Let the Dominoes Fall - Ch. 4
Disclaimer: See Previous.
A/N: Nanowrimo kind of put all my other work on hold. Since it’s over and everything’s all shiny again, well at least returning back to normal, I can get back to Buffy and Co. Thanks everyone!
Ch. 4 - The Bravest Kids
Summer 2002
Buffy pinched the bridge of her nose as she flopped back on the bed, Giles was sputtering in her ear and really she just wished he’d shut up. She understood, on some level, that he was concerned she was just as concerned, maybe even more so than the stammering Watcher, but her mind was made up. She liked to think that it was the logical parts of her brain telling her to do something beside just continue to exist. Buffy had spent the better part of her life, at least for as long as she cared to remember, fighting demons, her energy needed to go somewhere and as much as she was loathe agreeing with anything high school may have told her about her personality, she agreed that doing this would be a step in the right direction.
She tried every job that she could when Sunnydale was still around. The high school counselor job was okay; she felt like she was making a difference, and some days it had even showed. But if the slayer were honest, if it hadn’t been for Wood’s offer, she still would have been jobless.
What else was she going to do? Work at a fast food place to come back to her dingy apartment smelling like a fried stick of Buffy? The slayer didn’t think either was in the same zip code as a viable option.
Being in the city had given the slayer a look beyond the demons and admittedly, it wasn’t something she had seen a lot of. Vaguely she recalled a life before being called but it seemed so far away and different that it could have been someone else. At twenty-two, she had the means and inclination to start over. “Stop, Giles,” she snapped, “Look, this is what I’m doing. I need those vast Council resources to do their longest running slayer a good turn. What’s so hard about this?”
“Buffy,” Giles’ voice calmed, he knew he needed to get a hold on his emotions. “I just can’t seem to wrap my head around why you could possibly want this?”
“What’s there to understand Giles? I’m Peter Parker in New York City. I’d rather not do the vigilante shtick. I can just wear a uniform like everyone else. Admittedly, polyester should so not be made anymore, but I can change that. I’ve done the research,” Buffy reasoned.
“You did what?” Giles interrupted.
Buffy didn’t need to see him to know that he was probably standing where ever he was with is eyes closed, pinching the bridge of his nose, with his glasses dangling from between his fingers. It hit her then; she was pinching the bridge of her nose and immediately stopped. Rolling her eyes at his shock she pressed, “Yes, me and a bit of research. If I can get moved to plain clothes quickly, I’ll be out of that ridiculous uniform. To do that, I need your help.”
Buffy didn’t think she was asking for a lot, some type of paper trail showing she had been on the Sunnydale Police Department books and had working knowledge of police work. She admitted that she really knew next to nothing, save those few police type dramas that she caught here and there. But given the incompetence and corruption of the S.D.P.D., even if she had actually been on the force, she would still be just as knowledgable as she was now. She also figured that the new and improved Council could fake some records. The slayer had been witness to the abundance of faked ecords to get access to the Council funds and resources along with identification and other legal paperwork. The least they could do is fake a few more with a service record to give Buffy a leg up at the Training Academy.
“I just don’t think…” Giles tried again.
“Don’t; don’t you dare tell me that you don’t think this is a good idea.” Buffy pushed off the bed and began a tight pace from one end of the small efficiency to the other. “I’m done with everyone else telling me what’s best for me. I don’t need to hear it. I’m grateful you gave me the money to get away, but Giles, this isn’t some vacation I’m on.”
Steeling herself, Buffy spoke as calmly and clearly as she could, “I’m done with slaying. It’s taken everything from me. I need to find a way to get some of that back. Do this, get me into the N.Y.P.D. and as far as I’m concerned Giles, we don’t have talk to each other again.”
“I, uh, Buffy, that’s not…” she listened to him sputter and sigh. The same sigh she’s heard for the last seven years. It’s the one he gives once he’s resigned to an idea of hers.
