Title: Big Bad By The Bay 9/10
Author: Gileswench
Feedback: Constructive criticism always welcome. Praise abjectly sought.
Disclaimer: It all belongs to Joss, Mutant Enemy, etc., etc., etc. I just let them have all the fun Joss won't. I own nothing except my twisted mind which you really don't want. Please don't sue. Oh, and I don't own The Simpsons, Indigo girls, or San Francisco either, but I promise to put them right back where I found them.

Cordelia grunted as she readjusted Buffy's nearly comatose weight yet again.

"How can you be so heavy? Ally McBeal needs Jenny Craig more than you do!"

"Forget...me...get staff...Giles," Buffy mumbled.

"Yeah, and what's Giles gonna do when he finds out I dropped you in one of these tunnels to be gotten by a bunch of naked gay guys? No way am I telling him that. You're coming with."

*****

Kate couldn't believe her eyes when she saw the first man tumble over onto three of his companions, knocking them to the floor in a tangled heap.

"Hallucinations. Great. I must be about to pass out," she said to herself.

Then another man went down and part of the floor swung up. A head popped out.

"Angel! Oh thank God!"

The vampire took in the situation at a glance. Immediately, he became a whirlwind of feet and fists. With hope renewed, Kate found the strength to kick out at her attackers as well. Soon, she and Angel were surrounded by the wounded and the unconscious.

"Are you okay?"

Kate stretched out a few muscles.

"I'll be pretty bruised tomorrow, but I think I'll live. I'm more worried about Giles. He got hit in the head and he's been passed out ever since."

"I don't think we need to worry too much. Giles and head injuries...he'll be okay."

Kate began to look around the room with worry in her eyes.

"Weren't you with Lorne? Where is he?"

"I'm down here, thanks," came a disembodied voice from below. "and I'd like to get up there pronto, if I could."

Kate and Angel rushed over and helped Lorne up. The demon lost one shoe to the quickest of the men in the tunnel. Kate immediately grabbed her pike and thrust it into the trap repeatedly until Angel found a hammer and nails and shut the door permanently.

"That'll hold 'em for a while."

He met the stares of his companions.

"What?"

"You're not finding things a little, shall we say...drafty?" Lorne asked.

"Huh?"

Kate bit back her laughter.

"Um, Angel, you lost your towel."

Angel looked down. A stunned moment of inaction later, he moved his hands to cover his groin.

"Um...sorry....I don't know where my clothes are."

Lorne took pity on the embarrassed vampire.

"Here, you can wear my jacket until we find you something a little more...more."

Angel handled the jacket gingerly.

"Pink? I don't know..."

"That's not just pink; that's wild rose raw silk and it cost me a bundle. Go on. Nobody here wants that good a look at your goodies."

The vampire shrugged on the offendingly loud jacket. At least Lorne liked a fairly long cut for his jackets. It covered what needed to be covered.

Kate turned her back and tried not to laugh too hard.

"I think I'd better check on Giles. Y'know, make sure he's not as badly hurt as he looks."

"Where are Buffy and Cordelia?"

"We're right here, Angel. And will somebody grab her already? She's a lot heavier than she looks."

"Cordy! Are you okay?"

"Yeah. Got the staff and everything," she told them as Lorne took the unconscious Slayer and placed her next to Giles. "We better hurry up and smash that donut, 'cause there's about a jillion donut worshippers right behind me, and what are you doing dressed like that?"

"Dropped my towel. Lorne, where's the donut?"

"Check the left pocket. Not the breast! Lower."

On the second try, Angel found the ring of power. He placed it on the ground as Cordelia raised the staff.

"Okay. Here goes one donut-smashing stick. Wish me luck, guys."

"Forget about luck," Lorne said, "wish you'd hurry!"

At least two dozen Dohnohtus worshippers emerged from the corridor, screaming curses and threatening bloody vengeance on any who would desecrate the temple.

Cordelia took a deep breath and swung, only to be knocked off her feet. Angel grabbed the man by his leg and swung him off the ground and across the room. He turned to the crowd, demon face in place.

"Anyone else care to mess with my girlfriend?"

The crowd backed off.

Cordelia scrambled to her feet and raised the staff again. This time her aim was true. She brought the stick down with a mighty thwack, destroying the donut of doom.

"Wow. Look at me! Cordy the donut slayer!" she crowed. Nobody joined in her excitement. "What? That was what we came to do, right? Right, guys?"

"Just come here, and don't look behind you."

Angel held out his hand.

"This is not good. In fact, I'm gonna go out on a limb here and say this is bad. It's gotta be bad if you don't want me to see it."

"Please, Cordy, just come here."

With great trepidation, Cordelia looked over her shoulder.

"Willow?"

"It's not really Willow, Cordy. It's Dohnohtus."

