My Life is Different Ch. 11

I was on my second donut when a thought occurred to me. What if Professor Walsh's mysterious appearance on campus, and Ethan Rayne's theft from Queen Titania's realm were related somehow? I was pretty certain that the Professor Walsh that I saw on campus, wasn't really Professor Walsh, but actually some sort of shape-shifter.

"Elisedd, you said that some of your enemies were already here in Sunnydale," I said, "Are any of them capable of shape-shifting? Could they masquerade as someone else if they wanted to?"

"True shape-shifting is a rare talent," Elisedd replied, raising one eyebrow at my question, "However masquerading as someone else is not that difficult for agents of Queen Mab. A simple glamour is all it would take. Even King Dovregubben has agents that can perform a simple glamour. Many of the Sidhe learn this skill as children."

"Uh huh," I said, "Well, I think I might have seen one of your enemies on campus today."

* * * * * * * * * *

It was like I had just turned a knob and cranked Elisedd up to eleven. He wanted to know everything about the person that I saw on campus. He wanted to know what she said, what she did, what she wanted, how she was dressed, hand gestures, body language, fighting style, tone of voice, everything!

I felt like I was being interrogated by the FBI all over again.

"This was most likely one of Mab's agents," Elisedd declared after he was done interrogating me, "Dovregubben's agents don't typically use words like 'harridan'. They usually stick to words of two-syllables or less. Also, if one of Dovregubben's agents were to physically strike a human, they would almost certainly be dead right now. This imposter struck four humans, and none of them perished."

"So, we're dealing with one of Mab's agents?" Buffy inquired.

"For now," Giles responded, "However the longer the gauntlets are in Sunnydale, the more operatives we can expect from all three of the Sidhe kingdoms."

"Three rival Sidhe groups, all in Sunnydale," I said, "All fighting each other for the same prize?"

"There's going to be a lot of killing," predicted Buffy.

"There's going to be a lot of chaos," predicted Giles, "Which is almost certainly why Ethan sent the gauntlets here in the first place. Ethan loves chaos. He's probably in town right now, watching the turmoil from an undisclosed location, and gloating about the bloody great mess that he's caused."

"So, how do we stop Ethan from turning Sunnydale into a three-ring circus of blood, burning buildings, screaming, and ogres bashing in people heads?" I asked.

"Well, for starters, Elisedd and I will be checking out a number of motels, and other locations normally inhabited by transients. Perhaps we'll get lucky, and find Ethan's hiding place. Buffy will go to the Administration Building on campus and see if she can't acquire the package that was sent to Professor Walsh. If we're fortunate, it might contain the gauntlets everyone is looking for."

Then Giles turned to me and said, "Willow, I'd like you to pay a visit to Donna Yamamoto. See if she's learned of any unusual people coming into town in the past few days. Her club seems to be a magnet for paranormal beings. If any Sidhe agents come to Sunnydale, she'll probably learn of it before anyone else."

Last year, Donna Yamamoto opened a club in Sunnydale called Eye Candy. Buffy and I didn't notice it at first, but Xander told us about it after he had been there about two-dozen times. It was a strip-club. That alone would be enough to draw people in, however most of the strippers were succubi. Also, one of the bouncers is something paranormal. She's not a vampire or a succubus, but she's way stronger than human. Donna Yamamoto, herself, is half human and half kitsune demon.

With so many paranormal beings working there, it was inevitable that they would attract paranormal customers.

Donna wasn't all that fond of Buffy or Xander, but for some reason she'd developed a fondness for me. If I went to go talk to her, I'd get escorted back to her office with no problem.

* * * * * * * * * *

Eye Candy opens at noon, but they don't start getting a rush of customers until 7:30 at night. It was about 1:00 PM when I showed up, so the place was pretty quiet.

"Willow," called out the bartender before I saw her, "Happy Valentine's Day!"

The bartender's name is Ashley. She's in her early twenties and cute in a Sandy Duncan sort of way. She has short, blonde hair, she's always smiling and she's always cheerful and energetic. Everybody likes her. She's one of the most likable people I've ever met.

"Hi, Ash," I said, walking up to the bar, "Valentine's Day was yesterday."

"I like Valentine's Day too much to stop celebrating after just one day," Ash explained, smiling amicably, "It's a day so full of hope and expectation. People do all kinds of adorable, romantic stuff on Valentine's Day. We need more days where people do stuff like that."

