I forgot to mention in the last chapter - this takes place mid season 3 of Buffy the Vampire Slayer, a little after episode 10 'Amends'.
Enjoy!

Chapter 2: Time for research

Buffy listened suspiciously to the Soul Reaper as she began to explain.

"The creature that attacked you is called a hollow,"

"Huh. Figures." Buffy replied, remembering the gaping hole in the creature's chest.

A smile tugged at the corners of Rukia's mouth.
"You noticed the lack of a heart. Good. Hollows have no soul. They are creatures driven by their hunger, their need to devour human souls. It is a Soul Reaper's duty to protect lost souls from hollows, and ensure they get to the soul society."

Buffy frowned. "The Soul society? What's that?"

"Humans would call it the afterlife. Some may refer to it as heaven."

Rukia's expression hardened. "I must warn you, although hollows usually only go after the souls of the dead, they will also attack the living with unusually high spirit power."

"What does that have to do with me?"

"You can see ghosts and hollows. That is a sure sign of the presence of spirit power. From now onwards, you must be vigilant. The hollows will surely come after you."

Buffy groaned inwardly. Great. Now she didn't just have to worry about vampires and demons, she had to worry about these 'Hollows' as well?
"Wonderful. Well... how do I fight them, then?"

"You don't." Rukia put her hand on the hilt of her sword. "I do."

"Wait- are you telling me not to defend myself, or that I can't defend myself? Listen, if I'm gonna have these things running around wanting to eat my soul or whatever, I'm damn gonna protect myself. If you-"

Rukia held up a hand, her head cocked to one side as if listening. After a tense moment, she appeared to decide on something.

"I must go. I doubt we'll meet again."

"What? No! I still have-"

Rukia nodded politely to Buffy, before leaping gracefully into the night sky and, keeping to the treeline, sped out of sight.

"Damn it!" Buffy cursed. That was annoying, Rukia had barely told her anything., and she still had dozens of questions! Although Buffy was still unsure about the whole 'Soul Reaper' story, she could tell the woman was telling the truth about not being human. Demon still seemed the most likely option, though. She should ask Giles if he knew anything about these 'Hollows'.

Buffy turned around to talk to Angel, but he was nowhere to be seen.

Heh.. come to think of it, it must have looked pretty weird, me talking to thin air. I guess he got a bit freaked.

Buffy sighed. She wished he hadn't turned up in the first place, things were already hard enough. It had only been a month ago that Angel was being harassed by the first, it had been horrible seeing him like that. ...

Bufy glanced around the graveyard one more time. She could see them now. The ghosts. They looked just like normal people, except they each had a long, grey chain attached to their chest. They were staring at her curiously. Buffy wondered how many of them had been killed by the demons. How many had died where it was her job to save them.

She shivered. This was getting very disturbing. She knew she should stay to finish patrolling, but now she had to worry about the hollows, she questioned the wisdom of that desicion. She would have to bring a sword if she wanted any chance of fighting them off, and as it was, it was too dangerous out alone. She grimaced.

Home then, for tonight. I'll have to contact Giles tomorrow. She smiled.

Xander won't be happy that we'll be spending the weekend researching.

Rukia watched the town from her perch on the school's bell tower. Sunnydale. She had thought it was a joke, getting a posting here. However, the town had proved more... interesting than she had imagined. The number of dead were staggering, and there was an unusually high frequency of hollow attacks. In addition, she felt something else in this town. A presence she could only describe as evil. She thought back to that girl, the one who had been able to see her. She had called herself a 'Vampire Slayer'. Although Rukia had initially dismissed it, she now wondered. Could there have been an element of truth to Buffy's words? She certainly seemed unshaken by her encounter with the hollow. Rukia stared up at the sky vacantly. Had she made a mistake? Should she have given the girl more advice? If her spirit power was high enough that she could see spiritual beings, the Hollows would surely come after her. Rukia had been afraid telling her too much might make her a target, provoke her to be reckless, now she was worried that not telling her might have the same effect.

Rukia shook herself mentally.
What am I thinking? As if a human could stand a chance against a hollow. The girl's best hope are the soul reapers. I will keep the hollows at bay.

Suddenly, Rukia whipped her head round to the right. There. A surge of spirit energy. It was a hollow, and a large one. She drew her Zanpakuto with grim determination. She had work to do.

"Huh? A what?"

"Soul reaper. That's what she said. According to her it's basically the same thing as the grim reaper, only with swords."