Buffy liked to think the decision was logical, but if the slayer were honest, she never was good with critical thought. She worked off instinct, signing up was the right choice, Buffy knew it and she wasn’t going to explain her decision to anyone of them. If this did any harm to anyone, it was to herself. She was the only one of them she could kill with this decision.
“Alright, give me a few days to make some phone calls and have Willow draft something respectable,” the Watcher relented.
“Thank you,” Buffy said before hitting end on her cell. She tossed the phone on to her bed and looked around the small apartment. Now she just needed to wait it out. Grabbing her purse, she left the apartment intent on finding something to pummel.
Buffy straitened the stuffy jacket and blouse that she wore before squaring her shoulders and heading up the steps to the academy’s training building. She’d gone out and purposefully bought something ‘cop’-like to sell her story. Between Willow’s assistance on the paperwork and then two commendations Riley had secured from the military, Buffy was contacted about a week after she submitted the fabricated resume and documentation.
She personally thought it was the commendation from a defense secretary that had clinched the acceptance for her. Now all she had to do was sell it to the training director, Inspector Michael Walsh, and she was in. She wasn’t sure how well this was going to go. Buffy was notoriously bad at any type of undercover work, but she had to try. As she stepped into the lobby, the officer behind the desk, smiled and asked, “Can I help you?”
Smiling herself, she said, “I’m here to see Inspector Walsh.”
The cop behind the desk balked for half a second then gave her a once over. The man asked, “Are you with the news?”
She suppressed the eye roll. “No,” was all she offered. Remembering a lesson from Spike on less being more, she just offered the man a tight smile and waited.
The officer said nothing more as he picked up the phone and barked a couple of questions. Finally, he turned his attention back to her and asked, “Name?”
“Buffy Summers,” she answered.
He gave the person on the other end of the line her name and he sputtered a second before cradling the receiver and handing her a clipboard. “Please sign-in here.” He pointed to a line and then handed her a visitor’s badge. “Inspector Walsh asked that you wait a minute. He’ll be down to get you shortly.”
Buffy nodded her head and spun away from him to look around. She shook her head silently at the last name of the training director. It was either a bad sign or a really bad sign in her opinion on the shared name of her college professor, turned Dr. Frankenstien. The blonde fidgeted resisting the urge to escape before meeting the man.
“Ms. Summers?” a deep baritone asked behind her. Buffy spun around and looked over the man standing in front of her. He came in a few inches taller than she was. With thick, brown hair and deep brown eyes, a barrel chest and broad shoulders, he looked like he belonged breaking kneecaps not running the training academy for the N.Y.P.D.
“That’s me,” she said brightly, extending her hand in greeting.
“Mike Walsh,” he said. “Follow me and we’ll see what we can do.” He didn’t wait for her to agree, instead spun on his heel and marched away. Buffy trailed after him towards the rear of the building and up a flight of stairs.
She moved briskly behind the man, down a long hallway that ended with a brass plate witih his name next to a door. A receptionist looked up as the door opened and smiled at the both of them before going back to her typing. Buffy took the invitation and followed Mike through another door to a cluttered, over stuffed office.
“Pardon the mess. We’ve got a filing problem,” he said choosing to sit on the edge of his desk while Buffy took the one free chair that wasn’t stacked with boxes or paperwork. “So, I got your application, had a chance to read over it. In fact,” he said rubbing at the stubble on his chin, “I had your file hand delivered to me by a Colonel Norton.” He chuckled a little and then amended, “The Colonel said that his General told him to hand deliver the file. I’ve been in this position for fifteen years, Ms. Summers. I ain’t seen anything like that before.”
Buffy shifted in her seat. Riley offered to help, not raise warning flags. Sighing, she ran a hand through her hair and shrugged.
“So, usually, if we have an officer from another department transfer, even if they come from another state, there’s a process. You seemed to jump through all of those hoops and then some. Why?”
