by Various
Angel cleared his throat and they broke apart. “If you two are through with your patriotic farewells, I think we’d better get going.” He shot a glance at the library clock. “Midnight, remember?”
“Jenny, I still don’t like the notion of you coming with us,” Giles said a little breathlessly.
“Nonsense,” she said. “What happens if I don’t go, and one of you gets caught . . . or worse? Who’s going to perform the ritual then? In this instance, three isn’t a crowd — it’s safety.”
God help him, Giles just couldn’t find a good answer for that.
The stare that General Samson Murray fixed on him was red and hot and hellish, and reminded Angel of a whole lot of things he really didn’t want to think about.
“You are not among the living,” the dead man grated. “Why would you stand as their second-in-command?”
Angel fought the urge to shrug, knowing the military man would see it as an insult. “Just call me Diplomat Guy,” he answered. “Somebody has to do it. Do you want to meet Commander Giles or not?” As he waited for Murray’s answer, Angel let his gaze skim to the zombies guarding him. Fixed right there on the breast of the General’s uniform, the Opal of Unlife was impossible to miss . . . so close, and yet so far. He’d hoped to go with Giles’s original s cenario — snatch and grab — but there was just no way. The army leader had far too many dead soldiers strategically positioned between Angel and himself, and those same unfriendly zombies were wielding enough pointyended weapons to keep him, so to speak, on edge.
Samson Murray stared at Angel long and hard, as though he could somehow read his mind. Angel waited, knowing he couldn’t and hoping the dead old guy wasn’t going to just get peeved and order one of his ghouls to poke him with a bayonet. Finally, though, the military man’s blackened lips drew back. “So be it, though trusting a turncoat vampire is risky business. Have your Commander step forward.”
“Well,” Angel began, “we were hoping we could discuss this in private —”
“Are you still talking?” the General asked icily.
Angel winced as a couple of zombies moved toward him, brandishing rifles at the ends of which were affixed U.S.M.C. KA-BARS. “No. No.” He cleared his throat and stepped to the side, surreptitiously working his way backward as Giles moved in place and stood, stiff and ramrod straight, in front of General Murray.
Angel shuddered inwardly as he watched the two men face each other. He didn’t know if it was the fact that Murray was a zombie or as crazy as a bat in the sunshine, but he really didn’t think this was going to go well.
“I’ve come to discuss the terms of the surrender of Sunnydale,” Giles declared as formally as he could. Bluff and bluster, he decided, would have to make up for what he lacked in true military training. And yes, he knew it was all in the plan, but wasn’t it still a horrifying experience to be this close to a walking, talking dead man . . . who, by the way, smelled about as awful as his mold-mottled skin appeared?
When General Murray’s laughter came, it was harsh and loud. “You fool,” he wheezed. The skin of the animated cadaver’s neck rippled unpleasantly above the collar of his uniform. “Did you really think I’d give you terms? Look around!” He waved jerkily at the small knots of terrified human onlookers, and Giles realized that most had been herded into groups at gunpoint; a few unlucky resisters were either lying wounded in the street or being stalked by the zombies patrolling the perimeter of the park. “You call yourself a Commander of the Allied troops? This town is infested with the enemy, and I am not deceived by their attempts to masquerade as townspeople. I don’t know what your connection is here, but I strongly suspect you’re a spy. Thus there is only one term — surrender the town or everyone in it dies!”
“But General Murray,” Giles protested. “There are civilians here. Women and children, the elderly —”
“Casualties in war are a fact of life.” The zombie’s voice was frigid.
For a moment Giles didn’t know what to say. He’d been so certain he could play for time, perhaps haggle back and forth, all the while building up a sense of false camaraderie. This put an entirely different spin on things. With the lives of everyone in town resting on his shoulders, time was short and the weight of responsibility was heavy. “And if I agree?” he asked cautiously. “What then?”
The General looked down the remains of his nose. “Then you, and they, become prisoners of war and live. At least until I decide otherwise.”
