Fic: Orb Of Mentez (2/?)

[annelise@xxxxxxxxxxxxx]

Orb Of Mentez, Part Two.
Comments/Flames/Etc. to: annelise@xxxxxxxxxxxxx

--

Buffy made with the machete as she searched for Xander in the 
jungle.
"Up here!" Xander cried. Buffy looked up, and saw Xander hanging 
happily from a tree. 
"Help me down?" he asked.

*

Willow sat in her only little world as she surfed the web on her 
laptop. The jungle held no horrors for her... She'd cast a generic 
protection spell around herself that only the largest of jungle 
mammals could penetrate, and she could hear those coming. In fact, 
she could hear one now.
"Hut, hut, hut, hut, hut..."
She could recognise Xander's voice anywhere. She smiled as the 
voice got closer, and got to her feet as she recognised Buffy's 
unique whine.
"Why're you shouting 'hut' for?" Buffy moaned.
"Because I'd kill for a pizza!" Xander retorted.
More high-speed undergrowth removal.
"Over here guys!" Willow called, and her smile widened at Buffy's 
leaf-muffled "Yes!"
Xander's head broke through the undergrowth first, which was 
unfortunate, as it wasn't enough of an initial mass to pass through 
her anti-snake and creepy-thing shield.
*smack*
Xander's body fell into Willow's private clearing as Buffy helped 
him forward with a friendly punt.
"Hi lover!" she said. "Happy anniversary!"
Buffy shared a wistful kiss, followed by a mango that Willow 
offered her from the tree she'd grown with the aid of a little magic.
"Its really beautiful here," Xander noted, sitting with his back to 
a tree-trunk and massaging his sore head.
"Yes," Willow agreed. "It really is. How was your journey?"
"Dull," Buffy described as she chewed on a mango slice. "We had to 
stop for fuel way too many times. Anyway, what's the sitch with this 
vampire nest?"
"Oh that." Willow rolled her eyes. "Nothing I couldn't handle, 
really. But I used the excuse for some company. I missed you." She 
leaned over and kissed Buffy again.
"What about me?" Xander asked as he eyed the smoochies. "Didn't you 
miss me too?"
"Well," Willow considered, "an extra pair of hands is always useful."
"That's me!" Xander sighed. "Hands guy."

*

"Behave!" Giles cried to the miserable horde of seventh-grade 
monsters. They ignored him. He wondered, vaguely, how normal 
schoolteachers fared without Slayer strength or the ability to safely 
wield an axe in the classroom. A sudden thought hit him, as did a 
paper aeroplane.
"Field trip!" he shouted. The room went deathly silent. "Let's go to 
the museum!"
Let there be dust, he prayed.
"Boring!" claimed an obnoxious kid in row three.
"Will there be skellytuns?" asked a forthright little girl with a 
button nose.
"I do believe there will be skeletons, yes."
"Dead people?"
"I most certainly hope so." Giles agreed wittily, a dangerous act in 
the company of children.
"Cool!"
"Yay!"
"Yippee!"
"I want to go weewee!"
Giles head bounced on the wooden surface of the regulation-issue 
teacher's desk.

*

"So the plan is, we run blindly through the ruins, stake the vamps, 
nick the glowing ball, and dash back out again in time for tacos?" 
Xander concentrated on The Plan.
"That's the size of it," Willow agreed.
"I like it," Buffy claimed. "Simple, straightforward."
"And insane!" Xander cheered up. "This trip could be fun, after all!"
Willow picked up her crossbow. "Lock 'n' load," she said.

*

In the darkness, an evil awoke. Only to fall asleep again. No, 
something was upsetting the ancient vampire's sleep. A litany of 
foreign gibberish. Best to just go drain its blood and grab an extra 
century. *yawn*
"This way!" a male voice called out.
"The Incan carvings say, 'Beware all ye who enter within!'" a female 
voice cried.
"Yeah, well. All pyramids say things like that, don't they?" another 
female voice queried.
Enough! Grr! Arg! Gah! Ugh!

*

Willow looked at Buffy as the mummified vampire collapsed into 
dust. "They really don't improve with age, you know."
Buffy nodded. "I noticed."
"Look what I fou..." Xander's voice seemed suddenly very far away.
Buffy looked at the dark square hole in the floor.
"Xander's found a hole," she said.

*

End Part 2.