Sam knew taking his eyes off the fight surrounding him wasn't an option, yet his eyes wavered too many times to the small girl flanking his left. She was a skilled fighter. He had never seen anything like it before. She cut through the sea of demons surrounding them like butter, leaving bodies writhing in agony on the soft grass beneath their feet.
His gaze strayed too long on her form and he paid for it with a blow to the head, his head snapping back with a velocity that was bound to leave him with a stiff neck tomorrow. He recovered the best he could and forged on into the masses, for once glad to have this stranger helping him reach the other side. Even more so after a sharp pained exploded into the back of his skull and pulled a curtain of darkness around him.
All he saw in that last moment before he let the heavy feeling take him under, was one tiny girl defending him with what seemed like a powerful will that he could not quite explain.
Buffy Summers stood over the bed Sam lay unconscious in and set to wearing the carpet thin again. She had been pacing over him most of the night afraid he wouldn't wake up in time. She glanced furtively at the clock on her nightstand and frowned. If the big oaf didn't wake up soon she would have to leave without knowing his side of the story. And according to Giles and his big pile of all knowing-texts, this half of the Winchester team held the key to finding her sister.
She moved out into the hall and joined the Scooby gang, minus Giles (who was locked away in the basement with his books) in Dawn's now vacant room. Willow didn't move from where she sat on the bed, eyes closed in concentration and clutching one of Dawn's sweaters.
Xander met Buffy's eyes from across the room and smiled wanly at her solo status. "No luck?" He mouthed across the room.
Buffy only shook her head. She surveyed Willow finishing up another locator spell that seemed to be getting her nowhere from the look on her face. Dawn had been missing for almost a week now and with no trace of where she had gone or who had taken her Buffy was running a bit ragged in the sanity department.
A deep sigh escaped Willow as she lowered Dawn's sweater to the bed and lifted her gaze to match Buffy's weary one. Buffy didn't need to ask, Willow hadn't found anything. It was all useless. The only shred of hope came from one of Giles' dusty books that spoke of "the key" in rather vague context with yet another apocalypse and amidst all the soothsayers and other-worldlies he had contacted about it; only one had been able to help.
Except all he said opened Buffy's world to one she had never conceived of. Yes she had been to Heaven and back, but all of that was a simple after thought now. She remembered nothing of angels or a God or what came after this life. Yet according to this crazy prophet, who went by the name Chuck, there was a whole other war about to be waged and it involved two brothers and the key to the universe.
Did it matter that demons were possessing humans in a race to unleash their leader? Been there done that. Did it change anything that Heaven and Hell were in fact real? Been there, done that. The only thing that mattered anymore was finding Dawn, and if the intolerable drunk of a prophet, who had looked one too many times at her breasts to be honest, said this Sam Winchester could help her save Dawn, well then she'd do whatever it took to get him on her side.
"It's okay Will, we'll find her." Buffy wished her nerves matched the strength in her voice.
Yet she didn't have time to reflect on anything anymore, she had to get that damned Winchester awake! Turning on her heel she slammed straight into a very-much-awake Sam Winchester.
She bounced off his chest hard. He at least felt far more solid than he looked she thought with an embarrassing blush. Backing away she let out a false but hopefully convincing frustrated sigh and added a piercing glare to accompany it.
"Well now that you are done trying for the longest-time-unconscious record, maybe you'd like to help us stop the end of the world?"
Sam's jaw clenched at Buffy's biting tone. "Listen lady, I don't have to help you do anything, you helped me out of a scrape and I appreciate that, but I have things to do. I can't stay here."
Buffy looked back at Xander and Willow in the room behind her, her eyes froze for a second on Dawn's bed. Two tactics of gaining allies, that's all Buffy had. Violence and understanding.
She hoped they weren't going to be worn thin with this Sam guy. She sighed again, trying to reign in her panic of every moment passing and what it would mean for Dawn. Turning to face Sam again she took a different tactic unlike any she ever did in this kind of situation; she opened with an apology.
"I'm sorry, you know, for the whole face punching before the handshake thing, but you happen to be a very important person to me right now." Her face brightening as she stumbled to correct the look upon his face. "-Uh-US! Very important to all of, uh, us. And since I found you in a house surrounded by demons bent on killing you I think I can trust you not to go all black eyed on me. So maybe I can also skip past all the la-de-da and get right down to my 'you're-not-a-demon' theory. It pretty much goes like this, you're not a demon. And I need you to help me…please."
The look on Sam's face had moved from astonishment to anger and back to astonishment again in a matter of seconds. Buffy wasn't sure what to do to make him think she was the sane one, but talking more of her babble was probably not going to do it.
"Small sentences," she started again slowly. "Me Buffy. I fight demons. Slay to be exact. Slayer good, demon bad, and right now…" she paused for a moment, preparing to say the words out loud, "Demons have kidnapped my sister, and the only thing I know is that some walking beard with an angel radio frequency for a brain said that you and your brother can help find her."
Sam's face fell at her words. "My brother is dead," he said gruffly.
Buffy looked down, trying not to make an awkward moment even more awkward. "Oh."
"He was murdered, and the one pulling the trigger happens to be the empty vessel you and your friends snatched up from the floor beside him back there. Do you want to explain that to me?"
Buffy looked back hesitantly at Willow, pleading for a reprieve from the questions.
"I needed her," Willow cut in, "For a tracking spell. In case you weren't who we thought you were. We have been piggy backing on essence trails of empty demon vessels for over a week now, each one leading us a little bit closer to you. But you are Sam Winchester, aren't you?"
"How do you know I'm Sam and not Dean?" he asked, obviously unable to trust any of these new people who seemed to know far too much about him.
Buffy laughed at the question, giggles bursting forth from her like a volcano. She tempered them with the back of her and tried to stifle any amusement from her voice as she answered him. "There is pretty much only one description of you guys floating around among the demon world. The cute one and the tall one. That's what they call you. And well, I saw, I concluded. You are the tall one right?"
Sam gave an exasperated sigh and stepped back a step.
"I'm sorry, but I can't help you. I have to save my brother. Good luck with your sister."
"Wait!" She called after his receding figure down the hall. "Wait, just, maybe we can help each other. I died once too, twice actually. And yet here I stand, annoying you. We have a powerful witch, if I can promise you you will have your brother back, will you tell me what you know about the demons who we think took my sister?"
Sam paused on the stairs, absorbing every word from this bizarre girl. She stood her ground, her eyes soft and warm yet hard and strong.
He fell into them then and suddenly he knew beyond anything he could trust this girl. So despite everything logic said, he gave her a nod that spoke volumes and they returned together to the bedroom he had awoken in.
Buffy chattered on about what she planned on doing about her sister and where she had last seen her, most of which went in one ear and out the other. But one thing above all else did stick in his mind, and that was the trust he felt for this woman.
He let for the first time since he had found out that Dean had sold his soul, a sliver of hope curl itself around his heart and rest there. Because if what this girl had said was true, she had a way to save Dean from the pit, and from now till then, every second mattered.