had kept very close in touch after Buffy’s death. It was hard on all of them and in truth, they had little in common beyond the vibrant blond slayer they had all befriended. As they drove quietly to Giles’ small home on the outskirts of town, Willow realized she hadn’t seen the librarian since Buffy had died.
    “You nervous?” She asked her husband without turning see his face.
    “Actually, yeah, a little,” he admitted to her, “I mean, I feel like we should have kept in touch. I wonder how he is. I worry how he is,” he amended.
    “Me, too,” Willow whispered quietly.
    Xander silently reached for her hand and squeezed it comfortingly, “This is it,” he said as they pulled into the driveway.
    Willow summoned her courage and sighed heavily as she got out of the car and headed with Xander to the door. Unhesitatingly, Xander rang the doorbell.
    “Yes, yes, just a moment,” someone called from inside. A few minutes later, the doors opened to reveal a somewhat older Giles than they remembered, book in hand.
    “Good Gracious!” He exclaimed, “Willow? Xander?”
    The duo nodded in unison. “How are you, G-man?” Xander asked his former mentor affectionately.
    “Xander, I have told you many a time not to call me that name, but I’m fine… just fine. Do come in, have a seat! How is everything?” He asked cordially.
    “The kids have grown so quickly!” Willow told him proudly as she pulled some pictures out of her purse. “This is Alex, our oldest. You remember him, right? He’s seventeen now. This is Mina. She’s fifteen.”
    “Guys,” Xander spoke up, “as much as I’d love to sit here and make small talk for a while, that’s not the reason we came.”
    “No, no I assumed, not,” Giles said tiredly.
    “Spike is back,” Willow said timidly, “I think Dru and Angelus are, too.”
    Giles leaned forward, concerned, “How do you know?” He asked.
    “A group of vamps attacked the Bronze the other night,” Xander revealed.
    Giles raised his eyebrows questioningly, “You still frequent the Bronze?” He asked incredulously.
    “No,” Willow laughed, “but our kids do along with their friends. They said they saw a platinum blond headed deformed man in the group of what had to be vampires bite a girl on the neck. It had to be Spike.”
    “Yes… yes, I concur,” Giles mused.
    “Giles, we want to help. We need to help. Who’s the slayer now?” Willow begged.
    “I honestly haven’t a clue,” he informed them as he got up to pace the room, “I’ve been retired as a watcher since… Buffy… since the next slayer took over. I haven’t contacted the watcher council in years.”
    “But do you know how to find out?” Xander asked him.
    “Yes, yes, of course. Buffy’s rein was one of the best in history. There are those in the council who would have liked me to lead after my services as her watcher were no longer required. I refused. It wasn’t a life I wanted. But there are those who would still like to see me in that position. I’m sure I can get whatever information you need, given time.”
    Xander smiled sadly, “I hope not too much time, Giles. It seems to me like the vampires are coming back to town, and I for one would like to throw them a little welcome home party.”
 

    Ria munched on a rice-cake as she followed the familiar route to Ms. McKevern’s office. “Yum, Styrofoam!” She exclaimed sarcastically as she debated using it as packing material instead of eating it. “Hey, Ms. McK!” She called startling her watcher as she flounced into the room, dropping the half-eaten rice-cake into the garbage on the way.
    “Oh, Ria, thank goodness you’re here!” The woman exclaimed peered worriedly over an ancient text.
    “We have a problem,” Ria told her as she sat across from the older woman.
    The teacher raised her eyebrows in surprise, “That’s usually my line!”
    “Not this time,” Ria said, all business, “a group of vamps attacked the Bronze last night while I was there.”
    “Goodness! What happened? Why didn’t you call me immediately?” She asked jumping to her feet.
    “There were close to thirty of them and they chose not to fight me yet, thank God. I could never have defeated all of them! They killed two people though, I wish I was fast enough to stop them. The three head ones said their names were Spike, Dru, and Angel. They said to tell you they were back in town. As for why I didn’t call, we ran to Mina’s house and all spent the night there. What was I supposed to say? ‘Oh, I know it’s past midnight Ms. Harris, but I have to call my watcher!’ I don’t think so!” Ria was about to continue her tirade when Ms. McKevern motioned for her to stop.
    “Breathe, Ria,” she warned the girl.
    Rianna breathed in deeply before continuing, “He said his name was Angel,” she said suspiciously, but receiving no response from her troubled watcher.
    “I read Buffy’s stories,” she told her mentor, this time receiving the reaction she expected.
    “She was the slayer, wasn’t she? She broke all the rules and lived the longest. Angel, my Angel, is named after that blood-sucker out there, isn’t he?” she demanded fiercely.
    “Rianna, it’s far more complicated than that,” she sighed, “Angel, the vampire Angel, was unique, he had a soul and Buffy fell in love with him. You’re basically right though, on all counts.”
    “How could you hide this from me?” Rianna demanded.
    “I had to,” Ms. McK smiled sadly through her stormy gray eyes, “No slayer has ever been so close to another. We were worried how you’d react if you knew your best friend’s mother had been a slayer, by all accounts the best slayer ever, and died at the hands of vampires. At the hands of a vampire she was in love with. It wasn’t an issue they… we thought you could handle.”
    “So, I can handle preventing Armageddon on a regular basis, but the truth is beyond me?” Ria asked hurt and annoyed.
    “Ria, Buffy was amazing at what she did, but she also did things dangerously. To tell you the truth, I think they were scared because you are so much like her. We didn’t want you to do things like she did, even if they helped her, they were still wrong,” Ms. McK told her devotedly.
    “Angel read her books, too. He knows, he figured it out,” Ria muttered to her Watcher.
    Ms. McK collapsed into her chair and ran her fingers through her ash-blond curls, “What exactly does he know?” she asked.
    “Everything…” Rianna said, biting her lip.
    “So, you knew he knew a little and decided to fill him in on the rest?” Ms. McK scolded.
    Rianna shrugged.
    “Do you understand the concept of secrecy, Ria? It doesn’t mean tell your friends and keep it from everyone else!” Ms. McK fumed.
    “Like I did that? My own twin doesn’t even know! One friend knows. One!” Ria cried.
    “Well,” Ms. McK sighed acceptingly, “I guess it’s something we’ll have to learn to deal with.”
 

    Angel woke up late, as always. He was really much more of a night person, mornings and he never seemed to be on good terms with one another. As it was, he didn’t wake up voluntarily.
    A large down pillow smacked Angel squarely in the face, rudely awakening him from his dream.
    “You planning to sleep ‘til summer?” Alex asked hovering invasively over Angel.
    “Could I?” he muttered in reply, grabbing the pillow and placing his head under it.
    “Come on!” Alex grinned, “I was elected to be the one to wake you and so I must! The day is not so young and we have places to go, people to see, schoolwork to finish!”
    Angel abruptly pulled the pillow off his head and looked at Alex in shock.
    “Did that last one come out of my mouth?” Alex asked in horror.
    Angel laughed, “Ok, I’m up!”
    “Ria left early this morning, something about going to see some teacher,” Alex shivered as he headed towards the door, “And Mom and Dad went out to see some librarian they used to know or something. So, the rest of us were going to go head out for lunch at Dave’s Café. You comin’ with us?”
    “Aunt Will and Uncle Xander went to see their old librarian?” Angel asked, remembering the books he’d read last night.
    “Yeah, weird, huh?” Alex replied, “I mean, once I get out of high school I see no reason to ever have contact with a school official again!”
    “Did they say where they were meeting this guy?” Angel asked curiously.
    “No,” Alex said slowly, “Why?”
    “Just, um, wondering when they’d be back,” Angel lied.
    “K, cool,” Alex responded. “I’m headin’ downstairs. See ya soon.”
    “Hey Alex,” Angel asked as the boy headed for the door, “What’s your Dad’s middle name?”
    “Huh?” Alex asked confused, “His middle name? Why do ya wanna know that?”
    “Just curious,” Angel responded, trying to look like he meant it.
    “Lavell, and if you ever tell anyone I told you that, you die!” Alex promised.
    Angel’s eyes lit up as Alex closed the door behind him, “She did have friends help her!” He murmured.
 

    “Home, sweet home,” Angelus murmured as his vampire face dissolved into his usual human façade.
    “It sings with memory,” Dru danced happily around the warehouse.
    “I still don’t see why we couldn’t stay somewhere decent,” Spike grimaced examining the dust that had fallen over the table over the past thirteen years.
    “It’s home, love,” Dru whispered in his ear, “and it’s so happy we’re back!”
    “Dru, pet,” Spike licked his lips, “it’s a warehouse. It can’t miss us.”
    “You just can’t hear it cry. It cries in my head, Spike,” Dru assured him.
    Angelus raised an eyebrow at Dru’s even more insane than usual attitude. Leaning back in his old chair, Angelus propped his feet up on the table and clasped his hands behind his head. “The only thing I want to hear cry is that new slayer,” Angelus declared.
    “Any particular reason, mate? Or is it just that she’s the slayer?” Spike questioned, remembering the look on Rianna’s face as she saw Angelus emerge from the shadows.
    Angelus set his jaw, “I just don’t like her.”
    “Yes you do,” Dru insisted. “You like her far too much,” she ribbed.
    “What the Hell is that supposed to mean?” Angel asked defensively as he jumped up, kicking his chair over in the process.
    “She reminds you of the one who turned you back,” Dru grinned, draping her arms around Spike lovingly, “but don’t worry, you remind her of her Angel.”
    “What the Hell are you talking about?” Angelus asked, “You’ve gone even more crazy Drusilla.”
    “Dru, baby, what did you mean?” Spike coaxed her gently.
    “I am as I ever was, as you made me,” Dru informed Angelus. “Our Angel reminds her of her Angel,” Dru told Spike plainly, as if it should have been obvious to anyone.
    “Did you have a vision, love?” He asked.
    “Yes,” she answered, dancing around the room, swaying in time with nothingness, “and it’s started.”
 

    Giles sighed as he hung up his phone and turned to Willow and Xander, “Well, it appears as though none of my contacts are willing to speak with me. I… I can’t imagine why.”
    Willow gave her husband an exasperated look, “Well, she either has to be at the Hellmouth or coming to the Hellmouth, right?”
    “That… yes, it is an, um, plausible assumption,” Giles confirmed.
    “Well then,” Willow smiled, “we know what to look for!”
    “What?” Xander asked, not catching on.
    “History of violence, women consistently around when unexplained phenomenon occurs,” she smiled.
    “Yeah, we’ll either end up with the slayer or a very scary woman,” Xander said, less than enthusiastically.
    “There is, perhaps, another way,” Giles mused, “after all, a slayer must have a watcher.”
    “And a watcher must have a job which allows them to research constantly,” Willow finished proudly.
 

