FIC: MC 28 Aug ’00 Future Saved (1/?)

Faith hurried through downtown New Jersey, Slayer agility allowing her to effortlessly dart in and out of the crowd.  She glanced at her Seiko Diver’s Watch and grimaced.  “Fuck, gonna be late,” she muttered, “X always pisses and moans when I’m late.”

Picking up the pace, she ducked into a narrow alley, hoping to cut through some of the busy mid-afternoon traffic.  They’d only arrived in New Jersey the previous night, hunting a gang of vampires that had recently become very active in the area.  To relax before the night’s hunt, Xander had gone to some comic book auction, she’d cried off getting turned into a complete geek and headed for ‘Wild West City’, leaving Tara to study her magic books in peace.  But now they were supposed to meeting up for dinner at a bar & grill for some eats, but she was late.  “Faith, it’s not comics, it’s art,” she mimicked sarcastically as she remembered Xander’s lecture.  “It’s the new folklore of America.”  She shook her head.  “Jesus, he talks some crap sometimes.”  Reaching the opposite end of the alley, she spun out of it and headed west.

“Wow, you are one fine-ass bitch, how about I give you some blow for some blow?”

The crude come-on pulled her to a halt.  Turning to her left, she saw herself being leered at by a tall, skinny guy with long yellow hair and a short fat bearded man who looked like he was possibly retarded stood in front of a convenience store.  “Excuse me?” she said through gritted teeth.

“I’m Jay,” leered the blonde, “this is Silent Bob,” the scrawny dude nodded towards fatso who raised a hand and waved at her “my hetro life-partner.”  Hetro-life partner? Faith’s brow furrowed, what the hell was one of them?  Even as she opened her mouth to ask a question she’d probably regret, Jay continued.  “You are one fine-ass bitch,” he repeated, “If you were my boo-boo-kitty-fuck I bet I could give you,” Faith’s eyes almost popped out of her head when the dumb shit stared to thrust his pelvis at her while all the time sliding his tongue out of his mouth and waggling it around like it had been electrocuted, “the best night of your life.”  Faith snorted, worst 30 seconds more like.  “I’d suck, you’d suck, we’d fu-.”

It was then she hit him, a straight right cross to the jaw.  Jay’s eyes crossed and he folded like an accordion on route to slumping in a heap on the dirty sidewalk.  Faith turned to Jay’s companion.  “Ya got anything to add?” Hands raised in surrender Silent Bob shook his head.  “Yeah, that’s what I figured.”  Faith glanced down at the crumpled, unconscious dope dealer and then back at Silent Bob.  “Word to the wise, fatso.  Tell your hetro life partner the next time I see him, it won’t be his jaw I punch.  Ya dig?”  The mute nodded.  “Smart guy,” she charged off.

“You’re late.”

Faith smirked at her boyfriend as she slid into the booth beside him, winking across the walnut-coloured table at Tara.  Her nose quivered at the delicious smells drifting in from the kitchen.  “Ran into an asshole,” she explained.

“Are you alright?” Concern replaced irritation in Xander’s eyes.

“Five by five,” Faith’s heart warmed at her boyfriend’s interest in her well-being.  She kissed him softly on the cheek before speaking again.  “Ya get what ya wanted from the auction?”

Xander smiled wryly.  “With the amount of money I have, I could have bought the auction house much less the exhibits.  Yeah, I got the pieces I wanted.”

“Wicked cool,” stomach growling, Faith looked at the leather-bound menu, the picture of a longhorn’s head at the top of every page leaving her in no doubt just what sort of establishment she was in.  “We ordering?”

                                    *                                  *                                  *

The demon ran, leaping over a garbage can as he pounded through the streets, in a state of bewilderment as he fled the ambush he and his six companions had run into.  There’d only been three of their attackers, but one had been the blasted renegade Slayer, and her companions had fought like maniacs.  His family was dead, only he lived.

He slowed as a figure suddenly stepped out from a blue plastic dumper just ahead of him.  Realising it was the second female, the weaker of the attacking trio, he decided to gamble and leapt into a dropkick.  If he could just kill her quickly there was a chance the others wouldn’t manage to catch up with him.

His eyes widened as the girl gracefully stepped aside.  Her soft eyes hardened suddenly as she pulled out a stake and thrust it at him as he passed by.  He raised his hand to block her attack but too late, the stake smashed into his chest.

                                    *                                  *                                  *

Tara grinned triumphantly as the demon exploded into dust.  Hearing footsteps behind her, she turned only to relax as she recognised her two best friends charging towards her.  She opened her mouth to boast how she’d killed the lead demon, to show Faith and Xander how well their training of her was going.  Faith however beat her to it., her cupid-shaped mouth shouting her disapproval.  “Damn it, Tar!  You shouldn’t have done that!” her sister reproved. 

Tara took a momentary step back, years of whippings instilling an instinctive wariness when someone raised her voice to her.  Reminding herself it was her friend and that Faith would never dream of harming her, she stepped forward.  “You were occupied with the others,” she explained, her voice calm.  “I saw him slip away, so I headed him off-.”

“Damn it Tar!”  Tara blinked when Faith interrupted her again.  “It was the oldest of the seven, the strongest, you should have wai-.”

“Waited?” It was Faith’s turn to blink when she raised her voice.  “I can carry my own weight you know!  I’m part of this team aren’t I?”

Eyes hardening, Faith’s mouth opened.  Before the buxom beauty could speak, Xander was between the two of them, a nervous look on his face.  “Normally I like a cat-fight as much as the next guy,” Xander gulped when both her and Faith turned from glaring at one another to scowl at him, “but there was no harm done.  And Tara did great, all the vampires are dead and none of us are hurt, yay for our team.  So maybe we should just head to that club ‘Fairfax’ we passed on the way here and have a couple of drinks to celebrate?”

“Fine!”  Faith shook her head before spinning away, long flowing locks whipping behind her.

Tara continued to glare after her best friend.  “Hey,” she tensed then relaxed when she felt Xander’s arms around her shoulders.  “Faith doesn’t mean anything by it.  She just worries about you.”

“I’m not a passenger!” Tara’s bottom lip quivered slightly.  Now the anger and indignation had passed, the hurt was settling in.  Didn’t Faith trust her?  “I can hold my own!”

“I know,” Xander squeezed her shoulders a little harder.  “It’s just Faith, you know how protective she is of her friends, how she treasures them.  And you and me are the closest people in the world to her, it would destroy her to lose either of us, she’s just frightened.”  Xander’s tone lightened.  “Let’s get to this club, me and you are going to dance a slowy.”

Tara giggled and elbowed her friend in the ribs.  “In your dirty dreams!”

“Oh Tara!” her laughter increased when Xander dropped to one knee and stared up imploringly at her.  “You will be mine!”

                                    *                                  *                                  *

Lightning shot through the darkened sky, crashing into the ground of a deserted parking lot.  Instead of disappearing once it had hit terra firma, the energy bolt expanded, growing into a glowing bubble. 

And then suddenly it was gone and where it had struck there lay a tall, powerfully built man with muscles seemingly carved from granite, and a square, determined face.

                                    *                                  *                                  *

“AHHHHH!” he screamed as his molecules were reassembled after his harrowing, agonising journey through the time machine.  Body shaking, he rose, wincing as he noted his nakedness.  “They couldn’t build a machine where you could actually bring synthetic tissue through?” he groused.  Looking around, he found he was in an alley in the middle of the night.  Despite the lateness of the hour he could still hear the music blaring from the amusement arcade behind him.

“Where the hell did you come from?”

He looked across the alley, cursing himself for his inattentiveness.  At the other side of the alley, diagonally to his right, a man crouched over a crackling fire.  The grey-haired hobo was dressed in a tatty army surplus jacket and torn canvas pants, his eyes flitting from him to the meths bottle in his right hand as if trying to decide if Kyle’s appearance was drink-induced.

Kyle strode across the alley, the whiskered hobo backed away, eyes wary.  “I ain’t into that weird stuff,” the man warned. 

“Don’t worry,” Kyle smiled.  “Neither am I.”  Minutes later he’d taken the man’s hobnailed boots, canvas pants, and jacket, deciding to leave him his under clothes because of hygiene concerns.  He stopped at the entrance of the alley, noting a newspaper crumpled on the ground.  Lifting it up, he squinted under the flickering street light to read the date.  “12^th August 00,” he muttered, heart tightening in anticipation.  It was the right date, they’d gotten him back in time.  Now it was up to him to save the future by saving Faith Spenser and Alexander Harris.

He just hoped his leaders had trained him well enough for what was to come.

FIC: MC 28 Aug ’00 Future Saved (2/?)

“So I said to him ‘man if I wanted a job, I wouldn’t be robbing your fucking store would I?’”

Rocket dutifully laughed as Tank finished his story, his friend leaning against the near-by phone booth while he, Manny, and Snapper sat on the bench beside it.  “That’s a good one, Tank!” he crawled.  “What happened next?”

Tank turned to him.  The African-American was aptly named, standing well over six foot with a neck that was seemingly thicker than his shaven head and shoulders so wide that he had to go through some doorways sideways.  “I broke the fucker’s back for arguing with me, what do you think?”  The teen laughed, his gold capped teeth gleaming in the cold night air.  “Man, he didn’t argue then!”

“You showed him, Tank,” Rocket approved.  Tank scared the shit out of him, but it was easier to be the big black’s friend than his enemy.  He was someone you didn’t screw around with.  Not if you wanted to keep your limbs in working order.

Snapper nodded, the ferrety-faced gang member’s expression characteristically nervous.  “Right,” the short teen’s green eyes flicked left and right.  “How about we get some tabs, I,” the youth put his hands together and blew some hot air into them.  “I wanna get high!”

“Jesus,” commented Manny, a short Latino fireplug who doubled as Tank’s workout partner, his thick arms hanging out of his sleeveless denim jacket.  “You only bought some of that crap yesterday!  Where do you fucking put it?”

“Ain’t none of your fucking business what I do with my stash!” Snapper defensively exclaimed.

Their leader’s deep baritone cut through the duo’s burgeoning argument.  “Yeah, yeah,” Tank shot Snapper a disgusted look.  About the only vice that Tank didn’t have was drugs, the huge black was far too proud of his body to inject or sniff anything that might put it at risk.  “We’ll-,” the giant African-American’s stony grey eyes bulged.  “Will you look at that!”

Puzzled by what was surprising his leader, Rocket glanced over his shoulder.  His jaw dropped at the sight of a naked honky striding towards them, his thickly-muscled body cut to shreds.  “Jesus, Tank!  Asshole’s almost as big as you!”

”Yeah, yeah,” Tank growled.  Rocket winced, mentally reprimanding himself for irritating the always prickly gang-leader.  “We’ll just have to cut him down to size.”  Tank tore his eyes away from the naked man and to him and Snapper.  “Come on.”

Rocket thought about refusing, there was something very weird about some naked dude walking the streets of one of New Jersey’s roughest suburbs.  He couldn’t help but wonder if the dude had escaped from some military experiment or something.  But on the other hand, he glanced at Tank, you had to be a nuthouse escapee to say no to Tank.  “Sure,” jumping up, he dropped in beside Tank.  “We’re gonna teach this prick some respect for damn sure!” he enthused.

“Yeah!” Snapper’s enthusiasm seemed more sincere, but then all the shit his bud did seemed to have fucked up his head but bad.

The man appeared to notice their approach, but didn’t react.  He just kept walking at the same confident, unhurried pace until coming to a stop maybe a foot from them.  Rocket’s skin crawled as the man’s almost robotic gaze examined him before turning to Tank and doing the same.  “I need your clothes,” the naked muscle-man demanded.

                                    *                                  *                                  *

Tank stared down at the smaller, but still impressive-sized honky.  He’d show his boys who was the big dog around here.  “You need something mutha-fucker, thinking you can come into my town like this.  Who the fuck do you think you are?”

The man was unmoved by his anger.  “I need your clothes,” he repeated.

“You need a serious ass-kicking!” A hyped up Snapper suddenly leapt past him and towards the man.  Tank’s eyes caught the tell-tale gleam of Snapper’s switchblade arching up to gut the naked intruder.

The air rang to a thunderous crack as the naked stranger moved with awesome speed, his hand lashing out to backhand Snapper across the face.  Blood flew everywhere as his homie’s head snapped back, neck twisting at an impossible angle.

