by Mel Odom
“I can’t leave, Willow,” Jia Li said. “Not without knowing if he’s all right.”
“Let me get a few things out of the car, then we’ll both go.” Willow didn’t like the idea of Jia Li going with her, certain that there were things about to happen that she didn’t want her friend around to see. In fact, Willow was pretty certain she didn’t want to be around, either. Whatever held Lok in its thrall was powerful.
Images of the dead thing lurching free of the earthen wall kept looping through her mind. She noticed her hands were shaking slightly as she took the heavy-duty camper’s flashlight from the back of the station wagon. She also took up the spare bag of herbs and witchy things she kept there for emergencies.
When she turned off the car’s headlights, the dark shadows surrounding the beach seemed to rush in at her like rabid beasts. Okay, definitely the wrong place for wigging out. She took a deep breath and switched the flashlight on. The cone of light only helped a little, seeming to vanish almost instantly.
Resolutely, she led the way into the cave, following the waves washing inside. Slick stone turned downward immediately and the crashing waves sounded thunderous inside the passageway. At least we won’t be heard, Willow thought. Then she realized that they wouldn’t be able to hear anything lurking in the darkness inside the passageway, either.
When the sports car bucked against the doors to the cave mouth, Xander covered the girl in his arms protectively. Metal screamed and screeched as Oz kept the accelerator pegged and the huge doors gave way. Sparks flared on either side as the hinges scraped the length of the sports car.
“Brake!” Xander yelled, knowing at any moment he was going to feel the gut-wrenching twist of freefall. “Brake!”
“Got it!” Oz yelled. The Camaro skidded to a halt, slewing sideways. Then it dipped slightly like a bucket on a Ferris wheel.
Xander glanced at Oz, who was looking in the rearview mirror. “Over the edge?” Xander asked.
“Maybe a little.” Oz shrugged.
And the car rocked again.
“Everybody just stay still,” Xander advised. “Think ground thoughts.” Anxiously, he craned his head around and looked through the back glass. The dark Pacific Ocean stretched out behind the car. Something crunched under the tires. “We are not going to panic here.”
“They’re not staying still,” Oz said, staring ahead.
Xander looked and spotted a dozen Black Wind gang members charging out of the cave like a boiling mass of hornets. “Okay, it’s official: now you can panic.”
“Got to go for it,” Oz said, shifting gears.
“Do it.” Xander waited, holding onto the swordswoman. This dying thing won’t be so bad. I won’t be alone. I’m with Oz and — He still didn’t know her name.
Oz punched the accelerator and the front tires spun. “There’s not enough traction.”
“Hang on.”
“Sure,” Oz replied. “Hanging.”
Gingerly, Xander moved from under the swordswoman, not believing what he was about to do. He glanced at the approaching Black Wind gang members, spotting the muzzle flashes from their weapons, hearing the explosive chatter, and knowing it wasn’t mosquitoes cutting the wind around him. Nowhere near calmly, he climbed through the shattered remnants of the windshield and flattened himself on the hood. “Now try.” He gripped the hood tightly as a line of bullets chewed holes in the fender only inches away.
This time the tires gripped the dirt road, pulling the car back on level ground. Oz cut the wheel hard to the right, sliding back toward the cave for a moment.
Xander tried to scramble back into the car but lost his grip. He slid sideways, scrabbling hard to find something to hang onto. Then the swordswoman and Oz grabbed his legs and hauled him back inside the car. He landed in the swordswoman’s lap, which wasn’t an entirely bad place to be.
“Thanks,” Xander said, looking into those golden hazel eyes that had haunted his sleep the night before. “But this has gotta be really uncomfortable.”
The swordswoman smiled. “I find it curiously . . . tolerable.”
Oh, my God, and she thinks I’m tolerable, too, Xander thought. Then he bumped his head on the doorframe as Oz drove. He glanced behind them, seeing the Black Wind gang members pursuing them on foot. It wasn’t going to do them any good because they couldn’t run as fast as the sports car. They quickly disappeared in the dust clouds left by the Camaro.
