Sunnydale? You’re Welcome To It!

Part Three: Arrivals.

‘Poppy! Poppy! Get away from there!’ Helen stopped jogging along the dirt track which wound through the woodlands on the outskirts of Sunnydale. She jogged in place for a few moments then leaned over with her hands on her thighs, taking a few deep breaths, letting her heart-beat slow. Helen stood up, wiping the sweat from her forehead and upper lip with the back of her hand. ‘Damn dog!’ she gasped, trotting over to the thick clump of shoulder-high bushes beside the track where Poppy the wire-haired fox terrier snud and and whined excitedly.

As Helen approached she could see Poppy was tugging at something in the undergrowth, growling slightly. ‘Poppy, leave it!’ she called sharply, walking onto the grass verge where the dog was pawing frantically at something. *Not another dead squirrel!* she thought. *Damn dog’ll need another bath by the time we get home!* She reached down, grabbing Poppy’s blue leather collar. She could feel the little dog trembling all over. Poppy jumped up against his owner’s leg leaving dirty brown streaks on her grey track pants then dove back into the bushes.

Helen reached down to clear away a handful of the twiggy branches at ground level. Poppy was pulling at a white object but stepped back as Helen leaned forward, wagging his small tail stiffly and looking expectantly at his owner. The white object was a running shoe with a blue v-shaped stripe along the side. The laces were still tied. Helen stood up and touched the shoe with her own runner. It felt heavy and wouldn’t budge. She leaned forward over the top of the bushes, parting the dense top branches.

The face that stared up at Helen was sickly white, its glassy blue eyes sunken and gummy. The corpse lay on one side, its back bent so that the head and hips almost touched. One leg stuck out through the bushes, the other bent backwards towards the head. Dried blood, thick and still glistening in places, covered the front of telloellow tee-shirt the dead girl wore and plastered her blonde hair across her torn throat. Drops of blood reached as far as the knees of her faded blue jeans.

Helen staggered back, tripping over Poppy and started to scream.

*****

The Medical Examiner pulled back the white sheet, allowing Detective Sergeant Robert Orme to view the corpse beneath. Orme had been called back into work early from his annual leave to investigate a spate of unusual murders over the past few days and was not in a very congenial mood.

‘You say the cause of death is the same as the other one brought in at the same time?’ Orme nodded over his shoulder towards another stainless steel table on which a similarly covered body lay.

Gene Williams, Sunnydale’s overworked M.E., confirmed this was so. ‘Both men were drained of approximately a third of their blood volume then suffered a fatal fracture of the fifth cervical vertebrae which was the actual cause of death.’

‘They’re both pretty hefty guys,’ Orme said. ‘It’d take quite a bit to overpower either of them sufficiently to cut their throats and break their necks. Any signs that it may have been multiple assailants?’

Williams hesitated. ‘First of all, the throat wasn’t cut. There were a couple of ragged punctures along the jugular of each victim. It looks like something sharp was repeatedly jabbed into the neck.’ He paused again. ‘Then there are the bite marks.’ Williams took hold of the buzz-cut head of the nearest corpse, turning the slack face towards Orme to expose the imprints of a full upper and lower set of human teeth around the site of the wounds. ‘The position of the bruises on the neck and the type of neck fracture, it seems the attacker stood behind the victim while the blood was drained, then twisted the jaw to the right until the vertebrae snapped. There are no other bruises or abrasions to indicate a struggle.’

‘Hard to imagine these two staying still for that.’ Orme moved over for a closer look at the second body. Both were big men, tattooed, with short-cropped hair and long untrimmed beards. Indentations on the bridge of the nose, ears and lips of one of the corpses indicated multiple body piercings. The jewellery and clothes they’d been found in had been sent off to the Forensic lab for analysis. ‘Is it possible they were kneeling or already on the ground when it happened?’

‘The blood spray on their clothes indicates they were upright while the blood was drained,’ Williams said. ‘Whoever killed them also had to lift the bodies at least shoulder high to hoist them into the dumpster where they were found this morning.’

Orme checked his notebook ‘This was in the alley out back of a deserted brickworks on the north side of town?’ Williams nodded, Orme continued. ‘The last place both men were seen was at The Cage, a biker’s bar outside of town a couple of miles from the brickworks. Anything else I should know?’

‘The taller guy had his boots removed. Apparently they were brand new. We haven’t found them yet. Or either of the motorcycles.’

‘Anything missing from the other victims?’

