Waking Up The Evil Dead

by Random

***

DISCLAIMER:  "Buffy the Vampire Slayer" and all its characters are the property of Joss Whedon, Mutant Enemy, 20th Century Fox and the WB Network.  "Evil Dead," "Evil Dead 2," "Army of Darkness" and all their characters and names are property of Sam Raimi and Renaissance Pictures.  "Splattermania" written by Ginger, published by Warner Chappel Music Ltd.  "Far Beyond Metal" written by Devin Townsend, Gene Hoglan, Jed Simon, Byron Stroud and John Paul Morgan, published by Bucket of Nothing Music.

DESCRIPTION:  Buffy/Evil Dead crossover.  A mysterious book surfaces in Sunnydale and soon people start getting possessed by an evil force.  Now it's up to the gang to get things under control, all with a little help from a certain S-Mart clerk with a chainsaw for a hand.

RATING:  R

FEEDBACK:  Yes, please!

AUTHOR'S NOTE:  This was my very first Buffy fanfiction that I wrote way back in 1999.  It takes place towards the end of season three.  Thanks to Kent for pointing out my glaring omission of the term "boomstick."  And thanks to Devin, Ginger and Jason for all the music.

NOTE:  This fic's original title was "There's Something Evil In The Parking Lot".

* * *

PART I

* * *

"I'm sure that if the proper authorities were informed the cafeteria would be declared a biohazard," Xander was ranting, as he entered the library with Willow and Buffy in tow, the next day.

                      "Yeah, sure," Willow argued, "but what would we eat then?"

                      Xander took a moment to ponder the proposed loss of a meal.  "Well," Xander elaborated, "if you assume that the standard definition of 'eating' is ingesting food, and you redefine food to encompass many things that the same authorities would label as non-nutritional or inedible, I see you point."

                      The three kids found Giles sitting at the library table in deep sleep, right next to the book that Buffy had retrieved the night before.  His clothes were wrinkled, his hair was unkempt and he was still holding on to a half empty cup of tea.

                      The trio milled around the watcher and they gave each other questioning glances, seeing if anybody would make the first move to wake Giles up.  Finally Buffy took the initiative and she gently shook the sleeping figure.

                      Giles snapped back to consciousness with a start.  He blinked a few times, adjusted his glasses and looked around at the three figures in front of him.  His eyes were bloodshot and they made no attempt at hiding the fact that Giles had barely slept.

                      "Oh, good morning," he said apologetically, after getting enough cobwebs cleared to recognize the visitors.

                      "Morning?" Willow laughed.  "It hasn't been morning in hours."

                      "Riveting reading, I presume," Xander said as he picked the book up off the tabletop.  "Whoa," he blurted when he saw the cover, "that's some serious cover art.  I'm sure this baby practically sold itself."  He held the book up over his face and said in a sinister voice, "Buy me, or I will bite your head off!"

                      When Xander saw that he was the only one laughing at this joke he started leafing through the pages.  The symbols thereon, written in what seemed like red ink, were of an alphabet Xander had never seen before.  So he just concentrated on the illustrations, which depicted grotesque visions of decayed bodies that seemed to be neither human nor animal.  Xander assumed it to be a safe guess that they weren't mineral either.

                      "I see the book sparked your interest," Buffy remarked.

                      "Yes," Giles replied, "it's quite extraordinary actually.  At least from what I've been able to translate so far."

                      "Oh, look," Xander exclaimed holding up the book for the others to see.  He had turned it to a page with a picture of a head with half the skin rotted off, exposing the skull underneath.  "It's got a picture of Cordelia without make-up!"

                      Buffy and Willow acknowledged the comment with only half a smile.  They knew he was lashing out, the last months had been hard on him.  Ever since Oz and Cordelia had caught him and Willow kissing, he had not been the same.  Oz had been able to forgive Willow and their relationship seemed even stronger now.  Cordelia however had completely cut Xander out of her life.  Whenever they did see each other Cordelia always made a conscious effort to be excessively cruel to Xander.  Nobody knew exactly what was going on with her but it was fairly obvious that she had taken Xander's betrayal very hard.

                      "So what are we dealing with here?" Buffy inquired.

