Together We Stand Divided We Fall

Chapter 12

Xander walk through the cemetery looking for Spike. He knew that the vampire wouldn’t be home but he may be close by. “Spike…Spike where are you?” he yelled as he looked for him.

“Do you want to get killed boy?” Spike called as he walked up to the young man. “What’s wrong? Is it Buffy?” Spike started running to Xander.

“No she’s fine but she wants you back to the house right now. Something is going down…Spike, it’s Lindsey. He was the one behind the zombie. Now we think he’s going to make another one. The only problem is we don’t know where.” Xander filled the vampire in as they ran back to the house.

“He’ll need a large place to do the ritual and the Initiative is shut down. Where else is there…” Spike thought aloud.

Xander stopped running and looked in the opposite direction. “Spike, what about the mansion…Angel’s old mansion. That would be big enough wouldn’t it?” Xander asked.

“Xander, you may be right and if you are then we are in deep shit. We need the slayers and I hate to say it but we need Angel.” he said grabbing Xander’s arm and running to the house.”

***
Anya ran in to Giles’s house. “Giles?” she called for him. “Okay so the Magic Box…screw that I’ll call him.” Using the cell phone that Xander made her take.

“Magic Box.” Giles answered the phone.

“Giles you need to get to Buffy’s right away. We think we know who is behind this. Giles we need you now.” Anya told him.

“Anya who is it…who is behind this?” he asked as he gathered his things together.

“Lindsey. He was the one that took Faith and now he may be making another one. We think he is working in a large building somewhere in Sunnydale but we don’t know where,” she told the watcher as she gathered some things from Giles’s house. “Look Giles, I’m taking some books on zombies and all of your maps. We can use the maps to locate him then find the fastest route. Okay I’ll see you back at Buffy’s. Don’t take too long we need to get this thing working right away.” Without saying good-bye, she hung the phone up and put all the books and maps into a bag she found in his living room. ‘I bet Giles has a big enough bag that I can take his weapons.’ She started to look around and found one in his office. She filled it with as many weapons as it will hold and takes it to her car.

Giles stood looking at the phone for a second. Then he ran to his car packed out back. ‘Anya really is coming into her own this time,’ he thought to himself. ‘Blast weapons.’ He pulls his car to the back door and starts to fill the trunk with all the weapons from the training room.

‘Okay I need to get back to headquarters but we all could do with some food.’ She made her way to the Food-Mart. From the far sidewalk she could see Tara’s car and knew that one of them were there. As she walked closer, she could see that there was someone fighting with what she could make out to be Faith. She ran to see who it was as she came closer she could see that it was Joyce.

****

“So, Faith, you are protecting my girls now?” Joyce said. “I thought a Slayer wouldn’t need protection. Especially a one-armed murderess like yourself.” Her last words were barely out of her mouth before she lashed out, slapping hard against the side of Faith’s head. The dark slayer staggered away, dazed momentarily. Joyce turned to Dawn, who was still crumpled against the side of the car. Tears streamed down the teen’s face as she stared at what was once her mother.

“Mom,” Dawn began, “what...how...why?” She could do no more than whimper as Joyce stepped closer.

“You don’t deserve happiness, Dawn. You weren’t there when I died. Your worthless sister at least tried to help me. But not you, I looked down on you as my body died and I saw you laughing and smiling.” Joyce sneered as she walked closer, a hand coming out to grab Dawn.

“Stop it Mom!” cried Buffy. “She was at school, how could she know you died until someone told her? You weren’t looking long enough if you didn’t see me tell her!” Buffy kicked her former mother in the chest, sending her tumbling back. She knelt beside Dawn and wrapped her arms around her sister. “Don’t listen to her. That’s not Mom. She would never think that about you, about us!” But Dawn kept sobbing, lost in her hurt.

The thing with Joyce’s face laughed. “That’s right, Dawnie. Feel the pain of knowing my last mortal thoughts was anger at you for being happy!” She advanced towards the sisters against the car again. The zombie turned its head when a hand smashed down on its shoulder. Faith looked like an ancient Valkyrie must have looked, vengeful and full of wrath. “You shut your mouth, cunt. You’ll never hurt my Dawn. I’ll destroy you for the pain you’ve caused her. And hell, the one arm thing, it’ll be back to good soon. So let’s go.” She followed that with a twist, throwing the animated corpse into the middle of the lot.

****

Using her cell phone again, Anya called the last number dialed but Giles had already left. So she called the house. “Tara, get Willow. There’s trouble.” Tara ran with the phone to the other witch.

“Anya, what is it?” Willow asked when the phone was handed to her.

“Faith is fighting a zombie at the Food-Mart. I don’t see Buffy or Dawn but Faith needs help,” She said as she ran to the fighting slayer. “You have to help Faith…Willow the zombie is Joyce we have to do something!” she cried to Willow, as she got even closer to the fight. “Willow I see Dawn and there’s Buffy…I’m going to help them. Find a way to help us,” she told Willow. She turned off the cell phone and ran headlong into the fold.

