From: "Ryan Kinkor" kinkorknight@earthlink.net
Subject: FIC: Harsh Legacy: Brand New Day (Part 8)
Date: Saturday, October 26, 2002 3:33 PM
CONTINUED FROM PART SEVEN
Part Eight: The Night Abides
A demon inexplicably rising from the floor and deciding to eat her
arms off would have been more desirable to Willow than to be facing Giles in
her doorway. He was staring at her with what might have been the most
painful scowl she'd ever seen on his face. She knew she had to stay strong,
but did it mean having to take on Giles? How far was she willing to go to
save Buffy?
But it wasn't just Giles she had to consider. She knew nothing about
this creep named Valmont, but she knew that he wasn't someone to take
lightly. Even if she could bring herself to incapacitate Giles somehow, she
wasn't sure what Valmont could do, or would do.
"Before I decided to visit," said Valmont, as he backed off to give
Willow and Giles some space, "I figured that I should contact Giles. After
all, it was the body of his last Slayer being manhandled. We compared notes
and so I gave him the address. Surprise, surprise, he had a good idea what
was going on."
Giles held his hand up to Valmont. "Please, let me handle this." Valmont
made a gesture of concession and quieted.
Giles kept his eyes on Willow and said, "I see you didn't take my advice
to heart. It hurts me, Willow, that you would go behind my back like this.
It hurts me that all of you would go behind my back."
"You didn't leave me a choice," replied Willow, focusing her anger at
Giles. "You didn't even let me explain what I knew."
"Would it have mattered, Willow? If I had agreed or disagreed with you,
would you have changed your course in any way?"
"It always matters to me, Giles. That's why I came to you. But this is
more important than our friendship. This is Buffy's life, and her afterlife.
I would have thought that you would cared enough to listen."
"I've always cared, Willow," said Giles, his voice lowering but losing
none of its angry tone in the process. "I've cared more than anyone might
understand. And as Buffy's Watcher, I've always tried to act in her best
interest. I've made mistakes, but I've always cared."
"Well, right now, Buffy's best interest is us. And right now, she
doesn't need a Watcher saying, by his inaction, that she has to be alone for
the rest of her existence!" She had almost screamed out the last words at
Giles.
Giles' face softened. "Yes, she is alone, isn't she?" The anger was
draining from his face as he spoke. "I must admit, Willow, that the journal
you gave me wasn't a particularly long one, but it was very captivating,
nonetheless."
Giles looked away from Willow and addressed the group. "I won't pretend
that I understand what's going on anymore than any of you. All I know is
that when Buffy died, her soul didn't go free. The picture is incomplete for
me, so I'm going to have to take a leap of faith here and trust all of you
to do what has to be done."
He turned back to Willow. "I'm on your side, Willow. I've always been on
your side. And I'm sorry that I made you feel otherwise."
Willow's anger faded as quickly as Giles' had. She went and hugged him,
and he hugged back.
There was a massive release of tension from everyone else in the room.
"See, Willow," said Xander, wiping his forehead, "one of us."
Dawn also came over and hugged Giles. "You wouldn't have tried to stop
us, right, Giles?"
"If it had come to that," he said, "I don't think I could have stopped
you."
Willow's face had become apologetic. "Giles, I'm sorry about not
trusting you. I'm sure you..."
"All right! Enough with this peace and love crap! I guess I'm the only
voice of reason left in this bunch." Valmont's voice cut through the moment
like a stake through a vampire's heart. "Disappointing, Giles."
Giles resisted giving Valmont the finger. In his Ripper days, he
wouldn't have.
"This is a family affair. You're not needed," said Tara.
"Buddy, the votes are in and you're off the island, " said Xander. "Boy,
I never thought I'd actually use that line."
"The man's right," voiced an emboldened Anya. "Go... kill some bad
demons somewhere else." *Ouch,* she thought, *have to work on the insults.*
"You people aren't thinking here. This is going to go badly, and you're
all going to hate yourselves afterwards, if you live that long!" Valmont
knew he was losing the argument, but he couldn't just sit by and let a
zombie get made.
"We have this under control now, Valmont," said Giles, his calm demeanor
countering Valmont's anxiety. "You can go back to your patrolling, or
whatever you were doing."
"Oh, this isn't under control, not by a long shot. So..." --Valmont
grabbed a chair and hunkered down into a corner of the room-- "I'm just
going to stay here for now, out of the way. And wait for the party to end."
********
Showtime.
Willow was feeling a lot better about all this, now that Giles had shown
his support, but butterflies were still doing carpet-bombing in her stomach.
She and Tara had never tried running two powerful spells at the same time.
