Disclaimer: The characters of ‘Buffy the Vampire Slayer’ are the property of Joss Whedon and Mutant Enemy Productions, Inc. None of the writers of this fic are collecting any monetary compensation for it whatsoever, mores the pity . Any characters that we create we freely give to Joss, as recompense for borrowing his.
Rating: This chapter is PG-13-for some fairly intense violence. Nothing you don’t see on the show though.
Feedback: Please leave a review here at fanfiction.net. We appreciate all feedback, particularly in-depth reviews and we welcome negative ones as well. Flame away of you want, although no one has so far. We also accept feedback at BuffySpikeshiper@AOL.com.
Author’s note: As an explanation: Someone mentioned that they were unfamiliar with Anne Rice. Simply put the little girl vampire in the story Clarissa is referencing (she actually only saw the movie-Clary doesn’t read) was sentenced to death for the crime of murdering her grandsire. She was burned to death by sunlight, which is what all vampires fear above everything else, even the Slayer.
Chapter Six
"Something Wicked This Way Comes"
Part II
Written by Phil
****
"Hey, Buffy I've got some really bad news," Xander said ominously as he plopped down onto the couch next to Anya. At the Slayer's raised eyebrow, he continued. "You're out of cheesy chips." Ignoring Buffy's look of exasperation, he grabbed a handful of pretzels and popped them all into his mouth. Anya glared at him in a disgusted manner as he asked, "What?" with his mouth full of pretzel bits.
Buffy shook her head. "Okay, guys can we focus here a bit? We were, umm, are, talking about Willow. I think Tara has a point. Something's seriously wrong with her and whatever's causing it has got to be something very powerful. Tara thinks it’s the Urn of Osiris, right?" She looked over at the witch who, like Dawn and Anya, was watching Xander gobble down snack food at a horrifying rate.
"I-I'm not sure," she said. "What I do know is that Willow's been acting more and more strangely ever since that night that s-she...she brought you back." For some reason, she couldn't seem to meet anyone's gaze.
There was a very brief but incredibly uncomfortable silence in the room that Buffy felt compelled to disperse. "It's all right, Tara. I don't blame anybody in this room for what happened that night. I don't even blame Willow, but I do know that she's doing hurtful things to people that she cares about and that does bother me. So what I want to know now is what we are going to do about it. Is everybody on board with that?"
When they all nodded in agreement, she continued. "All right, then. What exactly do we know about this Urn of Osiris? Anya, you got it for her. What can you tell us about it?
Anya, who had been brushing pretzel crumbs off of Xander shirt, shrugged indifferently and mumbled something under her breath, which had the effect of immediately getting on Buffy's already frayed nerves
"Hey, Anya you want to be a little more cooperative here?" She snapped at her friend, which turned out to be a mistake.
Anya's eyes narrowed just a little bit while Xander shifted uncomfortably on the couch. "Fine. I said that it wasn't the Urn. The Urn of Osiris is a tool for channeling the spirits of the dead across the various panes of existence. It has absolutely nothing to do with what Willow is going through right now and I resent the implication that I had anything to do with it."
Buffy, nonplussed, tried to lighten her tone a bit. "Look, Anya nobody is suggesting that you did anything wrong. We just need some answers is all. I thought..."
"No, you really didn't," Anya snapped back at her. "That's the problem here. Nobody is looking at things the way they really are."
"Ahn.." Xander said, trying to defuse what appeared to be an increasingly tense situation but Buffy cut him off, her ire rising just slightly.
"What the heck is that supposed to mean?" she asked archly.
Anya sighed deeply. "You know, Buffy, I love all of you, I really do. You're the closest thing to I've had to a family for over 1,100 years, but there are times when your way of looking at things makes me want to stick my head into a gas oven and light several dozen really flammable matches."
Xander looked positively disturbed by this turn. "Okay Anya, I think maybe we need to table this discussion for right now.."
"No," said Anya, her eyes suddenly flashing in anger. "We're not going to table anything, Xander. For once, you're going to let me speak my mind, instead of hushing me because you're afraid I'm going to embarrass you in from of your precious 'family.' Well, they're my family too now, and I get a say like everybody else." She turned back to Buffy. "Right?"
Buffy nodded, although her anger was starting to rise as well. "Sure Anya, you get a say. Why don't you start by telling me what the hell you're talking about. What 'way of looking at things'...exactly bothers you so much?"
Anya pursed her lips before continuing. "Buffy, you're a hero and I respect that. A lot, if you really must know the truth, but you and Xander have this way of seeing everything in such black and white terms and I'm sorry; most of the time it really isn't that simple."