Swallowing his shock at his companion’s sudden demise, Tank lunged towards the weirdo, throwing a left hook.  His eyes widened when the man caught his fist in his own hand and twisted.  He screamed as his wrist snapped like kindling, pain shooting up his arm.

The stranger released his iron grip.  Tank’s world exploded in agony when the man kicked him full in the groin.  Bile rising in his throat, he dropped to the hard sidewalk, breath coming in desperate pants, tears forming in his eyes.  Out of the corner of his eye he saw the man grab a retreating Rocket around the throat and fling him into a lamppost some thirty feet away, his spine shattering with chilling snap. 

“Son of a bitch!”  Eyes wild, Manny swung his weapon of choice, a bike chain, at the asshole’s head.  The man’s hand snapped up to grab the chain and yank Manny towards him.  The moment Manny had stumbled into range, the bastard twisted at the waist and drove the palm of his free hand into his face.  The Latino dropped soundlessly to the ground, bone punched into his brain. 

And then the man was looming over him, eyes unemotional.

.   

                                    *                                  *                                  *

“I need your clothes,” T-100 announced before snatching a hold of the human’s head and twisting.  The man’s neck snapped and he crumpled to the ground.  T-100’s sensory system told him all four of his attackers were dead.  Satisfied that their minimal threat had been extinguished, he quickly stripped the man, and dressed in his outfit of black leather jeans, black t-shirt, and denim jacket.  Seeing a pair of sunglasses next the body he’d flung into the lamppost, he strode over and put them on.  Then he considered his mission parameters.

His logic chip told him that going against the Three would be tricky.  Normal humans, he looked down at the limp corpse at his feet, were no obstacle to him, but they were of a completely different calibre.  “I need weapons.”  Closing his eyes, he accessed his memory chip containing maps of 2000 New Jersey.  Finding what he needed, he set off through the darkened street, the four corpses already forgotten.

                                    *                                  *                                  *

“Look officer!”

“He’s full of bullshit!”

Kyle stared around, jaw open as he stumbled through the streets.  He’d seen photos in books but to see this time of legend for himself was incredible.  He couldn’t help but be amazed that people walked the streets so freely, without any apparent fear, shops, houses, businesses, and public buildings lined the streets were in less than a hundred years there’d be only ruins.  He stopped at the back of a patrol car and watched as  two arguing drunks were split up by a police officer.  He had to fight the urge to yell, tell the two men just how stupid and petty they were being.

Then he noticed the shotgun left negligently on the patrol car’s back seat.  After a glance around to make sure he wasn’t being watched, he eased the car door open, snaked a hand in and took the weapon.  Quickly shoving it under his jacket, he walked off.

Kyle pursed his lips.  He was armed, clothed.  He grimaced at the smell coming from his garments, well relatively speaking.  Reminding himself he’d had it harder back home, he furrowed his brow and thought.  “Where would they be today?”

After a second he remembered thanks to the book of the first Tara.  In his time, the diary of Tara was the most read book in the world, its readers far out-stripping those who clung to the religions of earlier times.  The witch had painstakingly documented the legendary quartet’s adventures during the five years until ‘The Brotherhood’s Battle’, the clash that had decimated a city but ultimately saved the world.  And he’d been reading the entries for this day by candlelight last night to prepare for this very mission.  “Fairfax,” he smiled as he remembered.  In Tara’s memoirs it was recorded as a peaceful but tense peaceful night out following an argument with Faith.  But thanks to his enemies that was all going to change.  He grimaced, but he still he had to do was find the damn place.  “I really wish she’d drawn maps to go with the descriptions.”

                                    *                                  *                                  *

T-100 stopped at the front of the gun shop and slammed a fist through the door’s bulletproof window.  Ignoring the instantaneous alarm shrilling overhead, he reached through the broken window and unlocked the door.  Shoving it open, he walked inside.

The walls of the darkened store were lined with steel cabinets.  T-100 strode over to the nearest and tore it open before moving onto the next in an attempt to find what he needed. 

In just a few minutes he’d done just that and armed himself with a Mossberg 590, two Berretta M9s , and a mini-Uzi.  “Sir!” a voice yelled from the doorway.  “Raise your hands!”

T-100 looked over his shoulder to see a policeman stood in the marksman position, his automatic pointing at him.  Before the man had chance to move, he’d turned, fired his shotgun, and blown a hole in the officer’s chest.  As T-100 picked up his other weapons, he accessed his memory chip, searching for references  to where his prey would be.  He nodded as the information was delivered to him and stepped over the policeman’s corpse and out of the shop. 

Faith Spenser and Alexander Harris were to die tonight.  

FIC: MC 28 Aug ’00 Future Saved (3/?)

“We’re here!” Xander forced a jaunty tone as he pointed up to the flashing neon light above the club’s double-door glass entrance.  “Fairfax”

“Not fucking blind, Harris.”

Xander withheld a sigh at Faith’s grunt as he led her and Tara into the club.  A stony silence had existed between the two supernatural beauties as they’d walked the five blocks to the nosy nightclub despite his best attempts to get them talking.  And the trouble was, he could see both points of view.  On the one hand you had Faith, a young girl who despite all life had thrown at her clung to the notion of loyalty, who wanted to do nothing more than protect those she loved, chiefly amongst them him and Tara.  On the other you had Tara, a young woman who had been taught that she was weak and defenceless but had learnt that she wasn’t, and wanted nothing more than to prove her worth to the two people she loved most in the world.

It was a mess and no mistake.

After passing by the club’s two suited tanks doubling as bouncers and paying the entrance fee at the booth, they moved from the plushly carpeted and mahogany walled foyer, and into the club proper, the sound of one of the latest plastic pop groups blaring out from within.  Strobe lighting of half a dozen colours danced around the room.  Soft carpet covered the majority of the floor, apart from the spacious wood-panelled area in the centre set aside for dancing.  The bar, Xander glanced over to his right, looked to be well-stocked and staffed by bright young things of both genders.  The other three sides surrounding the dance floor were filled with animatedly talking and enthusiastically drinking smartly-dressed people aged from their late teens to their early forties.  At the far end of the bar there was a raised area surrounded by a wooden railing with maybe half a dozen dimly-lit booths and a bouncer stood at the bottom of the six steps leading to the area, barring the entrance.  Xander guessed that would be the VIP area where New Jersey’s exclusively young would hang out, occasionally deigning to allow those not rich or famous enough but pretty enough to join their number.

“Right!” he forced a smile as he ferried his girls to a round, metal table bolted to the ground.  “I’m buying, what does everyone want?”

Faith didn’t look away from Tara, her eyes boring into the usually shy witch.  “I’ll have my usual, thanks hon,” the Slayer said with all the warmth of an iceberg.

“Usual for me too, thanks Xander,” Tara replied, staring right back at Faith with arms crossed.

Oh yeah, Xander sighed again as he rose, this was going to be one fun night.

                                    *                                  *                                  *

“Hey!”

“Watch it, man!”

“Asshole!”

T-100 ignored the insults as he pushed to the front of the queue waiting to enter the nightclub.  He strode past the bouncers, disregarding them as nothing more than a minimal threat, and past the payment booth.   “Sir!” the bleached-blonde sat behind the desk screeched.  “Sir!  Hey Frank!  The hulk thinks he doesn’t have to pay!”

“That right?” He heard the sound of the two thickly-muscled bouncers coming up behind him.  “Hey buddy!”

The moment he felt a callused hand on his left shoulder he was moving.  His left hand shot up, grabbed the offending fingers and twisted them back, breaking them with a brutal snap, the bouncer’s scream starting the half-second later it took for his brain to register his pain.  In the same moment he thrust his right elbow back, catching the other bouncer under the jaw, the force of the blow lifting the thick-set man off his feet and flinging him into the booth some six feet behind.  And then he continued on his way without a backwards glance, intent on finding his target.  Ignoring the disturbance his actions had caused amongst the club’s clientele nearest to the entrance, he looked around the crowded bar, searching his memory files for a match on his targets.  He reached inside his jacket as he found one.

                                    *                                  *                                  *

“Looks like there’s a fight in the foyer,” Xander commented.

“Yeah?” Faith didn’t bother to look towards the front of the club, choosing to stare defiantly at Tara.  “That’s what they have bouncers for.”  So she’d over-reacted a little, but she was right.  It was her responsibility to look after her sis and her man, and if Tar didn’t get that….  Well, there was no way in hell she was apologising.  She was in the right.  Faith smirked.  “Unless Tar thinks she should maybe sort the figh-.”

“Shit!” Suddenly Xander’s left hand was around her leather jacket’s collar, pulling her off her chair, and his right hand shoving Tara down to the ground.  “Get down!”

Even as her mouth opened in protest, an explosion rang out through the club.  For a half-second she thought the explosion was just a sound-effect in the song, then she registered the smell of gunsmoke in the air.  “Shit,” she muttered before shouting over the other customers’ panicked screams.  “X, use the Always-Pocket!  Some weaponry would be wicked cool right about now!”

“He can’t!” Tara shouted back.  “My chair hit in the head as he fell, he’s out cold!”

“Fuck,” Faith glanced at her boyfriend, wincing at his closed eyes.  That was her Xander, always sleeping on the job.  She looked towards the approaching man.  He was huge, a crew-cut giant with the muscles of a Mr. Olympia.  The crazy bastard shot anyone who got in his way, blowing people away with a chilling dispassion, but it seemed as if his path led directly to them.  “Council’s hired killers just got way scarier.”

With Xander out cold and their access to the weaponry contained within the Always Pocket closed off, Faith realised she’d have to improvise.  Snatching a hold of the table’s single leg, she pulled, her lithe but incredibly powerful biceps writhing.  The bolts securing the table to the ground popped out, and Faith flung her makeshift projectile at the insane killer. 

The heavy metal table crashed into the man’s chest, knocking him to the ground.  Faith’s eyes widened when the man just flipped the table off him, and stood, continuing his remorseless advance.  “That’s not good.”  That table was solid steel, and she’d thrown it with as much force as she could muster.  At the very least the guy should be unconscious if not dead.  Instead he was walking around without a bruise.

She glanced at Xander, grimacing as she realised he was still out.  “Shit.”  She turned her attention to Tara who was clinging onto her boy’s body, protecting him with her body.  “Tar,” she forward rolled to her friend’s side.  “The fire exit’s at the back, just past and between the bar and the VIP area.  We need to grab X, and carry his lazy carcass through it.”

Tara nodded before screaming.  “Who is he?”

“Fuck knows,” Faith pulled Xander’s arm around her shoulder.  “I ain’t for asking.”  She’d worry about that later, she was a hell of a lot more concerned with getting out alive.  “Now!”

They surged to their feet and dragged Xander towards the back fire escape, across the blood-drenched floor and almost twice tripping over corpses.  They were level with the bar when a wild shot from super-psycho hit the wooden railing of the VIP lounge, sending a chunk smashing into Tara’s right side.  The witch screamed before toppling towards them, setting off a domino effect.

Faith hit the ground on her side, just inside the bar, Xander and Tara landing on top of her.  Faith found herself grinning despite the predicament, X would be cursing if he ever found out he’d finally got both her and Tar horizontal with him and had been unconscious throughout the entire moment.

Of course to tease him with that they’d actually have to live through this, and right now, the odds were not looking good.  Faith looked around, the glimmerings of an idea forming.  She extricated herself from their bodily tangle.  “I need some alcohol,” she muttered.

“Alcohol?” Tara screamed before ducking as a shotgun blast hit the drinks arrayed above them, showering them with glass.  “Now is not the time to be drinking Faith!  Do you have a drink problem?”

Faith shot her sis a withering glance.  She was really getting on her tits today.  “To

make a Molotov cocktail with,” she explained through gritted teeth.

Tara’s eyes filled with understanding.  “Oh.”  The witch reached under the bar and pulled out a three-quarters full bottle of Jack Daniels.  “Here,” the witch rolled the corked bottle over to her.

“Choice,” Faith nodded before ripping the bottom of her shirt off and tying it around the mouth of the bottle.  That accomplished, she looked around for another bottle.  Finding some vodka, she soaked the rag in the strong alcohol, pulled out her lighter, and lit the rag.  The rag wooshed into fire, the heat causing her to turn her face away as she lobbed her makeshift weapon over the bar and at the advancing giant.

