Categories > TV > Buffy the Vampire Slayer > BUFFY Meets STAR TREK
- Final Battle -
--Blood Of The Damned--
36
Xander and Freeman followed the team's trail through the woods.
Dusk was slowly dissolving into sunset above them as they moved veraciously through the dark and thick bamboo trees that grew in a tangle all around them. Xander couldn't see beyond 10 metres in any direction making it difficult to even say where they had come from. At his feet, the loamy soil was covered with a carpet of dead leaves and shoots. From this sprouted the beginnings of new trees creating a landscape clustered with tender young leaves.
Xander held back so as not to spoil the path before them. Dave had shouldered one of his rifles and Xander gave him cover as he stooped to the ground and tracked their route. Lowering his head and testing the land with his fingertips, he identified areas of trampled leaves and broken shoots that showed recent activity. He separated the tracks from those made by animals by the clear transference of dirt onto a squashed leaf in she print of a Starfleet issue boot. It showed the direction of the Alpha Team.
"This way," Freeman signalled and moved off at 11 o'clock.
Xander fell in line behind him. He came to a sudden standstill when he walked into the back of the captain.
"Harris," said the frozen captain in a troubled tone.
Xander saw what waited for them beyond Freeman's shoulders. A light fog hung in the air before them and within it a group of dark misshapen figures blocked their way.
Freeman slipped the second rifle from his shoulder. "Let's go around."
"Um...Dave." Twice the number of them lay behind. "This's gonna slow us down."
"No it's not. Go."
"What?"
"Take this." He threw Xander his second rifle and pulled out his hand phaser. "Go find them. I'll hold these monsters back."
Xander looked to the few creatures ahead and back to the crowd behind. He couldn't' leave Captain Freeman here to face possibly a dozen of these Hellions. But, at the same time, his desire to reach Buffy was urgent.
Dave gave him an assuring nod.
Xander hesitated briefly, then he lifted both large guns and spun them ahead and pressed onward, blasting his way out of the snare.
Freeman stood alone. He held out the weapons as the demons and zombies moved in around him. Surrounded by a ring of nightmare creatures, he circled with his guns looking for movement. Partly he was reluctant to start firing because he knew that once he did... it would be over.
The rifle suddenly left his hand; whipped away by the foul and stretched tongue of a Zunge Demon. Winding its tumorous surface around the barrel, it wrenched the gun from his grip. The weapon yanked into a massive frog-maw and crunched in half. A second later it disappeared in a gulp.
Freeman wheeled around with his hand phaser. But they didn't advance. Standing. Staring. The way they watched him with their ghostly static presence grew increasingly unnerving with every second. Each of these monsters was a weapon of a kind he couldn't comprehend. Some had visible weapons - claws, teeth, knives. The terrifying potential of them frightened him. They frightened him because of the one thing he was truly afraid of.
Death.
Here he was facing these impossible odds after all the combat he'd lived through and all the horrors he'd seen. He'd been dodging death since he was a child on the Venus-3 colony. Battled the Dominion dozens of times and even survived the recent space battle. He wondered... /After everything/... Could it all really end here?
"Is this it? Really?" he said aloud. In reply the bullfrog snorted. Captain Dave Freeman had always expected to go out like Kirk - after a long life of death-dodging and in one final blaze of glory.
And, still, the creatures didn't advance.
He lowered his weapon, utterly overcome by the unreality of facing the knowledge that his life was over.
Disbelief soon became a peaceful calm when it suddenly hit him; he couldn't actually imagine his life beyond that point. Couldn't visualise a future. It seemed his mind had accepted the situation rather quickly.
"So...here endeth the mission?"
It had to happen sometime.
The zombies didn't advance. The demons didn't advance. They just watched him and his calm threatened to revert to fear.
Dave loosened and tightened his grip on the phaser nervously. "Come on. What are you waiting for?"
Nothing stirred. But, when his roving eye stopped, he saw that one of the monstrosities wore a vulgar and satisfied grin.
"Come on!" the captain incited. "I know what you're doing!" He raised his phaser. "Drawing out my fear." He aimed it square in the face of the frog beast. "Well, damn it, you've had all you're getting. I won't let you delay this any longer. If it's my time - /Come on/!"
Freeman set aside reality for one brief moment. He squeezed the trigger and opened fire.
*
Rhamhal returned to the open glade naked, his blood pumping for more slaughter. Over in the distance Worf still lay paralysed. Not far lay the broken captain. They were insignificant to him now. His sights turned right toward the trapped girl where the android stood. She was the one he was going to take apart. He stopped. The Slayer was gone.
Data still stood before him alone in the same frozen pose...only...with no arms.
The shoulders of his mining coat ended and then there was nothing. Rhamhal moved to the mechanical man, surveying the clearing for the Slayer. When he reached the android, the signs on the ground gave him good indication of where she'd gone. Into the woods. He took back his coat from Data and threw it on to give him a degree of modesty. The underlying fact was... he was beginning to feel a chill and he hated the sensation.
Darkness slipped away into the trees to stalk his prey.
*
Buffy sheathed her recovered bat'leth and scaled the thickest of the nearby bamboo trees. She was in the thick of the jungle preparing for the coming of Darkness. She was rushing up the tree now feeling time was short. Loosening Data's grip on her wrists had taken longer than she liked even after she'd snapped off his limbs. Now the arms were scattered back in the clearing.
Reaching the summit of the thick tree, she found her weight began to bend it. She caught herself on a second tree and held herself there - 30ft above the ground - by her arms; her legs drawn up and ready. She already heard him approaching.