"Okay, I've gotta stop you there Anya, because a lot of the times things really are that simple. I'm the Slayer. I fight evil. That's pretty much what I do. When you live on the Hellmouth, things are usually black and white," Buffy responded.
Anya sighed. "Yes, some things are. But not the majority. Most of it is one big gray area. Look at you. Magical resurrection is supposed to be against all the rules, but here you are and there isn't a person in this room who isn't thrilled beyond words to have you back."
That shook Buffy ever so slightly. "Look, Anya," she replied. "This really isn't about me..."
"Oh no? What about Spike, then? He's an evil soulless killer hundreds of times over, and yet you don't have any problem letting him watch after Dawn, or letting him hang around with the rest of us."
"Hey!" jumped in Dawn. "That's not fair. Spike's not evil. He just saved my life the other night. And what about you, Miss vengeance demon for over a thousand years?"
"Uh, Dawnie, maybe we should just let this drop, okay?" Xander practically pleaded with the girl.
"No," Anya said forcefully. "Let's run with that. She's absolutely right, you know. I wreaked bloody vengeance for centuries and caused a lot of hurt to people. Okay, well unfaithful, cheating, good for nothing creeps who would have saved the world a lot of trouble by never having been born, but people nonetheless...I suppose. Which is exactly my point. I'm on your side now. I help you guys do good, and you know what? I kinda like it. Spike probably does too, in his own twisted 'I have a bleedin' chip stuck in my skull and I want to have hot monkey sex with the Slayer' sort of way. Which, I can hardly blame him for because hot monkey sex really is the only way to..."
"Umm, Anya is there actually a point to this?" asked Buffy nervously, definitely not liking the reference to her, Spike, and hot sex all in the same sentence. At least Dawn and Tara had the decency to blush. Xander, on the other hand, was about two seconds from foaming at the mouth.
"The point is that while it might appear that all demons are evil on the surface, we all know that it's not true, don't we? Therefore, we've just established it's not necessarily about black or white, it's about perception forming our reality. Things are really various shades of gray, you just choose to see them as black and white."
"You know, Buffy," Tara said, piping up for the first time during the conversation. "She kind of has a point there."
"Yeah, okay, fine," Buffy said wearily. "Not every demon is evil and not everything is black and white. I'll go along with that, I guess, but I don't see what any of this 'Philosophy of Good and Evil 101' stuff has anything to do with Willow?"
"Don't you? Well, maybe not, which is another major blind-spot that every single one of you has."
"And that would be?" Buffy was getting annoyed again at Anya's continued implications.
"Willow, of course. Xander is the worst, probably because he's known her his entire life, but you and Tara can be incredibly obtuse about her when it suits you."
"Hey!" all three of them yelled at her, while Dawn looked uncomfortable at all the arguing.
"No, I'm serious," Anya continued. "We all know that something's definitely out of whack with her, so you three put your heads together and come up with evil spells and bad magical artifacts when the truth of it all is staring you in the face. This is not about evil."
"Okay, Anya," Tara asked. "What is it about then?"
"Power," the ex-demon replied. "She's absolutely in love with it. Oh come on!" she said in an exasperated tone as the room suddenly went silent. "You mean to tell me that none of you noticed what's been going on with her for the last few years?"
"Well," said Xander slowly. "I mean we all knew she was changing, what with the gay thing and all. Umm, no offense," he said clumsily to Tara he realized that she was sitting right there.
Tara gave him an amused smile. "Ahh, no offense taken, hon."
"Gods, and they think I'm thick," Anya half-muttered to herself. "This has nothing to do with her sexual preferences. Look, I can't expect Tara to really know this, but the rest of you have to remember what a little mouse she was in high school."
"Well, I wouldn't call her mousy...exactly," Buffy countered. "Maybe a little muskraty, possibly kittenish?"
"Fine," Anya replied waspishly. "Engage in your 'make fun of the silly ex-demon' banter if you want, but I'm telling the truth here. Willow's probably the most powerful magick user I've come across in a very long time. We all know this, right Tara?" When the blonde witch nodded, she continued. "So what happens when you take all this crap from people your whole life and then one day you realize that you can literally pound the snot out of anybody who crosses you, without so much as breaking a nail?"
"Actually," Buffy answered, "I think I can speak to that..."
"No, Buffy, I don't think you really can. I mean, it's not like you were ever picked on in school or treated like a leper before you became the Slayer, were you? You were Miss Peach Fuzz, or something equally preppy at your old high school, right?"
"Fiesta Queen, actually," Buffy replied sullenly.
