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Author's Chapter Notes:
Warning: character death.
Buffy snapped upright in her bed, panting wildly. The visions that the last spirit had shown her were still haunting her. The image of Dawn slashing her tender skin with a knife was emblazoned on her memory. She blamed herself, of course, for letting things get so bad.

Just as horribly, she couldn’t erase the nightmarish sight of Spike burning to cinders in front of her eyes from her mind. Being the Slayer, Buffy had grown used to being powerful, and powerlessly watching him crumble away was the worst kind of torture. Especially now she knew how she really felt about him. Her emotions for the chipped vampire ran deeper than she could ever have envisaged.

And she’d helplessly watched him blow away on the breeze.

However, the Slayer feared that the worst was still to come.

There was one more spirit that would visit her and if she was guessing correctly it would the Spirit of Christmases Still to Come.

Perhaps that was the one she feared the most.

Since being called as the Slayer, Buffy had figured her future was engraved in stone…headstone to be exact. As a Slayer her lifespan was limited and at first she didn’t think she would even survive to see the end of her teens. But she had survived that and then continued to survive beyond. Unlike most she’d even survived death twice.

And now the future was less certain.

There was no definitive ordinance that she would die anytime soon because history taught her that even death couldn’t bring her down thanks to her meddling but well meaning friends. Forever stretched sinisterly before her like a living presence.

As the chimes of the clock sounded, Buffy’s breath hitched in her chest.

It was time to face the music.

When the spirit appeared, Buffy immediately realized that this one was totally different to the other two she’d encountered. There was no trace of humanity to this ghost of the future, and that terrified her to her very core.

“So, I’m guessing you’re the ghost of Christmas future?” Buffy said, ignoring the tremble in her own voice.

The spirit didn’t speak, but gave her a slight nod. A black hood obscured its shadowy face, and a long black robe hung over its shapeless body. Buffy couldn’t help but draw a parallel with the Grim Reaper as she stared at the supernatural being.

Perhaps that was ironic. All that her future held was the same as her past and present.

Unhappiness and death.

“You’re the worst of the three ghosts,” she admitted to the robed being. “You know what pain is out there just waiting for me to find it. But I know it doesn’t matter because I can make things different, right?”

A pair of laser-red eyes glared at her and she shuddered under its disconcerting gaze. Still the spirit didn’t respond. The Slayer wrapped her arms protectively around her middle and licked her dry, chapped lips.

“So are we gonna get on the road with the fun show that is my life?”

Although she received no verbal response, the wind started to howl around her. Buffy had gotten used to the weird tricks of the spirits and she had no doubt that she was being transported into her future right now. The biting gale gnawed at her flesh like a rabid animal, cutting her deeply with its icy claws. Buffy thought she might have been screaming but she wasn’t sure because her body didn’t feel like it even belonged to her anymore. It felt cold and foreign like a badly fitting dress.

Images swirled around her, most of which she couldn’t even make out. They were just shadows of things that had yet to exist. Buffy wondered whether the future was a fluid entity. Would she see things that were set in concrete right now? Or would she see a possible future?

She hoped and prayed that it would be the latter because she didn’t want to encounter a hopeless future that she had no hope of changing.

When everything settled down around her, Buffy breathed a sigh of relief. Her head was pounding in her skull and her mouth was parched. Encountering these spirits was taking its toll on her.

As she took a look around, she realized that she was in her own house, on Revello Drive. However the place looked mostly unlived in. It was covered with dust and grime, a thin layer of cobwebs jutting out from the ceiling. Outside, she could hear the faint sound of carolers but there was no evidence that it was Christmas inside of the house.

However, that wasn’t so different from the present.

The slam of the door startled Buffy and she gasped as she saw an older looking Willow come marching in. Her best friend looked so different from the Willow that she knew that Buffy almost passed out in shock. The redhead’s hair was cut in a pixie cut, giving her a waifish look. Bands of black were interspersed with the red and she was clad in tight leather pants and a matching bustier. Gold jewelry hung from her neck and wrists, sparkling in the dim light of the house. What was most astonishing about the woman was the look on her face. She looked so cold, so hostile that she seemed unrecognizable.

