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Disclaimer: We didn't come up with the idea of Slayers, watchers etc. We're just borrowing them. The Characters themselves do belong to us though.

Written by Evilandrea, Dolph and Tinyclanger, from ideas generated by Kasper. Please let us know what you think.

Blue writing in the main text denotes a flashback sequence.

First Chronicle (Season 1 Part 1)

Monday

“So, do you reckon he’ll let us skip patrol tonight?” Alice Tyler asked, as she casually sipped her pint. Alice wasn’t a typical Slayer, but she had eventually accepted her destiny as one of those chosen to fight vampires, demons and any other evil things that happened to cross her path. Until six months ago she had been just like any other University fresher. Her main ambition had been to spend the next three years partying, getting drunk, and avoiding doing work connected with her history degree as much as was humanly possible. Fate, however, had other ideas. One night she had noticed a wheelchair bound man being attacked by an obviously stronger man. Alice had, on impulse, decided to intervene, and, before she knew it she had staked her first vampire. It must have been coincidence that the man in the wheelchair turned out to be her Watcher, Nathaniel Butterworth. Alice had gradually begun to accept that it had been a little more complicated than that. Nathaniel was the proprietor of a magic shop (with a small sideline in occult books) on the Barbican, which rapidly became the Slayer’s base of operations.

            “Nathaniel. Let us off patrol?” Dave Lytton exclaimed. “There’s more chance of it snowing in hell. Maybe we could do a little ‘patrolling’ in the Candy Store while we’re out though!” Despite being a human with no supernatural powers, Dave had proved a more than useful member of the team since he and Alice bumped into each other 5 months ago. Although the katana he carried helped a little with his vampiric encounters. 

            “Do you think that we could get away with it?”

             “Probably not, but that doesn’t mean that it’s not worth a try!” Dave knew that, even if they went there in secret, Nathaniel would still manage to find out… somehow. “Shall we go? We should probably check in with Nathaniel, see if anything interesting has happened.” Dave drained his pint, and stood up.

            “I suppose so.” Said Alice, as she finished the remaining mouthful of her beer. It wasn’t exactly uncommon to find the pair in the Student Union bar at this time of day. It sold alcohol… and it was cheap!

            Plymouth University had the misfortune of being built on a hellmouth. The Student Union cafeteria wasn’t exactly how you would expect a ‘centre of mystical convergence’ to look, but if there was a hellmouth, there had to be a Slayer. It gave Alice a good excuse to sit there for long hours drinking coffee, so she wasn’t complaining… too much.

            Nathaniel’s shop was a good ten minutes walk from the campus, so Alice and Dave slowly wandered in the vague direction of Southside Street, and the shop. As they strolled through the first set of subways, two hysterical women ran past them. Alice and Dave stopped dead. The Slayer felt a familiar tingle on the back of her neck.

            “Dave,” she glanced at him. “ Vamps.”

The next instant two men came into view, running after the women who had just passed. Both Alice and Dave visibly tensed as they approached. Alice stepped into the path of the quickest of the pair, and promptly punched him in the face. The vampire dropped to the floor as his momentum carried his legs forward, but his head had been stopped dead in its tracks.

            The second vampire was a couple of steps behind the first, and slowed down slightly when he saw his associate hit the deck, only to be sent flying into the wall as Dave’s foot connected with the back of his head. The first vampire rose to his feet, scanning around for the Slayer. Before he noticed her, a stake was thrust through his back, causing him to disintegrate in a cloud of dust.

            Dave stood in a classic fighting stance, waiting for the vampire to get up, which he eventually did, and then he began to run at Dave again. At the last second, he jumped, flipping over Dave’s head, landing behind him. The vampire grabbed his opponent, and went for the jugular vein. Dave’s hand shot up and caught the vampire across the bridge of the nose. He then faked a second shot, whilst he brought his katana out, and spun around, aiming to take the vampire’s head. The vampire’s supernatural speed allowed him to dodge the attack. He caught Dave with a ‘rabbit’ punch to the kidneys, and backed away several steps.

