The Xander Years, Vol.2

by Jeff Mariotte

  This had been a long time coming.

  Heidi made a fine target. Totally focused on Willow, she didn’t even see Buffy swing the fire extinguisher at her head. The metal made a satisfying clang against her skull, and she crumpled.

  Giles tugged Willow to safety, out in the hall.

  Relative safety, anyway.

  There was still Xander.

  He charged the doorway. Buffy brought the fire extinguisher up again. But it was a feint. He dodged the extinguisher, and she kicked out, catching him in the chest, knocking him backward.

  Twice in one day she’d had to indulge in some Xander-bashing. Not without its charms. . .

  But there was a noise in the hallway, at the intersection. The other three members of Xander’s pack, converging there. They saw Buffy, Willow, and Giles. Charged.

  “Run,” Giles shouted.

  They dashed into another classroom, and Buffy slammed the door shut. She held the knob.

  On the other side, she could feel them yanking it, trying to turn it. They pounded on the heavy wooden door, growling angrily.

  After a few moments of that, the barrage stopped and she heard their footsteps moving away.

  “I think they’re going,” she said.

  “They could be faking it,” Willow suggested. Buffy understood her friend’s fear — she felt terrible for having left Willow alone in such a vulnerable position. She couldn’t be everywhere — but that didn’t prevent her from feeling like she should be.

  She tried to reassure Willow. “No, they’re hungry. They’ll be looking for somebody weak.” Which is not us. “I’m really really sorry, Willow,” she continued. “I didn’t know they’d come after Xander.”

  “It’s okay,” Willow said.

  Giles caught his breath. “We must lead them back to the zoo if we’re going to stop this.”

  “Yeah, and before their next meal,” Buffy said. “That’s my job.”

  “Individually, they’re almost as strong as you,” Giles protested. “As a group —”

  “They’re tough,” Buffy said. “But I think they’re getting stupider. You guys go to the zoo and I’ll bring them to you.” She opened the door and went out into the night.

  Hope I’m right, she thought.

  Visiting friends was supposed to be fun, Rich Anderson believed. But they were barely out the door before Melissa started in on him.

  “I didn’t say she looked better than you,” he insisted. “I said she looked better.” Okay, lame. But he had to make an effort.

  “I heard what I heard,” Melissa said. She stopped on the walk, looked down at her son shoving a Twinkie into his mouth. “Joey, chew,” she said. “You have to chew or you’ll choke.”

  Little Joey nodded.

  They all got into the sport-utility vehicle, pulling their doors shut behind themselves. He couldn’t wait to get home. Maybe by then she’d have moved on.

  “I don’t see why we have to have this conversation every time we see them,” he said.

  “I didn’t start it,” Melissa answered. Her voice dripped icicles. Maybe she wouldn’t move on so quickly after all.

  Rich patted his pockets. “Damn,” he said. “Where are the keys?”

  “Huh?” she asked.

  And then, as they sat there in the suddenly quiet car, they heard it — a soft, feminine voice, calling.

  “Jo-eeey . . . Jo-eeey . . .”

  The Andersons looked at each other, the fight forgotten. What was that? Who was that?

  Suddenly a head appeared outside Joey’s window — looking down, from on top of the car. The head roared, and then there were more of them. They were all over the car, banging on it with fists, growling at them through the windows. Rich clicked the locks shut — just in time, since they were grabbing at the door handles.

  There were four of them, he thought, but there could have been more. It was dark, and they were moving, banging on the car here and then just as suddenly pressing their faces against the glass there. Shaking the big SUV, and roaring like wild beasts. Melissa was screaming, and in the back, Joey seemed petrified.

  “Hey!” Rich shouted. “What’s going on?”

  Surely someone will call the cops, he thought. All we have to do is wait here with the doors locked, until —

  One of them smashed through the back passenger window. Next to Joey. Arms reached in, grabbed for the boy. He held on to his mother.

  “Joey!” Melissa screamed.