"Right, and at Sunnydale High you ran for Homecoming Queen, I understand."
"Well, it's not like I won or anything. As a matter of fact, if it wasn't for the fact that Cordelia lost as badly as I did, that night would have made the top of my all time top ten sucky evenings out list."
"Buffy," Anya said in a deeply frustrated tone. "You're missing the point here...again. You were the center of attention throughout your formative years and let's face it, everybody in this town relies on you. You've always been a somebody. Willow never even got close to having any of that. From what Xander tells me, about the only people that ever noticed her were the two of you and Oz. Umm, no offense," she said quickly to Tara.
This time, Tara's 'no offense taken' seemed a trifle forced.
"Anya, I think I do see what you're saying here, "Xander cut in. "I really do, but don't you think you're overstating the problem just a bit? I mean I got picked on through most of high school and I haven't been trifling with any dark magicks. Well, not ever since that Valentines Day fiasco in the eleventh grade."
"No offense, Xander, because you know I love you beyond description, but you have all the sensitivity of a brick wall. You laughed it all off, like you do with everything else, but Willow couldn't. And it's not like you are tuned into the powers that she is. Even Tara isn't, and she's no slouch in the magick department."
"I'm not really very powerful at all, you know," Tara said quietly.
Anya looked at her very strangely for a moment before muttering, "Right and I'm Jennifer freaking Lopez."
"All right, everybody. Time out," Buffy interrupted. "So what you're essentially saying here Anya, is that Willow isn't under an kind of evil spell, she's just an angry, power mad bitch with a massive inferiority complex?"
"Well, I'm not sure we should use those exact terms..." Xander started to explain.
"Why not?" Dawn said, suddenly breaking into a conversation that until now she had barely been involved in. "Sounds about right to me."
Anya smiled in triumph. "See, the fifteen year old child gets it. Why is it so hard for the rest of you?"
"I'm not a child, "Dawn groused at her. "I'm a woman."
Anya gave her one of patented 'aren't you the most adorable little creature' smiles. "Right, sorry. I meant the child-woman gets it, of course."
Dawn grunted in frustration and stormed into the kitchen to grab a soda.
"Anya," Buffy said, trying desperately to get back control of the conversation. "It's not that I don't get what you're saying, because I think I do, I guess. It's just that I don't think it's really in Willow's character to act this badly. Um, not that you don't have a point," she added quickly as Anya started to frown again.
Just as Xander was about to throw his two cents back into the ring, a very loud knocking at the door, saved Buffy from having to continue what had degenerated into a pointless round robin on Willow's essential nature.
"Umm, I'd better get that. You guys think of ways we can approach her without setting her off. Even if she isn't under some sort of spell, we should try to reach out to her somehow."
Shaking her head in consternation, Buffy walked over to the front door, even as the frenzied knocking ceased. She yanked it open crankily.
"Yeah, all right. What's so important that you have to..."
That was about as far as she got. Just as she noticed the large Persian rug that had been left on the doorstop, and the fact that it reeked of gasoline, she heard a sharp whizzing noise fly past her left ear. She heard a loud 'thunk' as whatever it was struck the edge of the door and lodged there.
"What the..?" was all she could get out before she heard a loud popping noise and the shattering of glass as something else crashed into the front window of the house.
"Dammit!" she heard a shrill female voice coming from the street. "The sights on this thing must be screwed up. I know I'm not that bad of a shot."
Buffy eyes quickly adjusted to the dark, as she made out several shadowy forms standing in the middle of Revello drive, one of them wearing a bright red dress. Oh great, she thought. Just what I needed right now. Quickly, she slammed the door shut, as the rest of the gang flooded into the living room.
"Buffy, what's going on?" Dawn asked, just as the entire front window exploded under the weight of a hail of gunfire and the world dissolved into utter chaos..
There was glass everywhere, from the window, the lamp near the edge of the couch, and even a beautiful antique clock that her mother had picked up a few years ago. All shattered and turned instantly into instruments of jagged death, as everyone tried to dodge. Buffy's first thought was to try to push Dawn down onto the floor and out of harm's way. She was beaten to the punch by Tara, who had thrown herself onto the girl, thus succeeding in knocking them both onto the couch, where they hit with a loud thump and rolled off together, landing on the floor. Tara kept Dawn pinned on the ground, instinctively shielding her from the flying bullets and glass that had ricocheted all across the room.
Buffy found herself leaping for the relative safety of the hardwood floors as well, finding herself relieved to see that Xander had dragged Anya out of the line of fire too and was crawling along the edge of the wall, towards her.
