Take me for what I am

AU: Buffy the Vampire Slayer, tv - movie – comic.

Rated: M for violence, sex and language

A/N: A long time ago I started this story but life and a few hard drive crashes later and I gave up. I saved as much of my awful writing as I could and looking back over all my little stories fan fiction or not got me in to the writing mood again. Especially a rewriting mood. I can't say im that much better at writing but I'd like to try and revamp this and finish it.

Also just a reminder, I love people's feedback and I like to personally thank as many people as I can. So if you do respond, do it signed in so I can say thanks.

Prologue

Alone…

After all these years Buffy finally understood what these words meant.

When she was first called at the age of 15 her watcher had told her the life of a slayer was destined to be short and alone. That night she had fallen to her knees and begged that another girl be found. But no such luck was afforded her.

At first she refused to fight hoping that the powers that be would give up on her and find another champion. It was not until the night of her school dance that she understood they would never let her go. As she watched the vampire hoard tear through the gym and necks of her fellow classmates she felt a pang of guilt and a surge of combativeness. It finally hit her; she was the ONLY one who could save them and she had let them down. This massacre at her school dance was all her fault.

Before Buffy knew it the slayer had come out and she grabbed the closest table leg to act as a stake. Whether she refused to fight or not these nasties would never stop coming unless she killed them all. The slayer within her could never live with her self if she did not at least try to save the world.

In time she embraced her calling, even began to equate it to being something like a fireman or policeman. Those people knew it was more important to protect those that could not protect them self's and if they died (which is something they would try very hard not to do) at least they died with honor. So if the slayer had to have a short life she concluded, it was going to be a good one.

What she did not accept was being alone. That was her choice. At the time she had thought alone meant she would fight single-handedly. This suited her fine since she had no intentions of getting others killed. However one incident after another she began to feel the loneliness that plagued the slayers since the beginning.

First her father left because of her fighting and burning down of buildings. Her mother was still there but all the lies and half truths between them created a rift that only got bigger with time. She had tried having relationships with boys her age except found she either pushed them away when they got to close or they bolted for their own reasons. It was her own fault, she would tell herself, for not trying harder to let people in.

When her mother moved them to Sunnydale to make a fresh start the slayer was more than happy to accommodate her mother's wish for a normal teenage life. In spite of this her mother had the miss fortune of picking the only active hell mouth on the western coast.

One bit of luck had changed for the better though. The slayer had found friends she could share her secret with. It filled Buffy with hope to know she finally could confide in someone. Yet that joy was short lived when she realized they could not understand the pain and anger that came with being called. Her friends all tried to sympathize but thought her fluctuating moods were a result of the loss and pain that came with having to fight evil on a daily bases. They did not understand. Surprisingly to Buffy, ever since she accepted the call, these things never bothered her as much as people thought they should. It was such a part of her everyday life that at some point she had stopped caring.

No… her angst came from never having the choice to say no. Buffy loved her friends but they saw her as something special. Not one of them understood how she would ever want to give something like that up. To them it was cool she was the slayer, it made her quirky.

This though…this was the last straw.

As she stood over the recently dead body of her current boyfriend she finally understood the word alone.

It was never her fault for not trying harder or being too picky about who she dated. Buffy realized now it had never been her choice. The powers that be had not given her a gift, like she had been told so many times, but had cursed her and all those that came before her with death and solitude.

Why would they allow one of their champions to live such a miserable life? To never have the soul touched by another…and when she tried to reach for some light …they took it and distorted it into something ugly. This poor boy before her had died because of some cosmic need to keep the slayer apart from the world. No sooner had she opened her self to him, trusted him with her secret, they had been attacked …the powers that be had sent a message, for all the world to see if it cared to look… this was the price the world paid for touching a slayer.

Kneeling beside his head she cradled him in her arms. Buffy brushed the loose strands of hair from his eyes and stroked his already cold skin. He died tonight because the powers wanted her to be alone…

She laid her lips against his forehead and felt him stir under her. Before he could open his eyes he was dust. The slayer stood up and walked out of the alley. The night was calm without a star in the sky.

"You win," she said to the heavens. "I finally understand…I'm alone."