"SHARPE'S SLAYERS"
TTH Fic challenge #690, Buffy/Sharpe crossover
Crossposted to Twisting The Hellmouth
PAIRINGS: None at this stage.
TIMING: Post Season Seven, before Buffy departs for Europe. A few weeks after "Chosen", the gang has relocated to Cleveland while future plans are laid. Sharpe-verse wise, this takes place between "Sharpe's Enemy" and "Sharpe's Honour". I am placing this in the movie-verse, since I am more familiar with them than the books and have no desire to make big canonical mistakes. Also, who can resist Sean Bean?
Thanks for the plot bunny Starbug! I look forward to this one!
All the usual disclaimers apply.
ContextThe Peninsular Campaign of the Napoleonic Wars lasted from 1808 until 1814. In 1813, under the command of Arthur Wellesley, Viscount of Wellington (later Duke of Wellington), the British forces went on the offensive and drove the French forces northward, out of Portugal and Spain and off the Iberian Peninsula. The Battle of Waterloo was the culmination of the offensive in 1815. The story takes place in early spring 1813, during the preparations for Wellesley's push into Northern Spain.
Chapter One: Cakes and String
Eyes blazing and face contorted, Faith lashed out at Buffy with a combo guaranteed to snap both of a lesser mortal's shins. Buffy skipped backward and retaliated with a spinning backfist, using her opponent' s own momentum to increase the force of the blow. Faith shuddered as it connected, then swung upward and caught Buffy a glancing bow across the jaw that snapped her head back and gave Faith the advantage to move in for a couple of perfectly placed body blows that landed with several fleshy thuds. Buffy grunted and neatly tripped the dark slayer, who stumbled momentarily before regaining her footing. The two slayers circled each other, bloodied and battered and starting to bruise. Faith wiped inelegantly at the trickle of blood from her nose with a sleeve and snorted.
"Not sure why we're bothering with this, B. Not like either of us is actually gonna beat the other one."
Buffy sniffed and rubbed at her shoulder, massaging it briefly. "Practice."
"Right," Faith replied. "No fun sparring with the baby slayers. Its not like they've killed an army of uber vamps or anything. Fragile darlings."
Buffy continued to circle. "You and I are better matched. Older. More experienced."
"More likely to fight dirty?"
"Something like that."
"That red head nearly took you down the other day with a dirty move. They do okay in that department." Faith straightened, dropping out of her fighting crouch and flopping down on the floor of their makeshift practice room with a gusty sigh and stretched, groaning.. "So why do we do this?"
Buffy did not drop her stance, but did cock her head, considering. "Issues", she said at last. Faith nodded.
"Big ones. Shall we go again or grab some dinner?"
Buffy bent to pick up a pair of handaxes, tossed one to Faith and opened her mouth to reply.
Then everything slipped sideways, and the reply was lost.
The stinging on her cheek from where Faith had gotten in a lucky shot was what she noticed first, shortly followed by the fact that the two Slayers were now sprawled inelegantly at the bottom of a gully that seemed to cut through some sort of browned, grassy landscape. Buffy's head whipped around as she caught the sound of Faith gagging behind her. The brunette waved awkwardly as she caught her breath, and muttered "Fine, I'm fine." A cool breeze ruffled the hair around her face, and both slayers looked up at the figure before them.
Champions learned quickly to associate Whistler's appearance with a certain mixture of anticipation and dread. Although Buffy's contact with this agent of the PTB had been fairly limited in the past, she experienced this exact gut reaction when he appeared in front of the two slayers. The short dark haired almost-man was wearing a blue suit so shiny that she could almost see her shocked face reflected in his lapels. He grinned at her.
"Hi there, slayer. Slayers. Welcome to sunnyPortugal. Nice eh?"
Buffy shook her head and stood up.
"What are we doing here?" She looked around at the hilly landscape, mostly browned and muddy, with a few stubby trees doing little to break up the horizon to the west. To the east, a rock outcropping rose darkly against the grey sky. Buffy looked at Faith, who stood up and looked at Whistler, one dark eyebrow raised.
"Yeah. Who are you and what is with that suit?"
The demon didn't take the bait, instead smiling a small smile.
"You've been shifted here to save the world."
There was a pause when both slayers looked at each other with no small degree of incredulity.
Buffy spoke first.
"No. We defeated The First. What else do you want? No more world saving for a while, okay?."
He did not move, instead grinning at her even more broadly. "No such thing as a break, Slayer, and no such thing as defeating the First Evil. The First Evil is in everything. To defeat it you would need to kill everything from soil microbes on up."
"We've had this discussion a bunch of times with Giles, okay?" Faith commented, crossing her arms. "Do you have any other, more cheerful news? Maybe about puppies?"