"You could put ecstasy in the drinks," a familiar voice over my shoulder responded, "That would make people more affectionate."

I looked over my shoulder, and there was Daryl. She was one of the strippers that worked at Eye Candy, only she was fully clothed right now. She was wearing some really nice leather books, skintight blue jeans and a black t-shirt with the words "Sarcastic Comment Loading...Please Wait" emblazoned across the front in a large white font.

Daryl is a succubus. Most of the strippers at Eye Candy are succubi. Now, normally succubi are like these evil sex-demons who seduce humans and drain a little bit more of their vitality every time they have sex until the human is dead. That's typically how immortality works for succubi. They drain the vitality from young men (and sometimes young women) during sex, and that keeps them from aging. But Donna's strippers all took some sort of oath, and now they all use a much more complicated method of feeding off of humans that doesn't kill anybody. Buffy and Giles found it all to be confusing and counterintuitive. According to the Watcher's Council, Vampires and Succubi were all supposed to be evil, but sometimes Buffy and Giles found exceptions to that rule.

"Drugging people isn't romantic, Daryl," Ashley said, "In fact, I'm pretty sure it's illegal."

Daryl shrugged her shoulders and said, "When a guy falls in love, it's just chemicals in his bloodstream. Vasopressin hits his brain and whammo, he falls in love! Ecstasy is just a different kind of chemical. They both make a guy act affectionate and go crazy for you, so why is one chemical romantic, and the other chemical some sort of crime?"

"Um," Ashley began, but Daryl cut her off and said, "Either way, the guy is a slave to chemicals in his bloodstream."

"Yeah, but one chemical is produced naturally in the guy's body," Ashley replied, "The other is cooked up in drug labs in Cambodia."

Daryl had no comeback to this. She just shrugged her shoulders, sat down at the bar next to me and ordered a Long Island iced tea.

"Isn't it a little early in the day to be boozing it up?" I asked, glancing at my watch. It was 1:17 in the afternoon.

"I'm having a rough week," Daryl explained as she propped her elbows on the counter and looked at me, "My apartment building burnt down on Friday, and I haven't found a new place to live yet. Until I find a new place, I'm stuck living with Kendell."

Both of my eyebrows went up with that. Kendell and Daryl were both succubi. They were both strippers. They both worked for Donna Yamamoto. They seemed to have a lot in common. I kind of thought that the two of them would be ideal roommates.

"I thought you and Kendell got along pretty well," I said, "Why is living with her so rough?"

"Succubi living with other succubi," Ashley said as she brought Daryl's drink over, "It's a bad combination."

Daryl picked up her drink and sucked almost all of it up in one long, continuous sip, as Ashley elaborated.

"Succubi generate this sort of mystical field. When humans are exposed to it, it causes intense feelings of sexual arousal and a euphoric feeling, sort of like everything is right in the world. But, when other succubi are exposed to this field, it does the exact opposite. It shuts down the sex drive completely, and it causes feelings of helplessness, depression and frustration."

"But, she works here with succubi," I protested, "She's never seemed depressed before."

"Being around large numbers of humans neutralizes the effect," Daryl said, looking up from her drink, "The more humans we have in the building, the higher my morale goes."

"Oh," I replied, "Well, couldn't you have just moved in with a human instead of a succubus?"

Daryl shook her head and replied, "I've only been in Sunnydale a few months. The only humans I know are the ones who work here, and I've already asked all of them."

Daryl ordered another Long Island iced tea and then elaborated, "Stephen insists on living alone, claims he needs his space, Nika won't have me as a roommate because she's afraid of me, Cheryl won't let me come and live with her because that old gypsy woman on Edra Avenue told her that February was a bad month for her to make any changes in her life."

"What about Jack?" I asked, "He's human, isn't he?"

"Jack Finlay?" Daryl said contemptuously, "He's an asshole. He's like Rush Limbaugh, only taller, with broader shoulders, stronger, and with a much bigger gun collection. I'd rather step in front of a speeding bus, than move in with Jack."

"It doesn't look good," Ashley began, "And for some reason the motels and the apartment buildings around here all seem to be- "

Suddenly Daryl cut her off and said, "Wait a minute! You're human!"

