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"That's real creative, Miss Whoever!" Cordelia came behind Nick with a knowing look, much to the chagrin of Charisma. "Buffy would have done something much snappier."
"Yeah, so I'll work on my comebacks later," Sarah muttered. "This is a bit more serious."
"Let's run down the troops," Xander said in a mocking tone, foolishly trying to postpone the inevitable. "Me, my body double, *Cordelia*, *Cordelia's* body double, Giles, the guy who looks like Giles, and Buffy, only not Buffy." He paused, looked at Spike, and gulped audibly. "We are SO dead."
"I'm afraid so," Spike grinned, coming down the steps nonchalantly and crossing towards Sarah. "Sickness or no sickness, I can always use a little Slayer-death to cheer me up."
Sarah Michelle Gellar, twenty, Hollywood ingenue and television star, faced the vampire in the eye. And, as he came towards her, fangs bared, she did not waste her time on screaming.
With a high-pitched yip, Sarah chopped Spike in the face. He fell to the floor, smarting, but stood up quickly and, with a click of the tongue, came back to her neck ...
Xander was confused. "If that's not Buffy, she's still pretty ..."
Giles removed a scythe-shaped stake from his jacket pocket, miraculously, and rushed at one of the vampires, letting loose a flurry of kicks.
Cordelia stepped next to her sparring partner. "Xander, this is beyond weird."
Joss paused, a slow smile creeping onto his face, and typed some more. David tried to contain a laugh.
"What are you doing?" Buffy cried impatiently. "We're getting nowhere here! You don't even know if what you're typing is actually affecting anything. You don't know if that's even what's going on."
Willow glanced at her friend mirthfully. "I have to admit, though," Buffy conceded, the thought of Giles slaying vampires is pretty ..."
"Extraordinary," finished Joss. "Trust me, it's working. I have a file where I put all my story ideas, and I'm sure that's the magic wand." Buffy raised an eyebrow in disbelief.
"Okaaaaaay," the creator said hesitantly. "If you want proof, you got proof." There was a flurry of keystrokes. Before the Slayer could even answer, Angel was upon her. The tall, muscular vampire swept her up into his arms, enveloping Buffy's blonde head and clenching her in a passionate kiss. They broke apart, both sending each other a mixture of surprise and pleasure in their eyes. Willow rushed past a smirking David and leaned over Joss' shoulder, peeking at the screen of his laptop.
"Suddenly," she read aloud, "Angel strode across the room and pulled Buffy to him, filling her with his strong scent and covering her with the greatest kiss she'd ever had." Buffy felt her lips absently, trying to recover the sensation. Willow turned to Angel.
"It's amazing!" she cried. Joss typed some more, then cast his word processor a fearful glance. "Uh-oh," he said. "Uh-oh."
"What's the uh-oh?" Buffy asked softly, still reeling a little. Angel gave her a heart-melting smile.
"Listen!" Joss cried, and typed a few words more. And, as if listening to the neighbor's stereo, everyone in the trailer could hear it now.
"James!" whispered Juliet, but she was shushed by Joss, who shook his head ominously.
"You see," Spike was saying, "I thought that it would be a good way to get my strength back by hijacking Mr. Marsters. You know, channel his power from that worthless human body to mine. So, once we coaxed and prodded the world of technology, look what it gave to us! *I love* Netscape!"
Back in the library, Giles withdrew his stake and glanced at the vampire cautiously. "That's, uh, quite useful."
Tony scampered over to his double. "Why is Spike telling us his whole plan? I mean, I know that's a cliche, but no one even asked for it."
"Hold on!" Xander called gleefully. "Look!"
There was Sarah again. But, this time, she was different. Much different. She still wore the same clothes and was the same young woman in body. But, as she lifted her head towards the vampire, there was a different fire in her eyes.
"Buffy?" Giles whispered. She didn't answer. Instead, the brown belt was flying through the air, cat-like, doing a neat front handspring across the table and bringing a heavy book down onto the heads of one of the unsuspecting vampires. With an abbreviated hop, she crunched the dry wood through the unconscious bloodsucker's heart. Standing on the table now, she had Spike's attention, and she smiled sexily.