Slayer hearing allowed her to hear the cocktail smash home, and woosh into life.  “Wicked!” she exulted.  “Fuck you, asshole!” Faith glanced over the bar.  Her mouth dropped open at the sight of the still advancing gunman.  “Oh crap.”  She quickly ducked down again, her eyes shooting towards her slumbering honey. “Xander, really looking for you to wake up and produce a grenade launcher right about now.”

FIC: MC 28 Aug ’00 Future Saved (4/?)

Kyle’s eyes widened in horror as he reached his destination and found screaming people piling out of the club.  The stench of death hung heavy in the cold night air, clogging up his lungs, but it was his fear of having failed his mission that made it difficult for him to breathe.  He couldn’t be too late.  He just couldn’t be.  Leaping into the melee, he heedlessly shoved people out of his way as he fought against the tide to reach the nightclub. 

Once inside the club he found he was in a chaotic bloodbath.  Bodies littered the floor, viscera seeping out of their wounds, some were deathly still, others sobbing in pain.  Chairs and bottles likewise were scattered all over, but strangely only one table had joined them.  Kyle realised the tables were bolted down, the Slayer must have used it as a weapon.

And in the centre of the destroyed club stood a giant of a man, unleashing shotgun blast after blast into the rapidly disintegrating bar.  Kyle grinned even as he pulled out his own gun.  If the T-100 was still attacking, it meant his mission hadn’t been completed, they were still alive.

The moment he cocked his gun, the T-100 turned his head towards him, superior hearing allowing him to hear the sound even from a distance.  Before the cyborg could react he was firing, pumping load after load into it.  The robot staggered, he twisted to face it and fired again.

The blast smashed into the monster’s chest, lifting it off its feet, and sending its mammoth bulk flying through one of the club’s one-way glass walls.  Kyle rushed past the collapsed cyborg and around the bar.

His heart leapt at the sight of the sultry beauty who had to be Faith Spenser, but his attention was truly grabbed by her companion.  The mystical legend that was the great Tara.  And then his heart plunged as he noticed the crumpled body shielded by the two girls.  “Is Xander Harris alright?” he asked, forcing a calming tone.

“Who the hell are you?” the raven-haired beauty demanded, suspicion dancing in her eyes.

“Is Xander Harris alright?” he yelled, panic getting the better of him.

The Slayer’s eyes hardened and her mouth opened.  “He banged his head, but he’ll be okay,” the great Tara whispered.

Kyle breathed again.  He looked around, noticing they were missing one group member.  “Did he get-,” he clamped his mouth shut as he realised they hadn’t met her yet.  “We need to get out here before,” he looked over the bar, grimacing as he saw the T-100 struggling to his feet, “he comes back.”

“Fuck that,” the Slayer said flatly.  “I don’t run, not for nothing.  And especially with guys I don’t know from shit.”

Kyle shook his head and opened his mouth.  “Faith,” Tara interrupted with a look down at their unconscious companion, “we have to get Xander out of here.”

The sultry teen grimaced.  “Five by five.”  Faith glanced towards him, coal-black eyes promising death if it was a trick.  “We’ll carry him, ya cover us.  Ya got a car?”

“No,” he shook his head, “but if we leave through the back there’s a parking lot there, we can steal one.”

After a second the girl nodded.  “Deal.”  The Slayer glanced towards Tara.  “Ya ready, sis?”

“Ready,” the witch confirmed.  Faith nodded before lifting the unconscious youth onto her shoulders in a fireman’s carry and leading the way to the back entrance, the wicca next, and him third, backing his way out.  He heard the sound of the door splintering open under the force of the Slayer’s boot, and then they were back in the cold night air.  “Mister,” he looked around to see the Slayer staring at him, “ya got a hell of a lot of explaining to do.”

“Yeah,” he nodded, wincing as he picked up the sound of approaching police sirens.  “But let’s get a car first.”

                                    *                                  *                                  *

T-100 rose from his position led on the ground of the alley snaking its way up the side of the club.  He would have fulfilled his mission but for the interference of Kyle Reese, he recognised his attacker from his files on the resistance’s leaders.  They’d clearly managed to send an operative after him before the self-destruct exploded.  His head turned to the left, recognising the approaching sound of sirens as an indicator that the law enforcers of the day were approaching; he started down the alley after his prey. 

                                    *                                  *                                  *

“Right!  Start talkin’!  Who the hell are ya!”

Xander groaned at his girl-friend’s argumentatively strident  voice shot through his head.  He forced his eyes open and promptly wished he hadn’t.  He and Tara were sat in the backseat of a blood-red 50s Mustang being driven out a lamp-lit parking lot at a stomach-churning speed.  “Faith, where are we?  And what did I tell you about stealing cars?”

“You’re awake!”

Faith and Tara’s exuberant screams sent him over the edge.  Bile filling his mouth, and head thundering, he lent out of the window, and vomited onto the road before pulling back inside.  “Please,” he muttered.  “Don’t shout.”  He winced as he remembered the nutcase in the club.  “What is happening?”

“Yeah,” Faith glared at the man sat beside her in the front of the club.  “That’s what I wanna know.”

“My name’s Kyle Reese, I’m from the year 2055,” the stranger began.

“Ah bullshit!” Faith’s exclamation sent pain flying through Xander’s head.

“He’s telling the truth, Faith,” Tara whispered.  “His aura’s okay.”

“Okay,” Faith sounded less than convinced.  But then he was sceptical himself.  “But if that’s true, how in the hell did you know where we were?”

The man paused, as if embarrassed.  “In my time, the McClay Memoirs are the most widely-read books in the world.  Tara’s entry for today said -.”

“Most widely-read book in the world?” Xander didn’t miss and grinned at the mortified look Tara shot an obliviously front-facing Faith.  Just what had Tara been writing about his girl?  “B…but,” the witch reddened.

Xander cut through the girl’s embarrassment.  “I’ve got two questions.  Why are you here?” his tone hardened.  “And who was Dirty Harry in the club?”

                                    *                                  *                                  *

Lt. Ed Traxler struggled to hold down his dinner as he stumbled out of the club, gunsmoke clinging to his suit, and blood sticking to his shoes.  Ten years in the Marines, nearly twenty on the force, and he’d never seen anything even close to the carnage inside the club.  He stopped a portly medic as the pale-faced man made his way back into the club.  “How many?”

“Seventeen dead, nine wounded,” the man shook his head.  “It’s a bloodbath in there,” the medic stated as he released his grip, allowing the medic back on his way.

“Yeah,” he muttered under his breath.  “Tell me something I don’t know.”  What sort of hell was he living in?

“Sir!  Sir!” he looked around at the shout to see Detective Vukovich hurrying out of the club, ducking between gurneys, a grim look on his face and a video tape in his hand.

“Let’s take a look at that.”  Striding over to the watching TV crews, he brusquely declined to give a statement before commandeering one of their machines off them and retreating back under the cordon to watch the tape.  Five minutes later and the footage had finished. 

It was a long second before either of them spoke.  “I guess we know what he looks like now,” Detective Vukovich commented.

“We know more than that,” Traxler replied.  His subordinate looked at him in confusion.  “How many tables in that place were tipped over?”

The confusion on his junior’s face increased at his question.  “Just the one, sir.”

“Do you know why that is?” the junior officer shrugged.  “The tables are bolted to the floor, and yet,” he pointed at a replay, “she tore it off the floor and threw it at the psycho.”

Vukovich blinked.  “And she was one of the kids the nutcase looked like he was after.”

 

“Yeah,” he nodded.  “And she, or the other girl of the trio, but I’m betting it was her, knew enough to make a Molotov cocktail to throw at Muscles.”

“She must have been high on something,” Vukovich’s eyes widened.  “Drug gang feud?”

“Could be,” he looked at the film again.  “See if you can get a close-up of those three kids.  I want APBs on all of them.  They’ll lead us to the gunman.”

                        *                                  *                                  *

Newark International Airport.

“How long until our flight home?” demanded Hansen, an impatient Jock who’d served in the Scots Guards for ten years before joining his team.

“Yank airports,” he grinned ruefully.  “Who the bugger-.”  He was interrupted by the ring of his phone.  Muttering under his breath, he pulled the mobile out from his jacket, turned it on, and spoke into it.  “Robinson, here.”

“Travers.”  He stiffened at his boss’ curt voice.  “There’s been a report of a supernaturally powerful girl entered into the computers of the New Jersey police in the past half hour.  Check it out.”

“Yes, sir.”  Upon hanging up his cell, Robinson looked at his five intently-listening companions.  “We’ve got a Slayer hunt boys.”  Robinson grinned.  There was a hell of a bounty on that bitch’s ass, him and his boys were going to collect every damn penny.

FIC:  MC 28 Aug ’00 Future Saved (5/?)

Kyle flinched instinctively at the young man’s suddenly cold tone, so like his leader’s commanding tone.  Swallowing the bitter-sweet memories, he started to explain.  “At this moment in time, a company in Silicon Valley by the name of Cyberdene Systems is developing Artificial Intelligence for the government and other organisations.”

“Artificial intelligence?” Faith queried.

“The ability for machines to think for themselves, to have independent thought,” Xander explained.

Faith snorted.  “Think we can get some of that for B?”

Confused as to just who the two were talking about, Kyle continued on.  “Forty years from now, the company finishes its major project.  The government will have already replaced its soldiers with cyborgs-.”

 

“You’re not telling me that was the thing back at the bar!” Faith exclaimed.

He nodded, he was getting the feeling that completing this story with the motormouth Slayer sat beside him was going to be a lot harder than actually saving their lives.  “A later version, yes.  And motorised tanks and pilot-less planes etc.  But then Skynet, an all-inclusive, self-operating computer system to take control of our nation’s missile defence systems, launches on 12^th Aug 2040.  The next day, it becomes self-aware and reports non-existent attacks on the U.S. from Iran, Russia, and China.  The system fires back, the other nations retaliate.”

“And that starts a nuclear war,” whispered Tara.

“Well that’s not good,” Faith muttered in a massive understatement.

“For the next ten years, mankind is slowly beaten down by the cyborgs, every battle, every tactic is unsuccessful.  And then in 2050, the resistance gets three new leaders and over the next five years, these three warriors turn the tide against Skynet.  I was involved in the final battle to take Skynet’s largest and last manufacturing plant.  We did it, but found Skynet had been experimenting in time-travel-.”

“Whacky,” muttered Xander in the back.

Kyle ignored the interruption.  “And had sent a T-100 unit back in time to kill the grand-parents of the three warriors who would lead us to victory.  I was sent back in time to stop this from happening, to protect Faith Spenser and Alexan-.”

“What!”  the Slayer’s screech reached unimaginable decibel-levels.  “Harris!  You got me knocked up!”  the raven-haired beauty’s eyes were filled with an almost comical level of terror.  “No fucking way!”  Suddenly the car was swerving across lanes to come to a screeching halt at the side of the flyover. “I am nobody’s mom!”  Before anyone had chance to react, the Slayer’s door was open and the chestnut-haired beauty was out and moving, running as if trying to flee destiny itself.

“Faith!” Xander yelled.  Looking back, Kyle saw the young man was almost as rattled as the girl.  “Damn it!” the legend-to-be shot him a look that almost had him wetting himself.  “Who did you tact lessons off, a Chase?”  The boy shook his head and started to climb out of the car.

“Wait,” Xander looked towards the witch, mouth opening.  Tara beat him to it.  “You need to be armed, we all do.  We don’t want to run into that T-100 unarmed again.”

Xander nodded.  “Good point,” the young man climbed out of the car and began pulling weaponry out of The Always Pocket.  The boy glanced at him.  “Most people are surprised to see the Always Pocket for the fir-,” the boy nodded.  “Oh, but for you it’s not the first time you’ve seen it.”  The boy shook his head.  “This is weird.  Come on.”  The youth looked towards him as they stepped away from the car.  “So does this mean me and Faith are permanent?”

“I can’t tell you anything about the future beyond what I’ve already said,” Kyle nervously responded.  “It is against mission parameters.”

“Temporal integrity, makes sense.”  The youth’s eyes widened and he snatched a hold of Tara.  “Everyone, over the railing now!”

Kyle’s heart dropped as he looked in the direction the younger man was looking.  Turning, he sprang for the railing.

                                    *                                  *                                  *

“No, no, no,” Faith shook her head as she hurried away from the car, hands stuffed in her pockets.  “It’s gotta be a fucking mistake, it’s gotta be.”  What the hell did she know about being a mom?  Her mom had been like the biggest bitch in the world, she couldn’t treat a little kid like that.  If she hit a kid, with her strength she could do serious damage.  And if she lost her body, X wouldn’t stay around.  If there was one thing she knew about guys is they didn’t like their chicks saggy.