  The car was rocking badly now. It was like a night-mare — growling, animal-like teenagers outside, calling his son’s name. More windows were broken, and hands reached at them from every direction. The Andersons held each other, panic-stricken. What do they want with us? Rich wondered. What do they want with my son?

  Well, they weren’t hard to find, Buffy thought. Not exactly keeping a low profile.

  The screams and sounds of breaking glass had alerted her from a couple of blocks away, breaking through the suburban stillness like firecrackers in church. Closing in, the roars and snarls of the pack had confirmed her suspicions. She came upon them as they were trying to drag someone from the SUV — probably going for the kid first, as the weakest member, she thought. But the ’rents might be next — neither of them looked all that strong or confident, either.

  She jumped into the fray, grabbing the jacket of one of them — she could barely tell which was which, especially since they’d all taken to dressing in the same dark colors — and hurling him to the ground. Or her, she corrected.

  Then she jumped to the top of the vehicle. Kyle met her up there. She kicked him in the jaw and he sailed off.

  Through the smashed-in sunroof, she saw Xander, half in and half out of a window.

  “Didn’t your Mom teach you?” she asked. “Don’t play with your food!”

  He slid from the car, facing her. She looked down on him from her rooftop perch. The others backed him up.

  “Come on,” Buffy said. “You know what you want.”

  She jumped from the car, on the opposite side from them, and ran. Behind her, she heard their awful hyena laughter. And the unmistakable sounds of them giving chase.

  They were coming.

  * * *

  The zoo was dark and quiet when they arrived. The zookeeper had left Giles’s name at the front gate, and the one guard on duty looked too sleepy, or otherwise uninspired, to quiz them too much on their errand. He’d tried to hand them a map showing how to get to the zookeeper’s office, but Willow had told the man they’d been there before and knew how to find it. The guard said something about how dark the paths were, but she showed him the big flashlight she’d carried with her from Giles’s car. The guard stopped talking.

  Of course, the zookeeper’s office wasn’t their real destination.

  The hyenas were.

  Within a couple of minutes, they were there. She could smell the sharp musk from outside the enclosure.

  “The pathway to the hyena pit,” Willow said, winded. “Where’s the zookeeper?”

  “He must be inside,” Giles said, ducking under the yellow tape. “I’ll go in and prepare things. You just warn us when you hear Buffy and the others approaching.”

  He went down the pathway, and was swallowed by the dark. Willow gripped her flashlight a little tighter.

  Surrounding the zoo grounds, there was a wide swath of thick vegetation — Jungle-like, really, Buffy thought. She ran through it, shoving aside huge hanging leaves, dodging tree trunks. She guessed the idea was that the jungle reduced the animal sounds, for those outside the zoo, and maybe made the noise from Sunnydale more bearable for the animals.

  Not that Sunnydale was a really noisy place. But every now and then there were sirens, or demons howling, or hyena-possessed teenagers jumping on cars.

  So the soundproofing thing was probably all good.

  Except for the part where she was running through the trees and brush, and the hyena kids were running behind her. Chasing her.

  Because one
thing hyenas knew how to do better than Slayers did was run through the brush. More practice.

  She was making good time. They were making better, judging by the leaves and underbrush crashing behind her.

  She just hoped her lead would hold until she got them where they needed to be.

  Giles walked down the pathway. It was quiet inside, and dark, and a bit rank. There was more tape across the entryway. He wasn’t sure exactly what he’d been expecting, but he knew one thing. This wasn’t it.

  “Doctor . . .?” he tried. “Zookeeper — ?”

  A scuffling sound caught his attention and he turned. The zookeeper had come in behind him, from another entrance, possibly.

  Only he wasn’t dressed like any zookeeper Giles had ever seen.

  “Oh, of course,” he said. “You’re in the Masai ceremonial garb. Are you otherwise prepared for the trans-possession?”