The raven antichrist drifted cautiously through the woodland and seemed to pick up on something. He stopped beneath her and scanned around.
Buffy released herself... but, mid-drop, Rhamhal casts his attention to her wickedly, firing a poisonous barb at her. She reacted quickly and threw back her head. The barb shot by her - skimming her chin. With her eyes drawn upward, she smashed into the earth ass-first and lost her lungs.
Rhamhal appeared over her prone body, and pounded his foot into her face - burying her head into the mud. Taking her by the bodysuit, he dragged her out of the slime and smacked her into a tree. He formed a fist and punched her repeatedly under the ribs until she began to gasp for breath and then he struck her hard in the face.
Buffy yelped at the last punch, which made his day. Rhamhal lifted her again by the collar of her suit and threw her harshly, jarring her against a tree. She hit the soft floor and rolled to a crouch.
She winced and shook off the stinging sensations about her body. When she looked up, Buffy saw something that harked back to their first meeting on the traders' planet.
Her enemy moved through the trees slowly, his long coat drifting around his legs. Darkness in his eyes. Those eyes fixed on hers.
It was showtime. Again. Only this time... he was a man.
She coiled and sprang.
They ran at each other.
Buffy left the ground with an arc kick that lifted Rhamhal and knocked him down.
He raised his legs in a spin that brought him to his feet as the Slayer landed. She moved in with a punch that he caught, hooking a leg behind hers and pushing against her collar. She twisted and fell to the dirt. Rhamhal drew back he leg and kicked her flying into a bamboo trunk.
She came to rest on her knees and slammed a fist into his gut. She struck his face twice, dropped under his wild punch, and sent an elbow into his stomach before bashing his chin with an uppercut.
Rhamhal stopped her next blow with his forearm and slapped her with the back of his hand. Grabbing hold of her arm, he twisted it in a knot and jabbed a knee into her.
She recoiled and palmed him away. As she returned an attack, he took hold of the sides of his coat and whipped her face with its tails. The pain of the material slapping across her cheeks was intense and she took a spin-kick to him. He caught it and used his arm as a noose around her neck. Moving behind her, he fisted her in the spine. She cried out, enraged, and took his head; flipping him over her shoulder. But, as he landed, he kicked her across the head and Buffy stumbled back. Rhamhal picked up a length of bamboo as he stood and cracked it across her skull. The Slayer whipped around and crashed to the earth.
Rhamhal breathed a heavy sigh and disposed of the bamboo stem. He knelt by the Slayer and turned her over. She was out cold.
"Sleeping beauty," he remarked, gripping her jaw. "You're too easy to K.O, little girl."
With her plaited tail in his hand, he dragged her unconscious body from the forest and into the clearing once again. He wanted to take her to the canyon and wake her up. Then he wanted to see her fly. On the way he planned to use the local plant life to barb her. That way she would be no further trouble.
Halfway through the glade, Picard began to groan and move slightly. Rhamhal releases the girl. It looked like Picard needed more encouragement to stay down.
But Buffy was far from unconscious. The pain of being pulled by her hair had been worth it to reach this moment.
She rolled and threw an arm back. Buffy unsheathes her sword and sliced it through the back of her enemy's ankles.
Rhamhal cried out and froze.
Buffy didn't. She slammed her arm up into the back of his coat and bashed his testicles with all her might.
He wheezed and folded to his knees. Rhamhal's fall stopped when his hands met the grass and he growled with distress. He couldn't even attempt to stand as his feet were torn and folded beneath his legs.
Yet, he did not bleed. Not from his ankles, nor from the apparent wound Buffy now saw in his thigh. She watched his misery and struggling for a time, quite satisfied with herself.
Picard recovered gradually and joined her in standing before the fallen villain. "He is defeated?" he asked, unsure exactly what constituted defeat in her universe.
Buffy gave her head a shake. "He still has the power of Mastery," she replied.
"That's right and I always will!" Rhamhal spat out despite his crippled state. "You really think this weak flesh can contain my awesome power?"
"No," said Buffy. "What I really think is you talk a lot and make big with the noise. If you ever decide to change vocation you might wanna think about PR work. I just wouldn't represent yourself if I were you."
Picard looked across to her strangely.
"And what of the verbal garbage that oozes from you almost every second?" he returned bitterly.
"I can back up words with actions, Darko. Or did you miss the part where I just kicked your ass? And you should avoid trying to piss me off. It may seriously damage your health."
"What can you do, Slayer? You are NOTHING to me! I command an ARMY!"
Buffy laughed a little forcedly. "You command /nothing/. You enslave souls - force obedience. There's no loyalty there. No following. You're nothing but a sad puppetmaster."
His eyes stabbed at her and he bore his teeth with a snarl.
*
Freeman saw 5 of them vaporise before the others had the chance to retaliate. But they did retaliate.
The first to reach him was a vile little creature with short legs and long arms. It hooked his feet and took them from under him.
Freeman reeled as he fell to the ground, cutting himself against the brittle bamboo shards. The pain hadn't passed when he realised his hands were empty and his phaser was gone. He felt the racing need to scramble. To recover before they overwhelm him. To find his weapon before-
Dave let out a wild cry. He howled as something with an unnatural number of teeth bit down on his right thigh and tore out a good chunk of his flesh. The unbelievable pain threatened to knock him clean out but what he saw next he would never forget and it roused him from his stupor.
He saw the hideous monster chewing on the ripped meat of his leg. He saw the many others that drew up to him and loomed over his damaged frame.
And, then, he saw them vanish one by one in swirls of steaming mist.