Buffy looked up at him and offered another shrug. She had put together a back-story; she just hoped it was going to work. “After Sunnydale, I moved here. I’ve just been hanging out. Ran into one of your recruiting detectives and thought it would be a good thing. Ya know, embrace the now and all that, uhm…” she trailed off at his look. “I, just, well, I was tired of sitting in the park during work days,” she finished lamely.
Walsh clucked his tongue and shook his head. “I tried to get some more background info on you, but got stone walled ‘cause your service record requires a security clearance that I don’t have. “ He sighed and stood then, moving back around to his side of the desk. He sat and rocked back in his chair, lacing his fingers over his stomach. “I did review and follow up on the information so it’s golden there. If this is something you want, then we bring you in like a regular transfer. We knock your training down to six weeks. Three on tactical and such and the other three on a review and over view on New York State and County law, then we assign you to a precinct.”
Buffy sat there slightly dazed. The only thoughts going through her head was that this was actually going to work. “That’s all?” she managed to ask.
“That’s all. Everything else is in line. We’ve got all the right documentation and the investigative work was kyboshed when the State Department not-so-politely informed me that beyond what I had was classified, I’d say we’re good. This is a first for me, so…any questions?” Walsh tried for an easy smile, truthfully the little blonde made him a bit nervous and he wasn’t a man that got nervous easy, but he wasn’t lying about the delivery of her application nor the trouble he ran into trying to secure her military background. All they were able to tell him was that Buffy Summers had served as a consultant to several key military operations and that anything beyond that was classified.
Not to mention the colonel that dropped the file off made it a point to get a signature his boss, a two star general, required.
“Uh, when can I get out of uniform and back to regular clothes?” Buffy asked, trying to lighten the mood.
Walsh smiled at that and shrugged. “You come in as a uni, you’ll leave as a uni, but if you have an urge to move to plain clothes quickly, with your credentials, you should be able to earn the test scores and recs necessary to do so.”
Buffy felt her face brake out into a smile.
Blowing her bangs from her eyes, Buffy stared straight ahead. The instructor was going over firing range protocol as he shot off bursts from some type of machine gun or the handgun at his hip. Internally she cringed as each shot fired echoed in her ears; despite the protective earwear, Buffy heard them a hundred times louder than the other cadets. The blonde wasn’t sure how she was supposed to make the next two days at this rate. She’d be lucky to come out of training today with all of her hearing intact.
The day here was supposed to be a recap of gun safety, of things she was already expected to know. Guns wigged her out. For obvious reasons. She just needed to fake it well enough to not tip her hand to Sergeant “Wanna-be-Tackleberry” Castillo calling her out on her lack of skills with automatic weapons. She looked over at another cadet and saw a pair of ear plugs dangling from around his skinny neck.
Leaning over she whispered, “Can I borrow those?”
The cadet took a minute to respond, but he smiled down at her and handed them over. Grateful to the small act of kindness, Buffy removed her earmuffs and slipped the plugs into her ears.
“Summers!” the sergeant barked. Buffy’s head snapped up as his hulking form stopped in front of her. “Do you think interrupting today’s lesson is a good idea?”
“No,” she replied.
“That’s ‘No, sir,’ to you!” He shouted in her face. It took everything Buffy had not to wince at the volume of his voice. “Get up here. You’re going to help demonstrate to the group the kickback on our weapons selection. “
Buffy secured her earmuffs and followed the sergeant to the front of the firing range to stand by the table that held a selection of handguns and larger weapons. She recognized a shot gun and an assault rifle, but her eyes lit up at the sight of the smaller grenade launcher on the table. It looked very similar to the rocket launcher that she used junior year and she actually liked the rocket launcher.
“Summers, pick a weapon!” Sergeant Castillo barked his orders as Buffy looked over the selection of weapons.
She could have gone a few ways with the choice, pick a wimpy gun and deal with his sneer, pick a medium sized gun and feel slightly better that her pride is intact or go for one of the really big guns and watch his jaw drop. The decision wasn’t that hard.
