FIC: Two Slayers (7/?)
"Miss Chase! Cordelia!"
Cordy turned at the voice behind her. Having moved into a dorm a week ago, she was still getting used to all the people. "Riley isn't it?" she smiled at the handsome man. "One of Professor Walsh's assistants?"
"It is," he confirmed. The TA shuffled from foot to foot. "I was wondering if," the youth swallowed. "If you'd like to go out some time?" the TA smiled weakly. "If you'd like to."
Cordelia stared at the young man for a second before replying. "I'm sorry," an image of Xander's smiling face flashed before her eyes. "But while I'm flattered, I'm trying to get over someone right now. I'm not in a good place right now."
"Whoever he is, the man's a fool." Riley smiled painfully. "Well I tried."
Cordelia opened her mouth to comfort the man, explain further. Her eyes widened as she noticed something in the corridor behind her. "Harmony!"
Riley's heart dropped at the girl's negative reply. Even as he struggled to find a way to extricate himself with as much dignity as possible, he saw the girl pale and her eyes fill with fear as she looked over his shoulder. Puzzled, he glanced over his shoulder to see a small blonde hurrying towards them. "Hostile 17," he muttered even as his jaw dropped. How had she got loose?
"It's been done?"
"Yes ma'am."
Professor Walsh nodded at her subordinate's reply. "Dismissed," she brusquely ordered, Once the junior scientist had gone, she glanced around her space-age lab, a beaming smile slowly spreading across her face. Engineering the escape of a vampire had been a necessary risk, she'd not wanted the soldiers to find out about her actions, but she had to test the inhibitor chips. She'd minimised the risk by selecting the stupidest of the vampires, all they had to do now was wait and see.
And if Hostile 17 killed some civilians, well it was a worthy sacrifice, a stepping-stone in building an army of vampire soldiers to protect America. And to make her, she smiled slightly, President Walsh.
Harmony grinned as she looked down the narrow corridor. She'd escaped those soldier types, all very nice brawn but no brain – no match for her smarts, and now she was looking for food. And who did she find? Her old friend, Cordelia Chase. Now having her as a minion would be payback for all her high school years. And her friend, her eyes narrowed, one of the hunky soldiers, all yummy even without his uniform. Oh, how lucky was she? "Oh cooee!" she waved at her old friend. "Cordelia!"
Cordelia grabbed the boy's wrist. Thinking quickly, she forced a smile. "You just got lucky," she babbled. "That girl's my stalker, real weird, we need to get inside, away from her. Follow me."
Cordelia dragged the dazed young man into her room, slammed the door shut and pushed her companion against it. "Here," she passed the man a cross. "Take that, she's scared of religion, her parents were atheists." If that wasn't the lamest crap, she mused. "She's also strong, so lean against the door, I'll get something to keep her out, hold the door."
She hurried into the bathroom and pulled out her mobile, quickly found the number she wanted and dialled it. "Hurry up Kendra!"
"So he's there, with this huge bunch of flowers in his hand and blushing like crazy!" Faith only just managed not to roll her eyes as Kendra extolled Xander's virtues. Again. It was the same every patrol after Xander and Kendra went on a date, she'd go on and on about how wonderful her boyfriend was. One night she was going to fill big sis in what her and Jonathan got up to on their dates – then it would be Kendra and not Xman doing the blushing.
Her thoughts were interrupted by the sound of her fellow Slayer's phone ringing. In an instant, Kendra was talking into the phone. "Yeah?" the Haitian Slayer's face turned serious. "We'll be there asp!"
Faith raised an eyebrow as her sis turned and started running towards the college. "What's the sitch?" she yelled as she chased after the older Slayer. "Something up with G?" Faith felt her heart shrivel at the thought. They had to protect him.
"No," her sister replied, her breath coming easily despite the speed they were moving at. "Harmony's turned up at Cordelia's!"
"Ah shit!" she didn't much like Cor right now, but she didn't want to see her dead or turned. Hell, eternal Cordy, she shuddered at the thought.
"Okay!" Riley shouted as the beautiful Californian hurried into the bathroom, wondering why she didn't grab the office chair by the bed. But at least it gave him the chance to, he reached into his jacket and pressed his emergency pager, to send for help. "I'll hold," he winced when the vampire punched the door, it wouldn't hold her off for long. "The door!" He couldn't help but wonder why the girl had given him a cross, what a coincidence her being scared of religion and now being a vampire.
"Great!" Cordy hurried out. "Damn!" she shouted before grabbing the chair and hurrying over to the door. "I'm always moving the furniture."
Ah, Riley nodded mentally, that explained it. Women, they'd forget their heads if they weren't screwed on.
"What's that?" Forrest looked up at the beeping.
"Riley's beeper he's in Luton House!" Graham retorted, his eyes fixed on the console of their underground control room.