Phaser fire blasted overhead and ate away his attackers and Freeman angled back his head to see the shape of Xander Harris; the rifles in his hands erupting with fire.
Dave lost consciousness. He knew because his next experience was of being raised to a sitting position by Harris. Xander lifted him into a seated position against a tree. Freeman grunted at the pain of movement and looked to his new hero. Xander's face gradually came into focus.
"We need to get you to the medical camp," Xander said wisely then tied off the blood to his leg with a length of material from Dave's own uniform.
But Freeman shook his head and insisted that Xander go on. "I'll call in the cavalry and be in the hands of a nurse in no time, Harris. You need to find the others and make sure they finish the mission. The mission..."
After a few more seconds of cajoling, Xander - sweating like crazy in the humid jungle - stripped away his Starfleet jacket and shirt until he wore just the uniform vest, picked up his rifles, and went running into the distant forest.
Freeman sagged back and sighed. He tapped his badge and, with all the breath he could muster, said: "Freeman to med-centre... I think I could use a doctor here. When you're free."
*
Picard fought to reinforce himself against the pain of his broken ribs as Worf stumbled back to them unsteadily, still numb from the barbs.
Darkness had promised the Slayer would fail in her mission to bind him... and now he was flesh. He had promised her death... and now he was crippled. He could still achieve his goal, however. It would simply take a new tactic to get there. Using the knowledge he'd gained from the android, he targeted Picard's Starfleet sensibility:
"Captain Picard. I appeal to you. ...I give myself over willingly into your custody. All your questions I shall answer. I will be no further burden but I will open your eyes to knowledge beyond anything your Federation can conceive. You must accept. As a Starfleet officer, you must accept my surrender."
The captain considered him carefully. He knew one thing: Rhamhal had power of a kind that no prison he knew of could contain. When the Summers girl stepped into his view with an expression of such severity it threatened to turn her pretty face ugly, it underlined the fact that this was her realm.
"Finish this." He turned from them and helped Worf to stand.
"You're Starfleet!" Rhamhal screamed out. "You MUST accept!"
"You're the only one here having trouble accepting," Buffy said.
Darkness killed her a thousand times over with his eyes in that instant. "If you strike me down, Slayer, I shall become more powerful than you can possibly imagine."
Buffy rolled her eyes. "I won't even comment on that line. And, by the way, your power comes from your mind now. A physical thing. I like physical things. Take an ass for example. A physical ass is so much easier to kick than a spooky one, don't you agree? ...Like a physical power-source is a lot easier to disconnect." The Slayer raised her bat'leth above her shoulder like a baseball pro. "I hear Hell's pretty hot this time of year. Send me a postcard. Let me know."
Darkness uttered his final words as the Slayer drew back her sword. "I will be back."
She swung the crescent blade around and cut clean through his neck. "No," she replied. "You won't."
Rhamhal's head drifted away from his neck and tumbled to the heath.
*
Out in the foggy stretch of the valley, 326 dead bodies withered. Their strings were cut and their lifeless bones collapsed in final death. The dozens of surviving demons that fought by their side lost their coherence and stopped suddenly as their minds and memories were thrown into chaos. The few that continued their attack - powered by a crazed animal instinct - were soon shot, cut, and beaten down. Within a matter of minutes, the war had become a clean-up.
*
Rhamhal's severed corpse lay fallen and defeated at the Slayer's feet. She was very happy to finally put her sword to rest in its place on her back.
It was done.
Now came the exhilaration she always felt after a big win. She wanted to smile and gloat but, in all truth, her energy was expended. She wanted nothing more than to return to a comfortable room where she could bathe and rest. Then she planned to meet with her friends and enjoy a lengthy session of 'trash the fallen bad guy'. She would start by telling them all about how small his... well... there would be time for that later. Now the priorities were: bath, bed. Then fun. Nothing else was worth thinking about until after then.
"Some freaks never know when to quit," she said to the captain. He was holding Worf up, even despite his own injuries, and staring at the severed head in the grass. The mist about the body had strangely drawn back to unveil it in all its horrific glory.
"There's no blood," Picard noted, somewhat disturbed by events. "Is that...normal?"
Buffy eyed the blackness within Rhamhal's open neck. Like his veins were filled with solid tar it seemed to her. "When it comes to demons, Captain, unusual is usual. His blood is just...different." She suddenly thought of her mom and sister. Two people that shared her own blood. /Evil is evil/, she thought, /and Darkness is Darkness /... it's in his blood.
"The blood of the damned..." she muttered distantly. As the father was damned to Hell, so too would that damnation be with his son.
Blood. Her dreams. Danger. Death.
Rhamhal was dead. And, for all his talk, one thing he said did make sense to her when she considered it. Something about 'this flesh won't contain my power'. She wondered if he'd really meant his Mastery... or if he was talking about his true power... his Evil...
Or, she could just be paranoid.
"Is he...?" Picard began. "...Is it over?"
She relaxed and let it go. "It is," she replied, then went to Worf and helped the captain bare his weight.
The three of them began to hobble and limp away from the whole terrible episode when an unnerving sound - like the sizzling of bacon - froze them in their tracks.
Buffy removed Worf's arm from her shoulders and, with a heavy sense of foreboding, turned back to see the skin burning away from Rhamhal's carcass.
Picard spun Worf around.
What he saw threatened to break his resolve and plunge him into insanity.
The flesh and meat of the cadaver melted away with a smell beyond unbearable, leaving behind the mass with an oily blackness that harked to something unmentionable and Lovecraftian in nature.
