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Oz woke up hungry. He didn't know exactly why he was so hungry, it was a different kind of hungry. The kind that you know is wrong but you still want to feed it. "Huh." he said softly and got up when he heard the door behind him open.
The Master walked into the room gazing at Oz. He newest and most intelligent spawn. "Welcome home." He said and grinned. Willow and Xander flounced outside of the door Xander had Willow pinned against the wall and she was making soft mewling sounds. The Master rolled his eyes and glared at Oz. "You will not feed until you find the ones that were your friends in life, the ones that made you weak as a human." Oz only nodded, at a loss for words, even more so then usual.
The Master moved out of the room and grabbed Xander by the collar of his shirt slinging him into the wall across from Willow. Xander shifted into game face and growled at the master then quickly changed back to human realizing who it was. "What?" he asked not missing a step. The Master glared. "Take him to the white hats." he said to Willow ignoring Xander.
Willow pouted. "Do I have to?" the Master didn't even respond. "Xander, go find me a nice toddler. I'm hungry." Xander nodded bowing his head slightly as the Master left them to ponder what was up. Willow sighed dramatically when the Master was out of sight.
"I guess I better get him to the white hats." She said jerking her head towards Oz who was standing in the doorway looking disoriented. Xander shrugged and moved closer to her again giving her a passionate good bye kiss and then he was gone leaving Willow with Oz.
"C'mon." Willow said and walked down the tunnel throwing Xander one glance over her shoulder as he disappeared down the other tunnel. "Your very lucky you know, born to the Master himself. His blood. You might have a chance if you take the white hats out one by one." Willow said making conversation as the twirled her hair around her finger. "One by one." Oz echoed
~*~End Part 1~*~
Larry whistled along with Nancy waiting for any vamps to pop out and grab them. She was completely ignoring him, too worried about Oz. She wouldn't admit it of course but he knew that was the case. Nancy and Oz had been close and when he'd not shown up the night before she'd made them all go looking even though they knew it was useless. Now she was just quiet.
"Hey Nan, why don't you go home? I can take it from here I think. Giles said to stick together but.. it looks pretty dead out here. So to speak." He said waving his hands over the cemetery to show his point.
"No." She said with little to no emotion.
"Yes. You need to rest, you didn't sleep last night." Larry said in a caring *not cause your an invalid but its not good for your health* voice so as not to offend her and set her off.
He knew she was walking on thin ice and was bound to crack at any minute.
"We stay together. Nobody is going to patrol alone anymore, its not safe. Drop it." she said in the same emotionless voice she'd been using all night.
Larry shrugged and continued walking, he knew she missed Oz. He missed him too. They
were such a small band of fighters against all the vampires in Sunnydale, now they were
even smaller. Who would be next? They heard a high shriek coming from the other end
of the cemetery he heard Nancy curse under her breathe as they took off at top
speed.
They jumped a fallen tree and stumbled into where they had heard the scream coming face to face with that red headed bitch that had plagued them for months, there was blood smeared around her mouth and she dropped the limp body of Harmony onto the ground and smiled at them with bloody fangs. "Too late, white hats." She said giving them an insane grin. "Where's your librarian?" She asked in a sing song voice and turned to walk away.
Nancy jumped at her knocking her onto the ground. She quickly grabbed a cross out of her back pocket and applied it to Willow's open back. Willow screamed in agony and quickly rolled over knocking Nan into the nearest tree. "Shit." She mumbled and got up demonic yellow eyes glared at Larry and he threw a cross into her face making her hiss and back away. She turned and ran. *If I killed that whitehat bitch the Masters going to kill me.*
"Coward." he mumbled moving towards where Nancy had fallen.
"Nan?" Larry asked gently touching her head. She jerked and sat up looking dazed, red blood leaked down her face and she swiped at it angrily with her hand. "Here." He handed her a piece of clothe from his pocket. She took it and gently dabbed at the blood.
"Where?" She asked him finally finding her voice. He shrugged. "She ran. Just the Masters lapdog doesn't know how to fight without a group." Larry says reassuringly.
"Giles. She asked about Giles. I have a bad feeling." Nancy quickly climbed to her feet and started off towards the library. "Come on."
A bad feeling. It was going around. None of this felt right.
~*~End 2~*~
Oz crept through the stacks of the library Willow had shown him the door in. He saw the librarian sitting at one of the long research tables that probably hadn't been used for the original use in years. He was carving bolts for a small crossbow, Oz smiled. He remembered this man from his life, he'd been his mentor. Now he was going to be his first kill, how poetic.
Oz slowly went down the stairs erasing the smile from his face he concentrated on not letting his new demon face show. He knew it was crucial to put on the charade as long as Giles would buy it or else he would be like so many other piles of dust. But unlike the others, he knew how this team worked. Remembered their strategies and knew that Giles was what held them together, without him they would be easy floundering targets. He came up behind the old man, "Giles?" he said softly trying to sound like his human self.
Giles started turned around quickly nearly knocking the chair he was sitting in over. He stood up. "Where have you been?" Giles asked suspiciously looking Oz up and down. He'd been gone so long.. could he even dare to hope that this was his Oz and not some demonic thing taking over the boys body.
"Giles, I had to go to my family... I'm sorry I couldn't tell you guys. That's why I wasn't here last night." Oz said stepping closer to Giles.
Giles took a step back. Damn. He'd moved away from the weapons in that step. He couldn't reach them without being obvious. "How is your family, Oz?" He asked trying to inch his way to the weapons.
