Author: norgco
Type: Buffy/x-files/smallville crossover
Rating: NC-17 to be safe, Scully Kink, its supposed To be funny people.
Scully/Mulder/feathers/whips/geese/ mentioned
Summary: Scully explains how she and Mulder Finally became a couple
Disclaimer: I own only the Karnak demons
Feedback: Please
CPA3
by norgco
The Magic Box upstairs conference room, 5.30pm
Friday,
Mulder, Scully, Xander and Willow were sitting around just drinking coffee and eating apple and cinnamon rolls. The investigation they had been asked to undertake had provided a lot of fascinating information that, unfortunately, was not necessarily relevant to the case. They had learned why Xander was different, but not why people fixated on his apparent normality under strange circumstances and thought reasonable behaviour was abnormal. Since those fixations were the point of the investigation they had written up a preliminary report to Angel over the last few days and sent it off by courier an hour before. Now they were decompressing a little before going back into things if asked.
"So, you guys were working together for nine years, when did you become an item?" Willow asked.
"In what sense?" Mulder responded.
"In the sense of when did you realise you were in love?" Xander clarified.
"You tell her Scully, you tell it so well." Mulder said, smiling at Scully, who looked extremely nervous at the idea. Actually she had a strange mixture of emotions running over her face. It was a story she found a little embarrassing, as it related to a time when she was convinced she was in denial, about many things. It had been a turning point in both her and Mulders lives, and perhaps these people, who had had so many revelations in their lives recently, could learn from it, about the dangers of not accepting who you are and what you want.
"Ok, the story begins after Mulder had been turned into a human/alien hybrid and then turned back again. A few months later but anyway things had been going well, and then gone very, very badly."
Emergency ward, Washington Hope Hospital, 2.15 am
Sunday
Dana Scully stood in the hospital waiting room, and, well, waited. Mulder was still being examined, and while she was a qualified doctor, she was in no emotional state to be part of it. Everyone who examined him immediately assumed he had been captured and tortured, and told her how lucky he was to have a partner like her to not only rescue him but provide professional care until the ambulance arrived.
"Agent Scully, thank god you found him in time, from what the doctors say any more of the treatment he received might have killed him." It was Assistant Director Skinner, obviously rushed out of bed at this ungodly hour to see to his agents. He was being as consoling as he could, talking about the full investigation of this incident he would launch, and how this time 'they' had gone too far. He believed the lie.
Or perhaps, not a total lie. Mulder really had been whipped, beaten and subjected to as many instruments of pain as an inventive mind could imagine. The lie was in the assumption of who did it. It was not Krycek, or the cigarette smoking man, or an alien/consortium experiment team that had tortured her partner for hours, torn him up so badly. She had done it, because she thought it might be fun and exciting.
Many people thought Mulder and Scully were in love, and had been for years. After all, how many people would go to central Antarctica, by using god knows how many favours, bribes, threats, and lies, to follow up a claim his partner, Scully, was there? Mulder had, and then Scully had chased off to Africa after a ghost of a lead when he was in a mental hospital, in hopes of curing him. They had gone so far above and beyond the call of duty for each other so often it had to be love, right?
Actually, no, it didn't have to be. It was both more than that and less, Special Agent Dana Katherine Scully thought, as she drank her coffee, cold so that at least the terrible flavour was reduced. Mulder had come closest to describing it, they were not complete human beings alone, they were two halves of a soul, each incomplete without the other. They had been sex partners from almost the first day, sharing and acting out their most secret fantasies freely, well before they had even really been friends. They were far, far, far too weird a pair to ever be just secret lovers.
"We have to try to maintain a professional relationship Scully." Mulder had said, after sex on an early case. She had come to his room to talk about the case, and, as usual, they had had sex. Their best work was done after sex, they always discussed the present case so much better under those circumstance. "I think that is how the rule is phrased, 'maintain a professional relationship'."
"Ok Mulder, so I charge you for it, how does $20 a time sound?" Scully still remembered saying. And she meant it, she would be able to look Skinner in the eye and say 'we have a totally professional relationship' if she was prostituting herself to him. It would even be legally accurate, just not true.
She could enjoy the sex that way, god alone knows she could enjoy someone wanting her for her body for a change. She was a woman who had been admired for her brain rather than lusted after for her body all her life. Always older men with power and authority, who had respected her and asked her advice as an advisor as much as hungered for her body. Men closer to her age were always intimidated by her brains, until Mulder. She was hungry for cock, just some mindless fucking from a young guy with stamina and an imagination.
Scully had gotten what she wanted, a good friend, a professional relationship and sex in any way and at any time she wanted. Katherine, her whore persona, was available to Mulder any time they were not on public show. Their lives revolved around their duty, woke each other up in the middle of the night with any idea or request that was work related, so off duty time was basically only when they were sleeping or at least in bed.
Katherine could take pleasure as her duty, her own and Mulders. He was her sole 'client', she was 'on call' at all times Scully was not. She did not want explanations or justifications beyond Mulder needing a woman. He could and did just walk in while she was working on a report, push her onto the motel bed and start pleasuring himself with her body. The no-talk, no explanations fucking allowed Scully to shut down her mind, the only way she had. There are many different methods of meditation, which suit different personalities. Being Katherine was Scully's, that was all.
Has Mulder been doing this all these years because he wanted to help me meditate? Did he allow me to whip him into the emergency ward because he thought it would allow me to relax? The short answer was, of course, yes. Mulder had agreed to Katherine's experiment with Sado-masochism, to being on the receiving end, and had not breathed the 'safety word' right up to whatever point he passed out from pain. How long was he unconscious before I realised, how far gone was I that I did not even notice?
"Scully, are you alright?" She turned to see The Lone Gunmen watching her anxiously. She really didn't need the stress right now, didn't need to invent a story about what she had been doing that weekend and how she had 'found' Mulder after deciding to investigate his 'disappearance.' They had gone to an isolated hut for the privacy, she had not wanted nosy neighbours calling the police about any 'strange sounds' they might hear. If they had maybe Mulder would not be in surgery right now, and Scully's career would probably be over.
"Mulder will get better Scully, he can take a lot."
Assistant Director Skinner's Office, 7.35am Monday
morning
Eventually she had gone to see Skinner, like going to visit your executioner to discus what axe he should cut your head off with. It was only early morning, she was his first appointment. He had been planning out who to call to get the manhunt for Mulder's 'torturer', and was really worked up about it. She half expected him to shoot or arrest her on the spot, but she said it anyway.
"Mulder wasn't kidnapped and tortured by Krycek, or anyone else. I wanted to try S & M and he agreed to let me be the dominant." Skinner was staring at her with his eyes bugging out, the blood running out of his face rapidly. Scully had been fortifying herself with the knowledge that as a doctor she could get other work. That assumed she was not going to be killed right here in the Assistant Directors office, which seemed increasingly likely. "I guess I got carried away."
"You GUESS you got carried away." She had never seen Skinner's face that shade of red before, or the veins in his neck bulge out like this. And then there was the tone of his voice... "Your ACTIONS put him in intensive care, do you know how many MAJOR PLAYERS are currently involved in this? Everyone from The Consortium to UFO conspiracy organizations to several foreign intelligence services, that's who."
"Foreign intelligence organizations?" Agent Scully could barely hear her own voice.
"Mulder actually had a lot of success convincing honest, patriotic individuals in government that we are covering up experiments with alien technology and genetics." The Assistant Director ran his hand over his head. He was calming down, explaining the situation was focusing him away from his anger. "It's just unfortunate that those individuals were all in foreign countries that could never be included in a cold war era conspiracy. Russia, South Africa, North Korea, Poland..."
"Poland, Poland has spies following the X-Files?"
"The licensing rights to any of the alien technologies could underight rebuilding their whole economy. And apparently they always had a world class bunch of spooks, small country surrounded by hostile major powers and all that."
The red headed agent was feeling confused about a lot of things, including whether to be angry that her sexual appetites were going to be in international intelligence briefings, or that the North Korean government seemed to respect her and Mulders investigative powers more than the United States Senate. Or that the only political elites that did not sell out the human race were the ones who never got the opportunity.
"So, for how long were you lying to me about you and Mulder's relationship?"
"I never lied to you sir, I said we have a totally professional relationship, which, since I never had
sex with Mulder without charging him money, was literally true."
"You think that prostituting yourself to your partner is within bureau guidelines?" The AD was going through a series of changes of expression and emotion, anger, humour, outrage, acceptance, and more ran over his face as he slumped into his seat. "Special Agent Dana Katherine Scully, in your professional medical opinion, ARE YOU NUTS?!?"
"Agent Mulder never saw any difficulty with our arrangement either sir, and his..."
"His sanity was always doubtful, and he would do anything for you, hell he just let you torture him and you know how he can't stand pain." The AD interrupted her, back to plain old-fashioned rage now. Actually she hadn't realised he had a problem with pain, he had endured so much ... endured, yes of course, poor, dear, guilt stricken Mulder would endure anything for her, she certainly would for him after all.
"I will have to go over this with legal advisors, but you are on indefinite medical leave starting now."
"Medical leave, sir?"
"You're crazy as a bedbug Scully. Incontestably bugfuck, in my non professional opinion."
