Once Upon A Candra

Candra's eyes's started to flutter open as she slowly awoke. she realized with a gnomes-pounding-inside-my-head feeling that she had the worse hangover ever. everything around her was tinged green. she felt like she was gonna throw up. she started to remember bits and pieces of the previous night. she remembered that she'd been at the false pride concert. she swallowed remembering something she did't want to remember. she turned to look over next to her and saw that spike was sleeping next to her, then she really did throw up.

Candra rolled over and went back to sleep.

3 hours, a lot of advil, and a few glasses of water later, Candra was sitting at a table by a window. The window overlooked a narrow street with lots and lots of tall buildings. She couldn't remember exactly where she was. Spike was still sleeping, and Candra tried waking him up but she couldn't suceed; he just kept mumbling obsanities in his sleep. Oh well. That was spike.

Just then the door opened and in strolled a cat. It stood on it's hind legs, and glaring at Candra it hissed, "Have you seeen Katherine?!".

Candra looked at the very odd cat for a few moments, then burst out laughing. She fell off her chair, and rolled on the ground. The cat looked confused.

"Hey, I'm serious! Hey! HEY!"

The cat walked up to her, his anger building. "If you don't tell me where she is, I'll scratch the sleeping guy's eyes out!", he snarled. Candra slowly stopped laughing, her sides in great pain. She smiled at the cat and picked him up by his tail.

"You silly cat", she said to the now very unhappy animal, "You can't threaten us". She then proceeded to dangle the squirming kitty outside the window. Shall I let go? she wondered. She pondered for a second... then shrugged, and let go. She was curious to see whether the kitten would land on it's feet or not.

It was an intense shock to her when the kitten hovered in midair when she let go.

The kitten frowned, spit, began to shake like an unschooler on no sleep and a pound of sugar, and started to fuzz at the edges, and glow. Soon it got so bright Candra could hardly stand to look at it. Her eyes were watering but she tried her hardest to watch as the kitten grew and changed into... a person!

Candra frowned. She couldn't be sure since he didn't have a red dress or lipstick on... but wasn't this... Zack?!

Zack stepped off the air and through the window. He smiled at Candra in a way that made her insides feel like a delicate cake when someone's slammed the oven door in exactly the wrong way.

"I am Zack," he intoned, and winked.

Candra felt herself blush. What's wrong with me? she wondered. I haven't felt like this since Ted left... She firmly pushed that thought away, and just as firmly looked up and stared at Zack. "You're still glowing," she informed him, "and what the hell are you doing here?"

"Like you know where here is," he smirked. He walked over to the bed where Spike lay snoring, and frowned at him for a moment. Then he reached down and grabbed Spike's left ear with one hand while pushing his nose with the other, and muttered what sounded like an obscenity under his breath.

Spike sat up, looking around puzzledly. He saw Candra and started to grin. "Dude! Hey, you were something last night, I gotta tell you..." His eyes fluttered and he fell back on the bed and started to snore again.

Zack glared at Candra, and went through the ear-nose-mutter ritual again. This time when Spike sat up, he was somewhat coherant.

Zack turned his wickedly bright eyes to Spike. "Spike, I'm looking for Katherine. Have you seen her?" Spikes eyes grew wide and he held up his hands as if to shield himself from something very large, and very evil.

"wooooah" he said, sputtering, "i wasn't THAT out of it last night!" Zack rolled his eyes and turned back to Candra.

"It's imperative that we find Katherine," he said intensely. "She has the key."

The key? Candra wondered for a moment. But she found that her thoughts were turning pretty quickly to the fact that Zack was...getting closer. She could almsot feel his eyes on her. What was happening? She was having problems breathing suddenly.

"the key?" she mumbled, her eyelashes fluttering uncontrollably. Zack looked at her oddly. Spike watched her too, his eyes narrowed. "i'm...I'm sorry" she muttered, feeling faint. "I don't know what's gotten into me today..." Zack shook his head.

"this is IMPORTANT" he said, shaking his head at Candra. "Concentrate! We have to find katherine. She has the key."

"the key to WHAT?" Spike insisted. An odd look flashed across Zack's face and he looked slightly uncomfortable.

"the key," he said, "the key to Roya."

Candra and Spike blinked. Zack continued. "Well you're aware that Roya was Ted's brainchild, right? He constructed her, was in on the planning from the very beginning. Nobody is quite sure what her original function was, everyone who would know has been hushed up in one way or another. Of course there's wild rumors everywhere. Some say that Ted was trying to come up with the perfect fan. Others insist that he was trying to come up with a tangible inflatable ego. but whatever the real reason was, the end result is a living nightmare. None of us are invulnerable. With her purple hair, she fits right in with all the other unschoolers. People don't suspect anything until it's too late, usually."

Candra tried to calm the butterflies in her stomach to ask a question. "But what is it that she does that's so horrible?"

Zack gulped and took a deep breath. "It's not what she DOES, exactly, "he said shakily, "but more of what she is."

"Well?" Spike butted in. "Are you going to tell us or not?"

Candra swatted Spike across the arm. "Shh, Spike, can't you tell he's stalling to build up the suspense?"

"I don't think he really knows" Spike muttered, but kept quiet after that.

Zack turned on Spike, glaring. "YOU obviously haven't fallen victimto her....charms."

"WHAT IS IT?" Candra and Spike bellowed together.

Zack took another breath....... "She's.... a.... - NO. I can't tell you. It's too awful. But we have a new suspicion, actually, that points to your... girlfriend, if you can call the person who thinks of you as their sex monkey that. We think she might be tangled up in this Roya business. Rumor has it that they're both Sirens. Or Veelas. Or whatever the hell you want to call them. Plus, she's from Kentucky. And if that doesn't make her guilty as hell, I don't know what does."

Spike simply glared at Zack. Then he looked at Candra, and then back at Zack. "I slept with a Siren? Cool! Dude, I've gotta get Zen to write a song about this. Damn... this makes me wanna' go bang on some drums." He walked (no.. he ran) to his drums, dragging Candra behind him. add more