“Okay,” Dave said, with a touch of menace in his voice, as he raised the katana to the en guard position. “Now I’m pissed off. I really hate it when people try to eat me!” As Dave took a step towards the vampire, the tip of a stake poked out from the vampire’s chest. As the dust began to clear, Dave saw Alice, stake in hand.

“One more for the Slayer!”

“You only did that so that you could get ahead on the weekly kill count.” Dave muttered, as he placed his katana back under his coat.

When they arrived at Nathaniel’s shop, all the lights were off, and the door was slightly ajar. Cautiously entering, Alice was glad that her calling had lead to her having night vision. The shop was a total mess; display cases lay broken, and debris was strewn over the floor. Crime was not unusual in Plymouth, but Alice and Dave felt that something wasn’t quite right. They moved into the back room, which was in a similar state. Money was lying everywhere, but it didn’t look like any had been taken. This was no run of the mill robbery.

“Nathaniel?” Alice called; but there was no reply.

“Alice, be quiet for a sec. Can you hear that?” Dave said, as he strained to hear a faint knocking sound, coming from beneath them. Alice looked down to see the trapdoor that led to the basement. Dave lifted the door, and Alice lowered herself inside. Even with her night vision, the room was terribly dark. She could, however, just make out the end of a double-barrelled shotgun poking out from a pile of blankets.

“Nathaniel?” She called, gently. The gun slowly lowered, and her Watcher’s face appeared from underneath the blankets.

“Alice. Help me out of here!”

Once they were in the back room of the shop, Nathaniel explained what had happened.

“I had a premonition. From it’s content I gathered that the best thing to do was to hide!”

Dave handed Nathaniel the cash he had picked up from the floor. “They didn’t take the money. You really should keep this in a safe place you know.” Nathaniel muttered something about checking the apartment upstairs where he lived, and headed to the lift whilst Alice and Dave took the stairs. Nathaniel kept his personal library of occult books upstairs, which tended to contain much more powerful writings than those he kept in the shop.

Once upstairs, Dave flicked the light switch, and, to his surprise, the main light turned on. Nathaniel’s living room had also been ransacked, and the Watcher immediately went about picking things up, and returning them to their correct positions.

“Have they taken anything?” Alice enquired.

“They were looking for something, but until I’ve sorted out this mess I haven’t any idea what it was.”

Just then they heard a loud thud from downstairs, which Alice and Dave decided to investigate. In the shop a familiar figure was picking herself up off the floor.

“People shouldn’t leave bookcases lying around to be tripped over.” She said defensively, as she brushed the dust off her long black coat.

“Evening Em.” Dave said sarcastically. Emily McDonald was the latest addition to the group, after Alice and Dave had found the vampire cowering in Nathaniel’s back garden. Her recently implanted behaviour chip prevented her from feeding, and Dave and the Slayer had promised not to stake her if she joined them. It hadn’t posed that difficult a decision.

“Someone did over the shop. It seems that they were looking for something, and didn’t want to pay!” Alice informed Emily. “We don’t know yet if anything’s been taken.”

“Oh dear” Nathaniel muttered as he sifted through the mess. He vaguely acknowledged Emily as she appeared in the apartment.

“Emily, go make the tea.” Alice instructed.

“Why do I always have to make the tea?” Emily protested. “It has to be someone else’s turn.”

“But you’re so good at it. You’ve had so much more practice than anyone else!” Giving Alice a much-practiced disdainful look, Emily wandered into the kitchen, and, sulking, made the tea.

With Alice and Dave’s help, Nathaniel continued to tidy. Suddenly he stopped.

“Oh dear.”

“Oh dear? Oh dear what?” Alice said, looking worried. “I don’t like it when you say oh dear!”

“It’s gone!”

“What’s gone?” Dave asked. “Nathaniel?”

“The amulet of Frenmara”.