Daryl poked her finger at me and her face lit up, excitedly. I understood the implication of what she was saying, but I was too stunned to think of a response. I ended up just making some inarticulate vowel-sounds.

"You're human, you're not afraid of me, and you're not an asshole! You're perfect," Daryl exclaimed, and then she got up from her barstool and hugged me.

"Daryl, I live in a two-bedroom townhouse," I protested, "And there's already three of us living there. Actually, it's almost four, because Terri's girlfriend spends a lot of time visiting. There's no room. Where would you sleep?"

"I could sleep on the couch," Daryl suggested, "You guys have a couch, right?"

Daryl broke from the hug and looked me in the eye. What could I say? I didn't really want a succubus coming to live with me and Buffy, but I didn't want to say it like that. That would have sounded racist. Or speciesist. Or something. I looked into her greyish-blue eyes and tried to think of a response to get me out of this, but the only words that my brain seemed capable of forming were, "Yeah, we have a couch."

"This is perfect," Daryl proclaimed enthusiastically, "I'm gonna go tell Kendell the good news!"

Daryl paid for her drinks and then ran off towards the stripper's dressing room. When she was out of earshot, I said, "What the hell just happened?"

* * * * * * * * * *

Not long after that, I was told that Donna was in her office and that I could go back and talk to her. Donna sat behind her desk, looking very dapper and businesslike, in a tweed skirt-suit, and with four different piles of paperwork in front of her. She also had twelve different monitors nearby, that allowed her to keep track of what was going on in every part of her club, including the parking lot outside.

"Daryl looked very happy," Donna said as I sat down, "I saw her hugging you when you were at the bar."

"Yeah, apparently we're moving in together," I said without enthusiasm.

"You don't sound very happy about it," Donna observed.

"Can we not talk about my personal life?" I asked. I didn't want to make Daryl unhappy by turning her away, but I also didn't want to talk about the multitude of reasons why I thought having a succubus live with Buffy and me, was a bad idea.

"Fine," Donna said, "Let's get right down to it. I assume you're here on some sort of official business for Mister Giles."

I nodded my head in agreement, and said, "He thinks there may be three different factions of Sidhe here in Sunnydale, all wanting to claim the same mystical prize. Giles was wondering if maybe you'd seen anybody new in town that seemed suspicious."

"Sidhe?" Donna asked.

"Yep."

"Sidhe, as in elves, pixies, trolls, ogres, goblins, hobgoblins and things like that?"

"Yeah, I'm pretty sure that's what Giles is looking for, things like that."

"I thought those creatures were all just myths," Donna said, her face incredulous.

"Oh, they're real," I assured Donna, "One of them showed up at Giles's apartment, asking for his help."

"Holy crap," Donna said, and for a while she just sat there without saying anything. For somebody who was half Kitsune demon, and had almost a dozen succubi working for her, I thought she would be more at home with dealing with the paranormal.

Finally, she spoke up and said, "In the past two nights or so, we've had a few customers who seemed new in town, and who definitely weren't human. These were all big guys, looked like they could be offensive linemen for the Oakland Raiders. They drank far more alcohol than a normal human could handle, and they didn't have any American money. They paid for their drinks in gold and silver coins."

"It sounds like you made a profit from them," I said, knowing how valuable even one ounce of gold was. Even one gold coin could pay for drinks for dozens of people for the entire evening, and still have money left over for a huge tip. And apparently, they gave the bartender a multitude of gold coins.

"The woman who owns this club doesn't care what sort of business tactics I use, just so long as my tactics turn a profit. If strange creatures from out of town want to overpay for drinks, and create huge profits, I see no downside to that."

Okay," I said hesitantly. It was a sleazy business tactic, that neither Buffy nor Giles would approve of, but I wasn't going to mention that.

"Although the most suspicious thing about them wasn't their superhuman tolerance for alcohol, or their ignorance of how money works around here," Donna said, "The most suspicious thing about them was how strong they were. Jack got into it with one of those guys, when he grabbed one of my girls, and pulled her off the stage. We have a zero-tolerance policy when it comes to touching the girls."

"Yeah, I know that," I said. Most strip clubs had very strict rules when it comes to touching the strippers.

"Anyway, Jack tried to throw the guy out of the club, and the guy picked Jack up, and tossed him across the room like a poker chip."