The amount of mystic energy that was about to flow through the room was
going to be high. Nobody had voiced any doubts to her, for which she was
grateful. She had enough doubts of her own to combat.
Willow, Tara, and Dawn were sitting in the pentagram itself, straddling
the middle section. Buffy's body was in the direct center, and the three of
them formed a triangle around it. Dawn had to sit closest to the body, since
her part in the ritual required her to be within arm's reach of it. Dawn
seemed to be doing okay, as she had her eyes closed and was breathing deeply
and steadily as Willow had instructed her to do. A little self-meditation.
It would help calm her and focus her mind.
Giles, Spike, Xander and Anya sat at four of the five points of the
pentagram. They wouldn't be directly part of the spells, but their mental
energy would help create a stabilizing effect, reducing the chances of any
sudden magical surges that could screw up the spell. It would have been
better if they had one more person to fill in the last point, but four would
be fine.
Well, they did have a fifth person, but the idea of asking him to help
didn't ever cross Willow's mind. To Valmont's credit, he was doing as he
said he would do. He was still sitting in the corner, his hands on his
knees, his eyes closed. He seemed to be meditating. She had to admit that
she was almost glad to have him stay. She had a spell in mind that should
take out a zombie, Slayer or otherwise. But she wasn't sure if she would
have the courage, or the physical strength, to use it if she had to.
Valmont, though, didn't appear to have any qualms about taking on a Zombie
Slayer.
No more of that kind of thinking. There weren't going to be any
mistakes. No Zombie Buffy was going to appear. Only Buffy.
God, she sounded convincing. If only she could remove the...
"Willow, I think we're ready, " said Tara, dislodging Willow's current
thoughts.
Willow nodded. They all knew the spell process. She had gone over it
with everyone about half a dozen times, to make sure they all understood.
Everything was as ready as they would...
"I just thought of something," said Anya. "You'll be doing the
'readjustment' spell while the Astral portal is open, correct?"
"Yes, Anya. We been over that already," said Willow, a little irritated.
Anya seemed to have gotten stuck on this one point, but Anya couldn't
remember why. She just kept coming back to it.
"Which means that the energy from the second spell will be visible to
the Astral Plane." Anya looked worried now. "That may not be good."
"Not be good?" said Spike, "How 'not be good' are we talking, here?"
"Well, it won't hurt us or the spell, but it might... attract
attention."
Giles peaked his eyebrows. "Whose attention, Anya?"
"I remembered something about the Voxnork just now. They're spirits that
live around Hell, and they like to catch wayward souls. Usually they can't
find much to catch, but they do pick up on magic use in the Astral Plane.
The amount of spell power we're putting into this might look like a Fourth
of July to them."
It wasn't the kind of thing the gang wanted to hear right now. "Uh,
Anya," said Xander, "you have to work on your bad news timing. You've been
slipping up a bit lately."
"It doesn't change anything," said Willow. "I'm prepared for a hostile
spirit if I come upon one. Never hurts to have a back-up plan. But thanks
for the last-minute info, anyway."
Willow closed her eyes, breathing and relaxing. She would start the
spell, and then Tara would follow. She just needed a few breaths to clear
her...
"Willow?" It was Tara.
Willow opened her eyes and saw Tara's face. Renewed fear shown in her
eyes, and Willow figured it was fear for her.
"Willow, if you can't find Buffy, and you feel the spell start to end,
come back. Don't be a hero. We can always try again as long as we don't do
the second spell. But don't get lost yourself."
Willow wanted to hug her, but it wasn't the time for it. So she smiled.
And Tara smiled back. It was as much reassurance as they needed.
Willow closed her eyes again. She began breathing steadily. After a
minute, she found her stillpoint, the place in her mind where all thoughts
countered each other and left her mind balanced out. It was the best time to
start.
"Vespas, durandi, shu-shu-na!" she began, her right arm slowly sweeping
through the air in an arc.
"Junas, collenta, mak, turic mon shu-shu-ta!" Tara recited the beginning
of her part of the projection spell, also sweeping her right arm the same
way Willow had.
They continued chanting for several minutes, reciting the spell words
over and over. At each passing chant, Willow felt more and more weightless,
the world seemed less real, and her body was more distant. She stayed
connected to her corporal self long enough to watch Tara make the final
gesture. Tara touched Dawn on the head with her right hand, sprinkling a
fine blue powder on her hair. After that, the world went dark to Willow as
her body fell away into...
The desert. It was all brown sand, mountains of sand dunes flowing away
into the horizon on all sides. There was no sun, but there was still plenty
of light, as if the sky itself was the light source. It was cloudless, an
amazing blue that fading and grew in intensity as she watched. No living
thing, vegetable or animal, graced the sands.