The neck sprouted something bone-like that joined with the form of the severed head and the two came together as one creature again.
And then it moved. Opening up like a moth from a cocoon, the surface unfurled to reveal a sight that gripped even the Slayer's heart with icy panic.
A pair of massive shadowy wings stretched out.
Standing before them - three metres in height and not a millimetre less - an atramentous ebony Demon Bat - straight out of the deepest bowels of Hell.
The wings, rough and inky, were tipped with sharp bony spines. Its emaciated form bore hands of thin dark bone that ended in talons almost a foot in length. And the head, with its bony rows of horns that lined the chin, cheeks and forehead was frightening beyond description. Its eyes, thin and empty, seemed to see everywhere at once. And the fangs... they made a vampire's teeth look like toothpicks.
Buffy stood quite far away... yet she took a step back.
"Miss Summers?" It was Picard.
"Don't panic," she said, fighting her own.
The enormous horned skull turned to her and those eyes lit up and burned with fire.
Her tired hands made fists. "Now we're seeing the real you."
It squealed a horrid piercing cry and stormed her.
The Slayer hauled out the bat'leth from its sheath, went in under the snapping claws, and drove it through the demon's waist. It stopped suddenly on impact just below the thick tar-like surface and began to fry. The beast's touch burned!
Darkness took her by the arm and lifted her into the air. She screamed as her snared limb began to boil. She couldn't bare it. Kicking out, she caught the monster in the eye and it flung her into a pile on the ground.
She winced and cradled her charred flesh as it shot needles through the length of her arm. Nevertheless, she recovered her feet as Darkness tore out the sword from its side and threw it sizzling into the soft grass.
She charged and kicked it but the thing barely moved and she quickly found herself ducking as it made repeated swings at her. Until she gave up and dived away. She simply couldn't go on. Her melting arm had stricken her with remarkable pain that she couldn't fight through. Even in her best state... she wondered where to start with this undeniably pure demon.
Darkness delivered that cutting scream again.
Captain Picard tried to hurry Worf away but stumbled and tripped to the floor.
The demon viewed them one time finally. Its wings opened up to their full length in a threatening gesture. A predatory animal's method of intimidation. And it worked.
Worf recognised the attack formation of a Bird of Prey in those wings and he prayed for strength to stand. Before him, Buffy rose to her feet. His admiration for her threatened to rival that he had for the great Kahless. She was going to fight this horror to the very end of her and he marvelled at the bravery of the girl. Though part of him put it down to shear stubbornness.
Buffy held up her smoking sword and waited for the final attack. She knew this one would be the last because Darkness had given them the signal. He was preparing for his finishing move.
The mammoth wings flung back to form a shark fin and Darkness lowered his horned face. The mouth of it opened unnaturally wide and from it a shimmering jet of fiery air streamed out - burning up the heath until only ash remained. The head craned up and the scorching breath moved swiftly and destructively toward her - tearing up everything in its blazing path.
The sword fell from her hand. Buffy had nowhere to run.
"HEY!"
The heat subsided abruptly as Darkness paused and turned to the rise of land that led into the clearing.
Midshipman Xander Harris appeared on the hillock with 2 rifles braced against his bare arms. Cool as a snowman's cold bits, he thrust out his chin and said: "Eat hot phaser, demon scum."
Two orange globes of phased energy blasted from the guns and the Angel of Hell drew in his wings as a shield.
The balls of fire beat through the ebony cocoon and burned into the heart of Darkness. They all witnessed as the fire consumed the beast until all that remained of it were footprints in the dirt.
For Buffy and the two fallen members of her team, the next few seconds stretched out for much longer as they were unable to remove their eyes from the spot where the monster had stood just moments before. Now even the vapour of its destruction was gone from sight.
Still, they were frozen. Their sudden and unexpected deliverance proved too much to take in.
Xander took a deep breath of air. "Our work is done here." He threw the guns over his shoulder. "Let's go," he went on, "before I drown in my own sweat, thank you."
Buffy, a little bewildered, faced him. Picard and Worf also turned to regard him. Then the three of them leapt out of their skin suddenly when the pouches around the men's necks vanished in a golden wisp of light.
Buffy chuckled. Her arm burned like...well...hell. But, damn it, she was happy.
"Eat hot phaser?" she called to Xander after a time.
He scaled the slope and shrugged. "Well, I was gonna go with 'yippee-ki-yay'... but I heard some other vest-aficionado got there first. You know a better one?"
Buffy gave it brief consideration. "...Hasta-la-phaser, baby?"
"Damn."
Picard helped Worf to clamber up and Xander rushed in to support them. At the same time, Buffy collected the android's arms from the spot she'd left them.
She took one final look around and followed the men away.
As they left, Picard slapped his combadge on Data's armless body. Pattern enhancer aside, Geordi would have to beam him up ASAP to assess the damage to his positronic brain.
As they departed, Xander noted: "It's been a hell of a week."
Buffy huffed dubiously. "It's only been a week?"
And then they were gone.
*
Almost half an hour later, Spike emerged from the jungle like a walking shish kebab with the spear still protruding through his torso. He regarded the empty clearing and knew right away what had happened. "They soddin'-well did it again!"
Forgotten. Yet again. Left for dead without a thought. He was not impressed. He cursed repeatedly under his breath and walked away. Passing the Robo-geek, Spike nonchalantly gave him a good shove.
Data hit the ground with a clunk.
"Ponce."
*
In the centre of the valley plain; in the now still calmness of the battlefield, Commander William T. Riker stood regarding with deep concern the fallen corpse of a giant native bird. Around him he saw a number of others in the same state. He winced quite severely. "This isn't going to look good on the report."