Giles nodded, trying to appear thoughtful. “All right,” he finally said, and held out his hand expectantly.
The General stared from Giles to his outstretched hand and said nothing.
“If we don’t publicly shake on it,” Giles said with exaggerated patience, “the residents . . . those you believe are opposing forces, will suspect the decision was forced and they may resist. Wouldn’t it be simpler to present a unified front?”
General Murray’s heavy gray eyebrows drew together in a fierce scowl. Nevertheless, he stepped toward Giles and reached out a rotting right hand to take Giles’s own.
The librarian masquerading as a Commander leaned forward —
— and yanked the Opal of Unlife from the General’s jacket.
Samson Murray howled with fury, and Giles was instantly surrounded. With nowhere else to go, he leaped upward, hanging in the air for a fraction of a second like a basketball player aiming for the net. Somewhere in the scope of his vision he caught a glimpse of Angel’s hand waving frantically at him, and with a spit and a prayer, Giles tossed the Opal of Unlife up —
— and away.
Leaning over the stone railing on the roof, Jenny saw Angel’s arm snake up and snatch something white from the air, then the whole crowd of people, dead and undead, seemed to go up for grabs.
The handsome vampire was damned quick — she had to give him that. One second he was only a few feet from Giles, the next he was ten feet away and fleeing. Still, the General and his zombies knew what had happened — a good number of Murray’s undead army immediately went slathering after him. She saw frightened people and confused zombies as the soldiers who had been among the crowd tried to control “prisoners” now stumbling in front of them. Angel went through them all like a stiff-armed football player who couldn’t be bothered with worrying about whether he thundered over his own teammates or the opposition — zombies and humans alike were knocked in every direction.
She wanted to cry out a warning as she saw a knot of cadaverish soldiers rounding the corner at the far end of the building, but she didn’t dare call attention to herself. Their movements were lurching and awkward as they stumbled toward Angel, but they were still frighteningly quick . . . as capable and unrelenting as the ones coming up from behind. Angel was trapped.
Jenny leaned farther out and saw the vampire duck into a doorway almost directly below her. When she ran back to the entry door to the roof and strained to hear, she was rewarded by the sound of the lock giving way down on the first floor. She heard furniture grate across the floor and knew he was bracing the door, and a few seconds later fists began hammering against the metal barrier. It wouldn’t hold them back for long. Should she go meet him? It would save time . . . but no. The original resurrection spell had specified that it be read beneath the moon and stars — the reversal spell would no doubt have to be performed the same way.
Jenny backed away as she heard the metal give and noisy zombies begin piling through the door downstairs. Where was Angel? He should have been here by now. What would she do if he’d been captured, or even killed?
Then the door crashed open and rebounded off the wall, making her jump and clap a hand over her own mouth to stop a scream as she waited to see who — or what — would come lurching through.
“If I do not get my medal back, you will find, Commander, that you have made a fatal mistake.”
Giles lifted his chin and stared defiantly at General Samson Murray. “Yes, well, life is not without its annoyances.”
&
nbsp; Murray laughed, and the sound was like stiff cardboard being torn, grating and unpleasant. Still, there was a hint of something else beneath it . . . panic, perhaps? “In an orderly existence,” the military man said, “there should be no annoyances.” He held out his hand and one of his corpse soldiers stepped forward and dropped a bullhorn onto his palm, no doubt pilfered from a supply room in the city administration building. General Murray raised it to his lips and his voice, horrible and gravelly, boomed out over the street and the people once again being held prisoner by his troop. Giles saw most of the humans visibly wince at the awful sound.
“Attention — I demand your immediate attention. If the medal which was just taken from me is not returned within five minutes — FIVE MINUTES — I will have my troops begin executing civilians. If necessary, I will exterminate each and every person in this town. You will all suffer a horrible fate. RETURN MY PROPERTY!”
