A Tale of An Alternate Sunnydale
By Troll Princess
Let me give you an idea of my current situation at the exact moment that we're interrupting my life. I am, as I write, being held against the back wall of the UC Sunnydale library by some rank vampire with a severe case of copper breath who has threatened to turn my head into a flotation device. Then again, now, it's later. So obviously, I win. Surprise. But anyway, sweaty, pissed-off vampire ready to kill me. Not good. Never, ever good. Stake. I needed a stake. He leaned close as I groped at my waist with the hand he hadn't grabbed in Patented Vice Grip #4. I could have sworn I had an extra stake tucked away under my shirt. My hand flailed against my hip as he exhaled hot death breath in my face. "I'll bet you taste like apples and cinnamon," he said, in one of those raspy voices you get if you're either a heavy smoker or possessed by Satan. A meaty, dirty finger dragged down my cheek. "All sweet and innocent. My, oh my." I swear, I don't make this stuff up. "Innocent? Me? Who do you think I am, that chick from 'Sound of Music'?" His game face went ... well, gamey as his face moved towards my neck. "Shh," he whispered in my ear, "don't speak. Just be tasty." Oh, come on, I know I've got a stupid wooden ... damn it, where the hell was it? Stall, you moron, stall ... "Well," I said, squirming under his grasp, "I guess I could be a little tasty, or something, with the vanilla body spray and the cucumber cream rinse and --" Maybe on my left side? I know for a fact I had a stake on me. "Who knows? I mean, I probably taste like ice cream --" I waited, tense, nervous, just knowing that this was the night. This was the night the Slayer was going down for good. It took me a few seconds to realize the vamp had stopped moving. He pulled back a little, stared deep into my eyes, and said, with much eloquence and charm, "Ow." And then he exploded into dust. The pencil that had killed him for good dropped to the ground from where it'd been floating. I couldn't help it. I picked up the pencil, frowned, and said, "'Ow'? Those are your final words?" "Don't you mean 'word'?" A familiar voice came from behind me as someone pushed through the bushes to stand behind me. I shrugged and stuck the pencil behind my ear. "Whatever," I said, as I turned around. "I mean, come on. 'Ow'? Whatever happened to, 'You may kill me, but my minions will work your ass all over town'?" "Ooo, look. Now I'm in a visual place." The man-boy I was staring at, one Xander Harris -- ex-boyfriend, current co-best friend, and practicing Wiccan, emphasis on the "practicing" -- grinned as he plucked the pencil from behind my ear and handed me a sharpened stake. "By the way, you dropped this." "I knew I had one," I grumbled, tucking it back in my jacket. I was going to thank him for finding it for me, but the sneezing made me pause. Xander's smile widened. Xander thinks it's cute that vamp dust in the air makes me sneeze. We're also talking about the same guy who started learning Wicca so that he could go invisible and sit in the girls' locker room, though, so I think his view of the world is just way too off base. "Maybe you're allergic," he said, as we started walking back to the Magic Box. That thought brightened my day. "Hey, that'd be nice. Maybe I could weasel a vacation out of it. Think Book Boy would accept a doctor's note?" "Honestly? I doubt it." "Darn. By the way, you're getting good at that pencil trick." "I've been practicing," he said. Then added, almost as if I hadn't in my head, "Again." "Who would have thought? Xander Harris, willingly studying something. Isn't that the first sign of the coming apocalypse?" He cocked an eyebrow as he glanced over at me in the darkness. "I've lived on the Hellmouth too long. Joke, right?" But he was smiling when he said it, and he took my hand when we got to the bike path, just like he had when we'd been going out back in senior year. I've got to give Xander credit, though. For all the teasing I tossed his way when he first started up with the witchcraft gig, the guy got so into the whole studying witchcraft thing that it led right into Studying For School Land. Which somehow had led into the Land of UC Sunnydale Students. Would wonders ever cease. Xander swung our joined hands together as he said, "Tomorrow, I'm going for something heavier. I'm thinking Uncle Roary's car. Still brand spanking painted in the garage." Oh, please. "Xander, don't be an idiot." "Hey, is that the old Cordelia Chase I hear?" he asked in mock surprise. "I thought we killed her and buried her in her backyard." So I punched him in the arm. He winced and grabbed at the spot where I'd hit him, and I smiled sympathetically. I couldn't help it if my fists left big honking bruises. After all, that was all part of being Cordelia Chase, Sunnydale's resident vampire slayer.
Shelby wasn't his name.
No normal person would name their son Shelby. Not any normal person he knew, anyway. Pause. Rewind. He didn't know any persons. Not yet, anyway. So whether or not they named their sons Shelby ...
Well, hell, it didn't matter to him. Not when he had the key to power over the Hellmouth in his grasp.
But what he had to do before he went searching for any keys was watch television.
This was something Shelby had never made a habit of. And until one of his contacts had brought him a videotape he said held precious secrets to controlling the power that drew all manner of evil -- even the evil that had decided he'd be a Shelby -- he'd managed to avoid television altogether.
With the exception of that odd "Days of Our Lives" fixation in 1994. But he digressed.
Shelby had a sewer all to himself, which was nice. In Sunnydale, aboveground realty was easy to get and cheap. Belowground, the tunnel strewn with garbage he'd managed to secure was worth a pretty penny, and even a few ugly ones.
It was settling into the reclining chair that had given him the most trouble, though. Maneuvering his tail underneath him, and all that. The tape was just starting to scream out rather offensive guitar licks right about the moment Shelby was wiggling his tail out from under one of his hooves.
He was already comfortable the second "Starring Sarah Michelle Gellar" flashed on the screen.