--Blood Of The Damned--
36
Xander and Freeman followed the team's trail through the woods.
Dusk was slowly dissolving into sunset above them as they moved veraciously through the dark and thick bamboo trees that grew in a tangle all around them. Xander couldn't see beyond 10 metres in any direction making it difficult to even say where they had come from. At his feet, the loamy soil was covered with a carpet of dead leaves and shoots. From this sprouted the beginnings of new trees creating a landscape clustered with tender young leaves.
Xander held back so as not to spoil the path before them. Dave had shouldered one of his rifles and Xander gave him cover as he stooped to the ground and tracked their route. Lowering his head and testing the land with his fingertips, he identified areas of trampled leaves and broken shoots that showed recent activity. He separated the tracks from those made by animals by the clear transference of dirt onto a squashed leaf in she print of a Starfleet issue boot. It showed the direction of the Alpha Team.
"This way," Freeman signalled and moved off at 11 o'clock.
Xander fell in line behind him. He came to a sudden standstill when he walked into the back of the captain.
"Harris," said the frozen captain in a troubled tone.
Xander saw what waited for them beyond Freeman's shoulders. A light fog hung in the air before them and within it a group of dark misshapen figures blocked their way.
Freeman slipped the second rifle from his shoulder. "Let's go around."
"Um...Dave." Twice the number of them lay behind. "This's gonna slow us down."
"No it's not. Go."
"What?"
"Take this." He threw Xander his second rifle and pulled out his hand phaser. "Go find them. I'll hold these monsters back."
Xander looked to the few creatures ahead and back to the crowd behind. He couldn't' leave Captain Freeman here to face possibly a dozen of these Hellions. But, at the same time, his desire to reach Buffy was urgent.
Dave gave him an assuring nod.
Xander hesitated briefly, then he lifted both large guns and spun them ahead and pressed onward, blasting his way out of the snare.
Freeman stood alone. He held out the weapons as the demons and zombies moved in around him. Surrounded by a ring of nightmare creatures, he circled with his guns looking for movement. Partly he was reluctant to start firing because he knew that once he did... it would be over.
The rifle suddenly left his hand; whipped away by the foul and stretched tongue of a Zunge Demon. Winding its tumorous surface around the barrel, it wrenched the gun from his grip. The weapon yanked into a massive frog-maw and crunched in half. A second later it disappeared in a gulp.
Freeman wheeled around with his hand phaser. But they didn't advance. Standing. Staring. The way they watched him with their ghostly static presence grew increasingly unnerving with every second. Each of these monsters was a weapon of a kind he couldn't comprehend. Some had visible weapons - claws, teeth, knives. The terrifying potential of them frightened him. They frightened him because of the one thing he was truly afraid of.
Death.
Here he was facing these impossible odds after all the combat he'd lived through and all the horrors he'd seen. He'd been dodging death since he was a child on the Venus-3 colony. Battled the Dominion dozens of times and even survived the recent space battle. He wondered... /After everything/... Could it all really end here?
"Is this it? Really?" he said aloud. In reply the bullfrog snorted. Captain Dave Freeman had always expected to go out like Kirk - after a long life of death-dodging and in one final blaze of glory.
And, still, the creatures didn't advance.
He lowered his weapon, utterly overcome by the unreality of facing the knowledge that his life was over.
Disbelief soon became a peaceful calm when it suddenly hit him; he couldn't actually imagine his life beyond that point. Couldn't visualise a future. It seemed his mind had accepted the situation rather quickly.
"So...here endeth the mission?"
It had to happen sometime.
The zombies didn't advance. The demons didn't advance. They just watched him and his calm threatened to revert to fear.
Dave loosened and tightened his grip on the phaser nervously. "Come on. What are you waiting for?"
Nothing stirred. But, when his roving eye stopped, he saw that one of the monstrosities wore a vulgar and satisfied grin.
"Come on!" the captain incited. "I know what you're doing!" He raised his phaser. "Drawing out my fear." He aimed it square in the face of the frog beast. "Well, damn it, you've had all you're getting. I won't let you delay this any longer. If it's my time - /Come on/!"
Freeman set aside reality for one brief moment. He squeezed the trigger and opened fire.
*
Rhamhal returned to the open glade naked, his blood pumping for more slaughter. Over in the distance Worf still lay paralysed. Not far lay the broken captain. They were insignificant to him now. His sights turned right toward the trapped girl where the android stood. She was the one he was going to take apart. He stopped. The Slayer was gone.
Data still stood before him alone in the same frozen pose...only...with no arms.
The shoulders of his mining coat ended and then there was nothing. Rhamhal moved to the mechanical man, surveying the clearing for the Slayer. When he reached the android, the signs on the ground gave him good indication of where she'd gone. Into the woods. He took back his coat from Data and threw it on to give him a degree of modesty. The underlying fact was... he was beginning to feel a chill and he hated the sensation.
Darkness slipped away into the trees to stalk his prey.
*
Buffy sheathed her recovered bat'leth and scaled the thickest of the nearby bamboo trees. She was in the thick of the jungle preparing for the coming of Darkness. She was rushing up the tree now feeling time was short. Loosening Data's grip on her wrists had taken longer than she liked even after she'd snapped off his limbs. Now the arms were scattered back in the clearing.
Reaching the summit of the thick tree, she found her weight began to bend it. She caught herself on a second tree and held herself there - 30ft above the ground - by her arms; her legs drawn up and ready. She already heard him approaching.
The raven antichrist drifted cautiously through the woodland and seemed to pick up on something. He stopped beneath her and scanned around.