“You know,” Xander said, “I’d like to introduce you to my friend, Oz. That’s him driving.” He jerked his thumb in Oz’s direction.
Oz shot Xander a look. “Since there’s only the three of us, I bet she had that figured already.”
Xander ignored the comment, concentrating on the woman. “And I would introduce you to Oz, except that I don’t know your name.”
Moving gracefully, the swordswoman somehow managed to dump Xander onto the front seat while she slid into the back. She hesitated only a moment. “My name is Shing.”
Xander grinned. “Oz, meet Shing. Shing, Oz.”
Oz glanced up at the rearview mirror. “Hi.”
“It is very nice to meet you, Oz.”
“Thanks for the big rescue scene back there,” Oz said. He steered fiercely, keeping the car just barely under control as they rocketed down the dirt road. Rocks and gravel pinged constantly against the undercarriage.
Then the car skidded out of control, hitting a high spot in the road and going airborne for just a moment. Oz got the vehicle back under control just in time to keep them from piling into a large tree. They went cross-country for a moment till Oz spotted the thin sliver of highway ahead. They raced up the embankment and went airborne again in front of an oncoming eighteen-wheeler.
Xander yelled as the big truck bore down on them. It missed them by less than a foot, then the slipstream caught them and rocked them up on two wheels for a moment. They settled down with a harsh thump.
“You are welcome, Oz,” Shing said calmly.
“Screaming?” Oz asked, lifting an eyebrow.
“I thought I had time,” Xander said. “Anyway, that wasn’t screaming. It only sounded like it. That was a family battle cry.”
“A family battle cry.”
“I can see where you’d get the two confused, if your ear isn’t trained for the difference.” Xander grabbed the branches that had broken off and fallen into the car during their cross-country trip.
“You face gangbangers, demons with these incredible tongues of death, but you’re afraid of trucks?”
“I have a problem with head-on collisions,” Xander admitted. “Too many episodes of World’s Most Incredible Police Chases, maybe. Do you have any idea where we’re headed?”
Oz pointed at the sign ahead.
SUNNYDALE 3 MILES
“Once we get there,” Oz said, “I’m thinking Giles will probably be at the library. If not, we’ll go by his house.”
“Sounds good. Maybe we could stop and get a pizza on the way.” Xander looked at the swordswoman, who was busy pouring more gunpowder into her pistols. “Do you like pizza?”
“I don’t know,” she said. “I’ve never had pizza.”
“Really?” Xander grinned. “You’re in for a treat.”
She dropped balls into the pistol barrels, then seated them with the ramrod. “Do you think we have time for pizza? There is much evil about to be done if we don’t stop it.”
We? Xander decided he liked the sound of that we. It really sounded promising. “There’s always time for pizza. It was designed for on-the-go people.”
As the liondog lunged at her, Buffy leaped, drawing her feet up just out of the creature’s reach. Flames torched the area where she’d been, peeling paint from the wall and doorway behind her. In the next instant, she had Mr. Pointy out of her jacket pocket and in her hand.
One of the men opened his mouth—no, his head, she decided—and lashed out with his tongue. She turned in midair, feeling the tongue glide slick-wet over her jacket. She fel
l forward, not trying to land on her feet, trusting Angel to keep the liondog off her as she went for the three men facing them.
Landing on the floor, she rolled toward the first man, using him as cover as the other two brought up their pistols. She caught a brief glimpse of Angel going down under the liondog’s assault. Angel had both hands on the creature’s head, controlling the direction its mouth faced.
A huge bellow of flame spewed forth, narrowly missing Angel. He levered an arm under the liondog’s muzzle, his other hand gripping the back of the dog’s neck.
Then Buffy lost sight of them, rolling over to face the first man. She kicked hard and swept his feet from under him; she was up and moving again even as he fell. Striking from a crouched position, she drove a foot into the side of one man’s knee and heard bone shatter just before the agonized scream.
