Title: The Dead and the Dying
Author: Vadim
Rating: R
Disclaimer: Nothing, but the ideas is mine, maybe some new characters, that's it. Everything belongs to Joss Whedon and all that other good stuff!
Summary- Couple months after gift. All seems peaceful in Sunnydale, Christmas is days away. New Year's. Everyone is in a pretty somber mood. What they don't know is that something "BIG" is brewing down south. Buffy brought back. But not by who you think!!
South America - December 21, 2001
The gloomy look in their eyes said a lot. The fact that each of them had sparkling white fangs to begin with said a lot. It didn't matter now. Nothing did. Thoughts were racing through his mind, his hands trembled as he looked around for some subtly hidden escape route which he had overlooked. His breathing quickened as he realized there was none.
" Come on, damn it! Think! I can't go out like this...there's gotta be a way out...now to find it!"
He tried clearing his thoughts, but as his eyes focused in on the rapidly-moving figures approaching him, his thoughts quickened and became more diverse." Why the hell am I here...oh shit...shit...they're here...almost here...I could be back in Sunnydale... family...Buffy...and Dawn...look damn it...you must've overlooked somethin'...nice big house...nothing like the cheap crap they have here...oh God, a door...a door...yes!"
Making a mad dash towards a door, a door barricaded by about three crates and covered in graffiti of sorts, the man saw his assailants out the corner of his eye.They were fast. All six of them.
The door jammed the first couple of tries, but finally gave in. The man cleared the threshold just in time, as the door slammed shut, literally milliseconds, before one of the beasts could slip a finger in. Taking a quick and much-needed breath, the man looked back, for a moment, at the door that had prolonged his life another minute, just to see it fly off its hinges nearly missing his head.
" Fuck!"
" Yes, you are!" One of the beasts had finally spoken up throughout this whole melee.
" Get away from me you beasts! I...I did nothing to you!"
" Beasts. What a harsh word. We prefer to be called vampires. And yes, you did do something to us. But enough talk! Now you die, human."
The man tried to gather himself as best he could and maybe continue on with his mislead life for just a bit longer. He had happened to survey his new surroundings and realized that he had broken into a motel. Broken in. How about just twisted the knob. As he scrambled to his feet, in his head, he thanked the country of Venezuela for having such cheap and, apparently, low security housing.
He had now broken into a full sprint down the dimly lit hallway. He didn't bother to turn around. He knew they were there. They were right there breathing down his neck every step of the way, but yet still unable to get to him. He turned up the flight of steps without even glancing down. Two at a time, three at a time, even four steps at a time he had hopped. It is amazing what the fear of dying could do to a person. He had not cared for the broken glass that had smothered the carpeted floor. Every piece of glass that got lodged in his sneakers just made him run faster. Finally after reaching the top floor of the five-floor building, he looked down into the eerie darkness below.
Nothing.
It couldn't be. He had felt them. They were chasing him. Did they stop? Had he managed to outrun them? These thoughts, among others flowed through the middle-aged man's exhausted mind. He stumbled to the ground, completely drained, and leaned his near-lifeless body against the railing.
" It's not that easy."
The man flung his head up, sweat beading immensely from his forehead.
It was like the thing was able to read his mind. There was only one of them standing in front of him. For him, that was plenty.
"Honestly, did you think you were going to outrun us. Ha, ha!" The vampire was now leaning over the man's shoulder, eyeing his neck, and whispered into the man's ear.
" Don't worry, I'll make the pain last as long as possible."
"So this is how my life ends...come on Hank...give the sonofabitch one last parting shot...goodbye life..."
With that thought in mind, the man swiftly swung his husky right arm towards the deformed face of the vamp.The shot was a good one, mainly because it had caught the vamp off guard.
"Shi...t!" The vamp examined his broken nose, as the defiant man ran off down the hall. Instead of giving chase, the hurt vamp merely got up and pulled out a 12-gauge from under his coat and aimed at his fleeing victim. He was sick of chasing the guy and was going to end it now.
As he ran down the hall, the man eyed the pretty big window he was quickly approaching. And then, for a split second, his mind was clear. He heard absolutely nothing, except the unmistakable pumping of a 12-gauge shotgun. There was only one way out and little time to reach it. Even if he had reached the window, the fall would probably kill him. But all that had evaded his line of thinking as he dove through the unsteady and already broken window.
He never heard the shot go off as it was barely audible over the noise caused by his flying through the window.
"What am I doing?"
was the last thought that went through his mind, before he violently crashed onto the roof of a parked car below. The shot had missed him."So this is death...nothing. Or maybe I'm already in hell. My own private hell. Wait...I...I'm breath...breathing...can't feel anything...oh fuck it hurts..."
Thoughts clouded his mind again as he tried to open his eyes. At first his blood-covered and glass-pierced body would not respond, but slowly he began moving his arms and through a lot of pain, moved his leg." I survived," he quietly reminded himself. " I fuckin' survived! Yeah!"
His happiness over this new discovery would be short-lived.
" Nope, I'm sorry buddy, but you kinda didn't." The other five vampires quickly discovered him and were now hovering over him. His eyes were half open, but the view was good.
Throughout the whole chase from the bar through the streets and finally to the motel, the fleeing man failed to notice something very peculiar about his pursuers. Now that they were all hovering over him and he knew that he was at his end, he happened to look them over.
