Electricity flows

Chapter Four: Poor odds

The first kick caught her in the soft bit just below her ribs with enough force to spin her threw the air like a top. When she was near the ground again she tried to get her feet under her, but they slipped in the mud and the best she was able to manage was her hands and knees, which was still better than face down.

‘Oops spoke too soon.’ The next kick hooked under her stomach giving the kicker more leverage and up she went again. As the Kickee, Buffy was thoroughly not impressed with that. She allowed herself to roll with it, getting a little dizzy with the way the sky and ground kept switching sides.

“Fuckers!”

Okay, so she could hear Faith. That was good; it meant she was still alive. It didn’t sound like the victory cry Buffy wanted to hear though, and that was bad.

Buffy landed hard, belly-flopping in the muddy sludge, and struggled to catch her breath, or move, or do anything really, other than just laying there like a hooked fish. With a filthy hand she pushed her straggly locks out of her eyes in just the nick of time to dodge the boot aimed at her head. The faceful of wet soil she received instead was of little compensation, but probably less painful, those damn bike boots hurt.

The missed kick had thrown the vampire off balance and Buffy tried to take advantage of the situation, scrambling forward and trying to latch onto the offending boot. The vamp danced back out of her way laughing. It was the one that had got the jump on her earlier. Good, she still owed him some pain for that.

“That’s it Slayer, wriggle for me. This is better than naked mud wrestlin’, or at least it would be if you were naked.”

Buffy grabbed handfuls of soggy grass and pulled herself up on her knees again. “Guess that would be a real treat for you, huh, seeing your first naked woman outside the pictures in Playboy?” She was on her feet again at last.

The vamp grinned at her. “Ooh I like you; I think you might be a keeper.”

“In your dreams.” Buffy lashed out a foot as she spoke, hoping to catch him off guard while he was busy being full of himself. It was a vain hope. Her clothes were caked in mud now and had already been heavy with water before. The quick fire kick she’d been aiming for was slow and clumsy and nearly toppled her back over.

Her adversary caught her raised ankle in mid air and Buffy let out a little cry of surprise and another of pain as he twisted it. She went with the twist to stop the bastard breaking her ankle and saw Faith a little way in front of her struggling with the other three creatures. Faith was holding her own at the moment; in fact she was doing better than Buffy herself.

That thought spurred Buffy into action. With a grunt, she threw herself into a handstand and used her free foot to kick her foe in the throat. She grunted again as something wrenched in her captured ankle, causing a bright, hot pain to shot through her foot and up her left leg.

Her hands found purchase on the ground, and again she kicked upwards with her free foot. She connected with something but she didn’t know what. She did know that it pissed the vampire off at about the same time his knee shot into her sternum. She tried to suck in a breath at the pain, but she couldn’t, she felt like it was stuck deep in her chest. She brought both hands up to the injured area as if she could somehow pull the pain away. The cocky vampire held her upside down by her left ankle and laughed.

She recovered quickly, Slayer healing was good for all occasions, but her tormentor had already grown bored of seeing her dangle. With apparently no strain at all he turned and casually flicked her across the cemetery.

“Again with the flying,” she moaned. Her back hit a tombstone, could have been worse, could have been her head, she hurriedly reassured herself, although the complete lack of breath twice in as many seconds would probably kill her anyway.

The vampire was stalking towards her and she tried to get to her feet, but tonight was definitely not her night. Her injured ankle refused to take any weight and it wasn’t like she could lead a death charge by hopping.

“On second thoughts,” The vampire pulled out a knife as he came closer, “this might be one of those times where I just can’t get enough.”

Buffy eyed the knife as he waved it around in front of her.

“That was a complement, you’re supposed to say thank you.”

Buffy never took her eyes off the knife, her leg was going nowhere, but her arms still worked fine.

“Kids today, no manners.” He grumbled.

Buffy’s hand closed around his that was wielding the weapon and squeezed. “Thank you.” She smirked.