It was the Astral Plane, pictured as a vast desert in Willow's mind. She
knew that it was just a cover, that the realm she now walked was made of
energy. But the sand crunched under her feet as she walked and she breathed
normally, despite the fact that she didn't need to breathe. Her mind was
adapting to the Plane as well it as it could. She could see her body, the
afterimage of what she was back on Earth, but she looked translucent. She
tried to touch her left arm with her right hand, and was amazed to
see it go right through the arm.
She turned around and was happy to see a familiar face. Dawn, also in a
ethereal body, was standing right in a globe of shimmering light. It was
like looking at a heat mirage. Willow could see part of the desert behind
the globe, but it was distorted, like looking through a prism. It was the
gateway back home, and Dawn was her anchor.
Willow had done an Astral Communion spell once, in order to divine some
information to help Buffy. It wasn't as powerful as this one, since she
never actually left her body completely that time, but she had still needed
an anchor. This time, instead of Tara, Dawn had been chosen at the end of
the spell as Willow's anchor, partly because Tara still had to use her magic
in the next spell, and partly because Dawn seemed able to zero in on Buffy's
soul. It seemed logical. Once upon a time, this place had been Dawn's home.
"Dawn, can you hear me?" Willow's voice seemed slightly out of phase,
but otherwise she could talk the same.
"Yes," said Dawn. She tried to move out of the globe, but was blocked as
if touching a steel wall. "Willow, I can't move past it."
"You're only partially here. Just keep talking to me. Tell me which way
to go."
********
The others watched as Willow's body collapsed to the floor. She looked
almost dead, but Willow had assured them that it was just a stasis that the
body went into during a projection. Still, Xander couldn't help but think
about watching Buffy's body drop lifeless to the ground all those months
back. And it wasn't helping that Buffy's wrapped-up body was right next
to...
Xander switched channels on his mind to detour away from those
depressing thoughts. He glanced over at Giles, who was watching the spell
spectacle with keen interest. "Giles," he whispered, "Question."
Giles looked back at Xander. "Yes?"
"When Tara said we could try again unless we started the other spell,
what did she mean?"
"Alchemy is only normally used to transmute non-organic substances into
other non-organic substances," said Giles. "It doesn't work on organic
objects. We're bending the rules a little here, but if we revive Buffy's
body this way, and we don't get her soul back in time, not only will her
body die again, but most likely it will turn to ash within a few hours."
"Oh," Xander quietly remarked.
********
"You should keep straight, Willow! I think I can feel something straight
ahead!"
"Dawn, you don't have to yell. We're connected. I can hear you as if you
were standing with me."
Willow had been walking through the sand for some time, though it was
impossible to tell how much time had gone by. She would know when the spell
started to end, but otherwise she couldn't say how much time she had to
wander. The amount of time depended on the power of the mage, so Willow
hoped that she had a lot of time to work with. But that didn't mean she
could dawdle.
"Keep going straight," said Dawn, now speaking in her normal tone. "I
think it's straight."
"You're not sure?"
"I'm new at this. I mean, we'll find her eventually, right? It's so
barren out here."
"Dawn, relax. Focus on Buffy. I know you can sense her here. Whatever
direction you send me in is good."
Willow crossed over another dune. Even though she had no body, she felt
the exertion as she walked. It was mental exertion, though. Being on the
Astral Plane was tiring to a spirit still connected to a physical dimension.
But Willow was nowhere near exhausted. She was too hyped up now to let a
little thing like fatigue slow her down.
She passed around yet another sand dune. It was so vast, the desert. It
was probably infinite. If she kept walking, she'd never find a way out of
the desert. She hadn't seen anyone or anything yet. If it wasn't for Dawn's
presence, she'd lose herself here just hiking over the first dune. God, what
it must be like for...
She gasped. In truth, her mind gasped, but she wasn't caring about
technicalities just then.
She had crossed over another nondescript sand dune. She had seen the
base of the dune clearly from the top of another hill, yet somehow, Willow
had missed her. This place played games with your senses. But it didn't
matter now. At the base of the dune, someone was sitting. Someone with blond
hair, a white sweater, and leather pants.
"Willow? Are you okay?" asked Dawn.
A whole flood of emotions hit Willow right then, and for a moment she
couldn't talk. She forced back the tide in her and damned it up tight.
"Dawn, ask the others how much time has gone by," she said in a controlled
voice.
Dawn was still able to talk to the others back on Earth, though she had
to drop away from the Plane to do it. There was silence for a moment, then,
"Xander says it's been fifteen minutes since you went under."
Willow did a quick math check in her head. "Dawn, tell Tara to start the
revival spell in five minutes, her time."
"Willow?... Are you saying...?"