Buffy released herself... but, mid-drop, Rhamhal casts his attention to her wickedly, firing a poisonous barb at her. She reacted quickly and threw back her head. The barb shot by her - skimming her chin. With her eyes drawn upward, she smashed into the earth ass-first and lost her lungs.
Rhamhal appeared over her prone body, and pounded his foot into her face - burying her head into the mud. Taking her by the bodysuit, he dragged her out of the slime and smacked her into a tree. He formed a fist and punched her repeatedly under the ribs until she began to gasp for breath and then he struck her hard in the face.
Buffy yelped at the last punch, which made his day. Rhamhal lifted her again by the collar of her suit and threw her harshly, jarring her against a tree. She hit the soft floor and rolled to a crouch.
She winced and shook off the stinging sensations about her body. When she looked up, Buffy saw something that harked back to their first meeting on the traders' planet.
Her enemy moved through the trees slowly, his long coat drifting around his legs. Darkness in his eyes. Those eyes fixed on hers.
It was showtime. Again. Only this time... he was a man.
She coiled and sprang.
They ran at each other.
Buffy left the ground with an arc kick that lifted Rhamhal and knocked him down.
He raised his legs in a spin that brought him to his feet as the Slayer landed. She moved in with a punch that he caught, hooking a leg behind hers and pushing against her collar. She twisted and fell to the dirt. Rhamhal drew back he leg and kicked her flying into a bamboo trunk.
She came to rest on her knees and slammed a fist into his gut. She struck his face twice, dropped under his wild punch, and sent an elbow into his stomach before bashing his chin with an uppercut.
Rhamhal stopped her next blow with his forearm and slapped her with the back of his hand. Grabbing hold of her arm, he twisted it in a knot and jabbed a knee into her.
She recoiled and palmed him away. As she returned an attack, he took hold of the sides of his coat and whipped her face with its tails. The pain of the material slapping across her cheeks was intense and she took a spin-kick to him. He caught it and used his arm as a noose around her neck. Moving behind her, he fisted her in the spine. She cried out, enraged, and took his head; flipping him over her shoulder. But, as he landed, he kicked her across the head and Buffy stumbled back. Rhamhal picked up a length of bamboo as he stood and cracked it across her skull. The Slayer whipped around and crashed to the earth.
Rhamhal breathed a heavy sigh and disposed of the bamboo stem. He knelt by the Slayer and turned her over. She was out cold.
"Sleeping beauty," he remarked, gripping her jaw. "You're too easy to K.O, little girl."
With her plaited tail in his hand, he dragged her unconscious body from the forest and into the clearing once again. He wanted to take her to the canyon and wake her up. Then he wanted to see her fly. On the way he planned to use the local plant life to barb her. That way she would be no further trouble.
Halfway through the glade, Picard began to groan and move slightly. Rhamhal releases the girl. It looked like Picard needed more encouragement to stay down.
But Buffy was far from unconscious. The pain of being pulled by her hair had been worth it to reach this moment.
She rolled and threw an arm back. Buffy unsheathes her sword and sliced it through the back of her enemy's ankles.
Rhamhal cried out and froze.
Buffy didn't. She slammed her arm up into the back of his coat and bashed his testicles with all her might.
He wheezed and folded to his knees. Rhamhal's fall stopped when his hands met the grass and he growled with distress. He couldn't even attempt to stand as his feet were torn and folded beneath his legs.
Yet, he did not bleed. Not from his ankles, nor from the apparent wound Buffy now saw in his thigh. She watched his misery and struggling for a time, quite satisfied with herself.
Picard recovered gradually and joined her in standing before the fallen villain. "He is defeated?" he asked, unsure exactly what constituted defeat in her universe.
Buffy gave her head a shake. "He still has the power of Mastery," she replied.
"That's right and I always will!" Rhamhal spat out despite his crippled state. "You really think this weak flesh can contain my awesome power?"
"No," said Buffy. "What I really think is you talk a lot and make big with the noise. If you ever decide to change vocation you might wanna think about PR work. I just wouldn't represent yourself if I were you."
Picard looked across to her strangely.
"And what of the verbal garbage that oozes from you almost every second?" he returned bitterly.
"I can back up words with actions, Darko. Or did you miss the part where I just kicked your ass? And you should avoid trying to piss me off. It may seriously damage your health."
"What can you do, Slayer? You are NOTHING to me! I command an ARMY!"
Buffy laughed a little forcedly. "You command /nothing/. You enslave souls - force obedience. There's no loyalty there. No following. You're nothing but a sad puppetmaster."
His eyes stabbed at her and he bore his teeth with a snarl.
*
Freeman saw 5 of them vaporise before the others had the chance to retaliate. But they did retaliate.
The first to reach him was a vile little creature with short legs and long arms. It hooked his feet and took them from under him.
Freeman reeled as he fell to the ground, cutting himself against the brittle bamboo shards. The pain hadn't passed when he realised his hands were empty and his phaser was gone. He felt the racing need to scramble. To recover before they overwhelm him. To find his weapon before-
Dave let out a wild cry. He howled as something with an unnatural number of teeth bit down on his right thigh and tore out a good chunk of his flesh. The unbelievable pain threatened to knock him clean out but what he saw next he would never forget and it roused him from his stupor.
He saw the hideous monster chewing on the ripped meat of his leg. He saw the many others that drew up to him and loomed over his damaged frame.
And, then, he saw them vanish one by one in swirls of steaming mist.