“Okay. Um… what’s the amulet of Frenmara?” Alice enquired. Nathaniel muttered something under his breath, and reached for a large, dusty book. He began to flick through its well-worn pages.

“It’s needed in the ritual to raise a Beloux demon.” The other three looked at him blankly. “An eight feet tall green soul-sucking demon.” Nathaniel said, in the simplest terms he could think of. Alice and Dave looked concerned, but Emily stood there calmly. Alice and Dave stared at her.

“What?” Emily exclaimed. “Note to Slayer - soul sucking demon. I happen to be a bit lacking in the soul department, and you’re expecting me to be worried?” Sighing, Alice turned her attention back to Nathaniel, who had finished flicking, and was rapidly reading the text in front of him.

“So we stop whoever it is before they have time to do it!” Alice said. Stopping evil was her job, after all.

“Oh dear.”

“What now Nathaniel?” Dave asked.

“In order to raise the demon, they need the amulet, brambles from a grave, hair from a virgin….”

“Cos you’re going to be able to find that in Plymouth!” Alice quipped. Nathaniel ignored the comment, and continued.

“And three drops of Slayer’s blood. The ritual needs to be performed on the night of a full moon.” He said, still reading.

“Well, they’re not going to get any Slayer’s blood!” Alice said, defensively.

   Over the next few minutes, the discussion became a little heated, as they decided what they should do. Alice and Dave were trying to persuade Nathaniel to let them go clubbing, as a reward for completing their January exams, but Nathaniel tried to focus them on the matter in hand. Emily leant against a bookcase, not seeing what all the fuss was about this demon.

Eventually it was decided that Alice, Dave and Emily should go to the two local cemeteries, and look for brambles growing on graves. Alice mumbled her disapproval of this plan, but went along with it. She had learnt better than to disobey Nathaniel.

As Alice, Dave and Emily got off the bus near Efford cemetery, they jumped over the seven feet tall boundary wall, and split up to look around. After two sweeps of the graves, they hadn’t found any with brambles growing on them, and so decided to move on.

Next stop was Ford Park cemetery, which they hoped would hold the illusive brambles. As they made their way towards the centre of the cemetery, Alice suddenly stopped.

“Guys. There are vampires around here somewhere.” Scanning around they saw three figures standing around a grave. Alice and Dave quickly chose their targets.

“I’ll take the tall guy.” Dave said, as he slowly moved to the left. Alice quietly moved towards the short stocky male on the right.

“Guess that leaves me the one in the middle!” Emily mumbled, knowing that the others were too far away to hear her.

The tall vampire heard something, and turned, noticing Alice. “Leave here, this is not your conce…” Alice drew a stake from under her jacket. “Shit, Slayer!” He exclaimed, as his forehead creased, and his eyes turned yellow. As usual, the sight of the Slayer had caused the vampire not to notice Dave, who was now standing behind him.

“Do you kiss your mother with that mouth?” Dave said dryly. At the sound of his voice, the vampire turned around, just in time to catch Dave’s heel square in the jaw.

Alice had seen Dave moving behind the tall vampire, and the confusion his attack caused gave her the opportunity to lunge at her chosen target. Throwing her body forward, she grabbed the vampire around the waist, causing both of them to crash to the ground.

The other vampire, who was reasonably well built, had just noticed Emily, and began to walk towards her. As soon as he was in range, Emily drove her fist into his face. The vampire rapidly responded with a shot in kind, causing Emily to step back slightly. She paused briefly to re-evaluate her options, and then punched the vampire in the face again.   

Dave waited for the vampire to get up, standing in the classic ‘Slayer’ guard position. The vampire flipped to his feet, and launched at Dave with a front kick. Dave raised his arm, and swept the foot to the side, spinning around, and catching the vampire in the temple with his other elbow. Stepping back from the vampire, Dave took a stake from his jacket. The vampire launched himself at Dave again. Dave sidestepped the charging vampire, and drove the stake through his back. The vampire came to a halt with a surprised look on his face, and exploded in a cloud of dust.