An FBI approved psychiatrists office, later that week
"So tell me in your own words, Agent Scully, what you think of your relationship with Fox Mulder."
"Well I think the ass fucking is the best part, particularly when there is no warning. We always have two rooms, FBI accounting and all that, and I love it when he just walks in and helps himself." Scully warmed to the subject immediately, not noticing the stunned look on the shrinks face. "It's just so good to get to my room and suddenly feel a man behind me push me down and force his cock into my tight ass, no 'Hello Scully' or any of that, just a major assreaming that hurts like fire at the time and is painful for days after, Mulder has a really big dick and sometimes I bleed for a long time after, it just hurts so good, though a few times he says it wasn't him, so probably it was just some guy who ..."
"I meant your overall relationship, work, that sort of thing."
"Have you read our medical files?" The agent was concerned that trying to explain the X-Files would have her committed in a straight jacket. How to explain their relationship without talking about alien abduction, fluke men, shape shifting bounty hunters, and the cigarette smoking man. "Because if you have not, it will be impossible to understand us if you have not."
Scully had, of course, visited her partner at every allowed visiting time. He was coming along well, in his specialist's opinion. There would be permanent scaring on his back, of course, but it would simply be a more spectacular example of what was already there. There should be no loss of motor functions or feeling in any part of his body. Of course, he was still too doped up to talk to her. His improvement was all that allowed her to sleep, or avoid Skinner bringing charges against her. He had not specified what she could actually be charged with, just 'I WILL THINK OF SOMETHING'.
"Yes Agent Scully, I have read your medical files, and Assistant Director Skinner has given me a summary of your work on the X-Files." The psychiatrist was a large woman with a quiet voice, and Scully wondered if it was deliberately done that was so as not to risk exciting the dangerous loon in the office with her. She fought the urge to laugh, was she that far into Mulder's paranoia or was her imagination totally out of control? "Given all that has happened to you over the years it is not surprising that you have developed a, shall we call it an unusual stress release mechanism?"
Unusual stress release mechanism, well what was unusual about it? Scully thought hard about it, really why was she unusual? Ok, so she was a federal agent who investigates alien abductions, vampires, liver eating immortal mutants... Ok so if you throw in artificially induced cancer, being abducted myself - possibly by aliens & a vast international conspiracy - my sisters murder and some of the other things maybe she was under unusual stress.
But really, what was so unusual about sex as stress relief? And keeping Katherine and Scully totally separate just made so much sense really, they were different parts of her life, after all. She tried to explain this to her psychiatrist, who nodded and took notes, expression carefully neutral. Occasionally she asked a question, "And how did Agent Mulder respond to this, rather unusual, request?" was about the extent or it. What was so unusual, the chicken feathers had come off eventually, after all, and so what if nipple clamps aren't usually attached to ...
"I said, Agent Scully, that I think we should continue this next time, I have quite enough for today." Still the neutral tone and expression, looking somewhat forced with the pale complexion, she hadn't been this pale at the start of the session, had she. Actually, Dr Taylor seemed to be rather more pale at the finish than at the end of every session with Scully, which was rather odd.
Assistant Director Skinner's office
"I assure you, this was not my doing, and a full investigation is being conducted into the matter." C.G.B Spender, a.k.a Cancerman, aka the Cigarette smoking man, was smoking, this time with rage as well as Morley's. That he was here, with Krycek, trying to assure Scully and Skinner of their good intentions, was a measure of the infamy of the whole 'Mulder torture Affair'. That and the number of bodies turning up in the Potomac showing evidence of 'aggressive interrogation'. "Now I need to know why the FBI is putting so little effort into discovering who kidnapped and tortured one of its Agents. Or do you already know the identity of the sadistic bastard who so brutally..."
Spender stopped talking as he noticed the looks on the two FBI members faces, that and the way Scully had her hand part way up, like a naughty child facing an angry school principal. She had the nervous apprehension of the guilty child and Skinner the defensive parent look.
"Yes, agent Scully, do you have something to tell me?" Cancerman spoke in a tone amazingly reminiscent, to Scully, of her principal, Sister Maria, dealing with a schoolyard incident. She controlled the impulse to suggest to him that, perhaps, he had gone into the wrong line of work.
"Agent Mulder was not kidnapped and tortured by anyone."
"Then perhaps you can explain why he is in hospital looking like a victim of the Gestapo?"
"We were playing and I guess I got carried away?" Scully said with a sheepish expression on her face. The sheer embarrassment of the situation came through in her downcast look and tone. "Looking back on it my relationship with Agent Mulder may not be as healthy and balanced as I have always felt."
"Well Christ Scully, if that's how you treat a lover I'm damn glad you never got to work on me!" Krycek commented, fear and amazement in his tone. After all, he was someone she really had a hatred of, and a real reason to try to break that way. "You'll never take me alive, that's for sure."
The same office, later
"Agent Scully, that was the most embarrassing incident of my adult life." AD Skinner was sitting back in his chair, a glass mug of Sangria in his hand. It was from the same jug that she was drinking from. Ingredients for Sangria, chilled red wine, cinnamon, fruit, and ice, had been taken from a small office refrigerator where they were kept on hand for after visits from Spender. "If you ever put me through anything like that again I will personally dump your bullet riddled body into the Potomac."
"I will be sure to keep that in mind sir." Scully, who, like Skinner, had downed her first mug in one gulp, responded. Sangria tastes like a fruit drink, but it is still red wine after all, and drinking wine by the beer jug has predictable effects. With their second drinks mostly gone, the jug was emptying rapidly, and neither would be of much use for anything else today. "Perhaps I should have detailed more of My and Mulder's relationship, it would clarify what happened, or at least why."
"I think you have supplied enough blackmail material for one day, don't you?" He was looking through his mug at her, seeing her change shape and colour through the facets of the glass and the drink. "Although after the explanation of the geese and where they pecked their food from I don't see how many details could be left."
"I got the idea from Procopius, you know The Secret History, it has details of what the Byzantine Empress Theodora did for a living when she met the future emperor Justinian II." She was proud of her acquired historical knowledge, as a physics and Medicine student she was constantly kidded by the Arts students about having a narrow education. "I wanted to see if really put on a show like that, and what it would feel like. I am a scientist after all, it was a very important experiment."
"You will be the death of me yet Scully."
Mulders Hospital room, that evening
"Hi Scully, glad to see you're alright." Mulder seemed genuinely concerned, and a lot better than during her last visit. Of course, he was conscious now, always a big plus in the health stakes. The red head had been convinced he would hate, or at least fear her, after all she had not been harmed in any way.
"I'm fine Mulder." Her standard response, though she was far from ok. Putting her closest friend and lover in this place by losing control worried her deeply. They were supposed to be having fun, he was not supposed to be enduring torture for her benefit alone. "Mulder, why did you fail to use the safety word, did you forget it?"
"You were having fun, I didn't have the heart to stop you. I won't be volunteering for this again though." He sounded apologetic but firm, he had never refused Katherine anything but there are always limits. Being Katherine had been a part of there relationship from the beginning, and often fun for him too. But he had been doing it for her benefit, and what had happened in the cabin was in no-one's best interest. "Scully, you have a serious anger management problem, and a different form of therapy than 'Katherine and client' is obviously necessary."
Some people forgot that Mulder was a psychologist, and, arguably, the best that had ever worked for the Violent Crimes Unit. The man looking up at Dana Scully from the hospital bed was in full psych analysis mode, very focused. Having his attention was like staring into an industrial laser or possibly looking at a starving Leopard that was locked in a cage with you. It was very easy to remember Fox Mulder the Profiler under these circumstances.
"Why did you play my games all these years Mulder, looking back on it some of it has to have been unpleasant for you? What have I ever done for you that justified it all?" She had been thinking about it ever since calling 911. The more she thought about it the worse her previous behaviour seemed, and the more remorse she felt. Is Skinner right, am I nuts?
"Your my Scully, that justify's it. And don't think that sex with you was just a duty, you are absolutely sensational when you don't have a horsewhip in your hand." Smiling now, the dark haired man was doing his best to be disarming, in a 'relax, while the nice men in the white coats fit the straight jacket' way. Clearly he believed what he was saying, but by the same token he was watching her reaction to everything, modifying his verbal and non verbal responses appropriately.
"So, how can I possibly apologise for what I did to you?"
"You know me Scully, what do you think?"
"I've told you before Mulder, a threesome at Area 51 requires a higher security clearance than either of us will ever have. Besides, how do you know there are female test pilots flying Air Force UFO's?"
The Lone Gunmen's Office, 11am the next day
"Anyway that's why you have to help kill this story." The group were staring at her like she was crazy, not an unreasonable diagnosis really. Frohike was doing a reasonable job of controlling his drooling. Langly and Byers seemed more stunned than anything else, that seemed to be a standard reaction to the tale. "So, will you help?"
"Your telling us that the greatest government cover-up story since Roswell is really just you playing S & M games that got out of hand. Do you expect us to believe this, what are you covering up yourself Scully, how did they get to you?" This was the big problem with dealing with paranoid's, everything was a conspiracy.
"Well how do you expect me to prove it, bring in all my bondage and discipline gear and demonstrate on someone?"
"Well it might prove necessary, strictly in the interest of investigative journalism of course." Frohike said, predictable to the end. "And we may have to ask you to demonstrate that thing with the geese, where did you get them from anyway?"