Whistler regarded the dark slayer's stony expression and blinked at her. A moment of silence passed.
"All that I care about right now is that I've – we've – beaten the First so that it can't cause any trouble in this world. More than normal, anyway. No vampire invasions, no end of the world, no everything turning to Evil. This world is okay," Buffy declared and raised her chin at Whistler, shivering slightly in the chill breeze. "The plans for world domination have been foiled.," she said finally. "And I thought sunny Portugal was supposed to be… sunny."
He did not reply for a moment. Then he cleared his throat. He hated this part.
"There's a way. The First has found a way to change things."
Faith's eyes widened. "Another one? What, are we just made of loopholes now? I thought we did the whole restoring balance thing already."
Whistler nodded. "Yes, the First Evil was only able to reappear because of Buffy's resurrection, and that balance has been restored in full. This is unexpected, but not impossible. And quite in character, really."
Buffy blinked. "I'm sorry, what?"
"Time." Whistler swallowed. "And its chilly because its early spring at this time and there's a storm rolling in."
Buffy made an impatient gesture. "Time? What about time? Time to do what?"
The demon shook his head. "Not time to do something. Time. As in time and space. The building blocks of your reality. The blocks have… well… chinks in them. Points of weakness. The First has found one."
"So the First is… traveling back in time?" Buffy frowned. "I'm still lost."
Whistler paused to take a breath. "Time and space are completely relative. Everything exists and is happening on a quantum level in the here and now. As we speak, pyramids are being built, the roman empire is rising, Isaac Newton is making his big discovery, Hitler is shaving for the first time– linear time is a construct that makes everything easier to understand. Time isn't a line. Think of time as a layer cake, where each layer of sponge and cream exist in the same space and time as the previous layer. Get it?"
Buffy frowned. "Time space cake. Got it. Sort of. Whatever. Is the lecture necessary?"
Whistler nodded. "Not strictly I suppose, but it'll help. Each layer of the cake has a certain point of weakness where it meets the other layers. Not a physical point, since all the layers exist at once, more like a psychic weakness. The First is exploiting one of these weaknesses to change something about you in its favour."
"Its going back to wipe me out completely? But then it would never get the chance to rise at all. I thought this worked a little differently, like, if you change one thing in the past, everything changes in the future?"
"You're catching on, kids." Whistler looked pleased. "Lets leave the cake for the moment, and move on to the string." He produced a piece of string from his pocket and held it in front of her face.
"We've gone from cake to string?" Faith frowned at him. "Are you sure you know what you're talking about?"
He looked pained, and held the string horizontally taut in front of them, his fingertips several inches from either end. Buffy noticed they were unnervingly without any texture.
"This string is the chain of cause and effect that has shaped your reality as you know it. All along the length of the string, cause followed by effect, effect becomes cause to be followed by another effect and so on. Humans mistake cause and effect for Time and Space. Generally speaking, things which dwell within the chain of cause and effect are subject to its laws. You, for example, could not change something back here – " he twitched his left hand, "without everything from that point on changing. To some extent, The First is also constrained by this most basic of laws. The cause – the resurrection – created the effect – the imbalance that allowed the First to reach for ascendance. With me so far?"
The slayers glanced at each other and nodded.
"Good. Okay, so here we have the chain of cause and effect. Unbreakable, immovable, right?"
They nodded again. He shook his head.
"Wrong. Unbreakable, yes. Immovable, no. If you know how, you can bend the string, knot it, so that a cause here – " he twitched his left hand again, "will not take effect until here." He twitched his right hand, then looped the string so that both points touched and crossed over an inch from either end. Buffy regarded it for a moment.
"So, The First is going to cause something to happen in the past which will not take effect until after I was resurrected? Something that will wipe me out of history, so there is no Slayer to stop Its ascendance?"
Whistler looked genuinely disappointed. Buffy felt annoyed. She had more or less kept up with his cakes and string Intro to Vaudeville Physics act, why the disappointment?
"Not you, Buffy. You are too intricately interwoven into this chain. But there is another slayer. Remember?"
His gaze flicked to Faith.
She blinked several times and stared at the string that the blue suited demon held in front of her face. Her gaze flicked to Buffy, then back to Whistler.
"Boy," she said conversationally. "And here was I thinking smart guys were sexy." She rose and pushed past Whistler to pace a few steps then turn back when she reached the edge of a patch of glutinous looking mud.
"The First is going to time travel and wipe out my great great grandfather or something? To stop me coming into existence?"
Whistler shook his head. "No, you'll come into existence, you'll just blink out of it at a rather crucial moment. Say, just before the fight with the First. Or even earlier. Say, perhaps, leaving Angelus as an ally of the First."
