Disclaimer: I don't own Buffy or its characters, the same for Panzer Dragoon Saga, the inspiration for this story

Do They Really Breath Fire?

Prologue.

Buffy walked along in one of Sunnydale's many cemeteries, only this time Buffy didn't know which she was in, but it seemed familiar.

The cemetery was covered with a thick fog, Buffy could barely see, but the occasional silhouette of a headstone let her know she hadn't wandered out of the cemetery. What was strange about tonight, was that Buffy had no weapons with her, and neither did she seem to care, she just seemed to want to walk onward.

The cemetery was deathly quiet, usually, it was quiet in cemeteries, but you could hear insects, the wind, the rustling of trees and bushes, and on occasion, an owl. But tonight all she could hear was her own breathing. Not even a vampire could sneak up on her, the noise of it clothes rustling alone would be heard in the silence.

Buffy wasn't looking for vampires to stake of demons to slay either, she knew she was looking for something, but for some reason the details escaped her. But her current lack of memory wasn't bothering her, she was there for a reason, she knew that much.

The fog was thickening as she walked, and she finally reached a small headstone. Its form slowly appearing in front of her out of the thick white fog.

The fog thickening by the second, she could see no further than a couple of steps in any direction. It appeared like the world was shrinking around her. The moisture in the air was vaguely like that of getting out the shower, and breathing in the steam, only this was cold.

Buffy decided to sit on the headstone, she didn't know why, she wasn't tired, and it wouldn't help her tell where she was.

By now, she rarely looked at the name on the headstones she sat on, after the tenth time you look at the name, then a few minutes later a vampire pops out the grave, and you have to kill it while knowing it name and age, it got depressing. But tonight she checked the new looking headstone in the dim light anyway.

The headstone was blank. No name or other writing was on the stone of any kind, the headstone seemed completely as new, not a smear of dirt, a chip or a scratch, but the earth around the grave was undisturbed, as if it had been placed there only as a convenient seat.

Buffy sat back down on the unmarked stone, and looked up; she saw only fog, and a small faint light of the moon, barely recognisable, in the blur of the mist.

Then suddenly the flapping of huge wings, the beat slow and constant, filled the air and broke the total silence, each beat of the wings echoed for several seconds making it seem as though there was several creatures in the sky, and then a large dark shadowy form past over Buffy's head. Buffy didn't know whether or not the dark creatures outline was its shadow or its dark form in the fog.

The fog swirled because of the breeze created by the beast's nature given way of staying airborne. For a moment the moon became clearer, the heavy air displaced.

It, whatever it was, flew above Buffy in a wide arc then moved off in the direction it had come, or sounded so, it was impossible to tell by sight. In her brief sight of it Buffy had seen it had large wings, a pointed head, and a long agile tail, and may or may not have seen a faint green light, as the apparition flew overhead.

The sound of the air being manipulated by the monster's strong limbs echoed in the distance for a few more seconds then ceased to be. The fog stilled, and once again became a white, unmoving soup.

Buffy was surprisingly nonchalant after seeing it, and looked back to the ground, where the mist had begun to clear, and decided it was time to start walking again, she stood and began to walk away.

After a few steps, she had felt compelled to turn and look back, the headstone she had been sitting on, now looked old, weathered and cracked; Buffy doubted it could now support her weight, without crumbling to dust.

Buffy had seen many weathered tombstones and crypts, and had learned to estimate with relative accuracy the age of things in a cemetery, and this stone was now at least 150 years old. Also, instead of untouched ground, the grave was open, freshly dug.

Buffy walked to the headstone again, and looked at where the writing should be, this time there was writing, a lot, but it had faded like the memory of a book read long ago, only a few words could be made out: 'forgotten, wings, chosen one' and near the bottom 'Hellmouth', the rest had faded, and was never going to be read again.

Buffy turned her attention from the writing and looked into the deep black hole; mist seemed to be creeping into the grave, as if being sucked in by an unknown force. But as she looked, she began to see a faint green light; it got brighter and brighter, until it was bright enough to light the area around the grave.

It then floated up from the grave, and Buffy could see it was a small golf ball sized centre with a cloud of green with an almost water like mist, she could tell it was not water, because wisps of the substance were trailing off of the ball like small sprouts of smoke. The core was bright, and the mist around it also seemed to give of its own glow, though less impressive. It stopped dead still, level with Buffy's face, it felt as though the sphere of energy was looking at her.

The fog had lost its pure white and now begun to faintly glow a light greenish blue. It also starting swirling as if there was a light breeze, but the deadly silence, and stillness of the air remained.

