Chapter Two
Stark silence bombarded her as Buffy slowly came out of the trance. It was always like this when he left first, denying her the link she so desperately needed. The world he abandoned her in was not one she enjoyed. Disappearing into her mind where she could hear him speak was infinitely warmer, and rather than wondering why that was possible, Buffy just shivered and stood, surveying her immediate surroundings for some misleading reason the woods had stalled in time. No owls hooted and no wind blew against her cool skin, yet nothing supernatural seemed to be poisoning the air and for that the Slayer felt relief.
And then excitement steadily infused her with the strength to leave the hill.
He was coming. He was coming.
She’d not felt this happy in so long and that sad realisation was enough to halt the progression of cartwheels down the slight decline, but still…he was coming. She’d finally see his face, watch his words as they fell from his lips, hug him to her body so hard she’d almost break his ribs. She felt euphoric and there was no way she’d let Willow and her snide comments and vague missions into danger bring her down. Finally, in a period of time longer than she could remember, she had a reason to wake up the next day. Sure, having the link had given her focus, had given her hope, but it hadn’t given her life!
Buffy stopped at the bottom of her hill and breathed deeply, smiling. So much had happened in her short life that she was wary of getting too hopeful about this, but she was positive he meant what he said. He was coming and everything would finally be okay.
She hated this feeling—feeling grateful for something others so easily took for granted, like a person by her side, because it inevitably brought back the memories of all those that weren’t. It hurt to think of those she’d failed and yet their ghosts sometimes didn’t scream loud enough. The guilt wasn’t piled high enough on her head. Some days she even managed to breathe easily. Buffy was so ashamed that that was true, but living did that to a person, as did the fight that never ended.
It had all started the day Spike had rolled into town, bringing that life-sucking ho-bag with him. Every ounce of reason dictated to the Slayer that he should have left his sire in Prague to take her rightful end. If she’d dusted, so much in Buffy’s own life might have been different—no, would have been different. Taking Angel from her had been the first kick in her steady defence against the dark and for that Buffy was laying the blame squarely at Spike’s door. If he ever showed his face to her again he’d be dust quicker than he could smirk.
That stupid ritual had done nothing but give strength to an insane vampire. It sure hadn’t been a positive experience for anyone but Dru. They’d drained Angel dry and Buffy had had to watch as he lost all his vampiric power to Drusilla and then crumpled in on himself and created an ashen ode to what he could have been. Retaliation had been sweet and at least Buffy could smile—even if it was vindictive and completely unbecoming of her—at the fact that the instigator had had his back snapped in half. It served him right!
Not that she’d managed to make sense yet out of why Drusilla would taunt her with the image of a broken Spike before they’d managed to get out of town. Turning up at the Slayer’s house, pushing a furious Spike in his wheelchair had really not been of the good. However, the fact that the vampiress had actually shown the foresight to surround herself with an army of vampires so that Buffy would have been a fool—and a dead one at that—if she’d even attempted to fight them all, proved Drusilla to be using faculties Buffy had assumed she’d been incapable of. That was more than a little worrying. Not that it had mattered because she’d never seen either of them again, and that was exactly how Buffy liked her vampires—either dust at the end of her stake or off worrying the other slayer she’d never met.
Drusilla had left Kendra in the school library with her throat slit before she’d left town. For that alone Buffy was going to make sure Drusilla, Queen of the Nutcases, was a footnote in slayer history before she was done.
Kendra’s replacement had started what Spike had failed to finish. Faith had bounded along, full of enthusiasm for the slaying—until she’d made a mistake and turned all dark and dangerous on the good guys.
They’d been fools not to realise exactly how dangerous.
Xander found out the hard way. The details were a little sketchy, but it was no secret he harboured a slayer fetish. Thus, when he’d gone missing one night and was discovered by Willow and Buffy in Faith’s trashy hotel room, naked, purple bruises livid at his throat and with eyes that couldn’t hide his naked fear, the conclusions had been absolute. There was no coming back from this; Faith the Vampire Slayer was lost to them and no amount of repentance would ever allow her to break through their consuming grief and be amongst them again.
As always, the memories unleashed raw, choking emotion in her throat. Buffy gasped at the pain and collapsed to her knees. Giles had been next. God, Giles had been her father. He’d protected her where her biological parent had pushed her aside. He’d had lapses, of course. The Cruciamentum had almost destroyed everything between them, but at least Buffy had some relief that she’d forgiven him before his cruel and violent death.
Faith had believed she’d struck at Buffy’s power centre—she’d wiped out the heart and then destroyed the encyclopaedic mind behind their success. She’d been wrong. Each and every one of her friends had strength to contribute to the fight and leaving alive one knowledgeable gypsy and an aspiring witch had been a mistake. While Buffy’s brute strength had been next to useless against her sister slayer—both of them still standing, or limping, at the end of every fight—Willow and Jenny Calendar had joined together in harsh, vengeful grief and totally decimated the enemy camp. The Mayor’s big Ascension was nothing but an annoyingly distracting buzz in the air as the duo set every disease upon him they could imagine, holding Faith in a binding spell so that she was forced to watch the closest thing she had to a father succumb to infection and rot alive.
