Yes, I meant 1972. Too tired to fix it at the moment, but eventually. Thanks, Kat G:) Deana, if you insist I may include a Deana/Ardeth kissing scene. Just be patient ;) Thanks to everyone!:):):)

I apologize profusely for the delay on this story, but when my muse finds herself in the hell that is writer's block, it is sometimes hard to coax her out again. Sorry:):):) ~Buff

9: Being James Marsters

Beni was not one to be frightened easily, but he found the deserted White House to be quite disconcerting. He'd gone into the men's restroom and when he'd emerged minutes later, not a soul was to be seen. A few corpses lay strewn here and there, upon which a few scarabs munched happily, but for the life of him Beni could not figure out what was happening. Had he really been in the bathroom that long?

Suddenly Beni's answer came around the corner, causing Beni to jump nearly out of his shoes. It appeared to be a walking corpse, though of course he knew that was impossible. The corpse reached inside his moldy plaid jacket and pulled out a tattered photograph. He seemed to sigh as he looked at the picture.

Ivan was indeed quite depressed. How was he ever supposed to win back Meela like this? Apparently no one had opened the chest yet, and so there was nothing to be done for his decayed appearance. If only he had those damn human sacrifices!

While anyone else might be a bit perturbed by Ivan's appearance, Beni seemed to have gotten over his initial shock and was taking it rather well. "Who's that in the picture?" he ventured.

Ivan looked up, contemplating killing the man who'd interrupted his brooding but deciding against it. "She's my...well, she was my girlfriend." Ivan handed the picture over. "Now I'm not so sure."

"Maybe you're trying too hard."
"You think?"

"Don't beat her over the head with your intentions. Be subtle, you know, be cool. Be James Marsters."

"James who?"

"That's another thing. Get with the times." Beni eyed the corpse's attire with a critical eye. "I mean, look at that plaid jacket. Your girlfriend looks like a woman of the millennium, and you look like you've come straight out of the seventies."

"But I did come straight out of the seventies."

"Riiiiight... Like I said, we've got to modernize you."

"And how are we going to do that?"

Daniels emerged from around the corner, holding some sort of large box. "Hey, guys! Look what I found! It was in a cleaning closet, I think it's food!"

His two companions perked up at this. "But what's it say?" asked Burns. "Do either of you read ancient Egyptian?"

"Nah, but come on!" said Daniels. "What harm ever came from opening a chest?"

"I don't know," reasoned Henderson. "Didn't you see all those mummy movies?"

"It's food, I'm telling you! And I'm starving!"

Daniels threw off the top of the box with a flourish and as the dust blew into their faces the three men were all seized by sneezing fits.

"Where the hell's the food?"

"Hmm..." Daniels appeared to be thinking hard. "Sorry, guys, my mistake."

If either Burns or Henderson had had the energy, they might have murdered Daniels on the spot, but the fatigue of nearly a day lost in the basement of the White House was wearing on them. "Now what?" said Burns. "We have to get out of here!"

"Ooh! I've got it, I've got it!" shouted Daniels.

"You've got what?" asked Henderson.

"I've got a way for us to get out of here!"

"Oh, really. Does it involve you shutting the hell up?!?!"

"Come on, Henderson, don't let a little thing like lack of food and water get you down! I've got a master plan!"

"Let's hear it, then.

"Okay." Daniels took a deep breath, preparing his audience for the brilliance of his plan. "We...split up."

The other two returned only blank looks to the unveiling of Daniel's plan. "Come on, people! It's brilliant!"

"Uh...why?"

"Because, as soon as we split up, someone will find one of us. It always works in the movies! That, or we'll each be picked off by a homicidal maniac one by one, but what are the chances of that happening?"

"Aaah!" cried Burns as he stood. "I can't deal with this any longer! You two are idiots! You're gonna get us all killed! Good day, gentlemen!"

"Burns, where you going?"

"Away from you two!" Burns picked a random corridor and started down it. "I can't stand it any longer!"

"Um..." Daniels trailed off as he and Henderson watched Burns disappear down the hallway. "Maybe we should stick together."

"But the damn split up plan was your idea!"

"Yeah, but...now that it's actually happening...I mean, Burns seems pretty stupid to be going off on his own, doesn't he? What if there really is a homicidal maniac loose?"

"Bet you twenty bucks there's not."

"Okay. But double your money if we never see Burns again."

"Oh, he'll be fine. Burns is a smart guy..."

O'Connell locked the door behind them with a sigh of relief. "Okay, we should be safe in here. For a while, at least. Everyone accounted for?"

Someone flipped a light switch, revealing that they seemed to be in a broom closet of sorts. O'Connell counted heads. Izzy, Ardeth, Chamberlain (cowering in a corner, he noticed), Evelyn...

Wait, where was Evelyn? "Where's Evelyn? Where's Evelyn?!"

"Calm down, O'Connell." Evelyn stepped out from the corner and into the light. "I'm right here."

"Jesus, Evelyn, stay where I can see you!"

How dare he be so patronizing! "I can take care of myself, O'Connell!"

O'Connell took a step toward her, but the close quarters did not contain the shouting match that was quickly building. "Oh yes, you've certainly proved that so far, haven't you?"

Evelyn's mouth fell open. "What is that supposed to mean?!"

Izzy stepped between the pair. "Listen, you two, if you're having relationship problems, this is neither the time nor the place for discussing them."