Picking the largest assault rifle on the table, Buffy hoisted the gun up so that it was resting on her shoulder with the muzzle pointing up. She couldn’t tell you what it was, what kind of bullets were in it or what the hell someone would use it for, but that was beside the point. It was monstrous and it suited her needs.
“Summers that’s a long range sniper rifle. I think we should leave this for the professionals,” he snipped and Buffy bristled.
“What am I shooting at?” she retorted.
He shook his head as he shrugged and pointed to a target roughly three hundred yards away. Buffy’s eyebrow arched slightly and then she shrugged.
She figured if she could blow up a school or kill a vamp with a bow and arrow from an alleyway in the middle of the night that she could hit the target assigned to her. Not noticing the arms along the side of the barrell, she quickly recalled how to shoot a rifle. To her they were all pretty much the same and some of the countless hours with Giles studying weaponry had sunk in.
So Buffy did what she does every other time she faced with a new challenge, she faked it. The weapon was hoisted and brought flush against her shoulder; she lowered her eye until it was level with the scope. Shutting her left eye, she squinted through the scope and had a hard time adjusting her sight. She grunted in frustration and looked up, opening her left eye and focusing on the target. Flipping the safety off, she aimed and squeezed the trigger.
The sound of the shot was deafening, but at least the ringing in her ears was the only pain that she felt. As the ringing stopped and she looked at her target her face broke out into a grin. The center of the target was blown clean through. She spun around to her instructor who was still glaring at the target. Setting the gun down, Buffy took up her stance by the table waiting.
It took a second for the instructor to move but when he did he tried snatching up the rifle Buffy had picked up and stopped. He brought his other hand to the muzzle to help hoist it up. Taking a stance similar to the one that Buffy used, he took aim at a target next to the one that Buffy had blown through.
The sergeant also did not use the muzzle supports and struggled to keep the gun level as he took aim. Thinking that his shot was clear he fired and staggered back, nearly landing on his ass. He was saved from landing on his ass by a firm grip around his bicep that steadied him. Buffy grinned down at him as their eyes locked. She righted her instructor and took the gun, one handed, from his grip.
The grin remained through the rest of day as she practiced solo with a standard nine millimeter service weapon.
Stepping through the academy’s trainee entrance, Buffy was glad that week three was almost done. After the first week of general conditioning and the running, Buffy soon found out that the instructors here were big fans of running, and then there was the gun training. All of it was okay. Although, Sergeant Castillo hasn’t come within five feet of her since her first day on the firing range…she’s torn on whether or not that’s a bad thing.
Her first two weeks weren’t half bad and sure there was the militaristic style of the place, but being older, Buffy got it. She had a hard time with it as a teenager and with Riley, she just didn’t get the inability to question, but at least now, after Sunnydale she understood it to a degree.
So she breezed through her first two weeks and now at the end of her third, she was glad that she didn’t have to take the full course of training. A lot of time would have been wasted. The crash course Walsh set her up with was proving to fill in the gaps she was missing. The next three weeks would give her the rest of the information she was missing to actually do the job.
“Summers,” her name echoed in the entryway to the women’s locker room. She spun around and smiled as Inspector Walsh strode towards her. His smile was tight and Buffy flinched mentally. She really hoped that this wasn’t about what happened yesterday. “I need to have a word.”
“Okay,” Buffy moved to the side to let a few of the cadets through. She waited on the inspector but instead saw him motion for her to follow him. Hoisting her gym bag higher on her shoulder, she did as instructed. He strode down a hallway that was off to her left and stepped into an open office.
“What’s up?” she asked as she closed the door and took a seat on one of the folding chairs in the office.
“Oh, just wanted to see how the first three weeks had shaped up. The sergeants’ reports on you have been…colorful.” He tried smiling at her, but it came out as a grimace.
Buffy visibly flinched this time around, coming to terms with her rose colored view of her training thus far. She thought that overall she did really well. She beat out everyone on the training course. Apparently the N.Y.P.D. had one of the toughest obstacle courses for police cadets; Buffy broke the record to finish it. The previous record holder had been the sergeant that was in charge of it.