The last of it came out as more of a scream and Giles would have clapped his hands over his ears if a nearby zombie hadn’t glowered at him when he started to move. “I realize you need that opal, but really,” he said. “Losing your temper won’t accomplish anything.”
“Oh, yes it will.” The General pushed his face up to Giles’s, close enough for the librarian to see the way the dead man intentionally pulled in air so he could talk. “It will make me feel better!”
What if someone besides Angel had caught the Opal of Unlife, and what if, in mistakenly thinking they were doing right, they came forward with it? This small town in America, his home for the past year, would pay dearly — every man, woman and child would become a prisoner of this insane zombie. General Murray spun and stomped away, and Giles let him get about as far as he thought he would go before the dead man would do an about-face and return. Then Giles let his own voice rise above the forced knot of onlookers. “Don’t do it!” he shouted, his words tumbling out as quickly as he could make them. “Don’t trust him! He’ll kill you all anywa —”
Pain exploded across the right side of his face as the dead General, his movements much faster than Giles would have expected, sprang in front of him and hit him. “Another word from you and it will be your last,” he snarled. “Are you ready to die?”
Blood splattered from his lip, and Giles looked down and saw it drip on his nice, clean uniform. A pity — beyond the fact that the mess meant he would lose his deposit on the costume, for a Brit he’d really made quite the honorable picture in this getup. He found himself glaring at Murray as loyalty blossomed in him. “Die? I’d do it twice before I’d see you turn this town into a mass graveyard!”
General Murray grinned dreadfully. “Quite the patriot, aren’t you? Well, don’t worry, Commander Giles.” He glanced around, then plucked a bayonet-tipped rifle from the hands of a nearby zombie private. “In three more minutes, perhaps I’ll personally start the festivities.” His terrible smile widened. “And I’m sure I’ll get around to you eventually.”
“Angel!” Jenny gasped as he scrambled through the doorway. For a long second, her heart was pounding so hard she couldn’t say anything else. Then she hurried to meet him. “We have to do this quickly! Did you hear that? Murray’s going to start killing the townspeople!”
“I heard it,” Angel said grimly. “Loud and clear.” Off to the side was a small pile of short steel supports and cinder blocks, construction materials for some unfinished city project, perhaps a roof storage area. Angel grabbed a steel support and dragged it to the front of the door, then positioned it along the roof so that one end acted as a door stop while the other was braced against one of the roof vents. “There,” he said. “That’ll hold ’em — for maybe five minutes before the top door hinge breaks.”
Jenny’s voice was panicked. “And we only have three before someone dies! Come on!”
He ran to her side, then stopped and pulled out the Opal of Unlife. “What now?”
“Here.” She thrust the spell paper Giles had given her earlier into his hands, then took the medal from him, dropped it on the roof, and stood with one foot poised over it. “You read, I’ll shatter.”
Angel fumbled with the parchment, then looked from it to her helplessly. “Jenny, I have no idea what this says — I can’t read backward!”
“Oh, for Pete’s sake!” She seized the paper, then stared at it. No, he couldn’t . . . and neither could she. Her purse — she’d put her little mirror somewhere in there, hadn’t she? On the verge of hysterics, she dug roughly into the small, drawstring bag she’d used for today, just big enough for the bare essentials —
Bodies crashed against the other side of the rooftop door.
“Jenny —”
Now even Angel sounded alarmed, and that made their situation all the more terrifying. Something screeched over by the iron bar, the top hinge of the door protesting as the weight of the zombies on the other side began to bend it.
At the bottom of the bag, her fingers closed around something tiny and heart-shaped. Without looking, she kicked the medal toward Angel and brought out the antique fold-up mirror, such a small thing and barely big enough to use to freshen her lipstick.
It would have to do.
Another screech from the door hinge, a little louder and more threatening. Jenny ignored it and held up the tiny mirror, running it back and forth across the paper as she stumbled hastily through the backward words:
Those among the living are through with this
dark soldier,
His time of battle finally done,
his words and deeds grown colder.