Faith swore under her breath. "So, how do we stop it? Do we need to find the magic scissors to cut the magic thread of time or something?"
"You need to meet the threat where it occurs," Whistler said after a moment.
"Of course," Buffy responded, "that's what we do. Where is it occurring now?"
Whistler looked at Faith, who nodded. "I'm in on this in a big way. Point me at the thing to hit." She glanced at Buffy, standing beside her. "It's what we do. Besides… I'm just starting to kind of like my existence again."
Whistler smiled an odd, Mona Lisa sort of smile, then nodded. "Alrighty then. Lets move quickly. Time, as they say, is of the essence."
"Any idea what we're facing?" Faith asked as Buffy handed her one of the handaxes. The demon shrugged.
"Demons. Irriak Demons. Can cause a lot of havoc and bloodshed."
Faith raised her eyebrows. "So… average run of the mill havoc and bloodshed demons then?"
"No,", Buffy interjected, "I've read about Irriak Demons somewhere. I think they're mind controllers, aren't they?"
Whistler nodded. "Mind controllers that induce havoc and bloodshed by creating paranoia and panic."
Behind Buffy, Faith straightened her denim jacket after tucking the hand axe into her belt..
"How do we kill them?"
The demon nodded at the hand axe. "That oughta do it."
Buffy held up both hands. "Whoa, buster. Not so fast! I'm having a memory! They assume the form of a human by … oh, what was it?"
Whistler blinked. He did not reply.
Buffy frowned. "Oh, yeah, they inhabit the skin of a man to cause dissension among his friends." She made a face. "They're carrion eaters, so they'll be going for a maximum body count then tucking in to the buffet. They' re found mostly on battlefields, I think."
Faith turned to Whistler.
"If these things look like humans, how can we pick them? And, can we kill them?"
Whistler shrugged. "You're the slayers."
"So, let me get this straight," Buffy said sharply, directing her no-more-messing-around gaze toward Whistler. "The First has stuck a few of these Irriak things in the way of Faith's great great grandfather or whatever? He's, what, a farmer in Portugal? When exactly are we?"
From the east, where the low rock bluff thrust upward toward the dark clouds, a rifle shot rang out, and the breeze, rapidly becoming a wind, carried the sound of a shout. Buffy frowned.
"Irriaks are mostly found on battlefields," she muttered, and grabbed Whistler by his shiny lapels. "When?"
He swallowed. "The year is 1813, a few years off from the battle of Waterloo. This will become known as the Peninsular Campaign."
Something tugged at the back of Buffy's brain, something from half forgotten college classes.
"The Napoleonic War? You've landed us in the middle of the Napoleonic War?"
Faith glanced around as the wind picked up pace and a fat drop of water fell from the sky and thudded into the dust at her feet. "The Napoleon War? So, what, some French guys are marching across Europe? Led by a tiny man on a horse?"
More shots rang out from the bluff. Buffy squinted and made out some low, earth coloured buildings squashed against one side of its base.
Whistler pointed at the cluster of buildings. "Keep your wits about you." He grinned at them. "Things aren't always as they seem. I'll be back for you." A loud thud, what sounded like artillery fire, came from the top of the bluff. Both slayers turned toward the sound, and exchanged glances, before turning back to Whistler. He was gone.
Major Richard Sharpe was in a tricky spot. He was crouched behind a large sand coloured boulder at the top of a low bluff, his unit deployed around him, similarly crouched and alert. The Chosen Men of the 95th had been dodging a French patrol for most of the day, and when the patrol headed northwest instead of due west after Sharpe and his Men, things seemed to have been looking up. Even the setting sun and the distant storm rumbling in across the eastern horizon couldn't dampen the men's relief at evading the larger French patrol group on open ground. They had continued to head west, under orders to meet up with a group of cacaderos and escort them to a British position not more than two days travel further southwest. The ambush had come fast, as the unit crossed a small gully. The French patrol had joined their main body of troops – an entire regiment by the feel of it – and, after the initial volley of shots in the gully, pursued them almost casually to this very spot and had pinned them behind these boulders for half an hour under a cover of precise sniping at any movement. Night approached too rapidly, and with it the storm. Sharpe squinted out into the gathering gloom at the French position. He was uncomfortable with this set up; he felt as though he and his men had been… herded somehow to this spot. He cursed himself thrice over for allowing it to happen. The Chosen Men were effectively trapped, held fast to this position by the French infantry. For Richard Sharpe, however, there was always a back door somewhere… Sergeant Patrick Harper's boots scraping the sandy soil as he slid down next to him broke his concentration on the French position. The Major turned to the large Irishman expectantly.
"And?"
Harper nodded. "We found it. Seems clear at the bottom, no Frenchies, just some farm buildings at the base. Looks deserted. Purefoy's half way down already. Good lad that."
