Episode 10 (3/2/01)

Rose DeVega usually wasn't the type to "name drop," but since this was life or death, she didn't have much choice. "Captain Rancor!" Upon crying out the name of the commanding officer of the two hungry werewolves who had her at their mercy, the wolf pack froze out of reluctant recognition. Being ordered not to touch (let alone eat) any human bearing their flag was bad enough, but to have Rancor of all officers notice if they disobeyed..."Captain Rancor said to leave me alone!"

"Damn!" The werewolf who held Rose a couple of feet off the ground flung her aside as if he had smelled something unpalatable. "Rancor-tore-the-fur-off-Fritz's-arm-last-night! She's-not-worth-it!" Rose landed hard on the sidewalk nearby. As she was getting back to her feet, the other lycanthrope glared at her with blood-red, pin-drop eyes. "You-better-keep-that-flag-close...juicy human!"

Rose snatched the flag that had gently landed beside her and crammed it into the back pocket of her form-fitting pants. "Here! It's right where it belongs!" And she ran off before the wolf pack could grasp the insult.

The skies above were littered with bats heading in all directions on who knows what errands of malice. If any one of them were the vampire Captain Rancor had assigned to hunt her, she had no way of knowing--and for all she knew, the hunter could very well be a wolfman on the ground. Her only hope was to find holy ground and hope there were humans who would take her in. And yet, if Rose was in hiding, how could she ever find the love of her life, Lily Sloan?

Before she could begin to feel torn over a choice in strategy, an arm brushed past her peripheral vision and the hand connected to it yanked her off the streets and into an alley. The strange thing about it was the distance between where she was and the mouth of the alleyway, which should have kept anyone there from being able to reach her. It was as if someone had inhumanly stretched a limb all that way in order to grab Rose DeVega.

A hand that felt as cold and hard as metal muffled the shrill scream Rose belted out upon getting a good look at her abductor. A woman with the flat facial features of direct African descent seemingly coated in glistening sliver. "Quiet, Rose! I don't want them to hear us!"

"Lily?!" Rose couldn't believe that the voice she was hearing from this manikin-looking woman matched that of her lover until Silverbullet had willed the pewter coating her afroed head to peel back and melt away until the face of Lily Sloan could clearly be recognized even at night in the dark alley.

"I said keep it down!" The metal suddenly, immediately recoated her face as though a natural reflex stemming from being startled. Silverbullet then realized she was finally reunited with the only one her heart beats for and softly laid a single finger on Rose's lips as both a reiteration of the warning and an affirmation of how good it felt to see the Latina librarian again.

"What happened to you, Goldie?" Rose stammered in astonishment over what her mind was still trying to cope with. "Except that you don't exactly look so golden anymore. Not that it matters, but is your hair still--"

"Of course it's still dyed blond, this--whatever this is--doesn't seem to affect me at all. But it's too long a story to get into right now. Suffice to say--"

"Here you are!" the lieutenant that Rancor had sent after Rose caught up with her scent easily enough once he had healed from his stab wound. But coming around the alleyway's blind corner brought within view the very woman who wounded him in the first place. This left the young (when bitten) lieutenant in a momentary state of paralyzed shock. Silverbullet was also shocked, since she had been sure that impaling the junior officer "...should've killed you...I stabbed your ass, you should be dead by now!"

Rose, having read far more on the subject than Lily Sloan ever had any real interest to, blurted out something Father Mario Garibaldi actually tried to tell Lily earlier that evening. "You gotta decapitate vampires! Cut his head off!"

TO BE CONTINUED