The Xander Years, Vol.2 Read online

  CHAPTER 4

  School had long since let out, and darkness had descended on Sunnydale. Willow sat alone in the shadowed library, at one of the computer workstations Giles had reluctantly agreed to allow in his sanctuary. On the screen before her was video footage of a pack of hyenas. They were terrifying to watch as they savagely tore at their prey, a wildebeest they had brought down. She had always thought of hyenas as scavengers, but it turned out they were fierce predators, hunting in packs and going after the weak, the infirm — easy targets, in other words.

  Not brave animals, necessarily. But deadly ones. And not the cute jokesters they had been made out to be in the cartoons.

  The door opened and Buffy entered, dragging a heavy load behind her. “Hurry up!” she called to Willow. “We’ve gotta lock him up somehow, before he comes to.”

  Not just any heavy load, Willow realized. “Omigod, Xander — what happened?”

  “I hit him,” Buffy answered.

  There was a locking book cage in the library, for rarer books and manuscripts and some of Giles’s occult tomes that he didn’t want to fall into the hands of the wrong people — like, anyone but himself and maybe the Slayerettes. Buffy headed for the cage, Willow alongside, looking for signs of damage on Xander. Only the tiniest part of her was vengeful enough to hope there was at least a good-sized bruise or bump. He was out cold, but she couldn’t see any signs of impact.

  “With what?” she asked, opening the cage door.

  “A desk,” Buffy replied, hauling him into the cage. “He tried his hand at felony sexual assault.”

  “Oh, Buffy,” Willow said, horrified. “The hyena in him didn’t —”

  “No. No, but it’s safe to say that in his animal state, his idea of wooing somebody doesn’t include a Yanni CD and a bottle of Chianti.” Buffy came out of the cage, closed the door behind her, turned the key. She jingled the keys in her hand as she crossed to a desk. “There, that oughta hold him. Where’s Giles?”

  “He got a call to some teacher’s meeting,” Willow told her. Buffy took a big swallow from a bottle of water. Beating up your friends must be thirsty work, Willow guessed. “What are we going to do?” she asked. “I mean, how do we get Xander back?”

  That didn’t seem high on Buffy’s list of concerns. “Right now,” she said, “I’m worried about what the rest of the pack are up to.”

  Giles walked in just then. “The rest of the pack were spotted outside Herbert the mascot’s cage. They were sent to the principal’s office.”

  “Good. That’ll show ’em,” Willow said. The look on Giles’s face wasn’t reassuring. “Did it show ’em?”

  “They didn’t hurt him, did they?” Buffy asked.

  “They, uh, ate him.”

  Willow sank into a chair.

  “They ate Principal Flutie?” Buffy said.

  “Ate him up?” Willow added.

  “The official theory is that wild dogs got into his office somehow,” Giles said. “There was no one at the scene.”

  Willow found the bright spot — A tiny one, but bright just the same, she thought. Hoped. “But Xander didn’t — he was with you,” she said to Buffy.

  “Oh,” Giles said, seeing the unconscious boy in the cage for the first time. “Well, that’s a small mercy.”

  “Giles, how do we stop this?” Buffy asked. “How do you transpossess someone?” Buffy, as usual, was looking for solutions while everyone else was still focused on the problem. It was one of the things Willow loved about her friend, the Slayer.

  “I’m afraid I still don’t have all the pieces,” Giles replied. “Accounts of the Primals and their methods are a bit thin on the ground. There is some talk of a predatory act, but the exact ritual is . . .” He shook his head, and picked up one of his massive books. He flipped to a certain page, and continued. “The ‘Malleus Maleficarum’ deals with the particulars of demonic possession, which may apply.”

  He put the book down on the table, flipping a few more pages. “Yes, one should be able to transfer the spirits to another human —”

  “Oh, thanks, great,” Buffy interrupted. “Any volunteers?”

  “Oh,” he said, his voice small. “Good point.”

  Buffy went on. “What we need to do is put the hyena back in the hyena.”

  “But, until we know more —” Giles began.

  Buffy was onto something, an idea, and Willow got a little thrill from watching her dog its trail. “Betcha that zookeeper can help us. Maybe he didn’t quarantine those hyenas ’cause they were sick.”

  Giles seemed to catch on. “We should talk to him.”

  Propelled by her own enthusiasm, Buffy started for the door, then stopped again. “Oh, wait,” she said. “Somebody’s gotta watch Xander.”

  Willow stood. “I will.”

  “Are you sure?” Buffy asked. “If he wakes up —”

  “I’ll be all right. Go.” Willow’s voice was firm. She held her hand out, and Buffy put the cage keys in it.

  “Come on,” she said to Giles. They left, and Willow was alone again, in the dark library.

  Except for Xander, still out cold in the cage. She tucked the keys into the pocket of her skirt.

  Jessamyn walked through the park almost every night. The Southern California climate let her do that, not like where she’d moved from, in Michigan, where the winters were long and kept her inside most of the time. Here, the evening was cool but refreshing, and she liked the walk, the feel of the grass under her tennies, the bounce of the baby in his backpack, moving and breathing and sometimes gurgling against her back. These walks had helped her keep her sanity, stay centered after having him, and she thought he liked them too.

