Author's Notes: Betaed by Tasha
Maggie Walsh, Graham Miller, and
Riley Finn entered the outside seating
area of the coffee shop situated just off campus. The professor hadn't
expected the Slayer and her group to pick such a public place to meet.
Most of the hostiles that the Initiative had dealt with on a regular
basis preferred the darkness. Walsh didn't realize that her group was
ill prepared for dealing with beings that were more human than demon.
"Afternoon, Professor Walsh." Buffy's
called out to the older woman. "Why don't you guys come on over and sit
down?"
"Miss Summers. How nice to see you ...
and all your friends." Walsh
looked at the group of people waiting for her while she moved over to
sit down across from Buffy. This was no time for small talk, in her
opinion. So, she launched right into why she wanted to meet with the
Slayer. "I want you to agree to come in for some tests."
"Not bloody likely," Spike growled.
There was no way he was going to turn over his mate to the professor.
"We could just take you." Walsh gave the
group a knowing smirk. "After
all, you are harboring a hostile." Whatever reaction she was expecting,
she didn't get it.
"That wouldn't be in your best
interest." Giles returned the
professor's smirk, but where he had hadn't reacted to hers, she
flinched and sat back in her seat.
"Are you threatening us?" Riley gave the
petite blond woman a steely
look. He was still smarting from when she ignored his warnings about
the vampire she was currently holding hands with.
"If I was threatening you, Riley, you
wouldn't have to ask. You'd know." Buffy gave the male human a stony
look.
Spike took this opportunity to lean
forward, and he asked a still slightly shaken Walsh, "So, what's in
Room 314?"
Before she could stop herself, Walsh
gave a start at the vampire's
question. She resisted glancing at Graham before she sputtered, "How do
you know about that?"
"We have our ways," Buffy replied. She
twirled a lock of hair in a careless manner. "Answer the question."
"It's classified," Walsh sneered at the
blond. "I don't need to tell
you anything. You're just civilians. You interest us, but you are still
just civilians.
"Since you're newcomers to the
Hellmouth, let's be perfectly clear
about something." Buffy gave Walsh a wide-eyed innocent look. "We are
what stands between you and world endage."
"World endage," Walsh scoffed while she
gave Buffy a skeptical look. "I
find that hard to believe. Nowhere in your files has it been mentioned
that the world is about to end."
"Every May, just like clockwork," Buffy
replied in a perky voice. "And,
I've only died once because of it. Go me!" She arched an eyebrow at the
professor; almost as if she was challenging the woman to prove her
wrong.
"What's in room 314?" Spike suddenly
asked before he sniffed the air.
Graham and Riley's scents stayed the same, but Walsh's changed. Spike
relayed this information to the others in the clan.
"I have no idea what you're talking
about," Walsh spluttered. "Not only
is it classified, it's none of your business." She still wondered how
the vampire knew about the secret power, and why he was so interested.
"Don't lie to us." Spike leaned back in
his chair, and he gave Walsh a cold look. "We're not bloody stupid, you
know."
"She told you it's classified," Riley
announced. He felt the urge to stick up for his mentor.
"Shut up, Finn," Walsh snarled at the
young soldier. She could fight
her own fights; she didn't need some young upstart to do it for her.
"Otherwise, you might find yourself at the South Pole herding penguins."
"Yes, Ma'am," Finn said in a contrite
tone.
"Miss Summers, we are the United States
government. If we want to test
you, we will," Walsh said with confidence. She was tired of Buffy's
blasé attitude. Maggie Walsh was used to getting what she wanted
by any
means necessary. No college blond, and her rag tag group of idiots, was
going to stop her from reaching her goal.
Buffy turned to look at Giles, and she
cocked an eyebrow. At the
Slayer's mental prompting, the Watcher pulled a brand new cell phone
out of his pocket. After the push of a single button, he put the
electronic gadget to his ear.
"Quentin, it's Rupert Giles. The United
States Army has just threatened
the only active Slayer." Giles gave Walsh a very Ripperesque smirk.
"They wish to do experiments on her." He paused to listen to the person
on the other end. "Yes, you can call me back at this number." Then, he
hung up the phone.
"Who was that?" Walsh demanded to know.
"Someone with more power than you, Miss
Walsh," Giles answered. He refused to address the woman with any titles
of respect.
"That's Professor Walsh to you," Walsh
said. She glared at the British
man. She was quite sure there wasn't anyone in the world with more
power than the United States government. "Personally, I doubt an
unemployed librarian knows anything about power."
Before Giles or anyone else could reply
to the professor's words,
Riley's walkie-talkie let out a squawk "Finn, are you with the
Professor?" the disembodied voice bellowed.