"Melvin, Katherine did that for her reasons. I was always Scully, she was celibate, and I think Mulder is right, Katherine has to stop not being Scully before Dana winds up in a straight jacket. Anyway we only did S&M once, the equipment was borrowed from, hmm, lets call her a close friend."
"I think we should confirm your story with Mulder before taking action." Said Byers, clearly trying to be diplomatic, and not making too bad a job of it for someone with so little experience. The rather interesting expression on Scully's face when she described the equipment loaner's relationship to her and Mulder stirred more than the investigative journalist in him, but he controlled himself. "You have never lied to us before and none of us want to hurt a trusted friend, we don't have any to spare."
Mulders hospital room, 7pm
The man who had been her only friend and confidant for many years looked up at the short red head with a smile closer to his normal self. He lay on his back, which was the first time she had seen him able to do that since the session in the cabin. Holding her hand as she sat next to him, he first thought was that it was like old times, except she was not in the hospital bed next to his. Her second thought was concern that her nostalgic memories were of waking up in hospitals next to her closest friend after nearly dieing.
"We have to stop meeting like this, people are getting suspicious." Mulder said in his best movie cliché adulterer imitation voice. "Or at least paranoid as hell."
"While we're on the subject, I spoke to the gunmen this morning, they want to confirm with you before killing the 'Shock, Horror, Gasp, Mulder tortured and Government covers it up' story."
Scully felt better at the sight of her partner, at the feel of his hand and the simple fact that he was near. 'No, I'm not hopelessly in love with him, whatever gave you that idea' ran through her head as she really noticed the effect for the first time. She wondered how long she had been ignoring the signals, how long she had been in denial.
Mulders' devotion to her, his willingness to endure anything for her happiness, had come clearly into focus since 'the cabin', but her reciprocal feelings were still a surprise. Well, a surprise to her anyway, she wondered about all the people who had assumed they were in love all these years, and how they felt when she always denied it. Did they think she was lying or naive?
"Mulder, I've been thinking and you're right, I have to stop separating Katherine from Scully. Special agent Dana Katherine Scully is one woman not two, and Scully needs to have a love life." Her partner was watching her as she spoke, clearly wondering where this was headed. He had first raised the concept at her last visit the previous morning, before her promised visit to the gunmen. Was she going to cut off from him now, it might even be in her best interest, if a radical change, but it would wound him deeply. "That means Mulder and Scully have to start doing what
Katherine and her client have been doing. Among other things."
"Gee Scully, let me get out of hospital before putting me back in the saddle." He said with a grin, and because that damn saddle would hurt his back, it usually did even without the injury.
The Magic Box, 7pm
"And that's how we decided to start trying to be a normal couple, despite the FBI rules."
"What was that thing with the Geese anyway?" Xander asked,
"Well Xander, it was..."
*********************
The Hyperion Hotel, late morning.
One of the advantages of being dead is that it is hard for your health to become any worse. Having been dead for a few hundred years was starting to look more and more like an advantage to Angel, because otherwise he would be a prime heart attack risk, given the stress he was under. Courtesy of the patented vampire unbeating heart he did not have high blood pressure to blow out blood vessels, which, given the situation he was now in, would have been inevitable.
"Willow had a son, 8lb 6oz, named Jacob Thomas Rosenburg, at 3.15am this morning. Mother and baby are doing well." Cordelia was looking at the email, she had first to hear the news in a phone call from Giles, but reading about it made it more real.
She had been sitting staring at the message for hours now, occasionally reading it out loud, and kept mumbling variations on a limited number of themes. The whole post 'Faith, certified psycho slut, returns as a Certified Public Accountant' experience had thrown her severely, she had spent the last few months muttering comments on it all. "Xander is going to be father to Willows baby."
"Tark."
"No Angel, Cordelia, Cor-De-Li-A." The brunette said, speaking slowly and pointing at herself.
"No, Xander has agreed to be Tark, the male parent, as defined by the Karnak elders." The difference was important to Angel, given the condition the Karnak had put on the construction manager. Only he and Xander of the group knew, since a negative reaction to the demon Accountants 'screw this up and you die' announcement was anticipated from the Slayerettes. "The Karnak apparently made some kind of deal with him about it, and it's important to him.
Though 'daddy' is ok, I asked."
The youngest Harris had always willing to die to protect others, willing to do anything, ANYTHING AT ALL, to protect others actually, which was one of the worrying things about him. That the moral balance of the Scooby Gang was being partially set by Faith - who received a joy from killing even Angelus would find scary - and Xander - whose response to the nerve gassing and incineration of several thousand people in the Wolfram and Hart building had been to suggest a victory party - concerned him deeply. It was like the official police involvement in demon hunting on the hellmouth, the idea was scary, since the Powers That Be seemed obsessed with maintaining a balance between good and evil that it clearly upset, and yet exhilarating, because the balance was being tipped in favour of WINNING, and maintaining a balance that killed so many innocent people depressed him terribly.
"Ok Angel, tell me that Loser Boy sleeping with Buffy doesn't upset you. Look me in the eyes and say it, I DARE YOU." The ascended one of the pair said, her eyes boring into him. The term 'upset' seemed a little bit of an understatement about how he had initially reacted to the news, given that replacing the broken furniture had meant redecorating the hotels lower floor. "Tell me that finding out that he is a reject from a genetic re-engineering project who is fucking all the female Slayerettes except Dawn, and independently wealthy, and apparently so good at his work that he would be a multimillionaire from his own efforts by 25 even without the Karnak money doesn't burn you up."
"Not as much as it does you, apparently." The broody one responded. Partly it was just that Angel did not MIND being angry about it, it protected his soul from the joy he felt about the blonde slayer finally being happy and having her life expectancy improved. With the Slayers now acting as a small part of an increasingly efficient and well-armed police anti demon force they might even live to have their own children. No Slayer had ever lived to do that, in at least Watcher Council records, though the older Karnak records suggested it used to be perfectly normal. "Or is it the fact that you are the only remaining female heterosexual Scooby left that's getting to you?"
"Well you have to admit it's suspicious. The fashion reject is living the life he probably fantasized about since puberty, we both know that watching girls with girls is top of the male fantasy list." The only guys who had not at least mentioned it to her were the ones she had not dated long enough to discuss sex with. Even Angel had mentioned it, but he had never had the opportunity to do anything with her because of the... "Angel, I just realized something."
"That pro wrestling is faked?"
"No silly, that as an ascended being I can make your soul permanent."
"YOU'VE HAD THIS POWER FOR MONTHS AND JUST REALIZED IT!" The non-existent blood pressure problem would have killed a human at this point.
"Hey, the powers don't come with a manual, no one tells you anything it's really annoying." And really, how hard could it be to create an introductory video, 'You and your new powers, how to get the most out of being a higher being' seemed like a reasonable title, if a little long. Spielburg would be able to handle it, no problem at all. "I have to go upstairs and check with the PTB, and I'll be back."
The quarter millennia old vampire stared at the empty seat where his assistant had sat and thought about what he was being offered. He had not had sex since Buffy on 'the day that never happened' and for a being with the testosterone levels of a 20 something that was a long time. But having the soul secure meant so much more than that, it meant never again have to worry about accidentally becoming Angelus because he had a good time. Since having his soul restored it had been a constant background to his life, colouring everything he thought, felt and did. Suddenly the former Queen C was back.
"You forgot your clothes."
"I didn't want to waste time." The former cheerleader responded as she ripped his clothes off. Literally ripped, they were torn rags flung across the room as he was thrown to the floor. What was left of his rational mind hoped no potential clients walked in while they used the lobby floor this way. Then he was engulfed by a passionate Cordelia Chase, also celibate for some time, and thinking stopped.
The Hyperion Hotel, early evening.
"Damn, now that was an impressive performance." Charles Gunn announced. The couple who had occupied pride of place on the lobby floor all these hours had finally noticed the world around them, and gone off to shower and dress.
"We've done it for longer plenty of times, and with more variety." Fred responded. No handcuffs or even yoghurt and honey mix, how could anyone stand such bland sex?
"Yeah but ignoring us, two sets of clients AND three carloads of cops investigating noise complaints, that is impressive." Picking his way through the second set of broken furniture to litter the Hyperion ground floor during his stay here, the black man started the cleanup with the rags that were all that was left of his bosses clothing. He reminded himself not to get the former May Queen angry, tearing a leather jacket to rags like that took real strength.
"I wonder what the film from the lobby security cameras show, if they caught all the detail?" Fred mused, as she started leaning up the broken bits of furniture. She decided to change over the tapes herself immediately, there was a bank of them to capture a full days activity without wiping any of it, so putting new tapes into the system and keeping the 'action pictures' would be simple enough. She would arrange to have a talk with Cordelia about it later, some arrangement could be made, swapping the equivalent length of film of her and Charles should do it, after all she knew the camera's in their playroom captured every detail.
"I don't think the security cameras were designed with that in mind Fred." The former gang leader said. He loved her dearly but worried about her some times.
