Chapter 8:  A Door in the Walls

Nurse Nancy returned humming a grotesquely chipper tune.  Which, Buffy surmised, could only mean more bad news. Kennedy was evil in a rather lackluster way; just your average run-of-the-mill, hate-filled uber bitch. But over the past two days, she had become convinced that the nurse was clinically insane. The little mutant talked to herself constantly, even when other people were in the room. Occasionally when they were alone together, she would sit in bed next to Buffy and stroke her hand lovingly.  She did this for several hours once, recounting every detail of a vegetable garden she had planted when she was nine years old, her pink possum eyes dancing hypnotically in the florescent light.

They hadn’t given Buffy any more “treatments”, thankfully. Rich fantasy life aside, she didn’t think she could deal with listening to Kennedy’s villain-y monologue-ing again.  The Nurse had installed some kind of an IV drip this morning, and Buffy couldn’t feel the effects of the toxin weakening like before.  She was stuck in a prison without bars, it seemed.

“Miss Special!,” the Nurse cried, her voice lilting into the familiar Southern drawl.  “Why, don’t you look positively radiant this afternoon.”  She drew a small needle from her apron, and jabbed it unceremoniously into the side of Buffy’s jaw.

She gasped, feeling the strength flood back into her face. “Wha… sha da infuh nee,” she said.

Nurse Nancy patted her wrist.  “Don’t worry, Miss Special. You’ll be singing like a beautiful bird again in just a few minutes.  Nurse Nancy gave you a special treat so you can talk to her.”

“Whyggg?”

“Oh.  Well, us girls are just going to have so much to talk about over the next couple of days!  You see Miss Special, you’ve been chosen.”

“Choshen,” Buffy managed, feeling her tongue slide around the word.  “Choshen, for whagg?”

“For Nurse Nancy’s Big Girl Cure!” she squealed, seeming genuinely thrilled.  “I been working on this great new wonderful chemical called Ectocetamiene Chloride - ain’t that a big word?”

She kept grinning and nodding, like she expected Buffy to answer.  She didn’t.  “Anyway, the thing is hun’, The Cause thought it was just such a shame that there were so very few girls like them in the world.  I mean there’s still lots an’ all, but it seems like they’re always dyin’ on us, and there will never ever be any more.  That’s why we got those Chakau’Ri fellas helping us out a little, you know, teachin’ them the moves and what not.  But still, it’s not quite enough.  Especially when you're gonna take on every army in the whole big world. And so we got to thinkin’, wouldn’t it be a hoot if we could make more Slayers? ”

“You can’t do that,” Buffy said, matter-of-factly.

“Really,” said the Nurse, tapping her nose with a slender white finger.  “You know, I thought so too, for awhile.  I mean, I read up on all kinds of special things.  Talked to all sorts of people about it, too.” She leaned in close, and her peppy falsetto sank to a low and conspiratorial whisper. “Even talked to some people who weren’t exactly people, if you catch my drift. And you know what? Turns out it’s pretty easy after all. Let me see if I can explain…”  The nurse whipped out a makeup mirror, held it up to Buffy’s face. “You see that? That’s you right?"

“Right,” said Buffy.

C’mon, what’s the punchline, bitch?

“’Cept it’s not you. It’s just a reflection of one physical implementation of you, some light from a star bouncing off of a real smooth stone.  We are beings who live in three dimensions, but think in two.   But there's so much more going on...

"You see, Miss Special, what we like to think of as ‘the universe’ isn’t actually so. There are plenty of them out there, all bunched and wrapped together, like a big ol’ fuzzy ball of yarn, each with it’s own slightly different thread of reality as we know it. Together they form what some people like call the Multiverse.  You following me so far?”

Buffy tried to nod.  Couldn’t.

“Now, when astronomers look up in the sky, they see mostly light and energy.  But that’s only about ten percent of what is actually up there.  The rest is made up of something they call ‘dark matter.’  And dark matter isn’t even matter at all. It’s more like a bunch of tiny doors where all of the various dimensions and alternate versions of the universe rub up against one another.  Isn't that just wondrous?”

The pink eyes stopped dancing, and Buffy thought she saw something soft float inside them for a moment; something that was like love, except farther away and less specific.  She stood there silently for what felt like very long time, rocking gently back and forth.  Nurse Nancy suddenly reminded Buffy of the vampire Drusilla, but somehow incredibly scarier.

