Author's Note: Whoot! Action time!
Two scenes inspired this story. This was one of them.
My favorite line from this part is "Buffy clicked the safety off the gun". I'm working on using actions instead of dialogue, and that one action says more than a whole string of dialogue.
The Not-Doctor gave a long, weary sigh. "I knew this wasn't going to work," he said. And faster than anyone could see, the Not-Doctor whipped a small hand-gun with a silencer around the muzzle out of his pocket, and fired it at Buffy. The crossbow exploded in her hands.
Giles tried to come forwards, but the Not-Doctor glared at him. "Any closer, and she dies."
"She's the only one who can stop the Ascension," said Giles. "If you really wanted it stopped, you wouldn't kill her."
The Not-Doctor shrugged. "So far, the Slayer's track record for stopping Ascensions is zero. We've got all the tools we need. We just have to convince them to function correctly." He gave her a pointed stare. "Now. This Slayer could still be a valuable asset. So, Buffy. Agree to cooperate, and no one will get hurt."
Buffy gave a dry, humorless laugh. "I think you missed the point," she said. "I'm not going to cooperate. I said I'm going to kill you. That wasn't a suggestion. That was a promise."
Buffy leapt out at the Not-Doctor, swinging her foot to dislodge the gun from his hand. It skittered across the ground, and they both dove to grab it. He was faster, but Buffy was stronger, and managed to wrestle it out of his hands, but not before he clicked the safety back on. She got to her feet, and aimed the gun at the Not-Doctor. The Not-Doctor stood up and put his hands in the air.
"Shoot me," said the Not-Doctor, "and you're killing anything that's left of your friend. This isn't my body, after all. I'm just wearing it."
"He won't die if I shoot him," said Buffy. "He'll just regenerate. Maybe that'll be enough to bring the real Doctor back."
"You think he'll regenerate without a soul?" asked the Not-Doctor. "You really don't understand how Time Lords work. Can't regenerate without a soul. Ever. If you kill this body, the regeneration energy will just eat it up. Burn it to bits. Nothing will replace it. I'll wake up, back at the Concurrence headquarters, alive and well. With a fully functional and unspeakably powerful time machine, I might add. And you'll go to your grave knowing you just lost your last chance to get the Doctor back."
Buffy hesitated. "I can get him back?"
"He's lying," said Giles. "The Doctor is dead. His soul is trapped forever, and no power on this Earth would be able to free it. All that you're seeing here is an animated corpse."
"An animated corpse with all the Doctor's knowledge," corrected the Not-Doctor. "Everything he knows, I know. The answer could be somewhere in this brain. But you'll never find it if you force a regeneration."
Buffy's hand tightened around the gun. "I don't believe you," said Buffy.
"But you still won't shoot," said the Not-Doctor. "Because right now, there's an itty bitty sliver of hope inside you, some itty bitty voice that keeps saying, 'maybe, just maybe, I can get the Doctor back. Maybe, just maybe, he's not really dead.' And for that reason alone, you're not going to shoot. You're never going to shoot." He grinned. "I'm perfectly safe."
Buffy clicked the safety off the gun.
The Not-Doctor froze, a momentary flicker of fear appearing in his eyes. It was gone in a second.
"Oh, come on," said the Not-Doctor. "That's not the Doctor's style. What happened to 'there's always a better way'? What happened to 'you have to give them a chance'?"
"That's him," said Buffy. "That's not me. I don't do chances. I don't do better ways. I'm the Slayer; I kill the bad guys. Maybe you should have thought of that. Maybe, if you wanted a bit of compassion, you shouldn't have murdered the only person in the universe who might have convinced me to give you some!" She practically screamed this last bit at the Not-Doctor. Death was too good for whatever had done this. She didn't just want to kill it, she wanted to hurt it. She wanted to make it suffer, to make it beg for its measly existence of a life. Anything heartless enough to kill the Doctor and enjoy it, to trap the Doctor's soul in an eternal Hell — had to die. Her finger trembled on the trigger, as she realized she'd already squeezed it half way down.
Buffy calmed herself, easing her finger off of the trigger. This wasn't helping. She needed to find out where the Concurrence were meeting, so she could kill them. This animated corpse was the only lead she had. Buffy forced back her blind anger into determination.
"Now," she said to the Not-Doctor, "you may have the TARDIS, but I know you can't fly her without a Time Lord body. And you've got the only one in existence. So either you tell me where your headquarters are, or you lose all of time and space. You got that?"
The Not-Doctor tilted his head to the side, considering. Then, he shrugged. "Nah," he said. "Don't think I will. Oh, and quick tip. Never threaten someone with a gun, when he's got a sonic screwdriver."
And out of nowhere, the Not-Doctor produced the sonic screwdriver, which made the gun fall apart in Buffy's hand.