***

Willow ran to the living room. “The girls are in trouble. Anya said Faith is fighting a zombie…” She shook her head. “Tara, call Xander, tell him to get down to the Food-Mart Tara, Amie let’s go. We don’t have much time.

As they ran out of the house Angel and the L.A. group were walking up to the house. “Come on we need to get to the Food-Mart. Faith is fighting a zombie.” She told them while running pass them.

Angel did an about-face and ran after them. “Hey, want to tell me what’s going on?”

“Anya called. Faith is fighting a zombie. She said that Buffy and Dawn are there but then she had to go help. Angel, she said the zombie is Joyce,” she told the vampire as they all piled into Angel’s car.

Willow gave a small gasp when Angel faced her at the mention of the slayer’s mother. He was in game face and ready to fight. For most people the sight of Angel in vampire face would scare them to death, but for Willow the sight gave her great hope that everything would be just fine. Her biggest fear right now was Dawn and Buffy, it was going to be so hard for them watching Faith kill Joyce. She knew that Joyce was dead and now a zombie but to see your friend kill your mother, that had to mess with your mind on some level.

The car came to a screaming halt as they made their way into the parking lot. Amie was the first one out of the car. She ran over and stood in front of the two sisters. She turned and waved her hand in the air saying a word in Latin and Joyce was thrown away from Faith. “Faith, stop! Let me handle this!” she called to the dark slayer. “Faith, you can’t end her!” Amie told her as she waved her hand once again, but this time it was Faith that went through the air.

Landing on her ass, Faith yelled at the witch, “What are you doing…are you crazed?” She moved to get up but Willow kept her down. “Red, you best let me go…for fuck sake, your girl is going to get killed.”

“Shut up Faith for once in your life…SHUT THE FUCK UP!” Willow yelled back at her.
She knew that none of the Scoobies could be the one to kill this zombie. She just hoped that Amie was new enough that the two sisters would forgive her.

Amie turned back to Joyce bringing both hands up to her chest she started to chant. Bring fortãreaþã th wind bring fortãreaþã art.hot. apã bring fortãreaþã art.hot. pãmînt bring fortãreaþã art.hot. foc. I chemare upon tu la spre a face meu bidding. Mamã goddess a lua this evil de aici. Pentru acum ºi de-a pururi. A fi mers. So motel it a fi!

Joyce fell to her knees with a blood curdling scream. She brought her hand to her head and then fell flat on the pavement face first. All movement stopped as every one watched, waiting for what was to come next.

Amie was the only one to move as she raised her hands above her head again chanted. Remove tot wicked beings din aceasta place ºi timp! Joyce then smoldered into dust.

Faith crawled back to Dawn, who was now on her knees crying. The dark slayer took her lover into her arms and let her cry. As Dawn sat in her arms, Faith looked to see how Buffy was. The blonde slayer was also on her knees, crying and sobbing.

Another car came to a screaming halt. It was Giles. The watcher and Tara were at Buffy’s side with in seconds. “Faith, you need to help me kill a human. Oh god, I so want to kill him!” Buffy cried into Tara’s shoulder.

“Don’t worry B, he’s good as dead!” Turning Dawn’s face up she looked deep into her eyes. “I promise love, as soon as we find him,” she told her young lover.

“How are you going to kill this prick? You only have one good arm,” Anya asked, forgetting the fact that Faith had been fighting the zombie by herself.

“Me? What about you...you’re knocked up and were ready to fight. We do what we have to,” Faith told her.

Xander and the vampire ran up to the group with their information. “Giles, we think we know where he is. Spike and I were talking and we came up with the mansion…Angel’s old mansion. That would be large enough, right?” he asked the watcher.

“Of course…why didn’t I think of that?” he said his trademark line and turned to the other Scoobies and L.A. gang. “Okay, we will need to spit up and go at him from three sides. He may already know he has lost his zombie.”

“No, this is our fight now. We have to finish this. Dawn, Faith, and myself,” Buffy told the watcher.

“Buffy you can’t do this alone…let us come with you!” Willow said.

“No, she’s right,” Amie, said. “She has to finish it. Only we will be there to back you up.”

“Hey B, I would do as she says,” Faith said, rubbing her ass.

“Then we go. We don’t sit around making plans; we do this now.” The blonde slayer turned to her family. “We need weapons.”

Giles smiled and walked to his car. “Never leave home without them.”

“I second that!” Anya pointed to her car. “Never leave Giles’ without them...I took all I could!” She smiled at the watcher.

“And we stocked up before leaving L.A.” Gunn chimed in.

After gathering the weapons, the Scoobies and L.A. group walked to the mansion. Both vampires in vamp face. Both slayers were ready to fight. The rest of the now great family walked on like a troop going to war. They were out for blood and they would not stop until the last of it fell!