  The zookeeper stepped into the glow from lights inside the hyena enclosure. His face was painted blue and white, in a bizarre pattern that Giles half-recognized from the texts he’d pored over in the last few hours. A robe, of a fabric that exactly matched the blue of his face, covered his body, and beneath that he wore some kind of tights. At one ankle and one wrist he wore bone bracelets. He carried a big stick, a staff or club of some kind, which he tossed from hand to hand.

  The whole ensemble was more than a little disquieting.

  “Almost,” the man said.

  Giles noticed the strange red markings on the floor. “Right,” he said. “The sacred circle. You’d need that to . . .” He was suddenly confused. “Well, this would be here when the children first came. Why would you . . .”

  It dawned on him, all at once. He gave a small laugh, and turned to face the fright-masked zookeeper.

  “How terribly frustrating for you,” Giles said, “that a bunch of schoolchildren could accomplish what you could not.”

  The zookeeper held his gaze. “It bothered me,” he said, matter of factly. “But the power will be mine.”

  Giles knew, finally, that the man was beyond hope of reasoning. He needed to get away, to warn Willow and Buffy before it was too late. He started to bolt.

  But the zookeeper was faster. He stepped in, swinging the club one-handed into Giles’s stomach. Giles doubled over, and the blue man whipped the club around, brought it down on the back of Giles’s head. Giles went down, unconscious on the floor amid the strange symbols painted there.

  The zookeeper didn’t waste any time. He grabbed the librarian’s ankles and dragged him out of sight. His plans were coming to a head — the last thing he needed was a spare corpse on what was to be the stage for the greatest moment of his life.

  They were closer than ever. Buffy could hear them breathing, behind her. Not even panting with the exertion, which, she had to admit, was getting to be a bit of a strain on her.

  What was worse, was, they were laughing.

  That hysterical half-insane, high-pitched hyena laughter.

  Ever closer.

  She ran harder.

  Willow heard the crashing as they came nearer. It had to be Buffy — not like anyone else would be doing the jogging-for-health thing in the middle of the night in a closed zoo.

  Giles had said to warn them, so she passed under the tape and ran down the walk to the hyena house.

  “They’re almost here!” she called. “Giles . . . ?” No answer. “Giles?”

  No Giles, either. The only one there was the zookeeper, and he looked weird, all in blue with his face painted. But Willow was used to weird-looking creatures — at least this guy was human. “Where are the hyenas for the transpossession?” she asked him.

  He cocked a thumb over his shoulder, gesturing to the cage. “They’re right here, in the feeding area. Stay clear,” he warned. “They haven’t been fed.”

  “Where’s Giles?”

  “He’s laying in wait.”

  “They’re almost here,” Willow said, fighting hard to keep the panic from her voice. “Shouldn’t you bring the hyenas out?”

  The zookeeper picked up a long strip of leather. “When the time is right,” he said. He grabbed Willow’s wrists, started wrapping the leather around them. “I’m gonna need your help.”

  Well, it had seemed like a good idea at the time.

  But now the pack was right on her tail, and Buffy wasn’t quite to the hyena house, and if even one of those possessed kids had the presence of mind to make a leap, they could probably catch her.

  She’d wrestled Xander. She knew how strong they were. If they brought her down, as a pack, they’d take her. Just like she was one of those antelopes or whatever that they were brunching on in the tapes Willow was watching.

  She was close, though. Maybe Giles and Willow could do something.

  Like, bury whatever scraps the pack left behind.

  She burst through the yellow tape. “They’re right behind me!” she called.

  Please, Giles, she thought. Be listening for once, and not talking.

  “That’s Buffy! Get ready!” Willow said.

  The zookeeper had tied her wrists tightly together with his strap. Now he pulled something from beneath the flowing blue robe he wore — a long knife with a very shiny blade.

  “Here,” he said, like he was giving her a present.

  “What is this?”

  “The predatory act, remember?” he replied. He moved behind her, holding her in one arm and bringing the knife to her throat.

  “Oh, right,” Willow said. Talking was hard with the blade pressed against her skin. “You’ll pretend to slash my throat and put the evil in the hyenas?”

  He looked her in the eyes, but there was nothing reassuring in his voice. “Something like that.”