“Anyway, turns out that the vamps are full of the stuff,” she finally said. “I mean, right down to the subatomic level.  A vampire in one dimension is physically connected to all the versions of himself in every other dimension.  It’s the same effect you get when you aim two mirrors at each other, just a big, empty nothin’.

"That’s why light doesn’t bounce off them.  Turns out it’s also the reason they don’t age. Time and space doesn’t exactly work the same way with their bodies. If they actually got older, that would cause what a scientist would call a 'paradox.'  Ain’t that just fascinating, Special?” Nancy squinted hopefully again, like she really wanted her opinion.

“Uh-huh," Buffy replied.  "You should have a cable show or something. But what’s all that got to do with the Slayer line?  Or me?”

“Well that’s the thing. See, I figure, if the vampires could attract that kind of dark matter, why can’t we? I mean, if there are a limitless number of other universes out there with billions of awakened Slayers in them, why can’t we just rub a smidge of that dark matter on ourselves, and build a nice little pipeline to their doubles all around the Multi-verse. It would be like the old well back home. We could pull out as much as we want, wait for the river to fill it back up, then pull up some more again. Except…”

“Except, what?”

Nancy flashed a shark-like grin.  “Well, the dark matter works just fine. Great, actually!  Remember how our girls popped up on your lawn the other day?  I did that!  Did you like that?!   Did you?!”  She was sweating now, practically shrieking at her. She seemed to be becoming unhinged.

“Yeah.  Yeah that was pretty, uh, special.”

“Oh, I’m so glad you think so. It was so very hard to stabilize it. You should have seen what happened to the first batch of girls.”  The bloodless face twisted up into an ewww shape. “Only one problem.  When you take something out of one dimension, you always have to put something back in. It’s a very old rule.

“What do you mean?  Like, give a penny, take a penny?”

The madwoman giggled and spun away dreamily, her bleached cotton skirt floating up like a ballerina’s tutu as she danced towards the steel-ribbed double doors and flung them wide.  A Chakau’Ri demon rolled in a large machine on a gurney.  The device was a smooth, ebony cylinder with a pair of strange, whiplike antennae protruding from either end. It seemed to ripple with mysterious energy, bending the nearby air into a fog of distortion, like a hot desert highway.

“That’s where you fit in, Miss Special!” A small square panel on the machine slid back when she touched it.  She tapped a set of controls. “You remember those awful paradoxes I was talking about?  Well, it turns out that you are one of them. In fact, according to most of the people I asked, you ain’t even supposed to exist at all!  Which is good news for us!  You’re like a big ol’ walking door in the fabric of time and space.

The picture was starting to become clear.  Buffy felt something hard and cold begin to twist in her stomach.

"All debts were settled in the grave, Chosen One.  Coming back to life in this world the way you did, it was like you erased the rules for every possible version of yourself throughout the entire Multiverse.  So all those millions and trillions of Little Miss Specials out there, it’s like they don’t even exist anymore, either.  We can pull as much Slayer strength out of them as we want, the poor dears.  And I'm going to pull it all.”

“FUCK YOU, PSYCHO!”

Nancy’s brow hardened, feigning disappointment.  “Don’t be like that! Don’t you realize that I saved your life?  Miss Kennedy wanted you dead in that dirty hole of yours.  If it weren’t for Nurse Nancy, those girls would’ve chopped you up into little, itty bits!  You and your friends.”

The panic set in again as she watched the Chakau’Ri tug cautiously at the antennae, its coiled length unspooling like a garden hose.  Nancy tapped a few buttons, and a pair of six-inch, glowing needles slid out through the tip of each wire.  The nurse caught the fearful look in Buffy’s eyes and giggled.

“Oh, get your mind out of the gutter, Special.  It’s not going in there. In fact,  I don’t think this is going to hurt one bit!" She paused, chewing a finger thoughtfully.  "But I’m not too sure about that. That’s why I need you awake. I need you to tell me if it hurts, okay?  We don’t want you damaged, after all. What good would you be, then?”

Moving glacially, the monster positioned itself at the side of the bed.  Buffy stared intently into the cone of yellow light directly above.

C’mon, you can do this, she told herself, reaching deeply for her demon.  You can beat this. Find her!

