TITLE: Ghost Among the Machinery
AUTHOR: Sanguinary
COPYRIGHT: May 21, 2001
DISTRIBUTION: Ask and ye shall receive.
RATING: PG
CATEGORY: Drama, Random Thoughts
IMPROV: 16. Shippy goodness.
SPOILERS: General season 5.
DISCLAIMER: Joss and the WB own both Buffy and Angel. I'm just borrowing them for my own
devious reasons.
FEEDBACK: Crave it. Send to Sanguinary_515@hotmail.com
SUMMARY: Willow remembers...
AUTHORS NOTE: Written while listing to Genesis' "The Lamb Lies Down On Broadway". Could you
tell?

~~~

Outside, the sun has set.

And another night has begun.

I can see figures moving among the dust. Whether they are friend or foe has yet to be
discovered. Friends may bring comfort. Foes may bring oblivion.

And I don't care one way or the other.

I was real, a million years ago. I was alive and I was happy and I watched the sun set over
the ocean.

A million years ago.

When she died, the world died. The mouth of Hell was opened and it spilled its toxin across the
worlds. All things died. And that's left is the dry skeleton of a forgotten world.

When the sun is high in the sky, I can see remainders of a world where once I live. A world
that held hope and had a saviour that would lead us to paradise. A world that once held love
and hate.

Now there is nothing.

When the moon rises, I can see the shambling remains of two species. Neither demon nor human,
these lumbering hybrids walk a world where there is only death.

Part of me wants it to end. But I am dead and for the dead there is no end.

There is only nothingness...

I was a girl.

I was a girl with red hair and green eyes.

I was a girl with red hair and green eyes who laughed and sang and danced.

I was a girl with red hair and green eyes who laughed and sang and danced in a world where I
was alive and everything was alive.

I was...

My names have been lost.

What I was has been vanished in the wasteland of time. Another speck of sand in the desert
doesn't mean much.

I am hidden in the corridors of a structure that I called home. I am just another ghost amid
the remnants of civilization. Or is that a ghost among the machinery?

All I remember is them.

Friends and enemies united as one when the God opened the doorway. I was left screaming in the
ruins. I died in the corridor.

I don't know what happened to the others.

I only know that I'm dead. And so are they.

Even those who I though were immortal must be dead by now. Ash on the ground but none in the
air. There's no wind anymore. Hasn't been any wind for a thousand years.

I miss the wind.

I miss the way rain runs slick down your face. I miss the way that you'd dance across the lawn
as the sun rose, covering you with orange and yellow. I miss your laugh and they way it would
echo off the buildings. I miss your voice, soft like a ... a...

Sponge.

Holey, empty sponge like your mind after God put Her hands on your head and took you away.

I miss you Tara.

I know your name. I still know your name.

Nothing else remains.

Nothing of what I was remains but your name.

Tara.

My body, or what is left of it, is just a pile of dust lying in this corridor. I can't remember
my name. I can't remember my age or my sex or my favourite colour. I can't remember my laugh
or my smile.

But I remember everything about you.

Blond hair, those deep eyes. Your smile. Your laugh. You smelt like fresh flowers. You wore
dresses and you did magic. You went insane when God to your mind.

You died at God's feet.

The others dragged me away as I screamed for you. And when they let go of me, I ran back to
you.

Somewhere along the way I was trapped in her and I died her.

I still love you.

My mind is almost gone now. In a few more days or a few more years there won't be anything left
of me.

But there still might be you.

Outside, the sun has set.

And another night has begun.

~End~