Alice untangled herself from the vampire, and got to her feet. Bringing her stake up, she lunged at him lying on the floor, but he rolled to the side, and got up. The vampire swung his fist towards Alice’s head, but she blocked the blow and responded with a head butt to the bridge of his nose. Alice thrust the stake forward and drove it through the heart of the reeling vampire.

“Two down, one to go.” She said, as the dust swirled around her.

The vampire facing Emily heard his associate’s fate, and made a decision. He punched the female vampire in the face, sending her crashing to the floor, then turned and ran towards the edge of the cemetery. Alice saw him, and tried to give chase, but the vampire had too much of a head start. Admitting defeat, she walked back towards Emily.

“Why didn’t you try to stop him?” Emily gave the Slayer a disdainful glance, and silently rose to her feet.

“They must have been waiting for something!” Dave stated, as Alice walked over to the grave the vampires had been gathered around.

“Eighteen year old Michael Roberts.” She read from the headstone. “He only died a few days ago! I’ll ring Nathaniel, and see if he’s got any idea as to what’s going on.”

Whilst Alice spoke to the Watcher on her mobile, Dave and Emily stood over the grave, almost as if they were expecting its occupant to rise any moment.

“What did he say?” Dave asked, as Alice put her phone back in her pocket.

“He say’s going to look in to it. He’ll ring me back if he finds anything.”

“I guess we go back on bramble search now then.” Dave commented.

“Okay.” Alice paused. “ Dave, Emily, you go and try and find those brambles.”

“Emily, you take the right, I’ll go to the left.” Dave instructed. 

“And if I find any of these amazing brambles?” Emily said, disinterested.

“Come back here, and wait for the rest of us. I’ll meet you here when I’ve finished going over my half.”

“And what are you going to do?” Emily asked Alice.

“I’m going to stay here in case he rises. He’s obviously important, so we can’t afford to let him get away.” Without further words the group went their separate ways.

Emily quietly moved through the graveyard, scanning around for brambles. She dreaded to think how conspicuous Dave was being. Emily made a mental note to make Dave read the meaning of stealth in one of Nathaniel’s dictionaries. Emily, however, had over the years, learnt the merits of being stealthy. You get noticed less, and therefore, you are less likely to be killed. Squinting at the graves as she passed them, Emily began to mutter quietly to herself.

“Make the tea Emily, find the brambles Emily. Oh, I forgot, you can’t see very well in the dark, never mind, you’ll just have to look at everything really closely. What am I, the Slayer’s personal slave? If I could just….” She fell silent as she thought she noticed something. Walking over to one of the graves, she spotted what she had been looking for. Noting its position, she headed back to meet the others.

Dave wandered back through the cemetery after a fruitless search. He was undecided as to whether this was a good or bad thing. He found Alice sitting on the headstone opposite the grave the vampires had been watching.

“Find anything?” She asked. Dave shook his head.

Moments later Emily appeared, with a smug look on her face. The others didn’t need to ask if she’d found the brambles. Suddenly, Alice’s phone rang. It was Nathaniel.

“Well?” Asked Dave, as Alice finished the call.

“Looks like there should be a few rising. Two tonight, maybe another two tomorrow.”

“Great.” Dave said, exasperated. “Do we have any possible names?”

“Yeah. At least we know who they are, so it’s not needle in a haystack time.” Alice replied.

“Uh… what about the brambles?” Emily interrupted, feeling her discovery had been seriously overlooked.

“Okay. I’ll go with you to get the brambles.” Alice said. “Dave, you stay here and wait for this vamp to appear. Ring me when he rises.” Dave nodded, and Emily went to show Alice where her discovery had been made.

As they travelled across the graveyard, Emily made another mental note to get Alice to look up stealth too. She was being almost as bad as Dave. Eventually, they got to the grave, and began to cut down the brambles.

“What are you going to do with these once we’ve chopped them down?” Emily asked, putting another handful of bramble into Alice’s bag.

