I glanced back down the street. It was empty, lit only by the scattered streetlights, the sounds of the city filling the background.
Where is she?
I had only caught glimpses and hints of her all evening. Come on, Slayer. Make your move already.
Wolfram and Hart had not been involved, but I had hired a couple of private investigators to keep an eye on the airports. I had enough money for that, but if things continue like this, I would need to either get a job or go dig up one of those treasures Taz knows of within the next couple of months.
Though I suppose I could just get a group together and hit some vampire nests.
Okay. Let's do this.
We were close to the docks, well outside the city proper so there were plenty of alleyways to duck in to into.
Breaking into a run, I did so, dodging into the alley to the right I followed it and then , taking another right and then a left, across the street and onto the next alley. Around the corner and come to a halt. The area was barely lit, but still plenty enough to see.
It only took a couple of seconds or so before the slayer came around the corner, pausing when she spotted me to pull a big, nasty knife from beneath her jacket.
"You can not get away from me, daemon."
I shrugged, "Not a demon. Not even evil. I've told you twice now already." I said and turned to her, "If you would just listen for a second and we can go to a payphone, we could call the women you think I killed."
She hesitated, "I saw what I saw."
"No, you saw what your bosses think they saw or wanted you to see. In any case, it's wrong."
"Don't listen to him, Anna." A man said as he walked up next to her, working to catch his breath, "Demons lie, it's what they do."
I raised an eyebrow at him, "Watcher? And your name would be?"
"Irrelevant. Anna."
"Yes, sir." she agreed and whirled her knife once before stepping forward. Damn it, I almost had her to listen.
"Watcher, call her off. I have had dealings with the council in the past and despite you guys always acting like massive dicks and not paying what you owed, I'm willing to put that behind us." I said, my eyes locked at the slayer as I slowly backed away, circling to the left.
A little more. Come on.
She struck and instead of trying to meet her charge, I slipped to the side, lashing out to deflect her knife hand as I let her pass.
Anna span to face me again and Aiko stepped silently out of invisibility behind her and slipped her arms around her waist before kissing her neck.
The Slayer just kinda melted into her touch, the knife dropping onto the ground in a clatter as I turned and pulled my gun, pointing it at the Watcher who froze at the sight.
"Now, can we please have a pleasant conversation?" I asked him with a sigh, "Because I really don't want this to continue the way things have been going. Laz!"
Lazarus walked into the area from the other direction and did a small wave, "Hey."
I kept my gun at the Watcher and motioned at Laz, "One of the women I'm said to have killed. Now could you please calm the fuck down?"
He looked at her and then at me before turning to his slayer, "Anna?"
Aiko planted small kisses along the side of her neck and the slayer made small happy sounds. As fun as that would be to keep watching, I rolled my eyes, "Aiko, I think you can stop now."
No reaction.
"Aiko!"
She sighed and stopped, pulling back with a pout, "Very well." she said and smoothly bent down to snatch the dropped knife up before heading over to me with an admittedly rather nice sway in her hips, "She tastes good."
That didn't really surprise me to be honest. Slayers had a lot of power in a very small package. No wonder somebody that fed on life energy would like it.
The Slayer blinked and then scowled as she recovered, reaching up to touch her neck as I pointed my thumb at Lazarus again,
"Well?"
Anna blinked and looked at her before frowning, "This is a trick."
"Is that one of them?" her watcher asked and slowly moved up to her. I lowered my gun to not keep it aimed direction at (him but still kept it safely grasped and pointed in his general direction.
"She looks like the younger one." the slayer said with a frown, "But...it has to be some kind of trick."
I shook my head, "No trick. Either your bosses have had it with me fucking with their carefully laid prophecies or they saw wrong."
The Watcher frowned at me, "Prophecies?"
"I was not willing to be eaten just so things remained on track." I sighed and set the safety back on the gun and putting it back into my pocket, "Also another couple of things. I have killed humans, but just two. One was a chaos sorcerer trying to put a spell on an entire town and the other was trying to eat me. Literally. I'm on the side of the angels here."
Lazarus let out a small choked sound at that but nodded.
Anna stared at me, her eyes flicking between me, Aiko and Lazarus, "What are you?"
"Human. But I have some friends that are not. Such as the lady here." I stated, motioning towards Aiko.
"Bullshit, I saw you with wings."
I shook my head, "You dreamed I had wings. There is a difference." I said before I looked at her watcher, "So I would appreciate it if you stopped trying to murder me!"
AN// Big thanks to -Mech- for betaing this section.
