"Gitaru!" she hissed, her feet racing through the tall brush of the plains. She snatched the little boy up, and dragged him back, her teeth bared in anger. "What are you doing, running away, you silly thing? Your mother is furious!"
The little boy squirmed and whined, but she was able to keep a fast hold of him.
Did not dare let him go.
"You never let us have any fun, Sineya," the little boy complained. "Just because you're so stupid and ugly that Thairu preferred death than to stay married to you!"
Sineya smacked him on the upper arm for that.
Not very hard.
But Gitaru was always prone to overreacting, and so he wailed as if she'd struck him with her full force.
"I should have hit you harder!" Sineya snapped, as she leapt at the boy, trying to drag him into position so she could muffle the noise. "Now be quiet! Or the Shadow Men will hear you."
Gitaru went quiet.
Suddenly intrigued.
His eyes darting around the landscape, hunting for their fabled cave. As if it would magically appear, and bring with it the demons and monsters they'd heard so much about.
Gitaru tried to speak, but Sineya kept him quiet, as she led him back to the tribe.
"Stay away from the Shadow Men, Gitaru," Sineya said. Her voice shook a little, as she did. "They're… dangerous. More dangerous than you know."
Gitaru finally managed to struggle out of her grasp, as they reached the edge of the clan.
His voice rising in a high, excited tone.
"Is it true that they've captured a demon?" Gitaru asked. But didn't wait for an answer, before he plowed on with his next question. "Do they really live in a magic cave hidden from all sight? Why are there no Shadow Women? Can they really defeat monsters and—?"
"They have no women because they are ignorant fools," Sineya replied, as she spotted Gitaru's mother, wandering through the clan, looking for her son. Sineya called out, and the mother looked up.
Then raced towards them.
Hugging her boy tightly, tears in her eyes, as she scolded him for being so naughty.
Sineya stepped away. Letting herself wander away from the reunion, and wander away from all the others, so she could have some time alone. Some time… to think.
"It's not your job to look after these people," came a voice from nearby.
Sineya turned, to discover Mawara, the leader of the council of elders. Her hair was long and gray, her face wrinkled and worn. Sineya gave her signs of respect, instinctively.
Mawara brushed the recognition away. "You run out to save others. Do you believe your elders cannot protect the clan as well as you can?"
"I mean no disrespect," Sineya tried. "It's just—"
Mawara raised up a hand, and Sineya stopped speaking.
"You still mourn the loss of your husband," Mawara guessed. "Thairu. You could not protect him, and so… you protect everyone else. To prove your worth."
Sineya tried to protest.
But how could one argue with the elders? Mawara and the other elders always won, in the end.
"You are still young," said Mawara. "Still a great beauty. Your mourning period has passed. You must move on. Stop trying to heal our people, and instead, heal yourself."
"If I needed healing, I'd see the witch-doctor," Sineya snapped, before she could stop herself. Then, hurriedly, began to apologize for her sharp tone and lack of respect.
But she'd always had a temper.
Just as her grandmother had, before her.
Mawara stepped forwards, placing her hands on Sineya's shoulders. Looking deep into her eyes. "You must choose, Sineya," she said. "You can choose to forever be alone. No children, no family. And when you die, Sineya, the spirits of your ancestors will die forever with you."
Sineya shuddered.
"Or you can choose to heal from your loss, remarry, and regain a family," said Mawara. "The choice is yours. But I think… if you do not choose, soon… destiny will choose for you."
Seo grabbed onto the console with both hands, as the ship spun through the vortex, bouncing off the sides and making every mechanism inside go haywire.
"It's like he's throwing some kind of temper tantrum, or something," Seo said. Trying, in vain, to regain control. She yanked down a lever, and Oliver's engines gave a piercing scream, the ship jerking Seo and Jack around so that Seo could barely cling on.
"I'm starting to understand why the Doctor was so proud of his ship being 'old'!" Jack shouted, through the noise. "How long does it take for one of these TARDISes to grow out of the 'Terrible Twos'?"
Seo was too busy trying to calm down her ship to answer.
"Sh! Sh! It's okay — we don't have to go to ancient Egypt if you don't want!" she tried. Then, when that was getting nowhere, in a stern voice, "Oliver! You turn this ship right back to the time of the Pharaohs, or I'm giving you the time-out to end all time-outs!"
Oliver wasn't placated.
In fact, the scream of his engines got even louder and more needy.
"Maybe he's doing it to get attention!" Jack offered. "And if we ignore him, he'll get bored and stop!"