“Burn them.”

“Always with the burning! Why always burning?” Emily asked. It was just her luck to end up with a katana wielding, military hardware obsessed lunatic, and a pyromaniac Slayer.

Dave stood watch over the grave, and noticed that the grave opposite was also one of the names Nathaniel had given Alice. It looked like he might have two vampires to deal with, which might get his kill count even with Alice.

His attention turned to one of the graves as he heard a faint knocking sound, and noticed the soil starting to move slightly. Reaching into his pocket, Dave grasped his mobile, and pressed ‘2’, his speed dial button for Alice. He let it ring once, and then hung up. Mentally focussing himself for a fight, Dave dropped into a fighting stance, and watched as the vampire pushed up through the ground. As he climbed to his feet, the vampire noticed Dave, and launched his attack. Seeing the vampire charge towards him, Dave sidestepped the lunge. The vampire stumbled as he missed his target. Just as he regained his footing, a boot hit him in the side of the head, sending him sprawling to the floor. Dave drew his katana, and assumed a back-blade en guard position. As the vampire charged again, Dave struck with a spinning blow that severed the vampire’s head.

Whilst still cutting brambles, Alice felt her phone vibrate in her pocket. As she quietly got up and turned to leave, Emily noticed that the Slayer was on the move.

“Where are you going?”

“They’ve risen. Dave may need some help. Can you deal with the brambles on your own?”

Emily gave Alice a nasty look, and resumed what she had been doing. She was irritated that Alice had suggested she couldn’t even manage to cut down a few brambles by herself.

Alice covered ground quickly, and reached Dave’s position just in time to see him behead the first vampire. Noticing another vampire rising from a grave behind where Dave was standing, she leapt over a headstone, and drove a stake into its back. Upon hearing the noise, Dave turned to see Alice brushing dust off her clothes.

“What kept you?” He joked, only to be flipped off by a smiling Alice.

It had been several minutes since Alice had left, and Emily was becoming bored with the whole bramble thing. It wasn’t exactly the most exciting thing she could have been doing, and her mind involuntarily began to wander. An image began to form in her mind of something from years ago, when she was still human. Not that she could really remember what that felt like any more. 

Emily sat gazing dreamily out of the window. In the twilight the gardener was working hard to make the vast expanse of land around Langworth House look perfect. She loved this house, but knew she would soon have to leave it, due to the impending arrival of Richard McLeod. Joining two of the wealthiest families in eastern Scotland through the marriage of their two youngest children seemed a profitable thing to do. To everyone apart from Emily that was. Richard had to be the biggest bore in the whole of Scotland. It wasn’t that she didn’t like him, but she didn’t love him. She never would. 

            Emily sighed and moved away from the window. John was working hard making sure that everything was ready for the day that would break both their hearts. Seeing her staring at him would only be a distraction from his eager pruning. Besides, she had promised herself that she wouldn’t see him unless absolutely necessary, not even a glance. It would just make it even harder. Emily had offered to give it all up for him, walk away from the wealth, the house she had spent her entire life in, just to make their dream come true. She knew that John, however, could see past the dream to the reality that would await them. He knew he couldn’t give her the life he thought she deserved, so when the marriage proposal from Richard came, Emily could see him use every ounce of courage he had, as he smiled, and wished her luck in her new life.

Several people around the estate thought it strange that John could only be seen working after dark, but he had once confessed to Emily that he worked in his late father’s shop during the day to help his ailing mother. The shop didn’t bring in enough money for the family to live on, so he took the job at Langworth house to make ends meet. John knew how offended his mother would be if she knew he was working long extra hours to give her the best life he could, and so he only came at night, when his mother thought he was out with friends, or she was asleep. 

            Emily’s hand involuntarily moved up to her neck, as she gently held the locket that she wore. For someone of her status it looked surprisingly cheap, and low quality, but it was the most important thing in the world to her. If she closed her eyes she could see so clearly when John had given it to her. She was happy then.