"The girls' dorm?" Forrest grinned. "And he's paging to boast, he got lucky? Way to go Finn!"
"No," Graham turned to him, his eyes serious. "It's a hostile alert!"
"Ah hell," instantly Forrest slammed his fist down on the general alert. "Let's go!"
Giles grabbed his coat even as he spoke into the phone. "Xander! It's me, there's trouble at Cordy's room. No, she hasn't decided to enter a nunnery!" Giles shook his head, that boy. He approved of Kendra's relationship with Xander, he was a fine youth but why couldn't he take anything seriously? "Harmony's turned up there!" he heard a click. "Xander? Hello, Xander!" Throwing the phone down, he grabbed the keys and hurried out.
"Let me in!" Harmony screamed. Despite her vampire enhanced strength she was struggling to get through the door, for some reason she wasn't as strong as normal, she knew there'd been something wrong with the blood they'd fed her while prisoner. And she needed to feed. Snarling, her vampire face showing, she tore the nearby fire extinguisher off the wall and raised it to slam through the door.
"Hey Harm." Turning at the vaguely familiar voice, she caught a hard right to the nose, knocking her across the hallway. Blinking her eyes clear, she glared at her attacker who returned her hateful look with a smirk. "Always wanted to do that."
"Faith!" Harmony spat, the brunette was with her friend, the other skank. Leaping to her feet, she grabbed the fire extinguisher and raised it over her head, meaning to launch it as a weapon.
"Hostile 17!"
She turned her head, saw several gas-masked troops behind her and a number of guns levelled at her. "Oh crap!"
Kendra looked at her sister. "What is going on?"
Faith shrugged. "You're asking me?" her sis winked. "You're the brains, I'm the hotness of this operation."
Even as Kendra opened her mouth to loftily reply that she was the brains AND the beauty of their partnership one of the soldiers fired at the annoying vampire who'd once been the even more irritating Harmony Kendall. "Oh crap!" screeched the vampire. The bullet missed its target and crashed into the extinguisher.
Instantly the room was filled with smoke. "Oh well done!" Faith screamed at the soldiers even as they both proceeded to cough their lungs up. "Now where is she?"
The instant the bullet hit the extinguisher, the hallway filled with a grey mist. Grinning slightly, Harmony hurried towards the two blinded and coughing Slayers. The vampire who killed two Slayers at once, that would be bigger than being the Chief Cordette! Reaching out, she went to grab hold of Kendra's hair.
And screamed as a pain lanced through her head, causing her to stumble away in agony. Confused and scared, she decided that escape was definitely the best option and hurried out of the hall, and out into the campus only to bump into a firm chest. "What the hell!"She looked up at the youth she'd bumped into. Her eyes widened in recognition. "Harris!" she bared her teeth to bite him.
And hit the floor a second later when the same white-hot pain erupted through her head. She looked up to see Xander, a grin on his face, and a baseball bat in hand. "Oh if only this was ten years ago." And then her head exploded in pain again.
Xander stared down in confusion at the body at his feet. Normally his tactic when dealing with a vamp was break one of its limbs and then stake it, hence the bat. But there was something different about Harmony, other than the obvious retardation, something that warranted investigation.
"Don't we kill them now?" he looked behind him to see Giles leaping out of his car.
"There's something different about her," he replied.
"It's Harmony Kendall," Giles chided, "did you really expect the idiotic drooling to stop just because she's a vampire?""It's not that," Xander replied. "Well not only that," he amended.
Suddenly the doors crashed open and his two girls ran out. "Grab her and get in the car!" Faith ordered.
"So when you went after Harmony you were met by soldiers, and she herself admits to being captured by a military unit?"
"They ignored my rights as an undead American!" Harmony screamed from the seat they'd chained her to.
Giles sighed. "Xander, we don't need to listen to her prattle anymore." A half-second later and there was the sound of staking. "Thank the lord."
"G-Man!" he glanced across to see Xander picking a computer chip out of the dust. "You think this is how they stop her from being able to do violence?"
"Quite possibly," he nodded.
"G," he glanced at Faith. "What does it all mean?"
"I suspect the government has some black-ops unit investigating demons. For what I reason I shudder to guess."
"Then," Xander looked grim, "We've got a problem."
"Indeed we have," he agreed.
"There's no sign of Hostile 17?"
"No ma'am."
"And no clue as to how she escaped?" Walsh hid a relieved sigh at the soldier's shake of the head. She was in the clear. Returning to business, she glanced at the reports before her. "The two girls that confronted Hostile 17, they were definitely non-demon?" the soldier nodded. Walsh pursed her lips in thought, the descriptions her troops had given her of the two intruders were less than detailed and contradictory to boot. It could be a coincidence, but she didn't believe in them. "Ms. Chase disavowed all knowledge when discreetly questioned about them?" again the soldier nodded. "In that case, have a watch put on her. I want those two girls!"