Buffy heard a sharp intake of breath over the phone as Willow took in the news.
"Really? You sure? I mean, I know we're no stranger to the supernatural, but this is something else. We're talking about life after death, we're..."

"I know! I don't really believe her, but there sure is something wacky going on."

Willow was silent for a moment. "We need to figure out what's going on, for sure. Giles can get us into the library tomorrow, and I'll tell Xander. You can fill us all in on the details then, yeah? Oh, how about Faith? We'll want her there too, right?"

Buffy hesitated. It wasn't that she disliked Faith, she just found her... difficult. Well, she was part of the gang now. There was no sense in leaving her out.

"Yeah, get her there too."

"Okay, then. See you at the library tomorrow!"

"Sure. See you then."

The next morning, Buffy left the house and headed towards Sunnydale High. Along the way, she passed many souls in the street, some of which she recognised as former classmates. She hugged herself and shuddered. She wished she had brought a sword, but she knew there was no way she's get away with carrying it down the street in broad daylight. Instead all she had were her normal vampire slayer equipment and the largest knife she could fit in her bag.

She pressed on, avoiding looking directly at anyone she passed, until she eventually reached the school.

Upon entering the library, Xander, Willow and Giles all looked up.

"Buffy, you're here." Giles said. He frowned and looked at her carefully.
"You're pale. Is everything alright?"

"Hm? Yeah! Sure. Why wouldn't it be?"

Xander stood up. "Alright, Buff. What's going on? You promised Bronze tonight!"

"Something came up." She approached them, and looked around.
"Huh? Where's Faith?"

"Not here. Dunno why, she's probably just late."

Buffy rolled her eyes. "We'll have to get started without her. She can be filled in when she decides it'it's worth turning up." She looked at Giles. "Giles, have you every heard of a Hollow?"

"A Hollow? No, I don't believe I have."

"What about a Soul Reaper?

Giles frowned. "Uh, no. Buffy - what is this all about? It's sounding a bit..."

"I know. I know. Listen, last night I went patrolling, and I was attacked. I don't know what kind of demon it was, but it was big, and strong. I couldn't even see it at first, it was totally invisible. It sort of... melted into focus as I fought it."

"What did it look like?"

"Kinda like a big purple monkey without fur. But it had a weird head. Really weird. It was kinda like a skull, or a mask or something. Oh, and it had had a huge hole in it's chest."

Xander blinked. "Geez. Wacky, huh?"

Giles stared ahead thoughtfully. "I see... and what happened next?"

"Well, I ran around a bit and it tried to eat me and then this samurai chick, Rukia something, appeared."

"A Samurai? Seriously?"

"Well, close enough. She wore one of those black Japanese-style kimono things, only, like, for combat. She did have have a sword though! It was weird; I had been having so much trouble, and she just leapt up and sliced the hollow's head in two. Just like that!" Buffy pouted. "It was kinda annoying. She was all uppity and everything. She told me a bunch of stuff about 'Spirit Power' which I didn't really understand. Also - get this - she said she was a 'Soul reaper', which apparently involves killing bad guys and shepherding dead souls through to the next life."

She paused to let this sink in.

Xander's mouth dropped open. "... but she was lying, right? I mean, she must have been! Right?!"

Buffy shrugged. "Well, that's kinda what I want to find out. I hoped there'd be something on it here." She glanced up at Giles. "Any idea where to begin?"

"I think... I think I may know what you're talking about."

"What, really?"

Giles hurried off to his office and pulled some books out of his desk drawer. Upon returning, he set them down in the table in the middle. As usual, there were about five or six dusty books with worn leather bindings.
"Here, some of the watcher diaries" He explained. "What you've been saying, Buffy, it sounds very familiar. I do belive you are not the first to encounter these... beings." He picked up the book on the top of the pile and began rifling through the pages. "Somewhere... somewhere in one of these..." He stopped and looked around at the others. "Well, come on, then! Pick up a book and start reading!"

The others jumped in surprise.
"Oh! Right."

"Hey, hey! Found something!"

About an hour had passed, during which Giles had brought out three more sets of books, when Xander spoke up.

"Here! It was a hollow, right? I've found it."

Buffy leapt from her seat and ran over. She peered over Xander's shoulder to see the section he was pointing to on the page.

Xander was grinning triumphantly. "It says there was a slayer who started seeing ghosts, and monsters, which she refer to as hollows. It even mentions these soul-reaper guys!"

"When was this? What year?"

"Uh, ah, I'm not sure, hang on."

The pages rustled.