"Is everybody all right?" She asked as loudly as she dared. When they all nodded after checking themselves for bullet holes, she allowed herself a very brief sigh and waited for Xander to inch up to her.
"Okay," he whispered to her as they sat there panting on the floor. "Is there any particular reason that we just got transported into an Arnold Schwartzenegger movie?"
"Way to date yourself, Xan." Buffy grimaced back at him. "It's Jett Li now. Heck, I was dead for four months and even I know that."
"Excuse me," Anya hissed at them both from her hiding place under the table. "Instead of discussing rapidly aging Austrian movie stars, do you think you could try to find out why somebody just tried to kill us all with a machine gun?"
"Umm, technically, Ahn, that wasn't a machine gun." Xander told her. " It sounded more like an assault rifle. You can tell by the short bursts..."He stopped short as he realized that every woman in the room was staring at him with combined looks of horror and disgust on their faces. He shook his head. "I know I've said this before but if I ever get out of this thing alive, I really need to get some male friends."
"Men," Buffy muttered grimly to herself. Slowly, and very carefully, pushed herself off of the floor and onto her knees, grabbing the wall as she did so. She then inched her head ever so delicately up to the sill of what had been a large front window, and which was now a gaping hole in the middle of her living room.
The vampire leader was still standing there, surrounded by several members of her gang. One of them, a very large male, was holding an assault rifle and a couple of the others had torches. Torches? Vampires hate open flame. As she mulled this information over in her rattled brain pan, the female began to click her fingers together, making a bizarre rapping sound with them. Taking a closer look, Buffy realized that she had a couple of small bottles on her fingers.
"Slaayer...Come out to play!" She screeched "Slaaayer...come out to plaayy! Slaaaayer...come out to PLAAAY!"
Buffy sank wearily back down onto the floor. "I don't know what's worse," she complained to Xander. "The fact that demented bitch just shot up my mother's living room..."
"...Or that she's doing a scene from 'The Warriors.' And doing it very badly, I might add." Xander cut in. "Is she for real?" He asked in horrified fascination. "She's like, well like..."
"Darla on crack?" Buffy responded.
"Well, yeah, now that you mention it..."
"Hey, sweet cheeks, you still alive in there?" The vampire's high-pitched voice cut through the rest of what Xander was going to say. "We're getting a little bored out here waiting for you to bleed to death. Why don't you do us all a favor and stand up for a minute?"
"Yeah and why don't you take a long walk off a very fiery pier?" Buffy yelled back at her. "Shut up," she whispered fiercely at Xander, who was looking at her with that 'could you be any more lame' stare of his. "Go grab a couple of crossbows and some stakes out of the weapons chest."
"Don't you think we're slightly outgunned?"
"Just do it," she barked at him, her tolerance being seriously strained at this particular moment. "We've got to use what we have."
Nodding, he started crawling towards the main hallway as Buffy turned her attention back to the undead menace on her front lawn. "Hey, 'Vampira Mistress of the Night,' you got a name? I feel all informal calling you 'that really annoying piece of bloodsucking trash that I'm going to turn into a ball of dust in about sixty seconds,'" she shouted through the opening.
"Oh, sorry about that dearie. Where are my manners? I'm Clarissa and I'll be playing the part of the super hot chick who slaughters you all tonight," the vampire snarked back at her.
"Xander," Buffy called back into the hallway. "Where are the hell are those weapons?"
He came running back into the room, sticking close to the walls once more, and handed her one of the crossbows. Keeping the other one, he quickly loaded it and leveled it out the window, trying to get a clear shot off. "How many of them are there?" He asked.
"Not sure. At least ten, and a couple of them have some pretty heavy hardware."
"Well, on the bright side, they can't get in here without an invite. Maybe they'll give up eventually." He didn't appear to be all that hopeful.
Buffy shook her head. "Does that super vamp tramp look like she's the giving up kind? With the kind of firepower they're carrying, they don't need to come in here. They can just blow the house down around us, one piece at a time. Which kind of begs the question, doesn't it?"
Xander looked at her blankly. "What question?"
"Why haven't they done it already?"
"Yeah, and believe me when I tell you I am so not wanting to hear the answer to that one," he said.
Buffy nodded in agreement. "Let's not sit around waiting for her to give us chapter and verse then." Turning toward the couch, where Tara was slowly pushing herself up off of Dawn, the Slayer asked, "What about it, Tara? You got anything we can use against that band of beasties out there?"
Shaking the stray shards of glass off of her dress, the witch nodded grimly. "Yeah, I think I can manage something that might shield us all, but it's going to take a few minutes to get it working, Buffy. If they attack again while I'm in the middle of the incantation..."