But, she smiled wistfully, having a little baby that was all her own would be kinda cool, in with the pounding heart-rending fear.  Dressing it, reading it stories, listening to its first words, watching it walk for the first-.  Faith shook her head, dismissing the day-dreams.  She didn’t get the fairy tale, she should know that by now.

A garbage truck passed by her coming in the opposite direction.  Faith stopped, brow furrowing.  A garbage truck, in the middle of the night, that didn’t make any sense.  Puzzled, Faith turned to watch the truck.

Her heart dropped when the truck suddenly veered across busy traffic, knocking cars aside like tenpins, and drove right at where she’d parked the car.  “No,” she whispered with a shake of the head.  “NO!”  Heart pounding she charged back towards her friends.

The truck hit the car with a thud, crushing it like an angry child stamping on a toy before driving through it and off the bridge, shoving the wreck before it.  Tears blurring her eyes, Faith charged towards the accident.  And then one of the cars that had been sideswiped by the truck spun into a near-by car parked on her side of the road, exploding into flames.

The force of the conflagration flung her Faith into the air and headfirst into a lamp.  Body aching, she slid to the ground, her eyes fixed on the horrible sight before her.

The last thought she had before passing out was her fears didn’t matter.  She’d never get those kids and grand-kids now anyhow.

                                    *                                  *                                  *

T-100 ripped his truck door off and climbed out, dropping to the tarmac.  Ignoring the screaming humans and burning cars around him, he strode over to the car he’d rammed.  His eyes widened when he realised that his prey had somehow left the car between stealing it from the club parking lot and parking it on the bridge.  Looking around, he saw a trio of figures clambering up the embankment at the opposite side of the freeway.  Eyes fixed on his target, he raced after them.

                                    *                                  *                                  *

Lt. Ed Traxler stared left and right, unable to believe what he was seeing.  Cars lay everywhere, crumpled by the garbage truck that had heedlessly driven through traffic, decimating anything that had gotten in its way.  Burning wrecks were dotted all over the bridge, fire crews manfully battling to control them even as a fleet of ambulances tended to the injured.  And the damage hadn’t stopped at one level, the truck had flown over the bridge and down onto the road below.

“It’s a mess, sir.”

“You have a talent for understatement, Vukovich,” Traxler tore his gaze away from the carnage to look at his subordinate.  “But this isn’t homicide business, this is traffic.  And we’ve got a case, why are we here?”

“Because,” the junior detective looked towards an armoured truck, “of her.”

Puzzled, Ed joined his fellow officer in walking over to the truck.  His eyes widened at the unconscious figure huddled at the back.  Crouching down, he gently lifted her head before looking at Vukovich.  “It looks like the girl,” he commented.  His junior nodded.  “Has she been checked out by the EMTs?”

“Just a concussion, but they figure she should have a cracked skull at least, the distance she was thrown.”

Ed scowled.  Just another thing that didn’t add up about this case.  “Okay, any sign of her companions?”

“No, sir,” Vukovich hesitated.  “They’re believed to have been in the rammed car.”

“Damn,” Ed bit his bottom lip in thought.  “Okay, let’s get her back to the station and get to the bottom of what the hell is going on here.  Cuff and manacle her.”

“Sir?” Vokuvich stared at him.

“You saw what she did at the club,” Ed pointed out.  “She is not someone to take chances with.  I don’t know how she did the things she did, but she did them.  Call it in and let’s get her back to the station.”

                                    *                                  *                                  *

“Sir!  Sir!” T-100 pulled up as a patrol car screeched to a halt in front of him as he crossed over a busy road and a patrol officer jumped out, dropping into a marksman’s position.  “I’m afraid I’ll have to ask you to raise your-.”  T-100 shot the man through the chest, the man hit the tarmac in a bloody heap.  T-100 continued on his way only to stop when the car radio crackled into life.

“Suspect held in Fairfax shooting.  Taken to-.”

T-100 smiled as the report continued.  It appeared one of the Harris party had been separated from the others.  His files on Harris suggested that he would be compelled to risk himself to rescue his companion, so if he headed there, he’d be sure to find Harris.  He listened for the station name and then looked it up on the New Jersey 2000 map in his memory files.  That accomplished, he set off for his goal.

FIC:  MC 28 Aug ’00 Future Saved (6/?)

“Hell of a mess ain’t it?”

Patrolman Winkler tore his eyes away from watching the maintenance crew attempt to somehow clean up the wreckage strewn across the bridge and to his recently-arrived companion.  His fellow observer was only young, early-twenties at a guess and dressed in an ill-fitting, sweat-stained EMT’s uniform.  “Not wrong,” he confirmed.  In twenty-five years on the force he’d never seen a night like this.

”What was with that hot chick they toted away earlier, she cause all this?”

“No, not this” he spat on the tarmac, an expression of disgust at the youth of today.  “But the scuttlebutt is she was involved in that nightclub shooting earlier on.”

”The Fairfax shooting?” the kid’s eyes widened at his nod.  “Man, from everything I heard that was almost as bad as this. I was on the way there when the call came in for this and I was diverted here.”  The kid shook his head.  “Hell of a night.”

“Not wrong,” he said again.

“Where did they take her?  The hospital to be checked out?”

“No,” he shook his head.  “Station House 17 for questioning.  They want her somewhere good and secure, seems she’s considered dangerous.”

“That little thing?” his companion shook his head.  “No way.”

“Can’t be too careful,” he cautioned, years on the force had taught him that.

“True enough,” the younger public servant agreed before squaring his shoulders.  “Well, back to the grindstone.  You’re doing good work here, officer.”

 

Winkler stared at the kid, momentarily surprised by the praise.  “Yeah, you too kid.”

                                    *                                  *                                  *

“What ya got here, Jeffers?” queried the burly African-American sat behind the police station front desk as they were dragged inside.

“Jay & Silent Bob,” the big black stared with bushy eyebrow at the custodians of a fascist regime that had oppressed them.  “I know, but that’s what mouthy,” the shorter of the two arresting pigs pointed to Jay, “says their names are.”

“This is oppression by the man!” exclaimed his best friend.  “We were just selling weed to our brothers!”  His friend beamed at the black officer.  “After all, we’re all brothers under the skin.”

The sergeant looked towards the patrolmen.  “Tell me it’s April’s Fool’s Day,” he pleaded.

”They tried to sell drugs to us, they didn’t realise we were police officers,” explained one of the officers.

“But you’re in uniform and a squad car!” exclaimed the sergeant.

“Hey,” the other officer shrugged.  “Would we make this shit up?”

“And then they mooned us and tried to run away,” continued the first.

“Without pulling their pants up,” finished the second.

”How are you going to write this up?” asked the sergeant.

Both patrolmen grimaced.  “I’ve been trying to avoid thinking about that,” admitted the second.

Silent Bob shivered as the foyer door swung open behind them, the night’s chill biting deep.  The black cop peered over them and to whoever had entered behind them.  “Your interrogation room is ready, sir.”  Curious, Silent Bob looked over his shoulders, eyes widening as he recognised the beautiful brunette who’d so entertained him by knocking Jay out.  Now, she had a glazed look in her eyes and manacles fastened to her feet and hands.  The girl was under the guard of four police officers, each one twice her tiny size.

Jay had also unfortunately looked over his shoulder and seen her too.   “Oh baby,” he crowed.  “I knew you’d be back for more of the Jay experience.”  His best friend looked towards the desk sergeant.  “Give me a cell with her and we’ll be bumping and grinding, when I’m splitting her in half that bitch will be moaning my name, telling me I’m the best she’s ever had, I’ll be telling her what a fine piece of ass she is even as I’m giving it to her-.”

 

“Bromide, son,” drawled the cop.  “Invest in some.”

“Shame his mother didn’t invest in birth control,” commented the other pig.

“I hear you,” said the first.  Silent Bob found himself nodding in treacherous agreement.

                                    *                                  *                                  *

“The officer told me they’ve taken Faith to Station House 17,” Xander reported as he stripped out of the stolen EMT’s uniform and back into his clothes, their newly-stolen car parked behind a laundrette close to the accident site.  “Tara?”

“Already on it,” the witch didn’t look up from her computer screen.  Finally there was a beep.  “Here it is.  There’s four possible ways in, the front door,” Xander snorted, not likely.  “The skylight, the fire exit, and the underground parking lot.”

“Sewer access?” Tara nodded at his question.  “Underground parking lot it is, then,” he decided.

“This isn’t smart,” protested the stranger from the future.  “We should wait until they move her, then snatch -.”

“And what if T-100 goes in first?” he interrupted.  “Me and Tara are going in, you can come or you can sit on your ass, your choice.”

 

“I’ll come,” the man glumly conceded.

                                    *                                  *                                  *

“Sir!”

Robinson glanced over his shoulder and to Hansen sat in the back of their van with the other four members of his team, his subordinate listening to a police scanner.  “Yes, Hansen?” he growled.

“They claim to have gotten a suspect in the Fairfax shooting, a girl.  They’ve taken her to police station house 17.”

“Right,” Robinson pursed his lips in thought for a second before looking towards the van’s driver.  “Get us there on the double.  We’ll hide in the underground car park until they go to transport the Slayer out of the building and snatch her.”

“Yes sir,” the driver nodded before dragging the van into a screeching u-turn.

                                    *                                  *                                  *

Jeb Carter gasped as the door to his 18-wheeler’s cab was flung open and a giant of a man climbed in beside him.  “I need your truck.”  Suddenly a massive hand was around his throat, flinging him from his cab.

                                    *                                  *                                  *

Sergeant Reed shook his head as he filed his paperwork and took a listless sip of his coffee.  “Lukewarm,” he grimaced before shaking his head again.  It seemed so trite complaining about his coffee was so pathetic after the two disasters that had struck his city tonight.  “What’s the world coming to?” he muttered, suddenly feeling far older than his fifty years.

Suddenly he was blinded by shining lights blaring through the glass front of the station house.  “Damn!” he dropped his cup as he raised his hands in an instinctive attempt to shield his eyes.

The last thing he saw was the truck come flying through the front of the police station.

                                    *                                  *                                  *

“Anything?”

Vukovich shook his head.  “Not even a name, we’ve run the id on her, trying to find if she’s got a record, but other than that, nothing.  Threats, good cop, bad cop, she just stares at you with the same blank look, she’s catatonic.”

“Has she asked for a lawyer?” Traxler pressed, his eyes fixed on the beautiful teen sat on the opposite side of the one-way window.

“Sir, she hasn’t spoken,” Vukovich replied.  “Her friends’ deaths seemed to have made her shut down completely.”

“Uh, uh,” Traxler bit down on his lower lip, brow creased in contemplation. According to the footage they had from the club, the girl was dangerous, very dangerous.  But they had her chained and in a police station, just what could she do?   “Tell her we haven’t found her friends’ bodies, that ought to shock somethi-.”  He fell to one knee as the station shuddered.  He shared a shocked look with his partner.  “What the hell was that?”

 

                                    *                                  *                                  *

Xander grimaced as he shoved the manhole cover aside and climbed out, eyes glancing left and right as he searched the darkened chamber for any sign of life.  Finally reassured they were alone, he looked into the hole.  “I hate sewers,” he complained.

“No, really,” Tara scoffed from under him.  “Because I was thinking of investing some of that money you gave me into a sewer scented perfume range.”

“Sarcasm,” Xander climbed out of the hole before crouching down and offering Tara his hand.  “Thy name is woman.”

“Funny guy,” Tara grinned at him as he pulled her out of the hole.

“Wow,” he grinned at the witch as Kyle followed her in climbing out of the hole.  “Pulling you out of there was a real strain, are you piling on the pounds, Tara?”

“I take that back,” the witch scowled.  “Not funny at -.”

The witch squealed in shock when the building shuddered as if hit by an earthquake.  “What was that?” hissed Kyle, eyes filled with shock.

Xander scowled.  He’d have thought it was obvious.  “Wanna bet it was your T-100 unit?”

FIC:  MC 28 Aug ’00 Future Saved (7/?)

Only Faith’s Slayer instinctive reflexes and balance prevented her from being thrown to the floor when the police station shuddered as if hit by a quake.  She smiled slowly as she realised that the moment she’d been waiting for had come.  The T-100 was here to finish the job.  “Not fucking likely,” she snarled as she started to stretch her arms and legs apart, muscles straining as she weakened the manacles holding her.  “You’re going to pay for what you’ve taken from me, you bastard.”

