Something I wanted to get out.
Disclaimer: I do not own Buffy: The Vampire Slayer.
Buffy and Xander stood in her garden, talking.
"I thought I hit bottom, but… it hurt. That you didn't trust me enough to tell me about Spike. It hurt." Xander admitted.
"I'm sorry. I should have told you." Buffy said apologetically as Xander smiled.
"Maybe you would have, if I hadn't given you so many reasons to think I'd be an ass about it." Xander acknowledged.
"Guess we've all done a lot of things lately we're not proud of." Buffy noted.
Xander gave a slightly larger smile. "I think I've got you beat."
"Wanna compare?" Buffy asked.
"Not so much. I don't know what I'd do… without you and Will." Xander smiled as Buffy tried to hold back tears.
"Let's not find out." Buffy said as they hugged. "I love you. You know that, right?"
Xander spotted something over Buffy's shoulder and his eyes widened in alarm. "Buffy!"
They turned to see Warren enter the garden, still wearing the black outfit from the previous night.
"You think you can just do that to me? You think I'd let you get away with that?" Warren scoffed and laughed crazily. "Think again." He pulled out his gun and fired but Xander jumped to the ground, while Buffy dodged to avoid the bullets and Warren turned to run off as he fired few more shots blindly, one of them hitting the upper window.
Willow and Tara were in their bedroom, talking, when they suddenly heard gunshots, widening their eyes in panic before they dove to the floor, taking cover as the bullet broke through the window and Tara hissed in pain, feeling a scratch on her arm. Both girls got up as Willow looked in worry at the wound on Tara's arm.
"You're bleeding." Willow said.
"I'm fine, it's just a flesh wound, don't worry." Tara said as Willow held her arm, disturbed by the sight of the injury. "What happened?"
Buffy had helped Xander on his feet, when they checked each other for wounds.
"You OK, Xander?" Buffy asked.
"I'm fine." Xander assured before they looked up to the upper window and realized that Warren had fired into Tara's and Willow's bedroom and their blood ran cold, immediately worried about their friends.
"There. That should do it." Buffy said as she disinfected and stitched up Tara's wound, while Tara put on a different shirt.
"Now what?" Xander said, worriedly.
"If Warren was willing to go this far to kill you, who knows what is he gonna do next." Willow said with a mix of anger and worry and no one could blame her. If Tara had died or if Warren had shot Dawn, if she was at home, Buffy would have killed Warren herself.
"That does it." Buffy growled through gritted teeth as she slammed her hand on the kitchen counter angrily.
"What?" Tara asked.
"Trying to kill me is one thing but almost killing my friends?" Buffy seethed as she looked into her reflection in the window. "You're lucky no one died. When I find you, you're gonna wish you were dead."
Buffy had gone to visit the police station, trying to get Warren's location out of Jonathan and Andrew, while Andrew was unwilling to give Warren up, a repentant and remorseful Jonathan had decided to tell Buffy to make up for his own transgressions and being bitter about Warren and Andrew willing to leave him behind as he told Buffy everything he knew.
Buffy had scoured the whole Sunnydale and checked some hideouts Jonathan had mentioned before she got lucky when she entered to see Warren looking for some things in the boxes. Buffy carefully approached him before she heard 'click' and grabbed Warren, using him as a human shield as she turned to see another Warren with a gun, while the one in her hands turned out to be a robot who then short-circuited in sparks.
"I'm not falling for that one." Buffy said.
"You think you can take me down?" Warren said smugly, scoffing.
"Don't think. I will." Buffy sneered as she kicked the gun off Warren's hand and he barely made a half-step to one of his gadgets on the table, when she kicked him, sending him tumbling down the floor. "You missed but you almost shot Tara, when you ran off." She said and Warren paled and gulped before she reached for Warren's throat and squeezed lightly, not choking him but Warren was unable to take another breath mainly due to fear before Buffy ripped off Warren's belt with gadgets and threw it away. "You've been a bad boy, so I'm taking away your toys. You could've killed the people I love. If they had died, I would've just snapped your neck right here, right now. Usually I don't kill humans but I've had to make exceptions before and I'm seriously considering making another in your case. You tried to make my life a living Hell and tried to frame me for murder, poisoned my mind and now one of my friends almost died."