"Relationship?!" cried Evelyn. "What relationship? I met him yesterday!"

"Well, you certainly seemed willing to hop into bed with me! Or were you still drunk?!"

"How dare you imply that--" Evelyn stopped short. "Oh, God, O'Connell, you're bleeding."

"What? Damn it, the stitches must have pulled out while we were running."

Ardeth and Evelyn set about searching the shelves for supplies. "Well if you were more careful," said Evelyn, "it wouldn't have happened."

"Yeah, if I wasn't so busy saving your life."

Evelyn held a towel to the freshly-opened bullet wound. "Just watch yourself, okay?" she said. "I don't want you to..." She sniffed audibly and O'Connell tilted her head upward to see that she was crying. "I don't want you to..."

"Hey, it's okay. I'm okay. Don't cry."

"It's just that..." Evelyn finally met his eyes and the rest of the world seemed to fall away. "I love you."

O'Connell certainly would have responded but the president tapped him on the shoulder. Evelyn could not tell whether O'Connell was glad for the disruption, but he held tight to her while looking to an impatient Izzy.

"I hate to interrupt the moment," said the president, "but where did Meela go?..."

Meela ran until she'd lost the rest of the group. She had a feeling the scarabs chasing after them all was a direct result of her insulting the corpse, and she had no wish for anyone to get hurt because of her. All she wanted to do was curl up in a little ball and die. Of course, fat lot of good dying had done her the last time she'd tried it. Maybe next time she could be reincarnated as a bug or something. They certainly seemed to have less complicated love lives.

She realized she'd stumbled into someone's little office and caught sight of the phone on the desk. When all else failed, ask the experts! Of course! Meela rushed to the phone and dialed the 1-800 number. After explaining her problem to an operator, he told her to hang on for a minute and he'd put her on.

A few minutes passed and suddenly a woman's voice came on the line. "Next up we have Meela, in Washington, D.C. How are you doing tonight, Meela?"

"Thanks so much for taking my call, Dr. Lily. I just love your show."

"Thank you, Meela. Now what's your question today?"

"All right. See, it turns out I'm the reincarnation of this chick who killed the president thirty years ago, and now my ex-lover has risen from the dead to be with me. I already broke up with my boyfriend over this, which is okay cuz he was the president's son anyway, and you know, eew..."

"Did you know that while you were dating him?"
"No, because I couldn't remember my other life then. But, my question is, I know it's really sweet that this guy has come back from the dead to be with me and everything--"
"Meela honey, all that matters is what you feel. Don't let this guy push you into a relationship."

"I know, but I mean, how many guys would do that?"

"Do you still love him?"

"Well, see, it's not really me. I don't, but my alternate personality does. I think we're fighting for control of my body, you know, a two souls in one package kind of deal."

"Meela, it seems like you just need to step back from the situation for a minute, okay? A part of you obviously still loves this guy, and you probably always will, right? But now that you've experienced life without him, you're not so sure. Does it sound like I'm on the right track here?"

"Yes, Dr. Lily, absolutely."

"Okay. So now the question is, was your life better before he came back into it?"

"Well, people seem to be dying around me lately."

"Anything else?"

"Oh...I don't know. I think he still has to sacrifice some people to regenerate."

"Meela, this isn't about them, this is about you. It sounds like you need to take control of your own life and make your own decisions. Don't let anyone else tell you who you are."

"Wow, Dr. Lily, that was so beautiful."

"No problem, kid. Next caller!"

Meela hung up the phone and contemplated her shoes for a moment. When she looked up, a corpse stood in front of her, but at least he was a rather well-dressed corpse. The plaid jacket had been replaced by a worn-looking, knee-length duster and rather tight black leather pants, topped off by a bleach-blond toupee that sat crooked on Ivan's uneven head. "See?" Ivan said hopefully. "I'm, uh...cool. Yeah, that's it, I'm cool."

Suddenly Burns burst into the room, finally having found freedom from the basement. "Ha ha ha!" he chortled, a slightly mad gleam in his eye. "I knew I didn't need those idiots! I..." He trailed off at the sight of the mummy.

"Finally!" cried Ivan. "Took you long enough to get here! It's like the writer forgot to have someone open the chest before this chapter!"

Someone new ran into the room just as Ivan reached for Burns. "Hey! I'm sorry, okay! There's a lot of plot thingies to keep track of in this story! So sue me!"

Ivan rolled his eyes. "I forgive you, Buffelyn. Can I get on with the human sacrifice now?"

"Oh, I suppose."

Permission granted, Burns began his show of screaming, and Ivan promptly sucked the life out of him. As his shriveled body fell to the floor, the door burst open, and the rescue party stumbled in. "Meela!" cried Evelyn. "We've come to...oh."

Everyone stopped quite suddenly as they watched Ivan's flesh crawl and ooze around his heretofore nearly bare bones. "Who's next?" Ivan asked, quite innocently, and after the stampede to get away, only himself and Beni were left in the little office. Ivan's shoulders slumped. "Annie didn't go for the new look, I guess."

"I told you the wig was going overboard," muttered Beni.

"I think a new approach is in order..." growled Ivan, bitterness at Meela's rejection finally getting to him. "Let her hide among those puny mortals while she can. She will not be able to resist me next time..."

~*~*~*~

Buffelyn craves reviews...might you leave one for her?:):):)