                      "Well, I can't be exactly sure," Giles answered taking his glasses off to clean them.  "According to popular belief this book does not exist."

                      Xander looked up from the book's pages.  "I know that I'm not qualified to make this judgment, but I'm gonna say that they're wrong."

                      "Obviously," Giles conceded, "but even though there have been many legends and stories told about this book nobody has actually been able to prove its existence in nearly seven hundred years.  It has been known as Morturom Demanto or Necronomicon ex Mortis, which roughly translated means 'Book of the Dead,' a volume of ancient Sumerian burial practices and funerary incantations.  Legend has it that it was written by the Dark Ones, bound in human skin and inked in human blood."

                      "Yaaahhh!" Xander exclaimed as he flinched away from the book as if it had bitten him, dropping it back onto the table.  His disgust was evident on his face.  "You…" he stammered, fumbling for words, "you couldn't tell me before I picked that thing up?!"

                      Willow eyed the pained expression of the face stretched over the cover of the book with discomfort.  She wondered for a moment whose skin it was and what they might have looked like before they had become the pray of some demented bookbinder.

                      "That'll teach you not to play with Giles' toys," Buffy said, somewhat surprised at her morbid joke.

                      "So what can this book of the dead do for us?" Willow asked tentatively.

                      "Well, mostly warn us not to let it fall into the wrong hands," Giles said opening the book to one of the first pages.  "The book mostly deals with demons and demon resurrection and the forces which roam he dark bowers of man's domain.  It warns that these enduring creatures may lie dormant but are never truly dead.  They can be recalled to active life through the incantations in this book.  It is through recitation of certain passages in here that these demons are given license to possess the living."

                      "Is this radically different from the demons that we've dealt with so far?" Buffy inquired.

                      "Demons live and die by certain rules.  Since this book has been lost for seven hundred years there is very little information on these particular beings.  But the book speaks of a force of pure evil that when allowed to roam in our dimension, can possess people at will."  Giles seemed to be at a loss for further explanations.  "I still have to study and translate more of the book before I can know exactly what we are dealing with."

                      "You said we have to be careful about whose hands it falls into," Buffy mused.  "I got it off a troop of vampires.  Could that mean trouble?"

                      "It very well might.  The one advantage we have is that anybody dealing with this text has to start from square one, since it has been lost for so long.  I don't know how successful they might have been in deciphering the text, but the best thing to do is be prepared for the worst.  I will do my best to gain as much information as possible.  Buffy, make sure you check in with me before you go on patrol tonight."

                      "Will do," Buffy acknowledged.

                      "Can we help with the research?" Willow asked eagerly.

                      Both Buffy and Xander shot their friend an angry look.  They had no intention to spend their Thursday night in the library while the rest of the world would be out enjoying themselves at the Bronze.

                      "I doubt it," Giles said, accompanied by relieved sighs.  "No, I better do this alone, without any distractions around.  You go along and do…" Giles wrinkled his forehead in desperation.  "Um, whatever it is you kids do," he finished lamely.

                      "The consummate school employee," Xander quipped.  "Always with his hand firmly on the pulse of the younger generation."

                      And with that the trio of friends bid the librarian cum watcher farewell.  They exited the library and headed out of the school.

                      Outside they regrouped before going off on their separate ways.

                      "I trust I'll see you all at the Bronze tonight?" Buffy inquired.

                      "Absolutely," Willow said excitedly, "Count me and Oz in."

                      Buffy turned to her other friend.  "Xander?"

                      "Well," he stammered unconvincingly, "y'know, I have some things that I need to do and… I have to…"

                      "Bull!" Buffy interrupted, "you were going to sit at home by yourself and mope."

                      "I'd classify that as 'things to do'" he argued defensively.  "Moping is somewhat of a lost art form, I'll have you know."

                      "Come on you have to put Cordelia behind you and rejoin civilization," Buffy said.  "If you spend the weekend all by yourself she might think you're a loser."

                      "Cordelia thinks I'm a loser anyway," Xander answered dejectedly.

                      "Yeah, but if stay home you would prove her right!" Buffy stated triumphantly apparently satisfied with her argument.

                      Xander wasn't quite sure if what Buffy had said made any sense, but it had struck a nerve.  "All right," he conceded.  "I'll be there."