"Dawn, tell her! I'll get back to you in a minute."
Willow ran down the sand dune, spraying sand in great amounts as she
went. She got to about five feet of the sitting figure when Willow heard low
singing. She couldn't make out the name of the song, or any of the words,
but it was definitely coming from the figure. It was a sad and distant song.
Willow wanted it to stop, because the flood gate she had erected in her mind
was starting to open again, and that song was the reason. It was the song
that kept you sane when the world seemed so insane. It was the one that
brought memories and allowed you to escape your condition, if only for the
length of the song.
"Buffy."
Buffy stopped singing. She looked up, though not at Willow at first,
then turned her head toward Willow. Willow gazed into Buffy's eyes, and
whatever lingering doubts she had flew away. This was her Buffy. Sad,
horribly lonely eyes, a face that looked bleached and yet still held untold
strength.
For a minute that seemed infinite, the two of them stared at each other.
Then Buffy stood up. Her mouth opened and shut in what seemed like case of
stuttering shock. And then:
"Willow."
Her voice was soft and distant, almost unreal. Willow planted a mental
foot on her emotions and kept it there. "Buffy, it's me. I'm real. I'm here
to bring you back home."
Buffy seemed confused. "B...back? I can't. I...died. I know I... died.
I..."
Willow went to Buffy and tried to grasp her hand. But their hands passed
through each other. Willow cursed her own momentary stupidity. There was
nothing to grasp because they were nothing but energy here. She'd have to
get Buffy moving the old-fashioned way.
"Buffy, we don't have a lot of time to talk. You have to just follow my
words. I want you to walk with me, very closely. I'm going to lead us to a
way out of here. Do you understand?"
"I... saw you. You... and Dawn. I can't remember... when but I... I know
I saw both of you..."
A bit more urgently, Willow said, "Yes, you saw us, one day ago. That
was real as well. Now, Buffy, you have to walk behind me. Do you
understand?"
Slowly, Buffy nodded her head. She still seemed unsure, but when Willow
turned around and started walking back the way she came, Buffy followed
after her.
********
"Oh my God! She found her!" Most of the time during the spell, Dawn sat
cross-legged with her eyes closed, as silent and still as Willow. But she
would pop back at times to relay news or ask questions, though she remained
stone-like, her eyes shut. She could talk and listen, though.
Dawn's jubilation was Tara's first signal that it was time to start
preparing for the revival spell. She took a few herbal powders and sprinkled
them on Buffy's wrapped body. She then began a series of chants that would
begin building up magic energy. By the time five minutes rolled around, the
air was brimming with power.
*It's time,* Tara thought. She hated having to do this, especially after
what Glory had done to Dawn months back. But it was the only way to start
the spell. Tara picked up a small ritual knife, grasped Dawn's left hand,
took her thumb and made a cut. The cut wasn't too deep, but it bled
sufficiently well for what Tara needed. Dawn made no reaction to the cut, as
her mind was back in the Astral Plane.
Tara led the bleeding thumb over Buffy's body. Drops of crimson
sprinkled onto the white sheets around Buffy's corpse. As each drop hit, the
blood turned from red to a glowing blue. When roughly two dozen drops had
fallen, Tara gave Dawn's hand over to Anya to bandage. Buffy's corpse was
now covered in a bluish glow from head to toe.
Tara took a deep breath. *Here goes a miracle,* she thought, and she
enacted the final word.
"Met'taklin!" she yelled.
Buffy's body didn't just glow, it *surged* with blue light. It jumped a
few inches into the air and hovered there as the light went to work.
Everyone sat and stared in awe as Buffy's body seemed to not just glow, but
warp in and out of existence. Tara had an inkling that this would happen,
but even she was blown over by the light show playing before them. Valmont,
who had kept his eyes closed through the earlier parts of the ritual, opened
them. And while part of him wanted to crush out the light and end this
disaster-in-the-making, the better part of him made him sit and wonder at
the spectacle.
For close to ten minutes, the light enveloped Buffy's body. Then it
faded quickly, flowing off her body and evaporating into the air. Tara went
to the body and gently removed the top sheet around Buffy's head.
"My God!" It was Xander's exclamation. He had seen Buffy's face before
the spell. It had been gangrenous and rotting, covered with sores and a few
maggots. It hadn't been fun.
Buffy's face now was perfect. No bruises or signs of rot. As good as
new. Xander went over to her and felt for a pulse on her neck. No, she was
still dead. But the body felt warm. Almost like it was waiting to be filled
again.
Tara smiled. It had gone perfectly. Now it was up to Willow and Dawn to
do the rest.
A scream, Dawn's scream, jolted all of them from their warm mood.
"No! Tara! They're in trouble!"