  It was clear now that he wasn’t kidding. Nor was he on their side.

  Buffy burst into the hyena house. There was a strange-looking, blue-garbed man holding a knife to Willow’s neck. And Will’s hands were tied. There was no sign of Giles. Just to make things more complicated, Willow shouted, “Buffy! It’s a trap!”

  Buffy stopped in her tracks.

  Which, come to think of it, might not have been the best idea, since the pack was still running full speed behind her.

  Xander plowed into her, throwing one arm around her midriff and driving her to the ground. Then the others were on her, hands tearing at her, teeth gnashing hungrily.

  “Nyumba Ya Sanaa!” the zookeeper called. She recognized the edge in his voice from the first time he’d spoken to them outside the enclosure, and realized that’s who the blue guy was.

  Everybody looked at him. Except Buffy, who, because the pack wasn’t looking at her, looked at them.

  Their eyes, after all, were glowing green. It was the kind of thing that caught your attention.

  All of them — Kyle, Heidi, Tor, Rhonda — eyes flashing like traffic lights saying go. She risked a glance at the zookeeper, and his eyes flashed the same weird glow, as if in response to them.

  And she suddenly understood what it meant. This whole thing had been a setup. Somehow the hyena spirit had accidentally gone into Xander and the rest, when this guy actually wanted it for himself. So he’d arranged for everyone to be brought back here when he was ready.

  Now the hyena was out of the kids, and concentrated in one man. Who wanted it there.

  He was going to be trouble.

  As if forgetting how to use tools, the zookeeper dropped his knife, grabbing Willow’s head between his hands. He roared like a wild beast. He leaned toward her, baring his teeth like he meant to rip into her flesh.

  “Willow!” It was Xander. Sounding like himself. She never thought his voice could sound so wonderful. He pushed away from Buffy, launched himself across the room, and slammed into the growling zookeeper. They both went down, but the zookeeper regained his footing quickly. When Xander came at him again, he swung a backhanded blow that knocked the teen to one side.

  With Xander off her, however, and the rest of the pack watching
the fight, Buffy could stand. She did, then launched a kick at the zookeeper’s painted jaw. She connected, hard, and he fell back. In a second he was up again, and charging her. She stopped him for a moment with a left, and when he attacked again, she grabbed his robes and used his own momentum to throw him over her shoulder and down onto the hard stone floor.

  He was powerful, though. Most men would have been out cold, but he jumped up and came back for more with an animal-like growl.

  So she used the same trick, in the other direction. Grasping his robes, turning, spinning, bringing him over her shoulder and down.

  Except that this time, because he was coming at her from the other way, “down” meant into the hyena pit.

  He screamed.

  He reappeared again a moment later, trying to haul himself out by the bars of the cage. But there was a ferocious growling behind him. He screamed again, in pain this time more than fear, and was dragged down from the bars.

  He was out of sight, but the growling continued. And even worse, crunching, gnawing, gnashing of teeth.

  Buffy caught a glimpse of Kyle and his friends as they ran out of the hyena house, horrified. She didn’t blame them.

  She took another last look inside the cage and was sorry she had. If the zookeepers had rules against feeding the animals, she was sure feeding the zookeepers to the animals must be an even worse violation.

  When she turned away, unsteady and a little queasy, she saw Xander — who looked, at last, like the plain old Xander everyone knew and loved — untying Willow’s hands.

  A door opened, and Giles staggered into the room. He put a hand to his glasses, trying to gain his balance. “Uh,” he said. “Did I miss anything?”

  Where does a girl start?

  The next day was one of those bright, sunny days when it really becomes clear that summer is just around the corner. Buffy, Willow, and Xander walked across the quad, heading for class. Buffy was enjoying the sunshine, and, strange as it seemed, enjoying being with Xander.

  “I heard the vice principal is taking over until they can find a replacement,” Will said.

  “It shouldn’t be hard to find a new principal,” Buffy said. “Unless they ask what happened to the last one.”