                      Buffy grinned.  "Great!  I will see you 'round nine, then."  Then the smile faded from the slayer's face.  "Damn!" she swore.  "I promised my mom I'd pick her up some blank video tapes."  She looked up at Xander.  "Wanna give me a ride to the store, Xand?" she asked.

                      "No," Xander whined.

                      Buffy quickly grabbed Xander's arm, hugged it and gave him her best sad puppy look.  "Pleeeeeeeze?" she pleaded coyly, "please, please, please, super cool car-guy."  For good measure she also stuck out her bottom lip.

* * *

The sun set and it awoke.  And as soon as it awoke it was on the prowl.

                      It was in a smallish grove on the outskirts of the town.  It flew through the trees, close to ground level.  It was weaving and bobbing to avoid the branches, then headed straight for the trunk of a tree.  As it approached, the trunk split down the middle with a loud crack and it passed through the gash, as the two halves of the tree fell to the ground.  Soon the trees became less and less dense and then it emerged out of the grove onto a meadow.  It flew down a hill headed for an illuminated street and the big parking lot of the mall beyond.  It flew across the street and started roaming amongst the long rows of cars.

                      Then it saw her.

                      She was walking across the parking lot, apparently headed for her car, carrying a shopping bag from one of the upscale shoe stores in the mall.

                      It immediately zeroed in on her and it sped up as it flew in her direction.  It was all set on an intercept course, when the girl dropped her keys and stopped to retrieve them.  This forced it to make a change in direction and it slowed down.

                      The girl picked up her keys, looked up and that's when she noticed it.  She stared directly at it, wide eyed, as it closed in.

                      JOIN US.

                      The girl screamed, dropped her bag and started running back to the mall, right before it could catch her.  It pursued her as she ran towards the doors of a large store, but the girl was fast and she was able to gain on it.  The electric doors opened in front of her and she plunged through them screaming at the top of her lungs.  It headed right for the same entrance the girl had used.  But the doors slid closed right before it could enter.  From the outside it watched as the girl ran down the first aisle she found.

* * *

"I can't believe you suckered me into this," Xander grumbled.

                      Him and Buffy were trolling the housewares department of Sunnydale's newest addition to the mall complex: S-Mart.  They had opted for this store since they had never seen it from the inside and it had the parking lot closest to where they had pulled in.

                      "Well," Buffy argued, "now that you have a car, it is your duty to help out all your carless friends in moments of dire need."

                      "Dire need?" Xander countered sarcastically.  "We are, after all, talking about video tapes here."

                      "Hey, you don't know my mom when she can't tape her shows.  She makes Drusilla seem rational."

                      A little further down the aisle an S-Mart employee was going after a stack of toasters with a price gun.  He was in his mid thirties, tall and broad shouldered with dark hair and a square jaw.  For some reason he seemed to have what looked like the glove of a suit of armor on his right hand.  His S-Mart uniform shirt had the name Ash stitched onto it.

                      "Excuse me," Buffy said stopping next to him.  "I'm looking for blank video tapes."

                      "Video tapes," the employee repeated.  "Home electronics; aisle ten."

                      Buffy thanked him and they walked on.

                      "Shop smart, shop S-Mart," the employee called after them.

                      Xander was about to strike up conversation again when he heard a scream coming from the front of the store.  Both him and Buffy spun around just to see Cordelia running down their aisle screaming for help frantically.

                      "Cordelia," Buffy said catching her.  "What's wrong?"

                      "No, let me go!" the brunette cried hysterically.  "It is after me!  Let me go!  Please, Buffy, let me go!"

                      Xander looked in the direction that Cordelia had come from.  Through the glass doors of the store he could see all the way into the parking lot, but there seemed to be nothing there.

                      Cordelia was still struggling trying to break Buffy's grip.

                      The scene had attracted Ash's attention.  He had stopped pricing the toasters and now was looking around, as if he was trying to find somebody.

                      "Cordelia," Xander said, trying his best to sound reassuring.  "There is nothing there.  Nothing's coming after you."

                      "You don't understand," she screamed.  "You can't see it.  But I knew it was there, I could feel it.  It said something to me, I think it was something like 'Join us.'"

                      Ash had been listening to this exchange and with that he dashed down the aisle towards the back of the store, throwing Xander against the shelves.