    Ms. McKevern tossed a book down in frustration, “I don’t have the patience for this,” she muttered.
    “That makes two of us,” Ria sighed as she closed a dusty book and sneezed, “I hate books.”
    “What are we looking for, anyhow?” Ria asked her Watcher.
    “Hellmouth… resurfacing… events surrounding it,” the older woman reminded her.
    “Oh, right… that,” Ria smiled lightly.
    Ms. McKevern raised an eyebrow and smiled lopsidedly, “Not thinking about prophecies are we?”
    “No,” Ria admitted, not quite raising her eyes to meet her mentor’s.
    “If he looks anything like his namesake, I can understand why,” Ms. McK laughed.
    A broad grin overtook Ria’s face.
    “He looks a lot like him.”
    Her face contorted, lost in thought, for a moment, “Why is that?”
    “Why is what?” Ms. McK asked, peering over the rim of her glasses.
    “Why does he look like the vampire, Angel? Vampire’s can’t have children,” Ria stated matter-of-factly.
    “I don’t know,” Ms. McK told her as she reached for the next book.
    Ria slammed her palm down on the cover, “Uh-uh, no you don’t! Not this time! I want an answer!”
    “I don’t have one,” Ms. McK told her evenly, “and I would advise you to drop the subject.”
    “Why?” Ria asked through gritting teeth.
    “Because it’s none of your business and it will only get you into trouble,” Ms. McK assured her.
    “Another thing falls into the category of ‘don’t-tell-the-teen,’ huh?” Ria fumed. “Not this time! I won’t go around working like some robot, doing whatever you tell me to and obeying everything you say. I need to know! You can’t expect me to go and risk my life every time you clap you hands and say the magic words, even though I know nothing. Now, this is something I need to know and Angel needs to know. When you decide I can handle it, beep me. Until then, you can research by yourself!” Ria told her coldly as she stormed out of the room.
 

    Angel yawned as he walked down the stairs and stumbled into the kitchen still in somewhat of a daze.
    “Tired much?” Kaylan smirked at the fellow teen’s serious case of bed-head. Angel didn’t even blink in response as he mechanically poured himself a cup of coffee.
    “Angel,” Alex over-pronounced slowly, “you, sleep, bed, yes?”
    Angel glared at his brother and gulped down his coffee.
    “You should see him on a school day,” Mina murmured to Kaylan.
    “Yeah, he’s just a bubbly bundle of joy at six in the morning,” Alex quipped.
    “Do you have any clue how annoying you can be, Alex?” Angel muttered.
    Alex gasped in feigned shock, “It speaks!”
    “Grow up,” Angel said rolling his eyes.
    “Make me!” Alex smiled. Annoying Angel in the morning might not have been Alex’s absolute favorite thing to do, but it sure was on his top-ten list.
    Pouring himself a second cup of coffee, Angel started to look somewhat alive, “You guys go ahead and go out to lunch,” he told the trio, “I got some errands to run, anyhow. I’ll catch up with you all later, ok?”
    “You sure?” Mina asked.
    “Yeah, I’m sure,” he told them, “go on, have fun.”
    “Mr. Sleepy-bye here just wants some quality time with his bed until the Bronz opens,” Alex asserted. “Not that I can blame him, it’s not like there’s anything else to do around here.”
    “We always manage to find something,” Mina sighed.
    “Yeah, we do the best stuff when the Bronze is closed,” Kaylan grinned predatorily, “like seances, ouija boards, ghost stories.”
    Mina frowned, “No! Bronze good. Séance bad!”
    “Come on, Min,” Alex grinned as he headed for the door, “lunch, good!”
 

    “We’ll be sure to call as soon as we find anything,” Willow assured the former watcher.
    “Yes, yes, as will I,” Giles concurred.
    “Well then, G-man,” Xander grinned, “it’s been great seeing you again. You should come over one night for dinner. You know, catch up, see the kids again.”
    “Perhaps I will, after this latest crisis is past,” Giles smiled at the man he knew was still a kid at heart and always would be.
    “Bye, Giles!” Willow waved as she got into the car. Giles stood on his porch and watched the happy couple drive off until they were no longer visible.
    “Hum,” he murmured and went back into the house to start his research.
    About twenty minutes later, the doorbell rang, “Just a moment!” Giles yelled as he finished his phone conversation with a longtime friend in Britain who just happened to have a little bit of information on the current slayer.
    Not hearing the former librarian call out, Angel paced the porch for a moment and attempted to peak in the window to see if anyone was home. At that moment, Giles opened the door to see him standing in the shadowed porch. His hands were in the pockets of his black jeans and he wore the leather jacket his mother had given to him when he was little. She had told him it was his father’s. It was the only clue he has as to his father’s identity. In short, the teen looked exactly like the vampire he was named for.
    Giles screamed and threw a bucket of nearby water at the boy.
    A moment later, a very, very confused Angel, completely drenched, blinked in shock and wonderment. “Mr. Giles?” he asked.
    “Um, you, you aren’t… you aren’t him?” Giles asked surprised.
    “Who?” the confused teen asked, wiping the water from his eyes, “The wicked witch of the west? I don’t melt.”
    Giles chuckled, “Ah, no, of course you don’t. I apologize.”
    “Ok, no problem,” Angel responded, “mind telling me why you threw that bucket of water at me? I didn’t need a shower that badly.”
    “It was holy water. I’m somewhat superstitious,” Giles told him.
    “I’m no vampire,” Angel replied in a low whisper.
    “Obviously not,” Giles confirmed.
    “Can I speak with you?” Angel asked him, “It’s about the slayer.”
    “The slayer?” Giles asked in excitement, “You know who she is?”
    “Yes,” Angel told him.
    “Who?” Giles asked impatiently after a moment.
    “I can’t tell you that,” Angel replied, “she entrusted me with her secret. I can’t exactly go spreading it around, now can I?”
    “No, I suppose not,” Giles admitted, “but I need to speak with her!”
    “About?” Angel prompted.
    “About the coming dangers. She doesn’t know whom she’s up against! They are far more powerful than most would imagine,” Giles said impassioned.
    “Give me a message,” Angel told him, “I’ll deliver it to her.”
    “How do I know I can trust you?” Giles asked.
    “Why do you think you can’t?”  Angel countered.
    “I came out onto my porch to find a man who looks exactly like one of the most famous vampires in history staring through my window and you expect me to take you at your word?” Giles asked incredulously.
    “I look like what?” Angel asked.
    “You look like one of the most famous vampires in history… Angelus,” Giles told him, his voice chilling at the name.
    “Angelus is my name,” Angel told the watcher.
    For the first time, Giles stared into Angel’s eyes and saw those of his long-dead slayer stare back at him, “Good gracious!” Giles exclaimed, “You’re her son, aren’t you?”
    He nodded slowly, knowing who it was that Giles meant.
    Giles, feeling the need to sit, collapsed in a combination of shock, pain, and nostalgia into his favorite porch chair, “I will write out a message for you to give her. If you are Buffy’s son, then I trust you.”
 

    As Ria had left her watcher’s office, she’d swiped the one thing she could think of that might give her the answers she felt she deserved: Buffy’s diary. Now, as she sat next to the fallen slayer’s grave, she wondered how her predecessor would have felt knowing someone else would be reading her innermost thoughts. After thinking about it for a long time, Ria decided that Buffy would have eventually wanted her son to know the truth. Gulping, she opened the book and began to read.
    Enraptured by Buffy’s account of her life, which was much like her books but far more intimate, Ria failed to notice as time passed, the sun threatened to fall below the horizon, and someone approached her quietly.
    “What are you reading?” He asked softly, in almost a whisper.
    Rianna, startled, turned swiftly to face him, “Angel,” she smiled.
    “Must be a good read to get you so involved you didn’t know I was here. You know, Miss, you should really be more aware of your surroundings, you never know who might show up,” He grinned playfully.
    “True…” she murmured, “but then I wouldn’t have been so pleasantly surprised to see you, either.” She countered, closing the distance between them in a less than subtle manner.
    “Why are you here?” Angel asked her, trying not to look at his mother’s grave.
    “I needed somewhere to… to collect my thoughts,” Ria told him, glancing to the ground, “I needed to talk to someone who’s been where I am now. Someone who knows what it’s like.”
    Angel studied her for a moment, “You would have liked each other,” he decided.
    “Really?” Ria asked tentatively, hopefully.
    He nodded in reply.
    “How well do you remember her?” Ria asked, hoping that he wouldn’t shy away from her questions.
    “I remember her smile, her eyes. I remember the time she gave me this jacket. I remember asking her about my father,” he stated with a far off look in his eyes.
    “What did she say?” Ria whispered.
    Angel hesitated, “She… she got this real sad look in her eyes and told me that my father was a wonderful man who she would always love. She told me she knew he would have loved me but he died before I was born. I never knew… I never really believed that though.”
    “Why?” Ria breathed almost silently.
    “I don’t know,” he admitted, “I never saw a picture of him, not once. She never talked about him. I just always had this feeling that she wasn’t telling me the truth.”
    “Oh,” she nodded.
    “I’ll never know, will I?” he asked her. “I’ll never know who he was, what he was like. She never even told me his name.”
    “I don’t know,” Ria admitted as she reached up and gently touched the side of his face, “but I promise you that if I ever find out, I’ll tell you.”
    Angel smiled in return and clasped her hand in affection and gratitude. Ria stared deep into his eyes as their hands touched and an undeniable electric shock passed through them. Ria hesitantly reached up and pulled his head down to kiss her. They were within inches of each other’s lips, the heat of their breaths melding into one when a scream pierced the darkened night.
    Unable to ignore her sworn duty, Ria parted from the near kiss, grabbed her bag, and ran in the direction of the scream, Angel close at her heels. When she reached the roadside, Ria found none other than Willow and Xander cornered by three very big, burly vampires.
    Ria winced and attempted to put up a front of naivete, “What’s going on?”
    “Ria, Angel, get out of here, now!” Xander ordered in no uncertain terms.
    As the largest of the three vampires, fangs bared, closed in on Willow and prepared to bite, Ria found herself left with no options.
    “Shit,” she muttered.
    “I’ll take the one on the left and get Aunt Willow and Uncle Xander out of here as soon as I can,” Angel assured her.
    “Thank you,” Ria breathed as she launched herself at the vampire that Willow was barely holding off with her cross. Delivering a hitch-kick to his lower back definitely got the attention of the towering demon. Not even bothering to look behind her, Ria staked the vamp that had been slowly sneaking up on her. Out of her peripheral vision, she saw Angel knock the other vamp unconscious.
    “How about you and me go for a little one-on-one, big boy?” Ria asked the remaining vampire.
    Finding that the tables had turned and he was cornered, the giant demon laughed at the irony. “So, you are the slayer?”
    Deadpanned, Ria never took her eyes off of him.
    “So, you’re the moron? Say good-night,” She told him as she lunged at him with a stake.
    “You think you can beat me, girl?” He laughed, easily brushing her aside. “I have crushed the bones of more than half a dozen slayers who were far more experienced and larger than you.”
    “Maybe,” she said, studying him as he moved, circling around her, “but you didn’t piss them off as badly as you did me.”
    Angel tried desperately to get Willow and Xander away from the fighting, but the duo refused to budge.
    “Ria’s the slayer?” Willow asked incredulously.
    Xander snorted at the irony. “Cordelia’s daughter is the slayer!”
    Angel watched closely as Ria and the vampire taunted and rounded each other. After close to five minutes, neither one had gained any ground. Apparently, the vampire decided he had had enough and reached to his back pocket. Angel coached himself not to panic as he saw the demon pull out a gun. But the vampire had forgotten about Angel. Friends were probably something that the vampire had never had to deal with before when confronting a slayer. And forgetting Angel was, for him, a deadly mistake.
    As the gun went off and grazed Ria deeply in her side, an enraged Angel sprinted to the vampire and plunged a stake deep into his heart. The final look on his face was one of complete surprise before he turned to dust and blew away in the breeze, leaving only the gun behind.
    As he disappeared in a whirling cloud of dust, Ria began to shake uncontrollably, “Oh, my God,” she whispered as she collapsed to the ground, unable to will herself to stay standing. “He, he had a gun, Angel. How, how, do I fight a vampire with a gun?” she asked hysterically. “How do I fight that? He… he had them cornered and I was scared, Angel, I was so scared! The slayer isn’t supposed to be scared. I didn’t know what to do,” she sobbed as tears ran down her reddened face. “I thought I was dead. I thought, ‘this is it. I have no where to go.’ I… I was going to die like all those other slayers and he would… he would laugh and kill more people. I thought I was dead, I did!”
    “He, he would have killed me… if you weren’t here to stop him. I would be dead,” She shrieked in punctuated gasps of air.
    Angel could think of nothing to say, no comfort to give, but to sit beside her, wrap his arms comfortingly around her, and whisper, “I will always be there to stop him, Ria, I promise.”
 