Phaser fire blasted overhead and ate away his attackers and Freeman angled back his head to see the shape of Xander Harris; the rifles in his hands erupting with fire.
Dave lost consciousness. He knew because his next experience was of being raised to a sitting position by Harris. Xander lifted him into a seated position against a tree. Freeman grunted at the pain of movement and looked to his new hero. Xander's face gradually came into focus.
"We need to get you to the medical camp," Xander said wisely then tied off the blood to his leg with a length of material from Dave's own uniform.
But Freeman shook his head and insisted that Xander go on. "I'll call in the cavalry and be in the hands of a nurse in no time, Harris. You need to find the others and make sure they finish the mission. The mission..."
After a few more seconds of cajoling, Xander - sweating like crazy in the humid jungle - stripped away his Starfleet jacket and shirt until he wore just the uniform vest, picked up his rifles, and went running into the distant forest.
Freeman sagged back and sighed. He tapped his badge and, with all the breath he could muster, said: "Freeman to med-centre... I think I could use a doctor here. When you're free."
*
Picard fought to reinforce himself against the pain of his broken ribs as Worf stumbled back to them unsteadily, still numb from the barbs.
Darkness had promised the Slayer would fail in her mission to bind him... and now he was flesh. He had promised her death... and now he was crippled. He could still achieve his goal, however. It would simply take a new tactic to get there. Using the knowledge he'd gained from the android, he targeted Picard's Starfleet sensibility:
"Captain Picard. I appeal to you. ...I give myself over willingly into your custody. All your questions I shall answer. I will be no further burden but I will open your eyes to knowledge beyond anything your Federation can conceive. You must accept. As a Starfleet officer, you must accept my surrender."
The captain considered him carefully. He knew one thing: Rhamhal had power of a kind that no prison he knew of could contain. When the Summers girl stepped into his view with an expression of such severity it threatened to turn her pretty face ugly, it underlined the fact that this was her realm.
"Finish this." He turned from them and helped Worf to stand.
"You're Starfleet!" Rhamhal screamed out. "You MUST accept!"
"You're the only one here having trouble accepting," Buffy said.
Darkness killed her a thousand times over with his eyes in that instant. "If you strike me down, Slayer, I shall become more powerful than you can possibly imagine."
Buffy rolled her eyes. "I won't even comment on that line. And, by the way, your power comes from your mind now. A physical thing. I like physical things. Take an ass for example. A physical ass is so much easier to kick than a spooky one, don't you agree? ...Like a physical power-source is a lot easier to disconnect." The Slayer raised her bat'leth above her shoulder like a baseball pro. "I hear Hell's pretty hot this time of year. Send me a postcard. Let me know."
Darkness uttered his final words as the Slayer drew back her sword. "I will be back."
She swung the crescent blade around and cut clean through his neck. "No," she replied. "You won't."
Rhamhal's head drifted away from his neck and tumbled to the heath.
*
Out in the foggy stretch of the valley, 326 dead bodies withered. Their strings were cut and their lifeless bones collapsed in final death. The dozens of surviving demons that fought by their side lost their coherence and stopped suddenly as their minds and memories were thrown into chaos. The few that continued their attack - powered by a crazed animal instinct - were soon shot, cut, and beaten down. Within a matter of minutes, the war had become a clean-up.
*
Rhamhal's severed corpse lay fallen and defeated at the Slayer's feet. She was very happy to finally put her sword to rest in its place on her back.
It was done.
Now came the exhilaration she always felt after a big win. She wanted to smile and gloat but, in all truth, her energy was expended. She wanted nothing more than to return to a comfortable room where she could bathe and rest. Then she planned to meet with her friends and enjoy a lengthy session of 'trash the fallen bad guy'. She would start by telling them all about how small his... well... there would be time for that later. Now the priorities were: bath, bed. Then fun. Nothing else was worth thinking about until after then.
"Some freaks never know when to quit," she said to the captain. He was holding Worf up, even despite his own injuries, and staring at the severed head in the grass. The mist about the body had strangely drawn back to unveil it in all its horrific glory.
"There's no blood," Picard noted, somewhat disturbed by events. "Is that...normal?"
Buffy eyed the blackness within Rhamhal's open neck. Like his veins were filled with solid tar it seemed to her. "When it comes to demons, Captain, unusual is usual. His blood is just...different." She suddenly thought of her mom and sister. Two people that shared her own blood. /Evil is evil/, she thought, /and Darkness is Darkness /... it's in his blood.
"The blood of the damned..." she muttered distantly. As the father was damned to Hell, so too would that damnation be with his son.
Blood. Her dreams. Danger. Death.
Rhamhal was dead. And, for all his talk, one thing he said did make sense to her when she considered it. Something about 'this flesh won't contain my power'. She wondered if he'd really meant his Mastery... or if he was talking about his true power... his Evil...
Or, she could just be paranoid.
"Is he...?" Picard began. "...Is it over?"
She relaxed and let it go. "It is," she replied, then went to Worf and helped the captain bare his weight.
The three of them began to hobble and limp away from the whole terrible episode when an unnerving sound - like the sizzling of bacon - froze them in their tracks.
Buffy removed Worf's arm from her shoulders and, with a heavy sense of foreboding, turned back to see the skin burning away from Rhamhal's carcass.
Picard spun Worf around.
What he saw threatened to break his resolve and plunge him into insanity.
The flesh and meat of the cadaver melted away with a smell beyond unbearable, leaving behind the mass with an oily blackness that harked to something unmentionable and Lovecraftian in nature.
The neck sprouted something bone-like that joined with the form of the severed head and the two came together as one creature again.
