Welcome to Buffyness and Nightlurkers Presents: Fray, Issue #4 – “Chapter Four: Out of the Past”! In the previous installment, Fray starts training with Urkonn where she learns some of the basics of slaying (such as “kill the vampires”) as well the history of Slayers. There has always been one Slayer running around until it’s the next one’s turn. As long as there have been demons, there have been Slayers. Funny thing, though, the last Slayer banished all the mean demons to another dimension hundreds of years ago. No mean demons means no need for Slaying, so Fray is the first Slayer in generations. This means the mean demons seem to be coming back.

Some vamp named Icarus appears to be the Big Bad. He catches wind of Fray through Gunther, who alerts him of Urkonn’s presence when Fray drops off another grab. He has shown up to tear her a new B-hole, and that’s where we are now! Let the B-hole tearing commence.

Fray, Issue #4 [October, 2001]
Written by: Joss Whedon
“Chapter Four: Out of the Past”

Back to the Harth/Melaka flashback. They’re on the roof, with Harth having just almost died via Falling onto the Street Syndrome. They’re face-to-face with Icarus the Mean. “Don’t be frightened, little ones… It’ll only hurt for a minute.”

Aw hell no, son! Ain’t no vampire gonna be bitey today, dagnabbit! You better g– oh, the flashback is over.

Present day Fray looks more scared than I have ever seen her before, and I’ve seen three whole issues of her so far! That’s a lifetime of friendship! She stares at this motherfucker like she’s going to get hella killed and there’s no way out. “Don’t you remember your old friend?” Icarus snarls at her, as if they actually were old friends and she betrayed him by pretending she didn’t know who he was when the cool kids showed up.

“Remember you?” she thinks. “I’ve met you ten thousand times. I’ve killed you a hundred ways. In a rage, cool as ice, giggling like a schoolgirl…”

Is this perhaps referencing all the dreams that she denied having? Oh Melaka Francine Jefferson Starship Fray, you cold-blooded liar. Crying wolf never got anyone anywhere.

Icarus picks her up by the back of the head and throws her to the pavement.

The flashback continues…

Fray starts trying to kick Icarus’ tight little ass. She yells at Harth, tells him to get the heck out of there! But he remains frozen to his spot. Tears in his eyes. Fray starts getting scratched up a little bit, thrown this way and that. “Goddamnit, Harth, run!” she yells, bleeding on the rooftop.

Harth doesn’t run. Icarus approaches him. “You’re strong girl, but you’re out of your depth. Thanks for dropping off my dinner, though.” Icarus nearly shoves her off the side of the roof, but she hangs on.

There’s no good panel of Harth getting his neck all chewed up. This is the best I can do:

Mmm-hmmm. Tastes like nerd.

Of course, Fray is powerless to stop her boyfriend (or maybe her accountant) from getting his jugular vein tenderized. She topples backwards over the edge and down toward the street.

Back to the present. “Melaka, I’m disappointed. I thought you were a fighter,” Icarus frowns.

While the brawl still continues in the bar, Loo wonders where Melaka went. She runs out to the street where Melaka continues getting her ass kicked. I mean, really kicked. She’s losing like crazy here. “Monster man! Ugly monster man! Hey, hey!” she yells, trying to get Urkonn’s attention. Meanwhile, Icarus is RELISHING the beating he’s handing to Melaka Fray.

The vampire is about bite the ever-loving crap out of her neck, but at the very last second Urkonn leaps out of the bar and tackles this jerkbag right to the ground. “Go Monster-Face,” Loo bounces up and down, cheerleading him on. Fray is all banged up.

Icarus knows he has been bested. He looks to Fray sheepishly. “’Nother time then,” he says before Urkonn pushes him into the river with a SPLOOSH.

Flashback to Melaka in the hospital following her fall from the roof. The doctor discusses with Erin Fray her sister’s rapid healing. “The first scans showed spinal damage, but they must have glitched…”

Hatch was Erin and Melaka’s brother. Did I know that? “You were grabbing,” Erin says, arms folded. “You took him on a grab and you got our brother killed.” Then she walks out of the room.

In the present, Melaka implores Urkonn to finish the job and kill this gray vampire piece of scummy dirty scum. “No,” he responds simply. It’s unclear why! Oh well.

Icarus, you’re out of your league! You’re curtains, kid! You make me sick!

“We need her,” says a voice to Icarus after he complains loudly about Urkonn beating him up and throwing him around like a little ragdoll. “Without her, none of this means anything.”

Icarus is lost.

Urkonn is speaking to some similar in-the-sky entities. Two large faces in the clouds are all like “ARE YOU QUESTIONING US?!” To which Urkonn replies something to the effect of “of course not, sirs, this Fray girl just seems very un-Slayerlike, is all.”