"Oh, my God," I said. Jack is like a really big guy. He's at least 6' 6" and weighs over 300 pounds. There's no way anybody human could just throw Jack across the room like that. There's no human strong enough to do that. Well, maybe Buffy could do it, but she's not a normal human. She's the Slayer. She's got superhuman strength.

"Is Jack alright?" I finally asked.

"He'll be fine," Donna said, waving her hand dismissively, "Jack is one of the toughest people I know. He recovers quickly. And Marianne stepped in and took care of the guy who threw Jack."

Marianne was the other bouncer at Eye Candy. I'm not entirely certain what Marianne is, but she isn't human. She's as strong as a vampire, but she still casts a reflection, and she can go out into the sunlight without bursting into flames. But, whatever she is, she's way stronger than any normal human being.

"Any idea where these guys hang out, when they're not at your club?" I asked.

"None," she said, "But I bet you a dollar, they're back here again tonight. The past two nights they've shown up here between seven and eight."

"I'll tell Giles," I said.

"You do that, Willow," Donna said to me, "But do me a favor? If you bring the Slayer down here, tell her not to get into any fights in my club? There's a huge parking lot outside where she could fight, and not do any damage to my club, or scare away any of my patrons."

"I'll tell her," I said.

* * * * * * * * * *

Giles would be happy about the information I got from Donna. Buffy would be a lot less happy when I told her about our new houseguest. I was trying to think of a way to break the news to her gently, and I decided to stop into the Espresso Pump, grab a coffee, sit down and carefully compose a speech that made it sound like this was not my fault, and there was no reason to be mad at me.

I thought about it. I should probably wait until I was naked to tell her. It was hard for Buffy to get angry at me if I was naked. Also, chocolate. Buffy loves chocolate. If I bring her something with chocolate-y goodness, that would also make it hard for Buffy to get angry with me. Was there a way for me to bring her chocolate, in the nude, without it seeming blatantly obvious that I was trying to manipulate her?

I was so deep into my own thoughts that I didn't even notice when a strange man walked over to my table and set his coffee down in front of me. I don't notice him until he spoke to me.

"Willow Rosenberg?" he said.

I looked up and saw a well-groomed man in his late twenties or early thirties, dressed in a suit and tie. His dress slacks and blazer were such a dark shade of blue that they were both nearly black. And his face and his clothes were so serious, I immediately pegged him as a lawyer or a government employee, possibly both.

"Yes?" I said, somewhat cautiously.

"I'm Special Agent Fox Mulder with the FBI," he said, as he casually fished his federal ID out of the inside pocket of his blazer and showed it to me.

"I've already talked to the FBI today," I said defensively.

"Yes, that would have been my partner, Dana Scully," he said, "Her style of questioning tends to be very different from mine. Also, I tend to be a better listener. Do you mind if I sit down?"

"No. Go right ahead," I said.

I mean, he was an FBI agent. What was I supposed to say? The FBI has handguns, machine guns, high-tech surveillance equipment, an army of lawyers and computer science geeks who can hack into people's computers and read their e-mails. Cooperating with the FBI seemed smarter than saying stuff that might piss them off.

When he was settled into the booth, Agent Mulder looked me in the eye and said, "My partner and I both spent the morning interviewing witnesses, but the responses I got were very different from hers."

"Really?" I asked, not sure where this was going.

Agent Mulder made a sound that indicated an affirmative answer, and then he said, "Several of the witnesses I spoke to, indicated that odd occurrences happen in this town on a fairly regular basis."

"They did?" I asked timidly, "Odd how?"

"Odd, like an incident last year, where you assaulted a student from your old high school. From what I've heard, you bodily picked up a boy named Percy West and tossed him across a room using only one hand. And from my information, Percy West has a sixty-pound weight advantage on you. Then you got an impressive grip around his neck, which he was unable to break."

"Well, that really wasn't a normal day around here," I said nervously, "That was an anomaly."

"And was it an anomaly last year, when your high school blew up on graduation day?" Agent Mulder asked, "The Sunnydale Fire Department declared the explosion to be a tragic accident, brought on by a gas leak, but a lot of things don't add up. For instance, no one was inside the school at the time, yet the official town records declare that several people died in the explosion, including your high school principal, your town mayor, and at least one student."