  But tonight’s was different.

  There were buildings, not a hundred feet away. People in them, having dinner, watching TV, reading, bathing their kids.

  Here, beneath shadows cast by moonlight on the bushes, four young people slept on the grass, huddled against each other. They looked like puppies in a box.

  Only, not so cute.

  She’d give them a wide berth. They look like high school kids, Jessamyn thought. But, strange ones.

  Suddenly, eyes flashed silver in the moonlight.

  They were awake.

  Moving, their muscles fluid, like liquid beneath their skin.

  And even worse, growling, low throaty sounds under their breath.

  Looking at her.

  And, she realized, looking at the baby.

  Two boys, two girls. She wasn’t sure which looked meaner.

  Forget the wide berth. She backed away, back toward the buildings, toward the direction from which she’d come, until she felt she’d put some distance between them, and then she turned and ran.

  Afraid they were coming after her, padding silently like wolves, she risked a glance over her shoulder.

  But they weren’t there. They were settling in, as if their nap had been interrupted but they were going back to it. Already losing interest in her.

  She had liked these walks, through the park.

  She knew she never would again.

  “Willow.”

  It was Xander’s voice, from the cage. Willow paused the hyena video. Which, she admitted to herself, is morbidly fascinating. If yucky.

  She turned to face him. “How are you feeling?”

  He tossed her a wry grin. “Like somebody hit me with a desk.” He looked around the cage, registering where he was for the first time. “What am I doing here?”

  Awkward question. “You’re . . . resting.” Awkward answer, too. She walked toward the cage.

  Xander rose, hooking the cage screen with his fingers. “You guys got me locked up now?”

  “’Cause you’re sick. Buffy said —”

  “Oh, yeah,” Xander said, disgusted. “Buffy had her all-purpose solution: punch ’em out and knock ’em down. I’d love to see what she’d do to somebody who was really sick.”

  “That’s not fair,” Willow argued. “Buffy’
s saved both our lives.”

  “Before she showed up, our lives didn’t need that much saving, did they?” Xander said. He had a point, she had to admit. She couldn’t remember a time her life had been in immediate peril of being snuffed out, before Buffy. Since then, there had been several occasions. “Weren’t things a lot simpler when it was just you and me?”

  “Maybe . . .” But then again, there had always been strange deaths and unexplained disappearances in Sunnydale. The town was on a hellmouth, after all. Buffy showing up hadn’t made it worse. Willow and Xander had just become involved a little more personally — But by choice, she reminded herself. We volunteered for Scooby duty. It’s not like she drafted us.

  “When we were alone together,” he went on. She liked the sound of that — hoped she didn’t like it too much. “Willow,” he sighed, “I know there’s something wrong with me. I think it’s getting worse. I can’t just stand around waiting for Buffy to decide it’s time to punch me out again. I want you to help me. I want you.”

  She really liked the sound of that. “I am helping you.”

  “You’re doing what you’re told.”

  “Buffy’s trying to help you too, you know that,” Willow countered. “Or, Xander does.”

  “Yeah, Buffy’s so selfless, always thinking of us. Well, if I’m so dangerous, how come she left you alone with me?” Xander’s voice was low and warm — almost as if the cage between them was fading away, and they were the only two people in the world.

  Which was pretty close to what she’d always wanted.

  Too close . . .

  “I told her to.”

  “Why?” Xander asked.

  “Because I know you better than she does,” Willow answered. “And I wanted to be here to see if you were still you.”

  “You know I am. Look at me.” She did, and she saw Xander. The boy she’d known most of her life. The boy she had always harbored dreams of being with. Of dating, marrying, growing old with. “Look,” he said again.

  She moved closer to the cage, wanting to touch him, smooth his hair, kiss his cheek where it was red from being hit.

  Which was when he lunged, shoving his arm through an opening in the cage’s doorway. Reaching for the keys dangling from her skirt pocket.

  She jerked back, avoiding his grasp.

  “Now I know,” she said, with resignation.

  Xander lost all pretense of intimacy, of friendship. He pounded at the cage with his fists. “Let me out!” he screamed, fury in his voice. “Let me out!”

  The zookeeper’s office was bigger than Buffy expected. He seemed to know his stuff. There were diplomas and certificates of honor on the wall, as well as photographs, African masks and weapons, and other memorabilia. In the center of the room he had a light table. Transparencies were laid on top of it, and the light from below shone up through them, making them easier to see.

  For Giles, anyway, who seemed to know what he was looking at. They were meaningless to her.

  “ . . . the students have been possessed by the hyenas,” the zookeeper was saying. His manner was somehow reassuring, his voice level and calm.

  “Yes,” Giles said.

  “Are you sure?”

  “We’re really, really sure,” Buffy replied.

  “You don’t seem enormously surprised by this,” Giles suggested.

  “The zoo imported those hyenas from Africa,” the zookeeper said. “There was something strange about them from day one. I did some homework. That particular breed is very rare. Totally vicious. Historically, they were worshipped by these guys —”

  “The Primals,” Giles offered.

