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“So, what did Bobby say?”
Sam gave a shrug and tried to be nonchalant as he told Dean, “Oh, just that we have to go There.”
“Wait, there? As in There, There? As in the place we’re not supposed to go because of the thingie and the whositz – that There?” Dean’s fingers clenched the steering wheel.
“Uhm. Yeah.”
“Hot damn!” Dean whooped with delight and turned the car around to abandon their run to Phoenix and head to California instead.
Sam slumped down in the seat and covered his face with his hand. Sunnydale. Why did it have to be Sunnydale?
~*~
They got off the freeway at the exit, and Dean began to gripe that all the service stations and fast food places were closed, abandoned. There was a decided lack of traffic on the road to and from Sunnydale. When they reached the city outskirts, they saw why. Where there had once been a lovely little hamlet over hell, there was now a gaping crater.
Dean stood at the edge of the broken roadway staring down as Sam called Bobby to find out what was going on.
“Bobby doesn’t know exactly what went down, something big that got hushed up quick, even in hunter’s circles. He got a call, transferred down the info chain; someone will be here to meet us.”
“Dude, the McDonald’s isn’t even open. We gotta sit here and twiddle ‘em while we wait and watch a hole?”
“I hate Sunnydale,” Sam muttered, following Dean as his brother continued to rant and wave his arms as he headed back to the car and threw himself into the driver’s seat. Pushing the seat back, Sam tilted his head back and took a nap.
Dean’s hand pounding on his chest woke him; he sat up, looking around as Dean tugged on the front of his jacket. “Sammy, look alive, someone’s coming.”
A chartreuse Smartcar pulled up behind the Impala, and Dean rolled his eyes as the driver perfectly parallel parked the car at the edge of the ruined road, as if it mattered anymore where or how anyone parked in Sunnydale. The boys got out and leaned against the doors, waiting, as ordered.
The door opened and a perky redhead popped out, there was no other word for it, she popped out of the little car and bounded over to them, her shoulder length hair bobbing on her shoulders. She gave them a little wave and a big smile and then held out her hand to Dean. “Hi, I’m Willow.”
Dean took her hand and introduced them, “Dean, he’s Sam.”
The girl did not release his hand, instead she clenched it tighter. Her eyes went very wide and she stared up into Dean’s face. “Oh! Oh, you poor thing. No wonder they sent for you.” She patted and then released his hand, and circled the car to also shake Sam’s hand, but without any additional commentary.
“Yeah, so, Willow, who was it that called us, exactly? We’re only here because the call came through trusted channels, but we didn’t get any more info than that.” Sam scratched his head, wrinkled his nose and shifted uncomfortably; something about the girl was weird.
“The Council, well, the new Council, the old Council is gone, around the same time as that happened,” she pointed to the crater.
“What happened there?”
“Oh, that happened in the last apocalypse. It sucked.”
Dean pursed his lips and nodded. “Yeah, I can see that, I mean, they took out everything, pretty much.”
She nodded in agreement, looked at the pit and then sighed unhappily at the memory. “So, you guys have much experience with zombies?”
The Winchester brothers looked at each other and then at Willow. It was Sam who answered, “I wouldn’t say it ranks high on our resume. Demons are more our style.”
With an arched brow and a knowing grin, Dean added, “Or vampires, we do love killing vampires.”
“We have that covered, thanks so much. Your demon experience will be, like, totally cool, because these are demon zombies.”
“Demon zombies?” Dean asked.
Sam was shaking his head in denial. “That’s impossible; demons flee their host when the host body dies.”
“Demon freaking zombies?” Dean asked, a bit more insistently.
“Someone found a way to reanimate corpses and populate them with demonic souls,” Willow said.
“This is quite worrisome.” All three of them jumped and spun around at the new voice.
“Damn it, Cas!” Dean exclaimed. “You gotta learn to knock or ring a bell or something.”
Castiel ignored Dean’s griping and focused on Sam, the more reasonable of the pair. “If this has indeed happened, then the corporeal limits set upon demonic possession will be gone. They will be impossible for you to dispose of.”
Dean reached over and tapped Willow on the shoulder. “Where is this going down, Red?”
“Over at the new western Hellmouth. You know, since this one is out of business and all, the western Hellmouth moved a little east.” She gestured over her shoulder at what didn’t remain of Sunnydale.
“Then why did you bring us here?” Sam asked.
“The Council wanted to impress upon you the consequences of an apocalypse, if this one happens.”
Sam crossed his arms and snorted, “That was hardly necessary, I assure you.”