    Ria sat up abruptly, unaware of where she was.
    “Are you ok?” Willow Harris asked concerned as she brushed Ria’s dark auburn hair out of her face.
    “Where am I?” the slayer asked weakly.
    “You really * were* out of it!” Willow smiled kindly, “You’re at my house. Do you remember the fight?”
    Ria nodded and sighed, “Oh, right.”
    “We brought you back here,” Willow explained, “because you needed to rest and to heal.”
    Ria grimaced and laid back down, holding the gash on her side she’d gotten during the fight, “Am I going to be ok?”
    Willow nodded.
    “Where’s Angel?” Ria asked.
    “He went out to get some peroxide; we ran out of it,” Willow told her, “and I think he needed to do something: to feel like he was helping you.”
    Ria smiled and nodded, “You, weren’t surprised, about…”
    “No,” Willow confirmed.
    “Why?” Ria questioned.
    “Because we helped Angel’s mother slay many years ago,” Willow told her wistfully.
    “Like in the books?” Ria asked, wincing in pain.
    “You read them?” Willow asked astonished.
    “The other night, when we all slept over here. I recognized Spike’s description and realized Ms. Summers had to have been a slayer,” Ria told her.
    “I’d forgotten about the books,” Willow confided in her, “otherwise Xander and I would have gotten rid of them long ago. We never wanted our kids to have to face the reality of vampires or Buffy’s life.”
    “Or her death?” Ria asked.
    “Or her death,” Willow admitted.
    “Such a shame,” Ria said, “that you would rather forget her and everything she did than to remember in pain. I know I’d want to… I will want to be remembered,” Ria said softly.
    Willow drew back, “It’s… too hard, too… we didn’t want the kids to have to face Hell. Buffy wouldn’t have wanted it either.”
    “Well, guess what,” Ria said, biting back tears, “Hell will find us no matter where we hide.”
 

    “Pizza or Chinese food?” Alex questioned as he entered his house with Mina and Kaylan in tow.
    “We had Chinese last night, Alex,” Mina protested.
    “Pizza it is!” Alex replied with a grin.
    “Don’t you ever get sick of fast food?” Kaylan asked, shivering at the thought of the meat products she knew Alex would load on their dinner. “Can’t we all just make salads or pasta or something?”
    “But then there’s no greasy goodness!” Alex replied in mock horror.
    Mina shook her head and made her way towards her Mom’s room. “Ma, can we borrow some money?” She called as she half knocked on the door and opened it in one motion. “Oh my God! What happened?” Mina asked frantically as she saw the wounded Ria lying on her mother’s bed.
    “She’ll be fine, Mina. She got mugged, but she’ll be alright,” Willow said calmly as she rushed over to her dumbfounded daughter.
    Having heard Mina’s cry, Kaylan, and Alex soon entered the room, too.
    “Ria?” Alex questioned, his voice cracking with emotion as he ran to her side.
    “I’m fine, really,” she smiled weakly.
    “You don’t look fine,” Alex countered. “In fact, you look very not fine.”
    “I’ll be alright, I promise,” Ria said, touched by their concern.
    The thus far silent Kaylan set her jaw and very slowly managed to vocalize her thoughts, “Who was it?” She whispered with an intensity that scared even Ria.
    “I, I didn’t know him,” Ria told her.
    “What did he look like?” Kaylan seethed.
    “Angel took care of him,” Ria informed them.
    Alex’s head snapped up at his brother’s name, “He was there and let this happen to you?” He demanded.
    “It wasn’t like that,” Ria insisted. “He saved me.”
    “After letting you get hurt!” Alex pointed out.
    “I didn’t let her get hurt,” a voice announced from the doorway. “I would never let her get hurt. Don’t you know that? I did everything I could.”
    Alex turned to face him, the hatred and blame evident on his face, “Well, your everything just wasn’t enough, was it?” He asked.
    Normally Angel would walk away from whatever fight his brother presented him with, but Alex had just pushed the wrong button.
    “I don’t see her complaining,” he challenged Alex.
    “Stop it!” Ria demanded, wincing in pain as she gestured for them to quit fighting.
    “Why aren’t you at a hospital?” Mina asked, ignoring her feuding siblings.
    “We already took her by,” Willow lied, “they said she should go home and get some rest, but she needed someone to look after her so we took her here.”
    Alex glared menacingly at Angel as Angel sidestepped him and approached Ria. “How are you feeling?” He asked her, placing his hand lightly on the side of her face.
    “Better,” she murmured with a smile, “I’ll be fine by morning.”
    After allowing her eyes to linger on Angel’s face, much to Alex’s jealous annoyance, Ria looked to Willow and smiled, “Thank you so much, Mrs. Harris. And please give Mr. Harris my thanks, too.”
    “I will,” Willow smiled, “just as soon as he gets home.”
 

    Xander Harris stood in front of the enormous rosewood door and prepared to do something he had sworn to himself that he would never do: he knocked on it. Chase-Mullet manor defined extravagance, but that wasn’t the reason he’d sworn never to go there. Cordelia Chase-Mullet was the reason he’d never gone and cursed himself for going, even now. Rapping loudly on the ornate wood, Xander swallowed his pride and waited for someone to answer.
    The door creaked open to reveal a butler in full formal dress, “May I help you, Sir?” The man asked, with obvious distaste.
    “I’m here to see Mrs. Chase-Mullet,” Xander informed him.
    “I’m sorry, Sir, but Madame is otherwise occupied at the moment.”
    “I need to see her,” Xander said, determined not to back down. “Her daughters are best friends with my children. It’s a personal call.”
    The butler raised his eyebrows skeptically, “Please have a seat in the foyer, Sir. I will see if she will receive you.”
    Xander followed the butler inside, attempting not to openly gawk at the extreme display of wealth flaunted in the home. Chase-Mullet manor’s four floors could all be seen as one entered the house. Each one, from his view, appeared to be even more wildly expensive than the last. As the butler left him in the foyer and entered the room immediately to the right, Xander occupied himself with staring at what were undoubtedly real Picasso, Van Gough, and DaVinci paintings and sculptures.
    As Xander scrutinized a dotism impressionist era painting, the butler re-entered the room.
    “Ahem,” he pronounced, effectively receiving Xander’s attention, “Madame is quite busy now and assures me she cannot be disturbed. Perhaps Sir would like to leave a message or make an appointment.”
    Having had enough of the formalities, Xander rolled his eyes, “Look, this is extremely important. I don’t care if she’s chatting with Cleopatra, I need to see her, now!”
    The butler shivered at the bluntness, “I’m sorry, Sir, that’s not possible,” he insisted.
    “Bullshit,” Xander muttered as he pushed his way past the butler and entered the room that he’d seen him go into earlier.
    “Sir, this is entirely inappropriate. You cannot go in there!” The butler insisted, though Xander remained deaf to his cries.
    Xander wasn’t sure what he’d expected the room to be like. Whatever it was, he’d expected it to be costly, clean, and richly decorated. He wasn’t sure what he’d expected Cordelia to be like, but never had he expected to find her like this.
    Cordelia sat lazily on a sofa. Her usually luxurious hair was disheveled; her once luminous eyes encircled with dark rings. She held a nearly empty bottle of very expensive alcohol in one hand and a cigarette in the other.
    “Cordy?” He whispered.
    She looked up at him, recognizing him instantly, despite the haziness that fogged her brain, “What the Hell are you here for?”     She asked harshly.
    “What happened?” He asked her softly, ignoring the question completely.
    “What happened…” she repeated slowly, quietly. She began to laugh, “What happened. My life happened, Xander, my life.”
    “I don’t understand,” he said, shaking his head confused.
    “What don’t you understand?” she demanded, throwing her bottle of booze at him but missing by at least three feet. “My life is shit! I’m an alcoholic, occasional druggie rich-bitch who has no love in her marriage, maybe never did, and doesn’t even know her kids’ birthday!”
    Xander searched his head for something to say and found nothing, “I’m sorry,” he murmured truthfully.
    “You’re sorry?” she asked incredulously, “Day late and a dollar short, buddy! You left me, long ago, and I shut myself down because I never wanted to feel again. I never wanted that pain ever again. I never meant anything more to you than an occasional grope in a broom closet and you never realized you ever meant more than that to me, so don’t tell me now that you’re sorry! This is my life; this is my destruction, all because I let myself feel!”
    “Cordy, I never thought… I never meant for this to happen. You meant more to me than just that, I swear,” he told her, “but I fell in love with Willow. There was nothing I could do about that. If I had known that you were like this I would have told you all this years ago, but I never knew, Cordy, I swear, I never knew,” He proclaimed, astonished.
    “Day late, dollar short,” she repeated quietly, “What was so important that you came barging in on my little, private party?”
    “I need to talk to you about Ria,” he said solemnly, “but you’re in no shape to discuss this now. I’ll come back tomorrow, when you’re sober,” he decided.
    She shook her head and motioned for him to sit, “This is about as sober as I get, sit down and talk.”
    “Cordy, you need help,” he told her, concerned.
    “Maybe I don’t want it,” she hissed, “What’s the point, anyhow.”
    “The point is that you are missing your life as it goes by because apparently you’re high or drunk all the time. You aren’t happy this way. If your marriage is shoddy, try to fix it. If it’s beyond that, you can get a divorce. Try meeting your kids, they’re nice girls, the Cordy I knew would have liked them a lot.”
    Cordy started to open her mouth, but Xander motioned her to stop, “I don’t mean the ‘sheep’ Cordy, I mean the Cordy I knew. The one who talked about everything she wanted out of life and her plans for the future: the real Cordy. But right now it sure looks to me like she’s long dead.”
    Cordy’s lip quivered as conflicting thoughts ran through her head. “Get out of my house!” She finally pronounced.
    Xander set his jaw and hesitated before turning to the door, “I did love you Cordy, as a person and as a friend and for a while maybe for something more. I pray to God you fix your life because a part of me still does love you. Not romantically, not anymore, but I love you as a friend and as a person for who you were and I can’t bear to see you this way. Call me when you’re sober.”
    He didn’t look back as he left the room, so he never saw Cordelia collapse in muted sobs as she heard the only love her life had ever known show her more pity than she would have ever thought possible.
    “I love you,” she whispered to the air as she allowed the tears to totally overwhelm her.
 