"Well we can always get them to let us film them. Hey, that's an idea, we can do swaps and film each other so I can see your handsome face coming when I'm not distracted." The scientist of the pair was excited, finally someone to work the equipment, at last a chance to play some really interesting games and not have her robotic film direction system miss anything or use those over artistic camera angles. She should not have seen so many European art movies before programming it, the thing thought it was Fellini or something. "Faith and the Slayerettes too, this could be fun."
Willow And Faith's room, a few weeks later.
Faith watched Jacob sleep, awed by the experience. His tiny little hands, so perfectly formed, curled up on the blanket. His little face, so peaceful now, so capable of keeping all of them up and going when awake, was peaceful and rested. She was a mother now, or at least a mom, the exact status was not going to worry her. Willow was asleep, having handled the two o'clock feedings and most of the daytime. Xander always fed him first thing in the morning, changing him if, as usual, he needed it. It was strange to see someone who blossomed under responsibility as much as the male slayerette, most people she had known, her parents and even Buffy, had resented being stuck with inescapable duties.
And here was the Sunnydale High graduate voted 'most likely to die in a gutter as a wino' that thrived on it. His basic lack of self respect still inhibited him in situations like combat, where he was surrounded by people with greater skills and abilities. But in a situation where he had to take charge, where his duty to act was clear and organising for someone else's benefit was needed he was transformed. He needed to be needed, and Jake needed him.
The dark slayer watched her son and wife sleep, still getting used to both situations. Xander had married Willow in a Catholic Church, the Rabbi having been influenced by her parents into not allowing a Jewish wedding, while the priest had blessed their holy water and weapons for seven years and was honoured to help. The Vatican's opinion of the whole situation, marrying a man and woman when the woman had married another woman in a Wicca ceremony, would probably be very negative, actually excommunication was the term used, but Father O'Brien felt that representing God on the Mouth of Hell itself meant providing whatever guidance and comfort he could. His theological speculations on the meaning of it all were heresy, apparently.
Most employers would have a problem with her tendency to arrive late for work because she had watched her child sleep, but Harvey, Norman and Bates is not any accounting firm. The chroniclers of the Karnak race had weighed in on her side, arguing that the opportunity to record the thoughts and feelings of the first slayer with her own family for thousands of years justified a relaxed attitude. Little convincing was need by them, given that the End of Days was clearly coming soon and having the champions of the side of light argue in their favour would make all the difference, when the darkness failed, as prophecy said it would. So Faith arrived at her office, in her white Volvo station wagon, sat at her desk with the photo's of her child, wife and family, and read the note to go to the manager, Mr Smith's office, as soon as she went in.
Mr Smith's office, 10.30am
"Faith, good morning here is your ticket and mission file." The boss said without preamble. He was treating her with Karnak politeness, not asking her to justify being late and assuming she was ready to do her duty without unnecessary buttering up. To assume someone has to be persuaded to do their sworn duty has led to duels among them. "You are to go to Kansas and meet the Great and Powerful Oz."
For a second the slayer did not know if she was being kidded, before she remembered where she was and who was talking to her. Images of herself dressed as Judy Garland, standing in a field holding a small dog and waiting for a tornado to transport her therefore faded quickly. Suspecting what she would find, she opened the file to find a photo of Oz, the werewolf/musician Willow had been in love with when Faith had first met her.
He was an important figure now, having done further research into controlling the wolf, and achieving a teachable control system. Any werewolf could learn, it did not require anything expensive or rare, just the development of a certain level of inner peace. As she sat in the back of the company car on the way to the airport, the ex-con contemplated the upcoming encounter. Oz had tried to kill the last woman he had found Willow involved with, Tara barely escaping with her life. He had left town not long after, clearly depressed by the loss of control involved but not actually having apologised to anyone for his actions.
"Well wolfboy, it looks like you have certainly come up in the world." she muttered to herself. Oz had gathered a huge amount of influence, having a semi-religious status among werewolves everywhere. Basically a Dali Lama type figure, he also seemed to be responsible for the shutting down of the werewolf pelt trade. The traders had been given a 'quit or die' warning, exactly once, and then been forcibly shut down. Very forcibly. Now he was a potential ally, in contact with Lex Luthor - actually originally discovered and contacted by Lex - and waiting for her in Smallville. Specifically waiting for her, Faith Wilkins Rosenburg, wife of Willow Rosenburg Wilkins, as his request for a meeting had described her. She sat back and thought, the nerves getting to her a little, then she started to sing. "I'm off to see the wizard, the wonderful wizard of Oz..."
****************
Lex Luthor's Castle, Smallville Kansas, early morning.
Lex Luthor was a man of many talents and interests. All right, so most of those talents were developed at the behest of, or in a vain attempt to win the approval of, his father Lionel, one of the most truly evil individuals on the planet. The older Luthor had never had any interest in his son except as his heir, and since his mothers death Lex had had only his fathers example to emulate, reject, or despise, at least until he met Clark Kent, the Dudley Doright of the orphaned alien set.
The younger Luthor had never had any interest in having his own family, had not hung out with anyone who had children or wanted them except for reasons like his father, i.e., because it was a necessary part of the image.
So when it turned out that Lex Luthor, boy billionaire, ruthless businessman, and instigator of the Wolfram and Hart Massacre, had an uncanny ability to get crying babies to sleep it was enough of a shock that Chloe Sullivan started a 'Wall of Weird' investigation. Martha and Jonathan Kent were stunned to see Jeff, their newly adopted 1 year old, go from tantrum to smiling angel in the corporate predators arms. Clark, on the other hand, felt vindicated. He had been convinced there was something good in the purple clad one. Now he had something to use as evidence.
Faith Wilkins, Certified Public Accountant and Vampire Slayer, was feeling way out of her depth over the whole situation. She was back in Smallville at the request of her boss, to meet and try to 'bring on board' Oz, her wife's former boyfriend.
The werewolf former boyfriend, who had responded to scenting Willow on her late girlfriend - though not dead at the time, being Sunnydale people had felt the need to clarify that to Faith - by trying to eat her alive in the halls of Sunnydale university. The former boyfriend who seemed to be some kind of werewolf Socrates, or maybe the Pope. Certainly the quiet little man had a world-wide army of werewolves that hung on his every utterance.
"Which is what's making me nervous, is it not?" The dark slayer commented to herself. She was lying next to Clark after the most energetic sex of her life. Getting the 'man of steel', as she labelled him due to his incredible sexual stamina, to come across with the goods had actually required some convincing. He was a Kansas farm boy, after all, excruciatingly naive about sex in the practical sense, and convinced he would get in serious trouble over this.
Eventually Oz had partially 'wolfed out', to demonstrate WHY they knew he was not human, that most of them were not either, and that Faith, as a slayer, really did need sex as a part of her health routine. 'Oh, like how everyone has to eat from the five basic food groups and exercise regularly', the small town lad had commented. He said it with such total honesty, -of COURSE everyone eats only what's good for them...-that she had mentioned it to Lex.
"Do you know what the really scary part is Faith?" He of the multiple Italian sports cars had commented, in bed the previous morning.
"No, what?" the woman wielding the feather boa and riding crop had responded.
"I don't doubt for a second that Clark actually means it. He really is principally concerned with your health, not getting laid or scarred of Chloe or Lana dumping him." Faith had listened to every word, while wondering what the maid would think of the Mango pulp smeared into the sheets.
It had taken work to get this far, but she was here now. And so was Clark. And Chloe. And Lana. Not all in the same bed, since even Lex did not have a bed big enough to sleep four comfortably as normal furnishings. Chloe had been the key, in the end, getting her to accept the 'Anyanka solution' had finally clinched the deal. Clark had been willing to help, but not in a mood for fun, until the dark slayer had given her the unpublishable scoop of the millennia.
Leaving out the little matter of Lex being responsible for the most famous 'terrorist attack' since 9/11 she had laid out, with Oz again as her demonstration model, the vampire/demon/vampire Slayer/alien invasion conspiracy/Genetically modified super soldier nightmare. That the Karnak Elders had offered her a position as the first human to join their team of chroniclers also helped, they needed an independent investigation into whatever links there might be between it all. Faith's explanation that the red headed school newspaper editor could HAVE Clark, and everything else she had barely dared fantasize about, if she was willing to just TAKE CHARGE, had been accepted out of desperation.
Chloe knew Clark, he wanted to do the right thing, would not let Faith's health deteriorate because Lex was going to Nigeria on business. And she had always wanted to know what it was about sex with women that got men so hot and bothered. She could have everything or nothing, Clark Kent, a high paid job investigating most of the conspiracies in existence, and Lana Lang as, when and however she wanted, or sleep alone for years regretting her own cowardice. She chose.
The Luthor dining room, breakfast that day.
A certain awkwardness might have crept in after the events of the night before, except for some important facts.
First, Faith was completely used to these sort of domestic arrangements, but not really much older, and her treating it as a comfortable routine helped.
Second Chloe was playing her part right, having been coached by Faith and never having been afraid to speak her mind anyway. That what Faith had assumed would be the toughest part, getting Lana Lang into bed with Chloe, had been the easiest, was the biggest surprise. Whitney, Lana's former boyfriend, had talked about a threesome, Ms Lang had suggested Chloe, and 'negotiations' between the two women were ongoing when Chloe had thought she had no hope with Clark. With the former football star in the Marines it had only taken some persuasion from
the slayer to make it happen.