He smirked back, which disconcerted her a little. “No, thank you.”

“Huh?”

He pulled the knife back towards him roughly; Buffy kept her grip and stumbled forward after it. Her good leg was kicked out from under her and she was going down…again. “For the love of God…”

His free hand pounded her hard in the face on her way down. She used her free hand to block the second punch but was unwilling to let go of the knife to defend herself properly. He hit her again and again until the option was taken out of her hands literally.

With her last ounce of coherence she screamed: “FAITH!”

*********************************

With three of the bloodsuckers surrounding her and no stake, Faith had a feeling that the odds were stacked against her. She’d lost clear sight of Buffy too in the continuing deluge and that was making her uneasy. She could see the struggle the blonde was in, but she couldn’t make out who was winning.

A greasy little weasel with slicked back hair and dark shades, in the middle of the night in a storm, suddenly got brave and dashed forward to grab her arm.

Jeez, not this again, she was gonna have one arm longer than the other come morning.

She raised her arm and spun away from him like he was twirling her in a dance and suddenly she was behind him and there was no way his arm was supposed to bend like that, was it? There was a snap and a guttural growl of pain. Nope, guess it wasn’t.

His hand went limp and fell away from her wrist and she threw him away from her before his other hand clawed for revenge.

A skanky ho in a red velvet dress which was way to short for someone of her age to be wearing, even discounting the Undead years, took a swing at her next. Must have been the greaseballs girlfriend, considering the rage she had going.

Faith ducked the swing and slipping and sliding to the side managed to put a boot into her midsection, doubling her up.

The third Vamp had been circling her waiting for his chance and now he thought he’d found it. He rushed her, a long, thick branch held high above his head.

Faith grabbed the she-vamp and lifted her up to block the crashing blow. The bitch yelped as the branch struck across the back of her neck. Faith threw her into his face before he could bring the branch up for a second shot. He has to raise his arms to stop her from landing on him and Faith ducked low and ran her shoulder into his stomach.

Two vampires and a Slayer went sprawling over the mud.

Faith tried to scramble up first and get away, but one of them had a hold of her leg and wasn’t letting go.

Her hands clawed at the ground trying to pull herself up and away. The Danny Zuko wannabe was back on his feet and coming towards them fast. She was gonna be right back at square one. This was going down in the record books as being the most annoying night of her life.

“FAITH!”

Buffy.

The single thought kicked the lid completely off of her temper. Her sister Slayer needed her and these fuckers wouldn’t get the fuck off. Buffy was counting on her, she wouldn’t let her down.

Faith rolled herself over with difficulty and found that it was the bitch in red, looking less than lovely in vamp face, who was holding onto her leg. She looked the dress over again, it was familiar. It looked like it would have been expensive when new, but it had been washed so many times in cheap washing powder that it has lost its edge. Her mom had, had one just like it, she remembered, Faith had gotten a beating one day for playing dress up with it.

She sneered. “Happy memories.” And forced her free foot down into the bitch’s face.

On the second stomp, she let go. By the fourth, she was barely conscious. By the sixth, Faith was pissed that she’d have to clean all that squidgy grey shit off of her boots.

She flipped herself upright and with a spinning kick knocked out the vamp that had the branch.

She didn’t even bother with the other one. He wasn’t between her and B, so he wasn’t important.

She took off through the swamp and the sound she uttered was somewhere between a battle cry and scream when she saw Buffy unconscious on the ground. She was too late. She’d taken to long to get away.

The bastard that did it had stopped pounding on her and was fixing himself a snack. Faith took it all in as he pulled the blonde Slayer into a sitting position and almost reverently pulled her clothes away from her neck.

Then he was ten yards away, his eyes surprised and a complaint on his lips, which was forgotten when his back met a tree trunk with a lot of force.

Out of the corner of her eye, Faith noticed he managed to stay on his feet, but she didn’t wait to see what he would do next. She scooped the smaller Slayer into her arms and ran like hell through the downpour.