‘Yes. The teenage girl, the one killed a couple of nights ago on the way home from a study date,’ Williams said. ‘Her school uniform’s missing.’

‘Was she attending Sunnydale High? I didn’t think they had a uniform.’

‘No, one of the private schools.’

The double doors leading into the examination room swung open. Orme’s partner, Detective Lester, stuck his head through. ‘Sarge, you’d better finish up here. They’ve just found another one.’

*****

Detectives Orme and Lester arrived in time to see the body being cut down. The local ambulance and several police vehicles were parked haphazardly along the road and shoulder near the intersection of Vale and Canning Roads. A dark blue late model sedan had hit a large oak tree just off Vale Road, not doing too much damage to the car and very obviously not causing the death of the male driver whose body was being lowered onto the ground by the rope from which it had been suspended by the ankles from a large lower limb of the tree. Orme called out to the officer in charge. ‘Steve, lets get a look at the body before they haul it away.’

Taking a pair of thin latex gloves out of his back pocket Orme knelt by the body which had been placed on a plastic sheet on the ground beside tedanedan. A nasty but not fatal-looking contusion showed on the man’s forehead. It was bruised but the small cut across the swelling was minimal. Using just his fingertips, Orme tilted the jaw towards himself. A pair of ragged puncture wounds was visible along the jugular. Blood had sprayed down across the man’s throat and collar, which he wore open and tie-less, and down the left shoulder of his suit coat. A thicker trail of blood ran from the throat wounds down his left cheek, plastering his hair to his scalp and had dripped down to form a pool under the tree from which the body had been hung.

‘Who found this one?’ Orme called over his shoulder. Officer Steve Barrett indicated a battered four-by-four parked just outside the police cordon. A man of about fifty, dressed in overalls, stood beside it, smoking a thin hand-rolled cigarette.

‘Get his statement yet?’ asked Orme.

‘Yeah. He has a farm not far from here,’ said Barrett. ‘Was on his way into town just after sunrise when he came across the scene.’

‘He didn’t touch anything?’

‘Nope. One look at the guy and he took off. Rang it in from the emergency phone about a mile down the road from here.’

‘OK,’ Orme rose stiffly, brushing soil and dry leaf litter from the knees of his pants and snapping off the latex gloves. ‘Let him go. Bring the body in and let Forensics have the site to themselves.’

*****

The warm sun bathed Julia’s face as she stood looking out across the Pacific Ocean. She closed her eyes, feeling a light breeze ruffle the white cotton shift she wore, her bare feet feeling the sand beneath cooling now as the sun went down over Santa Monica Beach. Her brother’s beach house gleamed behind her, up past the dunes, its thick glass walls reflecting the lowering sun, a golden tribute to its slow dive into the sea.

Julia had walked the sands each morning and evening of the two days she’d been in Los Angeles, the milder rays of dawn and dusk less irritating to her skin. By the second day her jetlag had subsided and Julia had spent some time just enjoying the sea breezes and dozing on the wooden deck, listening to the slow susurrations of the waves as they flowed in to whisper watery secrets to the yellow sands.

Even now, with the sun almost gone, her skin constantly tingled from its electric touch. It was a minor but distracting by-product of what she had come to think of as her ‘accident’. Almost four years had passed since that night in the abandoned tenement building in Toronto but still she found the physiological changes disturbing. Strong sunlight felt like the ripples of an electrical charge crawling over her exposed flesh and she had taken to wearing sunglasses whenever she ventured out of doors. Other changes were less troublesome. Her muscular strength and speed were vastly increased; her night vision and other senses were heightened. Even her singing voice, which had been pleasant enough before, was improved, now strong and clear as her control over her breathing became absolute.

The next day she would attend to a few necessary chores, including finding a new left-hand drive car, before heading off. Julia took a final deep breath, savouring the tang of the salty air, then trudged up the dunes again to finish reading the reports Giles was already emailing her from Sunnydale.

*****

The interior of The Cage seemed to be in a permanent twilight which suited the clientele, mostly bikers and a few hardy locals. The appearance of Orme and Lester caused the noise level to drop to a menacing murmur as most eyes turned towards them. As they walked up to the bar the conversations and heated discussions around them slowly returned to their usual intensity. The barman, well over six feet tall and built like a wrestler gone to seed, sported a red waist-length beard and clean-shaven head decorated with a black tribal-style tattoo which extended from the base of the neck almoo tho the bridge of his nose. He slowly wiped the counter top with a beer-soaked rag that left the surface neither drier nor cleaner. As Detective Sergeant Orme took a seat at the main bar, a couple of bikers wearing the colours of a local gang took their drinks and moved to a table a few feet away.