"Don't tell me. Let me guess. We're screwed?" Xander asked bitterly.
"Then, we'll just have to make sure we give Tara enough time," Buffy rasped at him. "Keep that crossbow pointed at what's-her face-and if you get the shot, take it. The rest of you stay down," she finished, looking at both Anya and Dawn, who were scrambling for some kind of cover. When they both nodded their agreement, she turned back to the window.
"Hey, Vamprissa or whatever your name is, you still lurking about out there?" Buffy shouted at the vampire.
"Yeah, Still here," came back the amused reply. "I was just betting the boys on how fast it would take you to realize how completely doomed you were, come to your senses and surrender to us all. How are we doing so far, honey?"
"I'll let you know. You know, instead of waiting out there in the chilly night air, you could warm yourself in a nice bonfire, or something like that. Ooh, and I bet we could even find a nice blowtorch to get you started."
That only made Clarissa laugh. "We're quite comfortable here, thank you very much, dear. But now that you mention it, maybe your boyfriend could use a little lighting up. It's probably pretty chilly wrapped up in that old rug, with all that smelly gasoline all over him."
"What the hell are you talking about?" Buffy yelled at her. "I don't have a ..."
Then it hit her. That bundle on her front porch, the smell of gas in the air. The bitch had captured Spike. Not only that, she was apparently planning to set fire to him as well. Buffy watched in horror as the two vampires with torches, who she had pretty much forgotten about, charged up the lawn towards the front porch.
"Xander! Fire!" She shrieked as she dove for the door.
Swearing loudly, Xander let a bolt loose at the vampire in the lead, which while missing its heart managed hit the arm that the torch was in, knocking the torch into the vampire's face. It screamed horribly as the flame engulfed it and reduced it to a pile of dust. The other vamp though had managed to get past his compatriot and was well within throwing range of the front porch
Buffy, in the meantime, had flung open the door, only to be greeted with yet another poorly aimed shot from Clarissa. This time the bullet ricocheted off the brass light fixture. As the vampire continued to howl with rage, Buffy bent down to drag the gasoline soaked Persian rug into the house. She could definitely feel somebody squirming within the rolled up rug. Before she could get into the house though, the vampire with the torch managed to heave his fiery weapon up onto the porch, which landed almost directly on top of the makeshift prison that currently held Spike. The entire section of the porch that she was standing in suddenly burst in flames. Screaming for Xander, Buffy instinctively grabbed the burning rug with both hands and dragged it into the house.
Hanging on for dear life, despite the searing pain in her hands, she managed to pull Spike through the doorway, with Xander slamming the door behind them both. Anya, meanwhile, showing more presence of mind than the Slayer would have thought possible, had already grabbed a large comforter and was trying to smother the flames with it. Xander dropped his crossbow on the floor and joined her in beating out the remnants of the fire. Unfortunately, this left a gap at the window, where the really big vampire with the assault rifle, apparently taking advantage of the commotion on the porch, had positioned himself to get off one final, deadly burst in the direction of Xander and Anya.
Without even thinking, Buffy launched herself at the window, picking up a stake off the floor, the violent pain in her hands increasing, as she somersaulted towards the vampire. Before the demon could get a shot off she plunged the stake into its heart, the rifle falling into the dusty remains directly in front of the window.
That proved to be the last straw for Clarissa. Throwing all sense of playfulness or restraint to the winds, she screamed at her remaining henchmen to charge the house. Several of them had armed themselves with torches and one appeared to have picked up a makeshift Molotov cocktail. Egged on by the now enraged master vampire, they dutifully launched themselves at the front of the house. Just as they managed to get close to the window to hurl their deadly missiles into the living room, Buffy heard a powerful, commanding voice yell in a language that she did not understand. Instantaneously, a curtain of blue light appeared to insert itself between the walls of the house and the vampires. Howling in anger and frustration, they repeatedly threw themselves against it to no avail. They were effectively sealed off from doing any further damage to Buffy's house. Tara's spell had apparently worked like a charm.
Buffy swore loudly as she surveyed the damage. The living room was a total shambles, and her hands were already badly blistered and scarred from the second degree burns she had suffered. Tara, who had just saved them all with her timely magick, had passed out on the floor. Dawn had crawled out from under the table and was cradling the witch's head in her lap. The worst of it though was Spike.