The third man got off three shots before Buffy drove her stake into his heart. The impact shivered along her arm, letting her know she’d struck solidly. The man stumbled back, slammed against the wall, then looked down at her and grinned.
“Wrong.”
“Not human, not vampire,” Buffy reminded herself. “Forgot with you guys it’s the heads.” Before she could yank Mr. Pointy free, the demon punched her in the face, driving her back across the hallway.
The demon lifted his pistol and fired.
Buffy launched herself at her attacker, listening to the wind of the bullet whip past her ear. She grabbed the man’s gun arm and yanked him off-balance, threw a hip into him and flipped him onto his butt. Even as he landed with his back to her, she hooked a forearm under his jaw and her other hand behind his head. She tightened her grip and twisted, listening to the popping ratchet sound of the demon’s skull separating from the spine.
The demon dropped, turning into greenish slime on the way down.
Breathing hard and already moving, Buffy watched one of the two surviving demons suddenly burst into flames as the liondog belched again. Walking that thing must involve a really big pooper-scooper and a fire extinguisher.
Angel locked his legs around the liondog’s lower quarters and strained against it, bowing it backward. Then the liondog’s spine broke with a rolling crunch. It blew out a final gust of flames, shuddered, and died.
Bloodied and torn from his battle, Angel forced himself up, staring down the barrel of the third man’s pistol.
Buffy attacked without warning, launching herself into a flying kick. Her foot collided with the base of the demon’s skull, breaking it free of the spine. He was soup by the time he hit the floor.
“Kinda like Battling Robots,” Buffy said, referring to the boxing game she’d sometimes played with her friends. Her mother had insisted they’d been called Rock ’Em Sock ’Em Robots in another generation.
Applause sounded behind Buffy, causing her to turn at once, her fists raised in defense.
“Very good, Ms. Summers.” Zhiyong looked a lot like the pictures Buffy had seen on the school library monitor Giles had dug up earlier, but he probably paid to look that way.
Buffy gave the man a hard look, noticing the halfdozen other men standing behind him. “Gee, the Bad Guy generally doesn’t give me a standing ovation when I whack the help.”
“Perhaps not, Ms. Summers, but I believe that anyone fool enough to die at another’s hands deserves it.”
“You only say that,” Buffy replied, “because you’ve never died at another’s hands.” She and Angel both had.
“There are too many of them,” Angel whispered low enough that no one other than Buffy could overhear.
“I know. Plans?”
“Run like hell when we get the chance.”
Zhiyong permitted them their quiet conversation, obviously thinking he was in complete control of the situation.
Which, Buffy had to admit, it definitely looks like.
“Up until this point, Ms. Summers,” Zhiyong said, “I’d not believed the esteemed mayor’s insistence that you could become an insufferable thorn in my side.”
“Wait until I figure out what you’re really up to,” Buffy promised, “then you’re gonna find out how lousy I can get with insufferance.” She glanced at Angel. “ Insufferability? One sounds like an insurance and the other sounds like a superpower.”
“I think you mean you’re going to be really insufferable,” Angel said.
Buffy shook her head. “That doesn’t sound very threatening. I mean, not like a hero-threatening-a-villain threatening. More like you’re going to be annoying than threatening.”
“Sometimes,” Angel said, “it’s better to just say nothing at this point.”
“No,” Buffy said. “The staring thing never works for me. People just think I’m being quiet.”
“For myself,” Zhiyong said conversationally, “at this point I generally deal with those who get in my way in only one fashion.” He turned to the demons. “Kill them.”
The demons raised their weapons.
Knowing they’d never reach the stairwell before getting cut to ribbons, Buffy stamped the very end of the machine pistol the last demon she’d killed had dropped. The weapon popped up from the floor and the Slayer caught it, cradling it in her arms like she’d been doing it all her life. She pointed the machine pistol at Zhiyong.
“I’ve already been dead once,” she said coldly. “Didn’t care much for the experience. Me, I’m thinking this could be your first time.”
Zhiyong turned slowly.
“Maybe now would be a good time to do a little renegotiating,” Buffy suggested.