********
CONTINUED IN PART NINE
Subject: FIC: Harsh Legacy: Brand New Day (Part 8)
Date: Saturday, October 26, 2002 3:33 PM
CONTINUED FROM PART SEVEN
Part Eight: The Night Abides
A demon inexplicably rising from the floor and deciding to eat her
arms off would have been more desirable to Willow than to be facing Giles in
her doorway. He was staring at her with what might have been the most
painful scowl she'd ever seen on his face. She knew she had to stay strong,
but did it mean having to take on Giles? How far was she willing to go to
save Buffy?
But it wasn't just Giles she had to consider. She knew nothing about
this creep named Valmont, but she knew that he wasn't someone to take
lightly. Even if she could bring herself to incapacitate Giles somehow, she
wasn't sure what Valmont could do, or would do.
"Before I decided to visit," said Valmont, as he backed off to give
Willow and Giles some space, "I figured that I should contact Giles. After
all, it was the body of his last Slayer being manhandled. We compared notes
and so I gave him the address. Surprise, surprise, he had a good idea what
was going on."
Giles held his hand up to Valmont. "Please, let me handle this." Valmont
made a gesture of concession and quieted.
Giles kept his eyes on Willow and said, "I see you didn't take my advice
to heart. It hurts me, Willow, that you would go behind my back like this.
It hurts me that all of you would go behind my back."
"You didn't leave me a choice," replied Willow, focusing her anger at
Giles. "You didn't even let me explain what I knew."
"Would it have mattered, Willow? If I had agreed or disagreed with you,
would you have changed your course in any way?"
"It always matters to me, Giles. That's why I came to you. But this is
more important than our friendship. This is Buffy's life, and her afterlife.
I would have thought that you would cared enough to listen."
"I've always cared, Willow," said Giles, his voice lowering but losing
none of its angry tone in the process. "I've cared more than anyone might
understand. And as Buffy's Watcher, I've always tried to act in her best
interest. I've made mistakes, but I've always cared."
"Well, right now, Buffy's best interest is us. And right now, she
doesn't need a Watcher saying, by his inaction, that she has to be alone for
the rest of her existence!" She had almost screamed out the last words at
Giles.
Giles' face softened. "Yes, she is alone, isn't she?" The anger was
draining from his face as he spoke. "I must admit, Willow, that the journal
you gave me wasn't a particularly long one, but it was very captivating,
nonetheless."
Giles looked away from Willow and addressed the group. "I won't pretend
that I understand what's going on anymore than any of you. All I know is
that when Buffy died, her soul didn't go free. The picture is incomplete for
me, so I'm going to have to take a leap of faith here and trust all of you
to do what has to be done."
He turned back to Willow. "I'm on your side, Willow. I've always been on
your side. And I'm sorry that I made you feel otherwise."
Willow's anger faded as quickly as Giles' had. She went and hugged him,
and he hugged back.
There was a massive release of tension from everyone else in the room.
"See, Willow," said Xander, wiping his forehead, "one of us."
Dawn also came over and hugged Giles. "You wouldn't have tried to stop
us, right, Giles?"
"If it had come to that," he said, "I don't think I could have stopped
you."
Willow's face had become apologetic. "Giles, I'm sorry about not
trusting you. I'm sure you..."
"All right! Enough with this peace and love crap! I guess I'm the only
voice of reason left in this bunch." Valmont's voice cut through the moment
like a stake through a vampire's heart. "Disappointing, Giles."
Giles resisted giving Valmont the finger. In his Ripper days, he
wouldn't have.
"This is a family affair. You're not needed," said Tara.
"Buddy, the votes are in and you're off the island, " said Xander. "Boy,
I never thought I'd actually use that line."
"The man's right," voiced an emboldened Anya. "Go... kill some bad
demons somewhere else." *Ouch,* she thought, *have to work on the insults.*
"You people aren't thinking here. This is going to go badly, and you're
all going to hate yourselves afterwards, if you live that long!" Valmont
knew he was losing the argument, but he couldn't just sit by and let a
zombie get made.
"We have this under control now, Valmont," said Giles, his calm demeanor
countering Valmont's anxiety. "You can go back to your patrolling, or
whatever you were doing."
"Oh, this isn't under control, not by a long shot. So..." --Valmont
grabbed a chair and hunkered down into a corner of the room-- "I'm just
going to stay here for now, out of the way. And wait for the party to end."
********
Showtime.
Willow was feeling a lot better about all this, now that Giles had shown
his support, but butterflies were still doing carpet-bombing in her stomach.
She and Tara had never tried running two powerful spells at the same time.
The amount of mystic energy that was about to flow through the room was
going to be high. Nobody had voiced any doubts to her, for which she was
grateful. She had enough doubts of her own to combat.