The creature bent over gently, almost politely, cupping her breast with a huge clammy paw.  Before she knew what was happening, it pushed the needle in, spearing her heart mid-beat.

She screamed.

***

One instant before that happened, something else did.

Once upon a time, on a little blue planet floating inside a distant, irreducibly small speck of reality, a pretty young tax attorney named Beth Anne Summers was just finishing up a pile of paperwork.  It had been a grueling week, the big late-July adjustment push that drove everyone absolutely nuts.  In an hour, she would hook up with her buddies Glory and Kennedy for a girls-night out.

It was going to be a celebration, of sorts.  The homeless shelter had just made Kennedy Deputy Director of Hand-Outs for Losers, or something.  That girl seriously needed to get a life.  Glory would be more fun, hopefully. Or, at least,  more drunk.

Buffy would leave early, of course, faking a headache.  She needed to be with him tonight.  Between her clients and that darn evil wizard Xander who just rolled in town, an evening with Willy was the closest thing to a vacation she was going to get for a month.

In the next microsecond, she felt something crumble inside her. She stood up from her desk, clutched her chest and screamed. It was the last sound she ever made.

***

Tuffy Sums revved the Hog twice, her blue Mohawk wagging like a puppy tail in the wind.  There was going to be another slammer tonight at the Silver. The Jokes were gonna play a set, and Tuffy loved those crazy bastards.  Especially their hot blond singer, Bloody Bill.  There was something a little off about him, though. With her shit luck these days, he’d probably turn out to be a vamp or something, and she’d wind up having to stake him.

Ooohhh, unless he stakes me first, she thought.

She sped out over a cracked, asphalt vein of downtown Sunnydale.  In the distance, the factory stacks loomed on the smog-choked horizon like a row of tear gas canisters.  The bike was on full melt, engine ready to flood. She eased off the gas, and starting thinking about the little psycho at the coffee shop again.

The girl had approached her of the blue two weeks ago, doin’ the whole grabby-grabby routine, like they was friends or somethin’.  A little redheaded squirt, looked like something the cat had puked up.  Kept sayin’ her name was “Willow,” and she kept saying funny things about space and time, and about Tuffy bein’ in some kinda serious cosmic-type trouble.  She felt bad for the crazy little biznitch, but it wasn’t like Tuffy was born yesterday.

“Look, head-job,” she’d told her. “Not sure what your game is, but I don’t know anyone goes by ‘Willow’ or ‘Sunshine’ or any happy hippy shit like that.  Some neckbiter tries to snack on ya, you give Tuffy a call. But ‘til then, try laying off the brown acid, ‘kay?”

That didn’t still quite seem to set her straight, but at least it got her off ol’ Tuffy’s back.  Can’t be seen talking to the queermoes.  Got a rep to keep. 

The wind suddenly picked up somethin’ fierce.  Tuffy felt her t-shirt rip up the middle like a napkin and float away. In the next moment, she realized that it wasn’t her shirt.  Then something inside her chest turned to string and blew apart.

The bike kept going for awhile.

Then it stopped.

***

In the People’s Republic of Boston, Massachusetts, Skaya Anastasia Somerz rolled down the window to her yellow ‘94 Citroen, on loaner from the Bureau. A very strange person had been banging on it with her fist. The woman looked a little bit like her old schoolmate, Willow Rosenberg, only a few years older and a lot less dead.

Curfew was set to start in an hour, and, Slayer healing or not, Skaya had no interest in getting shot tonight. “What’s your malfunction, comrade?” she hissed. “Don’t you know what day it is?”

“Buffy,” the woman stuttered. “Buffy, it's me. Willow.”

“That’s not possible,” she said, her voice turning to iron. ”She’s dead. The Spetzas killed her, in the Great Cleansing.”

Skaya studied the girl for a moment. She was a bit slimmer than the chubby young Wicca she remembered, and her hair was not as dark. Still, the resemblance was uncanny; she could have easily passed for a sister, at least. She was trembling, not at all dressed for the weather. Skaya considered the possibility that the girl was insane, but there was something so familiar in the voice, and the eyes. She unlocked the door.

“Get in,” she said.

She drove lazily across the threshold of Veteran’s Square, eyes sharp for resistance fighters. The girl who called herself Willow Rosenberg gazed silently at the architecture of the monument there, the single upraised fist smashing through a broomstick.