Having put the fire out successfully, Xander and Anya had managed to cut through the remnants of the rug and pull the vampire out of his bonds. To say that he had been badly hurt was a massive understatement. Spike was an absolute mess. The fire had singed his hair in several places, and had blackened much of the skin on his unprotected arms and chest. His face was a mass of welts and scorch marks, and it appeared that the only reason that he wasn't screaming in utter agony was the fact that he still had the gag in his mouth that Clarissa and her gang had obviously put there. Buffy's could feel his shame, and deep sense of violation, and it wounded her very deeply.
Kneeling down next to him, she very gently took one of his hands in both of hers, trying not to cry at the wreckage of his formerly beautiful face. "Spike," she whispered to him. "You'll be okay. Everything's going to be fine now. You're safe. We're all safe."
Although he had to be in incredible pain, the vampire nodded his understanding and slipped into unconsciousness. She sat there holding his still holding hand even so, until she heard Xander clear his throat worriedly.
"Uhh, Buffy.."
"Yeah, Xan," she acknowledged him wearily. "I know." She pulled her self reluctantly back onto her feet and walked to the window. The vampires had retreated back onto the street and were clustered around Clarissa, who was still hurling obscenities at he house.
"This isn't over, you little bitch!" The master vampire snarled at the Slayer. "I'm going to have your guts for garters for this, no matter what else happens." The rest of her threats though were drowned out by the sound of approaching sirens.
""Oh peachy," Buffy muttered to herself. "Sunnydale's finest to the rescue. They really have that day late and a dollar short thing down cold, don't they?" Looking back out the window, she wasn't surprised to see that the street was now absolutely empty. The vampires had all vanished without a trace.
She felt lightheaded now, as the pain from the burns and the delayed reaction to the attack finally began to take its toll. Catching herself from stumbling against the wall, Buffy shook it off and began to issue orders, because, well it was in the job description. First things first though.
Looking over at Dawn she asked "Is she going to be okay?" When her sister nodded affirmatively, Buffy allowed herself a tiny sigh of relief. " Alright then, Anya, you help Dawn get Tara to her room. She's going to need to sleep off that spell I think."
"What about, Spike?" Xander asked her quizzically. "I don't think he's really in good enough shape to take back to his crypt, and I'm not sure I could get him past the cops right now anyway."
"Doesn't matter," Buffy replied. "He's not going back to his crypt. We're going to put him in my room. I'll bunk in with Dawn for the time being."
"Umm, Buffy, are you sure about this? I mean I know he took one for the team and all but..."
"That's right, Xander," she snapped back at him. "He took one for the team. Now the team is going to take care of him. It's how this family works. I don't think I really have to explain this to you, do I?" She wasn't in any kind of mood for an argument, and Xander knew her well enough to realize it.
"Fine, whatever. Come on then, Spike," he said to the unconscious vampire as he picked him up. "Time to go see the Promised Land."
Not bothering to ask him just what the hell he was talking about, Buffy sighed as she picked up the shattered remnants of the Swiss clock that Joyce had given her for Christmas. Already the block was swarming with police cars and a fire truck or two. For some odd reason, the one thing that keep swimming around in her head was that old Chinese curse that Giles had taught her when she had first met him. May you live in interesting times.
"Things get any more interesting around here," she said to herself. "I may have to apply to FEMA for disaster relief."
She was saved from any further morbid thoughts by the sound of loud knocking on her door from what sounded to be several very angry police officers.
*****
Several hours later, Buffy woke up to find that her hands were aching quite a bit. Slayer healing might be incredibly fast by most standards, but as far as she was concerned, it could never work fast enough. Lying there on her back, staring at the ceiling, it took her a minute or two realize that something was not quite right about the bedroom. All of a sudden it came to her what was missing. The bed had gone cold. Dawn was not there.
Sitting straight up, she threw the covers back and jumped out of the bed, heading out the door into the hallway without even bothering to stick the battered old pair of slippers that she had worn earlier that evening back on her feet. Her first thought was to go downstairs and check to see if Dawn had slipped down to watch a little late night TV. Don't panic, she told herself. She's probably just getting a snack. As she passed by the door to her room however, she noticed that it was slightly ajar. Knowing that she had closed it tightly when she and Xander had put Spike in there that evening, Buffy gently pushed the door open and crept quietly into the room.
The vampire was lying right where they had left him, partially covered by the bedspread which was somewhat askew. A sigh of incredible relief escaped her lips as she realized the reason for the rumpled state of the bed. Lying next to Spike, on top of the covers, was the very familiar form of Dawn Summers. From the regular sound of her breathing, Buffy could tell that her younger sister was sleeping quite peacefully.
