Flies to Honey: Part Twelve
by J Jericho Born
"What is it?" Xander called out, running to catch up with Buffy and the others.
"This place isn't as abandoned as we thought," observed Giles, looking through the opening in the fake wall intelligently.
Xander joined the onlookers to see a startling contrast to the warehouse they had seen previously. Several large, space-age looking chemical vats were the prominent feature of the orderly, modern factory that hid inside the rotting building. They spanned floor to celing and were accessed by a sturdy catwalk that ran consistently around the spacious area. A host of high-tech machinery intertwined amoung the vats in a methodical chaos. No sound could readily be attributed to the extensive plant that sprawled within, instead an eerie silence maintained the intergrity of a secret operation. The sterile odor of the place lended to the feeling of careful maintenence.
"It seems to be a biochemical factory," declared Giles.
"Duh, but what is it doing in the middle of dumpsville?" questioned Cordelia.
"I say we find out," suggested Buffy.
"What about looking for Oz?" reminded Xander.
"For all we know he's in there," responded Buffy, more to Willow than to Xander. The former gave an approving nod and Buffy entered the factory stealthily. Xander was fresh on her heels and the others followed with matching dilligence.
A lighting system made up of clean, flourescent units illuminated the manicured interior walls and cast multiple shadows on each of the intruders. The group, led by a competent as usual Buffy, made their way around the perimeter of the room. Ducking from cover to cover, they stopped at a useful vantage point and snuggled in between a large pipe and the wall.
"Duck," advised Buffy simply. An unusally fit security guard walked by with a face that alluded to his mind being elsewhere. A handgun firmly fastend to his belt cast his dopey demeanor in a threatening shadow.
"Did you notice that?" whispered Buffy in the wake of the passing guard.
"His uniform didn't have any identifying markings on it," replied Giles under his breath.
"This place is giving me the wiggins, I'm getting out of here," advised Cordelia as she began to stand.
"No!" barked Buffy as loudly as softly could get.
"Why not?" whined Cordelia.
"You'll give us away."
"How are you so sure?"
"Cordy, you're a lot of things, but discrete ain't one of them," informed Xander affectionately.
"Hey, look over there," interrupted Willow. Cordelia resigned herself to popular opinion and reassumed her crouch.
Willow gestured to a group of large cages that were piled against the wall a few paces away in an orderly manner. They looked quite secure, solid steel on the sides and heavy gauge grating on their fronts. Excitement brimmed in Willow's petite frame as speculations of reuiniting with Oz ran through her head. The contents of the cages couldn't be perceived from her current vantage point, but for the first time in awhile she felt optimistic. Willow's incantation to locate her boyfriend showed no signs of his presence, but she had long since disregarded its validity.
"Wait here," said Buffy protectively, but she couldn't even start to get up before a friend's hand met her shoulder.
"I want to see for myself," said Willow assuredly, abandoning her enchanted bowl to the cold, concrete floor.
Buffy didn't see it fit to disagree and together they crept to the steel cages, Willow in anticipation and Buffy in a reserved caution. They would have to step out from behind the machinery that provided relative cover in order to achieve their objective. The Slayer was wary of being discovered, but there was no stopping Willow.
A crawling pace quickend into a minature jog as Willow came upon the nearest cage and peered inside. Buffy assumed position next to her friend and also gazed in. At first glance the twisted creature inside could've been mistaken for a werewolf, but any sustained look would reveal this abomination to be a hideous mutation of an ordinary dog.
The expression of this poor creature's tormented face was both threatening and pitiful. A mouthful of its elongated teeth poked in and out of gums in various directions and its coat only existed in isolated patches. Various bones that could be likend to spikes protruded from the mangy animal's hide, giving it the appearance of being subject to callous experiments rather than mere neglect. A permanent expression of fright had fused itself around the animals maw, which was colored blood red from licking its own wounds.
Disappointment chilled its way down Willow's spine and she roughly shrugged off Buffy's comforting arm. She could only stare at the floor as Buffy looked over the rest of the cages and discovered they held a menagerie of equally deformed common animals. Buffy shook her head at the others, still huddled behind their cover, and they received the bad news with appropiate silence.
"Don't move!" commanded an overly aggresive voice, coming from behind Buffy and Willow. The Slayer beligerently turned to face a particularly edgy security guard leveling his cocked gun at location in Buffy's torso. Remaining calm, she quickly put a ditsy look on her young face. Willow noticed Buffy's expression and also turned with a look of mischievious innocence.
"They're just some teenagers," the guard called out, maintaining his eyeful watch on the pair of intruders.
"Whoa, don't shoot. We thought this place was abandoned," said Buffy in her best stoner voice. She began to compliment herself mentally for her quick cover story, but she soon realized her statement was true and lacked any ounce of deception.