                                    *                                  *                                  *

The T-100 climbed out of the cab, his eyes glanced towards the crushed human behind the desk.  Satisfied the cop was dead, he turned towards the internal door just as it crashed open and a trio of gun-wielding law enforcers spilled in to the foyer.  “Freeze!”

T-100 responded by shooting his recently acquired mini-gun at the trio, his weapon stolen from yet another New Jersey gun shop spewing out bullets at a most satisfactory rate even as it shuddered and jumped in his grip.  The bullets slammed into the unprepared law enforcers, shredding their bodies and making them dance like puppets who’d had their strings cut before crashing to the ground.

T-100 stepped over the three torn corpses, his hiking boots sloshing in their viscera, and into the narrow corridor beyond.  He’d barely taken a handful of steps when a pair of officers appeared in doorways to his left and right, their hands swinging up to shoot their automatics. 

Before either man had a chance, he’d riddled them and the surrounding walls with bullets.  Both officers screamed, blood vomiting from their mouths, as they plummeted to the ground.

Unperturbed, he walked on.  Hearing a footstep behind him, he twisted at the waist, finger squeezing his trigger as he did so.  “Son of a-,” the cop’s curse died as he did, body shuddering as bullet after bullet hit him, flinging him back through the doorway he’d been sneaking out of.

Raising his foot T-100 slammed it into the thick door at the end of the narrow passageway.  The force of his kick ripped the heavy door of its hinges and flung it into the room beyond.

The moment he stepped through the doorway a barrage of automatic and revolver rounds smashed into him.  Ignoring the attack, he looked around the darkened office and began firing, moving his mini-gun in an all-encompassing sweep. 

His audio sensors filled with the screams of the police officers as his bullets crashed into them, lifting law enforcer after law enforcer off their feet before unceremonially dumping their corpses on the ground. 

The building was plunged into darkness as the last of the officers was eliminated.  T-100 smiled as he dropped the empty mini-gun and pulled out his pair of mini-uzis.  Against a human opponent, the darkness was a good weapon to use, against one with his capabilities it was worse than useless, giving him yet another advantage.  Turning his visual sensors to night-vision, he started across the wrecked office.

He was just steps from the exit when the door crashed open and a burly detective

unloaded barrel after barrel into him.  “Take that mutha-fucker!”  T-100 staggered but didn’t go down under the impact of the shotgun blasts.  Raising his min-uzis, he unloaded half a clip into the cop’s head, bursting it like an over-ripe melon. 

Stepping over the corpse, he heard something rattling to the ground by his feet.  Looking down, he smiled to see a grenade between his legs and kicked it back to the far end of the passageway.  Flames erupted as the grenade landed, the air filling with the screams of the wounded and dying even as part of the left wall collapsed, scattering rubble across the floor.  Ignoring both the scattered fires and the injured’s moans, he climbed over the debris and through the door at the far end without any more resistance. 

                                    *                                  *                                  *

“What the hell is happening?” Traxler yelled over the sound of the blaring klaxons.

Vukovich turned from his questioning of a young patrol-woman, his subordinate’s face haggard and grey with shock.   “They say it’s the man from the club, he’s wiped out the ground floor and is heading up here!”

Traxler’s jaw dropped.  He’d expected the girl to lead him to the asshole, but not like this.  There was over a dozen cops on the ground floor, some of them good friends, all of them colleagues.  Shaking his head clear, he reached into the arms cabinet, and threw Vukovich a shotgun and a vest before taking one himself.  “Don’t bother about this bastard’s rights,” he ordered, voice hoarse with emotion as he slid his vest on.  “He’s killed too many, he’s too dangerous.  Just go for the kill.”

“Yes, sir,” Vukovich’s gun clicked ominously as he loaded one into the barrel.  “Wasn’t planning on asking him to surrender.”

“Good to see we’re on the same page,” Traxler nodded.  “Let’s head to the stairwell, this asshole’s smart, he’d know we’d turn the power off on the elevator.”

“Sir,” this came from the youthful patrolwoman busy pulling on a vest, “what about the suspect?”

Traxler didn’t even glance in the direction of the interrogation room.  “She’s going nowhere in there,” he scowled.  “And afterwards missy is facing some hard time for her part in this, that’s for damn sure.”  His scowl deepened as he watched the patrolwoman ready her shotgun.  It was on the tip of his tongue to order her to stay and watch the prisoner, but the woman had signed on to do a job, and god knows he didn’t need a sexism law suit.  “Come on.”

His two companions flanked him as he strode towards the stairwell.  His heart skipped a beat as he reached for the stairwell door, sweat beading on his forehead.  Just what would he find on the other side?

He let out a relieved sigh when he opened it to find not a machine-gun toting giant ready to blast him all the way to hell, but a boringly empty landing.  “Sanchez,” he whispered to the Latino patrolwoman, “you get on the stairs behind us, when you see him from your vantage point, whisper to us.”  He looked towards Vukovich.  “You stay by the railing, I’ll take the wall.”

His subordinate nodded before sinking into the shadows.  After a nervous breath he followed suit.  A few seconds later and Traxler heard the sound of gunfire and screaming.  He glanced across at Vukovich, even in the darkness he could see the stress he felt mirrored in the junior detective’s face.  “He’s coming.”

He started slightly at Sanchez’s taut whisper.  In the tautness he’d forgotten she was there.  Swallowing slightly, he cocked the shotgun and readied it for firing.  There would be no warning, just sudden, brutal death.

Suddenly the man was in front of them on the landing, having somehow leapt up a flight of eight steps despite weighing somewhere in the region of two hundred and fifty pounds.  Heart racing, he raised his shotgun.

Before he had a chance to fire, the muscular giant had emptied a magazine into Vukovich’s chest.   The detective screamed with the impact of every bullet, his body spasming like a punch-drunk boxer’s before falling over the railing, his vest shredded.

“Bastard!” Traxler let the murdering son of a bitch have it with both rounds, pumping shell after shell into his massive chest.  His eyes widened in horror when the killer staggered but didn’t fall and then aimed his other gun at him.  “Ahhhh!” he screamed as the bullets hit him in the chest, knocking him on his back. 

The stranger strode over to him, and stood over his groaning body, his hand feebly grasping for his dropped shotgun.  Suddenly the stranger’s head snapped up from his cool perusal of his struggles and fired into the air, flames spouting from the uzi’s muzzles.  Traxler’s heart tightened at Sanchez’s pained scream.

His last thought before the bastard blew his head off was he’d been right.  Sexism be dammed, he should have told her to stay behind.

                                    *                                  *                                  *

“Yes!  About damn time!” Faith exulted as the chains snapped at the twenty-sixth attempt.  For a second she sat in the chair and caught her breath, her arms and legs burning from exertion she’d put them through.  Heart still racing, and all too conscious of the sound of gunfire in the distance, she grabbed the chains and wrapped them around her fists. 

Eyes hardening, she stood and looked at her makeshift gauntlets before nodding.  One way or another this fucker was gonna know that you didn’t kill her and her’s without paying one hell of a price. 

She stalked over to the room’s door, her silent grace impaired slightly by the chains rattling around her feet.  She reared back when the door opened just as she reached it, right fist drawing back in a punch.

Her eyes widened as she recognised the interloper. “Xander!” She let out a half-choked gasp before flinging her arms around her lover’s neck, tears blurring her vision.  “I thought you were-,” her voice trailed off, unable to say the words.

“I know, I know,” Xander whispered in her ear, his hand gently stroking her hair, comforting her as only he could.  “But we’re alright.”

“But we might not be if we don’t get out of here and fast,” Tara pointed out.

Faith reluctantly extricated herself from Xan’s embrace and nodded.  “Preaching to the choir, sis, preaching to the choir,” she agreed.  “Let’s motor.”

“Back to the sewers,” Xander’s nose wrinkled.  “Oh joy.”

FIC:  MC 28 Aug ’00 Future Saved (8/?)

“How did you escape that car crash?  It looked like a freakin’ demolition derby!” Faith commented as Xander and the others led her out down the back stairwell, the sound of gunfire filling her ears.

“Yeah, we’d just got out of the car to chase after you when I saw the truck heading straight for us and we jumped over the bridge, onto the embankment by the side, rolled down, crossed the freeway, and escaped before he realised we’d survived,” Xander explained.

“Freaky,” Faith muttered as she shoved open the station’s back door and headed into the car lot.  “What’s the pla-.”

 

“Down!” Reese slammed into her back, knocking her to the ground behind a near-by squad car.

Even as her mouth opened in an enraged protest, the air filled with gunfire from in front in of them, the car between them and the shooter shuddering under the impact, glass from the car’s shattered windows showering them.  Wondering how the hell the android had got in front of them, Faith risked a look through the windows.  “Oh shit!” she exclaimed at the sight of a half-a-dozen khaki wearing thugs steadfastly advancing on them, the mini-uzis in their hands spewing out round after round.  “They must be Council.”

“Gee,” Xander commented.  “You think?  Only you’re so unpopular, it could be anybody!”

Faith glanced over her shoulder towards her boyfriend huddled in a crouch with Tara at the far end of the car.  “Me?  Why is it always my fault?”

“No-one tried to shoot me before I met you!” her soon to be ex-boyfriend retorted.

“That’s only ‘cause you didn’t know anybody!” she shot back.

“And you’re supposed to be the founders of the Brotherhood?” interrupted Reese, his eyes wide with disbelief.  “How did that happen?  You bicker like pre-teens!”

Faith’s mouth opened in a sulphuric curse.  Then the station’s back door crashed open and the cyborg strode out, his clothes smouldering from numerous bullet-wounds, but otherwise unharmed.  “Shit,” Faith croaked, an icy finger running down her spine.  The lifeless, implacable look in his eyes was wicked scary, any vamp would kill for a stare like that.

A hail of bullets from the hit-men smashed into the robotic intruder, knocking him back through the doorway.  A half-second later and he was back, his attention turning towards the Council hit-men, the massive gun in his hands coming up and firing round after round at them. 

”Faith!” she looked towards her honey, noting the tension in his face.  “See that manhole cover twenty paces to the right?” Faith looked then nodded.  “Head for it now!”

Faith charged across the ground, skin crawling and heart pounding, certain that at any second the firefight’s participants would notice her attempted escape and cut her down.  She was amazed when she reached the cover without incident, her companions close behind.  Flipping it open, she dived feet first into the hole below, landing in a crouch in hip-deep sewage, the filthy water splashing up to soak her from head to foot.  “Shit!” she cursed as her friends landed around her.  “Sewers, I freakin’ hate sewers!”

“Better than dead,” Xander pointed out.

“Not wrong,” she agreed.  “What’s the plan, now?”

“Strategic withdrawal,” Xander looked up at the open hole.  Like her, he’d heard the gunfire had stopped.  “We need time to re-group.”

”Running, I hate runnin’,” Faith groused as she looked around the dank, foul-smelling tunnel she found herself in before turning to her man.  “Oh, and Xander.”

“Yeah?”

”Thanks, lover,” she pressed her lips to Xander’s, working her tongue inside his mouth, her hands stroking his face as she smiled into his eyes. 

”You never thank me like that,” Tara joked.

“No time, Tar,” Faith winked at her sis.  “Let’s motor.”

                                    *                                  *                                  *

The Terminator moved over to the last of the men who’d fired on him.  Satisfied they were all dead, he moved over to the manhole and gazed down into the swirling waters below.  His targets had escaped him again.

For now anyway. 

He strode back to the wrecked police car, ripped its door off, and quickly removed its radio, checking it still worked.  That should be enough to keep him ahead of the local law enforcement units in their search for his prey, enabling him to get there before them.

                                    *                                  *                                  *

“We’ll come up here,” Xander announced, peering up at a manhole cover.  “No sound of life above us, so it should be deserted.”

“Wicked cool,” Faith muttered.  What seemed a lifetime sloshing through New Jersey’s  sewers had sapped her spirits.  Some of the disgusting crap people flushed away really didn’t bear thinking about, she was sure she was gonna come down with something nasty.  Looking around, she saw the same weariness she felt reflected in her companions’ eyes and drawn faces.  “I’ll go first.”

