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(This is original story written by Chris Kenworthy, based on the Buffy characters, who he does not own etcetera etcetara...)
As she crawled out of the van, she was about to call out to Willow, ask her where the delivery was. And then she realized that she didn't need to. Sitting right beside their two cars was that special little something she had asked for Mister Chase's help in procuring.
Buffy had put a lot of thought into her assault on the Retreat headquarters of the Tarakan Order. Franco Belone had been full of background information for Buffy about the retreat's defenses, and Angel had been more than happy to help Buffy brainstorm it out.
The one piece of good news was that the Order was quite centralized, above the hunter level. The authority headquarters, the facilities for summoning, capturing, or breeding new members for the Order, and training them once they had been 'procured' were all here in the Himalayan hideout. So was most of the disciplinary hierarchy that kept each individual Hunter toeing the Order line.
If Buffy and her friends could destroy this building, kill most of the Order muck-a-mucks there, including especially the highest leaders, all that would be left of the Order of Taraka would be a couple dozen expert demon bounty-hunters, strung all over the world. Probably, they would all choose to become independents, meaning that Buffy would have suceeded in 'destroying the Order of Taraka and all its works." They hoped.
The bad news was that the Retreat was exceptionally well-guarded. Of course, considering the remoteness of its location, and the general field of aversion that surrounded it as a site of ancient magic, no-one would discover it by accident. But the Order had its enemies who were resourceful enough to find out the location of headquarters, and the demon Taraka had become increasingly paranoid about his security this millenium.
Buffy knew that in the end, it would come down to the strength and skill of her companions against the ranking demons of the Order. But, rather than climb their way up to the Retreat and working their way through layers of guards vampires and minor demons before getting to the well-defended Retreat buildings, Buffy's friends would punch through those first few obstacles with considerably more ease.
"Wow," Lora Theron commented once she caught sight of Buffy. "Talk about doing it with style, Buff." From the look in the demon hunter's eyes, she had been admiring the delivery for at least a few minutes before Buffy arrived.
It was a beauty, she had to admit. Combat assault helicopter, armed with several of the traditional standbys and a few special surprises. "Can I have an update on the countdown?" she asked aloud.
Willow checked her watch. "T minus ten hours, forty-five minutes." Ah, right. It was probably... what? Just getting on for nine in the morning, local time? And the attack had to be scheduled for after sunset, so that their 'allies' in the Order of Taraka could escape without exposure to the light of day, which was harmful to a few of them. It also meant that the more powerful guard-demons might be off their guard, depending on the indentured vampires to keep security up, and not expecting an attack during the time that the forces of evil were generally stronger.
"Okay," Buffy said, nodding. Stepping up to the chopper, she addressed the young man behind its controls crisply. "You fly this bird??"
"Yes, miss. You Buffy Summers?"
"That's me," Buffy said, stifling her surprise. "You were told to expect me?"
"Of course, miss. You don't fly a battle bird out into the wilderness and take aboard just anybody. I always ask for a lot of details on who, and where, my contact will be. Mister Chase was very helpful."
"Good," Buffy said with a smile. "Now, who are you??"
"Eddie Roberts, miss." Eddie fired off a quick salute.
This time, Buffy couldn't mask her giggle. "At ease, soldier. You've got forces experience??"
"Three year stint, army flyers. Now, well, I pilot an assault chopper for hire. S'more fun."
Buffy blinked in surprise at that. "Did Mister Chase tell you what the target was??"
"Nope. Just that it was criminal, up in the mountains."
"Yeah," Buffy agreed. "Criminal is an understatement - these goons are monsters." Literally, though she didn't think Eddie would realize that. "I was thinking we'd fly up, take out as much of the defenses as we can with the armament on this copter. Then you land, let us out, and take off again. Your part of the job will be done then."
Eddie frowned a little. "Well, I'm all for keeping my own skin safe, when I can, but I don't like leaving my bosses' necks on the line either."
"The way it's gotta be," Buffy said with a shake of her head. "We gotta go in there, but if the copter stays around long, it's probably gonna get the kind of damage that isn't covered by the lease agreement."
"You'd be surprised how often that happens," Eddie said in an aside.
"Like, totalled," Buffy clarified. "Along with anyone who's still in it. If you want to pick out a site further down the mountain and rendezvous there, that'll be fine. But the copter can't stay right next to the retreat, which means that you can't."
"Okay," Eddie said. "Anything else??"
Buffy considered a moment. "Um, Franco and Angel are gonna want to talk to you, I think," she mentioned. "As for me, I'm going back to bed."
* * * *
Two hours before his shift would begin at the Bronze, Xander met with Vanessa and some of her witchly councillors, to present his idea about Cordelia.
