Chapter One

What the heck is that? Buffy wondered as she stepped from beneath the shelter of a tomb in Shady Rest, cemetery number eight on her hit parade of twelve. The repeated hollow sounds, which maybe were musical notes, had coincided with the stopping of the rain. They were even stranger than the Hindi songfest she had watched with Willow and Xander, the one about the podiatrist and the water buffalo.

She listened hard. Was it a distant boom box? Did it have anything—please—to do with the Rising? It would be so nice if something actually happened before she packed it in, aside from ripping her black leather pants on the chain-link fence she'd hopped to get in there. Plus dropping her big black flashlight, which now no longer worked.

There it was again, kind of a sinister tootling or something…. She was already trying to figure out how to describe it to Giles. It was nothing she had ever heard before.

A terrified shriek pierced the darkness.

Ah! But that was!

The Slayer brightened. No, no, not brightened—because that would be wrong—so much as erupted into action, racing toward the plea for help. She put on the turbo as the shriek was joined by a cry, this one lower in pitch. A guy and a girl, then.

Without her flashlight, Buffy scrutinized the passing shadows: grave, grave, crypt, tree draped with moss, grave, stone vase of dead flowers, darkness. Naturally whatever was going down, would go down in darkness. It was the way of evil.

From the sleeve of Angel's leather jacket, she pulled out a stake. Well-whittled death, that was the way of the Slayer.

She ran into the black gloom, her gorgeous and, unfortunately, suede boots crunching wet leaves and twigs, and a plastic drink cup—wishing now for Angel's help, because he could see in the dark—and then she stepped on, or rather in, something slippery and gross—okay, maybe it was okay that he wasn't here to witness that.

"Oh my God! Help!" screamed a girl. She was maybe twenty yards to Buffy's left… and she was being pursued by something big—make that a lot of something bigs, judging by the rhythmic thudding of many footfalls.

"Stephanie!" yelled a guy. From the somewhat familiar sound of his voice, Buffy figured him for David Hahn; and that would mean these were the Hahn twins. Sophomores, kind of geeky, definitely not part of the socially acceptable crowd. They both had scraggly teeth, which couldn't really be laid at the door of fault; but no one was forcing them to appear in public with monumentally bad hair, unless they were under a curse or something.

"David!!" Stephanie shouted.

"The Hahns it is," Buffy crowed under her breath as she homed in on their voices.

She did a huge leap across an open grave—hmm, the Rising, as in finally rising from a grave?—and landed hard in a pile of leaves.

There they were, two freaked-out figures dashing through a patch of moonlight. They were wearing baggy jeans and badly fitting sweaters with matching diamond patterns. The Hahns were as unfashionable, and therefore conspicuous, as vampires that had stayed underground too long, then tried to pass as regular kids.

The moonlight also revealed that the things after them were vampires, with elongated faces, mouths full of fangs, and glowing gold eyes. Not such good outfits on them, either, all dressed in black and thick, heavy boots—the total vamp fashion trend Spike seemed to have started. Maybe it would eventually die along with him.

"Vampires, so not a problem," Buffy muttered, gripping the stake in her fist as she ran toward the terrified twins. Stephanie and David were zigzagging, in an effort to dodge the monsters. Good strategy.

But the tallest of the vampires gained on them. He was scary-bad with tattoos—maybe brands—on his bald head and a motorcycle patch on his jacket that featured a skull wearing a pirate hat. The insignia read DEAD MEN TELL NO TALES, but Buffy knew that was wrong. In Sunnydale, the dead had lots to say.

Sure enough, the vampire caught David's sweater and gave it a good, hard yank. The fabric of the sweater ripped down the back, and the two sides flapped like wings.

"Hey! Stop that!" Buffy yelled, although truth be told, the vamp had done David a favor.

Copyright ™ & © 2006 Twentieth Century Fox Film Corporation.