It only took a moment for Buffy to realize that Xander was following behind, slightly slouched. He was skinnier than he’d been in a long time, his hair touching his shoulders as it hung in a shaggy mane. Buffy noticed the slight graying around his temples and wondered just how far in the future she actually was.

He leaned wearily against the wall as Willow rounded on him.

“I’ve been looking for you all day,” she said. “My locator spell fizzled out when I used it on you.”

“I was just out walking,” Xander said nervously.

“Yes, I know. I found you now, didn’t I? In the cemetery saying goodbye to those we…loved.” The last word was said with such a violent sneer that Buffy physically flinched at the contempt behind it.

“When this time of year comes around it makes me think about…stuff.” Xander defensively stuffed his hands in his pockets.

“Think about what?” she sneered. “How pathetic you’ve become?” She marched over to him and put her hand over his chest, long talon-like nails scratching him through his shirt. “Maybe I should just take the truth from you. Right in here. That’s where is isn’t it? It’s in your heart?”

“Please, Will. Don’t do this.”

“I won’t do anything if you’re honest with me, Xander. Now tell your little Willow the truth. Where were you?” Willow demanded, her blood red lips pursed into thin lines as she studied the dark haired man. Buffy couldn’t help but notice how tired and haggard her oldest male friend looked as he sighed.

He inhaled deeply, keeping his eyes downcast. “I went over to see Buffy,” he admitted quietly, like a little boy who’d stolen cookies out of the cookie jar.

“You did what?” asked Willow, energy starting to crackle around her fingertips. Buffy could see the strands of black increasing in the redhead’s short hair. The witch backed up several steps at her friend’s confession, pain and shock evident on her face.

“It’s Christmas, Wills. I just didn’t think she should be alone this year after…” Xander swallowed back his tears. “…after everything.”

“Buffy’s getting what she deserves,” Willow said coldly, twisting her pale face into a scowl. “She doesn’t deserve us. She doesn’t deserve anything but pain!”

“She was still our friend once!” Xander insisted. However, when he saw the expression on Willow’s face, he blanched and flinched away.

“Friend? She abandoned us after she came back from…heaven. She was happy to let us live in hell, Xander!”

“What happened here?” Buffy whispered to the unresponsive spirit. “How did things get this bad?”

Of course she could glean snippets of information from what both Willow and Xander had said. Apparently Willow was angry with her, imbuing her former best friend with blame. Buffy didn’t know what she was to blame for but she figured it had to be pretty bad to warrant a reaction like this from the witch. And Willow was an out of control witch by the looks of the magical energy that hummed around her.

Xander looked as if he was close to tears. “Willow, I know you’re mad at her but…”

“But…nothing!”

Willow turned her black eyes toward Xander. Sparks flew from her fingers and coursed through his body before he crumpled to the ground. He yelped in pain as the current tore through him. Tiny tics and jerks rocked him as he lay on the floor, otherwise motionless. For several horrific seconds Buffy believed that he might be dead, but finally he coughed and spluttered as blood ran down his chin.

“No do you see why you shouldn’t disobey me, Xander?” Willow said with faux sweetness. Her face was a mocking parody of the kind young woman she used to be.

“You need to stop this, Willow,” Xander gasped, trying to crawl onto his knees. “Buffy will…”

“Buffy, Buffy, Buffy!” yelled Willow. “Do you still have that silly little crush on her? God, Xan, you even fawned over her when you were with Anya. Never wanted you though, did she? She was too busy bedding the undead. She likes her lovers cold and dead. That bitch doesn’t want a heartbeat. It must be a turn off for her.”

“Stop it, Wills. Can’t you see what the magic is doing to you?”

“The magic lets me see things clearly. You know what I see? I see a sad rejected puppy. You were always the poor friendzoned little Xander, sniffing around after any scraps she deigned to give you. But she’s not here now. I’m here and I’m in charge. That silly little girl couldn’t cut it. Remember Xander?”

“I know,” he whispered harshly, tears leaking from under his closed eyelids.