“So,” Skaya asked. “How did you find me?”

“It took a long time,” said the girl, sounding exhausted.  “I’ve searched the ends of existence for you, Buffy.”

The blonde felt a muscle begin to jump in her thigh.  She kept her eyes on the road, her foot easing ever so gently off the gas pedal.  “Stop calling me that,” she said.

“What should I call you, then?” whispered the girl. Her voice had grown as distant as her eyes.  There was something almost tender about it, but Skaya could feel something cold rising underneath.  “Little Skaya? The Scourge?”

The river, she thought, swerving the car as casually as possible onto a dimly lit back street.  Take her to the river.

Willow kept talking. “Back when I started all this, I thought I knew what I was doing. Thought I could handle it. But it’s messed me up pretty good, Buff. Life is so different than I ever imagined it. I didn’t realize how easy it was to get lost. A twist here, a turn there, and suddenly everything stops making sense. Except that it does, too. You know what I mean?”

“Yes,” Skaya said, gritting her teeth.  As they rolled into the massive shadow of the Sarkovsky Bridge, she thought of the gun lying in the back seat.  “But you’re not Willow Rosenberg. She‘s dead.”

“Dead. I know. Killed by Spetzas, right?”  Her face twisted into a bitter smile. The two women stared at each other for a very long time.  Outside it had begun to snow.  Skaya killed the engine, pulled the leather duster tightly around her shoulders.

“It had to be that way,” she said.  “The world was changing. There was no place left for people like us.”

Willow was crying, now. “You mean people like me.”  She seemed to choke on the words. “People like Xander.”

“That wasn’t my fault,” Skaya said. “I warned him. He wouldn’t listen.”

“You sold him out,” Willow spat.  “The SBF keeps immaculate records, Buffy. Especially of their payroll.  You’re the one who told them about the tunnels.  He’s dead because of you. Whore. Lots of people are.”

Skaya laughed then. The sudden absurdity of it all hit her hard. All the old memories were flooding back in. She recalled the feelings of revulsion she’d had as she watched the girl’s powers grow. She felt the awful ache of seeing her friends flock to her side whenever Willow snapped her magic little fingers. Back then, everyone was always either falling in love with Willow or trying to kill her. Sometimes both. Skaya had suspected it was some kind of spell, a sinister glamour that made everyone forget who was the strong one. Forget who was the Chosen one.

In the end, the redhead had been a paper champion, all principals and no punch.  The Wiccans had resisted each treaty, every accommodation the Revolution had extended.  Yet, they refused to fight an open battle, relied on shadowy, smalltime operations that succeeded only in pissing the enemy off.  She thought of Spike, how the vampire had died fighting Willow’s pretentious, self-righteous little war.  Lots of people, she thought bitterly, are dead because of you too, Comrade Rosenberg.

It had happened in the morning, just before sunrise.  Willow Rosenberg had always been a heavy sleeper, the victim of her own dreams.  Skaya remembered the feeling of her hands wrapped around the girl’s pale throat.  It had been so easy.

It still would be.  Skaya drew a deep breath, and lunged.

The car roared magically to life, veering sideways into the bridge’s steel ankle.  In an instant, the girl’s eyes turned to black pits.  Skaya clawed at them desperately, wanting to put out the horrible light she saw burning behind them.  With a small sweep of a finger, Willow sent her sailing out through the windshield into the freezing, night sky.

Scrambling for footing in the snow, she heard the terrifying voice of the Witch. It sliced through the howling wind like a dagger.  “Somewhere far away, there is another world,” she crooned.  “There are people in it who love you, and whom you love.  There is a girl who held the walls of reality together with her hands, and died doing it. I was the one who brought her back.”

Willow strode forward, arms rising from her sides.  A thick purple vein pulsed at the center of her forehead.  Skaya felt something burning inside her lungs.  The Witch was boiling her alive.  She dug down for the knife in her boot.

“There is a very old rule,” the Witch continued.  “I broke it. Heavy prices have been paid. The hands have come to fix what the heart has broken.” She stood directly over Skaya, electricity arcing from her body in long blue waves. “When you put something in, you have to take something out. And you’ll do just fine, bitch!”

The knife came up. A short sharp scream echoed out across the Charles River.

The snow turned red.