Ignoring X’s mouth opening in a macho-bullshit protest, which was kinda sweet but also irritating as hell, she brushed past her boyfriend and started up the iron rungs leading to the cover.  “Careful everyone,” she cautioned.  “Damn things are wet, don’t slip.”  Reaching the top, she shoved the manhole cover aside with one hand, blinking as the early-morning light hit her.  “Damn, she muttered.  “Now I know how a vamp feels.”  Taking a breath, she peeked her head out of the hole, praying with all her might she wasn’t in the middle of a high street, and about to lose her pretty little head to a speeding truck.

A relieved hiss escaped her lips when her eyes were greeted with the sight of a disused warehouse just ahead of her, an assorted collection of refuse scattered around the grey tarmaced floor.  Looking down, she saw X crawling up behind her.

And not for the first time, she inwardly smirked before speaking.  “Coast’s clear,” she reported before crawling out. 

Once they were all out, the early morning’s chill wind making them shiver, X started to pull clothes out of the Always Pocket.  “What’s the point of changing without a wash?” Tara complained.

“The point is,” Xander threw Tara one of her flowing skirts, a red cardigan, and matching blouse, “unless someone gets too close, we’ll look normal.  All we have to do is steal a car, find a discreet hotel, and shower, change again, and leave.”

“Oh,” Faith grinned wryly as she grabbed a pair of denims and a wifebeater off X, “is that all?”  She looked down at her still manacled wrists and ankles.  “I know you can get kinky, X, and believe me, I’m liking it.  But these kinda stick out in polite company.”

“Like you’d know.”

Faith ignored Tara’s mutter.  Xander grinned at her.  “Sure,” her boyfriend pulled out a pair of bolt-cutters and quickly cut the chains off.

”Wicked, hon,” Faith smiled at her man before hurrying to the far side of the warehouse and joining Tara in quickly changing.

Four depressingly run-down blocks later and they found a rusted 1977 Corvette with a careless owner who either forgot or didn’t care enough to lock his car up.  Climbing inside, Faith flung the remains of a Chinese Takeaway and some chick’s panties out of the grime-streaked window before looking towards X.  “Where to now?”

Xander didn’t answer her question directly.  “Tara,” Xan passed the witch her laptop, “find us the nearest scummy motel, preferably one near to a car dealership.”

“Okay,” the witch replied as the car juddered away from the kerb, its lack of a muffler ensuring its departure was far from stealthy.

”Jesus, X,” Faith winced at the racket.  “Couldn’t you have stolen something a little classier?”

“A heap like this, in an area like this, people aren’t likely to have much use for the police, they probably won’t report it,” Xander replied.

Faith blinked.  Yeah, that made sense, back in the day if someone stole something from her neighbourhood or beat someone up, the pigs were never called in.  And this place, Faith shuddered inwardly as they passed a boarded up shop front, was just like home.

“Turn next right, then second left, and the first right,” Tara said, her eyes fixed on the computer screen.

”Thanks,” Xander nodded in acknowledgment.

                                    *                                  *                                  *

“Damn,” Faith muttered as she climbed out of the car and stared at the two-storey building in front of her.  Every window was filthy and most were cracked, while the front of the place looked like it hadn’t been painted or washed since it was built some time in the 50s, and refuse was strewn haphazardly by the door.  This place reminded her of the dump she’d stayed in during her time in Sunnydale.

Which was another memory she was less than willing to visit.

Shoving the door open, she led her friends inside to find the foyer lived down to her every expectation.  The place stunk of vomit, drugs, and sex, giving her every clue to this place’s usual clientele.  The dirty carpet was threadbare, worn through to the extent you should see the floorboards in several places.  The wallpaper was peeling and had more than one patch of mould clinging to it.  And, Faith cast a disdainful look towards the man stood behind the worn reception desk, he was about par for the course for a place like this, a short, fat man wearing a sweat-stained vest and with only a few wisps of stubborn hair holding onto his head.

“How can I help you kids?” The man’s leer at her died at her steady look.

“Two doubles with showers,” Xander glared at the man.  “For the night.”

“Sixty bucks,” Xander dropped the money on the dirty desk.  The man snatched the money up with almost vampiric speed.  The hotelier turned around and pulled a pair of rusted keys off a hook behind him.  “Rooms 2C and SD,” the man proclaimed before daring to shoot her a second gap-toothed leer,” you need anything extra, all you have to do is call.”

“Great,” Xander replied with a politician’s sincerity as he snatched up the keys.  “Come on guys.”  The moment they were up the stairs and in the corridor outside their rooms, X turned to them and pulled clothes out of the Always Pocket.  “Shower, change, and then out the back.  And hurry.”

                        *                                  *                                  *

Faith stared up into the night sky, clouds blocking the stars she used to stare at as a kid, wondering if there was someone looking down on her with the same shitty life as she had, the same hopes and fears.  After showering and changing, they’d hurried to the nearest car dealership, X buying a family saloon by cash, and quickly driving them to this nondescript but clean motel on the outskirts of New Jersey.  She sighed and shivered, the android searching for them was a scary fucker.  From what Reese said the robot wouldn’t stop until either them or it was dead.

On balance she preferred that it died.

“Mind if I sit with you?”  Faith didn’t start at the voice behind him.  Reese moved pretty good, but someone who hunted vampires for a living could hear him coming a mile off.  Taking her non-reply as permission, the freedom fighter dropped into a crouch beside her.  “That revelation about you having kids really shook you up didn’t it?”  Faith didn’t answer.  Reese might know a hell of a lot about her, but he wasn’t family, and no-one but family got to see her scared.  “You know in the future, all the legends tell of your beauty and spirit,” Faith smiled at that, “Xander’s loyalty and bravery, and Tara’s wisdom and compassion.  But they don’t tell of the love that glues the fo-, three of you together.”

Faith stared strangely at the man.  That was the second time he’d referred to there being four of them.  Deciding he wouldn’t tell her, she turned back to the sky. 

The question was out of her mouth before she could stop it.  “Am I a good mom?”

Reese’s answering smile was strained.  “I can’t tell you that,” the man rose.  “But a family with so much love has to be a healthy place for a child to grow up.”  The man turned and walked back inside.

Faith made a promise as she stared up into the clouds.  She was gonna be a mom, and a damn good one.  And no fuckin’ Robbie was gonna take that away from her.

FIC:  MC 28 Aug ’00 Future Saved (9/?)

The Terminator stepped back and looked at his creation, an amalgamation of eight computers he’d stolen in the early hours from a local shop.  Even with all their processors connected to increase their power and their RAM boosted to somewhere in the region of three GB, they still didn’t have a tenth of the power his inbuilt computer had.  Unfortunately though his own chip wasn’t built with the ability to interface with the local computer systems, they were too backward.  His invention would have to suffice.

His eyes flickered to the door of his apartment at a sound outside.  After a second he recognised it as the owner’s cat prowling the unsanitary corridors and returned to his work, fingers moving with surprising nimbleness over the keyboard.  Police and hospital computer systems proved embarrassingly easy to hack, their firewalls and password protection small protection against his advanced technology.  Unfortunately though there were no reports of anybody matching his preys’ description.  But thankfully none of him either.  The law enforcement units of this time were woefully unprepared to deal with him, but they were a complication that could make things difficult.

When his search through law enforcement databases came up empty, he changed tact.  His fingers once again dancing over the keyboard, he searched for any usage of credit cards in the name that history recalled Xander Harris had used in his Council-hunted days.  He nodded as he came up with a match, a room booked in the young man’s alias.  After checking his data chip for directions to the motel he stood and systematically dismantled his invention.  It was important not to leave anything behind that would advantage the humans.  Once that was accomplished he loaded  up his weaponry and made for the exit.

As he closed the door behind him, he looked around.  He was in a drab corridor, lit only by a solitary bulb hanging wanly from the cracked ceiling.  As he examined the corridor for any potential threat the ginger cat purred its way over to him, crawling over his boots.  Looking down at the unwelcome visitor, he dropped into a crouch, wrapped a hand around the feline’s neck and picked it up.

The cat hissed and clawed at him, he stared impassively at the pet before tightening his grip around its neck.  The cat let out a protesting mew an instant before its bones cracked like twigs.  Terminator dropped the limp creature on the boringly blue carpet.  Cats were vermin, and served no useful purpose.  It was fortunate they were so easy to dispose of.

Just like humans.

                                    *                                  *                                  *

“Hey.”

“Hey.”  Xander rolled over as his girl-friend crept into their darkened bedroom and undressed, stripping to a pair of black cotton panties.

Faith grinned at his avid look.  “See something ya like?” his girl-friend asked, her pelvis doing a slow hypnotic gyration even as she breathed in and out, ample chest rising and falling with every heavy breath.  At the same time as the brunette pouted and ran her fingers through her glossy locks.

Xander gulped and reddened at the show he was getting.  Faith undressing was definitely his second favourite part of the time.  Actually his favourite if you allowed for the fact just watching didn’t leave him looking for an oxygen tank and zimmer frame like his favourite did.  “I see the odd curve that has an appeal,” he gamely replied.

“I bet.”  Faith laughed before leaping into the bed beside him with a feline grace that no normal woman could match.  He was surprised when Faith didn’t go into her usual ‘man-eater’ mode, choosing instead to lie beside him, one hand supporting her head, long hair hanging down onto the bed, and troubled eyes staring at him.  “Me and you, parents, pretty heavy, huh?”

So that was it.  “Pretty heavy,” he agreed with a nod.  “But we’ll do fine.”

Faith’s snub nose wrinkled and her world-class dimples appeared as she dazzled him with a smile.  “Ya think?”

“Just as long as they get your looks and my brains, and not the other way around, yeah.”

 

“Asshole,” Faith snorted before playfully backhanding on the arm.  “But seriously?”

“We’ll do great,” Xander ignored his own doubts to assuage Faith’s fears.  “I couldn’t help but love anything that came from you,” he tousled his girl’s hair, marvelling as always at its softness.

“But my strength.  If I got pissed,” Faith began only to be stopped by his finger to her mouth.

“Don’t you dare.  You’d use it to protect our children, never to hurt them, it’s not in the warm, loving girl I fell for,” he reprimanded. 

Once again he was treated to Faith’s winning smile.  “But what about demons and shit?”

“You mean being the Slayer?” Faith nodded.  Xander thought for a second, he’d be so worried about his past, becoming his father, a drunken lout who disparaged his child at every opportunity, he hadn’t even considered that problem.  “That just gives us another reason to make the Mithras Brotherhood as large and efficient as possible, to make sure demons are too scared or dead to even think of coming near our babies.”

“Yeah, there’s a plan I can work with.” Faith leaned in and kissed him on his neck, giving him a chance to inhale the smell of her hair before pulling back with a sigh.  “And it’ll be years yet anyhow, at least ten.”

“As long as that?” Xander queried.  He didn’t mind waiting, the prospect of being a parent was a scary one. 

“Yeah,” Faith smirked.  “I’m young with money, a cool guy, and a wicked sis, I wanna enjoy life before comin’ chained to the kitchen.”

It was Xander’s turn to snort.  The idea of his hellcat a Miss. Domestic was just too ridiculous to take seriously.  “I’ve tasted your cooking,” he said, “the kitchen would be the last place I’d chain you to.”

”Oh yeah,” Faith smirked and tilted her head to one side.  An unconvincingly innocent flutter of the Slayer’s long eyelashes followed.  “And where would be the first place you chained me to, Xanderkins?”

Xander grinned at his girl-friend’s mocking nickname for him.  “I think we both know the answer to that,” he raised an eyebrow.  “The shower, that body odour problem of yours needs serious attention.”

“Is that right?” Faith’s eyes narrowed.  “And there was me suggesting we get in some baby-making practice.  Not tonight babe, my legs are staying firmly crossed.” Faith laughed before rolling onto her back.  Xander laid there in the half-light, comfortable in the intimate presence of the woman he loved.  “X.” 

His girl-friend didn’t speak for a long while.  “What’s up, Faith,” he prompted.

“What if I,” Faith gulped.  “What if I get fat after I have the kids?  Will you still-.”

“Heck Faith,” anger burnt through Xander at his girl-friend’s self-doubt and lack of esteem.  If he could just get hold of the people who’d taught his girl she was worth nothing more than a quick lay, he’d send them straight to a very painful corner of hell.  Forcing a light tone, he shook his head.  “I love you because of your heart and bravery.  And ‘sides,” he rolled over and peered down at his girl, “I won’t let you get too fat.”

Faith’s brow furrowed in genuine puzzlement.  “What do you mean?”

