TITLE: Abandon All Hope

AUTHOR: Lucky13

EMAIL: lucky13@quixnet.net

DISCLAIMER: Joss owns most of the characters. Inspiration came from the works of Colleen McCullough, John Byrne & Chris Claremont, Larry Niven, Jerry Pournelle and Phillipe Jose Farmer – I only steal from the best, you know…

JUMPING OFF POINT: Early Season Four – Post-Angel, no Anya, no Riley, no Dawn, no Tara.

DEDICATION: Daniel Steele, who also gave feedback on the teaser (And who has also probably forgotten doing so). I can't talk though, I forgot him in the first dedication (Doh!). All for the good, I think, the teaser gave away too much anyway. Also dedicated to Bill Haden, Luther Church, Matt Hutton, the Great and Terrible Ozmandayus and once more the incomparable Lori Bush!

CHAPTER TWO: Into the Hellmouth!

There's a quote I think I remember from high school. It's from a play called 'J.B.' by a man named Archibald Macleish (I think). "If God is God, he is not good. If God is good, he is not God." Don't know why I just thought of that, but I did…

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The ruins of Sunnydale High School, September 1999, in another universe.

The smell, Oh my God, the stench…that was once upon a time called Sunnydale High.

'Guh' Xander's brain crawled, 'I just stepped in some more mayor-meat.'

Ordinarily, Xander would have let that comment start a cascade of inappropriateness. You know, just some general wackiness to lighten the mood. A little Xander-nonsense to help keep everybody's spirits up, and (let's face it) drive away some of the butterflies that were swarming in his own stomach. Xander always looked at it as part of his job description. He was the Comic Relief of the Scoobies, and he saw no shame in that.

But right now…There was a feeling in his bones…This business was too serious…Heart attack serious…Even for a gang that stopped the Apocalypse on regular basis, this was serious.

Xander shifted the strap of his duffel bag where it was cutting into his shoulder and soldiered on.

Willow and Oz were in the lead, holding hands and talking softly together. Xander felt a twinge of old jealousy just looking at them. Maybe it was being back in the unhallowed halls of their Alma Mater. Although, looking around, it was hard to equate this over-sized demon barbecue pit with a place of learning.

"Ol' Sun-ny-dale, we-sing-to-thee, our-praise-of-victory!"

Xander's off-key singing voice echoed strangely in the deserted hallway. For a split second, he damned his twisted sense of humor. From one moment to the next, he hadn't known that he was going to attempt a joke, let alone sing part of their School Song. Heck, what kind of dork even remembers his School Song, anyway! Xander braced for glares and stares from his fellow Scoobies.

Whew! Smiles all-round, even Giles looked amused. Score one for the Comic Relief!

For a moment the dread had retreated, but there it was, back again for more. No getting around it, they were in the soup this time. The gang that had stood vigil at a portal to Hell for over three years was doing something unheard of; they were going to open the door themselves. More than that, they were going to go through that door. It was all a little crazy if you thought about it too long…

The glowing ball of sunlight that Willow the Not So Teenage Witch had summoned was no longer bobbing down the hallway. It hovered before a well remembered double doorway.

The Library…They were here.

"All hope abandon, Ye who enter in…" Quoted Giles under his breath.

"What?" asked Buffy, "What did you say?"

"Dante's Inferno?" Giles looked at Buffy expectantly, like he was hoping to jog her memory. Finally, he gave up and rolled his eyes a little. "Forgive me, I keep forgetting about the woeful state of the American educational system."

Willow spoke up, "Don't worry Buffy. If I remember correctly, you'll hit it sometime this year in your Freshman Lit course. "You kept asking the instructor about extra credit."

There was a beat of silence before Oz' low voice seduced them into listening.

"Through me the way to the City of Woe,

Through me the way to forsaken people,

Through me the way to sorrow eternal.

Justice moved my sublime Creator,

Here I was raised by the power Divine,

Primal love and the highest wisdom.

Before me there were no things created

But those things Eternal, beyond time I stand,

Abandon all hope if you enter here."

There was another beat of silence.

Willow gave a small sigh before turning her attention to the extra-large rotting chunk of Hizonner the Giant Snake that was blocking their way into the Library. She waved a hand and muttered a word in ancient Greek. The side of Wilkins slid down the hall leaving a trail of slime like an over large banana slug.

Giles was giving Oz the smile of a happy parent. "Interesting translation there, I don't believe I've ever heard it before."

"Oh, I combined a couple different versions. I thought it might make a cool lyric. Kinda dark, but that was back in my Goth stage."

