Southern Fornia:

The crater was huge – the size of an average sized city, at least. Saffron Isaacs gasped in amazement as she stared at it, this crater that for so long had been unvisited, untouched, and unmentioned. Hardly anyone in the Order of Sages ever discussed this place, but Saffron had been intrigued by it ever since she had first heard it mentioned in a journal from the 1800's. The place, back then, had been called the Boca del Infierno, or the Mouth of Hell.

It was an apt description for the area, Saffron thought to herself, as she breathed in the dusty air. This place, this crater, gave off an energy unlike any place that she had ever seen before. It was mystical, powerful, and oh-so-sinister. Saffron would have left if she wasn't so drawn to the place. But here she was, drawn to the former (?) Hellmouth, for reasons totally unknown to her.

This place, this crater, this entire area, it had been haunting her, making appearances in her dreams for a few months now. Saffron needed to find out why, and so she had come here, not telling any of the Order where it was she had disappeared off to. There couldn't have been any familial connection, she knew that much. Saffron's family had lived everywhere in Europe, but nowhere away from there. So, what was it then? None of the spells she had used had helped her see anything in any of her past lives that left a connection to the crater.

If I'm gonna do anything positive about this, I need to not just stand here staring into the abyss. So, spell time.

Saffron knelt down on the ground and placed her knapsack down in front of her. She unzipped and started pulling ingredients out and placing them near her, all the while brushing her magenta hair out of her face. It was breezy, and she hadn't brought anything to tie her hair back with. In a few moments, spread before her was a midnight blue blanket, held down by a large quartz crystal on each corner. On the blanket was painted a pentagram, along with some other arcane symbols as well. Once all of her ingredients were set out, Saffron seated herself directly in front of the pentagram and breathed in. If this was going to work, she'd need to tap in to all of the primal magicks that existed in the area. It would certainly drain all her energies, but Saffron needed answers – now.

And so she concentrated.

At first, her mind was a blank slate. Then, after about forty minutes, she began to see flashes of color in the inner corners of her mind. The colors slowly started to form images. They grew in clarity, and with the images came sounds, and smells. Saffron was slowly pulled into the visions that she received. At first the visions showed run-of-the-mill supernaturalistic things. Vampires, werewolves, possession, and other mediocre things. It was after all of those that the weirder images started to pour into her head. The Judge, the Turok Han, the First Evil, a Frankenstein-like being created by a mix of magic and science, an Ascension, and…a team of Slayers? The images then started getting older, more ancient. The images, these images that she was getting, this was the source of the magickal activity plaguing this place, Saffron knew.

At first she saw a group of robed figures, crowded around a temple, their heads bowed, blood dripping from their wrists. She saw sand painted red as blood, the stars from the sky starting to black out, and some of them starting to fall. Then she saw a large, stone temple. Snakes crawled up and down the temple, and its highest spire seemingly pierced into the moon. The temple, unlike other temples, seemed more evil than it did a place of holiness.

That's when Saffron saw her. The cause for all of the unholiness. It was a she-demon, in human form. She was stunningly beautiful, so beautiful, in fact, that she was ugly in it. Her skin, flawless and seemingly made from marble, sparkled in the dappled sunlight. Though there was no breeze, the she-demon's hair shifted and swayed in the air, as though it had a mind of it's own. Her dark, pink eyes glowed with malevolent love, and her full, silky lips shone with moisture. She had just feasted on twelve virgins, six boys and six girls. She felt good.

Saffron read deeper into this vision, for this was the vision that she had been looking for. This she-demon, she had grand plans for Earth. Indeed as grand a plan as any demon on this mortal plane who sought to bring the world back to its former glory did. The temple, behind, would funnel all of Earth's natural, most primal magicks, therefore destroying the entire planet and starting hell anew.

The young Sage gasped in horror as she realized what she was seeing and who she was seeing.

Proserpexa. One of the highest she-demons known to the world.

And she would wake up very, very soon.

Melaka Fray hated Fornia. It was a beautiful place no doubt, extremely clean and full of sunshine, and not the slightest bit of smog that plagued the Haddyn, but there was still something so very…off about the place. Fornia put Fray more on edge than Haddyn ever had; intriguing because Haddyn was the place where the entire world's evil was currently centered.

Wasn't it?

Fray sighed as she staked another vampire, her second in the fifteen minutes since she'd left the hotel at which she and Erin were staying, confused about the theory she had just come up with. In truth, Melaka had just ventured out of the hotel to take a walk and catch some fresh air. After learning of her calling as the Slayer, coupled with the fact that she was a grabber and thusly a nocturnal creature by every standard, Melaka found that she had an even harder time staying at home when the sun went down. It was all in her blood, she knew. Going out at night, getting into potentially dangerous situations, it was all because she was a Slayer, or at least had been a Potential Slayer.