"So, Clark, are you having fun this weekend?" The Alien had the biggest smile on his face Faith had seen since Xander's the night Anya had propositioned her for a similar ménage. It was a rhetorical question from the coffee shop partner, who had ridden him to climax twice the previous night.
"If you're having fun raise your hand, come on everyone a show of hands on who wants to make this a regular arrangement." Chloe asked, taking charge of events. Every hand went up but the Slayer, and all eyes went to her. "You're NOT having fun Faith, it didn't seem like that last night?"
"It was a double barrel question, and you should never answer those. Yes I had fun last night, no, I can't make this a permanent arrangement because I already have one in Sunnydale." A long phone call to her wife had not totally killed the homesickness. She missed the group. "I really miss them, and having a familiar home environment like this helps more than I can say."
Of her family, Willow was 'having fun', working on two different projects either of which could win someone the Nobel Prize, Buffy was having her regular 'can I fuck Xander to death?' weekend, this being the second weekend of the month, and Anya was attending a study workshop for Finance degree students. She couldn't go back to Sunnydale until coming to a conclusion about the werewolf alliance, which looked like taking another couple of weeks. At least the werewolf guru had a straightforward love life. He had female werewolves fighting over him. Literally. With most animals fighting over potential mates is what the males do while the female's sit back and watch the show. Werewolves are two human for that, and too animal to not have public violence over it.
"Still, he seems to be enjoying himself." She had explained it to Clark, he was fascinated with non-human intelligence and any resulting differences. For obvious reasons, if you thought about it, since he was a non-human intelligence, and he had no idea what was normal for his species. How much of Clark Kent was how his adoptive parents had raised him, how much was instinct, and how much his individual personality? He had no idea.
He knew what they were doing here was not typical or accepted among humans, but it felt right to him. Did that mean it was normal on whatever planet he was from, or was he just a horny 17 year old? Was he 17, he looked older than Faith, apparently, maybe his people had an extended childhood and he had actually been 10 or 15 when he found the Kent's overturned car, instead of the four years they had assumed? So many questions he had no answers to.
The slayer was startled out of her reverie by Lana sitting on her lap, then reaching around to kiss her deeply on the mouth. Clark was staring, and then sitting back as Faith realized why Chloe was not visible, she was under the table giving the eldest Kent's son what he she had not the previous night. She had asked the dark slayer to give a lesson on 'how to give the perfect blowjob', but been distracted by her female classmate before demonstrating if she had learned properly. Faith, who took teaching this sort of thing very seriously, moved off the chair so she could watch for technique.
"Are you giving marks out of 100?" The Lang girl asked.
"Yes."
"And what are you going to do if I get a fail, put me over your knees and spank me?" Chloe said, turning from her task for a moment.
"Only if you ask very nicely."
The Kent house, at the same time.
"We need your help." Oz stated. He was not alone, there was a small group with him, all very peaceful looking people if you were not aware they were werewolves. The Kent's had seen that, and were nervous, since the baby was here but they were alone with the lycanthropes otherwise.
"Who are we, exactly." The taller man responded.
"The population of this entire reality." The musician was still not used to explaining himself in this kind of detail, but one can hardly be a prophet and not communicate. "Normally we say, 'the world', but really it is the entire plane of reality that is endangered."
"We grow good apples but they're not that good." Jonathan responded. Delusions of grandeur were not in his makeup.
"Its about Lex, isn't it?" Martha said. It had to be about him or Clark, and they were already doing everything they could for their son. Since meeting the billionaire she had been coming to an understanding of why he kept hanging around.
"The wolf is dominant in him."
"He's a werewolf too, are you saying Lex is a werewolf?" Jonathan asked. Martha, the Metropolis University graduate, had described Oz as 'Oracular, at times' after meeting him before. Her husband just found it confusing.
"No. His father raised him to be a copy of himself, a predator. With the mother lost, the human side withered until Clark saved him." For Oz it was like pulling teeth. He had been wrestling the wolf for control for too long to really understand humans entirely, to understand how they were blind to the different sides of the personality. "You have noticed he refers to your son as 'my friend', NOT 'a friend of mine' or even 'one of my few friends'."
"What about Faith, they seem, friendly enough." Which was the polite way of phrasing it. It was a small town, purchases of riding crops, handcuffs and other assorted items by people with no standard use for it were noticed. Not to mention cleaning yoghurt/honey/smeared fruit off the
sheets, carpet, walls...
"Friendly, potentially a very good friend. But a woman with fighting a predatory side that makes Lionel Luthor look like Mother Teressa."
That stopped the conversation cold. For the Kent's there was no evil greater than Lionel Luthor. The idea that this woman, who wore clothes more expensive than Jonathan's truck, and drove a Volvo, was dangerous for some reason other than possible sexually transmitted diseases was stunning.
"She keeps crooked books or something, is that it?" It was the most dangerous thing they could imagine her doing.
"She was a professional assassin. She killed anyone her boss wanted, loves making people die." One of the werewolf assistants explained.
"How did she get a job as an accountant?" Jonathan was starting to see where this was headed. With associates like this it was amazing Lex was not a satanic priest, or a serial killer, or working for the Internal Revenue Service.
"She was in prison, because she surrendered herself. Her boss had been the Mayor of Sunnydale, and he destroyed the evidence of the murders. She did a few years for assault and studied accounting while she was there." The assistant added. "She is succeeding in her struggle with the wolf, but her ability to help Mr Luthor with his is fatally compromised by it."
Ok, even someone as cut off from popular psychological theory as Jonathan Kent could see where the problem was now. Lex could turn out to be worse than his father, if he wasn't given the right guidance. He was too old to be parented by them, but if he needed friends to show him right from wrong, they could manage that. They had never fought wolves before, but now seemed to be a time of new beginnings in many ways.
*******************
The Blue Light Bistro, 1.23am, Wednesday.
Rupert Giles was unused to being appreciated. Or at least to being appreciated in public places for what he actually regarded as his important work. Therefore sitting in a Sunnydale 'Cop Bar', having drinks bought for him by the Rapid Response Teams, was a pleasant shock. Having them bought for him by Lieutenant Vanessa Peters, a reasonably tall and certainly athletic blonde in her late thirties was an extremely pleasant shock.
It is a truism that 'Intelligence' services tend to explain where the bad guys were last week, not where they will be next week. Frustrating for all concerned, but still true. As the saying goes, 'prediction is always difficult, especially about the future', but Giles had prophecy to guide him, and had a track record of getting it right. This was new to the Sunnydale Police, however, partly because the Mayor had deliberately sabotaged any attempt to properly investigate the 'gangs on PCP' issue, and partly because human criminals do not work according to prophesy. Therefore when he had gotten them to stage raids based on books thousands of years old in dead languages they had expected the usual wild goose chase. Instead over the last eight months they had prevented the end of the world twice, and stopped major massacres and sacrifices so many times it was becoming a regular feature of life.
In short, they were actually doing the job they had signed up for, but been prevented from doing by the deliberately institutionalised incompetence of the Mayor Wilkins era. Lieutenant Peters was buying drinks for Giles, partly because she thought he was cute, and partly because he had just helped Red Team save seven schoolgirls from being the virgin sacrifices needed to open the Hellmouth. One of said girls being her 14 year old daughter Tracy, who she had afterwards publicly advised to start with Buffy's Sunnydale Street Survival classes, and privately told that, given the whole 'virgin sacrifice' phenomena, losing her virginity would improve her life expectancy, and mom would avoid asking awkward questions about who and when. The sight of one of Tracy's best friends spread-eagled on an alter with a demon about to rip her heart out with an obsidian knife kept returning, and the age of consent had become a death sentence in the cops mind, so it had to be ignored, for her daughter's sake.
"Jack, my ex husband, big guy, anyway he was real close to Mayor Wilkins bunch." Giles noticed how the rest of the patrons were giving the two of them space. It was boisterous crowd, mainly males who had deliberately chosen the most dangerous end of a dangerous profession. They were not choirboys, in fact they reminded the former librarian of his Ripper days, but they were letting their commander get drunk and try to pick him up without too much kidding. Which he took as an indication that if he allowed things to follow their natural course he would not be greeted with hostility for 'taking advantage' of her. "Asshole just kept covering up things, kept transferring anyone who asked questions to patrol duty on the nigh shift, the suicide shift. Me he had demoted and THEN transferred to night patrol."
"Yes, that is how we met, is it not?" Giles remembered all too well, it was the night of the big ambush that had started the Scooby gang's direct co-operation with the Police. He had mentioned it to distract her mind from his switching them both to non-alcoholic drinks. Even Ripper had had basic rules about who he slept with, one being to make sure she was in full possession of her faculties at the time, as Vanessa clearly was not with five bourbon and cokes in her system. "You were in one of the back up cars, were you not?"
"Got the bite marks to prove it too." Vampires had deliberately allowed the first car ambushed to call for help, then ambushed three carloads of backup. Giles first sight of the woman beside him had been of her sitting slumped against her car with vampire dust over her, two trickles of blood running down her neck, her service pistol and two spare magazines empty on the ground next to her. "Wilkins dusted the vamp and you helped me into the ambulance, as I vaguely recall."
