Those who have gone before ch. 2
Robyn's room was a fairly typical example of a fourteen-year old girl's bedroom. The walls
were covered in posters of pop stars and the floor was covered in dirty clothes. There was a
small bed with a frilly white bedspread and several stuffed animals propped against the
pillows. But Robyn was not a typical fourteen-year-old girl. In the pile of books on her desk
English and Chemistry textbooks were sandwiched between much older more esoteric
volumes, bound in what she could only hope was cow leather and decorated with mysterious
symbols. Robyn changed into her patrolling clothes and stood for a moment, admiring herself
in the mirror. Slim body, (still no hips), small, pert breasts, long athletic limbs.
'Pity I have no time for boys' she mused.
In the dim light of her desk lamp her face in the glass looked creepy, the skin waxy pale. Her
deep-set grey eyes were ringed with dark circles.
"Some Europeans say that it is unlucky to see yourself in a mirror by candlelight" she said
aloud.
"Dammit! I've got those stupid superstitions on the brain! David will be so pleased"
Later that night, as Robyn sat at her desk in her bedroom, hunched over her copy of Waring's
'Signs' and a cup of hot milo, there was a knock at the door.
"Come in!" Robyn called.
Her mother stuck her head around the door, looking worried.
"Sorry to disturb your homework, honey, but Mr Walton is on the phone."
Robyn grimaced, and stood up.
"Thanks Mum", she said, and went to the phone.
David got straight to the point.
"You may not have been aware of this, but the University Anthropology museum has for some
time been under threat of closure."
"No, I wasn't aware of that" said Robyn, her tone dripping sarcasm. She disliked David
intensely, blaming him for making her duty harder than it needed to be. He never cut her any
slack.
"Well, it had been" David continued, ignoring the insolence in her tone. "All in the name of
economic rationalism". He pronounced this word the way another person would say 'bile' "The
bastards have no time for an enterprise which does not make money. God forbid a university
should keep open a facility simply because it was educational!"
"David, I really ought to get back to my studies now. I was just-"
"Wait a minute young lady. This is important. The museum is closing, and for some time the
University has been attempting to sell off, or otherwise find homes for the artefacts it used to
store. Many of these artefacts had been given the museum in trust, for safe-keeping. This
includes a number of Aboriginal artefacts which were of deep significance to the tribes who
used to live in the area." He paused.
"Are you listening Robyn?"
"Of course. I'm just waiting for you to get to the 'this is the monster- here's how to kill it' part"
" There may not be any monster. As I was saying, the museum has been trying to sell or find
homes for all these artefacts, but they have not been entirely successful. Several artefacts,
which were not valuable enough to sell, are to be packaged up and simply thrown away.
They're sending a truck around to collect them tomorrow. Which is why we have to be at the
museum tonight."
"Why do we have to go and look at a load of old junk?"
"It's possible that in the act of removing the artefacts from their cases, vengeful spirits will be
disturbed."
"You want me to go and hang around a closed museum in the middle of the night just on the
off-chance that there'll be 'vengeful spirits' roaming around? Jesus David! You'd think we lived
on the Hellmouth or something!
David drove Robyn to the University grounds, then waited in the car while she went to check
things out. She insisted that he remain behind, saying that he couldn't move as quietly as she
could, but the truth was she just wanted a break from his whingeing about the unfairness of
the museum's closure. That he had agreed confirmed her suspicion that she was unlikely to
meet anything unpleasant that night. The campus was deserted, which was not surprising,
since it was 10pm on a Thursday. Student night.
'They'll all be at the pub' Robyn thought jealously, as she strode past the bus stop. ('If one
wants to drink to excess and not be the worse for wear, the Welsh recommend roasting and
eating the lungs of a pig…')Robyn herself was not yet old enough to drink, but she longed to
be indoors surrounded by crowds of happy, chatting people. Scratch that, she wanted to be
one of those people. People who can go out and party and not have to get up early in the
morning. People who can stay out all night without breaking a single nail or getting covered in
blood, ash or demonic bodily fluids.
She passed through a stone archway and into a large, grassy courtyard. It was deserted,
which was what she expected. The campus wasn't usually haunted by anything scarier than
the occasional lecturer, working late during exams. Robyn was pretty sure David was
overreacting again. It wasn't as if they lived on a Hellmouth or something. In the glow of the
security lights she consulted the campus map. Once sure she had the right building, she went
to the old wooden doors and tried the handle. ('It is bad luck to open the front door to a house
unless the back door is closed'). It was locked. With a sharp twist of her wrist she yanked the
handle free from the wood. She allowed herself a small, self-satisfied smile. Whatever else
she thought of being the slayer, being able to turn hardwood into matchsticks with her bare
hands was pretty cool.
Inside, Robyn waited a few moments for her eyes to adjust to the darkness, then surveyed
the room. The walls were lines with empty shelves. The few remaining artefacts were packed
into crates which were haphazardly piled in the middle of the floor. They looked sort of…sad.
Now that she thought about it, David had a point, for once. She lifted the lid of an unsealed
crate and peered inside. It was full of small objects wrapped in some old-fashioned non-
biodegradable packing material. She selected one, and turned it over in her hands. Sure, it
was just a piece of broken crockery, but it was a really old piece of broken crockery. Certainly
older than she was. A further search of the crates revealed most of them to be full of
aboriginal artefacts- stone axes (To carry an axe into a house may bring a death in the
family…), weapons and wooden objects she couldn't identify. But the room was empty of
anyone living, and if there were any troubled spirits around she could not see them. She
decided to call it a night, and carefully returned the artefacts to their proper place. She pulled
the door closed behind her, feeling a little guilty about the broken lock. Then again, she
supposed that no-one was likely to steal any of this stuff. If any of it was really valuable, no
doubt the University would have found a way to sell it by now.
Rather than accept that her trip out to the University had been a total waste of time,
Robyn decided to make a brief tour of the campus before leaving. David could wait. There
was a small forest near the library, and young couples had been known to fraternise among
the trees. (In some primitive societies it was once believed that a man who cut off the branch
of a tree would lose one of his own limbs…) That sort of thing always seemed to attract
vampires, so the slayer headed towards the forest. The moon was a thin crescent, so the
slayer had to pick her way carefully along the dimly lit path. The trees grew so thickly by the
sides of the path that she couldn't see more than a few meters beyond it. Suddenly, the air
was pierced by an angry shriek. The slayer whirled, stake in hand, then relaxed. Just some
possums fighting. She stopped to admire a huge strangler fig. It was easily five meters
across, and the nearest of its buttress roots was twice as thick as the Chosen One's legs.
This gigantic parasite must be over a hundred years old. Robyn peered through the lattice of
the roots to the cavern within, which had once housed the now long-dead host tree, and
shivered. 'Better head back to the car' she thought, and turned to go. Then something struck
her from above. The slayer glimpsed something vaguely humanoid, with a huge, cavernous
mouth. Hands with rubbery red skin closed on her.
('Trees were once believed to be the homes of wood spirits…') The slayer lapsed out of
consciousness.