It wasn’t that hard. The course was mostly running, some walls to jump, a few rounds of monkey bars and hurdles. The first time took her a little under seven minutes. She thought that it should have taken her less time, but she lost her grip on one of the monkey bars and dropped the eight feet into a mud puddle. She took an extra minute to hose herself off. There was no way she was going to let the mud dry all over her clothes or, more importantly, in her hair.
After years of slaying she knew from experience to wash her hair as soon as humanly possible. It was her opinion that mud fell in the same category as demon intestines. When she reached the end of the course the sergeant pitched a fit and demanded that she run it again, so she did, shaving nearly two minutes off her time. He made her run laps until the rest of the cadets finished the course.
Then there was the initial incident on the shooting range, Buffy didn’t think it was that big of an issue until she got into the locker room and the female cadets that were there started asking her a bunch of questions that she couldn’t answer.
Then there was the hand to hand combat training from earlier this week. She tried to play it off. Really she did.
“Summers,” Sergeant Freemen barked, “You and Cadet Lastoria front and center.”
Buffy stepped up next to Peter Lastoria and smiled. He was easily twice her weight, a foot taller and could bench press her with one hand. The problem was that Buffy could toss him over her shoulder with two fingers and not break a sweat.
“Lastoria, come at Summers full tilt. Summers you need to stop him,” Freeman instructed.
They nodded their understanding and Peter backed up a few yards then came running at Buffy. Doing as instructed Buffy sidestepped the attack while sticking her foot out and Peter ate a chunk of the blue mat they were sparring on. The instructor stopped them and yelled, “What the hell was that? I said stop him, not ignore the attacks. Summers, again.”
Again, Peter took a running start at her and this time she only flicked her wrist to push him out of the way, but in an attempt to appear a bit more confrontational she flicked too hard. Peter Lastoria went flying across the mats and smacked into the gym wall, breaking his arm in the process.
That was followed up with a sparring match with the weapon of your choice the next day. Buffy was teamed with a cadet who claimed to be a shodan and trained in use of the short sword, katana and bo staff. Buffy was silently thankful that there was someone there that could at least prove to be a little bit of a challenge.
“So,” she asked as they took their agreed upon weapon, the quarter staff, “How do you think it’s going?” They circled each other, Buffy waiting on him to make the first move.
“Little girl,” the guy smirked at her, “I think it would serve you better to pay attention.” With that he lunged at her and she side stepped him. He countered and used a backwards swing to smack his staff on the back of her thigh.
“Okay,” Buffy gritted out and swung around, missing his leg as she tried to sweep him off his feet.
He took the opening and she caught the second blow across her cheek. Stepping back, she felt the warmth on her cheek and the sting, knowing that he had cut her. He gave her a cocky grin and said, “Everyone says you have special training. You should step up.”
“Yeah, and this is supposed to be a sparring match, getting all Jet Li isn’t going to prove a damn thing,” Buffy countered.
“Oh, I think it’ll prove lots,” he retorted and came after her.
With that, it was on. Buffy let go and she lost herself in the movements, raining blow after blow down on the man. He matched her for a short while, when his staff broke in half he started getting creative and Buffy, in the spirit of competition, broke hers over her knee and the fight began anew. She had maneuvered him into a corner and he finally conceded. She took in his panting form and smirked. She’d barely broken a sweat and they had garnered the attention of the rest of the class. Sheepishly, she offered a wave at the cadets and took a bow.
“Uh, is that a good thing or a bad thing?” she asked, slouching down in her seat.
“It’s a first for us,” Walsh answered honestly. “We’ve had ex-military come through and join before. None of them as deceptively well trained as you.”
“Well, what can I say; I’m just full of surprises.” She tried one of her better smiles out on the man and was pleased at his reaction.
Walsh laughed at that. “That you are, Summers, that you are.”