Oz didn't want to play these stupid mind games. He wanted to feed. To feel this mans lives blood dripping down his throat while he struggled under Oz's strong, yes strong grip. Oz leaped forward and grabbed Giles by the collar. "I don't know, I'll be sure to ask them while I'm killing them." Oz growled and threw Giles back against the cage.
He thumped when he hit it and looked slightly dazed. Oz grinned as his face shifted. He moved forward and grabbed Giles by the hair and pulled him up again slamming him against the cage. Giles punched him hard. If Oz was human he probably would be on his ass, he wasn't human.
Giles continued to fight against Oz trying to sweep his feet out from under him. Oz had the advantage at having Giles pinned against the cage. He brought Giles forward and slammed him back a few times making Giles groan in pain his glasses slipping off his nose.
Oz stomped on them for good measure before pushing Giles head aside and sinking his fangs into Giles's soft throat flesh. Blood washed over Oz's tongue and fangs and he reveled in the feel of it. He knew he would enjoy it. He'd known he would enjoy killing.
~*~End 3~*~
Nancy and Larry burst into the library shouting Giles name when the smells of blood and death assaulted their noses.
"God." Nancy mumbled the blood was smeared all over the floor and pooled around the body of their former mentor. Nancy took in a sharp breath and moved forward. Better to make sure he was dead.
"He's dead." a soft voice from the table whispered. Nancy gasped. Oz.
"Oz? What the hell are you doing here?" Larry accused, Oz looked stricken.
"I came in and found him like this." Oz said with a shrug.
"Go, pick up a cross and hand it to me." Larry said coldly. "You don't trust me?" Oz asked standing up. "Nan? You don't trust me?" Nancy swung her eyes from Giles's blue corpse to look at Oz. She didn't answer.
"Go. Pick up. The Cross." Larry ordered keeping his distance from Oz, untrusting like Giles had always taught them. Never trust someone until they had passed the test.
Oz knew what Larry was trying to do. Test him. He didn't trust him? Boohoo. He'd work on the weak one. Nancy. She believed him, they'd been close in his life time. Larry didn't know how close. "Nan?"
Nancy stared at Oz. His eyes, his body, his voice. Him. Why was Larry acting like this? There was no reason for all of this crap. Obviously this was Oz. "Larry it's okay... Oz."
Larry glared at her. She was being stupid, he knew that, she didn't realize. Just Oz's being defiant about the cross test was enough to tell him. This wasn't there Oz, she was blinded by her want for him to be their Oz, to still be him. "Nancy, open your eyes." Larry growled trying to get her to wakeup and smell the vampire.
Nancy glanced at him. "My eyes are open. Your just being paranoid." Nancy shot at him a look. She didn't notice Oz moving closer to her.
"Maybe you should have been a little paranoid, Nan." Oz mumbled before slinging her into the open cage and slamming it shut.
~*~End 4~*~
Nancy flew into the cage and hit the opposite wall with a thud. She slid to the floor disoriented.
Larry jumped forward trying to knock Oz over, before he could reach him Oz backhanded Larry and he stumbled backwards.
Nancy got her bearings and got up, she slammed her fist against the wire mesh of the cage. "Oz, don't!"
Oz ignored her, watching Larry move. He had acquired a stake somewhere in the last thirty seconds, Oz grinned. "What do you think your going to do with that?"
"Kill you." Larry said glaring at his used to be best friend. *Its not Oz.. not Oz.. demon who took Oz.* he kept chanting in his head. Larry lunged forward and Oz knocked the stake from Larry's hand it skittered across the tile. Larry grunted in frustration.
Nancy searched in the cage for anything to break herself out of the cage. She'd been so stupid to trust Oz, and now she was probably going to pay with her life.. and Larry's.
Larry brought his fist up and it connected with the side of Oz's head. Oz growled his face shifting into its demon form, his true for now. Oz hit Larry hair shattering Larry's nose under his palm.
Nancy threw open the weapons cabinet in the back of the cage and grabbed the cross bow out of its spot high on one of the shelves. She glanced around for a bolt and saw one she reached up and grabbed for it and it got knocked down under the cabinet. She cursed and got down on her hands and knees looking for it.
Larry backed away from Oz. Oz smiled evilly.
"Bastard." Larry growled taking another step back Oz didn't even respond. Larry took another step and his foot slipped on Giles's sticky blood still spread out around the floor. Larry tumbled to the ground next to Giles still form and all the air fled out of his lungs.
Oz picked up the stake that Larry had dropped earlier in the fight and walked to where Larry was still on the floor breathing heavily.
"You were going to kill me with this." Oz said matter of factly. Larry just stared up at him. Oz brought the stake down hard splintering Larry's rib cage, blood sprayed everywhere and Oz licked his lips.
He turned to see Nancy's reaction. The pain and shock on her face would be beautiful to him. He grunted when he felt a wooden bolt enter his heart. "Nan?" He croaked before crumbling into dust.
Nancy refused to let herself cry. She hadn't cried when her family had been murdered, hadn't cried when her friends had been taken and made vampires. Hadn't cried when Oz had turned up missing. Now her whole world was gone everything, Oz, Larry, Giles. She didn't have any reason to cry, crying was for the weak and you were only allowed to cry when someone was there to comfort you. She had no one.
She leaned against the cage door, the door that had kept her from helping Larry. It clicked and fell open. She stood up straight and walked out into the library. She would get Larry and Giles to the incinerator and then she was leaving. Sunnydale was going to have to fend without its small band of white hats. There was no one left to save for her. No one was left to help, no one left to love.
No one.
--End--