Sharpe flashed his Sergeant a quick smile, his teeth pale in the storm's gloom. A few fat drops of rain hit his forehead. "Aye. Purefoy's a good lad. We'll see how he takes to being a Chosen Man, eh? Now, we should make good our escape. Get Harris down, Cooper and Perkins and I must stay til the last to keep the Frenchies busy. Head for the buildings below and we'll regroup there." He looked at Harper to be sure he was understood. The Sergeant nodded and, crouching low, headed once more the edge of the bluff. He let out a long low whistle, and several of the Chosen Men followed him. Sharpe watched them for a minute, then turned back to face the French position and, motioning to Riflemen Cooper and Perkins, raised his rifle to his shoulder. He squeezed off a shot, directed randomly, and was answered by several in return. Cooper and Perkins followed suit. He could hear scrapes and grunts as the remaining members of the unit eased themselves over the edge of the bluff, following the rough path that Harper and Purefoy had discovered. More shots followed from the French rifles positioned closest to Sharpe's position. He motioned to Perkins, and then to the lanky Isaiah Cooper, and both swiftly followed their comrades over the edge leaving Sharpe alone. He edged backward toward his escape route, and squeezed off a few more shots. From below, faintly, a whistle – the men were down and, presumably, heading toward the farm buildings. Sharpe grinned broadly and let himself over the edge of the bluff as the sun began to touch the western horizon, the heavens opened and the rain began to fall.
The way down was sliding on wet gravel and slithering through gaps in rocks and at one point nearly losing balance and falling down the more direct route to the bottom – but eventually, Sharpe reached the base of the bluff and landed in a crouch. He stood, checked his rifle, and wiped the rain from his face. Perkins materialized beside him in the heavy rain, his teeth shining as he grinned at his commanding officer.
"Good to see you sir. I volunteered to wait for you while the others secured the farmstead."
Sharpe clapped the younger man on the shoulder. "Good lad, Ben Perkins." He scanned the bluff above and the land around them, expecting pursuit. He frowned when he saw none, and followed Corporal Perkins toward the dark buildings a short distance away.
The cluster of earth coloured buildings was a small farmstead with a one-room cottage and two outbuildings. The more Harper looked around it, the more uncomfortable he felt. There were vegetables in the small garden, scrappy and struggling, but tended. The buildings looked to be in decent condition, cared for, not as one might expect from a farm that was in all other respects deserted. He supposed that the inhabitants had been scared off by the French forces, or perhaps had abandoned the land as the conflict drew near. Odd noises drew his attention past the cottage to where, a short distance away, a dozen well fed sheep and a nervous looking shaggy pony milled uneasily in a well built pen by the farthest outbuilding. Harper shook his head. No farmer would leave as abruptly as this, and leave his stock behind him. He headed for the door of the cottage and opened it slowly with the muzzle of his rifle, half expecting French infantrymen to pounce from the other side. Nothing. Purefoy and Hagman were watchful behind him. He turned to them.
"Harris, Hagman," he called softly, and indicated the nearer of the two outbuildings. The two riflemen edged toward it, alert to movement. Harper pointed Cooper and Purefoy to the farthest building. Cooper nodded shortly and motioned Purefoy to follow him, rifle ready.
"Looks quiet," Harper muttered uneasily, and edged once more toward the cottage door, stepping across the threshold. By the door, a bowl of beans left soaking had developed a thin layer of slimy mould. The smell of death was not overpowering, but it was distinctive and halted him in his stride.
He peered into the darkened interior and made out a long dark splash across the back wall, and a huddle of shadowed – something – in the corner beneath it. Harper stepped hesitantly toward it. The figure was shadowed, but he could have sworn that the body was wearing the blue and white of a French infantryman. Harper moved forward to investigate, but footsteps behind him pulled him back.
"We need to keep moving," said Sharpe, looming out of the half light and the rain behind them. "Now that we have the cover of the rain and the evening light, we need to keep moving. We may be able to meet the cacaderos after all."
"Aye sir," Harper nodded, glancing once more into the darkened, stinking cottage. He wiped rain from his broad, tanned face and opened his mouth to speak again.
From the top of the bluff, three French riflemen squinted into the rain and took what aim they could.
A/N: Please bear with my dodgy quantum theory. Timeline manipulation is tricky. I'm not a prolific writer, so the updates won't be coming thick and fast, but I like this premise too much and have too much planned to let this drop by the wayside. I promise the action will kick off in the next chapter!
Cacaderos were Portugese skirmish fighters who sided with the British against the French. Theresa Moreno was one. I use lingo and jargon with frolicsome abandon. You should be able to figure it out if you don't know it.