They were soldiers of some sort. They had the camouflaged uniforms of some army group. Those his vision was impaired by the blood flowing over his eyes, he easily made out the uniforms. They were Americans.
The leader of the group stepped forward and knelt down by the fallen man.
" Ah, the infamous Hank Summers."
" H...how do you know me? Who are you? W...what do you want from me?"
" Oh, I know a lot about you Mr. Summers. More than you think. The point is that you we need you dead. and well not just dead, but well, one of us."
Hank Summers had never been more astonished in his life. What the hell was happening? He didn't know. He had heard about vampires, but was never too interested in them or for that matter believed in them. Till tonight. If he was going to die then he wanted to stay dead and rest in peace. Not become one of them. Not a vampire. Right now, though, he had no choice.
"I'll see you in a little bit, Mr. Summers. Trust me, I think you'll like being one of us."
"Please, God, noooo!!!"
With that, Hank Summers' life was to come to an end and then...to a new beginning.
But before he died, Hank Summers' caught a bit of information that would help him in his so-called "afterlife."
As the head vampire was about to strike, Hank noticed the name that was etched onto the army uniform. He barely made out what it said, before the sharp fangs punctured his neck.
"F...Finn," was the last word uttered by Hank Summers and it was followed by a loud cry of pain and then silence.
******************************
Sunnydale - December 22, 2001
It was a beautiful night outside. The Sunnydale streets were lit up with the bright lights from all the little shops and restaurants. Hanukkah had already concluded a couple of days before and Christmas was quickly approaching. Everyone was in the holiday spirit. The streets were packed with scurrying parents trying to get in some last minute shopping; friends huddled tightly on the benches, sipping cocoa, laughing it up; youngsters running around throwing snowballs at each other, rarely connecting.
" Swearing is not permitted, William...treat customers with respect, William...why don't you ever work during the day, William?"
The job wasn't all that bad. Except for a few buggers, the management was okay. Starting pay at seven bucks. But the main thing that it had going for it was the all-black uniforms.
**Beep**
" Can't a guy get a moment's rest around 'ere?"
**Beep**
" Hold your bloody horses, I'm comin'...I'm comin'..."
" Hi, welcome to McDonald's, this is William speaking, how may I help you?"
" Spike?"
" Harris?" This was the first time Spike had seen any of the scoobies here. " What are you doin' 'ere?"
" I'm hungry. This is McDonald's. What in the hell are you doing in there?"
" Can't a person try and make an honest buck these days without bein' harassed about it by ignorant blokes like say, yourself?"
" A person, yes. You, no."
" You come 'ere to piss me off or you actually want somethin'?"
" Just give me...um...a cheeseburger."
" Would you like fries with that?"
" Ha, ha... I was waiting for you to say that! Give me a large fry and a Coke also."
" That be $4.23 at the first window."
" Thank you sir." Xander was frantically trying to control his laughter as he would soon pull into Spike's view.
His black Ford Explorer had soon pulled in front of Spike's window. He had gotten promoted at his construction job to a managerial position. This was what had become of it.
" You 'ere on your own? No Anya? Swear you two were just inseparable."
" Yeah, well, I don't know if the dead still celebrate it, but Christmas is just three days away."
" Oh, and I see someone has forgotten all 'bout it. And you bein' with a former vengeance demon an' all."
" As a matter of fact, I'll let you know that I did all my shopping a long time ago and I..."
" And you were just picking it up right now." Spike had kindly finished the sentence for him.
" Well ye...wait a sec. Since when do I have to answer to you?"
" It ain't me you'll have to answer to, Harris. It's your woman."
Xander had just finished giving Spike the money and was waiting for his change, as Spike took an extra long time taking it out.
" And by the way, I finished getting all my goodies a long while ago. I may be dead, but I'm not dumb," Spike quickly added as he gave Xander the change.
" Speaking of which, how did you land this job? Hold the manager hostage till he gave it to you?"
" Actually, I was very polite 'bout it and talked all friendly and, heck, those ol' blokes couldn't get enough a me. Then they found out what they had actually gotten."
" So why did you get this job?"
" I bloody told you already. I needed money. I am supposed to look after Dawn, maybe get her a teddy bear once in a while. Also, the crypt is gettin' kinda ol'."
" Why keep it a secret?"
" Hurts the image. Big bad vampire working at McDonald's. Yeah right. I didn't want there to be a big fuss 'bout it."
" So you gonna stop by tonight, visit Dawn, we got a frig full o' blood and not much to do with it."
" When don't I stop by to visit the nibblet?"
" Never, Spike. Always there."
" Hey, I'll bring the booze."
" Just what we need, a drunk Dawn."
" You want booze or what?"
" Sure Spike. We'll just have to wait till she's sleeping."
" Alright Harris, get a move on. You're holdin' up my line."
" See ya Spike."
With that, the Explorer pulled ahead to the next window. The conversation took up a couple of minutes and when Spike looked up at the screen, cars were lined up to the street.
" Bloody hell."
These types of conversations were not uncommon between Xander and Spike. At first they would always snap at each other, but in the end, always ended up in good spirits. Over the past couple months, after Buffy's death, they had become better friends. Most times, the bickering brought them even closer.