          “Emily darling, what are you doing? You need a good night’s sleep before tomorrow, there is so much still to be done! Mr. Matthews is due for another dress fitting, we have to decide on the colour for the bridesmaids…”

           “Yes mother.” Emily wasn’t sure when her mother had silently crept into her room, or how long she had been there. Her hand slowly moved down from the locket, and she turned to face the voice listing the vast number of tasks still to be completed before the wedding. Emily couldn’t see what all the fuss was about. There were still another four weeks to go, plenty of time to make all the necessary arrangements. Not that she cared about the details; she just wanted it over. Once she was married Emily had convinced herself that she could be happy, she just had to get through the next few weeks. 

Emily was quickly brought back to reality as she heard footsteps behind her. It sounded like three people, who were even less stealthy than Alice and Dave. Emily stood up slowly. She was bored, and really wasn’t in the mood for someone to start hassling her. Turning around, with a decidedly narked off look on her face, she saw three men dressed in dark, expensive looking suits. Two of them looked almost identical, well built, with a noticeable absence of any discernable neck. One held a crossbow, and the other a shotgun, both of which were aimed at Emily. The man standing in the middle was older, and slightly shorter, with white hair.

“I wouldn’t do anything rash if I were you.” The older man said. “The cartridges in that gun are loaded with a mix of garlic and holy water. Not your favourite substances, I shouldn’t imagine!” Emily was in no danger of doing anything stupid; her name wasn’t Alice, who, no doubt, would have tried to take on all three of them by now. Besides, these three looked like they meant business.

“My name is Charles Fitzpatrick. I believe you have something I need.” He said, looking down at the bag of brambles. Emily stood in silence, not being victim to the verbal diarrhoea that Dave was so prone to. Fitzpatrick gestured for the man holding the crossbow to retrieve the bag of brambles. Emily didn’t even have the smallest inclination to try and stop him. What was so bad about a soul-sucking demon anyway? And besides, he had a crossbow pointed at her; self-preservation was far more important than being in the Slayer’s good books.   

The bag of brambles was passed to Fitzpatrick, who looked strangely pleased.

“Tell the Slayer I will see her later.” He said, before turning, and walking away. It wasn’t until Fitzpatrick and his crossbow-wielding assistant had gotten into a black Bentley that Emily realised what he had said. He knew that she was working with the Slayer. What if other people found out? Two of them had gone, but she could still stop the one with the gun. He had turned his back on her, and begun to walk away. At least now she stood a fighting chance. Drawing her rapier, she began to run towards him, and managed to slash him across the back. The man was barely affected by her attack, and he turned around, and rammed the butt of his gun into Emily’s face.

“Four – three to the Slayer!” Alice said smugly.

“Don’t get cocky! You’re the one with the supernatural advantage, and it’s only Monday!” Dave protested. He was determined not to be beaten this week.

“Whatever!” Alice smiled. “Come on, we’d better go and see if Emily’s finished.” She knew that was a good point to end the conversation. Otherwise Dave would, once again, have been complaining that she didn’t train enough. They both moved off to where Emily had been dealing with the brambles, but when they got there, Emily was gone – and so was the bag.

“That’s it. I’m so going to stake her this time.” Alice muttered. Scanning around, Dave noticed something behind a bush, glinting in the moonlight. Looking closer he realised that it was a sword, and not just any sword. He’d chastised Emily enough for not having a ‘real weapon’ to recognise her rapier when he saw it. Moving closer, he noticed an unconscious figure attached to the rapier, which he then pointed out to Alice. Alice shook her head, and sighed. Why was it always Emily who got into trouble? Gradually, Emily began to move, and, through blurred vision, managed to recognise the Slayer.

“Lying down on the job?” Alice sarcastically asked.

“At least we know who we’re dealing with now!” Emily said, trying desperately to the redeem herself. She slowly and shakily got to her feet, trying to ignore her throbbing head.

“Why didn’t you try to stop them?” Alice asked.