                      "Hey," Xander shouted after him as he watched the employee disappear through a door marked Employees Only.

                      Cordelia was still pleading with Buffy to let her go, crying uncontrollably, but her struggling had gotten weaker and finally she just sank to the floor.

                      "I dropped my new pair of shoes outside," she sobbed resignedly.

                      "I knew there had to be a reason behind all the crying," Xander quipped.  Buffy shot him a dirty look, and Xander wished he hadn't made that comment.

                      A crash from the front of the store attracted their attention.  They saw the electric doors had violently been bent inward and the glass had shattered.  But no perpetrator was visible.

                      A cold breeze swept through the aisles, as a terrible silence fell over the store, causing more than the occasional case of goose bumps.  The breeze seemed to sweep towards a woman standing in a checkout line.

                      The woman suddenly spun around and screamed a ghastly scream.  Her skin had become a grayish blue color and flaky as though she had momentarily dried up.  But even more disturbing was that her eyes had turned completely white.

                      The people in the store panicked immediately and started rushing en masse for every conceivable exit, or even places that had never been conceived as exits.

                      The possessed woman stood limp for a moment then she was swept up into the air, hovering about a foot above the floor.

                      "We are the ones that were and shall be again," she said with a voice that sounded like a thousand tortured souls speaking in unison.

                      She reached out and grabbed a passing man by his neck and lifted him into the air.  With a quick move of her wrist she audibly broke his neck and then flung him across the store.  Finally she crashed limply to the floor, apparently dead.  All around the lifeless body the mayhem of fleeing patrons continued.

                      With all these things going on Xander hadn't noticed that Cordelia had begun screaming uncontrollably again next to him.  "There it is," she was screaming, desperately clutching to Buffy.  "It took that woman."

                      "Xander, you stay here with Cordelia," Buffy said passing the sobbing brunette to her friend.  "I wanna take a closer look at this."

                      Xander took Cordelia in his arms and he was instantly filled with an inner warmth.  He felt very protective, no matter what was out there he would not let it get to her.

                      By now the last of the S-Mart customers had cleared out of the store and peaceful silence had fallen over the aisles.  Even Cordelia seemed to calm down.  They watched as Buffy slowly moved down the aisle towards the corpse of the possessed woman.  She held a stake at the ready in her right hand.

                      Buffy stood over the lifeless form examining the dry, flaky skin and the expressionless face.  She looked back down the aisle to Xander and Cordelia, who were holding on to each other.  Buffy swallowed with some difficulty and slowly crouched down over the corpse.  She slowly reached out her left hand keeping the stake in her right ready.

                      An instant before Buffy's fingers touched the body the corpse's eyelids flipped opened revealing the all white eyeballs.  The corpse reached around, grabbed Buffy and threw her into a pyramid of canned beans, destroying the work of art that an underpaid teenager had probably labored all afternoon to create.

                      Xander considered rushing to Buffy's help for a moment but then decided against it.  He probably would just end up being in Buffy's way.  And besides Cordelia had a firm grip on him.

                      The corpse quickly jumped to its feet and started to move in on Buffy, who was trying to move out of the mess of tin cans but was already in a defensive stance.

                      "You shall die," the corpse screamed in its sinister voice and then attacked Buffy.

                      It swung at the slayer, but she caught the arm and kicked the corpse in the stomach and struck it a blow to the chin.  The corpse took a moment to collect itself then attacked again, this time connecting on a straight blow to Buffy's face.  The slayer spun around countered with a kick to the face and finally lodged her stake in the possessed woman chest.  Blood spurted out of the wound and onto Buffy's hand and the sleeve of her vest.  Her hand recoiled when the warm liquid splashed all over it.  She wasn't used to it since vampires didn't bleed when they got staked.

                      The corpse stumbled backwards looking at the piece of wood lodged in its chest.  Then it reached for the stake and slowly pulled it out.  The bleeding worsened when the stake was removed, then suddenly subsided.

                      "Is that all you got?" it sneered.

                      Oh shit, Buffy thought, how the hell do you kill this thing?

