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2: The Third Law

Two wine glasses clanked, causing the most beautiful ringing sound throughout the room. Bruce was leaned over on his barstool, resting his weight on the airport bar of LAX. He delicately held the glass of wine in his fingers as he gazed down at the dark red liquid. "You know what that sound was?" he slurred with a wide grin. "That was the sound of physics."

Johnny gazed at him from beneath the rim of his glass as he took a sip of wine. "What are you talking about, man?" he said with a smile.

"My glass touching your glass made a reaction," Bruce grinned as he tried to explain seriously. "For every action there's an equal and opposite reaction…"

"I know, man," Johnny sighed, nodding his head as he took another drink, "we saw Final Destination on TV the other night…"

"No, no, I'm talking about Newton's laws here," Bruce said almost with a giggle. "This is serious, can… can you be serious for a second?"

"Okay," Johnny nodded, with a smile, "you've had enough."

"No, I can't get enough," Bruce declared with a grin. "We're toasting victory here! A war won!" Bruce took a 7-11 sized big gulp from his wine glass, downing it all. He pulled the glass away from his mouth. "You know what we're gonna do when we get back home?" Bruce declared in delight. "We're gonna throw a party. And invite everyone we know. And some people we don't know."

"No one knows that we saved the world except you, me, Buffy, Walt and Sarah," Johnny explained. "Why would anyone else celebrate?"

"Let's tell them," Bruce blurted. He looked around at the other patrons of the bar as he pointed at himself and John. "Hey! We're heroes! We just stopped a nuclear catastrophe!"

Johnny glanced around, amused but still slightly alarmed, "Okay, man, quiet down." His phone began to ring. "You're gonna scare everyone away." He reached into the pocket of his leather jacket and retrieved his cell phone. He was now used to not knowing who was on the other end, so he answered as anyone would, "Hello?"

"John," a familiar voice responded, "it's Walt." The former Sheriff of Penobscot County, Maine, had a dark tone in his voice, one very different from his joyous one the night before.

"What is it, Walt?" Johnny asked, now suddenly concerned.

"I'm at the hospital," Walt Bannerman declared. "It's Buffy."


Johnny, Walt and Bruce stood in a semi-circle with the doctor, still in his scrubs, who performed the operations on Buffy as they stood outside of the operating room in Tyler Memorial Hospital.

"The damage is extensive," the surgeon declared. "The crash was bad. I'm surprised she survived it." Johnny stared straight forward at the doctor with his arms half crossed and a loose fist covering his mouth. He was in a single word – emotionless. "There was a great deal of internal bleeding," he explained. "We were able to take care of most of it—"

"Most of it?" Walt repeated with concern. "Wait a minute, you're saying that she's still… bleeding?"

"As I said," the doctor restated, "the damage is very extensive."

"Okay, so what are we looking at," Bruce asked, "long term?"

The surgeon stared at him quietly with an apprehensive expression. "I think we should sit down," he offered.

"No," Johnny declared firmly, breaking his silence for the first time in a while. He softened his tone a bit, "I'm sorry, doctor, but… I just… I don't want to sit." He stared at the doctor, bracing himself for an answer.

The doctor stared back at him with pity. "There won't be a long term," he declared flatly. "We've found something of a shadow in the left hemisphere of the cerebellum. Now at this stage, it's unclear exactly where it came from, it doesn't seem to be a tumor, but it's probably a result of the bleeding the skull…"

The doctor kept speaking. Johnny was sure of it. But he had no clue as to what he was saying. It didn't matter anyway. Johnny burned a hole into the wall as his eyes filled with bitter darkness.

Newton's Third Law. Every action has an equal and opposite reaction. Johnny and Buffy had finally stopped Armageddon. Now the Powers, or whatever was responsible, took their price for that exchange.

Their future. His future.


Later on that morning, Walt walked down the hallway of the hospital to the ICU waiting room with two cups of strong coffee in his hands. He entered the mauve and cream colored waiting room, something that looked like old Pepto Bismol, and handed one of the cups to Bruce. He took the coffee and remained in his slumped position in the waiting room chair with a depressed expression upon his face.

"Where's John?" he asked as he took a sip.

"He's still in the room with Buffy," Walt explained. "I guess because of his celebrity the nurses are nice enough to let him stay as long as he wants."

"Or maybe it's because they know the truth," Bruce grimly declared. "They haven't got much time left."

Walt was silent as he stared down at the ground. Bruce reached into his shirt and ran his fingers over the scar near his heart. "I hate hospitals," Bruce declared. "I used to not really care. Hell, I worked in one. I didn't understand what the big deal was."

The scar was from a knife wound sustained during a physical encounter with the Illuminati almost a year ago. Back then, they were so far from solving the great mystery of how to save the world. Now it seems that after foiling one disaster, another appears and now there's nothing anyone can do about it.

"It makes a difference," Walt explained as he took a sip of his coffee, "seeing people you care about being in the hospital. And being in there yourself."

"Was it worth it?" Bruce asked as he looked over at Walt. "Was it worth losing your job to join the good fight?"

Walt stared down at the black sea in his cup. "The right answer would be to say 'yes,'" he explained. "But when is anything that simple?"


Johnny sat in a chair at Buffy's bedside, encased in a glass room of beeping and tubes and flashing lights. Around them, there were boxes and computer screens that didn't mean anything. His hands were wrapped firmly around hers as his head was buried down into the sheets. He was far too lost and heartbroken to continue praying.

Every time her chest rose, he felt it, taken in how precious it was. He knew that in just a short while, it would rise and fall for the final time. He lifted his head and stared at her pale face, covered in bruises and cuts, and the golden curls that framed it. He stared closely at her closed eyes, imaging that they would open for one more time.

Now he knew very well how painful it was to watch someone in a coma. Someone that he loved very dearly. The doctors stated very plainly with full belief that her eyes would never open again. But he couldn't help but wait. He couldn't help the painful curse of hope that Buffy had planted in his heart.

A blurry, slippery memory ran through his mind. Sunlight and clean sheets. Buffy stared at him and declared simply, "Life always finds a way."

As quickly as it came, it was gone. For the first time, he wished dearly that he still had his visions so that he could experience the past with perfect clarity. He could escape there and remember like a photograph what it was like to see her smile.

A gasp of air filled her lungs and snapped Johnny out of his remorseful gaze. He stared at her face, stunned, as she began to stir in her sleep. Her eyes, sunken in, opened wide and sparkled with all the brightness left in her body. Her green eyes fluttered as they searched around the room until they found Johnny's face.

They gazed at each other for mere moments. Again, he made the mistake of staring into her eyes – the same mistake that caused him to fall in love with her. She whispered softly with dry, cracked lips and a sound barely reached his ears.

"You're welcome," she breathlessly said. Her words fell away as her eyes slowly closed. An obtrusive sound blared out from the machines signaling the stopping of her heart. It was the loudest sound in the world. Johnny stared at her blankly, his heart shattering.

A flood of nurses rushed into the room, followed by the doctors nearby. They began their fight to no avail. Johnny came to a stand and backed away from the hospital bed, still stunned from the sting of his misery.

Buffy Summers was dead.