"You girls are in big trouble," advised the guard, his tense neck stretched a collar saturated with persperation. He looked more worried about Buffy and Willow's fate then they did.
"Hey, Bubba," yelled a now standing Xander. The guard sent only a moment's glipse Xander's way, but it was enough time for Buffy to disarm him with a precise, well timed kick.
The Slayer wasn't about to settle with a single kick and quickly followed with several more meaty blows. The guard met a backhand to the face, a kick to the stomach, and a punch squarely on the jaw with no counter. Staggering to keep balance, he returned a bewildered look to Buffy.
"Not expecting moves from some teenager girl?" questioned Buffy with a smug smirk. The guard answered with his own set of precision attacks, the first blow hitting its mark on Buffy's abdomen before she could block the ones that followed. Surprised, Buffy did realize that such martial arts training was standard for security guards, but she was beginning to believe these weren't ordinary security guards at all.
"Make a run for it!" exclaimed Buffy, losing faith in her abilities to get out of the situation with a quick fight. Not wanting to abandon their friend, all of the gang remained when Buffy glanced over next during a short lull in the security guard's skilled assault.
"I said go!" reiterated Buffy. The others finally complied, hearing the mounting gravity in Buffy's voice.
The fight looked to turn against Buffy and she finally disregarded the safety of her human opponent in favor of self preservation. As the security guard lunged a right cross at her, she countered gracefully and sent him into a brutal collision with the side of some steel machinery. After a short moment for pain to be realized the guard fell to the floor unconcious. Without sparing any time, Buffy started on her own timely escape.
"Halt!" ordered another guard with the click of a cocking hammer, this time from the catwalk above.
"You imbescile! Don't use firearms in here! Do you want to get us all killed?" interrupted a man dressed in a plain, black business suit and tie. Also on the catwalk, he walked a few steps toward the security guard and brushed away the readied gun.
"Go get Freeman!" barked the business suited man. The security guard obeyed without question, holstering his weapon and scurrying off to complete his assigned task.
"You don't know what you've stumbled into, little girl," advised the mysterious man.
"Why don't you enlighten me then?" requested Buffy, postponing her egress for the moment against her own better judgement.
"This is much bigger than your little MTV wasted brain can comprehend, young lady, it doesn't matter anyway, you won't make it out of here alive, or perhaps we can recruit you into our little fold, your fighting skills are quite impressive," said the suited man, running his sentences into each other like a tragic train wreck.
"Behold, the entire lack of puncuation," quipped Buffy.
"I doubt you will live to enjoy your insult, indeed, I think the rebellious nature of your youth wouldn't bode well in our operation, it's a pity to strike down such a lovely specimen of the female half of humanity in her prime, but we cannot afford luxuries such as mercy," the man answered. After finally puncuating his speech with a pause he added, "Kill her."
Buffy had no time for a witty comeback, in quick response to the malicious order an ominus whirring noise of an electrical circuit warming up hummed from a short distance away. Instinctively, the Slayer hit the ground to dodge whatever was coming away. A odd swirling, blue light playfully danced above her head, hitting the metal apparatus next to her with no adverse affect. Regardless of the weapon's appearance of impotence, Buffy rolled away until the row of cages impeaded her progress.
Just as Buffy got to her feet, a man clad in a peculiar orange jumpsuit and wearing a backpack that fed into an odd weapon he carried turned a corner to face his prey. A pair of nerdy glasses that seemed to come straight out of a NASA Apollo documentry added to his humorous appearance.
"What are you, a reject from the Ghostbusters?" questioned Buffy, shortly before diving behind cover as the weapon hummed to life once more. She again suceeded in avoiding a blue stream that this time hit the poor, mutated dog, putting it out of its misery in a cataclysmic puff of organic mass.
With the idea of disintegration floating around her mind, the Slayer opted for a different strategy. When the orange-suited man rounded the corner this time he met a sharp jab to the face and struggled with a focused adolescent to maintain hold of his futuristic weapon. Buffy pulled with all her enhanced might, gripping the cylinder shaped device with both hands.
"Let go!" demanded Buffy's adversary, but she continued grappling for control of the weapon. Eventually, the Slayer's strength proved too much to handle and it slipped out from his hands, ripping the various cords that connected it to the backpack unit.
Amid cries of "Freeman, you idiot!" and with the odd device in hand, Buffy pursued her plans of escape with renewed vigor. She ran to the makeshift entrance briskly, sparing not a single iota of energy as she went. Whatever evils lurked in this place would have to be dealt with after regrouping.
This story archived at: The Slayer\'s Fanfic Archive
The Slayer\\\\\\\\'s FanFic Archive - http://www.slayerfanfic.com/viewstory.php?sid=3799