Willow jerked a thumb towards Cas. “Introduce your friend?”
“That’s Castiel. You sticking around for the zombie apocalypse or you got more important things to do, Cas?”
“I always have more important things to do, Dean.”
Sam stepped in front of his brother when he started to lunge towards Castiel. “I think what Dean is asking, Cas, is if you are coming along to help us or if you are leaving. Now.”
Ignoring Cas and his brother, Dean reached into his pocket for the car keys and began to jangle them. “Times a wasting, demon zombies walking the Earth and all, kids. Where’s this new Hellmouth?” ”
“Vegas.”
Sam’s mouth dropped open. And then he just shook his head and grumbled, “It figures.”
Willow added, “We have a base at Circus Circus.”
“I hope that is not a comment upon this operation,” Sam said, getting a bad feeling about this.
“Of course it is,” Willow chirped with a bright smile.
Eyeing the back seat of the Impala distastefully, Castiel growled, “I shall see you there.” Then he disappeared.
“Yeah, baby, we’re going to Vegas!” Dean thumped his hands on the roof of the car. “Meet ya on the strip, Willow.”
The Winchesters took off in a cloud of dust, leaving Willow standing on the ruined pavement. She crossed her arms and glared after them.
“They left in a hurry,” a disembodied voice behind her said.
“I know. I didn’t even get a chance to tell them anything, I had a spreadsheet.” Willow replied, tugging a folded piece of paper from her pocket and waving it at the disappearing black car.
“They have a powerful ally in Castiel.”
Willow turned a slow circle and then stomped her foot. “Do you have to do the invisible thing? It really freaks me out. What do you know about this Castiel, other than he apparently has mad peek-a-boo teleportation skills?”
Anya shimmered into sight. “He’s an angel of the lord.”
“Oh. Ok. Is that why you stayed all hidden and stuff?”
The blonde haired ghost nodded. “Hello? Ghost, former demon? If the winged one didn’t smite me offhand for existing, those Winchesters have a trunk full of stuff designed to make me disappear. It took quite a bit of trouble to get back here, and I have no intention of leaving yet.”
“I saw you.”
Willow and Anya both screamed, jumped and spun around to see the dark haired angel in the rumpled trench coat standing behind them. He waggled a pointed finger at Anya. “I’ll be watching you, Anyanka. You are a soul in flux; I wonder how much of Aud remains?”
Giving them one final, pointed look, Castiel disappeared, with an audible flapping of invisible wings.
“I see why that Dean is so jumpy, if the dude does that all the time.” Willow remarked, and rubbed her arms as she looked around for other angelic spies. She glanced back sadly at the pit of Sunnydale and then went to her car. Anya walked alongside her, turning circles and also keeping a wary eye out for their new shadow.
~*~
They crossed over the city limits into Vegas and everything suddenly changed. The lighting got weird, Sam remarked upon the odd color of the sky. It was late afternoon according to their watches, but seemed like nighttime. As Dean steered towards the strip and Sam wondered aloud, “Where’s all the people? Where’s all the cars?”
“Hellmouth. Weird,” Dean said by way of explanation. “Cell phone?”
“No bars.”
Dean frowned as he looked at the strangely deserted streets of Las Vegas and mused, “Maybe we should have gotten a little more information from the redhead.” The lights of the casinos still blinked.
“I don’t thing that’s going to be a problem, look.” Sam pointed out the window and Dean did a double take as he saw the green car from California parked near the front doors of Circus Circus.
Willow was leaning on miniscule vehicle and waved happily at them as they pulled up in front of the building shaped like a circus tent
“How? I don’t… that’s a freakin’ Smartcar!” Dean blurted out as he glared out the window at the girl beside the car.
“I know, isn’t it great? You should come on in, meet the others.”
Walking backwards through the lobby doors, Dean looked with dismay at the tiny efficiency vehicle that had beaten him here from California. There was a blonde woman sitting on the sofa, twirling her hair and looking bored.
Willow pointed to them, “The Winchesters. Winchesters; this is Buffy.”
Buffy rolled her eyes and shook her head. “I’m sorry, Winchesters, I’m really not entirely certain why you’re here. I don’t know why the Council insisted on calling you. We should be able to handle this.”
Dean snorted. “Right, you got some kinda super powers or something, ‘cause otherwise…”
He found himself on his back; the blonde woman crouched on his chest, with a wooden stake pressed against his throat. “Actually, yeah. I’ve got a few superpowers.” She stood up and dragged him to his feet by the front of his jacket. “Or something.”