Willow, Tara, and Dawn were sitting in the pentagram itself, straddling
the middle section. Buffy's body was in the direct center, and the three of
them formed a triangle around it. Dawn had to sit closest to the body, since
her part in the ritual required her to be within arm's reach of it. Dawn
seemed to be doing okay, as she had her eyes closed and was breathing deeply
and steadily as Willow had instructed her to do. A little self-meditation.
It would help calm her and focus her mind.
Giles, Spike, Xander and Anya sat at four of the five points of the
pentagram. They wouldn't be directly part of the spells, but their mental
energy would help create a stabilizing effect, reducing the chances of any
sudden magical surges that could screw up the spell. It would have been
better if they had one more person to fill in the last point, but four would
be fine.
Well, they did have a fifth person, but the idea of asking him to help
didn't ever cross Willow's mind. To Valmont's credit, he was doing as he
said he would do. He was still sitting in the corner, his hands on his
knees, his eyes closed. He seemed to be meditating. She had to admit that
she was almost glad to have him stay. She had a spell in mind that should
take out a zombie, Slayer or otherwise. But she wasn't sure if she would
have the courage, or the physical strength, to use it if she had to.
Valmont, though, didn't appear to have any qualms about taking on a Zombie
Slayer.
No more of that kind of thinking. There weren't going to be any
mistakes. No Zombie Buffy was going to appear. Only Buffy.
God, she sounded convincing. If only she could remove the...
"Willow, I think we're ready, " said Tara, dislodging Willow's current
thoughts.
Willow nodded. They all knew the spell process. She had gone over it
with everyone about half a dozen times, to make sure they all understood.
Everything was as ready as they would...
"I just thought of something," said Anya. "You'll be doing the
'readjustment' spell while the Astral portal is open, correct?"
"Yes, Anya. We been over that already," said Willow, a little irritated.
Anya seemed to have gotten stuck on this one point, but Anya couldn't
remember why. She just kept coming back to it.
"Which means that the energy from the second spell will be visible to
the Astral Plane." Anya looked worried now. "That may not be good."
"Not be good?" said Spike, "How 'not be good' are we talking, here?"
"Well, it won't hurt us or the spell, but it might... attract
attention."
Giles peaked his eyebrows. "Whose attention, Anya?"
"I remembered something about the Voxnork just now. They're spirits that
live around Hell, and they like to catch wayward souls. Usually they can't
find much to catch, but they do pick up on magic use in the Astral Plane.
The amount of spell power we're putting into this might look like a Fourth
of July to them."
It wasn't the kind of thing the gang wanted to hear right now. "Uh,
Anya," said Xander, "you have to work on your bad news timing. You've been
slipping up a bit lately."
"It doesn't change anything," said Willow. "I'm prepared for a hostile
spirit if I come upon one. Never hurts to have a back-up plan. But thanks
for the last-minute info, anyway."
Willow closed her eyes, breathing and relaxing. She would start the
spell, and then Tara would follow. She just needed a few breaths to clear
her...
"Willow?" It was Tara.
Willow opened her eyes and saw Tara's face. Renewed fear shown in her
eyes, and Willow figured it was fear for her.
"Willow, if you can't find Buffy, and you feel the spell start to end,
come back. Don't be a hero. We can always try again as long as we don't do
the second spell. But don't get lost yourself."
Willow wanted to hug her, but it wasn't the time for it. So she smiled.
And Tara smiled back. It was as much reassurance as they needed.
Willow closed her eyes again. She began breathing steadily. After a
minute, she found her stillpoint, the place in her mind where all thoughts
countered each other and left her mind balanced out. It was the best time to
start.
"Vespas, durandi, shu-shu-na!" she began, her right arm slowly sweeping
through the air in an arc.
"Junas, collenta, mak, turic mon shu-shu-ta!" Tara recited the beginning
of her part of the projection spell, also sweeping her right arm the same
way Willow had.
They continued chanting for several minutes, reciting the spell words
over and over. At each passing chant, Willow felt more and more weightless,
the world seemed less real, and her body was more distant. She stayed
connected to her corporal self long enough to watch Tara make the final
gesture. Tara touched Dawn on the head with her right hand, sprinkling a
fine blue powder on her hair. After that, the world went dark to Willow as
her body fell away into...
The desert. It was all brown sand, mountains of sand dunes flowing away
into the horizon on all sides. There was no sun, but there was still plenty
of light, as if the sky itself was the light source. It was cloudless, an
amazing blue that fading and grew in intensity as she watched. No living
thing, vegetable or animal, graced the sands.