Being powerless now and having no tricks left up his sleeve against the Slayer, Warren started sobbing and crying like the pathetic bastard he was. "Please… I'll do anything you want… I'll turn myself in… go to jail… I get it… it was wrong of me to try to kill you and your friend… I'm sorry…"
"You only live because she's still alive." Buffy sneered. "I protect the innocent, not punish the guilty. So I'm going to do what I have to do to protect my family and my friends, which means that you're not going to hurt anyone, ever again. If you walk away from this and go after me, Dawn or my friends again, you're gonna wish I'd killed you here."
She then lifted Warren and threw him as he screamed as his back hit the concrete wall, breaking his spine and most of his ribs, with him unable to move as he hit the ground, grunting in pain. Buffy then grabbed Warren, lifted him and slammed him repeatedly to the ground, breaking the remaining ribs and spine, crippling him.
"That's for the Buffybot." Buffy sneered.
"I'm gonna kill you, you bi—AAAAAAGGGGGGHHHHHHHHH!" Warren howled in pain as Buffy stepped on his crotch, crushing his testicles.
"This is for the hallucination." Buffy sneered before she punched him in the face, breaking his nose and the following punch knocked his teeth off his jaw before the final one knocked him out cold. "And this is for Katrina and Tara, you son of a bitch."
Buffy took a breath and sighed heavily. As much as she wanted to kill Warren for what he had done, she knew that if she gave into that rage, she could lose herself to the darkness like Faith once did. And she realized that Xander was right, Warren was just as bad as the Master, Angelus, Darla and other evil vampires she had met and while most of the time she relied on the law. She went upstairs and pulled out her phone, dialing 9-1-1.
Buffy had returned to the house, with a mix of shock, anger and relief, which was apparent to the Scooby Gang as Willow, Tara, Dawn, Xander and Anya approached her carefully.
"Is Warren…" Xander trailed off.
"No." Buffy shook her head and everyone immediately frowned in disappointment. "But given the beating I gave him, I'm sure he wishes he was dead. I didn't kill him but he's not gonna be walking away from it either anytime soon."
Xander, Dawn, Anya, Tara and Willow nodded, feeling some sense of satisfaction. As much as a part of them wanted Warren dead, now that they cooled off, they realized that it was mostly out of revenge and rage and there were lines that they should never cross, since once they gave into that darkness, there might not be a way back from it but they settled for this too.
As I've said before, Tara's and Cordelia's deaths are the deaths in Buffyverse that I can never forgive and to avoid another long rant, if Whedon wasn't the bastard we know by now that he is, Tillow, Cangel, Spuffy and others would've gotten the happy endings they deserve.
And this is something LyCox pointed out but when you think about it, it makes little to no sense how Tara died (then again, at this point it's not surprising given what we know about Whedon these days) is stupid, since after Warren had fired the first few shots and Buffy shoved Xander to the ground, Willow and Tara must have heard the gunshots and had a small opening to take cover before the following bullets would get into the bedroom and kill Tara, so here Tara only gets a flesh wound.
Originally, I was going to have Buffy snap Warren's neck at the end but I don't see her crossing that line, given the circumstances here and frankly, if she had at least tried to use the same argument Gunn did with Fred for him killing Seidel instead of her, she wouldn't come off as a hypocrite, since Gunn wanted to protect Fred from the burden of killing someone out of vengeance and rage, but Buffy only wanted to feel good about herself with her 'Slayer has no license to kill', which falls flat, when she killed an assassin from Order of Taraka in Season 2 and several Knights of Byzantium in Season 5 while protecting the Scoobies and she was also willing to kill Faith to save Angel. I like Buffy but she's behind Tara, Willow, Cordy, Faith, Dawn and Fred due to her naivite, self-righteousness and her (if I put it mildly) flexibility regarding killing humans, if she didn't have the stick up her ass so much, I'd like her a lot more.
So, what do you guys think?
Please review and let me know if you have enjoyed this one-shot.
With regards
Bl4ckHunter