It had turned Buffy’s stomach. Watching such a display of evil did nothing to help her heal from losing her mentor, or her friend. And added to it was the grief at losing Willow as well, because even then Buffy knew the redhead would never be the same. Ms. Calendar had left as soon as the dust had settled, claiming everything she stood for was gone, and Buffy found it hard to miss her.
Not when so much more loss had left her heart bloodied and sore.
Wesley Wyndham-Price had found it abhorrent to his sensibilities and had departed as suddenly as he’d arrived. Buffy knew he was still wandering out there somewhere, looking for his purpose, and truly, she wished him luck. He’d so quickly been rendered a watcher without a slayer, with Faith’s defection and Buffy’s refusal to give him the authority needed to do his job. But now, alone and constantly in fear of attack by her remaining contact in the world, Buffy wished he’d come back—naïve outlook and all. At least he wouldn’t be sending her into danger and hoping for her failure.
The walk back into Sunnydale proper was too short and Buffy marvelled at how quiet the night seemed to be compared to how dark and loud her thoughts had become. The only bright point had been enticing him to finally come to her, and now that Buffy’s euphoria had been shattered by her heaviest memories, she felt exhausted. Seeing her front door wasn’t a relief though, for she didn’t need to be a rocket scientist to know that whatever Willow had waiting for her behind it would be bad. Wasn’t everything Willow found for her to do these days? Almost impossible demons to fight—impossible to find, impossible to kill.
It was with a weary step that Buffy approached her house and ascended the porch steps. Soon everything she did would be shaded with excitement and maybe she’d finally have a chance at some happiness. But for now, there was duty and darkness.
Willow looked grave when Buffy finally returned. Anger vibrated around the room and Buffy took a step back in surprise before forcing herself to continue inside. The redhead stood with her arms crossed and her spine stiff, disapproval evident in the flat line of her pale lips.
“I’ve been waiting for you for hours. Even my locator spell wasn’t working. Where were you?”
Buffy quirked a brow as she casually pulled out a chair in the dining room of her old house and sat in it. “Gee, Wills. I thought you knew I patrolled at night. Every night. Fought some big hairy, crackly demon thingy. He was a bit sparky with the electricity so maybe there was some kind of magic dampener field or something that prevented you reaching me? I’m totally clueless.” Desperate to appear unconcerned, Buffy did a quick thank you prayer to whichever god had influenced her decision to keep a fruit bowl on the table and reached for an apple. The crunch of her bite was distracting enough in that it annoyed Willow about something other than her magic failing to do the simple task she’d set.
“Well, maybe that’s what I was trying to find you and warn you about,” she covered churlishly. All the softness had left Willow the previous year the second Xander’s body had been found naked and purple. She’d declared that Faith had fucked the life right out of him and had set about planning the other Slayer’s downfall. Buffy was exceedingly grateful she’d never given in to Xander’s many offers to date. Watching Willow decimate another human being had been rather gory and sickening; it was something Buffy had never wanted to see again but had been forced to as Willow made ever-widening excuses about which human scumbag could live and which couldn’t. It was a train wreck that Buffy couldn’t run away from; she wasn’t put on this earth to dole out judgement to humans. She was a vampire slayer: strong, proud and fixated on her mission. Willow was the one who blew their boundaries wide open.
Willow was the one that was slowly absorbing all the power and control.
“Well, I killed it,” Buffy puffed, her blasé attitude obviously pushing Willow’s Irrit-o-meter to the limits.
“Well, we still have a problem. A really big one and I needed to contact you about it urgently. We don’t have a lot of time.” She turned her back and stomped sullenly from the room and Buffy rolled her eyes in a manner that had become quite clichéd the last year. Willow made her grand announcements—somehow pinning blame on Buffy where there was no blame to be had—and Buffy buttoned her lips but rolled her eyes. They had a swell slaying relationship.
Before she could work up the effort to follow the witch, Willow had returned, her trusty laptop in one hand and some strange looking multi-pointed shell that she held next to her ear in the other. There was a serious furrow between her brows and Buffy was reminded of the conscientious Willow of old—where research and the desire to help Buffy stay alive was enough for her.
“There’s been some weird atmospheric disturbances happening in LA so I did a spell.” She looked up and Buffy wondered if she was supposed to be surprised. Willow and spells—both good and bad—were of the extreme these days. Barely an hour went by where Willow didn’t find something that needed a spell immediately to make matters right.
Buffy said nothing, knowing well enough by now that it didn’t matter, Willow would bound on with her discovery and ignore Buffy’s apparently-useless comments anyway. No better way to take the power in a relationship than when you simply ignored all input from the other person.