‘Martin Nagel?’ Orme inquired, flipping open his police I.D. The barman nodded.

‘They call me Nails.’

‘OK, Nails. I’m Detective Sergeant Orme and this is Detective Lester of the Sunnydale P.D. You hear about the two bodies found out back of the old brickworks yesterday morning?’

‘Yep.’

‘What’d you hear?’

‘Heard they was wearin’ biker colours.’

‘That’s right,’ Orme said. ‘Their jackets were from a club called the Saracens. Any of the members ever drink here?’

‘Sometimes have a brother or two in here when they’re ridin’ through.’

Lester leaned across the bar, placing a couple of photographs on the counter. ‘Recognise either of these men?’ Nails stared hard at the photos which had been taken in the morgue earlier that day.

‘Yep. Were both in here night before last.’

‘Names?’ prompted Orme.

‘Red-beard was Pig Dog,’ Nails leaned forward, grinning a nasty gap-toothed smile. ‘Prettier one called his-self Roadkill.’

‘How about their real names?’ Lester suggested.

‘Wouldn’t know.’ Nails slid the photographs back across the greasy counter.

‘Were they regulars here?’ prompted Orme.

‘Not what I’d call regulars. Come in with the club whenever they did a run to L.A. Used to come in on their own every few weeks or so.’

‘They have trouble with anyone here that night?’

‘Nope, but they did leave here with a couple of strangers.’

‘What did these two strangers look like?’ Orme asked.

‘One was a big guy, mean-lookin’. Dressed like a biker but not wearin’ colours. The other was a girl. Pretty little blonde thing.’

‘Did you happen to get *their* names?’

‘Big guy was called Luke, I think. He never said the girl’s name; just called her Darlin’. Not that he spoke much. She did most of the talkin’.’

‘What did they talk about?’

‘Didn’t heach och o’ the details but you might like to ask those guys.’ Nails indicated the two bikers who had vacated the bar area when Orme and Lester arrived. ‘They was sittin’ with the Saracens til the other two arrived.’

Lester and Orme nodded thanks to the barman and approached the two bikers. They sported the same colours - a grinning skull under a black top-hat indicating allegiance with a local club called the Gravediggers. The two ‘Diggers’ didn’t have a lot to add. They said that Luke and the girl offered the Saracens some kind of drug deal - something that would give them a rush like they’d never experienced before. The bikers assumed they’d left together do a deal, Luke and the woman riding pillion on the Saracens two Harley Davidson motorcycles.

*****

Darla squealed with delight, the wind whipping through her long blonde hair. She held tight to Luke as the stolen Harley Davidson leaned into a corner dangerously fast. Screeching to a halt at the Sunnydale Cemetery, Luke pulled the bike upright, kicking sta stand into place, his new boots gleaming in the moonlight. He and Darla dismounted and walked towards a large mausoleum.

Luke chuckled darkly. ‘So what happened with you and the travelling salesman?’

Darla glared at Luke. ‘Hitch-hiking!’ she snapped. ‘That was your stupid idea!’

Luke sniggered, hauling open the door to the marble edifice. ‘So you didn’t bring anything back for The Master! Again!’ Inside the tomb he lifted up the heavy slab covering the entrance to the tunnels below. Stepping back, he bowed mockingly, allowing Darla to precede him down into the darkness. ‘He won’t be very pleased!’

‘It couldn’t be helped,’ Darla snapped. ‘I had to eat him there!’ She sniffed. ‘No more middle-aged men for me! He had a damned *heart attack*! And crashed the car! I had to drag him out and string him up to drain him!’ Luke looked at her, puzzled. ‘No blood pressure!’ Darla explained. ‘I used the tow-rope from the trunk.’

*****

Detective Sergeant Orme had a headache that wouldn’t quit. It had started on his return to Sunnydale a couple of days before and hadn’t let up since. Four bodies in three days! Not to mention several missing persons reports in the past week, all young males from the local high school and college. Now the forensics reports had started coming in and they didn’t make a damned bit of sense!

‘Lester!’ he stood up and yelled to his partner who at that moment was walking past the office. t tht the hell shit goes on here!’

‘What do you mean, Sarge?’ answered Lester, poking his head around the door.

Orme strode over to him, waving a sheaf of reports in the younger man’s face. ‘Have you read this?’ he demanded. ‘Someone’s stuffed up in Records. These fingerprint results are all fucked up!’