                      Xander spun around when he heard the door marked Employees Only crash open and out of it stepped a tall figure.  Xander didn't recognize him right away but it was Ash, the S-Mart employee with the price gun.  Only it seemed he had traded his price gun in to upgrade his artillery.  The stock of a shotgun that was strapped to his back could be seen over his shoulder and gone was the mysterious metal hand.  In it's place he had a red, beat up chainsaw attached directly to his wrist.  Ash yanked at the rip chord and revved up the saw as he slowly stepped towards the two fighting figures at the front of the store.  Xander and Cordelia pressed themselves against the shelves to give Ash more than plenty of room as he passed by them.

                      "Yo, girly-girl!" he yelled.  "Get outta the way, 'cause the cavalry just arrived."  And with that he pulled the double-barreled, sawed off shotgun out of the holster on his back.

                      Buffy struck one last blow to the demon then dove for cover.

                      "It's showtime," Ash said.

                      He fired once, then twice into the demon's chest.

                      The corpse was startled for a moment, stumbling backwards from the impact of the shells.  Ash revved the chainsaw again and ran towards the demon.  The corpse saw him coming, jumped and flipped over him.  Ash stopped, spun around, only to be caught in the face by the demon's punches.  Then it grabbed Ash's head and started bashing it against a shelf.

                      Buffy quickly picked up a can of beans off the floor and hurled it at the corpse hitting it right in the face.  The demon was startled and let got of Ash's head.  Ash sank down to his knees, shook his head to clear the beating induced cobwebs and quickly brought the chainsaw around and cut into the corpse.  It screamed in agony as the saw buried itself into the corpse's side, sending blood spurting everywhere.  When the blade emerged on the other side the demon collapsed to the floor in two pieces, instantly forming a pool of blood.  The legs started kicking randomly, while the torso took a hold of Ash's leg and sank its teeth into him.

                      "Aaahhhh," Ash screamed, "you little bastard!"

                      Since he had shot both his shells at the beginning of the fight he started hitting the head lodged on his calf with the stock of his shotgun.

                      "Ow!" the demon yelped every time it suffered a blow to the head, but it's jaws remained clenched.

                      Ash's eyes fell onto the crowbars that had been on sale for the past week.

                      "Catch, blondie," he yelled before throwing his shotgun to Buffy.  She caught it and Ash grabbed a crowbar.  "Eat this," he said applying the crowbar to the demons jaws, hoping to get some leverage.  Finally he found purchase and pried the rogue torso off his leg.  Ash got down on one knee and plunged the chainsaw into the demon's chest.  He started laughing maniacally as blood was sent flying everywhere, soaking Ash's shirt and covering his face.

                      When the corpse stopped struggling he pulled the blade out of it, stood up and let the chainsaw die.  Slowly Buffy and Xander converged on Ash staring in horror at the bloodied carcass.  Cordelia stayed put, she wasn't about to get anywhere near all that blood.  Red really would clash with her clothes today.

                      As they watched the corpse they could see that it was still moving, although it was very weak.

                      "How do we kill it?" Buffy asked.

                      "We can't," Ash answered taking his shotgun back from her.  "The best we can do is bodily dismemberment."

                      Ash quickly reloaded his shotgun with his one good hand and snapped it shut.

                      The demon looked up at the trio standing over it.  "You will all die," it said.  "We will come back for you.  One by one we will take you!"

                      A fly, that everybody had been too busy to notice, went in for a landing on the corpse's face.  It was safe to assume that it had been attracted by the odor.

                      "Hang on," Ash said squinting down, "is that a fly sitting on your face?"

                      "A fly?"  The corpse tried to focus its eyes on its own nose, as its arms twitched, but were too weak to reach up and swat it away.  "Where?"

                      Ash pointed the shotgun down and pulled the trigger, splattering the corpse's head all over the place.

                      "There.  It's gone now."

                      He looked up at Xander.  "Quick, aisle five, get some trash bags, the ones with the strappy things on top."  Then he turned to Buffy.  "Aisle, seven, get some towels and a shovel from hardware."

                      Both Buffy and Xander ran off, as Ash holstered his shotgun.  Suddenly Buffy skidded to a halt and turned back to Ash.

                      "Video tapes," she called back.

                      "Aisle ten," Ash answered, before adding his customary "Shop smart, shop S-Mart."  Then he revved up his chainsaw.