Tiptoeing silently as she could to the edge of the bed, Buffy found herself staring at the two of them for a very long time, torn between taking Dawn back into the other room and not wanting to wake her up. Shaking her head at how absolutely unfazed she was at the thought of her baby sister in bed with this particular vampire, and wondering to herself just why that was, Buffy finally decided to pull the covers back and tuck Dawn up under them. As she moved the girl's legs however, she felt her stir a bit.
"Buffy?" Dawn asked sleepily as her sister finished covering her up. "Is everything okay?"
"Fine, honey," Buffy replied. "I just didn't want you to catch cold."
"I-is it okay that I'm in here? I'm sorry about leaving you alone, I just kinda thought Spike could use the company. I didn't feel right leaving him all himself in here, after everything that he...well, you know after everything that happened tonight." When Buffy said nothing, she continued. "Do you, do you think he'll be all right? I've never seen anybody in that much pain before." She said that with such a profound note of sadness and worry that Buffy could almost reach out and touch her sister's anguish.
"He'll be all right, Dawnie. I promise. Vampires heal fast-especially Spike. It's going to take a little while, is all. Fire damage is bad, but it's nothing he can't handle. We'll make sure he gets through it too, you and me...together."
"Promise?" the girl asked, her voice betraying her obvious fear that despite his enormous strength, he wouldn't be able to recover from an injury this severe.
"Cross my heart," Buffy smiled gently, as she turned and started to leave the room.
"Buffy," Dawn said quietly. "Don't leave us ,okay? Please?" The words she didn't speak were just as palpable though. Not again. Not ever.
Shaking her head for what seemed like the millionth time since she'd been back at how weird her life had become, Buffy walked back to the bed and pulled the edge of bedspread back.
"Move over," she told her delighted sister. "And you'd better not snore. Either of you."
Some time later, Tara woke up from a particularly nasty dream. She wasn't sure what it had been but it had left her with a very bad case of cotton-mouth. She quickly went into the bathroom in the main hallway to get herself a glass of water. Downing two cups in rapid succession, she found herself staring into the mirror, wondering who the strange, weary looking girl staring back at her was. Failing to shake off the overwhelming feeling of exhaustion she was suffering from, the blonde witch headed back to her room, noticing as she did so that the doors to the other two bedrooms were open. Hearing the sound of steady breathing coming from Buffy’s room, she popped her head in put of curiosity. She couldn’t help but smile to herself as she realized that the vampire had plenty of company. The two Summers girls were sprawled out on either side of him, arms and legs draped over one another. There in the dark, it was very hard to tell where one of them began and the other two ended, and for some reason that struck Tara as being the most natural thing in the world.
******
"I still say it's entirely too risky," Crispin McDermott said, his voice touched with an air of obvious concern. "This is not the type of magick that you should be playing around with, Willow. This sort of spell always has consequences."
Willow just snorted in annoyance. "Consequences, schmonsequences. I've raised the dead, dear. Something like this is nothing by comparison. I use more energy than this walking to lit class."
The professor shook his head and sighed. "Sweetheart, this isn't the same thing at all. You're dealing with supernatural forces here, and with all due respect, while it may not be quite as draining as Necromancy, transmogrification does require enormous amounts of stamina and concentration. The results can be disastrous if you're not very careful."
"So, I'll be very careful," she replied. "Relax, I've got stamina and concentration by the boatload. Besides, how do you know all this stuff? I thought that you were strictly a dabbler."
Crispin chuckled at her implied slight. "What I said, Ms. Rosenberg, was that I didn't practice very much. I said nothing about reading, which I happen to do quite a bit of. Just because my knowledge of the mystical arts is largely theoretical, it doesn't stand to reason that it is less valuable than your practical experience." He laughed as the witch stuck her tongue out at him.
"Yeah, okay Grandma. Your concern is duly noted," she said dryly. "Geez, since when did you turn into an old woman? It's so totally boring. If I had wanted more of that I would have stayed with Tara."
Willow realized that she had pushed what should have been gentle teasing a little too far when she caught a fleeting glimpse of hurt on his face. "Hey, I'm sorry. That was really insensitive of me, I know. It's just that for once, I'd like somebody to support the choices I make, instead of all the endless lecturing about responsibility and duty and blah, blah, blah. I just want to have fun with my power for a change. Is that so wrong?"
"No, it's not. Look, Willow, I'm not trying to stifle you, honestly. Lord knows you've had enough of that from, umm...other people in your life. I just don't want to see you get hurt." His voice dropped just a tiny bit. "You've become very dear to me, you know."