"I agree," Vanessa said once Xander was done. "It could do a lot to help around here. I think I know the magic she'll need... strength and shadow, endurance and agility. But it seems to me that the first question is... will Cordelia agree to do it??"
All eyes turned towards Cordy. She had changed from her outrageous waitress outfit to some clothes that she had probably found around the Resistance - blue jeans and a light blue shirt. She still looked pretty cute, Xander thought idly. No, don't focus on that. Remember Buffy?? "I'd like to," Cordelia finally admitted. "Well, not like to in the sense of being excited about it, because I'm not. But I'd like to do something to help out. Except..." She paused significantly, and Xander was surprised to see tears in her eyes. "I can't do it. I'd like to, but I just... can't!!"
Xander reacted without thinking about it, reaching out to grab Cordelia's hand in his, swinging his chair around to face Cordy nearly head on. "Don't say that. You can do anything that you put your mind to. I've come to realize that, over the past year. Remember how you saved the unicorns from Cain, in Oxford? That was pretty impossible. But you did it anyways."
"That was magic," Cordelia scoffed.
"Well, isn't what you need right now a little magic?? And it wasn't just ordinary witchcraft. Vanessa, you told me about this, once, right? Cordelia, you have an incredible power buried deep within you, down so deep that you can't even believe that it's really there. But when you start to draw on that, there isn't anything beyond your reach."
Cordelia nodded, seemingly coming to terms with the idea. "But then how couldn't I get you back from Buffy??" she asked, teasingly.
"You never really tried," Xander said straightly. "If you had, I would have been a goner."
Cordelia's eyes widened slightly in surprise at that admission. They weren't the only ones.
"Uh, okay," she said after a second, returning her attention to the rest of the group. "I'm willing to try it. What happens next??"
* * * *
"C'mon, Buffy, it's the only really fair way," Willow said. They had been arguing for ten minutes about choosing up weapons for the raid on the Order headquarters now.
"Okay," Buffy said. "Gimme the damn dice." She took the dark blue cubes from Willow and tossed them onto the cargo floor of the wagon. Six and a four. Ten.
"Was that so hard?" Willow asked. Each of them rolled the dice in turn. Marea. Five. Franco. Seven. Willow. Eight. Lora. Three.
Angel. Eleven.
"Go again," Buffy complained, knowing that none of them would go along with that. This was the only fair way, but... she couldn't let Angel pick ahead of her.
"The copper spear," Angel said quickly.
"No, Angel, you can't..." Buffy tried once again. Carrying the copper weapon meant that Angel would have to go up against all Rhodintor in the retreat - the species of immortal demon mages who included Taraka himself, the founder of the order, and the most dangerous individual in the entire place.
"Buffy," Franco said placatingly. "Angel has won the choice fairly. And he has a point. With the endurance of a vampire, he may be the best suited to slay Taraka."
"He's right, Buffy," Angel chimed in. "You're a better fighter than I am. But with this spear, taking down a rhodintor doesn't need your level of skill or agility. It's just a question of staying alive while you get the right throw off, and I have the edge on you here. Especially with Willow's amulet to protect me from Taraka's magic."
"Okay," Buffy groaned. "Auto crossbow." She had perfect aim, and experience with this kind of weapon, if not an actual automatic crossbow with a magazine of twelve quarrels (including some special-purpose,) and tangle-free auto-loading.
The rest of the choosing, once that difficult issue was out of the way, went quite smoothly. Willow took a white ash quarterstaff (whose wood was the only substance on earth that could kill a bloodwitch - by bashing the hell out of her/it,) and a bottle of holy water, which was to be specially kept to vanquish 'nosferatu,' demons similar to but much hardier and stronger than true vampires. They were more susceptible to blessed water, though, which was fatal to them, and only painful to ordinary vamps.
Franco Belone armed himself with a well-crafted mace, admanite-tipped, and a long-bow. Marea took an incindiary rifle, (similar to the fire pistol Buffy had used to kill Queen Kaliya, but more accurate and with several more shots,) a broad axe made out of cold iron, and a good old-fashioned wooden stake. Lora was going in with her own sword, of course, silver-edged throwing stars, and a lead ball and chain for putting the kibosh on serpent-men.
Buffy got a truesilver sword, (which she suspected the others left for her because of the spear thing,) and took a cross for dispelling any dark spirits that might be around. And Angel took a long scottish dagger as his side-arm, and throwing knives.
"Okay, let's go over the plan one more time," Buffy said, sighing. Angel and Lora spread out a map, while Franco got out his notes.
* * * *
Further up in the Himalayan mountains, the retreat waited...
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