 

    Angelus sauntered through the graveyard, watching for any hint of the slayer. Like many before her, Rianna had fast become an obsession for Angelus. Unfortunately for her, all of Angelus’ obsessions died or were turned into vampires. His obsession with Rianna, however, was different from all the others he’d had.
    Druscilla had been an idol curiosity; could he break her. She was beautiful enough, of course, but that hadn’t been his driving motivation. The sheer wonder of his capabilities was what fueled her destruction.
    Buffy he had loved and resented loving. Even after he lost his soul, there remained an undying animalistic attraction and obsession with her that he gladly fell victim to.
    Rianna, however, he found himself obsessed with because of her resemblance to his two most notable victims. Her manner and fighting style, from what he had heard, closely resembled Buffy’s. And while there were no overt similarities between them, there was something similar in Ria and Dru’s appearances. Maybe it was her pouty lips or her beautiful high cheekbones or her vibrant blue eyes, but something in her reminded him of Dru. The combination was intoxicating.
    Angelus mused over his thoughts as he idolly strolled past headstones, keeping a mental count of how many of them he had killed. A smirk overtook his flawless face as he reached her final resting-place.
    “Hello, lover,” he smiled as he looked down at Buffy’s grave, “miss me?” The smile faded from his face, however, as he heard someone behind him clear his throat. Tilting his head just enough so he could see who it was, Angelus rolled his eyes and sighed, “What is it, you dimwit? Can’t you see I’m busy?”
    “I’m sorry, Master,” the vampire hung his head in shame, “but I thought you would like to know that the Barbarian and Goroth have both been slayed.”
    Angelus’ interest was piqued, “The slayer killed the Barbarian?” That was impressive!
    “No, Sir,” the vampire continued, “one of her companions did. The Barbarian, Goroth and I were hunting. We came across a middle-aged unsuspecting couple. They looked like a great meal. The Barbarian had the woman cornered when the slayer came running from the graveyard to save them. Right behind her followed a friend of her’s. Master. He looked almost exactly like you. It was he who killed the Barbarian, to save the slayer.”
    Angelus raised an eyebrow skeptically, “You mean to tell me that the slayer has a friend, a mortal friend, who looks exactly like me and killed one of my best minions?”
    The vampire nodded worriedly, “And the older man called him ‘Angel’.”
    “If I find you are lying to me…” Angelus threatened.
    “I’m not, I swear it!”
    “How is it that you managed to escape the slayer and her friend,” he asked as he studied the less-than impressive vampire that stood before him.
    “The slayer’s friend knocked me unconscious, when I came to, the Barbarian was pulling out a gun. He shot the slayer, but the bullet only grazed her mid-section. I ran off so that someone would still exist to tell you what happened,” the vampire informed him.
    Angelus laughed slightly, “How long did it take you to make up that excuse, coward?”
    The vampire blinked as his shoulders dropped, “Not long, Sir.”
    Angelus laughed heartily, “I like you, so I won’t kill you. That and you just explained something to me that I’d been wondering about before.”
    Angelus grinned ferally, “’Our Angel reminds her of her Angel.’ Thank you Dru.” He laughed, speaking to no one but the masses of people he’d killed that lined up before him now. Looking around at the gravestones he smirked, “Hope there’s room for a few more!”
 

    Willow blew some air through her thinned lips and leaned back in her chair. Even asleep, Ria winced in pain periodically. Willow bit her lip, wishing there were something more she could do for the injured slayer, but at the moment the only thing she could think of was to keep watch over her. So, that was what she was doing. She’d shooed out the other children earlier, saying that Ria needed her rest. That was true enough, but the real reason was she’s needed to get the name of Ria’s watcher to inform her of what had happened. It wasn’t like she could ask that in front of the others, after all. Both Ria’s watcher and Giles were now on their way over.
    At the sound of a soft knock on the door, Willow sprung from her chair to greet Xander. “What took you so long? How did Cordy take it?” Willow asked.
    “I didn’t tell her,” Xander replied blankly.
    “What? Why not?” Willow asked in a surprised whisper, careful not to wake Ria.
    “Willow, Cordy’s a mess. She was totally drunk, which according to her she is more often than not. I couldn’t have told her and even if I had she would never have understood in the state she was in. She was just hysterical. Hell, she even threw a bottle of booze at my head. God, how did Ria turn out so stable?”
     Willow raised her eyebrows in surprise, “I… I’m sorry, Xander. I mean, you two did used to be… awfully close. It must have been hard to see her like that. I’ll go talk to her tomorrow.”
    Xander shook his head, “No. This is at least partly my fault. If I hadn’t just brushed her off like I did. If I had actually let her know that I did care about her, just not romantically anymore, maybe she wouldn’t be this messed up. This is my mess. I have to fix it.”
    Willow touched his face sympathetically and licked her lips slowly as she searched for the right words, “Xander, no matter how you would have said it, she still would have been hurt. There’s no good way to tell your fiancée you’re leaving her for your best friend! Even if you had told her you still loved her, but that you needed someone else, she wouldn’t have believed you. She’s sensitive and really, despite always acting like she thinks she’s ‘all that’, I think she has a low opinion of herself.”
    “Yeah, well, part of me wonders if maybe that isn’t partly my fault,” Xander grumbled.
    “How can you possibly take responsibility for what she thinks of herself?” Willow asked incredulously.
    Xander set his jaw and looked Willow in the face, “Remember what she was like before we were all friends? She always put on this prissy, stuck up, mask because that way no one could hurt her. She didn’t let herself care. When she joined the group and she and I started going out, every now and then we’d see her mask drop and get to see what she was really like. When I broke up with her, she went back to being… a sheep,” he scoffed, “she’d called them sheep. Anyhow, I think she really cared about me and trusted me. In fact, I think I might be the only person she ever really trusted enough to really be herself and not who everyone else expected her to be. Maybe, maybe she thought that I didn’t like her, that she wasn’t good enough. Maybe that’s why she went back to being a mindless, prissy snob. She thought it would make people like her and she’d never have to get hurt again. I think that’s what it was, but I also think she never realized she’d be even more unhappy than if she’d let herself feel.”
    Willow swallowed hard, “So, what could you have done? You couldn’t have stayed with her just because otherwise she’d go off the deep end. That’s no kind of life for you.”
    Xander sighed and looked at his toes. A small smile crept over Willow’s face as she turned his face back to her, “I know you loved her. Hell, I know you still love her, in a way. I’m not jealous of that, Xander. I can’t be. You need to tell her that she was and still is special to you and you love her. We all love her for who she was and we miss her. Make her understand that she’s a good person underneath that shell she has. The Slayerettes have been separated for far too long. I think it’s time for a reunion.”
    “She was the other one?” a hushed voice whispered from behind Willow. The redhead turned to see Ria groggily attempt to sit up. “She was the other one who helped the Ms. Summers?” The shock was evident in her voice. Willow didn’t find it surprising; after all, Ria had probably only known her mother as a myth, an absent, drunken, rich woman who preferred her gin to her daughter.
    “Yes,” Willow smiled sadly, “she was.”
    Ria’s face contorted as she tried to process this information through her medicated mind, “She fell apart because Mr. Harris left her and she thought that she was wasn’t good enough for anyone?”
    “Something like that,” Xander replied dryly.
    Ria sighed, “This is too much for me to think about right now.”
    Willow smiled kindly in response, “Don’t worry about it. Just get some rest and think about it later, when you’re feeling better.”
    An urgent knock on the front door sent Xander from the room to answer it. Willow turned back to Rianna, “Just close your eyes and try to get back to sleep, okay?”
    A few seconds later, a frantic looking blond woman followed Xander into the room. “Oh my God! Is she okay? What happened?” The woman asked rapidly as she ran to Ria’s side.
    “Hi, Ms. McK,” Ria murmured, “I’m gonna be okay. Don’t worry about me. I’m fine.”
    Willow smiled sympathetically at the slayer, respecting her for her strength to ease other’s pains and worries even when her own were so great. “Cora?” Willow asked, addressing Ms. McK, “Why don’t we talk in the other room so that Ria can get some sleep.”
    The Watcher looked worriedly from her Slayer to Willow and back before she nodded softly and turned to leave. “Call us if you need anything,” She told Ria. Ria nodded in agreement before dozing off into a deep, healing sleep.
 

