AUTHOR: Goddess Isa
EMAIL: goddessiesa@aol.com
SUMMARY: In the future, after a second Ascension, Buffy turns away the only person who can help her. Oh, and Angel was killed in the first Ascension.
SPOILER: Becoming, Homecoming, Lover's Walk, Graduation Day
DISTRIBUTION: Sure, just email me & lmk where it's going - I like seeing my name in print =)
FEEDBACK: Please, I'd hate to have to Slay for it. =P
RATING: TV-14 - dark and kinda morbid
DISCLAIMER: Everyone belongs to Joss. Of course, I like to pretend that they're mine. I keep them in a shoe box under my bed and every night a different Slayerette gets to come out and play. It's very exciting for them.
Buffy couldn't believe what she was actually doing. Her body allowed her to function long enough to open the gates and close them behind her, to dust the vampires that approached her, to go through the motions. She wasn't feeling everything. It was just like being in a dream you can't wake up from.
She thought of Giles, all alone in the hospital. She wondered if he would ever wake up. She wondered if it would be better for him if he didn't.
She sat on the grass in front of the graves and sniffled. "Hey guys. Long time no see. I would've been here earlier, but there were some vamps....you probably know that though, don't you? Sometimes I feel like you're with me, even in the strangest places. Xander that means you. Showers have doors for a reason you know. Look at me. I'm trying to be normal Buffy like everything is all right. It's not. Everything sucks."
"And it's only going to get suckier," a familiar British voice said behind her.
"What the fuck are you doing here?" she kept her eyes focused on the graves. She was still in shock that Willow and Xander's parents had allowed them to be buried next to each other like that. Married or not, their families shared few common interests and were less than thrilled when the two eloped.
"I came to help."
"It's too late to help," Buffy said. "I've lived through two Ascensions now and have nothing to show for it. Except for the loss of my lover and my two best friends."
"There's one more coming."
"It always comes in threes," Buffy said almost poetically. "They keep saying that. It comes in threes, it comes in threes. So who will be number three to die? Cordelia? Oz? Anya?"
"The third isn't another death Buffy," Spike said as gently as he could. "It's another Ascension."
"What the fuck are you doing here?" she repeated with the same ice in her voice as before.
"We've been over this Slayer. I want to save the world."
"Good trick for an insane Vampire who's about ten times my age, give or take a decade."
"Buffy, if you don't let me help, no one will make it out this time."
Buffy kissed the white roses she'd bought for Willow and placed them on the grave. Beside them sat a PEZ dispenser and a pentagram necklace from Amy. Buffy noticed there was but one Twinkie at Xander's grave, even though Cordelia brought one each and every day. Who would take a Twinkie from a gravesite? she wondered. "Are people really that heartless?" she asked aloud without realizing it.
"Yes," Spike said. "We've got to stop it."
"It's not worth stopping." she said, standing up. "Not anymore."
He watched her walk away, and wished he could stop her from pulling the trigger of the gun he knew she kept under her bed.