“I did. Did you think I was lying in a bush for fun?”

“I meant, why didn’t you try to stop them taking the brambles!” Before Emily could open her mouth, Dave intervened.

“What happened?” He asked. Emily tersely explained about Fitzpatrick and his companions, paying particular attention to her heroic mission to try and stop the last man from leaving.

“Great.” Dave sighed. “We’d better get back to the magic shop, we’re going to be in enough trouble with Nathaniel as it is!”

“Hold on a sec.” Emily said, the throbbing in her head gradually subsiding. “Fitzpatrick said that he’d see you later Alice!” Dave shook his head, as Emily continued mumbling about the damage to her credibility if it became public knowledge that she was associating with the Slayer.

They caught a taxi back to the magic shop, and arrived back fairly late. Using Alice’s keys, they unlocked the back door, and headed up the stairs to Nathaniel’s flat. Nathaniel was in the living room, surrounded by countless books. He looked up when he heard Alice, Dave and Emily enter, and noticed a bruise on the vampire’s forehead.

“What happened?”

“Blame the vampire!” Alice replied, annoyed. Nathaniel gave her a stern, disapproving look, and she fell silent.

“We found the brambles, but so did someone else!” Dave informed him.

“Who?”

“Alice and Dave were off killing things when this bloke called Charles Fitzpatrick and two other men jumped me.” Emily was being her usual informative self.

“Oh dear.” Suddenly Nathaniel seemed to take in what Emily had said. “Charles Fitzpatrick?” Emily nodded. “We may have a problem.” Nathaniel said, sounding troubled.

“You know him?” Alice asked.

“We were at Oxford together. He’s an amateur demonologist, and if it’s him raising this demon…”

“Only an amateur demonologist? Well, I’m a professional Slayer, and I’ll kick his little amateur ass!” Nathaniel gave Alice another disapproving look.

“Amateur as in unpaid, he’s actually very good at what he does.”

 “He also said that he would see the Slayer later.” Emily added.

“If he knows Emily, then there’s a fair chance he knows who the rest of us are.” Dave realised.

“So?” By this point, everyone was ignoring Alice.

“It might be wise for Alice not to go home tonight. Fitzpatrick may well have found out where she lives.” Nathaniel said, still occasionally glancing at the book on his lap.

“Do I get any say in this at all?” Alice got another round of disapproving looks.

“She can stay at my place. The security’s better than here.” Dave suggested.

“Good idea.”

“Okay. But I’ll need to pick some stuff up from my place.” Alice said, having admitted defeat.

“You three can do one more patrol, and then call it a night. By then the Candy Store should be closed!” Nathaniel wryly smiled at Alice and Dave.

Three quarters of an hour later, Alice, Dave and Emily stood at the sundial, having had a fruitless patrol.

“Right. I’m going home.” Emily muttered. It would be dawn in a few hours, and she wanted to be safe in her crypt by then. Emily had refused to tell anyone where she lived; she was chipped, not stupid. Telling the Slayer the location of your home was not the smartest move for a vampire to make.

Alice and Dave walked off in the opposite direction to Emily, heading towards Alice’s Hall of Residence. She lived on the top floor of one of the blocks, sharing a kitchen with five other people.

Alice and Dave wandered into the kitchen at around four am. Dave sat at the table whilst Alice filled her overnight bag with a mixture of clothes and weapons. After a few minutes Alice reappeared with a large backpack. Just as they were about to leave, Megan, one of the people Alice shared a kitchen with, walked in and began to make a mug of coffee.

“Some guy was looking for you earlier.” She said. The man’s description exactly matched the one Emily had earlier given of Fitzpatrick.

“What did he want?” Alice asked.

“Didn’t say. But he did say that he’d try again later.”

“If he drops by again, tell him I’ve gone on some society thing, I’ll be gone all week.”

“Okay” Megan replied, before leaving, mug in hand. Shortly afterwards, Alice and Dave made a speedy exit, and headed to Dave’s apartment on Mutley Plain.