Chapter 17 - Challenges


Cordelia noticed Buffy out of the corner of her eye. Apparently, the Slayer had finally managed to break free of her bonds. Buffy’s eyes possessed a feral gleam to them and she appeared angry and ready to strike.

Cordelia looked over to Riley to see if he had noticed. The soldier was too busy concentrating on the road ahead of them and tapping his hands along the steering wheel as if was the drummer in whatever godforsaken band he was listening to.

Therefore, the brunette beauty had a very important decision to make. Risk their lives by letting an angry Buffy attack Riley while he was in process of driving or suffer and listen to whatever shit Riley was listening to for the next couple of hours. The decision turned out not to be that difficult.

“Riley, I’m going to crawl in back to grab William. He looks like he’s about to get fussy.”

Riley did not even look at her. He mumbled a “sure” to her, sounding slightly annoyed that he was interrupted from his daydream. Quickly, she unbuckled her seat restraint, and crawled towards the back. She noticed that Riley’s coat was hanging off the back of the driver’s chair, and sticking slightly out of its pocket would be all she needed to resolve this situation, the taser. Carefully she removed it out of the pocket as she finished climbing into the back.

Luckily, Buffy was concentrating too hard on leering at Riley that she did not even notice Cordelia had reached behind her and zapped her with the taser. Cordelia collapsed against the back of the seat and relaxed. ‘Catastrophe averted.’ She thought. Then, she unbuckled little William from his car seat and rocked him gently. Hopefully, he would not try to bite her since she just knocked out his mom. She silently hoped that he had some way of being able to sense intent, and that her intent was out of the goodness of her heart.

“Yes!” Riley exclaimed from the front seat. “Man I love this song.”

Cordelia cringed as the volume of music increased and she had to listen to Warrant’s “Cherry Pie” belting out of the speakers and William start to whimper. William she could deal with. Bad 80’s hair bands she could not. She tapped Riley on the shoulder, and he immediately turned down the volume.

“What?” he asked her obviously annoyed.

“Look Riley, I understand it is a very long drive. I understand that it is helpful to have the radio on something you like. I even understand the whole reliving my high school dream of I want to be a rock star. I plead with you anything but this. Don’t you have some CDs in here that we can listen too?”

“Look under the passenger seat, there is a CD folio there,” he barked at her. She placed William back into his seat, making sure she secured it before proceeding to move down to grab the holder. She sat back up, opened it, and thumbed through his small collection. ‘Vanilla Ice, REO Speedwagon, Air Supply, Stryper….ugh this guy has shit in his collection,’ she thought. A frustrated driver interrupted her from her inner musing.

“Are you going to hand me something or not, because if not I am going to turn this back up,” Riley said.

“Fine, fine,” Cordelia huffed as she blew her hair out of her face. She quickly flipped towards the back and found a couple of CDs she could tolerate.

“Here, these two are good,” she said as she reached to the front seat and handed the discs to him.

Riley snagged them out of her hand. He smiled; pleased that she had found something that would allow him to continue using his steering wheel as a drum set.

“Perfect! I forgot all about this Motley Crue disk. That Billy Idol one must have been from an old girlfriend, but it’s still cool,” he said.

“Glad I could make you happy,” Cordelia replied. She would never admit it to anyone, but she actually was quite fond of Motley Crue herself. She smiled knowing that at least now they would spend the duration of the trip listening to some quality 80s music.

William began to fuss again in his car seat. Cordelia reached over and unbuckled him from his seat. Gently, she picked the little guy up and held him to her chest. He quieted down, but before Cordelia could be relieved, she felt like a little pin pricked her breast.

She looked down and saw that little William was a little hungry. Cordelia was relieved that for once, she had decided to wear her Victoria’s Secret water bra. After all, if would have hurt if the little vamp kid had stuck his teeth in her. As quickly as he struck, he also pulled back. He had recognized he was not going to get what he was looking for out of Cordelia. Cordelia looked in the back of the SUV and saw that the Slayer had fallen in such a way that William could easily be placed aside her so he could nurse. Before William could begin to fuss again, she gently lifted him over the back seat and placed him next to his mother.

In no time, William was a very happy baby.

~~~*~~~

Forrest made it to the helicopter pad only to find one little problem.

There was no helicopter.

It did not take him longer to identify his second problem.

There was no one there from the Initiative.

He was not sure what was going on, but he knew that for sure whatever had thrown a monkey wrench into their plans had to do with Walsh not showing up at as agreed. He had even tried her cell phone several times on the way over. Every time his calls had gone unanswered.

Usually, the self-assured soldier did not panic. After all, he had fought against demons in the jungles of South America so why should he suddenly feel insecure. ‘Because I can’t shake this feeling that I’m being followed,’ he thought. Forrest made his way back to his vehicle. He climbed in and then shut and locked the doors. Next, the soldier reached for his cell phone and hit the speed dial button for Finn. At first, all he heard was music blasting, but then he heard it abruptly stop.

“Finn?” Forrest queried.

“Hey Forrest, sorry bout that. I was wrapped up in my tunes.”

“No problem. Listen we may have some complications. Have you heard from Walsh at all?”

“No. Why?”

“She never showed up tonight. I’m at the helicopter pad now, and there is no one here. No copter either.”

Forrest could here Riley take a deep breath before he spoke.

“Forrest, I know the vampires are after me but I have one of their people here. She’s a seer. She had a vision about it and in that vision they caught up with me, attacked, but I won. I don’t want you to risk you life trying to get here to face them. Without having access to a helicopter to whisk us back to Initiative Headquarters, I put you at risk because we won’t have a quick escape. Do you have any contacts here that I can work with?”

“No. You’re on your own Finn. But, I’ll try to do what I can to get us some air transport. You know you could just grab a civilian flight?”

“That’s a good idea Forrest. I won’t be able to do anything until I get into Las Vegas. Even then I think I’m going to want to rest first.”

“That makes sense. Hey, have a little fun with the seer chick. Maybe you can play the tables at the Bellagio and make some dough. In fact, I have a friend that works there. Ask for Mac, he’ll hook you up with a nice room there.”

“Sounds sweet. Thanks for keeping me posted Forrest. Call me if there is any change.”

“No problem. Over and out.”

Forrest turned the phone off and placed it into the console between the front seats. He felt like someone was watching him again. He sat up, but before he could jump from being startled from seeing Giles in his rear view mirror, he had passed out from the chokehold that Giles had placed around his neck.

“Now what are we going to do with him Giles?” Willow asked.

“Well, now that we know specifically where Riley is heading to in Las Vegas we should call Angel and let them know,” Giles replied.

“There is no way we could get to Las Vegas in time to help them out. The car would take way too long, and we don’t have a helicopter at our disposal.” Xander said.

“Agreed Xander, we also don’t have the funds for airline tickets.” Giles said.

“Well I could go,” Willow offered.

“Wills, unless you have a secret stash of money, how are you going to go?” Xander asked.

“I have been studying teleporting. I could try to do it?” the witch shyly offered.

“I have to disagree with you Willow. I don’t think that would be a good idea, especially since you haven’t even practiced doing it over small distances.”

Willow pouted, but it did not have the same effect she desired.

“I suppose now that we are done with Forrest, you could make Amy another friend?” Giles offered.

“Ok!” Willow answered, knowing that later that night she would still be making a trip to Las Vegas.