Given how much blood she had lost that night, the fact that the Lieutenant remembered anything at all was impressive. She had been in shock, which is technically about loss of blood rather than a response to surprise, and stunned to have emptied three fifteen round magazines into something without any effect except to reveal it was a vampire. Still she had remembered enough to be a driving force in getting the RRT's reassigned to 'Monster Hunting'.
He also remembered the gleam in her eye when she had first used the new weapons and ammunition. The new shotguns made the standard issue Ithaca pump weapons look like bb guns, thirty rounds instead of five, Incendiary and Armour Piercing High Explosive -APHE- ammunition gutting the Lemor Demon like a trout. She had stood over its slowly burning corpse shouting 'Yes, Yes, Yes' and then turned to him and smiled.
The collapse of her marriage had started with her realization of her husband's responsibility for her demotion and transfer, but this was the real turning point. She pushed for an official investigation into the vampire and demon question, he turned out to have deliberately protected said night creatures as part of Mayoral policy. He had moved on to some other corrupt town and been shot as part of a 'criminal dispute'.
"Rupert Giles, do you want to go home to my place and fuck my brains out?"
"You have had rather a lot to drink, and I really don't want to..."
"Exploit poor, innocent little me?" She said, smiling. "Ripper, yes don't look so surprised, I did a little research on you, the last three drinks were plain coke. Dave cuts me off automatically after the first two, I arranged it, but it looks better with the guys if I order something stronger. This is still a mans world, in here anyway."
The point was proven when they got up and left, to whistles and catcalls from the rest of the crowd. In a testosterone fuelled environment like this keeping respect meant not breaking certain rules, unspoken but clearly understood. She had not done this before, her divorce being new, and certain double standards still applied in the eyes of some of her colleagues. Giles, as the official reason for the party, and a man she had obviously been developing an interest in for a while, was acceptable. Anything remotely resembling his younger charges arrangements would not have been. The feel of her hand sliding into his back pocket killed off his academic musing.
The Karnak Chronicles Repository, Virtual Reality version.
Working for the Karnak had convinced Chloe Sullivan of two things. First, that the difference between data and information is not fully appreciated, and second, that there is no substitute for an inquiring mind. Here she was, in a computer simulation like something out of a William Gibson novel, more like early twenty third century than early twenty first, at least to her small town experienced eyes. But it was all just data i.e. random facts, and had not been sifted through so
that it made sense, which is the definition of Information.
A simple case in point was that the ability of the Karnak to pass for humans indefinitely, and their historic employment as mercenaries, meant they had been present a certain crucial events in history, recorded what had happened, but then not interpreted that evidence since. It just sat here. The question of why Alexander the Great had burned down the Persian Capital a week after capturing it had been argued by historians for over two thousand three hundred years. Reasons of grand policy, some said. To induce fear, others argued. As revenge for Persian attacks on Greece, insisted a third.
The Karnak had been there, as supposed Greek mercenaries, with a commander or more in the command tent learning all the details. There was no clever, carefully thought out reason. Alexander and his group of commanders were all in there early twenties, had done something amazing, and proceeded to get falling down drunk. They stayed that way for the week after taking the city, and were all too plastered to stand when said a local prostitute said she had always hated the place and would like to see it burn. Alexander had ordered it done, and that was that. Neither then nor in the over two millennia afterward had any of the Karnak questioned it or commented on it. The many similar examples of great policy being made out of the bottom of a wine cup did not cause them to consider what it said about the fallibility of human decision-making.
"Or am I just being Chloe Sullivan, girl reporter again." She mused, sipping her coffee. The connection was in Lex and Lana's coffee shop/bookstore, and a constant supply of her favourite beverage was part of her employment contract. She knew that a rumour was spreading she had developed an addiction to internet porn, that she was here every day after school because of that but she did not care about irrelevant trivia.
And it was totally irrelevant to her duties why Big Al had done any of this, but she had heard of the debate and wanted to know the truth, it was just her nature. "No Chloe, this is important. You, who has yet to have her 17th birthday, were hired because you investigate where others don't, you connect facts together to make information where no one else sees a connection. You are being paid $100.00 an hour after tax by some very shrewd businessmen, don't assume it's just because of your pretty face."
Here primary duties were trying to make sense of the multiple weirdness that most investigators had rarely even heard of. There was the whole supernatural world, of course, Vampires, Demons, Werewolves, Bill Gates, and so on, that the Slayers in Sunnydale knew about. There was the Alien Invasion conspiracy that Mulder and Scully had been trying to deal with. Then the Genetically re-engineered Super Soldiers the former FBI agents had more recently discovered. There was the green meteor rocks and the strangeness caused by them, that she personally had been handling. Throw in Roswell, Area 51, the Kennedy assassination, and the popularity of rap music and there was more freaky stuff out there than you could reasonably count. The Karnak records covered all of it, and more, in minute detail.
What the Karnak wanted, desperately enough to pay a high school girl most people dismissed as a paranoid nutcase over $2000.00 a week for, was to make sense of it all in context. How did it all fit together, or did it all fit together at all? Did the Super Soldier thing really connect with Alien Invasion conspirators? Were they being run by the same people or by enemies, if by the same people were they, the mysterious Consortium, creating the SS to help with the invasion, or as an attempt to fight it?
"Fortunately Chloe, you don't have to come up with all the answers." She heard from behind her, it was Jane Smith, her immediate supervisor, or at least pay mistress. The way the Karnak had gotten away for so long with such totally unimaginative cover names was probably one more mystery to add to the pile, but she was stretched too thin as it was. "It is far more the directions your mind takes that ours never seem to that make you a worthwhile investment."
"You sound so much like Lex at times." She added, then thought that maybe Lionel Luthor was a better example of the mentality. But he was the enemy, better not mention him. "I am a 'worthwhile investment', am I."
"There is much talent being wasted in this world, and we look for it." The Karnak demon in human form explained, placing her Cappuccino down. The study booth Chloe used was private, like the ones the real internet porn addicts used. None of whom seemed to realize why when Lana took Chloe her coffee it sometimes took an hour for her to leave again. The loss of time was always made up for, carefully recorded as a break, the researcher was to honest to charge for time she was using for sex. Indeed 'Jane' had pointed out the possibility, as one advantage of working here rather than at some office location. "Our human employees are mainly from people your society has ignored or warehoused. Prisons, small towns, all sorts of places."
"Prisons and small towns, can you tell a difference?" The human of the two said.
"Principally in the rape and murder rates."
"That was a joke."
"In any case, I came here to give you your pay for this week, and congratulate you. Our researchers are finding your insights most useful, one of your three hour shifts creates enough intellectual ferment among them to increase their productivity many fold." The Karnak mainly paid her through direct deposit to her bank account, but Jane always came in person to talk and hand her overtime to her in cash. She was contracted for three hours a day Monday to Friday, any more constituted overtime. "$635.00 this week, after tax, $1500.00 direct to your account. We think you should really consider an offshore account with our bank in Jamaica, your direct deposits over the next year will be nearly $80,000 after all."
"For as long as it lasts." Chloe was dreading having the job end. Not so much for the money, but because she had unfettered access to one of the worlds greatest sources of information on things most intelligence agencies were starved for information on. She was on an eighteen-month contract, presumably they expected her to be finished by then. "I'll be sorry when my contract ends."
"You are not under the impression you will not be renewed, are you?" Jane seemed surprised, clearly the idea had not occurred to her.
"Why else an eighteen month contract? It ends on my 18th birthday, which may just be a co-incidence, or an attempt to avoid paying an adult rate or something."
"No, it is not for either of those reasons. The End of Days will occur on your 18th birthday, so all contracts will have to be re-negotiated after that date anyway." Jane said it as calmly as she would have a weather report. "Armageddon will actually start at 11.15 am that day, I hope we can have breakfast before hand if you have no other plans."
"Happy birthday to me." The human said, while thinking that at least she had cleared up why her contract ended when it did.
****************
Chloe Sullivans VR work booth
It is often not appreciated how alien human norms are to some other intelligent species. Some times the species themselves lose track of the fact that their ideas of proper behaviour are not those of humans, particularly if the human they are dealing with is a friend. Jane Smith, Karnak Demon, supervisor of Chloe Sullivan for the Karnak Chroniclers, was just now realizing she was guilty of such blindness. It all revolved around the title, Tar.
"Chloe, please try to understand these reports are written by my species, not yours." The girl was looking at a translation of her own file, which she had access to because it was policy that individuals check their files regularly to vet for inaccuracy. It was a report on her activities since meeting Faith from the accounting branch that was the problem. "We did not give you a full briefing on cultural differences for lack of time and because you were ..."
"A SLUT. That's what you called me, its what every report on me since I started working for you calls me." Ms Sullivan was ready to go get a chainsaw from Mathew's Hardware and start re-decorating the room with minced Karnak demon. "How could you, I work damn hard for you and, and ..."
"Chloe Sullivan, the nearest equivalent in Karnak to Slut is Tar, and it is a compliment. The full translation is 'she who is giver of the gifts of peace', and the term translated as 'dad' is Tark, more fully, 'he who accepts the gifts of peace, and their giver' and derives directly from it." Jane could see that the human girl was confused instead of angry, which was a good sign, given how long it had taken her to understand the human concepts that were equivalent. "You have taken responsibility for making a happy, cohesive mate group out of three people who had spent some time as romantic rivals. Lana Lang and yourself were competing for Clark Kent, while refusing
to admit to yourselves your attraction to women. Such rivalries and denials routinely lead to murder, or suicide, or both, in our two species."