Willow walked over to the table and kissed him passionately. "I know that, honey. Don't think that I don't appreciate everything you do for me. Or to me," she added mischievously.
"Mmm," the professor said with his mouth full of the witch's probing tongue. Slowly, and with obvious regret, he disengaged from his lover's advances. "Stop trying to change the subject, young lady. That particular trick only works the first dozen or so times you use it. I'm building up an immunity to it."
Willow grinned lustily at him, becoming aroused even more. These days it seemed like she wanted him more with every passing hour. They'd already made love twice this morning and she had to fight very hard to resist the urge to abandon her current project in favor of another trip to the bedroom. "Okay, Okay. I'll stop trying to seduce you. I've got to say though that this is the first time I've ever gotten complaints."
Crispin looked more than slightly amused. "Oh, of that I have no doubt whatsoever. Then again, your last paramour didn't really strike me as the demanding type, if I may say so. She seemed the more submissive sort of person. Rather helpless in fact."
"No, you may not," she snapped at him, suddenly irritated at his mentioning of her relationship with Tara, even though she had brought her up first. "It's obvious that you don't know her at all. If you did, you'd see that she gives strength away by the bucketful. She could be a very powerful witch if she would ever develop a backbone and use it instead of hiding behind her Wicca mumbo-jumbo; not that it matters to me anymore. Tara and I are finished, you know that. I'm yours and you're mine and that's all to be said about it."
He shrugged at her outburst. "You brought it up, dearest. I have to admit that I am more than a little curious about her though. She doesn't really fit the preconceived image of a lesbian after all. I just find it all to be...interesting."
"Meaning what, exactly?" She asked him archly. "That we all wear flannel shirts, refuse to wear make-up, and drive trucks for a living, and what the hell are you smiling about?"
"The fact that you felt the need to use 'we'. I hadn't realized that you considered yourself to be a lesbian, that's all. I'm a little intrigued though as to where that leaves me though. The last time I checked, I was still classified as a male, unless of course you know something that I don't."
That made Willow smile again. "As far as I'm concerned, any man who can use his tongue like you do deserves the title of 'honorary dyke.' Anyway, screw Tara. She seems to be very happy playing at being 'Mrs. Summers,' so more power to her and Buffy and let's leave it at that. What?" She asked as Crispin's face took on a puzzled look.
"I just hadn't realized that your friend Buffy was...well, like you, sexual preferences speaking, that is."
Willow burst out laughing. "Oh God. I was joking, Crispin. Honestly, Buffy Summers is about the least gay person I know. Besides, even if she was gay, she wouldn't be interested in Tara. Not unless Tara's heart stopped beating and she grew a set of pointy teeth."
"Eh?" He asked her, genuinely confused.
"Oh nothing. Bad joke. My lame way of saying that Buffy's into bad boys-not nice girls. Let's just end this discussion, okay? I have work to do, which I'm sure you're aware of since you just spent the last five minutes trying to take my mind off of it."
The professor threw up his hands. "I give up. If you're going to do it, though, at least let me help you. Do you have everything you need? Besides me, of course."
Willow suddenly found herself giggling like a high school girl." I do, kind sir. But I've got it covered. You have a lecture to prepare for anyway, don't you? You should probably do it in your office. It may get a little...distracting here for a bit." When he nodded reluctantly, she added, "Now give me another kiss, before I get started."
Reaching in, he planted a firm kiss on her forehead and quickly grabbed his jacket and briefcase from off of the table. "Until later then, my sweet." Blowing her a mock kiss, he closed the door behind him, leaving Willow pouting in the middle of the dorm room.
Brushing off the fleeting sense of helpless isolation that she always felt when Crispin left her on her own, Willow began to trace a pentagram on the floor with the materials she had gathered for the spell. Mumbling briefly in Latin, she grabbed the cage that had been sitting on her desk and opened it. Acting quickly, she grabbed the squirming rodent that had been resting on the bottom of the cage and placed it onto the floor in the middle of the pentagram. As she continued to chant, the rat's shape began to shift and expand until it became a human woman. Sitting on the floor, completely naked, all she could to was to stare at the redheaded witch in complete shock.
"Why, hello there, Amy." she crooned to her friend. "It's been a very long time, hasn't it?"
The other witch stared at her a full minute or so before letting out a blood curdling shriek and collapsing unconsciously onto the floor.
[Reviews - 2]
-
Table of Contents [Report This]
Chapter or Story |
Chapter or Story | 
Chapter or Story
Has been viewed 3249 times
- Text Size +
-
Table of Contents [Report This]
Chapter or Story |
Chapter or Story | Chapter or Story - Text Size +