Chapter 21
THERE IS NO WAY YOU COULD EVER MAKE A CAVE FEEL homey, Willow thought as she negotiated another switchback turn in the passageway. She played the flashlight over the rubble ahead, picking a path carefully. Jia Li followed closely behind her, hampered by losing the light occasionally when Willow blocked it from view. Water trickled down through the rocks, keeping a majority of them wet and slippery, causing the girls to go even more slowly. Of course, that meant any need to escape quickly would be just as hampered. Willow tried not to think about that, but after everything she’d seen while hanging with Buffy, it was impossible not to think about it.
Candy wrappers and Coke cans, even fast-food containers in some areas, showed that kids at least came down into the cave. That was a little reassuring, except when Willow realized that a lot of vampires liked to feed in areas like this.
“Do you see Lok?” Jia Li whispered.
“No.” That bothered Willow. Either Lok could suddenly see in the dark or he was so far ahead they couldn’t see him. Or maybe he was waiting just around the next switchback, a pick in his hands and an insane gleam in his eyes. She swallowed hard.
The passageway widened another sixty or seventy yards farther on, then leveled out in a cavern that was too big for Willow’s flashlight to completely shine across. But a light burned steadily on the other side. Willow took a deep breath, then turned and followed the wall to the right. When she worked mazes, she’d learned to always keep a wall to her right. Eventually, all the walls would lead to the center.
At least, that was the way it worked in the physical world.
However, since entering the cave Willow could sense the presence of Power with a capital P. It was the kind witches and warlocks and some of the fey creatures used. Of course, demonic things used it as well. That was the problem with power: it never really questioned who used it or whether it was being used for good or evil.
“What is Lok doing here?” Jia Li asked.
Willow concentrated on the rocky ground, knowing if she turned her ankle badly enough she might be stuck there. Not a good thought to be having in a dank, dark cave. “I don’t know.”
“You know more than I do,” Jia Li accused.
Guilt flooded Willow. “I’m sorry about looking into things behind your back.”
“You could have told me.”
“I didn’t know how.”
“Then why did you?”
“Becaus
e when the time got right I wanted to be able to tell you.”
“Tell me now.”
Willow stopped at the edge of a narrow stream. It ran through the cave they were presently in, nearly a yard wide, until it disappeared under the cave wall. “Mei-Kao Rong was a laborer. When he first came to California, he worked on the railroads. I can’t tell you any more than that. Sorry. The information I found was kinda skimpy.”
“He had a small obituary.”
“Actually, there was no obituary. I looked for one.”
Jia Li was silent for a moment. “The lives of Chinese laborers at that time were very cheap.”
Willow didn’t argue. Most history—of any country— was filled with unpretty moments. Empires, kingdoms, and nations generally got ahead of everyone else by taking advantage of someone. High school had the same kind of pecking order, and the socially privileged got more respected and feared by taking advantage of those who weren’t. However, time changed power, even in high school.
Taking a big step, Willow hopped across the small stream and almost fell into the mud on the other side. “In 1851 or ’52, the newspaper article wasn’t certain, Mei-Kao Rong settled in Sunnydale and started working in the mining camps. In 1853 he was trapped in a cave-in with thirty-six other men.”
“All Chinese?”
“There were two caucasian company foremen among those lost,” Willow said. She continued following the wall, grazing it with her fingertips. She could see the weak light better now, and realized that it was coming from another passage.
“They died in the accident?”
“Yes.” Willow turned to her friend. “I’m sorry.”
“Thank you, but I did not know my ancestor. My worries are about Lok.”
Willow continued toward the other passageway. Images of the vision swirled through her mind, pushing her panic levels up. Voice? Whoever you are? I’d really like nothing more than to leave right now.
But there was no reply.
Despite her feelings, Willow knew she couldn’t leave. Even if Lok was a jerk, she knew he’d been possessed by whatever guei had haunted him and wasn’t totally responsible. Being a jerk was one thing, but getting killed was another. And she was certain she’d never get Jia Li to leave.
