Disclaimer: I do not own Midnighters or Buffy the Vampire Slayer; they are the wonderful work of Scott Westerfeld and Joss Whedon.
A/N: Right, well, this is a crossover between Midnighters and Buffy the Vampire Slayer. It isn't necessary for you to have seen any of the Buffy episodes as the characters will be explained as the Midnighters find out more about them. If you are a Buffy the Vampire Slayer watcher, well, then you'll just know a few more things.
The story's centred mainly on Melissa as she is my favourite character, but includes all the other Midnighters and most of the Buffy characters as well.
Pairings so far: Melissa x Rex, Jonathon x Jessica, Buffy x Angel, Willow x Oz...
Setting: After the first Midnighter book and about mid third season of Buffy the Vampire Slayer.
...
Chapter One: The Town is Evil
"Why are we doing this again?" Melissa asked, hands tightly clutching the steering wheel as her and the rest of the Midnighters made their way towards the town of Sunnydale. They were still about 24 miles away from the town yet there was still a bitter taste caked with misery in the air coming off it. It made her sick to the stomach and not for the first time she wished she'd let someone else drive. She was sure to crash the old car if this continued. Her hands were clutching the steering wheel so tightly that it looked about ready to come off.
"Remember? We all decided we wanted to go on a holiday," Rex told her patiently, sensing her irritation.
"Yes, but why do we have to go to Sunnydale?" She said through gritted teeth.
"I told you: my aunts in Sunnydale and she offered us her place to stay at," Jessica told her from the back seat of the car.
"So your aunt's crazy then?" Melissa asked; she couldn't see how anyone living in Sunnydale couldn't be. She certainly would be in about an hour's time.
"No," the flame-bringer replied, looking rightly angry. "What makes you say that?"
"She must be – living in Sunnydale."
"You haven't even been to Sunnydale, what would you know?" Jessica retorted.
"No, but I can taste it," the brunette replied. "The town's evil."
Rex looked at Melissa cautiously. "Cowgirl, we must be over 20 miles away, how could you taste it from here?"
She didn't answer, her gaze fixed firmly out the window shield at the road in front of her. An uncomfortable silence took over the car.
"Come on, Melissa, how can a town be evil?" Dess asked, breaking the silence.
Still no answer.
"And besides my aunt and cousin have been living there for almost three years, and they're perfectly normal," Jessica said. "Well, as normal as my cousin could ever be with a name like Buffy."
That got Melissa's attention. "Your cousin's name is Buffy?" Jessica nodded. "And I thought Desdemona was bad."
"Hey!" said girl protested.
Jonathon and Rex chuckled.
"Anyway, you'll love them," Jessica continued as if she hadn't been interrupted.
Melissa didn't say anything more, they were approaching Sunnydale fast and with each passing meter the taste and emotions she was feeling got even worse. It was shoddier than any darkling she'd ever had the pleasure of knowing. Maybe it was because the Darklings weren't actually evil, but this town . . .this town was beyond that.
Rex eyed her carefully, for the first time noticing the tremble in her hands and the way she cringed out the window as if having trouble seeing what was in front of her. "Hey, do you want me to drive?"
Normally she would have protested, tried to convince him that she was fine, tried to act strong and not show any weakness. But right now she didn't even have the strength to shake her head let alone fight about it. Sunnydale was draining everything out of her and the conflicting emotions she received from it had her on the verge of passing out. She could barely even see the road anymore.
Without a word she brought the car to a screeching halt. The mindcaster slammed the side door open and stumbled out trying to bring the fresh air of the outside world into her constricting lungs. But the town's hold on her was too strong and she continued to get only a minimum amount of air in.
Melissa jumped as she felt a hand on her en-clothed shoulder and turned to see Rex standing behind her, looking thoroughly concerned.
"You OK?" he asked.
"Sure," she lied, slowly heading over towards the passenger side of the front seat.
The three people in the back of the car were silent, eyes wide in amazement at the weakness she had allowed herself to show. She could care less what they thought of her right now though, and heaved the car door open. Sliding into her seat she pulled out her headphones. She hadn't had to use them for much of the journey due to the fact that they were pretty much the only human inhabitants around for miles. It had been much of a relief to her, nearly as good as the Blue Time.