“Do you know? Remember how she let Anya die? That little demon ran a sword through the woman you love and you still defend her. She’s the reason Tara’s…gone, cold and rotting in the ground. My girlfriend would still be here if Buffy had given a damn! And still, still you side with the little bitch. How could you, Xander?”

Buffy’s hands flew to cup her mouth at Willow’s words. She’d let Anya and Tara die? No! She wouldn’t do that. “I would never do that,” she murmured to herself. “I save lives if I can do it.”

“That wasn’t her fault,” Xander sobbed.

“Wasn’t it? Did you ever think that maybe she just didn’t care enough? Think of all the people she couldn’t save Xander. She let Anya die, Tara die. Remember Jenny Calendar? She couldn’t even save her. Hell, she even let her puppy-vamp, Spike, die. He burned to dust and she was too freakin’ depressed to even care. She did grieve for that pathetic excuse for a vampire though. Remember that? Remember how she was so busy grieving for her undead sex-toy that she let the rest of us go to hell? That girl was as useless as a friend as she was as a slayer.”

Buffy’s heart cracked as she soaked in Willow’s cruel words. She supposed that in some ways she had been a bad friend and a bad slayer. In the past two years, maybe even longer, her own needs had taken precedence over anything else. Her desire to be normal, her need for acceptance, her wish to stop the pain…they had all engulfed her and twisted her into an unfeeling dead shell.

Faith had been right when she told Buffy that she was just becoming empty, a shell with no substance. But the blonde didn’t want to be that way anymore. She wouldn’t stand by and watch innocents die. And she refused to continue to be a passive observer in her own life.

With a heavy heart she watched as Willow stormed away, leaving a desolate Xander weeping alone on the cold wooden floor. It broke Buffy’s heart to see the scene that had just played out in front of her. She didn’t want to watch these horrifying caricatures of her friends any longer.

“I don’t want to see any more of this, Spirit,” Buffy said. “Please don’t make me see any more!”

She couldn’t take it. Her heart and mind couldn’t stand to have any more pain heaped onto them. This future was so bleak, so horrible, that the guilt it stirred up was almost causing her to implode. Added to the fact that not long ago she’d watched Spike dust and it was a nightmare. It was horrible.

All she could concentrate on was the fact that maybe she could have done something differently or better to give her friends a better future. If she hadn’t gotten caught up in her own pain then she could have helped them.

And she vowed she would.

She would change what she could change.

She would save them all if that was possible. Of course, she couldn’t save Jenny. Even a Slayer couldn’t travel through time as far as she knew. But she could save those that were still in her lives.

And her thoughts landed on Spike once again.

Even though she knew that her focus should be on her friends’ horribly bleak futures, she couldn’t seem to erase the image from her mind of him burning up into dust. It was indelibly printed there, maybe forever. But that wasn’t his future that she’d seen. It was his present.

Did that mean that it was too late to change it already?

God, she hoped not.

If she could change that, save him and keep him by her side then she was sure that the future wouldn’t play out this way. Things would be different. They would be better.

Apparently the spirit had shown her all it wanted to show her of this terrible place and the winds whipped through her hair once again as they moved to the desolate waste ground of an old cemetery. Although it was dim with the fading light on the horizon, Buffy could make out some of the names on the stones.

However, there was one in particular that caught her eye. She ran to the stone, tripping over the overgrown grass underneath her feet but she paid no attention to that. All that mattered was confirming her worst fear and when she did the headstone’s inscription stabbed at her heart. Feeling another bout of tears coming on she sank to her knees in front of it shaking her head in denial.

Dawn Summers: 1986 – 2004

“Not Dawnie. No, she can’t be gone,” Buffy whispered, tracing the gray stone with her fingertips. “Why would she die? How?” She whirled on the spirit, not even trying to hide her tears and red, blotchy face. “Tell me how I can stop this? How can I save my sister, Spirit?”

The lack of reply from the black cloaked ghost infuriated her. She wanted to scream like a wildcat, tackle it to the ground and claw at it until it was nothing but shreds of blood, skin and bone.

Before she could act on her feral impulses, the approach of another, macabre figure stunned her. With heartbreaking shock she stared at the emaciated image of her future self. The Buffy who was approaching slowly was a mess. Her hair looked as though it hadn’t been brushed in months. Similarly her clothes were disheveled and ragged but her alternate self didn’t seem to care.