    As the adults argued and analyzed the events of the evening in hushed whispers in the other room, Angel snuck back in to see Ria.
    “I’m sorry,” he whispered.
    “For what?” she asked, confused.
    “I’m sorry that I lost my temper with Alex… and I’m sorry that he’s right,” Angel murmured, looking past her as he stroked her hair.
    “Don’t even think that!” Ria demanded harshly, to Angel’s surprise.
    “I don’t mean that he was right that I let you get hurt. I’d never do that. I mean he was right that my everything wasn’t enough. I’m sorry.”
    “Angel, don’t apologize for not being some superhero! That’s my job, not yours, remember? Besides, you did save my life,” She smiled.
    “And what about next time?” He asked bluntly.
    “I thought we’d gone through this, Angel. You can’t be a sidekick here, Slayers work alone!” Ria told him, equally bluntly.
    “Not always,” Angel said pointedly.
    Ria sighed, “Your mother’s watcher allowed her friends to help her. My watcher would never do that. And, I can’t put you in danger like that, Angel. It’s no video game out there. You only have one life and there is no pause button. I, at least, have a faster turn-around time when I get hurt. You don’t even have that.”
    “I know all that. I know it’s dangerous and stupid, but I’m still helping you whether you like it or not. I won’t abandon you,” He insisted.
    Ria listened to his words, his raw emotions, and stared deeply into his eyes, “You didn’t abandon her, Angel. You were just a kid and you didn’t know what to do. It wasn’t your fault.”
    “What?” He whispered.
    “This isn’t about me, Angel. We both know that,” Ria said soothingly.
    “It is about you!” He insisted. She stared back in obvious disbelief, “But it’s not only about you,” he relented. “Grandma screamed so loud when she saw him. She knew who and what he was immediately, I think. She had just gone outside for a minute, to get some groceries she’d left in the car. I couldn’t hear much of what they said. He just stood there, all cocky for a moment, I think he was enjoying her fear. Then he bit into her neck and killed her. I remember that all so clearly. And I was so little when it happened. What I don’t remember clearly is my mother’s death,” he confided in her.
    “You were there when she died?” Ria asked timidly.
    Angel nodded, “I was looking out the window. I saw the same man, Aunt Willow, and my Mom. The next thing I remember, Aunt Willow was in my house on the phone with the police, the man was gone, and my Mother was dead.”
    “What did he look like?” Ria asked.
    “I don’t know, but I know it was the same person. He stayed in the shadows, never letting anyone really see him. He never knew I was there, either.”
    Ria squeezed his hand in comfort and sympathy.
    “Sometimes I see him in my dreams,” Angel said, breaking his revere and looking back to Ria’s face, “every time I see a little bit more and he seems more and more familiar. I know one of these days I will finally see him and I’ll know who killed them,” Angel half vowed-half predicted.
    “I hope so,” Ria smiled sincerely.
    Angel smiled back, “Get some sleep. I’ll be here when you wake up,” he promised.
    “Careful,” she murmured with a wide grin, “I could get used to that!” As Angel chuckled, she closed her eyes and quickly faded.
    Thinking her asleep, Angel bent over to kiss her. And even though she really was awake, Ria could hardly be sure their lips had even touched. It had been the softest, lightest kiss one could ever imagine. She smiled inwardly as it occurred to her that a real Angel’s kiss would probably be just like that.
 

    Unbeknownst to the love-struck duo, Angelus lurked outside the window, watching, waiting. Like Ria and Angel, however, Angelus found his emotions quite mixed and in fact found more questions than he did answers.
    Angelus’ amusement at the Slayer’s quiet romance was understandable. His confusion upon seeing the boy, Angel, who looked like him, expected. What wasn’t expected was his deep hated of the child.
    Maybe it was the fact that his long-lost soul would have identified with Angel. Maybe it was the simple idea that Angel had fallen for a slayer. Maybe it was that the boy had killed one of his favorite minions, but Angelus despised the poor teenager. For whatever reason, Angelus silently vowed he would defeat both of them, painfully.
 
 

    Willow’s cheeks puffed out as she blew air through her lips in frustration. It had all started off well enough. Ria’s Watcher and Giles had met happily. Cora even seemed to have a bit of hero-worship towards the older Watcher. But, from there on out, things had gone drastically downhill. Presently, the two Watchers had squared off and were yelling incessantly at each other.
    Once Willow had spoken to Cora, before Giles had arrived, she hadn’t really expected the two to be the best of friends or anything, they were too opposite, but this she also hadn’t expected. Cora was yelling and throwing in quotes from the Slayer’s Handbook as she defended the policy of the Slayer working alone. Giles, in turn, was screaming of the many times that someone other than Buffy in the group had saved the day.
    Willow had had enough, “All right!” She screamed at the top of her lungs. The two Watchers shut-up and looked to the frustrated redhead. “Whether or not it’s within policy or a good idea, we know, and we can’t and won’t sit idolly by while Ria has to fight for the world. She needs our support, not physically, maybe, but emotionally and mentally.”
    Willow looked at Cora who seemed to be grinding her teeth into nothingness as they stood there. “This isn’t a question, Cora, we are helping.”
    “You’ll get her killed or you’ll get yourselves killed,” Cora whispered with passionate intensity as she attempted to keep her exterior calm.
    “We can hold our own,” Xander assured her.
    “You mean you could hold your own,” Cora hissed, “back when you were teenagers. Guess what, news flash, you aren’t sixteen anymore! When was the last time you fought anything?”
    Willow, thinking about what Cora was saying, looked straight through the Watcher to see her past played out before her. The last time she had fought had been the day Buffy had died. Her eyes hazed over as her mind’s eye replayed that horrible night.
    “It’s been a while,” she admitted out loud, vacantly.
    “Look,” Cora said sighing, “I just want to do what’s best for everyone. You know that, right?”
    “That’s your intention, yes, I believe that to be true,” Giles spoke up, “but I also believe you are wrong. Willow and Xander know more about the dangers of the world than anyone. They are an invaluable resource that should not be so easily dismissed.”
    “The Watcher Council would have my head if I accepted your help,” Cora told them quietly.
    “Why?” Giles questioned.
    “Because there are some prophecies which would seem to indicate that Ria’s similarities to Buffy are dangerous. We don’t know why. All we know is that her similarities to Buffy could be her destruction. Then again, she also has a prophecy that would seem to indicate that she will have the longest and most productive rein of any Slayer ever. So, the counsel is quite protective of her, as you can probably imagine.”
    “May I see the texts?” Giles asked both hopefully and tentatively.
    Cora nodded and pressed her lips together tightly. “I’ll bring the ones I have, the counsel guards several quite closely back in England.
    “I’m gonna get in so much trouble for this,” she muttered beneath her breath, “I’ll be right back,” she told them as she left the room and the house, heading towards a fate she could never predict.
 

    Angelus smirked as he studied the blond woman who left the Harris house. “Who’s watching the watcher,” he murmured, snickering inwardly. Angelus was nothing if not an opportunist.
    Cora paused as she reached her car door, a chill ran down her spine as she felt eyes following her every move. Her mind was racing, her hands shaking. “Breathe,” she reminded herself silently to no avail. “Breathe!” she demanded more forcefully, resulting in a ragged broken breath, the sound of which made her only more nervous. She closed her eyes and counted to three. On three, she whirled around to find… nothing.
    Cora laughed, giddy with relief, “I’m paranoid!” she giggled.
    “Well,” someone replied, making her jump and turn in one smooth motion, “if someone really is after you, is it still technically paranoia?”
    A lump rose in Cora’s throat as Angelus’ intense eyes peered into her soul and laughed at the quivering woman it found within. Her mind was debating the best course of action, which would have been a lot easier if her pounding heartbeat hadn’t been so loud that it was hard to think. She had two options: run for the house or try and get into the car. In either case, her chances weren’t good and she knew it. So she opted for another approach; she stalled.
    “No, no it’s not,” she replied, “That was lame Cora!” she berated herself silently, “you’re gonna have to do a lot better than that!”
    “I’m sorry,” she said, feigning ignorance, “do I know you?”
    Angelus laughed aloud and watched her carefully, “All right,” he decided, “we’ll play this game.”
    “No,” he smiled dashingly, “I don’t believe I’ve had the pleasure.” He extended his arm over the car to shake her hand.
    Cora, her legs turning to Jell-O in fear, grasped his outstretched hand and shook firmly as a line from a movie she’d seen once flashed through her mind: “Have you ever danced with the devil in the pale moonlight?”
    “Well, now I have,” she thought to herself.
    “Pleasure to meet you,” she lied aloud, “my name is Cora.”
    Angelus could no longer keep up the pretenses. He laughed and gave a full and feral smile. “You honestly think I wouldn’t know who the current watcher and slayer are?” He asked.
    “No, I suppose I don’t,” she return, realizing her time was up and she had to make a choice. She grasped the cross in her pocket tightly and held it up in front of her. “You honestly think I wouldn’t be prepared for you to come after me?”
    Angelus grinned. This would be fun! “No, I suppose not.”
    Holding the cross in front of her, Cora backed up towards the house.
    Angelus tisked, chiding her lightly.
    “Cora, love,” he smirked. “Why are you leaving so soon? We only just met and I so want to be better aquatinted with you.”
    “Well, Angelus, that’s too bad because I want absolutely nothing to do with you,” Cora said as she reached the front porch.
    “No lying, my dear. We both know that’s not true,” Angelus admonished her. “You want me hunted. You want me to float off in the breeze at daybreak. Ashes to ashes and dust to dust, right?”
    Cora had nearly reach the doorway. She knew that if Angelus truly wanted to, he could still snatch her at any moment. But she couldn’t stand the sight of him any longer without voicing what she really thought.
    “You’re absolutely right, Angelus,” she replied. “I want you dead, again. I want you to have a big old splinter in that cold, dead heart of yours. Most of all, though,” she hissed, “I want you to suffer first for everything you’ve done, you son-of-a-bitch.”
    Angelus smiled, taken aback. He’d planned on killing this one as the first step in the destruction of the slayer, but now things were different. She had a vein of vengeance that ran through her, an acknowledged bloodlust, even if she didn’t see it that way. He could use that in the future.
    He smiled broadly at her as she reached the door and threw it open, finally in safety’s reach.
    “It really has been a pleasure meeting you, Cora. I’ll see you again very soon,” he pronounced, his dark eyes watching her amusedly.
    She quickly entered the house and slammed the door behind her leaving Angelus outside to contemplate what had just happened.
    “Yes, Cora, I’ll see you again very, very soon,” he murmured to no one at all.
 