"16th century, the slayer was from England. Yeah, it's all right here! Hey, apparently she had the luck to be living on top of a hellmouth too. A few years after she got chosen, she began to see them, and then... oh."

Willow frowned. "What is it? What's wrong?"

Buffy stood back, expression unreadable. "The watchers- they thought she'd gone crazy. They killed her."

"Oh..."

There was silence.

"Oh, but that won't happen to you!" Willow blurted out, seeing her friend's troubled expression. "We know you're not crazy. Even if you were we'd never hurt you."

Xander smiled. "Yeah! Not as if we could hurt you though, super - Buff."

"I know, guys." Buffy laughed. "This is good, right? We know this is real-"

"-My god.." Giles muttered. The others turned to him in surprise. He was staring at the far wall in shock. His eyes turned to the three teenagers.

"Don't you three realise the implications of this? This is evidence of an afterlife! The answers to so many of humanity's mysteries lie at our fingertips! Buffy, this friend of yours - what did you say her name was?"

"Rukia. And she's not my friend!"

"You must find this Rukia again. The things she could tell us - oh, it could tell us so much!"

Buffy stared at her mentor. His eyes were practically sparkling with excitement.

"Hey, slow down there! Little miss holier-than-thou made it pretty clear she didn't plan to see me again."

"Well, find her! We cannot let this opportunity pass us by."

Buffy held up her hands in front of her. "Alright! Alright, got it. I suppose I could do with another chat with her. She did say something about me being a target for the Hollows now that I can see them." She shrugged. "Y'know. Nothing new. Oh, that reminds me, from now on, I may need access to a sword every now and then."

Giles glanced sideways at her. "A sword? Whatever for."

"Well, since hollows don't have hearts, staking doesn't really work." She held up her hand, still scarred from where she had agonisingly worked out the splinters last night. "Believe me, I tried. If I'm gonna start being followed by these things I'd like to actually be able to do some damage."

"Very well then. Be careful. It's hard to look inconspicuous walking down the street with a katana."

Xander fidgeted impatiently.
"Well, are we done now? You got what you wanted to know, right? It's only five, so we can go the the bronze later, yeah?"

Buffy nodded. "Sure. You and Will can go. I want to stay and see if these books have any advice on killing hollows."

"Sure. But you'd better be there tonight, you are not bailing on us again." Xander jumped up. "You coming Will?"

Willow jumped. She had been staring blankly at the ground for the last minute or so. "Oh! Yeah, coming…" She seemed very troubled.

As Xander left, Buffy caught Willow's arm. "Are you okay? You seem a bit…"

Willow squirmed uncomfortably. "Well, yeah. No… I don't know. It… it's silly."

"If there's something bothering you, I'm here to listen."

"It's just… Giles is right. This is evidence of an afterlife. And this… so far, it doesn't really seem to mesh with the whole Jewish thing…"

The news swept over Buffy like a tidal wave. Of course! How didn't I see it? If this is real, it could put Willow's entire faith to the torch! Despite not being religious herself, Buffy understood what it meant to believe in something, how important their faith could be to someone. She looked sorrowfully at Willow.

"My god, Will. I didn't even…"

"Oh, it's okay! Really! I just.. need a minute to…" She took a deep breath. "I'll see you tonight at the bronze, okay?" She smiled cheerfully and then, without waiting for an answer, left the room.

Buffy was speechless, she could hardly believe she missed it! This could very easily become very upsetting for Willow if not handled right. How were you supposed to comfort someone in a situation such as this? Was there anything that could be said?

Sighing, Buffy turned back to the stack of books-

The door slammed open with a loud crash. Buffy looked around in alarm and saw Faith, bruised and bloody, staggering in through the door.

"Faith!" Buffy ran over to the other slayer before she collapsed. Giles reappeared from behind the shelves.

"What happened?"

"There's.. something out there…" Faith gasped. She tried to move forwards, but winced and clutched her side in pain. "Ergh! Shit. Heh, I'm pretty bashed up, huh?"

"What is it? What did you see?"

"Well, that's just the thing Buff. I didn't see anything! Son of a bitch was invisible, wasn't he? Look, I hears crashes, right? Real loud. I run over and see a bunch of craters in the ground just appear! Then I get smacked by god knows what..." She paused to spit out a mouthful of blood. "I couldn't see it, I could barely even hear it. I had no chance."

Buffy and Giles exchanged glances. Could it be…?

Buffy ran to the weapons closet and took out a sword. "Where is it?"

"Uh, well, here's the thing. I think it might have followed me…"