It was the Astral Plane, pictured as a vast desert in Willow's mind. She
knew that it was just a cover, that the realm she now walked was made of
energy. But the sand crunched under her feet as she walked and she breathed
normally, despite the fact that she didn't need to breathe. Her mind was
adapting to the Plane as well it as it could. She could see her body, the
afterimage of what she was back on Earth, but she looked translucent. She
tried to touch her left arm with her right hand, and was amazed to
see it go right through the arm.
She turned around and was happy to see a familiar face. Dawn, also in a
ethereal body, was standing right in a globe of shimmering light. It was
like looking at a heat mirage. Willow could see part of the desert behind
the globe, but it was distorted, like looking through a prism. It was the
gateway back home, and Dawn was her anchor.
Willow had done an Astral Communion spell once, in order to divine some
information to help Buffy. It wasn't as powerful as this one, since she
never actually left her body completely that time, but she had still needed
an anchor. This time, instead of Tara, Dawn had been chosen at the end of
the spell as Willow's anchor, partly because Tara still had to use her magic
in the next spell, and partly because Dawn seemed able to zero in on Buffy's
soul. It seemed logical. Once upon a time, this place had been Dawn's home.
"Dawn, can you hear me?" Willow's voice seemed slightly out of phase,
but otherwise she could talk the same.
"Yes," said Dawn. She tried to move out of the globe, but was blocked as
if touching a steel wall. "Willow, I can't move past it."
"You're only partially here. Just keep talking to me. Tell me which way
to go."
********
The others watched as Willow's body collapsed to the floor. She looked
almost dead, but Willow had assured them that it was just a stasis that the
body went into during a projection. Still, Xander couldn't help but think
about watching Buffy's body drop lifeless to the ground all those months
back. And it wasn't helping that Buffy's wrapped-up body was right next
to...
Xander switched channels on his mind to detour away from those
depressing thoughts. He glanced over at Giles, who was watching the spell
spectacle with keen interest. "Giles," he whispered, "Question."
Giles looked back at Xander. "Yes?"
"When Tara said we could try again unless we started the other spell,
what did she mean?"
"Alchemy is only normally used to transmute non-organic substances into
other non-organic substances," said Giles. "It doesn't work on organic
objects. We're bending the rules a little here, but if we revive Buffy's
body this way, and we don't get her soul back in time, not only will her
body die again, but most likely it will turn to ash within a few hours."
"Oh," Xander quietly remarked.
********
"You should keep straight, Willow! I think I can feel something straight
ahead!"
"Dawn, you don't have to yell. We're connected. I can hear you as if you
were standing with me."
Willow had been walking through the sand for some time, though it was
impossible to tell how much time had gone by. She would know when the spell
started to end, but otherwise she couldn't say how much time she had to
wander. The amount of time depended on the power of the mage, so Willow
hoped that she had a lot of time to work with. But that didn't mean she
could dawdle.
"Keep going straight," said Dawn, now speaking in her normal tone. "I
think it's straight."
"You're not sure?"
"I'm new at this. I mean, we'll find her eventually, right? It's so
barren out here."
"Dawn, relax. Focus on Buffy. I know you can sense her here. Whatever
direction you send me in is good."
Willow crossed over another dune. Even though she had no body, she felt
the exertion as she walked. It was mental exertion, though. Being on the
Astral Plane was tiring to a spirit still connected to a physical dimension.
But Willow was nowhere near exhausted. She was too hyped up now to let a
little thing like fatigue slow her down.
She passed around yet another sand dune. It was so vast, the desert. It
was probably infinite. If she kept walking, she'd never find a way out of
the desert. She hadn't seen anyone or anything yet. If it wasn't for Dawn's
presence, she'd lose herself here just hiking over the first dune. God, what
it must be like for...
She gasped. In truth, her mind gasped, but she wasn't caring about
technicalities just then.
She had crossed over another nondescript sand dune. She had seen the
base of the dune clearly from the top of another hill, yet somehow, Willow
had missed her. This place played games with your senses. But it didn't
matter now. At the base of the dune, someone was sitting. Someone with blond
hair, a white sweater, and leather pants.
"Willow? Are you okay?" asked Dawn.
A whole flood of emotions hit Willow right then, and for a moment she
couldn't talk. She forced back the tide in her and damned it up tight.
"Dawn, ask the others how much time has gone by," she said in a controlled
voice.
Dawn was still able to talk to the others back on Earth, though she had
to drop away from the Plane to do it. There was silence for a moment, then,
"Xander says it's been fifteen minutes since you went under."
Willow did a quick math check in her head. "Dawn, tell Tara to start the
revival spell in five minutes, her time."
"Willow?... Are you saying...?"
"Dawn, tell her! I'll get back to you in a minute."
