Author: Paladin Steelbreaker

Title: Friends and enemies

Copyright: March 2001

Rating: R for Violence (Strongly violent scenes)

Spoilers: Buffy: up until the end of season 3.

Keywords: Drusilla, Chatla the Great.

Summary: Buffy fights Drusilla, and just barely survives the fight. Still there is no such thing as a rest for the Slayer. The Hellmouth never rests. On top of all the normal activity, a warrior sorceress of the First Circle of Hell is coming to town. A foe so strong that even a Buffy, in top condition, would be unlikely to survive. And then an unknown woman appears saying that she can help them. Who is she? And can she be trusted.

Legalese: All characters except those noted below with their respective rights, properties and copyrights are the property of their respective creators, authors, owners, producers and agencies. These characters are used without permission. No copyright infringement is intended or meant, and no money will be made from this story. This story may be copied in its entirety, and may be distributed as long as all copyright information remains.

The characters Man on the plane, and Chatla the Great are mine. Did you hear that! Mine! Mine! Mine! (Uh, sorry. I got kind of carried away). Anyone wishing to use Chatla may contact me at pal-o-loonline.no

Author's Notes: FINALLY, I got this one beta'ed. I know it has taken a long time, and I apologise for that.

I would also give big thanks to my Beta Readers and Editor The Red Dragons Order and Grossclout. Without them this story would have been a lot harder to read.

Dedications: I would like to dedicate this story, how ever amateurish, in memory to maybe the best fanfic writer ever. He will be missed for a long time.

Tim Knight May he rest in peace.

If your want to comment on my story. Compliments, or fire spitting criticism, you are welcome to mail me at this address: pal-o-loonline.no

Now on with the story:

FRIENDS AND ENEMIES

The basement of the old factory was swarming with vampires. And in the middle of them, Buffy was fighting for her life.

She had come to the factory when she learned that her friends were kept prisoners there. She had run in and got them loose. Then she had taken on the whole vampire army, so that they could get a chance to run away.

It had worked. Her friends were free. But now she was starting to lose hope for her self. She had been fighting for the last hour, and every single muscle in her body screamed of pain.

Adding to that, she had countless wounds all over the body. And the combined pain threatened to take away her last strength. She clenched her teeth and tried to block out the pain as she did a backwards flip, turned around and staked another vampire.

She had lost count of how many she had dusted. But they just kept coming. For the first time she staggered, and would have fallen if a huge vampire had not grabbed her collar. Just as he was about to bite her, she gave him a vicious forehead, and a knee in the groin. As he bent over in pain she staked him, and turned around as the last vampires gathered before her.

There had to be about twenty of them left. Salty tears rolled down her cheeks as she realised that all hope was out. This was it. She was never to see her friends again.

Sweet funny Xander, the one who always saw the light side of a situation. Xander, who stood by her side, no matter how many times she broke his heart.

Willow, the shy and easily scared computer genius, who, despite her fear, always did what she could to help. She perhaps, was the one of them with the greatest courage. Willow, her best female friend, the one that she could talk to about everything and nothing.

Oz, Willow's boyfriend, the quiet and level headed computer genius and Werewolf.

And even Cordelia. Never to hear her bitch about the rest of the teams bad taste in dressing. With an odd smirk Buffy thought: If she could only have seen me now, with my clothes hanging around me in shreds.

Then the picture of her mom came before her inner sight; sweet mom, who had had such trouble getting used to Buffy being The Slayer and Hank, her father, who didn't know.

And sweet, stuffy, tea drinking, ultra British, book loving Giles, her Watcher, who was more of a father to her than Hank.

NO! It couldn't end this way. There was too much to live for. She had to see them again! With a thrust of adrenaline bursting through her veins she attacked, ignoring the pain and dizziness. She had to make it.

Suddenly every vampire in the room stopped up.

"Enough! The Slayer is mine."

The vampires parted like the Dead Sea before Moses, and forward came Drusilla.

She started dancing around the slayer, humming insanely. "The stars are singing tonight slayer. And Miss Edith is pleased. She is pleased that she gets to even the score with Spike. Miss Edith is getting bored by Spike always bragging about the two Slayers he has killed, while Drusilla only had killed one. I have to make a big tea party for her to celebrate."

Her eyes seemed lost in a sea of confusion, as she giggled like a little girl. From a fold in her black dress, she took out a doll, witch she placed on an empty crate a few meters away.

"That's nice," she hummed. "Now Miss Edith can watch."

Then she stopped in front of Buffy. "Now Slayer, it's time to fight."

Suddenly the lost girlish insanity was replaced with the eyes of a cold-blooded killer, as she morphed into her vampiric visage. Surprisingly quick, she attacked, and continued to attack, with increasing speed and viciousness.

Buffy felt real fear creep into her soul, as she realised that there was more to Drusilla than her insanity. She was strong, incredibly strong; perhaps even stronger than Angelus. Buffy tried every trick she had ever been taught, and then some she just made up. But to no avail, it was almost as if she knew her every move.

She must have been studying my fighting from a distance, Buffy thought as she caught a fist to the stomach that made her reel backward and stumble over the crate on witch Miss Edith sat.

"Naughty, naughty," Drusilla said in a madly shrieking voice. "You made Miss Edith fall on the dirty floor. Miss Edith is crying. Can't you hear it? She broke her foot!"

Her visage melted away, as bloodied tears ran down her face. "You made Miss Edith cry!" then her face became a cold mask of rage. "Now we will end this!"

Then the vampiress stopped right in front of her and Buffy let out a short sob of fear, as she saw Drusilla's eyes turn bright yellow with red sparks. "Look into my eyes," she started to chant in a singsong voice. "Look into my eyes, be in my eyes, be my eyes."

As she continued to chant those few words, Buffy found that she was incapable of moving. Suddenly, her head was invaded by images so lively; she knew the vampiress sent them just to torture her. She saw Kendra fight the vampires. She saw them step aside for Drusilla. She saw her using her hypnotic powers on the Jamaican Slayer. And she saw her slit her throat with a quick cut from her fingernails.

Buffy looked into those evil eyes, the eyes of a predator, and waited for death. She had survived Lothos, The Master, The Order of Teraka and Balthazar. She had survived being swallowed by the Bezoar. She had survived zombies and ghosts. Hell, she had even survived Angelus and Acathla. And now she would die at the hand of a crazy vampiress that was playing with dolls.

She waited for Drusilla to slit her throat. But instead, she leant down and bit into her jugular, rapidly draining her life force. The last thing Buffy registered was the pure and simple bliss on her killer's face, reflected in a piece of broken glass on the floor. Then everything went black. She didn't see the bliss turn into the most excruciating pain.

End of chapter one