“Hello, Dawn,” future-Buffy said coldly to the headstone. “I guess I had to come see you today. You always were the one who just loved this damn holiday.” She let out a bitter little chuckle, shaking her head. “It’s been five years since you died. Can you believe that? Five years since your little cutting habit killed you?”

“Dawn died from cutting herself?” Buffy asked the spirit, not taking her gaze away from her future self. She growled a little when the spirit didn’t reply, not that she’d expected it.

“Of course you can’t because you’re the lucky one that doesn’t have to believe anything now,” continued the future version of the Slayer. “You’re at peace and I’m stuck here in this hell. And all alone. Xander didn’t come again this year. It’s been four years since he visited me. I’m not blame-y girl though. I wouldn’t want to visit me either.” For a moment her voice faltered and future-Buffy shut her eyes as if she was about to cry. However, she quickly recovered. “I miss you Dawn. I’m sure I’ll see you soon.”

As Buffy watched her older counterpart walk away she shivered at how…sterile…her older self had become. There was no warmth in her manner, no gleam in her eyes. She truly was a dead shell without feelings.

“Is that how I’ve been acting?” she whispered to herself. “I’ve let my sister die and I can’t even bring myself to care?”

Her Slayer instincts rose up, overriding her grief and fear and she stood strong, meeting the ghost’s red gaze. “Tell me what I can do! I won’t allow this to happen. I died to protect my sister and I won’t let her die! I was born to save this world and I will save it and all of the people I care about.”

For a moment Buffy thought an expression of sympathy passed over the spirit’s shrouded face but it was gone almost instantaneously. She realized then that this other being wouldn’t help her. Her future was in her own hands.

It was hers to determine one way or another.

And she could mold it however she wanted.

As soon as the epiphany surged through her, the winds start to swirl around her once again and she coughed as they seemed to choke her with their ferocity. The ground rocked under her feet, everything around her dissolving from black to white to color.

When the images around her became clear once again she almost wished they hadn’t.

Right there in front of her she was confronted with the picture of her own mortality. The one thing that, as a Slayer, she both feared and craved in equal measure.

Buffy shrieked at the image of her own lifeless body, lying discarded on the ground. There was no one to bury her corpse this time. No one to help her.

She was dead again. And this time by her own hand.

The bloody razor blade that still dangled from her fingers was proof of what her future self had done. She’d slashed her own veins open and bled out on the bathroom floor. A pair of green eyes stared sightlessly from the corpse, accusing, guilty, and tormented all at the same time.

She couldn’t believe she would do this. How desperate would her life have to become to commit suicide? And then she realized that she’d been close to committing such an act for months. Every time she went on patrol she would act careless around the vampires and demons that challenged her. Sometimes she even craved the release of death from them.

But they had never been successful because Spike had been there to stop them.

Spike!

He would have stopped this, but he couldn’t. She’d seen him burn outside of his crypt. If he wasn’t there to support her, to help her, to love her, she knew for sure now that she would be lost.

But the fact that the future is unwritten allowed that tiny glimmer of hope leaked through to her heart. However, Spike had burned in the present and yet something told her that the last spirit wouldn’t have shown her that image if there was nothing she could do to alter it. Things could be different.

The future could be wonderful.

But with or without him she was determined that it wouldn’t work out this way. Not just because she had a duty to the world as a Slayer, but also because she loved her friends and her sister and she didn’t want them to turn out this way.

“No!” she yelled at the hooded spirit. “This doesn’t have to happen! I won’t let it happen. I’m not gonna give up, Spirit. I won’t!”

The mute spirit cocked its head as it looked at the raging Slayer, but she didn’t stop. Tears coursed down her face and the girl kept on muttering, not even noticing the spreading pool of blood on the ground. She stepped forward to take a closer look at her own dead body but she didn’t realize the floor was slippery.

As she went tumbling to the ground she let out a little squeal of pain. When her head connected with the hard tile and she dissolved into blackness her last thought was that it couldn’t end this way. If fate allowed her another chance then she would make things right.

She would make things better.





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