“Angelus is trying to end the world.” She paused, obviously hoping to get some kind of emotional reaction from Buffy—taking pleasure in inflicting hurt now wherever she could. As usual, she wasn’t disappointed.
Buffy exploded from her chair. “That’s impossible. Angel is dead. I saw him dust.”
The redhead smirked, her eyes flashing black and making Buffy’s skin crawl. “Oh, sorry. I forgot to mention that this Angelus is from another dimension.”
Hatred at Willow’s unnecessary cruelty burned deeply; Buffy slowly sank back into her chair and stared coldly at the preening witch. “Go on,” she seethed through tight lips.
Now that she’d achieved her cheap shot, Willow continued, unfolding her laptop and putting the shell down on the table. “Okay, this is bad. Angelus has attacked and killed a number of members of The Circle of The Black Thorn and demons from all dimensions are preparing an attack. There’s no way he can win this fight and that much evil in one world will do a lot of damage. I’m talking end of the world stuff—and not just ours. It’ll be like, dimensional tsunamis of damage. You’ll have to go and stop him.”
Okay, that bit sunk through Buffy’s hardened protective layer. “And why can’t the Slayer in that dimension do all the stopping? What, I’m intergalactic Buffy now?”
Willow stopped short, irritation dangerously close to the surface. “I didn’t say anything about sending you into space. You’ll still be on Earth, Buffy. It will be the same places and the same people—just…different. As for the other slayer...there’s no guarantee that she knows. I mean, the people in the other dimension might not be able to work this kind of stuff out. Maybe there’s no Willow there or if there is, maybe she’s…less like me.”
And wouldn’t that be a blessing to all concerned, Buffy thought spitefully before standing and heading for the stairs.
“Fine. I’m going to wash off the demon gunk, then you can tell me when we do this—”
“There’s no time,” Willow interjected, actually reaching out and grabbing hold of Buffy’s arm. It was the first time she’d willingly touched the Slayer since Xander had been buried deep within the earth. Buffy wished she’d continued to refrain because now the cold, claw-like fingers caused a sensation of revulsion to travel through her and Buffy wanted to get to the bathroom to scrub her skin clean now more than ever.
The touch had clouded her understanding of words briefly but Buffy panicked as soon as she realised what the witch was telling her. She couldn’t go. Not now! At least, not immediately; not without using the talisman to communicate to her nameless friend what was going on. For all she knew this was a trap—an elaborate and dangerous one it was true, but those words weren’t long shots for Willow when she had her mind set on achieving something, and getting rid of Buffy without a trace—not that she needed a trace—was a possibility the Slayer was willing to overlook. As far as Willow knew, no one would suspect a thing if she went missing. Her mother might grieve but believe her death to be at the hands of evil—especially if a torn up, contrite Willow was the one to deliver the news in person. The witch didn’t know about the talisman or the friend Buffy had at the other end of it. She didn’t know that someone was going to turn up here and demand answers. Buffy knew what Willow would do. She wouldn’t think twice about taking out the obstruction to her path to true, all-encompassing power. Destroying another slayer would be all the redhead would need to cement her position as a leader in the fight against evil—the fact that she was more than a little left of the good side was something no one, least of all Willow herself, would accept.
The talisman burnt a hole in her jeans pocket and Buffy felt the itch on her thigh. She had to warn him, tell him it was too late to be her saviour. Determination glittered in her eye and Willow backed away, a hardness taking over her as she stood up to the Slayer. “There’s no time, Buffy. The destruction of The Circle is already taking place. They plan to stand and fight in an alleyway and some of their army are already dead. You need to be there to stop it.”
“And how exactly am I supposed to do that against an infinite army from across all dimensions? I mean, God, there could be dragons. I can’t fly, Will.”
The other girl was panicked, already gathering together her ingredients and making the familiar sacred circle with sand, plonking herself down in the middle of it, along with her fascinating shell. Her hands were shaking and for the first time Buffy realised how big a deal this was. Despite Willow’s new wonky world view, she still lived in the world and didn’t want it to end. If the witch was this rattled, Buffy knew it was urgent. The Slayer surged forth and took control. Buffy patted the talisman and sent a mental apology she knew he’d never receive and prepared herself for the unknown.
“How do I get back?”
The portal opened with a whoosh, blue light gyrating and flickering in the small space.
Willow pursed her lips nervously and refused to look up and meet Buffy’s eyes. “I don’t know.” For a second she looked genuinely upset, as if realising that as much as she hated sharing the glory with Buffy, the blonde was still the only person she had left in this world. For that alone Buffy dismissed the risk of this being a trick, a plan to get rid of the Slayer.
“This is real,” Willow appealed and Buffy shrugged. There was no choice if this fight was going to end the world. She had to go.
“Okay. Just…find some way to bring me back.” She stared into the blue light, mesmerised with the possible death going through it might bring.
Willow looked up. “I will,” she promised, then nodded toward the light. “You better go. All the worlds need you.”
Buffy stepped forward, hesitated for just a second, and then took the leap.
She was at the world’s command.
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