But now that had passed, apparently, and she needed her music desperately. Sometimes she wondered whether her relationship with her headphones was the same relationship a junkie had
with drugs. She certainly couldn't go without them for long, usually breaking out in a cold sweat. Once she'd even bordered on hysteria when they were at school on Exam day and one of the boys there had snagged it and thrown it into a toilet. She'd had to go the rest of the day without it, all the while the school's unrelenting voices needling their way into her mind. Hence the near hysteria.
But was it really the same addiction? She needed her headphones to stop herself from going crazy whereas most drugs were usually something that made you crazy, or close to it anyway. So could it really be called the same thing? She doubted it, but still had a niggling feeling of contrdiction in the back of her mind regardless.
The mindcaster flinched at the sound of a door slamming and turned her head around to see Rex in the driver's seat, still eyeing her with concern. She turned her head away and looked out the side window, a sure sign for him to set off. Stumblingly she turned the volume up on her MP3 and allowed her eyes to close as the car took off. The music blocked the town's invasion to a point but not completely, and she soon found herself wishing they could have gone somewhere else.
Conversation had resumed in the back and Rex had turned his attention back to the road.
Twenty-five minutes later and Melissa felt as if her head was going to implode. They had almost reached Sunnydale and with doing so she had almost reached breaking point. Her MP3 was so loud her ears were beginning to ache beyond belief and her hands hadn't stopped trembling since she had handed the car over to Rex. She dug the heels of her palms into her temples trying desperately to get rid of the monstrous headache and block out the town's uncontrolled chaos that was now living inside her head.
Melissa had taken to counting in different languages in her mind. It was something Dess always did when she was under stress or some other chaotic occurrence. Melissa had taken to doing it as well.
Satu, dua, tiga, empat, lima, enam, tujuh, delapan, Sembilan, sepuluh, sebelas, duabelas, tigabelas...
Melissa rubbed her temples harder, the nausea she was filling getting stronger and stronger.
Un, deux, trios, quatre, cinq, six, sept, huit, neuf, dix, onze, douze, treize...
Her eyes snapped open.
"Stop the car," she said, trying to keep her voice under control.
"Wha-" but Rex didn't have time to finish.
"Stop the car!"
The seer slammed on the brakes and there was a collective sound of groans from the backseat. Melissa took no notice, heaving the side door open she stumbled out. Blindly making her way over to the Welcome to Sunnydale sign and emptying the entire contents of her stomach onto the grass beneath it.
Rex and Dess were out of the car before you could say 'huh?' and Jonathon and Jess looked about ready to follow suit. Rex was by her side in an instant sweeping back her hair as she continued to throw up, Dess looking on in silent concern.
Once Melissa was sure she wasn't going to be sick all over her friend's shoes she straitened up, eyes locked on the sign in front of her as if staring at Satan himself. After a pause Rex reached out and touched her arm hesitantly, turning her around to face him. She could now see the full extent of her friends' concern and was surprised at how much she saw. Rex she would expect it from but Dess? She'd always thought that Dess had been on the verge of hating her the entire time they'd known each other. But here she was looking at Melissa with an expression so worried that it nearly threw the mindcaster off her feet. She knew that the main cause for their worry was that they knew it wasn't car sickness that made her puke but the town. Not only because they knew Melissa didn't get carsick but because of the way she was eyeing the town that they were metres away from entering.
"You OK, Cowgirl?" Rex asked for the second time that day.
Melissa nodded wordlessly, not trusting her voice enough to speak just yet. She wanted so desperately to lean into either one of their ready arms but stopped herself – she wasn't prepared to reveal that much weakness to them, or to herself. She could feel the anxiety seeping off of them and had to look away. She wasn't used to that much concern for her and didn't know whether she liked it or hated it.
Rex eyed her carefully, noting the way she eyed the town of Sunnydale. "We'll stay the night with Jess's aunt and if it's still this bad by tomorrow we'll head back," he told her reassuringly.
Melissa expected Dess to protest but instead the polymath nodded in agreement still looking her over in concern. The mindcaster nodded before making her way slowly back to the car, her mind a chaotic mess.
...
A/N: What'd yah think? Love reviews so please, please post them.
The languages that Melissa is speaking – well, thinking – are Indonesian and French, just in case anyone was wondering. Oh, and I'm not all that certain whether Melissa has a cassette player or an MP3, I think it's the first but oh well, in this book it's an MP3. It's not that major a detail. This is my first Midnighter fic too so I hope I didn't get too out of character. If I did or do later on please tell me.
Next: Buffy and the Midnighters finally meet, glares are exchanged and Rex finds something out from the young mindcaster.