Riley grabbed the walkie-talked from his
belt, and he spoke into it, "Yes, sir. Professor Walsh is sitting right
beside me."
"Tell her to stand down immediately,"
the voice bellowed. "We just got
a call from the President of the United States. She is to leave the
Slayer and any of her people alone."
"What?" Walsh grabbed the walkie-talkie.
"What do you mean we are to leave them alone? They are vital to our
research!"
"You heard me, Professor," the voice
answered. "It came from the top.
Buffy Summers and her contingency are off-limits from here on out."
Walsh rose to her feet, and she pointed
a finger at Buffy. "I will have
my tests. Just you wait and see, Miss Summers." She turned to leave the
coffee shop, followed closely by Riley. Both of them failed to see the
grimace of sympathy Graham shot at Buffy and her group.
After a few moments, Xander said, "Well,
that was about as fun as a case of syphilis at Thanksgiving."
"You'd know, wouldn't you, droopy boy?"
Spike asked in a snarky tone.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Ronald Jones, the Uixa demon pledged to
the Clan Sultana-Aurelius,
watched from his spot in the darkened closet. He knew that Walsh was
off site with the Slayer and her group. He figured this would be his
chance to get inside of Room 314. He noticed over the past few days
that the door to said room took several minutes to fully close.
Ronald's plan was to slip inside the next time another person went
inside.
Ronald slipped out of the closet, looked
both ways to make sure no one
was around, and grabbed the door to Room 314 just before it closed.
Once inside he realized that it wasn't just a room, it was an entire
section. He walked confidently down the hallway to the biggest door.
Ronald could tell there weren't any humans in the room, but there was
something that felt off.
Ronald pushed the door open, and once
inside, he had to hold back a
gasp. Lying on the steel table in the middle of the room was a creature
that appeared to be part man and part demon.
"This is bad," Ronald muttered as he
inched closer to the table. "Very bad. What on earth are these humans
thinking?"
Ronald pulled a small digital camera out
of his pocket. He quickly took
several pictures of the creature while he wondered just how many demons
the Army had tried to merge together in one body. Then, Ronald moved
over to the computer terminal, but he soon realized he didn't have the
know-how to hack in.
Ronald made a mental note to bring up
codes and computer languages at
the next Uixa council. The world was changing after centuries of being
stagnant with just spoken and then written languages. The Uixa's needed
to grow and change too. Maybe some of the teenagers would be interested.
Ronald knew he needed to get the
pictures he had taken of the nightmare
creature to the Slayer. It wasn't alive, -- even he could tell that --
but the Uixa demon could feel the underlying evil supernatural feel of
its demonic parts. He made sure the hallway was clear before he left
the room. He did the same thing when he left the entire 314 section.
Ronald met his wife Betty at the base's checkout point. He was nervous
about carrying the camera out of the Initiative with him. Both he and
his wife breathed a sigh of relief when they made it past the guards
without being detected.
"It's time to do something else," Betty
muttered as they hurried across
the U.C. Sunnydale campus. "The human's government has no idea what
they're playing with here."
"What happened?" Ronald's eyes darted
around to make sure nobody could overhear them.
"Walsh is wanting Polgara's, Ronnie,"
Betty said in a quiet, but firm
voice. "Chipping vampires is one thing, but all these other demons?
This just isn't good."
"I know, baby." Ronald grabbed Betty's
hand, and he gave it a squeeze.
"We'll figure something out. Let's find the Sultana's witch. She'll
know what to do with the pictures I took.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Willow passed the pictures out to the
other Scoobies. After Ronald and
his wife had dropped a digital camera off with her, the redhead had
called a meeting with Buffy and the others. Then, she had printed off
the pictures.
"Well, I can see why Walsh didn't want
to tell us anything," Xander
said. He grimaced at the picture one more time before he threw it down
on the table. "Maybe she should change her name to Frankenstein."
"I'm working on hacking in to her
system." Willow walked over to where her laptop sat on Giles' desk.
"That's the easy part. Hiding it? That's the hard part."
"We can't do much until we know exactly
what Walsh is planning." Giles
shook his head as he studied the picture in his hand. "Normally, I'd
say destroying this creature would be easy for Buffy, but I have this
feeling there's more to it than just grafting human and demonic parts
together."
"We need to talk to Graham some more."
Buffy decided this would be the
best course of action until Willow was able to finish her hack job into
the Army's computer.
"He'll be at your birthday party this
weekend, luv." Spike grinned at his mate. "We'll hit him up for info
then."