“Point taken.” Dean rubbed at the spot where the stake had been digging into his skin.
A young man with a patch over his left eye stalked through the lobby towards them. “Aw, Buff, did you go waving Mr. Pointy around already?” She scowled at him and tucked the stake into the waistband of her jeans.
“So when is this all going down?” Sam asked Willow.
“We cleared this section of the town when we got here, but the main group of demon zombies seems to be hanging out at the other end of the strip.”
A blonde woman suddenly appeared beside Willow and said, “They’re coming.”
When Sam and Dean jumped, Willow gave them a cheesy grin, “You’ve got your jack-in-the-box, I’ve got mine. Thanks Anya.”
Dean looked from Anya to Willow and then back again. “You’ve got a pet ghost?”
“Still don’t know why they’re here,” Buffy sang in a bored voice.
“Don’t smite Anya, she’s a friendly ghost, she’s working through some issues.” Willow told Dean as she waggled her finger in warning at him. "She is off limits, hunter."
Xander clapped his hands and pointed towards the door. “Okay people, let’s go kill some zombies. Again.”
Sam’s attention was drawn down as the patterned carpeting on the floor of the lobby suddenly began to writhe, indistinct shapes flitting across the top of the rug, then becoming more noticeably people-shaped. The entire room suddenly erupted around them, transparent shambling corpses rising up from, no, Sam realized, rising up through the floor.
“Oh, you gotta be kidding me!” Dean shouted, spinning in circles as the incorporeal shapes rose and started to get more solid. “Friggin’ ghost demon zombies?!? Sammy, how the hell do we deal with this?” Dean side-kicked at a zombie that lurched towards him, then knocked another one aside with a sweep of his arm.
Small tussles broke out, each of them wrestling and fighting with the seemingly never-ending supply of rising demon-driven corpses.
“We can’t fight this. We have to find the source. Run!” Sam started towards the main doors behind the others, reaching down to grab a handful of the back of Xander’s jacket when the young man tripped over a zombie Buffy had decapitated with a sword seemingly drawn from mid-air. He dragged him up and they both spun in unison and kicked the heads of a pair of zombies coming up at their backs. They ran together through the doors just ahead of the floating, groaning zombie mob.
Dean had gone straight to the trunk of the Impala and yanked it open. He tossed a bag of salt at his brother and hefted two salt loaded shotguns. Surprisingly, the others followed him and availed themselves of proper weapons from the Winchester mobile arsenal. Running back across the pavement, Sam spread a line of salt across the doors of the hotel. The creatures hit the glass, bounced off and then began to mill aimlessly around the lobby.
“Their handler will figure this out soon, let’s go!” Buffy called and dove into the back seat of the Impala. Willow, Anya and Xander squeezed into the Smartcar.
Buffy waved to Dean and said, “Go!”
“Where are we going?” Sam asked, looking into the back seat.
The young blonde woman gave him a dirty look, “Just drive, we’ll know it when we see it.”
“See what?”
One slim hand waved loosely at Dean when he glared at her in the rear-view mirror. “The thing.”
“This is the lamest operation we have ever gotten mixed up in,” Dean muttered.
“Stop the car!” Buffy shouted, pointing out the window. Dean hit the brakes. The little Smartcar flew past them in a green streak and skidded to a halt close by. They piled out of the cars and stared at the oddity. In the center of the road a man stood with his hands in his pockets, quite calm, even in the face of six armed and suspicious demon hunters. He whistled a light tune and looked off and around at the flashing casino signs as they approached.
Buffy tilted her head and regarded the man, and slowly palmed her stake. “So, come here often?”
“Oh, yes. This is a most delightful place. Most delightful.” The man smiled, and the smile did not reach his eyes, which were black and luminous and deeper than the night sky when he turned to look straight at them. Immediately, simultaneously, Xander, Dean, Sam and Anya raised their rifles.
The man clucked his tongue. “Oh, now don’t do that.” He waved his hand and the guns vanished. He gave a mild sneer at the piece of wood in Buffy’s hand and said dismissively, “You may keep your toy.” He smoothed down his silvery gray sports coat and then checked his fingernails casually.
Xander regained his wits first and cleared his throat to get the little man’s attention. “Who are you?”
“I go by many names, I’m sure you’ve heard some of them; Osiris, Mara, Hades, Morrigan.”
“You’re Death,” Sam breathed out, drawing the connection between the names.”
He snorted, pushed the glasses up on his nose and gave a shake of his balding head, “No, that’s someone else’s gig.”
