Primal Hiding
by Salix
Game Plan
[reviews]
(Two hours earlier)
Willow, Giles and the AI team (except for Wesley, I don't really like Wesley so I try to keep him out of my stories) were sitting around a large table. A map of L.A. was unfolded and Willow had just finished preparing the spell. She handed Cordelia the other little bag of dust. She cleared her mind and when she counted to three she and Cordelia scattered the dust all of the map. Little lights started to appear all over the place, mostly white, indicating evil. The largest dot was the hotel itself, all of the evil that had been killed here left behind its essence. This place needed to be cleansed, but Willow would worry about that later. She knew that Buffy's light would be green, she's gone this spell before, but she didn't see a green dot anywhere.
"Oh god, where is she? What if something bad happened? We need to find her. There has to be another way. We need to do something we need-" Willow started to babble but Giles was able to quiet her down. Angel went and got another map, a larger one of California and he unfolded it and put it on top of the other one. Cordelia and Willow did the spell again and it only took a couple of minutes for them to see the little green dot, and it was moving further North.
"Why is she going North? Buffy doesn't know anybody up North," Willow said and looked around the room. All of that confidence that she had been feeling earlier was gone. She now felt like a scared little girl, lost in a supermarket looking for her protector. This was all her fault. She couldn't stop blaming herself, and she wouldn't, at least not until Buffy was back and safe and in her arms.
"My best guess is she's going to San Francisco. There's a lot of demon activity there. Wesley just finished researching it last week. They have a spiritual Nexus. That's what is drawing the demons there. Very few vampires, mostly lower level scavenger types. But upper level ones will go after it," Angel explained and crossed his arms. She was already in Hanford, another three hours and she would be in San Francisco. And he had to stay here because they wouldn't make it before the sunrise. He really hates being a vampires.
"What's a Nexus?" Willow asked, forcing the sickening feeling of guilt down. She watched the little green dot as it slowly moved North and it started to pick up speed. She wondered if it had anything to do with this Nexus or whatever it was called. She's never heard of that before and she really wanted it explained so that they could hurry up and find Buffy. They needed to find her before something bad happened.
"A spiritual Nexus is a point of incredible energy. It's equal distant from the five spiritual elements, if you were to trace it on a map it would form a pentagram and the Nexus would be in the middle. It's pure energy, neither good or evil, just raw power. A house was built on top of it but was destroyed in the 1906 earthquake. It was rebuilt and purchased by a witch who's magical heritage goes back to the Salem Witch Trials," Giles explained. Willow couldn't help but tense up at the mention of the trials, and she was reminded of her little experience being tied to a pole while fire is burning under you.
"Ok, well then we need to find her. If she's going to find the Nexus...why would she try to find the Nexus?" Cordelia asked and stood up, starting to pace again. Just sitting here was driving her insane. They needed to go out and find Buffy. She's isn't exactly thinking rationally and Cordelia's afraid that the slayer is going to do something that the human part will regret.
"To use its power, become stronger? Or perhaps to protect it? Demons are after it all the time, something that powerful that has the potential to do great damage needs to be guarded. It's being protected now by three extremely powerful Wiccans, and if we don't get there before Buffy does, if that's where she's going, then we might have a bad situation on our hands," the ex-watcher said and removed his glasses and started to clean them, thinking about all of the bad things that could happen if Buffy gets to the house.
"Bad situation, what type of bad situation? They wouldn't hurt her would they?" Willow asked and looked from person to person. It seemed like none of them wanted to speak, expect for the softer version of Anya. And all focus was on her as she spoke, pacing back and forth in front of the table.
"If some woman showed up at your house acting like something right out of the Stone Age would you be willing to let them in? And when Buffy wants to protect something she's fierce about it, I know we've all seen that. So either the witches will cast some sort of spell on her or Buffy might hurt them trying to get to...whatever it's called." Willow couldn't help but silently agree. She stood up, resolve face on, and she picked up the map. She looked at the little green light again, and it was steadily moving northwest, on a path straight for San Francisco.
"So we follow her, try to get there as soon as we can and we stop something bad from happening. Buffy won't kill a human, not even the slayer would do that. We just need to stop those witches from doing something that will cost them their lives," she said and she folded the map. She knew that the spell would remain active until she clean off all of the dust.
"I thought you said Buffy wouldn't kill a human," Angel said as he stood. He knew he couldn't go with them, and it upset him, wounded his pride but he was willing to deal with it, as long as Buffy stayed safe that's all he cared about. But still, not being able to help was making him extra broody.
"She wouldn't, but if they hurt her I'll kill them myself," the redheaded witch said, her voice was cold and her eyes were black where there should have been white. None of them doubted for a second that she was speaking in truth and that she would live up to what she was saying. With their goodbyes, and their plan set, Willow, Giles and Cordelia took off in Xander's car. The ex-watcher and the fashion diva praying that they got there before something bad happened to the slayer because they knew they wouldn't stop Willow from hurting those witches if it came to that.
A/N: I just couldn't help myself. Oh well, it'll make for a more interesting story, at least I think so, what do you think?