“I’ll send you to step aerobics classes,” Xander grinned at his girl-friend’s mock-glare.  “As long as it takes.”

”Ya will, will ya?” Suddenly Faith was on him, legs straddling his mid-section even as she gazed down challengingly at him.  “Gotta say, X, ya might wanna cut down on the junk food, hon.  You’re young now, but give it a few years and you’ll be packing those pounds on.  And if you don’t wanna me to go out looking for a young stud, you’re gonna have to show some discipline,” Faith smirked.  “’Specially cutting out the Twinkies.”

“The Twinkies!” Xander’s eyes widened in mock-outrage.  “Sacrilege!  Leave the Twinkies alone!”  Faith giggled helplessly as he threw her down and started tickling her.    Suddenly their hotel room door crashed open.  Xander reached for the Always Pocket only to pause when he recognised Tara’s pale face.  “In the middle of something -.”

“He’s coming,” the witch interrupted, “I put up a magical barrier so I could sense him coming and he’s-.”  The witch’s voice trailed off when their darkened room filled with light from the street.  “Here!”

FIC:  MC 28 Aug ’00 Future Saved (10/?)

“Shit!” Faith swore as she leapt out of bed and rushed to the door, any lingering thoughts of modesty dissipating at the thought of whatever was heading straight at them.  “How in the hell did he find-,” her voice trailed off at her honey’s sheepish look.  “What did you do this time, X?”

“I signed in with a credit card,” her partner admitted.  “He must have a record of the names we were using now.”

”Oh well done, dickhead,” she cussed.  “Our kids, they need my looks and MY brains.”

“The goddess help them,” Tara muttered.  She glared at her sister.  Tara smiled back innocently. 

Faith chuckled, shaking her head.  Her sister’s sudden bursts of off-beat humour often caught her unawares.  She looked towards X.  “So what’s the plan?”

“We run,” Reese hurried into the corridor.  His eyes widened at her semi-naked form.  Faith smirked.  If the resistance fighters had known this was waiting for them, the entire army would have jumped through the time machine.  The man tore his gaze away from her and to Xander.  “Why aren’t you dres-.”

The hotel shuddered as something smashed into it, knocking everyone but her to the floor, Slayer agility saving her.  “That answer your question?” she queried, pulling on the jeans she’d picked up off the hotel floor before turning back to the wrecked room. 

“FAITH!” She ignored her boyfriend’s shout as he clambered up from the floor in favour of kicking the door open.

“Jesus,” Faith muttered as she strode into the wrecked room, “no way is X getting his deposit back.  Place looks like Motley Crue stayed here.”  The window and the outer wall were utterly demolished.  A black van was stopped where their bed had been, the bed flung into the near wall, huge cracks in its plaster.  Seeing the cyborg climbing out of the driver’s side, Faith charged over and kicked the door into him.

Her eyes widened when the car door hit the cyborg with all the force of a Slayer propelled-kick and dented.  “Well that’s not good,” she muttered.  Her eyes widened when the Terminator ripped the door off and threw it at her.

Faith dropped into a crouch, the door flew over her head and through the doorway, from the sound of things hitting someone on its flight out.  Deciding to worry about that later, she straightened and threw a left hook at the android’s jaw.

”Shit!” she swore as her fist smashed into the cyborg’s face, not even having enough impact to knock his head to one side.  Faith stared in disbelief at her hand, bruises already forming on her knuckles.

Realising the lumbering ox was throwing an overhand right, she ducked again, his fist sailing over her head.  Seizing the outstretched arm at the wrist, she moved into a judo throw, intending on throwing him over her shoulder.

And instead flew up into the air, crashing into the lampshade, enroute to colliding backfirst into the ceiling, when the cyborg flexed his massive arm and swung it upwards.  “This is getting real old,” she mumbled as she plummeted back down.

Hitting the ground in a catlike crouch, she swayed away from a kick.  Grabbing the foot, she held it steady as she toe-kicked his grounded foot in the ankle.  “YES!” she exulted when the cyborg’s foot buckled and he fell to the ground, crashing into the dresser by the wall, snapping it into a real pretty pile of firewood. 

She groaned as the cyborg was immediately up and swinging a dresser leg at her.  Ducking under the attack she shot out a heel-kick, her foot crunching into the android’s jaw.  This blow did snap his head back but before she had chance to rejoice at her successful attack, his hand was around her foot.

”JESUSSS!” She screamed as her ankle snapped under the android’s iron grip, unwelcome tears springing to her eyes as pain coursed through her body.  Her pain increased when her remorseless attacker swung her into the side of the van with enough force to dent it.

She was only dimly aware of the cyborg lifting her again and throwing her into the wall at the other side of the van.  She hit the stone with a crack, her left shoulder breaking under the impact.  Barely conscious she slid to the ground.

The android strode around the van to stand ten feet from her.  She attempted to rise to face it.  “SHITT!” she collapsed against as her ankle blazed with pain.  Her heart chilled as the impassive giant reached into his jacket and pulled out the biggest damn automatic she’d ever seen. 

“You are to be terminated,” the muscle-man announced as he levelled his elephant gun at her.

“Jesus, look at the size of that cannon,” Faith forced a defiant smile even as her heart thumped.  This was it, the end.  “What ya compensating for needle dick?”

“Then I must be in real trouble.” Suddenly the android was flying out of the window, propelled there by two door-shredders fired out of Xander’s Mossberg.

Her heart caught as Xan stumbled into the room, blood leaking from his forehead and his right eye swollen shut.  “Shit, X,” she exclaimed.  “What the fuck happened to you?”

Her boyfriend smiled painfully.  “Remember ducking under that door?  It hit me on the way out,” Faith winced.  “It took Reese and Tara this long to get me round so I could arm myself.”  Xander’s face whitened as he took in her wretched condition.  “He really did a number on you didn’t he?”

“Gee,” Faith scoffed.  “You think?” Faith sobered.  “X, I can’t walk outta here, shit I can’t stand.”  She paused, hating to be weak even, no especially, in front of her man.  “You’re gonna have to carry me.”

Xander winced as he slumped against the van.  “Problem there, I can hardly stand.”

“Fuck,” Faith turned to her man’s companions.  “Reese, looks like you’re up.”

The resistance fighter blanched.  “I can’t, you’re Faith!”

”And that’s a problem for ya?”

“You’re the grand-mother of -.”

Faith’s eyes narrowed to slits, her always short patience not lengthening any with the pain she was in.  “Do I look like a fuckin’ grand-mother?”

Tara snorted.  “I sorta think that’s his point.”

”Oh Jesus,” she snapped.  “It’s a rack, every woman’s got one, sure not as nice as mine-.”

“Hey!” protested Tar.

“Get over it and pick me up,” she glanced over to where the Terminator had flown, “I ain’t waiting for round two.”  The resistance fighter swallowed before stepping forward, crouching, and lifting her in his arms.  “SHITT!” She screamed as pain roared through her shoulder, pushing her to the edge of consciousness. 

“Faith,” Tara was by her side in a second, a worried look on her big sis’ face.  “I can do a heal-.”

“Ain’t got the time,” she said through gritted teeth.  “Let’s just-.”

“What the hell!” Faith groaned as the manager, a self-important red-faced asshole, rushed in, jowls wobbling and eyes widening, “what is going on -.”

The manager’s voice trailed off when Xander shoved the muzzle of his shotgun under the man’s third chin.  “Someone drove their van through our window, your valet parking really sucks,” Xander said calmly.  “Now, if I were you I’d get the hell out of here before I really lose my temper.”

The manager bolted, fat ass swinging as he waddled out of the demolished room.  Xander twisted his head to face them.  “Reese, you’re driving.  Let’s get a move on.”

The battered quartet stumbled out of the room.  The corridor outside was filled with people, but they soon scattered at the sight of Xander’s bloodied face and the gun he was swinging about.  “Police are sure to have been called,” Tara commented.  “We’ll have to move fast.”

“Yeah,” Xander’s voice was hoarse, weary beyond measure.  “Tell me something I don’t know.”

Finally they reached the car lot.  Tara hurriedly opened the doors before helping Reese manoeuvre her into the back seat, her head cradled in the witch’s lap.  “That ankle looks bad,” Tara commented.

Faith forced a smile.  “Slayer healing, right?” she replied.  “I’ll be five by five in a week.”

If they lived that long. 

FIC:  MC 28 Aug ’00 Future Saved (11/?)

Faith bit her bottom lip, muffling a whimper as the car careered around a corner, the jerking motion sending pain flashing through her body.  From the way Reese drove they didn’t have cars in the futures, or at least speed limits or lane discipline.  “Damn!” she heard Xander’s exclamation as light flooded the car from behind.  Even through her pain-filled fog she could hear the fear in her honey’s voice.  “He’s coming and he’s driving an 18 wheeler.”

“How are we going to stop this guy?” Tara exclaimed.

Before anyone had a chance to admit they hadn’t a damn clue, Reese let out an alarmed shout.  “Police barricade up ahead!”

                                    *                                  *                                  *

Xander turned from his inspection of the rapidly closing truck behind them to the as almost as distressing spectacle of several wooden barricades and four police cars up ahead.  “Damn,” he muttered again.  Either they’d been set up after last night’s club and police station massacres in the hope of catching those responsible, or they’d responded to the hotel manager’s calls with amazing speed.  Either way, their luck really, really sucked.  He looked towards their driver.  “Ride through it!”

Reese bared his teeth in a half-grin, half-snarl.  “On it.”  The car screeched in protest as the resistance fighter slammed his foot down on the accelerator, forcing yet more revs from the already protesting engine. 

The policemen manning the barricade charged for cover at their approach, eyes alarmed and doubtlessly suddenly sweaty hands scrambling for their guns.  The wooden barricade splintered under the impact of the car crashing through them, but even so Xander ducked as splinters flew up, cracking the windscreen before flying over the car roof.  It seemed wood wasn’t only a hazard to vampires.

“What’s the plan, Xander?”

Xander winced at Reese’s question.  Looking ahead, he could see they’d be at a small copse of trees in just a few seconds.  He’d already come up with an answer to the question back at the hotel.  That had necessitated him pretending to be more hurt than he actually was, because he needed for someone else to be driving.  Faith and Tara were probably going to be really pissed with him, but he didn’t care about that, just protecting the two women he loved more than life itself.  He glanced towards the resistance fighter.  “Whatever happens, keep driving,” he looked towards the girls in the back, heart tightening with sadness, “and look after them.”

Reese’s eyes flooded with alarm.  “Xander, what are you planning-.”

“Keep driving!” He shouted as he kicked the door open.  Ignoring Faith and Tara’s horrified protests, he leapt from the car.  The cold winds hit him a half-second before he smashed shoulder-first into the hard, wet tarmac.  “OWWW!” he screamed as he rolled off the road and into the slightly comforting darkness of the wood, leaving skin from his shoulder and hip scraped along the road.  “That hurt even more than I thought it would.”

A second later and the 18 wheeler thundered into view.  “For the record,” he muttered,” this is definitely a very bad idea.  And definitely Mithras’ and not mine.”  Rising on weary legs, he raced across the street, towards the passing vehicle.  As he drew level, he pulled a stick of lit dynamite out of the Always Pocket and shoved it into the exhaust pipe.

Turning, he charged in the opposite direction to the lumbering truck, heart pounding in his chest and aching legs trembling beneath him.  Then the truck blew. 

“OH CRAP!”  The force of the explosion lifted him off his feet and flung him upwards.  Even as he flew through the air, Xander turned his head to see what his attack done. 

The explosion had obviously spread to the fuel tank, turning the truck to a blazing inferno on wheels, the entire vehicle ablaze.  Even as he watched it lurched drunkenly before flipping onto its side, hitting the ground with an almighty wallop.

Just as he did himself.  “Today,” he groaned as he tried and failed to raise himself from the ground, arms not strong enough to support him, “really sucks.”  His eyes widened as their car screeched to a halt between him and the blazing truck.  Forcing his head up, he glared up at the opening car door.  “I thought I told you to keep driving?”

“I did, right in a circle back to you,” explained Reese.  Xander scowled.  Someone had clearly been taking lessons in being difficult from Faith.  “Here,” the time traveller hurried over to him, “let me help you up.”  He winced as the resistance fighter hoisted him to his feet, every muscle, sinew, and bone protesting at the movement.  The older man grimaced.  “You look like-,” the resistance fighter broke off to look over his shoulder, “I thought I said to stay in the car?”