It bothered her, though, that there were vampires here in Fornia. Shouldn't the baddies have been centered around where the Slayer was? After all, if there was only one, then she couldn't very well be in a million different places at once to fight off all of the world's evil. So…what then? What if there was an apocalypse somewhere in the world and the Slayer couldn't get there to stop it in time? What happened then? Weren't there any precautions for that sort of thing?

At that moment, Melaka felt more than anything the need of a Watcher to guide her through these things, to help her understand her legacy, her destiny, and the workings of this old mystic thing that had suddenly become her life.

Too bad they were all pyromaniacal whack-jobs who desperately needed tranquilizer darts shoved in their veins to do her any good. After all, the only things the Watchers were good for now was either setting things of fire, or talking pure gibberish, neither of which Melaka was too keen on getting involved with.

The young Slayer crossed an empty street, lost in thought, a stake gripped firmly in her right hand. She idly wished that she had brought her scythe with her, but figured it was safer in Erin's apartment anyway.

Melaka did a few quick sweeps of some empty alleys and was just starting to head into her last one when she felt a familiar pain suddenly jab her in her abdomen. Melaka ducked into her chosen alley and scaled up a wall, instinctively grabbing onto a pipe that crossed over from one part of the alley to the other. Melaka held on to the pipe, waiting quietly.

A moment or two later, a figure in a long black leather duster entered the alley. His platinum blonde hair was short, and spiky. His acid washed jeans were tucked into a pair of well-worn combat boots, and he sported a black tee-shirt underneath his duster.

He was cute, for a vampire.

But Fray wasn't looking to date.

The Slayer let go of the pipe and somersaulted in mid-air, then brought her right leg out to smash into the vampire's chest.

The vampire seemed to expect this, though, because he swiftly side-stepped her and shot out his arm, grabbing the Slayer's ankle. Using her momentum against her, the vampire twirled Fray around and brought her crashing into the brick wall, sending chunks of brick flying everywhere.

While the move would easily have killed an other girl, Fray was back up on her feet in an instant, stake at the ready. She charged the vampire, pummeling him into the wall behind him. The vampire dodged her last punch, and her fist slammed into the second brick wall, shattering some of that also. The vampire then came back up, his fist solidly hitting Fray's chin, sending her stumbling back a step or two.

She was the slightest bit disoriented.

But not by much.

Fray made to go back into pummel mode, but stopped suddenly when the lurk spoke to her.

"You're good, Slayer. Rough, and definitely need some work. But you're good."

Melaka's instincts went on red alert. Was the vampire from Harth? Was he one of Harth's minions? It would explain why the vampire knew that she was the Slayer, since so many of the lurks that Melaka had come across had no clue who or what the Vampire Slayer was. The fact that this one knew her, and had anticipated some of her moves, alarmed her to no end.

She threw her alarm to the wind and sucker-punched the vampire, and then wrapped her hand around the vampire's throat, knowing that while it wouldn't strangle him, it would offer him some pain. She liked working off of pain.

"Did Harth send you?" Fray whispered viciously. "Did Harth send you?"

The vampire brought his hands up and tore Fray's hand away from his throat. "You know, Slayer-bird, you shouldn't get all Princess Stakes-A-Lot with every single being you meet with fangs. I haven't even put my game face on yet."

"You're all the same."

"Hardly love. I'm your new Watcher."

"Like hell you are. The last demon to tell me that killed a girl I cared very much for. You know what, Lurky? Not gonna happen a second time." Fray said, bringing her leg up and kicking the vampire in the head. The vampire went down and Fray started to bring her stake home when he suddenly moved. The vamp was up on his feet and behind the Slayer before she could even move. In a split-second, her held Fray in a tough grip, leaving the Slayer unable to move.

Fray's stake cluttered to the ground as she tried to struggle out of the vampire's iron grasp. It wasn't her time to go yet, it was too damn soon. She still had so much to do. And Erin…Erin was asleep in their hotel room, unaware that her little sister had gone out for a walk in the dark.

"I'm sorry, love," Spike said regretfully as he tilted the Slayer's head to one side. "But I'm afraid this is the only way."

Slowly, the Watcher shifted his features into his demonic visage and, yellow eyes glowing in the dark alleyway, he sunk his teeth into the Slayer's soft flesh.