Buffy watched the Not-Doctor's deft hand motions, as they shifted settings on the sonic. She darted forward, rushed at him, hoping to dislodge him before he had a chance to use it, but she was too late. He'd already buzzed it at one of the bookcases, which dislodged from the wall and fell towards Giles. Giles just barely got out of the way in time, but a particularly heavy book clunked down on top of his head, and knocked him to the ground. Buffy rushed to Giles, checking his pulse. He was still breathing, but unconscious. Buffy breathed a sigh of relief. She turned, to find Wesley pleading for the Not-Doctor to spare his life.
"Leave Wesley alone," Buffy demanded.
The Not-Doctor raised an eyebrow. "Yes, Ma'am," he said. He gave her a cold smile. "More interested in you, anyways. Good calibration test. What with you being the Slayer and all." He stood, a challenging gleam in his eye. "So go on," he said. "Slay me."
Buffy rushed at him, aiming a flying kick into his ribs. But she felt herself turning, twisting in the air, as a cool hand reached out and grabbed her ankle — not blocking her, but helping her, pushing her forward, gathering her momentum and forcing it towards the nearby wall. Buffy crashed into the wall, and heard a splintering sound from where she'd impacted. What the hell was that? She flipped back to her feet, and punched at him. He dodged the punch. Then dodged the next. Then caught her third punch and used it to toss her over his head and onto the floor.
"Not bad," said the Not-Doctor. "I'd have expected a bit more, honestly, but it's a nice start."
"I'm just warming up," said Buffy, getting back to her feet.
"Oh, sorry, didn't mean you," said the Not-Doctor. "Meant, you know. This body. Bit too dependent on the defensive moves for my taste, but, well, suppose that's just what happens when you possess a pacifist." His eyes lit up. "Oh, but he does know how to snap someone's neck," said the Not-Doctor. "Sort of wish there was something left of him, now. It'd be sort of brilliant, don't you think, making him watch as he snapped your neck?"
"You're sick," said Buffy. She grabbed a sword, unsheathed it, and ran at the Not-Doctor. The Not-Doctor seemed vaguely amused. He kicked a fallen book out, and before Buffy could stop herself, she'd tripped over it, the sword tumbling out of her hands and slamming into the wall, about two inches from Wesley's head.
The Not-Doctor frowned. "Forgot to carry the one," he muttered. "Vector equations. Mental math's a bit different in this brain."
Buffy didn't even bother to dignify this with an answer. She was too angry, too upset. She dove at him, then, at the last moment, stopped and kicked out at his legs, trying to trip him up. He crashed to the floor, where she kicked him twice in the stomach before he managed to catch one of her feet and toss her forward. Buffy turned the fall into a flip, and yanked the sword out of the wall.
The Not-Doctor popped back to his feet. He pointed the sonic screwdriver at the bookshelf nearest Buffy, and it wobbled, and smashed down onto the floor, as Buffy dove out of the way. She tripped over a (no doubt carefully placed) chair that wasn't where it had been a minute ago, and slammed onto the floor.
She only noticed the sword as it came crashing down, and wasn't quite fast enough to get out of the way. It ripped across Buffy's shoulder, and she gritted her teeth, turning her cry into an angry growl.
Just having the Doctor do this, something like this, was enough to prove to her that he was dead, really and truly dead. And she wouldn't rest until the jerk who'd done it was in pieces.
She leapt to her feet again, and faked out the Not-Doctor so that he thrust the sword into an electrical outlet. Then she pulled him by the arm and flipped him onto the ground. As he tumbled through the air, he grabbed her, and they crashed to the floor together. Buffy punched out at him, but a sharp shot of pain surged through the shoulder where she'd been slashed. The Not-Doctor took advantage of the distraction, and dragged her to her feet, throwing her against a corner of the library, so that she was jammed between him and the wall. He wrapped his hands tight around her neck.
"Say goodbye, Slayer," he said, and squeezed.
Buffy felt the world spin around her, as she gasped for air. She peered into those familiar, always-friendly brown eyes, now staring at her with such cold determination. Her vision blurred, and she wondered if this meant she was dying or crying.
"Goodbye, Doctor," she gasped out.
The hands loosened, all at once. Buffy heard a sharp intake of breath. A sudden spark of horror appeared in those deep brown eyes. "Buffy?"
The entire world seemed to freeze around Buffy, as she heard her name.
"Buffy Anne Summers," he said. "Please—"
And then his eyes rolled up in his head, and he dropped to the ground, Angel standing behind him. Buffy felt Angel's ice cold hands gently helping her to a nearby chair, noticed Willow as she started bandaging up the gash on Buffy's shoulder. They were talking to her, Buffy noted mildly. She didn't know what they were saying. She didn't care.
Her eyes never left the pinstripe body on the floor.
Because the moment he had said her name, her full name, her real name, it was like the rest of the world had gone silent around her. It was as if no one else existed except for her and him. And just for a second, just for one little moment, as he said her name, she could feel the warmth of two suns on her face, could taste the red dust of a planet she'd never been to, could smell the rich scent of alien flowers. And even though the sensation only lasted a moment, Buffy knew what it meant. Somehow, somehow, she knew.
The Doctor was still alive.