 
 

    Upon reentering the Harris home, Cora rushed back to the living room where the other adults were seated.
    “He’s out there,” she said with a quiet intensity, her voice and hands shaking.
    “Who?” Willow asked, rising to put a comforting hand on the distraught watcher’s shoulder.
    “Angelus,” she said, so quietly they barely heard her.
    “Oh good Lord, are you hurt, Cora?” Giles asked.
    She shook her head, “Just spooked.”
    “He’s outside? Right outside?” Xander asked loudly, jumping to his feet.
    Cora nodded.
    “Xander, don’t,” Willow ordered hysterically before even turning to face him.
    The sheer anger upon her husband’s face was one Willow hadn’t seen in years, not since Angelus left Sunnydale more than a decade ago.
    “Please, Xander, don’t,” Willow begged as her husband as he grabbed a cross off of the wall and a stake from the drawer in the end table.
    “He’s going down, Will,” Xander seethed. “If it’s the last thing I do, Angelus is going to answer for what he’s done.”
    “You mustn’t do this,” Giles ordered him, standing in the younger man’s way.
    “Give me one good reason,” Xander challenged him.
    “Because it’s not your job,” a voice came from the doorway. “It’s mine.”
    The group turned to see Ria limp into the room, her small frame supported almost entirely by Angel.
    “Mr. Harris, I appreciate the importance of the situation and the history between all of you, but this still isn’t your fight,” Ria said unwaveringly.
    “You should be resting,” Willow scolded lightly.
    “With this racket going on? You all could wake the dead with your yelling,” Ria smiled.
    “You must be Rianna,” Giles said approaching the wounded slayer. “It’s a pleasure to meet you. I’m Rupert Giles. I was Buffy Summers’ watcher.”
    “It’s an honor, sir,” Ria said, extending her free hand to shake the former watchers’ hand.
    “The honor is mine, my dear, I assure you,” Giles smiled sadly.
    Angel helped Ria ease into a chair, but remained by her side even after she was sitting comfortingly. He seemed reluctant to lose contact with her. It was a closeness that didn’t go unnoticed by the others in the room.
    “Mr. Harris, I understand the urgency to dispose of Angelus quickly, but as you can see I’m not exactly fit to take him on at the moment. And, like I said, it’s my job, not your’s,” Ria reminded him.
    “You are the slayer, Ria, and I respect that, but you cannot possibly understand the danger he possesses or the history between us. This is personal. I am not a human hunting a vampire. I am just a man trying to settle a very old score,” Xander reasoned.
    “If you go out there, you’re signing your own death sentence,” Ria said seriously.
    “I won’t lose,” he said indignantly.
    “He’s killed slayers, Mr. Harris, people designed to fight him. A regular human could never destroy him,” Ria said sadly. “I wish one could. It would make my job much easier.”
    “She’s right, Xander. Please listen to her,” Willow said teary eyed, grabbing her husband’s shoulder.
    Despite their reasonings and pleas, Xander still looked unconvinced.
    “Mina and Alex need their father, Mr. Harris,” Angel chimed in. “And honestly, sir, so do I. I’ve lost my mother and grandmother to that monster already. You and Willow have been the only parents I’ve known for years. I couldn’t bear to lose my family to him again.”
    At that Xander tossed the stake back in the drawer and pulled Angel to him in a hug.
    “I’m sorry, son. I didn’t even think about that,” Xander said.
    As Angel moved back next to Ria, she reached up and grabbed his hand softly.
    Ria looked up at him with empathy and resolve in her eyes. “We’ll get him, Angel. I swear to you. I will avenge your losses.”
 
 
 
 

    “She’s too young for this,” Cora sighed after Angel had helped Ria back into the Harris’ bedroom leaving the adults alone to attempt to work out a plan. Ria had wanted to stay and contribute, but her pain and exhaustion were evident and the adults had unified against her attempts to stay and help.
    “She’s older than Buffy was,” Willow pointed out.
    “She’s older than most slayers,” Giles added.
    “Then they were all too young,” Cora snapped. “She should be worried about what outfit to wear clubbing, not how to kill one of the most notorious vampires in history.”
    Giles sighed, she was absolutely right, of course. No one deserved to be put in the position that slayers were, much less young teenage women, but that didn’t change anything. Ria was still the Chosen One and she still had the responsibilities that title held.
    “I believe you to be an excellent watcher, Cora,” Giles told the younger woman, staring at her intently.
    “Thank you,” Cora replied a bit flustered.
    “Unfortunately, I also believe you to be a good friend,” Giles continued.
    “I don’t follow,” Cora said, a bit surprised by his comment.
    “Ria has many friends, even some who know this secret of her’s, now. But, she only has one watcher. Your priority has to be educating her with the skills and knowledge that she needs to survive, not empathizing with the unfairness of her situation. She has others who can fill that role, but you are the only person in the world who can be her watcher,” Giles told her solemnly.
    “Are you telling me that you didn’t rage against the unfairness of it all as Buffy’s watcher? That you didn’t wish day after day that the duties of the Chosen One could have fallen on some other girl or boy or no one at all? That you wouldn’t have given your life in place of her’s?” Cora asked, already knowing the answer.
    “I made many mistakes as Buffy’s watcher,” Giles admitted, looking past Cora in the direction that Ria had gone. “I cannot regret my friendship with her, but I do think that as a rule a close camaraderie between a watcher and slayer would be unadvisable and even dangerous.”
    “This isn’t the time to debate watcher/slayer relationships,” Willow pointed out, cutting off whatever Cora was about to say. “What did Angelus say to you, Cora? Maybe we can get some idea of his agenda.”
    “Oh, other than maiming and murdering everyone?” Xander asked shortly, still smarting from Ria’s shutdown of his ‘kick-Angelus’-ass’ plan.
    “He didn’t say much, really,” Cora said, thinking back to the encounter. “He knew I was the watcher and said he knew who the slayer was and he taunted me a bit. And he said he’d see me again very soon.”
    “Well, I can’t say I like the sound of that,” Giles mused.
    “Same old Angelus. I’d bet good money that he’s out to completely destroy the slayer. Not just kill her or anything, but destroy her like he did Dru, like he tried to do to Buffy,” Willow murmured.
    “Guess you really can’t teach an old dog new tricks,” Xander muttered.
    “So, what do we do?” Cora asked tentatively.
    “Much as I hate to say it, the slayer isn’t prepared for this yet and even if she were she’s not well enough to fight anyone. We have no option for now but to wait,” Giles responded. “I dread the thought, but for now it’s Angelus’ move.”
 
 
 

    Angelus strode into his lair, chuckling to himself as he went.
    “My eyes deceive me, pet,” Spike said, bemused. “I thought I saw my poof of a Grandsire smiling, but that just can’t be right, now, can it?”
    Dru let loose a hearty giggle.
    “Daddy knows the little bird is still learning to fly, Spike. One by one we’ll pluck out all her pretty little feathers and leave her wings all bloody.”
    “Yes, Dru,” Angelus agreed. “And it will be slow and painful.”
    “Just the way I like it,” Dru growled suggestively, to Spike’s annoyance.
    “What’s your plan, mate,” Spike growled.
    “This girl is young. Just killing her would be too easy, but she’s got plenty of weaknesses we can use to destroy her,” Angelus grinned.
    “Her friends? Her watcher?” Spike asked.
    Angelus nodded, “And her lover. But it gets even better. We get to finally settle this war once and for all. It turns out our little bird has herself all tangled up with some old adversaries. We can finished old business and help take her down all at once.”
Dru clapped giddily. “Oh goody! It will be like a very large tea party and I should like very much to drink up all of the tea.”
    “Waste not, want not, eh pet?” Spike asked.
    “Don’t worry, Dru. You’ll have your fill,” Angelus smiled. “Hope you have an appetite. Come nightfall we’ll feast like kings.”
 
 
 
 

    Sunlight streamed through the window, splashing the slayer’s face with morning rays. She awoke feeling safer and more at peace than ever before in her life, in spite of the events the night before. But, it wasn’t the comfort and safety that daylight brought that eased her soul; it was the continued presence of her best friend, her love, at her side.
    She realized quickly that her hand was softly entwined with his and she refused to move and risk wakening him. It had been a difficult night for everyone.
    He sat, breathing softly, in the chair at her bedside. It was the same position he’d been in when she fell asleep the night before, despite the fact that it looked anything but comfortable. She was certain he’d have a terribly sore neck when he awoke.
    “I think you are the most selfless, beautiful soul I’ve ever met,” she whispered softly, so as not to wake him, and moved her cheek so that it brushed against his hand.
    She heard his breathing pattern change slightly, a nifty trick that heightened slayer senses gifted her with.
    “Good morning,” she murmured without bothering to turn to face him.
    He ran his finger along her cheekbone again, mimicking the gesture she’d made moments before.
    “Good morning,” he echoed huskily.
    Neither spoke for a moment, unable or unwilling to break the sweet, silent moment between them.
    She kissed his hand lightly and rested her cheek against his palm. He shifted only slightly in his chair as he ran his other hand through her long auburn hair in soothing patterns.
    “How are you feeling?” He asked after quite some time.
    “Fine,” she replied lightly. “You?”
    “I’m fine,” he replied, stretching his neck to work out some of the kinks in it.
    “Liar,” she smiled, sure his neck had to be incredibly stiff.
    “I’m in good company,” he smirked back, knowing even with slayer strength she was still weak.
    “Well, at least I can make you feel a little better,” she reasoned, sitting up. “Come here, I’ll rub your neck for you.”
    He paused for a moment, knowing this was one of those defining moments. There was an invisible line there somewhere, but he didn’t know where. Right now, he could still explain away everything that had happened between them as one friend concerned for another, at least to himself. But, if he crossed that line, that thin, invisible line, there was no turning back. There was no pretending that he didn’t love her, that he hadn’t always loved her. The damned of it was, for the first time, he didn’t care where the line was and being more than just her best friend didn’t sound so scary.
    He silently got up and joined her on the bed. He immediately felt her strong hands working at the tight knots that had built up in his neck and shoulders.
    “You’re too tense,” she breathed across his ear. “You worry too much.”
    He chuckled. “I wonder why that could be.”
    She laughed lightly for a moment before turning serious again.
    “You don’t have to worry about me, Angel. I’m here to stay. I don’t think anything could ever make me leave you.”
    “I just… I don’t know what I’d do without you in my life,” he whispered. “You’ve been my best friend for almost a decade, more than half my life. You’re everything to me, Ria.”
    He heard her stifle a sniffle.
    “I love you,” she admitted, almost too quietly for him to hear. “And it’s not just like a friend loves another friend. I love you like my soul is missing pieces when you aren’t there.”
    She was so nervous after her admission that she was sure he could hear her heart pounding in her chest. Hell, she was sure all of Sunnydale could hear it. It was so loud that she almost didn’t hear his response.
    “I know,” he whispered. “I love you, too. I always have. I’ve just been so terrified of losing you that I didn’t want to risk my heart by letting myself show how much I needed you. But it doesn’t matter, because whether I show it or not, I still love you and I still need you. And nothing will ever change that.”
    “I… I didn’t think you felt the same way,” Ria cried softly. “I never thought I meant that much to you.”
    He turned to face her and cupped her face in his hands. “Don’t you know you’re everything to me? I’d do anything for you, Ria, anything. I even buried my own feelings because I was so afraid that if I loved you, you’d die. I’d do anything to keep you safe.”
    A soft halo of morning light surrounded the young slayer, bathing her in an ethereal glow. Angel brushed her luxurious hair from her eyes thinking all the while that this was where she belonged, in the brilliance of daylight, not the dark shadows of the night where no one could see her incredible beauty and grace.
    “Can I ask you to do something for me?” Ria asked as she stared at him adoringly and wiped a tear from her cheek.
    “Anything,” he replied as though the answer was incredibly obvious and to him it probably was.
    “Kiss me?” She whispered.
    His previous apprehension to cross that invisible line completely evaporated and he gave way quickly to his own desires and her request.
    The kiss was soft, but unlike their previous kiss, it had a fire and passion behind it. The intensity of emotion was overwhelming and Ria felt herself wrapping her arms around his neck and leaning into him for support.
    She moaned softly into his mouth as their tongues met for the first time. He wrapped his arms around her waist and kissed her once more before breaking to breathe.
    “I will love you forever,” he swore, keeping his arms around her protectively. “And I will never leave your side.”
 