Jane was not a sociologist, she was a Chronicler, with a degree in Information Systems. She really wanted to get on to the important work they were doing, but this had to be cleared up. Explaining really required an understanding of how Karnak culture had resulted from millennia where there only economic activity was war, and therefore where every generation of males had 'post traumatic stress syndrome.' Building happy, or at least comfortable and functional, communities out of such materials was the role of the Tar. After explaining a little of this, and giving the example of Xander Harris, a Tark who was instrumental in piecing together an even more emotionally damaged group in Sunnydale, the demon was finally able to start the work she had hoped to cover this day.
"You have an interesting insight into the arrival of the evil one, I am told." Which was a masterpiece of understatement, it was a revelation that gave hope for victory where there had only been prophecy. Not that the Karnak did not believe in the prophecy of victory in the battle of Armageddon, but having a logical explanation of how it could happen was a comfort.
"It has to do with the police involvement in slaying, which began in Sunnydale last year, the Super Soldiers, and Xander Harris." Preliminary findings had been sent to the main library, which had sent Jane for more information. Chloe was a student newspaper editor, not an experienced writer of policy analysis documents, which is what was required. "Demon numbers had been kept under control since the expulsion of 'the old ones' by the slayer, working alone, armed mainly with just a sharp stick. The ever expanding police combat role is reducing the numbers of demons and vampires on the planet as a whole,"
As a demon herself Jane might have taken this triumphal attitude to demon killing badly, but she saw where it was going. The statistical facts had been there, but its relevance to the End of Days had not registered. Which was one-reason humans like Ms Sullivan and, to a lesser extent, Xander Harris were brought in or allowed in. That monkey curiosity at work again, sometimes she just had to sit back and admire it.
"But the movement of demons and vampires to the hellmouth is unstoppable, it draws us to it, even I can feel the desire to go and replace those demons killed there." She was not an EVIL demon, the Karnak had never killed for fun, simply from economic necessity. But as demons died under the guns of the Colour Teams, as they were starting to be called, more always replaced them. "In fact major fighting has broken out in many cities and towns used by dark ones in transit."
"Exactly." The teenager said excitedly. The realization she had had was the most exciting thing that had happened to her since being told the devil would appear just before lunch on her birthday. Which was exciting in an all too dark way. "The demon army that the first evil is expecting to have is dying in a hundred battles in a hundred places, instead of all having to be all killed at once. There is a technical term for it, I looked it up in a dictionary of military terms."
"What is it?"
The Magic Box, upstairs study area
"Defeat in detail." Xander Harris said. His soldier memories were no longer what he automatically assumed was responsible for understanding concepts like that. Knowing that he was a lost result of a genetic engineering project to make the ideal soldier had changed a lot of his assumptions about himself. Willow was feeding Jake, while Faith make faces at the boy. He would explain himself to them again tonight, refusing to consider interrupting their family time. "If you have 10,000 men, and your enemy 100,000, in a head on fight you will lose."
Giles had not studied military history or concepts as such, but he understood the general idea. Vanessa had a police rather than military background but commanding the RRT's was a very practical education in organized violence. The rest of the Scoobies had never really been much for team activities, even slaying was something they did as a group rather than an organized teams with 'a place for everyone, and everyone in his/her place.' So all listened, not all seeing where it was going. Anya was holding Buffy around the waist, holding her close while admiring her boyfriend and, to be honest, listening carefully to every wore he said.
"But, if instead you divide them and fight them over a period of time in groups of, say, 5,000, you have them outnumbered two to one in each battle instead of being outnumbered yourself by ten to one in one big clusterfuck." The sound of massed shotguns punctuated the night, Yellow team was patrolling this part of town tonight, and they were handling another bunch of something evil even now. The RRT's commander was absolutely focused on the briefing, hard for Giles to recognize as the imaginative lover of his nights or the concerned mother she also was. A human has many faces, he reminded himself, and if you see only one you miss the whole person.
"And because Sunnydale police publicized what was happening, at least among the SWAT community, the new weapons and tactics are in use across the country, around the world. Police departments faced with demons on the move kill them instead of being eaten by them."
The Karnak had not anticipated the incredible demand for re-equipping and retraining that had resulted, but, had managed to deal with it. Production lines were running three shifts, but the ammunition which was the really critical part was under Karnak control, and they simply licensed production worldwide to meet worldwide demand.
One demonstration of demon hunting with an RRT made a convert of most small town sheriffs and foreign police chiefs, and the prices being asked for the complete shotguns, special ammunition and re-training package were very low. With the end of the world coming the Karnak Consortium felt losing money on the whole was acceptable. Certainly more acceptable than being tortured for all eternity like the humans would be, which was the alternative. Having a notable part to play in saving the human race from that fate would be a PR bonanza too, of course. Always good for business.
Chloe Sullivan's VR work booth
"Mr Harris and the Super Soldiers?" Jane asked.
"A major reason they are dangerous is because they lack certain personality traits. They are just inhuman killing machines."
"They have no honour." The demons responded, unconsciously reminding Chloe of her in VR conversations with Xander. He said the Karnak in true form reminded him of Mr Spoke as a Wookie. Chloe disagreed, they reminded her of Mr Spoke as a Klingon, at least the honour-obsessed part of them did. Though, of course, they had the table manners of Vulcans rather than Klingons, who had the table manners of some of the bikers her cousin had dated. Not to mention the same ratty beards, heavy drinking, and love of violence...Ok, maybe Xander was right.
"Definitely not people who can be trusted with the sort of power they have. And since this nation, and maybe more, has had water additives added to make the entire population readily converted to SS it means we can get to the SS through the water supply." The teenage girl added. The look on her supervisor's face made clear she had lost the demon. Where, it seemed fairly obvious to the school girl.
"Water additives, no one mentioned water additives, you mean I have been drinking something intended to make me into one of them?" The demon had shifted from human look to true form, simply from agitation. Which was extreme, since the Karnak had thousands of years experience in keeping up the mask under trying circumstances.
"Relax, look, from your own testing the stuff is harmless to non-humans, and waits passively in humans until activated." Once more a human sat in the chair opposite Mr Sullivans little girl. "The point is Xander was an attempt to make a dutiful, honourable soldier with a grasp of logistics. Your Sunnydale office has obtained samples from him and passed them along to some of the labs creating new versions of the Super soldiers, where Lex has 'persuaded' the researchers to add the traits to all new and existing soldiers."
"Through the water supply. You intend to add something to the water supply that the Super soldiers will automatically take up in their DNA, making them responsible citizens, an army of invincible Xander Harris wanna be's." Jane said.
"Well, Lex is actually handling the details, but yes, that is how the system was set up by the genetic labs in the first place. Everyone is guaranteed to be reached that way, and only someone who is already an SS will be affected. In six months the whole Genetic Super Soldier problem will be reduced to a new human sub species, unkillable boy scout types."
"Which handles our major problems, doesn't it. The End of Days and the Super Soldiers." The demon responded
"Well, there is the small matter of the Alien Invasion to consider. And, of course, eminem."
"I think the Elders may have their own solution to the Aliens, anyway."
*****************
The desk of Xander Harris's personal assistant, 4.35pm
One of the things that Xander Harris enjoyed about his life, because these days there were many things about it to enjoy, was being the member of the Harris clan people envied. It was not that he bragged particularly, he knew he was a success in his own terms and felt no need to justify it to anyone. But the fact was that he had money earned from his own efforts, the ability to make more if some disaster resulted in poverty, and, to put the most important fact last, and a happy home life. For a man with as miserable an upbringing as the Zeppo, this was the most important achievement of all.
"Mr Harris, your wife on line 3." As the owner of his own, rapidly expanding renovation and construction business the only employed Harris had an assistant, Sally Ride, to, among other things, screen his calls. At first she had thought all the women calling for him personally meant he was cheating on his wife, or just sleeping with anything female.
Then she met them, and the real weirdness started. Willow Rosenburg was known to Sally, but not in the biblical sense. It was a point of pride with her that she was one of the few people she knew who had turned down the red head in her self-destructive phase. Not that she had anything in particular against gay women, being an out lesbian, but she had a great deal against helping someone commit slow suicide. So the first of the women in the boss's life was a pleasant surprise. The phone rang again.
"Mr Harris, its your wife's wife on line 4, shall I link the calls?" With Willow, Faith and Xander all speaking she went back to the presentation she was working on. It was part of a re-development proposal for the Wolfram and Hart building site. Not for the whole building, White Knight Construction was not that big yet, but as a sub-contractor. Still, it was a lot of money, and she was to give the presentation of their proposal. It was a big opportunity, and she was determined to get it right.
She answered several calls about matters that she had the power to deal with herself, it was part of the 'grow our own managers' policy and she was studying for a finance degree part time. Then there was another call. "Mr Harris, your girlfriend on line 2."
Back to the presentation, she had to practice and decide what order to put things in. Some people recommended summarizing first, and then giving details, others the reverse. Her previous experience made her favour the summarize first school, with sub summaries at the start of each new phase of the presentation. The phone rang again. "Mr Harris, your girlfriends girlfriend on line1."