With that, werewolf and Watcher turned to help Willow who was trying to force open the sticky library door by hand.

Good to know she didn't use magic for everything, a little voice whispered in the back of Xander's brain.

Meanwhile, the front of Xander's brain was freaking. He felt like the world was vibrating, so much that his teeth should be rattling.

The depth of his wigging was etched in his face; his eyes were troubled and his mouth dangled slightly open. He turned to look at Buffy.

As if her face was a mirror, she reflected his wigging. The two of them communicated without words. Slayer and Zeppo looked at each other for a long moment, both knowing that the other was thinking the exact same thing.

'My God, what have we stepped into this time?'

Then the others forced the door, and they all entered the Library.

There wasn't much left, most of the room was gone. What was left made Giles think of an archaeological dig, with each level representing a different age, a different society that had left its mark only to be replaced by the next one.

For each of the Scoobies, the moment was different. Each one's eye sought a piece of the room that related to a memory.

Willow looked up at the remnants of the Mezzanine floor, where she first saw Xander kiss Cordelia and a part of her childhood died.

Giles saw the ruins of his checkout desk and thought of showing a tiny slip of a Slayer a heavy tome titled VAMPYR.

Oz thought of cold naked mornings waking up on the floor of the book cage, but the cage was gone along with the wall it stood next to.

Xander's foot kicked a charred Dewey Decimal card while his thoughts touched on Valentine's Day and a present unopened.

Buffy looked down through the gaping hole in the center of the room. Her mind on the fountain pool of the ruined Mission Church, she thought about drowning and the first breath of a second chance.

In a moment, the spell of reverie was broken, and the five got down to business.

Willow and Giles got with the portal spell preparation, while Buffy, Xander and Oz broke out the weapons.

Buffy had a huge gym bag open on the ground and it looked like she had cleaned out her weapons trunk entirely. She pulled out a battle-axe and her favorite cross bow, a few bottles of holy water and a pair of crosses and Mr. Pointy. Everything but the battle-axe went into her backpack along with her spare quarrel of cross bow bolts. She looked up at Xander and Oz.

"Giles is already set, I asked him on the way here. You guys need anything?"

"I got these." Oz held up a Super-Squirter and a large wooden cross. "I topped off at St. Mark's on the way over."

Buffy smiled, "Well, take the rest of my holy water, just in case. How about you, Xander?"

Xander had stripped off his jacket to reveal his Army-Guy fatigues from Halloween underneath. "I'm good, got cross, a couple of stakes and I liberated this from Uncle Rory's garage." Xander pulled a Mossberg 12-gauge pump-action shotgun from his duffel. "Got a ton of shells, too."

Xander hefted his backpack as proof.

Buffy frowned, "Xander we're demon hunting, not duck hunting."

"I thought we were wabbit hunting?" Xander gave it his best Elmer Fudd. That earned him a one grade-A Slayer smile.

"Very funny, but don't you want a cross bow?"

"Um, to tell you the truth, I've never quite gotten the hang of 'em. I like the odds better with this," he patted the stock affectionately. "More likely to hit something."

"Okay, just be careful with it, okay?"

"Sure"

Giles and Willow announced that the spell was ready to be cast. The five took up their positions; each marked on the floor with chalk. Willow closed her eyes and began to chant in an ancient tongue that only Giles could understand. She chanted faster and faster until it sounded like she was singing.

Suddenly, a brilliant scarlet light began to emanate from the Wiccan. It beamed across the Hellmouth at Buffy then she began to glow as well. From Buffy it bounced across to Giles, then to Xander and at last to Oz then back to Willow, forming a brilliant scarlet pentagram shaped in beams of light. Each Scoobie felt the hair rise up on their heads as they crackled with a mystical static charge. They grew dizzy and the cave walls wavered as if they were obscured by a heat mirage in a desert.

The red glow of the spell was everywhere they looked now, like a giant bubble, both surrounding them and penetrating them to their very bones. They felt themselves levitate upwards now, their feet no longer touching the ground. They levitated toward each other, until they joined hands, dangling over the Hellmouth inside the scarlet bubble.

Xander looked over at Buffy and caught her eye. He smiled tentative encouragement and she smiled back. They were thrumming now, every molecule humming. There was a sound in the air, a high pitched keening sound that filled and echoed in their minds.

Then the scarlet bubble of Willow's spell dropped downward into La Boca Del Inferno. The wall between the dimensions grew thin and they popped through.

The Scoobies had gone to hell.