"I was never a big reader," Sarah deadpanned as Cordelia looked on in admiration.
"She *has* been working on her put-downs!" the cheerleader said to Nick. He shook his head at her and turned -- towards a huge vampire coming their way! -- and, nonchalantly, hoisted Cordelia in the air. Before the vampire knew what hit him, he was dust. Brushing off Cordelia's shoe while still keeping her horizontal, Nick lowered her to the floor and tore a chunk of wood from the library staircase.
"Insta-stake!" he replied, as Cordy sighed wistfully.
"That's ingenious," Willow replied as she knelt next to Joss. "The way you've set everything up ... it's so cool!"
Buffy wanted to tell Willow that she was gushing just a little too much over the guy that probably had weird thoughts of them at night and got paid for it, but she was too busy with her new task. Easier said than done, it was, to fight vampires while not actually being present at the battle. Still, when she closed her eyes, the Slayer could see her foes as if she were really there. And Sarah was an excellent mouthpiece, or, more accurately, bodypiece, for her moves. No wonder she played the Slayer -- she could, when called upon, Slay. The teen wondered what her actress-double was thinking as she felt another person take command over her body. It was probably an extremely confusing feeling.
Across the room, Angel was having just as much fun with Nick. If this actor had the same body as Xander, they both ought to be good fighters. The vampire easily channeled his superhuman strength into the twenty-something Californian, not to mention his ingenuity. And the fact that Cordelia kept hanging on Nick made Angel even *more* comfortable with his unfortunate surroundings ...
"But I have one question," Aly said from Joss' left side.
On his right, Willow completed: "Why are you making Buffy and Angel fight for Sarah and Nick if you already know how to stop the fight in a second?"
"Yeah," Miss Hannigan muttered, eyeing her "role" suspiciously. "That's what I meant."
Peering at David and Juliet, cloistered in a corner, Joss smiled for a moment. He then abruptly turned back to the redheads. "I don't know, really. I was just having too much fun." He grinned like a toddler pulling wings off bugs. "Like, watch this."
Aly read aloud as the words appeared on the man's keyboard. "Spike suddenly fell flat on his face. Trying to get up, he was pulled back even harder to the marble library floor. A third time, the vampire attempted to bring himself to standing, only now tripping over his own boots. Giles stopped to watch the comedy, quite befuddled." She shook her head in disbelief. "Joss, you're nuts."
Xander was having *too* much fun. Now that Buffy-girl was kicking some butt, he could sit back and divide his time between two very cool shows: Xander Man in action (the part where he staked the vampire with Cordelia's wooden clog was TOO cool, Xander thought to himself) and the lost Fourth Stooge, Spike. At the moment, the second one was in full swing. The formerly menacing vampire now couldn't even manage to stand on two feet. The slacker munched casually on a Ring-Ding, slumped in a wooden chair in the thick of the fight. Most of the vampires were staked, though, and the live ones were too busy watching their master do a Shemp.
Tony turned to Giles. "If I didn't know better, I would say that the real players are doing this. Perhaps Joss has gotten into the act."
The Watcher still wasn't clear on the exact mythology of this "Joss" god, but he was sure that there was a certain measure of omnipotency involved in the man's capacity. So he wasn't about to argue.
Then, there was a blinding flash of light. Charisma stumbled to the floor, blinking hard. "What was THAT?" she asked, helped up by a flamboyantly dashing Xander. "Thanks."
"Don't mention it, my lady," he replied, switching back to Teen Boy mode. "Yeah, so what was up with that, Giles?"
"I don't know," said the Watcher. "Perhaps ..." He wanted to ask Sarah Gellar, the actress who played Buffy, if she knew what went on. After all, within the space of a millisecond, Spike and his vampires - not that there were that many left - had vanished, and the boy who played Xander was no longer swatting evildoers away like flies.
He wanted to ask her to explain. But she was gone.
Sarah rushed at Joss. "THANK YOU!" she cried.
"Was it that bad?" her boss asked, eyes glinting.
"Hey." She shrugged sarcastically. "You made it up. Man, being inside your head, Joss ... never want to do THAT again."
"Oh, shut up!" He slammed her playfully in the arm. "No kidding. There's
work to be done."