"Oooh, gotcha. So that's why I saw Ned Flanders with devil horns."

"That's right," Dohnohtus told her. "It's always the one you least expect."

"Wait a minute! I smushed your power donut thingie! How come you're here anyway?"

Dohnohtus moved to her followers. She smiled as they flattened themselves in an ecstasy of fear before her.

"You were too late. The ritual to raise me was performed last night."

"Last night? No fair! Wesley said it was tonight. How come they could bring you out early and make the prophecy all wrong?"

"Actually, I believe that Wesley miscalcualted," Giles groaned from where he raised himself to a sitting position. "I knew I should have gone over his figures myself."

"Silence, all of you!" Dohnohtus shouted. "Quake with fear, subcreatures, for tonight you die in hideous, painful ways."

Cordelia shrank back into Angel's arms. Kate took Lorne's hand. Giles pulled Buffy's unconcious form into his lap. Her eyes fluttered open.

"Hey," she whispered. "Did we do it?"

"Very nearly."

He held her tighter and kissed her forehead.

"Very nearly, love."

"What do you people not understand about the concept of silence?" Dohnohtus roared in a voice that shook the rafters.

The demon in Willow form moved to one of the Dohnohtus worshippers quaking on the floor. She pointed an index finger at him, and a bolt of electricity arced from her finger to his back. A moment later, there was only a charred corpse on the ground.

Dohnohtus shrugged.

"He had hairy shoulders. I don't like that. It just looks so gross."

She turned on the band of heroes.

"And that's another thing I can't stand: do gooders. Insipid, whiny, lily-livered hero wannabes. I mean, look at you! Since when do vampires try to save the world?"

"Since I found a reason to want to live."

"Why? Why do you want this farce of human existance to continue? They smell, they sweat, they fart, they're annoying as hell, and did I mention the farting issue just now?"

"Y'know, you might want to talk to somebody about this farting obsession of yours," Cordelia began. Angel squeezed her hand to silence her. "Or not. Therapy really doesn't work unless the patient wants to be cured, anyway."

"What gives you the right to decide which species should live, and which should die?" Giles asked. "Nobody has that right."

Dohnohtus held up a hand, palm out.

"Talk to the hand, buddy. Better yet, talk to the dodo bird. Oh, wait, you can't do that. Why? Because they're all dead! Human beings killed them all!"

"And for the sins of some misguided men hundreds of years ago, every life on the planet is to be snuffed out? Billions of people to die because some sailors in the seventeenth century didn't understand that the wanton destruction of an entire species was wrong?"

The demon approached Giles menacingly.

"Giles, please," Buffy begged. "Stop pissing off the demon."

"No. I think it's about bloody time somebody stood up to this...this...harridan and made it clear that what it's up to is wrong. We won't let you destroy us."

Dohnohtus laughed, still advancing.

"How are you gonna stop me, little man?"

"Oh, I'm not. I rather think the vampire behind you will, though."

The demon turned to find Angel on the spot.

"I really don't like you, subcreature."

"Yeah, well that makes us even."

Dohnohtus raised a finger to electrocute Angel. As the spark shot at his chest, the vampire hurled a bottle of water at the creature wearing Willow's face. The water met the current in a shower of sparks at the same time as the electric bolt hit Angel in the chest.

The vampire flew back against the opposite wall, where he lay hideously still.

The evil demon lord writhed in agony as it shorted out. It changed form until it appeared as a yellow, lumpy creature with green hair sticking out at odd angles from its head. Despite the charring, the red nose was clearly visible.

"Whew!" Buffy waved her hand in front of her nose. "Somebody in here cut the mother of all cheeses."

"Curious," Giles noted. "It looks just like Krusty the Klown."

Cordelia flew across the room to Angel.

"Oh God, Angel! Please be okay! Please don't be even more dead than you already were!"

She threw her arms around his neck, and buried her face in his chest. Immediately, her tears stopped flowing. She held her head to him for a moment, then raised her face to his in wonder.

"Angel...? When did you get a heartbeat?"

The others hurried over to join the pair. Giles gently moved the girl aside and performed a cursory inspection of Angel. Then he sat back on his heels and tugged off his glasses.

"I don't believe it. He's alive."

Cordelia gave a whoop of joy.

"Shanshu! He shanshued!"

"Um, Cordy, could you maybe say this in English?" Buffy asked.

"The PTB! They said when he'd saved enough people he'd shanshu. He'd get to live like a real, normal person. I guess saving the whole planet full of people was enough to get him his reward."

She threw herself into Angel's arms again.

"Oof!" exclaimed the former vampire. "Ow."

"Hey, Pinocchio. How's my real boy?"

"Huh?"

"Well, at least his mind appears unaffected," Giles observed.

NEXT