With Buffy now part of the conversation she went back to her work. An important issue was how to explain the nature of the 'blessing the ground' ceremony that had been requested, as part of the bid. Because of the companies close links with the Karnak, and their public status as 'good demons' the Los Angeles Mayors office had requested a Karnak religious ceremony be included in Xanders bid. Politically correct of them, but given that the Karnak worship a fertility goddess, and the highest sacrament is the female orgasm, likely to be more of a spectacle than was perhaps intended. The door opened and a teenage girl with black hair walked in.
"Can I see Xander?" The schoolgirl asked. Sally had never seen her before.
"Do you have an appointment?" The assistant knew full well there was no one due in this afternoon.
"No, but tell him Dawn is here and it's important." She knew who Dawn was, she had simply never met the girl in person. The TV was on in the background, tuned to a finance cable channel, for any visitors to watch. A news bulletin broke in, scenes of troops fighting demons in Tehran, mainly AK47's and RPG's, but if you blow the head off completely most things will die, as the Karnak had advised the Iranian government when the fighting broke out initially.
Interestingly the demon attacks had improved relations with the United States greatly. Having publicly referred to the USA as 'The Great Satan' since 1979 it was a habit, but facing real minions of the actual Great Satan put the horrors of the degenerate West into perspective. There was even talk of removing the 'DEATH TO AMERICA' slogans tiled into the lobby wall of some expensive tourist hotels in metre high letters, but the Ayatollah's thought that was going too far. Still, 'a journey of a thousand miles begins with a single step', and all that.
"Dawn what is it?" The boss asked, leaning out the door of his office. How had he noticed she was out here while talking to four women at the same time? It wasn't like you could see her from inside, it was an old fashioned office with actual individual offices instead of cubicles, the White Knight preferred that and always suggested it to clients. "Lets go into my office and talk."
"Actually it concerns Sally more than you." Suddenly shy now, Xanders - what? What precisely is the term for someone's girlfriends girlfriend's sister, who is actually the human embodiment of an interdimensional key, and created from a slayer who was therefore both sister and mother, when the girlfriend is also the mans wife's casual lover and the wife's wife's lover? - Xanders whatever the term was was looking nervous but determined, also red in the face. "Sally, I need to take up your offer of, a, help."
Sally might have been surprised if Mr Harris had not sounded her out about this a month ago. She had been kept informed of the family situation and its complexity, personal assistants often are as part of keeping the boss's schedule, sending birthday presents and such things. He might not have gone into too many details, but she had met the various alternatives, i.e. the other women in his life, and understood the problems. For a girl diagnosed to have 'deprived slayer syndrome' i.e. one with an increasing hormone imbalance due to a lack of sex, all had big disadvantages.
Buffy, Dawns 'sister', was protective to a point of keeping her a virgin, which was slowly killing her the way it killed several thousand years of Watchers Council raised slayers before her. Anya was a demon, whose idea of subtle seduction was to announce in public 'let go back to my place for sex.' Willow and Faith had both had far too much experience of the wrong kind, and would never clash with Buffy to the needed degree anyway.
That left Dana Scully, who had responded to the request for 'practical instruction', as opposed to what happened in school sex ed classes, by explaining that Dawn was under age in California. Given the health related nature of the request she was willing to teach everything she knew to the schoolgirl anyway, 'but someone closer to your age might work out better'. After seeing the scars left on Mulder by 'the great S& M weekend' the idea of being taught 'everything Scully knows about sex' was more than a little intimidating anyway. Actually mind numbing fear was closer to the mark, the red headed former FBI agent had done things that Anyanka dismissed as too kinky, and failed to understand anyone's problem with it. The geese...
"Mr Harris, it will take me another hour to finish this, or I can go now and handle it tomorrow." Which was the best way Sally had thought of, with a month to plan for this moment, to get a go/nogo without subjecting anyone to too much embarrassment if Xander or Dawn chickened out at the last minute. She looked at her boss, who had the look of a man sending someone on a suicide mission, and 'the key', who was determined, scared, and very obviously horny as hell. After a moments silence, she picked up the 'tool bag' Scully had left at the office for exactly this use, took the other woman's hand, and left for home.
The owner of the business watched them leave, then turned to the TV mounted in corner of the ceiling, and cleared his mind. The world news was ending, finishing with shots of blue and purple demon corpses lined up for the cameras in Peru. It was some small town that demons on the way to the hellmouth had converged on for some mystically inspired reason, not actually attacking, just moving through. But an army patrol had also been passing through, so the first evil's potential army got smaller, again.
"Buffy's going to kill me." He muttered.
Willow and Faith's bedroom, that night.
"Buffy won't really kill him, you know, it's just talk." Willow commented, quietly to her beloved cradled in the bed next to her. Xander had been asked where Dawn was, by the blonde slayer, and had told them. Which was either very gutsy or very stupid of him, depending on how you looked at it. The Zeppo being who he was, he simply refused to feel any guilt about taking a necessary decision, regardless of how unpopular. Dawn needed what she needed, they had several doctors' confirmation of the hormone imbalance to prove it, and as far as he was concerned that ended the matter. "It's so Xander. You know about the bloodstone vengeance spell, don't you?"
"No, well not anything about toyboy being involved no." Faith thought back, through the post sex tranquillity, to what she had heard of the very early days of the slayerettes. Something about Amy's mother, who was a very powerful witch, zapping Buffy as part of a scheme to take over Amy's body and relive her glory days as a cheerleader. "What did he do?"
"When Giles explained that the spell would kill Buffy in an hour or so, but that cutting the witches head off would end the spell..."
"Xanman offered to go get the axe and do it himself." The dark slayer interrupted. Jake was sleeping in the cot next to her, tucked in with his bunny rabbit bedcover. The level of love and comfort she felt here was hard to explain, she sometimes tried but words failed her.
"Basically." Willow was years over her crush on the construction manager, but her fondness for him remained. She wouldn't have married him in a Catholic Church, and allowed him to be Jake's dad and Faith's sex toy, without liking and respecting him. Still, after the revelations of the past few months, her oldest friend was undergoing constant re-evaluation by her. He was not just funny Xander, who always protected her or at least tried to. He was 'nearly unkillable genetically enhanced Xander, with added staff officer skills', a manufactured product. All she could really think was how glad she was that the rest of the Super Soldiers from the same assembly line were being re-made in his mental image. She slept better at night, knowing it
Anya, Buffy and Xander's bedroom, also that night.
Anya was thankful for the restraints tying her to the four-poster bed, because otherwise each of Xanders thrusts might have smacked her head into the wall. As a demon she would have had no problem with either the pain or the blows to the head, but the wall was freshly repaired from the last time her boyfriend had been angry with the elder Summers, and for some reason he always got embarrassed when she explained what had happened. She enjoyed his extra energy at such times, her lover always got his anger out through the workout, and Buffy missed out on some sensational sex, a point the vengeance demon always made to the slayer the day after.
Buffy had yelled at him and demanded to know Sally's address so she could go over there and 'rescue' Dawn. Rational argument got the new dad nothing, the slayer was determined to protect her sister. That such protection was counter to medical needs, that Buffy had slept with Angel while younger than her sister now was, and Ms Ride was a nice woman only two years older who would show her how to meet other nice girls, - and even guys, Sally thought threesomes a marvellous way to sleep with cute women - for some reason only enraged her. She was sulking in the other bed now, refusing to join in. Crazy bitch, Anya thought. Then thought became impossible, and she just enjoyed the pounding.
Casa Summers breakfast table, the next morning.
Dawn Summers had been retuned home in time to change and go to school. She seemed to be floating on air, with a calm and relaxed smile on her face. She had not whined or complained about anything, despite Buffy burning her toast and generally being obnoxious. Clearly here was an example of a non-deprived slayer.
"So Dawn, I take it you enjoyed yourself." Anya commented. She felt proud of her restraint, she had looked at Buffy and said 'Nyah, told you so didn't we.' Xander was holding Jake, carefully holding his head up while showing him around the room absentmindedly. It always seemed to improve the babies mood, or maybe it was just being held by the man himself.
"Mmm, oh, yeah, I learned why Buffy was always buying cucumbers but there was never any in the salad and that strap on thing..."
"WAY TOO MUCH INFORMATION DAWN. I'm glad Sally can help, but if you want to discuss the details do it without me or your sister in the room." He just didn't want to think about Dawn that way, and Buffy really was pissed at him. If looks could kill he would have been on his way to the morgue the previous night. Now the blonde slayer was embarrassed as well as angry, not a good combination. Faith and Willow had barely noticed the problem, being wrapped up in each other.
By the end of the meal Buffy was in a better mood. It was best to let things go quietly, in situations where the elder slayer knew she was in the wrong. If confronted her natural stubbornness just made her refuse to admit mistakes. Dawn was as blissed out as it was possible to be without chemical enhancement, proof Xanders decision had been right. If no one mentioned it, Buffy would quietly accept that, if confronted she would deny forever. The morning news showed a lull in the fighting, with congress debating the whole problem of the legal status of demons. Sunnydale itself had been comparatively quiet, with few demons left in the town and those on the way being actively targeted by FBI and state police units across the country.
It was fourteen months to Armageddon.
END