Castiel appeared behind the smartly suited man claiming to be a harbinger of death. “Azreal.”
Azreal tossed his head back and gave a dramatic sigh. “I prefer Morrie.”
“What game are you playing at here, Azreal?”
“Well, I was doing wonderfully at baccarat, once I finally got the gist of it, great game for culling the masses and gaining a bit of elbow room at the table, no one really understands it, or will admit to understanding it, will they?” He smiled at Castiel, and the smile turned into a sneer. “And I said - call me Morrie!” The angel raised his hand, made a gesture, and Castiel vanished.
“Cas!” Dean and Sam cried out simultaneously, moving forward towards the spot where their friend had been.
“Oh, hush, I didn’t hurt my brother, I just dropped him in a well on the outer edges of hell, he’ll be fine once he figures out how to get out. He’s a stick in the mud; I wanted him out of the way.” Morrie fluttered his hand dismissively and approached Buffy.
Walking a slow circle around her, he eyed her from head to toe while she stood and impatiently tolerated the insulting perusal of her form. “Now then. I have a proposition to make.”
“I’ll just bet you do,” Xander hissed.
Ignoring him, Morrie said, “I want you to work for me.”
From behind Buffy there was a chorus of; “Not gonna happen,”“Are you kidding?” “No way,” and one rather rude expletive suggesting a physically impossible action.
“Oh, come now, you’re in the business of death already, all of you. I’m asking you to come and work for the premier team. Power, prestige, luxury travel.” He eyed the little green car with disgust. “Think of the benefits, I can get you box seats at Fenway.”
“Dude, we kill monsters,” Buffy finally spoke.
Morrie shrugged. “Death is death.”
“We do not kill innocents,” she replied. “Never have, never will. Take your job and shove it.”
Sam and Willow were nodding in agreement with her, and Dean crossed his arms and tipped his head towards Buffy, “What the lady said.”
Morrie looked at each of them in turn, seeing the refusal in their eyes. Then he stepped towards Anya. “And you, little in-between one? You’ve felt power before, you’ve worked with the backing of superior beings, you know how the game is played. Would you walk away from a chance to live again, if that was the incentive on the table? You’re one of mine already; you’ve no right to be traipsing about in the sun. A snap of my fingers, and back you go to the eternity you earned for yourself.”
Anya gulped, but raised her chin and didn’t look away as the little business man paced in front of her.
“Work for me, do my will, and I let you stay. I’ll even make you mortal again, if that’s what you want.”
“Don’t do it, ghost-girl. Just say no,” Dean muttered.
Looking very nervous, Xander edged forward to stand beside Anya, offering her the comfort of his support. She looked up and gave him a small smile of thanks as he took her hand. Despite everything that had happened in the past, they were still friends. Xander asked, “What is it you want her to do?”
Morrie gave a sickly sweet smile at the sight of their joined hands. “Reap a few souls, make sure things stay balanced. Balance is very, very important. Imbalance makes things messy.”
“Messy? And what would you call ghostly demon zombies? That just unbalances all the rules,” Sam interrupted, waving his hand to encompass the eerie ghost town that Vegas had become.
The angel gave a little shake of his head, unconcerned with Sam’s assessment. “A job application, a bending of the rules for a short time to bring you all here. A word whispered in an old watcher’s ear to gather the candidates together for me. Back to you, my little escape artist, what is it to be? Fame and fortune or back to the great beyond?”
Morrie stood before Anya, staring down at her now bent head as she studied the toes of her boots. They were nice boots. She’d copied them from a pair she had seen in a window on Rodeo Drive. But they were only copies, this form was only solid because some purloined magic and a good dose of belief made it so. He was threatening to send her back to the eternity of nothing she had tasted once and worked so hard to escape from. He was offering her a chance to stay.
As she was thinking about the offer, Willow walked over and touched her fingers to Anya’s shoulder, suggesting, “Remember what Castiel said.”
Anya did. Her mind raced with thoughts. The Winchester’s friend had said her soul was in flux. He had said he would be watching her. He had come here and Morrie – Azreal – had sent him away. Did that mean something? Was it more than simply a petulant angel sending another away before he could spoil the game? A game. This was a game. She was a piece in the game. Her soul was in flux. Azreal wanted her agreement, he was tempting her. She knew about temptation, it had been one of her stocks in trade during her time as a vengeance demon.
She raised her head and met the fathomless eyes of the angel of death straight on and said quietly, “No.”
His eyebrow quirked and he repeated with mild affront, “No?”