Lester shook his head. ‘I’ve had them checked. I rang through myself when the report came in. It’s the damndest thing, that’s for sure.’ He walked into Orme’s office and pulled a chair up in front of the desk as Orme resumed his own seat.

One of the motorcycles had been recovered the day after the murders from an alley near the brickworks where the bikers’ bodies had been discovered, while the other Harley was found dumped the following morning at the Sunnydale Cemetery. Two sets of fingerprints had been lifted from the second bike and run through the California State database.

The first set came back almost immediately. Luke Bryant was a known offender in the state, havierveerved time on several minor charges from auto theft to assault. The only problem was, Luke Bryant was listed as deceased, having turned up in the Orange County morgue almost two years ago. Stranger still was the Coroner’s report which described a cause of death not dissimilar to the ones they were now investigating. Detective Lester had wasted no time in confirming the information and had contacted the Orange County Coroner’s office earlier that day. By chance, the attending medical examiner on that case was available to take the call and remred red the circumstances well. As Lester explained to Orme, there was a good reason why the case had stuck in his mind.

‘The M.E. working on Bryant says the body disappeared from the morgue before a full autopsy could be performed,’ Lester told Orme. ‘The night Bryant came in an unidentified woman tried to claim the body. Said she was from the undertakers but had no paperwork. She was told the body couldn’t be released and never came back,’ Lester paused. ‘Well, not that they know of. Anyhow, the Coroner’s Office was pretty busy, so they didn’t get to Bryant til a couple ofs las later. When they opened up the drawer, he was gone.’

‘What about the other set of prints?’

‘Well, this is even weirder, if that’s possible. The second set from the Harley match the prints found in the car belonging to the hanged motorist,’ said Lester. ‘They’re probably female. A hitch-hiker most likely.’

‘That’s not so surprising is it? Given the similarities in the M.O.s,’ Orme said. ‘We already guessed it’s the same perps.’

‘No,’ continued Lester. ‘But the really bizarre thing is they also match old crime scene records from Westminster where a number of college boys disappeared, some found dead several weeks later - freshly dead – with cause of death same as the victims here,’ Lister paused. ‘Only problem is, this all happened over thirty years ago.’

Orme ran his hand through his hair, taking in the unexpected information. ‘So we’re looking for a fifty year old homicidal broad who’s strong enough to hoist a 220 lb man into a tree and a dead guy who likes to ride Harleys? Is that what you’re telling me?’

‘I’m just telling you what the records search turned up,’ Lester answered. ‘What do you make of it? You think any of this is possible? Or do you think someone’s fiddled the evidence?’
en wen we catch ‘em,’ Orme replied darkly, ‘we’ll ask ‘em!’

*****

In the library of Sunnydale High, Rupert Giles and Julia Devereaux sat reading police reports on the recent spate of murders and missing persons that had been forwarded to them via the Council of Watchers’ contact inside the State Police Department.

Putting down the file she was reading Julia look across the table at Giles who was nervously cleaning his glasses, yet again. ‘Giles,’ she said, ‘we have to start patrolling now. We can’t wait any longer.’

‘The Slayer will be here any day now, I’m sure,’ he replied. ‘We really should wait.’ Giles had already expressed concern that the Summers girl had not yet arrived in Sunnydale. Arrangements had been made for her transfer from Hemery High in Los Angeles to the smaller provincial school in Sunnydale, while a job at a local gallery had been organised for her mother.

‘Rupert, people are dying while we sit here doing nothing. The least we can do is investigate some of the likely sites where this vampire group might have their lair. Then we’ll be ready for what ever action needs to be taken when she gets here.’

‘It’s too dangerous,’ Giles replied. ‘We’re just not equipped for this.’

‘Well, I’m going to take a look around tonight,’ Julia said firmly. ‘If I see any vampire activity I’ll run the other way. OK?’ Giles didn’t look convinced. ‘I promise!’

*****

Angel ran down the deserted passage towards the unmistakable sounds of fighting, scattering pages of torn newspapers and the contents of a burst garbage bag as he slid to a halt at the end of the filthy alleyway. Stopping at the corner of one of the red brick buildings flanking the alley he looked out into the moonlit arena formed by the abandoned buildings surrounding a derelict playground, taking in the scene in front of him.