Buffy suddenly felt compelled to touch the light, she didn't know why, and just lifted he arm and went to touch it. Her fingertips moved through the outer mist layer with ease, but there was a feeling of static electricity, like one would feel when putting their palm against a TV screen. The mist swirled in and around her hand, her fingertips touched the core of the light then, a bright green flash blinded Buffy. And there was a voice, it echoed through the silence like it was said in an empty theatre, the voice was deep, appearing to be a man's voice, and he spoke in a way someone would talk to themselves, quiet and thoughtful. Buffy had never heard the voice before. "It was an ominous light, someone once said" the disembodied voice echoed. Buffy had a gut feeling that the man who spoke those words, was from the past, and long dead now.

Then the intense light vanished, replaced by blurriness, and white, it took Buffy a few seconds to realise she was looking at her bedroom ceiling.

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She realised she had just had a dream, a very strange dream, and it was now morning, however the weirdness of the dream suddenly hit Buffy, and she lie and thought about it for several minutes, but unable to make sense of it, finally decided to get up. And vowed never again to eat day old reheated pizza again.

It was reasonably early on Saturday morning; the weather seemed good by the light coming through the curtains, it appeared to be sunny.

It had been a month now, since Tara had died and Willow had gone on a rampage, since then, Xander had been spending most of his time with her, or around her in general. He had reclaimed the title of being Willows best friend again. He now worked the evening shifts, so when he was at work Buffy was there to stay with Willow. Xander slept between the time he got home in the early hours of the morning, until just before Willow returned from her morning classes she was taking at college to make up lost progress, which was usually just after noon.

Willow herself, had been dealing quite well, the first week had been the worst, she hadn't really stopped crying or apologizing, but after the first week, they had finally got it through to her that they didn't blame her. Xander's care had helped immensely, at the end of the day, Xander knew Willow better than everyone else, even more than Tara. Xander had took Willow back to his place after saving her on the mountain, he had comforted her there, he left a message on Buffy's answer machine, and Buffy had made sure the rest of the gang were okay, and called him back. Once Buffy had told him about their other friends, and them being alright, Buffy had asked about Willow, and Xander said she was back, and safe. He had said the "She's safe" with an absolution that told Buffy that was how it was going to stay.

Meanwhile Buffy had been getting out of her depressions and had also focused a lot of her attention on Willow, but also Dawn, and even beginning to teach her how to fight.

Giles and Anya had spent time organising and supervising the reconstruction of the shop. Luckily the insurance investigation had not disproved their story about a gas leak and explosion, as no other evidence could be found to prove another theory.

And Buffy had also noticed, a couple or cigarette butts around her front lawn, so either spike was back, or some people had decided to make a collection of cigarette butts on her lawn for the sake of it, perhaps some drunks had decided to build a monument of some kind, but its unlikely. Buffy doubted there were any real tobacco god worshipers, but if there was, she had no idea why they would chose her front lawn as their holy land.

Buffy had been surprised to find spike missing, and after she failed to find him after a couple of weeks decided he had left, for good or not she hadn't known, but she had doubted he would stay away for long, he never did. However his lack of appearance since his apparent return was an obvious sign to her that he didn't want to talk or see them for now, so unless she was in need of him, she would leave him alone until he showed himself.

After Buffy was dressed she went down for breakfast, as it was still early there was only Xander there, waiting for Willow to wake up, so he wouldn't leave her to fall too deeply into depression, it was routine now. Xander practically lived there.

Buffy had asked him if he should leave willow with some breathing space and he had said that if she was irritated at him, she couldn't be extremely upset over Tara at the same time, it made sense, although so far willow seemed to want the attention, and not to be alone, Xander was all to willing to give it to her.

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However, there was something out of the ordinary, instead of sitting eating breakfast in front of the TV still half asleep, he was today, alert and seemed interested in the news presenter on the screen, as Buffy drew closer he turned to speak to her. Buffy neglected to tell him about the cornflake stuck to his chin.

"Mornin' Buff" Xander began "I've been watching the news, and it looks like there's a new demon, or possibly a new big bad in town." He said, pointing in the direction of the screen. He looked serious, but it was hard to take him seriously while he looked like he was turning into a cornflake man with messy hair.

"Really? What's the news? What does it look like?" Buffy was interested, it wasn't often new demons were on the news; most demons kept a low profile, especially bad ones. She managed not to smirk at Xander's appearance.

"Apparently, last night, a group of people saw this big flying thing, apparently huge, and had huge wings and a tail, they also say something about a faint green light, but they didn't sound too sure, anyway, these people were not drunk or high, but they are high school kids, they're not taking them seriously, but as you know, a story that turns out to be a prank is far less likely than a story that turns out to be true in this town." Xander explained, with a grin at the end. His explanation was funny to watch as he tried to balance his bowl of cornflakes on his chest. "No real leads though, so not much to go on" he added as an after thought.

Buffy was stunned, it sounded remarkably similar to whatever it was she saw in her dream, and the green light, it couldn't be a coincidence, there was definitely something going on.

"What's Wrong Buff?" Xander asked, or tried to, with a mouthful of cornflakes.