  “Yeah. Creepy guys. Now they had rituals for taking the hyenas’ spirits, but I don’t see how that could have happened to your kids.”

  “We don’t know exactly how the ritual works,” Giles said. “We know it involves a predatory act and some kind of symbol.”

  “A predatory act. Of course. That makes sense. Where did you read that?”

  Giles seemed to sense a kindred spirit. “Do you have Sherman Jeffries’s work on cults and —”

  Giles can go on for days with this stuff, Buffy thought. Better get back on track. “Boys!” she interrupted.

  “Sorry,” Giles said.

  The zookeeper glanced at his watch. “Look, I think we may have enough information so that together we can pull off a reverse transpossession.”

  “What do we do?” Buffy asked.

  “You gotta get those possessed students to the hyena cage right away,” he said. “I’ll meet you there and we can begin the ritual.”

  “Well, we can guarantee you one of them,” Buffy said. “But there’re four more and we don’t know where they are.”

  “I wouldn’t worry about that,” the zookeeper explained. “After hyenas feed and rest, they will track the missing member of their pack until they find him. They should come right to you.”

  Buffy caught Giles’s glance. “Willow,” she breathed.

  Xander paced in the cage like — Okay, why deny it? Like a caged animal. Willow was keeping her distance, now. He’d made his move, and she had dodged him, and now the keys to this trap were across the room.

  To make it worse, she was watching hyena video, over and over again. He could see the screen, hear the laughter of the pack on tape. He could almost smell the blood, taste the raw flesh. But just almost.

  “Willow . . .” he said.

  She glanced over her shoulder at him. “I’m not listening.” Turned back to the screen. She didn’t even want to look at him. Well, that’s okay with me. I don’t want to look at her either. Just want that key.

  Another boy wouldn’t have heard the faintest scuffling sounds from outside the library, wouldn’t have caught the scent on the other side of the windows. But Xander wasn’t another boy. He was something else, now. Something more. He’d been transformed. He heard, he smelled. And the scent was familiar.

  When he heard the voice, that was familiar too. Soft, taunting.

  “Wil-lowww . . .” it said.

  The Pack.

  CHAPTER 5

  They had come for him.

  “Wil-lowww . . .” The voice belonged to Kyle. Xander had known they wouldn’t just let him rot in here. They were his friends. His real friends. Not the losers he’d grown up with, or Buffy, the so-called Slayer. The Pack were the ones who really cared about what happened to him.

  “Xander, shut up,” Willow said.

  “Wil-lowww . . .” Kyle called again.

  Xander saw her shoulders tense as she realized the voice wasn’t his. She didn’t have time to react more than that, because suddenly they were crashing through the library windows. Glass rained onto the floor.

  She leapt from her seat and ran out the door, like the coward he’d long suspected she was.

  He kicked at the cage. Anxious to be free, on the prowl again.

  They came for him. The Pack. They tugged at the cage, their combined strength breaking the heavy wire screen, tearing and bending until they ripped the door from its very hinges.

  Xander was free.

  The Pack came to him, surrounded him. They sniffed each other, touched each other the way members of a Pack do.

  Yes, he was home, with them.

  But, he realized, she was out there somewhere. Willow. Loose on the school grounds. She was scared, but she could still be dangerous to them. To the Pack. She had to be found, and stopped.

  Xander led the hunt.

  Willow turned a corner, ran to the first classroom door she saw. Grabbed the knob.

  Locked.

  Oh, no, she thought. She could hear the sounds from the library, knew the cage had been breached. Knew they were on their way.

  And they ate Principal Flutie. And even Herbert.

  Xander’s with them now, but Xander isn’t really Xander.

  If they catch me. . .

  She crossed the hall to another door. This one opened. She darted inside, shutting the door quietly beh
ind her. Who knows how well they can hear?

  Or smell?

  Inside the darkened room, she threaded her way between the desks, crawled into the footwell of the teacher’s desk, and pulled the chair into position in front of her.

  It wasn’t much, but it looked like the best she could do.

  At the intersection, the Pack split up. Kyle, Rhonda, and Tor each went in different directions. Heidi followed Xander.

  He smelled the air.

  If there was one thing he knew, after all these years, it was Willow’s scent.

  That door.

  Heidi sniffed, maybe catching it too.

  Xander opened the door.

  The room was dark. Quiet. He and Heidi walked among the desks, alert. Sniffing.

  Willow remained crouched under the desk. She knew someone was in the room. No telling who. She heard soft footfalls. Someone breathing.

  Then footsteps receding, and the door closing.

  Safe.

  She’d done it. Now she just had to find help.

  She shoved the chair back, came out of her hiding place.

  Xander was waiting. Heidi had moved on, but he’d stayed here, convinced she was in the room. If there was one thing he knew. . .

  She started when she saw him, gasped. He gave a little roar and lunged at her, across the teacher’s desk.

  She evaded him, and ran.

  He gave chase, but she upended a chair as she went, and he tripped over it.

  Hit the floor.

  She reached the door, flung it open.

  Into Heidi’s arms.

  Willow screamed.

  Heidi growled, forcing the girl back into the room. Where Xander waited.