“Atta girl, you tell h…” Dean cheered, falling silent when Azreal glared at him menacingly.
Squeezing Xander’s hand, drawing courage from her friend, Anya took a deep breath and repeated with more conviction. “No. I say no. I would rather be a free soul bound to wander hell or purgatory than one enslaved to do someone else’s bidding in heaven.”
“Good answer.” Morrie smiled. “The others were expected to say what they did. But you were the one that might be turned. I had to know, had to get to you before the other side found you and turned you. Every soul is precious.” He reached his hand out and caressed her cheek with two fingers. “Each and every soul is so very precious, Anya. You do your soul honor with your choice.” He turned the hand to cup her cheek and then brought his other hand up and placed his palm to her forehead.
“A gift. Use it well.” There was a small burst of heavenly light, Anya’s eyes rolled up in her head and she slumped, Xander caught her as Morrie backed away.
“All will be as it was; this was merely an illusion, a stage. Continue to fight the good fight; each of you has more strength than you know.” Morrie snapped his fingers and Vegas was once again a noisy, bustling city. He raised a finger as if he had just had a random thought occur to him. “Before you go, if you could clear out the nest of vampires over behind the Bellagio? And there’s a family of shapeshifters doing a tiger act at The Grand, I’ll give you a hint, the tiger is not a tiger. You know, for the cheating alone, I’m turning them in, no performer’s ethics these days.” Azreal clucked his tongue in disapproval and then disappeared. If there was a flutter of wings accompanying his departure, it was too loud in Vegas to hear it.
They’d had to scramble to the sidewalk when the illusion dropped to get out of traffic. Sam looked over at Xander where he hunched on the sidewalk over Anya and asked, “Is she all right?”
“I’m a little fuzzy, but I’m fine,” Anya replied to the question herself and pushed at Xander until he let her climb shakily to her feet.
Willow patted her arm, “Try to do something ghosty.”
Anya blinked and stared stupidly at Willow. “What?”
With a shrug, Willow replied, “I wanna see what he did to you.”
Squeezing her eyes tightly shut, a look of intense concentration crossed Anya’s face. Nothing happened.
“He returned her to her original form, made her mortal once again,” a familiar gruff voice said. All eyes went to Castiel, standing between Buffy and Willow, who both backed away several steps, wrinkling their faces in distaste and waving at the air before their noses.
Sam gagged a little as he too put some distance between them. “Ew, Cas, what the hell were you rolling in?” Only Dean remained where he was, he blinked a little, his eyes watering, but he held his ground. He knew the scent and refused to back down from it.
“Hell.” Castiel glanced down at himself and grimaced. “It does take some effort to get it off properly. I came merely to see what the outcome of Azreal’s test was. I see that you all passed. I need to be elsewhere. Be vigilant.” And Castiel vanished, taking the stench of evil with him.
“So, dibs on the vamps,” Dean smiled wickedly at Buffy as he made the claim.
She shook her head. “You can’t call dibs on vamps. Vamps are my job. I do the vamps. You two can go wrestle the tigers.” She waved her hand in a shooing motion.
When Sam saw that his brother was going to go back at her he cleared his throat and said, “Since we’re all here, why don’t we work together, we can all gank some vamps, I’m sure there are plenty to go around.” He gave Dean a withering stare, daring him to argue with him, but his brother just shrugged.
“I’m not a ghost anymore!” Anya blurted, and bounced a little before she hugged Xander and then the others with glee. She looked down at the rifle in Sam’s hands and she realized something else. “That means I can get hurt again. That means I can die again. You, scary weapons guy. Give me something to fight with.” She pointed to Dean and he laughed and led her over towards the Impala and dug around, bringing things out while she hemmed and hawed over the decision on what to take.
“Old times,” Willow said as she stood beside Buffy and watched Anya bicker with Dean, complaining that he wasn’t giving her the best deal, which he contended was stupid because he wasn’t charging her anything.
Buffy agreed with a fond expression and a little nod of her head. “Yeah.” Looking from Sam to Willow and back, she clapped her hands together and asked, “So, should we take in the spectacle at The Grand before we slay the main attractions?”
“Well, we are in Vegas, I’d like to at least say I saw a show.” The red-haired witch said with a smile. Sam rolled his eyes, but gave a nod as well. The time in the audience could be excused as surveillance of their target, and would give them a chance to figure out which ones were the shapeshifters.
“Right, show first, then with the slaying. We have a plan.” Buffy gave a satisfied nod. “But first, let’s dust some vamps.”
The End