So heed this incantation,
its spell cuts like a knife,
To still the soul of this dead man,
and those he brought to life.
Return to the dead from whence you came,
no more to walk the land,
With the crushing of the Opal,
by someone else’s hand.
On this the same day of his birth,
nevermore to walk the earth.
Just as the word “earth” left her lips, the door caved in and at least a dozen, semi-rotting zombies rushed through. They were only a few feet away when the heel of Angel’s shoe slammed down on the Opal of Unlife that lay glowing on the dark surface of the roof.
Crraaaackkkkk!!!!
Blue-white light, like an explosion of lightning, swept over everything.
Jenny instinctively threw her arms over her eyes but still saw both the zombies and Angel collapse before a pseudo-snowstorm clouded her vision. Were Giles and the townsfolk safe? Had they completed the spell in time? And was Angel still alive? The words of the spell —
Angel groaned, and she rubbed her eyes and flailed at the darkness, gratified to see shadows and shape returning as her eyes readjusted themselves. She stumbled forward, and her hands closed over his arm, his flesh unnervingly cool beneath her touch.
“Whew,” Angel said. He sounded vaguely stunned. “I thought for a second that ‘return to the dead from whence you came’ part was gonna do it for me . . . but I guess I’m already there.”
Glad he was all right, Jenny squeezed his arm, then rose and ran to the edge of the roof. Nearly too frightened to look, dreading what she might find, she made herself lean forward anyway.
And there, at the edge of the steps below her and amid a crowd of collapsed zombies, stood a slightly bewildered-looking Giles. A few feet away from him, clearly as confused as the librarian, was a young man dressed in a private’s green uniform.
“Bummer,” Patrick Beverly said.
Just a second ago he’d been getting a good chewing out by General Murray for leaving that piece of parchment back at the mausoleum. Murray had been telling him to double-time it back to the cemetery and retrieve it, but now everyone around him, including the old fart General himself, had done a face-first concrete dive.
Well, except for the dude with the British accent who was dressed up like an Allied commander and standing only about three feet away.
And picking u
p a bayonet rifle.
Why did he get the feeling he was suddenly in enemy territory? Patrick’s mouth made an O of surprise that unfortunately did nothing to hide his vampire teeth, and he said the only thing that came to mind.
“Oops.”
* * *
“You!” Giles snapped. “Blast it all, you’re the one Angel told me about — the one who started this whole absurd mess!”
The young vampire, hardly more than a teenager but obviously capable of all sorts of evil mischief, gave a self-conscious shrug. Before he could turn that movement into fleeing, Giles swung the end of his rifle to bear and jammed its wooden-handled bayonet dead center and all the way to the hilt into the blood-sucker’s chest.
Dust.
“Well,” Giles said. “That was certainly bracing. Willow and Xander will be sorry they missed the excitement.”
They were nearly back to the library and somewhere behind them one of the church bells tolled, marking the midnight hour. They’d barely made it.
“Look at them,” Jenny said in awe as they passed a young couple stoically rolling one of the zombie bodies into a blanket as a police officer stood by and filled out a report. As they watched, the officer handed them a copy of it, then the couple hefted their load and marched off in the direction of Sunnydale Cemetery. “They’re just . . . claiming the bodies, I suppose to reinter them. Don’t they even think this is strange?”
Giles sighed. “I suppose they do, but it’s fairly obvious that only those cadavers with, shall we say . . . still viable parts — the ability to move around well on their own — came back to life.” He was silent for a moment, trying to work through something in his mind. Finally, he continued.
“You see, one of the things I recall reading about that V.A. Center some time ago was that a new administrator discovered evidence that many of the patients had been sedated with a compound that quite often induced a coma deep enough to be mistaken for death. Apparently this went on literally for years until it was discovered.”
Jenny’s face was white in the shadows. “Oh, Giles — that’s horrible!”
