Welcome to the Hellmouth

A Helping Hand


“Guys, you’re never gonna believe what I found!” Willow exclaimed as she glanced up from behind the giant computer.

“I find it nothing short of a miracle that you can find anything at all on that dread machine,” Giles muttered. Cleaning his glasses for the fifth time, he slipped them back in place and stepped behind the evil machine to get a glimpse at the screen.

William and Xander continued sparring, or rather, William kept picking Xander up off the floor each time he knocked him down with a single blow.

“I said ‘guys,’ guys,” Willow insisted.

“Thank God,” Xander exclaimed. “There’s only so much beating my ego can stand.”

“I thought you were more worried ‘bout your arse, Harris,” William teased, dabbing the back of his neck with a towel as he eased Giles out of the way to see what Willow had found on the computer. “What the bloody fuck?”

“Those, uh, we’re my sentiments, almost exactly,” Giles agreed.

“What’s up, Wills?”

“I-it’s the darndest thing,” the redhead said. “That guy who was in the locker, Ford, well, he had terminal cancer. He was dying. It’s in his hospital records. A-and the weird thing is that all the people who’ve been found with puncture marks recently… they were all dying, too.”

“You, um, accessed the hospital’s files? That is legal, I hope.”

“If anyone asks, “William assured him, “you were never here and you never saw anything.”

“Quite right,” the watcher agreed.

“So, there’s, what, a vampire with a conscience or something? I mean, killing people who’re already dying isn’t that bad.”

“Xander! It’s not anyone’s decision to make, least of all a vampire’s. Vampires are creeps.”

“Yes, well, that’s why one slays them,” quipped Giles, earning him a wry grin from his son.

“Okay, you totally walked right into that one.”

With a small smile, Willow nodded her agreement. “So, what are we going to do about it?”

“We’re not going to do anything,” William said firmly. “I’m going to figure out who the bloody Hell this Vampire Kevorkian is and put a stop to him.”

“Or her,” said a soft voice from behind a stack of books.

Giles and William drew stakes simultaneously, while Xander shoved Willow behind him and brandished a pencil in the direction the voice had come from.

“Who are you?” demanded the watcher.

“No, Giles,” William intervened when he recognized the voice. “It’s fine. You can come out now.”

Lowering her cloak as she emerged from behind the history section of the library, the raven-haired woman William had encountered the night before stepped fluidly down the stairs. “A slayer who doesn’t work alone,” she mused aloud. “Interesting.”

“William, are you quite sure there’s no cause for alarm?” Giles pressed on. “You do realize she is a vampire, I hope.”

“A… of course,” he covered. “She’s helping me. Gave me this last night.” He held up the silver cross.

“A vampire is helping a slayer?” Willow asked incredulously.

“D-drusilla?” the watcher gasped in surprise, suddenly recognizing the woman from the faded photograph in the Watchers’ Diaries.

“The same,” Drusilla replied. “I’m not like ordinary vampires, young William. I have a soul.”

“Which of you would like to explain what the buggering Hell is going on here?” the slayer insisted.

“First of all,” Giles began, “I would like to know how you got here in the middle of,” he glanced at the clock, his face falling, “well, the sun set an hour ago, so that question is pointless.”

“I’ve been here longer,” the vampire answered, indicating her cloak. “It isn’t the most comfortable way to travel, but I managed.”

“Hello!”

“Right, William, forgive me. Drusilla is, um, was… one of the most feared of her kind until, ah, she was cursed with a soul.”

“Cursed? I’d consider that more of a blessing,” Xander muttered. “Souls come in handy when it comes to making the right decision in, I don’t know, everything!”

With an irritated sigh, Drusilla explained, “A gypsy family cursed me with a soul so that I would suffer for the… acts of destruction I committed.”

“Okay, that explains a lot,” the slayer murmured. “Not! Yeah, you have a soul, but you’re still a vampire, which makes it bloody hard to understand why you would help me.”

“Don’t you see, William? I want to help you defend humans from the creatures of darkness, vampires like myself, or like how I once was.”

“If you’re so gung-ho to help humans, why not just take over for the slayer? I’d give you my job willingly.”

“Because I’m afraid,” she admitted. “And because it’s your destiny, not mine. My destiny is to help you, all of you, in any way I can.”

“Uh huh,” Willow spoke up, “a-and we’re just supposed to trust you and believe everything you say because you supposedly have a soul.”

“Willow…” Giles warned.

“Well, unlike William, I’m not going to just jump on the soul bandwagon!”

“Neither am I!” Xander conferred.

“Please, both of you!” Giles interrupted. “She does have a soul. It’s been documented and, as much as it pains me to say this, she’s given us no reason to distrust her.”

Both Willow and Xander fell silent, looking more than a little ashamed of their outbursts.

“That doesn’t mean you should trust me,” the vampire said.

“Never said I did.” Suddenly, William remembered what Drusilla had said to give away her location, and he queried, “Did you kill all those people?”

Smiling cryptically, Drusilla shook her head. “No, I didn’t, but I might know who is responsible. Give me time to look into it.”

“I’m sorry, but that is a job for the slayer.”

“No,” said William. “If she wants to help, this’ll give her a chance to prove it. You have tonight to find something, and if you come back empty-handed, then I’ll do my thing.”

“What, pray tell, is your… thing?” Drusilla inquired, obviously finding something amusing.

“You know, be the chosen one, kill vampires. Vampires! Grr! Nasty! I’ll annihilate them… for justice and for… the safety of puppies and Christmas, right? I’ll kill something!”

Willow looked disturbed, Xander smirked, and Giles groaned audibly.

“You have much to learn, young William,” the vampire stated, “but you will learn, and you’ll learn quickly. It’s in your blood.”

“It’s always the blood, isn’t it?” the slayer asked darkly.

“Always.”

Giles watched worriedly as something passed between his son and the vampire, though what it was, he didn’t dare attempt to quantify. “Well, I suppose you should go look for, um, information.”

Drusilla inclined her head and disappeared into the stacks once more, climbing out through the window she had left unlocked when she’d first sneaked into the school.

“Hey!” Willow exclaimed once she was gone. “I thought vampires needed an invitation.”

“Not to a school,” William answered. “It’s a public place.”

“Right,” muttered Giles. “You should, um, go patrol. Willow, see what else you can find on that machine of yours.”

“And Xander?” the dark-haired boy asked hopefully.

“Go fetch snacks.”

“Oh.” Visibly deflating, Xander skulked out of the library, muttering something about being a butt-monkey under his breath.

“Okay, I’m off.” Pocketing several stakes, a bottle of holy water, and a silver dagger, William meandered out of the library, hoping that he would run into Drusilla again. She was gorgeous… in an annoying way, and she seemed to know more about him than she was letting on, while he knew nothing about her.

Time to remedy that, he thought.