Willow ran down the sand dune, spraying sand in great amounts as she
went. She got to about five feet of the sitting figure when Willow heard low
singing. She couldn't make out the name of the song, or any of the words,
but it was definitely coming from the figure. It was a sad and distant song.
Willow wanted it to stop, because the flood gate she had erected in her mind
was starting to open again, and that song was the reason. It was the song
that kept you sane when the world seemed so insane. It was the one that
brought memories and allowed you to escape your condition, if only for the
length of the song.
"Buffy."
Buffy stopped singing. She looked up, though not at Willow at first,
then turned her head toward Willow. Willow gazed into Buffy's eyes, and
whatever lingering doubts she had flew away. This was her Buffy. Sad,
horribly lonely eyes, a face that looked bleached and yet still held untold
strength.
For a minute that seemed infinite, the two of them stared at each other.
Then Buffy stood up. Her mouth opened and shut in what seemed like case of
stuttering shock. And then:
"Willow."
Her voice was soft and distant, almost unreal. Willow planted a mental
foot on her emotions and kept it there. "Buffy, it's me. I'm real. I'm here
to bring you back home."
Buffy seemed confused. "B...back? I can't. I...died. I know I... died.
I..."
Willow went to Buffy and tried to grasp her hand. But their hands passed
through each other. Willow cursed her own momentary stupidity. There was
nothing to grasp because they were nothing but energy here. She'd have to
get Buffy moving the old-fashioned way.
"Buffy, we don't have a lot of time to talk. You have to just follow my
words. I want you to walk with me, very closely. I'm going to lead us to a
way out of here. Do you understand?"
"I... saw you. You... and Dawn. I can't remember... when but I... I know
I saw both of you..."
A bit more urgently, Willow said, "Yes, you saw us, one day ago. That
was real as well. Now, Buffy, you have to walk behind me. Do you
understand?"
Slowly, Buffy nodded her head. She still seemed unsure, but when Willow
turned around and started walking back the way she came, Buffy followed
after her.
********
"Oh my God! She found her!" Most of the time during the spell, Dawn sat
cross-legged with her eyes closed, as silent and still as Willow. But she
would pop back at times to relay news or ask questions, though she remained
stone-like, her eyes shut. She could talk and listen, though.
Dawn's jubilation was Tara's first signal that it was time to start
preparing for the revival spell. She took a few herbal powders and sprinkled
them on Buffy's wrapped body. She then began a series of chants that would
begin building up magic energy. By the time five minutes rolled around, the
air was brimming with power.
*It's time,* Tara thought. She hated having to do this, especially after
what Glory had done to Dawn months back. But it was the only way to start
the spell. Tara picked up a small ritual knife, grasped Dawn's left hand,
took her thumb and made a cut. The cut wasn't too deep, but it bled
sufficiently well for what Tara needed. Dawn made no reaction to the cut, as
her mind was back in the Astral Plane.
Tara led the bleeding thumb over Buffy's body. Drops of crimson
sprinkled onto the white sheets around Buffy's corpse. As each drop hit, the
blood turned from red to a glowing blue. When roughly two dozen drops had
fallen, Tara gave Dawn's hand over to Anya to bandage. Buffy's corpse was
now covered in a bluish glow from head to toe.
Tara took a deep breath. *Here goes a miracle,* she thought, and she
enacted the final word.
"Met'taklin!" she yelled.
Buffy's body didn't just glow, it *surged* with blue light. It jumped a
few inches into the air and hovered there as the light went to work.
Everyone sat and stared in awe as Buffy's body seemed to not just glow, but
warp in and out of existence. Tara had an inkling that this would happen,
but even she was blown over by the light show playing before them. Valmont,
who had kept his eyes closed through the earlier parts of the ritual, opened
them. And while part of him wanted to crush out the light and end this
disaster-in-the-making, the better part of him made him sit and wonder at
the spectacle.
For close to ten minutes, the light enveloped Buffy's body. Then it
faded quickly, flowing off her body and evaporating into the air. Tara went
to the body and gently removed the top sheet around Buffy's head.
"My God!" It was Xander's exclamation. He had seen Buffy's face before
the spell. It had been gangrenous and rotting, covered with sores and a few
maggots. It hadn't been fun.
Buffy's face now was perfect. No bruises or signs of rot. As good as
new. Xander went over to her and felt for a pulse on her neck. No, she was
still dead. But the body felt warm. Almost like it was waiting to be filled
again.
Tara smiled. It had gone perfectly. Now it was up to Willow and Dawn to
do the rest.
A scream, Dawn's scream, jolted all of them from their warm mood.
"No! Tara! They're in trouble!"
********
CONTINUED IN PART NINE