Seo gritted her teeth, then launched herself at the bottom of the console. Tearing off paneling, and accessing the systems beneath. "If I can find some sort of… abnormality in the vortex," Seo said, "I can force a materialization, and we can get out and give Oliver time to cool off! Something like…"
"That?" Jack offered, pointing through the window.
She glanced behind herself, at the area he was pointing to.
It was huge. Spanning the entire vortex, like a storm of time and chaos whirling ahead of them, its influence leaking out and spilling into the surrounding vortex.
"Maybe that's why Oliver's so upset," Seo said. "That looks… bad. Very bad."
"And spreading," Jack confirmed. He chuckled. "Always wondered what these things looked like close up. Think you can land on it?"
Seo fiddled beneath the console. "Emergency materialization… happening…" She waited until they were right on top of the anomaly. "…now!"
A spark, from where Seo was fiddling.
And then the ship ground to a halt.
The ship still.
Silent.
For a few seconds, Seo and Jack just tried to catch their breath. Swatting at the smoke that had suddenly emerged in the console room.
Out the windows, they saw nothing but white.
It wasn't until a loud boom sounded from outside the ship that they both knew… something was out there besides white. Something very bad, which needed investigating.
"Time for adventure!" Seo said, racing to the doors. "Let's go!"
Seo and Jack found themselves in a white room, with completely white walls, and was empty except for the gigantic piece of machinery aimed at the wall beside Seo and Jack. No… aimed at a fuzzy part of the wall. Seo squinted. It was as if… there were a smudge in the air. A smudge of something Seo couldn't quite identify, but which she could feel burning through each and every one of her senses.
The door to the white room flew open, and a group of armed women surged inside, their guns ready and drawn, immediately pointed straight at Seo and Jack.
"Don't move!" the soldiers shouted. "Drop any and all weapons, and surrender quietly, or we fire!"
Seo and Jack didn't have to wait for the warning. They had already raised their hands.
"No traces of the Wyorin that I can…" said one of the soldiers, waving around a gizmo.
But then… the soldiers all stopped talking. Froze.
Staring at Seo and Jack.
And lowered their weapons.
"A transmat capsule?!" came an angry woman's voice, as an official-looking person charged into the room. "How could — no, no time! Scan them, make sure they don't have any trace of the Wyorin in them. Then get that capsule and the intruders out of here, before the next experiment—"
The official-looking woman stopped in her tracks.
Staring.
Then her face broke out in a delighted smile. "It worked! Oh, I never thought…!" She raced forwards, grabbing up Seo's hand and shaking it, enthusiastically. "Diandarina Olichono. Chief Sergeant Scientist for this operation. It's an honor, oh Mighty Creator!" She knelt down before Seo. "And we throw ourselves at your feet."
Seo wasn't quite sure how to take this.
"Um…" She yanked her hand away from Diandarina. "I think you've got the wrong incarnation. I'm not due to go mad until my tenth life." She stepped back, and gestured at the fuzzy spot. "Now, about this… thing. What are you…?"
Another loud boom, and the whole building shook.
The giant machinery whining and lighting up, in the center of the room.
"Shields are getting weaker!" shouted one of the soldiers. "We don't have time for this!"
"Control, shut the experiment down!" Diandarina shouted back, through a comms link. "She's already here! We don't need to—!"
The building shook, again.
"Something in that transmat capsule must have fused the power circuits!" shouted a voice through the air. "Get everyone out of there, Diandarina! There's no way to power the device off!"
"What are you doing?" Seo shouted. Pointing at the machinery. "What is that? Are you trying to split open the universe?!"
"We were trying to contact you," Diandarina retorted. "Or any other aspect of the Creator! We knew your essence was located back in time, so we took the best scientists we had and constructed a time tunnel, with our own Slayer essence as the source. We knew it would find you, aspect of Buffy — at the earliest point in Slayer history."
"What?!" cried Seo.
She tore herself out of Diandarina's grip, and raced towards the fuzzy spot. She knew exactly what it was, now. Could feel it, as she stuck her hand inside the fuzziness. Those idiots!
"You're going to destroy the universe if you keep this up!" Seo shouted, turning back to face the others. "What were you…?"
"Creator!" screamed Diandarina, lunging for Seo, yet again, trying to drag her away. "Get—!"
But the machine suddenly blazed into life.
Shooting a high intensity beam squarely at Diandarina, Seo, and the fuzzy spot on the wall. Turning the two girls fuzzy, themselves, as they froze in place.
And then disappeared.
"What…?!" Jack cried. He ran forwards, ready to leap in himself, but was dragged back by the rest of the soldiers, and hauled out of the room.
"There's no way to shut the chronon accelerator off!" shouted the soldiers. "It's going to…!"
Then the machine blew up.