 
 
 

    Having been trapped by nightfall at the Harris house, it wasn’t until nearly noon that Cora managed to retrieve the prophecies concerning Ria from her office and return to share them with the other adults.
    “They’re hardly clear about their meanings,” Cora sighed, handing the original texts to Giles. “I’ve worked on translating and interpreting them for years and I haven’t been able to make any absolute conclusions about what’s to come other than that it will be very evil.”
    “Hey now, there’s something unusual,” Xander said sarcastically, “a vague prophecy that tells us we’re all gonna die.”
    “Like old times,” Willow agreed absently.
    “Yes, well, perhaps working together we can make some headway on this,” Giles said as he adjusted his reading glasses.     “What have you translated so far?”
    Cora pulled out another sheet of paper and began to read from it.
    “And she shall follow along the path of footsteps laid forth by her great predecessor. But like the light of justice shall she fall to evil’s clutches. As her forebearer in the years before her days, she shall bear the pains of man, suffer at the hands of the devil and not know peace until the day an angel falls from earth unto the depths of hell,” Cora recited more from memory than from the paper.
    “Sounds like your standard apocalypse junk to me,” Xander chimed in.
    “I don’t like this,” Willow said softly. “I don’t like this at all.”
    “Do you often like apocalypse prophesies, Will?” Xander asked, to which he received no reply whatsoever.
    “Cora, what language did you say this was in?” Giles questioned.
    “It’s an ancient demon language supposedly created by the demon God Acharett himself. It’s called Enthepia. We’ve been able to date it as far back as about 13,000 years,” Cora replied.
    “Enthepia,” Giles mused. “Yes, yes of course.”
    “You know Enthepia?” Cora asked surprised.
    “Giles knows more languages than I can name,” Xander informed her.
    “Oh, my, Cora,” Giles said, staring at the text in horror. “I don’t like this one bit.”
    “Rupert, what’s going on?” Cora demanded.
    “It is not ‘an angel’ that must fall from earth to hell, but ‘Angel’.” He replied.
    “Angel as in Buffy’s son, Angel, or Angel as in evil bloodsucker, Angel?” Willow asked.
    “Well, that is the problem, Willow,” Giles sighed. “I haven’t a clue.”
    “Giles, in all the ways that count, Angel is my son. I don’t care what some prophecy says, my son is not going to be sent to hell,” Xander insisted.
    “I can’t say I like the idea any better than you do,” Giles agreed. “I hardly know the boy, but he’s been through his own version hell for many years, I suspect, with his mother and grandmother’s deaths. At any rate, there’s not a person on Earth I’d wish to be sent to the real one, especially not your son.”
    “What can we do about it?” Willow asked, her eyes begging him for a miracle solution.
    “Perhaps,” Giles mused, “We can force the issue. If we can find a way to send Angelus to hell, we’ll either fulfill the prophecy and bring forth peace or we’ll know for sure exactly what the prophecy calls for."
    “If that’s our best option, let’s get looking for a way to send that bastard back to the pit,” Willow said as resolutely as she could muster.
    “I hate to say this,” Cora interrupted them, “but there’s more to this prophecy than just that first paragraph and it only gets worse from here on out.”
    “Hey, of course it does cause if it got better that would just be a big old anti-climatic let down,” Xander muttered.
    “The worst of it,” Cora sighed, “is the time frame. According to the texts, the darkness begins encroaching on the thirteenth day of the thirteenth year after the last closing of the Hellmouth. That’s tonight.”
 
 
 
 

    “I don’t believe this,” Mina wailed as she, Alex and Kaylan hurried down the dark streets of Sunnydale. “We are in so much trouble.”
    “Calm down, Min. We’re not that late,” Alex reasoned.
    “Mom was very, very clear that we should be home a half hour before sundown. We’re like an hour late. She’s going to have a fit,” Mina insisted.
    “There are no windows in the Bronze,” Kaylan reminded them both. “And I was sure you’d be wearing a watch Mina.”
    “No, mine is broken,” Mina protested. “I thought you’d have your beeper.”
    “Battery died,” Kaylan replied.
    “I don’t get it,” Alex said thoughtfully. “What’s up with the uber-curfew? It’s always been like eleven, maybe even ten thirty on a bad day, but six o’clock? That just makes no sense.”
    “It’s weird, but kind of sweet, in that whole parent sort of way,” Kaylan said, not making eye contact with either of her two companions. “My Mom and Dad wouldn’t notice for weeks, maybe months, if I didn’t come home.”
    “Hear that, Min? Months. All we’re asking for is one stupid little hour,” Alex consoled his overwrought sister.
    “We’re in trouble,” Mina repeated, picking up her pace.
    The three teens, their minds racing with the possible repercussions of their curfew breakage, didn’t even notice the approach of a pale brunette woman until she’d touched Alex’s arm lightly. Feeling the unexpected contact, Alex jumped in surprise and yelped slightly, attracting the attention of his two female companions.
    “I’m sorry to have startled you,” the woman said with a soft, lilting British accent. “I was out walking and got all lost. I was hoping you might point me toward the cemetery.”
    Alex backed away cautiously.
    “There’s like fifteen cemeteries in town, lady. Which one did you want?” Kaylan asked, more than a little weirded out.
    The woman stared at Kaylan for a long while and smiled very, very slowly.
    “I don’t know, love. Whichever one they’ll bury you at.”
    The wind’s howl died slowly. The sirens in the distance fell silent. There was a beat of cold, motionless silence as the words soaked in and then all hell broke loose.
    Alex grabbed Mina’s arm and took off in the direction of their house with Kaylan close on their heels. Mina made the mistake of glancing back at the pale, dark woman and screamed in terror at what she saw. The woman’s face had morphed into a grotesque parody of its former self. It was then that two more morphed people stepped out of a parked car and stood directly in their path. A quick glance to either side revealed that they were, in fact, surrounded.
    Alex grabbed Kaylan’s arm with his free hand and pulled her next to Mina, shielding them both with his body as best he could.
    “Shit, shit!” Kaylan swore, her loud voice barely audible over Mina’s sobs. “What the fuck is going on?”
    “Stay close,” Alex growled. “And watch for a way out.”
    “Aw… And they said chivalry was dead,” laughed a thickly accented male voice. “How bloody charming.”
    Alex watched as the same platinum blonde man that they’d seen in the Bronze just a few nights before made he way to the front of the pack.
    “What is it you want?” Alex asked, pulling the girls around so that they were as far from Spike as he could get them.
    “Want? What is it we want, pet?” He asked the pale brunette girl.
    “Mummy wants her supper,” the woman replied.
    “Here that, mate?” he asked Alex in reply. “Lady wants her supper. Can’t leave a lady hungry now can we?”
    “Yeah, there’s a great little Italian place up on Citrus,” Alex said warily. “All you can eat spaghetti. Enjoy.”
    “Ah, but my little pet here has a taste for American tonight, don’t you pet?” the man snickered.
    His companion nodded vigorously, her eyes never leaving Mina’s terrified face, which Alex was trying, valiantly, to block from her view.
    “Who the hell are you?” Kaylan asked, standing on the opposite side on Mina, blocking the meek frightened girl from the others that had surrounded them.
    The blonde man laughed heartily. “You mean you don’t know? Oh, my, this is delicious, pet, isn’t it?”
    The brunette simply growled in reply and snapped her teeth at the frightened teens.
    “I am Spike and this is Dru and we are the last thing you will ever see,” the blonde man said.
    “Ah, ah, Spike. Mustn’t spoil the fun all so soon. Remember?” Dru smiled, her eyes still trained on the girl that the redheaded boy blocked from her view.
    “Of course, pet. Forgive me. I got all carried away, is all,” Spike replied.
    Dru smiled, apparently satisfied with his response, and turned back to smile at the children.
    “Take the little girl,” Spike bellowed to the minions. “Don’t kill any of them yet, if you can avoid it. We need them alive.”
    “Like hell you will,” Kaylan vowed.
    Dru laughed as she closed in on the trio, “Yes, love, we will do it just like hell.”
    “Leave us alone,” Alex demanded as Mina shrieked for help in the hopes that someone, anyone, might hear them and come to their rescue.
    Dru and her friends just laughed and moved in closer.
    “I’m warning you,” Alex hissed. “Back off now.”
    Spike laughed in the background. “Well, well, the kid’s got a pair on him after all.”
    It was Alex who threw the first punch, which was only landed because Dru wasn’t expecting it. After that, it was an uphill battle. Dru twisted the boy’s arm behind him in a grotesque fashion as he screamed in horrific pain. Mina, responding to her brother’s agony, started beating on Dru’s arm as hard as she could, begging the woman to stop hurting her brother. Dru tossed the boy to the floor, slamming his head on the pavement and knocking him out cold. She then set her sights on Mina.
    As Dru reached for Mina, Kaylan, who had been studying martial arts since she was seven years-old, landed a round-house kick against the guy who had been attacking her and grabbed the petrified Mina just in time to wretch her from Dru’s grasp.
Kaylan stared down the older woman as they circled each other looking for weaknesses. Against a normal person, Kaylan would certainly have won, but against Dru she stood no chance. As Spike and Dru engaged Kaylan in a fierce battle, the minions carried Mina off.
    “She’s a fighter, this one,” Spike muttered as Kaylan busted one of his kneecaps. “Must be in the blood. Tell me, little one, what’s it like having a slayer for a sister?”
    Kaylan looked utterly confused, but kept silent to steel her concentration.
    “She doesn’t know, love,” Dru smiled broadly, licking some of Kaylan’s blood off of her own slender finger, savoring the taste of it.
    Spike laughed, “I do believe you’re right, pet.”
    With that, Spike grabbed her tightly around her neck as Dru restrained her arms.
    “Give that sister of yours a message for us, will you love? Tell her that it’s begun,” Spike hissed in her ear.
    Kaylan, in a last ditch effort to free herself, used Dru’s arms as leverage to bring her knees up hard into Spike’s groin. He howled in pain and let her go instantly as he backed away. The girl fell, gasping for breath as she hit the ground.
    “That was a mistake, child,” Dru spat. “You will answer for that. Not today, but soon.”
    As Kaylan sat choking and gasping for breath, Dru and Spike disappeared into the night from which they came. By the time she was able to stand, all of their attackers were gone. Only the unconscious Alex and the absence of Mina signaled that any of the incredible recent events had actually happened.
    The adrenaline coursing through her veins from her fight and the utter incapability to act now made Kaylan more frustrated than she’d even been in her entire life. She let loose an angry yell and kicked a random stone as hard as she could. It was then that Alex moaned and began to regain consciousness.
    “We have to get out of here,” she pronounced, helping the semi-conscious Alex to his feet and supporting him fully as they limped toward the safety of his house.
 