“Our enemy must be stopped,” says Head #1, who is not happy to hear anything about the Slayer being a scaredy-cat about the otherworldly. “If she is incapable…”

These two heads are named Vrill and Boluz, and they fight like an old married couple. Boluz wants to give Fray the benefit of the doubt, but Vrill wants to find someone who can handle the job! Is Lara Croft available? “I’m talking about the One Who Will Lead,” Vrill insists. “That is the threat. And she must be used to stop it before havoc is unleashed on all our worlds.”

Vrill is going to give Fray a chance, but if won’t work out then they’ll have to kill her to prepare a brand new Slayer. And that shit takes time, yo.

…

“I will make her ready,” Urkonn concedes, proverbial hat in hand. “She will fight.”

Hey, this is a pretty good idea! I gotta try this next time I’m between two buildings.

Fray is glad the pummeling is over. She washes up under a pipe flowing with what I hope is clean water. Whoever lives in that part of the building is getting a fantastic view of her nethers. “I could run,” she thinks, clearly scraping the bottom of the idea barrel. She’s got enough sil, she can make a break for it and live at Disney World. And never look back. “A place where demons and vampires don’t come looking for me every time I–”

She catches Urkonn staring up at her. She puts on a towel. “I thought you’d be gone,” they both say to each other. He thought she gave up. She thought the same. He notices that she’s not even limping. She puts on a shirt. “I heal fast. And I wanna go to work.”

“And being beaten senseless by a single vampire? This is your work?” Urkonn has quite a tone here! An unnecessarily mocking tone! “I got a history with that freak,” Fray tells him. “It threw me. Won’t happen twice.”

See to it that it doesn’t, you old bag of grapes. Urkonn is curious about their history, but Fray glowers at him as if it were none of his ugly business. Then she tells him anyway.

“Was he… younger? Your brother?”

“Older. By about twenty minutes.”

Ah, twinsies. This revelation is such a surprise, even Urkonn slightly changes his resting grimace face into an active grimace face! Was Harth strong? Fuck no! “Harth couldn’t open a jar of pickles.”

This Icarus cat, Fray wonders how he knew her name back then. “I remember every moment of that day on account of it being the worst of my life. But him… just another kill, and that was four years ago. He knew me. He knew me and he came looking for me.”

“Then the word is out. That you are the Slayer.” Urkonn rests his face back down to a simmering grimace! Word is out all right, and Fray’s going to the one “person” who may know what the herr is going on derr.

Lurks, man. Shifty, thieving Lurks. Griftin’ Lurks. You know what they say about Lurks right? Give a Lurk an inch and they’ll take a mile, those Lurks.

So Fray visits Gunther, who keeps making “WHO? MOI??” faces. “Oh come on, Gunther. There’s not a rat in this city you don’t know its hole. I do for you, you’re not gonna help me out this once?” She grabs. Grabs better than anyone! Boy, does she do the good grabs, sir. Cough up some info or her grabbin’ days for you are over, Gunther old boy.

“Melaka… My sweeeet… I am really sorry.”

BZZZZZACK!

Fray gets zapped, but not by Gunther. Her dear sister Erin’s got her futuristic cop gun out. “Melaka Fray… you’re under arrest.”

Well isn’t this a fuzzy, friendly family reunion. Erin henchmen drag her out of Gunther’s lair and across the street. Erin leads the way. “Get her in and bolted. She wakes up, you won’t be able to hold her.”

Well, they’re not going to have to worry about any of that. Descending from the sky, like goddamn paratroopers, are a gaggle of Lurks! They’re all like “SNARL! GRR!” as they brandish knives and land right on the faceless henchmen. Cops. Filthy, stinkin’ cops. They deserving every shanking they get. They drop Melaka face down on the pavement. The big one, Icarus’ buddy, he’s got Erin. Before he has a chance to take some mouthfuls of her fragile neck, Melaka grabs his ponytail and slams his face down into the cement with all her might. “GET OFF HER!”

Melaka makes sure Erin is ok, but that was a mistake. Big Bald Vamp exploits her temporary distraction and smashes her head with a sizeable piece of metal.

KRACK! Out.

…

“Fray. Wake up, girl.” It’s Icarus. Fray slowly regains consciousness, dazed and confused. Like that movie with a rapey Matthey McConaughey! “See, Master? Delivered as promised. And not even dead.”

Yes, very good. Master is quite pleased. You can tell because his speech balloons are nice and blue. “Hello, Mel.”

She looks around and sees something shocking. “Miss me?” says the Master.

It’s motherfucking Harth. T-shirt and glasses and it’s motherfucking Harth.

Fray looks like this —-> 😮

Final Thoughts

Yes, Harth became a vampire. Yes, he’s a bad guy now. Yes, he’s going to use his twin charm against her. Yes, Fray is going to feel hella conflicted. Yes, those are my Pizza Rolls ready in the oven. See you next time!