Eyes wild, Tara pointed over her shoulder even as she half-dragged a moaning Faith from the car.  “LOOK!”

Xander’s jaw dropped as he followed the witch’s finger to see a figure climbing out of the blazing wreck across the road.  “Oh no,” he whispered.  The flames had almost entirely stripped the mechanical creation of flesh, leaving it looking more menacing,  inhuman, and implacable than any demon they’d faced, its metal components gleaming even in the night. 

He groaned as Reese leaned him against the car before rushing over to pick up Faith.  “Tara, you help Xander,” the freedom fighter glanced towards him, “he just needs a shoulder to lean on.  We’ll head for that factory over there!”  The freedom fighter pointed to a towering grey building across a field.

“Who died and made you the Surgeon-General?” Xander groaned his disagreement with Reese’s dismissal of his injuries even as Tara looped his arm over her shoulders. 

“Stop moaning.  If you had to give birth you’d know what pain is,” Tara replied.

Xander glared at the witch as they hurried away from the car. ”Normally I give the floor to a woman on that argument, but hello, lesbian.  Hardly going to be dropping any kids any time soon are you?”

 

“It’s called empathising with your fellow female, Xander,” Tara looked over her shoulder and paled.  “Oh no, he’s shot at the fuel tank, get down!”

The back of the car lifted off the ground with the impact, Xander dropped to the ground, face turned away as the vehicle exploded in flames, the heat painful even at a distance of some thirty feet.

“Oh crap,” this time he was able to drag himself up to his knees before needing help to get any further.  “Let’s keep going.”

                                    *                                  *                                  *

The Terminator stared after his quarry.  They were proving more difficult than he’d ever expected, the Slayer fought well, far better than any human he’d ever faced, and their entire group was exceptionally resourceful.  He took a second to allow his in-built systems to repair as much damage to his damaged components before starting after his prey, heavy feet cracking the tarmac underfoot.

Harris and Spenser had done well to last this far, but both were carrying injuries.  It wouldn’t be long now.

                                    *                                  *                                  *

Even carrying Faith, Reese still reached a side door before them but had to wait for them to arrive and for Xander to summons a shotgun to blow the door open.  Reese glanced over his shoulder.  “He’s still coming!”

“Gee,” Faith slurred, her normally luminous eyes groggy, “next you’ll be telling us he’s like a Mountie.”

Reese didn’t respond, choosing instead to plunge into the shadowy room beyond.  Xander looked around, the place was huge, but cramped, filled with row upon row of disparate machinery lying eerily silent.  Tara leaned him against the cobwebbed wall and reached for the light switches by the door.  “Don’t,” the witch looked towards Reese, confusion in her eyes.  “Turn those on instead,” the freedom fighter nodded towards a button and lever-filled panel just in from the door.  “The noise and movement will confuse his sensors.”  Tara stared at the man.  “DO IT!”

The man’s shout spurred the witch into action.  In a heartbeat she was at the panel, feverishly yanking on levers and punching buttons.  In a second the air was filled with the whirling of machinery, the screech of parts needing oiling, and the flashing of lights indicating parts were either in need of repair or re-supply.  “Well done,” the time traveller bellowed before pointing his shotgun at the control panel and firing.  The panel exploded into flames.  “He won’t be able to turn it off now,” the time traveller nodded towards a passageway between two rows of chattering machines to the left.  “This way,” Reese led the way, carrying Xander’s barely conscious girl-friend in his arms.  

Xander limped after the hurrying freedom fighter, Tara offering steadfast support.  His eyes widened when the freedom fighter gently lowered Faith to the dusty floor.  “What?” he hissed, not wanting to risk the pursuing cyborg hearing them.  “We can’t stop! We’re not in any condition to face that thing!”

“We’re not making a stand,” he was struck by the sadness in the man’s eyes when he turned to face him, how tired he looked.  “I am.”  In his weakened condition he was helpless to block or duck the right Reese smashed into his jaw.

A/N:  Thanks to BigHeadFics for the idea right at the end of this part.

FIC:  MC 28 Aug ’00 Future Saved (12/12)

“What are you doing?” Tara shrieked as Xander dropped like a stone.  She brought her fists up, moving into a defensive position Faith and Xander had taught her, a spell forming on her lips.  How could he have betrayed them?  His aura was good!

She was surprised when the man didn’t attack, instead smiling sadly.  “”What’s necessary.  I always knew it might come to this.”  The resistance fighter looked down at the bodies lying at their feet.  “When they awaken tell them,” the man’s face tightened, “tell them it was a honour to meet them.  And,” the freedom fighter looked up at her, “don’t worry, you won’t always be on your own.”

“What?” Tara’s brow furrowed, confused by the man’s words.  Her stomach hollowed as he turned away from her, a sickening realisation hitting her.  “You can’t!” she screamed, starting after him.  “It’ll kill you!”

The resistance fighter turned his head to face her.  “Are you going to chase after me, a stranger, or are you going to protect the two people you love more than anything, the two people fated to save the world again and again, to build the strongest demon-fighting organisation the world has ever seen?”  Tara halted, stumped by the question.  Reese smiled at her.  “I thought not.  It was a honour to meet you, too, Tara.”

Tara sunk to her knees beside her friends, tears rolling down her cheeks as she stared after the man who’d coerced her into an unpalatable choice.  “Damn you,” she mumbled.

                                    *                                  *                                  *

Reese’s heart thumped hard enough to crack his rib-cage as he made his way through the noisy factory.  He was taking a terrible risk, separating himself from the injured legends, but if they stayed together they were dead anyway, there was no way they could out-pace the Terminator, not with their multitude of injuries.  Their only hope of survival was if he dealt with the Terminator himself.  He stopped as he saw a gleam of metal to his left, turning he saw the android striding obliviously on.  Taking a breath, he started after the monstrous machine.

Then stopped as he noticed something hanging overhead.  He took a breath.  “Well it’s a plan,” he muttered.  “Not much of a one, but it’s a chance.”

                                    *                                  *                                  *

The terminator stopped, his sensors searching in vain for his prey.  The noise and motion of the primitive machines was throwing off his sensors, his filters not working hard enough to block all the extraneous noise out.  He’d attempted to shut the factory machinery down, but the control panel had been sabotaged beyond his ability to quickly repair.

“Hey.”

Surprised by a voice behind him, he started to turn.

And caught an iron bar to the head.  Grabbing the other end as Reese pulled it away, he tore the makeshift weapon from Reese’s hands only for the man to bring a shotgun up from within his jacket and fire, blasting him full in the chest.  He stepped back a distance and then started after the fleeing resistance fighter. Turning a corner, he was rocked by another shotgun blast.  “Oh no,” even above the machines’ noise he heard the man’s croak and the empty shotgun click that preceded it

The Terminator started forward.  Reese might not be the prey, but he would know where the prey was hidden.  And he would tell him.

                                    *                                  *                                  *

“Xander!  Xander!”

Xander groaned at the sound of the heavy metal band playing in his head.  Three consecutive nights of Black Sabbath, that really hurt.  He opened his eyes to find he wasn’t at a heavy metal concert but lying on a dusty factory floor, a concerned-looking Tara hovering over him.  His body still felt like one massive bruise though.  “What’s,” he winced as pain shot through his jaw, “happening?”

“Reese,” Xander grimaced, he remembered now, “he’s gone off to take the Terminator on his own!”

“Not likely.”  Cursing himself for not putting a Zimmer frame in the Always Pocket, he struggled to his feet.  “I’ll get him,” he looked towards Faith, forehead creasing, “is she alright?”

“She’s sleeping,” his friend comforted, “I cast a healing spell.  I was about to do one on you.”

“Right,” he pulled a shotgun out of the Always Pocket and passed it to Tara before pulling one out for himself.  The way things were going, he’d have to re-supply.  “I’m going after that idiot.  Stay down, and be quiet.”  Tara nodded.  “Which way did he go?”

“Of all the fool-hardy things to do!” Xander grumbled under his breath as he crept through the factory, the chattering machinery doing nothing for his thumping headache.  And that was another thing.  No way was the Terminator going to kill Reese before he’d got a chance to pound him for his sucker-punch.

His heart stopped as he saw the Terminator ahead of him, charging to the left.  Taking a breath, he hefted his gun and hurried forward.

                                    *                                  *                                  *

“Here goes,” Reese reached out as the machine leapt for him, his fist punching down on the release of a crane hanging overhead.  The air left his body as the Terminator crashed into him, knocking him to the ground.  He smiled victoriously as he looked up and saw the massive machinery plummeting down to crush him and his attacker.  He’d done it.  He’d saved the Harris line.

                                    *                                  *                                  *

“NOOO!” Xander’s eyes bulged as he hurried around the corner to see a several ton machine smash into Reese and the Terminator, destroying the robot but also splattering Reese all over the ground.  Bile rising in his throat, Xander dropped to his knees and, eyes still fixed on the horror before him, vomited, puke spraying his jeans and the ground.  Breath coming in desperate pants, he clambered to his feet, forced his eyes away from the carnage before him and started back to his girls.

“Xander!”  Tara rose from checking over a now-awakening Faith, soft eyes alight with concern. “What happened?  Where’s Reese?”

“He’s dead,” Xander grunted. 

Tara’s face dropped. “How, why,” the witch babbled, tears forming in her eyes.

“Look, we don’t have time!” he shouted, angry at his own failure to get them out alive.  “We have to get out of here!”

“Hey,” Faith croaked.  “Don’t take your shitty mood out on sis.  What the fuck happened?”

Xander shot the witch an apologetic look.  “He lured the android into a trap, then dropped ten tons of machinery on them both.”

“Man,” Faith limped to her feet, a look of awe in her eyes, “that took balls.”

“Yes, yes it did.”  Xander winced as he remembered the carnage. 

                                    *                                  *                                  *

New York

Tony Stark rubbed his forehead wearily.  Nine at night and still the books didn’t balance.  Being a super-hero AND business tycoon sure was time-consuming.

BRING! BRING! BRING!

He looked up from his accounts at the phone ringing, pulse quickening.  It was his special phone, its number held only by members of his inner circle for use in emergencies.  Whoever was phoning would be phoning about something important.  Lifting the phone, he spoke.  “Hello.”

“Mr. Stark-.”

“Xander!” he boomed with delight as he recognised the voice.  “Now lad,” he affected a stern tone.  “Remember, only my close friends have this number.  And my close friends don’t call me Mr. Stark-,” his voice trailed off as he belatedly registered the weariness in the boy’s voice.  “Xander, what’s wrong?  Are you and the girls alright?”

“We’re fine, sir, thank you, sir,” the boy replied.  “Only did you see that mess in New Jersey?”

“The nightclub and station house massacres?” he nodded.  Like everyone he’d been horrified by the news.  “Yes.”

“We were in the middle of it, something was after us, and it didn’t care how many it killed to get to us.”

“Oh, Xander,” Tony winced.  He’d had powerful enemies who’d thought nothing of massacring a few innocents to get your attention, and the responsibility you felt. You hadn’t pulled the trigger, but you carried the guilt.  “Son, it’s not-.”

“Do you know a company called Skynet?”

Tony thought for a second, thrown by the sudden change of topic.  “Yes, I do,” he finally replied.  “There a small but cutting-edge Silicon Valley company working in the field of Artificial Intelligence.”

“Yeah, how much they worth?”

Tony was growing more and more puzzled by the second but endeavoured to stay with the conversation.  “Not much, thirty – forty million, maybe.  Like I said, they’re not big.”

“Could you buy them for me?”  Tony gaped.  “I’d pay you for it of course.  But I need someone to act as cov-.”

“Xander, what is this all about?”  He interrupted before listening with dropping jaw as the youth recounted what had happened and Skynet’s part in it all.  After a second he to gather his thoughts he spoke.  “I’ll get on it, Xander.  But if it’s a hostile takeover, it could cost a lot more than the forty million I estimated.”

“More than the world’s future?” the teen responded.

Tony blinked.  There was no answer to that.  “What do you want me to do with the place once I’ve got it?”

“Give their resources to Brill and Angela, and re-employ them in electronic surveillance, counter-surveillance, and encryption under the name of Slaynet.”

Tony chuckled.  The youth had obviously thought this out.  “I’ll get on it immediately, Xander.  And in turn, you make sure to look after yourself and those two girls, you hear me?”

”Yes sir, thank you sir.”

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