And then it moved. Opening up like a moth from a cocoon, the surface unfurled to reveal a sight that gripped even the Slayer's heart with icy panic.
A pair of massive shadowy wings stretched out.
Standing before them - three metres in height and not a millimetre less - an atramentous ebony Demon Bat - straight out of the deepest bowels of Hell.
The wings, rough and inky, were tipped with sharp bony spines. Its emaciated form bore hands of thin dark bone that ended in talons almost a foot in length. And the head, with its bony rows of horns that lined the chin, cheeks and forehead was frightening beyond description. Its eyes, thin and empty, seemed to see everywhere at once. And the fangs... they made a vampire's teeth look like toothpicks.
Buffy stood quite far away... yet she took a step back.
"Miss Summers?" It was Picard.
"Don't panic," she said, fighting her own.
The enormous horned skull turned to her and those eyes lit up and burned with fire.
Her tired hands made fists. "Now we're seeing the real you."
It squealed a horrid piercing cry and stormed her.
The Slayer hauled out the bat'leth from its sheath, went in under the snapping claws, and drove it through the demon's waist. It stopped suddenly on impact just below the thick tar-like surface and began to fry. The beast's touch burned!
Darkness took her by the arm and lifted her into the air. She screamed as her snared limb began to boil. She couldn't bare it. Kicking out, she caught the monster in the eye and it flung her into a pile on the ground.
She winced and cradled her charred flesh as it shot needles through the length of her arm. Nevertheless, she recovered her feet as Darkness tore out the sword from its side and threw it sizzling into the soft grass.
She charged and kicked it but the thing barely moved and she quickly found herself ducking as it made repeated swings at her. Until she gave up and dived away. She simply couldn't go on. Her melting arm had stricken her with remarkable pain that she couldn't fight through. Even in her best state... she wondered where to start with this undeniably pure demon.
Darkness delivered that cutting scream again.
Captain Picard tried to hurry Worf away but stumbled and tripped to the floor.
The demon viewed them one time finally. Its wings opened up to their full length in a threatening gesture. A predatory animal's method of intimidation. And it worked.
Worf recognised the attack formation of a Bird of Prey in those wings and he prayed for strength to stand. Before him, Buffy rose to her feet. His admiration for her threatened to rival that he had for the great Kahless. She was going to fight this horror to the very end of her and he marvelled at the bravery of the girl. Though part of him put it down to shear stubbornness.
Buffy held up her smoking sword and waited for the final attack. She knew this one would be the last because Darkness had given them the signal. He was preparing for his finishing move.
The mammoth wings flung back to form a shark fin and Darkness lowered his horned face. The mouth of it opened unnaturally wide and from it a shimmering jet of fiery air streamed out - burning up the heath until only ash remained. The head craned up and the scorching breath moved swiftly and destructively toward her - tearing up everything in its blazing path.
The sword fell from her hand. Buffy had nowhere to run.
"HEY!"
The heat subsided abruptly as Darkness paused and turned to the rise of land that led into the clearing.
Midshipman Xander Harris appeared on the hillock with 2 rifles braced against his bare arms. Cool as a snowman's cold bits, he thrust out his chin and said: "Eat hot phaser, demon scum."
Two orange globes of phased energy blasted from the guns and the Angel of Hell drew in his wings as a shield.
The balls of fire beat through the ebony cocoon and burned into the heart of Darkness. They all witnessed as the fire consumed the beast until all that remained of it were footprints in the dirt.
For Buffy and the two fallen members of her team, the next few seconds stretched out for much longer as they were unable to remove their eyes from the spot where the monster had stood just moments before. Now even the vapour of its destruction was gone from sight.
Still, they were frozen. Their sudden and unexpected deliverance proved too much to take in.
Xander took a deep breath of air. "Our work is done here." He threw the guns over his shoulder. "Let's go," he went on, "before I drown in my own sweat, thank you."
Buffy, a little bewildered, faced him. Picard and Worf also turned to regard him. Then the three of them leapt out of their skin suddenly when the pouches around the men's necks vanished in a golden wisp of light.
Buffy chuckled. Her arm burned like...well...hell. But, damn it, she was happy.
"Eat hot phaser?" she called to Xander after a time.
He scaled the slope and shrugged. "Well, I was gonna go with 'yippee-ki-yay'... but I heard some other vest-aficionado got there first. You know a better one?"
Buffy gave it brief consideration. "...Hasta-la-phaser, baby?"
"Damn."
Picard helped Worf to clamber up and Xander rushed in to support them. At the same time, Buffy collected the android's arms from the spot she'd left them.
She took one final look around and followed the men away.
As they left, Picard slapped his combadge on Data's armless body. Pattern enhancer aside, Geordi would have to beam him up ASAP to assess the damage to his positronic brain.
As they departed, Xander noted: "It's been a hell of a week."
Buffy huffed dubiously. "It's only been a week?"
And then they were gone.
*
Almost half an hour later, Spike emerged from the jungle like a walking shish kebab with the spear still protruding through his torso. He regarded the empty clearing and knew right away what had happened. "They soddin'-well did it again!"
Forgotten. Yet again. Left for dead without a thought. He was not impressed. He cursed repeatedly under his breath and walked away. Passing the Robo-geek, Spike nonchalantly gave him a good shove.
Data hit the ground with a clunk.
"Ponce."
*
In the centre of the valley plain; in the now still calmness of the battlefield, Commander William T. Riker stood regarding with deep concern the fallen corpse of a giant native bird. Around him he saw a number of others in the same state. He winced quite severely. "This isn't going to look good on the report."
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