It took Buffy a week to find the vampire that had killed Sung. Originally, she had thought that doing so would be impossible, even if the vampire hadn’t left town or been dusted in her rampage after Sung’s death. Vampires remembered individual victims the way people remembered individual meals, so trying to find the right vampire in Sunnydale wasn’t like trying to find a needle in a haystack so much as it was like trying to find a piece of hay that was the exact right shade of yellow.
Fortunately for Buffy’s search, Sung had been rather distinctive-looking.
*
"Yeah, yeah, sure," the vampire said, cutting a quick glance at the picture Buffy held in one hand, while he swatting contemptuously at her other arm, which was holding him pinned against the wall of Willy's Bar. "That’s the little Chinee girl I ate."
"She was Vietnamese," Buffy gritted out, twisting her hand in his shirt and pushing him against the wall even harder. This vamp apparently thought of himself as some kind of badass. He was certainly dressed like one—from the nineteen-forties. Bomber jacket and all. That also meant that she was dealing with her grandfather’s racial sensitivities here. At best. Well, she wasn’t interested in humoring either of his delusions.
"She had slanted eyes and a yellow streak in her hair—it was the chicky in the picture. What else do you want?" He demanded. He tried to pull away, but Buffy slammed him against the wall this time.
"Now I want answers to the *rest* of my questions," she answered.
Captain Bomber Jacket reached out and pushed her away. "I’m about done answering questions, you little bi—" He screamed as Buffy buried a stake in his gut. Then she tore it out, grabbed him by the shirt again, slammed him against the wall hard enough to rattle the boards, and laid the point against his chest.
"I think I’ve been called a bitch just about enough these past few weeks," Buffy whispered in his face, leaning in until their noses were nearly touching.
"Okay!" The vampire sobbed. "Okay, okay! Ask your questions! Ask your questions!"
"Uh, hey, Slayer, uh—" Willy began diffidently. He’d come out from behind the bar, but stopped well outside Buffy’s reach. "Do you think you could—"
"Willy," Buffy said in the same deadly calm she’d been using to address the vampire, "I’m working on a case right now. A case that I take *very* personally. If you interfere with this investigation, I will cripple you."
Willy blinked, then returned to the bar without another word.
"Since everyone else in this bar is a demon," Buffy continued, raising her voice but not changing her tone. "I will simply kill you if you interfere."
A group of vampires that had been standing to help their buddy quietly returned to their seats.
Buffy turned her attention back to Captain Bomber Jacket. "You see how it is," she said casually.
"What is this chi…this girl to you?" Captain Bomber Jacket asked.
"I’m the one asking the questions," Buffy said. "And the first is: do you know a guy named Darren Edwards?"
"Who?"
Buffy released his shirt and pulled a picture of Darren—a surveillance photo from the Initiative—out of her pocket. "Him."
The vampire shook his head. "Never seen him before."
"Careful. Whatever he’s paying you won’t do much good if you’re dust," Buffy warned, pressing just a little harder on the stake.
"He’s not paying me anything! How could he be paying me anything if I’ve never met the man in my entire—if I’ve never met him?"
Buffy returned the picture to her pocket. "Better be sure," she said. "You see, Mr. Edwards has been preying on women at UC Sunnydale for a long time, in his own way. Not as long as you have, of course. Now, his problem is that his way leaves survivors behind. For three years, he’s been lucky. None of them have fought back. But now, one finally has. He may be in real trouble for the first time. Know who that one was?"
"The girl in the picture?" The vampire suggested tremulously.
"Right," Buffy nodded. "Her name is Sung. She fought back, and she was in a position to get him in a lot of trouble, no matter how good his family’s lawyers are. So suddenly, one night, she dies. It doesn’t really look like suicide, but the Sunnydale Coverup Machine calls it that, and she’s buried. Case closed and our boy’s in the clear because oops, no plaintiff."
"Oops," the vampire said weakly.
"Right. Now, that’s all bad enough. But as the weeks pass, Darren’s other victims start disappearing, too. And they *all* look like suicide. Do you know what that looks like to me?"
The vampire shook his head.
"It looks to me like his close call scared him pretty good, and now he’s covering his tracks. The same way he did before."
"Sounds good," the vampire agreed, nodding frantically. "Just one problem."
"Which is?"
"If I was supposed to make sure that this, uh, Sung kept her mouth shut, then why did I sire her?"
Buffy froze. "You what?"
"It can be hard not to, when you’ve just drank somebody dry and you’re completely fueled up—it’s like when you’re alive and you’ve promised to pull out, but—"
"Okay, enough, I get the idea," Buffy interrupted, her face wrinkling in disgust.
"But I wouldn’t have done it if I was getting paid to shut someone’s mouth," Captain Bomber Jacket babbled on. "It’d kinda defeat the point, wouldn’t it?"
"Yes, it would," Buffy said, her eyes far away, thinking furiously. Then she refocused her attention on Captain Bomber Jacket. "If you’re lying, I’ll find you," she promised.
He held up his hands. "I’m squaring with you. On my mother’s grave."
She gave him one last suspicious glare, then she released him with one last shove and ran out the door.
Captain Bomber Jacket took a moment to dust himself off, straighten his jacket, and gather his dignity about him. He looked around the room, but everyone was still studiously Looking Away.
"Crazy bitch," he muttered.
A stake flew in through the door and dusted him.
Willy shook his head. "She told him she was sick of being called that."
|
|
|
|
Rave
Barbie Girl (Becca)
biscuit07
Filmtheory (Jim)
Malice (Jess)
MebbtheScribe (MichaelB)
Reset (Allie)
Shay (Marrisa)
somnambulist29 (Shea)
Stephanie Loss
Wendyness (Wendy)
Questions?Contact Us
|
|
All stories on this site have been archived with the authors' consent. Do not copy these stories for your own uses without the express consent of the author themselves. Buffy the Vampire Slayer TM and Angel TM are © UPN, WB, Fox and its related entities. All photos on the site are © UPN, Fox, Warner Bros, and/or their respective owners. No profits are being made by use of these images.
Powered with the assitance of eFiction.
|
|
|