 
 

    Soon after sunset hit, the Harris household turned into a wild frenzy. Willow was on the phone with the Bronze for ten minutes while they searched the club for Mina, Alex and Kaylan. Giles and Cora attempted to interpret the remaining portions of the prophecies. Xander had already collected all the stakes, crosses and holy water he could find and sat at the kitchen table whittling more wooden stakes for the coming battles.
    In the nearby bedroom, Angel sat reading the rest of his mother’s books as Ria slept soundly in a drug-induced slumber. Her wounds weren’t yet healed and there was little doubt she’d have to be in top shape very soon.
    “They can’t find them,” Willow said, slamming the phone down. “They were there earlier, but they left around 6:15 or so.”
    “After sundown,” Cora murmured.
    The adults all stared at each other, unwilling to give voice to their fears because, somehow, that would make it even more real.
    Willow looked at the clock again. “They’re over an hour late. We should start looking for them.”
    “I’ll check the Bronze, maybe they just missed them,” Angel said entering the room.
    “I don’t want you out there, Angel,” Willow insisted. “It’s too dangerous.”
    “I’ll blend in best at the Bronze and if I really do look like some famous vampire maybe I can use that as a cover, if I have to. It makes the most sense,” he consoled Willow. “Besides, I can’t just sit here. That’s my family out there, too.”
    Willow sighed and nodded. “You be very, very careful, Angel. Check in with me every half hour.”
    He smiled in reply.
    “I’ll check with Cordelia and her butler,” Xander murmured. “Maybe they went back to Kaylan’s house.”
    “I’ll stay here in case they come back,” Willow announced.
    “I guess I’ll check the hospitals,” Cora sighed.
    “Yes, good idea. I shall go down to the police station and see if they know anything,” Giles added.
    “Not likely,” Xander muttered. “But, I guess it’s worth a try.”
    “Where do I go?” Ria asked from the doorway.
    “Back to bed,” Angel insisted, making his way over to her in three large strides.
    “Like hell I do,” Ria said indignantly. “I’m the slayer, unlike the rest of you I’m the one who’s actually supposed to be doing this. Right Ms. McK?”
    Cora sighed and shook her head. “You’re in no condition to walk, much less fight if you have to, my dear. You’re drugged to the gills. Sleep off the medication and try to get back your strength. Lord knows you’ll need it soon enough.”
    “I belong out there looking for my sister and my friends,” Ria insisted.
    “You belong asleep in bed,” Angel said softly.
    “I need to do something, Angel. I have to help them,” Ria said, near tears.
    “I know, love, I know,” he replied, kissing her softly atop her head. “But they don’t need you out there in this condition. Imagine how guilty they’d feel if something happened to you because they got lost or sidetracked or something. What they need from you is for you to get better. Can you do that for them? Can you do that for me? Please?”
    Ria sighed, “You always know what damned buttons to push to get me to do something.”
    He smiled back at her, “Come on, I’ll help you get back to bed.”
    As he took her arm and began to lead her back into the bedroom, a fierce pounding on the front door broke the tension-filled silence.
    Willow ran to the door as fast as she could and threw it open.
    “Oh my God! Xander come help me,” She yelled as she took her badly wounded son from the arms of his equally wounded friend.
    “Oh good Lord,” Giles said. “What happened?”
    Ria and Angel rushed to their friends’ sides and helped Willow and Xander ease them down onto the sofa.
    “These funny looking people named Spike and Dru and a bunch of buddies of theirs took Mina,” Kaylan said angrily. “I’m so sorry Mr. and Mrs. Harris. We tried to stop them. We really did, but there were so many of them and they just kept coming and they were so very strong.”
    Willow began shaking uncontrollably.
    “My baby, they took my baby, Giles,” she whispered.
    “What the hell do they want with her? She’s just a little girl! She’s my little girl,” Willow sobbed, yelling through her tears. Xander held tightly onto her hand and sat weeping with his free arm around his unconscious son.
    “There’s something else,” Kaylan choked out as she spit some blood into a tissue Cora handed her. “Spike had a message. He said to tell my sister, the slayer, that it has begun.”
    “I have to go save her,” Ria insisted, nearly collapsing under her own weight as she stood up abruptly.
    “No,” Willow said so quietly that Ria had to strain to hear her.
    “It’s time and it’s my job and I will not let Mina die,” Ria insisted.
    “Die?” Kaylan asked wide-eyed. “You think they’ll kill her?”
    Ria let the question hang in the air and turned back to Willow as she placed a sad, comforting hand on the girl’s shoulder.
    “You know as well as I do that she’s already dead,” Willow whispered, choking on the words.
    “Not necessarily,” Ria said shaking her head in defiance. “Not if they wanted to get to me.”
    “You don’t understand,” Xander said quietly, wiping the blood and dirt from his son’s wounds with a peroxide-soaked cloth that Cora had given him. “That’s not how they work. Not Angelus. He’ll destroy everyone around you. He’ll try to break you before he tries to kill you. That’s just his way. Believe me. We know.”
    “Maybe he’s changed,” Angel insisted, his arm around Ria comfortingly. “Maybe he’s after something else this time.”
    “He’s had the same methods for nearly two-hundred and seventy years. He’s not going to change them now,” Willow said.
    “Two-hundred and seventy years?” Kaylan asked, completely confused. “I must have been hit harder than I thought.”
    Cora gave the girl some pain pills and a cold compress. “Just try to rest,” she said.
    “So, what? We just give up and assume she’s dead?” Ria asked confoundedly.
    Willow started to nod, but Xander handed Giles the cloth to attend to Alex and he rose and placed his shaking hands on his wife’s shoulders. No one else in the room could begin to understand what the two were feeling. It was a moment that the rest of them hoped desperately that they would never fully understand.
    “I can’t, Will,” Xander said, staring into his wife’s eyes. “I can’t just assume she’s gone. We have to at least try to find her.”
    “I can’t lose you, too, Xander,” Willow said, her voice breaking on almost every word. “We’ve lost so much all ready.”
    “Maybe not,” Angel interrupted.
    “Angel and I will go look for her,” Xander said. “We’ll be careful and we’ll be well armed. We will come back to you, Willow. I promise you that.”
    She didn’t like it, but Willow did understand and knew she had to accept. So, she kissed her husband will all the fear and passion she felt and pulled Angel in for a tight hug.
    “Don’t take any risks you don’t have to,” she whispered to the boy. “Do you understand me?”
    To be honest, Angel really didn’t understand. His loyalty to his friends and his family was so strong that it blinded him to any personal risks. It always had. It always would. But, he nodded anyhow to reassure the only mother he could ever remember having.
    “I’m going, too,” Ria announced.
    Angel shook his head.
    “You need to take care of your sister and my brother. Aunt Willow is too upset to think straight and Giles is too old to carry them anywhere,” he told her quietly.
    She stared straight through his bullshit reply. “Between Mrs. Harris, Mr. Giles and Ms. McK, I think they can manage.”
    Angel sighed, he hadn’t wanted to have to say this, but if it was the only way to keep her safe, so be it.
    “Ria,” he began. “You’re medicated and you’re hurt. If we find her… and we will find her… we can’t be worried about making sure you get out okay, too.”
    She stared at him as though she didn’t quiet get what he was saying.
    “You’re a liability right now, Ria. We can’t give them any more weapons to use against us,” he continued, wincing as he said the words.
    Ria looked as though she’d been slapped and she backed away from him slowly.
    “Ria…” he began apologetically.
    “No, hey, I get it,” she said, biting her lip hard. “I do. I’ll stay here and play house. You boys go play superhero.”
    “I didn’t mean it like…” Angel said as he was interrupted.
    “I said I get it, Angel,” she yelled at him harshly. “Now get the hell out of here and save my best friend. Go!”
    Angel looked at her with regret and pain written all over his face as he grabbed a bag full of wooden stakes, a few crosses and a handful of vials of holy water before charging out the door with Xander in tow.
    “Do you think they have a chance of finding her?” Ria asked, staring after them as they went.
    “Honestly?” Giles asked in reply.
    “Honestly,” Ria confirmed.
    He sighed, “It will take a miracle.”