A dark-haired young woman was being pursued across the grassless park by two vampires. Dodging between broken swings and gym sets, she leaped up onto a see-saw, running along the plank as one of the vamps kept pace alongside. She stopped in the centre, balancing the old wooden plank on its axis. The closest vampire ran to one end of the see-saw, the second taking up position at the other end. As Angel stepped out of the shadows, he saw the woman turn and run down the plank towards the vampire to her right. Taking advantage of the momentum, she drove a long silver knife into its chest, not even slowing her pace as the undead attacker exploded in a cascade of dust. Momentarily surpr, th, the other vamp stared after her for several seconds, giving voice to an angry roar before taking off after her again.

Angel, equally astonished, withdrew into the darkness of the alley. This woman could obviously hold her own and he was interested to see if she could dispatch the second assailant.

Julia ran to an open area not far from the alleyway and turned to face the on-coming vampire. She crouched slightly as the vamp approached, holding the Serpent’s Tooth dagger well in front of her body in a defensive posture. As the enraged creature lunged at her she sidestepped quickly, ducking low to trip the vampire as it ran past. As it fell to the ground she dove on top of it and, with both hands grasping the hilt, rammed the silver and ash wood blade deep into its heart.

Dust from the second vampire swirled around her like a tiny whirlwind, spreading out in a circle around her with the force of the molecular disintegration. Breathing heavily, Julia pulled the dagger out of the compacted dirt where the force of her thrust had plunged it several inches into the soil.

Still down on one knee, she became aware of another presence nearby. At the sound of a slight movement from the alley between the abandoned tenements across the road she became instantly alert once more.

*Who the hell is she*? Angel wondered. *Not the Slayer, that’s for sure*. Angel had already seen the Chosen One when Whistler took him to observe her at her old school in L.A. and this tall brunette certainly wasn’t her. As she stood up and began walking towards the alley Angel started to move forward, then stopped. Realising that it was too soon to reveal that he was here in Sunnydale, Angel retreated back into the shadows, his right hand gripping the rough brick corner of the building as he flattened himself against the alley wall.

Julia could just make out a dark figure, someone tall, probably young, as the form faded away into the blackness. As a pale hand disappeared from view she caught sight of something shining in the moonlight - a silver or white gold ring with a raised design of hands clasped around something that she couldn’t quite distinguish – but seemed vaguely familiar.

She began to run, racing down the shadowy alley, avoiding spilled garbage cans and empty cardboard boxes in an effort to get another look at the anonymous spectator. The long alley spilled out onto a quiet suburban street. Julia glanced around quickly, catching a momentary glimpse of the young man, his coat swirling out behind him as he walked through the light of a streetlamp already several blocks away.

*****

Back at boarding house, Julia stepped out of a long hot shower, pulled on a towelling robe and wrapped a thick towel around her wet hair. Her right hand was still sported a red burn-like welt from its contact with the hilt of the silver dagger.

Walking into the combined bed-sitting room she picked up her diary and a pen fthe the bedside table then flopped down into a deep tapestry-upholstered armchair, putting her feet up on the matching ottoman. Her entry was, as usual, undated.

‘God, I’ve only been in Sunnydale a week and already I’m washing the grave-dust out of my hair! This isn’t how it was supposed to be!’

Julia paused for a moment, reflecting on the events of the evening. She felt sickened, nauseated at the recollection of her first kills as the reality of the situation began to sink in. One of the dead vampires had, until a few days ago, been a student at Sunnydale High; his picture had appeared in the local newspaper the previous weekend. Just a kid really, who hadn’t asked for any of this to happen to him. *This isn’t why I’m here!* she thought unhappily. *I’m a researcher, not a killer*!

‘Someone saw the whole thing tonight, I’m sure. A man, watching from the shadows, who didn’t want to be seen. Is he working with them? Watching them too, maybe? If he’s a vampire-hunter, why didn’t he make his presence known? If he’s with them, why didn’t he attack too? Perhaps he was just a passer-by after all and got spooked by what he saw?’

Somehow, this last possibility seemed the least likely.

‘Maybe Giles will have some thoughts on the matter. With any luck things will quiet down once the Slayer gets here. God, I hope Buffy gets here soon!’

***** Finis *****

Author’s note: ‘I Ching’ is pronounced ‘Yee Jing’ and is an anc Chi Chinese form of divination which is almost too complex to attempt an explanation. The hexagrams mentioned all exist, as do the descriptions I’ve used (some slightly altered), but I’ve mixed them up to relate them more closely to the story line. The description of the decline of the Mayans is also reasonably accurate (except for the demons, of course! Well, that we know of!)